Review: Rose Under Fire

Rose Under Fire
Code Name Verity, Book 2

Author: Elizabeth Wein
Pages: 368
Publisher: Disney Hyperion
Read: September 1-2, 2013
Source: ARC from publisher

Description from Goodreads:
While flying an Allied fighter plane from Paris to England, American ATA pilot and amateur poet, Rose Justice, is captured by the Nazis and sent to Ravensbrück, the notorious women's concentration camp. Trapped in horrific circumstances, Rose finds hope in the impossible through the loyalty, bravery and friendship of her fellow prisoners. But will that be enough to endure the fate that’s in store for her?

Elizabeth Wein, author of the critically-acclaimed and best-selling Code Name Verity, delivers another stunning WWII thriller. The unforgettable story of Rose Justice is forged from heart-wrenching courage, resolve, and the slim, bright chance of survival.

Previous Book in Series:
1: Code Name Verity

First Sentence: "I just got back from Celia Forester's funeral."

Review:

Code Name Verity is one of those rare books that awed both critics and actual readers. Initially, I almost DNFed Code Name Verity, but I ended up being seriously impressed with both Wein's writing and her gumption. At the same time, though, Code Name Verity never really got me right in the feels, the way it did so many other people. Thus, though I suspect it may not be a popular opinion, I love Rose Under Fire more than Code Name Verity. Once again, Wein's story is incredibly dark and daring, and with a powerful narrative voice.

As Rose Under Fire began, I really wasn't sure how I felt about Rose Justice. She's very different from Julie and Maddie, the heroines of Code Name Verity. Rose lacks their seriousness and their cleverness; she's not stupid, but she's a good deal more innocent and has seen less of life's dangers. Thus far, she's been sheltered and pampered, and, like many Americans setting off for the front, she sees the war as something romantic and anticipates performing heroic actions. She desperately hopes to be allowed to fly to France, stifling under the few jobs that American female civilian pilots are allowed to perform in the war effort.

Rose's narration fits her perfectly. Her sentences are long and push forward with excitement, as though venturing out in search of something exciting and wonderful. There's a perkiness to her in the beginning, a freshness, as well as a flair for the poetic, coming through in metaphors and unique word choices. As Rose's story darkens, the brightness and naivete seeps out of her narration, leaving her the same Rose, but weighted down by all that she has experienced.

Wein looks at World War II through a female lens, which is part of what makes these two books disparate from the mass of WWII fiction out there. The youth of the characters also distinguishes this series from the rest, particularly given the unflinching treatment Wein gives the dark subject matter. Wein does not shy away from the atrocities committed, and in Rose Under Fire she focuses on the concentration camps, particularly Ravensbrück.

Last year, I read a nonfiction novel about a train full of women sent to Auschwitz called A Train in Winter. As I read Rose's account of her time in Ravensbrück, I could not help compare this fictional experience with what I learned in A Train in Winter. That book puts forward the theory that the women were better able to survive in Auschwitz because of the way they all supported one another throughout the whole experience, putting the survival of the group over that of individuals, and creating a real family with their fellow prisoners. This same sort of spirit appears in Rose Under Fire, as Rose bonds with her bunk mates, the Rabbits. So many women survive Ravensbrück that might not have because of the way they all worked together and helped buoy one another's spirits. Those that did not survive will be remembered, their names memorized for posterity, and justice searched out in their honor.

The most heartrending aspect of Rose Under Fire is the accounting of the Rabbits, the women who make themselves into a protective family for Rose. These "rabbits" were medical test subjects. They were shot with bullets, given gangrene, amputated, and had bones removed from their legs so doctors could test cures for soldiers on the front. What these women went through is unbelievably horrific, but they are still such powerfully strong characters, such fighters, so desperate to live or at least get their story out. While the characters are fictional, real women went through these sorts of experiments and these tears that are slipping out of my eyes as I type (yes, this book did manage to make me cry) are for them. Wein's Afterword, in which she explains why she wrote this book, really drives the whole point of the book home.

Much as I loved this book, I was not a fan of Rose's poetry. Though I did quite enjoy Edna St. Vincent Millay's excerpts and the reference to Emily Dickinson in one of Rose's poems, I did not get Rose's. Most of them felt like prose chopped up into shorter lines to me. However, I will be the first to admit that I do not really get poetry. My heart and mind like prose. As such, I found myself generally skimming through her poems, since even reading them aloud didn't make them work for me, a technique that often helps me find the rhythm in the poetry and comprehend its beauty.

Rarely do books evoke so much of an emotional response from me, so suffice it to say that Rose Under Fire has every bit of the powerful emotional punch of Code Name Verity. I wouldn't really say that one or the other is a better book, but likely one will resonate more with each reader. I highly encourage readers to try these beautiful, emotional, historically resonant novels. Also, please note that while these are fabulous books for teen readers, they have wonderful crossover potential, and are good books to give out to skeptical adults who do not believe teen fiction can be literary.

Rating: 4.5/5

Favorite Quote: "Writing to you like this makes me feel that you are still alive. It's an illusion I've noticed before—words on a page are like oxygen to a petrol engine, firing up ghosts. It only lasts while the words are in your head. After you put down the paper or the pen, the pistons fall lifeless again."

Audiobook Review: The Bitter Kingdom

The Bitter Kingdom
Fire and Thorns, Book 3

Author: Rae Carson
Narrators: Jennifer Ikeda & Luis Moreno
Duration: 12 hrs, 57 mins
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Read: August 27-September 1, 2013
Source: Digital copy from publisher

Description from Goodreads:
The champion must not waver.
The champion must not fear.
The gate of darkness closes.

Elisa is a fugitive.

Her enemies have stolen the man she loves, and they await her at the gate of darkness. Her country is on the brink of civil war, with her own soldiers ordered to kill her on sight.

Her Royal Majesty, Queen Lucero-Elisa née Riqueza de Vega, bearer of the Godstone, will lead her three loyal companions deep into the enemy's kingdom, a land of ice and snow and brutal magic, to rescue Hector and win back her throne. Her power grows with every step, and the shocking secrets she will uncover on this, her final journey, could change the course of history.

But that is not all. She has a larger destiny. She must become the champion the world has been waiting for.

Even of those who hate her most.

Previous Books in Series:
1: The Girl of Fire and Thorns
2: The Crown of Embers

Review:

My relationship with Rae Carson's Fire and Thorns series is a complicated one, and probably always will be. When I first read The Girl of Fire and Thorns, I did not like it. As time passed and endless praise rolled in, I felt like maybe I'd not given the book a fair shot, so I tried again, this time with the audiobook. Why reread a book I didn't like? Because tastes can change. In this case, though, they really didn't. However, I still went ahead with the audiobook version of the series, which I'm sure would be looked at askance by many. Why would a person read the sequel to a book they've disliked twice? Because you never know. This time my persistence paid off, and I found myself wholly wrapped up in The Crown of Embers. Though I still have some rather large reservations about books two and three in the series, I also loved them in some ways. Make of that what you will.

Though I do love romance in books, it's not often what makes a book for me. Generally, I would say I love the characters first and the romance between them second. In the Fire and Thorns series, the romance comes first. The arc of this relationship gets a full five star fanfare of cellos and unicorn whinnies, okay? (I'm just going to assume that would sound awesome. Roll with it, yo.) Hector and Elisa go from having no real romantic attachment in book one (note that this is the book I didn't like), but with a nice solid foundation of respect and mutual admiration, to love and impending marriage in The Bitter Kingdom. They do so slowly and with quite a bit of swoon.

The ending scenes of this book almost made me happy cry, something I do much more easily than sad cry. Attending weddings of friends, I find a lot of the trappings of them quite sexist and unappealing. Carson's series is, I think, at its most beautiful and woman power-y right there at the end in a traditionally patriarchy-dominated ceremony. Hector loves that Elisa is powerful, and is man enough not to feel challenged by that, and just so much yes to all of that.

