Flight into Fantasy

I am several reviews behind, and I wanted to jstart fresh and review books I’d read in 2010. With that in mind, I thought I’d steal an idea from Kailana. She does a feature occasionally called Six-sentence Saturday, in which she talks about recent reads in reviews of only six sentences. Here, then, is my attempt at the same kind of thing.

• Hard Candy by Andrew Vachss: This is the fourth in Vachss’s Burke novels, and is largely a transition book. The case Burke works on is incidental except that it allows him to deal with some of the demons he’s been fighting since the last book. As such, I didn’t think it was as strong as some of the others I’ve read. Still, Burke is one of my favorite characters in all of literature, and I can’t wait to dive into the next adventure in his life. This book works fine as a stand-alone, though I think you’d get more out of the series by starting from the beginning. This book rates a B.

• Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel: This classic Mexican novel of romance and cooking had an interesting premise–a woman is thwarted from marrying her true love because she has to take care of her mother, so she throws herself into life in the kitchen. Sadly, as awesome as this idea was, and as much as it’s a modern classic, it didn’t work for me very well. I found the novel quite readable, but the main character, Elena, struck me as a Mary Sue. I also thought a few of the magic realism bits were just random, and that took me out of the story. I’m sure this makes me a plebe of the lowest order. I have to give this one a C.
• I Am a Genius of Unspeakable Evil and I Want To Be Your Class President by Josh Lieb: The premise is pretty much right there in the title. I thought this book was quite fun, and enjoyed it while I was reading it, but it wasn’t perfect. Mr. Lieb tried too hard to make this book appeal to both kids and adults, and I’m not sure how well it would appeal to either. It did make me laugh out loud in places, though, so it succeeded somewhere. I’d read more by Josh Lieb in the future. This book gets a B-.
• His Ordinary Life by Linda Winfree: I officiallhy love the Hearts of the South series. Each book is an intimate glimpse into the life of two small-town Georgia residents and their friends. In this installment, the romantic conflict–a marriage in trouble due to poor communication–is expertly handled, and I was invested in Dell and Barbara’s making things work. The suspense plot was also quite well-handled, with a villain I didn’t see coming. I’ve got to stop waiting months between reading these books. My grade is a strong B+.
• A Countess Below Stairs by Eva Ibbotsen: What a fun, delightfully fluffy confection of a book! This is a romance in the best sense of the word, with an impoverished Russian countess charming everyone she meets in the house of an earl where she is working as a housemaid. I smiled all the way through this book, and eagerly look forward to reading more Ibbotsen. I suspect that fans of more realism in their romances will find this book hard to deal with, but to them I say “Thppppt.” I loved it anyway, and the book neatly avoids any romance tropes that make me cringe. I rate this another B+.
• The Book of Vice: Very Naughty Things and How to Do Them by Peter Sagal: I like books like this, which are deeply personal encounters journalists have with whatever they’re studying. Sagal, who hosts the NPR show, Wait Wait, Don’t Tell Me goes on a personal journey through several vices. Ultimately, he decides he’s better off sticking to his vanilla lifestyle. Mostly, I thought this book was quite funny and I definitely couldn’t put it down. Still, there was a certain prissiness to Sagal’s writing that kept me from really taking him seriously. Despite that, though, I’d rate it a B.

And there you have it, the last of the books of 2009. There is one more review forthcoming of a book I read last year, but I’ll let it speak for itself when the time comes.

Yesterday I reviewed the adult fantasy and SF I’ve been reading. Today, I’m going to take a brief look at some of the YA fantasy I’ve gone through over the past few months.

• Skellig by David Almond came recommended by Nymeth. It’s the story of a sad and lonely little boy whose family moves to a ramshackle house. His parents are preoccupied by the fact that his baby sister is seriously ill. Michael, the boy, is fascinated by the garage, which is condemned, and discovers a strange, winged man inside. He begins feeding the man, and with the help of a misfit girl he meets, he begins finding hope again.

  This story packs a lot in a very few words. It took me a while to get into it, and I’m still not entirely sure everything worked for me. I enjoyed the imagery, and I enjoyed the story’s gentle hopefulness, but I’m not sure it’s a book I would have chosen to read on my own. I think this one will get a C.

• I Was a Teenage Fairy is the first book by Francesca Lia Block that I’d read that wasn’t part of the Weetzie Bat series. like the Weetzie Bat books, Block takes us to a glittering version of Los Angeles. We meet Barbie, a struggling teenager whose mother, the worst stage mother ever, wants her to be a model so that she can relive her glory days. Barbie finds herself powerless, and she befriends Mab, a fairy she meets. Mab has a lot to teach Barbie, and in turn, there’s a lot Barbie can teach Mab as well.

  This is the kind of urban fantasy I like–the kind that evokes a definite sense of wonder. I don’t think I’d want to live in Block’s L.A., but it sure would be fun to visit. I found Barbie to be a bit of a doormat at first, but I adored Mab, and I liked watching Barbie come to find a sense of pride in herself. This one gets a strong B.

