Se p tember 2012
VOLUME 3, ISSUE 5
NEW AND OF INTEREST
11
Young Master Roman Politics For The Beginner Page 7
The Shadowed Sun
21
An Immensely Satisfying Fantasy Page 33
Last Laughs: Animal Epitaph Ghoulish Giggles Page 46
53
You Animal, You!: Charlotte Cory
San Francisco Chinatown By Philip P. Choy
City Lights Publishers, $15.95, 184 Pages, Format: Trade
92
Part history book and part tour guide, San Francisco Chinatown is definitely niche, but wonderfully so. In it, Choy quickly outlines the history of San Francisco as a whole, then jumps into a section by section investigation of the city’s famous Chinatown. Working within the grid structure imposed by Chinatown’s streets, Choy takes each noteworthy building in a geographic area and explains its unique architectural elements and significance, along with the building’s previous and current use, then uses the strucSee CHINATOWN cont’d on page 120
Whimsial Victorian Human/ Animal Photos Page 86
Selecting A President
Premier of Presidential Elections Page 114
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By Kate Summerscale San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 3
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Hello readers! This issue is finding your way a bit later in the month than our usual. We try to finalize it and get it published as close to the first of the month as possible. Since starting the publication four years ago, Ross and I took a 10-day, much needed, “unplugged” vacation. As all good parents do, we left instructions with the staff here to not blow the place up while we were gone and no parties allowed! Apparently they don’t need us as much as we thought, because everything continued to function without a hitch. Well, except producing this September issue. We ended up lending a helping hand to our licensed publication Portland Book Review this time, which was closely followed by laying out Tulsa Book Review’s October issue. And then there’s our whopper 100+ page SFBR digital issues. But it’s a good problem for a two-person design staff to have to juggle. It means things are going well in bookland. It means that readers are devouring our unique publications. Inside this issue, you’ll find some new bells and whistles, which came from a seasoned publicist, Nicholas Latimer with Knopf, who suggested that we let some of our reviewers loose with writing one- and two-page reviews. Inside, you’ll find six Feature Reviews, which also include biographies and photos of the authors. We also have a very special cookbook review written by 5-year-old Hayden and a Featured Review by 4-year-old Delany in the Kids’ Book Review section. Hopefully, you can find some books that interest you inside.
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Book Reviews Category
Historical Fiction
tional Louise was magnetic. She quickly found herself falling for the man she could not have, despite the fact that an affair with him would sully the crown and cause a great scandal. I simply couldn’t put this book down. The Wild Princess is historic fiction at its finest: captivating, spectacularly written, and just steamy enough to keep the pages turning. Reviewed by Jennifer Melville Jack 1939 By Francine Mathews Riverhead Hardcover, $26.95, 361 pages, Format: Hard
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The Wild Princess By Mary Hart Perry William Morrow, $14.99, 417 pages, Format: Trade
««««« They called her the Wild Princess. One of Queen Victoria’s five daughters, Princess Louise followed her heart throughout her life and threw royal protocol to the wind, much to her mother’s dismay. When Louise broke tradition and married a man far below her station, people whispered that hers was a love match … or a scandal being covered up by the Crown. Louise herself was excited for her wedding, until she discovered her happily-ever-after wasn’t about to be so perfect after all. Author Mary Hart Perry delves into the marriage of real-life Princess Louise and her husband, Lorne, and offers her own interpretation as to what happened in their childless and evidently loveless marriage. Just when things looked the worst and Louise had accepted her situation, American secret service agent Stephen Byrne walked into her life. It was his job to protect Her Royal Highness’s children, and his attraction to the unconven-
In 1939, Jack Kennedy’s life is hardly a fairy tale story. Only twenty-one years old, in and out of hospitals, Jack is the black sheep of the family, perennially disappointing his father and languishing in the long shadow of his brother Joe. But when President Roosevelt recruits Jack to be his eyes and ears in Europe during the Nazi Party’s rise to power, knowing that Jack’s illness makes him an unlikely agent, Jack accepts. Now forced to balance family and patriotic obligations, Jack finds himself learning spycraft on the fly and hoping to stop a Nazi conspiracy to buy the next presidential election. It’s always fun to cast larger-than-life people in largerthan-life adventures, and Jack 1939 does so with brashness and gusto. Mixing fact with fiction, Mathews supposes an ulterior motive behind Kennedy’s globe trotting during that tumultuous year, and for the most part, she crafts a convincing narrative of underworld intrigue and political gamesmanship. A bit like James Bond without the gadgetry and confident smirk, Jack makes for a sympathetic protagonist, hobbled by insecurity, inexperience, and illness. Mathews’ fine grasp of historical nuance adds impressive depth to an already interesting “what if.” Reviewed by Glenn Dallas
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 5
Book Reviews
Historical Fiction
CIRCA 1957: Coming of Age, Girls, Cars and Rock & Roll By Chuck Klein BeachHouse Books, $18.95, 306 pages, Format: Trade
«««« With this second edition, Chuck Klein offers up an expanded tale of cars, sex, and being a teenager in the 1950s. Full of slang, songs, and adventures, CIRCA 1957 is a fast-paced, rollicking story that is sometimes shocking, sometimes heartwarming, and never, ever boring. As a somewhat fictionalized account of growing up in the Midwest during a time when hot rodding and rock & roll were the most, this novel follows teenager Paul Auer as he gets and rebuilds his first car, falls in and out of love, graduates high school, and gets into more than his share of trouble. Paul’s story feels real and makes the reader root for the protagonist. Though Paul is not the most sympathetic character (he tends to be selfish and rash), it is clear that he has a good heart. There are several points in the story where his future hangs in the balance, and these moments are tense and unsettling. The concern for Paul that these parts create is evidence of a strong character and solid writing. The fact that Paul is both frustrating and endearing is a testament to Klein’s skill. My favorite thing about this book is how fully it immerses you in the world of the 1950s. The slang, the cultural attitudes, the lifestyle – it’s all bursting from the page with such complexity and richness that Auer’s entire world comes alive. Even the parts of the story that I dislike (the frequent discussions of cars and the prevalent disrespect for women) add to the picture of an era that, while only several decades removed from the present day, is completely different. As someone who did not live through the ‘50s, nothing has made that time in American history more real for me than Paul’s story.
This book is not for the overly sensitive, as it features an accurate look at teenagers (and thus an awful lot of swear words and awkward sexual encounters), but it is perfect for anyone who wants one man’s honest recollection of adolescent life in 1950s Middle America. Focusing on kids who look forward to nothing so much as the next thrill and fear nothing but boredom, CIRCA 1957 is one exciting ride. Sponsored Review The Queen’s Pleasure By Brandy Purdy Kensington, $15.00, 384 pages, Format: Trade
««« Tudor and Elizabethan England are a time period used by historical romance writers. They love that time period. From long flowing dresses to marriages for political reasons, to dashing men on horses and in tights. many books have been written featuring historical and semihistorical characters. They live daily lives, fall in love, have affairs, and live passionately. With so many books to choose from you really have to stand out. This book unfortunately does not stand out. It is a bit dull, and weak across the board. It tells the story of Amy and Robert Dudley, during the time of Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth. Robert was a young man who fell in love with Amy, and instead of becoming his mistress they married at a young age. Amy never forgot her first experiences with Robert, and wanted to keep those memories alive, while Robert came to regret the decision and slowly fell in love with Elizabeth so he could become king. This book is just poorly written: long paragraphs, almost all from the point of view of Amy, little action, and poor characters outside of Amy, who grates on the nerves. There are better books available. Reviewed by Kevin Winter
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 6
Book Reviews
Historical Fiction
Young Master By David Warren CreateSpace, $9.95, 240 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Poor Servius Fulvius Flaccus. He has been given a farm and must turn it around. Young Master looks at the beginning of the political career of Servius and how he may one day be an important player in the world of Roman politics, if he survives the first few steps. He has made all of the right friends, and a few lucky events show that he can plan ahead, but that he is not afraid to act. He may even be able to turn his father’s farm around, given enough time, but those who have seen his plans are definitely impressed. He just needs to survive a few months in war-torn Hispania. This book is set up like the first book of a series, with a cliffhanger at the end. If Warren delivers on that promise, this could make for a fine series. Young Servius is proof that Fortuna favors the bold and the prepared; although there is some luck in his career, it is how you deal with what you are given that makes the difference, and Servius makes the most of what he is given, even when it is a white elephant. He is definitely a hero to watch. Be advised that this is not an action-filled book, and that is arguably what makes it a fun read. There is a glossary, and you will need it every so often, and the book slows down a bit, especially when new characters are introduced. However, the writing of the political scenes allows you to keep up without getting bored, and even the length of the names actually works to the book’s rhythm. For what is arguably one of the most realistic books on what happened really in Rome, this is a fun read. Sponsored Review
Southern Secrets By Rick Richardson, Sandra Dee Outskirts Press, $14.95, 184 pages, Format: Trade
«««« It is easy to forget that the South was not a completely genteel place. Southern Secrets is the story of two sisters with special abilities that become slaves. Eventually they are freed due to the Civil War, and start a town for freed slaves that becomes somewhat of a success. All of this is framed by a grandfather telling his grandson about it, which ends in a neat twist at the end that on one hand wraps up the sisters’ story while promising great things to come on the other. This is a fascinating look at slavery, and arguably one of the more realistic depictions of the cost of slavery and its historical effects. This isn’t to say it is not watered down a bit, but it does touch on a lot of the aspects on it from the perspective of the slaves. Writing wise, the characters are portrayed sympathetically across the spectrum, allowing us to judge them on their actions rather than function within the plot. This makes for an interesting first step into the world of slavery, allowing for a conversation about its effects rather than merely a condemnation, which is makes it much more effective. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim Safe On Third By D.F. Zorensky CreateSpace, $14.95, 390 pages, Format: Trade
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San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 7
1940 was a tumultuous year. The war was on in Europe and the Presidential race in the United States was anything but a foregone conclusion. Zorensky plops his characters right into the thick of things and knocks it out of the park with a painstakingly researched historical thriller. Alfred Charles Percival Brown is a sports writer with a following who has
Book Reviews
Historical Fiction
seen better days when he is offered the chance to do his part by spying for his homeland, Britain. He may have been in the United States since 1910, and fallen in love with baseball, but when his country calls he doesn’t fail to heed or to turn down the extra income. Elsa is a beautiful German-American with a special skill set that the Brits want to put to good use and a fierce need to fight back against the Nazis. She cozies up to Karl Mueller, a Nazi spy determined to do anything to keep the U.S. out of the war, including assassinating President Roosevelt if he gets the chance. Can Elsa weasel her way into finding out his true plans? Can Percy keep both he and Elsa alive until the last batter is called out? Their stories are intermixed with cameos from from baseball’s heroes, real political figures, and real events of the 1940s. That is what makes Safe on Third stand out from most historical fiction; Zorensky molds his characters and his story to fit history’s real events as opposed to changing the facts to mesh with his storyline and star players. Thrilling until the last page, Safe on Third will leave you singing “God Bless America” and looking for more from the author. Sponsored Review The Queen’s Lover By Francine Du Plessix Gray Penguin Press, $25.95, 292 pages, Format: Hard
««««« One winter evening at a ball attended by the leading nabobs of the French court, the Swedish diplomat Count Axel von Fersen meets the young Antoinette, Archduchess of Austria-Hungary. Mercurial in mood, vain, and self-indulgent, she is also “deliciously pretty and amiable,” with splendid eyes, and luminous skin of delicate pink beneath an outlandish headdress. She becomes the central passion of his life. Through his diaries, we learn of the court’s unusual mating practices, the convoluted intrigues at court, and the political yearnings of ordinary Frenchmen that will soon overtake the court. As the Queen rides her gilded sled, oblivious of the revolution
swirling dangerously around her, Fersen, a democrat and republican, risks his future by arranging an escape into Belgium for the royal family in a coach pulled by six horses and outfitted in white velvet upholstery and chamber pots of burnished leather. Then—but wait, I don’t want to reveal the outcome, particularly for the morose, little known Count. Plessix Gray’s narratives of daring French women—Madame de Stael and Simone Weil—are highly regarded. In this historical novel of a revolutionary epoch, she writes of a daring woman’s lover in prose as rich and sating as the Queen’s cakes. Reviewed by Zara Raab The Twelfth Enchantment: A Novel By David Liss Ballantine Books, $15.00, 411 pages, Format: Trade
««« While certainly a departure for author David Liss, The Twelfth Enchantment tells a very Jane Austen-esque fantasy tale in a way that remains true to Liss’s history as a historical fiction writer. Lucy Derrick, a heroine after Austen’s own heart, with her good breeding and the dissolute state of her finances, enters the fray ready to be sold in marriage to the owner of the local mill. Through mysterious and Gothic circumstances, the naïve Lucy finds herself a student of magic and alchemy, fighting ancient evils as the people of England suffer industrialization on the home front and battle the French abroad. The Twelfth Enchantment combines the fantastical and the historical under the stroke of Liss’s steady hand. The novel is fast-paced and surprising, naturally progressing from Lucy as a biddable nobody, to a strong young woman of self-made distinction. Using the historical figures of Lord Byron and William Blake, borrowed Austen charac-
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 8
Book Reviews ters like Mary Crawford (Mansfield Park), and evil immortal beings; while The Twelfth Enchantment is a departure in Liss’s work, it’s an entertaining and solid display of fiction. Reviewed by Axie Barclay The Borgia Mistress: A Novel By Sara Poole St. Martin’s Griffin, $14.99, 406 pages, Format: Trade
««« Sara Poole is back with another story of Francesca Giordano, the poisoner for the House of Borgia. This time, the Pope and his entourage travel to a small village, where they are greeted by news of an unknown assassin who threatens to destroy the Pope’s alliance with Spain. Francesca must use her wits and skills to keep the holy family and their guests safe while confronting past trauma, facing accusations of witchcraft, and possibly losing her mind. Will she be able to pull herself together long enough to stop the threat, or will she be lost to the darkness within? Despite an overwrought writing style and a religious subplot that feels like an afterthought, this book is quite enjoyable. Poole keeps the suspense high and the twists unexpected. The world of 1400s Italy feels complete, with descriptions of the marketplace and meals that bring the Borgia’s world to life. The character interactions are interesting, as they are all fraught with politics and emotions that make even the simplest relationship complex. This is a fun bit of historical fiction, but I would avoid it if you prefer things written in straightforward English. If you can get past the writing, however, The Borgia Mistress provides a thrilling plot, complicated characters, and a satisfying, shocking, conclusion. I look forward to more in this series. Reviewed by Audrey Curtis
Historical Fiction A Pimp’s Notes By Giorgio Faletti Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $27.00, 336 pages, Format: Trade
««« Sometimes of the most unlikely heroes are the most unwavering people, like Bravo or Giorgio Faletti. Set in Milan, in 1978, Faletti uses the real life events like the Red Brigade and terrifying political kidnappings to blur fantasy and reality. We follow anti-hero Bravo, a man that makes money off the wealthy by catering to their legal, and illegal, needs. When one of his ladies gets into trouble, Bravo ends up being framed and part of a larger conspiracy. He must dive deep into the underbelly of both higher and lower society in order to prove his innocence. This book should be made into a movie, and while reading, all I could do was imagine who the cast would be. It is very much a summer blockbuster book. The characters are incredibly real-feeling, and I loved all the surprising plot twists. I do think that the translation was lacking a bit in places, because I got confused by some sentences and had to re-read them to make sure I understood what was going on. Also, the book seems to be struggling with an identity crisis, trying to be both action-packed adventure and political thriller with noir undertones, two things I don’t think mix well. It made for a confusing whole piece, but there are sections in the book that are great. The characters and excellent plot twists make this a great book for those lazy summer days. Reviewed by Kevin Brown
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 9
Book Reviews Category
Modern Literature
of characters that includes a petty thief, an overeducated hot dog vendor, and an elephant. He also reveals his extraordinary past as an explosives expert and world traveler. A Swedish Forrest Gump, Allan has influenced history and dined with political leaders throughout the world, including Truman, Stalin, Churchill, and Mao, despite the fact that he is actively disinterested in politics. His easygoing nature, kindness, and abundance of luck allow him to escape unscathed from a wide array of tricky situations. They also keep the reader laughing and waiting for the next unlikely mishap to unfold. Reviewed by Tammy McCartney Without Sin By David S. McCabe Sunstone Press, $24.95, 276 pages, Format: eBook
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The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared By Jonas Jonasson Hyperion, $15.99, 400 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Faced with the prospect of an unwelcome birthday party (and a complete lack of alcohol), 100-year-old Allan Karlsson absconds from the nursing home via his bedroom window and disappears. At the bus station, Allan meets a young man trying to wedge his large gray suitcase into a very small bathroom. Allan kindly takes charge of the suitcase and conveniently forgets to return it before he boards his bus. Upon arrival, Allan is surprised to find a large quantity of cash and an angry young man in pursuit. In his efforts to evade both pursuing thugs and the police (he has no desire to return to the nursing home), Allan meets a cast
Without Sin tells the story of Garret Harrison, a twenty-four-year-old who has joined up with the U.S. Border Patrol after a tour of duty in Iraq. His Cuban ancestry and fluency with Spanish make him an anomaly among the agents working on the border of Mexico and southern California. Harrison seems equally comfortable inhabiting both the Latin American culture of illegal immigrants and the rough-and-tumble culture of his predominantly lower-class white co-workers. It is a great irony of the book that Harrison and his fellow agents spend most of the day trying to prevent individuals from entering American illegally, while at night these very same officers drive into Mexico to do things that are illicit on the American side. On one such visit to a Mexican brothel, Harrison meets a beautiful girl in her late teens. He falls madly in love with her, but it turns out that she is the favorite of the brothel’s proprietor, “El Cacique,” a Mexican gangster vaguely affiliated with Los Zetas. As Harrison
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 10
Book Reviews
Modern Literature
becomes increasingly aware that “El Cacique” is above the law, not punished by society but actually accorded respect and profit for his brutal conduct, he decides to take matters in his own hands. Vigilante justice is swift, but it comes at a cost. Angelina and Harrison’s love will never be the same, and the justice Harrison dispenses is at best ephemeral. A book rich in insights about the illegal immigration crisis and the interpersonal dynamics on the Mexican-American Border, Without Sin is a fast-paced work of characterdriven fiction. Its major theme is the role that duty plays in our lives. It explores deeply the tension between our duties to other individuals, our duties in society and to our jobs, as well as the duty religion expects of us to do good, and certainly not to sin. The question of who is “without sin” seems to be asked everywhere in this book; given the agonizing circumstances in which the characters find themselves, David McCabe has made it awfully hard to cast the first stone. Sponsored Review The Girl Giant: A Novel By Kristen den Hartog Simon & Schuster, $15.00, 240 pages, Format: Trade
««« Ruth Frances Beatrice Brennan is the incredibly tall child of average-sized parents. At each visit the doctor pronounces her normal even as she grows at an alarming rate. Ruth is nearly five feet tall when she starts school, and she is seven feet tall at the age of thirteen. Unsurprisingly, Ruth’s abnormal height defines her family. Her father James spends most of his free time renovating the house—raising doorframes, altering furniture—in order to accommodate his ever-growing offspring. Her mother Elspeth struggles to alter Ruth’s clothing fast enough for Ruth to wear it. Yet no one talks about Ruth’s condition, at least not in her hearing, or seeks a second medical opinion. Her height isolates each family member, from the townspeople and from each other, as they move in the silence of the things they don’t speak about.
Inexplicably, Ruth knows the stories of her parents’ pasts, their most intimate secrets, and their most private thoughts. She interweaves the stories of her parents’ struggles with stories of her own, giving the novel a layered feel. Her nearly omniscient voice tells tales from her naïve childhood, and this emotional distance makes the painful subject more poignant. Reviewed by Tammy McCartney Seven Houses in France: A Novel By Bernardo Atxaga, Margaret Jull Costa, Translator Graywolf Press, $14.00, 256 pages, Format: Trade
«« Captain Biran commands a motley crew of characters on the banks of the Congo River. He’s there to seek his fortune and to buy his wife seven houses, for each of the years he’s been abroad. Under his command are evil, despicable men who kidnap and rape locals. One of them aspires to own a brothel one day; another is a vicious womanizer. Their dark dynamic is thrown off course by the arrival of an apparently good officer, Chrysostome Liege. His puritanical nature makes the men hate him instantly, yet nothing will be quite the same again after he arrives. Seven Houses in France was written by an acclaimed Spanish novelist and translated into English. Some things may have been lost in translation, or perhaps cultural differences made this novel so shocking. I stopped reading it several times because it was so disgusting. The raping was repulsive. The virginity checks and locking girls in cages until the men were ready to have sex with them were disgusting. I’m sure there is an audience who would like this dark, nasty world. That reader was not me. I will not be keeping this book on my library shelf. I was gravely disappointed with it! Reviewed by Jennifer Melville
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 11
Book Reviews Category
Mystery, Crime & Thrillers
Red Fox Knight By Osvaldo J. Faucher CreateSpace, $25.95, 792 pages, Format: Trade
««« Red Fox Knight is an enthralling read; an escapist work of fiction coupled with real-life scientific theory and historical insight into the Middle Ages and knighthood, Osvaldo Faucher is a thrifty storyteller. His novel unfolds with the inspired events of the First Crusade, which introduces to the reader an age-old scroll detailing the last days of Jesus Christ that may or may not go contrary to the universally accepted biblical account of the day. This serves as an equally canny and masterful outline to the remaining plot lines in the book, which diverges between three different groups of characters: first story is set in NYC with an entrepreneur savant, Robert Whiteside and his wife, a defec-
tor from Russia turned anthropologist, Olga and their son, Edward; the second is set in Boston with an ex-priest, Professor Alan Mullins and his girlfriend Blanche; and third, in Paris and Lautremont, is a direct descendant from the Red Fox order, François Premet and his wife Thérèse with their daughter, Emily. Thus amplifying the circular quality of the work, these characters are all interconnected through the peg of this ancient and extremely valuable religious text. Though crafty in delivery, much of the time span from the past to the present--in between chapters and suggested occurences--as well as the transitioning hence forth between each and every one’s exposition is extremely muddled and awkward. For instance, we learn of Alan and Blanche’s backstory in the very beginning of the book, and about two hundred pages later, they only reappear relevant to this serpentine tale. And just like the typos and grammatical errors in the book, there are abrupt situations that interrupt and interfere with the cohesiveness of the various stories. All and all, too much is going on in these 800 pages rendered with arbitrary sex scenes and coerced dialogue, that of which becomes suddenly catastrophic with cancer, death, love triangles, and abduction. Also, much of the labyrinthine flair and quality to Red Fox Knight is overly wrought and therefore falls flat because of the heavy handed banter; throughout the course of the book, the characters are on their soapboxes about moral, ethical, and legal issues, so no real action is hereof. But nonetheless, Osvaldo Faucher’s superb insight and introspection hits it right on the head when he writes, “each group is looking for its final truth about life in this world” and this is Red Fox Knight effectively: an excavation of history and human interaction, where one can find purpose and validity in religion and/or scientific reasoning. Sponsored Review From Barcelona, with Love By Elizabeth Adler St. Martin’s Griffin, $14.99, 338 pages, Format: Trade
««« Bibi Fortunata, brooding singer and wild child, disappears from Hollywood just after she is acquitted of the murders of her lover and girlfriend. Two years later, Bibi’s wealthy
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 12
Book Reviews
Mystery, Crime & Thrillers
Spanish wine-making family needs closure on the issue of whether she is dead. They hire Mac Reilly, Malibu TV detective, to find her. Instead of taking his sexy girlfriend, Sunny Alvarez, trout fishing on the Rogue River, Mac travels alone to Barcelona, where he is startled to encounter the woman who was his first true love. With the help of friends and their private jet, Sunny quickly joins him and puts the kibosh on any further rekindling of the old relationship. Bibi allows herself to be found, much to her daughter’s delight. Elizabeth Adler has a can’t-fail formula. She likes to write about rich people with expensive habits romping around Mediterranean countries. This is her twenty-third such novel: the fourth in a series starring Mac and Sunny and
their dogs: Pirate, the three-legged mutt, and Tesoro, the vicious Chihuahua. Adler believes you can tell a lot about people by their choices of clothing, furniture, and accessories. She is lavish with this kind of detail, but I’m not convinced it’s necessary. Reviewed by Elizabeth Benford Dandy Gilver and an Unsuitable Day for a Murder By Catriona McPherson Minotaur Books, $18.37, 304 pages,
«««« Dumferline, Scotland, in 1927, is the scene for this unusual who/why-done-it, featuring Mrs. Dandelion Gilver as the detective. It isn’t exactly a cozy mystery, however. There are two rival families in Dumferline, the Aitkens and the Hepburns. Think Hatfields and McCoys, or maybe Capulets and Montagues, and you’ll have an idea of the
A tough private investigator with a troubled past searches for the “killer of his mentor and father-figure in this mystery-crime thriller.
Vin Hardin, the hardheaded PI, is known in the stuffy San Fernando Valley for his ability to take a punch. As the story unravels, Halpern bends narrative standards by resisting fixed fates and the happy ending format many readers have come to expect. This speculative side urges readers to not only keep reading but to go back and search for the minutiae that could have been overlooked. His detective dialect will keep readers captivated like a cigarette-smoke voiceover from a gritty film noir. The complicated hero compellingly careens this action-packed joyride.” -- Kirkus Reviews
Click/Tap here to purchase San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 13
Book Reviews
Mystery, Crime & Thrillers
scope of the rivalry. Add in the fact that each family owns a well-established dry goods store in Dumferline, and the potential for disaster is even greater. The current youngsters are Mirren Aitken and Dugald Hepburn; and it’s the body of Mirren, which is discovered during the Aitken’s jubilee, that sets the story in motion. Not being familiar with the author’s writing style (and maybe she doesn’t do this every time) I had a hard time keeping the many characters straight in my head, as there are several similar names and sometimes a character goes by another, different name. The period details; language, costumes, manners, etc.; are fabulous in their accuracy, so kudos to the author for setting the scene so accurately! Also, as a once-upon-a-time elevator operator, I was totally enchanted by the historical research conducted by the author in order to better describe the “lift” at Aitken’s Emporium, it quite made my day! This is not your everyday, hastily read book, not by a long shot. It’s beautifully written and demands your attention. But then, you’ll be amply re-paid by the unforgettable experience. Reviewed by Kelly Ferjutz A Fistful of Collars By Spencer Quinn Atria Books, $25.00, 320 pages, Format: Hard
««««« I love Chet! His insouciant manner reminds me so much of my grand-puppy Tramp, the most loveable pit bull that ever was. I know Chet isn’t that variety, but both of them are true gentlemen, and that’s what matters, even if the attention span is only as long as a very short second. Chet is the canine half of the Little Detective Agency, with his human, Bernie Little, as the other half. Chet watches, listens, and on occasion takes down the bad guys, but only when Bernie
suggests that might be a good thing to do. Otherwise, Chet rides in the co-pilot’s seat in whichever car hasn’t been demolished that week. When the mayor of their hometown hires the guys to watch over a volatile, young, male movie star, who’s involved in a film being shot nearby, Bernie questions the high rate of pay. But they’ll earn it – in spades! Bernie’s main squeeze Suzie, a reporter for the local paper, breaks their hearts by taking a job in Washington DC, a long ways away from California. But Bernie’s ex, Lydia, and their son Charlie, are still around and being able to spend time with his boy helps a bit with the problem of loneliness. There are a few more bodies and more blood than usual, and unfortunately they’re not movie fakes. There’s also nothing fake about either Bernie or Chet – prime stuff all the way! Reviewed by Kelly Ferjutz The Colony By Blaine Readler Full Arc Press, $16.95, 307 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Kiel is a fugitive, on the road hiding from his past, and when he stops for the night under a bridge on the Bakke farmstead, he has no way of knowing that his life is about to change. The Bakke farm is the unwitting host to a strange new life form: tiny metallic creatures that will eventually be referred to as “crablets.” Innocently fascinating at first, the crablets quickly become a menace as they multiply and learn to work together, literally joining forces to create larger and deadlier beasts intent on destroying the humans they see as competition. It is only a matter of time before Kiel and the Bakke family are embroiled in a desperate battle for survival. It would be completely understandable for readers to be skeptical after reading the back-of-the-book synopsis of The Colony; the story sounds a little, well, lame. However, Blaine C. Readler’s novel is a surprise winner! The charac-
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Book Reviews
Mystery, Crime & Thrillers
ters are engaging and the plot is not what you’re expecting. Readler is a writer who knows how to use language to his advantage; the dialogue does not sound forced at all, and while some plot points are patently unsurprising, others come seemingly out of nowhere, which is always refreshing in a thriller. Kiel is a bit of an enigma, with a background story that gets revealed in fits and starts, while Cam, the super-smart-but-mildly-embittered thirteen-year-old, will easily be a favorite. The rest of the characters are a bit cliché: the easily-hated a-hole father/soon-to-be-ex-husband, the family matriarch, the attentive and caring female love interest. The crablets were both fascinating and extremely creepy; the mental imagery of the shapes they formed could potentially be the stuff of nightmares. Overall, The Colony is a great page-turner and definitely worth picking up. Sponsored Review Going to the Bad: A Lilly Hawkins Mystery By Nora McFarland Touchstone, $15.00, 274 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Going to the Bad by Nora McFarland is an unbeatable combination of interesting mystery to solve, thrills for our heroine in her hunt for the truth, and some laugh-out-loud moments to brighten our day. When you get all this in a bargain paperback package, you keep your bank manager happy and yourself smiling. This is the third outing for our intrepid shooter (that’s a television term for the people we think are reporters but actually point the cameras and take the pictures of themselves talking). This time it’s personal when her Uncle Bud is gunned down in her own house. So off we go as she spends her Christmas Eve running around the landscape, picking up rocks to see what crawls out. As before, we’re involved with the local powers-that-be who think they can do what they like and get away with it. To make the experience worse, the police think her boyfriend has something to hide and, when she starts making waves with her own
investigation, they want her in the interview room with the bright lights and the threats. Put all this together and you’ve got a ho-ho-ho, action-packed ride into Christmas. Reviewed by David Marshall Death of a Schoolgirl: The Jane Eyre Chronicles By Joanna Campbell Slan Berkley Prime Crime, $15.00, 352 pages, Format: Trade
«« Death of a Schoolgirl, by Joanna Campbell Slan, is the first in a projected series continuing the story of Jane Eyre. So, if you’re a fan of Charlotte Brontë and want to see what happened to the main characters after Jane settled into Thornfield Hall, this may be for you. I say may because she doesn’t stay in the Hall after giving birth. Two letters summon her to London to see what’s happening to Adèle Varens at Alderton House School for Girls. As she arrives she finds one of the girls dead and Adèle unconscious thanks to a dose of laudanum. Faced with this drama, our heroine talks herself into going undercover at the school as a teacher. After befriending the girls, winning the trust of the servants, and impressing the Bow Street Runners with her keen intellect, Jane works out who killed the girl and why. It’s a reasonably well-done pastiche with a nicely constructed plot. It plays fair with all the clues in plain sight. There’s also a double reveal at the end as Jane ties up all the loose ends and protects the reputation of her old friend, leaving this as an interesting mystery in period style. Reviewed by David Marshall Grace Among Thieves: A Manor House Mystery By Julie Hyzy Berkley Prime Crime, $7.99, 278 pages, Format: Mass
««« Julie Hyzy’s Grace Among Thieves is the third book in her Manor House Mystery series. In this installment, Grace Wheaton, the curator and manager of the elegant Marsh-
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Book Reviews
Mystery, Crime & Thrillers
field Manor, must deal with various thefts around the manor and a murdered tour group guest. At the same time, she discovers a budding new romance, while still negotiating the complexities of a prior relationship. Finally, Grace needs to tiptoe around the manor owner’s problematic stepdaughter, a grumpy office assistant, and a hostile police officer. All of this combines to make for a light, fun read. Hyzy’s strength as a writer is her ability to create a compelling setting and likable characters. Readers will want to visit the delightful Marshfield Manor and meet Grace, her boss Bennett Marshfield, her roommates Bruce and Scott, and even Grace’s cat Bootsie. Solving the mystery is not especially challenging, and this book seems to presume significant knowledge of the first two books in the series. That said, the characters and setting are strong enough to make fairly certain that readers who enjoy one of these mysteries will want to read them all. Reviewed by Annie Peters The Second-Last Woman in England By Maggie Joel Felony & Mayhem, $14.95, 334 pages, Format: Trade
««« The Second Last Woman in England by Maggie Joel is something of a conundrum. You might think it a variation on an inverted crime novel where we know from the first page whodunnit, except there’s no detective to take down the killer. Instead, what we have is a true crime novel which explains what led up to the murder. This rather eliminates any tension or suspense. It starts as a devastatingly accurate recreation of life in the upper reaches of British society in 1952-3, nicely capturing the paper-thin hypocrisy of those in positions of influence. It also skewers the class divide between the wealthy
and those employed as servants. Although the life of service was withering after the end of the war, some were still forced into the work, finding little thanks and even less pay for their trouble. So this novel takes a snapshot of two families, one wealthy, the other poor, and explains why a wife should pick up her husband’s gun and shoot him dead in front of a room full of witnesses. What terrible thing did the husband do to deserve such an end? The answer is a fascinating commentary on the times. Reviewed by David Marshall Niceville By Carsten Stroud Knopf, $26.95, 383 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Any reader knows that if a place is called Niceville, it is probably anything but. A small southern town, Niceville is beautiful to look at, but the main problem is that people keep disappearing into thin air. It’s a good bet that an area called Crater’s Sink, where things go in but never come out, might be the problem. Though technically in the horror/mystery genre, the novel is a dark comedy. There are certainly chills, but those are greatly tempered by the humor inherent in the plot, dialogue, and characters. The bad guys don’t seem so bad, and the horror element is not nearly as scary as it would be if the tone were more serious. The principal protagonists are Nick, a C.I.D. (Criminal Investigation Division) guy, and his wife Kate, who is an attorney. As for antagonists, there are many, as there are several plot lines running simultaneously. There’s not only the problem of why townsfolk are disappearing; there’s also a bank robbery, a cop killer, a hapless loser with a grand scheme, a pedophile, a mysterious electronic device, and some odd characters who supposedly died years before. Although it is sometimes difficult to keep all the characters and story lines straight, the book is worth reading. It has wit; sharp writing; quirky, vivid characters; and a few surprises. Reviewed by Leslie Wolfson
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Book Reviews
Mystery, Crime & Thrillers
The Last Six Million Seconds By John Burdett Vintage, $15.00, 386 pages, Format: Trade
««« Burdett’s first novel, previously published in 1997, is back in print with this Vintage Crime/Black Lizard paperback. Fans of Burdett’s Sonchai Jitpleecheep Thailand Series might find this book interesting, though far more breathless than Sonchai’s first person ironic narrative. It’s two months before the British turn over Hong Kong to mainland China. When Royal Hong Kong Police Chief, Inspector Chan Siu-kai; a half Chinese, half-Irish Hong Kong native; matches three severed heads with DNA profiles found in a vat of minced human meat abandoned in a warehouse, he’s relentless in solving the case, despite the British political pressure against him. This book is a conspiracy thriller matched with a police procedural. The characters constantly philosophize about the conflicting mores of the British; the Hong Kong money makers; and now the former communist, but more gangster-like Chinese already buying up Hong Kong and ready to take it over officially. Chan, like Sonchai, is a “Half.” The evil caricatured Xian, former communist general, now dealer in nuclear weapons and heroin, who launders his cash in Hong Kong real estate finds he can’t buy off Chan, so they play a delicate game of chess. Burdett, a former lawyer in Hong Kong, knows the island. But, all the movements of Chan are tiring, his characters are one-dimensional, and everybody knows each other; everybody’s corrupt, with the only common denominator, keeping business as usual. At least in Bangkok they have fun. Reviewed by Phil Semler
Strange Embrace/69 Barrow Street By Lawrence Block Subterranean Press, $30.00, 336 pages, Format: Hard
««« I just read A Drop of the Hard Stuff by Lawrence Block a few weeks ago. That was his seventeenth book about Matthew Scudder, my absolute favorite private eye. It may be the last for the 74-year-old Grand Master of mystery fiction. Now we have—ahem—69 Barrow Street by Sheldon Lord, written in 1961. This was his third book. It’s about a building at the “intersection of sin and madness” and its beatnik inhabitants. It’s a kind of Harold Robbins about the “Sick Ones” who partake in just about every depravity and perversion known to man…or woman! Strange Embrace was written by Ben Christopher in just three weeks. It’s the story of the serial murders of Broadway actors. These books are published for the first time in half a century. Written just for money? It couldn’t have been much… I can’t say much about the writing. It’s raw and unintentionally funny, with softcore sex written for the exploitative paperback market of the time. Subterranean Press presents the books in a classic Ace Doubles format with new trashy cover art by the legendary Robert McGinnis, illustrator of naked women. This is strictly for fans of Block’s whodunits who want to see where it all began. Reviewed by Phil Semler
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Book Reviews Category
Horror
are very likeable and some make choices that sound reprehensible when stated, and yet it makes the reader wonder if they would have behaved any differently. The writing style is beautifully done but the lack of likeable characters and that true zombie action is missing may be a turn off for some. Reviewed by Debbie Suzuki No Sharks in the Med and Other Stories By Brian Lumley Subterranean, $40.00, 320 pages, Format: Hard
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This Is Not a Test By Courtney Summers St. Martin’s Griffin, $9.99, 323 pages, Format: Trade
««« Sloane’s world came to an end six months ago when her sister left and abandoned her with their abusive father. So when the world goes crazy and there are dead people beating down the doors trying to eat people, Sloane is ready for it all to end. Instead she ends up hiding out in her high school with five other students who want to live. For those looking for the typical zombie book with nonstop action and gore, look elsewhere. This story actually features very few scenes containing the zombies and instead focuses on Sloane’s inner turmoil over how her sister could abandon her the way she did. Her confusion and self-pity also shade the way she reacts and treats the other teenagers hiding out in the high school. None of the characters
A young man meets the strange caretaker of a town slowly crumbling into the sea. A couple is reminded of a horrific trip to Greece. Two friends are trapped on a bridge by a mistreated sociopath. Townspeople discover curious holes bored into a recently buried coffin. A man explores the moors that inspired The Hound of the Baskervilles. Humanity finds itself waging an endless war against a terrifying and unexpected force. Brian Lumley is an elder statesman of Weird Fiction and one of its foremost practitioners; No Sharks in the Med and Other Stories just reaffirms his seat at the Algonquin Table of unnerving and horrifying storytelling. A sense of foreboding accompanies each of his tales, no matter how innocuous the opening paragraphs seem, and his uncanny ability to draw terror out of the mundane makes a great Lumley story an unforgettable experience. (And you know it’s a good one if you suddenly find yourself suspicious of even the most pleasant circumstances.) With horrors both human and beyond human within its pages, you’ll find something to unsettle you in No Sharks in the Med and Other Stories. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas
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Book Reviews Category
Humor/Fiction
Earth’s only hope? Nick Carter. (No, not THAT Nick Carter.) Yup, humanity’s future is in the hands of a copyright lawyer. We’re in big trouble. A lot of books over the years have claimed to be the heir apparent to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Well, for the first time, we have a real contender. Year Zero is laugh-out-loud funny, clever, and completely mad. From the wimpy planet names to the myriad ways our music has influenced alien culture, every page has another wrinkle to add to the ludicrous and delightful tapestry unfolding. It’s an absurd story spun from absurd truths, loaded with hilarious ideas and told at a breakneck pace. This book is utterly silly and incredibly smart. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas Scandalous By James Carter Smashwords, $0.00, eBook, Format: eBook
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Year Zero By Rob Reid Del Rey, $25.00, 364 pages, Format: Hard
««««« There are forty great art forms in the universe, and Earthlings suck at all but one: our music is the best in the universe. Aliens have been listening to it since stumbling upon it in 1977. Unfortunately, they’ve recently discovered our strict music piracy laws, and they now owe us ALL of the money in the universe. Naturally, some aliens are upset by this, and they’re plotting our destruction so they don’t have to pay up.
