Teens, what are you reading these days? Oh, how I wish I could hear you! Tragically, my earshot is no match for the miles between us, so I will have to imagine your response. What? You want to hear about what I’m reading? Would you believe I just happen to have a stack of YA nonfiction sitting next to me right now that I’ve been dying to tell you about? You asked for it…
Gail Jarrow’s “White House Secrets: Medical Lies and Cover-Ups” will have you clutching your red, white, and blue pearls. Did you know eight United States presidents have died while in office? Did you know more than a third were gravely ill at some point during their presidencies? Through no fault of your own, you probably didn’t, as many of these health crises were kept hidden from the American people. But this book pulls back the curtain.
With chapter titles like “Doomed by Dirty Fingers,” “The Hidden Diagnosis,” “The Vanishing President,” “An Image Manipulated,” and more, Jarrow takes us to the concealed bedsides of these ailing leaders. Here’s a tiny taste: President James Garfield was shot by a would-be assassin, but science says it wasn’t actually the bullet that killed him. So, what did? I’m not going to tell you (but this book will)! If you like blood, guts, and uncovering a cover-up as much as I do, you may want to check this one out.
“A World Without Summer: A Volcano Erupts, a Creature Awakens, and the Sun Goes Out” by Nicholas Day is a book about history’s deadliest volcanic eruption. It’s also a book about Mary Shelley and the birth of her novel “Frankenstein.” Don’t see the connection? “A World Without Summer” will show you.
The year was 1815, and in a burst of pyroclastic flow, Mount Tambora in Indonesia erupted, triggering a disruption of the world’s climate that would last for years to come. Against the backdrop of an invisible veil of global atmospheric shock, the brilliant Mary Shelley would experience a summer like no one had ever seen. A summer where rain and thunder seemed never-ending. She would be challenged in a contest to write a horror story…
Agh! I wouldn’t have guessed a book about weather would be impossible to put down, but this one is. You will walk away with a better understanding of the far-reaching and enduring effects of climate shock, and an incredible story to tell at the dinner table.
Fame is a bee.
It has a song—
It has a sting—
Ah, too, it has a wing.
Emily Dickinson
Thus begins Barb Rosenstock’s “American Spirits: The Famous Fox Sisters and the Mysterious Fad That Haunted a Nation.” In Spring of 1848, young sisters Maggie and Kate Fox discover they can communicate with the dead. What follows is a meteoric rise to fame and fortune as the sisters seem to activate a nation-wide obsession with the occult. So-called “mediums” pop up around the country, séances become commonplace, and young women, many of whom had been pushed to the edges of society, suddenly find themselves elevated to positions of power and influence.
But were these “spiritual” encounters a hoax? Were the Fox sisters really able to transcend the boundaries between life and death? Answers will be provided, but of course, not in this article. I am being told by the twin ghosts of Albert and Alfred Smiley that you will have to read this book to find out.
Teens, I hope these nonfiction books, which feature a mix of horror, spirits, and science, will be ones you read and then want to talk about. I promise my ears work much better in person.
Kristina Naftzger is a Youth Services librarian at A.K. Smiley Public Library who loves reading books about fascinating historical things that she can use to sound clever around the dinner table (but will probably forget in a week). She is happy to now have an article to refer back to!