Sunday 9 August 2009

My Heart is Popping

A Book Review of Gordon Korman’s Pop.

I’ve been a supporter of Gordon Korman for many years. He was one of the very first YA authors I had to the pleasure—decades ago—of recommending to my students. He can make me laugh, he can make me cheer, he can make me cry.

Pop was, for me, a don’t-stop-except-to-sleep read. I am no athlete. In fact, I have never been able to understand people who are.  And I was still in love with this book about a football-loving teen who meets an ex-NFL linebacker, Charlie, in need of a true friend.  I loved Charlie. I loved Troy. I felt empathy for Charlie’s family, and wished I could meet Mac in person. And I cheered on Troy as he made tough choices about—and took personal risks for—his new friend.

There are some sad moments in this book, but Korman handled them in a way that left me feeling good—hopeful—at the end of the book. I strongly recommend Pop.

My Good Reads...

Amy's bookshelf: read

The Other Boleyn Girl
The Twentieth Wife: A Novel
Conrad's Fate (Chrestomanci, #5)
Circle of Friends
The Handmaid's Tale
Faery Rebels: Spell Hunter
Dairy Queen
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance - Now With Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!
Possession: A Romance
The Call of Earth
The Scarlet Pimpernel
The Lovely Bones
What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist-The Facts of Daily Life in Nineteenth-Century England
The Hunt for Red October
To Kill a Mockingbird
City of Bones
How to Be Good
Great Expectations
The Thirteenth Tale
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
The Joy Luck Club
Beloved
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Wives and Daughters
Howl's Moving Castle
The Kite Runner
Nothing But the Truth
Anne of Green Gables
About a Boy
Doctor Thorne
Romeo and Juliet
Among the Hidden
The Color Purple
World Without End
The Children of Men
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
For Whom the Bell Tolls
Sarum: The Novel of England
Doomsday Book
The Golden Compass
Year of Wonders
Memoirs of a Geisha
Flowers for Algernon
The Subtle Knife
Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
The Valley of Horses
A Tale of Two Cities
Uglies
Bridget Jones's Diary
Dune
The Serpent's Tale
Angels & Demons
The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle
Dracula
Among the Impostors
The Frog Princess
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
The Nanny Diaries
The Ships of Earth
Charlie Bone and the Beast
Spanking Shakespeare
Ender's Shadow
Wake
A Farewell to Arms
Emma
The Outsiders
Frankenstein
Witch Week
Allegra Maud Goldman
The Count of Monte Cristo
The Fellowship of the Ring
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Ellie McDoodle: New Kid in School
Charlie Bone and the Hidden King
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Charlie Bone and the Shadow
Among the Barons
The Name of the Rose: Including Postscript
Thirteen Reasons Why
The Crucible
Charmed Life
Ellie McDoodle: Have Pen, Will Travel
Timeline
Framley Parsonage
The Time Traveler's Wife
The Man Who Was Poe
Girl with a Pearl Earring
Little Women
The Shadow of the Wind
The Pillars of the Earth
Ender's Game
Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood
Night
Charlie Bone and the Invisible Boy
The Clan of the Cave Bear
The Secret Life of Bees
The Shifter
An Inspector Calls


Amy Huntley's favorite books »