Marcelo in the Real World by Francisco X. Stork

Marcelo, a 17-yr-old, high school senior who is also on the Autistic spectrum. Marcelo is fixated on two things...religion and his IM (inner music) – his own brand of inner noise.

Marcelo is anticipating his final year at Paterson - a school for disabled kids – and his job in the stable. Dad has other ideas he wants him to work at his law firm to get a taste of the real world. Dad makes a deal with Marcelo – if he follows the rules for the summer he will allow Marcelo to decide where he attends his final year of high school. Marcelo becomes a mailroom worker with Jasmine. She is open and honest and doesn’t really want him there. But, a friendship develops. Each gives the other a listening ear without judgements attached.

The law firm is defending a windshield manufacturer for negligence. The windshield is supposed to splinter and break instead it breaks in big pieces and kills and maims people. Marcelo and Jasmine discover a photograph of a girl who lived through the horror. Now, Marcelo must decide what to do – get in touch with the lawyer for the girl and share that the company knew about the problem, or stand by his dad…

It's a story of a young man entering the bigger world and figuring out what it means to stand.

This is an excellent book for anyone who has worked with kids on the spectrum. It really provides an insight into what their world is like. How scary, how exciting and how different their view is from what we accept as our reality.

I loved this!

Mercy by Jodi Picoult

image from LibraryThing

WOW! This is one of those I couldn't put down - until I got mad! Then I stopped. I didn't want it to end. I wanted it to end. I wanted to go to sleep. I couldn't go to sleep. I was a mess! I don't know whether to thank Kim for recommending it or to be mad at her for messing with sleep again!

This is another amazing Picoult story. She has a way of drawing the reader in to a world that you didn't even know you wanted to experience. I am so impressed every time I read one of her books. Even the one I really didn't love (Tenth Circle) - still drew me in to the story!!

The story opens with a garage sale. A woman has taken every bit of her husband's paraphernalia out of the house and displayed it on the lawn to be sold... she is more interested in emptying the house than in making money. Because of that - everything but a few pairs of boxers is sold. When her husband comes home that night he sees the remains of the sale as his wife walks away across the lawn.

This is a story about that kind of all or nothing love. There seems to be no gray. A commitment can not be partial. So - the solution is just as complete.

Anyway - this is the story of two marriages with many similarities and startling differences. Jamie and Maggie enter the story as Jamie climbs out of the cab of his pickup in front of the police station announcing that he killed his wife who was sitting in the cab beside him. Cameron, the police chief and his overly devoted wife Allie react very differently to this moment. Cameron with the weight of his position as the chief of his clan and Allie as a woman who understands giving yourself for another person.

Then Mia, enters the story and Cam is tempted in a way he never expects.

You can probably guess what will happen and you will only be partially right.

Read it!!

This was chosen for our October Book club book - Booker Babes!

State of Fear by Michael Crichton

image from LibraryThing

I haven't read a Michael Crichton book for a long time. This was just the book I needed to escape. My grandfather died this week and I wanted something to make me forget all the things I needed to do and relax. State of Fear is one of those books that you need to be fairly focused on - there are lots of things going on - because it makes you question what you thought you knew.

The basic premise is an environmental agency that is a money sucking hole and to convince people of the need to donate money to the global warming crisis - they create climate events to scare peoples' checkbooks open.

Peter Evans, a mild mannered lawyer, gets sucked into crisis by representing George Morton, an odd duck of an environmentalist and a very rich man. George begins to become disillusioned with NERF, the environmental group he is funding, and starts to ask many quesitons. Drake, the leader of the group, becomes suspecious and begins pressuring George to change his mind by threatening to kill him. After a drunken acceptance speech - George is killed in a fiery car crash.

Peter thinks things are over, but then he meets Kenner, George's accomplice and a naysayer for all things environmental. Actually, he isn't a naysayer - but a questioner. He pushes Peter to question all he knows about global warming by presenting studies and facts that contradict the general understanding. As Peter becomes more and more embroiled in whatever is happening with NERF, his life is threatened in the Anarctic, in the desert of the Southwest and finally on a little island in the Pacific - that one is the most gruesome - he learns there are still cannibals...

I really enjoyed this book. Although it helped me to escape - it also forced me to think about what I understand and what I believe. It made me believe that the only way to escape this state of fear is to trust in things that are not of this world! :)

Enjoy this!

ps - I read this outloud to Rod right after I finished! So - this should actually count as two books. I think I liked it even better the second time around!