TBR - books To Be Read AND books To Be Reviewed! (reflective)

Well, the holiday season is almost complete, the old year nearly done, the new year peeking around the clocktower... and soon I'll be back in the saddle, writing BooksYALove blog posts, recommending YA books that you might miss if you rely on the big-box stores' displays and promotions.

So it's a great time to make resolutions - especially ones that you can successfully keep! I'm taking my cue from Evie over at her Bookish blog and concentrating on my overflowing TBR piles and shelves.

For me, that's the To Be Read shelves, whose covers I haven't even opened yet, as well as the other TBR shelves, my To Be Reviewed/Recommended books, the ones that I've read and enjoyed, but haven't quite gotten around to crafting my recommendations for... yet.

And they're really good books! Otherwise, I just chuck them into the giveaway box. Y'all don't have time to read ho-hum, formulaic books, do you? So I have stacks of 2012 copyright books that I haven't told you about...yet.

So that's my priority for BooksYALove in 2013: to efficiently tackle my 2012 awesome books while bringing you the best debut titles and books from smaller publishers as they arrive, hot off the presses throughout the year. TBR Challenge, here I come!

To keep me honest, I'm registering my intent over on Evie's blog: http://www.evie-bookish.blogspot.com/p/welcome-to-2012-tbr-pile-reading.html and will be checking in with a linked post monthly, highlighting my 2012 must-reads, as shared with y'all through BooksYALove (and usually on Barb Langridge's abookandahug site, too: www.abookandahug.com).

Promising an exact number of posts each week seems unrealistic, but I'll do my best to make you hungry to read these wonderful books at your local library or purchased from your favorite indie bookstore (keep your money in town, okay?) - and please, let me know if I'm bringing you titles that sound intriguing, unmissable, or out-of-the-ordinary.

Indeed, 2012 was a great year for Young Adult books, so let's hope that 2013 is equally stellar.
Which genre is your can't-wait-to-read favorite? Happy New Year, and happy reading!

*kmm
(celebratory cat cartoon courtesy of DesignedToaT: http://www.designedtoat.com/newyears.shtml)

Iron Hearted Violet, by Kelly Barnhill (fiction) - a plain princess, evil whispers, lying mirrors

Must every princess be beautiful?
Must every king be brave?
If they aren't, can the realm survive?

Secret rooms in the castle, glinting hints in mirrors, lost dragons under the two-sunned sky - Princess Violet lives in a world where stories have more power than anyone living can imagine, and no one living can imagine the threat that lies just ahead for the kingdom.

Find this September-published adventure of a most-unusual princess,  a clever stableboy, a forbidden book, and a long-suppressed god of the metaverse at your local library or independent bookstore today.
**kmm

Book info: Iron Hearted Violet / Kelly Barnhill; illustrator: Iacopo Bruno. Little Brown, 2012. [author's blog] [publisher site] [illustrator interview]

My Recommendation: Princess Violet isn’t beautiful, but she is brave and clever and loved by all. If royal storyteller Cassian hadn’t always made the princesses in his stories beautiful, perhaps plain-looking Violet might not have listened to the sinister whispers from mirror corners, might not have searched deep below the castle with her friend Demetrius, might not have found the evil something that wants to destroy their world.

In the Old World, there were twelve gods (no one dares speak of the thirteenth) and dragons and such. Now, the King has gone searching for the possible last dragon, taking Demetrius along for his amazing skill with animals, little realizing that the Mountain King is preparing to invade the Andulan Realms or that the something beneath the castle is spreading evil thoughts like a fog.

Perhaps Violet can change her mismatched eyes to the blue of the sky, if she discovers enough secrets in the hidden library. Perhaps she can be a “real princess” if she becomes beautiful, the unwanted thought sneaks in. Perhaps the evil Nybbas will be able to control everything if it leads Violet along the selfish path that makes her neglect the kingdom…

A mournful dragon who can’t remember where it has hidden its heart, the ill-health of Queen Rose, three very worried ancient guardians, and the twisty stories used by Nybbas to turn people on one another – is Violet strong enough to discover her true path and save her kingdom? Can the wrong stories be turned right before both suns set forever?

This epic tale of adventure and forgiveness introduces an unforgettable princess, as she and Demetrius discover the true power of stories in creating the world.  (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

The Filth Licker, by Cristy Burne (fiction) - Japanese demons attack British school camp!

A week at camp with school chums means bonfires,
ghost stories, silly pranks,
demon attacks?

