April Book Flight: Birds

Graphic by Jessica Pace

The thriller

Bird Box
Josh Malerman
Horror/Suspense
Recommended by Elinor Epperson

Even if you’ve seen the movie starring Sandra Bullock, this book is well worth your time. The story centers on Mallorie, a young mother living in a post-apocalyptic world filled with indescribable monsters that make humans go insane with just a glimpse. She has been living in the same house for almost five years with her small children and decides to leave for a community of other survivors. The only thing standing between her and contact with other human beings is a river that she must navigate blindfolded.

Although the bare bones of the narrative are the same, Netflix made significant changes when adapting the book for the screen. Reading this book, you’ll meet new characters, learn new details about the post-apocalypse, and feel an entirely new level of suspense. The book is even more intense and terrifying than the movie and, for Michiganders, more familiar. Author Josh Malerman is a native to southeast Michigan, and the book takes place in the Detroit area (which begs the question: Which river is she floating down blindly? The River Rouge? The Huron River?)

“Bird Box” is a master class in horror drama. You will get attached to the characters and then get upset when they risk their lives for some canned food. You will wonder what you would do if you lived in a world where the only way to survive is to stumble about outside like a bad party game. You’ll definitely see parallels to the COVID-19 pandemic and that’s a bit disconcerting. If you like creepy page-turners that stick with you long after you’ve set them down, this book is for you.

The sci-fi

The Sparrow
Mary Doria Russell
Science Fiction
Recommended by Emily Landau

Do you like first contact narratives? A broad and diverse cast of interesting characters, both human and extraterrestrial? Theology? Complex and fully realized alien societies? Jesuits? Interstellar travel? Linguistics? The emotional consequences of time dilation? Zoology? Cultural misunderstandings? Music? Meditations on colonialism? Profound and haunting spiritual themes? If the answer is “yes,” do I have the book for you!

The drama

The Raven Boys
Maggie Stiefvater
YA Fantasy
Recommended by Jessica Pace

Blue was born into a family of psychics, but she has no unearthly power of her own—until one St. Mark’s Eve, when the souls of those who will die in the year to come walk along the mysterious ley line that runs through her town, Blue sees one of them. A boy in a private school uniform who tells her his name, “Ganzy, just Ganzy,” then disappears. When fate brings Blue and the boys from the local private school together, the adventure of a lifetime ensues, full of tarot readings, ancient talking trees, and a lost tomb. But can Blue keep the secret of Ganzy’s impending death from him, and how will it come about? The entire Raven Boys series will keep you on your toes and make you want a real-life tarot reading, or maybe a pet raven of your very own. The audiobooks read by Will Patton are a mesmerizing delight.

The verse

Swan: Poems and Prose Poems
Mary Oliver
Poetry
Recommended by Jessica Pace

“Just as truly a the earth is ours, we belong
to it. The tissue of our minds is made of it,
and the soles of our feet, as fully as the
tiger’s claw, the branch of the whitebark pine,
the voices of the birds, the dog-tooth violet
and the tooth of the dog.”
—Excerpt from “More Evidence,” page 49

Do I really need to say more? Poems teeming with birds and ferns and stars. Read them.

The classic

To Kill a Mockingbird
Harper Lee
Southern Gothic
Recommended by Jessica Pace

This popular and controversial novel has been called “our national novel” by Oprah Winfrey, but somehow I missed it in my grade school education and didn’t read it until I was a young adult. The book follows the story of Scout and her older brother Jem through a year of their childhood in Alabama during the Great Depression, during which their father, a local lawyer, takes it upon himself to defend a Black man, Tom Robinson, who has been falsely accused of raping a white woman. While the story is well-written, engaging, and even moving at times, it has become problematic in many of the ways it is taught and discussed in America’s schools, causing a lot of harm to our students of color. The book is well worth the read, not only for its compelling story but for the significance it has in the ongoing and ever-evolving discussions on race in America, but take the thoughtful points in this article to heart while you read it yourself and discuss it with others.

The memoir

When Women Were Birds
Terry Tempest Williams
Memoir/Essay
Recommended by Jessica Pace

Terry Tempest Williams beautifully blends her life’s story and reflections on womanhood, nature, voice, and spirituality vs. religion. This is a little book with a big impact. Having grown up in the same religious culture as Wiliams I really resonated with many of her experiences, but anyone can find a nugget of wisdom here.