Sorrow’s Knot by Erin Bow

In The Fault in Our Stars, the protagonist describes falling in love as “the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once”. That’s how I fell in love with this book.

In some ways, I was looking forward to Sorrow’s Knot for the pure magic of Erin Bow’s prose. She has an eerie ability to paint such vivid, startling pictures with just a certain choice of words that I sometimes wonder if she isn’t a wizard. Like it's forerunner, Plain Kate, this book cast a spell over me. Sorrow's Knot is a stunning yet harrowing story about a girl named Otter, a binder of knots that keep back the dead. Her world is a rare one and Erin Bow weaves it well. With rangers and binders and storytellers, with names like Willow and Mad Spider, Otter’s world of the pinch evokes images of an indigenous community untouched by colonialism and it’s like nothing I’ve ever seen in YA. The friendship between Otter (the protagonist) and Kestrel and Cricket is refreshingly real and all three are so very brave in very different ways. I adored Kestrel’s quietness. My heart thrilled with Cricket’s storytelling. And I ached at Otter’s struggle to find her place in the world.

The most compelling thing about this book, though, is the role of binding and unbinding. In Otter’s community the dead are banished by knots and strings and the binders of these knots are magical, powerful people. But, as Otter's mother tells her, "something is wrong with the knots." And thus, in a story that is largely about loss, the theme of binding things too tightly and the problems that arise with not letting things go becomes its beating heart.

Sorrow’s Knot is a book that looks darkness straight in the face with depth and courage and grace. It sits in the hard, sad places as much as it sits in the light, and that is my favourite kind of story.

-Kristen

The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars...

John Green, with misplaced manuscript

Sixteen-year-old Hazel Grace has stage four cancer that is spreading to her lungs. Thanks to a hopeful new trial drug, the growth of her cancer has been halted for a time. At a cancer support group meeting to help her deal with her depression,  Hazel meets Augustus Waters, a handsome, charming young man whose own cancer prognosis looks better than Hazel’s. Hazel is drawn to Augustus' sense of humour, unique worldview and thorough grasp of irony and metaphor. Augustus has a weird habit of dangling an unlit cigarette between his lips, but later explains: “It's a metaphor, see. You put the killing thing right between your teeth, but you don't give it the power to do its killing.” Hazel’s relationship with Augustus and their shared love of a book called An Imperial Affliction by a reclusive Dutch writer named Peter van Houten take them along an unusual path of self-discovery.

Beautifully written and filled with humour, The Fault in Our Stars is also one of the most highly anticipated Young Adult titles this year. And it’s no wonder. It’s author, John Green, has almost two million followers on Twitter (http://twitter.com/realjohngreen) and a whole community of nerdy fans at vlogbrothers (http://www.youtube.com/vlogbrothers) , a collection of video journals that are a back and forth correspondence with his brother Hank. The videologs are caffeine-fuelled musings on just about everything worth talking about. It’s not an exaggeration to say that Green’s fans are of the die-hard variety, regularly posting encouraging comments on his website like “I can’t wait to receive my signed, pre-ordered copy of your new book so I can lick your signature!” OK, maybe no one actually said that, but you get the idea.

The new book does NOT disappoint. The plot and topic of this new book was a closely-guarded secret with Green and his publishers for a while, so I had no idea what this one was about. John Green could sell his shopping lists on ebay and make a fortune so it almost seemed like what he chose to write about was irrelevant. But here’s the kicker: The Fault in Our Stars is about one of the single most difficult topics around: childhood cancer. In a lesser writer’s hands, this would be the kind of book I would diligently avoid; however, this is why it’s not a problem:

1)      John Green’s previous (and award-winning) book Looking for Alaska deals with death in a sensitive, intelligent, and even, at times, humorous way.

2)      Green writes teenage dialogue good enough to make Joss Whedon (Buffy) and Amy Sherman-Palladino (Gilmore Girls) sit up and take notice.

3)     The Fault in Our Stars is filled with lots of literary references and poetry. I love that Green never assumes that his audience is stupid.

The Fault in Our Stars will be a feast for existing John Green fans, and--for new readers--a great introduction to a young adult writer at the top of his game.

-Erica

Review *White Cat: The Curse Workers #1* by Holly Black

White Cat is the first in a new series called The Curse Workers, and my first time reading Holly Black. Who very much surprised me, I have to say. I think that Holly and Francesca Lia Block could be buddies; I just see a definite similar sensibility in their writing styles.

White Cat opens with Cassel Sharpe having sleepwalked out of his dormroom and onto the roof. It's actually a pretty great scene. Cassel's sharp wit and vulnerability come across in the writing immediately, and I love that he calls out for help even though he knows it makes him less manly:

"Help," I say softly, and feel crazy nervous laughter bubble up my throat. I bite the inside of my cheek to tamp it down.

I can't ask for help. I can't call anyone. If I do, then my carefully maintained pretense that I'm just a regular guy is going to fade forever. Sleepwalking is kid's stuff, weird and embarassing.

Except, once he's helped down from the roof, he's kicked out of school. It's no secret that his whole family are Curse Workers, his grandfather having been a death worker for the powerful Zacharov family. Cassel has never shown signs that he's inherited his family's worker gene, but the school thinks that maybe he's been cursed himself, on account of the shady dealings his family is associated with. Because although it is not illegal to have the ability to work, actually using your abilities to victimize others in any way is definitely illegal. Cassel's mother is in jail for this reason.

One of the coolest things about the world in White Cat is the notion and complexity of curse working. Bits of its history and rules are offered throughout the book, but there's no full-on explanation for its existence, or how some people have access to these abilities. People go around wearing gloves to protect themselves from skin contact, or if they're a worker, to show that they mean no threat to others. Traditionally a curse is transferred via the hands, and can only be countered by charms--bits of stone that have been created by workers to offer protection to the wearer:

Charms to throw off curse work, charms like the ones Audrey has hanging around her neck, are as old as curses themselves. Workers make them by cursing stone--the only material that absorbs a whole curse, including the blowback. Then that stone is primed and will swallow up a curse of the same type. So if a luck worker curses a piece of jade and wears it against her skin, and then someone tries to curse her with bad luck, the jade breaks and she's not affected. You have to get another charm each time you're worked, and you have to have one for each type of magic, but you're safe.

There's so much background info about curses and charms and how everything functions, the type of society that would grow around a world with this magic in it. Holly works * har har * this into the story flawlessly and even attempts to explain the ability to work in a scientific frame.

Getting back to Cassel's entry into the story, he tells the reader, in a Noirish way that permeates the tone of the story:

Don't be too sympathetic. Here's the essential truth about me: I killed a girl when I was fourteen. Her name was Lila, she was my best friend, and I loved her. I killed her anyway. There's a lot of the murder that seems like a blur, but my brothers found me standing over her body with blood on my hands and a weird smile tugging at my mouth. What I remember most is the feeling I had looking down at Lila--the giddy glee of having gotten away with something.

Lila was a dream worker and Cassel just expects that his nightmares and sleepwalking are just a part of his guilt. Until he starts digging through his family's secrets and finds out there's way more going on to Lila's death than he remembers.

One thing that surprised me about the story was that there was no main love interest theme. It's kind of about Cassel's resourcefulness and wit, regardless of not being a worker with special abilities. He's a bookie at his school and a smartass, and his comebacks are hilarious. But he's not exactly cocky. I wasn't annoyed by his personality. I was interested to see how he'd scheme his way out of the tight situations his family puts him in. He's the baby of the family and has to be the strongest because of it. His family members are nuts. Except for his grandpa, who is probably my favourite character. Here's a great exchange between them:

"I need to talk to you," I say, taking out a mug and pouring milk into it first, then adding the coffee. The milk billows up from the bottom, along with flecks of dust I should have probably checked for. "I had a weird dream."