Away from the protective pillar in her family's home back in Japan, Miku is accosted by yokai, unearthly spirits ranging from annoying to deadly. And away from London, with just a few teacher-chaperones, Miku's classmates will find more in the forest than normal foxes and badgers.

Cursed tofu and Shape Shifters, an amnesia attack on her best friend, sickle weasels and a yuki-onna - maybe the seventh graders should have stayed at school!

Grab the first Takeshita Demons  book (my recommendation here) at your local library or independent bookstore along with The Filth Licker  (#2). You ought to get Monster Matsuri  (#3) while you're there - you know that the demons will keep chasing Miku and her friends!

Hmmm...and perhaps you'd consider having a toad-shaped aka-na-me in your bathroom to slurp up mold and soap scum, right?
**kmm

Book info: The Filth Licker (Takeshita Demons #2) / Cristy Burne; illustrated by Siku. Frances Lincoln Children's Books, 2011.  [author's website] [publisher site] 

My Recommendation:  A week at camp should be great, but Miku senses demons lurking in the forest. Cait scoffs at her – until the ghost stories told by school friends around the bonfire start coming true!

Ever since Miku’s family moved from their ancestral Japanese home to London, evil spirits have targeted them. So the young teen brings protective charms to camp, along with all the stories and knowledge of the supernatural shared by her grandmother before they left for England.

Of course, nothing can keep Alex from calling her names or stop goofy Oscar from eating anything offered (eww, now he has a stinky black rash!). No one could predict that they’d find a red aka-na-me Filth Licker in the boys’ bathroom, or that its pet keukegen might innocently attract malicious ShapeShifters to camp.

When the campers’ round-robin ghost stories accidentally complete an ancient ritual, the woods become alive with evil spirits in animal bodies, trickster sprites rain down stinging sand from the trees, and Cait’s memory starts to blank out. And somehow, Alex stops teasing Miku and starts helping her track down the forest demons before they can get the rest of their friends.

Which animals will the demons use for their attack? Have the ShapeShifters already taken over any of the campers? Can Miku and friends turn back these evil forces before it’s too late?

Second in the Takeshita Demons’ series, The Filth Licker is followed by Monster Matsuri (#3) as Miku continues to face ancient evil Japanese spirits in a modern world.  (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

Bill the Boy Wonder: The Secret Co-Creator of Batman, by Marc Tyler Nobleman (nonfiction)

Gotham City,
Bruce Wayne,
The Dark Knight.

These words make us think immediately of Batman. Fans of the DC Comics series or the 1960s television show might even name Bob Kane as the character's creator.

But Batman had two fathers - and now his co-creator's story is finally being fully told through Marc Tyler Nobleman's careful research. Using the "Golden Age of Comics" style, illustrator Ty Templeton presents the pivotal events in the superhero's journey into print.

Whether you're a fan of comics in general or Batman in particular, you owe it to yourself to get this book to learn the true story behind the legend. Available now at your local library or independent bookstore.
**kmm

Book info: Bill the Boy Wonder: the Secret Co-Creator of Batman / Marc Tyler Nobleman; illustrated by Ty Templeton. Charlesbridge, 2012.  [author's blog]     [illustrator's blog]     [book website]  [publisher site]    [book trailer]  

My Recommendation:

Bill Finger was so good at crafting secret identities that he co-created Batman, one of the greatest super-heroes in comics, while remaining in the shadows himself.

He changed his name from Milton to the less-Jewish-sounding Bill to avoid the widespread anti-Semitism in 1930s New York City. Although he wanted to be a writer, he took any job available during the Depression. Then he met cartoonist Bob Kane who asked Bill to write adventure stories that he could illustrate, just after the epic debut of Superman.

Challenged by their editor to create a new superhero, Bob sketched all weekend, but needed Bill’s inventive mind to make the character come to life. Taking Bob’s drawing of a red-clad Bat-man with large wings, Bill told him to change the small mask into a face-covering cowl with slitted eyeholes and pointed bat-ears, make the rigid batwings into a swirling cape, and clad their hero in all-black. This new superhero made DC Comics into a very successful company.

Bob took all the credit for Batman – in those times, it was common for a comic to use several illustrators and inkers to complete the drawings with just the main cartoonist being named. But even as the success of Batman grew, Bob refused to give Bill credit for being the series’ writer.

Bill’s strong storytelling skills gave Batman all the details that we recognize today – a human without superpowers, orphaned during a terrible crime, a vigilante detective protecting his city from master villains like the Joker and Catwoman. Bob called Bill a “boy wonder” because he kept coming up with ideas for the series; when Bill decided that the Dark Knight needed someone to talk to, another boy wonder came into being, Batman’s sidekick Robin.

