Uglies by Scott Westerfeld

From Goodreads.com:

Everybody gets to be supermodel gorgeous. What could be wrong with that? 

Tally is about to turn sixteen, and she can't wait. Not for her license -- for turning pretty. In Tally's world, your sixteenth birthday brings an operation that turns you from a repellent ugly into a stunningly attractive pretty and catapults you into a high-tech paradise where your only job is to have a really great time. In just a few weeks Tally will be there.

But Tally's new friend Shay isn't sure she wants to be pretty. She'd rather risk life on the outside. When Shay runs away, Tally learns about a whole new side of the pretty world -- and it isn't very pretty. The authorities offer Tally the worst choice she can imagine: find her friend and turn her in, or never turn pretty at all. The choice Tally makes changes her world forever.

Who doesn’t want to be pretty?  Come on.  Admit it.  You KNOW you want to be thought of as pretty, handsome, beautiful even.  It’s human nature isn’t it? That very idea is challenged in Scott Weterfeld’s book Uglies, the first in a series that deals with the themes of what is true beauty?  And what happens when a society will go to any lengths to make sure every person is exactly the same?  Set in an advanced, dystopian society, the novel tells the story of young adults who are challenged to think about and decide for themselves, what true beauty really is. 

I enjoyed the challenging themes presented in the book, and think that it would make for some lively and interesting discussion with students.   What does it mean to be beautiful?  Can a person truly be beautiful if every person in the world looks the same?  Tally’s ideas of ugly versus pretty are significantly challenged when she meets a group of people who have never had the operation that standardizes and optimizes people’s looks.  Obviously, this isn’t a particularly original theme:  Twilight Zone had an episode that dealt with this same concept.  In it, a young woman is hideously ugly (even though to the TV audience she was quite beautiful) and it is revealed that she lives in a society where the truly beautiful people look like pigs.  Like the Twilight Zone episode, Uglies had a twist that I didn’t see coming, and that made the ideas, which were not original, have a freshness that is more updated for the 21^st century. 

Like most dystopian novels, the setting is a city of the future, where some cataclysmic apocalypse has destroyed most of what readers know.  The futuristic world of the book is a result of a virus that destroyed all petroleum, so the society had to find other technologies to support itself with.  While there is not full development of the themes, there are many places where the novel touches on the ideas of “green” technologies, and how the people of the past, called “rusties” destroyed the world in which they lived through poor management of resources.  One example of this happens when Tally discovers that the citizens of “the Smoke” (where those who refuse to have the operation escapes to live) have to cut down trees to have fuel, she is appalled.  This could be another area where teachers could develop discussion and research points for students. 

Overall Uglies is well written. While the primary audience is young adult, the language is not dumbed down in any way.  There is strong vocabulary and active description throughout the novel.  The scenes of Tally learning to “hover board” were exciting, and I imagine that anyone who has learned to skateboard and challenged themselves to do complicated tricks would relate to a futuristic styling of that activity.  The action sequences seemed to have a “video game” kind of description, that would appeal to readers who enjoy those pursuits.

Overall I thoroughly enjoyed the novel, and intend to continue reading the series.  I really want to know what happens after that cliff hanger ending!  I recommend it as a DANGEROUS BOOK for students who want to read an action filled novel that will challenge them to think about what the future might look like under certain conditions, and I recommend it to teachers who want to challenge their students to develop independence in their thinking.  Tally Youngblood is definitely a strong female heroine who can demonstrate that to students. 

Divergent by Veronica Roth

According to Goodreads.com:

In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is—she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself. 

During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles to determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes infuriating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers a growing conflict that threatens to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves . . . or it might destroy her. 

Debut author Veronica Roth bursts onto the literary scene with the first book in the Divergent series—dystopian thrillers filled with electrifying decisions, heartbreaking betrayals, stunning consequences, and unexpected romance.

In recent months I have thoroughly glutted myself reading young adult dystopian fiction, a genre that is expanding exponentially these days, fueled by the highly successful Hunger Games series.  It’s a genre that I loved when I was in high school, and I have rediscovered this spring as I have read and enjoyed the plethora of well written young adult ventures into this style.  I have to say that Divergent  is a novel that I won’t soon forget, and I’ll be excited to know what happens next in the adventures of the heroine, Beatrice.

