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I'm sure that the Met has appeared in any number of books, but the first one that comes to mind is Tom Dolby's Secret Society—because the Met doesn't just have a cameo, it's one of the key locations in the story.

Anyway, it's not a super book, but it's a pretty entertaining* entry in the Rich NYC Kids Being Snotty To Each Other While Getting Involved In Nefarious Activities subgenre:

After the initiation, it quickly becomes apparent that There Is More To The Society Than Meets The Eye (in a bad way), and that Getting Out Might Be A Whole Lot More Difficult Than Getting In. Afterwards, things get stranger and more uncomfortable, and all four characters realize that they might be in way, way too deep.

And that's all before the first death...

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*Entertaining enough that I read the second one, anyway.

As you probably know, D.E.A.R. first appeared in Ramona Quimby, Age 8, and it inspired teachers and librarians and parents and other literary-minded folk to institute similar programs in their own classes and libraries and lives. And, at some point—I have no idea when, do you?—April 12 became National D.E.A.R. Day in honor of Beverly Cleary's birthday. 

As I've never covered any of Beverly Cleary's books—which I'm thinking I might have to rectify, despite the fact that they're geared so much younger than my usual fare—I shall instead point you to Deb Caletti's Honey, Baby, Sweetheart, which isn't about Sustained Silent Reading, but IS about a girl whose librarian mother has her join an octogenarian book group in order to get past an unsuccessful romance with a Bad Boy:

The Casserole Queens, as they call themselves, are a riot. They've named themselves after the group of widows that prey on new widowers by feeding them until they get a new ring—they are, for the most part, a gossipy, loud, hilarious bunch. 

Without giving away too much, just know that there's an escape from a nursing home, a road trip, and a long-lost love involved.

Other books that deal with book groups: The Jane Austen Book Club, The Unbearable Book Club for Unsinkable Girls... I'm sure there are a million more. Are there any that I should absolutely, positively, under no circumstances, miss out on?

So, what I really wanted to highlight today is that April 11 is BARBERSHOP QUARTET DAY, which is pretty much the coolest thing ever. Sadly, I couldn't think of a YA book that featured a barbershop quartet—let me know if I missed one!—and I hope that some author out there GETS ON THAT, STAT.

So, instead, in honor of the safety pin, I'll point you back to a pair of books that paint very different pictures of the punk rock lifestyle: Gordon Korman's Born to Rock, in which Leo Caraway, young Republican, spends the summer on tour with his father (the illustrious King Maggot), and the band Purge; and Micol and David Ostow's So Punk Rock (and Other Ways to Disappoint Your Mother), in which a group of students from Leo R. Gittleman Jewish Day School start a band and gain a little bit of fame and a whole lot of swollen egos.

I know there are plenty more, but those were the first two that came to mind. Any other favorites?

Michael Northrop's Rotten, of course, would be a perfect book to commemorate the founding of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, but as I wrote about that one so recently, I feel like it would be cheating to highlight it in one of these posts.

And as I mostly avoid animal books, I'm blanking on another one that focuses on animal rescue specifically. (I'm sure that some of you will have plenty to suggest in the comments, though! *coughElizacough*) For now, though, I'll point you back to Tallulah Falls, a story about a girl who heads out on a mission of mercy, gets robbed and abandoned, and then is taken in by the staff of a local veterinary clinic:

[Fletcher] reminded me of other authors: a bit like Joan Bauer, in that girl-has-a-job-that-is-a-huge-part-of-her-life-oh-and-there's-a-boy-who-works-there-too kind of way, a chunk of the Crutcher grittiness, a bit of Sarah Dessen's talent for creating a likable but imperfect main character. 

But Tallulah Falls doesn't have the same Bauer gentleness or Dessen's everything-is-eventually-going-to-work-out-don't-worry-too-much feel. Or, for that matter, a Chris-Crutcher-totally-lovable-good-guy hero. It's harsher and much darker. As the book progresses, there's an impending doom sort of feel.

While Kristen Stewart is—to her slight dismay*, I suspect, judging by some of the comments she's made over the years—best known for playing Bella Swan in the Twilight franchise, she ALSO starred in the film adaptation of Speak and had a cameo in Jumper. Other appearances in literary adaptations: The Safety of Objects, Zathura, Into the Wild, and the recent On the Road movie. Even the Joan Jett movie was based on a book.