"Let me guess. You got tied up by lady ninjas. With big hooters."

"Uh, no." I take a sip of the coffee and wince. Grandad made it ridiculously strong.

My grandfather shoves a strip of bacon in his mouth with a grin. "Guess it would have been kind of weird if we'd had the same dream."

Holly is a very strong writer when it comes to characters and dialogue. One of my favourite scenes is when Cassel goes to see Crooked Annie, a sharp, wizened fortuneteller who's real business is selling powerful charms. The dialogue is perfect, the back and forth between them. The scene is so vivid and really gives a lot of unspoken information about Cassel and his growing concern that his family is conning him.

The ending was not what I expected and was left a little up-in-the-air. There are two more books slated for the series and I can't imagine where the story will go from here. White Cat is a great choice for the dudes, too.

Mandy

Reviewing *Flawless: Pretty Little Liars #2* by Sara Shepard

When I finished the first book in the series, I wasn't exactly sure if I was going to go all the way, read through all 7 books, just to find out who "A" really is. Now I'm hooked, and possibly doomed. The Pretty Little Liars books fills my need for a quick read that has a lot of intrigue but also the right amount of fluff. Well, not that the PLL books are fluffy, exactly. I find them smart at times, especially when insights are made about the popularity phenomenon in general. The way Alison had these girls basically doing anything for her is quite powerfully shown in the series, via flashbacks and such. Also even in the notes left by "A". In Flawless in particular you start to see Emily, Aria, Hanna and Spencer having to act out things that A compels them to do. Mostly out of fear of their secrets being found out.

And I think I mentioned in my review for the first book--I love that their secrets are normal. They aren't too over-the-top. Hanna has a past with Bulimia and her father continually rejects her in favour of his new family. Spencer keeps making out with her perfect older sister's boyfriends. Emily likes kissing girls. And Aria's father is having an affair that would rip her family apart. As secrets go, they are tame. Unless you're the one with the secret, and you go to school at Rosewood Day where anything even slightly out of the norm is mercilessly preyed upon. And these girls should know; they used to be Alison's henchmen, doling out bullying without question. The four girls let their fears control them, and Alison and A both feed on their fears, egging them on to act in certain ways that are ultimately destructive. Actually it's kind of painful at times, like "Noooooo!!! *slow motion waving hands*"

In Flawless, A is suspected of being a certain person who has had a run-in with the group in the past. More secrets come out, like Spencer knows more than she says she does. And her silence costs the group, and a really good secondary character. You find out more about the woman Aria's dad is having an affair with, and Hanna's volatile nature is pushed to the limit. Everyone is cracking and under the pressure they keep blowing their cool and making really stupid mistakes. The anxiety is high and it shows in their judgment.

I'm finding it a little hard to accept that A could be so omnipresent in the book. She can leave notes now within seconds of an incident happening. Physically notes, not just texts, on cars that people are sitting in, along lockers, etc. But the final note at the end reads:

If you were as smart as me, you'd probably have figured out who I am by now. OMG, not being a genius must be so annoying. And I can't help you with that one--I've got my hands full with four pretty little liars at the moment. But since you've been so patient, I'll give you one hint: Spencer may have a 4.0, but I've got As to my name, too. Kisses! --A

AH! FIVE more books. Man. I am really and truly tempted to grab Killer off the shelf at work and flip through to find out who A is. Oh no, Killer is number 6. Heartless is the last one. And it came out in January...And we have it in stock....Gah! There's been foreshadowing that any of the four girls could be A, or could also be Alison's killer. Emily's nickname is Killer, for a reason that wasn't obvious in the story. She was obsessed with Alison, and kissed her once. Emily thinks she was just in love with Alison, but then became very intimate with Maya, the new girl who moved into Ali's old house (could SHE be the killer?). There are so many red herrings in the story it isn't even funny. I truly truly hope that the end reveal will satisfy. Because I'm gonna really try and pretend that I don't see Heartless just sitting there on the shelf vulnerable to an impatient perusing.

One of my favourite parts in Flawless is when Hanna uncharacteristically finds herself at a Virginity Club meeting:

"We're so happy to have you, Hanna." Candace beamed. "You'd be a very positive role model for us."

"Thanks." Hanna felt a little thrill. Even if it was V Club, she wasn't often embraced like this. Not by her third-grade tennis coach, not by her friends, not by her teachers, certainly not by her parents. Perhaps V Club was her calling. She pictured herself as the spokeswoman of V Club. Maybe it was like being Miss America, except instead of a crown, she'd get a fabulous V Club ring. Or maybe a V Club bag. A cherry-monogrammed Louis Vuitton clutch with a hand-painted V.

I love how it goes from feeling this pathos for Hanna because she is kind of an unloved girl, or feels completely unloved, which is really very sad, to shaking your head, because seriously, a V Club bag?

Pretty Little Liars is like a messed up Gossip Girl, where Chuck Bass knows all your secrets and is calling all the shots. Fun!

Mandy

Don't read Flawless unless you've read the first book.

Review *The Secret Year* by Jennifer Hubbard

Julia was killed on Labor Day on her way home from a party. I didn't get to see her that night. I used to meet her on Friday nights, but I was never invited to the parties that she was invited to. We'd meet on the banks of the river, clutch at each other in the backseat of her car, steam up her windows and write messages and jokes to each other in the fog on the glass, and argue about whether to turn on the A/C. Sometimes we swam in the river late at night when the water was black and no one could see us. We did all that for a year, and nobody else knew.

The Secret Year opens a few hours after Julia dies in a car accident. Colt hears about it through his best friend, Syd, who heard it from Kirby, a girl who straddles the social divide between Black Mountain Road kids and people from The Flats. Colt has to act uninvolved as he wrings details from Syd: He and Julia were the only two people who knew about their affair. Now it is just him. When Michael, Julia's brother, hands Colt a journal of letters she's kept for him, it's the only connection he has to the girl he lost.

The story follows Colt for about a year after Julia's death, as he reads her letters/journal and tries to piece together the year they spent together in secret. Julia has a boyfriend, and she lives up on Black Mountain Road with the rich elite. Colt is from The Flats. He gets to the theme of their story right away, telling us:

That was the biggest difference between Julia and me: Black Mountain versus the flats. Not that we were Romeo and Juliet or anything. Nobody was trying to keep us apart. My family wouldn't have cared if I'd gone out with her. Julia's family probably would've hated me, but they wouldn't have locked her in her room. It was what her friends would've thought that bothered her, I think.

A cool image in the book is the river where Colt and Julia go on Friday nights to be together. They meet at night and the river looks black. After her death Colt goes there to be alone. I was looking around Jennifer's blog and I found an entry mentioning her fascination with "the river cure" mentioned by Anais Nin in one of her journals:

Described a[s a] folk cure for madness that involved placing a person next to a flowing river. The person was supposed to throw a stone into the river to unlock any blocked feelings, so that the feelings could flow again. I was not aware of this before I wrote my book, but it certainly reminded me of Colt. (Yes, there’s even a scene where he throws stones in the water.) Whether he succeeds in healing his “madness” and unlocking all the secrets that bound him to Julia, I leave you to discover. (Class of 2k10)

Another important character goes to the river when she wants to think or be alone, too. Although I don't remember the part where Colt throws a stone into the water. I DO remember the first time he kisses Julia. She's waded in wearing a slip and she teases him to come in with her. And he does. It surprises her. I liked in the book how the river was like a test of character; it attracts a certain type of person who can identify this river-attraction in others. It was well-done.

