Five of my favorite books from 2015 (and six 2016 books I'm looking forward to)

It's that time of year for bloggers to make some lists. So, with the caveat that there are a lot of 2015 books that I haven't gotten to yet, like Thing Explainer, here are my five favorites from this year.

It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life of Love and War by Lynsey Addario
Lynsey Addario is now an acclaimed, award-winning photojournalist and combat photographer who has worked in Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, and Libya (where she and several colleagues were kidnapped). But though she began taking pictures as a teenager, she never considered photography as a career until after graduating from college. At first, photography was something she did to earn money to travel around the world. Then, as she increasingly ventured into dangerous regions despite the risks and the effects on her personal life, it became her job and her calling. It’s What I Do, featuring some of Addario’s photographs, is an eye-opening memoir exploring how she became a photographer and why she continues to venture around the world to document war and injustice.

Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad by M.T. Anderson
Here in the U.S., when we think of 20th century Russia/Soviet Union, things like the fall of the Romanovs, communism, and the Cold War come to mind, not World War II. As M. T. Anderson demonstrates, in order to understand what happened during the war, we do need some understanding of the Romanovs, communism, and the Cold War, but it’s also worth noting what we’re ignoring by overlooking the Soviet role in World War II: it “eventually suffered 95 percent of the military casualties inflicted on the major Allied powers (the U.S., the U.K., and the USSR)—and 90 percent of Germans killed in combat died fighting them.” An estimated 27 million Soviets, both military and civilian, died during the war, over 15% of the USSR’s population. The city of Leningrad (formerly Petrograd, formerly and now once again St. Petersburg) suffered under a German siege lasting 900 days; a million people died, and a million others went to desperate lengths to survive the freezing cold and starvation. It is in this context—the instability of the last days of the Romanovs, the rise of the Communists, then the treacherous consolidation of power by Joseph Stalin, and the suffering of World War II—that the famous composer Dmitri Shostakovich, who was alternately honored and denounced by the authorities, wrote his Seventh Symphony during the siege of Leningrad in honor of his beloved birthplace. (See also Colleen's review from earlier this year.)

The Way Home Looks Now by Wendy Wan-Long Shang

Family and loss are themes that are not usually the themes in jfic books and when one does encounter one such book it is hard not to feel depressed upon completion of the book. This novel is different however, so light is the author's touch (it is no wonder she has won awards for her writing) that the book is a page turner despite the heavy subject matter.

Witch Hunter by Virginia Boecker

Elizabeth Grey is a witch hunter. No, she's not chasing down bed knobs and broom sticks, she's the real deal. Her work includes taking down dangerous wizards & necromancers that summon ghouls, impose curses and generally wreck havoc in their city.

One day, after a long shift of crushing evil, Elizabeth and her partner Caleb go for a drink at the local watering hole. One thing leads to another and Elizabeth finds herself disoriented, confused and frightened.

In her delirium, she finds herself in possession of illegal substances and in a cruel twist of irony is accused of witchcraft and sentenced to death.

Waiting to die in a freezing jail cell, abandoned by her friends and sick with fever, Elizabeth is offered salvation from an unlikely source, a notoriously dangerous wizard named Nicholas Perevil.

Saved by the enemy, she's asked to perform a deadly task as payment: Find and destroy the source of the life-draining curse that's been thrust upon Nicholas by an unknown adversary.

Wolf by Wolf by Ryan Graudin

Back in the fall, The New York Times Magazine asked its readers whether they would go back in time and kill baby Hitler if such a possibility existed. And because we are heading into an election year in America, and because the twenty-four-hour news cycle must be constantly fed, and because the Internet and any mention of Hitler is a toxic combination, the question went viral.

A CHRISTMAS CAROL by Charles Dickens

Who says a book needs to be a new release? Certainly not those of us at Guys Lit Wire.