One of the key selling points of Fire and Thorns is Elisa's weight. There aren't many novels about non-skinny heroines, and even less so in the fantasy genre. Now, Elisa does lose a good deal of weight over the course of book one while tramping about in the desert. This did concern me a bit, especially since the romantic interest in her really kicks up at that juncture. However, now that it's done, I'm really happy with the portrayal of weight in the series. Elisa never gets thin or reaches her society's standard of beauty, which is slim like our society currently holds up as ideal. Elisa will always be curvy or even overweight. Hector finds her very sexually attractive, and that's fantastic. What really makes the portrayal of Elisa's weight issues so powerful, though, is that Elisa herself comes to love her own body and to stop yearning to be someone else with a different body type. The reason people are beautiful is their uniqueness, and Elisa's road to self-love has been long and bumpy, but she made it and I think I finally like her as well.

The Bitter Kingdom also spends much less time on the religion elements which made me so batty in book one. While I know this worked for some, I found the fact that it was basically relabeled Christianity both lazy and preachy. By The Bitter Kingdom, Elisa has no real idea what the deal is with god. She still prays and believes somewhat, but she's questioning. She no longer has that certainty that her way is right and is really seeking knowledge. Where before the series came off as dealing with religion, The Bitter Kingdom takes a much more theological angle, which I love. Fun fact: I minored in theology.

So far as the cast goes, this is one of those rare books where I feel things but don't really identify with the heroine. Though I do have some commonalities with Elisa, we have never been able to bond. I respect her now and admire her, but we would never be best friends (maybe because I'm plotting her death to steal Hector? - kidding...mostly). Hector is everything fabulous, and other YA love interests should learn from him. He walks the line between protective and trusting perfectly. There's a place for protecting your lady and a time to step back and let her get shit done, and he knows when to do which thing. My favorite characters are Mara and Belen, and they are both just the cutest. The Bitter Kingdom gave me a couple of new ships, and I actually would really like another book set in this world about one of them. *coughs* (Who would have thought, right?) I'm a little disappointed that Rosario basically didn't show up in this book, since the little prince is kind of important, but oh well. (I'm asking for more moppet? What has this book done to me and my values?) Oh also, Red is an incredibly adorable moppet as well, and, yeah, she's the best, even if her name is straight up My Little Pony.

The plot of The Bitter Kingdom meanders a little bit. There's a lot of journeying to one place and then hearing about a thing and needing to go somewhere else and OH HEY a plot point. It's not a huge issue, but I also wasn't really all that concerned about the plot overall. You basically know what the endgame is and ride that train all the way around the theme park until it gets to the final stop. There was one part that was straight out of Lord of the Rings basically, which was a little bit ridiculous to me, but, again, not a major problem for me either. Carson also took things a bit easily, with Lord of the Rings being a good comparison actually. The stakes are always really high, but she's not merciless to her characters, which I know some people love but I like knowing that anything could happen at any time.

Only one aspect of The Bitter Kingdom seriously irked me. To explain it, I will have to delve into SPOILERS in this section, so stop here if you do not want to know, mmkay? In The Bitter Kingdom, Carson throws in this huge world building twist, but doesn't really address it. She just throws it out there like it's no big deal and I'm like WHUT. Anyway, Elisa and company learn that if an Invierno mates with a Joyan, their offspring will be unable to reproduce. These offspring are referred to as mules.

Now, I seriously suck at science, but this immediately set off serious warning bells, because the reason mules, the product of horse and donkey sex, cannot reproduce is because they come from two disparate, if similar, species. Considering all of the racial themes in the series, this made me really uncomfortable, especially since the word mulatto, came from the same root word of mule. Now, it turns out the Joyans actually came to the planet and colonized it much like the Europeans came into the Americas, so they are actually not the same creatures, but I still feel like this is some really messy, sensitive subject matter to throw into book three. I especially do not feel like enough world building was put into this, since apparently one or the other of them is not human but alien. This begs so many questions. It's a pretty cool twist, but leaves me feeling hyper-curious and not entirely satisfied with the world building.

The audiobook versions of this series have been marvelous. Jennifer Ikeda does a fabulous job with the different characters all the way through. I'm not as thrilled with the casting of Hector, who sounds a bit too much like Kevin Spacey for any guy as sexy and hispanic as Hector is in my head. Still, he doesn't do a bad job. I'm also not entirely sure Hector's POV was necessary in The Bitter Kingdom, but whatever.

Rae Carson's Fire and Thorns series is one that I do think is well worth reading, even if it has always been varying degrees of problematic for me personally. The series gets better as it goes along, and features one of the best and healthiest romantic relationships.

Rating: 4.5/5

Review: The 5th Wave

The 5th Wave
The 5th Wave, Book 1

Author: Rick Yancey
Pages: 480
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile
Publication Date: May 7, 2013
Source: Gifted - Thanks Audrey!

Description from Goodreads:
The Passage meets Ender’s Game in an epic new series from award-winning author Rick Yancey.

After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother—or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up.

First Sentence: "There will be no awakening."

Does It Pass the Bechdel Test? Only sort of. Cassie talks to a female doctor. It's not a long conversation, but I guess it counts. That's it, though. For the most part, the female characters (of which there are four that are alive) don't talk to one another.

Review:

Anyone who follows my book haul vlogs or my Twitter probably knows how excited I was for this book. The preliminary reviews convinced me that this book and I were destined to have a great love affair, that it would break me emotionally, and end the fairly long streak of lackluster post-apocalytpic/dystopian fiction I've been on. Well, The 5th Wave is good, and I can see why everyone's been loving it, but, perhaps because of the hype, it wasn't everything I dreamed it would be.

The 5th Wave hooked me right from the start. What really sets this book apart from the bulk of young adult fiction is the air of hopelessness that permeates this post-alien attack vision of Cincinnati. Cassie is a hard heroine, determined to survive for as long as she can, afraid she might be the last actual human alive. The 1st wave of the alien attack was an EMP, knocking out all technology in an instant. The 2nd wave stirred the oceans and killed those on the coast. The 3rd wave was a plague, carried by birds, that killed all but a few naturally immune or able to fight off the infection. The 4th wave consisted of the Silencers, sleeper agent aliens within human bodies. At this point, 7 billion people are dead, and the enemy could be anyone.

Too often, apocalypses in young adult fiction don't really wreak all that much destruction. Humanity seems to have a serious fighting chance, but Yancey's world is suitably bleak enough to please me. With the 5th wave feared and anticipated every moment, humanity hardly seems to have a chance in hell of surviving. I love how high the stakes are in this book, and that Yancey doesn't pull punches. The 5th Wave is dark and intense.

As the novel opens and we meet Cassie, we learn her rules for living, the first of which is to shoot anyone else she meets on sight. She knows that aliens are walking around in human guise, because she saw them murder her father, shortly after her brother, Sammy, and the other children were rescued by soldiers. As such, Cassie trusts no one. Cassie will kill to protect herself, without waiting to find out if the other person is human or alien, because there's no way to know, and she has to stay alive to find Sammy. It's not just Cassie, though. Every single surviving person in this world has blood on their hands. No one comes through these experiences innocent, and that is my favorite aspect of the novel.

Yancey's writing is beautiful too, complex and in no way talking down to the audience. He is even at turns poetic. This would be one of the rare YA books I would recommend to adults who normally turn up their noses at books for teens, because I think the writing and darkness of the subject matter will hold appeal for adult readers as well, even snobby ones.

However, much as I love the concept and the writing itself, Yancey's use of perspectives didn't really work for me. I had three main concerns with his use of multiple points of view. First, I had trouble discerning Cassie's narration from Zombie's, and was really thrown when the POV switched, even going so far as to wonder if Cassie was a boy all along and I'd missed something. I simply could not tell their voices apart except by seeing where they were or a gender reference.

Second, there are two perspectives used for only one chapter, while the rest of the story bounces between Cassie and Zombie. As a general rule, if a perspective is going to appear once, it's best not to use it at all, and I think that holds true here. Nothing was learned from those two single-use perspectives that could not have been discovered later with greater impact. The use of one of these even, whether intentionally or no, spoils a plot twist that could have been startling.

