Tag: wndb

Twinchantment

~ rachelbenzine ~ Leave a comment

Review:

In the Kingdom of Kalloon, magic has been outlawed for decades. After a magical attack on the royal family, it was decided that the only way to keep everyone safe was to get rid of all magic and potentially magic beings. Black cats, twins, and other potentially magic beings obviously also had to go. Any magic-weilders were banished from the land to the Twists. And this sounds great in theory… until the twin princesses Sara and Flissa are born, and their parents decide to conceal their twin-ness and introduce them to the world as Princess Flissara. The girls have lived as one for twelve years, and their Ascension Day (when they will officially be in line for the throne) is drawing near. However, when the Queen is attacked with magic, Sara and Flissa must go on a journey to the Twists in hopes of saving her and the Kingdom of Kalloon.

Favorite Passage:

“It was like Sara had reached inside Flissa and twisted her stomach.
“I like sharing a life with you,” she said. “I thought you did too.”
Sara sighed. She looked tired. She squeezed Flissa’s hands. “I like you. I love you. But I don’t want to be you, and I don’t want you to have to be me. It’s not fair. To either of us.””
– Chapter 16, Flissa

What I Loved Most:

Flissa and Sara are extremely different girls. Flissa is athletic and adventurous, ready to race horses or compete in swordsmanship tournaments. Sara loves people – making connections with both nobility and servants, speaking publicly to the kingdom, etc. Their strengths complement each other, and they can fill in for one another’s weaknesses. I loved that one personality type isn’t prized over the other. It doesn’t matter if you’re outgoing or shy, if you’re athletic or charismatic… what matters is learning how to embrace who you naturally are.

Read this book if you like:

Magic, people of color, adventures, siblings, things that aren’t always as they appear

Book Details:

With the Fire on High

~ rachelbenzine ~ Leave a comment

Review:

The two most important people in Emoni Santiago’s life are her daughter (two year old Emma, affectionately called Babygirl) and the grandmother who is raising her (‘Buela). Emoni is a senior in high school this year. When her school decides to offer an elective class in culinary arts, she is torn between the desire to improve her cooking skills and the knowledge that she doesn’t have time for a seemingly frivolous class. But Emoni’s cooking seems to be magical – it brings out emotions in the people who eat it. In her heart, she knows that cooking is her calling.

I absolutely adored With the Fire on High. The chapters are written in short vignettes, so it’s a great book to read if you only have a couple minutes at a time. But be forewarned – it’s so compelling that you can’t help but pick it up again shortly after you put it down. It’s a great read for high school students, particularly for those who are trying to decide how they want to navigate life after high school. It comes out one week from today, and is a must to add to your TBR list!

Favorite Passage:

I dream everyday for Babygirl. I see people in business suits on the bus and I imagine Babygirl grown up with a briefcase and a nice executive office job. I watch a TV show and imagine Babygirl as a famous actress winning an Oscar. There’s so much I want for her that somethings I think the seams of my skin aren’t enough to contain every hope I have. And I whisper it to her all the time. When I’m feeding her. When she’s asleep in my arms. When we are playing at the park. I whisper all the everything I know she can be and the ways I’ll fight for her to be them. I want her to know her entire life her mommy may not have been much but that her moms did everything so that she could be an accumulation of the best dreams.
— Dreams

What I Loved Most:

I’ve read several books about teen pregnancy, but they always seem to be about that moment when the girl finds out she’s pregnant and is deciding what she wants to do. With the Fire on High is an empowering story of a teenager who is successfully raising her daughter. It goes beyond the “OMG I’m pregnant” time period to focus instead on what it looks like to raise a child while being in school and working to help support a household. Emoni is a great mom, and I loved exploring her mindset and the way she cares so fiercely for her daughter.

Read this book if you like:

Contemporary fiction, teen moms, dreaming, charting your own path

Book Details:

Color Me In

~ rachelbenzine ~ Leave a comment

Review:

At the beginning of Color Me In, Neveah Levitz is just beginning to understand what life is like with separated parents. She and her mom recently moved to her mom’s family home in Harlem, which seems leagues away from the affluent neighborhood she grew up in. Between taking the subway to her private school back near her old house and learning how to navigate the intricacies of her new neighborhood, Neveah has to figure out how to adjust to her new reality.

Neveah’s mom is African American and Baptist (Christian), and her dad is ethnically and somewhat-religiously Jewish. She has never worked out where exactly that puts her, or how to fit in with either side of her heritage. Her school is mostly white, and she knows she doesn’t fully belong there. However, upon moving in with her darker-skinned relatives, she begins to see the challenges most African American people are confronted with daily – the ones she has avoided as she usually passes as white. To further complicate things, her dad decides she should embrace her Jewish side by having a belated bat mitzvah rather than a sweet sixteen birthday party. This story chronicles Neveah’s struggles to figure out who she really is.

Color Me In is a wonderful story of identity and coming of age and trying to decide who you want to be. Diaz wrote this book semi-autobiographically – she is a multiracial woman who grew up navigating the complexities that come along with having a multicultural identity. As such, the realness and genuineness of this story shine through every word. This would be a great read for high schoolers as they are navigating their own identities, but I also loved it as a twenty-six year old woman. I received an Advanced Reader’s Copy of Color Me In from the publisher, Delacorte Press. This book will be published in August 2019 – make sure to keep your eyes out for it!

**Trigger warning for sexual assault.**

Favorite Passage:

The rage I’ve felt for so long bubbles over, and the avalanche of emotion is almost impossible to withstand. I want her to know that her words don’t disappear when they leave her lips; they create tiny invisible lacerations, reminders that the sum of my parts will never be sufficient. I want to stop being expected to give people the benefit of the doubt as I take a seat at the table I would never have been invited to if I were three shades closer to my mom. I want to stop feeling like an imposter in my own skin, undeserving of my rich blended heritage.
–Chapter 36

What I Loved Most:

I have never read a book written from a perspective of someone who seems to have white privilege while being a person of color. Colorism in our American society allows people who look “more white” to escape much of the discrimination that their darker-skinned peers do. Neveah’s cousin Jordan, who is dark skinned, challenges Neveah to identify the way that her lighter skin affords her privileges that Jordan will never get. In this book, we see Neveah learn that by remaining silent when she sees racism, she is complicit in the continuing oppression of people of color.

Read this book if you like:

Coming of age stories, poetry, searching for identity, multicultural families, calling out white privilege

Book Details:

  • Author: Natasha Diaz
  • Publisher: Delacorte Press
  • Date of Publication: August 20, 2019
  • Age Recommendation: High School
  • Pre-order Color Me In from Amazon if you’d like to own a copy!