Venom – Fiona Paul (Secrets of the Eternal Rose #1) (Review)

Hardcover, 432 pages
Expected publication: October 30th 2012 by Philomel
Source: Publisher

Synopsis:

Cassandra Caravello is one of Renaissance Venice’s lucky elite: with elegant gowns, sparkling jewels, her own lady’s maid, and a wealthy fiancé, she has everything a girl could desire. Yet ever since her parents’ death, Cassandra has felt trapped, alone in a city of water, where the dark and labyrinthine canals whisper of escape.

When Cass stumbles upon a murdered woman—practically in her own backyard—she’s drawn into a dangerous world of courtesans, killers, and secret societies. Soon, she finds herself falling for Falco, a mysterious artist with a mischievous grin… and a spectacular skill for trouble. Can Cassandra find the murderer, before he finds her? And will she stay true to her fiancé, or succumb to her uncontrollable feelings for Falco?

Beauty, love, romance, and mystery weave together in a stunning novel that’s as seductive and surprising as the city of Venice itself.

Review:

Venom invites you to a rich world of mystery and intrigue set in Renaissance Venice. It offers secret rendezvous in graveyards, masked balls and errant lovers mixed with absent fiancés. With a premise like that, I could not help but be interested in the novel. The cover, too, is beautiful and alluring.

So what went wrong?

Many things, I’m afraid. This will take a while so bear with me. I went to this author event recently where Kenneth Oppel presided as the main author in attendance. He spoke about his writing and showed us the amount of work he does before he comes to a draft that he is willing to call his first (it’s actually the 4^th or 5^th and is about knee-high in papers). By the time he has finished writing a novel to his satisfaction, he has accumulated papers that are nearly thigh-high when stacked together. The reason I talk about this is because as I read Venom, I saw the potential of a good novel but what I was reading seemed more like a first draft than the copy you send out for reviewing purposes. This seemed more like a first draft than the final one.

This is the academic in me but it made me wonder whether the standard is being disregarded because it is children’s literature -  but of course, that cannot be true because Oppel is also a YA novelist though I believe his novels are more cross-over than strictly YA. Anyway, I shall now detail to my readers what troubled me about this novel.

The setting of the novel, as I said, is historical Venice. The characters populating a novel set in such a time and place will necessarily be constructed by the ideas and thoughts of the period. Their actions will be informed by the norms of the society they were born and live in – even if they are thinking against the grain. When you take a character that is born in a different culture in a different time and place and project upon her the thoughts and actions of a contemporary American girl, it makes for an illogical and frequently jarring read. Her constant sneaking out and meeting a strange man (despite being engaged to another) without any thought of her position in society is improbable and does not read as an authentic portrayal of a girl of her time period. The lack of attention given to the titles of nobility by the serving class also throws the reader out of the narrator. It does not seem possible that the maid would address her employer by her name – especially in its diminutive form. There probably would be more hesitation when making fast and loose with one’s virtue than Cass shows at any time. Also, I am no expert but I doubt going from one place to another in a gondola was as easy as this book seems to insist it is.

We meet Cassandra at a funeral and her lack of respect for the dead girl is astounding. She assures the readers that she was not very close to the dead girl in question and then proceeds to talk about how much the death is affecting her – how sad she is even though she is backing out of the church and falling into the arms of an erstwhile artist. At her friend’s funeral. Right. She does not read the letter her fiancé sent her in the beginning of the book for about one third of the book despite mentioning it once and again. The letter seems as though it was tampered with (its seal is broken) but this goes nowhere.  Cass tells us how her fiancé kissed her for the very time and all she could think about was the bench digging into her back and then as soon as he gets back, she starts noticing him in all these splendid new ways. His shy eyes, his soft hair and oh, his broad shoulders!

The love interest is an artist who takes her to shoddy places, leaves her alone amongst men with rapacious intents, digs up graves and steals corpses, lies to her, drugs her – does he sound charming yet? Cass has no reason to go looking for the killer other than the disappearance of a body – flimsy excuse that does not get better as the novel proceeds. The mystery is under-developed, the villains are vanilla and read almost as though they were cut out from cardboard and the so-called killer is ridiculous enough to induce an eye roll. There are no connections between the “mysteries” and there’s no answer to the question “why do I care?”

