Where'd you go Bernadette - Maria Semple

Where'd you go Bernadette - Semple, Maria

Summary: When her notorious, hilarious, volatile, talented, troubled, and agoraphobic mother goes missing, teenage Bee begins a trip that takes her to the ends of the earth to find her.

Booklist Reviews
*Starred Review* Bernadette Fox, practically a shut-in, who's hired a virtual assistant in India to remotely arrange every task, from hiring a gardener to planning the trip to Antarctica she's promised her star-student daughter, Bee seems pretty crazy. But don't be fooled. Suspicions that madcap Bernadette is as clever as her last name implies will be confirmed heartily. When she's party to some unfortunate events, her erratic behavior leads her husband, Microsoft guru Elgin Branch, to commit her to a local mental-health facility. But Bernadette intercepts his plan at the pass, escapes the staged intervention, and disappears without a trace. Though much of the story is told through documents—e-mails, letters, magazine articles—precocious young teen Bee as narrator is great company, entertaining and convincing in her comportment. TV writer Semple (Arrested Development) pokes fun at the Pacific Northwest as only a Seattlelite can and concocts a caper that, if seen from outer space, might be a mess but in the minutiae of its tangles is clear and rewarding. Under the guise of a hilarious romp, Semple explores the universal questions of why we do what we do and love what we love to some sweet and unexpected ends. Copyright 2012 Booklist Reviews.

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Necromancing the stone - Lish McBride

Necromancing the stone - McBride, Lish

Summary: Six weeks after escaping from the necromancer Douglas, Sam LaCroix is under the protection of the Blackthorn pack of werewolves and fey hounds and unsure if his necromancer rival is dead.



Kirkus Review
A slacker wrangles zombies, werewolves, gnomes and gods in this amiable second entry in a humor-horror mashup series (Hold Me Closer, Necromancer, 2010). Life is looking up for Samhain LaCroix, college dropout, oldies aficionado and former fry-cook. After accidentally killing the evil necromancer Douglas, Sam has inherited his powers, fortune, minions and seat on the Seattle Council of magical beings. On the downside, Sam's new servants hate him, one of his best friends is now a ghost and another a were-bear, his girlfriend's father has just been murdered, and her werewolf pack blames him…and, oh yeah, apparently Douglas isn't completely dead after all. Fans will be happy to revisit the likable characters and learn more about paranormal politics, but those expecting the first book's manic action, grisly violence and sexy romance will be disappointed by the leisurely pace and wistful, almost melancholic tone. Indeed, the plot consists almost entirely of endless and repetitive meetings, leading up to a climactic confab with his erstwhile enemy. While the story stops dead when a few chapters slip into the viewpoints of secondary characters, only important for setting up the (just barely plausible) denouement, Sam's marvelously witty, self-deprecating narration carries readers along effortlessly to the very end. With most loose plot threads neatly tied off, there is still room for further adventures with Sam and his merry band. After all, they've got rhythm, they've got music, they've got the legions of the undead--who could ask for anything more? (Urban fantasy. 14 & up)(Kirkus Reviews, August 1, 2012)

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The absolutely true diary of a part-time indian

Summary: Budding cartoonist Junior leaves his troubled school on the Spokane Indian Reservation to attend an all-white farm town school where the only other Indian is the school mascot.


Kirkus Reviews
Alexie nimbly blends sharp wit with unapologetic emotion in his first foray into young-adult literature. Fourteen-year-old Junior is a cartoonist and bookworm with a violent but protective best friend Rowdy. Soon after they start freshman year, Junior boldly transfers from a school on the Spokane reservation to one in a tiny white town 22 miles away. Despite his parents' frequent lack of gas money (they're a "poor-ass family"), racism at school and many crushing deaths at home, he manages the year. Rowdy rejects him, feeling betrayed, and their competing basketball teams take on mammoth symbolic proportions. The reservation's poverty and desolate alcoholism offer early mortality and broken dreams, but Junior's knowledge that he must leave is rooted in love and respect for his family and the Spokane tribe. He also realizes how many other tribes he has, from "the tribe of boys who really miss . . . their best friends" to "the tribe of tortilla chips-and-salsa lovers." Junior's keen cartoons sprinkle the pages as his fluid narration deftly mingles raw feeling with funny, sardonic insight. (Fiction. YA) Copyright Kirkus 2007 Kirkus/BPI Communications. All rights reserved.

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Joy for beginners - Erica Bauermeister

Joy for beginners - Bauermeister, Erica

Summary: Six women gather to celebrate their friend Kate's recovery from cancer, where she strikes a bargain with them: to celebrate her new lease on life, she'll do the one thing that's always terrified her, but if she does, each of them will also do one thing that they'd find difficult.

Publishers Weekly Reviews
In Bauermeister's sensual second novel, a party for a woman who has beaten breast cancer results in six friends reconnecting, not just to each other but also to parts of themselves they had long neglected. Admittedly an "incongruous group," with each woman at a different point in her life, Kate's friends agree that each "will do one thing in the next year that is scary or difficult." Kate selects tasks for each of her friends; undertaking the tasks will bring heartbreak, joy, and adventure to everyone. Bauermeister's (The School of Essential Ingredients) evocative prose creates a magical world where gray goo becomes "forgiving dough" in an oven and a woman protects herself from loneliness by hiding in an unruly garden. Kate's well-meaning tasks, be they as grand as a trip to Venice or as banal as baking bread, push the friends toward much-needed awakenings. A book designed to both fill you up and make you hungry for life. (June)

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No-no boy - John Okada

No-no boy - Okada, John

Summary: In the aftermath of World War II, Ichiro, a Japanese American, returns home to Seattle to make a new start after two years in an internment camp and two years in prison for refusing to be drafted.

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