I cannot review Where She Went without reviewing If I Stay. So I will do a double review here and try not to give out any spoilers. I loved this book set so much I want everyone to read them for themselves and not hear it secondhand.

If I Stay Tells the story of seventeen year old Mia.  She is a talented, young musician who plays the cello, has a wonderful, yet quirky family and a boyfriend, Adam, who literally rocks.  The story has a unique way of backtracking through her memories seamlessly, so that you really get to know the family, their history and how much Mia loves them and loves Adam.  After a terrible accident, Mia, has an out-of-body experience that shows her world from a different perspective. As a nurse, I especially loved how Forman portrayed the nurses and hospital staff. She nailed it, from caring to cranky –  nurses do make the hospital experience what it is!

Where She Went continues on three years later with Adam being the storyteller. I have to say I missed Mia’s narrative at first, but gradually settled into hearing Adam’s voice.   Adam is so vulnerable after his experiences with Mia, but to the world he is a rock star.  He is not allowed to show his feelings of loss and therefore his anxiety is sky-high and he is very skittish, and appears arrogant and standofish to those who try to get to know him.  Spoiler alert here in that Mia does show up again in the story, though not exactly how I wanted her to.  It all makes perfect sense in the end and it doesn’t leave you hanging.  Along with the rock and roll theme throughout the book, there are lyrics at the end of the book that are great to read and tell more of the story which is awesome.

I will stop there. It’s hard, but I will stop.  Go read this book series! It is rated 14 and up.   High schoolers will like it and I think if you read it first and talk about a few things, seventh and eighth graders would like it as well.  Check out the BlogHer Book Club discussion page and find out what others are saying about this amazing book!

The book trailers can be found here and I predict a movie to be made.  It’s that good of story and what is so great about it, is that it is realistic, it could happen.  I’m off to mourn now that I have finished these books.

Any suggestions for a good read?

(Disclosure:  This is a paid review for BlogHer Book Club but the opinions expressed are my own.)

Then I was picked!  I had 30 books to choose from to give out and my number one pick was The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, not thinking I  had a chance with my first pick.

Then I got The Hunger Games! Whooo-ooo. Did I feel lucky!

So today, Monday, April 23rd, I got to giveaway twenty copies of The Hunger Games with special covers to my local high school students!  I worked with the librarian to pick the twenty lucky kids. I really wanted kids who may not like to read, but liked the movie enough to maybe want to try to read the book . She helped me find 20 kids who are reluctant readers.

Now I did deliver the book at to-darn-early-in-the-morning instead of at night, due to the fact I had a young adult book and my target population is held captive during school hours! I do think  I stayed in the bounds of the World Book Night theme though.

I love to read. I want others to love to read. Reading makes us smarter, gives us levity and takes our imaginations to amazing places.   April 23 is UNESCO’s World Book Day, chosen due to the anniversary of Cervantes’ death, as well as Shakespeare’s birth and death.  World Book Night started and is celebrated in the UK. This is the first year for the US and I hope it catches on and I get another chance next year to pass along some more books!

If this sounds like fun to you, check out the World Book Night website and make a note to apply next year to be a giver.  I am so happy and pleased that I was apart of this!

Which means right about now your child’s backpack is full of the cutest art projects you have ever seen!  Projects that you don’t want to toss but cannot realistically keep on your fridge or in a scrapbook either.  Unless this is your first child.  Then you will keep everything for years until your basement or garage is full and realize that something has to hit the recycling bin or you have to buy a bigger home.

After having Meg fill 5+ bins I started to realize that with four kids, the bin thing wasn’t happening. So three years ago I started making school project photo books on Shutterfly (tons of other sites, but Shutterfly is my fav).  I take the pictures of the projects and save them for the next book. This makes it so much easier to toss the projects.  I don’t enjoy junking them, but it is a necessary evil of motherhood. I have also made thank you cards and notecards out of some of the projects.

So back to Dr. Seuss.  Elle came home with a few really cute things that I cannot throw away. Maybe it is because she is my baby and I’m realizing that this may be my last Dr. Seuss birthday bonanza, maybe it’s because I’m tired of taking out the recycling.  Who knows?  What I do know is that an idea popped into my head that I am happy with and thought I would share.

As a reading family there are some books that will never be donated or passed on. Dr. Seuss books are those sorts of books.  Elle has fallen hard for the rhyme master and has even read me Green Eggs and Ham backwards before (a realllllly loooonnnggg story btw!). So I merged the two and have not lost any space.

