Title: Food, Girls and Other Things I Can’t Have
Author: Allen Zadoff
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Egmont USA
Source: Advance Readers Copy provided by publisher
Parental Warning: Bullying, Minor foul language

Summary:
Andrew Zansky is the awkward and unsure.  As an overweight, studious, asthmatic, girl starved high schooler he hangs out with his BFF Eytan talking about chicks and model UN. They don’t talk about just any chick though, recent circumstances have brought April (a seemingly dorkish girl in her own right) to Andrew’s attention.

Thinking he’d never see her again after that first meeting Andrew is surprised when fate smiles on him and she turns out to be the new girl when school starts up.  Naturally, wanting to impress and court the lovely April Andrew attempts to re-position himself out of dorkdom to instead be part of the in-crowd.  Though initial efforts fail he finally gets his foot in the door as a result of a humiliating gym class snafu; a happenstance that gives him the ultimate popularity catapult — access to the football team.  Not just typical score keeper team mascot access though, but honest and true participation in the form of being a respected and active part of the team as a player.

Andrew then adds the crown jewel of high school social climbing to his crown when he is befriended by the most popular guy on campus.  O. Douglas, the star quarterback of the football team, mentors Andrew in not only in all things football but also provides guidance on navigating his burgeoning popularity and most importantly snagging the girl of his dreams.  What Andrew doesn’t realize, initially is that his radically changed and exciting new life comes with a price.

Traveling down a path to self-discovery Andrew’s journey navigates him through issues related body image, friendship, love and the importance of family. Building new and strengthening old he learns what all teens must to be a better person sometimes we have to be brave and endure.

Opinion:
Zadoff has written not only an entertaining and sometimes comical story but one of depth and heart.  Taking Andrew from geek to chic in ten seconds flat the reader is brought through a gambit of emotions — self loathing, fear, love, discontent, empathy, distrust and much more.  Rolled all together he’s created a wonderful story of perseverance and growth.

What worked for me?  Andrew is as self depricating as it gets.  He knows exactly who he is and where he sits in the caste system of the typical high school.  He is certainly the low man on the totem pole and though he wishes otherwise he is the first to admit he’ll never be one of the cool kids sitting at the poplar table.  What stood out in his characterization was that though he has a wonderful sense of humor I could always feel just the slightest bit of sadness and trepidation in everything he did or said.  Even when I was to believe he was truly happy I always knew that perhaps things weren’t all they were cracked up to be.

Zadoff did a fabulous job of showing the bumps in the road. Andrew was mocked and tortured by bullies before during and after he was embraced by the popular crowd.  His own behavior towards the “uncool” was objectionable at times.  He was in no way perfect yet he was someone the reader could root for.  I wanted him to be successful, wanted him to get the girl and be popular and get all the things he thought he wanted out of his family and friends.  Then when he went on that journey to do all of that I just adored the events that transpired and what the results were (won’t spoil that here though).

That realism is what made this story.  It’s truly about coming of age and discovering who you really are inside and out.  It’s about finding what is right for yourself, embracing it and being satisfied with the results.

I admit this book was remeniscent of the movie Lucas which I loved as a teen in the 80s.  I’ve always been drawn to the geek overcomes adversity to be a better person scenario so I really enjoyed the end and where Andrew landed.  I felt tremendously satisfied with the why and how of it all.  I also liked that there were excellent messages about body image, family, friendship and love without getting remotely preachy. At no time did I feel like I was watching an after school special or being taught all about important social issues.  This was thoughtfully written with relatable characters in an interesting and entertaining story that works for audiences young and old.

One of my favorite books of the year I strongly encourage you to pick it up and read it then encourage everyone you know to pick it up and read it too!

[This review is part of a blog tour arranged by Traveling to Teens]

In the spirit of the upcoming holiday Allen Zadoff, author of Food, Girls, and Other Things I Can’t Have, graciously agreed to write a guest post for us to enjoy.  My review of the aforementioned is slated for tomorrow but I’ll let you know that I enjoyed it tremendously and am so pleased that Allen was generous enough to share some of his wit and insight with us today.

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The Miracle of Halloween

In my novel Food, Girls, and Other Things I Can’t Have, my hero Andrew Zansky has a little weight problem.  More than a little. He’s really fat.  Andy’s  a sophomore and he already weighs 306.4 pounds.  People ask me where I got the inspiration for the novel.  Honestly, I did not weigh 306.4 when I was a sophomore in high school.  I only weighed 275.  Gulp.

