Middle Grade Monday: Crewnshaw, by Katherine Applegate

 

Title: Crenshaw

Author: Katherine Applegate

Publisher: Feiwel And Friends, 2015. 245 pages.

Source: Library

Publisher's Summary:

Jackson and his family have fallen on hard times. There's no more money for rent. And not much for food, either. His parents, his little sister, and their dog may have to live in their minivan. Again.

Crenshaw is a cat. He's large, he's outspoken, and he's imaginary. He has come back into Jackson's life to help him. But is an imaginary friend enough to save this family from losing everything?

Beloved author Katherine Applegate proves in unexpected ways that friends matter, whether real or imaginary.  

My Review:

As you might expect from the author of The One and Only Ivan, Katherine Applegate plays with the boundaries between reality and imagination, and comes up with something unexpectedly moving. The book is written in Jackson's voice, a simple and spare style that nicely conveys the struggle between his head and his heart.

Jackson is a boy who believes very firmly in science and the probable. Even when he was 7 and Crenshaw first appeared, he didn't believe in him. Now that he's ten and about to start 5th grade, he really doesn't believe in imaginary friends. To the delight of the reader, Crenshaw doesn't seem to let that stop him. After all, he's a cat. Cats do what they want, though some of what Crenshaw wants is none too cat-like (because, he explains to Jackson, he's the result of Jackson's own interests, which were by no means limited to cats). 

So Jackson himself knows that Crenshaw isn't real, and no one else can see him, and yet. Things happen that need an agent, and Crenshaw is the only available agent. Neither Jackson nor the reader can ever be 100% sure that there's no such thing as imaginary friends. What Jackson is sure of is that he needs all the friends he can get, and it takes a nudge from the cat to make him say what has to be said to keep his best human friend. Telling Marisol about their money problems and incipient homelessness doesn't fix anything, but it allows her to be his friend, and she helps him loosen his grip on facts just a little.

My Recommendation:

A nice read, not too challenging, but one that deals gently with both homelessness and friendship. For ages 8 up.

FTC Disclosure: I checked Crenshaw out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising." 

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Join the Ninja Librarian in celebrating the release of The Problem With Peggy on Nov. 28! Preorders are now available from Amazon and Smashwords for the ebook. Preorder the paperback directly from this site and we'll pick up the shipping costs!

NaNoWriMo Update #2

Something happened to my good intentions about weekly updates, and since my first update on Nov. 5, somehow an extra week slipped past.

I'm happy to report, though, that it didn't slip past my writing, and I can report progress good enough to probably carry me through the Thanksgiving weekend with its more limited writing opportunities. I caught up to par on the 14th (so it did take me almost half the month), and have been sailing on ahead since, continuing with 1800-2200 words most days.

I will confess that because I am turning a collection of flash fiction into a novel, I am able at times to lift a paragraph or two from the short stories (far less than I expected, though, and each of them needs careful consideration and reworking to fit the novel). I guess that means I can't claim a "legit" victory. News Flash: I'm not interested in playing by a set of arbitrary rules. I'm interested in writing a novel.

I think that's the text for the pep talk part of this post. The writing is the thing. Whether you are doing NaNo or not, it's not about rules. It's about finding the way that works for you to write and keep writing. Maybe that means locking yourself in a room for a month each year and writing like crazy (and then searching elsewhere for the much greater time commitment involved in revising it?). Maybe it means writing 350 words a day.

Or maybe you fall somewhere in between, like most of us do most of the time. The point is, you write, and then you edit. You don't sweat about anyone else's "rules" because there are no rules about this. You do whatever helps you and inspires you (so I play along with NaNo because it gives me artificial goals and deadlines, which works for me), and you ignore what doesn't. Let no one tell you at the end of this month that you aren't a "winner" if you don't have 50,000 words. If you write anything on any given day or in any given month, you're a winner in my book.

So go forth and write, whenever and however you can.

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One week until release day! The Problem With Peggy goes live on Nov. 28, but you can preorder now from Amazon and Smashwords for the ebook. For the best deal, Preorder the paperback directly from this site and we'll pick up the shipping costs--offer only lasts through November 30.
 

Friday (recycled) Flash: The Tomb of the Strange Feast

What with pounding away on my NaNo novel and finalizing the formatting and all for The Problem With Peggy (see below), there really was no time this week for a new story. So I dug into the archives, and as a way to get warmed up for Thanksgiving feasting (for my US readers!), I bring you again,

The Tomb of the Strange Feast

Mom never was a good cook, but that night she really outdid herself.  Her smile when she brought in dinner didn't convince even Lily, and she's only five.

