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books

Gabi, A Girl in Pieces by Isabel Quinetero

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Sometimes, you read the book you didn’t know you needed to read when you read it. Enter Isabel Quintero’s Gabi, A Girl in Pieces.

Mexican American Gabi is a senior this year, and the book picks up in the months leading up to her final year in high school. It jumps in immediately, as this is a diary-style novel, and we’re quickly introduced to Gabi’s best friend Cindy and Sebastian. Cindy just discovered she’s pregnant and Sebastian, who Gabi has known to be gay for a while, just came out to his family. Those two revelations set off the string of events to follow — Cindy’s pregnancy, as Gabi is by her side through the entirety of it and Sebastian’s coming out, as Gabi helps him find a stable place to live after he’s kicked out of his own home.

But this isn’t the story of what happens to Gabi’s friends.

Gabi’s own home life is imperfect, as is her love life. Her father is an addict, and he’s more unreliable than he is reliable and stable. Gabi’s upset and hurting by it, but because it’s such a normal part of her life, she depicts it as such.

She’s interested in a number of boys, but she has no idea whether they’re interested, and she certainly has no idea how to kiss them, were that opportunity to arise. But as the months roll on, we see Gabi test out relationships with a number of guys throughout, and she offers her keen insight into what she did or did not like about each one . . . and whether her final choice was the right one for her. There is keen, positive depictions of sexuality and Gabi’s understanding of her limits, as well as discussion of consent. Her aunt taught her the phrase “eyes open, legs closed,” which is a theme that runs throughout her diary, but it’s a phrase in which he can’t always agree — especially as more unravels about Cindy’s pregnancy and the pregnancy of another of Gabi’s classmates. Oh, and there’s the surprise pregnancy her mother has, too.

Because we get Gabi unfiltered, we see the pregnancies through her eyes without any glossing over. We know what it was like to be in the delivery room with Cindy and we know what it’s like when someone has to go to an abortion clinic and all of the steps and secrecy involved in that.

One of the biggest challenges Gabi faces in the story is that she’s torn between going away to college and remaining at home with her family. She’s stuck in that space between pursuing her own dreams as an American girl and the traditional role she has in staying home and helping with the family, as children in Mexican families often do. She applies to schools, including some big name universities, and ultimately gets accepted to her dream school. The wrestling she does about her future is complicated and thoughtfully approached, but it’s made even more challenging when she does something at school that gets her in trouble. Huge trouble.

And it’s here where Quintero’s good debut novel becomes an outstanding novel.

Although this is a diary of Gabi’s life, it’s a deep exploration of sexuality and more specifically, it’s also an exploration of “dude culture.” That is, why do we allow “boys to be boys” but we don’t offer protection to girls from boys? Or more accurately, why do we allow “boys to be boys” anyway? What does it say when boys are allowed to do what they want to and it’s permitted, where a girl has to suffer the consequences not just of her own actions but of the things acted upon her? Gabi won’t stand for it, and she keeps turning her mind back to that phrase “eyes open, legs closed.” It becomes almost a tool of power for her when she begins working through the anger and frustration she has, even though that wasn’t the intended purpose for her aunt telling it to her.

Gabi is also a fat girl. But she’s not just a fat girl in a YA novel. She’s a fat girl in a YA novel who loves to eat, who loves to talk about eating, and yet, she’s brutally honest about what being fat means in her life. She’s regularly teased and she’s given a lot of grief at home about it, and she herself admits to wishing she could be thinner. Trying on clothes is a pain, among other things. But what Quintero does not do in this book is make Gabi any less of a full, exceptionally-realized, dream-seeking main character. Her fat does not hold her back. It becomes a thing she talks about in a way that is another part of who she is, even if it’s something she feels like other people judge her much more harshly for than she does. Gabi’s body is not the whole story. Gabi’s body does not make her unable to live her life to the fullest. It does not make her unattractive to boys. It does not isolate her from her friends. It does not make her depressed or sullen or fearful of food. Her body is just that: her body. This is an amazing and affirming message to see in a book, and I think it will resonate deeply with readers.

This is a story that also includes positive female friendship, positive male-female friendship, laugh-out-loud moments of awkward interactions with boys, and really heart-warming scenes. There are some really tough parts to read, as Gabi’s family does suffer a major blow, but those are tempered with moments that make you cheer for Gabi, too. The diary format for Gabi, A Girl in Pieces was the absolute right choice for telling the story because it allowed both immediacy and distance from events (Gabi has to reflect on what happens after the fact, when she’s writing, rather than in the immediacy as it’s happening) and because it is exceedingly rare to see a “year in the life” diary of a character of color. Gabi owns every bit of this story.

