Review of Aurora Rising (Aurora Cycle, book 1)

Aurora Rising (Aurora Cycle, book 1)

Author: Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf

Publication date: May 2019

Date of review: August 2019

    Alpha Tyler Jones - the top-ranked graduating cadet at the Aurora Academy, trained to do whatever missions the people (human or otherwise) of the Milky Way need.

    Legionnaire Scarlett Jones - a saucy diplomat who happens to be Tyler’s twin sister.

    Legionnaire Cat Brannock - the best pilot in the academy who’s only scared of her own emotions.

    Legionnaires Zila Madran, Kal Gilwraeth, and Finian de Karran de Seel - the misfits of Aurora Academy who somehow landed in Tyler’s squad.

    Aurora Jie-Lin O’Malley - the rescued mystery girl who has been asleep for 200 years. 

    Meet squad 312. After Tyler rescues Aurora, the girl who was thought to be dead two centuries ago, what begins as an ordinary supply mission turns dark. The squad discovers that Aurora has escaped quarantine and snuck aboard their ship. She has powers that she is unable to control and soon she has the squad fleeing from aliens and stealing relics of a species said to have gone extinct long before the oldest known species still around began recording history. The squad begins to discover what and who they can trust as a galactic war that began a million years ago rekindles.

    Fans of Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner’s Unearthed will enjoy the bold, sassy heroines of Aurora Rising. The story itself has some mature elements more suitable for young adult than middle grade readers. The characters are diverse (in both personality and species), and so relatable to a wide audience. Adults might also enjoy Aurora Rising. Each chapter is told from the perspective of a different member of squad 312, helping you get to know each one a little better. I highly recommend this story to YA readers who enjoy science fiction set in a future where humanity is not alone in the galaxy and must adjust to fundamentally different cultures, customs, and concerns. 

- D. K. Nuray

Review of Wilder Girls

Wilder Girls

Author: Rory Power

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Publication date: July 2019

    The girls on Raxter Island are no longer students, but survivors. Sent to a boarding school for girls ages 11-18, their bodies have become infected with a mysterious plague that they call the Tox. It has not only poisoned them, but every living thing on the island. Each flare up is worse. The number of girls left alive is dwindling, and the Navy won’t lift the quarantine order they set on the island when the Tox began. Hetty, Byatt, and Reese are a part of the handful of girls who are left. All they know is their rotations on Gun Shift atop the roof, the meager supplies the Boat Shift girls bring back, and that unless they are those Boat Shift girls, they must never venture outside the school’s gates. That is, if they want to stay alive. Then Byatt, Hetty’s best friend, goes missing. Hetty and Reese will do anything to find her - sneak past the gates, defy Headmistress, and face the woods that the Tox has poisoned almost beyond recognition. But braving the woods brings even more hardship than the ever worsening challenge of surviving. Hetty and Reese begin to uncover the island’s darkest secrets, and begin to discover the pain that each of them has been hiding from the other.

    Wilder Girls is a chilling read, but it is also a heartwarming story of friendship persevering against all odds. The author’s use of sentence fragments sharpens the anxiety and eeriness saturating this story. More than just suspense, there is often a feeling of dark emotional vertigo. This is a great book for any middle grade or young adult reader who savors transfixing horror with strong female characters set in a recognizably modern world.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of The Book Thief

The Book Thief

Author: Marcus Zusak

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf

Publication date: March 2006 (USA)

    Unlike Liesel Meminger, I may not have enough words for the brilliance and agony of this story. Thankfully, Marcus Zusak did. Death is the narrator. It is 1939 in Nazi Germany. Liesel’s little brother is dead and her shattered world will begin to tentatively rebuild when she picks up one book beside his grave. Left with foster parents and terrorized by her dreams, Liesel finds comfort in words and books. Her own story is one of halting wonder as she begins learning to read, fear and danger when her new family hides a Jew in their basement, and indescribable pain when she loses both her words and her world once more. 