Scandalous begins in eager anticipation of a party at Hampton Court Palace. Each character prepares with a different goal in mind. Belinda, beautiful, vain, and attended by fairies, vows she will not eat until she has found a husband. Lascivious Baron Charles also plans for conquest. Society matrons hope for scandal and ruin to add variety to the dull affair. The event progresses without incident until Belinda scorns the Baron and defeats him in a heroic game of cards. The Baron revenges himself by cutting a lock of Belinda’s well-maintained hair. Goaded by the interference of an evil fairy, Belinda rails against the Baron and destroys her reputation. The story closes as several characters agree to pay a poet to memorialize the day’s events. Inspired by Alexander Pope’s “The Rape of the Lock,” Scandalous is a unique combination of Shakespeare and Springer, poetry and prose. While the characters are highborn, beautiful, and wealthy, base deeds are not beyond them. The contrast is heightened by Carter’s use of prose
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Book Reviews
Humor/Fiction
for descriptions and poetry for conversations. Like “The Rape of the Lock,” the satirical novella pokes fun at the social conventions 18th century high society but does so in a much more lowbrow format. Sponsored Review The Incense Game: A Novel of Feudal Japan By Laura Joh Rowland Minotaur, $25.99, 290 pages, Format: Hard
«««« It pays to research a book a little bit. Madame Usugumo invents two women to The Incense Game, and all three die just before a massive earthquake devastates 1703 Japan, preserving the bodies. When those bodies are found Sano Ichiro is blackmailed into finding their killers with the threat of civil war, should he fail. Meanwhile, events swirl around his son, Masa-
hiro and his retainer Hirata, forcing them into places where they can be destroyed. The murder mystery of this book works rather well, with all of the prerequisites of a modern mystery present and appreciated. That aspect of the book is a fun look at how Japanese culture works and how it can inhibit an otherwise simple murder mystery. However, the court intrigue part makes this book feel like this book is part of a larger series; it is left unresolved, as Masahiro gains new responsibilities and a new enemy, and Hirata’s problems set up the next book rather well. It may obvious to a fan of the series, and they are well served here, someone new to the series will feel somewhat cheated. Nonetheless, this is a mystery with an interesting twist, and well worth an afternoon’s time. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
Growing up in rural Indiana gave Sheryl St. George and her sister Tara an unbridled sense of adventure and the feeling that they could survive anything. Which is good, because for them life has been one hysterical turn after another, constantly putting them in situations that teach them the importance of laughing at themselves. An uproarious journey from childhood to adulthood and the bumps, bruises, and stitches in between, St. George delivers an uncommonly funny and lighthearted look at life and all the damage it can cause. A rollicking, riotous look at two women who have the gift of making life as ridiculous as possible at every turn, St. George’s book is a smile-inducing tonic for anyone in the need of a laugh or even just a sense that they are not alone in facing life’s more incomprehensible moments. Full of good-natured laughs and familial warmth, A Tale of Two Sisters is an extraordinary gift that will teach you how to enjoy life and laugh at all of its misadventures.
Buy your copy today on Amazon.com $16.99
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 20
Book Reviews Category
Popular Fiction
Oceana: A Love Story By CC Lindh Singing Trees Productions, $19.99, 92 pages, Format: Trade
««« Oceana: A Love Story is aptly titled. The main plot focuses on a romantic relationship, but the story includes so many other kinds of love as well: love of nature, lost love, remembered love, passion for life, and more. It is also obvious that the author loves her subject. Every page makes it clear that this story is very important to Lindh, and that, in turn, makes it more important to the reader. The book follows Oceana, a surfer with a traumatic past, and her new neighbor Guy as they meet and develop a serious relationship. Problems arise when Oceana begins exhibiting symptoms of early-onset dementia, and the couple must cope with both the immediate problems and the future possibilities.
This is a tender story that spurs contemplation of love, life, death, and personal passions. Unfortunately, it is not without its flaws. A story of this scope could easily fill a novel, and the brevity of Oceana means that some parts are skipped over or not fully explored. For example, when Oceana and Guy meet, she is hostile towards him. She later slams her door in his face. Then, just a few pages later, she teaches him to surf and invites him to dinner. This quick change in feeling seems rushed and unrealistic. The book could definitely benefit from added exposition. Also, the writing is a little stilted. It feels like the author wants to be so sure that the readers understand everything exactly as she imagines it that, in the parts of the relationship that she does show us, she includes excessive descriptions. This keeps readers focused on the minutiae and prevents us from becoming fully involved in the story. That said, the more I look back on the book, the more I like it. As the particulars of the writing fade, and I am left with the plot and emotions of the tale, I find that the heart of the story is beautiful. This would be a great book for teenagers or for anyone who enjoys details but does not need an in-depth exploration of larger themes. Lastly, at the end of her book, Lindh asks readers to support organizations that focus on dementia. Through this story, she certainly draws attention to the importance of dementia research and care, and, for that, I say this book is a success. Sponsored Review Semi-Charmed Life By Nora Zelevansky St. Martin’s Griffin, $14.99, 330 pages, Format: Trade
««« The astute reader will note there is no “a” preceding the title of this novel. There should be. The life in question belongs uniquely to Beatrice Bernstein, not to the raffish, incomprehensible world at large. Beatrice, a desultory student at Barnard, has a poet sister, Gertrude, who holds salons and studies Proust. Their fa-
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Book Reviews
Popular Fiction
ther is an artist. Their mother curates contemporary art exhibits. None of them has a lick of sense. For no discernible reason, Beatrice is cornered into taking on the job of ghost blogger for the fabulous and gorgeous socialite Veruca Pfeffernoose, who is apparently too busy with personal maintenance, event sponsorship, and party attendance to write her own blog. Sweet Bea quickly acclimates to a life of luxury fantasies come true. After a whirlwind tour of the world by private jet wearing Ugg slippers, Bea’s adventure comes to an abrupt end. If you believe that talking about your hopes and fears (independence and a raucous lifestyle) to a disdainful Manhattan pigeon who responds by defecating on your blank moleskin notebook is the pathway to dream fulfillment, this is a book you will want to keep under your fluffy pillow. Otherwise, feel free to hurl it across the room. Reviewed by Elizabeth Benford Porch Lights By Dorothea Benton Frank William Morrow, $25.99, 336 pages, Format: Hard
«««« By alternating narrators in a rich mother/daughter counterpoint of attitude and need, Ms. Frank provides a novel of pride, passion, and purpose. Annie Britt’s husband, Buster, had walked out on her eleven years ago, crushed by her overbearing domestic management. Their home was her castle, but not his. Never divorced, they have had little communication over the years. Now, approaching sixty, Annie is lonely and her stubborn need to be needed is raging. Her daughter, Jackie McMullen, has just tragically lost her firefighter husband. She and her ten-year-old son, Charlie, are struggling through a very rocky period of mourning. Mid-thirtyish Jackie, who has had three tours of duty in Afghanistan as an army nurse, cannot begin to imagine her future. Though she has had a strained relationship with her judgmental, hard-to-please mother, this disoriented young woman has decided to leave New York temporarily
for a visit to the family home on Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina. Magic is truly in the air. A Southern tonic of climate, community, and consideration introduces a gradual process of reconciliation, healing, and self-discovery. Important agents in this process include Annie’s old friend Deb, her new neighbor Dr. Steve Plofker – who shares with Jackie the recent loss of a spouse – and also Buster Britt who, in the process of aiding his daughter and grandson, rekindles his relationship with Annie. Atmosphere is everything in this winning tale in which family values are made vivid and tangible. Frank exhibits perfect pitch in tuning the elements of her enchanted, lowcountry, island. Reviewed by Phil Jason One Mountain Away: A Goddess Anonymous Novel By Emilie Richards Mira, $14.95, 480 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Readers who love details will love One Mountain Away which holds nearly five hundred pages of them. By the time you’ve finished reading this book, there’s little you won’t know about Lotty Lou Hale, and how she transformed herself into the adult Charlotte Hale, wealthy real estate developer in Asheville, NC. Written in alternating chapters, Charlotte begins a ‘first day diary’ to recap her tumultuous childhood. These diary entries are interspersed between episodes of current day events, some of which involve Charlotte, even if she knows nothing about them as they happen. Charlotte has not willingly seen nor talked to her daughter Taylor since the seventeen-year-old disclosed her pregnancy. The younger couple didn’t marry, but have been supported (financially and emotionally) by Taylor’s father and Jeremy’s parents. The child, Mattie, was diagnosed as a toddler with epilepsy, and it’s a constant battle to keep her condition stable.
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Book Reviews
Popular Fiction
When Charlotte is diagnosed with a possibly terminal illness, her outlook on life suddenly changes, and she realizes that while mountains can’t exactly be moved, there’s more than one way to get around or over them. She strives mightily to mend the broken fences in her life, and to leave the world a better place than the one in which she was raised. Have the tissues handy! There’s also a Reader Guide included, to help book clubs. Reviewed by Kelly Ferjutz Reunion: A Novel By Lauraine Snelling FaithWords, $14.99, 315 pages, Format: Trade
« Keira Johnson would like to accompany her husband on an anniversary trip to Norway but she has to find her birth certificate in order to get a passport. When she locates it, she finds that her father is listed as “unknown.” This throws Keira into a tailspin. She has been living the lie of being legitimate for fifty-some years! How can she hold her head up at the family reunion? Meanwhile, her teenage niece, Kirsten, has missed two menstrual periods. Could she be pregnant, or has she just been exercising too vigorously? Will she sacrifice her shiny life to motherhood, or will she consider abortion? Will she be shunned by her peers for breaking her vow of chastity? How will her pastor father and pro-life crusading mother react to her situation? Answer: everyone will cry a lot, pray a lot, wallow in selfpity, and whine. Oh, and bake and eat pans full of cookies, washing them down with gallons of herbal tea. The purpose of this book is apparently to expound upon the evangelical position in regards to abortion: one of Satan’s slimy tricks. If the characters had been individuated enough to distinguish them from one another, some meaningful interactions might have occurred. As presented, these godly folk are so self-absorbed and unimaginative that it is very hard to care what happens to them. Reviewed by Elizabeth Benford
Alif the Unseen By G. Willow Wilson Grove Press, $25.00, 440 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Alif nominally lives in an unnamed emirate in the Middle East, but he pledges his true affiliation to the community of hackers who cache their ideas in the Cloud and correspond almost exclusively via the Internet. Alif’s job is to digitally protect his clients from state surveillance, which he does well, until his lover jilts him for an arranged marriage and tells him that she never wants to see him again. In childish retaliation, he writes a program that profiles her computer use and makes it impossible for her to ever find him electronically. This ingenious program draws the attention of the state’s security force, nicknamed “The Hand of God,” and endangers the hacker community. When his former lover sends him a book titled The Thousand and One Days, Alif draws the attention of the jinn as well, and he finds himself running for his life. A deft combination of the digital and the mystical, Alif the Unseenasks questions about the evolution of religion and of the totalitarian state in the modern age. What impact do computers have on religion? What does it mean for a state to be free? What does revolution look like? Profound and entertaining, the novel is a page-turner. Reviewed by Tammy McCartney
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Book Reviews Category
Science Fiction & Fantasy
This book picks up with all interested parties converging for the final confrontation. Needless to say, you should not start with this book. Knowing who everyone is and how they relate to each other is an essential part of the reading experience. It’s best to start with The Crooked Letter. This will represent the rousing climax you can expect, followed by quite a long epilogue as the survivors of the battle make sometimes emotional decisions about their personal future and the world they live in. Reviewed by David Marshall Whispers Under Ground By Ben Aaronovitch Del Rey, $7.99, 320 pages, Format: Mass
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The Devoured Earth, Books of the Cataclysm: Four By Sean Williams Pyr, $11.99, 598 pages, Format: eBook
««« The Devoured Earth, Books of the Cataclysm: Four by Sean Williams brings us breathless to the final episode in this sprawling epic fantasy. In many ways, this tetralogy is a remarkable piece of work. Our Earth is destroyed quite early on and all life might have perished were it not for the efforts of key characters who create temporary stability in other realms. With the right characters using their powers, these dimensions can interact with each other, providing a shifting environment in which the survivors struggle to defend what’s left against Yod, a predatory being of voracious appetite that simply consumes all life wherever it is found.
Whispers Under Ground by Ben Aaronovitch is the third in the Rivers of London series and, if you enjoy British humor at the expense of urban fantasy, this is a must-read. Instead of a powerful woman striding around town and keeping everything in apple-pie order, young Peter Grant defends London against an alarming underground threat. The history of the Victorian butty gangs and their implication for modern Londoners is but one of the myriad delights as you read this. At one level, this book is a police procedural but, when the supernatural comes to the fore, we can see the depth of invention with the author expanding the range of the types of magic on display as new groups of players join the fray. We’re also honored by the presence of an FBI agent who quickly gets into the thick of the action and manages to contribute significantly to the quality of trans-Atlantic understanding. Put all this together and it signals the development of a major new voice in British fantasy. With this third book continuing the high level of entertainment from the first two, you should be adding this author to your must-read list. Reviewed by David Marshall
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 24
Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Assignment in Eternity By Robert A. Heinlein Baen, $13.00, 256 pages, Format: Trade
««« Heinlein always makes for the best stories. Assignment in Eternity combines four stories into one book. He looks at the supermen in our midst (“Gulf”) as well as the consideration that we may all be supermen, we just need to figure out how to regain those talents (“Lost Legacy”). He also looks at what it takes to be a man (“Jerry Was A Man”), and how irrelevant it is how we interact with our universe as long as we do interact with it (“Elsewhen”). Although some interesting writing, it just would not stack with Heinlein’s best. “Jerry Was A Man,” despite looking at the sentience of other species, is dated; it just would not work today. “Lost Legacy” is just too sunk in New Age enlightenment to work. “Gulf” and “Elsewhen” work; the latter is a nice piece of philosophical fluff and the former makes combines the best of pulp with some decent fiction. These is a great collection for those interested in his earlier fiction or 1940s science fiction; otherwise this is an easy pass. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim Broken Angels By Harambee K. Grey-Sun CreateSpace, $16.99, 310 pages, Format: Trade
««« Robert Goldner and Darryl Ridley both suffer from the White Fire Virus, an STD that grants the ability to manipulate light and energy, but also condemns the infected to a hideous leprotic death. Robert struggles daily with his troubling past, while Darryl dedicates himself to curing people of their attachment to love. As recruits of the Isaac-Abraham Insti-
tute as Watchers, they use their strange abilities to help locate missing children. But when their latest case leads them into a tangled web involving Virus-carriers who believe themselves “angels” destined to save the world, they’ll both find their most cherished beliefs challenged. What is the alternate dimension known as XynKroma? Is this STD a gift or a curse? Are they changing the world for the better, or dooming it? Broken Angels is a curious mix of the fantasy and detective genres, blending magical abilities with medical science and police procedures, and liberally dashed with moments of body horror. The book sets an ambitious pace, loaded with lots of fascinating ideas, but stumbles quite a bit along the way. Clumsy narration and dialogue often hinder the story’s development, jarring the reader out of the moment and distracting from both the slow unfolding of the plot and the larger exploration of the world the characters inhabit. Grey-Sun has a phenomenal amount of world-building to do here and manages to avoid info dumps or other hamfisted attempts at exposition. While the reader doesn’t entirely understand XynKroma or the nature of the White Fire Virus, it’s clear that the characters don’t either, so that minor confusion makes the characters more relatable. Unfortunately, the conclusion lands with the disappointing thud of anticlimax, souring a solid build-up and squandering some of the book’s potential. Interesting and frustrating all at once, Broken Angels succeeds as often as it missteps. Sponsored Review Pathfinder Tales: Blood of the City By Robin D. Laws Paizo Publishing, LLC., $9.99, 368 pages, Format: Mass
««««« Luma Derexhi is what’s known as a cobblestone druid, with a rare breed of magic that allows her do all sorts of useful things simply by tapping into the energy of the city of Magnimar. Together with her siblings, Luma helps solve problems for anyone who can pay. San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 25
Feature Book Review
Science Fiction & Fantasy
The Monster Hunters Written by Larry Correia Baen, $24.00, 1200 pages, 5 Stars
Guest reviewer: Steve Diamond, Elitist Book Reviews San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 26
Featured Book Review
Science Fiction & Fantasy
T
he world of Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter series is a welcome addition to Urban Fantasy. This is a world where monsters of all types are real, and private companies hunt them down for the protection of the world…and because the pay is amazing.
The Monster Hunters is a 1200-page hardback omnibus collecting the first three novels in Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter series: Monster Hunter International (MHI), Monster Hunter Vendetta (MHV), and Monster Hunter Alpha (MHA). This omnibus was released in anticipation of Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter Legion. MHI starts when Owen Pitt’s boss turns into a werewolf. Rather than being eaten, Pitt throws his boss out the window of the office building. Pitt is soon approached with a job offer to work for Monster Hunter International, a private company that hunts down monsters that are loose in the world. Pitt soon becomes the only shot keeping the world from being destroyed. And, of course, Pitt needs to get the girl: the beautiful and intelligent Julie Shackleford. MHV follows soon the events of the first novel, where Pitt has made an enemy of the Old Ones—think Lovecraftian Gods. The Old Ones want Pitt dead, they have a cult on earth to do that very thing, and it’s again up to Pitt stay alive and save the world. MHA is a spin-off story following one of the best side-characters of the first two novels, Earl Harbinger, one of the greatest werewolves to ever live. There is a plot that surfaces in Michigan to spread a werewolf plague using a smalltown as ground zero. Harbinger recruits a member of local law enforcement to help him, Heather Kerkonen, and they go about uncovering an even deeper conspiracy. The first thing any reader should know is that these novels are geared towards those who love pulpy, B-Movie, action-packed stories. The first novel, MHI, is probably the weakest. It’s longer than it should be, and it is tailored to gun-nuts everywhere. The novel is still fantastic, but you can tell it is Correia’s first novel. Things dramatically improve in MHV. The characters are more well-rounded, the humor is even better than the first—though it can stray into the silly at times—and the story is more focused. MHA is, by far, the darkest of the three novels. Where Pitts PoVs lend to humor, Harbinger has such serious gravity to his character. What I like best about this series is the progression every character goes through over the course of the series. I love every side-character (especially Agent Franks, Harbinger, and the entire female cast), so when Correia begins stacking the bodies, you worry about them making it through the scene— which doesn’t always happen. Characters never escape unscathed, and usually end up permanently damaged in body and soul. Like the silly humor, the gun-nuttery of the novel could turn away some readers, but every action scene is unique and accurate, thanks to Correia’s expertise in the field. The Monster Hunters omnibus is for readers who like less San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 27
sparkly vampires and pretty werewolves, and more fight-for-your-life action against the most horrifying monsters in man’s imagination. This is currently one of the most entertaining series in Urban Fantasy. Fans of Jim Butcher, Simon R Green, and even Charlaine Harris should enjoy The Monster Hunters immensely. Highly recommended.
Larry Correia is the New York Times bestselling author of the Monster Hunter International series, the Grimnoir Chronicles, and the thriller Dead Six. His next novel, Monster Hunter Legion, will be available September 2012. All of his books are available in eBook format, but currently only from www.baen. com’s webscriptions. (cheap and DRM free!) Audio versions of most of my books are available from www.audible.com.
Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
And yet, despite being the oldest, Luma has never really fit in with her siblings, and the feeling is clearly mutual. However, when she finally decides to stand up for herself, everything goes very wrong. Of all the Pathfinder Tales novels I’ve read so far, Blood of the City is my favorite, no question about it. Luma is a delightful heroine: smart, savvy, competent with a blade, and wronged by those she loved she is out for bloody vengeance. Robin D. Laws brings the city of Magnimar to life through Luma’s magic, almost giving it a personality of its own. Readers don’t need to be at all familiar with the Pathfinder role-playing game to enjoy this novel; it’s a delightful, stand-alone fantasy story that will likely leave you hungry for more. Reviewed by Holly Scudero The Apocalypse Codex (A Laundry Files Novel) By Charles Stross Ace, $25.95, 326 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Bob Howard looks like your average work-a-day bureaucrat, which helps when you’re a government agent secretly defending England from supernatural threats so horrific the mind can barely comprehend them. So when Bob is unofficially tasked with a special assignment, he packs up his good suit, some chicken feet, and his grab-bag of tricks. His job? Keeping an eye on Persephone Hazard, a freelancer investigating a dangerously persuasive American televangelist. And he’ll need every trick he’s got to save the world this time... Part supernatural procedural, part Office Space-like examination of bureaucracy, The Apocalypse Codex is the latest in Stross’s Laundry Files novels, a series that deftly meshes the spirit of James Bond, the mania of Benny Hill, and the terrors of H.P. Lovecraft. As with all of Stross’s work, the little details are killer, and he finds both humor and horror in the trivial, whether it’s the eccentricities of merging occult rituals and technology, the vagaries of crossing the shadowy forces at work in
the world, or the small affectations of his most engaging villain yet. I can’t wait for the next one. Bob Howard might not be ready for the Apocalypse, but the Apocalypse is certainly not ready for Bob Howard. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas The Devil Delivered and Other Tales By Steven Erikson Tor Books, $27.99, 336 pages, Format: Hard
««« The Devil Delivered by Steven Erikson is a collection of three unrelated novellas by one of fantasy’s most interesting authors. “The Devil Delivered” is a story about humanity’s reaction to an unfolding ecological disaster and, unless all life forms adapt, this could signal species extinction. Although mainly science fiction in form, there are overtones of both supernatural and fantasy as we watch the final days in the life of one scientist who ignores the imminence of his own death to continue observing the adaptation of some species out in the desert. “Revolvo” is a quite stunning example of absurdism redux. Sixty years ago we were recovering from World War II, and therefore keenly aware of the absurdities around us. Today, social conventions have changed and it’s no longer so politically correct to label what people say and do as being absurd. That said, Erikson produces a sly deconstruction of many features in our modern lives and, with a wry sense of humor, suggests they are worthy of reevaluation. Finally, we have the slightly less successful “Fishing with Grandma Matchie,” which is a potentially engaging fantasy that overstays its welcome. It would have been good at half the length. Reviewed by David Marshall
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Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Zombie Island: A Shakespeare Undead Novel By Lori Handeland St. Martin’s Press, $14.99, 265 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Life is already complicated for monster huntress Katherine Dymond and vampire playwright William Shakespeare, just as star-crossed as that other famous pair of lovers. But when they hatch a plot to fake Katherine’s death and dissolve her loveless marriage, events go further awry, stranding Katherine on a mysterious island where a mad wizard, a mischievous air spirit, and hideous zombies reign. I previously described Shakespeare Undead as “a curious hodgepodge of romance, comedy, supernatural mystery, and winking tribute,” and Zombie Island follows that formula to a tee. Handeland has fun with both Romeo and Juliet and The Tempest, mashing them up gleefully with her own monster-rich storytelling. But there’s something a bit deeper at work here, as the author juxtaposes the playfulness of Shakespearean misunderstandings and madcap plotting with more serious questions of sacrificing for love and what it means to be a monster. Zombie Island hits some surprisingly resonant emotional notes, while maintaining a lighter tone via the tongue-in-cheek references to popular culture past and present. Romantic angles dominate the story -- with varying degrees of success -- but Handeland’s sheer audacity when it comes to rewriting the history of both England and Shakespeare is where the book really shines. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas Monster Hunter Legion By Larry Correia Baen, $24.00, 378 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Fans of Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter books already know exactly what they have discovered – an urban fantasy series full of adventure, comedy, action, fantastic charac-
ters and locations, romance, danger, and monsters galore. Monster Hunter Legion is the fourth book in the best-selling series. The team is attending the annual International Conference of Monster Hunting Professionals in Las Vegas at the Last Dragon hotel. There they meet hunters (and their competition) from all over the world. Things turn nasty when a monster created during a WWII experiment turns up determined to make the Hunters’ nightmares into reality. When the hotel is quarantined and locked down, it is up to Owen Pitt and his team to save the day. Which nightmare from the depths of Owen’s mind will they have to battle? Readers unfamiliar with the books should start with the first one to fully enjoy the series. Correia is a firearms expert so he knows his way around weapons. This shows in his writing. Mosh, Owen’s brother, has a bigger role this time around. Correia’s overall storyline is gaining major momentum as Julie learns more about her “curse” and the Hunters discover more about a monster showdown hinted at in previous books. Reviewed by Kathryn Franklin Accidentally Dead, Again By Dakota Cassidy Berkley Trade, $15.00, 344 pages, Format: Trade
««« The ladies of OOPS -- vampire Nina, werewolf Marty, and hybrid Wanda, self-appointed counselors to the supernatural community -- discover newly-minted vampire Sam on their doorstep. When a confrontation with a woman claiming to be Nina’s sister leads to her getting bitten by Sam, suddenly OOPS has double the fanged trouble on their hands. Accidentally Dead, Again is the latest in Cassidy’s Accidentals series, but it’s the first of them I’ve encountered. And here’s hoping it’s a misstep in an otherwise enjoyable series.
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Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
The plot is A+ stuff, involving a vampires dying horrifically amidst the mystery of Sam’s transformation, which casts a long (and narratively effective) shadow over the burgeoning supernatural romance between Sam and Phoebe. But virtually every character is so intolerably bitchy or obnoxiously laid-back and lackadaisical that the otherwise peppy banter suffers for it. They often play more like caricatures than characters. There are soap opera theatrics at every turn, which would have worked better for me had I been less irritated with much of the cast. Similarly, there are revelations that probably served as well-earned reveals for longtime readers, but definitely left a newcomer to the series somewhat baffled. It’s a mixed bag, at best. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas Live and Let Drood: A Secret Histories Novel By Simon R. Green Roc, $25.95, 361 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Edward Drood, aka Shaman Bond, has literally been to hell and back protecting his family and his true love, witch Molly Metcalf. At the beginning of Simon R. Green’s latest Secret Histories novel, Live and Let Drood, Eddie and Molly return from a romantic vacation to find that the Drood Hall has been attacked and destroyed, and the whole family is dead. In order to avenge them, he must armor up and set out with Molly to find the villain responsible. But wait! Eddie’s golden armor isn’t working. It’s time to finally venture into the dreaded Drood Maze (insert readers’ cheers here) to find a solution. Eddie routinely comes up against baddies with weapons like the Hand of Glory (it can uncover any secret, open any lock, or take command of any magic), elven wands, guns made from alien technology, teleport devices, and biting bullets (made from the bones of uncaught murderers). He gets to play with all the neatest toys, compliments of the family Armourer who creates the latest and greatest weapons and
spy devices. Point the Protein Exploder at any foe and, with the push of a button, all that is left are bones. Do yourself a huge favor and begin with the first Secret Histories novel. You’ll have a blast getting to know the Drood family and their arch-enemies. Green’s characters are always quick to provide a snarky comment and hilarious humor. He’s created a masterpiece of a series filled with fantastic, out-ofthis world plot lines and fun dialogue. Reviewed by Kathryn Franklin Libriomancer: Magic Ex Libris, Book 1 By Jim C. Hines DAW, $24.95, 308 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Sometimes it is the pet fire spider that makes all of the difference. Isaac Vainio is a Libriomancer, able to pull items from a book. After his dryad friend Nena stops by his work and saves him from a trio of sparkly vampires, he finds himself in the middle of a vampire/libriomancer war that apparently only he can stop. Along the way he finds out a few secrets that should have remained secret, and that the dryad may be in love with him. Yeah, it’s going to be one of those kinds of weeks. For those with a love of books, this is a rare chance to get their geek on. Hines writes a really fun book, looking at book-based magic. Between some of the best action scenes out there, combining dramatic actions with realistic after-effects, this makes for a great book. It is also the first book in a series, but rather than the usual dread of a new series it looks like it could be fun; although it could be a stand-alone book, enough threads are dangling that a sequel looks promising. This is how a series should begin, and it is still a great book. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
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Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
A Guile of Dragons (A Tournament of Shadows, Book 1) By James Enge Pyr, $17.95, 320 pages, Format: Trade
«««« A Guile of Dragons by James Enge is a delightfully thoughtful fantasy. Instead of recycling tired old tropes with dragons, dwarves, and general magical folk, he creates a new context for a son of Merlin story. Of course, the old boy is still around to beget the youngster and hover in the background while his offspring earns his spurs, but this is an engaging story of conflict taking off along a brand new plotline. Behind it all are the warring forces of Fate and Chaos. In order to destabilize the Wardlands, they incite the dragons to attack in the north where the dwarves, the traditional enemies of the dragons, have their mines and homes. Fortunately, young Morlock is in the right place to confront the invaders. In the ensuing conflict we learn much about his back-story, watch a young man come to terms with his father’s legacy, and grow in effectiveness. Even though the prose tends to be slightly functional, the overall result is a tense race to save as many local people as possible while inflicting the maximum damage on the dragons. Put simply, James Enge presents us with a must-read for anyone who enjoys elegant ideas converted into pure adventure. Reviewed by David Marshall The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick: Volume 3, Upon the Dull Earth (1953-1954) By Philip K. Dick Subterranean Press, $40.00, 430 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Upon the Dull Earth collects some of the most interesting science fiction stories from one of the most successful science fiction writers in the history of the field. Philip K. Dick was a 1960s avatar who produced mind-bending work which challenged our perception of reality. Dick struggled with mental illness and depression; he himself was not al-
ways sure what reality was, but he was field stalwart who produced a tremendous amount of science fiction and elevated the field for some. His characters could have been anyone, not just the super scientists or space explorers. This is just one of five volumes. He also wrote over twenty novels. Here one will find a variety of fascinating stories he wrote between 1953 and 1954, before he was famous and awardwinning. Though there are metaphors and symbols, the work is representative of science fiction with robots, time travelers, and extraterrestrials. The title story may disappoint some, but one will find gems here like “The Father Thing,” “The Golden Man,” and “War Veteran.” It is sometimes hard to plow through a story collection, ie. it is easier to read a group of stories as they were originally published or individually. In Dick’s case, all the mind twists can leave one’s mind raw and open to new ways of looking at the universe. Reviewed by Ryder Miller vN: The First Machine Dynasty By Madeline Ashby Angry Robot, $12.99, 307 pages, Format: Trade
«« vN starts so very well; I was hopeful it would prove to be one of these very good dystopian novels that takes a nice set of ideas and then rigorously explores how it would all work out in fact. The vN is a reference to von Neumann androids who have reached a stage in their development when they could become more like humans. Sadly and inevitably, this includes overcoming their Asimovian failsafes and being able to act violently.
