ALAN MENDELSOHN, THE BOY FROM MARS by Daniel Pinkwater

What?!?!?! A review of a kid's book not written by JJ? What is this world coming to?

The time had come for me to re-read Alan Mendelsohn, the Boy From Mars. I first read this book when I was nine years old and as an adult, I tend to go back and read it every two or three years. I've always enjoyed the story and it holds up pretty well, even after all these years.

The story is told by Leonard Neeble, a short, portly kid with glasses whose family has just moved to the neighborhood of West Kangaroo Park. He attends Bat Masterson Junior High School where all the kids seem to be tall, tan and don't wear glasses. Leonard doesn't fit in and struggles with school as a result.

One day a new kid starts school there, Alan Mendelsohn, who is also "uncool". Mendelsohn is from the Bronx and the two become friends.

Leonard starts to see a psychiatrist who recommends he takes some time off from school. Alan starts a riot which results in him being suspended. The pair use their time off from school to go into Hogboro to look for comic books. They encounter Samuel Klugarsh, a purveyor of books on the occult. He convinces the boys to purchase a course in mind control. They take the course home and learn how to control the actions of others. The only thing they seem to be able to get anyone to do, though, is to make them take off their hats and rub their bellies (with an occasional dance).

Bored, they return to Klugarsh and trade the course in for one on Hyperstellar Archeology, which involves the study of lost civilizations like Atlantis and Waka-Waka. The course comes with Yojimbo's Japanese-English Dictionary and seems like complete nonsense. It tells how there are chickens as smart as Einstein and that packaged pudding can be turned into a deadly explosive with the addition of an unnamed substance found in most households. The pair make fun of the course until it mentions them by name, saying one day they will read about the lost civilizations.

They meet up with Klugarsh at the Bermuda Triangle Chili Parlor where a member of a biker gang there having chili exposes himself as noneother than Clarence Yojimbo, a Venusian man and author of the aforementioned Dictionary. He tells them that Klugars hahs everything mixed up and gives them the true key to reaching "lost civilizations", one of which they travel to and save from a trio of Nafsulian pirates.

I love this story. It's a lot of fun and very clever. The original, pictured on the left, isn't easy to find. But Pinkwater relased a book of five of his novels, including Alan Mendelsohn, which is pictured on the right. I did not read all of the stories in there. I find Pinkwater to be uneven in his writings. The Last Guru, which is in Five Novels, also is good. I couldn't finish Slaves of Spiegel and didn't feel like reading the other two stories in Five Novels. My other favorite Pinkwater title is Lizard Music. Not quite as enjoyable as Alan Mendelsohn but a good one, nonetheless.

Some of you might recognize Pinkwater as he sometimes appears on National Public Radio as a commentator. He still writes children's novels. If you're looking for something off the beaten path for youngsters, check him out.

--Jon

CATCHING FIRE AND MOCKINGJAY by Suzanne Collins

So now I have read Catching Fire and Mockingjay, the last two books of the Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins.

After the first book, I wondered where the moral outrage against the leaders in the Capitol was. Well, it shows up in the second book. Unrest in a few of the districts is heard as rumor. Security is tightened in District 12, Katniss’s home. And a new hunger game is begun. This time the players are chosen from among the previous Hunger Game winners. So Katniss is back in the thick of things again, forming alliances with the other players and vowing to keep her friends from being killed.

And then fighting against the Capitol takes over in all the districts and Katniss reluctantly becomes the symbol of rebellion, the mockingjay, a bird that’s a cross between a mocking bird and a jay which can repeat the songs of humans.

Is Katniss in favor of the rebellion? Does she see it as a way to punish the Capitol leaders? Is she defending her friends and family? Is she guilty of the deaths of innocent people? Would she fight for survival if it meant killing her friends? Or is she being manipulated by the leaders of the rebellion who would repeat the crimes of the leaders of the Capitol?

In the end, all of what she was initially fighting for is lost, but for one steadfast relationship that leads her to a peaceful new life. Phew. At last.