    In The Book Thief, passionate emotions, colors, and language strangely blend in an aching harmony. The conflations of sight and smell and touch and taste become an oddly sane view of the world from Death’s perspective. This story is certainly not one for audiences below sixth or seventh grade because of the depth of feeling and brutalities integral to the story. The Book Thief is well-written, as rich and bitter as dark chocolate, depressing, and extremely thoughtful and thought-provoking. I highly recommend it to any reader who is willing to have their senses and sensibilities wrenched at the same time.

    With Death narrating, our first assumption would be that The Book Thief is bound to be dark and gory. And it is dark - it is about a girl who is abandoned by her mother in the midst of war. However, Death both accentuates and lightens the darkness of the story. He speaks of carrying souls from children who have died from bombs and cold, but he also speaks of noticing colors to keep himself sane (at least as sane as Death can be). There are also moments of witty relief, such as when Death says “It kills me sometimes, how people die.”

    Learning about Nazi Germany in history class conveys the scope and scale of the horror, but the magnitude of it all can overwhelm a personal perspective.  Numbers and facts and even pictures don’t necessarily let us really see the people themselves. Oddly, words do. Marcus Zusak’s words almost luxuriate in the potent, stabbing, inevitable grief of terrible loss.  There are times when Marcus Zusak’s metaphors and sensory combinations overwhelm or confuse, but that’s not often. His characters are beautifully drawn and realistically flawed. And we lose them. They are taken not by cancer or old age or even by Death, but by their fellow humans. By bombs and fear and hunger and hate. Especially towards the end of the story, I had to set the book down because I could only take the constantly impending horror in small doses. But I came back.  And I was as sorry as I was relieved when it was done. Just as we learn to regard Death as part of a story rather than merely its end, we learn to appreciate loss as something that colors and accentuates everything beautiful.

    To the kids reading this review - please read this book. It will make you think, it will make you cry, and it will open your eyes to just how much beautiful language can affect a reader. To the adults reading this - you will be better able to engage with this story in terms of its historical context than kids will. Lastly, to parents - please read this with your children if you can, but consider their emotional maturity first. The combination of perspective, language, and history in The Book Thief makes a wonderful story to both read and discuss.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of The Girl Who Drank The Moon

The Girl Who Drank The Moon

Author: Kelly Barnhill

Publisher: Algonquin Young Readers

Publication date: August 2016

    What if moonlight was magic? What if paper birds could fly? What if sorrow could become hope? Enthralling and well-crafted, The Girl Who Drank The Moon is about the impossible becoming possible, a girl’s struggle to find out who she is, and the wonder of magic. Magic. It fills Xan’s body. Xan, the “witch in the woods,” is extremely kind. She lives with a wise Swamp Monster and a Perfectly Tiny Dragon who thinks he is Simply Enormous. None of them know what to think about the Protectorate, where each year, a baby is sacrificed to the “evil witch” that supposedly poisons the woods around their town. The citizens of the Protectorate live simple lives, nourished by The Bog and covered by a cloud of sorrow, which is made heavier each year by the Day of Sacrifice. Each year, Xan makes the journey from her home in the woods to the Protectorate, rescuing the abandoned babies and bringing them to loving families on the other side of the woods. She feeds these children with starlight on the journey, but one year, she mistakenly feeds one child moonlight. The child becomes suffused with magic, and so Xan decides to raise her, naming her Luna.

    Of course, there are consequences. Magic becomes both a blessing and a curse. A man from the Protectorate is determined to kill the witch to save his child at the same time that Luna’s magic is beginning to emerge. Kelly Barnhill’s story of witches, children, and ordinary people becoming extraordinary quickly becomes a puzzle, with pieces clicking into place faster and faster as the story progresses. The Girl Who Drank The Moon is written for a slightly younger audience, but is also engaging for middle grade readers and has a depth of imagination and suggests questions that might make it intriguing to young adult audiences. Stories within the story could also make it a fun read for younger readers and parents to share.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of The Bookwanderers

The Bookwanderers

Author: Anna James

Publisher: Philomel Books

Publication date: September 2019

    This is a story for readers who wish the characters in their books were real. Matilda “Tilly” Pages has a vivid imagination and a voracious appetite for books. That’s expected - her grandparents own Pages & Co, the bookstore she lives above in modern-day London. Tilly’s mother disappeared years ago, and she has no idea who her father is. All she has left of her mother is a necklace with a bee pendant. When Tilly starts seeing characters from her favorite stories in Pages & Co, she thinks she must be imagining things. But her grandparents tell her otherwise. As Tilly begins befriending characters from her books and venturing into their stories, she learns that there is more to book wandering than fun and games. She must learn the dangers of her books and navigate the ability to become part of them.

