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Review: With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo

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With the Fire on High
Elizabeth Acevedo
QuillTree Books
Published May 7, 2019

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About With the Fire on High

With her daughter to care for and her abuela to help support, high school senior Emoni Santiago has to make the tough decisions, and do what must be done. The one place she can let her responsibilities go is in the kitchen, where she adds a little something magical to everything she cooks, turning her food into straight-up goodness.

Still, she knows she doesn’t have enough time for her school’s new culinary arts class, doesn’t have the money for the class’s trip to Spain — and shouldn’t still be dreaming of someday working in a real kitchen. But even with all the rules she has for her life — and all the rules everyone expects her to play by — once Emoni starts cooking, her only real choice is to let her talent break free.

My Review

It’s probably weird that the first book by Elizabeth Acevedo that I’ve read is the one that isn’t a novel in poetry? I usually gravitate toward those, and I do have hard copies of both THE POET X and CLAP WHEN YOU LAND, but somehow I wound up reading this one first. (Truthfully it happened because I needed to sit in my littlest’s room to make sure she didn’t sneak out of bed, and I needed something to read from my phone.)

I loved Emoni right from page one. Her experience cooking and her understanding of it, her love and instinctive approach all had me spellbound. I loved that everyone has such an emotional experience eating her cooking, too. It’s not quite magical realism, but it made the story feel bigger than just contemporary.

The journey Emoni takes in learning to go beyond cooking by instinct and how to sort of put that together with cooking as part of a team was really powerful and felt so realistic. I wanted to try all her recipes and visit an unusual upscale restaurant to try dishes with unusual pairings (though we are not eating at restaurants right now… someday!).

Also, and many people have already said this, I appreciated her experience as a young, single mom. She tries to do all the right and admirable things. She knows the stakes are high, for herself and for her daughter. I love that she consistently puts Emma first, and that her challenge is learning how to be a mom without limiting herself to being just a mom.

Her relationship with ‘Buela also totally got me. The protectiveness on both sides. The love. I never doubted ‘Buela’s role as the parent in the relationship, and it’s so clear that it’s not easy for her, but she loves her family so much.

On the whole, this is a phenomenal book. I love it so much, and I feel like this is one I might read again soon, just to experience it all again. I absolutely recommend it to anyone who enjoys cooking or stories about following your dreams.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 14 up.

Representation
Emoni is Black and Puerto Rican. Her best friend is Black and a lesbian.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Extreme profanity used infrequently. Emoni doesn’t like anyone swearing near her daughter, and she tries very hard not to swear at all.

Romance/Sexual Content
Some references to Emoni and her ex having sex. She also talks about how once people know she has had a child, they sometimes treat her a certain way. With men, sometimes this means treating her like she will have sex with anyone, which isn’t how she is. A couple scenes show a boy and girl kissing. One scene shows them taking off shirts and touching and references them doing more, but doesn’t describe.

Spiritual Content
Malachi mentions that he has studied Islam.

Violent Content
None.

Drug Content
Emoni and her friends visit a bar in Spain. It’s legal for them to drink there, but against the agreement in the field trip forms they’ve signed. A couple students get very drunk. One girl gets sick and is super embarrassed about her behavior later. Emoni does not drink alcohol.

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Review: Thomas Jefferson and the Return of the Magic Hat by Deborah Kalb

Book Review and Content, Fantasy, Historical, Middle Grade 8-12, , , , , , ,

Thomas Jefferson and the Return of the Magic Hat (The President and Me #3)
Deborah Kalb
Schiffer Kids
Published September 28, 2020

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About Thomas Jefferson and the Return of the Magic Hat

After almost six months in Maryland, fifth-grader Oliver still misses his friends back in New Jersey. But things start to change one day, when his neighbor–and possible new friend–Sam lends Oliver a magic hat that takes him back to the 18th- and 19th-century world of Thomas Jefferson. Oliver and his sisters–Cassie, the nice one, and Ruby, the annoying one–end up learning more about Jefferson than they’d expected. And Oliver finds that his new neighborhood might not be so terrible after all. 

