How to use this Page

Jacqueline Kelly very kindly wrote another book about Calpurnis Tate. In The Curious World of Calpurnia Tate, Callie Vee, as her six brothers and parents call her, is disappointed to find that life in the year 1900 goes on pretty much like always.  She goes on rambles with her scientist grandfather.  She makes meticulous notes in her notebook.  She is by turns bedeviled and beguiled by her brothers.  And she disappoints her mother and baffles her father almost weekly.

Almost every other chapter tells of her struggles with Travers, her wild animal loving younger brother, and his latest "find".  The armadillo is a bust.  The raccoon is fated for failure, but the coy-dog??  Really???

Then there is the hurricane of 1900 that wiped Galveston, TX, off the map.  The barometer and Callie's chance sighting of a strange bird sends Callie's grandfather to the telegraph office to send wires to the coast.  Callie has to give up her bed to a cousin she barely knows - a greedy, penny-pinching cousin who has no appreciation of nature.  That and the disappearance of Callie's gold piece add up to a recipe for high drama.

In between, Callie runs errands for the new veterinarian, learns how to type, gets even with a conniving brother and deals as well as she can with her parents' expectations for her future.

This feels like a bridge book.  I am eager to see if Callie prevails.

MEANWHILE, in San Francisco, Lizzie Kennedy hates her school, Miss Barstow's.  She'd much prefer going out on doctor's calls with her father.  She loves science but, just like Callie Vee, her obsession is considered unseemly for a young woman. 

In Chasing Secrets by Gennifer Choldenko, there are rumors that plague has broken out in Chinatown.  Lizzie's uncle, the owner of one of the biggest newspapers in town, refuses to believe the rumors without proof.  But Chinatown is quarantined and trapped inside is Lizzie's cook and friend, Jing.  Jing leaves behind a secret - a real LIVE secret.  And that secret teaches Lizzie to look at her world in a whole new way.

There are a lot of secrets in this book; secrets that endanger a whole city; secrets that hide the way people really feel; secrets about how to fit in.  Lizzie has to find Jing, learn how to be friends with people her own age, survive her first ball, and prove her worth as a nurse. 

It all happened in 1900!

Add a Comment

Enter to win a copy of Chasing Secrets (Wendy Lamb Books, August 2015), written by Gennifer Choldenko. Giveaway begins August 26, 2015, at 12:01 A.M. PST and ends September 25, 2015, at 11:59 P.M. PST.

Add a Comment

Newbery Honor–winning author Gennifer Choldenko deftly combines humor, tragedy, fascinating historical detail, and a medical mystery in this exuberant new novel, Chasing Secrets.

Add a Comment

I was recently invited for an interview by Brittney Breakey over at AUTHOR TURF. Brittney has really accomplished a lot with her site. It’s worth checking out. She’s recently interviewed Holly Goldberg Sloan, Sally Nicholls, Gennifer Choldenko, Jo Knowles, Kathryn Erskine . . . and my great pal, Lewis Buzbee.

For me, that’s a double-edged sword. I’ll be honest, I’ve always hoped to be the kind of person who somebody wanted to interview. It’s an incredible compliment. And a true honor.

In my career, some of the first work I ever did was interviews of authors for promotional brochures. I think Ann McGovern was my first interview, back when I worked as a junior copywriter for Scholastic. Or it might have been Johanna Hurwitz. I don’t think I saved them. This would have been in 1985, I guess. Life went on and I’ve interviewed some talented authors and illustrators over the years.

You’d think I’d have learned some things along the line, but my basic feeling is usually one of disorientation, a sense that I have no idea what I’m doing, most likely saying the wrong things, awkwardly. Oh well.

I do have lucid moments, times when I think, “Okay, not terrible.” But in general I can’t read things like this without wincing, without twitching and blinking too often. I don’t know, it’s weird. I try to be honest, authentic, and hope for the best.

Below, you’ll find a brief excerpt of a much longer interview. Click here for the whole shebang.

What’s the worst thing you did as a kid?

