The big kids were away for two weeks, and we're on summer break, so I kicked out a few more books this month.
1.
The Mad Woman Upstairs
A 2016 release, this story follows Samantha Whipple, the last of the famous Bronte line. Samantha is in England attending Oxford when copies of the Bronte books start showing up anonymously at her room. A rumored Bronte treasure trove has followed her family's life through time. The book had heavy references on all of the Brontes' works. I felt a little unprepared for appreciating them since I have only read Jane Eyre. This book was fast paced and decent. I felt like Samantha's professor and her relationship seemed highly unlikely and unbelievable, but there was some very fascinating theories on several of the books as well as the Bronte sisters. I don't know enough about any of them to know if the theories are legit, but it certainly makes me want to look into them. Read it but get it from the library.
2.
The Weird Sisters
Three sisters end up home for various reasons, just in time to help their mother who is dealing with breast cancer. All three of the girls have some fairly serious issues going on. Add to it that their father is a famous Shakespeare scholar who pretty much uses only passages from his plays to communicate and you get an okay novel. I've never been a fan of Shakespeare, so it was interesting to see someone use so much of it to make a modern story. The story is written by one of the sisters perspective but she always talks about herself and the other two in first person so in the end, you never know who really is the narrator. I found it extremely annoying and never got used to it through the whole book. I can't figure out what the authors intent was by doing so. This book was okay, I didn't love it but I didn't hate it. I won't be rereading this one.
3.
Allistair Grim's Odditorium
This is a youth novel which I knew going into it and aimed at kids in grades 3-6. Put out by Disney, I have to say my first thought was wondering if it was written with the express purchase of becoming a movie or a cartoon series. It follows a young boy named Grubb who accidentally ends up with Allistair Grim, an interesting character who is surrounded by magical things. Grubb sets a crazy race in motion when a magical watch ends up in his pocket when he's outside of the special building the magical things are supposed to stay inside of. People say that there are a lot of Harry Potter elements in it, which I was actually hoping for. In the end I didn't really feel that way about it. Usually, I love children's novels, they can be such a breath of fresh air after some heavier reading, but this one was only okay. Kids will like it a lot, but adults who also like children't literature will find it lacking somewhat. There's a second novel, after a fairly decent cliffhanger at the end, but it's not on my list of to-be-read books.
4.
Through the Looking Glass
I have this exact copy from Barnes and Noble. Love it. It's technically flexibound, but has all the original drawings and good, thick paper. I read this book at least once a year. At this point in the game if people haven't heard of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, I don't have much to say!
5.
Matilda
I have a confession to make- I don't really read Roald Dahl. I've just never gotten around to it. But Matilda is definitely one of my favorite children's books. I always wanted to be a genius child who could move things with my eyes. And her family! Pretty sure there isn't a worse one. (Although Harry Potter's aunt and uncle are definitely in the running!) My older kids loved this book, but the movie terrified them. But of course Ms. Trunchbull will do that to anyone.
6.
Passenger
A 2016 release, I've seen this one hyped up a bit on several different blogs. It follows Etta, a 17 year old violin virtuoso who unbeknownst to her can travel through time. She ends up in a different time trying to figure out how she got there, stuff about her family and how to find an object that another time traveling family wants. I love the time travel stuff and that was the main reason I wanted to read it. The book fell flat for me for the most part though, which is disappointing because I think it could have been really good. One of the biggest issues is Etta's age. At 17 I think we would all consider her fairly young. But she has such advanced moral feelings and thoughts in her decision making that it was extremely hard to believe. Seventeen year old sheltered girls do not think and make choices like she does. She also falls in love fairly quickly in the book which you kind of see coming but it would have been good for it to build to that instead of essentially insta-love. Her love interest is black though, and from a time period where a biracial relationship never would have been allowed so I do appreciate that as a momma to black kids myself. And then, of course, this book doesn't end at the last page. Turns out there will be a sequel some time in the future. For the love of all things holy, can't anyone write a stand-alone book anymore?
