The Bitter Kingdom

I have raved (in the reviews of book one and two) about how amazing this book’s heroine is- I will now move on to her other half. Swoon-some Hector. Yes- like 90% of the female population reading this series, I am completely in love with Hector. Like a lot. Like, I’d give up coffee forever to have him for my own.

I love coffee like Sméagol loves the ring. Just to put that in perspective.

Seriously, Hector may be one of the best written male leads in the HISTORY OF WRITING. Dangerously close to Mr. Thornton and Mr. Darcy. He manages to pull off being dutiful, strong, honor bound, restrained, wise, a wonderful warrior, and mysteriously brooding AND at the same time he is tender and loving and protective and where the hell is my Hector?!

However, I do have tiny complaints. Having Hector’s POV in this book weakened him IMO. I didn’t feel like his character was developed enough to provide as amazing of a POV as Elisa does. Unfortunately his segments were sandwiched in between Elisa’s, and in contrast they just seemed weak.

Another complaint I had was the mines. It just felt like a mash up of Lord of the Rings and Hunger Games, providing scorpions instead of Tracker Jackers, and mines vs the mines of Moria.

Okay- on to what I loved! Everything!! This book was fantastic. Elisa continues to grow as a character and I died when this scene happened:

“You look beautiful,” Alodia says.

“I startle at the complement. Then I smile, “I’m beautiful to the one person who matters.”

“She nods. “Hector’s mouth will drop open when he sees you.”

“I hope so. But I meant me. I’m beautiful to me.”

That she says this to her sister is huge. For two and a half books Elisa has felt inferior to Alodia. Inferior in beauty, power, abilities. By book two she finders her own inner strength, but she doesn’t think she is beautiful. IN this book she finds herself beautiful, signaling that she has completed her journey of self-confidence and growth. And I loved it.

Ximena. OMG. The tears when she whispered, “My sky…” I should have guessed she was going to die after Elisa didn’t need her any more, but still. It hurt more than I thought it was going to.

In conclusion, this is a wonderful series, the best I have read in quite some time. Everyone who loves fantasy, who teeters the gap between YA and adult should read it. Five stars for sure.

Crown of Embers

A while ago I freaked out about The Girl of Fire and Thorns. Honestly one of the best books I have ever read. I lament that it has taken me so long to read the second installment, but it was missing from my library for a while and of COURSE the bookstore only had books 1 and 3. But finally I have read it.

This book was amazing. Like “I’m so hungry. Must cook dinner, but I cannot put this book down. Okay- I’ll cook with one hand!” kind of amazing. The writing is sublime. As I mentioned in my review of the first book, “I read slowly because the writing was beautiful and I didn’t want to miss a single word. Honestly some of the best writing I have ever encountered.” This book was the same. The love triangle disappeared, thankfully. And her story blossoms.

Book two did not have as much character development as the first. I think Carson was more focused on developing the love story. But I am completely fine with that <3

And…

The only complaint I had with the story was with the execution of a character. We were introduced to this particular character, emotional ties were constructed, but the character was killed before we were able to really feel those ties. I wish we had been given a chance to love the character- to really feel the emotions between the two before he was killed. I was sad-ish when this character died, but not devastated because those emotional connections had not yet taken hold in me.

The book of course left off with a killer cliff hanger, so I am dying to know what happens next. I am running down to the library to get book 3 as soon as I get off work today. Even though I am in the middle of reading The Words of Radiance. (Please don’t murder me Katie <3)

Five stars. Because this book was fantastic!!

Crown of Midnight

First of all, I would like to apologize for not updating in a while!! I promise I have been reading, I just have been neglecting to blog about the books :/

I read this book a while ago, but wanted to make sure I posted about it because of my violent reaction to it. Seriously, Crown of Midnight is the best book I have read this year. This may eventually be overshadowed by the brilliance of The Words of Radiance, but as I have not yet finished reading it, Crown of Midnight still has that distinction.

For some of you who read my blog often, you will remember that I read book one a while back. I had heard wonderful things about it, and I enjoyed it, though I did not enjoy the love triangle. This caused me to give the books 4 stars, which is still high, but not what I had expected to give it.

This book blew me away. With hurricane winds and tornado spirals. I think I may have seen Dorothy and the Witch of the West while being carried away. I was carried to the clouds, smashed on the ground, and then crawled out of the wreckage…grinning. And crying a tiny bit inside too.

From approximately page 1.5 this was me…

For fear of ruining the twists and turns of this book, I will not reveal anything about it. But I will advocate that everyone from YA, New Adult, and Adult reading genres who enjoy fantasy should read this series. NOW.