I was a really big kid, and like my hero, I was crazy self conscious about it. All year long, I tried to fit in—to the desks at school, to the cool cliques, and especially into my pants. Today you have a choice between skinny jeans, slim fit, relaxed, or even baggy jeans. Thank god for hip hop culture, the savior of big kids everywhere. But when I was a kid, clothes were tight! Especially pants.  It was the era of the designer jeans, jeans so tight you had to lie on the floor and yank at them for ten minutes to get them on. Brooke Shields was a teenage model then, and she had a famous commercial where she said, “Nothing comes between me and my Calvin’s.”  (YouTube it. You’ll get a good laugh.) To be in, you had to wear those skin-tight designer jeans.  My high school years were absolutely miserable. I was a fashion failure.

That’s why Halloween was so special to me. It combined two of my favorite activities:  hiding my body and eating enormous amounts of food.  On Halloween, being a big kid was not necessarily a disadvantage.  For example, I could wear a ghost costume.  I looked good in a sheet, and best of all, they were one size fits all. I could be a big Frankenstein. I could be an ogre or a giant.  One year I cut holes in a cardboard box and said I was a walking refrigerator.  People loved it.

And then there was the candy!  Most of the year I had to hide my love of food and my need to eat huge amounts of it, but on Halloween I could flaunt it.

“How many bags of candy did you get?” my friends would ask.

“I got four!” I said.  “Giant bags!”

Unlike the rest of the year when people were careful with food, on Halloween everyone ate like me. My parents would try to ration the candy (“You can have ten pieces tonight, then five tomorrow.”), but they ultimately failed to keep my brother and I from attacking our horde of candy like hungry Vikings.  For two or three days, everyone talked about food and ate until they were sick.  I was in heaven.

Years later I would learn the word “binge” and find out that I had an eating disorder.  I’d learn that it wasn’t normal to eat every meal to the point of being stuffed, feel guilty, swear you’d never do it again, then do it again.  But for one glorious night on Halloween, I was just like everyone else, dressing up in funny clothes, running around the neighborhood begging for candy, and eating without limitations, without worrying that I was fat and getting fatter.  Halloween was like freedom to me. And then, sadly, life would go back to normal, and I was once again the fat, weird kid who ate too much and couldn’t fit into his pants.

—-

Thank you Allen for taking the time to share this with Galleysmith readers.  I’ve greatly enjoyed hosting you.  If you’d like to hear more from Allen please follow him on Twitter at @allenzadoff or at his webpage at Allenzadoff.com.

Title: When the Whistle Blows
Author: Fran Cannon Slayton
Genre: Middle Grade
Publisher: Philomel Books
Source: Review Copy Provided by Author
Parental Warning: None

Summary:
Jimmy Cannon is a young boy in rural West Virginia marking the progression of his teenage years by reflecting on how he spent Halloween.  Starting in the 1940s Jimmy is showcased in numerous situations with friends and family. As each year passes he is seen trying to infiltrate the local secret society his father and brother belong to, marking  the evening with typical boyish highjinks — rotten food, payback and bullies, protesting the high school administrator that wants to take away a coveted day off school, playing on the high school football team, spending the day at work with his father and brothers, watching his hometown and the railroad it caters to die, and eventually the passing of a beloved family member.

Opinion:
Reading more like a collection of short stories than a novel Slayton has created a touching and intimate look at the life of her main character Jimmy and his family.  Transitioning from one year to the next using the central focus of one particular day (in this case Halloween) allows for each individual snapshot to flow together in a way that provides readers a great view of Jimmy’s life and how he’s lived it.  The transitions are abrupt in the way that we are able to discern that a new year has come upon us but not so abrupt that the story doesn’t work or that we’re unable to follow along with the premise.

Where Slayton does a remarkable job is in showcasing the strong bond between Jimmy and his family.  She does so delicately and in muted tones as we see festive, emotional and sometimes tragic events throughout the eyes of this boy.  Slayton subtly shows his growth from a curious and precocious youngster into a thoughtful man while allowing him to maintain core values of tradition and family.  Informing the story is the appearance of the local railroad through which the reader is threaded through the passage of time. Ever present in scene, dialogue or just as a thought in the mind of the reader it was this element that made the story more about home than anything else.  The vivid imagery of Rowlesburg (Jimmy’s hometown) and it’s railroad industry allows the reader to really feel the character’s physical surroundings and relate to why it is that Jimmy has such a fondness for his hometown.  In the end we learn that his life isn’t just all about the people he encountered but the place where he grew up and cherished. It informed his relationships and his decisions in a way any living and breathing family member would yet didn’t stand out as over the top or too dramatic a character.

In my opinion this book would be a great quick read for a reluctant boy. Not only does it focus on a male protagonist the situations tend to show situations that a boy may relate well to — pranks, sports, and general mischief.  Even better, is the fact that within those elements are interwovent the more tangibly emotional aspects of family dynamics, work ethic and sence of belonging.  There are some soulful and meaningful lessons to be learned.

