Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.
Judy Blume


Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
copyright: 1970
format: hardcover
pages: 149


Another banned or challenged book that I didn't think I'd ever be rereading but still enjoyed. My library copy had this same girl but it wasn't '3 books in 1'

Margaret moved on the Tuesday before Labor Day. She came home from camp and found out that their New York apartment had been rented to another family and they now owned a house in New Jersey. She had been left out of the decision completely. Her father commutes to Manhattan, Margaret now goes to public school and her mother has a yard.

"I think we left the city because of my grandmother" Oh yeah, when grandma finally shows up she brings food because New Jersey may have deli, etc. but it's "not like what you get in New York" and leaves with a "just because I can't drop in everyday" Everyday? Yikes! I'd move too.

I laughed and I cried and I remembered.

We've all read the book. Do you remember what it felt like to find out you weren't the only one? Read it again as an adult. What a difference!

As for the challenging: Margaret talks to God but doesn't go to church. She and her friends opening talk about their periods (or lack thereof), their changing bodies, find out what a boy looks like naked, and check out a Playboy together. I think the biggest problem some may have is that Margaret and her mother TALK about these things. Margaret may be embarrassed but she still knows her mom with calmly answer her questions.

When I was her age, this wasn't something you talked about. I didn't make that mistake with my daughter.

Judy Blume has written for the pre-teen, young adult and adult. She's still a name that makes my mom cringe but I think it was Forever that she's thinking off....

James and the Giant Peach

James and the Giant Peach
Roald Dahl, author
Quentin Blake, illustrator

This edition -
publisher: Puffin Books
release date: August 16, 2007
format: paperback
pages: 160


I'll admit that this is not what I thought I'd be reading this year but I needed a banned or challenged book and James and the Giant Peach is short ;-) The book may have been banned from school and/or public libraries across the USA but as of July 18, Amazon.com's sales rank is 2,268. It is #1 when looking for Roald Dahl and #52 in humorous children's books. How can this be? When books are removed from libraries parents must buy them.

A personal note about censorship. I don't really mind that you don't allow your child to read specific books just don't tell me MY CHILD, or myself, can't read a specific book. There is a place for every book and I can see why some might be upset about some of them but really now. Just tell your child not to check it out at the library. It is not the teacher or the librarian's job – or the School Board - to monitor for you. I myself am guilty of censorship. I asked my kids not to check out "The Stupids" or any of the books in the series. Why? It was a word that we did not allow to be spoken in our home. I didn't want my kids reading it throughout the whole book. Did I make a big deal out of? No. Did I demand the books be removed from the library? No. I think it helps that I was a volunteer in the library, and had access to the books to read myself and to question the librarian. The Goosebumps series was one of my favorites and I recommended them to many fifth grade boys - you know, the one that only checked out a magazine because their teacher said they had to get something. No one ever told me it was bad that their child was reading a book. Here’s the thing, if your child’s school librarian won’t talk to you about the books that your child has access too, maybe you need to volunteer and find out for yourself. All of us want our tax dollars to purchase the best books but find out what your school administration thinks are “best books”.

...stepping off my soapbox....

James and the Giant Peach starts by telling us how wonderful James’ life was by the sea. He "lived peacefully with his mother and father in a beautiful house beside the sea. There were always plenty of other children for him to play with...It was the perfect life for a small boy."

When he was four, his parents went shopping in London were they were “eaten by an enormous angry rhinoceros which had escaped from the London Zoo”. Eaten mind you, not just killed. Leaving him to be sent to live with his aunts. So James becomes the drudge. Two aunts, many chores, no children to play with, very little play time, no toys, no leaving the garden, sometimes no food. And he meets a man with magic. And the songs?

A Gnu and a Gnocerous surely you'll see And that gnormous and gnorrible Gnat Whose sting when it stings you goes in at the knee and comes out through the top of your hat.

Yes, I can see where people would complain, it sounds just like a Disney movie. (by the way, that was sarcasm)


Mr. Dahl's first stories were written for his own children. Can you see him in a comfortable chair with his children and maybe a neighbor or two sitting on the floor in front of him? I'm sure he slapped his hands on the chair and bounced, just a bit, when the peach ran over James' aunts leaving them "ironned out upon the grass as flat and thin and lifeless as a couple of paper dolls cut out of a picture book."

Mr. Dahl died in 1990. The edition that I have was published in 2007. That is the extent of his popularity. May it live on forever.


Puffin books by Roald Dahl

The BFG
Boy: Tales of Childhood
Charlie and the Chocolate Factor
Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator
Danny the Champion of the World
Dirty Beasts
The Enormous Crocodile
Esio Trot
Fantastic Mr. Fox
George's Marvelous Medicine
The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me
Going Solo
James and the Giant Peach
The Magic Finger
Matilda
The Minpins
Roald Dahls Revolting Rhymes
The Twits
The Vicar of Nibbeswicke
The Witches
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More

recognize any favorites?

He also wrote adult novels, the only one I own is My Uncle Oswald, picked up because of the cover (legs!) and purchased because I thought it would be funny - "Uncle Oswald makes Casanova look like Winnie the Pooh"

Death by Cashmere

Death by Cashmere
by Sally Goldenbaum

An Obsidian Mystery
NAL, a division of Penguin Group
August 2008
294 pages plus scarf pattern




Isabel "Izzy" Chambers leaves her law career in Boston and heads to Sea Harbor, the quaint fishing town where she spent summer vacations as a girl. She opens a knitting shop where a diverse group of women begin congregating each week to form the Seaside Knitters.