I award this fantastic, mind-blowing book five stars. But only because one cannot have a physical representation of 6 stars out of 5. Because that is what I would like to award it. Because it’s bloody brilliant.

Now go and devour Crown of Midnight. You can thank me later ;)

Have you read this book? Let me know what you thought of it!!

Stardust

I feel a tiny bit like I have failed in being a fantasy-loving English major. How have I managed to reach the age of 23 and NOT read anything by Neil Gaiman? Perplexing.

I have to admit, I really only read this because I was introduced to its existence through the movie. But I think that is not such a bad thing as the movie is one of the more well done renditions of the “book to movie” trend. Of course there were things left out, things changed, things omitted, things added. But such is the way of transferring from media to media.

And Robert De Niro plays Captain Shakespeare wonderfully.

The writing was clear, easy to read, and enjoyable. It was rather…odd to get used to the frequent mention of urinating in the book. It is just one of those things that books tend to avoid- whether because it is unimportant to the plot, or whether it is understood and just not stated. But Gaiman states it. Frequently. I’m all-a-puzzle about his reasons.

Anyway. The story was diverting, as is the movie. The characters had just enough comedy, romance, adventure, and spunk. It was a short read, and definitely worth the time.

I do not see why he is one of the more famous writers of fantasy, though I did think his writing was good. I will read another of his books, but his writing did not send me in a tizzy to the closest bookstore for another sample of his writing.

This book is a firm 4 star book. There are some lapses where the action drops, but overall this book is fantastic.

Read it. And then watch the movie :)

I Am Alice

I must be brave.

I must do what has to be done.

I am Alice.

I feel like I say this every time, but I am conflicted about this book. On one hand, I loved it. Alice is BAD ASS, and yet holds on to her morals. And I love her. On the other hand, I feel like the last…3 books have all been fillers because Delaney isn’t sure how to finish the ending of the series as of yet. I had THOUGHT that this was the final book. Surprise…it’s not. Just more filler. But it’s KICK ASS filler.

In this book Alice leap frogs through time. We get more of her back story, what she endured before she met Tom, and we also get to see how she gets the final sword needed in the Dark. Lots of enemies, in the Dark, and there is nary a dull moment. With the rapidly approaching end of the series, Alice has extended herself as far as she can go to the brink of losing her soul.

Though I was disappointed to learn that this was not the end of the series, I loved this book. Delaney’s style of writing crosses the divide between age groups, and the plots are highly diverting. Anyone from 8+ would love this series. I Am Alice deserves 5 stars. I cannot wait to find out what will happen to Alice and Tom. Need the thirteenth book. Now.

The Lies of Locke Lamora

Well first of all, there is the fantastic cover art and title. I mean just LOOK!

Then there was the first chapter, and I was sold. Locke is delicious fun. The fact that he is called the Gentleman Bastard should be enough to make this book amazing, but add in the alarming (and silly) threats to people’s manhoods, the wonderful and fantastical world building, the brilliance of the crimes, and the witty banter? Five star book, ladies and gentlemen.

I very much enjoyed this five star book, and I definitely will be purchasing it for my collection.

Poison

I was actually rather surprised how this book developed. It started off as a very dark fairytale, very Grimm-esque, but then it transformed and grew beyond what I expected. And I LOVED it.

I love how Poison’s relationship with Bram grows, each unexpected twist and turn of the plot, and the way Poison grew into a resourceful, strong heroine at the end. The only complaint I have is the cover doesn’t do the book justice. The cover portrays a violet-eyed girl, which Poison is, but the cover seems to portray a level of flighty YA fiction filled with stupid love triangles and an excess of angst. This book is nothing like that. It is high quality young adult fiction filled with mystery, magic, things that go bump in the night, and best of all- zero romance.

Poison gets 5 stars.

Endlessly

This book was slightly more exciting than Supernaturally. Slightly. Evie was still whiny, but in this book things happened! That automatically makes it better than the last book.

Things I didn’t like:

Carlee ends up being kidnapped at one point, and Evie knows that she has been taken by the fairies. How? Seriously. We didn’t receive any ransom notes from fairies. No hint of logical reasoning that a fairy would have taken Carlee. It made no sense, and seemed to me to be a device to simply push the plot along.

The ending. One of the most Deus Ex Machina endings EVER. Vivian wakes up just in time so she can close the fairy gate so Evie doesn’t have to. So ridiculous. And I hated it.

