The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo

I was blown away by The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo!  This novel is so beautifully written that it will leave you wanting so much more.  In verse, Acevedo tells us the story of a young Dominican girl, Xiomara, and her journey to discover her voice. We are given a character that we root for every step of the way.

Xiomara is a teenage who has kept silent for too long.  She has kept silent as boys, and even men, have continued to comment about her curves.  She has kept silent as her strict mother has placed her own troubled past on to the shoulders of her daughter.  She has kept silent just as she is expected to do.

This silence has manifested itself over the years in a book filled with her words, her poems.  When she meets a boy who wants to listen, her words start to find their way out.  But not until her English teacher introduces her to the world of slam poetry does Xiomara finally find her voice.  And oh, what a voice it is. 

From Amazon:

“Crackles with energy and snaps with authenticity and voice.” —Justina Ireland, author of Dread Nation

“An incredibly potent debut.” —Jason Reynolds, author of the National Book Award Finalist Ghost

“Acevedo has amplified the voices of girls en el barrio who are equal parts goddess, saint, warrior, and hero.” —Ibi Zoboi, author of American Street

Fans of Jacqueline Woodson, Meg Medina, and Jason Reynolds will fall hard for this astonishing #ownvoices novel-in-verse by an award-winning slam poet, about an Afro-Latina heroine who tells her story with blazing words and powerful truth.

Xiomara Batista feels unheard and unable to hide in her Harlem neighborhood. Ever since her body grew into curves, she has learned to let her fists and her fierceness do the talking.

But Xiomara has plenty she wants to say, and she pours all her frustration and passion onto the pages of a leather notebook, reciting the words to herself like prayers—especially after she catches feelings for a boy in her bio class named Aman, who her family can never know about.

With Mami’s determination to force her daughter to obey the laws of the church, Xiomara understands that her thoughts are best kept to herself. So when she is invited to join her school’s slam poetry club, she doesn’t know how she could ever attend without her mami finding out. But she still can’t stop thinking about performing her poems.

Because in the face of a world that may not want to hear her, Xiomara refuses to be silent.

After the Shot Drops by Randy Ribay

With March Madness in full effect, it's pretty appropriate that my latest read was After the Shot Drops by Randy Ribay.  But while basketball plays a role in this novel, it takes more of a back seat to the real issues.  More than basketball, this is a novel about friendship, family, and compassion.  More than once I found myself talking to or yelling at characters in the book, and by my standards, that makes for an excellent read.  To me, that means that I am invested in the characters and story and I care about what is happening.  All very good signs.

After the Shot Drops is a story about Bunny, one of the best high school basketball players in the country.  It is also a story about Nasir, Bunny's best friend.  Told in alternating perspectives, this is a story about Bunny's decision to leave the high school in his home neighborhood and instead accept a scholarship to St. Sebastian's, an expensive private school with a rich basketball history.  Bunny believes that this is what is best to eventually help provide for his family, both through basketball and the better education he will get.  But he made this decision and subsequent announcement without ever talking to Nasir about it.  Nasir feels like he never really mattered to Bunny, that Bunny cares about basketball over everything else. 

While Bunny is trying to lead his new team to a state title, and fit in along the way, Nasir is starting to spend a lot of his time with his cousin Wallace.  But Wallace and his grandma are about to be evicted from their apartment and nobody by Nasir seems willing to help.  When Wallace makes a series of bets against Bunny, with money he doesn't have, he starts to put himself in an every more dangerous situation.  Nasir and Wallace may have a solution, but it may come at the cost of Nasir's rekindled relationship with Bunny.  And maybe even more than that. 

From Amazon:

A powerful novel about friendship, basketball, and one teen's mission to create a better life for his family. Written in the tradition of Jason Reynolds, Matt de la Peña, and Walter Dean Myers, After the Shot Drops now has 3 starred reviews!

