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Canadians have a vast lexicon of phrases they use to diminish accidents and their negative consequences. We acknowledge that “accidents will happen,” and remind ourselves that there’s “no use crying over spilled milk.” In fact, we’ve become so good at minimizing these seemingly random, unpredictable incidents that they now seem commonplace: we tend to view […]

The post Rethinking the “accidents will happen” mentality appeared first on OUPblog.

Bull Rider
by Suzanne Morgan Williams

upper middle grade/ya

Drugs, sex, teenage pregnancy, you name it, children's authors write about it. Suzanne Morgan Williams is no different. She has taken on perhaps the mother of all controversial issues for this country, the war on terrorism. Bull Rider's story is current, it's controversial, but far more importantly, it's really really well-written. Any book can take on controversy, but take it on without becoming preachy, now that's good writing.

Cam O'Mara's older brother is a marine. He goes off to fight in the Middle East, is injured, and comes back home a very different person. Cam's family struggles with the effects of war on their own world, the world at large, and the way people see them. Cam, a skateboarder by passion, turns to bull-riding, a time-honored family profession, because it is the only way he can escape the discomfort and uncertainty of his life. In the end, he chooses bull-riding to help his brother realize that if Cam can face his fears and straddle a thousand pounds of bull, then his brother can face his, learning to walk again.

This isn't a light read. It isn't a comfortable one. But it is unforgettable. Williams isn't preachy. There are no easy answers to war, not for those opposing, those waging it, and especially not for those fighting it. Her characters are well-shaped, offering all sides to the debate but no judgments. Family, love, hanging in there for each other, these are the driving force of her story.

Read it. It'll make you think.

And for other great reads this crazy December month, hop over to Barrie Summy's blog.

Image via Wikipedia

Like many British people (and I suspect many other people around the world), it’s a real treat to crunch on a biscuit when enjoying a cup of tea or coffee.  So you can imagine my surprise, when having my early Sunday morning imperfectly made cuppa (see http://purpleslinky.com/offbeat/the-complicated-cuppa-cup-that-cheers-or-mug-of-misery/) that I discovered I was amongst those idiots who have managed to suffer a minor injury at the hands of the humble hobnob.

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/125767/Crumbs-half-of-us-have-been-injured-by-biscuits

I regret to admit that I’m one of the 29% of adult Brits who have managed to splash themselves with hot tea when dunking my digestive.  For those of you who’ve never dunked or heard of dunking let me enlighten you.  Once you’ve made your tea (or coffee) (beverage) and taken the biscuit of your choice from the biscuit tin (dunkee), you then proceed to dip a bite size piece of the dunkee into the beverage while holding onto the remainder to use as a ‘handle’ .  Once the dunkee has been dunked for a couple of seconds you bring it to the surface of the beverage and then manouevre the dunkee together with beverage as close to your chin as you can before biting (or sucking) the dunkee.  The skill is in getting dunkee to lips before it drops back into the beverage.  More often than not the dunkee drops its load back into the beverage thereby splashing the dunker with hot beverage!

If you’re lucky enough to dodge the hot beverage if the dunkee drops, don’t believe for one minute that the danger ends there.  You then have the job of taking a teaspoon, delving to the bottom of the beverage and trawling the cup to retrieve the errant dunkee to prevent choking.  This is no mean feat as, more often than not, the dunkee slips back into the beverage like an eel through a fishing net, which again can cause the dunker injury from splashback!

Having overcome the hazards of dunking, I have also regularly fallen into the 28% of Brits who have choked on biscuit crumbs and at times I’ve fallen into the 7% of Brits who have dropped a biscuit tin on their foot and the 7% who’ve been nibbled by a pet while feeding it with a biscuit (obviously I’m so sweet they can’t tell the difference between a biscuit and me), but thankfully none of my injuries have required the services of the A&E Department of the local hospital.

So there you have it – the Great British Biscuit Bite Back!!  I’m now going to get my mid morning coffee and I’m just pondering on whether to risk having a Bourbon (the UK version of the Oreo) biscuit – could be a nice treat or could end up as ‘death by chocolate’!!!  If it turns out to be the latter then at least I will have died happy!