Language: 0

Violence: 2

Sexual Content: 0

Adult Themes: 1

Title: Which Way To The Wild West?  Everything Your Schoolbooks Didn’t Tell You About America’s Westward Expansion

Author: Steve Sheinkin

Illustrator: Tim Robinson

Ratings Explanation

Violence: The Alamo, a massacre of many various Indian tribes and buffalo.  Many Chinese immigrant deaths accompanied the railroad expansion through the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range.

Adult Themes:  The advent of the Indian Reservation.

Synopsis

An entertaining, captivating and completely digestible book on America’s Westward Expansion.  The search for gold and land led to a hard scrabble rush for wealth.  There were many casualties that accompanied the American Westward Expansion.

Sheinkin, formerly a textbook writer, collected stories: good, funny, amazing, inspiring, surprising, and disgustingly true stories. He has succeeded in writing an entertaining, captivating and completely digestible story of America’s Westward Expansion.  I loved this book!  I really enjoyed the last chapter, “What Ever Happened to….?”

©2010The Literate Mother

Language: 0

Violence: 2

Sexual Content: 0

Adult Themes: 2

Title: King George – What Was His Problem?: The Whole Hilarious Story of the American Revolution

Author: Steve Sheinkin

Illustrator: Tim Robinson

Ratings Explanation

Violence: The Revolutionary War.

Adult Themes: War.

Synopsis

An entertaining, captivating and completely digestible revolutionary war history book.

Sheinkin, formerly a textbook writer, collected stories: good, funny, amazing, inspiring, surprising, and disgustingly true stories. He has succeeded in writing an entertaining, captivating and completely digestible revolutionary war history book.   I laughed aloud when reading, ” Dawes and Revere (Paul) had a quick snack (you have to eat, even in the middle of famous historical events), Captain John Parker got the Lexington minutemen together on the town common.”  A snack amidst the start of The American Revolution?  I just don’t think of historical figures being concerned with eating.   I highly recommend this book.

©2010The Literate Mother

Language: 0

Violence: 2

Sexual Content: 0

Adult Themes: 2

Title:  Two Miserable Presidents

Author: Steve Sheinkin

Illustrator: Tim Robinson

Ratings Explanation

Violence:   The Civil War.

Adult Themes:  War, death, and deplorable conditions for soldiers and P.O.W.’s.  Jefferson Davis’ five year old son slipped off a balcony to his death.

Synopsis

An entertaining, captivating and completely digestible civil war history book.

“War is cruelty.  There is no use trying to reform it.  The crueler it is, the sooner it will be over.” – William T. Sherman

Sheinkin, formerly a textbook writer, collected stories: good, funny, amazing, inspiring, surprising, and disgustingly true stories.  He has succeeded in writing an entertaining, captivating and completely digestible civil war history book.  I highly recommend “Two Miserable Presidents – The Amazing, Terrible, and Totally True Story of the Civil War”!  My sixth grader is currently held hostage by this fabulous book!

©2010The Literate Mother

Language: 1

Violence: 2

Sexual Content: 0

Adult Themes: 3

Title: Alone: Orphaned on the Ocean

Author: Richard Logan and Tere Duperrault Fassbender

Ratings Explanation

Language: A couple of swear words and profanities.

Violence: A matter-of-fact description of a suicide in which a man makes deep cuts all over his body, bleeding to death. Terry Jo sees her mother and brother dead in a pool of blood. Harvey strikes Terry Jo. Two women die in a car crash. Speculation as to what happened the night of the ship wreck, including the alleged murders of Terry Jo’s family and Harvey’s wife.

Adult Themes: Tragic events leave 11-year-old Terry Jo an orphan. She sees her mother and brother dead and survives alone on the ocean. It was well known that Julian Harvey had many affairs. Harvey is possibly involved in smuggling guns to Cuba. Fraudulent insurance claims. Terry Jo’s experience is compared to being raped – losing her innocence. When she is older Terry moves in with a man, gets pregnant and then they marry. Terry and husband #4 fall in love while he is still married.