It’s interesting you ask this, because I recently wrote about it in my journal. A theme that I’m exploring in the book I currently writing (or should be writing), which is a quasi-sequel to BYSTANDER. I have superstitions about talking about books before they are finished, but I’ll say this: In the summer between 7th and 8th grade, a girl in my homeroom died unexpectedly. I didn’t know her well, and wouldn’t call her a friend. When I first heard about Barbara’s death, I was with a bunch of friends –- I can picture it vividly, a bunch of us lounging around — and I said something dumb, snarky, immature. Of course, the death of a peer was completely new to me, a big deal, and I didn’t know how to react. I still feel a sense of shame about it, across these forty years, that one dumb thing I said that no one else even noticed. I’ve been reflecting a lot about identity lately, the idea of self not as a revelation, but as a made thing. Something you earn. Bryan Stevenson gave an incredible presentation for TED Talks -– everyone in America should Youtube it -– and he said, “I’ve come to understand and to believe that each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.” That’s a huge, complicated, controversial idea –- and it speaks directly to the topic of my next book. [NOTE: I've embedded Stevenson's talk, below.]

Was there ever a time in your writing career where you wanted to seriously give up? If so, how did you find the motivation to continue?

Yes, I’ve wanted to quit. Absolutely. Mostly because it’s hard, and because I’ve felt (and still feel, though less so) insecure about my own ability –- that I was a pretender, a self-deceiver, a fake. Also, it’s a bunny-eat-bunny business that can crush your soul at times. As a husband and father, I’ve worried about my ability to provide for my family, to keep paying the bills. But that’s life, right? You have to keep getting up. You can’t just lie there on the canvas. That said: Every day I feel blessed that I can do this for a living. The hard is what makes the good.

What’s your favorite writing quote?

It’s not a quote, so much as an attitude about doing the work, a sort of blue collar distrust of pretentiousness. In a phrase, shut up, sit down, and write. Or not! But either way, shut up. It’s hard, writers are told that we need to promote ourselves, we need to “have a presence” on the web, we need to “get out there.” And I just keep thinking, we need to write great books. That’s all that matters.

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in writing? What comes easily?

The whole thing is a challenge. One thing about having published a bunch of things over a long period of time is that I’ve come to understand that each book is its own, self-contained thing. You write the story that’s in front of you. Then you write the next one. And the next. You don’t control what happens after that and, on good days, you accept that plain fact.

Add a Comment

By Nicki Richesin, The Children’s Book Review
Published: February 6, 2012

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner and you know what that means: time to read some love stories! Below are just a few selections with which you’re sure to fall in love. So snuggle up with your favorite little reader and share a good laugh, a cuddle, and a whole lotta love.

Mr. Prickles

By Kara LaReau; illustrated by Scott Magoon

Even though Mr. Prickles may be prickly on the outside, he’s warm and fuzzy on the inside and looking for someone to see past his rough exterior. Thank goodness for Miss Pointypants who knows a thing or two about being judged on her sharp appearance. The deeper message LaReau humorously imparts is how to control one’s anger when ostracized by friends. Little kids who have been banished from the sandbox will love Mr. Prickles. (Ages 2-6. Publisher: Roaring Brook Press)

A Giant Crush

By Gennifer Choldenko; illustrated by Melissa Sweet

Ah, young love. This book is absolutely perfect for second and third graders confused by their beloved’s sudden mood swings. When a little bunny falls in love with another funny bunny, what’s a bunny to do? Leave it to a good friend to help him unravel the mysteries and agonies of a first crush. First rule of thumb: you have to speak to the one you love. (Ages 5-8. Publisher: Penguin Group (USA))

Love, Splat

By Rob Scotton

This tale about two star-crossed cats is seriously funny. Scotton’s silly illustrations of Splat the Cat reminded me just a bit of Garfield, but his story is pure fun. Splat goes to great lengths to impress his lady love, Kitten, but when Spike intervenes, it seems all is lost. Leave it to Kitten, with her feline prowess, to choose the best suitor to win her affections. (Ages 4-7. Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers)

Hedgehug

By Benn Sutton; illustrated by Dan Pinto

Two books about pointy critters in one review? Yes, indeed. In this “sharp lesson in love,” Hedgehug discovers love hurts after his many failed attempts to share a hug. In Sutton’s playf

Add a Comment

Gennifer Choldenko is an award-winning author of many books for young readers.

