Making It Up

as we go along

2016

A boy made of blocks – the blog tour

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I read and reviewed A boy made of blocks last September – you can read my thoughts here. To summarise from then:

although some parts of the ending are kind of predictable, I totally admit that I was swept up in the emotions, and may have shed a tear or two (or even a few more) at what felt like the big climax at the end. (Turns out it goes on a bit after that, but loose ends irritate, so I’ll forgive the tidy up.)

All in all, I’m glad I read this one. Hope my perspective is useful

So I was wondering what I could add to a review this time around, and in discussing the book further on twitter, I found out.

In my first post, I queried some of the language in use in the book. For example the passage around diagnosis:

Last year, the paediatrician told us, after interminable months of tests and interviews , that he is on the upper end of the autism spectrum. The higher-functioning end. The easy end. The shallow end. He has trouble with language, he fears social situations, he hates noise, he obsesses over certain things, and gets physical when situations confuse or frighten him. But the underlying message seemed to be: you’ve got it easy compared to other parents.

This is problematic for those of us with autism spectrum diagnosis. We’re moving away from functioning labels – recognising that someone who is high functioning at some times and in some situations may be low functioning at others. It doesn’t help to think of autism this way – it isn’t a linear progression. There are some excellent articles around on this sort of topic – for example here and if you google functioning labels autism, you’ll find a whole stack more.

Going back to the linear progression idea, I also picked up on references to the autism scale. This is not a phrasing that I’ve come across (and I have more experience with autism than just my own diagnosis – I’ve worked in care homes with autistic adults, and have other family experience too) so I went on a hunt. There does appear to be a three step scale mentioned with the DSM V which is the American diagnostic manual, which may or may not be referred to in diagnosis here. There’s a breakdown of diagnostic criteria and so on on the National Autistic Society website – it doesn’t mention the autism scale. I think this would be better understood as the autism spectrum, which encompasses a set of different diagnosis. Again though, they aren’t linear, and someone can have aspects of more than one diagnosis.

Basically, autism is complicated, and dealing with it as a parent is kind of a minefield. The best advice I can give is to read widely, find support groups that include autistic adults and listen to us.

I don’t regret in the slightest reading this book – I very much enjoyed it. It *is* possible to enjoy a book while recognising problematic aspects, and hopefully I’ve given some further explanation on parts of this which is useful. Do let me know what you think in the comments.

A boy made of blocks is available in a number of different formats from Amazon. (affiliate link). Alternatively, if you find any of my writings on autism useful, feeld free to

Check out the other blogs on the tour:

Cover reveal: Domina from L S Hilton

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Everything you thought you knew about Maestra… You don’t.

Publishing with Bonnier Zaffre, March 23rd 2017. I admit I’m intrigued. If you are too, you can pre-order at amazon here (affiliate)

If, like me, you’re behind the loop on this one, you might want to look up Maestra:

WHERE DO YOU GO WHEN YOU’VE GONE TOO FAR?

Fatal Attraction meets The Talented Mr Ripley, and soon to be a major Hollywood film – prepare for this year’s The Girl on the Train

By day Judith Rashleigh is a put-upon assistant at a London auction house.

By night she’s a hostess in one of the capital’s unsavoury bars.

Desperate to make something of herself, Judith knows she has to play the game. She’s learned to dress, speak and act in the interests of men. She’s learned to be a good girl. But after uncovering a dark secret at the heart of the art world, Judith is fired and her dreams of a better life are torn apart.

So she turns to a long-neglected friend.

A friend that kept her chin up and back straight through every past slight.

A friend that a good girl like her shouldn’t have: Rage.

The Talented Mr Ripley meets Gone Girl in this darkly decadent and compelling new thriller that asks:

Where do you go when you’ve gone too far?

(How *have* I missed this one? Anyway, cover is another of those Amazon affiliate links. If you’ve already read this I’d love to hear your thoughts on it.)

Gravity by Andy Briggs

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gravity-blog-tour

gravity

Buy from Amazon here

We very much enjoyed being part of the blog tour for Inventory: Iron Fist last spring, and I leapt at the chance for Small to read the sequel, not least because I love his reviews.

I think you’ll agree with me that he has not disappointed 😉

I tried to go into Gravity with an open mind. While I had somewhat mixed (though generally positive) feelings towards the original, I was hoping that the second book in the The Inventory series would be an improvement. Thankfully, I was not disappointed. The sequel manages to go in a much more interesting direction than the first book did, now focusing more on the characters and plotline than the technology within the inventory (which is a good thing, because the technology isn’t plausible enough to be interesting by any stretch of the imagination). Speaking of the characters, it goes much further in developing them than the first book did, making them much more interesting (except the main protagonist Dev. Dev is overpowered and boring), and creating a much more interesting book to read as a consequence. The series will still likely not appeal to people who prefer hard Sci-Fi, as the technology only continues to be ludicrously absurd and impossible (funnily enough, Andy Briggs’ previous series about superheroes actually pulled itself off in a far more plausible manner than The Inventory does), but I can safely say that I recommend this book, moreso than I recommended the original. (The fact that a word counter lists the three most used words in this review as “Book More Interesting” in that order should be a testament to that.)

(If you would like Small to read your book, be aware that he will be brutally honest about it. Feel free to get in touch.)

