Anyways, in Goodnight Goon a little werewolf is having a hard time going to sleep.  He names the things in his room which includes pictures of martians taking over the moon, three little mummies rubbing their tummies, moans and groans, a skull, and a pot full of goo.  After he names them he says goodnight one by one to each of them. He puts the monsters under the bed (so clever) and ends by saying goodnight monsters everywhere.

This has potential to be a really, really cute book but the illustrations were just not doing it for me.  My kids weren’t crazy about it either but I only tried it once on them.  And well, sometimes, especially my kids, need to be exposed to a book more than once.  So, it doesn’t seem fair that I’m sharing their reaction after only one reading but to tell you the truth, they never picked it out of the pile on their own either.  It just couldn’t compete with Where’s My Mummy or Leonardo the Terrible Monster this week.

But overall, I think it’s worth taking a look at this Halloween picture book to discover if it will be a new classic in your home.  Because your kids just might love it.

Links of interest:  Michael Rex website, more book blogger reviews.
Genre:  Picture Book, approx ages 4-8.
Publisher:  Putnam Juvenile.  August 14, 2008.
Hardcover, 32 pages.  ISBN 0399245340
Goodnight Goon is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

A family tragedy which is slowly revealed in the story has torn her family apart.  Her father is out on an inopportune extended business trip and calls all the time but when he does Mazzy just hangs up on him.  He has no idea how bad things have gotten at home.  Her mother is severely depressed and lies in bed comatose every day.  This leaves Mazzy very much on her own with neighbors who do try to look out after her.  Social services is also suspicious and Mazzy has to deal with the stress of trying to keep her family together – at least what’s left with it.

Everything is Fine is told in a very sparse prose.  A style which I found refreshing but many might find disconcerting.  It’s also told through the random stream of conscience of Mazzy.

He calls back and I let it ring.
He calls back again and I let it ring.
He calls back again and I finally answer.
He says:  Mazzy, I am going to say one more thing and then you can hang up.nes
I pick my toenail and lie on the couch.
He says: Your mom and I love you very -
But then I hang up again.
A rerun of Judge Judy is on.

Dad and Mom used to dance.
Late at night when we were supposed to be asleep.
Mom would throw back her head and laugh and Dad would pick her up.
“Stop it, Dave,” she’d say.
“What?” And he twirled her around and around.
“You’re going to to hurt your back.”"Well, I guess I should stop, then,” he’d say, and keep twirling and twirling and twirling.
I used to lay on the floor and watch them from the hallway.
Watch them laugh.
I’d lay there until maybe Dad saw me and he’d say, “Well, looks like someone is in big old trouble,” and I’d scream “No!” and he’d put Mom on the couch, and her face.  I can see her face.
All giggly.
I’d start down the hall but he’d catch me.  He always catught me and then it was me laughing and twirling and everything was how it was supposed to be.
My mom  used to love my dad and my dad used to love my mom.
And they both used to love me.
He went for a one-week audition for ESPN 360.  One week became forever.

This book was so odd and so touching.  The whole time, I was reading it I kept thinking, this book is so weird!  But I loved it!  Ellis is an author to look out for.  She’s different.  And I love that.

Back when the book was released (March), I went to hear Ann Dee Ellis (another of our wonderful Utah authors) give a reading at The Kings English Bookshop.

I’m smiling funny but dang, she’s so cute! Can’t wait to see what she has coming up next.

Links of interest: Ann Dee Ellis website, more book blogger reviews, and Maw Books review of  This is What I Did by Ann Dee Ellis.
Genre: Young Adult
Published:  Little Brown Young Readers; March 1, 2009
Hardcover, 160 pages.  ISBN 978-0316013642
Everything is Fine is available from your independent bookstore, Powell’s, Barnes and Noble, and Amazon.

Haunting Bombay is the story of the family’s dark secrets that have been kept hidden for more than a decade.  In the attempt to rid the household of the small ghost, the family must reveal that which they’ve ignored for years and risk tearing their family further apart while doing so.