The Secret Year isn't exactly a romance novel, either. Which is the sense I initially got from the cover. Colt's interest in Julia after her death, I felt, was very natural. Kirby kind of throws it in his face a bit, like he's drawing it out too much by holding on to her journal. But I disagree. Their relationship wasn't perfect or really normal, but it was passionate and real at the time. Colt takes the year after her death to really process what she was to him and subsequently what he represented to her. Jennifer has this great blog post talking about how romance in a novel can bring out vulnerabilities in the characters, and I think this makes total sense for the "romance" in the book. Julia has flaws and only retrospect showed Colt that she wasn't exactly who she seemed. I wouldn't call their connection romantic, or really any other relationship Colt has with girls afterwards, as much as it's about two people finding out more about themselves through the eyes of another.

It's funny. This review is kind of short. I enjoyed reading the book but it was more like something to experience than to pick apart. It's very character-driven, which I like, and I enjoyed the central mystery of finding out who exactly Julia Vernon is and what her last night was like.

Mandy

Recently:

Review of Book One of The Vampire Diaries by L.J. Smith
Review of Book Two of The Vampire Diaries (I've been on a kick)
A funny take on judging books by their cover
A review of Possessed by Kate Cann (to show that I can write an okay review :) )

*Little Brother* Book Clubbing with A Book A Week!

Mostly because I didn't know how to start this review, I went trolling around to see if I could pinpoint exactly what type of SciFi sub-genre Little Brother falls into. It's not exactly apocalyptic or dystopian, but it does fall into the category of "Mundane SF", which "focuses on stories set on or near the Earth, with a believable use of technology and science as it exists at the time the story is written" (wikipedia article, which has more info and links).

Little Brother feels like it's set exactly five minutes from now. Marcus lives in San Francisco and expertly hacks his school's "safety" mechanisms. Like the gait recognition technology--"these idiot cameras that were supposed to be able to tell one person's walk from another"--and "free" student laptops which log, record and analyze every keystroke made. Marcus lives in an alternate Big Brother reality which feels like a few small steps from our own. I don't want to get too pulled away by looking up stuff, but gait recognition technology is already being developed with the intent to use it for a society's apparent safety. And the linked story is two years old.

That's what I really liked about Little Brother--it made me very interested to know how technology may be used against society in the name of communal safety. Cory also presses the point that citizens are the strongest promoters of this safety, justifying the governing body's surveillance as a way to not feel afraid. Or, at least to Marcus, citizens over 25 are most afraid of their safety.

On an afternoon that Marcus and his group ditch school to play this awesome-sounding game called Harajuku Fun Madness, there is a major terrorist attack and he and his three friends are arrested by Homeland Security on suspicion of being terrorists. With no grounds, of course, except for being young, not in school, and in the middle of the attack. But getting back quickly to Harajuku Fun Madness, how amazing does this game sound:

It's an ARG, an Alternate Reality Game, and the story goes that a gang of Japanese fashionteens discovered a miraculous healing gem at the temple in Harajuku, which is basically where cool Japanese teenagers invented every major subculture for the past ten years...They slip the players coded messages that we have to decode and use to track down clues that lead to more coded messages and more clues...Imagine the best afternoon you've ever spent prowling the streets of a city, checking out all the weird people, funny handbills, street maniacs, and funky shops. Now add a scavenger hunt to that, one that requires you to research crazy old films and songs and teen culture from around the world and across time and space. And it's a competition, with the winning team of four taking a grand prize of ten days in Tokyo, chilling on Harajuku bridge, geeking out in Akihabara, and taking home all the Astro Boy merchandise you can eat.

It's when Marcus is checking out a set of GPS coordinates as that day's clue when the attack happens and he and his friends are violently arrested after waving down a military jeep, thinking that the police might help their wounded friend. The few days that Marcus is in some secret jail, after taking a short boat ride, is a turning point in the tone for the story. His imprisonment and humiliation--the absolute power that his captors have over him--fuels Marcus to somehow get back at them for taking his rights. Homeland Security also still have Darryl, or so Marcus believes, and he's commited to freeing his friend.

If I found the surveillance technology neat so far, what is cooler is the description of how Marcus gets around them. Cory has an amazing way of describing technology in super user-friendly ways. He actually made me want to learn how to write code:

If you've never programmed a computer, you should. There's nothing like it in the whole world. When you program a computer, it does exactly what you tell it to do. It's like designing a machine--any machine, like a car, like a faucet, like a gas hinge for a door--using math and instructions. It's awesome in the truest sense: it can fill you with awe.

There is also this very long explanation of how you can rig an Xbox to create a truly secure online connection. The idea comes from a book called Hacking the Xbox, "a wonderful book that tells the story of how bunnie [Andrew "bunnie" Huang], then a student at MIT, reverse-engineered the Xbox's antitampering mechanisms and opened the way for all the subsequent cool hacks for the platform." Actually Cory has a full bibliography of sources for someone who wants to know more about the tech referenced in Little Brother. And even as a person who has little background knowledge, I totally want to know more about security systems, how to use them, and how to hack them. It was the funnest part about this book--I want to read everything Cory read before he wrote it.

*****

Followed by an early morning chat with Kiirstin from A Book A Week, on Little Brother:

Mandy: I liked your review, it was spot-on.

kiirstin: Thank you! I liked yours as well. You seemed to focus more on the technological aspects than I did. I didn't realize, for example, that gait recognition tech was something people were already working on.

Mandy: I was inspired to do some further reading, which is what I hope people would do after reading the book. My further reading was Google related, but I love that Cory included some fantastic resources at the end of his book for anyone interested.

kiirstin: Absolutely. And the essays by others at the end, I thought that was a neat touch.

Mandy: Gait-recognition technology sounds so silly after reading LB. It makes no sense. I love that LB made me question something that might otherwise seem like an okay technology to develop.

kiirstin: I thought he was very tech neutral, in some ways. Not necessarily saying "this is a bad technology" but "it is stupid to use technology in this way." Also, it made me decide I'd better password protect my cell phone.

Mandy: Many times throughout the book I was like "hunh?" about the techno-talk, but I'm used to that in SciFi. What is so cool about LB, and "mundane SciFi" in general, is that the techno-talk is not techno-babble; terms made up and used for plot purposes in some SciFi.

All of his explanations made perfect sense and were well researched. He also explained things very vividly.

kiirstin: Which all leads to that creepy "um, yeah, this could actually happen. yikes" feeling, because the technology behind the story was so established.

Mandy: Completely. You could see it all happening. LB did make me more paranoid in general--which was a big theme in the book. It also made me want to hack my Xbox with my zero hacker knowledge, but exuberant interest.

kiirstin: I think making you a bit paranoid's exactly what it was supposed to do. Even the times where I felt it might be a bit over the top, part of me was whispering that it wasn't really that over the top.

And then there was that thing on the border with the SciFi author who got the crap kicked out of him by border guards, like, a week after I finished the book.

Mandy: I didn't know about that. Who was the author?

kiirstin: Dr. Peter Watts. The first article I read about it was at Making Light. The comments on that post are really wonderful to read, too. Cory Doctorow was the first one to really break the news about that one. Dr. Watts is a friend of his.