Oh, and she was in that borderline-incomprehensible Snow White and the Huntsman movie, too. (Which we watched, because, c'mon: Charlize Theron, Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, and Nick Frost? Love them all.)

ANYWAY, even though Adventureland WASN'T based on a book, it's my favorite of the KStew movies I've seen. In its honor, I was PLANNING on featuring David Lubar's Dunk or Neal Schusterman's Full Tilt, but apparently I've never written about either. Shocking! So instead, I shall point you to my posts about Rot & Ruin and Dust & Decay, in which the fun-sounding "Gameland" is actually a dangerous and horrible place run by people with nefarious (but profitable!) motives.

And now I am reminded that I need to read Flesh & Bone. MY WORK HERE IS NEVER DONE.

Other fave amusement park-ish reads?

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*Though I'm sure that her dismay is alleviated whenever she looks at her bank statement. If she ever even bothers looking at her bank statement. She probably has people to do that for her?

And, as one of its most well-known songs is this one (PERFORMED HERE BY GLENN CLOSE. As I've been watching her on Damages via Netflix Streaming, it's a bit of a jolt to see her doing something so... non-conniving and/or manipulative.):

Anyway, so with South Pacific (but more specifically, that song) in mind, I shall point you back to my way-old post about Scott Westerfeld's So Yesterday, which is a crazy mystery about consumerism that features (among many, many other things) a shampoo that dyes its users hands and hair purple. Which, granted, is a ridiculously thin connection, but sometimes I find the more random connections even more fun than the more obvious ones.

Anyway, more than the mystery or the plotline itself, what I love about So Yesterday—like, love so much that it has worked its way into my vocabulary—is the Pyramid of Cool. EVEN JOSH REFERENCES IT, AND HE'S NEVER EVEN READ THE BOOK. Which says... something, but I don't know if it says more about the coolness of the pyramid or about the ferocity of my love for it.

Although he wrote loads of critically-acclaimed short stories, won a Hugo, a Bram Stoker, and a World Fantasy Award, Robert Bloch is still most widely known for writing the novel that inspired Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho.

So, obviously, in honor of Bloch's birthday, I shall point you back to my old post about Jack Gantos' The Love Curse of the Rumbaughs, which is wonderfully weird and could possibly be viewed as slightly sick and twisted, and, like Psycho, features characters who make taxidermy a family affair:

This is not a book for your young Joey Pigza fanatic. It’s definitely a book for people who are already familiar with the gothic genre, but also for older (I’d say at least teenaged) fans of the darker aspects of Polly Horvath’s The Canning Season. My guess is that two out of three readers will, at the least, find it disturbing. But that lucky third will love it for its delicious creepiness.

Such a great book. TOTALLY OUT THERE, and NOT FOR EVERYONE, but a great match for me.

Fittingly enough, I covered a dog book already today.

But, to celebrate the founding of the Kennel Club (and my mother-in-law's avid viewing of any and all dog shows whenever they air—sometimes they make her a little weepy, even), I shall also point you back at my post about Deborah Wiles' Each Little Bird that Sings, which is a lovely, lovely, fabulous book... BUT OH MY GOD, MAKE SURE YOU HAVE, LIKE, THREE BOXES OF KLEENEX ON HAND. Seven+ years later, and I still can't talk about it at length without getting choked up:

I was warned by a friend that "you must be prepared to bawl your eyes out. In the delicious kind of way". That was a huge understatement. I read the whole book this morning before work--by the time I was done, my shirt was drenched with tears. I'm talking about big gasping sobs, not little weenie sobs. I thought I was going to die. Don't get me wrong. There were laughing parts, too. But ultimately, "tearjerker" is not a strong enough term.

Do I have this figured out right? The first Baby-Sitters Club book came out in 1986, and the girls were in seventh grade. According to Wikipedia, they were thirteen. So, assuming that my simple math is correct, Stacey would have been born in 1973?

It seems weird that Stacey McGill is older than me.

ANYWAY, it's her birthday. According to this calendar, at any rate.