Synopsis

This is the real life tragedy of the Duperralut family and the mystery that still surrounds the survival of one of their daughters. In 1961 the Duperraults set out on the adventure of a lifetime. Chartering the Bluebelle, a 60-foot yacht out of Florida, they planned to spend several weeks, and possibly an entire year, sailing the tropics under the skilled hand of Julian Harvey, a decorated war veteran. But early in their sailing vacation, tragedy struck.

According to Harvey’s testimony at a Coast Guard hearing, a violent storm crippled the Bluebelle and she went down.  When Harvey was rescued, he had the dead body of 7-year-old Rene Duperrault with him, which he claimed he found floating in the water shortly after abandoning ship. Everyone else aboard was presumed lost at sea. But four days after the tragedy, 11-year-old Terry Jo was found floating on a cork raft, miraculously still alive. After hearing the news of Terry Jo’s survival, Harvey committed suicide, calling his entire testimony into question since Terry Jo was the only person alive who could corroborate or refute his account of the events of that fateful night.

From her hospital bed, Terry Jo gave her account of the events that led to the ship sinking and the death of her entire family. Her testimony was in direct contrast to that of Harvey. Not everyone believed the young girl, but based on her recollection of events and the murky details that emerged concerning Harvey’s sordid past, a plausible theory of murder and fraud emerged.

This is quite a gripping real-life mystery. Unfortunately for those who like all the ends tied up neatly, we will never know exactly what happened to the Bluebelle, Terry Jo’s family and Harvey’s wife. An amazing story of survival, I was glad to see Terry find peace after tragedy. The author seems a bit redundant at times, repeating on several occasions the same information, but for the most part it kept my attention. Although not written specifically for young adults, I think this true story would interest a young person.

Language: 5

Violence: 1

Sexual Content: 4

Adult Themes: 4

Title:  Talking to Girls About Duran Duran – One Young Man’s Quest for True Love and a Cooler Haircut

(Available July 2010)

Author:  Rob Sheffield – Author of the National Bestseller “Love is a Mix Tape”

Ratings Explanation

Language: This book is laced with nearly every profane word.  Each word of profanity is used with grammatical variation – as a noun, verb and adjective.

Sexual Content: Teacher/Student Affair.  References to a blow job, gorilla condoms, sex-cookies, raging hormones, masturbating, sex, gay sex, bi-sexual sex, and a friction boner from wrestling.

Violence: The ice cream wholesaler says he will break Rob’s ankles if he ever hears of him selling anything other than ice cream out of the truck.

Adult Content: Rock Star Lifestyle. Drugs. Alcohol. Sexual Promiscuity. Adultery. Bisexuality. Homosexuality.

Summary

This is Rob Sheffield’s memoir.

“Rob Sheffield has been a music journalist for more than twenty years.  He is a contributing editor at Rolling Stone, where he writes about music, TV, pop culture, and regularly appears on MTV and VH1.  He is the author of the New York Times Bestseller Love is a Mix Tape, which has been translated into French, German, Swedish, Italian, Japanese, Russian, and other languages he cannot read.  He lives in Brooklyn New York.”

Each chapter is the title of a song.  Sheffield writes of his progression and transformation from pre-pubescent male to manhood via weaving each artist/song’s significance with his personal experience.

The Go-Gos, “Our Lips Are Sealed”

David Bowie, “Ashes to Ashes”

Ray Parker Jr., “A Woman Needs Love”

The Rolling Stones, “She’s So Cold”

The Human League, “Love Action”

O.M.D., “Enola Gay”

Culture Club, “I’ll Tumble 4 Ya”

Hall & Oates, “Maneater”

Roxy Music, “More Than This”

Bonnie Taylor, “Total Eclipse of the Heart”

Haysi Fantayzee, “Shiny Shiny”

A Flock of Seagulls, “Space Age Love Song”

Chaka Khan, “I Feel For You”

Prince, “Purple Rain”

Paul McCartney, “No More Lonely Nights”

Madonna, “Crazy For You”

The Replacements, “Left of the Dial”

The Smiths, “Ask”

