Alice Cary

Children's & YAMiddle Grade

After school stories

Review by Alice Cary

“My mother is ruining my life,” notes fifth-grader Allie West.

Many kids come to that same conclusion, but Allie really can’t escape her mom, who is the principal of her elementary school. Allie is stuck at school all day, long after everyone else has headed home, which is why she’s such good friends with the kindly custodian.

Allie has several things on her mind, especially the fact that her best friend, Chloe, hasn’t spoken to her for months, ever since Allie mistakenly got her in big trouble—with the principal. Allie desperately wants to make things right and also hopes to be chosen for the school math team, of which Chloe just happens to be captain.

Confessions from the Principal’s Kid has plenty of heart and soul, especially since author Robin Mellom actually was a principal’s kid and weaves some of her own memories into the story. “This novel is not a memoir nor an autobiography,” she writes, “but it was inspired by my experiences as an After.” Afters are the handful of faculty kids forced to hang out after school while their parents finish up their duties. Not only do the Afters know every nook and cranny of the school, their bonds go deeper than Allie realizes, especially Allie’s friendship with a bullied boy named Graham.

Like Allie, this tale is full of fun, pluck and longing as she learns to navigate difficult social situations while discovering the true and sometimes tricky meanings of friendship and loyalty.

 

This article was originally published in the August 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

“My mother is ruining my life,” notes fifth-grader Allie West. Many kids come to that same conclusion, but Allie really can’t escape her mom, who is the principal of her elementary school.

NonfictionHistoryFood & Drink

A literary and culinary feast

Review by Alice Cary

Everyone’s got a food story, writes culinary historian Laura Shapiro, but most will never be told. Shaprio believes that one’s relationship with food typically defines who we are, and What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories profiles six vastly different women and their appetites: author, poet and diarist Dorothy Wordsworth, sister of William; British chef Rosa Lewis, known as the “Queen of Cooks,” whose champions included King Edward VII; first lady Eleanor Roosevelt; Hitler’s mistress and eventual wife, Eva Braun; British novelist Barbara Pym; and writer and publisher Helen Gurley Brown. Each of these women is fascinating, and Shapiro’s carefully researched, astute writing sheds light on their unique places in history, as well as the culinary trends of their time.

Take, for example, Roosevelt, who proclaimed herself “incapable of enjoying food.” Shapiro asserts that instead, Roosevelt had “an intense relationship with food” all of her life, bringing the home economics movement to the White House while insisting on hiring “the most reviled cook in presidential history,” who served dishes like Shrimp Wiggle—shrimp and canned peas heated in white sauce, on toast.

Meanwhile, in Europe, Hitler’s consort, Braun, regularly sipped champagne while the rest of Europe suffered complete devastation. She adored treats but considered keeping her figure of utmost importance, eventually choosing to kill herself with cyanide rather than by gunshot so she could be a “beautiful corpse.”

British novelist Pym “was not a food writer, but she saw the world as if she were,” leaving behind diaries and 88 notebooks that proved to be a culinary historian’s dream, often including shopping lists and recipes. And while her literary characters sipped vast quantities of Ovaltine and tea, Pym showed in both her books and in her life that “good food can be found anywhere.”

Each of the six essays in Shapiro’s What She Ate is a culinary and historical delight. Feast on them slowly so as not to miss a crumb.

 

This article was originally published in the August 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women and the Food That Tells Their Stories profiles six vastly different women and their appetites.

Children's & YAPicture Book

Tub time for everyone

Review by Alice Cary

Who’s ready for a bath?

After tackling “chores through the ages” in Why Do I Have to Make My Bed?, Wade Bradford takes young readers on a squeaky-clean tour of tubby time in Around the World in a Bathtub. In the opening pages, a young boy runs from his mother at bath time, shouting, “No, no!” as she proclaims, “Yes, yes.” Splashy spats like this one are happening “all over the world,” Bradford explains, “but sometimes in different ways.”

For example, in Japan, “family members take turns, from oldest to youngest, relaxing in a square tub called an ofuro.” Bathers in Himalayan valleys enjoy dipping into hot springs, while Columbians might try a mud bath in a small volcano.

