Book Review(s): Anya's Ghost; Wildwood; Doll Bones

I've been rediscovering libraries.

I finally got a library card out here in Colorado. Checked out:

• Anya's Ghost, by Vera Brosgol
• Wildwood, by Colin Meloy (illustrated by Carson Ellis)
• Doll Bones, by Holly Black (illustrated by Eliza Wheeler)

 ... and I read them all in three days.

Yes, okay, they're all kid's books.  They're all fantasy.  Why? Because books for kids are fearless and daring and vulnerable in a way that books for grownups aren't. Or often aren't, at least.

They're scary in a primal way.  Beautiful. Fierce and raw. Blacktop and skinned knees and papercut perfect.

Anya's Ghost is about a teenage girl. Pretty standard story - feeling insecure, fighting with friends, trying to fit in, feeling lost. Except she's also got a ghost hanging out with her. And her new friend is sure she and Anya will be best friends. Forever.

It's honest. A girl, self-involved. Learning to be better, to think about more than herself. The themes are less about ghosts and the supernatural and more about fears and disappointment and what drives us to do what's right.

Wildwood reads, as you might expect, like an entire Decemberists album. A baby boy is stolen by a flock of crows, and his big sister must venture into a mysterious woods that grown ups avoid talking about. There are coyote soldiers, a beautiful but crazy Dowager Duchess, a useless Governor-Regent, an owl prince, a band of bandits, and mystics that talk to trees. There's the threat of civil war. Sacrificial rituals. Black magic. Quests. Bicycles. Doubt. Fancy, slightly archaic vocabulary.

Needless to say, I loved it.

It doesn't pull any punches. Characters die. There is bloodshed and terror and hunger and uncertainty. The protagonist, a prickly girl named Prue, has to learn to trust herself and her friends. It's a lush, wayward offering of love and betrayal and courage.

Doll Bones is at once eerie and familiar, like de ja vu. Part ghost story, part coming of age tale, part adventure, it's haunting and legitimately creepy at times.

It struck chords with me, because the heart of the story is three friends who've played and pretended together, reaching that strange in-between time. That time when the heart still wants to make believe, but when the head can't let you.

It's also about unraveling a mystery behind a china doll, and the strange mix of ash and bones that's inside it.

It's about growing up, letting go of some things and holding onto others. It's about belief and wishing and trying to understand what goes on in your own head.

There's a really heartbreaking passage toward the end, which I can't resist sharing here. If you plan on reading the book, look away. 

SPOILER:

One of the kids can see the others are pulling away, that their need to pretend isn't as strong as it used to be, as hers still is.

"It's not fair. We had a story, and our story was important. And I hate that both of you can just walk away and take part of my story with you and not even care. I hate that you can do what you're supposed to do and I can't. I hate that you're going to leave me behind. I hate that everyone calls it growing up, but it seems like dying. It feels like each of you is being possessed and I'm next."

Okay, it's safe to look again - spoiler's over.

I read this and couldn't help feeling gutted.

It's exactly how I felt when my friends and even my own treacherous brain couldn't carry on playing. When the stories were taken away. Things that had been important. It was hard seeing my friends moving away from our games, living easily without them.

The end of the story is about how the story goes on - just in a new way. Not with dolls - but with words.

Doll Bones is a little scattered. It leaves some questions unanswered. But it resonates so fully. It's honest. It took me back to the first heartbreak I knew.

I devoured these books. I need to get back to the library.

Smooooooooooooooth

The days keep getting longer, the temperature keeps rising, and it's turning into smoothie season.

Nick and I have been playing with smoothie recipes. Smoothies with oatmeal. Smoothies with peanut butter. And now - smoothies with spinach!

Get the recipe (and more delicious, pretty pictures) after the jump!

Variables

Nick and I were listening to an episode of This American Life the other day. I learned that, apparently, a frequent and common sign of autism is a tendency to fantasize about traps.

A woman begins to suspect that her husband may be autistic, so she has him answer a diagnostic questionnaire normally given to children and teens.

"And then the questions started getting just bizarre, where I was like, this must be a typo. I remember there was one question about, have you ever fantasized about making traps? And I said, 'Oh, that must be a typo.' And he's like, 'No, I totally have.'"

Nick and I were trying to figure out why traps, specifically, would be this universal thing.

We decided that maybe it was just an extension of the desire to control or predict situations, particularly chaotic ones. Building a trap to catch, say, a rabbit - that's a pretty good analogy for taking an unpredictable situation (i.e. nature) and carefully constructing a series of logical events (i.e. rabbit smells bait, rabbit approaches bait, rabbit triggers sensor, etc) which lead to an easily controlled and predictable end result (i.e. a rabbit in a trap).

It makes a kind of sense.

It got me thinking about my own tendencies to plan for adventures and disasters. I have fun discussing zombie contingency plans. I like to pack imaginary Adventure bags. What would I take with me on a quest through a vampire-infested city? What would I need on a voyage through Fairyland? What kind of tools would I want to survive an alien abduction?

It's kind of fun, thinking through the variables. It's also nice having these pre-defined worlds populated by monsters with clearcut weaknesses.

Like, if I found myself facing off against a werewolf or The Fair Folk, I could totally handle it.

I think that's one of the reasons fantasy and scifi are so appealing. The worlds they describe follow rules, and if you just learn them, you're fine.  I can understand why people with autism find traps so soothing. If you can just figure out the rules, if you can account for all the variables, everything works.

I kind of feel that way, particularly right now. I'm sort of getting the hang of my new job, but I keep feeling like I'm forgetting things. I don't feel fully trained. On top of this, the girl who also does this job the other half of the week just announced that she's moving to Texas with her husband. So in a few weeks, I'll be the most experienced person doing this job.

The person they're hiring will potentially take over my shift, and I'll move to the other half of the week. I might be a jerk and put my foot down and refuse to change shifts. I've already gotten to know the volunteers on my shift, and the idea of starting what's basically from scratch is hugely unappealing. I just trained for this shift; I don't feel like I have it down well-enough to train someone else for it.

Also, I'm a little concerned about hiring someone who was from the same applicant pool as me last time. I'm afraid that this situation will result in competition - who's doing the job better, who was the better hire after all? I'm not feeling competitive - I just hope the new person isn't, either.

And I can't find my keys. So, in all, I'm feeling a bit unequipped to deal with everything that's going on right now.

I just want someone to hand me a rule book, a field guide to doing this job well, to making the right decisions. If I can figure out all the variables, I can make solid plans
.

new new new

So the new job is going pretty well. At this point, the volunteers I manage still know more than I do, so that's a bit awkward. Hello, I'm doing the same job as you, but less well, and I'm getting paid to do it!

I'm sure it'll get better.

My laptop has decided to stop working. Or rather, the keyboard quit and the ability to detect and connect to wifi signals followed suit shortly thereafter. SO I got a Chromebook.

I know it's just a netbook, but honestly, pretty much everything I do is online anyway. Word processing, video watching, music listening, etc. It's all done on the internetz. And I use google products almost exclusively.

So far, I'm digging the experience. It's taking a bit to get used to the Chrome OS, but for someone who's used gmail and the like for a decade, it's a pretty easy learning curve.

I just recorded a video with it. Not astonishing quality, but it doesn't need to be. I have my handheld pocket camcorder for better quality videos.

It's been nice having a stable job. I don't feel guilty about doing silly, unproductive things with my free time anymore.

For example:



Yep. Completely useful and grown up, I know.