Young Adult Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog

Pandemoneium Giveaway

2012-03-01T16:39:00.000-05:00

Read.Breathe.Relax. is one year old and Lisa is celebrating by giving away four copies ofPandemonium by Lauren Oliver! Head on over and try to win yourself a copy!

Angelfall by Susan Ee

2012-02-29T00:01:00.000-05:00

It's been six weeks since angels of the apocalypse descended to demolish the modern world. Street gangs rule the day while fear and superstition rule the night. When warrior angels fly away with a helpless little girl, her seventeen-year-old sister Penryn will do anything to get her back.Anything, including making a deal with an enemy angel.Raffe is a warrior who lies broken and wingless on the street. After eons of fighting his own battles, he finds himself being rescued from a desperate situation by a half-starved teenage girl.Traveling through a dark and twisted Northern California, they have only each other to rely on for survival. Together, they journey toward the angels' stronghold in San Francisco where she'll risk everything to rescue her sister and he'll put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies for the chance to be made whole again.

Angel books, they are so difficult to review. This one is especially hard. It had great pacing. It’s the kind of book that picks you up in the first chapter and you just can’t put it down until you get to the end and even then you want more. I loved how the plot slowed at just the right points to keep the reader wanting more, and sped up when it needed to but not so much that it left the reader behind. The climax is particularly well paced, with a series of mini-climaxes that hit at just the right spots. Even the cliffhanger ending is so well done that I’m not as mad about it as I am about some books. There is obvious resolution and yet also an obvious need for the characters to continue the story. The character development works well, too. I identified with Penryn almost immediately. She is resourceful, tough, and loyal to her sister. It is a little hard to contrast with her relationship to her mother, but I can see how her mother’s illness and history with Paige has made their relationship more strained. However, my major issue with this book is with the angels. Raffe is fully fleshed out as a character, but he doesn’t fit into the angel mythology. It’s very hard for me to believe that beings who are without sin can curse or be agnostic or be as aimless as the angels in the story. Even without the voice of God to tell them what to do I can’t believe that angels would go on a killing spree. And it is with the angel mythos that the worldbuilding fell apart for me. The angels just seemed too human, with human motivations and politics and pettiness. It’s as Penryn thinks in the book "The thought of superhuman beings with human temptations and flaws sent a chill through me." But angels are supposed to be different from humans. They’re not supposed to have human temptations and flaws. If Ee had claimed the angels were actually alien beings directed as an army and their communication with their home planet was cut off I think the story would have worked out. However, Ee takes all the angel mythology as it is and just takes out the part where angels cannot commit sin. For me, taking all the mythology as true except for one part and never mentioning why that one part is untrue just doesn’t work. If something is discarded from myth then it needs to be explained somehow. I’m sad that it wasn’t, because this was a really, really good book but that flaw ruined it for me. However, I will pick up anything that Ee writes and devour it because her writing is so superb, but it may be me over in the corner pouting and grumbling about angel mythos.

Soul Thief / Forbidden by Jana Oliver

2012-02-28T22:28:00.000-05:00

Riley's beginning to think being a demon trapper isn't all it's cracked up to be. Her dad's been stolen by a necromancer, her boyfriend's gone all weird and she's getting warm and fuzzy feelings for someone who's seriously bad news. It's tempting to give it all up and try to be normal, but that's not an option. Because the demons have plans for Riley. And they're not the only ones.

WARNING: Review contains SPOILERS for

The Demon Trapper’s Daughter

(also published as “Forsaken”).

Another great book and a great sequel, I couldn’t wait to devour

Soul Thief

after I finished

The Demon Trapper’s Daughter

. Riley is a remarkably likeable character. Even though she has demons after her and some kind of huge destiny looming she still deals with things like bills, boy troubles, and the misogyny in the demon trapper guilds, and it makes her very relatable. And although bills and misogyny are problems for Riley this book slows down in order to really be all about the boy troubles. Don’t get me wrong, there is still plenty of demon hunting, killing, and side issues for Riley to deal with. But I also like how the romantic plots developed along reasonable, realistic lines. I really liked how the realism wasn’t only a realistic relationship, but also realistic for a girl of Riley’s age. It seems that sometimes adult authors put too much of their current relationships into books and forget that when you’re a teenager romance is different and permanence seems like such a tenuous thing.

I liked the relationship with Simon. He seemed like a nice, normal boy that was safe and relatable for Riley. A relationship like that is something that every teen girl needs, and it’s nice to see her get in a few relationships before she finds that head-over-heels forever kinda love. I can really understand how Riley could see the forever kinda love staring her in the face and run away to a safe, boring relationship because she’s just not ready for commitment and scared of forever at that point in her life. I’ve been there, and even if Oliver has not she’s got the feelings and actions down well enough to make Riley very convincing at it. The ending to their relationship is also logical, and I like how Riley still has feelings for Simon while she’s also developing feelings for Beck and while Simon is having serious doubts about her (and trying his hardest to hurt her in the process in order to push her away). Beck is also great, you can see his conflict between his developing feelings for Riley and his desire to honor and avenge the memory of her father. Ory, though, I just don’t know about. Although he puts himself out as Riley’s protector there is something suspicious about him that makes me not trust him as a romantic interest. Perhaps it is because I suspect he is more supernatural than he lets on, and I just don’t want the series to turn into a demon/human or angel/human romance thing. I really like how romance isn’t a priority with Riley, and I hope the series continues to be about her problems with demon-hunting and her relationships only form a side-plot.

The only real problem I had with this book is the twist ending. It was brilliant move, totally in keeping with everything before it and yet entirely unexpected, but it makes me way too anxious for the next book! I’m also a little upset that the series is being republished under different names and covers, but that’s just because I like my book series to be the same and I’d rather not repurchase books just to get covers in the same theme. I may, though, if I ever get to see Jana Oliver again. I’m very glad she attended Dragon*Con last year because it made me pick up her books, and I only regret that I had to lecture myself during her signing in the dealer’s room and wasn’t able to get her to autograph the books. I’m rather sad that I can’t go back to Dragon*Con next year, because I seem to find the best books and authors by just walking through the dealer’s room or sitting in the Young Adult Literature track and hearing them speak about what’s good. I can’t thank them enough for Diana Peterfreund and Beth Revis, and now I also owe then for Jana Oliver. Hopefully soon WorldCon and Dragon*Con will diverge again and I will be able to come back.

Waiting on Wednesday: Loss by Jackie Morse Kessler

2012-02-28T22:06:00.000-05:00

I'm going to start participating in Breaking the Spine's Waiting for Wednesday, where bloggers post about a book they just can't wait to get their hands on!

Loss by Jackie Morse KesslerMarch 20th 2012

Fifteen-year-old Billy Ballard is the kid that everyone picks on, from the school bullies to the teachers. But things change drastically when Death tells Billy he must stand in as Pestilence, the White Rider of the Apocalypse. Now armed with a Bow that allows him to strike with disease from a distance, Billy lashes out at his tormentors...and accidentally causes an outbreak of meningitis. Horrified by his actions, Billy begs Death to take back the Bow. For that to happen, says Death, Billy must track down the real White Rider—who is lost in his memories.

In his search, Billy travels through White Rider’s life: from ancient Phrygia, where the man called King Mita agrees to wear the White Rider’s Crown, to Sherwood Forest, where Pestilence figures out how to cheat Death; from the docks of Alexandria, where cartons of infested grain are being packed onto a ship that will carry the plague, to the Children’s Crusade in France—all the way to what may be the end of the world. When Billy finally finds the White Rider, the teen convinces the man to return to the real world.

But now the insane White Rider plans to unleash something awful on humanity—something that could make the Black Death look like a summer cold. Billy has a choice: he can live his life and pretend he doesn’t know what’s coming, or he can challenge the White Rider for his Crown. Does one bullied teenager have the strength to stand his ground—and the courage to save the world?

If you haven't been around here for long you can go back and read my reviews for the previous books in this series, Hunger and Rage. Or you can trust me and go out and buy all three because they are simply AMAZING!!!

The Shattering by Karen Healey

2012-02-27T00:00:00.000-05:00

Seventeen-year-old Keri likes to plan for every possibility. She knows what to do if you break an arm, or get caught in an earthquake or fire. But she wasn't prepared for her brother's suicide, and his death has left her shattered with grief. When her childhood friend Janna tells her it was murder, not suicide, Keri wants to believe her. After all, Janna's brother died under similar circumstances years ago, and Janna insists a visiting tourist, Sione, who also lost a brother to apparent suicide that year, has helped her find some answers.As the three dig deeper, disturbing facts begin to pile up: one boy killed every year; all older brothers; all had spent New Year's Eve in the idyllic town of Summerton. But when their search for the serial killer takes an unexpected turn, suspicion is cast on those they trust the most.As secrets shatter around them, can they save the next victim? Or will they become victims themselves?

This was a very difficult book for me to read. The discussions of suicide survivors hit me very close to home, and the difficult topic overshadowed a lot of the book. I also come from a very small, dying town in Kansas, so the struggles of Summerton were very relatable as well. The other problems I had were with the plot line. The first half or so of the book reads like a contemporary YA book about suicide, something I usually avoid reading because I dislike it. There’s also a strong disjoint in the front of the book because the switching narration between the three lead characters and the tenses that are used (Keri is first person, Sione and Janna are third) that makes it harder to identify and relate to them and thus get invested in the plot. In the second half they discover magic and the book starts turning into a fantasy story. At this point I’ve seen enough of each person to become invested in Keri, Sione, and Janna despite myself and the story starts to move quicker. Although I won’t spoil the magic in the book I will say that I loved how it was a modern twist on a very ancient tradition and the permutation is as logical and relatable as it is chilling. This makes the plot a little predictable, but it’s well handled so it doesn’t feel as foreshadowed as it could. There are parts, however, where the plot seems to drag, and it really messes with the tension in the story because by the time the kids get to a mini-climax the section before has taken all the drive out so the climaxes seem like a laundry list of tasks, not a real climax. However, at the end my heart still bled for Keri, and I can’t really say why other than her first person narrative and her development made me feel for her, and that was the true gift of this book.

The Iron Witch by Karen Mahoney

2012-02-24T10:57:00.000-05:00

FREAK. That’s what her classmates call seventeen-year-old Donna Underwood. When she was seven, a horrific fey attack killed her father and drove her mother mad. Donna’s own nearly fatal injuries from the assault were fixed by magic—the iron tattoos branding her hands and arms. The child of alchemists, Donna feels cursed by the magical heritage that destroyed her parents and any chance she had for a normal life. The only thing that keeps her sane and grounded is her relationship with her best friend, Navin Sharma.When the darkest outcasts of Faerie—the vicious wood elves—abduct Navin, Donna finally has to accept her role in the centuries old war between the humans and the fey. Assisted by Xan, a gorgeous half-fey dropout with secrets of his own, Donna races to save her friend—even if it means betraying everything her parents and the alchemist community fought to the death to protect.

This book was a fast read, and it was good but not great. I found the alchemy angle on magic kind of interesting. It is different to have magic that is crafted rather than learned or from an innate power. The plot had some good high points, but the pacing seemed really off and it could jump from very slow to very fast and full of tension without any ramp up which left me kind of distracted and alienated from what was going on.Donna is a well-crafted character, and I really felt for her when she felt alienated from her peers and had only Navin for a friend. Navin was a little two-dimensional to me, though, and Xan barely registered. The love between Donna and Xan didn’t really spark for me either. Xan seemed way too invested in Donna and got nothing really in return. I don’t like it when romances in books cause a character to make huge gestures of undying love that just can’t be present in such a short time. Perhaps that is because Xan was barely present in the book, and as they grow in subsequent books perhaps it will become more convincing. I at least hope that there doesn’t end up to be a Navin-Donna-Xan love triangle, but it doesn’t seem like Mahoney is setting that up. I will pick up the next book in this series and hope for the best.

Cinder by Marissa Meyer

2012-02-21T20:01:00.000-05:00

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. . . .Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

There’s really only one thing I can say about this book: WOW! I loved every part of this cyborg retelling of Cinderella. The worldbuilding seemed more extensive than we got in the book, and what’s there is good: there are people on the Moon, they have strange powers due to generations living on the moon, people enslave cyborgs because they’re not really people, and there is a strange, deadly illness much like the boubonic plague going around killing people. In the midst of al l this, plus the threat of a war between the Earth and the Moon, the Prince must throw a coronation ball. Cinder the cyborg gets caught between all this. Cinder is a very intriguing character. Much like The Adoration of Jenna Fox this book forces you to think about where the line is drawn between human and machine. Cinder is a 36.28% cyborg. That means that the augmented leg, arm, and spinal cord she has from an accident as a child are 36.28% of her body. To the future society in Cinder this means she is a slave, purchasable and sell-able just like a full android. However, she has a brain, independent thoughts, and emotions. However, so do the androids around her. Does that mean they are human, even though the only part of them that came from a human is their programming, their personality chip? In a world like this can a prince even fall in love with a girl who is thought of as a machine? Will his country let him, politically? This book doesn’t answer all the questions, ending in a great cliffhanger for book 2, but I didn’t even mind that because I was so enamored with the rest of the book that I gave it a pass. Everyone should go out and get it today!

The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson

2012-02-20T11:03:00.000-05:00

Elisa is the chosen one.But she is also the younger of two princesses, the one who has never done anything remarkable. She can't see how she ever will.Now, on her sixteenth birthday, she has become the secret wife of a handsome and worldly king—a king whose country is in turmoil. A king who needs the chosen one, not a failure of a princess.And he's not the only one who seeks her. Savage enemies seething with dark magic are hunting her. A daring, determined revolutionary thinks she could be his people's savior. And he looks at her in a way that no man has ever looked at her before. Soon it is not just her life, but her very heart that is at stake.Elisa could be everything to those who need her most. If the prophecy is fulfilled. If she finds the power deep within herself. If she doesn’t die young.Most of the chosen do.

I feel so sad that this book sat on my shelf for so long. I was finally encouraged to read it after seeing all the good reviews about it, and I’m so glad I did. This was an excellent book, one of the best reads of the year. Elisa is a very relatable princess. She wants to be a good person and a good ruler, but she was raised as the second to a perfect child and never taught how to rule or pushed to realize her potential. Combine that with the fact that she’s considered a treasure – the carrier of the Godstone – and you can see how she’s never struggled to do anything more than learn religion. When things happen, though Elisa learns that she has gifts too, gifts that can help her find value as a ruler and as a person. It is this basis on excellent character development and Carson’s worldbuilding that makes the book so good. There are other well-developed characters in the book (Cosme, Ximenia, Rosario) and some not-so-well crafted ones (Alexander, Arina). Since the cast of characters is huge, though, I excused this because it’s impossible to develop so many characters in detail. Speaking of the world, although I think it has fantasy climatology the development of the religious systems are very intricate and make the plots and issues surrounding Elisa more rich and believable. The plot follows well, using Elisa’s characterization as the driving force, and has many twists and turns. In fact, I feel like I picked up on a lot of clues that weren’t discussed in the book, like it is book one of an epic series (it may be, there is a sequel coming). My only problem in the book comes with Elisa’s character arc. In the beginning she is a sheltered princess who admits she is fat and likes food. As she gains a purpose, though, she grows skinnier and stops eating so much. I don’t think this is a good thing. There are so few overweight heroines for girls to look up to, I feel it’s a problem to tell girls that Elisa is only fat because she’s lazy, if you stop eating you will be skinny, and Elisa is only considered worthy when she is skinny (as a part of the skills she gains during the book). The rest of the book, though, is excellent, and worth reading.

Blood Red Road by Moira Young

2012-02-14T23:58:00.000-05:00

Saba has spent her whole life in Silverlake, a dried-up wasteland ravaged by constant sandstorms. The Wrecker civilization has long been destroyed, leaving only landfills for Saba and her family to scavenge from. That's fine by her, as long as her beloved twin brother Lugh is around. But when a monster sandstorm arrives, along with four cloaked horsemen, Saba's world is shattered. Lugh is captured, and Saba embarks on an epic quest to get him back.Suddenly thrown into the lawless, ugly reality of the world outside of desolate Silverlake, Saba is lost without Lugh to guide her. So perhaps the most surprising thing of all is what Saba learns about herself: she's a fierce fighter, an unbeatable survivor, and a cunning opponent. And she has the power to take down a corrupt society from the inside. Teamed up with a handsome daredevil named Jack and a gang of girl revolutionaries called the Free Hawks, Saba stages a showdown that will change the course of her own civilization.Blood Red Road has a searing pace, a poetically minimal writing style, violent action, and an epic love story. Moira Young is one of the most promising and startling new voices in teen fiction.

This book was hard to get into at first. I’m not sure where an Australian writer living in England learned an Ozark accent, but she had it down pretty well. That was really what was so harsh about this book: the voice of the narrator, Saba, is written in accent as if she was speaking to you. There are no quotation marks, only ‘But no I said.’ Add in the grammatical idiosyncrasies and a liberal dose of misspelled words and the result is a book that’s very difficult to get into since it’s not the way we’re used to reading books. As you read, though, the strangeness of the narrative voice forms a strong basis for the character and development of Saba. It turns from a strange way of writing to an quirk of the lead, something that shows where she came from and how much she has overcome to get to where she is. After I got over the narrative voice and started to appreciate it I found a really interesting story. Saba is harsh, uneducated, mean and unfair to her younger sister, and downright rude to most people. Somehow, though, we grow to love her anyway. I love how the narrator gives her a pet crow, Nero, from the beginning of the book. He is so loveable and smart that the reader can’t help but like Saba for his sake. Her quest to rescue her brother in the harsh, post-apocalyptic world drives the reader to look towards Lugh as well and forgive Saba of any small mistakes along the way. After all, she’s got bigger things to worry about than offending a crazy man on a boat. As Saba fights in gladiatorial battles I am still somehow rooting for her. After I met Jack I started rooting for him, too. The Free Hawks also get two thumbs up. I love a good tale of smart warrior women. In fact, I think the only thing I didn’t like was Saba’s treatment of Emmi. I loved seeing Emmi grow as a character, and even though Saba tried to deny it and hold her down as much as possible Emmi keeps rising to the occasion and showing that she’s got just as much grit as Saba does. There was also the problem with the Pinches. They didn’t seem incredibly realistic, and once you’ve reached the end of the books a lot of their actions seem insensible and illogical, making them seem more like plot devices than real characters. However, once I got past the language that is my only real complaint, which means this is an excellent story with no major drawbacks, a few different but equal examples of strong females, and an excellent romance story. I highly recommend it to everyone who can get past the writing style.

Legend by Marie Lu

2012-02-13T09:38:00.004-05:00

What was once the western United States is now home to the Republic, a nation perpetually at war with its neighbors. Born into an elite family in one of the Republic's wealthiest districts, fifteen-year-old June is a prodigy being groomed for success in the Republic's highest military circles. Born into the slums, fifteen-year-old Day is the country's most wanted criminal. But his motives may not be as malicious as they seem.From very different worlds, June and Day have no reason to cross paths - until the day June's brother, Metias, is murdered and Day becomes the prime suspect. Caught in the ultimate game of cat and mouse, Day is in a race for his family's survival, while June seeks to avenge Metias's death. But in a shocking turn of events, the two uncover the truth of what has really brought them together, and the sinister lengths their country will go to keep its secrets.Full of nonstop action, suspense, and romance, this novel is sure to move readers as much as it thrills.

This book started out kind of confusing. It took me a while to catch on that we were switching perspective between Day and June, and not that June was secretly Day. That made it very confusing when talking about Day as a boy, I kept expecting them to reveal him as a girl in disguise even after I had gotten the Day/June part straight. However, even with that confusion I really liked this book. I really got into the character of June, she sounded so realistic, and I felt for her as she started having doubts and liking Day. I didn’t identify as much with Day’s point of view, but I never identify with male characters as much as females. Day did provide some much-needed exposition, and his point of view as a poor criminal was needed to show the dystopia for what it was. I liked that Day had a female friend that didn’t have any romantic relationship with him and that June didn’t really care, either. In fact I think this book is worth reading for the character’s relationships. June and Day have a very healthy relationship built on each others’ strengths and supporting the other’s accomplishments. Although June suffers from no-parent syndrome (a common trope in YA literature) her older brother Metias seems to encourage her more than shelter her, and only keeps secrets from her that he was keeping from everyone else, too. Even June’s relationship withThomas shows that the dystopia Lu has built has a very realistic gender parity, and although Thomas is power hungry and his attempt at a relationship is not good or healthy it is colored by the power differential of status, not gender. I did feel that although this aspect of the worldbuilding of Los Angeles was interesting the rest of the world seemed sparing, as if Lu only invented what she needed, but that could be because the book concentrated on characters and not place, or because to reveal to much is to spoil the future. Either way, I can forgive and I will be placing the sequel on my must be read list!

Tortall and Other Lands by Tamora Pierce

2012-02-13T09:38:00.001-05:00

Collected here for the first time are all of the tales from the land of Tortall, featuring both previously unknown characters as well as old friends. Filling some gaps of time and interest, these stories, some of which have been published before, will lead Tammy's fans, and new readers into one of the most intricately constructed worlds of modern fantasy.

