Clearly Leslie Ludy doesn’t care about being culturally relevant. Her book, The Lost Art of True Beauty: The Set-Apart Girl's Guide to Feminine Grace is a clarion call for young women to return to virtue, manners, and modesty. Not exactly the kind of headlines you see in most publications geared toward teenaged girls and young women today. In fact, it seems to me, a casual observer but an observer nonetheless, that Ludy is correct in her observation that many young women today are surrounded by “peers who [applaud] self-obsessed, arrogant, sexually aggressive young women.” Where are the women who possess genuine grace, poise, elegance and charm? Are these lost virtues? Is true beauty a lost art? According to Ludy, no, it is not. In fact, we must recapture the definition of true beauty and how we find it. Ludy tells her own story of ...
Category Archives: High School
Claudette Colvin
I was curious to read the Cybils Nonfiction Finalist Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice because it's gotten so much buzz, and also because unlike some, I had heard of Claudette Colvin -- from, in fact, the Cybils MG/YA Nonfiction winner from 2006 that I was also privileged to help select -- Russell Freedman's Freedom Walkers (linked to my review). It was a teenaged Claudette Colvin who was one of the first who chose not to give up her seat on the bus in Montgomery, not Rosa Parks, who was sort of chosen to be the face of the lawsuit. The author Phillip Noose pulls us into Colvin's story right away, and I found it to be well-written and quite readable, though it did drag a bit towards the end. The fact that certain elements were not buried (such ...
A Wish After Midnight
Fifteen-year-old Genna is too smart, too dreamy, too tall, too dark, and too much of a loner. Like most fifteen-year-old girls, she's trying to figure out who she is and who she wants to be. Also like most fifteen-year-old girls finding a boyfriend gives her some self-confidence. Like Gemma, Judah is different. He's a rastafarian, a guy who is looking to get back to his African roots, and encourages Genna to do the same. Neither of them have any idea just how acquainted Genna is going to get with her roots. One night as Genna is throwing pennies in a fountain as she thinks about her future, as is her dreamy custom, she awakens in 1863 Brooklyn, after a severe beating. She isn't sure what brought her there or why, or what happened before she woke ...
I Am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced
I am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced is the true story of Nujood Ali (as told to Delphine Minoui). That's right, by the age of 10, this young girl from Yemen had been given in marriage by her own father to a man three times her age. He promised not to be with her sexually until after one year after she started her period, but he did not keep this promise. When Nujood tried to resist him, he began beating her. After a few months, the only refuge she found was on the rare opportunity that her husband let her visit home. It was on one of these visits that she decided to try to get a divorce. I don't know if you like using books as I do -- like a window -- but this book offered a peek into ...
After Ever After
I admit to being a semi-newbie to YA literature. Sure, I was obviously a 'young adult' back in the day, and I've been an avid reader my entire life, so this must have been my choice genre at some point. As an adult, though, my tastes have mostly run toward contemporary fiction primarily, and I've sometimes wondered why some adults opt to read so much literature written toward a YA audience. As a reviewer here for the last year, I've had the opportunity to read a handful of YA novels, and I'm starting to figure out the appeal. That understanding comes a heck of a lot easier after finishing a book like Jordan Sonnenblick's new After Ever After. The story of what it's like to be an eighth-grade cancer survivor is told from the perspective of ...
Candor
What parent doesn't harbor a wish for their children to behave beautifully, with a polite attitude that would even impress Miss Manners herself, and to consistently conduct themselves with respect, regardless of their parents' presence? In Pam Bachorz's debut young adult novel Candor, this ideal is realized, although it's not a pretty picture once you discover the secret to the parents' success. In Candor, Florida, the houses are beautiful, designed and built with state of the art appliances and a customized audio system throughout the rooms. In fact, music is everywhere. At home. In the stores. At school. Even played through outdoor speakers in public places. What might seem charming at first, is actually an integral part of the founder's master plan for the residents of Candor. Underneath the melodies of that ever present ...
Audiobooks for Teens: The Immortals
Each month my post on the first two books in The Immortals series by Alyson Noel (Evermore and Blue Moon) receives a noticeable number of hits, and occasionally a comment from a teen fan, which tells me that these books are hot. The Immortals series consists of Evermore, Blue Moon, and the recently-released Shadowland (which brings us to the mid-point in the six-book series). These books follow the trend of the paranormal. Though I know that some younger kids try to jump on the bandwagon with some Young Adult offerings, I think that these books are definitely for teens. While there's nothing overly explicit, there are many mature themes presented including drinking, physical relationships, not to mention some dark magic. I've been taking in the series on audiobook. The excellent narration from Katie Schorr adds to the experience. I don't ...
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Jennifer Donovan
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