So I shall point you back to my post about Raina Telgemeier's comic-style version of the first book in The Baby-Sitters Club series: Kristy's Great Idea:

It's all in here—Kristy's bossiness and her issues with her parent's divorce; Stacey's secret diabetes and boy-craziness; Mary-Anne's sensitivity and her very protective father; Claudia's solid relationship with Mimi and her difficulties with Janine—without the slog through (admittedly unintentionally hilarious) three paragraph descriptions of Claudia's fashion choices, etc. 

My plan was to post about Son of the Mob, because you know, IT'S AWESOME.

But apparently I read it before I started Bookshelves of Doom. So I never actually wrote about it. Which is a problem I'll have to rectify in the near future.

In the meantime, I shall point you to the SEQUEL to Son of the Mob, which is slightly inferior to the original, but still lots and lots of fun:

Vince, Alex and Kendra are all off to college. Vince and Kendra are in the L.A. area, and Alex is in Las Vegas. Vince (stupidly) assumes that being on the other coast will mean that Dad's business won't affect his life anymore. Of course, it doesn't take him long (4 pages) to realize otherwise...

I'm not a huge fan of April Fools' Day.

Partly, of course, because I am old and crotchety and I HATE FUN, but mostly because, for me, it still carries a tinge of hold-over feeling from late elementary/early middle school: where people would use April Fools' Day as an excuse to just be mean.

Like, trip someone down the stairs and then sing out, "APRIL FOOLS'!"*

HILARIOUS, RIGHT?

ANYWAY, THOUGH, in a more POSITIVE, HAPPY VEIN, in The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks, Frankie pulls off lots of pranks, and they are the sort of pranks that are way fun to read about. So without further ado, I shall point you back to my post about it:

It doesn't take long for Frankie to realize that Matthew is involved in the all-male secret society that her father always goes on about, though Matthew has never said anything about it to her. His failure to include her in that part of his life is one of the things that sparks another big change in Frankie: that of her refusal to accept situations she is unsatisfied with.

So she sets out to take over the Loyal Order of the Bassett Hound.

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*No, that is not something that happened to me. But you get the drift, I think.

I was going to post about Kevin Brooks' Black Rabbit Summer, because, you know: rabbits. But then I thought: YIKES. SO DEPRESSING.

Also, I discovered that I hadn't written about it, so that was problematic.

So instead, I'll point you back to my post about Peter Abrahams' Down the Rabbit Hole:

A thirteen-year-old heroine who admires and emulates Sherlock Holmes? Check.
An awesomely crotchety grandfather who secretly teaches said heroine to shoot? Check.
Loads of references to Alice in Wonderland? Check.
A leetle bit of romance? Check.
A murder mystery that unfolds slowly and culminates in a nail-biting finish? Check.

There's no actual rabbit, and certainly no Easter, but it's a great little mystery, and just thinking about it reminds me that I need to read some of Peter Abrahams' adult books.

Okay, then: I'm off to eat more jelly beans.

And so, in honor of that somewhat dubious distinction, I shall point you back to my post about Richard Peck's fabulously frothy (seriously, the plotting puts Days of Our Lives to shame) Amanda Miranda, some of which takes part on the Titanic:

The book starts out with an omniscient narrator, but around the midway point, Miranda starts to take on more and more of the narration, and Amanda herself pipes up for at least one chapter. While it's got moments of Gothic flavor, a leetle bit of Wuthering Heights, anddefinitely some of the fun Downton Abbey/Upstairs Downstairs action, it's more like a YA Daphne du Maurier than anything else. Recommended if you like atmospheric, slow-moving-in-a-good-way historicals that deal with gossip and class and social maneuvering.

Speaking of books featuring the Titanic, I really need to read The Watch that Ends the Night. And Distant Waves. Others?

From the very little I've read about Mary Wollstonecraft, all I know is that I want to read more. Although it's easy to get distracted by her famous daughter, Mary Wollstonecraft was a writer and philosopher and groundbreaker in her own right: her A Vindication of the Rights of Women is one of the earlier feminist texts.

Sadly, except for Nancy Means Wright's Mary Wollstonecraft mysteries, there isn't a whole lot of fiction about her. And not for lack of material! Seriously, go skim through the Biography section at her Wikipedia write-up. The lady crammed a whole lot of living into her 38 years.

