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Mini-trend: Circuses

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I’ve noticed that circuses have become a bit of a thing in YA fiction lately (two of the seven Cybils finalists feature a circus). While I was never one of those kids who dreamed about running away to the circus, I get the appeal for characters (and readers) who feel like they’ve never quite fit in the “normal” world. Perhaps the circus, traditionally seem as a place that showcases outcasts, would provide a more welcoming home.

It’s possible that the Night Circus is the forerunner to this trend, though I didn’t include it here on this list. Darren Shan’s Cirque du Freak may also be a predecessor. All descriptions are from Worldcat. What other recent or upcoming YA titles feature circuses heavily?

Conjured by Sarah Beth Durst
Haunted by disturbing dreams and terrifying visions, a teenaged girl in a
paranormal witness protection program must remember her past and why
she has strange abilities before a magic-wielding serial killer hunts
her down. [This description is no good for this post, so I’ll elaborate: the terrifying visions are of a circus.]

Pantomime by Laura Lam (plus its sequel, Shadowplay)
Gene, the daughter of a noble family, runs away from the decadence of
court to R.H. Ragona’s circus of magic, where she meets runaway Micah,
whose blood could unlock the mysteries of the world of Ellada. [This description is terrible in general. I’ll talk more about this book in a week or so.]

That Time I Joined the Circus by J. J. Howard
After her father’s sudden death and a break-up with her best friends,
seventeen-year-old Lexi has no choice but to leave New York City seeking
her long-absent mother, rumored to be in Florida with a traveling
circus, where she just may discover her destiny.

Fever by Lauren DeStefano
In a future where genetic engineering has cured humanity of all diseases
and defects but has also produced a virus that kills all females by age
twenty and all males by the age twenty-five, teenaged Rhine escapes her
forced marriage and journeys back to New York to find her twin brother. [Another description that’s not particularly useful for this post. On her journey, Rhine is captured by the head of a sinister circus/carnival.]

 
Wonder Show by Hannah Barnaby
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, step inside Mosco’s Traveling
Wonder Show, a menagerie of human curiosities and misfits guaranteed to
astound and amaze! But perhaps the strangest act of Mosco’s display is
Portia Remini, a normal among the freaks, on the run from McGreavy’s
Home for Wayward Girls, where Mister watches and waits. He said he would
always find Portia, that she could never leave. Free at last,
Portia begins a new life on the bally, seeking answers about her
father’s disappearance. Will she find him before Mister finds her? It’s a
story for the ages, and like everyone who enters the Wonder Show,
Portia will never be the same.

Tiger’s Curse by Colleen Houck
Seventeen-year-old Oregon teenager Kelsey forms a bond with a circus
tiger who is actually one of two brothers, Indian princes Ren and
Kishan, who were cursed to live as tigers for eternity, and she travels
with him to India where the tiger’s curse may be broken once and for
all.

Middle grade is also experiencing the trend: 

 
Circus Galacticus by Deva Fagan

Trix’s life in boarding school as an orphan charity case has been
hard, but when an alluring young Ringmaster invites her, a gymnast, to
join Circus Galacticus she gainss an entire universe of deadly enemies
and potential friends, along with a chance to unravel secrets of her own
past.
The Boundless by Kenneth Oppel
Aboard “The Boundless,” the greatest train ever built, on its maiden
voyage across Canada, teenaged Will enlists the aid of a traveling
circus to save the train from villains.
 

The Boy Who Swam With Piranhas by David Almond
Stanley Potts’s uncle Ernie has developed an over-the-top fascination
with canning fish in the house, and life at 69 Fish Quay Lane has turned
balmy. But there’s darkness in the madness, and when Uncle Ernie’s
obsession takes an unexpectedly cruel turn, Stan has no choice but to
leave. As he journeys away from the life he’s always known, he mingles
with a carnival full of eccentric characters and meets the
legendary Pancho Pirelli, the man who swims in a tank full of perilous
piranhas. Will Stan be bold enough to dive in the churning waters
himself and choose his own destiny?
 
Chained by Lynne Kelly
To work off a family debt, ten-year-old Hastin leaves his desert village
in India to work as a circus elephant keeper but many challenges await
him, including trying to keep Nandita, a sweet elephant, safe from the
cruel circus owner.

