Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side

Author: Beth Fantaskey
Year: 2009
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Pages: 351
Reading Level: Young Adult

Genre: Fantasy/Romance
Location: Pennsylvania and Romania
Time Period: Present Day (2009)

Plot: On the first day of her senior year, Jessica is surprised to meet Lucius Vladescu, the prince of a powerful Romanian vampire clan, who claims that Jessica is Antanasia, his betrothed vampire princess. A mathlete with an exceedingly rational mind raised by hippies, Jessica finds Lucius' claims hard to believe. She couldn't be a vampire princess--she doesn't even have fangs! Besides, what about Jake Zinn, the cute farm boy next door? As she gets to know Lucius, Jessica struggles with her budding attraction to him and with the idea that vampires are real. SPOILER! When Lucius is severely injured by a horse, Jessica sees Lucius healed by drinking blood. She can no longer deny that he's a vampire, and she can no longer deny that she cares for him. On seeing Jessica's reaction to his injuries, Lucius realizes that Jessica is too tender-hearted to be a vampire princess and that she would be an easy target for their enemies. He tries to push Jessica away in a number of ways: by dating the most popular girl at school, deciding he's not going to honor the betrothal, and eventually returning to Romania without her. Jessica, knowing the horrors that await Lucius if he returns to Romania without a bride (a war between his vampire clan and hers), follows Lucius to Romania. Jessica forces Lucius to acknowledge his love for her by proving that, although he is a ruthless vampire, he could never harm her.

Comments: I didn't realize how dark this book was until I started writing the plot down--and I skipped the attempt the high school kids make to stake Lucius. When I finished the book, my overall reaction was that it is one of the better Twilight knockoffs out there. Then, as I wrote this review, almost talked myself out of that idea.

As much as I liked the story's sense of humor and I liked the chemistry Jessica and Lucius share, there is the glaring problem of the fact that the Jessica/Lucius plot comes to a dead stop right in the middle of the book. I liked Lucius for the first 150 pages. I thought he had a good sense of humor (mostly revealed in his letters home) and I liked how his respect for Jessica actually encouraged her to have some respect for herself. Then, right in the middle, he declares that he's no longer interested in Jessica and thus starts 150 pages of Lucius being a jerk and Jessica trying to get him back. This sudden switch made the plot come to a screeching halt for me, and it took awhile to get going again.

Also, for some reason, some of the names were hard for me to read. I kept reading "Antanasia" as Anastasia. And Jessica's kind-of boyfriend, Jake Zinn, will always be Zake Jinn to me.

Despite the glaring plot problem, this may still be one of the better Twilight knockoffs out there. The writing is still smarter than most. The dialog is witty, and the characters are fleshed out. Lucius is funnier than Edward ever could be, and Jessica is much smarter and more self-confident than Bella. This book is also shorter, which is a mercy.

Red Flags: Some swearing, fighting, an attempt to stake a vampire, vampires biting each other.

Multicultural Elements: Lucius is a Romanian vampire.

Maximum Ride: School's Out--Forever

Author: James Patterson
Year: 2007
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Pages: 407
Reading Level: Intermediate (ages 9-12)

Genre: Action/Fantasy
Series Information: Second of the Maximum Ride series
Location: Eastern United States, especially Virginia, Florida
Time Period: Present Day (2006)

Plot: Maximum Ride and her five friends: Fang, Iggy, Nudge, Gassman, and Angel are special. Kidnapped in infancy, they've been raised in a lab where they were genetically altered. Now they are half human, and half bird, and they are trained with military defense tactics. Max and her flock have escaped from the lab, and now they're on the lam. However, they quickly meet trouble when the Erasers (a human/wolf/bird hybrid) catch up to them. Fang is mortally wounded in the fight, and he has to be taken to the hospital. The FBI finds out about Max and her flock, and a head agent offers Max the chance for all of them to stay at her house and recouperate. The next thing Max knows, she and her friends are all enrolled in a private school, and the FBI agent is talking about making the arrangement permanent. This doesn't sit well with Max, who has her own agenda: to find the lost family members of her flock, and to take down the evil power that genetically altered her flock in the first place. Can she convince the others to leave their comfortable new existence? SPOILER! When Max and her flock discover that the FBI agent is actually one of the heads of the lab where they were made into mutants, Max and her flock head off on their own again. They head for Florida for information about their past. Following a lead that points them to the headquarters of a large corporation, Max and her friends break in and are very nearly captured--but not before learning more about their past and their possible future destiny.

Comments: I picked up this book thinking that it looked like one that would appeal to boys. Even though the cover shown here isn't the same as the cover of the book I read, it has the same idea: the silhouette of a winged teenage boy. Surely that boy was the main character, Maximum Ride? It was therefore rather surprising to me to find out that Max is actually a winged teenage girl. Kudos should be sent to James Patterson for writing a very strong female character, but I still think this type of book will appeal to boys more than it will to girls.

