The Bar Code Prophecy by Suzanne Weyn

The final book in the bar code trilogy tells the story of Grace Morrow and her friend Eric Chaca, who is the son of barcode resistance fighter and native spiritualist, Eutonah. Eric is Native American; half Irish and Cherokee and Hopi. Grace knows Eric from the rock climbing center, where she is learning to climb. She works as a part time receptionist at GlobalHelix, the genetics division of the multinational Global-1 corporation. Grace's father, Albert works at GlobalHelix in maintenance.

Grace learns that Eric is part of Decode, a group working to destroy the practice of branding citizens with the bar code. She is warned by Eric not to get bar coded on her seventeenth birthday but Grace ignores his advice and does so anyways. After getting her tattoo she is warned by Dr. Harriman to leave at once and go home. Harriman invented the bar code in 2012 and in thirteen years it has spread all over the world, first in Asia and Africa and then to Europe and America.

When Grace arrives near her home, she sees that Global police have staked out the house waiting for her and possibly her parents. Her capture is prevented by Eric and by Mfumbe Taylor and Katie who have shown up with a tractor-trailer to scoop her away from the Global-1 police. Eventually, Grace meets the most important of the Decode resistors who have been keeping a watchful eye on her. They know that Global-1 wants Grace but they are not sure exactly why. They know that Grace is the daughter of Dr. Jonathan Harriman, designer of the bar code tattoo and that her file in Global-1 is deeply encrypted.

Grace and Eric learn from Eutonah (who is Eric's mother) that the Native Americans have been meeting to discuss the future of the planet. The ecological balance of Earth has been deeply disturbed by the mining efforts of Global-1, particularly on Hopi lands. The Hopi consider their sacred lands to be the center of the universe and as a result, such disturbances are believed to have profound affects on Earth. Grace is told that the Hopi have prophecies which have correctly predicted past events. However, an unknown tenth prophecy has been discovered. This prophecy is incomplete and refers to both Grace, her father and Eric. Grace, along with members of Decode are in a race against time to discover the prophecy and what it means for Earth.

As with the other two books in this trilogy, The Bar Code Prophecy is entirely action driven with little character development. Events are conveniently contrived to further the plot and the discovery of the prophecy seems to have little bearing on the outcome which happens independently of the prophecy anyways.

These short novels are recommended for younger, reluctant readers, aged 9 to 12, who enjoy science fiction, are less likely to question some of the more flimsy coincidences, and an innocent touch of romance. It's really a shame that these novels were written in such a superficial way. The idea of tattooing everyone with a bar code, encoding their genetics and using nanotechnology to track and even control people is an interesting concept that deserves a more in-depth and mature treatment. This is no so unbelievable and the implications are far-reaching.

Book Details:
The Bar Code Prophecy by Suzanne Weyn
New York: Scholastic Press 2012
202 pp.

Reached by Ally Condie

This final novel in the Matched series by Ally Condie alternates between the narratives of Xander, Cassia, and Ky.

Reached opens with Xander who is now an Official working in the physic division of the medical center for the Society. His job is to oversee aspects of the medical centers, including the Welcoming Day ceremonies in which new babies are named and inoculated. Still in love with Cassia, Xander hopes some day to make her fall in love with him. 

Xander along with two other Officials attend the Welcoming Ceremony in Camas City and administer a red pill which is a kind of inoculation against disease. Xander reveals that the Rising has been gradually substituting the red pills for their own, which not only make the children immune to disease but also to the red pills which the Society forces people to take when they don't want them to remember certain events. The pills also include some unknown ingredient as well.

When the older sibling of the child being named falls ill with the plague, Xander reveals that this is a sign that the Rising (or rebellion against the Society) is beginning. Xander is taken along with the family and his fellow Officials to a quarantine center where he begins working as a medic taking care of the sick. The plague manifests itself as a rash with the patient eventually going unconscious or "still". Xander isn't worried because he knows the Rising has a cure and that they will survive.

Meanwhile, Cassia has been sent by the Rising to work as a sorter in the capital of Central. She has been told to look for some unusual type of data and to sort it incorrectly. Cassia, who believes she is immune to the red pill, continues to rebel against the Society in her own personal way by trading poems and wearing a bright red dress under her official clothing. On the day she is supposed to meet Ky, Cassia is called into work unexpectedly to sort and that is when the data she has been waiting for appears. She sorts the data incorrectly as the Rising wanted her to, while expecting to be caught, but nothing happens. At the end of her work shift, all sorters in the facility are forced to take the red pill to lose their memories. Cassia discovers that she is not immune to the red pills and she cannot remember why she was at work that day. She wonders what she has lost both now and in the past.

Having missed her meeting with Ky, Cassia becomes involved with the Archivists who are trading in artifacts and relics from before The Society. Since the Society banned all forms of creativity, this is Cassia's main form of rebellion. Like her grandfather who saved poems, Cassia trades in poems and memorizes them. Eventually she starts a Gallery where people can post poems and artwork that they have created. Cassia continues to trade poems and other artifacts with the Archivists who have been preserving artifacts from the society that existed before the current one, while wondering how to find Ky and Xander.

Ky is situated in the Borders, in Camas, where he has been training as a pilot. Unexpectedly, he and Indie, along with all the other pilots, are ordered to fly missions. During the flight, the Pilot who is leader of the revolution, broadcasts to the rebels telling them that the Rising has begun with the onslaught of the plague in the Cities and the Boroughs throughout the Provinces. It just so happens that the Society created the plague in an attempt to poison the Enemy, which they ultimately destroyed. They never let the citizens of the Society know this and instead begin wiping out the Anomalies and Aberrations. Although the Society had a cure for the plague, they didn't have enough for a pandemic. Now the plague has sickened so many that the Match Banquets have collapsed, with sorters (such as Cassia) disrupting the creation of matches. The Rising must now step in, taking cures to people, and hoping to win them to their side.

However, as in any rebellion, just when the Rising seems to have won and has the upper hand, a mutation occurs in the virus, and a deadly form re-emerges to overwhelm both the Society and the Rising. Everyone who was immunized with the first version of the plague but was exposed to that version is immune to the mutation. This amounts to very few people. The race is now on to find a vaccine for the mutated form.

Indie comes to get Cassia from Central and take her to Camas City. There, Indie also brings Xander and eventually Ky on board. Once on the ship, they discover that the Pilot will be flying the three of them out of Camas City to the mountains. Xander is wanted by the Pilot to help with a cure and Indie is attempting to reunite Cassia and Ky so they can eventually flee to the Otherlands. The Pilot however, doesn't trust the three of them whom he claims have been behaving suspiciously and have been present when many suspicious events have occurred. During the flight to a village in the mountains, they discover that Cassia and Xander have the mark on their backs that means they are immune to the plague mutation but Ky does not.

The Pilot takes them to Endstone, the last in a line of stone villages to help him find a cure. Without a cure, the Rising will fail. The people in Endstone are Anomalies who are are immune to the plague but it is not known why. It is believed that some environmental or dietary factor is involved in their immunity. Those living in the villages have agreed to help the Pilot find a cure in exchange for being flown out to the Otherlands, where they believe they can live in peace and in freedom.

When Ky becomes "still", Xander and Cassia know their search for a cure has become much more personal. Xander works with Oker, an elderly man who escaped his Final Banquet at aged eighty and is now ninety years old. Oker is a researcher who discovered a cure for Alzheimer's Disease and who was partly responsible for creating the first plague virus. Because of this, he has a keen interest in stopping the mutant plague. The villagers distrust Xander and Cassia and have them locked in the prison when they are not working. Can they find a cure in time to save Ky and what remains of the Society? And with what is left, who will be in charge? Will they have the freedom to choose their own path in life? Will people be able to create, to heal and to lead?

Discussion

Overall, Reached was a somewhat meandering and very lengthy conclusion to the series. It's always challenging telling a story with three narrators. With three voices the trick is to try to make each voice unique and Condie doesn't fully accomplish this. She does with Xander and Cassia, but Ky's voice just never quite evolves into something distinct. And Ky being removed from the narration part way through doesn't help either. The three narrators also makes it difficult for the reader to keep track of the complicated storyline, the vast number of locations,  and especially in the case of this third novel, the numerous details about almost every aspect of the story. Some of these details might have been better presented and developed in the weaker second novel. A good example of this is the back story to the Rising.