Izzy rents the apartment above the shop to a returning home-town girl, even though it raises concerns and eyebrows. People thought Angelina was too big for the town and wondered why she would take a job at the local museum. Angelina saw everything in black and white and had a temper. She may have been unpopular with some of the townspeople but would any of them hate her enough to kill?


Have you ever had someone tell you a story where they put in so much detail you just want to shake them and yell, "get to the point already!"? This book was a little like that for me at the beginning. I almost felt like I was dropped in the middle of the story but that cleared up. This was a library book (that's one challenge), a new author (that's another challenge), and a mystery (that's a third challenge) and just interesting enough that I kept picking it back up. I am very glad I persevered. All the details filled in what life is like in the small town, how everyone fit together and how the death (murder?) of one pulls the weave off center.

I was very satisfied with how this one ended, how all the pieces fit together without loose ends or a big rush to the finish. I'm looking forward to reading the next book, Patterns in the Sand.



I improved my review time! Reviewed the day I finished reading and remembered to post on the 999 Challenge site :)

Banned/Challenged Books

I've never seen the reason for banning/challenging a book. If you don't like it, don't read it. If you don't want your child to read it, fine but don't tell me that mine can't!

I've decided that one of my 999 categories will be banned/challenged books. This is what the American Library Association has to say:

The ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom received a total of 420 challenges last year. A challenge is defined as a formal, written complaint, filed with a library or school requesting that materials be removed because of content or appropriateness. According to Judith F. Krug, director of the Office for Intellectual Freedom, the number of challenges reflects only incidents reported, and for each reported, four or five remain unreported.

The 10 most challenged books of 2007 reflect a range of themes, and are:

1. And Tango Makes Three, by Justin Richardson/Peter Parnell
Reasons: Anti-Ethnic, Sexism, Homosexuality, Anti-Family, Religious Viewpoint, Unsuited to Age Group

2. The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier
Reasons: Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Violence

3. Olive’s Ocean, by Kevin Henkes
Reasons: Sexually Explicit and Offensive Language

4. The Golden Compass, by Philip Pullman
Reasons: Religious Viewpoint

5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain
Reasons: Racism

6. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
Reasons: Homosexuality, Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language,

7. TTYL, by Lauren Myracle
Reasons: Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group

8. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou
Reasons: Sexually Explicit

9. It’s Perfectly Normal, by Robie Harris
Reasons: Sex Education, Sexually Explicit

10. The Perks of Being A Wallflower, by Stephen Chbosky
Reasons: Homosexuality, Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group

And since I don't own all of these, I'll be able to use them for the Support Your Local Library challenge too!

999 Challenge

I'm an idiot! I know I read a lot but why, WHY would I commit myself to this?

9 Categories
9 books from each category
Finished in 2009

That's 81 books! Not just 81 books, but from specific categories! Luckily, 9 books can overlap another category and I do have other challenges where the books will fit.

sigh, Sign-ups are here and the blog is here.

I still need to narrow down my categories:

1-8: I've chosen my categories:

Thought about but decided against.
Paranormal, book challenge books, travel, Bestsellers, other, miscellaneous

7-5: This is a LibraryThing challenge and I forgot the "For an added challenge, try completing your books by 9/9/09!" Good thing it is just an additional challenge!


Romance
1. Married in Seattle
2. It's In His Kiss
3. To Sir Philip, With Love
4. An Offer from a Gentleman
5. When He Was Wicked
6. The Matchmakers
7. The Duke & I
8. The Viscount Who Loved Me
9. Romancing Mister Bridgerton



Fantasy/Sci-fi
1. Arrows of the Queen
2. Arrow's Flight
3. Arrow's Fall
4. Exile's Honor
5. Exile's Valor
6. Take a Thief
7. By the Sword
8. Winds of Fate
9. Winds of Change



Mystery/Thriller/Suspense type
1. The Spy Who Came for Christmas
2. Dashing Through the Snow
3. Eye Contact
4. Familiar Vows
5. Hide
6. Death by Cashmere reviewed
7. The Penguin Who Knew Too Much
8. Killed by Clutter
9. The Book of Lies reviewed



eBooks
1. Key of Light
2. Key of Knowledge
3. Key of Valor
4. Hide
5. Brighter than the Sun
6. Masterharper of Pern
7. The Outstretched Shadow
8. The Secret Diaries of Miranda Cheever
9. When Darkness Falls



non-fiction
1. Dewey: the Small-town Library Cat Who Touched the World
2. and Tango makes Three (banned overlap)
3. Mistaken Identity
4. The Fit Factor (health overlap)
5. After Etan
6. Fit or Fat
7. Soft Spots
8. The Dog Who Rescues Cats
9. The Man Who Loves Books Too Much



Bond. James Bond
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.



Health/Fitness
1. The Fit Factor
2. Fit or Fat
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.



Young Adult
1. The Warrior Heir
2. The Wizard Heir
3. Endymion Spring
4. The Perks of being a Wallflower (banned overlap)
5. The Summer of Cotton Candy
6. The Fall of Candy Corn
7. The Winter of Candy Canes
8. The Spring of Candy Apples
9. The Summoning
(these are all NEW reads!)



ALA Banned/Challenged
1. and Tango makes Three
2. The Perks of being a Wallflower
3. Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.
4. James and the Giant Peach
5. Bridge to Terabithia
6.
7.
8.
9.







and just for fun: