It's Monday - Terrific Books To Share

          Visit Jen at Teach MentorTexts and Kellee and Ricki at UnleashingReaders to see what they've been reading, along with everyone else who link up.  
          First, a link you might know, but wanted to share in case you missed it. Here's a great list of "15 picture books to help you raise kind, tolerant kids" from Today.com.

        This just out May 22nd. I didn't read it fast, found it fascinating, sad, filled with the main character Noah's thoughts, that soon-graduated boy who has been breaking swim-competition records, is being scouted by colleges, suddenly has a back injury. Hm-m, is there more to know? And would teens reading this understand what's really going on? I bet many will and then pass this on as a terrific book! 
       Adam Silvera, in part of his review, writes: "A stunning surrealist portrait, The Strange Fascinations of Noah Hypnotik is a story about all the ways we hurt our friends without knowing it, and all the ways they stick around to save us." And it is about friends, and what happens when we think they've abandoned us. And it's about a couple of betrayals, between friends and by one acquaintance. Noah has these "strange fascinations" that become all too fantastic and true, but maybe not. Finally, they change into a few real answers that have been sought by him, knowing he's moving into his own adult life, saying: "I'm beginning to suspect a plot wherein my Strange Fascinations have been conspiring together to remind me that this world is both very real and full of very real magic." 

         How can I know that many teens will like this? I only hope that those who will find a kinship with Noah will read it and re-read it again. There are good things here in this story. Thanks to Net Galley for the ARC.

        In his refugee camp, the biggest thing Joseph wants to do is ride the one bike in the camp. But it is too big. He learns to repair it, then waits to grow so he can ride! Each time he sees the bike, the owner tells him "Tomorrow. Hey!" Then he moves to America, and among all the new, interesting and sometimes scary things, there is a girl whose hair goes "whoosh" who rides a red bike, one that is just Joseph's size! The events after that will fill your heart. Illustrations are black-outlined and full of feelings and color.

       Back and forth mother and daughter go, the mother is willing to work hard picking coffee beans at ten cents a pound so that her daughter can go beyond the mountains and see the world, go to school. The daughter is torn by her decision to leave, seeing her mother's hands "coarsened and scratched." She says "I will stay with you." Later, "Your back, Mama. I can see, How it bends and stoops in pain. . . I will stay with you." Then, Mama tells how she is bound to the village, implying lack of education. Finally, "I will come home to you, by and by." With these brief words between two who love each other, the story shows beautifully the poignant parting, the sacrifice made. I read it to my young granddaughters and they understood and realized that others lead very different lives than they do. The full-page illustrations are wonderful, filled with the present heartbreak, poignant in that final double spread of the two hands pulling apart.

        Writer Cary Fagan tells the story of the travels of a little blue chair, showing its movement and the various owners’  uses of it. It begins with one little boy, playing as all little boys do: He sat while he ate his breakfast, lunch and dinner: he carried it outside to look at books, and so on. But he grew up, and no longer did it fit, so his mother put a sign on it that said “Please take me. A man with a truck drove by and put it in the back, sold it to a lady who ran a junk shop who sat a plant on it for her shop window. The travels are sweet and the ending, even sweeter. What a lovely idea for a story, each page pulling the reader on to the next! For her first picture book, Madeline Kloepper uses a predominantly blue and red palate, including lots of details. 

         Dear Sascha, the family dog, has died, and the family heads off for their vacation without her. In the midst of grief, a young girl spends time by the water. She watches others play, yet remains alone, searching for stones. That beautiful one she discovers takes us on a journey of imagination from ancient times through ocean adventures, time moving on as the stone's history is revealed (imagined?). The connection from one moment in time along the cycle of history is fascinating. Like Becker's other wordless books, this one will be read and examined more than once; the illustrations are gorgeous, with many details.  Some of the pictures within the history are cut into parallel, vertical pieces, showing the movement of time. I enjoyed the other-worldly connection very much, am reminded of a quote by John Muir: "When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe."

Next: Truly I have started John Green's Turtles All The Way Down! Happy reading, and Happy Summer Vacation if you are out!