• Graceling by Kristen Cashore is another book I read because of all the hype. I think Renay was the one who eventually got me to pick this up. And I’m glad she did. While the book does lose a few points for not being as awesome as advertised, those don’t really matter outside of my head. This story features Katsa, a prickly, sharp-tongued young woman with different-colored eyes and amazing special powers. Mary Sue fanfic, right? Well, I thought it veered that way at the beginning, and so it took me a while to truly get to like Katsa. But gradually, without my picking up on it, Ms. Cashore made me care about her. It’s the vulnerability that I really like in my bad-ass fighter chicks, and though Katsa hides hers well, eventually it became obvious and from that point on, I was in her corner all the way. I also really loved Po, and I got why Katsa finds him fascinating. And I do have to say that I agree with part of Renay’s assessment of the book, and I’m glad to see a book end with the couple still together but not married, because that’s a perfectly acceptable choice, and anything else wouldn’t have been true to Katsa. My grade wavers on this one from a B to a B+, so I think I’ll be generous and go for the higher grade, because I do want to revisit this particular fantasy world.
• The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J. K. Rowling wasn’t a book I’d intended to read. I actually haven’t readd any of the supplimentary Harry Potter materials, because honestly, that kind of stuff feels a bit like the author cashing in on the hype. And, in this case, that’s exactly how I felt reading these stories. I didn’t feel like I got much insight into wizarding culture that I’d missed before, and the fairy tales, while interesting in and of themselves, are kind of forgetable. I think I’ll stay clear of JKR until she writes another actual novel. C- for this one.

Come back tomorrow for some quick peeks at the romances I’ve read.

I haven’t been blogging much lately, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. Life got in the way, and then the number of books I had to review kept getting larger and larger, and I’ve found that if I don’t get my thoughts down quickly enough about a particular book I’ve been reading, I tend to lose it.

So, for the next few days, I’ll be writing mini reviews of the stuff I’ve been reading. I’m going to abandon my normal reviewing format for these posts, just to make it easier on myself.

Today’s list of books are all adult and are SF and fantasy related. And, just to put how far behind in reviews I actually am in some perspective, I read this first book in May.

• Nine Princes in Amber is the first of Roger Zelazny’s The Chronicles of Amber. It tells the story of Corwen, who wakes up in a hospital room with no memory of who he is, and is enmeshed immediately in a family feud so powerful that the wrong move could cause destruction throughout every demension.

  Like the reader, Corwen is simply dumped into the story, and I liked learning along with Corwen what was going on. Of course, Corwen does think rather highly of himself, which colors the narrative, but I found him engaging. I’m not sure yet whether I’m intrigued enough to keep going with the series, but this one does rate a B-.

• Luck in the Shadows by Lynn Flewelling is an epic fantasy. Alec, wrongfully imprisoned by a cruel lord, is rescued by the mysterious and compelling Seragil, who teaches Alec the art of spying. Soon the two are embroiled in adventure involving cursed objects, wizards, and deadly politics.

  I read this one back in May as well, and it was fairly forgetable. I think a lot of the reason for this is that I’m used to a lot of the tropes Ms. Flewelling employs, and I just don’t find them memorable, although I can see this being a good choice for a newbie fantasy reader. Alec and Seragil, sadly, weren’t particularly compelling characters. I did, however, like that the dialogue flowed in what I thought was a natural way. There’s no pretentious, high-falutin speech here, nor is there a tendency to be as crude as possible, both sins other fantasy writers commit all the time. I did enjoy the book while I was reading it, and may finish up the series. This one gets a C.

• Four and Twenty Blackbirds by Cherie Priest was one of those books I read for the hype. I know several bloggers think she rocks, and whenever bloggers speak in hyperbole, I do tend to listen. It centers around Eden, who has developed some rather unusual abilities, and is told in a compelling Southern Gothic style. I really enjoy Southern Gothic stories, and this one had plenty of the elements I like from that genre–small Southern towns, lots of family drama, and engrossing horror elements. Unfortunately, after I finished it, the details slipped away. I know that I like Ms. Priest’s writing, but I really can’t remember very much about the plot overall, so I’m going to have to give it a B-.
• Blue Diablo by Ann Aguirre is an urban fantasy set in an unusual location. Corine Solomon is living a quiet life running an antique shop in Mexico when she is contacted by her ex, Chance, who wants her to help him find his missing mother.

  As a reviewer, the hardest books to talk about are the ones that don’t leave a significant impression. Particularly when the book is written by one of the reviewer’s favorite authors. Ann Aguirre is talented, and I did find myself enjoying the story while I was reading it, but the gripping excitement I feel when reading her Sirantha Jax series just isn’t here. The story felt a little quieter somehow, and I do like that Ms. Aguirre writes her characters with distinct enough voices that, while I was reading, I wasn’t thinking, ‘OK, so this is Jax but in Mexico.’ Corine seems to be more reflective than Jax, and she’s got a lot of reasonable issues to work through. But there was something about this story that didn’t quite grab me. I don’t even particularly want to argue about which of the two love interests Corine could develop– for the record, I am on team Chance. To that end, this book gets a C+.

