Week 8 Annotations: All We Ever Wanted by Emily Giffin

All We Ever Wanted

By Emily Giffin

Synopsis:

Nina Browning was born into a middle class family, but married into riches.  Her husband sold his tech company, and now her family has more money than she had ever dreamt of.  Nina attends fundraisers and charities with the towns upper-class, but since acquiring this extra cash, has felt like an outsider in this world.   Nina’s pride and joy is her high school aged son, Finch, who was recently accepted into Princeton University. 

Lyla Volpe was raised by her contractor/Uber-driving father after her mother ran out on them when she was only a toddler.  They live paycheck-to-paycheck, yet, Lyla is able to attend the towns most prestigious high school on financial aid.  She has been crushing on Finch since first laying eyes on him, and when he invites her to a party at his best friends place, she happily agrees.

It was at this party where every ones lives were turned upside down.  After having too much to drink, Lyla wakes up in the morning to find out a semi-nude photograph with a racist caption was taken of her at the party and sent around the school.  The photograph was sent from Finch’s phone.  

This book is about how one persons terrible decision, can affect so many lives around them.

Characteristics of Women’s Lives and Relationships:
- Tone/Mood: The tone of All We Ever Wanted is realistic AND provocative.   It is emotional, and relatable.   It delves deep into issues that teenagers face in this day of age, and doesn’t hold back. 
- Characterization:  This book is centered around two female characters, Lyla and Nina and the relationships with the people around them.  Lyla’s focus is her relationship with her father, who is trying to protect her throughout this scandal.  Nina is definitely the primary focus in this book, as she is at a crossroads trying to figure out if this is the life she wants for herself.  Lyla’s the secondary focus, and is tied in when the scandal occurs. 
- Storyline:  A sentence from The Reader’s Advisory Guide to Genre Fiction particularly stood out to me because of its exact depiction of All We Ever Wanted, and that was “This sprawling story examines how life changes people and how people change with life’s vicissitudes...” (p. 158).  This is so true of All We Wanted because Nina is convinced that she and her family would be a lot better off had her husband not sold his tech company and brought them into riches.  She believes that this huge life change changed her husband and her son.
- Frame/Setting: The issues discussed in this book are current issues that teenagers and their parents face today.  Issues involving technology, social media, revenge porn, online bullying, rape, and abuse are all discussed in this book.  This is a characteristic of the genre because, as discussed by Saricks, “Currency of issues constitutes part of the appeal of this genre” (p. 159).  We also learn a lot about the background of the characters (the story of Lyla’s mom running out; Nina’s high school sweetheart and the end of that relationship) which helps to frame the story. 
- Style/Language: The story is told from three different points-of-view, Nina, Lyla, and Tom (Lyla’s father).  Email exchanges and text messages are thrown into the chapters, making it a more modern style. 
- Pacing: The pace of this book is a leisurely pace.  The timeline of the book seems to be about a month long, maybe less, with some flashbacks thrown in for good measure.  The read is completely engaging and quick, due partly because of the twists and secrets and keep coming out. 

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Read-A-Likes:

If you enjoyed All We Ever Wanted, you might also enjoy these similar books:

• The Perfect Couple by Elin Hildebrand
• Not My Daughter by Barbara Delinsky 
• The Goodbye Year by Kaira Rouda
• Testimony by Anita Shreve
• A Spark of Light by Jodi Picoult

Week 7: Prompt Response

I, for one, am a huge fan and supporter of celebrity inspired book clubs. When I’m struggling to find something to read, I’ll google “Reese Witherspoon + Book Club” and see her latest picks and suggestions. As the article Celebrity Book Clubs Create Virtual Reading Community by Angela Liao noted, she also has an Instagram page for her book club recommendations, which I happen to follow. Never for once second had I questioned her motive behind posting these books publicly. Reese Witherspoon is a producer, an actor, and an avid reader. She isn’t posting these books so that she “looks intelligent” to her followers — she IS intelligent.  I’m also certain she is posting about books that she loved in order to see how many other people feel the same about a certain book.  As a producer of films and television series, this is an intelligent move for her.  Not only is she getting her fans to read more often, but she is also planning for future moves in her career.  

Also, if celebrity book clubs are getting more people reading books... then I’m 100% for that.

Week 6: Prompt Response

Integrated Advisory display I created to
advertise the “scary” items at our library.

