Howton's Hidden Corner Posts

What makes a monster? How can we deal with unbearable loss? These questions and more are dealt with in a heartwarming and heart wrenching way in this book. Nan is such an authentic character and the grief process we watch through her eyes is beautifully told. I fell into this world and enjoyed every moment I spent there.

It’s been five years since the Sweep disappeared. Orphaned and alone, Nan Sparrow had no other choice but to work for a ruthless chimney sweep named Wilkie Crudd. She spends her days sweeping out chimneys. The job is dangerous and thankless, but with her wits and will, Nan has managed to beat the deadly odds time and time again.
 
When Nan gets stuck in a chimney fire, she fears the end has come. Instead, she wakes to find herself unharmed in an abandoned attic. And she is not alone. Huddled in the corner is a mysterious creature—a golem—made from soot and ash.
 
Sweep is the story of a girl and her monster. Together, these two outcasts carve out a new life—saving each other in the process. Lyrically told by one of today’s most powerful storytellers, Sweep is a heartrending adventure about the everlasting gifts of friendship and wonder.

Harry N. Abrams Publishing

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I fell in love with all versions of love portrayed in this story: love of fashion, love for design, love of attention, love for your parents (and the fear that they will not be proud), love of another person, unconditional love for your children, and ultimately finding a way to love yourself. The style of drawings and pacing of storytelling was perfect! I thought this was a beautiful story and look forward to talking about it with students!

Prince Sebastian is looking for a bride―or rather, his parents are looking for one for him. Sebastian is too busy hiding his secret life from everyone. At night he puts on daring dresses and takes Paris by storm as the fabulous Lady Crystallia―the hottest fashion icon in the world capital of fashion!
Sebastian’s secret weapon (and best friend) is the brilliant dressmaker Frances―one of only two people who know the truth: sometimes this boy wears dresses. But Frances dreams of greatness, and being someone’s secret weapon means being a secret. Forever. How long can Frances defer her dreams to protect a friend? Jen Wang weaves an exuberantly romantic tale of identity, young love, art, and family. A fairy tale for any age, The Prince and the Dressmaker will steal your heart.

First Second Publishing

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I COULD NOT  HAVE LOVED THIS BOOK MORE!!! Yes I was screaming, and yes I know that is rude and inappropriate, but oh my gosh I loved this book.  As a person who constantly fears small talk, finds comfort in book characters rather than “real” people, is a crippling introvert at times, thrives in creative spaces, and has experienced panic attacks, and general anxiety, this book spoke to my heart and my mind! I felt that it looked at the darkest parts of an anxious mind with care, understanding and concern without judgment or glossing over the way anxiety really feels. It gave voice to some of the moments of my life that I couldn’t fully understand in the moment and made me feel like a warrior for surviving them. This will be one of those books that I re-read over and over again.

 

In the real world, Eliza Mirk is shy, weird, and friendless. Online, Eliza is LadyConstellation, anonymous creator of a popular webcomic called Monstrous Sea. With millions of followers and fans throughout the world, Eliza’s persona is popular. Eliza can’t imagine enjoying the real world as much as she loves her digital community.

Then Wallace Warland transfers to her school and Eliza begins to wonder if a life offline might be worthwhile. But when Eliza’s secret is accidentally shared with the world, everything she’s built—her story, her relationship with Wallace, and even her sanity—begins to fall apart.

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I was enthralled by this book. I loved the main character, her internal voice narration, as well as the supporting characters around her.  I was amazed by the lore built into the first book and I look forward to filling in some of the holes that Sanderson has left open. My husband loves this author and is always amazed at how he basically says “this is going to be important” throughout the entire book and even series of books and then you get to the end and even though he has constantly been telling you that this one thing is important, it somehow becomes the plot twist that blows your mind. There were definite plot twists that create a satisfying but open ending for this installment in the new realm of Sandersons imagination, however I know that easter eggs of importance are strewn throughout his writing that will have great significance in the last book.

 

Spensa’s world has been under attack for decades. Now pilots are the heroes of what’s left of the human race, and becoming one has always been Spensa’s dream. Since she was a little girl, she has imagined soaring skyward and proving her bravery. But her fate is intertwined with her father’s–a pilot himself who was killed years ago when he abruptly deserted his team, leaving Spensa’s chances of attending flight school at slim to none.