Much of the back story to the Rising and it's relation to the Society is revealed as well as the function of the coloured pills and how the Rising attempted to subvert their use by the Society. We learn more about the Pilot - the leader of the rebellion. For example, the Pilot was one of many in a long line of "pilots". Cassia's great-grandmother was a Pilot, leading her grandfather to naturally resist the status quo of the Society. The current Pilot was from Camas and was one of the pilots who flew people to the Otherlands - a place from which no one has ever returned. The Pilot would run people who wanted to escape the Society out to the last stone village. Unfortunately, readers never learn who the Pilot is or what happens to him - a major disappointment since this enigmatic character piques the readers' interest throughout the other novels! Readers also never find out who ends up controlling the new order; the Anomalies represented by Anna, the Society, or the Rising. All we end up knowing is that the people are allowed a vote on who will govern them.

The best book was Matched, which promised an interesting look into a world where everything was decided for the individual from birth to death and where creativity was completely prohibited - to the point where citizens weren't even taught to write.   Reached attempted to explore some of these themes through Cassia's narrative but never fully succeeded. Many of the themes like the right to self expression, the right to life, the right to self-determination, and the right to choose a life partner got lost in the details of the world and the large cast of characters.

Condie did do a great job though of exploring the idea of creativity and how its loss had affected the people of the Society. Cassia at first believes that trading is the way to that expression of creativity but she eventually realizes that the creative process involves sharing and giving. It's another way of communicating ourselves to others. "I realize all over again, that we don't need to trade our art -- we could give, or share. Someone could bring a poem, someone else a painting. Even if we took nothing away, we would all have more, having looked on something beautiful or heard something true."

Reached was predictable, especially with regards to the love triangle. Condie set up an interesting love triangle in which forbidden love played a major part. The tension that existed between Xander and Ky was largely diffused as a result of the plague - unfortunate because it played such a large part of the first novel. Instead the third novel focused on the race for a cure and perhaps would have been more aptly titled, Plague.

Because Condie's world in the Matched trilogy was so complex, a map showing the cities, the Boroughs, the Provinces, the Outer Provinces, the location of the stone villages, the Otherlands, the Carving and the Enemy territory would have been very helpful to the reader. These maps could have been developed and added to with novel. It would have been nice to see a copy of the map that Cassia saw in Oria, in Matched. A list of characters would  have been useful too.

Book Details:
Reached by Ally Condie
New York: Dutton Books 2012
512 pp.

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

This is the first John Green novel I've read and I have to say that I have mixed feelings about it.
Sixteen year old Hazel Grace Lancaster was diagnosed with Stage IV thyroid cancer that has metastasized into her lungs at age thirteen. After surgery, radiation and chemo, Hazel's lungs began filling with fluid. By the time she was fourteen, Hazel was preparing to die. But a new (fictional) anti-cancer drug, Phalanxifor, resulted in a miraculous reprieve. Still considered  a terminal case, Hazel's damaged lungs require extra oxygen to help her breathe, so she lives life attached to a small oxygen tank. She doesn't attend school but Hazel does go to a cancer support group and it is at this group that she meets a handsome boy named Augustus Waters.


It turns out that seventeen year old Augustus Waters has osteosarcoma, a form of bone cancer which has resulted in the amputation of his right leg above the knee. Augustus has been told he has an eighty-five percent chance of remaining cancer free but as he says, he's "on a roller coaster that only goes up".

Attracted to Hazel, who looks astonishingly like his former girlfriend who died of a brain tumour, Gus asks her to come back to his house to watch the movie, "V for Vendetta". Hazel meets Gus' parents and learns about his family and discovers that  before cancer he was a good basketball athlete.

Hazel challenges Gus to read her favourite book, An Imperial Affliction by Peter Van Houten. Hazel is obsessed with this book which she feels contains some truisms about her life.

"It wasn't even that the book was so good or anything; it was just that the author, Peter Van Houten, seemed to understand me in weird and impossible ways. An Imperial Affliction was my book, in the way my  body was my body, and my thoughts were my thoughts."

In return, Gus challenges Hazel to read something different too; his favourite book, The Price of Dawn which is a novelization of his favourite video game starring Staff Sergeant Max Mayhem.

They read the books but it is Hazel's book that focuses their interest. An Imperial Affliction is a book about a girl named Anna dying of cancer that has a hanging ending and Hazel has always wanted to know what happened to the characters in the novel. When Gus reads the novel, he feels the same way. Gus is able to contact Van Houten via email despite Hazel's prior insistence that he is unreachable. After reading the email sent by Van Houten's assistant,  Lidewij Vliegenthart, Hazel also writes him begging him to tell her what happens to the characters in the novel. The response she receives is that Van Houten cannot respond to her request because his answers might constitute a sequel and therefore violate copyright. The unsuspecting Van Houten invites Hazel to visit him should she ever find herself in Amsterdam, of course knowing full well that she likely won't ever be able to.

But life has its twists and turns and in a strange turn, Hazel and Gus are able to travel to Amsterdam to meet Van Houten.  However, nothing turns out as they quite anticipated. There are no brilliant answers from Van Houten, because as they later learn, he too is searching for answers for a similar tragedy in his own life. Hazel and Gus exprience blossoming love for each other as well as a stunning revelation that tips their already upside down world.

Told in the past tense voice of Hazel, The Fault in Our Stars is about living life in the best way we can in the time we are given and especially for those who die young. Hazel and Gus live their lives as most of us do, with a mixture of good and bad. The only difference is they have less time to do it in. The basic idea of this novel, about the short lives of people who are suffering from a serious illness has been in Green's mind for a long time. Green worked as a chaplain at a children's hospital ministering to the families of children who were dying or who had died from serious illnesses. Expecting to become a minister, Green's experience as a student chaplain changed him and ultimately his choice of vocation.

The novel takes its title from a quote in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar in which Cassius says, "The fault dear Brutus, is in not our stars/But in ourselves"

There are plenty of cultural references (Swedish hip hop, America's Next Top Model, Anne Frank) in the book. The Fault in Our Stars can be read as just a simple, enjoyable read or the reader can go deeper and consider the many metaphors and symbols in the novel and enjoy those too. Just a few examples will do. Water is a big metaphor in the book. Green states that he wanted to show how often times things that are of benefit can also bring harm. For example, we need water to live but too much water, as in Hazel's case where her lungs continue to fill with water, is deadly. Gus' last name is Waters. And, key events in the book take place in Amsterdam, a city of dykes and canals that are used to keep back the sea, in the same way that her doctor, Maria is trying to keep the water in Hazel's lungs at bay too.

There is plenty of foreshadowing in the novel too. For example, Gus' death is foreshadowed when he and Hazel are watching movies on the flight over to Amsterdam and Gus' movie begins before Hazel's (he is older!) and ends sooner than hers. Another example of foreshadowing is that of Gus always hanging up the phone first when he is talking to Hazel.

Green makes interesting use of the novel An Imperial Affliction. Hazel is focused on this novel because the circumstances of Anna's life mirror her own life. Hazel wants to find out what happens to the characters, particularly Anna's mother, in An Imperial Affliction. This is important to her because as a person with a terminal illness she feels like she is "a grenade". Grenades explode and kill people and Hazel expects her eventual death will similarly cause great hurt and devastation to her parents. It is important to her that her mother continues to live her life since Hazel will one day not be there. Hazel wants to minimize the impact her death will have on her parents. Similarly she doesn't want to fall in love with Augustus for the same reason. For Gus however, this is a risk he is willing to take.

One of the most appealing aspects of this novel and one of the reasons for writing it (according to the author) is the realistic portrayal teenagers with a terminal illness. First we see how Hazel's life has been affected by cancer in the part where Hazel's best friend, Kaitlyn takes her shopping. The shopping episode demonstrates what Hazel's life was once like and how different Hazel's life is now. But it also shows that Hazel is a teen with cancer who still likes to shop. Young people with cancer, are still young people. Despite living in a world often filled with hospitals, medical procedures, pain and missed opportunities, they have dreams and desires just like everyone else. And not every ending is a happy one.

Green's use of sarcasm in Hazel's narration makes the two main characters, for whom day to day living is a struggle, very realistic. This realistic portrayal continues throughout the book. Hazel is concerned how her illness will affect others including her parents and Augustus. Gus and Hazel fall in love, just like many teenagers all over the world. When Augustus is dying he is no longer the nice guy he was at the beginning of the novel demonstrating that people who die of a terminal illness are human beings, not saints. Death is the final struggle and most of the time it is not a pretty or even necessarily heroic one.

