Reviews

Ink Exchange (Wicked Lovely #2), Melissa Marr

Even though Ink Exchange is the second in the Wicked Lovely series, the focus has shifted to one of Aislinn’s mortal high school friends, Leslie, and the Dark Faery King, Irial. The premise of the story is that the Dark Faeries feed on human and faery emotion, and it is the job of the Dark King to make sure his fey are taken care of, supplied with enough emotion (good and bad) on which to live.

In the first book, Wicked Lovely, Leslie is little more than a fun side character who is a bit lascivious and enthralled with body art and piercings. Ink Exchange shows that Leslie has a whole other side, a dark side, that she is trying to hide from everyone. At the tattoo parlor she determines she is going to get a piece of art on her body that will symbolize the change she wants in her life. Little does she know that the art she finally chooses will bind her to the Dark King and let him feed off her emotions so that she feels none.

I love the premise of this book, and I love that Melissa Marr does not make every moment of the Wicked Lovely series about Aislinn, Keenan, and Seth. There were a few points when I thought the romance/lust aspect of the novel turned a little Stephenie Meyer-esque, bordering on the obsessive, but that was also partly the point of the story. Leslie is caught between her bond with Irial and her interest in Niall, advisor to the Summer King, who is a Gancanagh and extremely seductive and dangerous to mortals.

So I enjoyed this side trip to the Leslie-Irial-Niall love triangle, but I will also be very glad to get back to Aislinn and Keenan in the next book, Fragile Eternity. At least they are super powerful and I don’t end up feeling so helpless and trapped.

Splendor (Luxe #4), Anna Godbersen

Sob. The Luxe novels are done forever. If you haven’t started reading them, what’re you waiting for, a written invitation from Anna Godbersen? They are completely delicious. I read the first two (Luxe and Rumors) back to back within a matter of two days, had to wait foreveeeeer for the third (Envy) to come out, and finally, finally had this fourth and final installment sent to me over my winter break. It did not disappoint.

Warning! Spoilers ahead! Sorry, but I have a raging need to dish about Diana and Henry.

I know a few people have mentioned that they were disappointed with the ending, but I really feel like Diana and Henry ending up together would have been just too anticlimactic. Also, I kind of hate Henry even though I love Diana (seriously: on Anna Godbersen’s website they have a quiz to find out which Luxe girl you are and I am most definitely Diana Holland). Henry always seemed so wishy-washy, with his bold claims of love and melodramatic enlisting in the Army and whiny sense of entitlement. All talk, no action, that one. On the other hand, Diana actually DOES the things she feels; she is bold and daring and fun. So when Henry decides to stay and take up his father’s role as Richest Man in Manhattan I was all, yeah, saw that one coming. PEACE OUT, HENRY. Diana will find someone way cooler in Paris anyway.

Ahem. Moving on. The rest of the story was just as great. The Elizabeth and Snowden showdown? Awesome. Carolina finally being the rich girl she thought she wanted to be, but losing out on the love of her life? Awesome. Diana getting caught totally buck naked in the army barracks in Cuba with Henry? SO AWESOME.

I’d say the only thing I had a minor problem with was Elizabeth ending up with Teddy Cutting. I mean, sure, he’s nice and all, and he’d be a better surrogate dad than Snowden for sure, but that she really loves him? That’s a bit much.  I don’t buy it. Maybe platonic love, but making out in the carriage is like an insult to Will’s memory. Anyway, I’m glad Elizabeth finally manned up and let loose some of that rage on Snowden but she was always a little pale of a character for me to truly get into.

Overall, I loved this book as much as the others and I’m truly sad to see them come to an end. On the other hand, I was just informed that Anna Godbersen has a new series coming out this fall that will take place in the 20’s. Woot!

Wicked Lovely (Wicked Lovely #1), Melissa Marr

I’d seen this series numerous times when I’d visit the young adult section of the independent bookstore I frequent but somehow I continually passed it by despite its pretty cover. Maybe I was wary of starting a new series since I had just been burned eight too many times by the ridiculous Sookie Stackhouse series, or maybe I just couldn’t tear myself away from the vampire genre to be bothered with faeries, but I am so glad the lovely people at Harper Teen sent me Melissa Marr’s books. They have fully restored my faith in the urban fantasy genre!

