Recommended Reading

Written by Paul Coccia

Zando Young Readers

978-1-63893-149-2

320 pp.

Ages 12-17

January 2025

 

Seventeen-year-old Bobby Ashton has got a plan for the perfect summer before college. He's got plans for a perfect job, the perfect boyfriend, and more. The problems with planning everything down to the last second is that "it only takes one second to throw it all off." (p. vii)

 

All goes amiss when Bobby's big-gesture proclamation of love for his crush Truman becomes a streamed fiasco of broken glass and more, landing Bobby and his mother Cass in the office of Little Elm College's Dean Perez. Bobby loses his job at Campus Books, is removed from his freshman liaison gig for the Big Summer Reading Festival, and he could lose his scholarship and even his admission. His grand gesture was an epic fail, but Bobby is nothing except determined and resilient. His mother, a renowned but retired artist, makes a deal with the Dean to create a sculpture for the college out of the broken glass, and Bobby promises to stay out of trouble.

 

First thing Bobby does is get his Uncle Andy, a friend of Cass's, to let him work at his bookstore Corner Books, a  run-down bookstore that mostly carries used books. And with that new endeavour, the plan for The Summer of Bobby (AKA Bobby Ashton's Plan for the Perfect Summer Before College) begins to transform. Everything Bobby thought he needed for the perfect summer, from the job and the boyfriend to his fashion and achievements, start to change. His tasks may start off as seemingly manageable, like playing nice with crotchety Gladys at the bookstore to overhauling Corner Books to bring in more customers, but Bobby is nothing but persistent. And his new reputation as the Book Whisperer, the young man who knows just the right book for each person, helps make things happen.

 

One of the bookstore visitors Bobby meets is Luke, a college student, with whom he becomes friends. But Bobby knows that after his romantic fiasco, Dean Perez had warned him off of boys, telling him that, "Adolescent crushes will still be there after you graduate." (p. 10) That doesn't stop Bobby from doing a little matchmaking with others, like Luke's roommate Jerome and Mya, the coffee shop girl, his mom and Andy, and even best friend Wanda and a gamer called chickn-backflip. Will it be enough romance for Bobby, affectionately called Casanova by Luke a.k.a. the love Grinch, or will Bobby find himself falling for the least romantic guy around?

 

If you're a book lover, you'll adore Recommended Reading for its literary references and bookshop character. If you're a romantic, you'll fall in love with the dreamy Bobby and his efforts to help others connect, and find his own true love, albeit circuitously. If you appreciate reading about characters that are real, dealing with issues of missteps that need to be corrected and of body image and self-acceptance, while being fanciful and hopeful, then Paul Coccia's Recommended Reading is recommended for you. Paul Coccia, whose earlier books include I Got You Babe, Leon Levels Up, On the Line (co-written with Eric Walters) and The Player, gives us teens who are authentic in their feelings, whether it be their fears or loves, relationships or insecurities. These teens haven't got it all figured out, yet, but they are looking for ways to understand themselves and how they fit in with others. There are no easy fixes–are there any in life for anyone?–but they're trying. Bobby is looking for love and to have a positive impact on his community. He makes mistakes but he connects with people, whether through his book recommendations or through his sensitivity. And he does so with personality–and lots of book and movie references–and an awesome fashion sense.

 

Bobby may be the Book Whisperer but he's also the guy you want to have in your corner to cheer you on, help you find love, and to appreciate yourself. And with Recommended Reading, Paul Coccia gives readers the opportunity to fall in love with Bobby.

It's My Body!

Written and illustrated by Elise Gravel

North Winds Press (Scholastic Canada)

978-1-4431-9650-5

32 pp.

Ages 3-8

September 2022

Elise Gravel has always used her quirky illustrative way to entertain while teaching STEM, from her Disgusting Critters series to The Mushroom Fan Club and even her early graphic novel series Arlo & Pips. But in recent years, Elise Gravel's picture books have shown a proclivity for encouraging young readers to be respectful of self and others by demonstrating that we are more alike than our differences might suggest. In It's My Body!, Elise Gravel reminds us that our bodies are our own, to love and appreciate, even as they are different in shape, colour, ability and how we feel about them.