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Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Our heroine belongs to a clade designed to deliver nursing services. These androids have been manufactured to conform to sexual stereotypes, i.e. nursing is mostly performed by women, so these female androids have coding to give them empathy, they marry for “love,” and nurture children, and so on. Yet all these android clades, regardless of apparent gender, are self-replicating, i.e. they can all produce children. Why then are they assigned genders? This is one of many unanswered questions. It would have been possible to design each clade to maximize their ability to perform the given tasks. Handicapping them by making them humanoid is inefficient. Indeed, the book becomes an uninspiring story of a machine in search of her soul and romance. Reviewed by David Marshall The Woman Who Married a Cloud: Collected Stories By Jonathan Carroll Subterranean, $45.00, 582 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Despite constantly appearing on the World Fantasy Awards rolls, it’s unfortunate that Jonathan Carroll lacks the instant name recall of some of his contemporaries. Hopefully this new collection of short fiction will shine the spotlight on this incredible writer who deserves superstar status. The Woman Who Married a Cloud is dense with thoughtful, haunting tales. Most of the characters are painfully-flawed normal people who are thrown into extraordinary situations. There’s always a sense of impending doom, but Carroll handles his moments so well that the reader never sees the final crash. It’s only felt after the book has been put away for the day. I enjoyed “Friend’s Best Man” and “The Second Snow,” which both feature a dog lover’s worst nightmares; “The Sadness of Detail” which deals with the growing incompetence of God; and “The Fall Collection,” “Nothing to De-
clare,” and the title story, which contemplates superficiality and the pursuit of love. These slightly melancholic stories are meant to be savored. A reader must go slowly in order to examine the emotional weight and philosophical questions of each tale. Reminiscent of classic “Twilight Zone” episodes, this is first-rate fantasy which lingers long after its been read. Reviewed by Rachel Anne Calabia The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Ninth Annual Collection By Gardner Dozois (editor) St. Martin’s Griffin, $40.00, 704 pages, Format: Hard
««« It is hard to believe that this book series has been going on since 1984. Every year, the best writers in science fiction are showcased the this longrunning series. This year’s book includes writers like Peter S. Beagle, Ian R. MacLeod, and Gwyneyth Jones, to name a few. The collection is a hodgepodge of short stories, novellas, and good old fashion pulp science fiction fun. The plots of these stories range from alien invasion stories to high tech morality decisions, and everything else in between. There is no real connecting theme in the book; each story is unrelated to the next. I found the book to have a pleasant mix of both older and newer writers. Science fiction is a great way for writers to explore morality and human characteristic in a new light. My favorite story was Dave Hutchinson’s “The Incredible Exploding Man,” a dark take on the typical comic superhero genre. There are also some stories that are not so astonishing. I’m not saying they were not well-written or interesting; I just couldn’t get into them. The book has a little something for everyone, and by doing so not everyone is going to like it. This is defiantly a book for those die hard science fiction
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Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
fans, but for the others, you might want to wait until next year. Reviewed by Kevin Brown Confessions of a Five-Chambered Heart By Caitlin R. Kiernan Subterranean, $40.00, 327 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Confessions of a Five Chambered Heart is a thought-provoking collection of short stories by Caitlin R Kiernan in which she deliberately blurs the lines between conventional dark fantasy, classic Lovecraftian horror, and eroticism. Because some of the content is explicit, you might be reluctant to pick it up. This would be a sad outcome. The quality of the prose and the subtext about individuality should interest everyone. Subterranean Press is to be commended for publishing these edgy explorations into the worlds of transformation and metamorphosis. For example, if a magician transformed a wolf into a young girl, how should society react? Or if aliens could offer us the opportunity to surrender our individuality and merge two minds into one, would the outcome be satisfactory? Back on Earth, love implicitly involves the surrender of some independence. Unless we get into a relationship of dominance and submission, the partners who form a single unit must find room to respect each other’s right to individuality. Yet there’s always a tension, a suspicion of inequality, a sense one may have somehow betrayed the other. I found this collection a positive delight. As all good art, it challenged my preconceptions and offered new insights. Reviewed by David Marshall
Indignities of the Flesh By Bentley Little Subterranean Press, $35.00, 203 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Indignities of the Flesh, by Bentley Little, is another elegantly produced book from Subterranean Press. Without small presses like this, we would not have the chance to read the work of authors like this; mainstream publishers do not believe there are enough buyers. Without mass-market promotion, the prophecy is self-fulfilling. In fact, this is an excellent, if eclectic, collection of contemporary horror stories. Although we have elements of the supernatural and one zombie, these are stories about the folks we meet in the streets or who live in our neighborhood. This is horror rooted in everyday reality and all the better for it. Indeed, even the zombie story is nonstandard, showing a completely different relationship between a man and a zombie. The best stories deal with the power of fear and obsession to produce unexpected or irrational responses. Just what would a jealous rodeo clown do? What would a stalker do if confronted by his victim? What is the significance of this particular recurrent nightmare? The answers to these and other questions will take you on a journey, sometimes frightening, and sometimes, darkly humorous. Whatever your taste in horror, you will find something to like in this collection. Reviewed by David Marshall The Shadowed Sun By N.K. Jemisin Orbit, $14.99, 519 pages, Format: Trade
«««« The Shadowed Sun by N K Jemisin completes a two-book fantasy exploring how access to power corrupts even the most righteous. We may tell ourselves we’re bound by morality yet, when threatened, we defend ourselves. When
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Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
we see others threatened, we defend them. If that means killing the attackers, we do it. The result? We rewrite our codes of morality so that it’s acceptable to kill in self-defense or defense of others. This is a moral system of yin and yang. On one side, there’s the magical power to heal those who can be saved and to guide the souls of those who are dying to a place where they will find contentment. On the other side, there’s the ability to deny healing and kill without mercy. It’s the same power but used with a different intention. This novel beautifully captures this difference and constructs an emotionally satisfying journey for our heroine. She may start off an innocent, but is soon forced to confront the horrors of the world. Inevitably she’s changed by her experiences and learns to shape her own destiny in this quite remarkable fantasy. Together with The Killing Moon, this is a must-read! Reviewed by David Marshall Blackout (The Newsflesh Trilogy) By Mira Grant Orbit, $9.99, 672 pages, Format: Mass
«««« The conclusion to the action-packed and riveting Newflesh trilogy, Blackout, does what Feed did in exploding out of the gate with great writing, strong characters, and a story you couldn’t stop reading; as well as what Deadline continued with in ratcheting up the tension and delving out shocking plot twists to keep readers demanding more. The most important thing about this book is that it remains true to its characters in every way so that if the reader has been paying attention from the first line of the first book, they shouldn’t
be too surprised, and yet it’s still satisfying and rewarding to see the events you hoped might happen on the page before you, as well as some great shockers you might not have seen coming. We last left George apparently somehow alive and well, living the life of a clone in a CDC lab. She slowly puts things together as time passes, but for every answer there are fifty more questions. Also, is she really Georgia Mason? She doesn’t have the reservoir condition anymore; she’s a lot thinner that George ever was; and her hair is annoyingly long and bleaching with every shower. Then she finds out she might have an ally or two on the inside, but she isn’t sure if she can trust them. Meanwhile, as Shaun continues to talk to Georgia in his head and act all kinds of crazy, he keeps the gang of After the End Times on the move. After spending some time with Dr. Abbey in her secret lab, as she takes copious daily amounts of his virus-immune blood, he thinks about where the trail is leading next, where he can get more answers, and find out just what this whole conspiracy is all about. It will involve possibly going on a rescue mission to Florida, which has been designated a zombie-ridden loss for the country; meeting with his parents who he hates, to ask for help; and tracking down the best I.D. counterfeiter in the business to start their new lives. Mira Grant skillfully switches between the George and Shaun storylines with each chapter, making the characters appear as distinct and complex as they were in the first two books, as she slowly but seamlessly brings them together, building the tension and thrill. The reader knows the step-siblings are going to meet up again at some point, but will Shaun be able keep his sanity or will he just be pushed over the edge? Then there’s the question of which clone of Georgia Mason will be there to greet him? Blackout is the perfect, satiating finish to the trilogy, making the three-book series feel like one long, epic story. No reader will be disappointed, with a worthwhile ending that will leave him or her sad that the wonderful journey is now over . . . but just like when the end of Harry Potter was reached, or the final page of
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Book Reviews
Science Fiction & Fantasy
Stephen King’s Dark Tower series, how many of us turned back to the first book and started reading that first page once again? Having reread the first two books, this trilogy will be one I will continue to reread constantly throughout my lifetime. Reviewed by Alex Telander God Save the Queen By Kate Locke Orbit, $16.99, 352 pages, Format: Hard
never feels too overwhelming or bloated. This is definitely a guilty pleasure kind of book and I look forward to the next installment. Reviewed by Kevin Brown Second Skin By Peter Darrach CreateSpace, $16.00, 328 pages, Format: Trade
««««
««««« Xandra Vardan has some issues. You see, she’s a halfie. She is one half vampire and one half plagued human, and an outcast on both sides of society. In this world, genetic mutations changed the upper class of Britain into vampiric rulers, while the lower classes stayed human. In between these fractions are the halvies, goblins, which are viewed as genetic trash. As part nobility, Xandra is a member of the royal guard and is sworn to protect Queen Victoria, who has been ruling for over 170 years. Xandra might have to risk it all to find out what happened to her sister, and to discover her own mysterious history. This book is a mishmash of every geeky subculture, but never looses focus of the story. I love the world that is created here. It is the kind of world Shakespeare would envision if he had been born in the 1980s, being forced to swallow pop culture. Werewolves, zombies, goblins, and other like creatures make frequent and stunning appearances. It is refreshing to read a book that treats these creatures more like people, and characters, than as monsters. Overall, the relationships between Xandra and the other characters, especially Winston Churchill, are what make this book so enjoyable. There is also enough to explore in this book that it
Second Skin is a near-future novel set in and around Mars and the Asteroid belt, where highly developed mining operations take raw ore for the asteroids and shoots it to refineries near Mars for processing. Mars has recently gained its independence from Earth and is expanding its own influence further out into the Solar system. Teleportation is being developed, but not yet perfected, and an anarchistic group of ice pirates is preparing to challenge both Mars and Earth. In this setting, young Max Cody is preparing to bring an asteroid in-system to be precessed at a MOSA (Mars Orbital Smelting Array) station in orbit around Mars. He’s injured in the process and gets healed and upgraded by aliens from another dimension. These upgrades give him new abilities he has to master to help save both Earth and Mars from the pirates and their allies. Second Skin is a fun read, reminiscent of early Heinlein, Bova, or Asimov stories. Max makes a good young protagonist, and the director of the MOSA station, Daniel Sinclair, a good balance of an older male figure (also Heinleinesque in its first- and second-stage male characters). There was some awkward dialog to bring the reader up to speed about the current setting that didn’t feel natural to the story, but that quickly passed. It’s an entertaining novel, with lively characters and situations, and an open storyline for further books. Sponsored Review
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Night Shade Books $14.99, 363 pages, 4 Stars Reviewed by Jamais Jochem
T
here are just some books that are better when you read them with the voice of Patrick Warburton. Alexander Outland: Space Pirate just wanted to make some money on magma delivery when he is forced to land on Herion, and became embroiled in a plot to take over the planet by the late, great Pierre de Chance and Chatouilleux Francais Armada (yeah, do the translation). He must foil the plot or never be able to fly in the spacelanes ever again, and he has arguably one of the most skilled teams to do it with. Or so he’s been told. This is not a book for those who like their science fiction hard and dry. The Outland is of Captain Kirk’s mold, if he were a pirate. He starts with a curvaceous weapons/security officer, a naïve mechanical genius, and a deposed governor who is also one of the greatest criminal minds of all time. He adds in a robot based off the late Audrey Landers, a mostly telepathic spy, and a major from the local army. Somewhere along the line they add the ghost of a floating tank. And it goes downhill and around the mountain from there.
Better yet, nothing is wasted; this is that one literary meal where even the drippings are made into gravy. Little details keep coming up well after they are introduced, and in such a way that they work. A really nice touch is that the evil mastermind that they are up against has been dead fifty years; he was killed by the deposed governor. Although it is set up well for a sequel, this is one of those books that works well on its own; the end arrives and you are very happy where it ends off. Fans of comedy will appreciate having this book on their shelves.
Most science fiction/humor books make the mistake of keeping too close to the conventions, making fun of them but in a way that they stick out, making them go from clever plot device to cliché in the space of a heartbeat. This book takes all of those conventions and actually uses them as part of the background, making for some really incredible comedy. It even throws in jokes you would swear only work when you can hear them, and still bats them out of the park.
ABOUT G. J.KOCH G. J. Koch writes science fiction. Not the hard stuff, though. Because that requires actual scientific knowledge or at least actual scientific research. Knowledge may be power and research may be cool, but they take time away from writing jokes, action, and romance, and being witty in the face of death is what it’s really all about.
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Book Reviews Category
Poetry & Short Stories
language of the poems must both convey violence and hold it at bay. McKinney’s style of writing often emphasizes the autonomy of each unit of language, such that each stanza, and each line within it, holds or at least hints at its own meaning, so that the transition from one line to the next is a moment of wonderful uncertainty, and the appreciation of a poem changes with each new word. The diction shifts sometimes between the modern and the archaic, but the shifts are consciously controlled, drawing the wealth and weight of the words into conflict with a modern directness that seeks to do violence against the beauty of language itself. Mad Cursive is an excellent use of poetry as a vehicle for real thought: a good read. Reviewed by James Rasmussen Between Eden and the Open Road By Philip Gaber Amazon Digital Services, $9.99, 184 pages, Format: Trade
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Mad Cursive By Joshua McKinney Wordcraft of Oregon, $14.00, 73 pages, Format: Trade
«««« It is sometimes difficult to say what a poem is “about.” On the surface, the poems in Mad Cursive are about swordsmanship, about dying, about playing Modern Warfare 3, but they work together, with intent, to explore a deeper, cohesive subject. Mad Cursive professes to be a collection of poems reflecting on the relationship between violence and language: violence both within language and against language. The disciplines of poetry and swordsmanship connect in these poems to create a tension between beauty and destruction, but not in the way that a reader might expect. As the vehicle through which that tension is explored, the
In an extremely esoteric and sincere collection, Philip Gaber writes with an abundance of insight for readers everywhere. His poems read like anecdotal reports about the human being in a fixed notion of tension. While so much of the poetic trajectory is critical of existence and worthy of communicating the urgency of our time, the morbid and grimness of this all is redundant and formulaic. The simple and general materializations of anger, resignation, anxiety, and paranoia are vague and too matter-of-fact in some selections, which allows little depth and resonation beyond the heavy verbatim of self-analysis. However, there are still solid pieces that are spot-on with inner monologues, from which the poet coins a lyrical reality like “It’s about not extending myself./It’s about...being too involved in my own head” (from my own weight) and “happiness is a fickle mistress who sometimes likes to falsely accuse you of communicating threats” (the bright coming morn). Though, at times, the usual abstractions of chaos and disorder weaken the poetic design and dialogue
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Book Reviews
Poetry & Short Stories
with such rigidity, Gaber’s enthusiastic approach to the various levels of perception is idiosyncratic and heartfelt: “the ridiculous/ is just a matter of/ ejaculating the awkward parts/ and rejuvenating the/ Soul/ as we know it/ to be/ or not to be” (a construct, a fallacy, a lie) and solely, “’Bein’ human really hurts sometime...’” (our absence from life). Sponsored Review I Could Pee on This: and Other Poems by Cats By Francesco Macriuliano Chronicle Books, $12.95, 112 pages, Format: Hard
«««« As I write this, my cat is “playing” with my feet – with her claws. This behavior is explained in “Unbridled Love,” one of the many hilarious, and oh-so-accurate poems contained in I Could Pee on This, and Other Poems by Cats. Covering such important topics as hairballs, catnip, redecorating, and the dreaded bath. This collection of short poems explains the world from our feline friends’ point of view. All cat lovers, along with most anybody who has spent time around a cat, will chuckle along as the many moods and strange activities of these lovable and confusing creatures are explored. Many of the poems are accompanied by adorable or ridiculous pictures of cats and kittens, adding a charming visual element to this book. Marciuliano is the creator of the comic strip Sally Forth, and a comic strip sensibility is present here. The poems are all brief, with the punch line coming at the end. However, like his comic, these poems are all sincere, and it is clear that whatever new ways our cats find to make our lives difficult, we will continue to love and treasure them. This is the perfect gift to give a cat lover or to purchase for yourself when you want to smile. Reviewed by Audrey Curtis
21st Century Dead: A Zombie Anthology By Christopher Golden St. Martin’s Griffin, $15.99, 338 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Students are entrusted with undead babies as part of a re-education program. A girl plots to get a job at a strange apothecary shop. Mercenaries battle a zombie-infested town to rescue a young girl. Domesticated zombies serve the residents of a high-rise refuge. The ghost of a beloved dog tries to protect a boy from a dark force. A cured, former zombie, is interviewed by the photographer who made her infamous. This is the sixth or seventh collection of zombie-centric stories I’ve reviewed over the last few years. I keep coming back to the zombie genre because some of the most innovative and fascinating short stories emerge from our fascination with death, the undead, and humanity’s collective identity. 21st Century Dead: A Zombie Anthology is a fine example of the emotionally charged and inventive storytelling that typify the best of the genre. From speculative fiction veterans like Orson Scott Card and Simon R. Green to recently established stars like Chelsea Cain and Daniel H. Wilson, some of the best and brightest have contributed to this collection, and it shows. These stories are utterly individual, wildly different from each other, and a few of them will linger with you for quite some time to come. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas Shout Her Lovely Name By Natalie Serber Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $24.00, 240 pages, Format: Hard
«««« However tumultuous the terrain of mother and daughter relationships can be, they are a mountain to be climbed and quite the vista to look out from. Each tiny element lends to the intricacy of what makes
San Francisco Book Review • April 2012 • 39
Book Reviews
Poetry & Short Stories
each relationship so unique and hard earned. Natalie Serber captures the delicacy of these relationships with a finesse and transparency that leaves the reader hushed at its realness through the short stories of her new collection. We follow a mother who is caught in the dark violence of her teenage daughter’s eating disorder, looking for a way to understand and relate to her child, while escaping the abuse of the disease, as well as a couple of other stories that lend to the theme. However, the core of the book is dedicated to Ruby and eventually her daughter Nora. The relationship spans decades, weaving in and out of loops of relationships with men, identity, and acceptance. Serber is a writer with talent, no doubt. Her words are carefully crafted and make for a true connection between story and reader. The only possible disjoint comes from the inclusion of three separate, unrelated stories. I enjoy variety in my short story collection and don’t mind the jump from stories, but all except three of the stories belong to Ruby and Nora, which leads the reader to wonder why. Still, a beautiful read. Reviewed by Sky Sanchez-Fischer Baba Yaga’s Daughter and Other Tales of The Old Races By C. E. Murphy Subterranean, $40.00, 264 pages, Format: Hard
«««« C.E. Murphy is known for her paranormal romances, with characters such as vampires, werewolves, dragons, and more. Each is human in quality, but paranormal in reality; with the strength, speed, agility, and life span beyond that of normal humans. Though they walk among us, they are not one of us. This collection is set in her world of The Negotiator. These stories feature two of the main characters, Daisani and Janx. One is a Dragonlord and the other is a vampire. They travel the world together maintaining the peace between their races, falling in love, and forging bonds beyond time. Together they are thrust into many different situations: from Tsarist Russia, where they meet a witch; to Chicago
when the great fire happened, which was started by Daisani to distract from the fighting. Each story stands on its own, but they all take place in the same universe across time. They also deal briefly with Vanessa Gray who is more influential in the trilogy. This book will excite fans of C.E. Murphy, though if you do not know the series you will feel lost and bored. She brings back these characters and fills in some back story on each one. It also frees her hand at writing short stories, instead of just book length stories. Reviewed by Kevin Winter Bright Moon, White Clouds: Selected Poems of Li Po By Li Po, J. P. Seaton, Translator Shambhala, $14.96, 224 pages, Format: Trade
««««« The great Chinese poet Li Po was born in the outer reaches of empire in the year 701, when the brilliant Hsuan Tsung ruled China. Six feet tall—a rarity in China––Li Po claimed kinship to the T’ang Dynasty through his illustrious ancestor, Lao Tzu, whose philosophical Tao Te Ching underlies Li Po’s poetry. Some of Li Po’s poems are unabashed drinking songs, others address serious questions about the meaning of life––the value of friendship; the emptiness of fame, as even Lord Shao, once revered by his subjects, now sells melons at the Green Gate; the futility of war, soldiers being the direst of instruments, which “the wise make use of […] only when there is no other way.” Celebrating nature, Li Po is sensitive to her beauty, hearing “dogs barking in the sound of the water.” Our troubles come from our knowledge of self; obliterate that with wine—“this is the deepest joy.” Taking a long view also helps us overcome our troubles. Time passes, the Fu-sang tree is “already turned to kindling,” yesterday breaks faith and goes. Beyond honest, loyal friends and good wine, life has few satisfactions, according to this poet, who becomes an old man with “hair like dead weeds under frost,” his only hope to be buried properly on the warm side of the mountain. Reviewed by Zara Raab
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Featured Book Review
Poetry & Short Stories
: w o h S w o d a Sh n i s e i r o t S w e N l l A f o n o i t a Cel ebr bur y Ray Brad t Castl e
M or , r e l l e W m gs a p 5 4 By S 4 , 9 9 . 5 1 w, $ o r r o M m a i l l Wi
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Review By Ryder Mill er
hadow Show a tribute anthology of original stories dedicated to Ray Bradbury joins a number of other recent tributes with there being recent centennials of some of his influences: Edgar Allen Poe and Charles Dickens. Bradbury was a modern American literary giant who almost everybody who reads in English has probably encountered at some time in their lives. Bradbury’s writing can be characterized by being lyrical with the occasional poetic outburst, hard truths revealed or exposed, odd surprises of subjects and word choices, and with fantastical elements and subject matter. He also had a penchant for powerful writing that could move the reader emotionally. He was memorable and evocative, and also metaphorical for the parental reader. He is remembered here as a macabre or horror writer, even though he was one who could transcend genre with stories which spoke to our collective hopes and fears. The assembled writers fall more on the fantastical side, and there are not a lot of stories about space and other planets here. It turns out the “rocket dreams” that he wrote so deftly about in The Martian Chronicles, /he Illustrated Man, R for Rocket, and S for Space were much harder to realize than expected. He has since been relegated to being a fantasy writer (for him in the broad sense) with him saying so himself. We are still stuck here on earth with our foibles, scares, scary families, and problems, as this anthology attests. There has been discussion, but no realization, of a fuller anthology of Bradbury’s amazing Mars stories, unlike Fahrenheit 451, but one may argue that such a collection would ruin the impact of The Martian Chronicles, which is more deeply moving than what is collected here. The anthology does not stand in the way of their being a revival of his “rocket dreams,” but they are now only dreams. One could find a quenching for their desire for more Mars stories in The Illustrated Man, but not sadly in this volume. The stories also contain personal Afterwards, rather than story introductions, which would have made the collected stories more understandable. One can get a greater appreciation of the writer and his accomplishments from the assemble authors. This is not the first tribute to Bradbury, with there also being a biography and tribute anthology called /he Bradbury Chronicles, the biography by Sam Weller, and the anthology edited by William F. Nolan and Martin Greenberg from 1992. Bradbury was different than other science fiction writers in not being a academic or a veteran. Since that time, Bradbury has gone on to write more novels and stories, with he himself being the tough San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 41
act he has had had to follow. One could say the same for the assembled in Shadow Show, which may not appeal as much to Bradbury fans as those of modern fantastical literature. Sadly, not all of the writers who wade in this dark maybe coincidental lake are not still wanabees. Many modern giants have assembled, including such notables as Margaret Atwood, Dave Eggers, Harlan Ellison, Neil Gaiman, Joe Hill, Ramsay Campbell, Kelly Link, Audrey Niffenegger, etc....
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Utilizing paper cutouts held between a light source and a translucent screen, shadow puppetry dates back more than two thousand years, most experts believe, to ancient China."
One will find his influence on the modern cannon as attested here by those who have not forgot his impact upon them. What is contained here is new, different, and usually dark, and not just emulation.
Book Reviews
Poetry & Short Stories
The Book of Mischief: New and Selected Stories By Steve Stern Graywolf Press, $26.00, 384 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Divided into four sections or locations, this new retrospective collection takes us to Memphis, New York, Europe and the Catskills. The stories blend Yiddish folktales with dark humor and magic realism and use the macabre in often comical ways. In the striking story “The Sin of Elijah,” one of the most popular biblical figures in Jewish folklore is turned into a voyeur. Known for making appearances on Earth in a variety of guises to perform miracles, attend circumcisions, and help keep the morals of mortals in check, Elijah spies on a young couple so in love they fear “they would perish of sheer ecstasy.” Elijah describes the Fefers’ awkward lovemaking as a “shower of sparks” that sends them to heaven prematurely. His voyeuristic relationship with the Fefers eventually obligates him to smuggle them out of heaven, leading to a bleak but amusing finale. Although Stern provides a glossary of Jewish terms to situate readers, the Jewish themes function only as filter to tell these tales. With all of its dark humor and magical features, this collection offers readers universal access into the world of Jewish folktales and themes. Reviewed by Wendy Iraheta Observations of the Coral Reef By Hunter Vaughan CreateSpace, $2.99, 86 pages, Format: eBook
««« Offering brief snippets of lives, discussions, and descriptions, Observations frequently fluctuates from profound beauty to offensive banality and back again, just like life itself. With no clear theme connecting the short works, this collection is more a series of musings than it is anything else. As disparate as they are, the individual pieces occasionally aspire to brilliance.
Vaughan’s poetry, in particular, offers several high points throughout the work. “Hatred” is a chilling piece that skillfully references Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, and “Flower” is full of gorgeous imagery and a hopeful message. Two other pieces that might be considered poetry and are worthy of note are “We Live in Terrible Times” – a simple but poignant look at modern society – and “Heroes” – a delightful piece about, well, heroes. All of the poetic pieces are wonderful and truly show Vaughan’s ability to capture emotion and images in a deeply felt way. Unfortunately, a fair portion of his prose does not live up to the standard he sets in verse. For some reason, Vaughan continually returns to middle-aged male characters looking for a cheap thrill, whether from outrunning the cops or from flirting with a younger woman. The short format of the individual pieces does not do these men justice. If we were to have full access to their lives and motivations, they might be sympathetic. However, as we only see them in their moments of thrill seeking, they come off as immature at best and creepy at worst. The only story featuring this type of character that I truly enjoyed was “Enlightenment,” in which the narrator pokes fun at himself. I would love it if Vaughan spent more time exploring this brand of self-awareness and less time indulging his character’s foibles. Among his soaring poetry and annoying characters, Vaughan has also sprinkled heartbreakingly accurate descriptions of depression, seemingly masturbatory “Lecture Notes” in which the narrator explains his life philosophy without explaining why, a series of strange e-mails from “Natalia,” and a fascinating piece called “Coral Reef.” There is no rhyme or reason to what is included, except that it is all interesting (if not always fun). Observations takes the reader on a roller coaster, and, like a roller coaster, it leaves the rider vacillating between “I can’t take this anymore” and “This is awesome!” Sponsored Review
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 42
Book Reviews Category
Early Readers
love and care for the visitors. Shortly after the other family leaves to continue their journey, tragedy strikes the Alden family. This prequel to the series is most satisfying. The writing closely matches that in the original books and maintains the old-fashioned language and appeal of the earlier books. The only disappointment is the illustrations. They have a 1980s feel to them. The modern illustrations replacing the charming silhouette illustrations of the originals are a real loss. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck Judy Moody’s Mini-Mysteries and Other Sneaky Stuff for Super Sleuths By Megan McDonald, Peter H. Reynolds, illustrator Candlewick Press, $4.99, 96 pages, Format: Trade
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The Boxcar Children Beginning By Patricia MacLachlan Albert Whitman & Company, $16.99, 144 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Fans of the Boxcar Children books, and there are legions of them, have probably wondered just what life was like for Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny Alden before they found themselves making their own way in the world. More than sixty years after the first Boxcar Children book appeared, Patricia MacLachlan, Newbery Medal winner, has brought that story to life. Times are hard for a lot of folks, but the Alden farm is a place of refuge. The Aldens don’t have a lot, but they are a sharing family, and take another family in when their car breaks down during a blizzard. The children learn to share their space and include others in their life. They come to
Judy Moody has a new love— she wants to solve mysteries. As a big fan of the Nancy Drew mystery books, Judy has lots of good ideas for figuring out pesky problems. She starts by helping all her readers become good detectives by building a detective kit. This contains all kinds of useful implements—everything from bobby pins to listening cups to a detective journal. Judy’s class is on a field trip. She really wants to spend time looking at the penguins, but one is missing. This is Judy’s first mystery. She uses all her skills and deductive reasoning to figure it out. There are six minimysteries in this terrific book that include everything from a pencil heist to a disappearing hamburger. These are interspersed with detective skill-building information such as how to make and break codes, using logic to solve puzzles, and the way to draw a suspect sketch. Judy Moody fans and mystery fans ages six and up will find this book fun and useful. Megan McDonald has written another terrific book in this great kids’ series. The illustrations by Peter H. Reynolds are the perfect complement for a perfectly wonderful text. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck
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Book Reviews Category
Children’s
on a mission to send a strong message to the British Parliament. The men boarded the first ship and ordered the captain and crew below. They did not want anyone to be hurt. They merely wanted to fill the Boston Harbor with the entire shipment of tea. Russell Freedman has found many fun and interesting facts to make this book a fascinating read for kids looking to learn about this important event. The detailed and muted drawings by Peter Malone complete the story nicely. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck The Fly Flew In (I Like to Read) By David Catrow Holiday House, $14.95, 32 pages, Format: Hard
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The Boston Tea Party By Russell Freedman Holiday House, $17.95, 40 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Americans loved their tea. It was great comfort to those who lived in the American Colonies to sip their daily tea. But the British Parliament imposed a tax on tea, and ships loaded with the tea were in the Boston Harbor. Americans didn’t feel it was fair to have taxes imposed on them when they didn’t have a vote. A protest meeting was called and thousands came to the Old South Church. The colonists voted to appeal to Governor Hutchinson to send the tea back, but he refused. A group of men, all disguised as Mohawk Native Americans, went to the harbor. Others joined along the way, the youngest a fourteen-year-old rope maker’s apprentice. They carried hatchets and axes. They were
How much trouble can a little fly cause? When one gets into a concert hall during a performance, it can get pretty interesting. We follow the fly from the nose of an usher into the lobby of a concert hall. He lands on a bald man’s head from whence he is flicked by the man behind, causing some trouble in the line. He continues to fly from this person to that person, causing problems wherever he lands. But when he gets up onto the stage and into the orchestra, things really start to happen. The percussionist tries to get him between the cymbals, the timpanist tries to hammer the fly, the singer finally goes after the fly and things get really out of hand. David Catrow has created a picture book of the finest kind. The words are perfect for beginning readers with lots of alliteration and rhyme to please the ears of little ones. But the illustrations are what really make this book. They are colorful and funny and smart and filled with lots of surprises. Kids from two to ninety-two will love this silly book. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck
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Book Reviews
Children’s
The Mousier The Merrier By Eleanor May, and Deborah Melmon Kane Press, $7.95, 26 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Don’t tell your child, but The Mousier The Merrier is a counting book for the more advanced students, taking readers clear up to fifteen! It all begins on a cold, rainy day when Albert, bored with nothing to do, wishes he had someone to play with. His mother suggests he go ask Leo if he could come over to play a game. His little sister asks if she can invite her friend Lucy, and their mom says, “The mousier, the merrier!” On their way to Leo’s, they run into Charlie and invite him, then into Ronald and Rachael and invite them, and they keep going until they eventually invite thirteen friends over to play. What will their mother think? True to her promise, she exclaims, “The mousier the merrier!” By this time the sun is out and they all run outside to play. The Mousier The Merrier is a counting story with a real plot, suspense, humor, likeable characters, and a loving mom. What better way to invite a child to practice their numbers—they hardly know they are doing math. Reviewed by Susan Roberts Elephant Joe, Brave Knight! By David Wojtowycz Random House Books for Young Readers, $16.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
««« Elephant Joe and his sidekick, Zebra Pete, are splashing in the moat when they hear a cry for help. The Dark Knight has stolen the king’s crown! The intrepid duo mount up and travel through the Enchanted Forest to the Dark Knight’s tower where they must face a fiery dragon and rescue a damsel in distress. Good manners and a sense of fair play serve the heroes in good stead as they successfully evade the traps set for them and recover the crown.
Wojtowycz’s illustrations, one part realism and one part whimsy, give the book a unique visual texture while a wisecracking frog provides comic relief. The combination of cartoon-like drawings, vibrant colors, speech bubbles, and witty asides makes Elephant Joe, Brave Knight! read like a comic book for the youngest readers. The conflict is simple and simply resolved; the fun is in the character’s enthusiasm and good-natured approach to problem solving. Reviewed by Tammy McCartney I, Galileo By Bonnie Christensen Knopf BYR, $17.99, 40 pages, Format: Hard
««««« In this book children learn Galileo’s story in the voice of Galileo, himself. As an old man, imprisoned in his own home, he shares his boyhood, his studies, his adult life’s work and discoveries, and what price he paid for his unpopular, but later proven truthful, ideas. The use of this older voice to speak to children offers the effect of a grandfather sharing his wisdom through his stories, which I believe to be one of the biggest strengths of this book. Born in 1564, Galileo died in 1642, but the centuries between then and the present day disappear as Galileo comes alive sharing his life. The illustrations provide added support to this excellent biography. Framing this story is a preface that describes a little of the world of 1564, setting the scene for Galileo to speak, and an afterword that shares how after acknowledgement of Galileo’s ideas, Albert Einstein called him “the father of modern science.” The back of the book shares a chronology placing Galileo’s accomplishments into a historical setting, a list of Galileo’s experiments, his inventions and improvements, and his astronomic discoveries. Additionally, there is a glossary, bibliography, and list of websites for further exploration and more information. Reviewed by Angie Mangino
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Book Reviews
Children’s
Even Aliens Need Snacks By Matthew McElligott, Illustrator Walker Childrens, $14.99, 40 pages, Format: Hard
««««« A young boy likes to make his very own concoctions in the kitchen, and his mother lets him. Pretty much anything he wants. And he wants some very strange combinations – like lemonade, eggplant, and mustard smoothies. He thinks they are delicious. His sister has a whole different idea about them. She says no one in the world – no, wait – no one in the UNIVERSE would want to eat the things her brother comes up with. The boy builds a stand to sell his interesting eats, but no one comes to buy anything. Not even when he puts them on sale. He’s pretty disappointed. Until late one night, long after dark, a customer shows up – someone from another planet. He likes the mushroom iced tea the boy serves up, and before long the word spreads. Every night, the most interesting characters show up at the boy’s stand. But summer is coming to an end and the boy cooks up something really special! Matthew McElligott has created a really fun story for youngsters four years old and up, but it is his enchanting art work full of creative, quirky characters that really make this a delight to share with little ones. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck Florentine and Pig By Eva Katzler, Jess Mikhail, Illustrator Bloomsbury, $16.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Florentine and Pig, while eating breakfast one sunny, warm day, talk about what they should do that day. Florentine has a wonderful idea. It is such a beautiful day; they should do something outside, and that something is to have a picnic. She gets busy planning and plotting for the very best picnic she
can think up. They are going to have apple and carrot muffins, rainbow sprinkle cookies, and lots of other homemade goodies. But suddenly Florentine realizes that Pig ate the very last apple they had for breakfast, and she doesn’t see any more in the tree. What will they do? Will their wonderful plan be ruined? Eva Katzler has fond memories of cooking and making crafts and imaginative play with her parents all through her childhood, and she is ready to share. She has not only created a wonderful story for little ones, but has included kid-friendly recipes for all the picnic food and a decorative craft as well, so the picnic will look as lovely as the food. Jess Mikhail’s enchanting, brightly-colored drawings are the perfect complement for this sweet story and creative instructions. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck Last Laughs: Animal Epitaphs By J. Patrick Lewis, Jane Yolen, Jeffery Stewart Timmins, Illustrator EarlyLight Books, $16.95, 48 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Imagine what one might write on the tombstones of creatures great and small, if one were inclined to do such a thing and if such creatures were likely to have tombstones. Bugs and beasts and birds and barnyard denizens are all eulogized in this collection of silly epitaphs – everything from cats to worms, feathered friends to denizens of the deep are represented here. Most of these epitaphs are written in rhyming poems, but some are simply a title and a line or short unrhymed poems. But all have one thing in common: they are funny. They are often ironic and also dark in many cases. This is just the sort of thing that supplies enough of the ick factor to delight youngsters. J. Patrick Lewis and Jane Yolen have created thirty-one of these darkly charming and witty epitaphs, but perhaps the real strength of the book is the incredible illustrations by Jeffrey Stewart Timmins. The sepia-toned illustrations are almost entirely brownish-grey and white, but have clever splashes or smears of blood red. The comical details
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Book Reviews
Children’s
will fascinate youngsters (and the rest of us!) and will have readers spending lots of time looking through the book. It’s a winner. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck Toads and Tessellations By Sharon Morrisette, Philomeno O’Neill, illustrator EarlyLight Books, $16.95, 32 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Enzo is the son of the village magician, but try as he might, he can’t seem to learn the magic spells his father tries to teach him. He reads his magic books, but he also reads books about physicists, astronomers, and mathematicians, and dreams of being a great mathematician. The daughter of the village shoemaker comes looking for Enzo’s father to help with a problem the shoemaker has. He has been told to make twelve pair of dancing slippers from one piece of leather by that night. He needs to have the leather made larger with a magic spell. Enzo’s father isn’t there, so Enzo goes along to see if he can help. He tries a couple of spells, but has rather disastrous results. Finally, Enzo figures out a clever way to solve the problem of the shoes with a mathematical solution and saves the day. Sharon Morrisette finds a way to make the math of tessellations part of a very fun story for children, then backs it up with some interesting factual back matter. Charming illustrations by Philomena O’Neill complete this magical story. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck The House that George Built By Suzanne Slade, Rebecca Bond, illustrator EarlyLight Books, $16.95, 48 pages, Format: Hard
««««« The new United States of America elected a president to lead them and knew they never wanted to have a king running the country. The president chosen to lead the new nation was
George Washington. One of the things he felt he needed to do was build a house for the future presidents. He ran a contest to find a design that would be appropriate for such an important building. The magnificent drawing by James Hoban was chosen. Washington found a beautiful setting overlooking the Potomac River and set about the work of having the new presidential home built. Suzanne Slade has clearly done her homework and writes clearly about the process of the building of the White House and intersperses the non-fiction text blocks with a cute poem about the work based on the old folk song, The House that Jack Built. The illustrations by Rebecca Bond are colorful, sweet, and have enough detail to completely support the text. Young children will enjoy learning about this fascinating part of our country’s history and George Washington’s hands-on participation in the project through this charming book. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck The Race to First By Juli-Ann Ruben CreateSpace, $12.99, 40 pages, Format: Trade
««« Rachel likes to be first–first in line, first to finish homework, first at everything. When her mother takes her to the doctor for her check-up, they find Rachel might be having vision trouble, so she has to have an eye exam. The news is not what Rachel wants to hear. She is afraid she’ll be the only person in school to wear glasses. It’s nice to be first, but it’s not nice to be the only one. She thinks other kids will make fun of her. She tries to prove she doesn’t need glasses by reading all the signs along the road, but to no avail. She argues about how often she has to wear them and is unhappy to hear she must wear them all the time. She chooses cute cheetah-patterned frames, but when school begins, is still afraid she’ll be teased. This little book, on the surface, looks like an early reader, but it is is not. The language is not for early readers, nor is the story. This is a lesson-teaching story, a bit heavy-hand-
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ed, and would benefit from some good editing. The illustrations are rather amateurish and probably will not be interesting to young children. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck The Muppets: Kermit’s Costume Caper By Martha T. Ottersley, Amy Mebbeson, Illustrator LB Kids, $4.99, 24 pages, Format: Trade
««« Children love the Muppets, with the concept of a costume contest adding to their interest. Illustrations by Amy Mebberson keep children anxious to keep turning the pages to see more. The addition of flaps for children to lift adds hands-on experience to the excitement. The author, Martha T. Ottersley, writes a pun-filled story with some that readily had this reviewer laughing, while others brought pun-appropriate moans. The Muppets appeal to children from pre-school age up, with many parents enjoying them with their children. The puns in this book, however, seem appropriate only to the older child on up to adults. Young children will find themselves drawn to the pictures, enjoying lifting the flaps, but following the story will be difficult, if not impossible. With no idea as to what the puns mean, the story will be incomprehensible to them. Even some older children may get lost with dated puns, such as reference to Janice as a flapper. This reviewer was disappointed in this Muppet book not being more appropriate, at different levels, to all ages. Reviewed by Angie Mangino The Klampie Mystery By Luis Rodriguez Mascot Books, $14.95, 34 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Before setting out on a family vacation to Australia, Samantha’s parents give her a plush koala. She names him Klampie, because he can clamp onto anything (a cute name that a child would actually choose). Once in Australia, a strange thing happens. A real koala accidentally
pushes Klampie under the driver’s seat and takes his place! Because the koala sleeps all day and sneaks out at night to eat, Samantha does not realize a real animal has replaced her toy. The longer she goes without noticing, the more exciting the story becomes. The reader grows increasingly eager to know when she will discover the switch and what will happen to both koalas. I, a full-grown adult, was particularly concerned about the fate of the stuffed animal. In addition to an entertaining story, The Klampie Mystery also has an educational aspect. Mirroring the way that children and adults interact, Rodriguez often has Samantha asking questions, such as “What does ‘vice versa’ mean?” Young readers will also learn the meanings of a few other words, why the weather is different in Australia, and a little about koalas. The only thing I dislike about this book is the occasionally clunky dialogue. In the middle of a dramatic scene, for example, the excitement is broken so someone can explain that koalas are not bears. This should only be an annoyance for adults though, as most kids will be too interested in the story and pictures to notice that the narrative could be streamlined. Overall, I really enjoyed this book. The plot is fun, and the pictures are adorable (my favorite one features a tiny koala in the zoo, waving at Samantha). I heartily recommend this book, along with a trip to the zoo. Sponsored Review Grammy and Me The Family Tree By Mrs. Thompson Xlibris, $21.99, 32 pages, Format: Trade
«« Geneaology research and the creation of family trees to have a visual image of one’s lineage is a very popular hobby. With the recent release of the 1940 U.S. Census Records, parents are likely gathering their children around the computer to find their ancestors names
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Children’s
in the historical records. In Mrs. Thompson’s book, Grammy and Me: The Family Tree, a young girl creates a family tree with the help of her grandmother. Starting with a tree, the pair adds leaves, branches, a trunk, and a root system symbolizing each member of the child’s immediate family. Names of grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and siblings are added to the tree. Once completed, photos of each person are added in place of the names; only the author uses photos of teddy bears, rather than real-life images. Grammy and Me is a well-intended book encouraging children to make a simple family tree to hang on their walls. There are several ways to create a family chart ,with the tree structure being one of the more popular representations. Mrs. Thompson’s tree depicted in the book is rather confusing with the granddaughter, her siblings, and cousins pictured as leaves; mother and father as the trunk; and grandparents as the roots. Perhaps the author wanted to depict the oldest generation as the roots of the family; however this differs from most family trees which have the oldest generation at the top and newer generations at the bottom. Readers may prefer to see photos of real people rather than stuffed animals. Still, adding pictures of each family member is a great way to further personalize the tree, bringing the child that much closer to relatives. A blank tree and several blank pages follow this short story allowing readers to create their own visual family histories. The book also mentions two Bible verses. Sponsored Review King Arthur’s Very Great Grandson By Kenneth Kraegel Candlewick Press, $15.99, 40 pages
««««« Henry Grummerson, great-greatgreat-great-great-great-great-grandson of Arthur, King of Britain, had reached the ripe old age of six years old. This would be a momentous day. He gets up early that day. He has a great breakfast. He straps on his sword and slaps his helmet on his head. Then he mounts his trusted steed, the donkey Knuckles, and heads out in
search of adventure. He has heard of a fire-breathing dragon and rides off to challenge him to a battle. The dragon, however, wants to play at blowing smoke rings. The dragon suggests Henry might do better with the Cyclops in the high mountains, but the Cyclops only wants to have a staring contest. The Cyclops thinks the ferocious Griffin might be a better challenge for Henry, so off Henry goes in search of the Griffin. When Henry finds the Griffin, it turns out he is only interested in playing chess. The Griffin sends Henry to meet the Leviathan in the sea. Will Henry ever find a great battle to fight? Kenneth Kraegel both writes and illustrates this most enchanting picture book. Youngsters will love this and want to read it over and over. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck Bang! Boom! Roar! A Busy Crew of Dinosaurs By Nate Evans, Stephanie Gwyn Brown, Christopher Santoro (illustrator) Harper, $15.99, 40 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Parents, teachers, and children will be pleased with and amused by this multi-use book. Not only does it introduce the letters of the alphabet, it’s an action-packed construction and building-themed book with a colorful cast of prehistoric creatures as the building crew. But wait, there’s more! It’s a seek and find book as well, with letters and objects cleverly hidden in each spread. There is much for readers of various ages to focus on. Whether it’s identifying the dinosaurs on each page, finding the hidden letters, or connecting the text to the illustrations, what first seems like a rather chaotic alphabet book turns out to be much more. With their attention focused on the crazy happenings at the construction site, readers may not think about what the dinosaurs are actually building. They’ll be pleasantly surprised by the finished product and ready for recess. Fast-paced with four lines of rhyming text per page, this book may become a read-aloud favorite.
