The Princess and the Hound

by Mette Ivie Harrison

{ 2007 | HarperTeen | 416 pgs }

I apologize for not writing reviews until now – a downside, for me, is that I don’t have as good a memory of the books as I would have earlier…

Harrison’s book The Princess and the Hound was not at all what I expected. It isn’t told by the princess: she isn’t introduced until a fair bit into the book. Instead, the narrator is the prince who is betrothed to the princess. Yes, surprisingly, the storyteller in a vaguely romantic medieval fantasy novel is male, written by a female author. And it was good storytelling! I suppose the most basic premise of the book is that this kingdom has forbidden communication between humans and animals – in the past, there were some who practiced “animal magic,” but those days are gone (in part because of a wicked king who…well, I won’t give it away). And not only are they gone, they’re lost in legend. So you can imagine the trouble it would bring if the current king married a woman who could – and did – speak to animals.

And then we add in the storyline of the princess, Beatrice, and her hound. Beatrice is notoriously cold, her only relationship being a deep friendship with her hound. I’ll just say that I was rather thrown off by Harrison’s plot; she set everything up so that I could easily predict what was coming next – and then I turned out to be wrong. It was brilliant. Harrison included extremely subtle hints and foreshadowing for both the obvious and the surprise plots, which meant things still made sense even after I was caught off guard.

I might say that the book had too many loose ends tied up too neatly, but here my memory fails me. It could have been the opposite, that I had lingering questions left unanswered. If it is the latter, Harrison has followed this book with The Princess and the Bear (2009). I plan to read it.

Defining Twilight

by Brian Leaf

{ 2009 | Cliffs Notes | 192 pgs }

I was kindly sent a copy of this book by the author for review. It’s a workbook that helps students learn vocabulary for the SAT and ACT by using words found in Twilight by Stephenie Meyers. Having both read Twilight and tutored a student preparing for the major standardized tests, I felt like I was in a good position to evaluate Leaf’s book.

The book contains 40 groups of vocabulary words, and for each group, students are asked to look up the words in their handy copy of Twilight and guess a definition based on context. Then the definitions are provided; students begin a series of drills: choosing synonyms, making analogies, and completing sentences.

While I liked the general structure of the book, there were two things I wished had been different. First, the vocabulary words are taken sequentially from Twilight, so they don’t increase in difficulty at all. Each group of words is from a 2-3 page range of text in the book. Second, there are only 8 drills for each group, which means not all words will have a practice exercise. (I could add a third complaint – that students must have a copy of Twilight with them, instead of being able to read the relevant sentences in the workbook – but since Leaf’s book is not specifically authorized by Meyers, I can understand why it was done this way.)

Overall, I think Defining Twilight would be a fun exercise for a Twilight fan preparing for college entrance exams, but only as a supplement to a more in-depth study aid.

reading list 2009

New books: 95 ( 20,919 pgs )

Longest book: Breaking Dawn (768 pgs)
Shortest book: The Tales of Beedle the Bard (108 pgs)
Oldest book: Oliver Twist (1838)
Newest book: How to be a Hepburn in a Hilton World (August 2009)
Best book: The Grapes of Wrath
Best children’s/YA book: Fablehaven
Worst book: Samson’s Walls
Most disappointing book: Austenland

Conn Igguden & Hal Igguden, The Dangerous Book for Boys
Raymond E. Feist, Krondor the Betrayal
Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist
John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath
Nancy Farmer, The Sea of Trolls
Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop
Stephanie Meyer, Twilight
Ruth Bornstein, The Dancing Man
Steven Kellogg, The Mysterious Tadpole
David L. Harrison, Detective Bob and the Great Ape Escape
Anthea Davis, Sir Orfeo
Bill Martin, Jr., The Ghost-Eye Tree
Stephanie Meyer, New Moon
Stephanie Meyer, Eclipse
Kate Dicamillo, The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane
Stephanie Meyer, Breaking Dawn
Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass
Mark Helprin, A City in Winter
Richard Peck, The Teacher’s Funeral
Mark Helprin, Veil of Snows
Mary Norton, The Borrowers
Garth Nix, Sabriel
David Ives, Monsieur Eek
Jeanne DuPrau, The People of Sparks
Roald Dahl, James and the Giant Peach
Polly Horvath, The Trolls
Robert Louis Stevenson, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Brandon Mull, Fablehaven
Brandon Mull, Rise of the Evening Star
Brandon Mull, Grip of the Shadow Plague
Brandon Mull, Secrets of the Dragon Sanctuary
Albert Camus, The Stranger
Marjorie Weinman Sharmat, Gila Monsters Meet You at the Airport
Ann Tompert, The Hungry Black Bag
Tenzing Norbu, Himalaya
Esphyr Slobodkina, The Wonderful Feast
Lynn Reiser, Night Thunder and the Queen of the Wild Horses
Diana Pomeroy, One Potato
Coleman Polhemus, The Crocodile Blues
James Stevenson, Mud Flat April Fool
Deborah Lee Rose, One Nighttime Sea
Chris Raschka, Waffle
Paul Paolilli, Silver Seeds
J.K. Rowling, The Tales of Beedle the Bard
Jeff Kinney, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules
Jo Frost, Supernanny
William Goldman, The Silent Gondoliers
Rachel Fershleiser, ed., Not Quite What I Was Planning
Mark Leyner, Why do Men Have Nipples?
Allan Ahlberg, Previously
Jeff Talarigo, The Ginseng Hunter
Kathi Appelt, The Underneath
Sandra Dallas, Tallgrass
Trenton Lee Stewart, The Mysterious Benedict Society
Jhumpa Lahiri, Unaccustomed Earth
Paula Rinehart, What’s He Really Thinking?
Max Lucado, Fearless
Mitali Perkins, Secret Keeper
Kristin Cashore, Graceling
Matt Birkbeck, Deconstructing Sammy
Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code
Brian Leaf, Defining Twilight
Anita Diamant, The Red Tent
Mette Ivie Harrison, The Princess and the Hound
Tiffany Baker, The Little Giant of Aberdeen County
Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture
Robin Benway, Audrey, Wait!
Fiona Watt, That’s Not My Puppy
Melanie Gerth, Ten Little Ladybugs
Roger Priddy, Funny Faces Alien Al
Jordan Christy, How to Be a Hepburn in a Hilton World
Robert L. Rabin, ed., Torts Stories
Alistair MacLeod, No Great Mischief
Shannon Hale, Princess Academy
Brandon Mull, The Candy Shop War
The Arbinger Institute, The Anatomy of Peace
Shannon Hale, Austenland
Jud Nirenberg, Samson’s Walls
Jonathan Stroud, The Amulet of Samarkand
Theodore Le Sieg, Maybe You Should Fly a Jet!
Karma Wilson, Bear Snores On
Leo Landry, Space Boy
Nicholas Heller, The Monster in the Cave
Stephen Cosgrove, Bangalee
Mabel Watts, Never Pat a Bear
Stan & Jan Berenstain, The Berenstain Bears and the Bad Dream
Barbara Shook Hazen, The Gorilla Did It
Eileen Spinelli, Do YOU Have a Hat?
Jessie M. Knittle, The Circus Train
Fred Phleger, The Whales Go By
David A. Adler, Cam Jansen and the Mystery of the Stolen Diamonds
Maurice Sendak, The Sign on Rosie’s Door
Margaret Hillert, A House for Little Red
Jonathan Stroud, The Golem’s Eye
Jonathan Stroud, Ptolemy’s Gate

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