This one has the benefit of being out of copyright and therefore available for free download on pretty much every platform you can think of, though being a bit of a traditionalist, I prefer an actual book. There's a lovely, slim, leather-clad volume available quite reasonably at Barnes & Noble, but today, I'm going with the Candlewick Press edition illustrated by P.J. Lynch, since it was close at hand.

Perhaps you've seen one of the (many) film versions of this story, from the Muppets to Patrick Stewart to Vanessa Williams to Bill Murray (in Scrooged) to musical versions and animated versions (including Mr. Magoo, Mickey Mouse, and one with Jim Carrey). They are all good, in their ways, but nothing comes close to the humor of Dickens's writing, and the conversational tone of the narrator.

Here, for instance, is the start of the story, from "Stave One: Marley's Ghost":

Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge's name was good upon 'Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

Mind! I don't mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail. I might have been inclined, myself, to regard a coffin-nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it, or the Country's done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail.

Scrooge knew he was dead? Of course he did. How could it be otherwise? Scrooge and he were partners for I don't know how many years. Scrooge was his sole executor, his sole administrator, his sole assign, his sole residuary legatee, his sole friend, and sole mourner. And even Scrooge was not so dreadfully cut up by the sad event, but that he was an excellent man of business on the very day of the funeral, and solemnised it with an undoubted bargain.

The mention of Marley's funeral brings me back to the point I started from. There is no doubt that Marley was dead.

FUZZY MUD by Louis Sachar

Author Louis Sachar, famous for HOLES, is back with a new release called FUZZY MUD. 

Tamaya and Marshall attend Woodridge Academy.  Tamaya is in fifth grade and her mother insists that she not walk to and from school alone.  Since Marshall, a seventh grader, lives nearby, he is Tamaya's companion twice a day.  Years have gone by uneventfully, but that is about to change.

Marshall is the victim of school bully Chad Hilligas.  When Chad threatens to beat Marshall up on the way home, Marshall insists he and Tamaya take what he calls a "shortcut."  The supposed shortcut takes the two through the woods and makes Tamaya very uncomfortable.

The two soon become separated in the dense woods.  Sure that she has heard Chad following closely, Tamaya trips in her rush to escape.  She feels her hand sink into something she describes as "fuzzy mud."  When she hears footsteps coming closer, she clutches a handful and flings it at the noise.  The mud hits Chad full in the face allowing Tamaya to make her escape.

Overnight Tamaya's hand develops an unusual rash which develops into bleeding blisters.  The condition worsens throughout the next day, and she begins to wonder what happened to Chad.  That worry deepens when it is announced at school that Chad has been reported missing.  After that the plot (and the mud) thickens.

This frightening tale is perfect for middle grade readers.  Many of them may have not even heard of HOLES or Sachar's other books, but FUZZY MUD is sure to earn fans who can then be pointed in the direction of his earlier books.


Previously posted at readingjunky.blogspot.com

Reading Without Reading: Dramatic Audio from LATW

Some literature—novels, short stories, essays—you are meant to read, silently, to yourself. But some—spoken word poetry, play scripts, film scripts—have to be performed to be complete. You can read them, sure, but you're truly only getting a fraction of the picture.

LA Theatre Works is a loosely affiliated group of actors who perform audio-only productions of many of our finest theatrical works. The casts are often composed of well-known tv and movie actors like John Lithgow, Hilary Swank, Neal Patrick Harris and many many others. Most of their plays are from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. They run the gamut from recent Broadway dramas by the likes of John Guare and Wendy Wasserstein to classics like Arthur Miller’s a Death of Salesman. They do, however, have a number of productions by Shakespeare and Sophocles. Here’s a hint: If you’re struggling to read Hamlet or Romeo and Juliet or Julius Caesar for English class, try to listening to a professional production instead. It will do wonders to clear up the language. And it’s not cheating, I swear!

Celebrate Cyber Monday with a last 2015 gift for Ballou High School Library

We have opened up the wish list for Ballou High School one last day this year, just in case you have a few dollars to share with library while you are in the midst of your Cyber Monday shopping. You can find all the details about the Book Fair for Ballou in our post from November 9th and check out the remaining 198 books on the Amazon wish list here.

