Book Reviews

Mini-Review: Talking as Fast as I Can by Lauren Graham

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Rating:  ★★☆☆☆ – it was okay
Genre:  autobiography, celebrity autobiography, memoir, celebrity memoir
Pros:  conversational, unpretentious, sometimes funny
Cons:  sometimes boring, sometimes aimless

It could have been a more enjoyable read, but somewhere around the halfway mark it just got rambling and aimless and…. I hate to say boring, but I was bored. I found myself almost skipping chunks and having to force myself back to read it completely. I’m someone who loves an autobiography, so I’ve got no problem reading little details about people’s lives and thoughts, but this just stopped holding my attention. I think if there had been a little more guiding or coaxing from the publisher to make sure there was interesting material throughout (or perhaps a shorter book), it would have been 3 stars.

 

Review: Forest of a Thousand Lanterns by Julie C. Dao

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Xifeng has always been told of her great destiny, but she doesn’t know if she believes in it. When she travels to the Imperial City she will have to choose between warring urges. Will she marry Wei and live a simple life or embrace the darkness that draws her and chase a powerful destiny?

Rating:  ★★★★★ – it was amazing
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya fantasy, fairytale retelling
Pros:  #OwnVoices, beautifully written, excellent spin on an old story
Cons:  somewhat slow beginning (but this is barely a con, and I’ll explain why)

An Own Voices novel and a fairy tale retelling, what could be better? Well, it could be beautifully written, as Forest of a Thousand Lanterns most certainly is.

The most interesting thing to me is how Dao had me completely forgetting that this was the story of the evil queen! I was rooting for Xifeng the entire time, constantly hoping she would find ways to outsmart her enemies and get more powerful. It wasn’t until the very end that I started to remember I was cheering on someone who is technically the villain of the story! And even once I did I found it impossible to dislike her.

This is not the first time I’ve read a book about this fairytale character’s origin, but never have I found myself rooting for her or liking her, or even feeling all that sorry for her for that matter. But with FOTL I knew from the beginning who Xifeng was, and I still didn’t think about it until almost the end of the novel because I cared about her the whole time.

There was a short time at the beginning of the book (basically, the parts leading up to Xifeng’s arrival in the Imperial City) where I felt like things were moving kind of slowly. It wasn’t unenjoyable to read or anything; I never felt like I was forcing myself to keep reading. I just found myself wondering if some of the stuff I was reading even needed to be there.

However, I don’t actually think it was a real problem, because later on I came to believe those things did need to be in the story. I think all the stuff in the beginning which made it seem a bit long before the action really began may be what helped to build that great empathy I felt for Xifeng that let me forget she was supposed to turn into a villain.

I honestly never expected to get so excited over a retelling of Snow White, since it’s a really well known and oft retold tale, but Julie C. Dao did an amazing job. The new setting and the dark fantasy aspect really made this story better than any others I’ve found.

Another great thing was the descriptive language the author uses. It painted such a vivid picture that I never had trouble staying in the story and I often found myself stopping to reread a line or two because it was just so beautifully written.

I pretty much recommend this book to everyone, but specifically fans of fairytale retellings & YA Fantasy, or anyone wanting to read more books with non-white characters/authors. Because the only real drawback to this book is having to wait to read the sequel!

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Completed: The Swan Maiden by Heather Tomlinson

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The Swan Maiden by Heather Tomlinson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Raised as a chastelaine-in-training unlike her sisters who are learning the arts of sorcery, Doucette discovers when she is sixteen years old that she too has magic in her blood, and she must brave her mother’s wrath–and the loss of the man she loves–in order to follow her birthright.

This is a pretty good fairytale retelling, but there’s just something about the writing — the pacing I think? or the flow? — that keeps it from being a 4 or 5 star book. That said, I definitely recommend it to fans of the genre.

(I may do a fuller review later on.)