All in all, the book was a fun, quick read. Sentences are short and to the point, as are the chapters, which average about two pages in length. Patterson's writing style fits perfectly with this setup. Dialog is quick and witty. The book is filled with one-liners. The action scenes are extremely fast-paced (and a little gruesome). And, impressively, even though Patterson gives hardly any recap of what happened in the first book in the series, the plot is still easy to follow. This is achieved by the fact that most of the book is written from Max's perspective, so you get a lot of her innermost thoughts. Even though Max is "Avian-American," she still has extremely human emotions. And lots of them since she's a fourteen-year-old teenager. This makes Max relatable even though her actions are tough.

Perhaps the biggest downfall of the book is that so much of the book is spent with hardly anything happening. This allows us to get to know Max better, and it's part of why she's as relatable as a genetically enhanced, military trained being can be, but if this series is supposed to be a sci-fi thriller, why are they taking a break to attend school? I wasn't too bothered by this fact while I was reading the book. The fast-paced dialog does help this section move along, but it's something that puzzles me now.

Themes: Evil Corporations, School, Definition of what a Family is, Saving the World

Red Flags: Violence (breaking bones, explosions, etc.) in the fight scenes.

The Manny Files

Author: Christian Burch
Year: 2006
Publisher: Atheneum
Pages: 304
Reading Level: Intermediate (Ages 9-12)

Awards: 2007 Josette Frank Award

Genre: Realistic Fiction
Series Information: First of the Manny books
Location: New England (New York area)
Time Period: Present Day (2006)

Plot: Third grader Keats Dalinger is extremely excited about the new nanny his mother just hired--he's a boy just like Keats is! The nanny insists that everyone call him the Manny, but the fun doesn't end there. He puts fun notes in Keats' lunch, reminding him to "be interesting." He meets Keats after school wearing crazy costumes. And when Keats and his sisters are bored, the Manny always has an idea of something fun to do. Keats and his sisters India and Belly love the Manny, but the oldest Dalinger sibling, Lulu, has other ideas. She keeps notes of all of the weird things the Manny does in a notebook named the Manny Files, and Keats is afraid that she's hoping to gain enough ammunition to get the Manny fired. Lulu's done it before. Can the Manny win Lulu over too before it's too late? SPOILER! When Lulu calls a family council to reveal all of the Manny's misdeeds, Keats finally gets over his fear of his older sister and asserts his opinion that the Manny is the best nanny they've ever had. The Manny gets to stay, and Lulu learns to appreciate him as well.

Comments: I'll admit it: I originally picked this book up because it had a guy doing the Mary Poppins pose on the front of it. I love Mary Poppins! It didn't take long, however, to enjoy the book for it's own merits. The book is witty and clever, and I found myself laughing aloud many times. The plot is rather subtle, and not very developed or fast paced, but it seems the point of the book is more to show the Dalinger family and the Manny growing together and learning about each other on a day-to-day basis than it is about deciding whether or not the Manny should stay. Potentially hard issues are brought up in the book, but they're done so gently and light-heartedly that it doesn't get depressing. Keats himself is a fun, quirky character to pick as the narrator of the story. His starry-eyed worship of the Manny is endearing, as is the evidence that the Manny is someone who really encourages Keats to get out of his shell be who he really is. Younger children will enjoy the fun escapades the children have with the Manny, while older readers will enjoy the subtler themes as well.

Themes: Nannies, Bullies, Family, Death, Finding out who you really are

Red Flags: Keats' grandma dies; there are subtle comments about the growing relationship between the Manny and Uncle Max, but it's handled very gently and younger children probably won't even pick up on it.

Mr. Lincoln's Boys

Sub-Title: Being the MOSTLY True Adventures of Abraham Lincoln's Trouble-Making Sons, TAD and WILLIE
Author: Staton Rabin
Illustrator: Bagram Ibatoulline
Year: 2008
Publisher: Viking Press
Pages: 36
Reading Level: Intermediate (ages 9-12)

Genre: Picture Book/Historical Fiction
Location: White House, Washington, D.C.
Time Period: Civil War (1860's)

Plot: Tad and Willie live with their parents, Martha and Abraham Lincoln, in the White House in Washington, D.C. Even though their father is a very busy man, the President of the United States always makes time for his sons. The boys are also mischievous, and they often get into trouble. They have a toy soldier that they frequently charge for some violation or another, then they come up with a different way to execute and bury the doll. SPOILER! During one of these execution plays, The gardener finds Tad and Willie digging in the flower bed to bury the toy soldier. Furious, the gardener chases Tad and Willie away. Unable to carry out the execution, Tad and Willie must figure out what to do with their doomed doll. They take the problem to their father, who is the middle of a meeting, and ask for a pardon. The President awards the doll a pardon, and it is shown that the President's stressful life is made easier by watching his son's antics.

