Rules

What does it mean to be normal? Is there some magic set of rules that one must follow in order to be consider average? And who wants to be average anyway? Just how important is it to fit in with the mainstream? Or is it even more important to follow your own path, even it that means you may not fit in? Meet Catherine, a twelve-year-old girl who asks these questions to herself. For Catherine, her main concern in life is something that cannot be changed-her younger brother’s autism. Author Cynthia Lord writes the story of an extraordinary sibling relationship in the book, Rules. In this story, Catherine gives her brother rules that she believes will help him seem more normal to the outside world, but these rules are in place to make her feel more normal. Through trial and error, she will learn that not everything in life is picture perfect, and that some of the more beautiful things have quirks that make them so wonderful.
Rules is a story that many can relate to. How many of your own rules do you have that you make yourself follow each day? And have you ever stopped to think just how much easier life would be if you let these rules go? Read Catherine’s story and discover just how liberating it can be to go with the flow and realize that normal is overrated.

“First the colors.

Then the humans.

That’s how I usually see things.

Or at least, how I try.

* * * HERE IS A SMALL FACT * * *

You are going to die.

I am in all truthfulness attempting to be cheerful about this whole topic, though most people find themselves hindered in believing me, no matter my protestations. Please, trust me. I most definitely can be cheerful. I can be amiable. Agreeable. Affable. And that’s only the A’s. Just don’t ask me to be nice. Nice has nothing to do with me.

* * * REACTION TO THE * * *

AFORMENTIONED FACT

Does this worry you?

I urge you- don’t be afraid.

I’m nothing if not fair.

How many books open with a statement telling the reader he or she is going to die? Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief isn’t just any book. It’s the one book that every person should read in their lifetime. It elicits laughter, tears; time spent pondering certain philosophical ideas, and a reevaluating of one’s life. The Book Thief isn’t just a book or story: it’s an invitation into the life of one young girl, into her sorrows and joys, her triumphs and downfalls, into her very being.

In The Book Thief we are told the story of Leisel, a young girl caught in the middle of Nazi Germany. What makes her story so interesting is that it’s told by Death. He begins the tale when He first met her, and continues on throughout her life, talking about the many times He encountered her but didn’t take her soul, and how entranced He was with this young girl. We learn about Leisel’s life: how she’s come to live in Germany, how she loves to read, and how she has a rebellious side. Throughout the book Death chimes in with facts and knowledge of His own, giving His wisdom to the reader. At one point Death is talking about war and the men who are eager to join the war and He says, “A small but noteworthy note: I’ve seen so many young men over the years who think they’re running at other young men. They are not. They’re running at me.”

Because the story is told from the point of view of Death, it’s unlike any other Holocaust story ever written. It’s not a generic overview of what Nazi Germany was like. Instead it’s an emotion packed journey through one little girl’s life, and everything she experiences. This book is truly one everyone should read before they die.

An Abundance of Katherines

“Hassan stopped on the staircase, and Colin with him. ‘She wants to make me happy. We fatties have a bond, dude. It’s like a Secret Society. We’ve got all kinds of shit you don’t know about. Handshakes, special fat people dances-we got these secret fugging lairs in the center of the earth and we go down there in the middle of the night when all the skinny kids are sleeping and eat cake and fried chicken and shit. Why d’you think Hollis is still sleeping, kafir? Because we were up all night in the secret lair injecting butter frosting into our veins. She’s giving us jobs because a fatty always trusts another fatty.’

‘You’re not fat. You’re pudgy.’

‘Dude, you just saw my man-tits when I got out of the shower.’

‘They’re not that bad,’ said Colin.

‘Oh, that’s it! You asked for it!’ Hassan pulled his T-shirt up to his collarbone and Colin glanced over at Hass’s hairy chest, which featured- okay, there’s no denying it- minor breasts. An A cup, but still. Hassan smiled with great satisfaction, pulled down his shirt, and headed down the stairs.”

What pudgy high school male hasn’t referred to his chest as “man-tits”? Hassan and Colin are classic high school goofballs, even though Colin is somewhat of a genius. An Abundance of Katherines is Colin’s attempt to understand why he has been dumped by all nineteen of his girlfriends, who all happen to be named Katherine. He and his best friend Hassan decide to go on a road trip after Colin’s graduation, and it becomes sort of a coming of age tale.