Religion & Religious Memoirs: Reviews From the OBCB List

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Since the Outstanding Books for the College Bound (OBCB) list is finally live and active, I’m really excited to talk about the books I read this last year and loved. I couldn’t intentionally blog about them last year — though certainly because the scope of our charge was so large, it was impossible to know which titles I had blogged about would show up as potential considerations — so now that I can, I’m hoping it’ll encourage readers to pick up something completely new or consider recommending titles to other readers that may not have otherwise crossed your radar.

I served on two subcommittees of OBCB, reading those titles which fell under the category of Arts and Humanities and those which fell under the Social Science category. I nominated and read and talked about titles in other categories, but the almost fifty titles in my subcommittee lists are all ones I did get a chance to read (with one or two exceptions).

Rather than go down the list and talk about the titles in that order, I thought it would be more worthwhile to talk about them as they relate to different themes. Since I talked a little bit about how much I loved Aaron Hartzler’s Rapture Practice yesterday, it seemed fitting to dive in on the titles which explored religion or spirituality.

As someone who isn’t particularly religious, I won’t lie and say these were the books I was most looking forward to reading or talking about. But I think what makes these books so good and worth talking about is that they all captured my interest despite my own feelings and experiences with religion. There were four books that could really be categorized as “religious” from the Arts and Humanities list, and each one tackles something very different and those very different takes make them really worth reading, discussing, and passing along to other readers.

World Religions: The Great Faiths Explored & Explained by John Bowker

This is a DK book, which if you’re not familiar with, is a publisher that puts together these huge tomes on different topics and explores them in great detail. They tend to be very visually-driven, to the point where I can find them troubling to read because there is so much to wade through.

But it’s that abundance of information which makes Bowker’s exploration of world religions here great. This isn’t a cover-to-cover read. It’s a reference text, and it’s a bigger book, which makes the browsing factor of this more obvious.

This is an incredibly comprehensive overview of religions that are familiar and those which may be less familiar to readers. There are Western religions and Eastern religions, and what makes this book such a great tool is that it’s presented in the most objective manner possible. Bowker doesn’t have an agenda; instead, he’s offering the who, what, where, when, and why of each of the religious practices, and the book itself then highlights the visual artifacts, symbols, and more that give readers even deeper insight into the various practices.

Rapture Practice by Aaron Hartzler

Harzler’s memoir was, hands-down, one of my favorite reads in 2013. In fact, as soon as I finished reading it, I was tempted to write a length post about how much I loved it. But instead, I nominated it for committee consideration.

This is a story about Hartzler growing up in a very Evangelical household as he tries to come to terms with his own religious beliefs, as well as his own sexuality. But the second part of that is not out-and-out the focus of the book. This isn’t Hartzler’s coming out story, and I think knowing that is vital. This is instead his memoir about learning who he is when he’s living in an environment that doesn’t always encourage that sort of exploration. He knows early on he doesn’t have the same affinity toward religious practice and devotion that his parents do, but it’s not something he can be as open and honest about as he would like to be.

But what takes this story from being good to great is that Hartzler is incredibly respectful of everyone in the story. While he thinks a lot of what his parents believe — that the Rapture could happen any minute and they thus need to be prepared — he is conscious of why it is they believe that and he’s okay with it. And a lot of why he is that way is because he hopes that kind of respect can be extended toward him.

Rapture Practice isn’t a condemnation of belief or Evangelical practice. It’s a story about coming to terms with what it is you believe when you don’t necessarily believe in what you’ve grown up with. There is humor as much as heart in this one, and it has great teen appeal. This is a rare memoir written for and about being a teenager.

The Butterfly Mosque by G. Willow Wilson

Wilson’s memoir was published for adults, but it has great teen appeal. Perhaps maybe more than having appeal for teens, this is the kind of book that college students and those who are just out of college will find tremendously interesting because it explores those post-college years in a way that a lot of other books simply don’t.

When Wilson took a course in Islamic Studies in college, she thought she found her path. She wasn’t Islamic, but it was a culture that fascinated her, and when she finished college, she decided to move to Egypt and find work. It was meant to be a way to shock herself with a new and different culture, but what it ended up doing was convincing her that converting to Islam was the right path for her.