• In the Cities of Coin and Spice by Cathrynne M. Valente is the second and final volume of her Orphan’s Tale duology. I really loved the way that the stories spun out in the first book, but the second wasn’t nearly so captivating. The stories in the second book are quite a bit darker than in the first, and when I wasn’t reading I found myself pondering logistical questions, like how the girl who spins the tales acquired language skills considering she was thought to be a demon and banished to the castle gardens. The end wraps all the plot threads up in a neat and tidy bow that, upon further reflection, I find eyeroll-inducing. For all that, though, I do enjoy some of the ideas Valente plays with. I really love the feminist themes in her books, and I like the way her female characters must survive and do the best they can in a world that is often cruel. I think I would read more Valente, but sadly, her urban fantasy novel, Palimsest doesn’t really appeal. C+ for this one.
• Elantris by Brandon Sanderson is a rare breed of book. It is an adult epic fantasy, and it stands alone. It is the story of the titular Elantris, which is a city of magic and beauty. Unfortunately, ten years ago, everything changed when the magic ran out, and now the citizens of Elantris are little more than half-rotten, mad corpses.

  I think I would have liked this book much better had I not listened to an audio version. The narrator doesn’t do this book any favors, and I found his style kind of giggle-inducingly self-important. Also, Sanderson’s writing isn’t particularly polished, something I pick up on a lot more if I listen to someone read me a book than I would have if I were reading on my own. Still, the characters are fun, and subversive enough that I didn’t feel I was reading a cliche-ridden fantasy novel. The characters are warmly drawn, and there’s only one who is distinctly hard to sympathize with. My quibbles with the book are minor, and purely my own preference–I hated that the end required the strong, capable female character to need rescuing from capture, but that’s just me. A strong B for this one.

Tomorrow, come back for some reviews of the children’s and YA fantasy I’ve been reading!

Some months ago, I ran into Sybil on a yahoo group. It soon became clear that we have exactly the opposite taste in books, and so, armed with this knowledge, Sybil has begun twisting my arm, reletlessly, for book reviews. She’s even sweetened the pot with offers of free books–as many as my little heart desires.

So I’ve officially become a staff reviewer for The Good, the Bad, and the Unread.

What does this mean for all four of you who read my blog? Well, I’ll still post reviews over here, especially series books that people have already reviewed at Sybil’s. And there are a few books I do intend to read this month that I wouldn’t post up over there, like Tabitha King’s Candles Burning which is a horror book I’ve started and would love to finish if I didn’t stop being distracted by shiny objects.

Anyway, I do have a few reviews posted over at Sybil’s, so I’ll go ahead and round up those links.

One of the complaints I hear a lot around blogland is that a lot of paranormal romances are basically retreads of each other, even though the notion of paranormal romance ought to invite a lot more variety in the genre. This seems to be true for me–after all, how many times can I read about fated vampire mates or fated shifter mates or, hell, anybody’s fated mates without wanting to snap?

That being said, Alice Gaines isn’t writing the same old paranormals. In fact, my reaction upon learning, from my friend Jaliya, to the series I’m going to be writing about was pretty much, “What the fuck was she smoking?”

I am, of course, referring to the Mannhof,/a> series from Changeling Press. Normally, I don’t buy from them much because when I buy ebooks, I want to buy something that’ll last me a while. But this series had me breaking that rule, because it’s about shape-shifting motorcycles. Yep, you read that right. I was startled, too, and then intrigued. Could Ms. Gaines pull this off?

Surprisingly, the answer is: mostly. It’s not the shape-shifting motorcycles that I had much of a problem with. I don’t think shape-shifting inanimate objects will become the next trend in paranormal romance, although what do I know? But the premise is certainly not one I’ve read before.

The books in the series go in this order:

• One Owner, Lady Driven

• Driven to the limit
• Driven to Justice.

The problem with all three of these books, for me, is the problem I have with a lot of shorter ebooks. There’s not really enough story to let me get to know the characters. They are painted in very broad strokes, and though each of the women faces different issues in their lives, I thought that the healing process and the road to love required a bit more time than the space permitted.

One Owner, Lady Driven starts off the series when Claire Wilcox purchasses one of the horrendously rare Mannhof motorcycles at an auction. When the bike changes into a stud named Will, well, there goes Claire’s productivity and her sense of control.

To be honest, I didn’t ever warm up to Claire. I thought it was awesome that she knew exactly what she wanted and went for it, but she was kind of a shrill harpy, and I hate reading about those. I also felt horrible for her junior executive, Ted, who Claire never appreciates. She never really thanks him until the end of the book, and I thought she should at least give him a raise. As for the romance? It worked for me mostly except for one scene in the climax of the book where I thought the hero was being kind of a whiny, codependent jackass.