SS

AGAINST MEDICAL ADVICE by James Patterson and Hal Friedman

When I found Against Medical Advice by James Patterson and Hal Friedman while browsing the nonfiction collection, I decided to read it simply because a certain friend of mine does not appreciate James Patterson, a very popular fiction writer. Never having read a Patterson book, I thought it would be fun to try one. This story, which he co-wrote with Hal Friedman, is his first nonfiction book.

Cory Friedman woke up one morning when he was almost five years old with an uncontrollable urge to shake his head. His irrepressible movements and tics and unmanageable utterances began to take over his life. This book is the story of thirteen years of his life, living with Tourette’s Syndrome, a neurological disorder characterized by repetitive, involuntary movements and vocalizations called tics. His parents take him to many specialists and try different treatments. At some points Cory is taking so much medication, it is hard to distinguish whether his symptoms are caused by Tourette’s or by the side effects of the medicine.

The story is told in Cory’s voice. It is easy to read and very interesting. I was hoping for more information about the disorder, but this was just a surface tale of his day-to-day life of living with a very misunderstood illness. People were rude to him; he didn’t fit in at school; he felt like a failure most of the time. Throughout his life, his parents were supportive of him and took extreme measures to help him. At one point, Cory discovered that alcohol was the only thing that gave him relief from his tortuous and exhausting tics. His mom and dad intervened and sent him to a wilderness camp so he would escape all temptation and be forced to struggle through withdrawal.

Patterson’s co-author, Hal Friedman, is Cory’s father. He had to live through his son’s nightmarish teenage years, and has earned my respect.

The book ends on a good and surprising note, which is hard to believe, but full of hope. (Whether I’m going to read more by James Patterson – we’ll see.)

JJ

BATTLE HYMN OF THE TIGER MOTHER by Amy Chua

 

I read this book only after seeing Ms. Chua being interviewed on two different occasions on NBC’s Today. The first interview was with Matt Lauer who asked questions about her daughters’ musical accomplishments and why she wrote the book. Not an interview that made me stop making the bed to listen.  Meredith Vieira on the other hand, demanded explanation as to why she called her own daughter garbage and quoted demeaning arguments between Amy and Lulu from the book. As a parent of teenagers, this is what got me interested. My sons have never given me back talk, we have great relationships, but I’m always wary of this possibility looming in the background.

Ms. Chua point-blankly describes Chinese parenting versus Western parenting in very basic principles. Chinese parents treat children as resilient beings; they are innately tough and will rebound stronger as a result of struggle. Western parents treat their children as fragile beings who must be protected from emotional damage.  Western parents tend to encourage children to try out new things and cheer them on. “You never know if you’ll like it unless you try it.” Chinese parents assign their children to do something, set the bar high, and expect outstanding achievement while the parent cracks the whip to make it happen. Second best is unacceptable. Western parents are proud of their children while Chinese parents credit themselves for their child’s accomplishments. A Western parent would never do that! Yea,right!

Although a lot of the story is written to sell the book, with long dialogues of nasty arguments and cameo appearances of the girls’ father that leaves the reader wondering why he allows this to go on, the summation is that the task of parenting is daunting and there is no one perfect way. Learning from Amy’s mistakes – which she admits - and strengths can give a parent a new direction when working with their own child.

Amy let Lulu have control of her own violin playing and allowed her to try tennis.  Now my son practices his piano more and will continue to take lessons through the sport season (from a teacher less than a mile away, not a weekly 5 hour travel commitment), where in the past we took “time off” from piano to play.

Compromise.

--Kristin

THAT OLD CAPE MAGIC by Richard Russo

After reading Straight Man, I was looking forward to reading more of Richard Russo. I had heard good things about That Old Cape Magic and decided to read it. The two books share some similarities. The main character is a middle-aged male professor sort of going through a mid-life crisis. Whereas in Straight Man, the book is witty and entertaining, I thought TOCM was sort of sad and desperate. The writing was still terrific and I kept wanting to read it for that reason, but for that reason alone. I just don't know that a novel about someone else's personal problems is all that enticing.

