Jun 14, 2007 22:19
Since school has been out I’ve had the opportunity to catch up on some reading. Here are the highlights of the past week:
The Rules of Survival and Are You Alone on Purpose?, Nancy Werlin
I had the fortune of meeting Nancy when I was in graduate school, right after the release of The Killer’s Cousin, and then re-connected with her at last month’s NESCBWI conference. She’s an amazingly talented writer, evidenced by her Edgar award and her National Book Award nomination for Survival.
Survival takes the form of a long letter from Matthew to his youngest sister, Emily, explaining the circumstances of their family’s disintegration at the hands of their abusive mother, Nikki. Matt’s gripping account shows the ways in which love can be twisted in the act of saving, protecting, damaging others-and, ultimately, its power to heal.
Are You Alone is Werlin’s first novel. Alison’s autistic twin, Adam, becomes neighborhood bully Harry’s target. An accident that draws the two families together in surprising ways finds Alison and Harry in an awkward friendship that tests the boundaries of forgiveness and empathy.
Both books are shaped by Werlin’s rich characters and compelling narratives-don’t miss them!
Sleeping Freshmen Never Lie, David Lubar
Scott Hudson is entering his first year of high school, and nothing is as it should be. His older brother moves back home, his mother and father drop a huge bomb on him, and his social life turns inside out. But somehow, he ends up involved with a zillion extra-curricular activities, discovers an unlikely friend, and maybe even finds romance. Lubar’s poignant tale made me tear up a little and laugh a lot.
The Road, Cormac McCarthy
I do love me some postapocalyptic fiction. As a matter of fact, my Comp II class is based around dystopian/postapocalyptic novels. So I eagerly picked this one up, ready to add it to my reading list for fall.
Oh. My. God.
I couldn’t put the book down. It was horrifying, stunning, shocking. Yes, Oprah had it on her book club-but this is not your mamma’s Oprah selection. This bleak, bleak story follows the Man and the Boy on their journey down the road to the coast and an unknown future. McCarthy’s description of the landscape-constantly gray, covered in ash, cold, with a sun that never breaks through the clouded sky, chilled me. The depths of the love that the father feels for his son, the desire to protect and save him above all else, brought tears to my eyes. This book reaches the heights of human bonds and the depths of inhuman horror. It’s unbelievable.
I can’t use it for class this fall-I don’t know how to approach it and need time to manage its impact on me.
I’m also rereading the Harry Potter novels, so I can gear up for book 7 next month. I read book 1 last week, and started Chamber of Secrets last night. Rowling planted so much in these first volumes-it’s been a treat to discover how she paved the way for future characters and events in the early volumes.
ABA Writing Boot Camp
Today’s word count: 1,026
Yeee-haw!
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