Cynthia Voigt

Review: Jackaroo by Cynthia Voigt

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Note:  This book has also been published under the name The Tale of Gwyn.

Everyone grows up with tales of Jackaroo, who rides on behalf of the people in times of greatest need, but everyone knows they’re just stories… As the innkeeper’s daughter, Gwyn is certain of her place in the world, but being stranded during a blizzard leads to a startling discovery and Gwyn begins to see the Kingdom in a new way. When Jackaroo rides out of legends to aid the people, he will change Gwyn’s life forever.

Rating:  ★★★★★ – it was amazing
Genre:  young adult fiction, young adult fantasy, non-magical fantasy
Pros:  well written, good character development, beautiful descriptive language
Cons:  needs POC

Jackaroo is the first in the loosely-connected Tales of the Kingdom series. Because they are “loosely-connected” all of the Kingdom novels can be read as stand-alone books, though I’m not sure why you’d want to skip any of them. I like that this is the first book in the series though, because it’s a little lighter than the next three and therefore an easier read and the perfect introduction to the world of the Kingdom.

This book is simultaneously a fantasy adventure about a Robin Hood-esque highwayman who shows up in times of need to serve the people, and a coming-of-age story about a young girl discovering her place in the world.

As with a lot of Cynthia Voigt’s characters I really love the way Gwyn thinks about things. She’s a somewhat steady girl, hard-working and strong. In the beginning she has a tendency to be a bit scornful of those around her, but she grows into a more understanding and insightful person as the story goes on, which is just one example of the satisfying character development to be found in Jackaroo.

Voigt’s world-building is subtle and immersive in a way one rarely finds in a fantasy novel. She lays out the Kingdom at the perfect pace, so that one never has too much information to keep track of, and always enough to understand what is going on in the story. Between that and her excellent use of descriptive language, the reader is swept up into the story and world with ease.

My only complaint about these books is the lack of POC. The closest it comes is having one character mentioned with “olive skin”, which is…disappointing. It’s not super surprising that a white author doesn’t think to put people of color in their story, especially in 1985 when this story was first published, but I can still wish it was different. It’s really the only thing I can think of that would improve this beautiful story.

I recommend this book, and it’s sequels, to literally everyone — but most especially to people who like fantasy, ya fiction, and coming-of-age novels, or anyone who is trying to read more backlist books.

Goodreads | Book Depository | Author’s Website

Friday 56: January 12, 2018

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The Friday 56 is a weekly meme hosted by Freda’s Voice and the rules are simple:

  • Grab a book, any book (I, personally, prefer to use my current read.)
  • Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader (If you have to improvise, that’s ok.)
  • Find any sentence, (or few, just don’t spoil it)
  • Post it

Jackaroo by Cynthia Voigt
(Tales of the Kingdom, book 1)

Whatever Blithe wanted, she wanted absolutely and immediately. There was no budging Blithe.

WWW Wednesday: January 10, 2018

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Welcome to WWW Wednesday! This meme was formerly hosted by MizB at Should be Reading and revived on Taking on a World of Words. Just answer the three W’s!

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Currently Reading:  Talking as Fast as I Can by Lauren Graham

I grabbed this one because I was getting a little stuck on the other book I’m reading. Lauren has a quarter-serious, mostly comical way of looking at her life and it’s pretty fun to read.

I almost feel as if she’s sitting there just chatting to me rather than me just being curled up reading a book.

I’m looking forward to finding out about behind-the-scenes Gilmore Girls things, but I don’t see how she can top the Top-Secret Hollywood Secrets on dieting.

All the Crooked Saints by Maggie Stiefvater

I am both enjoying, and not enjoying this book…

Basically, it’s fascinating and strange, exactly like I was hoping it would be. But I don’t like it as much as I hoped.

I was warned that it might seem less magical than TRC, which when I first started I thought was erroneous, but the more I read of it the more I start to see what they meant. That’s not to say there isn’t any magic, in fact there’s quite a lot. But that’s my problem. There’s so much magic, it feels… somehow less magical…. And I can’t really explain that very well, but there it is.

Recently Finished:  Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

The decision to read this was pretty spur of the moment. Some other readers had made me want to try out Gillian Flynn’s novels, but I wasn’t going to for little while yet. And then I just sort of…. did? I have no idea what made me do it, but I’m sooo glad!

