Review: Out of Reach by Carrie Arcos

Out of Reach by Carrie Arcos



Rachel's older brother Micah has become addicted to methamphetamines and run away from home.  She watched silently as his addiction developed, but after receiving an email from an anonymous friend she has decided that she can longer ignore what is happening.  She must face reality and try to find her brother and bring him home.  With that goal in mind, she sets off with his bandmate, Tyler, to search for him.  Along the way, she is forced to confront truths about herself, her relationship with her brother, and the reality that she may be searching for someone so lost, he may not be found.

Books about addiction must inevitably walk the fine line between providing a responsible account of the effects of drug use without coming off like an afterschool special.  While there are several points throughout the novel that it appears Arcos is about to tread into preachy territory, she manages to maintain the balance between informative and overly educational.  As any concerned sister would, Rachel browses the internet for information about meth.  She also attends high school where, inevitably, a conversation about the dangers drugs occurs in the midst of a history class.  Thankfully, Arcos doesn't dwell too long in these scenes, allowing them to stand as fairly normal ways that information about drug use and addiction would occur in a normal teenager's life.  Similarly, when Rachel reflects on her relationship with her cheating ex-boyfriend, she realizes how in failing to stand up for herself and allowing her boyfriend to dictate the terms of the relationship  she lost a part of herself.  Written differently, this story may come off too message-y, but in Arcos' hands, it comes off as sincere and meaningful.  Out of Reach is a well-crafted story about a girl coming to terms with her own bad decisions as she struggles in vain to rescue her brother from his.  It's not the best story about addiction or even the best writing, but there aren't any obvious flaws or missteps.

My biggest complaint about this book is that the cover art does not in any way convey the story.  Rachel is a teen girl, but the novel covers her search for her brother during one long day in Mission Beach, CA  In the summer.  A snow hat, puffer coat and jeans make no sense.  A cover that doesn't connect with the story inside is such a waste.  I hope this is remedied for the paperback edition.

Out of Reach was one of five finalists for this year's National Book Award for Young People's Literature.

The LibrariYAn is an Amazon Associate. If you click from links on this blog to Amazon and buy something (anything!), I receive a small percentage of the purchase price.

Review: Never Fall Down by Patricia McCormick

Never Fall Down by Patricia McCormick



Arn Chorn-Pond was just a child when the Khmer Rouge came to his village in Cambodia and forced the people out of their homes and into the countryside.  One moment he was dancing outside the theatre with his brother, hustling for change, and the next he was torn from his family and forced to labor in the rice fields.  He makes a promise to himself that he will never fall down.  Because if he does, the soldiers will kill him.  Instead, he chooses survival by any means necessary, volunteering to play in a band, even though he's never played a note in his life, assisting with executions and cozying up to individuals with power.  He is not always proud of his actions, but he does what he needs to do to survive and tries to help others when he can.  Then he is handed a gun and forced to become a soldier himself.

Arn Chorn-Pond is a real person.  He is alive today because of willingness to do whatever it took to survive.  Once freed from the control of the Khmer Rouge he began to work for peace in Cambodia and to spread public awareness of their atrocities.  Patricia McCormick spent many hours over the course of several years interviewing him and then molding his story into a work of historical fiction.  One risk McCormick took in telling Arn's story is that she used his voice, broken English and all.  At first, the choppiness and improper grammar made it difficult to read.  I forced myself to keep reading, and the words turned into a voice that I heard as I read.  It almost felt like he was sitting before me, telling me his story.  I wondered if McCormick would be able to maintain the voice, or if there would be parts in the middle where it would vanish, in favor of  a more easily comprehensible language.  It never wavered.  More impressive, perhaps, was the care with which she handled violent scenes.  When awful, grotesque things happened in the story (which was often) McCormick described the brutality of the scene and conveyed without going into gritty detail.  Her intent was to educate the reader about about the horrors of the Khmer Rouge, not to sensationalize their acts of violence.

At the end of the book, both Arn Chorn-Pond and Patricia McCormick offer acknowledgements.  Having little prior knowledge about the Khmer Rouge or Chorn-Pond I was actually shocked to find out that he was an actual person.  My jaw literally dropped and I read his acknowledgements in awe of his struggle and his will to survive.  Learning that he was real made the story more powerful and the actions of the Khmer Rouge that much more detestable.  I wouldn't be surprised to see this book added to the 8th or 9th grade curriculum over the course of the next few years.

Never Fall Down is one of five finalists for the 2012 National Book Award for Young People's Literature.

The LibrariYAn is an Amazon Associate. If you click from links on this blog to Amazon and buy something (anything!), I receive a small percentage of the purchase price.

Review: Endangered by Eliot Schrefer

Endangered by Eliot Schrefer



Sophie has returned for the summer to live with her Congolese mother who runs the only sanctuary for bonobo apes in all of the Democratic Republic of Congo.   On the ride from the airport she spots a man selling a baby bonobo.  Seeing that the animal is undernourished and has been mistreated she forks over a bunch of American money to rescue the ape, who she names Otto.  She immediately forms a bond with the ape, and though her mother is angry and disappointed that Sophie would enable the animal trafficker by giving him money and fueling the trade, she allows Otto to stay at the sanctuary, requiring Sophie to mother him.  While Sophie's mother is off doing a release of older apes who are ready to transition back into the wild, a rebel army seizes control of the capitol and havoc ensues.  Armed revolutionaries take over the sanctuary, and Sophie barely makes it into the enclosure with Otto.  Here, they learn together how to forage for food and interact with the older apes. But they can't stay; the soldiers know they're inside and their only hope for long-term survival is to find help outside.  Danger awaits at every turn, and teenaged Sophie is suddenly responsible not just for her own survival, but Otto's as well.

I'll admit that it took me at least 50 pages to get into this book.  At first, I wasn't comfortable with the pacing and the sentences felt a little choppy and strung together.  I reminded myself that Endangered had been selected as a finalist for this year's National Book Award and that there was probably a good reason for that.  Maybe I was being overly critical and looking for things to take issue with, just because I loved Bomb (another finalist) so much and wanted it to win.  So I kept reading.  And I as learned more about bonobo apes and about the government and struggles of the Congo and became invested in Sophie and Otto's survival, something strange happened: I found I couldn't put the book down.  I read the last 150+ pages in one sitting.  From 6:30 to 8:00 in the morning.  On a Sunday.  When I could have been sleeping.  I'm not sure exactly what happened.  I can't imagine that the writing style changed.  Perhaps it was that the pace of the story quickened and the urgency of Sophie and Otto's situation increased just as the need for a constant stream of background information background information background information settled into a sentence here or there about bonobo ape habitat and behavior or mineral wealth and societal poverty in the Congo.  What really sold me on the book though (as I had lingering curiosities about how the author knew so much about bonobos and the Congo and wondered about his research), were the author's note, author Q&A and acknowledgments provided after the novel's close.

I passed this one on to one of the teachers at my school who I know has a deep interest in apes and the welfare of the people of the Congo and other war-torn and perpetually impoverished nations in Africa.  I haven't gotten a review from her yet, but will try to remember to keep you posted.  I think Endangered would be a great introduction to the Congo and to bonobo apes for older middle schoolers and high schoolers.  Books set in foreign countries are few and far between, and those that spotlight modern Africa are even more sparse.

Endangered is one of five finalists for the 2012 National Book Award for Young People's Literature.

The LibrariYAn is an Amazon Associate. If you click from links on this blog to Amazon and buy something (anything!), I receive a small percentage of the purchase price.