Driven to the limit worked slightly better for me. Lauren has come home from rehab, and now she’s back working for Dagger, a successful rock star who is into drugs, violence, and the whole party scene. Lauren’s only bit of solace is Dagger’s Mannhof motorcycle, Jake.

This book worked the best for me out of the whole trilogy, at least it did after I stopped fretting about why anyone would want to bear her internal struggles to a motorcycle. I know I wouldn’t. The nearest thing to talking to machines that I do involves cursing at them. But hey, whatever works for Lauren.

I liked watching Lauren recover some of her self-confidence, and I loved the climactic scenes in the book.

Driven to Justice rounds off the series. Cop Charlie Thomas’s job is being threatened because she insists on going after the men who raped her. With the help and love of Nick, another Mannhof motorcycle, she might just manage to do it.

I wanted to like this last story very much. But I thought that, yet again, everything was dealt with too quickly and easily as per the word count. Charlie could have been a great complex character, but she wasn’t really allowed to be. The thing is that at least in the end she is agreeing to go to therapy, which made me feel a lot better about the lightness with which the issue of her rape was treated.

Overall, I thought the series was cute. It’s nothing that’s going to stick around very long in my memory–well, the shape-shifting motorcycles pretense totally will–but it was a pleasant enough read. I would have liked for each of the boys to have had a distinct personality. They really didn’t, so it was hard not to see them as basically pieces of meat.

I think I might be interested in some of Ms. Gaines’ longer works, but for this series, I’m going to go with an overall grade of C+.

Lately I’ve been reading Dave Barry because, well, he’s awesome, and also because I’ve been reading him before I go to sleep. I can’t read fiction at night because invariably I’ll get caught up in the book and then, whoa, it’s 4 A.M. already.

Anyway, no proper book reviews, but I have finished Dave Barry’s Greatest Hits and Dave Barry Slept Here which I recommend highly because Dave Barry is hillarious.

I am currently in the middle of–let’s count them–five books, so last night I decided, hey, why not, I wanted to read something short that I could finish in a few minutes that was unrelated to anything else.

The first thing I tried was Understood by Maya Banks

Summary: When she breaks free from the bondage of her past, he’ll be waiting.
Jake Turner committed the ultimate mistake of falling in love with his best friend’s
wife. The distance he puts between them costs both him and Ellie Matthews dearly.
Jake will never forgive himself for not seeing what a bastard his friend was. Now
that Ellie is free from her nightmare, Jake waits, needing and wanting. He’ll be
there when Ellie is ready to spread her wings.

My thoughts: As someone who has in the past volunteered at a shelter for victims of domestic violence, I find myself curious to see whether books like this will deal with the issues in a thoughtful and sensitive manner. In this case, the answer is no. Our hero, Jake, is an alpha male straight out of central casting, which doesn’t exactly leave me hopeful for a long-lasting relationship between these two. And if I were a survivor of a horrible marriage, the last thing I’d appreciate is some jerk I thought was my friend saying things like, “I’m going to make you mine!” It would make me run the complete other way.

Of course, Ellie totally fails to do this, and we get to the part of the book where my suspension of disbelief packed its bags and left entirely. Which would be the part where Jake says the following:

He grinned. A cocky, self assured grin. “I’ll fit, sweetheart. You’ll take
all of me. In your mouth, in your pussy, and in your ass. And you’ll love
every minute of it.”

At that point it became abundantly clear that this was just another run of the mill contemporary erotic romance, and I was going to have to endure long, interminable sex scenes, so this book went straight to the land of “cannot finish, do not want”.

The other book I actually finished (mostly because it was incredibly short) was Wizard’s Moon by Michele Bardsley.

A wizard cursed…
Handsome and desperate wizard True Karn becomes human during the “wizard's moon”—the
only two nights of the month he can look for his mate. The rest of the time, he must
live in his monstrous, cursed form. When he rescues a pretty lady from the lascivious
attention of two guardsmen, he realizes that she could be the one he’s been searching
for.
A woman scorned…
Plain and reliable Alissa Rogers works in a house of ill repute—as an accountant.
She’s not pretty enough to be a prostitute, but it seems she’s still woman enough
to gain the attention of an infamous wizard…

My thoughts: This was fun. My suspension of disbelief was stretched for a while there, but I’d rate it a pretty solid B because neither of the characters actively pissed me off. As usual, the heroine turns out to have low self-esteem rather than be ugly, and she is a bit of a Mary Sue, but then, that describes 98 percent of heroines in romantic fiction.

The world-building here is way shaky. I couldn’t tell if this was supposed to be urban fantasy, standard fantasy, or what. Alissa (whose last name changes once at completely random BTW! Bad editor! No cookie!) seems to live in a pretty modern house, but the taxis in this world are horse-drawn.