From It's My Body! by Elise Gravel

If we're going to talk about our bodies, we first have to recognize all the different kinds there are. Brilliantly, Elise Gravel gives us dozens of bodies, all unrecognizable as people but all representative of the myriad of human body types. Some have two legs, some do not. Some have ears, and some do not. Some are tiny, some thin, some pear-shaped, and others stocky. Some move by wheels and some with canes. And they can all do stuff.

From It's My Body! by Elise Gravel

What we choose to do with our bodies is up to us but Elise Gravel recommends that we honour them by keeping them healthy and happy with good food, activity, cleanliness, fresh air and rest. And she reminds us that "Nobody should touch your body in ways that you don't like" and we should respect that for others as well.

From It's My Body! by Elise Gravel

Without belabouring any one issue like inappropriate touch or hygiene, illness or diversity, disability or body positivity, Elise Gravel gives it all to us. She reminds us to be kind to ourselves and others and to appreciate our differences as well as our similarities. With her one-of-a-kind monsters, Elise Gravel makes us feel worthy and included, no matter what we can do, feel or look like. That will help children with the ideation of self-esteem, while also shepherding them to good mental and physical health. After all, as Elise Gravel's green-and-yellow-spotted character reminds us:

Thank you, BODY. Without you, I would be a NO-BODY!

Benjamin's Blue Feet: Q & A with author-illustrator Sue Macartney

Benjamin's Blue Feet
Written and illustrated by Sue Macartney
Pajama Press
978-1-77278-111-3
32 pp.
Ages 3-7
June 2020

Today is the release of the picture book Benjamin's Blue Feet, reviewed here on CanLit for LittleCanadians yesterday. To help launch Benjamin's Blue Feet,  I had the pleasure of interviewing author and illustrator, Sue Macartney.

Sue Macartney, author and illustrator of Benjamin's Blue Feet

HK:  What was the germ of an idea that started your writing of Benjamin’s Blue Feet? Was it finding a mirror on the beach, a trip to the Galapagos, reading a news story, or something else?

SM:  Working with young children as an art educator I’ve been struck by how early they can start comparing themselves negatively to others. This was one of the little sparks that got me writing Benjamin’s Blue Feet. I’m also passionate about nature and knew that I wanted it to be central in my storytelling.



HK:  There have been lots of books recently published that deal with the plastic problem in oceans and the colossal environmental problem of ocean garbage, but most of those books have been non-fiction. Why choose to tell your story as a picture book and not an illustrated book of non-fiction?

SM:  I was particularly drawn to the picture book format because of its amazing versatility. As a picture book author-illustrator I get to play with plots and visual subplots and can write about things like self-awareness and pollution for a very young audience. In picture book format, Benjamin’s Blue Feet is intended as a gentle and humorous exploration of these issues but can also be discussed in more depth depending on the child’s level of understanding.
         Incidentally, I started out in biology and I’m also really attracted to writing non-fiction books for children.



HK:  Though Benjamin’s Blue Feet  makes a comment about ocean garbage, it also addresses the issue of body image and wanting to look like someone else.  Why choose the blue-footed booby to focus on this concern?

SM:  The primary focus of the story is on self-awareness and I wanted my main character to be a uniquely memorable animal. The booby’s blue feet already fascinated me and became the starting point for my story. I was surprised to learn that the word “booby” is believed to come from the Spanish word “bobo”, which in English actually means “fool”. Something that might make any bird feel insecure!  So-named because the blue-footed booby’s large wings and feet can make its on-land movements seem awkward and comical. These same features also happen to be its indisputable strengths. Being able to champion an animal character that initially doubts its own attributes and then learns their intrinsic value felt like a very satisfying fit.



