Sending up love

Ask the Passengers by A.S. King

Read this book.  At first glance, I thought this was just going to be another “pink” book aka problem novel. But, boy, was I wrong. Instead, I fell in love with A.S. King all over again.

When I try to summarize this book for potential readers, it sounds dull and kind of weird.  Astrid Jones spends a lot of time lying on her back on her picnic table “sending up love” to unknown passengers on planes that fly overhead.  That, and she’s trying to figure out whether she’s gay or not.  What that summary doesn’t give you is Astrid’s voice, the fullness of her personality. If you only paid attention to a summary, you’d miss how much Astrid loves:  loves her family, loves her girlfriend, loves her sister.  Her capacity for love is so great.

So, in the end, Astrid sends up love, kind of figures our her gayness, and accepts her family for what they are and what they can be.  She’s lucky; she can “do whatever [she] wants”.  Really.  Read it.  You'll love it. 

In search of truth

Vivian Apple at the End of the World by Katie Coyle

I really like Vivian Apple. Katie Coyle has created a character with a great, read: very realistic, voice who is true to herself and her friends in the face of immense challenges.

When we join the story, Vivian Apple’s parents have just been “taken” in “The Rapture” and have disappeared – to heaven, maybe…  They were part of the chosen group of Believers, a weird, scary cult, called the Church of America. And, yes, the irony is intentional.

Vivian Apple and the End of the World is an apocalyptic tale.  Vivian is an atheist.  Her vest friend, Harp whose parents were also taken, is all Vivian has left in the world.  Together they set off on a cross-country trip with Peter, a handsome boy with a mysterious past.

The world does not end, but the ending is not sugar coated.  The story lines are pulled to their ends, and those endings are sometimes sad. The post-Rapture world is a scary one, but those in search of the truth are not easily deterred.

I think, I hope, you will fall in love Vivian Apple (I just love to say her name) like I did. Her adventures continue in the next installment, Vivian Apple Needs a Miracle.