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books

Annie Sullivan and the Trials of Helen Keller by Joseph Lambert

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The Cybils graphic novel categories were full of true life stories this year – a couple of graphic memoirs and two or three (depending on your definition) historical biographies. Annie Sullivan and the Trials of Helen Keller was a standout among them – just really well-done overall, with a fascinating true story and art that does more than just illustrate the book.

The relationship between Annie Sullivan and Helen Keller is a fairly well-known one, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a way to mine the same material in new and interesting ways. Lambert uses Annie Sullivan’s own letters as a springboard for the story, thereby grounding it in historical fact. It’s also a great way to give the reader some personal insight into Annie’s mind and allow us to experience the many frustrations as well as triumphs she experienced while working with Helen.

The story jumps back and forth in time, between Annie’s childhood in an almshouse and at the Perkins School for the Blind to her time as a young adult with Helen at the Kellers’ home. (The technique is well-intentioned, but sometimes transitions are difficult to pick up on.) This makes the book much more Annie’s story than Helen’s. We get a clear picture of Annie as a determined and intelligent woman, sometimes quick to an outpouring of temper, but well-matched to deal with Helen in her younger years.

One of the best techniques used here is the art, which really illuminates Helen’s transition to understanding the world around her. Before Annie is able to communicate with Helen, Helen’s world as drawn from her point of view is gray and shapeless. As the idea that things have names begins to crystallize for her, so too does the world around her. It’s a simple and brilliant visual idea, something so well-suited to a comic book about a blind girl.

I wouldn’t call the art beautiful, but it doesn’t need to be. It’s well-done and visually interesting, though sometimes the text can be a bit difficult to read. This is a great example of a graphic book where writing and art go hand-in-hand, each necessary to the other.

The end of the book focuses some on a plagiarism scandal that I hadn’t know about previously. Helen wrote a story as a child called The Frost King that was later discovered to be very similar to another author’s story. When this comes to light, Annie is accused of copying the story and passing it off as Helen’s, or of narrating the story to Helen, who then copied it. It was difficult for Helen to understand the concept of owning words, and the book leaves this pretty open-ended, which frustrated me (but perhaps that’s more of a personal failing than the book’s). It certainly encouraged me to do some further reading after I had finished the book, which is not a bad thing at all.

This will certainly appeal to kids already interested in Helen Keller, who seems to be a perennially popular topic for school reports. I can also see it being used in classrooms in conjunction with Miss Spitfire or a viewing/production of The Miracle Worker (which was put on by my own high school class when I was a teenager).

Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell

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It’s 1986 and Eleanor has just moved. She’s the new girl, and she’s got to sit somewhere on the bus. Park prays it’s not next to him. She’s weird looking. She has long red hair. He’s gotta stay under the radar so that Steve leaves him along. Steve who always loves to torment the person who gives him too much attention . . .

Eleanor sits on the same bus seat with Park. They don’t talk. Day after day, they resent their situation. Until one day, they don’t. Until one day, Park notes that Eleanor is looking at the comics he’s reading. Until he realizes she’s someone he wants to talk to. Until one day they talk. 

Until one day they realize they are mad for one another. Except it’s not one day. It’s the accumulation of days and hours and moments together (and more, the moments apart) when they realize just how much they need one another.

Rowell’s YA debut novel, Eleanor and Park, is excellent. Park and Eleanor are two fully-realized characters who are both dealing with tremendously tough things in their lives. Park lives with a demanding — and at times, demeaning — father who finds him a disappointment to his family and his culture (he’s Asian), but ultimately, Park just wants to get through life. He’s a nice guy and he doesn’t want that reputation marred. Eleanor, on the other hand, has it rough and that’s the only way to say it.  Eleanor’s step father is abusive but in subtle and horrific ways. He makes an effort to make existing as uncomfortable and painful for her as possible through little things that aren’t really little. Their bathroom in their tiny home has no door. Her clothes are never clean. She has no where to put anything except her bed. Eleanor has absolutely no safety or security in her own home. She’s not a romantic, not an optimist, not hopeful for anything because she’s never had a reason to be. Even when she bumps into Park and even as their relationship progresses, she still maintains her distance because she has to. Because that’s how she’s learned to deal with life. 