But, really, my “bzuh?” moment comes at the end, and if you want to avoid being spoiled for this book, which I’m sure you’re just all going to race out and buy, I suggest you not read farther.

OK, is that everybody else? Good.

At the end of the story, Alissa has to save True from his curse via the old heroic fantasy stand-by of… you guessed it..,. double penetration. Because True’s curse endows him with two dicks. And of course Alissa loves this. Me, I was trying to picture this actually happening, and smothering immature giggles.

I read a lot while I was gone, since I didn’t have the Internet to distract me during my downtime. I’ll see if I can remember everything.

Young Miles by Lois McMaster Bujold: I really did love reading about Miles Vorkosigan. He’s a compelling character, and so far his stories have been wonderful.

Kushiel’s Dart by Jacqueline Carey: I’d heard so much about how wonderful this book was that I was a little wary of reading it. After some initial irritation with the prose style and the faux French, I found myself captivated by the story, and once Phedre went off on adventures, things really picked up and I was hooked.

Kushiel’s Chosen by Jacqueline Carey: Once more, a great book. Again, I found the beginning slow, but I finished it in one sitting after I got about halfway through.

Storm Front by Jim Butcher: I’d started this one ages ago, but never finished it. I loved the combination of urban fantasy with a detective story, and I stayed up ridiculously late one night to finish it.

Undead and Unwed by MaryJanice Davidson: Chick lit meets vampires? I really didn’t expect to like this as much as I did, but I love Betsy, our vain, shallow, shoe-obsessed protagonist who is also the queen of the vampires.

Undead and Unemployed by MaryJanice Davidson: The sequel to the previous book. I didn’t read these back to back, or I might have been annoyed that Betsy really isn’t very bright. But nonetheless, still a good read.

Hot Spell by Emma Holly, Lorra Leigh, Meljean Brook and Shiloh Walker: I’ve been reading this anthology for months as well. I loved the Emma Holly story, and the Meljean Brook story, though a bit of a slow start, was great. The Shiloh Walker was meh, and the Lorra Leigh was… a bit of a mess, although it did have a great premise. (It’s just that our male protagonist had a barbed penis. Yes. A barbed. Fucking. Penis.

Bewitched, Bothered and Bevampired by MaryJanice Davidson, et. al.: A much better anthology. The stories were all varying degrees of funny, but they were all cute, and I can’t say there were any I hated.

Fine Flickering Hungers by Alesha Brio: Wonderful, well-written erotica. The only drawback to these stories was that I needed help navigating the publisher’s website, and letting the 60-year-old woman you’re staying with find out you want to read erotica is definitely embarrassing.

Pirate’s Price by Darlene Marshall: I was expecting a historical romantic comedy. And the book was funny in places, but the story was good enough that I wasn’t disappointed it wasn’t more hillarious. And it was a refreshing change to read about a kick-ass female lead in a romance story.

Promises Keep by Sarah McCarty: I adored Promises Linger but this sequel was meh. Mostly because I got the impression Sarah was writing the same story, only with duller characters. Plus, unlike the heroine in the previous book, Mara Kincaid, our erstwhile heroine here, was dropped on her head occasionally as a baby, which is the only excuse I can come up with for what a moron she was in places.

Guardian of Honor by Robin D. Owens: I shouldn’t have liked this book, because it was utterly cheesetastic, but I did. I can’t explain its appeal, either. I just know it was highly satisfying and I can’t wait to read the sequels.

The Year of the Unicorn by Andre Norton: I’m not sure that I like Norton’s writing style, either, as it was quite overblown, and it took me a while to understand where the plot was going, but in the end, it was a fairly good story. I would read more Witch World books.

A Wind in the Door by Madeleine L’Engle: I guess this counts since it was a reread. I adore the adventures of Meg and her friends, and have read almost everything L’Engle has written about them.

The Riddle of Pencroft Farm by Dorothea Jenson: The couple I was staying with and I read this together. It’s a children’s book, and would be great for a fifth or sixth grader studying about the Revolutionary War. For me as an adult, it was didactic and a little boring.

Assassin’s Apprentice by Robin Hobb: I read a recommendation for Hobb’s books on a George R. R. Martin message board and decided to try her for myself. I loved it. Fitz is an interesting and compelling character, and I’m curious to see where the story arc goes from here.

> Tales of the Shareem: Rhees by Allyson James: I did finish this eventually, but it wasn’t really all that exciting. James’s erotic romance formula was patently obvious from the beginning, and I wish she’d paid more attention to her world-building and less to smexing up her characters.

I think those are all the books I actually finished. At the moment, I’m in the middle of several other books.

Oh, and I have to mention that a couple of ebook authors made it onto my never read list again:

• Jordan Summers: Her stories are about five close female friends who all stupidly go off to the jungle for haut smexing. I never made it to the hot smexing part, because I couldn’t get past the fact that the heroine of the first book freely admitted she knew nothing about the outdoors, yet was happily galavanting around the jungle.