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Children’s
The front matter pictures all the dinosaurs appearing in the book and their eating habits, meat eater or plant eater, while the back matter features the many construction vehicles and equipment used throughout the story. Reviewed by Africa Hands Nothing Ever Happens at the South Pole (The Berenstain Bears) By Stan & Jan Berenstain, Mike Berenstain (illustrator) HarperCollins, $10.99, 40 pages, Format: Hard
««« Penguin is excited to receive a book in the mail. Not an ordinary book, but a journal, for its cover reads, “Write in Me! Something happens every day. Write it down right away.” What a thrill for penguin to write down the day’s many exciting events; he can’t wait to get started. Walking through the South Pole, penguin encounters many events to write about, but he wants to write about something that is big or rough or dangerous. Penguin is totally unaware that he’s nearly attacked by wolves, that the lumps he’s just jumped over were really polar bears, or that he’s nearly eaten by whales and a walrus. Nope, nothing good ever happens at the South Pole. Alas, Penguin returns home with an empty book but readers know what awaits him tomorrow when he gives the South Pole another look. This beginning reader for ages 4-8 features simple vocabulary and few words per page, typically four lines of text. The pattern of the text is not consistent throughout, making it difficult to find a good rhythm and pace for reading aloud. Amusing cartoon-style illustrations play a big role in the story: penguin is oblivious to the many dangerous, big, rough, and tough things happening around him at the South Pole, but the illustrations let readers in on the secret. Reviewed by Africa Hands
Trick or Treat By Leo Landry Houghton Mifflin Children’s, $12.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
««««« There is an old empty house at the very end of the street. At least, it seems empty to the people who live on the street. Actually, Oliver occupies it. But nothing much happens there until Oliver’s favorite day of the year—the very last day of October. Oliver, you see, is a ghost. And the last day of October, of course, is Halloween. Oliver gets ready for a party he has planned for the big night. He delivers invitations to a dusty mailbox, a moss-covered tombstone, and a dark, cool cave. But as Oliver hurries home, an envelope falls from his bag and lands near two young boys walking down the street. Oliver has a lot of work to do to get ready, but he doesn’t mind. It’s his favorite night of the year. Oliver’s guests begin to arrive. There are witches, skeletons, bats, spiders, black cats, and plenty of jack-o-lanterns. But then two young boys in costume show up at the door! Leo Landry not only has written a charming Halloween story, but he has illustrated it with delightful drawings in warm colors that will enchant little ones. This book is a real treat. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck Just Say Boo! By Susan Hood HarperCollins, $12.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
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Halloween night is full of all kinds of potentially scary things, but Susan Hood offers a universal solution for anything that might be frightening to kids: just say “Boo!” From wind to rustling leaves, spiders to spooky ghosts, this little trick means there’s nothing to fear.
Book Reviews
Children’s
Arriving only a few months early, Just Say Boo! is packed with Halloween fun for youngsters. Delightfully written, full of rhymes that kids will love to read or have read aloud to them, this exciting book is sure to be a hit with everyone, and not just kids ages three and up, as recommended; even younger children will love having this story read to them, and looking at Jed Henry’s whimsical illustrations. There’s even a subtle dose of manners here, a reminder to kids to say thank you for the candy they receive from trick-or-treating. With its positive messages and a strong theme of Halloween fun, this picture book is surely destined to become an autumn classic. Reviewed by Holly Scudero What To Do If An Elephant Stands On Your Foot By Michelle Robinson, and Peter H. Reynolds (illustrator) Dial Books for Young Readers, $16.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
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You will be fine as long as you don’t run away, because as everyone knows, running is very likely going to attract tigers. Oh, too late? Have you already started to run? Have you already attracted a tiger? Well, now you most certainly stay silent, because if you make the tiniest sound, even, for instance, if a sneeze were to happen, a rhinoceros will hear you. And you can only imagine what will happen then! There are few things kids are more fascinated with than danger, but when that danger is mixed up with a great big helping of giggle-inducing silliness, every kid will love it and want to have it read to them over and over and over again. Michelle Robinson’s laugh-out-loud story is accompanied by the most delightful illustrations by Peter H. Reynolds. They are absolutely the most perfect completion for the story. This will fast become a favorite book in any child’s life. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck
Imagine if you will, having an elephant standing on your foot. What would you do? Of course, you must stay calm. You certainly wouldn’t want to startle an elephant, now would you? But if you do, well what’s the worst that can happen?
The astounding new children’s book from author Adam Byrn Tritt and illustrator “Java John” Goldacker for Young People
“Young Bud, a couch potato if there ever was one, literally fulfills his destiny after eating binges in front of the tube and no exercise [and] lives to regret it. . . . Kids will love the gruesome, psychedelically rendered details—and likely learn an important lesson. Funny and supremely gross.” —ForeWord Reviews “Speaking not just as a guitarist and former congressman, but as a professional ski instructor, avid tennis player, and sailor, I thank Adam Byrn Tritt for writing—and Java John for illustrating—Bud the Spud. Adam, John, and Bud encourage kids to get off the couch and move!”
54 pages, color illustrations throughout For ages 4 and up • 8.5 x 11 ISBN: 978-1-60419-062-5 $16.95 laminated hardcover
—The Hon. John Hall, two-term congressman for NY’s 19th district; fmr. president of the Saugerties Board of Education; singer/ songwriter for the band Orleans
In a unique feature, the book has three separate endings—three different outcomes for poor Bud—which range from the positive and uplifting to the deliciously macabre. Bud the Spud was created to be read aloud, and has been field-tested with delighted children of all ages, from elementary through middle school. The book is a stealth weapon to help combat childhood obesity, a tool to convince young people that aspiring to be a couch potato is no aspiration at all.
“I’ve been a middle school and special ed teacher for nearly twenty years, and this book honestly made me laugh out loud. Please don’t be afraid that the content is too ‘dark’ for young kids. I promise you they’ll find it as hysterical as I do, and the message packs a punch. I can’t wait to read it to my students!”
“As parables go, I can’t recall encountering one quite so gruesome. Which of course means my children loved it! Yet the power of a parable isn’t measured by its appeal, but rather by its effect. A delighted grimace followed by ‘Later, Mom, we’re going out to play!’ instead of ‘Hey, it’s my turn on the PS3!’ speaks volumes about Bud the Spud’s ability to teach as well as entertain.”
—Joyce Hatch, sixth grade teacher in Hillsborough, NC
—The Rev. Ann Fuller, PhD, community minister
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Book Reviews Category
Tweens
discovery of an old ammo box in the garage and the dogtag inside stir equally painful memories for Dad. Partridge unfolds the effects of post-traumatic stress on victims of any age with sensitivity and understanding. Both Tracy and Dad have been held hostage by separate horrors. Dad drinks away evenings after work each day. Tracy has only lived on the surface of her life. Her adoptive mother struggles to cope with their fraying home life. Probing the past also takes a toll on Tracy’s friendship with Stargazer. The storytelling is haunting. The characters and their plights entirely believable. The resolution satisfying. Reviewed by Elizabeth Varadan Toppling By Sally Murphy, Rhian Nest James, illustrator Candlewick Press, $15.99, 128 pages, Format: Hard
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Dogtag Summer By Elizabeth Partridge Bloomsbury Children’s, $7.99, 215 pages, Format: Trade
««««« For five years, twelve-year-old Tracy has adjusted to her life in a small town in Northern California, her earlier memories of life in Vietnam repressed. She plans to spend the summer building a miniature Viking ship with her best friend, Stargazer. His parents are hippies from the sixties. Tracy is half Vietnamese, her father an American GI. On the last day of school, a fragment of memory wells up from Tracy’s life in Vietnam—life fraught with horrendous dangers because of her con-lai or “half-breed” appearance. Once unleashed, more memories come. Meanwhile, her
John has a passion for dominoes. He loves to set up intricate, precise patterns that will allow them to topple one after another until they all fall. When John is in school – and can’t play dominoes – he spends time with his very best friend, Dominic, whose name sounds like domino, and his other buddies, Joseph, Christian, and Tran. The five of them are very close and have a great time. The only problem is Ky, who is something of a bully and calls them names. One day Dom gets sick right in the classroom. When he doesn’t come back to school for several days, everyone worries. Finally, they get the bad news. Dom is in the hospital and has cancer. Their world begins to topple. Everyone makes cards for Dom. Even Ky makes a really nice card. When the project reports are done, there are some surprising ones, and when Dom comes to visit at school, there is an even bigger surprise.
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Tweens
Sally Murphy’s wonderful story is full of important lessons, but never seems preachy or didactic. Rhian Nest James charming illustrations add much to an already lovely story both boys and girls eight and up will enjoy. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck Ted & Me: A Baseball Card Adventure By Dan Gutman HarperCollins, $15.99, 208 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Stosh has a special gift – one no one else has. He can travel through time. All he needs is a baseball card from another era, and when he holds it, he is taken to the time and place of the player. How the FBI found out about his special gift, he doesn’t know, but the FBI sent an agent to get Stosh to go back in time on a very special mission. He is asked to use a Ted Williams card to travel back to 1941 and warn Franklin Delano Roosevelt about the attack on Pearl Harbor. Agent Pluto argues it will save millions of lives. His mother leaves it up to him, and he goes. Unfortunately, the FBI agent give him a card from 1953 instead of 1941, and Stosh ends up in the Korean War. He’s nearly killed. He finally gets to the right year, meets Ted Williams, and has to convince him to help get the message to FDR. Dan Gutman has built quite a franchise with his timetraveling protagonist. This is the ninth books in the series that combines fascinating history, baseball acumen, and fantasy in books that will have middle-grade boys (and girls) reading, reading, reading. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck
Lone Bean By Chudney Ross Amistad, $15.99, 208 pages, Format: Hard
««« Bean was named for a flower, but it’s a big, long name and no one calls her by that name unless she is in b-i-g BIG trouble. She’s starting third grade and can’t wait, even if her older sisters, Rose and Gardenia, who are m-e-a-n MEAN, have to walk her to school. Bean is excited about her new teacher and seeing her best friend for the first time since summer vacation. But her best friend, Carla, seems to have made a new best friend and Bean is left with no one. While Bean struggles with feeling left out and lonely, she also struggles with her mother working long hours and her father, a music instructor, insisting she take up an instrument. In her effort to have someone to hang out with, Bean spends time with Terrible Tanisha, the local bully, and Bean’s mean side shows. She starts getting in trouble, and she doesn’t seem to know how to get back to normal. Good writing, but it’s hard to cheer for the protagonist who is bratty, mean, and selfish through much of the story. She finally gets her act together, but it’s a long time coming. Little girls may like it though. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck The Book of Blood: From Legends and Leeches to Vampires and Veins By HP Newquist Houghton Mifflin Books for Children, $17.99, 160 pages, Format: Hard
««««« What a unique style of presenting biological information by combining science with culture and history! Designated for the young audience, this accounting of blood
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will capture the curiosity of readers of all ages. Beginning with a basic physiologic review of blood comparing its components to the ingredients in a chocolate milkshake, the story of blood continues with its history of how its significance was misconstrued over the ages. Interspersed within the anatomical descriptions, chapters are devoted to the ancient beliefs and superstitions associated with this life substance. In fascinating narrative, the historical physicians who erred and self-corrected while trying to understand blood and its functions from ancient times to the present are chronicled. Blood letting was a popular practice used to rebalance the body humours; unfortunately history recalls that George Washington was bled to death when suffering from a common cold. Think about red blood, yellow blood, blue blood (not in royalty), the prime colors which which make up the blood of different animals. Our current craze over bloodsucking vampires is fascinatingly traced back to the horrors of a Transylvanian ruler in the fifteenth century. This author has a flair for capturing the reader’s interest while making an esoteric subject bloody compelling reading. Reviewed by Aron Row How to Train Your Dragon Book 9: How to Steal a Dragon’s Sword By Cressida Cowell Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, $12.99, 384 pages, Format: Hard
ing. When the young warriors arrive at Flashburn’s School of Swordfighting, they discover more evil afoot. The witch Excellinor, mother of Alvin the Treacherous, challenges everyone to a contest, the winner of which will become king. We know who she wants. Everyone agrees and signs in blood. The best fighters begin to disappear, including Hiccup’s own father. The only one who might be able to save the day is Hiccup. With the help of his friends, Fishlegs and Camicazi, they set off on a most difficult quest. Is it possible for these three smallest of the tribal members to save the day? Only time will tell. Book 9 in the middle-grade How to Train Your Dragon series by Cressida Cowell is full of exciting and funny adventures kids from eight to eighty will enjoy. Silly sketches throughout support the sense of fun nicely. It will leave readers wanting more. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck
e t i r l W i l W r o
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Scrawny, small Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, along with other young Warriors of the Tribes of the Archipelago, are on their way for training when they are attacked by dragons. Hiccup, who is able to speak and understand Dragonese, finds out there is a dragon rebellion in the off-
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Become an SFBR book reviewer! email us three sample reviews of recent books (150-200 words) to reviews@1776productions.com San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 54
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Young Adult
readers, while the adventure of the big city will keep them hooked as Kitsy learns about herself through both her city adventures and her art lessons. A particularly fun read for those who have visited New York City and will relate to some of Kitsy’s adventures, A Long Way From You also deals with long-distance friendships in a realistic way. Kitsy may be a charming and innocent protagonist, but she isn’t afraid to deal with issues head on, which turns A Long Way From You into a more solid read. While it’s not necessary to read the two books in the order they were published, some relationships are better understood that way. Fans of Kitsy in Where I Belong will certainly want to follow her adventures in Heasley’s newest. Reviewed by Shanyn Day Ten By Gretchen McNeil Balzer + Bray, $17.99, 304 pages, Format: Hard
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A Long Way from You By Gwendolyn Heasley HarperTeen, $8.99, 336 pages, Format: Trade
««« A companion novel to Heasley’s Where I Belong, A Long Way From You follows the most likable character of its predecessor, Kitsy, while sparing the reader too much additional time with Corrinne. Invited to New York City by Corrinne and her parents to partake in a summer art school class, Kitsy finds herself away from home and in the big city. Her charming attitude and willingness to try new things will instantly endear
Best friends Meg and Minnie are going to an exclusive house party on Henry Island. Little do they know that slowly the guests will start dying, one by one, after discovering a DVD that delivers the message “Vengeance is mine.” Ten is a retelling of Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None with McNeil’s own spin to the story. Agatha Christie fans who go in comparing the two books may be slightly disappointed, but for those who have not read her book, or who go in with an open mind, they will find Ten a thrilling read. A modern twist is added as the teens begin dying off in a manner outlined in a dead girl’s diary, and Meg has to figure out who the murderer is before she and Minnie become the next victims. The murderer was pretty obvious from the start, but how each person was going to die will have the readers biting their nails in anticipation and wondering if Meg will make
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Young Adult
it to the end. Minnie’s mental unstableness throws in an element of the unknown as to what part she will play. Young adult readers who enjoy suspense stories should definitely pick up Ten. Reviewed by Debbie Suzuki The Dead Girls Detective Agency By Suzy Cox HarperTeen, $9.99, 368 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Charlotte Feldman had a fantastic boyfriend, great friends, and her mom’s new suede boots. In short, she had it all. That is, until someone pushed her in front of the F Train and took it all away. Now trapped in the ghostly limbo of a strange hotel, Charlotte has to solve her own murder to move on, but not without help. Overenthusiastic Nancy, fashion-focused Lorna, and abrasive Tess are The Dead Girls Detective Agency, and they’re on the case, whether Charlotte’s ready for them or not. The Dead Girls Detective Agency is not at all what I expected. While it has its Clouseau-esque bumbling touches and a few unabashedly goofy scenes, it’s not the lighthearted romp the back cover promises. Sure, the book is funny, bolstered mostly by Nancy’s unbridled energy and the book’s undeniable young adult sensibilities, but that’s not what won me over. It’s impossible to forget this girl was murdered. Some might consider that a failing, but I don’t. I’m grateful for the heartfelt, heartbreaking moments. They resonate with you, far more than the silly madcap ones. Those moments of loneliness, pain, and unexpected discoveries that Charlotte experiences as she investigates the people she knew, or thought she knew. It’s wonderful stuff. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas
Sweet Shadows (Sweet Venom) By Tera Lynn Childs Katherine Tegen Books, $17.99, 336 pages, Format: Hard
««« I’ve been trying to figure out what to say about Sweet Shadows for a few days now. Tera’s writing is very sweet and funny. This is a great book if you’re not looking for a tear-jerker or something that’ll make you feel like you’re being pulled in many different directions. It is also a quick read if you’re looking for that. The story picks up immediately after Sweet Venom; in fact, there even seemed to be some overlap from the different POV’s in the story. I still can’t stand Greer, the snobby rich triplet, and Grace has started to grow on me. My favorite POV is still the butt kicking, nononsense Gretchen; she’s just one awesome heroine! Also, there’s like no love story in this. I mean, there are boys and the girls like them, but I felt absolutely no connection to them. Overall, this story was a good (cute) quick read that I’d suggest to fans of Tera’s other books. Reviewed by Jaime Arnold The Crown of Embers By Rae Carson Greenwillow Books, $17.99, 400 Pages, Format: Hard
««««« I have never in my life finished a book and picked it back up to re-read it, not until now. The Crown of Embers was an amazing book! Rae Carson took what she did in The Girl of Fire and Thorns and kicked its behind, and has become one of my favorite authors of High Fantasy, right up there with Maria V. Snyder (my favorite of all time). I loved the first book, don’t get me wrong, but, The Crown of Embers was a gazillion times better; one of the main reasons I think so is Hector. I fell in
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Young Adult
love with him in book one and there just wasn’t enough of him. However, in book two there’s plenty. Oh and the story? Amazing! Within the first ninety pages there’s an assassination attempt, treachery, a death, back stabbing, and Elisa has to start meeting suitors to marry. I mean it was pure craziness. And it went on being amazing from there, I could not put this book down. Not even the second time. This book made my heart soar, ripped it to shreds, pieced it back together, and then tore it apart again. And if that wasn’t enough, it also gutted me for good measure. I can’t say anything else but read this book! It’s that good! Reviewed by Jaime Arnold Wake By Amanda Hocking St. Martin’s Griffin, $17.99, 320 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Sixteen-year-old Gemma loves the feel of the water. She trains in the pool at school and she swims in the ocean late at night. She’s pretty, has a loving dad and devoted older sister, and is starting to fall for the boy next door, Alex. But three mysterious teens in her seaside town change her life one night, and she ends up, not necessarily a different person, but a different being. The changes in her body aren’t all bad; they’re kind of nice, she swims even more naturally and is even prettier and stronger, but she knows that there’s more to it than what the three strange (and, honestly, creepy) girls initially tell her. As a little time passes, Gemma realizes that not only are things worse than she feared, but she’ll have to leave behind her family and Alex. Amanda Hocking has been a hit as a self-published author, best known for her Trylle Trilogy. Now, she is being published traditionally, reaping the benefits of finding a larger audience and professional editing. Wake, the first in a new series, clearly shows Hocking has great stories to tell that can keep readers entranced page after page. Reviewed by Cathy Carmode Lim
Starling By Lesley Livingston HarperCollins, $17.99, 352 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Starling was everything I expected it to be! Lesley Livingston is an amazing writer (if you haven’t read her Wondrous Strange series, go get it!) and I love that she brought so many areas of mythology to light. The story mainly has Norse myth, but there’s some Greek, Celtic, and Egyptian, as well as some others I can’t quite remember right now. I adored the main character Mase, she’s a pretty tough chick, and when we first see Fenn he’s fighting beasts and looking like the hero he is. So there’s this prophecy, and together Fenn and Mase have to try to stop it or really bad things will happen, like end of the world bad things, and her family is playing a big role in this prophecy. I hated her dad, and one of her brothers is a total jerk. As for her other brother, I really liked him, and if Fenn didn’t already have my heart Roth definitely would. Mase has this, I guess I would call her a friend, Heather, and she is absolutely hilarious. She has some of the best lines in the book. Let’s just say I am completely in love with this book and can’t wait for book two, because some crazy things happen towards the end. Reviewed by Jaime Arnold Erasing Time By C. J. Hill Katherine Tegen Books, $17.99, 368 pages, Format: Hard
««« I would have rated Erasing Time a four star if a few things would have happened. I loved the story/idea/plot. I highly enjoyed the characters, but the pacing for the first one hundred pages was off; I don’t mean slow, I mean it was too quick. I normally don’t complain about stories being too fast, but with this one I felt we lost something. Oh, and one more thing: this book is being called a dystopian. Well, there’s a dystopian world, yes, there is also time travel and
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Book Reviews
Young Adult
futuristic machines, which also makes this a sci-fi book. So I’d prefer it be called a sci-fi/dystopian. Here’s what I liked about the story. I loved Sheridan, one of the twins; she was selfless, brave, smart, and funny. Her sister Taylor was okay too, but not a favorite. I also loved Echo and his father, Jeth. The world itself was written really well and CJ threw in some twists that I didn’t see coming. There were some loose ends that were not wrapped up by the end and I’m hoping there will be a second book to resolve these. I would definitely read a sequel. Reviewed by Jaime Arnold Defiance By C. J. Redwine Balzer + Bray, $17.99, 416 Pages, Format: Hard
««««« So at first glance reading the synopsis you’d think, “oh cool a fantasy novel,” right? And that’s what Harper is calling it; a fantasy trilogy, which it is, but it’s so much more! There’s a dystopian edge to it as well, and let’s just say those are two of my favorite genres. Needless to say I am completely obsessed with this book, and C.J.’s writing is stunning, absolutely breathtaking! I was hanging on the edge of my chair with the action; cringing at the evil, villainous bad guy Commander Chase; and swooning like an idiot during the . . . what did CJ call it in the acknowledgements, oh yes, awkward kissing scenes! Yes my heart did little flips and yes I cried, more like bawled actually. One of the things I loved the most about this amazing story were the multiple points of view. We got the story from both Rachel and Logan, and I honestly think this made the book better. With Rachel’s you got passion, anger, despair, and a strong desire for revenge and redemption; and in Lo-
gan’s you got logic, plus the anger and passion, and a little something extra I can’t quite put my finger on. Oh, and did I forget to say there’s a dragon like creature? Defiance is a must read! Reviewed by Jaime Arnold Don’t Turn Around By Michelle Gagnon HarperCollins, $17.99, 310 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Sixteen-year-old Noa wakes up one day on an operating table in the middle of warehouse with no idea how she got there. She finds a scar on her chest and is afraid of what might have been done to her. Peter is a rich teenage hacker who finds something in his father’s business files that has thugs beating down his door and threatening him. Noa and Peter soon realize the two events are linked together and must figure out what is going on. This book is full of action, mystery, and thrills with intriguing characters. Noa is quick-thinking and has a knack for survival. Peter, despite his rich upbringing, started a hacker alliance to help those being preyed upon by others. He utilizes his alliance to try and bring down those who are targeting Peter and Noa. Soon they find out Noa may be the key to curing a disease that has been targeting teenagers, but what are Noa’s former captors going to do with her next? Watching the two work together to piece the puzzle together will keep readers engrossed and on the edge of their seats to see what happens next. Reviewed by Debbie Suzuki Something Strange and Deadly By Susan Dennard HarperTeen, $17.99, 400 pages, Format: Hard
««««« I loved Something Strange and Deadly! Susan Dennard has created a world in historical Philadelphia where zombies walk the streets, Necromancer’s lurk behind the scenes, and a girl bred from high upbringing longs for a life of ad-
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Book Reviews
Young Adult
venture and a little bit of danger. This story has it all; romance, mystery, danger, and comedy! Eleanor was an amazing main character. She didn’t put up with anyone’s lip, except for her mother, who was a royal pain. She was willing do anything to find her missing brother Elijah, even if it meant going to someone below her class, like the Shadow Hunters, for help. I fell in love with Daniel, one of the hunters, almost immediately. His quick wit and sharp tongue won me over, but most of all, I loved his immense protectiveness over Eleanor, even if she did fight him every step of the way. The story bounces back and forth between Eleanor’s time with the Shadow Hunters and her time with the people society deemed appropriate. You could always tell she never wanted to be with those people and that she had the heart of a Shadow Hunter and a scholar. I will admit that there were a few things that I had figured out early, but that didn’t stop me from reading. I was so involved in this story and this world that I didn’t want it to end! Reviewed by Jaime Arnold Once: An Eve Novel By Anna Carey HarperCollins, $17.99, 368 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Full of action and suspense, Once will meet the expectations of fans of Eve. Picking up nearly directly where Eve left off, Once has enough information that the reader won’t feel immediately lost in the dystopian world of Eve and Califia. Several characters from the first book that one may not expect to be back make appearances, pulling both books together in a nice way, and building more on the fantastic world Carey has created. One of the best things about Once is the evolution of Eve from book one to book two. It’s clear that she has learned some things and grown stronger in her time away from
school, and the reader will appreciate this growth and progress. This becomes especially evident early in Once, when Eve is forced to make big decisions and shows her strong, intelligent side. Part of a three book series, Once is a great middle marker, not simply acting as filler as the second book in a series but truly delivering with a solid storyline and ever growing cast of characters. The original plot of Eve is expanded and continued in this action packed sequel. Reviewed by Shanyn Day So Close to You By Rachel Carter HarperTeen, $17.99, 320 pages, Format: Hard
««« Combining history, science, and time travel, So Close To You is an interesting start to a new series. Between her obsessed grandfather and her hometown, Lydia has heard about the Montauk Project her whole life. She often accompanies her grandfather on trips to an abandoned military base, and one day Lydia finds herself inside a structure containing a vessel which accidentally transports her back in history, to a time where her grandfather is a small child. Rachel Carter does a great job explaining the time travel and taking it slow enough that those not interested in science would be able to follow along, all while keeping the action moving. Though passionate, Lydia felt, at times, unrealistic on her quest to find the answers to her questions. Willing to risk her life long before the questions turn into answers that could drastically affect her family, Lydia seems more foolish than brave, especially for someone unwilling to trust a boy who tries to help her. A solid start to a time travel series, So Close To You satisfies by answering some questions while leaving others unsaid, combining romance, science, and history in an interesting twist. Reviewed by Shanyn Day
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Book Reviews
Young Adult
Endlessly By Kiersten White HarperTeen, $17.99, 400 pages, Format: Hard
««« One thing I absolutely love about Kiersten White’s books is that she tells a good story and that story has humor. I mean laugh out loud humor! Thanks Kiersten for that, and for writing a series that I really liked and was sad to see end! Her books aren’t overly gloomy, heart wrenching, or angsty, so if you’re looking to be tortured, you won’t be . . . or at least I wasn’t. That being said, there were some scenes in Endlessly that did make me a little angry, and those included Reth. I love that fairy and it was hard to see some of the things that happen to him in this book. Team Evie and Lend fans will be very happy with the ending to this series, it wraps up nicely but not without issues. Endlessly throws a few twists in the way, like the end of the paranormals, a new IPCA boss, the impending war between the fae, and a curse. Oh, and Jack’s back, which was awesome because I loved him! I was really happy with the ending but a little sad also, it was bittersweet. I really think fans of this series will enjoy it! Reviewed by Jaime Arnold
Echo has arms covered by scars, but can’t remember what happened. All she knows is that she was with her mother when it occurred and is no longer allowed to see her. Brought together by a counselor they are both seeing at school, Echo starts to tutor Noah. During their budding romance, Noah starts to seem extremely unrealistic. Each piece of dialogue is so carefully thought out that it doesn’t match his personality or age, which removes some of the romance as it lacks believability. The pacing and length of the book also play against the reader, as some chapters seem extremely slow. Ultimately Echo’s story is more interesting and Pushing the Limits could have benefited by writing from just her point of view, fleshing out opportunities for the reader to connect to one protagonist, rather than splitting their time and making it hard for either to shine. Reviewed by Shanyn Day The Legacy of Tril: Soulbound By Heather Brewer Dial Books for Young Readers, $17.99, 394 pages, Format: Hard
«««««
Pushing the Limits By Katie McGarry Harlequin Teen, $17.99, 384 pages, Format: Trade
«« With alternating points of view, Pushing the Limits fails to connect the reader to either narrator. Noah is struggling in school as he attempts to find a way to see his brothers more. Split by the foster system, Noah has limited visitation rights, and is determined to gain custody after he graduates high school. San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 60
Kaya is a Healer who lives among the Unskilled. Her parents are both outlaws and would be killed if found. When they get a letter from the Zettai Council, Kaya is forced to go to a school for the Skilled and fight for their cause in a war that has been going on for decades. She also learns that her Soulbound Baron- the person that is her perfect counterpart- is dead. Upon arriving at the school, Kaya is en-
Book Reviews
Young Adult
raged to learn a few “normal” customs. The social hierarchy is very rigid- healers like Kaya are inferior to Barons, or warriors. There are strictly no baron-baron or healer-healer relationships, and healers do not learn how to fight, instead depending on barons to protect them. Kaya becomes determined to learn how to fight- even if it is forbidden. The world of Tril sucks the reader in- mainly because of Kaya’s fight with the unfairness of the system and her trouble with romance, not to mention an original world frought with danger. Kaya is a strong character who really creates a role model for standing up to what you believe is right, even when the majority disagrees. Everyone will be rooting for the sequel after they reach the ending. Reviewed by Amanda Muir
There is a lot of heartbreak in this sequel but there is also hope. The love that Charlotte and Harlin have for each other is so powerful and beautiful, and yet so achingly heartbreaking that it makes you want to cry and hold yourself tight. There were times where my heart truly ached for them. These two face the impossible to be with each other and yet they know that there are sacrifices involved. This was a very good conclusion to this two book series. I’ll be sure to look out for Suzanne Young’s next project. Reviewed by Patricia Mendoza
A Want So Wicked By Suzanne Young Balzer + Bray, $17.99, 288 pages, Format: Hard
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«««« A Want So Wicked has a much faster pace than the previous book, A Need So Beautiful. Suzanne Young does have a wonderful way of moving the plot along nicely. As I was reading, it kept me at the edge of my seat and always wanting to know what would happen next. We see some of the characters from the first book as well as being introduced to some new ones. One of the more dynamic and interesting characters we meet is Abe. Abe is charismatic and mysterious, with a great sense of humor, but something is not totally right. There’s something about Abe that leaves you questioning what’s really up with him. One thing that really frustrated me with the main character was that she was so self-involved sometimes that she didn’t see what was going on right in front of her eyes. I kept waiting for her to see and figure out what was so blatantly obvious. Other than that, I really enjoyed A Want So Wicked so much more than A Need So Beautiful.
The Intrigues of Haruhi Suzumiya By Tanigawa, Nagaru Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, $8.99, 288 pages, Format: Trade As a long-time fan of the Haruhi Suzumiya series, I was excited when I found Intrigues in my mailbox. I read a fan translation before the series was licensed, and I was eager to devour the authorized translation. Alas, I forgot that Intrigues is actually the weakest in the series! It suffers from the absence of its chaotic titular character, who spends most of her time planning an elaborate prank from the sidelines. Unlike The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya, in which Haruhi’s unexplained disappearance drives the plot, Intrigues is content to shove her, literally, unseen into a kitchen. Intrigues instead focuses on Kyon’s time travel escapades, accompanied by someone who’s eight days from the future. While the issues of personal freedom and predestination come to the fore, Intrigues lacks the wit and passion of the earlier novels. Even the introduction of a new villain can’t save Intrigues from occasional tedium.
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Young Adult
Despite these disappointments, I am still eager for the next volumes since I know Nagaru Tanigawa got his writing groove back after Intrigues. If you are a completist, by all means purchase this book; if you are only a casual fan, maybe you should wait for the next installments. Reviewed by Rachel Anne Calabia Lies, Knives, and Girls in Red Dresses By Ron Koertgem Abdrea Dezo (illustrator) Candlewick Press, $17.99, 96 pages, Format: Hard
««««« The first words in this strange and wonderful book say, “Do you want to sleep? Find another storyteller.” The author is not kidding. Retelling of fairy tales is quite a popular form. This is unlike anything else out there. First, each of the pieces is very spare. Most are written in verse, with a couple of exceptions written in monologue form, and the stories are not the usual selection. Sure, some are quite familiar – Cinderella, The Ugly Duckling, Rumplestiltskin, and some others – but many are stories that are not familiar to most of us, such as Diamonds and Toads and Bearskin. And they are dark. Dark as a new moon night. But there is plenty of irreverent humor as well. In addition, the book is illustrated by Andrea Dezsö with the most amazing cut-paper illustrations that match the darkness of the writing and create an atmosphere that is the perfect backdrop for Ron Koertge’s extraordinary take on fairy tales. You can easily read this slim volume in an afternoon, but you won’t want to do that. You will want to savor every word and intricate piece of art. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck
Losing Elizabeth By Tanya J. Peterson CreateSpace, $6.99, 154 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Elizabeth Carter has a pretty good life, and her junior year looks to be great. She has a good chance to make the varsity tennis team, has a life-long best friend, Meg, who is fun and supportive, and she has the classes she needs to prepare for her future in engineering. Her parents clearly love, trust, and support her. The only thing she doesn’t have is a boyfriend, but there is a guy she has on her radar. Brad Evans is a senior and star on the varsity football, basketball, and baseball teams. He happens to be drop-dead gorgeous. When Lizzie, Meg, and their friend Jenny go to the local hang-out, Lizzie decides to get a closer look at Brad and, miracle of miracles, he not only talks to her, but says he’s been keeping an eye on her and wants to get to know her better. Without so much as a good-bye to her friends, she leaves with him. Before she has time to think, she and Brad are an item, and he wants her to spend ALL her time with him. Time for tennis, homework, clubs, friends, family is demanded by Brad. Suddenly, Lizzie’s life is no longer her own, and things that were important to her fall away. This is a cautionary tale teenage girls (and boys) should read. The very realistic picture drawn of an abusive, controlling relationship is something an unfortunately good number of young people will recognize only too well. The writing, however, is not very authentic “teen-speak,” and some readers might find it off-putting. There are point-ofview issues that may confuse the reader; however the story is compelling and should be enough to keep the pages turning. Sponsored Review
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September 2012
I
t’s back to school time for the children and tweens who participate in Kids’ Book Review. Many of the participating children come from a home-schooling program, and we were very fortunate to have stumbled upon. The Gifted Homeschool Forum (GHF) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting thousands of families in the United States and around the world who are educating gifted children at home. Among its many goals, GHF works to increase awareness of gifted homeschooling as a viable educational alternative and to provide ample resources for families of gifted children through its website, GiftedHomeschoolers.org. We have also had a few kids who are local to Sacramento come into the office to peruse the book shelves for prime selections. It’s great to put faces to names and see how excited they are to walk out with an arm-load of books.