Haunting Bombay was a beautifully told book with haunting characters.  I loved getting to know each of the characters, including the servants.  I love back stories and Agarwal gave us enough story for each character that the story needed each and every one of them.  Although there is still the element of the cruel family who unwillingly takes in an orphan, I’m glad that her grandmother fiercely loved her.  It was an nice change from the typical orphan story.   I loved the Indian setting and culture, the oppressiveness of the monsoon heat and dampness, the superstitions, and the food (mmmm . . . . why do I always pay special attention to the food?).

At the heart of this story is a ghost.  I knew there was a ghost when I started to read the book, but I wasn’t prepared for just how much the ghost would present itself in the story.  Haunting Bombay truly has its supernatural elements which I honestly didn’t enjoy as much.  I might have preferred the suggestion of such things rather then the clear manifestation of the supernatural.  But I thought that Agarwal did a great job of seamlessly combining the supernatural with a story about a family tragedy.  I also think that the book could have been a bit shorter.  At 362 pages, it’s not a long book, but  I struggled a bit through the ending and found myself anxious to finish.

After finishing the book and unraveling the mystery behind the young ghost, I could see that clues had been scattered throughout the story but I was glad to have  not picked up on them while reading.  I truly did not know how this story would end which kept me involved and invested in the story.  For those who would not only love a cultural book set in the heart of India but also a ghost story during this fall season, Haunting Bombay would be an excellent book to pick up.  For a debut novel, Agarwal does an excellent job with characters, language, and a sense of time and place.

While I didn’t find myself falling head over heels in love with the manifested supernatural elements of this particular story, Agarwal is an author that I would definitely read again for the pure joy of  story, setting and characters.

And as a total side-note, when I was little I named my journal for a while.  I had completely forgot that I had named it Pinky until coming across this oddly named character.  Funny.

Links of interest:  Shilpa Agarwal website, blog, and on Twitter.  Visit TLC Book Tours for more reviews on Agarwal’s blog tour.
Genre:   Fiction
Publisher: Soho Press. April 1, 2009.
Hardcover, 368 pages. ISBN 156947558X
Haunting Bombay is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Girl in the Arena comes out today and I’d love to see people picking it up to read because I think it makes for some great discussion.  The more that I think about the book, the more I like it.  It has some fascinating insight into a culture that has gone mad for violence and touches on some deep issues.

Girl in the Arena is a dystopian novel but man, it felt like the culture was not such a far fetched idea.  There are a lot of references to current culture – Skyping, Wikipedia, watching Crouching Tiger and Stranger than Fiction but wrapped up in all of this is the Gladiator sport.  And it’s actually more than a sport, it’s an entire culture that began first underground at about the time of the Vietnam War.  Gladiators now fight in front of large crowds and a TV audience and can fight anything from animals to other Gladiators to the death.  It’s a blood sport more popular than football or soccer.

Lyn was born into the Gladiator lifestyle and living the rules and bylaws of the association is second nature to her family.  Her mother is a high profile Glad wife who has been married and widowed by seven Gladiators.  Lyn is known as the daughter who had seven fathers.  They are celebrities.  Tommy, her current father has been matched up with Uber, a new gifted young fighter and if there’s a bylaw that Lyn knows all to well it’s – Never leave the stadium when your father is dying. Uber wins Lyn’s dowry which means that she must marry him.  But after watching her mother lose seven husbands, the last thing that Lyn wants to do is become a Glad wife.  But the Association is intent on her celebrity wedding.  To win her freedom, she challenges Uber to a fight in the arena.  It’s a  first for the association and they’ll do anything for publicity.  The only problem is – she might actually like the guy.  And while she considers herself a fighter, she actually doesn’t like violence.

I loved Lyn’s little brother Thad.  Although, it’s not stated specifically, I imagine that he is Autistic.  Everything that Lyn does, she does for Thad.  I loved their relationship.  Lyn’s relationship with her mother was odd in the sense that she seemed to be taking care of her instead of the other way around.  Plus, I always find it odd when children call their parents by their first name.

Stylistically, I found that the choice to not include quotation marks in dialogue to be very interesting.  It took me more than half of the book to be able to see past it.  It was really hard to read this way at first and took me out of the story.  I honestly don’t know why the dialogue was this way.  I was okay with it the second half of the book after I got in the rhythm of the book.  You can get a slight idea of what I’m talking about in the following passage where Lyn recounts the first time she went to her first Glad fight at the age of five.

