STACKED

books

Cracked by K.M. Walton

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Bull doesn’t let up on Victor. As his name might suggest, Bull is the bully here and Victor is his target. It’s been this way since elementary school: Bull lets out his aggression and Victor lets him. Doesn’t fight back. Although KM Walton’s debut Cracked sounds like a standard story of bullying, readers learn there is a lot more going on beneath the surfaces of both boys. That both Bull and Victor are the bully and the bullied in their own ways.

Bull comes from a poor family, with parents who are angry and abusive toward him. When I say he’s poor, I mean, he’s poor. Unlike many books that try to portray poor characters through simply calling them poor (something which bothers me to no end), Walton actually depicts a boy who is growing up in a lower income bracket. I don’t know if I’d characterize him as living in poverty, but his home is infested with insects, there is hardly any food at home for him, and he really has nothing. All of this, along with his award-winning parents who regularly remind him that he was an unwanted child, cause him to seek out a way to feel better about himself. From very early on in his life, Victor was an easy target. Everything that Bull has pent up from home he lets loose on Victor who, rather than fight back, takes it. Because of this, Bull continues being a bully because, well, it helps him feel like he has some sort of power and control in his life.

Victor is almost the complete opposite of Bull — or at least, that’s what we’re lead to believe about him. Victor comes from a home where there is money. Both of his parents work hard and he lives in a big house and has everything he could possibly want at his fingertips. Of course, that’s all superficial; his parents are never home and his parents aren’t happy he exists at all. He’s a burden to them. Victor’s lonely and frustrated and while he never wants to be the victim of bullying, it offers him a kind of attention he’s not getting anywhere else. There’s not a suggestion bullying is good for him because it’s not, but as readers, it’s easy to see why he doesn’t fight back. Aside from being afraid, of course, it’s just part of the reality he’s accepted and it feels like something he thinks he deserves, given everything else in his life. There is one good thing in Victor’s life, though, is his mother’s dog Jazzer. But Jazz is really old and, well, I won’t spoil what happens, even though it’s obvious.

Cracked is written from the perspective of both boys, with alternating chapters. In setting up the story this way, Walton shows us that despite the external differences between Bull and Victor, they’re actually very similar. They’re both hurting and aching, and they’re both seeking some sort of validation that their lives are worth something because neither feels like it is. In fact, both boys are so down on their lives that they each end up attempting suicide — even if it’s not through the same means or with the same goals in mind (one is much more direct in his attempt while the other goes about it as a way to protect himself from other harm). When the boys wake up from their hospital treatment, they find themselves in the same room. In the same psych ward. And now, they have to face one another and face their own demons at the same time.

While both boys are now forced together in space and in time, they do a great job of avoiding talking to one another, even when they’re in the same group therapy session. Bull has physical injuries that limit his mobility, and Victor, well, he just hides. Although they do eventually talk and find out the things about one another that we as readers figured out long before, I had a little trouble with the believability here. The therapy/recovery period is very short — four days — and in that time, both boys seem to make pretty hard turnarounds. Moreover, and maybe the only real troubling part for me as a reader, is that both boys in the story are “saved” by girls they meet in therapy. The message here about love and sharing love is excellent, and it’s what the boys both needed; however, the place from which it’s coming — others who were in the same short treatment/therapy group — didn’t work for me. I didn’t quite buy that those girls had themselves gained as much wisdom as they did from such a short recovery period (given they, too, were assumed to be in this psych ward because they, too, had hit rock bottom like Bull and Victor). I hoped for a little more between Victor and Bull, too. The girls almost got in the way of that.

What I did like, though, was another character who shows up and supports Bull in a way he wasn’t expecting. There was another person looking out for him for a long time, and when he realizes who it was, his outlook on life changes a lot. The same could be said for Victor, who has a family member step in and offer him the sort of love he was missing out on from his parents (who, I should note, went on a European vacation and when they heard Victor had tried to kill himself, continued their trip anyway). Although this felt almost a little too happy-ending, particularly when it came to Bull’s after-care recovery needs, because I wanted a good ending for both of these boys, I accepted it.