The book follows as she rectifies the knowledge, experience, assumptions, and privileges she’s had her whole life as a westerner as she enters into the middle eastern world. She’s very insightful and perceptive, but this never comes off as preachy and it never once comes off as a story about how one culture or experience is better or more right than another. A lot of that comes through when Wilson falls in love with an Egyptian who grew up Islamic — she has to face the prejudices that his family may have and does have about his wanting to marry someone who converted. Could there be bridges built between their very different worlds?

The Butterfly Mosque also offers some interesting views of what it’s like to be a woman in a country where being a woman doesn’t allow as many rights as it does in the western world, as well as what it’s like to be an Islamic woman in this new world. It’s about being a foreigner but wanting to be involved in a new culture without exploiting or using that culture as a means of understanding herself. There are so many wonderful little lines in this book about life and about experiences, but I think the thing that stood out to me the most was that Wilson never comes off as privileged nor does she preach at readers suggesting that the only way to ever live is to have these foreign experiences. Instead, much of her point is that self-reflection is key to finding peace with yourself and beliefs and that self-reflection is precisely what makes you smart, strong, and gives you confidence to face new and challenging things, whatever those things in front of you may be.

There is definitely romance here, and I think for many teen readers, that will be a really great hook to the bigger story. I love, too, that OBCB has both Wilson’s memoir, as well as her more well-known novel Alif the Unseen, because it really showcases who she is and what it is she’s doing with her career. And she’s really young, too, which should inspire readers in its own right.

The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner’s Semester at America’s Holiest University by Kevin Roose

I read this book back in 2009, and I actually reviewed it here at STACKED back then, too, so I won’t rehash my thoughts on it. One of my hesitations about the book back then was that I had some questions about the authenticity of Roose’s experience, as his mentor was A. J. Jacobs and it reminded me a lot of those “do one weird thing for a year for a book deal” situations.

But I didn’t let that color my beliefs on the value of having this book on the list because I think that Roose talks about and learns, as well as the respect he comes to develop for students at Liberty University, were important and interesting enough to merit a place. Roose’s story replaced Jacobs’s A Year of Living Biblically, which was on the 2009 iteration of OBCB, and I think that the replacement was a good one. Not because Jacobs’s story is no longer relevant — it definitely it is — but because it offers another story, another voice, and another angle on religion and religious practice.

What I find to be interesting in looking at the books on the list in this way, rather than in their big, overarching category of “Arts and Humanities,” is that I can see what the biggest theme is uniting all four of these books, and it’s a simple one: respect. Each of these books explores religion, both eastern and western practices, in very respectful ways. They’re never exploited, and they’re never meant to be studies. The three memoirs specifically are experiential, with great reflection offered by the authors. And I think that those sorts of stories are not only relatable to teen (and adult!) readers, but they give a look into a world through a set of eyes that may or may not go in with an agenda but that come out more educated, more respectful, and perhaps more humble.

Hardcover to Paperback: Six YA Redesigns to Consider

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Cover redesigns are maybe my favorite thing to think about. Obviously, I like to blog about them since I think I do one of these about once a month. Let’s call today’s installment cover redesigns with a bit of a twist. The twist is two out of the five not only got a cover makeover, but they also got title makeovers in the process as well. Some of these are great makeovers and some are maybe not as great as the original.

Melissa Marr’s Carnival of Souls got a new look in paperback in September, along with a new title. Rather than being Carnival of Souls, it’s now Untamed City: Carnival of Secrets. You may or may not remember, but this is a book that had a lawsuit brought upon it by someone who claimed to have trademarked the title Carnival of Souls. So it’s not really a surprise that the paperback got a new title all together to avoid the mess (if you haven’t read the story linked above, I suggest you do because it’s a doozy).

In terms of the cover change itself, I didn’t have an issue with the original, though it’s not necessarily original or memorable. The paperback on the right, I think, is an improvement, though it certainly changes the entire feel of the book itself. In many ways, the redesign reminds me of the cover for Amy Garvey’s Cold Kiss. I like how the cover does feel a little bit cold, which fits with the book’s title and “secrets,” if you will. In many ways, the paperback redesign also feels a little bit older to me, and it might have appeal to more adult readers than the hardcover design.

