Suck it Twilight!

2.12 – Daughter of Smoke & Bone

Two friends, independent of one another, likened this to The Girl with The Dragon Tattoo and I would amend that to likening the heroine to Lisbeth Salander, as the overall plots couldn’t be more different.  This is not a murder mystery but a war mystery; a war between the Chimera and the Seraphim that will only end when one race is completely destroyed.  Karou is much like Lisbeth in the fact that she feels lonely and lost, yet has a wonderful network of support around her. She also can certainly take care of herself; and, the fact is, you root for her.

I loved the set up of the story and the setting of Prague, seeing the art and culture.  I loved that the author didn’t define everything as it was introduced, like Chimera and Seraphim, she showed us what they were instead of telling and so it all felt more real.  I love that the secondary characters were developed just as much as the mains.  I loved Brimstone (he is by far the most complex and honorable character I have found in YA since Macon Ravenwood burst through the doors of that cafeteria.) I loved that about half way through the book we got to go back and get the back-story that readers so often crave, we got to see and understand how things got to this point.  I loved the changes in time and point of view and found them pretty seamless to read.  I loved that even though the last words were literally, “To be continued…” I didn’t want to throw the book at the wall.  I felt excited to see what comes next yet also satisfied that anything that comes will be a continuation instead of a completion.  This may be a start of a new trilogy but it felt like a complete story and that is not easy to achieve

My one issue is that I have a huge concern that girls are going to start to really believe that you just walk down the street, look at someone, and suddenly realize your reason for being.  That love is an instant thing will make sense, and you will suddenly do anything for someone and they will do anything for you without any work or sacrifice. Sound familiar?

At least Karou stood up for herself and didn’t take the easy way out, and she loved her family as much as she did the boy.  But still… Really do we need to keep doing this?  I do think that the plot faltered here and became a bit tedious but then a huge time shift came and I was back on board. The soul mate thing is bothersome, but the fact is I would actually tell readers to check out this book while that other one… I still can’t do it.

My Best of 2011

So my grand total for books read in 2011 is 61. It would have probably been 62 if I hadn’t started reading 11/22/63. I am about half way through, and so its over 1000 pages will straddle from this year into the next, which honestly feels quite appropriate.

 

Anyway, my award for 2011’s best goes to Moondogs.  It is an odd little book, and certainly isn’t for everyone, yet it somehow found its way to me, and I loved it.  In a big world with many books there is nothing that feels more special and worthy of celebration than the right book finding the right gal.  I hope for many more happy accidents in 2012!

Mission Complete

61. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

So this was my big rereading test:  Would I like it?  Would I ruin my wonderful memories?  Would I constantly badger myself about wasting valuable reading time?

Turns out that my timing for this couldn’t have been better.  I was sick.  Sicker than I have ever been in my life.  Like turn off the lights and sit in a cold, dark room for a week sick.  I couldn’t read more then a few pages at a time and if I had been reading something that was unknown to me I would probably have to start it over. Since I knew the plot of this already, I came out of my haze and was able to carry on without being lost.  So no need to worry about reading time lost, it would have been either way.  Whew… because this was my big worry, and I am not very good at giving myself a break.

So, did I like it?  In a way, yes, because it was kind of a comfort.  Did it stand up to my memories of the first time?  No, it did lose some of the magic.  But the part that was very fun and new was that I had never read any of these book when I knew what was coming next and so to see all of the foreshadowing and Easter egg laying that Rowling did was really great.  So, for that I am thankful. 

But I am still not a re-reader.

Not Your Momma's Werewolf

60. The Last Werewolf

He is more like 007.  That spy who somehow walks out of the shattered ruins while everyone else dies.  He is a brute, and a cad.  A man who was once more man than animal but is now much more animal than anything, and he is the last of his kind.  And he doesn’t really give a crap.  He has dilly-dallied around for over 200 years and is over it.  He feels like he lost the desire for anything so long ago that it isn’t even worth it to run away from all the people who are after him, until he sees her...

