Stunning YA trilogy: ‘Graceling,’ ‘Fire,’ and ‘Bitterblue’

In the last few months, I was able to finally finish the Harry Potter series, then the Hunger Games series, and last night, finally, Kristen Cashore’s excellent trilogy: Graceling, Fire, and Bitterblue.


I love this series. Every book stars a brave and complex female protagonist. Every book also features a panoply of strong and fascinating female characters. Females are spies, fighters, queens, healers, on and on. There are also great male characters. The books also have heroic gay characters and disabled characters.

These books are disturbing. They deal with rape and incest, not directly, but implied and discussed in the book. If the reader doesn’t get the horror of those acts, she misses a lot of the story. Also, each book features a passionate love affair. My oldest kid is 10, and I would not let her read these because of the rape/ incest parts of the story. I don’t yet know what age would be appropriate because I’ve learned not to trust the recommendations I see around. In fact, that’s why I started Reel Girl. IMO, Cinderella  gets a triple S for major gender stereotyping/ not appropriate for kids. I’m thinking 15 for Bitterblue because the sexual violence is central to the plot, but Graceling and Fire, age 12? But then again, rape and incest happen in the real world, so if this is going on or has happened in kids’ lives, reading about it would be a good thing. It’s such an individual choice.  Let me know if you or your kids have any experience with these books.

Reel Girl rates Graceling, Fire, and Bitterblue ***HHH****

Why is Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes magical store as sexist as Target? #NotBuyingIt

In Half-Blood Prince, the sixth book in the Harry Potter series, Ron’s twin brothers, Fred and George Weasley, open a magic store.


I’ve been waiting to get in this store for five books. Its creation is the life dream of the Weasley twins, and Harry even gave them his galleon winnings from the TriWizard Tournament so Fred and George would have the funds to open it. I was so excited to finally enter Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes at the beginning of Book #6 along with Harry, Ginny, Hermione, and Ron. What a major disappointment. I was so bummed. Let’s just say this is not the store Margot Weasley would’ve come up with. Here’s the passage.

“Haven’t you girls found our special WonderWitch products yet,” asked Fred. “Follow me, ladies….”

Near the window was an array of violently pink products around which a cluster of excited girls was giggling enthusiastically. Hermione and Ginny both hung back, looking wary.

“There you go, said Fred proudly, “Best range of love potions you’ll find anywhere.

Ginny raised an eyebrow skeptically: “Do they work?” she asked.

“Certainly they work, for up to twenty-four hours at a time depending on the weight of the boy in question–”

“–and the attractiveness of the girl,” said George, reappearing suddenly at their side. “But we’re not selling them to our sister,” he added, becoming suddenly stern, “not when she’s already got about five boys on the go from what we’ve–”

“Whatever you heard from Ron is a big, fat lie,” said Ginny calmly, leaning forward to take  a small pink pot of the shelf. “What’s this?”

“Guaranteed ten second pimple vanisher,” said Fred….

“What are those?”

She was pointing at a number of round balls of fluff in shades of pink and purple, all rolling around at the bottom of the cage and emitting high pitched squeaks…

“They’re really cute!”

“They’re fairly cuddly, yes.”

Pink, love potions, pimple cream, cute, and cuddly stuff for girls? Why is the girl section segregated out at all? Pink wasn’t even a “girl” color a hundred years ago, so why does it dominate marketing strategy in Diagon Alley? Why, in the magical world, for goodness sake, is a store selling products to kids as gender segregated as a Target in California? Don’t wizards get pimples? Is the point that guys just won’t care if they have a break out? They don’t need to be “attractive,” the efficacy of their love potion doesn’t depend on that?

At least Hermione and Ginny seem skeptical, right? They hang back, the products are “violently” pink. But why do the cool girls have to be the exception, different from the rest of their pathetic gender? The other females are shown in “excited” cluster, “giggling enthusiastically.” Ginny ends up joining the crowd, anyway, seduced by a cute, fluffy thing.

Why do my kids have to read gender cliches in a series as imaginative as Harry Potter? In the imaginary world, anything is possible: animals talk, kids fly, unicorns prance around. Can’t we show children a magical land where girls and boys are treated equally? Is that so hard? Why do we have to bring stereotypes to fantasy land?

I’m on Book 7 now, and I’ve got to write: If Harry Potter, a series with a male protagonist, titled for that male, where the author was told by her publisher to use initials to hide her gender, is considered feminist because a third of the characters in power positions are female, we have a long way to go before achieving gender equality in the fantasy world.



The rape of Dolores Umbridge in Harry Potter?

