The I Love You Book by Todd Parr

 

This colorful book celebrates the unconditional love between parent and child in various situations such as when playing peek-a-boo-boo, feeling sad, scared, brave, cuddling, and other times throughout the day.  Reassures the child that they are loved every day no matter what the situation.  

Age Group:  0-6.

- Julie B. 

Julie B. is a classroom volunteer with Ready Readers, a non-profit organization that strives to expand literacy for young children in low-income communities through high-quality books, strong relationships and literacy-related experiences.

The Bad Seed by William March

 

William March's Rhoda has seeped into our cultural lexicon, so that like The Stepford Wives or Cujo, you don't need to have read the book (or seen the movie) to know that a well-dressed, polite child wearing formal, old-fashioned clothes is most likely a psychopathic killer. This child doesn't just braid her own hair, she loops them into "hangman's nooses." Her shoes have iron cleats to conveniently transition from outerwear to deadly weapon. You better hope you don't have anything she wants. 

What do you do when this murderous elementary schooler is your kid? March focuses his story on that dilemma. Christine's husband is abroad for work and though she writes him passionate letters full of desperation that verges on the erotic, those are locked in a drawer with other troublesome things like, oh, a loaded gun and a couple bottles of sleeping pills. She only writes him carefully edited letters that keep up the facade that all is well back home. 

The book begins with "the day of her last happiness," but darkness has assiduously followed Christine her entire life, a fact she forcefully tries to deny, despite the encouragement of her neighbor Mrs. Breedlove to delve into every unexamined thought and impulse. 

Speaking of Mrs. Breedlove, she is a fantastic character: a devotee of analysis, an older woman who speaks her mind (constantly!) and bucks convention. Her parties are the best. My favorite is the one where she invites three older ladies to get soused to convince them to fund her new endeavor -- a rehab facility for alcoholics. With Mrs. Breedlove, nothing is off the table. She freely talks about latent homosexuality and incestuous desire, true crime, and what is most fascinating to her: the inner workings of her own mind. But she has a massive blind spot when it comes to Rhoda, whom she just adores. Probably because Rhoda is quiet and well-mannered, the kind of kid adults who don't enjoy children adore. 

Through Mrs. Breedlove's influence, Christine is introduced to the dark and fascinating world of true crime, which she dives into obsessively, like a detective, hoping to find some sort of answer to the riddle of her child's behavior. The deeper she goes, the more unsettled she becomes, and finally, decisive action can not be avoided. It's a pretty good read! I'm looking forward to re-watching the movie. 

- Michael G.

The Children's Blizzard by Melanie Benjamin

The uncomfortable images the title of this book conjures up! I didn't want to know the story behind it. Like me, you may resist opening it, but once you have gotten past the first pages and been introduced to several characters, don't expect to come up for air for a while. In fact, expect your regular routine to be disrupted as you delay meals, sleep, and morning showers while your cat or dog complains of neglect. It is not only a compelling story but a shockingly revealing bit of history as well. 

The story told herein is in many ways like a Little House on the Prairie for grown ups, but not in the gently told way of Laura Ingalls Wilder's books. 

Remember all the catastrophes the Ingalls and Wilder families endured on the prairies - the fire that engulfed Laura and Almanzo's home, a locust plague that destroyed an entire year's crop, droughts that rendered the labor of other years useless? The chronic poverty, harsh weather, frequent new beginnings, and the relentless struggles to establish stability? These devastating setbacks weren't merely one extended family's bad luck; this was typical of farm life in the upper Midwestern territories in the 1800s. The Ingalls and Wilder families were just two of thousands that suffered such misfortunes repeatedly. One of the revelations to me in reading this historical novel was that of a dishonest campaign perpetrated in European countries to lure immigrants to the upper Midwest. The U.S. government wanted settlers. "Have you longed for the magic of a prairie winter, gentle yet abundant snow to nourish the earth, neither too cold nor too warm, only perfection in every way?" - an ad in a European newspaper might say. In fact the opposite was true; living and farming conditions on those plains in the 1800s were so rough that over 60% of the homesteaders that had been attracted by such advertising ended up abandoning properties and dreams to return to the unpromising circumstances they had hoped to leave behind in Europe and the eastern United States. Of those who stayed, many didn't survive.