No one will let Spensa forget what her father did, yet fate works in mysterious ways. Flight school might be a long shot, but she is determined to fly. And an accidental discovery in a long-forgotten cavern might just provide her with a way to claim the stars.

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I DID IT!!! I finished this series! 14 books, 11,564 pages, 4,287,886 words, and countless moments of laughter, tears, anger, frustration, entertainment later and I have finished this series.  However, I do not imagine reading them again in the near future!  I loved these characters. They were flawed and made me so angry at times but they were realistic and Jordan/Sanderson somehow made them feel so human. I was amazed by the magic system in this series and the way good and evil were not as black and white as some authors envision. I reveled in Jordan’s world that thrived in shades of grey.  However, the amount of characters and the worldbuilding got in my way of interpreting the story.  I know that YA literature is my favorite for a reason.  I want plot with purpose but not purpose and meaning without plot.  I look forward to delving into Brandon Sanderson’s new YA series (Skyward) next in order to get back to a faster, more succinct plot line!

The Wheel of Time turns and Ages come and go, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth returns again. In the Third Age, an Age of Prophecy, the World and Time themselves hang in the balance. What was, what will be, and what is, may yet fall under the Shadow.

When Robert Jordan died in 2007, all feared that these concluding scenes would never be written. But working from notes and partials left by Jordan, established fantasy writer Brandon Sanderson stepped in to complete the masterwork. With The Gathering Storm (Book 12) and Towers of Midnight (Book 13) behind him, both of which were # 1 New York Times hardcover bestsellers, Sanderson now re-creates the vision that Robert Jordan left behind.

Edited by Jordan’s widow, who edited all of Jordan’s books, A Memory of Light will delight, enthrall, and deeply satisfy all of Jordan’s legions of readers.

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Since Elementary school, I have been drawn to stories surrounding the Holocaust. I read all the fiction I could get my hands on, watched documentary films, and sought out biographies in Middle School when I had exhausted the historical fiction options. Since my years in school, authors have sensed a need in Middle School/YA historical fiction that gives an authentic, potent, view of the Holocaust from multiple perspectives.  When I heard about the Librarian of Auschwitz at a literature conference, I was enthralled. Once again, someone had found a narrative that I had never heard . Someone’s story that hadn’t been told before, was available.

As soon as we got this book in the Library, I….had to give it to a student! I truly expected to be the first person to take it home. However, a student came looking for a Holocaust story and had read everything else we had. She wanted a real, raw, gritty, what actually happened, not glossed over account and I knew that this book was what she was looking for. So I waited…and waited…it is a long book and is emotionally hard to get through so she renewed it. Once I finally got it in my hands, I couldn’t wait to read it.  I had all Thanksgiving break and this was going to be my free time.

It did not disappoint.  The narrative of Dita’s story is inspiring and heartbreaking at the same time. The descriptions of things that are unthinkable from an outsider’s perspective (starvation, vermin infestations, the smell of death, gas chamber executions, work details collecting the dead or their personal belongings, etc. etc. etc) are harrowing and given in great detail.  The grotesqueness of the camp, government, medical experiments, and humanity in general (Nazi, Gypsy, Pole, and even Jew) is not hidden. And while the depravity of the situation is in your face, hope still finds a way to break through. I could not be more appreciative of this novels authenticity in telling this story and I hope others who find stories like these have the courage to tell them before the memories and stories are forgotten or fade away.

 

Fourteen-year-old Dita is one of the many imprisoned by the Nazis at Auschwitz. Taken, along with her mother and father, from the Terezín ghetto in Prague, Dita is adjusting to the constant terror that is life in the camp. When Jewish leader Freddy Hirsch asks Dita to take charge of the eight precious volumes the prisoners have managed to sneak past the guards, she agrees. And so Dita becomes the librarian of Auschwitz.

Out of one of the darkest chapters of human history comes this extraordinary story of courage and hope.

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When I saw that Iko would have her own story in Marissa Meyer’s new graphic novel duology, I almost passed out. I loved the Lunar chronicles and Iko was one of my favorite characters. I was so thrilled to have a graphic representation of all of these characters that I had grown to love. Some of them were imagined in different ways than I expected and the graphic format of the story did take some getting used to. However, I loved seeing these characters expand even further and where their stories have gone since the end of the book series. I would read 15 more of these stories in graphic or novel format.

