The Happiest Are Sometimes the Most Miserable...

Happyface by Stephen Edmond is an amazing book. The story is added to and punctuated by drawings and sketches of Happyface, the protagonist, and his thoughts and experiences. The book is set up to be his journal.

Happyface can't escape his past. His brother is dead, his relationship with his former-best friend and love is torn to shreds, and his parents are separated. He moves to a new town with his mother. He realizes he has an opportunity to put his past behind him and be the person he choses. And Happyface is born. He makes new friends and even a new love interest named Gretchen. Things are going great until Gretchen's ex-boyfriend Trevor reappears. Afraid of their romance rekindling, Happyface's facade begins to slip. The situation gets worse when Chloe shows up, a dark figure in his past. Happyface struggles to keep the life he wants, without denying the one he had. Edmond unravels extreme loss in a teen's life through Happyface's story. Through the facade of joy, Happyface attempts to rebuild his life the way he'd like to be. To conquer your fears, you have to face them. While you can't run away from your past, it doesn't have to destroy you either....9/10

More thoughts on The Book Thief

I stated before that this was and is one of the best fiction books I'd read in a while, and I stand by that. There were several things that struck me about this book; I want to talk about them a little bit here.

First, Death as narrator. An interesting idea, and one that I thought Zusak pulled off well. Death was quite a sympathetic character; one who didn't necessarily love his job, but didn't loathe it, either. I thought it interesting that when it came to adults, he would just as easily sling the soul over his shoulder to carry them, but children he always carried lovingly in his arms. It's not often to find an author that can portray Death as an interesting character; only two others spring to mind, actually. Piers Anthony did it well (and interestingly) in On A Pale Horse, and Neil Gaiman's portrayal of Death as a perky (yet at times insightful and downright snarky) goth chick in his Sandman stories/mythos certainly is one not to be missed.

The theme of the power of words really hit home with me, though perhaps I'm a little biased, being an English teacher and all. I found it interesting that Liesel's first act of thievery occurs when she is illiterate and dreams of meeting Hitler, yet as the book progresses and she becomes increasinly literate and intellectually driven, her understanding of Hitler's words grows and she begins to loathe him and the effects his words have on her immediate world and the world at large, reflective of Hitler's difficulties with (and loathing of) intellectuals of his time.

Anyone else? I've got more, but let's hear you first!