Book Review: Everything, Everything, by Nicola Yoon

Writing Quality: 3/5
Personal Enjoyment: 2/5
Wider Appeal: 4/5

So, this book. Everything, Everything has been on my to-read list since it came out. Honestly, that cover is absolutely gorgeous. I want to blow it up to poster size and put it on my wall, it's so pretty. And the premise is interesting: Madison is basically allergic to the world, and she lives with her mother in a house that's essentially a sterile bubble, visited every day by her nurse/care-taker, and infrequently by tutors and professors. It's always been this way, until a family with a son her age moves in next door, and Olly changes the way she sees the world. The story is told in diary entries, drawings, charts, and IM conversations. Very modern teen, and also surprisingly seamless and more than a little beautiful.

This book was unique in that its characters weren't both healthy, middle-class white teens. Madison is emphatically not healthy. She's also half Japanese and half African American, which is refreshing. It was, however, another drop into the growing pool of angsty realistic teen lit with lots of romance, and I felt like the things that were unique weren't enough to make up for the fact that there's so much of this stuff out there right now. Maybe I've just been reading too much teen lit lately.

I liked Madison, and I thought she was realistically dramatic and self-involved, as a teen should be. But every once in a while, the story (and Madison herself) just got a little too unbelievable. Madison has basically zero body-image issues, which I just couldn't believe, given that even a home-bound teen is going to be online and exposed to the media all the time. It's a pretty fantasy, but unrealistic. Also, why isn't she involved in any online communities? The Internet is an entire world unto itself, and a lot of sheltered/lonely kids find sanctuary and friends online. There's no way a teenager would only be online to shop and take classes.

I really enjoyed the sketches that David Yoon did for this book, and the way they were worked into the text. They were all simple black-and-white images (pen and ink?), and they added to the book without distracting from the story.

Overall, the book and the story were fairly average for modern teen lit, and the sheer averageness of it made it less enjoyable for me (I'm a high-maintenance reader, and I always want innovative writing). But I think the fact that there is a non-white female protagonist is important and appealing. We need more diverse books is not just a hashtag; it's a reality, and I think a lot of young people will read and enjoy this book simply because it puts a multi-racial character in the lead position of a normal modern novel.

I'd recommend Everything, Everything to anyone who's not sick of realistic teen fiction, readers who enjoy lots of romance, and readers who are ready for a story that's a little more upbeat than books like The Fault in Our Stars. :)

Recommended ages 12+. New York: Delacourt Press, 2015. Print. 310 pages. ISBN: 9780553496642.

Book Review: Oyster War, by Ben Towle

Writing Quality: 4/5
Personal Enjoyment: 3/5
Wider Appeal: 3/5

I bought Oyster War for the children's graphic novel section of my library, but I think it's appropriate for teens and adults as well. I feel like that's pretty rare: a book that can be enjoyed equally by all ages, without the adults feeling like they're being talked down to.

I'm not really sure what genre to categorize this book in. Historical fantasy? Magical realism? Mythology and folklore? Based on the Oyster Wars in the Chesapeake Bay that took place from the mid 1800s to the mid 1900s, this story draws on superstition, real history, and local tall tales to create a fantastically fun book.

The characters are fun, if a little one-dimensional. The ending was fairly predictable, but I enjoyed the process of getting there, and there were a few surprises along the way.

Oyster War is a graphic novel, and it's one of those spectacular examples of the format that's written in such a way that the writing and the art cannot be divided without losing all the meaning. The art is beautiful and also super cool. :) I also loved that each character's face was so distinct! So many comics and graphic novels have characters whose facial features look so similar that they get confusing in busy panels, but take a look at the individuality of these characters:

While there is a good amount of text and dialogue, there are also quite a few wordless panels, and Ben Towle tells so much of the story so eloquently and without a single word.

At the end of the book, Towle writes about different aspects of Oyster War: what was true, what was made up, what was pulled from local folklore... I loved learning a little bit, while also being able to enjoy something that was so fantastical.

I would recommend Oyster War to any reader who seeks out unique graphic novels, and doesn't mind sacrificing depth of character for the sake of an interesting story. I'd also recommend it to anyone interested in the history and legends of the Chesapeake Bay and surrounding areas.

Recommended ages 10+. Portland: Oni Press, 2015. Print. 167 pages. ISBN: 9781620102626.

