A List of Things That Didn't Kill Me by Jason Schmidt

From inside jacket:

"Jason Schmidt wasn't surprised when he came home one day during his senior year of high school and found his father, Mark, crawling around on the kitchen floor in a giant pool of blood. Things like that had been happening a lot since Mark had been diagnosed with HIV three years earlier. From watching Mark get arrested in their living room when Jason was three years old to enduring a series of house fires, homelessness, and a bout of flesh-eating staph infection, Jason had figured out a long time ago that his home life wasn't like most other people's."

 

This book may not be for everybody, that being said I think this memoir is great. Jason seriously lives through some ordeals that you can't even fathom happening. This isn't a very PG rated book. There is swearing. There are situations that some parents may not want younger teens to read, but ironically many of those situations happened to Jason when he was even younger. 

This is a great read for teens that thinks their family is dysfunctional, have issues in their home life, or even feel lost.  Many of us have lived a sheltered life compared to Jason, but there are plenty of times while Jason is growing up that we can all relate to him. I think the major benefit of reading memoirs like Jason's is being able to step back from your own life. We are all egocentric but it's memoirs like these that we can appreciate people like Jason for their perseverance and honesty about their struggles in life, and ultimately reevaluate our own major problems in life and downgrade them to annoyances or, better yet, take them on with a new sense of tenacity.   

My only issue is that while Jason takes the majority of the 419 page book to tell us about his childhood and teen years, once he is on his own really struggling with his future, we only get the last page in the book tackling that. I would have liked to read about his struggle with adulthood and how he eventually came to peace with his dad (if he really did forgive him) and how much he has "settled down." 

my rating: A-

 

A.B.

The Stepsister's Tale by Tracy Barrett

This summer, Disney told the story of Sleeping Beauty from the perspective of Maleficent. Tracy Barrett has now told Cinderella's story from the perspective of the stepsister. It's an interesting interpretation of the story that seems a bit removed from the original.

Jane's mother has high standards for her daughters to present themselves as ladies like their ancestors always have. That would be easy for Jane to do, if they weren't living in a house that was nearly beyond repair and she weren't forced to work in the family's dairy so that they could survive. When her mother returns from a trip with a new husband and stepdaughter, Jane thinks this might be the answer to their prayers. However, her new stepsister seems a bit stuck-up and her stepfather has his own set of debts. None of this helps them, especially when he suddenly gets sick and dies. In the meantime, Jane forms a friendship with a family of people who lives in the woods, people that she'd initially been warned by her mother to stay away. Then the prince comes with an invitation for all unmarried women as he seeks one particular lady - a girl he met one day on his travels. Jane realizes he means her stepsister Isabella, and while she would love the opportunity to "get rid of" the girl, she begins to realize the prince might not be the happily ever after they were all looking for.

This retelling of Cinderella feels very removed from the original story that everyone seems to know. Given that it's from the perspective of the stepsister, that's to be expected, but at times it felt like a completely different story. For the most part, it feels like a story about a girl whose class status shifts due to unfortunate events and is now living the life of poverty and how she adapts to this life. It addresses misconceptions about people - Will from the family in the woods thinks she's high and mighty because of her class, which is completely wrong because her family has less than his, and she thinks he's too proud to associate with her; then Jane has a misconception about Isabella who has a misconception about Jane. It's a theme throughout the book about how people aren't what you think and how status and title doesn't make a person good. When it comes to the actual Cinderella parts of the story, there's a nice twist to the whole ball and prince that fits with the themes about misconceptions and makes it more original. For the most part, though, this novel felt like it was Jane dealing with their living conditions and trying to survive and keep her family from falling apart. For a while, I kept wondering when the whole Cinderella story was going to happen. I don't know what to make of the Cinderella character, though. For the most part she comes off as a whiny brat and is barely in the book. I would have like more of her, or seen her character develop more. I had very little sympathy for her. I also would have like a bit more clarity with the epilogue. There's closure for a happy ending, but I thought it was a bit vague in terms of where everyone ends up. I wanted more specifics or nothing at all. 