– Kitten, we’re going to see some funny things today.  Men being a . . . . little silly.

She rubbed my knuckles with her thumbs as she spoke.

– If we see anything that makes us a little sad or upset, we just have to make a game of it.

I said I wanted to play a game.  And she started over.

– The men are going to look like they’re having a big fight.  Your father is a famous fighter, so this is something to be proud of.

– He’s a gladiator, I said.

– Yes, exactly, and we know that gladiators hav weapons.  Like . . . axes and knives and . . .

– And clubs.

[. . . . ]

– Yes, clubs too.  Good girl.  So nothing to be concerned about.  And I brought your coloring book and crayons.  And look, she said, reaching into her bag and pulling out my favorite stuffed animal.  — I brought your dog and her pajamas if she gets tired.

This is also one of those covers that isn’t truly representative of the book’s character.  I personally like the cover but Lyn is actually bald for the entirety of the book.  She’s got a nice set of hair in that cover.

Girl in the Arena explores a world of violence and how the lines between reality and games are blurred.  It’s a story that I won’t forget simply because it is SO disturbing.  How does a culture move from being normal to one where killing each other for sport is celebrated?  I don’t think this book will be for everybody.  It is bloody.  So be warned.  But it’s worth picking up.  A fascinating premise and story line.

And although I think it stands completely on it’s own, yes, its true, for fans of The Hunger Games . . . .

Other bloggers on the Kidz Book Buzz tour:  Abby the Librarian, A Patchwork of Books, All About Children’s Books, Becky’s Book Reviews, Fireside Musings, Homeschool Book Buzz, KidzBookBuzz.com, Maw Books Blog, My Own Little Corner of the World, Reading is My Superpower, Through a Child’s Eyes.
Links of interest:  Lise Haines website and on twitter.
Genre: Young Adult Fiction
Publisher: Bloomsbury. October 13, 2009.
Hardcover, 336 pages. ISBN 1599903725
Girl in the Arena is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Skeleton Creek finished with a huge cliffhanger.  Argh!  I couldn’t wait for the next book.  I had no idea that I would be receiving a copy of Ghost in the Machine, so I know that I let out an audible squeal when I opened a mystery package one day and it was this book!  Seriously, so excited to read this one.

In Ghost in the Machine, Ryan and Sarah are still forbidden to see each other and trying to solve the mystery at the gold dredge, which is haunted by the ghost of Old Joe Bush.  Time is running out because the town has decided it’s become so dangerous that they are going to burn it down.  But things get complicated when Ryan and Sarah uncover a secret society called The Crossbones which keeps the secrets of the dredge and Ryan’s father is in the middle of it all.

This is a great follow-up to Skeleton Creek.  Kids will enjoy the mystery and love getting spooked with the videos.  I remember that I jumped in one video and for another I had to keep pausing it because it was just plain scary.  Such fun!  But nothing to lose sleep over at night – unless maybe you don’t finish the book before you go to sleep which is virtually impossible because you’ll want to read it in one sitting.

The videos do take some time to load so I recommend skipping ahead to the next video as soon as you finish one so it’s already loaded by the time you get to it.  Be warned though, it’s hard to not have your eyes glaze over potentially spoiling text when skipping ahead.   Although everybody is in need of a few acting lessons, the videos are great.  I was hoping for a third book but everything wrapped up pretty tightly.

Which does remind me.  Ryan writes in his journal like ALL the time.  So I was surprised to see at the end of the book he doesn’t write for four days.  His last entry reads like an epilogue.  It wasn’t in his character to not write during those four days where everything gets wrapped up.  And Sarah also writes in the journal at the end too.  I’d much rather her stick to the videos.  So the ending felt a little bit unbelievable to me because they acted out of character.  But all in all nothing to spoil my enjoyment of the book.

My biggest disappointment is that there is not another book in the series.  I’m not ready for it to be over, I’d love to have more.  And the mystery/ghost story is the PERFECT genre for this concept.   October is also a great time to read this book especially together as a family.  I can see everybody gathered around the computer watching the videos and somebody else poking somebody right in the middle of a cliffhanger.  I can see screams.  Oh, I love it.