Book Review: The Fifth Season, by N. K. Jemisin

Writing Quality: 5/5
Personal Enjoyment: 5/5
Wider Appeal: 5/5

The Fifth Season was the absolute perfect choice for my first read of 2016. It's the most innovative book I've read in a very long time, challenging the genre format and the idea of what fantasy traditionally is. The Fifth Season is not traditional genre formula fantasy.

N. K. Jemisin starts the book with the end of the world. This is already genre-shifting. Because in fantasy, the world doesn't end. That's the point. Someone is chosen to save the world, right? Here, she tells you right at the beginning: this story does not have a happy ending where a chosen one saves everyone from certain death, their loved ones survive, and they get the girl. The world ends. And the main character is a woman, and middle-aged, and a mother, and she has already lost her son.

The world ends, but the world has ended before. The land is rocked by frequent large and small quakes, and its population includes orogenes (aka roggas), people who can sense the vibrations and also control them, stilling or creating earthquakes. I can't tell you too much about the plot without giving it away, because Jemisin weaves tiny surprises throughout the book, slowly peeling away the story bit by bit to show you how characters are connected, and their histories and scars. There is not one big twist, but dozens of tiny ones, and the complexity of this story is absolutely beautiful.

The characters, Damaya, Syenite, and Essun, are all roggas of different ages and different stages in life. Damaya is a child, taken from her family to be trained. Syenite is a four-ring orogene who is beginning to realize that she is really just a slave. Essun is a free woman, hunting down her husband after he murdered their son.

I loved so much about this book. The ideas were amazing, and one part in particular was utterly awe-inspiring when I imagined what it looked like (which was easy, given Jemisin's excellent writing). The characters were believable, and it was easy to empathize with them. It was especially easy because Jemisin (again in a very uncommon choice) wrote all of Essun's chapters in second person. I also loved her casual attitude toward gender and sexuality. Gay, bi, straight, trans, poly...It's all here, and while it's commented on, Jemisin writes it in the same way you might write that a character has kinky hair, or they went for a run this morning. It just is, and it's nothing overly special. Why can't more books be like this?

I always end my reviews by telling you what types of readers would particularly enjoy a book, but this one is difficult, because I'm having a hard time pinning down a particular audience to the exclusion of others. This book is for readers who enjoy fantasy in which the magic system is actually an integral part of the story and not just a sideshow, readers who like strong female protagonists who are also realistically flawed (not just clumsy) and complicated, readers who like their books to be multi-racial and/or multi-gendered without making a thing of it, readers who like stories that are so well-constructed that by the end you can practically trace the lines of each moment back to something in the past that caused or influenced it...

If you're reading this review, The Fifth Season is probably for you.

Recommended ages 16+. New York: Orbit, 2015. Print. 498 pages. ISBN: 978-0316229296.

2015 Reads - Looking Back and Looking Forward

Last year at about this time, I was making my annual Goodreads challenge. I'd easily met the previous year's challenge, and I had just started a job as a children's librarian, where I was reading tons of children's books. So I picked 300 as a nice, round number of books to read in 2015. You know, like you do. :) Yes, I count children's books, picture books, and graphic novels (but not individual comic books, because those are basically like reading a single chapter). They're books. I read them. And I like to put them into Goodreads so I can remember reading them after I've read 300 books.

I almost made it. I read 297 books by the end of the year. Could I have crammed in another couple graphic novels or picture books? Yes. But by the end of the year, I was feeling a little silly about binge-reading picture books just to say I'd read some arbitrary number of books in 365 days. Instead, I looked at some information about the books I did read, and I found some startling (and not-so-startling) things. Prepare to geek out with me here.

I tag a lot of my books with multiple genres/topics, so this chart is not a 1-to-1 kind of chart. But, you know...wow. I read a lot of fantasy. Like, almost 3 times more fantasy than anything else. Lots of the humor is children's books, because so many picture books are humor. But I definitely need to up my genre game. In 2016, I'd like to read more other stuff. More romance, more mystery, more crime, more poetry, more memoirs, more historical fiction, more books with protagonists with disabilities. Just more. If you've got some non-fantasy recommendations, I'm all ears. When it comes to fantasy, though, I've obviously got it covered. :)

YA = young adult     NA = new adult

Not surprisingly, most of my reads were children's (I'm a children's librarian, guys. No judgement. Although 12% is pretty low...), the formats were pretty evenly divided, and about half of the books I read last year were by men and half by women. That little 0% neither/both is one author who does not identify as either male or female (the author of George, which is, incidentally, amazing), but in the sea of so many books this year, one doesn't add up to a full percentage point.