Colin’s journey to understanding is one filled with many laughs and realistic scenarios, such as Hassan showing his chest to Colin. Colin’s pessimistic attitude towards life mixed with Hassan’s dry sense of humor leads to nonstop laughter. Their realness makes it easy to connect with both characters, and to see this story taking place in the lives of the people around you. One of the more humorous moments is when Hassan and Colin decide to pretend they are foreigners in Gutshot, the small southern town they land in during their road trip. Colin pretends to be French, and Hassan speaks very little English. Eventually Hassan translates Colin’s words to mean he has hemorrhoids, and the whole scene plays off of that misunderstanding.

This book is perfect for high school and above, especially for boys. It’s funny, which makes it easy to approach, and it’s told from a male’s perspective. It’s hilarious no matter what sex the reader is, and it’s definitely a must-read.

Tenderness

Robert Cormier’s Tenderness depicts the journey of two teens both looking for tenderness in two completely different ways. Both are emerging into adulthood and seeking a feeling lost at childhood.

Lori is a fifteen year old runaway looking for the attention and tenderness she never gets at home. Her mother struggles with alcoholism and brings men into the home that do nothing but cause more stress between mother and daughter. Finally, having had enough of home life, she picks up and leaves to fulfill a fixation she has with rock star Throb. When the plan backfires, she finds herself drawn to the eyes and smile of a handsome boy, whom she shares a past with.
Behind the beautiful eyes and innocent smile lies Eric Poole. Poole is a convicted murderer being released after serving his three year sentence in a juvenile facility for the deaths of his mother and stepfather. He too is looking for a feeling of tenderness that he never got at home as a child. Only problem is that Eric finds tenderness in all the wrong things. Death of innocent animals and girls is how he achieves that tender feeling.

Lori and Eric reunite after a fateful meeting three years back, and from there readers are thrown into suspense wondering what will happen between the two. Lori is looking for the tenderness Eric once showed her, and he is looking for the tenderness in killing an innocent girl. Written in both characters point of view allows you to get into their heads and see how differently they see things and interpret events, and how they find tenderness in the same things, yet in different ways.

A suspenseful journey between the two will keep you on the edge of your seat and turning pages to see how the events will play out, and what the end result will be. Can a convicted murder looking for tenderness through charming and then killing innocent girls, and a lost lonely teen looking for tenderness from a charming guy ultimately save each other? Together can they overcome their fixation for a feeling lost years ago, and learn to live and love?

"The Rules Of Survival"

" I don't know if you'll understand this, Emmy, but for me, fear isn't actually actually a bad thing. It's a primative instinct thats your friend. It warns you to pay attention, because you're in danger. It tells you something, to act, to save yourself."
One thing that I grew up being taught by my parents was "trust your fears." By father would tell me that once in a while. Not to scare me, but to keep me on my toes being a girl and his first born. He would watch over me at all times if he could, but as I grew up and ventured out on my own to parties and on dates, he wanted me to remember that there are bad people out there and if I fear something, I should get myself out of that situation. I know the same is true for many other teens growing up, their parents tell them little sayings so they also, stay on their toes. Now what if our mother or father was the one that we feared? Not the fear of what would happen if you got a bad report card or what would happen if you got caught drinking. That is good fear. That fear means they care about us. What if it was the fear that scared the shit out of you. Like you feared your parent was going to kill you or a sibling. In the book, The Rules Of Survival by Nancy Werlin, Matthew is writing a letter to his baby sister, Em. In this letter he desscribes the torture that he, their sister Callie, and Em endured at the hands and words of their mother. This book is intense from start to finish and keeps the reader wanting to put it down. I recommend it to all children that have their own fears and need help learning how to over come them.

Queen Bees and Wannabes

Imagine living in a world where every movement you make, every word you say, and even everything you wear is constantly being judged by your peers. A place in which gossip is the native language and friendships are as fleeting, and usually just as unappetizing, as the daily lunch special. Welcome to the world of adolescent girls, a place in which you must constantly redefine who you are in order to fit in. How do teenage girls deal with all of the pressure they face at school, their changing bodies, their peers, and with the opposite sex? How did you deal? What group did you fit into, and more importantly, what role did you play in that group? Take a walk down memory lane, and by doing so, take a deeper look into the inner workings of cliques and how they can make or break an adolescent girl. Were you a mean girl? Did you betray your friends in order to gain a step on the social ladder? Or were you an outsider, desperately wanting an “in”, but not willing to sacrifice your true self just to be accepted?

