Review: Word of Mouse by James Patterson and Chris Grabenstein

I rarely read middle grade books, especially now that there are no middle grade readers in my house. But every now and again one crosses my path that looks too cute to pass up. Patterson and Grabenstein's pun-tacularly titled Word of Mouse is one of those.

Isaiah is a mouse. But he's not just any mouse, he's a very special mouse. Together with his ninety-six siblings, he lives in a lab and has clearly been modified to be a rather spectacular specimen of mousehood, even if he is the smallest and youngest of his mischief (the name for a group or family of mice). He can read and communicate via computer. He can say a few words, very quietly, and he can mimic other animals. Oh, and he's blue. His fur is blue, one of the only colors mice can actually see. One day with his siblings, he breaks out of the lab but it turns out he's the only one who isn't immediately recaptured and returned. This is hard because he's not a very brave mouse and he's all alone as he navigates the suburbs, birds, cats, and humans out to get him. But when he meets a pretty girl mouse who sings, even though only boy mice are supposed to be able to sing, he learns that being brave isn't about never feeling fear, that family has always got your back, and that being different isn't a bad thing. With his newfound bravery and the help of his friends and family, he determines to rescue his siblings from the evil lab.

This was in fact a cute book about embracing difference and taking chances. Its unusual mouse main character, who narrates his own tale, is sweet if occasionally a little overt in imparting the lessons he's learning. There are inconsistencies in what Isaiah, who has never been outside the lab before, knows and doesn't know thanks to his laboratory upbringing but these can mostly be ignored to go with the story flow. Complimenting the text, Isaiah's exploits are rendered beautifully in drawings by Joe Sutphin and his narrow escapes, in paragraph and picture will surely delight middle grade readers who will also happily absorb the moral of the story: "We're all different. It's the only thing we have in common."

Review: The Reluctant Cannibals by Ian Flitcroft

I hadn't even finished reading out the back cover copy for this book before members of my book club were shaking their heads vehemently and saying no and nope as fast as they could. Interestingly, their reactions mirror the reactions of the characters in the book when the word cannibalism (sorry, it's anthropophagy according to the character suggesting it because that somehow makes the concept more palatable--snort!) is first brought up. All I have to say is that it was their loss since this was a slyly funny and highly entertaining read about morality and taboo set in the normally staid, hidebound world of academia.

It's 1969 in Oxford. St. Jerome's College is the epitome of the hallowed halls of learning, with a gatekeeper who regularly yells at students to keep off the grass, gowned faculty and students, tutorials, crews of eight, and so on. Intriguingly, St. Jerome's is also the site of a secret dining society, the Shadow Faculty of Gastronomic Science, and one of the gastronomically adventurous dinners they throw is going to bring them some rather unwanted attention. Japanese diplomat, Takeshi Tokoro, the guest of one of the shadow faculty members prepares the potentially deadly delicacy of fugu for the assembled company. An incorrect preparation means death. And Tokoro does indeed do one small thing that ensures his own death right at the table. Now this group of six gourmands, all members of the faculty and staff of St. Jerome's, is garnering attention and threatened with forced disbanding. First, the vice-chancellor, a veritable stick in the mud whose taste buds run to bland nursery food, gets the group in his sights for causing him to have to hush up an international debacle that could have cause the college's reputation grave harm. Then a snobbish undergraduate whose opinion of his own importance is excessive, the Honorable Matthew Kingsley-Hampton, takes offense that he has not been invited to join this secret society (assuming incorrectly that it's made up off fellow undergraduates like himself) and so determines to expose the society, but mostly through manipulating others around him to do his dirty work.

The best thing to do given the climate at the school would be for the shadow faculty to either skip one of their scheduled end of term meals or at least not court controversy in any way. But Professor Arthur Plantagenet, one of the founding members of the group, an eccentric, and lifelong food and wine enthusiast, discovers that his unbridled appetites have left his heart failing and his time on earth much shorter than anticipated. Rather than fighting fate, he devises a plan for his remaining time and for what to do with his remains after death and his plan will embroil the shadow faculty in a situation the likes of which they've never before faced. He is going to donate a piece of himself for consumption at one of the shadow faculty's culinary adventures, looking on this as a scientific donation to determine not only what people taste like but if he tastes better than the animals we do eat. The others are horrified and when the time comes, as executors of the good professor's will, they will face moral, legal, and ethical dilemmas as they contemplate the horror (or is it intrigue?) of eating their late colleague.

