FINISHED:
Jinks, Catherine. (2013). How to catch a bogle. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.


[.]


STARTED:
Lynch, Chris. (2013). Casualties of war (Vietnam #4). New York: Scholastic.


[.]


*

FINISHED:
Sedaris, David. (1997). "C.O.G." from Naked. Boston: Little, Brown.

[.]

STARTED:
Jinks, Catherine. (2013). How to catch a bogle. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

[.]


*

FINISHED:
Barrows, Annie. (2013). Ivy + Bean take the case. San Francisco: Chronicle.

[.]


STARTED:
Sedaris, David. (1997). "C.O.G." from Naked.  Boston: Little, Brown.

[Recently watched the film (Focus Features, 2013) based on this short story and decided to go back and reread the source material.]


*

FINISHED:
Kadohata, Cynthia. (2013). The thing about luck. New York: Atheneum/Simon & Schuster.

[.]


STARTED:
Barrows, Annie. (2013).  Ivy + Bean take the case.  San Francisco: Chronicle.

[.]


*

FINISHED:

Marcus, Leonard S. (2013). Randolph Caldecott: The man who could not stop drawing. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.

[.]


STARTED:
Kadohata, Cynthia. (2013). The thing about luck. New York: Atheneum/Simon & Schuster.

[.]


*

FINISHED:

Weston, Robert Paul. (2013). The creature department. New York: Razorbill/Penguin.

[Elliot and Leslie are invited by Elliot’s eccentric Uncle Archie to take a tour of the much guarded headquarters of DENKi-3000, an electronics company responsible for such life-changing products as the telelectric pencil and wireless breathmints.  What the two discover is that the research and development department is actually staffed with an odd assortment of dim sum-gobbling creatures who are tasked, along with help from Elliot and Leslie, with coming up with an invention that will stave off a looming hostile takeover by Quazicom, a ruthless capital investment firm.  Each chapter is headed by a full-page, black and white illustration, with other artwork scattered throughout, courtesy of London-based visual effects house Framestore (though that fact is, oddly, never explicitly stated anywhere in/on the book), and though they do help to give a visual for the myriad of creatures, their cartoony, obviously digital style renders them generic.  In addition, a fascinating premise involving adding “essences” of intangible concepts to inventions to imbue them with special properties is wasted, only getting a brief mention, and some of the writing comes off as though it’s been ripped from a Hollywood screenplay.  An average offering with a fun premise that comes up a bit short.]


STARTED:
Marcus, Leonard S. (2013). Randolph Caldecott: The man who could not stop drawing. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux.

[.]


*

FINISHED:
Jones, Rob Lloyd. (2013). Wild Boy. Somerville, MA: Candlewick.

[Now a sideshow freak in London in 1841, Wild Boy, so named because he is covered in hair from head to toe, finds himself on the run when he is wrongly accused of the murder of a professor who was working on a mysterious machine.  With only a sideshow acrobat as an ally, the two discover a plot involving a man with a golden globe for an eyeball, a shadow society called the “Gentlemen”, and a device which, Wild Boy is told, “is a very powerful machine, one that changes you.  Imagine a machine that could make you normal, like everyone else.”  Wild Boy is a complex character who, even after an early life of abandonment and brutal abuse, is strong and determined, and it is a Sherlock Holmes-ian gift for reading people that ultimately leads him to triumph. Though seemingly aimed at a younger audience, this is a novel that doesn’t shy away from brutality – Wild Boy is ruthlessly (and sometimes disturbingly) taunted and beaten, both verbally and physically, again and again throughout.  This is a strong, Victorian-set mystery which brings into the mix the early understandings of electricity and its properties and uses, giving the proceedings a hint of Frankenstein-ish gothic darkness.]


STARTED:
Weston, Robert Paul. (2013). The creature department. New York: Razorbill/Penguin.

[.]

*

FINISHED:
Ursu, Anne. (2013). The real boy. New York: Walden Pond/HarperCollins.

[.]


STARTED:
Jones, Rob Lloyd. (2013). Wild Boy. Somerville, MA: Candlewick.

[.]


*

FINISHED:
Tartt, Donna. (2013). The goldfinch. New York: Little, Brown.
[This one was a BEAST that took me WAY TOO LONG to get through - amazing, because I tore through her last book, The Little Friend, in just a few days.  "Long, plodding, uneventful" best describes her current novel.  Don't get me wrong, I think that she's an AMAZING writer, but this one just went on and on without much of a point.  A character study with too much minutia.  I'm finding it somewhat hard to believe that people are falling over it THAT MUCH.]


STARTED:
Ursu, Anne. (2013). The real boy. New York: Walden Pond/HarperCollins.

[.]


*

FINISHED:
Blackwood, Sage. (2013). Jinx. New York: HarperCollins.


[.]


STARTED:
Tartt, Donna. (2013).  The goldfinch. New York: Little, Brown.


[A new Donna Tartt!  A new Donna Tartt!  Every 10 years or so...]


*