STACKED

books

A Few Cybils Reads – Part X

|

Cybils season is almost over. I really enjoyed participating in Round 1 this year, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about a few of the nominated titles each week. As it does every year, the Cybils force me to read books I never would have read otherwise, and I’ve been pleasantly surprised by many of them. That said, it’s going to be really nice to kick off 2015 reading books that I’ve been so eager to dive into but have neglected due to Cybils duties (The Winner’s Crime, I’m looking at you).

Here’s my last roundup of Cybils titles for the year.

Monstrous Affections: An Anthology of Beastly Tales edited by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant
I generally don’t read short story collections. They’re usually uneven, with some stories that are fantastic, some that are awful, and most that fall somewhere in between. Monstrous Affections is no different, though I’m glad I got a chance to read the standouts.

Out of the fifteen stories in the anthology, I really dug two of them: Ten Rules for Being an Intergalactic Smuggler (the Successful Kind) by Holly Black and Wings in the Morning by Sarah Rees Brennan. Black’s story is set in outer space and has a sort of Firefly feel, but it’s a touch darker and uses the second person perspective in a clever way to great effect. Plus it has aliens! Brennan’s story is set in a world populated with humans, harpies, elves, and other magical creatures who must keep their border safe from invaders. It opens with our protagonist’s mother telling him he’s half-harpy because she has needs when his father is away and she hooked up with a harpy once because she’s rather adventurous and well wouldn’t you know, the harpy is his biological father and not the human man who raised him. It’s done in such a funny way, I was hooked immediately – there’s so much character and voice in the story. The bulk of the story is a romance between the main character and his best (male) friend/enemy, but there’s also some interesting stuff with the elf culture, whose gender roles are the opposite of humans’ traditional roles. I would definitely read a novel-length book about these characters and their world.

Honorable mentions go to Patrick Ness and Joshua Lewis, whose stories I liked but didn’t love. Also of note is the Introduction, which may be my third favorite “story.” It includes a fun, funny little quiz that sets a great tone for the collection. The book itself is beautiful, slightly oversize with a unique cover and designed with ample white space. It would sit very pretty on your shelf.

The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton
Sixteen year old Ava narrates this book, telling first the story of her grandmother, then her mother, focusing mainly on the way love has destroyed their lives. This family has always been foolish when it comes to love, and Ava – a girl born with wings – is perhaps no different. The events of the story, beginning with Ava’s grandmother and her doomed siblings, all lead up to a terrible tragedy hinted at by Ava’s brother in cryptic language that becomes clear much too late.

This is a beautifully-written book, using magical realism in a way that makes you hurt. It’s also a tremendous downer. It’s certainly unique and ambitious – it tells a three-generation story in about 300 pages, and it feels fully developed. I think it’s successful in what it tried to do, but it also gave off a very strong adult feeling to me rather than YA. Perhaps that’s because the teenage narrator never felt like the main character – she has an omniscient POV and narrates in a somewhat detached way. It’s her mother, whom we see as a child, then a young woman, then a middle-aged woman, who feels like the most central character. She’s also the one who seems to grow the most. The Goodreads description is a little misleading since Ava herself (as a character, not a narrator) doesn’t enter the picture until pretty late in the book. This is a Candlewick book, which doesn’t surprise me in the least.

Death Sworn by Leah Cypess
Ileni was a magical prodigy, brought to a magic school that promised to sharpen her talents. Key word: was. She’s been losing her magic steadily, trying to hide it from her teachers. Ileni supposes they’ve suspected this, because she’s sent to be the new magic tutor for a group of assassins with whom the magicians have an uneasy alliance. The last two magic tutors died mysteriously, and Ileni figures they were probably murdered. Though Ileni figures her assignment is a death sentence, she’s determined to survive as long as she can, and hopefully figure out what happened to her predecessors.

