ALAN Picks (April 2024)

ALAN Picks: An Exploration of Girlhood Through Fantasy

This month’s ALAN Picks features books that focus on poetry, fantasy and grief. For those looking for a series to hook their students, check out The Mermaid, The Witch and the Sea by Maggie Takudo-Hall. Continue your celebration of National Poetry Month with the verse novel We Are All So Good at Smiling by Amber McBride. Discuss tough topics while reading a ghost story in Funeral Songs for Dying Girls by Cherie Dimaline.

Looking For Teen Reviewers: If you know students who are interested in writing book reviews of recently published young adult and middle grade books, let them know they can write for ALAN Picks too! 

ALAN Picks Book Selections: ALAN Picks accepts reviews of books published from spring 2020 to present-day, including soon-to-be-released books. This gives ALAN members who are interested in reviewing books more great titles to choose from, as well as accommodate some great books released during the beginning of the pandemic that still deserve highlighting. If you have some books in mind that you would like to review, please reach out to me!

Let Us Know How You Use ALAN Picks! If you read an ALAN Picks review and end up using the book with your students, let us know! We want to hear all of your great stories and engaging ways you are using young adult and middle grades literature in your classrooms. Remember, ALAN Picks are book reviews by educators for educators! Click on the archives to see previous editions. 

Submit a Review: Would you like to submit a review? Check out ALAN Picks for submission guidelines and email ALAN Picks Editor, Richetta Tooley at richetta.tooley@gmail.com with the book title you are interested in reviewing. Rolling deadline.

–  Richetta Tooley, ALAN Picks Editor

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Synopsis: When Whimsy meets Faerry while in the hospital for depression, Whimsy is quick to find connections between herself and the fae boy. For in their world, magic exists, hidden in plain sight. Developing a close friendship, both characters reveal they are searching for similar people, with the same questions, about the same place–The Magic Garden. Whimsy and Faerry find themselves battling against more than just the typical goblin or vampires, but the very monsters that plague some of us everyday.

Review:

As someone who does not read a ton of fantasy, We Are All So Good at Smiling is not one that I would typically gravitate to. However, this book is such a magical, adventurous read! Filled with lots of lore, laughs, a few tears, and some silent headshakes from myself, it is action packed. Additionally, the characters are relatable and fun! Whimsy is witty and funny, while Faerry is loveable and loyal. The combination of the characters really makes for a thrilling adventure between two friends in an alternate reality.

Suggestions for Curriculum & Classroom Use

Thematic Connections:

• Mental health 
• Depression and Anxiety 
• Trauma 
• Racial stereotyping 
• Grief and sudden loss 
• Friendship between two genders 

Essential Questions:

• How does the formatting of text impact the tone?
• In which way do we use stories to convey more than one message?
• Does genre have an impact on the theme of a book?
• How does setting impact the main idea of a text?

Activity:

In We Are All So Good at Smiling, the crux of the plot begins when Whimsy and Faerry are stuck in the magic garden, facing all of Whimsy’s greatest fears. While reading the text, it is evident that the fictional characters Whimsy has chosen to put into the magical garden are representations of Whimsy’s inner struggles. A good activity for this text would be to have students draw their own characteristics of their struggles. They could be already existing, or a new representation. To level up this assignment, ask students to look into different mythologies around the world, and choose one of those creatures to represent a struggle they may have experienced. Otherwise, you could always ask your students to include some of Whimsy’s monsters they may relate to into their drawings. 

Assessment Possibilities

Formative:

Throughout reading the text and creating their monsters, have students find the moments where we are introduced to the various characters Whimsy has created within her forest, and mark it. This could be inside or outside of the actual forest itself. You could have these serve as inspiration for the “monster” project. 

Summative:

After the completion of the book, have students pair/group together to compare their  findings of these creatures in the text, and decide which possible internal struggle(s) Whimsy was representing with these such characters. Be sure to point out power differences between characters, and how that may guide their interpretations of the text.

Level Up:

 As an additional mindfulness measure–after proper feedback has been given to the students for their hard work, have them crumple their monsters up, and throw them away in fun ways (a fake snowball fight is always fun!). Point out to students that this may serve as a way for them to “throw away” their more negative mindsets toward themselves, and help settle any internal struggles they may be facing.

