fantasy

Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

| Tasha

daughter of smoke and bone

Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Karou is a blue-haired art student in Prague who lives a double life.  She has her small flat where she sleeps under the spread of a pair of huge wings she created.  She attends class, tangles with her ex-boyfriend, and hangs out with her best friend.  Her sketchbooks are filled with strange creatures, so she is known to have a great imagination.  No one knows that these are not creatures she has made up, but rather some of her closest family.  Because she also has her secret life where she runs errands for Brimstone who is a wishmaker.  Her errands take her across the world through magical doorways and what sounds amazing actually results in hauling elephant tusks on Paris subways or bargaining for the teeth of the dead in Morocco.  Brimstone needs teeth to do his job, and it’s Karou’s job to bring them to him.   Her life is complicated and busy, but filled with questions that are never answered.  Karou has always felt something is missing, she’s just not sure what it could be.

Taylor has created a stunning novel here.  Her heroine is complicated, vibrant, amazing and conflicted.  She is strong, vulnerable, beautiful, and mesmerizing.   She is also tough as nails when pushed, raised by monsters, and at the same time big-hearted and kind.  She is a study in contrasts that really works, each piece making sense and creating a believable whole.

The writing is equally spectacular.  Taylor’s descriptions of places is filled with beauty.  She describes Prague as “a city of alchemists and dreamers, its medieval cobbles once trod by golems, mystics, invading armies.”  Contrast that with Marrakesh “a mad, teeming carnival of humanity: snake charmers and dancers, dusty barefoot boys, pickpockets, hapless tourists, and food stalls selling everything from orange juice to roasted sheep’s heads.”

The entire book is filled with richness.  Her descriptions are deep and meaningful.  The relationships between characters are strong and true.  And when she writes a love story, you’d better be ready for your own stomach butterflies to awaken and flutter.  It is honey-sweet, hot and shining.  She has created a world that you will not want to ever leave.

This is one ravishing read that breaks away from the paranormal romance label that could have bound it.  Whether you are a paranormal romance fan or not, this is a book worth reading.  Appropriate for ages 15-18.

Reviewed from ARC received from Little, Brown and Company.

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NPR’s Top 100 Science Fiction and Fantasy Books

| Tasha

From a group of titles nominated and then voted on by over 60,000 people, here are the top 10 titles in NPR’s Top 100 Science Fiction and Fantasy books.  You can click here to see the entire Top 100 list. 

My biggest gripe with the top titles are that there is not a single female author in the bunch.  The first female author appears at #20 and is Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.  That is followed closely by Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale.  But then there is another large gap until Anne McCaffrey appears at #33 with Dragonflight.

I know it was a democratic voting process, but I still think it shows how dominant male writers are in sci fi and fantasy despite such amazing female authors.  Sigh.  We have a long way to go!

Note:  the list does not include horror or teen books, but teen readers enjoy fantasy and science fiction for adults, so I thought the list still had a place here on my blog.

Top 10

   

1. Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien

2. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

3. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

   

4. The Dune Chronicles by Frank Herbert

5. A Song of Ice and Fire Series by George R. R. Martin

6. 1984 by George Orwell

7. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

  

8. The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov

9. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

10. American Gods by Neil Gaiman

Book Review: Hourglass by Myra McEntire

| Tasha

hourglass

Hourglass by Myra McEntire

Emerson wants to be cured more than anything!  That way she can stop seeing the ghosts around her and start being normal.  The visions have plagued her since before her parents’ death but now they seem to be getting larger and one, who calls himself Jack, even talks directly to her.  So when her brother hires another consultant to try to cure her, Emerson agrees.  She didn’t expect to find a consultant who is not only completely hot, but who also understands her situation so completely.  As Emerson finds herself electrically drawn to the dark, mysterious Michael, she also wonders about the mysterious Hourglass organization he works for.  This mysterious, romantic and paranormal read mixes science fiction and fantasy into our modern world.