The Psychedelic Furs, “Pretty in Pink”

Lita Ford, “Kiss Me Deadly”

Tone Loc, “Funky Cold Medina”

New Kids On The Block, “Hangin’ Tough”

Big Daddy Kane, “Ain’t No Half Steppin’”

L”Trimm, “Cars With the Boom”

Duran Duran, “All She Wants Is”

Admittedly, I was sucked in by the hilarious title.  (Yes, judging a book by the cover…I am aware.)  This book is entertaining, and, I do love Duran Duran.   I enjoyed reading  Sheffield’s navigation of how to communicate with females.   If you choose to read, “Proceed With Caution”, this is loaded with language and sexual references.

©2010 The Literate Mother

Language:2

Violence:3

Sexual Content:1

Adult Themes:3

Title: Red Scarf Girl

Author: Ji-Li Jiang

Ratings Explanation

Language: A few common swear words.  Taunting and degrading talk towards those who were accused of being non-revolutionists (teachers, parents, wealthy, elderly etc).  Signs were hung around the city claiming unlawful actions and wrong doing on the part of many innocent people.

Violence:  The Revolution caused many to look down on the wealthy regardless of age or health.  Many teachers, parents and elderly were pushed around and beaten to get a confession of wrong doings.  Those who were suspected of having different political views and opinions were tortured and beaten until they confessed, whether they were guilty or not. Some committed suicide rather than face a life of disgrace.

Sexual Content:  Teacher accused of having relations with a student.  Mention of a women who had several sexual relations outside of marriage.  Ji-Li has an admirer but wants nothing to do with him.  When Ji-Li’s home is searched they find her sanitary belt.  She is humiliated that nothing is kept private.

Adult Themes:  The Revolutionaries taught that political status comes before family.  Many young people were caught up in the allure of their Revolutionary leaders and disowned their families.  The Revolution was meant to bring new ideas and change to improve China.  All old traditions and anything alluding to them were to be destroyed.  The homes of many families were searched for photos, books, clothing, antiques etc. that reflected old China.  These things were confiscated and destroyed leaving many families in poverty.  Teachers were looked down on as corrupting the minds of the youth with old ways.  They were publicly disgraced and replaced with new Revolutionary-minded teachers.  Reverse discrimination from the poor to the wealthy was common.  The wealthy were publicly humiliated and made to work regardless of age or health to help them repent of their years of wrong doing.  Those who were suspected of different political views were subjected to verbal torture from family members and physical punishment from captors.

Synopsis:  When Mao Zedong launches China’s  Cultural Revolution, young Ji-Li’s world turns upside down.  She was top of her school class and highly recognized for her hard scholastic work.  Ji-Li comes from a well-to-do Chinese family with a history of wealthy landlord ancestors. The Revolution taught that all old culture must be abandoned and the wealthy blamed for China’s suffering.  Ji-Li’s father, the son of a wealthy landlord, is detained leaving the rest of her family living in constant fear.  Over the next few years, Ji-Li must decide whether to disown her ‘black’ family and join the Revolution or give up all she has worked so hard for to help her family.

I was deeply touched by Ji-Li’s story.  I have a better understanding of how an entire nation can be swallowed up in an idea that leads to their destruction.  The Revolution through a child’s viewpoint was powerful and eye opening.  I closed the book with an appreciation for our incredible freedom and an admiration for all of the heroes around the world that choose to follow their heart.  The author, Ji-Li, currently oversees projects that promote eastern and western relations.  She also shares her story in person with many students around the nation.  

©2010 The Literate Mother

Language: 0

Violence: 3

Sexual Content: 0

 Adult Themes: 2

Title: Invasion: The Story of D-Day

Author: Bruce Bliven

Ratings Explanation

Violence: Stories where soldiers are wounded and killed are mentioned often as factual consequence to war, not in gory detail.  Instances of field mines, sniper fire, drownings and other related causes  of death are mentioned.  Among the stronger stories are when a leader is shot through the cheek while giving his troops a motivational speech.  He continues his speech spraying blood as he speaks.  Many soldiers are overcome with fear and drown in the ocean or lay out in the open where sniper fire seriously wounds or kills them.  One leader is shot in the stomach while attempting to direct a tank into  position.

Adult Themes:   Many instances are related where fear overtakes young soldiers leaving them mentally and emotionally paralyzed and vulnerable to enemy fire.   These weak moments allowed opportunities for heroes to rise and take the spotlight as they lead their comrades on to battle.  Several instances where leaders had to make difficult decisions that could put several soldiers lives at risk.

 Synopsis

This book takes a look at one of the greatest invasions in our country’s history, D-day. The author includes insight into the risky plans of the allied forces and takes a look at some of the different missions carried out by thousands of courageous soldiers. The author also discusses some of the successes and setbacks the troops experienced along with stories of individual heroes that helped to turn the war around.

 Author Bruce Bliven did a fantastic job in describing one of our country’s important, historical moments.  His writing was very reader friendly even for the ‘non-war buff’ like myself.  I enjoyed his simple style.  It helped me to understand the bigger picture behind the D-day Invasion.  Also included are pictures of soldiers in action, as well as a translated letter from a German soldier describing his point of view of one of the paratrooper invasions.  There are other books in this Sterling Point Book series that take a look at other historical events in our nation’s history.

Language: 0

Violence: 0

Sexual Content: 2

Adult Themes: 2

Title: The Big House

A Century In The Life Of An American Summer Home

National Book Award Finalist

Author: George Howe Colt

Ratings Explanation

Sexual Content:  Grandma suffers a nervous breakdown, after the birth of of Aunt Sandy.  ”Grandpa always suspected it might have had earlier roots, in guilt Grandma felt over an affair she’d had with a family friend while living in Santa Barbara.”  When observing a beach on Cape Cod, the author, recalls his first sexual experience.  A disabled, great-uncle “got into trouble with girls.”  ”No one in the family knew exactly what that meant, since wealthy Bostonians were able to keep their scandals hushed up.  A fondness for prostitutes?  Statutory rape?”

Adult Themes:  There is a family history of mental illness.  Several family members spend time in institutions following nervous breakdowns.  The author recalls experimenting with marijuana and beer drinking.

Synopsis

George Howe Colt and his family, are faced with the sale of their family summer home on Cape Cod.  The property taxes have grown too expensive and they can no longer afford the upkeep on the century old house.  George has spent a summer month or two each year for the past forty-two years at “The Big House”.  He returns for one last stay with his wife and children, Susannah and Henry.  George laments the loss of future summer memories for his children.  He weaves five generations of family history with his childhood’s summer memories into his final visit.  He savors his family’s delightful memories and confronts the less desirable.  In addition to George’s family history and a glimpse of Bostonian social structure, he provides a brief history of Cape Cod,  beautiful architectural descriptions, and details of local flora and fauna.

I enjoyed this detailed account of Howe’s family history and the loss of their century old summer home. 

©2010 The Literate Mother

Language: 0

Violence: 2

Sexual Content: 0

Adult Themes: 0

Title: The Sinking of the Bismarck

Author: William L. Shirer

Ratings Explanation

Violence: Naval battles, shooting guns, dropping torpedoes, explosions. Injuries and death resulting from battles, but no gore.

Synopsis

William L. Shirer, author of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, recounts Britain’s quest to find and destroy the Bismarck, Germany’s greatest battleship in WWII. Full of stratagem and battles, this historical account is sure to hold the interest of youth interested in WWII.

My husband found this 1962 copy on my parents’ bookshelf last time we visited them and we started reading it aloud to the kids on the drive back to our house. Our sleepy 7-year old dozed off and missed the first several chapters and never really got interested in it, but our 12 and 10-year olds were hooked. There are many ships and captains to keep track of, but it is quite exciting, and we all enjoyed learning this part of WWII history. This book could definitely be used as a source for a research paper.