This is not to say that the book is not appealing to girls as well as I enjoyed it a great deal. I just envision it’s greatest strength (characterization and plot) appealing to boys who don’t typically enjoy reading as much as playing sports or video games.  Further, the fact that it is a quick read doesn’t diminish it’s impact on the reader.  The story is in depth and emotional providing an entertaining and enjoyable journey from start to finish.

Title: In A Perfect World
Author: Laura Kasischke
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Source: Review Copy Provided by Publisher
Parental Warning: Mild Language, Adult Themes

Summary:
Widowed early in life and left to raise three children on his own Mark Dorn is the man every girl wants a crack at.  Gregarious, gorgeous beyond words and more than a little unattainable women throw themselves at him at every opportunity in the hopes that they’ll finally be the one to reel him in.  Jiselle, on the other hand, has the perfect slightly oblivious existence.  As a flight attendant with a free and easy jet setting lifestyle she’s well traveled, extremely fashionable, vivacious and living her life in blissful indifference until she’s assigned to fly with Captain Dorn.

Over time layovers for work blossom into more than friendship and the two become happily involved.  Jiselle is swept up in the budding moments of love feeling energized and wrapped up in Mark.  Overnights in exotic and romantic locations, intimate dinners for two and incredible sex lead the two to a hasty and passion induced betrothal.

Forewarned of disastrous results by her skeptical mother Jiselle jumps feet first into marriage and an instant family. Letting go of her job to move into the home he shared with his dead wife she takes on the role of mother to three resentful children.  More than that Mark has become distant in both emotional and physical proximity as Jiselle struggles to adjust to her new life at home. Being tested by his spiteful and unwelcoming children is ultimately the least of Jiselle’s worries though, as not long after she begins to realize that her life is forever altered in a way she isn’t prepared to fix and that her relationship with Mark is not all she’d thought it would be an epidemic begins to sweep more fully through the United States.

The initial onset of Phoenix Flu had begun long before, influencing travel and international relations on a small scale. Now, as it takes a stronger hold Americans are universally feared and despised by the International community and are quickly persecuted and shunned.  Having traveled to Germany Mark is detained and quarantined while Jiselle is left at home to care for the children alone as the US descends into anarchy and decimation.  Faced with starvation, loss of basic utilities, illness and the unknown Jiselle steps outside of her own misery to become the woman she’d always hoped to be. She became a mother.

Opinion:
In a story built around an illness reminiscent of the avian or swine flu Kasischke portrays the United States as a country abandoned and isolated by the global community.  Viewed as the root of all evil as it relates to global warming and economic crisis American’s are left to fend for themselves in their greatest hour of need.  The picture of depression both physical and emotional the United States has descended into anarchy as the population begins to contaminate to the point of decimation.

Knowing the above to be true, this book is not for the faint of heart.  Not particularly graphic by any means it is also not a particularly light or uplifting read.  There is very little happiness to be found as Jiselle goes from flight attendant in love to mother of three fighting to keep her family alive.

What works well for me as a reader was how Kasischke writes the slow descent of Jiselle’s seemingly perfect life.  Moving from carefree professional, to being the other half of a hot love affair, to the eventual mother of ungrateful children we see Jiselle’s struggle with her own identity.  We watch as she fights for what she thinks is the perfect life then reluctantly accepts that it’s not.  We watch further still when she takes what’s left of that life and tries to build something more from it.  Taking the opportunity to be a better person even in the most dire of circumstances.  Instead of picking up and leaving Mark’s family to fend for themselves she turns her descent into depression and chaos into opportunity and builds a shaky foundation for a new and stronger life.

<spoiler>

What didn’t work for me? The ending.

I tend to be more of a black and white girl.  I like a definitive ending and this one was all about the grey and leaving it up to interpretation.  Was there a nuclear bomb that wiped Phoenix Flu off the face of the Earth?  Was air traffic restored indicating things were going to go back to the way they used to be?  It’s hard to say.  I’d like to think that Jiselle and her newly built family survived but we don’t know for sure and that kind of ending is not my cup of tea. I like the bow that ties things up nice and tidy like.

</spoiler>

As a fan of dystopian literature I enjoyed the Phoenix Flu portion of the story as it was used as the foundation for Jiselle learning about herself and becoming a stronger woman.  It was not particularly distinct from other stories in the genre but in the end I don’t think that element was the intended focus of the story as much as a catalyst.  It was the family dynamic and drama evolving that was the central focus of the story.

If you are interested in a story that draws on the difficulties of infusing into and building a new family, endurance of spirit and a bit of the end of the world as we know it then grab a copy of In A Perfect World.

[This review is part of a blog tour arranged by TLC Book Tours]

Good morning all!

