Notes from the Dog - Adventure, Sports and Mystery

1.  Paulsen, Gary.  Notes from the Dog.  New York:  Wendy Lamb Books, 2009.

2.  Plot Summary.  Fourteen-year-old Finn is looking forward to the summer when he won't have to talk to anyone.  He has set a goal of talking to no more than a dozen people for the entire summer break, with a life goal of getting a job where he doesn't have to talk to anyone.  He just doesn't feel comfortable with people.  And then Johanna, a college student, moves in next door to housesit for the summer.  She hires Finn to plant a garden, and suddenly he is talking to people left and right, much to his consternation.  However, Johanna has breast cancer, and as she trains to participate in a triathlon geared to raise money for breast cancer research, Finn begins to realize how important people really are to living a fulfilled life.

3.  Critical Review.  Gary Paulsen is king of the adventure story for Young Adults.  When I think of Paulsen, I think of stories that are set in the wilderness with one of the major conflicts being man vs. nature.   Notes from the Dog is one of his novels that does not fit in this category, though there is a dog.  Finn lives in the suburbs, and his dog is a border collie who starts bringing Finn notes such as, "You're not as ugly as you think."  Finn figures out quickly the notes are from Johanna and is surprised to realize later, after he receives the fifth and last one, that they have had a positive effect on his self-confidence. 

I found the handling of the cancer part of the story to be sensitively done; however, I also thought it was handled somewhat unrealistically with Johanna being almost too upbeat all the time.  Yet she does have issues with nausea (she throws up all over Finn and his buddy Matthew after one of her chemo treatments), and she's obviously ill as Finn notices how thin and pale she is along with the fact that they discover her red hair is actually a wig.  A review in VOYA agrees when the reviewer says, "in this book, the dialogue and story line seem a little too pleasant and the lives of the teens lack any real angst or conflict outside the horrors of Johanna's chemo side effects."   The same reviewer makes a note of the fact that this book is written for boys and states, "Given the brevity of the book and its inclination to be a book for boys, it could be recommended to reluctant readers."  Brief it is.  At 132 pages, this is an easy read that might appeal to middle school readers - both boys and girls.   The characters are in junior high, and have the feeling of being younger than high school, and the conflict is definitely light.  Finn's journey from self-proclaimed loner to integrated member of a budding community lacks the emotional conflict that most 14-year-olds endure when they are experiencing an upheaval of their world.

Nevertheless, this book is Paulsen, and I have yet to read a Paulsen novel that disappoints.  Matt Campbell, Grade 8, describes reading Gary Paulsen novels in this way, "While reading Gary Paulsen's books I get the feeling that he shares my feelings about animals. I enjoy reading his books so much because of how he describes everything, and makes you feel like you are the main character."  
(http://comminfo.rutgers.edu/professional-development/childlit/paulsen1.html)  I find this to be true of all of the Paulsen novels I have read.  The characters are well-developed, and it is easy to find myself lost in the plots, often unwilling to put the book down until I have finished it.  However, for readers who love Paulsen for novels such as Hatchet and the Brian books, The Foxman, or Dogsong, this novel may feel just a little too "tame."  But for experienced Paulsen readers who understand at the outset that this story will be a different type of adventure, Notes from the Dog will provide a stepping stone to enjoying the eclectic mix of excellent stories Gary Paulsen creates. 

4.  Review Excerpts

Publishers Weekly:   "The plot is straightforward, but Paulsen's thoughtful characters are compelling and their interactions realistic. This emotional, coming-of-age journey about taking responsibility for one's own happiness and making personal connections will not disappoint."

Children's Literature:  "Gary Paulsen has written another treasure, but the challenge this time is not weather or wildlife but befriending a young woman with cancer."

School Library Journal:  "Paulsen's fans may miss his trademarks: the notorious exploits of boys, the page-turning wilderness adventures, or the sled dogs that often take center stage. Yet this candid and tender tale, told with his signature humor, is a salute to the bravest of the brave."