©2009 The Literate Mother

Language: 0

Violence: 4

Sexual Content: 0

Adult Themes: 4

Title:  David Kherdian

Author: The Road From Home – A True Story of Courage, Survival, and Hope

Newberry Honor Book

Ratings Explanation

Violence:  September 16, 1916 – To the Government of Aleppo.  “It was first communicated to you that the government, by order of the Jemiet, had decided to destroy completely all the Armenians living in Turkey…An end must be put to their existence, however criminal the measures taken may be, and no regard must be paid to either age or sex nor to conscientious scruples.”  An extermination order against the Christian minority, the Armenians, was put into force by the Turks.  The Armenians were deported from their homes. ” The youngest Armenian boys were circumcised and converted to Islam, while the older boys were sold into slavery.  The women who converted to Islam were attached to harems; those who did not were raped and then either murdered or sold to the Arabs.  On the death march, the older people began to fall down, but no one was allowed to stop and help them.  The Turkish gendarmes then rode back and shot the elderly who had collapsed.  When they march through Kurd territory, the gendarmes stood aside while the Kurds robbed the caravans and defiled the women.  The gendarmes also traveled from tent to tent through the camps taking the most attractive women into town.  None who were taken, returned.  Veron’s mother says, ” Our executioner is everchanging, but always death awaits its task.”  The Armenians are infested with lice and then cholera decimates their camp.  Veron is injured in a bombing and loses part of her calf.  The archbishop is brutally murdered.  The Turks burn the city to the ground.  They burn people alive in their homes, and the smell of burning flesh hovers in the air.  Dead bodies are removed from the road to drive the auto.  The Turkish soldiers throw kerosene on a raft in the harbor and burn the people alive.  “The Armenian people, nearly half a million human beings, were herded into an area a mile and one half long and not more than a hundred feet wide.  The Armenians jumped in the harbor, hoping to swim to the ships.”  The Italians took people aboard, but the English poured boiling water down the sides of the ship on the people (apparently, a sign of neutrality?).  The Americans lined up with their movie cameras filming.  The Turkish soldiers came through the Armenians huddled on the wharf, carrying off the young women and girls.

Sexual Content:  (Rape is included under violence.)  Veron becomes engaged and then has a bad feeling about the impending marriage.  She breaks the engagement and saves her family name from disrespect. 

Adult Themes:  Veron’s father’s business was harvesting and selling the gum that was used in making opium.  The girls were second class citizens, “When a girl dies, the ground must approve; while she lives, the public must approve.”After Varon is orphaned, her extended family treats her horrribly.  She chooses to go to an orphanage where she will receive an education.  The cousins never visited her, not once!  Many of the young girls who arrive at the orphanage were rescued from Arab harems by the British.  They arrived in the orphanage with little blue tattoos on their cheek or forehead.  When Veron is injured and needs help getting out of the wagon, she asks her aunt for help.  Her aunt “turned and looked at me without speaking and I saw a look of hatred come into her face.  You should have died instead of my children, they are dead, and now you have become my burden – thanks to your grandmother.”  A kind Greek general tries to adopt Veron.  She runs away to the Armenian Archbishop, where she receives help.

Synopsis

Veron Demhjian Kherdian was born into a prosperous Christian Armenian Family.  In 1915, the Turkish Government began to systematically exterminate the Armenian population.  The author, David Kherdian shares the story of his mother’s childhood interrupted by a devastating holocaust.  Veron and her family are forced on a death march by the Turkish gendarmes.  Veron is orphaned, as she witnesses the deaths of her family and friends.  Veron realizes that she will need to take risks to ensure a future for herself.  Veron’s courage ultimately results in her survival.

I love stories with a strong heroine!  Veron witnessed many atrocities, yet she remained resilient and courageous.  Veron took her future into her own hands as she ultimately chose to come to the U.S. as a mail-order bride.  Veron wanted to belong to the U.S. “because at that moment, the darkest of my life, foreign dignitaries had been searching for their citizens and offering them safety.  I wanted to belong to a country that cared for its people in that way, and had the power to ensure their safety, even in time of war.”  

I could not put this book down.  I recommend this book for adults as well as junior high level readers.  I love this quote, “What you learn in childhood is carved on stone; what you learn in old age is carved on ice.”