This is a high fantasy novel with a very strong sense of place. The assassins live in a set of caves, giving the book a claustrophobic feel and enhancing Ileni’s sense of being trapped. It also features a complicated backstory, with shifting alliances, exiled magicians, assassins who may be rebels, and lots of political maneuvering – off the page and on it. What is said is not always what is meant. Ileni must learn to listen for subtext; her life depends on it. She also must learn to defend herself without the aid of her magic, and hide the fact that her magic is disappearing as long as she can. As a reader, I felt Ileni’s persistent danger keenly, and I appreciated that Ileni showed fear and didn’t always know how best to protect herself. There’s a minor romance here, but the real highlight is the plot, whose pieces fall together so neatly and brilliantly at the end. I’m a sucker for a well-plotted book, and this one fits the bill. This is a great read for fans of high fantasy – it’s got magic, kingdoms, royalty, war, and all the other good stuff we love so much.

Reviews, Reviews, Reviews

|

I spend a good amount of time on Goodreads. I’ve built up a solid group of friends whose reviews I see first beneath a book, and they generally give me a good idea of whether that book is worth my time.

But sometimes I venture lower, to the reviews from people I don’t know. Sometimes when I’m feeling particularly masochistic, I’ll view only the one star reviews for a book I loved. But usually, it’s out of simple curiosity. I want different perspectives. I want to know what good things people see in a book I thought was terrible. I want to be reminded that a book I love isn’t for everyone, and I want to see why. Most of these reviews actually have good points and help to broaden my own perspective. 

Inevitably, though, I’ll read a review that will irritate me. And I don’t mean the one star reviews of books I loved. I can get over that. I mean the ones that get the facts wrong, or dismiss a book because its characters are unlikeable. You know the kind. Lately, three specific things have jumped out at me, three things that I wish people would stop doing when they write their reviews.

1. “TSTL”

In case you’re unaware, “tstl” means “too stupid to live” and is used in reference to characters whose actions seem, well, stupid. It’s all well and good to call out a stupid action that stems not from character, but from the need to further the plot, but this “tstl” designation is not relegated to those instances. It’s used to describe protagonists – overwhelmingly girls – who do things the reader, personally, would not have done, things that have negative consequences.

There are so many problems with this. Firstly, you as the reader are not the character. We place a lot of importance on characters being “relatable” to us, perhaps too much. But the author’s job is not to create a character that would act the same way you would in a particular situation. Her actions don’t have to be relatable. In fact, they should be strange to us sometimes, because humans are strange and don’t act sensibly. They don’t act in the ways we would all the time. That’s why we have conflict, and conflict is why we have stories.

Secondly, teenagers do stupid things. I’m a smart person and I did tons of stupid shit as a teenager. Be honest: so did you. Heck, a lot of them were probably over someone you had a crush on. You probably still do stupid things as an adult. A character behaving in a way that is stupid does not make a book bad, nor does it make that character inherently stupid. It just means the book is about a human being.

2. “Selfish” characters

In multiple reviews of Mary E. Pearson’s The Kiss of Deception, Lia is called out for being selfish. She’s the princess of a kingdom and her parents are about to marry her off to a prince from another kingdom whom she has never met. She decides she’d rather not, and she runs away. 

Let’s just set aside the fact that teens (and grown ups) often do things that are selfish, just like they often do things that are stupid. There is a larger problem at work here, and it’s one I see as very gendered. In a lot of our social discourse, women and girls are expected to sacrifice for others, and the lack of sacrifice is framed as selfishness. Women who choose not to have children or who uproot their families for a lucrative job are often called selfish. Girls who turn down a date with a “nice” guy they’re not attracted to are often called selfish. Women and girls who want to choose the way they live their lives are called selfish over and over again.