Great book, great fun!  We are reading mysteries this month for my Children’s Literature Book Club.  I can’t wait to meet next week to see what everybody thought about this one.

So are you up for it?

Links of interest: Maw Books review of Skeleton Creek (including book trailer to give you an idea of video content), more book blogger reviews, Patrick Carman’s website, extensive alternate reality Skeleton Creek game.
Genre:  Middle Grade Fiction with video elements, approx ages 9-12
Publisher: Scholastic.  October 1, 2009
Hardcover, 192 pages. ISBN 054507570X
Ghost in the Machine is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Marcus is having a hard time both at home and in school.  Since the death of his sister, his father has moved out of the house and his mother is having a hard time just keeping it together.  Marcus has begun to fight at school and is headed down a road that will get him kicked out of school and his house and one that will be difficult to travel back from.

While at the park, he is challenged to a game of chess from C.M., a nickname that stands for Chess Man, Check Mate and Chess Master.  It is through their games together that Marcus begins to learn how to keep his own emotions in check and to always be looking at least three moves ahead – both on the chess board and in real life.

The dust jacket says, “Inspired by inner-city school chess enrichment programs, Chess Rumble explores the ways this strategic game empowers young people with the skills they need to anticipate and calculate their moves through life.”  This is a statement that I would completley agree with.  I do also agree with Ms. Yingling’s statement that the size and format (including page stock) of the book borders too closely of a picture book.  I just can’t see a teenage boy feeling cool touting this book around, if you know what I mean.

Chess Rumble is also told in verse, a format which I always enjoy. Overall, I liked Chess Rumble and found it well worth the read.  I just wonder if the same could be said of its intended audience.

Book trailer:

Links of interest:  G. Neri website, follow on Twitter, more book blogger reviews,
Genre:  Middle Grade Fiction, approx age 9-12.
Publisher:  Lee and Low Books.  November 8, 2007
Hardcover, 64 pages.  ISBN  1584302798
Chess Rumble is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Gilly has been bouncing around in foster care homes for as long as she can remember.  She has a rough exterior and she won’t allow herself to get close to anybody.  Because what’s the point?  She’ll just be gone soon anyways.  But she’s smart and bright.  She does well in school just to prove everybody wrong and at the height of her success she purposely stops trying.  She feeds off of being able to control her surroundings and being able to manipulate those around her.

Gilly is in yet another new home.  One that she obviously will not tolerate.  How could she with  Maime Trotter, her obese foster mother, her new brother William Ernest who cowers at the slightest look in his direction, and the blind man next door who loves poetry – but that’s not the worst of it – he’s black too.  Gilly carries around a photo of her mother Courtney and knows that one day she will come and get her.  But when she finds herself beginning to care about her new family, she realizes that she better abandon them before they abandon her and she devises her own escape.

Gilly begins as a little girl with many prejudices and a rough exterior that she won’t let anybody through, as well as a heart that doesn’t want to be broken again.  She only wants one thing and that’s to be wanted.  But it’s the one person that she wants the most that doesn’t want her in return.  And when the chance comes will she realize that she was only chasing a dream?

A beautiful story about breaking through walls and the softening of the heart.  I highly recommend it.

I read The Great Gilly Hopkins as part of  Banned Books Week (I’m reading one banned book a day) and it was in the top 25 of most often challenged books from 1990-2000.  And to tell you the truth, it felt pretty obvious while I was reading what some parents would find offense about.  This includes Gilly’s language particularly the use of the words “damn” and “hell.”   But she is always reprimanded for it, she knows it’s wrong and the language is specifically used to illustrate the background that Gilly came from and how she changes.   Her character simply wouldn’t be the same without it.  Another reason is that Gilly is prejudice against her black school teacher and her black next-door neighbor Mr. Randolph.  Although Gilly doesn’t think much of them, both characters are portrayed in nothing but the best light.  At the end of the book, both are people who Gilly love dearly.  It’s an example of how prejudices are overcome once you actually get to know somebody.  And really, that’s something that is supposed to be wrong?  Hmmm . . . she also steals money.  So that could be another reason.  A ridiculous one at that.  (Edited to add – I found it ridiculous because she was made to return the amount and pay it off by doing chores).   SmallWorld Reads has some great commentary over at her blog about Gilly’s language that is worth checking out.