Abigail Haas, who you may know better as Abby McDonald, will see her psychological thriller Dangerous Girls get a new look in paperback this summer. I’m reading this book right now (which I’ll talk about in a post later this week) and part of what attracted me to the book in the first place was the really standout hardcover image. It’s so different. I love the use of sand, as it not only gives a sense of the story’s setting — it’s on a tropical island — but there’s also something mysterious, intriguing, and maybe more than anything, there’s something unsettling about the impermanence of the sand letters and handcuff. This is a story which looks as trust and mistrust, and I feel like the hardcover does a good job portraying that.

The paperback, which will be available May 6, gives a very different image on the cover and yet still somehow captures the feel of the story well. In many ways, it’s more telling of what happens in the story (there is a dead girl) though I’m not sure it’s different enough to stand out on shelves in the same way that the hardcover is. Is that a bad thing? Maybe or maybe not. Readers who like thrillers will easily see that in this cover, and maybe even more noteworthy, readers who like female-driven thrillers in adult fiction, like Megan Abbott or Gillian Flynn, may be tempted to pick this up because it’s reminiscent of their covers. I love the font for the title a lot: it’s fun in a way that is almost uncomfortable in context of the story and words themselves.

Rapture Practice by Aaron Hartzler was one of my favorite reads last year, and I’m really excited to talk about it a little more now that the Outstanding Books list is out and this book is on it (that’s a spoiler for a future post). The cover on the left is the hardcover. It’s not a bad cover, but I don’t think it’s the kind of cover that has people clamoring to pick it up by looks alone. It’s pretty basic, and it doesn’t give a whole lot of insight into what the story is about. You know the title — which, while a great title, also doesn’t tell you much — and the tagline, “My one-way ticket to salvation” suggests this is a book about a person coming to terms with their faith.

That paperback though.

That paperback.

This redesign might be one of my all-time favorite redesigns because it nails the book perfectly, and not only does it nail the book, but it has massive reader appeal to it. Readers see this and they want to know the story. The boy on the cover just did something bad by cutting his tie. And his tie has a cross on it, so you know this is something serious. The tag line for the paperback changed quite a bit, too, and for the better. Rather than claiming this is a story about the author’s salvation, it’s instead “A true story about growing up gay in an evangelical family.” That absolutely nails the story, and not only does it nail the story, it does so in a way that’s really appealing and allows readers to know exactly what they’re getting into. Perhaps they relate! Perhaps they’re just curious! It’s much more enticing and engaging than the prior one.

Also added on the paperback is a blurb from Maria Semple. What’s interesting is her book, Where’d You Go Bernadette? is adult fiction, but it earned an Alex Award. So there’s a less-than-subtle attraction to this YA memoir for adult readers, too. The image and tag line are completely teen friendly but that blurb invites older readers into the story too.

Rapture Practice will be available in paperback on June 10, and I think even though I bought a copy of the hardcover for my library’s collection already, I’ll also be picking up a paperback because it’ll bring the story to even more readers.

Here’s the second of the six books in this roundup of cover makeovers that not only got a new look in paperback, but it also got a new title. Boy Nobody by Allen Zadoff came out last summer, and the cover is on the left. Again, not a bad cover at all. The tagline doesn’t tell us a whole lot about the story, but the image on the cover itself does a good job explaining what the story is about. It’s action adventure and this has definite appeal to male readers (though I don’t think in any way it is a cover that would turn off female readers).

The paperback, which will be available May 13, has a new title: I Am The Weapon. I think I like the new title, as it does a much better job telling readers what the story is, and as can be seen on the cover, there’s no longer a tagline. Perhaps this is because the title is explanatory enough without further elaboration. The image on the cover changed, but it’s not so drastic a change that the feel of the cover or story is different. Rather than being black, it’s got a blue hue to it, and the character who is running is much more in the forefront than on the hardcover. There is a blurb from the Publisher’s Weekly review on the paperback, and while I don’t tend to love blurbs on covers, I feel like it works really well here. That it highlights the story is hard-edged and entertaining should sell the story to the exact right readership. This paperback also tells readers this is the first in a series, “The Unknown Assassin,” which itself is printed on the cover.

The sequel to the book also got a bit of a title change, too, and it’ll fit with the new one for this book: I Am The Mission.

