Wicked Girls: A Novel of the Salem Witch Trials...random thoughts

Wicked Girls: A Novel of the Salem Witch Trials by Stephanie Hemphill.

It was just luck that dropped this book into my lap. Luck, in the form of a 13-year-old daughter, that is. I had never heard of this book until Annie brought it home from the library a couple weeks ago.

A couple years ago, Annie developed a fascination with the Salem Witch Trials...a fascination I fully related to--remembering the days when I was her age. But truthfully, it's a fascination I never quite outgrew...I just don't actively seek out new books on the subject these days. But it was, for example, with great joy that I got to introduce Annie to The Crucible a couple years back. :)

But what is it that makes the horrible events of this time so intriguing? For me, I think it's the myriad of unanswered questions. We will never truly know the motivations of these young girls. What resulted because of their actions is unforgivable. But why? Why would they do what they did? Why would they send innocent people to their deaths? Why why why?

Wicked Girls is yet another speculative journey into the minds of the young accusers. Written in free verse style, it read unlike any other novelization of these events I've encountered. It wasn't all that long ago that novels in verse made me quite wary, but with a handful now under my belt, I can honestly say that I quite enjoy the form.

Hemphill told the story through the voices of three of the "afflicted"--Mercy Lewis, Ann Putnam Jr., and Mary Walcott (called Margaret in the book). And they are definitely three distinct voices. With three different backgrounds. With three different probable futures. All of these things are explored, not overtly but subtlely, as we watch the story unfold. It is easy to see how all of these things might come into play as motivations, both conscious and unconscious, for each of these girls. And the complicated and ever-changing relationships among the girls shine even more potential light on the reasons why things might have unfolded the way they did.

Perhaps what I loved most in its exploration, however, was the look at the life of women in general at this time. Hemphill doesn't come out and say, "Look, their lives sucked, so it's inevitable these girls would behave this way." Obviously, that's ridiculous. But she gives us glimpse after glimpse after glimpse into the lack of power these girls had over anything in their lives...that is, until they became revered for their ability to see witches...

It goes without saying that this is a complicated topic. And we never will know all the answers. But I think it's a good thing that we do continue to try to understand. After all, using the less literal meaning, witch hunts still occur today.

book gushing and blame

I'll start with the gushing. :) I read Foiled by Jane Yolen last night. I know a few different people who have read this, with somewhat mixed results. But I'm happy to report that I fall squarely in the "I adored this book!" camp. I stayed up past my bedtime finishing it. And then I immediately had to get on the computer to try to find out when the second book was coming out. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the answer. All I know is that I want it NOW!!! And then I had to email Chris to gush because I knew he'd understand. Heck, I was tempted to wake Gray up to talk to him about it, too, but I managed to stop myself. ;)

So what did I love so much about this book?

1. Aliera. Socially awkward, tremendously talented, incredibly authentic.

2. The art. Wow, Mr. Cavallaro...you are an amazing artist!

3. The black/white vs. color concept.

4. The ways it reminded me so much of Gray...fencing, social anxiety, role-playing...yeah, it's no wonder he loved this book, too.

5. The ending! Oh, oh, oh...what can I say...I utterly adored the turn this story took! It's not that it was totally unexpected--after all, it is Jane Yolen writing, right? And she gave subtle hints throughout the book. But still, it delighted me to no end. :D

Yep, another one for the win column.

*****
I don't actually want to combine my rambling about books with a blame post. But with so many books sitting here on the computer table waiting to be put away, I figured I'd go ahead and deal with a few more.

Sweetness and Light: The Mysterious History of the Honeybee by Hattie Ellis. (Sorry for the blurry image.) This is one that Rich and I sort of bought together, as we both love bees. In fact, I think if we were more of a honey-loving family, we'd really be tempted to try beekeeping. Anyway, if I have a correct feel for the book, it examines not just the honeybee but also human relationships with this incredible animal. Sort of a blend of biology, human history, and natural history.

