Wonderstruck

have you watched Hugo and fallen in love?
wondering about Brian Selznick's other books?
well here is my review of Wonderstruck, his new release.

while you're there, follow us on facebook, subscribe to our blog, and if you live in perth sign our petition!

Pin-up Post: best literary boys

happy valentine's day my beautiful readers.
I'm sorry for my absence, teachers do not lie when they say 20% increase in work load for year 11.
this is a list of my favourite literary boys :)
* is for the Aussie lads

1. Will Trombal from The Piper's Son*
i love his awkwardness, his integrity and his intelligence. i love me a smart boy.
the thing i love most is his relationship with Francesca, i wish i could steal him.
favourite quote:“And if I get a little chemically imbalanced in the head, like we all know I tend to get sometimes, and I don't want my parents or brother knowing, Will's like, 'We'll deal with it.' He's never said, 'I'll fix it up.' He just says, 'You're not up to going back to uni to finish your Honours this year? Big deal. There's next year. We'll deal with it.'" She nods. "That's what he does well.”

2. Adam Wilde from Where She Went
oh i love his passion, how strongly he feels it all. i just want to hold him. the music thing i really like as well. i also love how
he gave up his career for her. go Gayle Forman!
favourite quotes: “I get it now. I have to make good on my promise. To let her go. To really let her go. To let us both go.”
“I needed to hate someone and you’re the one I love the most, so it fell on you.”

3. Alex Delaney from After January*
sensitive and awkward, and so keen to get things right. he also writes stuff, which is an added bonus. i like how he's quiet,
and how he's constantly thinking.

4. Cameron Wolfe from the Wolfe Brothers series*
he is so bad, so many faults, but he fights so hard, and there are few things i value more than that. he always says ' if i get a
girl i'll treat her right' and he did. he thinks, and he yearns for so much more. i just want to give him a hug.
favourite quotes: I stopped walking when I knew all the good feeling had vanished from me. Maybe it had slipped out of me and was given to the derelict. Maybe it disappeared somewhere in my stomach and I did’t even notice. All there was now was this anxiety I couldn’t explain. What a sight. What a feeling. This was terrible: a skinny kid, standing, alone. That was the bottom line. Alone, and I didn’t feel equipped to handle it. Yes, quite suddenly, I didn’t feel like I could handle my feeling of aloneness.
Was this how it was always going to be? Would I always with kind of self-doubt, and doubt for the civilization around me? Would I always feel so small it hurt and that even the greatest outcry roaring from my throat was, in reality, just a whimper?


5. Will from I lost my Mobile at the Mall*
he's quiet, and sweet, and calm and doesn't fuss. he's just a beautiful guy who loves surfing.
favourite quote: "that's what i like most about you Ellie, you're strong and independent"

6. harry potter from harry potter
can i just keep him? pleease.

Piper's Son

Title: The Piper's Son
Author: Melina Marchetta
First Published: 2010 by Penguin

Tom wants out. he wants oblivion and he's seeking it every way he can to escape the death of his uncle, his family falling apart in every direction possible, the best friends he had and lost, one night stands and heart break over Physco Tara Finke. then he finds himself back where he started, at his pregnant aunt Georgie's, with the st Sebastian's girls. he starts remember everything from two years ago, before Joe was blown to smithereens. this time Tom needs saving, so he can put his family back together.

Quotes
“Maybe she'd always been there. Maybe strangers enter your heart first and then you spent the rest of your life searching for them. ”

“He knows bad days. Bad days take him completely by surprise. They make him not trust the good days because it's likely something is lurking twenty-four hours away.”

“And if I get a little chemically imbalanced in the head, like we all know I tend to get sometimes, and I don't want my parents or brother knowing, Will's like, 'We'll deal with it.' He's never said, 'I'll fix it up.' He just says, 'You're not up to going back to uni to finish your Honours this year? Big deal. There's next year. We'll deal with it.'" She nods. "That's what he does well.”

