Carmen Reid: Cross my heart

Carmen Reid: Cross my heart

The usual follow up to "Cross my heart" is "and hope to die". Here, it is "and hope to live" - for someone who has very little chance of that. Nicole is 15 and a resident of Nazi-occupied Brussels. She joins the Belgian Resistance and is transformed into Coco of Group K. La Belle, one of her fellow agents, reveals that she thinks she'll be lucky to be alive in 6 months time, and Coco too is soon risking her life for her beliefs.

The gruelling subject matter is leavened both by the romance between Nicole / Coco and fellow agent Anton / The Poet and the author's fluid writing. I whizzed through it. When I first started reading, I was sceptical that 15 year olds would have been involved in the Resistance to this extent. Nor was I convinced that Coco could have escaped some of the situations she faced in quite the way described. However, Carmen Reid's afterword makes it clear that, although fictional, her story is based on considerable research which is detailed on her website. The afterword is also worth reading for Carmen's story of her own family - she is half British, half German, and her grandparents were on different sides of the Second World War. Cross my heart is, touchingly, dedicated to them.

I won this book in a competition on Scottish Book Trust's website. I'm grateful, as always, to them for everything they do. I'm now going to donate it to Glasgow Women's Library's collection for younger women. As Carmen says "Soon all the grandparents who fought in this momentous war will be dead. We need to preserve their stories and experiences. Teenagers need to remember there was a time when turning eighteen didn't mean being able to drink and go to uni; it meant you were old enough to fight, kill people and die for your country." Her book is testament to that.

Books for Brownies - International Book Giving Day

International Book Giving Day is dedicated to getting new, used and borrowed books into the hands of as many children as possible - check the site for ideas of how to take part. I'm going to be helping my friends at Glasgow Women's Library who have been collecting books for younger women for some time. Now that they have moved to new premises, they are home to a Brownie Pack whose members are wondering why there are no books for them. Also, children's books are always useful to keep the young ones occupied while their mothers are in the library choosing books or attending an event. I've been collecting books for GWL for a couple of weeks now, and here's the result so far:

Oxfam

It's great to get second-hand books in good condition - and if it helps another charity too, so much the better. A search of my local Oxfam shop yielded Emily Gravett's picture book Wolves, a signed copy of The mountain's blood by Lari Don and Gene Kemp's classic Turbulent term of Tyke Tyler. The latter has a great twist in the tail, but I wonder if it would be as surprising today as when it was written in the 1970s? For teenagers, I got Theresa Breslin's Remembrance, which is about the First World War and therefore very topical in this centenary year, and Solace of the road by the late Siobhan Dowd.

Publishers

Sometimes publishers send me books to review, and sometimes I'm lucky enough to win them in draws by email or social media. I have three to add at the moment, so thanks to Templar for sending me Firebird by Saviour Pirotta and Catherine Hyde, a retelling of the Russian folktale which inspired Stravinsky's ballet, and Yokococo's Hans and Matilda Show about a school talent competition. From O'Brien I received Eva and the hidden diary, one of a series by author Judi Curtin. In this story, Eva and her friend Kate find an old diary and try to put right mistakes that were made long ago.

Book shops

Of course, you can just go into a regular book shop and buy something! I chose these two - one a classic, Astrid Lindgren's Pippi Longstocking, and one more modern, Clarice Bean utterly me by Lauren Child. Can you spot the link? Lauren Child illustrated them both in her highly distinctive style. Both books feature enormously engaging heroines.

How can you help?

As I said at the beginning, there are plenty of ideas on the IGBD website, where you'll also find posters, book marks and book plates to go with your gifts. However, should anyone who happens to read this live in Glasgow and just happen to have some spare books suitable for girls of all ages (though I'm particularly keen to help out the Brownies who are around 7-11 years old) - let me know! Maybe you have daughters or nieces who have outgrown some of their books? Leave a comment and I'll get back to you.

Update 12/2/14

I catalogued all the above books at GWL this morning - ready to be borrowed on IGBD!

 

National Libraries Day is coming - 8th February

If you look at the sidebar, you'll see that I've sprouted two new badges. They're for National Libraries Day and International Book Giving Day. Each is important for children's literature and I have plans for both - however, I'll leave IGBD for later and concentrate on NLD for now.

