Chasing Vermeer — 4 stars

If you look back through the list of books Mountain Gal and I have reviewed on this blog together, you’re going to realize that we read fantasy, at least for the most part. However, in the interest of being a helpful resource to people who read other kinds of books, I have been trying to expand my own reading to things I wouldn’t normally pick up. Because (gasp!) there actually are other kinds of books out there.

That's why today’s review is a non-fantasy book. Chasing Vermeer, by Blue Balliett, is set in modern-day Illinois, and it's about two 6th graders, coincidences, and the paintings of a 17th century artist from the Netherlands. A most unlikely combination, in other words.

Chasing Vermeer is a mystery kind of story, but not the whodunit, hunt-for-fingerprints kind of mystery. This mystery is one that has to be solved by believing in coincidence, in chance, and luck. Lots of luck. It has to be solved by looking for clues in everything, by finding connections between perfectly ordinary events that together have a significant meaning. Sherlock Holmes and Nancy Drew would never have solved this mystery—they wouldn’t have seen the clues. But for 6th graders Calder Andalee and Petra Pillay, clues jump out at them from every direction.

There’s nothing particularly unusual about Calder and Petra that makes them perfectly suited to solve this mystery, but it certainly does help that Petra is willing to believe even the most unlikely event could be a clue, and Calder is a visual thinker whose pentominoes—flat geometric figures formed of five squares—help them find many of their best clues. But besides these qualities that make them both uniquely themselves, Calder and Petra are just two ordinary 6th graders—who happen to be in the right places at the right times to solve a mystery, save a painting, and prevent a giant art fraud from taking place.

And that’s really all I’ll say. About the plot, at least.

I figured this book would be targeted toward the 8-12 range, both because of the age of the characters and because of the cover art. (NOTE: the illustrations on the inside are really great too!) However, the story is actually pretty complicated. I had to pay attention to catch all the clues and remember all the connections they had made. I also really liked the way the two characters played off each other. They’d swap ideas and put clues together really well—and they were usually way smarter about it than me. Basically, the mystery was really, really interesting, and was definitely not something you’d be able to solve until the characters did. And it was super complicated, which I think makes a mystery story that much better.

For really critical readers, here's a specific thing about Chasing Vermeer that I'd like to praise. Blue Balliett (that can't possibly be her real name!) has two very young narrators in this story, and I was very pleased with the way she handled the fact that they were solving a mystery that baffled even the FBI. At some point in the course of their sleuthing, they had to end up in danger, but I was worried that Balliett would shrink from that and keep Calder and Petra perfectly safe. But she didn’t. They ended up in very real, very serious danger, and when that happened the tension in the story went up a notch—maybe two. It made for a climax that was memorable, instead of a simple “mystery solved, bad guy in jail” kind of ending.

My final opinion of Chasing Vermeer is that it’s certainly worth reading. The story is fun, there are great characters, and a very interesting mystery! Definitely preferable to Nancy Drew. I’ve also read the sequel, The Wright 3, and that was just as good. There’s a third book that I haven’t gotten a chance to read yet, but given the track record of the first two, I’ll vouch for it being a great book.

Link to Blue Balliett’s website: http://www.blueballiettbooks.com/
And since her website is kinda tricky to maneuver, here’s the link to her Amazon page as well: http://www.amazon.com/Blue-Balliett/e/B001IGLPXG/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1437576663&sr=8-1#

The Fault In Our Stars ~ 1.5 stars

Suggested by kimi

     The Fault In Our Stars, by John Green, is a book that's apparently a huge bestseller. It's so popular that there's already a movie out based on it, which means a lot of people must have liked it a lot. I've never seen the movie, so this will be a review based strictly on the book, but given what I think of the book, I don't think the movie would be much good. And a short disclaimer before I begin - I know this book has its avid fans, and has been given lots and lots of positive reviews. This review is just my opinion, which you can feel free to disregard if you want.

     The main character of this story is Hazel Grace, a sixteen-year-old diagnosed with cancer. She knows she'll be dead within five years - if she's lucky. But when an incredibly handsome boy turns up at her cancer support group, her life begins to turn into a roller-coaster ride that seems like it can only go up. She and Augustus Waters start seeing each other regularly, getting to know each other better. She knows she's in love, but hesitates to get closer to him because she doesn't want him to be heartbroken when she dies. Then Augustus admits that he's had a cancer relapse, and that it's spread to his entire body. Hazel has to watch as he starts to deteriorate from the laughing, drama-inclined person she knew to someone wallowing in depression and hopelessness.

     That's a quick plot synopsis of The Fault In Our Stars. In a nutshell, this is a book about two cancer patients who fall in love but know they have only a few years of life left. The main struggle in the book is the two of them trying to answer the questions: Why am I here? Will I be remembered after I'm gone? You know from the moment you open the book that one or both will be dead before you get to the end - a somewhat depressing beginning to a somewhat depressing book. 

     As far as characters go, I was less than impressed. Hazel wasn't too bad, but her boyfriend Augustus was pretty shallow. Almost everything you learn about him through the course of the book can be traced back to Hazel in one way or another, and it seemed to me that he existed merely to be there for her - to make her happy while he was well and to make her sad when he was dying. Also, the things that Hazel found attractive about him - his sense of humor and his tendency to be theatrically dramatic - didn't do much for me. I didn't find him funny, and his dramatic flair seemed silly and pointless to me. More importantly, I couldn't follow Hazel and Augustus's arguments about the meaning of life and what the afterlife would be, which was a pretty important part of the book. I couldn't figure out where they were getting any foundation for the ideas they had, so the whole discussion was confusing. John Green's beliefs are definitely not mine, and so the point he was trying to make with this book didn't resonate with me, and without that point, his story doesn't have any appeal.

     Besides having a theme that I didn't agree with and some pretty shallow characters, The Fault In Our Stars has a quite a lot of bad language and some other bad content. I was very tired of reading swear words after only fifty pages. My soapbox stand is this: if you're an author, surely you have a wider vocabulary than that! Also, when Hazel and Augustus are in Holland, they spend an afternoon alone together in his apartment. What they did during that time is part of why I give this book such a low review and why this isn't a book I'd be telling a ten-year-old to read. Or for that matter, a fourteen-year-old.

     In fact, the only really positive thing I have to say about The Fault In Our Stars is that it did make me teary toward the end, after Augustus died. I usually say any book that moves me enough to make me have an emotional reaction is a good book, but obviously I don't feel this way about The Fault In Our Stars. Part of the reason those last twenty pages made me sad is because the events were pretty sad - Augustus was only 18 or 19, but his life is over. It was during this small, twenty-page space when Hazel was dealing with Augustus's death that John Green actually managed to do some good writing. That was the only moment when I could really connect with the story and other than that, The Fault In Our Stars was a flop.

     Would I suggest you read this book? No. I'm glad I read it, because now I'll know what people are talking about when they start to rave about how good The Fault In Our Stars is. I won't be one of those people, and I don't think I'll ever read it again. It lacked meaning and purpose, and I don't have a lot of respect for authors who use bad language in their books. In the end, The Fault In Our Stars is a book I don't think I'll be suggesting as reading material for anyone. For me it holds no interest.