Altered by Jennifer Rush
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This may not be the best literature, but it is a great story.

Something’s going on in Anna's house. Her father does strange genetic experiments in their farmhouse on four boys who live in their basement. As Anna gets to know the boys, she falls in love with Sam, and when an organization called the Branch threatens to take the boys away, they stage an escape and Anna goes with them.

They are on the run, and the secrets about the boys start to come out...


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The Influencing Machine: Brooke Gladstone on the Media by Brooke Gladstone
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Gladstone is both narrator and visual tour guide, popping up throughout Neufeld's comic panels as both her contemporary self and camouflaged alongside historical figures.

The comic book format permitted me to read and learn about a subject I would not have attempted in a formal book format; the graphic format makes sense as a way to ease the "pain".

Beginning with the Incas, Herodotus, and the Acta Diurna of the Roman Senate, she wends her way to the present. The history’s always interesting, and her discussion on objectivity, and what psychological research has revealed about how people receive news and opinion is amazing.

One of the most intriguing sections deals with bias: commercial, bad news, status quo, access, visual, narrative, and fairness. This leads nicely into a discussion of war journalism. Throughout I was scandalized by the tidbits of information about falsehoods, lies, and tampering that goes on in the media.

This is definitely an interesting and easy way to read about a complex, interesting subject that has an effect on us all.


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A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book is very well written but I didn’t enjoy it.
I was drawn by the interesting title and intriguing blurb on the back of the paperback. The plot had unexpected twists and turns and the characters behaved or reacted in unpredictable ways.

The characters were despicable and their motivations and desires were disturbing. Their lives were sad and full of despair. This is not a book you feel happy after reading.  However, I could not put it down nor leave it on the shelf after starting.  I had to keep reading to see where the plot took the characters and how the story resolved itself.

I stayed with it and I’m glad I did, even though it is not to my taste (too dark) it was worth reading.  I can see why it was so well reviewed.  It was good literature.


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Tell The Wolves I'm Home by Carol Rifka Brunt
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a special book, one you’ll remember long after you have finished the last page.  It is not marketed directly to YA but easily will delight and inspire young readers.
It's 1987, and awkward 14-year-old June's favorite person in the world, her Uncle Finn, has just died of AIDS. Finn leaves her a message asking her to take care of his longtime partner Toby, whom June’s family blames for Finn’s illness. At first cautiously, then enthusiastically, June tries to fulfill Finn’s wishes, and discovers complicated parts of her family history that she’d rather not have learned.
We are witnesses to June’s dreams and insecurities. She searches for answers on how to heal her rocky relationship with her sister Greta; how to be the person Finn thought she could be; how to understand her parents; and how to recover from a broken heart.
The characters’ relationships are exquisitely complex and real.  The writing is descriptive to the point that you can feel June’s aches. This novel is full of emotion so have your tissues ready.


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Without Tess by Marcella Pixley
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Lizzie watched her sister slowly deteriorate and die.  Tess promised to never leave, but she still died.  
After Tess died, Lizzie snatched Tess's Journal and has clung to it and the memories it holds ever since.  She often reminisces about the good times and getting pulled in to Tess's magical make-believe world.  Lizzie was too young to realize how dangerous Tess’s magical world could be.
Now Lizzie is in high school and lost in a world of guilt and grief.
How can Lizzie make peace with what happened to Tess?  Can she start to live her own life?


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For The Win by Cory Doctorow
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

On-line gamers beware!
Millions of people around the world addictively play in multiplayer online games, battling to win virtual gold, jewels, and precious artifacts. Meanwhile, millions of “gold farmers” slave in electronic sweatshops harvesting virtual treasure that their employers then sell to First World gamers for real money.

But unrest brews across the globe as slave gamers unite to create a union that challenges the status quo. From the US to China to India, young gamers fight pitched battles in the virtual world.   Their aim: crash the economy of every virtual world and win their emancipation.


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My rating: 3'>http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/355406900">3 of 5 stars


Life : an exploded diagram
By Mal Peet

Forbidden love
Class barriers
Politics
War
Environmentalism
Some major explosions, both literal and not.

This book has them all.  A story that spans generations set against a backdrop of war and global politics. It describes minute facets of the characters lives in intimate, colorful and satisfying detail. Clem came, a “wartime mishap,” whose birth was brought on by a German air raid over rural England is smart and has a gift for drawing. He attends school on scholarship which brands him as trying to “get Above Yerself.”.  Clem falls in love with Frankie, the daughter of a wealthy man. Both know this romance can go nowhere but they become deeply involved.
Mr. Peet’s narrative drips with sentimentalism about the past; it’s full of delightful colloquialisms and humorous anecdotes. For example, imagine Clem trying to find out about sex through Lady Chatterley’s Lover.
Mr. Peet depicts the uncertainty of both young love and of the nuclear threats of the time.
Does love conquer all and win out in the end?




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