Karl's Reading List

Published by Victor Gollancz Ltd: London, 1974 (1963). First published 1949. I first read this story as a kid, and have fond memories of it. It is also very weird, something that Elise pointed out as well. This is the only book I have read (so far) of Robert A Heinlein, and yet I know by reputation that he was a prominent science-fiction writer in his day. This book, first written in 1949, is certainly of its day. We get a Mars with canals, native plant and animal life, and a sentient Martian species with ruined cities on the surface and still-thriving (if less populated) sections underground.  Our main character, Jim Marlowe Jr, is a teenager living in South Colony. He has befriended a local 'bouncer', a basketball-sized Martian creature that can perfectly mimic what it hears, parrot-like, and also has some level of intelligence. 'Willis', as Jim calls the creature, is a hugely important part of the plot, helping Jim and his friend Frank get out of numerous scrapes, as...

Published by Definitions/Random House Children's Publishers: London, 2014 (2013). This is an odd book. It is a little bit fairy-tale - a label that is made more explicit by the inclusion of Jacob Grimm's ghost as the narrator! It is a little bit horror, but only subtly, particularly to begin with. It is a little bit young adult romantic drama, but with one of the pair possibly under an enchantment. It is a little bit coming-of-age and taking responsibility for the difficulties of life, but this is told through the main boy's father's storyline (a very distant B-Plot), as well as through a Mastermind style TV show. It feels old-fashioned, but also is set in a vaguely contemporary world. It is also a book I almost accidentally got through. I picked it up off my classroom shelf and had finished it in two days.  As mentioned, the narrator is the ghost of Jacob Grimm, a spirit who can only be heard by the main protagonist, Jeremy Johnson Johnson (both his parents had the sam...

Published by Candlewick Press: Somerville, Massachusetts, 2012. The main character in this book, Daniel, is obsessed with death. Ever since his older brother, Eli, was killed in the Iraq War, Daniel has been keeping a 'book of the dead', writing down the cause of death of various historical figures. Although Daniel doesn't recognise it, this is his way of coping with the grief surrounding his brother's loss. His parents are coping far worse. Although the 'book of the dead' is an important feature of After Eli, the plot doesn't focus on it too much, mostly including facts from the book as epigraphs to open each chapter (and tie into the theme of the chapter slightly). Instead, After Eli is far more reminiscent of something like Bridge to Terabithia : a slightly melancholic story about a young boy falling in love with a girl who draws him out of his shell, even though foreshadowing makes us predict they will not end up together. In After Eli, the girl is quest...

Published by Tui/HarperCollins Publishers (New Zealand) Ltd: Auckland, NZ, 1994. Book 3 in 'The Solar Colonies.' Preceded by ' The Ghosts of Triton. ' Elise and I (along with Ezekiel) have just returned from a two-week holiday/church ministry time in Australia, visiting friends in Tasmania and Melbourne. It was a great trip, with lots to unpack, but one without a lot of time for reading. Also, the main book I've been working my way through - Moby Dick - is in a big omnibus, which would have weighed too much to justify taking on the plane.  So, instead, I took two books with me that were a little bit smaller, one of which - Fear and Trembling - I was already part of the way through, and the other - this one - a book that I knew was an easy read to unwind with in the little bit of downtime I would find. Both were finished while in Australia, but this one (the easier read) was the first I completed. Both of the two Solar Colonies books I have read have had a differen...

Published by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc: London, 2000. First published 1998. Ages ago I saw the film that this book was based upon. Except for the physical appearance of the main character (who in the book is quite fat but in the film is portrayed by a young, slim Shia LaBeouf) the film turns out to be quite faithful to the plot. That makes sense, because the plot is one of those intricately constructed ones where there are a number of factors that all come together at the end - think of the way the movie Signs makes sense of every character quirk and random non sequiturs in the final showdown with the alien. Holes includes a lot of back-story, interspersing it with the 'current' events, and each event and quirk from the past (a family curse, the family name, onions, etc) all come together at the end to help resolve the plot. So, its an interesting story. I wouldn't say I was 'gripped' while reading it, but it still gives that sense of "oh, clever!" at the ...