This anthology of short stories by my most favorite author ever, Tamora Pierce, came out early in 2011. With the Hugo awards coming up I wanted to be sure and review it because I will be nominating one of the stories for an award and I think other people should consider the stories when making their nomination choices.Student of Ostriches: To be honest this story wasn’t one of my favorites, but I think that is because it is a reprinting of a story included in the Young Warriors anthology so I have had a few years to read and absorb it. I like the idea of following a female trying to become a Shang warrior, though, and it gives me hope that some day Pierce will write a set of books based on a girl (or even a boy) training to become Shang.Elder Brother: This is the most intriguing story in the book. When Numair turns the rogue sorcerer Tristan into a tree in Wolf-Speaker he said that the rebound of the spell was that somewhere a tree turned into a man. Qiomis that tree. This story is the sad, funny, emotional tale of his first days learning to live not as a tree but as a man. It also introduces the harsh muslim-like culture that will feature in Hidden Girl.The Hidden Girl: A story of a girl traveling with her preacher father and her attempts to educate women in religion just like her father educates her, and to take his place after he dies. This is a very interesting story to compare with current events in the Middle East and the efforts of women there.Nawat: This is the story of Nawat Crow, the bird who took human shape for the love of a girl, and a story about that girl. Nawat and Aly have gotten married, you see, and Aly is about to have children. Told with Nawat’s voice, the story illustrates how difficult it was for the crows-turned-human to integrate their crow society into human society and how their animal instincts still cause them to do animal things like Nawat’s nesting and pestering of Aly before she gives birth. After the children are born Nawat is faced with a horrible choice, and the result is heart-rending no matter how you look at it. I will be nominating this story for a Hugo.The Dragon's Tale: This was one of my favorite stories in the book. It is hard to remember that Kitten, Daine’s baby dragon companion, is a sentient being that just cannot communicate vocally yet. This story took Kit’s voice, which Pierce crafted as delightfully shrewd and yet playful, just the personality a baby dragon should have. I loved watching Kit work out how to accomplish her task, and although the end ing was a little deus-ex-machina it left me smiling.Lost: This is the story of a girl with a gift for math. I liked how Pierce used the Tusiane society to parallel some of the things that girls face nowadays when they decide to put serious study into the maths and sciences. The introduction of new Darkings is also a delight as always.Time of Proving: This story shows a great logic fallacy that I’ve always found funny: why does a rampaging dragon want virgin sacrifices anyway? In a funny story about a cloth merchant Pierce explores this common fairy tale trope with a fun new twist.Plain Magic: I loved the premise of this story: who in the world thought that dragons needed a virgin sacrifice, and how stupid is that? Tonya is a great girl, and in the tradition of Pierce’s female leads she knows what she wants and figures out how to get things out of the way so she can have it. The old peddler, Lindri, also had me smiling with her practical manner and her kind demeanor.Mimic: I thought this was one of the few so-so stories in the book. Perhaps that is because I didn’t really have a clear indication of where the book was set. It seemed to be in Tortall, but the dragons didn’t work in the same way, which confused me the whole way through the story (I had almost convinced myself that Mimic was a basilisk). It didn’t end badly, but my confusion left me feeling less than favorably about it.Huntress: I downright disliked this story. The premise was nice: a scholarship teen tries to fit in with her rich private school classmates and is saved from bullies by the goddess her family worships. The way it worked, though, with kids killing homeless people and the goddess killing them in turn, seemed really unnecessary. It was too violent for my liking.Testing: I’ve met Tamora Pierce. She is very short, very soft-spoken, and yet has very strong opinions and looks like she can be tough-as-nails when she needs to be. She reminds me very much of my grandmother who was also short, soft-spoken, and yet willing to wrestle a 3’ snapping turtle when necessary (yes, there’s video). This made the story Testing a lot more interesting to me. I could imagine the reactions to the mischiefs of the girls and see the twinkle in Pierce’s eye as she got them to come around. In all this book was great. I love seeing Pierce’s craft applied to shorter snippets of work. I also really liked getting some stories in a male voice, something I think Pierce does well but has been scarce in her book series. As I said above I was absolutely delighted with Nawat and I think it is one of the best stories to come out this year. I suggest this book to anyone who is a fan of Pierce’s work or to someone who has heard of her and wants to taste her writing style.

all these things i’ve done by Gabrielle Zevin

2012-02-08T19:07:00.000-05:00

In 2083, chocolate and coffee are illegal, paper is hard to find, water is carefully rationed, and New York City is rife with crime and poverty. And yet, for Anya Balanchine, the sixteen-year-old daughter of the city's most notorious (and dead) crime boss, life is fairly routine. It consists of going to school, taking care of her siblings and her dying grandmother, trying to avoid falling in love with the new assistant D.A.'s son, and avoiding her loser ex-boyfriend. That is until her ex is accidently poisoned by the chocolate her family manufactures and the police think she's to blame. Suddenly, Anya finds herself thrust unwillingly into the spotlight--at school, in the news, and most importantly, within her mafia family.Engrossing and suspenseful, All These Things I've Done is an utterly unique, unputdownable read that blends both the familiar and the fantastic.

Throughout the book I identified most not with Anya, but with Scarlett. I like how she’s a loyal friend and is present throughout the book, not just as the plot needs her. That doesn’t mean that Anya is a bad character, though. On the contrary, she is smart and crafty, always thinking five steps ahead of everyone else and never giving in to impulse. I think this is why I didn’t identify with her as much as Scarlett because Anya seems to have super-human restraint, something that I don’t care for much. However, I like how Win is Anya’s only weakness, which makes her seem at least a little more human, and how he tries to win her over in a way that is not stalker-y or threatening but is sweet, patient, and normal for a teenage boy. I also like how he in the beginning he is willing to give up if that is what Anya wants, showing that Anya is not the beginning and end of his whole existence but just someone cool he would like to hang around with. The plot of the book is rather difficult to deal with. Anya lives in an apartment with her ailing grandmother, a mentally injured older brother, and a twelve year old sister. Add in the common YA trope that her parents are dead this makes Anya a wise-beyond-her-years teenager as well as caretaker of her family. I find it a little unrealistic, though. If Anya’s father was the mob leader and her grandmother is the mother of the current mob boss I don’t think the mob would leave the family alone as much as the Balanchines ignore Anya. It’s intimated many times that Anya’s maturity means she would be a much better mob boss, and I wish Zevin had explored this a little more in the book. Perhaps she’s saving it for a sequel. If she is I’ll be buying.This review was of an ARC I got through a YA blogger trade. I received no compensation for this review.

The Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan

2012-02-05T16:10:00.000-05:00

Seven half-bloods shall answer the call,To storm or fire the world must fall.An oath to keep with a final breath,And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death.Percy is confused. When he awoke from his long sleep, he didn't know much more than his name. His brain fuzz is lingering, even after the wolf Lupa tol him he is a demigod and trained him to fight with the pen/sword in his pocket. Somehow Percy manages to make it to a camp for half-bloods, despite the fact that he has to keep killing monsters along the way. But the camp doesn't ring and bells with him. The only thing he can recall from his past is another name: AnnabethHazel is supposed to be dead. When she lived before, she didn't do a very good job of it. Sure, she was an obedient daughter, even when her mother was possessed by greed. But that was the problem - when the Voice took over he mother and commanded Hazel to use her "gift" for and evil purpose, Hazel couldn't say no. Now because of her mistake, the future of the world is at risk. Hazel wished she could ride away from it all on the stallion that appears in her dreams.Frank is a klutz. His grandmother says he is descended from heroes and can be anything he wants to be, but he doesn't see it. He doesn't even know who his father is. He keeps hoping Apollo will claim him, because the only thing he is good at is archery - although not good enough to win camp war games. His bulky physique makes him feel like an ox, especially infront of Hazel, his closest friend at camp. He trusts her completely - enough to share the secret he holds close to his heart.Beginning at the "other" camp for half-bloods and extending as far as the land beyond the gods, this breathtaking second installment of the Heroes od Olympus series introduces new demigods, revives fearsome monsters, and features other remarkable creatures, all destined to play a part in the Prophesy of Seven.

This book marks the triumphant return of Percy Jackson to Rick Riordan’s books. Honestly, though, I think I’d rather have left him at the last series. While The Lost Hero had some life injected into it by the introduction of a new main character The Son of Neptune seemed to just be rehashing the same story from its previous book. I know that Percy is supposed to parallel Jason’s experiences at Camp Half Blood I think it would have made for a much better story if there was one book switching back and forth between the two perspectives rather than two books that read so alike. It is also a little disappointing that Jason’s friends parallel Percy’s: a token girl who has a fighting skill but is mostly a thinker who will provide exposition and keep Percy out of trouble, and a clumsy companion who will put Percy in trouble by bumbling into it. I really would have liked to see a more different set of companions to make the stories less obviously alike, especially since Greek and Roman mythology seem to mash together in most Westerner’s minds nowadays anyway. Putting my issues of parallelism beside, though, the book wasn’t bad. It was classic Rick Riordan book full of adventure and excitement that hides a good lesson in classical literature, history, and ancient religions. The characters develop in ways that readers can identify with them, and Riordan is good at writing a despair of loneliness into Percy. The plot once again centers on the character’s knowledge of mythology and clever problem solving as it does their brute force, and it has a fast pace that keeps things moving quickly past the expositional- and teachy-bits. In all, I think if you loved the Percy Jackson series you’re probably already reading this series, and if you were only so-so on the series you should skip over to Riordan’s Egyptology series instead of investing in this one because you will get a new and exciting world to play in.

Dark of the Moon by Tracy Barrett

2012-02-03T09:34:00.000-05:00

Ariadne is destined to become a goddess of the moon. She leads a lonely life, filled with hours of rigorous training by stern priestesses. Her former friends no longer dare to look at her, much less speak to her. All that she has left are her mother and her beloved, misshapen brother Asterion, who must be held captive below the palace for his own safety.So when a ship arrives one spring day, bearing a tribute of slaves from Athens, Ariadne sneaks out to meet it. These newcomers don’t know the ways of Krete; perhaps they won’t be afraid of a girl who will someday be a powerful goddess. And indeed she meets Theseus, the son of the king of Athens. Ariadne finds herself drawn to the newcomer, and soon they form a friendship—one that could perhaps become something more.Yet Theseus is doomed to die as an offering to the Minotaur, that monster beneath the palace—unless he can kill the beast first. And that "monster" is Ariadne’s brother . . .

This retelling of Theseus and the Minotaur in the Labyrinth is an interesting take on bringing the story to life. Theseus is the life of this book. I liked the description of how he came to meet his father and how the court twists his tale into a great heroic adventure. The need to get rid of him is also well done, and his character follows logically as someone who is more analytical then physical. Ariadne is an interesting character. Her longing for and yet fear of her future creates an interesting duplicity that helps to bring the character to life. Barrett well portrays her solitary position in the palace and why she might go looking for companionship amongst slaves. I really liked how Ariadne and Theseus don’t have a romantic relationship, as it made it easier for me to like Theseus since I knew that he ends up marrying Ariadne’s sister. Ariadne’s mother, She-Who-is-Goddess, is well portrayed as a woman with much religious power as well as being a Queen of her lands. My major problem with this book, though, is this religion. Like many of the “moon goddess” religions it seems scantily sketched out, stale and yet full of holes that are explained by calling them “mysteries”. The religion is such a heavy plot driver in many points, so its shallowness can make the plot seem contrived and, in places, slow. In fact, I think this whole book reads rather slow, like a history rather than an adventure story. I don’t know how, but it needs more life injected into it. Perhaps it is that the adventurous roles in Barrett’s books are held by the lead men and I just don’t connect with the male characters enough to get the thrill and excitement. Or perhaps it is just that I need to stop reading Barrett’s books, as they clearly aren’t for me and this second try at her work had the same result.

New Hunger Games Trailer Y'all!!!

2012-02-02T15:20:00.001-05:00

Still gives me chills and makes me tear up! I can't wait!

Going Bovine by Libba Bray

2012-02-01T15:32:00.000-05:00

Can Cameron find what he’s looking for?All 16-year-old Cameron wants is to get through high school—and life in general—with a minimum of effort. It’s not a lot to ask. But that’s before he’s given some bad news: he’s sick and he’s going to die. Which totally sucks. Hope arrives in the winged form of Dulcie, a loopy punk angel/possible hallucination with a bad sugar habit. She tells Cam there is a cure—if he’s willing to go in search of it. With the help of a death-obsessed, video-gaming dwarf and a yard gnome, Cam sets off on the mother of all road trips through a twisted America into the heart of what matters most.

In a book less dark than her X series, Libba Bray creates a psychologically deep book that is also a very entertaining read. Going Bovine is full of the fantastic: a fairy/angel character as well as a talking yard gnome, and yet it could also be read as an entirely realistic contemporary fiction book. All these doubts in what is going on center around the narrator, Cameron. Cameron is a normal boy when he starts getting hallucinations. He finds out he has a rare form of Mad Cow disease and sets off to find someone who can cure him before he dies. Cameron is an (understandably) driven character in the book, a kid who still has some sarcasm left in him but is also overcome at many times with fear and longing for a normal life. His “imaginary” friends Dulcie and Balder, are well developed as well and you feel they are along for the ride for a purpose and have good reason to help Cameron. The plot moves well, with a few slow spots for exposition but mostly moving along nicely thanks to Cameron’s drive and softened by his sense of humor. The ending, though, is amazing. It feels like you have been watching a semi truck come towards you for what seems like ages only to be hit from the side by a bus right as you’re bracing for the semi’s impact. And it is a hell of a bus, too. Bray has us questioning what of Cameron’s quest was real and what was fake, and does it really matter what the difference is in the end? This is a great stand-alone book that deserves a thorough reading.

The Fox Inheritance by Mary E. Pearson

2012-01-30T19:55:00.000-05:00

Once there were three. Three friends who loved each other—Jenna, Locke, and Kara. And after a terrible accident destroyed their bodies, their three minds were kept alive, spinning in a digital netherworld. Even in that disembodied nightmare, they were still together. At least at first. When Jenna disappeared, Locke and Kara had to go on without her. Decades passed, and then centuries.Two-hundred-and-sixty years later, they have been released at last. Given new, perfect bodies, Locke and Kara awaken to a world they know nothing about, where everyone they once knew and loved is long dead.Everyone except Jenna Fox.

This is a very interesting choice in a sequel to The Adoration of Jenna Fox. I like how it chose to follow Kara and Locke instead of Jenna again because I’m not sure I could handle more strife and conflict in Jenna’s life. I really felt at the end of The Adoration of Jenna Fox that she was getting the peace she deserved, and I like to go on thinking that. I like even more how Locke and Kara are such different people, both from each other and from the people they were before the accident and the download storage. Both of them have been stuck inside the data cubes for centuries, but it affected them in different ways. Locke comes out hungry for life, wanting to experience everything that he can now that he can feel and sense again. Kara, on the other hand, was changed by her cube experience by becoming angry and bitter, and she wants nothing more than revenge. The two characters are good as foils for each other and written in such a way that they are both believable; even when Kara has her most crazy moments you can understand and sympathize with her. The plot follows the world Pearson built in the previous book, and the plot twists and issues that Locke and Kara face are different from what Jenna experienced but still feel realistic and not contrived. Although Kara is the driving force in the book she’s not always present, which allows Locke to develop a voice all his own. In fact, this voice develops so far that it is hard to figure out some of the other characters because we see them through the lens of Locke and his perceptions, and this filter sometimes stilts the development of other characters in a way that Jenna didn’t have in the first book. Locke’s voice, however, is worth listening to, and you should stick it out for the surprise action-filled ending.

The Hourglass Door by Lisa Mangum

2012-01-25T10:55:00.000-05:00

His past. Her future. Can love bring them together in time?Abby's senior year of high school is textbook perfect: She has a handsome and attentive boyfriend, good friends, good grades, and plans to attend college next year. But when she meets Dante Alexander, a foreign-exchange student from Italy, her life suddenly takes a different turn. He's mysterious, and interesting, and unlike anyone she's ever met before. Abby can't deny the growing attraction she feels for him. Nor can she deny the unusual things that seem to happen when Dante is around. Time behaves differently when they are together - traveling too fast or too slow or sometimes seeming to stop altogether. When the band Zero Hour performs at the local hangout, Abby realizes that there's something dangerous about the lead singer, Zo, and his band mates, Tony and V. Oddly, the three of them are also from Italy and have a strange relationship to Dante. They also hold a bizarre influence over their audience when performing. And Abby's best friend, Valerie, is caught in their snare. Dante tells Abby the truth of his past: he once worked for Leonardo Da Vinci, helping to design and build a time machine. When Dante was falsely implicated as a traitor to his country, he was sent through the machine more than five hundred years into the future as punishment. As the past and the present collide, Abby learns that she holds a special power over the flow of time itself. She and Dante must stop Zo from opening the time machine's door and endangering everyone's future. More than one life is at stake and Abby's choice could change everything.

This book is one that I’m really regretting putting off. I’ve had it on my shelf for quite a while, but I never got around to picking it up. I’m glad I finally did, though, because it’s a great book and seems to be the launch of a great series. I think the best of it is the realism in Abby’s life. Abby is a typical teenager with a typical steady boyfriend and two typical parents who set typical rules and limitations for Abby’s life. I know I make it sound boring but it really is refreshing to find a teenager in a YA book who has to work around parents and rules as plot points instead of just staying out fighting bad guys or romancing cute guys until the sun comes up without any consequences. Abby also deals with the situations that face her in a very realistic way. She develops a friendship with Dante that develops into more because of their attraction. This means she has to deal with her steady boyfriend, and Abby accomplishes this with a maturity that is mature but still teenaged. It is these regular, typical situations that really characterize Abby, however, Mangum does an excellent job of using them to make Abby and Dante’s relationship seem exciting and exotic which really serves to enhance the characterization of Abby as she works through how to deal with the emotional situations she is put in. Although we see less of Dante I liked him as a character as well. He seemed to have solid motivations behind his actions even when Abby wasn’t aware of them herself. I’d also like to think that he truly tries to stay away from and protect Abby, which makes the “love of destiny” issues a little less creepy (although I think they are still rather problematic no matter how healthy the relationship is that results from it). The plot moves faster than in most romance stories, and the tension between Dante and the people out to get him make the story more than just infatuation turning to love. The time-travelling plot twists are a long time coming, but they do push this book over the edge into a fantasy-like science fiction, even though the science in the book is flimsy, and although there is a rational-but-tenuous explanation for the time travel the resulting method it happens in seems more like fantasy than science to me. I can take a little fantasy in my science fiction, however, and in all I think this book is worth a look by fans of a good time-travelling romance/mystery, and I’ll be rushing out to get the rest of the books to complete the series.This book was a free ARC provided to me through LibraryThing. I received no compensation for this review. Unfortunately I did not receive the sequels, so I will be going out to get them posthaste!

Liar’s Moon by Elizabeth C. Bunce

2012-01-24T06:21:00.000-05:00

Prisons, poisons, and passions combine in a gorgeously written fantasy noir.As a pickpocket, Digger expects to spend a night in jail every now and then. But she doesn't expect to find Lord Durrel Decath there as well--or to hear he's soon to be executed for killing his wife.Durrel once saved Digger's life, and when she goes free, she decides to use her skills as a thief, forger, and spy to return the favor. But each new clue only opens up new mysteries. Durrel's late wife had an illegal business on the wrong side of the civil war raging just outside the city gates. Digger keeps finding forbidden magic in places it has no reason to be.And for a thief in a town full of liars, sometimes it doesn't pay to know the truth.

Once again we are back with Digger, and her life keeps getting more and more interesting. Having left the Decath family she’s back in the capitol city surviving, stealing, and watching. As she spies on the city more and more bad things happen to her, and she once again entangles herself with the Decaths as Durrell is arrested for killing his wife and he asks Digger to prove his innocence. Thus begins a tale of adventure and intrigue that Digger has to unveil and put together. Although this book has a classic who-done-it plot, it doesn’t read as much like a mystery as Starcrossed did. Instead, Liar’s Moon seems a lot more like traditional medieval fantasy, with its Kings and Queens and plots against the throne and sorcerers and magic users who are fought by a populace afraid of magic and what it can do to them. Although she became a pretty solid figure in Starcrossed Digger develops more in this book, from a household maid figuring things out for her family to a full-on spy working alone to help her friend and her country. The sub-plot of magic users being reviled, condemned, and even murdered gives the non-magic users a little more power, and Digger exploits all of them to find out who the real murderer is. I can’t tell you much more of the plot without spoiling it, but suffice it to say that it will keep you reading the book long after you meant to stop for the day. I love how engrossing Bunce’s work can be, and I look forward to another Digger story soon because there are still many things left unexplained in Digger’s world, and plenty more trouble for Digger to get thrust into :D

Torn by Margaret Peterson Haddix

2012-01-23T18:31:00.002-05:00

Still reeling from their experiences in Roanoke in 1600, Jonah and Katherine arrive in 1611 only moments before a mutiny on Henry Hudson’s ship in the icy waters of James Bay. But things are messed up: they’ve lost the real John Hudson, and they find what seems to be the fabled Northwest Passage—even though they are pretty sure that that route doesn’t actually exist. Will this new version of history replace the real past? Is this the end of time as we know it? With more at stake than ever before, Jonah and Katherine struggle to unravel the mysteries of 1611 and the Hudson Passage...before everything they know is lost.

I love Haddix’s The Missing series. It’s awesome time travel with a liberal dash of historical biography. Add in characters that are written to be children but still connect with the reader and you have a great series. This latest book in the series doesn’t disappoint either. I like how it tells the tale of something more obscure than the first two travel stories. I had heard of the princes in the tower and Roanoke colony, but I had never known a boy was lost with Hudson. Jonah has a starring role in this story as he takes the place of John, and he develops as a character much as Katherine did in Missing. The plot is intriguing, and the fact that most of the story happens on one close boat makes it even more exciting because there’s not far for any of the characters to go or for Jonah and Katherine to maneuver around problems. The result is a tight, logical progression that has good character development and a great voice. Although the ending made it seem that the series could be over there are plans for more books, so I’ll let Jonah and Katherine enjoy their short rest before we have more educational history adventures.

The Demon Trapper’s Daughter / Forsaken by Jana Oliver

2012-01-22T00:40:00.002-05:00

Demon Trapper Riley Blackthorne just needs a chance to prove herself—and that’s exactly what Lucifer is counting on…It’s the year 2018, and with human society seriously disrupted by the economic upheavals of the previous decade, Lucifer has increased the number of demons in all major cities. Atlanta is no exception. Fortunately, humans are protected by Demon Trappers, who work to keep homes and streets safe from the things that go bump in the night. Seventeen-year-old Riley, only daughter of legendary Demon Trapper Paul Blackthorne, has always dreamed of following in her father’s footsteps. When she’s not keeping up with her homework or trying to manage her growing attraction to fellow Trapper apprentice, Simon, Riley’s out saving citizens from Grade One Hellspawn. Business as usual, really, for a demon-trapping teen. When a Grade Five Geo-Fiend crashes Riley’s routine assignment at a library, jeopardizing her life and her chosen livelihood, she realizes that she’s caught in the middle of a battle between Heaven and Hell.

I think I’m going to surprise a lot of people when I say that what I found in The Demon Trapper’s Daughter was a great love story. It’s not apparent on the surface. The story is about Riley Blackthorne and her adventures (and problems) fighting demons and trying to become the first female demon trapper. Riley is a typical sarcastic teenager, but Oliver writes the sarcasm and teen angst very well and it seems to be natural in both the dialogue and in the narration. Riley’s romantic interest in the book is Beck, her father’s apprentice demon hunter, but there is little room for romance because they are busy fighting demons and Beck is twice as sarcastic and guarded as Riley is. No, this is not the great love story I found. The love story is between Riley and her father, Paul. The touching relationship between the two is a well developed pairing of the parental relationship of independent older teenagers and their authority figures, and you can really tell that loyalty and love are the foundation of Riley and Paul’s lives. Riley’s drive to be a demon trapper like her father is a result of this “daddy’s girl” relationship is the impetus behind the entire plot, but it never seems stilted or flimsy because Oliver set up the parental relationship so well. Riley herself is a great character and it is through her eyes that we see the future of Atlanta. I really liked how the plot was very specific about the places Riley lived, worked, and existed in. I could pinpoint on a map where the battle with the level-five or the old hotel sat in the city. Of course you can skip over these fun details and still find an action-packed read full of demon fights and strife, so there really is a little bit of something for everyone in this book.

Goliath by Scott Westerfeld

2012-01-20T10:48:00.002-05:00

Alek and Deryn are on the last leg of their round-the-world quest to end World War I, reclaim Alek’s throne as prince of Austria, and finally fall in love. The first two objectives are complicated by the fact that their ship, the Leviathan, continues to detour farther away from the heart of the war (and crown). And the love thing would be a lot easier if Alek knew Deryn was a girl. (She has to pose as a boy in order to serve in the British Air Service.) And if they weren’t technically enemies.

The tension thickens as the Leviathan steams toward New York City with a homicidal lunatic on board: secrets suddenly unravel, characters reappear, and nothing is at it seems in this thunderous conclusion to Scott Westerfeld’s brilliant trilogy.