Promoting Horror at the Library

I always found catchy displays to be the best way to promote our horror books at the library.  Since I love anything and everything horror, I always found these displays to be the most fun.  I think if you have fun making a display, its more likely to be a hit in the library.  My “scary” displays were always the most popular at the library and the books/DVD’s/audiobooks would be flying off them! I created the display pictured and received a lot of compliments on it.  I think the CAUTION tape and the blood caught a lot of patrons’ attention, and made the display stand out more than some of the others that we had.

Actual post I created to advertise my
Horror Movie Night at the library.

Another way I’ve promoted horror successfully at the library was with a Horror Movie Night.  This was a 21+ event (because it served alcohol) and we showed the movie Child’s Play.  I created the post to the left to share on our social media pages and it turned out to be one of our most liked posts!  I created a mini display of books and movies like Chucky that was set up so that when patrons were leaving they could easily find something they liked to take home with them.  By showcasing books along with DVD’s, I unknowingly incorporated integrated advisory in my programming.

We had a great turnout at this event and everyone said that they enjoyed it and were hopeful for another, so I believe this would be a successful program for other library’s as well!

Week 6 Annotations: “Heart-Shaped Box" by Joe Hill

Heart-Shaped Box

By Joe Hill

Synopsis:

Former rock star Judas (Jude) Coyne is a collector of all things disturbing.  He has items personally sent to him from John Wayne Gacy, a hangman’s actual noose, a three-hundred-year-old confession from a witch, and so on and so forth.  Most of these items were sent to him from fans of his music, however, if something ever caught his attention, he was likely to purchase and add it to his collection.  So, when Jude’s assistant, Danny Wooten, came to him with an email from someone claiming to be selling their stepfather’s ghost, Jude did not hesitate to purchase it.  He paid the $1,000 for it to be immediately shipped to him, and went on with his day. Days later, the suit arrives to Jude’s house in a black heart-shaped box. Jude immediately gets the impression that this suit is in fact haunted, and the spirit that haunts him is evil. After a little investigation, Jude determines that this suit was sent to him by the sister of a former girlfriend/groupie who committed suicide, and that the spirit is out for revenge on Jude and anyone who tries to help him.  Jude is determined to rid himself of this evil spirit, and save the lives of himself and his current girlfriend, Georgia.

Characteristics of Horror:

·     Tone/Mood:  Author, Joe Hill, did not follow his famous father’s (Stephen King) trend in bolding, capitalizing, or italicizing words for extra emphasis in this novel.  The tone of this novel follows the Visceral end, where “violence occurs early on and the intensity never flags” (Saricks, p. 114).  As soon as the suit is delivered to Jude, we are introduced to the vengeful spirit, and he is present throughout the entire novel, wreaking havoc on all the lives that surround Jude. 

·     Frame/Setting:  This novel is extremely descriptive, and feels like you’re watching a film while reading it.  Descriptive writing is a must in a horror novel, because in order to scare a reader, they must be able to picture with detail everything that is happening in the novel.  Heart-Shaped Box follows the horror trend of containing a supernatural “monster”, which in this case is the vengeful spirit, Craddock.  “Horror novels usually contain graphic violence and themes of sensuality and sexuality...” (Saricks, p. 115) and Heart-Shaped Box contains all of these as well.

·     Storyline:  The storyline of Heart-Shaped Box is pure horror; a highly-troubled goth rock star purchases a suit that is said to contain the ghost of the sellers step-father.  After purchasing the suit, the main character becomes haunted and is unable to rid himself of the evil spirit who was delivered to him with the suit.  As stated in our class reading, “The presence of the supernatural pervades these stories and sets Horror apart from other genres” (Saricks, p. 116).  One way that this book does not follow the traditional horror style, is the ending.  It is common for a horror novel to end unresolved, with loose ends. This book seems to be heading in that direction, but turns out to end clear and straightforward.  

·     Style/Language: Profanity and sex play a role in this novel. As I stated before, the language of this book is extremely descriptive, with the use of a lot of adjectives to help describe to the reader what is going on. 

·     Characterization: Majority of the characters in Heart-Shaped Box have dark back stories.  These stories range from child abuse, to molestation, to depression and suicide.  The two main characters, Jude and Georgia/Marybeth are both described as gothic.  This is a common theme in horror books as most characters in horror are out-of-control and “shattered individuals” (Saricks, p. 118). 