Ironman - Adventure, Sports and Mystery

1. Crutcher, Chris. Ironman. New York: Greenwillow Books, 1995.

2. Plot Summary. Bo Brewster doesn’t get along with his father – at all. He doesn’t get along with his English teacher, and ex-football coach, Mr. Redmond, either. All his anger lands him in Mr. Nak’s Anger Management class as a condition of returning to school after a suspension. At first, Bo is afraid of attending the early-morning group. He’s not like the kids in that group - they’re seriously disturbed, truly criminal, definitely weird. However, given that his choices are very limited, Bo consents and joins the group which turns out to be a life-changing experience. As Bo trains for the Yukon Jack triathlon and goes to Anger Management, he learns more about life than he ever expected.

3. Critical Analysis. Chris Crutcher is known as a Young Adult author who writes “sports adventures.” While sports is always an element of the setting and plot, sports really simply provides a backdrop for delivering powerful stories of young adults who are facing fairly serious obstacles. Crutcher’s prose is a fabulous combination of serious intensity and entertaining humor. One minute he’s delivering a line to live life by (“if I ever want to see how something works, look at it broken”) and the next he has readers chuckling with his descriptions of the characters actions. And the characters are a strong suit of this novel. The eccentric kids in “Nak’s Pack” – the Anger Management group – are definitely the weird, scary group Bo thought they would be, but Crutcher develops each one so that he or she is a dynamic character, changing as the group progresses, and they all find out they are not so different from each other after all. Even very minor characters, such as Lonnie Gerback, one of Bo’s competitors in the triathlon who surprisingly switches bikes with Bo for the race to help Bo gain an edge he’ll need for the race, is a nicely drawn character who moves the plot along. As a teacher, I’d love to have Mr. Nak’s insight into life and the knack of saying just the right thing at the right time, which while somewhat unrealistic, might make any reader wish he had that teacher in high school.

The primary theme of how father/son relationships affects both the fathers and the sons is played with a fairly heavy hand. Not only is there the conflict between Bo and his father, but dysfunctional relationships with fathers is the underlying issue with most of Nak’s Pack. While some may think that the character of Bo’s father is unrealistic, he definitely reminds me of a father I know, though thankfully not my own! I’m sure many teenagers have parents like Bo’s father, as well as some of the other fathers described in a sad light. The good relationship that exists between Lonnie and his father, which has a positive impact on Bo’s participation in the triathlon, exists in the distant background, providing just a hint of a reason to be optimistic that not all fathers are jerks (or worse).

Teenage readers will surely find themselves experiencing some of the same feelings as the kids in Nak’s Pack, even if their lives are relatively good. I can’t imagine anyone reading the book without being on the edge of his seat waiting to see how the triathlon works out. I believe readers will love the humor, the strength and perseverance of the young adult characters who are fighting against many things that are not fair. Bo leaves readers feeling hope that even though life doesn’t go the way they want it too, they can still turn out all right and have a positive impact on the world around them.

4. Review Excerpts.

Publisher’s Weekly: “the narrative crackles along in the author's inimitable style”

School Library Journal: “Powerful, perceptive, and wickedly funny.”

Booklist: “With its highly charged intensity channeled into riveting prose, an array of eccentric and strong characterizations, and dramatic plot climax (messagey conclusion notwithstanding), Ironman is a combination of the psychological and the sports novel at their best.”

Teenreads.com: “Chris Crutcher is a master when it comes to capturing the essence of intelligent teen angst. His prose is crisp, funny and fast moving. His characters have genuine depth and undeniable heart. . . . It is bright, thoughtful young adult fiction at its best.”

The Terrorist - Adventure, Sports and Mystery

1. Cooney, Caroline B. The Terrorist. New York: Scholastic Press, 1997.

2. Plot Summary. Sixteen-year-old Laura Williams and her family have moved to London for one year while her father closes the Eurpoean offices of the floundering company he works for. She and her eleven-year-old brother Billy attend the London International Academy with students from all over the world. One day, on their way to school, Billy is handed a package, and too late, realizes that it is a bomb. In order to protect the people in the crowded tube entrance, he curls himself around the box just before it explodes, killing him. Laura, not ever one to pay attention to world events, is suddenly thrust into a reality that involves terrorism as she fights to discover who killed her brother, and why.