In this issue, you’ll find several reviews written by the kids; however, you’ll also find two Feature Reviews -- one cookbook review of Easy Peasy Recipes by Hayden (who’s 5) and a review of Little Sweet Potato by Delaney (who’s 4). If you’re a publicist, keep the children’s, young adult, and tweens books a-comin’! The kids are gobbling them up! Want your daily dose of cute? Click or tap on the icon to follow us on Facebook. We try to upload a review each weekday there. Find current and past reviews written by the children on our website. If you have a child who would enjoy participating in KBR, click or tap HERE for information. They need not be a homeschooled child or from a gifted program. If they love books and love to read, get in touch with us.
President & CEO San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 63
Book Reviews
Category
Children’s
Cat Tale By Michael Hall Greenwillow Books, $16.99, 40 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Cat Tale is about three silly cats that find different spots to go to for an adventure. On the way they meet up with different characters that cause them trouble. Lillian, Tilly, and William J are the three main characters. All of the other characters in the book are supporting characters that add humor to the story. First the kitties come upon some ewes. This is my favorite part because I love farm animals. Next they have to walk in a box to hide from the bees. Then they
make boxing gloves out of boxes to box the fleas. After that they have to flee a steer that tries to charge them, but the kitties escape by steering a plane. Then they plane a board and I learned a new meaning to plane. The kitties then get on a train and met up with a duck and then a gnu. I had not seen a gnu before this. Then the really silly part comes when the words get all mixed up! Finally, the cats get back on track by following a bear, making their way through hail, and riding on a whale, until they get back home. As the reader travels along with the kitties, they will notice that the words start to repeat, but they have different meanings. Some of the repeating words are spelled different and some are spelled the same, but they all sound the same. Mommy taught me that these types of words are called homonyms. It’s fun to go from page to page to see how the word will be used next. I really enjoyed the illustrations. They are all made out of shapes and it made me want to do a craft of my own to make some ewes out of paper just like the ones in the book. I loved the part where the words get jumbled and they say “A Shoo-Shoo Train. No, No, No.” It really made me laugh. I would recommend this book to other children because it was funny and I learned what a homonym means. Also, I liked that I could read the book all by myself. I think children ages three to eight would like this book. Reviewed by Hayden, Age 5 Creepy Carrots! By Aaron Reynolds, Peter Brown (illustrator) Simon & Schuster Books For Young Readers, $16.99, 40 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Jasper Rabbit loved to eat carrots. Every day he ate a lot: morning, noon, and night. All he had to do was stop at Crackenhopper Field and eat as many as he wanted. But then, one day, Jasper thought that the carrots were following him. He saw them in the bathroom as he brushed his teeth.
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Book Reviews Children’s He saw them in the shed and in his bedroom at night. Jasper felt scared. Soon he saw creepy carrots creeping everywhere! He knew that he had to do something about the problem. Jasper Rabbit built a really tall fence all the way around Crackenhopper Field and even made a moat around it with crocodiles. No carrots were going to get out and bother him again! Creepy Carrots was a pretty cute book. I liked it a lot when Jasper built the fence because he solved his problem. What was really funny was that the carrots actually wanted Jasper to build the fence, because he couldn’t eat them anymore! Everyone’s problems got solved. I would love to read this book again and again. It’s funny! Reviewed by Alexandria, Age 7 Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs: As Retold by Mo Willems By Mo Willems Balzer + Bray, $17.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
««««« The main character of this book is a little girl named Goldilocks. This Goldilocks has trouble listening to everyone! She’s a bad girl because she also wanders into stranger’s homes when they’re not there. One day, she barges into a strange, enormous house that belongs to some dinosaurs. There’s Mama Dinosaur and Papa Dinosaur and they also have a dinosaur visiting from Norway. Just before the three dinosaurs left the house, the dinosaur from Norway went, “H?r! H?r! Horjfisk! Huügrk!” They left the house and waited in the forest for Goldilocks. After barging in, Goldilocks found three bowls of delicious chocolate pudding! So she ate it all. Next, Goldilocks saw three chairs that were too tall for any human so she went to the bedroom. There, Goldilocks saw the beds were also huge. Before Goldilocks could get into the bed, she heard a loud noise. You will have to read the book to find out what happens to the girl who doesn’t listen.
I would recommend this book to people who like silly stuff. I really loved the illustrations! It was the silliest book I’ve ever seen and I’ve read a lot of Mo Willems! (P.S. My favorite part was the inside front and back covers!) Reviewed by Murphy, Age 6 Good News, Bad News By Jeff Mack Chronicle Books, $16.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Good News Bad News is a book that kind of makes you think, because there are not a lot of words. There are a lot of really great and funny pictures. This book reminds us that even though something may seem like bad news, there can be a good side. Like if an apple falls out of a tree and hits us on the head, we could pick up the apple and have a nice snack. There is a rat in this book who has a lot of bad news, and his friend rabbit tries really hard to turn it in to good luck. But sometimes it just makes it worse! One time there was a swarm of mad bees chasing them, so they ran into a cave, but then something even worse chased them out of the cave! You won’t believe what happens next! Rabbit tries so hard to help his friend, but it doesn’t work and he gets upset and hurts rabbits feelings. You will have to read the book to find out what else happens. I think this would be a good book for all friends of all ages to read. I like that it makes me laugh, and teaches me a lesson. Reviewed by John, Age 9 My Brave Year of Firsts: Tries, Sighs, and High Fives By Jamie Lee Curtis, Laura Cornell, Illustrator Joanna Cotler Books, $16.99, 40 pages, Format: Hard
««««« This book is about a girl who tries things for the first time and learns a lot. She discovers what a homonym is: I just learned this too from another book. The main charac-
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Book Reviews Children’s ter learns how to jump rope and swim. When you try new things, it helps you to grow up. Some of the things she tries, I’ve tried too, like swimming, taking care of my new puppy, and making a bug habitat. The girl in the story learns that it’s good to be brave, true and strong. I like that the girl kept trying even when she didn’t do something right on her first try. When she couldn’t tie her shoes and when she fell off the horse, she tried again until she got it. It’s important to try again because that’s how all kids and people learn. If she didn’t try to get back on the horse, she’d never have learned that “whoa” means stop! I would recommend this book to other children because they would learn that everyone has a first time at doing something and that you have to keep trying stuff until you get the hang of it. I think children ages three to eight would like this book because that is the ages when kids learn and try new things. Reviewed by Hayden, Age 4 Penny and Her Doll By Kevin Henkes Greenwillow Books, $12.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
««« Penny and Her Doll is about a mouse named Penny. One day when she was in the garden, a package came to her from her grandma. There was a note in the box, and the note said, “Dear Penny, I saw this doll when I was shopping. I hope you like it.” Penny said she loved it already, and she tried to think of a name for it. She couldn’t think of a name for it, and so she thought and thought, but she still couldn’t think of a name for it. She showed the doll to everyone, but no one could find the right
name. Finally when she was in the garden, she showed the doll some roses, and then she ran inside because she had finally found the doll’s name. I liked the pictures in this book. The flowers and all the pictures were very pretty. I didn’t like the story very much, and I didn’t like that the babies didn’t say anything, but it was fun to read. It helped me think of a name for my walrus, who I named Polly. Reviewed by Rachel, Age 5 Seed by Seed: The Legend and Legacy of John “Appleseed” Chapman By Esme Raji Codell, Lynne Rae Perkins (illustrator) Greenwillow Books, $16.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
«««« This story is about John Chapman or Johnny Appleseed. He lived a long time ago and traveled from the eastern to the western united states. He plants apple trees because he thought angels and spirits told him to. He also taught lessons by the way he lived his life. Some of these lessons were to use what you have and share what you have and respect nature. Maybe someday you might eat an apple from a seed from one of his apple trees. My favorite part is where saves a wolf from a trap. He shows kindness. This book is a nice book to read because it is interesting and teaches you. I also like the pictures and the story of Johnny Appleseed. Reviewed by Bobby, Age 7 Victricia Malicia: Book-Loving Buccaneer By Carrie Clickard, Mark Meyers (illustrator) Flashlight Press, $16.95, 32 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Victricia Malicia Calamity Berret is a girl pirate who loves books. Her whole family is made of pirates and they want her to be a buccaneer too. Her mother was the ship’s captain, her father was the cook, and her sisters are pirates as well. Victricia’s pirating skills are never up to par even though she’s been learning them all her life. Her mistakes
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Book Reviews Children’s almost get her kicked off the boat, until she saves everyone from a sea monster. Still, Victricia knows that the pirate’s life is not for her. Instead, she opens her own bookstore on land and teaches the other pirates how to read. Victricia Malicia is an interesting book, but the words were kind of hard. Victricia was hard to pronounce, and there were lots of other really big words in the book as well, like vehemently and vernacular. I liked when my mom read it to me, but it was hard to read by myself. I liked Victricia because she was a bookworm just like me and because she stood up for what she really wanted. Reviewed by Alexandria, Age 7 Wrong Way By Mark MacLeod Kane/Miller Book Publishers, $14.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Wrong Way is a book about a duck who’s name is Wrong Way. Wrong Way doesn’t like to follow the rules. Sometimes that gets him in trouble. The other baby ducks, Right Way, and Your Way, are very good and listen to there mom. One day, their mom decided to take them to the pond so they could learn how to swim. Wrong Way didn’t want to walk; he said his legs where bored and he wanted his mom to carry him, but she said “No!” So they went on their way, but Wrong Way dove right in to the bushes after a big, juicy snail! So his mom had to stop again. Every time they would get going again Wrong Way would find something to get into. So
his mom said she would carry him if he would watch where they where going, but Wrong Way didn’t watch, and something very dangerous happens! Once they reach the pond, Wrong Way doesn’t swim like he is told to, but he sure has a lot of fun! Sometimes just because we do something differently than everyone else doesn’t mean it is the Wrong Way. I think this is a great book every kid should read. It lets us know it’s okay to be yourself. Something very special happens to Wrong Way, but you will have to read the book to find out what it is! Reviewed by John, Age 9 You Choose By Pippa Goodhart, Nick Sharratt, Illustrator Kane/Miller Book Publishers, $7.99, 32 pages, Format: Trade
«««« In this book you find which person you want and you say all the things you want your person to do, and travel in, and wear, and live. It is really fun for going on long trips. With this book, the trip is not very boring, because there are lots of pictures to choose from. I usually choose the girl on the front -- I like being a big city girl. Outside my house, I would put a trampoline and a huge swimming pool, and inside I would put a disco dance ball over the toilet! No, I wouldn’t; that would be silly. It is fun to imagine all the things I could put inside, like the pink and yellow lamp and a piano. I would travel in a pink limo with fins -- I wouldn’t choose a rickshaw, because the other person would have to pull it for me! For dessert, I would choose cupcakes, but for breakfast I would choose pancakes and for lunch I would choose -- too bad stroganoff isn’t on here! -- I would choose drumsticks, and for dinner I would have stroganoff, even though stroganoff isn’t on here. There are lots of things to choose, like pets, beds, houses, clothes, and shoes. I really like this book! Reviewed by Rachel, Age 5
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Easy-Peasy Recipes: Snacks & Treats to Make & Eat is a book filled with simple recipes that even kids like me can make all by themselves. The recipes are healthy and delicious. I selected three recipes to try out.
Ants in a Log
The first one I made is called “Ants in a Log,” but don’t worry…they aren’t real ants. “Ants in a Log” was very easy to make and I enjoyed adding lots of “ants” to the “log.” This recipe was really yummy and I want to make it again, but this time I’ll try the suggested “Do it Another Way” and use blueberries as my ants instead of raisins and dried cranberries.
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Feature Book Review The Breakfast Train
The next recipe we made was called “The Breakfast Train.” I love trains, so I was very excited to make this. I broke a couple of pretzels that were supposed to be the axles, but we had plenty more! I also sampled the ingredients as I made the recipe! I tried melon for the first time. The melon tasted sweet and good. The book shows a cute bunny in the train, so I brought along my stuffed bunny to help me make this yummy treat. I pretended like my bunny was riding on the train. The best part of this recipe was eating the train.
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Feature Book Review Starry Night Sandwiches
The third recipe that we made is called “Starry Night Sandwich.” This one was my favorite of the three recipes, because I loved the stars. This was really easy to make, which was good because I was hungry when we made it and I ate the whole thing. I had never tried turkey before and I’m glad I did because it was tasty. I made another “Starry Night Sandwich” the next day, but I made it with a heart shaped cookie cutter for fun. This book is lots of fun for kids and great for moms too. I’m excited to try the rest of the recipes in the book. I would recommend this book to other children (and mommies) because it was fun and easy to make the new recipes and it helped me to try new foods that I wouldn’t have tried otherwise! I also think it’s important for kids to eat healthy. Mommy says eating healthy foods will help me grow strong! This book is great for kids ages 3 to 10 and even adults would like the foods. Mommy tried some and liked it! Looking for more A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E reviews written by children? Click HERE. Do you have a child who loves to read and wants to review books for us? Here’s some info.
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Feature Review by Delaney - age 4 Katherine Tegen Books
$16.99, 32 pages, Format: Hard, 5 Stars!
that even though there will always be some vegetables out there who are just plain mean, many will accept you for who you are, along with many other themes that you can discuss with your child. Best of all, it is such a cute story that I don’t mind being asked to read it again and again!
T
his book is about a Little Sweet Potato. He fell out of his garden and didn’t know where he was. He rolled on. He met the carrots, and they treated him mean. Then he met the eggplants. They told him to “Scram!” and were mean, too. He met flowers. They said they were so beautiful, and the sweet potato was lumpy, dumpy, not beautiful and not a flower. No one would let the sweet potato come live with them. He felt very sad. He thought there was no place for him to live, and one tear ran down his face. Then, a voice came, and it said very nice things! It invited him to a garden. All the vegetables and flowers in this garden told him that some flowers are nice and some are not. They said that they liked all kinds, not just the same kind. The sweet potato felt happy to be home. I liked this book a lot. I liked the parts that were nice. I thought that the bad vegetables were mean, mean, mean. Being nice makes you feel good. I would be nice to the mean vegetables and show them how to be nice too. I didn’t like when Little Sweet Potato met the mean vegetables. If I were his friend, I would say, “You can live in my garden, even if you are a different vegetable. I loved the pictures in this book. The flowers and vegetables were so colorful. I thought that the mean faces on the flowers and vegetables looked real! I liked the beautiful picture of the garden with all of the different nice vegetables and flowers best. I would like the author to make stuffed vegetables and flowers to go with this book so I could play with them and sleep with them. This book is good for little kids and kids who have learned how to read. I read this book a lot of times because I really liked it, and my mom read it to me a lot, too. I give it five stars. Mom’s review: This book is wonderfully written. The story is told with sincerity and the reader immediately empathizes with the poor Little Sweet Potato as he tries to find his home. The lessons taught in the book are plentiful and excellent for little readers. Little Sweet Potato teaches us to be polite even when others are not polite to you, to persevere through difficult times, and
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Amy Beth Bloom, Writer In Residence at Wesleyan University, has been nominated for a National Book Award and a National Book Critics’ Circle Award for her adult fiction. This is her first book for young readers. You can visit her online at amybloom.com. Noah Z. Jones is an author, illustrator, and animator. He has illustrated numerous books for children, including NOT NORMAN by Kelly Bennett and THOSE SHOES by Maribeth Boelts. Noah lives with his family in Los Angeles, California. You can visit him online at noahzjones.com.
Book Reviews
Category
Early Reader
My opinion of this book is that I would absolutely recommend this to a friend who likes superheros a lot, because it is not that interesting for me. I give this book 3 stars. I do like the chapter called, “Volkswagens, Chevy’s, and Ford’s Oh My,” because my dad likes Volkswagens. Reviewed by Bobby, Age 7 The Familiars #3: Circle of Heroes By Adam Jay Epstein, Andrew Jacobson Harper, $16.99, 325 pages, Format: Hard
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Adventures of Jo Schmo: Dinos are Forever By Greg Trine, Frank W. Dormer, Illustrator Harcourt Children’s Books, $12.99, 112 pages, Format: Hard
««« Jo Schmo is a fourth grader. She is also a superhero in San Francisco. Jo keeps her city safe by catching bad guys with her dog, Raymond. She uses her super strength while Raymond just drools. A mad scientist named Dr. Dastardly and his assistant, Pete, are planning to capture the city with a giant gang of dead dinosaurs. Dr. Dastardly has a re-animator laminator that he uses to revive the dinos. Jo Schmo has to stop them while also learning to fly.
The Familiars, Aldwyn, Skylar, and Gilbert, are the prophesied Three, destined by the stars to defeat Paksahara and her Dead Army. Paksahara is destroying the three Glyph Stones, magical pillars inscribed with runes which are the only way to find her lair. The Familiars set out to find the Seven Descendants, which are needed to call Paksahara’s lair. On the journey, Aldwyn discovers a disturbing entry in a journal:”I have become troubled lately by a great fallacy that many Vastians have taken to be truth: that all prophecies are divine and certain... A warning to those with a destiny of their own: just because it is written in the stars does not make it so.” What if the stars are wrong? What if Aldwyn and the other Familiars fail? Will Paksahara succeed? This book was a fun way to pass the time, but I don’t think I will read it again. The zombie army was kind of a strange addition to the plot, and seemed just a little pointless to me. The different animals and the powers each race had was exciting and interesting, as well as the vivid scenes. Reviewed by Gretl, Age 11
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Book Reviews
Category
Tweens
are good, like Keegel Farzym. Keegel tells them about The Unravelers, a group of bad monsters that want Humana and Always October separated forever. Lily and Jacob are joined on their quest by some helpers from their world, including a talking, glowing cat! Their group meets with the Council of Poets. At this meeting, they learn that they will have to find a magical bracelet to take back to Humana. Suddenly The Unravelers appear and begin to battle with The Council of Poets while Jacob, Lily, and their friends escape. After this battle, their adventure gets even stranger. I liked this book a lot! It would be a great book for anyone who loves scary fun! Or monsters. Reviewed by Murphy, Age 6 Beware the Ninja Weenies: and Other Warped and Creepy Tales By David Lubar Starscape, $15.99, 192 pages, Format: Hard
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Always October By Bruce Coville HarperCollins, $16.99, 368 pages, Format: Hard
««««« This story is told by Jacob and Lily, two kids who are in the sixth grade, like to read scary stories, and live near the cemetery—and they’re going to have the scariest adventure of their lives! The adventure begins when Lily sees strange things in the mausoleum and a baby named Little Dumpling (L.D.) is left on Jacob’s porch. The weirdness gets weirder when L.D. turns into a REAL monster! Using Jacob’s grandfather’s notes, Jacob and Lily are able to travel to Always October, a land where our fears live. In Always October, they meet many monsters. Some are bad, but some
Beware The Ninja Weenies: And Other Warped and Creepy Tales is a book of short tales. I liked one called “Smart Food;” it’s about a piece of broccoli who talks to a girl saying that people need to stop eating vegetables, and that vegetables have feelings too. There were lots of kinds of creepy stories. I also liked a creepy one called Poser about a preteen boy looking for a summer job, and the job he ends up with is an artist’s model. After weeks and weeks of sketching the artist finally works on the finishing piece, a sculpture. There was one about two girls who spy on a witch trying to catch her doing something witchy. But they end up getting irresistible candy, and whoever finishes their bag first, will die. And (drum roll please) the ninja weenies! And TONS more! I really liked Beware The Ninja Weenies; I would recommend it for ages seven-nine. I would rate it four stars, but if I could I would rate it 4 and a half. I think it could be a great book for girls or boys. Reviewed by Ronen, Age 8
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Book Reviews Tweens Chickadee: Book 4 of the Birchbark House Series By Louise Erdrich HarperCollins, $16.99, 191 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Chickadee was a twin Indian boy who was kidnapped from his home, because two men wanted a servant. He was taken out into the plains where he had to learn how to get along and to eat bouyah, a strange food. He tried to be a good servant and take care of everything, but if he ever had a chance he would try to escape. His twin brother, Makoons, had gotten a high fever and his mother and grandmother were trying to heal him, so they couldn’t go after Chickadee, and also there was a river that was flowing too fast for them to cross. Chickadee’s father goes hunting for Chickadee and tries to find a way to reunite the family. I liked this book because it has very interesting words, Anishinabe words, that I got to learn. I liked learning how Chickadee survived and did things. The most interesting part is what happens to the family in the end, but I can’t tell you about that without giving away the story. I liked Chickadee the best, because he has more adventures. Reviewed by Miriam, Age 8 Gravediggers: Mountain of Bones By Christopher Krovatin Katherine Tegen Books, $16.99, 322 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Three sixth graders, Ian Buckley, Kendra Wright, and PJ Wilson, are in the wilderness to learn about nature. They were having a sucky time because they didn’t get along well. Things got more exciting when Ian saw something in the woods. It was an unusual twelve-point buck. They decided to follow it and got lost in a haunted forest. They were lost for
days and finally found a wall. Behind that wall was... uh-oh! Zombies! They ran like crazy. They climbed a wall, but PJ, having sprained his ankle, fell. Then, just as the zombies were about to turn him into dinner, a warden came along and sent the zombies away. She helped them, but do you know how they repaid her? They burned her magical dream catcher, which is used to confine the zombies. Now they are free to run amok and eat people. I know what you’re thinking! What happens next? Can a jock, a nerd, and a social misfit save everyone from the zombies? This story gave a tingle of curiosity though my mind, especially the parts where people are about to die. This book is pure awesome! Reviewed by Esther, Age 8 Grey Griffins: The Clockwork Chronicles #3: The Paragon Prison By Derek Benz Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, $16.99, 350 pages, Format: Hard
«««« The Paragon Prison is the exciting final installment in the Grey Griffins Clockwork Chronicles trilogy, with plenty of action and suspense. It chronicles the next quest of four young teenagers who call themselves the Grey Griffins. Here, the Grey Griffins are working on the Paragon Engine. The Paragon Engine is a bit like the wardrobe in C.S. Lewis’ Narnia series. It is not a time machine, but an engine that takes people to other worlds just like theirs, with small differences. The Grey Griffins are trapped in a different world, where they find they are dead! They must defeat the evil Von Strife before he destroys the Paragon Engine and rips apart the multiverse. I liked this book because it has everything an adventurer or sci-fi reader craves: action, suspense, and drama. There are hard-hitting battle scenes and lots of fantasy crea-
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Book Reviews Tweens tures, such as changelings and faeries. I also enjoyed Max’s “Round Table” sport. I give it a 4 and ½. The only downside was that I found the setting a bit confusing. Their world was just like ours, but there were many high-tech machines that belonged in the future. Reviewed by Brendan, Age 8 Lost in Petra By Melissa Mahle, Kathryn Dennis, Jeff James (Illustrator) SpyGirls Press, $8.99, 234 pages, Format: Trade
««« Eleven-year old Anatolia Steppe is on a mission. She arrives in Petra to meet up with her mom, who is an archeologist, searching for the Golden Girdle, a lost treasure of Petra. As Ana waits for her mom in the hotel lobby, she meets a suspicious man named Mr. Hasan, who is with the “Ministry of Antiquities.” Ana decides to go out into the big world of Petra to find her mom. But it’s not a lets-go-andfind-her-and-be-back-for-dinner type of mission. First, her new nanny’s son, Gordy, is following her, and he’s really annoying. Second, Ana’s nanny, Mrs. Brown, finds them and takes them for a tour with Mr. Hasan. Third, she needs to find the Golden Girdle so she can find her mom. Join Ana as she balances staying away from Gordy and Mrs. Brown, finding her mother, and keeping out of the tricks of “djinn” (people who play bad tricks and kidnap children), all at the same time. I liked this book because it was suspenseful and somewhat funny. It was fun to read about Ana being annoyed with Gordy. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the Kingdom of Jordan or Petra, or who enjoys reading mysteries. Reviewed by Faith, Age 8
Mrs. Noodlekugel By Daniel Pinkwater, Adam Stower (illustrator) Candlewick Press, $14.99, 72 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Mrs. Noodlekugel is about two kids named Nick and Maxine, who live in an apartment building where all the rooms are stacked on top of each other. Mrs. Noodlekugel is a old lady who lives in a house that they can see from their apartment. Their parents tell them not to ever go to her house or to bother her-they think she’s a witch who doesn’t like children. They decide to go anyway. They find out she is very nice and has a talking cat that can make tea, serve dinner, and play the piano. They eat cookies and they learn that she not only has the talking cat, but also three blind mice. They have a good time at her house , and when they get home, their parents have a surprise for them. I liked this book, it was not very long though. I would recommend this to kids who like shorter, good stories. Reviewed by Sebastian, Age 7 Olivia Bean, Trivia Queen By Donna Gephart Delacorte Books for Young Readers, $16.99, 288 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Olivia Bean has always wanted to be on Jeopardy! but she’s not that good at geography. One day her neighbor/friend/enemy tells her that soon there will be kids week on Jeopardy! She makes it all the way to the finals after nonstop studying to get there. When she gets on the stage with her competitors, she thinks about her divorced dad. She looks into the audience and sees her little brother Charlie, her mom, and her mom’s
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Book Reviews Tweens boyfriend, Neil, but no dad. She gets nervous, worried, and panicked. Will she win Jeopardy! get a trip to California where she can see her dad, and win the $15,000 to spend and also help her mom because she’s low on money? Or will she not be ready enough to win? I really liked Olivia Bean Trivia Queen. I mainly liked it because as soon as you think something is going to get boring, something exciting happens. I also liked Olivia Bean Trivia Queen because I have never read a book about the same topic and plot this book has (not even the teeniest tiniest little bit). I give it 5 stars. I would recommend the book for ages 7-9. Reviewed by Ronen, Age 8 Sword Mountain By Nancy Yi Fan HarperCollins, $16.99, 314 pages, Format: Hard
«««« I felt really good about the book Sword Mountain because it was a really surprising book! You never knew what was going to happen! But it has a lot of killing in it, which I personally didn’t like very much. I loved the book’s ending because it ended very differently than I thought it would be. My favorite character was Cloud-Wing because he was a good warrior. I did not like the Archeoptrix empire because they did most of the killing. I would definitely recommend this book to others. This book was exciting, sad, a little funny, somewhat violent, and surprising. Reviewed by Braeden, Age 8
The Great Unexpected By Sharon Creech Harper, $16.99, 226 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Naomi is a spirited orphan girl who lives with her guardians, Joe and Nula. She has a friend named Lizzie, who talks, and talks, and talks. One day, when Naomi and Lizzie are out digging clay, a boy, Finn, falls from a tree, almost on top of them. They find out that he is from Ireland, and he changes their lives forever. I loved this book! It was so fun, because it was about Ireland, and there were so many connecting pieces to the story. One part of the story follows the connection between Naomi and dogs; another is about Nula and her family, in Ireland; another part is about how all the people in the town are connected to people across the sea; yet another part is about how Naomi and Lizzie are connected. I liked the characters; it was fun to listen to their voices and personalities as they discovered their connections in their interactions with each other. My favorite part was when I read about Mrs. Kavanagh’s revenge. I will definitely read this book again and recommend it to my friends. Reviewed by Gretl, Age 11 The Magnificent 12: The Key By Michael Grant Katherine Tegen Books, $16.99, 277 pages, Format: Hard
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Book three in the series about the Magnificent 12 begins with Mack, Xiao, Jarrah, Dietmar, and Stefan being held captive in William Blisterthong MacGuffin’s castle in Scotland. Even though they are only twelve-year-olds, they must get the other half of the Key from the red-eyebrowed MacGuffin so that they can master the ancient Vargran spells. It would have been helpful
Book Reviews Tweens if Mack had studied his Vargran instead of riding the London Eye Ferris wheel. They must round up the remaining members of the Magnificent 12 and defeat the Pale Queen and her evil daughter, Risky, before the human race is destroyed. While Mack is trying to save the world, his golem is at home pretending to be Mack. With a million-dollar credit card, Mack and his friends travel to Paris but end up going down into the stinky sewers to find other Magnifica in hiding before time runs out. In less than thirty days, the Pale Queen’s three-thousand-year banishment ends. That’s a lot of pressure on Mack MacAvoy! The Magnificent 12: The Key is a little scary at times, but it is still a great book! I recommend that you read the first two books in the series beforehand, too. Reviewed by Kyle, Age 8 Tollins 2: Dynamite Tales By Conn Iggulden, Lizzy Duncan (illustrator) HarperCollins, $16.99, 188 pages, Format: Hard
««««« The Tollins are small winged creatures who keep to themselves and love a good tea and toast. In Tollins 2, Sparkler’s first adventure begins when he is out training Wolfenstein, his pet dragonfly who he is walking home, but sees a van unloading boxes of books into a human building. Sparkler, intrigued, comes back after dark and reads a work by Shakespeare. Later, he asks the High Tollin if he can do a play, Romeo and Juliet. He has casting, rehearsals, and then more rehearsals. Finally, they are ready. But with Romeo and Juliet sick, who will save the play? The next two stories are just as fun and captivating as the first: Radio, and last, Bones. Radio is how Sparkler turns back an entire army with the use of a radio; bones is what saves another colony in the third book.