The language is too contemporary and some of the words (such as “creepy”) are out of place as is the attitude of the main character.

There is not a single likable character in the novel. And no, it is not like Thackerary’s Vanity Fair where such ambivalent characters are intentional. The main character is rude, unappreciative and deliberately stupid. Also, writing in a journal does not make her a writer no matter how much the author insisted. I really did not like her. At all. The love interest is creepy, stalkery and sometimes murderous. The rest of the characters are under-developed. The pacing is lagging and the diction is troubling. The plotting is weak and full of holes.

Look, this book had the potential of being a lot better. If I were the editor, I would have told the author to work on her characterization – especially where Cassandra is concerned. She is a sheltered young girl of the noble class. If she has to be rebellious, well, sure but not in a way that reads so out of place in the setting. Also, she is very abrasive. She comes off as cold and unfeeling – even to the so-called artist to whom she professes her love. I would have asked the author to work on the mystery, the villains, to create something more substantial than what is present. But alas.

Would I recommend this one? Unfortunately, no.

Obernewtyn (The Obernewtyn Chronicles #1) – Isabelle Carmody (review)

Paperback, 256 pages
Published February 17th 2003 by Tom Doherty Associates
Source: Library

Synopsis:

The Obernewtyn Chronicles – Book One

For Elspeth Gordie freedom is-like so much else after the Great White-a memory.

It was a time known as the Age of Chaos. In a final explosive flash everything was destroyed. The few who survived banded together and formed a Council for protection. But people like Elspeth-mysteriously born with powerful mental abilities-are feared by the Council and hunted down like animals…to be destroyed.

Her only hope for survival to is keep her power hidden. But is secrecy enough against the terrible power of the Council?

Review:

This series has been recommended to be me time and again by numerous people – most memorably Jess and The Giraffe and I had been meaning to pick this up but somehow something else always drew my attention. However, I finally decided to take the plunge this Ramadan and I am so glad I did because, wow, this book is so very good and such a tremendous beginning to what may end up as one of my favourite series and another testament to the prowess of Australian authors.

The novel is a Dystopian. Perhaps one of the earliest YA dystopians ever (though I could be wrong). It deals with humanity after a nuclear disaster wipes out most of the civilization. The novel mixes magic and science wonderfully. Elspeth Gordie, the protagonist of this novel, when we meet her in the beginning, is a prickly creature doing her best to fit into the community established by the survivors of the Great White as they call the nuclear disaster. She has powers that label her misfit and automatically sentence her to death but circumstances conspire to lead her to Obernewtyn instead – a repository of Misfits, if you will.

The novel does, as first installments in a series are wont to do, spend a lot of time setting things up but it does not do so at the expense of the primary narrative. Obernewtyn establishes itself to be propelled by not just character development but also the unfurling of a grand narrative. A lot of characters are introduced, main plot points are established and events take place with the consequences promising to last through the entire series. There is also a Cat Character and I think we have all established that I am a bit Silly for Cat Characters.

If you are looking for a dystopian with a solid story though not much romance initially, I recommend this to you. It’s an exhilarating adventure, fraught with danger, friendship and a glimpse of what life may be like were we to continue to play with things we have no business playing with.

Blood Red Road (Dust Lands #1) – Moira Young (review)

Hardcover, 459 pages
Published June 7th 2011 by Margaret K. McElderry Books
Source: Library

Synopsis:

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.

Review:

I just found out that Moira Young was born in New Westminster which is the city I lived in for the first ten years after I moved to Canada so yes, immediate bias. That said, Blood Red Road really was all sorts of awesome. I was initially hesitant to read it because of I had read that it was written in dialect but I found that the dialect was not at all intrusive where reading is concerned. In fact, you somehow don’t even notice it as the novel progresses.

I had trouble with Saba’s character from the get go. I thought she was unnecessarily mean to her younger sister but as you follow the trajectory of her growth as a person through the length of the narrative, you can’t help but come to like her, flaws and all. Young is particularly skilled at building believable characters who are not at all stereotyped. Saba is mean to her sister but she has her reasons and her reasons show her immaturity but she overcomes this, her attitude is addressed explicitly and I quite liked that.

