#IMWAYR March 8, 2021

Hello out there. It's #IMWAYR time again, when readers share what they have been reading and find out what others have been up to in the past week. Kathryn hosts the adult version of this meme at Book Date. Jen at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee and Ricki at Unleashing Readers host the kidlit rendition. Whatever you are looking forward to in your next great read, these are fabulous places to start your search.

Happy International Women's Day Everyone! If you are looking for a strong, YA female literary character to celebrate the day/week, I highly recommend the Binti series by Nnedi Okorafor. You can read about them below. 

The Canada Reads Debate begins today and I have read only two of this year's finalists. (I have read more of the long list though.) I will eventually get to them all, just not in time to agree or disagree with the winner. The two I finished are brilliant. 

Titles with a 🍁 indicate this is a Canadian Author and or Illustrator. 

Clicking on the title will take you to the Goodreads page of the book. 

BEGINNING READERS

5 stars

See the Cat: Three Stories About a Dog by David LaRochelle & Mike Wohnoutka (Illustrator)

Quality books for beginning readers are hard to find. They are probably harder to write. Mo Willems hits the sweet spot with his Elephant and Piggie series. See the Cat is an another excellent example of what we hope to find. it’s sweet, funny and clever at the same time. This dog is a character you want to see/read more of.

NON FICTION PICTURE BOOKS

5 stars

Honeybee: The Busy Life of Apis Mellifera by Candace Fleming & Eric Rohmann (Illustrator)

Did you know that before her work is done, a honeybee will have visited thirty thousand flowers and collected enough nectar to make one-twelfth of a teaspoon of honey?

With these jaw dropping, illustrations, you will want to pore over this book again and again. It takes the reader through the life cycle of one Apis Mellifera. Readers learn about the different jobs a worker bee engages in before and after she heads off in search of nectar, water, plant sap or pollen. Fleming builds suspense as she marks each stage in her nonfiction poem with a refrain of Flying? Not yet...  

I really appreciated the extra information in the back matter. It includes a labeled diagram of a bee with extensive details about each part.  Additional information includes a section on how to support honeybees and a list of more facts about these important creatures. A bibliography with internet links and print resources finishes this section off. While neither the author or illustrator are Canadian, Dr. Mark I. Winston, the world's leading expert on bees, who they worked with them on this project, is. 

NOVELS

3.5 stars

Aggie Morton, Mystery Queen: Peril at Owl Park by Marthe Jocelyn 🍁

I wanted to love this more than I did. Aggie, her best friend, Hector Porot, and Grannie Jane, head off to the country to spend Christmas with her older sister, Marjorie and her new husband, James. She is happy to be reunited with Lucy, James' niece. Two other guests arrive to spend the season with them. It looks to be a festive season with an acting troupe pulling together servants and family for a tableaux performance on Christmas Eve. The next morning the three children discover a dead body in the library. The police are called in but the trio do what they can to figure out who the murderer is.
I enjoyed this a lot but wish it was not so long. I worry that while older readers like myself will be undaunted, I'm not so sure about the target audience.

5 stars

Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots & Alex McKenna (Narrator) 🍁

I loved this book. I know it's a trite way to begin a review, but honestly, this is a fascinating look at people working for super villains. Anna is a data analyst who ends up employed by them because it's the only job she can get. When she ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time, a superhero nearly kills her when he throws her against a wall. (She was the token female at a news conference where one of the villains threatened to have the kidnapped mayor's son cut off his own fingers if he didn't get a ransom. It was terrifying.) As she recovers she starts collecting data and realizes that it's actually the superheros, not the villains, who create the most damage and kill the most people. It's all about how it's marketed.

She starts blogging about her findings and ends up head hunted by the most powerful super villain of all. Eventually she ends up in charge of her own department where data collection and analysis is used to create plans to takedown superheros. Unfortunately her boss doesn't have her patience for playing the long game.
I appreciated so much about this book. Anna is not really a sympathetic character, but that didn't stop me from wanting to know how her life might turn out. That she's bisexual adds all kinds of nuances to her relationships. In spite of this, there isn't really sexual content. One relationship that barely gets started ends up in a hilarious disaster. There is some suggestion of a romance between Anna and her boss, but really, this book focuses more on friendships and the role media coverage and marketing manipulate how we see the world. 