This was an excellent end to Westerfeld’s World War I alt-history steampun k trilogy. Based on the premise “what if Darwin had continued his studies and discovered genetics and genetic engineering?”, the series is set in a world where genetically mutated monsters fight battles with huge mechanical devices. In the midst of it all Deryn serves on a war-blimp whale, all the time hiding the fact that she’s a girl because only boys can serve in the war. Alek is the prince of a key mechanical nation, but he fled Austria after his parents were assassinated and he has now found asylum with the ship and Darwin’s granddaughter, a geneticist named Dr. Barlowe. This book is a great way to end a trilogy.

*****Spoilers*****

I like how Deryn’s gender secret is revealed to Alek towards the beginning of the book so that we can see the repercussions and reactions of Alek instead of at the end where we’re left to guess. The two characters develop a better relationship despite the plot twists of trying to stop the war before it destroys all of Europe. A really good part of these books are how both Deryn and Alek have strengths and weaknesses and the plot utilizes both of them to use their strengths to get out of hairy plot twists and to progress the story. Although the romantic relationship is a little immature, the characters are also immature so I thought it was rather realistic. The book’s only weak point is that Tesla is a rather odd choice for a villain, and I never thought his motivations for world domination were adequate to what he was doing. The book does include a lot of these early 19th century historical figures, and I found it fun and educational to see who popped up next. In all, a good book and a great end, and I’m very sad that there won’t be any more of these books, but I look forward to following Westerfeld on to an entirely new world.

Black Hole Sun by David Macinnis Gill

2012-01-19T12:25:00.004-05:00

Durango is playing the cards he was dealt. And it’s not a good hand.

He’s lost his family.

He’s lost his crew.

And he’s got the scars to prove it.

You don’t want to mess with Durango.

This classic sci-fi western book was a delight to find. Although it has some of the issues that are ingrained in its genre Black Hole Sun was still a breath of fresh air in the current sci-fi/romances and fantasy/romances. Durango is a great character, and I was surprised to find that I really identified with him even though I almost always identify with the female lead. Perhaps Mimi, Durango’s iPhone-in-his-head-voice has a lot to do with that. Mimi is delightfully sarcastic and has a distinct personality of her own, but it connects with Durango’s very well in a great friendly, motherly, mischievous way. The alien bad guys in the story, the Drau, are a mix of zombie and alien and seem to be something I have seen before until a plot twist at the very end of the book changes my mind. Speaking of plot, although this book falls into the trap that many of the classics of its genre have in that it is a very slow starter and the plot can drag until it gets to its main storyline. It does give us time to get to know his davos, including Vienne, a tough-as-nails second in command mercenary that nonetheless had a personality that made her a very rounded character that plays well off the humor of Fuse. I did find some things confusing, like the slang (a friend said it was Australian maybe?) and the charting of time and calculation of ages. Although I understand why the author did this I wished there was a little primer or exposition that would explain it better early in the book. In all, though, if you like sci-fi western/military like Firefly or Zoe’s Tale you would be delighted with this book. I will be picking up the sequel soon, and since the plot picks up where this book left off I have high hopes that it will be even better than this book.

Bumped by Megan McCafferty

2012-01-18T15:02:00.000-05:00

When a virus makes everyone over the age of eighteen infertile, would-be parents are forced to pay teen girls to conceive and give birth to their children, making teens the most prized members of society. Girls sport fake baby bumps and the school cafeteria stocks folic-acid infused food.

Sixteen-year-old identical twins Melody and Harmony were separated at birth and have never met until the day Harmony shows up on Melody’s doorstep. Until now, the twins have followed completely opposite paths. Melody has scored an enviable conception contract with a couple called the Jaydens. While they are searching for the perfect partner for Melody to bump with, she is fighting her attraction to her best friend Zen, who is way too short for the job.

Harmony has spent her whole life in Goodside, a religious community, preparing to be a wife and mother. She believes her calling is to bring Melody back to Goodside and convince her that pregging for profit is a sin. But Harmony has secrets of her own that she is running from.

When Melody is finally matched with the world-famous, genetically flawless Jondoe, both girls’ lives are changed forever. A case of mistaken identity takes them on a journey neither could have ever imagined, one that makes Melody and Harmony realize they have so much more than just DNA in common.

From New York Times bestselling author Megan McCafferty comes a strikingly original look at friendship, love, and sisterhood—in a future that is eerily believable.

Bumped is an interesting tale of a future society when people become infertile after their teenage years, and so teenagers are encouraged, and paid, to have children for older couples. It is told through the eyes of two teenagers, Melody and Harmony, who were separated at birth and adopted by two separate families. When they turned 16 they opened their birth records and found eachother. One is a contractual birth-mother waiting for a "male contributor" before having her first pregnancy, and the other is a spiritual girl awaiting a marriage that will allow her to have children before she is too old and becomes infertile. The two characters are very well crafted. Melody is a driven young woman who reminds me a lot of many teenagers today who are pushing to get into a great school: filling their lives with activities, creating and running school groups, hinging on grades and test scores and always being pushed by parents who want the best for them. Harmony seemed very believable as well, a religous girl who was raised by a close religious family who joined every facet of her life to religion and the missions behind it. The conflict of their intersections is a great twist, and gives very believable plot twists.

However, while I liked a lot of things about this book, I also felt there were a lot of missed opportunities and confusions. The turning points for both Melody and Harmony felt a little sudden, as if there should have been a bit more lead-up to their change of heart. While they were understandable given the backgrounds of the two girls I did feel that I wanted to see more indecision and confusion leading up to their change of heart to make it seem a little less sudden. I also felt that there were so many other angles that the author could have explored, such as the fact that girls can only have one paid pregnancy a year while boys can have hundreds, and thus have the potential to possibly get paid more due to their frequency or less due to their commonality, causing gender issues. There is also the issue of teenagers wanting to keep their baby, which is dealt with by drugging them but is only brushed slightly over in the third person as a disease rather than tackled head-on. While the issue of genetics comes up when Melody's contract is made due to her good genetics the only markers mentioned are height and beauty, leaving aside issues such as racial equality and access to income aside. Melody's large plot twist also hinges on a commodification issue that I won't spoil, but I will say I found problematic especially because it seemed to be brushed under the rug. The world created in Bumped is so rich I would have liked to see more about it and the darker sides of the issues it raised. Hopefully the author will have that chance in further books and will explore more about the problems created by having teenagers be the only fertile people in a society.

I received a copy of this book free through NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review. I have since purchased a copy for my personal library.

A Million Suns by Beth Revis

2012-01-18T10:54:00.001-05:00

Godspeed was fueled by lies. Now it is ruled by chaos.

It's been three months since Amy was unplugged. The life she always knew is over. And everywhere she looks, she sees the walls of the spaceship Godspeed. But there may just be hope: Elder has assumed leadership of the ship. He's finally free to enact his vision - no more Phydus, no more lies.

But when Elder discovers shocking news about the ship, he and Amy race to discover the truth behind life on Godspeed. They must work together to unlock a puzzle that was set in motion hundreds of years earlier, unable to fight the romance that's growing between them and the chaos that threatens to tear them apart.

In book two of the Across the Universe trilogy, New York Times bestselling author Beth Revis mesmerizes us again with a brilliantly crafted mystery filled with action, suspense, romance, and deep philosophical questions. And this time it all builds to one mind-bending conclusion: They have to get off this ship.

Poor Beth Revis. She fixed one physics problem by creating another one. In Across the Universe many science fiction fans were annoyed that Elder discovers that the ship has no engines therefore it is not moving (physics says it would be moving through intertia). Revis tries to fix that in this book but only succeeds in creating another physics problem:

*****Spoilers*****

The solution to the problem in A Million Suns is to put the ship in orbit around a planet. It’s considered “not moving”, but orbit is a form of moving: moving constantly around the planet in a constant freefall (a not-moving ship would fall and crash into the planet in a fiery ball of goo) as well as moving through space around a star (or stars) in its yearly orbit in order to have seasons. If the ship really is stationary then is it just lucky that the planet happened to be close by in its yearly orbit so that Elder and the people on the ship could see it and it was not on the other side of the sun where they wouldn’t have seen anything. They also would be having a problem with having no engines to counter the gravitational pull of the planet. Then there’s also the trick of having the hatch where they expel bodies into space always face the stars so that no one who opens it knows the planet is there. The only real explanation is that the ship is in a synchronous rotation orbit, like our moon, where one side always faces the planet and the other side never faces it. That’s not the same as not moving, though.

*****End Spoilers*****

Just like Across the Universe, though, if you can forgive the physics flaw in the text then you are in for a treat of a book. Amy and Elder are further developed as Elder slips into an entropy of not being willing to lead the ship’s people and Amy tries to fight her depression of being stuck on the ship for the rest of her life without ever seeing her parents. The plot, centered around the inevitable chaos resulting from the populace’s loss of both phydus and effective leadership in one harsh blow. A saboteur and rabble rouser works to enflame the doubts and fears of the people of Godspeed, further driving them from peace. This tension in the plot makes this book seem to move a little faster than Across the Universe. I was pleasantly surprised at this because most middle books in a trilogy suffer from over-exposition and weak, slow plots that serve to drive towards the climax in the third book but don’t let the second stand on its own. I think that A Million Suns, though, could stand on its own if it was read without Across the Universe. Revis also didn’t lose her relaxed tone even through the most tense sections of the book, and the book retains just enough (but not too much) romance to develop Amy and Elder without turning the book into a romance set in space just like Space Opera at its best. A Million Suns is really worth reading and I encourage everyone to try it out.

Gone by Michael Grant

2012-01-14T11:48:00.004-05:00

In the blink of an eye. Everyone disappears. GONE.

Except for the young. Teens. Middle schoolers. Toddlers. But not one single adult. No teachers, no cops, no doctors, no parents. Just as suddenly, there are no phones, no internet, no television. No way to get help. And no way to figure out what's happened.

Hunger threatens. Bullies rule. A sinister creature lurks. Animals are mutating. And the teens themselves are changing, developing new talents—unimaginable, dangerous, deadly powers—that grow stronger by the day.

It's a terrifying new world. Sides are being chosen, a fight is shaping up. Townies against rich kids. Bullies against the weak. Powerful against powerless. And time is running out: On your birthday, you disappear just like everyone else...

This was another very difficult book for me. I’m not really good with books that seem to have a bleak ending where things can only get worse. This book totally starts out like that. There are children killing children with bats and guns, babies starving and dying, and a lack of resources and the knowledgeable people required to make more that doesn’t look good for the kids stuck in the FAYZ. I felt somewhat for Sam, and more for Astrid, but I don’t think I could let myself feel totally connected to them because I was afraid for them. The addition of a school full of psychotic teenagers was overkill in my opinion. I think enough of the trapped children would do horrible things after they lose authority and the people who love them that the Coates kids appeared as a contrivance to have an easy villain that Orc couldn’t be. I did like the initial results of the *poof*. The addition of a nuclear reactor was strange, it didn’t play much into the plot other than as a location just like any other. On one hand I like that (because the science behind the reactor not going nuclear as soon as there are no people to watch it is sound, at least for the short time), but I’m not sure I’m going to like having it around in the future as it decays and causes problems. The creation of the FAYZ is explained late in the book, and I’m not sure I am convinced with how it happened or what happens when people *poof*, and the explanation of how to avoid *poof* is very confusing to me, as is the closet light and the darkness force. I guess some of these things had to be left for the future books, but I’m not sure I believe that the society will go on far enough tobe worth 3 more books. I guess I will have to try the next one to find out, but I do it with trepidation.

Nightspell by Leah Cypess

2012-01-13T09:49:00.001-05:00

Here be ghosts, the maps said, and that was all.

In this haunted kingdom, ghosts linger—not just in the deepest forests or the darkest caverns, but alongside the living, as part of a twisted palace court that revels all night and sleeps through the daylight hours.

Darri's sister was trapped in this place of fear and shadows as a child. And now Darri has a chance to save her sister... if she agrees to a betrothal with the prince of the dead. But nothing is simple in this eerie kingdom—not her sister, who has changed beyond recognition; not her plan, which will be thrown off track almost at once; and not the undead prince, who seems more alive than anyone else.

In a court seething with the desire for vengeance, Darri holds the key to the balance between life and death. Can her warrior heart withstand the most wrenching choice of all?

Nightspell is a book about ghosts. Sorcerers in a country where everyone wanted the throne and assassination was a matter of course created a spell that allowed murdered people to come back as semi-corporeal beings in order to avenge their deaths. Although the idea was that they would avenge their deaths and thus move on, eliminating the rash of murders, instead people quickly exploited the spell in order to live forever and murder became not such a big deal since murdered people lived on. Cypess has fully fleshed out this world and spent a lot of time thinking about the consequences and unintended effects of her choices. The result is an eerie, rather uncomfortable place that made me want to move on and yet I had to keep reading in order to find out how Darri would save Callie and get out. And, speaking of, Darri is a strong character. She has a sense of self and loyalty but her regrets have turned her into an avenger herself, interested only in righting the wrong she committed when she let her father send Callie away to marry Prince Kestin. Callie starts out a little confusing, but I grew to really like and sympathize with her. Varis was a jerk, but he was a well written jerk, and much more understandable and sympathetic than Viserys Targaryen from A Game of Thrones (which, for some reason, my mind wouldn’t let me stop thinking of whenever he was in the picture). The plot is so full of twists that I feel I can’t talk much about it, other than saying that I really liked the ending and although I feel it should have turned out the other way I can really see why it turned out why it did and I agree that it’s much more in character, I am just wistful for the ‘what if’ that’s left unsaid. In fact, my only disappointment with this book is that it wasn’t a sequel to Cypess’ excellent first book. I’ll be sure to pick up anything she writes in the future and give it a try.

Crossed by Ally Condie

2012-01-10T15:26:00.002-05:00

In search of a future that may not exist and faced with the decision of who to share it with, Cassia journeys to the Outer Provinces in pursuit of Ky - taken by the Society to his certain death - only to find that he has escaped, leaving a series of clues in his wake.

Cassia's quest leads her to question much of what she holds dear, even as she finds glimmers of a different life across the border. But as Cassia nears resolve and certainty about her future with Ky, an invitation for rebellion, an unexpected betrayal, and a surprise visit from Xander - who may hold the key to the uprising and, still, to Cassia's heart - change the game once again. Nothing is as expected on the edge of Society, where crosses and double crosses make the path more twisted than ever.

***Spoiler Review***

Such high hopes for this book, and I don’t feel they were met. Don’t get me wrong, this wasn’t a bad book by any means. I just feel that it’s not worth its hype, and definitely not the next Hunger Games like it was marketed. This sequel to Matched turns Cassia from a potentially strong female lead with agency and a tendency to act for herself into a passive woman following the instructions of her love interest and the authorities around her. This is a huge character change for Cassia. Instead of manipulating the people and technologies around her to find out information like Matched, Cassia drifts around in work camps until she happens upon someone who knows of Ky. Instead of preparing food and water for her escape like Ky Cassia relies wholly on the unnamed boy and her stock of useless blue pills. When she finds Ky Cassia follows him and his goals, having made no plan for survival or her future further than “I will find my boyfriend”. Even when they get to the Rising Cassia goes along with what the Others tell her to do, and when they decide to send her back as a spy there is little emotional reaction. Combine this with a snail-like pace of plot as the group travels through a barren wasteland and you get a book that suffers from middle-trilogy syndrome as well as the character issues. I am so sad that the promise of Matched wasn’t met, and I will probably sadly pass on the third book in this series.

Speculative Fiction

2012-01-09T18:22:00.004-05:00

Really, when we talk about Sci-Fi and Fantasy we're talking about Speculative Fiction. Speculative fiction is the broad category of fiction books that are not set in a realistic world. Unlike contemporary fiction, which is set in the factual present, or historical fiction that is set in the factual past, Speculative Fiction (or spec-fic) deals with book settings that are not realistic in some manner. To relate to this blog, it covers both sci-fi and fantasy books.

So if spec-fic covers both sci-fi and fantasy how do we tell them apart? The difference is in how the non-realistic things are dealt with. In sci-fi all of that is dealt with by science. Ships fly at the speed of light because there are light-speed engines, strange-looking beings are aliens who look different because they evolved on a different planet, or people have greater-than-natural abilities due to genetic manipulation. Fantasy, on the other hand, doesn't have a scientific explanation for things. Things fly because someone wills them to, strange-looking beings are magical incarnations such as faeries or goblins, and people have greater-than-natural abilities because they're under a spell or gifted by a god.

...

So what are the types of sci-fi? Here's a list of the categories I'll be using in my tags, shamelessly stolen from Wikipedia:

Hard SF - this is what people usually think all of sci-fi is. It's books that have plots that concentrate on physics and other "hard sciences" and meticulous worldbuilding with plot twists that generally rely on scientific things or phenomenon.

Soft SF - books that concentrate on the "soft sciences" such as sociology and politics. Dystopians are Soft SF books that take sociology or psychology to the extremes.

Cyberpunk - plots that rotate around technological advances of cybernetics - where people and technology merge into one being.

Biopunk - focuses on sciences that manipulate the human body through genetic technology instead of technological implantation.

Steampunk - imagines that the past (usually Victorian Europe or US) had advanced technologies. Called "steam"punk because the technical innovations often run by steam power instead of batteries or the like. There are variations, like decopunk, arcanepunk, and enginepunk, but I'm not going to separate them out.

Time Travel - plots where people travel through time.

Alternate History - plots that imagine the past was different than it really was. Steampunk is a sub-set of Alt History.

Military Sci-Fi - concentrates on wars and soldiers in big battles with advanced technologies.

Superhuman - plots that have human characters that have unusual powers due to some scientific reason. Closely related (and often intertwined) to Cyberpunk and Biopunk.

Apocalyptic - deals with the end of the world, either right before and how humans deal with it or right after and how humanity tries to recover. Usually split into pre- (before the end of the world) and post- (after the end of the world). Differs from Dystopian in that nature caused the end of a society and a rise of a new (sometimes oppressive) one, not people or their actions.

Dystopian - deals with a society that exists based on the deprivation, oppression, or terror of the people in the society. The plot usually searches to overthrow this society.

Space Opera - tales that deal with life on other planets or space travel. Often has a heroic tale slant to the plot.

Space Western - A plot that takes the tropes of westerns (cowboys, shoot-em-ups, frontiers) and combines it with science-fiction tropes (space ships, interplanetary travel, space exploration).

Generation Ship - not often an entirely different sub-genre, but it's become a popular slice of space opera crossed with dystopian so I'm separating it out.

...

There are even more types of Fantasy than there are Science Fiction, but I'm not going to use all the variations on this blog. I don't feel there's a lot of need to show people the varieties of fantasy since it's readily embraced by YA readers. Here are the few I'll be using:

Urban Fantasy - modern people in modern settings encounter magic or the fantastic. Contains the Paranormal Romances so popular right now.

Hard Fantasy - where magic exists, but everything emulates worlds we know and is as realistic as possible (magic obeys laws of physics, etc.). This is a very difficult thing to describe, so I'll apply it sparingly.

High Fantasy - Heroes, sorcerers, intrigue, and a quest to resolve it all just like Tolkien.

Historical Fantasy - a historical setting, only with magic.

Mythic - retelling of myths, fairytales and/or folklore.

Mythical Creatures - technically a section of mythic, but there are so many of these today that I'm separating them out.

Superhero - people have magic powers for some reason.

I'll be working in the next few weeks to backdate all my old posts with these tags.

Halo by Alexandra Adornetto

2011-12-27T22:26:00.004-05:00

Three angels are sent down to bring good to the world: Gabriel, the warrior; Ivy, the healer; and Bethany, a teenage girl who is the least experienced of the trio. But she is the most human, and when she is romantically drawn to a mortal boy, the angels fear she will not be strong enough to save anyone—especially herself—from the Dark Forces.

Is love a great enough power against evil?

This was an incredibly difficult read. I will readily admit this was an impulse buy based on the amazing cover. Unfortunately the inside of the book just doesn’t measure up to it, or even to a mediocre cover. It falls into the all-too-common difficulty with angel books: angels are perfect beings with no emotions and no free will, and that makes personal conflict and inner turmoil a hard thing to introduce because, by definition, an angel experiencing those is a renunciation of everything they are. I know, I know, it’s my constant refrain with angel books and why I don’t like them. However there is much more wrong with this book than just a mischaracterization of a legendary being. The plot is so slow it’s pretty much non-existent until the last hundred pages. There are the bare bones of an angels-working-on-earth idea but it’s completely covered up by Bethany’s ultra-scary relationship with a mortal. As soon as Bethany falls in love the entire plot is about her obsessing, clinging, and whining over her ultra-love. The end of the book tries to redeem things with a battle scene between ultimate good and evil, but it falls very flat because the set-up is so scant. In all I would recommend that anyone who’s not a die-hard Twilight fan to pass on this book.

Mistwood by Leah Cypess

2011-12-27T20:54:00.003-05:00

The Shifter is an immortal creature bound by an ancient spell to protect the kings of Samorna. When the realm is peaceful, she retreats to the Mistwood. But when she is needed she always comes.

Isabel remembers nothing. Nothing before the prince rode into her forest to take her back to the castle. Nothing about who she is supposed to be, or the powers she is supposed to have.

Prince Rokan needs Isabel to be his Shifter. He needs her ability to shift to animal form, to wind, to mist. He needs her lethal speed and superhuman strength. And he needs her loyalty because without it, she may be his greatest threat.

Isabel knows that her prince is lying to her, but she can't help wanting to protect him from the dangers and intrigues of the court . . . until a deadly truth shatters the bond between them.

Now Isabel faces a choice that threatens her loyalty, her heart . . . and everything she thought she knew.

I feel so guilty that I put off this book as long as I did. It’s been on my shelf for at least a year but I never got around to it. I’m really glad I finally got around to it, though, because it was wonderful.

I loved Isabel. That is good because the plot is really the story of her, trying to figure out who she is, how the Shifter is supposed to act, and how she can navigate the new court when she knows that intrigues are all around her and smells lies coming from every corner, even from the prince she is supposed to protect. Her characterization is spot on, which is part of what makes the incredibly blended plot/character study work. The other characters are very layered as well. I like how Prince Rokan has a duty to his country and deep yearning to be a good king, but a rather blank slate when it comes to a plan because his father really taught him how NOT to be, not how to be a good king. Clarisse is also a very interesting person, although it would spoil you to tell you how. And, speaking of spoilers, the plot has many great twists and turns, and although they’re foreshadowed and set up very well they still totally surprised me when they came along. I love a book that keeps me surprised instead of telegraphing its twist from far away. All in all I thought this was an amazingly good read, and I will be going out to get the sequel tomorrow!

Witch Eyes by Scott Tracey

2011-12-26T23:20:00.005-05:00

Braden was born with witch eyes: the ability to see the world as it truly is: a blinding explosion of memories, darkness, and magic. The power enables Braden to see through spells and lies, but at the cost of horrible pain.