Comments: When you're writing about events that really happened in world history, it's easy to stick to facts and take all of the emotion and story out of it. Staton Rabin does an excellent job focusing on that emotion and story, and successfully creates a tale not just about Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War, but about fathers and sons and the importance of making time for family. Rabin is open about the fact that he changed the way things happened in order to help children relate with the story, and it's possible that he helped them understand a little more about the Civil War because of it. Despite all of this, I appreciated the notes found in the back of the book explaining exactly what the author changed, and why. With this, an explanation about who the characters in the story are, and a list of further reading, this book makes a good way to celebrate the 200th anniversary of Lincoln's birth.

Of course I have to mention the artwork of Bagram Ibatoulline, who illustrated one of my favorite children's books of all time, found here. Ibatoulline succeeds again in capturing the mood just right. The pictures are warm and golden and very lifelike, and I laughed at the realistic look on the boys' face as they solemnly walked into the President's Office to ask for a pardon. Both the pictures and the prose work well together in telling the story of an amusing thing that happened during a very somber period of American history.

Themes: Civil War, Soldiers, Abraham Lincoln, Importance of Family, Fathers and Sons

Red Flags: Willie and Tad imagine different ways to execute their toy soldier.

The Graveyard Book

Author: Neil Gaiman
Illustrator: Dave Mckean
Year: 2008
Publisher: HarperCollins
Pages: 320
Reading Level: Intermediate (ages 9-12)

Awards: 2009 Newbery Medal, 2009 ALA Notable Books for Children, 2009 ALA Best Books for Young Adults, 2008 Horn Book Fanfare Award

Genre: Gothic fantasy
Location: A forgotten graveyard in Britain
Time Period: Present Day (2008)

Plot: When a baby boy hides in a graveyard while a man named Jack murders the rest of his family, the inhabitants of the graveyard agree to adopt him. They name him Nobody (Bod) Owens, and bestow on him the power of the graveyard, which allows him to fade from sight, walk through walls, and see in the dark. Bod spends the next fourteen years in the graveyard. He makes friends with the inhabitants, learns to read by deciphering gravestones, and learns English history from people who lived it. While Bod wants to learn all he can about the world, his not-quite-dead and not-quite-living guardian, Silas, warns him that the man Jack is still out there, searching for him. SPOILER! When Jack discovers where Bod is, he and his band, the Jacks of All Trades, infiltrate the graveyard. It will take all that Bod has learned and the help of all of his friends in the graveyard to defeat this mighty foe. However, when this is done Bod no longer needs the protection of the graveyard, and he is allowed to leave the graveyard and seek his fortune in the world.

Comments: I did something I don't normally do when I read—instead of actually reading the book, I listened to the book on CD, which is narrated by the author. Gaiman is a great storyteller, and it was fun to hear the story come to life in his telling of it. He gave different inflections to most of the characters in the book, sounding young and youthful whenever Bod spoke, ghostly and ethereal when a character from the graveyard spoke, and deep and harsh whenever the man Jack spoke. My favorite voice, however, what the Scottish accent Gaiman used whenever Bod's only living friend, Scarlet, was on the scene.

The story itself is interesting, and it grabs your attention from the very first sentence: "There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife." Although the wording and the setting are both dark and tense, Gaiman keeps this book light, allowing the reader to experience Bod's wonder and pleasure in the world around him. The book follows Bod's adventures as he grows up, and for awhile I wondered if the tense scene at the beginning with the man Jack would ever be referred to again. The time Gaiman takes in telling the story pays off, however, when Bod uses the knowledge he gained from almost every chapter before when the man Jack finally makes another appearance.

It's the small touches Gaiman adds to this book that really make it great. With every new character introduced, the epitaph on their gravestone is read. Bod is a precocious main character, and he learns life lessons that even adults will find interesting and applicable. Even though Bod is in a situation that would never really happen, it seems completely natural that a boy in this situation wouldn't find death scary or frightening at all, which makes the book more believable. Oddly enough, despite all that happens in this book, the scenario I had the most trouble accepting was that fact that Bod was allowed to leave the graveyard and seek his fortune at the young age of 15. This is a fact that will be appealing to younger readers, however, and it's not a hinderance to the story.

I really enjoyed this book. My only regret from having listened to the book instead of reading it is that I missed Mckean's dark, jagged drawings, a few of which I have seen and which I think would add just as much character and life as Gaiman's inflections added. I'll just have to read the book again, won't I?

Themes: Murder, Family, Definition of Home, Seeking one's Fortune, Destiny, Standing up for what you believe in.

Red Flags: Bod deals with bullies, Silas gets run over by a car (but that's okay, because he's not alive), the book contains (good) werewolves, goblins, ghouls, murderers, and other creepy things that go bump in the night.