I simply added her art work to the insides of the books and now the books mean even more to me than before. I can imagine Elle’s kids opening the book and seeing mommy’s artwork from when she was a girl….ahhhh. Tears. Sniff. Sniff.

Awesome.

They better appreciate this stuff!

If only is about the first year a thirteen year old, Corinna Burdette, goes through after her mother dies.  It is told from her character, and is aimed at tween/teen girls, but will keep adults interested as well.  Corinna has to go to school and be surrounded by her friends who don’t know what they should say or do.  Who sometimes say or do the wrong things.  The book goes through the seasons and focuses on her feelings and her relationship with her grieving dad as well.

It has all the normal developmental things such as body changes, boy crushes and drama over the little things plus is a great way for young people to learn about grief.  Most of us don’t know what to say or do when someone looses someone. It’s tough. I’m not very good at it really, but I am learning. I wish I would have learned earlier in my life and having a book such as this one could have been a big help.

I am encouraging Meg to read it and review it on  her blog from her point of view.  I hope Mita will read it as it may help her know that the feelings she has about loosing her mother in Ethiopia are normal, that loss is a messy, nasty thing that never goes away. It does change though, into something that softens and doesn’t sear all the time.  Someday Enu will be ready to read it as well and I think she will respond to the character well. Though our situation is different, there is still grief to be dealt with.

I must mention that Geithner has worked as a clinical social worker who has worked with children and adults who have lost a parent while they were growing up.  She is Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at George Washington University School of Medicine.  This is her first book and frankly I think she did a spectacular job. As a mom of two girls who have done counseling, I know when someone gets it.  Geithner does.

The book If Only definitely has a niche in the grief community to give girls who have lost a parent a tool to work through thier loss.  It also belongs in the mainstream middle school library as a tool to help students learn about grief in an non-stressful way and how to treat those who are grieving.

(Disclosure:  Scholastic sent me a copy of the above book at my request to read and review on my blog. No other compensation was given.)

I’ve read enough book series turned movie franchises to know that it is impossible to put everything from the book on the screen. The movies would be five hours long. I would still pay to see it, but apparently the movie people don’t know how die-hard readers can be!  The Hunger Games the movie was close enough to the book to please me. I can excuse the few missing characters, though I miss them.

If you have not read the books and only seen the movie the way Katniss gets her Mockingjay pin is not correct, and it loses some of its value I think in how she obtained it.  In the books Cinna is one of my favorite characters, he is very flamboyant, yet supportive.  The movie Cinna is certainly supportive, kind and him and Katniss work well together, but he was lacking in some of his charm.  Except for his eyeshadow, he wasn’t that WOW as he was in the book.

What I loved about the movie. Woody Harrelson as Haymitch was great, I enjoyed his portrayal.  Katniss was the Katniss from the books,  I think she nailed it.  Peeta was perfect, Gale had a small part in this first film, but I feel he is going to be perfect in this role.  I hate the whole Team Gale/Team Peeta thing. This is about Katniss!  She is not a prize to be won, she is a stand alone person.  Trying to tell this to my giggly girls is aggravating.

The violence in the movie was PG-13 for sure.  It was really hard to watch children kill children. The books can be hard to read, but as I am a visual person, it was hard to watch.  I questioned letting Mita and Meg see it on the screen.  They had read the books, I’ve tried to discuss the issues with them as they read them. I still don’t know if they get the entire picture, but I feel they are on the right track.  I would be hesitant to allow a young tween/teen see this film if they hadn’t read the books and started digesting the whole fight to the death theme of the books.  I don’t think murder should be glorified.

The theme of The Hunger Games being a reality TV show is very important for this upcoming generation especially.  It shows how real live human beings can be turned into mearly characters to play with. Watching the behind the scenes people come up with dogs, fires and darkness to add to the games appeal is reprehensible and yet it rings a bit to close to home.  Reality TV is not reality. We see people turn into diva monsters all the time for a few minutes of cheap fame.  A great discussion starter with the kids about the realities of reality TV and how human lives should not be treated lightly.

I  encourage parents to read this series if they have kids reading or watching them! If you want to learn more about them Scholastic has a great site to check out.  Have you read the books and seen the movie?  Did you allow your tweens or teens to see the movie? What are your thoughts.

Here is Meg’s blog about the movie. Notice how much time she spends on Peet and Gale! Arghh!