See, 007 I tell you.

This was a quick thriller but the very frank and explicit sex, remember they are animals, will run quite a few people off.  But for a story that seems to be over before it even starts it was fun to see where it went.

Reread or Not to Reread

There is something about this time of year that makes me want to reread books, I think it is the sense of comfort that I am craving.  It comes up as I browse for gifts, I see all the books I have once loved and wonder if other would feel the same. 

The other night, a friend mention that she had just read Rebecca and I was flooded with memories. Manderlay, the first time she searches through Rebecca’s desk, the ill-fated costume ball, and The Danvers.  Ohhh, The Danvers – the name alone makes me shiver.  I read Rebecca while preparing to student teach and I was absolutely taken away by it.  I loved it so much that it became my go to recommendation.  I immediately found it on my shelf and wanted to stop doing anything else to read it again, but I didn’t.

Then this weekend I was bedridden with the cold from hell and watched a Harry Potter marathon on TV.  I love the movies and I loved the books.  The third book, Prisoner of Azkaban was my favorite book and is the only one I have ever considered rereading. Watching the movie brought that all back.  That book was my favorite because it was so magical and so much of that was left out of the movie simply because they couldn’t recreate it.  I went to my bookshelf and picked it up, none of the other movies had this effect on me.

But here is the rub: I never reread books.  Other than while I was teaching, I have done it maybe a half dozen times.  I know people who reread the same books on a yearly basis and I absolutely can’t understand it.  How do you have time to reread something when there is so much more to be read?  This is what plagues me when I try to do it… the what if (Really, the what if’s have become the plague of my life lately.) So I am going to do it.  I am going to reread Harry Potter #3 and hope that my original experience with it isn’t ruined but instead enhanced.

And Sometimes They Were Very Sad

59. The Marriage Plot

This book was a gut punch for me to read.  It wouldn’t be for other people, but for me it was painful for reasons I won’t write about here.  It made me very sad, but I also read it differently than anyone else would and so I think all of my opinions are going to be skewed.

I identified with Madeline, maybe too much.  I also have spent much of my life escaping into stories and have so many plots and characters floating around in my mind that my realities can never live up to my expectations.  I identified with all three characters as they fell in to the chasm of the “Real World.”  We hear about it during our education, everyone around us pretends that we have done everything right to be prepared for its realities.  We go to school and study in order to Be something.  We believe that we have a handle on who we want to be for the rest of our lives, but truthfully we know nothing.  We have simply been hiding, avoiding.

The book is wonderfully written, Eugenides plays with time in a wonderful way.  His writing shows how two people can share an experience but feel and remember it in excruciatingly different ways.  He highlights again how insecure people truly are with themselves and how the people around them know very little of the truth.  He brings each of the characters to life in a very vivid, though not always happy, way.  I am sure there will be many complaints about the entitled nature of the advantaged youth of the 1980’s.

I keep seeing the story labeled as a love triangle but I didn’t see it that way; it is more about choices.  We all make choices, big and small, every day.  We also constantly wonder what the other choice would have brought us, often believing that the better choice was the other option.  I am so glad that Mitchell gave Madeline a choice, for his sake as much as for hers.

Left Cold

58. The Skating Rink

 

I found myself a little bored and less absorbed than I usually am with Bolano’s books, so I would say that this is my least favorite. Also, I have to say it was a lot less exciting than the blurb on the back made it sound; I mean, "hair raising"? Not at all!

Since he died, they are printing all of his stuff whether finished or not and I think he might be a bit horrified by that fact as it smacks quite a bit of money grubbing.  The fact that I thought about that while reading this is also an indication of my lack of interest in the story.

The story is told from three male points of view, they are only linked by off chance meetings but they all know details about the skater, the rink that was built, and the murder that occurred there. I liked all three guys even though one is a corrupt politician, he is clearly a romantic; and another has left his wife and son even though he clearly loves them dearly. Not sure I liked them as I read, but looking back I do. Also, any mention of a band of poets from Chile makes me instantly smile, as if I am in on Bolano’s joke. Each of the chapters reads like an interrogation report of what happened, as if they are making sure to highlight the best of their actions.  You have to read this in a pretty steady fashion in order to stay on top of who is who.