Third, the chapter from the perspective of Sammy is in third person, while the rest are in first. Rarely do I approve of this technique in multiple points of view either, however, it can be done to great stylistic effect, intentionally distancing the audience from a particular perspective to represent how closed off that character is. In this case, though, I fail to fathom this authorial decision. For what reason should the reader be distanced from Sammy? This section could have been emotionally resonant, following a scared, confused five-year-old through his experiences in this harsh landscape. Instead, the third person narration alternates between Sammy's childish thoughts and observations obviously coming from the narrator. Done in first person, this section could have highlighted Yancey's skill writing perspective, but, alas, this was not done.

Even though Cassie and Zombie were written in first person, I also failed to really connect with them. In Zombie's case, I suspect this was because he sounded like Cassie to me, so didn't really become his own person in my head. Cassie, though, I was well-disposed to like, and was bonding to in the beginning. Unfortunately, she stopped acting like the Cassie of the outset and embarked on an instalove romance. To be fair, the romance was not instalove from her side, but she pursued the relationship as well, and the whole thing made me roll my eyes. The one plus I will give the romance in this book is that I'm not entirely sure who Yancey wants Cassie to end up with in the end.

Overall, I very much enjoyed The 5th Wave and will be eagerly anticipating the sequel. Readers who enjoy dark, action-packed novels will want to pick this one up, as will those who liked The Host or Animorphs, but want something much more intense.

Rating: 3.5/5

Favorite Quote: 

"'From what you've told me about the Silencers, its not logical to rally anywhere.'
     'Or stay anywhere longer than a few days. Keep your numbers small and keep moving.'
     'Until . . . ?'
     'There is no until,' I snap at him. 'There's just unless.'"

Review: Dark Triumph

Dark Triumph
His Fair Assassin, Book 2

Author: R.L. LaFevers
Pages: 400
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children
Publication Date: April 2, 2013
Source: Gifted by Little Shop of Stories

Description from Goodreads:
Sybella arrives at the convent’s doorstep half mad with grief and despair. Those that serve Death are only too happy to offer her refuge—but at a price. Naturally skilled in both the arts of death and seduction, the convent views Sybella as one of their most dangerous weapons.

But those assassin’s skills are little comfort when the convent returns her to a life that nearly drove her mad. Her father’s rage and brutality are terrifying, and her brother’s love is equally monstrous. And while Sybella is a weapon of justice wrought by the god of Death himself, He must give her a reason to live. When she discovers an unexpected ally imprisoned in the dungeons, will a daughter of Death find something other than vengeance to live for?

This heart-pounding sequel to Grave Mercy serves betrayal, treachery, and danger in equal measure, bringing readers back to fifteenth century Brittany and will keep them on the edge of their seats.

Prior Book in Series:
1: Grave Mercy

First Sentence: "I did not arrive at the convent of Saint Mortain some green stripling."

Review:

I have made no secret of my immense love of Grave Mercy, and have been recommending it to everyone I know who enjoys historical fiction, fantasy, and kickass heroines. As with every sequel to a book I loved, trepidation filled me as I approached Dark Triumph. There's always that chance that the sequel will not live up to its predecessor and will color your enjoyment even of that first book. Robin LaFevers, though, hits her sequel out of the park. Dark Triumph does not fall victim to middle book syndrome and even surpasses Grave Mercy.

Grave Mercy was fairly dark, but still a nice readalike for Maria V. Snyder or Kristin Cashore. Dark Triumph is even darker, not a novel I would recommend to those who do not like unhappy tales. Sybella's dark past makes what Ismae went through look like a healthy childhood, and, those who read Grave Mercy, know that Ismae's youth was no picnic. Ismae and Duval do make a couple of appearances in Dark Triumph, and it's startling how much more optimistic and friendly Ismae is in comparison to Sybella.

My attachment to Ismae formed immediately in Grave Mercy, but Sybella took me some time to adjust to. She's darker, moodier, more pained, and sometimes verges on crazy, though one can't blame her. However, as I got used to her and came to know more about why she is the way she is, I became even more bonded to Sybella, and even more desirous for her to overcome the horrors of her life.

Sybella's childhood, I will reiterate yet again, was...there aren't really words for it. Her father, d'Albret, used her as a pawn, and she had to watch him kill off wife after wife. Two of her brothers sexually abused her, one for the fun of it and one from a misguided sense of love. Her past is without brightness, and I'm warning you now of triggers for rape and incest. On top of that, there is a whole lot of violence.

One of the main criticisms I've seen of Grave Mercy, even from those that liked it, had to do with the circumstances of the consummation of Ismae's romance. It was seen as a bit of a cop-out, as though Ismae needed an excuse to have sex. In Dark Triumph, the same could not be said. Sybella has had more than one sexual partner, some willed and some not, and does not have any hesitancy about having sex when she desires it. Sybella seems a bit more empowered than Ismae, and will likely be a big hit with those disappointed by that part of Grave Mercy.

The romance in Dark Triumph makes me even happier than that in Grave Mercy. Though I do think this series could just as easily have been marketed to an adult audience, I love that this book will be going to a young adult audience. LaFevers tosses aside convention and delivers a hero utterly unlike those to be found in the bulk of YA romances. He is not handsome; in fact, he is described as ugly more than once. That does not make him unlovable to Sybella or to me. This message is so important for teens, the importance of personality and common interests over physical appearance.

If you loved Grave Mercy, get excited, because you will surely love Dark Triumph too. If you were in the camp of readers who thought LaFevers pulled some punches in the first book, then I urge you to give this installment a try, because it is much darker and more unique. My love for Robin LaFevers' writing has been firmly cemented, and I shall proceed to wait impatiently for the third His Fair Assassin novel.

Rating: 4.5/5

Favorite Quote: "'Jewels can be replaced, my cousin. Independence, once lost, cannot.'"

Review + Giveaway: Firebrand

Firebrand
Rebel Angels, Book 1

Author: Gillian Philip
Pages: 368
Publisher: Tor Books
Source: Unsolicited Copy for Review

Description from Goodreads:
At the end of the sixteenth century, religious upheaval brings fear, superstition, and doubt to the lives of mortals. Yet unbeknownst to them, another world lies just beyond the Veil: the realm of the Sithe, a fierce and beautiful people for whom a full-mortal life is but the blink of an eye. The Veil protects and hides their world…but it is fraying at the edges, and not all think it should be repaired.

Discarded by his mother and ignored by his father, sixteen-year-old Seth MacGregor has grown up half wild in his father’s fortress, with only his idolized older brother, Conal, for family. When Conal quarrels with the Sithe queen and is forced into exile in the full-mortal world, Seth volunteers to go with him.

But life beyond the Veil is even more dangerous than they expected, and Seth and Conal soon find themselves embroiled in a witch-hunt—in which they are the quarry. Trapped between the queen’s machinations at home and the superstitious violence of the otherworld, Seth must act before both of them are fed to the witch-hunters’ fires…

Brimming with intrigue and rebellion, Firebrand is the first book in the Rebel Angels series by Gillian Philip, the Carnegie Medal–nominated author of Crossing the Line and multi-award-nominated Bad Faith.

First Sentence: "The courtyard stinks of animals and much and human waste."

Review:

What I'm realizing lately is that I have different requirements for fantasy than for most other genres, particularly fantasy of a more classic, epic vein. Where I don't mind essentially plotless books in realistic fiction or science fiction, characters drifting and just living out their lives, it really doesn't work for me in fantasy. Now, I don't mean that nothing happens in Firebrand; in fact, a lot happens, much of it exciting, but there's no driving, overarching plot. When I read fantasy, I want there to be a clear goal from the outset, whether it be a quest or a villain to defeat or whatever. Firebrand does not follow this style and, thus, I enjoyed it less than I'd hoped, though it's a well done novel.

Since the hero is 16, Firebrand has been getting some attention as possibly being YA, though its imprint is not. Though Seth is 16 through most of it, the story is told like he's an old man looking back on his life. This removes some of the immediacy and means that he comes off more like a grownup than a teen. He occasionally reflects on things he would have done differently had he known then what he knows now, making sure the reader remembers this. I really wouldn't call Firebrand YA.