So, due to the sad dearth of material about Mary Wollestonecraft herself, today I'll point you back to Veronica Bennett's Angelmonster, which is about Mary Shelley:

At sixteen, in her father's bookshop, Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin meets Percy Bysshe Shelley. It isn't long before she runs away with him, regardless of the fact that he's already married.

Poetry and passion, birth and death, addiction and madness, jealousy and desire, suicide and drowning, restless wandering and estrangement, radical politics, free thinkers, free love and a heart snatched from a funeral pyre. Mary Shelley lived a Gothic novel.

As you may have noticed, I've been making an effort lately to highlight some of the books I've covered in the past. After all, we don't want to be all new, all the time, right? That gets boring. (<--And to those of you who're all, "Yes, Leila, but that INTRO IS SURE GETTING BORING", I'll get rid of that in a week or so, once everyone is up to speed.)

Annnnd, we're back to covering depressing subjects. On this day in 1941, Virginia Woolf filled her coat pockets with rocks and walked into the river.

So I shall point you back to a few books that feature drownings.

The one that immediately leaps to mind is Megan Miranda's Fracture, in which seventeen-year-old Delany Maxwell falls through the ice, drowns, is resuscitated, and gains paranormal powers:

The other issues that Delaney grapples with are more mundane—reintegrating into school and home as That Girl Who Died, her mother's new hyper-protective nature, the fact that she accidentally made out with her most obnoxious male friend (not Decker) shortly before the accident—and it reads more like a contemporary with paranormal (or sci-fi, if you prefer to look at it that way) elements than like a straight paranormal.

There are loads of others. Off the top of my head: one of the bullies in Elizabeth Woods' Choker drowns; in Sasha Gould's Cross My Heart, the main character's older sister drowns in a Venetian canal; in Alyxandra Harvey's Haunting Violet, Violet keeps seeing the ghost of a girl who drowned; and, of COURSE, I have to at least mention A Drowned Maiden's Hair, because I bring it up at every opportunity. It is awesome and I love it.

OH. There's also one in Ariana Franklin's Mistress of the Art of Death. Loved that book, and years later, the drowning scene is still seared into my memory.

I know there are zillions more: any favorites?

As you may have noticed, I've been making an effort lately to highlight some of the books I've covered in the past. After all, we don't want to be all new, all the time, right? That gets boring. (<--And to those of you who're all, "Yes, Leila, but that INTRO IS SURE GETTING BORING", I'll get rid of that in a week or so, once everyone is up to speed.)

After the last two posts in this semi-regular series, I promised a non-depressing subject today, so Viagra? I guess? At the very least, it has provided years of totally immature giggles.

And I actually thought of a completely relevant title! It's not even a stretch!

Ned Vizzini's Be More Chill is about a life-changing pill for dudes, but instead of affecting one's nether regions, it affects one's brain:

Everything changes, of course, when he learns about the squib. A squib is a supercomputer that you swallow--it fuses to your brain, and tells you (in a Keanu Reeves voice--they couldn't get the rights to use Brad Pitt's) how to BE COOL. Of course, learning about the squib and actually getting a squib are two totally different things--Jeremy's get rich quick scheme involves pilfered Beanie Babies.

As it's one of my older posts, it's less of a review and more of a response, so I should definitely add it to the list of books to re-read. And as I remember it being hilarious, the idea of revisiting it is a super-welcome one.

Other suggestions that fit the (somewhat broad) theme?

As you may have noticed, I've been making an effort lately to highlight some of the books I've covered in the past. After all, we don't want to be all new, all the time, right? That gets boring.

So, yeah. Today is the anniversary of the last nine of the Heaven's Gate suicides. Wow, what with yesterday's Triangle Shirtwaist Fire post, I am picking some hugely depressing anniversaries to cover. [NOTE TO SELF: FIND A FUN TOPIC TOMORROW.]

So, CULTS.

I wrote about Eireann Corrigan's The Believing Game over at Kirkus a few months back, and among other things, it's a hugely enjoyable look at how a cult could form:

The first half of the book—as Greer gets to know Addison and starts to give Joshua the side eye—is a slow build, but then, at a not-exactly-school-sanctioned-retreat with Joshua and a few other McCracken students, it takes a sharp left into Crazytown. That’s when the gloves come off, Greer knows she’s not imagining things, and Joshua gets nauseatingly creepier by the minute. 