Blood Red Road has some of the most villainous villains present in literature – the most horrible of them being the mother of the official villain of the series. The actual villain is not so much a threat as a warning to all about the vagaries of power and corruption. The romance in this one is liable to make a girl heart sputter and then race and then sputter some more. Jack is somehow the answer to all I want a dystopian love interest to be. Seriously.

Plotting, pacing, characters, the novel has them all. This is the one dystopian that I can whole heartedly endorse. I recommend this to everyone who wants to be thrilled. Go forth and acquire this novel.

A Want So Wicked (A Need So Beautiful #2) – Suzanne Young

Hardcover, 288 pages
Published June 26th 2012 by Balzer + Bray
Source: Library

Synopsis:

Elise is a normal seventeen-year-old girl until the day she wakes up in a desert park, with no idea who she is.

After that episode, her life takes a bizarre turn. She’s experiencing unexpected flashes of insight into people’s lives—people she’s never met before. Strangers frighten her with warnings about the approaching Shadows. And although Elise has never had a boyfriend, she suddenly finds herself torn between two handsome but very different young men: Abe, the charming bad boy whose effect on her both seduces and frightens her, and the mysterious Harlin, who’s new to town but with whom Elise feels an urgent, elemental connection—almost as if they are soul mates.

Now Elise begins to question everything about her life. Why do these guys both want her so desperately? What are the Shadows? Why does the name Charlotte inspire a terrifying familiarity? And who is Elise, really?

Review:

I was looking forward to this novel. The first one had such an effect on me – I found the ending of the first one to be so compelling, so poignant that I read it multiple times. A Want So Wicked failed to bring the same sort of magic to me. I enjoyed it. Especially the portions that included Harlin. I thought Elise’s relationship with her father and sister was heartwarming and well portrayed and I liked the writing and the general flow of the narrative. I just wasn’t too impressed by where the novel went. The love triangle which wasn’t much of a triangle and the ending…I don’t know, you guys. The book was okay but it wasn’t the brilliant I wanted it to be. I would still recommend it to you but now I kind of wish I had stopped at the end of the first so I could contain the memory  of it and it alone. Ah well.

Beta – Rachel Cohn (Annex #1) (Review)

 

Hardcover, 304 pages
Expected publication: October 16th 2012 by Disney Hyperion
Source: Publisher

Synopsis:

Elysia is created in a laboratory, born as a sixteen-year-old girl, an empty vessel with no life experience to draw from. She is a Beta, an experimental model of a teenage clone. She was replicated from another teenage girl, who had to die in order for Elysia to exist.
Elysia’s purpose is to serve the inhabitants of Demesne, an island paradise for the wealthiest people on earth. Everything about Demesne is bioengineered for perfection. Even the air induces a strange, euphoric high, which only the island’s workers–soulless clones like Elysia–are immune to.
At first, Elysia’s life is idyllic and pampered. But she soon sees that Demesne’s human residents, who should want for nothing, yearn. But for what, exactly? She also comes to realize that beneath the island’s flawless exterior, there is an under-current of discontent among Demesne’s worker clones. She knows she is soulless and cannot feel and should not care–so why are overpowering sensations cloud-ing Elysia’s mind?
If anyone discovers that Elysia isn’t the unfeeling clone she must pretend to be, she will suffer a fate too terrible to imagine. When her one chance at happi-ness is ripped away with breathtaking cruelty, emotions she’s always had but never understood are unleashed. As rage, terror, and desire threaten to overwhelm her, Elysia must find the will to survive.

Review:

The cover of this book is so amazingly beautiful that I spent a few minutes being creepy and caressing it. The satin finish of it complements the colours and the model is so incredibly beautiful and the cover merges so very fantastically with the content in the novel. I went into this book knowing that it was about clones and that’s about it. I have read other books by Cohn and liked them so I was reasonably confident that I would appreciate the writing if not love the story. I didn’t start the novel and love it immediately. No – well okay, let me restart this review so I don’t sound so fractured.