It was amazing. Except for the parts where I wanted to climb into the book and push Nick off something tall for being a pretentious douche… But otherwise, completely amazing!

I’ve already ordered it online because I know I’m going to want to reread it.

Reading Next:  Jackaroo (Tales of the Kingdom, book 1) by Cynthia Voigt

I’ve found myself in a major YA Fantasy mood and I haven’t even managed to finish the two books I’m currently reading!

I thought about looking for a book I hadn’t read before, but I know how much I love the Tales of the Kingdom books so I’m going to reread them yet again. After all, it’s been just slightly over a year since I reread them last!

The hard part will be making myself wait to start until I finish the two books I’m already on.

First Lines Fridays: November 24, 2017

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First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?

  • Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
  • Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
  • Finally… reveal the book!

First Lines:

When Jeff Greene was in second grade, seven and a half years old, he got home from school one Tuesday afternoon in early March, and found a note from his mother, saying that she had gone away and would not be coming back.

Interested? Scroll down for the cover and summary!

A Solitary Blue by Cynthia Voigt
(The Tillerman Cycle, book 3)

Jeff Greene was only seven when Melody, his mother, left him with his reserved, undemonstrative father, the Professor. So when she reenters his life years later with an invitation to spend the summer with her in Charleston, Jeff is captivated by her free spirit and warmth, and he eagerly looks forward to returning for another visit the following year.

But Jeff’s second summer in Charleston ends with a devastating betrayal, and he returns to his father wounded almost beyond bearing. But out of Jeff’s pain grows a deepening awareness of the unexpected and complicated ways of love and loss and of family and friendship — and the strength to understand his father, his mother, and especially himself.

October 2017 Wrap-Up (Part 1)

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Sons from Afar by Cynthia Voigt
(The Tillerman Cycle, book 6)
Rating:  ★★★★☆
Review:  No
Reading Dates:  October 2 – 5
Read Count:  3
Favorite Thing:  The way James and Sammy both admire each other, with neither of them realizing it.
Least Favorite Thing:  Not enough Dicey & Gram.

I was right in this post, to expect that I would like this book more now that I’m older. I even rated it higher than I had in the past.

My Posts About Sons from Afar

Seventeen Against the Dealer by Cynthia Voigt
(The Tillerman Cycle, book 7)
Rating:  ★★★★☆
Review:  No
Reading Dates:  September 5 – 6
Read Count:  3
Favorite Thing:  The way Dicey thinks about things.
Least Favorite Thing:  Cisco. (Please read that name with your lip curled up in disgust, because that’s how I think it and how I typed it.)

Wow. I was right to expect it to be different to read when I was older. Not good different or bad different, but different.

The best way I can think to explain it is:  When I was younger and I read it, I was reading it with the kind of optimism about the future that mostly only people under 18 have, even the ones who don’t think they really have it much. Because no matter what was going on I thought pretty much like I always had with all the other books, that everything would fall into place and work out because Dicey deserved for it to. And because that’s what I was reading it for, when Dicey feels satisfied with the way she’s moving forward at the end, I felt like everything had fallen into place and worked out.

Now though, I see it more realistically. Things don’t work out because you deserve for them to or because you want them, but even when things don’t work out the way you dreamed, there’s usually something you can still do to pick yourself up and keep going with your life, whichever way you go. Not that it’s all hunky-dory, of course, but if you look at things with an eye to solve problems and keep surviving, that’s almost always what you’ll do eventually, even if it doesn’t feel good the whole time and even if it isn’t the way you wanted it to be.

I feel like this book was trying to teach me something my whole life, and I got it, but I didn’t get it.

It’s a great book, but it’s a hard one too. Because you only want things to work out the way they ought to and be simpler, and you have to grow your thoughts up right alongside Dicey as you read. And the process doesn’t feel very good most of the time, though there are bright spots, but in the end you feel satisfied with yourself and with the book.

This bit got a lot longer than I usually have it, but I can’t see a single thing I’m willing to take out, so long it will have stay.

My Posts About Seventeen Against the Dealer

Empress of the World by Sara Ryan
(Battle Hall Davies, book 1)
Rating:  ★★★☆☆
Review:  No
Reading Dates:  October 12
Read Count:  2
Favorite Thing:  Nic’s insistence on “bisexual”.
Least Favorite Thing:  It’s a tie between everyone else insisting on saying Nic was gay/lesbian and her straight friend Katrina making every single thing about Nic and Battle into something sexual as if queer relationships aren’t about anything except sex.  (Note:  I didn’t enjoy reading those things, but they are totally accurate so I wouldn’t want them removed from the book.)