Wicked Lovely is the story of a mortal girl, Aislinn, who has been chosen by the Summer King faery, Keenan, to become his Queen. The problem is, Keenan has been attempting to choose girls for the past nine centuries to become his Queen and each of them has failed. Once chosen, the mortal girls have only one choice: to attempt to take the staff from the current Winter Girl and try to claim the throne alongside Keenan, or become one of the Summer Girls, a group of vapid, beautiful faeries content to pleasure the rest of the Summer Court. Only a handful of girls choose to try the staff- if they choose the staff and they are not the Queen, they are doomed to live frozen as the Winter Girl until Keenan can convince another to take the staff.

Oh, and the other problem? Aislinn does not want to become a faery. She has just discovered that she is in love with her best friend Seth and has no desire to be Keenan’s Queen. Unfortunately, it becomes quickly apparent that she is the Summer Queen and there’s really not much she can do about it. Or is there?

The thing I love most about Marr’s books is the setting. Wicked Lovely takes place in a gritty urban area and the mortal characters have very real mortal problems like dealing with high school drama, drugs, and relationships. Intertwined with this realistic setting and complex characters are the faeries that no one but Aislinn can see and has to pretend to ignore. I would recommend this book to anyone looking to start a new fantasy series, or anyone who enjoyed books like Holly Black’s Tithe or Cinda Williams Chima’s Heir trilogy.

Emily the Strange: The Lost Days, Rob Reger

I’ve always been intrigued by goth girl Emily, so I was excited to pick up this advance copy of The Lost Days. Turns out, Emily has got herself a case of amnesia and finds herself hanging out in the strange town of Blackrock.

The book is her journal, hand-written instead of typed, with fun illustrations and filled with a special type of tongue-in-cheek humor. As she stalks the townspeople of Blackrock searching for clues that might tell her who she is and what she’s doing in that podunk little town we learn about her life at the same time she does. The combination of crazy characters and even crazier situations keeps up the pace the whole time.

The style of the book is fun and fresh and I enjoyed her lists almost as much as the rest of the book content. It seems like this format is becoming increasingly popular, with examples such as The Diary of a Wimpy Kid and The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, both of which have proved wildly successful with young adults. This book is also a great transition into a more adult version of that format, as well as a great gateway to other types of graphic novels.

Only one thing gave me pause while reading this book, and that was that by not having read any of the other Emily books before this one I often felt like I was maybe missing in-jokes that I might have otherwise caught throughout this novel. But really, that just makes me want to go read the rest of them right away.

Hancock Park, Isabel Kaplan

I read this book expecting to be a mix between Megan McCafferty’s <i>Sloppy Firsts</i> and a Gossip Girl novel and I wasn’t too far off the mark. Except it wasn’t quite as well-written as <i>Sloppy Firsts</i> and it wasn’t quite as trashy/entertaining as Gossip Girl.

And yet, it was still enjoyable enough for me to read the whole thing in one afternoon because I really did want to find out how Becky Miller’s junior year at Whitbread ended up. Would she claw her way to the top of the popularity chain or would she finally learn to embrace her intellectual side despite her fears that she will never be cool enough?

SPOILER ALERT: Becky Miller embraces her less cool, intellectual side! But only after she’s lost her “cool” friends (the Trinity) and her boyfriend. Throughout the novel she drones on and on (and on AND ON) about her parents’ divorce, her multiple therapists, her ridiculously high IQ, and her medicine cabinet full of Xanax and Prozac. Still, there is something likable about how unlikable Becky Miller is. A girl with an IQ of 155 drinking vodka until she passes out with condoms in her mouth and ending up with her picture plastered all over Facebook? I’m down with that kind of angsty high school drama.

Still, I don’t think I liked Becky enough to find out how her senior year in Hancock Park goes. Unless she can cure herself of her Chronic Whining Syndrome, that is. Is there a pill for that?

Switch, Carol Snow

I enjoyed this book as a cross between Meg Cabot’s Airhead and Lois Duncan’s Stranger With My Face. Electrical impulses (like shock from static cling, or lightning storms) cause Claire to leave her body and enter the body of another girl, one who was born under the same moon. She discovered this when she was young and she realizes it is pretty strange, but I suppose no more strange than the fact that her dead grandmother’s ghost hangs out in her bedroom and talks to her. And anyway, once she goes to sleep for the night she always switches right back to her own body.

One day Claire wakes up in the body of a new girl who is staying in her seaside town for the summer. The new girl is beautiful but totally rude, and Claire relishes being able to turn the head of the boy she’s been crushing on. Eventually, she tries to sleep to get back to her own body but finds that she’s stuck, and the new girl’s life is not exactly a bed of roses. She’s babysitting for a family with rotten kids and her own mother dumped her for the summer to go on a cruise with her new boyfriend.

