Dangerous Lies

Fitzpatrick, Becca. Dangerous Lies. 2015. 416p. 616 mins. ISBN 978-1-48142492-9. Available as an audiobook from Overdrive.

Stella has just moved to Thunder Basin, Nebraska. It is the middle of nowhere, with not much to do. She used to live in Philadelphia, but she can’t tell anyone. Stella is not her real name. She’s in the witness protection program because she saw a dangerous drug dealer and the head of the local cartel murder another dealer right in her house, in front of her drug-using mother. And that dealer then severely beat Reed, her boyfriend. With the dealer and his crew looking for her, the U.S. government is protecting them both in exchange for their testimonies. While in Thunder Basin, she will live with Carmina, a retired police chief, and cannot communicate with her boyfriend, nor reveal her true identity.

With nothing to do, Stella quickly finds a job at the local diner, and begins to meet new people, pretending to be a foster care kid from Tennessee. Stella also meets Carmina’s neighbor, nineteen-year-old Chet Falconer. Stella finds herself attracted to Chet, but since she doesn’t plan on being here very long she sees no need to become friendly with him. As days, then weeks pass, however, and Reed never communicates with her through their secret email account she accesses at the local public library, Stella becomes worried at the prospect that the dealer’s men found him. At the same time, her attraction to Chet continues to grow, and Stella feels torn between the two of them.

Meanwhile, local high school baseball captain and sure major league prospect Trigger, who also happens to be the town bully, has set his sights on Stella and makes her life miserable. Plus, he looks familiar to Stella, and he also looks like he recognizes her from somewhere. With Trigger lurking around her, drug dealers chasing her, and Chet’s dark secrets, danger is lurking everywhere. As she’s about to discover, dangerous lies could get her killed...

The Dorito Effect: The Surprising New Truth About Food and Flavor

Schatzker, Mark. The Dorito Effect: The Surprising New Truth About Food and Flavor. 2015. 259p. 498 mins. ISBN 9781476724218. Available as an audiobook from Overdrive.

Older people often complain that the food they eat is bland and doesn’t taste like the food they used to eat when they were children. For the most part, they are right. Over the last one hundred years, humans have managed to tremendously increase the yield of food. Crops now produce five, ten, or sometimes twenty times the amount of food they did a few decades ago. Thanks to the green revolution, we are able to feed an ever increasing population. However, it comes with costs.

Eating chicken used to be an expensive proposition, but industrial processes now make chicken fatter quicker, all the while keeping the price cheap. However, much like the crops we eat, what has been lost in this industrialization and standardization is the taste these foods developed as they aged. To compensate for this, food companies developed flavoring compounds to ensure that the taste of any given product could be enhanced. The birth of the Dorito chip is symptomatic of this process. A perfectly good crunchy corn chip was made to taste like an entire taco, thus opening supermarket doors to this new product. But in the process our brains became tricked by these new flavors that are not related to the taste of the food.

In this book the author explores a growing gap between how the food taste (better and better) and the nutritional value it has (worse and worse). For examples, blueberry waffles in the frozen section of the grocery store contain no blueberries, yet the consumer is baited and switched to a product that taste just like blueberries, without the nutritional value of actually eating blueberries. Societies worldwide are experiencing this phenomena, which leads to higher rates of obesity and diseases.

Other countries have taken measures to address these issues, by banning flavoring, and by consumers being aware of the products they buy. Chicken is more flavorful in France because poultry is not grown on an industrial scale and is given more time to mature and acquire a taste. Italian pasta and heirloom vegetables continue to be the pride of specific regions and are jealously protected.

It is up to us, the consumer, to demand better tasting food grown through natural processes, and not enhanced by a flavor industry diminishing the nutritional value of food. Pair this book with The Omnivore’s Dilemma for a depressing yet hopeful overview of the whole food industry in the United States.

Johnny Tremain

Forbes, Esther. Johnny Tremain. 1987. 322p. ISBN 0440442508. Available at FIC FOR on the library shelves.

With the death of his mother, Johnny Tremain moves in with the Lapham family in Boston so he can become a silversmith apprentice with old Mr. Lapham. The Laphams had lost their children, but took care of their grandchildren, and they planned to marry Cilla and Johnny together so the business could stay in the family. But in 1773, at fourteen, Johnny is not really interested in Cilla. Of the three apprentices, he is the better one and he can craft silver as fine as Mr. Lapham in his heyday.

When Mr. Hancock requests a silver dish to match one Mr. Lapham made decades ago, Johnny agrees to make it. Filled with pride in his work and in his abilities, however, Johnny has been less than charitable towards the other apprentices, so Dove, one of them, decides to get even. During the manufacturing process Johnny burns his hand badly when molten silver pours on it, and he becomes crippled.

