Curious, Healing

Books about healing, business, and fun

survival story

“Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes” by Chris Crutcher

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Recommended to me by: Tess Alfonsin

A hard-edged book for teens that takes on multiple tough issues:

  • Children’s cruelty to each other for being fat or disfigured
  • What it’s like to grow up fat or disfigured
  • Surviving parental abuse and abandonment
  • Abortion
  • Hypocrisy
  • Religious intolerance by some Christians

While I applaud the author’s courage in addressing all these important issues, I think the book would have been stronger with at least one fewer sub-plot and more attention to characterization. The major teen characters showed some complexity, but the adults were either all-good or all-bad.

I was caught up in the plot and characters until the book suddenly turned into a thriller with a violent climax. I felt tricked into reading something far more violent than I expected or enjoyed.

I’m glad teens are reading and thinking about all the issues in this book.  I wish the issues weren’t packaged with a violent, all-good/all-bad wrapper.

Available at bookshop.org.

“Mister God this is Anna” by Fynn

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I bought this book about 20 years ago for the delightful drawing on the cover. At the time, I read it as a rescue story, set in the 1930’s in London’s East End. 5 year old Anna has run away from an intolerable home life, and is found and adopted by gruff, kind, 19 year old Fynn and his dependable mum.

Fynn makes an effort to educate his new best friend, and finds himself educated at the same time by her headlong explorations of physics and her effervescent ideas about Mister God.

I picked the book up recently and re-read it, and this time it reads more like an allegory, where Fynn and young Anna are vehicles for the Author’s Message about God.

The Wikipedia page about the book reveals that Fynn is a pseudonym for Syndey Hopkins, and gives more information about his life. He did grow up in the East End of London in the 1930’s.

In the book, as Fynn and Anna discuss philosophy and religion, they also explore the East End with all their senses, and share it with the reader. Those details, along with William Papas’ impressionistic line drawings, are my favorite parts of the book.

Available at bookshop.org.

“The Conquest” by Yxta Maya Murray

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Recommended to me by: Cofax

This layered novel combines plot-driven swashbuckling adventure with a more cerebral battle over the contents and authorship of the historical record.

In the first layer of story, Sara, a proficient rare-book restorer, is absorbed by her work on a sixteenth century manuscript allegedly by a Spanish monk, to the point of ignoring the military man she intends to marry someday. She is convinced the manuscript is historical rather than fictional, and sets out to prove her theory.

The second layer of story is the manuscript itself, describing the adventurous and amorous life of “Helen”, an Aztec princess who is captured during the destruction of her city by Spanish explorers.

The double stories explore the consequences of colonialism on both the national and personal fronts, and bring refreshing perspectives on race and homosexuality.

While swashbuckling adventure and romance are not my favorite genres, the deeper layers made this book well worth reading.

A typesetting footnote, in a book about books: Since I don’t spend a lot of time looking at a book’s cover while I’m reading it, I often find that I don’t remember the title or author’s name a few months later. This book had the author and title at the bottom of alternating pages throughout. Great idea!

Available at bookshop.org.

“Not Even My Name – From a Death March in Turkey to a New Home in America, a Young Girl’s True Story of Genocide and Survival” by Thea Halo

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Recommended to me by: Joe Graziosi in a East European Folklife Center (EEFC) mailing list post Re: Books on Pontos/Pontian People?

Thea Halo and her mother Sano Themia Halo present a gorgeously detailed first-person account of the countryside, daily life, and people living in a tiny village in the Pontic mountains of Turkey south of the Black Sea in the early 20th century. Equally vividly, they describes the end of that way of life as ten-year-old Themia, her family, and everyone else around them are forced away from their homes on a months-long, heartbreaking death march.

I found myself skipping over the occasional departures from a personal account into paragraphs of historical numbers and dates, and Joe Graziosi notes that these history lessons are “biased and often incorrect“.

I learned about the Pontic people and their peaceful village life. I learned about the little-known genocide of Pontic Greeks, Armenians, and Assyrians in Turkey after World War I. I learned that the Assyrians are a living people, not just a shape on a map in Ancient World History class.

I learned about one girl’s survival, and her decision to act in kindness rather than meanness throughout her life. When she had finally come to relative safety after her horrific journey, I recognized a trauma response in her daily bouts of shivering. I’m glad she finally reached a place where she could receive caring and warmth.

Available at bookshop.org.

“Stay with me” by Garret Freymann-Weyr

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Recommended to me by: Marissa Lingen

Narrated by oddly mature sixteen year old Leila (“Lee-la”) Abranel, this coming-of-age novel shows her both grappling with her much older sister’s suicide, and embarking on her second romantic relationship. The story is absorbing, but harrowing events and difficult emotions are described so quietly that the characters seem flat and distant.

My favorite theme is Leila’s mother encouraging her to trust her self and her instincts. In turn, Leila says, “My body is the one thing in life I completely trust.” I wish I had learned that as a teenager!

Available at bookshop.org.

“Transparent – Love, Family and Living the T with Transgender Teenagers” by Cris Beam

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book cover

Cris Beam moved to LA with her partner and, almost accidentally, started teaching at a “small, scrappy high school for gay and transgender teenagers.” Many of the kids live on the street, supporting themselves through prostitution. This first-person account portrays their individual quirks, triumphs, and tragedies in casual, engaging detail.

“Living the T” is street-talk for both living as a Transgendered person, and living the Truth. This book shares Truth generously, by the armload. What it’s like to know you’re transgendered from toddlerhood; to be thrown out of your parents’ house as a young teen; to learn from your “drag mother” the tips and tricks of looking like a woman; to pass flawlessly but both long for and fear intimate relationships. Cris Beam includes her own experiences and feelings as she mentors, protects, and finally adopts Christina, a troubled transgender teenager.

Available at bookshop.org.