The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu: And Their Race to Save the World's Most Precious Manuscripts by Joshua Hammer

★★★★

I was really excited to read this book (the title pretty much says it all!) - even though I don't normally read too much non-fiction.  Even though the book started off slow, it was really interested and I really enjoyed the last few chapters.  Such a unique and amazing story!

Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter by Kate Clifford Larson

★★★★

This was a very interesting book on Rosemary, the oldest of John F. Kennedy's sisters and the first non-fiction book that I had managed to finish in a long time.  It tells the tragic story of Rosemary's life as a intellectually disabled child growing into adulthood and the lobotomy that was performed on her and kept quiet for many decades after.  The story was very heartbreaking, but gave a lot of insight into the lives of disabled individuals during the time and was able to shed light on rights gained for the disabled due to the influences of Rosemary's siblings.

Novel Living: Collecting, Decorating, and Crafting with Books by Lisa Occhipinti

★★★★

I've been trying to fit some non-fiction books into my reading list lately and picked this up after a patron had returned it to my public library.  I read it over my lunch break over a few days and found it extremely interesting.  The book was divided into four sections: collecting books, creating a library, preserving and conserving, and crafting with books.  It gave a lot of really great ideas about each topic and I appreciated the author's insight, photographs, personal examples in each area.  My favorite section was the one on different craft projects and decorating ideas using books and I am looking forward to reading the authors first book on this topic, The Repurposed Library.

Same Kind of Different as Me by Ron Hall and Denver Moore

★★★ 1/2

"But I found out everybody's different - the same kind of different as me.  We're all just regular folks walkin down the road God done set in front of us.  The truth about it is, whether we is rich or poor or somethin in between, this earth ain't no final restin place.  So in a way, we is all homeless - just workin' our way toward home."

This memoir is the story of two men from very different backgrounds that becomes friends.  Ron Hall is a wealthy art dealer living in Fort Worth, Texas.  His wife Deborah becomes active in the church and convinces Ron to help out at a mission center near their home.  Ron reluctantly agrees and the couple serves meals to the homeless at the center once a week.  Ron and Deborah meet many homeless people and Deborah tells Ron that she had a vision about a withdrawn man named Denver.  After awhile, Ron and Denver slowly becomes friends.  Denver is a homeless man from Louisiana that grew up on a plantation in circumstances similar to slavery.  Where he grew older, he left the plantation and spent the next years on the streets and in and out of jail trying to survive.

Denver becomes like a part of the family and Ron and Deborah becomes more and more involved in serving at the mission.  Deborah is diagnosed with cancer.  After a long battle with many failed treatments, she dies at her home.  Many people give money to the mission in support of her name and a new mission is built in her honor.  Ron and Denver reach out to each other to support there lose of Deborah and work together selling artwork on an estate.  Denver also becomes interested in art as well and begins selling art of his own.  He is active in the church and preaches about his love of God and tells about Deborah impact on him and her work with the homeless.

I don’t usually read nonfiction, but I generally liked this book.  The book read as a narrative and was able to keep my interest.  I enjoyed reading the story from two very different perspectives and thought that the book brought up new understandings of individuals that are homeless and in similar situations.  It was a bit preachy at times, but I was glad that the authors were able to use their tragic situation to inspire others.

Hole in My Life by Jack Gantos

★★★★

"Someone once said anyone can be great under rosy circumstances, but the true test of character is measured by how well a person makes decisions during difficult times."

In this memoir, Jack Gantos begins his story when he is a senior in high school where he is spending the year away from his family after they moved from Florida to the Virgin Islands.  Dreaming of becoming a writer, Jack finds himself left with little money for pay for his college tuition.  He begins working for his dad where he meets Hamilton and Rik who promise him $10,000 to sail from the Virgin Islands to New York City to sell a large amount of hash to dealers.  After a six-week trip, Jack arrives in New York and is captured by the FBI for drug trafficking.  He is sentenced to up to six years in jail.  Jack spends the next fifteen months behind bars where he works as an x-ray technician and begins to write his thoughts in a journal.  He is released early because he applies to a university for creative writing and moves in with a family friend near the college.

I don’t normally enjoy memoirs (or nonfiction) and wasn’t really looking forward to reading this book. I figured it was just another book I was going to have to get through, but I ended up really enjoying it.  I really liked the author’s narrative style and was engaged with his story from the beginning.  It was fast paced and got the story across without being too drawn out and preachy like many memoirs that I have read.  I really appreciated that he did not blame others for his actions and focused on dealing with the consequences of being involved with drug trafficking.  The book ended on a positive note showing that he was able to make the best out of his terrible situation.  I would recommend this book to all young adults.  It was a good read and showed how one bad decision can lead to a stream of criminal and dangerous events.  

The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi

★★★★ 1/2

"When we're afraid, we lose all sense of analysis and reflection.  Our fear paralyzes us.  Besides, fear has always been the driving force behind all dictators' repression."

In this autobiographical graphic novel, the author tells of her life growing up in Tehran, Iran during the Islamic Revolution.  It was originally published in four volumes from 2000 through 2003.  The story begins when she is ten years old in 1980 and focuses on Marjane’s life with her family.  There are many changes that she faces, such as having to wear a veil in public in the increase threat of being bombed. Marjane struggles to understand the difference between her life and home and the image she must portray while in public and tries to keep herself informed by reading books and participating in demonstrations.  The author witnesses several family members and friends being arrested during the new ruling and they are eventually put to death.

Supported by her family’s encouragement, Marjane is a very outspoken young lady and often goes against authority, especially in her strict school.  When she is sixteen, her parents send her to a French school in Vienna to provide her with a good education and keep her away from the revolution.  There she makes a few friends, but is constantly moving around and feels she no longer has a home to belong to.  Missing the much-needed support from her family, Marjane gets involved with a number of boyfriends and drugs.  After a breakup with a serious boyfriend, she finds herself lost and ends up on the streets.  After four years in Vienna, Marjane returns home to Tehran.  Here, she struggles to fit in as well.  She eventually marries and attends a graphic design program at a local college.  After a few years her marriage falls apart, but Marjane finds support from her parents and grandmother.  The story ends with her leaving Tehran to continue her art education in Europe.

I really enjoyed reading this book.  It was told from a unique view poit of a young girl growing up in the Islamic Revolution and her journey to find her place in the world.  The book gave a lot of information about the war and Islamic culture in an interesting way.  I appreciated Marjane’s honesty in telling readers of the mistakes she made and how she learned to cope with the tragedies around her.  I also really enjoyed the artwork and how it complemented the story.

Eyes Wide Open : Going Behind the Environmental Headlines by Paul Fleischman

★★

Eyes Wide Open is a young adult nonfiction book looking at different aspects of the environment.  Topics center on the role that humans play in the environment and include population, consumption, energy, food, and climate.  The book is written directly at a young adult audience to explain why learning about these issues is important.  It looks at how to use information to make informed decisions about what is going on in the world around them.  The information given through out the book aims to provide readers with a positive outlook on the future of the environment.

This book was ok.  It was very informative and well researched, but I wouldn’t think that too many young adults would pick up this book for leisurely reading.  It seemed to read a lot like a textbook to serve as research material.  The book was interesting at first, but I found myself getting board with it after awhile and a lot of the information seemed very repetitive.  I was glad that there were so many pictures and graphics to go along with the text otherwise I think I would have had a much harder time getting through it.