Would you ever guess by the title, tag line, or image that the hardcover on the left was not a dystopia but instead a psychological thriller about a cult? Because I wouldn’t, and that’s why when I was given a copy of Amy Christine Parker’s Gated, it fell and fell and fell to the bottom of my pile of reading. I love cult stories, but I am not huge on dystopia. And the cover didn’t compel me in the least either. Simply stated: it blends in. It’s boring. I think the tagline doesn’t do it any favors either: “She thought the evil lived outside the walls. She was wrong.” It’s generic.

But the paperback. I love the paperback. It has an entirely fresh feel to it and it feels like a psychological thriller, rather than blending into the sea of dystopians. I love that it’s a font-driven design, and yet, I also love the girl who is on the cover. She’s in a dress, but it’s not a fancy one. It looks pretty generic, like the kind of thing a girl in a cult might be forced to wear. I love how the blue font plays against the orange-hued wheat field the girl is standing in, and I also think that the blurb use on the cover is a huge enhancement. You know immediately it’s a psychological thriller.

We’ve seen a million covers with girls who have hair blowing in their faces, but it works here so well. You know there’s something more going on here. That it’s purposeful. This cover also seems to have a lot of crossover appeal to it, and again, like the Haas cover, I think that it is being done in a smart way. I’m much more tempted to pick this book up now than I was with the original cover. And since I don’t think I bought this one for my collection when it was out in hardcover, I’m eager to get this series going at the library with the new look.

Gated will be available in paperback on May 27.

I don’t even know what to say about this cover redesign, so I’ll keep it pretty simple: why? Why did they insist on putting a girl doing duck face into the background of the paperback edition of Mindy Raf’s Symptoms of My Insanity? It is not only scary but it also almost undermines the title, as well as what the book itself seems to want to be tackling. I’m positive there’s some humor in this story, and perhaps that was the thinking behind it, but no. No. This was a real huge step back and makes little sense. I like the addition of the tag line, the removal of the oddly-darker-than-the-rest smiley face, but that girl. It kills the paperback cover for me.

I really wish the US edition of this book had gone with this look because I feel like it captures the feel of the story so much better without being a little … horrifying.

What do you think? Which cover and title redesigns nailed it and which ones fall flat?

Links of Note: February 8, 2014

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I’ve been really good about photo documenting my displays in the teen area since starting this job in 2012. It’s helpful to me in not only thinking about what I’m doing, but it gives me a quick visual in what I might not be doing, too. The display above came out of an idea I had been wanting to do but never approached management about — and then when it came up in management notes that adult services would be doing a blind date with a book display, I asked if I could in teen too. Voila! I love it. Not only is it a fun way to entice readers, but visually, it just looks really nice too. I wrote really short but enticing descriptions of the books and I’m eager to see how it plays out with readers.

On to this week’s links! There’s a little bit of everything, I think. And as usual, if there’s something good I missed over the last couple of weeks (especially because it took me a week to fully recover from ALA), let me know in the comments.

  • Outstanding Books for the College Bound‘s list is finally live! I am so wildly proud of this list and love that it offers such a variety of books. I’m going to talk more in depth about many of the titles, as well as how to use and promote the list, in the coming weeks. But go! Dig in! There are 124 titles, 25 in each category (except for in social science, where we couldn’t choose a final title and decided to only pick 24). 
  • Did you know this week was Dawn Schafer’s 40th birthday? I never thought book characters aged. This post over at Rather Be Reading about Dawn and her legacy with the Babysitter’s Club is fun. 
  • This isn’t a new post, but I found it while looking for book-inspired cookie cutters last weekend (if you don’t look around for really off-the-wall things once in a while, you’re probably lying). I’ve never quite understood or appreciated what a 3-D printer might be able to do, but when I saw that you could make cookie cutters on one, my perspective changed a little bit. Shakespeare cookie cutters! Made from a 3-D printer! This is really fun. 
  • Fan of figure skating? Jennifer Rummel wrote a nice roundup of YA books (and some movies) where ice skating plays a role in the story. Check it out. 
  • Adele is blogging again at Persnickety Snark! I used to read her blog when she updated it regularly, and so her coming back is super exciting. I’m not a huge podcast listener — I used to be able to listen to “Welcome to Night Vale” when it was warm enough to go for walks outside — but I dig Adele’s roundup of what she’s listening to. Maybe I’ll have to give them another shot. 
  • So you probably know Judy Blume’s covers are getting new looks. But did you know that they’re being updated for middle grade readers, as well as young adult readers? Some books will get redesigns for one or the other and some will get dual redesigns. It’s interesting (and a little confusing). Here’s the scoop with the middle grade cover images. I’ll be honest and say I’m not in love with the YA redesigns. The tag lines are pretty bad, especially.  