Mandy: Cory is the coolest.

I love that his book was impeccably researched. He really knows his stuff. It's great to see someone who has a real message and gets it across, even in fiction.

Not to denigrate fiction, of course, as I love reading it. A heavy dose of non-fiction is great, though, and a bit of a breath of fresh surveilled air compared to many contemporary YA books.

kiirstin: There's a lot of fluff out there, which of course is wonderful to read too, but LB definitely had meat to it.

He just felt so familiar with the subject material. Although... if I can admit... that was one of the small things that kind of bugged me every once in a while.

Mandy: At times it was too much for me, as well.

kiirstin: It was just sometimes that there was such a clear agenda. While I agree wholeheartedly with the agenda, it was still quite noticeable.

Mandy: I agree. It was a little heavy-handed. I did like how he brings up the question, a few times in the book, how can you tell the difference between the good guys and the bad guys? Both know how to hack but the good guys are the ones who use it for a "good" purpose. However, who's the judge of that?

He touches on this a few times. I would have liked him to bring this to the fore a little more in the book.

kiirstin: Oh yes! Definitely. I liked what he did with that but I did want a bit more. The thing with Marcus' father was interesting -- I think any parent reading that would understand Marcus' father's perspective perfectly.

He was like the walking question "How much freedom and privacy would you give up to protect your family." And I *know* for many people it would be "all of it" except that without a bigger picture it's hard to recognize that by giving up those things, you're also harming your family.

Mandy: And the question of security was huge in the book. But when does the need for a sense of security become a means to possibly "evil" ends? Can we ever attain the type of security we're so set on keeping?

kiirstin: For example, how far are we willing to go just to catch wankers who decide that putting explosives in their underwear is the ideal way to inspire terror?

At the risk of overloading, there's another great Making Light thread talking about that issue. The point that is made somewhere in there is that there will *always* be outliers that we will never be able to predict.

Mandy: The lengths that we'd HAVE to go, according to LB, would only be "good" for the whole, not the individual and then you get on the slippery slope of means to the end for the greater good, which sometimes bulldozes the individual. And Homeland Security in the book demands that predictability be the norm. Which is crazy to suggest. And desperate to maintain.

kiirstin: Yes, exactly! Actually, something that stuck with me about that even though I didn't write it down was an offhand comment made about a kid who was HIV positive and his parents didn't know. And because of DHS' movement-watching scheme, they flagged his (her?) movements and blew his cover. Which would quite possibly have ruined his life.

Actually, this is something we've started having to deal with in libraries. In the States, their have been a couple of cases where the DHS has wanted libraries to release patron records to see what someone who is suspicious has been checking out of the library.

Mandy: I've heard of the library records cases. Crazy.

I also love the theme of Don't Trust Anyone Over 25. Because in the book anyone over 25 doesn't trust them. It's a theme that's interesting; the latter generation doesn't trust the newer generation because they are the next world-makers. What if they aren't right for the job?

"What if we haven't taught them the right way of being in the world and now it will come back to haunt us?" = blanket mistrust.

kiirstin: That whole blanket mistrust is SO PREVALENT though. Even some parents don't trust the kids they've raised to make good decisions. And true, teenagers sometimes make stupid decisions. But adults also often make stupid decisions, and they're the ones with the power.

I really liked that push-back.

Thanks, K!

Pop over to Kiirstin's blog for HER side of the story!

Mandy

Review of *Possessed* by Kate Cann

I want to mention the cover. I like it, it drew me in, but now that I've read the book my response is "hunh?"

My initial assumption of Possessed by Kate Cann = it looks like it might be a scary book. From the title I would guess that there is a ghost involved, maybe also an exorcism or scary ghost possession. I'm getting a strong "Paranormal Activity" (the film) vibe.

And it's really not this kind of book. Possessed didn't "scare" me. Not at all. But that's okay because it was a good book as it is. However, I would definitely classify it as a mystery. It was ghost-story lite. I could have used some more chills.

BUT, it also surprised me with nuances that I really enjoyed while reading. Themes and a general tone that I was not expecting. Rayne lives in a cramped apartment in London with her needy mother and younger brother Jelly. Her mother sleeps all day, she's her brother's primary caretaker and her boyfriend, Damian is coiled energy--kind of dangerous but also psychically draining. Rayne feels a low-level anxiety all the time, especially peevish with the constant noise of the city and the demands of the people in her life:
But what did she want? Whenever she thought about that, all she could come up with was: space. Silence.

So she applies for a number of jobs online, intending to apply to the one farthest away. Just to get away for awhile, she tells herself. It's how she discovers Morton's Keep, a grand old mansion miles away in the quaint town, Marcle Lees:

Marcle Lees--it sounded like a backwater village. The sort with one church, one school, one village hall. It sounded...empty. The kind of place to let your head out of its clamp, where you could breathe deeply with no one and nothing to make you choke up...

Morton's Keep is a great setting for the book. I do love a good haunted house. Rayne decides to stay in the "Sty" just outside the mansion, which gives her the willies and freaks her out so badly that she thinks of leaving. Actually I loved that Rayne was easily spooked; every noise at night was a murderer or a ghost and if dawn hadn't come, she would have run away from there in the night. It's nice to see a bit of scaredy-cat in a main character.

Rayne has this connection with nature, with being away from the city, that comes up in her first week in the country and which really adds something to the story. In my opinion it is the main story, apart from the dark presence at Morton's Keep and the weird history of the townspeople.

The scenes where Rayne realizes the power of nature in the book were the strongest, for me. One in particular is when she and St. John, who has suspect motives for wanting to get closer to Morton's Keep, are in the woods and a stag suddenly bursts through the foliage. His antlers are covered in moss and pieces of tree and St. John tells her stags strengthen their neck muscles by thrashing around in preparation for mating season. Usually cocky and irreverent, St. John starts backing away from the animal, while Rayne finds it alluring:

"Yeah, well, we should probably get out of here," said St. John. His voice had lifted in pitch; it was starting to sound nervous. "If he doesn't go after that other stag, he might come after us."

"No, he won't," said Rayne. "Oh, he's beautiful." She was feeling incredibly stirred. She thought the stag was noble, powerful, free. Its great spreading antlers could kill, or protect.

After, Rayne makes a move on St. John, stirred by the connection she has with the stag, and he rejects her, taking her home early. Her awareness of the primal energy in the woods is like a balm for her overanxious, shut-down personality. There were also some strong passages which surprised me:

She walked on, and the silence was so heady it was like wine, making her heavy, languid. There was no one to watch her, no one to judge her. She felt like her shape had gone, like her skin wasn't holding her in anymore, she was just flowing through into the woods. She sat down on a fallen tree trunk. The wood was all around her, silent but for tiny rustling noises, glowing in patches where the sun got through. She was flowing into it, she was part of it, all her edges were blurred.

Rayne also has a connection with Ethan, a member of the local Fire Festival group. Through the book this group has an ambiguous reputation. And they remain wary of Morton's Keep and its history. St. John and Ethan are enemies, Raybe doesn't know why, and she's torn between them, although mostly infatuated with St. John and his group of followers, who seem so cool.
I was also suprised by the romance in the story. I thought it would be about a girl leaving her possessive boyfriend at home to get some air and she finds herself in a similar situation in Maracle Lees. Which makes sense for her character, especially in the scene where she hides in a tree trunk which is my favourite scene in the whole book, very powerful. I thought it was cool that Possessed has to do with ancient rituals which have lost their significance, but haven't lost their power. There is a strong folklore magic in the book which was well written.