A Firefly Named Torchy

Author/Illustrator: Bernard Waber
Year: 1970
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Company
Pages: 29
Reading Level: Beginning Reader (ages 4-8)

Awards: 1971 Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor

Genre: Picture Book
Location: The edge of the woods
Time Period: Present Day (1970)

Plot: Torchy the Firefly wants to join his friends in twinkling, glowing, flashing, and sending secret messages. But when he turns on his light, it's so bright that it feels like day. The day animals wake up, the night animals hide, and the flowers open up. Everyone complains that Torchy's light is too bright. Sad and dejected, Torchy wanders off on his own to figure out what the problem is. SPOILER! When Torchy sees the lights of a big city, he discovers that there are many different kinds of light. Torchy learns that his light is special and unique, and he decides that he shouldn't hide it just because it's different.

Comments: I originally found this book while I was looking for non-fiction books about fireflies, but the book's title and the lovely 1960's font (as seen here) made me want to read it. Sometimes you can judge a book by its cover.

Torchy is a cute little firefly, and the message of the book is a great one for kids. As with most picture books, the artwork tells most of the story on its own, with night-black pages splashed with thick, muted colors. The excitement of the city is show with big, bold strokes and bright colors. The text of the story is amusing too. A lot of repetition is involved, with Torchy and the lights around him twinkling and glowing and flashing. Perhaps a better example of this, though is the part where Torchy wakes up all of the forest animals and they all have the same reaction. The flow of the story is simple, but the repetition would make it a good one for both group and individual enjoyment.

Themes: Fireflies, Self-Confidence

Haroun and the Sea of Stories

Author: Salman Rushdie
Year: 1991
Publisher: Viking
Pages: 219
Reading Level: Young Adult

Awards: 1992 Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Children's Literature

Genre: Fantasy
Location: On Earth, in a city that has forgotten its name in the mythical country of Alifbay; Also, the mythical moon Kahani
Time Period: Once upon a time (but in the near past)

Plot: Rashid Khalifa is a storyteller who is so good at his craft that people clamor for his stories from miles around. However, when his wife leaves him and his son, Haroun, Rashid loses the will to tell another story. Alarmed, Haroun decides to go on a quest to restore his father's storytelling ability. With the help of the water genie Iff and his mechanical Hoopoe bird Butt, Haroun flies to the moon Kahani, where the source of all stories, the Ocean of the Streams of Story, is located. There, Haroun finds trouble is brewing. The evil villain Khattam-Shud is poisoning the streams of story, and plotting to put a stopper in the wellsprings of the ocean. Khattam-Shud has also captured Princess Batcheat, and he is threatening to sew up the lips of her and her rescuers in an attempt to rule the world and turn it into a place of eternal silence and darkness. It is up to Haroun and his friends to defeat Khattam-Shud before it becomes too late. SPOILER! Haroun and his friends succeed when Haroun manages to get the moon to start turning again, assuring that no one will ever be in complete darkness forever. Khattam-Shud's evil lairs of ice and shadow are ruined in the sunlight. Because Haroun has helped save Kahani, the people of Kahani offer Haroun a boon. He wishes for a happy ending, and arrives home to find that everyone is happy, Rashid's powers of storytelling have been rekindled, and Haroun's mother has come back home.

Comments: I read this book for book club, and it was interesting to see the different opinions people had about it. One person loved it. Another person couldn't stand the writing style. The book had many elements of a classic hero adventure tale, which is something I love, but I could see where the person who didn't like the book was coming from.

Rushdie's writing style is very epic and exotic. He frequently repeats the same idea three times in three different ways. For example, Rashid the storyteller is an Ocean of Notions, the Shah of Blah, given the Gift of Gab, etc. The repetition sets the tone of the story nicely, but it also has an edge of humor in it. This is, after all, designed as a child's tale. The humor can be somewhat off-putting because it is sometimes silly, but it is something that children should love.

This is a story that I think adults would appreciate too. Despite the sometimes silly humor and repetition, there are many layers of meaning to the story. What goes on in Kahani can be directly related to what is going on down on Earth below. The book also tries to raise the question, "what's the use of stories if they're not real?"

Haroun is a likeable character whose braveness is fueled by his love for his father and by his yearning for Rashid to be happy. Most of the other characters are somewhat cookie-cutter characters, but that works for this type of story.

I liked the story a lot, and I would recommend it to others. The ending left a little something to be desired because it all ended so suddenly and so neatly, but it is the classic happy ending that a tale of good vs. evil should have.

Themes: The power of Storytelling, Good vs. Evil

Red Flags: Haroun's mother leaves Rashid for the upstairs neighbor, who ends up being Khattam-Shud.

Multicultural Elements: Although this is a fairy tale, the characters and storytelling elements are very much influenced by an Indian/Asian storytelling influence.