Poetic Hill by Karen Lyon

In Kitty Felde’s “State of the Union,” young detective Fina Mendoza goes in search of a bird who pooped on the president’s head in the Capitol.

had just moved here with her sister and her father, a newly-elected representative from California. She has settled into a routine, going to school (where she struggles with fractions) and walking Senator Something, a shaggy pooch who belongs to a Congresswoman.

Things get a little unsettled in the Mendoza household when Fina’s grandmother comes to live with them. Her fragrant cooking reminds them of home, but she becomes something of an embarrassment to Fina and her teenage sister—and especially to their father, whose work on a special immigration committee is undermined after Abuelita is interviewed on TV at a protest. Will they all be able to resolve their differences and live amicably together? Will Fina find and rescue the displaced bird?

Packed with lots of inside-DC poop (sorry), “State of the Union” is a frisky and entertaining read that’s also full of heart, compassion, and valuable lessons in tolerance and understanding.

Kitty Felde is a journalist who covered Congress for public radio and is currently host of the award-winning “Book Club for Kids” podcast and creator of the “Fina Mendoza Mysteries” podcast. www.kittyfelde.com

Dearly Departed

If you could live your life without experiencing pain of any sort, would you? That’s one of the conundrums posed in E.J. Wenstrom’s new science fiction novel, “Departures,” where, under the domed Quads of the Directorate, everyone’s life is “optimized and perfect.” As one citizen notes, “No one hardly even gets a paper cut in the Directorate.” Careers and marriages are carefully assigned and everyone’s date of departure is printed on her wrist at birth, all

“neat and tidy.” But what happens when things don’t go as planned? Evalee Henders has always been scheduled to depart at age 17, but for some reason, the morning after her “death,” she wakes up, groggy but still very much alive.

Whisked out of her home in a body bag, she is rescued from the crematorium by a group of rebels who spirit her to their camp outside the domes, which she discovers is nothing like the toxic, ruined wasteland she’d been led to expect. What else, she wonders, has the Directorate been lying about?

Meanwhile, her younger sister Gracelyn is convinced she heard movement in Evie’s room the morning after her supposed departure. A model citizen, even Gracelyn begins to question her orderly existence, “the tight schedules, the carefully-monitored food…the com-

plying and optimizing… I can’t believe I ever bought into all this,” she thinks. But can she break free? And how much will she be willing to give up in order to find her sister?

“Departures” is an absorbing, thoughtprovoking book that questions the choices people make, the choices that are sometimes made for them, and whether “a life dedicated to just avoiding the bad” is really much of a life at all.

E.J. Wenstrom is a sci-fi writer whose book, “Mud,” the first in her Chronicles of the Third Real War series, won the Royal Palm Literary Awards’ Book of the Year. www.EJWenstrom.com u

E.J. Wenstrom’s “Departures” follows two sisters struggling for autonomy in a controlled, post-apocalyptic world.

We get up early everyone is still asleep we are on the 3rd floor so We run down the stairs and outside to the tiny postage stamp front And then it’s time to chase squirrels and birds and run by the Shakespeare library again this time we walk behind it And come out by the LOC (library of congress) and run over to the See the US Capitol building we stand right in the street because It’s blocked off with metal barricades and green steel post Barricades we run up the stairs of the Jefferson Building then back Down and stop at the fountain, the Court of Neptune and let the Water splash on us and we move a half block over and jump up The steps to the Supreme Court and we go over to one of the Round baby blue fountains and wish we had a coin to throw in But we went out of the house without any money it’s a walk only A walk with Mom and dog and we just needed a leash, doggie Bags, a cell phone to take pictures and off we went we walk Beside the Supreme Court building and stop to look at all the Flowers and look at the fountain behind the building no one ever Goes behind the building but there’s a relief there too We jog by Florida house and then take the alley behind the house To see someone tried to get in the back gate so we go on Through the alley by the Lutheran church (across from the Shakespeare Library) and we stand back and wait for all the big Dogs to run by before we dart up and head back down the street And back in the house where we head into the kitchen and into The Patio to fix the back gate and then it’s back inside up to 3rd Floor to wake everyone up for the day to get going.