After a few days, Claire’s grandmother warns her that she really needs to get back to her own body or she’ll be stuck there for good, which was what happened to her, and why she died so early in a mental hospital.

This book was humorous and fun, it was light-hearted but also dealt with some prevalent issues in adolescent life- family, boys, and strengthening your own identity.

How to (Un)cage A Girl, Francesca Lia Block

I was surprised to see that this was a three-part book of poems by Block, one of my favorite authors from middle school. Block’s Weetzie Bat novels really gave me hope for a society that was accepting and loving rather than bitter and cynical. The poems in her newest book, How to (Un)cage A Girl, were still beautiful, but they also hit a nerve that will resonate with every high school girl. Why are some girls popular? Why are some girls total skanks? How am I supposed to make it through the school day when I have a hundred million more important things on my mind?

Although I think this book might be aimed at an older audience than my middle school kids I would definitely include it in any high school collection.

The Hunt for the Seventh, Christine Morton-Shaw

The concept of this book intrigued me from the start. Jim has recently moved to an estate with his father, who is the new Head Gardener, and his sister. His mother has recently passed away and moving to this giant estate, where people come to get guided tours of the house and the grounds, is the family’s way of making a new start.

This all seems pretty promising until Jim starts seeing and hearing creepy things all around the estate. Eventually he finds himself in the middle of a mystery dating back hundreds of years, and he is haunted by the ghosts of six children who had died on the grounds. Each of the ghosts urges him to “find the seventh”, but as Jim gets closer and closer to understanding what this means he also gets deeper and deeper into trouble with the Master of the estate, Lord Minerva. Although Minerva is in a wheel chair, he is still horrible to Jim and his sister and makes sure they know that he is following their every move via video camera. Unfortunately, Jim can’t hide that he is sneaking around the grounds looking for clues at all hours and repeatedly gets caught.

Throughout the book Jim gets help from Henry, Minerva’s son who is supposed to be at boarding school but is hiding out on the grounds. Henry is autistic, but shows Jim clues in his own way and leaves Jim to figure them out.

The story itself is well-written if not totally believable, and the finding of the clues becomes a little repetitive in the middle, but I think the surprise ending made up for it. The last few chapters of the book were packed with energy and the macabre, and I think that is a winning combo for middle school readers.

Gone, Michael Grant

First off, I loved this book. From the very first page where a bunch of kids are sitting in school and suddenly all the teachers disappear- poof!- every sentence kept me in suspense. I especially loved that there were twists and turns, that the characters were not simplified despite being kids, and the way all the story lines were woven together. I would hate to give away any key plot moments, so instead I will say that I compared this book to a cross between Lord of the Flies and The Stand, with a little bit of Heroes thrown in. Really, it was very well-written and super interesting, and I thought it was everything a young adult novel should be.

So then. Just two quick complaints, eh? One- the cover art. Bad WB drama or awesome novel? You decide!

Number two- the ending. I mean, most things got tied up but it was one of those, “We are leaving the ending so open because this book is so awesome it simply must! have! a sequel! I don’t mind sequels but I felt like it somehow cheapened the rest of the book.

Otherwise, two thumbs way up!

The Summoning, Kelley Armstrong

I thought the premise of this book was kind of trite at first- I mean, seriously, another teen book about a girl who can see ghosts? But surprisingly, I didn’t hate it. I thought the manner in which the story was presented, through a teenage girl committed to a group home for hallucinations, was an interesting twist. I also thought the dialog rang pretty true for a high school-aged girl. Once I got into the story and more of the plot began to unravel I realized I was hopelessly sucked in.

Basically, Chloe Saunders can see ghosts but doesn’t understand where that power came from or why it suddenly appeared during her freshman year of high school. Also, it freaks her the hell out. I mean, dead janitors with their faces half burned off would probably scare me too. But when she finds herself in a group home with doctors telling her she is schizophrenic, she has to turn to the other kids in the home. It’s then that she finds out that all the kids in the home are in there for strange “supernatural” reasons.

I think it was the fairly strong writing that saved the day with this book, for me anyway. But again- again with the sequel invitation at the end of the book! Way to be subtle, YA authors.

