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fineplan

Scavenging Book Stores and Libraries

Currently I'm a librarian and before that I was an archaeologist, a journalist, and definitely a bit of a world traveler.  I tend to mostly read science fiction and fantasy, though I do love a good mystery and I'm a bit of a book dabbler overall. I've been doing Goodreads for awhile, but a friend thought I might enjoy this as well. Let's see, yeah?

One Bite and All You Want is More...

Magic Bites -  Ilona Andrews

I hadn't picked this book up because the cover really makes it look as if it's high on the romance and probably skimpy on the paranormal.  I've been fooled too many times by novels that, for instance, feature werewolves only because they're going to shred their clothes when they change and that makes for easy access to potential lovers.

 

Happily, this book is nothing like this.  I'm not saying that there wasn't some werewolf nakedness or whatever, but it didn't just lead to sexy times.  It was sensible detail.  That's the thing that impressed me about this book -- no, not naked werewolves!  The DETAIL.  The authors (apparently Ilona Andrews is actually a pseudonym for a wife-husband writing team) fleshed out their world so well with all these details.  Even better, this kind of book needed that nice streamlined speed into all the action and hijinks and the authors are able to fit their world building in pretty seamlessly!  Sure, it helps that this is an urban fantasy, more or less, so a lot of the details are our world...  But there's a lot that's different, too.  I feel like, for most part, I didn't ever feel disoriented as we follow Kate around.  The information was always produced before I wanted to ask for it and it rarely interfered with the plot at all.  

 

(though, I actually do enjoy plenty of novels with tons of exposition -- I enjoy learning about new worlds a lot)

 

The authors also pull in some really interesting mythology.  I don't know how much of it is directly from legends and how much they tweaked or made up, but it all feels very folkloric and I suspect quite a bit of it has analogues in our world's folklore.  It's always nice to see authors use less common creatures and beings and to create new takes on the standard ones.

 

Some of the plot was pretty easy to figure out, more was not as easy as it seemed.  Either way, I enjoyed this a heck of a lot and may go on to read book two right away (which is something I usually do, lately).

 

My copy of the book had a bunch of fun extras at the end -- glossaries and FAQs, character lists, a quiz, and an extra short story.  It's definitely worth it to get a copy with all that.

A Sign of Good Things to Come

Omens - Kelley Armstrong

I wasn't sure what to expect from this novel -- I've read most of Armstrong's Women of the Otherwold books, as well as the teen spin-off series and enjoyed most of them.  I absolutely loved some of them.  The Otherworld is done with, now, and Omens is the start of a new series...

 

There were some negative reviews about it because of certain twists not meeting people's expectations.  I would say that sometimes you need to let your expectations go and enjoy the story.  I enjoyed the book immensely -- it was a fun ride, easy, with lots of interesting tidbits doled out along the way.  A whole lot isn't answered a whole lot is implied...  But this is just book one.  I'm eager to see what book two reveals.  I don't know how long the series is, but as long as we get a few answers each book it should continue to be excellent.

 

I did have a hard time following the author's instructions NOT to look up strange words...  But at leas I only checked out one.  ;)  I thought it was pretty neat that she starts off the book saying that you CAN look up the foreign words to get clues into what's going on (even without, I can figure out a lot, I think...) but that if you don't you'll be able to enjoy the mysterious atmosphere longer and that all will be explained in later books.  I decided that (mostly) I'll go for the mysterious atmosphere.

 

It's also important to not that there is a choose-your-own-adventure kind of app that is related to this storyline (set in the past) that offers other interesting hints about the mysteries.  It's also a pretty good story.

 

So, Omens: an enjoyable, easy read, high on atmosphere and hints of future awesomeness, characters who grow and are full of flaws that make them more relatable and real.  The main character is no pushover -- she is stubborn in that way that means she can accomplish a lot. It's refreshing to follow her through her story.  I couldn't help but root for her all the way.  

 

 

Coming of Golden Age?