Again, all of Bolano’s female characters are adored as opposed to being real characters; men are willing to do anything for them but we are never quite sure why. This is a complaint that I have with all of Bolano’s works, the women are just never developed and I had hoped that since one of the main characters in this book is a woman we might finally see that side of his writing, alas…

Vivid in Black and White

57. The Night Circus

 

The circus appears and disappears as if by magic, and the whole thing is magical.  The descriptions of the circus are quite amazing.  I wanted to be there, to wander the tents, and stand in front of the clock (I LOVED the clock!).  To eat the food, all the food!  It is a place that can only exist in the pages of a book, and I hope it remains safely there.  Although I think the movie rights are already sold, ugh.

There are many characters, too many for the author to handle them all well, and they are all more than meets the eye, and that is one of the aspects I loved most about the book.  It highlights the idea that we humans love to be cynical about things instead of believing in the possibility.  The circus is wonderful and yet it is believable because people don’t question it.

But the circus is also an arena for a duel.  A duel between two magicians selected, groomed, and educated solely to compete.  And this is where the plot lost me.  I don’t know why they were selected, what the duel is really about, or even how it is played.  The two characters dueling, Marco and Celia, are the most flat characters in the book and I had zero investment in their love or their fight.  Oddly, I still don’t understand the outcome of the duel, how it happened or why.  This is a problem.

So the circus totally works, but the dueling totally does not, leaving me to say that this is a fun, quick, beach-y read; but I think in the end this amazing circus will become forgettable and that is too bad.

Hence the Title

56. Child 44

I have been known to declare, “Hence the title!” while watching TV shows and movies.  I learned it from my brother, and I do it without even thinking. Sometimes the reason is obvious and sometimes more obscure; sometimes it is inappropriate.  The Hence the Title moment in Child 44 is rather shocking and made me sit up and exclaim it out loud.  In fact, there were quite a few moments like this and that is why I will say it is truly the most intense and fast paced thriller I have read in some time.  It isn’t a perfect book, but it is certainly an entertaining one.

The set up of the story and atmosphere were really great. A former MGB agent, in post WWII Russia, finds himself on the wrong side of the agency he works for and his life falls apart rather quickly. The stress of knowing that no matter what you do someone can interpret it as a crime is terrifying, and you feel the fear as you read about it all happening to him.

He is sent on an errand to remind a family that the death of their son was an accident and not a murder, as they think, because such things do not happen in their perfect society.  He soon realizes that this was not first murder and decides that someone needs to stop them from happening. The murders are horrible and graphic, and I only learned after reading that they are based on a real case.

The second half of the book felt a bit rushed with some decidedly far-fetched antics. That, and the sappy sweet ending, took a bit of the-thrill-of-it-all out for me, but overall I enjoyed it for what it is. I had zero expectations going in and was pleasantly surprised.

Money, Money, Money

55. Name of The Wind

You know when you read a book and you think: Man, I wish I had done that!  Well, clearly Patrick Rothfuss has done it too.  He read The Lord of the Rings, The Narnia books, and other “Geeky” things (he calls himself a geek, not me – especially since being a geek is the new cool kid thing to do.)  Then he spent seven-some odd years writing this book and what ever is to come next since I wouldn’t even call this a first book in a trilogy as much a first half of a book that is being published as a trilogy, or series, because that is what we do now.  It is worse than a cliffhanger ending; it is like pages fell out.

All of it just felt like it was trying to be something instead of organically becoming something new.  I felt like he needed to stretch a bit more, show a bit more, work a bit more.  Basically write more.  But not print every word he wrote!