No longer able to work as an apprentice, Johnny is lost and doesn’t know what to do. The sin of pride has cost him everything. Eventually, Johnny meets Rab, another youth who secures work for him as a rider who delivers newspapers. In 1774 Boston, the colonists are railing against British authority and taxes being levied by the King. The entire city is divided between Patriots and Loyalists to the Crown, and crippled Johnny is able to maneuver between both sides though he supports the Patriots. As Johnny gets more involved with the Sons of Liberty and running messages for them, he re-evaluates his life, including his interest in Cilla. And when British troops depart Boston in the night, Johnny knows that this is the match that will light the powder keg and ignite the Revolution. Can Johnny make a significant contribution even though he is crippled?

The Disappearances

Murphy, Emily Bain. The Disappearances. 2017. 400p. ISBN 978-0-544-87936-2. Available as an eBook from Overdrive.

It is 1942, and fifteen-year old Aila Quinn’s mother, Juliet, has just died, and her father has just been drafted by the U.S. Navy to fight in the war. With no other relatives in the small town of Gardner, Connecticut, Aila and her younger brother Myles are sent to live with Mathilda and Malcolm Cliffton in another small town called Sterling a few hours away by train. Mathilda was Juliet’s best friend when they were growing up, and Aila vaguely recalls her coming to visit them when she was four with her son Will. Present at the funeral, she volunteered to house the children while their father was away.

Pulled away from everything, Aila is resentful of her mother’s death and her departure from everything she knows. Wanting a souvenir from her mother, she takes her old copy of Shakespeare’s complete works and discovers a ring and a message addressed to Stefen and hidden in the book. In the message Juliet tells Stefen she loves him. Aila has never heard of Stefen, but her mother always kept her childhood a secret.

Arriving in Sterling, Aila quickly discovers that all is not well. The town, along with two other villages, have lost several ordinary things present everywhere else. Titled the Disappearances, these elements have vanished one at a time, every seven years, over the last thirty five years. There are no smells in Sterling. No vivid colors. No stars in the sky. No dreams. No reflections in mirrors. And the next Disappearance is coming soon. The people of Sterling have developed variants, dust that can temporarily alleviate these missing things, but for the most part they do without.

The disappearances began on the day that Juliet was born, and she is known as a catalyst. Aila quickly realizes that the people in town feared and hated Juliet, for she was the only one who regained a Disappearance when she left the town. As Aila begins to investigate this mystery, she discovers that the Disappearances appear related to Shakespeare’s plays, and her mother had taken extensive notes in her book. The more she digs, however, the more she discovers information about her mother she did not know. She also begins to fall for handsome Will, who likes her as well.

But a powerful actor is bent on insuring that no one solves the Disappearances, for there is profit to be made selling variants. With the next Disappearance fast approaching, can Aila navigates small town politics and enemies before it is too late?

The City in the Roman Empire

Mackley, Daniel. The City in the Roman Empire. Part of the Life in the Roman Empire series. 2017. 80p. ISBN 978-1-5026-2259-4. Available at 307.76 MAC on the library shelves.

As the model for every city in the Roman Empire, Rome stood at the height of urban development not equalled until the Industrial Age. Roman cities had many features recognizable to a person living today, from fresh running water piped to fountains and baths throughout the city to paved roads and sewer systems. Restaurants and shops lined the streets, while large apartment complexes stretched up to seven stories in the sky. Entertainment facilities such as amphitheatres and arenas allowed the citizens to relax and enjoy themselves.

Without artificial lighting powerful enough to banish the night, most Romans awoke at dawn and were out and about until dusk, when the city became unsafe. The average Roman, who lived to be 27, worked in the morning and returned home for lunch, followed by an afternoon of entertainment at the baths, libraries, or in public places with friends. Men, women, and slaves all had leisure time build in their schedules. A myriad of public holidays ensured that the workweek was never too long.

Most citizens lived in apartments with no cooking facilities due to the risk of fire. They ate out, or enjoyed a meal of cold beans and bread. Dangers such as fire and natural disasters could wipe out cities in a manner of hours. The cost of living was high in Rome, and work could be hard to get. A prelude to the feudal system, most Romans had a patron that took care of them. In exchange they accomplished small tasks for them.

Though Roman life was hard, living in a city could provide significant enjoyment for its residents. It wasn’t until the growth of London and Paris in the 1700s that Rome’s population of over one million people was finally exceeded in the Western world.