After the Golden Age - Carrie Vaughn

I am so glad that I read this book just weeks before the sequel comes out!  It's not that this ended on a cliffhanger or anything like that -- in fact, if I'd read this when it first came out, I wouldn't have thought there would ever be a sequel.  The book is complete on its own.  No, I'm excited because I loved the characters and can't wait to see what Carrie Vaughn brings into this world next.

 

On the one hand, this was a superhero novel -- the main character has no powers other than determination, stubbornness, and intelligence.  However, she is surrounded by super powered humans because both of her parents are gifted that way and they are part of the city's superhero team.  

 

Much of the set up is what you'd expect from a superhero story.  There's a lot less angst than some of the other modern stories have.  Things aren't particularly grim or nasty.  I kept expecting horrible revelations to pop up...  But no, this is the Golden Age, right?  Stories then, from what I understand, tended to be a lot more fun and sometimes even a little silly.  This book, while fun, is not silly.

 

What this book is -- at least to me -- is a book that acknowledges that growing up takes a lot longer than we pretend it does.  There are a million coming of age tales where a young protagonist, maybe ten, maybe seventeen, has this life altering event and learns to see the world more like an adult and their path is set...  After the Golden Age references plenty of big, child- and teen- hood events but these don't just make the characters grown up.  These change their world views, these push them in directions, but it takes time and a will to process things and grow from them.  Some people never do.  It's nice to read a book with a protagonist near my age who has really just started figuring things out recently.  

 

Maybe I can relate, yeah?

 

So I say, read this book for the fun superhero story, for a scheme to decipher and heroic deeds of derring-do, but also read it for a glimpse into a life, to share the experience of finding your place in the world and dealing with the things that upset you so much when you were younger.  And read it to wonder if we are shaped more by "nature" or "nurture" and how much choice do we really have?

 

This was an excellent book.  Hopefully I'll be back in a few weeks' time to tell you the next book was just as fantastic!

Sweet Interlude

Night of Cake & Puppets - Laini Taylor Daughter of Smoke & Bone (Daughter of Smoke and Bone) - Laini Taylor Days of Blood & Starlight - Laini Taylor

Well, I guess since this Night of Cake and Puppets was released after book two it is more of a delicious dessert to the current series, but I feel that it fits in very well between books one and two.  And now that I am typing this I realize that I'm very behind on reviewing the books I've read -- and that I never did speak about the first two books in the series.

 

Well they are all absolutely five stars (even though I doubted that book two would be that way for the first half).

 

So, at any rate, Daughter of Smoke and Bone was, because of the awful cover -- the U.S. cover, to me, gives the impression of stereotypical mushy teen angst book with probably a lot of angst and maybe a circus, rather than a book full of fascinating mythology, tons of adventure, plenty of tension -- was a reluctant read for me that turned out to be an amazing read.  It's one of my favorites for the year.  I absolutely love the characters and the world -- both Prague and the secret world -- and all the magical mysteries that surround our heroine, Karou.  The second book, Days of Blood and Starlight, continues directly from the first book with just a small interlude in between that the novella Night of Cake and Puppets fits in, even though it was released afterwards.

 

I can see why Night wasn't just a part of Days, because Days is a depressing read.  It's harsh and tragic (and, unfortunately, a bit annoying for part of it).  It's also excellent and has me very bummed that book three doesn't get released until April!  (I guess, since I finish my Masters degree in May and is such a big milestone, it just feels a million years away and not just five months...)

 

Night is sweetest confection, it's beautiful and wonderful and fascinating even though it's basically just a little love story that contains so little of the magic that infuses the novels.  I don't know how the novella would stand on its own, but as a story that explores secondary characters of the books (which are very much beloved by this point) it works perfectly.  The reason I recommend that the novella be read before the second book is because the second book is so very dark in comparison from the first book, so I think reading the novella would really help ramp up the tension.  I can see that it also works afterwards because it's a bit of niceness to cut back the horror after the second book, yet doesn't negate the cliffhangers of book two since the novella takes place before it.

Pulling a Hutch

Starhawk - Jack McDevitt

What to say about Starhawk…

 

I think the author made some interesting choices, here.  It’s a prequel a long-running series of his, so we get to learn how Priscilla become “Hutch” and I was really excited for that.  McDevitt does two main series – the Alex Benedict series and the Academy series.  This book is part of the Academy series.