All valid reasons for having a parent know what their children are reading so they can discuss things like how words can effect people or prejudices are wrong.  I think it’s sad that somebody would rather try to remove it from a library’s collection instead of using the opportunity to engage their child with meaningful dialogue and teachable moments.

Links of interest:  Katherine Paterson website.  Other Paterson books reviewed by Maw Books:  A Midnight Clear, Selected Christmas Stories, Bridge to Terabithia (often challenged as well).
Genre:  Juvenile Fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher:  Harper Collins.  June 1987.  (Copy I read and cover shown here is from Scholastic reprint 1995)
Paperback, 160 pages. ISBN 0064402010
The Great Gilly Hopkins is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon

Hush is the story of Toswiah.  Toswiah has a nice life.  In fact, a great life.  Her family is great,  her best friend is great, school is great, she loves the mountains of Denver and her father loves his job as a cop.   But everything changes when her father witnesses the murder of a black boy from two white police officers.  Loyalty is the most important thing in the agency but when he considers testifying against the men, his family is put at risk.  So much so, that they have to leave in the  middle of the night and join the Witness Protection Program.

No longer twelve-year-old Toswiah from Colorado, she is Evie from San Francisco.  Her father spirals into a deep depression, her mother is overcome with religion, and her sister is making plans to leave for school the first moment she can.  Hush is a coming of age story but how does one come of age when you are suddenly forced to reinvent yourself?  To leave everything behind – your entire identity and look to the future when you can no longer speak of the past?

I appreciated this quote from Woodson from a Reading Rants interview:

A lot of what Hush, the book about the witness protection program, the big question is, when someone takes your name away, who do you become? If I woke up tomorrow and I couldn’t be Jacqueline Woodson, what would that mean? How would I begin to re-identify myself?

I ask the same question about myself.  What if I was no longer Natasha Maw?  How would I reinvent myself?  And if this had happened to me when I was twelve, instead of thirty, how would that have changed me?  Would I have splintered off into somebody completely different?  And what happens when permanence is taken away?  When you are no longer defined by even the possessions, momentos, and even family photos that you had in the past?

In Evie’s/Toswiah’s own words: “Does it matter what I am, if I’m not anyone?!”

Beautiful book.  Highly recommended.

I read Hush as part of Banned Books Week in which I’m reading and reviewing a challenged or banned book a day. Hush was on the Challenged Children’s Books compiled by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.  However, my internet searches of why it’s been challenged have turned up empty.  There was one instance of a friend calling her sister retarded and then went on to explain mentally challenged.  It might be a stretch but this is the only thing that I can even think of of why it could have been challenged.  Nothing else sticks out to me at all.

Links of interest:  Jacqueline Woodson website,   More book blogger reviews of Hush.  Other Woodson books reviewed by Maw Books:  I Hadn’t Meant to Tell You This, Show Way, Feathers, If You Come Softly, Behind You, Peace Locomotion, Locomotion, and Miracle’s Boys.  My experience meeting Woodson at LA Times Festival of Books.
Genre:  Young Adult Fiction
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile.  January 7, 2002.
Hardcover, 192  pages.  ISBN:  0399231145
Hush is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Once I got past the rocky start, I really enjoyed this book.  The letters are in majority to and from Juliet Ashton who after World War II has ended is living in London.  Juliet is a columnist and receives a letter from Dawsey, a member of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, based in Guernsey, who is simply making an inquiry about another author and would she be so kind to send the name and address of a bookshop in London so he may order more of his books by post.  His letter has caught her attention because Guernsey was occupied for five years during World War II and his description of the society brought into being because of a roast pig kept hidden from the German soldiers.  She wants to know more.

Juliet and Dawsey begin a correspondence that soon includes several other members of the book society.  Juliet begins to research everything that she can find out about Guernsey, its people, and the occupation in which she hopes will be material for a new book.  Through the letters, she creates a close kinship with the people of Guernsey and feels a strong desire to visit.  She does and never leaves!