3. Critical Analysis. Caroline Cooney has long been one of my favorite authors for young adults. Her novels include sympathetic characters caught up in over-the-top adventure that most people will never experience. In this story, there is a combination of adventure and mystery as Laura spends the novel trying to figure out who killed her brother and finds that she suspects everyone and trusts no one. As the story unfolds, Laura's character is developed through her interactions with her classmates, students from around the world. She seems to be the only teenager who doesn't know, and doesn't care, how the relationships between various countries affects the relationships among the students at the school, and she realizes quickly that her ignorance hinders her ability to think through who may be responsible. As might be predicted, her naivete also leads her into trouble. Interestingly, the characterization of Laura seems to be developed more weakly than I expect from Cooney's protagonists. The reader actually learns more about Billy through his family's reactions and responses to various stimuli as the proceed through a fog of trauma after his death, and I found myself enjoying the development of Billy much more than the development of Laura.

As a mystery, the plot itself includes plenty of characters who are possible suspects; however, none of them is developed very fully, and when Laura becomes involved with the actual terrorist, she seems to be the only one who doesn't realize it. The storyline is thin as Laura decides to hone in on her classmates and goes from person to person, annoying and frustrating most of them.  When the terrorist is finally known, the terrorist's motivation is unclear, and so is her connection to the people whom Laura had met living with her.

While this story has verisimilitude - enough reality to convince the reader that the story is plausible - it is simply not as engaging as the stories I've come to love from Cooney. The plot and amateur detective work of Laura is not intricate enough to create the suspense that is so captivating in some of Cooney's other novels. While her classmates get annoyed with Laura, I as the reader am annoyed as well. Unfortunately, it's not the kind of annoyance that Cooney may have intended.  Her family's grief over Billy's death as they insist on remaining in London despite the pleading from family, business associates, and the London police to return to the States will bring an occasional tear but not the tension and anxiety Cooney fans love. 

What started as excitement over the fact that I was "required" to read a Caroline Cooney novel for homework fizzled into a bit of disappointment at it not being one of her best novels. Absent are the fast-moving plot and quick-thinking teenagers of novels such as Flight #116 is Down and Flash Fire. Absent are the characters that are dynamic and sympathetic such as Janie in The Face on the Milk Carton series. Absent are the twists and turns that keep the reader wanting to turn the pages until the conflicts are resolved. The best chapter is Chapter One when we meet Billy and discover that he has been the target of a terrorist that results in his death at the end of the chapter.  The best parts of the remaining chapters are when characters reminisce about what Billy was like, or when they think about how he was likely to act or feel in the current situation. 

The cover art was done by Tim O'Brien, husband of Elizabeth Parisi, Executive Art Director at Scholastic. It is a beautifully painted package wrapped in brown paper, intricately tied with twine, and complete with the cheap cellophane tape that Billy mentions in Chapter One. The cover art wraps completely around the front and back covers and the spine in one unbroken picture. O'Brien is also the creator of the cover art for The Hunger Games series from Scholastic. A gifted artist, O'Brien's work is worth checking out at his website  http://www.obrienillustration.com/ and his blog  http://www.drawger.com/tonka/?

4.  Review Excerpts. 

teenreads.com:  "Underneath the action, suspense, and the seemingly ordinary life of an American teenager in an English school is the sorrow and the confusion that only the violent death of a son and a brother can cause in a family's life."

School Library Journal:  "Indeed, readers come to know the short-lived Billy better than many of the other characters, including the vaguely draw villain, whose motivation is never really clear. Cynicism rather than honor is the victor at the tale's conclusion; it ends not with a bang, but a whimper."

Kirkus Reviews:  "The novel isn't perfect: Laura's transformation from a self-involved ``ugly'' American abroad to vengeful paranoiac is fairly convincing, although readers may have trouble getting past their initial dislike of her and her self-satisfied oblivion. While most of the characters are as real as their grief--making human choices, and suffering the consequences--others simply fade out of the story, and the culprit is based more on a stereotype than on logic. If the novel requires a few big leaps of faith, readers will be glad they stayed with it, and will be caught up in exciting, compulsive reading."

