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On Becoming A Re-Reader

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I’ve never been a re-reader when it comes to books. Well, that’s a bit of a stretch. I’m generally not one to re-read. I like to think when I finish a book, I’ve read it and taken away the things I need to from it, and I can move on to the next books. 
I started this year’s reading a little differently though. There’s always a weird pressure to pick the ideal first book to start a year, as if it somehow sets the tone for how the rest of the year will go in books. I can’t be the only person who feels that way. But rather than succumb to the possibility of disappointment this year, I decided to crack open my all-time favorite book: Ann Patchett’s The Magician’s Assistant. 
Patchett’s book is one of the rare ones I’ve picked up and re-read over the course of my life, but it had been a good five or seven years since I last read it. For once, I didn’t worry about whether the magic of the book would be lost in the re-read. I let myself go at it with my whole heart, knowing that it’ll always been a book with a place in my heart. 
Back in the summer of 2006, my college roommate got married in her home state of Montana. My husband and I decided we’d drive out there from Iowa, then we’d go down to Austin, Texas, in order to look at the University of Texas, where I’d been thinking about going to library school. From the trip down the belly of the plain states, one of the things we decided we would do is stop in Alliance, Nebraska — half of the setting of Patchett’s work. Both of us were fans of the book, and we’d had the opportunity just months before that to go out to Los Angeles, together (my first trip on a plane!), where we’d both remarked about how that city will always be a “place” to us because of Patchett’s book. Alliance was not as exciting as Los Angeles, of course, but it was neat to be where the book had drawn inspiration.  
I curled up on the couch and read The Magician’s Assistant nearly cover-to-cover on New Years. I loved it, maybe even more than I had before. It was so interesting to think about the things I hadn’t considered in previous reads. The characters were much younger than I remembered them being, and part of that is simply that now I was of a different age myself and could compare my life experiences to their own. The language, the imagery, and the setting still hit me hard and reminded me why this book is so special to me. 
It was a good start to my reading year.
My re-reading didn’t begin and end there though. Just a couple of weeks later, after spending days with Leila at ALA talking about seminal YA titles, I couldn’t stop thinking about how I would feel re-reading Laurie Halse Anderson’s Speak. I read it when it came out — when I was 15 — but hadn’t picked it up again since. I ordered it and picked it up to re-read, and I think I loved it even more than when it opened my eyes as a teenager. I had forgotten how amazingly voice-driven it was, and it’s Melinda’s voice that stays with me and makes me think about how powerful it is to have a voice and how much power one can wield with it. This book not only absolutely holds up, it will continue to hold up forever. It makes me want to revisit Wintergirls because Anderson is a writer I trust and I suspect that re-reading that book would crush me as much as Speak did. 

But not all re-reads bring such delight. I recently picked up To Kill A Mockingbird to re-read and found myself….bored. Not only was I bored with the reading experience, I didn’t feel any sense of hope or enjoyment out of the experience. If anything, I walked away from Lee’s classic wondering why it was such a beloved, widely-read book. Was it because it’s an easy, mostly-palatable examination of racism? Is it because we really enjoy being able to see the world through the construction of innocence Lee builds (and it’s constructed — she’s telling the story as an adult looking back at her youth, which is a detail easy to miss but vital to, I think, the endurance of the story and its message). Finishing this book didn’t put me on the “excited” side for Go Set A Watchman. I’m happy I re-read this one and reconsidered my feelings for it, as I was able to not only see the flaws in the story, but I was able to look at my own intellectual growth and see what does and doesn’t work for me. Idealism and idolization aren’t aspects of fiction I find endearing or enduring in my life. At least at this point.

Earlier this summer, I talked about how I planned on spending these few warm months catching up with back list titles and slowing down a bit to savor some classics I’ve missed out on. So far, it’s been a rousing success. One of the things I’d mentioned was finally getting around to Harry Potter. I should be fair: I’ve read the first four books in the series. It was back during the summer the final book came out, and I read it because I was working with teenagers who told me I needed to. And because of the circumstances under which I read it — a hot dorm room with no a/c or kitchen after long days in a hot classroom helped teach those same teenagers about Shakespeare — I never got the spark from them that I’d hoped to find.

I picked up the first three books last month at the bookstore and cannot wait to re-read them with my mind open and ready to be excited by them. Technically, half of the series is a re-read; the other half is a first read.