Let me start by congratulating the team behind the 24 Hour Read-A-Thon for organizing a fabulous (and wildly successful) event. I’m sure all are tucked away warm in their beds decompressing and recuperating but lets make sure we all give them a giant round of applause for all their hard work. I’m sure it was no easy feat to put together and maintain.

Second, mad props to all the cheerleaders! The flurry of posting and Tweeting and in some cases vlogging was awesome with a capital A. I totally felt the love and support.

Lastly, super charged kudos to all the participants.  Whether you read one book or fifty; whether endured through all 24 hours or just 12 everyone had a great time and got loads of great reading, blogging, and socializing under their belts. That is no small feat!

As for me, I endured about 15 hours before I had to call it a night and sleep. I must admit I lasted a lot longer than I anticipated so I’m jazzed.  More than that I was convinced I’d only read one book so the fact that I got through 3 was a giant accomplishment for this old tortoise.  In case you weren’t following me in my recap post Read-A-Thon: The First here are my final stats:

• Books Read: 3 books (and 32 pages)
• Hours Spent Reading: 13
• Hours Spent Cheerleading: 2
• Pages Read: 711
• Minutes Read: 570

For me that’s HUGE! Seeing as though I usually only read a book a week, two tops! LOL

I’d announced that I would be accruing funds based on these stats (and others) to donate to the Lupus Foundation of America and at the moment the tally is: $30 (3 books read), $14.50 (58 comments),  $10.60 (106 Tweets referencing @galleysmith) – this means I’m going to donate $55.10 to charity.

BUT WAIT!

I’ll keep the funds flowing for comments to this post as well.  It’s Read-A-Thon related right?  So, as outlined in my original structure for every comment I get to the post I’ll add $.25 more to the pot!

I didn’t get the chance to participate in many of the mini-challenges — this was a conscious decision on my part — but now that the flurry of activity has peetered out a bit I’m going to do the final challenge.

End of Event Meme

Q: Which hour was most daunting for you?
A: Clearly 16-24, haha! Actually I knew going in that I wasn’t going to do all 24 and that I’d go to bed eventually. I’d hoped to stay up a bit later than I did but in the end when I couldn’t concentrate on the pages any more it made sense no sense to fight it.

Q: Could you list a few high-interest books that you think could keep a Reader engaged for next year?
A: This is such a subjective question because everyone’s interests are so diverse. I’d say that choosing books that are short easy reads would be a good way to feel accomplished as the potential to finish them and finish more of them is higher.

Q: Do you have any suggestions for how to improve the Read-a-thon next year?
A: I’d have to think on it but one area where concentration for improvement could be focused is in how to manage blog updates and visiting participants blogs (mainly for readers).  I wonder if there is a way to have kind of a central location for updates as compared to just on our blogs.  I only subscribe to so many of the participants but I’d like to check in with some of the others and having a central location to do that might be good.

Also as it relates to the cheerleaders, maybe have a situation where you group blogs into teams and then cheer leaders root for team A from hour 1-4, then team B from hour 5-8, etc….etc.  That allows for variety for both parties.  I loved my cheerleaders they where super encouraging but I imagine it may have gotten a bit boring for them to keep seeing the same thing from me.  I think this scenario also allows for new people to meet and find blogs they may not already know.

But again, my cheerleaders rocked and I loved having them visit me through the process!

Q: What do you think worked really well in this year’s Read-a-thon?
A: I don’t have anything to compare it to so it’s hard for me to say. I didn’t see anything that was a total and complete fail as it related to my participation.

Q: How many books did you read?
A: A shocking 3 books!

Q: What were the names of the books you read?
A: Shaun Tan – The Arrival (GN), Susan Beth Pfeffer – The Dead & The Gone (YA), Laura Ruby – Bad Apple (YA).  I also started but only got a couple chapters in on Alex McAulay’s Shelter Me (YA)

Q: Which book did you enjoy most/least?
A: Honestly, none of them really “wowed” me to the point that I couldn’t put it down.  Tan’s was beautifully illustrated but I tend to like a story with words, Pfeffer’s was darkly powerful but as the second in a series that focuses on the same event as the first some of the anticipation and unexpectedness was lost, and Ruby’s Bad Apple was an entertaining quick read with some moments of laugh out loud humor but I wouldn’t say it was one of the best books I’ve read this year.

All in all I’d say everything was pretty much even.

Q: If you were a Cheerleader, do you have any advice for next year’s Cheerleaders?
A: Wasn’t a cheerleader but I’d encourage you to visit more than the specific blogs you were assigned if you can.

Q: How likely are you to participate in the Read-a-thon again? What role would you be likely to take next time?
A: I’ll totally do it as a reader again.