This novelized account of that time and place concerns one particularly deadly catastrophe (the historic part) - the January 12, 1888 blizzard in Nebraska and the Dakota territory during which hundreds of people - the majority of them children - froze to death. Why mostly children? The book will tell you.      

The best novelists are able to create a cast of characters who come from vastly different life experiences and are on differing trajectories when their paths cross and lives intertwine within the framework of a compelling story. Characters that give us new perspectives, making us see the world in ways we hadn't previously been able to. This novel does that, engaging readers with a small assortment of people and their varying motivations and motives, and the ways they help and hurt each other. On occasion the perspectives of wildlife do what people can't: foxes, hawks, wolves, coyotes, rabbits, even prairie dogs help us to see and feel what the earth is doing during this colossal storm. Through a hawk's eyes as it searches from the sky for a meal on the morning after the storm, we begin to see the cruel toll of the ghastly event in an impersonal way - briefly - before zooming back in to learn the fates of the individuals we have become so interested in. 

Author Melanie Benjamin drew on archived news accounts and written memories of people who lived through the storm to create sympathetic fictional characters caught badly unprepared for this shattering event that in real life left so many dead, so many lives changed, and so many families and communities throughout the upper Midwest bereft. In this bittersweet novel much more unfolds after the storm - unimaginable pain, gradual healing, growth, a few surprises among the characters, occasional redemption. The unredeemable fate of one character in particular though - Gerda - will remain in my mind for a long time.    

Thank you to patron Richard B. for recommending this informative, absorbing novel that I put off starting because of its title and then couldn't stop reading.

- Marianne W. 

Legendborn by Tracy Deonn

Generations upon generations of history and legacy weave through the life of this 16 year old girl. 

    This story is revolves around Bree Matthews, a young girl who recently lost her mother, as she navigates a new school campus. She finds herself involved with a secret society linked to the Knights of the Roundtable that fights shadowy beasts using a magic called "aether", all unbeknownst to the common people. It's all told from Bri's perspective as we watch her experience crazy rituals, battles, and culture, all while she has literally no idea what's going on and how she fits into it. All she knows is that she needs to find out who killed her mother.

    While it seems to have a simple premise, there are many themes that come into play surrounding racism, grief, and generational trauma. Bree has to navigate a PWI, or predominantly white institution, while also being dragged into a secret society that caters to the lineage of white people that goes back centuries. This very same society is deeply entrenched in privilege and high status, so Bree's presence in the space a rarity as a black person. When you also factor in her belief that has mother was potentially killed by one of them, it's a story many black folks are all too used to hearing.

    While trying not to spoil, one of my favorite things about the book is how deeply it involves ancestors and the effect they have had on us. Their choices have a chain reaction leading to our grandparents, our parents, and then to us. We are the living embodiment of each ancestors' choices, all the way down to our blood stream. All the way down to our magic. And this story is a reminder that even though this holds true, our history does not define all of who we are. We are the makers of the present and the power is in our hands.

Feel free to check the book out! I'll be happy to hear what you think. It is the first book of a trilogy, and I promise that if you get hooked on this one, you'll be hooked on the rest . I'm currently hooked on the second!

- Leo H. 

Big Boy Joy by Connie Schofield-Morrison; illustrated by New York Times bestselling illustrator Shamar Knight-Justice

 

A joyful ode to playing on a playground narrated by a Back boy who climbs up a high slide and crashes,  makes new friends, races, swings, makes imaginary worlds with toy dinosaurs, and plays in water puddles. His big boy feelings and lots of energy spread big boy joy for all to share.  With beautiful and bright illustrations, a book children ages 3-5 will be sure to enjoy. 

- Julie B.

Julie B. is a classroom volunteer with Ready Readers, a non-profit organization that strives to expand literacy for young children in low-income communities through high-quality books, strong relationships and literacy-related experiences.

Tilt by Emma Pattee

 

The novel I have been recommending to everyone recently is Emma Pattee's Tilt. As with Headshot, it was recommended on The New York Times book review podcast episode on Mrs. Dalloway. The individual who recommended it described the plot as if Mrs. Dalloway went out "to buy the flowers herself" but then a massive earthquake devastated London and she had to walk home through the ruins. 

Annie is extremely pregnant and in IKEA looking for a crib when an enormous earthquake strikes. In the destruction, she loses her purse with her car keys and cell phone. She sets off to walk into the city of Portland where she hopes to reunite with her husband at his job. 