So after I post that in Harry Potter #5, female characters move closer to center, I get this comment from Emily:

One quick note that I didn’t realize when I read the 5th book, but was pointed out to me later. As for what the centaurs do to Dolores Umbridge–take a look at what centaurs were known for in Greek mythology and what Umbridge’s reaction is after her experience.

I know that this was J.K. Rowling’s very subtle wink to readers with a similar education/background in classics (which would be very very very very few, and would include NONE of the children reading her books, I am certain), but it is still a little off-putting to realize what exactly Hermione (because I suspect she would have known) and Rowling herself (who certainly did know) were willing to put even such an evil character through.

Not to ruin your enjoyment of the books! I love J.K. Rowling, and I am incredibly awed at her ability to include such subtle layers into her story. I love the stories and I love the realness of her world. I just wish Umbridge could have gotten her comeuppance in the (relatively gentle) way I’d originally read it, rather than in the brutal way it must have gone.

After reading Emily’s comment, I did a Google search and found several posts about the rape of Dolores Umbridge. Here’s one from Dollymix:

It is surprising that Rowling, known for the intense research of things she puts into her books, would use centaurs to “punish” Umbridge. Some evidence provided by Rowling helps to point us in the direction of discovering Umbridge’s true punishment. Umbridge’s usually neat appearance is changed in her hospital bed: her “mousy hair was very untidy and there were bits of twig and leaf in it, but otherwise she seemed to be quite unscathed” (2, p849). Despite lack of physical evidence, the students know something terrible has happened to her because of her physical and apparent mental states. When Ron jokingly makes the sound of hoof beats, Umbridge frantically sits up in her bed and looks for the source of the noise. Her reaction to this sound and her shock like state are symptoms commonly experienced by rape victims (RAINN). Why Rowling chose to punish Umbridge this way when she could have used many other means is unknown. The rape of Professor Umbridge is perhaps one of the most horrifying instances of violence against women in the entire series.

It is fascinating to me that the very illustration I picked for my post to show how strong the female characters are becoming in Harry Potter #5, could be a scene of Hermione leading Umbridge to her rape.


The fact that Harry is not in the lead, looking down while Hermione strides ahead, is surrounded by females, and has no idea where he is going– all of which I noted as unusual in this image and also the text– now seems to be constructed just in this way to absolve him. How disappointing that I noticed the narrative shifted here but could have missed the real significance as to why: one female goes against another in a vicious way, the other female is raped, and Harry is in the clear.

Imagine if Harry were the one to lead Umbridge into the forest to give her up to the sinister centaurs. Imagine if a male writer came up with rape as a punishment for an evil female character. I’m reeling from this analysis. What are your thoughts?

Update: On Reel Girl’s Facebook page, I’m getting lots of comments defending Hermione and J.K. Rowling, writing that this is not a rape scene. I want to believe that, but I cannot get over the fact that I picked this exact scene in my previous post because I noted something was different about it. That seems too strange to be a coincidence. If Rowling did not intend this scene to imply rape, I am feeling annoyed with her for sending an evil female off, at the hands of another female, to mythological creatures known for rape.


Reel Girl Recs: First Chapter Books

First grade is amazing. My six year old daughter, Alice, began this school year slowly sounding out words in picture books. Now, she saves those to read aloud to her enraptured little sister and then reads Harry Potter to herself.


That said, after spending her entire life in picture books, Alice was tentative to make the transition to chapter books. It wasn’t about skill but familiarity. Here’s the good and the bad history in books of how she did it:

Rainbow Magic Series  ***S***

This was the first chapter book my daughter picked up. I thought I purged the house after my older one grew out of this series, but apparently I did not.


There are so many damn books in this series that I missed about 10. How did my older daughter acquire so many? All I can say is it happened before I knew better. Generally, I don’t forbid books. I may roll my eyes at a selection. I did refuse to let my eight year old read Twilight but mostly, I “highly encourage” books that I think would be great for them, and they would love and try to ignore the rest. So what did my six year old daughter do when I told her for one too many times she was ready to start chapter books? She picked up Lucy, the Diamond Fairy and brought it to be, beaming, knowing I would cringe. I caved. She read.

To learn more about how and why I hate this series and a few things that are OK about it, read here.

Junie B. Jones  ***HH***

I’m not a fan of Junie B. either. She is super annoying and talks baby talk. I hate baby talk.


But the print is big, the stories are simple, and my daughter felt accomplished finishing the book. Parts of it are funny. Alice liked it okay. And, I’d rather her read about a brat than a navel baring Fairy who goes on about her outfit for pages. My daughter got through three of this series and then she went on to…

Judy Moody ***HH***

Judy Moody has a similar lay out of print size, book length, and illustration as Junie B.


