Born Of Illusion by Teri Brown (review)

Hardcover, 352 pages
Expected publication: June 11th 2013 by Balzer & Bray
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:
Anna Van Housen is thirteen the first time she breaks her mother out of jail. By sixteen she’s street smart and savvy, assisting her mother, the renowned medium Marguerite Van Housen, in her stage show and séances, and easily navigating the underground world of magicians, mediums and mentalists in 1920’s New York City. Handcuffs and sleight of hand illusions have never been much of a challenge for Anna. The real trick is keeping her true gifts secret from her opportunistic mother, who will stop at nothing to gain her ambition of becoming the most famous medium who ever lived. But when a strange, serious young man moves into the flat downstairs, introducing her to a secret society that studies people with gifts like hers, he threatens to reveal the secrets Anna has fought so hard to keep, forcing her to face the truth about her past. Could the stories her mother has told her really be true? Could she really be the illegitimate daughter of the greatest magician of all?

Review:

Born of Illusion is, I can tell because I have superior powers (just kidding), the first in a series. It will either be a trilogy, no, it most probably be a trilogy. The novel is set in the 20s, as, for some reason or another, YA novels are wont to be. The setting does not play as large a part in the novel as it does in Bray’s The Diviners but the narrative is nicely sprinkled with meaty tidbits that situate the reader firmly in that decade.

My favourite part of this novel is Anna van Housen. Oft times, in my experience at least, I may  like a main character, I may even empathize with her but once the book is done she will be, ultimately, lost among all the other main characters so plentifully present in YA novels. Anna feels real. Her mommy issues are genuine and understandable and her small actions to separate herself and grow as a person in her own right rather than as an extension of her mother makes for intriguing reading. I think the dynamics of the relationship between mother and daughter with the layered conflicts and rich emotional payoff is what makes this novel so successful. Oh, the mythology, the paranormal aspect is gripping enough but Brown’s skill is in the way she creates believable and seemingly genuine relationships between people.

Anna’s mother is beautiful and uses this beauty and the accompanying charisma to further her business as a mentalist. She pretends to hear the voices of the dead and fleeces grieving parents/sons/daughters off their money. Oh and she also tells the world that Anna’s dad is Harry Houdini. The Houdini question is never answered explicitly but enough is implied that it is easy enough to read between the lines. Anna is the one who has the true powers, powers that she does not necessarily need or even want. There is a secretive society made up of magic practitioners and a supreme villain looking to harness the powers of the uninitiated for his own nefarious plans. Oh, there’s also this loveable inventor whose inventions come in very handy. All that’s missing is a talking cat but one can hope that the next few installments will provide that as well.

The romance I liked. There is a bit too much mush but I’m forgiving because the love interest is so interesting in his own right and evinces qualities that are not usually common to a love interest. He has a personality! Haha.

I had two main issues with this novel. First, the pacing seems intentionally slow. The novel is 352 pages and I think some tighter editing could have culled it down without losing anything but heightening the tension. The mystery, such as it was, was a bit too predictable and since I connected the dots so very easily, I wondered why Anna didn’t. Also, I wonder why there wasn’t more information given about Anna’s otherworldly powers but I have a feeling that Brown is saving that for the second book which, from the hint given to us at the end of this one, is going to be pretty darned awesome.

Get your hands on this book, guys. It has a wonderful protagonist, a kissable love interest and some fantastic action.

 

Another Little Piece by Kate Karyus Quinn (review)

Hardcover, 432 pages
Expected publication: June 11th 2013 by HarperTeen
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:
The spine-tingling horror of Stephen King meets an eerie mystery worthy of Sara Shepard’s Pretty Little Liars series in Kate Karyus Quinn’s haunting debut.

On a cool autumn night, Annaliese Rose Gordon stumbled out of the woods and into a high school party. She was screaming. Drenched in blood. Then she vanished.

A year later, Annaliese is found wandering down a road hundreds of miles away. She doesn’t know who she is. She doesn’t know how she got there. She only knows one thing: She is not the real Annaliese Rose Gordon.