Flitcroft has managed to write a hilarious novel about one of the biggest taboos in our society. The characters are wonderful, from the pragmatic Augustus Bloom to the spiritually agonizing chaplain Charles Pinker, from the unpleasant bully Matthew Kingsley-Hampton to his meek and downtrodden roommate Patrick Eccles. The novel feels madcap and somehow filled with hijinks even though it really isn't. The shadow faculty can be pretentious in their gustatory delights and pompous opinions but they are also endearing and the reader enjoys spending time with them as they go into raptures at their over the top dinners and as they spar with each other over the subject of eating Arthur's left thigh. Sounds wonderful and crazy, right? It is. This novel has it all: decadent, mouth-wateringly described feasts, a ghost or two in the wine cellar, undergraduate shenanigans, a moral and ethical dilemma, a wet blanket of an administrator, a secret society with declining membership, and plenty of gallows humor. Clever, funny, and original, after reading this rollicking tale I might be a bit wary of eating anything with Flitcroft but I'll happily read more of his work.

Waiting on Wednesday

This meme is hosted by Breaking the Spine and is meant to highlight some great pre-publication books we all can't wait to get our grubby little mitts on.

Windy City Magic: The Best Kind of Magic by Crystal Cestari.

The book is being released by Disney Hyperion on January 9, 2018.

Amazon says this about the book: Amber Sand is not a witch. The Sand family magical gene somehow leapfrogged over her. But she did get one highly specific bewitching talent: she can see true love. As a matchmaker, Amber's pretty far down the sorcery food chain (even birthday party magicians rank higher), but after five seconds of eye contact, she can envision anyone's soul mate.

Amber works at her mother's magic shop-Windy City Magic-in downtown Chicago, and she's confident she's seen every kind of happy ending there is: except for one-her own. (The Fates are tricky jerks that way.) So when Charlie Blitzman, the mayor's son and most-desired boy in school, comes to her for help finding his father's missing girlfriend, she's distressed to find herself falling for him. Because while she can't see her own match, she can see his--and it's not Amber. How can she, an honest peddler of true love, pursue a boy she knows full well isn't her match?

The Best Kind of Magic is set in urban Chicago and will appeal to readers who long for magic in the real world. With a sharp-witted and sassy heroine, a quirky cast of mystical beings, and a heady dose of adventure, this novel will have you laughing out loud and questioning your belief in happy endings.

Review: The Leisure Seeker by Michael Zadoorian

Very often we tend to infantilize the elderly. We say old people are in a second childhood and act as if they need to be protected from themselves and all the things that can go wrong to and for them. Most often we do this out of a sense of love. We want them to be safe and cared for but we are undeniably taking away much of their own agency, discounting their knowledge and wishes. Don't get me wrong, sometimes the decisions we make on behalf of the frail and elderly in our lives are the only ones we can possibly make. But we also have to consider their situations and think long and hard before we deny them the pleasures that make life worth sticking around for. Getting old doesn't automatically equal incompetence and sometimes death, the scary outcome we try so hard to deny both for ourselves and on behalf of those we love, is a risk worth taking if we get to live more along the way. Michael Zadoorian truly gets this, as evidenced by his funny, entertaining, and poignant novel, The Leisure Seeker, coming out this month as a movie starring Helen Mirren and Donald Sutherland.

Ella and John Robina are in their eighties. They've been married for 60 some odd years and they've had a full life together. Now Ella has terminal breast cancer and John has Alzheimer's. Ella is failing physically and John is failing mentally but they want to make one last trip together. Well, Ella wants one last trip and John is amenable to suggestion even though the Robina's children and their doctors are against it. These two old codgers sneak off in their '78 Leisure Seeker, determined to follow Route 66 from their home in Detroit to Disneyland one last time, escaping the futile medical treatments and unwelcome opinions of those who want to choose how they spend their final days or years.

Ella is hilarious, acerbic and witty; she's the brains of the operation. John might only have very sporadic flashes of memory but he can still drive and he's happy to be directed by Ella; he's the brawn. As these two travel across Route 66, they are traveling back into their history together, watching slides each evening as they camp and talking through their long life (or at least Ella is even when John can't), but they are also enjoying their life right now. Sure, Ella has to pop little blue "discomfort" pills and John doesn't often know where he is or who the people Ella is talking about are, but their love for each other and all of its attendant joy and frustration continues to shine through the novel. They have some crazy escapades on their road trip and they do some perfectly banal things as well but in both cases, the reader is happy to travel along with them.

There is both regular humor and black humor galore here leavening the fact that Ella and John are making it clear that aging isn't for sissies. Ella's first person narrative voice is honest and straightforward and the story itself is touching. Zadoorian has a great eye for detail (as in the description of the 70's decor of the camper) as well as a deep understanding of his characters and the curve balls that they've been thrown in these, their twilight years. His depiction of a man with Alzheimer's is heartbreaking and true but he refrains from wallowing in the sadness of John's loss by celebrating the moments when John's memory sparks and showing the simple joy Ella feels in those fleeting moments. His portrayal of Ella is equally well done, her stubbornness and determination, her refusal to consider ridiculous treatments in the face of her real prognosis, and her deep loyalty to her husband. The book doesn't flinch from the realities and indignities of aging and disease but it also celebrates life for as long as there's life left in the old geezers. Although the story could be depressing, it is in fact the exact opposite. It's life affirming and highly entertaining in spite of the omnipresent shadow of mortality. The end is perfect; it could not be any other way. This novel is both laughter and tears, light and dark. In a nutshell, that's life.