I love the spunky, lovable-ness about the Tollins! They are the funniest creatures I have read about, and I love the way Conn Iggulden creates personalities for the Tollins. Reviewed by Gretl, Age 11 Waking Storms (The Lost Voices Trilogy) By Sarah Porter Harcourt Children’s Books, $16.99, 390 pages, Format: Hard
««««« This is an awesome book. I love it because it has mermaids, and heroes, and secrets in it. There is swearing in it but I don’t think that matters. This book is about mermaids and humans who are enemies with each other. The humans are trying to find out where the mermaids live, because the mermaids have been sinking a lot of ships and drowning a lot of people. But the mermaids want to remain a secret, so if humans hear a mermaid sing, they must die. Luce wants to stop singing and sinking ships, but the other mermaids don’t let her because they want to keep everything the same. Luce saves Dorian (a human) and breaks the mermaid’s law of timahk. She has to leave her tribe and live by herself. The FBI was curious how Dorian survived, and when one of agents went to Dorian’s house to question him, he saw a drawing that Dorian had made of Luce, because he loved her. The whole book is about the FBI trying to capture the mermaids, and the mermaids trying to remain a secret. It is also about the mermaids fighting with each other. Reviewed by Zoe, Age 9
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Book Reviews
False Covenant
By Ari Marmell Pyr, $16.95, 280 pages, Format: Hard
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Category
Young Adult
Widershins is a thief, and one with a special advantage--i.e. her personal god, Olgun, with whom she constantly bickers. But even they have been beaten back in a string of defeats and betrayals. First there is a terrifying stalker, then a demonic killer who has a member of the thief’s guild, one of Widershins’s former acquaintances, in his service. To top it off, all this happens in the midst of turmoil over Archbishop William de Laurent’s murder (also partly her fault) in Davilon City half a year ago, where it all takes place. No one trusts her, and she can trust no one, not even her own thief’s guild. Widdershins must stop the murderer while keeping her friends and the city safe. She must also unravel the church conspiracy while juggling her love interest in the guard. Although I thought False Covenant was a reasonable medieval read, it seemed a bit...well, mainstream, I suppose. Not a lot stood out to me as far as the characters or plot line. I’m not going to write any spoilers, but overall I thought it was...well a bit over average I guess. That’s the most I have for it. Average. Reviewed by Tee, Age 13
Photo Belongs to Jason Chan at jasonchanart.com
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Book Reviews Young Adult a little younger. The book was clearly and carefully written, and it sucks you right into the book. When the next book comes out, I will certainly be one of the first to buy and read it! Reviewed by Zarra, Age 12 The Sweetness of Salt By Cecilia Galante Bloomsbury Childrens, $9.99, 311 pages, Format: Trade
««« I liked this book because it is pretty thoughtful and funny. I also liked it because it has a nice twist in the plot, because Julia goes to her sister’s house just to ask her about Maggie and then ends up staying to help her sister with the bakery. I don’t like the book because it has a ton of swear words in it, but other than that, it was an enjoyable read. Reviewed by Aleah, Age 9
What’s Left of Me: The Hybrid Chronicles, Book One By Kat Zhang Harper, $17.99, 352 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Eva and Addie were both born into one body. Addie was considered the dominant soul, the lead soul. Eva was the smaller, weaker soul. She was supposed to disappear, but she didn’t. Yet, even with her soul intact, she couldn’t move or speak. She couldn’t do anything. Addie was the only person who knew Eva was still there and she did everything in her power to keep her hidden. When a girl in their class offers Eva the ability to move again, Eva wants nothing more than to do so, no matter the cost. Will they be able to pull it off or will Eva be forced to fade forever? I really liked the book What’s Left of Me. The plot line was interesting, and the relationship between the two sisters was very realistic. I would definitely recommend it to a friend. I would say the age range is 12 and up, maybe even
The Lost Girl By Sangu Mandanna Balzer + Bray, $17.99, 432 pages, Format: Hard
««« The Lost Girl is a story about an echo named Eva. Eva was created in order to replace an Indian girl named Amara in case she died. Eva, however, has other plans. She wants to live her own life and be her own person. When Amara passes away in a tragic accident, Eva is forced to pretend to be her, go to her school, laugh with her friends, even love her boyfriend. Yet Eva wants nothing more than to run away and be with the boy she loves. Can she pull it off? Or will she be turned into the Weavers, the cruel humans that create echoes and can also unmake them? I was not a huge fan of The Lost Girl. I disliked the main character, Eva, and found the love story annoying. I really detested the first part; the second part
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Book Reviews Young Adult was pretty good and the third part was ok. I had a hard time getting through the first part, but the rest of the book was alright. I probably wouldn’t recommend this book to a friend. I would say the age range for the book is ten and up. Reviewed by Zarra, Age 12 Shift By Kim Curran Strange Chemistry, $9.99, 293 pages, Format: Trade
«««« When sixteen-year-old Scott Tyler is invited to an afterschool party and decides to climb a pylon, the piece he was holding breaks off and he falls to his death. Or he should have, anyway. Instead, he finds himself on the ground near the fence where he decided to climb the pylon. A strange girl apprehends him and takes him to a bar, where she tells him he is special. Scott Tyler is a shifter, a different type of human who can redo his decisions. When he changes a decision far in the past, he ends up killing his sister, and needs to go to the shifters organization, ARES, to teach him how to control his shifting. But soon mysterious things happen: a former shifter is blown up in a train station after going insane; another is killed and the frontal lobe of his brain eaten; and, in the middle of writing a report on the latest murder, Scott senses a shift, and suddenly, the report in front of him says suicide--not murder. As Scott is dragged further and further in, you are forced to wonder: will he survive? I thought that Shift was a fast-paced and highly enjoyable read with a thoroughly creative plot line, although predictable at times. Overall, I would recommend it to teenage hero-type fans. Reviewed by Tee, Age 13
Getting Genki in Japan By Karen Pond, Akiko Saito (illustrator) Tuttle Publishing, $17.95, 192 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Getting Genki in Japan is about a woman who moved to Japan with her family because her husband got a new job. She didn’t know how to speak Japanese. She didn’t really know any stores there. She needed to learn new ways of doing things in Japan because it’s very different from what she did in the United States. This is a non-fiction book, and the chapters are very short. This is a funny book. I didn’t finish reading some of the chapters, because they weren’t that funny, but a lot other chapters were funny, like when she didn’t know she wasn’t supposed to eat the whole edamame, or when she couldn’t figure out how to get the public toilet to flush. Another funny chapter was when everyone was saying “Iraishimase!” to her at the department store. She thought they wanted her to take off her shoes, but they were just saying “Welcome.” Also, apparently there are a lot of words that are similar in Japanese and she would get very confused and crazy things would happen. I would get this book for the funny chapters. Reviewed by Zachary, Age 5
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Book Reviews
Category
Parenting & Families
loses a lot of her authority when she discusses current culture. She simply does not get that people in general look at community differently than they did even a few years ago, and has the usual anti-media bias. Worse, she sees American issues as solely American, without consideration of the degree of influence that exposure to the culture of other lands. This is a great idea, but the editorializing about the evils of pop culture gets a bit annoying. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim Heart and Hands: A Midwife’s Guide to Pregnancy and Birth By Elizabeth Davis Ten Speed Press, $35.00, 336 pages, Format: Trade
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Talk to Me First: Everything You Need to Know to Become Your Kids’ “Go To Person” About Sex By Deborah Roffman Da Capo Lifelong, $14.99, 296 pages, Format: Trade
«« Talking about sex is hard; talking about talking about sex is even harder. Talk To Me First explores how to talk to your child about sex and all of the associated issues. This book points out that it should be a constant discussion from early ages on forward, with just a little revealed as needed, as children need a little information to go on and revealing it all once could cause some serious trauma. In that regard, this is a great book and worthy of being on any parent’s shelf. Books that look at culture need to take a wider view of that culture. The problem with this book is that Roffman is great when she is talking about talking about sex, but
The field of obstetrics once nearly did away with midwives, but women fed up with the typical hospital birth experience are beginning to turn once more to this time-honored profession to help them through pregnancy and birth. Consequently, the field of midwifery is growing. Midwives specialize in a more holistic, mother-centered approach to birth; giving birth with a midwife usually means being allowed to labor however the mother sees fit, in whatever position they desire, while avoiding unnecessary interventions and ultimately giving birth where the mother feels most comfortable, whether in a hospital or in the comfort of her own home. This fifth edition of Heart & Hands: A Midwife’s Guide to Pregnancy and Birth is an ideal guide for both the experienced midwife as well as the midwife-in-training. It reads almost like a textbook, with detailed guides to prenatal care, the birth itself, postpartum care, and more. There is an extensive chapter detailing potential labor complications, and the appendices feature several basic forms for midwives to adapt to their own practices. Of course, becoming a competent midwife requires hands-on experience, but this book is a good place
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 82
Book Reviews
Parenting & Families
to start the journey. Full of stories, encouragement, pictures, and lots and lots of information, this book is a treasure trove of knowledge. Reviewed by Holly Scudero
Side by Side: 20 Collaborative Projects for Crafting with Your Kids By Tsia Carson Roost Books, $19.95, 192 pages, Format: Trade
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The Right to Be Parents By Carlos A. Ball NYU Press, $35.00, 239 pages
««««« When this book arrived in the mail, I wasn’t sure what to think. While I’ve always supported gay rights, the issue is so politically charged that the very mention of it often sends me running the other direction. I was worried about writing this review because it was sure to offend someone. Yet when I opened the cover, I was instantly drawn in. The Right To Be Parents was no light read, but it truly opened my eyes to issues I didn’t understand and gave me a whole new lease on gay rights. To be gay or lesbian in the 1970s, 1980s, and even 1990s almost certainly guaranteed that a parent would lose custody of their children in a divorce proceeding. I had no idea about this and was really touched by the court cases Ball discussed. Families were torn apart because of love, children basically ripped from their mother’s or father’s lives. Gay and lesbian parents have had to fight for the rights that other Americans enjoy every day. I enjoyed learning how gay parenting rights have grown and evolved over the past few decades. This book sheds light on the dark underbelly of hidden American history. I imagine that this book would be an amazing read for LGBT families. As a straight American, I learned a lot and have a whole new appreciation for the struggle for gay rights. Reviewed by Jennifer Melville
“Here’s a well-known fact: children love to take a tube of glitter glue and squeeze a giant pile of it onto a piece of paper while their parents say, “No, no! That’s too much.” This solidifies me at the crafting table with my little one at many times, and yet the act of creating yields to one of the most gratifying feelings, no matter how many days I am left chasing glitter with my broom and dustpan. I am always left with a masterpiece (or eight) and cherish the time spent. Tsia Carson has provided an ample guide that is created with your little crafter at the core. With twenty collective art projects, you (and your child) will be entertained and inspired, from hand-stamped bookmarks and stationery to indoor succulent gardens and, of course, the old favorite, potato prints. An added nod, there are three sections to this guide; the first includes collaborative projects, the second, projects to be worked in parallel (based on skill level) and the final, a Family Field Trip (moving from the table to the great outdoors for more inspiration). With easy-tofollow directions, as well as vivid photographs to guide the projects, you and your artist will be well on your way to making keepsakes and memories. Reviewed by Sky Sanchez-Fischer
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 83
Book Reviews
Category
Crafts & Hobbies
sion” —and I can imagine parents using this book to teach their children how to sew properly. The “Portrait of Papa” piece is a lovely example of how a childlike imagination, coupled with almost expert-level sewing, can produce brilliant and whimsical work. My favorite projects in Knot Thread Stitch are those that stem from the author’s interest in her Japanese heritage. The robot and kokeshi finger puppets, along with the sashiko skirt, are items I’d probably make for myself. The author’s procedures are good introductions to these styles. It’s unfortunate that there are some copy editing gaffes; I hope these oversights can be corrected in a future edition. Reviewed by Rachel Anne Calabia Cast On, Bind Off: 54 Step-by-Step Methods; Find the perfect start and finish for every knitting project By Leslie Ann Bestor Storey Publishing, LLC, $16.95, 215 pages, Format: Hard
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Knot Thread Stitch: Exploring Creativity through Embroidery and Mixed Media By Lisa Solomon Quarry, $22.99, 144 pages, Format: Trade
««« Most of the projects in Knot Thread Stitch are great for beginners. Some craft books can be daunting for someone starting out with a new hobby. Unfortunately, someone with a ton of craft books and magazines might be disappointed. The usefulness of this book will depend heavily on the reader’s level of skill and the complexity of her ideas regarding mixed media. While it’s not marketed that way, this book is ideal for a crafter with curious children. There are two examples for most of the projects—a basic procedure and the “artist ver-
All knitters, no matter how advanced or new to the art, will want a part of this compendium of creative and unique cast ons and bind offs. This compact reference book makes the perfect addition to the knitting basket! Not a beginner’s guide to learning how to knit, it is designed for those who already know how, or who have another guide to begin with. Every knitter knows a beginning cast-on, perhaps the first one they learned, or maybe one or two others they picked up for a fancy sweater or ski cap - but this book will take you far and away beyond that, with fifty-four different cast ons and bind offs laid out with color photographs to guide the knitter. Categories are handily sorted to guide the reader for whatever project is at hand by All-Purpose, Ribbing with moderate stretch, Ribbing with a lot of stretch, End-of-row, Super Stretchy, Decorative, Temporary & Hems, Toe-Up
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Book Reviews
Crafts & Hobbies
Socks, and Circular. Bind offs are sorted by All-Purpose, Lace, Decorative, Stretch Ribbed, and Specific Use. Traditional mingles with innovative or unusual, and the knitter is assured to find every method necessary to create projects with a fresh new look, and bring renewed interest and pizzazz to their knitting projects. Reviewed by Andrea Huehnerhoff Steampunk Accessories: 20 Projects to Help You Nail the Style, from Goggles to Cell Phone Cases, Gauntlets, and Jewelry By Nicola Tedman, Sarah Skeate Barron’s, $18.99, 128 pages, Format: Trade
«««« The steampunk movement grows bigger by the day, and more steampunk enthusiasts than ever are turning from passive admirers to active crafters of quality and interesting fashion pieces and accessories. Rings and earrings, goggles and gauntlets, belt clips and slipcases to conceal the most advanced phones and tablets... virtually anything can be transformed to offer the charm and whimsy of the steampunk aesthetic. Steampunk Accessories is a terrific tool in the arsenal of any aspiring member of the Society of Creative Anachronism, providing detailed instructions for each project as well as preliminary tips on working with leather and other materials, along with project templates in the back of the book. Evocative and inspiring photographs kick off every chapter, and illustrations accompany the step-by-step instructions, offering valuable guidelines and touchstones. While the projects range in complexity and difficulty, none feel out of reach for even casual crafters, and as relatively small-scale endeavors, this is the perfect place to
develop confidence and technique before tackling bigger projects. (Gotta walk before you can run, even if the leg is a steam-driven brass-inlaid prosthetic!) With infinite potential for customization, the projects of Steampunk Accessories will get you off to a great start. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas Art Is Every Day: Activities for the Home, Park, Museum, and City By Eileen S. Prince Zephyr Press, $16.95, 165 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Art Is Every Day: Activities for the Home, Park, Museum, and City by Eileen S. Prince is a thorough book—providing sixty-five different activities for kids and parents to do. The book is divided into six main sections encouraging artistic engagement in general (such as the broad category “Everywhere”), in one’s home, an art museum, in a city, and in a park. Besides posing the question “What is art and why should we study it?” in Prince’s introduction, Prince delves into the terms and principles of art as well. Most—but not all—of the sixty-five activities are also accompanied with examples or illustrations. The variety of undertakings include some standard fare, such as paperbag puppets and vegetable prints, to more advanced works, such as drawing on photos for perspective. There is a colorful eight-page spread in the middle of the book that provides an overview of the color wheel and the use of colors. Prince writes that a main drive of going through the exercises in this book is to help to understand and to appreciate beauty in the world around us. Prince’s book certainly can accomplish that—for adults and children alike. Also useful for educators. Reviewed by Elizabeth Humphrey
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 85
Book Reviews Category
Art, Architecture & Photography
drawings (or created by Photoshop?), but nowhere there is a clear explanation of how they were produced. The Victorian settings (she calls her subjects Visitorians) using the typical background setups, poised bodies (since time exposures were long), wearing fanciful Victorian garbs and accessories were all like in those carte de visites. The photos are color tinted (hand-tinted?) and they are all fascinating though somewhat overwhelming in their sheer numbers. Brief texts by three contributors give some insight to the reader on this art project. Reviewed by George Erdosh The French Dog By Rachael Hale Stewart, Tabori, & Chang, $29.95, 168 pages, Format: Hard
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You Animal, You!: Charlotte Cory By AN Wilson, Sophie Gordon, Jane Sellers Black Dog Publishing, $29.95, 159 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Carte de visite was a Victorian craze in which everyone in the upper echelon of British society took part. Each was a photograph in the Victorian photo style mounted on a small cardboard not much larger than our business cards. Eventually they fell out of fashion. Charlotte Cory, a photographer, sculptor, printmaker, novelist, and playwright, decided to bring carte de visite back to modern times in You Animal, You!, a whimsical, most unusual art book exploring her subject through photography with a large number of stylized Victorian photographs but with a twist. Here her subjects have human bodies but animal heads. Some heads look like those of stuffed animals, others like
Photos of dogs by the dozens and scores! Dog lovers will enjoy The French Dog, a large-format high-end production printed on heavy, glossy paper stock. All are color photographs ranging in size from not much bigger the thumbnail prints to full-page and double-page photos. Artistically, they are good to very good, but few are exceptional; in fact, many are simply snapshots. Photos of French indoor and outdoor settings are also included with no visible dogs. Those only interested in the artistic aspects of photos are likely to get bored leafing through the great number of photos. Short paragraphs of text are interspersed on many pages, and in the first eight pages author/photographer Rachael Hale has written a more extensive description and stories about French dogs. The writing is good but, again, not exceptional. Many quotes and proverbs about dogs take full pages, and there are also some reproduced paintings and illustrations in which dogs appear. The photographs are roughly divided into groups of dogs at home, on the streets, outdoors, and as working dogs. She included several pages as sets of small photos that are simply a group of snapshots. These are fillers that should’ve been left out. Reviewed by George Erdosh
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 86
Book Reviews
Category
Sequential Art
admirable job of giving each hero his or her time to shine. Nul is a supremely impressive villain, and the looming battle makes for great reading. But as the story develops into the hunt for answers behind the Concordance Engines, it becomes a little harder to follow. Thankfully, the gorgeous art and intriguing mysteries more than make up for any lingering confusion. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas John Emmett Connors: Artist from Troy By John Emmett Connors, Vito F. Grasso, Collaborator Excelsior Editions, $29.95, 120 pages, Format: Trade
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Defenders Vol 1 By Matt Fraction, Terry Dodson, Illustrator Marvel, $19.99, 136 pages, Format: Trade
««« Imagine a force so dark and powerful that The Hulk would ask for help stopping it. That force is Nul, the Breaker of Worlds, and its very existence leads The Hulk to Dr. Stephen Strange, the Marvel Universe’s resident master of mysticism. Strange recruits mystic warrior Iron Fist, cosmic wanderer Silver Surfer, undersea king Namor, and crimson powerhouse Red She-Hulk to stop Nul. But when their adventures lead them into a far more baffling mystery, the very fabric of time and space will be threatened. Are the Defenders up to the challenge? Team-up books are a staple of comics, and The Defenders, Volume 1 gathers an intriguing group of heroes from across the Marvel Universe. And while it’s always difficult to give newcomers all the necessary backstory to appreciate some of the lesser-known characters, Fraction and his team do an
Troy, in upstate New York, has been home to world traveled artist John Emmet Connors, and renowned surgeon and essayist Richard Selzer, who recounted his childhood in Troy in his memoir Down from Troy. In this book of nostalgic pen and watercolor paintings, Connors records the memories from his youth while maturing in this city. Sites such as schools, homes, hospitals, cemeteries, stores, and streets are captured in nostalgic, reflective strokes of pen and colorful brush. These illustrative images are accompanied with descriptive recollections of the impressions they made on the adolescent who, as an adult, wistfully and fondly recaptures the formative memories of his hometown. While the artist grew up in the fifties, these scenes of the working-class city capture the descriptions of that city during the Great Depression that was so movingly described in Richard Selzer’s account of his youth. This assemblage of paintings, along with the accompanying narratives of life in Troy, is an elegiac, poetic tribute to a city, its milieu, and the families that molded the resident artists. It is indeed a work of lyrical art. Reviewed by Aron Row
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 87
Book Reviews
Sequential Art
Eye of the World: the Graphic Novel, Volume Two By Robert Jordan, Chuck Dixon, Andie Tong (illustrator) Tor Books, $24.99, 176 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Rand al’Thor and his friends have left Emond’s Field under the protection of the Aes Sedai Moiraine and her Warder. This is definitely not the adventure they had all dreamed of having someday! As they try to keep a low profile to avoid the notice of any servants of the Dark One, issues begin to arise. Who can they trust? How much can they reveal about their pasts? Who is the mysterious girl Min, and how does she know so much about them? And what is Nynaeve, the village Wisdom, doing in Baerlon? Lovers of Robert Jordan’s epic fantasy series will definitely enjoy this second volume in the graphic novelization of The Eye of the World. Chuck Dixon has done an outstanding job converting the first novel of The Wheel of Time to comic-book form, and Andie Tong has put memorable faces to the names we’ve all been reading about for so long. The depictions of Moiraine’s weavings of saidar are well done, and the landscapes and towns are true to how they are described in the book. Fans of Jordan’s world will eagerly eat this one up and then wait in gleeful anticipation of the next volume. Reviewed by Holly Scudero Metro: A Story of Cairo By Magdy El Shafee, Chip Rossetti, Translator Metropolitan Books, $20.00, 98 pages, Format: Trade
«««« A story does not always need to end on a happy note. Metro: A Story of Cairo follows the exploits of Shehab, a software designer that robs a bank in order to make sure that his company does not go bankrupt. When he does so, he becomes part of a murder investigation that throws him into a corrupt world where all that matters is the size of your wallet. This all leads into some plot twists that make for some unhappy endings when all is said and done.
Although the art may be a little rough, it works rather well for this story. The subway maps make for some great transitions, and the characters are unique enough that it is easy to keep track of which character is doing what. The story is tight with a brisk pace, making this almost a noir light, and the twists back the theme rather nicely without being forced. You feel sorry for Shehab, as he can see the cage that is his life but he is ultimately unable to walk out of it. This is a great graphic novel, and helps set the mindset for Egypt prior to the Arab Spring. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim The Art of War: A Graphic Novel By Kelly Roman, and Michael DeWeese (artist) Harper Perennial, $22.99, 352 pages, Format: Trade
««« Sometimes it pays to leave the classics alone. The Art of War: A Graphic Novel is the story of Kelly Roman, an ex-Special Forces soldier who is looking to avenge his brother’s death. He thus enters into a world where his skills and implants help him gain an internship; although he is fired from the internship, he manages to obtain a leadership position in the company under Sun Tsu, the CEO. He is seeking an enigmatic figure known as The Prince. This is sort of a weird book to review. The art style, while stuck in the 80’s, right down to the mohawks, works well for this story. To a degree, even the story about vicious corporations has more of an 80’s feel to it; only the use of India makes it relatively current. However, naming the two villains after two specialists in management works against it, making it too obvious. The other issue is the constant use of Sun Tsu quotes; the quotes are used too frequently and when combined with there actually being a “Sun Tsu” character, makes it seem silly rather than effective. It’s a nice book, it just falls victim to its own devices. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 88
Book Reviews
Sequential Art
Fever Moon (Graphic Novel) By Karen Marie Moning Del Rey, $25.00, 184 pages, Format: Hard
««« Okay, so at least it wasn’t vampires. Fever Moon is a graphic novel based off the Fever series by Karen Marie Moning, exploring what happened during Dani’s absence. London is put through the wringer as a new menace preys on its population, taking facial features from its victims, leaving them as if the feature had never existed. MacKayla must deal with this menace, before all of its victims die and the danger fades once again. Although this is not for the kids, it makes for a pretty good horror story. Most of the supporting characters, such as Rowena, are portrayed as cardboard cut-outs, making interactions with them far too predictable. Also, in a debatable 1980s homage, Mac is a strong women who owes that to rape, giving her an aversion to sex even as she wears tight clothing. However, the story itself is strong; the buildup and exposition work, and the main villain is seriously scary. It actually helps that even the good fairies are scary, and not people you want to deal with. In the final analysis, this is actually not a bad graphic novel, especially if you like the strong sexy types of either gender. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim Wet Moon, Vol 6 By Ross Campbell Oni Press, $17.99, 154 pages, Format: Trade
« Nestled in between our world and one of fantasy is the town of Wet Moon, Florida. In this volume, the happy times of Fern’s twenty-first birthday are shattered by a sobering reality. Trilby was found beaten up, near death, and is in a coma. The group struggles to deal with the stress in their own way, with some coming out of this distress stronger and others weaker.
I enjoy the blur of reality and surrealism that Wet Moon brings to the party. While there are psychics and masked vigilantes, they live in a grounded world. As far as characters and plots go, the book falls a little flat. With being the sixth book in a series, characters should be more defined and distinguishable. Halfway into the book, people and plot lines begin to swirl together, making for a disjointed reading experience. When it comes to the art work, it is really well done. It keeps within the idea and theme of the book, but never delivers a memorable moment. For a book that wants to stand out and be different, it comes off very bland and homogenized. I think older audiences can find a little more bang for their bucks somewhere else. Reviewed by Kevin Brown Courtney Crumrin, Volume 2: The Coven of Mystics Special Edition By Ted Naifeh Oni Press, $19.99, 133 pages, Format: Hard
«««« The adventures of young teenage witch Courtney Crumrin continue in this volume. Courtney is still learning how to use her powers for good purposes and not just for selfish reasons, is struggling to make friends at school, and gets in trouble with her new teacher who is a witch as well. In this volume we follow Courtney as she encounters a dreaded hobgoblin, learns that life can’t be fair, and that even her uncle can’t control all events. Along the way Courtney learns many valuable lessons about the real world, and her role in it. How she can face her problems head on, and that life is not just black and white, but many shades of gray. She runs into political issues with the coven of mystics while trying to help out a new friend. At the end she is starting to work on making real friends in the nonmagical world. Like the previous volume, this book is focused on the night world, the world where things go bump in the night. Courtney has a lot of soul searching to do and Ted Naifeh does a good job of moving the story along. Reviewed by Kevin Winter
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 89
Book Reviews
Sequential Art
Guerillas, Volume 2 By Brahm Revel Oni Press, $17.99, 160 pages, Format: Trade
«« Private Clayton becomes our eyes as he travels with this AWOL platoon of chimpanzees. Set in the war-torn Vietnam countryside in the height of the Vietnam War, the cat and mouse game continues in Volume 2. Following the chimps are a platoon of human soldiers, Dr. Hiesler, and his blood hound baboon, Adolf. The chimps and Clayton stumble upon a viper nest of Viet Cong, and show some of their more humanistic qualities. Closely following, and ruining out of patience, are Captain Stewart’s men, as they deal with both external and internal enemies. This is an interesting book. I didn’t read the first volume and the story was easy enough to understand without having to read it. The art is simplistic with a couple of really detailed closeups for dramatic effects. Sadly, half of the metaphors for the story become cliché and out of place. It hurts the overall feel of the book when storylines being to feel less genuine. After reading it, I wasn’t sure who to root for, or who was the protagonist of the plot. Plain and simple, I wasn’t captivated by the story. Much like Clayton, I was only there to watch the ride. Reviewed by Kevin Brown
Channel Zero: The Complete Collection By Brian Wood, Becky Cloonan (illustrator) Dark Horse, $19.99, 296 pages, Format: Trade
««« It is sort of interesting how even a decade can age some works. Jenny 2.5 is the producer of Channel Zero, a pirate broadcast in a totalitarian version of the United States. She is eventually captured and banished; when she returns she decides that the fight is no longer hers. There is also the prequel, which is how she became the agent provocateur of a worldwide movement. All told, the first half is a great book, and it should have been a lot better known than it was, especially as it has all of the potential to have become a great meme. The second story, “Jenny One,” shows why prequels rarely work; there are just too many clichés at work for it to be related to the first half. However, the rest of the book is a worthy classic; it makes a great point that the fight does shift to the next generation, and would have been a great first chapter for a series; in fact, there was supposed to be more, but, well, things happened. For those who like dystopian futures, especially with the United States as the bad guy, this is definitely a must read. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 90
Book Reviews Category
Music & Movies
blueprints of the Batcave and The Bat (the flying vehicle that made its debut in The Dark Knight Rises), and a map of Gotham City. The back of the book even contains a hidden disc with awesome high-res images. This definitive guide for Batman aficionados will satisfy anyone’s need to know more, and will help them not only find a new appreciation for Christopher Nolan’s work, but a newfound understanding of the complex world in his Batman trilogy. Reviewed by Ross Rojek Batmobile: The Complete History By Mark Cotta Vaz, Paul Levitz, Foreword, Nathan Crowley, Foreword Insight Editions, $35.00, 141 pages, Format: Hard
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The Dark Knight Manual: Tools, Weapons, Vehicles and Documents from the Batcave By Brandon T. Snider Insight Editions, $40.00, 112 pages, Format: Hard
«««« With Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy coming to a close with The Dark Knight Rises, we say farewell to the movies that redefined Batman for this generation. With this chapter of Batman’s long history, fans of this iteration can delve even further into Christopher Nolan’s world with The Dark Knight Manual, the must-have guide to Batman’s tricks of the trade showcased in the movies. After his manor was destroyed, Batman started collecting documents and observations pertinent to becoming the Dark Knight, and then conferred the manual to his ever loyal butler Alfred. The book has everything from the movies; every gadget, every vehicle, every key location, and even case files on villains from the movies, like The Joker and Dr. Crane. The book also has removable inserts, including
From it’s first appearance in Detective Comics #27, to the awesomely realistic Tumbler in Christopher Nolan’s movies, the Batmobile has been an icon alongside the dark knight. Starting as a simple sedan, the car took on darker paint and bat motifs, slowly evolving into the powerhouse of a machine that rushes Batman to the scene of crimes. From its start and changes in the comic industry, to it’s big appearances on the TV and movie screens across the world, Batmobile: The Complete History examines the the different forms this iconic car took over the years. Seeing as though this book is being released alongside The Dark Knight Rises, readers can expect this book to go into deeper detail on the Tumbler featured in Nolan’s movies more than other versions. The Batmobile changed with the times alongside Batman, reflecting the time in our world, and increasingly changed from the boring grey convertible, heading into the 1955 Lincoln Futura with the iconic jet exhaust. This fun and campy cars soon gave way to the dark, gritty, and sleek Batmobile created by Tim Burton and Anton Furst. Even that beast would be overshadowed soon by the awe-inspiring car from Batman Forever. Whether you’re a huge Batman fan or you just want to see the history of the iconic car, this book is sure to find a nice place in your collection. Reviewed by Ross Rojek
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 91
Book Reviews
Category
Pop Culture
There was a ridiculous amount of research that went into this book, and it shows. This is a fun romp through history, looking at how food was stolen and then stolen back, each time improving it in some way. This book shows how two cultures are linked by the food and the history of the two lands, and that the link cannot be ignored, no matter how serious the attempt, as the two countries inevitably will be brought closer together. This is a fun book, and one that anyone who is serious about their food will enjoy; just remember to read with a treadmill nearby. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim Robots Feel Nothing When They Hold Hands By Alec Sulkin, Mike Desilets, Artie Johann, Joe Vaux (illustrator), Dominic Bianchi (illustrator) Chronicle Books, $14.95, 192 pages, Format: Trade
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Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America By Gustavo Arellano Scribner, $25.00, 310 pages, Format: Hard
««««« This is a book for those who enjoy their food, and who enjoy knowing where it came from. Taco USA looks at the history of a number of Mexican foods, exploring the past and the stories of the food, and how it became prominent in American culture. This book also demonstrates the discrimination against the Mexican people, and how their food was co-opted by white America. Eventually there were two paths taken by most foods: One path led to the food becoming “corrupted” by corporations and the other led to delicious food being created by the people who loved the food.
For the majority of users, Twitter is a place to upload pictures of food and make complaints about the minutiae of their daily lives. In the right hands, though, Twitter becomes an exercise in creative genius. Family Guy writers Alec Sulkin, Artie Johann, and Michael Desilets have perfected the art of the Twitter update, and this inaugural collection of their most hilarious tweets (I cannot believe this will be their only compilation) delivers small bites of their humor with the teeth of a piranha. With their background on what can be one of the most pointlessly offensive shows on network television, you’d to expect this book to contain some truly gross stuff, and you’d be right. At least half of the jokes made me shake my head in disbelief. But all of the jokes made me laugh. Out loud. The rough illustrations by Joe Vaux and Dominic Bianchi are a nice touch, too. (Think of those old cartoons from Playboy, only funny.) Robots Feel Nothing When They Hold Hands would make a great gift for anyone who isn’t easily offended, especially if they think social media websites are just a place where creativity goes to die. Reviewed by Amanda Mitchell
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 92
Book Reviews Category
Humor Nonfiction
Whether it’s listing five ways plants interact with each other -- “They don’t. They’re plants. They can’t talk or hang out. Is this a trick question?” -- or explaining how the brain is like a cantaloupe -- “It is delicious” -- some of these responses are laugh-out-loud funny. (The sheer chutzpah behind this one had me stitches: Correct the error in the sentence: The girl were extraordinarily intelligent. “The boy were extraordinarily intelligent.”) A few of these were so spot-on, I would’ve awarded full credit for ingenuity. What great fun. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas Steel Rainbow: The Legendary Underground Guide to Becoming an ‘80s Rock Star By Jordan Hart Lyon’s Press, $12.95, 202 pages, Format: Trade
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F for Effort By Richard Benson Chronicle Books, $9.95, 128 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Funny test answers are among the most commonly shared Internet memes. If you’ve never stumbled across one yourself, I’m sure an email’s worth has been forwarded to you at some point. F for Effort is Richard Benson’s second collection of these meme-worthy messages, and there are some real gems hidden within its pages. The book is divided between elementary school answers and high school answers. The elementary school ones are mostly misspellings and misapprehensions like “If you are really naughty you get exploded from school” or “Two halves make a whale,” while the high school ones are a mix of genuine mistakes and clever attempts at distraction or dodging the question.
Remember: after reading this book, destroy it. Steel Rainbow looks at how hair bands were able to take over the world for one brief decade, and why they are still some of the most remembered bands even when they completely mess it up. This book covers how to become a successful hair band and what it takes to be on top of the world, even if you don’t know anything about playing your instruments, even though it helps. Do everything this books says and you, too, will be rich and famous. If you loved Spinal Tap, you will love this book. It looks at how hair bands ruled the world, making it look like there was a formula for success that actually worked. It explores every aspect, including how to properly wear scarves and do guitar tricks. It even shows who is the most important in the band, showing why it rocks to be the lead singer and why bass player is the worst position in the band. This is arguably one of the funniest books on rock bands in a while, and definitely a nice nostalgia trip for those of us in the know. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 93
Book Reviews Category
Romance
an Englishman abroad comes up missing, another wayward Brit is charged with finding him and the one hundred thousand pounds he was carrying to safety. Problem is, the wayward Brit had previously been betrothed to the sister of the now-missing man. I didn’t much care for any of the characters or the plot, and the writing was badly mishandled by the editing process, but the dénouement? Splendid. Adventuresome with a few unexpected twists. I ended up quite liking the entirety! Reviewed by Kelly Ferjutz Save The Last Dance By M.G. Crisci Orca Publishing, $15.95, 332 pages, Format: eBook
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Blackstone’s Bride By Kate Moore Berkley Sensation, $7.99, 304 pages, Format: Mass
««« Have you ever gone to a renowned restaurant for a scrumptious meal, but nothing was quite as you imagined it would be? It was all edible, but just not the spectacular treat you’d planned? But then – ah, then came dessert, and it was so great, you ended up feeling quite satisfied by the entire experience! That’s sort of my reaction after reading this book. Kate Moore has written some of my very favorite books – all Regency novels. When that genre tried to go belly-up, helped along by the publishers who totally ignored their devoted readers, authors were forced to try other genres. Kate turned to mostly historicals, set close to the Regency period. This one is 1825, after the death of Lord Byron in Greece. There are still rebels here and there, however, and when
The prologue shows Fanny today at age 92, showing a glimplse at her life now as she remembers Charlie. Then the novel begins going back to July 26, 1912, setting the historical scene in Little Italy in New York with the beginning of the story of a seven-year-old Fanny Coscia and eight-year-old Charlie Imperale. As Fanny and Charlie age, readers are there beside them watching, rapidly turning pages to keep up with all that occurs between and around them. Based on a true story, this novel does not disappoint. In this reviewer’s opinion, writing a novel about a true story many times falls short in the telling, bringing with it a sense of being unbelievable. Crisci, however, brings a mastery of his fiction writing skills to all areas of this novel. The plot, historical setting, pacing, dialogue, and character development excel. His scenes are authentic with characters true to their time. Photographs that look taken from a family album add credibility and historical validity to the story. Absorbed in the story of Charlie and Fanny, readers additionally are privy to a time in the past they may not have lived, but feel like they are living now beside them. Readers will relate to their story, discovering a time when things were concurrently simpler and more difficult.
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 94
Book Reviews
Romance
Thinly veiling the identities of Charlie and Fanny, Crisci has shared much more than had he written just a historical memoir. The novel illustrates enduring, unconditional love that transcends decades and circumstances. This is a love rarely found, and one easily misunderstood. It is a love that seeks only the well-being of the loved one, standing strong in all human frailties. It is a tribute to this love that Crisci has so expertly crafted, allowing readers to be part of the experience. Sponsored Review Rescue Me By Rachel Gibson Avon, $7.99, 373 pages, Format: Mass
««« Sadie is back in her hometown as an attendant in a wedding and she’s not thrilled about it. Her hometown is a small town she left as soon as she could, and has rarely been back to visit over the last decade and a half. The fact that everyone there knows her business and thinks they know what is best for her doesn’t help. Vince Haven finds himself in this same small town to help out an aunt, and when Sadie does a favor for him he decides her request of a wedding date will square their deal. Sadie and Vince are easy characters to get behind. They are both self-motivated entrepreneurs and know how to get things done. The fact that those attributes can lead to them rubbing each other the wrong way is as inevitable as it is believable. It’s natural that the two outsiders would be drawn to each other, and, excepting an odd choice on Gibson’s part for their first intimate interaction, their relationship hits just the right note. As the story progresses, they each experience personal changes that make them re-examine what it is they want in life. Readers will be as satisfied with their personal solutions as with the support they find in each other by the book’s end. Reviewed by Rachel Wallace
A Night Like This By Julia Quinn Avon, $7.99, 373 pages, Format: Mass
«« Anne Wynter has a secret that she has been keeping quite well. She is a governess in a welcoming household full of people who don’t ask any questions about her family or background, which is just as she prefers. That is, no one asks any questions until the head the household is once again welcome in England. Daniel Smythe-Smith has been exiled for years after a drunken night led to a duel that ended badly. He is home again and more than intrigued by the woman employed by his cousin. Sparks fly almost immediately, and the two must decide best how to contend with their extraordinary circumstances. In A Night Like This Julia Quinn serves up an indifferent and rather bland romance. While there is certainly nothing to dislike in the main characters, or even the lively secondary characters, there isn’t much to strongly engage a reader either. The plot makes no attempt to stray from well-worn romance staples, and the mores of the Regency period are only loosely followed. Quinn’s refreshing style and wit will appeal to longtime and new readers, but new readers won’t be seeing Quinn at her best if they were to start with this title. Reviewed by Rachel Wallace Bride of the High Country By Kaki Warner Berkley, $15.00, 373 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Margaret Hamilton had a hard start in life and was saved from a horrible brothel only by a fire and kind strangers. A wealthy benefactor offered her a fresh start and introduced the poor Irish miss into American society. Marrying Irish railroad businessman Doyle Kerrigan is the logical next step in the equation. She doesn’t love him, but he offers her security. As the wedding nears, Margaret starts
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Book Reviews
Romance
to hear rumors about Doyle’s cruel past. His true colors become blatantly clear and she know she has only one choice: to run away. Urged on my her benefactor, Margaret leaves behind her life in Manhattan and flees west to start a new life: new name, new friends, new future. Unfortunately her past isn’t so easy to escape. When Tait agrees to track down and return Doyle’s runaway bride, he doesn’t expect to fall hopelessly in love with her. The last thing Margaret wants is a relationship with her ex’s right-hand man. Yet passion has other plans… if murderous revenge and hot-on-the-trail detectives don’t get in their way! Kaki Warner’s newest novel in her Runaway Brides series is instantly captivating. I normally stick to renaissance romance and had not read anything by this author before, but quickly fell in love with Warner’s American West setting and her deep, multi-dimensional characters. I’ve never met a set of characters quite like these and cannot wait to pick up the next book in this series! Reviewed by Jennifer Melville Almost a Scandal: The Reckless Brides By Elizabeth Essex St. Martin’s Press, $7.99, 368 pages, Format: Mass
«««« With its conventional chest-baring cover, a reader might dismiss Almost A Scandal: The Reckless Brides without a second thought. For readers willing to take a chance, however, they will be rewarded with fast-moving action that’s dense with nautical details. Sally Kent, a fetching lass who comes from a family of distinguished naval officers, plans to pull off one of the oldest ruses since Shakespeare. Her youngest brother has refused his sailing orders; Sally thinks that taking his place will save the family honor. Her brother is named Richard, of course. Sally’s impersonation goes undetected until her superior, Lieutenant Colyear, finds himself physically attracted to the ship’s newest recruit. His relief at discovering her secret is full of subtle humor.
