Author: Stephanie

Joy

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joyJoy, a 2015 biographical comedy-drama, stars Jennifer Lawrence as Joy Mangano, a suburban mother at the end of her rope. Joy grew up as a very creative child in a loud and boisterous home. Her parents split up when she was young, leaving her in a creative lurch as she had to forgo college to take care of her parents as they worked through their divorce.

As an adult, Joy lives with her two children, her mother, and her grandmother, while her father and ex-husband are both camped out in the basement. Her father owns a body shop where both Joy and her half-sister, Peggy, help out sometimes. Her ex-husband sings in a nightclub, barely contributing any money to the household, leaving Joy to manage all the finances to herself. This movie follows all four generations of Joy’s family with her grandmother narrating Joy’s journey to her place as the matriarch of her family and eventually the founder of a massive business dynasty.

Joy struggles financially as she works to bring one of her inventions to life, while also juggling her family and work. This movie highlights the dark side of commerce and how people just starting out really have to find their own ways in the world. Joy fights through betrayal, loss of love and innocence, and treacherous backstabbing as she works to patent, manufacture, and sell her invention to the world. Joy follows the title character’s rise to becoming the matriarch of her complicated family and her journey to success in commerce.

 

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell

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fangirlHave you ever read fan fiction? Fan fiction is when fans of television series, movies, books, etc. write fiction about the different characters present within that certain TV series, movies, books, etc. Quite simple. A famous example of fan fiction is Fifty Shades of Grey, which is a Twilight fan fiction story. (If you look online, there are many, many other examples, as well as popular fan fiction websites.)

Fangirl focuses on Cath, a teenage girl just graduated from high school preparing to head to her first year of college. Cath is a GIANT Simon Snow fan. While other people love Simon Snow, Cath lives and breathes him. She has spun a new world for Simon through her fanfic website, “Carry On, Simon”. Simon Snow is a character in a magical series that Cath and her identical twin sister, Wren, write about online. Once college starts though, Cath and Wren begin to drift apart.

This first year of college is rough for Cath. She and her sister are going to the same college, but her sister doesn’t want to room with her, a fact that Cath can’t understand. Rooming with Reagan, a much older girl, and somewhat-rooming with Reagan’s ex-boyfriend, Levi, who never seems to leave their dorm room, Cath struggles to find her balance between the real world and the fanfiction world of Simon and Baz. Cath’s relationships with Reagan, Wren, Levi, and her father all add necessary personal touches to this book, allowing readers to draw connections between what Cath writes about in Simon’s world and what is actually happening in Cath’s world during the day-to-day.

This book alternates between sections of the Simon series, sections about Cath’s real life, and sections of various fanfiction(whether it be Cath’s or someone else’s). While all this switching may seem overwhelming, the book actually benefits from the many different points of view. Don’t give up! Stick with it and soon you’ll be sucked into Cath and Simon’s world.

This book is also available in the following formats:

  1. OverDrive ebook
  2. OverDrive e-audiobook
  3. CD audiobook

All the Summer Girls by Meg Donohue

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all the summer girlsAll The Summer Girls by Meg Donohue focuses on the lives of three friends: Philadelphia lawyer Kate, Manhattan mom Vanessa, and San Francisco writer Dani. Kate’s fiancé has dumped her on the same day she found out she was pregnant. Vanessa is dealing with news that her husband cheated on her with another woman and is searching the internet for a man she dated eight years ago. Dani has just been fired yet again in San Francisco and is turning to her good friends (drugs and alcohol) to cope.

Kate, Vanessa, and Dani have been best friends for years, but have drifted apart. Their separation is as much to do with where they each live, their adult lives, and a major event that happened eight years ago during their last summer at the shore, as it is with normal daily life. The three plan a long weekend getaway at Dani’s father’s house in Avalon, the place where they spent two weeks out of their summer every year until one deadly night eight years ago. Being back in this familiar place brings tension to the surface of their friendship, making them all realize just how much their choices eight years ago have shaped their lives today. Each woman is holding onto a big secret, one that each is afraid to tell, and yet all of their secrets are interconnected. Kate, Vanessa, and Dani are forced to come to terms with the decisions they made eight years ago as their friendship hangs in the balance.

This book is also available as an e-audiobook through OverDrive.

Low, Volume 2: Before the Dawn Burns Us

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low v2Rick Remender’s Low series is so far one of my favorite discoveries this summer. Low, Volume 2: Before the Dawn Burns Us brings to light the tragedies that the Caine family was faced with in the first volume and expands upon the ways the mother, Stel, is trying to rise up and save who she can.

In the first volume, the entire Caine family is torn apart with the father dead and the two daughters torn away from Stel and her only son. She vows to bring the family back together only to fall into despair. The sun has gone radioactive forcing all of the Earth’s inhabitants underwater, knowing they cannot stay there forever and hoping for an eventual inhabitable world to be found elsewhere. Shoot forward ten years and a probe has been recalled to the surface of the Earth, one that shows Stel that there is an inhabitable world elsewhere. She must get to the probe first and  find her children along the way.

