Bookburger

30-Sec Lit Crit: The Hollywood Sisters: Backstage Pass by Mary Wilcox

[HEY BURGERFOLK! We're back from vacation, and totally thrilled to welcome to our newest teen reviewer, Jocelyn! Here's her take on the first novel in a new series from Mary Wilcox--oh, and if you like this one, #2 is out March 13....]


Backstage Pass is a very fun read about the kind of life the rest of us have only dreamed about (and I'm sure we've all wished for it at one time or another!): life in Hollywood. It sounds great, doesn't it? In Backstage Pass, Jessica Ortiz has had to leave behind her friends and move to Hollywood, because her older sister, Eva, is the newest Hollywood It-girl. Jessica's not like most people in LA, though. She's not trying to become a singer or an actress or anything. She wants to help Eva, though. These sisters get along a lot better than any I've known in real life! They're not totally unbelievably close all the time, though, so it's okay. Anyway, Jessica wants to help out her sister by catching whoever's trying to sabotage Eva. Which, of course, is not as easy as she thinks--whoever it is, they're trying to frame Jessica!

It's a really entertaining read, of course, especially because dreaming about celebrity life is always fun. Obviously--why do you think People and Us Weekly are so popular? Still, though, it could have been a lot better. Mostly because of the characters involved--they didn't seem exactly real to me, except for Jessica. It's a good book, still, but not as good as some other books I've read that are similar--and books about life in Hollywood are everywhere right now! I guess it's some tough competition, as there are some really fantastic ones out there. Backstage Pass is fun enough to make me anxious for the sequel (as you'll be if you read it!), but it's not fabulous. It's a fun way to pass a boring afternoon, though! 

between the buns with...margo rabb

Cures for Heartbreak is Margo Rabb's debut novel, and it's the kind of book that makes you feel she'll be around for a while. This New York writer tells us the story of a very New York girl who searches for love while coping with the death of her mom, the weirdness of her dad's new girlfriend, and a family history shadowed by the Holocaust. We think it's a beautiful read....so we asked Margo to take our pop quiz, and here's what she said:

Who is your favorite writer that most people have never heard of?

Zibby O’Neal, who wrote In Summer Light.  I first read it when I was seventeen, and afterward I wrote in my diary: “It’s one of the few books I’ve read about someone who’s my age which gives a teenager any bit of credit for the ability to think, to be mature—to not be an idiot.”

Laurie Colwin, the author of short stories, novels, and essays on cooking—Happy All the Time, Passion and Affect, and Home Cooking are a few of my favorites.

Betty Fussell, who wrote My Cooking Wars (I love food writers.)  It’s not only about food, but about being a wife and mother in the 1950s, and reading it made me incredibly grateful to be a woman in this era.

What kid or teen books rocked your world growing up?
Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery. My best friend and I call ourselves Anne-heads, and a few summers ago we made a pilgrimage to Prince Edward Island, where the books are set. Anne is like a religious figure there.  Her image adorns everything from license plates to clothing, candy, soap and dinnerware; even her favorite drink, Raspberry Cordial, is sold at local convenience stores. We even went to a faux Anne village, and met a boy dressed up as Gilbert Blythe, Anne’s true love.  Life doesn’t get much better than that.

Describe your ideal place to write.
A quiet room with no phone, no email, and hopefully a view of the trees (not a thing you take for granted in New York City, where I grew up and still live.) A nice warm cat on the lap would be a plus, too. In fact, I think writer’s retreats should let you borrow a cat to keep your lap warm while you’re typing.

Your life is a TV series. Name the theme song, one event that would be on the "best of" episode, and one that would be on the blooper reel.
The theme song at the moment would have to be “Who Needs Sleep?” since I gave birth to a baby girl three months ago.  The song is by Bare Naked Ladies, though I haven’t listened to them in ten years.

For the “best of” episode, I’m going to go with the time I was writing my novel in an old fishing shanty in Nantucket in October (the idea of writing in a shanty in Nantucket had sounded very romantic, but in reality it was cold and lonely), and my boyfriend (who is now my husband) surprised me by knocking on my door.  He’d flown all the way from New York City just to visit me for one night.  I felt like a character in a romance novel. 

The blooper reel: A long, long time ago I went on a date with a guy who told me, “Why should I read a book when I can just see the movie?”  Indeed.

Burger-flippers want to know: have you ever had a job that required you to wear a geeky uniform? Details, please!
When I was a freshman in college I looked for a work-study job late and the only one I could find was on the grounds crew.  I’m five-foot-one and less than 100 pounds—not exactly muscle-clad maintenance-woman material.  I wore overalls—yuck—and shoveled gravel on the college walkways.  The guys on the crew let me off pretty easy though—eventually I became more of a mascot.