In Divergent author Veronica Roth has created a futuristic society of divided factions, each one dedicated to a particular virtue: honesty, selflessness, bravery, peacefulness, and intelligence.  Throughout the novel runs the theme of what does it mean to be a person who possesses these virtues?  Is it true that a person has one virtue to the exclusion of others?  And what are the true definitions of the virtues themselves?

I think Divergent is definitely a DANGEROUS BOOK as any reader will be compelled to examine their own lives in the light of the questions raised in the book.  As Tris (as the heroine Beatrice renames herself) questions what it means to be brave, readers will confront their inner fears.  Like other great dystopian novels, Divergent raises questions of morality, right and wrong, and our place in society. 

While there is no background information to explain how the world became this futuristic society and broke into the five factions, that did not detract from my enjoyment of the story.  As a reader, I didn’t even care about the missing information, because I was so drawn into the personalities of the characters in the story. 

The characters, Tris, her possible love interest, Four, and the other initiates, are well drawn.  Most of the characters have conflicting motivations, just as real humans do.  There is often no clear right and wrong answer to the challenges faced by Tris and the others, just as there is not often clear right and wrong answers in life.   The strong development of the character’s various personalities allows readers to imagine friends and family that we know, in similar situations. 

And even though this book offers a great deal of mental “meat” to chew on, it’s not missing elements of action and adventure.  Roth’s written descriptions of the feats Tris and the others face as they proceed through the Dauntless Faction’s initiation is extremely well done.  When Tris has to literally jump off a seven story building into seemingly nothingness below, it truly is a breath taking moment.  It’s the kind of action that I could see will easily translate to a movie version, and readers who enjoy fast paced action movies would easily be drawn to the excitement of the book.

Overall I highly recommend Divergent for readers who want a story that offers strong characters, amazing adventurous action, and the chance to think for ourselves in a world that seems to dictate to much of our thinking for us.  

The Enchantment Emporium by Tanya Huff

According to Goodreads.com:

Alysha Gale is a member of a family capable of changing the world with the charms they cast. Then she receives word that she's inherited her grandmother's junk shop in Calgary, only to discover upon arriving that she'll be serving the fey community. And when Alysha learns just how much trouble is brewing in Calgary, even calling in the family to help may not be enough to save the day.

I want to go on record that I am a Tanya Huff fan.  As a lifetime reader of fantasy, science fiction, and supernatural stories (long before they were popular with the Twilight set) I have enjoyed several of Huff’s books completely.  Her writing is usually fast paced, with frequent references to pop culture and a great deal of humorous dialogue (and that’s usually not limited to just the human characters of her books).  As a fan of the Buffy the Vampire series on TV, I have often thought that Huff could have easily written for that show which also relied on snappy dialogue.   Other books of hers have had smart, quick plots, and supernatural elements that were enjoyable and, dare I say it, believable?  The Keep Series, with the talking magical cats, are some of my favorites, because I could imagine my geriatric old tom saying many of the things the cats in those books said.  But having said all the reasons why I have liked other Tanya Huff books that I read, let me say that the best thing The Enchantment Emporium  was the summary I found on Goodreads.com. 

From the opening chapter of The Enchantment Emporium I felt like I had been dumped into a blender with lots of action, about a thousand characters, and magical elements, with the blades chop chop chopping, and no way to make sense of the combinations. 

I often teach students to begin writing a story in the middle of the action as a hook to readers, then later move into narration. And Huff did the same. And then did more of it.  Then a little more.  She forgot the narration part.  After the first 50 pages I was so frustrated that I wanted to just quit, because I had no idea what was really going on.  There had been lots of action, lots of magic, and a whole passel of hints about underlying cause and effect, but truly, I was as lost as any reader could be.  I kept up though, because I was sure it would get better. 

I was wrong.