View all my ratings on Goodreads

Review: Untold by Sarah Rees Brennan (The Lynburn Legacy, book 2)

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As Kami Glass and her friends continue to battle the sorcerers of the Lynburn family in the sleepy English town of Sorry-in-the-Vale, friendships and families are torn apart.

Rating:  ★★★★☆ – really liked it
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya mystery, paranormal fantasy
Pros:  queer rep, more banter!, funny
Cons:  love triangle (ish), occasionally choppy narrative

A lot of the things I would talk about in a review for Untold are things I already talked about in my review of the first book, Unspoken. To avoid being repetitive I will skip those and advise you to read that review, then move on to Untold-specific things:

Untold is one of the better sequels I’ve read in a while. It didn’t fall into the traps a lot of “middle of a trilogy” books fall into.

We get more insight into the personalities of several characters that we didn’t get in the first book. This is done through a ton of POV switching (Unspoken switched between Jared & Kami, Untold goes much farther than that). This can sometimes make the narrative feel a little choppy, but overall I think it’s good for the story.

Almost everyone got a little character development. Kami has to learn to cope with things on her own, Holly must learn to accept who she is, Jared learns to care about other people and let them in, just to list a few. Even the adults got some moments of development.

I’ve never read a book with such a strong ensemble of characters, and I’m not sure how I can go back to reading books where background characters are 2-dimensional plot devices now that I’ve found Sarah Rees Brennan’s novels.

I want to take a minute to talk about the queer representation in the novel, because something happened that you so rarely see. We already have the character whose sexuality we discovered in the first book, and that gets developed a bit. Turns out she knew and accepted that she was a lesbian, but wasn’t quite ready for other people to know. Then we get another character who is unsure of her own sexual identity because she knows she likes boys and now is shocked to discover an attraction to another girl. She discusses this with another character and this is where I braced myself for the inevitable “you can just like people, not labels” or some other such copout. But instead he openly discusses bisexuality with her. He even says the word “bisexual”! For some people this probably seems like a small thing to be so excited about, but being bisexual myself, and constantly seeing media refuse to acknowledge it even when they have bisexual characters, this scene was very important to me and utterly refreshing.

The plot feels a little slower paced than the first book, but I think this is mostly due to the fact that there is less suspense and mystery. Instead of finding bodies and trying to figure out who the bad guys are, the group are preparing for a showdown. There is still some mystery and there’s a big confrontation at the end like the first novel, but most of the book is about planning and preparing. Luckily, the book is well-written and there is enough going on the keep the reader interested despite the somewhat slower plot.

On the whole, Untold is an excellent bridge between the first novel and the third. The reader ends up just as invested in the main plot arc as in the first novel and more invested in the characters, which is exactly what a second book needs to do to move a trilogy along. It’s an easy read with enough substance not to be considered fluff.

In addition to those who enjoyed the first novel, Unspoken, I recommend Untold to fans of ya romance, paranormal fantasy, and novels with strong characterization.

Spoiler Zone

I mentioned in my review of Unspoken that there was something about the first book that left me angry and that I hoped would be resolved in the sequel. It was! If you are someone who found yourself angry at Jared’s character in the end of the first book and you aren’t sure if you want to read Untold because of that, this spoiler is for you!
[start] We learn that Jared lashed out at Kami because of what she said before she broke the link and his belief that she wanted nothing to do with him. Her avoiding him afterwards (because she believed what he said) confirmed for Jared that she must hate him so he tried to maintain a distance from her, partially because of his hurt feelings and partially because he believed it’s what she wanted. [end]

Goodreads | Book Depository | Author’s Website

Review: Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan (The Lynburn Legacy, book 1)

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Sorry-in-the-Vale is full of things no one wants to talk about: the secretive Lynburn family, ritual killings, and a history of magic. But Kami Glass is no stranger to mysterious things. Since childhood she has had a boy in her head that no one believes is real. With the danger mounting, Kami is determined to unravel the mysteries of her little town.