Thanks very much to Andy for the chance to be included in the tour.

Andy Briggs

Book info

Title: Gravity (The Inventory #2)

Author: Andy Briggs

Release Date: 6th October 2016

Genre: MG Sci-Fi

Publisher: Scholastic

Format: Paperback

Find it on Goodreads. Buy from Amazon here

Disclosure: amazon links are affiliate links, we were supplied a copy of the book in return for an honest review.

Finding Black Beauty (and 10 other horse stories you might enjoy)

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Post contains affiliate links.

finding-black-beauty-cover Find it at Amazon.

Finding Black Beauty by Lou Kuenzler. An enchanting retelling of Anna Sewell’s classic horse story, a moving and uplifting tale of friendship.

A horse needs the help of a young girl…

Aspiring groom Josie comes to love her spirited charge, a black colt called Beauty. When he is taken from her, she travels to London to find him – on the way discovering the truth about her own past.

Finding Black Beauty is a sweeping tale of a young girl; her love for her horse, and the circumstances that divide them.

finding-black-beauty-blog-tour I am a huge fan of horse stories, have been about as long as I can remember. Black Beauty is an absolute classic – but it’s not particularly accessible, language wise, to today’s children. This reframing of the story, although still set in the past is in modern language, and a great introduction to the original story. It stands alone as well in that the focus is on the main human character rather than the horse – another thing that makes it a little more accessible.

Aimed at children from 8 upwards, there are some sad or scary moments in this book, so if your child is particularly sensitive you’ll want to approach with care. But mostly it’s a wonderful story about a girl and her love for horses. Well worth adding to your library of horse books.

In case you’re looking for a few more titles to fill up your shelves, here’s 10 of my favourites.

The original Black Beauty. Being a horse was a hard life in Victorian England.

Fly-by-night by KM Peyton. Ruth has never ridden a pony before, but she falls in love with Fly-by-night. Where will she find the money for him, and how will she learn to ride? (Also worth finding the rest of the books about Ruth and her friends – KM Peyton is a wonderful story teller.)

The Silver Brumby ever wondered what the life of a wild horse is like? Wonder no more, but run free with the silver brumby. (Start of a series. All worth reading. And rereading.)

My Friend Flicka. If you don’t weep when reading this book, you may just possibly be made of stone. Honestly, I teared up just looking at the cover again.

National Velvet. One of the few books I came to through a film, just sublime.

The Glory. Proving that there are still horse stories being written that are worth reading, The Glory takes its place among the classics of yesteryear.

Phantom Horse. There’s something about wild horses isn’t there? They enchant us. This series is wonderful.

Jill’s Gymkhana is the start of Ruby Ferguson’s Jill books, and I grew up on these. Worth hunting down.

I wasn’t the only pony mad teenager who wanted to move to Follyfoot was I?

And finally? A Wind in Cairo by Judith Tarr. Something a little different from the majority of the pony/ horse stories I’ve mentioned before. The story of an arrogant princeling changed to horse shape as a punishment. Absolutely magical from an author who knows a massive amount about horses, and is well worth getting to know on social media too.

A boy made of blocks by Keith Stuart

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I kind of wanted to hate this book. Yet another story of an autistic boy, rescued from his lonely locked in state by some external power, this time in the form of a computer game.

But I didn’t.

I don’t entirely love it either. Repeated references to the autism scale, what is that? Spectrum, not scale. It isn’t linear. High functioning and low functioning are terminologies the autism community (yes, we have an active and broad ranging community built across social media) is rejecting. Along with the idea that it’s a disorder, or that we suffer from it.

But along the grounds that if you’ve met one autistic person, you’ve met one autistic person, I figure there probably are children kind of like Sam, fighting their way through an unforgiving world. And parents like Alex, wallowing in a pit of despair about the whole thing. And there has to be room for their stories too. The difficulty we all experience comes when they are the only stories told, as that reinforces the damaging stereotypes and stigmas that surround autism.

I’ve met a lot more than one autistic person. I am one, I live with at least a couple more, I’ve (lots of) autistic friends, have worked in care and support roles with adults and teenagers. There are some parts of this story that ring very true, but I struggled with how long the book takes to get to the interactions between Alex and Sam. The back story/ current situation is laid out with painful self indulgence it felt – it just took so very long to get to any point. Perhaps that’s intended to feed into Alex’s characterisation but I just wasn’t taken with it. It felt like hard work. 

However, the second half of the book is much better, and I’m pleased I persevered. We get to spend much more time with Alex and Sam together, and as we get to discover Sam, it feels like Alex does too. There are some lovely moments of insight and character development in Sam, largely based around the Minecraft referred to in the title Blocks. (If you don’t know much about Minecraft prepare for a crash course, it will probably be good for you.) Keith’s expertise in games and tech shows through in the understanding he has of the value of games like Minecraft, and the positive environment they can provide for children.

And, although some parts of the ending are kind of predictable, I totally admit that I was swept up in the emotions, and may have shed a tear or two (or even a few more) at what felt like the big climax at the end. (Turns out it goes on a bit after that, but loose ends irritate, so I’ll forgive the tidy up.)

All in all, I’m glad I read this one. Hope my perspective is useful 🙂

Available now at Amazon (affiliate link). Disclosure: I was supplied a copy for review.