Shelf Life

PODCAST
Do you know what is inside you? I mean, do you really know? Or do you just accept that your body is just like those pictures in biology books? Richard Smith never really thought too much about it—until that day in the hospital.

It was just supposed to be a routine examination to check for an ulcer. An endoscopy, an out-patient procedure, is very common but what the doctors saw inside Richard was not normal—not human. Phone calls were made and people showed up. People in suits with hard faces, cold eyes, and guns. People like Ryan, who kills without a second thought. Richard was sedated and they cut him open. And while they had their hands and their cold metal instruments inside his guts he woke up. With the help of a stolen gun he escaped.

Now Richard is on the run and he has to find out what is inside him. They had to be wrong. He is human. He eats, he sweats, he goes to bathroom, he gets excited by the touch of a pretty girl. He’s just a normal, teen-aged human, right? But there it is on the endoscopy video—weird silver, brown, and black things inside him– tubes, filaments, and casings that didn’t show up on x-rays. And the cut they made in his stomach is healing fast—inhumanly fast. He can’t go home, not that a foster home is really home. And he doesn’t really have any friends. The only one he can think to turn to is Eddi. He doesn’t really know her but he knows she lives outside the law, making fake IDs. He can’t trust Eddi but he has no other choice. Can Richard and Eddi escape from Ryan and the others? Can they find out the truth about Richard? Do they really want to know?

Brooks (Martyn Pig, Lucas, Road of the Dead) has crafted a gripping mystery with his trade-mark other-worldly feel. Lots of action early on will hook readers quickly and the mystery of who (and what) Richard is will keep them reading to the end.

By Mr. Doyle

PODCAST
McCormick’s book Cut, about the very controversial topic of self-mutilation, is one of the most popular titles is our library. In Sold she takes on another controversial topic– forced prostitution. Lakshmi is a 13-year-old village girl in Nepal. Her family is just barely scraping by, thanks to her gambling step-father. When a monsoon washes away their meager crops the family faces ruin and starvation.

At her step-father’s urging Lakshmi accepts a job working as a maid in the city. She hopes to be able to send money home to her mother, enough for food and maybe even a real roof for the house. She is transported by her new “auntie” who hands her off to an older man. Told to pretend she is his wife, she is transported over the Indian border and taken to Calcutta. She soon discovers that she has been sold into prostitution. At the brothel, Happiness House, she is beaten, starved and drugged until she submits.

This first-person narrative is told in spare, poetic language. The account of her subjugation is agonizing but never gratuitous. Lakshmi’s strength in the face of brutality and humiliation is impressive. How anyone, much less a 13-year-old girl, can endure what Lakshmi experiences is almost beyond imagining. Most heartbreaking of all is the author’s note telling readers that Lakshmi’s life is based on the real life experiences of thousands of Nepalese girls.

McCormick handles a sensitive topic better than almost any other writer could. The story is never sensationalistic and is one that demands telling.

By Mr. Doyle

PODCAST

A direct impact by an asteroid on the moon is big news for scientists but for Miranda, a typical teen growing up in modern day Pennsylvania, it just looks like an excuse for more homework from her teachers. The asteroid turns out to be more massive than expected and the collision alters the moon’s orbit, pushing it closer to the earth with devastating effects. Tide surges, earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions kill untold numbers of people and wipe out most coastal cities. All of which leads to the swift breakdown of society, with schools and stores closing and gas and electrical service disappearing.

Miranda and her family are left to survive on their own. Thanks to Miranda’s mother they have a store of supplies but they can’t last forever. Day by day old, mundane concerns lose their importance and are replaced by more urgent needs like food, heat and water. And as global climate change makes the earth less and less hospitable to life they wonder if there will be any reason to keep on living.

Told through Miranda’s journal entries this is a truly frightening story. Although death and destruction are all around they are not described in any detail. It is the plausible day-by-day disintegration of Miranda’s life that makes the story scary. This is a book that is hard to put down and a it is a story that will stay with you long after you finish it.

By Mr. Doyle

PODCAST
Astonishing life of Octavian Nothing, traitor to the nation ; v. 1. The Pox Party by M.T. Anderson

Anderson has, with great results, tried his hand at the teen drama/satire (Burger Wuss), the vampire story (Thirsty), and the dystopian science fiction novel (Feed). In his newest work he extends his range to historical fiction. The Pox Party is, like the life of the protagonist, astonishing.

Octavian comes of age during the build-up to the American Revolution. Told that he is an African prince, he and his mother are residents of The Novanglian College of Lucidity. At the college Octavian receives a classical education, studying Latin and Greek, science and music. He is taught by the members of the College, men so dedicated to reason and science that they have forsaken their names and call each other by numbers. As Octavian grows up he comes to realize that despite the top notch education and fine clothes provided by the College he is a slave. He is also the subject of an experiment to determine if Africans are a different species.

As the Revolution approaches, the college loses its patron and becomes the property of a group of investors. The new ownership changes the nature of the college and its experiments. As a result, Octavian begins to experience more and more of the life of a household slave.

When a smallpox epidemic threatens the colonies the collegians and their household retire to a country estate for a “Pox Party.” Each member of the household is exposed to the virus in hopes of immunizing everyone. Most people suffer only a mild reaction but a few, including Octavian’s mother, contract full-blown smallpox and die in agony. For Octavian this is the final straw and he escapes, joining up with a militia unit headed for a confrontation with the British in Boston.

The story is told through journal entries, letters, and other documents typical of the time period. Anderson gives Octavian and the other characters authentic 18th century voices. This makes the prose initially dense but persistence is rewarded as the story unfolds and Octavian grows. The reader develops a growing sense of indignation and anger, bordering on horror, along with Octavian as the true nature of his existence is revealed.

Anderson challenges our cultural “mythology” of the American Revolution. In the Pox Party it is the good guys– the colonists– who own and mistreat slaves. It is the bad guys–the British– who have eliminated slavery and offer a safe haven for escaped slaves. The good guys perform bizarre and sometimes dangerous experiments on unsuspecting slaves and even their own children. The author shines a bright light on the dark side of the American Revolution, making us face some unpleasant truths about the founding of our nation.

By Mr. Doyle

PODCAST
Deanna is a 13 year-old eighth grader when her father finds her having sex in a car with a 17 year-old (her older brother’s best friend). The boy’s spin on the story and the lurid details invented by the school-gossip grapevine make Deanna the school slut. Even 3 years later she is dogged by that incident. Her formerly affectionate father can’t even bear to look at her. Her older brother has added to the family shame by getting his girlfriend pregnant. The brother, girlfriend, and baby all live in the basement. Add in the father’s underemployment and the rapidly aging, overworked mom and you have a fully dysfunctional family.

Deanna finds her home life unbearable and school is no better. She fantasizes about moving out with her brother and his family and the four of them setting up a home away from her father’s disapproving glare. To enact her “plan” she needs money- first and last months’ rent and a security deposit in the San Francisco Bay area requires a pile of cash. Jobs in Pacifica are scarce though so she ends up at a run down pizza parlor. To her horror her coworker is Tommy– the boy her father caught her with. Out of desperation to keep her dream of a new home alive she keeps the job. Daily facing the leering young man.

Deanna’s voice is authentic and her needs and fears feel very real. The author’s presentation of the tense, dysfunctional household and the decaying blue-collar town are very well done. Her growth and transformation are artfully rendered and very believable. There is no deus ex machina resolution to all of the protagonist’s problems. Deanna enters her junior year with many of the same problems to face but the author gives her hope and a new sense of herself. Who could ask for more?

(This title is on order)

By Mr. Doyle