We Were Here

There's a certain charm in stick with something challenging until the end. Sure it's easy to give up if things seem like they aren't going well, but greatness comes from finishing what you started. We took that message to heart as we attacked Matt de la Pena's We Were Here. At first we thought the book was a joke. Written in a supposed dialect, the book features a main character, Miguel, who says stuff like, "yo," and "a grip," instead of, "hello," and "a lot. We struggled. Man did we struggle. We struggled a grip, dog. But we kept with it, and for this, we feel no regret. Here's what we found.

Miguel is a young man who has been sent to a group home for an unknown crime. He doesn't fit in there and spends most of his time reading. After some time passes, Mong, a possibly insane boy in the group home, decides to break out. Miguel, Mong and a third boy, Rondell, escape from the group home into California. The rest of the book focus around how Miguel survives, and what he learns while on the lam.

As we said, we were unsure. Surely no one really says things like, "'sup, dawg?" anymore, right? But the more we read, the more we realized that this book had actual merit. While the conversations may be enigmatic, the book's heart is clear. Miguel learns what it means to be a "bad kid", and what his own character is truly like. This book is a good read for someone with a few hours and a "street slang-to-English" dictionary.

Graceling

We were initially skeptical when the big bosses at Patricorp assigned us Graceling to review. Fantasy novels? Generally not our thing. Sure, we've read some of Tolkien's work, enjoyed it even, but we have a hard time with fantasy if the plot gets too convoluted. So that trepidation set the tone for our reading of Graceling. Maybe you feel the same way. We hope that you'll eventually agree that it's a good fantasy novel for the fantasy shy.

The book revolves around Katsa, the niece of a feudal king. Katsa is relatively normal, except that she has heterochromia. What's that, you ask? Heterochromia is the condition of having differently colored eyes. In Graceling, this means that one is "graced" or especially skilled at something very specific. Katsa's grace happens to be killing people. She's not so normal then, right? For some time, Katsa has been sent by her uncle, King Randa, to kill those he does not approve of. Katsa begins to realize that she can either live life as the King's thug, or she can use her power for good. The rest of the story follows her attempt to do just this, and her relationship with a friendly Prince.

We said earlier that Graceling is almost fantasy-lite. What we liked about it is that everything in the story is basically normal. We say normal to mean that it is a completely possible story that may have occurred at some point during human history. The only time one has to suspend disbelief is when considering graces. There's no magic or spells, etc.

As a protagonist, Katsa is awesome. She is (generally) a strong female character who knows how to get what she wants. She bucks convention by refusing to be married or be saved. We really liked that in Katsa. Her supporting cast is pretty fun as well. The book certainly stresses the role of the "evil king". Seems like there's one everywhere.

We believe that anyone interested in fantasy or interested in being interested in fantasy should read Graceling. If you don't like it, we'll give you a free widget.

Head Underwater (Breathing Gets Harder)

We think Sara Bareilles is pretty neat. Sure, her favorite word is "love", and she attempts to use it about 45-80 times in each song, which eventually gets old. But she's still a pretty neat act. You might remember her 2007 single "Love Song", which starts with the phrase, "Head underwater, and you tell me to breathe easy for once. Breathing gets harder. Even I know that." What does this have to do with Young Adult literary criticism?

We recently read Alex Flinn's Breathing Underwater. BU tells the story of Nick, a sixteen year old boy whose ex-girlfriend Caitlin places a restraining order on him. At the beginning of the novel, Caitlin tells the judge that places the restraining order that Nick hit her. Nick goes to the stand a vehemently denies this. While he never believes this, he seems to believe that he still deserves to get the girl. The story continues in two paths; one explains what happens after the trial, and one recounts (in the form of a journal) how Nick got where he is in the first place.

The title comes from a discussion in anger management class about being terrifically angry. The class' teacher Mario describes being angry as like breathing underwater. You keep gulping, but you don't get any relief. Being pacifists who are slow to anger, we've never been there, but one might agree with this description.

We didn't dislike BU. We've read worse books. We've mentioned before that authors are taking a risky path when they write using a teen's voice. Flinn does a pretty good job of of emulating Nick's "spoiled kid from Florida/bratty jerk" tone, while displaying some of Nick's motivations too. The thing that kept us from really liking this book is that it's so dark and sad. We have trouble with books where we don't like the main character. Believe us, you won't like the main character. You'll probably hate him.

What we're trying to say is this: if you're okay with reading books about emotionally troubled bratty teens who hit their girlfriends, give this one a look. If you want to see how one attempts to come back from an irreconcilable mistake, read this book. If you're the sort that had (or are having) a troubling childhood and you need to read about someone who's worse off than you, read this book. Otherwise you shouldn't think of this as a must read.