Middle Grade Pick: The Whispers

The Whispers
by Greg Howard
G.P. Putnam's Sons
Penguin Random House LLC
2019
229 pages
ISBN: 9780525517498

Heartfelt, beautiful, mesmerizing and a tale that will captivate readers!

The Whispers is this year's must read for young readers, teachers, parents, everyone! It is that middle grade book  readers will remember long after finishing it.

Riley is ten when his mother disappears. He misses her and sees her influence everywhere he looks. He tries to find her in the whispered voices he hears at twilight. He prays that the voices can tell him where she's gone or better yet, bring her back home. The whispers is a story Riley's mama used to tell him every night.

Riley's family doesn't mention Mama. Photos of her have been put away as if she never existed to anyone but Riley. His grandparents refer to his "condition." Riley has two conditions: his foggy memory on the day his mother went missing and his secret "condition"--the fact that he likes boys.  His family considers Riley quiet, weak and a "Mama's boy." He is introspective, creative and soft-spoken.

Riley has to meet with "Fat Bald Detective" many times. The man keeps asking him the same questions. What does he remember about the day Mama disappeared? Riley remembers she was lying on the couch and he touched her hand. Then, he went out to play and Mama went missing. Riley doesn't see why the cops aren't searching for whoever took Mama. Why do they keep questioning him? He didn't have anything to do with her disappearance, but he does have secrets.

Everyone deals with grief differently. Riley's father becomes a shell of himself hardly speaking to anyone and he won't make eye contact with Riley.  Riley remembers Mama and how they learned a word a day from a calendar. Mama would make him use the word in a sentence and Riley continues the practice. He turns to "the whispers" to find his Mama.

The Whispers has a favorite trope of all time: the unreliable narrator--ten, now eleven-year old, Riley. He has developed an alternative narrative where "...your head and your heart tell you a different story in order to protect you" (from the Author's Note). His memory loss is a break with reality and his coping method.

The Whispers is my early pick for Best Middle Grade Book of the Year and are you listening, Bluebonnets? I believe this book will be a Texas Bluebonnet pick and other states will step up to the plate. This is a must have for all collections and a must read. The Whispers would be a great book to read as a class and the discussions would help so many kids.

Highly, highly recommended and DO NOT MISS THIS ONE.
Grades 5 and up.

FTC Required Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. I did not receive monetary compensation for this review.

Texas Library Conference: Taking Texas By Storm

 

Texas Library Conference

Austin, Texas

April 14-17, 2015

 

That's Naomi Bates (on right) and me, Pamela Thompson (on left) right before we sit down to interview the keynote speaker,  New York Times best-selling author David Baldacci! What a thrill!

You can find David's books at any bookseller and almost always on the Top Ten list. David has recently entered the YA market with the release of his first YA title, The Finisher. I reviewed it last year and interviewed David with a group of librarians and book sellers.

Naomi filmed the interview at TLA and  that I'll post it  to the blog soon.

David Baldacci is a practiced speaker. In the keynote, he was entertaining and witty. A crowd of 4,700 librarians attended the conference this year and everyone enjoyed the keynote. He talked about writing and being a famous author and how it's not that different from anything else. He admits he often wrote his finest fiction when practicing law (big laughs from the audience). A case of mistaken identity where a woman mistook him for the other lawyer turned writer, John Grisham, also got big laughs. Baldacci spends his time writing and in charity work. His charity "Wish You Well" donates books to food banks. Baldacci says we all need food to eat in order to survive, but "we can do better." Books are food for the soul.

As for the rest of the conference, it was equally entertaining. Whether networking with other Texas librarians or chatting up the authors, the conference was a blast! I stopped by to see Nikki Loftin, (author of Wish Girl)  and congratulate her on a fantastic book. She was Texas sweet. She jumped up and hugged me and thanked me for my review. Wish Girl is the BEST middle grade book I've read in years and I told Nikki that I see many awards in her future. Nikki said that she was turning the guest bedroom in her house into the "Pamela Thompson suite" and invited me to stay with her any time I'm in Austin. How Texan is that?!

A road  trip to Austin would never be complete without bluebonnets. They were blooming everywhere! The hill country sure came out for me. Bluebonnets as far as the eye could see! Like Wish Girl, the bluebonnets are a love letter for Texas.