It shouldn’t have come as a surprise to me that Lia – one of my favorite fictional characters this year – was subjected to this as well, but it did. I read so many fantasy novels when I myself was a teenager that featured girls escaping unwanted arranged marriages. There wasn’t even a question in my mind of the girl’s selfishness or selflessness. Why would she marry someone she didn’t love? Of course she’d want to escape! I was so floored reading these reviews from all these readers who apparently expected Lia to marry someone she had never met, sleep with him, have babies, and so on, to facilitate a political treaty. She’s selfish because she doesn’t want her entire life, literally her entire existence, to be one giant sacrifice? Because she dares to choose her own life? Would you choose this for yourself or your daughter? What are we teaching our kids when we say that Lia’s actions are selfish? That girls should be meek and accept their parents’ directives, even if they know it will make them unhappy? That the only life worth living is the one where all your own wants and desires are subservient to someone else’s?

So no, Lia’s decision to flee this marriage, one that she knows is predicated on a lie (she can’t do what her parents say she can do, remember!) is not selfish. It’s normal. It’s brave. It’s feminist. It’s what draws so many teen girls to fantasy fiction – girls standing up and saying to others, through their words or actions, that their lives belong to them. What’s selfish is the continued demand that girls continually give away pieces of themselves to make others happy. Lia refuses to do this. It’s not easy for her to do. It’s hard. It’s painful. It takes immense courage. But it’s empowering to say “no.” It’s empowering to realize that you can demand the right to your own decisions, especially for teenagers. That you can demand the right to own your life and you don’t have to apologize for it.

3. “I have never read a successful book about _______.”

Fill in the blank with whatever topic you like, and you will probably have a sentence I object to. In this case, it was time travel, but it could easily be shapeshifters or romance or anything else under the sun. There are successful books about every topic. The fact that you haven’t read a successful one is due to one of two factors: 1. You haven’t read very many of them; or 2. You just plain don’t like that topic. I don’t think it’s a huge leap to assume that most of the time, it’s the second reason.

I say this as a huge fan of time travel who didn’t care for this particular book that was being reviewed. I have read lots of successful time travel books. They probably wouldn’t work for someone who doesn’t like paradoxes and plots that can make your head hurt. They probably wouldn’t work for someone who wants their science fiction to be completely plausible, because time travel is inherently implausible. (If time travel existed, wouldn’t we have time travelers in our midst right now?) That’s the fun of it. It’s likely that someone who doesn’t think any time travel books she’s read are successful can’t get past these things, and that’s fine. You don’t have to like books about time travel. That doesn’t mean they’re not successful; it just means they’re not for you.

Are there any other trends in book reviews that bug you (or enrage you)? Let me know in the comments, and please weigh in on the ones I’ve pointed out here. I’d like to know I’m not alone.

A Few Cybils Reads – Part IX (Time Travel Edition)

|

Glory O’Brien’s History of the Future by A. S. King
A. S. King’s books are in a class by themselves, both in terms of genre and writing. Set solidly in our own world, they also use fantastical elements in such clever, creative, and meaningful ways. I’m always amazed by the level of craft in each of her novels. Her latest is no different.

Glory and her friend-by-default Ellie find a dead bat, which eventually disintegrates to something resembling ash. They decide to mix the remains with beer and then drink it (as you do). The next day, whenever they meet another person’s eyes, they see glimpses of that person’s past, present, and future – including ancestors and descendants. Glory’s visions show her a terrible near future, one where women are
denied the right to work and the United States splits into two, spawning
a second Civil War. The people participating in these acts, both the
atrocious and the heroic, are often the descendants of the people she
knows, and possibly of herself as well.

A more traditional novel would have focused most of its attention on the mystery of the future, and there’s certainly some of that going on. But it focuses an equal amount of attention on how the future informs Glory’s present – her mother’s suicide, her pseudo-friendship with Ellie, her relationship with her father, her plans for her own future. How do you live your life knowing that these things you see will come to pass? It’s also a staunchly feminist novel, the extremism of the future tempered by the everyday sexism Glory experiences. Teens will easily see how one leads to the other. Because this is a King novel, I’ve only scratched the surface of its depth. There’s a lot going on, and it all fits together to tell the complicated, messy story of Glory’s teenage life. This might be my favorite of King’s books. It has a few killer ending lines that legitimately gave me chills and rank right up there with the last lines of The Book Thief.