Cracked is fast-paced, and both boys have great, believable voices. The alternating perspectives work here, and Walton offers up two distinct characters. Even though a lot of their personalities shine through their differences in class and in experience, internally, they’re struggling with their own problems in a way that makes them individuals. Walton’s novel came out earlier this year and didn’t get a whole lot of attention, but I think it’s one that deserves a lot more. It doesn’t necessarily tread anywhere entirely new, but what it does cover is well-written and engaging and will be a great read alike to a number of other strong contemporary titles (and more stories with authentic male voices never hurt). I was reminded quite a bit of Swati Avasthi’s Split, as well as Andrew Smith’s Stick. I also think fans of Amy Reed’s books — particularly Clean and her forthcoming Crazy, both of which depict teens struggling with recovery and with pain and mental illness — will want to check this one out. Walton’s debut impressed me, and I’m really looking forward to her sophomore effort, Empty (January 2013), which also explores bullying.

Finished copy purchased for me from Lenore. Cracked is available now.

All These Lives by Sarah Wylie

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Dani and Jena are fraternal twins, and they spent most of their lives pretty close to one another. When Jena is diagnosed with cancer, her life is turned upside down, right along with Dani’s. Dani finds it unfair her sister has to suffer with endless rounds of chemotherapy, with losing her sense of self, with the possibility of losing her life all together. See, Dani feels like she’s been granted 9 lives, given that she herself has survived near-death experiences more than once. It’s unfair — beyond unfair — her sisters one life might end so soon before she’s had the chance to live it.

So Dani makes it her mission to die so her sister doesn’t have to suffer.

All These Lives by Sarah Wylie is the kind of cancer novel I appreciate because this isn’t a book about cancer as a disease. It’s not a novel about the things cancer does to a body. It’s a novel instead about how cancer can be a means for people to find a reason to live and to survive.

Dani’s a sarcastic narrator, and she’s hurting deeply because of her sister’s illness. At times it feels like she may be a tiny bit envious of her sister because she’s getting so much attention and special treatment because she’s sick, but the truth is, Dani is grieving heavily. For her, sarcasm, coldness, and distancing herself from the present help her cope with what her sister is going through. She doesn’t want to remain close to anyone because she’s struggling with guilt in being the sister who is okay. The one who isn’t sick. More than that, though, Dani feels like she’s been unfairly blessed with the ability to keep on living, despite numerous brushes with death.

Throughout the book, Dani attempts more than once to die — having survived more than one near-death experience, Dani believes she’s been blessed with nine lives, rather than just one. She sees her own death as her way of letting her sister live. Because they’re twins, she believes they have a special sort of connection to one another and by giving up one of her lives, Jena can live. The problem, of course, is that in Dani’s attempts to end her life, she only hurts herself more, not to mention she hurts her family more than she could imagine. It would be easy to call what she’s doing selfish, but it’s not. Dani aches, and this is her release. Each time she made an attempt to die, I hurt for her because she was doing what she thought was good and right. As the reader on the outside, you know it’s not the case, but she is unable — not unwilling, but unable — to realize that. At least immediately.

Although this is a novel about Jena’s cancer, never once did it feel like a drawn out book about an illness. In fact, very little page time is devoted to the illness and what it was doing to Jena. Instead, the book focused more on what cancer did to the sister who didn’t have it. I felt this made the issue of illness more powerful than had the story focused on Jena. Cancer stories have a way of being manipulative sometimes because they put the onus of emotion on the reader, who always brings their own experience to the story. While writing this story from the perspective of the sister dealing with someone else’s cancer certainly will pull upon the reader’s own experiences, Wylie successfully develops a whole story without requiring the reader to face the cancer and implications head on. We’re not forced to feel sympathetic toward a character because they’re battling a disease they have no power over. We’re allowed instead to develop sympathy toward a complex character who may or may not be all that likable. She’s more than a disease. This is a book where illness plays a role in the story, rather than the story playing a role in the illness.