I also like Kate's reason for writing Possessed, from her website:

To me, the most frightening arena is inside the mind. I wanted to explore that, and the fear of the not-known, in this book. I wanted to look at what would happen when a town-girl is transplanted to a remote place where nights are pitch black and nature dominates. Rayne is deeply drawn to the woods, but she hears strange stories about them, and the mysterious fire people. She must fight to find out the truth, and be brave in facing up to who she really is ....

The sequel to Possessed is called Fire & Rayne, at least in the UK. Possessing Rayne is the UK title to Possessed, so the sequel might have a different North American title.

Possessed is coming out at the beginning of February.

Mandy

Review *Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood* by Eileen Cook

I read Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood at a frantic pace. I loved it and I see that Eileen Cook has other books. I feel a backlist marathon coming on.

First, I was absolutely drawn in by the cover. It's the single most coolest Teen cover I have seen in awhile. It stuck in my mind when I was perusing YA 2010 lists and as soon as I got my hands on a copy it rushed to the top of my gotta read 'em list. I found out on Eileen's website that the doll was custom made because legally you can't used knifed Barbies to market your wares. Who knew? Here's a cool response from Eileen on how the cover came together:

When they asked me what I had in mind for Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood I thought of a scene in the book where the main character tosses a Barbie doll dressed in a cheerleader outfit into a wood chipper. The brilliant designer, Cara, pointed out that Mattel doesn’t take kindly to people chucking their trademarked doll into a wood chipper on the cover of books. Now, personally I think Mattel owes me as I’ve bought more than my fair share of Barbies over the years. I was never a baby doll kind of person, however I had a herd of Barbies. I created elaborate lives for them and even did sort of a Project Runway kind of thing where I made clothes out of scraps of fabric. Still it was a no-go on any Barbie destruction.

Cara found a place to order a custom made doll. We could do whatever we wanted. GENIUS! The doll arrived with lace panties on. Sort of makes you wonder who the typical buyer is for this product. They wasted no time in setting up a photo shoot for the doll. Cara selected cover colors and font for the title. The finished product can be seen to the left. I love it! It captures what I wanted, the revenge aspects, that the story is funny, the artificial “fake” aspect of some friendships.

Now I just hope the average person in the bookstore likes it as much as I do! (Eileen's website)

*Waves hand frantically and shamelessly in class like Brenda* I Do!

And I was not disappointed with the story. Helen Worthington and Lauren Wood are *Best Friends*. They are just about to enter highschool, a time when, Lauren believes, you can have a do-over, a clean slate. Helen is a bit of a puppy dog and lets Lauren run the show. In the book Helen is described as the diplomat and Lauren is the drama queen. Helen always thought that Lauren was just more sensitive than most people and needed to be handled with kid gloves, but she realizes later, after "the incident", that Lauren manipulates every situation to get what she wants.

Before they start highschool neither girl is particualrly popular, and Lauren seems the most worried about this. So it comes as no surprise to the reader when she sets Helen up for a very public humiliation, something that she can't live down, which also pushes Lauren to the top of the food chain. Thankfully Helen's family move away and she never has to see Lauren again. Except for Helen's obsessive Facebook stalking of her ex-best friend that lasts 3 years and her vow for revenge. When Helen decides to move back and finish off the last year of highschool in her old town, she is unrecognisable. All of her attention is focused on cracking the popularity code and getting revenge on Lauren Wood.

It took me until Helen changed her name to Claire Dantes, but I think I actually yelled out, "Ohmigod it's The Count of Monte Cristo!!" which is one of my favourite books. Edmond Dantes is the consummate avenger, imprisoned unfairly for years because of his best friend. So I was very impressed with this reference. And Getting Revenge... was a bit Pygmalion, too. When "Claire" gets to school she's stuck with Brenda, official school buddy for new kids. She's the opposite of a Lauren Wood and Claire feels like she could balance out her revenge karmically by taking Brenda under her wing. As long as the popular girls don't notice, which would blow Claire's undercover act. So Brenda is made over and even plays a role in Lauren's downfall:

"Look, popularity is a science. It's not as shallow as it looks."
"Really?" Brenda crossed her arms.
"Popularity is a mathematical formula based on desirability criteria. High schools are a classic anthropological case study, and getting people to respond in the way you want is psychology. All science. It's just not the type of science you're used to."

Claire/Helen is basically a good person. She just wonders whether people who are horrible ever get theirs. What if karma accidentally overlooks giving out dues to the deserving. Claire wants to make sure that Lauren pays for what she's done. And as she gets closer to Lauren's inner circle she sees that she's not the only one who feels that L could be knocked down a peg or two.
I really liked how not outrageous Claire's schemes are. Orchestrating L's break-up with her boyfriend seems like cake, until she realizes that maybe L isn't that broken up about it. As Claire moves her pieces into place I actually cheered for her. Maybe I am not as evolved as Brenda is, but Claire is seeing to it that Lauren is put in exactly the same situation she put Helen into. And I got behind her motivations. Getting revenge on Lauren Wood takes over Claire's life and she realizes that even the best laid plans never turn out the way you thought they would.

The writing is tight and I loved all the characters. Except for Christopher who I thought was a little righteous. But Lauren's cronies are really well written and hilarious:

Bailey saw me first and waved like she was a plush Disney creature at the doorway to the Magic Kingdom and I was a guest from the Make-A-Wish Foundation. If they could bottle what Bailey had it would be better than Prozac. You usually didn't find people this happy unless there was serious medication support.

I found Claire a very strong character. Even if her plans are pretty crazy. She's so focused on Lauren but she doesn't see how that energy has actually been channeled into cracking the popularity code. She becomes very insightful into the nature of pack mentality, although she's using it for less than good ends. Just like Edmond Dantes, Claire doesn't know who she would be without her revenge gig and just can't pull back. She becomes a courageous, sexy, popular girl which would probably be the revenge she needs in itself, but Claire just can't help herself. She needs to see Lauren crushed:

I'd checked off established popularity on my to-do list. Now it was time to move to stage two: active destruction.

Eileen is also a fellow Canadian. View her blog here.

Mandy

And since I liked it so much I'd love to give away a copy for you to enjoy! I have a finished hardcover copy of Getting Revenge on Lauren Wood here to give away! Simply fill out the form below and tell someone about this giveaway via your blog, facebook, twitter, word of mouth!

Good Luck!

Reviewing *The Dark Divine* by Bree Despain

I am going to have a hard time reviewing this book because I absolutely don't want to give out any spoilers. Here, briefly, is how I started reading The Dark Divine:

"ohmigod, look at her toenail polish! I LOVE this cover!"

Obviously I was interested in the content as well. The back cover only gives out a bit of what you're cracking open. Grace Divine, daughter of a Pastor, has strange memories of three years ago when her brother Jude was attacked and their best friend Danile disappeared. When Daniel suddenly shows up in her Art class one day, looking completely changed, she begins to seek out answers. There is also a schism between Daniel and her brother, Jude. So Grace finds herself trapped between the two while trying to find out the truth.

The premise was mysterious enough for me. I was very eager to find out what this was all about. And I had two certain ideas in my mind as I was reading, which both, in their own way, turned out to be the case. I really liked where the story went. Again, sorry to be vague but most of my excitement while I was reading was really not knowing what I would find.