The surprising (and embarrassing, and horrible) thing about my reads this year is that such a small fraction of them were authored by people of color. As a librarian (and a human!), I believe so strongly that #weneedmorediversebooks, and like so many white Americans, I've been following the #blacklivesmatter movement with mixed feelings of wanting to support it but not knowing how or what kinds of support would be welcome and what might be offensive.

Racism in the U.S. is a huge topic, and instead of speaking for others, I am going to simply direct you to a few people who can write about it more eloquently than I (links at the bottom of this post).

But one of the things I can do (and you can do) as a reader is take a critical look at our reading material. Are we supporting authors of color by reading and talking about their books? Saying #weneedmorediversebooks is pointless if we're not reading them! This is especially important for those of us who are also librarians. We're providing reader's advisory and information about books to patrons every day, people! We need to take a careful look at whether our own reading lists reflect our professed ideology.

Mine doesn't. So in 2016, I'm going to make a point of reading more books by non-white authors. And by "more," I mean more than 50%. Because I'd like my reading choices to reflect the actual world and not this strange white-washed version that I seem to have inadvertently settled into.

I'm not setting myself a crazy high reading goal this year. I want to read more adult books, and I want to focus more on quality, content, and diversifying both my reading material and the authors I read. So no binge-reading picture books in late December 2016. :)

Do you have any book recommendations for me? I'll never judge your reading preferences, and I'd love to discover books I may never have found otherwise.

Happy New Year!



Promised links:
I Don't Know What to Do With Good White People
This Is What White People Can Do to Support #BlackLivesMatter
Why Is It So Controversial When Someone Says "All Lives Matter"?
Between the World and Me - This is on my immediate to-read list for the year.

Book Review: Gryphons Aren't So Great, by James Sturm, Alexis Frederick-Frost, and Andrew Arnold

Writing/Art Quality: 4/5
Appeal/Enjoyment: 5/5

I love this series. Is it a series? Maybe not... But I love all the books that reside in the Adventures in Cartooning universe. Adventures in Cartooning is a great introduction to comic creation that makes it accessible to children. Even better are the books that follow, like Gryphons Aren't So Great, which are physical, published books using the skills taught in Adventures in Cartooning, and show by example how kids can take what they learned and make a real story out of it.

In this book, the knight and her horse Edward are playing when she spots a gryphon and hops on it to go for a ride, leaving Edward earth-bound and alone. The story is simple and sweet, and the art is equally simple and sweet, with doodle-like lines and bright colors. Like in the other books, the front and back endpapers of this book contain instructions for doodling some of the characters in the book, which is especially fun for kids who like to draw.

I would recommend this book to any small children who like drawing, telling stories, or reading about knights and fantastical creatures. :)

Recommended ages 5-10. New York: First Second, 2015. Print. 40 pages. ISBN: 978-1596436527.

Book Review: You're Never Weird on the Internet (almost), by Felicia Day

“The internet is amazing because it connects us with one another. But it’s also horrific because...it connects us with one another.”

I was reading You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)  at the reference desk when a 70-something library patron asked me what I was reading. I proceeded to try to explain who Felicia Day is to a woman who's never heard of YouTube and whose idea of online gaming is Words With Friends. You have no idea how hard this is until you've tried it. :)

For those of you who don't know who Felicia Day is, she's an actress and producer whose career has landed solidly in the geek world. She's especially well-known for her webseries The Guild, about a group of gamers.

I waited a month to get my hands on my library's copy of this amazing book, and I kind of wish I'd pulled my librarian status and snagged a copy earlier. Like probably every other geek girl ever, I wish Felicia Day was my friend. Nearly every sentence I read, I was like, yes, this! In this book, Felicia is very candid about her experiences, describing her addiction to gaming, her procrastination, her perfectionism, and her depression with a kind of open generosity, and I felt a lot of the time like she was writing about me, but with a few quirky details added and changing my career choice from librarian to actress/producer. A little more glamorous. :) Her book describes her road to success, her tips for other people to do what they love, her love of and participation in geek culture, and her thoughts about the positive and negative aspects of the internet.

Felicia's writing feels like she's just talking to you over lunch. It's funny, vulnerable, and infused with awkward charm - in short, exactly what I expect Felicia herself is like. Her honest it's-hard-but-it's-worth-it approach to being successful at something she loves is utterly inspiring. If I wasn't already working at my dream job, I'd be going out to get it after reading her book.