The Fault In Our Stars is a great read and if you haven't had the time this year, do so.

Book Details:
The Fault In Our Stars by John Green
New York: Dutton Group    2012
318 pp.

Movie Review: Anna Karenina

Set in Imperial Russia in 1875, Anna Karenina tells the story of a forbidden love affair that destroys the lives of all involved. 

The movie adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's novel of the same name is directed by Joe Wright who uses the vehicle of a stage play within a movie to tell the story. 

The film is chock full of actresses from the many British period dramas. Anna is played by Kiera Knightley, while Oblonsky, Anna's brother is played by Matthew Macfayden. Other well known faces include Emily Watson (Oranges and Sunshine's Margaret Humphreys), Michelle Dockery (Lady Mary Crawley in Downton Abbey and Erminia Whtye in Cranford), Thomas Howes (William Mason in Downton Abbey) and Ruth Wilson (Jane Eyre 2006 version).

Anna is married to Count Alexi Alexandrovich Karenin, a government official, who is twenty years older than her. They have a son, Sergei, whom Anna loves but her marriage to Alexi is an unhappy one. Anna takes the train from her home in St. Petersburg to Moscow to try to help save her brother, Prince Stepan Oblonsky's marriage. Stepan, known as Stiva, is a womanizer and has been caught in an affair with the family's governess. His wife Darya known as Dolly, is expecting another child and wishes to divorce him. When Anna arrives, their household is in chaos but she urges Dolly to forgive her brother. It is a foreshadowing of her own situation soon to come.

While taking the train to Moscow, Anna has a chance encounter with Countess Vronskya, who is a widow who had many affairs both during and after her marriage - another foreshadowing of the future. Upon leaving the train, Anna meets the Countess' son, Count Alexi Vronsky. Vronsky, a cavalry officer is immediately infatuated with the beautiful, aristocratic Anna. It is at this time that a coal worker on the train meets with a terrible accident and is killed - another foreshadowing of death to come. Anna is horrified, but impressed when Vronsky gives money to the stationmaster for his widow.

There is a second storyline that is followed throughout the movie and it is that of Konstantin Dmitrievich Levin, a shy, but devout man. Levin arrives in Moscow the same time as Anna, with the purpose to propose to Dolly's younger sister, Princess Ekaterina "Kitty" Alexandrovna Shcherbatskaya. Levin, unlike many aristocrats prefers living on his country estate and working with his tenants. Kitty is a debutante and having a successful first "season". She has attracted the attention of the handsome Vronsky. She turns down Levin's shy proposal believing that Vronsky will propose to her. But at a ball, Vronsky shocks everyone by dancing with Anna, humiliating and devastating Kitty.

As Vronsky continues to pursue Anna, she begs him to leave her alone but when she returns to her home in St. Petersburg, she finds that she is no longer attracted to her religious and legalistic husband. In St. Petersburg, Anna begins to socialize with Vronsky's cousin, Princess Elizaveta, known as Betsy. This association causes a stir in the St. Petersburg social circles with rumours swirling about Anna. Karenin continues to insist upon his wife's honour but he is concerned about their reputation. Evenutally Karenin is told about the affair by Anna and she also tells him she is pregnant with Vronsky's child.

Karenin decides to divorce Anna but changes his mind when he learns that Anna is dying after giving birth to her daughter. He forgives Anna and Vronsky and tells him that he will look after Anna for the rest of her life. However, Anna cannot live with her husband and decides to elope with Vronsky to Europe. Meanwhile, Levin and Kitty reconcile and marry. Their marriage is a happy one for the most part, with the couple living a simple life on Levin's country estate. Kitty eventually gives birth to a son.

Anna with her husband

 As time passes, Anna and Vronsky's relationship begins to deteriorate. They argue and Vronsky seems bored and unhappy. They return to Russia but Anna is now shunned in the aristocratic social circles she once frequented while Vronsky is not. Anna becomes increasingly paranoid and believes that Vronsky is flirting with other women. She commits suicide by throwing herself in front of a train. Karenin is left to raise Anna's daughter and their son Sergei, as Vronsky is sent away by his mother to fight a war.

Discussion

For those who have read the book, the movie will be easy to follow. Nevertheless, Joe Wright's adaptation is uniquely brilliant and also easily conveys the three major story lines within the novel, Anna Karenina. The concept of telling the story as a play within a movie is one that will either appeal to viewers or not. 

The movie opens as though the viewer is watching a play, set in an abandoned theatre. However because this is cinema, beautiful stage sets morph into scenes one after another with doors opening and closing onto new scenes and situations. Some of the initial sets are quite amazing. The lower classes of society are seen below the stage and at other times the actors are looking down upon a scene from the catwalks which provides a unique perspective. However, the use of the stage becomes less apparent as the movie moves along. Of course, Tom Stoppard who wrote the screenplay, is another reason why this worked so well.

Anna and Vronsky dancing.

Wright also uses the actors in ways that suggest themes. For example, when Anna attends the ball in Moscow where she dances with Vronsky many times, all of the dancers perform a balletic choreography. But when Vronsky and Anna do this, it suggests their increasing entanglement with one another. When we first see Princess Kitty, she is part of a set that has beautiful white clouds, suggesting her innocence and virginity, so attractive to the altruistic Levin.

Performances by Jude Law as Alexi Karenin (ironic since Law himself committed adultery with his children's nanny) and Kiera Knightley as Anna Karenina were exceptional. Law was perfect as the stoic, devout, thin-lipped older Karenin, who tries repeatedly to warn his wife about her behaviour and who tries to save her from herself, all the while concealing his intense pain. Kiera Knightley with her regal beauty, effectively portrays Anna's descent into passion and paranoia as she breaks all the rules 19th-century society imposes upon women and reaps all the consequences reserved exclusively for women.

Alicia Vikander's Princess Kitty was another brilliant performance; innocence and naive when she meets the careless Vronsky but more mature and grounded when she returns to Levin. Vikander's expressive performance conveyed Kitty's devastation when she realizes Vronsky is only interested in Anna. Vikander manages to convey Kitty's sense of innocence and purity, after suffering rejection and betrayal, that is so attractive to Levin.

However,  Aaron Taylor-Johnson's performance as Count Vronsky was lacking the passion and charisma necessary to entice an aristocratic woman like Anna to abandon all for love. Anna was stepping off a precipice for the chance to find a meaningful love, and Vronsky's passion and pursuit was what motivated her to do so. Somehow this characteristic one would expect of Vronsky was never really conveyed to the audience by the actor.

Overall this adaptation was quite well done, unique and very visually appealing with the aforementioned beautiful sets, and the gorgeous costuming. The haunting, lyrical score which was composed by Dario Marianelli whose work is easily recognizable as similar to that Jane Eyre (2011) and Pride and Prejudice (2005). Viewers are encouraged to read the novel, Anna Karenina. It was considered by Tolstoy to be his greatest work and his only true novel. This epic novel deals with the themes of love, betrayal, forgiveness, the purpose of life, and the place of women in society.

Image credits:

Anna and Karenin: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/aug/31/rereading-anna-karenina-james-meek

Anna and Vronsky: https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/anna-karenina-12a-8113951.html

The Barcode Rebellion by Suzanne Weyn

The Bar Code Rebellion is the second book of the trilogy by Weyn which explores a futuristic society where an attempt has been made to control people by their DNA.
The novel opens with Kayla and Mfumbe Taylor have left the Adirondacks and are on their way to the barcode resistance march on the Capital, Washington, D.C. They are protesting the now mandatory barcode tattooing of everyone seventeen and older. Senator David Young plans to challenge President Loudon Waters over the constitutionality of the barcode which infringes on the personal freedom of US citizens. He also wants the President to admit that the barcode is being used to store "other unknown information about a person.

While waiting outside the White House for President Loudon to appear, Kayla and Mfumbe meet up with August Sanchez who is also a barcode resister and who was part of a fringe group attempting to contact aliens via their thoughts. The protest turns deadly however, when the jets and Global-1 forces attack the protestors and begin arresting them. Mfumbe is captured but Kayla is rescued by the long haul trucker, Katie, whom Kayla met in the first book. Katie is now going by the name of Dusa. Kayla learns that may of the barcode resisters were arrested and tattooed against their will. Dusa and her friends, Francis and Nate, believe that Gene Drake, Kayla's neighbour who was killed trying to destroy a barcode facility discovered that the tattoos contain more than just a person's genetic information.