Published by Noisy Crow Ltd: Crosby Row, London, 2021. Having finished Scavenger: Zoid too quickly to use in the Reading Challenge, I needed another book featuring AI or robots, and got this one from the school library, knowing nothing about it except what I saw on the cover. In a lot of ways, Adam-2 is similar to Scavenger: Zoid. It is set in the distant future, in a world where robots have turned on humanity and now pockets of humans try to resist against them. Like in Scavenger: Zoid, a more sophisticated robot is introduced who starts trying to help the humans. That robot develops a friendship with a main human, while other main humans remain suspicious. The difference here is that the robot - the titular Adam-2 - is the main character, whereas the robot in Scavenger: Zoid was a supporting character. Having the story be told primarily from Adam's viewpoint is an interesting touch, particularly as Adam learns about both sides in the conflict and begins to have doubts about the ...

Published by Macmillan Children's Books: London, Basingstoke and Oxford, 2014. I began reading this book in class when I was nearing the end of reading The Jungle Books , by Rudyard Kipling. I had selected The Jungle Books to fit the next category on the reading challenge I'm doing this year, and decided that I was near enough the end of that book that starting this one (which fits the   category after that one) was safe enough, especially since I would only be able to read this during silent reading times, and it would likely take a while. Whoops. I under-estimated how busy my home life would be, how slow The Jungle Books would be, and how quickly I'd get through this book, which probably took just over a week of class time! So, now, I find myself in the mildly annoying situation of having read a book that fits the 'robots or AI' category of the challenge, but - because of my self-imposed rule of doing them in order - not being able to use it. And I only finished i...

Published by Walker Books Ltd: London, 2018. There was a Christmas tree at work set up with mystery books underneath it. The wrapper for this one said something like 'Young adult dystopian climate change.' That about sums it up! When I think of Young Adult dystopias I usually think of a futuristic science-fiction world, either fallen apart (like The Hunger Games ) or still pretending to hold it all together (like Starters ). Dry is quite interesting in its difference; it takes place in a world that is - to all intents and purposes - our own. There is no futuristic science going on, no government conspiracies to deal with, no underground rebellion seeking to take down the president... its far more 'real.' And that adds to it's power. The only change from our reality is one that we feel could happen - an extreme drought has meant that the state of California is entirely out of water. This is the set-up, and the driving force of the plot: how do you survive, what do yo...

Published by Puffin Books/Penguin Random House: Great Britain, 2013 (2009). Book 5 in the 'Percy Jackson' series. Preceded by ' Percy Jackson and the Battle of the Labyrinth. ' This final book in the Percy Jackson series does all the things final books should: it turns into an epic battle, it has some (mostly minor or villainous) characters die, and it wraps up the major story-arcs while allowing some characters to have room for development in the future. Knowing that there is a number of other stories featuring Percy Jackson following this series, it makes sense that another 'Great Prophecy' is also featured near the end of the book. In being all of these things, the story of The Last Olympian is in some ways the most predictable of the series: we know that Percy will face off against Kronos. We know that Grover and Annabeth (and in these later books, Rachel) will also have a part to play. We know that some people will die. We know (well, assume, but come on, i...

Published by Simon and Schuster UK Ltd: London, 2014. This is a weird book that's been on my classroom library shelf for quite a while. The main character, Travis, had terminal cancer five years ago, and agreed to have his head cryogenically frozen, in the hope that in the future it would be possible to attach it to a donor body. Now, he has woken up, only the second patient to successfully have the procedure complete, to find that everyone in his world, including his parents, his best friend and his girlfriend, have lived five extra years of life. Travis is sixteen, and the difference between a sixteen-year-old and a twenty-one-year-old is a much bigger difference than it would have been had Travis been an adult. Also, his girlfriend Cate is now engaged to someone else. The difference between a sixteen-year-old and a twenty-one-year-old is also small enough that it is conceivable that Cate and Kyle (his former best friend) would also still be keen to in-some-way have Travis back i...

