002. Tooth and Claw by Jo Walton
Publication: Tor Books (April 1, 2010), ebook, 333pp / ISBN 0765319519
Genre: Fantasy, Romance, Historical Fiction sort of?, Alt. History as well!
Read: January 1-2, 2011
Source: Bought (Dec. 25, 2010)
Like most books I buy, it’s been so long since I bought this one– over a year!– that all I could remember about Tooth and Claw was that it had dragons. And, well, yeah, it’s got dragons. But it’s got a lot of other stuff, as well! Continue reading »
98. The Unwanteds by Lisa McMann
Publication: Aladdin (August 30, 2011), ARC paperback, 390pp / ISBN 1442407689
Genre: MG Sci-fi/Fantasy, Dystopia
Read: August 11, 2011
Source: Publisher (thank you!)
Summary from Amazon:
When Alex finds out he is Unwanted, he expects to die. That is the way of the people of Quill. Each year, all the thirteen-year-olds are labeled as Wanted, Necessary, or Unwanted. Wanteds get more schooling and train to join the Quillitary. Necessaries keep the farms running. Unwanteds are set for elimination.
It’s hard for Alex to leave behind his twin, Aaron, a Wanted, but he makes peace with his fate—until he discovers that instead of a “death farm,” what awaits him is a magical place called ArtimÉ. There, Alex and his fellow Unwanteds are encouraged to cultivate their creative abilities and use them magically. Everything Alex has ever known changes before his eyes, and it’s a wondrous transformation.
But it’s a rare, unique occurrence for twins to be divided between Wanted and Unwanted, and as Alex and Aaron’s bond stretches across their separation, a threat arises for the survival of ArtimÉ that will pit brother against brother in an ultimate magical battle.
I was really excited when I got this book, mostly because I had tried to get it during BEA but was scared off by the truly massive line leading up to LM’s table. When I DID get it later, and when I read the first two chapters or so, I was thrilled. This is an awesome book, I thought. Those first few chapters were terrifying and exciting and really chilling, just like all good dystopian books should be. But then. Oh, but then. Continue reading »
82. Hard Spell by Justin Gustainis
Publication: Angry Robot (July 7, 2011), ebook, 400pp / ISBN 0857661159
Genre: Urban Fantasy, Mystery
Read: July 18-25, 2011
Source: Author (thank you!)
Summary from Amazon:
Stan Markowski is a Detective Sergeant on the Scranton PD’s Supernatural Crimes Investigation Unit.
Like the rest of America, Scranton’s got an uneasy ‘live and let unlive’ relationship with the supernatural. But when a vamp puts the bite on an unwilling victim, or some witch casts the wrong kind of spell, that’s when they call Markowski. He carries a badge. Also, a crucifix, some wooden stakes, a big vial of holy water, and a 9mm Beretta loaded with silver bullets.
I don’t know why, but I basically compare every urban fantasy mystery with The Dresden Files, which can be detrimental to how much I like a book when it’s really not like The Dresden Files at all. Hard Spell is sort of like TDF in that it’s got urban fantasy stuff and a dude who walks around wearing a trench coat, but TDF is fantasy noir and Hard Spell is more like a police procedural (with vampires). TDF has snarky, pun-y humor; Hard Spell has bantering police officers and really dark humor. TDF has more twisty, interconnecting plots; Hard Spell is more straightforward.
Okay, so: did I enjoy Hard Spell? Yes, even though I kept wondering why it wasn’t The Dresden Files. Continue reading »
72. Phoenix Rising by Pip Ballantine & Tee Morris
Publication: Harper Voyager (April 26, 2011), Paperback, 416pp / ISBN 0062049763
Genre: Mystery, Action/Adventure, Sci-fi (Steampunk), Romance (sort of)
Read: July 4-14, 2011
Source: Publisher (thank you!)
Summary from Amazon:
Evil is most assuredly afoot—and Britain’s fate rests in the hands of an alluring renegade . . . and a librarian.
These are dark days indeed in Victoria’s England. Londoners are vanishing, then reappearing, washing up as corpses on the banks of the Thames, drained of blood and bone. Yet the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences—the Crown’s clandestine organization whose bailiwick is the strange and unsettling—will not allow its agents to investigate. Fearless and exceedingly lovely Eliza D. Braun, however, with her bulletproof corset and a disturbing fondness for dynamite, refuses to let the matter rest . . . and she’s prepared to drag her timorous new partner, Wellington Books, along with her into the perilous fray.