Reviewed by: Cassie Bickford, Pre-Service Teacher, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado

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Synopsis: Funeral Songs for Dying Girls follows Winifred, a 16-year-old girl who lives with her father and obese dog in the Winterson Cemetery. She’s an outcast, “weird,” and determined to save the cemetery so she and her father can stay in their apartment on the property. After a few accidental “ghost sightings,” in which Winifred was mistaken for the ghost, a local ghost tour expresses interest in adding Winterson to their route. Winifred believes this may be the key to saving her home, especially after befriending a real ghost, Phil, on the property. Winifred must decide to exploit her new friend to save the cemetery or risk losing everything. 

Review

Funeral Songs for Dying Girls is a beautifully written and haunting story. Winifred’s goals are realistic and understandable. She reads exactly like a teenage girl just trying to figure herself out. Winifred’s recurring grief for her aunt and her mother (among others) and the loss of an important friendship are both portrayed with care and gentleness. The pacing is slow as the story is more focused on character development than on plot. Overall, deeply personal, and poignant, with writing that conveys the trials and beauty of growing up as a girl. This novel would be perfect for book clubs in a classroom.

Suggestions for Curriculum & Classroom Use

Thematic Connections: 

The themes in this book can resonate with all teenagers but would be best suited for teenage girls. They touch on grief, loss, and death, while also incorporating the issues of murdered and missing Indigenous women and girls and cultural appropriation within the storyline. 

• Grief and Loss
• Coming of age
• Belonging
• Identity
• Mental Health
• Sexuality, LGBTQ+

Essential Questions

• How does our sense of self develop based on where we live and where we grow up?
• How does a sense of belonging factor into identity?
• How does belonging to a specific culture or community shape our identity?

Teaching Strategies and Activities to Use:

• Research and discussion about Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIW)
• Discussion about the issue of cultural appropriation in the novel, how it’s used and by whom.
• Pair with texts that address grief, loss, and coming-of-age.
• Discussion and research about OCD and mental illness; encourage students to explore how the character’s condition influences her actions, decisions, and behavior, especially in terms of coping strategies. 
• Create a ghost tour advertisement based on the new addition of the Winterson Cemetery.

Formative/Summative Assessments

Formative: 

• Reading Journals: reflections on passages, scenes, characters, and/or how students feel while reading the novel. Possible prompts could include character analysis, theme exploration, chapter summaries, symbolism analysis, theme exploration, personal connections, author’s craft, and/or predictions for the story’s resolution.

Summative: 

• One-Pager
  • Identify themes, important concepts, and quotes and give a review of the book.
  • Epilogue Expansion: What is Winifred’s new home and life like?
  • Alternate Universe: What would Phil’s life be like if she made it back home? OR What would Winifred’s life be like if her mother didn’t die?

Reviewed by: Mackenzie Pfund, English Education Student at University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, Eau Claire, WI

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Synopsis: This novel is about an orphan turned pirate Flora, going by the name Florian to fit in with a crew of all men. She sails under false pretenses to ensure a safe voyage on a ship on a journey to distant islands. But she is surrounded by marauders, thieves, and even murderers and rapists.  At the time of departure at the start of the novel, Lady Evelyn Hasegawa, a highborn Imperial daughter, is on board as well and is accompanied by her own casket as tradition for her colonizing home country. She is sailing to an arranged marriage in the Floating islands, months of sailing away, and has to leave everything she holds dear behind. Everything except for her parents, who had arranged this trip to get rid of her for good, as she is an embarrassment to the home. The books are full of stolen memories, magic,  illicit mermaid’s blood, double agents, and haunting mythical creatures, and as the trip continues on over the sea to the final destination when the guests will be sold into slavery, Flora and Evelyn begin to fall for one another. Both their lives are at risk as they attempt to stay together when everything seems to be pulling them apart and controlling their identities. 

Review

The Mermaid, The Witch, and The Sea is a fantasy fiction novel told in alternating perspectives from the different characters including Flora and Evelyn, with three distinct sections included. Readers can find it easy to relate to or understand one or more of the concepts or personal struggles that the characters experience and encounter within the text. The author, Maggie Takudo-Hall creates a vivid and expansive world that almost feels real when reading through the text, with its complicated history of the world and distinctive appearances and specialists of the different colonies and nations discussed throughout. The novel demonstrates the power of fate, and what it truly means to take fate into your own hands. The use of the mermaid, the witch, and the sea within the title of the novel is also unique and plays a significant role for many of the characters and in the ending of the novel. 

