Any World (That I'm Welcome To)

So, there is this teenage girl dealing with teenage girl problems like school and her parents' divorce, and one day a mysterious older guy who only goes out at night moves to town. You know where this story is going, right?

Except not this time!

The Night Wanderer alternates viewpoints between Tiffany Hunter, an Anishinabe girl living on the Otter Lake Reserve, and the vampire formerly known as Owl, who, after four centuries of blood-sucking his way around Europe, has now finally come home under the name "Pierre L'Errant." There is no romance between them whatsoever. Because she is a teenager and he is four hundred years old and has more important things to do anyway.

Tiffany's sections strike a good balance between showing how her problems are both big deals because they do affect her whole life at that moment and also not (all) such big deals in the grand scheme of things. Okay, so she feels like her new white (but not sparkly-white!) boyfriend is saving her from a really tedious life and is all that and a bag of chips, and every little thing that might threaten their relationship (like her dad not approving, or getting grounded) feels like a huge blow - well, okay, that is a big part of her life right now. But learning to judge whether said boyfriend really is as awesome and necessary as all that is also an important part of growing up. Some of her problems, like failing in school, straddle the major/minor problem boundary: on the one hand, school is not actually your whole life; on the other hand, it could seriously affect the few chances she has to not be quite so poor when she grows up, and part of the reason she's failing is because the systemic disregard for Native kids' perspectives (not to mention the casual bigotry of other students) in school is really alienating. So you can both sympathize with her growing feelings of hopelessness and Pierre's eventually snapping at her to get some perspective and grow the hell up.

Pierre, meanwhile, tells the reader some of his story in flashback (he was a normal Anishinabe kid looking for adventure who found himself essentially kidnapped to France, caught smallpox, and was "saved" by being vampirized - infected with European ultra-violence, you could say - and then was both hampered by the travel restriction of not being able to tolerate sunlight and too ashamed to try going home until now) and explores the area, searching for landmarks of his old village. He clearly has some ultimate goal in mind for this homecoming, but we don't know what it is. All we know is that he's fasting for it because it's so important, and that as he gets hungrier, he has an increasingly hard time not eating people...

Tiffany's disconnection from both white society and her own people's past and Pierre's disconnection from everyone and his search for his much-changed home are the constant poignant motifs running through the book, unifying their stories. One of the highlights toward the end is when Pierre shows Tiffany some of the landmarks he's uncovered and has her imagine it as it once was. For the first time, the history truly comes alive to her, and she feels like she's connected to a history where she belongs. (I will not, however, spoil whether he breaks down and eats anyone, Tiffany or those jerk high school kids or otherwise, or what his plan is XD )

It is YA, so it might not be everyone's thing, but it's definitely one of the better YA novels I've read in the past few years. Plus, the vampire is both dangerous and sympathetic and doesn't date the teenager, and the main commentary on romance is Do Not Put Up With Shit!

Pastor says armed militia to protect church during Quran-burning event

Never read the comments section on CNN articles if you want to have hope for humanity. Actually, christian82, there WAS someone who said you have to turn the other cheek... it was in this book you may have heard of...

Plus, book-burning watched over by an armed militia to prove how OTHER people are violent and intolerant. What could possibly go wrong?


The Kootenai Tribe's forgotten war

The BIA said they couldn't give grants for houses and a highway, so in 1974, the Kootenai declared war on the US. By making people driving through their land pay tolls. And they won. And no one died! Great war or greatest war?


The Best Revenge by Arsinoe de Blassenville

I think this is my favorite Harry Potter AU. It diverges from a small, ordinary point: Snape is pissy about Harry coming to Hogwarts, stops by McGonagall's office while she's sending out the acceptance letters to gripe, and spots the address on Harry's letter (The Cupboard Under the Stairs). Given Snape's own background, he's outraged at anyone mistreating a child that way, especially - he realizes now - Lily's child. Plus, the petty, vengeful part of him decides it would be pretty awesome revenge if James Potter's son grew up to like Severus Snape, of all people. So he offers to go deliver Harry's letter, since he can honestly say he knows Petunia and can, erm, handle the Dursleys, who might not be thrilled if the letter just showed up by owl. And everything proceeds logically from there (Harry gloms onto the first person who tells him he's special and gets to leave Privet Drive, and since he's not such a twerp at 11 Snape decides Harry's not all bad, etc.)

And speaking of logic, this story reverses the artificial brain-removal of the books! Snape, as I mentioned, is still petty and bitter, but since in canon he also is on decent terms with the other staff, in this story he actually talks to them sometimes. Like storming into Dumbledore's office with McGonagall to protest the outrageous child abuse Dumbledore knew all about. Which leads to McGonagall coming up with a clever plan to help. And the Heads of Houses talk about the whole fishy Philosopher's Stone plot, and decide they need to improve on the trap a bit, and see if they can't rescue Quirrell too while they're at it. And oh, maybe someone should write to Flamel to let him know what's up, just in case he didn't get the full story. There's also all the sensible details you'd expect from a universe that doesn't just change or vanish in bits at JKR's whim: what happened to the original Potter house (not the emergency hideaway in Godric's Hollow) and why Harry didn't inherit it, did any former DEs ever notice anything funny about Harry's scar, did Quirrell really invite Voldemort into his head or was Voldemort effectively Imperiusing him while tagging along, what happened to all the fan mail Harry surely got over the years, etc. You actually hear the names of characters and magical items who were there all along before they become plot points four years later, because duh, they were there all along. (Cedric is around, Narcissa tells the boys Lockhart is a phony when his name comes up, the kids see Crouch and Moody etc. on a field trip to the Ministry, Floo powder and Portkeys actually get used...)

The characters are still recognizably themselves: Draco is spoiled and bigoted, Hermione is a bossy overachiever, Percy is a bit self-important but also helps the younger kids, Dumbledore usually means well but doesn't know how to share information and delegate or really relate to anyone else, etc. Except in this version, people can slowly change, like real people. For instance, the Malfoys, trying to make sure Draco doesn't offend Harry, advise him that some Muggleborns like Harry's mom can be accepted into decent society with a little proper advice from a good Pureblood, which leads to Draco taking their advice more seriously than they meant and trying out some noblesse oblige on Hermione (with a little prodding from Harry, who sees that Draco's a brat but also persuadable and able to act decently if he tries), which leads to him slowly deciding she's not half bad. They start a club to help the new kids adjust to the wizarding world, which ends up with kids of all four Houses hanging out together (there's good food!) and swapping information on everything from wizarding fairy tales to Muggle ballet.

I won't tell you what House Harry's in, but it's probably not the one you expect.

The sequel, The Best Revenge: Time of the Basilisk is in progress. Lupin arrives, Dumbledore gives some more second chances, Kettleburn explains that snakes aren't evil any more than lions, Charity Burbage plants the idea in Snape's head that maybe Lupin was just as much a victim in the Prank as Snape (how awful to nearly kill someone and get sent to Azkaban because your "friend" thought it would be fun to take advantage of your condition), Lucius tries to dispose of the Diary but does a bad job of it, Bob the snake tells Harry about The One in the Walls, and Fred and George notice a name they don't recognize on the Map (who's this Pettigrew character and why's he in the common room?), just for starters. It's so refreshing.