Because I Am Furniture by Thalia Chaltas

Anke is invisible.

She had never had the same amount of attention as her brothers and sisters. Her dad barely knew that she existed. But that was all right with her. At least she wasn’t hit. At least she wasn’t abused.

She wants it to stop. But does she? Can she say anything? Why don’t they say anything?

How can she utter the words that will instantly crumble her family? How can she do that?

And does she have the courage to do so?

“Because I Am Furniture” by Thalia Chaltas receives four stars out of five due to it’s originality and sincerity. Written believably in the mind of a freshmen in high school, it captures the emotions perfectly.

Burned by Ellen Hopkins

Pattyn is the oldest of too many siblings, and has always been the workhorse for her apathetic, lazy mother. She hated the dirty diapers, the sticky messes, the sporadic puke. But she couldn’t bring herself to complain. She didn’t wake up with bloody noses and puffy eyes and bruises on her neck like her mother. She wasn’t married to a raging alcoholic. She wasn’t abused. Yet.

She wasn’t her mother. She didn’t have to be her mother. But she did. Her church told her so. Her church seemed to know the question to everything, except for the questions she is asking.

Is it okay for a man to beat his wife?

Is it okay for the man to sin horribly if he asks for forgiveness, even if he doesn’t mean it?

“Burned,” by Ellen Hopkins receives three and a half stars due to it’s originality and expression of raw emotion. While it was more relatable (for me personally) than “Crank,” the characters were not quite as developed as I would have liked. Excellent novel.

Crank by Ellen Hopkins

Kristina Georgia Snow is a bright-eyed straight-A student and an obedient daughter. She is quiet. She is smart. She is shy.

Kristina Georgia Snow is perfect.

Bree is a free-spirited party-goer and boy-crazy player. She is popular. She is sexy. She is wild.

Bree is free.

Clogged

To many, a clogged storm drain is useless, broken, and defective. You don’t think of a pristine, shining silver metal plate, but instead a rusty, reddish-brown, eroded disk covered with the gunk of God-knows-what. Your stomach turns. You don’t want to think about the mass of sludge plugging up the holes.You can barely see the metal, but what you can see is crumbly and fractured. It’s disgusting. It’s worthless. It needs to be fixed. For the small community of misfits, though, it wasn’t broken. It wasn’t useless and it didn’t need to be repaired. It was, in fact, the clogged storm drain that held them together. It was the broken drain that fixed them.

Timeless Giants

“I think I’d like to taste like salted caramel,” I mused to the silent, sun-baked eyes. “Sweet up front, but not afraid to be honest, to be unique. A little quirky, but always grounded. Real.”

The wrinkles relaxed as the old oak let out a drawn-out, understanding sigh. “You worry too much,” he exhaled. I stood up, wiping the rubber crumbs out of my palms, and then reached for the lonely puffs of whipped cream floating through the sky.

How are you?

Hi. How are you?

Most of us are guilty of starting off 98% of our conversations with this superficial and meaningless phrase. Not to imply that we don’t genuinely care about how our fellow survivors are carrying on, only to point out that our ardent greetings might not be as sincere as we think. This common phrase is banal, one-dimensional, and leads us to a monotonous cycle that is difficult to escape.

Vietnamese Iced Coffee

Wake up! Yes you! Open those eyes, sleepyhead! One step. Then another. That’s right, you’ve got it! As Kris Kringle would say from one of my favorite Christmas movies:

Bundt Cake Banana Bread

What do you do when you’re craving cake, you want it for breakfast, and you have two huge extra-ripe bananas? You make bundt cake banana bread of course!