When Gennifer finishes a draft of one novel, she starts researching the next.

Don’t be lazy. This is where time away really helps.
Good work takes time.

Don’t be defensive. Open your mind to what people say without being a doormat and doing everything everyone says.

Every writer needs an editor. Getting feedback doesn't mean you didn't do a good job.

Do be patient with the process.

Some of us are late bloomers. Some of us need to learn our way to things.

Don't be a good girl. If someone suggests you make a change that you know isn't right for you, then don't make it. In the end its not going to work if you just do what somebody says.

The goal is to make your book better, not check off every item of the critique letter.

Do follow your instincts.
Do revise as creatively as you can.
 
Do have courage.
 
Do believe in yourself.

Add a Comment

Last week, I shared some fun tidbits from a Gennifer Choldenko event I went to. While I was there, I bought her newest book, Al Capone Shines My Shoes. This is the sequel to her Newbery honor book, Al Capone Does My Shirts. Shirts was an enormously wonderful and successful book, and I know there was a lot of buzz about how can she top it? But this sequel delivers, and all the reviewers agree. Both books feature Moose Flanagan, a 12-year-old kid whose family lives on Alcatraz in the 1930s because his father is a guard/electrician for the prison. Moose's mom and sister with autism (though it wasn't named/diagnosed in those days) round out the family, and colorful convicts and other civilian families fill out the cast of characters.

Me with Gennifer Choldenko (right)        Photo: Dara Dokas

I loved Shirts (and it was the favorite book all year of the 6th-grade book club I led several years ago), and I was so excited to read Shoes. And I loved it, too. Mostly because it's just such a good book. I'm not drawn to historical fiction, but I love wonderful stories set in times and places that come to life for me because of the stories set there. And an island prison? That's a setting that's hard to beat.

But I also connect with the book in other ways. Moose's family is defined by his sister Natalie. She's different, she's not understood, and their family life is all about accomodating her, protecting her, and trying to cure her. I grew up with a close family member with obsessive-compulsive disorder, but back then, this brain disorder didn't have a name and it wasn't treatable. People just figured anybody who washed their hands hundreds of times every day was crazy. I remember all the tears, the looks, the questions...visiting her one year in a group home at Christmas...Today I have another close family member with a different kind of brain disorder (one that is named, but controversially diagnosed and not easily treated), one that makes daily life extremely challenging, to say the least. So Moose and his family really touch my heart. Their struggle feels close to home for me.

In Shoes, Al Capone has done a favor for Moose, a favor that helps Natalie. And so Moose is in Al Capone's debt--not a good place to be. That favor, and the high stakes it has for Moose, sets up a fantastic conflict. And I can so sympathize with Moose. If I thought Al Capone could have helped any of my family members with various illnesses, I probably would have done the same thing Moose did.

One of the other things I love about this book is the rag-tag group of kids who are Moose's friends and not-so-great friends. Kids on Alcatraz didn't have the luxury of parents who would happily tote them across town for a playdate. Nope. You hung out with whoever lived nearby. That's how my childhood was, too, and I didn't even live in a prison. So there's this set of kids of different age and social status on Alcatraz who have all sorts of conflicts, but they're stuck with each other. That sets up all kinds of great situations and relationships. And those relationships between the kids--the hurt feelings, the crushes, the jealousies--they feel so real. So right.

Shoes is funny, dramatic, tense, and warm all in turns. I think it's one of those rare books that will appeal equally to guys and girls, and I hope you'll read it and love it as much as I do.

Add a Comment

Last week, I went to a Children's Literature Network event featuring Gennifer Choldenko. It was a lovely dinner and then a simple Q&A talk with Gennifer, author of the the Newbery Honor book Al Capone Does My Shirts and the brand new sequel, Al Capone Shines My Shoes. (More on the sequel as soon as I finish reading it!)

