* = skip it
** = only so-so
*** = pretty good read
**** = recommended
***** = don't miss it, excellent book!

Tamar
(check out the review below)

Review: Currently reading this for my graduate class! More to come...

Summary: Presents an account of the 1984 murder of Brenda Lafferty and her fifteen-month-old daughter Erica by Mormon Fundamentalists Ron and Dan Lafferty, brothers to the victims' husband and father who claim they were acting on an order directly from God, and provides insights into Mormon Fundamentalists and other extremist belief systems.

Review: Very interesting, intense history about the Mormon church. The murders are only a small portion of the whole book. Krakauer writes in an interesting, easy-to-read style.

Summary: Huckleberry Finn, the son of the town drunk, and Jim, an escaped slave, make a break for freedom down the Mississippi River on a raft, sharing many adventures along the way.

Review: Classic novel. It was good to reread it after many, many years! Intensive class discussion will follow later this semester...

Summary: Fellow actors and motorcycle enthusiasts Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman provide an account of their 15,000 mile journey from the northernmost tip of Scotland to the southernmost tip of South Africa, discussing the places they visited, the people they met, and the challenges they faced along the way.

Review: Really interesting story about two friends who decide to ride their motorcycles on this incredible journey. I found the descriptions of their African experiences  very interesting. And they did a good job of comparing the various countries they traveled through. Maps are included, so you can chart their progress as you read.

Toward the end of summer, I read as many Abe-nominated books as I could get in! Some of my favorites are Dairy Queen, The Girls, I am the Messenger, Looking for Alaska, The Lightning Thief, and Sold. Go to http://www.islma.org/pdf/2009AnnotatedMasterList.pdf for the complete list of nominees as well as summaries of all books.

book summaries from Follett Titlewave

* = skip it
** = only so-so
*** = pretty good read
**** = recommended
***** = don't miss it, excellent book!

Stardust
(check out the review below)

Summary: Frankie Landau-Banks attempts to take over a secret, all-male society at her exclusive prep school, and her antics with the group soon draw some unlikely attention and have unexpected consequences that could change her life forever.

Review: Lockhart seems to be a new and upcoming teen author, so I had been meaning to read one of her books this school year. The Disreputable History is her latest and I really, really enjoyed it. It is funny, reflective, and well-written. Basically, Frankie attempts to secretly control the all-male secret society at her boarding school (of which, her boyfriend is a member!). She has a lot of success, but also faces consequences. After reading this, I plan to read more of Lockhart's books!

Summary: Young Tristran Thorn, having lost his heart to the lovely but cold Victoria Forester, leaves the safe English town of Wall and sets out into a strange world on a quest to retrieve a fallen star he has promised to his beloved.

Review: I meant to read this book last fall when the movie came out and just got around to it now in May! It was a quick, enjoyable read. I liked the tone of the book... it was a fantasy, but with humorous aspects to it. I am now anxious to see the movie!

Summary: Convinced that fate is out to get him, fifteen-year-old David Case assumes a new identity in the hope of avoiding what he believes is certain doom.

Review: I am not a big fan of Rosoff. I did not care for How I Live Now, her first novel. But, I decided to give this one a shot anyway as it won the 2007 Carnegie Medal. I found the book very confusing. Basically, it is about a teenage boy in England who is trying to change his fate, all the while he is taking care of his "invisible" dog, Boy. I found this very odd. His parents are no help to him. And his friends try to help, but don't really know how to. It is a quick read, but doesn't have much else going for it, in my opinion.

Summary: Veterinarian Travis Parker is very content with his good job, loyal friends, and waterfront home in North Carolina, so he is not looking for love, especially not with his testy new neighbor Gabby Holland, but he cannot seem to keep from trying to ingratiate himself with her, even though he knows she has a longtime boyfriend, and it is not long before they find themselves facing an important choice.

Review: I normally am not a super fan of Nicholas Sparks, but I really enjoyed this book and didn't predict what was going to happen. I did find the love story to be slightly unrealistic, which seems to be common with Sparks. However, every now and again, it is nice to read a happy love story!

Summary: Haunted by flashbacks, fifteen-year-old Meredith learns that three years in prison has not changed the abusive father who molested her.

Review: This is a hard to read book as it deals with a father molesting his daughter as well as other children and a mother who takes his side every time. It allows you to view the world of someone going through this horrific abuse and how she deals with it.

Summary: Twenty-year-old Pat, working at an Edinburgh art gallery while on sabbatical from college, becomes involved in the lives of her eccentric neighbors at 44 Scotland Street, while trying to solve the mystery of a possible lost masterpiece.