I read this book once before when I was in middle school or early high school. I decided to reread it because there’s something about the cover art and title that constantly bring me back to it even though it’s not exactly a mind-blowing piece of writing. But I can actually remember clearly the exact moment I first saw this book on a shelf, and if you know anything about me and my terrible memory, you know that’s a huge deal.

I did have a couple of complaints, but they are small:

  • There was something off-putting about the way all Nic’s straight friends kept saying “dyke” all the time… Maybe Yankees use the word more than Southerners and that’s why I’m not used to it, but it practically made me flinch every time.
    (It’s only used as an insult a couple times, the rest are it being used in place of the words “gay” or “lesbian”, but in my life I’ve only ever heard anyone use that specific word on tv, even my queer friends never used it.)
  • It didn’t feel like there was a plot? I’m sure there must have been, and I guess it was that the romance was the entire plot, but honestly it barely felt like it had a plot at all. I’m assuming that I am just not used to novels that are literally about romance and nothing else at all.

Overall it was a decent book and it was nice to see a portrayal of the different ways bisexuality is erased and dismissed by other people.

My Posts About Empress of the World

Persuasion by Jane Austen
Rating:  ★★★☆☆
Review:  No
Reading Dates:  August 2 – October 13
Read Count:  1
Favorite Thing:  THE LETTER!!!!!
Least Favorite Thing:  Anne’s family…

I no longer hate Persuasion. I don’t love it, but I don’t hate it either. It’s just as well written as all Austen’s novels, even if I couldn’t get into it, and I’m so glad to have finally read it all the way through.

I finished this book for The Cookie Read-A-Thon 🙂

My Posts About Persuasion

I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You by Ally Carter
(Gallagher Girls, book 1)
Rating:  ★★★☆☆
Review:  No
Reading Dates:  October 13 – 14
Read Count:  2
Favorite Thing:  Mr. Moscowitz during the final!
Least Favorite Thing:  D’Man.

I’m pretty glad I decided to reread this one and see if I wanted to finish the series (which I never did the first time I found this book, back in middle school.

I read this book for The Cookie Read-A-Thon 🙂

My Posts About I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You

Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy by Ally Carter
(Gallagher Girls, book 2)
Rating:  ★★★☆☆
Review:  No
Reading Dates:  October 15
Read Count:  1
Favorite Thing:  The suitemates’ friendship makes me happy.
Least Favorite Thing:  Cammie doesn’t question things enough man… Or when she does she forgets them almost immediately.

I can’t believe someone actually debated who would make a better Gallagher Girl between Buffy and Veronica Mars when the answer is so clearly and unarguably Veronica. Buffy wouldn’t know stealth if it kicked her in the face…

Also I don’t actually remember reading this book before, but somehow I knew about Blackthorne? That is, I knew it was a boys school when Cammie overheard that first conversation and I knew it was specifically “Blackthorne Institute” so….???

I had a short feeling of Second Book Syndrome, but the book was engaging enough that I could just keep reading through it and luckily it didn’t last very long.

I read this book for The Cookie Read-A-Thon 🙂

My Posts About Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy

Part 2

 

Musing Monday: October 23, 2017

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Musing Mondays is a weekly meme, hosted by Ambrosia at The Purple Booker, that asks you to choose one of the following prompts to answer:

I’m currently reading…
Up next I think I’ll read…
I bought the following book(s) in the past week…
I’m super excited to tell you about (book/author/bookish-news)…
I’m really upset by (book/author/bookish-news)…
I can’t wait to get a copy of…
I wish I could read ____, but…
I blogged about ____ this past week…

THIS WEEK’S RANDOM QUESTION: Are there any books you really want to see made into tv shows or movies?

I blogged about ____ this past couple weeks…

Okay so this prompt is usually for a single week, but since I just finished up a read-a-thon, I figured I would go back over the past two weeks because I blogged way more than usual and also I just like things to be more even so there it is.

