Swirlies by Roman Dirge

     This week, for the seventh time, I read Swirlies by Roman Dirge. Swirlies is the fourth book in the Lenore series. In the books, Lenore Lynchfast, who died in the late 1800s, "lives" (she accidentally was over-embalmed and came back to life) with her best friend Ragamuffin, who is a vampire trapped in a doll's body, and her other friend Pooty, who is a demon from Hell who has a bucket for a head.
     This all sounds very childish.
      Oh God, no. Lenore is a foulmouthed, slightly-stupid mass-murderer, she is stalked by her kind suitor Mr. Gosh, a dead guy (killed by her) who covers his gory face with a sack and two buttons for eyes, she crashes a poor girl's birthday party and accidentally scars her for life by killing all of her friends and leaving, and has many more strange (mis)adventures.

     Ragamuffin can be called the "voice of reason" in this series. He scolds her kindly when he needs to, stopping her more often than not. He definitely cares about Lenore a lot, putting up with her treating him like a baby, ("You're not calling me a baby, are you? I'm over 400 years old." "Shh, baby. Shhhhhhhhh.") her planting him in the ground in the middle of the night while he sleeps because she wanted to create 'baby Ragamuffins,' and dealing with her general weirdness. When a mortician kept alive on steampunk machinery and overdoses of embalming fluids wanted to finish embalming her, he stole a giant robot to kill him and save her. In the third book, the Dark Overlord of Hell wanted to bring Lenore back after she escaped, so Pooty turned Ragamuffin into his old self so he could kill the Nazi Soldiers sent to retrieve her. When Lenore found out that Mr. Gosh owned a castle and was quite rich, Ragamuffin supported her when she asked Mr. Gosh out, even though Ragamuffin was in love with her. (When Mr. Gosh blew up the castle, she left him.)
     Why does Ragamuffin care about her so much? She is cruel, stupid, abusive, mean, a murderer, and a terrible friend. It would be so easy for him to get Pooty to turn him into his vampire form, kill Lenore for good, and leave. But he doesn't, and he even likes her. I think that this may be because when she is nice to him, it shows. She often calls him adorable, eats breakfast with him, goes to the park with him, and plays horseshoes with him when he asks. She obviously enjoys his company, however teasing she may be. Also, she saved him. Her blood brought him to life, and he now owes her his protection.
     Lenore is my favorite book. It's hilarious, dark, and is REALLY fun to write fanfictions for. (I have the most popular Ragamuffin/Lenore, or Raganore, fanfic on the Internet. It's called Hardest Of Hearts.) I can't wait for the fifth book to come out, but unfortunately, this might not be for a year. This seems like a long time for a die-hard fan like me- Swirlies came out in August.

Wasted: A Memoir of Anorexia and Bulimia- by Marya Hornbacher

     Imagine having your first two fingers shoved down your throat, sharp nails scraping at your flesh, holding your hair back with a ponytail or your free hand, or perhaps letting it fall over your face, letting it get stuck in vomit and mascara-tears. Imagine the roar of the bathwater drowning out your retches and gags so your mother and father can't hear you. Bulimia is terrifying. It leaves scars on your knuckles, a stench on your breath, and a pale and miserable face. Marya Hornbacher describes bulimia like this in her book Wasted, horrifying and something out of a nightmare. She says that having anorexia or bulimia is like having this "evil skinny bitch" inside of you, saying that the pain will stop when you're thin, only when you're thin, except in your eyes you can never get thin. These terrible feelings change Marya so much throughout the course of her memoir, she is like a different person.
     Marya's feelings of self-hatred grow in her like a cancer, starting out small when she was young, telling her friends at five years old that she wouldn't eat and needed to be skinny, to getting into drugs and sex and bulimia and anorexia by the age of thirteen. She talks back, curses, and acts rebellious towards everyone. Her eating disorders cause her to become someone who is quite unlike the Marya we met in the beginning, innocent, happy, eating Fritos on the couch, watching TV, and cuddling with her dog. She now writes depressing poetry, cries herself to sleep, and pukes after everything that she eats.
     I knew a girl at summer camp with bulimia. I'm not saying who, but it has changed them, much as it has changed Marya. She makes frequent bad decisions, some of which make me not want to hang out with her. She had gotten piercings, arguably tried drugs (she denies it), and spends time with people who are bad influences on her. She described her first purge to me, and was open about it. I remember her saying something along the lines of this: "It was really scary, and I didn't really know what I was doing. I turned on the bathwater, pulled my hair back, and shoved my fingers down my throat. I hacked for like ten minutes, but nothing came up. Finally, I stuck my whole hand into my mouth, and my entire dinner came up. It was terrifying, and it hurt, but I'm used to it now. It stings to drink lemonade now because I have a raw patch on the back of my throat." This is very similar to what Marya describes in her book.

