Grave Mercy by Robin LaFevers

Seventeen-year-old Ismae escapes from the brutality of an arranged marriage into the sanctuary of the convent of St. Mortain, where the sisters still serve the gods of old. Here she learns that the god of Death Himself has blessed her with dangerous gifts—and a violent destiny. If she chooses to stay at the convent, she will be trained as an assassin and serve as a handmaiden to Death. To claim her new life, she must destroy the lives of others.

Ismae’s most important assignment takes her straight into the high court of Brittany—where she finds herself woefully under prepared—not only for the deadly games of intrigue and treason, but for the impossible choices she must make. For how can she deliver Death’s vengeance upon a target who, against her will, has stolen her heart?

The blurb to this book sounded awesome, so I went in with high hopes.  I don't want to say that my hopes were dashed, exactly, but they weren't exceeded.  Perhaps the premise of assassin nuns is just so awesome that nothing can totally meet it.

The characterization in this book is good.  I felt a connection with Ismae and her confusion, logical workings, and her heartbreak over her job.  Through her eyes we meet a vast cast of characters that all seem individualized and realized, with motivations that follow through to actions.  The pacing started off slow, and was a little jarring at the beginning (it switches from "we want to make you an assassin" to "you're an assassin now" with only a chapter break), but towards the middle it picked up speed and really became the book of court intrigue.  I saw the romance coming miles away but it still felt natural and logical.  I did not see the big villain twist coming and yet it still felt like it fit with the book and the characters.

Now, the things I didn't like.  There was a lot of "story" to this book, especially the first part.  I felt like I was being told a lot of stuff without evidence to back it up.  For example, I was told "Ismae is now an assassin" without seeing much of her training or her relationships growing with her fellow nuns and superiors.  The book gets better as it goes on, but there is still a lot of telling going on.  I also felt that the worldbuilding was a little suspect when it came to the nuns and their world.  Perhaps that is because we spend so little time there, but it felt as if details about the nuns' beliefs only came up when they were necessary, not planted chapters before, which makes things seem a little contrived.

In all, I think this was a great but not amazing book.  Perhaps I am jaded by all the amazing court intrigue books that have come out this year, but it just didn't click with me like some others did.  It certainly wasn't a waste of time, though, and I'd highly recommend it over many other books.

Dark of the Moon by Tracy Barrett

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.

Torn by Margaret Peterson Haddix

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.

Goliath by Scott Westerfeld

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.

Speculative Fiction

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.


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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.


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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.