Hello fellow bookworms!
I am doing this as my weekly link-up with the lovely ladies over at The Broke and the Bookish who host this little get together.
This week the topic is which TTT topics have been your favorite? Since I have not been blogging long enough to really be able to answer this question I thought that I would just simply look through the list of topics and pick one that I want to answer. I ended up choosing my top ten children's books. I have divided the list into picture books and chapter books due to the fact that I can then accurately tell you what my true favorites are!
Picture Books:
1) Goodnight Moon Margaret Wise Brown
2) Anything by Dr. Seuss
3) Old Turtle by Douglas Wood
4) Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst
5) The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister
6) Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
7) The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein
8) The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
9) Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig
10) Strega Nona by Tomie dePaola
Chapter Books:
1) The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
2) Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
3) The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
4) Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Peterson
5) Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
6) The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes
7) Holes by Lois Sachar
8) Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling
9) A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle
10) Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli
11) The View From Saturday by E.L. Konisburg
Which children's books are your favorite? What are you favorite list ideas thus far? Let me know in the comments.
Happy Reading!
Showing posts with label recommendations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label recommendations. Show all posts
Monday, June 22, 2015
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Book Revew: When the Emperor was Divine
Title: When the Emperor was Divine
Author: Julie Otsuka
Publication: October 14, 2003
Series or Standalone: Standalone
Paperback or Hardback: Paperback
Acquired: Bought used from Second and Charles
Pages: 144
Rating: 5 stars
Summary:
On a sunny day in Berkeley, California, in 1942, a woman sees a sign in a post office window, returns to her home, and matter-of-factly begins to pack her family's possessions. Like thousands of other Japanese Americans they have been reclassified, virtually overnight, as enemy aliens and are about to be uprooted from their home and sent to a dusty internment camp in the Utah desert.
In this lean and devastatingly evocative first novel, Julie Otsuka tells their story from five flawlessly realized points of view and conveys the exact emotional texture of their experience: the thin-walled barracks and barbed-wire fences, the omnipresent fear and loneliness, the unheralded feats of heroism. When the Emperor Was Divine is a work of enormous power that makes a shameful episode of our history as immediate as today's headlines.
Review:
When the Emperor was Divine is the companion novel to The Buddha in the Attic which was written first and is her debut novel. I decided to be informed on the back story before I read her first book and I stand by this decision.
I have not read any books in the fiction genre that deal with the existence of the internment camps for Japanese Americans so this novel immediately peaked my interest. I was not sure what to expect but I was certainly not disappointed. The most gripping thing about this novel is that the main characters do not have names and all the other minor characters have an identity and are acknowledged by the main characters. This goes along with the theme of the story in which the people who were put in these camps by the U.S. government were stripped of their identity. In order to "prove" that they were not spies they were forced to strip down their heritage and denounce all ties to their family back in Japan.
I loved all of the characters and we get to see a little bit from the point of view of the mother, the sister, the brother, and the father. The father was already in a camp at the beginning of the story so we don't really hear from his point of view for a while except through the letters that he sends to his family. The rest of the family is packing up their house in anticipation of being sent to a different internment camp in the middle of the desert. The two children in the beginning are able to keep up their morale and handle things with that sense of childlike wonder and innocence. They understand that they have to go away from home but they do not understand the full significance of what is going on in the world and in the United States. Overall the book does a great job depicting the fear and hopelessness that the people in these camps felt while they were there. I liked that the story continued on after their release and showed the struggles that the main characters faced when they returned home. People were still not very accepting of them because of their heritage which only added to their sadness and loss of identity. The author also focuses on the family unit which is an element that I love to be included in books. I won't say a whole lot on that subject because I do not want to spoil the book for you.
Overall I absolutely adored this book and I read all of it in one sitting so I know that it was good. I highly recommend this book and I hope to read more by this author and more books on this subject.
Happy Reading!
Wednesday, June 3, 2015
Book Review: The Secret History
Title: The Secret HistoryAuthor: Donna Tartt
Published: April 13, 2015
Series or Standalone: Standalone
Hardback or Paperback: Paperback
Acquired: Bought new from Books a Million
Pages: 559
Rating: 5 stars
Summary:
Under the influence of their charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at an elite New England college discover a way of thinking and living that is a world away from the humdrum existence of their contemporaries. But when they go beyond the boundaries of normal morality they slip gradually from obsession to corruption and betrayal, and at last - inexorably - into evil.
Review:
I found out about this book from Choncey Boddington who has a YouTube channel when she just raved about how much she loved this book. Since we have similar taste in books her opinion was one that I trusted and I knew that I needed to check this book out. I would just like to say that the synopsis on the back is amazing, how could you not want to read this book?