    Tilly and her grandparents are relatable characters, with curious and kind personalities. Readers who enjoyed Story Thieves will enjoy The Bookwanders, as might readers looking for a lighter version of Inkheart. The Bookwanderers illuminates the power and the beauty of imagination, and offers readers a literal sense of what it means to immerse yourself in the world of books. I recommend this book to slightly younger readers from ages 9 to 14 who like fun fiction stories, mystery, and an exciting plot. 

- D. K. Nuray

Review of Charlie Thorne and the Last Equation

Charlie Thorne and the Last Equation

Author: Stuart Gibbs

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers

Publication date: September 2019

    “The man who created this clue had an IQ of 230. Mine’s 220 at best, so it’s going to take me a little while to figure this thing out.” Meet Charlotte “Charlie” Thorne. She’s only 12, but she’s already almost as smart as Einstein. That’s fantastic, because the CIA needs her to solve Einstein’s greatest puzzle - the hint leading to his last equation, known as Pandora. Pandora could solve humanity’s energy problems or it could fall into the hands of the bad guys and be used to pretty much blow up the world. Charlie has to use her smarts to outwit the criminals on her tail in a race to find and solve Einstein’s last clue as to the whereabouts of Pandora.

    Stuart Gibbs is back with another fast-paced comedic mystery, filled with exciting chase scenes and intriguing snapshots of history, some real and some fictionalized. Charlie Thorne, snarky and brilliant, will draw in younger readers, while complex connections and a clever plot will keep a middle grade audience engaged.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of Lord of the Flies

Lord of the Flies

Author: William Golding

Publisher: Faber and Faber

Publication date: September 1954

    Yes, I am reviewing a book that was published before my parents were born. But for all of the thousands of kids, like me, who might be required to read Lord of the Flies in school, it’s new. And I’m reviewing it because, even if our teachers don’t make us read this book, it really deserves to be read.

    If we’re being fancy (or trying to impress a teacher) we can call Lord of the Flies an allegory. What that really means is a lesson wrapped in a story. The good news is that the lesson is relevant and powerful and that the story is a believable page-turner. As simply as I can put it, Lord of the Flies is an engrossingly horrifying story about the horrible aspects of being human.  But it’s an awfully good story about awfully bad stuff.

    The story begins with a group of British schoolboys who have crashed on an uninhabited island. William Golding doesn’t hold back on symbolism and irony, and it’s significant that we find out later the boys were being evacuated from a war zone. All adults accompanying the marooned boys died in the crash, and the boys have to decide how to govern themselves. They quickly find out that grown up decisions are more than a matter of “meet and have tea and discuss” (as one of the boys says). Two boys begin to fight over the position of “chief.” As the story progresses, they represent more and more the tension between restraint and savagery, and the fragile line between the two.

    Through the boys, Golding conveys a dark and disturbing perspective of humanity’s true nature. The inevitability of savagery - how much it may be an inseparable part of our nature - is one of many questions left for the reader to consider.

    At first, the boys do what we might hope they would do - form a simple, democratic society with fair rules and functional roles. But that just makes it worse when that society crumbles into discord and brutality. And the reason it crumbles is because some choose to give in to their baser desires.

    The brilliant thing about Lord of the Flies is that Golding picked children. Children on an idyllic tropical island with plenty of room and plenty of food and resources. We can’t blame adults or society or hunger or cold or anything else for what the boys become. By isolating the children in such a place, Golding is telling us something. He’s telling us that what the boys become isn’t taught to them or forced on them. What they become is simply what was inside them already.

