proseandkahn

Illustrated by Todd Nauck. 200 p. Marvel Enterprises Inc. April, 2009. (Borrowed from the public library.)

This is the blog of thirteen-year-old Eric, one of the newest students at Xavier’s Institute for Gifted Students, or, more popularly known as X-Man Training Camp. While most new students probably wish they could be invisible, Eric actually is invisible - not physically invisible, but people don't see him - kinda like the Schwå. That is his mutant power. And it’s a lame one. Not even Professor X can see him. In fact, they give each other headaches. That doesn’t stop Eric from getting called to his office on a regular basis though. He’s lonely and getting angry and he identifies with Wolverine’s solitary ways, so he follows him. Regularly.

Not quite a Wimpy Kid diary, not quite a graphic novel, yet it works better than most non-traditional novels like those written in IM-speak. It's episodic and punctuated with Eric's art and quite entertaining.  

Not sure why three bonus comics were included at the end of the book though.

Daphne's Diary of Daily Disasters series #2. 80 p. Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, July, 2011. (Borrowed from the public library)

This alliteratively entitled series is the diary of a fourth grader named Daphne and will appeal to fans of Moss’ Amelia books. Those were formatted to look like notebooks and these, in the Post-Wimp age are formatted to appeal to fledgling wimp fan-girls. I say girls because it’s very pink. It’s also very fun and dramatic. 

WoW is a weekly meme hosted by Jill over at Breaking the Spine, in which we share the books we can't wait to be released.

I set this post up on Saturday because I just finished reading the review of it at PInk Me and I didn't want to forget about it. 


Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews. 304 p. Amulet Books/ Abrams, March 1, 2012.

Publisher synopsis: Up until senior year, Greg has maintained total social invisibility. He only has one friend, Earl, and together they spend their time—when not playing video games and avoiding Earl’s terrifying brothers— making movies, their own versions of Coppola and Herzog cult classics. Greg would be the first one to tell you his movies are f*@$ing terrible, but he and Earl don’t make them for other people. Until Rachel.

Rachel has leukemia, and Greg’s mom gets the genius idea that Greg should befriend her. Against his better judgment and despite his extreme awkwardness, he does. When Rachel decides to stop treatment, Greg and Earl make her a movie, and Greg must abandon invisibility and make a stand. It’s a hilarious, outrageous, and truthful look at death and high school by a prodigiously talented debut author.

Sounds totally amazing and certainly begs to be compared to a recently released, much ballyhooed dying girl book, which is awaiting me near the top of TOM.

Fever Crumb Series #2. Unabridged audio book on 7 compact discs, 7 hours. Read by Jenny Agutter. Scholastic, Ocober, 2011. 978-0-545-31527-2. (Purchased.)

This sequel to the spectacular Fever Crumb (2010) picks up two years later. After barely escaping London with her life, Fever, now sixteen, has been content to travel with Persimmon’s Electric Lyceum, tinkering behind the scenes and fostering Ruan and Fern. The company’s travels take them to the coastal city of Mayda, where most machinery, except for the funiculars that move entire houses up and down its slopes, is suspect and its residents are oddly superstitious. But Fever faces the fact that she is bored, so when she comes across a small glider and hears stories about Arlo Thursday, an eccentric boy said to be trying to build a flying machine, Fever is intrigued enough to stay behind when the company left Mayda for the next village.

As in Fever Crumb, the worldbuilding is quite vivid. While the city of Mayda seems to be quite peaceful as compared to the dangers of London, Fever soon finds herself caught in a web of manipulation and conspiracy. She continues to be a fascinating character as she grapples with notions of love and attempts to deduce whom she should trust while she feels real excitement contemplating the possibility of air travel. Secondary characters are well developed as well. While this installment lacks the razzle-dazzle action and machinery of the first, the villains are vicious and the suspense is nearly unbearable. There are also quieter moments as well as surprises and at least two tear-inducing scenes. Thankfully, the ending is not a cliffhanger, but Fever’s fans will still breathlessly await the final (?) installment.

Illustrated by Jan Spivey Gilchrist. HarperCollins Publishers, December 2010. (Borrowed from the public library.)

Eloise Greenfield wrote an introduction to her collection of poems to explain the movement that became known as “The Great Migration.” Between 1915 and 1930, more than a million African Americans left the south. Slavery was ended, but segregation was firmly entrenched and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan made life unsafe for many. Even though Ms. Greenfield was just a baby in 1929, her father moved to Washington D.C. and, after he found a job, sent for the rest of the family to join him. While racial discrimination existed in the north, the climate was better for employment, housing and personal safety.

It shouldn’t be surprising that moving was fraught with fears and worries. Roots go deep and transplantation can be traumatic. In poem after poem, Ms. Greenfield depicts the hopes and fears of the young and old as they pack bags and board trains north.

The illustrations are as striking as the poems. They appear to be mixed media collages, but no information is provided about the media. The palette is multihued – no color predominates the work, though individual spreads may feature a particular hue or two, such as one striking illustration in which the ever moving train north cuts a swath through a wheat field. Look closely at that field and one finds people painted in among the stalks of wheat, not working the field, just inseparable from the land. Powerful symbolism.

unpgd. Enchanted Lion Books, March, 2011. 978-1-59270--96-1. Purchased.

A community of pigs works together to set about solving the problem of their water shortage. They fit out the gigantic ship that sits at the edge of their island and sail fly through the air to their agreed upon destination, presumably Antarctica, where they locate a huge ice berg and lasso it to tow it home.

The format of long and narrow in design lends a sort of timeline effect. Young readers are bound to lean in to peer at the many details both humorous and ingenious. While this wordless wonder tells a distinct story, readers may ponder how they got there in the first place and from where given their spectacular flying ship. I just love this one.

unpgd. Chronicle Books LLC. October, 2011. 978-0-8118-7898-2. (Purchased.)

Librarians and teachers who choose to read this one aloud had better start at the front jacket flap, where the reader is asked, “What happens when the most important letter in the alpha bet gets a big owie?”

The letters H & A trot along the bottom of the flap foreshadowing in more ways then one the outcome. Teach/ review the concept of homophones on the end-pages as the cast of characters are introduced on one page and the cast on letter E’s leg is shown on the next. Don’t skip the title page where a swerving ambulance heads straight for the authors’ names. And! By all means, take your time flipping the pages as you read the story of E’s terrible accident because each page is packed, packed I tell ya with puns and visual jokes from D and C reading comics in the attic to the skeleton in a closet on the fourth floor to Q’s profession of love to U at the front door.

After E takes a tumble down the stairs, EMTs come to take her to the hospital and O is tapped to take her place. Now, you read aloud chops will be tested as A states with finality that it’s “ O instead of E. That’s it PORIOD.”

The art is zingy and lively and readers will want to reread it again and again. I promise that each time they do, they will find something new to delight. So, is this an alphabet book? Not like anything you’ve ever seen. Is it sure to delight the littlest of readers? Not quite. They may not get the jokes. Surely by second or third grades, the concepts will be set enough to appreciate, but it is sure to have appeal all the way up through a high school language arts class.

Highly recommended!