Thomas Jefferson and the Return of the Magic Hat is the third in The President and Me series that began with George Washington and the Magic Hat and John Adams and the Magic Bobblehead. This new adventure brings back previous characters Sam, Ava, J.P. (blink and you might miss them, though!), and of course the cantankerous talking hat itself.

My Review

Oliver is a sweet character with a big family who’s still acclimating to his new school. He struggles with a couple classmates who bully him for blurting out little known facts about presidents. I found him pretty easy to identify with.

He time travels backward to Thomas Jefferson’s lifetime and witnesses some key moments in his life: seeing him working on the Declaration of Independence, meeting him as he’s looking at the land which will become his estate, Monticello, and eavesdropping on the meeting between Jefferson, Hamiton and Madison to discuss the US capital.

It was neat to get to see snippets of those moments. The historical scenes always seemed really short to me– whenever Oliver removes the hat from his head, he returns to the present, and he seems to do that a lot!– so sometimes that felt a bit choppy. But it also kept the balance of the story focused on Oliver and the things he learns about friendship and family through his time traveling experiences.

One of the things I was really interested in is that early on in the story, Oliver and his friends discuss the fact that though Thomas Jefferson wrote about equality, he owned slaves. In fact, some were his own children. It seemed like the story might have intended to explore that issue more deeply, perhaps even to discuss it with Jefferson himself.

Oliver does meet Jefferson’s son, Madison Hemmings, and there’s a brief drive-by of a sort of explanation that Jefferson moderated/removed overt anti-slavery words in the Declaration of Independence because the Revolution needed the support of colonies who depended on slavery.

The obvious contradiction in his belief to be against slavery and the fact the he owned slaves is acknowledged. But on the whole, the issue isn’t deeply explored, and I was a bit disappointed by that because of the setup.

I thought the book was interesting, and enjoyed the present-day conflicts that Oliver had to navigate with friends and sisters. I think readers who have just outgrown the Magic Treehouse books, but still enjoy that type of story will enjoy this series.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 8 to 10.

Representation
Main characters are white. Oliver has brief encounters with a young Black slave in Thomas Jefferson’s house.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
None.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
A talking hat guides Oliver and his friends on time travel adventures.

Violent Content
None.

Drug Content
None.

Note: I received a free copy of THOMAS JEFFERSON AND THE RETURN OF THE MAGIC HAT in exchange for my honest review. This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use, but which help support running this blog.

Review: The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley

Book Review and Content, Coming of Age, Historical, Mystery/Suspense/Thriller, , , , , , ,

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (Flavia de Luce #1)
Alan Bradley
Delacorte Press
Published April 24, 2009

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About The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

It is the summer of 1950–and at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, young Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison, is intrigued by a series of inexplicable events: A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. Then, hours later, Flavia finds a man lying in the cucumber patch and watches him as he takes his dying breath.

For Flavia, who is both appalled and delighted, life begins in earnest when murder comes to Buckshaw. “I wish I could say I was afraid, but I wasn’t. Quite the contrary. This was by far the most interesting thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life.”

My Review

A long time ago, after I reviewed and enjoyed a mystery featuring a young narrator, someone suggested the Flavia de Luce series to me. I borrowed THE SWEETNESS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIE from the library but only got maybe halfway through before having to return it. I liked what I’d read, but got sidetracked by other things and didn’t pick it up again until now.

Flavia is spunky and whip-smart. She has an interesting relationship with her two older sisters which mostly consists of giving each other a hard time and playing tricks on one another. There’s an undercurrent of protectiveness and caring in there, too. Sort of the only-I-can-mess-with-my-sister type of thing. It was kind of sweet.