 

The Benedict series is the better one, in my opinion, because all the entries – except maybe the first – are solid.  As for the first one…  I think McDevitt realized that his Holmes needed a Watson, so he added one in and the series became MUCH better.  Really, if Benedict left and Chase stayed, I’d be fine…  At any rate, the Academy series starts out great and then just didn’t connect with me as well after a couple of books.

Part of it may be what my friend who introduced me to the series calls “pulling a Hutch.” This is a phrase that her family coined from the novels and use it to mean that someone asks you to do something which you know is a terrible idea and doomed to failure and heartache so, of course, you tell them know.  They come back and ask again and even though you still know it’s going to pretty sour, you say yes this time.  Then terrible things happen just like you knew they would.

 

In any case, as an ex-archaeologist, I feel a little bad liking the Benedict series more than the Academy series.   See, the Academy series often deals with space archaeology.  The Benedict series deals with an artifact collector and, as nice as some can be and as helpful as some can be, for the most part collecting artifacts is terrible for science.  There is so much knowledge that can be gained from context and studies of an artifact before it’s moved.  Once it’s moved, the amount of information you can gain from it – not to mention much of the proof of its veracity – is lost.  Add to that the fact that selling and buying artifacts pretty much divorces the item of its history and culture and just makes it into a pretty little object with some prestige attached…  Anyway, so I don’t like Benedict’s professions.  But his stories are just so good.

 

I’m really getting off on a tangent.  I guess it’s because I was a bit disappointed in this book.  Hutch really takes a back seat in all these adventures.  Yeah, I get that she isn’t her cool self yet but she just seemed such an… observer throughout the book.  So it’s kind of an interesting route for the author to take.  We’re basically seeing the events that shaped her into who she becomes, maybe, rather than seeing her shape events?  On the other hand, the tragedy level fits in well with her later adventures, so I kind of wonder why she didn’t just become a lawyer like her mother wanted…

Trauma and Beauty

The Sparrow - Mary Doria Russell

I’ve had to wait a bit before I finally decided to talk about The Sparrow because, quite frankly, the book left me feeling really traumatized.

 

So here’s what I’ve decided.  I DO recommend the book as a fantastically well written book with amazing characters, a fascinating alien culture, a fascinating Jesuit culture (it’s exotic to me, since I knew nothing about them), and an interesting plot.  You’ll just have to be in the mood to be really sad at the end.  For me, I literally – for a week or so – could not deal with books where anything particularly sad or violent happened.  Luckily, I’ve recovered because that pretty much covers most books – there usually has to be SOME sort of emotional or physical conflict to advance the plot, right?

 

You are told from pretty much page one that something awful happened.  I just naively assumed it was all a big mistake and everything would work out in a lovely way.  Please don’t make my mistake – maybe the end will not be as shocking for you, then.

 

Now, as for the book itself, I think the strongest component is the characters.  I, without reservations, loved the core cast.  These are people I would want to know and spend time with.  They’re people I wish wonderful futures for and think deserve great happiness and to have all their dreams come true.  Further, part of their amazingness is how they all work together.  They’re basically a perfect complement of human beings.

 

The next strongest component is the alien culture.  Mary Doria Russell was (is?) a biological anthropologist and you can see how her training and education helped her create this alien culture that is so fascinating and makes such interesting sense.  I want to know more about them!

 

I plan to read more of the author’s works because, not only was this so well written, but she is also an amazing speaker.  I saw her at the High Plains Library District’s ReadCon event in Greeley, Colorado and I have to say that if she is ever speaking nearby, you MUST go see her.  She was phenomenal. (in the talk I saw, she was primarily talking about her new Doc Holliday book)

 

I plan to read The Sparrow's sequel because I do want to know what happens to the characters and the culture…  But I also hope I’m not eating my words when I say the worst surely must be over and nothing that terrible can happen again…

Love Over Survival?

