Month: February 2025

Thien Pham was born in 1994.He is a famous author,blogger and content creator in the Vietnamese online community.” Family Style” to share thoughts,feeling and lessons about family love and life.

Thien Pham his family moved America during the war years the road to here for him and his famiy was extremely diffcult when the language was different everything became more difficult.Thien’s mother tried dish ” banh cuon” that Thu, a friend assigned to her,but things were not easy,there were often no customers so his charged by the hour,they went to work as porter,..Another very intersting memory was the first day he went to school, he remembered that he did not want to go but whebn his mother said we came here for this.The gave him more motivation, his friends gave him an English name is Tin

I really recommed this book because i i feel Thien he want experince and share personal experiences,as well as the value and perspectives that he has learned in the process of building and nurturing family relationship,each chapter can speak of the bond in the family where love and sacrifice are the foundation.Stories these are nor simply everyday stories,but also full of humanity helping reader realize that every moment with family is preciuos

Demon Copperhead is a story about a boy growing up in Lee County during the opioid crisis. His mother struggles with addiction and is perpetually in and out of rehab, forcing him to face the challenges surrounding the foster care system. And just after his mother nears the end of her rehab, she overdoses, leaving Demon to be thrown back into the continued neglect of the foster care system.

After moving from one foster home where he was forced to harvest tobacco on his foster parent’s farm, and living under less than pleasant circumstances, he was whisked off to a new foster home. He was soon to realize that this new home housed a slightly different form of neglect. His life conditions consisted of living without a proper room and bed, and constantly going hungry due to his foster family’s poor financial situation.

This book illustrates Demon’s life and all his experiences with drug abuse and overcoming addiction himself. He witnesses the various effects of drug addition, first hand, and at the hand of his loved ones. This is a devastating book, that still manages to weave bits of humor amongst the suffering, which I think is a much needed balance.

I enjoyed this book more than I had anticipated, I found the large book to be daunting, but soon found myself engrossed in the story and unable to stop consuming the story. I feel the writing style is very unique in a way that really captured Demon’s personality and helped him shine through, which I feel like is something that many authors have a hard time doing. I love reading a book that feels thoroughly personal to the character, like he felt very believable despite being a fictional character. I also enjoyed how raw and real all of the experiences described in the book felt, the fact that Kingsolver interviewed real people and wrote about their experiences really shone through and helped the experiences feel very real to me.

My one big complaint with this book is the fact that a lot of characters kind of lacked depth, their characterizations and backgrounds weren’t explored much and left them feeling rather flat. For example, the character Stoner was a prominent aspect of Demon’s early life, and his abuse and terrorization was so important in shaping his relationship with Stoner as well as his resentment towards his mother for marring him. However, his background wasn’t explored at all, or any kind of insight into why he behaved this way, which I found rather frustrating.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys very devastating stories that still have humor and optimism tied into them, or anyone who enjoys realistic fiction.

Rez Ball by Red Lake born author Byron Graves is the semi-autobiographical story about sophomore Tre Brun, and his relationship to basketball. Tre hopes one day to join the NBA, with his best friend Wes helping him by filming a documentary about his early life before the NBA.

I did not enjoy this book. I found the language used in it to be dated and awkward, as if the author had forced himself to write the words to please a certain audience, possibly teens, but inevitably, this chill diction used by Graves makes it impossible to take the book seriously. As a Native myself I found the depiction of Native people in this book to be stereotyping and odd. I’m not sure if I think this way solely due to their being a large difference in Ojibwe and Passamaquoddy characteristics or if this is just due to the author not properly fleshing out characters and making up for it by making them “relatable” in the way they talk or how they love video games and snacking, both of which are brought up repeatedly, mainly the former.

Some other issues I had with this book in particular are how the book tries to force feelings or methods used to build characters in a chapter or two, sometimes even shoving them in during a paragraph just to try and have something to hold on besides colloquial language and basketball. For example, during the story a character gets upset that a girl he liked ( without spoiling anything too much ) ending up liking his best friend instead, the character that had seen the two fall for each other gets jealous and resents his best friend then stops being friends with him after a fight, but then next chapter they’re already feeling regret and the chapter after they both forgive each other. This book does not work, not as a biography, and definitely as a fictional story.

I honestly wouldn’t recommend this book to anyone, not because it’s the worst thing ever written, but it suffers from forget-ability, and lacks any features that I would care to tell someone else to seek the story out for. If I would recommend this book, I would recommend it to another Ojibwe.

