In recent weeks I have started two YA books that I could not finish (Vandal by
Michael Simmons and Playing the Field by Phil Bildner). I found that with both
books I had to really push myself to read them and so I followed the advice I give
my students-- life is too short to read bad books (unless your English teacher
makes you).
I had purchased both books at Barnes and Noble with my own money based on the
jacket blurbs. Out of curiosity I checked the reviews on Follett's Titlewave. Was
it just me? Was I burned out on YA lit? I had just finished Octavia Butler's
excellent Fledgling (which is unfortunately not appropriate for school libraries)
so maybe these just paled in comparison. For both books the reviews were very
inconsistent. Vandal got a starred review from Kirkus but was panned, rightly so,
by SLJ. Playing the Field got a glowing review from Booklist and was lambasted,
again, rightly so, by SLJ. The 2 SLJ reviews were done by different reviewers.
For me, Vandal just had no spark and didn't seem to be going anywhere. Playing the
Field was just awful. I was groaning and rolling my eyes with every other
paragraph. I can see people having differences of opinion about books (e.g. my
students love Cirque du Freak but I am not a fan). I have trouble imagining,
though, a professional reviewer reading these books and seeing a diamond where I
saw a lump of coal.
So, based on this very unscientific sample I would say that SLJ has better reviews,
because I am always right and so are the people who agree with me ;-). The odd
thing is that in the past, without really thinking about it, I have always gone
with the SLJ reviews when they disagree with other sources. Just a gut feeling
from reading so many reviews I guess.
Has anyone else had similar experiences?
Anthony Doyle, Librarian
Livingston High School
Livingston, CA
tdoyle@MUHSD.K12.CA.US
Http://www.lhswolves.org/library/index.htm
"You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture; you just have to get people to
stop reading them."
Ray Bradbury
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