End of the Year Reading

Goodness, it's already the new year! Make that 28 days until the Youth Media Awards. While I am looking forward to the new year of reading (ahem Sarah Dessen and Melina Marchetta) I still have a small mountain of reading to finish for 2012. Here's a terribly thrifty review list of what I managed to read recently. Happy New Year, Oops Readers!

Every Day by David Levithan
He pulled off what could have been a disaster. A little sci-fi, a little mystery, and chapters of great characters. This one made Patti's Mock Printz list and I would love to hear the discussion. It's still a distance from Stars and Verity for me, but dang, David Levithan is amazing. How does it do it all?

Liar & Spy by Rebecca Stead
I loved this book. I didn't burst into tears like I did for When You Reach Me, but I was with Georges the whole book. Reading as an adult, there aren't too many mysteries in middle grade stories, but they're not written for me so I overlook it.  Knowing that things are never what they seem in a Rebecca Stead book I still fell for this one hook, line, and sinker. The one about his mother I didn't even see coming. And I thought I had the title all figured out. Silly me.

One Year in Coal Harbor by Polly Horvath
A second Polly Horvath novel this year! A cause for celebration. A companion to Everything on a Waffle? Deliciously wonderful. Twelve year old Primrose continues to delight and we also have a return of chapter-ending recipes complete with our heroine's comments. I submit the final line of "Tater Tot Casserole", which, by the way, is in Primrose's charity cookbook entitled Just Throw Some Melted Butter on It and Call It a Day. :

On a cold rainy night when people are not participating in the better plan you have for them, this can be a comfort. (p. 116) 

Polly Horvath books are refreshingly strange. She makes you think with vocab like ersatz and adjudicator and references to Mary Oliver essays and French recipes. She's left of center with a big heart. And really, really funny.

A Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling
Rowling is a bad ass. Case closed. A total departure from HP while also being completely great in its own right amazes and thrills me. She didn't have to write anything else, ever!, but she did and it is really good. The best book of the year? Nah. The most surprising? Probably.