The 100 - Kass Morgan

The 100 starts off really well.  It’s not especially beautifully written or unique in plot or anything like that, but the set up is interesting and the three of the four characters held my interest.  We have a dystopian society in a box – the remainders of humanity floating around an irradiated Earth, running out of space and resources and with an increasing gap between the rich and poor.  Many small infractions lead to immediate execution – unless you’re under the age of eighteen.  In that case, they imprison you until you’re eighteenth birthday… And then they kill you.

 

The leaders decide to take one hundred of the underage prisoners and ship them down to Earth to see if it’s survivable.  There could be radiation, toxic food, plague, dangerous creatures…  Who knows what?  One hundred kids, down you go.  We’ll monitor whether you survive or not.

 

Sounds pretty cool, right?  Plus the CW is airing a show based on it starting this January (or is the book based off the show as a publicity stunt?  I don’t know).

 

I cruised through the first half of the book, enjoying this brain candy style science fiction novel.  There’s no hard science, the difficult questions aren’t being asked, it’s just teenagers engaging in adventure with a bunch of flashbacks to fill in the meat of the story.  There’s a little Lord of the Flies, a little Lost, and then…  halfway through it just goes goofy.  Love takes center stage over things like, you know, survival.  People stop thinking and start causing all kinds of mayhem – unintentionally, of course, though in situations where it was obvious they were making a poor choice…  And the back and forth love bit was getting so strange and so dramatic, I could only shake my head…

 

I will probably try out the show, but if there is a second book, I’m not making the effort there.

Greek Moods

Antigoddess - Kendare Blake

I absolutely loved the idea of this book -- Greek gods in the modern day who are suddenly dying from strange, but personalized curses.  I also absolutely loved Kendare Blake's Anna Dressed in Blood and I liked Girl of Nightmares quite a bit.  Obviously I was waiting for Antigoddess very impatiently!

 

As you've probably noticed from my three and a half star rating, this book didn't work for me as well as her others.  The book was really interesting, but for me, my suspension of disbelief never quite kicked in.  Why, for instance, are the gods and goddesses mostly teenagers?  Were they always teens and we just couldn't tell from the Greek artwork?  Why are some people reincarnated and others not?  Odysseus shows up, but not Penelope (who had a pretty important part of the story, even if she didn't go adventuring!)?  And how come some had the same names and others didn't?

 

And then, why hide the presence of monsters?  There was plenty of evidence left around.  The people could have just blown the whole thing wide open and got a bit more help!  But instead they come up with a cover story that's probably going to lead to them being greatly hindered?  Luckily everyone around them -- family and school-wise and not evil villain-wise -- seems to be so nice and trusting.

 

Of course, everyone also seems pretty lacking in knowledge of Greek mythology -- even after you'd think they'd go to the library and look some stuff up.  Especially once the Cassandra finds out she's supposed to be special to them.  Surely that's the time to google "Cassandra" and "Greek myth" if she's never heard of the cursed girl from the Trojan War...

 

I've noticed a lot of reviews talk about how well Blake shows her knowledge of Greek mythology.  I actually wasn't sold on that point.  I didn't think there was enough evidence either way.  She obviously knows something, but she twisted others things in totally different directions than the myths without acknowledging the originals.  So I don't know if she knew about the origins or not.  She could just as easily have been taking random names and placing them into the situations she needed.  Or, she cleverly twisted them to fit her very dark story.

 

And believe, this thing is dark and often gruesome.  However, I don't think the gore or nastiness was gratuitous.  It all fit the story just fine.  

 

I guess when it comes down to it, most of the characters didn't really seem real to me -- I have more connection to the fleeting image of a female goddess running through the woods, laughing as she's chased by wolves -- than I did to any of the characters who actually kept center stage.  The plot was a bit weak and the characters were too satisfied not knowing what was going on.  What the big DID do really well, for me, is create a mood and give me wonderful descriptions of awful things.  It's the atmosphere that brings the book up to three stars for me.

 

Slow Heat

The Cold Dish - Craig Johnson

This is a hard book for me to review.

