YA New York

It’s hard for me to think of a book I’ve read in the last six months that was as absorbing as Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X. Stork.

The pub date is officially not until March, but Amazon’s already got it for sale, so I’m going to tell you about it now:

Marcelo Sandoval is a seventeen-year-old boy who suffers from Asperger’s Syndrome. (We talk a lot about Asperger’s these days, in a joking, offhand manner. We may say that anyone who is a bit nerdy must have Asperger’s. I myself have been party to a few of these conversations. But what we’re talking about is completely different from the more severe illness that falls within the autism spectrum.) Marcelo is highly-functioning, but while he could probably have gotten through a regular public school, he went instead to a school for children with autism. Until the summer after the end of his junior year, when his father announces that he will be attending public school in the fall and working at his father’s law firm this summer.

Of course, Marcelo doesn’t want this at all, and so we read about the struggles of working at the firm, but in the end the story is about much more than what is said. It is about coming to understand and love a character who suffers from a disorder most of us know very little about. Since Stork writes from Marcelo’s perspective, we get to think along with him, to share the way he sees the world.

Back to the story, I suppose: It’s a good one. Marcelo does face a lot of challenges in the real world, at the law firm, than he has in his thus-far protected life. He has to make decisions about what to do about a complicated moral dilemma. There is a bit at the end that is left unresolved — which left me wanting just a few pages more — but that is a personal preference and not a professional criticism. In other words, I can see quite plainly why things left off the way they did, and it works well.

Anyway, the reason I am so strongly recommending this book isn’t actually for the plot. Marcelo could be doing anything, and I’d read about it. His internal life is so fascinating, his character so complex, that he is completely real to me. It is as if Stork magically called a flesh and blood human being to my side.

Okay, so there’s no star system here, but if there were, I’d give this five hundred thousand. Go. Read. Come back, discuss.

I honestly don’t think I’ll ever stop wanting more of Princess Mia Thermopolis, who emerged in 2000 as an awesome vegetarian/die-hard liberal/Greenwich Village-dwelling teenager and completely unwilling heir to the throne of Genovia.

Which is why this book left me a little, you know, misty. It’s the final installment of Meg’s series, and it takes place almost two years after volume nine, Princess Mia, just as our awesome heroine is about to graduate from high school.

Her friendship with Lana Weinberger (!!!), formerly the evil wench who tortured her when she was naught but a nerdy, gawky girl, has thrived. Indeed, Lana has become part of Mia’s pack, while Lilly Moscovitz is still not quite a friend. Furthermore, Mia is still dating J.P., aka the guy who hates when they put corn in the chili. And Michael, Mia’s long-lost love? To her knowledge, he’s still off in Japan.

The future looks bleak. Like, you know, Mia is going to end up with chili-corn guy, not friends with Lilly, and to top it all off, her father may lose the election for prime minister of Genovia to his own cousin!

Okay, but down to the nitty gritty: The book is well-written (of course), and super-fun (of course), and generally everything we’ve come to expect from the legendary Meg Cabot.

… But what can I say? I want more. I want more Mia. I will always want more Mia, because the girl is seriously awesome. (Although I’ve yet to read her romance novel, Ransom My Heart, but it’s next on my to-buy list.)

Seriously? I think we all sort of have to mourn the end of an era here. Meg has written lots of other awesome books, and she’s got lots more coming. Still, my dear friend Jami B. introduced Meg’s writing to me shortly after I’d left college because I’d gotten sick. She sent me a copy of the freshly minted Princess Diaries, along with a plastic tiara (covered in pink feathers and pink rhinestones). Jami insisted I’d enjoy the novel best if I wore the tiara while reading the book, and she was right. I think I still have that thing in one of my “memory boxes” somewhere.

Suffice it to say, Meg’s writing has made dark times more bearable for me for a good eight years now. When I’m really down in the dumps, I whip one of Meg’s books off the shelf I have reserved for her writing, and then I draw myself a nice rose-scented bubble bath. It never fails.

So yes. I’ll miss Mia’s crazy antics quite a bit. Almost enough to suggest that you shouldn’t read Forever Princess until you’ve prepared yourself emotionally. But honestly? Who can wait. Go dig in. And don’t forget the bubble bath. I personally recommend JASON Cosmetics rosewater and glycerine bath gel. Grab the book, grab a bottle of JASON bath gel wherever organic cosmetics are sold, and hop into the tub.

Then, of course, come back and tell me what you think.

This will be the last Stephenie Meyer post in awhile, methinks. (I’m not going to the movie, not only because our dearest Jami B. did a fantastic job of reviewing it, but also because I don’t feel like wasting ten dollars and two hours.)

I finally read Breaking Dawn. It took me awhile to get to it. First I had to read the other three books in the Twilight saga. And …

I hated them. I mean, I enjoyed them, but I didn’t think much of them. By the time I cracked open book the third, I had decided I was going to have to burn some fake vampires in effigy if I read the word “marble” one more time. Bella Swan was getting on my nerves.

But then … well, everything changes in book the fourth. And contrary to most people’s views, I think it was the most feminist, most interesting, best written part of the whole saga. Seriously, I did. Look inside for my reasoning; slight spoiler alert. (more…)

It’s no secret that I have Opinions about assembly-line books. You know the kind, devised by old white men sitting around a board table.

“What do the kids these days want? Rich, naughty Upper East Side school girls! Rich, naughty Upper East Side school girls who are also vampires! Rich, naughty Upper East school girls from the nineteenth century! Yes!”

The old white men agree that this is what kids today want, and then an editor writes up an outline and sends it off to a starving writer who is desperate to be published.

It makes me cry. I have this whole concept of the-writer-as-artist in my mind, of the book as a baby borne of its author’s imagination and ink, and I suppose that’s old-fashioned.

But the worst part is … sometimes these books end up being good. Case in point, Simon Holt’s The DeVouring. (more…)