And back in 2011, I wrote about Pam Bachorz' Drought, which is about an immortal religious group that is very definitely viewed as a cult by outsiders. So that's an interesting twist on the topic. I had some issues with the book, but as I said in my review, it's one that would make for good book group conversation:

It raises questions about faith versus pragmatism versus faith tempered by pragmatism; about how religion can look when seen from the inside and out; about being protected versus being controlled; and about how being controlled is being controlled, regardless of the controller's motive.

Anyway, there are tons of other YA books that deal with cults and cult-like behavior, many of which I can't believe I haven't read. Most notably Micol Ostow's Family, but I know there are loads more.

Recommendations?

As you may have noticed, I've been making an effort lately to highlight some of the books I've covered in the past. After all, we don't want to be all new, all the time, right? That gets boring.

Anyway, as today is the anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist fire, I'm pointing you back to my post about Katharine Weber's Triangle, which I adored:

I loved Katharine Weber's writing, period—I'm not usually drawn to reading about science and math, but I found the segments about George's music (and about Rebecca's job as a genetics researcher) just as fascinating as the personal relationships and the history. The transcripts of Esther's interviews and testimony brought her to life for me. It was short (less than 250 pages), but it was tight, so tight that I felt much more strongly about these characters than I have about many in other, longer novels.

As mentioned in my last post, I plan on doing Retro Friday reviews of older books I love that would have made my Unsung YA list. I hope to get to On Fortune’s Wheel next week, but I wanted to kick things off with Victoria Hanley’s The Seer and the Sword in honor of Angie, because I think she would like this book.

Once, Torina was a princess, daughter of the king of Archeld. King Kareed was aggressive monarch, waging war not so much for the safety of his kingdom as simply for the sake of conquering nearby lands. After conquering the kingdom of Bellandra, Kareed returns to Archeld with presents for his daughter: a beautiful crystal ball, and a boy a few years older than her named Landen, who he says will be Torina’s slave.

Bellandra was an idyllic, peace-loving land. Its people were artistic and compassionate. They’d grown complacent with their possession of the legendary Sword of Bellandra, since people throughout the kingdoms believed it able to protect Bellandra from hostilities. Then Kareed waged war against Bellandra and won, killing its king and capturing its prince, Landen.

But Torina does not want a slave and so frees Landen. Kareed makes Landen a member of his household, one who will be trained in the arts of war. With nowhere better to run, and desiring to fulfill his father’s dying words, “Find someone who can teach you to fight,” Landen accepts his new life.

Gradually, a quiet friendship develops between Torina and Landen, who realizes that, with the crystal, Torina has the rare powers of a great seer. But the friendship falters as the two grow up and Torina is forced to spend increasing amounts of time with the duties of a princess. Then, too, she is courted by Vesputo, commander of Kareed’s army. But with a name like Vesputo, how could he be anything but devious? Sure enough, Vesputo craves power and the kingship of Archeld, plotting to kill Kareed and frame Landen for the assassination.

I was taking some notes on the story this afternoon, and between that and writing the summary above, it made me realize how much of the story relies on coincidence or fortune, as well as how familiar the plot and characters sometimes seem. There’s also the depiction of too-good-to-be-true Bellandra, which occasionally made me pause. It’s so idealized, and not just in the perceptions of Torina, her mother, and other’s who had never been to Bellandra. We can see from Landen’s reminisces that it’s not a result of their outsider’s perspective, that Landen also thinks of the kingdom in the same way. Then again, I suppose this could be a romantic, yearning remembrance of Landen’s lost past and birthright versus his new reality in Archeld’s martial society, where Landen is woefully unprepared to fit in.

But in the hands of some authors, none of this matters. They are still able to craft an irresistible story, one that hooks the reader and keeps them reading. That is what Victoria Hanley does in The Seer and the Sword.

Basically, what makes The Seer and the Sword work are Hanley’s style and character development. The story flows and some of her phrasing shines. Nothing fancy, but vivid descriptions and thoughtful insights that reflect and enrich the character development. The characters are