The thing that really got on my nerves was how often he brought up money.  The author created his own currency system (good on oh-so-creative you!) and brought up, over and over again, how the narrator got, spent, and was constantly in need of more money.  The problem with that is that it is a story, so while you can say someone is poor you can’t constantly dwell on it because it doesn’t really matter – it is all fake!  And dwelling on it takes me out of the story; because really, is he going to get kicked out of the pretend school because he doesn’t have enough pretend money to pay for it?  No, because there are 400 more pages and, since this is all told as a flash back, you already told us he went to school!  Clearly, it got to the point that I couldn’t think about anything else.

Anyway, there were parts of the story that were intriguing but I don’t think I care enough about them to continue on to the other books.

Am I Me?

54. Await Your Reply 

“There are so many people we could become, and we leave a trail of bodies through our teens and twenties that it’s hard to tell which one is us. How many versions do we abandon over the years?” – Dan Chaon. Truth.

I literally said, “Wow!” at the end of this one.  It is three seemingly separate story lines that weave together to reveal a truth at the end, and while I wouldn’t really call it a thriller, I would say that the shifting back and forth from each story propels the plot along and made it quite hard to put down.  One thing that really helped was that no specific time frame is given and so each story kind of revolves in its own world (until you realize that it really doesn’t.) All of the stories include characters that change their identity for one reason or another.  With the advent of the Internet it seems that this is a fairly easy thing to do, but it is also something that people have been doing for much longer.  Don’t we all want to leave our hometown at some point and "become" something?

These shifts in identity lead to my one complaint, and I am sure it is a common one, as a reader you felt a bit detached from things because you aren’t drawn close to many of the characters. But wasn’t that the point?  We as readers can’t know the characters when they keep changing who they are and leaving who they were behind. You can’t know fully developed characters because they haven’t developed yet. They are just names and documents. 

The truth in life is that we know what people want us to know about them.  We don’t really know ourselves. We highlight our positives and hope the negative fades away. Would we really say no if someone said we could start all over? All the characters say they are hoping to find someone who truly loves them. Is that what makes us real?  When we matter to someone else?

Sublime Choas

53. Beautiful Chaos

 

This is the third in the Beautiful series, and I have read them all in their first week of release.  I don’t even know how I found out about the first book but I have truly enjoyed the ride.  As I said, this is the third book and in many ways I thought it was the best.

The books have the typical YA appearance: A beautiful girl, who will become a witch on her birthday, falls for an average guy (in fact, they seem destined for one another) who may not be as average as he seems.

But what is so new, and really well done, is that we see it all from the young man’s POV.  We see him act stereotypically tough, but feel shame for it.  We see him feel truly fearful for those he loves, we see him sacrifice, and act heroically.  And we see him admire the girl for her loyalty and bravery.  Like I said: New.  What is also great here is that the peripheral characters, made up of close friends and family, are really well developed and are given very important places in the plot lines.  These characters have returned in all three books and continue to be hashed out and more deeply developed instead of being retired and replaced with each new book, and I love that because it makes the payoff of sticking with the series that much more sweet. The southern gothic setting with its traditions and superstitions has also become another character. The plots are written much more like mysteries with subtle hints given throughout, but also little surprises along the way. Each book does end with a cliffhanger, which is a bit tired but I guess also a bit necessary.

Safe to say I will pick up the next one as soon as I can and that is rare for me with a series, usually by this time I only stick with it because I feel like have to.

SO DONE!

Ok, over the last year or so I have been keeping more of an eye on the publishing world and I find that every three months or so there is a MUST read book.  Some are new works from past winners like The Marriage Plot or Freedom, but many are from brand new authors like: The Tiger’s Wife, Swamplaidia!, and The Night Circus.  It pains me to know that I bought all of the later three in hardback because I just couldn’t stand not having the new “it” book.  The Tiger’s Wife was enjoyable but far from great, I just finished Swamplandia and I feel sick about it, and now I am hearing a lot of push back on The Night Circus.  So I am stating right here, right now, NEVER AGAIN.  I will buy hardback copies of books that I am looking forward to, but no more of these publishing darlings.

