Harsh Light

The Radium Girls by Kate Moore
Naperville, Ill. : Sourcebooks, [2018]
xviii, 477 p. : ill. ; 214 cm.

This is a fantastic book that ties several important periods of US history together - WWI, The Roaring Twenties and The Great Depression.  It also has a local interest in that half the drama of the story is in Ottawa, IL about an hour and forty-five minute drive from here in Urbana.

But it's a tough book, too.  It's the story of literally murderous corporate exploitation and dishonesty that shortened the lives of hundreds of women who worked in the factories where the luminous (and dangerously radioactive) radium was painted on wartime instrument panels and on civilian-use watch dials.  The deaths of several of the women featured in the book are slow, agonizing, and terrible to read about.  What makes the book inspiring, though, is the courage, grit and determination of the victimized women as they take on the companies that used and abused them - and eventually win significant victories.

This book has a lot of heart. The author succeeds in putting the reader into the lives of the women who worked in the radium-dial industry - capturing the initial excitement of well-paid employment for young women of the twenties and the freedom it gave them, and humanizing the gruesome and tragic illnesses that stalked these young women several years after they started the work.

The book is a great lesson about the dangers of unregulated corporate behavior, the power of unified resistance, and the importance of family, friends, community and the media in taking on powerful foes. It's a long, but very worthy read for anyone interested in US history.



    

Open Heart

The Inexplicable Logic of My Life by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, [2017].
445 p. ; 22 cm.

Yes, it's kind of a long book (logging in at over 400 pages) but it reads pretty easily and it really is a lovely book to read.  A cursory description of the book (teen with dead mother has loving gay adoptive father, smart snarky female friend who loses her mother, and homeless friend who loses his mother, all set in a Mexican American family setting in El Paso) might make it seem like a parody of the YA realistic problem novel, but it is a lot more than that.

The novel is definitely a bildungsroman centering on Sal, the boy whose mother died when he was three and who left him in the care of her wonderful gay friend, the painter Vincente who raises him.  Sal has to deal with changes in him that happen during his senior year.  Who "really" is he?  What is this new anger that causes him to punch out a couple of bigots and homophobes? How will he cope with the loss of his beloved aunt Mima who is old and dying.  And what about his friend Sam - who is very smart and ambitious, but only dates crummy "bad" boys? And theirs Fito, too, Sal's friend who lives with an addict mother - is studious and saving up for college - and ends up homeless?  Yes, it's a lot and yet, Sáenz manages to spin out his novel as if he's just telling you the true story of his own life. 

There is so much heart in this novel.  Several passages really did get me teary, especially the depth of friendship between the teens and the depth of parental love from Sal's father.  As a Kirkus review states, this book is another "stellar, gentle look into the emotional lives of teens on the cusp of adulthood."

In this year of bigotry, racism, presidential vulgarity, and government-inspired hatred of immigrants, reading this novel felt like a spa-vacation for my heart and a retreat for my mind.

Yes, I would recommend it!

Wolves Where?

A Dog in the Cave: The Wolves Who Made Us Human by Kay Frydenborg
Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017.
ix, 246 p. : ill. (some col.), maps (some col.) ; 24 cm. 

The details (pages, illus, etc) above are for the print version which we have in our library, though the version I read was the eBook edition through the Axis360 collection that our library provides. Yes, that means I read it on my little cell phone - and it's not a bad experience.

This book offers a lot to think about.  Probably the most interesting thing about A Dog in the Cave, is how it really got me to see how incredibly unique the human-dog relationship is in the history of animals on the planet.  Here the author introduces us to the mutually beneficial relationship between two sentient apex-predators and how that relationship has shaped - though evolution - who we both are.  It's a pretty crazy thing to think about. 

A for instance?  Well, consider that humans and dogs both experience the endorphin pleasure in their brains from gazing at each other.  Or consider that unlike the extremely intelligent wolf, only dogs can solve a guessing game by following the glance cues of humans.  Essentially, Frydenborg is arguing that by entering into a cooperative alliance with humans some 40,000 years ago the original wild proto-dog wolf began evolving traits that made it more suitable to be with humans, AND humans began evolving traits that make us ideal companions to dogs.  Pretty neat stuff.

There's a lot of ground that gets covered in this book and anyone interested in dogs, paleontology, evolution or human-animal relationships will find something to enjoy here.

It's Complicated

Frida & Diego: Art, Love, Life by Catherine Reef
Boston : Clarion Books/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014
168 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 26 cm. 