Suggestions for Curriculum & Classroom Use

Thematic Connections and Analysis:

Identity – Everyone has their own unique and personal identities, and Flora/ Florian and Evelyn have complex personalities that clash through this novel. Identity is very important not just between these two characters, but also for everyone living in this world. For a lot of time, the physical attributes of people are pointed out as being different and connected to a certain area or group, and this can be connected back to how people see others in our world and group them based on preconceived beliefs and bias. 

Class – There is this underlying theme of rich vs. poor or upper class vs. lower class and colonies. Back in the history of the world, colonizers terrorized other nations and it has left big scars and conflicts even in today’s world. In this novel, there is a lot of hate towards colonizers and we get to see how a colonized person and a colonizer interact and clash. 

Addiction –   There is an addiction to drugs and alcoholism within this novel, and for many of the sailors it is their only escape from the past and the crimes they commit. Mermaid blood is one of those addictions, and although it is against the law for sailors, it is used to forget painful memories and can even lead to forgetting your own name like the captain of the Dove does. But there are other addictions in this story, such as freedom and escape from the natural or traditional cycles of life, and power. Power over others is something everyone is constantly fighting for, as a system of hierarchy exists in this world. 

Right vs Wrong –  The lines between right and wrong are constantly being blurred within the text, and for characters such as Evelyn and Flora what is right versus what is wrong is especially hard to discern in the face of love. For many other characters, what might be considered wrong has become their way of life, such as murder and robbery. Colonialism and rebellion are sides of the same coin in this novel, and while one is seen as gracious and upper-class, the other is looked down upon. 

You can also discuss: Race and Racism; Sexism and Hierarchy; Power; Homophobia 

Essential Questions:

• Flora questions her gender identity throughout the book. Why and how does she struggle with this?
• In what ways are Flora and Florian alike? In what ways are they different? Do their two different identities help or hurt them?
• Why does Flora choose the name Florian and why does she seem to hide behind it and its reputation? 
• Most of the men in The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea neither treat women as their equals or believe that women are as smart as men. Why is this the case? 
• Why would Alfie use years of savings on Mermaid’s blood, even if it was against the law, at the beginning of the story? Why would he try to forget his own memories, with everything that was at stake for him and Flora?
• How is destiny and duty different? Are they ever similar? Why or why not?
• What is power in the world of The Mermaid, The Witch, And The Sea and how is it important? How do people use their power once they obtain it? What does power really entail for those who hold it? 
• What is the role of the sea in The Mermaid, The Witch, and The Sea? Is it significant? Are there those who value these things, and those who do not? Why?

Strategies

• Symbolism is an important part of this novel. An example of this in The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea is how the Pirate Supreme’s ship is named the Leviathan. Look up the definition of the word leviathan and explain how the ship’s name is used as a symbol throughout the book. Then, choose another example of symbolism and explain its significance.
• Discussion on racism within the text, as well as how it relates to race and racism outside of the text. 
• Flora sings a song at the beginning of this novel, and it comes up throughout the novel in unexpected places. Reread the lyrics to the pirate anthem Flora first sings on page 22. Then explain how the song foreshadows events of her own life.
• Taking fate into your own hands is an important part of this novel, and the definition of fate is important to understanding how it affects different characters. Discuss how fate is perceived by the various characters that experience it directly. 
• The title of this novel holds plenty of meaning to the rest of the novel, and each part of the title comes up again and again throughout. Discuss how the mermaid, the witch, and the sea are all utilized within the novel and affect the ending. 

Assessment Possibilities:

Formative:

• Make a list/map/paper/etc on how Fate affects each of the characters of the novel, as fate plays a big role from many of the main characters
• Lead a class discussion on how racism, homophobia, and sexism all affect the reading of the story and how it affects the different character within the story, including how the choose to respond

Summative:
Pick a concept found within this story such as poverty, racism, colonialism, etc. and form some type of project such as a drawing, a paper, a map, etc to apply these concerts found in the book into real life situations. You can use real world examples such as impoverished countries, news articles or reports about any concept, and even photos from history and currently relating to your concept. 

• There is no page or word limit for the project, but try not to go over 20~ pages for this project 
• You can turn it in online or in person depending on the project
• Make sure to use a least one element from the book outside of real world examples, including your concept, different characters, or even quotes  

Reviewed by: Caroline Collignon, student, Colorado State University