In Beta Rachel Cohn presents readers with a utopian society existing on an island engineered to be paradise on earth. From the rejuvenating waters of the sea immediately surrounding the island to the fresh and pure air pumped in the atmosphere to the aesthetically pleasing clones manufactured to serve humans in all capacities. Our protagonist, Elysia, is one of these clones but she’s a Beta, that is, one of the first teen clones ever manufactured. Now, I do not know much about science but I felt that the explanation and the process of clone-making is thought out but obfuscated from the readers for reasons that become clear at the end. Cohn does a remarkable job in world building though and her world actually makes sense – it could have been a dystopian setting – maybe it is but somehow, I doubt it. The entire novel takes place on Demesne, the human-engineered paradise, with brief mentions of other cities that, waterlogged though they may be, still exist.

There are two major reasons I loved this book. The first one is Elysia. At the beginning, she is more machine than human and I was so impressed by Cohn’s ability to successfully portray a being who is a girl but not a girl. It is way more difficult to do than it seems. There is a definite growth in Elysia as the book grows and you can almost see her begin to cohere into something, someone, more than what (and who) she is created to be. Her questions are endless as she seeks to learn more about this world she has emerged in, as she gradually realizes the concept of personal freedom, of owning herself rather than being owned by someone else. She is not a shade of the person from whom she was cloned, she is her own person and Elysia seeks to prove that once and again, in her thoughts and her actions. She takes what little agency she has and she utilizes it. She avenges herself and she saves herself. She is not ashamed of her sexuality and she is not apologetic of her desires. For a being who was born perfect, she is charmingly flawed but at the same time, there is this sense of innocence about her that reminds you that no matter what she behaves or looks like, she is not human. She is something other.

“What’s a slut?” I ask him.
“A girl who puts out too easily.”
“Puts out what?” I imagine Greer putting put dinner and don’t understand what Ivan wouldn’t like about that.
“Puts out, you know…” His face, already beet red from our run, turns a darker scarlet. “Sex.”
I wonder where Greer puts the sex out. (pg. 59)

The second reason I really liked this novel is the plot. Oftentimes, I can predict what’s going to happen next but this was definitely not the case with Beta. I won’t say too much about it because I don’t want to give anything away but I would definitely love to discuss the book with you once you’re done because Cohn makes some brave narrative decisions that leave me curious as to where the story is going to go. The book ends in a cliffhanger and while I am a bit nonplussed by that (as opposed to being annoyed), I am more than curious to know what happens next. Because Cohn takes what I thought I knew about the world, the clones and the humans and turns it upside down so all I have are questions and no second book to answer them. It’s a good cliffhanger though. I liked it.

The novel deals with themes of greed, rampant materialism and rigid class system. It asks the reader what it means to be human and asks whether you have to be born and created in a womb to be human. It asks how you can quantify souls and how you can say something that has never even been seen or measured can be said to exist in one person and not in another. Demesne could easily exist in the world. Highly exclusive, highly illegal and highly coveted – the island where just breathing makes a person feel better is perhaps the ultimate vacation destination of the future. What are the implications of a society so bent towards leisure and pleasure that they would manufacture humans to be little more than slaves – no worse than slaves?

I could go on and on about this book – talk about the relationships, the power dynamics and so much more. But I think it would be more fun for you to go and find out for yourself how awesome this book is. Strongly recommended.

Small Damages – Beth Kephart (A Review)

Hardcover, 304 pages
Published July 19th 2012 by Philomel
Source: Library

Synopsis:

It’s senior year, and while Kenzie should be looking forward to prom and starting college in the fall, she is mourning the loss of her father. She finds solace in the one person she trusts, her boyfriend, and she soon finds herself pregnant. Kenzie’s boyfriend and mother do not understand her determination to keep the baby. She is sent to southern Spain for the summer, where she will live out her pregnancy as a cook’s assistant on a bull ranch, and her baby will be adopted by a Spanish couple.

Alone and resentful in a foreign country, Kenzie is at first sullen and difficult. She begins to open her eyes and her heart to the beauty that is all around her and inside of her.

Review:

I loved this book. A lot. I got my mother to read it and she loved it as well. A lot.