• Charlotte Boyett Compo: In the book of hers I tried, her male character refers to a woman’s secretions as tasting like boiled potatoes… which took me out of the story and made me collapse into hysterical laughter for a long time. Seriously… WTF, boiled potatoes? Not romantic.
  

Talking it Out by Jenny ni Carthy and others: This is a very very dated guide for those people who want to start support groups for victims of domestic violence. As in, I was two years old when this thing came out. And reading a textbook is rarely much fun, especially when the invormation is so dated. But a lot of what ni Carthy says is highly relevant to people still working in domestic violence advocacy and I plan on using some of her ideas because I work as an advocate on support group night at the shelter. C for this one.

Finders Keepers by Lacey Savage is the second book in the Paranormal Mates Society series offered up by Changeling Press. In this short story, our heroine is half-telepath and half-clairvoyant, and not good at either, while our hero is a genie.

The bar was set pretty high with this series for me because of the Willa Okati story I reviewed yesterday. And I liked Savage’s contribution, though for different reasons. Claudia, our heroine, isn’t on the paranormalmatessociety.com website looking for love. She’s being paid to find Aladin’s magic lamp, and she thinks that Xander will lead her to it. So she manipulates him to try and get him to do so.

Xander is a lot of fun. As a geenie, he just wants a normal life. He has some trust issues, but they rang true for me, and despite my initial meh reaction, I warmed to the character.

But Claudia's by far the cooler of the two, even though she isn't the geenie. She's sexy and manipulative (although she denies it), and she isn't a silly prude like a lot of romance heroines.

I think Lacey Savage is also going up there on my authors to watch list. B+ for this one.

ETA November 17, 2007 – I'm trying to sort my tags out better, so I've added grades to these books, given what I remember of them.

I’ve read a lot since the last time there was a book post, so we’ll just hit the highlights:

The Sweet Potato Queens’ Book of Love by Jill Conner Browne
God Save the Sweet Potato Queens by Jill Conner Browne
The Sweet Potato Queens’ Big-ass Cookbook and Financial Planner by Jill Conner Browne
The Sweet Potato Queens’ Field Guide to Men: Every Man I Ever Loved is Either Married, Gay or Dead by Jill Conner Browne
The Sweet Potato Queens’ Wedding Planner and Divorce Guide by Jill Conner Browne

I loved all of these books and seriously read them all while suffering from a massive summer cold that is still hanging on. She's hillarious, witty, and insightful. I recommend reading what she has to say.

The Blue Girl by Charles de Lint

I really wish I could recommend this book higher. It just didn't work for me. De Lint at his best is fucking brilliant, but his later works just lack the sparkle of his early stuff. Even this book, which thankfully only references Jilly Coppercorn once, just didn't do it for me. Mostly this was because I wasn't convinced by de Lint's teenaged voice. Imogene, our plucky heroine, is only the kind of teenager you'd find in a de Lint book–plucky yet somehow wise beyond her years. She didn't strike me as authentic at all, and therefore I couldn't enjoy her story as much as I'd have liked. However, Adrian, the ghost whose unlife gets sort of embroiled with hers was a fun character and by far more sympathetic, for me at least.

Edited to add some grades: Given that I am really tempted to go out and buy the SPQ books on Audible just so I can listen to them being read, I'd say they're definitely all A books. The de Lint I'm giving a B- grade to, just because my memories of the book are pleasant, and he's by far better than a lot of other urban fantasy authors I've read since.

Only two this week.

Tithe by Holly Black is a fun YA urban fantasy with real, flawed, three-dementional teenagers. The heroine, Kaye, becomes a pawn in the Seelie and Unseelie courts. And Kaye and her faeries are a whole lot more likable than the seelie and unseelie courts in another famous urban fantasy series I could name.

Knight of a Trillion Stars by Dara Joy: I loved this book, though not for its heroine, science fiction writer Deana Jones. Deana is not the sharpest tool in the shed, and has several moments of hysterical neuroses that really got on my nerves. No, the fascinating part about this book is Lorgin Ta'al Cru, the alien warrior who travels through space and time to earth, which is justthe beginning of the adventures he and Deana have. Lorgin is sexy as hell, larger than life, and every inch the alpha male. Sometimes, this manifested in me rolling my eyes, but Lorgin was so devistatingly sexy that I forgave him being a complete asshole.

Joy's secondary characters are also compelling. Most of them are obvious sequel bait, from Lorgin's half-brother Rejar, whose book I want to read, to the poor, tortured, angst-ridden Traed, and the revered mystic Yaniff. It's obvious that Joy loves her characters, and she made me love them, too.

Edited for grades: In hindsight, the white trash protagonist with the rebellious spirit who is also a teenager doesn't quite work for me, since I wasn't that teenager. So Black's book gets a B+. On the other hand, I remember dreaming about the characters in KOATS, which means I'll give it an A.