Things I liked:

Reth. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. Reth is my favorite character. He is interesting, dimensional, and one of the only characters, no wait. THE only character I like at the end. I loved how he couldn’t understand Evie’s decision to stay behind. And his love for what he thought she could become was wonderful (in terms of characterization). It’s realistic, and what some people tend to do when they are in love.

The Seelie and Unseelie queens were the second saving grace of this book. I enjoyed the scenes where they made appearances. The queens being sisters, their past together, their interactions and their struggle, all made for very interesting reading. Then Evie had to ruin it all by being so annoying.

This book only deserves two stars because no character should outshine the main character. It’s hard to respect or like a whiny, annoying, irresponsible girl.

Supernaturally

What do Evie and this book have in common? Nothing. Nothing happened in this book, and Evie’s new favorite whiny word became ‘nothing’, mostly to describe what she was or how she was feeling. I would go back and count how many times she uses this word, except I really don’t want to reread this terribly boring book.

Supernaturally lost so much of what made Paranormalcy awesome.

Why do people praise this book?

It’s not for the main character. She isn’t relatable or awesome like she was in the first book. Evie is whiny and lost and she runs away from her problems like it’s her job. Her kick assery basically disappears into the vast nothing of this book and her sarcastic, witty banter is reduced to lots and lots of monotonous whining.

It wasn’t for the love story. There are three men all giving Evie oodles of attention, and two of them are just as boring as she is. Jack is the new character and is a random, kinda weird love connection. He’s unstable, and rather crazy, and yet she keeps going on adventures with him. For no reason. And then he becomes randomly evil for absolutely no reason at all! I still do not understand why Evie chose Lend. He’s boring, and his whining rivals that of Evie. Wait…maybe they ARE meant for each other…

But then there is Reth…thank goodness. Reth continues to be one of the only interesting characters. He leads Evie to the only thing of exciting-ish substance in this book: finding her father. The realization of who her father was should have been this monumental thing, the way it was laid out, but it wasn’t. It just sort of disappeared from the plot. There was no point in revealing the info because there was no follow through or impact Evie in the least. Unless you count having a three page inner dialogue about being nothing because she was made by a fairy and a human. Get. A. Grip.

I really wanted to like this book. But sadly, this disappointing sequel only deserves 1.5 stars.

Words of Radiance (excerpt)

Today is going to be a bit of a deviation from a full book because I am excited, and want to share it. The first two chapters of Words of Radiance came out yesterday. Today I took the plunge and read them. And because I am so moved and excited by what I read, I want to count it as a book and blog about it.

Firstly, Brandon Sanderson is my favorite author. I have read a lot of books, by a lot of different authors. Each book, no, each paragraph Sanderson crafts is exact, beautiful, a work of art. The way he can forges characters and worlds is unprecedented. The way he drops the tiniest of hints along the way of the story, tiny little gems for you to pick up, pocket, and they dazzle you when finally revealed again. Sanderson is a genius. And I have ADORED everything I have read by him. Admittedly, I have not read every book he has written, but I am slowly buying each of his books so I can read them all. I have even rethought my refusal to read any more of the Wheel of Time series…just because he has written the last few for deceased Robert Jordan.

Take this segment from the Prologue:

“Jasnah wanted to speak with them, but her appointment would not wait. She’d intentionally scheduled the meeting for the middle of the feast, as so many would be distracted and drunken. Jasnah headed toward the doors but then stopped in place.

Her shadow was pointing in the wrong direction.

The stuffy, shuffling, chattering room seemed to grow distant. High-prince Sadeas walked right through the shadow, which quite distinctly pointed toward the sphere lamp on the wall nearby. Engaged in conversation with his companion, Sadeas didn’t notice. Jasnah stared at that shadow—skin growing clammy, stomach clenched, the way she felt when she was about to vomit. Not again.”

Now, for those of you who have not read the first book, Jasnah and Sadeas are both characters we know well. And this prologue is Jasnah’s view of the event that already happened at the beginning of book one. So. Much. Revealed. I can’t even…

And then there is the artwork. Brilliant, gorgeous, and captures the intensity and fantasy of the world we slip into.

Look at that cover! (which features Kaladin)

And this gorgeous painting which features Shallan. Shallan is, at the moment, my very favorite of characters.