The world itself is very cool. There's a sort of parallel universe vibe. Basically, Seth and his people live in one world and beyond the Veil lies another, the land of the full-mortals, our distant, unwashed ancestors. They can pass between the Veil, but they are persecuted for witchcraft there, not being normal by full-mortal standards. I love stories about a world of magic hidden within the ordinary one, and I love how it ties into history here.

Seth and his half-brother, Conal, have an interesting relationship. Seth, not by nature especially trusting, assumes that his brother will want his death, but Conal is actually the sweetest guy, and essentially raises Seth. Their love for one another, even when they very much do not agree on important matters is touching, and not the sort of relationship I've seen much of in fiction. None of the other connections rang as true or mattered as much as this one. Seth does fall in love, but he would still choose his brother over his woman any day.

One thing I do need to mention about the romantic relationships is that I like that Philip didn't use a cop-out. The Sithe can essentially live forever, so long as they don't get killed (or at least so long that it feels like forever compared to our lifespans). The full-mortals have lifespans of 16th century humans, so not long. One of the Sithe falls in love with a human, and I love that Philip didn't come up with some loophole that would let their love last forever.

If action-based fantasy is your thing, there's a good bit of sword play and fighting. As I said, there's a lot that happens, but I just couldn't get especially caught up in the story, a combination of the lack of driving plot and the storytelling method, which means you know Seth will survive ultimately. I was, however, entertained and I didn't have to struggle through the 364 pages. It's good, but not necessarily the ideal book for me.

Firebrand is well-written and has a fascinating concept, but is more ideal for a different type of fantasy fan. I probably will not be reading the next book, just because there are so many other books out there I would probably like more, and I'm okay with where Firebrand ended.

Rating: 3/5

Favorite Quote: "'A woman can admire a man without being in love with him,' she told me acidly. 'A woman can be grateful to a man, and think he's a good and brave and decent human being, without being in love with him.'"

Giveaway:
I'm passing my copy along to one of my readers. US/CAN only, since I'm shipping, sorry. Just fill out the Rafflecopter.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Review + Giveaway: Shadow on the Crown

Shadow on the Crown
Emma of Normandy, Book 1

Author: Patricia Bracewell
Pages: 416
Publisher: Viking Adult
Source: Publisher for Review

Description from Goodreads:
A rich tale of power and forbidden love revolving around a young medieval queen

In 1002, fifteen­-year-old Emma of Normandy crosses the Narrow Sea to wed the much older King Athelred of England, whom she meets for the first time at the church door. Thrust into an unfamiliar and treacherous court, with a husband who mistrusts her, stepsons who resent her and a bewitching rival who covets her crown, Emma must defend herself against her enemies and secure her status as queen by bearing a son.

Determined to outmaneuver her adversaries, Emma forges alliances with influential men at court and wins the affection of the English people. But her growing love for a man who is not her husband and the imminent threat of a Viking invasion jeopardize both her crown and her life.

Based on real events recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Shadow on the Crown introduces readers to a fascinating, overlooked period of history and an unforgettable heroine whose quest to find her place in the world will resonate with modern readers.

First Sentence: "She made a circuit of the clearing among the oaks, tree times round and three times back whispering spells of protection."

Review:

I read a fair amount of historical fiction, but so much of it covers the same eras and places over and over again. Not that there's not a lot to draw from in Tudor or Regency England, or from WWI and WWII, but it's so refreshing to read historicals that draw from other eras, ones that I know less about. In fact, I knew nothing about the time period in which Shadow on the Crown is set, early eleventh century Europe, primarily England. Bracewell draws a brilliant portrait of a young woman sent to foreign shores to be Queen of England.

Shadow on the Crown captured me immediately. The beautiful writing and vibrant characters pulled me into this past era and made me want to stay there for a while. Bracewell has a knack for description and sets the scene so well. She introduces her rather large cast of similarly named characters with a deft hand, and I had no trouble remember which names corresponded to which characters.

Emma, though a product of her age, is not a weak woman by any means. In fact, her brother sends her to wed Athelred, King of England, instead of her older sister, because he thinks she will be of more use. Though intimidated by her new role in life, Emma does not cower or shrink. She confronts Athelred with her thoughts and opinions, though he has no wish to hear them. I love her for her spunk, and I felt horribly for every horrible thing she went through, of which there were many.

Emma's relationship with Athelred is rocky. He is accustomed to a weaker wife, and ends up seeking pleasure in other arms, scheming ones. Though she doesn't miss him, Emma needs an heir to cement her role as queen. Further complicating matters are Emma's mutual feelings for someone so close to her but so out of reach. Their love is heartbreaking in its dedicatedness in the face of lack of hope.

All of the characters are well-drawn, not just Emma. Especially fascinating is Athelred, haunted by the memory of his brother Edward, slain so Athelred could have the crown. Beset by his inner demons, Athelred descends into ever-worsening spirals of paranoia and cruelty. Even Elgiva, the scheming sexpot from the Northern part of the country is more complex than she at first seems. I love that Bracewell took the time to add depth to even minor characters, like Hilde, daughter of a traitor.

In so much of the historical fiction I've read, England is a strong country, dominant on the political scene or at least a force to be reckoned with. In Shadow on the Crown, England is sorely pressed to keep the Vikings from taking over. Though there are not many conflicts that occur within the pages of the novel, the Vikings are a looming menace throughout. The Viking attack scenes that do happen are intense.

Towards the end, the pace of the book did slow a bit for me. I started worrying that everything would not be able to wrap up, and it didn't. Evidently there are more books in the works, though this information is not yet on Goodreads, so I made up my own series title. I am not completely happy of the ending of this installment, but if I had the next book within reach, I would eagerly dive into it. I must know what happens to Emma, and will try to resist the urge to google that.

Historical fiction fans, do yourselves a favor and procure a copy of Patricia Bracewell's Shadow on the Crown. I expect that I'll be reading many more Bracewell books in the future.

Rating: 4.5/5

Favorite Quote: "'You are not the first bride, Emma, to go to the bed of a foreign king, and you must be very clear about what is expected of you. Bear in mind that you go to your lord not as a woman, but as a queen. In the same way, he comes to you not as a man, but as a king. He will not be father to you, not lover, nor even friend. Do not expect it. All you can expect from his hands is what any of his subjects can expect, and that is justice and mercy. You, as queen, though, must demand one thing more. You must demand his respect. Never forget that for a moment, and never do anything that might cause you to forfeit it.'"

Giveaway:
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Audiobook Review: Earth Unaware

Earth Unaware
The First Formic War, Book 1

Authors: Orson Scott Card & Aaron Johnston
Narrators: Stefan Rudnicki, Stephen Howe, Arthur Morey, Vikas Adam, Emily Janice Card, Gabrielle de Cuir, Rozanne Hernandez
Duration: 13 hrs, 59 mins
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Source: Own

Description from Goodreads:
A hundred years before Ender's Game, humans thought they were alone in the galaxy. Humanity was slowly making their way out from Earth to the planets and asteroids of the Solar System, exploring and mining and founding colonies.

The mining ship El Cavador is far out from Earth, in the deeps of the Kuiper Belt, beyond Pluto. Other mining ships, and the families that live on them, are few and far between this far out. So when El Cavador’s telescopes pick up a fast-moving object coming in-system, it’s hard to know what to make of it. It’s massive and moving at a significant fraction of the speed of light. But the ship has other problems. Their systems are old and failing. The family is getting too big. There are claim-jumping corporates bringing Asteroid Belt tactics to the Kuiper Belt. Worrying about a distant object that might or might not be an alien ship seems…not important.

They're wrong. It's the most important thing that has happened to the human race in a million years. This is humanity's first contact with an alien race. The First Formic War is about to begin.

Review:

I've read Ender's Game two or three times, and I love it. Needless to say, the fact that it was getting a prequel series filled me with curiosity and trepidation in about equal measures. While finding out about first contact with the aliens could be interesting, Card could definitely much it all up with his asshole opinions. Turns out, though, that this was mostly neither. Card didn't assault me with a religious message, but this book also just was not that good.