I'd recommend You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost) to anyone who likes Felicia Day's work. Honestly, I'd recommend this book to anyone who's ever felt like success is easy for everyone but them. Now please excuse me while I go re-watch The Guild and follow Felicia on Goodreads.

Short Story Saturday: How Old Holly Came to Be, by Patrick Rothfuss

Writing Quality: 5/5
Enjoyment/Appeal: 5/5

"How Old Holly Came to Be" is Patrick Rothfuss's contribution to the anthology Unfettered, which I talked about in this post. The story is told in an almost chant-like rhythm that uses repetition to describe the change, growth, and rising consciousness of a holly tree. The lady who lives in the tower beside the tree cares for it, and in return it cares for her. There is war and magic and love and pain, but they are described in the slow, distant, matter-of-fact way in which I imagine a tree would see the world. The story spans decades. Centuries. But for the tree, time doesn't seem to mean much.

I've never read anything quite like this story before. The idea of conscious trees isn't new, but the question of how they gain self-awareness and what the world looks like from their point of view is new, and Pat's answer to that question is raw and beautiful.

This story left me with a sort of sweet, melancholy sadness. I loved it, and I read it a second time through immediately after reading it once. I'd like to read it again right now, even though I just put it down, like a favorite new song a teenager listens to over and over and over again, memorizing every word and note.

I would recommend this story to fantasy readers who like to delve into something a little different once in a while. In particular, if you're a fan of Pat's and you haven't read this yet, get on it! It's one of the shortest offerings in Unfettered, and it's incredibly good.

Recommended ages 16+. Seattle: Oak Press, 2013. Print. 574 pages. ISBN: 978-0984713639. 

Book Review: The Grace of Kings, by Ken Liu

Writing Quality: 5/5
Appeal/Enjoyment: 5/5

I picked up The Grace of Kings because I've heard so much amazing stuff about it. At first, though, I was a little hesitant about this book. The language brings to mind the stiff, impersonal style of a legend or a myth, with crystalline moments of poetry, like, “He was like a seed still tethered to the withered flower, just waiting for the dead air of the late summer evening to break, for the storm to begin.” These are characters who are almost gods themselves, and it's difficult to care about characters like that. As the story progressed, though, the themes started to emerge, and Ken Liu's ideas brought me back to the book every time I set it down.

The Grace of Kings is about war, empire, and revolution. It's also about the idea that war cannot be governed by the same moral code as life, because it cannot be won that way. In the same manner, life cannot be governed by the loose morals necessary for success in war, because peace cannot be maintained in such an environment. Ken Liu also writes about love, marriage, and fidelity, and his ideas are surprisingly feminist and progressive in nature. Maybe I'm only surprised because I don't know anything about Ken Liu other than the fact that he's Chinese American, he wrote this amazing book, and he translated The Three-Body Problem, which won the Hugo Award for best novel this year. Liu writes about equality in relationships, he writes a very liberal interpretation of marital fidelity, and he uses a misogynistic society to show how elevating women to positions of equality can improve an entire nation.

I'll be nominating this book for a Hugo next year. Frankly, I wish I could quote every single page of this book, but I'll stick with these:

“The heart is a complicated thing, and we're capable of many loves, though we're told that we must value one to the exclusion of others...You can be loyal to your husband at the same time that you take a lover for your own sake, though the poets tell us this is wrong. But why should we believe that the poets understand us better than we do ourselves?"

“I've always thought it nonsense to believe something true simply because it was written in a book long ago.” 

I'd recommend The Grace of Kings to readers who are interested in Imperial China (the inspiration for the setting of this book), fantasy where magic doesn't fix everything (or even take a major role), and readers who are in the mood for excellent writing and a slow, epic pace.

Recommended ages 16+. New York: Saga Press, 2015. Print. 640 pages. ISBN: 978-1481424271.

Short Story Saturday: That Seriously Obnoxious Time I Was Stuck at Witch Rimelda’s One Hundredth Birthday Party, by Tina Connolly

Writing Quality: 3/5
Appeal/Enjoyment: 4/5

Set in the world of Seriously Wicked: A Novel, this short story is seriously funny. Camellia is the non-witchy daughter of a wicked witch, and she's stuck at the one hundredth birthday party of another wicked witch. Everyone's wicked, down to the pool full of witchy children. After a party game in which all the witch children each have to defeat an animated inflatable octopus as it grows increasingly larger, the children are shunted off to the pool house, where they discover that their wicked parents are planning on sending their beloved librarian a seriously hexed loaf of banana bread.