There are a lot of realistic war scenes in the novel that makes it unusual for a historical romance. Unfortunately, the last third of the book is set on dry land, and the characters don’t fare well there. The pacing and the narrative changes considerably at this point, which might frustrate some readers who just got used to the blood and bluster of the previous chapters. Despite this small flaw, Almost a Scandal: The Reckless Brides is probably the most enjoyable romance I’ve read recently. Reviewed by Rachel Anne Calabia All Afternoon with a Scandalous Marquess By Alexandra Hawkins St. Martin’s Press, $7.99, 315 pages, Format: Mass
««« I am a huge fan of Alexandra Hawkins’ Lords of Vice series and was extremely excited to delve right into the latest novel in the series, All Afternoon With a Scandalous Marquess. Would the “Saint,” the Marquess of Sainthill, finally find the woman of his dreams? Or would he revert to the gambling, womanizing, decadent ways for which he is famous? True to his reputation, Simon Jefferes, the Marques of Sainthill, sets out to do the impossible. He falls in love with one woman he cannot have, mysterious and beautiful Madame Venna. The proprietor of London’s most exclusive brothel, Madame Venna must keep her guard up at all times. She even wears a half mask to protect her identity, just as she protects her business. The closer she and Sainthill become, the more she feels she has to lose and the more he wants her. Can Sainthill do the impossible and make her his? While I loved the plot line and the chemistry between Sainthill and Madame Venna, I was shocked by the ending. It just ended. Seriously. There was no conclusion to the story, no tying together of the loose ends. It feels as if the story is not complete, and not in a good way. This isn’t my favorite in the series and doesn’t live up to Hawkins’ previous titles. I’ll still read the next book in the series and hope it’s much more conclusive than this one! Reviewed by Jennifer Melville
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 96
Book Reviews
Category
Fashion & Beauty Marilyn in Fashion: The Enduring Influence of Marilyn Monroe
By Christopher Nickens, George Zeno Running Press, $30.00, 288 pages, Format: Hard
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Marilyn Monroe will always make for an interesting case study in pop culture. Marilyn in Fashion looks at the fashion history of Marilyn, who designed for her and why she wore what she did. It looks at her mistakes as well as her successes, giving us a glimpse into the world of the person being dressed. This is an impressive exploration of a person who defined part of our history, giving us a glimpse into a very private person. Although there is a much higher percentage of black and white pictures than there probably should have been, it is nonetheless a great pictorial of how important Marilyn was. Most books on her have attempted to look at her through her history; this is one of the few that helps us to understand her and that history in terms of the fashion itself, and how hers changed over the years in order to make herself more beautiful. At the same time, it tracks her personal tragedies and how she had to adapt to meet those challenges. Although it can be read as a simple sartorial history, there is a lot more to this book than it seems, just like its subject. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 97
Book Reviews
Three-Way: Erotic Adventures Category
Relationship & Sex
By Alison Tyler, editor Cleis Press, $15.95, 230 pages, Format: Trade
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When you pick up a book with the words “erotic adventures” in its title, you expect the stories inside to be, well, erotic. You expect them to inspire fantasy and to be titillating, and some of the tales in this collection fulfill those expectations perfectly. However, many of the stories in this book caused me to think more about humanity and the temporary nature of happiness rather than about anything erotic. One story begins with a female hooker attending the funeral of her former client. Another is about a long-married couple who try to escape the obvious fact that their marriage is failing by having a weekend tryst. There is a beautifully written narrative in which a model discusses the many pressures women face to be attractive and the damaging psychological and physical effects of those pressures. All of the authors included in this book are incredibly talented, however, I feel as though many of them are using the erotic genre to express deep thoughts about life. This is great if you want an almost philosophical read about the various ways that sex becomes involved in human emotional conflicts, but if you’re just looking for a few fun stories to pass the time, this book is not for you. This is a shame because some of the inclusions, such as “If You Can Make It Here, You Can Make It Anywhere” and “Harvest Time,” are perfect examples of erotic writing, meaning that they do exactly what you expect them to. Reviewed by Audrey Curtis
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 98
Book Reviews
Category
Health, Fitness & Dieting
gestions to help any woman attain the body of her dreams. I love working out and am always looking for a new way to change things up a bit, so I was really excited to try this book. The stretches felt phenomenal and the leg toning exercises worked well. I swear that I could tell a difference after the first workout! These exercises challenged my muscles a lot. I only wish that the descriptions had been a bit more detailed. I haven’t done ballet since I was a child and didn’t know exactly what I was supposed to do much of the time. I ended up guessing a bit, and it seemed to work. Although, I think I’d prefer the author’s DVD series over the book. Bowers’ recipes and lifestyle suggestions are helpful. I really liked her five ballet-beautiful eating principles: be prepared, eat often, substitute for satisfaction, be flexible, and forgive yourself and move on. Combining Bowers’ exercises and eating tips is a surefire way to change up your workout or jump-start your weight loss plan. Reviewed by Jennifer Melville The Healing Remedies Sourcebook: Over 1000 Natural Remedies to Prevent and Cure Common Ailments By C. Norman Shealy Da Capo Lifelong Books, $25.99, 432 pages, Format: Trade
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Ballet Beautiful: Transform Your Body and Gain the Strength, Grace, and Focus of a Ballet Dancer By Mary Helen Bowers Da Capo Lifelong, $20.00, 251 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Dancers are known for their long, lean bodies and amazing physiques. What woman wouldn’t want to look like that? Now it doesn’t take hours of dancing and years of practice to achieve that goal. Professional ballerina, and former New York City Ballet dancer, Mary Helen Bowers offers a sixty-minute full body workout, short fifteen-minute workout alternatives, as well as diet and lifestyle sug-
Jampacked with over one thousand natural remedies, and nicely illustrated, this sourcebook could quickly replace just about every remedy reference book that you have on your shelf now. The Healing Remedies Sourcebook is broken up into two parts. Part one covers a multitude of therapy methods; such as, Ayurvedic, Folk, and Flower Essences; explaining their history and basic methods. Part two gets down to the specific remedies used to treat common ailments with specific treatments taken from each discipline. The sheer breadth of information covered might be a bit daunting at first, but one can quickly find assistance for everything from skin problems to first aid, and every body
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 99
Book Reviews
Health, Fitness & Dieting
system in between. What makes this book stand out is that it doesn’t focus on just one particular therapy method. One can quickly find multiple options taken from the different disciplines that fall under the natural healing umbrella. Written for both the beginner, and those that are more experienced and ready to try a different path, The Healing Remedies Sourcebook is just that, the perfect source for the answers to all of your natural healing questions. Whatever ails you, or if you are just curious as to your alternatives, this is the book to add to your arsenal. Reviewed by Gwen Stackler The French Twist: Twelve Secrets of Decadent Dining and Natural Weight Management By Carol Cottrill Morgan James Publishing, $17.95, 228 pages, Format: Trade
our population weighs in as obese.” We worry about obesity in our children, yet America’s school lunch programs lag behind the French. “In France, school meals are important. The French spend more on school lunches than we do and use school meals as an educational tool to instill proper eating habits and good manners.” After an epilogue, there is an appendix of body and beauty foods with their key nutritional elements and benefits, which, when eaten, improve both health and appearance. This appendix could be a book unto itself. Further endorsing the French concept of variety in food choices, it shows how each, specifically and differently, benefits health, providing an exceptional reference guide. Sponsored Review
««««« American nutritionist Carol Cottrill shares the French Paradox. The French have a higher life expectancy and lower average weight than Americans do. Yet, as the French indulge in the rich foods, we consider forbidden, their health is better. “The French style of eating – sitting down with delight and savoring every bite with discretion, moderation, and passion – is the answer.” In twelve chapters, with interludes on cheese, bread, and chocolate, Cottrill expands on the paradox, sharing how Americans can learn to use these twelve French secrets to manage weight and improve health. The twelve secrets are your natural weight, no resistance, quality, pleasure, balance, real food, portions, metabolism, exercise, rhythms and rituals, values, and eating the French way. Each chapter shares personal anecdotes with statistical information to delve further into each area, showing the wisdom of this more natural and enjoyable approach to our relationship with food. What this reviewer found especially significant was how obvious this natural approach seems, but how it is one to which most Americans have not been privy. As the author shares, our society endorses diet after diet, but still we have “the highest obesity ranking in the world – 34.3 percent of San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 100
Book Reviews Category
Cooking, Food & Wine
and plenty of beverage ideas. The author also includes hints such as how to spruce up store-bought desserts and party ideas such as manicure mania, a hair station, and spin the nail polish. But it is not without its faults. The organization and layout are poor; no simple steps of party planning, and the pages are confusing with changing fonts and double-page collages of photos, mixed with color photos and comics-like sketches. The author’s identical smiling face on every few pages is almost embarrassing. Index is very good. Reviewed by George Erdosh Seriously Simple Parties: Recipes, Menus, & Advice for Effortless Enterntaining By Diane Rossen Worthington Chronicle Books, $24.95, 224 pages, Format: Trade
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You’re So Invited: Panic Less, Play More, and Get Your Party On! By Cheryl Najafi St. Martin’s Press, $29.99, 191 pages, Format: Hard
««« You’re So Invited is filled with a lot of useful information for anyone who wants to throw a party—well, not exactly anyone. Cheryl Najafi has written this book targeting young female hostesses only, although she added a chapter, “Guys-Only Scotch & Cigar Gathering.” She includes anything and everything for organizing and executing a good party; having numerous tables, lists, sidebars, secrets, and hints, such as a final countdown, starting three weeks before going to right before the party, and seven rules introducing the book. Using unusual flower containers, lighting and a shopping guide for the party, and much more helpful information. A large number of simple recipes are scattered throughout that include preparation and cooking times
Who doesn’t love a party? Now, what about throwing the party? I sense fewer hands in the air. I, for one, love to plan an inviting soiree from time to time, but I have to admit the anxiety can put a damper on the process and what starts out as great idea becomes overwrought with overwhelm. Help! Seriously Simple Parties is on the way…an inclusive guide to aid in the planning for your next celebration (grand or casual). Diane Rossen Worthington shows readers how to begin with lists and schedules, stock the party pantry, whether it is a family-style event or a potluck you are host(ess) of, and menus. A wonderful addition to this enticing offering is the ease of execution on the meals. As a food lover, but not a chef, I take great confidence and encouragement in the selections. I can hardly mess up the Warm Sweet and Spicy Mixed Nuts. Feeling a little more inspired? Go for the Grilled Flatbreads or Pizzas for that Super Bowl afternoon. She displays a wide selection for your event, taste, and skill-level. Don’t forget the sips and sweets. She has everything covered… now just pick a date and get to the (anxiety-free) planning. Reviewed by Sky Sanchez-Fischer
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 101
Book Reviews
Cooking, Food & Wine
The Pickled Pantry: From Apples to Zucchini, 150 Recipes for Pickles, Relishes, Chutneys & More By Andrea Chesman Storey Publishing, LLC, $19.95, 303 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Pickled Pantry could not have been published in a more appropriate time—many cooks are going back to canning, and using local, fresh ingredients assures that in off-season they can open a jar of their very own pickles. Does it take too much time? Not at all. Many, particularly fermented pickles (sauerkraut, half-sour, kim chi), take no time to assemble and not much equipment. Andrea Chesman nicely outlines the makings of a complete array of pickles in her book: fermented, single jar, fresh-pack, and refrigerator/freezer pickles, also salsas, relishes, and chutneys. This trade paperback book is well organized and attractively packaged. Many small, beautiful gouache-on-paper paintings enliven the pages—they are so pretty you want to leaf through the book just to find them. Recipes are easy to follow, well-written with ingredients offset on the left, and many with helpful kitchen notes. Head notes are also good, providing you with information on the origin of the recipe or about the ingredients. For your convenience, recipes are laid out on single pages. The book is filled with useful sidebars. Chesman includes twelve profiles of prominent pickling people and their web sites. The well-cross-referenced index is excellent. Reviewed by George Erdosh Joe: The Coffee Book By Jonathan Rubinstein, Steve Pool (photographer) Lyons Press, $19.95, 139 pages, Format: Trade
««« The second most popular beverage of the world after tea, most of us love a good coffee. Dozens of books have been written on coffee over the years, and Joe: The Coffee Book is just another one in this succession. Like all the others, the authors give detailed history of how coffee is grown,
harvested, processed, roasted, brewed, and finally served by skilled baristas, illustrated by photos and sketches. Many of the photos and text are simply promoting Joe, a small New York coffee chain, showing the place, owners, guests, and baristas. The book is a medium format high-quality trade paperback, written by the sibling owners Jonathan and Gabrielle Rubinstein. The layout and artistic creativity are disappointing. Photos placed in mosaics are confusing with nothing the eye can focus on, many mixed with sketches to make presentation even more crowded. Illustrations in general are not of very good quality. A section of nineteen pages of many quotes and photos by people from all walks of life appears to be filler with little meaning. A chapter called “Bringing it Home” describes the many home brewing equipment available. Reviewed by George Erdosh The Book of Beer Awesomeness: A Champion’s Guide to Party Skills, Amazing Beer Activities, and More Than Forty Drinking Games By Applebaum, Ben Chronicle Books, $15.95, 206 pages, Format: Trade
«««« There are a number of ways to get drunk, but the best ways involve a crowd. The Book of Beer Awesomeness explores the history of beer, how beer is drunk properly, and then veers quickly into drinking games. The games covered range from games requiring no skill or even much thinking to those requiring some skill and strategy; there is a game for everyone in this tome and there is an extremely helpful flow chart to help you. This is a great book for those looking for a good drinking primer. The drinking tricks will help you amuse the casual drinkers, and the drink-
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 102
Book Reviews
Cooking, Food & Wine
ing tips are great for advanced drinkers. The large number of games presented will allow for many nights of drinking fun. This book does not treat itself too seriously, and that is probably its greatest strength; with the beer quotes, coaching tips, and brew facts throughout the book, it makes for some great reading. The only flaw with this book is the lack of the more interesting beer recipes, but that’s about it. If you want to see just how much fun someone can have while drinking, this is the book for you. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
that we are in the process of losing forever. The chronology of them is summarized at the end of the book, though only for Britain. Under useful addresses, U.S. seed suppliers are also listed. Reviewed by George Erdosh
Looking for some down-home cookin’?
Heirloom Fruits and Vegetables By Toby Musgrave, Clay Perry (photographer) Thames & Hudson, $50.00, 324 pages, Format: Hard
««««« This large-format book, Heirloom Fruits & Vegetables, was created by the Royal Horticultural Society at a no-expensespared luxurious style. It can adorn and be the centerpiece of the coffee table in the most sophisticated, most demanding home. The cover is cloth over heavy-duty card stock and the pages are thick and glossy. The content is of no less quality. The fruits and vegetables are listed by seasons. Each is accompanied by a half- to one-page text giving the plant’s botanical and historic settings and a quote from early history. The accompanying photographs are museum-quality pieces of art work, any of which you would be glad to hang on your wall. Some half- some full- and some double-page photos are so stunning that you are likely to leaf through the book before reading the text. Published in Britain, all references refer to the British scene, though non-British readers will enjoy this publication just as much. This book celebrates and describes our heirloom fruits and vegetables
Download the Unofficial Guide to Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 103
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Book Reviews Category
Sports & Outdoors
you what to do. The most important tip, and the one most expounded upon, is to make sure that you do not have to fight in the first place. For those who want a few more suggestions on how to fight, this makes a welcome addition to the bookshelf. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim Big Hair and Plastic Grass: A Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging ‘70s By Dan Epstein St. Martin’s Griffin, $15.99, 340 pages, Format: Trade
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Hank Reinhardt’s Book of Knives: A Practical and Illustrated Guide to Knife Fighting By Hank Reinhardt Baen, $13.00, 192 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Knife fighting has been romanticized too much so it’s nice to see a book take a shot at that reputation. Hank Reinhardt’s Book of Knives looks at the history and evolution of knives, as well as offering some tips on how to conduct oneself in a knife fight; from an undisputed master on both. The book is divided into three parts: general notes on how to fight from Reinhardt himself, some notes on fighting and knives from various experts, and more specific tips from Greg Phillips. Reinhardt, prior to his passing, was one of the few undisputed experts in both the history and manner of knives. This book is an informal tutorial in how to fight with various bladed weapons, and there is little doubt that what is presented here will help you if you have no choice but to fight; with illustrations and pictures which help to show
Author Dan Epstein takes the reader on a ride through baseball in the 1970’s with Big Hair and Plastic Grass: a Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging 70’s. The Seventies were my first full decade of being interested in baseball. I remembered all of the events that Epstein talks about, but he brings an in-depth detail that I was not aware of in most cases. Epstein covers all of the big moments in baseball in the 1970’s, from the move of the Seattle Pilots to Milwaukee and the Washington Senators’ move to Texas. If you stop and think about it, the 70’s were one of the most eventful decades in baseball. The decade in baseball really began with the Curt Flood anti trust case ruling, the tragic death of Roberto Clemente, the free agency that marked the mid-decade that closed out with the first multi-million dollar contracts, the disco destruction fiasco at Comisky Park between a White Sox doubleheader and the Pirates “we are family.” Epstein breaks down each of the teams headed for the playoffs and world series each year, both the highlights and lowlights and the players that got them there. Epstein writes in an easy style. He has some interesting anecdotal commentary about the events that affected baseball and, to a certain extent, society. Reviewed by Marc Filippelli
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 105
Book Reviews Category
Science & Nature
The account is at times a little dry because all of our questions about dolphins have not been answered. Many will find this personal diary inspiring nonetheless. The research goes on and one can join The Wild Dolphin Project and be part of the effort to try to communicate with our oceanic neighbors. We have reached an impasse here with dolphins. Storm seasons have also grown worse over the years, making this effort more difficult. We do learn that dolphins form groups and, like whales, may be part of cultures we don’t fully understand. Herzing’s account is filled with anecdotes and a wealth of knowledge about other efforts to communicate with animals elsewhere. She has added to the work that has already been done with dolphins. Her cosmological musings suggest that maybe animal communication research belongs in the field of SETI which seeks to communicate with intelligent life out in the cosmos. There are some “aliens” right here. Reviewed by Ryder Miller Zoobiquity: What Animals Can Teach Us About Health and the Science of Eating By Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, Kathryn Bowers Knopf, $26.95, 310 pages
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Dolphin Diaries: My 25 Years with Spotted Dolphins in the Bahamas By Denise L. Herzing St. Martin’s Griffin, $16.99, 314 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Dolphin Diaries provides a fascinating account of Dr. Denise L. Herzing attempt to establish two way communication between human beings and the spotted dolphins of the Bahamas. Her efforts establishes her in the ranks of such notables as Dian Fossey and Jane Goodall, who had spent their lives doing similar work with primates. Chronicled here is a personal story of twenty-five years of research.
Zoobiquity reveals a hidden side of animal behavior few suspected ever existed. Most of the book is written in the first person narrative style with Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, M.D., holding the reins. The link between animal and human maladies is often seen as disparate sides of the same coin. During the course of exploring this book, the reader finds that there’s much more common ground between human medicine and veterinary medicine than most of us ever thought possible. It is because, according to the authors, all animals (including humans) share common experiences in mating, eating, fear, and anger. Exactly how each of us (or each of the animals) deals with it depends on the animal’s unique survival strategy.
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Book Reviews
Science & Nature
The chapter devoted to fainting opens up understanding to an amazing adaptation strategy that works equally well for animals and humans. Among the biggest chapters, Chapter Four, Roar-gasms, takes the reader by surprise. It establishes, in purely scientific terms, the extent to which human sexuality embraces the same characteristics as animal sexuality. As human beings emerge into the twenty-first century, we are realizing our true place in Earth’s biosphere. This book teaches us a great deal. Here is a collection of information that any scientist, physician, veterinarian, or layman can find appealing and learn from. It’s a volume that bestows upon us insight and appreciation of our evolutionary past in pristine detail. The book reads like a best-selling novel, crisp and directed towards a serious goal with a tight grip on the theme. Read it! Reviewed by D. Wayne Dworsky Secrets of Triangles: A Mathematical Journey By Alfred S. Posamentier, and Ingmar Lehman Prometheus Books, $26.00, 300 pages, Format: Hard
««« Triangles seem simple. They’re the simplest shape, after all, just three lines connected to each other. There are isosceles triangles, right triangles, and equilateral triangles; triangles with acute angles and obtuse angles. But did you know that lurking amidst those three simple lines are numerous complex ideas and relationships, some discovered thousands of years ago, and some still being discovered today? Secrets of Triangles is both a rather dense mathematical treatise and a joyously nerdy celebration of the history of geometry and trigonometry, exploring the dozens and dozens of curiosities sitting just beneath the surface of a seemingly ordinary triangle. There are loads of interesting concepts here, relationships and parallels and other mathematical wonders that make you marvel at the ability of the mathematicians who uncovered them.
Make no mistake, Secrets of Triangles does require an investment of both time and patience, as the book quickly escalates into some pretty heavy mathematics, but worry not, as the numerous proofs and formulae are thankfully mitigated by numerous diagrams illustrating the given concepts. By no means a casual read, Secrets of Triangles is nonetheless worth a look, if only to blow your mind. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas Love’s Executioner: & Other Tales of Psychotherapy By Irvin D. Yalom Basic Books, $15.00, 312 pages, Format: Trade
«« In the second edition of this book originally published in the 80s, the writer adds his more current impressions of the work following this lapse in time. The author, Irvin Yalom, is a noted psychotherapist stationed at Stanford University. Combining storytelling with descriptive case studies, each chapter views a different patient and the problems he/she confronts. Whether it be love addiction, obesity, approaching death, fear of attachment, or other dilemmas, the writer shows his attempts to assist his client to confront the haunting challenges and to work on processes that can lead to a more functioning reality. Psychotherapy appears to be a discipline that relies on both art and science. While the science aspect of the doctor’s ministering was fuzzy for this layperson, it may be more apparent to the specialist. Most of the treatment appeared to emanate from personal intuition and the ability to achieve empathic communication between the therapist and patient. Unfortunately, while the patients seeking therapeutic help appeared to suffer severe mental anguish, they did not arouse a sympathetic appeal in this reader. This is a book that will probably speak to those engaged in the psychology field; however, tales of years of recalcitrant mental clients are not especially uplifting. Reviewed by Aron Row
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Book Reviews
Science & Nature
The Locavore’s Dilemma By Pierre Desrochers, Hiroko Shimizu PublicAffairs, $26.99, 304 pages
cannot decide whether its premise supports the locavores or the technological specialists. Reviewed by D. Wayne Dworsky
«««« This book appears to describe the dichotomy of local vs. global food production and supply. On the one hand, the production of local food is very beneficial (arguments provided). On the other hand, globalization and specialization is inescapable. The authors compare the many disenchanted factions with the SOLE food operation. We’re not talking about soul food. SOLE means sustainable, organic, local, ethical. It’s way too much to serve on anyone’s argumentative plate, but authors Pierre Desrochers and Hiroko Shimizu have penned a curious reflection on the world’s food supply. Although I don’t see this book as a revolution, as the theme indicates, the book compels me to think that a sound argument exists for a movement towards that end. The five myths of locavorism make a case. While the myths serve to tear apart our scientific and technological bases as incredulous, impersonal, and material, the locavore operation is impractical given the massive world population. The book is filled with unresolved arguments. The globalization of the food supply has put the locavore generation in an awkward position. In order for a SOLE food movement to take root, the entire globalization infrastructure would have to be replaced—a massive undertaking. My main beef with the movement centers around our ever-expanding world population. If we can put a lid on that and reverse the growth rate to a diminishing population, then the movement would make much more sense. The problem occurs not because locavoreism is undesirable, but because it quickly calls for an alternate environment—one which we don’t have. It’s the specialization of food service operations that run the globalization engine and the specialists who make it possible. At times, it was hard to tell whether the authors were in favor of or against the localization movement. In a way the book lives up to its name, since after reading this book, I
Running on Empty: Origins of the Universe By Gilberto Davila Jr. CreateSpace, $18.99, 40 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Looking back, we take scientific facts for granted. People used to believe that breaking the sound barrier would cause you to hit an invisible barrier, killing you on impact. Today that seems like a silly notion, but until we push and question our facts, we’ll never know the truth. In the book Running on Empty, Gilberto Davila, Jr., explores the known universe around us and peers behind the veil of current scientific thought. The book’s main focus is on looking at old ideas and challenging them. Since the big bang, gravity and magnetism have existed side by side. The book goes to great lengths to look at many different questions and challenges us to think about them. Hopefully, by unlocking the mysteries of the universe, we can help understand our place in the cosmos. I am no physicist, and I had no problem understanding the book. Davila uses simple words and the ideas are very fascinating. I liked how he explained the concepts of “emptiness” and “nothing.” These words have been misinterpreted. Nothingness should not be used when thinking about the big bang. The universe was not created out of nothingness but out of emptiness, like a jar that is empty. The most interesting thought brought up by Davila is that the sun is powered by magnetic pressure and speed. I like how the book wants you to challenge the ideas long thought to be fact, like Einstein’s observation that light is the fastest thing in the universe. Some of the ideas I did need to look up so that I had a better understanding, like dark matter. This book might be the start of something big, and I look forward to another book expanding these ideas. Hopefully in the future, we will have all the answers of time and space, and the entire universe will be at humanities’ doorstep. Sponsored Review
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Book Reviews
Category
Spirituality & Inspiration
our life is run. We allow our frustrations or complaining nature to take charge and most often the result is defeat and unhappiness. “When a person isn’t satisfied with the condition of her life, it would be wise to take an inventory of the words she has spoken.” Joyce Meyer’s latest contribution is a call to focus on the life we breathe into our realities through verbal and mental manifestations. In other words, we are what we speak life into. She guides her readers to a healthier way of being: letting in the positive and watching the words grow into a constructive reality. Meyer’s writing is pretty straightforward and she lends plenty of personal accounts; she uses God’s word to solidify the mission of living the lives that we were meant to live, not the silenced, cornered lives we often hole ourselves up in. Her writing style speaks to readers of all calibers and there are many take-aways in her message. Some of the writing seems a bit elementary, but that could be why the message is so loud and clear. Speak life into your words! Reviewed by Sky Sanchez-Fischer Confronting My Elephants By Rubi Ho Amazon, $9.99, 92 pages, Format: eBook
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Change Your Words, Change Your Life: Understanding the Power of Every Word You Speak By Joyce Meyer FaithWords, $22.99, 320 pages, Format: Hard
«««« Have you ever talked yourself out of something even before you gave it a real chance to become anything? Maybe it was a career change, a new relationship, or (not so) simply a new way of thinking about change? Oftentimes we allow our fears, insecurities, or ‘ways of being’ to dictate the way
By all accounts this is a story of survival; a life-affirming testimony to the faith and determination of a child who becomes a man through failings and short-lived victories. But with a deeper scope this is also a call to live life out loud, a bullhorn to stomp the stampede of self-defeat. Rubi Ho is a Vietnam transplant, who was shown at the earliest of ages the skills and heart of tenacity and the brawn of overcoming obstacles. His mother led herself and eight children out of Saigon in 1975, one day before the fall. Their country in shambles, they fled and landed in the United States, where they clung to hope and the heart-sleeves of a kind-hearted, God-filled couple. Given a new opportunity to start again, the family began to plant themselves and bring forth fruit, new jobs, compassionate friends, and the never-ending togetherness of the family thread. Naturally, the challenges did not end, as is life, and Ho takes his read-
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Book Reviews
Spirituality & Inspiration
ers on a voyage woven with missteps, mistakes, and grief, and the redemption of a life lived through God, and not self. Further into the journey readers may relate to the feeling of being ‘different,” or most aptly ‘feeling different’ and the mental hardship it results in. Ho’s feelings of inadequacy and differentness are far from foreign. Elephants can be ways of thinking, addictions, or behaviors, and they can become larger than our true life purposes, trampling a life not yet defined. This tie makes for a vital key in the relationship between reader and writer; Ho applies his life story to that of the reader by inviting us into his world and opening it up for speculation into our own. Here stands a man, strong in his own abilities and, yet stumbling through life, trampled by self-defeating thoughts and paralyzing theories. He leads us further into his examinations through the word of God, and ultimately how only a true relationship with our Creator can lead us to the defined life that we so desperately seek: a life free of anxiety, pressure to be ‘more’ and the colossal weight of our elephants. Ho’s story is refreshing; it speaks boldly and unapologetically, ardently laced with a tone of thanks and grace. It is encouragement for the lost and afraid, a life-affirming tale of true surrender and claim. Confronting My Elephants is for anyone who knows there is more to the life they have called for themselves, there is a life created for them by One who has no limits. Sponsored Review
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San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 110
Four books to choose from every week
Book Reviews Category
Religion
What Would Jesus Read?: Daily Devotions That Guided the Savior By Joe Amaral FaithWords, $16.99, 400 pages, Format: Hard
««« Most are familiar with the Bible and the basis for a welllived life and salvation, but how far do most readers and believers of God delve? Joe Amaral provides a book of devotionals that prompt readers to follow a reading plan, outlined by weeks and days. Each entry is begun with a line of scripture and follows with deeper insight into the reading, as well as a personal relatable experience. He takes his readers on a short escape into the inner workings of the Lord’s wisdom and how it is still relatable in today’s world, even more so at times. As a reader of daily devotionals, I found this to be a welcome addition to my readings. The entries are quick and thought-provoking, and left me with questions that prompted me to seek further within the Bible. This could serve as both a new believer’s reading plan and a faithful Christian’s step into a deeper walk. If you are curious about how Jesus is relevant in today’s fast-paced society or you desire a more intimate relationship with the Word and the One who speaks it then this may just be the starter for you, a daily seed for future growth. Reviewed by Sky Sanchez-Fischer
The Villa By Ben Rolphe Carpenters Son Publishing, $15.95, 246 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Dan Branson has faced disappointments and tragedy in life. Nevertheless, he is a man of exceptional integrity and faith. In The Villa, by Ben Rolphe, Branson’s adopted daughter, Mattie, is about to embark on an adventure with her two best girlfriends to help a missionary serving orphans and abused women in Guatemala. At nineteen, Mattie is mature and committed to her loving family and friends. People familiar with the region where the girls are headed try to dissuade the Branson family from allowing Mattie to go on the trip. The area where the girls are headed is extremely dangerous, due to the narcotics trade, corruption, poverty, and political instability. Acting on faith, the girls decide to proceed with their plans to work with the missionary. Dan enlists the help of a CIA contact in Guatemala in case the girls encounter trouble. Their plans go awry when evil-minded drug dealers hatch a scheme that could separate the girls from their families forever. This book is an uncomplicated representation of a struggle between good and evil, with a bonus peek at heavenly forces on the side of good. In other words, angels pop up at crucial points in the story to help people caught in dire straits. The angels look like men. The characters on the side of good are presented as people almost devoid of flaws while the evil characters are presented as people without any redeeming qualities. This reviewer found the most intriguing character to be Isabella Coronado, a dignified, but fearful, woman caught between the drug dealers and doing the right thing. The story builds slowly, but once the action begins, it moves along at a suspenseful pace. This is definitely a religious genre book as it contains traditional Christian doctrine woven into the plot. A quick and pleasant read. Sponsored Review
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 111
Book Reviews Category
Current Events & Politics
California’s Next Century By Marcus Ruiz Evans CreateSpace, $10.00, 187 pages, Format: Trade
««« America is in a recession, and California is one of the hardest-hit states. Many solutions have been put forth to help get us all back on track, but this book offers one of the most radical. Marcus Ruiz Evans proposes that America grant California independence so that it can become a new global negotiations hub, a place where all countries can come together to work out trade deals along with other pieces of international legislation. This idea is extreme, but Evans supports it well. The appendices are clearly organized and cite many respectable sources to effectively argue that California is well positioned to become a place of global cooperation and that the transition from an American state to an independent nation is both beneficial and precedented.
Unfortunately, the main text of the book is not so straightforward. The chapters are arranged in a confusing manner, and the book is riddled with grammatical errors that sometimes make it difficult to understand. The author also fails to consistently and properly cite his sources, an error that is highlighted by the perfect citation in the appendices. The biggest problem, however, are the occasional glaring factual inaccuracies. For example, at one point the author claims that President Obama granted West Virginia statehood. While these inaccuracies do not detract from the author’s overall argument, they do interrupt the reader’s progress and call into question the author’s authority. All of that aside, however, Evans does provide solid evidence for California’s independence, and he effectively argues that independence would be good for California, America, and for the world as a whole. I just wish that the clarity and citation presented in the appendices were present throughout the entire book. Were that the case, this text would be impossible to ignore. As it is, California’s Next Century has provided me with lots of food for thought, but also with a lot of confusion. Sponsored Review The Obama Presidency: A Preliminary Assessment By Robert P. Watson, Jack Covarrubias, Tom Lansford, Douglas M. Brattebo, editors. Suny Press, $29.95, 443 pages
««««« President Obama is completing his first four years as president and running to be president for another four years. Many books have been written about President Obama and his campaign, from his use of social media to being the first African-American president. Many pundits, bloggers, and radio talk show hosts have written about the Obama Presidency. Most of these people disagree with him, and want to get Mitt Romney elected instead. Most books that have been written have been less
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Book Reviews
Current Events & Politics
than scholarly, or even without bias. It is nice to see a book like this published, which examines the Obama presidency without all the vitriol or hate. The contributors do an excellent job of examining how well Obama has done as president in a scholarly manner. Each contributor takes a different topic, from his handling of Iran, to health care reform, his handling of Congress, and Libya. Each chapter is not that long, but the contributors take a long look at what he has accomplished and what happened in context. They reach the conclusion that Obama is a bit above average to past presidents, and that he is not as bad as some people think. This is a book for people who want a more balanced view of President Obama. Reviewed by Kevin Winter
Tablets, smart phones, and social networks all promise better opportunities to connect and stay connected. However, what they do is to replace face-to face interactions and disguise our growing inability to trust others. Recent studies find that sixty million Americans, or twenty percent of the population, have become quite isolated, reporting that loneliness is a major source of unhappiness. This reviewer believes that several questions can be answered after reading this heavily researched book. Do city dwellers think solitary music is a soothing or comforting technology? Does an iPod or any headphone device prevent one from too many contacts? Has modern music become an enjoyable alternative to social interaction? Reviewed by Claude Ury
The Big Disconnect: The Story of Technology and Loneliness By Giles Slade Prometheus, $19.00, 314 pages, Format: Trade
Dam Nation: How Water Shaped the West and Will Determine Its Future By Stephen Grace Globe Pequot Press, $24.95, 333 pages, Format: Hard
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This very highly technical book is of interest to the specialist or scholar who seeks to discover what caused the explosions in population and the economic and technological growth which shaped our modern world. An analysis is made of changes that have taken place from the late nineteenth century to the present in terms of technology. Using inferences from neuroscience, the author shows why Americans use certain technologies to make connections with other human beings rather than face to face contact. In the final section, the author describes ways in which interpersonal strategies build empathy, community, and mutual acceptance. It provides a synthesis into increasingly artificial relationships and how one can rediscover genuine community and human empathy.
The author explains that many of the first settlers in the West were forced to divert water. This diversion was done without government assistance and the settlers used their own capital and labor to clear ditches in the plains and along mountain slopes. John Widtsoe, an irrigation expert and a Mormon, changed this by creating the Bureau of Reclamation, through which he worked with the government to construct dams and develop Federal water programs. According to this writer, these federallyfinanced programs led to huge profits for the rich. For instance, during this period, the Southern Pacific Railroad became the largest beneficiary of any water project in the history of the United States. These water projects in
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Book Reviews
Current Events & Politics
the Western United States also provided jobs for construction workers and engineers and enough water for farms and communities to develop. In 1932, the United States Department of the Interior issued a report to develop hydro-electric power from the Colorado River to the Imperial Valley in Southern California. To accomplish this, the Corps of Engineers controlled water by building levees, dams, and canals to direct the flow of water. This construction allowed farmers in the Central Valley access to more water and the opportunity to pump water whenever needed to irrigate their crops. During this time, Congress was forced to extend the repayment of construction costs borne by taxpayers (including Southern Pacific Railroad) from ten to twenty years. Reviewed by Claude Ury Selecting a President By Eleanor Clift, Matthew Spieler Thomas Dunne Books, $19.99, 196 pages, Format: Hard
««««« This book offers one of the most comphrehensive guides to presidential elections, from a candidate’s first trip to Iowa up to the inauguration of the newly sworn president. It is just opportune to have this excellent book in time for the 2012 presidential elections. One is shown the features, structures, and institutions which have shaped presidential campaigns from pledged delagates to the Electoral College to the caucuses.
At the 1964 Democratic National Convention, President Lyndon Johnson laid out his vision of a great society, a place where the meaning of man’s life matches the marvels of man’s labor. In total, the Electoral College is made up of 538 electors or electoral votes. The winner of the electoral votes must have 270 to be elected president. Of note is the fact that electoral votes are adjusted every ten years upon the census releasing data on population growth in each of the states. Exit polls are surveys of voters taken upon their leaving the voting booths. Voters are asked which candidates they voted for, along with personal demographic information such as income and race. These exit polls provide projections as to which candidate prevailed in each state. Campaigns are filled with dirty tricks, such as the case involving President Nixon and the Watergate crisis when five men working for Nixon’s re-election campaign burglarized the headquarters of the Democratic Committee. Facing impeachment and removal from office, he resigned as president on August 9,1974. This outstanding book closes with five invaluable appendices: a glossary of election terms, the Presidential oath of office, past presidential elections, further readings, and speeches from presidential campaigns. Readers desiring further readings on the presidency please see in these pages my review of Cato, Robert A, The Yeats of Johnson The Passage of Power, Knopf 2012 which discusses the Johnson v. Kennedy Presidential Election of 1960. Reviewed by Claude Ury
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 114
Book Reviews Category
History
American Empire: The Rise of a Global Power, the Democratic Revolution at Home 1945-2000 By Joshua Freeman Viking, $36.00, 530 pages, Format: Hard
««««« In this book, one is given a brilliant synthesis of postwar American history. It looks at the economic and social growth along with political conflicts from the period of 1945 to 2000. From 132 million people in 1940, the population of America more than doubled to 281 million. The immigrants who came to this country brought diversity to the population. Technology changed the way people worked, lived, and pursued entertainment. America changed between World War II and the twenty-first century by militarization of American life with the onset of the Cold War, and the African-American freedom struggle brought about cultural changes that came from the1960s. The economy was restructured by corporations in the 1970s and1980s. The end of World War II is brilliantly discussed, along with the 9/11 attack on American soil just fifty-five years after World War II. This book looks at developments in economics, foreign relations, social structure, everyday life, and popular culture.
The main lesson to be learned from reading this outstanding book is that Americans, after the depression, provided the American dream. In World War II, Americans felt that they had cultural power, economic power, intellectual power, and military power, which brought about confidence in our country. The basic policy issues to be answered after reading this incredibly researched book is how after World War II, America used its great wealth and power to shape the world and those who would make these decisions. Also, it might be asked after the twenty-first century why America lagged behind industrialized countries in areas such as manufacturing, infrastructure, and education. The most amazing bibliography of works cited in each chapter closes this brilliant work. A must-read for all, whether a student or a scholar. Reviewed by Claude Ury The Voodoo Wave: Inside a Season of Triumph and Tumult at Maverick’s By Mark Kreidler W. W. Norton & Company, $15.95, 243 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Big-wave surfing requires a curious combination of devil-may-care bravado, observational and technical skill, and an appreciation for both the power and beauty inherent in Mother Nature’s capricious fury. That rare mix of qualities can be found in every person who has ever dared tackle the towering waves of Maverick’s, the legendary Northern California testing ground for big-wave talent. The Voodoo Wave is an in-depth look at the fame, infamy, and chaos that emerged from the collision of surf culture and business at Maverick’s over the last decade. The history of Maverick’s and its evolution into a key destination in bigwave surfing is teased out bit by bit in the midst of the two overarching narratives: the birth and turbulent growth of the Maverick’s Surf Contest; and Chris Bertish’s years-long quest to compete at Maverick’s, a quest that culminated in a day of monstrous waves in 2010.