I can’t help but point out Serena at Savvy Verse and Wit, who reviewed the book yesterday, because I so enjoyed her description:

This novel is one of those books that will hone in on the perfect reader.  The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is chock full of bookish quotes and must have been written with the love of books in mind. Beyond the WWII details, the rationing, the tip-toeing around German officers, and the loss of good friends shipped off to concentration camps, this is a novel about a writer who blooms in the countryside among new friends and new scenery.

The Guernsey Literary Potato Peel Society is just that.  It’s a fun read because of the quirky and fleshed out characters (one of the books many strengths) but yet it was touching and sad when learning of concentration camp stories and details of the German occupation.  Details about the war was what I appreciated the most about this book.  I love learning facts and tidbits about the war and the many stories had me completely fascinated.  The other central part of this story is about Juliet and how she comes to transplant herself among new people.  They are all healing from the war and it is through their shared membership of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society that they are able to begin to move on with their lives.

Excellent video of Annie Barrows discussing The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society:

I recommended this book to my mom several months ago before I even read it because I knew she would like it.  After finishing the book, I was happy that I had already told her to read it.  And really, telling your mom to read a book?   Sometimes I read a book and think, no way am I telling my mom to read that!  Not so, with this book.  I liked it and so did my mom.  And really, what more of a recommendation do you need than that?

The publisher has made available five copies to give away to each of the  TLC  Book Tour stops.  So here’s your chance to  pick up a free copy for yourself.  To enter, simply leave a comment on this blog post answering this question:  are a member of a book club and if so does it have a name? If so, what is it? Anything to rival the name The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society?

Links of interest:  Visit other reviews/interviews at other TLC  Book Tour stops, other blogger reviews, readers guide for book clubs, Potato Peel Pie recipe and more, Annie Barrows website.
Genre:  Historical Fiction
Publisher:  Dial Press.  July 29, 2008
Hardcover, 288 pages.  ISBN:  0385340990
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s and Amazon.

Eve always wanted to join the Peace Corps but once she realized that she was all talk and that she wasn’t getting any younger, she finally arrives at the Peace Corps office only to find that her recruiter, John, is not only really cute but one heck of a nice guy too.  As they arrange for her two years abroad, she secretly wishes that she could stay home instead and try to win John’s heart.  So in a round about way she gives up her comfortable life in New York, leaves John behind, and heads to the jungles of Ecuador and hopes that this sentiment will be enough to prove to John that she’s the type of girl that he wants.

After living in Ecuador for a year and unable to recover from the now unburied memories that surfaced after her co-worker was raped, Eve returns to the busy and frantic States and finds herself overwhelmed just by shopping in the soup aisle.  But she’s happy to have her cappuccino’s and other comforts of life back.  John and Eve marry and it’s not long after that he get’s a job with CARE and they are packing for yet another adventure – this time to a remote outpost in Uganda.

I loved Eve’s experiences and the way in which she shared them with us.  Having a background in AIDS education, Eve had visions of doing great work among the Africans but instead found herself without work and playing tennis everyday.  The story got really good when Eve became pregnant but yet nobody could confirm the pregnancy.  The Dr. asked her if she felt pregnant and if so, then yes!  Eve joked around about needing to write a book about What You Need to Know When You’re Expecting In Africa because the only good that the American book did her in Africa was to smack all the bugs in the house.

The scene that will be most memorable to me is when she recounts that early in her pregnancy, she went to the bathroom, sat down and went about her business.  When she was done, she looked down and there was a creature in the toilet! Not just any creature, but a rat!  A rat that was in the toilet the whole time!    I loved it when she said, ” . . . I knew I would never enjoy a leisurely sit on the toilet again.”  Oh my goodness!

I loved Eve’s portrayal of all the people whom she met on her journey.  I imagine that the highlight of traveling and living in different countries would be all the interesting people.  I also loved how Eve showed that living abroad isn’t all fun and games but yet she had a lot of fun and played a lot of games.  There are ups and downs and she wrote about them with not only a great deal of consideration but with a lot of sass.  She’s fun and witty and the book was a real enjoyable read.  I imagine that she’d be the life of the party wherever she goes.

Links of interest:  Eve Brown-Waite website. Other blogger reviews.
Genre:  Memoir
Publisher:  Broadway.  April 14, 2009
Hardcover, 320 pages.  ISBN:  0767929357
First Comes Love, Then Comes Malaria is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.