 

Wires and Nerve

When rogue packs of wolf-hybrid soldiers threaten the tenuous peace alliance between Earth and Luna, Iko takes it upon herself to hunt down the soldiers’ leader. She is soon working with a handsome royal guard who forces her to question everything she knows about love, loyalty, and her own humanity.

 

Gone Rogue

The world of the Lunar Chronicles comes alive in this thrilling continuation of Wires and Nerve. Iko—an audacious android and best friend to the Lunar Queen Cinder—has been tasked with hunting down Alpha Lysander Steele, the leader of a rogue band of bioengineered wolf-soldiers who threaten to undo the tenuous peace agreement between Earth and Luna. Unless Cinder can reverse the mutations that were forced on them years before, Steele and his soldiers plan to satisfy their monstrous appetites with a massacre of the innocent people of Earth.

And to show he’s serious, Steele is taking hostages.

Cinder and Kai, Scarlet and Wolf, Cress and Thorne, and Winter and Jacin all feature in this epic new battle. But it is Iko who must face her deepest fears when she uncovers the truth about her own unusual programming.

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I had a very long car ride to the beach by myself after school on Friday.  So I downloaded an audiobook from Sora, our new overdrive app, and was able to drive and read at the same time.  Due to horrendous traffic on the way home, I was able to listen to the entire book in one weekend. I loved the alternating narrative setup of this novel.  The tension and irony of knowing things that both of the narrators do not know, made the action taking place even more dramatic.  I look forward to the second and third audio books…whenever I can have the time to listen to them!

 

What was once the western United States is now home to the Republic, a nation perpetually at war with its neighbors. Born into an elite family in one of the Republic’s wealthiest districts, fifteen-year-old June is a prodigy being groomed for success in the Republic’s highest military circles. Born into the slums, fifteen-year-old Day is the country’s most wanted criminal. But his motives may not be as malicious as they seem.

From very different worlds, June and Day have no reason to cross paths – until the day June’s brother, Metias, is murdered and Day becomes the prime suspect. Caught in the ultimate game of cat and mouse, Day is in a race for his family’s survival, while June seeks to avenge Metias’s death. But in a shocking turn of events, the two uncover the truth of what has really brought them together, and the sinister lengths their country will go to keep its secrets.

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My husband has convinced me that I have to read an adult fantasy series called the Wheel of Time. I have read 6 out of the 14 books in the series over the spring and summer.  This journey has truly been eye opening to the difference between YA and adult fantasy writing.  Adult fantasy series writers focus more on world building which leads to a lot of political tension and map building storylines rather than action storylines.  These books have been very hard to slog through. I love the story but I have to force myself to read through information I don’t care about in order to glean one or two sentences about characters I do care about.  I have been pushed into the realm of what I am sure some of you feel like when you are reading.  It isn’t easy and most of the time (about a fourth of the book) isn’t fun.  I am going to finish these books because I am now sucked into the story; but it is going to be a fight to get through them all.

 

The Wheel of Time turns and Ages come and go, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth returns again. In the Third Age, an Age of Prophecy, the World and Time themselves hang in the balance. What was, what will be, and what is, may yet fall under the Shadow.

When The Two Rivers is attacked by Trollocs―a savage tribe of half-men, half-beasts― five villagers flee that night into a world they barely imagined, with new dangers waiting in the shadows and in the light.

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I could not wait for the second book in this series. When I found out I would be on the long bus ride to Orlando with the band I knew exactly which book I was going to take with me.  Thunderhead is an excellent second installment in this series. It expands the story well without leading to character or plot holes. It easily kept my attention on a bus filled with middle school conversations. I am greatly looking forward to the third instalment!

The Thunderhead cannot interfere in the affairs of the Scythedom. All it can do is observe—it does not like what it sees.

A year has passed since Rowan had gone off grid. Since then, he has become an urban legend, a vigilante snuffing out corrupt scythes in a trial by fire. His story is told in whispers across the continent.

As Scythe Anastasia, Citra gleans with compassion and openly challenges the ideals of the “new order.” But when her life is threatened and her methods questioned, it becomes clear that not everyone is open to the change.

Will the Thunderhead intervene?

Or will it simply watch as this perfect world begins to unravel?

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