After touring a bit of the world’s intriguing bathtubs, readers return to the boy and his mother, enjoying part two of their “bath-time battle.” Of course, once kids are in the tub, they don’t want to get out.

Micha Archer’s vibrant collages make this book come alive, especially in scenes featuring the bathing boy and his mother. He plays with a beach ball that looks like a globe, quietly reminding readers of the book’s global quest.

Meanwhile, there’s plenty of learning to enjoy. With each new country, mothers and kids say, “yes, yes” and “no, no” in their native languages, providing a natural refrain for out-loud readings. Notes at the end of the book add more details about bathing practices in various countries.

Around the World in a Bathtub is a welcome addition to young readers’ nighttime routines.

Who’s ready for a bath? After tackling “chores through the ages” in Why Do I Have to Make My Bed?, Wade Bradford takes young readers on a squeaky-clean tour of tubby time in Around the World in a Bathtub.

Children's & YAMiddle Grade

Our favorite authors and illustrators as young artists

Review by Alice Cary

Calling all writers, illustrators and lovers of children’s books. Whether you’re a child or an adult, this book is for you.

Our Story Begins: Your Favorite Authors and Illustrators Share Fun, Inspiring, and Occasionally Ridiculous Things They Wrote and Drew as Kids, edited by Elissa Brent Weissman, presents the very first work and inspiration of 26 children’s writers and illustrators, including childhood photos, summaries of their achievements, brief personal essays about their earliest literary aspirations and attempts, plus photos of these childhood works, including handwritten stories on notebook paper, childhood drawings and illustrated stories.

Dan Santat remembers being amazed by a Norman Rockwell painting at age 5, trying to perfect his own talent for years and suddenly deciding in a college biology class to become an artist, instead of the doctor his parents had in mind. Thanhha Lai writes movingly about leaving everything behind in Vietnam when her family left in 1975, and remembers the hours she spent listening to her mother tell stories from her childhood.

During the Depression, Phyllis Reynolds Naylor wrote and illustrated a little book called The Food Fairies on the back of used paper. Gordon Korman shares a wonderful fifth grade speech, “How to Handle Your Parents.” Rita Williams-Garcia was desperately trying to sell her seventh-grade stories while enduring a crush on a boy named Franky, a trumpet player. Kwame Alexander spent two days writing an epistolary poem for his mother, which she still has framed in her living room. As a middle schooler, Grace Lin won fourth place in a national book contest for her illustrated “Dandelion Story.” Ashley Bryan shares drawings he made in the 1930s.

The wonderful diversity of these writers and artists shines through in this fun, insightful collection. A page of tips for young artists and writers may very well inspire the next generation.

Calling all writers, illustrators and lovers of children’s books. Whether you’re a child or an adult, this book is for you.

NonfictionTrue Crime

Burning down the house

Review by Alice Cary

BookPage Top Pick in Nonfiction, July 2017

Abandoned buildings were going up in flames in sleepy Accomack County on Virginia’s Eastern Shore in late 2012 and early 2013. More than 60, one after the other, lighting up the skies in the middle of the night. Neighbors grew suspicious, vigilante groups were formed, and police checkpoints dotted lonely country roads.

In the end, a bizarre story emerged once police captured the culprits, who turned out to be engaged lovers Charlie Smith and Tonya Bundick. The story of the hunt for these Bonnie-and-Clyde arsonists, their capture and trials is mesmerizing, as told by Washington Post feature writer Monica Hesse in American Fire. The chase involved 26,378 hours of work by the Virginia State Police and 14,924 hours of overtime for nearly five months. Teams of men spent nights in tents beside potential targets, hoping to catch the fire starter red-handed.

Hesse happened upon this story when she went looking for an assignment that would simply get her “out of the office for a day.” She got more than she bargained for, spending the next two years researching, writing and trying to understand the why behind the strange crime spree.