I had met Gennifer over the summer at ALA in Chicago, and we had had a nice walk and chat one morning. I hated to monopolize her time, since I'd at least had the opportunity to talk with her before, and the home we were at was jam-packed with accomplished authors and illustrators and eager librarians and parents, all waiting to talk with her. So, although I said hi, I didn't really have a one-on-one conversation with her. On the way home, I wished I'd been more assertive and had done more than ask how her travels are going. I'm so bad at party-setting chat, though.

Anyway, here are a few tidbits from the Q&A session.

Before writing Al Capone Does My Shirts, Gennifer had one picture book out and hadn't sold another book in seven years. (Her breakout novel Notes from a Liar and Her Dog sold and came out--if I got the timeline correct--while she was working on Shirts.) She saw an article in the newspaper about families who lived on Alcatraz when it was a prison and thought, "Now this might get a New York editor's attention."

She modeled the relationship between Moose and Natalie (the main character, who lives on Alcatraz in the 1930s because his father works there, and his autistic sister) on the one between her older brother and her older sister, who had autism. Her brother said, "That's not me." His best friend said, "You nailed him."

She knew it was going to be a trilogy when she started. "But to think that I was going to write three unpublished novels..." was too much, so she just concentrated on book one, not worrying about sowing seeds for later storylines or anything.

On Al Capone: "He's not all that interesting. It's all that mythology about him" [that is].

Scholastic Book Club lobbied hard for title changes (before book publication) to exclude Al Capone's name from the title.

On finding Moose's voice, which she really struggled with at first: "I realized there were millions of boys alive in the 1930s, and they didn't all sound the same."

On her writing process: "I do write outlines, but if I stick to the outline, I know the book will suck."

On balancing the business side with the writing side: "I try to give my best time to the writing and then push the other stuff to when I'm tired."

Gennifer was funny and charming. I'd love to see her do an actual presentation, too. I'm sure she captivates the crowd. Meanwhile, her books have definitely captivated tons of readers. I'm halfway through Shoes and wishing I was going to have time tonight to finish it. But we're going to the So You Think You Can Dance show (yay!), so Moose, Natalie, and all the cons (and I include Piper in that group) will have to wait one more night.

Add a Comment

Awesome!  Inspiring!  So many books, so many authors, so little time!



Neil Gaiman (!) and me.  The highlight of the weekend was meeting him, getting my copy of The Graveyard Book signed and hearing his Newbery speech in person.  Wow.



Me and Tammi Sauer with her new picture book, Chicken Dance.  Check out this youtube

link www.youtube.com/watch of her publisher (Sterling) having fun with her book.  I wish all publishers were like this!  Tammi's coming to Wisconsin's SCBWI Fall Retreat in October.  We'll be bawkin' n rollin'!



Me, Kashmira Sheth, gbeaverson , and Ann Bausum.  Kashmira, and Ann are in critique groups of mine and Georgia's, though not the same one, if that makes any sense.  If not, oh well, it's not important.  :)  Kashmira received the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature for her beautiful picture book, Monsoon Afternoon.



This is Ann Bausum and Kashmira Sheth, who both had signings of their awsome books!




The illustrious Richard Peck so graciously signed two books for me, Newbery Honor A Long Way From Chicago and and an arc (advanced reading copy) of his newest, A Season of Gifts!



Mo Willems.  Love him!



I couldn't decide which copies of Sarah Dessen's books to get for my daughters (I read them, too!) so I bought six, and she signed every one! 



Lisa Albert, a fellow Wisconsin SCBWI-er, whose Enslow biography of Stephenie Meyer just came out!



Me and Georgia with Janet Halfmann, another fellow Wisconsin SCBWI-er, signing her wonderful book, Seven Miles To Freedom.



The SCBWI booth fantastically decked out by the Illinois chapter.  That's Esther Hershenhorn on the right, the fabulous Illinois Regional Advisor.



Talk about BONUS!  I had my copy of The Calder Game signed by author Blue Balliett and her editor, David Levithan, was there!  Squeeee!  I loved Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist!  (He wrote the boy parts)  :)



Georgia, Holly Black and me.  I got my copy of Geektastic signed AND got the coveted Geektastic pocket protector.  Does that make me a geek?  Hell, yeah, and proud of it!