Every woman remembers the trials and tribulations of adolescence quite well, but how do you help your daughter cope with the same thing in a new generation? Whether you are a mother or father of an adolescent girl, a teacher, a coach, or a teenager seeking answers to the complicated world of adolescent girls, Queen Bees & Wannabes will be an eye-opening reading experience for you.

Brave New Girl

"It was so hot the whole time. Burning right up. I could feel the sweat on my back seeping through the sheets. My mouth was dry, and I felt like all my bones were creaking like a rusty bicycle every time I moved. But I didn't actually move all that much. I didn't know what I should do. It was easier having my eyes covered, I think. I think staring at a bunch of black was easier. It sort of made me feel like I was in space or something. It helped because I didn't know anything about anything. Sometimes it helps for someone to cover your eyes because that was you don't have to see if you' re doing anything wrong."
IF only we could have someone put their hands over our eyes to avoid all the terrible experiences we endured in our adolescence. Unfourtanely, many teenagers go through where a simple "hand over the yes so I am invisible" tactic cant prepare us for. In Louisa' Luna's book, Brave New Girl, the main character Doreen has to deal with being an outsider in a school of clicks, parents that don't understand her, an older brother that was kicked out of her family when she was much younger, and having to deal with issues that no fourteen year old should have have to endure. As a modern day Holden Caulfield from Catcher in the Rye, Doreen brings back the craziness that many people go through in adolescence. Every reader can relate to something in Doreen's life that has either happened to her or to someone in her surroundings. It is important to remember where you came from how you became the person you are now. Brave New Girl takes the hands over your eyes and brings you back to the time that shaped who you are today.

"Things I Have To Tell You"

Going back in time can make you remember both the highs and the lows of a certain time in your life. It doesn't matter whether you grew up in the Depression and money was tight, "the flower child" years of the 60s, or were a member of the big hair, B.U.M. sweatshirt, and ugly leggings that had stirrups on the bottoms posse. Everyone will be reminded of what they went through during their teenage years after reading, Things I Have To Tell You. The language may be different, but the concerns are universal. The poems in this book took me back to the love for boys, the heartache they caused, stealing alcohol from my parents, the constant gossiping about other girls, the times I couldn't look at myself in the mirror because I was never pretty enough, the back stabbing, the semi-formal dances, and the terrible school pictures. From eating disorders, to first loves, to questioning your sexuality, to finding yourself, this book has a poem to help stimulate your heart and bring you back to your teen years. Find out where this book take YOU back to.

"In Darkness, Death" by Dorothy & Thomas Hoobler

Every time I find myself standing in a Hot Topic reading their wall of T-shirts printed with profound statements such as “Are You a Ninja or a Pirate?,” I think to myself that I just don’t get it. I could just never understand the fascination behind pirates, or these seemingly mythical martial arts warriors known as “ninjas.” But quite honestly, I never understood what a ninja truly was until I read the young adult novel In Darkness, Death by Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler.

Recently Nominated for the 2008 Nutmeg Award, this mystery begins with the murder of the Samurai Lord Inaba after him and his guests fall into a deep sleep from a powder that is slipped into their drinks at the Lord’s homecoming party. The famous samurai Judge Ooka and his adopted son Seikei are called upon by the shogun (or chief military commander) to the ancient Japanese city of Edo to investigate the crime. Seikei, the 14 year-old samurai in training, is noble to a fault yet naïve of the world; a characteristic which often lands him in trouble, especially with Tokugawa, a ninja who Judge Ooka assigns him to travel with when he departs on his own investigation.

During these chapters the difference between a samurai and a ninja is revealed. Samurais are warriors similar to knights, as well as the highest ranking in society before the Lord and the shogun. According to Tokugawa, ninjas used to live in the mountains and be “close to the kami [Shinto deities or spirits] of nature,” but samurai chased them out of their terrain because the shoguns and emperors did not like them living beyond their rule. Having a connection with the kami allows ninjas to have supernatural powers such as the ability to become invisible, thus making them the most skillful killers in Japan. All of Lord Inaba’s servants and subjects believe he was killed by a ninja because no one saw the murder and as Tokugawa explains to Seikei, because “whenever the shogun and the daimyos [feudal lords]—and anyone else—wanted a killer, they knew that they should hire a ninja.” Furthermore, their one piece of evidence from the scene of the crime is a red origami butterfly speckled with black dots on its wings. Tatsuno says that “the person who left the butterfly did so to drive off the evil kami he had released by killing” the Lord.

