Love is the Higher Law September 1, 2009

Title: Love is the Higher Law

Author: David Levithan

Summary: In Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, co-author David Levithan created a light-hearted love letter to New York City. In his latest, he tackles the city’s darkest day: September 11, 2001. Three young people each respond to the attacks in different ways: high school junior Claire races to her little brothers side and worries for her mom, her classmate Peter sees the attack first-hand, and college student Jasper sleeps through the whole thing.

As a year goes by, each of the three describe their shifting feelings to the attack as their lives intertwine: Peter and Jasper go on the date they had originally scheduled for that fateful day. Insomniacs Claire and Jasper meet randomly as they both are drawn to Ground Zero. Peter and Claire, formerly just acquaintances, form a deep and lasting friendship. This moving book tells a simple story that neatly evokes the events of 9/11 without ever taking the focus off these three remarkable young people who are just beginning to understand their place in the greater world around them.

Who will like this book?: Mature readers who like nuanced, emotional books. Like all of Levithan’s work, this is a great read for GLBTQ teens.

If you like this, try this: Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan. Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist by Levithan and Rachel Cohn. For more on a teen discovering themselves after 9/11, try Shine Coconut Moon by Neesha Meminger.

Recommended by: Nicole, Teen Librarian

Hero January 30, 2009

Title: Hero

Author: Perry Moore

Summary: Who is Thom Creed?  A  high school star basketball player who keeps his distance from his teammates; son of a disgraced former superhero and a mother who abandoned him years ago; a teenager coming to grips with his sexual orientation; or a soon-to-be hero with developing superpowers?  He’s all of these and more.  

And, as if  Thom’s life isn’t complicated enough he will soon find himself thrown onto a team with misfit superheros including a chain-smoking senior citizen with the power to see the future, an angry girl who can set things on fire with her mind,  Typhoid Larry (the name pretty much says it all, his power is making people sick), and a cranky demoted superhero.  As individual superheros they may be laughable, but put them together and they become a team that just might be able to save the world. 

Who will like this book:  How to describe who will like this book?  Hmm…If you like humorous stories that feature superheroes, adventure, love, and friendship (while confronting homophobia and evil villains) this is the book for you.   Basically, this is a great book for mature readers who can appreciate a non-traditional hero in a comic book-type story.

If you like this, try this:  Geography Club by Brent Hartinger,  My Most Excellent Year by Steve Kluger.

Recommended by:  Jen, Fairfield Woods Teen Librarian

My Most Excellent Year April 16, 2008

Title: My Most Excellent Year: A Novel of Love, Mary Poppins, and Fenway Park

Author: Steve Kluger

Summary:  There are some books that are about so many things, it is hard to put them into categories, or even describe what they are about. This is definately one of them. Three Boston eleventh-graders, baseball-crazy T.C., his diva ’brother’ Augie, and new girl Alejandra, are given an assignment to describe their ‘most excellent’ year. All three choose their freshman year – when T.C. fell in love with Ale and became friends with an orphaned deaf kid obsessed with a certain flying movie nanny, when Augie came out and fell in love with Andy, and when Ale fell in love with musical theater…and fought against falling in love with T.C.

Throw in a romance between T.C.’s dad and his school advisor, a production of Kiss Me, Kate, a petition to rebuild the baseball diamond at the Manzanar internment camp, and a visit from Julie Andrews, for a story that is way more than the sum of its parts.

Who will like this book?:  People who like upbeat stories about how friendships – and romances – start and last.

Recommended by: Nicole, Teen Librarian