After a terrifying vision reveals imminent danger for the uncle who raised and instructed him, Braden retreats to Belle Dam, an old city divided by two feuding witch dynasties. As rival family heads Catherine Lansing and Jason Thorpe desperately try to use Braden's powers to unlock Belle Dam's secrets, Braden vows never to become their sacrificial pawn. But everything changes when Braden learns that Jason is his father--and Trey, the enigmatic guy he's falling for, is Catherine's son.

To stop an insidious dark magic from consuming the town, Braden must master his gift—and risk losing the one he loves.

This book was very good, worth reading for the great characterization and a creative fantasy retelling of a familiar plot. Braden is wonderful. I love that the book starts with an out teenager, because so many stories of LGBT teenagers are stories of discovery. Not that discovery is bad, but I know there are gay teenagers that have known they were gay since before puberty, and it’s good to have diverse characters to let people know about the many facets of gay life. However, Braden is much more than just his sexuality. He’s a powerful witch, a trusting (or gullible) young man, a teenager in love, a little rash and impulsive but creative in his on-the-spot problem solving which serves to help him out of most problems. His powers are multi-faceted as well, having a great advantage but also causing Braden debilitating pain and even loss of consciousness when he uses them too much. It’s always good to have checks and balances on the uber-powerful character, and I just really don’t see “morality” as enough of one. Not that Braden isn’t normal, but the disadvantage adds another facet that rounds out the story well.

And it is a great story. Tracey plays well on and around the traditional theme of Romeo and Juliet, weaving in a homosexual love story that also has action and adventure. The beginning did slow a little bit, but after the first chapter-ish things really get going and you quickly forget the start issues. I recommend this book to fantasy fans that are looking for some good action and an intriguing tale with a fresh take on magic.

Life and the Future

2011-12-15T11:20:00.001-05:00

Sorry for the silence the last few weeks, I got hit by a major case of life from many different directions. I'll be trying to post two reviews a day to catch up to the books I've read this year before it's next year. I've also got my annual top 10 posts coming at the end of the month as well as a connected giveaway, and I'm working on a ridonkulous Hunger Games Movie post, so there's going to be a lot of traffic for the rest of the month.

Also, I've been thinking a lot about this blog and what I want to change about it. I've always thought of this as a blog about reading YA fiction from an adult perspective. I think that YA has a lot of good books in it that should be read and enjoyed by adults, and I want to promote them so that adult sf/f fans can find good reads that will be engaging and interesting. I don't think I've made that point very clear on the blog, however, so I'm trying to figure out ways to change that.

I think I'm going to start with tags. I'm going to add an "adult recommended" as well as an "adult not recommended" and a "potential top 10" tag. I'm also going to try to categorize more books. Right now YA sci-fi especially is a categorical swamp of confusion. YA will not label a book sci-fi upon pain of death, so there are a lot of books that are only barely or not-at-all dystopian that get that label to avoid the dreaded "science" label. Adults, though, aren't as afraid of the label and, as fans of sf, they know the categories of sf and what they like. So I'll be trying to add breakdown tags that split sf into its subcategories and help fans to see that there is a large variety of sci-fi available in YA fiction, and maybe educate current YA fans in the process so they understand the different kinds of sci-fi and get a better understanding of the genre. I'll probably do the same for fantasy. I'll also be posting some educational stuff after the new year so that people who don't know the types of sci-fi can learn how all the new area tags describe a book's plot.

I'm also toying with posts about upcoming fiction so you can keep up with new releases and preorders, or some more interactive discussion posts to engage discussion on facets of books, book fandom, and reading styles. I don't know what I will have time for, though, so I'm still only in the thinking phase on this because I don't want to overload myself right away.

Finally, I want to know what you think? Do you like these ideas? Hate them? Know of a current book meme or posting style that you would like to see here? I'm open to suggestions, so feel free to comment with what you like or hate about this blog.

The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson

2011-12-15T10:18:00.001-05:00

Who is Jenna Fox? Seventeen-year-old Jenna has been told that is her name. She has just awoken from a coma, they tell her, and she is still recovering from a terrible accident in which she was involved a year ago. But what happened before that? Jenna doesn't remember her life. Or does she? And are the memories really hers?

This fascinating novel represents a stunning new direction for acclaimed author Mary Pearson. Set in a near future America, it takes readers on an unforgettable journey through questions of bio-medical ethics and the nature of humanity. Mary Pearson's vividly drawn characters and masterful writing soar to a new level of sophistication.

This was a very difficult but absorbing and rewarding book. The plot is great, and, while I won’t give away the plot twists, I will admit that I saw some of them coming but not nearly as far as I usually would. To me this made the book the story of the journey I knew was coming, and how the characters arrive at the conclusions I had guessed was just as good as the twists being a surprise. The difficulty comes in the heavy source material: how do we determine that a person is worth life-saving medical interventions, especially when the public finances it? How much of their “original” body parts does a person have to lose before they’re no longer a person? Just how far should we go to save a life, even if we’re not sure that the outcome will be the same as us? What if those same lifesaving procedures could be used to prolong the life expectancy? How about if they double it? Triple it? Where is the point where you stop saving lives and start making “sins against nature”? I think the book deals with all these problems in a very open way, doing little to dictate and much more to provoke the reader into deciding for their self. The characters are well constructed, and the growth of Jenna’s emotions and her cognitive reasoning as she recovers from her accident and discovers more about herself is beautiful and seems as true-to-life as science fiction can be. The whole is an engaging read that will peak the interest of many readers, and after I finished the book I had to go out and get the sequel immediately. In all, a highly recommended read.

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

2011-11-29T09:06:00.004-05:00

Juliette hasn't touched anyone in exactly 264 days.

The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette's touch is fatal. As long as she doesn't hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don't fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color.

The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war-- and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she's exactly what they need right now.

Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior.

In this electrifying debut, Tahereh Mafi presents a world as riveting as The Hunger Games and a superhero story as thrilling as The X-Men. Full of pulse-pounding romance, intoxicating villainy, and high-stakes choices, Shatter Me is a fresh and original dystopian novel—with a paranormal twist—that will leave readers anxiously awaiting its sequel.

This new release has shot to my shortlist of best books released this year. I loved the plot, the characters, and everything about it. Juliette is a broken girl, but that is to be expected when she’s been in jail for 2 years and had no human contact for almost 1. I like that she still has agency and pushes to overcome doubts that she was born wrong. I think that, in her position, it would be very easy to give in to depression and despair, and although she brushes those she always manages to pull herself back enough to keep on going. The plot in this book is great, surprising but it has a flow to it that seems very natural and makes you want to keep reading. The romance is especially good. The two characters seem to support each other while still being independent and making choices jointly. Even though he’s stronger the boy never overpowers Juliette, instead they both recognize the strengths and weaknesses of themselves and their partner and work together to utilize them to get themselves out of bad situations. The very end seemed a little forced or not well set up in the former parts of the book, but since I think it is a setup for future books I will forgive it.

Mastiff by Tamora Pierce

2011-11-28T10:02:00.003-05:00

The Legend of Beka Cooper gives Tamora Pierce's fans exactly what they want—a smart and savvy heroine making a name for herself on the mean streets of Tortall's Lower City—while offering plenty of appeal for new readers as well.

Beka and her friends will face their greatest and most important challenge ever when the young heir to the kingdom vanishes. They will be sent out of Corus on a trail that appears and disappears, following a twisting road throughout Tortall. It will be her greatest Hunt—if she can survive the very powerful people who do not want her to succeed in her goal.

This has been a hard review to write. I’ve been sitting on a review for Tortall and Other Lands for even longer. Mostly because any Tamora Pierce book is, in my opinion, the pinnacle of enjoyment. You can see on my post of Books I am Thankful For that I wax poetic on Wild Magic, my first exposure to the author. Really, though, I love all her books and I would be hard pressed to pick a favorite. I own multiple copies and re-read at least one series a year, finishing all of them about every 3 years so I can start over. As you can tell, I have a serious soft spot for the author, and showed up at the bookstore at 10 am to pick up my book.

Trying to put my prejudice aside, however, I will say that I thought this was a good book. I remember when I first started with Terrier I was a bit put off by the first person journal style the book has, but by the third book it seems normal. I’m glad too, because this book was worth it. In fact, I’d say that this book functions as a good stand-alone as well as a great series ender. In fact, the book itself seems kinda like a trilogy. It is MASSIVE, you can feel all 600 pages when you pick up the book. However, don’t let that throw you off. Every page is packed with action and tension, and I never felt a lull or down spot. Pierce knows very well how to weave through action, clue-finding tension, and romance scenes to make them all seem fresh and integral to the plot. Beka is a great character, independent and career driven for a job she loves.

***Spoilers***

I know that a lot of people didn’t like a lot of things about this series. Beka’s abusive relationship is often questioned. I didn’t feel that was a bad thing, though, because SMART GIRLS GET IN ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIPS. In fact, because they’re smart they’re less used to asking for help so they let abuse go on far too long. I love this part of the series because it teaches a very valuable lesson to the people who have never educated themselves about abuse.

The other gripe I keep seeing is the ending. I felt that it was heartbreaking, but I thought it was well set up in the book. Beka kept noticing the status differences, so you know the couple did, too. And I believe that could eat on a person until they did something out of character to change it. Love makes people do crazy things, and the love in that relationship has been set up in the series so that I believe he would do something horrible to keep her close.

***End Spoilers***

Then again, I may be seeing the whole book through rose-colored glasses. But I think that’s ok. It gives me so much joy that I don’t care if I’m a little biased. And I think you should read it and let it give you joy too.

Gratitude Giveaway Winners!

2011-11-28T09:25:00.001-05:00

Thankfulness Giveaway!

The Thankfulness Giveaway ended yesterday, and this morning I chose two winners.

Congratulations:

Hannah Lorraine
and
Megan Kyser!!!

Your emails have been sent, look for them soon!

And, since we blew past 150, 200, and 250 followers I'm planning a massive giveaway soon. It won't be until next week, though, I need a little down time :D

RIP Anne McCaffrey

2011-11-22T18:10:00.001-05:00

Tor and other sources are reporting that Anne McCaffrey died yesterday (Monday). After I graduated high school I found her Acorna series. It was the first series I can remember waiting on books to be published for (before that I only had access to older stuff, so it was waiting on the library to get it in instead). She also wrote the incomparable Pern series, which made her the first woman to win a Hugo and the first woman to win a Nebula award. She's also won a Heinlein award, been named a SFWA Grand Master, and been inducted in to the SF Hall of Fame. She will be missed, but her great works will live on.

Hourglass by Myra McEntire

2011-11-22T16:06:00.001-05:00

One hour to rewrite the past . . .

For seventeen-year-old Emerson Cole, life is about seeing what isn’t there: swooning Southern Belles; soldiers long forgotten; a haunting jazz trio that vanishes in an instant. Plagued by phantoms since her parents’ death, she just wants the apparitions to stop so she can be normal. She’s tried everything, but the visions keep coming back.

So when her well-meaning brother brings in a consultant from a secretive organization called the Hourglass, Emerson’s willing to try one last cure. But meeting Michael Weaver may not only change her future, it may change her past.

Who is this dark, mysterious, sympathetic guy, barely older than Emerson herself, who seems to believe every crazy word she says? Why does an electric charge seem to run through the room whenever he’s around? And why is he so insistent that he needs her help to prevent a death that never should have happened?

Full of atmosphere, mystery, and romance, Hourglass merges the very best of the paranormal and science-fiction genres in a seductive, remarkable young adult debut.

**Spoilers**

Although this book shows its origins as a first novel from McEntire overall I think it’s a win.. Emerson is a great character. I love how she’s snarky in the right way that teenagers are and how the author uses it as exposition and to lighten heavy tensions in the plot. However, I also feel that’s all I can really say about her, and “snarky” is not really a personality-defining trait. Michael, Kaleb, and Jack are even more undefined, making the romance angles rather puzzling to me (if I’m expected to fall in love with a boy, or accept that a heroine falls in love with a boy, I wanna know why, and “he’s pretty” just doesn’t cut it). I think the plot makes up for these shortcomings, though, and really makes the book worth reading. The pacing is good overall, even though there is a middle romance section that kinda drags a bit. I like the twist in the plot where the seeing ghosts turns in to time traveling, and I wish there was a little more explanation behind the science of time travel, but I also recognize that the general teen audience doesn’t feel the same way so I’ll give it a pass. The book concludes logically but leaves an opening for another book, so I’m looking forward to the sequel!

My Very Un-Fairy Tale Life by Anna Staniszewski

2011-11-18T03:11:00.003-05:00

"You know all those stories that claim fairies cry sparkle tears and elves travel by rainbow? They're lies. All lies."—Twelve-year-old Jenny has spent the last two years as an adventurer helping magical kingdoms around the universe. But it's a thankless job, leaving her no time for school or friends. She'd almost rather take a math test than rescue yet another magical creature! When Jenny is sent on yet another mission, she has a tough choice to make: quit and have her normal life back, or fulfill her promise and go into a battle she doesn't think she can win.

This is a cute book. It is perhaps a bit younger-directed than the books I usually read, being aimed at what I suspect is the 8-12 crowd. It’s not long, due to that, but it is a good story. Jenny is a great character, and she will be relatable to children and pre-teens. The fantastic setting is a great plot twist, with just enough explanation to things that it’s fantasy without making it too complicated. It’s a great author that knows just how much to explain the magical workings without going into so much detail that the reader is lost. The twists and turns on Jenny’s journey are wonderful, and the author has crafted an adventure that highlights the strengths and weaknesses of her lead without making her jump through too many hoops or do things that seem out of character or too overpowered. Her helper, Anthony, is a delightful character as well, with just enough sarcasm to lighten the tone when it’s needed. The villain is truly villainous, and what he lacks the magic council makes up for! In all, this is a delightful quick read, and I rather hope Jenny’s adventures become a series so I can read more about her and her world!

Liar by Justine Larbalestier

2011-11-17T01:42:00.003-05:00

Micah will freely admit that she’s a compulsive liar, but that may be the one honest thing she’ll ever tell you. Over the years she’s duped her classmates, her teachers, and even her parents, and she’s always managed to stay one step ahead of her lies. That is, until her boyfriend dies under brutal circumstances and her dishonesty begins to catch up with her. But is it possible to tell the truth when lying comes as naturally as breathing? Taking readers deep into the psyche of a young woman who will say just about anything to convince them—and herself—that she’s finally come clean, Liar is a bone-chilling thriller that will have readers see-sawing between truths and lies right up to the end. Honestly.

I think the best way to describe this book is “mystery”. From the first page to the last you’re not sure what you’re reading, and slightly uneasy that you don’t quite understand what’s going on, but the author puts that tension to work and keeps the reader guessing throughout the entire book. At first I wasn’t sure how I would react to having a liar as a narrator, but it doesn’t take long before you realize that Micah’s lies are part of the exposition and start to enjoy the game of guessing whether what’s being told to you is the full truth or not. Add in the major twist in the middle that makes this book solidly fantasy and the ending that makes the reader still unsure if anything they’ve read is true or false to Micah, and you’ve got a thoroughly entertaining read. It takes great skill to make a liar accessible and identifiable as a protagonist, and even more skill to make that person sympathetic, but Larbalestier accomplishes both brilliantly. The plot has predictable reveals of Micah “revising” her story, but the revisions are so different that they don’t seem formulaic or staid at all. If you don’t mind being a little uncomfortable I think you should try Liar, it packs a great payout.

Sirensong by Jenna Black

2011-11-15T23:42:00.005-05:00

When Dana is invited to Faerie to be officially presented at the Seelie Court, it’s no easy decision. After all, everyone knows Titania, the Seelie Queen, wants her dead. But Titania claims not to be the one behind the death threats; and her son, Prince Henry, makes the decision a whole lot easier when he suggests Dana might be arrested for (supposedly) conspiring with her aunt Grace to usurp the Seelie throne. So she and her father better do as they're told…

The journey through Faerie is long – and treacherous. Dana thought it would be a good idea to have friends along, but her sort-of-boyfriend, Ethan, and her bodyguard’s son, Keane, just can’t seem to get along, and Kimber’s crush on Keane isn’t making things any easier. When a violent attack separates Dana from their caravan, the sexy Erlking saves her just in the nick of time… and makes it clear that he hasn’t given up on making her his own.

Arriving at Titania’s beautiful palace should be a relief. But Dana is soon implicated in an assassination attempt against Titania’s granddaughter, and is suddenly a fugitive, forced to leave her father behind as she and her friends flee for their lives. Will she be able to prove her innocence before the forces of the Seelie Court – or, worse, the Erlking – catch up with her? And will she save her father before he pays the ultimate price in her stead?

Review of Previous Book in Series: Shadowspell

I was pretty upset with this series after the prior book. In fact, I debated quite a bit over whether or not I should even get this book. In the end I’m satisfied that I didn’t make a bad choice.

I’m not sure I would recommend the series to a new reader, but the third book didn’t have a lot of the problems of the second so it’s not a total loss. The biggest issue it still has is Dana’s forced into action by her father. Although Dana really doesn’t want to go to Faerie she’s really left with no choice, which grates on me because of all the other choices that have been taken from Dana in this series. The Ethan-Keane triangle is still rather annoying, although it does come to a conclusion which is nice (although I’m not sure I’d choose either boy with how they treat their love interest). The book has a lot more action, though, which is really a strong point. The plot moves a lot faster past agonizing emotional moments so they seem a lot less grating, and the fighting scenes are really well written and so vivid I can easily imagine what’s happening. The travelling/running/hiding parts, though, tend to drag and pull down what could be a really sparkling plot. Add in a healthy amount of issues with the Erlking still being a creepy, squick plot line and I’m a little glad the series is over.

Gratitude Giveaway!

2011-11-15T23:29:00.004-05:00

Thankfulness Giveaway!

For this giveaway I decided to give away some books I have that I just didn't love. I hope someone will be thankful to get them, and I will be thankful to see them get the love they deserve!

I will choose two winners and email them at the same time. First to respond gets first choice of books, second to respond gets choice of what's left. All books are read once by me and come from a non-smoking home.

+50 and +100 Followers Giveaway Winners!

2011-11-14T10:56:00.002-05:00

Winners have been chosen for my +50 and +100 Followers Giveaway!

I've emailed the winners! I've also hit 150 followers, but I've got another giveaway hop started this week (Gratitude Giveaways Hop) so I'm going to put off the +150 followers giveaway until December. Right now it's got 10 books in it, hopefully I can find a few more to add.

Scored by Lauren McLaughlin

2011-11-14T10:51:00.003-05:00

Set in the future when teenagers are monitored via camera and their recorded actions and confessions plugged into a computer program that determines their ability to succeed. All kids given a "score" that determines their future potential. This score has the ability to get kids into colleges, grant scholarships, or destroy all hope for the above. Scored's reluctant heroine is Imani, a girl whose high score is brought down when her best friend's score plummets. Where do you draw the line between doing what feels morally right and what can mean your future? Friendship, romance, loyalty, family, human connection and human value: all are questioned in this fresh and compelling dystopian novel set in the scarily forseeable future.

I really identified with this book. Or, more specifically, I really identified with Imani. Imani is a great character, and we have a lot in common: good students, considered “good kids” by the teachers and public, from a low-income family striving to give their kids a better life, and seeing nothing in the future but college and the promise of a better life that it holds. In Imani’s world, the better life is by working the “score” system that can get her a full ride into a good school. The problem is that although the company that runs the score publishes their parameters no one really understands how it ranks students or why some have high scores and some have low. Association, though, is apparently one of them because Imani falls from the low 90’s to the 60’s because her best friend, Cady (a 70) is dating an “unscored” (someone who has not submitted to the scoring system) , something completely unheard of for the scoring system and earning her a score in the 20’s. At the same time Imani is assigned a scholarship essay on how the score system is bad, and her research leads her to some unexpected places and associations. The plot is great, flowing from action to action with just enough rest that it feels well-paced and not breakneck-throttle. Imani is a great character, and like I said when I started, I saw a lot of my teenage self (and I imagine a lot of other high-school overachievers) in her. Her conflict between friendship and loyalty and the opportunity to better herself with the score system is so realistic it’s heartbreaking. I recommend this book to everyone who likes a good traditional 1984 and Brave New World –type dystopia.

Enclave by Anne Aguirre

2011-11-11T00:58:00.001-05:00

WELCOME TO THE APOCALYPSE

In Deuce’s world, people earn the right to a name only if they survive their first fifteen years. By that point, each unnamed ‘brat’ has trained into one of three groups–Breeders, Builders, or Hunters, identifiable by the number of scars they bear on their arms. Deuce has wanted to be a Huntress for as long as she can remember.

As a Huntress, her purpose is clear—to brave the dangerous tunnels outside the enclave and bring back meat to feed the group while evading ferocious monsters known as Freaks. She’s worked toward this goal her whole life, and nothing’s going to stop her, not even a beautiful, brooding Hunter named Fade. When the mysterious boy becomes her partner, Deuce’s troubles are just beginning.

Down below, deviation from the rules is punished swiftly and harshly, and Fade doesn’t like following orders. At first she thinks he’s crazy, but as death stalks their sanctuary, and it becomes clear the elders don’t always know best, Deuce wonders if Fade might be telling the truth. Her partner confuses her; she’s never known a boy like him before, as prone to touching her gently as using his knives with feral grace.

As Deuce’s perception shifts, so does the balance in the constant battle for survival. The mindless Freaks, once considered a threat only due to their sheer numbers, show signs of cunning and strategy… but the elders refuse to heed any warnings. Despite imminent disaster, the enclave puts their faith in strictures and sacrifice instead. No matter how she tries, Deuce cannot stem the dark tide that carries her far from the only world she’s ever known.

I loved this book a lot. I read it right after Divergent, and the similarities really jumped out at me. Deuce seemed a bit more real to me, though, and the threats in her world were more vivid, so this book holds a little more love. Deuce is such an active character, and her relationship with Fade is a really neat situation. It's refreshing to see that Aguirre has constructed a world where gender really doesn't matter and has no past patriarchy to undermine the equality ideal and yet allows characters to have romantic attachments as equals without destroying the worldbuilding. The plot is full of action and I liked how Aguirre describes things in a matter-of-fact manner that lends a little more voice to Deuce. The halfway twist is a great way of turning the plot around, and even though Fade's world is a little more boring and slower-paced than Deuce's I didn't really mind because I needed a break from all the piling-on of horror that I had in the first part and the promise of two more books makes me excuse some slowing down for worldbuilding and exposition that will be needed later. I anxiously await Outpost, too bad it's going to be almost a year!

Tiger’s Quest by Colleen Houck

2011-11-10T11:11:00.003-05:00

Back in Oregon, Kelsey tries to pick up the pieces of her life and push aside her feelings for Ren. But danger lurks around the corner, forcing her to return to India where she embarks on a second quest-this time with Ren's dark, bad-boy brother Kishan, who has also fallen prey to the Tiger's Curse. Fraught with danger, spellbinding dreams, and choices of the heart, TIGER'S QUEST brings the trio one step closer to breaking the spell that binds them.