Gennifer Choldenko signed both my copies of Al Capone Does My Shirts and Al Capone Shines My Shoes.  Saweet!



You may know her asthatgirlygirl , Tanya Seale was in my very first critique group when we were greenhorns, waaay before we even knew what SCBWI was!



Jon Scieskza and Lane Smith



Laurie Halse Anderson



Judy Blume.  Love her!  I grew up with her books.



Georgia, Ingrid Law, me



Libba Bray



 Libba Bray sat in the loooooooong line for her signing (before it started) and chatted with fans.  How cool is that? Had my copy of A Great And Terrible Beauty signed AND got an arc signed of Going Bovine!

That's the great thing about ALA, you're surrounded by people who love books as much as you do.  Publishers give away tons of arcs, I scored bags full!  Bags people!  Can you say a little piece of heaven?  I just wish I could hole up for weeks and read, read, read. 



Isn't that a beautiful sight!  :)

For now, don't be surprised if you happen to run in to me at one of my son's baseball games and I seem to be engrossed in the player's list.  It's hiding a book.  :)

Add a Comment

I hope everyone's holidays are going/went well. I hope that Hanukkah Harry, Solstice Sam, Santa, and Kwanzaa Kofi were good to you and yours and that now you're all full of cookies and goodness and curled up with the parts of your family that don't drive you crazy and a good book.

I had to leave Wisconsin much too soon, but it was a lovely time even if the Packers totally sucked in Sunday's game. (ouch. seriously. ouch.) It even snowed...

Also, I got a lot of reading done. I now have 21 books to read before Monday turns to Tuesday. I can totally pull that off, right? Yeah, I know. But, it will be fun to see how far I get.

Anyway, here are a few of the books I read in various airport lounges, airplanes, and my parents' living room.

If a Tree Falls at Lunch Period by Gennifer Choldenko

Someone remind me to stay away from really well done non-humorous realistic fiction about junior high. They make all the memories I've worked so hard to repress come up.

Anyway, Kirstin's best friend is hanging around the mean girls they used to hate. Kirsten could maybe be included if she just tried a little harder to fit in. That's what her mom wants--to the point where she'll call up the other mothers. Kirsten's not dumb. She knows that Ms. Queen Bee doesn't want her there. She also knows she doesn't want to be there, so she starts hanging out with some other people.

Boys. Scholarship students.

Walk is one of those scholarship students-- one of a very few non-white students at this exclusive private school. He wishes he were back at his old school, with his friends...

Choldenko could have had a beautiful story, just on that. But there's also a deep dark looming secret. I'm not sure how I feel about that. It wasn't really necessary.

I did, however, love Kirsten's little sister, Kippy.

Thanks to Kelly for turning me onto this title!

You Are SO Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah! Fiona Rosenbloom

This was the very last book I read in 2006. I remember racing to the end so it would be done before we went out for New Years Eve so it would firmly end up in th 2006 pile.

Anyway, it's Bar and Bat Mitzvah season in Westchester County. So, 13 year olds dealing with the opposite gender, social ranking, friendships, divorced parents and geeky little brothers.

It's true to life while still being funny enough that it doesn't send me back into therapy.

It's a very nice coming-of-age (literally!) story.

My one complaint is that the time line is really screwed up. There are a few things that happen where the times of various events are mentioned, but it doesn't make any sense when you try to reconstruct the day. Plus, geeky little bro undergoes big changes over the book. But the book only takes place over the time span of 1 week, so that also doesn't make sense.

But this old review leads us to a new review!

We Are SO Crashing Your Bar Mitzvah! Fiona Rosenbloom

In this sequel (which I just read) Stacy and Lydia have a whole new look and can't wait to show Kelly.

Only Kelly's full time hanging out with the Chicas (mean girls!) and Stacy and Lydia aren't invited.

Literally. Queen Bee Kym's cousin Eben is having the Bar Mitzvah to end all Bar Mitzvahs and everyone else is invited.

So, Stacy and Lydia do the only sensible thing-- crash. Coupled with the outlandish lies they've been telling to make themselves seem cooler, they've spun a web that's about to catch them.