The cover on this book captured me immediately.  Happily, the gorgeous cover and its unusual feel work very well for the book.  The book has the same sort of modern but off-kilter beauty about it.  Though this is McIntire’s debut novel, it never feels that way.  She has created a book that has a maturity about it, especially in its world building and its characters.

Emerson is a very strong protagonist who is petite, powerful and gifted.  Her sarcasm elevates the book with its humor, keeping it modern and fresh.   Emerson is flawed too, very aware of her own fragility after her parents’ death, and never willing to share more than she has to with people.  Readers will relate to her effortlessly.

The world McEntire has created is our own but features people with unusual gifts.  While some of the gifts are only hinted at, others come only to full fruition when shared with others.  It creates a world of power but only when people work together.  In this way, it pushes Emerson personally to see if she will be willing to be that open.  The tension this creates is inherent to the success of the novel.

In a market filled with paranormal novels, this is one that you should definitely find time for.  It’s a gripping, mysterious read filled with plenty of romance.  Appropriate for ages 14-17.

Reviewed from copy received from Egmont.

Also reviewed by many other blogs.

Book Review: Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

| Tasha

missperegrines

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

Built around real vintage photographs, this book is itself a lovely oddity.  Jacob’s grandfather has been telling him stories his entire life.  Stories that are filled with monsters, death and magic.  But when Jacob becomes a teen, he knows better than to believe his grandfather’s stories any more.  In fact, his grandfather is losing touch with reality, babbling about needing weapons and being in danger.  When Jacob goes to check on him, he discovers his grandfather mauled and dying in the forest.  It is his grandfather’s last words that take Jacob on a journey to a remote island in Wales.  There he finds a deserted orphanage where his grandfather had once stayed as a teen during World War II.  There are still signs of the children who once lived there, but they point to children who were peculiar and strange.  And even stranger, they may still be alive.

The story is slow moving at first, but picks up into a whirlwind pace by the end.  In between, the reader will delight in solving the mystery of the orphanage and what is to be found there.  Riggs has created two very vivid settings in the remote island and the orphanage.  They are beautifully rendered in his prose, creating worlds within worlds like a nesting doll.

This fantasy has the added delight of the vintage photographs, which bring a strange sense of altered reality to the book that works particularly well.  Riggs has created a strong but human protagonist in Jacob, who struggles with fears but turns out to be very brave and driven.  The mystery of the book entwines itself around the story, always nudging to be noticed and wondered at. 

Riggs has written a peculiar book in the best sense of the word.  This unique read will have both teens and adults entering a suspenseful world of monsters, children and magic.  Appropriate for ages 14-adult.

Reviewed from library copy.

Book Review: Spellbound by Jacqueline West

| Tasha

spellbound

Spellbound by Jacqueline West

Released July 11, 2011.

This second book in The Books of Elsewhere series is just as magical as the first.  Olive is still searching for a way to save Morton, the boy trapped inside a painting.  Now that the spectacles are broken, Olive must rely on the permission of one of the three cats to enter the paintings.  But nothing she tries is working.  So when her new neighbor, Rutherford, mentions that there may be a spellbook left by the McMartins, Olive immediately begins searching.  When she finds it though, she may not be ready for what it brings with it.  Plenty of adventure, magic and surprises await the reader.

West writes with an ease, a comfort that makes the book read quickly.  At the same time, she does use imagery very well, especially when describing characters.  Olive continues to be a great protagonist.  She is far from perfect, allowing her pride to get her into further scrapes in this book.  I am a fan of a flawed protagonist and Olive manages to be human and relatable throughout the novel.

As Olive spends more time outside the house, the neighborhood begins to come to life in this book much more completely than in the previous novel.  Olive’s parents are also more involved in this second book, though they do continue to leave Olive alone often, much to the delight of the storyline.

This is a charmer of a series filled with witches, magic, cats, and danger.  Fans of the first novel in the series will be clamoring for this second one.  A perfect summer read for ages 9-12.

Reviewed from ARC received from Dial Books.