All These Lives is literary, and the story and characters never falter beneath the prose. They work together, and in doing so, the pace stays steady throughout. But more than being literary, what I loved was the message Dani and the reader walked away with — that living is the greatest thing you can ever do for someone else. It’s a realization that emerges after one of the close brushes with death Dani has, and when she has that moment, I understood just how much pain and grief she’d been dealing with and how heavy it truly weighed on her. It was almost easy to believe Dani’s defensiveness and believe that she was sarcastic through and through. The truth was, it was her way of letting herself be dead. That wasn’t what Jena would want from her at all. Some of the lines made me a little teary eyed, as Dani wrestled with the pain of knowing how she’d behaved and the pain of knowing it wasn’t at all what she should be doing to support her sister.

This paragraph’s spoiler-ridden, so proceed with caution. Maybe the thing I appreciated most about this book was that no one dies, but there’s also no miracle cure. Instead, once Dani wakes up and decides she needs to live and to love to the best of her capability, the story comes to a satisfying ending. We’re not made to suffer as Jena’s life withers, nor are we forced to believe that she’s suddenly all better. For me, this was the way a story like this is best handled because it really wasn’t Jena’s story. It was Dani’s through and through.

All These Lives will appeal to readers who are looking for a good sibling story, and even though this is fully contemporary, I think it’ll appeal to readers who loved Imaginary Girls for the sibling relationship aspect. Readers who liked Before I Die or Gayle Forman’s If I Stay will find the same emotionally connection with Dani as they did with Tessa and Mia in those two stories. Writing-wise, this one reminded me of Ilsa J. Bick’s Drowning Instinct, and despite being less edgy (even though Wylie’s book is certainly edgy), All These Lives should appeal to fans of Bick’s novel.

Wylie’s debut impressed me more than I thought it would, and I’m eager to see where she goes next. She’s earned my trust and respect as a reader by taking a subject and twisting my expectations. I also give bonus points to this book for developing a story without a romance in it, which is a rare find, and I think the story is stronger because of that choice.

One of the trends I’m noticing in YA this year is that of survival, of living despite feeling like there’s reason not to, and it’s been fascinating to see how this theme plays out across genres. I’m thinking there’s a great potential book list sometime in the future on this very topic.

Review copy received from the publisher. All These Lives will be available June 5.

Black Heart by Holly Black

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Holly Black’s Curse Workers series is such fun. I love stories about cons and I love stories about magic, and these books have both of those things, plus a narrator with such an engaging, unique voice it should make other writers envious. Because I’m reviewing Black Heart, the third book in the series, there will be spoilers for the first two here.
At the end of Red Glove, Cassel had teamed up with the federal government to use his powers as a transformation worker in the legal way. Since he’s still a minor, he’s supposed to shadow his older brother, Barron, who has also gone over to the government side. There are a few problems with this: Barron is still a sociopath, conning comes as easy as breathing to Cassel, and Cassel isn’t quite sure what the government is asking him to do won’t get him arrested or killed.
Meanwhile, Lila starts to be drawn further and further into the life of crime as her father prepares her to take over the family business one day. Cassel still carries a major torch for her, naturally, but if he let her know what side he was working for now, it would be the end of him. 
There’s a lot going on in Black Heart, and I’m very impressed by the way Black handles it all. In fact, all of this stuff – including two pretty major subplots – is a big reason I enjoyed the book so much. Aside from the job the Feds have for Cassel, he also has to deal with a vengeful mob boss and his threats against his mother, a female classmate who needs his help getting out of a blackmail plot, and the tension between his two best friends since it was revealed Daneca is a worker. Frequently in stories like this, where the author juggles multiple plotlines, they all tie together in some way, but that’s not necessarily the case here. I appreciated that – it made for a more complex read. Furthermore, all of the plotlines were compelling. I didn’t want to skim past any of them to get to the good stuff.
Like Red Glove, Black Heart builds upon the events of its predecessors. Cassel’s actions have consequences here, and not always good ones. The characters also grow based on their previous experiences, and not always in a good way. All of this may make the book difficult as a standalone, but again, it makes for some very satisfying reading

Nothing Special by Geoff Herbach

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Last year I met Felton Reinstein in Stupid Fast and fell madly in love with his character. Then, of course, Herbach’s book went on to win the Cybils award in YA fiction. The combination of a great male lead who was able to tackle the tough issues of family, love, small town life, and friendship with humor and with depth stood out. So when I heard there was a continuation of the story, I was beyond excited. And Nothing Special lives up.