The chapters alternate between the present moment and the past, as Annie copes with the stress by narrating the events to her unborn child, who she calls "Bean."  Annie was a promising playwright but what with necessities like rent and health insurance she has hedged herself into a life of Excel spreadsheets and planning office lunches. Her attitude towards her first (and only) play has soured, but her voice is sharp and funny, and by the end of the book I felt close to Annie and wanted her to write another play. 

Pattee is a climate journalist and wanted to write a novel that was fairly realistic about what will happen when the Cascadia earthquake hits the west coast. But Tilt is more than a disaster novel, it's a novel about the ambivalence between loving what you have and still wanting more. 

- Michael G. 

Children of Anguish and Anarchy by Tomi Adeyemi

“I teach you to be warriors in the garden, so that you may never be gardeners in a war.”

A quote that sums up beautifully much of the meaning behind the trilogy's events. The hardship and strife of the Orïshans paved the way for a new, even stronger, generation. 

This story continues from the last with a chilling twist that there is an enemy larger than the conflict between tîtáns and maji. We always knew the world was bigger than Orïsha, but the thought that that world would close in on them was something never fully considered. We see this nightmare in its entirety as Zélie and all the others were kidnapped and thrown onto a ship steered by men who only crave carnage, power, and domination. Working together to overcome the Skulls is the only way for survival. 

This books ramps up the scope and scale of all the conflict that we've seen within the trilogy thus far. Along with it, we see the heightened struggles of our main characters as they are pushed to their lowest points yet. We sit with them as they see what a truly united civilization could be like, and just how far their own has yet to go. All the while the constant threat of all civilization looms, with Zélie right in the center.

For me personally, it aroused thoughts of what could really unite a civilization. Thoughts to truly see that those around us are also those we need, we must be willing to be vulnerable and honest. Thoughts that that very same willingness won't come unless people are pushed to the brink. And that sometimes, what is needed is a common goal. I mean, would you work with those you despise to overcome the one who threatens you all? What other choice do you really have? 

- Leo

Two Poets - Frank X Walker and Mosab Abu Toha

When I mentioned to coworker Michael - who was putting together a poetry exhibit at the library - that there were a couple of recently published books of poetry that I had found 'harrowing,' he raised an eyebrow at the word I used and suggested reviewing the books here.  

It is an apt word for the poems in these two books. The poems, based on fact, are full of bitter tales of family separation and longing, loss and displacement, and scenes of annihilation of people and places. Coming to terms with the daily threat of death before you have barely had a chance to experience life is an overall theme in each book.

Poets Frank X Walker and Mosab Abu Toha are from ethnic groups whose people have been viewed throughout history as disposable, and while the contexts of these two poetry collections are different in place and time, the themes expressed have such strong parallels that it made sense to review them together. One collection is set in the context of the American Civil War and the other in present day Palestine. 

Walker, a professor of English at the University of Kentucky and a former Poet Laureate of the state, has published 13 books of poetry. His poems often focus on specific historical events. His latest is called Load in Nine Times and draws on actual events while imagining the thoughts and emotions of Black Civil War soldiers and their families. These carefully composed poems give us a view of the horrors endured by men who eagerly signed up for soldiering in the Union army in exchange for the commonly understood expectation of emancipation from slavery for themselves and their wives and children. 

Walker often does many months of research on a historic event before writing a poem about it, and several of the poems in Load in Nine Times imagine the thoughts of real people whose stories he found in archival records. The horrors described take time to emotionally digest, and these poems often left me feeling haunted. The two poems "Unsalted" and "How Salt Works" are about the 1864 massacre by Confederate soldiers at Saltville, Virginia of 46 Black soldiers who had been inadequately armed for battle and then abandoned on a muddy, freezing battlefield by order of their commander after they had been wounded. Other poems describe equally depraved behavior by commanding officers of both armies.

The poems reveal that like so much else in the American story, the military experience was much worse for Blacks than for white soldiers. And yet I was left with the impression that this terrible experience of going into battle with all its terrors and risk was still preferred to remaining enslaved. This series of poems provides such a close look at our gruesome history that the book felt a bit sacred to me once I had finished it; there is deep respect due to the people who suffered these experiences. At the back of the book, a timeline of Civil War developments and turning points plus several pages of notes discussing specific events that inspired some of the poems provide a helpful interpretive context. 