Rating:  ★★★★☆ – really liked it
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya mystery, paranormal fantasy
Pros:  funny, unique premise, Banter!
Cons:  love triangle (ish), occasionally choppy narrative

Prior to Unspoken I had never heard of a young adult gothic novel. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but the unique premise drew me. I have to say, I’m glad I gave it a chance!

The absolute best part of the book is the banter between characters. I’m a sucker for quality banter. If you are too, then you’ll be hooked on Unspoken in just a few pages.

I really appreciated the female friendships in this book. Too often in YA female friends wind up in competition somehow, and at first I expected this book to go the same way. In fact, there was a point in the beginning where I expected this book to be just another Not-Like-Other-Girls-girl irrationally hates Popular-With-The-Boys-girl book, but instead we get some character growth instead and ended up with loyal, dedicated female friends.

It was also nice to see a family that mattered in a YA book. A lot of times, the protags family is mentioned, but barely and rarely. In Unspoken, we see that Kami has a loving family, still touched by the secrets of Sorry-in-the-Vale, and the family dynamic is mercifully believable.

I loved the connection between Kami and Jared, but I didn’t like the way it kept somehow being turned into some idea that they should be romantically involved. That never did make sense to me. And, as you may have guessed, I wasn’t at all interested in the love triangle the author kept trying to create. I mostly tuned out that aspect, if I’m being honest.

Kami is of mixed ancestry, with her paternal grandmother being Japanese, and it served the story well. Kami was seen by a lot of people as a partial-outsider, in the way that small towns full of mostly white people tend to see anyone whose entire family tree isn’t rooted right there in that very ground. And there were some bits of Japanese folklore thrown in as well. Not being Japanese myself, or well-versed in Japanese folklore, I can’t say if it was done accurately, but I do think it was good for the novel.

There was a bit at the end that I won’t say too much about, because of spoilers, but it seemed highly incongruous with previous characterization and I was as stunned as Kami over it. My shock quickly gave way to anger. However, because it happened at the very last moment, and because this is only the first book in the series, I have some hope it will be explained or justified in the second book.

The paranormal aspect wasn’t as scary as I would have expected based on the character’s reactions to it, but the rest of the mystery really was quite creepy. As the book went on I found myself in the same predicament as Kami, with a reason to suspect everyone, trusting no one. And yet, for all my suspicions I didn’t quite manage to predict that ending. (Note:  I don’t mean the part of the ending that I mentioned left me angry, that part is actually just one little moment, after the resolution of the mystery.)

I would recommend Unspoken to young adult fans of gothic novels or mysteries, and as previously mentioned, to anyone who is a total sucker for witty, funny banter between characters.

Spoiler Zone

One of the more disappointing things, for me, was a plot point, and mostly affects the story going forward, but due to it’s spoilery nature I’m going to hide it below:

[start] I really hate the loss of the connection between Kami and Jared. It was the most interesting part of the story and I don’t see how the next book will be quite as good without it… [end]

Goodreads | Book Depository | Author’s Website

Review: When the Moon Was Ours by Anna-Marie McLemore

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As their deep friendship turns to love, Latina teenager Miel, who grows roses from her wrist, and Italian-Pakistani Samir, a transgender boy, fear their secrets will be exposed by the beautiful Bonner girls, four sisters rumored to be witches.

Rating:  ★★★★★ – it was amazing
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya fantasy, magical realism
Pros:  chock-full of representation, lyrical prose, beautiful imagery
Cons:  occasionally dense

When the Moon Was Ours is a lovely story that I officially recommend to everyone.

The writing is beautiful and flows like a song. Even when things are happening in the story that are hard, the writing is so lyrical you don’t entirely hate to read it.

I’ve never described my favorite thing about a book as “the colors” before, and in any other context it would make no sense at all. But the imagery used by McLemore paints such vibrant pictures in the mind! Reading this book left me with a swirl of colors in my imagination.