I thought Flavia cleverly followed the thread of the mystery, having her own child-like moments here and there between highly analytical research, experiments and deductions. I feel like it should have been harder to believe that she’s eleven years old, but for some reason, I wasn’t really bothered by that as I was reading.

One section shows her listening to a long recounting of her father’s life at school. It’s interesting because it’s some of the only real interaction we see between them, but it goes on for a long time and sort of shifts the focus of the story to be about him from there on out.

Another thing to note is that there are a couple of racially insensitive (at best) situations or comments in the story. I’ve listed them below in the contents. To be honest, these are the kinds of things I have the most trouble with as a reviewer. This book is set in the 1950s and published in 2009 (which isn’t that long ago). I feel like the face-painting and Flavia’s comment could have been easily left out. They may have been historically accurate representations of ideas at the time, but including them feels insensitive to me, and none of them were critical to the story.

I enjoyed the mystery elements, and felt like the characters are believable and interesting. I wish it hadn’t included those few references.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 12 up.

Representation
Takes place in England.

Flavia’s father and a friend had a performance routine in which they dressed up as a Chinese man using make-up and an unflattering accent. Flavia later makes an off-hand comment about colonization “civilizing” the indigenous people– though it’s unclear if she says this sarcastically. These things may have been historically accurate representations of feelings and behavior at the time the story takes place, but are at the least racially insensitive and prejudiced.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Mild profanity used infrequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
Flavia sees a young man kiss a young woman.

Spiritual Content
None.

Violent Content – Trigger warning for bullying, suicide and murder.
Flavia is the youngest of three sisters, and her older sisters boss her around and bully her sometimes. Flavia also commits pranks against her sisters. She also learns of a student her father knew who was bullied.

Description of a man throwing himself from a rooftop. Flavia discovers the body of a stranger in the garden who appears to have been murdered.

Contains situations of peril. Two scenes show Flavia tied up and locked away.

Drug Content
Adults drink alcohol socially.

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Review: A Sky Beyond the Storm by Sabaa Tahir

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A Sky Beyond the Storm (An Ember in the Ashes #4)
Sabaa Tahir
Razorbill
Published December 1, 2020

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About A Sky Beyond the Storm

Picking up just a few months after A REAPER AT THE GATES left off…

The long-imprisoned jinn are on the attack, wreaking bloody havoc in villages and cities alike. But for the Nightbringer, vengeance on his human foes is just the beginning.

At his side, Commandant Keris Veturia declares herself Empress, and calls for the heads of any and all who defy her rule. At the top of the list? The Blood Shrike and her remaining family.

Laia of Serra, now allied with the Blood Shrike, struggles to recover from the loss of the two people most important to her. Determined to stop the approaching apocalypse, she throws herself into the destruction of the Nightbringer. In the process, she awakens an ancient power that could lead her to victory–or to an unimaginable doom.

And deep in the Waiting Place, the Soul Catcher seeks only to forget the life–and love–he left behind. Yet doing so means ignoring the trail of murder left by the Nightbringer and his jinn. To uphold his oath and protect the human world from the supernatural, the Soul Catcher must look beyond the borders of his own land. He must take on a mission that could save–or destroy–all that he knows.

My Review

Normally, I really struggle with longer books, but I pretty much tore through this one. There were so many things on my list of things I needed to see happen. Romances that needed to be faced. Villains I wanted destroyed. So many things.

I am going to do my absolute best not to give anything away in this review, since I know a lot of people are still reading or haven’t been able to start reading yet. So bear with me if I sound cryptic.

The author has pretty much already stated that there are some heartbreaks coming in the book. There are. Some of them were really tough. There were some big surprises that had me cheering, too. Lots of things unfolded in ways that weren’t quite what I expected, and often I was like wait, wow!

Ultimately, I will say that I loved getting to follow the story to its conclusion. I think one of my favorite things about the series as a whole is Laia’s evolution from the girl too afraid to do anything but run to the girl who not only learns combat from the Blood Shrike, but who’s like, “Hey the Nightbringer has an awesome weapon which I believe I will try to steal right off his back.”

