Learning to Swear in America
Learning to Swear in America book cover

Learning to Swear in America

Hardcover – July 5, 2016

by
Price
$5.15
Format
Hardcover
Pages
352
Publisher
Bloomsbury USA Childrens
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-1619639096
Dimensions
5.85 x 1.19 x 8.56 inches
Weight
1 pounds

Description

From School Library Journal Gr 9 Up—A unique take on end-of-the-world novels. Yuri is a 17-year-old physicist from Russia sent to California to help NASA stop an asteroid. Yuri faces struggle after struggle trying to cope in a new country and get an older physicist to listen to him. Then Yuri meets Dovie, a fun girl who marches to the beat of her own drum. The protagonist is then forced to learn how to cope in a world with girls and teenage problems (something he has never done before), all while trying to save the country. He must decide if escaping total disaster is something worth risking his life and reputation for, or if he should just flee back to Russia. The book starts off slowly but then really dives into a roller-coaster ride of emotions and characters with the introduction of Dovie, and the enjoyable fast pace continues all the way to the unexpected conclusion. Kennedy has created wonderful characters who are quirky and endearing. VERDICT This work is thought provoking, heartwarming, and unforgettable and is recommended for readers who enjoy science-based fiction. A superb addition to any library collection serving teens.—Danielle Fabrizio, Swanton Public Library, VT "At turns sweet, funny, moving, and suspenseful, this is a book to devour. I fell in love with the endearing, maladjusted genius Yuri, and held my breath--fault of the all-too-real and terrifying threat steadily mounting throughout the story. A fantastic read!" - S.J. Kincaid, author of THE INSIGNA TRILOGY and THE DIABOLIC"The science Kennedy weaves throughout the story is fascinating and accessible, and Yuri and Dovie’s gentle romance is pitch-perfect. This novel is made to savor--readers will want to catch every nuance of Kennedy’s multidimensional characters." - starred review, Publishers Weekly "The balance of wit, romance, danger, and one huge philosophical and ethical dilemma is brilliantly managed here. . . . A nail-biting climax with a cinematic aftermath and an even more nail-biting resolution round out this thoroughly entertaining sci-fi disaster, romance, action/adventure mashup." - starred review, BCCB "Katie Kennedy is an author to put at the top of your watch-for-and-read list!" - USA Today "An end-of-the-world romp that will prompt readers to think and to laugh." - Kirkus Reviews "An entertaining, genre-bending mix of quirky romance and realistic sci-fi, with some thought-provoking questions about adulthood thrown in for good measure." - Booklist "Will appeal to many types of readers. Its NASA setting and sarcastic lead echo The Martian , while its quirky, whip-smart characters and sweet romance will capture Green and Rowell fans. . . . Recommended for all collections." - VOYA "Katie Kennedy writes with incision, fire, and euphoria. Savor this one." - Christian Science Monitor Katie Kennedy is the author of Learning to Swear in America and What Goes Up and is a college history instructor. She has a son in high school, and a daughter in college. She lives in Iowa.www.katiekennedybooks.com Read more

Features & Highlights

  • Brimming with humor and one-of-a-kind characters, this end-of-the-world debut novel will grab hold of Andrew Smith and Rainbow Rowell fans.
  • An asteroid is hurtling toward Earth. A big, bad one. Maybe not kill-all-the-dinosaurs bad, but at least kill-everyone-in-California-and-wipe-out-Japan-with-a-tsunami bad. Yuri, a physicist prodigy from Russia, has been recruited to aid NASA as they calculate a plan to avoid disaster.The good news is Yuri knows how to stop the asteroid--his research in antimatter will probably win him a Nobel prize if there's ever another Nobel prize awarded. But the trouble is, even though NASA asked for his help, no one there will listen to him. He's seventeen, and they've been studying physics longer than he's been alive. Then he meets (pretty, wild, unpredictable) Dovie, who lives like a normal teenager, oblivious to the impending doom. Being with her, on the adventures she plans when he's not at NASA, Yuri catches a glimpse of what it means to save the world and live a life worth saving.
  • Also by Katie Kennedy:
  • What Goes Up

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
30%
(88)
★★★★
25%
(73)
★★★
15%
(44)
★★
7%
(21)
★
23%
(67)

Most Helpful Reviews

✓ Verified Purchase

I’m fairly certain that this will be my favorite NetGalley read of the year

Even though we have five months and some change left to go before we bid 2016 adieu, I’m fairly certain that this will be my favorite NetGalley read of the year.