Gabi is an empowered teen girl from the start, but it’s not something she entirely realized. It’s through this year she comes to discover that about herself — and those moments of getting it are rich for the reader.

Gabi, A Girl in Pieces has garnered five starred reviews so far from the trade journals, but I have seen virtually no discussion of this book and I think that may be because this is from a smaller press. But this is a book with huge teen appeal that I hope people pick up, give a chance, and then talk about. Quintero’s writing style and story telling reminded me a lot of Amy Spalding. Fans of Sara Zarr, Susan Vaught, or Siobhan Vivian’s novels will do well with this book, too. Readers looking for serious books that are infused with good moments of humor and honesty, as well as depictions of awkward teen relationships, dynamic families, the challenges of pursuing your own interests while also respecting and being part of a host of cultural traditions, and great female leads will find a lot to enjoy here.

Gabi, A Girl in Pieces is available now. Review copy from the publisher.

October is…

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If you’re a public librarian, you’ve probably used Chase’s Calendar of Events. It’s one of the few print reference resources we still hang on to in my branch, and we use it a lot for display inspiration. It’s also good for a laugh, since it will tell you that January is Teen Driving Awareness Month (be very aware of those teens and you’ll stand a better chance of survival) and that July is Horseradish Month. Important stuff.

With that in mind, I thought it would be fun to highlight a few (mostly YA) books that would be good for some of those more obscure October holidays.

American Cheese Month
Bake and Decorate Month 
Car Care Month
Crime Prevention Month 

Go Hog Wild–Eat Country Ham Month
Orthodontic Health Month

Photographer Appreciation Month

Positive Attitude Month

Roller Skating Month

Squirrel Awareness and Appreciation Month
Stamp Collecting Month

Workplace Politics Awareness Month

A Few Cybils Reads – Part II

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The public nomination period for the Cybils closed last week. I have 32 print books and 4 e-books checked out from the library currently scattered at various parts throughout my house (well, I guess the e-books aren’t really scattered), in addition to the books I already own (easily another dozen or so). You’d think that a kitchen table would be for eating things, but right now it’s pretty much just serving as a surface upon which to sort books – this stack I’ve read, this stack I haven’t, and so on.

Here are a few more brief reviews from the stack I’ve read.

Strange Sweet Song by Adi Rule
This book lives up to its title. It is very strange, almost too strange, for most of its existence, and then it hits you with some sweetness near the end that makes for a very satisfying resolution. Sing da Navelli is the daughter of a famous soprano, a woman who made a name for herself in opera – not only because of her voice, but also because she died in the middle of an aria. When Sing starts at Dunhammond Academy, a boarding school for musicians, she feels the weight of her father’s expectations as well as the public’s. As luck (good or ill) would have it, the school is performing Angelique this year, the opera that Sing’s mother died singing.

Parts of the story are told from Sing’s point of view as she tries to gain the lead role in the opera, make friends, date the cute boy, deal with rude teachers, and so on. Other parts are told from the point of view of the Maestro of the school in his youth, his young apprentice, and a strange being called the Felix who inhabits the woods outside the school. The Felix – which kills almost everyone it meets, but grants wishes to a select few – is itself a part of the opera, used as inspiration by the opera’s composer long ago. Its life is tied inextricably to the history of the school. At times the school story and the mythical story exist uneasily side by side. It takes a patient reader to push through all the parts and learn how they join together, but the payoff is lovely and rewarding, very fairy tale-esque with a sweet romance and interesting magic. The writing is lovely, too, giving the book a dreamlike quality. This would be a good pick for readers fascinated with the opera, the lives of classical musicians, and the magic that music can create.

Amity by Micol Ostow
Ostow has written a seriously creepy horror novel that most readers could probably finish in a single sitting. It tells two parallel stories both set in a house called Amity, but separated in time by ten years. Connor’s story is the past story; Gwen’s is the present. Each story begins with the teens’ families moving into Amity and noticing that something is a bit off with the house. In Connor’s case, he develops an affinity for Amity; the house gives him a sort of power. He feeds off of it and vice versa. In Gwen’s case, the house frightens her; it starts to do strange things to her brother, and she becomes more and more disturbed as she learns more about what happened ten years ago with Connor’s family.