52. Swampladia!

 

Fuck you.  Fuck you.  Fuck you.

You cannot have a whimsical cover like this and then torture me with the dreadful existence of these characters.  I know people have it rough and life is hard, but is there not one thing to be hopeful about?  Not one shred of light to keep moving towards?  Because if there is, where was it here?  I have been told not to judge a book by its cover, but come on.

I thought there would be a little fun in this set up:  A family who name themselves Bigtree and live on an island in the Florida Everglades, wrestling alligators and delighting fans at their park, Swamplandia!  Fun, right?  But we missed all that.  All that is over.  What we have now is a crumbling park, a crumbling family, and crumbling psyches.  A father and a son trying to do right but failing miserably while the sisters, and daughters, wander through the very real dangers of the island after being left on their own.  You would think that the worst pain they would feel would be the loss of their mother, but it gets worse.  In an awful and sickening way.  And then it is over.

Is it well written? Yes.  There are some silly plot holes and continuity errors, but overall it is good.  It is original? Setting wise, absolutely, but plot wise not really.  Is there potential for this writer? Yes, but I can see why she started out writing short stories.  Over all, is this a MUST read book? NO!!!  Frankly, I kind of wish I had missed it.

Stuck in the Muck

I remember reading the reviews for Swamplandia! earlier this year, and I was so excited about it I decided I HAD to buy it on its release day. Then it sat. The other day I noticed that the paperback version is now out and I still haven’t read my hardback that I just HAD to have, and that drives me crazy! So, I picked it up last Wednesday and now I am only on page 59. Almost a week and only 59 pages!  I read a 1000 page book the week before. I have read a few paragraphs every day instead of my usual few chapters.

The real issue is that I don't know what it is that is holding me back. It is an original story and it is well written. Truthfully, I think I just can't take any more mothers dying of cancer and leaving their children behind to face the world unguided. I know it happens; chances are good it will happen to me and the realization of that is heart wrenching. It stops my breath and makes my heart ache. Both my son and my husband turned a year older this weekend so maybe I am just super aware and sensitive to time passing and things changing right now, not to mention busy trying to make everyone feel celebrated, to also be reading a book about an entire family’s upheaval. 

Anyway, I feel bogged down by the swamp, but hopefully I will be able to scrape myself out of it and enjoy myself again.

Whew!

51. Savages

Well, I need to catch my breath here for a second.  I mean, literally, my eyes can’t focus…

I flew through this in just over a day. The format makes it very easy to read and it becomes literally un-put-down-able. It reads very much like a screenplay, and apparently is already in production.  There are far too many pop culture references that will be obsolete in a few years time, but it is a fast, hip (maybe a bit too pretentious) read that pulls you in, gets your heart beat racing, and is over before you know it.

The plot involves two young Southern California pot growers trying to get back their girlfriend who has been kidnapped by the Mexican Cartel.  One is a sweet, hip, do-gooder; and the other a violence-is-the-only-answer war vet.  And the girl?  Well, she shops a lot and sleeps with both guys.  So basically I would not like these people, but for some reason I really liked them, and I was rooting for them.  Even when the things they were getting away with were laughable, I pushed aside my doubts and just hung on for the ride and it was certainly a ride.

I have to admit that I liked this book, but because it is a primary example of one of those over the top kind of hip things to like, liking it makes me feel kind of dirty.

So long Pennywise!

50. It

At some point Pennywise says, “What child doesn’t love a clown?” Umm… Me, and almost every person I know. They are creepy.  Period.

 

As I said before I wanted a scary book to read to get me in the mood for Halloween, and this fit the bill.

The build up of the story is great. I thought the shifts between the action of the characters as kids to the present action as adults was handled very well and also succeeded in pushing the plot along.  Some parts were very over written but this is Stephen King we are talking about.  In fact there were so many long, drawn out chase scenes I was able to skim quite a bit and get my reading over faster.  Because the fact is, I wanted it to be over.  Not because I didn’t like it, but because I didn’t like to read it before I went to sleep. 