* “Belongs on the shelf alongside contemporary heavy-hitters like Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give, Brendan Kiely and Jason Reynolds’s All-American Boys, and Nic Stone’s Dear Martin."—School Library Journal, starred review
  
Bunny and Nasir have been best friends forever, but when Bunny accepts an athletic scholarship across town, Nasir feels betrayed. While Bunny tries to fit in with his new, privileged peers, Nasir spends more time with his cousin, Wallace, who is being evicted. Nasir can't help but wonder why the neighborhood is falling over itself to help Bunny when Wallace is in trouble.

When Wallace makes a bet against Bunny, Nasir is faced with an impossible decision—maybe a dangerous one.

Told from alternating perspectives, After the Shot Drops is a heart-pounding story about the responsibilities of great talent and the importance of compassion.

All We Can Do Is Wait by Richard Lawson

All We Can Do Is Wait by Richard Lawson is a beautifully written story about family and friends, understanding the past, and accepting the future.  Told through the stories of  five different teens, strangers to one another, who have come together because of great tragedy, the reader will become invested in what the future looks like for each of these characters.

When the Tobin Bridge collapses in Boston, people converge on the hospital  where both victims and survivors are being taken.  Through this shared tragedy, five teens come together to comfort one another as they await the news of their loved ones.  We learn about where each of these characters comes from, but also wonder what the future may hold for them.



From Amazon:

Debut author and Vanity Fair film critic Richard Lawson makes your heart stop and time stand still in his extraordinary and life-affirming novel that's perfect for fans of If I Stay and We All Looked Up.

In the hours after a bridge collapse rocks their city, a group of Boston teenagers meet in the waiting room of Massachusetts General Hospital:

Siblings Jason and Alexa have already experienced enough grief for a lifetime, so in this moment of confusion and despair, Alexa hopes that she can look to her brother for support. But a secret Jason has been keeping from his sister threatens to tear the siblings apart...right when they need each other most.

Scott is waiting to hear about his girlfriend, Aimee, who was on a bus with her theater group when the bridge went down. Their relationship has been rocky, but Scott knows that if he can just see Aimee one more time, if she can just make it through this ordeal and he can tell her he loves her, everything will be all right.

And then there's Skyler, whose sister Kate—the sister who is more like a mother, the sister who is basically Skyler's everything—was crossing the bridge when it collapsed. As the minutes tick by without a word from the hospital staff, Skyler is left to wonder how she can possibly move through life without the one person who makes her feel strong when she's at her weakest.

In his riveting, achingly beautiful debut, Richard Lawson guides readers through an emotional and life-changing night as these teens are forced to face the reality of their pasts...and the prospect of very different futures.

Hooper by Geoff Herbach

 I just can't say enough good things about this book.  I absolutely loved it.  Geoff Herbach has given us a novel that is not only about basketball, but about so many other things in life, like family, friendship, love, integrity, compassion, self-discovery, and so many others topics.  I flew through this one and never wanted to put it down, and when I did I always itched for that moment to pick it back up. 

 Herbach tells the story of Adam Reed, a high school sophomore, who has quickly become one of the top basketball players in Minnesota.  On the court he is outgoing and passionate,  but once he steps off the hardwood, he is quiet, reserved, and very unsure of who he really is.  We learn about the difficult past he had as a child in Poland, but also see the beauty in the woman who has adopted him and given him a wonderful life in the United States.

Through his friendship, and eventual budding romance, with Carli Anderson, a fellow classmate and basketball phenom, he starts to find his voice.  But it is his inclusion on the top AAU basketball program in the state that really helps Adam figure out who he is and what he stands for.

Hooper is beautiful and captivating and heartwarming.  I had heard so many good things about this book from the likes of Andrew Smith and Gae Polisner that I knew I had to give it a read.  And I am so glad I did.  It was amazing.  Not to mention there are several references to Joel Embiid and Andrew Wiggins, two of my favorite NBA players and two Kansas Jayhawks!

From Amazon:

From Geoff Herbach, the critically acclaimed author of the Stupid Fast series, comes a compelling new YA novel about basketball, prejudice, privilege, and family, perfect for fans of Jordan Sonnenblick, Andrew Smith, and Matt de la Peña.