The chapters are broken up with scene changes. So wherever the action is now taking place has a heading; "After Lunch", "Dinner", "Memories", even "A Few Minutes Later". This really worked for me. It gave the action immediacy, an instant context. The author sometimes plays around with this structure and makes it funny. Another funny instance is Grace's description of her art class: "This is art class. We paint pictures while listening to classic rock." I totally had an art class like this in highschool and I loved it. Although the highschool is not the main setting for the story. I felt like we were at Grace's house, and in her yard with the Oak tree most often.

When I started reading, I didn't exactly know where the story was going to go. Grace is entering her art class and this jerk guy is in her spot AND he's messing with her picture of the Oak tree. He's cocky and angsty with Grace, teasing her for being the daughter of a Pastor. Then she realizes that he's Daniel, her best friend who disappeared when they were younger. He was closer to Jude, her brother, but Daniel stayed with their family when he was young and Grace always had a crush on him. Not knowing that he knew her, I was like "who IS this guy? Grace please punch him". When she realizes it's Dan, she wants to know what happened to him and to Jude, five years ago. Jude is tight-lipped and resentful, he storms out when Grace invites Daniel for dinner. Daniel is reluctant when it comes to information, but eventually outs everything. Grace also realizes that her father knows a lot more than she can guess.

You really have to read more than half of the book to get a sense of what's really going on here. I loved how slowly the Reveal happened.

I was a little put off by the character name Grace Divine, daughter of a Pastor? It seemed a little obvious. But in the story Grace informs us that along the way her ancestor's last name used to be Divinovich. But it was changed to reflect the family's religious connection. Other characters' names play a symbolic role as well, for those of you who want to try and figure out what will happen before the end.

The Dark Divine gets a bit sexy along the way too. Daniel plays this cocky character--well actually he was darker than that. He's more sarcastic than cocky. But he's kind of controlling as well. He tells Grace what to do all the time. Or what not to do. And he holds information from her. Then he's a jerk and takes off on her all the time. Anyway, here's a juicy bit:

Daniel leaned toward me until his warm breath lingered on my face again. "You know, some religious scholars believe that when faced with overwhelming temptation"--he reached out and brushed a tangled strand of hair off my neck--"you should commit a small sin, just to relieve the pressure a bit."

In the shadows, his eyes seemed darker than usual, and his stare didn't just make him look hungry--he was starving. His lips were almost close enough to taste.

"That's stupid. And...and...I don't need any pressure relieved." I shoved him away and stepped out of the alcove. "I'm going home."

Their push and pull was fun to read, but I really enjoyed finding out the mystery of what happened in their lives.

And here's a bit of Bree's initial inspiration for the book:

People often ask me where I got the inspiration to write The Dark Divine. Honestly, it's a hard question to answer because it didn't just come from one place, or a dream, or a single idea. It was more like a perfect storm of ideas, thoughts, and memories, over a few weeks time. It all came together while I was riding in the car on a dark January night in 2005. It was shortly after I'd read the book Speak, watched the show Buffy the Vampire Slayer for the first time, listened to the song Such Great Heights over and over again, and was asked to teach a lesson about the concept of grace at my church. I was thinking about all of these things, along with a random memory from the 9th grade, when we stopped at red light and I looked up at billboard in the dark and suddenly this conversation between a brother and a sister popped into my head. The brother was warning his sister to stay away from their former best friend. "He's dangerous. He isn't the person he used to be. You have to promise to stay away from him." And that was when it all started. . . (from Bree's blog)

Okay, it's crazy but at the time I had this quiet passing thought that the art class scenarios and the art teacher reminded me of Speak! Man, I should have written that before so you would believe me. :)

The Dark Divine is coming out in like a week! Pick it up for a holiday read. You'll finish it in a snap.

Mandy

Review of *The Maze Runner* by James Dashner

I'm trying to think about how I'll begin this review, but I can only think of saying "I loved it like whoa!". Which is kind of helpful and unhelpful at the same time. But I can say for sure that The Maze Runner has pitched itself fitfully into a top five placing as my favourite fiction of all time. This book is so good.

And I hummed and hawed during the first 50 pages or so, thinking "this book can go either way in my esteem". And then something happened and I was reading this book faster than I was processing the words. I craved the story when I wasn't reading and burned to know what the heck was going on.

Thomas wakes up in a pitch black metal box which begins moving upwards. He knows somehow that he's forgotten everything about his life except his name. Then the box opens, he realizes he's been in an elevator-type place and a bunch of faces are peering down at him from above. He's hoisted out to meet the Gladers; boys, only boys, who have been living in The Glade for two years. None know their pasts or how they got there, or even what is beyond the world they're trapped in. Do you remember the movie The Cube? It's what The Maze Runner reminded me of at first; strangers wake up to find themselves trapped in a labyrinth that shifts and moves, trapping them and testing them. Except The Maze Runner also has particularly horrible beasties running around. The boys are safe as long as they stay in The Glade and have even managed to set up a system of governing and a decent day-to-day lifestyle. But every night they send out a team of Maze Runners who try to out-pace and out-smart the maze. No one has solved the problem after two years and then one day the Gladers receive a note, and a girl, and everything changes.

There is so much mystery in this book that I was actually frightened of how it would end. Would the ending be satisfying? It's also the first of a trilogy. And I have to say that not only does The Maze Runner end in a satisfying way for its own contained story, it also makes you desperate for the sequel. As a lady familiar to reading sequels, trilogies and series, I can say that this is very hard to do. The drive to know the answers is very strong. And I have no idea when the second book is available...Ah, Fall 2010 (from James' Blog). He also mentions that he didn't just pull the sequels out of the air, but had them planned all along as an on-going larger story arc, but also as stand-alones. The second book will be called The Scorch Trials. I really appreciate and love when I feel I can trust an author; there is a LOT of mystery in The Maze Runner but I have faith that all will be revealed and it will make sense to the story.

I also love that TMR does a few genre-defying tricks. One scene in particular; Thomas is in the maze, at night, explicitly a really bad time to be trapped outside The Glade, and he's been spotted. *shivers* So scary. The tension was beautifully crafted, and I still have this very vivid sense of the action. I think SciFi can segue neatly into Horror pretty easily, but this scene was a great example of this potential--total spookstown.

I think also that the designer did a pretty good job on the cover art. If I was left to my own imaginative devices I probably would have just been picturing David Bowie's Labyrinth and it wouldn't have been so scary. Although, reading TMR, I felt like the maze might look a little less green and a little more robotic? The hanging vine/ropes are there in the story but I don't remember wall-spikes. I also had a problem trying to picture The Glade; it looked smaller in my mind than it was described in the book. I was like, "Oh, there are gardens and a forest? *push the edges of my mind's map back significantly*".

Mandy

I want to shout out an extreme thank you to Random House for making this giveaway possible!

Review of *Salt* by Maurice Gee

How wasn't I aware of Salt by Maurice Gee? It's the first installment in one of the darkest books I've read in a while. Seriously, Salt is dark and desperate. It doesn't let up and I'm afraid of what I'll be getting into by reading the other books in the trilogy. Maurice Gee is a pretty prolific writer, but I haven't heard of him before. He's a New Zealand writer and he's won a ton of awards and accolades.

Salt has a strange setting; I can't describe it. It is dystopian--ruined and dying. Company rules with an iron fist. Although, when they came from over the sea their flags showed open hands, as if in greeting and peace. The rich live lavish lives and the poor die of starvation or illness. Many are hauled away every day to work in the various mines and other manual labour jobs where not much of you is left at the end of the day. The worst place to be is the salt mines, and to be assigned to Deep Salt is a death sentence. A slow and painful death sentence.