In volume 2, Stel wrestles with herself as she feels her hope in the future fading, something that had previously seen her through numerous bad situations. Stel struggles to salvage what she can of her mission to find the probe and ultimately save all of humanity, while a side story shows Stel’s estranged daughters working to find themselves and each other after their horrific split from their parents. One of her daughters, Della, is the relentless Minister of Thought, living in a totalitarian state where hope and optimism are squashed. Stel and two members of Marik’s surviving gladiator team are still searching for the probe. This second volumes is full of tragedy, loss, and hopelessness, but is ultimately about what happens to all of us when we lose hope and try to find it again.

The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins

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the girl on the trainThe Girl on the Train is a messy intrigue of a book. If you’ve read Gone Girl, this book covers the same bases: suspense/psychological/mystery fiction, murder victims, witnesses, married people, and missing persons. This book is fast-paced and, at least for me, it was difficult to pin down who the killer actually was.

The Girl on the Train is the story of Rachel Watson’s life post-divorce. Every day she takes the same commuter train to London to work and passes the same houses and scenery. As one is apt to do on long train rides, Rachel creates stories about the people, places, and things that she sees along the way. One particular couple catches her eye on every trip. Rachel soon finds herself looking out for this married couple every time she speeds by, hoping to catch more of a glimpse into their daily lives. She gives them names, invents background stories for them, and even gives them careers. Everything is seemingly perfect until one day when she sees something out of the ordinary happen at the married couple’s home and soon after, the woman goes missing.

Rachel is forced to confront whether she should go to the police, contact the missing woman’s husband, or just lay low. Rachel is having a rough time dealing with her past, with her ex-husband, Tom, and his new wife, Anna. Her life is spiraling out of control and the peace that she found while watching the married couple has been shattered, leaving her in the lurch and without a solid place in the world. This novel shifts between three different narratives: Rachel, Anna, and the missing woman. Each narrative is packed full of action. Readers will be left wondering what happened and wondering about each characters’ motives.

The Girl on the Train will also be released as a movie on October 7th!

This book is also available in a wide variety of other formats.

 

The Danish Girl

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the danish girlThe Danish Girl follows the lives and work of artists Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener. This movie is based on the real lives of these two Lili Elbe was a transgender Danish painter, born Einar Wegener. Einar and Lili were married and lived together painting and illustrating different portraits and landscapes.

Einar Wegener was a Danish landscape painter born in 1882 who married Gerda Gottlieb when they were just 21 and 19. This movie begins with them being happily married with a loving relationship. One of the couple’s friends walks in on Gerda painting Einar as he is holding up a dress and wearing heels and tights. The friend says that they should start calling Einar, Lili instead. This name-giving serves as a sort of shift for Einar.

Einar begins dressing up more as a woman with Gerda even helping him get into character one night when they go to a party. Einar ends up in full Lili garb and this new persona is born. Einar begins treating Lili as if she is a totally separate individual from himself. Einar has begun his transformation into completely becoming Lili, something he always knew he wanted to be. Einar and Gerda’s relationship becomes strained, but they don’t stray from each other’s sides, eventually settling in Paris with Einar fully transitioning to live openly as Lili.

This movie follows Einar’s journey to Lili and how Lili struggles to accept the truth that this ‘Lili’ persona is her true an authentic self. He reveals that he is a woman, that he was simply born into the wrong body, but that it sometimes feels like he has two people in his one body and that they are both fighting to see who will take over. Einar struggles with revealing this admission because the doctors he visits sometimes either do not believe him or wish to send him to a mental institution. Lili eventually meets a doctor who tells her that he can help her become her true self through sex reassignment surgery, something she desperately wants. Gerda and Lili’s relationship evolves and changes throughout this movie as both of them struggle to deal with their new identities. This movie was sincerely eye-opening for me and the actors did a wonderful job of portraying each character.

This movie is also a book, available in a physical copy and also as an OverDrive ebook.

 

Prez, Vol. 1: Corndog-In-Chief by Marl Russell

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prezIn a world where corporations have the power to rule the world, where social media has infiltrated presidential elections, and when the age restriction on who can run for president has been abolished, you know things are bound to get interesting really quick. Prez, Vol. 1: Corndog-In-Chief tells the tale of this messed-up world and all the deals happening behind the scenes.

In the not so distant future, 2036 to be exact, the world is topsy-turvy. People vote for elections via Twitter, corporations have the ability to run for President, and a strain of cat flu has infested the world, one that costs millions of dollars to cure and that is infecting people worldwide. One of the people infected and dying is Beth Ross’ father. Beth becomes viral-video famous, an internet celebrity named Corndog Girl, after an unfortunate incident at the fast food restaurant where she works.