A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah

     The book A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah is a very powerful, almost depressing memoir about Beah's childhood as a boy soldier. He was separated from his parents at twelve, and became a child soldier until he was rescued by UNICEF at age sixteen. Throughout the book, Beah lets the reader see how his childhood was stolen from him through descriptions and language.
     In the beginning, Beah states how his life was good, he had a rap group with his friends in school, a family, and overall a good life. But when the Rebels invaded his town, he saw dying families, people being shot, and a messy, bloody scene of gore and terror. "Each gunshot seemed to cling to the beat of my heart."
     Beah and his friends traveled across brutal deserts and beaches, encountering savage villagers who let him pass only for his rap skills. It is so absurd that it almost sounds fictional. The seven boys had the bottoms of their feet literally burned off from the 120 degree sand; listened to their friends tell the stories of how the rebels raped their sisters and killed their parents, and starved in the sweltering Africa heat.
     Death is something nobody, let alone a child, should have to see. However, for almost five years of his life, Beah does, and some of those deaths he caused. Once he joined the army, they drugged him, gave him weapons, and trained him to be a ruthless, violent killer. "Killing became as easy as drinking water," he says. After a day of brutal murder and war, he would go back to the base with his troops, sniff cocaine, smoke marijuana, and watch war movies in a tent with other young soldiers.
     When he was rescued by UNICEF, he behaved like the changed person he was, cruel and mean to those who want to help him, starting fights with other refugees, bullying staff, and overall behaving badly. He behaved like someone who has been badly damaged, and needs fixing. I have not finished the book yet, but I am sure that he will change once again, shaking off the demonic personality that the war has forced on him.
     I think that Beah wrote this memoir to show people not just how unbelievably terrifying being a child soldier could be, but also how it can change a person, and rob their childhood away from them. Beah moved to New York and graduated from college because he was changed from the person war turned him into, with help from UNICEF.

"Am I Blue?" By Bruce Coville

     Finding your true identity is one of the important themes in the short story "Am I Blue? " by Bruce Coville. The main character, Vincent, is confused with his sexuality, and often gets teased for it. For example, Butch Corrigan, a bully, pushes him into a dirty puddle at the beginning because he is convinced that Vincent wants to "jump his bones." That's when Melvin comes into the story. Melvin helps Vincent out of the puddle and tells him that he is his fairy godfather; that he has come to grant him three wishes and help him find out who he really is.
     Accepting your identity and not deceiving yourself and others is very important in life. Vincent is not sure whether he is gay or not. When he is in the coffee shop with Melvin, he thinks to himself, "I didn't mention that I had been trying to figure out the same thing for about a year now," after asking Melvin if him being Melvin's "first case" meant he was gay. This shows that Vincent is confused about his identity and insecure about himself.
     One thing I noticed was that if there is a boy who bullies gay people, such as Butch Corrigan, they usually turn out to be gay themselves. In The Perks Of Being A Wallflower, a boy who bullies the main character's best friend Patrick for being gay turns out to be in love with him. I think that authors usually add this element to their books to show that the bully has a reason for being homophobic: he is afraid of his feelings and himself.
     I think that "Blue Day" not only helped Vincent, but a lot of other people, too. For example, it helped Butch Corrigan. Overall, it helped the world accept gay people more, now there is no more hiding from yourself.