Review: This was originally written as a serial to appear daily in The Scotsman newspaper in Edinburgh, Scotland, and then was compiled as a book. It is about the daily life of people who live in the same apartment building. I decided to read this book as I am going to Scotland for a few weeks in June to observe in school libraries. And I thought I would get familiar with some of the names of popular places and phrases there!

Summary: Traces the journey of a father and his son as they walk alone after a great fire has consumed the nation and left everything in ashes.

Review: We recently read this title for West staff book club. It is a very different book (subject matter and how it is written). It provided a lot of discussion material for the group!

Summary: High school seniors Sara and Tobey attempt to figure out what is important in life as they try to balance their preparations for their futures with their enjoyment of the present.

Review: Very good story about two high school seniors who eventually find out they like each other and are a good match. So this is part love story, but also part "what am I going to do with my life next year??" story!!

Summary: Izzy Spellman, an employee at her family's private investigation firm, becomes convinced that her neighbor is hiding a dark secret, and is willing to lose her license to find out what it is.

Review: This is a sequel to The Spellman Files, so it picks up where the first one left off. It is just as funny as the first!!

Summary: Comic book artist Daniel Stone, a stay-at-home dad with a fourteen-year-old daughter Trixie, and an unfaithful wife, turns a blind eye to Trixie's first broken heart and wife Laura's affair, but the feelings of rage he has buried for years come to the surface when Trixie is raped at a party and accuses her former boyfriend.

Review: This book deals with some pretty serious topics, but I thought several aspects of it were quite unbelievable. I would recommend a few other Picoult books over this one (My Sister's Keeper and Nineteen Minutes).

Summary: Seventeen-year-old Nathan Nelson awakens from a two-week coma and finds he has an extraordinary memory, but even with his new ability and a change of schools he cannot live up to his genius father's high expectations.

Review: This is a hard-to-read book about a teenage son and his strained relationship with his father. It does have some interesting parts to it, but overall, I didn't feel it was worth the effort I put forward reading it!

Summary: While deciding if she should quit working for her family's private investigation firm, Izzy Spellman copes with meddling parents, an alcoholic uncle, the disappearance of her younger sister, and her own problems with men and drinking.

Review: Hilarious book!! But, this is an adult book, so a word of warning... It is fast-paced and has elements of mystery, family drama (lots of family drama!), love, and action in it. I believe there is a sequel to this book as well.

Summary: George Hall is ready to settle down to a comfortable retirement, until his tempestuous daughter, Katie, announces she is marrying someone George disapproves of, and George is diagnosed with a devastating illness.

Review: This is a very bizarre book! It takes place in England and has some of the most interesting characters in it. I didn't know what to make of it at first, but somehow the storyline drew me in and I kept reading to find out how they would "sort things all out." (British phrase)

Summary: In 1899 Manhattan, the drowning of beautiful Elizabeth Holland, daughter of New York society's ruling family, brings to the surface the scandalous behavior of several teenagers of varying social class.

Review: Interesting story focusing on a very rich social class in New York at the turn-of-the-century. Warning: this is the first book in a series! I thought I had predicted the ending about halfway through the book, and I was mostly right! However, I still wanted to keep reading it and find out what happened to all of the characters.   

Summary: During the summer after her sophomore year, Deanna Lambert tries to come to terms with the reputation with which she was slapped in the eighth grade when she was caught by her father in the backseat of a car with a high school senior, and struggles with her still-strained relationship with her father and her changing feelings for her best friend, Jason.

Review: This is a story about a girl who gets a bad reputation in junior high and is still trying to overcome it within her family, her peers at school, and the boy who helped her earn it. She is also trying to sort out her feelings with two of her closest friends. It is a pretty good book that deals with common issues for teens.

Summary: Sixteen-year-old Sophie has been frail and delicate since her premature birth, but discovers her true strength during a journey through Mexico, where the six-year-old orphan her family hopes to adopt was born, and to Guatemala, where her would-be boyfriend hopes to find his mother and plans to remain.

Review: Nice story about a teenage girl who learns to have more confidence in herself through those around her and trying things she normally wouldn't. It isn't a "can't-put-down" book, though!

Summary: Justin spends time with Jinsen, the unusual and artistic new student whom the school bullies torment and call Buddha Boy, and ends up making choices that impact Jinsen, himself, and the entire school.

Review: Very quick read about a new kid to school who doesn't quite fit in and the friend who tries to help him.