I also love, love, LOVE Helene. She’s 100% my favorite character, though I did not like her at all at first. I think the fact that she is so committed to protect her family and so committed to her people– and so committed to doing what’s right, even if it doesn’t follow traditions or what people in power want her to do– made it impossible for me not to love her.

There are so many complex, amazing characters in the book, though. I loved that over and over one of the things that Laia and Elias and Helene have to do is learn the story of their enemies. Learn what makes them who they are. I thought that exploration made the story a lot deeper and changed how I felt about certain characters.

On the whole, I feel like this is one of those books that you’re either already planning to read or you haven’t followed the series this far or at all. This isn’t the book you’d want to start with, if you’re unfamiliar with the series. Definitely start with AN EMBER IN THE ASHES if you haven’t read it yet.

I think this one was worth the wait. I’m super glad it came out before the end of the year so that I had something to look forward to reading this month.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 14 up.

Representation
Tribes and Scholar people are oppressed by the Empire. Scholars have been enslaved for many years. Both have bronze skin and dark hair. Elias’ father was a Scholar, and he was raised in a tribe. Laia is a Scholar.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Mild profanity used fairly infrequently. Most swears are things like, “Skies.”

Romance/Sexual Content
Several scenes show couples being intimate. There are enough details to let you know what’s happening. Most are descriptions of kissing and undressing, but some brief descriptions beyond that.

Spiritual Content
Elias is the Soul Catcher who serves Mauth, or death. He is responsible to help human ghosts make peace with their deaths and pass on. Mauth first created the Jinn to serve this purpose, but they’ve rebelled against him. There are other spirit creatures like efrits who have elemental abilities and ghuls that feed on grief and wights which spy for a character.

The tribes also have a spiritual leader who passes on stories. There’s a spiritual component to how the stories are kept and discovered. There is also a leader who performs burial rites for tribe members to help them pass on peacefully.

Violent Content
Many depictions of battle violence, some pretty graphic.

Drug Content
None.

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Review: The Monster of Marnmouth Valley by CJ Greene

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The Monster of Marnmouth Valley
CJ Greene
Published October 15, 2020

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About The Monster of Marnmouth Valley

“Deep in the Kelna forest in the heart of Marnmouth Valley lies a fountain with extraordinary water. A creature discovered the fountain and began to drink the water. It has since found a way to ensure it is the only one that gets any of the water from the fountain. The less water that reaches the land, the more it dies. And if the valley dies, everyone in it will have to leave, or perish along with the land.”

Ellian Woodborough has dreamt of adventure all twelve years of her life and when the neighbouring Marnmouth Valley is threatened by a mysterious creature, she is given the chance to go on a real quest. The only issue? Ellian is given the role of the sidekick while the one fated to save the valley turns out to be 72-year-old Beth who would much rather stay at home and finish her knitting.

With Beth knowing nothing about adventures or fighting monsters and harbouring secrets even she is unaware of, Ellian soon finds her lifelong dream becoming a nightmare. Still, she must lead Beth along the treacherous path towards her destiny if they ever want to survive the forest and defeat the monster of Marnmouth Valley.

The Monster of Marnmouth Valley is the debut middle-grade fiction novel of author Charlie J Greene. It explores the idea of exceeding the expectations and limits people have for you—even the ones you have for yourself. Young readers will delight in the humour, danger, and what it really means to be a hero.

My Review

This is one of those books that I read telling myself, “Just one more chapter,” all the way until I reached the end. The characters, especially Ellian, had me invested and engaged, and I had to know how the quest would end.

I loved that the storytelling created this feeling of leaving breadcrumbs, where characters would discover something or learn something, and then later it would be important. It was often done through things that celebrated the story world but also then helped with the plot.

THE MONSTER OF MARNMOUTH VALLEY is a pretty quick read. I finished it in a single sitting, which is pretty amazing since I’ve been so tired lately that often when I sit down to read, I fall asleep after 30 pages or so.

