The White Pine Program

The White Pine Program is part of the "Forest of Reading" set up by the Ontario Library Association. Since I'm now working in the school library, I have become much more familiar with the program, and I think it's just great. The "Forest of Reading" is set up so that children and adults can become familiar with Canadian literature. Every year, members of the Ontario Library Association select a number of books to be considered for the "Forest of Reading". The White Pine Program, which is the focus of this post, is for students in high school. This means that many of the books selected belong to the Young Adult category of books.

Young Adult books have come a long way since I was a teenager. I remember Sweet Valley High and the books put out by Scholastic. These books always seemed really simplistic to me, so I ended up reading adult books, even if I wasn't emotionally ready for them. Unfortunately, they were the only ones that didn't appear childish to me.

I'm trying to read all the White Pine books for this year, but I'm not sure I'll get through all of them. I've read two of the books for this year, The Uninvited by Tim Wynne-Jones and The Landing by John Ibbitson. I absolutely loved the Wynne-Jones book, and was quite bored with the Ibbitson book. Next on my list will be Getting the Girl and Wondrous Strange.

The Uninvited is a mystery about a young woman who goes to spend the summer at her father's cottage in Ontario and what happens to her when she gets there. There are numerous threads running through the story, and a number of twists that would are quite unexpected. Dan Brown could learn a thing or two from Tim Wynne-Jones. Another good thing about The Uninvited is that it has aspects that will appeal to all sorts of readers. It has a strong female character, but it also has strong male characters. There are lots of relationship issues, but also drama, mystery, and a little violence.

Unlike The Uninvited, which kept me interested from page one, I never really did get into The Landing. The Landing is the story of a young man growing up in in a town like Bracebridge. The novel is set during the Depression and is really a coming of age story. Ben lives with his mother and uncle and works providing fuel and cigarettes to rich tourists from the south. A chance encounter with a rich widow from New York opens up new opportunities, and challenges, for Ben. Unfortunately, I never really cared what happened to Ben and didn't even finish the novel. I skipped to the last few pages and that was good enough for me. This doesn't mean that others might not find the book interesting, but it wasn't for me. I would have to think very carefully about who I would suggest read The Landing.