When She Was White: The True Story of a Family Divided by Race by Judith Stone. This is the story of Sandra Laing, born to Afrikaner parents in South Africa during apartheid. She was officially registered as "white" and was sent to a boarding school exclusively for whites. There she was persecuted for her brown skin, and was eventually kicked out of the school and reclassified as "coloured" (mixed race). Her parents fought this ruling, and the law was eventually changed and Sandra officially became "white" again. This book follows not only Sandra's story as a child and as an adult, but it also looks at the cruelty and the insanity of apartheid. I added this book to my wish list in the days before I started keeping track of where I first heard of them, but I'm fairly certain it was on NPR. POINT FOR NPR.

Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd edited by Holly Black and Cecil Castellucci. No question who gets the blame for this one! It's been on my wish list ever since I read Ana's review! The only thing that makes no sense is why it took me so long to buy it! :)  POINT FOR ANA.

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. There's a bit of blame sharing to be done on this one. Despite the fact that I'm a little intimidated by this book, I've wanted to read it for a long time simply because Dewey loved it so much. It's been on my paperbackswap wish list for what seems like forever. And you know, I was finally starting to get close to the top of the list. But then Ana read and reviewed it, and I found my patience had simply run out. ;)  I simply had to buy it! POINTS FOR DEWEY AND ANA.

The Unwritten: Inside Man (vol. 2) by Mike Carey and Peter Gross. (Simply could not find the cover image that graces my copy anywhere.) So Ana, I'm really sorry--I realize this seems a tad unfair, but I'm blaming you for this one, too.  It's your fault I bought the first volume, because of your incredible review. If I had read the first one and then had to buy the second, I wouldn't shoulder you with the blame. But since I haven't actually read it yet (sorry Kelly!), the fact is that I trust you so much that I knew I had to buy this one, too. See it is your fault! POINT FOR ANA.

Okay, that makes a tiny dent in this embarrassing pile anyway. But there's plenty more blame to come. :)

Well, that makes a teeny dent in this embarrassing pile...but there's plenty more blame to come...

Unwind...random thoughts

I finished up Unwind a few weeks back, but I never really added my final thoughts here. Though I wonder if I even need to...I suspect this one is going to stick with me.

I love this book. Is it perfect? No. But it had so much to offer...

My favorite--questions. It asked so many questions. Not flat-out asked them, of course. But it made me ask them to myself. Even better--it didn't try to tell me the answers.

Of course, there's the whole issue that sets up the book, abortion. But even here, it doesn't so much focus on the idea that abortion is "right" or "wrong"...instead it explores a number of possible scenarios that could arise if abortion was made illegal. Actually, I'm not wording that correctly, but I can't quite figure out how to say what I mean without giving things away.

But that's only one of the intriguing roads this book takes. There are also questions like, "what does it mean to be alive?" and "when does one label an act of violence as terrorism?" and...honestly, I could go on an on. Really, there's just so much to this book. But I swear, it's not overdone. And all these multitude of issues meld together remarkably well.

Control of one's own body...war...religion...terrorism...parental rights and responsibilities...

And you know what--it's just a damn compelling story, too! My heart pounded in fear for characters I loved, and I cried big fat tears for a character I hated.

Oh, and one more thing...I mentioned in an earlier post that I wasn't sure I bought into the brief explanation that sort of sets up the whole book, but that I could set that aside. Well, Chris told me that things were eventually explained a bit more. They were, and yes, I'm going to have to agree with him that even this explanation is questionable. But it really did add a bit more credibility to the story overall. And actually, it provided one of the many passages in this book that just made my heart ache:

"...You see, a conflict always begins with an issue--a difference of opinion, an argument. But by the time it turns into a war, the issue doesn't matter anymore, because now it's about one thing and one thing oly: how much each side hates the other..."

Anyway, many thanks to Annie and to Chris for making this book sound so intriguing. I owe you.

I can't believe how little I got read...