HK:  What do you believe are the best ways to tackle the issue of young children comparing themselves negatively to others?

SM:  Speaking only from personal observation, I think this is symptomatic of a much broader spectrum of behaviour surrounding issues of self-esteem and self-awareness. I would say that overarching societal attitudes have an enormous impact on how a child sees him/herself.  The attitude regarding healthy body image in Scandinavia, for example, is very different from that in North American.  I think primary education and more candid discussions about healthy body image with the very young are key components in tackling these issues.



HK:  Your double-spread of “Creatures of the Galapagos” depicts a variety of land and water animals from the Galapagos Islands. Do you have any personal experiences with these unique islands and would you consider another book to focus on this unusual ecosystem, particularly the endemism within?

SM:  When I was seven I got a copy of Helen Haywood’s The New Noah’s Ark of Rare Animals. Among all sorts of amazing creatures, I was introduced to Galapagos tortoises and land iguanas and learned about Charles Darwin for the first time. I think these fascinating islands have probably been floating somewhere in my brain ever since.  A real Galapagos adventure is high on my dream “bucket list” and a book examining the endemism within this remarkable ecosystem would be an amazing writing project…time to start saving for that trip!



HK:  The copyright page describes your art as  created with pen and ink and digital media.  Can you please explain the process of illustrating Benjamin’s Blue Feet?

SM:  The process for this book started with a particularly cute photo of a blue-footed booby. I really enjoy the deep dive into visual research and googled multiple images of blue-footed boobies and did lots of drawings until I found the right look for Benjamin.  The illustrations start as a series of small pencil thumbnails that I refine and enlarge for a finished pencil rendering. Next I add preliminary ink washes and details to the drawing. Then I scan the images into the computer using Photoshop for further work on colour depth and shadows. I like to incorporate paper and photo textures into my illustrations too.

•••••••••••••••••••

Many thanks to Sue Macartney

for sharing insights into the writing and illustrating of Benjamin's Blue Feet with this interview with CanLit for LittleCanadians

Thanks also go to Laura Bowman,
Sales and Marketing Manager at Pajama Press,

for arranging this interview.

Benjamin's Blue Feet

Written and illustrated by Sue Macartney
Pajama Press
978-1-77278-111-3
32 pp.
Ages 3-7
June 2020

Benjamin is a blue-footed booby who lives on an island in the Galapagos and loves searching for treasure. Unfortunately, with plenty of garbage clogging the oceans, it’s not surprising that much settles on Benjamin’s island. He finds a red “string-stretch-it” and an orange “hole-thing-um” and then he finds a “twink-um-doodle” a.k.a. a mirror. 

From Benjamin's Blue Feet by Sue Macartney

Unfortunately mirrors can be a curse for those of us who see in them what we don’t want to see. Benjamin sees that his beak is straight and very long, his wings are wide and bristly and his feet that are blue and floppy. And everything is different from those of his island mates.

From Benjamin's Blue Feet by Sue Macartney

Sadly Benjamin looks to his other found treasure to change his appearance, squeezing several onto his body to mask his “unsightly” body parts. 

From Benjamin's Blue Feet by Sue Macartney

Though a host of animals including sea lions, iguanas and finches laugh at his plastic enhancements, it is not until Benjamin recognizes the value in his big feet to his swimming, the beak to his fishing and his wings to his flying that this blue-footed booby appreciates all his attributes as they are.

From Benjamin's Blue Feet by Sue Macartney

Author-illustrator Sue Macartney tackles a lot of big issues in Benjamin's Blue Feet while maintaining a sweet story about a curious bird who finds novelty in junk. Like a child who finds gems among stones, Benjamin finds treasure in the garbage that washes up on shore. But it's that mirror that causes him to lose faith in himself when he finally sees what he looks like. By comparing himself to others, he deems himself less. And though he uses dangerous garbage to amend his appearance and can safely extricate himself from its inherent peril, this is what it takes for Benjamin to appreciate his morphological appearance as perfect for the functions of a blue-footed booby.