Ok, so I get it now: ninjas are badass because can acquire superpowers from nature. They aren’t just black belts in karate who became a little too obsessed with the whole martial arts thing after they graduated. If you like ninjas, samurais, and reading about foreign cultures, then you will enjoy Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler’s Nutmeg Award Nominee In Darkness, Death.

Dreamland

Caitlin has always been in the shadow of big sister Cassandra. That is until Cass picks up and skips town with her new boyfriend Adam. Her parents, so upset that their little girl has run off and ruined a perfect life, withdraw themselves from everything, including Caitlin. That’s when Caitlin meets Rogerson Biscoe.
“There were so many things I loved about him. The smell of his skin, his hair, wild and dreadlocked. The way he pressed his hand into the small of my back. He was so attentive, with one eye on me regardless of what else he was doing.”

Rogerson is different from anyone Caitlin has ever known. He is everything Caitlin isn’t. He’s confident, compelling and dangerous. Rogerson makes Caitlin feel on top of the world. He puts aside his “bad boy” persona and lets her in to his deepest feelings. She is finally able to forget about her parents and sister. It’s almost as if she is in a dreamland. Everything is so perfect with Rogerson, there is no way it can be real.

Finally, Caitlin has someone to make her feel alive. She is no longer in anyone’s shadow. She pushes away all her friends and spends every last minute with Rogerson. It’s as if she can’t live without him. Their relationship seems flawless to those on the outside.

To those on the inside, however, they know things with Caitlin and Rogerson are far from perfect. He has thrown Caitlin into a world she never knew existed. A world of sex, drug abuse, and violence. Suddenly, being with Rogerson is Caitlin’s biggest problem. Buts she’s fallen so fast and hard and can’t see the problem. So what if he slapped her in the car. After all, she was late. But what happens when the slaps turn into punches, and the punches turn into kicks?

“When he hit me, I didn’t see it coming. It was just a quick blur, a flash out of the corner of my eye, and then the side of my face just exploded, burning as his hand slammed against me.” “We didn’t talk about what happened. Rogerson parked in front of my house and kissed me tenderly, cupping my chin in his hand. As much as I hated to admit it-it seemed impossible, just so wrong-I felt that rush that always came when he kissed me, the one that made me feel unsteady and wonderful all at once.”

Can Caitlin wake up from this dreamland she’s fallen into and save herself and Rogerson before it’s too late? Dessen places you within the relationship of Caitlin and Rogerson. You will be right there through the good times and the bad, wishing and hoping for Caitlin to just wake up.

The Perks of Being A Wallflower

“‘Sam tapped her hand on the steering wheel. Patrick held his hand outside the car and made air waves. And I just sat between them. After the song finished, I said something. ‘I feel infinite’” (33).

There a time in all of our lives when we feel infinite, whether it is listening to our favorite song, spending time with a best friend, or even reading a great story. The Perks of Being a Wallflower written by Stephen Chbosky is one of those great stories that every high school student must read!

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a book of letters written by the main character, Charlie. Charlie is a modern version of Holden Caulfield in the book The Catcher in the Rye written by J. D. Salinger. Both of these characters have similar traits and the plot of both stories also have similar themes. Both of these Characters share a passion for English, and develop a close connection with one of their teachers. However for both these students, school doesn’t come easy. In both books Charlie and Holden go through the hard ships in meeting friends and holding on to friendships. Even more importantly they both seem to have issues within their family lives, and both try to cope with the hard times.

In The Perks of Being a Wallflower the reader experiences Charlie’s first year of high school with him. Similar to Holden Caulfield who explains his high school experience. Both of these characters express their ups and downs about many issues that occur in teenage life such as friendships, family and sexual relationships. These stories push the limits by adding sex and drugs into the text, which make reading them even more exciting! Even though these books were written in different time periods, The Catcher in the Rye was written in 1951 while The Perks of Being a Wallflower was written in 1999 many of the same issues arise. However today’s readers can connect to The Perks of Being a Wallflower because it targets teenagers of today by sharing different situations that arise for a teenage kid living in the challenges of today’s society.