The story starts out confessing the crime that the group of students committed and then jumps back in time to give the events that lead up to the fateful night. By the time that the actual crime happens the reader is fully engrossed in the character's state of mind and can feel the waves of emotion coming off the page. The author did an amazing job with her characterization, even some of the more minor characters just have such addicting personalities that the reader can't help but feel for all of them. While at first the amount of drinking and drugs seems a bit excessive and over exaggerated when I got to thinking about it I could bring to mind a few friends from college who were big partiers. By the end of the book I felt like the characters had always been apart of my life and I could feel my own emotions intertwining with theirs.
In addition to the amazing characterization is a glimpse into the multiple codes of moral conduct that are called into question and the different ways that people deal with grief. The book touches on a variety of topics including murder, incest, addiction, and abuse which are handled differently by each character. Some of them slip into a deeper depression and turn to other evils to help alleviate their pain while other characters are disturbingly awakened by the evil that they commit. While this is disturbing and slightly unnerving it is still believable. That is what makes this book so haunting is that the characters are so well done that they could be people in your everyday life. It calls into question just how well you actually know someone and what lengths they might go to in order to protect themselves and their own interests.
I highly recommend this book and I want to pick up more by this author.
Happy Reading!
Monday, June 1, 2015
Top Ten Books That I Want to be Seen Made Into Movies/TV Shows
I am doing this as my weekly link-up with the lovely ladies over at The Broke and the Bookish who host this little get together.
This week the topic is what books do we want to be seen made into TV shows or movies. Personally I do not think that books really make great movies/TV shows and here is why. I feel that a movie does not always have the ability to capture all of the awesomeness that is in the book and a TV show will often embellish just a little bit too much. So my list is going to be books that I believe should be movies because I would rather lose a few things than have so much added that it completely changes the storyline (I am looking at you Vampire Diaries!).
1) Catherine by April Lindner
Catherine is tired of struggling musicians befriending her just so they can get a gig at her Dad’s famous Manhattan club, The Underground. Then she meets mysterious Hence, an unbelievably passionate and talented musician on the brink of success. As their relationship grows, both are swept away in a fiery romance. But when their love is tested by a cruel whim of fate, will pride keep them apart?
Chelsea has always believed that her mom died of a sudden illness, until she finds a letter her dad has kept from her for years—a letter from her mom, Catherine, who didn’t die: She disappeared. Driven by unanswered questions, Chelsea sets out to look for her—starting with the return address on the letter: The Underground.
Told in two voices, twenty years apart, Catherine interweaves a timeless forbidden romance with a compelling modern mystery.
2) The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called "Le Cirque des Reves," and it is only open at night.
But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.
True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus performers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.
3) Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
Surrounded by enemies, the once-great nation of Ravka has been torn in two by the Shadow Fold, a swath of near impenetrable darkness crawling with monsters who feast on human flesh. Now its fate may rest on the shoulders of one lonely refugee.
Alina Starkov has never been good at anything. But when her regiment is attacked on the Fold and her best friend is brutally injured, Alina reveals a dormant power that saves his life—a power that could be the key to setting her war-ravaged country free. Wrenched from everything she knows, Alina is whisked away to the royal court to be trained as a member of the Grisha, the magical elite led by the mysterious Darkling.
Yet nothing in this lavish world is what it seems. With darkness looming and an entire kingdom depending on her untamed power, Alina will have to confront the secrets of the Grisha . . . and the secrets of her heart.
Shadow and Bone is the first installment in Leigh Bardugo's Grisha Trilogy.
4) The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken
When Ruby woke up on her tenth birthday, something about her had changed. Something alarming enough to make her parents lock her in the garage and call the police. Something that gets her sent to Thurmond, a brutal government “rehabilitation camp.” She might have survived the mysterious disease that’s killed most of America’s children, but she and the others have emerged with something far worse: frightening abilities they cannot control.
Now sixteen, Ruby is one of the dangerous ones.
When the truth comes out, Ruby barely escapes Thurmond with her life. Now she’s on the run, desperate to find the one safe haven left for kids like her—East River. She joins a group of kids who escaped their own camp. Liam, their brave leader, is falling hard for Ruby. But no matter how much she aches for him, Ruby can’t risk getting close. Not after what happened to her parents.
When they arrive at East River, nothing is as it seems, least of all its mysterious leader. But there are other forces at work, people who will stop at nothing to use Ruby in their fight against the government. Ruby will be faced with a terrible choice, one that may mean giving up her only chance at a life worth living.