You don't need to have read the book to enjoy That Seriously Obnoxious Time; it stands on its own very well. The story is told in first person, and Camellia's moody, rebellious teenage voice is absolutely believable. A simple, light story, this fluffy fiction entertains but also slips in some sneaky commentary about competitive parenting and petty revenge. I also don't mind that the action hinges on a librarian, although she never makes an appearance in the story.

Much like Seriously Wicked, I would recommend That Seriously Obnoxious Time to teens who feel like they don't belong, and who like fantasy that takes place in the modern world. Especially to readers who like stories that make them laugh. I'd also add that both (and especially the short story) can also be enjoyed by adults.

Recommended ages 11+. Tor Teen, 2015. Web. 26 Aug, 2015. www.tor.com.

Book Review: Chloe and the Lion, by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Adam Rex

Writing Quality: 4/5
Appeal/Enjoyment: 3/5

This book about mistakes and giving up and perseverance and bravery and cunning and collaboration is kind of adorable. Mac Barnett wrote himself and illustrator Adam Rex into the story; Chloe just wants to ride the Merry-go-Round, but Mac fires Adam over an artistic disagreement, then realizes that if he can't work with Adam, Chloe's story will never get completed. The writing and dialogue are casual and realistic. Chloe is a cheeky, clever, brave little girl sharing her story with her creators, who are believably absurd, self-involved adults.

The multimedia art was a little strange for me, because I kept trying to figure out what was drawn and what was three-dimensional, and in what order they had drawn and photographed things. It wasn't exactly conducive to following the story.

Overall, it was a unique story, and the multimedia aspect would be a good way to introduce kids to new types of art.

I recommend Chloe and the Lion for discussions about perseverance and working together, and also for readers looking for a unique experience and those interested in introducing their children to new artistic mediums.

Recommended ages 4 - 8. New York: Disney Hyperion Books, 2012. Print. 48 pages. ISBN: 978-1423113348.

Short Story Saturday: Seeking Boarder..., by Rahul Kanakia

This short story by Rahul Kanakia is another from Clarkesworld Magazine, and you can read it for free here. The full title of this short story is "Seeking boarder for rm w/ attached bathroom, must be willing to live with ghosts ($500 / Berkeley)," and that title tells you pretty much everything I can say about the plot without telling you the whole thing. The story is told in the form of several listings for a boarder, and the poster may or may not be a reliable narrator. That's for the reader to decide. :)

I love stories with unreliable narrators, where I spend half of my time reading it trying to figure out if I'm the narrator is telling the truth, lying, or just delusional. I always think about "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, a short story I read in college that is, in my opinion, one of the best examples of an unreliable narrator.

"Seeking Boarder..." is extremely well-written. The voice of the narrator was consistent and believable, and the story had a strange, uneasy mood that stayed with me for a while after reading. The story is more a study of the narrator's character than it is a plot-driven tale.

I would recommend this short story to people who enjoy unreliable narrators, stories told in non-standard formats, character-driven stories, and modern supernatural tales. It's extremely short, only 3762 words long, so I would also recommend it to someone who wants to spend no more than ten minutes reading something thought-provoking.

Rating: 4 stars

Book Review: A Monster Calls, by Patrick Ness

To be honest, I'm not sure how to classify this book. There are monsters, but it's not really horror. There is magic and dreaming, but it's not really fantasy. It's in that strange place between children's and YA fiction, but it is also mature enough for adult readers to get something out of reading it. I do know that I loved it unreservedly and will definitely read it again.

Conor's mother is receiving treatment for cancer, he's being bullied at school, and he feels like he's been betrayed by his best friend. Patrick Ness writes a beautiful, poignant, heartbreaking, honest story about how Conor confronts his own personal monsters, aided by the help of the monster that was the yew tree growing in the church yard across the street.

I can't think of anyone I wouldn't recommend this book to. I let it sit on my shelf for almost a year before reading it, and I regret that immensely. Read this book immediately. You'll be glad you did.

Rating: 5 stars

Book Review: Shades of Milk and Honey, by Mary Robinette Kowal

Jane Ellsworth is a 28-year-old single woman in an alternative Regency-era England where magic is commonplace, and viewed as another "womanly art," similar to drawing or music. She and her younger sister Melody, as most of the young women of the time period are portrayed, are very preoccupied by their marital status and the interest of the eligible bachelors.