She ended up moving to the area for a while, riding on fire trucks, visiting Smith and Bundick in jail, getting to know residents at church potluck suppers and digging deep into the area’s past, present and future, even reading a book about the chicken industry “that is more interesting than any book about chicken farming has a right to be.”

So why did Smith and Bundick commit these crimes? “The answer,” Hesse writes, “inasmuch as there is an answer for these things, involved hope, poverty, pride, Walmart, erectile dysfunction, Steak-umms . . . intrigue, and America.” What more is there to say? American Fire is deftly written and endlessly surprising.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read a Q&A with Monica Hesse about American Fire.

This article was originally published in the July 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Abandoned buildings were going up in flames in sleepy Accomack County on Virginia’s Eastern Shore in late 2012 and early 2013. More than 60, one after the other, lighting up the skies in the middle of the night. Neighbors grew suspicious, vigilante groups were formed, and police checkpoints dotted lonely country roads.

Children's & YAPicture Book

It’s hard to be patient

Review by Alice Cary

Badger and Rabbit spend a day together after Badger inquires, “What are you waiting for?” and Rabbit responds, “Wouldn’t you like to know.” Thus begins many rounds of a guessing game as the friends traipse through the woods, spying many wonderful discoveries: field of daisies, deer, a snake, squirrel, mischievous mice and more.

Very young children are often forced to wait, and they’ll greatly enjoy the give and take of these questions and mysterious answers. The illusive thing has a smile, but no legs or tail, and it’s very old and always changing. The day goes by, with seemingly aimless exploring and delights, as the pair get closer and closer to their goal.

“I’m tired. I give up,” Badger laments.

“Don’t give up now,” Rabbit urges. “We waited all day.”

Badger persists with question after question, while Rabbit patiently answers, never giving in to Badger’s pleas for an answer. Finally, as night comes, Badger falls asleep, nearly missing the big surprise.

Scott Menchin’s gentle tale of friendship is a perfect bedtime tale, and Matt Phelan’s pencil and pastel drawings are reminiscent of crayon scribbles, artfully conveying the story’s perfect mix of energy and anticipation with the rewards of patience and fortitude.

Badger and Rabbit spend a day together after Badger inquires, “What are you waiting for?” and Rabbit responds, “Wouldn’t you like to know.” Thus begins many rounds of a guessing game as the friends traipse through the woods, spying many wonderful discoveries: field of daisies, deer, a snake, squirrel, mischievous mice and more.

NonfictionBiography

The last days of a tyrant

Review by Alice Cary

What's it like to spend hours with a murderous, monstrous world leader? Can such a person be capable of kindness?

In the summer of 2006, a group of 12 American soldiers deployed to Iraq were astounded to find themselves in a strange crosshair of history: They were assigned to guard fallen leader Saddam Hussein throughout his trial during the months leading to his execution on December 30. Calling themselves the "Super Twelve," and ranging in age from 20 to mid-30s, the men weren't allowed to take notes or tell their families about their mission.

Author Will Bardenwerper, a former Airborne Ranger in Iraq and Presidential Management Fellow at the Pentagon, listened to Army interviews with these 12 men and conducted hours of his own questioning of the group as well as others. The Prisoner in His Palace offers a behind-the-scenes look at history that's nearly impossible to put down. Interspersing tales from Saddam's past with scenes of his final days, Bardenwerper paints an intimate portrait of a man sometimes called "Vic," for "Very Important Criminal."

Hussein's atrocities are numerous and well documented. Desperately poor as a child and terribly abused by his stepfather, the CIA has described him as a "malignant narcissist" with certain "psychopathic attributes." He had his own sons-in-law assassinated and was responsible for the ruthless killing of many.

Interestingly, this bellowing showman who was on trial for his life immediately quieted down once out of the courtroom, often sharing expensive cigars with the Super Twelve while asking for stories of their families. An FBI agent described Hussein as "a genius in an interpersonal setting," and indeed, he proved to be an excellent listener.

Certainly a man of contradictions, this murderer was a germophobe, a skilled chess player and a neatnik who saved crumbs to feed the birds. Hussein even wrote a poem for his medic's wife, and urged the youngest of the Super Twelve to leave Iraq and go to college. In fact, he offered to pay for the soldier's college if he ever gained access to his bank account.