We'd like to name a burger in your honor.  What kind of fixins should
it have?
I’m going to go high-end here: there’s a burger made at one of the fancy restaurants in NYC that has both foie gras and black truffles and costs $69.  I’d like that to be my burger, because it sure beats White Castle.

30 SEC LIT CRIT: How to Get Suspended and Influence People by Adam Selzer

[review by lovely Leila Roy, parachuting in from Bookshelves of Doom]

Fourteen-year-old Leon isn't your stereotypical "gifted child":

Now, on TV or in the movies, whenever the main character is a boy genius or something, the smart classes are made up of dorks who tuck their shirts into their underwear, do math in their heads, and might actually sign up for the good grooming activity.  In reality, our advanced classes and gifted pools were always made up of a bunch of miscreant kids who just happened to read books from the adult section of the library.  Many of us even read newspapers.  That was all.  The real dorks weren't smart enough to get in.

When he and the rest of the advanced students are told they are to make health-related videos for the sixth and seventh-graders, they aren't interested in recreating the snorefests that they've been subjected to for years:

It sounded to me like the school was just trying to spare the expense of buying a bunch of new videos, but I had to admit that the project sounded like fun.  When Mr. Streich passed around the list of possible subjects, I looked them over and was a bit surprised to see that sex ed was on the list.  They were actually going to trust an eighth-grader to make a sex-ed video?  Were they drunk when they wrote out the list of topics?  It was like being handed a live grenade and being invited to lob it at one of the teachers.  Eating disorders struck me as a good topic, too, because you'd have a great excuse to do a puking scene, but I couldn't say no to the chance to make a sex-ed video that every student really wanted to see.

At first, Leon is mainly concerned with cramming as much nudity as possible into his video, but as he progresses, he becomes more and more interested in making Great Art That Might Help Kids Understand Themselves.  Of course, what with the subject matter (and the nudity) some adults don't see it quite the same way. 

How to Get Suspended and Influence People is a freaking laugh riot.  Leon is super smart but not overly mature for his age, I loved his friends and his parents.  Totally fun and enjoyable (and educational, but not in an annoying or overly obvious way).

I wouldn't be all that surprised if this one gets challenged at some point -- though that would be a tad ironic, since it is partly a story about censorship.  The book jacket will hopefully (HOPEFULLY) make the content obvious to any freak-out-prone adults.  The inside flap is very clear about the topic of Leon's project and the word 'smart-ass' pops up both there and on the back cover, so maybe they'll steer clear. 

If they don't, they'll probably find something to be offended by -- the gifted kids pretend to be Satanists to annoy a teacher, there is some swearing, some talk about pot and (this might end up being the biggie) one of Leon's main video goals (other than flashing boob pictures) is to get a "masturbation is normal" message across.

As I said though, WAY FUN.  I hope that it finds an audience, and I hope that there'll be more from Adam Selzer soon.

the clique movie--and giveaway!

Will there EVER be a movie made of The Clique books? This is the burning question on the minds of many burgerfolk who've read our interview with Clique series author Lisi Harrison.  We flippers have made it our mission to answer this query, so we've been dialing our Hollywood sources (ok, our cousin in Redondo Beach) in a quest for info. While our investigation continues, we ask you this question:

who would YOU cast (other than yourself) to play Claire, Massie, Dylan and the other roles in the big-screen versions of the Clique books?

ATTENTION CLIQUE FANS:  Check out our HUGE giveaway, including five copies of The Clique #10: Sealed with a Diss...
 

10 SEC LIT CRIT: Boys That Bite by Mari Mancusi

Every full moon, it seems, a novel about nightstalking dental misfits turns up in our mailbox.  Here's teen reviewer Hannah's take on Mari Mancusi's Boys That Bite, which came out in paperback last year.

A few months ago I reviewed Mari Mancussi's Stake That! I liked it alot,
and I was incredibly pumped to read its prequel, Boys That Bite. And it didn't dissapoint me--I couldn't put it down. Imagine being bit a week before prom by an incredibly gorgeous vampire (who was actually going for your twin sister).  Hard to picture? Well, you honestly don't have to... you could just read this book! Because that's exactly what happens to our friend Summer, who's just trying to get through high school, and doesn't really need an aversion to sunlight on her plate. Mari Mancussi has done it again and I'm betting she'll do it at least one more time... I can't wait to read Girls That Growl!