The first chapters of Earth Unaware are simply interminable. I cannot for the life of me fathom why Card and Johnston thought that it would be an awesome idea to start the book the way they did. Up until the time the aliens make an appearance and the action scenes begin, this book was incredibly boring.

The entire novel is told in alternating third person limited. Most of the time, the narration follows three main characters: Victor, Lem, and Wit. However, interspersed between these are brief sections from the points of view of other characters. These I found a bit obnoxious, particularly when the novel lost the nice orderly method of starting a new chapter for each new perspective. Also annoying is the fact that Wit's storyline never really syncs up with the others, though I do know why he's included.

Alright, now that you have the gist of it, you need to hear about the first chapter. We begin with Victor, a teenager and accomplished mechanic.When we meet him, he is in the midst of all of the angst. He and his second cousin, Alejandra, have been accused of inappropriate feelings for one another, much too close for cousins. Because of their improper closeness, Alejandra is being zogged, married off to someone on another mining ship.

Victor at first whines about the unfairness of this accusation, pissed off that no one understands that they are but friends. Then, he thinks of a time when Alejandra gave him 'a look,' and decides that she did have feelings for him. As he continues to ponder this, he decides that he too loves her, and that she has been sent away for the best, and that he too must leave El Cavador, their family's mining vessel, sometime soon because he cannot get over her surrounded by memories of her. Also, I feel like they must be trying to make some sort of statement, since, otherwise, the same feeling could have been established without their being related.

That is the entire first chapter. Honestly, I have NO clue whether Card and Johnston want people to root for the two of them or to be disgusted at the thought of second cousins in love or what. Worse still, it became apparent that this incredibly unpleasant plot device had been put in place solely to up the melodrama of the novel. This gives everyone a reason to mope about and be sad and do stupid things in an attempt to find her. All they do with her character is kill her off, without the reader ever meeting her. Later in the book, Victor even realizes that he didn't love her like that after all, a revelation that incensed me even more after having had to listen to so much of his weepy angst over their separation.

Another thing that bothered me about this opening and the novel in general was the sexism. When charges were brought against the two, Alejandra was sent away from her home to be married off hastily as punishment, and Victor had no change in status, except for extra sympathy from some and anger from Alejandra's father. Really? Apparently, future humans do not believe in the strength of women at all, having regressed from the current climate. With the notable exception of El Cavador's captain and a teenage girl who works the eye (which watches for threats to the ship), the women all stick to traditional female roles, like parenting. None get to help defend the ship. Two strong female characters do not make up for suggesting that in the future most women will be forced back into a powerless role. Also, highlight for spoiler: both of the strong female characters, along with all the men, die because of the emotional decisions of the female captain.

Lem, too, is annoying; all of his sections consist of his bitching and moaning about his daddy issues. *yawns* Wit was my favorite perspective, but it felt like Card and Johnston continually forgot he was there. Much was made in his introduction of the recruitment of Mazer Rackham, a name I recognize from Ender's Game, though I do not remember the significance, but nothing else is made of him for the rest of the book, which is incredibly sloppy.

If, however, you feel compelled to read everything set in the Enderverse, then I recommend audio over print, because I definitely think I would have had to DNF the physical book.

Rating: 2/5

Narration:
Macmillan Audio procured an almost full cast for this production, using a different voice actor for the different third person perspectives. Most of them do a pretty good job, though I really think they could have chosen better voice actors in several cases and done a better job with accents. The worst casting error in my opinion was Victor. He's supposed to be a teenager, but the voice actor sounds much older. The crew of El Cavador is hispanic, but only some of the voice actors used an accent when reading. In the cast of accents, it should really be all or nothing.

The best narration was done by the guy who voiced Wit. He has this incredibly deep voice that perfectly matched the gruff soldier. However, he also was a whiz with accents and could change the depth of his voice to match the different characters. It seems as though the producers knew this guy was the best, because he, for some reason, voiced for two characters' perspectives, while everyone else just voiced one. Sure, one of them only had a very short section, but, still, couldn't they hire someone for that?

Rating: 3/5

Overall Rating: 2.5/5

Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone

Daughter of Smoke and Bone
Daughter of Smoke and Bone, Book 1

Author: Laini Taylor
Pages: 417
Publisher: Little, Brown & Company
Source: Own

Description from Goodreads:
Around the world, black hand prints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages—not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.

When one of the strangers—beautiful, haunted Akiva—fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

First Sentence: "Walking to school over the snow-muffled cobbles, Karou had no sinister premonitions about the day."

Review:

One of the interesting things about being late to read a really hyped book is that everyone reports to you with their predictions of and hope for your reaction to the title. There's no doubt that Daughter of Smoke and Bone has been heavily hyped. Despite that, my expectations remained relatively low, because I'd heard of instalove and angels, neither of which generally work for me. While this book did not turn out to be a five star read for me as it has been for so many, DOSAB actually impressed much more than I ever could have anticipated.

Laini Taylor writes beautifully. Her prose has an edge to it that results in an entirely different atmosphere than I'm used to reading, and that was so unbelievably refreshing. Something about the phrasing really sold me on the foreign setting as well. The characters and setting and syntax did not feel American. Taylor's writing bursts with dark humor, which I just love. Seriously, the amount that I love her writing can hardly be overstated.

If I had to use a single word to sum up DOSAB, I met say 'refreshing,' because this book has a feeling all its own. Though on the surface, the plot seems somewhat ho-hum, another special snowflake set to fall in love with the super gorgeous paranormal hero, that barely scratches the surface. Laini has clearly put a ridiculous amount of thought into the building of this world. She has created an incredibly vivid landscape that came alive in my mind.

Karou sets herself apart from the garden variety heroine very quickly. Yes, she can make wishes and have them come true because of the chimaeras that raised her, and, yes, she will fall in instalove with a sexy paranormal, but she has so much verve that makes her just Karou and like no one else. Karou has blue hair (thanks to a wish), tattoos, and speaks numerous languages (also thanks to wishes). She attends art school in Prague, and has a clear passion for drawing. Brimstone, Karou's chimaera guardian taught her how to defend herself too, so she also kicks ass. When we meet her, Karou has recently dumped her first boyfriend Kaz, whom she thought she loved and with whom she had sex for the first time. Karou is a much edgier, darker heroine than can generally be found in young adult fiction and I loved her snark.

Her best friend, Zuzana, however, totally stole the show. I freaking adore Zuzana. For one thing, it's completely wonderful to get to read about a real friendship like theirs. They share ideas for projects, play delightful-sounding games together at their favorite cafe (for example How much would your life have to suck to want the Apocalypse?), and actually talk about stresses in Zuzana's life, not just those in Karou's. In fact, Karou cares so much that she scheduled a trip out of her way just to buy a present for Zuzana. This was such a delight after so many YA heroine using their supposed BFFs as doormats. Zuzana has an even darkier, dirtier wit than Karou. Also, she and Mik are so completely adorable, although a bit to prone to PDA.

As much as I geared up to hate the instalove in DOSAB, that aspect of the book really did not bother me. Karou and Akiva certainly do trade some eyerollingly cheesy lines, but they're not nearly as ridiculous as most instaloving characters. They do at least both show some evidence of a personality, which always help. What really made this okay, though, was Taylor's writing and the fact that there's sort of a reason for all of this.

Oh, also, I need to mention again how cool the creatures in here are. The chimaeras are like nothing I've read about before. More surprisingly, so are the angels. Taylor's seraphs are definitely my favorite angels thus far. Why? Because they have nothing whatsoever to do with religion! That reminds me of another thing I loved: each group of creatures had their own explanation for the creation of the universe.

Up to this point, I have pretty much been raving. Here's where I had to mark the book down. Through roughly the first half of the book, DOSAB could even conceivably have earned a 4.5 from me. However, most of the last half consisted of flashbacks to Akiva's relationship with his first love, the late Madrigal. While I see that these contained necessary information for the reader, they bored me quite a bit. Akive evinces a bit more personality, but does not have enough charisma to carry my interest. Madrigal, sadly, interested me not at all; she seems to have so little to her. Basically, as long as these flashbacks continued, I kept hoping that the end of the next chapter would bring me back to the present time with Karou. When they're finally over, so is the book. Le sigh.