Now Annaliese is haunted by strange visions and broken memories. Memories of a reckless, desperate wish . . . a bloody razor . . . and the faces of other girls who disappeared. Piece by piece, Annaliese’s fractured memories come together to reveal a violent, endless cycle that she will never escape—unless she can unlock the twisted secrets of her past.

Review:

I discussed in an earlier blog post the sudden proliferation of amnesiac protagonists currently littering the landscape of YA novels. Another Little Piece features such a protagonist. When Annaliese Rose Gordon is found, she is miles from home with no memory of who she is, how she got there and where she has been in the year she has been missing.

What follows is a journey: a real time construction of an identity, a tense realization of the incongruity between the physical self and the entity that resides in the physical shell. Anna, as the person inside Annaliese calls herself, is an other, not in the postcolonial sense but in a “not-human” context. There is a deal that bound Annaliese and Anna together and the completion of that deal is what leads Anna to be inside Annaliese in a very Stephen King-esque way.

The book is dark, dealing with themes of love (in all of its manifestations), the desire for immortality and the matter of choice. There are poems scattered throughout the novel, poems that were written by the real Annaliese, the one who is gone and will never be again. They are poignant and heartbreaking – they offer  glimpses of a girl who could have been much more if she had just given herself a chance. But she didn’t and now she is gone, leaving snippets of herself in various unexpected places.

The romance is interesting. Though it is not the most compelling one I have read, it does offer more than just binary expressions – he loves me, he loves me not. I still think the relationship could have deepened slower but I seem to have this problem with every YA novel I read. I liked how the love interest in this novel is more than a love interest. He is a person with his own thoughts, dreams and ambitions. He has his own problems and his own “abilities” to deal with.

And that’s the thing. This novel does not belong to, as Alison Waller would term it, “fantastical realism” (where the world is normal and the paranormal aspects affect only one person, my definition) but neither is it magical realism. It’s not outright fantasy where special abilities are the norm. The paranormalcy is not explained and scattered, the powers manifesting in different people without any reason given for their origin. The twin whose sister’s dead, the love interest – why do these people have these abilities? The novel does not even attempt to explain and while I have no problem accepting that they do, I would have liked some engagement with the mythology to give the narrative more substance.

This directly affected the denouement of the novel. I have no idea what happened and how or even why. Things worked out rather too neatly and I didn’t like that. I wanted more explanation, a slower pace to give the resolution more credibility.

The pacing has problems but the writing doesn’t. The writing has the right hooks and I had no problem immersing myself into the story. It’s only when the book is done and you are thinking about it that you realize that you still have some questions that remain unanswered.

However, when all is said and done, this novel entertained me. A lot. It is a strong debut and makes me look forward to what Ms. Quinn comes up with next. Recommended.

Transparent by Natalie Whipple (review)

Paperback, 368 pages
Expected publication: May 21st 2013 by HarperTeen
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:
Plenty of teenagers feel invisible. Fiona McClean actually is.

An invisible girl is a priceless weapon. Fiona’s own father has been forcing her to do his dirty work for years—everything from spying on people to stealing cars to breaking into bank vaults.

After sixteen years, Fiona’s had enough. She and her mother flee to a small town, and for the first time in her life, Fiona feels like a normal life is within reach. But Fiona’s father isn’t giving up that easily.

Of course, he should know better than anyone: never underestimate an invisible girl.

Review:

Natalie Whipple’s YA debut novel is quite a strong one. I enjoyed it. It certainly presents an interesting new premise. Before I started the novel, I thought the invisibility thing was something she could turn on and off so I was a happily surprised when I realized that Fiona McClean is invisible all the time. Even to herself. This may have been the first time I have encountered an invisible protagonist.

The set up is intriguing: a mob boss’s daughter in a world where “special skills” are common, running so her father cannot exploit her invisibility and use her in his war with the other mob bosses. A mother who is addicted to her father who is really satan’s spawn. Nothing soft about this man. More on this later. She finds herself in a new town, meeting new friends and two brothers. I have a soft spot for books that take time to build relationships between family members. I also like it when the romance is not the cheap kind (the insta-love, I mean) and is accorded attention and given time. Cohere. However, I have some complaints about that so more on that later.

