Never.
comedy
The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy by Kate Hattemer
Blurb from Goodreads:
Witty, sarcastic Ethan and his three friends decide to take down the reality TV show, For Art’s Sake, that is being filmed at their high school, the esteemed Selwyn Arts Academy, where each student is more talented than the next. While studying Ezra Pound in English class, the friends are inspired to write a vigilante long poem and distribute it to the student body, detailing the evils of For Art’s Sake. But then Luke—the creative force behind the poem and leader of the anti-show movement—becomes a contestant on the nefarious show. It’s up to Ethan, his two remaining best friends, and a heroic gerbil named Baconnaise to save their school. Along the way, they’ll discover a web of secrets and corruption involving the principal, vice principal, and even their favorite teacher.
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When I saw this title and read the initial blurb, I knew I had to read it. I’m a sucker for a witty protagonist, vigilante world-changers, and prose involving poetry.
For the most part, I really enjoyed The Vigilante Poets and liked Ethan as a character. He’s the kind of guy who falls in love with girls for unusual reasons, like a beautiful neck because it’s the connecting point between the mind and the body, which is kind of cool. He’s smart and funny, but not really over the top nerdy in a way that makes it difficult to relate to him. I also like the main supporting characters of Jackson, Elizabeth, and Luke, though at times it was difficult to follow their conversations full of academic lingo.
The story moves along at a good pace, and I like the Arts Academy setting. The idea of a poetry-based revolution initiated by industriouos students is a dream of English teachers everywhere, including myself. The fact that they are led by their passion to preserve the integrity of their school makes it even better.
There are a few qualities that make this completely unlike anything else I’ve ever read, though. One, for a young adult novel (and most adult novels, really), the vocabulary and the poetry are incredibly advanced. I mean, I’m an English teacher and I wanted to look up some words to make sure I really knew what Hattemer was saying. Plus, Ezra Pound is not an easy poet to read, so there was some having to figure that out on my part. While I can breeze through most books in a matter of a few hours, this one took considerably longer. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, just different.
Another unique quality of this title is found in Hattemer’s style. Ethan is the protagonist and narrator, but sometimes he would address the reader directly, acknowledging that this was a book. I won’t say it went as far as some postmodern-type literature, but it was enough to sort of startle me as a reader because the character was suddenly talking to me. It’s sort of unsettling.
Overall, I recommend The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy. I think it will resonate particularly well with upper teens who enjoy a bit of a challenge in reading material, but want an entertaining challenge. Also, those with an interest in poetry or the impact of Pop Culture on the Arts will enjoy the story of Ethan and his friends.
The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy releases this Tuesday – check it out here on Amazon or at your preferred bookseller!
#ThrowbackThursday: Louise Rennison’s Georgia Nicholson series
This recommendation originally posted on Pimples, Popularity, and Protagonists in September 2010. My love of this series is still firmly in place!!!
A few years ago, I read Louise Rennison’s Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging. I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I didn’t realize it was part of a ten book series. Then, this summer, I happened to notice a film version of it available for rent on Netflix. I put it in my queue and prepared myself for yet another disappointing book-inpired movie. I was pleasantly surprised by how good the movie version was, and it inspired me to check into Rennison’s other books. Imagine my surprise when I found another nine books featuring the Angus protagonist, Georgia Nicolson! It was pretty exciting. (I know I’m a book nerd, ok?)
I put all of the books on hold at my local library and waited until I had them all to start reading. Then, when they were all finally in, I tore through all nine books following Angus… in a matter of ONE WEEK. Several times, as I was reading in the evenings while my husband was watching TV, I would seriously laugh out loud at the sheer hilarity of the books. I’m seriously considering buying all of the books so I can reread them whenever I need to have a good laugh.
A note about content – some of the titles sound a bit risque sexually… but the content is not. Though all of Georgia’s friends are preoccupied with boys and the constantly rate themselves on a “Snogging Scale” (snogging is British for kissing), the girls never do anything beyond kissing with their boyfriends, and there’s very little inappropriate language in the books. Out of all the young adult series I’ve read, this one is pretty clean.
Basically, in the series, (don’t worry – no spoilers – this is VERY general) Georgia Nicolson and her group of friends navigate their way through a year or so of school at Stalag 14, an all-girls high school. The group calls themselves the Ace Gang, and they are absolutely hilarious together – constantly trying to pull little pranks, getting in trouble, and torturing the school’s staff. Georgia’s family is crazy (maybe certifiably) and full of funny situations, and Georgia’s love life is, well, complicated but constantly interesting and exciting.