I’ve read a lot recently and because of computer troubles haven’t had a chance to update sooo.

• Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein: I love this book. Loved it the first time I read it, loved it this time. Especially now that I really get it. That book made me love Heinlein. Grade: A

• Charms for the Easy Life by Kaye Gibbons: Not terribly memorable, but a good portrayal of a group of very different, but strong women during the early twentieth century. Charlie Kate, the narrator's grandmother, is the central figure in this book, and she's a marvelous character. Grade: C+
• Daughters of the New World by Susan Richards Shreeve: Another wonderful portrayal of life during the twentieth century, and four generations of strong American women. This was made into a craptastic Lifetime movie that sucked me in, so I had to read the book. Naturally, the book was a lot better, and a lot less schlocky. In fact, what I really liked about it was that it was a feel-good story without being terribly sentimental. Grade: A-
• A Cure for Dreams by Kaye Gibbons: This one was short. I finished it within a couple of hours of starting. Another story of strong women in the Depression. I liked Charms for the Easy Life better, though. Grade: C
• World's End by Joan Vinge: The sequel to The Snow Queen . This didn't work so well for me because I found the style–that of a journal–insufferable and our hero is extremely whiny throughout and I spent the whole book wanting to smack him upside the head. Grade: D+
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith: I'd read this book before, too. I got a lot more out of it on a second reread. Another nostalgic story about life in the early twentieth century. Smith's book is surprisingly dark, with moments of sweetness throughout. Francie Nolan, the protagonist, really resonated with me, and she led a hard life, but there wasn't really anything noble in her or her family's being poor. Smith also delves into such issues as sex, marital problems, and racial tensions, and I was surprised at how candid and frank the book was in parts. Grade: A

I'm going back and forth between two books now, Joan Vinge's The Summer Queen which I'm finding interesting except that at the part I'm at now, all of her characters are either pregnant or mommies, and I'm finding that a little bit irritating, Elizabeth Haydon's Rhapsody which would be a great book if it weren't for the title character, who is very inconsistently written and who makes me want to stick a fork in her eye. (However, Rhapsody's reluctant companions, Achmed and Grunthor, are worth reading about because Achmed is snarky and Grunthor is a gentle giant and we all know I love that archetype, even if Grunthor is written with an annoying cockney accent. I'm also starting to reread Charles de Lint's The Little Country which I know is going to be great since I've reread it several times.

So yesterday was obligatory Family Togetherness day. Which meant I could bring a book and pretty much ignore my family after a while. Which is a horrible thing to say, but our idea of family togetherness is watching a DVD with the volume cranked up loud so my father can hear it. Nobody actually talks during these outings, so it wasn’t like I was missing much.

Anyway, the result was that I could actually read Who Censored Roger Rabbit? by Gary K. Wolf without interruptions. And I’m glad I did. I’m not really a fan of hard-boiled detective novels, but this one was kind of cute, and the mystery element was compelling enough for me to keep guessing. It was definitely a lot different from the movie, at least what I remember of the movie. And it’s very highly recommended.

Also attempted last night was a start on Poul Anderson’s collection of novellas, The Time Patrol. I’m assured this is all classic SF, but I couldn’t get into the first one, so I figured there was very littlehope for the rest of the collection.

I want to make sure I keep track of what I am actually reading and I have not been, so here:

1. To Ride Pegasus – Anne McCaffrey (which I blogged about)
2. Pegasus in Flight – Anne McCaffrey (which surprisingly was a lot better.)
3. Live from Golgotha – Gore Vidal (wonderfully biting social satire)
4. An American Werewolf in Hoboken by Dakota Cassidy (ebook) (Very amusing and erotic romance)
5. A Storm of Swords – George R. R. Martin (OMG!)
6. The Twinkie Squad – Gordon Korman (a relic from my early teens that my mom read to me but never finished. I still found it hillariously amusing.)
7. Weetzie Bat – Francesca Lia Block (A reread, and I didn’t really feel the magic of the world she creates quite so much this time around.)
8. Baby Be-Bop – Francesca Lia Block (OMG I loved loved loved this book. It doesn’t quite have the same tone as Weetzie Bat, and is markedly less cheerful, but it’s also tackling coming out as gay, and the problems that entails. It was beautiful and surreal and nearly made me cry.

Currently I intend to finish reading the other books in Block’s series of loosely connected novels. I’m also reading Zenna Henderson’s Ingathering which is her collection of The People stories, and am nearly done with another old collection of the year’s best fantasy and horror. I should make a note that this second collection was much easier to get through, because the reader was extremely engaging, and actually could act.

You can all see where these are going if you’ve been reading my LJ lately.

Book 40: Magic’s Promise by Mercedes Lackey. Another very quick read, and pretty much engaging from beginning to end. I’d forgotten how dark this book was. Poor Tashir. What a shitty hand that poor man got dealt in life.