I think I liked it even better than the first one!

Add a Comment

pensamientos on 4 books - by RudyG (Denver)

It would be a stretch for me to link this post to Father's Day, so I won't try. . . I've been gone so long from this site. . . I thought of sharing memories of my past year with 22 bilingual second graders, but alas, there were no tearful moments to end such a piece with. . . I considered ranting about the strain of reaching and teaching U.S. children when the educational bureaucracy binds one arm about your body, but thankfully, I'm bored with my rants.

Anyway, since my compa's on La Bloga have done a better-than-scholarly job since my going on sabbatical, I accept that anything I post is destined to pale. . .

Though I've written little in past months, I have read, some great and some so-so. Since I suck as a reviewer, better I just share mis pensamientos about four books, which I highly recommend, for differing reasons:

First: Dan Olivas recently gave us a great interview with Mario Acevedo, author of X-Rated Bloodsuckers (from Rayo press). I enjoyed his first, Nymphos of Rocky Flats, even though the vampire genre is not high on my list of must-reads. Maybe I read both because like some of you I'm aburrido con movies, TV programs and books where even the bad guys are usually Anglo. Mario's storytelling talents made his novel well worth the digression.

Now, to my minor, peculiar thoughts about this book: the format Mario--more likely his publishers--used to handle Mexican vocabulary. Here's two examples:
1. "He snipped the pouch open and squeezed blood over his chile relleno combination plate. "Smothered. The only way to eat Mexican food. Come tomorrow this chile and beans are going to turn my ass into a weapon of mass destruction." [Nymphos, p. 214]
2. " 'Tripas for menudo. Sesos. Lengua. You name it.' . . . It wasn't tripe, brains or tongue that I wanted." [Nymphos, p. 35]

As an accommodation to the non-Spanish readers, this style feels non-intrusive. An English reader should get that the relleno plate was chile and beans, and easily understand the second passage. In the back of my bilingual brain I notice this accommodation, but glide over it. Now look at the format adopted in Mario's latest book:

"Que bonito chante," Coyote said. What nice digs. . . "Pa'que?" What for?" [X-Rated, p.78]

Not every Spanish word is handled this way. Nada is not translated, assumedly because of wide usage. And other formats are sometimes used, like dashes around the translation instead of a literal repetition in English. But the vast majority of Spanish terms are tediously, almost inexorably follow the above format.

The style used in Nymphos required more skill by the author, and at times more effort by the reader, both desirable in a literate society. But flexibility in Mario's first work, gave way to regimentation in his second. It reminds me somewhat of a condescending approach toward Anglos. "Let's repeat it to the poor English reader, right afterwards, very obviously, so he doesn't have to use his brain to grapple with a foreign tongue," I can hear the editors thinking.

Clearly, I'm putting words in people's mouths. This may in fact be Mario's new approach to dealing with monolingual readers. Since I'm not one of them, I can't complain as such. I'm simply ranting as a bilingual that this format draws more attention to itself in its didactics than his previous style, making me very aware of its usage and taking me out of the story, not a desirable literary feature.

Notwithstanding its peccadillo, do check out X-Rated Bloodsuckers. Then you will also learn what tapetum lucidum means.

Second: Fellow Bloguista Dan Olivas also previously highlighted Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream, from UNM Press, the second collection of border/migration chronicles by Sam Quinones.

If you enjoy investigative reporting--hard facts and wonderful trivia--this book is a must. It's historical in that it details anomalies like the rise and demise of Elvis-velvet paintings, and it is insightful in the wealth of personal narrative Quinones collected over many years of communicating with Mexican immigrants.

In our ignorant era of anti-immigrant hate-propaganda, billions-for-border-patrols and the attempted elimination of U.S. bilingualism, I have an added reason you should check this very readable book: because you work with mexicanos. I recommend this book (plus his True Tales From Another Mexico) to those of you--Chicano or otherwise--who need to know more about the mexicanitos you teach, the immigrant families you service or the expatriated machos you sell to.

Face it: Americans, including Chicanos, don't really have much prior knowledge about the mexicano. We have stereotyped ideas about why they came, what their aspirations are, what they hope their children's futures will be.