 

On the one hand, it's a solid story with well crafted characters and perfect descriptions of Wyoming.  The Sheriff is both very small-town in personality and highly educated and his observations of the world show this.  Most of the people seem a lot more real than they do in other novels -- but the people who don't feel real, are pretty cliche or cardboard.

 

The mystery itself seemed more of the "let's journey with the detective" kind rather than the "let's see if you can solve this first" kind.  The killer was one of my main suspects pretty much from the get-go, but that had much more to do with the way stories tend to go than with clues found along the way.

 

The strong characterization in the book was both a pro and a con.  I like well rounded characters, but the way it was done here slowed the book down quite a bit for me.  This is a book to read slowly on the front porch, a few pages at a time, savoring the language and being in no hurry to reach the end -- which, for me, feels pretty strange in a mystery novel where there are four possible victims and they're going down one by one...

Sweet and Sharp

The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland and Cut the Moon in Two - Catherynne M. Valente, Ana Juan

Valente’s Fairyland books get me all giddy.  I love this series so much and wish it wasn’t limited to one a year – and I’m worried about how many more years September can have before the series must end.  Will her adventures continue until she’s an adult?  I’d be alright with that – I think Valente could pull it off.  Besides, I still am not sure I believe these are kids’ books at all.  They’re whimsical enough and sometimes cute enough and, of course, the protagonist is young enough, but I don’t think the themes are young enough.  It’s not that they are inappropriate for younger audiences.  I just don’t think kids are really going to get most of it.  Valente, as the knowing narrator, is always giving advice and making jokes about growing up and I think these are really the kinds of things that only make sense once you’ve gone through them.  Anyway, I’m sure kids enjoy the books too, just on a different level.

 

I guess of the three books (so far) this is my least favorite, but that doesn’t mean much.  They’re all five stars.  This one just has a characteristic that the others didn’t have…  But I won’t spoil that for you!  The book is still full of clever lines (I especially love the one about marriage), all of our favorite characters return, and lots of new ones are introduced.  I especially loved the Stationery Circus (yes, with an E!).

 

The plot, as per usual, is both too simple and too madcap to be worth relating, but, as per usual, the book is sweet and funny and thoughtful and a little bit sad underneath it all.  It’s really one of my favorite series of all.

 

An Ending

Eternity (Fury) - Elizabeth Miles

I absolutely loved the first book in this series, Fury, and the second book, Envy, was great as well.  Eternity, with it's name that doesn't quite fit (it ends with a Y, but doesn't it feel like it should be either four letters or an emotion or both?) just didn't quite live up to the earlier books.  It does tie up lose ends and bring us to a satisfying ending, but the book didn't have the chilling nature of the first two, nor the deep look into people's psyches.

 

In a way, much of this book felt like the wrap up to a novel, rather than a novel on its own.  Spread out, of course, to fill an entire novel, but I think much of the action could have been condensed and placed at the end of the prior book (with some rework to make the time frame fit) or, better yet, fit at the end of an entirely new third novel that felt more like the first two.  One more journey into supernatural/psychological horror before things end.

 

It sounds like I didn't like the book.  That's not the case.  I did enjoy it.  I just...  Wished it were more like the other books.

 

I guess I don't really know what to say about this book except that it's good to read the entire series and I hope the author continues to write.  Fury was really a favorite the year I read it.  Also, you should check out the British covers -- they are awesome.

Pretty Good Mystery, Pretty Annoying Characters

The Visitant - Kathleen O'Neal Gear;W. Michael Gear

This is a hard book to rate.  It jumps back and forth between the present and the past, following a mystery -- what appears to be a prehistoric serial killer who stalked Anasazi villages.