For a malevolent brotherhood is operating in the deepening London shadows, intent upon the enslavement of all Britons. And Books and Braun—he with his encyclopedic brain and she with her remarkable devices—must get to the twisted roots of a most nefarious plot . . . or see England fall to the Phoenix!
Finding a good steampunk book is a mite trickier than you would think. Myself, I prefer an emphasis on the people and the world they live on than on the tech– though I still think the tech is a big part of it. If you’ve got a book set in a steampunk world, then not only does the steampunk tech have to interesting, it has to be integral. Otherwise what’s the point? The really good steampunk books, the ones I enjoy the most, have a good balance between the people and their tech, and I think Phoenix Rising has that balance. Continue reading »
This is my second year judging for Nerds Heart YA, and this time I’m judging with Kristen of Bookworming the 21st Century. I must say that I really enjoyed the books I judged! Both of them were really good, but while I liked both only one was a clear winner (well, obviously). Continue reading below for my thoughts on both books and our decision on which book will move forward.
55. Toads and Diamonds by Heather Tomlinson
Publication: Henry Holt and Co. (March 30, 2010), Hardcover, 288pp / ISBN 9780805089684
Genre: YA Fantasy
Read: June 9, 2011
Source: Borrowed
Summary from Amazon:
Diribani has come to the village well to get water for her family’s scant meal of curry and rice. She never expected to meet a goddess there. Yet she is granted a remarkable gift: Flowers and precious jewels drop from her lips whenever she speaks.
It seems only right to Tana that the goddess judged her kind, lovely stepsister worthy of such riches. And when she encounters the goddess, she is not surprised to find herself speaking snakes and toads as a reward.
Blessings and curses are never so clear as they might seem, however. Diribani’s newfound wealth brings her a prince—and an attempt on her life. Tana is chased out of the village because the province’s governor fears snakes, yet thousands are dying of a plague spread by rats. As the sisters’ fates hang in the balance, each struggles to understand her gift. Will it bring her wisdom, good fortune, love . . . or death?
Toads and Diamonds is set in a fictional version of historical India, with gods and people that sort of resemble the ones in our world, but not really. It’s also a retelling of Charles Perrault’s Les Fées, who you may recognize as the dude who popularized stories like Bluebeard, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty. Luckily, Toads and Diamonds does what The Goose Girl did for the original goose girl story: it makes it way better and way more interesting. It has character depth, and self-actualization, and character growth! Diribani and Tana are two of the strongest characters I’ve ever read about, and yet they were still vulnerable to dangers both inside and out. Also, it has romance! Yay!
The only downside to Toads and Diamonds is that I thought Diribani’s troubles, when compared to Tana’s, seem almost inconsequential. Tana has to deal with plague victims, near-death at least twice, and shoveling horse poop. Diribani has to deal with danger to her spiritual beliefs– and to her heart. Both are powerful stories, but I can’t help but think that Tana had the upper hand in emotionally impacting the reader (i.e. me). Plague and death is just always going to affect me more than the push-pull of living in one culture while belonging to another, and so I sympathized with Tana and her snakes way more than Diribani and her flowers.
Plus, the villain was basically non-existent except for right at the end. In fact, I don’t think the villain was even that important, for all that he kept throwing wrenches into things.
Still, despite what I saw as an imbalance, I really liked Toads and Diamonds. It’s a fantastic fairy tale retelling and I definitely recommend it.
56. Finding Family by Tonya Bolden
Publication: Bloomsbury USA Children’s Books (August 31, 2010), Hardcover, 192pp / ISBN 1599903180
Genre: MG Historical Fiction
Read: June 14, 2011
Source: Borrowed (special thanks to Kristen for letting me borrow her copy!)
Summary from Amazon:
Delana has never known her parents. Raised by her Aunt Tilley and a reclusive grandfather, Delana has led a sheltered existence, nurtured on her aunt’s wild family histories. But when Aunt Tilley dies, Delana confronts her pent-up curiosities and embarks on a quest to unravel her aunt’s fictions and draw out her mysterious grandfather. In searching for her true history, Delana finds herself, and a home in the one place she never thought to look. This moving fictional story is imagined from real antique photographs that author Tonya Bolden has collected. Bolden’s well-researched historical details about 1905 Charleston, West Virginia lend authenticity, while spare, lyrical writing make this young girl’s coming-of-age resonate.