Each teen tells their own story, and both teens at first seem fairly normal, but it quickly becomes apparent that Connor brought his own disease with him to Amity, a disease that Amity recognizes and exploits. Gwen suffers from a disease, too, but of a different kind. Eventually, Connor’s and Gwen’s stories combine. The switches in perspective are frequent, chapters are short, and there’s a lot of white space. These stylistic choices create an urgency to the story, which is perfectly paced (if perhaps just a touch too short). I know next to nothing about the actual Amityville events, so I can’t tell you how much of the book pulls from them and how much springs completely from Ostow’s imagination. What I can tell you is that Ostow excels at creating a haunting mood, one that isn’t driven by gore or things that jump out at you. It’s a slow burn, and by the end, most readers should be deliciously scared. Keep the lights on.

The In-Between by Barbara Stewart
The voice is what makes this book stand out from other is-it-or-isn’t-it-a-ghost stories. Ellie is fourteen, depressed, and on her way to a new town with her parents to make a fresh start. On the way there, her family’s car is involved in a crash which kills one of her parents and her cat. Ellie herself is seriously injured, but she pulls through. In her new home, she meets Madeline, a beautiful, perfect girl who quickly becomes her best friend. But then Madeline is gone, and Ellie finds herself adrift without her, struggling once again to put together the broken pieces of her life – and mostly failing.

Ellie’s story is difficult to read sometimes – she’s in such pain, and her voice is so achingly fourteen. It would take a hard heart not to be transported back to one’s own adolescence while reading this. Though I didn’t experience the same exact problems as Ellie, Stewart’s writing made me acutely aware of just how everything felt at that time in my life. Fourteen year olds experience things differently than adults. Sometimes it hurts to remember that. This is a first person story, told through Ellie’s journals (though it doesn’t feel overwhelmingly like an epistolary novel) and we are close, so very close, to Ellie as narrator. It’s possible she’s unreliable. What’s more likely, at least to me, is that Ellie just doesn’t know what’s going on. She can’t trust her own experiences, so we as readers can’t either. This is a short, intense read that should resonate with a lot of teens, many of whom will see themselves in Ellie.

Put a Moon on It: The Moon on YA Book Covers

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Every year, we try to write about horror or scary books throughout October. While there are more posts planned, I thought I’d take the Halloween/October spirit of things into a little bit of a different direction. 

Let’s talk about the moon. More specifically, let’s talk about the moon as it appears on YA book covers. It’s interesting that the moon is a trend-y sort of image in cover design. I didn’t think it was until I started to look through YA books published by year. We’re in a moon upswing, after a handful of years where we didn’t see it on covers as much as we currently — and soon will — see it. When we did see it as a cover trend a few years back, it was a pretty solid indicator of a werewolf story. Now? Not so much. 

All of the books on this list feature a moon on the cover, even though not all of these books fall into the horror/scary/thriller categories. I think this could make for a fun display because the visual of it is great. I’ve noted places where the book is part of a series. 

Descriptions come from Goodreads, unless otherwise noted. If you can think of other YA books with moons on the cover, feel free to let me know in the comments. I stuck to covers where it was obvious the image was a moon, rather than something that could be the moon. 

Bright Before Sunrise by Tiffany Schmidt: Jonah and Brighton are about to have the most awkwardly awful night of their lives. For Jonah, every aspect of his new life reminds him of what he has had to give up. All he wants is to be left alone. Brighton is popular, pretty, and always there to help anyone, but has no idea of what she wants for herself.

Earth & Sky by Megan Crewe (October 28, first in a series): Seventeen-year-old Skylar has been haunted for as long as she can remember by fleeting yet powerful sensations that something is horribly wrong. But despite the panic attacks tormenting her, nothing ever happens, and Sky’s beginning to think she’s crazy. Then she meets a mysterious, otherworldly boy named Win and discovers the shocking truth her premonitions have tapped into: our world no longer belongs to us. For thousands of years, Earth has been at the mercy of alien scientists who care nothing for its inhabitants and are using us as the unwitting subjects of their time-manipulating experiments. Win belongs to a rebel faction seeking to put a stop to it, and he needs Skylar’s help–but with each shift in the past, the very fabric of reality is unraveling, and soon there may be no Earth left to save. (Description via Goodreads). 

The Dead & The Gone by Susan Beth Pfeffer (series, with ALL covers featuring a big old moon on them): After a meteor hits the moon and sets off a series of horrific climate changes, seventeen-year-old Alex Morales must take care of his sisters alone in the chaos of New York City.