I thought that removing the body from the girl would perhaps give us a chance to see a narrative without discussion of beauty and physicality. However, if anything, this magnified the issue and Whipple does Fiona’s desire to see herself very well. I felt her yearning to see what colour her hair is and what her eyes look like – things we take for granted but are actually impossible for her. The pacing is fast and the writing is smooth. There are no awkward transitions and I like the flow of the narrative from one scene to another.

The climax, however, could have done with more work though I appreciate that for once, there was no grand forgiveness scene; sometimes parents suck and it’s totally okay to tell them that they do and no child has to forgive a parent when the parents actions are beyond atrocious and YA novels should probably stop perpetuating that ideal of parents as flawed but ultimately redeemable. Yes, I have an issue with that but we’ll discuss it some other day.

So this book, you guys, it was fun. Entertaining. There were two things I had issues with though:

1. I thought the girl friend and her family were too welcoming and friendly. There needed to be more in the way of their motives. Some explanation. I believe in goodness, I truly do, but that kind of goodness is suspicious. Everyone’s looking out for number one. Maybe I’m just cynical?
2. This is a spoiler so avert your eyes.
   I wondered how Whipple would address Fiona’s invisibility where the romance was concerned. I thought it was amazing that the dude, even though he couldn’t see her, had fallen for her and it made me feel all kinds of tingles realizing that. However, in the end we find out that he had been able to see her all along. That was his skill and it was disappointing. It was even more concerning however when Fiona mentions that having him see her made her feel complete, as in, his recognition of her physical person made her feel complete. I would have liked to see Fiona come to that realization, that state of feeling, without a man helping her. Her reaching the point where she was self-actualized, assertive and confident of her own existence would have had more impact had she found the feelings through her own actions. It would have been more satisfying to see her get there on her own. As it is, all this is doing, albeit unintentionally, is reaffirming patriarchy. And yes, I went there.
   /End spoiler

Do I recommend this book to you? Yes, I do. While it has some troubling aspects, at the heart of it, it is entertaining, fun and dude, it would make such an awesome movie but the movie would probably make the protagonist visible and that would ruin everything. Ah well. I liked the book! I hope you do too.

The Sweet Dead Life by Joy Preble (review)

Hardcover, 244 pages
Expected publication: May 14th 2013 by Soho Teen
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:
“I found out two things today. One, I think I’m dying. And two, my brother is a perv.”

So begins the diary of 14-year-old Jenna Samuels, who is having a very bad eighth-grade year. Her single mother spends all day in bed. Dad vanished when she was eight. Her 16-year-old brother, Casey, tries to hold together what’s left of the family by working two after-school jobs— difficult, as he’s stoned all the time. To make matters worse, Jenna is sick. When she collapses one day, Casey tries to race her to the hospital in their beat-up Prius and crashes instead.

Jenna wakes up in the ER to find Casey beside her. Beatified. Literally. The flab and zits? Gone. Before long, Jenna figures out that Casey didn’t survive the accident at all. He’s an “A-word.” (She can’t bring herself to utter the truth.) Soon they discover that Jenna isn’t just dying: she’s being poisoned. And Casey has been sent back to help solve the mystery that not only holds the key to her survival, but also to their mother’s mysterious depression and father’s disappearance.

Review:

The synopsis for this book is pretty convincing and I was sold as soon as I read it. We don’t read as much about brothers and sisters as we should or perhaps I should, possibly because I have two older brothers and I’ve lived the experience in real life and do not seek to repeat it in fictional life. Big brothers are often gross, coarse and mean. They are also unexpectedly sweet and caring, protective and warm. They scare away prospective boyfriends with a glower and have the weirdest tastes in music and movies. I have some questionable music tastes thanks to my brothers.

What makes The Sweet Dead Life so sweet is the relationship between Jenna and Casey. They are in a terrible situation where the adults of their lives have checked out leaving them to fend for themselves. Their father possibly pulled a runner and their mother seems to be sinking further and further into depression. Oh and Jenna is on her way to dying. She’s almost there when Casey crashes the car on their way to the hospital and the game changes dramatically.