There were a few times where the prose got a bit dense and I would find myself needing to reread a passage to figure out exactly what was occurring or impatient to get past the descriptive language to the action again. Luckily, these instances were few and far between. Overall the book was a joy to read.

The absolute best part of the book was the representation. Reading a book with so much racial diversity and LGBT+ representation right at the forefront — not shoved into a passing remark or a single character — was like a breath of fresh air. And what’s more, it was all handled with loving sensitivity.

If you are one of the many readers challenging themselves to read more #OwnVoices novels, a fan of the Magical Realism genre, or just a lover of well-told stories, you absolutely must get your hands on a copy of When the Moon Was Ours. It is a unique and thoroughly enjoyable tale of magic and romance.

Goodreads | Book Depository | Author’s Website

 

Review: The Cursed Queen by Sarah Fine (The Impostor Queen, book 2)

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Ansa has always been a fighter. As a child, she fought the invaders who murdered her parents and snatched her as a raid prize. She fought for her status as a warrior in her tribe, but the day the Krigere cross the great lake and threaten the witch queen of the Kupari, everything changes.

Rating:  ★★★☆☆ – liked it
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya fantasy
Pros:  queer protag, better than the first book, many strong women
Cons:  not exciting, not enough main characters of color

The Cursed Queen is the sequel to The Impostor Queen, but the events of this book actually run almost parallel to the events of the first book, only advancing the timeline a little bit from the end of The Impostor Queen. (Which does make sense, because we would want to know what led the Valtia to meet the Astia, wouldn’t we?) I went into this book expecting to learn what happened after the rebellion of Impostor, and in that respect I was mostly disappointed.

However, the story itself was not a disappointment at all. In fact, Cursed was (in my opinion) an improvement on Impostor. The events were slightly less predictable and the pacing was better. In Imposter I spent a major portion of the book begging for something to start happening, but in this one things were happening from minute one. And even when major things weren’t happening, the intrigue and Ansa’s struggling with the curse keep things from getting too dull. There’s no real urgency, but it moves along well and it’s easy to continue reading at a steady pace.

I enjoy queer representation in my books, but I get tired of just reading books about people being afraid to come out or fighting to be accepted by family and friends for their sexuality, so this book was a welcome relief. The main character isn’t straight and a lot of background characters aren’t either, but even when there is relationship drama it has nothing to do with their sexualities.

I do wish there had been more main characters that were POC. Almost every main character is white, despite being set mostly in a city of POC (stolen by the mostly white Krigere). I’d say this is yet another one of those books that does better than others on representation, but not quite good enough.

There was a very nice scene where a black character, belonging to the subjugated city, tells a white character that while it’s cool she’s not actively trying to kill them, by not fighting back against the other white people who are subjugating the city (of black people), she’s still basically complicit and not technically a good person. Excellent scene. (I’m not going to tag this as a spoiler because it doesn’t give away any plot points.)

Despite the protag being white, this is not a White Savior story. It looks like it might be for a bit, but it turns out better. I can’t explain much without giving away major spoilers, but I’ll put it down in the Spoiler section just in case someone wants it.

The best thing about this book was the variety of strong female characters. Some are strong in family, some clever and sneaky, some fierce fighters, some good survivors. A lot of times when you say strong female character you just get a fighter, but this book showed many different ways a woman can be strong and I really enjoyed that.

It’s nice to see that Ansa is very different from Elli. You can clearly see how they could balance each other out or clash horribly (or maybe both), and I look forward to seeing them come together in The True Queen.

I recommend this book to those who liked The Impostor Queen for sure, but even if you didn’t love that one, you may like The Cursed Queen. If you are a fan of Magical YA Fantasy or, like me, crave books with queer representation that isn’t all about how hard it is to come out, you should give this book a shot.

Don’t expect to be blown away, this book isn’t amazing, but it is a good, solid, 3-star book. The draw would be the content, not the writing style.