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Book Reviews
History
Kreidler does an impressive job of dispelling the rumors and presenting even-handed reporting of those involved in the surf contest’s often-troubled history, and manages to do so without losing an iota of the mystique that surrounds Maverick’s nigh-mythical heroes and setting. The Voodoo Wave is part-tribute, part-cautionary tale, and part-history, but it is always fascinating. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas The 100 Greatest Americans of the 20th Century: A Social Justice Hall of Fame By Peter Dreier Nation Books, $19.99, 500 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Many of the Great Americans profiled in this book fought for the eight hour day, progressive income tax, federal minimum wage, government subsidized health care and housing, woman’s suffrage, right for unions to be formed by workers, and an end to lynching. America, to these great Americans, meant social and economic equality, free speech and civil liberties, citizenship for women and minorities, and an open door for many oppressed people. A twentieth-century timetable is provided from 1900 with the founding of the International Garment Union to 2000 and Vice President Gore wining the popular vote over George W. Bush in the presidential race. This invaluable compendium will be of interest to the general reader or scholar, closing with an outstanding bibliography. An assessment is made of the twentieth century with lesser known personalities born in the 1900s, 1970s, and 1980s, too numerous to cite in the course of this review. Between 1979 and 2007, incomes of the richest one percent individuals grew by two hundred twenty-four percent. A lesson to be learned from reading this outstanding reference book is the fact that Americans of the last century were instrumental in shaping the leaders of today and will continue to do so for generations to come. Also, tens of
thousands of baby boomers born between 1946 to 1960 became politically active and were committed to social justice in twentieth century. Reviewed by Claude Ury Thomas Becket: Warrior, Priest, Rebel By John Guy Random House, $35.00, 448 pages, Format: Hard
««« Thomas Becket is one of the most famous Archbishops in all of history – more famous for his afterlife than what he did while he was alive. He was killed in the church at Canterbury by knights of King Henry III, after a long, and often violent, dispute between the two of them over church rights and property. In this new work, John Guy explores the life, times, and personality of Thomas Becket, from his humble upbringings in London to his rise through the Church and becoming Chancellor to Henry III, before becoming Archbishop of Canterbury. Mr. Guy explores the dangerous world of 12th Century England, from the constant worry of death from swords or disease to the feuding of people at court. It was a dangerous world. The breakdown in the relationship came early, and it never left. Both Henry III and Thomas Becket had explosive personalities and very thin skin. They could not take insults and they could not forgive. Caught in the middle was the Pope and everyone else. It ended soon after a peace deal was negotiated, and Thomas Becket quickly became a saint. The biography is serviceable; it does not break any new ground. The writing could have been better, because he mentions things at the beginning of the book that he repeatedly says he will talk about later. It could have been smoother. Reviewed by Kevin Winter
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Book Reviews
History
Desert Reckoning: A Town Sheriff, a Mojave Hermit, and the Biggest Manhunt in Modern California History By Deanne Stillman Nation Books, $26.00, 308 pages, Format: Hard
««« In this true crime story, readers will learn about a crazy hermit who lived in the Mohave desert community of Antelope Valley in California, killed a wellliked sheriff, and was on the lam for seven days. On August 3, 2003, Sheriff Steve Sorensen responded to a call from a resident complaining about a messy squatter. The Mohave is filled with squatters, as well as hermits, mixed in among the middle class folk. The sheriff made the mistake of stepping onto Donald Kueck’s property, where he burst out of his trailer and fired two rounds of high velocity bullets at Sorensen. Kueck then hid in the desert for seven days. The crime and the chase comprise only a portion of the story. The rest of it is filled with historical background on the area itself, and lots of exploration of the main and supporting characters. It’s a combination of true crime, local California history, and character study. Before it became a full fledged book, “Dead Reckoning,” was an article for Rolling Stone. Since the narrative often seems overly talky and rambling, the story might have been better off remaining in its shorter and more concise form. Reviewed by Leslie Wolfson Wellington’s Wars: The Making of a Military Genius By Huw Davies Yale University Press, $38.00, 303 pages, Format: Hard
«««« More of a study in nineteenth century warfare than a biography of Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington, this story begins with his purchase of rank and subsequent bungling of his first real action. Davies, an extraordinarily thorough historian, carries us through the campaign in India, now almost completely overshadowed by the Napo-
leonic wars. He brings us to the jaded years of Wellington’s life when the Iberian peninsula is almost totally lost to the French, thanks to weak alliances and lack of commitment by the British crown. Determined to learn from the previous mistakes, Wellesley secures more financing at home and draws the Portuguese together with the Spanish forces. In a remarkable strategy that still defies then known geography, Wellington presses this army northward across Spain to attack Napoleon’s weaker holds. Then came the daunting assault of the Pyrenees, and the routing of the French. Napoleon’s escape from exile reunites the allies for Waterloo. True, Wellington never acknowledges the priceless contribution of the Prussian cavalry which turned the tide of battle for him. His ego still shrouds his military prowess, but not his political acumen. Reviewed by C.D. Quyn Oreos and Dubonnet: Remembering Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller (Excelsior Editions) By Joseph H., Jr. Boyd, Charles R. Holcomb Excelsior Editions, $19.95, 172 pages, Format: Hard
««« This is an odd book; I am not quite sure what to make of it. It is not a straight forward biography. It is not quite a standard history book either. Instead, it is a collection of remembrances of Nelson Rockefeller during the time he was governor of New York and briefly when he was Vice-President during the Ford years. He was a Republican in a changing political landscape. He was an icon in New York, helping to build the World Trade Center, the State University of New York, and more. He was an enigma from a rich and well-to-do family. He made a name for himself and etched his mark forever in the state of New York.
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Book Reviews
History
This book suffers from a lack of focus, or even chronology. Each chapter is stand alone. They do not connect with each other. Even in individual chapters there is little to connect material within them. Instead, it is many of his staff members, and other people he worked with, remembering Mr. Rockefeller, from his interest in art, to how he got the legislature to work with him, and how he got along with staff. The book would have been much better if it had a more narrative flow. Reviewed by Kevin Winter Road to Valor: A True Story of WWII Italy, the Nazis, and the Cyclist Who Inspired a Nation By Aili McConnon, Andres McConnon Crown, $25.00, 318 pages, Format: Hard
««««« In startling visuals, we roll with the wheel men through draining peaks and valleys of the most grueling cycling competition on earth. We see the champion, Bartali, win the Tour De France in his prime, only to be snubbed by Mussolini so that no celebration was allowed. The McConnons team up to take us behind the scenes of war-torn Italy, into the underground movement to save as many Jewish families as possible from the sweeping Holocaust. Not even Bartali’s wife knows what he’s transporting in the tubing of his bicycle. We feel the strain of terror as Bartali is hauled to interrogation. We rejoice when Italy finally throws off the Fascists, and opts for democracy over communism. But a decade of wars has cost a generation the prime years of its champions. Tragedy strikes with a pistol crack, and the whole country riots. The Prime Minister calls Bartali. Only a win of the Tour De France will reunite the people. Unbelievably, Gino Bartali does it!
This story should find its way to the cinema. But no film auteur can capture in a couple of hours the rich detail and background of personal lives that these two fine writers have produced. Reviewed by C.D. Quyn The Weight of Vengeance By Troy Bickham Oxford University Press, USA, $34.95, 325 pages, Format: Hard
«««« The War of 1812 is an odd war in the history of the United States. It was the second major war for the young country and against the same commandant as the Revolutionary War, yet for completely separate reasons than the original go around. With Europe engulfed in flames, the United States wanted to remain neutral and trade with both France and England. England did not want that; instead, they wanted to keep the young United States firmly within the orbit of British influence and to quash any attempts by the United States to grow and become a powerful country. The United States wanted to be treated with respect by the major European nations, without having to constantly fight in European wars. In the end it can be argued that both sides won and lost. The United States gained more respect, but at the same time they ran out of money, and the White House was burned down. The British held onto Canada, but they could not break down the United States. Mr. Bickham does an admirable job tying together all the pieces of a largely forgotten war. He does not dwell in individual battles, but focuses on the major themes and issues. Reviewed by Kevin Winter
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Book Reviews
History
All in the Family: The Realignment of American Democracy Since the 1960s By Robert O. Self Hill & Wang, $30.00, 51 pages, Format: Hard
«««« In this well-researched book, Professor Self of Brown University has shown that since the 1960s Americans have had more discussions on topics such as sexuality and gender roles for males and females than ever before in their history. Professor Self’s brilliant research, drawn from many sources, gives us a terrific synthesis of political and social opinions on sexuality in the last half of the twentieth century. In his book, three major issues have arisen from activists such as Gloria Steinem, Shirley Chisholm, and Harvey Milk. One issue was equality for women in the labor market and economic equality regardless of sex or race. The second concern was to maintain reproductive and sexual freedom for women, and to prohibit forced sterilization and enact stronger laws dealing with rape and sexual harassment. The third important issue was sexual rights for gays, transsexuals, and transgenders, and the end of heterosexual dominance. Presently, conservative viewpoints on feminism, abortion, gay rights, and welfare have gained in support and weakened the American liberal left. The conservative opinions are dominating the political voice on issues such as health care, the anti-war movement, and gay marriages. From the New Deal to the Great Society, social welfare liberals have supported labor unions, enacted government poverty programs, and subsidized home ownership in America. Over the last half of this century, Americans have broadened women’s rights and protected all of its citizen’s rights for making their own sexual decisions. In 1964, the political climate of America changed by citi-
zens demanding sexual freedom and an end to the sexual and racial discrimination. This change in political opinion was led successfully by the the middle and working class, as well as the poor, to insure that their mutual rights for freedom would be protected. In conclusion, today’s highly-financed conservative movement has created a storm of media and is effectively swaying the opinion of Americans toward conservative viewpoints. Reviewed by Claude Ury My American Revolution By Robert Sullivan Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $26.00, 272 pages, Format: Hard
«« If quirky and meandering is how you like your Revolutionary history served, Sullivan’s latest is the perfect meal. In it, he takes you on his journey through landmarks, from the war in the Middle Colonies, that are still visible, and also quite a few that are lost to history. Sullivan starts out at the top of the Empire State Building, looking out and trying to see what landscape is still unchanged from the American Revolution. The vast majority of the war was fought in the Middle Colonies and, as he goes on to show, it is still possible, albeit quirky, to walk many of the miles that the Colonial Army did. Sullivan shares his obsession, and features the callings of others by sharing the stories of reenactors and other assorted champions of history. It’s a peek into what may be more obscure history for many of us; like Duke Riley who, in 2007, got into trouble with Homeland Security for launching his replica of a submarine that was tested in the Revolutionary War.
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Book Reviews
History
What comes through in My American Revolution is the passion that Sullivan feels and that he is not alone in continuing to celebrate our freedom. His meandering path to investigate history proves that we all have a lot to be thankful for and a lot to learn. Reviewed by Gwen Stackler Where They Stand: The American Presidents in the Eyes of Voters and Historians By Robert W. Merry Simon & Schuster, $28.00, 298 pages
«««« Forty-four men have held the highest office in the land, each with his own victories, missteps, and a legacy left behind. But when actually rating the presidents, ranking them as successes or failures, what are your criteria? How do you measure a president when so many factors can impact his policies, his decisions, and the direction of the country under his auspices? These are the questions Robert W. Merry tackles in Where They Stand. An examination of various polls in which the presidents were ranked, Where They Stand judges the presidents not only on how history views them, but on how the electorate viewed them during their time in office. From employing the thirteen keys to explain why a president won or lost reelection to determining what defines a Leader of Destiny, Merry explores the complexities of the presidency with impressive zeal and confidence. It might seem petty to rank the presidents from best to worst, but in truth, there are a lot of valuable lessons to be gleaned from this book. And while Merry leaves it to history to measure our last five commanders-in-chief, he offers his opinions on every president, no doubt sparking some worthwhile debates along the way. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas
Chinatown, con’t from page 1 ture as a jumping off point from which to discuss the larger history and culture of the area. Choy reveals the buildings as signposts of history, and invites one to go out and engage with what they’ve learned after reading, with the address and description of each place of interest included. My only complaint is, not being intimately familiar with the layout of the streets of San Francisco, it is easy to become disoriented as to the shape and position of each investigated section, as most locations are described in relation to nearby streets. More than anything, San Francisco Chinatown whets ones appetite to learn more about Chinese-American history. Reviewed by Evelyn McDonald
e t i r w s l l k i w or boo f Become a book reviewer! email us three sample reviews of recent books (150-200 words) to reviews@1776productions.com
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 120
Mrs. Robinson's Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady By Kate Summerscale Bloomsbury, $16.00, 304 pages, Format: Hard
Reviewed by Audrey Curtis
T
his is not your typical novel. Thoroughly researched, Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace expertly blends real excerpts from a Victorian lady’s diary with narration to bring to life a true tale of restrictive social norms, scandalous intrigues, and a very public trial.
Isabella Robinson was a remarried widow who diligently recorded her life in her diary. Using this diary as a guide, Summerscale recreates Isabella’s daily experiences, including her love affairs. The book follows her through the highs of being near her potential paramours and the lows of being with her overbearing husband until, finally, it all breaks loose. After Isabella’s diary is discovered, she stops writing, and our perspective shifts. We now get an account of the divorce proceedings without being privy to Isabella’s side of the story. While the entire book is fascinating, it loses its emotional core when the narrative shifts. Instead of hearing from Isabella, we are hearing about her, and, as a fallen woman, the things we hear are not complimentary. After following Isabella’s thoughts and feelings for the first hundred pages, the reader is sympathetic to her. To then see her close friends and former lover cast aspersions on her character is painful. The fact that Summerscale stays largely out of the narrative, letting the historical documents (letters, editorials, court records, etc.) speak for themselves is further disheartening. It makes for an accurate historical record, but it also causes the main character to lose her voice as the result of a sexual transgression. Though true to the Victorian era, this made me, as a modern reader, uncomfortable. One more word of warning: the text, both quoted from Victorian documents and added by the author, is written in the Victorian style. Readers unaccustomed to this style might find it difficult to maintain interest in the story. Very exciting things happen within these pages, but the formal writing weakens their effect. If you are looking for a salacious story about a naughty lady, this book is not for you. If, however, you want to learn about Victorian social mores and expectations and the beginnings of Divorce Law, Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace offers an interesting, extraordinarily well researched look into our social past. San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 121
“Ah! If I had the hope of anotherlife,allwouldbebright and well with me. But, alas! Ihaveitnot,norcanpossibly attainthat;andastothislife, anger,sensuality,helplessness, hopelessness,overpowerand rend my soul, and fill me withremorseandforeboding.” About Kate Sumemrscale Kate Summerscale is the author of the number one bestselling The Suspicions of Mr Whicher, winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-Fiction 2008, winner of the Galaxy British Book of the Year Award, a Richard & Judy Book Club pick and adapted into a major ITV drama. Her first book, the bestselling The Queen of Whale Cay, won a Somerset Maugham award and was shortlisted for the Whitbread biography award. Kate Summerscale has also judged various literary competitions, including the Booker Prize. She lives in London.
Book Reviews Category
Business & Investing
The Lost Bank: The Story of Washington Mutual-The Biggest Bank Failure in American History By Kirsten Grind Simon & Schuster, $27.00, 400 pages, Format: Hard
«««« This book reveals the underlying truth of a bank that wrote billions of bad mortgages, failed, and became one of the disasters in the 2008 financial crisis. The author traces Washington Mutual’s failure and its abrupt sale to J. P. Morgan Chase. This book explores banking tactics which inflicted harm to the finances of the banks themselves as well as employees and investors. In this book, the author chronicles the fact that in the 1990s, Washington Mutual bought small savings and loan companies as well as banks throughout the United States. During this period, the stock of Washington Mutual dropped below $2.00 and many frightened depositors started to withdraw millions of dollars each and every day from their Washington Mutual stocks. A large fire sale ensued and J.P. Morgan brought Washington Mutual assets for a small amount of their worth. Lessons to be learned from this highly researched book are as follows.
One, the failure of Washington Mutual along with its sale by the Federal Deposit Insurance and the role of the Office of Thrift Supervision were crucial to the survival of banks in the U.S. Two, the title “Lost Bank” denotes the customer service type of bank that was lost over the past thirty years. Rather than customer service, many banks like Washington Mutual were concentrating their efforts on enormous growth and compensation while jeopardizaing the solvency of their bank and investor’s capital. Three, Washington Mutual’s major failings were due to its inability to manage its growth from a medium-size operation to a giant bank with operations all over America. Four a detailed analysis is provided of the personal and professional rise and fall of Washington Mutual Chief Executive Officer Kelly Killinger. Five, it is safe to say that when one buys stocks and other investments, one is always taking a risk, and therefore one should be cautious about any investment. Reviewed by Claude Ury Moods and Markets: A New Way to Invest in Good Times and in Bad (Minyanville Media) By Peter Atwater FT Press, $39.99, 181 pages, Format: Hard
«««« We like to believe that the Dow Jones moves in a rational manner. During times of good news, it will go up, and during times of bad news, it will go down. Peter Atwater argues that investors, managers, and policy makers should be aware of how mood affects the markets. Mr. Atwater approaches it from the idea that the current mood will have an effect on the market. From rising oil prices, to terrorist attacks, to the unemployment rate. He brings in the idea of socioeconomics into the picture to explain why the market moves the way it does--from identifying what is a mood, and how to differentiate it from emotion to exploring the world of bubbles – both in housing and education; explain-
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Book Reviews
Business & Investing
ing the role of horizon preference. Mr. Atwater brings together these different ideas to show why people will still invest in at the highs and try to get out at the lows. Mr. Atwater does a serviceable job at explaining his theory across multiple chapters. He makes several convincing arguments. My only problem is that the book is short. It would have been nicer if the book was longer to give Mr. Atwater more room to fully develop his ideas. Reviewed by Kevin Winter The New Geography of Jobs By Enrico Moretti Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $16.46, 294 pages, Format: Hard
perity despite its tremendous change? Young workers face an unemployment crisis; do they deserve minimum wages in low skill jobs? How will unemployment affect the 2012 presidential election? On this latter issue the reviewer refers the reader to the fine op-ed piece in the New York Times (July 23,2012). This op-ed piece says that unemployment is still the biggest election issue, pointing out that fewer Americans are working in 2012 than in 2000. Many economists attribute this lack of employment to the labor force in America growing by 11.4 million people. Reviewed by Claude Ury
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Click Millionaires By Scott Fox Amacom, $22.00, 278 pages, Format: Hard
This book looks at the changes that have taken place in the labor force over the past three decades and the economic forces that have caused these changes. From 1946-1978, it is shown that the standard of living more than doubled and has become stagnant ever since. Our national well-being, from this writer’s analysis, depends on creating new jobs, new technologies, and new products which are not spread uniformly over the entire USA. From this writer’s research, it appears that cities with many colleges tend to have an economy with much innovation and excellent salaries. Empirically, it is shown that in both good and bad years college graduates with the highest mobility have the lowest unemployment rate while high school dropouts have a very high unemployment rate. Also, American cities with corporate headquarters and a prosperous economy are the ways cities generate the most charitable contributions for local non-profits. From the quantitative data, it’s shown that life expectancy is determined not only by one’s life style but also by such factors as socioeconomic differences. A number of policy questions can be asked at this point. How does one end a recession? What should be included in this year’s budget? How can America maintain its pros-
The basic purpose of this book is to help entrepreneurs and small business owners learn how to profit from the internet lifestyle business revolution. After reading this invaluable book, one should be able to find their niche and become an expert on on-line publishing, publishing through the medium of digital publishing, blogging, marketing, and promoting a product. It is also suggested to test customer demand before wasting your time on a product that does not have a market. Of note to this reviewer are the strategies for becoming click millionaires, which include topics from focusing on profitability and lifestyle instead of growth to keeping yourself in control of the product. This book closes with a ten-step action plan for redesigning your life by starting to do things such as: (1) reallocate your time by deciding how much time to invest to in a new project, (2) redesign your schedule, (3) start a budget for your product by opening a new bank account exclusively for your project, (4) a good investment of time should be spent on strategic thinking, (5) dream big and have fun thinking up clever ways to re-invent your life, (6) find out as much as you can about your field by going on-line, reading blogs and studying your competitors, (7) start a test
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Business & Investing
website once you have a clear idea of your goals, (8) try doing some free lance contracting away from your current job to find out what the market is looking for that your project may have or be lacking, (9) make any changes needed and develop any skills you need to produce and sell your project, and (10) once you have a name for your company put it on social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, etc., to publicize your presence and attract customers before your competitors reach them. Reviewed by Claude Ury Broken Markets: How High Frequency Trading and Predatory Practices on Wall Street Are Destroying Investor Confidence and Your Portfolio By Sal Arnuk, Joseph Saluzzi FT Press, $34.99, 296 pages, Format: Hard
«««« The good news is that these two market gurus write in layman terms so that you don’t have to have an MBA or be a financial analyst to grasp the concepts. The bad news is that you’d better read it quick. Technology has rapidly changed our markets, and regulator agencies can’t keep up with the scalpers. The focal point of the crisis highlights the Flash Crash of May 2, 2010, when markets dropped suddenly; they recovered, but left investors reeling from the quake. Could it happen again? Arnuk and Saluzzi explain that with the current rules in place that favor short-term high frequency traders (HFTs), the market is now designed for creating more volatility. Long on the evolution of America’s financial markets, the authors impressively string together a series of vignettes to illustrate how HFTs are privy to information about who is buying or selling a stock, then trade it ahead of you. Like a market parasite, this new creature sucks the investment capital out of the market, while riding on the coattails of
the investors to trim the trade. Can it be stopped? “...what little the SEC has done since the Flash Crash won’t prevent another crash.” Reviewed by C.D. Quyn The Mobile MBA: 112 Skills to Take You Further, Faster By Jo Owen FT Press, $24.99, 198 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Finding the equivalent of a course in a book is always a good thing. Mobile MBA looks at what it takes to survive as a manager, and how to deal with life at the corporate level. Not only are how to manage people looked at, but also how to manage one’s career and how to survive in the cutthroat world of management. This can be a valuable resource for anyone interested in a management career. What makes a resource valuable is how well it covers its chosen area. This book covers a lot in the management area, and looks at more than just the theoretical; it covers almost everything that a manager needs to think about in order to have a successful career, from keeping up appearances to office politics. It is also written in a conspiratorial way, as one colleague to another, giving it an informal edge. The organization is also pretty good, with highlighted sections such as lists and spelled out acronyms in gray boxes, and with each section having its own table of contents. For those wanting to take an MBA class, or looking for supplemental material, this is exactly what they are looking for. Reviewed by Jamais Jochim
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Book Reviews
Business & Investing
Smart Retail: Practical Winning Ideas and Strategies from the Most Successful Retailers in the World By Richard Hammond FT Press, $24.99, 224 pages, Format: Trade
««««« This world survey of retailing is divided into three sections: personnel tips for creating teamwork among your employees, how to entertain and develop return customers, and finding the best location for a retail store. The basic purpose of this book is to show ways attract more purchasing customers and beat your competition by using your retail team to increasing sales. It shows the value of becoming an expert on the product you are selling and how to use your expertise and that of others in the field to win over customers. Of interest to this reviewer is the discussion of how staff can be trained by a manager. Fifteen case studies show how a successful manager can motivate his staff through staff meetings. In these daily meetings, a manager needs to instruct his sales team on crucial persuasive techniques of selling. For instance, a smart manager will point out to his employees the value of encouraging complaints, which can be used as free market research and even motivate people come into a store. Once these customers walk into the store, this can be an opportunity for a salesperson to turn a complaint into a sale and even develop a relationship with the customer, who will want to return to buy from that salesperson again. Some questions one might ask after reading this outstanding book include: What are some additional techniques use to train successful sales people? How are window displays used most effectively to generate sales? How can accessibility and ease in reaching a product for purchase and swift
payment for the chosen product affect sales volume? What criteria should be used when a business is trying to find out how well it stacks up next to the competition? Reviewed by Claude Ury Get Up to Speed with Online Marketing: How to Use Websites, Blogs, Social Networking and Much More By Jon Reed FT Press, $24.99, 250 pages, Format: Trade
««««« The Internet has changed the world, and simply put, we need to get up to speed. Jon Reed explains the methodology of using the Internet in Get Up to Speed with Online Marketing: How to Use Websites, Blogs, Social Networking and Much More. This book is about online marketing. The point is to drive traffic to you—your website—your business. To do this, we must understand social media. This book helps you focus on your marketing strategy. It helps you understand how to use Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Wordpress, and the other new sites that pop up in order to promote your business. It is really good for small businesses, but the internet is the way for any business. The point of social media is to find your target audience and then engage them in a two-way dialogue. Online marketing works for business because it is affordable and effective, but you must be authentic. You have to be who you say you are so clients and customers will trust you. Get Up to Speed with Online Marketing: How to Use Websites, Blogs, Social Networking and Much More is very valuable. Jon Reed is not just talking; he invites you to contact him at www.getuptospeed.biz. Reviewed by Vivian Dixon Sober
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Business & Investing
A Practical Approach to Performance Interventions and Analysis: 50 Models for Building a High-Performance Culture By Gene E. Fusch, Richard C. Gillespie FT Press, $49.99, 202 pages, Format: Hard
«««« In the modern world of business, speed is everything. If you slow down, you will be passed by a competitor, whither, and fade away, forever placed in the dustbin of history. At the same time, businesses are looking at how to improve their internal culture, at how to make the employees happier, work harder, and become more productive. This is becoming more and more of a challenge and problem. With numerous books being published about this topic and how to deal with it, this book looks at how you can start the process of improving your company’s culture. Instead of a onetime solution, they build on it, and teach managers how
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to constantly build, work, and implement this high-performance culture. Without a high-performance culture, businesses will have a hard time retaining valuable employees and hiring competent employees, and as a result will suffer. The authors do a good job going through each chapter, building from the previous chapters. It is obvious this book is written for managers, since it is short and sweet but with some powerful ideas. Reviewed by Kevin Winter
Book Reviews Category
Biographies & Memoirs
Paula’s relationship with him and the rest of her dysfunctional family is at the center of the story. Her uncle, Psycho Gil, is a pedophile, which nobody in the family will actually admit to; her sister Rhea is anorexic and suicidal; her baby brother has practically no relationship with his father; and Paula herself is engaged to a married man, an alcoholic whose soon to be ex-wife constantly harasses her. A very small portion of the book focuses on Paula’s investigation into her dad’s murder. The possibilities are endless -- crazy roommates, angry clients, drug dealers, murderers, prostitutes -- her father has been associating with all of them. Paula has her suspicions, but the case is never solved. Quotes from the author’s investigation are sandwiched in haphazardly, which disrupts the far more interesting narrative, but otherwise this memoir is highly recommended. Reviewed by Leslie Wolfson Dodging Machetes: How I Survived Forbidden Love, Bad Behavior, and the Peace Corps in Fiji By Will Lutwick Peace Corps Writers, $15.95, 268 pages, Format: Trade
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The Shyster’s Daughter By Paula Priamos Etruscan Press, $16.00, 250 pages, Format: Trade
«««« When Paula Priamos’s mother leaves her father and moves out of state, her sister and brother follow along. Paula decides to stay with her dad, a once competent defense lawyer, who has has since lost his way. When the memoir begins, he has just been murdered. Proud of his Greek heritage, larger-than-life Paul Priamos has been disbarred for embezzlement. Though it embarrasses her mother and sister, Paula sticks by her father. Over the years, Paula sees him sink further into amorality, depression, and debt, but they watch each other’s backs even when nobody else will.
True love is hard to find. In a world of billions of people, is there really only one person for you? Will Lutwick was just an average guy who joined the Peace Corps Volunteer in the 1960s. He worked in an office in the island nation of Fiji when it hit him. A beautiful Hindu woman named Rani entered his life, and nothing will be the same again. What follows is an adventure of two young lovers as they face both interracial hate and their own personal demons. The book is an eye-opening story about love, loss, and discrimination. This is a romantic tale of a man looking back on his life. There is such a great scene of nostalgia and regret in every page, which I love. It adds a sense of realism to the book. Not only is this a exciting memoir, but it’s a great modern day Romeo and Juliet tale. You can tell that this book was a passionate labor of love. Each page is as addicting as the last, with great emotional elements driving the story. Each
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Biographies & Memoirs
person in the book is multi-layered and wonderfully written. Rani was my favorite, and it is easy to see why Will is so intoxicated with her. I also loved the inner conflict that Will faces and how he struggles to make some really hard choices. This is a great book for those looking for a wellrounded love story with a few laughs and a lot of heart. Reviewed by Kevin Brown Treacherous Beauty: Peggy Shippen, the Woman Behind Benedict Arnold’s Plot to Betray America By Mark Jacob, Stephen H. Case Lyon’s Press, $24.95, 259 pages, Format: Hard
««« He was audacious and ambitious, a polarizing figure even during his greatest military successes. His name became synonymous with betrayal. Benedict Arnold was a pivotal figure during the Revolutionary War, but the influence and involvement of his wife, Peggy Shippen, has been marginalized and ignored for centuries. How involved was she in Arnold’s plan to betray America and hand over West Point to the British? Treacherous Beauty details the lives of the three primary players in the failed plot -- Arnold, Shippen, and British officer-turned-spymaster John Andre -- exploring the fateful events and curious coincidences that drew them together, and in doing so, weaving a web that attempts to place Peggy Shippen at the center of events. Whether you agree with Jacob and Case’s assessment of her cunning and ambition, you cannot deny the impressive case they build against her. But perhaps even more interesting than the history itself is the pattern of behavior evinced by many of the major and minor players featured. Treacherous Beauty reads like an ode to the historical impact of pettiness, from that of those who overlooked or persecuted Arnold to that of the man himself. It’s a fascinatingly humanizing look at a crucial moment in American history. Reviewed by Glenn Dallas
The Amazing Harry Kellar: Great American Magician By Gail Jarrow Calkins Creek, $17.95, 96 pages, Format: Hard
««««« When children are assigned biographies for their literature classes, this is the one they will all fight for in the library. In fact, children of all ages, from eight to eighty, will love this fascinating story of Harry Kellar, arguably the greatest magician America has ever produced. This is also a story of great perseverance and focus. Harry Kellar was on his own by the time he was eleven years old. After seeing his first magic show, he became fascinated. When Harry found out the magician he had seen – the Fakir of Ava – was running an ad for an assistant, Harry made his way to Buffalo, New York, to apply for the job. He got the job and was on his way. He traveled the world, learning from the best magicians, figuring out or buying the very best illusions and tricks, and learning how to run the business of being a magician. It wasn’t long before he was one of the most famous magicians, not just in America, but in the world. This amazing book is also one of the most beautiful biographies ever printed. Wonderful photographs and the lush posters Harry Kellar created for his shows support the story. Reviewed by Rosi Hollinbeck John Quincy Adams By Harlow Giles Unger Da Capo Press, $27.50, 348 pages, Format: Hard
««««« Unger sets upon us with the honed skills of a well-versed historian to resurrect the life of John Quincy Adams, sixth American President and son of the second. But it is not his presidency we remember.
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Biographies & Memoirs
Born early enough to watch the Battle of Bunker Hill, George Washington mentors to him and young John Quincy gains favor in foreign diplomacy while our nation grows from its infancy. However, the years away from his countrymen make him alien to them, a sting he feels more keenly after becoming commander in chief. His political career all but ended with the most ineffective administration in history when John Quincy was elected to Congress without campaigning. There he won the hearts of ordinary people across the country by representing the nation as a whole rather than any political party. A champion of constitutional law, he fought to uphold rights of free speech, and introduced the first legislation to abolish slavery. In an era of Code Duello when congressman often squared off with pistols, Harlow captures the murderous debates on the House floor where John Quincy Adams eventually died defending the rights established by the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Reviewed by C.D. Quyn Cracking the Egyptian Code: The Revolutionary Life of Jean-Francois Champollion By Andrew Robinson Oxford University Press, $29.95, 272 pages, Format: Hard
resulting in awe-inspiring monuments that survive today. Yet for hundreds of years after their fall, no one could read Egyptian hieroglyphics. This is hard to imagine, but true. To the Greeks and Romans, ancient Egyptian was a lost language. The hieroglyphics unearthed in Egypt were a complete mystery. This all changed with one of history’s most significant discoveries, the discovery of the Rosetta Stone in 1799. Cracking the Egyptian Code: The Revolutionary Life of JeanFrancois Champollion details the life of the man who deciphered ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. Today considered the founder of Egyptology, Champollion’s work changed what we knew about world history in a heartbeat! Reading about how he solved the code, his interesting life, and his Egyptian expedition was very interesting. Though, I would have liked the book to include a whole lot more Egyptology and less life story. This book was not light reading. I can imagine it being a fabulous college textbook in a beginning Egyptology course. It’s detail rich, contains some splendid pictures, and does justice to a life that deserves not to be lost to history. Reviewed by Jennifer Melville
«««« Who isn’t fascinated by the Ancient Egyptians? Their culture raged strong and marvelous for thousands of years,
Man of the Waterfront: The Story of Kaye Williams and Captain’s Cove by Ralph Harvey CreateSpace / Amazon 505 pages • Paperback $ 19.99 • Kindle $ 6.99
Life on the waterfront. Large sailing ships. Love and marriage. The replica of an early American airplane. Russian sailors on the Bill of Rights bicentennial tour. Moving a wedding from the North Pole to an inner city courthouse. An urban revival in a gritty coastal city − and much more!
“A thrilling story of one man and the sea. Chock full of adventure, imagination, love, hard work, vision, heartbreak, and accomplishments − more than enough for three lifetimes.” − J. Russell Jinishian, noted maritime art authority and the publisher Marine Art News.
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Book Reviews
Category
Reference
new way that makes Wired for Story different from the same old book on writing. Most books guide you in creating the structure of framework for a story and yet here, we get down to brass tacks on how to steer your plot, theme, and characters in a way that pulls readers in, thanks to the help of neuroscience. Each chapter breaks down the cognitive approach to each part of a book’s structure, from the plot to the final editing. Much like Vogler’s The Writer’s Journey, it will become a well-thumbed reference in any writer’s arsenal. Reviewed by Gwen Stackler Loaded Words By Marjorie Garber Fordham University Press, $26.00, 304 pages, Format: Trade
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Wired for Story: The Writer’s Guide to Using Brain Science to Hook Readers from the Very First Sentence By Lisa Cron Ten Speed Press, $14.99, 272 pages, Format: Trade
«««« There are hundreds, if not thousands, of books on how to write well, but very few focus on neurological studies and give techniques on how to keep readers turning page after page, long into the night. Cron explains how story fuels our everyday life and that the key to hooking readers isn’t just about having the ability to write beautiful passages or being passionate about the plot. It is more about making the story real, so that your reader can see themselves in the protagonist’s shoes, you might say. While many of the tips and information included aren’t new, it is how Cron packages the information in a whole
Loaded is a word that explodes with different meanings depending on culture, time, and context; the message in the title is that the gist of language shifts with individual, place, and time. In a series of fifteen essays, Harvard professor of English and Shakespeare scholar, Marjorie Garber explores how language is used and how vocabulary evolves with time. Words like madness, celebrity, the humanities, and genius are dissected and probed to expose the shifting connotations as such expressions metamorphose to match different settings and intents. Excess usage of specific words; like genius, creative, elite, and too many others which have been abused in the media, has distorted the original objective of the expression itself. Think of the word genius, which arose specifically in connection with the arts, and has now been transported to the sciences, and more recently to commercial technology in label-
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Book Reviews
Reference
ing the Apple geniuses. The humanities are stressed as academically essential to guide student-thinking skills with language as the essential instrument for thought. Words lead to ideas, but for clarity it is essential that the listener be aware of the nature of language, how words can be used and their power. Those stimulated by explosive thoughts will find this selection of essays compelling. Reviewed by Aron Row A Year of Writing Dangerously: 365 Days of Inspiration and Encouragement By Barbara Abercrombie New World Library, $15.95, 388 pages, Format: Trade
««««« Abercrombie offers writers a daily thought to help their creative, and sometimes dangerous, life. It is why many who “want to be” writers hesitate to make the four-word commitment that will ultimately define them: “I am a writer.” To her credit, Abercrombie wrote this book for writers of every genre. After 365 days of quotes, sharings from other writers, practical tips, and inspiration, the book concludes with the additional help of 52 writing prompts to kick-start writers each week of the year. For example, one prompt from the book proves the multiple genre use of the advice. “Take your notebook to a public place and spy. Write down what you see and hear.” What a wonderful exercise to gather a scene for a novel, ripe with location, dialogue, and human interest! The same notes can translate into an essay, or be the start of a journalistic article with followup research. With both fiction and non-fiction, the detailed human element gives meaning to the writing. A Year of Writing Dangerously is inspiration, encouragement, and an entry into what other writers have said and done, benefiting all writers, both novices and veterans. “Everybody else works out – actors, musicians dancers – why not writers?” Reviewed by Angie Mangino
You Can’t Make This Stuff Up: The Complete Guide to Writing Creative Nonfiction--from Memoir to Literary Journalism and Everything in Between By Lee Gutkind Da Capo Lifelong, $16.00, 254 pages, Format: Trade
«««« Creative nonfiction can seem like magic, bringing drama to subjects which seem dull at times. Rather than just the news, there is also dialogue, telling details, and scenes. Lee Gutkind’s motto here is drama, and to show rather than tell. It is also as popular as ever, but the big names have changed. In the past it was Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson, Joan Didion, Norman Mailer, and others. Gutkind has other favorites now; including Gay Talese, Rebecca Skloot, himself (his impressive writing is also included), and others. That may be because the majority of selections included for illustration are medical stories. Gutkind is a bit unimpressed with the state of modern journalism, writing that the news is biased and non objective. He is not the first to say it, but You Can’t Make This Stuff Up is really a textbook for the upper division journalism student who already has a grounding in journalism, i.e., they may not be the best writers, but they know what angle has gone before them and they know how to get and display the information. What Gutkind is going for in creative nonfiction is very impressive, but not everybody has a good enough memory to write it. Some need to have spent some time as a journalistic grunt to learn the rules before they are ready for this challenge. Reviewed by Ryder Miller
San Francisco Book Review • September 2012 • 131