5) Saint Maybe by Anne Tyler
In 1965, the happy Bedloe family is living an ideal, apple-pie existence in Baltimore. Then, in the blink of an eye, a single tragic event occurs that will transform their lives forever--particularly that of seventeen-year-old Ian Bedloe, the youngest son, who blames himself for the sudden "accidental" death of his older brother.
Depressed and depleted, Ian is almost crushed under the weight of an unbearable, secret guilt. Then one crisp January evening, he catches sight of a window with glowing yellow neon, the CHURCH OF THE SECOND CHANCE. He enters and soon discovers that forgiveness must be earned, through a bit of sacrifice and a lot of love...
6) Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant by Anne Tyler
Pearl Tull is nearing the end of her life but not of her memory. It was a Sunday night in 1944 when her husband left the little row house on Baltimore’s Calvert Street, abandoning Pearl to raise their three children alone: Jenny, high-spirited and determined, nurturing to strangers but distant to those she loves; the older son, Cody, a wild and incorrigible youth possessed by the lure of power and money; and sweet, clumsy Ezra, Pearl’s favorite, who never stops yearning for the perfect family that could never be his own.
Now Pearl and her three grown children have gathered together again–with anger, hope, and a beautiful, harsh, and dazzling story to tell.
7) The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
Four mothers, four daughters, four families whose histories shift with the four winds depending on who's "saying" the stories. In 1949 four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, begin meeting to eat dim sum, play mahjong, and talk. United in shared unspeakable loss and hope, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. Rather than sink into tragedy, they choose to gather to raise their spirits and money. "To despair was to wish back for something already lost. Or to prolong what was already unbearable." Forty years later the stories and history continue.With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between mothers and daughters. As each woman reveals her secrets, trying to unravel the truth about her life, the strings become more tangled, more entwined. Mothers boast or despair over daughters, and daughters roll their eyes even as they feel the inextricable tightening of their matriarchal ties. Tan is an astute storyteller, enticing readers to immerse themselves into these lives of complexity and mystery.
8) 1984 by George Orwell
While 1984 has come and gone, Orwell's narrative is more timely than ever. 1984 presents a "negative utopia", that is at once a startling and haunting vision of the world — so powerful that it's completely convincing from start to finish. No one can deny the power of this novel, its hold on the imaginations of entire generations of readers, or the resiliency of its admonitions — a legacy that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.
9) Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell
Cath is a Simon Snow fan.
Okay, the whole world is a Simon Snow fan...
But for Cath, being a fan is her life—and she’s really good at it. She and her twin sister, Wren, ensconced themselves in the Simon Snow series when they were just kids; it’s what got them through their mother leaving.
Reading. Rereading. Hanging out in Simon Snow forums, writing Simon Snow fan fiction, dressing up like the characters for every movie premiere.
Cath’s sister has mostly grown away from fandom, but Cath can’t let go. She doesn’t want to.
Now that they’re going to college, Wren has told Cath she doesn’t want to be roommates. Cath is on her own, completely outside of her comfort zone. She’s got a surly roommate with a charming, always-around boyfriend, a fiction-writing professor who thinks fan fiction is the end of the civilized world, a handsome classmate who only wants to talk about words... And she can’t stop worrying about her dad, who’s loving and fragile and has never really been alone.
For Cath, the question is: Can she do this?
10) Cinder by Marissa Meyer
Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl.
Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.
Do you guys agree about not really being down with movie/TV adaptations of books or am I alone on this train? Let me know down in the comments.
Happy Reading!
This week the topic is what books do we want to be seen made into TV shows or movies. Personally I do not think that books really make great movies/TV shows and here is why. I feel that a movie does not always have the ability to capture all of the awesomeness that is in the book and a TV show will often embellish just a little bit too much. So my list is going to be books that I believe should be movies because I would rather lose a few things than have so much added that it completely changes the storyline (I am looking at you Vampire Diaries!).
1) Catherine by April Lindner
Catherine is tired of struggling musicians befriending her just so they can get a gig at her Dad’s famous Manhattan club, The Underground. Then she meets mysterious Hence, an unbelievably passionate and talented musician on the brink of success. As their relationship grows, both are swept away in a fiery romance. But when their love is tested by a cruel whim of fate, will pride keep them apart?Chelsea has always believed that her mom died of a sudden illness, until she finds a letter her dad has kept from her for years—a letter from her mom, Catherine, who didn’t die: She disappeared. Driven by unanswered questions, Chelsea sets out to look for her—starting with the return address on the letter: The Underground.
Told in two voices, twenty years apart, Catherine interweaves a timeless forbidden romance with a compelling modern mystery.
