Review: This is All by Aidan Chambers

Dear Blog,
a review In Which Tesni Fangirls. 

Summary (from Goodreads): Using a pillow book as her form, nineteen-year-old Cordelia Kenn sets out to write her life for her unborn daughter. What emerges is a portrait of an extraordinary girl who writes frankly of love, sex, poetry, nature, and, most of all, of herself in the world. As she attempts to capture “all” of herself on paper, Cordelia maddens, fascinates, and ultimately seduces the reader in this tour de force from a writer who has helped redefine literature for young adults. A book not to be missed by any serious reader.

Review:  I honestly have no idea where I ought to start.  I've spent the last week entirely engrossed in This is All, and now I finished it's like all I can do is completely fangirl over it and want to re-read the whole thing over and over again.

It's like a journey in some respects, that begins when Cordelia is fifteen and ends when she's about twenty.  The book is her life, and the reader is like her shadow so it kind of becomes a part of theirs, too.
 At some points in the book it makes for very confusing reading.  Part two of the book is split so that you have to read all the left sides of the page from 200 to about 400, then go back to 200 again and read all the right pages.  Also part four of the book, which chronicles her creepy experience with Cal, a man who's obsessed with her, will cut suddenly from her talking about what's happening to her to her thoughts on other, completely irrelevant things.  It's actually very clever in that sense; On one hand you want to whizz through those parts of the book to get back to the central plot, but on the other when Cordy's experiences with Cal are so terrifying, the interludes about school, sleep etc seem almost like relief and a diversion. 

I loved Cordelia for the range of emotions she possessed, and the variety of reactions she could get from me; one minute I would be shouting "Yes!  Life feels like that!   Poetry is like that, and loneliness, and music is that satisfying. If you were real and I would totally follow you around everywhere",   The next I wanted to hug her; others she made me facepalm (the "It's...it's your period" scene *cringes* 'nuff said), others she made me want to cry.  She's intelligent but naïve, romantic but selfish, sometimes intense and others silly.  How does Aidan Chambers, a man and an adult, manage to write the thoughts of a teenage girl so powerfully and so personally?   There are some sections about periods, masturbation and the appeal of breasts; sex is quite an important topic. It's quite a mature read, certainly, and some of the topics I imagine a lot of parents wouldn't want their little darlings to be reading; but all I can say to them is  to just deal with it.  It's an entirely enlightening, frank book.

If I said I didn't like Will, that would be lying.  However, if I said I liked him, that also wouldn't be true. There were some moments when I really wanted to slap him and shriek; "But you care about Cordelia and you need her and she needs you!  The balance of the universe can only be restored if you love one another!" I hated him for his actions, or lack thereof.  Other times, however, I just wanted to steal him for myself,  and I very much envied Cordelia. That's part of the glory of the book; it portrays love in an entirely realistic way, ups and downs; Take for instance their "sex saga".  Aidan Chambers has eight hundred pages to build up a really deep emotional connection between the two of them.  It's not just lurrrve at first sight, complications ensue, they break up and Cordy learns a valid life lesson. There's way more substance to it than that.

Miss Martin.  MISS MARTIN IS JULIE FROM NOW I KNOW.    When I realised this I totally punched the air.  And she's all kinds of awesome in This is All because she has a deeper understanding of herself, and after taking on Nik she's pointing even more people in the direction of fulfillment.  And she's an English teacher, too, so she reads books, which is always a huge hit with me.
Now onto Edward and Cal *shudders*.  They're both...yeah.  I absolutely loathe them both, but then I think I was supposed to.  Note to self:  Never go out with a man in his thirties who works in sewage.  Especially not if you yourself are only seventeen.  Cordy's experience with Edward was one of the only points in the book I wanted to slap her. Why? What did she see in him?  I guess there was a lot of psychological stuff going on about it; how after she breaks up with Will and Izumi goes back to Japan, she needs to feel loved and he makes her feel sexy and mature.    As for Cal *shudders again*.  The less said about him the better.  He's creepy right from the start, and you know he cannot bode well.  More I shall not say.

The ending.  I totally didn't see it coming.  More I shall not say because it would totally ruin everything if I gave it away. But the impact is sudden and entirely frank; one of those endings that both makes me want to burst into tears and smile at the same time.  It's also kind of like Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness in the way it ends; how when you've finished it all you can do is just stand there in an entirely shocked and/or blown away manner.

In conclusion=  Whoooah. Aidan Chambers you are amazing for being able to write that well and that convincingly, to the point where you forget that it's only a story.
In Three Words: incredible incredible incredible.
Recommended for: mature teenagers. Adults.  Everyone. 
Rating: 5.

Review: The Fences Between Us

Dear Blog,

This will have to be a pretty short review,  seeing as my time is of the essence, but anyway-

Summary (from Goodreads): Thirteen-year-old Piper Davis records in her diary her experiences beginning in December 1941 when her brother joins the Navy, the United States goes to war, she attempts to document her life through photography, and her father--the pastor for a Japanese Baptist Church in Seattle--follows his congregants to an Idaho internment camp, taking her along with him. Includes historical notes.

Review: When I first heard about the relaunch I was like "ohymword ohmyword new Dear America books MUST PRE-ORDER NOW." Alas I couldn't pre-order it, and ended up spending a fortune on postage trying to get to it.

Piper, the protagonist, was pretty likeable. She seemed to sound very much like a thirteen-year-old; I think that sometimes when people write historical fiction, they can forget that the main character is a child, and how to write from their way at looking at the world. I guess (nay, know) that Kirby Larson isn't thirteen, but Piper's voice really seems clear and sort of shines through. Plus, she's funny and thoughtful and considerate in turn, kind, but with suitable elements of selfishness to give her flaws and stop her seeming overly perfect.

