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Academy 7, by Anne Osterlund (Speak, 2009, 259 pp).
At an ultra prestigious and ultra exclusive boarding school (only 50 students admitted a year, of whom only half get to stay the next), two paths cross. Dane is the son of privilege and power, and for him entering Academy 7 is an act of defiance against his abusively controlling father. For Aerin, the Academy offers hope that, after a desperate escape from the miserable existence she endured after her father's death, she will have a future.
Aerin and Dean are the two brightest students at Academy 7, challenging each other, and the assumptions that underlie their lives. By the end of the year, a relationship that began in competition has turned into much more, and they discover the secrets held at the top of the dark tower that looms over the school....
....a tower that can only be reached by space ship. Because Academy 7 is not an ordinary school, nor are Dane and Aerin typical American teenagers. Although plotwise, there's not a lot here to set the book apart from a standard girl meets boy at school story, Academy 7 isn't on earth. It's set in an interplanetary future, with a back story, geographic details, and technical tidbits that make it science fiction.
However, because the science fiction elements are essentially extraneous to the plot, Academy 7 might have more appeal for fans of the teen romantic fiction, who might find it an enjoyable change of setting. This is perhaps a good thing, because it seems to be marketed toward that audience, as there's absolutely nothing on the cover (either in the picture, or, more surprisingly, in the blurb on the back) to let the browser know that this story does not take place on earth. It is easy to imagine readers being rather surprised when they find themselves, in the first paragraph, on board a crippled spacecraft struggling to survive.
On the other hand, now that the characters have been introduced and the stage is set, there is most definitely room for more books in this world, and lots of scope for Aerin and Caleb to adventure out in the vastness of space....I would like that. Although, being a sucker for boarding school stories, I would be sad to say goodbye to the Academy and its intriguing headmistress just yet. At least one more book should be set there!
Other reviews at
YA Book Nerd and
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs.
Stunning video and commentary about boarding schools... Created by Missy Whiteman, titled Indigenous Holocaust. If you teach Shirley Sterling's My Name Is Seepeetza, consider using this video along with it.
By: Stacy Dillon,
on 12/1/2008
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So every now and again I get a hankering to order some books from the UK. Better covers, different release dates, and all that. This batch included Vivian French's The Bag of Bones, Oliver Jeffers' The Great Paper Caper, and Eva Ibbotson's The Dragon Fly Pool. Now this was a nice box to receive for sure!
I am an unabashed fan of Ibbotson. She is my go-to author for so many students, and the author of books that I read again and again. The Star of Kazaan is a real favourite of mine, and I was wondering how The Dragonfly Pool would sit with me. Well folks, I have a new favourite.
Tally is living with her father and her Aunts in London. Tally's father, Dr. Hamilton, has just been given an offer that he cannot refuse. A scholarship at a boarding school for Tally. His is not a stereotypical doctor's household. They have very little since Dr. Hamilton only charges his patients what he can afford. With Hitler raving on the radio, getting Tally out of London is a priority.
So off to Delderton goes Tally.
When she gets there she is a little surprised. It is not at all like the boarding schools that her cousins told her about. First off, the children are not in uniform. They address their teachers by their first names, and they only have to go to classes if they care to! Delderton is, after all, a progressive school.
Tally's letters home are reassuring to Dr. Hamilton, and she quickly emerges as a leader at the school. When the school Head throws out the fact that they have been invited to a folk dancing festival in Bergania during a school meeting, it is Tally who rallies her fellow students to form a folk dancing group and even make up a dance in order to go. She's not a bully about it either. She just has a way of getting people to agree and get excited about things.
Once the children are in Bergania at the festival they are quickly tossed into a situation that should be too much to handle. It is up to the children, no matter their nationality, to help Prince Karil in his time of need.
I don't want to give too much plot away here, since Ibbotson manages to dodge and weave avoiding predictability all together. Ibbotson's children and adults are all memorable, and even though Tally is the protagonist, there are others that readers may savour just as much (Matteo, perhaps). Friendship, education, class and character are all themes that show up throughout.
I tend to get a chuckle reading about progressive schools since I work at one. Delderton may be a leap or two away from today's progressive schools, but the heart and soul is really there. That the teachers are so caring and allow the students to discover their passions is spot on and a pleasure to read about.
Fans of Ibbotson should love this, as should fans of Creech, Birdsall, and even Cushman. With strong boy and girl characters and a fast moving story, the appeal crosses gender lines as well. A perfect choice for the tweensters during this season of gift-giving!