2) The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
The circus arrives without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within the black-and-white striped canvas tents is an utterly unique experience full of breathtaking amazements. It is called "Le Cirque des Reves," and it is only open at night.But behind the scenes, a fierce competition is underway—a duel between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood expressly for this purpose by their mercurial instructors. Unbeknownst to them, this is a game in which only one can be left standing, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will. Despite themselves, however, Celia and Marco tumble headfirst into love—a deep, magical love that makes the lights flicker and the room grow warm whenever they so much as brush hands.
True love or not, the game must play out, and the fates of everyone involved, from the cast of extraordinary circus performers to the patrons, hang in the balance, suspended as precariously as the daring acrobats overhead.
3) Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
Surrounded by enemies, the once-great nation of Ravka has been torn in two by the Shadow Fold, a swath of near impenetrable darkness crawling with monsters who feast on human flesh. Now its fate may rest on the shoulders of one lonely refugee.Alina Starkov has never been good at anything. But when her regiment is attacked on the Fold and her best friend is brutally injured, Alina reveals a dormant power that saves his life—a power that could be the key to setting her war-ravaged country free. Wrenched from everything she knows, Alina is whisked away to the royal court to be trained as a member of the Grisha, the magical elite led by the mysterious Darkling.
Yet nothing in this lavish world is what it seems. With darkness looming and an entire kingdom depending on her untamed power, Alina will have to confront the secrets of the Grisha . . . and the secrets of her heart.
Shadow and Bone is the first installment in Leigh Bardugo's Grisha Trilogy.
4) The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken
When Ruby woke up on her tenth birthday, something about her had changed. Something alarming enough to make her parents lock her in the garage and call the police. Something that gets her sent to Thurmond, a brutal government “rehabilitation camp.” She might have survived the mysterious disease that’s killed most of America’s children, but she and the others have emerged with something far worse: frightening abilities they cannot control.Now sixteen, Ruby is one of the dangerous ones.
When the truth comes out, Ruby barely escapes Thurmond with her life. Now she’s on the run, desperate to find the one safe haven left for kids like her—East River. She joins a group of kids who escaped their own camp. Liam, their brave leader, is falling hard for Ruby. But no matter how much she aches for him, Ruby can’t risk getting close. Not after what happened to her parents.
When they arrive at East River, nothing is as it seems, least of all its mysterious leader. But there are other forces at work, people who will stop at nothing to use Ruby in their fight against the government. Ruby will be faced with a terrible choice, one that may mean giving up her only chance at a life worth living.
5) Saint Maybe by Anne Tyler
In 1965, the happy Bedloe family is living an ideal, apple-pie existence in Baltimore. Then, in the blink of an eye, a single tragic event occurs that will transform their lives forever--particularly that of seventeen-year-old Ian Bedloe, the youngest son, who blames himself for the sudden "accidental" death of his older brother.Depressed and depleted, Ian is almost crushed under the weight of an unbearable, secret guilt. Then one crisp January evening, he catches sight of a window with glowing yellow neon, the CHURCH OF THE SECOND CHANCE. He enters and soon discovers that forgiveness must be earned, through a bit of sacrifice and a lot of love...
6) Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant by Anne Tyler
Pearl Tull is nearing the end of her life but not of her memory. It was a Sunday night in 1944 when her husband left the little row house on Baltimore’s Calvert Street, abandoning Pearl to raise their three children alone: Jenny, high-spirited and determined, nurturing to strangers but distant to those she loves; the older son, Cody, a wild and incorrigible youth possessed by the lure of power and money; and sweet, clumsy Ezra, Pearl’s favorite, who never stops yearning for the perfect family that could never be his own.Now Pearl and her three grown children have gathered together again–with anger, hope, and a beautiful, harsh, and dazzling story to tell.
7) The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
Four mothers, four daughters, four families whose histories shift with the four winds depending on who's "saying" the stories. In 1949 four Chinese women, recent immigrants to San Francisco, begin meeting to eat dim sum, play mahjong, and talk. United in shared unspeakable loss and hope, they call themselves the Joy Luck Club. Rather than sink into tragedy, they choose to gather to raise their spirits and money. "To despair was to wish back for something already lost. Or to prolong what was already unbearable." Forty years later the stories and history continue.With wit and sensitivity, Amy Tan examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between mothers and daughters. As each woman reveals her secrets, trying to unravel the truth about her life, the strings become more tangled, more entwined. Mothers boast or despair over daughters, and daughters roll their eyes even as they feel the inextricable tightening of their matriarchal ties. Tan is an astute storyteller, enticing readers to immerse themselves into these lives of complexity and mystery.8) 1984 by George Orwell
While 1984 has come and gone, Orwell's narrative is more timely than ever. 1984 presents a "negative utopia", that is at once a startling and haunting vision of the world — so powerful that it's completely convincing from start to finish. No one can deny the power of this novel, its hold on the imaginations of entire generations of readers, or the resiliency of its admonitions — a legacy that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.9) Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell
Cath is a Simon Snow fan.Okay, the whole world is a Simon Snow fan...