Anyway, I ordered Days of Blood and Starlight when I was only partway through and will be devouring that very soon. From the reviews and statuses I've seen about that one, I suspect it will be a much stronger read for me.

Rating: 3.5/5

Favorite Quote:

"'I don't know many rules to live by,' he'd said. 'But here's one. It's simple. Don't put anything unnecessary into yourself. No poisons or chemicals, no fumes or smoke or alcohol, no sharp objects, no inessential needles—drug or tattoo—and . . . no inessential penises, either.'
   'Inessential penises?' Karou had repeated, delighted with the phrase in spite of her grief. 'Is there any such thing as an essential one?'
   'When an essential one comes along, you'll know,' he'd replied."

Audiobook Review: The Girl of Fire and Thorns Reread

The Girl of Fire and Thorns
Fire and Thorns, Book 1

Author: Rae Carson
Narrator: Jennifer Ikeda
Duration: 12 hrs, 9 mins
Publisher: Harper Audio
Source: Library

Description from Goodreads:
Once a century, one person is chosen for greatness.

Elisa is the chosen one.

But she is also the younger of two princesses, the one who has never done anything remarkable. She can't see how she ever will.

Now, on her sixteenth birthday, she has become the secret wife of a handsome and worldly king—a king whose country is in turmoil. A king who needs the chosen one, not a failure of a princess.

And he's not the only one who seeks her. Savage enemies seething with dark magic are hunting her. A daring, determined revolutionary thinks she could be his people's savior. And he looks at her in a way that no man has ever looked at her before. Soon it is not just her life, but her very heart that is at stake.

Elisa could be everything to those who need her most. If the prophecy is fulfilled. If she finds the power deep within herself. If she doesn’t die young.

Most of the chosen do.

Review:
I have always loved rereading, and with my memory it's both a necessity (if I want to remember any details of my favorite books) and a pleasure. Even once I have a book pretty well ensconced in my head, I love to revisit the characters, to discover intricacies of the plot or little jokes that previously escaped me. On first rereads, I can be caught off guard by twists I had forgotten. In this case, though, my first reread of a book I've reviewed on my blog, I am rereading a book I didn't care for originally. You see, I read it and it left a bad taste in my mouth, but then everyone with similar taste read it and thought it was awesome, and I just felt I had to try again. Unfortunately, I still don't love it, but I do think I was a bit overly harsh in my first assessment, when I simply was not in the mood for the story.

I have two main issues with The Girl of Fire and Thorns: Elisa and religion. I'll discuss Elisa first. Initially, I was very excited to read a fantasy novel centering around an overweight heroine. Such a thing simply isn't seen. You do get some muscular heroines (like Kel from Tamora Pierce's Protector of the Small Quartet) who stand out from the svelte, trim crowd, but an unfit heroine...not so much. Then I met Elisa. She irritates the heck out of me. When the reader first meets her, she has sister issues like crazy, no self-esteem, hates herself for being fat, and eats everything in sight. Because of her inferiority complex, she moans and whimpers, blaming everyone else for her own shortcomings.

What I hoped for was a plus size heroine who would be okay with her size, but, instead, Elisa hates herself for it, yet refuses to do anything about it, taking a sort of perverse comfort in not trying, because she doesn't think she could live up to Alodia anyway. She does, through the course of the story, lose some of the weight, though she never becomes slender. With the loss of weight, her sense of self improves, and she looks at her previous clothing and deems it a tent, judging her former self. If she doesn't have sympathy for herself, why should I? She does sort of comes to term with her size, whatever it may be, to some degree later, I felt, but only because she found a boy she knew would love her no matter what she weighed. Again, I would really like this to come from inside. Maybe I'm being too picky because something about her narration just grates on me, but this is how I felt.

Pretty much the only thing I like about her in those first couple of chapters is how she wishes for an old, ugly husband or one with pock marks, even if it is so he won't be disappointed in her. Of course, what she actually gets is the most beautiful man she's ever seen, King Alejandro. For all that she hates how attractive she is, she kind of swoons all over him for a while, falling prey to his charms without really knowing anything about him.

I will give Elisa this, though. When the chips are down, she usually steps up. In quiet moments and social situations, she feels awkward and comforts herself with food and hatred of herself and others. In the midst of adventure, her mettle shows through. I like that Elisa so much better, and, thankfully, she comes to the forefront as the novel progresses. Even at the end, though, there's something about her that just grates, though I can't put my finger on precisely what. Oh, and I know this isn't a smooth transition but this thought doesn't merit a full paragraph, I could have done without a full chapter that kept mentioning how she'd pissed herself. Mentioning it once is good enough; I can remember it happened without constant descriptions of the acrid smell, okay?

Anyway, moving on to religion, Elisa happens to be the bearer of the Godstone, the Chosen One. This sounds really exciting and comes with some nice bling (a big jewel in her belly that appeared when she was a baby), but mostly just means she has to pray a lot and likely eventually give her life in service. For those that don't know, I am not religious, but I did minor in theology, so I do have some tolerance for religious discussions. I do not, however, generally like it to be a main theme in my novels. Sure, this religion has been made up, but aren't they all? The constant praying and such just wears on me. Again, this is my own issue, and other readers obviously weren't bothered, but, for those who are sensitive to such things, be forewarned.

As far as the other characters go, I really wasn't interested in most of them. The only female character I like is the prickly Cosmé. I appreciate her candor and her refusal to pretend to like people when she doesn't. Alejandro, Elisa's hottie husband, is incredibly weak and pathetic. He just bores me to tears. Hector, his man-at-arms, hasn't been given a ton of personality yet, but fits into the same archetype as the heroes from Grave Mercy and Touch of Power, so I like him thus far. Humberto, Cosmé brother is a sweetheart and reminds me a lot of a puppy. Rosario, Alejandro's son, actually was one of my favorite characters. He already has way more sense than his father.

The best thing about the novel, what really saved it from being all the way down in the 'didn't like it' end of my rating scale is that Carson does do some surprising things. While much of the book did feel unoriginal, she throws in some genuine twists. She's not afraid to hurt her characters, and I love that in an author. I hope she continues to take the plot in somewhat surprising directions.

I will be listening to Crown of Embers shortly, and I hope I like Elisa a bit better in that installment. I've seen The Girl of Fire and Thorns compared to Kristin Cashore's novels or Maria V. Snyder's and so far, I don't see it, but I'm going to give the series another shot.

Rating: 2.5/5

Narration:
Jennifer Ikeda's narration fits the story very well. She has a gift for accents, which helps keep the characters clear and separate in my mind. The voices she gave suited the characters well, and at no time did her narration make me roll my eyes. Her tone suited Elisa quite well, I felt. Her voice was an easy one to pay attention to.

Rating: 4/5

Audio or Print?:
In this case, the audio worked much better for me, since I really liked Ikeda's narration. This made me try to think more kindly on Elisa, although obviously that was only somewhat successful.

Overall Rating: 3/5

Audiobook Review: Carnival of Souls

Carnival of Souls
Carnival of Souls, Book 1

Author: Melissa Marr
Narrator: James Marsters
Duration: 8 hrs, 5 mins
Publisher: Harper Audio
Source: Harper Audio for review

Description from Goodreads:
In a city of daimons, rigid class lines separate the powerful from the power-hungry. And at the heart of The City is the Carnival of Souls, where both murder and pleasure are offered up for sale. Once in a generation, the carnival hosts a deadly competition that allows every daimon a chance to join the ruling elite. Without the competition, Aya and Kaleb would both face bleak futures--if for different reasons. For each of them, fighting to the death is the only way to try to live.

All Mallory knows of The City is that her father--and every other witch there--fled it for a life in exile in the human world. Instead of a typical teenage life full of friends and maybe even a little romance, Mallory scans quiet streets for threats, hides herself away, and trains to be lethal. She knows it's only a matter of time until a daimon finds her and her father, so she readies herself for the inevitable. While Mallory possesses little knowledge of The City, every inhabitant of The City knows of her. There are plans for Mallory, and soon she, too, will be drawn into the decadence and danger that is the Carnival of Souls.