Sue Macartney’s art, created with pen and ink and digital media, always places the emphasis on Benjamin’s blue feet except when the garish garbage is around. His blue feet are vibrant and still harmonious with the earthiness of his environment, unlike the incongruous junk with its artificial and discordant colours.  Though Sue Macartney carries the reader to the unique environment of the Galapagos through the content of the landscape and its creatures (she also includes a double-spread of an assortment of "Creatures of the Galapagos"), I was especially mesmerized by her aquatic environment. She imbues her water with such hues of green and blues and textures of crinkly waves and whitecaps that the saltwater spray is almost palpable.

From Benjamin's Blue Feet by Sue Macartney

Benjamin may be surreal as a blue-footed booby who talks and can manipulate man-made junk, but the problem of ocean garbage and negative body image are not. They are dangerous challenges to our world and ourselves and teaching young children about them via an amiable bird reflects well on Sue Macartney and Benjamin both.

 • • • • • • • • • •

Tomorrow I interview author and illustrator of Benjamin's Blue Feet, Sue Macartney, about her new picture book.

On the Spectrum

Written by Jennifer Gold

Second Story Press

978-1-177260-042-1

336 pp. 

Ages 13-18

September 2017

The push for books that reflect diversity has been extending more recently to include those with characters on the spectrum or with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) as does On the Spectrum.  But, unlike the recently reviewed Slug Days by Sara Leach (Pajama Press, 2017), On the Spectrum takes a different approach, placing the character on the spectrum in a secondary role, as a step-brother to the teen protagonist, thereby providing a different perspective to life on the spectrum. 

In On the Spectrum, the protagonist Clara is a sixteen-year-old whose issue is orthorexia i.e., an unhealthy preoccupation with how much and what she eats.  After a social media faux pas and the intervention of social workers disturbed by her ballerina mother’s own extreme healthy lifestyle fixation, Clara heads to Paris to spend the summer with her Dad, his new wife Mag and her half-brother Alastair, a six-year-old child on the spectrum.  While visiting Parisian tourist attractions and adhering to Alastair’s routines, Clara begins to learn about her little brother’s behaviours and needs, like his weighted vest and use of noise-cancelling headphones to help him calm, and starts to really care about him.  Conversely, Alastair is learning about his sister, putting together the pieces of what he overhears from his parents’ discussions and interpreting her words and actions, convinced that, though Clara denies it, she must be on a spectrum herself, on an eating disorder spectrum.  Complicating matters for Clara is Alastair’s friendship with Michel, the son of a local baker, who whips up amazing pastries and meals with Alastair and is convinced he can help Clara enjoy food once again.  

Young adult author Jennifer Gold, whose previous books Soldier Doll (Second Story Press, 2014) and Undiscovered Country (Second Story Press, 2017) have been reviewed on CanLit for LittleCanadians, gives Alastair voice through Clara’s narration; only through his sister’s interpretations do we hear what Alastair says and does.  It’s still a valid voice but it reads very differently from the first-person narrative of Slug Days or Spaghetti is Not a Finger Food (Jodi Carmichael, Little Pickle Press, 2013), both of which are written for younger audiences.  But then again, On the Spectrum is Clara’s story and Alastair is akin to her sidekick who is there to help steer and illuminate her thinking, which he does so effortlessly both about his autism and her issues.  He may be on the titular spectrum but apparently Clara is on one as well.  The spectrum, whatever it may be based upon, is broad, indicating that there is no one way of being autistic or having eating issues.  Even being different is different for everyone, and Jennifer Gold's Clara and Alastair and all those in-between make that abundantly clear.

✈✈✈✈✈✈✈✈✈

(A version of this review was originally written for and paid for by Quill & Quire but space limitations prevented its inclusion in the recent October issue.)



Small Displays of Chaos

by Breanna Fischer

Coteau Books

978-1-55050-661-7

102 pp.