I’ve had a lot of disappointing and mediocre reading experiences this year, so I wasn’t expecting much from Katie Kennedy’s Learning to Swear in America. Sure, the blurb sounded fantastic, but when you read as much as I do, you quickly learn not to place much hope on that back-cover text.

The writing is excellent. The story is excellent. The characters are–brace yourself–excellent. This book is endlessly quotable. I tried to choose just one snipped to include in this review, but that simply can’t be done, so prepare yourself for a beautiful literary onslaught:

Dovie exerted a giant gravitational force. She was the closest thing to Jupiter of anyone he’d ever met, but you probably couldn’t say that to a girl.

“I’m late because I’m raging against the machine, Mrs. Lee.”

He hit “send,” and wondered how good NASA’s bulls*** detector was. Their other detectors were pretty good.

“So I have to give you advice without any idea what you’re talking about.”
“Yes.”
“In that situation, I always turn to Immanuel Kant.”

“You’re very grave.”
“I’m always grave about gravity.”

But it had only taken him a cell phone and fifty seconds to hack in–not because he was a genius, but because he was a teenager.

If you follow my reviews, you know I normally go into a little more detail as to why I like or dislike a particular title, but here, words are insufficient. Learning to Swear in America is so many things: a young adult novel, a coming-of-age tale. It’s a story of first love and near apocalypse and what it means to be human–not Russian, not American, just human. If I were a betting woman, I would bet a fortune and a half that this book will be considered a classic in fifty years.

Read it. Read it now.

I received a complimentary copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.
6 people found this helpful
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Hilarious and memorable!!

First, you need to know that I really, really loved this book.

17-year-old Yuri is a genius. He's brought over from Russia to work with NASA on stopping a huge asteroid from hitting the Earth and taking out California. While in the US, he meets a girl named Dovie and her brother, Lennon. And through them, he finds that the entire predicted orbit of his life has changed.

You should read this book if you like the following: hilarious, spot-on dialogue. Fresh, memorable characters who seem like they could walk off the page. Small animals. Physics. The night sky. High school (also, you'll love it if you didn't like high school) (also, if you're in high school). Prom. Those scooters you had to roll around on in gym class.

And the cover. Oh the cover is such a perfect fit for this novel.

Hell yeah, Katie Kennedy. This book was amazing. I can't wait to see what she writes next.
4 people found this helpful
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So delightful you won't want it to end

Sometimes a book is so delightful and so charming that you just don't want it to end (think Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda).

Sometimes a book is about astrophysics, and particularly, how to save the world from a meteor headed straight for it.

It's infinitesimally rare for a book to be BOTH of those things, and yet Katie Kennedy's debut does just that. It charms your socks off with its Russian narrator Yuri, who is both incredibly intelligent and awkward like you might expect a seventeen year old PhD toting physicist tasked with trying to figure out how to stop a meteor from crashing into earth to be. There's so much that's working in this book: expert plotting, hilarious scenarios, characters you will fall in love with and wish were real, and high stakes (possibly the highest, since we are talking about the end of the world as we know it).

I *love* this book and can't wait to share it with all my astrophysics friend. As someone who's married to an astrophysicist, everything about this book just gets it.

Love, love, love, love, LOVE! Also, Yuri is my new book boyfriend.
4 people found this helpful
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Wonderful!

"High school is boredom punctuated by humiliation." So says Yuri Strelnikov, the delightful protagonist of this charming book.

LEARNING TO SWEAR IN AMERICA is both a science fiction page turner and a love story that features two irresistible main characters, plus a python, a prom, and a bat-mobile wheelchair. What’s not to like?

Ms. Kennedy has done her research and chosen just the right details to make this story come alive. It’s difficult enough to write a story from the point of view of the opposite sex. But it’s even more impressive that the main character is also a seventeen-year-old Russian who happens to be a mathematical prodigy. The author has accomplished all this with skill and panache. Five stars.
3 people found this helpful
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You WANT to Read This Book!

What a cute little book! I wasn’t sure what to expect going into this one – it could be funny, serious, sad, anxious, endearing, quirky… And yet, somehow, the book managed to do all that and more.