Book 41: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling. Ordered because I also have a library copy of the latest book. This was probably my least favorite HP book to date, but then, Umbridge makes up for all of it. I just wish she hadn’t gone batshit crazy at the end and gone all maniacal villain on Harry and company. She was creepy and disturbing, and for the most part one of the coolest villains ever because she had motive, nor was she stupid or particularly cheesy.

Book 42: Magic’s Price by Mercedes Lackey. In which we are introduced to Stefen, who I will fangirl endlessly for being a wonderfully complex character and who also failed utterly to get on my nerves…something I can’t quite say for the actual hero of the books.

I should add that I really do like Mercedes Lackey. Her writing is flawed, yeah, but I can overlook the flaws and enjoy the books, provided that I don’t try to analyze them too deeply.

So, now that that’s out of the way, here’s an ethical question. I see that Mr. Goodkind has actually published “Debt of Bones”, the short novel in the Legends anthology which I am currently reading as a standalone novella. Can I include that as a book I’ve read for the year, or are you all gonna insist I finish the whole Legends anthology before I can count it?

I haven’t been listing my book reading of late so I have a lot to post.
Book 32: Needful Things by Stephen King. Well-written, though not one of his better books.

Book 33: Dance upon the Air by Nora Roberts. Light and fluffy romance, kind of weak for the first book in a trilogy.

Book 34: Heaven and Earth by Nora Roberts. By far the best book in the trilogy with a wonderfully compelling hero and heroine.

Book 35: Face the Fire by Nora Roberts. Not nearly as good as the other two, because the heroine really shouldn’t have gotten her own book, given that she’d been set up as the wise mentor type.

Book 36: The Nonesuch by Georgette Heyer. Classic Regency romance. Extremely engaging.

Book 37: Ritual of Proof by Dara Joy. The sex scenes were hot, and some of the social issues she brings up in this futuristic romance were interesting, but overall somewhat disappointing.

Book 38: A Clash of Kings by George R. R. Martin. Still wonderful. A Song of Ice and Fire is the best fantasy series out right now, in my opinion.

Book 39: Magic’s pawn by Mercedes Lackey. A reread. Very delightful, and my favorite book in that trilogy. One of the few books out there not published by small independent publishing companies with a gay lead character.

I haven’t reported my book reading for a while, so will do so here.

Books 27-29 were the remaining three books in Louise Rennison’s series about Georgia Nicolson. They’re called Knocked out by my Nunga-Nungas, Dancing in my Nuddy-Pants and Away Laughing on a fast Camel. There’s another book out, but it’s not anywhere where I can access it. The last three books in the series were quick reads. Rennison clearly is putting out product now, and is more likely to make jokes about knickers than tell a good story. And I hated Georgia with each passing moment.

Book 30: The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman. I struggled through this book, too, because at the time I had nothing else to read. I found lots of the themes disturbing, and not in a pleasant way.
The climax of the book concerned the two main characters, Lyra and Will, falling in love and, well, having sex. Those characters were maybe twelve and thirteen. I thought the very idea of that was creepy. And the anti-religion stuff annoyed me, even though I’m not religious myself.

Book 31: A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin. I love this book. It took me ages and ages to get into it, and I’m moving through A Clash of Kings at about the same pace, although that’s because someone else has A Storm of Swords checked out from the library already. Anyway, once I got all the people straight in my head, AGOT was a wonderful book. It’s not light reading, and nothing happens as you’d expect it to. Martin draws his characters well. There is no real good or evil, just a lot of moral ambiguity, which I like because, yes, that’s how things are in the real world.

So I had a lot of time to read, and so I did. Here’s what I managed to finish.

I’m not going to post reviews because I read a lot and don’t really feel like doing more than summarizing.

Book 13: Sea of Silver Light: Otherland, Volume 4 by Tad Williams. A great way to close out the series though it did go on a bit too long.

Book 14: Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell. Quite funny and full of interesting facts delivered in a droll, witty style which I liked very much.

Book 15: Deerskin by Robin McKinley. An interesting story. The climactic moments of the book seemed very weird to me, and they didn’t make much sense, and the main character was something of a Mary Sue, but she gets raped by her own father, so I guess that’s a compensation.

Book 16: Dolores Claiborne by Stephen King. Definitely not King’s usual style, but a gripping read nonetheless.

Book 17: Trader by Charles de Lint. The things I hated about Onion Girl> and Spirits in the Wires weren’t there. It was a very well-told story, although I think I may be one of the few De Lint readers who could really despise his character Joe Crazy Dog, known in this book as Bones.
Book 18: Wicked: the Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire. I really enjoyed this book. Not enough to pick up any of Maguire’s other titles, but it was an interesting story anyway, and makes me think of Oz in a completely different light. I didn’t really identify much with Elpheba, the main character and the aforementioned witch, but I didn’t despise her the way I did several of the other characters.