I was disappointed in this book. I've really come to appreciate good chick lit, and the entire time I was reading Shades of Milk and Honey, I kept thinking that it was so similar to Pride and Prejudice, except that it was a pale imitation. The characters really missed the mark for me. Jane Ellsworth and her younger sister Melody (and pretty much everyone else) are simple, flat characters that the author seems to have pulled out of a book of basic character types. Jane is the plain but talented one who's resigned to spinsterhood, and Melody is the pretty but vapid one, and each of them are envious of the other's blessings. Their mother is sickly and obsessed with marrying them off, their father is beneficent but distant, etc., etc. I did identify with Jane a little bit. I'm the older daughter in my family, and I used to be jealous of my sister's model-worthy good looks while she envied my singing voice and artistic abilities. Except that we got over that when we were teenagers. I'll remind you that Jane is 28 years old, and her sister is in her early 20s. I'm just not sure if I believe their behavior was realistic. Beyond that, Jane's romantic story line was completely confusing. The love interest didn't have much screen time, and I only remember one extremely ambiguous and extremely brief description of what he even looked like. There was no tension between the two, just ambivalence and a mild quizzical feeling, so when they were suddenly in love, I felt like I should be flipping back through the chapters looking for when that happened.

All of that said, I did finish the book in one day, so it wasn't all bad. I liked the world that Kowal created, and her magic system was interesting, albeit without depth or purpose. Magic has so many possible useful applications, other than decoration, that could have been (but were not) explored. I feel like this whole book was like that. Enjoyable and mildly interesting, but without the real depth and social commentary that was present in Austen's books.

With some reservation, I would recommend this book to someone looking for very light reading set in a Regency-era England with magic.

Rating: 3 stars

Short Story Saturday: Fade to White, by Catherynne M. Valente

I read "Fade to White" when it was nominated for a Hugo last year, and it stuck with me all that night and through the next week. It was just one of those sticky kinds of stories. It had so much to say, and it did it in such a unique (to me) way.

It's a sort of alternate history of the post-WWII era. Something went entirely wrong with the war, and California was completely obliterated, in what sounds like some kind of nuclear bomb or disaster. It left most American men completely sterile, and many American women as well. In a sort of reversal of The Handmaid's Tale, the few men who are still potent become Husbands who have four or more wives. The story is told in three ways: first, there's advertising copy with the editors changes included. It's upbeat government-funded advertising that's meant to reassure Americans that as little as possible has changed. The second aspect of the story is in the point of view of Sylvie, a 15-year-old half-Japanese girl who is about to go to her Presentation, the ceremony where she submits to dozens of tests and finds out whether she's fertile and what careers she's eligible for. The third aspect of the story is told by Martin, a 15-year-old boy who daydreams about nothing but becoming a Father and is preparing for his Announcement, the corresponding ceremony and test for boys. These three views alternate, telling a tale that is extremely chilling, in part because of its believability.

I pretty much adore everything Catherynne Valente has ever written. She's amazing with words, writing things like, "she could cut glass with the diamond of her mind," and she always has a fascinating and beautiful story to tell, or a new observation to make about the world.

I would recommend that pretty much everyone click on that link above and go check out this story. It was published in Clarkesworld Magazine, and it's available for free online. It was nominated for a Nebula and a Hugo, and it was a Sidewise Award finalist. I would especially recommend it to alternate-history fans and people interested in the 40s, WWII, and the changes the war made by bringing women into the workplace.

Rating: 5 stars

Book Review: Underland Chronicles, by Suzanne Collins

I realize that this is not so much a book review as a series review. I read all five volumes of this series in three days. It's safe to say I enjoyed it immensely.

Gregor is an 11-year-old who falls into a New York kid's version of Wonderland. Instead of talking rabbits, caterpillars, and cards, he finds himself in a world populated by six-foot tall talking rats, bats big enough to ride on, and enormous cockroaches, as well as a race of humans with translucent white skin and violet eyes. The Underland is on the verge of war, and according to the Underlanders' prophecies, Gregor is the warrior who will save them all.

Each book follows a formula: Gregor and his sister Boots (and sometimes one or two other members of their family) go to the Underland, Gregor finds out about a prophesy concerning him, he goes on an adventure, the prophesy is unraveled, and Gregor and Boots go back home.

Within this format, the books explore what it means to belong somewhere, when (and if) war and violence are legitimate, and whether you can have any power over your own life when someone else is telling you what you have to do (even when the person telling you is doing so through a centuries-old prophesy). Collins does not hesitate to kill her characters when it's necessary, which makes the story more believable, and I think that death and grief are important things for children to read about. This series is full of darkness and pain, but also humor, love, and excitement. I also loved Luxa, the princess of the human Underlanders. She's young, but she's a strong-minded warrior, and I've always been a fan of strong female characters.

