Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain

Hello loves!  Perhaps you've noticed I haven't been in the WHHS LMC this week.  I had urgent surgery Monday morning and will be out until 1/23.  Ms. Boyke will be filling in for me.

I saw the preview for the movie version of this book when we went to see Inferno.  As you know, it's my rule to read the book first.  I thought, based on the movie preview, it was a true story, however it is fiction.  It is written in such a way that makes it feel like it really happened.

A group of soldiers in Iraq have their actions filmed by a TV crew.  These young men go from nobodies to national heroes, simply because what they were doing was captured on film and broadcast.  Billy and his comrades are coming home to parties and accolades he doesn't feel they deserve, including recognition at a Dallas Cowboys game.

This book is about what many of soldiers face upon returning home from war.  Billy has no choice but to keep his emotions inside because he has been thrust upon a national stage for doing his sworn duty, one he might not agree with in totality.  While some soldiers get interviews, bridges or parks named after them, school assemblies, or some such publicity, many return home to find their homes in foreclosure, medical care out of reach (look at recent articles about our own VA hospital right here in West Haven), friends and family who have moved on without them, nightmares that never go away....

We will be putting this novel on our wish list for next autumn.

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Happy Holidays!  See you all very soon!

The Queen of the Night by Alexander Chee

I could NOT get into this!

I picked this up on a whim at WHPL when picking up Without Mercy.  It was on display and the jacket I read while waiting in line sounded intriguing.

I've tried to read this since writing the review for the Jefferson Bass novel.  I pick it up and put it down.  Finally, I am giving it up about 1/3 of the way in.  It pains me to do so, but as I tell all of my students, sometimes it just isn't doing it for you, no matter how your thing you think the book was going to be!

Paraphrased from the jacket: an opera singer in Paris is given the chance of a lifetime--the leading role in a new production, claimed to be written just for her voice.  But Lilliet knows the truth--this opera is based on her real life and there are very few people who know the truth to divulge it to this writer/composer.

I really wanted to like this, but I found Lilliet tiresome and her supporting characters boring.

A no from me.

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Without Mercy by Jefferson Bass

I've reviewed another Body Farm novel by the writing team of Jefferson Bass here before (Breaking Point).  I've really liked all the Body Farm novels except one.

Now, having finished this last night, I'm of the opinion this will be the final book in the series.  The villain of the very first book in the sequence (not the series, as it was a prequel) returns to exact revenge on Dr. Bill Bass.  Bass is aging, showing signs of forgetfulness, and out of touch with the latest technologies, even those in his own field.  Miranda, his graduate assistant, has completed her dissertation, earned her PhD, and been offered a job with the FBI.  The acknowledgements also allude to the finality of the series after 10 years and multiple novels.

Without Mercy is a frightening look at racial and religious relations right now in our country.  Obviously written before the election campaigns took off in earnest, I don't think the authors knew just how bad it was going to get.  Just this morning, the New Haven Register posted a story about a hate letter sent to our local Muslim organization.

This was a very quick read that kept me engaged for 3 hours straight.  I couldn't put it down.  That being said, it's really necessary to read the others first to understand the relationships between all the characters in this (final) novel.

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The Great American Whatever by Tim Federle

I wanted to like this book.  I really did.  It seemed to be billed as a new Catcher in the Rye with a more modern twist.

Instead of Holden, I saw a whiny entitled brat.  Yes, Holden was a whiny entitled brat too, but he made the reader care about what he was going through.  Like Holden, Quinn is working through the grief of losing a sibling.  But let's throw in Quinn being gay.  Even Quinn says his life is playing out like a typical LGBTQ coming of age novel.  Very much so.  So much that it bored me.  I made it to page 64 before bringing the book back to the WHHS LMC.  I just couldn't care to read anymore of it.  NOTHING happened in those 64 pages to make me want to keep reading.

This is the second book I've read that felt like Catcher, 2.0 version; the other being The Tragic Age  by Stephen Metcalfe (I didn't review that here, imply what you will).  Catcher was beautiful and meaningful and can't be redone.

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Undertow by Michael Buckley

This book was part of the Olenick fund order, suggested to me by our vendor's hot books list.  I was intrigued by the cover and hooked by the jacket snippet--hello, we are in Coney Island!  How many books have I read and reviewed set there?  Slight obsession to be sure!

This is book one in what I guess will be a trilogy.  Book 2 is called Raging Sea.