By: Stacy Dillon,
on 7/9/2008
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It's 1969 Atlanta, and Bliss Inthemorningdew (yes that is her name) has just been dropped off by her hippie parents at her grandmother's place. Her folks have just left the commune and are heading to Canada, and Bliss' world is about to change.
Her grandmother is a true Southern lady, and quickly enrolls Bliss in the tony Crestview private school. Bliss is excited about actually going to a real school, but she is keeping her friend from the commune Flying V's warning about mean girls in the back of her mind. (Flying V has a gift of sight, and Bliss has a bit of it herself).
Bliss is thrown for a loop when her peer mentor Sarah Lynn ditches her. Luckily Thelma has decided to take Bliss under her wing and she and friends Jolene and Deedee school Bliss in the ways of not only Crestview, but life in Atlanta off the commune.
Unfortunately, when Flying V's warning seems to come into play, and Bliss witnesses some cruelty between classmates, Bliss ends up befriending Sandy. Sandy who the other kids make fun of because she's clumsy, she smells, and well, she's Sandy.
But Bliss feels good about being friends with Sandy. At first. They talk about conformity, power and the Manson Family murder trial. But Sandy is really needy, and it's draining spending time with her. Bliss would rather be with Thelma, Deedee and Jolene, not to mention super cute Mitchell.
What will happen when Sandy gets mixed up in a quest for power that involves the supernatural? Can Bliss disentangle herself from this girl who is set on revenge?
Lauren Myracle has written a thrilling page turner reminiscent of Nixon and Duncan. It's perfectly paced and will keep readers wanting more. Chapters are interspersed with journal pages which are border line terrifying when one thinks about the implications of animal torture and the dark arts.
Bliss is not only a scary thriller. The setting of late 1960s Atlanta allows for some frank discussions of race and the nature of racism. From the token black student at Crestview, to the Klan daddies, to teachers feeling free to use the "N" word in their classrooms, Bliss will have readers chewing on some big ideas as well.
I just (30 minutes ago) had a very nice find at a library booksale--a lovely copy of The Pavilion, by Elfida Vipont, for fifty cents. Vipont is best know for The Elephant and the Bad Baby (if you've never read it to your small children, do):
but she also wrote excellent family/school stories, published in the late 1940s/1950s. The Lark in the Morn and Lark on the Wing tell the story of Kit Haverard, a motherless Quaker girl determined to become a singer (Lark in the Morn is mainly about young Kit at boarding school; Lark on the Wing is about Kit's training as a singer, and growing up, and a little romance).
These were in most US library systems until fairly recently (they were published in American editions in 1970--)--if your library still has them, check them out now! They are great (I am not the only who thinks so. Lark on the Wing won the Carnegie Medal). Because they were reprinted both in England and here, and were in many libraries, it's possible to find copies at reasonable prices.
There are three other books about Kit's family--The Pavilion, Spring of the Year, and Flowering Spring. The first is about the efforts of various Haverard cousins to save a old building that's part of their family's history, the other two are about Kit's niece, who hopes to be an actress (these two books are set in the most lovely English village imaginable). I just checked to see what The Pavilion is going for (to see if I can quit my day job; I can't). There are still some affordable copies. However, Flowering Spring and Spring of the Year are very rare, so if you see one in any condition selling cheaply, grab it.
Vipont also wrote about another family, in
The Family at Dowbiggins and
More About Dowbiggins (aka
A Win for Henry Connors). These have almost a Noel
Streatfeildian feel to them, but also quite a bit of gardening, which I like. They are also
hardish to fine for reasonable prices. She wrote a few other fictional books, but they are disappointing, so I shall say no more.
It can be rather frustrating collecting English books here in the states--I hear many stories from friends in England and South Africa of the masses of wonderful books they find at car book sales and charity shops. So when I find a book like I did today, it is a very nice thing indeed. We go to England quite often, as my husband's family is there, but somehow never seem to find the right car book sales. However, my boys are saving up to go to Egypt (only a few thousand more dollars to go); I will be travelling with them as their chaperon, and since I read about the Cairo used book market, I feel much more enthusiastic. There were, I hope, many British ex pats who had large collections of girls' books which are now for sale and that no one else is buying.
I would also very much like to go to the British Virgin Islands, and other, more obscure, Outposts of Empire. A girl can dream...
Read the rest of this post
As more resources and books are published on this topic, I will add them to this list. Most of the items are available from Oyate.