Finding Family an adorable and heartbreaking book. Delana’s story is about growing up, and when you grow up sometimes you find out the truth about things you didn’t even know there was a truth for. That can have devastating consequences, but luckily Delana is strong enough– and has a solid support structure in her family– that she isn’t ruined forever. In fact, she gets stronger! Character growth, yay!
One of the best parts of Finding Family was the integration of actual antique photographs. It just makes the whole book seem more real, and like the people Delana talks about could have actually been people living back at the turn of the century. That gives it an edge that most YA/MG historical novels don’t have.
Like I said, though I enjoyed both books, only one could move forward and I knew which one I wanted it to be. Luckily my judging partner agreed, and so we’ve decided that Toads and Diamonds by Heather Tomlinson will be moving forward!
Congrats to Toads and Diamonds, and here’s hoping it does well in the next round!
36. Love Among the Chickens by P.G. Wodehouse
Publication: originally published 1906, ebook published 2003
Genre: Fiction, Humor
Rating: Borrow it
Read: April 13-15, 2011
Source: Project Gutenberg
I don’t think I’ve ever been disappointed by a Wodehouse book, and I’m not really disappointed with this one. But I AM underwhelmed. This is, I feel, one of his more lackluster books, with more fluff than wit and entirely forgettable characters. It’s a funny story and it’s a good book to read if you’re bored on a train somewhere, but it’s definitely not up to the level of Mr. Wodehouse’s other, more popular books.
40. The Explosionist by Jenny Davidson
Publication: HarperTeen (July 1, 2008), Hardcover, 464pp / ISBN 0061239755
Genre: YA Urban Fantasy, Action
Rating: Borrow it
Read: April 20-30, 2011
Source: Borrowed
This book is so interesting. I love alternative histories, and stories that mix science with magic (or spiritualism, I guess). This one is particularly good because it’s got so many important parts of history running around inside it: the battle of Waterloo, spiritualism, women’s rights, the Industrial Revolution, and so on. I also loved the protagonist, Sophie, and the mystery/thriller bits were very entertaining. However– the end. The ending killed it for me. The last two chapters or so were just so boring and obvious and blah, and it really left me with a sour impression of a book that really deserves more. I understand those chapters setting up the plot for the second book, but I wish it had done it in a more vibrant way.
41. The Warrior Heir by Cinda Williams Chima
Publication: Disney Hyperion (September 23, 2009), ebook, 448pp
Genre: YA (Urban) Fantasy
Rating: Borrow it
Read: May 1-2, 2011
Source: Bought
I so wanted to love this book. Instead I’m left feeling like I just stepped in cow poop after a fun day at the county fair. You know what I mean? I like CWC’s writing voice and I like the world The Warrior Heir resides in, but it’s just so full of the same ol’ fantasy tropes I’ve seen over and over again that I couldn’t stand it. If I hadn’t been focusing on those (or if this was my first ever fantasy book) I probably would have enjoyed the book more, but all I could think the whole time I read it was “and then I bet THIS is going to happen”– and it did.
At least it had plenty of strong female characters! And I also really liked the friendship element running heavily throughout, and how Jack actually learns more than just how to swing a sword (I mean emotional stuff, yeah). I just wish it had tried to do more new things than just doing the same old things everyone else already did. Still, I’ve got the next book already and that one might have something going for it, so I’m going to go ahead and continue the series.
15. Thirteenth Child by Patricia C. Wrede
Publication: Scholastic Paperbacks (June 1, 2010), ebook, 352pp / ISBN 0545033454
Genre: YA fantasy, Alternative History
Rating: Borrow it
Read: January 31, 2011
Source: Bought
Summary from Amazon:
Eff was born a thirteenth child. Her twin brother, Lan, is the seventh son of a seventh son. This means he’s supposed to possess amazing talent — and she’s supposed to bring only bad things to her family and her town. Undeterred, her family moves to the frontier, where her father will be a professor of magic at a school perilously close to the magical divide that separates settlers from the beasts of the wild.