Forest of Noise is a collection of poems by 32-year-old Palestinian writer Mosab Abu Toha. His poems have been published in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The Nation, The Paris Review, The Los Angeles Review of Books, and many other periodicals. He has won several prizes for his poetry. Like most Gazans, Toha has lost numerous family members, neighbors and lifelong friends who have been killed in the onslaught of retaliation by the Israeli Defense Forces in response to the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israeli civilians. He, too, writes of bereavement, longing and unfathomable destruction of the people and community he has known all his life. So many people are missing from the world he knew that he writes of "Frying pans [that] miss the smell of olive oil. Clotheslines everywhere pine for soap scent," the doorknobs missing the touch of human hands and the ubiquitous rubble where the homes, olive and orange tree groves, and gathering spots of family and friends used to be. Like Walker, Toha brings you right into the immediacy of deep grief and it stings. 

Here are some lines from his poem "Under the Rubble," which I first read in The New Yorker, before I knew who this poet was:

       In Jabalia Camp, a mother collects her daughter's 

       Flesh in a piggy bank, 

       hoping to buy her a plot

       on a river in a faraway land.

       A group of mute people

       were talking sign.

       When a bomb fell, 

       they fell silent.

       The scars on our children's faces

       will look for you.

       Our children's amputated legs

       will run after you.

       He left the house to buy some bread for his kids.

       News of his death made it home,

       but not the bread.

       A father wakes up at night, sees

       the random colors on the walls

       drawn by his four-year-old daughter.

       The colors are about four feet high.

       Next year, they would be five.

       But the painter has died

       in an air strike.

       There are no colors anymore.

       There are no walls. 

       Where should people go? Should they

       build a big ladder and go up?

       But heaven has been blocked by the drones

       and F-16s and the smoke of death. 

...Even our souls,

they get stuck under the rubble for weeks. 

These are important books at a time when American history is being suppressed, erased and deceptively revised, and when the people of Palestine are feeling abandoned by the whole world as the entire population of Gaza continues to be under relentless assault, and profiteers wait for a chance to redevelop the places Palestinians call home. These two collections of poems are treasures. 

- Marianne W.

Headshot by Rita Bullwinkel

 

Eight young women gather in a bare-bones boxing gym in Reno, Nevada to compete for the title of best teen girl boxer in America. There are seven matches. During each match, we alternate between the minds of the two competing girls, slamming from one to the other, but also flitting into the minds of the viewers. Time isn't linear, either, and we get glimpses of their futures (without revealing the outcome of the match). 

The energy is like heat coming off the page and I read this in a frenzied two days. Each character is specific and heart-breaking in their own way. Bullwinkel anchors them with phrases that repeat like a leitmotif, reminding you this is the character that never left her home town, this is the character who had a kid die while she was on duty as a lifeguard, this is the girl who has a "weird hat philosophy." 

Bullwinkel's narrative is kinetic and she has a gift for describing what it is to be embodied. I had so much respect for the young women these characters represented: women who are dedicated to a craft, devoted to challenging themselves, regardless of whether or not they are being watched. 

This was recommended on the New York Times book review podcast on the episode where they discuss the 100th anniversary of the publication of (my favorite novel) Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway. The guests were asked to recommend books to read after the experimental stream-of-consciousness narrative of Mrs. Dalloway. Both books are currently on the shelf at our library. I encourage you to check them out! 

-Michael G.

Kiss of the Basilisk by Lindsay Straube

To be honest, I'm not sure how to:

1. review this book in a way that makes sense
2. keep it somewhere around PG or PG-13
3. not freak out my coworkers and our patrons by my reading choices.

But I'm going to try anyway!

If you're a voracious romance reader of any and all types and enjoy hanging out in the bookish corners of social media, then this book has probably come across your feed. However, if you aren't constantly online, prefer your romances fairly sweet, and/or think that a knot is simply how you tie two strings together, then this is NOT the book for you. Please scroll away now, and if you keep reading, don't say I didn't warn you.