·     Pacing: The pacing in Heart-Shaped Box is erratic, like most horror titles — jumping from a slow and calm pace to heart-thumping terror.  Some parts of this book seem slow, but then are immediately followed with a sudden burst of intensity.  This book is unpredictable, and the pace of it keeps readers at the edge of their seat, waiting in fear and anticipation for what will happen next.

Read-A-Likes:

If you enjoyed Heart-Shaped Box, you might also enjoy these similar books:
-   A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

-      The Damned by Andrew Pyper
-      A Stir of Echos by Richard Matheson
-      The Dead Path by Stephen M. Irwin

Kirk’s Style Book Review: Dark Matter - Blake Crouch

DARK MATTER
by Blake Crouch



Buy Now From:
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KIRKUS REVIEW

Brilliant quantum physicist turned family man is kidnapped and forced into an alternate universe where he must fight to return to the only life he knows and loves.

Jason Dessen lives a somewhat ordinary life with his beautiful wife and their teenage son.  He lives this somewhat ordinary life because years ago he gave up his dreams of becoming a world-renowned quantum physicist when his now wife, Daniela, became pregnant with their now teenage son, Charlie.  Jason is satisfied with how his life turned out, and rarely thinks of what could have been, until one night Jason decides to meet an old college buddy at a bar to celebrate this buddy winning a prestigious science award.  While Jason is walking home from the bar, he is kidnapped and knocked unconscious by a masked assailant.  When Jason wakes up, he is in exactly the same place he last remembers before blacking out, but everything around him is entirely different.  His wife is no longer his wife, his son does not even exist, and he is no longer a college physics professor, but the award-winning quantum physicist he had once dreamt of becoming.  Although this new life might seem ideal to some people, it is a nightmare to Jason, who just wants to get home to his real life and his real family.  To make matters much worse, the people around him are beginning to question his authenticity, and Jason knows that he needs to get back to his own real world before its too late

Dark Matter is everything you could hope for in a sci-fi thriller.  Suspenseful, exciting and emotional engaging - you won’t be able to put this book down until the very last page.

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Pub Date: July 26, 2016                         Page Count: 342                             Review Posted Online: 10 February 2019
ISBN:  9781101904220                          Publisher:   Crown Publishers                  

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Week 5: Prompt Response

The Billionare’s First Christmas is a book I would not recommend my library to purchase based on the reviews.   I don’t find the reviews to be unreliable (despite the grammar and spelling errors), however, neither of them convinced me that this is a book worth reading.  I don’t think the library should be spending money on a book that is “just fine” when there are millions of books out there that are a lot better than “just fine”.  Also, I have a hard time trusting a person’s judgment who had “tears rolling down her face” from the description of a characters love for Santa Claus. (Only half kidding).

I’ve already read Angela’s Ashes, but for the sake of this assignment, lets say I hadn’t.  Reading those reviews would have definitely persuaded me to adding Angela’s Ashes to my library’s collection.  This sounds like it would be a book that would be of interest to many people, and all the reviews seem extremely positive towards this book.  I love that the reviews explain how the book is heartbreaking, but also humorous, and believe that others will also like that mix.

I don't think its fair that one type of book gets reviewed to death and other types get little to no coverage, but if more people are reading a certain genre of books than others its bound to happen. I think libraries are generally good at keeping books of all different genres to suit the needs of different patrons, so I don't believe that a lack of reviews impacts a library's collection too much.  Even when it comes to Ebook only books,  I think a lot of librarians (or the ones I worked with at least) read reviews on Goodreads and Amazon even, that aren't professional publications, to get an idea of what patrons might like, so I don't believe that lack of professional reviews impacts the collection too much.  I don't think I'd trust a review source that refuses to print negative content. I feel that both negative and positive reviews should be available so that the person seeking out the reviews has an opportunity to decide for themselves if they want to read something. There are so many classic books and movies that were once reviewed or received poorly, that people rave about today.  I think its so important to post the negative reviews because that gets the word out about these books and more people can read them and decide for themselves.

I personally love reading short reviews about a book before reading the book.  I like to know what other people thought of the book before reading it myself.  I'll never read a long review though because I don't want too much information - just a quick idea of what to expect when reading it.