My Best Everything by Sarah Tomp (March 2015): Luisa “Lulu” Mendez has just finished her final year of high school in a small Virginia town, determined to move on and leave her job at the local junkyard behind. So when her father loses her college tuition money, Lulu needs a new ticket out. Desperate for funds, she cooks up the (definitely illegal) plan to make and sell moonshine with her friends, Roni and Bucky. Quickly realizing they’re out of their depth, Lulu turns to Mason: a local boy who’s always seemed like a dead end. As Mason guides Lulu through the secret world of moonshine, it looks like her plan might actually work. But can she leave town before she loses everything – including her heart? (Description via Goodreads).

Starbreak by Phoebe North (second in series): After five hundred years, the Earth ship seventeen-year-old Terra and her companions were born and raised on arrives at Zehava, a dangerous, populated world where Terra must take the lead in establishing a new colony.

The Monstrumologist by Rick Yancey (first in series): In 1888, twelve-year-old Will Henry chronicles his apprenticeship with Dr. Warthrop, a New Escientist who hunts and studies real-life monsters, as they discover and attempt to destroy a pod of Anthropophagi.

A Creature of Moonlight by Rebecca Hahn: Marni, a young flower seller who has been living in exile, must choose between claiming her birthright as princess of a realm whose king wants her dead, and a life with the father she has never known–a wild dragon.

Bright Coin Moon by Kirsten Lopresti (November 18): Lindsey Allen, seventeen, aspires to be an astronomer but her eccentric mother decides they must move to Los Angeles to become psychics to the stars, and soon Lindsey must either betray her mother or her new mentor.

Dove Arising by Karen Bao (February 24, 2015): On a lunar colony, fifteen-year-old Phaet Theta does the unthinkable and joins the Militia when her mother is imprisoned by the Moon’s oppressive government. 

Defy The Dark edited by Saundra Mitchell: Seventeen original stories that take place in the absence of light.

Girl On A Wire by Gwenda Bond: A ballerina, twirling on a wire high above the crowd. Horses, prancing like salsa dancers. Trapeze artists, flying like somersaulting falcons. And magic crackling through the air. Welcome to the Cirque American! Sixteen-year-old Jules Maroni’s dream is to follow in her father’s footsteps as a high-wire walker. When her family is offered a prestigious role in the new Cirque American, it seems that Jules and the Amazing Maronis will finally get the spotlight they deserve. But the presence of the Flying Garcias may derail her plans. For decades, the two rival families have avoided each other as sworn enemies. Jules ignores the drama and focuses on the wire, skyrocketing to fame as the girl in a red tutu who dances across the wire at death-defying heights. But when she discovers a peacock feather—an infamous object of bad luck—planted on her costume, Jules nearly loses her footing. She has no choice but to seek help from the unlikeliest of people: Remy Garcia, son of the Garcia clan matriarch and the best trapeze artist in the Cirque. As more mysterious talismans believed to possess unlucky magic appear, Jules and Remy unite to find the culprit. And if they don’t figure out what’s going on soon, Jules may be the first Maroni to do the unthinkable: fall. (Description via Goodreads)

The Mad Scientist’s Daughter by Cassandra Rose Clarke Finn looks and acts human, though he has no desire to be. He was programmed to assist his owners, and performs his duties to perfection. A billion-dollar construct, his primary task now is to tutor Cat. As she grows into a beautiful young woman, Finn is her guardian, her constant companion– and more. But when the government grants rights to the ever-increasing robot population, however, Finn struggles to find his place in the world.

Fateful by Claudia Gray: When seventeen-year-old Tess Davies, a ladies’ maid, meets handsome Alec Marlow aboard the RMS Titanic, she quickly becomes entangled in the dark secrets of his past, but her growing love puts her in mortal peril even before fate steps in.

Nocturne by Christine Johnson (second in series): After the tragic events of the summer, Claire wants to worry about nothing but finding the perfect dress for the Autumn Ball, but her worst nightmares come true when someone learns that she is a werewolf, placing everyone she knows at risk.

Wolfsbane by Andrea Cremer (second in series): Alpha wolf Calla Tor forges an alliance with her masters’ enemies and tries to rescue her pack from imprisonment in Vail.

