don't fail me now. una lamarche.

as part of penguin's first to read program, i was able to read don't fail me now by una lamarche.  here is my review for the first to know website:

Having read LaMarche's "Like No Other", I decided to spend the points to guarantee my reading of "Don't Fail Me Now."

Again, LaMarche has taken teens with different backgrounds and thrown them together to learn that you can always find common ground regardless of your differences.  "Don't Fail Me Now" told the story of Michelle Devereaux and her struggle to keep her family together.  Michelle was 17 years old, but did not enjoy the carefree life that most teens do.  Her days were not filled with parties or hanging out with friends, instead Michelle worked part-time at Taco Bell and took care of her younger siblings, Cass and Denny.  Unfortunately, their mother was a drug user and in jail and their father had left years before, thus leaving Michelle as the responsible one in their home, making sure her siblings attended school and were fed.   When we first met Michelle, she was tying to keep her siblings out of foster care and living with an aunt that was more concern with money then helping take care of her family.

As Michelle struggled to keep it together, she was thrown a curveball.  Michelle's half sister, Leah showed up with the help of her stepbrother, Tim to inform her that their estranged father, Buck, was dying.  prior to this Michelle had never met Leah, and only knew of her because of her parents arguments, when she was younger.  Though Michelle had always dreamt of meeting her sister, once she did, she wished she hadn't.  Michelle's regret at meeting her half sister was due to the fact that Leah's life was not as complicated and Michelle and her siblings' lives.  Leah's mother remarried a wealthy man and Leah did not have to the same money issues as Michelle.  There was also a difference due to race, Buck their father was White, and so was Leah's mother, but Michelle's mother was Black.  Leah lived a very privileged life in contrast to the ones of her siblings.  As much as Michelle wanted to have a relationship with her half sister, she was upset that Leah was sheltered from the issues Michelle faced.

When Tim and Leah first met Michelle, they mentioned that Buck had something of value for her. Hoping that this gift would provide her money to get her mother out of jail and pay her aunt, Michelle decided to drive cross country to California to visit Buck on his deathbed.  In an act of goodwill, she invited Leah so that she could get closure as well.  Leah's stepbrother, Tim, joined the road trip to help Leah.

The trip got off to a rocky start.  Leah and Tim were used to traveling a certain way while Michelle was on a budget, caused a division between the siblings.  However, as they travel, they work together to survive their trip.  In addition to that they learn, that tough they may differ based on race and class, they have had to face similar struggles in life.  They learn more about each other and begin to relate not only as friends, but also as sisters.  There is even a romance that blossoms between Tim and Michelle.  I have to add I had a total book crush on Tim, he was so sweet and the boy could sing.

Without giving too much away, they do make it to california, and though they lost their father, they became a family.  "Don't Fail Me Now' was an enjoyable read, demonstrating that we can't always pick our relatives, but at the end of the day, they are the ones that care and love us the most.

a heartbreaking work of staggering genius. dave eggers. (208)

i have discussed this before but i do have hipster tendencies.  so when the huffington post listed the most hipster books of all time, and i had only read a handful of them, i decided to check them out.  i started with dave eggers' a heartbreaking work of staggering genius.

i feel horrible for saying this, especially considering it's premise, a memoir about raising a younger sibling after both parents passing away, but i hated this book.  it took everything i had to actually finish it.  ironically, i should have listened to the rules and suggestions for enjoyment of this book (which is listed at the beginning) it suggested that "the first three or four chapters are all some of you might want to bother with.  that gets you to page 109 or so, which is a nice length, a nice novella sort of length."  i thought eggers was being cheeky when in fact he was just being honest, he knew the second half wasnt' worth it. 

 

a heartbreaking work of staggering genius covers eggers' early twenties and what he encountered raising his little brother, tophe, after having lost both their parents within three months of each other.  they lost their mother to stomach cancer, and the father to what i am assumed was a heart condition  (i feel eggers really didn't share what happen to him, other than his sister finding him kneeling in the driveway one night), since he was a heavy drinker and smoker.  due to the title and the premise, i imagined myself having an emotional connection to the book having just lost my grandmother.  i was actually very hesitant about reading, worried that it would stir up too many memories and thoughts that i was not ready to revisit.  i will admit that reading about their mother is icu was difficult to read, i did cry, reminded of being in icu with my grandmother. and later in the book when eggers discussed his speaking at this mother's memorial service (their parents donated their bodies to science so there wasn't a formal burial), i understood what he went through.  i do recall when my grandmother first entered icu, i thought about what i would say at her funeral.  one feels bad for thinking such thoughts but its something that needs to be considered.  i also identified with egger's uncertainity when it came to speaking at the service.  i was the same way, wanting to share but not wanting too.  though i will add, i didn't want pity like he did but to honor my grandmother.  but that was as far as my identification and enjoyment of the book went.