The novel is an interesting interpretation of the story of Cinderella. It is definitely the author's take on the familiar tale, although that tale is more of a secondary story compared to everything else going on in the novel - so keep that in mind. It was an enjoyable read though.
MMK

Keeping Hope Alive by Dr. Hawa Abdi as told to Sarah J Robbins

Abdi is a medical doctor who had the fortune to train in Russia on scholarship at a time when few women did.  Later her daughters and son would also receive education in Russia on scholarship.

While doing her residency in various specialties, she changed her mind many times about she wanted to do.  When she began caring for women and children she unexpectedly found her niche.  She wanted very much to help the many poor women receive needed medical care, find jobs, feed their children.  Abdi had resources both in land and in a bit of money that she used to establish first a clinic then a hospital for these needy people. Any money she had she poured back into the compound, adding farming, job training and so on. When drought hit and later during spurts of violent clashes between warring clans, Abdi expanded her hospital, served anyone in need who did not bring the fighting and intolerance into her compound.  Such was her dedication that she sent her children to safety in Kenya and remain behind to administer to the needs of those caught in poverty, starvation and violence. 

Abdi has a charisma, wisdom and strength that allowed her to keep out of politics, and keep her growing compound neutral territory.  As problems deepened aid groups from around the world tried to step in and help. One such agency was Doctors Without Borders which had to pull out when some of the aide workers were killed in violence.  Eventually the United States tried to help as well but their military tactics tended to add to the problems rather than help with solutions.

Things are a bit more settled now.  Abdi's two daughters do much to run the compound for their aging mother.  Abdi still focuses on women, children and anyone else in desperate need.  She concentrates on schooling and on campaigning against female circumcisions which are so harmful to women.  She has received several prizes for her tireless work for her beloved Somalians.  She has established a foundation to keep her projects funded.  See dhaf.org.

Although Abdi was blessed in many ways her life was not without hardship, errors in judgment, heartache.  I think its important to remember this. 

What bothered one reader most was that there was not more Somalian History and Politics explained.  For another reader the frequently out of sequence memories were confusing.

This memoir is mostly well written and quite riveting.  It would make a good Common Core Narrative Nonfiction selection.  It could be paired with Nick Lake's historical fiction book In Darkness as there are similarities in the cause of violence, and poverty.
LD/JW 7/22/13

In Darkness by Nick Lake

This is a fictionalized account of Haiti's history as told through the thoughts of Shorty.  He is a boy who was buried in a cave of rubble and dead bodies after the catastrophic earthquake of 2010.  There was actually a boy pulled alive from the wreckage after 8 days, after rescue workers no longer expected to find anyone living. The real boy was badly dehydrated but otherwise mostly ok. 
 
The fictional boy is a gun toting, murdering drug gang member. While in his dark cave, he sings songs he can remember words for.  He thinks about his recent experiences in the gang, when his father was hacked to death and his sister stolen.  He remembers revolutionist Dread Wilme's voudou funeral.  He remembers making mud cakes to tide himself and his mother over til real food can be gotten.  He remembers the poverty, violence, chaos.  When he drifts off to sleep he dreams of Toussaint L'Ouverture an early revolutionary leader who tried to stabilize his people and government after the French pulled out, freed the slaves and the British tried to take over. 
 
In the early 1700's and in the 1600's Haiti was a thriving trade center.  One of its export/imports was,  unfortunately,  slaves.  The country became unstable, violent, and impoverished when the French pulled out and a new strong government failed to be formed and it remains so today. 
 
The darkness in the title has multiple meanings as readers will discover.  This is a hard novel to read.  There is a lot of violence.  And, there is much difficult to understand language from French, from Kreyole (creole or Haitian dialect), from blanc (a blend of English and gang language and swearing), from voudou and African language.  I did not understand all of it and most readers will not, though perhaps unfamiliar words could be found on the Internet.  This is a Prinz Award winner which is the top honor for Young Adult Literature.  It could easily be an adult crossover book.  Anyone wanting to become more familiar with Haiti and its history could learn from this title.  But, most teens are unlikely to get through story. JDW 7/14/13