The country is in the midst of a presidential election, one that is being controlled behind the scenes by a few major corporations. Two candidates have been presented, but a famous video blogger has chosen to endorse Corndog Girl for President instead! She’s eligible to become president, something the corporations never believe would happen, so they write her off. Joke’s on them! She becomes president and soon finds herself thrown into a messed-up world of politics and corporate power grabs. Beth is left to fill her cabinet with people she can trust and all the while try to figure out how if she has the power to take back control of this upside-down world. This graphic novel is full of snark, witty social media commentary, and a glimpse into what our lives could possibly be like if corporations are given more control over our way of life.

Low, Volume 1: The Delirium of Hope by Rick Remender

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low v1Low, Volume 1: The Delirium of Hope by Rick Remender blew all of my science fiction/fantasy/graphic novel expectations out of the water. Even though the woman on the cover, Stel Caine, the matriarch of the Caine family, is wearing heels, she is an incredibly strong and powerful leader who leads her family and community through despair. Her belief that human consciousness can change your reality pushes her through dark times, leading her to believe deeply that hope can change anything, no matter what the people around her may say or do or what her current circumstances are.

In this first volume, Low begins by introducing you to the Caine family, mom Stel, dad Johl, and their three kids. Many millennia in the future, humanity was forced to abandon the earth’s surface and take refuge underwater because of the sun’s intense radiation. They knew that living underwater would only prove to be a temporary solution as the sun’s radiation would reach them eventually. As a result, the first batch of mankind to live under the waves sent probes into the galaxy to look for inhabitable worlds, knowing their great-great grandchildren would be the only ones who would benefit from the results. Generations later, the Caine family is in control, fighting off invaders and trying to keep their lives together. A great disaster alters their family forever and the Caines are forced to reach deep within themselves to try to find the strength to survive. Grief cannot be given control leading Stel to work to find a solution to both the loss of her family and the necessity of finding a new inhabitable world quickly.

Tocchini’s artwork grew on me. His work is sketch-like with colors that are rich, but also at the same time, muted. His style of drawing really leads you into the different scenes and the different places underwater that the characters find themselves traveling to. I recommend you check this out! (I’m currently deep in the second volume, so stay tuned for a review of that one!)

Bizarro by Heath Corson

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bizarro

Everyone loves a good superhero, right? They swoop in and save the day, leaving the public stunned at their magnificent feats of strength and good will. Not all superheroes are worshipped though. Enter in Bizarro. Bizarro is Superman’s opposite in every way. From the way he speaks to the way he flies, Bizarro is truly Superman’s mirror opposite.

In this first volume of Bizarro by Heath Corson, Jimmy Olsen, one of Superman’s friends, finds himself on a roadtrip with Bizarro from Metropolis to Bizarro America, aka Canada. Jimmy has an ulterior motive: he wants to create a coffee table book of their adventures, something that will hopefully make him lots of money. Road-tripping with Bizarro turns a little crazy when he introduces Jimmy to Colin, his pet chupacabra, and when Bizarro takes the two of them off on strange and funny adventures. This graphic novel allows readers to follow Bizarro’s mixed-up life and the messes both Jimmy and Bizarro inevitably end up entangled in. I hope future volumes will give readers more of a look into Bizarro’s back story.

Corson is giving new life to Bizarro in this first volume, highlighting all the differences between Superman and Bizarro and even giving the superstars of Metropolis multiple cameos in this book, a shout-out fans of Superman are sure to enjoy. This addition of familiar people to Bizarro’s world helped me ground and better understand this book. (The way Bizarro speaks may push you out of this book, but I encourage you to stick with it and just remember that he always means the opposite of what he is actually saying.) Happy reading!

All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven

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all the bright placesAll the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven handles difficult topics for teens, from emotional problems and mental illness to death and suicide, but in such a way that everything is written eloquently and seriously, showing the consequences of all actions, no matter how big or small. Niven’s characters are beautifully written. The story really captures the heartbreaking yearning for everything to end up alright by showcasing a compelling search for hope when all seems lost.

All the Bright Places is told from the points of view of two high school students, Theodore Finch and Violet Markey. Theodore and Violet meet on the ledge of the bell tower at their school. Finch is fascinated with death, chronicling ways to kill himself. Something good stops him from hurting himself every time. Violet has a countdown until graduation, when she can finally leave Indiana and start a new life away from the aftermath of her older sister’s death.

That first meeting is the start of a very unlikely relationship between the freak, outcast boy, Finch, and the popular, yet damaged girl, Violet. This book weaves an exhilarating and  charming, yet simultaneously heartbreaking, love story between the two that immediately draws you in. When Violet and Finch then pair up on a class project to discover the natural wonders of their state, they learn more about each other than they initially thought. Death-fascinated Finch and future-focused Violet find hope and help by working with each other. Their lives will be forever changed.

This book is also available as an audiobook. If you use RiverShare OverDrive, our e-book and audiobook service, you can check out All the Bright Places as an e-book, as well as an audiobook.