As he was being led away to his execution, Hussein thanked the 12 Americans guarding him, adding that "they'd become 'more family to him' than any Iraqis had been." The Prisoner in His Palace offers a mesmerizing glimpse into the final moments of a brutal tyrant's life.

What's it like to spend hours with a murderous, monstrous world leader? Can such a person be capable of kindness?

Children's & YAMiddle Grade

A young girl confronts injustice to save her friend

Review by Alice Cary

Quicksand Pond, hidden off the Rhode Island coast, is a place of lingering mystery and illumination for a pair of 12-year-old girls.

When Jessie Kettel arrives with her family to spend the summer in a rental cottage, she finds an old raft and meets Terri Carr, who tells her about two boys who drowned there and a long-ago murder in a huge house on the edge of the pond. The daughter of those murdered parents survived, and old lady Henrietta Cutting still lives in the house.

Jessie learns that the wrong person was imprisoned for the murders: Terri’s great-great-grandfather. The consequences of this injustice continue to the present, as Terri’s family is still considered “no good.” When Terri is forced to hide from her abusive father in a makeshift camp on the edge of the pond, she and Jessie form a Tom Sawyer/Huck Finn-type friendship. Meanwhile, Henrietta watches the pair through binoculars, struggling to find a way to make her long-ignored voice heard. Gradually, Jessie finds herself becoming “sucked into” Terri’s messy, difficult life, and so she retreats from her friend just when she is needed most. Quicksand is everywhere, it seems.

When Terri is accused of setting fire to the Cutting home, history seems to be repeating itself. Jessie learns some wrenching lessons about discrimination and judgment, and her testimony becomes crucial to her friend’s future.

Newbery Honor winner Janet Taylor Lisle has written a riveting chronicle of a monumental summer, one with no easy answers.

 

This article was originally published in the June 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Quicksand Pond, hidden off the Rhode Island coast, is a place of lingering mystery and illumination for a pair of 12-year-old girls.

Children's & YAMiddle Grade

Fortune-telling and guardian owls

Review by Alice Cary

Three Pennies by Melanie Crowder is a gorgeously told orphan’s tale, with an old-fashioned ring that pairs with modern elements to create a fast-moving, carefully structured plot.

Eleven-year-old Marin Greene lives in a foster home in San Francisco where she tries to tell her fortune using the I Ching book that once belonged to her mother, who abandoned Marin at age 4. When a single, lesbian surgeon named Dr. Lucy Chang hopes to adopt Marin, the preteen becomes more determined than ever to reunite with her birth mother, despite the appeal of this extraordinarily kind, loving physician.

With short chapters that keep the action rolling, the story unfolds from multiple viewpoints that include Marin, Dr. Lucy and Gilda, a hardworking social worker who gives readers an informative peek into the thorny world of foster care. Marin also has a guardian angel in the form of an owl who watches her carefully, adding yet another uniquely wise voice to the mix.

Neither Marin’s nor Dr. Lucy’s life has gone as planned (the doctor loved a woman who died), but when an earthquake strikes, they realize that they’ve found each other. Three Pennies is an enjoyable reminder that despite the many “topsy-turvy changes that come with this life,” unexpected guardians are often waiting to guide us.

This article was originally published in the May 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Three Pennies by Melanie Crowder is a gorgeously told orphan’s tale, with an old-fashioned ring that pairs with modern elements to create a fast-moving, carefully structured plot.

Children's & YAPicture Book

A colorful lesson on creativity

Review by Alice Cary

What’s it like inside the mind of an artist at work? Readers will get an uplifting look at the process in Corinna Luyken’s debut picture book, The Book of Mistakes.

“It started with one mistake,” the book begins, showing a small face on a big white page with one eye noticeably larger than the other. Even the correction fails, as the new eye is even larger than the first. Then voilà, a pair of bright green glasses fixes everything.