Another thing I found incredibly difficult about the story was the huge number of characters.  The lead character, Alysha, comes from a large family of magical witches.  Which is great.  I come from a large family too (and while some might be witches, they’re not magical, but that’s an entirely different blog entry).  But as a reader I had a terrible time sorting out who everyone was.  Part of the problem was the sheer numbers, but added to that were characters who had gender opposite names (Charlie is a girl I had to keep reminding myself) and characters who had both a name and a nickname, each frequently referenced.  Then there were multiple references to how these characters were related: whose aunt, whose cousin, whose sister’s brother’s ex-boyfriend’s gay boyfriend.  It was overwhelming.  As a reader all the relationship ins and outs just didn’t make the action or story of the book move along.  It added nothing, and detracted a great deal.

A third aspect of the book that I really disliked was the magical mechanism itself.  I’ve had 40+ years of experience reading supernatural/magical stories, so I know how to fall into a “wiling suspension of disbelief” with great ease.  But honestly, the mechanism of this magic I just could not bear.  While I understand and have no problem with the idea of magical families, this magical family was . . . incestuous.  While there weren’t any graphic depictions of sex,(although there was some strong and graphic language in parts) it was clear the cousins were sexually active with each other, an idea that I find reprehensible.  No matter how many times Huff wrote that the Aunties were “keeping the lines separate” to indicate that the cousins weren’t too genetically closely related to marry and procreate, I’m sorry, I just can’t believe it.  I come from a large family, raised closely together like the cousins in this book, and there is no way that a family raised that closely could grow up and look at each other as potential mates.  My ability to suspend my disbelief just doesn’t extend to long term, ingrained incest.  Certainly I’ve read my fair share of books with depictions of intercourse, but the idea of a large incestuous family that outsiders just determine is perfectly OK, that was just too gross for me to bear.

By the end of the book I had a clear idea of the story, the magic, and the characters, but there was nothing that I enjoyed.  This book will not become a Dangerous Book, because it truly had nothing redeeming to offer.  There is no one for whom I can recommend this book, and I will be deleting it from my Kindle roll, posthaste!. 

Mrs. Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

According to Goodreads.com:

A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. And a strange collection of very curious photographs. It all waits to be discovered in  Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience

I have to say that Mrs. Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children was a thoroughly enjoyable young adult novel.  I had expected to enjoy it, but not like it quite as much as I did.  That was a nice surprise.  In this book Riggs has captured just the right touch of suspense and excitement.  It gave me the heebie-jeebies in all the right places, but was still fun to read. 

The characters were well developed, with a mix of personalities and motivations.  Jacob, the lead character and narrator, was fully developed, and a strong male.  I think that boys in my classes will enjoy reading a book that doesn’t seem particularly “girlie” to them, and the good thing is that Jacob has a bit of romance during the story, so that might satisfy some of the girls in my classes.

 I also really appreciated the terrific vocabulary that Jacob, the first person narrator of the novel, used.  As a teacher I felt like this book could easily be used to do a wide ranging vocabulary study.  I will say that while I didn’t find Jacob’s cursing to be personally offensive (that would be hypocritical of me) there was some .  . . language . . . as we teachers in the Coalfields of West Virginia might say to each other.  I don’t remember it to be overwhelming or frequent, but then again, I’m no judge of that. 

The plot was exciting, with one large twist that I never saw coming, and I love it when I am caught totally by surprise in a book.  The setting was intriguing, with the idea of an island so isolated from the modern world that there is no cell service and only one phone for every inhabitant to use, and that setting really enhanced the plot. 

The thing that attracted me to the book originally was the fact that throughout the book are photographs of the “peculiar” children and inhabitants of the home.  I completely enjoyed them as I read (I had an electronic version of the book, and they were very nicely done there).  What really added to my enjoyment though, was the author’s note at the end that let me know every single photograph was real, and had been picked up from various yard sales, antique stores and similar places.  Riggs even gives a list of the collectors to whom the photographs belong.  That was exciting to me, and I had to go back through and look at them all again, imagining a writing invitation given to students with a number of old pictures, asking them to create a story around them to weave the pictures together.  I’ll have to work on that some, but I’ve got an idea for my classroom perking, thanks to that bit of information. 

