Deer Run Home by Ann Clare LeZotte

Deer Run Home   by Ann Clare LeZotte  209 pages

Effie and her older sister, Deja, have recently moved into their father’s trailer after an incident at their mom’s house. Daddy communicates with Effie by pointing, stomping on the floor, and making thoughtless jokes. Even if they did understand each other, could she tell the terrible secret she carries when telling feels impossible -- and dangerous? But what if telling is the only way to be seen? This tender, spare, emotionally charged story about the impact of abuse and the power of love explores what it feels like to be an outsider in your own family and to awaken -- through friendship, writing, and kinship with the natural world -- to a new understanding and appreciation of yourself.

I really enjoyed this book! It is written in verse so it was an easy read.  Very sad story about child neglect.  But I am very interested in the deaf community and this book shows how hard it is for them to communicate when there is not an interpreter.  
 

Code Name: Johnny Walker by Johnny Walker and Jim DeFelice

Code Name: Johnny Walker by Johnny Walker and Jim DeFelice
304 pages / 10 hrs, 30 mins

"In this illuminating and informative memoir, an Iraqi translator who risked his life working with...the Navy SEALs tells his remarkable and inspiring story, offering a refreshing new perspective on the Iraq War.l

"As the insurgency in Iraq intensified following the American invasion, U.S. Navy SEALs were called upon to root terrorists from their lairs. Unsure of the local neighborhoods and unable to speak the local languages, they came to rely on one man to guide them and watch their backs. He was a 'terp'--an interpreter--with a job so dangerous they couldn't even use his real name.

"They named him Johnny Walker. They soon called him brother. Over the course of eight years, the Iraqi native traveled around the country with nearly every SEAL and special operations unit deployed there. He went on thousands of missions, saved dozens of SEAL and other American lives, and risked his own daily. Helped to the U.S. by the SEALs he protected, Johnny Walker's life is so remarkable that his tale reads like fiction. But every word of it is true."  --from the publisher

Great book! If you are the least bit interested in the subject matter, you will enjoy it. Johnny Walker is a good storyteller and has left quite a legacy. A true, modern-day hero with solid values. I recommend listening to the book because the reader is terrific. This one gets four out of five stars from me.