Charlie is a teenage boy who starts high school with no friends and a family loss to his favorite aunt Helen. However, through his first year he learns to cope and understand death in his family. He meets friends, falls in love with a girl, dates a girl he doesn’t like, and fights the star of the high school football team. These adventures are only some of the experiences that Charlie shares with his reader in this coming of age tale of high school life. I highly recommend this book to not only high school students, but to college students, and even parents because the dilemmas that arise are intriguing for anyone’s interests. Charlie is a modern day Holden Caulfield and anyone who liked The Catcher in the Rye will love The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

When I was Your Age

I was not very good at sports. Awkward would be a kind term. Clumsy would be accurate. The sidewalk was our playground. I was not good at any of the sidewalk games, Hopscotch: Drew the lines better then I could stay in them. Jump Rope: Never could jump in. Always had to stand in. (doubledouch is still a mystery.) Roller Skating: fell a lot. Never learned to brake. Had to run into something to stop myself. Bicycling: still bear a scar under my chin from when I finally learned to ride a two-wheeler and went straight into a hydrant.

I was hopeless at music. Once a week Miss Klinger came into our classroom to teach music. She divided our class into redbirds and bluebirds. The bluebirds were allowed to sing; the redbirds listened. I was a redbird. At Christmas redbirds were allowed to sing, but all Miss Klinger offered were carols. Being Jewish, I did not think I should, but I wanted to, so I did. But I never sang all the words. When I came to Jesus or Christ, I hummed.

Fortunately, gym and music were never given letter grades. (How could anyone give a redbird a grade when she was never allowed to sing?) So those subjects never interfered with one of my two best things: getting A’s. My other thing was being the baby of the family.

As we pass through the years of adolescence, we learn that our teenage years can be a struggle. When I was Your Age provides real life stories of children growing up, stories of tragedy, and stories of triumph. The book is an anthology that includes several stories that all provide different perspectives on growing up. Each author takes readers back with them to their childhoods and shares an important life changing event that they endured in their own lives. Although the stories are from an earlier time, around the 1950’s, the issues remain the same which allows today’s readers an opportunity to make their own connections with these stories.

For example, readers can connect to stories about curiosity and imagination that go hand-in-hand with growing up, as well as stories that focus on the challenges, struggles, and triumphs. Readers of all ages and from different time periods will be brought back to their own stories about inspiration, tragedy and loss, their first summer job and their first time at summer camp. The best part of the book When I Was Your Age is that everyone can find at least one story with which to connect. The book targets issues that occur during school years including family life, friends, passions and adventures. We all know growing older is hard and that’s why I think it’s so important to read a book that enables the reader to connect to others that may have been through similar situations. These stories are sure to encounter a sense of recognition and joy in reading these stories.



Work Cited

Ehrlich, Amy, ed. When I Was Your Age: Original Stories About Growing up. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 1999
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Jane Yolen- A Must-Read for ALL

“The woman in the blue dress was speaking again.

‘Quiet! Quiet!’ she shouted, putting up her hands.

‘Now, since you are all filthy from your trip, you must take a shower. You will undress here. Help the children. It must be done quickly. Quickly.’

‘What, here?’ Gitl asked. ‘In front of each other?’

The woman looked disgusted. ‘You have not learned the first lesson yet. You will not last here.’

Gitl stared at her. ‘I will last,’ she said, her voice low.

‘Now, all of you, undress. Schnell! Pretend you are in one of your ritual baths. Oh yes, I am not a Jew, but even I have heard of it. What do you call it?’

“Mikvah,’ murmured Esther’s mother.

‘Yes, mikvah,” the woman said. ‘Then this is your mikvah in preparation for your new life in the camp.’ She smiled and left.

Some of the women sat on the wooden benches and began slowly to take off their shoes and stockings. But Hannah stood in the center of the room, staring around.

‘Don’t you understand?’ she cried. ‘There are no showers. There are only the gas ovens. They will burn us all up.’

Two benches away, Esther was crying softly as she took off her right show. ‘There are no ovens, Chaya. Do not try to frighten us. We are frightened enough.’

Hannah started to answer but Gitl pulled her down to the bend. ‘She is right, child. What is here is bad enough. Let us live moment by moment. There is no harm in dreaming about a shower. God know we could all use one.’