Now the past stuff is pretty interesting.  I studied more Northern Plains and Southwestern US archaeology (with a small side of Alaskan and a dabbling, once, into North Mexican), so I can't tell you off the top of my head if the authors' Anasazi archaeology is valid or not.  Their bibliography indicates that they conducted plenty of research and one of my friends who is still in the archaeological field says her boss is friends with them.  It seems likely that they've got grounding in at least some theories of the area. (when it comes down to it, there's a lot we think is likely, but little we know for sure, so there tend to be many competing theories in archaeology -- who you respect, who taught you, etc. matters a lot as to what theories you believe)

 

The Gears do a great job of placing you in the exotic past (except for one character's name...  Browser...  I couldn't figure out what that was supposed to mean to the Native peoples in the book...  He window shopped instead of hunted?  His parents wanted to name him Internet Explorer but it hadn't been invented yet?  Anyway, for some reason his name kept pushing me out of the story).  We learn lots of interesting things about Anasazi religion and history and... there are some gory murders.  I didn't figure out who the killer was, but it was pretty satisfying once I got there.

 

Oh, back to Browser...  I also thought he was quite the scummy ladies' man, despite him apparently being super good in all other ways, so I was really annoyed with the other past protagonist who had the hots for him...  She was such a cooler character who could do a lot better for herself.

 

As for the present...  I honestly didn't get much out of it.  They used it for some foreshadowing, but otherwise it didn't seem to touch the mystery too much.  I can't figure out if it's just a frame story or if it will become more tied in later on in the series.  What I can tell you is that I found the portrayal of the anthropologists really irritating.  They did well, first off, capturing the camaraderie and joshing of an archaeological dig, but then it suddenly goes left with this weird idea that the archaeologist was only sucha  good one and a good guy because he'd been adopted into a Native American tribe and was one with their beliefs and so on.  Those can all be very good things, but I know plenty archaeologists who are great at their jobs, have fantastic relationships with tribes, have respect for them...  And still believe in science or Christianity or whatever.  You don't have to believe what other people believe to respect them.  You just need to be open to the fact that people believe different things and understand that some things are very important to them.  Treat those things with respect and we can all get along.  The physical anthropologist wasn't much better.  She was basically a caricature of one -- a mega "lab rat" and so stiff with her beliefs (though she got better later on, in some ways...).

 

Now, this was the first book in a series, so the mystery wasn't completely solved.  I'll try out the next book and see if it gets any better.  If it gets any worse I will be unlikely to finish the series.

Land of the Lost

Everlost  - Neal Shusterman

I have been really lousy when it comes to posting about my books here, lately.  I blame it on school.  I'm doing the full time work and full time school deal, hoping to get my MLIS (Masters of Library and Information Science) done by next May.  I'm even taking my comprehensive exam in a week and a half!  I figured I'd take it early to give myself a buffer...  So wish me luck. :)

 

At any rate, a friend commented about how I was at 999 rated books on Goodreads and that I should do something special when I rated book 1,000!  Okay, so maybe no balloons and parties, but I figured I should post about it here.  Homework can wait. :)  

 

I like Goodreads because of the social for book lovers nature of it, but I don't care for much of the reviewing there...  Consequently, I tend to just do short reviews if I do any review there at all.  

 

So...  Book 1,000.  Everlost.  I read this one because I enjoyed Neal Shusterman's Unwind pretty well and it just happened that he was speaking at a library conference I went to last week.  The plan was to read Everlost and listen to the Bruiser audiobook before I heard him talk.  I didn't manage to finish either before the conference, but I enjoyed both talks of his that I attended.  He was a phenomenal speaker and it was great fun to get previews of some of his upcoming books.  I am really looking forward to one called Challenger Deep...  But it doesn't come out until 2015. :(  It seems to be a surreal tale about a teenager dealing with mental illness.  He says part of it is based on his son.  That was a real tear jerker of a story (but his son is doing fine now).

 

I didn't enjoy Everlost as much as I liked Unwind and I wasn't sucked in as powerfully as I am to the Bruiser audiobook (three hours left!), but I did enjoy Everlost.  I guess, for me, there is something that feels very simplistic about the book and characters, despite the complex and fascinating world building.  So the world and the adventures kept me hooked in pretty well and since the characters are decent enough people, I was fairly interested in what happened to them.

 

I have always been particularly fond of ghost stories and this is a story that is basically all about ghosts.  In fact, after the first few pages, there are almost no living people in the story at all -- the protagonists die and get derailed on their way to the light.  They find themselves in a strange and dangerous world that overlays the land of the living.  They meet powerful others who try to guide them with their own agendas...  It's definitely a land of legends and strong personalities.