Kitty Kitty, Michele Jaffe

The cover art of this book is laughably bad. Which is unfortunate, because Michele Jaffe’s writing is unbelievably refreshing in a sea of stereotypical YA. Her characters are funny and real which is in direct opposition to the insanity of the plot.

Jasmine is forced to pick up and move to Venice, Italy the day before her senior year of high school, leaving behind her friends and very kissable boyfriend. The adventures that follow her to Italy are a mix of zany and crime-busting, but always hilarious. Also, the main character’s footnotes throughout the story keep a running commentary so it’s like reading in-jokes while reading the book which I thought added another new dimension to an already fast-paced read.

I completely devoured this book in one day, cracking up at the way the characters interacted and talked to each other. I highly recommend this book for anyone looking for something different.

Coraline, Neil Gaiman and P. Craig Russell

I was so excited that HarperCollins sent me the graphic novel version of Neil Gaiman’s Coraline. I’ve been dying to read it and was planning on buying it as an addition to my library’s graphic novel collection. The original story was so creepy and nightmarish that I had a hard time imagining how the illustrations would add to what my imagination had already conjured up. Well I am here to tell you, the illustrations are SCARY AS HELL.

Ever wonder what it would be like to find yourself in an alternate universe, where your parents exist but instead of looking like your parents they have buttons sewn into their eye sockets and extra long fingers with extra long nails? No? Well LUCKY YOU, because it is freakish. Not to worry though, Neil Gaiman will show you for yourself.

Coraline finds a doorway in her parent’s apartment that has been bricked up. When she decides to open it one day she is amazed to find the bricks have disappeared and there is a hallway leading to… her apartment. Only, it’s not her apartment, it’s a bizarre-o world that seems almost like her own, created by her “other mother”. The other mother wants Coraline to stay and love her forever in this strange world, on the condition that the other mother can sew up Coraline’s eyes with buttons. When Coraline refuses and escapes back to her own world she discovers that her parents are missing and she knows she must return to the other mother if she ever wants to get them back.

I thought the illustrations for this graphic novel adaptation were well-done, although I did think they would be a little less polished-looking. I think half of the creepiness of the story comes from the strange dream-like quality of the world created by the other mother and I don’t know that that translated well enough to the drawings. Otherwise, I thought it was a great book to adapt into this format.

The House on Fortune Street, Margot Livesey

In The House on Fortune Street, Margot Livesey deftly weaves together the stories of four different characters that share a common bond. Sean has recently left his wife to live with his lover, Cameron is a father whose proclivities land him in some trouble, Dara is Cameron’s daughter and happens to be dating a married man, and Abigail is Sean’s lover who despite her very strange childhood has grown up to be, at least by appearances, the very successful owner of a small theater company.

I loved the way this book was pieced together. Each section started out with a familiar character from a previous section and then turned your already-formed opinions about that character upside down. Livesey’s attention to character detailing is flawless and each of the story’s characters is compelling in its own way. I also think the story provides a valuable lesson in learning to view others without prejudice, as we almost never fully know the entire life story of anyone we meet, regardless of whether they are friend, family, or stranger. Livesey delivers this message without being heavy-handed though, through a telling of each person’s life rather than spelling it out for the reader.

As one of the few pieces of adult fiction that I have read in a while I would say that I enjoyed this book rather much more than I expected to at its start. I thought it was moving and the prose was often very pretty. Often times when I’m reading fiction not geared towards young adults I feel that it is missing something, a direction, but this work moved forwards at all times, even when Livesey was describing the histories of the characters. However there were a few instances when I felt as though there could have been more explanation about certain actions or behaviors that did not necessarily fit with the character Livesey had outlined. It seemed as though I had missed some part of the character’s background that would cause them to act in the way they were acting.

The story’s conclusion was not as tight as I wished it would be, as I am a girl who likes endings that are definitively happy or sad and this ending was both. I suppose in many ways this type of ending is much more realistic but that doesn’t mean I have to be pleased with it, right?

I think I would recommend this book to someone looking for intense characterization and a flair of drama. It is definitely a compelling and easy read, but the subject matter would probably not be considered a fluffy beach book. If you read it I would be very interested to hear what you think!

Stolen Innocence, Elissa Wall

Stolen Innocence is the memoir of a former member of the FLDS Church, otherwise known as the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints, a polygamous sect of Mormonism. Right from the start I knew I would be fascinated by this book, especially with all the recent news surrounding the raids in Utah and Texas of FLDS family compounds. The book recounts the life of Elissa Wall, from growing up as the child of a second wife in a enormous family to her eventual escape from the religion and her own abusive husband.