I think readers who enjoy adventure stories and tales of mentors and unusual friendships will like this one a lot. I think fans of TUESDAYS AT THE CASTLE by Jessica Day George will enjoy this one.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 10 to 14.

Representation
Major characters are white.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
None.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
One character has learned spells from her mother.

Violent Content
Mentions of attacks by a monster or other dangerous creatures. Situations of peril. A couple battle scenes.

Drug Content
None.

Note: I received a free copy of THE MONSTER OF MARNMOUTH VALLEY in exchange for my honest review. This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use, but which help support running this blog.

Review: A Reaper at the Gates by Sabaa Tahir

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A Reaper at the Gates (An Ember in the Ashes #3)
Sabaa Tahir
Razorbill
Published June 12, 2018

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About A Reaper at the Gates

Beyond the Empire and within it, the threat of war looms ever larger.

The Blood Shrike, Helene Aquilla, is assailed on all sides. Emperor Marcus, haunted by his past, grows increasingly unstable, while the Commandant capitalizes on his madness to bolster her own power. As Helene searches for a way to hold back the approaching darkness, her sister’s life and the lives of all those in the Empire hang in the balance.

Far to the east, Laia of Serra knows the fate of the world lies not in the machinations of the Martial court, but in stopping the Nightbringer. But while hunting for a way to bring him down, Laia faces unexpected threats from those she hoped would aid her, and is drawn into a battle she never thought she’d have to fight.

And in the land between the living and the dead, Elias Veturius has given up his freedom to serve as Soul Catcher. But in doing so, he has vowed himself to an ancient power that will stop at nothing to ensure Elias’s devotion–even at the cost of his humanity.

My Review

This might be my favorite book in the series. I loved Helene’s point-of-view. Of all the characters facing all the situations, I felt the most moved by her story– especially her love for her sister and Harper.

Which isn’t to say I loved Laia and Elias any less in this book. I think one of the things I like so much about the series as a whole is how much Laia has grown. At the beginning of the first book she could barely stand in the presence of soldiers. Now she’s about to lead the rebellion against the whole empire. And I find her transformation totally believable.

I also love that this is such a female-centric story. Yes, we have Elias and the Nightbringer and some other male characters here and there. But when you stop and think about the critical story characters, so many of them are female: Laia, Helene, Cook, the Commandant. Every single one of those is an absolute force. I love it so much.

The only truly difficult thing for me in these books is the level of violence. It’s a lot. There are references to and threats of rape (not so much in this book, but in the first for sure), some scenes showing torture and graphic battle violence. So it’s definitely not for the faint of heart.

On the whole, I’ve really enjoyed the first three books in the series (see the links to my earlier reviews below.), and I’m super anxious to read the final story, A SKY BEYOND THE STORM, which is supposed to come in December of this year.

An Ember in the Ashes Series Reviews

Book One: An Ember in the Ashes

Book Two: A Torch Against the Night

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 16 up.

Representation
Laia has bronze skin and dark hair and is from an oppressed and often enslaved people called Scholars.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Mild profanity used very infrequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing between boy and girl. One scene shows two characters leading up to sex.

Violent Content – Trigger Warning
Emperor Marcus continues to abuse his wife, Helene’s sister, hurting her and threatening to hurt her if Helene doesn’t deliver the results he wants. Multiple graphic battle scenes. Scenes involving torture. A woman kills her husband and child to spare them from being tortured further.

Spiritual Content
The Nightbringer uses magic to heal or manipulate others. Another character uses magic to heal. Elias is tasked with helping ghosts pass through to another place. Some ghosts possess humans and attack others. Augers relay prophesies about certain characters. Other spirit creatures, ifrits and jinn, try to stop Laia and her allies. Another character uses spirits to spy for him.

Drug Content
None.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use, but which help support the costs of running this blog.