 

At any rate, this is the first book of a series.  I think you could read this and stop, if you wanted, but it definitely opened up the story for a more epic slant.  I'll definitely be reading the next book soon...  But not right away because I have Catherynne M. Valente's The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland and Cut the Moon In Two sitting on my desk.  It takes precedence over everything else. ;)

The End is Nigh

Fire & Ash  - Jonathan Maberry

Here it is!  At last!  The final book in the Rot and Ruin series!

 

Over and goodreads I rated the rest of the series five stars -- I definitely recommend reading it.  Wait, so why is this one three and half stars?  Well, like I said in the previous post, maybe I was just having a bad reading week?  I'm not sure.  But here's what I felt about the book:

 

1)  It knew it was the last book for sure.  There were many pages where every word Means Important Stuff.  The messages that just existed in the prior books seemed shoveled on here.

 

2)  The Joe Ledger character.  I knew I had to look him up because you could just tell he was from another series -- and he is.  He was one of the major shovelers of Important Stuff, too.

 

3)  The religious cult hadn't quite sold itself to me in book three -- it worked less so in this book.  Especially the leader's reaction to certain events.

 

4)  The romance issues popping up... again.  I don't generally care much about the romance aspects, but I got tired of this one doing the on again off again bit, being layered with the we need to be more mature, etc.  Perhaps part of my problem is that so much happens in the series that it doesn't feel like it was just a year of in book time.

 

5)  The ridiculousness of the military.  Also, we get the first unattractive woman in the series, far as I remember, here.  So I guess it isn't only beautiful women who escape the apocalypse (a criticism I had in an earlier book).  She is, of course, not one of the heroes.

 

Now, it's definitely worth reading the book.  I just don't think it was as great as the predecessors.  It end the series well and ties up all loose ends in a series that could have continued if the author wanted it to.

Have the Next Book Ready!

Spell Games - T.A. Pratt, Tim Pratt

I'm not sure why this book comes up with the wrong author -- it's T.A. Pratt, the altered name to Tim Pratt (he was told that readers wouldn't like his female protagonist if they knew the author was male).

 

At any rate, maybe I was just having a bad reading week or two since basically everything I read felt close to three stars...  I hate to rate a Pratt book at 3.5 stars because I'd much rather his publisher picked him up again -- though he's kept the series going via e-book.  I have the next one on my Kindle to read soon.

 

I really enjoyed books two and three of the Marla Mason series, but this fourth book felt a lot more like the first book to me...  And that one just rubbed me the wrong way for some reason.  There's this level of grime and dirt that he layers on this world (well, our world with magic) that sometimes works for me and sometimes doesn't.  I can't exactly tell you where the line is, but it exists in this series.  Sadly, for this one it's on the wrong side for me.

 

I enjoyed his magical techniques, as per usual, and it's always interesting to get to know the powers in Felport.  This time, not all the opponents are magical, however, though that plot line seemed rather more predictable.  You definitely get a lot more back story on Marla, and that's great.  I definitely was sucked in by the very end -- be aware this ends on a cliffhanger!

 

Like I said, maybe the low stars are all me...  It could have just been a bad time to read these.

 

 

Watch the Movie After

The Girl Who Leapt Through Time - Yasutaka Tsutsui, David James Karashima

The title story was not a bad novella at all, though I think this is one of the few times when I have to say that I enjoyed the movie (anime) more.  I'd probably have liked the story much better if I hadn't seen the movie -- even though the movie is about different characters, it just goes so much deeper into the story and consequences.  From what I understand, the story is supposed to be about the aunt in the movie but...  basically the framework of the movie is present in the story.  Just with...  less.

 

There is a second novella included in the book called "The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of."  It didn't really do much for me -- perhaps it was the translation?  At any rate, it's the straightforward tale of a girl who hears that fears can be conquered when you figure out where they come from so she sets about quieting hers and her brother's by thinking about them and overhearing conversations.