Despite the presence of a feathered human being (not a werebird), there is very little holiness present in the novel. It is funny, poignant and disarmingly real. Jenna’s familial situation is narrated without romanticizing anything. From the mold growing in her mother’s bathroom to her brother’s uh…recreational activities under his blanket, Jenna narrates everything in an authentic fourteen year old voice. When her life takes a turn for the weird, she manages to convey disbelief without going overboard and her gradual acceptance of the A-word is believable.

The weakest part of the novel is the so called mystery and the resolution of it. While it is not terribly done, it could have been stronger. I wish the mystery portions of the novel had been better woven into the rest of the narrative. However, I appreciated that the resolution is not neat and tidy. There is a sense of time having past and that some irretrievable losses have occurred. I liked that the ending is ambiguous in certain details and that though there is an emotional payoff, it is not in your face and explicit.

I really liked this one, you guys. I recommend it.

Parallel by Lauren Miller (review)

Hardcover, 432 pages
Expected publication: May 14th 2013 by HarperTeen
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:
Abby Barnes had a plan. The Plan. She’d go to Northwestern, major in journalism, and land a job at a national newspaper, all before she turned twenty-two. But one tiny choice—taking a drama class her senior year of high school—changed all that. Now, on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, Abby is stuck on a Hollywood movie set, miles from where she wants to be, wishing she could rewind her life. The next morning, she’s in a dorm room at Yale, with no memory of how she got there. Overnight, it’s as if her past has been rewritten.

With the help of Caitlin, her science-savvy BFF, Abby discovers that this new reality is the result of a cosmic collision of parallel universes that has Abby living an alternate version of her life. And not only that: Abby’s life changes every time her parallel self makes a new choice. Meanwhile, her parallel is living out Abby’s senior year of high school and falling for someone Abby’s never even met.

As she struggles to navigate her ever-shifting existence, forced to live out the consequences of a path she didn’t choose, Abby must let go of the Plan and learn to focus on the present, without losing sight of who she is, the boy who might just be her soul mate, and the destiny that’s finally within reach.

Review:

 

Reading this novel is like turning into a yoyo. You are up and then you are down and then you are dizzy and then your head is spinning and you are not aware whether you are standing up or sitting down. Or if you are in fact upside down. These things happen.

If you are familiar with chaos theory (which I am not) and know anything about The Butterfly Effect (Wikipedia helps), you will know that according to it, a small action could have drastic consequences later on. For example, if you are sitting in class one day and realized that you had lost your eraser but instead of asking the person sitting beside you for one, you decide to just cross out the word or whatever and continue with your work. Seemingly harmless, yeah? Now consider this, if you had asked the person for the eraser and struck up a conversation with them, you may have become friends and that person could have introduced you to his father who was one of the interviewers at the university you wished to go to. And had you met the father, you would have been more comfortable at the interview which would have led you to passing the interview and getting accepted, graduating with honors, becoming say a doctor and saving thousands of lives. All because you asked for an eraser.

With me so far?

Okay, Parallel, truthfully, it confused the heck out of me for the first third. I am not scientifically-inclined to begin with and I just couldn’t  place myself in the narrative so I took a break. A long break. So long that I almost didn’t come back to it but I did and I am so glad I did because this book is kind of awesome. Still confusing and not perfect, but original and interesting.

There is some kind of collision between two universes and Abby gets displaced or something like that – this is the hazy part. The parallel world is one year behind the “real world” and somehow all the actions of her parallel self affect Abby in the real world. I think. Let’s go with that. So the chapters are alternate usually from high school parallel Abby to Yale Freshman Abby. But the “real” Abby is actually a movie star. Yikes. Anyways.

The pacing is steady and the writing is unproblematic. The mechanics are unclear but that could just be me. I liked seeing  how the high school Abby’s decisions affected Freshman Abby in the future. That was the fascinating part.

There is a love triangle and it was handled rather clumsily but still, there are two separate Abbys and so two different soulmates and just…I’m getting confused again. I did like the friendship between the best friends, warts and all.

I think you need to read this book for yourself. It’s certainly different and other people may articulate their reviews with greater eloquence than I seem to have the capacity for. I enjoyed the novel mostly though I wasn’t a fan of the waffling. I thought the ending was a bit too neat and too smug, if that makes sense, but that didn’t take away from my enjoyment of the novel as a whole. Recommended.

