The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise by Dan Gemeinhart

Okay, this book. I was pretty sold on it just from the blurb--a father-daughter duo traveling around the country in an old bus? Yes please, fulfill all my dreams. 

And the cover! See that cover? 

That there is Coyote sitting on the top of Yager, the school bus, with Ivan the cat. A few wispy leaves, a touch of red, and a fancy script?  

A GREAT COVER. 

(Whoever said you shouldn't judge a book by the cover was full of baloney. A good cover is pretty vital. That is one thing I have learned as a school librarian--no matter how good the book, kids will not read it if the cover is some cheesy thing from the 1990s.) 

So a great cover, a great premise, and it even delivers. 

SO GOOD. 

The first page sees Coyote in a gas station in bare feet, choosing her slushie flavor wisely, (watermelon is always a mistake) while her dad is filling up. Strong start with an interesting female lead with plenty of depth. 

Coyote's hippie father Rodeo operates under the belief that if the past was hard (and it was) the only way to deal is to pretend it never happened. So his life (and by default, Coyote's life as well) is one giant game of pretend nothing bad ever happened and that we don't miss anyone at all. 

Which worked fine when Coyote was 8. But now that she is verging on being a teenager, she is beginning to question that philosophy a little bit. After a phone call from her grandmother that lets Coyote know a childhood park with nostalgic, personal treasure is being torn up, she has to finagle her father from Florida to Washington state to reclaim her treasure in a weeks time without him really being aware of it. Because going "home" is a hard no from Rodeo. Too painful. Just like his rule about Coyote never calling him Daddy. 

Hard, absolute no. 

With the help of a fate and a few wayward strangers, Coyote gets him very, very close to the goal before he figures out what is going on. That is when things fall apart a little bit for Rodeo. 

But when things fall apart Coyote can finally put them back together again in the right order for the first time in five years. Because sometimes fathers need their daughters. Just like daughters need their fathers to be fathers, not just traveling companions. 

My only minor complaint about this book is that the people they picked up along the way seemed a little like someone was checking off a checklist. An African-American? Check. A single Hispanic mother and son? Check. A misunderstood lesbian? Check. A crazy goat? Check... (oh wait--that was just a bonus.) That is not to say these characters were not well developed. I loved all of the characters. And how they joined Coyote's story was well done. The identities just seemed a teensy bit too coincidental. 

Don't let that put you off the book though--It was so good! I laughed and I cried. And there was hope. And a goat. And a bus. 

Read it! 

Emily of New Moon by LM Montgomery

Since we were talking about magic, I thought I might as well trot out Emily of New Moon. 

LM Montgomery has always tended toward magic and the unexplained. While that tendency is kept in check through most of her books, it peeks out every once in awhile. Emily of New Moon is one of those times. 

(This is a newer edition of the book, but I really like the cover. I think it is my favorite of the ones I own.)

Since Emily is an orphan sent away to live with elderly relatives on a farm, people sometimes think Emily and Anne are pretty similar. But Emily is supposedly more autobiographical, and is definitely a few shades darker than Anne ever got. Situations for Emily were not as sure to end well as they did for Anne. 

(This was the cover that we got when I was a teen--mid 1990's.)

Of course, there are other differences between the two books as well--Emily lived with her father until she was 8-10. So she had sweet memories to sustain her when her relatives didn't understand her and her poetic flights of fancy. Similarly, she also was grieving on a level Anne never got to since Anne couldn't remember her parent's death. 

But similarly, Emily settles into her new life, just like Anne, with a close friend or two; austere older relatives who soften up and love her; and an imaginative, poetic mind. 

The difference is that the ending here has a deeper level of magic than any of Anne's experiences. A fevered hallucination brings a long unsolved mystery to a close. 

I would say I like Anne better, but Emily is more relateable in many ways. So.... both are definitely worth reading! 

Anything by LM Mongomery is worth reading though, so that's not surprising. 

(This cover was the first one I read, probably early/mid-1980's.)

I took these picture last summer (why am I so bad at getting posts up on time?!) and I MISS wildflowers. We have three inches of fresh snow from last night..... Spring IS coming. We had a day in the 50s this week, so we are getting closer! 

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie & Illus by Ellen Forney

This is a book I have heard about for years, but didn't read. I was in a cozy read rut for several years and didn't think this would be a cozy read. Of course, it isn't. But it is so good. And for all the terrible things that happen and the difficulty of Junior's life, it is chockablock full of hope. 

(chockablock is such a useful term. I resolve to use it more frequently in life.)

Have you read this book? You should read it now if you haven't. Most everyone should read this book. It is a frequently challenged book because it is a very honest portrayal of being a teen aged boy--not the most PC and G rated species on the planet. But if don't let that bother you, SO GOOD. 

There are quite a few cartoon pictures. After all, Junior, the main character, is a cartoon artist. Ellen Forney hits all the right notes with her renderings of "Junior's" work. 

Junior's sister, Mary Runs Away

There is a lot of anger and horribleness in this book. But Junior refuses to yield to the darkness of life. He lives around the horribleness and somehow manages to keep hope alive when all the world (or at least the world around his Spokane, WA area Indian Reservation) did their level best to drown hope at its very outset. 

This is so well written. I mean, it is Sherman Alexie, so duh. Of course it is well written. But Junior is so real, so vivid. Probably because a lot of this book is auto-biographical for Alexie. 

Junior's struggle between seeking a better life and leaving the reservation is raw and funny at the same time. He has a clear understanding of what life would be like if he stayed on the reservation and also an understanding of what a complete betrayal it would be to his family, friends, and tribe  to leave the reservation. How to reconcile those two things? 

Oh the angst of being a teenager! The beginning of the individual vs. the collective--making choices that are about you and not for others.

Fisticuffs! So much humor mixed into the anguish and pain of life in this book. So well done! The humor is a little like Junior's coping mechanism. And you laugh even while you are hurting for all the hopelessness of reservation life. 

Junior's Grandmother wears basketball sneakers "because she's got mad skills."

I like how the drawings vacillate between cartoon and more intricate drawings. 

I feel ya, Junior, I feel ya. Being poor never really bothered me as a kid. But it was something you would rather people not know about you. Just.... because. 

As a teacher, I often think about this--the struggle student's have in even being awake, clothed, and present at school.