Temperance (Tem for short) is one of 14 young women eligible to marry the prince. Tem has long felt like an outsider - she and her single mom live on the outskirts of their village, raising chickens. She has one best friend, Gabriel, and one mean girl enemy, Vera, who is also in the running to marry the prince. Marrying the prince would make life considerably easier for Tem and her mother, so Tem wants more than anything to be the one chosen. Except... well, Tem doesn't have much experience when it comes to romance and intimacy, and the prince is going to pick his bride based not only on her looks and personality, but also on how well she performs in bed.

Which is where the basilisk comes in.

You see, many years ago, when humans arrived in that part of the world, they found that basilisks were already there. In human form, basilisks are alluring and seductive, and well-versed in pleasure. But in basilisk form, they are huge snake-y predators capable of killing you dead in an instant. As the humans moved into the basilisks' territory, a great and bloody war broke out, and the humans only prevailed once they learned that the basilisks' greatest weapon (turning people to stone by looking into their eyes) could be used against them by simply brandishing mirrors and forcing them to look at themselves. In the aftermath, the basilisks agreed to help keep the monarchy going by training eligible young women on how to have sex with each successive prince, since that will ensure that a new heir to the throne is always born.

Have I lost you yet? No? Good.

As Tem and the others begin their sex lessons, Tem finds herself paired with Caspen, who the humans know as the Serpent King. In truth, he's the son of the Serpent King, but his students usually get picked by the prince, so Tem feels like she maybe actually stands a chance to win the human prince's hand. But her relationship with Caspen quickly moves beyond the confines of their teacher/student role and into something deeper. Meanwhile, as things grow more serious between her and Caspen, she also gets closer and closer to the human prince, Leo, who clearly wants to make her his bride, despite his father's disapproval. Soon Tem is torn between the two, and what would be best not only for her and her heart, but also the two worlds she is now straddling. Plus, there's this mysterious voice calling for help every time Tem visits the castle, which only she can hear...

There is a whole lot more going on in this story that I haven't even touched on in this synopsis, and honestly, probably can't, given the explicit nature of this book (plus some things are best experienced without prior knowledge, if you know what I mean). Looking at other readers' reviews of this book on Goodreads, feelings are split - most reviewers either loved it or hated it, with some in the middle who enjoyed it for what it is while acknowledging that work still needs to be done. I'm definitely with those who are somewhere in between - the smut was incredibly smutty, which was honestly kinda great, but the character- and world-building do leave a lot to be desired. There are moments where you can tell Straube came up with a plot twist as she was writing, which I can almost forgive, as she initially released this chapter by chapter, but edits to lay more groundwork for those twists should have been made once it was picked up by a traditional publisher. There's also a sorta feminist bent to the story that is completely undermined not only by the lack of character development beyond the love triangle, but also by some of the actions of both Caspen and Leo and how Tem responds to them. Yes, the story basically revolves around Tem embracing pleasure and gaining self-confidence through that (that's the sorta feminist part), but there are moments when both men emotionally abuse Tem and no consequences happen beyond calling them out on it and them apologizing and promising not to do it again. Tem's relationships with the other female characters in the book are also trash. Either they have some familial relation to the main three characters or are an off-page cipher and therefore aren't a threat, or they're competition and deserve her ire more than anything. While I'm not totally a proponent of the notion that all women must support each other, no matter what, it was glaringly obvious that Straube was more interested in making sure that the reader knew that Tem was the ultimate chosen one, and the way to do that was to make sure Tem was superior to all other women in the book in a way that was detrimental.

All that being said, this was a wild romp that I read in the span of 4 days and the bonus, alternate-universe scene inspired by the movie Challengers may or may not, in my estimation, have made up for all of its flaws. I would one hundred percent read this again, I am going to read the sequel, and I may go ahead and buy a copy just because (especially if I can get my hands on one of the last deluxe editions with the fancy sprayed edges). But I'm not sure I can recommend it to the average reader, because it does fit into a very specific niche that will likely only appeal to very specific readers, and I'm not sure what that says about me.

The Seep by Chana Porter

 

After an alien invasion solves the world's problems, Trina's wife wants a fresh start. Specifically, as a baby. She wants to become a literal baby (again). 

Anything is possible in the new world that has been fully infiltrated by "the Seep," an amorphous consciousness that is willing to give us ANYTHING so that it can learn about being human. What its end goal is we don't know, but since the invasion everyone seems happier, healthier and...mildly stoned. It's like the whole world has become a utopian Portland: "But just then, a herd of deer clipped down the street, followed by a topless unicycle collective."