I hope that Mita and Meg will read this book as it speaks to their age and I think Mita can identify with the main character, Lahni.  Of course I can not push it on them to forcefully or it will come right back. The joys of having twelve year old girls!

A quick plot review:  Lahni is a tranracially adopted, only child who is fourteen years old. Her parents are white and she goes to an elite private school where she is the only student of color.  It seems her main goal in life is to not be noticed and she ends up being put in the spotlight without her asking to be.  Along the way she deals with divorcing parents, an older boy who is threatening, dealing with normal school issues and trying to find her voice.  She also developed some new relationships with adult African Americans and this makes a big impact on her.

As a mother to two trans-racially adopted children there were a few parts of the book that made me feel triumphant, as I am a much more open and affectionate mother than Lahni’s mom.  Here are a couple of lines where I felt this:

“Do you think I have a decent voice?”

“Of course I do. God knows where you get it from.  Certainly not your father or me.”

How could she be saying this. It is not as though she knows more than I do if my real mother or father were good singers.  But it was something my mom always did. Speak as though were were really one family, instead of me being apart of someone else’s.

The family dynamics demonstrated in the book showed that Lahni was very loved by her parents, but that they were distant enough to Lahni to sometimes think that they thought the adoption was a mistake.  While reading the book I would get irritated at some of the interactions of the family, but I do acknowledge  that her younger memories show a happier, close knit family. The strain of the divorce and Lahni becoming a teenager may be a couple of factors for the emptiness felt in this family. You can see both parents struggling and so can Lahni.

I have to wonder though, if the author is showing his experience or lack of experience with trans-racial adoption in this story, or if in fact this is just how he envisioned the story. I would love to talk to him and ask him.  I  hope that people don’t assume that trans-racial adoption, or any type adoption at all for that matter produces lack-luster affection in families or families who don’t address and celebrate their differences.

Any thoughts on this book if you have read it?  I really enjoyed it. I even sat in a Sears parking lot today reading it, because it was driving me nuts having it in my purse while I was running errands and I couldn’t finish it!  I love it when a book gets into me that way.

(Disclaimer:  I was not asked to read or review this book, I just wanted to for participation in the 2012 Adoption Reading Challenge hosted by Jenna.  Links are Amazon Affiliates.)

I have not watched To Kill A Mockingbird since I was young and was anxious to watch it again as an adult to glean more of a message. I am also inspired to re-read the book, and have put it on my library list.

Mita and I cozied up on an icy day when the rest of the family were on a snow hike. We popped some popcorn and watched the movie together. I love watching old movies with the kids.  Being a black and white film, long beginning credits and the length of the movie itself are a history lesson.

To Kill A Mockingbird is a movie filmed in 1962 and was based on the novel of the same name that was written by Harper Lee. Set in the deep south in the 1930′s  Atticus Fitch, a single father,  is appointed to be the defense attorney for an accused black man.  The story is shown through the prospective of Atticus’ children, and covers far more than the racial divides of the day.  For example the topic of a neighbor with a mental delay/illness shows us how people with special needs were treated and feared in that time.  The poverty of the depression is shown throughout as is the mourning a family without a mother is noted upon.

I will not give away the story as it is such a powerful one, I do recommend watching this movie and reading the book if you have never done so before.  A great movie to watch with your older children.  It was great to watch with Mita and point out how things were just  100 years ago. The jury in the courtroom consisted of twelve, white men. The courtroom only allowed blacks in the balcony and the use of the n word and calling grown black men boy was very noticeable.

To Kill A Mockingbird hits the stores January 31st in DVD and Blu-ray.  The extra features include a conversation with Gregory Peck, and his Academy Award acceptance speech for Best Actor.   I enjoyed watching the Scout Remembers feature and seeing Scout all grown up and learning the story of how she was chosen to act in the film.  The book,To Kill a Mockingbird: 50th Anniversary Edition is now available at Amazon.

(Disclosure: I was provided with a preview copy of To Kill A Mockingbird from Universal Home Entertainment for my honest review. No other compensation was received.  Amazon links are affiliate links.)

Or did they?  I have slowing gleaned that while they seem conversationally fluent, if they don’t know something they fake it, or guess the meaning by the context of the conversation.  I have learned we need to work on vocabulary, tone, sarcasm and idioms.  They are still very literal in many ways.