Hannah was furious. They had to listen. She would have to make them. What use was her special foreknowledge if no one would listen? Maybe they thought her strange or sick of even crazy, but she was none of that. She was from the future, somehow. She could summon up those memories by trying really hard. She knew she could help them all if only they would let her.”

For Hannah, every teenager’s dream has come true: she’s traveled through time! But not to a place of happiness and freedom; she’s traveled back to a concentration camp run by the Nazi’s during World War II. Hannah, a young Jewish girl who never took her own ancestry seriously, is now thrown into the frightening situation of being a Jew during the Nazi regime. She knows what really happens in the concentration camps, but struggles to make the people around her listen and believe.

As an author, Jane Yolen effectively takes her readers on a historical journey, weaving fact and fiction into her stories. Yolen takes serious events and makes them approachable, affording the reader the chance to delve into a serious subject without the judgment of others looming about. She simultaneously touches your heart with realistic and moving characters, such as Hannah in The Devil’s Arithmetic. Hannah’s journey through time combines the true events with the Holocaust and the experience of a young girl during those times, creating a powerful and moving story. Yolen also has a gift for combining historical events with fairy tales. In Briar Rose, she weaves the Holocaust, into the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty. The combination of the two creates an unforgettable and moving story. Yolen’s works are incredible, heart warming stories about the real struggles everyday teenagers have faces. She is a must-read for all ages.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

“Dear friend,

I am writing to you because she said you listen and understand and didn’t try to sleep with that person at that party even though you could have. Please don’t try to figure out who she is because then you might figure out who I am, and I really don’t want you to do that. I will call people by different names or generic names because I don’t want you to find me. I didn’t enclose a return address for the same reason. I mean nothing bad by this. Honest.

I just need to know that someone out there listens and understands and doesn’t try to sleep with people even if they could have. I need to know that these people exist.”

Everyone, no matter what their age, needs to know that these people exist. People who listen and understand. For Charlie, it’s that he needs someone to listen as he tries to make sense of his new beginning in high school. Charlie’s days are spent noticing the details of the world around him. He sees what most people are too busy to see, too busy rushing through life.

Charlie’s story is a modern coming-of-age tale, similar to The Catcher in the Rye. The Catcher in the Rye’s main character, Holden Caulfield, is similar to Charlie, but much harder to connect with. Holden comes from an old-fashioned era, so his language and actions are somewhat foreign to today’s teens. He comes across brash at times, and even outspoken. Charlie, on the other hand, is soft and likeable, and easy to relate to. He goes through the typical teenage crises of drugs, the intrigue of older, more experienced friends, and self discovery. Holden is a rebel of all sorts whereas Charlie is a quiet rebel, searching and discovering his way through his freshman year of high school. His encounters with new older friends, drugs, sex and young love all bond together to shape this young wallflower as his high school career takes off.

“Sam tapped her hand on the steering wheel. Patrick held his hand outside the car and made air waves. And I just sat between them. After the song finished, I said something.

‘I feel infinite.’

And Sam and Patrick looked at me like I said the greatest thing they ever heard. Because the song was that great and because we all really paid attention to it. Five minutes of a lifetime were truly spent, and we felt young in a good way.”

Read Stephen Chbosky’s The Perks of Being a Wallflower and I guarantee those minutes of your lifetime will be truly well spent.

"Under the Wolf, Under the Dog" by Adam Rapp

Have you lost a loved one or know anyone who has? If so, you know that everyone deals with loss differently. Steve Nugent from Under The Wolf, Under the Dog, can only find solace in drugs, detachment, and the subsequent insanity that controls his actions when a deadly cancer eats his mother into her grave.

But how is one to deal effectively after witnessing a loved one in an incurable state? Nearing the end of her life, Steve describes his mother as “[. . .] totally bald [. . .] and the whites of her eyes had dulled to this weird brownish gray. She only weighed eighty-something pounds and her lips had sort of disappeared. [. . .] I could see a new growth pressing through her forehead. There were things emerging all over her lately. At first they were calling it breast cancer, but now it was everywhere. A few weeks before, the oncologist had discovered a tumor in her abdomen that was the size of a baseball” (p. 48).