After we left Felton in Stupid Fast, he was making a name for himself, and now, he’s being recruited by some of the top colleges in the country for his athletic prowess. It’s stressing him out — as it would — because he wants to make sure he’s making the right choice. If the attention he garnered last year made him crazy, the attention he’s getting on the national level now is making him downright insane.

Things at home aren’t as bad as they were last year, but they’re also not exactly great. Especially when Andrew, his brother, goes missing. Turns out Andrew’s taken an impromptu trip to Florida and now Felton has to go rescue him and bring him back home. Without his mother finding out. He pulls off this wild road trip in a strikingly similar way his brother pulled it off: with a few little lies to his mother about where he was going for a week. Whereas Andrew said he was heading to a camp in northern Wisconsin, Felton tells his mom he’s heading to a recruitment camp in another state. And Jerri, their mother who has never quite had herself together, buys the story. It’s then Felton sets off to Florida with Gus. Gus who used to be his best friend. Gus who now Felton feels he has little or nothing in common with anymore.

Let me back up a second and explain how the book is set up. It’s a letter to Aleah, Felton’s girlfriend/not a girlfriend, and it’s written at the end of the summer between airport trips down to Florida. He’s explaining the road trip with Gus in the past, since it had already happened. By framing the story this way, Herbach not only leaves readers wondering where Felton is heading now, but he complicates it further by making us wonder what happened between the initial road trip and the flights because in both instances, we know Felton’s going to Florida. This works well not only because it pushes the story forward but also because it mirrors how the first story was set up. We know Felton’s the kind of guy who needs to work his problems out by paper. It would be inauthentic to his character for this to be a straightforward narrative.

Nothing Special is Felton’s story, but it’s just as much about Andrew, even though he doesn’t once have an opportunity to tell. We’re wondering right along with Felton why his brother skipped town and lied about it, and as he pieces together the story, we start to get a real image of who Andrew is and why he would make this decision.

If your brother were getting so much attention at home, you wouldn’t blame Andrew, either. If you were constantly living in the shadow of a guy being recruited by so many big name schools, you would look for a place where you could earn some attention. But Andrew’s reason for his trip to Florida are much more than about finding a place where he could stand out and be special. It’s about reconnecting with his family. With family who his mother has essentially divorced herself from and never told her boys about. If you’ll remember in the first book, Felton helps reconnect with a long long family member, this is what is going to happen through Andrew. Except — and maybe this is pretty bold — I think Andrew’s much more successful in his quest and helps both himself and Felton reconsider what it means to be family and to love one another.

The family relationships and family dynamics in this story ring true. Where I could see some readers suggesting that maybe there’s too much mess in Felton’s family, I buy every moment of this story. Families are tricky things. It’s not always clear where people stand with one another, despite being connected by genetics. I’m not sure in the end that things are resolved, either, and that’s a huge part of what figuring out family is all about. It constantly shifts and changes and it’s not always comfortable. At times, I found myself getting a little welled up because Felton’s experiences with family hit close to him.  Fortunately, Felton’s trademark humor brings levity to the situations he works through. They don’t become heavy issues nor do they become messages or lessons to learn. They just are.

Herbach’s writing is easy to read and he nails voice. Felton still remains one of the most authentic males I’ve read in YA. He had feelings and thoughts, but he doesn’t necessarily act upon them in the most logical manner nor in the way we would want him to. He makes mistakes and he does stupid things. But he has to in order to get to the heart of things. He’s selfish and self-absorbed, but it doesn’t make him the kind of character you dislike because of it. Instead, he’s able to gain the reader’s interest and sympathy because of these qualities. The thing is, you know deep down he is a great guy and he knows deep down he’s a great guy too.

As much as this is a story about family, Nothing Special is also a story about friendship and about love. Where Felton found himself lost without Gus the summer before, he’s learning that maybe he and Gus aren’t meant to be the kind of friends who stick together to the end. Relationships are dynamic, ever-shifting things, and Felton learns to deal with this head on while in the car with Gus. They’ve both changed and their lives are going separate ways. Part of it has to do with Felton’s character and his selfishness, but part of the blame lies squarely on Gus for the same reasons. Then there’s Aleah. We know this entire story is a letter to Aleah, but what makes it more powerful is knowing how much of himself Felton gives her through it. He’s raw and broken, and he is absolutely unafraid of being that way with her, even if he’s not entirely sure of what their future together is. That Felton has this sort of person in his life made me cheer because, even if she’s not right there with him in person, she’s there with him in the way he really needs her. She’s there to listen. 