These characters are real and they are aching. You want them to succeed, and you want them to have the ultimate outcome. I’m not a fan of romances, but the truth is, neither is Eleanor. She’s tough as hell and she has no reason to believe anyone could ever give her the sorts of things she needs and deserves emotionally (and physically). Rowell has a knack for getting to these characters and their insecurities and allowing those things to be what brings them together. Their relationship is strained and cautious, and in that caution, there is tenderness. 

I related to Eleanor on many, many levels. Aside from sharing a lot of her feelings when it comes to love and romance, I related to the relationship she had with her stepfather. It made me so uncomfortable because much of it was my experience with a step parent, as well. I just wanted to give the girl a hug and then tell her that she was worth a hell of a lot more than what she was being given. Park was sweet without ever being unrealistic. He doesn’t save Eleanor, and this isn’t a story about where a girl gives into that sort of trope. And in fact, I believe the ending of the book said it all — the next lines are spoiler, so feel free to skip down if you don’t want it. This was a story of Eleanor being the hero of her own journey. She was just lucky to have had the time with Park that she did and what they had — it could never, ever be taken away from her or from him.

This book will be enjoyed by readers looking for an emotionally mature story — there’s virtually nothing sexual here at all. It’s much more about emotional intimacy with moments of raw physical ache (vs. sex as sex). It reminded me at times of Natalie Standiford’s How to Say Goodbye in Robot and it will have appeal to teen readers who liked Laura Buzo’s Love and Other Perishable Objects. Readers who appreciated the hard-fought romances in the style of Gayle Forman will likely enjoy this book, too. 

Yes, this story is set in the 80s, which is usually a huge turn off for me. Fortunately, the heart of the story is timeless. The only thing giving it that time flavor are the pop culture references which, yes, could have been brought to current references to have had the same impact. But it wasn’t a deal breaker.


Eleanor & Park is available now. Review copy received from the publisher. 

Little White Duck: A Childhood in China by Na Liu and Andres Vera Martinez

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I mentioned previously that the Cybils graphic novels categories had two memoirs this year, and Little White Duck was the middle grade selection. It’s the story of Na Liu’s childhood growing up in 1970s China, beginning near the end of Mao Zedong’s life. Rather than tell one linear story, she instead chooses to show us her early life in a series of vignettes, some more engrossing than others.
The vignettes cover a range of incidents, some touching upon major national events (Chairman Mao’s death, the great famine), others relaying a more personal, familial story (a visit to some poorer cousins, a mistake with some chicks while attempting to emulate elders). Through these very short stories, Liu makes the reader aware of the how different her childhood was from our own childhoods in a different place and time. Importantly, though, she also makes us realize what we hold in common: love of family, childhood fears and jealousies and confusion, the need to impress the adults around you.
Vignette-style stories are always a risk, in much the same way that short story collections are: it’s very unlikely all stories are going to be knock-it-outta-the-park incredible. The vignettes in Little White Duck are a bit uneven, some memorable, some not. What is consistently excellent, though, is the art. Wow, this is some gorgeous art. Everything about it is beautiful: shapes, colors, expression. I could pore over these pages and completely ignore the words and I’d be a happy reader. It’s easily digestible art, too: not cartoony, but not too photo-realistic either. I know some kids who would really dig it.
For kids inquisitive about another (real!) place and time, this would be a great choice. And the vignette style could be a real plus for kids who sometimes struggle to read what can seem like very long chapter-less graphic novels (or the longer chapters in traditional novels).
I tried to think of some good readalikes, but really, Abby gave me plenty: The Wall by Peter Sis, Kampung Boy by Lat, Drawing from Memory
by Allen Say. Her Goodreads post has a few more.

The Murmurings by Carly Anne West

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Ever since Sophie’s older sister Nell was found dead in Jerome, Arizona, she’s been grieving. But it’s not simply grieving. There’s something suspicious about Nell’s death that Sophie can’t wrap her head around. Her sister suffered from what the doctors called Schizophrenia — she was hearing voices and they were telling her to do things that weren’t okay. Nell had tried committing suicide with a piece of shattered mirror glass, for example, after she’d been told she had to do that.

Nell was found hanging by her toe from a tree.

