BOOK REVIEWS
Open by Andre Agassi: “Surprisingly candid . . . The baseline bad boy serves up his harrowing anecdotes with the same force he put behind every on-court ace.” Entertainment Weekly 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2009
The Help by Kathryn Stockett: Southern whites' guilt for not expressing gratitude to the black maids who raised them threatens to become a familiar refrain. But don't tell Kathryn Stockett because her first novel is a nuanced variation on the theme that strikes every note with authenticity. In a page-turner that brings new resonance to the moral issues involved, she spins a story of social awakening as seen from both sides of the American racial divide. From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com Reviewed by Sybil Steinberg
Zorro by Isabel Allende: In her latest historical novel, she imaginatively creates, in the words of the narrator, "the origins of the legend"--the legend being none other than Zorro, the famous Robin Hood of eighteenth-century colonial California. Brad Hooper
Copyright © American Library Association.
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie : a Flavia de Luce mystery by C. Alan Bradley:
In an early 1950s English village, Flavia is preoccupied with retaliating against her lofty older sisters when a rude, redheaded stranger arrives to confront her eccentric father, a philatelic devotee. Equally adept at quoting 18th-century works, listening at keyholes and picking locks, Flavia learns that her father, Colonel de Luce, may be involved in the suicide of his long-ago schoolmaster and the theft of a priceless stamp. Publisher’s Weekly Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc.
The Gates of the Alamo by Stephen Harrigan: A huge, riveting, deeply imagined novel about the siege and fall of the Alamo in 1836-an event that formed the consciousness of Texas and that resonates through American history-The Gates of the Alamo follows the lives of three people whose fates become bound to the now-fabled Texas fort. The story unfolds with vivid immediacy and describes the pivotal battle from the perspective of the Mexican attackers as well as the American defenders. Filled with dramatic scenes, and abounding in fictional and historical personalities-among them James Bowie, David Crockett, William Travis, and General Santa Anna. Amazon.com
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins: A not-too-distant future, the United States of America has collapsed, weakened by drought, fire, famine, and war, to be replaced by Panem, a country divided into the Capitol and 12 districts. Each year, two young representatives from each district are selected by lottery to participate in The Hunger Games. Part entertainment, part brutal intimidations of the subjugated districts, the televised games are broadcast throughout Panem as the 24 participants are forced to eliminate their competitors, literally. The plot is tense, dramatic, and engrossing. Jane Henriksen Baird, Anchorage Public Library, AK School Library Journal
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