When the book opens, Hari is hiding in a cart, watching while his father is one of the many men being taken to a labour mine. Tarl fights back, insults Company and is marked to work in Deep Salt. Hari, using his ability to speak with animals, causes a diversion with the horses in an attempt to save his father. He fails, Tarl is taken away, and Hari escapes, vowing that he will save Tarl from Deep Salt whatever the cost.

Then we're introduced to Pearl, who is given to Ottmar of Salt to marry. He's a cruel feudal Lord and Pearl and her maindservant, Tealeaf, have made plans to run away. For Pearl, the plan to run away is simply to get away from a situation she hates the idea of. But Tealeaf has her own motives and she turns out to be a different character entirely. One of the coolest things is that you don't get a physical description of Tealeaf and I just pictured her as an older, wizened woman. When she and Pearl escape Tealeaf treats her like an equal now that they're on the run together; she wants Pearl to be able to take care of herself. You get the feeling that Tealeaf never thought of herself as a servant to begin with. And the plot confirms this. What is the most mysterious part about her character, though, is her final physical description that left me really needing to know more about the world in Salt and how T's alien features came about. Maddeningly, I love when speculative fiction suggests a setting and refuses to explain. The world in Salt is just how it is, but it's left for the reader to experience as they go along. I can tell that in the next two books you'll get a few more pieces of the puzzle.

An amazing part in the book was when Hari and Pearl finally make it to Deep Salt. Most of the book has been a "road movie", where the characters get to know and trust each other and their mettle is tested by sudden action after long periods of just walking. You have no idea what is inside Deep Salt, a cavernous--well cavern--where men go in, work to the bone and never come out. There is rumour that any number of different beasties could be living there, eating the men, but you truly find out when Hari goes in search of his father. Chilling!

I also found three different covers for Salt. The top pic is the version I have. I really like the cover; the green and black is striking. I love Salt spelled out in "chalk". At the top I originally thought the green spikes were leaves. But then I realized that they are mineral deposit growths of some kind. They look like stalactites in a cave. And the green makes me think of radioactivity. This stalactite look is used for the other two covers I found, too. Which is neat; I don't think there was any creative connection between the designers of each cover.

But as for the story, know that it's a pretty dark tale and doesn't ever really let up. I took a little break halfway through and read something else because I felt it was a little suffocating. There is light in Salt, but very little of it. I felt like I had to dig to find it. But, ultimately it's worth the read because of the Great Reveal of the plot, the unique setting, and the exciting ideas explored on speculative questions like how does history play itself out? Do time periods repeat themselves? Will we ever have an answer to poverty? Some very interesting cerebral terrain is explored in Salt.

Mandy

It's sequel is Gool. Available soon in North America. The first chapter is printed at the back of Salt. I refrained from reading it because I think I'll just wait for Gool to release. Let me see if I can get a date...hmm, no date set for the North American version. Salt just came out via Orca in October, so it might be awhile for Gool. It looks cool, though, a bit of a stand-alone story. Characters from Salt are referenced but the main characters are new. Salt ended in a way that is satisfying as its own story.

Review of *Fat Cat* by Robin Brande

I had no idea that Robin Brande was going to have her second book published this month. I had read her first book, Evolution, Me and Other Freaks of Nature in one sitting at the library last year. I was browsing the shelves and picked it up at random, thought I'd just read the first chapter to get a feel, and found myself a few hours later having finished it. So I was very excited to get a copy of Fat Cat this week.

When I saw the front cover online I thought the purple form being squished by the measuring tape was a person's body, but it's actually a purple book. There are curled pages along the right hand side, if you look closely. Catherine, Cat, is a science nerd. She feels she's overweight and is addicted to sugar, caffeine, and other additives. She's an overeater and is generally lazy about her eating habits, often eating from an emotional need rather than a sense of bodily hunger. Her addiction to crappy food also fuels her cravings for more crappy food. One thing I loved about Fat Cat is that Brande never gives out the numbers; we never know how exactly "fat" Cat is, or how skinny she gets when she starts eating right. Which is great. You just get this sense of how Cat feels about herself at the beginning and how she feels as the story goes on. Her weight is measured by how good she feels inside.

So Cat is in her highschool research science class and her teacher Mr. Fizer is describing their big project of the year. The project is independent and each person has 7 months to work it out for themselves. Everything is top secret and the final presentation is very important for college applications and scholarships. Secretly, winning with her project is important to Cat because it would mean beating Matt McKinney, her nemesis. According to Cat, Matt is a total jerk. We're also told that Matt did something unforgiveable years ago that Cat has held onto, and now she's making it her personal goal to beat him.

The project is assigned randomly. Students pick a picture out of a face-down pile and have to form a hypothesis based on the image. If you're lucky you'll get a picture that has something to do with your strengths; like Matt's strength is Astronomy, and when he picks his picture, peers at it and smiles, Cat is beside herself. It just fits in with her image of him as someone who gets everything in life so easily. Cat's picture, however, gives her a lot to think about:

The picture was worse than I thought.

Naked Neanderthals.

No, I take it back. Not Neanderthals, but something even more ancient--Homo erectus, to be exact. Early hominins from 1.8 million years ago, the caption said. Great. Highly relevant to my own life, not to mention my fig wasps.

At first she is lost in self-doubt. Then she takes a good look at the woman Neanderthal:

And she was thin. Not emaciated, fashion-model thin, but that good muscular thin like you see on women athletes. She looked like she could run and hunt and fight just as well as the men--maybe even better.

And that's when I realized: I wanted to be her.

Not her in the sense that I wish I had to fight saber-toothed hyenas just to get a decent meal, but her in looks. I want--and I know this sounds incredibly shallow, but science requires the truth--I wouldn't mind for once in my life seeing what it's like to actually look...good. Or at least better than I do right now. Maybe even pretty, if that's possible.

So Cat does some research and finds out what Neanderthals would have eaten at this point in their evolution and she follows the spirit of their diet for the next 7 months. She has to get over her cravings, give up sugar, diet coke, caffeine, crappy foods. She even gives up most forms of technology, although allows herself necessities like running water and cooking with a stove. Her early hypothesis is that modern people have let themselves go soft; they are lazy about what they eat and its led to all types of modern problems like Diabetes and obesity. But this need to be like that Neanderthal woman is at the heart of Cat's new lifestyle.

At about the three-quarter mark in the story, I started to worry that the basic science part of Cat's project was lacking, that she was only doing it to look better. And seriously, like two pages later, her teacher brings this exact idea up with her. Cat's priorities take a turn and it adds this depth to her story that I really appreciated while reading.

Fat Cat is also really funny:

He took me to Goony Golf and we sat up inside the giant Mondo Head in the dark and he kissed me, which I was prepared for, but then he made an unauthorized reach for the breast. Luckily I was wearing my new special sports bra with all the complicated hardware and about fifteen layers of fabric between me and the outside world, impervious to both nuclear weapons and unauthorized groping, and when I pushed Greg away and said, "What are you doing?" he answered, "Come on, babe, I love you"...

My favourite character is Nick, Cat's classmate. He's a science brain and keeps to his own during school season but in the summer he's a "major hound dog", hooking up with science geek babes at summer camp. He and Cat have a fling in the book and it's the funniest section.
I really enjoyed Cat's transformation. It was subtle and I knew what was probably going to happen by the end, but the way Robin gets us there is the real story. I felt happy for Cat by the end and kind of pumped to eat apples slathered in peanut butter.