Now, before I start this review, I will say that people who like books in which there are lots of action and things happen will probably not be happy with this book. Not many things happen in this book. If I were to describe it to you using my own words, I’d say this book is a journey of internal growth, a retrospection of life and love. An investigation on what it means to be a mother and what it means to have a mother. A journey into yourself to find the person you always were and to coax her out into the world. This is a story about finding a family that has ties deeper than blood and the colour of your skin. And above all, this book is a love letter to Spain. You cannot read this book without wanting to go to Spain and experience life the way it is narrated here.

The strongest part about Small Damages is its writing. The prose is so exquisitely beautiful that I, for the life of me, cannot cull out one sentence or paragraph to share – okay, here’s a tiny bit:

“The day is collapsing into dusk. The Gypsies in their white shirts are the only lamps. The moon is coming in like a pan on fire.” (164)

The style of the prose is somewhat stream of consciousness paired with a lyricism that gives it an almost hypnotizing cadence. This is no purple prose but genuine lyrical prose that is anchored by the skein of sincerity and honesty that befits the character. Kenzie is a pregnant teen sent away by her mother to have her baby and then give it up for adoption to a Spanish couple. The book is addressed to the child. Kenzie’s voice is fresh, melancholy and at the time same, a bit hopeful. There is angst but of a different flavor than the usual. The angst is dampened by the grief that is so apparent in her words. She has lost her father and she can’t lose the baby because it contains a bit of her father. The loss here is not imparted by the tears (which are frequent) but the quietness in the book.

And then there are the characters. Every single character in this novel is beautifully etched out. Estela is perhaps my favourite character but she is not the only one who shines. The gypsies, the silent boy who watches Kenzie, the various other adults, even the people who want to adopt Kenzie’s child – they all seem to occupy tangible space, they are that detailed. And then there is the gradual pace of the book – the book is slow and the things that happen are internal. The setting is a character in its own right – vivid, vibrant and demanding an emotional return for its beauty.

This book, you guys, is lovely. It takes realistic fiction and gives it a whimsical twist. It takes grief, fear and all other heavy emotions and filters them through the lenses of a beautiful and strange place. This is one of the few instances when the cover of the book totally matches the story inside. I recommend this to you if you want something introspective, quiet and beautiful.

Crewel (Crewel World #1) – Gennifer Albin (Review)

Hardcover, 368 pages
Expected publication: October 16th 2012 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
Source: Borrowed ARC from Lindsey

Synopsis:

Incapable. Awkward. Artless.

That’s what the other girls whisper behind her back. But sixteen year-old Adelice Lewys has a secret: she wants to fail.

Gifted with the ability to weave time with matter, she’s exactly what the Guild is looking for, and in the world of Arras, being chosen as a Spinster is everything a girl could want. It means privilege, eternal beauty, and being something other than a secretary. It also means the power to embroider the very fabric of life. But if controlling what people eat, where they live and how many children they have is the price of having it all, Adelice isn’t interested.

Not that her feelings matter, because she slipped and wove a moment at testing, and they’re coming for her—tonight.

Now she has one hour to eat her mom’s overcooked pot roast. One hour to listen to her sister’s academy gossip and laugh at her Dad’s stupid jokes. One hour to pretend everything’s okay. And one hour to escape.

Because once you become a Spinster, there’s no turning back.

Review:

Let’s do something different with this review. Usually my reviews are lines and lines of prose that nobody probably even reads but this time, I shall utilize bullet points to make my…er…points. This will streamline the review and hopefully make it more enjoyable for anyone who chooses to read it.