Published by Puffin Books/Penguin Group: London, England, 2013 (2008). Book 4 in the 'Percy Jackson' series. Preceded by ' Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse. ' Followed by 'Percy Jackson and the Last Olympian.' I finally found a cheap copy of this book to add to my school library shelf, and - home sick for a few days - picked it up and raced through it. As book 4 in a series of 5, it is obvious that things are building towards the epic conclusion. Kronos (like the Voldemort of this series) is taking form and will soon be free to wreak havoc on the world, Percy's nemesis Luke continues to be a hindrance, and - at the end of the book - Percy turns 15. Considering that there is a prophecy that most characters believe refers to Percy, saying that when he turn 16 terrible things will occur, this is also significant. In this particular entry, Percy and his friends must journey into the Labyrinth of Greek mythology, searching for the inventor Daedalus who the...

Published by Penguin Books: London, 2017. This book is fairly popular amongst my students presently, and (like many of the books I have read this year, it turns out) is another murder mystery. The gimmick for this one is that the crime happens during a high school detention. Each of our characters/suspects fits a broad stereotype (somewhat like the characters in The Breakfast Club ) and yet, of course, they each have secrets ready to be revealed. The secrets are particularly important in the plot of this book, as the murder victim - Simon - ran a blog in which he would reveal the secrets of his fellow students. It turns out that he had a blog post prepared in which each of our four main characters was going to be exposed in some way, and considering that each of the characters seem to have arrived in detention under suspicious circumstances, it is possible that each of them could have done it. Or is it? As with In the Hall With the Knife (the Cluedo inspired book I read earlier in the...

Published (as an e-book) by YorShi Publishing, 2024. So, I won a book! An e-book, but still!! In order to keep track of the books I own  (numbering over 1000 now) I used to have a particular book app. However, when that became obsolete I joined a separate app/website called LibraryThing, which - among its other features - has a monthly book giveaway competition. Living in New Zealand, I am not eligible for physical books, sadly, but I am able to apply to receive a copy of an e-book, as long as I review it when I get it. Gosh, what a sacrifice to make. So, anyway,  My Name Is Nkechukwuọma is the debut novel of a Canadian-Nigerian author named Gloria, and follows a young Canadian-Nigerian woman as she deals with the usual older-teen issues of dating, rebellion against parents and family dynamics. She also has to deal with the traditional Nigerian elements of her upbringing, including aunts that have quite a large deal of influence over her choices in life, as well as gradually ...

Published by Amulet Books/Abrams Books: New York, NY, 2020 (2019). I came across this book when I saw a student reading it in class, and was curious enough to get it out after them. As the title may give away, this book is inspired by the game Cluedo (or Clue in America). It is even subtitled 'A Clue Mystery', although it is a fairly loose adaptation, with the characters now almost all being high-school students, and their names and characters being reworked to fit that setting better. So, instead of 'Professor Plum' we now have Phineas 'Finn' Plum, who is a science geek but very much not a professor. And instead of Colonel Mustard we have Sam 'Mustard' Maestor, a relative new-comer to the school with a military school background. Mrs White, however, remains pretty much identical to her character in the game. The setting is much closer to the game, with the house in question - Tudor House - being an old accommodation building in the school grounds, with ...

Published by Corgi Books/Doubleday: Great Britain, 2012 (2011). Book 1 in 'The Books of Beginning' series. Followed by 'The Fire Chronicle.' I'm going to burn this book. Wow! What?! Karl! Yeah, I thought that would be an interesting way to start this review, but it's far less dramatic than it may appear. In The Emerald Atlas we are introduced to siblings Kate, Michael and Emma. They have grown up in various orphanages after their parents mysteriously abandoned them in an event involving some monstrous adversaries that we see portrayed in the prologue, but that the siblings don't clearly remember. The first main chapter of the book has the siblings trying to get adopted but failing when the woman trying to adopt them turns out to be a weirdo. The head of the orphanage them ships them away to the only orphanage she can find that will take them, in a journey that reminds me a bit of Series of Unfortunate Events and some other mildly supernatural series... mayb...