Unfortunately, I don't there is much of a plot outside of the crisis. It felt like more of a character sketch. The thing is, and perhaps this is some of the appeal of the book to others, Russo's characters are very normal and mundane. Boring, even. The lack of anything special or positive about them made me not care about how the book ended or what happened to any of them.

I'm also not sure if I care whether or not I read more Russo. This wasn't quite terrible but it certainly wasn't Straight Man. Given the number of other books out there, I don't know if I feel like gambling on a third book by him.

KNOCKEMSTIFF by Donald Ray Pollock

This was a weird, crazy, depressing book. I'm going to steal a review from the author's website:

"Spanning a period from the midsixties to the late nineties, the stories in Knockemstiff feature a cast of recurring characters who are woebegone, baffled, and depraved—but irresistibly, undeniably real. Rendered in the American vernacular with vivid imagery and a wry, dark sense of humor, these thwarted and sometimes violent lives jump off the page at the reader with inexorable force. . . . Donald Ray Pollock presents his characters and the sordid goings-on with a stern intelligence and a bracing absence of value judgments. . . . Knockemstiff is a genuine entry into the literature of place."

Knockemstiff, Ohio is a real place and the town from where Pollock hails. To me, the key words in the above review are "depraved", "sometimes violent" and "bracing absence of value judgments". Oh, and "sordid goings-on". Humor? Intelligence? If they were there, they were trampled by the depravity. I found this to be a rather disturbing book and although I read something somewhere where Pollock says that the stories are not based on real people, I'm not sure what is more disturbing - that the book might be based on real people or that Pollock thought them up.



Lest you think I'm kidding, that maybe I think of depravity as, oh, returning a library book late, here are some topic matters in the book: rape, incest, murder, drug and alcohol abuse.

While I did find the book to be weird, crazy and depressing (and sordid and disturbing), I thought the writing was pretty good. I just don't know that I thought it was good enough to say, hey, check it out but be aware of the content. There is plenty of good writing out there that isn't disturbing (like Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell which STILL sits on the Staff Picks shelf waiting for you, yes YOU, to pick it up and read it).

--Jon

THE IMMORTAL LIFE OF HENRIETTA LACKS by Rebecca Skloot

Okay, I need to admit that I was never one to excel at science classes. I made it to and through high school biology and then set my sights on more nonscientific pursuits in life (basically anything that did not involve cutting into frogs or stabbing pins through insects). So, I did not know much about cell growth or genetic science before reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Scientific smarts is not needed to enjoy this book. You can read it like a novel and fly through it, or you can read it like a textbook and learn more than you ever could from a class.

In 1951, George Gey cultured the first immortal human cell line using cells from Henrietta Lacks's cervix. Henrietta died in 1951 from cervical cancer. The HeLa cells (named for the first two letters of Henrietta’s first and last names) were a boon to medical and scientific research, soon becoming in demand around the world. With the HeLa cells, a polio vaccine was developed. They were also the first human cells ever cloned.

Rebecca Skloot learned about HeLa cells when she was young and eventually set out to uncover the history of the woman they came from. Years of research entwined Rebecca’s life with the embittered Lacks’ family, who received no financial compensation for the cells. In fact, it was not until 1973 that Henrietta’s family learned the cells were still alive. They later found out the cells had been commercialized, yet they received nothing.

  

The author’s Web site http://rebeccaskloot.com/the-immortal-life/ says: “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks tells a riveting story of the collision between ethics, race, and medicine; of scientific discovery and faith healing; and of a daughter consumed with questions about the mother she never knew. It’s a story inextricably connected to the dark history of experimentation on African Americans, the birth of bioethics, and the legal battles over whether we control the stuff we’re made of.”

Another great book!

JJ

RUNNING THE BOOKS by Avi Steinberg

Wow, wow, wow! Wow! Wow, wow, wow!

Did I mention wow? I loved this book. And yes, as a librarian, you'd expect me to be biased because this is about a prison librarian. Doesn't matter. This is just a great book.