I thought this book took a bad turn. Although I liked Tiger’s Curse this book took a totally different direction, especially at first. I almost gave up on the first third of the book. The story starts out where Tiger’s Curse left off, with Kelsey returning to Oregon and leaving Ren in India. However, her life in Oregon is far from normal. For her “service” to Ren she’s gifted with a full ride to a college she didn’t have to apply to, a house, an outlandish car, all expenses paid, credit cards in her name . . . and the list goes on. I admire that Kelsey tried to move on and date, but the choices are so obviously not for her that I have to wonder if there was any effort at all put into them. Li is so transparent as a plot point setup that I was more annoyed than anything. I really wish this whole section of the book had been put into a one-chapter prologue at best.

After Ren returns, spends time romancing Kelsey (something that annoys me because he insists he must do it for her benefit even though she doesn’t want it in a horrible case of ‘mansplainin’) and they get attacked and Kelsey escapes with Kishan while Ren is captured. While I like that Kelsey has adventures away from Ren, with Kishan the quest seemed like less of a partnership. It never seemed to be them working together, more that one of them was holding the other one back. At least it alternated so that one person wasn’t always hobbling the other. I’m still holding out hope for the series as a whole, however, and I’ll get the third book in hope that all the dramatic romantic dragging out is done with and we can get back to amazing adventures.

Carrier of the Mark by Leigh Fallon

2011-11-09T06:08:00.001-05:00

Their love was meant to be.

When Megan Rosenberg moves to Ireland, everything in her life seems to fall into place. After growing up in America, she's surprised to find herself feeling at home in her new school. She connects with a group of friends, and she is instantly drawn to darkly handsome Adam DeRÍs.

But Megan is about to discover that her feelings for Adam are tied to a fate that was sealed long ago—and that the passion and power that brought them together could be their ultimate destruction.

This book was so popular on Inkpop that Harper Collins published it. I think this is both a blessing and a curse. It’s going to sound like I hated this book, and I really didn’t. I thought there was a lot of potential and some great ideas. However, I do think that Harper Collins was a little afraid to mess with such a popular item that a large public had already seen, and I think it was a problem because the potential in this book was undeveloped. I feel like it needs one more time with a good editor to clean up some hanging threads, solidify character development, and tighten the direction of the plot. It still has a wonderful, indefinable spark that totally screams out *This is why I am popular!* but all writing can benefit from an edit by someone not engrossed by developing the work. That said, I loved Megan and her development. I totally felt what it was like to be a new girl in a new town trying to fit in when everyone there knew everything about everyone else. I liked her dad and how involved he was in her life. I felt that Adam could have used a little more work but he wasn’t entirely flat. His relationship with Megan was abrupt, I would have liked to see a few more scenes where they got to know each other instead of leaving their relationship totally up to destiny and the folly of teenage love at first sight. However it does make the plot with the druids more believable, I would try to break up that relationship too if I were an authority figure because it seems to be built on clouds and kitten laughs and nothing really solid and lasting. I do think, however, that this series is totally worth reading and I’ll be anxious to get the next book when it comes out.

Sweetly by Jackson Pearce

2011-11-08T09:11:00.001-05:00

SWEETLY is a modernization of Hansel and Gretel and a companion book to SISTERS RED.

Twelve years ago, Gretchen, her twin sister, and her brother went looking for a witch in the forest. They found something. Maybe it was a witch, maybe a monster, they aren’t sure—they were running too fast to tell. Either way, Gretchen’s twin sister was never seen again.

Years later, after being thrown out of their house, Gretchen and Ansel find themselves in Live Oak, South Carolina, a place on the verge of becoming a ghost town. They move in with Sophia Kelly, a young and beautiful chocolatier owner who opens not only her home, but her heart to Gretchen and Ansel.

Yet the witch isn’t gone—it’s here, lurking in the forests of Live Oak, preying on Live Oak girls every year after Sophia Kelly’s infamous chocolate festival. But Gretchen is determined to stop running from witches in the forest, and start fighting back. Alongside Samuel Reynolds, a boy as quick with a gun as he is a sarcastic remark, Gretchen digs deeper into the mystery of not only what the witch is, but how it chooses its victims. Yet the further she investigates, the more she finds herself wondering who the real monster is, and if love can be as deadly as it is beautiful.

Sweetly is a twisty retelling of Hansel and Gretel. Ansel and Gretchen, though, make much more sense than the children in the original story. Sweetly’s characters all jump off the page with life. In fact, a lot of the time I was torn because I knew that two characters were in conflict but I wanted them both to win so badly. I found it really great that each character had such clear and sympathetic motivations. I also really liked the idea of magic candy, and the descriptions of sweets were so vivid I wanted to go buy tons of chocolate every time I picked up this book! The plot was well paced; although I knew where the book was generally going it developed well along the way and provided so many good twists that by the end I was completely satisfied even though I had predicted some of the ending. The romances in the book are good, acting as sub-plots and yet moving along in realistic patterns. The few action scenes are great, however, I think that this really set this book apart from Sisters Red because the plot concentrated more on plot and character than action and battle. It was really great to see some variety from Pearce and know that although she can write an amazing ‘war’ book she can also do justice to slower-paced stories.

The Vespertine by Saundra Mitchell

2011-11-07T00:16:00.003-05:00

It’s the summer of 1889, and Amelia van den Broek is new to Baltimore and eager to take in all the pleasures the city has to offer. But her gaiety is interrupted by disturbing, dreamlike visions she has only at sunset—visions that offer glimpses of the future. Soon, friends and strangers alike call on Amelia to hear her prophecies. However, a forbidden romance with Nathaniel, an artist, threatens the new life Amelia is building in Baltimore. This enigmatic young man is keeping secrets of his own—still, Amelia finds herself irrepressibly drawn to him.

When one of her darkest visions comes to pass, Amelia’s world is thrown into chaos. And those around her begin to wonder if she’s not the seer of dark portents, but the cause.

I feel really sad about this book because it was beautiful and well written and yet I didn’t like it at all. I think it’s really a romance book with an emphasis on historical society and a small dash of paranormal, and romance and societal intrigues really don’t do it for me. It’s too bad, though, because the book deserves some love. Amelia is a character that draws you in and makes you want to understand her. She’s in a new place and experiencing society for the first time, and Mitchell does a great job of showing you life through her eyes and with her particular viewpoint to color the explanations. Zora is a perfect foil, adventurous enough to draw Amelia into some plot-twisting situations as well as encourage her romance. I didn’t like the two paramours, Nathaniel or Thomas, as much as I did the girls. They felt a little flat and the romances seemed based on fluff rather than a solid grounding of connection, however, Mitchell does provide a seeming that this is how romance is done in the world of 1889 society so it seems less realistic and more juvenile and sad. I was a little skeptical of the twist ending, it seemed a little too abrupt and manufactured, but the journey of the book was so good that I’m willing to excuse it. I just hope this book finds love with others, because it deserves some love but I just can’t give it.

50 and 100 Followers Giveaway

2011-11-07T00:13:00.002-05:00

The Spooktacular Hop gained me so many followers I'm doing my 50 and 100 Followers Giveaways together! And I'm only 2 people away from 150 followers, if I get two more by next Monday I'll add a whopping 10 books and start that giveaway right away, so tell your friends to friend me soon!

Here's what I'm giving away this week:

Rulez~

~Contest lasts until midnight EST on Nov 14th.
~I will email the winners on Nov 15 and they have 48 hours to reply or I may pick another winner.
~Contest is limited to US and Canada.
~I will randomly choose which winner gets which book.
~ARCs should not be sold. If I find out you sold an ARC I gave away as a prize I will ban you from any further contests. Even if I don't find out you will have very bad karma.

Misfit by Jon Skovron

2011-11-04T11:42:00.001-04:00

Jael has always felt like a freak. She’s never kissed a boy, she never knew her mom, and her dad’s always been superstrict—but that’s probably because her mom was a demon, which makes Jael half demon and most definitely not a normal sophomore girl. On her sixteenth birthday, a mysterious present unlocks her family’s dangerous history and Jael’s untapped potential. What was merely an embarrassing secret before becomes a terrifying reality. Jael must learn to master her demon side in order to take on a vindictive Duke of Hell while also dealing with a twisted priest, best-friend drama, and a spacey blond skater boy who may have hidden depths.
Author Jon Skovron takes on the dark side of human nature with his signature funny, heartfelt prose.

This was a pretty amazing book. I loved Jael’s voice, her characterization, and her development arc. It all seemed believable and genuine, and it also had some indefinable appeal that not only made me believe her as a character, but love her and want to see her succeed. The truth about Jael’s mother and uncle are revealed a bit at a time, and Skovron knows exactly how to reel in the reader with just enough information to keep them hooked. I also like the presentation of the Catholic Church as a multidimensional uber-being that doesn’t always know what every segment of itself is doing. The best part of the book, though, is Jael’s father. He is a great character, his motivations and actions are straightforward when you learn his secrets, and he is a great supporter of his daughter. It is very nice to see a healthy, close father-daughter relationship in YA today.

For Darkness Shows the Stars Cover Release

2011-11-03T16:39:00.002-04:00

I don't usually post new cover releases, but I can't wait on this book and I think the image is so gorgeous! Visit Diana Peterfreund's Blog for an excerpt from the book as well!

Cleopatra’s Moon by Vicky Alvear Shecter

2011-11-03T01:26:00.005-04:00

"The Luxe" meets the ancient world in the extraordinary story of Cleopatra's daughter. Selene has grown up in a palace on the Nile with her parents, Cleopatra & Mark Antony—the most brilliant, powerful rulers on earth. But the jealous Roman Emperor Octavianus wants Egypt for himself, & when war finally comes, Selene faces the loss of all she's ever loved. Forced to build a new life in Octavianus's household in Rome, she finds herself torn between two young men and two possible destinies—until she reaches out to claim her own. This stunning novel brings to life the personalities & passions of one of the greatest dramas in history, & offers a wonderful new heroine in Selene.

I know, I’m really stretching the idea of “fantasy” with this book. It’s really more of a fictional biography, but I’m gonna claim fantasy because there is one scene where Cleopatra Selene casts a spell and communes with a goddess.

I really liked this book. It cast the world of Ptolemaic Egypt in a new light for me and gave a new face to the legendary characters. Selene is a great character. I thought her determination and will were a great trait that she shared with her mother. At first I was a little surprised that she also didn’t share her mother’s legendary sexuality as a manipulation tool, but the book does a very good job at presenting Selene as not only adapting to survive but also rejecting the parts of her mother that she thinks led to her downfall. The romance in the book is barely there, but this is not a bad thing. Selene’s life is adventurous enough, and just staying alive takes up much of her time. The plot closely followed history, but it flowed very well and only seemed forced near the end where history took a strange turn that the author didn’t connect to the rest. That end was rather abrupt and out of character for Selene, and I feel it could have been better written so that it flowed better and fit the rest of the book. I forgive it, though, because it did make me happy about leaving her in a good place. In all I feel that this book is totally worth reading.

Books I am Thankful For

2011-11-03T00:10:00.003-04:00

Beth Revis is running an amazing giveaway. The prize is tons of books, and the entries are so inspiring! I know I'm supposed to write a post about the book I'm most thankful for, but I am thankful for three, so this is going to be a long entry :D

1. I am thankful for Over Sea Under Stone by Susan Cooper

My fourth grade teacher assigned this book in our English class, and my nine-year-old self was totally changed. It was a book I actually liked reading. I read ahead of the class. I re-read it. I couldn't put it down. I went on to read the rest of the series on my own. I learned to use the school library and checked out books for recreation. It started my life-long joy of reading, and I will always be thankful that it was assigned.

2. I am thankful for A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle

In the second semester of fifth grade we got assigned this book. It was my first Sci-Fi ever. I was totally floored to find that people could have scientific adventures, not just magical ones! Not only that, but it wasn't boys having all the fun, but there was a girl, and she was a girl like me with glasses and bad hair and a geeky brain that did math and not popular stuff! I think this is the first book that I totally identified with, and I think that was very important for me loving the genre as a whole.

3. I am thankful for Wild Magic by Tamora Pierce

If I had to pick just one book to be thankful for this would be it. In Elementary school I devoured my school's library, but I hadn't figured out genre much (and I had a very limited selection) so I read a lot of contemporary fiction and classic literature meant for children. In seventh grade, however, I moved not only to middle school but to an entirely different school in an entirely different state. They had this book and reading it changed my life. I didn't have a lot of friends in my new school, but I had books. I also had a role model. Daine was a fighter, she endured a lot of hardship and overcame problems and she was a girl! It didn't take me long to discover other girl-lead books like Pierce's Alanna and Sherwood Smith. I made a new friend over a joint love of this book, and we are best friends to this day (and still share books both good and bad). I also learned the agony of waiting for a series to come out because for the first time I had started a series that hadn't been completed by the author. I am now a lifetime fan of Tamora Pierce and her books have inspired me to endure my military career, push on through college, and entertained me when I needed a pick-me-up. I have multiple copies of all of her books because I can't stand the thought of not loaning them out to people who haven't read them, but it frightens me that I would not have them to read myself if I loaned them out (and now, thanks to a few great con visits I have the autographed set that WILL NOT BE TOUCHED because dude, books personalized to me by Tamora Pierce!). I don't think I would be the costuming, sci-fi movie watching, con organizing fandom girl I am today if it wasn't for this book. (No that's not me crying on my keyboard, it must be raining inside).

Mermaid: A Twist on the Classic Tale by Carolyn Turgeon

2011-11-02T00:22:00.003-04:00

The story of two very different women, one mortal, one mermaid, and the clash between worlds best kept apart... It is a cold day at the end of the world when a young woman, a princess in hiding, looks out across a Northern sea and sees something she could not have seen. It looks...it can't be. It looks like a mermaid's tail. And, as she looks more closely, she sees that the mermaid is dragging a drowning sailor in her arms. Because, only hours before, another princess, the daughter of the sea queen, has decided to risk everything and take a look at the world above the sea: the world of mortals. And there she finds a storm, a shipwreck, a sailor, and sets in train events which will change both women's worlds forever.

This book was an excellent retelling of the original Little Mermaid legend. It made both the princesses even more realistic and choosing between them even more heartbreaking. The plot follows the original story very closely event-wise, but it freshens up the tale by totally throwing the character motivations out the window and giving them new backstories, lives, and reasons for action. Margrethe is a wonderful role-model as a girl, a leader who loves her country and her people and strives to bring better to them, especially when she realizes the truth about the wars, her father, and her chosen prince. Lenia is more of the mermaid stereotype, falling fast in love and having fewer motivations, but watching her grow and flesh out into a real person as she learns the advantages and pitfalls of human society is a real joy. As a reader I couldn’t put the book down, yet I was dreading the ending because, knowing the story, I knew that both girls couldn’t end up with the prince. My heart was breaking right up until the end (I won’t tell you what happened after that, you’ll have to read the book to find out!).

Always a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough

2011-11-01T01:09:00.002-04:00

The adventures of Tam and Gabriel continue with more time travel, Talents, spy work, and of course, the evil Knights.

Since the gripping conclusion of Once A Witch, Tamsin Greene has been haunted by her grandmother's prophecy that she will soon be forced to make a crucial decision—one so terrible that it could harm her family forever. When she discovers that her enemy, Alistair Knight, went back in time to Victorian-era New York in order to destroy her family, Tamsin is forced to follow him into the past. Stranded all alone in the nineteenth century, Tamsin soon finds herself disguised as a lady's maid in the terrifying mansion of the evil Knight family, avoiding the watchful eye of the vicious matron, La Spider, and fending off the advances of Liam Knight. As time runs out, both families square off in a thrilling display of magic. And to her horror, Tamsin finally understands the nature of her fateful choice.

Review of previous book in series: Once a Witch

This is a great follow-up to a great book. Tamsin hasn’t changed much between stories, but her family sure has! Their reaction to her reveal of a talent is very logical and nicely presented in the frame of Tamsin’s sister, Rowena, and her wedding preparations. I love the development of Rowena and the reveal of her moral compass. It was totally believable and a nice touch that really made her a real person in my head. Tamsin’s powers develop, too, and I like how Tamsin discovers the boundaries and drawbacks to her ability while developing her own morality while using it. Gabriel is back as well, and he really turns into a boy I could like. He supports Tamsin and her quest without demanding to take over, and he’s there for her when she needs him without seeming like he’s charging to the rescue or has all the answers. I think the only characters I would have liked to see a bit more of are the villains. I never felt Alastair was fully fleshed out, and the other Knights aren’t really either in this book. Their motivation is clear, but rather flat and stereotypical. I really like the ending, though. It was bittersweet, but logical and it wrapped up the remaining mysteries nicely and in a reasonable manner. This series is highly recommended.

Giveaway Winners

2011-11-01T01:08:00.001-04:00

Wow, the Spooktacular Giveaway Hop blew my expectations out of the water! So many good contests, and so many of you who thought that my contest was worth entering! Thank you so much! I'm very excited to announce the winners!

Savanna Ucinski

and

Grace S.

your emails are on their way! I hope you like your prizes!

To everyone else, the giveaway completely blew away plans for a 50 follower and 100 follower giveaway, so starting Friday I'll be throwing one massive giveaway! I haven't chosen what I'll give away, but I promise it will be at least 4 books that I love and I hope you'll love too.

The Mephisto Covenant by Trinity Faegen

2011-10-28T11:57:00.004-04:00

Sasha is desperate to find out who murdered her father. When getting the answer means pledging her soul to Eryx, she unlocks a secret that puts her in grave danger—Sasha is Anabo, a daughter of Eve, and Eryx’s biggest threat.

A son of Hell, immortal, and bound to Earth forever, Jax looks for redemption in the Mephisto Covenant—God’s promise he will find peace in the love of an Anabo. After a thousand years, he’s finally found the girl he’s been searching for: Sasha.

With the threat of Eryx looming, Jax has to keep Sasha safe and win her over. But can he? Will Sasha love him and give up her mortal life?

This book didn’t really work for me. It was bugging me from the beginning. The first chapter is nearly all exposition of the lead male’s back story in a very read-out manner, and at the end of the chapter the lead male makes the lead female forget the whole story so we have to read it again in chapter 3. Chapter 2 is a similar exposition dump on the back story of the lead female. There is more of the same exposition stated again and again in the book whenever it comes up again. I can’t tell if the author is reveling in her own cleverness or thinks the reader needs to be told things seven times before they understand them, but it’s very annoying either way. Once you get past the complicated and unnecessarily tangled back plot the story is pretty straightforward and rather frightening. The girl is destined to fall in love with the guy because “he smelled her first”. She realizes she loves him after he punches a guy friend of hers for greeting her with a hug and a kiss on the cheek. His rages and attempts to control her behavior are 'only because he cares about her'. This is not the only issue I had with the book, though. I really couldn’t find an example of a healthy relationship in the whole thing. Even the relationships you think are stable end up being selfish and scarred. Add on the fact that the lead character is “without sin” and presented as perfection incarnate and the whole book really became rather blah. I’ll be passing on the sequel.

Tankborn by Karen Sandler

2011-10-26T23:06:00.001-04:00

Best friends Kayla and Mishalla know they will be separated for their Assignments. They are GENs, Genetically Engineered Non-humans, and in their strict caste system, GENs are at the bottom rung of society. GENs are gestated in a tank and sent to work as slaves as soon as they reach age fifteen.
When Kayla is Assigned to care for Zul Manel, the patriarch of a trueborn family, she finds secrets and surprises;not least of which is her unexpected friendship with Zul's great-grandson. Meanwhile, the children that Mishalla is Assigned to care for are being stolen in the middle of the night.
After weeks of toiling in their Assignments, mystifying circumstances enable Kayla and Mishalla to reunite. Together they hatch a plan to save the disappearing children. Yet can GENs really trust humans? Both girls must put their lives and hearts at risk to crack open a sinister conspiracy, revealing secrets no one is ready to face

I think this is the Young Adult book that the adult science fiction fans have been waiting for. Tankborn is not only an excellent science fiction dystopian, but it shares the hallmarks of classic science fiction: excellent worldbuilding, a scientific foundation, morality that leads to more questions than answers, and a plot that ties them all together. Sandler’s take on class warfare and the solutions to it are interesting as reflections to our modern issues. Her characterization of Kayla is sympathetic and believable. The world of Loka is incredibly detailed, and unlike a lot of modern dystopians, where you feel that the author is making up the world as they need it to advance the plot, with Sandler you get the feeling that there is so much more to Svarga than presented. The plot has great twists that come out of nowhere and yet still seem like reasonable follow-ups to the action that happened before them.

I’m a little more conflicted on the cover, though. While I really want to congratulate the publisher for putting a person of color on the cover, I can’t help but point out that the society in the book is pretty clearly Indian, and conflating African heritage with South-Central Asian is not really helping. People of color have distinct societies and heritages, and making them all a homogenous mish-mash because they’re “NOT WHITE” is part of the problem, not part of the solution.

Nonetheless, Tankborn is an excellent book, and should be considered for a Hugo next year for its appeal to readers of all ages.

Giveaway!

2011-10-24T10:44:00.005-04:00

For my second giveaway I decided to join the The Spooktacular Giveaway Hop is being hosted by Inspired Kathy at I Am a Reader, Not a Writer.

I am giving away two spooky autographed books!

Blood Magic by Tessa Gratton and Forever by Maggie Stiefvater!

I'm also trying out Rafflecopter on this giveaway. I really like it when I've entered contests in other blogs, and I hope you like it too. I will email the winners on Nov 1 and they have 48 hours to reply or I may pick another winner. And, finally, sorry guys, but this contest is limited to US and Canada. I'm still not up to figuring out international shipping.

Memento Nora by Angie Smibert

2011-10-20T00:31:00.002-04:00

Nora, the popular girl and happy consumer, witnesses a horrific bombing on a shopping trip with her mother. In Nora’s near-future world, terrorism is so commonplace that she can pop one little white pill to forget and go on like nothing ever happened. However, when Nora makes her first trip to a Therapeutic Forgetting Clinic, she learns what her mother, a frequent forgetter, has been frequently forgetting. Nora secretly spits out the pill and holds on to her memories. The memory of the bombing as well as her mother’s secret and her budding awareness of the world outside her little clique make it increasingly difficult for Nora to cope. She turns to two new friends, each with their own reasons to remember, and together they share their experiences with their classmates through an underground comic. They soon learn, though, they can’t get away with remembering.

What happens if people can choose to forget traumatic memories? This book starts with a great premise and only goes up from there. Nora’s mother forgets all the time. Nora, though, is not so sure. When she sees a bombing victim her mother takes her to the clinic to forget, but a schoolmate of Nora’s shows her how to buck the system and remember instead. Nora learns her mother’s horrible secret of why she forgets things so often, and Nora realizes she’s stuck in a world where she can’t trust anything she thought she could. Nora starts making friends with the classmate, and along with another new friend they try to discover the truth about what everyone’s forgetting. I love the development of this dystopian world. The description of it seems rather sparse, but the book is only 184 pages, so there wasn’t a lot of room to put it down. You never really get the impression, though, that the world only exists where the character is, and it feels like there’s always more out there if the book was longer or the author had more time. The plot is a great mystery that the reader can follow along with and guess correctly if they’re insightful enough. I’m not sure you want to take your time with it, though, because the implications in the plot are chilling! If you like books that make you think it’s a great thing. In all Memento Nora was a great short read that you should pick up!

Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough

2011-10-19T12:43:00.002-04:00

Tamsin Greene comes from a long line of witches, and she was supposed to be one of the most Talented among them. But Tamsin's magic never showed up. Now seventeen, Tamsin attends boarding school in Manhattan, far from her family. But when a handsome young professor mistakes her for her very Talented sister, Tamsin agrees to find a lost family heirloom for him. The search—and the stranger—will prove to be more sinister than they first appeared, ultimately sending Tamsin on a treasure hunt through time that will unlock the secret of her true identity, unearth the sins of her family, and unleash a power so vengeful that it could destroy them all. This is a spellbinding display of storytelling that will exhilarate, enthrall, and thoroughly enchant.

Where to start with such a great book? Tamsin is delightful and her story is great. It flowed well, jumping around like a good mystery but never going overboard. Tamsin is a great character and she seems like any conflicted teenager in a bad situation. I like her reactions to the plot, she is proactive but she doesn’t always have the right answers (which, really, is half the fun!). My only complaint would be the scope of the world. It was a little hard to keep all of the family members straight as well as remember what time period Tamsin is operating in. Perhaps that is because the book didn’t really have any lulls to catch your breath, which is not entirely a bad thing. The action kept coming and I never felt bored or rushed. To be honest, the bare bones of the plot seemed a lot like Holly Black’s Curse Workers books. It doesn’t seem like the same book, though. MacCullough deals with the same premise in a totally different way, so if you liked White Cat I’d recommend this series as well.

I am Number Four by Pittacus Lore

2011-10-18T02:00:00.003-04:00

In the beginning they were a group of nine. Nine aliens who left their home planet of Lorien when it fell under attack by the evil Mogadorian. Nine aliens who scattered on Earth. Nine aliens who look like ordinary teenagers living ordinary lives, but who have extraordinary, paranormal skills. Nine aliens who might be sitting next to you now.

The Nine had to separate and go into hiding. The Mogadorian caught Number One in Malaysia, Number Two in England, and Number Three in Kenya. All of them were killed. John Smith, of Paradise, Ohio, is Number Four. He knows that he is next.

I AM NUMBER FOUR is the thrilling launch of a series about an exceptional group of teens as they struggle to outrun their past, discover their future—and live a normal life on Earth.

I AM NUMBER FOUR.
I AM NEXT.

I’m not sure why, but this book is a miss for me. The first problem is with the motivations. I don’t get the Mogadorians or their reasoning behind attacking Lorien, and I don’t get how the Loriens were able to smuggle children and their protectors off the planet. Mostly, though, I don’t get what nine earth children can do against a race of super-soldiers that a whole planet of adults couldn’t figure out. The whole premise seems very off to me. John is not much of a redemption either. His character seems rather flat, and he’s always reacting in a logical, boring manner. His romance of Sarah is almost scary. She is really a cardboard cutout for John to fill with his expectations, and at the end it’s revealed that John has “bonded” with her and she is the only person he will ever love – a heavy thing to put on a teenage girl, imo. The only character I really liked was Henri. The author seems to have thought a lot more about who he is and what he thinks of the world, so he’s a lot more believable as a person. Perhaps the pretentions of the author have a bit to do with things, too. “Pittacus Lore” is an alien elder, and putting him forward as the author of the book seems rather arrogant, and this arrogance kinda extends through the story as well. It’s not very tangible, but there were definitely times I felt the author was saying “Look! Amaze at the cleverness of me!”.

I have to admit that I read the book right before seeing the movie, so the two kinda blended together in my head. I did think that the movie was more choppy than the book, but it did flesh out 6 a lot better than the book, so thank goodness for the trend of injecting a sassy female. Henri suffered, though. The movie makers seemed to take the pretentions of the author and try to cram it as full of explosions as they could manage, whether it made sense or not. In all, I think both the book and the movie are a pass.

Demonglass by Rachel Hawkins

2011-10-17T01:49:00.002-04:00

Sophie Mercer thought she was a witch. That was the whole reason she was sent to Hex Hall, a reform school for delinquent Prodigium (aka witches, shapeshifters, and fairies). But that was before she discovered the family secret, and that her hot crush, Archer Cross, is an agent for The Eye, a group bent on wiping Prodigium off the face of the earth. Turns out, Sophie’s a demon, one of only two in the world—the other being her father. What’s worse, she has powers that threaten the lives of everyone she loves. Which is precisely why Sophie decides she must go to London for the Removal, a dangerous procedure that will destroy her powers. But once Sophie arrives she makes a shocking discovery. Her new friends? They’re demons too. Meaning someone is raising them in secret with creepy plans to use their powers, and probably not for good. Meanwhile, The Eye is set on hunting Sophie down, and they’re using Archer to do it. But it’s not like she has feelings for him anymore. Does she?

Review of Previous Book in Series: Hex Hall

This review is so hard! I feel as though I’m spoiling anything in “Hex Hall” by even setting up the plot, and I don’t want to spoil you a bit because the books are so good! Ok, I’ll stop with the exclamation points. However, this book is a great sequel, and I really like how it’s a great story with a strong girl making all the calls. Sophie is still as sarcastic as she was in the first book, but she shows vulnerability too. I like that Hawkins is able to blend the two, it makes Sophie seem like a complete person rather than a stereotype character. The Sophie-Archer-Cal love triangle is still going strong, and it has some good twists along the way that tear up both Sophie and the reader. I like how there’s really no clear winner in this problem. I could really see Sophie choosing either boy and being happy with the result (or equally unhappy, depending). That makes the romance so much easier to digest than the typical since it really is a mystery. And, speaking of mystery, this book is a bit more of a cliffhanger than “Hex Hall” and it left me desperate for March 2012 and the final book in the series!

Feeds

2011-10-12T13:41:00.001-04:00

Apparently I messed with my feedburner account a little too much because it started transferring the feed from this blog to the posts on my costuming blog. So if you've been getting some very strange posts for a book blog I apologize. You may also have been getting no posts, and if this is the case and you're interested you might want to come to my site and read the last few weeks' worth of posts, since I don't know how long this has been going on. So sorry for the inconvenience and I really hope it's fixed now!

Eona by Alison Goodman

2011-10-12T01:27:00.004-04:00

Where there is power, there is betrayal…

Once she was Eon, a girl disguised as a boy, risking her life for the chance to become a Dragoneye apprentice. Now she is is Eona, the Mirror Dragoneye, her country’s savior—but she has an even more dangerous secret.

She cannot control her power.

Each time she tries to bond with her Mirror Dragon, she becomes a conduit for the ten spirit dragons whose Dragoneyes were murdered by Lord Ido. Their anguish floods through her, twisting her ability into a killing force, destroying the land and its people.

And another force of destruction is on her trail.

Along with Ryko and Lady Dela, Eona is on the run from High Lord Sethon’s army. The renegades must find Kygo, the young Pearl Emperor, who needs Eona’s power if he is to wrest back his throne from Sethon. But if Eona is to help Kygo, she must drive a dark bargain with an old enemy that could obliterate them all.

This has been a very difficult review to write. I really love Eon. It had great characters, a great plot, and a lot of promise. While the result, Eona, is great, I’m not sure it lived up to the expectations I had in my head. I’m not entirely sure that is Goodman’s fault, though.

A few of my problems with this book were the disconnect with book 1. For all that Eon struggles with his gender identity in book 1, one of my favorite parts of the book, in book 2 it is a non-issue. Eona adapts seamlessly to being a girl. I really wish there had been a little more of a transition, a learning phase where Eona has to cope with figuring out how to be a girl after having lived as a boy for so long. I know that her heart and her soul were accepting of her gender, but it still takes time for the brain processes to catch up. It was the same with the disability and her coping of how it happened. Once Eona is healed of her hip problem she doesn’t really seem to need to relearn coordinated fights and movements which seemed very unrealistic to me. However, I did really like the power struggle and love triangle between Ido, Kygo, and Eona. The issues of power and love never seemed to fully separate, which I found to be very realistic, and Eona had to work t o understand how she felt and how to trust in a relationship. More importantly, she had to learn that she can’t have it all and that she has to choose, which is a very adult thing I liked to see in a YA book. I liked the death that happens late in the book and how the other main characters deal with it, it seemed very in character for all of them. The story of Kinra and the Dragons is even more compelling, and although I am not entirely comfortable with the surprise ending, I do acknowledge that there was no “easy” way to end that plot, which is very realistic and grown-up.

Cybils Nominations

2011-10-11T02:13:00.001-04:00

I'm still so torn over my Cybils Nomination for Sci-Fi/Fantasy Teen Category because there are still so many good books that haven't been nom'd yet! If you haven't made a nomination yet here are some suggestions to jog your memory:

The Demon Trapper's Daughter by Jana Oliver
Mermaid by Carolyn Turgeon
Rage by Jackie Morse Kessler
Outside In by Maria V. Snyder
12.21.12 by Killian McRae
Memento Nora by Angie Smibert
Sweetly by Jackson Pearce
The Boy from Ilysies by Pearl North

Sirenz by Charlotte Bennardo and Natalie Zaman

2011-10-11T00:17:00.002-04:00

Bickering frenemies Meg and Shar are doing some serious damage at a midnight sample sale when they find themselves arguing over a pair of shoes—with fatal consequences. One innocent bystander later, the girls are suddenly at the mercy of Hades—the god of the underworld—himself. To make them atone for what they’ve done, Hades forces the teens to become special-assignment Sirens, luring to the Underworld any individual whose unholy contract is up.

But just because they have an otherworldly part-time job now doesn’t mean Meg and Shar can ignore life’s drudgeries (work) or pleasures (fashion!). Finding that delicate balance between their old and new responsibilities turns out to be harder than they expected, especially when an entire pantheon of Greek deities decides to get involved. Then there’s the matter of the fine print in their contracts . . .

A lot of people rage at stereotypes and their use in books. And it’s true, stereotypes can be very one-sided and flat, leading to characters that seem dull and predictable. This can make you forget, though, that stereotypes can be used by a skillful writer to make wonderful characters. This book is an excellent example of that. Meg and Shar start out as very stereotypical high school girls. Meg is a goth, angry at the world and rejecting the mainstream. Shar is a princess, always chasing the trendy clothes and the gorgeous boys. Along their journey, though, their stereotypes are only starting points, and they react and grow along very realistic but unpredictable lines that make their characters shine.

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

2011-10-10T11:38:00.001-04:00

When Thomas wakes up in the lift, the only thing he can remember is his first name. His memory is blank. But he’s not alone. When the lift’s doors open, Thomas finds himself surrounded by kids who welcome him to the Glade—a large, open expanse surrounded by stone walls.

Just like Thomas, the Gladers don’t know why or how they got to the Glade. All they know is that every morning the stone doors to the maze that surrounds them have opened. Every night they’ve closed tight. And every 30 days a new boy has been delivered in the lift.

Thomas was expected. But the next day, a girl is sent up—the first girl to ever arrive in the Glade. And more surprising yet is the message she delivers.

Thomas might be more important than he could ever guess. If only he could unlock the dark secrets buried within his mind.

This book wasn't bad. It was a little light on character, but the good plot made up for it. Thomas is a little over-powered for my taste: everything he tries he does right, he figures out all the problems without much help from other people, he is essentially the key to everything and you get the impression that if he had a few more weeks he could have done everything alone. This leads to a non-investment problem: when most of the characters die I felt rather detached, as if they were ants instead of people, and I don’t think it quite had the tension impact the author wanted. Or this could be an issue of the only female, Teresa, being little more than just a plot driver and not a fully developed character. Since I tend to identify strongly with female characters it could be that I couldn’t get into watching the boys develop because the one girl was so flat.

If you can ignore the slight superhero problem, though, the mystery is engrossing. Dashner has set up a very clever problem for the boys, and his pacing and plot twists are artful. I won’t spoil how the plot is solved, but it was set up well with building blocks and not one big lightning-bolt exposition that made it rather unbelievable. The ending also makes it pretty clear that all we have is one small slice of the puzzle, and the puzzle is clever enough that I’ll go along for the ride and see if I can’t get more invested in the characters later.

Challenges

2011-10-07T09:38:00.002-04:00

I've added a few more challenges to my challenge page:

Relic Master: The Dark City by Catherine Fisher

2011-10-07T05:44:00.003-04:00

Welcome to Anara, a world mysteriously crumbling to devastation, where nothing is what it seems: Ancient relics emit technologically advanced powers, members of the old Order are hunted by the governing Watch yet revered by the people, and the great energy that connects all seems to also be destroying all. The only hope for the world lies in Galen, a man of the old Order and a Keeper of relics, and his sixteen-year-old apprentice, Raffi. They know of a secret relic with great power that has been hidden for centuries. As they search for it, they will be tested beyond their limits. For there are monsters--some human, some not--that also want the relic's power and will stop at nothing to get it.

Relic Master is a slow starter, but I suggest sticking with it because the payoff is worth it.

This book is the first of a trilogy to be relased this summer. I received this book free from librarything in exchange for an unbiased review, but I will definitely be getting more of them because this was an absorbing book that leaves you wanting more! I love the characterization of Galen, Raffi, and Carys. Galen’s situation and his solutions are intriguing. Carys is a great character and will prove to be much fun throughout the series and also serves as a clever way to get exposition without it seeming too laborious or put on for the reader only. The plot, while obviously being a small part of a greater whole, is not an entire cliffhanger and has a good resolution while still making you want to read further in the series. I love books that make a blending of science fiction and fantasy, and a great part of the plot mystery is figuring out this mystery. I also haven’t figured out how the present dovetails into this future, but I’m intrigued. And it’s great that the series is being re-published in the US with only a month between books. I will be picking up the rest of these books soon to finish out the series.

I was provided with a free ARC of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

Jane Jones: Worst. Vampire. Ever. by Cassie St. Onge

2011-10-06T01:55:00.002-04:00

For Jane Jones, being a vampire is nothing like you read about in books. In fact, it kind of sucks. She's not beautiful, she's not rich, and she doesn't "sparkle." She's just an average, slightly nerdy girl from an ordinary suburban family (who happens to be vampires.) Jane's from the wrong side of the tracks (not to mention stuck in the world's longest awkward phase), so she doesn't fit in with the cool vampire kids at school or with the humans kids. To top it all off, she's battling an overprotective mom, a clique of high school mean girls (the kind who really do have fangs), and the most embarrassing allergy in the history of the undead, she's blood intolerant. So no one's more surprised than Jane when for the first time in her life, things start to heat up (as much as they can for a walking corpse, anyway) with not one, but two boys. Eli's a geeky, but cute real-live boy in her history class, and Timothy is a beautiful, brooding bloodsucker, who might just hold the key to a possible "cure" for vampirism. Facing an eternity of high school pressure, fumbling first dates, or a mere lifetime together with Timothy, what's a 90-something year-old teen vampire to do?

Fans of the Vladmir Tod Chronicles, You are So Undead to Me, and Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side will feast on this deliciously readable, smart, and fantastically funny debut.

This was one of the cutest books I have read this year. I love the thought of a dorky, un-conventionally-gorgeous vampire with a blood allergy. Jane is loveable and relatable and she makes me root for her every step of the plot. Zachary is a wonderful character as well, somehow managing to capture the wisdom of the immortal along with the permanent immature mentality of a ten year old. St. Onge has a gift with comedy, and Jane’s voice rings true even through her predicaments. From the amusing premise to the twist on current literary trends to the characterization of the players, this book makes me wish it was twice as long so I’d have twice the fun! In fact, I think the length is my only complaint. I really wish there was more book to love.

Beastly by Alex Flinn

2011-10-05T11:09:00.003-04:00

I am a beast. A beast. Not quite wolf or bear, gorilla or dog, but a horrible new creature who walks upright – a creature with fangs and claws and hair springing from every pore. I am a monster.

You think I’m talking fairy tales? No way. The place is New York City. The time is now. It’s no deformity, no disease. And I’ll stay this way forever – ruined – unless I can break the spell.

Yes, the spell, the one the witch in my English class cast on me. Why did she turn me into a beast who hides by day and prowls by night? I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you how I used to be Kyle Kingsbury, the guy you wished you were, with money, perfect looks, and a perfect life. And then, I’ll tell you how I became perfectly beastly.

To be honest I didn’t really like this book. Although I love the turn-a-fairytale-modern subgenre this one just didn’t seem believable. Lindy is all talk, doing some token raging about her situation but never actually attempting to remedy any of the problems her father creates or make a better situation for herself. I get the feeling that her falling in love with Kyle is just because it’s the default, how the story should end, and not through any great motivation of her own. That’s not to punish her too much, though, because Kyle doesn’t really give her much to work with. In the end I couldn’t believe their relationship because there wasn’t enough character behind either of them for me to believe it. Plus I really couldn’t get over the fact that if Lindy had as much spunk as Kyle puts on her then she would have just called the police on him and her father.

Thanks

2011-10-04T01:43:00.001-04:00

Many Thanks to Leah at Smart Pop | BenBella Books for donating a copy of The Girl Who Was on Fire for my giveaway!

Everyone should look at their books and consider getting a couple. They are very thought provoking! I remember coming upon them when I did a paper on Battlestar Galactica for a film/TV class in college, and their essays were very helpful and made me think more critically. Here are some of the series they have analyzed:

Harry Potter
Christopher Paolini’s Inheritance Series
Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials Trilogy
Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series
Ellen Hopkins’ Crank and Glass
Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson and the Olympians Series
P.C. and Kristin Cast Vampyre Series

They've also got TV and Movie-centered books, so be sure to check them out!

Glow by Amy Kathleen Ryan

2011-10-04T01:24:00.002-04:00

What if you were bound for a new world, about to pledge your life to someone you'd been promised to since birth, and one unexpected violent attack made survival—not love—the issue?

Out in the murky nebula lurks an unseen enemy: the New Horizon. On its way to populate a distant planet in the wake of Earth's collapse, the ship's crew has been unable to conceive a generation to continue its mission. They need young girls desperately, or their zealous leader's efforts will fail. Onboard their sister ship, the Empyrean, the unsuspecting families don't know an attack is being mounted that could claim the most important among them...

Fifteen-year-old Waverly is part of the first generation to be successfully conceived in deep space; she was born on the Empyrean, and the large farming vessel is all she knows. Her concerns are those of any teenager—until Kieran Alden proposes to her. The handsome captain-to-be has everything Waverly could ever want in a husband, and with the pressure to start having children, everyone is sure he's the best choice. Except for Waverly, who wants more from life than marriage—and is secretly intrigued by the shy, darkly brilliant Seth.

But when the Empyrean faces sudden attack by their assumed allies, they quickly find out that the enemies aren't all from the outside.

Glow is the most riveting series debut since The Hunger Games, and promises to thrill and challenge readers of all ages.

I was very torn about this book when I read it, and to be honest I’m still not sure where I stand. On some days I think it is one of the best science fiction YAs to come out this year. On others I can’t help but pick apart its flaws. I think the biggest one of these, in my mind, is that the plot is very grim. It’s a very personal thing, but I greatly dislike plots where I don’t feel that the protagonists have much hope to make their conditions better. It’s why I call Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer the wonderful, horrible book: it’s very well written, but I can’t help but hate it because I know everyone’s going to die either before the book ends or shortly after. I felt that way the entire way through Glow. Additionally Ryan’s view of humanity is very grim. She sets up two dichotomies for society, atheistic liberals and religious conservatives, and then makes them equally horrible places to live. The one oppresses women and encourages them to serve their husbands, and the other sets up gang rape as a way of life. Both of them see no problem with the mass rape of the young girls in the books, the liberal group literally and the religious group figuratively when they use them as breeders for new children. With the horrible turn the boys’ society takes in the absence of the girls it seems as if the book is saying you are either victim or oppressor, all humanity is horrible so it only matters if you are on top or on bottom. Even though Kieran tries to help the boys he cannot help but become the very thing that Waverly despises. There are also some strange physics problems with the science in the book. Ryan seems to be under the impression that a ship in space that is not accelerating is coasting to a halt, like a car or boat on Earth, and a ship that is not powering its engines is decelerating and will not lose gravity, but will have less gravity than an accelerating ship. Uniting the book over all these problems, however, are engrossing characters and a plot line that grabs you and forces you to keep going. I will pick up the next book in this series because of that indefinable “something” that’s making me curious about where Ryan is going.

I was provided with a free ARC of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

The Throne of Fire by Rick Riordan

2011-10-03T02:07:00.004-04:00

Ever since the gods of Ancient Egypt were unleashed in the modern world, Carter Kane and his sister Sadie have been in trouble. As descendants of the House of Life, the Kanes have some powers at their command, but the devious gods haven't given them much time to master their skills at Brooklyn House, which has become a training ground for young magicians.

And now their most threatening enemy yet - the chaos snake Apophis - is rising. If they don't prevent him from breaking free in a few days' time, the world will come to an end. In other words, it's a typical week for the Kane family.

To have any chance of battling the Forces of Chaos, the Kanes must revive the sun god Ra. But that would be a feat more powerful than any magician has ever accomplished.

First they have to search the world for the three sections of the Book of Ra, then they have to learn how to chant its spells. Oh, and did we mention that no one knows where Ra is exactly?

Narrated in two different wisecracking voices, featuring a large cast of new and unforgettable characters, and with adventures spanning the globe, this second installment in the Kane Chronicles is nothing short of a thrill ride.

Like The Red Pyramid Throne of Fire is a great book. The plot is fast-paced and full of action, and there is just enough characterization for the reader to invest in the characters without slowing it down. I love to call Riordan’s books “brain candy” because they have a fun, effortless way of making you learn ancient history and mythology. While I’m reading I can’t help but go look things up, which is frustrating only because when I’m reading about Egyptian Gods on google links I’m not finishing the book! I loved Zia’s twist, it’s nice to see a book teach boys that just because they love a girl doesn’t mean the girl has to love them back or she’s a horrible person. I am a little annoyed with how the Kanes are turning into less of a brother-and-sister-team and more of a hero-with-sister-sidekick. Sadie seemed a little more reactionary and in an assistant role than she was in the last book. I hope Riordan doesn’t leave his female readers in the lurch in the future. However, he has plenty of time to redeem himself in the next book, and I will be happy to read it!

Cybil Awards

2011-10-01T16:30:00.001-04:00

I've been sitting on this for a few days, but since it was posted last night I think I'm free to announce that I've been chosen as a 2nd round judge for the Fantasy and Science Fiction Cybils! I'm really excited about the opportunity to have some serious analysis discussion of some very good books :D

Which, btw, you should go nominate so we have books to read :D Here's the post with the nomination info.

ARCs

2011-09-30T11:36:00.003-04:00

The Nostalgic Librarian is giving away some ARCs, including a copy of Liar's Moon! I am really looking forward to this book, it would be great if someone from here won it!

http://nostalgiclibrarian.blogspot.com/2011/09/teen-arc-giveaway-handmade-vintagey.html

The Red Glove by Holly Black

2011-09-30T03:48:00.001-04:00

Curses and cons. Magic and the mob. In Cassel Sharpe's world, they go together. Cassel always thought he was an ordinary guy, until he realized his memories were being manipulated by his brothers. Now he knows the truth—he’s the most powerful curse worker around. A touch of his hand can transform anything—or anyone—into something else.