Review
it feels pointless to review it, no matter what i said i could never capture how much i LOVED The Piper's Son. it is now my favourite book. it was heart breaking and HILARIOUS within pages. it seemed like a real story and now i want to know more about Jimmy, more about Anabel and mostly more about the baby. please can their be a 3rd book? when i read Saving Francesca for the first i fell in love with everyone, it seemed so real, so perfect in it's broken way. i wanted more and that is exactly what's delivered in the book.

the way Melina Marchetta understands depression is one of the reasons i love these books so much. it's so hard to capture, to explain, and yet it's done so honestly, nothing left, not a cliche in sight. this is a godsend, especially Francesca who fights it with all she has and talks of it so honestly.

i love all the characters, so flawed, so honest, so messed up. the relationships were portrayed perfectly. i love them all, for all their faults.

i almost cried, i laughed and i sang with this book, because it captured life, the hardness of it and showed the beauty of it and made you want to fight for it. I am in love with this book.

Pan's Whisper Giveaway

to round off Pan's Whisper day on Cherry Banana Split i'm very happy to tell you their one copy of Pan's Whisper up for grabs on Perth YA Fans Unite.

while you're there sign our petition and follow us. we've got lots of great stuff coming up :D interviews, great reviews and more giveaways.

ENJOY!

Sue Lawson Interview

having read the review of Sue Lawson's latest novel Pan's Whisper you people are lucky enough to get an interview with her! any of you who've read my other Sue Lawson Reviews will know just how excited i was to have this oppurtunity.

Hi Sue, welcome to Cherry Banana Split. Make yourself at home. I really loved Pan’s Whisper, as well as all your other books.
Thank you so much for answering me questions: D

Thanks Anna. I’m so glad you enjoyed Pan’s story, and it is lovely to drop in on Cherry Banana Split.

The thing I love most about your books is the characters. They’re so realistic. How do you develop or get to know your characters?

Thank you. I’m thrilled you enjoy the characters. They become like real people for me, which I guess makes me rather strange. I spend most of my planning-time working on characters, creating collages and profiles, so I understand not only who these characters are, but what their motivations are.
I don’t use most of the stuff I gather about my characters, but nothing is wasted. Every detail makes the character more rounded and real for me.

You seem to love dramatic endings; they work really well for you. You build tension to have things ‘explode’ at the right moment, and then reveal everything.
Is there a reason you like this technique or does it just work well for you?
Yeah, I guess I am a bit of a drama queen when it comes to endings. I’m glad they are working for you. I must admit, I like to have an idea – a very rough idea – of how the story will end before I start writing. That way it helps me trickle out information to the end, so the ‘explosions’ aren’t deliberate, but just how my books pan out.

It is hard not to use the ‘dramatic event’ as a cop out to solve the problems or as an excuse for character development?
I guess by knowing where I am headed, I avoid the cop out situation. The development occurs along the way, rather than in that dramatic moment. I think my characters, like Pan, cope with the event because they have grown and changed through the course of the book.

Memories are really important in Pan’s Whisper. Could you have told Pan’s story without using Pan and Morgan’s memories as a story telling device?
I don’t think so. Morgan is as important as Pan, and gives us a much better understanding of Kylie’s character and her issues and so why Pan is as angry and mixed up as she is. Having access to Morgan’s memories as well as Pan’s helps the reader build a more rounded understanding of Pan and of the truth.

I love Hunter and Pan’s friendship, can you tell me a bit more about that?
I’m so glad you enjoyed Hunter and Pan – I love Hunter ( not in an old lady pervy way!) He was initially a bit character, but I realised his experience was integral to Pan facing her truth. His friendship, despite Pan’s efforts to chase him away, sparks the biggest leap of faith for her.
I’ve noticed in life people who have been through trauma and tragedy, even if the events are markedly different, often gravitate and have an intrinsic mutual understanding of each other’s situation. They ‘get’ each other’s situation without having to explain, which is why I decided Hunter could recognize pain and loss in Pan.