1. There is a propensity in recent novels aimed at young adult audiences to focus a bit obsessively on the material aspect of life. Or rather, if I’m going to be blunt, they go on and on and on about dresses and cosmetics, who’s wearing what, how much it costs etc etc. Crewel is no different in that regard. Of course the main character is against such lavish attention to the superficial aspect of life but fact remains that many, many pages are sacrificed to descriptions about who is wearing what.
2. Where is the weaving, man? There are photo shoots, parties, booze, interviews but I came into this expecting there to be some weaving. Why isn’t there more weaving?
3. The love triangle is ridiculous. The little twist at the end is even more ridiculous. The two boys that Adelice kisses? One of them was fascinating but his appeal diminished somewhat by his attraction to Adelice. Someone who is supposedly mature being so attracted to Adelice? Hmm…I wasn’t impressed.
4. The author seems confused about the antagonist because at one point in the novel, Adelice says that her hatred of him must be misplaced or misdirected. Heh. I found him appropriately creepy though. I would have liked the ambiguity about his person to be gon.
5. Adelice is snarky and I like snark but at the same time, I felt that she was inappropriately snarky. Because the tragedy which she lived through is so humungous that getting through it and functioning like a normal human being becomes difficult. Yes, I understand she took a drug that numbed her initial feelings but when the drug has worn off, I demand emotional chaos. I mean, come on.
6. The mean girl is kinda ridiculous too. I understood, somewhat, the mean girl’s motivations but I never understood why she blamed Adelice for something that was quite clearly not her fault. She seemed a gratuitous presence thrown into the narrative for flavor. And the other mean…woman? Mmmreh.

This book, look, I’m not a hater. I really am not. This book had a very interesting premise but I found the execution to be lacking. Specially where the weaving part is concerned. I thought Adelice’s weaving portions were interesting. I also liked how homosexuality was addressed and kudos to the author for taking a contemporary issue and making it one of the themes of the novel. Bravo. I also thought that the invention of the “world” itself, how it exists, why it exists is also splendidly innovative. The action in my opinion was too saturated at the end of the novel and not spread out throughout the length of the novel as I would have liked it to be. However, this is bound to appeal to anyone who looks for an entertaining story but not to people who want logic, who want something more than the usual paranormal. It has its good parts and its not so good parts. It just didn’t appeal to me as much as I wanted it to.

A Girl Named Digit – Annabel Monaghan (Review)

Hardcover, 192 pages
Published June 5th 2012 by Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
Source: Library

Synopsis:

Farrah “Digit” Higgins may be going to MIT in the fall, but this L.A. high school genius has left her geek self behind in another school district so she can blend in with the popular crowd at Santa Monica High and actually enjoy her senior year. But when Farrah, the daughter of a UCLA math professor, unknowingly cracks a terrorist group’s number sequence, her laid-back senior year gets a lot more interesting. Soon she is personally investigating the case, on the run from terrorists, and faking her own kidnapping– all while trying to convince a young, hot FBI agent to take her seriously. So much for blending in . . .

Review:

This novel danced its way into my favourites. It manages, in its short length, to be discerning, fun, funny and adventurous. It also manages to subtly incorporate something more substantial than you would think given its length and tone.

Digit has been trying to fit in all her life. Born with a genius IQ that makes math to her what cookies is to the cookie monster, she often has to dampen her eccentricities so that people don’t call her a freak if not worse. And then when she makes certain connections, notices certain things, she lands smack dab in the middle of something dangerous that rapidly grows way too much and too fast for her to handle.

Digit and her FBI partner’s race to safety, amongst other things, is a wild ride. There are bad guys dodging their footsteps, carrying guns and blithely handing out death threats. There is betrayal and mothers who get to do the role of a lifetime. There is also a surprising development where the romance is concerned and lots of kisses to keep your toes almost permanently curled. Digit has a disarming personality that makes it a pleasure to read about her and even when the angst hits like a grade A hurricane, it remains steadfast.

I thought Digit forgave too easily but there is an installment to what has turned into a series and I, for one, cannot wait to see where Digit goes next. Do I recommend it? Most definitely. Go get your hands on it!

Two and Twenty Dark Tales: Dark Retellings of Mother Goose Rhymes – Various

Paperback, 340 pages
Expected publication: October 16th 2012 by Month9Books
Source: Net Galley

Synopsis:

In this anthology, 20 authors explore the dark and hidden meanings behind some of the most beloved Mother Goose nursery rhymes through short story retellings. The dark twists on classic tales range from exploring whether Jack truly fell or if Jill pushed him instead to why Humpty Dumpty, fragile and alone, sat atop so high of a wall. The authors include Nina Berry, Sarwat Chadda, Leigh Fallon, Gretchen McNeil, and Suzanne Young.

Review:

This anthology is populated by numerous stories that each take one specific Mother Goose tale and rewrite it as a YA paranormal short story. Some of these stories are more successful than others in correctly portraying the intent and feel of the original rhyme while others are more a facsimile of the original rhyme than a true retelling.