Kayla, with the help of Dusa, manages to rescue Mfumbe who is badly injured. After leaving him at his parent's home, Kayla and Dusa head west. When they arrive in St. Louis, a chance encounter brings Kayla face to face with a girl named Kara, who looks identical to her. Kayla learns that in fact there are at least four others who look like her

Kayla and Dusa travel to the Great Basin Desert where they meet up with other resisters, called the Drakians, hiding out in the limestone caves.There the mystery about Kayla's origins begins to deepen. From the stolen personal files the resistance uses to make fake barcodes, Dusa has come across Kayla's grandmother's file. She learns that her grandmother had not only a son - Kayla's father, but another child named Kayla M1-6. And from a third girl named Kendra, who is also a Kayla look-alike, she learns that all of the Kayla's have the same barcode.Eventually Kayla discovers that her grandmother gave birth to sextuplet clones of which Kayla is one.

While in the desert Kayla meets a genius computer hacker, Jake who has designed a special kind of hovercraft which he calls a "swing-lo".Kayla and Jake decide that they need to contact Allyson, Kayla's friend and former Decode member who is now doing nanobot research at CalTech. They travel there to enlist Allyson's help in solving the mystery of Kayla and also the barcodes. What they learn is far more sinister than they could ever have imagined.

The Bar Code Rebellion is a short novel that might appeal to younger readers. As the second novel in the trilogy, The Bar Code Rebellion is entirely plot driven with little character development and a bit of romance. The idea behind the novels, that a multinational corporation uses nanotechnology to control the citizens of a country is an interesting idea but is poorly developed with large plot holes. For example, we learn that Kayla is actually one of six clones who were created from Kathryn Reed and implanted in Ashely Reed who was married to Kathryn's son, Joey. This means that Kayla is actually a clone of Joey's mother and her father is not her father, but her son. The clones were part of a transgenic experiment, with each clone getting a bit more bird DNA than the next. Joey and Ashley got the first clone, Kayla, who had the least amount of avian DNA. Yet when Kayla's "mother" Ashley is ranting against the barcode in the first book, she never mentions to Kayla or even hints that she is a clone - surely an important fact she would want her to know, given the dire situation that is developing. Another glaring inconsistency: GlobalHelix which created the six transgenic clones loses them - highly unlikely in a corporation which excels in controlling each and every citizen.

The writing is poor, with many coincidences that are just too convenient. As an example,  Amber who has run away from her crazy Aunt Emily wakes up one morning to find a maniacal clone of Kayla in her tent, in the middle of the desert. And she just accepts this? Mostly the plotline is predictable with everything easily and quickly resolved. It's a shame because the concept with its inherent themes of identity, privacy, control, and ethics of research and consent are important in our highly internet-based society.

I'll read the third book, since it will be a short read and I'm curious to see how Weyn can possibly write a third novel after all the ends were wrapped up in the second,  but I don't hold out much hope for this trilogy.

Book Details:
The Bar Code Rebellion by Suzanne Weyn
Scholastic       2006
265 pp.

Movie: Lincoln

"One eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the Southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war...Yet, if God wills that it continue, until all the wealth piled by the bond-man's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash, shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord, are true and righteous altogether"

                                                                Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural Address
                                                                          Washington, D.C. April 4 1865

The movie, Lincoln is a brilliant biopic about a president uniquely fitted to the challenging period in a young country's history as it battled not only for its very survival but for the soul of its people. Lincoln is partly based on Doris Kearns Goodwin's biography, Team Of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln.

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States and the first to be assassinated. Born in Kentucky in 1809, Abraham Lincoln grew into a very determined, ambitious man who was self-taught (he had only one year of formal schooling). 

Lincoln married Mary Todd and they had four sons. In 1860 he was elected President. On January 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation which stated that all persons held as slaves in the seceded states were free. This proclamation, although not freeing all slaves in the United States, changed the country and the course of the war. Lincoln was re-elected in 1864, a year which saw the Union win many significant battles in the Civil War. Lincoln was assassinated on Good Friday, April 14, 1865 by John Wilkes Booth.

The movie, Lincoln, focuses in on a very narrow time period in US history, the month of January 1865 when Lincoln, struggles to get his 13th Amendment to the Constitution which would forever ban slavery in the United States passed by the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives. But President Lincoln has before him two choices: an early peace thus dooming his amendment (the southern states will vote against the amendment) or pushing through passage of the amendment ahead of peace so that slavery in the United States is no longer legal when the southern states return to the Union post-Civil War. Lincoln, the consummate politician fought for what he had come to believe in - that all men are created equal before God and ultimately succeeded.

The film focuses on portraying Lincoln as a political strategist while giving us a glimpse into his relationship with his political adversaries and party members as well as his personal life. As is typical of a Spielberg film, there is much attention to historical detail. Although there was a censors warning and there is a bit of spicy language, there isn't much gore and Lincoln's assassination is done offscreen. The most poignant scene in the film is the one where Lincoln leaves for the Ford Theatre and viewers watch, as, along with his black servant as he walks down a long hall.

This is a movie with many fine performances including those by Daniel Day-Lewis as Lincoln, Sally Field as Mary Todd Lincoln, David Strathairn as William Seward. Tommy Lee Jones almost steals the spotlight as Thaddeus Stevens, a crusty Republican who had worked against slavery for thirty years.  Stevens had a reputation for being witty and sarcastic, a characteristic Tommy Lee Jones brilliantly portrays in the film. Stevens was known to have supported the rights of many different races in the United States but gradually came to focus more and more on slavery. Today we can appreciate his strength of character in promoting and supporting the equality of all men and women before God, at time when most felt white men were deemed by God to be superior to all others.

Despite the focus on only the last four months of Lincoln's life, the film is able to capture the essence of Lincoln as a man and a politician. The movie effectively captures, if only in brief scenes, the bloody conflict and the tremendous loss of life that characterized the Civil War. And John Williams, famous for his Star Wars music, composed the beautiful, soaring musical score for Lincoln.

Those interested in the life of Abraham Lincoln can access an online biography, Abraham Lincoln: A life by Michael Burlingame on the Knox College website:

https://www.knox.edu/academics/research-and-creative-work/lincoln-studies-center/burlingame-abraham-lincoln-a-life 

This online version is the author's original unedited version of his two volume biography which was published in 2008. Each chapter is presented as a separate pdf file. It is "believed by many Lincoln scholars to be the most exhaustively researched and fully documented biography of Abraham Lincoln ever written." Please remember that this work is copyrighted and therefore any use must be accredited to the author.

The Maid of Fairbourne Hall by Julie Klassen

Margaret Elinor Macy lives with her mother and her stepfather, Sterling Benton, in London in 1815. Her mother remarried after the death of Margaret's beloved father and after selling the family's Lime Tree estate, they now live in Sterling's home at Berkely Square. Sterling Benton, is a controlling, manipulative man who has Margaret followed and her mail opened. He refuses to give her any money further increasing his total control over her. Margaret is due to receive a substantial inheritance from her Great Aunt Josephine, when she turns twenty-five. Because of this inheritance, Margaret decided to wait and marry for love or not at all. Not that long ago, Margaret had rejected Nathaniel Upchurch's marriage proposal in the hopes of winning his handsome brother Lewis' heart. But Lewis, although initially interested in Margaret, didn't seem to follow through and Margaret now finds herself in a predicament with her stepfather determined to see her marry his nephew, Marcus Benton.

The novel opens with Margaret attending a masquerade ball where she hopes to once again attract Lewis Upchurch's attention. But Lewis isn't interested in Margaret and her attempt is rebuffed. The ball is marred by a brawl between Lewis and his brother Nathaniel who has unexpectedly returned from the family's sugar plantation in Barbados. To Margaret's surprise, Nathaniel is a much changed man, well muscled, handsome and tanned, and no longer the quiet bespectacled man she brutally rejected a year ago.

The next day Margaret's situation becomes dire when she learns that her stepfather has advised Marcus to "compromise" her if necessary, in order to force her to marry. Margaret decides to flee at once and does so with the help of her maid, Joan Hurdle who has been fired for stealing. Margaret and Joan end up at Joan's sister, Peg Kittleson's home. Peg puts them up for a few days and during their stay, Margaret does a man a good turn by preventing a robbery. This good turn will end up being the salvation of Margaret.