As soon as I finished the book, I wrote down a quote that stuck with me and that I think nails Felton’s character and his story: “If you act out of love, whatever you do is both perfect and right. It doesn’t matter if you’re a deep thinker or a squirrel nut if you act out of love. Crap starts getting seriously screwed if something else gets in the way, something like fear or revenge or even victory or being famous or some other dumb thing. The only thing we need to do is figure out what we really love.” Even though things suck sometimes, even if things suck a lot of the time, and even if things make no sense whatsoever when they’re happening, all that matters is acting out of love. Felton, for all his faults, is ultimately a likable because as readers, we know this is precisely why he does the things he does. 

Nothing Special will appeal to the same readers who fell in love with the first book, and while it’s possible to read this one without having read Stupid Fast, I wouldn’t recommend it. To come to the conclusions Felton does, readers need to stick with him throughout. My only qualms with this story are that at times it feels it runs a little long and at times it takes on a lot of heavy issues at once. It’s not that they’re not relevant or important to the story, but it can feel a bit overwhelming to the reader. Herbach, though, has a gift for voice, and I am beyond excited to see what sort of story he offers next. If you like funny, thoughtful, and authentic male characters, this book and its predecessor are essential reads. 

Review copy received from the publisher. Nothing Special is available now.

Kill You Last by Todd Strasser

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In Kill You Last, Shelby’s comfortable existence has just ended. Her father, who runs a photography and modeling business, has been connected to three missing teenage girls, and the evidence pointing toward his guilt just continues to pour in. She’s also started to receive threatening emails from a person who promises vengeance for her father’s actions. When it seems like everyone has already decided her father is guilty, Shelby decides to do a little investigating of her own.
I quite enjoyed the first two books in Strasser’s “Thrillogy,” but I think the shine has worn off a bit for me. This go around, I was much less forgiving of the thin characterization and somewhat juvenile writing style. The little snippet he gave the reader at the beginning – present in all the books – was also a little tiresome this time. The reason for that is that this prologue isn’t actually any new material: it’s simply an excerpt from a later portion of the book with a few bits edited out to avoid spoilers. When I reached the part of the book the prologue had been taken from, I felt cheated rather than illumined. As a hook, it falls short.
 
All that said, the mystery itself is quite good. Strasser is excellent at dangling several possibilities before the reader, making them all equally plausible, and then making the big reveal at the end seem as if it should have been obvious all along. And despite the lackluster writing, this book is a surefire page-turner. I even read it in the car, something I almost always avoid due to motion sickness, because I wanted – needed – to know whodunnit.
I also have to give Strasser credit for not pulling his punches. Shelby starts out steadfast in her defense of her father, but she slowly grows to realize that he is a lot worse than she knew. In fact, he’s a downright dirty creep, and as Shelby learns more, her picture of him just deteriorates. I appreciated that Strasser made her father this creepy guy who is perhaps innocent of murder, but certainly not innocent of other awful things. In too many stories, the end of the book tidily resolves the parental issues to show that it was all a misunderstanding or the person isn’t as bad as they seemed. Not so here. Shelby’s father isn’t the only one, either – her other friends, family, and acquaintances have dirty secrets too, even if they may not be murderous.
In all three books, Strasser writes from a female point of view. I’m always curious to see how male writers do this (and how female writers do a male point of view). Due to the almost complete lack of character development, though, I can’t really judge how well Strasser succeeded in capturing the female voice. This is especially apparent in the last chapter, when Strasser quickly wraps up the story in what might as well have been a series of bullet points describing what happened to each character. It’s a prime example of the kind of telling, rather than showing, that is used to develop character – and pretty ineffectively. It’s a flaw for sure, but if you’re a fan of this type of story, it won’t prevent you from enjoying it.