Spoiler Zone

I have one thing I want to talk about regarding relationships that includes a pretty decent sized spoiler so only read it if you don’t mind that:

[start] I was really wary for a good half or more of the book that this was going to follow the same path of the last book relationship-wise. That is, the girl starts out with a crush on a girl, but later meets a boy who is perfect for her and falls for him instead (with possible death of the girl). It would have set a disturbing pattern of “fixing” the bi girl, but luckily that didn’t happen. [end]

Re: Not A White Savior (Seriously, this is a major spoiler, think before you read.)

[start] The people of Vasterut are black, the people of the Krigere, who took the city, are (mostly) white. In most books like this, little white Ansa would come along with her magic and rescue the subjugated Vasterutians. However, in this story, the Vasterutians have been working to free themselves before Ansa’s tribe even arrives in the stolen city. They have built allies and networks, but have hit a snag in their plans. The white Chieftain Thyra helps them, but only in a diversionary way, and ultimately it is the Vasterutians and the allies they made for themselves who free their city from Krigere control. Ansa’s actions during the revolt are solely related to her lady-love Thyra, and prior to that she was merely a pawn of the Vasterutians to help distract the Krigere. So as I said, the white people do not save or free the black people in this book. [end]

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Review: Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor

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In the aftermath of a war between gods and men, a hero, a librarian, and a goddess’ daughter must battle the fantastical elements of a mysterious city stripped of its name.

Rating:  ★★★★★ – it was amazing
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya fantasy
Pros:  beautifully written, bibliophile mc, fascinating world, banter!
Cons:  triggering Carnage descriptions, could use more diversity, no pronunciation guide

Trigger Warning:  Descriptions of the Carnage include the death of infants. It doesn’t go into gory detail, it’s a little more abstract, but it’s still vivid and mentioned many times.

The world of Strange the Dreamer is interesting and dynamic. I found myself wishing to know more about the history and customs — of Weep especially, but all the other kingdoms, too. I’d love to have several more novels set there (about literally anything) so I could just live in this universe longer.

The writing is beautiful. It’s been a little while since I read one of Laini’s books so, while I remembered I liked her writing, I had forgotten just how lovely it could be. The descriptive language paints masterpieces and it’s a purely enjoyable experience for the reader.

One of the best things in the book was the banter between characters. Lazlo and company had me giggling so many times. In fact, I kept stopping to read bits of dialogue to my husband so he could enjoy it too.

The only real drawback for me was (as is often the case) the lack of diversity. This book has character descriptions that are ambiguous enough for one to decide for themselves whether many of the people are white or POC, and that is better than a lot of books in this genre. However, we know Laini Taylor loves to describe things — her descriptive language really being a major draw for her books — and we see this with her poetic depictions of the Godspawn with their blue skin. (“Blue as opals, pale blue. Blue as cornflowers, or dragonfly wings, or a spring — not summer — sky.”) So there’s no reason in the world she couldn’t have given us some explicitly diverse characters. Overall, I’d say it’s a step in the right direction for representation, but just not quite enough.

I do wish the book had included a pronunciation guide for some of the proper nouns. Nothing takes me out of a story like constantly wondering if I’m saying names correctly. Luckily, Laini’s writing drew me right back in again.

The plot is really engaging. I honestly couldn’t read fast enough! The foreshadowing was, in my opinion, done perfectly. Some books have foreshadowing that’s too obscure, some have foreshadowing that’s too obvious, but Strange the Dreamer had that perfect middle ground. I was able to predict a lot of things, but more because I was familiar with the genre than because the foreshadowing wasn’t subtle enough. And another sign it was done right? Even when I expected something, it was still completely satisfying when it happened!

If you liked Laini’s Daughter of Smoke and Bone trilogy or you’re a fan of Magical YA Fantasy, I definitely recommend reading Strange the Dreamer.

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Review: Crashed by Robin Wasserman (Cold Awakening, book 2)

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Living with other mechs since her wealthy parents transplanted her brain into a mechanical body to prevent her from dying in a horrible accident, Lia becomes a pawn in a religious leader’s movement to outlaw mech technology and eradicate machines such as Lia.