Sophie withdraws in school. She doesn’t care. She’s late all the time. She doesn’t care. Maybe she even looks forward to her punishment for being tardy because it means a little time with Evan, the new boy. Evan transferred to her school just six months ago from the other side of Phoenix. And as much as Sophie thinks falling for the new boy is so cliche, well, she does anyway.

It’s possible that Evan’s cousin Deb may have the clues to unlocking what happened to Nell at Oakside Behavioral Institution. He knows Sophie’s story. That’s because it’s his story, too. Together, Sophie and Evan are going to comb through the clues of Nell’s mysterious death, of the suspicious Dr. Keller who runs the Institution, and maybe save cousin Deb and everyone else still under Keller’s orders.

The Murmurings is West’s debut novel, and it’s straight-up horror. There are paranormal elements, but it’s not a paranormal romance. The overarching tone and mood of the novel is horror. Things happen that don’t make sense and that are creepy. Nell’s body was found dangling by a toe. It’s possible there is more than one character whose fate, too, will be found dangling upside down by a toe.

West builds great atmosphere in her novel. This is achieves not only through strong writing, but through great setting. The book takes place primarily in a couple of places: Jerome, Arizona and Oakside. Jerome, for anyone unfamiliar, is known for being the Wickedest City in the West. Weird things happen. Weird people live there. While Evan knows that Sophie’s sister died while being treated for her illness, he isn’t aware that she was found dead in Jerome, and knowing Sophie’s love of horror, Evan wants to take her there for a date because, well, it’s scary. Little does he know how scary, and when Sophie gets wind of this plan, she immediately breaks down and tells Evan about Nell’s death. Of course, he backpedals. It doesn’t stop them from a trip to Jerome, though.

It just makes their trip have a different purpose when they realize that Dr. Keller’s former second-hand man may have the clues to unlocking the truth of Oakside.

Oakside is the second primary setting. It’s here where the true action unfolds. It’s creepy. We know how the doors do and don’t work. We know that Pigeon — one of the heads in the facility — is to be feared. We know that those admitted here as patients all have something off about them. More than anything, though, we know that Dr. Keller isn’t in his right mind either. I can’t explain a whole lot more without unraveling the rest of the plot, but I can offer this much: Keller’s grieving his own loss. And it’s because of his own loss that he lords over his patients. It’s his grief that forces him to behave as he does, and Oakside is his playground. While it’s true Nell may have experienced Schizophrenia, she’s forced through treatment by Keller that comes as a result of his need to control, rather than his need to actually treat his patients.

Where The Murmurings doesn’t work, though, is in much of the execution of the story. It relies heavily on coincidence and on telling the reader backstory, rather than allowing the reader to piece it together. Evan and Sophie’s trip to Jerome allows them to meet Keller’s former partner at Oakside, Adam. Both were aware of Adam prior to their trip because he ran a blog “exposing” the truth of the treatments at the Institution, but when they arrive and find him in an underground bunker, Adam tells them everything. Yes, tells. We learn about Keller’s loss. We learn how his loss created different types of creepy creatures (these being a metaphor for the loss, that is). And Sophie’s fear that she’s becoming like Nell in hearing voices and having issues with mirrors? That’s part of the loss Keller suffered and it’s inflicted upon her because she’s part of Nell by being her sister. While readers are allowed to be skeptical about Adam’s information dumping, there’s not enough loops thrown from this point out to allow questioning. Sure, there are times Sophie wonders if she and Evan were led astray, but it doesn’t quite translate for the readers. Especially as more pieces snap into place.

At times, the story dragged because of the insistence on telling. Lengthy passages of back story of Oakside and of Keller and of the Tellers/Seekers/Insiders were uninteresting. It would have been much more effective for these things to occur throughout Sophie’s journey of discovery, rather than to have them incorporated simply as story explanation. In other words, the hand holding of the reader leads to a less-than-satisfying resolution and weak tension building. So where West is able to offer good atmosphere, her writing fails to conjure the same strength in tension. Since much of horror hinges on both elements working with one another in a story like this, having one of these elements lack impacts the greater whole. It doesn’t mean there’s not tension — there is and at times it’s quite creepy — but opportunities to take it a step further were instead used as opportunities to tell too much.

Likewise, The Murmurings depended a lot on coincidence. Evan, the new boy, of course has the key to unlocking the truth of Nell. Of course his cousin was friends with Nell at the institution. Of course Sophie just trusts him and she just trusts Adam. It was too easy for the characters and too easy for the reader. Had there been more red herrings and more plot twists, then this could have gone from an okay story to a great one.