Joan and Margaret manage to flee London, and make their way to Maidstone where they must try to get hired on. Both Joan and Margaret do get hired but to different houses. In a strange twist Margaret finds herself hired by the man she helped in London and even stranger yet, she ends up as a maid in the Upchurch household. Having fled her home in a disguise of a black wig and servant's clothing, Margaret must continue to hide her identity. If she can just hold out until she turns twenty-five in eight months, she will receive her inheritance and be free of Sterling and Marcus Benton. But can she work and live in the Upchurch household without her true identity being discovered? Should she approach Nathaniel or Lewis and divulge who she really is and ask for their help? And can she remain hidden while Sterling Benton frantically searches for the stepdaughter whose wealth he covets?

Discussion

In The Maid of Fairbourne Hall, the author uses a set of contrived conincidences to form the major storyline. Margarent just happens to end up in the home of the man she helped in London as well as working as a maid in the home of the brothers she is interested in! In the 1800's it wouldn't be easy to get hired on as a maid without some kind of reference from a mentor or previous employer. But somehow both women manage this. Nevertheless, it sets the stage for a blossoming romance.

Klassen skillfully portrays the evolution of Margaret's character throughout the novel. Margaret changes from a spoiled, self-absorbed, young woman to one who cares about others. At the beginning of the book she is insensitive to the feelings of Joan, her maid, even when Margaret's theft of Sterling Benton's money causes Joan to lose her position at Margaret's home. But she soon discovers that the life of a servant is a hard one, with little respect and poor pay. And she comes to understand that Joan's situation in a difficult household is directly the result of her actions. She tries as much as her situation will allow to alleviate some of Joan's difficulties and at the end does make reparations to Joan.

Working in the Upchurch's household provides Margaret with a unique chance to learn the truth about both the characters of Lewis and Nathaniel and how appearances can be deceiving. The handsome Lewis is, in reality, messy, dissolute and insincere. On more than one occasion, Margaret catches Lewis returning late at night after some escapade. He has allowed the estate to fall into ruin in his father's absence. Lewis has no qualms about the family's wealth being obtained through the practice of slavery. In contrast, Nathaniel proves to have the character of a true gentlemen. He treats the staff respectfully, and has a strong sense of justice as evidenced by his feelings about the family making a living off of slavery. His experience in Barbados has changed him forever.

Because of both her change in character and her new information about the Upchurch brothers, Margaret begins to deeply regret turning down Nathaniel's marriage proposal and wishes she could apologize for the hurt she caused him.

The Maid of Fairbourne Hall is historical Christian romance at its finest. Although the plot and the ending are predictable, getting there is half the fun. Klassen builds the romantic tension gradually and repeatedly by throwing Margaret and Nathaniel together in countless ways. Added to this is the increasing suspense as Sterling Benton searches for his missing stepdaughter. He shows up at Fairbourne Hall in search of Margaret and later on he tries to flush Margaret out by a carefully planned ruse. The ending is as satisfying as it is romantic.

There is great attention to detail in the lives of the serving class in the 1800's. It is evident that Klassen did much research in order to portray her characters as realistically as possible. The storyline is told from the point of view of both Margaret and Nathaniel, often providing the reader with insight into how each character views a particular event. Each chapter begins with a from servants manuals and guides from the 1800's. Klassen toured the belowstairs and attic servant's quarters of several homes in England as part of her research for this novel. Recommended for fans of historical novels and the series, Downton Abbey.

Book Details:
The Maid of Fairbourne Hall by Julie Klassen
Minneapolis, Minnesota. BethanyHouse Publishers 2011
412 pp.

The Opposite of Hallelujah by Anna Jarzab

Sixteen year old Caroline Mitchell, known as Caro is angry that her older sister, Hannah is coming home to live after an eight year absence. Hannah left home at the age of nineteen to enter the Sisters of Grace, a fictitious contemplative order located in Middleton, Indiana. Narrated by Caro, The Opposite of Hallelujah begins her story when she was nine and told classmates at her Catholic school that her older sister was dead, earning her the nickname "Caroliar". When Caro's parents confronted her over her lie, she tried to defend her actions. She has now rationalized her behaviour those many years ago by indicating that she was never given the words to know exactly what happened to Hannah.

Now in high school, Caro doesn't want her sister home and she doesn't want to go with her parents to meet Hannah at the train station. Caro hasn't seen her in four years, having refused to visit Hannah at the convent. Caro's parents haven't said much about why Hannah has left Sisters of Grace so Caro doesn't really know what has happened to cause her to leave.

But when Hannah arrives home it is obvious that something is terribly wrong with her. In Caro's words, Hannah "looked gaunt and drawn, tired and pale and fragile, like a porcelain doll that had been badly propped in its stand." Neither her parents nor Hannah will really open up about about what is going on. When Father Bob comes to the house for a visit, Caro is at first cynical towards him but after talking to him, she wishes her sister would talk to their priest.

Caro's personal life isn't going so well either. Her boyfriend Derek is also returning home at the end of the summer after being away for almost two months at camp. Caro wanted to meet him instead of going to pick up Hannah but that wasn't an option. So when he doesn't call or text her, she calls her friends Reb and Erin to ask them if she's going to get dumped by Derek. In an attempt to beat Derek to the punch, Caro shows up at his house to break up with him only to have him break up with her first.

But this frees Caro to forge a friendship with a much more interesting and caring boy named Pawel Sobczak, who speaks Polish and French. At first Caro isn't too open with Pawel about her family, carefully avoiding any mention of having an older sister and not inviting him over. But eventually she can't hide this fact forever, and Pawel guesses that she is not an only child. In order not to look mean and uncaring and so as not to have to explain her sister's difficult situation, Caro once again takes to lying. She tells Pawel that her older sister has just returned from working in the Peace Corps in Africa. This is a lie that will come back later on to haunt her.

Meanwhile at home, Hannah's fragile emotional condition continues to spiral downwards. She spends most of her time in her room and doesn't eat much. When Caro is asked by her mother to clean her bedroom closet (what mother doesn't ask her daughter to do this?) she discovers some of Hannah's old boxes in the garage. It is there that Caro unearths a hint of what may be troubling her sister.

Eventually, everything comes to a head in Caro's relationships with Pawel and Hannah. Caro's parents insist she invite Pawel over for dinner and it is at the family table that Caro's lie comes back to haunt her. When her family learns what she has done they are horrified. This time Caro cannot claim she doesn't have the words to understand. She must face up to why she keeps lying about her sister. Caro's explanations to Pawel ring hollow and destroy his trust in her. Caro is forced to finally talk to Hannah and apologize.

When Caro seeks out Father Bob for "confession" he helps her understand that her choice to lie has repercussions, some of which might be permanent. Caro is worried she is not a good person, but Father Bob tells her that this choice and that her past choices do not dictate her future. He also suggests that God's universe is a work in progress and suggests that Caro try creating something instead of always destroying things. Can Caro redeem herself and heal her relationship with Pawel? More importantly, can she discover what happened to Hannah and help her and her family heal?

After Caro confronts Hannah about what happened years ago, Hannah becomes seriously anorexic, requiring hospitalization and a feeding tube. Caro's conversations with Father Bob help her to understand how Hannah may have ended up so ill and how to help her.

Discussion

The Opposite of Hallelujah handles the unusual premise of a young woman returning home after leaving the convent with sensitivity and in a refreshing way. The positive portrayal of a Catholic priest has to be one of the outstanding features of The Opposite of Hallelujah. Father Bob of St. Robert's Parish (an unfortunate co-incidence of names) is a genuinely caring priest who through his conversations with Caro, intelligently discusses, some very heavy concepts including free will, discerning the will of God, the nature of the universe, the different types of religious life, and the complementarity between science and faith, the nature of forgiveness and suffering and guilt.

Their relationship is probably the most interesting in the novel. Caro is initially quite cynical and even a bit disrespectful towards Father Bob. He doesn't have any profound words of wisdom for her. But she finds herself seeking answers to tough questions from him and it is through intelligent discussion with Father Bob that Caro begins to understand her sister and many other things too.

Caro doesn't really understand what her sister's contemplative order was like and why her sister might have joined one. Through Father Bob, readers learn what a contemplative order is (the focus of the vocation is prayer) and how it differs from active orders which work in teaching and nursing for example. Father Bob doesn't have the answer as to why Hannah might have joined a contemplative order. He does offer some interesting ideas though, 'It appears that the contemplative life didn't' bring out Hannah's best self," Father Bob said. 'It didn't fulfill her in the way it should have if it was her true, lifelong vocation. That's nothing to be ashamed of.'