Elsewhere for me:

  • I put together a timeline to black history in YA fiction over at Book Riot this week, and I think it might be one of my favorite — and most eye-opening — pieces I’ve done. Historical fiction is an area I’m fairly weak in, despite liking quite a bit of it, and I found my knowledge of black historical fiction to be even more lacking. But as it turns out, it’s not necessarily my own lacking. It’s just a genre REALLY lacking in YA fiction. I built a solid list, but thanks to the help of a bunch of awesome librarians, I was able to draw together some more. What’s disturbing, though, is how the books fall in history. There’s a lot in some areas and virtually nothing in others. WHERE are the books about teens living and making art during the Harlem Renaissance? What about the 80s and the era and birth of hip hop? We need more variety in black historical fiction. While we have some and it covers important ground, this needs to get better. Also bothersome is how little of this is recent. 
  • I’m presenting with three other teen librarians next month at the Public Library Association’s conference, and we’re seeking input on what we should talk about. We want to make this the kind of presentation that’s useful to attendees who have questions and want answers, so we’re soliciting questions people might have about teen programming. Have one? We’d love to know. 
  • Earlier this week on my post about YA urban fiction, and we had a reader comment asking about urban fiction for YA readers featuring LGBTQ characters. So I pulled together a quick list at Tumblr — feel free to add more to this, if you know of others. 

What I’m Reading Now

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Dangerous Women edited by George R. R. Martin & Martin Dozois
I’m reading adult fiction! And short stories to boot! I’m pretty sure Martin’s “novella” in this collection is longer than a lot of the YA books I read, though. I’ve read the first story (Some Desperado by Joe Abercrombie) and thought it was OK, but not fantastic. It demonstrates why I usually don’t read short stories: there’s not enough time to develop an interesting plot with a satisfying conclusion, much less any character growth. This first story felt more like a chapter from a longer book than a full story in and of itself. It is one of the shortest in the collection, though, so I’m interested to see how I fare with the others.

The Shadow Throne by Jennifer A. Nielsen
This is the conclusion to the trilogy that began with The False Prince and continued with The Runaway King, all solid upper middle grade/lower YA fantasy. This final volume finds Jaron finally facing the war that’s been threatening. One of the best things about this series is Jaron’s voice, which can be simultaneously funny and painful.

Butterfly Summer by Anne-Marie Conway
My sister-in-law, who teaches tweens in London, gave me this book as a Christmas gift. She told me it’s been popular with the kids in her class, and I can see why. It’s middle grade that’s pitch perfect for its marketed age group (8-12). It also reminds me a lot of books I enjoyed around that age. It’s fairly short, mostly realistic, with a few family secrets and very slight mystical elements. It’s a little bit fantasy, a little bit mystery, and a good bit coming-of-age. The plot hinges on a secret that’s pretty obvious to spot as an adult reader, but I’ve a feeling that a ten-year-old reader would figure it out at just the moment the author intended – perhaps just before the young protagonist does – and then delight in turning back the pages to spot the clues that she knows the author dropped.

Cinderella vol. 1: From Fabletown With Love by Chris Roberson & Shawn McManus
This is a spinoff of Bill Willingham’s very popular Fables comic book series. I thought it was pretty well-done. Cinderella as a secret agent for the Fables is a clever idea, and I liked how Roberson and McManus re-worked the traditional Cinderella story into a James Bond-esque tale.

Speaking From Among the Bones by Alan Bradley
I really enjoy this series about precocious pre-teen and amateur sleuth Flavia de Luce. I’ve previously read all the books in print and am giving this one a try on audio, after hearing great things about the narration from multiple people. I have to admit I’m having a harder time with this volume. It could be that the mystery simply isn’t as engaging as the previous books, but I’ve a feeling it’s more to do with the voicing. Jayne Entwhistle’s narration is full of inflection – a bit overfull, actually. I find myself following the ups and downs of her voice rather than the meaning behind her words, and my attention wanders. I seem to be the only one who isn’t entranced, though.