Grace by T. Greenwood

Where to begin?  Thirteen year old Trevor Kennedy has been bullied at school for as long as he can remember but now his fear has turned to rage.  But he isn't the only troubled Kennedy as his father, Kurt, is consumed with a failing business, a wife who wants more than he can give, and an aging father with a hoarding problem.  His mother, Elsbeth, has a lustful need for things and is stealing from the local stores and dotes all her attention on Gracy, Trevor's six year old sister.  The only one who sees the trouble this family is going through is eighteen year old Crystal who works at the local Walgreens where Elsbeth has been stealing.

I normally wouldn't read a book with the flair of young adult fiction but I persevered and I'm glad I did.  Miss Greenwood has complete control over this book as it twists and turns at every chapter.  She leads you to expect the complete opposite of what actually happens.  That got my attention early on and kept me reading.

This book was published by Kensington in 2012 and was selected as BookSense76/IndieBound pick for 2012.

The Maid: A Novel of Joan of Arc by Kimberly Cutter

It's the fifteenth century during the Hundred Years War and Jehanne d'Arc is a dirty abused daughter of a farmer in Domremy France who is spoken to by God and the archangel Micheal and the saints Catherine and Margeret.  She is instructed to drive the English from French soil and restore the rightful heir to the French crown to King Charles VII.  We all know that Jehanne or "Joan", as we know of her, succeeds in her mission from God but how she gets there had me spellbound in this delightful graphic novel from Ms. Cutter.

Joan is a fierce warrior who leads ten thousand of France's best men into war and slaughters the mighty English army.  But as the voices have warned her she would die in less than two years and she is taken prisoner by the English and thrown into prison to await her sentence of death by burning at the stake.  She tries to kill herself by throwing herself over a tower 70 ft tower but is uninjured.  The restored King has turned on her and refuses to pay her ransom and she is ultimately burned.

When I first saw this new book at the library, I walked right past it because I normally wouldn't read a war novel but the picture on the front cover got me.  I went back to the shelf the book was propped up on and picked up, went home and started reading and didn't put it back down til I was done.  I highly recommend this book even to those who wouldn't normally read historical fiction.  It is fascinating, divine, and gruesome all at the same time.

Published in 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Nightwoods by Charles Frazier

From the author of Cold Mountain and Thirteen Moons comes a new and thrilling suspenseful novel called Nightwoods.  A young woman named Luce, the caretaker of an old lodge in small-town North Carolina, becomes the guardian of the twin children of her murdered sister. In turn, she must defend them from Bud, their former stepfather, who killed their mother while they watched, and who believes the traumatized children know the location of some stolen money.

Meanwhile, the owner of the Lodge has died and his young grandson, Stubblefield, has shown up to claim his inheritance which includes the lodge and other various businesses and lands around town.  Stubblefield is soon smitten by the young Luce and becomes her ally in protecting the children and Luce.

I loved Cold Mountain and I think this book is a lot like it in it's settings, plots, and flow of writing.  And although the book, to me, is a cliffhanger, I did enjoy it very much and was disappointed that it ended so quickly.  Hopefully, there will be a sequel in the near future.

Published September 27th 2011 by Random House Publishing Group.

In the Sea There Are Crocodiles by Fabio Geda

In the Sea There are Crocodiles by Fabio Geda is based on the true story of a young Afghan boy named Enaiatollah Akbari who, with the help of his mother, escapes Taliban rule in 2000.

It tells the story, in first person, of how his father, in Nava, is enslaved by the Taliban and sent on a mission to retrieve supplies in another city and told that if anything goes wrong, his family would be killed.  Things did go wrong.  His father was killed.  The Taliban threatened to take the two young boys in payment for his father's wrong doing so his mother takes him across the border to Pakistan and leaves him there to fend for himself.

The young Enaiatollah suffers through some very harrowing circumstances as he, alone, finds his way from Pakistan all the way to Italy where he later seeks and attains political assylum.  The situations that he finds himself in are extreme and life threatening such as dangerous border crossings, traveling across bitter cold mountains on foot, crammed into the false bottom of a truck with hundreds of other immigrants, traveling across violant waters in an inflatable raft.

Fabio Geda is an Italian novelist who works with children under duress and helped Enaiatollah put his story in words.

This book was originally published in Italy as Nel mare ci sono i coccodrilli by B.C. Dalai editore, Milan, 2010 and translated to English by award wining translator Howard Curtis and published by Double Day books in 2011.

This book really puts into perspective, for me, what it must have been like for Afghans during the last decade.  I had a different view on how people lived and had been treated in the middle east during the war and even now it's not safe for Enaiatollah to return to his family.  For the record, he has contacted his family,  paid for them to travel and live in Pakistan and plans to visit them soon.

It's OK to Tell by Lauren Book

This is a true story about Lauren Book, a 11 year old girl who was sexually, physically, and mentally abused by her nanny, Waldina Flores, for five years.  She endured extreme abuse at the hands of this awful woman including rape, beatings, and torment.  Finally at the age of 17, with the support of her boyfriend, Lauren gets the courage to speak out against her abuser.  Her father then fired Flores who fled to Oklahoma.  Later Flores was arrested and tried and sentenced a life in prison.

 Lauren and her father have fought and succeeded in passing laws to protect innocent victims of child abuse.  She helped pass a law eliminating the statute of limitations for victims of child abuse under the age of 16.  She has also founded Lauren's Kids to educate and prevent child abuse and let others know that it's OK to tell.

There are more than 39 million survivors of sexual abuse in America.  OMG!

1 in 3 girls are sexually abused before the age of 18.

1 in 5 boys are sexually abused before the age of 18.

1 in 5 children are sexually solicited while on the internet before the age of 18.

30% of sexual abuse is never reported.

I read this whole book in less than 3 hours as I was completely enthralled by it.  Through most of it, I had tears streaming down my face at the sheer shock and horror of what happened to this girl.  I hope you read it! 

95% of sexual abuse is preventable through education!