I’d recommend this series to teenagers… mature upper grade middle school girls through high school and adult readers (especially if you work with or have teenage girls). Here are all ten books of the series, in order:
1. Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging
2. On the Bright Side, I’m Now the Girlfriend of a Sex god
3. Knocked Out By My Nunga-Nungas
4. Away Laughing on a Fast Camel
6. The He Ate My Boy Entrancers
7. Startled By His Furry Shorts
8. Love Is a Many Trousered Thing
Don’t Even Think About It by Sarah Mlynowski
Don’t Even Think About It is a quirky new YA title from Sarah Mlynowski in which almost an entire homeroom of fancy New York tenth graders is given a flawed batch of the flu vaccine, giving twenty-two students the power of telepathy within 24 hours after the shot. As you would expect, there are serious ups and downs to this new ability, and the group of students come together to figure out what to do about it.
Because there’s a whole group of twenty-two students that share this flu-vaccine induced ability to hear people’s thoughts, we really get to know more than just one protagonist. At first this threw me off – I like hearing and connecting to one character’s voice at a time. I do enjoy alternate POV books, but this was like an alternate POV to the extreme. By the time I got used to it, though, I actually enjoyed hearing everybody’s honest thoughts and opinions.
It would be impossible to read this book without thinking about what it would be like to have this ESP power. Would you even want to hear people’s thoughts about you? I’m thinking no… Especially as a teacher of 8th graders. I don’t want to know everything my students are thinking, whether it’s about me or not! But what if you couldn’t choose not to hear people’s thoughts? Your parents, classmates, boyfriend/girlfriend, random people you walk by… So many opportunities to hear things you don’t want to hear.
Of course, because our thoughts tend to be way more filtered than what comes out of our mouths, there was some language and content in this that I don’t normally choose to read and recommend, but honestly it was probably pretty tame in comparison to the actual thoughts of teenagers (and adults). Despite that, though, by the end of the books I found that I really cared about each of these characters and how this worked out for them. It was also really neat to see how hearing each other’s thoughts at first drove them further apart and highlighted their differences, but then brought them closer together as they began to understand each other better.
Overall, Don’t Even Think About It was definitely interesting and at times really funny, but I don’t think it’s one that I’ll want to reread. While the group protagonist thing was interesting, it did keep me from being able to really connect with one single character that would stick with me beyond the experience of reading it for the first time.
You can find it here on Amazon or at your favorite local bookseller after it releases on March 11!
Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell
This book is exactly what YA novels should lead into and what the NA genre in general should strive to be. Wow.
Fangirl is the story of Cather, a twin trying to find her own way in her first year of college. Throughout the book, she deals with her dad’s health, her mom’s abandonment, her sister’s rebellion, her first love, and her obvious talent for writing. What I love about Cather, though, is that she’s not your typical book heroine. I mean, she’s strong, but it’s an understated strong. She wouldn’t consider herself strong, but she’s incredible. She knows her passion and goes for it whole-heartedly.
What I love even more than Cather and her writing talent is Levi’s adorable self. There’s something about the way he talks to Cath that is irresistible, and as much as I don’t usually go for country guys, but his sweetness and ever-present flannel are perfect.
A Bookish Beginning to the New Year…
Last year, I gave you lots of book recs for Christmas gifts, and from the feedback I got it seemed like you guys really appreciated the help. I’m sorry my list is so late this year. Where did all the time go? How is it 2014 already?
Anyway, let’s consider these ideas for good ways to get your year started off with great stories.
For the upper HS/College aged student who would love to travel: Gayle Forman’s books, Just One Day and Just One Year, center around a girl traveling during the summer after her high school graduation and the guy she happens to meet while in England. That description doesn’t do it justice AT ALL, so just trust me. If you’re only getting one of them, get Just One Day.
For the high school/college girl who loves all things British: Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging by Louise Rennison. This series of books makes me laugh out loud constantly. It centers around Georgia Nicholson, a high school girl with a crazy sense of humor, a crazy family, a crazy cat named Angus, and a crazy crush on a very cool, very hot guy. This series goes on for ten books, and all ten are equally as hilarious. In fact, I love them so much that I once used every bit of my birthday money to buy them all in matching editions. True story.
For anybody who likes to think and be inspired: Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card was just made into a movie about month ago. The movie was good. The book is infinitely better. People need to read the book. In a lot of ways, Ender reminded me of Jonas from The Giver – both boys are young when they take on the responsibility of changing their worlds for the better, and I’m a sucker for a story showing a young adult making a difference. What impresses me about Ender’s Game, too, is a completely unexpected and really beautiful display of compassion and empathy at the end.
