You're Getting a Baby Sister!

This board book, written by Sheila Sweeny Higginson and illustrated by Sam Williams, was a big hit with my 18 month-old son and me.

Why did I like it? This book not only talked about how cute and fun baby sisters can be, it also talked about how horrible they can be—they drool, smell, scream, pull hair, break toys, steal your mom and dad time. What jerks! But when a kid is getting a baby sibling, what good does sugarcoating it actually do? So this approach made a lot of sense to me. But the book doesn’t leave it at that. It goes on to explain why baby sisters are that way—they just don’t know better. So true. And then the book takes it one step further and tells kids how fun it can be to teach your baby sister all that you know.

It’s a great book. Informative on both the good and bad points of having a baby sister, and it leaves the reader with an overall, positive message.

I do, however, have one thing about this book that I didn’t like. When explaining that baby sisters don’t know better, the book says, “she’s not smart yet like you.” And I disagree. Babies are incredibly smart. Not knowing something doesn’t make a person or child not smart. I know, I know, it’s a small matter of word choice, and I am being nit-picky. But if “she’s not smart” does that make her stupid? Anyway, that phrase rubbed me wrong when I read it, but if I were in the market for a book about getting a baby sister (I borrowed this one from the library), that phrase wouldn’t stop me from buying this book for myself or someone else.

Now, why did my son like this book? Maybe it was the colorful pictures, maybe it was the fun rhyming, I don’t know. But an entire week after having returned this book to the library, he is still asking to read it. “Baby sister? Baby sister!” It’s pretty cute.

There is also a book by the same author and illustrator called, You're Getting a Baby Brother!

PS: My mom came over and was reading books with my son. He gave her this book to read, and she read it to him. Afterward, she came up to me, book in hand, and said, “You’re pregnant! This is how you’re telling me!” No. One day, but not today.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

I had heard from a lot of people that The Hunger Games trilogy was a good read, so I finally got around to reading the first book. I started reading Friday night. I was done, in tears, Sunday night.

To say The Hunger Games was good would be absolutely true, yet slightly misleading. I found it horrifying and was slightly traumatized by the end. But I LOVED the book.

Here is one brief synopsis from the official website: Set in a dark vision of the near future, a terrifying reality TV show is taking place. Twelve boys and twelve girls are forced to appear in a live event called The Hunger Games. There is only one rule: kill or be killed. When sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen steps forward to take her younger sister's place in the games, she sees it as a death sentence. But Katniss has been close to death before. For her, survival is second nature.

The book takes a dramatic look at the effects of violence on adolescents, and while it is in the extreme (I had to keep reminding myself throughout the book that the society I was reading about was not my society), it raises some interesting questions. The book also begins an examination of politics (again not our politics, but the principles there are true). While the book looks at some pretty serious issues, it is not didactic. The author, Suzanne Collins, perfectly blends an intense narrative with these serious issues.

And while I say I found The Hunger Games horrifying, amid the horror is a delightful mix of humor and wit that balances out the tragedy. All-in-all I’d say this book is practically perfect in every way. If you can only read one book this year, read The Hunger Games.

Fablehaven by Brandon Mull

By the time I finished reading the Fablehaven series by Brandon Mull, it had been a couple years since I started it. Why did it take me two years to read five preteen/young adult fantasy novels? Excellent question. Well, there are a couple reasons. First, I didn’t find the first one interesting enough to quickly pick up the second one. Second, I borrowed them from my mother-in-law who was also loaning them to a friend. So I had to wait until her friend finished, and then I had to wait until either she or I remembered to give/ask for the next one.

So why didn’t I find the first one interesting enough to quickly pick up the second one? The scope of the book was narrow. For those who don’t know the premise of the series, allow me a quick summary: the books follow two young siblings who discover that their grandparents are caretakers over a magical preserve, and then these two kids proceed to have a variety of adventures interacting with the magical community of the preserve. So the scope of the book was narrow because all the action in the first book was centered at the magical preserve, Fablehaven, which for a first book introducing the reader to a new world is kind of understandable. But at the same time, the first book didn’t leaving me anxiously wanting more.

The next question is: did the later books get any better than the first? Yes! And I would say the rest were all significantly better than the first and all at about the same quality as each other. The later books very rapidly began integrating characters and events from outside Fablehaven, and then the two main characters themselves began encountering magical creatures in the “real” world (outside of Fablehaven)—and throughout the world. Which satisfied my dislike of the narrowness of the first book.

Personally, I think the series’ greatest strength is the pacing. Brandon Mull gets things started and keeps things going. I may have encountered passages that made me want to stop reading maybe once or twice after the first book. But while the books are set at a good pace, they aren’t so intense I couldn’t ever stop if I needed to do something else. And it was easy to get back into them once I picked them back up.

The series greatest weakness is that the books tend to be a bit didactic. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy learning from literature and I appreciate books that support good morals and values, but I don’t like it when an adult character gives a kid character a lecture on how they can improve (which probably happens a little more than once per book in this series). I see it as a failing of the author. A good author should be able to show good morals and values and principles like repentance and redemption instead of just talking about them.

Now, I must concede that in my mid twenties I am not the author’s target audience. The books are intended for preteens and young adults. If I try to imagine twelve-year-old me, I think I would have devoured this series with reckless abandon.

Overall, the books are entertaining and fun to read. I would recommend the series to anyone looking for a fun bit of light reading.

Introduction

I'd like to create this blog in order to provide readers with reviews for books, author biographies and interviews, supplemental bookish information, and a virtual book club.