Overall I highly recommend Mrs. Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children as a DANGEROUS BOOK.  It will be one that will make you enjoy the time you spend reading, catch student’s interest, and offer several entry points into writing practice. 

The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child by Donalyn Miller

According to Goodreads.com:

“Donalyn Miller says she has yet to meet a child she couldn't turn into a reader. No matter how far behind Miller's students might be when they reach her 6th grade classroom, they end up reading an average of 40 to 50 books a year. Miller's unconventional approach dispenses with drills and worksheets that make reading a chore. Instead, she helps students navigate the world of literature and gives them time to read books they pick out themselves. Her love of books and teaching is both infectious and inspiring. The book includes a dynamite list of recommended "kid lit" that helps parents and teachers find the books that students really like to read.”

For me, this book is a DANGEROUS BOOK because it is a clear challenge to my pedagogy.

I am a High School Language Arts teacher who professes to have as a goal the desire to help students develop a love of books, but Miller challenges the practices I have employed for over two decades of teaching.  Admittedly there have been successes in those years, but there have also been failures, and I wonder if a change in my practice of reading in the classroom might not be in order, after reading this book.

One of the things that I most appreciate about this book is its truthfulness.  This book is clearly written by an active and engaged classroom teacher – not a researcher studying a teacher or looking into a classroom.  It’s written from the inside of the room, and Miller doesn’t hesitate to show the challenges to her practice, as well as the success. 

I really appreciate that Miller continually encourages her teacher audience to focus on the positive gains our students make, instead of getting our minds focused on the lack of success toward meeting high goals.  Over and over Miller admonishes the active classroom teacher to frame conversation with students in the most positive terms.  It’s a reminder the needs repeating probably even more than she does in this book.  Throughout the book Miller also encourages teachers to set high standards and reminds us that students live up to the standards we set for them. 

Miller seems to really know the characteristics of readers, and she frames her discussion and description in positive terms:  developing, dormant, and underground readers.  And in her description of underground  readers I see myself, as I was in first grade, tenth grade, and even now.

Many aspects of Miller’s teaching practice seem to speak to my own personal experiences as a reader.  For example, she writes “Do not pair your lowest readers with your most gifted ones.  High-ability students resent being used as tutors, and they, too, deserve the ability to grow as readers—something they will not be able to accomplish by reading with readers who are less capable than they are.”  This statement speaks to my personal truth; I was the child who decided in first grade to fail school because the failing students got to read.  Because I had high grades and was a good reader I didn’t get time to read, I had to go to the back of the room and be a peer tutor.  Listening to the plodding pace of those students sounding out the individual syllables of words nearly destroyed my six year old learning soul.  I was also the high school student who read two books continually—the one I read in class because it was assigned (which I often enjoyed) and the one I read because I wanted to read.  The only behavior problems I ever had in junior and high school were the times I got in trouble for getting so caught up in the novel I had hidden inside my text book that I forgot to listen to the cues of the classroom and got caught by the teacher for “not paying attention” to the lesson. 

I also really appreciated, on a deeply satisfying personal level, Miller’s truthfulness about the lack of success of programs like Accelerated Reader or Scholastic Reading.  She writes, “ . . . in which books are assigned a point value and students must complete a multiple-choice test after reading them, are the worst distortion of reading I can think of.” While I have never seen professional literature call out these programs and challenge their effectiveness, most teachers I know have an innate understanding that these programs are doing far more damage than good to our students.  Those of us who teach grades after these programs are used especially see the effects:  students who don’t like to read because they fear they will have to take a test or create a project.  I remember a few years ago when I mentioned to my niece, Rachael, who loved to read, that we could have a book club at her school.  She quickly dismissed the idea saying “No one wants to go to a club where we’d have to take tests.  Just forget it.”  Her automatic assumption was that book club would necessarily be tied to the Accelerated Reader program as used at her school. 