Father Bob eventually helps Caro to understand how Hannah, consumed with guilt, couldn't forgive herself and ultimately shut God out of her life. Father Bob tells Caro not to run away from what scares her and to face her mistakes because in the end they must be dealt with.

By creating an intelligent priest character and making him have a degree in astrophysics, Jarzab has created a character whose intelligence is never in doubt. He is both scientist and priest and he shows the complementarity of science and faith. Father Bob helps Caro grow from the self-absorbed girl who cares only about what she can get from others to someone who is trying to be better and to think about how others perceive her actions.

The overall character development in this novel is excellent. Even secondary characters such as Reb, Erin, Derek and Pawel are well drawn. Although he has a small part in the novel, Derek evokes strong emotions (for being a jerk) and the exchanges between Reb and Caro are realistic and filled with humour.

There are many other interesting topics readers may be introduced to in the novel including Rube Goldstein machines, the paintings of Escher, and single-bubble sonoluminescence. The Opposite of Hallelujah is one of the best books this year. It's long, at 449 pages but well worth the effort. Highly recommended for readers who enjoy novels that focus on relationships.

Book Details:
The Opposite of Hallelujah by Anna Jarzab
New York: Delacorte Press        2012
449 pp.

Bookmark Days by Scot Gardner

"There was only one way to communicate with a Carrington and that was with fire in your eyes and broken glass in your words." So thinks Avril Stanton until the day she meets Nathaniel Carrington!  Avril lives with her family on a sheep farm in an extremely rural area of Australia. She does her schooling by correspondence as the nearest school is 165 km away. Avril rides her horse whenever she wants and loves to read.

Avril also has learned to hate the Carringtons who live a mere fifteen kilometers away. No one knows just when the feud between the two families began, except that it started sometime after the war in which Hoppy Stanton and Les Carrington Sr. served together.

Avril meets Nathaniel Carrington when she and her grandfather go out to check on some sheep that have supposedly strayed into the Carrington's canola fields. Instead they find that their fence has been damaged by the Carrington's and they set out to mend it. Nathaniel arrives on a quad bike, apologizing because he was the one who damaged the fence. 

When he offers to mend the fence, he gets the royal brush off from Avril's grandfather, who is intent upon throwing more fuel onto the fire of the feud. Avril however, sees that Nathaniel is polite and sorry for what has happened. And she also finds herself instantly attracted to this handsome neighbour, with the tousled blond hair and the cap. Avril feels like Juliet when she first saw Romeo and this confuses her because she's been taught the Carrington's are bad people. Nathaniel doesn't look evil. He's handsome. It is a bookmark day. "It's called a paradigm shift....and I had one that day. It was the biggest one in my life and it left me reeling. It was a whole mix of things that messed me up, like seeing my grandfather adding fuel to a fire that he'd always said blew in from the other side of the fence. Seeing a boy I'd been taught to hate and feeling the way Juliet probably did when she first saw Romeo."

Avril's cousin Katie and her Aunt Jacq arrive for a visit. Katie overwhelms Avril with her constant talking and bragging about her many boyfriends. Avril feels that she doesn't have the social confidence her cousin has but she soon comes to realize that Katie's approach to life is very different from hers.

Avril and her family take their visiting relatives to the Forsyth Agricultural Show in Mildura. This day also turns out to be a "bookmark day", a day that changes Avril's life in ways she never dreamt. Avril meets Nathaniel at the Show, but she is too shy to talk to him. However, later on they find each other again and have a blast dancing to a band. Avril realizes that she is falling for a boy she shouldn't like - a boy from the family her own family has had a feud with for two generations. A feud she doesn't know the cause of and doesn't understand. At the Agricultural Show, Avril makes an astonishing discovery regarding her grandmother.

Shortly after Nathaniel leaves the Agricultural Show with his father, there is a violent thunderstorm and a lightning strike at the bandstand. In the chaos of the storm, Avril searches for Katie so they can go home. After getting her hungover cousin into their truck, Avril and her father come across the Carrington's ute which has overturned. Les Junior is badly injured but to Avril's relief,  Nathaniel is only bruised. The Stanton's help the Carringtons, despite the elder Carrington, Les Senior's violent response towards their presence at the accident scene.

Avril begins to understand that the feud between the older men of both families doesn't really seem to exist between her parents and Nathaniels parents nor between herself and Nathaniel. She doesn't understand the deep hatred the two men have for each other because it doesn't seem to exist in the younger generations of either family. Avril reaches out to the Carringtons, not only because they are in a tight spot with Nathaniel's father injured but also because she wants to be able to see Nathaniel again. Although she and Nathaniel attempt to keep their blossoming love a secret, it is soon common knowledge in both families. When the two devise a plan to meet one another, a crisis develops. Will Avril be able to take a stand for what she believes in and also for a future with Nathaniel?

Discussion

Bookmark Days is a twist on the Romeo and Juliet theme set in the Australian outback. Two feuding families, and a young couple in love, secret meetings and co-conspirators like those in Romeo and Juliet can be found in this short novel. Avril Stanton is a likeable character who stays true to herself. She has little of her cousin Katie's "talent" for make-up, dress, and flirting with boys but she does come to recognize that she has abilities that her cousin doesn't have. In this way, she doesn't try to copy her cousin and at one point is thoroughly disgusted with Katie's behaviour. Instead she forges her own path. Her strength of character not only helps her and Nathaniel but also both of their families.

Bookmark Days is a sweet story about a girl's first love. Avril's uncertainty and awakening to love is tender and endearing in contrast to Katie's more cynical approach. This short novel is well written and is a great choice for reluctant readers. The unique Australian setting adds another layer of interest. The themes of identity and love make this a book young readers can relate to. Scot Gardner has definitely succeeded in writing a wonderful romantic novel.

Book Details:
Bookmark Days by Scot Gardner.
Crows Nest: Australia       Allen & Unwin   2009
170 pp.

DVD Movie: Oranges and Sunshine 2010

In 1986, Margaret Humphreys was a child protection officer working in Nottingham, England. Incredibly, she stumbled upon one of the most astonishing and horrendous secrets safeguarded by the British government for over eighty years. In the movie which is based her book, Empty Cradle, one day after work Margaret is approached by a woman by the name of Charlotte, asking her to help her locate her family. Charlotte had been visiting from Australia where she lives and she tells Margaret that all she knows is that she, along with a large group of children, were sent over by ship in the 1940s and 50s to Australia. Charlotte was four years old at the time. She was told her mother had died and she was unsure of her true name and her birth date.

At first Margaret is reluctant to get involved until one day in her post-adoption group therapy session, one of the attendees, Nikki, tells the group that out of the blue she got a letter from someone claiming to be her brother Jack and that he lived in Australia. Nikki cannot understand how this can be. As she tells the group more, Margaret realizes that this must be more than a coincidence and she decides that she must look into what is going on.

Margaret researches Charlottes birth certificate and manages to track down her mother, reuniting the two women. When she meets Charlottes mother, Margaret learns that she had been told her daughter was adopted out to a family.  She never knew her daughter had been sent to Australia. And she had always hoped to get her daughter back, not see her adopted out.

Margaret eventually meets Nikki's brother Jack, who seems devastated over what happened to him. In an attempt to learn more about the children, Margaret flies to Australia on her own time and using her own funds to determine how many other children have had a similar experience and to try to understand the scope of what happened.

Eventually Margaret and her husband, Mervyn uncover a migration scheme so widespread that there is no way the British government could not have known about it.They discover that these "forced migrations" began as early as 1900 and lasted until 1970. During that period of time there were "waves" of forced migrations and there were so many children involved that upper levels of government would have had to have given permission, including the Home Secretary. All of the children were in care and it was evident that these children were systematically deported. These schemes were run by charities and churches, among them, the Christian brothers.

Margaret, through her visits with children who were forcibly sent to Australia, learns that many suffered abuse, both emotional, physical and sometimes sexual, and worked as virtual slaves. Some received little educating and were basically indentured slaves. All this despite being told they were going to a warm country where there was plenty of sunshine and they could pick oranges off the trees.

Margaret attempts to get the organizations involved in the migrations to accept responsibility and acknowledge that they did a great wrong to these adult children and their families. It took 23 years before the British and Australian government finally issued an apology for the child migration schemes. More than 130,000 children had been deported. Margaret, with the help of her husband, continue their work today of helping reunite children with their families.

