Review: A Thousand Pieces of You

A Thousand Pieces of You

By Claudia Gray

Harper Teen November 2014

357 pages

From the library

Marguerite Caine lives a normal life, if your definition of normal includes dinnertime discussion of theoretical physics. She loves her scientist parents, but prefers to spend her days painting. When her father is murdered, all evidence seems to point to a student of her parents. Marguerite teams up with Theo, another physics student, to track Paul down. But it won't be easy - Paul has stolen technology that her parents created and used it to escape to a different dimension. Theo and Marguerite jump from one dimension to another, to places with more technology and some that are much less modern, in a desperate search for answers and justice.

A Thousand Pieces Of You has some threads that are going to seem familiar - a love triangle, a young woman thrust into a situation she feels unprepared for, and time travel. The heart of this story, though, is a family. I've discovered that I like a strong familial connection when reading YA. At that point in your life, you certainly have your friends, but you still live at home and I appreciate seeing parents who are supportive of their children and kids who admire and love their parents (even if they get on their nerves sometimes). As Marguerite travels through time, she is looking for revenge on the man she thinks killed her father and hoping that she can somehow get him back. At the same time, she realizes that every jump takes her farther away from her grieving mother and sister and wishes she could be back home. 

One of the coolest parts of this story was the way that Claudia Gray really brings each dimension to life. In each jump, Marguerite inhabits a slightly different version of herself and meets slightly different versions of the people she knows and loves. In a futuristic world, both of her parents have died and she lives with her clueless aunt. But in Imperial Russia, she is a duchess and she meets her father under very surprising circumstances. The characters and sense of time and place are so firmly established with each jump that I would have been just fine spending hundreds of pages in each world.

As with many YA novels these days, A Thousand Pieces Of You will be the first book in a trilogy. But this story is self-contained, which I appreciate. If I pick up the sequel, it will be because I found the characters fascinating and the world building excellent instead of feeling like I had to get the resolution to a cliffhanger. This is the kind of book you can sit down and devour in one glorious gulp. It's not going to change your life, but it is a really fun and entertaining ride.



And hey, look at that beautiful cover. Isn't it lovely to have a cover that has something to do with the story and doesn't feature some strange headless girl?

It's Monday - tell me about your books!!

Am I the only person who feels as if they need another week off after a vacation? Getting back into a routine is not easy. It doesn't help that it has been miserable and rainy/sleeting here in NJ after soaking in the Florida sun. 

I'm pleased to report that reading went well this week. Station Eleven deserves every bit of praise it has been earning and the second Veronica Mars book was perfect for a wonderful binge read. 

Read This Week:

Station Eleven

By Emily St. John Mandel

Veronica Mars: Mr. Kiss and Tell

By Rob Thomas and Jennifer Graham

Your Left-Handed Child

By Lauren Milsom

Posts from this Past Week:

It's Monday

Top Ten Tuesday: Books I Meant To Read in 2014

Review of The Wonder Of All Things

Reading Now:

A Short Autobiography (for Jazz Age January!)
By F. Scott Fitzgerald

Up Next:

The Sun Also Rises (also for Jazz Age January)

By Ernest Hemingway

What are you reading this week? 

Review: The Wonder of All Things

The Wonder Of All Things

By Jason Mott

Mira September 2014

304 pages

Read via Netgalley

The residents of Stone Temple, North Carolina, have gathered to hold an air show. As a hometown hero flies high above the crowds, disaster strikes. People work to free their loved ones from the rubble and they soon discover Ava and her best friend Wash. He is bleeding until Ava holds her hands over him and miraculously heals him. News of her ability spreads quickly and soon the media, the faithful, and the publicity-hungry descend on the small town. People clamor for Ava to use her gift, but she becomes weaker with each healing. She must decide what she owes to herself, to the sick people clamoring for her help, and to the people who love her. 

There are many similarities between these book and Mott's debut novel The Returned. We see something miraculous, but get no explanation about how these things happen. Both feature small town people, just trying to survive...at least until something unexpected happens. But that doesn't mean that this story feels like a retread of Mott's previous work. Instead, the fascinating details of this story will keep you engaged with each chapter and each character. 