One more hilarious quote to finish off this review:

Research Project, Phase II: Effects on male population of changes in female appearance. Experiment #1...

The question is, can I do this right? There are so many variables when you start involving other people. It isn't like working with fig wasps. I can't just crush boys into a petri dish and extract their DNA. Or really, in this case, their whole psychological makeup.
But it's like what Einstein said: "If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?"

Mandy

Review *Pretty Dead* by Francesca Lia Block

I'm not sure how to best start this review, but my very first reaction, even after reading the first PAGE of Pretty Dead, was "wow. Really? Wow".

Francesca Lia Block's writing astonished me. I was almost unprepared to read this book. I'm going to copy out the first paragraph because after I read it my mind shifted gears, knowing I was about to read something totally different:

Teenage girls are powerful creatures. I remember; I was once one of them. They are relentless and underutilized. They want what they want, and they will do what they must to get it. Love, possessions, beauty, food, sweets, friends. Unless they are crushed so hard as to give up. But then they are just as relentless, only seeking different things. Detruction, annihilation. Unless they can find a way to birth something beautiful out of themselves. In this way teenage girls and Night's children are not that much different, are we?

Pretty Dead is a book about vampires unlike any other teen vampire novel published now. It has a classic Anne Rice sensibility; old world vampires and the weight of the universe. But it's also about true love, it's magic, and centuries-old boredom, brother to destruction. Sadly, the cover is misleading. This story has real weight to it, and the cover is too light; it has this cute candy-sweetheart look, where the story has this deep passion and intensity. The story is also surprisingly erotic, definately for an older reader. It's a powerful read.

Pretty Dead is about an old beautiful, lonely, bored Vampire named Charlotte who goes to highschool on a lark and loves a girl named Emily because she is innocent and alive. They are best friends, although Charlotte is in love with Em's boyfriend Jared. Charlotte is also being stalked by her maker, an even older vampire named William, who seduced her after the death of her twin brother. When Emily dies and Jared can't cope, Jared and Charlotte find a mutual solace. And Char realizes that it will be the biggest transforming power in her whole unlife.

As for sexy and dangerous vampires, William is one of the best written fiends I've come across. The scenes in the book with him were my favourite, tantalizing and scary. I felt like Charlotte, overwhelmed and intrigued by this person who dressed like the Devil the first time they met at a Hallowe'en party. He is completely how he seems; destruction follows him through the many years Char is with him, until she realizes the true horror of living such a long life.

F. Block is an infinitley quotable book. You can open it at random and find a passage so sensual and alive that it will catch you off-guard. F. Block doesn't write so much as she crafts a living animal with her words. Very very powerful stuff. Here are a few lines in particular:

"That doesn't sound so bad in my opinion," she laughed. "I'd like to be immortal. In this house. With you. We could dance and dance and never stop."

I smelled the rich red wine of her blood again then. Like tiny grapes. Plums. Berries. A bit of cocoa. A hint of cinnamon. A tang of iron.

***

We were in Rome when we finally succumbed. I say "we" because it seems to me that it was something we did together in Rome in the dark. Something both of us wanted at that time. I had figured out what William was and I wanted to join him. How can you not succumb to such a desire in Rome, in the dark with a fountain spurting outside your window, the shadows long from the white moon?

I was like that moon to William's demon sun.

Pretty Dead was a quick read, more of a novella, but it packs a lot in. F. Block has a gritty urban magic-realism sensibilty which I think runs through most of her books, the Weetzie Bat books in particular. I don't know why it took me so long to actually read her stuff. The cover of Pretty Dead drew me in, although it sets a different tone than the actual story. I would have gone with cover art more like this Tara McPherson print, which is edgy-cute, dark and older than it seems (pictured above).

And because I loved this book so much, I want to give it away. So I'm hosting a Pretty Dead book giveaway. Just leave your name and e-mail address and consider yourself in this draw. My copy is not a galley, it is the real hardcover deal. How much do you want this book?

Giveaway ends October 18th.

Mandy

Review of *Graceling* by Kristin Cashore

It took me forever to get around to reading this book. And there was no excuse for it!

Graceling starts out with this action sequence where graced Katsa has infiltrated another Kingdom's dungeon to un-kidnap an aging royal. The pace is clipped and energizing, you get an idea of how powerful Katsa is. She is graced with the ability to kill or maim instantly. And she's been used for years as her King Uncle's dog, let out when he needed to send a violent message or punish someone. Her Uncle, King Randa, rules by invoking fear and has kept Katsa loyal by playing against her self-esteem; she thinks of herself as nothing but a killer. Her grace is worth nothing more than inflicting pain and fear.

There's a long passage near the beginning of the book about how the world in Graceling is set up. The land is broken into 7 ruling Kingdoms, each with a King. Some Kings are passive and peaceful, some war-mongering. I was a little confused by the description at the start; I couldn't get my mind around the information bomb, knowing short descriptions of each King and kingdom. As it turns out through the story, only a few characters seem the most important. But I was initially worried that I was going to miss something if I couldn't retain all this information. And I worried because there was no Cast list at the start to help me with the characters.

There's also a cool map at the opening of Graceling. I haven't been able to find it online, or I would have posted a link. I love maps at the beginning of books.

About 100 pages into the book I seriously wondered what the overall story was going to be. It srated with a bang and then there was a lot of dialogue and intrigue. Farther in, I settled into Graceling as a romance, foremost. I knew that romance would be a theme within the book but had no idea that it is pretty much what makes up Graceling. The other strong element is Katsa and her search to know her Grace better, to know herself and what type of life she wants to lead, and if there is room for a significant other.

Graceling also reminded me of The Lord of the Rings because it is a travel-log, finding-growth-on-the-road story. Most of the story is Katsa and Po on the move. The land is barren sometimes, hard to cross, and always a matter of survival. There was a lot of walking in LOTR, and then sudden crash-bang action. Same here.

The relationship between Katsa and Po is pretty awesome. It has a slow development, but never seems falsely written. Ever. You'll get angry at Katsa for being a bonehead about her feelings, but it's because she's had a violent and loveless past. She just doesn't know how to take Po and his attentions. Po is a total babe, too; sweet and soulful with a bit of mischief. One of the coolest things about Graceling is that contraceptives are discussed, and there is a powerful women-taking-control-of-their-own-choices theme. Katsa fights and lives like a man and Po steps back in awe. It was a cool dynamic to their relationship.

It;s funny, I was just skimming through the book looking for quotable passages, but much of the punchy dialogue and tension between the two is built up over many pages. The relationship between them is a total build-up, so you have to know what's come before to get their conversations.

One or two qualms? I could have used a bit more plot. Just a bit. Like, more intrigue with the Council that Katsa formed to do good deeds in the land. That's a very cool idea but it seems like it was abandoned. Also, the end taking-care-of-the-bad-guy was a little too perfunctory for his character. I needed more scenes about him, his motives. I wasn't sufficiently chilled by this character who was supposed to be a pretty terrible person.

Katsa's understanding of her Grace is done really well. Actually, the whole Grace notion is written and imagined very well. Graces are the element of magical realism within a pretty familiar world, it's the only thing that makes this story "fantasy". Katsa's understanding, as she relates to Po's Grace, expands and she develops this wider sense of herself and the true use of her Grace in the world.

Fire by Kristin Cashore is a companion novel, out in October. It has an entirely new cast of characters but I believe Katsa plays a cameo part.

Mandy

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Teaser Tuesday for *Graceling*