Let me explain the problem in this book: a girl named Mia has a disease called synaesthesia, and what it basically means is that when she hears a sound, she sees colors and shapes. For example, if someone has this disease and you snap your fingers they might see red designs or spirals in the air. In the beginning of the book Mia thinks that everyone has synaesthesia, so she doesn’t tell her parents until towards the end of the book. So by the time she tells them, they don’t believe her, because she has never talked about it before.
Finally, when Mia tells them about her experiences, they see a doctor to find out what’s the matter. Is this normal or not? When they talk with the doctor, he tells them about a place where a bunch of people have synasthesia meet and she learns a lot about it and other kinds of synaesthesia. One person married her husband because when someone said his name she would get the taste of buttered popcorn in her mouth. One of the main characters in the book is Mia’s cat, named Mango, because whenever she purrs, Mia sees a mango color.
I recommend this book to people that are animal lovers or people that are sympathetic towards people and their pets, because you really can’t connect with this book if you aren’t like that, I don’t think.
If you liked this book you will also like Perfect by Natasha Friend, which is a book about a girl with an eating disorder. Some other books by Wendy Mass are: 11 Birthdays, Every Soul A Star, Heaven Looks a Lot like the Mall, Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life. These are teen issue, mixed genre, and free verse novels. One thing I really like about Wendy Mass: she doesn’t write the same genre every time. I don’t think there is a comparable author to Wendy Mass; I think she has her own way of writing that is unique. A lot of books I have read are just like another book or series; it’s like re-reading.
This story takes place mostly in Mia’s home, in her bedroom, and some specific places like the woods, fields, her school, their helicopter, and with the group of people with synaesthesia. The reason I tell you this is because I was a bit lost with all the setting changes.
The “So What?” or theme of this book is to try and live a normal life no matter what, because at one point in the book Mia is really disappointed about having this disease; she just wants to be a normal human being. The main character, Mia, thinks positively, and she gets over guilt easily. She is unique because she thinks differently in a cool and fun way, cautious because she is always looking after herself and her brother and sister, and forgiving because whenever someone makes her feel bad, she always forgives them immediately and forgets everything that just happened.
This book left me feeling jealous, sad, happy and amazed. The reason why I say jealous is because I really wish I could see shapes and colors, because I love art and colors, so it would be really fun for me. I was sad was because I didn’t want the book to end and I just wanted it to keep going. I also felt happy because it was one of the best books I have ever read. I was amazed because I had no idea that this disease ever existed, and it was really fun to read about. That’s why I rate A Mango Shaped Shape a ten.
Catherine
Publisher: Little, Brown Young Readers, 240 pages
I am reviewing Raiders Night by Robert Lypsyte. It’s a sports book about a boy named Matt whose life centers around football. Outside of school, everyone treats the football team like kings, but the team isn’t perfect. Almost all of them do steroids and some of the less-skilled team members get beat up by the better ones.
Gym Candy is about a boy named Mick who is struggling through high school and his athletics as his dad pressures him to be the best he can possibly be at football. Mick looks up to his dad and sees a former superstar NFL player, and feels that he has to be as good as him. Under this pressure, he feels he needs to take steroids. Coaches and players all suspect him of using them because his bench-pressing weight doubles in a very short time. While he is still trying to hide the steroids from everyone, he finds out that his dad was a fake and never played a NFL game in his life, instead choosing to skip practice and party. Mick is overwhelmed by everything that is happening in his life and Carl Deuker does a great job of wrapping it all up with a great cliffhanger ending that made me want to read the epilogue.
Martin lives in a dome; a dome like a snow globe that doesn’t lead to the outside world, except for one loading dock, where luckily, Martin’s dad works. There’s a painted sky to decorate the roof with no moving clouds, just sun and warmth all the time. The weather doesn’t change; the same thing everyday for their whole life. No one in the globe has biological parents; everyone is an import baby who’s made in a science lab, so you can “Buy a baby!” There are also some regular-looking people who are not really normal beings, but robots that live both in the dome and outside it.
Amanda is dreading her upcoming eleventh birthday. One year ago, she and her life-long friend, Leo, are suddenly not best friends anymore. Amanda runs home distressed and angry from her and Leo’s joint tenth birthday party and is found on her front steps crying. That was the tenth of the eleven birthdays they have shared together as friends, and this will be Amanda’s first birthday party without him. After not speaking to him for a year, she thinks she can handle it.
Thirteen-year-old Jonah always knew he was adopted and finds out that his new friend, Chip, who just moved in across the street, is also adopted. Then one day both of them receive letters sent to them with no return address. The first letter says, “You are one of the missing,” and the second one says, “Beware! They’re coming back to get you.” These two mysterious letters send Johan, Chip, and Katherine, Johan’s sister, to solve the mystery of what these letters mean. Who’s sending them? Who are their real parents that gave them up for adoption?
Danny Watts, a teen living in modern day London, tries out for the army, but George Finchim of MI6 prevents him because of his hatred for Danny’s grandfather, Fergus Watts. Then Danny sets out to find his grandfather, who is accused of being a traitor to both Colombia and England. When Danny finally finds his grandfather, they travel together through England to evade MI6 and find out who the true traitor is.
I rated this book a ten because Han Nolan puts you inside the mind of the main character, Miracle, and makes you care deeply about her chances in life and her problem. Now let me tell you about this problem. Miracle McCloy is a ten-year-old girl who lives with her grandmother Gigi and father Dane. Miracle believes in a world of spirits and places beyond the universe. But one night, Dane disappears into thin air, believed to have melted into the spiritual world. Miracle is never the same after Dane’s “melting.” All she wants to be is a normal ten-year-old. But for her, that is impossible. Miracle is obsessed with bringing Dane back to her and finding out the reason he melted. As the book progresses, she becomes mad with longing, filled with questions, and crushed by despair as she feels she should have died with her mother in her “miracle birth.” Miracle is no longer the once happy ten-year-old she was.
Chosen is the first book of a series called The Lost Books where Johnis, a young boy, is one of the four chosen to lead the Forest Guard, an army that protects the forest from the Horde, led ultimately by Tomas Hunter. In the “Other World” of Dekker’s Chosen, you must bathe in Elyon’s water (given to the Forest Dwellers to ward off evil) every day or you get the disease called Teeleh’s teeth. With the disease, you transform into a Scab, which is a Horde member that was once human. A Scab’s skin peels and turns against the Forest and to the Dark One.
Brian is a high school basketball star and self-taught guitarist. He’s recovering from his childhood friend and girlfriend Amanda’s death, who was killed along with her mother and brother. The suspect is her father, but Brian is not sure he’s the murderer. If that isn’t enough, Brian’s faith in the justice system is shaken when his best friend Julius is wrongly accused because he’s black and lives in the wrong part of town. When he studies about Leo Frank, a innocent man charged for murder, in history class, he reexamines the day of Amanda’s death and remembers a small, seemly insignificant detail. He begins to ask: What can he learn from Leo Frank? Did Amanda’s dad really kill her? Can what he knows bring the real killer to justice?