The Wonder of All Things makes the reader reconsider what it means to be a family. Ava lives with her father Macon and her pregnant stepmother Carmen. Her mother committed suicide when Ava was a small girl and she finds herself unable to really let Carmen into her life. But in a small town, family is not limited to just blood relations. Ava often feels closer to her best friend Wash then she does to anyone who lives in her home. Wash also has to make some decisions about his family when his absentee father shows up out of the blue. 

As scientists and religious leaders search for the source of this miraculous gift, Ava and her family find themselves with fewer and fewer answer about what they should do and how they can care for each other. I love the ordinariness of the characters in Mott's stories. They are people you might walk by at the grocery store or the bank. But in this author's capable hands, I would read a book about each one of them. The Wonder Of All Things makes magic seem possible in our everyday lives, but also reminds us of the all too-human and often terrible consequences of our choices. 

Top Ten Tuesday: 2014 Releases I Meant To Read, But Didn't...Yet

Today, I'm linking up with The Broke and The Bookish to talk about all of the 2014 releases that we meant to read...but then we read those other books instead. 

1. An Unnecessary Woman

I'm really intrigued by books that feature nontraditional protagonists, especially if they are older women. This star of this story is Aaliya, a crank elderly woman who is dealing with an aging body and memories of the Lebanese Civil War. 

2. What The Family Needed

A family discovers that they are gifted with superpowers at moments of crisis. Sounds awesome, right?

3. The Transcriptionist

Lena is the last transcriptionist at a massive NYC newspaper. She makes a discovery that will change the way she thinks about language, technology, and people. 

    

4. An Untamed State

Hi there. I'm the last person to read this book. I know, I know. 

5. The Queen of the Tearling

I don't read a ton of fantasy, but readers are loving this tale of a young girl who feels unprepared to be queen.

6. Speak: How Your Story Can Change The World

Blogger Nish Wiseth asks why we don't use stories the way that Jesus did. Wiseth is a great writer and I can't wait to dig into this one. 

        

7. What We See When We Read

I love reading books that teach me things and make them seem accessible to my decidedly unscientific life. Art Editor Peter Medelsund sets out to teach us why we visualize the people, places, and events in our favorite stories the way that we do. 

8. Belzhar

I love Meg Wolitzer. I love Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar. I think this is what we call a no-brainer.

9. Girl on a Wire

As a child, one of my favorite stories featured a girl who learned to walk the high-wire from a man staying in their family's boarding house. This sounds like a grown-up version, with shades of The Night Circus. 

10. The Nesting Place: It Doesn't Have To Be Perfect To Be Beautiful

Let's be real here. Our home is the current residence of a toddler and a seven year old. Tidy is an unusual condition at this point. But this book posits that we can decorate our home for real life - ninja boys and glitter messes included. I'm totally in. 

Which 2014 releases do you still need to read?

It's Monday and we are home!

Hi friends!

So we went to Disney World. We went on the new Little Mermaid ride, went on Mission Space for the first time, met Belle, Mike and Sully, and Darth Vader, and enjoyed a delicious Dole Whip. That was great...and exhausting. Did I mention that we drove there from New Jersey? That's a lot of driving. It was a great trip, but as David said, "I really missed our home."

Greetings from Cinderella's Carousel, a princess, and a jedi padawan! 

Read during the past two weeks:

Love: The Saint and the Seeker

By Christina Stevens

Last Night at the Lobster

By Stewart O'Nan

The Gurnsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

By Mary Anne Shaffer and Annie Barrows

Recent Posts:

It's Monday

Reviews of First Impressions, And Then There Were None, My True Love Gave to Me, and Caleb's Crossing

Reading Next:

Station Eleven

By Emily St. John Mandel

What are you reading this week? 