I enjoyed most of the stories. They truly are dark and do not promise a neat and tidy resolution at the end, most often having open-ended endings that could go either way. There are also potential longer stories that can be developed into novels and I have no doubt that some of the authors may just go that way. One of the creepiest stories in the collection just may be “Little Miss Muffet” though of course that could only be because I hate spiders so much. One I enjoyed a lot is “As Blue as the Sky and Just as Old” by Nina Berry. It was creepy and fulfilling in the short length it was granted. “Sing a Song of Six Pence” by Sarwat Chadda is also intriguing as is Blue by Sayantani Gupta.

Readers looking for a nostalgic look at childhood through the lens of this book will be disappointed but readers who go in expecting childhood dressed in somber colours with danger whispering in the corners will love this book.

Sapphire Blue – Kerstin Gier (A Review)

Hardcover, 368 pages
Expected publication: October 30th 2012 by Henry Holt and Co. (BYR)
Source: Publisher

Synopsis:

Gwen’s life has been a rollercoaster since she discovered she was the Ruby, the final member of the secret time-traveling Circle of Twelve. In between searching through history for the other time-travelers and asking for a bit of their blood (gross!), she’s been trying to figure out what all the mysteries and prophecies surrounding the Circle really mean.

At least Gwen has plenty of help. Her best friend Lesley follows every lead diligently on the Internet. James the ghost teaches Gwen how to fit in at an eighteenth century party. And Xemerius, the gargoyle demon who has been following Gwen since he caught her kissing Gideon in a church, offers advice on everything. Oh, yes. And of course there is Gideon, the Diamond. One minute he’s very warm indeed; the next he’s freezing cold. Gwen’s not sure what’s going on there, but she’s pretty much destined to find out.

Review:

I am usually wary of middle books in trilogies because, like the middle child, they’re just there. Not as intriguing as the first book and not as satisfying as the last one. They are a bridge between the beginning to the conclusion and are often just a set up for the conclusion and do not have a story, a solid narrative, of their own. Usually. However, I was very pleasantly surprised by Sapphire Blue. I think I like it better than Ruby Red and I liked Ruby Red a lot.

Sapphire Blue begins with a kiss and it took a moment for me to orient myself because it has been a year or so since I read the last novel but once I did, the story took off with me hanging on by the skin of my fingers. Oh, that sounds painful but what I mean is that the novel is a rollercoaster ride. There are lulls in between but mostly it is a thrilling experience. I love stories about secret societies, the proverbial underdog finally winning the day, dashing love interesst and, most of all, a main character you can uninhibitedly cheer for. This book’s success is due to its main character, Gwen. She is such a wonderful, protagonist, you guys. I remember mentioning in the review for Ruby Red that Gwen seemed very young for her age but in Sapphire Blue, there is an actual sense of Gwen growing up as you read her. She is changed by what she has experienced and it shows in the way she talks and/or reacts to situations. She is still very much the underdog, not even suspecting what I do about her origin and who her real parents are. I’m just speculating but I am thinking that she just may find some truly interesting things in the next novel.

Anyway, Gwen is a normal teenager with time traveling abilities and a very large crush on her “partner.” The handsome, mysterious Gideon. I am still not sure how I feel about him. But back to Gwen, what endeared her to me was her reaction to Gideon. She likes him, a lot, but she doesn’t let her like turn her into a ninny. She remains witty, contained (more or less) and just generally herself even when she is going through her heartbreak. Such as it is.

There is also a gargoyle who looks like a cat. And you all know how much I love cat characters. The friendships portrayed in novel feel genuine and there is no harem or even a triangle. I don’t think Gwen would appreciate the complication, anyway. There is a creepy count who is the proverbial villain of the piece and a couple of rogue time-traveling deviants who are way more than meets the eye. The narrative is compelling and the plot construction serves to deepen the mystery. There are several new characters and the whole idea of time traveling is addressed sufficiently.

I thought this was a fantastic novel. It had be laughing in some parts and thinking in others. If you haven’t yet started this trilogy, I recommend that you do so. And if you have started it and are wibbling about whether or not to read the second one, I say that you need to. Get your hands on a copy as soon as you can.