Book Review: Red Glove by Holly Black

| Tasha

redglove

Red Glove by Holly Black

This second book in The Curse Workers series continues the story of Cassel Sharpe.  Cassel was born into a family of curse working con artists and mobsters.  Cassel had always thought he was the only of his brothers without any curse working talent, but as he discovered in the first novel in the series, his memories were being manipulated by his brother, Barron, so that he forgot his unusual power and that he killed with it.  Now Cassel knows that he is one of the most powerful curse workers in the world.  When Cassel’s oldest brother, Philip, is murdered, the feds come to Cassel for some answers, but the problem is that Cassel cannot remember the truth about what happened with his brothers.  Now he is under pressure to provide some information to the feds.  At the same time, he is going to high school and trying not to take advantage of the fact that the girl he loves has been cursed to love him.  Plus there is at least one mob family eager to have Cassel start working for them.  The only way to proceed is to weigh the pros and CONS.

This is a worthy second book in the series with Cassel continuing his struggle with his mobster family, his own role in their business, and his personal history.  Cassel is a very intriguing protagonist with his tough exterior but loyalty and strong sense of right and wrong, though it may not be the same right and wrong as the reader’s.  His view of the world is evolving yet very consistent and strong, which is a large part of why this book and series work so well. 

Along with the strong characterization, the book has plenty of action, cons, humor, and puzzles to figure out.  Nothing is ever as it appears at first in this book filled with con artists.  The big question here is who killed Cassel’s brother, but that pales compared to the puzzle of his own life and family.  There is a great richness to the world that Black has created, enough richness to leave on wondering what is coming next at almost every point in the book.

Beautifully crafted, well written, with compelling, funny characters, this book is a must-read for fans of the series and a must-have for any library serving teens.  Appropriate for ages 14+.

Reviewed from copy received from Margaret K. McElderry Books.

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Book Review: Imaginary Girls by Nova Ren Suma

| Tasha

imaginarygirls

Imaginary Girls by Nova Ren Suma

Released June 14, 2011.

Chloe knows that she can depend on her older sister Ruby.  Ruby is a girl who has always seemed to be more alive, more beautiful and more intense than anyone else.  She has series of boyfriends, some of whom never go away, lingering for more attention from Ruby.  Chloe knows that Ruby would do anything for her and that she will always live with Ruby.  But that all changes one night at the reservoir when Ruby asks Chloe to swim across the water and return with a trophy from a long-sunken town below the surface.  Chloe trusts Ruby implicitly, knowing the Ruby would never let anything happen to her.  So she starts across, but she doesn’t find the other side of the reservoir, instead she discovers the body of a dead girl floating in a boat.  Now Chloe is sent away to live with her father.  But Ruby will not allow them to be separated from one another and will do anything to get her sister back.  Anything.

This is horror fiction that is literary at the same time.  It takes its time slowly becoming more and more eerie and strange as the reader continues.   The journey here is a large part of the book, as layers are peeled away, readers begin to understand more and more about the sisters, about Ruby, and about the dead girl, London.  It is a book that gives readers the space to think, to untangle the knot, to solve the puzzle.  It is a joy to read.

The prose is beautiful even at its more horrific and strange.  In the early pages there is this section from page 34 that epitomizes the beauty of the language:

It felt like we could have made it to the station in seconds, flown there and back with a canister of gasoline, our eyelashes glistening with frost, our bones weightless from cold.

And you can see within that passage that even the most mundane, running out of gas, can be made sinister yet mesmerizing.

Chloe is a character who struggles with living in her sister’s shadow even as she basks in the attention that it brings her from others and from Ruby.  Their relationship is strange, but Chloe continues to see it as normal.  Readers must wrest their thoughts free from Chloe’s to begin to understand what is happening.  The world the two sisters inhabit is beautiful, troubling and irresistible.

The design of the book is very effective.  From the cover that is beautiful but haunting to the way the chapter titles are done.  Each chapter title is pulled from the first few words of the chapter, giving the book an echo and each title even more strange weight.