For instance, my previous assumption was that many mexicanos who send money back to Mexico will return or retire there. I even had a student this year who repeatedly retorted to my criticizing her poor attendance with, "My dad says we're going back to Mexico one day, anyway."

It's only from Quinones' book that I learned how and why this aspiration has instead resulted in Mexican ghost towns filled with custom-built homes financed by immigrant dollars, homes that are occupied maybe twice a year by expatriates whose ties to the motherland weaken with each year they spend in the U.S. Many become permanent residents of their adopted country.

This knowledge led to my adjusting discussions with immigrant parents about their kids' schoolwork. One parent was surprised I knew so much about Zacateca migration, about his upgrading his home there, about my prediction that he might never return with his family--all things garnered from an informative read of Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream.

Visit Quinones's website for more information.

Third: I've been accused of being a homophobe, but I like to think it's just cultural vestiges of my muy macho-ness. I do admit queer lit is even lower on my list than vampire novels. This means that added to my weaknesses as a book reviewer, I've little knowledge of novels written by or featuring lesbians. So, when I picked up Like Son (Akashic Books), by Felicia Luna Lemus, I wouldn't have been surprised to not like it, or not finish it, something I rarely do.

But this is one of the most captivating, literary novels I've read in years.

Set against a thematic backdrop of historical figure Nahui Olin (the mesmerizing cover photo), Like Son feels like a novel only a Chicano, una mujer escandalosa as Lemus calls herself, could write. That it is considered a jewel in the transgender circuit unfortunately may mean many in the Chicano-reader world will never enjoy the experience of Lemus's great writing.

Yes, even a homophobe will find considerable merit in the well-developed, complicated plotting in this coming-of-age story that engaged this hetero from beginning to end. And you won't even have to set aside your abhorrence of lesbo scenes. This is one fine work.

The novel and author have been greatly praised by the literary world and there's no point in my attempting to outdo them. Check her website or the publisher's for yourself.

Fourth: Wings Press, publishers of Cecile Pineda's Redoubt, describe her book like this: "Imagine Woody Allen, Lewis Carroll and John Barth with a feminist surrealist twist." From my read, I'd suggest something more like: "Imagine Paul Auster, Samuel Beckett and a flashback of your best mescaline trip, through a totally female introspection."

This book is heavy on the experimental, as it's called. Plus, if you can't spell existentialism, if you easily tire of free-flowing prose, however well presented, and if you'd rather be story-led in the manner of Acevedo's publishers, stay away from this one.

But if you're a writer or a serious reader, looking for prose that takes you to the type of places where few have successfully kept your attention before, pick this one up. As the publishers further describe it, Redoubt is "Told in the voice of a lone holdout standing guard on an unnamed frontier. Redoubt addresses questions of conception and birth, gender, war and the slouch toward Apocalypse. Structured like a jazz riff, it takes as its thematic underpinnings the dictionary definitions introducing each section."

If I'd read that, I doubt I'd ever have opened its pages. Again, to differ with the publishers, here's my version: "Told through the mind of one unfathomable woman permanently relegated to warn of imminent invasion by the Enemy, Redoubt will carry you into an emotional maelstrom where Apocalypse would seem like liberation, in contrast to the heroine's timeless solitude. Enmeshed in an existence more Huit Clos than Sisyphus's most dreaded nightmare, it will carry your unwilling Self into niches of life never described in any dictionary."

Redoubt is a road many readers--forget about just Chicanos--wouldn't want to take. Of course, many of us have no idea what the labors of childbirth or the daily grind of repressed-but-one-day-liberated females might be like, either. We males would not be lesser males for learning about that. Redoubt takes you there; it is as close as I've ever come to "being one" with a woman, through the pages of a book.

You can find out more about Cecile Pineda and her other works at http://home.earthlink.net/~cecilep/index.htm.

That's enough for a return post. If you're one of our readers who has no life and nothing better to do on Father's Day, I'd be interested in comments about my approach to these works. Of course if you have a life, please go enjoy that, instead.

Display Comments Add a Comment