The Here and Now by Ann Brashares
This is the most traditional time travel story in this grouping. Prenna comes from a future not far off, one where a disease transmitted by mosquitoes has killed off millions of people. Though they haven’t cured the illness, apparently they have figured out time travel, because Prenna, her mother, and a few others travel back to our own time in order to stop the plague from happening in the first place (it’s tied to climate change).

Here’s where the internal logic of the story loses me, because Prenna and the other time-colonists have a lot of rules to follow, and one of the rules is not to interfere with history. Which is kind of the whole point of them being there – to interfere and create a better future. So um, what is their point, after all? And none of the other characters seem to notice or care about this discrepancy. There’s a somewhat engaging romance with a “time native,” and some nifty plotting with a potential paradox and a couple of other surprise time travelers, but this was a mess overall. There are scads of better time travel novels out there, both better written and better-conceived. Recommended for only the most ardent time travel fans.

Subway Love by Nora Raleigh Baskin
I read this a couple weeks ago and already my memory of it is weak. The book focuses on two different characters – Laura in the 70s and Jonas in the present day. They each have problems within their homes. Laura’s mother has gone full hippie, plus she’s married a man just a few years older than Laura. He hits Laura and Laura’s mom doesn’t do anything about it. Jonas is dealing with his parents’ recent divorce. The two teenagers meet each other on the subway, which is the only place where their two time periods overlap. They fall in love.

Baskin’s writing style has always seemed more middle grade than YA to me. The content of this one is more mature, though, making it hard to recommend for a specific age group. It’s a slim novel, easily absorbed in an afternoon, but its impact is equally fleeting. There’s some interesting stuff about graffiti artists on the subway, which will definitely appeal to kids into street art. Ultimately, the book is a rumination on how some relationships can change us, even if those relationships do not – and cannot – last. I wonder if I would have appreciated it more as a short story.

A Few Cybils Reads – Part VIII

|

Starbreak by Phoebe North

This is the sequel to North’s debut, Starglass, and picks up right where the first book left off. Terra and a few other humans flee the chaos of the ship and make it to the planet below, which they know by now is already inhabited. Much to Terra’s surprise, they run into Aleksandra, the captain’s murderous daughter, who leads the rebels. They’re all eventually captured by the aliens that live on the planet, and Terra finally gets a chance to meet the alien boy she’s been literally dreaming about for months – it turns out he’s the translator between humans and aliens. The culture clash between the humans and the aliens is as fractious as you’d expect. It’s unclear whether the aliens will allow the humans to live on the planet – or if they’ll exile them to space once more.

I’ve long wanted more alien books where the aliens are less humanoid and more…something else. Starbreak fulfills this desire and tells a fascinating story to boot. While the first book was relegated entirely to the ship of humans, the sequel takes us onto an alien planet peopled with two different species of sentient creatures. They’re somewhat humanoid in that they speak through their mouths and walk on two legs, but they’re plant-based rather than animal-based. The idea of sentient plants is so cool to me, and I loved seeing how North built upon it. For example, one species of alien is carnivorous, like a Venus fly trap, whereas the other subsists on sun and water alone. The two species of aliens also have a unique relationship with each other, unlike anything on Earth (at least among humans). Of course, this story is also about human Terra, and it is in this book that she truly finds her voice and comes into her own. It’s a love story as well, a sweet one and a weird one.

All books about humans meeting aliens can be read as a metaphor for different human cultures first interacting with each other, and Starbreak is no different. It would take a shallow reader not to note the parallels, but this is not a message-driven book that wants you to Learn a Lesson. It’s a character-driven story imbued with human truth and a lot of creativity, solidly science fiction but always relatable. It would be a great readalike for fans of Beth Revis’ Shades of Earth (the best book in that trilogy, in my opinion) or perhaps Cecil Castellucci’s Tin Star, another book where a human finds herself alone among aliens.