"Brussels sprout-tofu casserole, with non-fat cheese," Mom announced, all bright and enthusiastic, the way grown-ups sound when they are trying to convince kids of the wonderfulness of something they really don't like it.  Totally fake.  Mom could pretend, but we all knew she didn't like the food she made any more than we did.  She didn't even put crumbled potato chips on top of the stuff, the way Nana does, which at least means there's some part of her “hot dishes” a kid can eat.

Trouble is, Mom's on a health-food kick.  Health food and bad cooking are a really awful combination.  When my buddy Lianne's mom cooks healthy food, it's things like grilled veggies and chicken breasts.  Kind of boring, but you can eat it.  Sometimes she gets these veggie-burger things that are really good, especially with plenty of ketchup and mustard.  You’d hardly know they were healthy.  But my mom makes Brussels sprout-tofu casserole, and tofu "cheesecake" for dessert.  Sometimes I think I should run away from home.

So that night Mom put the pan on the table, and we all just sat looking at it.  Lily looked like she was about to cry, and Dad swallowed hard.  The stuff looked nasty and smelled worse.  Mom was still trying to smile, and she served each of us a nice big heaping pile, but she had to work harder and harder to keep smiling as she went on.  She knew.  That’s the worst part: Mom knows she's a lousy cook.  She always has been.  Used to be, she just went ahead and made hot dogs and frozen pizza and stuff like that, which was fine.  When she was dieting, she’d get those “Lean and Mean” frozen dinners, and I got pretty used to them, too.

But last month she got hold of this book about fat kids and how bad eating and junk food was going to kill us all, and maybe that’s true.  But in our family, Mom’s attempts to cook her idea of healthy food are going to kill us all a whole lot sooner.  Like this casserole we were all staring at like gawkers at a traffic accident.  Horrified and fascinated at the same time.

Dad’s a real hero.  He smiled at Mom and picked up his fork.  “I’m sure it’s marvelous, Dear,” he said, and plunged his fork into the heart of the steaming pile on his plate.  He didn’t take a bite, though.  I figure the telephone saved his life, because before he could lift the fork, his phone rang, and he got up to answer it.  Mom doesn’t allow our phones at the table, so he had to hunt for it, and when he found the right one, it was Mom’s phone that was ringing after all.  I don’t know why they don’t use different ringtones.  Maybe they haven’t figured out how.

Anyway, Mom got on the phone and came back a minute later with her purse in her hand.  “Poor old Mrs. Carruthers is sick, and she needs me to go pick up her medicines.  She uses that discount drug store on the other side of town, so I’ll be a while.  Don’t worry about saving dinner for me—I’ll grab something while I wait for her prescription.  Just clean up when you finish.”

Mom has a sort of business running errands for the old people in our neighborhood.  I’m not sure how many of them pay her, but she does it for all of them, regardless.  Mom’s a great person.  She just can’t cook.

When the door closed behind her, Dad, Lily and I looked at each other, then at the casserole.  Then Dad stood up.  “Karla, you get the shovel.  I’ll bring this stuff.”

“I’ll get that dessert thing,” Lily said.  We’d tasted that before and knew better than to do so again.  Of all the things to mess with, dessert is the cruelest.

Dad began scraping plates back into the dish, and I got the shovel from the shed.  By the time I’d picked a good place, Dad and Lily were outside, and I held the dish while Dad dug a hole with a few quick stomps on the shovel.  We scraped in the mess, shoved the dirt back over it, and sprinkled some leaves over it to make it less obvious.  Then we loaded the dishwasher and Dad took us to the Burger Prince and got us burgers and strawberry shakes.  They make their shakes with real fruit, so we decided that was close enough to health food for tonight.

That was hours ago.  When I looked out my window just now, with the moon lighting up the yard, I swear I could see that fresh pile of dirt and leaves moving.

I hope we really have seen the last of that strange feast.

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©Rebecca M. Douglass, 2016
As always, please ask permission to use any photos or text. Link-backs appreciated!

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Just ten days until release day! The Problem With Peggy goes live on Nov. 28, but you can preorder now from Amazon and Smashwords for the ebook. For the best deal, Preorder the paperback directly from this site and we'll pick up the shipping costs.