The exploration of grief in conjunction with horror isn’t new territory, but thematically, it works well here. After letting this book settle for a while, another small element I felt worked spectacularly well was the parallel storyline of Sophie’s interest in and passion for Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis. She claims she doesn’t like it. And while that’s likely true, it plays a larger role in her own life than she’s likely to admit. This metaphor was a smart way to bookend Sophie’s own story.

Pass The Murmurings off to readers who want a horror story that doesn’t rely on creatures to tell it. Yes, it’s possible there’s a creature or two here, but it’s not in the werewolf/ghost/vampire/zombie tradition. That may or may not be up to the reader’s interpretation of what’s real and what exists within the mind. This is a story about mental illness and about grief and loss and how those things can tangle, twist, and mangle a person. Readers who want scary will find it here. Even though this didn’t quite capture my attention and didn’t quite deliver on the fear factor in the way I anticipated, West’s writing is strong enough and the potential for going even further in the next story make me eager to see what she delivers next.

The Murmurings will be available March 5 from Simon Pulse. Review copy received from the publisher. 

Darkroom by Lila Quintero Weaver

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I was thrilled to be a round 2 judge in this year’s Cybils awards, helping select the winners of both the middle grade and young adult graphic novels. I had actually only read one of the finalists before the shortlists were announced, so I had a terrific crop of new reading to dig into. Among them were two memoirs of two different places and eras, and I enjoyed them both quite a lot, for different reasons: Little White Duck by Na Liu and Andres Vera Martinez (middle grade) and Darkroom by Lila Quintero Weaver (young adult). I intended to review them both here, but I discovered I had a lot to say about Darkroom, so I’ll discuss Little White Duck in a future post.
When Lila was five, her family moved from Buenos Aires, Argentina to Marion, Alabama. It was 1961, and the American South was heavy with Jim Crow, segregation, and the Civil Rights Movement. In that time, the dominant white group had not yet decided to marginalize people of Latin descent, who were not yet emigrating to the United States in the waves they do now. So the Quinteros were not reviled like their black neighbors, but nor were they quite accepted, either. This made Lila a bit of an in-betweener, neither black nor white, and therefore gave her a unique perspective on the events that unfolded in the 60s.
I normally avoid stories about race relations in the 60s. I’ve learned about Jim Crow and the Civil Rights movement since the moment I began attending school, but more than that, I just find it all incredibly depressing, mostly because I still see so many of the same awful attitudes reflected in my peers today (toward black people and other marginalized groups, too). (You should probably know that I live in the American South and have my entire life.)
Despite my predisposition to not enjoy these kinds of stories, though, I quite liked it. Lila describes how she, as a child and a teenager, reacted to what was going on around her: what she witnessed, what she heard about, what was hidden from her. Because of her unique vantage point, she learned at an early age what it meant to hold a prejudice, and she learned to fight against it. She also weaves in her own experience as a Latina and the prejudices people had about her family. She was constantly embarrassed by her parents’ use of Spanish in public, for instance, and she yearned to look more like the white ideal espoused by so many of her classmates. It’s not a story entirely about race and culture, either: Lila also tells us about her everyday life, her parents’ vocations and values, her friends, and so on. While this could have been a dry treatise on the evils of Jim Crow, instead it’s a deeply personal story – of both Lila and our country.
The black and white illustrations are competent, though not breathtaking. She uses the black and white medium to great effect, particularly shadows. She also varies the composition of the pages, creating some with strict panels, some with full-page illustrations, and some that are a mixture of the two. One particularly memorable spread features a drawing of a history textbook Lila’s class used, with the actual text reproduced. (This particular textbook reminded me strongly of some of the textbooks purportedly being currently used in some Louisiana schools, where slaves were happy and well-treated and the KKK was an upstanding community organization.)
While it’s very well-done, I think the appeal is a bit limited. The perspective is clearly that of an adult reflecting on childhood. It’s a lovely, poetic reflection, though, with a fantastic parallel beginning and end. For readers interested in graphic memoirs, this is a good selection, and it’s particularly impressive considering it was a school assignment for Weaver, and her first published effort.

Finished copy checked out from my local library.