It was widely known in the comics community that Bill wrote all the Batman comics stories, but it took decades before he was publicly recognized for his work in creating Batman’s character. Today, the Bill Finger Award for Excellence in Comic Book Writing honors the best story creators in the business.

Fittingly, the main events of Bill’s life and Batman’s origins are told in graphic novel format in this book, followed several pages of detailed information about Batman’s history and Bill’s family – a fascinating mystery finally brought to light in classic comic book style. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

The Big Picture (reflective)

Have you ever WORDLED? I used their free app to create the nifty word cloud here, using my initial blogpost about MotherReader and Lee Wind's annual Comment Challenge for kidlit bloggers, 2012 edition.

What fun it's been to "meet" illustrators, authors, and book bloggers through the Challenge! Getting out of my "writing silo" where I see only my computer screen and the books that I'm recommending so that I interact more with the diverse and supportive kidlit community online - priceless!

Since BooksYALove is a fairly new blog, I'm grateful for new visitors (and new followers - yay!) who will help spread the word about the wonderful YA books from debut authors and smaller imprints that I'm discovering.

After all, I'm writing these recommendations (no spoilers ever! I promise) for YA readers... right book for the right reader!
**kmm

You Just Can't Help It! (nonfiction)

From the "oohh!" to the "ewww!!!" on Fun Friday, we're taking an off-beat (but very well-researched) look at curious and confusing aspects of human behavior.

If you've ever wondered whether birth order really makes a difference in how people behave as adults or how colors affect our moods, you'll love perusing this lively book from Canadian author Szpirglas, whose previous titles include Gross Universe (more ewww) and They Did What?! (more oohh).

You'll understand yourself, your friends, and your family better after learning that You Just Can't Help It, plus some fun animal behavior facts and unusual scientific research studies, too.

**kmm

Book info: You Just Can't Help It! Your Guide to the Wild and Wacky World of Human Behavior / Jeff Szpirglas; illustrated by Josh Holinaty. Maple Tree Press, 2011. [author's info] [publisher's site]

Recommendation: Ingredients of human tears? Ten million shades of color? Birth order and cattle egrets? Dive into the world of senses, emotions, communication, and human interaction.

Human behavior can be accurately predicted in some areas – body language of liars, organization of army ants, gesturing while talking – while it’s variable in others – most annoying sound or what makes someone laugh.

Find answers to puzzlers like “why can’t you tickle yourself?” and “why do stores play music?” while you learn about your senses. Learn how to detect fake happiness and true fear, as well as the one hand gesture that means the same thing in almost every culture (and it’s not the one you’d expect).

What facial muscle helps your nose avoid stinky stuff? Why do we use “um” and “uh” and “like” when we speak? Why do crowded elevators make us nervous? And what about that whole birth order thing, anyway?

Canadian author Szpirglas helps you understand more about why you, your friends, your pets, and other creatures act the way that they do with this funny and factual book of wacky information and cool experiments. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Pieces of Me, by Charlotte Gingras (fiction) - seeking friendship, hiding Mom's illness

Being a teenager is difficult. Coping with a parent's mental illness can make it unbearable. And it's just Mira and her mom, in that basement apartment.

How can you be anyone's friend if your mother has your walk home from school timed to the second? Who wouldn't have a crush on the only teacher who ever encouraged you?

Originally published in French as La Liberté. Connais pas... this slim, lyrical story won a 1999 Governor General's Literary Award from the Canada Council for the Arts. Susan Ouriou's translation is flowing and true, bringing us Mira's story from the chilly Quebec streets.

Find this gem at your local library or independent bookstore to hear Mira's tale.
**kmm

Book info: Pieces of Me / Charlotte Gingras; translated by Susan Ouriou. Kids Can Press, 2009. [author biography in French] [publisher site]

Recommendation: At 14, Mirabelle feels separated from real life – trapped in the basement apartment by her divorced mother who knows to the minute how long it takes Mira to walk home from school, reading in the school library so she doesn’t have to talk to anyone at lunch, hiding behind her long golden hair so no one sees her sketches.

Then Catherine arrives at school, and Mira’s life moves out of its dark cloud, bit by bit. They invent a club so that they can meet after school in the café once a week. Cath brings Mira to a table of friends at lunch. And they both work hard at the challenging assignments in art class.

Cath gets a boyfriend and drifts away, just a little, as Mira’s admiration of her art teacher becomes infatuation, and life becomes more complicated. Her wildlife biologist father returns to the city, asking about her plans for college – a startling idea for Mira, who isn’t sure how her mother would survive without her.