This series, with its prophesies and wonderful young characters, was a really fun read. Gregor's 2-year-old sister, Boots, comes with him on all of his adventures, and she brings an element of lightheartedness to the books, while grounding Gregor in reality. He can't get too lost in being a hero when he needs to change his baby sister's diaper.

I would highly recommend these books to readers who thought Wonderland wasn't gritty enough, and readers who like exciting adventure stories.

Rating: 4 stars

Book Review: The Magicians, by Lev Grossman

I loved this book. It's been on my to-read list for a very long time, but for some reason, I never managed to pick it up. Actually, I know the reason. The cover is uninspiring, and I have always been a girl who judges a book by its cover. If you're not supposed to do that, what's the cover for, anyway?! After having read the book, I'm rather unclear on exactly what the crooked, badly "pruned," yellow-leaved tree on the cover has to do with the story whatsoever. But I don't make those decisions, so...

As I said, I loved this book. The Magicians is divided into four parts. In the beginning of the first part, Quentin Coldwater, a brilliant high school senior obsessed with a series of fantasy books set in the magical world Fillory (a sort of Narnia-like place of clear-cut good and evil, talking animals, and ram gods, accessed at random through clocks, closets, etc., and in which children always seem to go on exciting quests), has one of his closest-held dreams come true. He is told that magic is real, and he's offered a position in the only American university that teaches it. The first part of the book is reminiscent of Harry Potter, if only because it is a bunch of young(ish) wizards learning how to do magic. But instead of seeming like a pale imitation of something else, Lev Grossman acknowledges the inevitable similarities and creates something entirely his own.

One deliberate reference to the similarities was when Quentin went to look for a member of his welters team (welters is a sort of magical man-sized chess game in which teams try to capture squares on a giant board using magic). Josh is talking to a dealer in magical items when Quentin finds him, half an hour after the game started. Josh looks at the dealer and asks, "Got anything for time travel? Time-turner or something?" When the dealer says he'll look into it, Josh says, "Awesome. Send me an owl." Later in that same scene, he says, "Gotta get my quiddich costume. I mean uniform. I mean welters."

But instead of being a book about becoming a wizard, The Magicians is a book about becoming a man. Quentin has everything. He's incredibly smart, he's probably headed to Princeton, his parents are still married and live well enough in Brooklyn...but he's unhappy. When he is told magic is real and offered the chance to learn it, his dreams come true. But he's still unhappy, feeling like his real life hasn't really started yet. At its core, The Magicians is an exploration into the follies of living for some more desirable future, rather than being happy with an already amazing present. Lev Grossman does this by writing about what it would be like for someone to get everything he ever wanted, only to realize that bringing his fantasies into the real world changes them, or changes his perception of them, and once he gets everything he wants, he has to find something new to desire, or feel directionless.

I think Lev Grossman's use of Harry Potter and Narnia references is incredibly smart, because those are the worlds that today's young people fantasize about. He hands those dreams to Quentin with no strings attached. And then he asks the question: Now what?

I would recommend this book to anyone who's ever fantasized about being spun into another, more beautiful, magical world.

Rating: 5 stars!

Short Story Saturday: The Chapel Perilous, by Kevin Hearne

This week, I was in the mood for an anthology with multiple authors, and Unfettered, edited by Shawn Speakman, was the perfect book to pull off the shelf. For those of you who have never heard of Unfettered, it's a volume that only exists because of the generosity and friendship of some of the most talented writers in Sci/Fi and Fantasy, who donated stories for the anthology to pay off the medical debt of Shawn Speakman after his second bout with cancer in 2011. There is no theme to this anthology. Instead, the authors were given the freedom to submit whatever short stories they wanted.

Kevin Hearne's story takes place in the same world as his Iron Druid Chronicles and features the druid Atticus as the main character (and Oberon as the usual show-stealing wolfhound). Atticus tells the true story of the quest for the Holy Grail (which he features in heavily...well, pretty much almost exclusively), and in its telling, reveals that the history of the Grail began long before Jesus' time.

I was fascinated by the new-to-me origin story of the Grail (or Celtic Graal). I read "The Chapel Perilous" with the expectation of being entertained, and Kevin Hearne did not disappoint. In spite of Atticus's obvious run-in with the Chapel Perilous (given the title), what could be very dark and macabre tale maintains its lighter mood. Kevin Hearne has a wry sense of humor, and Atticus's interactions with Oberon and with the horse he rides in the story were some of the best (and funniest) parts of the tale. I loved that it ties in with the other Iron Druid books as well, but that you don't need to read them to love this story.