As much as I liked Patricia C. Wrede’s Enchanted Forest Chronicles series, I like Thirteenth Child even more. I love the world it’s set in, I love the story, the writing is fantastic and it was so much fun to read! (Then came the sick feeling, but we’ll talk more about that later.)
One of my favorite genres is alternative histories, or alternative Earths. I love seeing how things would be if there was legit magic in the world, or if cyborgs conquered the Romans, etc. Thirteenth Child is like Laura Ingalls Wilder meets Diana Wynne Jones. Yay!
I also really like it when fantasy authors play around with convention. That seventh son of a seventh son thing? SO overdone, and I’m actually kind of bored with it. That’s why I was so happy when PCW didn’t focus on the super special, super magical double-seven kid, and instead focused on the (supposedly) unspecial, unlucky thirteenth kid. It was also interesting how there was very obviously gender conventions and “roles” in place– the sort you’d expect there to be in a book set vaguely in America’s frontier age, where women stayed at home and cooked and men went out and did things, but PCW didn’t really make a big deal about it.
Sometimes with these alt. history books you get the female characters acting obviously modern, with an independent rebellious streak a mile wide and lots of talk about “why can’t women do what they want.” None of the female characters in Thirteenth Child did that, but then I think women are slightly less locked into their “proper roles” as maybe women would have been in the real frontier age. There’s a few women who are college professors, and Eff ends up wanting to do a rather manly job and no-one says anything about it. So. Yeah.
I liked Eff, though I don’t think she’s quite as strong a person yet as, say, Cimorene was. But she’s getting there! It did get kind of annoying when Eff was STILL going on and on about how she was going to turn evil one day, even when she was an adult and, y’know, still not evil.
There was an explanation in the story (by another character) that habit and fear kind of stick with a person, though, so even though Eff intellectually knew she wasn’t evil– it was still hard for her to accept that, emotionally. (Which is why she had so many problems with her magic.) I understood her difficulties, but I also kind of wanted her to just come out and be all “Bam! I’m awesome! I’m just as awesome as my double-seven brother is!” Maybe she’ll do that in the next book, who knows.
Unfortunately– and here comes the part that, after reading a lot more about it, made me feel sick– the reason I’m rating this “borrow” instead of “buy” is because of the WTF race fail in here. I’m ashamed to say I didn’t notice this when I was reading the book (white privilege going on like woah) but I’m sure as hell noticing now.
Where the hell are the American Indians? Did they get eaten by dragons? Wiped out by Columbus and his ilk? Are they all living on the other side of the mountains? What? And more importantly: why was it okay to just completely disregard a huge fucking chunk of American AND human history? Hello?
There are bits of the worldbuilding that are brilliant, and then there’s this shit. Disappointing isn’t even the right word.
Basically: Love the characters, love the idea, but WOAH wtf with the missing whole sections of humanity.
If you like: Diana Wynn Jones, Cherie Priest, or Neil Gaiman’s books, you’ll like Thirteenth Child. On the other hand…
Everybody knows that a seventh son is lucky. Things come a little easier to him, all his life long: love and money and fine weather and the unexpected turn that brings good fortune from bad circumstances. A lot of seventh sons go for magicians, because if there’s one sort of work where luck is more useful than any other, it’s making magic.
And everybody knows that the seventh son of a seventh son is a natural-born magician. A double-seven doesn’t even need schooling to start working spells, though the magic comes on faster and safer if he gets some. When he’s grown and come into his power for true and all, he can even do the Major Spells on his own, the ones that can call up a storm or quiet one, move the earth or still it, anger the ocean or calm it to glassy smoothness. People are real nice to a double-seventh son.
Nobody seems to think much about all the other sons, or the daughters. There’s nearly always daughters, because hardly anybody has seven sons right in a row, boom, like that. Sometimes there are so many daughters that people give up trying for seven sons. After all, there’s plenty enough work in raising eleven or twelve childings, and a thirteenth child — son or daughter — is unlucky. So everybody says. (Chapter 1)
Get your own copy @ Amazon (paper) or BookDepository.com and support Birdbrain(ed) Book Blog!
Other reviews: Jenny’s Books | Bookshelves of Doom | Charlotte’s Library
More about my rating guide, including the buy/borrow/bin rating system used Sept. 2010-May 2011.
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