Tina's Mouth: An Existential comic Diary by Keshni Kashyap

This week, in a further attempt to catch up my TBR, I read Tin’as Mouth: An Existential Comic Diary.  I loved it.  I simply loved it.  This was the first time in a long time that I have read a whole book, even a comic, in a day.  It was hard to put down, even when I planned on putting it down.

Tina is a fifteen year old at Yarborough Academy.  For her English Honors class final project, she is keeping an existentialist diary which she chooses to write to Sartre.  The idea is that she will explore philosophical questions and her life and her teacher will mail the diary back to her in three years.  Tina sets to work thinking about who she is and learning how to be.

But, like any fifteen year old, she is going to face a lot of changes in the coming year.  It all starts when her best friend Alex, an ex-Mormon whose parents recently divorced, starts wearing tight clothes, gets a boyfriend, and dumps Tina for a whole new group of friends.  Tina suddenly finds herself pretty much completely alone at school.  She begins spending time on her “bench of existential solitude” but before long she finds herself branching out and filling up her life.

Friend fights.  Loneliness.  Family drama.  First love.  School plays.  Tina is about to learn that she is a lot more than she previously thought.

As I said, I loved this book.  I loved it enough that I wrote down a few quotes from it just to keep in mind.  Tina’s feelings were very accurate to my own past experiences and I felt them achingly along with her.

Blankets by Craig Thompson

I was surprised to see that this book came out in 2003.  The way Thomson talks about his teenage years, which I placed vaguely in the early 1990's, made it feel more distant at the time of writing.  You know, I am one of those people who forgets that I graduated 16 years ago so I guess that's not really surprising.

This book, well, it was a bit of an emotional rollercoaster for me.

Thompson tells the story of his coming of age.  I can't think of any better way to describe it.  He tells stories throughout that are memories of his childhood, when he shared a bed with his little brother.  Craig says that he was not a very good older brother, that he was sometimes mean to his brother and that he didn't protect him.  He touches on the inappropriate conduct of a babysitter, a trap that he let his brother fall into and that sent him headlong into religion and the striving for heaven.

Craig takes religion seriously, seriously enough that his pastor asks if he has considered going into the ministry.  Craig hasn't really considered anything about his future.  Then he meets Raina at winter church camp and he is instantly smitten.  When he goes to stay with Raina and her family in Michigan for two weeks in the winter, he begins to see that he may have missed out on some of life.

This book touched on a lot of sensitive and emotional subjects: religion, abuse, first lover, doubt.  However, I felt like all of these things were handled very well.  I can promise that I was invested in this story after my initial doubt that it was for me.  Craig's experience of first love and his realization that he may not have been invested enough in the real world felt like legitimate experiences to me.  They felt real.

This was a touching tale but one which I can see not fitting for everyone. -RYQ

Rats Saw God by Rob Thomas

I picked up this book purely because it was mis-shelved and on the day that I found it I think that I was feeling a bit like I needed a sign of some sort.  Books make fabulous signs.  I read the first couple of pages at my desk and then took it home with me.  You may recognize the name Rob Thomas, the creator of Veronica Mars, but I didn't.  This was nothing more than a short book with a strange name in the wrong spot on the shelf.

It was great.

It's the early 90's and I got a healthy dose of nostalgia from that.  Steve is living in San Diego with his mother, her new husband, and his sister.  When we meet Steve, he is in danger of not graduating due to being short an English credit.  His guidance counselor, Mr. DeMouy, offers to make him a deal.  He can make up his English credit by writing 100 pages about anything he wants.  DeMouy has seen Steve's transcripts and knows that he was pulling straight A's when he lived in Texas, that he was smart enough to be a National Merit finalist.  Steve doesn't have to tell him what happened, he just needs to write.  Steve agrees and ends up telling the story of his Sophmore and Junior years in Texas.

Back in Texas, Steve lived with his father, worked at the Cineplex after school, and had friends.  His best friend, Doug, has a $500 bet with his father that he will appear in the year book and so they form a club, The Grace Order of Dadaists or GOD, with no intention of it going anywhere.  Instead the group widens their social circle and together they work on a number of dada inspired school projects.  It's through this club that Steve meets Dub, short for double-u, short for Wanda, who he falls for almost immediately.

Steve's story bounces between the past and the present.  He writes his paper about what happened in Texas and struggles to make something of San Diego.  He's sarcastic and the antics of GOD are entertaining.  This was definitely worth the read.

-RYQ

Our Chemical Hearts, by Krystal Sutherland

I really loved this book. It was funny and cute but it also had a lot of meaning. I loved how everything was balanced and it wasn't just a fluffy contemporary and it wasn't one of those books that will leave you feeling like you got ran over by a train. It had a perfect mix of humor and sadness.

I really liked the main character, Henry. I also loved his group of friends as well as his family which are quite amazing. I thought each character had interesting and different perspectives. Although I had a difficult time liking Grace in the beginning of the story. It was very obvious that Grace was keeping something major to herself so it is no wonder that her character was more of a mystery. I also enjoyed the interactions between Henry and Grace when they were together.

The main focus of this book is really solving the mystery that is Grace and Henry slowly builds a relationship with her. Grace does have some tragedy in her past which is greatly impacting her present life. Henry is patient and tries to be there for Grace even though he wants to move forward and focus on a future with her. For Henry, Grace become his total focus often to the detriment of other things in his life. In addition to being a story of first love, Henry learns a lot about himself, his family, and his friends over the course of the story.

Overall, Our Chemical Hearts is a great read. It's so well written and original. *JK*

Burn Baby, Burn Baby by Kevin Craig.

Francis Fripp, (France to his best friend Trig), endured years of abuse from his dad, culminating in a horrific burning incident when he was in elementary school. Now he is 17, and his dad cannot come anywhere near him, but France continues to suffer from the relentless tormenting, bullying and name-calling of some of his peers because of the physical scars his dad left him with. Readers will quickly realize that France also has massive emotional scars which seem to cause him even greater harm and put the good parts of his life at risk; he doesn’t think he is worthy of romantic attention from the new girl in school, Rachel Higgins, and that the long friendship and unconditional support of Trig are undeserved.

This is a story of a young man trying to find where he fits in a cruel, but unfortunately all too realistic world, where the school jock/chief bully keeps getting away with his sadistic behavior towards Francis, until one of his own henchman finally sees the truth and speaks up for Francis, in a violently shocking and unexpected conclusion. Readers will be drawn into the relationship between France and Trig, a true friendship between two young men who have grown up together, with a bond that apparently cannot be broken, even when France pushes Trig away for caring too much. The typical older, male teen interests of girls and alcohol are included, but in a believable way; readers will understand why Francis thinks he needs to drink before he can talk to Rachel, and applaud her for telling him not to. The secondary characters are equally well-drawn, especially Trig’s dad, who is a gem of a male role-model to fatherless Francis.

At times this story was so vividly written it was impossible to keep reading; brace yourself for the horrific first-person descriptions of the abuse suffered by Francis as a child. This is a truly unforgettable novel for older teens, with characters that will stay with the reader long after the all-too brief 150 pages have been devoured.
(Burn Baby, Burn Baby by Kevin Craig.Published December 2014 by Curiosity Quills Press. Reviewed by Sian Marshall)