I'd recommend this story to any reader who likes Kevin Hearne, but also to any readers who enjoy a new take on an old tale, or a lighthearted story with a little action, magic, and history mixed in.

Rating: 5 stars!

Back to the Beginning

I have not published a single post on this blog in a year and a half. I've written many, and I've written quite a lot of book reviews on Goodreads, but I haven't posted here. So I'm essentially starting over, after a very, very long break.

In real, off-line life, I earned a Masters in Library and Information Science, I spent a while working four jobs simultaneously, I moved from Michigan to Illinois and then to New York, where I am now. At this very moment, I am unemployed, a state with which I am uncomfortable and unfamiliar with, and I'm living in a city I don't know surrounded by complete strangers, half a country away from all of my friends and family, with the exception of my wife and our two dogs.

Faced with this status and with nothing but job applications, cooking, and cleaning to occupy my time, I've decided to revive this blog from its rather long, languishing sleep. I'll be posting three times a week about what I'm reading, and after my year in library school, what I'm reading is much more varied than it used to be.

I still love fantasy, fairy tale re-writes, science fiction, and young adult, and those are what I have lined up for now. But I'll also be writing about romance, children's picture books, literary fiction, mysteries, and more. If you have a book you've loved, feel free to recommend it. If you have a book you'd like me to review, feel free to send it (please, please, please!). If you want to see all the books I've been reading while I was busy not posting to this blog, you can follow me on Goodreads. :) I'll probably slowly begin moving my Goodreads reviews over here, for weeks when I can't manage to read enough to fill the blog.

Why should you be reading this blog? What do you have to look forward to? For now, I'll be posting reviews of adult lit on Mondays and children's lit on Wednesdays. I'll also be re-instituting Short Story Saturday, and I'll be posting about a short story every Saturday. At some point in the future, I might take part in my own version of Throw-back Thursdays, by re-reading and reviewing books I read when I was younger.

So....Hello, again, Internet!

Short Story Saturday - Abyssus Abyssum Invocat, by Genevieve Valentine

The first time I heard of Genevieve Valentine, I was looking at books by Catherynne Valente and happened to see Valentine's Mechanique: A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti.

It's a book I need to re-read, because it's been too long since I first read it. Mechanique is a story about a circus troupe made up of completely and partially mechanical performers. The circus travels the world, trying to avoid the war that seems to be going on everywhere, and performing wherever there are people to watch and pay. As they do, there is a battle going on between two of the troupe's best performers, and the clash of war within and war without is an inevitability I tensely waited for as I read. Genevieve Valentine slowly reveals one detail after another about the performers and their pasts, creating a beautiful story that reads like a circus show of one astounding feat after another.

I've decided to start my Short Story Saturday series off with Valentine's short story "Abyssus Abyssum Invocat." It's a story about a mermaid and a boy and the way two people's souls call to each other. Valentine evokes a feeling of poetry and old-world storytelling, and she tells a story that is romantic, tragic, and strange. She puts words together beautifully, and I'll be thinking about her story for a long time. Because it's such a short story, I can't tell you much more without giving away the whole thing, so if you're interested in what I've already said, you should click on the title and go read it. :)

Book Review: The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

The Night Circus is purely magical. Opening its covers is like stepping into a dream from which you will never want to wake; every element of the story is almost painfully beautiful. If I were dropped on a desert island with only a single box of books, this book would be in that box.

The Night Circus is the story of Celia and Marco, a girl and a boy chosen and trained by two different magicians to compete in a game of illusion and strength. The game commences when they are adults, and it is played in a dream-like circus that travels the world. One illusionist travels with the circus while the other plays from afar. They fall in love, neither of them realizing that the game will only end when one of them dies. The circus impacts more and more lives the longer it goes on, and not always in a good way. Alongside the interplay of Celia and Marco is the story of Bailey, a boy fascinated by the circus who will play an integral role in the story as the two story lines merge.

Erin Morgenstern's book is wonderful. The setting is enchanting, story is interesting, and the prose is beautiful. The characters could have been developed further, since I feel like the defining characteristics of the main characters were quite similar (one of their major features is that they are all obsessed with books), but that is really the only criticism I have of this book. I can't wait to see what she writes next!