Summary: Katie Wilkinson, blissfully in love, is suddenly abandoned by the man who made her happy, left with only a diary written by a new mother named Suzanne for her infant son, Nicholas--and as Katie reads, she gains a new understanding of Matt, the man who left her.

Review: This is a quick, easy to read love story. There is a surprising twist at the end. If you like love stories, you will definitely enjoy this book!

Summary: After Odella's mother leaves her, her sisters, and their father in Manitoba and moves to Iceland with another man, she then dies there, and the family finally learns some of the many secrets that have haunted them for two generations.

Review: This is a quick read about a Canadian girl and her family who have dealt with a lot. The mother leaves them for Iceland and ends up never coming back. Toward the end of the book, several things are revealed that had been kept hidden and partially explain the mother's behavior.

Summary: A fallen angel, tired of being unappreciated while doing his pointless, demeaning job, leaves Hell, enters the body of a seventeen-year-old boy, and tries to experience the full range of human feelings before being caught and punished, while the boy's family and friends puzzle over his changed behavior.

Review: Very quick read about a "fallen angel" who takes over the body of an American teenage boy. He experiences everything human for the first time and tries to make some positive changes in this boy's life before he exits the scene. This book won the 2008 Printz Honor Award.

Summary: Hairdresser Deborah Rodriguez details her experiences in post-Taliban Afghanistan, discussing the opening of her beauty school and recalls the personal stories of various women who overcame obstacles to obtain an education in cosmetology.

Review: Very interesting, true story about an American woman who wanted to make a difference in Afghanistan and help the women who had been repressed under the Taliban.

Summary: During the 1967 school year, on Wednesday afternoons when all his classmates go to either Catechism or Hebrew school, seventh-grader Holling Hoodhood stays in Mrs. Baker's classroom where they read the plays of William Shakespeare and Holling learns much of value about the world he lives in.

Review: This is an excellent book! I thought it was very funny, sometimes sad, and always well-written. Holling is in middle school, but anyone can enjoy this book. (I sure did!)

Summary: Eighteen-year-old James Sveck copes with the uncertainties of adolescence as he works in his mother's Manhattan art gallery, falls for a charming older gentleman, and tries to decide what he wants out of life.

Review: This was an interesting book about a high school boy who is trying to figure things out... he doesn't really like to interact much with people and doesn't think he wants to go to college. The ending of the book didn't really resolve things for me, but maybe the author did that on purpose?

Summary: Tells the story of Chris McCandless, a twenty-four-year-old who walked into the Alaskan wilderness on an idealistic journey and was found dead of starvation four months later. Attempts to discover what led the young man to that point.

Review: Very interesting, TRUE story about a young man who leaves everything behind (possessions, money, and family) to roam around the United States on his own. He eventually ends up in Alaska attempting to survive on his own in the wilderness, where he meets an unfortunate end. The author of this story analyzes Chris's life, what happened to him in Alaska, and why he might have attempted this experiment.

Summary: A novel set against the three decades of Afghanistan's history shaped by Soviet occupation, civil war, and the Taliban, which tells the stories of two women, Mariam and Laila, who grow close despite their nineteen-year age difference and initial rivalry as they suffer at the hand of a common enemy: their abusive husband.

Review: This is the second book by the author of The Kite Runner, one of my favorite books. I enjoyed this one, but not quite as much as his first book. (If you like sad books, check out The Kite Runner!)

Summary: Through journal entries sixteen-year-old Miranda describes her family's struggle to survive after a meteor hits the moon, causing worldwide tsunamis, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions.

Review: After reading about 3/4 of this book, I quit... I just didn't get into it and there was a lot of repetitive description of how the family survived after the meteor hits the moon.

Summary: At the age of fifteen, Sam Jones's girlfriend gets pregnant and Sam's life of skateboarding and daydreaming about Tony Hawk changes drastically.

Review: This is a very funny book with a serious message about how having a baby when you are a teenager drastically changes your life and your future plans. Hornby is the author of several British novels - High Fidelity, A Long Way Down, About A Boy, and more...

Summary: Budding cartoonist Junior leaves his troubled school on the Spokane Indian Reservation to attend an all-white farm town school where the only other Native American is the school mascot.

Review: At the same time funny and depressing, this is a story about an Indian named Arnold who leaves the safety of his reservation to go to an all-white school in the neighboring town. He deals with both sides judging him for his decision as well as the loss of several people he was very close to. A sad story, but yet he experiences success with his difficult decision and the reader is left with the sense that Arnold is going to be okay.

Summary: Greg Mortenson recounts the experiences he had while trying to help impoverished villages in Pakistan's Karakoram Himalaya build schools for their children.