my enjoyment, seriously only went up until page 109, because that is the only part that truly discussed tophe.  the rest was pretty much about the magazine, he and his friends started, which i did not find interesting at all.  to be completely honest, the only real take away i had from the remainder of the book, was that eggers wasn't casted on mtv's real world: san francisco and that puck came to do a photo shoot for them.  well not for a feature on puck but he was a model, they needed nude models for a piece about humans being the same.  but yeah that is all i really remember.  oh and i would have appreciated the innovativeness of the real world "interview" being a means of eggers discussing his childhood, but then when he had to let the cat out of the bag, recognizing that it was a made up interview to allow for this exploration, so i started to lose interest.

i really hated it.  it was seriously just about the magazine.  it could have been a work of staggering genius if he focused on the issues that he confronted while raising his brother more than whether or not he could still get laid. 

i also think that i may have missed the mark on this book.  had i read it 2000 (though i was in high school, i maybe have been to young) this would have been revolutionary.  maybe if i read it fresh out of college, i would have enjoyed it more.  i don't know what its right, i just know that it bored me.

i also want to add that i see how the book is hipstery.  i mean this is the publishing page!

its very tongue-in-cheek and clever and i would have praised it if i loved the book.  but since i did not enjoy it, i find it excessive and annoying. 

furthermore, there is the "rules" for enjoying the book that i mentioned earlier.  in addition to that there is a preface, contents page, acknowledgements (which runs for like 10 pages and includes diagrams and a random drawing of  a stapler, seriously?!?!?!) all of which i did not read because i did not want to give this book, any more time in my life.  though i will add that in the acknowledgement section, eggers says that the first 200 people that take a picture of a book and your receipt can receive a $5 check from him.  i wonder if people really did that, i would have done that and still felt robbed because the book was horrible.  you can also send it for a fictionalized version of the book on floppy disk, i might look into purchasing that if i still can.  but yeah, i can see the coolness in this, but like anything hipster, if it sucks, one does become annoyed but it.

if a heartbreaking work of staggering genius is on your to-read list, just read up to page 109.  i can tell you the story about real world and puck so you don't have to read the rest.

here's go you, rachel robinson. judy blume (207)

i picked up here's to you, rachel robinson, on blumesday.  my friend chandra said she was going to reread it in honor of blumesday.  i didn't recall the book so when i stumbled upon it at the library, i decided to check it out.

i don't remember reading here's to you, rachel robinson, but i did remember reading its predecessor, just as long as we're together.  as i was reading and came across the vietnamese friend and jeremy dragon, i thought it sounded familiar so googled and discovered here's to you is a sequel.  i also learned thanks to wikipedia that the title is a reference to "mrs. robinson" by simon and garfunkle, so now every time i read the title, i think of that song.

here's to you, rachel robinson is the story of rachel robinson, a smart, straight-a student, with a troublemaker for a brother.  the story opens with the rachel stressing out about her brother, charles, returning home.  he was sent away for school but was kicked out.  rachel was super stressed out about his return, which made me think that maybe he secretly sexually abused her.  i know that sounds outrageous but she was seriously freaking about his charles' return.  thankfully, charles' abuse of the family did not involve sexual abuse, instead he bullied his sisters by constantly making fun of them and was extremely disrespectful to their parents.  he also smoked pot, drank (i think) and may have been sexually active.  rachel did have an asshole for a brother but she seemed to be a little too sensitive about it.  i would be like sucks do be him screwing up his life versus worrying about him.  i know i am so loving, but he obviously did not want to help himself so why bother?

since it is a blume book, it does discussed the difficulties of growing up.  rachel, was super smart and involved and school, and as result felt overwhelm by her activities.  though i hate to seem like too much of a school geek, but i was super involved in school but never felt overwhelmed by all of my activities.  i was able to do everything and still get A's.  so i didn't really see what her issue was.  she should have taken that course for the credit, she would have managed, she was a genius according to her brother.

rachel's no new friends issue of just as long as we're together reared its ugly head in this story.  she was still jealous of stephanie and allison's closeness.  it's tough feeling like you are losing your best friend,  an issue all girls have and drake too.  

also rachel ended up kissing jeremy dragon which was super exciting but seemed a little random to me.  but i mean maybe rachel is a hottie.  sorry but lets be honest, rarely does the hot guy go for the school geek.

i also have to add that rachel thinking her night out with paul was a date was sad.  she is smart girl, shouldn't she know better?  and boo to blume sad for

having rachel's sleazy cousin ended up with him.  i loved that rachel dropped the baby bomb on them. lol

oh and in the end, charles started to grow up and got his act together.

all in all, an enjoyable read.  not the best of blume, but still a good story.  and hopefully girls take away the lesson about assertiveness, alot of rachel's problems stemmed from the fact that she didn't speak up for herself.