For those who like a good dystopian trilogy: The Divergent Trilogy by Veronica Roth. There are lots of things I like about this. The whole dystopian, perfect society that’s actually completely horrible mostly because of the government thing is really well done in Roth’s trilogy. I also love the protagonist, Tris, because she’s smart and is beyond driven to do the right thing in all situations, causing you at times to want to yell at her through the pages of the book because you actually WANT her to think about herself a little bit. Tris’s love interest, Four, is incredible and totally book-crush worthy. And, without giving anything away, the ending of the trilogy solidified for me a few things about Veronica Roth: she’s super brave, she clearly has faith, and she’s one amazing writer. I put the last book down full of emotions from the book and full of respect for Roth.mpathy at the end. That’s all I can say without giving it away, but know that it’s good. Really good. And it’s not an easy read – I’d even say it’s not necessarily a YA book, but people would argue with me – so it’s good for readers aged 8th grade and up through adulthood, really.
For high school and college girls, period, because we live in crazy times: Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. In Speak, the protagonist lives through the repercussions of breaking up a big summer party resulting in several upperclassmen getting busted. How did she break up the big party? By calling the police due to something horrible that happened, though we don’t find out what happened until the end of the book. It’s a powerful and important book about the power of your voice and the necessity of speaking out against awful actions.
For the teen (or adult for that matter) interested in classic rock and the Woodstock-era: Are You Experienced? by Jordan Sonnenblick. I really, really loved this. I’ve been a fan of Sonnenblick for a long time, and this might just be my new favorite of his. In it, the main character is transported back in time to experience the Woodstock festival, where he learns crazy things about his family and befriends Jimi Hendrix. Really. It’s not at all cheesy, either, in the way it’s done… totally realistic historical fiction with a smudge of mysterious time-travel.
I’d love to hear what’s on your to-read list for 2014!
A Catching Fire parody that actually made me laugh…
It’s the Sesame Street Hungry Games, Catching Fur. I laughed out loud. A lot.
Friday Favorite: The IT Crowd!
I used to think British TV was weird. I still do. But in the case of The IT Crowd, it’s an amazing kind of weird.
Basically, it centers around three people who work in the basement IT department of a big corporation. The company isn’t important. The characters are. Not only are they well-written and interesting, they are some of the funniest characters I’ve ever encountered. Roy and Moss, your stereotypical, socially awkward computer geeks, work in the department alone until Jen, a woman who lied on her resume and has absolutely no clue about anything computer related, is hired as their supervisor.
My husband and I have watched every episode multiple times (you can find the entire series on Netflix, and tons of episodes/scenes on YouTube) and they just never get old. It’s like a British Seinfeld. Classic comedy.
So go search for it on Netflix and watch it. Yes, even teenagers, because while not a specifically teen show, it’s freaking hilarious. I seriously dare you to watch it and not laugh, which is absolutely impossible (especially in the one titled “The Work Outing”). For now, though, enjoy his infographic of the very best character ever: Maurice Moss.
Friday Favorite: MJ Makes The Twitterverse Fun.
Hands down my favorite YA author presence on twitter is Maureen Johnson.
I felt this way even before she live-tweeted the dramatic misfortune of being stuck on a delayed flight a few months ago, but that totally sealed the deal for me. There’s nothing much better than airplane selfies and disgruntled passengers for twitter comedic gold.
Go follow her. Trust me. She’s good for at least one laugh a day.
Reasons I Fell For the Fat Funny Friend by Cassie Mae (writing under the pen name of Becca Ann)
Several weeks ago, I wrote about the New Adult genre – what it is, what I love about it, what I wish was different about it – and introduced you all to Cassie Mae, author of Friday Night Alibi.
Well, I enjoyed Friday Night Alibi so much that I looked up Cassie Mae’s other titles and was intrigued by this story. Now I’ll say that I usually shy away from stories featuring protagonists that stress about their weight and obsess over it and try to go on diets and are generally annoying and cause me stress as the reader. This isn’t like that. At all.
In this, Hayley (dubbed the funny fat friend because she sets her friends up on dates but doesn’t go on any for herself) holds tight to a crush on her sign language partner, Brody. She knows, though, that Brody has a huge crush on his brother’s ex… so she offers to help him get a date with her even though it will amount to torture for Hayley.
What I really like about this book is that we get to hear Brody’s point of view, which is a breath of fresh air. I don’t want to say too much more for fear of ruining any surprises, because really I liked this that much. It wasn’t your stereotypical kind of overweight girl story, and it had a true and really satisfying depth to it.
I really, really, really recommend this for high school girls and especially any young (or not so young) woman who struggles with confidence in their physical appearance, even if it’s not weight. There was just something really special about watching Hayley come through the story better in the end than she was when it began. It’s available on Amazon here, both in kindle and print editions.
Pimples, Popularity, and Protagonists 