The problem I had was that the build up was so good that the ending just could never live up. I thought things got drawn out and then also went to a silly quasi-philosophical place, but ultimately the ending was ruined by a scene that was totally out of character, out of place, and, frankly, out of line. The character of Bev was really ruined by the scene and there was no reason for it.

Long story (literally), short:  It was a fun, scary read, that I would never recommend because it went somewhere it really didn’t need to go.

Boo!

Rainy, dark skies, leaves falling; it is time for a Halloween read, and I wanted a scary one, so I picked Stephen King’s It.  I have seen the movie and so a lot of the plot isn’t a surprise to me, but the thing about It that makes it so scary isn’t really what you read, it is what it makes you think.

 

The brilliant thing about It is that for each kid in the story It is something else. It is each child’s worst nightmare; their most base fear and so it is impossible to read without conjuring up your own It.  And what it was when you were eleven.

At eleven, I remember turning off the light in the basement and running up the stairs, not just running, but running with all my might and almost feeling something closing in behind me. It was vaguely vampiric as I recall. I still get a shiver going up those stairs; especially at night.  I wonder how my brothers felt since they slept down there?   

My It now is much more basic and much less confined to the dark, and that is what rises my heckles, and enters my dreams, about this book and makes it a pretty great Halloween read so far.

An Unexpected Surprise

49. The Fall

 

This book was a totally unexpected surprise that I devoured in two days.  It also marks a return to reading on the Kindle and I have to say that I really enjoyed the experience and think it lent itself to me progressing so quickly. 

This is the sequel to The Strain, and the third in the trilogy comes out at the end of the month.  It has been well over a year since I read the first book and I didn’t think I remembered much but I found myself right back in the swing of things without much trouble, and the authors made the transition very easy.  There wasn’t a lot of rehashing of plot points from the first book, instead a new plot was introduced that I thought was a lot of fun.

And how does one keep a girl like me hooked on a doomsday vampire book?  You introduce Nazi vampires and an ancient book that holds secrets.  Do that and you have me hook, line and sinker!  I love that the bad guys are really bad and the good guys are really good, and all seems lost but then you find yourself chuckling over one-liners.  This isn’t some great piece of literary writing, but it sure is a heck of a lot of fun and a great way to spend a rainy weekend.

Oh How I Wanted to Love You!

48. The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making

Great title, beautiful cover, and lovely illustrations.  All of this made me think I had found a perfect little gem that would become a long-time favorite. Something that I would love to recommend to young girls. But it just didn’t all come together for me.

What we have is a very sweet YA book that reads a little too old for its intended audience. The reading level is teens but the plot and action is 7-10.  I loved September and all of the crazy characters she met, but we have all been here before, and so in the end I think it is a pretty easy story to forget.

High School Sucks

47. Prep

 

This was an uncomfortable read for me.  I really recognized myself in the main character; I wanted her to change in ways I was never confident enough to, and then I just wanted it to be over.  Kind of like high school. And when it was, I felt disappointed because really nothing happens.  Kind of like high school.  Lee lets us in to her four years at boarding school and then it is over, and nothing has really changed for her or for anyone else.

The setting of the boarding school with the dorms, and the mailboxes, and the cafeteria reminded me of my college years, so I had to keep reminding myself that Lee was much younger than I was picturing her.  I can’t imagine living in that world at such a young age, but either way so much of what she went through are things that I remember going through as well, and are obviously things many more people go through than anyone is aware of.

The feeling that you know every odd detail about everyone else, but they know nothing about you.

Being painfully aware of the you inside versus what people see, or what you allow them to know. Even, and especially, your family and closest friends.

Being constantly caught up in thinking socially when you should be studying and learning, and only understanding the consequences of that too late.

The fleeting realization that there are so many people living, and wondering what they are doing. It is all so big, and you really are so small, but it always closes back in on you.

But mostly, wondering if you will ever fit in... anywhere.