From Melissa Marr, bestselling author of the Wicked Lovely series and "Graveminder," comes a brand-new tale of lush secrets, dark love, and the struggle to forge one's own destiny.

Review:
I've been a Melissa Marr fan since Wicked Lovely, though I admit that I've gotten way behind, having missed reading several of her more recent books. This one, though, I simply knew that I had to listen to, because James Martsters, so I made time. Melissa Marr's newest differs quite a bit from her Wicked Lovely series, but shares the dark romance and gritty world building that I enjoyed so much in those books.

Mallory has been raised knowing that daimons and witches exist, that her father, Adam, is a witch. Because of something he stole from the daimon ruler, she and Adam move constantly, and she's never had the chance to get close to anyone but him. What the reader knows and Mallory does not is that what Adam Stole is Mallory, the daughter of the daimon ruler, Marchosias. She is a daimon, but has been trained how to kill them, tutored on the use of firearms.

Witches and daimons do not get along. They fought wars over The City, and the daimons won, thanks to the leadership of Marchosias. The witches live hidden in the human world; the daimons live in the demon world, comprised of The City and the Untamed Lands. The City is dark, violent, sordid, and built around a rigid social hierarchy. In an effort to provide the slightest chance of social mobility to his citizens, Marchosias hosts a competition, wherein daimons can sign up to battle, the winner obtaining high rank and a position in the government. It's rather like The Hunger Games, only made up of a series of individual battles during a long span of time, and the battles do have the option of ending in forfeiture, though forfeiting, for those in the lower castes, ends in fates worse than death.

The story opens with Mallory, in the throes of her first real crush upon a boy named Kaleb. Reality strikes a blow when her dad announces that they have to move yet again. However, she runs into Kaleb unexpectedly before the move and they bond. What she does't know is that Kaleb is a Cur, the lowest of the daimons, and that he is fighting in the competition in pursuit of higher social status for himself and his pack mate. Even more, Kaleb has been contracted to murder Mallory, and he has been befriending her to that end. Their romance, while initially disgustingly saccharine recovers itself in Mallory's sane reactions to knowledge when she obtains it. Though I do feel bad for Kaleb's status and the life he's had to live, I still cannot like him because of how he behaves. Mallory, again, I sympathize with, but feel no real bond to because she's not had enough life experience or self-awareness to really have a personality yet.

I have to say that I was really confused at first when the story switched away from Mallory to other characters. The transition was awkward and, on audio, you always wonder if you've missed something, accidentally skipped a chapter somehow. Furthermore, all of the Melissa Marr novels I've read followed one particular character and I expected this to do the same. Anyway, Aya and Belias, the other two main character, ended up being my favorites and I'm so glad she included them, even if it did make the story a bit harder to follow.

Aya, a high caste woman, signed up to fight in the competition, the only woman ever to do so. That she did this is scandalous, both because women are for breeding and because, as a high caste woman, she already has high status. Her reasons are twofold: 1) she does not want to breed ever 2) she wants to be part of the government to improve life in the daimon world. Her situation is further complicated by her ex, Belias, who would have been her marriage partner and whom she does love (marriage without breeding is not an option for daimons), who enters the competition in a misguided attempt to save her and win her back. The tensions between these two delighted me. Aya, of course, I love because she doesn't want children and refuses to fall into gender roles. Holla!

Though the characterization could use work, I still highly enjoyed Carnival of Souls' plot and world building. I have hopes that the characters improve in the next book in the series.

Rating: 4/4

Narration:
I probably wouldn't have gotten around to reading this novel for a while had James Marsters not done the narration. Who doesn't want Spike to read to them for hours? Of course, I was expecting the British accent he used on Buffy, but he doesn't talk like that here. This turns out not to be a hardship, though, because James Marsters voice is marvelous to listen to in any incarnation, and I do mean any, since the Curs talk in annoying southern accents.

Marsters has serious talent for audio narration, and I sincerely hope he continues to narrate this series and other audiobooks. He really is, Spike fangirling aside, one of the best narrators I've had the good fortune to listen to thus far. He even does a good job with the voices of the girls, even though many professional audiobook narrators struggle with the voices of the opposite gender. His narration for Carnival of Souls was all that I hoped and more.

Rating: 5/5

Audio or Print?:
Did you not read all of that about how James Marsters is the freaking best? LISTEN TO THIS BOOK.

Overall Rating: 4.5/5

Review: Sacrifice

Sacrifice
Legacy, Book 3

Author: Cayla Kluver
Pages: 437
Publisher: HarlequinTeen
Publication Date: October 23, 2012
Source: HarlequinTeen via YA Books Central

Description from Goodreads:
This is not the time for the fight to end. Now is when the fight will begin. This is the time to regain what has been lost.

Alera

Queen of a fallen kingdom, secretly in love with the enemy.

Shaselle

Daughter of a murdered father, rebel with a cause.

One lives behind the former Hytanican palace walls and walks the razor's edge to keep the fragile peace in her beloved homeland. The other slips through the war-torn streets, seeking retribution for her family's tragedy, following whispers of insurgency.

Both face choices that will separate them from those they cannot help but love. As their stories intertwine, a conspiracy ignites that may end in slavery or death—or lead to freedom anew, if only each can face what must be sacrificed.

Series:
1: Legacy (review|Goodreads)
2: Allegiance (review|Goodreads)
3: Sacrifice

First Sentence: "The Captain of the Guard instinctively glanced behind, scanning the palace's third floor corridor for enemies who might be monitoring him."

Review:
The Legacy Trilogy has not garnered immense acclaim from most of my blogger friends. In fact, a full three of them rated the first book one star on Goodreads. So yeah, these books aren't for everyone, and I know that, but, despite them being imperfect, I really love this series. Sacrifice was one of my most desired ARCs of 2012, and that's why it was my first ARC request as a YABC staff reviewer. I'm happy to have been able to read it early, because, yet again, I found myself wholly swept up in Cayla Kluver's world. At this point, be advised that there will be spoilers for the first two books in the rest of this review.

Sacrifice gets off to a bit of a slow start, dealing with the political ramifications of Cokyri's takeover of Hytanica. That first chapter was a snoozefest, but, thankfully, things picked up a few chapters in. For the rest of the novel, I was wholly engrossed, just as I remember being every time I read a book in this series.

What I love about these books, what makes me look past their faults and hold them up as personal favorites, is the fact they Cayla Kluver always manages to convince me that I know what's going to happen and then pull the rug right out from under me. Seriously, this happened in every book, usually more than once. It's so rare for me to be so unsure what will happen to the characters, and I love that feeling, especially since Kluver does so without stooping to impossible twists. I just find that so refreshing, and it's also why I'm always on tenterhooks as I read, because anything could happen.

Both Legacy and Allegiance were written entirely in Alera's perspective, but in Sacrifice Kluver adds a second narrator, Shaselle. At first I was hugely skeptical, but I ended up really liking Shaselle's point of view. She's snarky and very different from Alera. Her romance plot line was cute, and I really loved her refusal to be put into a box of people's expectations. I was just sitting here about to make the assertion that her perspective doesn't really add anything to the story from a narrative point of view, but, on further reflection, I think her story serves as a foil to Alera's, showing how things might have been a bit different had Alera chosen another path. Maybe I'm crazy, but I like this new theory of mine.

Now, the romance did get me down a little bit. Here's the thing. I liked Narian at first in Legacy, but I very much switched allegiance (see what I did there?) in the next book. Steldor, while obnoxious at first, just seems so much more passionate and interesting than Narian. I kept holding out hope for him to win in the end, but, honestly, I knew as soon as I saw the second narrator that Alera wouldn't have any love triangle drama in this one. I'm glad Alera's happy, but my heart breaks for Steldor. Perhaps a spinoff about Steldor is in order?

The writing was a bit clunky in places, but I hope those issues will be fixed in the final version. I usually don't mention such things when reviewing ARCs, but I have to comment on one particular oddity. At one point, Shaselle referres to a horse as 'loco.' Since when do they know Spanish in Hytanica? The use of that totally threw me out of the text for a bit, and I hope it's caught by the editor before final printing.