Almudena has always lived with her mother and has never known her father. when her mother must go on a once in a lifetime trip to pursue what she loves but must leave Almudena behind with a father she has never known. and the worst part is he doesn’t even speak English he speaks Spanish which Almudena does not speak at all. Almudena only has two months to get to know her father and try to learn how to understand him before she has to go home.

This is a surprisingly good book. it is a graphic novel which I don’t really enjoy because they are to easy to read. I went into the book expecting to read it in a hour and not be that involved in the story. but I actually liked the story. its an interesting plot and the author executes it perfectly. even though you aren’t able to understand what the father is saying unless you speak Spanish,you are able to understand his personality from the way the illustrator draws him.

The characters didn’t really develop much except for the obvious. but one character in specific does and that is the sorta girlfriend of the dad. and its a very good development and it is important to the story.

i would recommend this book to anyone who likes graphic novels and coming of age story’s.

Is a historical fiction novel which blends ghostly elements and real-life figures. Set in 1838 the story follows Blanca, a 14 year old girl who died 350 years before but remains as a ghost haunting a monastery in Mallorca. Blanca has spent the years of her ghostly life observing the living, intervening in small ways, upon the monks who inhabited the monastery.

Her quiet afterlife takes a turn when George Sands shows up with her lover, the composer Frederic Chopin, and her two children. Blanca become obsessed with George, drawn by her boldness, independence, and unconventional way of life. She watches as the couple navigates a difficult winter, dealing with Chopin’s worsening tuberculosis, local hostility towards their unmarried status, and creative tensions. As Blanca spends more time observing George she falls into love, bringing to light her own past heartbreaks and the lingering desires that tether her to the world.

I honestly cant decide if I liked or hated this book, I really wanted to like it because it seemed so profound. The story explores themes of desire, love, expectations and artistic struggles. The main character is 14 years old as I said before and while she might have been around for 364 years many of her thoughts experiences and emotions are that of a 14 year old. For any age group I think re-reading a book is the best way to fully understand its content but I would say especially for this one. I think this book would be best understood and read by the higher age range of the YA lit readers. I think the story is beautifully written and to someone it might feel compelling and important, but to me it did not feel so. I would most likely not suggest.

Ignite Me by Tahereh Mafi is a dystopian novel in the Shatter Me series. It is both the 3rd and the 5th book in the series. Mafi has set up the series in a way that there are the normal book one, book two, book three, and so on, but there are also books 1.5, 2.5, and so on. These books are from a different character’s point of view, rather than from the main character, Juliette’s, point of view.

The baseline of the series is that, in response to climate change, the world is now under the control of The Reestablishment. The Reestblishment is a corrupt government that has burnt most of the books in the world and will ruthlessly murder civilians. Though some people, including Juliette, are born with powers. These powers range from turning invisible, to making things float, to Juliette’s deadly power, of torturously killing anyone who touches her skin. All of her life Juliette has been shunned until, when she was 14 her parents put her into asylums, where she didn’t interact with anybody for 3 years. After she was taken out of the asylum she was put into the care of the 19 year old son of the leader of The Reestablishment, Aaron Warner. There she falls in love with a soldier and together they run away and join the underground resistance.

All of this leads up the Ignite Me. In this book Juliette is recovering from being shot while under the care of Aaron Warner. The story follows Juliette and Warner as they bond and plan their attack on The Reestablishment and Aaron’s father. Together they need to convince the surviving resistance members to join them and hone their powers. All throughout the story we get to watch Juliette manage her love life, which adds some much-needed humor and release from the tension in the rest of the storyline.

I really liked this book. It dived deep into trauma and how that changes and shapes people. It shows how childhood trauma has shaped some characters into dangerous weapons and deeply distrusting people. It also shows how experiencing abrupt and devastating things will make a person either retreat into themselves or forget everything except revenge.

This book and series is real good if you like dystopia, fantasy, and romance. The series is made up of shorter books ranging from 100 pages to 300 pages, and very short and fast-paced chapters that are never longer than 8 pages. Overall a very good series.

The Queen of Nothing is the third, and final book in Holly Black’s The Folk of the Air series. There is also a novella called How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories and then a seperate series of books that follow Oak and Suren, characters from the first set of books in a series called The Stolen Heir Duology.