  • Monday, October 9 – Just a little Musing Monday action with a great prompt about books that changed your life.
  • Thursday, October 12 – Thursday everything was about Empress of the World by Sara Ryan. It started with a Currently Reading bookstagram (where I also took the opportunity to show off my delicious food), then once I’d finished that book I posted a rating post for it, and I used it for Thursday Quotables as well.
  • Friday, October 13 – This was the start of The Cookie Read-A-Thon, and a very busy day for me! First Lines Fridays went up as scheduled, then I shared Mary’s tumblr post about her Cookie Read-A-Thon before I started on my own read-a-thon journey with Day 1 of the Kind of Daily Challenge. I intended to read just my weekly chapter of Persuasion, but I managed to enjoy myself so much I kept reading all the way to the end! This resulted in a very long version of my weekly Persuasion update, a rating post, and after some consideration I went ahead and put together a Persuasion Project master post. But wait, there’s more! I started another book, I’d Tell You I Love You, But Then I’d Have to Kill You by Ally Carter, so I posted a Currently Reading bookstagram for that, then later that night my first daily wrap-up for the read-a-thon.
  • Saturday, October 14 – I finished the first Gallagher Girls book and did a rating post for it, then a Currently Reading bookstagram for the next one (Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy), and that night my second read-a-thon daily wrap-up.
  • Sunday, October 15 – Sunday blogging started with a delicious cup of tea (and more biscuits than would strictly be necessary for just one person) which I posted for Tomes & Tea, then a rating post when I finished the second Gallagher Girls book, followed by Day 3 of the Kind of Daily Challenge. Later, a Currently Reading bookstagram for the third Gallagher Girls book (Don’t Judge a Girl by Her Cover), which I also managed to finish that day so I posted another rating post, and then my read-a-thon daily wrap-up.
  • Monday, October 16 – Monday started with a Currently Reading bookstagram for the fourth Gallagher Girls book, Only the Good Spy Young, and then Musing Monday, where I talked about my decision to give the new John Green book a chance, and how I felt about memoirs. I finished the book I was reading and made a rating post, followed by a Currently Reading bookstagram for the fifth Gallagher Girls book (Out of Sight, Out of Time), and lastly my daily wrap-up for read-a-thon.
  • Tuesday, October 17 – I finished that fifth Gallagher Girls book (officially my favorite of the series) in the wee hours of Tuesday morning and got my rating post out, and since I had already scheduled Teaser Tuesday I decided to get some sleep! My sleep lasted longer than I intended, but I still managed to get through the sixth Gallagher Girls book and do a Currently Reading bookstagram and a rating post. Then I talked about my favorite genre in Day 5 of the Kind of Daily Challenge, and wrap the day up for read-a-thon.
  • Wednesday, October 18 – Sad, sad, neglected Wednesday. I fully intended to do things, but my body decided my intentions meant nothing and that I should sleep fitfully all day long and completely neglect everything that didn’t have to do with sleeping on the couch and worrying my husband by missing every phone call and text all day long. Whoops!
  • Thursday, October 19 – I got (kind of) back on track Thursday, starting with Thursday Quotables and posted a Currently Reading bookstagram just before I took a long bath with Love & Gelato. Admittedly I didn’t get very far before I fell asleep (and the book thankfully fell on the floor and not into the bath…), but when I woke up I did post a progress update. Before I went back to bed, I did Day 7 of the Kind of Daily Challenge and waxed poetical about all the favorite reading spots I had the privilege of knowing in my life. (I didn’t, I’m not poetically skilled, I just talked about them, but it did earn me the greatest compliment I’ve ever had from one of my favorite book bloggers.) And of course I ended the night with my daily wrap-up of my read-a-thon progress.
  • Friday, October 20 – First Lines Fridays & Friday 56 went up first thing, then a rating post for Love & Gelato, and that night I did my usual daily wrap-up for read-a-thon.
  • Saturday, October 21 – I did eventually get my thoughts in order (after talking to a friend who very helpfully tells me when I’m over-reacting to things and when I’m normal-reacting) and put together a post about some casual racism found in Love & Gelato. I actually managed to pick a book to read pretty easily (We Are Okay by Nina LaCour), which surprised me, and I used it in a bookstagram for Day 9 of the Kind of Daily Challenge, and ended the night with a penultimate read-a-thon daily wrap-up.
  • Sunday, October 22 – I finished We Are Okay, easily one of my favorite books in a while, and posted a rating for it as well as some quotes. Then I picked a new book, Mind Games by Kiersten White, yet another that I have no idea how I wound up with it on my TBR, and used it in Tomes & Tea, then my final wrap-up for The Cookie Read-A-Thon.