Promise of Shadows by Justina Ireland

Zephyr is a harpy, and she’s been banished to Tartarus (sort of like Hell) for exacting revenge against the god who killed her sister. The thing is, she shouldn’t have been able to kill a god in the first place. This ability indicates that Zephyr may be the long-lost Nyx, able to use dark magic and protect the harpies and other half-god beings from gods like Hera who mean to wipe them out. First Zephyr has to escape Tartarus, which she does with the help of a long-lost (and hot) childhood friend. Then she has to accept this destiny, not an easy thing to do for someone who is a coward (a refreshing character trait. Being brave is hard and doesn’t come easy for most of us).

Ireland’s writing is smooth and easy to read – and I mean that in a good way. I read this book coming off a string of duds and it was so refreshing to finally read something well-written and competently structured. It’s not hugely different in premise or plot from the scads of other mythology-inspired paranormal reads out there, but it’s done quite well and features a black protagonist, helping to diversify a genre that is too often lily white. Zephyr feels like her own person, not an everygirl – she’s not very brave, tends to run from fights, and is pretty bad at school. This makes for a satisfying character arc when she finally does learn how to be the Nyx (because you knew she would, right?). Ireland takes traditional Greek mythology and builds on it, weaving many different elements together into an interesting whole. The story is action-packed with a side of romance (rather than vice versa). Ancillary characters are well-drawn as well. It’s just a good book in every way. I can see it having lots of appeal for readers who can’t get enough of Greek mythology; it would be a natural next read for fans of Percy Jackson who are ready for something a little older.

Talker 25 by Joshua McCune
Melissa lives in a country much changed from the one we know. Dragons have terrorized the people for years, but humans have finally achieved a tenuous peace – they’ve hunted the most violent dragons to their deaths or exile, and have put the rest on reservations. When Melissa and her friends go to one of these reservations as a prank, it sets off a chain of events that will utterly change her life. For starters, she learns she can talk to dragons with her mind. Then a terrible dragon attack destroys Melissa’s town, and she’s rescued by dragon sympathizers, usually called terrorists by everyone else. This encompasses the first part of the book, where Melissa realizes that a lot of what she’s been told about the dragons is wrong. The second part involves Melissa being captured by the government and exploited for her telepathic abilities. She’s forced to trick dragons to their deaths, and sometimes she’s forced to kill them herself.

I wasn’t crazy about this one. I’ve always been a bit tepid toward dragons. I loved Pern, but nothing dragon-related since then has really grabbed me. The premise of Talker 25 – that some humans can communicate with dragons telepathically – is interesting, but the execution was pretty jumbled. I never got a clear idea of what exactly the dragons had done to start such a war, which meant I had no context for the humans’ fight against them. It seems like McCune just assumed that we’d know humans and dragons had been locked in a deadly fight for years, but I never figured out why. There’s some stuff about a reality show thrown in that feels odd and out of place, too. I read the whole thing feeling a little lost. The first part of the book I mostly felt mystified; the second part, where Melissa is in captivity, I mostly felt ill. It’s quite violent, with several scenes of dragon torture, some committed by Melissa herself under duress. There’s one scene in particular where McCune details just how many strokes it takes to decapitate one of Melissa’s old dragon friends (hint: it’s a lot). It felt too drawn out and a little lurid. Recommended for readers who can’t get enough of dragons – and can stomach a lot.

All books borrowed from my library.

A Few Cybils Reads – Part VII (Audiobook Edition)

|

Noggin by John Corey Whaley
Whaley’s follow-up to his Printz-winning Where Things Come Back is a character-driven novel with an SF twist. Travis’ cancer was going to kill him, so he opted to have his head chopped off and put in cold storage, hoping one day science would advance far enough and he’d be revived using a donor body. He figures he’ll wake up in hundred years or so. Except that’s not what happens. It only takes five years. For newly-awakened Travis, it seems like no time has passed at all. But for everyone else, the world has changed. His friends (including his girlfriend) are now adults. His death profoundly affected his parents, and the fact that he’s alive again doesn’t magically fix everything. Not to mention the fact that he’s walking around in (on?) someone else’s body.