Review: Caleb's Crossing

Caleb's Crossing

By Geraldine Brooks

Viking May 2011

306 pages

From my shelves

In 1665, a man from the Wampanoag tribe became the first Native American graduate of Harvard College. That is the only record that history leaves us about this person. But Geraldine Brooks has taken this tiny piece of history and created a rich story. Our narrator is Bethia Mayfield, a girl who is growing up as the daughter of a Puritan minister. As she wanders around their island home, searching for knowledge and freedom, she becomes friends with Caleb from the Wampanoag tribe. Although their lives look radically different, they find parallels in their struggles between a thirst for knowledge and a respect for tradition, and the pull of their families and the need for freedom.

It is no surprise to anyone who reads this blog that I am a huge fan of Geraldine Brooks and her historical fiction. She took readers back to 1665 and a small village that quarantined itself to prevent the plague from spreading in Year of Wonders. People of the Book had us imagining the origins of the Sarajevo Haggadah and March threw everything we thought we knew about our beloved Jo, Amy, Beth, Meg, and their parents right out the window. Ms. Brooks has a gift for fully inhabiting a time period and a set of characters, even if she is working from just one letter or historical document. I was equally excited and apprehensive to read Caleb's Crossing, because it is the last novel by Brooks that I had to read. 

By telling Caleb's story through Bethia's eyes, we get to see twice what it means to be a second-class citizen. Both characters are seen as less-than, as an other in a society that gave respect based on your heritage as a white man. This is especially frustrating when Bethia and Caleb are contrasted with Bethia's brother, Makepeace. He gets every opportunity simply because he is a white male, although he is the least intelligent of the three. 

Perhaps the trouble with this novel is that Brooks is true to her time period. As modern readers, we can see the potential of both Caleb and Bethia. But we know, as they do, that they are ultimately destined to live and die within the cruel constraints of their time and place. As we reach the end of the book and Bethia looks back at her decisions and the sacrifices she made, she almost has no choice but to be grateful. What else can she do as a woman of the 17th century? 

I enjoyed reading Caleb's Crossing. As usual, Ms. Brooks brings history to vivid life and makes readers think about the differences between the past and the present. But it took me a while to really care for these characters. Readers new to Brooks' novels would be better off starting with one of her earlier novels. 

Review: My True Love Gave to Me

My True Love Gave To Me

Twelve Holiday Stories

Edited by Stephanie Perkins

St. Martin's Press 2014

321 pages

From the library

My knowledge of YA authors is rather slim. I've read most of Rainbow Rowell's books and of course know about the juggernaut that is John Green. Other than that, I tend to steer clear of the young adult section. When I do happen to wander over that way, it's rather daunting to know where to start. I thought this anthology of holiday stories might help me whittle down my list and pick a few YA authors to try. It did.  It was also a total delight to read and I can see myself buying this anthology and cracking it open each December.

These stories are all centered around the holidays, but I appreciated that they weren't all about Christmas. The first story, by Rainbow Rowell, was about two best friends at their annual New Year's Eve bash over several years. Two other stories feature Jewish protagonists and Holly Black even tackles Krampuslauf, which celebrates the evil spirit who visits bad children instead of Saint Nicholas.

Each of the writers featured in this collection wrote really good stories that left me wanting a longer story, perhaps even a whole book. Some of these characters are still in high school and others are in their first years of college, but there was a good balance of teenage impulse and the beginnings of understanding about relationships and responsibility. Shy is spending Christmas cat-sitting for his boss in "Angels in the Snow" and Maria from "Welcome to California, CA" is working in the local diner because of family financial problems.

There is also a variety of settings, time periods, and genres to be found between these covers. "The Lady and The Fox" and "The Girl Who Woke The Dreamer" are both set in the past and have supernatural flair. "It's a Yuletide Miracle, Charlie Brown" and "Your Temporary Santa," on the other hand, are decidedly modern and feel like they might have happened to your friend or maybe even to you.

It's rare to find an anthology where you enjoy all of the stories. While I obviously had favorites, this is a fantastic collection of stories that celebrate the joy of relationships and the magic of the holidays. My True Love Gave To Me is the perfect choice to read while hiding out from your crazy family on Christmas, while lazing about on winter break, or just when you are craving a bit of holiday magic at any point during the year.