I’m finding that re-reading is bringing me to texts in a much different way now. After reading so much more and simply living much more, it’s interesting to see what things I take away on a new read and which things I don’t. I’m definitely motivated to revisit more books now and see what does and doesn’t work for me now, as compared to the person I was when I initially read it. I was recently told to revisit, of all things, Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, a book I never found myself quite enjoying like I hoped to. I was told now that I know about how the publishing world works, I’d appreciate it on a whole other level, and that sort of recommendation makes me excited about a re-read in a way I never anticipated.

And that’s the power of books — they grow with you, and like any relationship in your life, sometimes growing means becoming tighter and sometimes it means choosing to come to an amicable split.

Tell me: do you re-read? What books have you found to be immeasurably better upon re-read? Which have you found yourself disappointed in? What makes the difference to you?

Third Quarter To-Read

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I love Kelly’s quarterly round-ups of YA books to look forward to over at Book Riot (in a totally unbiased way!). It’s an easy way to organize my to-read pile and is great for planning blog posts. Here are a few titles that I’m really looking forward to diving into this quarter.

Silver in the Blood by Jessica Day George
This is a new twist on the Dracula story from an author I like. Really gory or dark Dracula retellings are not my cup of tea, but George’s stuff is usually pretty light so I feel a Dracula story from her would be a good fit for me.

A History of Glitter and Blood by Hannah Moskowitz
I’ve heard a lot of good things about Moskowitz, but she hasn’t written a book with a plot that really hooked me enough to give her a try. This one, with its storyline full of fairies and other magical creatures, looks to be that book.

Con Academy by Joe Schreiber
Y’all may know how much I love books about heists, con artists, and the like. The synopsis for this book makes it seem a little like Holly Black’s Curse Workers series (without the magic) with a dash of E. Lockhart’s Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks.

Legacy of Kings by Eleanor Herman
This is historical fantasy about Alexander the Great as a teenager and a host of fictional characters. I really dig historical fantasy in the vein of Grave Mercy and Herman is well-known for her historical nonfiction for adults, so I have high hopes for the quality of this story.

The Shadow Behind the Stars by Rebecca Hahn
I read Hahn’s first novel, A Creature of Moonlight, for the Cybils last year and was impressed with the writing, though I thought the plot itself was a bit slight. Her next book, a spin on the Greek Fates, seems perfectly suited to her dreamy writing style.

The Hired Girl by Laura Amy Schlitz
This is historical fiction set in 1911 Pennsylvania that seems a little bit Hattie Big Sky with a smattering of A Northern Light. Funnily enough, I liked the concept of both of those books better than I liked their actual execution, but I have high hopes for Schlitz’s take on this time period.

Ash and Bramble by Sarah Prineas
It’s a retelling of Cinderella with magic and a girl in a pretty dress on the cover. Deep down (or maybe not so deep down), I am still that girl who just wants to have magical powers and wear a really pretty dress.

The Appearance of Annie van Sinderen by Katherine Howe
I really liked Howe’s first try at YA, Conversion, and I have high hopes for her second outing. While the historical aspect is missing here, it does seem to have that same thread of is-it-or-isn’t-it-magic throughout. (The synopsis for this would be a turnoff if the book were written by a man, but in Howe’s hands I have more trust in it.) Also, that cover design is pretty cool.

Sound by Alexandra Duncan
Salvage was one of my favorite books of 2014 and I’m super excited to read the companion novel, which focuses on Ava’s adopted sister Miyole. Thankfully, the cover for this book features a girl who looks alive.

What I’m Reading Now

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I’ve taken this month off of blogging to relax in my reading. I’ve spent a lot of time laying on my couch, zoning out and listening to old audiobook favorites. In fact, I’ve been doing a lot of re-reading in general, in audio and in print. While organizing my bookshelves at my new home, I couldn’t help but page through some of the books that now sit on what I call my “books that changed my life” shelf. (Every time I pass by a copy of The Book Thief, whether my own or at a bookstore, I have to pick it up and read the last few pages.)

Now that my house is in order (more or less) and things seem to have settled down a bit more in my personal life, though, I’m really excited to dive back into new stuff, especially children’s and YA. I’m especially excited because I’m transitioning into a new job within my organization, one that is allowing me to return to youth materials collection management. So my post for today is a nice, healthy mix of the old and the new.

For starters, I’ve been working my way through the Amelia Peabody series by Elizabeth Peters. I first read a few of these as a teenager, then made a concerted effort to listen to them all on audio while I was in library school in 2009. I decided to re-listen to them all again after being reminded how great Barbara Rosenblat is, and the decision has been a good one. I’m currently on book number 8, The Hippopotamus Pool, and the entire series has been great fun. It’s been so good to reconnect with characters I have such fond memories of from both my childhood and my early adulthood. I love looking forward to a character being introduced or a particular event happening, and I love knowing that everything will work itself out happily – mostly – in the end (though it may take a few books to get there, and some endings are more bitter than sweet). Each time I re-read these books, I pick up more on Amelia’s character (she’s actually not a great sleuth, nor is her husband, and she’s quite a bit snobbier than I initially realized, though I still love her). Re-reading favorites is a great pleasure.