Ages 13+

May 2016

It wasn’t supposed to be this way.  Everything in her life was supposed to be better when she was thinner. (pg. 50)

For Saskatoon teen Rayanne Timko, her eating disorder began with a Phys Ed class fitness goal of healthy eating and improved exercise regime to get a good grade to match those of her academic subjects.  But the recording of all foods and monitoring her physical appearance became a ritual she couldn’t let go, ever hopeful of finding “the person who she wanted to be…hiding somewhere underneath.” (pg.  9).

Now a high school senior, Ray’s life is a complex existence of school counselling sessions, community service at a dog shelter, crushing on Josh Reid who’d witnessed her purging at a party, and convoluted family dynamics with a twin sister, an angry father, a conflicted mother and an impending family wedding that requires her dreading her participation as a bridesmaid.  And I haven’t even mentioned the voice of her judgemental thinner self Edie for whom Rayanne never seems to be good enough.

But even with a referral to an eating disorder specialist, Ray doesn’t know what she needs and finds it hard to ask for help.  It’s not until the family wedding that the desperate teen realizes that she’s been in the “final stage of a grand Disappearing Act” (pg. 74) from which she wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone and could finally just give up.

With all the positive affirmations about body image and awareness campaigns about eating disorders and mental illness, Small Displays of Chaos is still a timely and relevant story that needs to be told and heeded.  Breanna Fischer has based Small Displays of Chaos on her own experience being diagnosed with anorexia with bulimic behaviours and convincingly shares her skewed thinking and dangerous pursuits with candor and insight.  Luckily both Rayanne and Breanna Fischer are able to survive their crises and find the words to astutely convey the depth of those crises to provide valuable lessons. 

Small Displays of Chaos: Book launch (Saskatoon)

Join 

Coteau Books

and 

debut YA author

Breanna Fischer

for the launch of

Small Displays of Chaos

by Breanna Fischer

Coteau Books

9781550506617

112 pp.

Ages 13+

May 2016

on 

Monday, May 2, 2016

at

7 p.m.

at

McNally Robinson Booksellers

3130 8th St. E.

Saskatoon, SK

A riveting, haunting novel about one teenager’s journey toward self-love and strength.

17-year-old Rayanne Timko is only a few months into her senior year of high school, and her biggest concern should be deciding on a university and career path. But while her classmates are filled with anticipation, nothing in her life seems to going smoothly, and Rayanne finds herself struggling to overcome anorexia. She has a new friend: Ed - the seductive and demanding presence in her head who insists she be as skinny as possible. With Ed around, Rayanne is blind to nearly everyone else in her life. But what happens when Ray begins to suspect she may be losing more than weight? Will she be able to save her family - and herself - before it’s too late?

Filled with complex relationships and realistic young adult tribulations, Small Displays of Chaos follows Rayanne as she struggles with the astonishingly common yet stigmatized disorder of anorexia nervosa. Throughout her story she fights to discover who she is despite her illness, and learns that by loving herself, she is better able to love those around her.

Retrieved from Coteau Books website at http://coteaubooks.com/index.php?id=1046 

on March 28, 2016.

10 Ways to Improve Your Body Image from Cheryl Rainfield, author of "Stained"

Stained

by Cheryl Rainfield

Harcourt Children's Books/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

978-0-547-94208-7

304 pp.

Ages 14+

Release date October 1, 2013

Tomorrow is the release date for Cheryl Rainfield's Stained, reviewed by CanLit for LittleCanadians here.  Body image is a key factor in plot development in Stained, with multiple characters focusing on their perceived imperfections or those of others to an unhealthy degree.  Knowing the damage that a poor body image can have, Cheryl Rainfield has shared her thoughts, as well as links to relevant resources, in this downloadable article:   

10 Ways to Improve Your Body Image and Feel Better About Your Body

This is an important read for all of us, even younger than the mature readership needed for Stained, as teachers of media literacy will recognize. Help your students and your children understand the issues of body image to ensure good health, mental and physical.