And then there is the length. The Way of Kings was 1,007. My mother laughed at me when I asked her to pick it up from the library on her way home one day. Laughed. Because I was crazy to read such a giant book. Mom, this is book one. Of many. THANK GOODNESS. Know how book lovers never want their books to end? Well these books are huge, there will be many of them, and Brandon Sanderson is young- so hopefully will complete the series before passing from the world as some other fantasy epic authors have done…and George R.R. Martin is feared to do. Anyway, Words of Radiance is 1,088 pages.

Ooch! Look at the beauty of that tall, tall manuscript!

This blog post is summed up by these three words:

I

CANNOT

WAIT.

Period. Exclamation point.

Tombs of Atuan

The Tombs of Atuan is an amazing story. The plot, the writing, the character development is all wonderful and original. Ursula le Guin is an amazing writer.

The atmosphere of this book is the greatest part. Le Guin creates this dark, overwhelming tone in the beginning of this novel which follows Tenar as we learn more about her and the Nameless Ones.

I also love how she restricts Ged’s powers. There is nothing more boring than a wizard who is all powerful. Readers like reading about characters who struggle. And boy do Tenar and Ged struggle.

The last thing I’d like to mention is the cover of this book. Isn’t it beautiful? I’m terrible, and judge books by their covers. Thank goodness this cover called to me, because it is one of the best, most interesting books I have ever read.

This is a solid 5 star book.

Persuasion

This is my favorite of Jane Austen’s novels, which is saying a bunch, because I love Jane Austen. The development of her characters alone is something to be praised, but then her writing is beautiful, her characters are awesome and jump off the page, she is awesome.

Persuasion is a story of love gone wrong, and the couple’s chance to make it right years later. Captain Wentworth is one of my absolute literary crushes; he could sweep me off to sea any day. I always identify with Anne, though I am more selfish than her, certainly. Anne is far too selfless, she becomes a rug for half the book.

I think my favorite part about Persuasion is how Anne and Wentworth change. Anne gets a back bone, but in the best way. She is still quiet, still kind, soft spoken, but she allows herself to make decisions that others may not agree with. I love when she quietly disagrees with people near the end of the book. Wentworth realizes how resentful he has been, and how it has blinded him to the fact that he is still in love with her.

His speech near the end (in the form of a letter) is one of the most beautiful things ever written:

”I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone, I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes?”

Just gorgeous. It makes my soul sigh. *Applaud the genius of Austen*

As I sing this book’s praises, obviously it receives 5 stars.

Wolf Wing

In Wolf Wing all the questions are answered in a great, wonderful, explosion of awesomeness.

Unfortunately, all the stuff that happens in this book is rather spoiler material…and I can’t spoil this wonderful series for anyone.

But I will say happy ending, exciting story, wonderful series. Five star book.

Wolf Queen

Because Tanith Lee is a queen of twisting plots, we get more unexpected awesomeness in this book. And learn more about Cladi’s past, and her heritage.

This quote is just so awesome, I had to share: “Whatever the hell I am, I am Me.”

I feel like life would be so much easier if people could just accept that as fact. So lovely <3

Another 5 star book for this series.

Wolf Star

In this book Cladi is getting married. Everything is going well until…she is kidnapped during her wedding. WHAT?! Cladi is taken to a jungle where she finds Prince Venn.

Venn is a very interesting character. And his home is a quite interesting place, where Cladi gets into quite a bit of trouble. As she struggles to find a way to leave and get back to her fiancé, our story develops.

I love the way Lee leaves little bread crumbs for the reader to pick up and at the end she reveals everything. In that manner she is very like Sanderson, who anyone who reads my blog knows I adore, only Lee’s version of clue dropping is less covert, and more Middle School. What can I say? She writes to her audience!

Wolf Star also gets 5 stars.

Wolf Tower

I cannot even express how much I love this book. So original. Pure genius. I have lost count of the amount of times I have re-read them. Less than Ella Enchanted, I know that, but more than any other book I have re-read. This is the opening segment, and captures perfectly the tone of the book.

“Yes. I stole this book. I don't know why. It looked…nice I suppose, and nothing has been nice for years. It was in her stationary chest, out of which she sometimes makes us - mostly me - get her a piece of silk paper or thick parchment. Then she doodles a few stupid lines of awful poetry. Or a foul painting. And then we all have to applaud. "Oh, how clever Lady Jade Leaf. What bright-shining genius." Because she's royalty. And we are not. Oh no. We couldn't ever do anything wonderful like that. Frankly, I think I could spit in more interesting patterns. And as for the poetry, well, here's the latest example: I drift like a petal all upon the air and the roses bow Drift like a petal…she's more like a hippopotamus in the river. I don't mean she's fat, Lady Iris is fat - but she's also graceful and glamorous. Jade Leaf is slim, but the way that she moves… If the roses bowed, they did it because they fainted with fright, screaming "don't let that great thing bash into me!" (Having said this, I feel I should add that hippopotami are graceful, too, underwater. Besides, a hippopotamus has never picked up its ornamental cane and cracked me across the palms of my hands so they bled. Which Jade Leaf has done so many times I can't remember the number). If you found this, and are reading it, need I ask you not to tell anyone? There's someone banging on the door - and I must go do more important things - like wait on Lady Jade Leaf. But let me sign my name here so you'll know it's me next time: Claidi.”