Speak - Realism, Romance and Censorship

1.  Anderson, Laurie Halse.  Speak.  New York:  Scholastic, 1999.

2.  Plot Summary.  "I have entered high school with the wrong hair, the wrong clothes, the wrong attitude.  And I don't have anyone to sit with.  I am Outcast."  So begins the story of Melinda.  A few weeks before school is to start, she attends a party where many high school kids are celebrating the last glorious days of summer.  However, Melinda calls the police to come break up the party.  Everyone knows she did it, but no one knows why.  And she's not telling - anyone.  So when school finally begins, Melinda is a marginalized member of a class who knows she ruined everyone's fun.   As the year progresses, Melinda finally begins to find ways to express her frustrations and fears through art, and when the students in her class find out what really happened at that party, Melinda's year of being unable to speak is finally over.

3.  Critical Analysis.  Anderson hooks readers immediately with the first few paragraphs in her novel.  Melinda is an outcast, and it becomes quickly evident that something is going on besides the angst that goes along with the first day of high school.  Something has happened that has caused her friends to reject her, and Melinda isn't talking to anyone about what it was.  In fact, Melinda is not talking much at all.  For her entire freshman year, Melinda rarely says a word to anyone.  The only place where she feels comfortable is in art class, where her teacher Mr. Freeman - something of a rebel and constantly in some kind of trouble with administration - has given a year-long project to students to create art out of a word drawn randomly from a pile of words.  Melinda has drawn the word "tree" and is spending the  year sketching, painting, sculpting and creating trees.  Interestingly, her trees always look half dead, but Mr. Freeman continues to encourage her to go where her heart is leading her.  He understands that something is on Melinda's mind that she is unable to share.  He quietly, gently offers to listen if she ever wants to talk, but in the meantime, the tree obviously has meaning for Melinda and he encourages her to continue to work with it.  Mr. Freeman is the one sympathetic adult in this novel.

Melinda is exhibiting the symptoms that many young adults show when they have a traumatic experience.  Melinda has been raped at a party by an older student.  For reasons she doesn't explain, Melinda doesn't tell anyone until her friend Rachel begins dating the rapist.  Then Melinda begins to feel compelled to warn her friend.  However, that goes wrong, too, for a while.  But Melinda perseveres, and in the end, she is obviously going to be a survivor of her ordeal.  At the end of the novel, after everything has come out, she is surprised by the fact that she not only is no longer an outcast but something of a hero. 

Some reviews criticize the unlikely coincidence that the girls' lacrosse team happens by when Melinda is struggling with Andy after he's trapped Melinda in a janitor's closet with him.  However, anyone who has hung around in a high school for very long knows that many students stay at school for hours after classes are over - athletic practices, club meetings, social organizations all keep kids and teachers at school long after the last bell rings.  This doesn't seem to be such a stretch for me as a high school teacher.  However, the nice part is that Melinda has already turned the situation before the girls arrive when she manages to threaten Andy with a piece of broken mirror which she's pushed into his throat.  She gets the help she needs AFTER she has begun to provide the help for herself, after she's been able to scream "NO" to him and to herself, after she has been able to start to regain her voice, literally and figuratively.

In response to the 10-year anniversary of Speak in 2009, Anderson wrote a poem titled "Listen" which uses the words and phrases from thousands of letters she and Melinda received over the years.  Anderson reads the poem on her website.  If you have read Speak, you MUST go listen to her poem.  What a powerful, moving piece. 

The website is http://madwomanintheforest.com/youngadult-speak/

A copy of the poem, for those of us who are also visual and like to combine the sound of the poem with the look of the poem can be found on her blog at  http://speakupaboutspeak.blogspot.com/  Scroll down to the Thursday, February 26, 2009 entry to find a copy of the poem which can be printed. 

4.  Review Excerpts
Publisher's Weekly:  "In a stunning first novel, Anderson uses keen observations and vivid imagery to pull readers into the head of an isolated teenager."