©2009 The Literate Mother

Language: 0

Violence: 0

Sexual Content: 0

Adult Themes: 0

Title:  In Defense of Food – An Eater’s Manifesto

Author: Michael Pollan

Synopsis

Food.  There’s plenty  of it around, and we all love to eat it.  So why should anyone need to defend it?  Because most of what we’re consuming today is not food.  Instead, we are consuming “edible foodlike substance” – no longer the products of nature, but of food science.  Pollan urges us to once again eat food, by challenging the prevailing nutrient-by-nutrient approach, what he calls nutritionism.  Pollan urges us to escape the Western Diet and the many chronic diseases the diet causes.  Pollan sets forth a few guidelines, below are a few that are just plain common sense.

 1. Don’t eat anything your great grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.

2.  Avoid food products containing ingredients that are A) Unfamiliar, B) Unpronounceable C) More than five in number, or that include D) high-fructose corn syrup.

3.  Avoid food products that make health claims.

4.  Shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle.

This book came highly recommended by my sister-in-law, Arielle.  Arielle is a professional athlete, who earned a degree in exercise science with an emphasis on strength and conditioning from Brigham Young University. 

Arielle Martin Verhaaren

2008 UCI SX World Cup Champion

http://go211.com/u/ariellemartin

 This book has completely changed my family’s eating habits.  After finishing the book, I spent a day reading the ingredient labels on all the food items stocked in our pantry, refrigerator, freezer and food storage room.  I was stunned by the sheer number of foods labeled with the following phrases: “high fructose corn syrup”, “partially hydrogenated”, “palm oil” as well as many ingredients I had difficulty pronouncing.  I am spending much of my “shopping trips” deciphering the content of ingredient labels.  Seriously, can you believe there is high fructose corn syrup in chocolate milk?  I feel enlightened regarding the history of nutritionism in America.  I am now prioritizing preparing healthier meals for my family.  Pollan’s chapter entitled, “Eat Food: Food Defined” is practical and common sense.  Eat Food.  Not too much.  Mostly Plants. 

©2009 The Literate Mother

Language:2

Violence: 5

Sexual Content: 1

Adult Themes: 4

Title: Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust

Author: Immaculee Ilibagiza

Language: Only a couple of profanities and swear words. Hateful and violent language such as the Hutu killers chanting “Kill them, kill them all” as they go through the neighborhoods hunting Tutsis. Tutsis referred to as cockroaches by the ruling government as well as the killers. Verbal propaganda.

Violence: The Rwandan Government orders Hutus to kill all of the Tutsis, even the old and the babies. Nearly one million Tutsis are killed within three months. Tutsis seeking refuge in churches and stadiums are massacred. A mother is killed and her baby left to die. Heaps of dead bodies on the streets where dogs eat the rotting corpses. Many are hacked to death with machetes. A woman is raped while her husband and children are forced to watch, then they are all killed. Human limbs are cut off and babies are killed.

Sexual Content: Women are raped, but there are no descriptions of this violence.

Adult Themes: Ethnic cleansing. Long time neighbors and friends turn on each other. The horrors of what humans are capable of doing to each other.

Synopsis

In 1994, 22 year-old Immaculee is home from college to spend the Easter holiday with her family when the death of Rwanda’s Hutu president sets off a massacre of ethnic Tutsis. Over the course of three months, nearly 1 million Tutsis are killed. In order to survive, Imaculee hides in the tiny bathroom of a Hutu pastor along with seven other Tutsi women. Terrified that they will be found and murdered, Imaculee turns to God for protection and comfort. She prays for hours every day and is eventually able to forgive those who are hunting down and killing the Tutsis in her country. Once they are able to leave their hiding place, Imaculee must discover the fate of her family and build an entirely new life.

This is an amazing story of faith. Although there are many descriptions of the atrocities committed, the focus of the book is Imaculee’s personal transformation and what she learns through this horrific experience. Her ability to forgive and move on is inspiring and helped put my own challenges in perspective. I highly recommend this book for adults.

©2009 The Literate Mother