Highly recommended, this is a phenomenal horror novel filled with gorgeous writing and a strong paranormal feel.  Ideal for teens who think they have read it all.  This is a book full of surprises and twists that will have them regretting reading it after dark.  Appropriate for ages 14-17.

Reviewed from ARC received from Penguin Young Readers Group.

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Book Review: Kat Incorrigible by Stephanie Burgis

| Tasha

katincorrigible

Kat Incorrigible by Stephanie Burgis

Mix a Regency setting with plenty of magic and one smart, sassy heroine and you have this winning novel for children.  Kat never knew her mother, since she died when Kat was born.  She does have a stepmother who is far more interested in the wealth her stepdaughters will bring with strategic marriages than with their future happiness.  Kat is the youngest of the three sisters and she discovers early in the novel that she has inherited her mother’s magical talents.  One of her older sisters, Angeline, has also gotten magical talents of a different sort.  As the eldest sister, Elissa, is about to be betrothed to a grim fiancé, the younger two get deeper into trouble as they explore their magical gifts.  All too soon, Kat will be called upon to use her magic to save those she loves, while trying to act graceful and polite in society.

I’m a huge fan of mixing historical settings with fantasy, and this novel does it very well.  Readers never lose the fact that they are reading a Regency novel, thanks to the elements of society that are woven successfully throughout the novel.  At the same time, the fantasy elements are tantalizingly and beautifully done as well.

The characterization is superb, especially Kat, who is a Regency girl that modern children will relate to happily.  She is intelligent, irreverent and irresistible.  From the first glimpse readers get of Kat with her short-cut hair and her desire to save her family, Kat is an intriguing character.  Happily, Burgis has incorporated plenty of humor into the novel as well.  There are scenes that are filled with genteel sarcasm and bites but sometimes the story merrily heads closer to farce with delightful results.

Highly recommended, this is a book that children will adore with just the right mix of humor, fantasy and style.  Sounds like ideal summer reading to me!  Appropriate for ages 9-12.

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Reviewed from copy received from Atheneum Books.

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Book Review: Divergent by Veronica Roth

| Tasha

divergent

Divergent by Veronica Roth

Beatrice lives the selfless life of a person in the Abnegation faction.  She wears gray, avoids mirrors, and tries to always think of other before herself.  But she feels that she isn’t any good at it, unlike her brother, who manages the strict lifestyle perfectly.  In this dystopian novel set in Chicago, there are five factions who keep the peace.  Now that Beatrice is 16, she is tested for suitability in different factions and then is given the choice of which faction she wants to join.  But her results are odd, indicating that she could be suitable for three of the factions, meaning that she is divergent.  It is something that is not only rare but could put her life in danger if others found out.  Now Beatrice has a choice, leave her family behind in Abnegation or stay and be selfless as she has always been taught.

I tried to keep any spoilers from my summary above.  You’ll find that all of that action happens in the first few chapters.  I avoided reviews of this novel, waiting to get my hands on a copy, and I was very happy to discover the world of Divergent myself. 

Roth has created a dystopian fantasy that is a wild ride of a novel.  There is lots of violence, tons of action, and scenes that are guaranteed to raise your pulse from excitement.  And just with any great teen novel, there is romance.  In this case, it’s a romance that may not surprise but builds and matures with grace.  Roth has created a world that is alarming and very different from our own.  The political intrigue of the novel gives it a wonderful depth.

Beatrice is a great heroine who has plenty of self-doubt, learns about herself, underestimates herself, and learns to make friends, depend on others, yet stay uniquely independent.  She is a strong heroine who shows her vulnerability too.  With that touch of doubt, she becomes a much more human character whom readers can relate to.

A delight of a dystopian fantasy, make sure you have this in your library teen collection.  Get it directly into the hands of Hunger Games fans, who will return begging to know when the next book is coming out!  Appropriate for ages 15-18.

Reviewed from library copy.

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