School Library Journal:  "This is a compelling book, with sharp, crisp writing that draws readers in, engulfing them in the story."


The Horn Book, starred review:  "An uncannily funny book even as it plumbs the darkness, Speak will hold readers from first word to last."


Kirkus Reviews, pointer review:  "The plot is gripping and the characters are powerfully drawn...its raw and unvarnished look...will be hard for readers to forget."

Hope was Here - Realism, Romance, and Censorship

1.  Bauer, Joan.  Hope was Here.  New York:  G. P. Putnam's Sons, 2000.

2.  Plot Summary.  Hope and her aunt Addie travel around the country following the work they can find.  Addie is short order cook extroidinaire and Hope is "the best waitress under 30 I've ever seen," according to one of the other waitresses at the Welcome Stairways Diner in Mulhoney, Wisconsin, where Hope and Addie have just moved after having to close their diner in New York City.  Hope couldn't even finish out her sophomore year, and having to move yet again - out to the middle of nowhere no less - is almost more than Hope can endure this time.  However, she and Addie quickly find themselves embroiled in a political duel between incumbant Mayor Millstone and G. T. Stroop, the owner of the Welcome Stairways who decides to join the race, challenging what he believes has been a corrupt city government.  In unexpected twists and turns, the election and the story have emotional endings. 

3.  Critical Analysis.  Hope was Here was named a 2001 Newbery Honor Book, and for good cause.  This novel has strong young adult characters, and the themes are clear - life is hard and young people can make a difference.  Hope may not be an entirely realistic character.  She seems to take her hardships easier than most teenagers would.  However, she does explain that she is heartbroken to be leaving her friends and her home in New York City.  Mulhoney, Wisconsin does not have any of the things she has grown to love in New York - no museums, no concerts, and no sushi.  She discovers, though, that believing in a cause can unite people of all ages, and fighting for that cause makes life meaningful. 

Hope has not struck out on her own yet; nevertheless, her journey with her aunt is a quest to discover who she is.  Hope has an eccentric mother who is in and out - mostly out - of her life.  She has left a string of friendships behind with each move.  She legally changed her name from Tulip to Hope after 12 years of enduring the embarrassment of her birth name, and with that change, she has consciously been trying to live up to her new name.  Hope finds the father she's been looking for all her life in an unlikely person, and she begins learning to relate to her first boyfriend.  Lots of changes in a 16-year-old's life, and Hope handles them mostly with grace and success.  After all the forced new beginnings, readers are left with a feeling of relief that, in spite of some further tragedy in Hope's life, she and her aunt have finally found the security of a place which they will never need to leave again. 

Bauer does a terrific job of building suspense in the story surrounding the town's mayoral election, and the endings to the plot points do not all resolve in a "happily ever after" kind of way, but the story is satisfying and young adults, especially girls, will find a good role model in Hope and proof that there are adults who are supportive, loving and special.  

I have particular interest in the titles of stories and novels, and Hope was Here is one of my favorites.  The play on the word "hope" as both Hope's name and what she experiences makes this title especially nice.  High schoolers who must fight with their lives not turning out exactly as they wish they would should enjoy reading about Hope's life.

4.  Review Excerpts. 
Kirkus:  "As always from Bauer, this novel is full of humor, starring a strong and idealistic protagonist, packed with funny lines, and peopled with interesting and quirky characters."

School Library Journal:  "When it comes to creating strong, independent, and funny teenaged female characters, Bauer is in a class by herself." 

Booklist:  "It's Bauer's humor that supplies, in Addie's cooking vernacular, the yeast that makes the story rise above the rest, reinforcing the substantive issues of honesty, humanity, and the importance of political activism. Serve this up to teens--with a dash of hope."

Amazon.com:  "Here's a book that's as warm and melty as a grilled Swiss on seven-grain bread, and just as wholesome and substantial. . . .Joan Bauer, who won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Rules of the Road, has served up a delicious novel in Hope was Here, full of delectable characters, tasty wit, and deep-dish truth."