Published by Doubleday/Random House Children's Books: London, Great Britain, 2012. Followed by 'Enders.' This book with a weird and striking cover has been sitting on my classroom bookshelf for a while. I decided just to browse it to see if it was suitable to keep in the classroom, and got a lot more caught up in the plot than I expected. Set in a dystopian future, the world of Starters is one where a virus has decimated the population, leaving only the elderly (or 'Enders') and young people (or 'Starters') behind. This interesting dynamic is explained because those were the two groups most vulnerable to a coming biological attack, and therefore were the groups first immunized against it. The power dynamic is heavily weighted on the side of Enders, with enough medical breakthroughs meaning that they can live for a few hundred years, and laws passed meaning that they are the only ones who can vote, or work. Starters are second-class citizens, and those who ha...

Published by Puffin Books/Penguin Books (NZ) Ltd: Auckland, NZ, 1988 (1986). An easy story to read, The Keeper is set in a post-apocalyptic New Zealand, where a small group of villagers live on the shores of the 'Big Lake', which is later explicitly identified as Taupo. Within the village, Michael (our main character) is one of the few people - and the youngest - who can still read, and is called a 'Keeper' from the way he can 'keep' the information found within books. Michael narrates the story to us in the form of a journal he is keeping. An older 'keeper' named Charles also adds notes in a few places, expanding on the storylines that Michael remains unaware of. The Keeper is fairly typical for this type of book; there are groups of survivors, some 'outsiders' who may at times be antagonist but also may be misunderstood, there are challenges to face (Michael and his friends must help hunt down a rogue tiger, descended from those released from z...

Published by Puffin Books/Penguin Group: London, England: 2013. Book 1 in the 'WARP Series.' Followed by 'The Hangman's Revolution.' This at times surprisingly violent young-adult novel begins in Victorian London, where we meet Riley, a stereotypical Victorian street urchin. He has been trained by Albert Garrick, a stage magician and true psychopath, who has turned to the life of an assassin following the on-stage death of his lovely assistant. When we first meet Riley, Garrick is supporting him to attempt his first assassination, something that Riley is understandably a bit reluctant to do (thus the title). However, as the attempt goes sideways, Riley is sucked into a time portal, and emerges in the present day. Here he meets Chevron 'Chevie' Savano, a 17-year old FBI agent, hired under a now defunct youth programme. Chevie, who was somewhat responsible for the programme being shut down, is impulsive and a bit over-confident, and becomes our second protagon...

Published by Egmont UK Limited/Electric Monkey: London, UK: 2012 (2009). First published by HarperTeen: New York, USA, 2008. Book 1 in the 'Gone' series. Followed by 'Hunger.' I borrowed this book from a family member knowing nothing about it except that some of my students like it. I soon learned it was seen as a combination of Stephen King meets Lord of the Flies - neither of which are my usual jam (he says, having literally just finished reading a different book by the author of Lord of the Flies ). Yeah, it is like that. Particularly Stephen King's Under the Dome, which I know from the mini-series of the same name. Plus, it also has similarities to Lost (which I loved) and X-Men (some of which I enjoy). So, anyway... The basic premise of Gone  is that all of a sudden everyone fifteen and older who lives in or near the town of Perdido Beach mysteriously disappears, and the remaining children discover that they are now trapped by a mysterious barrier that has a ...

Published by Knight Books/Brockhampton Press Ltd: Leicester, England, 1973. First published 1955. Book 3 in the 'Adventure' series. Preceded by ' South Sea Adventure. ' Followed by ' Volcano Adventure. ' Picking up straight after the end of South Sea Adventure , and still based in the same region of the world (the Pacific Ocean, particularly around the Marshall Islands), Underwater Adventure sees Hal and Roger Hunt continuing their animal gathering expeditions. This time, however, the focus is a little different, with the brothers (and their friend Omo from the previous book) joining forces with Dr Blake, a scientist with the Oceanographic Institute, to explore (surprise, surprise) the underwater world. Although there is still some animal collecting, the focus is far more on scientific discovery and trialling of various 'cutting edge' underwater technology (such as aqualungs, diving bells, and even snorkels - which I guess were cutting edge in 1955). As ...