Other titles in this series include The Countryside in the Roman Empire, Patricians in the Roman Empire, and Religion in the Roman Empire.

Yvain: The Knight of the Lion

Anderson, M. T. Illustrated by Andrea Offermann. Yvain: The Knight of the Lion. 2017. 134p. 978-0-7636-5939-4. Available in the graphic section of the library.

The Knights of the Round Table are celebrating Pentecoast when one of their junior members, Sir Calogrenant, return to Arthur’s castle bloodied and beaten. When he explains to Dame Guinevere and the assembled knights that he was defeated by the Duke of Brocéliande and barely escaped with his life, his cousin, Sir Yvain, immediately decides that he should challenge that man himself. Arthur agrees that they should all head there, after the party ends. Sir Yvain has other ideas, however, and he heads out alone to confront the miscreant.

Reaching the magical fountain in the woods of Brocéliande, Sir Yvain is attacked by the same Duke, but he manages to slay him. Following the body back his castle, Yvain is stuck inside and meets Lunette, the Duchess’ servant. Wielding magic, she protects him from the soldiers who search for him, and he witnesses the Duke’s burial. Glancing the Duke’s widow, Yvain immediately falls in love with her, and through careful planning Lunette is able to set them together. Now married, Yvain agrees to protect the fountain, but Sir Gawain manages to convince him to depart for a year’s worth of tournaments. Yvain’s new wife, Laudine, warns him that if he does not return in one year he will be forever banished from the castle and from her life.

When Yvain fails to return, Arthus is notified of Laudine’s order, and Yvain, realizing that he has lost everything, decides to end it all. Wandering the forests looking for death, he discovers a lion fighting a dragon, and he slays the dragon and cares for the lion. Now known as the Knight of the Lion, Sir Yvain searches for ways to atone for his sins and regain Laudine’s confidence and love. In the process, Yvain destroys more monsters, frees slaves, and fights his best friend in a battle to the death, all to find salvation.

Based on a tale told in one of Chrétien de Troyes’ 12th century epic poems, Sir Yvain’s story explores the meaning of love at a time when women controlled precious little. The illustrations lavishly render this period in history into visual representations that add to the storytelling. Fans of the Middle Ages and of graphic novels will appreciate this book and Sir Yvain’s quest to become a better person.

Eragon

Paolini, Christopher. Eragon. Book 1 of the Inheritance Cycle series. 2003. 509p. ISBN 0-375-82668-8. Available at FIC PAO on the library shelves.

On the large continent of Alagaësia, fifteen-year-old Eragon occupies a very small place in the village of Carvahall, as removed from everything else as one can get. An orphan, Eragon lives with his farming uncle Garrow and his cousin Roran about 10 miles out of the village, in the shadows of the Spine mountains. A foreboding place and rumored to be full of magic, the Spine mountains are left alone by the local residents, but Eragon long ago learned how to hunt and avoid its pitfalls.

Eragon is looking for food for the coming winter during one of these hunts when he comes across the strangest stone he has ever seen. Polished and with different shades of blue, it must be worth a small fortune. He brings it back to the village and attempts to sell it, only to discover no one wants to purchase it because it comes from the Spine. Then one night the stone hatches, and a dragon emerges. Soon, Eragon and Saphira are inseparable friends, but as the dragon grows it becomes harder to hide her.

Agents of the evil king Galbatorix are on the move, searching everywhere for the dragon egg that was stolen from the king. The elf that carried the egg was captured, but not before she transported the egg away. Two of those agents, a mix of bird and men, the Ra’zac arrive at Carvahall looking for Brom, a former dragon rider, but they stumble upon Eragon and begin the chase. Eragon escapes in the Spine, and the Ra’zac kill his uncle Garrow.

Vowing vengeance, Eragon decides to pursue his attackers as they retreat. Brom accompanies Eragon and trains him on the history of dragon riders and of Alagaësia, as well as on the proper ways of magic and combat skills. Soon the pursuers become the pursued as Galbatorix’ soldiers are intent on capturing Eragon and forcing him to join forces with the evil king. Saved from imprisonment several times by a new friend named Murtagh, Eragon rescues Arya, the elf who carried the egg, but she is dying and in a magically induced sleep. Now Eragon and Saphira’s only hope is to find the Varden, an opposition group fighting Galbatorix, in their secret base before it is too late. But with an army of Urgals, fierce and ruthless creatures, on their tails, will they reach their destination in time to save Arya, and, if so, at what cost?

Peopled with amazing creatures and vivid descriptions, Eragon is fantasy at its best, with magic, dragons, and sweeping vistas. Fans of Lord of the Rings will find themselves at home in the universe of the dragon riders.