Lyric and her friends once walked along the famous boardwalk at Coney Island carefree.  Migraines her only problem, Lyric calls herself a former wild thing.  Everything changed when a nation of sea dwelling humanoids came up out the sea and made the Coney Island beach their new home.  Lyric and her mother Summer were there when the Alpha arrived.  Fast forward a few years.  The Alpha and those who have not fled Coney Island (undocumented immigrants without ID primarily) are about to face school integration.  The President has declared several Alpha children will attend high school with their human counterparts, including Lyric and her best friend Bex (Bex actually has a subplot storyline with an abusive stepfather and a wonderful boyfriend who happens to be Latino).

We learn Lyric's mother is an Alpha, sent ahead 20 years earlier as some type of scout.  Her particular race is something akin to Mermaids (again, this is Coney Island afterall).  She will be viewed as a traitor for not returning.  Because she lacks ID, she cannot leave Coney Island.  Her husband, Lyric's father, is NYPD and vows to protect them.  However, Lyric is recruited to teach the Alpha's prince how to be an American.  Somewhat as expected, she falls for Fathom (all of the Alpha children are given English names that have something to do with Coney Island--Arcade, Bumper, Ghost, Luna, etc.).  Lyric's father can't protect her from the various players and plots.  There are racist gangs out to kill the Alpha, helped by a Governor with political aspirations who intends to rid New York of the Alpha.

The book is a statement on the way immigrants and minorities are treated in this country.  Seriously, it couldn't be more timely.   

I LOVED this book until about 3/4 of the way through.  The ending felt rushed, too much was happening too fast to keep it all straight.  It almost felt like the author had a page cap or word limit.  I had to go back and reread several paragraphs because I felt I was missing things.  The ending left me unsatisfied.  However, that may be simply an attempt at a hook for the next book.

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Quick Check-in

Hey all--

So, it turns out I'm going to be having surgery just before Christmas (Dec. 19th).  I will out on medical leave until at least January 23rd.  At least I'll have plenty of time to read! ;)

I'm almost done with a new book I snagged from the Olenick order.  Look for that review in a few days!

Also, if you search for Everyday Magic by Emily Albright or That Burning Summer by Lydia Syson on Barnes & Noble or Amazon, you might read a little snippet from someone you know! ;)

Speaking of SLJ, I have my next assignment, which I'll read after finishing my current book.

I decided to organize the yearbooks today (Counseling has commandeered the computer lab for Naviance and we don't have a single class in the Library today--say what?!?!).

Check this out:

That's my Dad (Class of 1974), me (Class of 1998), and my cousin Kaleb (Class of 2020)!
#bleedblue

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The Borden Murders by Sarah Miller

I have always had an interest in this famous double murder in our neighboring state of Rhode Island.  I've even visited the historic sites in Fall River.  I heard about this new book, geared for young adults, and added it to our wish list.  Thanks to the Denise Madera Olenick memorial fund, we were able to purchase it.  It went on display with horror for Halloween week, and then I snagged it.

Many people know some variation of the jump rope rhyme--
Lizzie Borden took an axe
Gave her mother forty whacks
And then when she was done (or when she saw what she had done)
She gave her father forty one

Andrew and Abby Borden, Lizzie and her sister Emma's father and stepmother, were brutally murdered with an axe or hatchet in August of 1892.  The accused murderer was none other than Lizzie herself.

Often, Lizzie is portrayed as a teenage girl.  In reality, she was over thirty and her sister Emma much older.  The two sisters shared a home with their father and his much younger second wife, along with their housekeeper Bridget (for some reason called "Maggie").  There was strife in the family.  Lizzie and Emma often refused to eat with their stepmother, either eating at different times or in a different part of the house.  They were angry at their father for using part of their inheritance to buy a home for Abby's family members.  These facts were used against Lizzie in her trial.  Lizzie also faced rumors and gossip used as evidence.

In the end though, Lizzie was found not guilty in court.  She continued to be tormented though, in the press and in public, for the remainder of her life.  She even changed her name, to Lizbeth, in an effort to hide from her past.  Her dying request was to be buried at her father's feet, and she left $30,000 to the Fall River Animal Shelter.

I like the way the book is written, much like one of my favorite books, The Murder of Helen Jewett.  It is told in narrative, with facts from court records, newspaper stories, interviews, and letters.

The Borden murders have never been solved, if one believes Lizzie is in fact innocent.    

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