The Mad Man’s Daughter – Megan Shepherd (review)

Hardcover, 432 pages
Expected publication: January 29th 2013 by Balzer + Bray
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:
In the darkest places, even love is deadly.

Sixteen-year-old Juliet Moreau has built a life for herself in London—working as a maid, attending church on Sundays, and trying not to think about the scandal that ruined her life. After all, no one ever proved the rumors about her father’s gruesome experiments. But when she learns he is alive and continuing his work on a remote tropical island, she is determined to find out if the accusations are true.

Accompanied by her father’s handsome young assistant, Montgomery, and an enigmatic castaway, Edward—both of whom she is deeply drawn to—Juliet travels to the island, only to discover the depths of her father’s madness: He has experimented on animals so that they resemble, speak, and behave as humans. And worse, one of the creatures has turned violent and is killing the island’s inhabitants. Torn between horror and scientific curiosity, Juliet knows she must end her father’s dangerous experiments and escape her jungle prison before it’s too late. Yet as the island falls into chaos, she discovers the extent of her father’s genius—and madness—in her own blood.

Review:

I recently read a book called The Mad Scientist’s Daughter and I thought that instead of Mad Man, this book deserved the title of the previous novel. The sanity of the father was much discussed in this novel but there was never any in depth discussion with the person in question. I wonder why conversations with the mad man were never more than him coldly reiterating his inhumanity and her gasping her outrage at his inhumanity.

Anyway, sorry, this is a review. I am writing a review, yes I am. I am entirely unfamiliar with Moreau and his island so I went into this book without any expectations or perceptions about how the book would unfold, plot-wise at least. The opening of the novel is particularly interesting and I wish the setting had remained London because it was so well done. The eerie atmosphere of the hospital, the scary doctor, the rather promiscuous best friend (she was portrayed as such, I’m not making any judgments), the tension, the pace, the danger, everything was perfectly portrayed. I had no problem with Juliet and was rather intrigued by her darker self. It is when she sees Montgomery and has him take her to the island on which he lives with her father that things get murky.

The novel has promise. Some people will like it more than others. The love triangle is kind of intriguing but the whole inconsistency of Juliet’s feelings is deeply annoying. Her penchant to vacillate between the two men are annoying and strangely occur at inappropriate moments as you know, there are times when romance is the last thing on your mind. If the romance had been a little less focused on than it was I would have liked the book better. No, well, I think Juliet’s character was inconsistent. She hated her father, she didn’t, she loved Montgomery but she was attracted to Edward.

I don’t know if Shepherd does this intentionally but there are times in the novel when Juliet’s character is seriously unlikeable. For instance, with that poor girl whom she perceives a threat to her lasting happiness with Montgomery and then that moment at the end, her willful deception of a helpless, childlike character. I had less than kind feelings for her which is always a risk when you want a reader to continue reading the novel. The ending of the novel does make me want to continue reading the series because I know things are not as simple as they look and the outlook for Juliet is just so damned bleak. Where is she going to go and what is going to do? I am curious so I will read the next one in the series.

The novel is a lot of running in the jungle and the pace lags a bit because of all this running around. The themes explored are interesting – the meaning of being human, humanity, duty, filial, romance, gender – and were I writing about gender in one of my classes, I would totally use this novel. Ooo, I can still use this novel somehow. Anyway, to put it simply, this book is entertaining in the end. Intriguing in the beginning and rather frustrating in the middle. Still, it was an interesting read and if Moreau’s island was your thing, give this a try.

Prophecy (The Dragon King Chronicles #1) – Ellen Oh (Review)

Hardcover, 312 pages
Expected publication: January 2nd 2013 by HarperTeen
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:
The greatest warrior in all of the Seven Kingdoms… is a girl with yellow eyes.