This is one of the Canada Reads books. I love that the titles on the list are often ones I wouldn't pick for myself. This is one of those. 

4 stars

Home (Binti 2) by Nnedi Okorafor & Robin Miles (Narrator)

I'm having a hard time separating out what happened in the last two novels in this trilogy because I listened to them back to back. Binti and Okwu, her Meduse friend, return home to earth. Okwu comes in peace as an ambassador. Binti hopes to go on her coming of age pilgrimage, but on the eve of her leaving is taken into the desert by her father's people. One day turns into many as she is initiated into new ways of communicating with the world. While she is away she learns that Okwu and her family have been attacked the Khoush, ancient enemies of the Meduse. It is not known if there are any survivors.

5 stars

The Night Masquerade (Binti 3) by Nnedi Okorafor & Robin Miles (Narrator)

Binti and her new friend, Mwinyi, travel from her desert family back to Binti's Himba family. They arrive to discover they have been murdered by the Khoush and her friend Okwu is missing. The Khoush are patrolling the area searching for him and Binti. Okwu and an army of Meduse are hiding in the lake. In spite of her loss, Binti arranges to meet with the Himba elders to set up a meeting to bring peace to all sides. Even though they betray her by not showing up at the rendezvous, she attempts negotiating with leaders of both armies to try and broker a peace between them. It ends up in disaster, but it's not the end of the book.

The Binti series chronicles a young girl's journey from a small African village in Namibia to a prestigious galactic university, her return home again, and a final departure. It's a metaphor for how we are transformed as we leave home, interact with others, learn and grow. It's about figuring out our identity as we change with each new being we meet and connect to. In the end it's about discovering home inside ourselves.

I'm so excited by Okorafor's writing, I've put a hold on Akata Witch.

 

DISCWORLD NOVELS

I can't believe I didn't finish even one Discworld novel this week!

NONFICTION

5 stars

Call Me Indian: From the Trauma of Residential School to Becoming the NHL's First Treaty Indigenous Player by Fred Sasakamoose

Fred Sasakamoose overcame almost overwhelming obstacles to play hockey for the Chicago Blackhawks in 1954. Even when his time there was over, hockey continued to play an important role throughout the rest of his life. He went on to make huge contributions to his community, the province of Saskatchewan, and Canada. I am not a sports fan, but Sasakamoose is such a gifted storyteller, that his narrative drew me in and wouldn't let go.
I'm working on a detailed review that I'll post closer to the publishing date of May 18. I wish my father-in-law was still alive so I could preorder it for him. He was a hockey fanatic who played the game well into his late 70's. 

It's a testimony to how personable the writing it, that I wept when, after reading the book, I discovered that Sasakamoose died last November of Covid complications. He was one of those who truly left the world a better place than he found it.

CURRENTLY 

The nonfiction title I have on the go is The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert. I'm almost finished listening to Going Postal by Terry Pratchett. I might read it again as soon as it's done. I'm also listening to Furia by Yamile Saied Méndez. I've started Beetle & the Hollowbones by Aliza Layne. I'm making my way through Shopping Cart Boy: Poems of My Life by Joshua Jordan G.H. He was sixteen when he wrote them. They are an emotionally hard read. 

UP NEXT

I plan to read and review a netgalley title, The Case of the Burgled Bundle by Michael Hutchinson. A pile of picture books is waiting for me so I'll try and get to those. I also have a lot of audiobooks lined up. Why oh why does everything come available from the library at the same time?

PROGRESS ON MY READING GOALS 

#MustReadIn2021 5/25 

#MustReadNFIn2021 2/12 one in progress

#MustReadPBIn2021 15/100

Books by Canadian Indigenous Authors: 7/25 one in progress

Books by Canadian Authors: 21/100

Canada Reads 2021 2/5 

Discworld Series 31/41 

Goodreads Reading Challenge: 87/333