ISBN-13: 9780439837064 Availability: Readily Available Published: Scholastic Press, 02/01/2010
In this sequel to Drums, Girls, & Dangerous Pie, Sonnenblick follows little brother and cancer survivor Jeff-- now in 8th grade. Jeff has made it past 5 years of remission, but he's still dealing with a lot of after-effects from chemo-- he has a limp and brain problems (including lots of trouble with math). His best friend Tad is a cancer survivor, too, who is confined to a wheelchair because of nerve damage after licking brain cancer twice. This is a side of "curing" cancer you don't normally see.
Even as they deal with the aftermath of the chemical warfare their bodies have gone through, the boys are facing all the real things most kids do-- standardized tests, girls, secrets between friends. Tad is such a snarky, funny guy, and Jeff is so honest and likeable that although the premise seems weepy, the book is incredibly entertaining, even as it is emotionally meaningful.
While fans of Drums, Girls & Dangerous Pie will enjoy learning what happened to Steven and Jeff after the first book, readers new to the characters will not have any trouble diving right in. ~ Tegan
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell
I became a fan of Mitchell after I read his wildly inventive Cloud
Atlas, so I was expecting literary pyrotechnics from his latest.
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, the sweeping story of the Dutch
East Indies Company in Japan at the turn of the 19th century, reads like a
combination of Patrick O'Brien's nautical historical fiction, the
exoticism and passion of Shogun, and "Indiana Jones and the Temple of
Doom" because of a creepy part of the plot. Wow!... read the rest of Tegan's review
The City & the City by China Mieville
I think good Science Fiction uses an altered reality to reveal something
about the real world that couldn’t be revealed without that altered
setting. Great Science Fiction does this and entertains as well. China
Mieville’s The City and the City is really great Sci-fi. It
begins feeling like a dark, well-written, noir-style mystery – a body
has been found in the city of Beszel, detective Borlu has been assigned
to investigate – but the story quickly takes a sci-fi turn... read the rest of Lillian's review.