Most people have some passing familiarity with the art of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, but this is one of those great non-fiction books for young adults that really expands the range of information about these two stunning Mexican painters.

The book is richly illustrated with photos and includes back matter featuring a nice selection of famous works by the two artists.  The back of the book also includes a timeline and copious notes by the author.

I really loved how this book does not condescend to young adults and manages to objectively convey the very unconventional nature of Rivera and Kahlo.  The book also skillfully conveys the artistic excellence of both artists - showing that Rivera was definitely more famous, prolific and well paid, while Kahlo was truly both a skilled (and self-taught) and truly original painter.  The book conveys the deep and complex love that existed between these two as they married, split up, and eventually remarried.

I also appreciated that Reef was able to honestly portray what a sexist user Diego Rivera was, but she also conveys the poignant tenderness that he held for Frida, and the deep bond between them.

"Stuck in the hospital [1950], Frida missed seeing Diego receive the National Prize for Plastic Arts....She saw her husband often, though, because he took the room next to hers, to be nearby at night.  Diego's presence comforted Frida like nothing else.  He read poetry to her and rocked her to sleep.  About once a week he brought in a borrowed movie projector and showed her the old Laurel and Hardy films....he did whatever he could think of to lighten her mood, even if he had to shake a tambourine and dance around the room, or roar like a bear with his arms raised and fingers curved like a claws." (p.101)

I would definitely recommend this book to any student interested in knowing more about Frida Kahlo or Diego Rivera... or both!

Bullish on Mythology

Bull by David Elliot
Boston : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, [2017]
185 p. ; 22 cm.

This Bull gives you a wild ride! It's a whip-smart retelling of the Minotaur myth, told in structured poetic forms but with the tone and attitude of hip-hop.

Well, it's a pretty bizarre myth to begin with - a king slights Poseidon who causes his wife to fall for a bull and she ends up giving birth to a half-human, half-bull monster. Elliot runs with it with a bit of street language that might be too rough for middle-schoolers but should intrigue high-schoolers.

At the end of the book he explains the various poetic forms he used for each character - it's a study in prosody worth reading.

It's not a book for every taste, but I'll recommend it to students looking for something mythology based or who like hip-hop influenced writing.

Gruesome Transformations

Nightstruck by Jenna Black
New York : Tor Teen, a Tom Doherty associates book, 2016.
302 p. ; 22 cm.

This was an exciting, creative, and very readable paranormal, horror novel. The hero of this tale, Becket, unwittingly becomes the bridge to a portal to evil forces, allowing them to enter the regular world and wreak havoc in Philadelphia.  At sunset inanimate objects come to life inflicting injury and death on anyone caught outside. People are safe from these terrifying "constructs" as long as they are indoors, but some of the people caught outside become Nightstrucks - accomplices to the forces violence and mayhem taking over the city at night - and they can enter homes and do violence.

The novel builds in horror and suspense as it goes on, claiming surprising victims and pitting the hero of the novel against her best friend who has become one of the Nightstruck.  The hero also gets to find romance in this terrible time, so all is not bad...

However, the novel has a few problems, that remain unanswered.  The above mentioned best friend is unlikable before her transformation, and absolutely horrid afterward - and yet the hero of the novel just can't seem to fully reject her.  Also one has to wonder why the supernatural horror is limited to the boundaries of Philadelphia?

Problems aside, the novel is exciting and keeps one's attention.  Its ending is pretty surprising and clearly invites a sequel.  The reviews of the sequel are not very good, and I started it and had to agree that the first few pages were pretty bad.  Maybe the author should have let it end at one installment, but my guess is that she was under pressure to drag it out into at least a trilogy and maybe more, which is too bad.

     

A Hell of a Read

Evil Librarian by Michelle Knudsen
Somerville, Mass. : Candlewick Press, 2014.
343 p. ; 22 cm.

This was just what the doctor ordered.  A fun, excitingly plotted high school adventure and romance featuring the drama crowd and - unexpectedly - a very handsome young male librarian who just happens to be a demon wreaking havoc on the school for his nefarious plot to take over the underworld throne...

Sounds crazy, right?  Yes.  The best part is that the book just rolls with the nonsense and if your roll with it you get caught up in the main character's heroic quest to save her best friend from an eternity of being a demon's consort, to save her school from a pending massacre, and to - create the best stage props ever for the school production of Sweeney Todd.

It's a really enjoyable mix of the supernatural plus high school friendships/romance plus thrills and danger.  If you've been lost in following the hellish news of the world, this fun romp with a strong female hero is a welcome break.