All of the factual information, including the religion’s background, was very well outlined. I felt like I could really understand the trials that FLDS members had to face if they decided to turn their back on religion. Leaving the FLDS meant that they were considered apostates and that their family and friends would no longer be allowed to associate with them. Elissa Wall wrote of the turmoil her family went through each time a sibling decided to leave and wove that into the reasoning she used every time she decided not to leave the religion herself- she just couldn’t bear to leave her younger sisters behind because she knew how terrible it was to lose your loved ones. Mixed in with these strong attachments was the psychological warfare the religious leaders employed. Nonbelievers were most certainly going to hell, as were people who even doubted the religion or the Prophet. When Judgement Day came and all the believers were led to Zion, Elissa Wall wanted to be among them.

After being forced into an illegal marriage at age 14 and witnessing her own family being torn apart, Elissa began to realize that all was not right within the FLDS. She continued to question why God would tell the Prophet that she should marry at such a young age and when she verbalized these questions she was met again and again with the answer, “It is God’s will that you submit to your husband.”

As a bystander it is easy for me to sit back and judge the entire religion as ridiculous. I mean, for real, if some tall, skinny, ugly dude came to me and said “I am the Prophet of God and you must do as I say if you want to get to Heaven” I would laugh in his face- but these people not only take him seriously, believe that God is speaking directly through him, but then they do whatever he asks of them! When reading the book I actually cheered when the police finally caught up with the Prophet Warren Jeffs and arrested him in and his cohorts. They pulled him over and he had something like $50,000 on him, money that came from the tithes of his followers that was supposed to go to the Church. But still, I couldn’t be as contemptuous of the ridiculous religion as I wanted to be because at the same time I could understand how their lives were so isolated and the religious leaders were so good at their mind games that they didn’t have a chance from the very beginning. Elissa Wall did a great job of capturing that sense of desperation, of being trapped, of the hope that she felt when she realized that she could have a different life.

The one drawback to this book was that it felt very heavily edited. I’m not sure if this was a result of Elissa Wall’s lack of a full education or just the style of the book but it sometimes felt as though the same words and phrases were being used too frequently, maybe with a thesaurus at hand.

Overall, I would highly recommend this book if anyone is interested in learning more about the FLDS church. After I finished reading I came across an article about the trial of “the Prophet” Warren Jeffs and the recent case where children were taken from their families because of illegal polygamous and underage marriages. Honestly, after reading Elissa Wall’s memoir I feel like removing those children was for the best, even if the mothers had the best intentions for their children. There’s no way for those children to grow up with a full understanding of the larger world and I find that to be unimaginable.

Moose: A Memoir of Fat Camp, by Stephanie Klein

Anyone who has read Stephanie Klein’s blog knows that her writing is upfront and hilarious. And maybe writing about being a former fat kid gives her a glut of material to work with right off the bat, but Klein has a way of describing her years spent at fat camp as a camper and as a counselor that is both self-deprecating and confident. After years of dieting, exercising, and yo-yoing in her weight, Stephanie Klein went to see her doctor when she was pregnant with twins and was told for the first time ever that she actually needed to gain weight. For her, this seemed like an insurmountable task, so used to counting calories and judging herself by what she ate that she could barely bring herself to gain weight for the health of her children.

Growing up, Klein’s parents seemed, for the most part, well-intentioned, but expressed their concerns in very stressful ways. Her father would make remarks about how no boy liked a fat girl while her mother complained endlessly about her own weight despite being a slender size 4. So when Klein first arrived at fat camp and realizes that she is on the “thin side of fat” she launches herself into full-on fat camp diva complete with boy drama and friendship woes. At fat camp Klein quickly learns the distinction between the “fat camp champs”, people who came back every year, to the first-timers such as herself. She learns all the tricks the campers use to sneak snacks and extra calories, she dabbles in bulimia, and she’s even surprised to learn that fat kids can be just as petty, jealous, and mean as the “regular” kids she knew from school.

If the book sometimes seems like an overshare, that’s because it is. I don’t really need to know that she started experimenting with her sexual side in second grade. Still, it’s wickedly funny and sincere, which makes the moments of TMI seem okay. And I like that about Stephanie Klein: she tells it as it is. In the end she realizes that she will always have issues with her weight, she might not handle those issues very well all the time, but she is aware that they exist and is working on it. Really, what more can anyone ask?