The supporting characters are all likeable in their various ways; Betty Sato was a particularly interesting, if only for the circumstances she was in, and Bud made suitable material for Piper's first boyfriend.
Piper talks a lot in her journal about her older brother Hank, serving in the navy and at Pearl Harbour at the time of the infamous Japanese bombing. Yet for a lot of the book he himself remains a mystery, only appearing once or twice to visit Piper and her father, and only for a few days. So it was quite hard to really relate to Piper and hope for his safe return if I didn't know him, or read about him anyway.

I can't help but think, though, that for all its interesting subject matter, The Fences Between Us would have been even more fascinating/effective if it had been written from the point of a Japanese-American incarceree in Minidoka. I mean, it's all very well that Piper goes to school there and such, but it's not the real insight into an internment camp that you might get from the point of view of an Issei or Nikkei. Two words: companion novel, from the point of view of Piper's Japanese-American friend Betty Sato, perhaps, à la Molly Flaherty from Where Have All the Flowers Gone?  and her brother Patrick  in the My Name is America series.  So although I guess it was pretty interesting to have an "outsider"'s point of view, it would be even more so to see things from the point of view of an internee.

So, well, it makes me very happy that Dear America  has been brought back for another generation of readers.  It was well worth the wait, and the read.

In Three Words: insightful, rewarding, enjoyable.
Reccomended for: Dear America fans old and new.

Rating: 4.

Dear America? Dear World?

Dear Blog,
I write you today on the subject that is the relaunch of the Dear America series.  I have been rummaging around in the blogosphere a little more and I came across an idea that is pure awesomeness:  Why just Dear America?  Why not Dear World?

I found two blog entries on this subject: Here  and  here.  But my blog entry about this subject may not work because, well, I live in the UK, which has it's own equivalent of Dear America, which is My Story (which I talked about in my entry Why I Dislike the My Story relaunch).  And the two blog entries talk about My Story , Dear Canada, and My Australian Story being more available to readers of Dear America (The equivalent to these in New Zealand is called My Story as well).  And the two links are about making them more available to Americans.  No matter.

I've been reading My Story and Dear America for years, and I've just started reading Dear Canada as well.  Yes, as you may have guessed I love historical fiction in diary form muchly.  

I think the whole idea: Dear World I mean, would be quite interesting. Yes, yes.  Historical journals from every corner of the Earth.  YES! YES! YES!  But I don't think that Dear World is such a good title.  Dear Canada  is translated into French as Cher Journal (Dear Diary).   That has more of a ring to it.

Anyway.  It would be a good idea, since D.A spin-offs are written in Canada, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, France and Mexico as well.  It'd be various books from all such series' rolled into one, perhaps.  I know I'd buy it.

It'd be something for Scholastic to think about.
I better go.  My sister wants to use the computer *sigh*. Oh well.

Review-Footsteps in the Snow

Dear Blog,
today's review is for Footsteps in the Snow, by Carol Matas (and part of the Dear Canada series). I got it for my birthday and, well, I thought it deserves a mention. Also as I'm still working my way through The Sweet Far Thing (about 300 pages to go), which I stayed up until 1:30 last night reading.
Anyway. On with the matter at hand.

Summary: It's 1815. As the book begins, 12-year-old Isobel Scott is on the voyage from Scotland to Canada with her father and two brothers, following the death of her mother, who died on the voyage. Isobel finds her old journal and, seeing as there's only a page or so written in, she starts recording her thoughts and feelings. They're on their way with some other Selkirk settles to Rupert's Land, but various complications ensue as they have too few supplies to last a winter, struggle to claim their land, and are caught in the conflict between the Hudson's Bay Company and the North West Bay Company.

Review: I have a thing for historical fiction in diary form. I started reading the My Story series when I was eight, and since then I've also started working through the Dear America series and Dear Canada, as well. But Footsteps in the Snow is only the second book in the Dear Canada series I've read because they're so hard to get in England. But my general outlook on such fiction is: you can never have enough.
Anyway.
My favourite thing about this book had to be Isobel herself. She was such a believable character and I really found myself rooting for her. Maybe this was because she was unlike the uncountable numbers of female protagonists in such historical fiction, i.e being awful at sewing, wanting to run around climbing trees, getting their hair tangled and all in all looking for adventure, Isobel was the exact opposite. Nay: She spoke English as well as Scottish Gaelic and could read and write better than many other children in that era (i.e 1815). shewanted to be a lady, and believed that in Canada she could be just that. She wanted to live a life of luxury and happiness, "living in a grand house in the New World, with servants to wait on me and young men coming to call." This is what made her seem even more out of her depths traversing the Canadian wilderness at minus thirty degrees. This quote particularly struck me:

I cannot believe how far from my dreams we have sunk. We were supposed to begin a life where I would be a lady. Instead I am nothing more than a servant to the savages. I always try to bear myself with dignity, however, so as not to let them see that my pride is injured.
As I read it I was thinking, "YES! YES! YES! That's exactly how somebody in her situation would feel!" Carol Matas captured her character perfectly. Her frustrations, her joys, her initial resentment at her father marrying White Loon (a local Cree woman)...Everything was there. Eventually Isobel overcomes many hardships in the end and emerges as a strong young woman.

However. Despite this the book was quite slow moving at times, and I felt it needed a little push to get going again. Though it was a pleasure to read, when you sort of stand back and think, "so what happened?" The answer is, well, not as much as you think as you're reading this. But then, I suppose, it was told in diary form and you can't expect such a beginning-middle-end type plot as such.
Oh well. That aside, it's well worth a read for all fans of such historical fiction.
Rating: 4/5