Voices from our pre-historic past

I read Kit's Wilderness by David Almond for my YA lit class last summer. I didn't like it.

I read Bog Child by Siobhan Dowd this weekend and absolutely loved it.

But, when I was finished Bog Child on Monday morning and was thinking about it (because it is a book that stays with you) I was struck by the similarities in the stories, and how one was so much more successful than the other.

Kit's Wilderness is the story of Kit, who moves to an English mining town to help take care of his elderly grandfather. He and his friends play the game of Death, to scare themselves. His grandfather tells him the stories of the mines, of his family. He develops a relationship (not friends, but almost) with the school troublemaker. He writes a story about a pre-historic cave family that's woven in throughout the main story.

Look, Kit's Wilderness is a Printz winner and I haven't liked the other books by Almond I've read. The story was good. But... it was heavily layered and full of symbolism and parallels. I don't mind that--it usually makes a good story, but the craft of the story was just so obvious. I could see what Almond was doing as I was reading it. When the craft of a story is so blatant that I notice it as I'm reading? Then I can't enjoy the story. I don't want such things to be obvious until I put the book down and start thinking. In this, the parallels were SO OBVIOUS. The book should come with a frying pan, because it kept hitting you over the head.

Now, Bog Child is completely different.

Fergus lives in Northern Ireland, near the border with Ireland in 1981. One day he finds a body in the bog and assumes it's a victim of the increased violence since Bobby Sands died. But, the body in the bog turns out to be from the Iron Age. Fergus must navigate life in Northern Ireland with a hunger-striking brother in prison, being recruited into IRA activities, and the archaeologists trying to discover the story of the body he dreams about at night.

So the similarities are:

Mood--Kit's Wilderness gets its bleakness from the winter season and mining landscape. Bog Child's is from the political undercurrents and family tension.

Pre-historic Story--Kit writes a story about a cave family that's woven through, Fergus dreams the life of the Bog Child leading up to her death.

Parallels--Both have several parallel stories and layers.

The story Kit's writing in English class parallels what is going on in his day-to-day life in a way that's so obvious I couldn't handle the book. Bog Child is subtler--Fergus's brother is starving himself in prison, the Bog Child is living through a time of famine, and there are subtle hints that Cora might have an eating disorder, starving herself for another reason (although this is NEVER said and might be me reading more into the text, but I'm willing to write a pretty strong paper on why I think this is so.)

All in all, Kit's Wilderness left me cold, while Bog Child haunts me. I had to force myself to finish the first (hello homework!) and couldn't put the second down.

Catching up on the ol' Reviewing...

We're now delving back deeply in the reading log, to find all of those unblogged books.

For those who are interested, I keep a small unlined spiral notebook in my bag. If you open it one way, it's my "have read list" with a large heading for every month. Open it the other way, and it's my "to read list" so I can easily jot down interesting titles when I see or hear about them. I have a separate book where I write my impressions of a book during and after reading. These cryptic notes often provide great hilarity later on when I try to figure out what the heck I meant. On the actual reading log, I just place a little check mark next to the title...

I am now attempting to blog books much closer to the date in which I read them. In fact, I have already reviewed all the books I read in May of 2008. Pretty impressive, no?

But, let's delve back into those archives to find today's 5 reviews shall we? These books have nothing in common. I'm starting with my oldest unblogged book and working my way forward...

Also, I decided to start putting age ranges on my reviews. These are just who (a) the book is aimed at or (b) who I think it will most appeal to.

Silk Umbrellas Carolyn Marsden

Noi is an 11-year-old girl living in rural Thailand. There, she learns to paint silk umbrellas with her grandmother, Kun Ya. The family faces money problems and her older sister, Ting, is sent to work in a factory. Noi is horrified at the working conditions in the factory and fears that it's only a matter of time before she has to go there as well.

This is a really sweet story and rather short. I longed for more of the day-to-day details-- the struggles that made Ting's work in the factory so necessary and also just Thai village life.

age range: 4th-6th ish

An Ocean Apart, a World Away Lesley Namioka

Set in that tumultuous time of the Chinese Republic (1911-1949, although this takes place in the inter-war years.) Yanyan belongs to a modern family and wants to grow up to be a doctor. Her boyfriend, however, is a revolutionary who wants to restore the Qing dynasty. After their love sours, Yanyan finds a way to get to Cornell where she struggles with racism and fitting into a new culture.

I really wanted to like this book, but overall I struggled with it. Yanyan's voice was completely unconvincing. There was way too much explanatory text for a novel told in the first person-- it jarred and took away from the characterization of Yanyan, to the point where I no longer cared much about her story. Also, I have a hard time believing that such a modern girl, raised in a modern household, had no idea what the May 4th movement was!

age range--YA, appropriate for younger YAs

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Clay David Almond

Davie and Stephen are alter boys in England who are starting to question God. Enter Stephen, the freaky (and deeply religious) new kid who lives with his mad relative and create clay figures that come to life. Stephen wants to create a clay man, a Golem, and set him on the local bully.

This was a Best Book for YA but... it didn't grab me.

The main question is if Stephen Rose is a devil or a saint. But, I don't really care enough to think about it. I couldn't decide if the book was subtle or just straight-up boring. I didn't have a lot of patience for Davie's dithering about the questions raised. Also, there's a weird shift in tense when they start building the clay man that I can't figure out.

This book took me forever to read. I'd set it back down and wasn't compelled to pick it back up, except that I felt it deserved a full read because everyone else apparently loved it.

Me, eh.

age range: YA

Shug by Jenny Han

I really liked this one. This tells of the summer between 6th and 7th grades, when suddenly boys and popularity start to matter, that time when everything starts to change. Shug (Annemarie) is trying to negotiate her life when she realizes she like likes her best guy friend and her best girlfriend is suddenly much more popular than she is. At the same time, her dad is never home, her mother is a snobby alcoholic, and her sister is always out.

Han perfectly captures the sheer pain and agony of being 12 and not being sure if growing up is really the right direction that one should be taking.

I think everyone has read this already, but if you haven't, go!

Age range: 5th-8th grade

Thumb on a Diamond Ken Roberts

The tiny fishing town of New Auckland, in British Columbia, has 42 buildings. The kids in town want to see the big city, but have no way of getting there. They then realize they have enough to form a baseball team and can get school funding to play in the provincial tournament down in Vancouver. Who cares if none of them have actually played baseball--that's what the internet is for! And well.. who cares if there's not enough flat space to actually put together a diamond? The whole point is to go down, get eliminated in the first round, and explore the city.

Full of heart and realism, a nice story. I especially loved their reaction to escalators, which none of the kids had seen before.

An excellent bet for 3rd-5th graders.