by Elizabeth Avecedo
A quick, YA book about a girl who loves to cook but has no self-confidence for anything outside the kitchen. Recommended for the target audience, but as an adult I found it a little too full of magical thinking. Plus, nothing all that bad happens, so when the good stuff happens it wasn't as exciting as it might have been.
The romantic relationship was boring and seemed to be ninety-five percent sexual attraction even though she tried to make it otherwise. I'm okay with sex (not explicit) in a young adult book, I just feel like it should be in the forefront if it's going to be there, not pulled in subtly as a side-effect of "true love." But maybe that was the author's point.
That said, I enjoyed every page. And, thankfully, no recipes--oh, wait. I think there might have been recipes. No matter--they didn't interest me and I skipped them.
The hidden truth about Elli Vossen, the youngest helper of the Secret Annex
by Jeroen de Bruyn, Joop van Wijk
So...I'm addicted to Anne Frank stories. Get that right out in public at the first. I read everything I can get my hands on; I own several books on the subject; and I even tried to read The Critical Edition once--that's the one where all three versions of the diary are printed in the same volume, intermixed. I didn't get very far with that--it's basically like reading an author's second draft, third draft and first draft at the same time and that gets old really fast.
For an addict, this is required reading. For anyone else, no. It really didn't get into the subject's (Bep Voskupfil) mind as I'd hoped. The author tried, but there was too much missing material. To tell the story I'd hoped he'd write the whole autobiography of Bep and her life in context, would have required fictionalizing to make up the details. He didn't do that and I'm grateful...but it would have made a good story.
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