Kira’s the only female in the king’s army, and the prince’s bodyguard. She’s a demon slayer and an outcast, hated by nearly everyone in her home city of Hansong. And, she’s their only hope…

Murdered kings and discovered traitors point to a demon invasion, sending Kira on the run with the young prince. He may be the savior predicted in the Dragon King Prophecy, but the missing treasure of myth may be the true key. With only the guidance of the cryptic prophecy, Kira must battle demon soldiers, evil shaman, and the Demon Lord himself to find what was once lost and raise a prince into a king.

Review:

I had been looking forward to Prophecy ever since I read the synopsis. It sounds so bloody fantastic. But alas.

Okay, this may be unfair considering that the novel is Oh’s debut but I could not help but compare Prophecy to Eon/Eona. Considering the thematic nature and the similarities in not just setting but also subject matter, comparisons are inevitable. The Eon/Eona duology, though not without flaws, is a sophisticated work where prose, plotting and characterization are concerned. The novels are well thought out and the world building is detailed and exquisite. So when I say the bar was set high…it would be an understatement.

Prophecy is original in that the setting is a mythical Korea and while we have seen mythical Japan, we, or at least I, have not seen a Korean setting for any YA novel. I studied Korean for four years in University and I can speak and write it though not as fluently as I would like to. I am also familiar with the culture and the food of the place though I am not a great aficionado of the pop music. Dramas are what I love and keep reading for a chance to see me cast Prophecy with Korean actors. Anyway, back to the review.

Kira could have been a very interesting character had Oh given her a chance to develop on her own rather than handing all aspects and facets of her personality to us. Showing rather than telling would have been better and the pacing is a bit too fast. Oh relies too much on reader familiarity with the trope. What I mean by this is that though readers have seen many female warriors in fantasy novels, each one is different and each one deserves careful development. Kira doesn’t get that development. We meet her and are immediately flung into the action. There needed to be more visual descriptions – that would have served to slow the pace as well as give us secondhand information about Kira – how she kept her room, what was in her room, her private conversations with her mother – these would have spoken immensely about her character. I also did not appreciate how the court ladies were immediately shoved into a stereotype – there was no delicacy to this and I would have loved to see something extra, a quick explanation about these court ladies, an explanation of their motivations and an understanding beyond the superficial “they hate me because I am not feminine like them.” Also, I really did not buy the hatred the King has for Kira. I would think that saving his son would be enough to overrule his objections to her femininity.

It would have been so awesome to see a scene where Kira’s parents receive gifts from the uncle who wants his nephew to marry Kira. There was potential for so much in the way the gifts would have been received and Kira’s reaction to the gifts and to the evidence that someone desired her as she was and not as she should be. Instead, we have the first side of a love triangle forcefully established as Kira faces the dude who wants to marry her and instead of being totally repulsed by him she is unwillingly intrigued and that is it to their relationship. There is no gradual growth or conversation or any communication really apart from him popping up at odd intervals vowing to take Kira back as she is his betrothed and he cannot wait to have her writhing beneath him. I’m rolling my eyes here.

The other love interest, Jae something, is very interesting and perhaps one of the few people I was really intrigued by. The prince is very annoying simply because he is not very princely. If there is trouble to be got into, he gets into it. I would think that he being the prince of a country, would be aware of his importance to his people and would act thusly. However, he lacks the gravitas which is a bit unbelieving because despite his young age, he has been brought up to be the next king so it makes no sense that he would insist on going to places and in situations that could potentially kill him.

The pacing, as I have said, felt rushed and the plotting didn’t appeal to me either. Korean culture and myth is so rich and so many of the mythical elements could have been worked into the narrative. Alas, not many of them were and I was just disappointed.

There were a lot of terms used in the narrative that I hope will be placed in a glossary so that those not familiar with the language will be able to better visualize and understand. There were a couple of things I had a bit of trouble with. For one thing, “kumiho” (nine-tailed fox) is spelled (in Korean) 구미호.  The ㄱ is usually a “g” sound and so, as far as I know, it is not “kumiho” but “gumiho.” The “k” sound comes in the hangul letter ㄲ. Also “Omanim” troubled me a bit because I’ve heard 엄마 (Omma) and 어머니 (Omoni which is a lot more formal than Omma and therefore the most likely to be called 어머님) but don’t quote me on that as I’m not sure.