As this face evolves into a girl, clever fixes cover additional mistakes: a lacy collar on a too-long neck, elbow patches that disguise a misshapen elbow, roller skates on shoes that don’t touch the ground. Mistakes pile on as the roller-skating girl gradually becomes part of an elaborate, poster-worthy scene: a giant tree full of kids floating through the sky on wildly imagined, balloon-powered contraptions. Anticipation and excitement mount as each part of the scene unfolds through Luyken’s striking use of black ink, white space and deft additions of soft green, yellow and pink watercolor and colored pencil.

Just when you think the scene is complete, Luyken has another trick up her sleeve, deflecting readers’ attention back to the artist and how art is made, warts and all.

Mistakes in art—as in life—happen, and Luyken shows young readers in a glorious way how they often lead to bigger and better outcomes than anyone could imagine.

 

This article was originally published in the May 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

What’s it like inside the mind of an artist at work? Readers will get an uplifting look at the process in Corinna Luyken’s debut picture book, The Book of Mistakes.

Nonfiction

A case that hit uncomfortably close to home

Review by Alice Cary

During a summer internship in Louisiana in 2003, Harvard law student Alexandria Marzano-Les­nevich heard about a case involving a pedophile who murdered a 6-year-old boy in 1992. When she watched the recorded confession of Ricky Langley, she writes that it “brought me to reexamine everything I believed not only about the law but about my family and my past.”

Marzano-Lesnevich lays out that re-examination in her unusual and riveting book, The Fact of a Body: A Murder and a Memoir, in which she interweaves the story of Langley’s crime with her own personal trauma.

The author, the daughter of two lawyers, grew up in a New Jersey family that was loving but refused to look back at the past. Problems such as her father’s depression and the death of Alexandria’s triplet baby sister were rarely, if ever, discussed. Marzano-Lesnevich, however, couldn’t stop looking back. Her grandfather sexually abused her and her sisters, and her parents tried to bury this fact. Later, they tried to ignore her anger. Despite this and other challenges, including tumultuous years spent dealing with undiagnosed Lyme disease and an eating disorder, Marzano-Les­nevich made a “Hail Mary pass to the future” by enrolling in Harvard Law School.

Marzano-Lesnevich’s triumph is in the way she simultaneously tells her story and Langley’s, showing how in both cases the past haunts the present, and how facts, memories, guilt, responsibility and forgiveness can be impossibly hard to pinpoint or fully understand. Her recounting of her grandfather’s abuse is a haunting exposé of what it feels like to be a victim. And while Langley will spend his life in prison, her grandfather, she writes, “got away with it.”

The author tells Langley’s story by reconstructing scenes based on court documents, transcripts, media coverage and even a play based on the case. She also relies heavily on the “creative” part of creative nonfiction—a method some may question—layering her “imagination onto the bare-bones record of the past to bring Langley’s past to life.”

Both stories are gripping enough in their own right to fill a book; Marzano-Lesnevich’s artful entwining enriches them both.

 

This article was originally published in the May 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

During a summer internship in Louisiana in 2003, Harvard law student Alexandria Marzano-Les­nevich heard about a case involving a pedophile who murdered a 6-year-old boy in 1992. When she watched the recorded confession of Ricky Langley, she writes that it “brought me to reexamine everything I believed not only about the law but about my family and my past.”

Children's & YAPicture Book

A musical elegy for the victims of war

Review by Alice Cary

When young children ask about the violence that fills our world, what do we say? Folksinger John McCutcheon’s picture book Flowers for Sarajevo provides an insightful response, combining history, humanity and music in a memorable picture book that’s perfect for young elementary school students.

