The Smile
by Donna Jo Napoli
Genre: YA Historical Fiction
Review: If you love Italy, the Renaissance, or Art, then you will enjoy this novel. Elisabetta is 13 years old when she meets Leonardo da Vinci, who vows to one day paint her portrait. She also meets Giuliano, her star-crossed love, the youngest Medici brother, at the wrong time in history. Lisa struggles with the choices that are best for her family, and what she desires. This book is a great way for teens to enjoy history while relating to the characters and enjoying a romance. The setting descriptions of Tuscany and Florence are intriguing and sensual.
Author Website: http://www.donnajonapoli.com/
Song to Read By: Italian Lute Music
Dear YA Lit in 100 Words or Less:
ReplyDeleteI'm an award-winning author with a new book of YA fiction. Ugly To
Start With is a series of thirteen interrelated stories about teen life
published by West Virginia University Press in November
of 2011.
Can I interest you in reviewing it?
My book's only 160 pages short. The writing is easy and open, and all
the stories are interconnected--same hero and story arc throughout. It
reads like a brisk novel in the form of stories.
If you write me back at johnmcummings@aol.com, I'll send you a PDF of my book.
At this point, my small publisher is out of available review copies, so
I hope and politely ask that you consider the PDF. I would be
very grateful.
My publisher, I should add, can offer your readers a free excerpt
of my book through a link from your blog to my publisher's website:
http://wvupressonline.com/cummings_ugly_to_start_with_9781935978084
Here’s what Jacob Appel, celebrated author of Dyads and The
Vermin Episode, says about my new collection: "In Ugly to Start With,
set in the eastern panhandle of West Virginia, Cummings tackles the
challenges of boyhood adventure and family conflict in a taut,
crystalline style that captures the triumphs and tribulations of
small-town life. He has a gift for transcending the particular
experiences to his characters to capture the universal truths of human
affection and suffering--emotional truths that the members of his
audience will recognize from their own experiences of childhood and
adolescence.”
My short stories have appeared in more than seventy-five literary
journals, including North American Review, The Kenyon Review, Alaska
Quarterly Review, and The Chattahoochee Review. Twice I have
been nominated for The Pushcart Prize. My short story "The Scratchboard
Project" received an honorable mention in The Best American Short
Stories 2007.
I am also the author of the nationally acclaimed coming-of-age
novel The Night I Freed John Brown (Philomel Books, Penguin Group,
2009),winner of The Paterson Prize for Books for Young Readers (Grades
7-12)and one of ten books recommended by USA TODAY.
For more information about me, please visit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Michael_Cummings
Thank you very much, and I look forward to hearing back from you.
Kindly,
John Michael Cummings