That was how Lila, the girl he loved, became a white cat. Cassel was tricked into thinking he killed her, when actually he tried to save her. Now that she's human again, he should be overjoyed. Trouble is, Lila's been cursed to love him, a little gift from his emotion worker mom. And if Lila's love is as phony as Cassel's made-up memories, then he can't believe anything she says or does.

When Cassel's oldest brother is murdered, the Feds recruit Cassel to help make sense of the only clue—crime-scene images of a woman in red gloves. But the mob is after Cassel too—they know how valuable he could be to them. Cassel is going to have to stay one step ahead of both sides just to survive. But where can he turn when he can't trust anyone—least of all, himself?

Love is a curse and the con is the only answer in a game too dangerous to lose.

Review of Previous Book in Series: White Cat

Another great sequel from Holly Black! Continuing from the first book, Red Glove has excellent characterization. I love how Cassel really grows into his self-confidence as a caster while figuring out the plots and twists of the people around him. The twist of Lila's love and Cassel's rejection of the fake as a poor substitute for the real is a great and realistic action for all the parties involved, and it injects the cliche'd sub-plot of "girl likes boy but boy rejects girl" with a fresh point of view, especially with all its unexpected developments. I loved watching the struggle of Cassel trying to figure out morality in a criminal family. And the plot resolution is unexpected yet well tied together. I can't wait for the next book in the series!

Giveaway Winner

2011-09-29T00:41:00.001-04:00

The Girl Who Was on Fire: Your Favorite Authors on Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games Trilogy Edited by Leah Wilson

Didn't get to post a winner yesterday due to a plague that hit my house plus a wonderful water shutoff due to city work on the main. It's been exciting :P However, even though it's a day late, I'm sure you're excited to see who won!

1. Smiley Girlie
2. Smiley Girlie (+1 follower)
3. Erica Binns
4. Erica Binns (+1 follower)
5. Essence
6. Essence (+1 follower)
7. Emily

And the RNG chooses . . .

2

Amy, please contact me at yasffblog(at)gmail(dot)com by Sunday with your address! Thanks everyone for making this a painless giveaway, I will try to run another one soon!

Events

2011-09-26T15:46:00.001-04:00

I had a blast at Dragon*Con and the Decatur Book Festival, so I want to tell you about a new event where you can meet authors and hear them speak about writing, their books, and what inspires them:

Y'All Fest is a book event/festival for Young Adult authors in Charleston, SC. I'd really love to go, it's been 10 years since I've been to Charleston and I'd love to see the city again, especially if it also gives me the opportunity to see some amazing authors like Beth Revis, Carrie Ryan, Sarah Rees Brennan, Victoria Schwab, Saundra Mitchell, Diana Peterfreund, Caitlin Kittredge, Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl. I'm sure it will prove to be an amazing time!

The second thing I want to tell you about is the book blogger awards, the Cybils:

Nominations for books are coming soon. I am having such a hard time deciding what to nominate! I've also thrown my hat in the ring for judging the Sci-Fi and Fantasy category. I don't think I'll get it, my blog is so new and I've been neglectful of reviews lately, but maybe it will give me better chances next year :D

Speaking of reviews, I've added a new book list to the left side bar: waiting on review. I've read so many books this year that the reviews are piling up, but I can never motivate to finish editing and posting them. I'm gonna be more diligent about that for the next few weeks, and I may post a few one-paragraph quick reviews to get back on track.

What I've Read of Popular YA

2011-09-26T15:30:00.002-04:00

This is a list of the 100 most popular YA books. I dunno who compiled it, if it's worldwide or just US, UK, Australia, or somewhere else entirely, but it seems to be one meme I could get behind. Got this list from Bookswarm who got it from Annette's Book Spot who got it from Rather Barefoot than Bookless. If you like you can trace it back from there, I wish you better luck than I had :P I'm using Gold for books/series I've completed, Pink for series where I've read one but not all, and Italics for books I have on my wishlist/to-read list.

1.Alex Finn – Beastly
2.Alice Sebold – The Lovely Bones
3.Ally Carter – Gallagher Girls (1, 2, 3, 4)
4.Ally Condie – Matched
5.Alyson Noel – The Immortals (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
6.Anastasia Hopcus – Shadow Hills
7.Angie Sage – Septimus Heap (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
8.Ann Brashares – The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (1, 2, 3, 4)
9.Anna Godbersen – Luxe (1, 2, 3, 4)
10.Anthony Horowitz – Alex Rider (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
11.Aprilynne Pike – Wings (1, 2, 3)
12.Becca Fitzpatrick – Hush, Hush (1, 2)
13.Brandon Mull – Fablehaven (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
14.Brian Selznick – The Invention of Hugo Cabret
15.Cassandra Clare – The Mortal Instruments (1, 2, 3, 4)
16.Carrie Jones – Need (1, 2, 3)
17.Carrie Ryan – The Forest of Hands and Teeth (1, 2, 3, 4)
18.Christopher Paolini – Inheritance (1, 2, 3, 4)
19.Cinda Williams Chima – The Heir Chronicles (1, 2, 3)
20.Colleen Houck – Tigers Saga (1, 2)
21.Cornelia Funke – Inkheart (1, 2, 3)
22.Ellen Hopkins – Impulse
23.Eoin Colfer – Artemis Fowl (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
24.Faraaz Kazi – Truly, Madly, Deeply
25.Frank Beddor – The Looking Glass Wars (1, 2, 3)
26.Gabrielle Zevin – Elsewhere
27.Gail Carson Levine – Fairest
28.Holly Black – Tithe (1, 2, 3)
29.J.K. Rowling – Harry Potter (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
30.James Dashner – The Maze Runner (1, 2)
31.James Patterson – Maximum Ride (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
32.Jay Asher – Thirteen Reasons Why
33.Jeanne DuPrau – Books of Ember (1, 2, 3, 4)
34.Jeff Kinney – Diary of a Wimpy Kid (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
35.John Boyne – The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
36.John Green – An Abundance of Katherines
37.John Green – Looking for Alaska
38.John Green – Paper Towns
39.Jonathan Stroud – Bartimaeus (1, 2, 3, 4)
40.Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl – Caster Chronicles (1, 2)
41.Kelley Armstrong – Darkest Powers (1, 2, 3)
42.Kristin Cashore – The Seven Kingdoms (1, 2)
43.Lauren Kate – Fallen (1, 2, 3)
44.Lemony Snicket – Series of Unfortunate Events (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13)
45.Libba Bray – Gemma Doyle (1, 2, 3)
46.Lisa McMann – Dream Catcher (1, 2, 3)
47.Louise Rennison – Confessions of Georgia Nicolson (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
48.M.T. Anderson – Feed
49.Maggie Stiefvater – The Wolves of Mercy Falls (1, 2, 3)
50.Margaret Peterson Haddix – Shadow Children (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
51.Maria V. Snyder – Study (1, 2, 3)
52.Markus Zusak – The Book Thief
53.Markus Zusak – I am the Messenger
54.Mark Haddon – The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
55.Mary Ting – Crossroads
56.Maureen Johnson – Little Blue Envelope (1, 2)
57.Meg Cabot – All-American Girl (1, 2)
58.Meg Cabot – The Mediator (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
59.Meg Cabot – The Princess Diaries (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
60.Meg Rosoff – How I live now
61.Megan McCafferty – Jessica Darling (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
62.Megan Whalen Turner – The Queen’s Thief (1, 2, 3, 4)
63.Melina Marchetta – On the Jellicoe Road
64.Melissa de la Cruz – Blue Bloods (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
65.Melissa Marr – Wicked Lovely (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
66.Michael Grant – Gone (1, 2, 3, 4)
67.Nancy Farmer – The House of the Scorpion
68.Neal Shusterman – Unwind
69.Neil Gaiman – Coraline
70.Neil Gaiman – Stardust
71.Neil Gaiman – The Graveyard Book
72.P.C. Cast & Kristin Cast – House of Night (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
73.Philip Pullman – His Dark Materials (1, 2, 3)
74.Rachel Caine – The Morganville Vampires (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
75.Rachel Cohn & David Levithan – Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist
76.Richelle Mead – Vampire Academy (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
77.Rick Riordan – Percy Jackson and the Olympians (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
78.Rom LcO’Feer – Somewhere carnal over 40 winks
79.S.L. Naeole – Grace (1, 2, 3, 4)
80.Sabrina Bryan & Julia DeVillers – Princess of Gossip
81.Sarah Dessen – Along for the Ride
82.Sarah Dessen – Lock and Key
83.Sarah Dessen – The Truth about Forever
84.Sara Shepard – Pretty Little Liars (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
85.Scott Westerfeld – Leviathan (1, 2)
86.Scott Westerfeld – Uglies (1, 2, 3)
87.Shannon Hale – Books of a Thousand Days
88.Shannon Hale – Princess Academy
89.Shannon Hale – The Books of Bayern (1, 2, 3, 4)
90.Sherman Alexie & Ellen Forney – The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
91.Simone Elkeles – Perfect Chemistry (1, 2, 3)
92.Stephanie Meyer – The Host
93.Stephanie Meyer – Twilight Saga (1, 2, 3, 4)
94.Sue Monk Kidd – The Secret Life of Bees
95.Susan Beth Pfeffer – Last Survivors (1, 2, 3)
96.Suzanne Collins – Hunger Games (1, 2, 3)
97.Suzanne Collins – Underland Chronicles (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
98.Terry Pratchett – Tiffany Aching (1, 2, 3, 4)
99.Tonya Hurley – Ghost Girl (1, 2, 3)
100.Wendelin Van Draanen – Flipped

Dystopian YA

2011-09-06T14:44:00.001-04:00

From the handout made by me for the Hunger Games panel and the handout and discussion from the Dystopias for Teens panel at DragonCon.

Series are represented by the first book only to keep the list manageable.

Enclave by Ann Aguirre
Feed by M.T. Anderson
Restoring Harmony by Joelle Anthony
Candor by Pam Bachorz
Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi
Pure by Julianna Baggott
Bloodtide by Melvin Burgess
Eve by Anna Carey
Dark Secrets by Elizabeth Chandler
Matched by Ally Condie
The Maze Runner by James Dashner
Wither by Lauren DeStefano
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau
The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer
Incarceron by Catherine Fisher
Shades of Grey: The Road to High Saffron by Jasper Fforde
Truancy by Isamu Fhkui
The Difference Engine by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling
Black Hole Sun by David Macinnis Gill
Flux by Beth Goobie
Gone by Michael Grant
Feed by Mira Grant
Dark Parties by Sara Grant
Among the Hidden by Margaret Peterson Haddix
Found by Margaret Peterson Haddix
The Girl in the Arena by Lise Haines
The Line by Teri Hall
Nomansland by Lesley Hauge
The Eleventh Plague by Jeff Hirsch
Possession by Elana Johnson
Awaken by Katie Kacvinsky
XVI by Julia Karr
In the Company of Whispers by Saillie Lowenstein
The Giver by Lois Lowry
Legend by Marie Lu
The Declaration by Gemma Malley
Jellicoe Road by Melina Marchetta
Rot & Ruin by Jonathan Mayberry
Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi
The Unidentified by Rae Mariz
Tomorrow When the War Began by John Marsden
Bumped by Megan McCafferty
The Unwanteds by Lisa McMann
A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
Ashfall by Mike Mullin
Birthmarked by Caragh O'Brien
Delirium by Lauren Oliver
Witch & Wizard by James Patterson and Gabrielle Charbonnet
The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson
The Dead and the Gone by Susan Beth Pfeffer
Fever Crumb by Philip Reeve
Across the Universe by Beth Revis
Divergent by Veronica Roth
Glow by Amy Kathleen Ryan
The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan
Tankborn by Karn Sandler
Unwind by Neal Shusterman
Memento Nora by Angie Smibert
Inside Out by Maria V. Snyder
The Water Wars by Cameron Stracher
Battle Royale by Koushun Takami
Ashes, Ashes by Jo Treggiari
Mechanique: A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti by Genevieve Valentine
Skinned by Robin Wasserman
Variant by Robison Wells
Uglies by Scott Westerfeld
Empty by Suzanne Weyn
The Children of the Lost by David Whitley
Julian Comstock: A Story of 22nd-Century America by Robert Charles Wilson

Hunger Games Resources for Dragon*Con

2011-08-30T22:43:00.003-04:00

I haven't been posting here much because I've been preparing for (and attending) WorldCon in Reno and Dragon*Con in Atlanta. At WorldCon I did costuming stuff, but at Dragon*Con I'm lucky enough to get to give a panel on The Hunger Games. I know it's a few days away, but here are the essays I'm using to study up for the panel:

Hunger Games Essay By Andie R.
Hunger Games Study Guide
The Hunger Games Symbolism, Imagery, & Allegory
Why 'The Hunger Games' isn't the new 'Twilight' by Tina Jordan
Hogwarts Professor: Thoughts for Serious Readers' Hunger Games category
'The Hunger Games': How reality TV explains the YA sensation by Darren Franich
Panem for Thought: A Hunger Games Discussion Comm on LJ
A Speculative Map of Panem by aimmyarrowshigh and badguys
A Complete Entymology of the Names in Panem by aimmyarrowshigh and badguys
Katniss Everdeen: A Heroine For the Ages by Emmy

Finally, the most awesome, a book that looks critically at themes in The Hunger Games series:

The Girl Who Was on Fire: Your Favorite Authors on Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games Trilogy Edited by Leah Wilson

In fact, I liked this book so much that for my first YASFF Book Giveaway I'm going to give away a copy!

Contest Rules:

1. Comment with your name (or pseudonym you'd like to use publicly).
2. I'll give an extra +1 chance of winning if you're a follower of my blog.
3. Winner will be announced on Tuesday, September 27th with a post in the blog. The winner has 72 hours to contact me at yasffblog(at)gmail(dot)com with their address or I reserve the right to choose another winner.
4. Contest is open only to residents of the US and Canada. Sorry international peeps, I hope to figure out international contests soon but not for this one.

That's it! I want to keep my first contest pretty simple, but I hope it tides you over until I can get out of the con costuming rush and back to writing book reviews!

Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

2011-07-18T20:36:00.003-04:00

Set initially in a future shanty town in America's Gulf Coast region, where grounded oil tankers are being dissembled for parts by a rag tag group of workers, we meet Nailer, a teenage boy working the light crew, searching for copper wiring to make quota and live another day. The harsh realities of this life, from his abusive father, to his hand to mouth existence, echo the worst poverty in the present day third world. When an accident leads Nailer to discover an exquisite clipper ship beached during a recent hurricane, and the lone survivor, a beautiful and wealthy girl, Nailer finds himself at a crossroads. Should he strip the ship and live a life of relative wealth, or rescue the girl, Nita, at great risk to himself and hope she'll lead him to a better life. This is a novel that illuminates a world where oil has been replaced by necessity, and where the gap between the haves and have-nots is now an abyss. Yet amidst the shadows of degradation, hope lies ahead.

I ordered this book because I saw it on so many award lists (Andre Norton Award, Michael L. Printz Award) and I wondered what all the fuss was about. To be honest, the book blurb kept me away for quite some time. It just seemed stale and formulaic, like someone was trying to cash in on the dystopian trend and didn't quite know how to go about it. I'm glad I finally gave in, though, because this book was excellent and nothing like the impression the blurb gave me. Lucky is a great character, believable as a rich girl in her situation, and her situation is a great plot twist that sets her up to be not only rich and privileged, but also intelligent and competent in her situation. Nailer is a great foil to her and a unique voice, providing us with insight into how unique her “ordinary” (to the reader) life is and helping to illustrate how his world has changed from ours. The plot follows logically, and although it seems that everyone is motivated by the same thing (money) it doesn’t seem contrived to me because money and survival is a constant obsession with people living constantly on the brink of not having any to survive on. Although Bacigalupi has written another book in this world, I haven’t read it and I didn’t feel that it was necessary to understand what was going on, although I am tempted to find it now that we’ve been introduced. In all, this was a very good book and I will be looking for more work by the author in the future.

Possession by Elana Johnson

2011-07-13T02:23:00.005-04:00

Vi knows the Rule: Girls don’t walk with boys, and they never even think about kissing them. But no one makes Vi want to break the Rules more than Zenn…and since the Thinkers have chosen him as Vi’s future match, how much trouble can one kiss cause? The Thinkers may have brainwashed the rest of the population, but Vi is determined to think for herself.

But the Thinkers are unusually persuasive, and they’re set on convincing Vi to become one of them….starting by brainwashed Zenn. Vi can’t leave Zenn in the Thinkers’ hands, but she’s wary of joining the rebellion, especially since that means teaming up with Jag. Jag is egotistical, charismatic, and dangerous: everything Zenn’s not. Vi can’t quite trust Jag and can’t quite resist him, but she also can’t give up on Zenn.

This is a game of control or be controlled. And Vi has no choice but to play.

I honestly don’t know how I feel about this book. It’s another in a long series of mind-control dystopias overcome by love. It also has a love triangle between two “good” guys, which is so cliché in YA Lit right now. The result is coherent, though, and, if not quite fresh, definitely not stale. Yet I just get the feeling that somehow it’s not my thing, even though there are no technical difficulties I can point to that make that so. The plot is tight, is not overly verbose or stale in its exposition. It is surprising yet logically follows, and shows some good worldbuilding. The characters are realistic and engaging. Vi makes good decisions for a teenager but shows that she is still young and not always thinking things entirely through. She sometimes lets her head rule her heart and sometimes she’s emotionally impulsive, something that makes me happy because real people are rarely just one or the other. She also reacts as I would expect someone who is fighting brainwashing to react. Jag is a great foil to Vi, having grown up independent and knowing inside information that makes him more confident in his reactions. I also wasn’t as annoyed at his hiding information from Vi as I usually am in these situations: for Jag it made sense because he was protecting people and wasn’t sure he could trust Vi even if he had feelings for her. I saw the exposition about Vi’s father coming from a long way off, but it only felt slightly contrived and I’ll give it a pass. Zenn was the least developed character in the book. I’m still not sure why he acts and reacts like he does in a lot of situations. I don’t think this is too bad of a thing, though, because it helps the reader to feel like Vi does: uncertain of his motivations and slow to trust. The ending is a bit of a cliffhanger, but I suspect there is more down the road, and I think I found enough in this book that I’ll be tempted to go along for the next book in the series if it manifests itself.

Linger by Maggie Stiefvater

2011-07-11T11:19:00.003-04:00

In Maggie Stiefvater's Shiver, Grace and Sam found each other. Now, in Linger, they must fight to be together. For Grace, this means defying her parents and keeping a very dangerous secret about her own well-being. For Sam, this means grappling with his werewolf past . . . and figuring out a way to survive into the future. Add into the mix a new wolf named Cole, whose own past has the potential to destroy the whole pack. And Isabelle, who already lost her brother to the wolves . . . and is nonetheless drawn to Cole.

Since the final book in the series, Forever, comes out tomorrow (and because I’m going to a signing on Thursday!) I had to catch up on Maggie Stiefvater’s werewolf series. I’m so glad I did. This is a very good book. It does suffer a little bit from “middle syndrome” (the thing that makes the plot seem to be stalled for the majority of the book because it’s really the lull before the climax of the third part, see “Empire Strikes Back”) but it has enough going on to make it stand up on its own as well as work well to advance the story. Although Grace and Sam seemed to be in a holding pattern, character-development-wise, the work on Isabelle and Cole more than made up for it. Although I think the ‘foreshadowing’ on Cole’s secret was laid on a little thick (especially since the reader already knew the secret, and especially because nothing came of it), but his interactions with Isabelle were great, and I like the match of the two of them. They both seem to understand the other’s pain without condescension or a time table, and although they deal with it differently they still respect the other’s choices. There’s also subtle foreshadowing that there’s going to be a fight about their different approaches in the future. The major plot point is interesting. I like how there’s more exposition on how the “werewolfing” works and how the “cure” served Sam even though they didn’t quite know what they were doing. My only disappointment was that we didn’t see much of the new wolves other than Cole. Hopefully all that will be resolved in the third book, though.

Luminous by Dawn Metcalf

2011-07-08T11:34:00.004-04:00

As reality slips and time stands still, Consuela finds herself thrust into the world of the Flow. Removed from all she loves into this shifting world overlapping our own, Consuela quickly discovers she has the power to step out of her earthly skin and cloak herself in new ones-skins made from the world around her, crafted from water, fire, air. She is joined by other teens with extraordinary abilities, bound together to safeguard a world they can affect, but where they no longer belong.

When murder threatens to undo the Flow, the Watcher charges Consuela and elusive, attractive V to stop the killer. But the psychopath who threatens her new world may also hold the only key to Consuela's way home.

Although this book turned out good it got off to a rocky start. The author rather dumps you from the "real" world into the Flow, and I felt very disjointed and confused over what was happening and where we were. I think it was done to emphasize the disorientation and confusion of Consuela, but it isn't done in a way that made me identify with the character. Instead I wanted to put the book down. It was just too fast, plopping us into the fantasy world without explanation or reason, and the contrivance is only emphasized by Consuela’s placid acceptance rather than questioning of the issue.

I endured, though, and as the author got around to explaining what happened and why I started to enjoy the world and the characters, although I never really felt as if I understood it or them. In order to maintain the mystery of the plot the characters all have hidden agendas and ulterior motives, and you're always questioning why they're doing what they're doing, but you're also questioning why you care. There are a lot of characters that seem to be put in place so that they can die to amplify the plot, but because you didn't ever identify with them it doesn't work as well as it could.

However, even with these major flaws there is something about the book that is absorbing and makes you want to keep reading despite all the incertainty and confusion. Perhaps it is the artful dealing with the subject matter: what happens when we die, and what about people who seem to be *dead* but are still functionally alive? What do they experience? What do they feel? Add in an overlay of murder mystery and a dash of romantic subplot and the question is very deep as well as entertaining. This gift extends even beyond the ending, turning an ending that is simply ambiguous into a cliffhanger mystery that keeps you thinking about the book even after you're done with it. Although this book wasn't altogether my cup of tea I can see many people who would be able to look past its flaws and fall completely in love with the great existential mystery that is presented in this book.

I received this book free from Librarything as an ARC in exchange for an unbiased review.

Bookaholics Giveaway!

2011-06-24T12:38:00.002-04:00

Bookaholics is giving away jewelry by Hebelmet inspired by Cassie Claire's Mortal Instruments books! Enter here:

http://the-bookaholics.blogspot.com/2011/06/hebelmet.html

Wither by Lauren DeStefano

2011-06-13T06:08:00.004-04:00

Obviously, something went terribly wrong. Genetic mutations have festered, reducing human longevity to twenty-five, even less for most women. To prevent extinction, young girls are kidnapped, mated in polygamous marriages with men eager to procreate. Sixteen-year-old Rhine Ellery, a recent victim of this breeding farm mentality, has vowed to break loose from its fetters; but finding allies and a safe way out is a challenge she can only hope she will survive. A dystopian fantasy series starter with wings. Editor's recommendation.