LITERATURE
Picture Books
Campbell, Nicola. Shi-shi-etko, Toronto: Groundwood Books, 2005.
Santiago, Chiori: Home to Medicine Mountain, San Francisco, Calif: Children’s Book Press, 1998.
For Upper Elementary
LaFlesche, Francis, The Middle Five: Indian Schoolboys of the Omaha Tribe, University of Nebraska Press, 1978.
Loyie, Larry, and Constance Brissenden: As Long as the Rivers Flow: A Last Summer before Residential School, Toronto: Groundwood Books, 2003.
Sterling, Shirley. My Name Is Seepeetza, Groundwood Books, 1998.
Middle and/or High School
Qoyawayma, Polingaysi, No Turning Back: A Hopi Indian Woman’s Struggle to Live in Two Worlds, University of New Mexico Press, 1977.
Tohe, Laura: No Parole Today, West End Press, 1999.
NON-FICTION, HIGH SCHOOL/COLLEGE
Adams, David Wallace, Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience 1875-1928, University Press of Kansas, 1997.
Archuleta, Margaret, Brenda J. Child, and K. Tsianina Lomawaima (Eds.) Away from Home: American Indian Boarding School Experiences, Heard Museum, 2000.
Child, Brenda. Boarding School Seasons: American Indian Families, 1900-1940, University of Nebraska Press, 2000.
Cobb, Amanda J. Listening to our Grandmothers' Stories: The Bloomfield Academy for Chickasaw Females, 1852-1949. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2000.
Johnson, Basil, Indian School Days, University of Oklahoma Press, 1995
Lomawaima, K. Tsianina, They Called It Prairie Light: The Story of Chilocco Indian School, University of Nebraska Press, 1995.
Trafzer, Clifford E., Jean A. Keller, and Lorene Sisquoc, Boarding School Blues: Revisiting American Indian Educational Experiences, Bison Books, 2006.
WEBSITES
Carlisle Indian Industrial School History
--The most well-known of the schools. Established in 1879 in Carlisle, Pennsylvania
Brainwashing and Boarding Schools: Undoing the Shameful Legacy
--Extensive set of links
Bibliography of Indian Boarding Schools: Approximately 1875 to 1940
--Prepared at Arizona State University
VIDEO
The Indian Boarding Schools: Keeping the Culture Alive, is a two-part series, prepared with the full participation of the Hopi Cultural Preservation Office. Go here to order the series and view the trailer.
In the White Man's Image, PBS, 1992
I spent much of yesterday with Dovie Thomason. She was at UIUC's Spurlock Museum for it's annual storytelling event.
I'd be willing to bet that most people---when they think of Native stories---think of stories about animals. That isn't a bad thing, but it isn't the only kind of story Native people tell.
Recently, Dovie is telling a very different story.
You can get her Lessons from the Animal People, or her Fireside Tales: More Lessons from the Animal People, or Wopila, a Giveaway: Lakota Stories from Oyate.
You can invite her to your school, or your college, or city, or performing arts center, to tell the stories of the Animal People.
But, consider inviting her to tell the story she told here yesterday: The Spirit Survives: The Boarding School Experience, Then and Now.
As she started, she said "There are some stories you don't want to tell your children. And, there are some you have to."
The story she's telling is among the too-many dark episodes in U.S. history about the ways this country has treated American Indians... It is among the stories that are completely left out of textbooks used in elementary or high school.
It is about Carlisle Indian Industrial School, established in 1879. The school was designed to "Kill the Indian, Save the Man." In her story, she talks about being at Carlisle a few years ago, with her daughter, standing in the cemetery, reading the headstones there. Headstones of children who were at that school.
To get in touch with Dovie, write to her at this address:
Dovie Thomason
P.O. Box 6351
Harrisburg, PA 17112
.
Pointing you, today, to an interview at papertigers.org. In the interview (conducted by Aline Pereira) Cree writer Larry Loyie talks about his life, his books, and his views on books about First Nations people.
Back in July of 2006, I included his As Long as the Rivers Flow in a short list of books about boarding schools that I recommend. Since then, I've read Nicola Campbell's Shi-Shi-Etko and also highly recommend it. Read a review of her book here.
If you've got Ann Rinaldi's My Heart is On the Ground, replace it with As Long as the Rivers Flow. And if you've got Eve Bunting's Cheyenne Again, replace it with Nicola Campbell's Shi-shi-etko. Rinaldi and Bunting are well-established writers, but both missed the mark in their books about boarding schools. Keeping their books means, in effect, continuing a long history of mis-educating readers about American Indian and First Nations history, culture, and life. You have the option of providing your students with better books. It sounds corny, but I'll say it anyway: Seize that opportunity!