For Adam Reed, basketball is a passport. Adam’s basketball skills have taken him from an orphanage in Poland to a loving adoptive mother in Minnesota. When he’s tapped to play on a select AAU team along with some of the best players in the state, it just confirms that basketball is his ticket to the good life: to new friendships, to the girl of his dreams, to a better future.

But life is more complicated off the court. When an incident with the police threatens to break apart the bonds Adam’s finally formed after a lifetime of struggle, he must make an impossible choice between his new family and the sport that’s given him everything.

The Disturbed Girl's Dictionary by Nonieqa Ramos

The Disturbed Girl's Dictionary by Nonieqa Ramos is a heartbreaking story that will pull at your heartstrings as you desperately wish to take these characters in to your own home in order to protect them. 

It is the story of Macy, a girl who has been labeled as "disturbed" by her school.  But who wouldn't be disturbed if you had to live the life that she does.  From dealing with a mother who has no idea how to be a mother, to a father in jail, to a little brother who has been taken away by CPS, to trying to protect your best friends, it is a hard life to live.  But Macy does her best in trying to not let these things define her.   She finds hope in knowing that she has room to grow and become the person she knows she is destined to become, someone much greater than the lot she has been given. 

From Amazon:

Macy's school officially classifies her as "disturbed," but Macy isn't interested in how others define her. She's got more pressing problems: her mom can't move off the couch, her dad's in prison, her brother's been kidnapped by Child Protective Services, and now her best friend isn't speaking to her. Writing in a dictionary format, Macy explains the world in her own terms, complete with gritty characters and outrageous endeavors. With an honesty that's both hilarious and fearsome, slowly Macy reveals why she acts out, why she can't tell her incarcerated father that her mom's cheating on him, and why her best friend needs protection . . . the kind of protection that involves Macy's machete.

And She Was by Jessica Verdi

Once again I was given the opportunity to review a book for ALAN Picks.  And She Was by Jessica Verdi was the book I was sent and the following is the review that was written for publication:

Dara Baker is a recent high school graduate who is working to fulfill her dreams.  Since she was young she has dreamed of becoming a professional tennis player, taking on the best in the game on the biggest stages.  But achieving this isn’t easy.  She lacks the financial resources of many of the other young players.  To complicate things even further, her single mother, is not supportive of what Dara is trying to accomplish.  Mellie Baker offers little in terms of support, both emotionally and financially.  Her mother is often distant, keeping the details of her past a secret. 

When Dara needs a passport to play in her first professional tournament, she goes in search of the birth certificate her mom tells her is lost.  What she finds changes her life forever.  Her birth certificate contains the names of a mother and father. But the mother’s name does not match up with the woman who has raised her and the father’s name is one that Dara has never heard before.  When Dara’s mom finally reveals the truth, it causes Dara’s world to spin out of control.  But could that spin bring Dara to a greater place in her life?

In the last novel from Jessica Verdi, she gives us a novel about self-discovery, love, and family.  The reader will see the growth, not only in Dara the narrator, but in her mom Mellie.  Verdi does something in her story that isn’t often done in young adult literature.  She presents to us the perspective of an adult in the story through the series of emails Mellie will end up sending to her daughter.  Readers will be able to gain a better understanding of the struggle she has gone through in trying to protect her family in a world that is not always kind to people who do not conform to the norms of society. 

From Amazon:

Dara's lived a sheltered life with her single mom, Mellie. Now, at eighteen, she's dreaming of more. When Dara digs up her never-before-seen birth certificate, her world implodes. Why are two strangers listed as her parents?

Dara confronts her mother, and is stunned by what she learns: Mellie is transgender. The unfamiliar name listed under "father"? That's Mellie. She transitioned when Dara was a baby, after Dara's birth mother died. She changed her name, started over.

But Dara still has more questions than answers. Reeling, she sets off on an impromptu road trip with her best guy friend, Sam, in tow. She is determined to find the extended family she's never even met. What she does discover -- and what her mother reveals, piece by piece, over emails -- will challenge and change Dara more than she can imagine.

This is a gorgeous, timely, and essential novel about the importance of being our true selves. The back matter includes an author's note and resources for readers.