 
A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness: Thirteen-year-old Conor awakens one night to find a monster outside his bedroom window, but not the one from the recurring nightmare that began when his mother became ill–an ancient, wild creature that wants him to face truth and loss.
Mechanica by Betsy Cornwell (August 4, 2015): Nicolette’s awful stepsisters call her “Mechanica” to demean her, but the nickname fits: she learned to be an inventor at her mother’s knee. Her mom is gone now, though, and the Steps have pushed her into a life of dreary servitude. When she discovers a secret workshop in the cellar on her sixteenth birthday—and befriends Jules, a tiny magical metal horse—Nicolette starts to imagine a new life for herself. And the timing may be perfect: There’s a technological exposition and a royal ball on the horizon. Determined to invent her own happily-ever-after, Mechanica seeks to wow the prince and eager entrepreneurs alike. (Description via Goodreads). 
Liar’s Moon by Elizabeth C. Bunce (second in series): In a quest to prove her friend, Lord Durrel Decath, innocent of the murder of his wife, pickpocket Digger stumbles into a conspiracy with far-reaching consequences for the civil war raging in Lllyvraneth, while also finding herself falling in love.

Moonglass by Jessi Kirby: At age seven, Anna watched her mother walk into the surf and drown, but nine years later, when she moves with her father to the beach where her parents fell in love, she joins the cross-country team, makes new friends, and faces her guilt.

Written in the Stars by Aisha Saeed (March 24, 2015): Naila’s vacation to visit relatives in Pakistan turns into a nightmare when she discovers her parents want to force her to marry a man she’s never met. 

Plagues & Epidemics

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I’ve noticed a lot of plagues and epidemics in YA fiction lately. It used to be that a plague was a good way to explain a decimated world in a YA post-apocalyptic story, but more frequently now I’m seeing stories that tackle the plague during its rise and dominance rather than its lingering after-effects. This includes some historical fiction about the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, which can evoke the same sort of mood as post-apocalyptic tales set in a fictional future. To many who lived through it, the 1918 flu may have felt like the end of the world.

Below are a few titles published within the last few years that feature plagues or epidemics prominently. I tried to focus on stories where the plague is the plot rather than simply exposition. Are there any that I’ve missed?

The Way We Fall by Megan Crewe
Sixteen-year-old old Kaelyn challenges her fears, finds a second chance
at love, and fights to keep her family and friends safe as a deadly new
virus devastates her island community. | Sequels: The Lives We Lost, The Worlds We Make

Masque of the Red Death by Bethany Griffin
In this twist on Edgar Allen Poe’s gothic short story, a wealthy
teenaged girl who can afford a special mask to protect her from the
plague that decimated humanity in the mid-1800s, falls in love, becomes
caught up in a conspiracy to overthrow an oppressive government, and
faces the threat of a new plague. | Sequel: Dance of the Red Death

Conversion by Katherine Howe
When girls start experiencing strange tics and other mysterious symptoms
at Colleen’s high school, her small town of Danvers, Massachusetts,
falls victim to rumors that lead to full-blown panic, and only Colleen
connects their fate to the ill-fated Salem Village, where another group
of girls suffered from a similarly bizarre epidemic three centuries ago. | Kimberly’s review

Love is the Drug by Alaya Dawn Johnson
A chance meeting with Roosevelt David, a
homeland security agent, at a party for Washington DC’s elite leads to
Emily Bird waking up in a hospital, days later, with no memory of the end of
the night. Meanwhile, the world has fallen apart: A deadly flu
virus is sweeping the nation, forcing quarantines, curfews, even martial
law. And Roosevelt is certain that Bird knows something. Something
about the virus–something about her parents’ top secret scientific
work–something she shouldn’t know.

A Matter of Days by Amber Kizer

In the not-too-distant future when a global pandemic kills most of
humanity, a teenaged girl and her younger brother struggle to survive. | Kimberly’s review

A Death-Struck Year by Makiia Lucier
When the Spanish influenza epidemic reaches Portland, Oregon, in 1918,
seventeen-year-old Cleo leaves behind the comfort of her boarding school
to work for the Red Cross.

Pandemic by Yvonne Ventresca
Lil is left home alone when a deadly pandemic hits her small town in New
Jersey. Will Lil survive the flu and brave her darkest fears?

In the Shadow of Blackbirds by Cat Winters
In San Diego in 1918, as deadly influenza and World War I take their
toll, sixteen-year-old Mary Shelley Black watches desperate mourners
flock to séances and spirit photographers for comfort and, despite her
scientific leanings, must consider if ghosts are real when her first
love, killed in battle, returns. | Kimberly’s review

The Program by Suzanne Young
When suicide becomes a worldwide epidemic, the only known cure is The
Program, a treatment in which painful memories are erased, a fate worse
than death to seventeen-year-old Sloane who knows that The Program will
steal memories of her dead brother and boyfriend. | Sequel: The Treatment | Dual review