Although it was called a modern, YA version of "The Handmaid's Tale", I didn't really identify with this book like I did with Margaret Atwood's Sci-Fi classic. Although the plots have a lot of parallels, Atwood's book is steeped in the religious right of the United States, while Wither is concerned with genetic manipulation gone wrong. The two don't really corrolate, at least not for me, and I was rather confused over the result. The society that is created is strange. Why are girls commodities? If everyone dies at a young age why are there marriages with multiple wives instead of farms where eggs and sperm are harvested and forcibly carried to term in order to perpetuate the species and provide for research? There were many questions that made the world of this book seem rather copied and not well thought out. However, once the world was made up DeStefano worked well within the framework. I loved the character of Rhine and her reactions to the situations she was placed in. She maintained a strong character and drive throughout her situations, and she drew you in to the story when the world failed. The plot was rather unremarkable, containing yet another YA love triangle complicated by the multiple marriage, but Rhine's voice and the characterization of the other players served to keep it fresher than it probably should have been. I'm not sure if I'm completely invested in the story enough to buy a sequel, but I don't regret reading this book as a one-off.

Ash by Malinda Lo

2011-06-09T13:46:00.004-04:00

In the wake of her father's death, Ash is left at the mercy of her cruel stepmother. Consumed with grief, her only joy comes by the light of the dying hearth fire, rereading the fairy tales her mother once told her. In her dreams, someday the fairies will steal her away, as they are said to do. When she meets the dark and dangerous fairy Sidhean, she believes that her wish may be granted.

The day that Ash meets Kaisa, the King's Huntress, her heart begins to change. Instead of chasing fairies, Ash learns to hunt with Kaisa. Though their friendship is as delicate as a new bloom, it reawakens Ash's capacity for love-and her desire to live. But Sidhean has already claimed Ash for his own, and she must make a choice between fairy tale dreams and true love.

Entrancing, empowering, and romantic, Ash is about the connection between life and love, and solitude and death, where transformation can come from even the deepest grief.

Ash is a great retelling of the Cinderella story. Unlike the traditional story, though, Ash has a lot of plot packed into it. Not only is there the main plot line of Ash's romance with the Prince of the land, but there is the side plot of Ash's wicked stepmother, another on her friendship with Kaisa, and a third on her encounters with Sidhean. Lo weaves all the plots together with great skill, always abandoning one right before you get tired of it and making you really want more. She also has a gift of suprising you with every twist, something that is very fresh in a fairy tale retelling where you think you know where the story is going. All the characters fit well, both in their world and with eachother, and they are well made to be likeable and realistic. Well, all of them except Sidhean, who maintains his aloof exterior and you are never quite sure where he stands and whether he is a good guy or a bad guy. All the parts of this book work very well together, and I was enthralled from the beginning to the end.

**Spoilers Ahead**

Really, though, it's hard to talk about this book without talking about the big spoiler. At the end of the book Ash decides that as admirable as the Prince is, and as bad-boy-hot as Sidhean is, she is really attracted to Kaisa. Honestly, I don't know how I avoided this spoiler before reading the book, but I did, so the "twist" came as a total surprise. I'm very glad it did, too. My experience with LGBT novels is very limited, and the few I've read have seemed very in-your-face and preachy, so I probably would have avoided this book had I known. I'm glad I didn't because I would have missed out on a great read. Lo has a great flow and the relationship evolves very naturally, so instead of preachy it comes off as how things really should be. Since I didn't have a warning it also really challenged my preconceived notions and made me think about romance tropes in YA in a very good way.

Divergent by Veronica Roth

2011-06-06T10:29:00.003-04:00

In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is—she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself.

During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles to determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes infuriating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers a growing conflict that threatens to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves . . . or it might destroy her.

Debut author Veronica Roth bursts onto the literary scene with the first book in the Divergent series—dystopian thrillers filled with electrifying decisions, heartbreaking betrayals, stunning consequences, and unexpected romance.

Divergent was a good book, but I didn't feel it was as great as its hype. Don't get me wrong, it was a great start. I loved how Tris was set up as a character, and the world created was interesting and realistic, and I could see the roots of the society in the issues of modern society. I did feel, however, that in the "moralistic" structure of the society the author was rather preachy and overt in her judgement of the values of each segment of society, especially in her placement of religion in the abnegation sector and making the Erudite the bad guys. Tris was well-written, and I liked how she followed her heart and was encouraged by her mother even though her father tried to abandon her for thinking independently. Dauntless society and training was the best part of the book. It was a great mix of military training gone bad with middle school politics and competitiveness mixed in. I liked how I could see the roots of team-building exercises and how they were perverted by the competitive hierarchy. All of the student characters in this part were great, and I liked how each one dealt with the harshness of Dauntless differently and how not all were able to cope sufficiently. Four was a great teacher, if a little young, and he seemed to be concerned with his students and making them fit in to Dauntless as well as giving the community the best soldiers that could be made out of each person. Four and Tris was one of the rare times when I really didn't mind a relationship between a teacher and a student, perhaps because they were so close in age, or perhaps because it was handled in a discreet, balanced way that didn't seem to interfere with either Tris's school or Four's job.

The plotting throughout the training was strong, and I liked the subtle foreshadowing to the climax. However, the climax was my major issue with this book. The previous parts of the book were so well written, but it seems as if the writer ran out of ideas, or space, or doesn't understand how war happens because the ending was very glossy and off-hand. People died, but Tris (and through her, us as the reader) didn't really feel anything about it, a style that came off as not caring rather than urgently callous. Even her father's redemption and sacrifice didn't have the impact I feel it should have. I suspect a final chapter where Tris dealt with her feelings of seeing so many people she cared for killed would have helped a lot, but I think what it really needed was a better internal dialogue for Tris so we could see her being torn over people dying rather than not caring. I don't think this was a complete detraction from the quality of the rest of the book, though, just a middling flaw. If this book gets a sequel I will be delighted to get it, because I think Roth is a good writer working her way to being great and I am confident that her plotting issues can be overcome with a little more practice.

Blood Magic by Tessa Gratton

2011-06-04T17:48:00.001-04:00

This page-turning debut novel will entice fans who like their paranormal romances dark and disturbing. It's a natural next-read for fans of Stephanie Meyer, Carrie Jones, and Becca Fitzpatrick. But instead of mythical creatures, blood magic has everything to do with primal human desires like power, wealth, and immortality. Everywhere Silla Kennicott turns she sees blood. She can't stop thinking about her parents alleged murder-suicide. She is consumed by a book filled with spells that arrives mysteriously in the mail. The spells share one common ingredient: blood, and Silla is more than willing to cast a few. What's a little spilled blood if she can uncover the truth? And then there's Nick—the new guy at school who makes her pulse race. He has a few secrets of his own and is all too familiar with the lure of blood magic. Drawn together by a combination of fate and chemistry, Silla and Nick must find out who else in their small Missouri town knows their secret and will do anything to take the book and magic from Silla.

From the start I loved Blood Magic. The first (full) chapter is riveting, and things just get better from there. Silla is a great character, and I like how you can feel her confusion and pain without it turning you off her as a character. She has a hidden strength that shines through her situations and empowers her instead of letting things paralyze her. I also like how it is very evident even before she meets Nick, which helps to underscore that she enjoys his company but she doesn't need him and can act independently and make her own decisions. Nick and Reese are also great examples, treating Silla like an equal who can make independent decisions instead of working to protect her from her situations or from herself. Although it is pretty evident from the beginning that there is a disguised baddie I like how there are just enough people acting crosswise to Silla that you're never quite sure who is going to turn out to be the opponent until it is revealed, and even then you're not sure if there are other crossways villains hiding in the shadows. The major plot twist at the climax is a great surprise without being ridiculously out of left field (although I don't want to say more for fear of spoiling it!). If I had to be picky I would say that I felt a bit of the school life was not realistic for as small of a school as Yaleylah had (having experienced a 400 person school some things seemed to be adapted from life in a larger school, but that could have been the strangeness of my school) and I'm really disappointed that the story behind the not-a-baddie was not really resolved in the end of the book, but those are really minor problems that didn't detract from the reading. In all this was an excellent book, one of the best I have read in a while, and I'll be anxiously awaiting the companion book next year.

Human.4 by Mike A. Lancaster

2011-06-01T23:13:00.001-04:00

Kyle Straker volunteered to be hypnotized at the annual community talent show, expecting the same old lame amateur acts. But when he wakes up, his world will never be the same. Televisions and computers no longer work, but a strange language streams across their screens. Everyone’s behaving oddly. It’s as if Kyle doesn’t exit.

Is this nightmare a result of the hypnosis? Will Kyle wake up with a snap of fingers to roars of laughter? Or is this something much more sinister?

Narrated on a set of found cassette tapes at an unspecified point in the future, Human.4 is an absolutely chilling look at technology gone too far.

This book was very interesting. Kyle misses out on a vital reboot of the human brain and has to deal with the people who also missed the next brain OS while running away from the people out to get him. The plot is a great idea, and the execution is pretty good, leaving some great suspenseful moments that fit in well without feeling over-foreshadowed. Where the book falls short, however, is in characterization. Although the plot sparkles there doesn't feel like there is as much invested as their could be because the characters don't draw you in to their situations and make you feel for them. I was not really invested in Kyle's relationship with Lilly for the same reason. There was tension coming from the plot that kept me reading, but it was more to find out what the next twist was rather than how the characters would get out of their current situation. The book was also rather short (231 pages) and I really feel that it could have benefited from another 50 or so pages of character development pre-fair to make the characters as strong as the plotting.

Joplin Missouri

2011-05-23T23:33:00.001-04:00

Although I live in upstate New York I have lots of family in Southeast Kansas and Southwest Missouri. On Friday I left New York to come visit them. On Sunday we had a big lunch at Cheddars in Joplin, Mo. My brother and his wife and three kids, other brother and his girlfriend, my mom, and my best friend. Afterward we went to JoAnn's to shop for fabric to make my four year old niece a pageant dress, then back to my brother's house and chatted for a while. It quickly got really dark, the power started to flicker, and when I opened the door trees were doing circles. We spent the next half hour trying to keep three children under the age of five in the back hallway without freaking them out. It was really loud and we lost power for a while, but it came back and we went back to watching tv.

Turns out we were lucky. A tornado was probably forming over the house and skipped us over. Lots of people weren't so lucky, though. The Jo Ann's where we shopped at a few hours earlier is completely gone. So is the high school and one of the two hospitals, as well as miles of houses and businesses. My brother quickly got called in to his job with the police department, and my sister in law responded to a call for nurses not long after that. They've told me a lot of stories, but they're all so heartbreaking I don't think I can post any here. What I can say, though, is that things are bad. Really bad. The water's not safe to drink and there's not enough of it to give pressure for the fire department to put out fires started by the storm. Hundreds of people have no homes. Many of them are injured, and enough are injured badly and the hospitals are running out of blood. There is debris everywhere and rescuers are still finding people in wreckage.

It always hits close when something like this happens. Right now I can say that if you want to donate money please contact the Red Cross. Better yet, if you can please donate blood this week. They really, really need blood at the blood banks. Also, since the high school is gone, I'm going to try and coordinate a book donation drive to get books to restock the high school library when it gets built again. It probably won't be for a few years, but I know that fiction from the library was the joy of my high school days, and I'd hate for some of these students to miss their opportunity because of this storm. I know I have some good-quality hardcovers that I can give to a good cause, and I bet some of the rest of you do, too. I'll post more on this when I get in touch with the high school librarian in the next month and get more info on what they need and when they might need it.

The Goddess Test by Aimee Carter

2011-05-10T12:40:00.001-04:00

EVERY GIRL who has taken the test has DIED.

Not it's KATE'S TURN.

It’s always been just Kate and her mom—and her mother is dying. Her last wish? To move back to her childhood home. So Kate’s going to start at a new school with no friends, no other family and the fear her mother won’t live past the fall.

Then she meets Henry. Dark. Tortured. And mesmerizing. He claims to be Hades, god of the Underworld—and if she accepts his bargain, he’ll keep her mother alive while Kate tries to pass seven tests.

Kate is sure he’s crazy—until she sees him bring a girl back from the dead. Now saving her mother seems crazily possible. If she succeeds, she’ll become Henry’s future bride, and a goddess.

If she fails...

After reading the summary of this book I expected another close rehashing of the Percy Jackson series. I am SO glad I decided to give it a try, though, because this book was great! If you're like me and worry about another re-do of Gods and Goddesses fighting eachother and causing epic battles among humanity in the process, then rest assured that this book is none of that. These Gods and Godesses actually seem to care somewhat for humanity (I know, this might be a hard stretch for the Greek and Roman pantheon, but it works well). Instead they are all about free will, justice, and caring for people, even if they are not above a little manipulation to get what they personally see as the best outcome to help the greater good. Kate is a great character. She's a mature teenager that pulls off both facets of that title without seeming to be an adult in teenager guise. The people around her are all characterized well and their actions are logical even when they are unpredictable. Kate's mother is wonderful, being a good mother and still portraying her illness well. The connection between Kate and her mother was very touching, heartbreaking, and made me cry a few times. The plot is great, and although I don't want to divulge a lot of it in fear of wrecking some of the great twists I will say that it kept me riveted the entire time I read the book. I will be greatly looking forward to the sequels in this series.

This book was provided to me free through NetGalley in exchange for an unbiased review. I thought it was so great I went out and bought a hard copy for my library after reading.

Break

2011-04-15T21:26:00.003-04:00

Costume Con is coming up in two weeks, and I'm competing there, so I'll be scarce on here until it's over. Don't worry, though, I'll be back on May 6!

Invasion by Jon S. Lewis

2011-04-15T14:27:00.001-04:00

He didn't ask for the job, but now all that stands between us and chaos . . . is Colt.

Colt McAlister was having the summer of his life. He spent his days surfing and his nights playing guitar on the beach with friends. He even met a girl and got his first car. But everything changes when his parents are killed in a freak accident.

He's forced to leave his old life behind and move to Arizona with his grandfather. The only person he knows at the new high school is a childhood friend named Dani. And Oz, a guy he's sure he's never met but who is strangely familiar.

But what if his parents' death wasn't an accident? His mother, and invesitgative reporter, was going to expose a secret mind-control program run by one of the world's largest companies. Before she could release the story, what if agents from Trident Biotech made sure she couldn't go public?

Vowing to uncover truth, Colt gets drawn into a secret world of aliens, shapeshifters, flying motorcycles, and invisible getaways.

The invasion has begun.

This is the first book in the C.H.A.O.S. Series. Even though I am a series completionist I think this will be my last read in this series. I just didn't connect with this book at all. Perhaps it is because I'm not really in the target demographic of pre-teen boys (who I think would eat this up and ask for more), but I found all the technical problems too glaring to enjoy the book. First was the author's problem with starting the book. He jumps us into a "boot camp trial" at the CHAOS Agency where a character named Oz Romero acts as the exposition computer and our lead, Colt, experiences a little bullying for being so small but finds out that he is the seventh son in a history of alien-fighters extending back to his grandfather, who was so legendary there is a popular series of comic books based on his World War II exploits (I'd call Colt a Mary-Sue, but that would imply that there was some kind of female influence in the book which really wasn't present at all). After the military trial we skip to Colt being attacked by a tentacle monster while his parents are killed in a car wreck with a drunk driver. Colt responds to this much like he responded to the bullies at the military tryout: woodenly. He does make best friends with Danielle, who he thinks of as "the little sister he never had" but who is a "quick study" at video games (*insert sarcastic tone* extraordinary, really, since boys are much better at video games than girls, of course). It's ok, though, because she eats salad like a normal girl, and she forces him to explore his feelings (difficult to do in such an emotionless character) and other *girly* emotional things. She's nothing, though, compared to Lily, who has "playful" eyes, "golden waves" of blonde hair, and a "melodic" voice that captivates Colt even before he discovers that she smells like orange blossoms. Meanwhile Colt becomes best friends, again, with Oz (CHAOS wiped his memory of his tryout) and gets tipped off that his parents were killed because his mother was about to write a huge exposee on the Trident company's experiments with mind control.

I think one of the strangest things about this book, though, are the details. It is as if the author felt that he should flesh out the story by making interesting details, but they're so unrelated to what's going on that they read like filler. His male characters get strange names like Colt, Oswaldo, and Aristotle. He wastes half a page on Colt and Danielle arguing over who should pay for gas (he does, of course), and another paragraph on the color of sheet they use to cover up Colt's stolen motorbike/plane (because pink is icky). Some of these details are downright misogynistic. Danielle evades capture in a high-speed car chase but looses the laptop her pursuers were after because she leaves it in her car as she goes for ice-cream (because although she eats salad like a good girl she needs to follow up high-speed pursuit with a triple chocolate sundae). And the most concerning part of being chased by robots to Danielle is worrying about whether or not the robot recorded any close-ups where her makeup is smudged. Even the robots are gendered: the killer ones are male and the servant/waitress ones are obviously "made to look and sound like a female". The cliched sentences even start to contradict themselves. Danielle warns Colt that "if you really care about her like I think you do, you need to protect her" while on the next page Colt thinks to himself that Lily "wasn't wearing a ring on her finger" (because lots of 16 year old girls are?) "that meant she was fair game" to Oz, but Colt is torn because he "didn't want to reduce Lily to some kind of a prize that went to the winner."

The other major issue is Colt's Mary Sue tendencies. He steals a motorbike/plane to escape from trained military assassins and easily outruns them. He outfights a mind-controlled superhuman programmed to capture him. He is the seventh son of a seventh son . . . (okay, the first is true but the second is not - although I wouldn't be surprised). He's also implied to be psychic: he knew *somehow* that Trident was behind his parents' deaths, and that Oz knows more about Trident than he lets on. He has the highest test scores in the history of CHAOS, and he's hand-picked to lead the organization before he even starts attending their academy (and while he's still 16). He has a girl sidekick (the scatterbrained Danielle, mentioned above) who "gets computers" well enough to hack into an alien corporation's top secret network and a guy sidekick who is probably the only person under the age of 20 who knows all about alien planets and has connections on all of them. And, to top it all off, he plays guitar just enough so that he can accompany the future-country-star Lily as she sings in church.

In all, I think this book shows its roots too much. It reads rather like a comic book without the pictures, complete with stilted dialogue and cookie-cutter plotting. It also is way too sexist, even when it is trying not to be (another major problem I have with much of the comic industry). I don't think I could recommend this book to anyone, even the pre-teen boys who might enjoy it, because I would worry that it would give them bad ideas about girls and gender.

I was provided with a free copy of this book through netgalley, however, I felt guilty getting such a book for free and declined the review and bought a copy so that I could do what I thought of as a proper review.

Tender Morsels by Margo Lanagan

2011-04-09T02:12:00.001-04:00

Tender Morsels is a dark and vivid story, set in two worlds and worrying at the border between them. Liga lives modestly in her own personal heaven, a world given to her in exchange for her earthly life. Her two daughters grow up in this soft place, protected from the violence that once harmed their mother. But the real world cannot be denied forever—magicked men and wild bears break down the borders of Liga’s refuge. Now, having known Heaven, how will these three women survive in a world where beauty and brutality lie side by side?

I almost didn't make it through the beginning of this book. It was tough. Really tough. The first 50 or so pages deal with incest, forced abortion, gang rape, infanticide, and suicide. Hefty, icky stuff. I'll be honest, I wasn't sure if the payoff would be worth it. I'm glad I stuck it out, though, because the rest of the book was almost free of these issues and a pretty wonderful story. And yes, it really did need that setup, so I don't even mind the beginning much. Liga is an amazing character. Even as she's shaped by her history of sexual abuse she isn't consumed by it for the entire book, and I like how she grows and changes without loosing sight of who she used to be. It's also pretty great how she always retains a childlike quality that reminds you how sheltered and abused she was as a child and yet she always strives to rise above and do the right thing. Branza and Urdda are well constructed too. They are unique without being shaped by their conception, which is a hard thing to do when dealing with such heavy material. I like how they each have predictable, unique reactions to the events around them. I also really liked the overall moral of the story: no matter how hard your life is you have to grow up and live it sometime or things will be harder for you later. A good lesson for us all to learn.

Young Adult Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog

Pandemoneium Giveaway

Angelfall by Susan Ee

Soul Thief / Forbidden by Jana Oliver

Waiting on Wednesday: Loss by Jackie Morse Kessler

The Shattering by Karen Healey

The Iron Witch by Karen Mahoney

Cinder by Marissa Meyer

The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson

Blood Red Road by Moira Young

Legend by Marie Lu

Tortall and Other Lands by Tamora Pierce

all these things i’ve done by Gabrielle Zevin

The Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan

Dark of the Moon by Tracy Barrett

New Hunger Games Trailer Y'all!!!

Going Bovine by Libba Bray

The Fox Inheritance by Mary E. Pearson

The Hourglass Door by Lisa Mangum

Liar’s Moon by Elizabeth C. Bunce

Torn by Margaret Peterson Haddix

The Demon Trapper’s Daughter / Forsaken by Jana Oliver

Goliath by Scott Westerfeld

Black Hole Sun by David Macinnis Gill

Bumped by Megan McCafferty

A Million Suns by Beth Revis

Gone by Michael Grant

Nightspell by Leah Cypess

Crossed by Ally Condie

Speculative Fiction

Halo by Alexandra Adornetto

Mistwood by Leah Cypess

Witch Eyes by Scott Tracey

Life and the Future

The Adoration of Jenna Fox by Mary E. Pearson

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Mastiff by Tamora Pierce

Gratitude Giveaway Winners!

Thankfulness Giveaway!

Congratulations:Hannah LorraineandMegan Kyser!!!

RIP Anne McCaffrey

Hourglass by Myra McEntire

My Very Un-Fairy Tale Life by Anna Staniszewski

Liar by Justine Larbalestier

Sirensong by Jenna Black

Gratitude Giveaway!

Thankfulness Giveaway!

+50 and +100 Followers Giveaway Winners!

Scored by Lauren McLaughlin

Enclave by Anne Aguirre

Tiger’s Quest by Colleen Houck

Carrier of the Mark by Leigh Fallon

Sweetly by Jackson Pearce

The Vespertine by Saundra Mitchell

50 and 100 Followers Giveaway

Misfit by Jon Skovron

For Darkness Shows the Stars Cover Release

Cleopatra’s Moon by Vicky Alvear Shecter

Books I am Thankful For

1. I am thankful for Over Sea Under Stone by Susan Cooper

2. I am thankful for A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle

3. I am thankful for Wild Magic by Tamora Pierce

Mermaid: A Twist on the Classic Tale by Carolyn Turgeon

Always a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough

Giveaway Winners

Savanna Ucinski

Grace S.

The Mephisto Covenant by Trinity Faegen

Tankborn by Karen Sandler

Giveaway!

Memento Nora by Angie Smibert

Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough

I am Number Four by Pittacus Lore

Demonglass by Rachel Hawkins

Feeds

Eona by Alison Goodman

Cybils Nominations

Sirenz by Charlotte Bennardo and Natalie Zaman

The Maze Runner by James Dashner

Challenges

Congratulations:

Hannah Lorraine
and
Megan Kyser!!!