The movie has clearly been changed a bit from the book but in the ways that matter, it looks as if it will be true to the story and I am looking forward to seeing it. It releases on January 19th but in the meantime, you can view the trailer on YouTube here or watch below.

For more information about Michael Zadoorian and the book, check out his website, like the book on Facebook, or follow Zadoorian on Twitter. Check out the book's Goodreads page, follow the rest of the blog tour, or look at the amazon reviews for others' thoughts and opinions on the book.
Thanks to Trish from TLC Book Tours and Harper Collins for inspiring me to pull this off my shelf sooner rather than later.

Review: The Crown Derby Plate by Marjorie Bowen

I had no idea that there was once a Victorian tradition of reading a ghost story on Christmas. Without doing any research at all into the matter, I suspect that this tradition may be at least one of the sources of Dickens' A Christmas Carol. But other than that famous story of a haunting, I had never before come across a tale that might have been a part of that tradition until I was sent this short tale. Of course, that could also be because ghost stories generally fall outside the realm of my usual reading choices.

Miss Pym bought an almost complete set of Crown Derby china several years at a local estate sale and she's always wanted to have the full set. After all, she's only missing one plate. Back in the neighborhood for the holidays, she determines to see if the missing plate has been found. But when she heads off to the purportedly haunted neighbor's house in the drear of winter in hopes of completing her set, she has no idea of what she'll encounter. Her journey is strangely disconcerting and the neighbor, who she hasn't met before, is decidedly queer. Her unease grows and when she finally leaves the cold and oddly smelling estate, she makes an unsettling discovery about her visit and what she encountered there.

This vintage story is a very brief one and not surprising at all; the conclusion being obvious long before the reader gets to the final pages. The feel of the writing is very much reflects the Victorian interest in all things ghost and death despite the story not being particularly chilling. I was very definitely not the reader for this tale, feeling nothing so much as baffled by the draw of the story when I finished it. Put in context of the time it was written in, I can appreciate it for its place in historic literary trends if not nearly as much for its plot.

Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy of the book to review.

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

This meme is hosted by Kathryn at Reading Date. It is still chaos here but because of the looming New Year (Happpy 2018 to all of you!), I tried to finish up a few of the books that have languished on my bedside table for a good long time. Managed to do that but no reviewing as I am still having to try and beat back the worst of the construction dust and debris on a daily basis. Hopefully things will start getting back to normal soon!!! And as is usual, I will refrain from listing last year's unreviewed books anymore, even as I do still hope to go back and get to reviewing them at some point.

Books I completed this past week are:

Murder for Christmas by Francis Duncan
The Lake House by Kate Morton
The Leisure Seeker by Michael Zadoorian
Close Enough to Touch by Colleen Oakley

Bookmarks are still living in the middle of:

A Manual For Cleaning Women by Lucia Berlin
The Beauty of the End by Debbie Howells
Country of Red Azaleas by Domnica Radulescu
A Hard and Heavy Thing by Matthew J. Hefti
Paint Your Wife by Lloyd Jones
The Company They Kept edited by Robert B. Silvers and Barbara Epstein
No One Can Pronounce My Name by Rakesh Satyal
Thousand-Miler by Melanie Radzicki McManus
Dear Fang, With Love by Rufi Thorpe
America's First Daughter by Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie
Hope Has Two Daughters by Monia Mazigh
After the Bloom by Leslie Shimotakahara
Metis Beach by Claudine Bourbonnais
Smoke by Dan Vyleta
Coco Chanel by Lisa Chaney
The Amazing Story of the Man Who Cycled from India to Europe for Love by Per J. Andersson
The New York Time Footsteps by various authors

Reviews posted this week:

nothing

Books still needing to have reviews written (as opposed to the ones that are simply awaiting posting):

nothing for 2018 yet!

Monday Mailbox

This past week's mailbox arrival:

My Ex-Life by Stephen McCauley came from Flatiron Books.

A college counselor in San Francisco whose boyfriend has left him and whose amazing apartment is being sold out from under him, a woman whose husband has left her for a younger woman and whose daughter refuses to apply to college, these two have an old history with each other and their current untenable lives will bring them back together to face their past. Really you should read the jacket copy because I haven't made it sound nearly as enticing as it strikes me. And it does strike me as a fantastic read!

If you want to see the marvelous goodies in other people's mailboxes, make sure to visit Mailbox Monday and have fun seeing how we are all doing our part to keep the USPS and delivery services viable.