I will admit that some of the claims Miller makes about her classroom and teaching practice are hard to believe and accept.  As I read her continued descriptions of the sheer volume of books contained in her classroom, I wondered how she could have so many resources.  She addresses this point toward the end of the book, stating that her extensive classroom library has been purchased at her own expense.  While I could understand the reasons she gives for investing what must be upwards of a million dollars of her personal funds this way, I am frustrated because I know I can’t make that kind of investment, and it will take me years, even being as creative as I can be, to have the number of books at my fingertips that Miller says she draws from when pairing reluctant readers with books they might like. 

Another concern I have issues with is Miller’s early claims that she doesn’t teach whole class novels now, instead relying on student’s choices to teach all the reading and analysis skills students need.  That’s a scary feeling to me.  Like most teachers I have relied on the whole class novel for my entire teaching career.  Toward the end of the book, however, I began to realize that Miller hasn’t apparently done away with all class novels.  She just doesn’t rely on them as the center point of the instructional method. 

Now that I’ve finished with this book I have much to process and consider.  Next year I’ll be teaching 9^th grade Honors Language Arts, for the first time in my career.  This summer I’m trying to read as much as I can about teaching (both reading and writing) as I try to form the first vision of what this new course will be like.  I’m sure that Miller’s ideas about reading are definitely going to shape the course that I structure.  While I may not go as far into independent reading that Miller has over her years, I will certainly be making changes in the way I share books and reading with my students, based on her ideas. 

Overall I highly recommend The Book Whisperer”  to any teacher looking to challenge their practice in reading education.  

Teaching With Poverty in Mind

Here's a link to a  Review of Teaching with Poverty in Mind  a book by Eric Jensen.  The review is an audio podcast, created on cinch.  Check it out at http://cinch.fm

Why We Teach by Sonia Nieto

As part of the National Writing Project’s Summer Institute for Teachers, the Coalfield Writers Satellite SI facilitation team has been reading Why We Teach by Sonia Nieto.  It’s a collection of essays from both new and experienced teachers, addressing the question of the title.

Overall I have to say I have enjoyed reading the book.  The personal vignette/memoir angle is really something that I enjoy.  Since our summer institute this year is focusing on personal memoir writing and reflection about our work in education, this is definitely a book that contains lots of models of the kind of writing that we’re working to produce. 

Over the last few summers I’ve read various memoir collections about teaching:  most notably Penny Kittle’s books like Public Teaching:  One Kid at a Time, and The Greatest Catch:  A Life in Teaching, and I have enjoyed them, but our institute has needed to read the voices of more teachers writing about their practice.

That’s one of the things I like about the Sonia Nieto book:  each chapter is written by a different teacher, so there are many voices in the collection.  Since the teacher’s experiences are wide ranging (some have just taught one year and others are long-term veterans; some have always been called to teaching and some came to teaching the long way around; some share successes, some share failures) there’s something for almost any teacher in any circumstance to be drawn to.  There’s some nugget of truth that each of us can grasp on to.

The longer I work in this field, the more important I begin to believe it is for us to tell our teaching stories to each other.  Now I admit that I’m a story teller, and I’ll always have on hand some story to share that can make the crowd laugh, but that’s not exactly what I mean here.  What I’m more and more coming to realize is that there is great power in the sharing of who we are at the core of our teaching lives. 

There is empowerment there as well.  When we know who we are, and what we believe to be true, and why we believe it, it becomes a good deal more difficult to be swayed from the path we’ve chosen.  Even when we’re dealing with querulous administrators, cantankerous parents, and irascible students, if we, as teachers, are firmly grounded in the WHAT WE KNOW TO BE TRUE of our lives in education, then we’re going to be far more likely to survive the storms. 

Why We Teach gives me a group of model essays to help me think about how I can write about my own practice.  It also gives me a group of model essays to help me think about the pedagogy of my own practice.  I recommend this book to any professional educator who wants to think a little more deeply about why he or she chooses and remains in the field of education, and I challenge each teacher who reads it to begin their own writing about their practice, and sharing it with other teachers.  Why We Teach can become a DANGEROUS BOOK in the hands of practicing teachers, who decide to become reflective about what goes on in their classrooms and schools day in and day out.