    Lord of the Flies is certainly not an enticing fantasy with a happy ending. But it is a story that makes you want to keep turning pages, even if only because you keep hoping for better choices from the characters and a better vision of ourselves. To all you kids out there who get assigned this book, don’t be bored of the flies. To all you adults out there, be careful how you treat us; apparently we can be very mean.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of Strange The Dreamer

Strange The Dreamer

Author: Laini Taylor

Publisher: Little Brown Books

Publication date: March 2017

    Everyone in Weep knows about the Godslayer. They have heard the legend of how he vanquished the gods who lived in the citadel above their homes. The people of Weep live in the citadel’s shadow, cold and fearful. But Lazlo Strange, a war orphan living far from Weep, dreams of the city as it once was and as he still believes it to be - beautiful, full of wonder and magic. So when the Godslayer visits his abbey, he does everything he can to be accepted into his regiment so that he can finally see the city of his dreams. Lazlo expects to be traveling with soldiers of legendary ability. What he doesn’t expect is that he will also be traveling with a natural philosopher, engineers, a mathematician, and a girl who can climb anything. They all know of what the Godslayer has done. Yet no one knows that five of the gods’ children are still alive. Ruby, Sarai, Feral, Minya, and Sparrow eek out a meager existence in the citadel, hiding from the people of Weep and using their powers to survive. They don’t know that the Godslayer has arrived - not until Lazlo starts communicating with Sarai in his dreams. As their worlds collide, Lazlo and Sarai must figure out who they were born to be, and how to break free from their past as a romance forms between them.

    Strange The Dreamer is one of the most captivating, thrilling, and enjoyable books I have read. What is beautiful about Strange the Dreamer is its strangeness - a fantasy book that manages to combine mystery and magic in a way that is compellingly different. This story is great for adults as well as mature young readers age 10 and up.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of The Waning Age

The Waning Age

Author: S. E. Grove

Publisher: Viking

Publication date: February 2019

    Natalia Peña, also known as Nat, has been emotionless for years. That’s as it should be; most kids in her generation “wane” around the age of 10 or 11. Her kid brother, Calvino, is different. No one knows why, but he hasn’t waned yet. He still has all of his emotions and they aren’t going away. Nat isn’t supposed to love him - she has waned. But when he is kidnapped by RealCorp, which sells “drops” that can make people feel emotions again, she will do anything to get him back, and not just because it is the logical thing to do. It turns out that Natalia loves Calvino. In pursuit of her brother, Nat faces Fish, the equivalent of sadists, except that they are unable to take pleasure out of the terror and pain they inflict. To find Calvino, she has to get help from an unlikely source - someone so desperate for real emotion that he’d kill for it. Nat gradually realizes that in a world deprived of emotion, her emotions and the ones of the people around her are something precious she must rediscover and understand.

    S. E. Grove’s novel explores the differences between instinct, reason, and emotion, and the surprisingly difficult challenge of determining which is which. Striking, well-written, and engaging, The Waning Age is a great pick for middle grade and young adult readers who savor daring characters in a thought-provoking alternate reality. I wouldn’t call this book a mind-bender, but there are creative ideas in the story that adults may also find engaging.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of Out Of My Mind

Out Of My Mind

Author: Sharon M. Draper

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Publication Date: March 2010

    Melody is brilliant. She has a photographic memory, loves listening to books on tape, and knows the capitals of all the countries in the world. And she’s only eleven. The only problem is that she can’t walk or cogently speak - she has cerebral palsy. Living her entire life in a wheelchair, Melody is judged, degraded, and people much less intelligent than her seem to get all the opportunities. Her own teachers treat her like a baby. When Melody gets a computer that she programs to talk for her, she thinks the bad days will be over. Instead, they just get worse.