I like Judy more than Junie. Thankfully, so does my daughter. I was kind of bored by these books, I like more drama. Alice also read a couple and then moved on to…

Magic Tree House ***HH***

If your new reader likes Magic Tree House, you’re in luck. There are so many of these books, and the kids always travel to a different place and time.


There is a lot of history woven into the stories, and of course, magic. I like these books a lot, though being me, it does bum me out that it is always “Jack and Annie” and never “Annie and Jack.” I mean, we’re talking hundreds of stories, can’t the girl come first at least half the time? When my older daughter got into this series, I was overjoyed and blogged about it here.

Ramona the Pest ***HHH***

I love Ramona.


The writing is great and the characters are awesome. This series is a jump from the previous 4: smaller print, longer, and more complex, IMO.

I think the only think I don’t like about this series is that Ramona thinks her brown hair and brown eyes are boring. If this was one book of many that had that theme, I wouldn’t have an issue, but dark haired girls don’t fare well in children’s media, from Rapunzel who literally loses her magic and power when her hair turns brown, to Ramona. Alice has two blue-eyed, blonde sisters, so its even more of a bummer to read about how Ramona is obsessed with other peoples hair. And no, it’s not something my daughter relates to, because she’s never felt like there is anything less good about brown hair. So that’s my tirade about hair. Otherwise, great series, read what I wrote about it here.

The Magic Half **HHH***

After Ramona, my daughter made the jump to The Magic Half.


This is a full on next level book and she plowed through it. I did not read it, but here is the synopsis from Amazon:

Miri is the non-twin child in a family with two sets of them–older brothers and younger sisters. The family has just moved to an old farmhouse in a new town, where the only good thing seems to be Miri’s ten-sided attic bedroom. But when Miri gets sent to her room after accidentally bashing her big brother on the head with a shovel, she finds herself in the same room . . . only not quite.
Based on the rec of Alice and Lucy, I rated it 3 Hs
And that brings us to…
Harry Potter, the Sorcerer’s Stone ***H***
YAY. If you want to know how I feel about the series, begin here. My daughter loves the book so far, especially the way Hagrid talks.



Rick Riordan and the persistence of the Minority Feisty






The Lightning Thief:


Here’s the movie poster from 2010:


Sea of Monsters, the second book in the series:



Percy Jackson 2 Sea of Monsters



Battle of the Labyrinth:


The Last Olympian:




Riordan_Red pyramid

And now, my favorite Riordan cover: Throne of Fire.



The Serpent’s Shadow also has a pretty great cover:



The Lost Hero









Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter, and the gender matrix




Here’s a passage describing Harry’s first look at Voldemort:















After we finished, my daughter drew this.


Look at the cover:




Prisoner of Azkaban and the subtle patriarchy of Harry Potter

First things first: I loved Prisoner of Azkaban. I could not put it down. I am onto book 4. That is a big deal for me. Since I started Reel Girl, I have read the first book of many series, because I want to get a good idea of what is out there. It is rare that I keep going and going, but with Harry Potter, I cannot stop.

Prisoner of Azkaban is my favorite book so far, and I loved the first two. For me, reading Harry Potter is like being in an incredible relationship where you fall more in love everyday.

Part of the reason I was so into this book was the dementors, terrifying and compelling new characters. J. K. Rowling’s description of them is one of the scariest I have read in kidlit:

Standing in the doorway, illuminated by the shivering flames in Lupin’s hand, was a cloaked figure that towered to the ceiling. Its face was completely hidden beneath its hood.  Harry’s eyes darted downward and what he saw made his stomach contract. There was a hand protruding from the cloak and it was glistening, grayish, slimy-looking, and scabbed, like something dead that had decayed in water.

But it was only visible for a split second. As though the creature beneath the cloak sensed Harry’s gaze, the hand was suddenly withdrawn into the folds of its black cloak.


An intense cold swept over them all. Harry felt his own breath catch in his chest. Th ecold went deeper than his skin. It was inside his chest. It was inside his very heart…

The scabby hand looking like it had decayed in water! EEK.

So are we clear, I love Harry Potter?

Not only do I love it, J.K. Rowling is the writer. She can call herself the androgynous “J.K.” if she wants to, for God’s sake. And, if she wants to create an imaginary world that is a patriarchy, it is her right to do so.