The author, Avi Steinberg, is an interesting cross between successful and ne'er-do-well. He grew up in a moderately well-to-do family and graduated from Harvard. He's Jewish and was an absolute zealot in his childhood, studying scripture at all times. He lost his way in college, got involved with drugs a bit, wrote his senior thesis on Bugs Bunny, and found himself writing obituaries in his twenties, just sort of aimlessly going through life.

He attends a Jewish gathering where he is somewhat berated by his former mentor. Steinberg had recently seen an ad for a position as a prison librarian at a Boston prison. Motivated by his encounter with his mentor, he decides to apply and hopefully help those less fortunate than himself.

Steinberg gets the job and spends the next two and a half years in a sort of intriguing limbo. As a prison librarian, he is supposed to help the prisoners and provide them with books and resources to help them better themselves. He is, however, an employee and as such is supposed to keep himself detached from the inmates. The fine line he walks and the times he falls into one side or the other make up the majority of the book.

Steinberg's struggles is part of what makes the book so great. He is honest - with himself and with his readers. You can tell that there were certain inmates for whom he cared and wanted to see do well. But he knows also that these people are in prison for a reason and that most of them, if they get out, will return to a life of crime. Steinberg is even mugged at knifepoint by a former inmate at one point. The mugger recognizes Steinberg and comments that he still has books from the library. Their past together does not stop the mugger from taking what he wants.

This isn't the only encounter Steinberg has with former prisoners on "the outside". He runs into another inmate at a donut shop and sits and chats with him for a little bit. Suddenly, a former female prisoner comes out from the bathroom and the realization sets in that the male ex-con is now the woman's pimp.

It would take me a zillion edits for me to adequately express how I feel about this book. I like that Steinberg is not judgmental. There are some easy opportunities for him to generalize on race, economic and social status, etc. He does a good job at avoiding that and really is able to look at each individual as a unique person. He sees the good and bad and shares both sides with the reader.

Beyond that, the book is informative. You get an understanding of prisons from a very different standpoint. A prison librarian is in a special position. He or she does not have the authority of a guard. The librarian is usually a civilian employee. Because the librarian is often helping the prisoners, the guards aren't always on the side of the librarian. This can make for some awkward situations because, likewise, the librarian is not a prisoner and so the prisoners, too, are not always on the side of the librarian. It seemed like a tough job and ultimately, the stress of the job causes Steinberg to quit.

For me, one of the characteristics of an excellent work of non-fiction is the ability to make me want to learn more about something after I've read the book. Steinberg motivated me to want to learn more about a topic. There is a section where he delves into prisons and their history. That has prompted me to get a couple of books on prison architecture, which Steinberg gets into during the history section. It's not something I ever really thought much about but Steinberg made me want to learn more.

The only bad thing I can say about this book is the ending isn't quite satisfying. It's neither good nor bad. I guess it felt a little unfinished to me. Outside of that, this is an absolutely phenomenal book and one I will probably read again down the road. It has passed Unbroken for my top book of 2011.

Oh, I almost forgot. Love the dustjacket on this book, too. A portrait of Steinberg done with library date due stamps. Too cool.

--Jon

THE HUNGER GAMES by Suzanne Collins

Katniss Everdeen and her family live in a futuristic country where districts are fenced off from wilderness and residents toil to provide the Capitol with all the food and energy that the leaders need. Conditions are spare and most residents go cold and hungry.

The Hunger Games are a diversion for the amusement of the Capitol. Two teenagers are chosen by lottery from each of the 12 districts. These 24 must fight to the death. When Katniss’s younger sister is drawn to represent her district, Katniss volunteers to take her place.

The Hunger Games is a fast-paced read which took me quickly through the set up and suspense of the games. I was expecting an outrage against the Capitol for forcing these teens into combat against each other. Instead, as is reasonable for facing death, Katniss deals with survival, humanity, and love at a personal level. I guess I’ll need to read the rest of the trilogy, Catching Fire and Mockingjay, to find out if enough rebellion exists to bring down the Capitol.

SS