The Queen of Nothing follows Jude and Cardan, the king and queen of Elfhame. Jude starts the story in exile, a sentence given by her husband, Cardan. She only returns to Elfhame when her twin sister, Taryn, begs her to take her place in a trial. Jude agrees but things take an unexpected turn when their father steals her away believing she is her sister. Jude is left to fend for herself in enemy territory until she can esacpe and return home. Once home Jude deals with unseen trials filled with twists and turns. She learns how to deal with the betrayel and pain she has been dealing with for so long. She also learns to accept her fate and her role as queen. She works through her feelings and begins to and understand and even trust them.

This was by far my favorite book in the series. The character growth throughout the three books was incredible. You can watch Jude and Cardan go from children to adults over the course of these books. In the beginning of the series Cardan is a spoiled, rotten, and cruel prince with no regard for other people and their feelings. By the end of this book his heart has thawed and he is a different person. Jude, on the other hand, is still very determined and strong willed but unlike in the first book she has found her place and accepted who she is.

This was a very fast paced book. The characters all have such interesting connections that are constantly evolving. One chapter they may hate one another and the next they are beginning to make amends and start anew. The romance really takes of in this book, especially between Jude and Cardan, which adds even more tension. There are a couple of more explicit scenes toward the end of the book, but nothing extreme. This is definently a young adult fantasy book with an enemies to lovers subplot and adventure. It fits in many categories which makes it likeable to a wide variety of readers.

Another Brooklyn tells another kind of young adult story, one that is less forgiving. This is the story of young girls in a world where, for every kind soul on the street, there are twice as many shadows, lurking, waiting to pounce. This is the other Brooklyn.

It’s the early 1970s, and August has just moved to Brooklyn with her father and brother. She’s left her mother and sweet memories of a Tennessee childhood behind for the big city. Shortly after arriving, the children convince their father to let them explore more and more of the burrough, where August meets Sylvia, Gigi, and Angela. Gigi dreams of becoming an actress. Sylvia is expected to get educated and “rise above”. Angela hopes to become a dancer, like her mother once was. Despite their many differences, be them aspirations or ancestry, the four girls’ friendship guides them through perilous young adult years–until it doesn’t.

Although the book advertises friendship as a key theme, I found that familial love and relationships were just as significant. August’s mother is not present in her life, leading her father to bring home a cacophony of different women. One of them introduces him to the Nation of Islam; August loses yet another parent, this time to the local mosque. August’s feelings toward and memories about her mother overshadow the entire novel. The fact that August’s parents are mostly absent contrasts the lives of Sylvia and Gigi. Sylvia’s parents hope their daughter will overcome racism with success, but their suffocating standards cast their daughter out. Gigi’s mother encourages her dreams but blames her for others’ actions. Even though the other girls have their mothers, none of them have anyone to teach them how to truly survive. This creates a cyclic effect that follows the four of them on their individual journeys forever.

I loved the language of this novel; it was almost not a novel but a 170-page poem. This made it a bit more challenging to read than your standard YA book, where the plot and characters are often plainly laid out before you. Woodson’s descriptions of 1970s Brooklyn were vivid and striking. Although some of the dialogue isn’t exactly realistic for what friends ages eight-fifteen would say to each other, it’s more about the meaning in those phrases. Young people may not have the eloquence Woodson gives them. But what the emotions and opinions they might have are reflected in the four friends’ voices.

The book is not a happy one. Racism, drugs, sexual assault, and suicide are present. Some of the girls escape from the shadowed alleys of Brooklyn, some don’t. Woodson doesn’t disguise the fact that the world holds much evil, rather, exposing this is partially her ambition. At the beginning, August, Angela, Gigi, and Sylvia are fearless and confident eight-year-olds. As readers, we grow with them, watching them learn firsthand the dangers of the city.

One could argue that this isn’t meant for YA readers. I would argue that while Another Brooklyn may introduce foreign ideas and themes, provoke questions, or cause consternation, that shouldn’t be reason enough for young people to not read it. Woodson portrays the life endured by these girls at a certain time, in a certain place. To axe this book from YA shelves would be to deny the reality of anyone living a similar story and prevent the understanding of situations different from our own.

Anyone who enjoys coming-of-age stories, tales of friendship, or fiction with deeper meaning will enjoy this book from award-winning author Jacqueline Woodson.