A couple of posts ago I mentioned that One Man and His Beard was collecting photos of people holding up their library cards to illustrate the video for his song We need libraries. Well, it's here! You can see my picture at approximately 3.15 and my Mum and Dad are also there at 1.47. A banner runs underneath the photos listing the reasons we need libraries, many of which involve children's reading. If you love libraries too, please share the video widely.

In Scotland, we're also hoping to collect reasons to love libraries with The Big Question: "What did you do in your library today?" Read more via CILIPS (Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals in Scotland) and take part if you can. And keep using your library!

Natasha Mac a'Bhaird: Missing Ellen

Natasha Mac a'Bhaird: Missing Ellen

Teenagers Maggie and Ellen have been best friends since they were five. Ellen is lively, outgoing and impetuous while Maggie is quieter and more sensible. The story starts with a new school year. Ellen is missing, though we don't yet know why, and Maggie is missing her dreadfully - this dual meaning of "missing" is reflected in the story's two voices. Both are Maggie's - one a narrative from the point where she thinks Ellen's problem started until the time she disappeared, and the other a set of letters to her friend in which she tells her what her life is like now.

It's not difficult to guess where Ellen's story is going as she gets involved with a different crowd and makes choices that Maggie doesn't agree with. She's an attractive character on the surface, but thoughtless and reckless, and I much prefer Maggie who is left bereft at Ellen's disappearance and tortured by "what ifs", wondering if she could have changed the outcome by behaving differently herself. Her family and other school friends don't know how to help her and she has to find her own way through the grief and guilt.

It's hard to say much more without giving away the plot, so I'll leave it at that. I thought the story was very well told and the breakdown, in different ways, of both girls sensitively handled. It's not all gloom though - there's a glimmer of hope for Maggie at the end when she finally realises that she has to let Ellen go, and there's also a hint of romance ahead.

Thanks to O'Brien Press for sending me this book, which I won in a draw. I will now be donating it to Glasgow Women's Library for their younger women's collection.

Library cards for National Libraries Day

Musician One Man and His Beard is looking for library lovers to contribute to his We Need Libraries video for release on National Libraries Day 2014. What he’s after is a photo of you holding your library card(s). Here's my effort - I have cards for Glasgow public libraries, Glasgow Women's Library and the University of Strathclyde. Send your photos to him at weneedlibraries@gmail.com or tweet @weneedlibraries by 5th January.

Give the gift of reading this Christmas

Reading is the greatest gift - it opens up so many new worlds. The children in your life probably already have easy access to this gift, but could you help some of the children who don't this Christmas? Here are a few suggestions you could consider.

National Literacy Trust - Gift of Reading

Many children across the UK do not have books of their own, nor are they likely to receive any for Christmas this year. Donating just £7 will buy a book for one such child.

Blackwell's - Children's Giving Tree

Giving Trees in the Children's Departments of a number of Blackwell's shops are adorned with gift tags with requests from children who might not otherwise receive any presents (in association with local charities). Customers choose a tag and the booksellers wrap the requested book and deliver it to the child in time for Christmas. You don't have to live near a shop - gifts can be purchased online for £5.99 or £9.99.

Finally, Playing by the Book lists 125 Literacy / Book charities that you could choose from. Happy giving!          

Julie Berry: All the truth that's in me

Julie Berry: All the truth that's in me

The place and time of this story are never specified, but I'm guessing colonial era America. After two years missing, Judith comes home with her tongue cut out. Her friend, Lottie, who disappeared around the same time as she did is dead. The villagers of Roswell Station, including her own mother, are ashamed of Judith and she is treated like a pariah. All she can do is silently pour out her heart to Lucas, the boy she has loved since childhood, but he is now engaged to another girl. When the village is attacked by "Homelanders" Judith and Lucas effectively save it, but their actions bring them both into disrepute. What is the mystery surrounding Judith's disappearance? Can she learn to talk again? Will she and Lucas survive their disgrace and end up together? These are the questions that Judith's narrative slowly resolves.

 At first, I found this book a little irritating. It's written in the first-person present tense, and Judith addresses herself to Lucas who is referred to throughout as "you". Some of its chapters, or sections, are only a few lines long. These factors combined to make me feel the book was bitty and difficult to get into. What changed my mind was taking it with me to Glasgow Women's Library's Reading Hour for Book Week Scotland - a whole hour of concentrated reading got me gripped, and I started to care what happened to the characters. The book is more than just a romance or a mystery - it raises important questions of what defines our identity and how we treat those who are different from the norm. I'm glad I persevered.

My thanks to Templar Publishing for supplying me with a copy of this book.