I have now written an essay on the book. Sorry. If it’s tl:dr, just take this away: I wish I could have liked the novel a lot more than I did. It did not live up to my expectations. However, don’t take my word for it. Make up your own mind.

The Drama Casting!

Kira

I had a few actors in my mind for this role but ultimately I went with Park Min Young because I thought she’d acquit herself rather well.

For the two sides of the love triangle, I would cast Woo Bin as the negative one (because he’s really pretty and I think he’d do an awesome job) and Kim Bum as the loveable Jae because he has dimples and that’s who I imagined Jae to look like. So Woo Bin and Kim Bum:

The prince is 12 years old but I think I’d cast Yeo Jin Gu because he’s good at acting princely and in fact has done so several times.

I would cast the two brothers but they have such little part that I don’t feel like doing so. Oh also, there really needed to be more girls in this novel.

The Water Witch (Fairwick Chronicles #2) – Juliet Dark

Paperback, 352 pages
Expected publication: February 12th 2013 by Ballantine Books
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:

After casting out a dark spirit, Callie McFay, a professor of gothic literature, has at last restored a semblance of calm to her rambling Victorian house. But in the nearby thicket of the Honeysuckle Forest, and in the currents of the rushing Undine River, more trouble is stirring. . . .

The enchanted town of Fairwick’s dazzling mix of mythical creatures has come under siege from the Grove: a sinister group of witches determined to banish the fey back to their ancestral land. With factions turning on one another, all are cruelly forced to take sides. Callie’s grandmother, a prominent Grove member, demands her granddaughter’s compliance, but half-witch/half-fey Callie can hardly betray her friends and colleagues at the college.

To stave off disaster, Callie enlists Duncan Laird, an alluring seductive academic who cultivates her vast magical potential, but to what end? Deeply conflicted, Callie struggles to save her beloved Fairwick, dangerously pushing her extraordinary powers to the limit—risking all, even the needs of her own passionate heart.

Review:

I quite enjoyed Demon Lover, the first in the series so I expected to like The Water Witch just as much. Unfortunately, some elements in the novel prevented me from immersing myself into the world as fully as I wanted to and this in turn affected my enjoyment of it.

I think there were too many things occurring in the novel and not enough attention given to all of them. There are a lot more supernatural beings added to the mix, the Nordic (I think) handyman gets badly hurt and is stuck somewhere in the ever after, Callie gets dangerously addicted to a faery drug (or not, I wasn’t quite sure), there is another supremely hot male who has ambivalent plans for Callie, Callie’s grandmother waltzes into town, there are Elves who call themselves Seraphim and oh, Liam makes another appearance in the form of someone I won’t tell you who and there’s a handyman called Bill (I am not making this up).

For all the events populating the plot, the story itself seems to lack tension. It’s not gripping and I found it difficult to find myself caring. Even though the odds are high, the door to faery could close, Callie assures the reader she has it under control when that is the last thing she does. I wished the author had chosen one thing out of all the things happening and worked to develop it as much as was possible before introducing something else.

The ending is just too simplistic and not in a good way. I didn’t like the ending and I didn’t like the way the romance angle played out. It seemed a bit too cliché. I don’t know, you guys, the book wasn’t for me. I may still read the third one because I am curious but I certainly didn’t think much of the sequel to the Demon Lover – especially when I think about what the demon lover ended up as.

Strobe Edge – Sakisaka Io

Softcover, 200 pages
Expected Publication Nov 6th by Viz Media LLC
Source: Edelweiss

Synopsis:

Having no experience in romance, the vibrant Ninako curiously explores the meaning of what “love” really is, and is surprised to feel a colorful range of emotions as she grows closer to the school heartthrob, the quiet yet gentle Ren, who also happens to be involved in a longtime relationship. With every intention of keeping her head held high, Ninako prepares to face the mental pain of this one-sided love that she had allowed to take root, facing a series of trials that would either contribute to her growth as a headstrong woman, or break her as it did with other girls. However, is this really a one-sided love? Or had something been silently sown in the most hidden part of Ren’s heart?