Woo! Busy two weeks for me! So aside from the fact that I feel icky sicky and can’t even remember how it feels to just breathe without suffering, I think I’m doing pretty well.

Are there any books you really want to see made into tv shows or movies?
Yes! Yes! Okay! I’m going to try to put my thoughts in order for this because I can see it so perfectly in my mind and have for a while, but I’ve never tried to explain it to anyone before.

First of all, it would be a miniseries, three or four 90-minute episodes per season, four seasons in all. Each season would cover a single novel in Cynthia Voigt’s Tales of the Kingdom series.

This series is a non-magical fantasy, so it would probably look somewhat like Game of Thrones, except without all the gratuitous rape scenes and dragons.

It’s also important to note that it is a loosely-connected series, meaning it’s all set in the same world, but at different times, so the main characters of each book never meet each other. For example, in book 2 (On Fortune’s Wheel) there is a point where Birle and Orien are shipwrecked on some rocky outcropping and are trapped. They scratch their names on the rocky cliff. Later in book 3, Oriel and Griff are hiding out there and they find the names on the cliff wall, which is how Oriel comes to be called that in the first place. By this time Birle and Orien are long gone of course.

All this is to explain why, in my mind, they use mostly the same ensemble of actors for each season even though the previous season’s characters are gone into history already. This would also be an easy way to show when someone is a descendant of a main character from a previous novel, because they could be played by the same actor.

It would be so amazing! In fact, when I read them I can picture it playing out in my mind so perfectly. If I was loaded I would pay to produce this I swear.

First Lines Fridays: October 20, 2017

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First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?

  • Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
  • Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
  • Finally… reveal the book!

First Lines:

The woman put her sad moon-face in the window of the car.
“You be good,” she said. “You hear me? You little ones, mind what Dicey tells you. You hear?”

Interested? Scroll down for the cover and summary!

Homecoming by Cynthia Voigt
(Tillerman Cycle, book 1)

It’s still true…

That’s the first thing James Tillerman says to his sister Dicey every morning. It’s still true that their mother has abandoned the four Tillerman children somewhere in the middle of Connecticut. It’s still true they have to find their way, somehow, to Great-aunt Cilla’s house in Bridgeport, which may be their only hope of staying together as a family.

But when they get to Bridgeport, they learn that Great-aunt Cilla has died, and the home they find with her daughter, Eunice, isn’t the permanent haven they’ve been searching for. So their journey continues to its unexpected conclusion — and some surprising discoveries about their history, and their future.

The Cookie Read-A-Thon Kind of Daily Challenge, Day 3: Book(s) You Read in One Sitting

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I’m doing The Cookie Read-A-Thon, started by Mary @ Books & Cookies (on her tumblr blog though). Learn More

I decided to interpret this prompt as “the type of book I usually read in one sitting” so here goes:

I’ve noticed that for the most part, I don’t usually read my favorite genre (YA Fantasy) in one sitting, but I’m not sure why. The genre I’m most likely to sit down and read all in one go is YA Contemporary, like the book I read last Thursday, Empress of the World (by Sara Ryan). That’s not to say there aren’t exceptions, but those usually have more to do with extenuating factors like lack of internet connection, unusually good writing (*cough* Cynthia Voigt *cough*), or the book being due back at the library the very next day.

The best I can figure, it must be the setting that does it. Because with a fantasy novel you have all this world building that goes into it, and with a contemporary novel it’s just your world so you can just jump right into it and go without having to remember where places are or how they do things or whatever.

Since I sort of mentioned her, I’ll point out that I can almost always read a Cynthia Voigt book in one sitting, regardless of genre. Unless something comes up that makes me have to stop reading, I won’t put a Cynthia Voigt book down until it’s over. (And possibly not even then.) I’ve read most of them several times over, but every single time I love them just as much as if it were the first time! I’ve never loved an author more honestly, as anyone who spends more than 30 seconds on this blog can probably tell.

Even if you’re not doing the read-a-thon, I’d love to know what sort of books you usually devour in one sitting, or even specific books you have (because I live for book recs, y’all). Comment (or reblog/message me if you are reading this on tumblr instead of wordpress) and let me know!