Stoner and Spaz is a novel about an unlikely friendship; Ben and Colleen. Ben has a disability called Cerebral Palsy meaning some of his body parts are heavy and numb which limits his life. he has always been quiet and reserved spending most of his time at school, the movie theatre and with his grandma. He loves the movies because he feels like it is the closest he will get too experiencing life, living vicariously through them. Colleen is a punk outlandish stoner and drug addict, she is challenging and a rebel. Ben and Colleen strike up their unlikely friendship when she goes to the same movie as Ben one night, she sits next to him and initially Ben is totally freaked that she is sitting with him. She ends up getting a ride home from the movie with ben and his grandma and throws up in the backseat of his grandmas car. She grows to really hate Colleen. From then on their relationship progresses, becoming friends and lovers. It is a touching story relating how two people who are so different are still capable of finding common ground and how they can have such a good influence on each other. Colleen breaks Ben out of his shelter and teaches him how to take risks and live despite his disability. Ben shows Colleen that she is capable of so much more than being a highschool drop out, drug addict for the rest of her life, he shows her what stability can look like and helped her make meaning of her life. I really loved this book it was easy to read and quick to get through. It was a beautiful example of the ideal exchange that happens between two people in a friendship or relationship. Ben and Colleen helped each other confront their problems and helped each other grow.

Everything We Never Had describes four Filipino men’s lives and the ways they navigate the challenges they are faced with. It is a multi-generational story following four men: Francisco, Emil, Chris, and Enzo, each from four different time periods.

Francisco deals with the experience of coming to the US in the 1930’s with the promise of prosperity and freedom, and being met with the harsh reality of racism, discrimination, and exploitation in the work force. All he wants is a way to earn enough money to support himself as well as to provide for his family back in the Philippines, but is unable due to the mass exploitation of immigrant workers.

Emil is Francisco’s son, who greatly resents his father for never being around and barely providing for their family. Francisco is a labor organizer, and is almost always busy with activism and giving speeches to his followers that he neglects giving Emil any attention. Emil is determined to be nothing like his father, so he places all his focus into his studies and into his job in order to help provide for his family. Despite experiencing the challenges of school life in the 1960’s as a Pilipino boy, with the abundance of racism from his classmates, he places faith in his own resolve. Emil aspires to go to college and make enough money to support his own family one day.

Chris is Emil’s son, living through his high school years in the 1980’s, who is frustrated at his father’s abrasive and overbearing nature. Suffocating his curiosity and passion for football as a missing assignment about family heritage causes Emil to prevent him from participating on his school’s team anymore. Emil was determined to culturally assimilate to US ideals, and neglected to teach Chris anything about his heritage and family, which ignited Chris’s fascination with the Philippines and it’s rich history. Chris gets more and more angry at Emil’s refusal to even acknowledge their heritage, as Chris’s passionate rants about history are cut short because Emil deems it “unimportant.” Chris vows to not be like his father and raise his family with love for their heritage and support for them to be who they want to be.

Enzo in Chris’s son, he in a very sensitive and anxious person, and has a hard time adapting to change, so when COVID-19 starts hitting the US in 2020, his parents offer to host his lolo (Grandfather) Emil at their house because he is more at risk at a retirement home. Enzo is forced to give up his room and reluctantly share his living space with an barely familiar face. His relationship with his lolo is strained at best, Chris and Emil never really made up, so the dynamics are full of animosity. But things start to get better when Enzo begins to join walks with Emil and his dog, and they start to connect with stories from their lives. Enzo desperately wishes to mend Chris and Emil’s relationship, but as more history between the two surfaces, it seems harder and harder a task to complete.

This story emphasizes father-son relationships, and how certain behaviors continue to repeat themselves through multiple generations of a family, as well as the efforts to break negative habits. It really portrays how people are products of their environments, and how heavily-implemented thought-processes are often hard to break.

I loved Everything We Never Had, it felt so refreshing to read a book where the focus was on family relationships rather than friendship or romantic ones. I feel like a lot of YA literature focuses a lot on dynamics between similarly aged individuals that I was pleasantly surprised with the depth that this book went into on how parental relationships affect someone, and how people from different generations interact.

My one complaint is the fact that there are a few plot holes. Since there are multiple POVs, I get that it can be challenging to answer every question that the plot presents, but it just left me feeling slightly unsatisfied at the end of the book when I realized I still had many questions. I feel like the story was very short, and that a little extra after the final chapters for each character would’ve gone a long way for my enjoyment.

I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys stories with multiple POV’s, or stories that focus on the depth of family dynamics.