But this is what I want to write about it: Harry Potter’s world, both the Muggle one and Hogwarts, are patriarchies. Before I read Harry Potter, I was often told that the series is populated with strong females, and it is. But the females are sidelined to the males, and it’s important to recognize that there is not gender equality in this popular series the way there is in the The Hunger Games. The reason this inequality is important to acknowledge is because the imaginary world, 99% of the time, is sexist. If we cannot imagine equality, we cannot create it.

Okay, have I qualified my criticism enough?

Here we go. I am going to point out how the sexism of Hogwarts and the Muggle world that I have already referred to in previous posts is further advanced in Prisoner of Azkaban.

First, the book cover:

The cover shows Harry riding Buckbeak, the Hippogriff, with Hermione clinging to his back. How many times have you seen this image of male in front, girl behind? It’s all over kidlit, in movies and in books, and my God, its all over the grown up world. It’s everywhere on the streets when you see a guy on his bike, the woman behind him. Do you ever see a female alone on her dragon? What about a dragon that is also a female, like in for example the reverse of “How to Train Your Dragon,” which features a male rider and male beast. Do you ever see a female rider with the male behind her, clinging to her back? This gendered, repetitive image sends the message that the male drives while the female is along for the ride. It’s a powerful message and it’s everywhere in the imaginary world. I was disappointed to see it in Harry Potter.

Then there is Lupin. I loved Lupin, but he is the third male Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, the most important class at Hogwarts.

Sirius Black is a great character, but also male. I loved discovering the history of friendship between Harry Potter’s dad, Lupin, Sirius, Peter Pettigrew, but they are all male. Lily, Harry’s mother, apparently hung out with the group, but she wasn’t an animagus. She was the only female.

Mrs. Weasley and Mrs. Dursley are both homemakers while Mr. Weasley and Mr. Dursley have careers that factor into the plot.

Percy Weasley is the Head Boy. For a while, I couldn’t even figure out if there is a Head Girl. I have, now, seen the Head Girl referred to, but I don’t know her name or what she does. She has no role in the book so far.

The Minister of Magic is male and the headmaster of Hogwarts is male. Hogwarts was started by two males and two females 1000 years ago and that is progressive, but the two houses started by the males, Gryffindor and Slytherin, dominate the series.

Chang Cho, the Ravenclaw seeker, is the only girl on the team. Would there be a Quidditch team with only one male? Is there a female captain? So far the rivalry between Slytherin and Gryffindor is between two male captains.

To me, it seems like Quidditch is a boy’s game in which girls are allowed to play. I feel the same way about the series.

More fat-shaming in Harry Potter: the inflating of Aunt Marge

Yesterday, I posted about the fat-shaming of Dudley Dursley in the Harry Potter series, specifically quoting from the opening of Chapter 2, Prisoner of Azkaban which I’d just read. I have since finished the chapter. So this what happens: Unable to contain his anger when the evil, annoying, and fat Marge constantly puts his parents down, Harry uses magic illegally to inflate her, making her even fatter. To readers, this punishment comes off as humorous and deserved.

I have not seen “The Prisoner of Azkaban” yet, but looking at the image from the movie pasted below, and after reading J.K. Rowling’s prose, I am wondering if there is a child who could watch (or read about) the fate of wicked Aunt Marge and not burst into laughter. Can you even look at these images and not smile? And again, if this fat-evil-stupid-comic imagery happened once in a while, it would be no big deal, but its ubiquity in kids’ media trains kids that it’s normal to laugh at fat people.

Reading  into night, I was also fascinated that Harry’s act– so far– remains unpunished. Underage wizards are not permitted to practice magic in the Muggle world, and Harry assumes he will be expelled for his act.  Yet, when Cornelius Fudge , the Minister of Magic, meets Harry on Daigon Alley, he assures Harry that he took care of the infraction, deflating Aunt Marge and erasing her memory. Harry wonders why this reaction is so different from the time when he was wrongly blamed for the magic done by Dobby, the house elf, in Book 2. At that time, Harry received a letter of warning from the Ministry threatening expulsion.

Obviously, there is some reason in the plot why Harry is forgiven, given a cozy room in the Leaky Cauldron instead of a letter of expulsion. But the subdued reaction thus far underscores the deserved punishment for Aunt Marge.

I have been trying to think if there are any fat protagonists in kidlit. Please tell me if you know of any: not sidekicks, main characters. So far I’ve thought of one: Wilbur. I just blogged about how Charlotte’s Web may be the best book ever. without even thinking about that. Could E. B. White get any more original?

