*Not pictured: Quickbane (The Vale Chronicles #1) |
Quickbane (The Vale Chronicles #1) by Chelsea Starling
This book came recommended by Pauline Creeden during a day when it was free,
so I picked it up. I read the blurb first, and there was a little part
of me that worried this book would turn out to be the cheap, "fluffy",
shallow variety of YA chick lit—but I trusted Pauline on account of her
own writing, so I gave it the benefit of the doubt.
I
am so glad I did. Jessa is the quintessential "Child of Destiny", but
she spends much of the story trying to figure it out, and her fiery
temper and her stubborn pride get the better of her and threaten to
unleash terror on her whole community. Coupled with a trapped demon
desperate for any avenue of escape, and a rite of passage that requires
knowledge of the darker side of magic—
Starling creates a fascinating world reminiscent of Gaiman and Funke, and I found Quickbane to be an enchanting, enjoyable read!
I Am The Messenger by Marcus Zusak
I
had never heard of Marcus Zusak till someone suggested I read The Book
Thief. That book has henceforth been counted time and again in pretty
much every single one of my "Books You Simply Must Read" lists, and is
the pivotal book in opening my eyes to unorthodox styles of writing that
stick with me and work well. So, naturally, when I saw a second book by
Zusak, I had to read it.
"I
Am The Messenger" doesn't quite carry the same dramatic
"punch-to-the-feels" that Book Thief did, but it still carries that same
thoughtful deliberation over those everyday decisions we take for
granted. How often are we content to float through life without even a
second thought for our neighbors, to say nothing of our community? What
if you were given the chance to care enough to do something nice for a
total stranger? Would you care enough to save the life of someone down
the street? Ed is just an ordinary young man with a dog that is
described exclusively and repeatedly in association with the foulest
stenches known to man—and by some twist of chance he is thrust into the
forgotten corners of his community as the Messenger—bringer of hope, of
life, and of joy. Zusak's trademark careful use of language kept me
attached to the book and certainly got me thinking about my own
community. It does have bouts of objectionable material; not enough to
make me wholly reject the book, but just barely over the "recommendable"
limit.
Emperor of Thorns (Broken Empire Trilogy #3) by Mark Lawrence
And then there's Mark Lawrence. HEY GUESS WHAT? I DID IT! I FINALLY FINISHED THAT BLOODY (literally) TRILOGY!
I still remain squeamish; I still cannot stand reading books with so much darkness and such murder and depravity...
But
there's just something in the way Mark writes that keeps me coming back
again and again, something in that dry "guillotine humor" (makes the
gallows seem tame...) and the spell-binding use of technology in this
erstwhile "medieval" world that stirs me to peep between my fingers as I
cover my face in horror.
And
it has payed off. Now at last the enigma that is Fexler Brews is
unraveled. I was disappointed to find that it had been so long since I
had read King of Thorns that I had forgotten the intricate side plots
and tandem storylines—but all the same, at this point all I wanted was
to find out how it ended. I wasn't particularly attached to how the kid
got there. (Apologies to the author, but that's how it is)
That
being said, if all the final reveals over the course of the book were
not enough to blow my mind as the series has done time and again... The
ending blew my mind in the way it turned my expectation on its head!
Even now as I recall it, I cannot figure out what in the heck I just
read... If Zusak left me pensive and looking closely at my world with
renewed interest, Lawrence leaves me disoriented, puzzled, and spinning
through a void of a post-apocalyptic world that I thought I understood,
but now cannot even fathom. Full marks for use of descriptive and
poignant language... But dock one for that finish...
Snow White and Rose Red by Patricia Wrede
It's
fairy tales, in Elizabethan English! I prided myself for knowing
exactly what everyone was saying. Besides, only the dialogue was in the
archaic vernacular, and—contrary to the metered lines of Shakespeare—it
wasn't all truncated and full of the chopped-up syllables to get it to
fit, which made it easier to understand. The style of the story itself
was more your average modern-day fairy tale—and a beautifully-done one
at that! I thoroughly enjoyed this one.
Dark Fire (The Last Dragon Chronicles #5) by Chris D'Lacey
I did it. I'm sorry. I read another "Last Dragon Chronicles," even after I told myself I didn't want to.
This
one wasn't so bad. It's a lot less of the Fain/Ix/Polar bear hoodoo and
a lot more confrontations... And this time there's a fully-grown dragon
instead of just a sculpture of one! I think D'Lacey finally (after
floundering like a beached whale for two or three books!) found out
where he wanted to go with the series, and so there seems to be more of a
heading toward a certain goal, instead of the neverending cycle of
"Good guy tries it, bad guy stops him." As with the Broken Empire
(SORRY, MARK!) I might just stick with the story till it ends, but there
doesn't seem to be any of the characters I am particularly fond of.