Steve, the main character, reminds me of J.D. Salinger’s Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye. Both characters are the same age, have similar physical features, are easily unnerved, preoccupied by women, and are ultimately torn up inside by their experiences in life. Holden generally has depression and is sad about the loss of innocence in the world, whereas Steve has to cope with the death of his mother. In my opinion, Steve’s issue is the most troubling, causing him to transform from being a normal guy with an above-average academic standing to a deviant teenager that wanders the streets. Like Holden, he winds up in an institution for troubled adolescents. There, he finds himself surrounded by kids with suicide scars and a talented ex-junkie who can insert $1.87 in change up his nose.

Today’s generation might not be able to identify with Holden’s world in the coming of age novel, The Catcher in the Rye and may appreciate and connect to Steve’s struggles in Under the Wolf, Under the Dog’s more modern version of a distraught adolescent ineffectively dealing with life’s hardships. I found Steve to be a more interesting character than Holden because of his daring nature. Unlike Holden for instance, he doesn’t just think about calling the girl he has a crush on, he becomes a genuine stalker: Steve breaks into her house, calls her several times, and ends up meeting her for a date. He also experiments with drugs, which gets him into more trouble than a passive Holden Caulfield ever could have made for himself.

As a modern-age, drug-induced Catcher in the Rye with a bolder Holden Caulfield who carries heavier baggage, Adam Rapp’s Under the Wolf, Under the Dog takes the reader to the brink of insanity and then drops them at the mental health institute.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Charlie is the youngest of three children. He lives in the shadow of his athlete older brother and his activist older sister. While trying to fit in at school, he befriends a pair of older siblings and soon becomes part of their group. He lucks out too, because before this he didn't really have any friends, and he struggled with the grief of having his close friend commit suicide. These new friends completely take him in, and help him grow and become more comfortable with himself. Have you ever felt like no one in the world understood you? And then out on a whim, you make a connection with someone who completely knows you inside and out? And then, you get a crush on her? Life is hard for Charlie, but somehow, he tries to pull through, by making mistakes, and trying his best to recover from them. For Charlie, the course of one school year completely changes his life, and he will never be the same again. Can you imagine becoming an entirely different person in nine short months?

Guys Write for Guys Read

Have you ever thought that because you were a boy, you couldn't write or read as well as the other people in your class? Since you were a boy you were automatically doomed to be a bad speller, and to never know when to use a comma? There are lots of boys who feel this way, but the authors of the stories in Guys Write for Guys Read don't listen to what people tell them about not being good writers. The men who wrote the stories talk about all the other problems they had growing up, like asking out girls and being the last picked kid in gym class, things that most boys have suffered through. They don't worry about spelling and commas, because after a lot of practice, these just come naturally, something that will also happen to you. They write because they want others to hear about their stories, to let other young men know that they aren't alone in the world, and other people are going through the same struggles. A couple of the stories might be about topics you don't know anything about, but the man writing it is letting you know about his experience so you can be ready if it happens to you. How often will you connect with a story and feel like it was written specifically for you? How often will you see a new solution to an old problem. How many times will you read this book in order to help you cope with the hard times of being a young boy?

Queen Bees and Wannabes

What should I wear today? Does he like me? Why is she mad at me? I’m alone. Those are just four thoughts that go through the head of a teenager everyday. It seems like most teens have nothing to say to their parents, but a million things to say to their peers. Your teen may seem happy one day and depressed another, and as a parent you have absolutely no clue as to why. Rosalind Wiseman’s Queen Bees and Wannabes puts you inside the head of your teenaged child, and into the harsh reality of high school. An age most parents think is the most fun for their child can turn into hell for some kids. And all because they wore the wrong clothes, sat at the wrong lunch table, or failed to be an athlete. Queen Bees and Wannabes breaks down the social hierarchy of cliques and explains why your child is either at the top or why she is at the bottom.

The input in every section of the book from real life teenagers may be what puts the book over the top. To read a powerful message, and a real thought on popularity from teens at the top of their crowd and those way down below make for an eye opening experience to what your teen may be feeling. From the tender age of eleven your daughter is faced with making decisions that will impact the rest of her social career. Who she invites to her birthday party, and who she doesn’t will shape lives. What she wears, or doesn’t wear will brand her a label as a preppy or a slut. Who she dates, where she goes, and what she does will establish an unbreakable reputation.

If you’re struggling to understand your teen and the decision he or she is making, Queen Bees and Wannabes will answer all your questions and allow you a backstage pass into what school and social life are like for your teen. For once you can begin to understand the underlying effect peers and cliques have on your child and how they shape their everyday lives. You will finally be able to decode the mind and life of your teenager.