7.
Emmy and Oliver
This book is actually a cute concept about two children aged 7 that are best friends, when the boy gets take by his dad and disappears. Fast forward 10 years he's found and brought back to his mother and old community and we follow him trying to live life with the people he would have had his dad never kidnapped him. Emmy was super affected by his kidnapping as well as her parents who basically try to shelter her from everything. Her last memory of Oliver is a note passed where he essentially checked yes or no if he "liked" Emmy. He circles yes. When she sees him all these years later she focuses on that and if they are meant to pick up where they left off and most likely would have if he had never gone. Overall I really liked this book, however I have a rather large caveat. Aimed at grades 9 and up, there is some mature content in this one, enough that I won't let Ava read it. Under age drinking and drugs, as well as multiple references to one gay character having sex with his new boyfriend all make an appearance in this book. And while some may argue that it's just high school stuff, I am no fan of normalizing poor behavior and choices. This book would have been just fine without all of that.
8.
Lessons From Madame Chic
I love this book. It follows an American exchange student in Paris who's host family teaches her all about living the best life possible always. This isn't my first read through this, but I completely enjoyed it again this round. You will laugh as she talks about using her host family's rectal thermometer in her mouth and all of the other faux pas she makes as she lives in Paris and transforms how she thinks about life. It's essentially lessons that she learned and how to apply them to your everyday American life. She touches on clothes, always wearing what fits you best, bringing down your choices, getting rid of clothes with holes, etc. to using your fine china because everyday should be beautiful and appreciated. I'm not making it sound very good, but trust me, you will want to read this book. Probably even buy it, I sure did!
9.
A Wrinkle In Time and A Wind in the Door
Confession: I read A Wrinkle in Time when I was young and loved it, but had no idea it was a trilogy until I saw this copy at my local Barnes and Noble. Enter forehead slap. Still working on the last book, but I have to say I love these! And oh my goodness, I don't really think for kids. My kids would have nightmares. I am super intrigued by Madeline L'Engle and want to look at everything else she's written. I think I would have liked to have known her. The books focus on one family with extraordinary abilities and the things that happen to them over the course of several years. For books written in the 1970's I feel like her knowledge on theoretical space physics and mitochondrial science are astonishing. Especially since the next book I am talking about focuses on cancer and mitochondrial issues. It was a bizarre gap between two books you'd normally never think about the other at the same time.
10.
Tripping Over the Truth
This is an interesting one. It focuses on an older theory that cancer is in fact not a genetic disorder caused by mutations, but a theory that it's caused by diet and how cancer ferments glucose. Essentially, that diets high in sugar promote cancer growth. It's an idea that the cancer community has been unwilling to except, but in light of a huge cancer program to map all the cancer genomes proved unable to show
any consistent markers in people for cancer, has forced researchers to keep looking. This is definitely a minority position in the world of cancer researchers but even James Watson, half of the discoverers of the DNA double helix has come out in the last few years and said that metabolism of sugar and cancer is a link we need to study. This is in direct contrast to his previous position on cancer. Pretty much all of the cancer funding is focused on genetic issues for cancer. The book talks about how cancer treatment has essentially stayed the same since WWII and the accidental discovery of poisons to use as chemotherapy to beat down a person's cells and start from scratch hopefully back to health. It also goes through heartbreaking statistics that in the last 50 years we have not increased the cancer survival rate, the death rate has in fact grown by 9%. It also delves into how cancer drugs are approved the FDA. They really only need to shrink a tumor for 28 days to be approved. That's it. If the tumors grow back it doesn't matter, all they need to show is some type of shrinkage for a short amount of time. There has been a push to target combo chemotherapy drugs to people for specific types of cancer of the last decade or so. There have been approximately 700 different types of specific drugs targeted at specific cancers, and none of them have been cured. Heartbreaking to read, especially since most of us know someone who has been affected with cancer and many of us will fight this battle at some point in our lives. It's definitely a theory that needs to be tested more thoroughly.
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