.
Frankie has always been underestimated by people. From her family calling her "Bunny Rabbit", to her virtual invisibility on campus her first year at Alabaster, Frankie is seen as less than. Less than her big sister Zada. Less than the boys on campus who take up too much space. Not even capable of wandering into town on her own at the Jersey shore.
And then she falls off her bike.
Suddenly, gorgeous senior Matthew Livingstone is Frankie's boyfriend. His friends are her friends and she loves all of the attention that she gets. But she doesn't like the fact that Matthew seems to be at Alessandro's (Alpha) beck and call. So one day when Matthew dumps her for the boys, Frankie engages in some espionage. Turns out that the old boy network that her dad is always going on about is still alive and well at Alabaster. Frankie is certain that she could do it better.
Since this is still in arc format, I am not going to give too much away, other than to say that I love this book. Boarding school, feminist sensibilities, and smart characters. From wordplay to the introduction of other authors and social theory, from discussions of class to that of following the crowd and the rules, there is so much going on in this book. Frankie is an amazing girl, and I think that E. Lockhart has outdone herself. Every student at our school who has read this is raving about it. The readers who love Waiting for Alaska will fall for this title as well.
When Zoe Sharp gets recruited for the swanky Allbright Academy by none other than Secretary of State Martha Evergood, she says that she will not attend without her twin brother J.D. and her older sister Franny. All of them are relatively freaked out by the 2 days of testing, but thanks to Zoe's moxie, they all end up on the picturesque campus, and are thinking that this opportunity is too good to be true.
Franny is bothered at first by the perfection of the place. Everyone seems flawless in appearance and in habits. Who has every heard of a perfectly clean dorm that houses 6th-12th graders? But eventually she gets over it. She is realizing her potential and changing her ways with the help of her PD (personal development) counselor. Her grades are climbing, her room is neat, and she wants her friends to do as well as she is doing. Cal looks amazing, compared to when Franny first met her, and she's much more positive, and Brooklyn is changing his name to Brook and cutting off his dreads so that people will take him seriously.
Franny, Cal and Brooklyn are a threesome whenever it's possible. They sign up for the same field trips and the same PE option. One day while they are on their PE hike, Cal doubles over in pain. Franny, Brooklyn and Cal try to carry her back to the dorms for help. It turns out Cal's appendix has burst and she needs emergency surgery. Cal is out of the picture for weeks.
When Cal comes back, she is different. Very different. And she has a theory about why this is. Is Allbright Academy exerting control over it's students? How is this being accomplished?
Franny, Cal and Brooklyn are soon knee deep in a mystery that has enormous repercussions. Can a school drug its students and get away with it?
Diane Stanley has written and fun, intriguing and fast paced mystery with a hook every kid who has ever gone to school will love. The cover is spot on, and I've had many middle schoolers reach for my arc over the last week. Mystery lovers, and fans of boarding school fiction will approve!
Best friends Lissa Dragomir and Rose Hathaway are on the run from their boarding school St. Vladimir's Academy, hiding from the well-meaning but misguided Guardians of the school and the evil vampires the Strigoi. Lissa is a Moroi princess,
By: Liz,
on 8/10/2007
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When a tracker marks her as a fledgling vampire, Zoey Redbird is afraid her life is over. It could be if her body rejects the Change. As a vampire fledgling, she must attend the House of Night, a boarding school where she wil
A little digital exercise for this morning. Archie Andrews, after Dan DeCarlo.
Academy 7, by Anne Osterlund (Speak, 2009, 259 pp).
This looks interesting - would you recommend it? I open to either sci fi or romance so I've gotta think that's a good sign.
Sounds very interesting!
Psst...There's an award for you on my blog.
http://talesofwhimsy.blogspot.com/2009/07/take-bow.html
Suzie, I think if you like romance and sci fi you will like this one! I'd recommend it much more strongly to the teen romance reader than the science fiction reader, though...
Thank you, Charlotte, for taking the time to read and review Academy 7! Aerin, and Dane also, though he would never admit it, are thrilled that you read their story. There are excerpts for the prologue and chapter 1 on my website if anyone would like to read them before deciding to read the book.
Anne (who is spoiling herself royally this week with Harry Potter, Bloodhound, and two plays at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival)
www.anneosterlund.com
Hope your week is going as well!
You are welcome, Anne--the pleasure was mine!