A heartbreaking novel mostly about a son who's returned to his mother after she's suffered for years with dementia. While I can see why so many people love this novel, I wished the ending had been tied into the rest of the novel more seemlessly. It wasn't a mystery novel. In fact, I found myself forgetting there were things to be "unconvered" until they came up again.
I just think it could have been more powerful for me had the past trauma of the novel's characters not been left as a surprise, almost plot twist, for the ending.

I read this for my Global Literature in Canada course at uni. After reading Lives of the Saints for the same class, this feels like a relief.
Mistry weaves together short stories following the lives of people who live in Firozsha Baag, an apartment complex in Bombay. It's full of lower to middle class residents, each trying to get by with what they have. I really enjoyed that whoever put this together, took the time to make it chronological so that if we met a character as a child near the beginning, they were an adult by the end.
I liked the writing a lot, too. So, 4/5 stars!

While I enjoyed what this book was trying to do, I can tell that not only was it written by a white guy, but it lacked a lot of substance. I read this for class, but at the end of the day I found it deeply misogynistic. Why would a 7 year-old constantly be describing the way his mother's breasts strain against her blouse while she's tending the garden? Or when his mother's friend is over, describe the "marble fat of her inner thigh"? Ricci is a man trying to write in the perspective of a 7 year-old boy, and fails miserably. Meanwhile, the boy's mother is trying to somewhat be a "feminist" by not caring what the village might think of her affair and pregnancy, but I hated the way she treated her son, and she was, bottomline, an unlikable character. Why to go for making the feminists unlikable! (she says sarcastically).
Other than that, I guess it accurately portrayed the time, and the little village in Italy, it's population dreaming of the day they'll all have enough money to move to America.
So I did not enjoy this. 2/5 stars.

4/5 stars.

This Teen novel is about Kat, who's just moved to Alberta from Ontario so her family can take care of her grandad, and is starting again with high school (I actually had no idea highschool starts in grade 10 in Alberta - so weird!). She has a panic disorder and is very particular about plans and rules because of it. She's calculated because if things start to go awry, she panics.
It also follows Meg, her mom and step-dad have been divorced for about a year now, and Meg is still dealing with her step-dad not wanting part-custody of her in the divorce. She also as to deal with day-to-day racism because she's black, and ADHD. She has a hard time keeping friends because of her hyperactivity and her boyfriend of two-months broke up with her.
Meg and Kat are paired for the science fair project and spawn a friendship through their mutual love of the video game Legends of Stone and YouTube Gamer, LumberLegs.

I really enjoyed a good friendship story. I haven't read a YA book like this in a while - usually they're just filled with unacknowledged insta-love, omigod-we're-gonna-die tropes. This was a good break.
3.5 stars cause I found myself a bit bored at times. The plot seemed to kind of stagger at certain points between each conflict leading up to the climax. But I don't believe in "filler" chapters - every word and every sentence should contribute to the plot. I also found myself unable to relate to the characters. But I'm 20, and the teens in this are in 10th grade (so, 14 or 15, right?), so take that with a grain of salt. I did, however, relate to Kat and her panic attacks. She and I actually extremely similar in our ways. I found her relationship with her grandad so touching, and even shed a few tears.
You should definitely pick this up in November if you're tired of all the romantic tropes and want to snuggle up with some friendship. It's also pretty short, and easy to fly through on a snowy day.

This book takes place in the point of view of a girl named Evelyn, and follows her thought process when a new boy shows up to school. A boy named Queen.
I loved this, I think it really captures what being "different" is like at a young age (the characters are in 5th grade). Although I wouldn't consider myself "different", and have no experience. I was able to connect with Evelyn in that I just let others be themselves and became confused when they were treated with less respect than I.
I do wish it could have been in Queen's point of view, and I wonder what the author's thought-process was to put it in Evelyn's instead. I also found myself wondering why the "different" characters we find in books always have to have "different" parents as well, why/how do their parents have so much influence on them? Why can't they have "normal" parents and still grow up to have "different" personalities? - this is something I've found myself wondering a lot in fiction of any age group.

4.5 stars. I'm planning a discuss of this for my YouTube channel, so watch out for that. I just really loved this book.

review to coming as soon as I organize my thoughts. I really loved this!

I may or may not have cried at the end so 3.5/5 stars.
my review on my blog -> http://emilyspeaking.blogspot.ca/2013/12/old-man-by-david-poulsen-white-pine.html

my video review -> http://youtu.be/xyfjd97rtsU