The ending was a little bit too happy for my tastes, but good enough. All in all, I declare this an immensely satisfying conclusion to the trilogy, though I still want that spinoff. I hope Cayla Kluver continues to write books than can completely catch me off guard!

Rating: 3.5/5

Favorite Quote:

"He took a breath, then proclaimed, 'Lady Shaselle of Hytanica, I am in love with you.'
   I burst into laughter, pulling my legs up to ease my aching stomach muscles. He rolled onto his side to look at me, propping his head up with his hand.
   'I'm serious,' he insisted, grinning foolishly at me.
   'You're drunk.'
   'True, but even drunks can be in love.'"

Review: Violins of Autumn

Violins of Autumn

Author: Amy McAuley
Pages: 326
Publisher: Walker Children's
Source: Own

Description from Goodreads:
When the Germans begin bombing London in World War II, Betty is determined to do her part. Instead of running air raid drills like most girls her age, she lies about her age and trains to become a spy. Now known by her secret agent persona, Adele Blanchard, she finds herself parachuting over German-occupied France under the cover of darkness to join the secret Resistance movement. Prepared to die for her cause, Adele wasn’t expecting to make a new best friend in her fellow agent or fall for a handsome American pilot. With the brutality of war ever present, can Adele dare to dream of a future where the world is at peace and she is free to live and love of her own accord?

First Sentence: "The shackles binding my arms and legs to the chair scour my blistered skin to a bloody mash."

Review:
Violins of Autumn mines the fertile literary ground of World War II, which has a seemingly limitless number of stories to be told. The plot of Violins of Autumn follows the work of a teenage female spy in the months leading up to D-Day. While I did enjoy this novel, the timing of my reading was bad. Unfortunately, Violins of Autumn came out on the heels of another novel about a young female spy for the Brits who is captured and tortured, Code Name Verity, and I could not help comparing the two, which weakened my experience of VoA.

This novel begins, as so many do these days, with a brief into a climactic scene from the end of the novel. This technique has become exceedingly popular in YA fiction and, while it can and has been used to great effect in some cases, I maintain that it should be used sparingly. The right scene put at the beginning can create dramatic irony, keeping the reader on tenterhooks throughout the book to figure out what's going on or how the main character ended up in that situation. If this technique does not succeed, it comes off simply as a lame attempt to create additional drama, often having the adverse affect.

The opening dramatic snippet of Violins of Autumn depicts Adele's torture by the Nazis. Adele (though her real name is Betty, I prefer her spy name for her and will refer to her that way), we now know will be captured at some point, and, based on the ending of that concluding section, possibly die. Wow, really, prologue? You mean a spy might be tortured or even die? Can this be true? This felt like such an unnecessary ploy, as I already expect that sort of stuff to happen in a novel about a spy and I felt less interested knowing what was coming than if I had been waiting to find out. Plus, Code Name Verity also opens with torture, and that made comparing the two even more inevitable.

Where Violins of Autumn wins over Code Name Verity is readibility. The story is much less complicated, the characters simpler and it also doesn't make you want to weep for the rest of your life. For the reader that loved the idea of a teenage spy but could not get through Code Name Verity (and seriously no judgment for that since I nearly DNFed it too), Violins of Autumn is the book that you're looking for.

McAulay keeps the plot moving along at a steady pace. Missions and danger and Nazis abound. All of the action kept me turning the pages. While I didn't particularly connect with the characters, nor did I dislike them. Adele is capable and skilled with language, so that was awesome. She avoided making stupid mistake and proved herself much cleverer than a lot of the other spies we see in the book, though she does struggle to do so well. However, I did not care for the love triangle, which resolved in an annoying way. Adele is one of those 'I love them both in different ways' girls, which I just cannot stand. With constant possibility of death, I am all for enjoying oneself, but attraction and fear do not love make.

The ending of Violins of Autumn struck me as the weakest part of the book. I thought it too optimistic. In the chapters before the last two, some sad things happened: people died, torture, etc. Yet, in those last two concluding chapters the tone is one of unmitigated celebration. There is not one mention of the fallen comrades, and, while I don't think they should wallow, THIS JUST HAPPENED. I expected something a bit darker and more contemplative.

Looking back on my review, I see how most of my comments are negative. I want to stress that this isn't a bad book; I did enjoy it. The timing was just off. Had there been a year or two gone since I read Code Name Verity, which covers the same basic concept, I would have appreciated this much more. So, if you've read CNV, give yourself some time.

Rating: 3.5/5

Favorite Quote: "My place in the world doesn't matter nearly as much as the people who open their hearts to me while I'm there. And wherever I am, as long as they're by my side, I'll be home."

Review: Before the Rain

Before the Rain: A Memoir of Love and Revolution

Author: Luisita Lopez Torregrosa
Pages: 226
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Publication Date: August 7, 2012
Source: TLC Book Tours

Description from Goodreads:
In a voice haunting and filled with longing, Before the Rain tells the story of love unexpected, its fragile bounds and subtle perils. As a newspaper editor in the ’80s, Luisita Torregrosa lived her career. Enter Elizabeth, a striking, reserved, and elusive writer with whom Torregrosa falls deeply in love. Their story—irresistible romance, overlapping ambitions, and fragile union—unfolds as the narrative shifts to the Philippines and the fall of Ferdinand Marcos. There, on that beautiful, troubled island, the couple creates a world of their own, while covering political chaos and bloody upheavals. What was effortless abroad becomes less idyllic when they return to the United States, and their ending becomes as surprising and revealing as their beginning. Torregrosa captures the way love transforms those who experience it for an unforgettable, but often too brief, time. This book is distinguished not only by its strong, unique, and conflicted heroines, but also by Torregrosa’s lyrical portrait of the Philippines and the even more exotic heart of intimacy.

First Sentence: "In the years since that first letter came, postmarked New Delhi and written on pale lavender Claridges Hotel stationery, I have begun this story a hundred times, and each time I was afraid."

Review:
Having completed Before the Rain, I find myself with very little to say, a rather rare occurrence for me. Speechlessness, of course, can be the result of many emotions, too fraught by the impact of the tale or too bored to care. Unfortunately, my reactions more closely resemble the latter.

What drew me to this book was both the lgbt element and the historical aspect. Coming into it, I knew practically nothing about the history of the Philippines, and learning about that history as a backdrop for a touching romance sounded like perfection. Having read the last page of this memoir, though, I do not feel that I know much more than I did when I started, other than now knowing a couple of names of political figures.

This autobiography should, more accurately, be subtitled simply A Memoir of Love, as there is little of revolution. The focus lies almost entirely upon the relationship between Luisita and Elizabeth. While that's fine, the book's description prepared me for something with a broader scope. History receives only the barest treatment, insomuch as it separated the two lovers, as both are reporters and had to travel to cover various events.

I would expect, though, that I would have a very strong picture of Luisita and Elizabeth in my head, since they are the focus, that I would have a good sense of their bond. Alas, I do not. I feel like Torregrosa keeps the audience at a distance from them. She clues us in on the big events of their romance, but does not let us in on any of the small details that really make a life. For all that she is proudly discussing her lesbian relationship, I found it surprising that we never get any sense of their sexual life at all. For all the talk of their intense passion, only a couple of kisses and hugs are mentioned. This made for a disconnect between what she claimed and what I was actually sensing through her words.

I will say, however, that the writing is incredibly beautiful. Torregrosa composes lovely sentences, and she has a unique flair for language. She puts her sentences together in ways I might never think to, slightly strangely, and coaxes a new and different beauty out of them.

For me, this memoir was vastly disappointing, but lovers of language largely for its own sake might find this more interesting than I did. I, personally, hoped to learn more about the author in reading a memoir, but left it with very little sense of Luisita herself.

Rating: 2.5/5

Favorite Quote: "Elizabeth, who readily saw the things in me that were so much a part of her, too, had touched that sense of aloneness in me, had been drawn to it. I was dark and fierce and had a face of shadows and moods, a face that to her seemed ageless. I was the very thing that she wanted to avoid—chaos, intensity, a fall from grace. I was writing, passion, books, long drinks in the night."