Review: Very interesting (and true) story about one man's drive and desire to make a difference in a part of the world he fell in love with while mountain climbing in the Himalayas. The book gets a little long, but does have an interesting take on 9/11 from somebody who was in Pakistan at the time and knows the region and different cultures very well.

Summary: After a nasty fall, Naomi realizes that she has no memory of the last four years and finds herself reassessing every aspect of her life.

Review: This was an interesting book about a girl who is trying to piece together the last few years of her life. She wants to become her own person and not the girl everyone tells her she was before her accident. This results in some good decisions, along with some not-so-good decisions. An interesting idea, even though I'm not sure how plausible it is! For her second book, the author (Gabrielle Zevin) seems to come up with very unique book concepts. Her first book, Elsewhere, is also a good read.

Summary: In England in 1995, fifteen-year-old Tamar, grief-stricken by the puzzling death of her beloved grandfather, slowly begins to uncover the secrets of his life in the Dutch resistance during the last year of the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands, and the climactic events that forever cast a shadow on his life and that of his family.

Review: Wonderful book! It flips back and forth between the mid-90s and WW II. It is a long book and takes a while to get into the story, but definitely do not put this book down!! It is one of the best WW II books I've in the past few years.

Summary: Fifteen-year-old musician J.J. Liddy leaves his small, Irish town and travels to the land of the fairies to search for time so he can give it to his busy mother, but when he gets there, he discovers that the inhabitants are in trouble and learns about his family's secret history.

Review: Enjoyable fantasy book. Lots of Irish vocabulary! (glossary included) It is a longer book, but reads really quickly.

Summary: When thirteen-year-old San Lee moves to a new town and school for the umpteenth time, he is looking for a way to stand out when his knowledge of Zen Buddhism, gained in his previous school, provides the answer--and the need to quickly become a convincing Zen master.

Review: Not as good as Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie (one of my all-time favorites!), but a funny story with a good message. And a quick read...

Summary: Given the medical diagnosis of one year to live, high school senior Ben Wolf decides to fulfill his greatest fantasies, ponders his life's purpose and legacy, and converses through dreams with a spiritual guide known as "Hey-Soos."

Review: Loved it!! One of the best books I've read recently. Word of caution - have some Kleenex handy!

Summary: After finding out he is part machine, sixteen-year-old Robert Smith runs from the covert government agents who are trying to pin a murder on him, and together with Eddi, a nineteen-year-old criminal, tries to uncover his true identity.

Review: This book reminded me of the Bourne Identity movies. Robert is on the run, but has no idea why he is being chased. A lot of action, some adventure, and just a little of science fiction!

Summary: Dairy queen. High school junior D. J. Schwenk staggers under the weight of caring for her badly injured brother, her responsibilities on the dairy farm, a changing relationship with her friend Brian, and her own athletic aspirations.

Review: I LOVED both of these books! The main character, D.J., is a high school girl who is strong, spunky, and caring (as well as funny). I hope there are more books about her.

Summary: A novel in vignettes, in which Lakshmi, a thirteen-year-old girl from Nepal, is sold into prostitution in India.

Review: Very emotional book about a young, innocent girl sold for money by her father. This is a quick book to read because it is written in one-page passages, but it is a very heart wrenching story.

Summary: Grady, a transgendered high school student, yearns for acceptance by his classmates and family as he struggles to adjust to his new identity as a male.

Review: Interesting story about a girl named Angela who decides she feels more comfortable living as a boy. The author does a good job of bringing up many issues one would face after making such a decision.

Summary: Having won thousands of dollars playing high-stakes poker in Las Vegas, seventeen-year-old Denn Doyle hits a losing streak after falling in love with a young casino card dealer named Cattie Hart.

Review: If you like poker, this is the book for you! Denn, a poker prodigy, has lost all of his money and the girl he loves. After some soul-searching, he decides to play in a 'winner-take-all' poker game and try to reconnect with Cattie. Tons of poker action... and a quick read.

Summary: Carlton Dunne IV, an outcast boarding school student with a secret identity as a graphic novelist, teams up with a beautiful Scottish girl who yearns to be an American police officer, to resolve an ancient feud and rescue Carlton's kidnapped father.

Review: This is a fantastic book! Carlton's dad has been kidnapped, so he flies to Scotland to find him. As soon as he gets there, he teams up with a very outspoken girl who is determined to help him. Together they go on quite an adventure to solve the mystery and track down Carlton's dad. A combination of action, mystery, humor, graphic novel, realism, footnotes, and more. This book has it all!!

book summaries from Follett Titlewave