Review:

I love, love, love Io Sakisaka and Strobe Edge is definitely one of her more brilliant series. The first volume in this 10 volume work sets up the conflicts and themes that will last throughout the series. The manga shows the coming of age of teenagers in an unnamed high school in Japan. The main character, Ninako, is utterly innocent in the matters of the heart and in this first volume, she comes in contact with Ren who makes her feel things she hasn’t felt before and grapples with her sense of friendship for her best friend who feels more for her than she wants him to.

Ren has a girlfriend which further complicates Ninako’s life but rather than cheapening it with jealousy and other negative feelings, Sakisaka takes us on a journey through adolescence. Sakisaka is particularly talented at taking the trivialities of life and making them beautiful in all their ordinariness. She shows that there is beauty in heartache and joy in friendship.

The art is wonderful. The humour prevalent and no North American reader will struggle with situating herself in the context of the story. All of us have been through that painful first love. Those first feelings of love and the bittersweet knowledge that your love will remain unrequited. I totally recommend that you, even if you do not read manga, give this one a chance. It is wonderful and I have this tiny crush on Ren. Seriously.

Through to You – Emily Hainsworth (Review)

Hardcover, 272 pages
Expected publication: October 2nd 2012 by Balzer + Bray
Source: Edelweiss
Official Website

Synopsis:

Camden Pike has been grief-stricken since his girlfriend, Viv, died. Viv was the last good thing in his life: helping him rebuild his identity after a career-ending football injury, picking up the pieces when his home life shattered, and healing his pain long after the meds wore off. And now, he’d give anything for one more glimpse of her. But when Cam makes a visit to the site of Viv’s deadly car accident, he sees some kind of apparition. And it isn’t Viv.

The apparition’s name is Nina, and she’s not a ghost. She’s a girl from a parallel world, and in this world, Viv is still alive. Cam can’t believe his wildest dreams have come true. All he can focus on is getting his girlfriend back, no matter the cost. But things are different in this other world: Viv and Cam have both made very different choices, things between them have changed in unexpected ways, and Viv isn’t the same girl he remembers. Nina is keeping some dangerous secrets, too, and the window between the worlds is shrinking every day. As Cam comes to terms with who this Viv has become and the part Nina played in his parallel story, he’s forced to choose—stay with Viv or let her go—before the window closes between them once and for all.

Review:

This novel surprised me by its depth. It was more substantial than I had expected it to be and reading it was a pleasure. While the premise is rather bleak with a bereaved Camden trying to search a way out of his all encompassing grief and finding a second chance, the execution of the novel saves it from being depressing and too emotional. I was not sure that I would like the male narrator as I usually have trouble with them but I needn’t have worried as Camden’s voice is readable and is not…how should I say it, there is no obvious effort to make him sound like a guy. What I mean by this is that usually when female writers write male characters, they add stuff like “man” and “dude” to their dialogue to make them sound manlier. Okay fine, not usually but enough times that I have to come to expect it. And there usually is a stilted awkwardness about the character which indicates that the author is not quite comfortable writing in a male voice.

However, there is none of that in Through to You. Camden is simply a teenager trying to deal with the loss of the most important person in his life. I found his sessions with his shrink to be engaging and revealing of his character. He is, in many ways, a typical teenager dealing with emotion in the only way he knows: by shutting down and retreating into himself. There is a lots of angst as there are parental issues but it is not needlessly melodramatic. Instead, it serves to deepen the reader’s understanding of Camden as a person.

Another thing I liked about this novel was how the character coming across the barrier separating the alternate worlds was not Camden’s dead girlfriend but someone else entirely. If you think about it, having the girlfriend show up would give the initial creepy factor but it would be too easy and too predictable. By switching things up, Hainsworth very cleverly portrays new facets of the story and develops Camden’s character in different ways.

The novel tackles the question of second chances; it asks whether you really know the people the way you think you do and it makes you think about the things (and people) you may be missing out or not seeing just because you are too occupied with one person or thing. It is a gripping story about coming to terms with loss, both of your own self and of other people. There are many more ways to lose people than just through death.

Camden was an interesting character as was Viv. The supporting cast of characters were also were developed. I found the pace to be spot on and the narrative to flow smoothly. I liked this one, you guys, and I think you will appreciate its fresh and innovative style too.