    Sharon Draper paints a heartbreaking story of one girl’s journey of hope and hardship. Melody’s thoughtful, lonely voice will give readers a different view of the world. Out Of My Mind gives as much perspective as it does entertainment. This is a wonderful read for realistic fiction lovers from elementary school all the way through adulthood. Thought provoking laughs and cries also make this a good read for parents and kids to share.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of The School for Good and Evil: book one

The School for Good and Evil: book one

Author: Soman Chainani

Publisher: HarperCollins

Publication date: May 2013

    In the town of Gavaldon, every child reads fairy tales. They know about the School Master deep in the forest, who takes two children every four years to the School for Good and Evil. One good child and one bad child. Which is which has always been obvious - except for Sophie and Agatha. Sophie, a blond girl who loves pink dresses and doing good deeds, seems to be the clear choice for good. Agatha, the exile of the town who always dresses in black and lives in a graveyard, seems destined for evil. Both girls dream of being the ones picked by the School Master, even though Agatha denies it. But when they finally get chosen, all they want to do is go back home. And failing out or leaving the school means exile or worse. Sophie and Agatha vie for true love, each becoming more and more devoted to their side, good or evil. The two began as best friends, but as the story progresses, their loyalties to the school and their new friends begin to tear them apart.

    The School for Good and Evil is the first book in a series capable of being loved as an engaging twist on fairy tale and school of magic themes. Characters evolve, good and evil clash, and two girls discover who they really are. Although the language can be a bit simple and lacking in subtlety, the story will be gripping for younger readers.

- D. K. Nuray

Review of The Hearts We Sold

The Hearts We Sold

Author: Emily Lloyd-Jones

Publisher: Little, Brown

Publication date: August 2017

Dee Moreno lives with demons. They aren’t a common sight in the boarding school that she is about to be forced to leave. They aren’t casually strolling around on the street. They come to those in desperate need, often before the victims themselves know that they will be desperate enough to make a deal with demons. Dee, who has a terrible home life and is almost out of money, becomes one of those victims. Her demon is not ordinary though. For one, he openly calls himself a “daemon”. But most important, instead of the usual limbs or toes, Dee’s demon deals in hearts. Dee becomes part of his cohort of three, now four “heartless,” sneaking out of school at the daemon’s bidding to close portals used by monsters that could supposedly destroy Earth. She finds that the only people she can trust are her roommate Gremma and the rest of the daemon’s cohort of human victims. As she grows closer to them, she finds the heart that is no longer hers yearning for another heartless, James. They must find out whether their hearts are still theirs to share before time runs out for James. An alluring combination of mystery, horror, and fiction spiced with romance, The Hearts We Sold is great for young adult readers and may be appreciated by adults who enjoy YA. Be prepared for some pleasing disquiet and suspense.

D. K. Nuray, age 12

Review of Legends of the Sky

Legends of the Sky

Author: Liz Flanagan

Publisher: David Fickling Books

Publication date: October 2019

Milla might be seen as just an ordinary servant. She is not a native of Arcosi, the island where she lives, rarely gets a break from her work, and is looked down upon by the slightly older servant who works with her. But Milla is not ordinary. That’s because she has found something that no one else has even laid eyes upon for a century. No one who lives on Arcosi, anyway. Milla has found dragon eggs. Her battle to protect the eggs propels her into adventures that she never could have imagined - flying, living in a palace, and fights for her life and that of the dragons. “We aren’t born knowing things: that’s what life’s for.” Along the way, Milla learns about her heritage and the secrets of Arcosi that the duke has been hiding. She must return the dragons to their ancestral home or else risk their final disappearance. Filled with mystery, unexpected discoveries, and adventure, Legends of the Sky is an exciting read that makes you want to keep turning pages. I highly recommend this book to readers who are not afraid of some suspense and who appreciate the purpose of fantasy - to help us step out of our ordinary world into another.

