For your viewing pleasure:

I know many of you have seen this, but it makes me giggle each time I see it. I think it is a goofy fantastic example of censorship.

Monster High by Lisi Harrison

I went into this book with my mind already made up. For two reasons. 1.) It's by Lisi Harrison, author of the Clique and Alpha series. She kind of only does one thing. 2.) I was aware there was a line of dolls from Mattel called Monsters High so this was clearly a tie-in, and I'm judgey like that.

Frankie Stein is soooo excited to be going to high school! She's only 15 days old, but she is all set with spending the days in her father's lab. She wants to get out into the world! The only problem is, she must hide her true identify, because people get freaked out by monsters and all. Luckily for her, her high school is where all the other teenage monsters go (in disguise, of course). Melody and her family have just moved to town. Melody yearns for someone to accept her for who she is, not for her surgically created beautiful exterior (she got a nose job at her family's promoting). Although she might be beautiful outside, on the inside she's still that bumpy-nosed girl. Both Frankie and Melody struggle for acceptance, with a good old dose of Lisi Harrison style makeup and brand dropping and stealing other people's boyfriends. With monsters.

Banned Books Week!

Happy Banned Books Week everyone (though it actually started yesterday)! In celebration of freedom of speech, intellectual freedom, and not letting the man keep you down; I'm going to try and find a little something for you each day that banned books week is going on. Support challenged books, they're the ones that once they get labeled you want to go and read anyways, and support allowing children the resources they need to understand the world around them.

"10 Banned Books you didn't expect" Who knew Brown Bear Brown Bear, What do You See? was supporting Marxism?

Here's a fun little video talking about banned books.

And in case you haven't seen it in a while, the top ten banned books of this year and of the decade.

Up From the Blue by Susan Henderson

Tillie Harris goes into labor six weeks early, in her new apartment in a new city where she doesn't know anyone. And her husband is away on business. The only person Tillie can think of to call is her father, who she hasn't spoken to in years. As Tillie is in the emergency room, she thinks back to when she was 8, and how that single year formed her relationship with her father.

The year she was 8 the family moved to Washington, D.C. and her mother completely fell apart. Tillie recalls the helplessness and frustration she felt, as she struggled to understand what was happening around her.

The Diary of Piper Davis: The Fences Between Us by Kirby Larson

I was all sorts of excited when I saw that Dear America was going to be publishing more fictional diaries of girls from different time periods in America. I loved the Dear America series. I had practically all of them. And a couple of the boy equivalents, My America, which I don't think was as popular.

Piper Davis is the daughter of a minister in Seattle, Washington during 1941. Her father's congregation is all from Japantown, and while Piper spends Sundays with those of Japanese descent, her close friends are her school friends, who are all white, as she is.

Piper's beloved brother, Hank, has just joined the navy and has been stationed in Hawaii. You can probably see where this is going. On December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor is attacked, and although Piper's brother is unharmed, America is now involved in WWII, and everything changes.

People begin to turn on the Japanese citizens, even those who were born in America. Piper is conflicted, she's worried about her brother and would do anything to protect him, but it doesn't seem right to mistreat the Japanese-American people. When all people of Japanese descent are deported to camps, Piper's father decides to follow his congregation, taking Piper with him.

News

Interesting article on the life of Roald Dahl. From The New York Times Magazine.

It's nice to see that Lane Smith's It's a Book is already doing well. From MiamiHerald.com.

Nikole Hasler, of the Mid-West Teen Sex Show podcast, now has a book, Sex: A Guide for Teens. Here's an interview with her. Nikole, it breaks my heart you don't do the podcast anymore. From Authors Unleashed.

What do people know about Diaspora? I've been following this since end of school last year, and I am intrigued, although not completely convinced it is the answer to all our Facebook woes. From School Library Journal.

Along with Sherman Alexi's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak is being challenged. In the same general area too. From Southeast Missourian and Laurie Halse Anderson's web site.

Plain Kate by Erin Bow

Kate is alone; her father has just passed away from the unknown disease that is tearing through the country and her known friends are slowly leaving her side as the allow fear to color their judgment. Kate has a gift with wood that seems magical to some, and makes other whisper witch. All Kate wants now is to survive, and to do so she makes a deal with the unknown. In exchange for her shadow, Kate receives her secret desire and the tools to survive. It is only later that she understands the repercussions of her actions and how it will impact those she is coming to care about.

So there's not a ton of stuff I want to say about this. It was good. It reminded me a lot of a Russian fairytale. Kind of dark and pleasing all at the same time. I wouldn't say that blew me away though. It was acceptable, or rather above average. Not super stupendous, but neither boring nor falling into stereotypical tropes. I don't know why I didn't love it. Possibly because I didn't really find the main character all that empathetic until the very end. Anyways, I liked it, didn't love it. Read it, but maybe borrow it from the library instead of buying it.