Rating:  ★★★☆☆ – liked it
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya science fiction, ya dystopia
Pros:  well written, allegorical, realistic
Cons:  slow paced, frustrating main character, realistic

I’m giving this book 3 stars because every problem I had getting into the book and enjoying the story was because I personally didn’t like Lia (the MC), and with the first person POV it’s all Lia all the time. If I had liked her I can tell this story would have been entirely engrossing.

One of the things I really liked about the writing is also one of the things I liked the least. That is, that the characters and their actions were so realistic.

Despite being mechs, with damage resistant bodies and memory back-ups in case they are destroyed, none of them are elite fighters or even excelling at anything much. They are completely realistic teenagers. Give them extra-strong bodies and they pull extra-dangerous stunts. Put a group of them in a house and leave them to their own devices, they screw around (in all meanings of that phrase) and bicker. There are no “maturity level of an adult, leading a teenage revolution” sort of characters. Just a group of kids with problems, facing the destructions of all their rights, trying to figure out if there’s even anything they can do about it.

The reason I almost wish it wasn’t so realistic? The constant bickering leading nowhere at all! Not to mention, hardly anything ever got done. (It was the last 1/3 of the book before they really got down to making any moves.)

This book deals a lot with prejudice. Mechs are struggling to even be seen as people. Wasserman portrays it accurately, with nuance from character to character. As opposed to a homogenous group who all feel the exact same way and hate without logic. Not everyone against the mechs is just an evil creep; some are just angry and looking for someone to be angry at, some are confused and genuinely think they are on the right side, some hide behind religion. Of course, some are just hateful people, too.

I definitely recommend this series so far. Wasserman’s writing is good enough that I enjoy it even with first person narration (something I personally hate) and a main character who sometimes tested my patience.

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Review: The Impostor Queen by Sarah Fine

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Chosen to be their queen, Elli grows up surrounded by luxury only to be banished when she fails to inherit essential magic, a situation that leads to devastating revelations about her world’s magic and the role Elli was meant to play.

Rating:  ★★★☆☆ – liked it
Genre:  young adult fiction, ya fantasy, magical fantasy
Pros:  bisexual protag, interesting magical mechanics
Cons:  hard to get into, first person narration, felt a bit too long for the story

I definitely recommend this book and look forward to reading the sequel, but I think it’s important to know going in that it’s difficult to get into for quite a while. I think it took me almost half the book to actually start caring what was happening. If it hadn’t been for all the positive reviews online I wouldn’t have even kept trying.

There’s quite a bit of foreshadowing. I can’t quite decide how I feel about it. On the one hand, I love foreshadowing and always appreciate it, but on the other hand… It was really obvious foreshadowing and made the story overly predictable. Never once did I wonder what was coming, it was all pretty obvious from the very beginning, never a drop of mystery as much as the story tried.

If you are cool with first person narrators, you may not have as much trouble with this book as I did, but I really feel it hindered the story’s movement. I can only assume the intent is to keep us within the realm of what the main character knows, and have us learn as she learns, but it isn’t done well enough to feel worth it.

I did enjoy that her abilities were realistic. When she’s banished she is woefully unprepared for the real world and I appreciate that even with her book knowledge, she still had to learn how to do things. I’ve seen way too many fantasy novels where the protag is just magically good at things, but not Elli! It makes her much more relatable.

The mechanics of the magic are really interesting and I found myself glad the protag is who/what she is, as opposed to just a “late bloomer”. I won’t say more so I don’t spoil anything, but I feel like it serves the story better this way.

Spoiler Zone

That’s about everything I can say without giving spoilers, but I’ll put some of that below if anyone wants it:

[start] I really love that Oskar and Sig’s personalities resemble their ice and fire!

I love that Elli has to learn to accommodate for her missing digits, that was an excellent touch.

I am almost 100% sure that the Valtia is Soturi. [end]

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