But for Cath, being a fan is her life—and she’s really good at it. She and her twin sister, Wren, ensconced themselves in the Simon Snow series when they were just kids; it’s what got them through their mother leaving.
Reading. Rereading. Hanging out in Simon Snow forums, writing Simon Snow fan fiction, dressing up like the characters for every movie premiere.
Cath’s sister has mostly grown away from fandom, but Cath can’t let go. She doesn’t want to.
Now that they’re going to college, Wren has told Cath she doesn’t want to be roommates. Cath is on her own, completely outside of her comfort zone. She’s got a surly roommate with a charming, always-around boyfriend, a fiction-writing professor who thinks fan fiction is the end of the civilized world, a handsome classmate who only wants to talk about words... And she can’t stop worrying about her dad, who’s loving and fragile and has never really been alone.
For Cath, the question is: Can she do this?
10) Cinder by Marissa Meyer
Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.
Do you guys agree about not really being down with movie/TV adaptations of books or am I alone on this train? Let me know down in the comments.
Happy Reading!
Thursday, May 28, 2015
Book Review: A Monster Calls
Title: A Monster CallsAuthor: Patrick Ness
Published: March 12, 2013
Series or Standalone: Standalone
Hardback or Paperback: Paperback
Acquired: Bought used with my own money
Pages: 206
Rating: 5 stars
Summary:
An unflinching, darkly funny, and deeply moving story of a boy, his seriously ill mother, and an unexpected monstrous visitor.
At seven minutes past midnight, thirteen-year-old Conor wakes to find a monster outside his bedroom window. But it isn't the monster Conor's been expecting-- he's been expecting the one from his nightmare, the nightmare he's had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments. The monster in his backyard is different. It's ancient. And wild. And it wants something from Conor. Something terrible and dangerous. It wants the truth. From the final idea of award-winning author Siobhan Dowd-- whose premature death from cancer prevented her from writing it herself-- Patrick Ness has spun a haunting and darkly funny novel of mischief, loss, and monsters both real and imagined.
Review:
I absolutely adored the book! It is one of the few books that has actually reduced me to a puddle of tears while simultaneously ripping my heart out to tear it into a thousand pieces. Only put it back together at the very end of the story. I thought about this book for so long after I read it and it still can bring tears to my eyes when I think about certain parts. I am not usually a very emotional person so this kind of reaction was not exactly expected.
The story just grips you from the very beginning and never lets you go. It is one of the most beautiful and compelling storylines that I have ever encountered and I am just mad that I put off reading the book for so long. It has been sitting on my shelves just waiting for me to get to it for over a year now. I read the entire book in one sitting and had trouble putting it down to perform basic functions such as breathing and eating. I did have to stop at one part though and come back to it later (my roommates came home and I did not want to have to explain why I was sobbing like a baby over a book).
The characters were easy to relate to, which is something that I have found is extremely important to me when reading a book. I could definitely root for the home team so to speak and all I wanted was for both the mom and son to finally be healed by whichever method the author saw fit. I loved the character development that takes place with Conner, our main character. He starts off feeling angry and alone because his entire world has been turned upside down by his mom's illness. It is easy to feel sorry for him and to understand where his anger and frustration come from. Throughout the book we see him come to terms with the gravity of the situation and search for the ultimate healing source: acceptance and forgiveness.
This book does deal with some very difficult subjects like cancer, grief, bullying, and forgiveness. Cancer is a subject that always hits close to home for me and I am sure a lot of people can relate. We have all known someone who has been affected by cancer which is a disease that leaves devastation in its wake for both the patient and the family members. Grief is also a subject that many people can relate to because everyone has dealt with things in their life that have caused them immense pain and you know that those wounds do not heal easily. Perhaps the most difficult subject touched upon is the concept of forgiveness. I know that we all struggle with the ability to forgive people who have hurt us and situations that are out of our control. I know that there are things in my life which I have had to consciously say that I am no longer going to carry their weight around with me and I need to let this pain go. That is the main thing that Conner is struggling with because he has carried the weight of the pain that his parent's splitting up and his mother's illness have caused him for so long that he has forgotten what it feels like to be free.
I highly recommend this book because not only is the writing absolute perfection but the illustrations that accompany it are breathtaking. In short this is perhaps the best book that I have read this year!
Happy Reading!
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