Discussion

Oranges and Sunshine deals with this difficult subject in a forthright way but one that also demonstrates how the forced child migration affected the children, their mothers and how it continues to affect them to this day. Emily Watson does a stellar job portraying Margaret Humphreys in a performance filled with intelligence, gentleness and subdued passion. She is never deterred from her mission of finding these "lost children" even when her personal safety is at stake. Eventually the stress of dealing with so many people who have been hurt takes its toll on Margaret and she is diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. She tries to keep her distance and set personal boundaries but the breadth and depth of the tragedy is so overwhelming that she is unable to accomplish this. Watson conveys this with such utter realism that we forget we are watching a movie.

The effect of her work is especially well portrayed in the scenes with Len (David Wenham) near the end of the movie. Len is a man who has been deeply affected by his experiences; by his own admission he stopped crying at the age of eight. Wealthy enough to afford a private detective to find his mother, he is at first doubtful of Margaret's intentions and her ability. Yet after finding his mother for him, Margaret is challenged by Len to go to Boys Town at Bindoon to see what he and other child migrants experienced. She doesn't want to but in the end she agrees. Bindoon is in the middle of nowhere, and as Margaret and Len look down from afar at Boys Town, we see a colossal structure built by child migrants who were at the mercy of the Christian Brothers and who suffered some of the worst abuse. The cinematography effectively captures the isolation and the fear these children must have felt as they saw themselves being driven far from any town or village.

When Margaret sees this place she is terribly shattered because she feels that what she is doing is not enough. But Len tells her, "You feel it for all of us because we can't...You're in there for us. You're fighting for us. So let the rest go. Just let it go."

Oranges and Sunshine is based on the book, Empty Cradles by Margaret Humphreys. The film was produced by Emile Sherman and Camilla Bray who also produced The King's Speech. The Oranges and Sunshine website (orangesandshunshine.com.au ) has more information on the making of the film and the actors involved.

Albert Einstein and Relativity for Kids by Jerome Pohlen

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."

                                                                                         
Everyone knows Albert Einstein developed the theory of relativity but how much do we really know about this famous scientist and his theories? Adults and children alike will be fascinated with the details they learn about Einstein's life and his theories in Jerome Pohlen's book on Einstein. Pohlen tells Einstein's life story in a straightforward manner while also presenting simple experiments that explain some of the points of relatively and physics.

Einstein was born in Ulm, Germany in 1879 to nonobservant Jewish parents, Hermann and Pauline Einstein. His family moved to Munich where Albert lived until he was 15. When their electrical business failed, Hermann moved the family to Milan, Italy without Albert. Albert was not pleased about this and soon found a way to join them. He managed to gain entry into the Swiss Cantonal School of Aarau in Aarau, Switzerland in 1895. At this time of his life, Einstein wanted to renounce his German citizenship and after a period of time he managed to get his father to agree to his request. His citizenship was revoked in January, 1896.

In the fall of 1896, Albert began classes at the Zurich Polytechnic Institute, studying to be a physics teacher. However, Einstein was not a serious student. It was at this time that he met Mileva Maric, one of five students studying physics. Interestingly, Switzerland was the only German-speaking country where Mileva could apply to undertake post-high school studies.

Mileva and Albert gradually became romantically involved. She was the perfect companion for him at this age; intelligent and stimulating. When he graduated, Einstein was unable to find a job and in 1901 Mileva became pregnant and gave birth to a baby girl.  It is not known what happened to this child named Leserl.

Albert and his first wife, Mileva

In 1903 Mileva and Albert married and a year later they had their second child, Hans Albert. It is amazing to see the strong resemblance Hans Albert had to his father when he was younger. You can see this for yourself by viewing the picture of Albert Einstein and his younger sister, Maja, on page 4 and that of Eduardo and Hans Albert taken in 1914 on page 60.

1905 is considered Einstein's "Miracle Year" or "Annus Mirabilus" when he published five groundbreaking papers on time, space and matter that forever changed the way we look at the universe. At this time, the Einsteins were living in Bern, Switzerland, and Albert, chronically underemployed, was working at the Patent Office as a Technical Expert, Third Class. This was a perfect situation for Einstein as he had a group of mathematicians and physicist with which he could discuss problems in theoretical physics. And it provided the right environment for him to formulate some of his key ideas into his most famous theory.

Discussion

In Albert Einstein and Relativity for Kids, Pohlen takes readers through a brief explanation of the innovative concepts in each of Einstein's five papers using examples and simple experiments. An entire chapter explains the basic concepts behind Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity while another chapter explores the ideas of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity.

After Einstein's ideas were published and he began to gain widespread acclaim, some began to question his theories. claiming his work was Jewish physics and others that his work was immoral because it suggested everything in the universe was relative, included morality. Amazingly, Einstein never won the Nobel Prize for relativity. Instead he won the 1921 Nobel Prize for his work on the photoelectric effect - an area of research his major detractor, German physicist, Philipp Lenard specialized in!

This book also delves into Einstein's personal life which involved him abandoning his first family for another woman, his estrangement from his oldest son, and his fleeing Germany at the outbreak of the Second World War. It also touches on Einstein and the development of the atomic bomb and his pacifist views on war, as well as his latter years. Einstein was not directly involved in the Manhattan Project, which resulted in the first a-bomb, but many of his contemporaries were.

Albert Einstein and Relativity for Kids is marketed as a book for children in Grades 4 to 6 but this book is probably too advanced for that age group and contains too much detail for the younger end of that group. Instead it is better used for older children aged 12+ who have a keen interest in relativity and for those studying the early 20th century. Pohlen's style is readable and engaging. This is a beautiful book, with glossy pages, lots of photographs of Einstein and the major characters in his life story as well as famous scientists of this time period. The front of the book contains a timeline of important dates while the back of the book has a list of books for further study and websites and places to visit.

Image credits: 

Einstein and his wife: https://www.teslasociety.com/Mileva.htm

Book Details:

Albert Einstein and Relativity for Kids by Jerome Pohlen
Chicago: Chicago Review Press   2012
126 pp.

The Bar Code Tattoo by Suzanne Weyn

The Bar Code Tattoo is the first book in a trilogy written by Weyn that explores a not so futuristic world where everyone has a bar code tattooed on their wrist.

Kayla Reed is sixteen, soon to be seventeen, the age at which she will qualify for a bar code tattoo. The bar code tattoo is all the rage, with not only kids getting them but adults too. Both of Kayla's parents recently got the tattoo but Kayla thinks the tattoo is bizarre.

"Even though she saw tattoos everywhere, they continued to fascinate her. How bizarre to be branded like a box of cereal. Didn't people mind being counted as just one more product on a shelf? There had to be more to a person than that."

For people with the tattoo, it means that all their personal information is quickly available with a simple scan of their right wrist. Information such as banking, medical records, and insurance is readily accessible. But for those who don't have the tattoo, life is gradually becoming more and more restricted. All tattoos are done through the US Postal Service which was taken over by Global-1, an international affiliation of corporations and billionaires.

One afternoon Kayla returns home to find that her father who worked as an FBI researcher has committed suicide.Her mother, a nurse, is convinced that the bar code is responsible for his death but she won't divulge to Kayla why she feels this way.

At school, Kayla connects with several students who have formed a resistance cell. Nedra Harris a cynical red-head, Allyson Minor, August Sanchez, Mfumbe and Zekeal Morrelle are working with Senator David Young who has organized a resistance group named Decode. Young is attempting to place restrictions on the bar code tattoo. Led into the group's secret meetings by Zekeal, Kayla eventually becomes involved in this group and  romantically involved with Zekeal. At her first meeting in an abandoned warehouse, Kayla is invited to use a virtual reality helmet which puts her in touch with resistance groups. While using this helmet she meets a mysterious woman named Eutonah who lives in the mountains. Kayla learns that there are dozens of resistance groups who are organizing and hiding out in the Adirondack Mountains.

As the pressure to get the bar code tattoo intensifies, Kayla begins to see the lives of those who get the tattoo unravel. The parents of her best friend Amber, suddenly find their bar codes are no longer working and soon after they are without jobs and unable to purchase a home. Those who have worked hard and achieved success suddenly lose their jobs and homes while others see their economic status inexplicably improve overnight. Kayla knows that this has something to do with the bar code tattoo.

When the bar code tattoo is made law, Kayla arrives home to discover that her mother has been able to access her father's FBI profile and learns that genetic testing was done on him and that he had the genes for alcoholism and schizophrenia.