First things first, the three ‘main’ characters of the book were just adorable. You’ve got a genius prodigy and a brother and sister who are just trying to make it through life. Dovie was a force to be reckoned with and Lennon realistically portrayed having a disability and just living beyond that. He was more than his wheelchair and practically stole the spotlight at times.

Yuri is socially awkward – no matter what country he’s in. I mean, if you’re so smart you could win the Nobel prize at 17, odds are you’re not one who worked on their social skills. So not only is Yuri uncomfortable being submersed in a new culture with no one to remind him of home, but he’s also dealing with the perils of being a person who doesn’t always understand how to work the angles of humanity and social interaction. But somehow Dovie and Lennon balance Yuri out and help him to see that life is more than studies.

The thing about Dovie is that she isn’t some manic-pixie-dreamgirl. She’s bold and fun and quirky, but in a real and honest way. And Lennon is all personality. He is the comic relief, but he’s just so REAL. These three could honestly walk in the room at any moment they were so well-rounded. Along those lines, the dialogue was witty and endearing and spot-on. The true badge of a great contemporary novel is getting the dialogue down, and Kennedy stole the show here. If you come for nothing else, come for the banter. It’s totally worth it.

This isn’t necessarily a deep book – if you’re looking for Rainbow Rowell, you’ll see that top layer, but this one is more of a light, fun read. But there are definitely some serious and high tension moments, because… asteroid. And also, teenagers.

The thing I love most about this one is the seamless blend of contemporary and science fiction. There’s enough to put the book in both categories and yet the balance is perfect. If you’re looking for something fresh and new, Learning to Swear in America is just the book for you.
2 people found this helpful
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A fun story of friendship and learning what is most important in life

This book contains characters that I grew to love immediately! I love how this author made them authentic and real to me right away. Katie Kennedy writes with subtle humor that I also enjoy as a person who tosses sarcasm myself. Katie titled her chapters well and I enjoyed the length of each one. This novel has great pacing and I never found myslef not wanting to keep reading. I'm looking forward to reading more of Katie's books.

The title alone tells readers this is going to be a fun book and it did not disappoint. The ending is more than satisfactory.
2 people found this helpful
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One of my FAVORITE books in 2016!!!

You know how when you read a book and you can just tell by the first few words, you're going to love it? Yeah, that was LEARNING TO SWEAR IN AMERICA for me.

I cannot tell you how much I loved this book! Loved the writing. Loved every character - Yuri, Dovie, Lennon, even all the small roles played by various scientists and other students! Loved all the great lines!

Loved it all.

No joke, I think I hearted, starred, smiley faced, !!!!, practically every sentence in this book. So many ha-larious lines had me laughing out loud at 2am in the morning and I know woke my husband up way too many times. But oh was it so worth it.

The writing is gorgeous, the story flows so well, and the science behind it all will make you question if Mrs. Kennedy is really a Russian physicist masking herself as a YA writer (yes, the science is that good and by far the best I've seen done on any "Earth is coming to an end" book) -- and by the end, you'll want to nominate her yourself for the Nobel, right along with Yuri.

If you don't have this one on your TBR yet, what are you waiting for? Better yet, go now and order it -- I promise you will not be disappointed.
2 people found this helpful
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Highly recommend

Highly recommend if you enjoy effortless writing that is hilarious and smart. It's like a YA mashup of The Martian & The Perks of Being a Wallflower. The main character is both a genius physicist who must save the world and a clueless horny teenager. And the craft the author shows in balancing those two sides of his character is so skillful that it's both laugh out loud funny and totally believable.
2 people found this helpful
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Kennedy's sweet and clever debut is rife with delicious prose and ...

Kennedy's sweet and clever debut is rife with delicious prose and prime numbers. It's one of my favorite books of 2016.
2 people found this helpful
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LOVED this book

Got this for my 14 year old boy to read and started glancing through it. Then I couldn't put it down. It's probably the single best teen book I've ever read - and I have an MA in American Literature, so I've read a WHOLE lot of books. Truly creative and smart with tons of humanity to it. A bit too convenient at the end but, hey, it is aimed at kids...

Also, my teen, who has ADHD and really does not like to read, told me he'd like to read more by Katie Kennedy. So there's a coup right there!
1 people found this helpful

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