I’m pretty picky about the middle grade books I read, but Louis Sachar’s books are usually a good bet (Holes remains one of the best books for children I’ve ever read). He’s also local, which makes me more inclined to to read his stuff. Inevitably, anything Sachar publishes will be compared to Holes, which is probably unfair. In reading his latest, Fuzzy Mud, which will hit shelves in August, I tried to also evaluate it independently. The book is recognizably Sachar – a bit wry, a bit dark, with a plot that seems kind of goofy but is also quite serious. Sachar’s kid characters are brave and scared at the same time, and he never writes down to his readers. The plotting doesn’t match the mastery of Holes and the humor isn’t as overt as the Wayside School books, but it’s quite a good story regardless, with a few uniquely creative touches that I really appreciated. I’ll review this one more in-depth closer to its publication date.

I don’t remember where I got the recommendation for Jude Deveraux’s A Knight in Shining Armor (possibly a list of must-read canonical romance novels somewhere). I don’t know that I’ve ever read any Deveraux before, and this one had a few strikes against it already: it was written in the 80s (I have an unreasonable prejudice for any media created in that decade), it doesn’t have a typical happily ever after, the audiobook is narrated by a man (so awkward during certain scenes), and the heroine’s name is Dougless. Thankfully, this last strike has an explanation within the novel, though it takes a while to get to it. Overall, I’m enjoying it. It’s a little campy, but in a fun way. Once I got past the setup describing how awful Dougless’ situation was with her terrible boyfriend (a bit too pathetic and something I probably would have skimmed in a print book) and the literal knight in shining armor showed up from the 17th century, things got a lot more interesting. Right now, Dougless and her knight are stumbling around in the 1980s as he tries to convince her he actually has traveled from the past. Later, I know they’ll travel back to the 17th century, and that should be extra fun. It feels kind of like Outlander lite – there’s a hunky man from the past, but a lot less violence and mortal peril.

July Debut YA Novels

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It’s time for another round-up of debut YA novels of the month.

Like always, this round-up includes debut novels, where “debut” is in its purest definition. These are first-time books by first-time authors. I’m not including books by authors who are using or have used a pseudonym in the past or those who have written in other categories (adult, middle grade, etc.) in the past.

All descriptions are from WorldCat, unless otherwise noted. If I’m missing any debuts out in July from traditional publishers, let me know in the comments. As always, not all noted titles included here are necessarily endorsements for those titles.

 

Pretending to be Erica by Michelle Painchaud: Violet has been preparing her entire life to step into the shoes of the missing heiress Erica Silverman, in order to pull off the biggest inside job in Las Vegas history. She doesn’t count on having a conscience.

You and Me and Him by Kris Dinnison: Maggie Bowers thinks she knows what to expect her junior year of high school, but when she and her out-of-the-closet best friend Nash have feelings for the same boy she wonders if winning someone’s heart means losing her soulmate.

Jillian Cade: Fake Paranormal Investigator by Jen Klein: A seventeen-year-old girl runs a fake paranormal detection agency, but when she takes a case involving a non-paranormal missing person, things start to get strange and her feelings for partner Sky Ramsey start to grow.

Damage Done by Amanda Panitch: Julia Vann has a new identity after being forced to leave town because of her twin brother’s terrible crime. Julia is the only survivor but she can’t remember what happened–at least, that’s what she tells the police. 

Ruthless by Carolyn Lee Adams: When Ruth is kidnapped, she’s determined not to become this serial-killer’s next trophy. After she’s able to escape, her captor begins stalking her through the wilderness.

Stone Rider by David Hofmeyr: A young man who seeks revenge and redemption from his past joins a brutal race to win a chance to escape his dying world. 

Forever For A Year by B. T. Gottfred: Two young teens fall in love for the first time, and discover it might not last forever. 

Recently at Book Riot

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Even though we’ve been on a vacation here at STACKED, I’ve been writing quite a bit over at Book Riot. We’ll be back to our regular programming here on Monday, but in the mean time, you can catch up with everything over there:

  • How we can — and why we should — combat fat phobia in YA books. I talk quite a bit here, too, about graphic novels for teens that are depicting fat characters in great ways.