The narrator is a young boy named Drasko who helps his father sell flowers in the Sarajevo marketplace. Their world changes overnight when war arrives and Drasko’s father heads to the battlefield, leaving his son in charge of the flower cart. The mood of the city has changed, as well, making Drasko’s job harder than ever, but he takes refuge near an open window outside a building where the orchestra practices. Drasko bears witness to real-life events as he describes a 1992 explosion, when 22 people waiting in a breadline were killed in a mortar attack. The next day Drasko watches a cellist dressed in a tuxedo make his way through the rubble to the scene of the explosion, where he plays “the most beautiful and heartbreaking music anyone could ever imagine.” Drasko notes: “All of us―Serb and Croat, Muslim and Christian―stand side by side, listening to a language we all understand.” That musician was Vedran Smailovic, and Drasko explains that he returns to play for 22 days, one day to honor each of the victims. Kristy Caldwell’s illustrations add dimension to the story by imbuing the central action on each spread with color, leaving the rest of the scene in muted tones. She brings the busy marketplace to life, depicting the mortar explosion and its destruction without being gruesome. Drasko and other characters possess the energy and emotion of a graphic novel, perfect for the slightly older picture book audience for whom this book is aimed.

While the narrative is simple and accessible, end notes round out the educational experience, including an author’s note about the mortar attack and Smailovic’s musical memorial, a discussion (with maps) of the Balkan’s history of unrest, suggestions of books and websites for further learning and a short biography of Smailovic.

Flowers for Sarajevo also includes a CD recording of Smailovic playing Albinoni’s Adagio in G Minor as well as McCutcheon’s own composition, “Streets of Sarajevo,” accompanied by Smailovic. A final spread contains McCutcheon’s lyrics and music.

This book offers no easy answers or happy endings; instead, it’s a powerful story about persevering in the face of tragedy and war. Drasko and his flowers provide a sense of hope and humanity, as the boy explains: “And tomorrow―like my father, like the cellist―I’ll do my own small part to make Sarajevo beautiful once again.”

When young children ask about the violence that fills our world, what do we say? Folksinger John McCutcheon’s picture book Flowers for Sarajevo provides an insightful response, combining history, humanity and music in a memorable picture book that’s perfect for young elementary school students.

Children's & YAMiddle Grade

Checking in to a makeshift family

Review by Alice Cary

“I loved my dad’s tattoos―they told the story of his life,” writes eighth-grader Stevie (named after Stevie Nicks), narrator of Blooming at the Texas Sunrise Motel. She adds, “Tattoos covered most of his upper body from his neck down to his belly button. He said he’d eventually make it to his toes but he still had a lot of living to do.”

Sadly, her father doesn’t get that chance. And, as it turns out, there’s quite a lot that Stevie doesn’t know about his life, or her mother’s, for that matter. Settle in for the latest offering by National Book Award-winning author Kimberly Willis Holt (When Zachary Beaver Came to Town, Dear Hank Williams); you’ll be in good hands as mysteries, as well as people, reveal themselves.

Stevie’s world―on a small farm near Taos, New Mexico, where her parents have a fruit and flower stand―is shattered when a drunk driver crashes into the stand and kills her parents. She’s sent to live with her estranged, crusty grandfather, Winston, who runs a ramshackle motel in a small Texas town. As they subsist on cans of Campbell’s soup, Winston can’t seem to look Stevie in the eye nor stand to mention her parents.

Thankfully, a host of kind people welcome Stevie, including a handyman and his eighth-grade son Roy; a classic movie fanatic receptionist named Violet; and Horace and Ida, a wheelchair-bound couple who live at the motel. Winston sends Stevie to be home-schooled with Mrs. Crump, an elderly narcoleptic who once taught her mother. As always, Holt adeptly turns her quirky characters into a multidimensional, believable cast.

As with previous novels, Holt sensitively portrays a teen attempting to navigate the world without parents. Carrying on with the gardening skills learned from her parents, Stevie gradually starts building a new life and trying to get to know her grandfather, while secretly working hard to unravel the mysteries of her parents’ past. Stevie’s story begins with tragedy, but Blooming at the Texas Sunrise Motel remains firmly rooted in hope and perseverance. As Stevie concludes, “Even if life doesn’t turn out exactly like we thought it would, it can still be wonderful.”

“I loved my dad’s tattoos―they told the story of his life,” writes eighth-grader Stevie (named after Stevie Nicks), narrator of Blooming at the Texas Sunrise Motel. She adds, “Tattoos covered most of his upper body from his neck down to his belly button. He said he’d eventually make it to his toes but he still had a lot of living to do.”

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