Somers Library Blog

The novel All American Boys written by Jason Reynolds follows the story of Rashad, an African American boy who is in high school, from two different perspectives, Rashad’s perspective and his classmate Quinn. In the early stages of the book Rashad is a victim of police brutality outside a shop that he shops at often. The police officer, who falsely accuses him of shoplifting, uses a lot of unnecessary force to subdue Rashad even though he was not resisting at all. He is sent to the hospital and then after a few days, when he wakes up, he is treated for many injuries including a few broken ribs. Rashad’s family now faces a tough choice, they can either go public with the story or keep the story within the family and police department. The choice is made for him when one of his friends reports the problem to the news and the story is all over local and national news the next day. Now Rashad’s family needs to deal with the local and national news. Rashad also goes back to school to contra...

Invitation to a Beheading follows the story of Cincinnatus, who has been sentenced to death for the crime of “gnostical turpitude.” Cincinnatus’s beheading is set to take place in an unknown amount of time, and the book revolves around Cincinnatus’s predicament and the people he meets while jailed. Among the people Cincinnatus meets are Rodrig, the prison director, Rodion, the jailer, and Roman, the lawyer for Cincinnatus. None of these people will reveal the date of Cincinnatus’s beheading, which troubles him greatly. Cincinnatus also awaits a visit from his wife Marthe, who is unfaithful. Despite this, Cincinnatus is eager to meet with her. Monsieur Pierre additionally joins Cincinnatus as a seemingly benign fellow inmate, and Monsieur Pierre attempts to befriend Cincinnatus. Cincinnatus at first dismisses Pierre, but Pierre continues to try to become acquainted with Cincinnatus. The novel is rife with symbolism and is often more focused on Cincinnatus’s internal conflicts, making th...

Show me a sign is an engrossing historical fiction novel that embraces our similarities and differences as people and will take you on a vivid journey through the past and will change your perspective on the future. The story begins on the isolated shores of Martha's Vineyard in the early 1800’s. The perspective is one of a deaf girl, Mary Lambert. Mary has spent her whole life on the Vineyard and knows the island – from the people who inhabit it to the animals to the wild landscape – like the back of her hand. She knows that ever since her ancestors settled on her island, the deafness has been a part of the culture of those who live there. As she grows up, one in every 25 people is deaf, and almost everybody knows sign language. Times are tough for Mary. Her family, still shattered with grief after losing Mary’s brother the previous year, and the town’s foundation crumbling with disputes over land between the English settlers and the Wampanoag people. Even so, Mary knows she belon...

Clay and his 4 friends, Sunny, Starflight, Tsunami, and Glory, all live inside of a mountain trapped there by the ones who care for them. They are the Dragonets of Destiny, prophesied dragons destined to stop the great SandWing war. The SandWings, a tribe of dragons, have been waging war against the other tribes for the past 100 years. It started as just a dispute between SandWing queens, but one of them named Blister roped her allies into it, forcing each of the dragon tribes to take sides and to fight in a war that wasn't their own. Clay and his friends have trained under the mountain for years now, never seeing the outside world. After all that time, they're finally ready to try and make an escape, to get out from the mountain. Their escape attempt is successful, but they soon learn that the outside world is more dangerous than they had ever imagined. Mere hours after leaving the mountain, they are captured by the SkyWing queen, and taken prisoners to their palace. All priso...

The main character Kamran, was just an average high school student. He played on the football team, had a girlfriend and was prom king. Okay fine, he was a lucky high school student. He had always dreamed of being in the Military like his brother Darius. Darius was older than him and had been training for the military. They had grown up together and Karman had always looked up to him. In a crazy turn of events his whole world is turned upside down. His brother is said to be a terrorist! A threat to his own country and part of an attack on the US Embassy. Kamran is shocked as he watches the video on TV of a still undetermined figure about the same height as his brother Darius. In this video the figure is taking part in an attack on the US Embassy! As more time goes by it's determined that yes, it is Darius. Kamran and his family's house is inspected and all their stuff is gone through. Then more videos come out of just Darius where he makes threats and foreshadows future attacks...

Zelie, a seventeen-year-old girl, is not like everyone in Orisha. She was born as a diviner, meaning she would have power only some were gifted with- magic. When she came of age, she would be able to join her mother and become a great Maji. Tragically, when she was six, King Saran of Orisha committed the Raid. Magic disappeared and he slaughtered every Maji and hung them for the world to see. He let the children survive, but it would never be the same. The diviners were discriminated against, forced into slavery, and countless other laws that made life for them and their families impossible. Zelie and her older brother, Tzain (who was not Maji), were living life on the low. It was all going well until Zelie bumped into someone that would change their lives forever. Amari, the princess of Orisha, stole a sacred scroll that could bring back just a bit of magic at the touch of a diviner, from the palace. She made a split-second decision that would throw her into something much bigger than...

Looking for Alaska by John Green is a story about an awkward, introverted teenager named Miles Halter who doesn’t have any close friends. In search of a fresh start, he goes off to boarding school. He uses the term “the great perhaps” to describe the feeling he gets when he zones out and daydreams about what he wants his life to be like. He also has an obsession with famous last words, which stems from his fear of ending up unsatisfied with his life. At his new boarding school, he meets a group of friends who take him under their wing and allow him to become more confident. He develops a connection with them and starts to experience all the “great perhaps”s he dreamed about. As he begins to find himself, a tragic event occurs, leaving him depressed and invalidated. Throughout his recovery he loses hope several times, but ends up coming to the conclusion that although times can be rough, it’s important to persevere, because fulfillment will come along eventually. Overall, I loved this b...

“The Forgetting" by Sharon Cameron is about a closed off city called Canaan. In the city, every twelve years, a day of forgetting occurs. The event makes everyone there forget; and by forget, I mean the city won’t remember anything since the last forgetting, that includes everything about themselves as a person, and again all they know about everything and everyone, unless like some people who write down all their memories. Nadia, the main character never forgot anything, meaning whatever is used to “reset” the city's population, doesn’t work on her. In the book, the event is soon to occur; this time Nadia wants to figure out how to stop this “forgetting” for everyone. In the city’s walls, lives a special someone in her life, Gray. Nadia wishes that she could leave the city with him, but no one is able to leave nor is anyone able to enter Canaan either. So, Nadia is left with the decision, let her city forget all over again? Or find a cure. I feel that The Forgetting gives off...

This novel starts off as what seems like a realistic fiction story. Just a mechanic in her shop. Slowly, the author begins to reveal more and more about the world around them. Subtle hints of advanced technology suggest that this book is set far into the future. We soon discover that the main character, Linh Cinder, is cyborg, meaning partly robot. In this futuristic world, cyborgs are thought of as less than human, nothing more than the androids that serve the humans. We first find out about the injustices against cyborgs from the woman in the shop next to Cinder, who refuses to serve any and all cyborgs. Soon after, a plague is introduced when the very same neighbour who refused to serve Cinder gets sick. The next day, Cinder returns to her shop and is confronted with the prince of New Beijing. He asks Cinder to fix his near ancient android, under very suspicious circumstances. The day after, Cinder brings her sister Peony to her shop. Cinder was working on a treasure she had found, ...