Tag Archives: friendship

Early Review: Call the Shots

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Call the Shots by Don Calame (pub date 9/11/12)

Another YA treat that I picked up from BEA!  This one is part of a series but it can be read on its own.  I haven’t read any of Calame’s previous books but Call the Shots is a self-contained story and I was able to pick up on the characters pretty quickly.

Coop, Sean, and Matt are fifteen, best friends, and always coming up with new schemes.  When wise-cracking Coop hears about an upcoming indie horror movie festival, he knows he can make a movie that’ll win the top prize.  At first his friends aren’t interested, but then Sean finds himself in a situation in which he needs cash fast, and decides to go in on the project.  With movie-buff Sean as the screenwriter, the three boys begin working on their idea for the next big horror flick: a monster movie featuring zombie/vampire/human/chimp hybrids.  All they need is start-up funds, actors…and a camera.

Soon the project becomes more complicated than they had imagined.  Between borrowing money from Sean’s stoner uncle, and using his psycho girlfriend’s camera on the condition that she star in the movie, the guys start to wonder if they’ll ever finish their masterpiece.  At the same time, Sean is dealing with an unrequited crush on a girl at school, a drama teacher with too many suggestions for his screenplay, and a twin sister who hates his guts.

I really enjoyed this cute and funny story.  It has great comedic timing, and realistic characters.  I think it’s harder to write teenage characters than some people think; they can sometimes sound too adult or too childish.  But the boys’ witty dialogue felt very natural to me.  Due to its rough language and drug references, this is definitely a book for older teens.  And if you’re an adult who enjoys YA, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised by this book.

Early Review: The Yellow Birds

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The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers (pub date 9/11/12)

“Nothing is more isolating than having a particular history.  At least that’s what I thought.  Now I know: All pain is the same.  Only the details are different.”

There have been a great number of novels written about war over the years, but I imagine that very few of them are as visceral and real as this one.  Bold and gripping, this book is about the damage battle does to the one who survive.

The Yellow Birds is written by an Iraq War veteran, and tells the story of the friendship between twenty-one-year-old Private John Bartle and eighteen-year-old Private Daniel Murphy.  Since basic training, when Bartle made an impossible promise to Murphy’s mother to protect her son, the two young men have been like brothers.  But as the war progresses and takes its toll on them and on their strict sergeant, Murphy becomes uninvolved with the world around him.  And soon Bartle finds himself seeing and doing things he never thought he would have to.

There is more to the plot but I don’t want to give too much away.  I went in not knowing much about the story and found myself surprised and moved by how emotional it is.  I think other readers should have the same experience I did.  The Yellow Birds is more about the effects of battle on the soldiers than it is about the actual war.  Author Kevin Powers wrote some incredibly deep passages where Bartle describes the many racing thoughts and emotions that consume him after he is discharged.

Even if you think you don’t like war stories (I usually don’t), I encourage you to give The Yellow Birds a try.  It reminded me of the film The Hurt Locker, so if you enjoyed that then you should definitely read this book.  It has a great protagonist, beautiful prose, and universal themes that anyone can relate to.  I liked that there was no hidden agenda in this novel; it didn’t strike me as either pro-war or anti-war.  It simply relates the sometimes devastating effects that combat has on the people who volunteer to serve their country.  Sad and thought-provoking, this is a great piece of literary fiction.

Book Review: Dare Me

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Dare Me by Megan Abbott (pub date 7/31/12

“When you have nothing inside you, you feel everything more, and you feel you can control all of it.”

Friendship, teamwork, with a little jealousy and an eating disorder or two: there’s a lot more to cheerleading than meets the eye.  For the teen characters in this novel, cheerleading is about being loyal to your “sistahs” for life.  In short, it is life.

Dare Me is a novel not just about cheerleading, but about dangerous relationships and emotions spinning out of control.  Beth and Addy are best friends and high school seniors, Beth being the self-appointed queen of the cheer squad and Addy being her faithful second-in-command.  Now there’s a new cheer coach who challenges Beth’s authority as ruler of the squad.

Within a few weeks, Coach Collette French whips the cheer team into shape, teaching them to perform dangerous stunts instead of the hip wiggling and pom-pom shaking that they had previously been doing.  And the girls quickly become enamored by Collette’s cool, confident demeanor.  Especially Addy, who becomes Collette’s friend and even her confidante.  But how close is too close?

When Collette is investigated after a suspicious death, things quickly start to unravel for both her and the squad.  Only Addy seems interested in the truth, and once she starts looking for it she gets deeper in the situation than she thought.

This is a very well written book, with a lot of plot twists and a surprising ending.  What was most interesting for me was the apparent role reversal of Addy and Coach French.  Coach seems to have everything anyone could want: great job, great body, perfect family.  At first she comes off calm and collected, but as the story progresses, her character is shown to be rather immature and impulsive.  Her relationship with her squad borders on inappropriate, and some of her actions are rather self-destructive.  And though Addy is only a teenager, she demonstrates more maturity and insight than her friends, even Beth.  Beth is also a great character, a girl you will love to hate.  Beautiful, confident, and manipulative, Beth is more dangerous that you might first suspect.

Like I said, the writing is great.  Abbott writes teenagers really well, using slang and mannerisms that feel genuine and not contrived.  It’s a pretty quick read with a good story and an air of mystery that will hold you from beginning to end, and offers a disturbing look into the mind of today’s teen girls.  So whether you were a cheerleader in high school, or you secretly envied or hated them, you’re sure to enjoy Dare Me.

Early Review: The Unfinished Work of Elizabeth D

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The Unfinished Work of Elizabeth D. by Nichole Bernier (pub date 6/5/12)

“That’s the funny thing about people who don’t fit into a box.  They grow to infiltrate everything, and when they suddenly go missing, they are missing everywhere.”

Who knows you the most?  Is there anyone in your life who knows all of your secrets, your past, your craziest thoughts?  Think about the people in your life closest to you: your spouse/partner, parents, friends.  Is there a part of you that none of them knows?  For some people, the one who knows them the most is not a person but a journal. 

The Unfinished Work of Elizabeth D is about a thirty-something wife and mother named Kate whose best friend Elizabeth died in a plane crash.  Several months after Elizabeth’s death, Kate finds out that Elizabeth had willed her a trunk full of old journals, along with explicit instructions that Kate be the one to read them.  Though she is at first reluctant to read her friend’s private journals, Kate accepts her new duty out of loyalty to Elizabeth.

Kate takes the journals along on her vacation, and quickly discovers an Elizabeth completely unlike the one she thought she knew.  The cheerful, capable Elizabeth was a mere shell, hiding a painful past and crippling depression.  Kate struggles to reconcile her own guilt over not recognizing her friend’s suffering, and also deals with constant inquiries from Elizabeth’s widowed husband Dave about what is in the journals.  Resentful that the journals were given to Kate and not him, Dave has doubts about what his wife was really doing on the day she died.

I really enjoyed this bittersweet debut novel.  Bernier captures all of the joy, angst, and uncertainty that comes with the best friend relationship.  And though Elizabeth’s character is dead all throughout the story, she came alive through the journal entries.  It takes a great writer to make a dead character seem alive, and Elizabeth is a rich and dynamic character, as is Kate.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys stories about women’s relationships, and also to anyone who enjoys real-life human drama.  It’s an absorbing and very enjoyable story, and it might make you think about the secrets we all keep, even from our best friend.