Whaley’s writing is very, very good, matched by Kirby Heyborne’s equally good narration. I wouldn’t have enjoyed this nearly as much if Heyborne weren’t narrating. Travis’ growth, the way he comes to terms (or not) with the way his life has changed, the way his family and friends come to terms with it – it’s masterfully done and quite compelling. Travis’ voice is clear; he’s not always likeable, not even at the end, but he’s believable. I can see why it was shortlisted for a National Book Award, and I can easily see this appealing to readers who normally don’t enjoy science fiction. The focus is entirely on Travis’ adjustment, and the medical/scientific procedure that allowed him to wake up five years after his “death” is not explained. That’s not what Whaley considers important in this story. I’ve seen some reviewers describe the premise as absurd or weird, but as far as SF novels go, it’s pretty tame.

Night Sky by Suzanne & Melanie Brockmann
Sasha, the little girl that Skylar babysits, has gone missing, and her father – who has also disappeared – is the prime suspect. The police already think Sasha is dead, but Skylar refuses to believe it. Then a girl named Dana comes into town, and Dana exhibits some of the abilities that Skylar believes she may have – like telekinesis. She learns that she’s a “greater-than,” which basically means she has superpowers. A lot of them. She and Dana, along with wheelchair-bound best friend Calvin and Dana’s sidekick Milo, decide to figure out what happened to Sasha on their own – and they discover it has everything to do with the greater-thans.

I’ve never read an adult Brockmann book and I can’t say this would encourage me to pick one up. The premise certainly has appeal for a certain kind of reader – those who can’t get enough books about teens with superpowers, for instance. It’s fairly diverse, too, though only in its ancillary characters. It’s action-heavy with a good vs. evil plot. But it goes on a little too long and the writing is weak. There’s a certain sentence structure that’s overused, so glaring that each time it happened I winced. (“He did this as I did that” or “I did this as she did that” with a long, drawn out second half. I could hear the narrator run out of air trying to get the whole sentence in without pausing for a breath. Just make it two sentences!) The narration isn’t great. Melanie Brockmann does it herself and she doesn’t voice any of the characters. Her voice is reedy and it sounds like she’s not getting enough air, even when the sentences are short. There are better offerings. (Kirkus gave it a starred review. But what do they know?)

Divided We Fall by Trent Reedy
This is one of those books that may be good in print, but is absolutely fantastic on audio. It’s about a high school kid, Danny, who joins the Idaho National Guard at age 17. He’s sent to help police a protest in Boise. Things get out of control. Someone bumps into his gun and it goes off. Then more people start shooting. Twelve people are killed. Not even Danny knows exactly what happened, but he becomes the face of the state of Idaho’s resistance to the federal government, which started as a refusal to implement a controversial federal ID law. The president wants Danny and the rest of the soldiers arrested, and the governor refuses. Events escalate. Each chapter ends with snippets from television news programs, tweets, radio callers, and the like, and these are all fully voiced by a diverse group of narrators. Some strongly recall Fox News or Rush Limbaugh (the latter of which is particularly painful to listen to), while others are more middle of the road, or simply reactionary. You’ve heard this stuff before, about similar things, things that are happening in real life right now. It’s at times more interesting than the main narrative itself.

Reedy does a good job of balancing each “side” of the story – those who support the state government and those who support the federal government. It’s a really tough tightrope to walk, but he succeeds in not making his book seem like it has an agenda. That’s partly due to Reedy’s protagonist, who is an everyguy – but of the kind we don’t see a lot in YA fiction: he lives in a semi-rural area, participates in rodeos, plays football, doesn’t intend to go to college, enjoys guns and country music. He joined the National Guard because he loved his state and he loved his country. These are all things we tend to associate with conservative kids, but his political views aren’t what’s on display. He never wanted to get caught up in everything that happens and would rather it all go away. This is a tricky, very discussable book that will probably piss some people off. The setting could have been Texas (my home state) and been just as believable. It’s very close to home; that’s what makes it worth the read.