After spending a night with Zekeal, Kayla makes a shocking discovery about him and flees his apartment. Arriving at her home Kayla finds her mother distraught and now attempting to burn the tattoo off her wrist. In this confrontation with her mother, she learns the truth behind the bar code tattoo and what is happening at the hospital where her mother works. It turns out that Global-1 is murdering babies who are not genetically perfect and taking those who are and genetically altering them through transgenics. It is at this time that their house is set on fire and Kayla awakes to find herself in hospital, being prepped to be tattooed.

Kayla escapes and decides that she must make her way to the Adironadack's and to safety with the resistance groups hiding there. She manages to make it partway and connect up with Mfumbe who has also fled his home.But Zekeal and Nedra are not so willing to let Kayla escape and they pursue her into the mountains. This leads to a climatic confrontation. With Global-1 apparently holding all the cards, Kayla and Mfumbe must decide whether to hide in the mountains or go back and fight Global-1.

Weyn's short novel is an excellent book for reluctant readers with its high interest and action packed plot and its fast pace. At just over 200 pages The Bar Code Tattoo seems perfect for younger teens. There is some suggested sexual content in the Kayla and Zekeal's relationship but nothing overt.

The Bar Code Tattoo is timely because it deals with privacy issues in the electronic age. The story is set in 2025 and society has transitioned from debit cards to e-cards to the bar code tattoo which stores information about a person and allows them to function in society. In Weyn's book, the tattoo goes from being a fad to being something that is required in order to function in society. For example, Kayla cannot receive university scholarships nor her drivers license without the tattoo.

This ultimately raises the question of how much personal information should a government have access to? And who can access and use that information? What can this information be used for? Should individuals have a say in who accesses their personal information? In our age of debit cards and e-transactions, almost every personal transaction from purchasing groceries to where we travel, to our health records can be monitored. This gives whoever controls such information enormous power.

Weyn has created a strong character in Kayla, who is both determined and principled. While others around her tend to follow the path of least resistance, Kayla becomes determined not to get a bar code when the evidence increasingly points to a sinister motive behind the tattoo. She doesn't know how she will exist but she knows it will be with out the bar code. This is not without some conflict - Weyn doesn't present this as an easy choice for Kayla. She struggles and realizes to that to just get the tattoo would make her life much easier.

American author Suzanne Weyn has penned numerous novels including the popular Wildwood Stables and several contributions to Simon Pulse's Once Upon A Time series of fractured fairytales.

Book Details:
The Bar Code Tattoo by Suzanne Weyn
New York: Scholastic Inc.    2004
252 pp.

Soldier Dogs by Maria Goodavage

Soldier Dogs tells the amazing story of dogs who serve in the United States military. Goodavage, a well known author who has written previously about dogs, provides readers with a detailed look into how military dogs are acquired, trained, and deployed along with their soldier-handlers in the military. As she leads us through this journey, she also provides more personal accounts of the dogs and their handlers.

Not many people know about dogs serving in the military. (I vaguely knew they existed but not much more.) These dogs receive no reward and no military honors for their service, despite the fact that their work is dangerous and despite continued pressure from veterans and from advocacy groups. Currently, dogs are considered equipment by the US military and equipment doesn't get honoured. But in 2010, U.S. military dog teams in Afghanistan located more than 12,500 pounds of explosives, saving numerous lives of both soldiers and Afghan civilians.



Interest in soldier dogs increased greatly after it became known that a Belgian Malinois was part of the SEAL Team Six which took out Osama bin Laden. Throughout history, dogs have been used in warfare as trackers, messengers, scouts, for protection, for sentry duty and also for attacking. Goodavage provides a brief history of the use of dogs by the military, including their use during the Vietnam War as sentry dogs. Dogs provided companionship during wartime. I know from my dad who served during World War II, having a dog helped ease the stress of war. He took in a stray and kept it during his time in England preparing for deployment to the continent.

Soldier Dogs begins by following Corporal Max Donahue and his dog, Fenji, a black German shepherd, who is walking point one hot August day in Safar, Afghanistan. They are part of coalition forces who are sweeping the area for insurgents and their bombs. As they walk along, leading the men from the Third Battalion First Marines, Fenji locates something of interest at the side of the road, sniffs the area and then her tail begins to way. She lies down and her handler praises her as he draws her away from the area. Fenji has just located an IED and this is her way of alerting to such a find. Its location marked, they move down the road to search for more bombs. On this day, Fenji will find three more roadside IEDs. Such is the life of a working military dog and her handler. It is a dangerous job and one in which at least seventeen handlers have died over last decade working in the Middle East.

Surprisingly, the United States military buys all its dogs overseas in Europe. This is because most of the best breeders are located in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and France. Stewart Hilliard, the military working dog (MWD) program manager at Lackland Air Force Base where dogs and handlers are trained, explains the different roles dogs have in the military and how the US procures its dogs. Dogs are evaluated on the basis of their health, environmental stability (how well a dog tolerates intense stimuli), and how much they desire to hunt for a ball. The latter trait is bred into them, as they are often hunting dogs. The most common breeds utilized by the military are German Shepherds and Belgian Malinois.

Once dogs arrive state-side, they must go through boot camp for dogs and then canine basic training. Dog school consists of first going through detection training, learning eight explosive scents. The next part is patrol training and training to bite. Not all dogs make it through patrol training. Goodavage discusses the training method used by the US military - which is mostly reward-based. For a job well done, military dogs receive much praise and a Kong toy which they are crazy for.

Military personnel go through an eleven week course on how to become a handler. The chapters on predeployment training are fascinating, not only because of the experiences described but also because of the unique people who co-ordinate the training. And that is one of the prime strengths of Goodavage's book. She had unprecedented access to military personnel for interviews and was able to view the training facilities and watch dogs and their handlers being trained.This up-close-and-personal perspective not only makes her book enjoyable but helps the ordinary person see the devotion and care that handlers have for their dogs and how the dogs in turn help the soldiers cope with the trauma of war.

Handlers must learn to provide medical aid.

Handlers and their dogs can take the Inter-Service Advanced Skills K-9 (IASK) Course at the Yuma Proving Ground where the climate and terrain are similar to many Middle Eastern countries where troops are deployed. Dogs and their handlers are exposed to raids, night operations and home made explosives. Dogs also learn to work off the leash, a valuable skill outside the wire.

There's a fascinating section of the book on canine physiology and behaviour. Another section deals with the special bond between dog and handler, a bond that sometimes transcends death. And of course what would a book on military dogs be without stories of dogs and their handlers. Many of these stories are heartwarming, some are terribly sad.

Maria Goodavage's Soldier Dogs. The Untold Story of American's Canine Heroes is a must read for those interested in the military and definitely for dog lovers. Well written and informative, with lots of attention to detail, this book is at times deeply touching with its stories of heroes - both human and canine. If anything, the reader will come away with a deeper respect for man's best friend and a better understanding of soldier dogs.

For more pictures and videos please visit Maria's website, Soldier Dogs and take time to visit the Bonus Features page.

Book Details:
Soldier Dogs. The Untold Story of America's Canine Heroes by Maria Goodavage
New York: Dutton 2012
292 pp.

Oddrey by Dave Whamond

 Oddrey is cute little girl, with her short black hair and her red and white striped tights. But Oddrey is a very different girl. She's unlike anyone else. Oddrey likes to do the unexpected and she doesn't mind being different. She likes blue apples and crazy hop-scotch games. While her classmates get "run-of-the mill" light-bulb ideas, Oddrey gets ideas so big and unusual, she needs a chandelier to represent them!
But sometimes being different and choosing your own path can be challenging. Oddrey wishes she had friends who are just like her. Despite her disappointment at being cast as a tree in her school play, Oddrey decides to be the best tree she can. When things go awry during the play though, Oddrey's creative approach saves the day. Afterwards, Oddrey isn't quite so odd anymore.

Canadian author-illustrator Dave Whamond is the winner of the 2011 Blue Spruce Award for My Think-A-Ma-Jink. His work has appeared in OWL, Chickadee, and National Geographic Award.

Oddrey is a delightful picture book, reminding us that each person is unique and special and that we all have gifts worth sharing. An ideal book for Reading Buddies programs, Oddrey is an Owlkids Books. Their website offers free Oddrey activity pages for children to enjoy.

Book Details:
Oddrey by Dave Whamond
Toronto: University of Toronto Press 2012