Discerning older teen readers will remember Mira’s love of color, her worries about her first kiss, and her dreams of escaping the basement apartment long after they close this slim volume, lyrically translated from the French by Susan Ouriou. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

Annexed (fiction)

Anne Frank and the Annex - so many have read her story through her diary. Radio messages from the Dutch officials exiled in London during World War II reminded those who remained in the Netherlands that their diaries and memoirs would be testaments to the Nazis' atrocities. Anne knew this as she wrote, always striving to be "a writer" and telling the tales of hope and deprivation and worry that circled and recircled in the Annex.

So hearing Peter's voice brings more to the story, like looking at a familiar statue from another angle gives us a different perspective. Not everyone has been pleased with this alternate view of the Annex, but Dogar's comments on the controversy reveal that she wrote Annexed because she and her daughter wondered what happened after the Diary ended, not to rewrite Anne's history.

A gripping story well worth reading (with hankie in hand).
**kmm

Book info: Annexed / Sharon Dogar. Houghton Mifflin, 2010. [author interview] [publisher site] [book trailer]

Recommendation: Peter walks slowly, savoring the sun and wind before he enters the Annex. Who knows how long the Franks and his family will stay there, Jews escaping the Nazis in Holland by going into hiding?

Yes, those Franks. This is Peter’s side of the struggle for survival chronicled in The Diary of Anne Frank, as the young man gives up his first romance, his training, his future, just trying to stay alive day by day. Oh, the story was whispered in Amsterdam that both families had fled, far from the ominous army trucks which loaded up in Jewish neighborhoods and returned to the city – empty.

Peter longs for his woodworking tools, not the books that Anne and Margot seem to live in. How appropriate that a bookcase covers the hidden door into the Annex! How difficult it must have been for others to bring food to those in the Annex when there was little to find.

As time passes, books become more appealing to Peter… as does Anne, who is no longer the child who entered the Annex. Anne – who writes to tell the truth, who writes as a testimony against the cruelty of the Nazis.

We know that this saga does not end well. Peter’s tale continues on the horrific train journey out of the city, to the brutalities of the prison camp called Auschwitz. Annexed is a powerful story for mature readers, no less real because it uses the voice of fiction. (One of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) Review copy courtesy of the publisher.

I Love Him to Pieces (fiction)

Romance, baseball, zombies... a typical high school day, right? This is such a great comic! Its subtitles - "My Date is a Dead Weight, or He Only Loves Me For my Brains" - hint at the tone of the whole book - really funny, a little creepy, a touch slapstick.

The writer and artist together have crafted a very plausible way for the "mutated Cordyceps fungus" to infect people and, uh, dissolve their brains. And it doesn't take long for the "zombie fungus" to do its work... Hey, the CDC just released Emergency Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse on 5/16/11 - life imitates art?!

Tsang's writing is humorous and serious in all the right places, while Gorrissen's drawings make every character distinctive and real - both cartoonish and lifelike at the same time (except thoroughly dead, in the zombies' cases).

Dicey is a hoot, playing baseball on the varsity team and giving the guys back what they dish out, while Jack is super-brainy, getting totally flustered when Dicey agrees to a date = you can just see him blush, even though the whole book is in black and white.

I was excited to see that I Love Him to Pieces was nominated for YALSA's 2012 "Great Graphic Novels for Teens" list. So nice that they confirmed my enthusiasm!
**kmm

Book info: I Love Him to Pieces (My Boyfriend is a Monster #1) / by Evonne Tsang; art by Janina Gorrissen. Graphic Universe/Lerner, 2011. [author interview] [artist's website] [series site] [publisher site]

Recommendation: Who knew that being “egg parents” together for a school project would lead to making a stand against the undead on a senior skip day?

The “zombie fungus” should never have reached Florida. But suddenly varsity baseball star Dicey and her super-scientific boyfriend Jack are in the middle of it, as zombies begin to take over their city.

Are Jack’s researcher parents safe in Mexico, at the meteorite crash site where the fungus was first discovered? Are Dicey’s dad and little brother safe across the bay? What about their fantasy-gaming friends and the baseball team at St. Petersburg High School? Just one bite from a zombie, and it’s all over…

Somehow, the stunningly detailed art in black and white makes the zombies scarier than a blood-and-guts palette would - fantastic! First in the graphic novel series “My Boyfriend is a Monster,” each book featuring a different writer/artist pairup and a different variety of monstrous boyfriend. (one of 5,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com) (review copy courtesy of the publisher through NetGalley.com)