Fat-shaming, Harry Potter, and kidlit

I am reading Prisoner of Azkaban, the third Harry Potter installment. Here’s the first paragraph of Chapter Two:

Harry went down to breakfast next morning to find the three Dursleys already sitting around the kitchen table. They were watching a brand new television, a welcome-home-for-the-summer present for Dudley, who had been complaining loudly about the long walk between the fridge and the television in the living room. Dudley had spent most of the summer in the kitchen, his piggy little eyes fixed on the screen and his five chins wobbling as he ate continually.

Do fat people always sit around and watch TV? Are fat people obsessed with their refrigerators? Do they eat all day long? Are fat kids spoiled and self-indulgent? Are there thin people who are lazy and addicted to television?

Before you argue that my irritation with the portrayal of Dudley means that I want to censor artists with my PC views– the fat, evil character is a cliche. It’s not original, and its ubiquity in kidlit doesn’t show imagination or innovation. You know what would be creative? Fat heroes in kidlit, showing fat characters who are good, magical, and smart. Fat characters who are leaders, not followers. Fat protagonists, not the sidekicks or comic relief.

When you teach your kid that people come in different shapes and sizes, as well as colors and genders, and one is no better than the other, it sucks to read in books and see movies where fat characters are continually derided and made fun of by the hero of the book. In most of kidlit, as well as movies, when others are teased or mocked, there is usually a lesson to be learned: bullying is bad. But fat characters are exceptions to that rule: making fun of them and teasing them is often portrayed as justified and deserved.

I just watched the movie Chamber of Secrets, the second Harry Potter, where Crabbe and Goyle, Malfoy’s dumb sidekicks are lured into a trap by cupcakes: their appetites are their stupidity.

As I just posted, I’ve only read books one and two so far. Commenters told me that Dudley redeems himself in later books, and also that Mrs. Weasley is a positive fat character.  But does Dudley’s later redemption justify the mockery? Does Mrs. Weasley just happen to be fat, or is her fat part of her character and the dilemmas she finds herself in? Dudley’s fat is Dudley.

Update: I finished the chapter: More fat-shaming in Harry Potter: the inflating of Aunt Marge

Finally, Reel Girl devours Harry Potter

I’ve only finished The Sorcerer’s Stone and Chamber of Secrets, and I’m going to give you my bottom line first: I love the Harry Potter books.

The series is brilliant and engaging, suspenseful and so well plotted. Most of all, I love the characters. J.K. Rowling creates a magical world with heroes who readers can relate to and admire and also scary, evil villains who we passionately root against. Rowling does a great job of hooking the reader into these relationships. We see real friendships and rivalries form through a series of events that we were there for, that we witnessed and were a part of; that, for me, that is the most engaging aspect of the book.

So here’s my history with Harry Potter:

I saw a couple of the movies but had a hard time following them because I hadn’t read the books. Therefore, though they were beautiful to watch, I didn’t quite get what all the fuss was about.

When my daughter was in first grade, I started reading the books to her. But when reading time was over, she was rushing down into her bed, hiding under her covers with a flashlight, reading late into the night. The next day at reading time, our reading time, she would be 100 pages ahead. Left in the dust, I was lost. No matter how she tried to fill me in, I grew frustrated with the fragments that made no sense to me, and I gave up. Liberated, my daughter finished the series on her own (then went back and read the whole thing again and again.)

My third challenge with Harry, I’ve written about before on Reel Girl: I wish J. K. Rowling had made a female character front and center. Hermione is a great character, but she is there to support and help Harry on his quest. There are many other strong female characters but, still, I don’t feel the total gender equality in this imaginary world the way I do in The Hunger Games. Hogwarts is run by men (don’t get me wrong, I adore Dumbledore). So far, Harry’s main rivals: Voldemort, Snape, and Malfoy are also male. Not only that, but why is J.K. Rowling “J.K.”?

One more complaint so far, fat people don’t come off so well. Poor Dudley is portrayed as selfish, spoiled, and greedy, personified by his body and eating pattern which is constantly mocked. I don’t like Dudley, of course, but I feel sorry for him getting such a bad rap because he is fat. The reason I bring this up is because making fun of fat characters happens so often in kids’s books. But so far (I have to keep writing “so far” because there are 7 long books) it doesn’t seem that in the series fat equals evil with any consistency. I LOVE how J. K. Rowling mocks the vain and idiotic Gilderoy Lockhart. She wins lots of points with me here: I am happy to see a man be so in love with his reflection. As we know, mirrors and females have a long, long history in kidlit.

So while I have some issues, finally reading Harry Potter on my own– no kids, no movies– I cannot put it down! It is as good as I was told it would be. A boarding school for wizards and witches may be the best setting for a series of all time.

Reel Girl ratings are based on girlpower and I’ve only read the first two books: Reel Girl rates Harry Potter  1 & 2***H***