D. K. Nuray, age 12

Review of Cogheart

Cogheart

Author: Peter Bunzl

Publisher: Usborne Publishing Ltd

Publication Date: February 2019

Where to begin? Mechanical animals? Men with mirrored eyes? Set in an intriguing alternate London with steampunk elements, Cogheart is the story of one girl’s journey to find her father, and in turn, find out the truth about her past. Lily Grace Hartman, also known as Miss Grantham at Miss Scrimshaw’s Finishing Academy for Young Ladies (which she hates), is not your average English girl. She loves gory comic books and working with her father, who makes mechanical people and animals. She never realizes that his work might endanger his life - until it does. A strange, remarkable, and perilous new world is suddenly unveiled to Lily. Fleeing her home with her new friend Robert, she soon realizes that the people meant to protect her are the ones who are the most willing to do the opposite. A thoughtful story with engaging characters, Cogheart is a great read for middle grade readers who enjoy realistic fiction and adventure.

D. K. Nuray, age 12

Review of Titans

Titans

Author: Kate O’Hearn

Publisher: Aladdin

Date of Publication: July 2019

My first thought when I finished this book was “What? No!” Fortunately, it is only the first book in the Titans series. In this book, readers get introduced to the titans Astrea and Zephyr, whose society has quarantined Earth and disdains humans. But the Titans’ planet, Titus, has problems too - quarrels with Olympians, detention, and secret prisons. Both humans and titans are forced to put aside their disputes when their worlds are brought together by alien invaders. Titans is a roller coaster of a story filled with interesting characters. It captures with humor the fine line between assumptions and reality. I highly recommend this story for readers in grades 4-10 with a soft spot for mythology and excitement.

D. K. Nuray, age 12

Review of Skychasers

Skychasers

Author: Emma Carroll

Publisher: Chicken House

Publication Date: June 2019

“Families, I reckon, are overrated.” It’s not a surprise that Magpie, an orphan thief in the streets of France, thinks this. What she doesn’t reckon is that she’ll wind up being a part of one. When Magpie is told to steal a box from the Montgolfiers, she thinks it will just put some more coins in her pocket and feed her for another day or two. Instead, she fails to get the box and is forced to go back to the house, only to save their child from near-death and become the Montgolfiers’ maid. In this whirlwind story, an ordinary family goes to the king’s court, an orphan becomes an inventor, and anyone can fly. Perhaps best for younger readers but also enjoyable for middle school readers looking for a fun read with interesting characters in a historical setting.  

D. K. Nuray, age 12

Review of Voyage of the Dogs

Voyage of the Dogs

Author: Greg Van Eekhout

Publisher: HarperCollins

Publication Date: September 2018

When the spaceship Laika is breached and the dogs Champion, Lopside, Bug, and Daisy are left alone without their humans, they must decide which is more important - their mission or their family. Or is it possible for them to save both? The four dogs you meet in this book have been handpicked and trained specifically for space travel. They are the bravest and smartest dogs on Earth (or off). They have been prepared for any and every situation that could happen. That is, as long as their humans were still on board. But when that changes, the pack must find ways to survive with minimal supplies and a collapsing ship. Voyage of the Dogs is a heartwarming story of love and survival against all odds. I recommend this tale for readers ages 9 to 13, and for science-fiction readers and dog-lovers who enjoy personification and suspense.

D. K. Nuray, age 12

Review of the original Frankenstein

Frankenstein

Author: Mary Shelley

Publisher: Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones

Date of Publication: technically 1818

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein will bring your thoughts about anything else to a complete pause. It is powerful, shocking, and brilliant. Written in the early 1800’s by a nineteen year old woman, it is a story of the limits of human ambition, and how humanity is about more than just being human. Victor Frankenstein is the scientist who creates a monster and gives it life, and then is haunted by his own creation. While its appearance is horrific, the creature begins as innocent and kind, but is not accepted by anyone and slowly begins to magnify and reflect the cruelty inflicted on him. This is what ultimately makes his actions as monstrous as his appearance. Both the scientist and his creation turn blind to almost all of the people around them, focused only on revenge on each other. The ending has a gravity to it that will weigh on your thoughts and feelings. Despite the thought-provoking moral weight of the story, Frankenstein is above all exciting, suspenseful, and frightfully compelling. 200 years and countless retelling have done nothing to dull the original tale.

D. K. Nuray, age 12