Books make wonderful gifts—we hope that you are planning to share all of your favorites and more with your loved ones this holiday season.

Dead Ringers by Christopher Golden

Not everyone is who they appear to be in Dead Ringers by Christopher Golden.

Frank isn't where he thought he'd be in life. Literally. He's recently been confined to his basement by a menacing assailant who looks like exactly like him. This strange man starts to live Frank's life, getting a better job, establishing a better reputation, even looking better, while his original becomes weaker and more miserable, handcuffed at the bottom of his house. The longer he's trapped there, the more Frank forgets who he was - and the less he wants to remember.

Tess, scarred physically and emotionally by the curves life has thrown her, tries not to harbor resentment for her ex-husband, Nick, who seems to have moved on quite easily after their divorce. He even has a new girlfriend. One day, when Tess encounters Nick in the street, he acts like he doesn't know her, even claims to have another name. Then Tess calls her ex and discovers he's nowhere near Boston, and that man she saw - that perfect twin - couldn't have been him. But who was it, then? Tess confides in her best friend, Lili. But soon, Lili has troubles of her own - and perhaps a double of her own, too...

Audrey's work debunking faux psychics and charlatans has also exposed her to people who do have a sixth sense and who can communicate with the dead. Well-educated and happily married with a baby on the way, Audrey knows that there is true evil in this world - and she must be careful not to let it touch her family, or herself. But she can no longer keep such things at arm's length when a group that she worked with years ago comes knocking at her door, needing her help and expertise in order to protect themselves and their loved ones from the strange dopplegangers that are populating their lives...

Dead Ringers is a new twist on the evil twin story, one of otherworldly horror laced with intrinsic doubts, where personal histories and dark, supernatural elements mix with motives and instincts that are deeply human. Combine that with strong, layered characters and this makes for a frighteningly real foray into our darkest fears.

Christopher Golden employs a diverse cast, the kind I wish more movies, TV shows, and other stories would showcase: characters with different backgrounds, different skin colors, different pairings and homes and physical limitations and emotions and responsibilities - and these character traits are described and discussed responsibly. For example, how Nick deals with things, because he has Asperger's, which is never an excuse, never an apology or a punchline, simply the scope through which he views the world. I also appreciate the fact that although most of the main characters are roughly the same age and have some overlapping interests, they are at different stages in life and have vastly different jobs.

Let's not forget our youngest character, Maddie, Nick and Tess' daughter. She is delightful, youthful, and important to the story without ever being a textbook pawn nor a victim.

And that ending! Once again, Golden gives a solid conclusion to the overall story and wraps up the individual storylines, then delivers a haunting final page that tears right into the eyes and hearts of readers.

There's a certain element in this book that reminded me of a classic story I enjoy. I won't say which one, because I don't want to give too much away, but I will say the way Golden employed this item gave me shivers and slivers.

Dead Ringers was released November 3rd, 2015.

If you're new to the world of Golden books, check out my post Where to Start: Reading Christopher Golden.
My favorite standalone novel by Golden is The Boys Are Back in Town.
His latest releases include Tin Men and Inheritance.

The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness

I don't usually like to read the little blurb on the dust jacket of a book if I know I am going to read the book simply because of the brilliant author who has written it. So, maybe in this case I should have.  I have to admit, I was thoroughly confused to start with in this book! I just kept reading, trusting that Ness would somehow pull all of the craziness together. I mean zombies, soul-sucking ghosts, indie kids, blue lights and Gods all have a part to play in this. That's a lot of territory to cover! As usual, we are left with an amazing finish to a beautifully written story. Despite my initial confusion, I really liked this book and have suggested it to many teens as something new and fresh to read. Many authors try to relate to the lives of teens and what they have to deal with each and every day, but in this story I think that Patrick Ness hits the nail on the head in a sometimes funny, sometimes tragic and sometomes touching way. The underlying threads of difference and acceptance make this a story with something for everyone.