Enu and I have worked a lot with word ladders.  This has improved her spelling and vocabulary and they are fun to do.  I found two other books that helped with her language skills:

In A Pickle And Other Funny Idioms by Marvin Terban

Ever wonder where the expression “To let the cat out of the bag” came from? This book will tell you along with other idioms like “He got up on the wrong side of the bed” or “Keep your shirt on.”  I learned some things reading this and I know Enu did as well.

How Much Can A Bare Bear Bear? by Brian P. Cleary is a book on homonyms and homophones.  “A bee can be.” ” A horse can get hoarse from talking of course.”  An easy read that shows kids how to learn our complicated English in a fun, silly way.

I would love for Mita to read these books as well, as I know she too struggles with some of these things as Enu does. Of course a fifth grader is not always open to such suggestions from mother ;)

I wanted to share these books to help out the fellow homeschooler and the parents of newly adopted older kids who are learning English. They are helpful and fun and free if you get them from the library as I did. I did get the word ladder of Amazon, but it was totally worth the few bucks it cost.

(Disclosure: I was not asked to review these materials, nor do I make money on the links.  I should do something about that shouldn’t I!)

Before I start with my review I have to tell you that Melissa Fay Greene is a part of my adoption story.  It was her article in Good Housekeeping that I read sometime in 2004 (while pregnant with Elle) that I fell in love with Ethiopia and got my dormant adoption feelings going again.  It was also her book There Is No Me Without You that tugged at our hearts so dearly when we were doing the paper chase in 2006 and 2007.  It must be said that in tough times she has been blamed for this!  After reading her newest book, I know she doesn’t think ill of us for those blaming thoughts.   No Biking In The House provides some back story to my situation.  We used the same agency, so reading about Layla House and AAI, well it’s like reading a prequel.

Greene does a nice job in combining this biography of how her family of eleven came to be with anecdotes of daily life with her children.  As a fellow  mom who adopted after having biological kids and who twinned  two of her kids, I could really relate in some of her stories, thoughts and fears.

This book is a must read for large families and adoptive families and for families who dream of becoming large and adoptive. All mothers can relate to this story just with the hilarity that motherhood can be at times.  I loved reading how her bio kids and adoptive kids became closer, how she maintained her Ethiopian children’s heritage and languages and found the biological mother for her Bulgarian son.   She bulks against have a group home effect, and in that I can totally relate. There have been times that I feel I am the maid in a bed and breakfast.  Families have to work at being families sometimes, and that is okay. She gets International Adoption for what it is. Not a solution for poverty, but a way to build a family for parents who want to parent a child who has no family that can care for them.

The feelings that ran through me while reading No Biking In The House Without A Helmet, ranged from sadness, joy and knowing to jealously.  Yes, I said Jealously.  When reading about Helen’s disobedience over a can of Coke and how it led to an hour-long holding her violent little body I could wholeheartedly relate. I’ve been there, many, many times.  When she ended that story with “That was the only tantrum we ever had out of Helen.”  I was envious.  One time!  I’ve been spit on, bitten, kicked, pinched and hit so many times that we do not do the “holding therapy” anymore. They are just to big.  Her bout with post-adoption depression resonated in me as well.  It’s not all roses and rainbows, those first few months.

I am also acutely aware that we do not live in a diverse, metro area as she does in Atlanta.  She was able to hire an Ethiopian babysitter who spoke Amharic to her kids and could make Ethiopian food. Her town also offers many different schooling and recreation opportunities that my rural town doesn’t offer.  I wonder how my lack of access to these things have effected my girls and if that could have made the difference with some of our issues.

Melissa Fay Greene has written a thoughtful, funny and lovely book that speaks of the truths of adoption while not being to heavy of a read.  Go and read this book and laugh out-loud!

That was a lot of reading and I enjoyed 98% of it so I look forward to my new goals.

1)  Reading 3 adoption themed books at the Adoption Reading Challenge 2012.

2)  I wish to keep my reading goal at 75 books at Good Reads this year.

3)  I want to explore poetry, a type of writing that I have never spent much time on.  I hope to read at least three different poets this year.

4) I would love to do an online book club. I would adore having a in-real-life book club, but with schedules so crazy I don’t think this will be possible for many years!

5) I want to continue to write book reviews on my blog and host more book giveaways.

You may have noticed that my goals are not  higher or the same as they were last year.  I wanted a more relaxed approach as this year is going to be a busy one!  If you have any book suggestions or a Poet you think I should read please let me know.

What are your reading this year?