Anger is a Gift Audiobook

 

My Thoughts:

Similar to urban contemporary books like The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, I Rise by Marie Arnold, This is My America Kim Johnson, and Dear Martin by Nic Stone. What makes this different, though is that Mark Oshiro is not black, nor a female like the authors I mentioned. Mark Oshiro (they/them) is a LatinX, Japanese, queer YA author.  Here is what stands out about this book as well as why I have it with these other diversify your bookshelf, social justice books. He is with these other authors because although the protagonist, Moss or Morris Jefferies Jr. is black and queer, it is not about being black in America, or even being queer in America. It is about continuing to survive through racism, social injustice, marginalization, trauma. Surviving is not enough though. Not wanting to jump off a building is not enough. This book, like the others is about YA characters fighting for a human experience and wanting to be seen as heard as individuals. 

The frustration was so sharp that I had to stop but Moss is a character that readers want to love and protect. It is a frustratingly brutal read. Read it (or listen to it) any way.

From the Publisher:

Six years ago, Moss Jefferies' father was murdered by an Oakland police officer. Along with losing a parent, the media's vilification of his father and lack of accountability has left Moss with near crippling panic attacks. Now, in his sophomore year of high school, Moss and his fellow classmates find themselves increasingly treated like criminals in their own school. New rules. Random locker searches. Constant intimidation and the Oakland Police Department stationed in their halls. Despite their youth, the students decide to organize and push back against the administration. 

When tensions hit a fever pitch and tragedy strikes, Moss must face a difficult choice: give in to fear and hate or realize that anger can actually be a gift.

Publication Information:

Author/Narrator: Mark Oshiro 

Publisher: MacMillan Audio (May 22, 2018)

Queens of New York

 

My Thoughts:

The newest Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants Asian version (and without the pair of jeans). For Jia Lee, Ariel Kim, and Everett Hoang, this summer is supposed to be the first step to their future selves. Told in alternating first person narratives, each girl deals with secrets, heartbreaks and huge decisions. Although they are miles away from each other, their friendship, now mostly through group chat, weaves the solid bond between these girls from Queens, New York. 

This is not a fluffy summer read. Each character deals with very difficult issues alone: grief, racism, obligation, and heartbreak.  Although the three of them try to keep their struggles from each other and put up a cheerful front,  what they find in the end is that their bond is unbreakable and that even physical distance cannot break their system of support. They have different talents and dreams, they are from different ethnic groups, and they go to different schools, but their friendship is the strong rope that lets them drift away and pulls them back together. 

From the Publisher:

Best friends Jia Lee, Ariel Kim, and Everett Hoang are inseparable. But this summer, they won’t be together.

Everett, aspiring Broadway star, hopes to nab the lead role in an Ohio theater production, but soon realizes that talent and drive can only get her so far. Brainy Ariel is flying to San Francisco for a prestigious STEM scholarship, even though her heart is in South Korea, where her sister died last year. And stable, solid Jia will be home in Flushing, juggling her parents’ Chinatown restaurant, a cute new neighbor, and dreams for an uncertain future.

As the girls navigate heartbreaking surprises and shocking self-discoveries, they find that even though they’re physically apart, they are still mighty together.

Publication Information:

Author: E.L. Shen

Publisher: Quill Tree Books (June 6, 2023)

Multicultural Interest, Romance, Teens &YA

One of the Good Ones

 

My Thoughts:

In chapters that switch between narrators, as well as travels in a non linear fashion moving from before and after the arrest as well as a confluence of past family trauma and current grief, One of the Good Ones is a road trip between grief and healing. 18 year old Kezi is the golden child and activist. Happi is the disconnected youngest sister. When Kezi is killed while in police custody, older sister Genny drags happi and Kezi's best friends Ximena and Derek on a last road trip, planned by Kezi. They route has been planned by Kezi for months prior to her death using a copy of the Green Book that takes the four of them along Route 66 and Sun Down towns that were often deadly Black people in America.

Like all good road trips, this book is more about what each character learns about themselves and their connection to the road and each other than any final destination. It is both a social commentary and history reminder about growing up  black in America. 

This is not a newly published or pre published book. It actually came out in January of 2021, but it has been in my TBR pile long enough for me to forget the premise of this book. Perhaps the title or the cover did not catch my eye. However, there is an author's note about the title. If I had read it earlier, I would have moved it up on my pile. Here it is:

From Author Note:

We chose the title One of the Good Ones because it’s something that “well-intentioned” people say all the time without realizing how harmful it is. “One of the good ones” is usually code for a person our country deems worthy. That importance is usually tied to level of education, income, class, zip code, gender identity, and sexual orientation. If most or all of those acceptable boxes are checked, then we care… There is no allotment for who deserves justice and who does not. 

From the Publisher:

A shockingly powerful exploration of the lasting impact of prejudice and the indomitable spirit of sisterhood that will have readers questioning what it truly means to be an ally, from sister-writer duo Maika Moulite and Maritza Moulite, authors of Dear Haiti, Love Alaine.

ISN’T BEING HUMAN ENOUGH?

When teen social activist and history buff Kezi Smith is killed under mysterious circumstances after attending a social justice rally, her devastated sister Happi and their family are left reeling in the aftermath. As Kezi becomes another immortalized victim in the fight against police brutality, Happi begins to question the idealized way her sister is remembered. Perfect. Angelic.

One of the good ones.

Even as the phrase rings wrong in her mind—why are only certain people deemed worthy to be missed?—Happi and her sister Genny embark on a journey to honor Kezi in their own way, using an heirloom copy of The Negro Motorist Green Book as their guide. But there’s a twist to Kezi’s story that no one could’ve ever expected—one that will change everything all over again.

Publication information:

Authors: Maika Moulite, Maritza Moulite

Publisher: Inkyard Press (January 5, 2021)

Dear Martin

This has been on my TBR list for winter break and I just finished it now because sometimes, work, school observations, commissioner duties, and watching grandkids gets in my way of reading, but I am glad I finally carved out time to read this, it is fabulous and wrenching, hopeful and sorrowful - - the whole package.

Description:

Justyce McAllister is a good kid, an honor student, and always there to help a friend—but none of that matters to the police officer who just put him in handcuffs. Despite leaving his rough neighborhood behind, he can't escape the scorn of his former peers or the ridicule of his new classmates.

Justyce looks to the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for answers. But do they hold up anymore? He starts a journal to Dr. King to find out.

Then comes the day Justyce goes driving with his best friend, Manny, windows rolled down, music turned up—way up, sparking the fury of a white off-duty cop beside them. Words fly. Shots are fired. Justyce and Manny are caught in the crosshairs. In the media fallout, it's Justyce who is under attack.

My Thoughts:

Teri Lesesne wrote a book called Reading Ladders  that basically talks about a way to start with what students are interested in and "rung by rung" connect students from their preference to more complex reading. I would like to say the Dear Martin is a rung to lead to The Hate U Give, however, I don't think it is a rung, I think it is a parallel scaffold to talk about social injustice, racism, finding a voice and literature as a catalyst for social activism.

Dear Martin, with the male protagonist is more in tune with the struggling male reader that I try to reach. I know that some classrooms are already using THUG as a class novel, but one of the reasons why I do not believe in the class novel is that for struggling readers, it just teaches them how to "not read" and still get the work done. For readers that devour the book, the pace of doing one book, chapter by chapter over a month just kills the aesthetic enjoyment of the book. Martin should sit next to a book like THUG as an alternative reading, an excerpted mentor text, and a way to talk about similar issues through different voices.