One Thing Stolen by Beth Kephart

In 1966, the River Arno  overflowed its banks and flooded the city of Florence. The resulting 600,000 tons of mud, rubble and sewage that flowed through the city’s streets damaged or destroyed millions of masterpieces of art and rare books, as well as displacing 5,000 families. This despair was overshadowed by Mud Angels, people from around the world, who also flooded into Florence to help remove the mud and sludge and help restore both the city and the antiquities.

In One Thing Stolen, Beth Kephart (my favorite author) contrasts the despair and hope described above with the despair and hope of Nadia Caras, a seventeen year old girl in Florence for her professor father’s sabbatical, who suddenly has trouble verbalizing. It is her best friend, her family and a doctor, who provide the hope that she will regain her communication skills.

Although Nadia is supposed to be her father’s right hand during his research of the 1966 flood, she is losing herself in Florence. She is barely sleeping. She, inexplicably, has the urge to steal things, many of which end up in the intricate nests she weaves and hides under her bed. As she wanders the city alone, against her parents’ wishes, she runs into Benedetto, a young boy who steals flowers. He shows up in the oddest places, often giving Nadia a flower. The problem is that no one other than Nadia has seen him.

As Nadia begins to lose herself and think herself crazy, her link to sanity is finding Benedetto. However as much as she searches, he does not want to be found.

Beth Kephart has layered her stories here. There are the constant flashbacks of Nadia and her best friend, Maggie, in Philadelphia, when Nadia was in full control, when she was the one with all the ideas, the leader of the two person pack, in contrast to Nadia’s struggles now. There is the story of Nadia’s father’s empty notebook, his story of the flood more resembling a drought. There is the story of Nadia’s brother Jack and his budding love affair with the beautiful Perdita. And there is Katherine, a Mud Angel, a doctor and her father’s friend who devotes herself to helping Nadia.

While the story is an unusual one (I can’t think of any comparable plot), it is the descriptive use of language that makes any Beth Kephart book special. It is through this language that we get the feel of Florence, its alleyways, its cobblestone streets, its cathedrals, its myriad of markets blanketing the bridges over the Arno. It is through language that we understand Nadia’s frustration with herself, her fear that she might be going crazy. It’s through language that we understand all the different types of nests that birds construct (who knew?).

If you want a literary treat, read a Beth Kephart book (adult or young adult), my favorites being: One Thing Stolen, Nothing But Ghosts, Small Damages and You Are My Only….heck I love them all.

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Top Ten 2011

For a while, I thought I’d be hard pressed to come up with a 2011 Top 10 list for YA books. It was only in the past two weeks that I heaved a sigh of relief. Late reads solidified my list. So, here goes:

Topping my list at Number 1 is You Are My Only by Beth Kephart. I commented that, “As always, Kephart chooses her words with care, and while the language is not as ‘ethereal’ as in some of her recent books, her images and descriptions and wording remain essential in understanding the characters and surroundings.  There are secrets that need to be unearthed and things to ponder.  There are relationships that you are jealous you are not a part of and those you are glad you have not experienced.  You can read You Are My Only quickly and enjoy the story or you can read it slowly and savor every word and nuance and description.  Either way, you must read Beth Kephart’s latest addition to Young Adult literature.”

Night Circus by Erin Morganstern may or may not be considered a YA book, but I’m sure it will appeal to teens, so it comes in at number 2. It takes place in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The Night Circus is dream-like.  Celia and Marco are unwilling pawns in a competition between two magicians, one that will last years, if not decades.  The competition’s only rule: there are no rules and neither player knows what to do and how a winner is determined. Erin Morgenstern has written a dream-like book similar to the dream state of the book’s Circus of Dreams.  It’s indescribable.  A must read.

Life: An Exploded Diagram by Mal Peet, a late comer to my 2011 reading, lands the number 3 slot.  Peet masterfully merges two stories, the first about England during WW II and and the second about the Cuban Missile Crisis into a book you can’t put down. His language, his sarcasm, his observations, his stories keep you reading way past bedtime.

Any Top 10 without a Brian Selznick book is lacking, so I must include Wonderstruck. Ben lives in Gunflint, Minnesota in 1977.  Rose is a lonely deaf child, living in Hoboken, NJ, overlooking the Hudson River, in 1927. Similar to Mal Peet, how these two stories, taking place 50 years apart, converge is one of the wonders of Wonderstruck.    There are more, such as the fact that Ben’s story is primarily written while Rose’s story is presented entirely in illustrations.  Selznick’s illustrations entice the viewer to scrutinize every line, every object, every picture, they are just so amazing. While you’re at it, reread The Invention of Hugo Cabret. I’m sure you’ll find something new in each drawing.

You know how much I love Joan Bauer and Close to Famous was as good the second tiem around as it was the first time. Number 5 on the list, it’s got great characters, a good story, and luscious sounding baked goods. It teaches you how to overcome adversity.

Coming in at nubmer 6 and 7 are Liesl and Po by Lauren Oliver and Widsom’s Kiss by Catherine Gilbert Murdock, two wonderful fairy tales with amazing characters, wonderful writing and absorbing stories. Liesl and Po is geared more for upper elementary or lower middle school while Wisdom’s Kiss is for slightly older audiences.

Eona: The Last Dragoneye by Alison Goodman is an action adventure with roots in Chinese astrology. The sequel to Eon: Dragoneye Reborn, it is action packed. This will attract boys and girls since there are  protagonists of both sexes. It is a marvelous way to introduce teens to the 12 astrological signs.

Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine got great reviews and rightly so. Twleve year old Caitlin has to deal with the death of her mother from cancer two years earlier and the recent middle school shooting death of her older brother Devon.  It’s a lot to contend with even if you don’t have Asperger’s.  While her father understands her, he must deal with his grief, and is unable to translate that to Caitlin.  It was Devon who really understood her and explained the world to her.  Caitlin’s special nature comes through loud and clear; her drawing ability, her affinity for dictionaries and the meanings of words, the comfort she feels when she puts her head under the couch cushions to feel closer to those people who sat on it.  Erskine doesn’t downplay the socialization difficulties Asperger children have because of their unique nature.  What you come away with after reading Mockingbird is a real sense of who Caitlin is–she is a real person and you want to get to know her, to be her friend.  There is a love and warmth that emanates from Erskine’s writing…you get the feeling she really loves Caitlin, not an emotion you often get when reading a book.   I had picked up Mockingbird back in mid-September and put it down within a chapter.  I guess I wasn’t ready for the book.  This time, I read the book in one day; that’s how much I liked it.  Mockingbird is a book for all age groups.  It is beautifully written, tender and informative as well.  It is worthy of its award (not something I can say about every award winner).

Forgotten by Cat Patrick was an unexpected find. Each night at precisely 4:33 am, while sixteen-year-old London Lane is asleep, her memory of that day is erased. In the morning, all she can “remember” are events from her future. London is used to relying on reminder notes and a trusted friend to get through the day, but things get complicated when a new boy at school enters the picture. Luke Henry is not someone you’d easily forget, yet try as she might, London can’t find him in her memories of things to come. When London starts experiencing disturbing flashbacks, or flash-forwards, as the case may be, she realizes it’s time to learn about the past she keeps forgetting-before it destroys her future.

I hope you pick up a few of these books and enjoy them as much as I did.

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You Are My Only by Beth Kephart

I debated about the topic of my first post but since we decided that telling you about ‘orphan authors’, those wonderful authors who don’t get enough attention, I realized that I had my first post had to be about Beth Kephart, a marvelous Young Adult author.  Beth is an online friend (we’ve never met), but we became friends because I read one of her books and loved it.  I don’t remember how we connected, but we did.  If you love literature, you’ll love her books.  (You should also read her blog: beth-kephart.blogspot.com.  It is smart, literate, lovingly written.

Without further adieu, my review of her latest book, You Are My Only:

You Are My Only, the latest gem from Beth Kephart, is about family, losing one and gaining one.  Sophie is fourteen, home-schooled and alone.  Her mother works at the local diner all day, leaving Sophie home and cautioning her to lock the doors and not venture out.  She has her home-school assignments, the current one being creating the perfect icosahedron (look it up, if you don’t know what it is).  But there’s a whole world next door that Sophie sees as she peers out her attic window.  She watches Joey, the same age, play catch with his dog, Harvey.  She sees his aunts Cloris and Helen, one physically strong and the other weak, lovingly tend to each other and their nephew.  Sophie can no longer abide her isolation, and willing to accept the consequences if caught, ventures outside, only to be embraced into the next door family.  She partakes of custard and lemonade and readings from Willa Cather, the total opposite of her Spartan, hermit-like life.

Conversely, Emmy, not much older than Sophie, puts her infant in the backyard swing and realizes the blanket she wants to lay on is indoors.  In the split seconds it takes to run up the thirteen steps to the bedroom and back down those thirteen steps, Baby is kidnapped.  She searches and calls out, but to no avail.  The police aren’t successful either.  Her abusive husband, Peter, berates her.  She follows the railroad tracks trying to find Baby and is on the brink of letting an on-coming train hit her in her grief when she is saved by a wanderer, Arlen.  Together they search, with no luck.  When Emmy thinks she sees a woman carrying Baby at the train station, she causes a scene.  The police arrive and once Emmy is in custody, Peter has her committed.  No one will help her, except her roommate Autumn, who plans their escape to find Baby.

To tell you any more of the story would be to tell too much, if I haven’t already done that. In some books, it’s the story that captures you and in some, it’s the characters.  In You Are My Only, it is that rare combination of story and character.  Kephart has created two (almost) separate but equal stories, both intriguing and engrossing.  In addition, she has created the perfect characters.  I defy anyone not to fall in love with Sophie, Joey and Aunts Cloris and Helen or Emmy and Autumn and even Harvey, the dog.  I defy anyone not to hate (maybe intensely dislike) Sophie’s mother or Peter.  As always, Kephart chooses her words with care, and while the language is not as ‘ethereal’ as in some of her recent books, her images and descriptions and wording remain essential in understanding the characters and surroundings.  There are secrets that need to be unearthed and things to ponder.  There are relationships that you are jealous you are not a part of and those you are glad you have not experienced.  You can read You Are My Only quickly and enjoy the story or you can read it slowly and savor every word and nuance and description.  Either way, you must read Beth Kephart’s latest addition to Young Adult literature, You Are My Only.  More than likely, after you’ve read it once, you’ll go back and read it again.  I know I will.

Other books by Beth include: 

Dangerous Neighbors (my personal favorite)

 

 

 

 

 

Nothing But Ghosts

 

 

 

 

 

Undercover

 

 

 

 

 

House of Dance

 

 

 

 

 

The Heart is Not a Size

 

 

 

 

 

Susan here… this is Ed’s post, but I just have to butt in (and no I didn’t ask his permission) here because I love the way Beth writes.  I truly can’t say enough about the truth of her characters and the beauty of her prose.  She truly is a must read and an “orphan author” that needs to find a home in your heart.

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