Day of the Predator (TimeRiders #2) by Alex Scarrow
CAN SOMEBODY PLEASE TELL ME WHAT THE HECK I JUST READ??
Time
travel over "millions of years" to the time of dinosaurs, throw in a
new "organic AI" that was a guy in the first book and now is a girl...
Recipe for a YA treatise on the evolutionary theory, right?
Thankfully,
Scarrow has yet to lose track of bringing his characters through an
actual story in the midst of all this crazy time-hopping. He's not
trying to make a point, the environment is still the medium for his
characters, not the message for his readers. So I can worry less about
whether he's trying to convince me of gender fluidity and just enjoy the
fact that Bob and Becks, while "based" on the same AI program, are
still very separate and distinct entities. And the connections between
the team members are getting stronger and deeper, and they're learning
not just about themselves but also about the dangers and mysteries of
time travel and what all that entails. And then...
THAT ENDING THOUGH!!!!
Here
I was, just beginning to relax, getting ready to put the book down with
a smile after that great escapade that turned out all right in the
end...
AND SCARROW THROWS IN THE MOTHER OF ALL PLOT TWISTS IN THE VERY LAST SENTENCE AND NOW I CAN'T EVEN!!!
Must finish this series or I just might explode.
L is for Lawless (ABC Mysteries #12) by Sue Grafton
Another
mystery, another chance for Kinsey Millhone to screw things up and get
herself into impossibly uncomfortable and pretty-near life-threatening
situations. It's pretty sad when the most entertaining part of the book
is the secondary character who only shows up every so often. That being
said, I love Grafton for inventing the Pitts family: four geriatric
siblings (the youngest is I think eighty-five) and one of them is
marrying a garrulous Ukranian named Rosie. Actually I found the
undercover work Kinsey does this time around to be mildly entertaining.
But the nature of the crime, the "mystery", and the "periods of peril"
involved with this installment left quite a bit to be desired, compared
to some of the earlier books in the series. "L" is for "Lackluster."
Death Comes To Pemberley by P. D. James
Jane
Austen and a murder mystery? Yes please! James slides her "fanfiction"
seamlessly into Austen's most famous work, plunging Pemberley into the
dark embroils of murder, centering around—who else—one George Wickham.
As Darcy muses to himself, "Am I never to be rid of that man?"
The
mystery itself, as with the outcomes of most of Austen's novels, is
clear right from the beginning, although the exact conclusion is
affected by some twist that only happens just before the denouement. But
as far as language (my fetish) is concerned, James does ample justice
to her source, even getting derailed in a treatise on the politics and
practices of the day, which I skim-read in the middle.
Couple
that with watching the BBC series on Netflix at the same time (why,
yes, I did in fact finish the adaptation before I finished the book;
what of it?) I must say I rather enjoyed myself during this one, and
would recommend it to any Austen fan!
Emerald Green (Precious Stone Trilogy #3) by Kerstin Gier
Augh!!
After seeing this book on the library shelf for SO LONG I finally start
the series and I FINALLY reach this, the last book in the trilogy.
I
have only this to say: IT WAS EVERYTHING I COULD HAVE HOPED IT TO BE!!
Gier keeps the tension and the mind-blowing ingenuity right to the last
sentence, and even with all the time-hopping, she (like Scarrow) manages
not to get her timelines knotted. So much so that, with what I know
now, I very much want to go back and read the whole series over again!
It was a lovely time with fantastic characters and wonderful intrigue,
and I loved the entire series!!!
*UPDATE: SAKES ALIVE I JUST FOUND OUT THAT THE FIRST TWO BOOKS WERE MADE INTO MOVIES.... IN GERMAN, BUT WHATEVER! I AM SURE THERE'S AN ENGLISH DUB VERSION OUT THERE!!
The Cardinal at the Kremlin (Jack Ryan #4) by Tom Clancy
All
right, so this was my first time choosing a Jack Ryan book that I
didn't know the title, and apparently I didn't choose very well. Now I
know... But it was fun seeing Ramius from Red October again! I remember
thinking that I didn't expect it to be such a very long book... And
really, I skimmed a lot of it in the middle there... Even now, a few of
the plot points I am thinking, "Why is that even part of the story??" I
did find some parts fascinating, though. The more I read Jack Ryan's
character, the more I envision him as portrayed by Harrison Ford... Not
Ben Affleck, Chris Pine, or Alec Baldwin!
On the whole, it
did not turn out to be as "bone dry" as a friend warned me it would be;
however, that might be because I was skim-reading to finish the darn
thing. The parts I read, though, were entertaining, and the characters
were very intriguing.
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