Do you use music when you write?
It varies. When I am editing I tend to prefer silence, but when I am writing, I usually have a CD playing, but never one I know really well. (Otherwise I’d become distracted and sing – no Powderfinger, Whitlams, The Police, Queen, or Midnight Oil when I write!) While writing Pan, I listened to ABC Digital radio station, Dig Music, relaxation CDs, the soundtrack from the movie Mongol (LOVE that soundtrack – very intense and emotional!), Pete Murray, and South African street music.

If you could befriend one of your characters who would it be and why? What would you like to do or talk about?
I guess I already have befriended them all. While I am writing and editing, I’m ‘talking’ to them the whole time, about how they would react in certain situations, what cards/clothes/stuff they would buy in shops etc.
I sound crazy I know, but the more I do this, the better I know them and the ‘easier’ it is to write about them and understand their situations. I actually miss my characters when I finish writing!

What’s your favourite Australian kids or YA book?
That is a REALLY tough one. Can I pick more than one? Please??
In no particular order…
Jackie French’s A Rose for the Anzacs, Julia Lawrinson’s Bye Beautiful, David Metzenthen’s Black Water ( And Jarvis 24 and Tiff and The Trout – in fact anything by David.) Cath Crowley’s Graffiti Moon and Karen Tayleur’s Six.
OOOH! most of those are my favourites too.

Thank you so much for having me Anna and for the sensational questions. What a great way to finish off a rewarding and fun blog tour!

thank you Sue for an amazing interview :D

Pan's Whisper

Welcome to Pan's Whisper day. let's kick it off with a review.

Title: Pan's Whisper
Author: Sue Lawson
First Published: 2011 by Black Dog Books

Pan Harper is angry. she's been placed in foster care, and is mad at her mum and older sister. she is sure she knows her life story better than anyone. but does she? memory is a tricky thing. then she meets her foster family, teachers, and most importantly Hunter. is he worth breaking her most important rule, Never Trust Anyone?

Quick Review
Pan's Whisper is a story of family and friends. Pan may be angry, but you can't help but like her. the more of her story you learn, the more you respect her, even as she makes mistakes over and over again. Sue Lawson once again has created an emotional rollercoster of a story which is amazingly true to life.

Quotes
know where i am? right in the heart of legoland, living with plastics and going to a school filled with spastics. why? because of You. Pan- page 37

"come on Panda, we have to get to Grady's before the hairy-nosed, boogie-bummed bunyip catches us." Kylie stomped up the hall..."get back here now"- page 95/96

i grab the 1st harry potter book and settle into read. Sure I've read it 1000 times but there's something comforting about the familiarity of the characters- page 236

babble
Pan's Whisper is told in three forms. most of the story is in 1st person from Pan's point pf view, but the story is also told in letters to Morgan and in memories from Morgan. they link together in little groups to tell the story. you slowly build a picture of what actually happened, as pan does. it's really clever. it builds suspense also me and you get to know Morgan.

they characters are fabulous. you don't really meet Morgan, or Grandy or Kylie but you know them really well, which i think is quite an achievement. in building them up you really get in Pan's head. the new people she meets, like hunter, Ari and her foster family were good characters, but i would have liked to get to know them even more, but you got their background story, which really added to the story.

over all i really enjoyed Pan's Whisper, and would definitely recommend it to anyone.

luckily for all you Perth readers a copy is going to be up for grabs on Perth YA Fans Unite very soon. so follow us to be eligible to enter.

Pan's Whisper Blog Tour

Cherry Banana Split is excited to announce that we've been invited to take part in the blog tour launching theSue lawson's new book Pan's Whisper. the tour kicks off tomorrow at Let's Have Words and will finish here on the 21st.
i'll have exclusive content including, an interview, a giveaways, reviews and perhaps a guest post from sue lawson herself, here and over at Perth YA Fans Unite, so follow both of us to keep up :)