...though not because I usually read more than this or anything. In fact, many days I read a lot less. No, the thing is that I'm totally sucked into Unwind...it's so distracting, because I find myself thinking about it and wanting to pick it up all the time. But thus far, I've been good and stuck with getting my work done instead of ditching it all and just curling up with this book until I finish it. Anyway, yesterday I managed another 45 pages in it. For me, it's one of those books that isn't perfect, there are some definite flaws in my mind, and yet I'm thoroughly enjoying it anyway. :)

*****
And in the dangerous world of blog-reading, these books have been added to my wish list:

*Love's Executioner by Irvin D. Yalom (thanks to Chris' heartfelt review...dang, I meant to look to see if the library had this when I was there this morning)
*No Place Left to Bury the Dead by Nicole Itano (thanks to Eva's glowing review of what sounds like an incredible book)

*****
And what I'm dying to read from our own shelves (shelf #2):

*Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden
*The Homecoming by Ray Bradbury
*The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley
*The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier
*The Sisters Grimm: The Usual Suspects by Michael Buckley
*Northlander: Tales of the Borderlands by Meg Burden
*Black Hole by Charles Burns
*Fledgling by Octavia Butler
*Mijeong by Byun Byung-Jun
*The Unwritten: Tommy Taylor and the Bogus Identity by Mike Carey and Peter Gross

Like last time, if you could please help me maybe weed this list down a bit, I would greatly appreciate it. Tell me which ones you think I should leave on, and I will strike the rest off (with the exception of one I get to pick myself). 

perhaps I should change the name

Of this blog, that is. Because I'm doing a lousy job of keeping up here on a "day-to-day" basis. Of course, I won't really--it's still fulfilling its purpose of giving me a place to record my personal reading journeys.

So, in the past two days...I read another 56 pages in Scrapbook Page Maps (and am still unsure as to whether this will make the "keeper" pile), only another 9 pages in Last Chance to See, and a mere 6 pages in Shadow Man.

But I did start a new book. Bad, bad, bad me!!! My pathetic story: Rich and I went out to buy new towels last night (our old ones are literally falling apart--not surprising seeing how they are over ten years old). Anyway, being so close to Borders, we decided to pop in, grab a coffee, and relax a bit. But I was just in one of those finicky moods where I couldn't find anything I wanted to look at while we sat in the cafe. Well, with Chris' review fresh in my mind, I decided to go grab Unwind and just read the first few pages. I'd already decided it was going to be my next read after finishing Shadow Man anyway. And I promised myself that when we went home, it was right back to Shadow Man, and Unwind would have to wait. Yeah, easy to see where this is going, huh? Yep, I'm a big fat liar...we weren't home for five minutes before I was down grabbing Unwind off Annie's shelf. I apparently just can't be trusted.

But at 54 pages in, I am absolutely loving this book! The whole concept (abortion being made illegal, with the caveat that teens from the ages of 13 to 17 can be "unwound"--that is, they are taken apart and all their body parts go on "living" as organ transplants--if their parents so choose for any reason) is just so thoroughly disturbing, but thus far, the book is not graphic in any way. I do somewhat question the point where it all began--years ago with the Second Civil War (fought solely over reproductive rights) and the constitutional amendments that were passed to end the war to the satisfaction of both sides. See, what I question is why the pro-choice side would agree to the terms...as they really do nothing to protect a woman's rights over her body and yet all responsibility is still laid fully on women. I'm just having a hard time seeing what was gained for the pro-choice side. It just doesn't sound plausible to me. I have a feeling, though I could obviously be wrong, that this isn't even going to be talked about in the book...that the Second Civil War and the resulting constitutional amendments are just the set-up for the story. And I guess I can live with that...the story is so incredibly intriguing! It may just be one of those incongruous things that I have to set aside to enjoy the book. (And then again, maybe I'm wrong and this will be discussed later in the book, bringing up points I haven't considered.) Anyway, I fear there's no stopping me now--I will be reading this book right alongside my other reads, instead of waiting like I'd promised myself I'd do. Oh well. :P

 But on a "I'm proud of myself" note--neither Rich nor I has bought a book for ourselves the last three times we've been in a bookstore!

*****
And in the dangerous world of blog-reading, these have been added to my wish list:

*Love by Toni Morrison (thanks to Ana's amazing review, which literally left me in tears)
*The Kitchen Boy by Robert Alexander (thanks to Eva's fun "cold reading" post)
*Terra Incognita by Sara Wheeler (as above)