Post-Seep, your body can look however you want. Identity is fluid. Body modification is taken to new heights: It's easy, painless, and nothing is permanent. Want horns? You got 'em. Want to live as a woman sometimes, but not always? Sure thing. Like Trina's wife, you can even transform into a baby. No problem! Except for the grieving spouse you leave behind. 

Wrecked by grief, Trina leaves their home, struggling to find her footing in her new, upended world. And no one seems to understand her unhappiness. Everything is easy with the Seep! What is there to complain about? 

Trina bucks against this queasy utopia, but it is difficult to rationalize, like when she is confronted with the neglect of her house. A volunteer offers assistance, and then makes clear that if she continues to do nothing, she will be removed from her home: "This place isn't yours to let rot. It's an asset for the community. It was built by the energies of many different life-forms, including the trees that gave their lives for its construction, the animals that gave up their homes so yours could be built here." He's got a point, and her wallowing is difficult to justify against the larger argument of communal responsibility, but also: How would you cope if your spouse ended their life in order to start again? 

Amidst the easy solutions offered by the Seep, she clings to what makes her hurt; she is uncomfortable with the placidity and gentleness that are the new norm. Sometimes we want what is bad for us and sometimes, we want to remember and hold onto pain. Trina holds on to her identity as a trans woman. Her body and her history is what makes her her. "[She] had labored for this body! She'd fought and kicked and clawed to have her insides match her outsides." Our struggles, our pain, our sometimes difficult journeys are what make us human. 

What kept striking me was the prescience of Porter's Seep (published in 2020) -- its voice is uncannily like the now ubiquitous AI we see all over the internet, with its chummy but alien helpfulness and cheery exclamation marks ("So, Your True Love Has Become a Baby"). At under 200 pages, The Seep is a great example of how to create a compelling world and space for ideas in a short novel. 

-Michael G. 

Children of Virtue and Vengeance by Tomi Adeyemi

“You carry all of us in your heart. We shall live in every breath you take. Every incantation you speak. You are the children of the gods. You shall never be alone.”

The words reverberate through the entirety of this story as a lesson learned and a lesson shared. 

A continuation of "Blood and Bone", "Virtue and Vengeance" follows Zélie, Amari, and Tzain as the tension of the war in Orïsha continues to rise. The king is now dead, but with the return of magic, there is now the new threat of tîtáns, people who are half kosidán half maji and wield uncontrollable power. The biggest threat of them all, is the queen.

The book continues with its signature shifts in perspective each chapter, continuing to follow Zélie, Amari, and Inan, each following their own beliefs in how they can end the war. As the title suggests, vengeance and grief are large themes in this book. We see the toll war takes on each one of the characters, and how that grief (or their attempts to prevent it) can motivate the characters to do actions that blur the lines of morality. 

Family, community, and love. This book explores the lengths we're willing go to protect them.. and to avenge them. As I listened to this story, I was completely immersed in the world and invested in these characters. And now, I'm speeding through the third book! I highly encourage checking out this series, hoping that you will fall in love with it too, just like I have. 

- Leo H.

Glinda of Oz by L. Frank Baum

 In his final Oz book, Baum gives us enormous spiders, a mechanized sinking island led by a tween tyrant, and silent Mist Maidens. Each chapter of Baum's Oz books has been a fresh, light surprise. The stories are so easily entertaining, and definitely not without some thrills. 

The edition I read came with an illuminating introduction and annotations by Jack Zipes, who puts things in context of the (much larger) whole of Baum's work, giving testament to the man's imagination and productivity. 

Baum allowed the rules of Oz to change, but didn't forget to acknowledge that or make his characters reflect upon it. For example, the use of magic in Oz is strictly limited to the Supreme Ruler Ozma, the Sorceress Glinda, and later to the Wizard (who is brought back to Oz and favor after his flight in the first novel). 

When Ozma learns that there are warring tribes in the North using magic, she and Dorothy journey to put an end to both offenses. However, once there, they find themselves trapped. 

This is one of the central fascinations of Glinda: its focus on the limitations of ability and power. Even the Supreme Ruler can become stuck, not knowing how to escape a situation, and what's more, the most powerful Sorceress doesn't know how to save her. But with help, study, experimentation, patience, and a hopeful outlook (plus an unexpected coincidence), things can work out for the good. 

-Michael G.