Grabbed. There is no way I could not love Cladi! She is cheeky, witty, and later she becomes quite the bad ass!

Then there is her love story. Unconventional, well developed, love story. I shan’t say any more because there are a few stray…wrinkles and crinkles, and they are just too good to spoil!

If…oh gosh…this is a large claim, but if only one of my blogs inspires someone to read a book, I hope it is this book. Tanith Lee is an amazing author, and this is an amazing, 5 star book, and it deserves to be read and enjoyed by all who love Middle School fantasy.

The Silver Metal Lover

I have been meaning to read this book for forever. I adore Tanith Lee. I think she is a phenomenal writer, and her Cladi Journals series is one of my very favorites. This book did not disappoint me.

Our heroine doesn’t fall in love with a vampire, werewolf, dwarf, elf, human, or zombie! She falls in love with a robot. One she is sure is more than a robot. One she thinks might be able to love her back. She feels his emotion in his music.

Lee explores the humanity and meaning of life in inhuman things, as well as the concept of love. This story is deep, beautiful, and one that I will need to add to my bookshelf.

This five star book has inspired me to re-read her Cladi series. I’m in a Tanith mood!

The Decoy Princess

The first thing I should mention is that Dawn Cook is Kim Harrison. The one who writes the kick ass witch series The Hallows. While I enjoyed this book, and another kick ass heroine, the realization that Kim and Dawn are the same kind of paled this book.

The idea that a princess was actually not a princess, and was just being used to keep the real one safe is really great! The prose was okay, nothing special. Tess is fun, but no Rachael.

This book gets 3 stars for being good, but not amazing.

The Forgotten Sea

This is a paranormal romance…adult version. Which basically means there is going to be less angst and more sex. Sometimes this is a good thing. Sometimes…it just makes me want to bash my head against the wall. This book was the latter.

Lara and Iestyn were interesting characters, but as soon as the hormones started flowing the character development stopped. And then we got action and sex. IMHO we get enough action and sex on the TV, I want deeper interaction before you delve into those two aspects. Appreciation, respect, learning who these characters are. We are deprived of that.

Interesting story with a cool plot, but the characters fell flat for me. This story gets two stars.

The Magician's Nephew

I recently rewatched the three Narnia movies, and had the desire to re-read this book. This is my favorite book of the entire Narnia series. It gets a bit muddy because this is technically, chronologically the first book, but it was published way after some of the others.

This book explains how the “Queen” of Narnia came to be in Narnia. This book is awesome.

Polly and Diggory, two human children, borrow Diggory’s uncle’s magic ring which allows them to jump through portals into other worlds. I, as someone who greatly desired to jump into different worlds, found this idea to be fascinating.

“As he rose to his feet he noticed that he was neither dripping nor panting for breath as anyone would expect after being under water. His clothes were perfectly dry. He was standing by the edge of a small pool—not more than ten feet from side to side in a wood. The trees grew close together and were so leafy that he could get no glimpse of the sky. All the light was green light that came through the leaves: but there must have been a very strong sun overhead, for this green daylight was bright and warm. It was the quietest wood you could possibly imagine. There were no birds, no insects, no animals, and no wind. You could almost feel the trees growing. The pool he had just got out of was not the only pool. There were dozens of others—a pool every few yards as far as his eyes could reach. You could almost feel the trees drinking the water up with their roots. This wood was very much alive.”

The scene where Diggory and Polly come to the world Jadis is from, where they feel the creepy atmosphere, the red light, the crumbling walls of the building, and all the beautiful, frozen people inside, is one that will stay with me for the rest of my life. The scene is so well written. I was going to pull out a quote, but the whole thing is good. It was impossible to choose.

The prose, as usual, is young, readable, but enjoyable. Lewis has a way of writing that can capture the attention of all age groups, and that is quite a feat.

The Magician’s Nephew is amazing, and deserves 5 stars.