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Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

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Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein is one of those books that has been talked about to death already. You’ve probably already read a review of it, and that review was probably positive. I can’t say that my review will contribute anything very different – I loved this book to death. But if you still haven’t read the book, I hope my review will convince you to pick it up. (I know so many of you were waiting with bated breath for me to weigh in before making your reading choice…)
Verity is a young, female spy for the British during World War II. She makes a small mistake while on assignment in German-occupied France, and that mistake leads to her capture by the Germans. She’s tortured over the course of many weeks and finally agrees to write down everything she knows for her captors. The majority of Code Name Verity is this confession, which details how she came to be a spy, what she does for the British war effort, and her friendship with the English pilot Maddie, the young woman who dropped Verity (via plane) in France.
In the words of my favorite guest reviewer, this is a story that unfolds. You have to trust Verity (even though it’s a given that her words are misleading) and Wein to lead you to the place you were meant to be. You have to trust that they’ll give you the information you need, when you need it. You have to believe the voice in your head that tells you “Things are going to go down! Revelations will be had!” They will. And it’s done so expertly – not all at once, with a huge surprise that makes you gasp, but slowly, over many pages, so your eyes grow wide and your heart twists in anticipation and pain. Lots of pain. Yeah, it’s that kind of book.
Of course, Code Name Verity doesn’t inspire only love and cuddles. Kelly wasn’t really a fan – she found it slow and boring. (Don’t worry, we are still friends.) I can understand this point of view. I have a built-in interest in World War II, spies, and females in positions of power, and I have a friend who is a pilot. If none of these topics interest you, you may have a hard time connecting with the story. I’m also fascinated by unreliable narrators, and Wein triumphs in that respect with Verity. Because of all these things, I didn’t find the book slow at all.
I also have to admit that I’m seeing this book in a whole new light since I learned that my best friend in town is moving two hours away. Code Name Verity is, aside from all those things I mentioned in the previous paragraph, very much a story about friendship: what it feels like when it starts (akin to falling in love) and how it affects your actions after it’s established. My friend isn’t going to be captured by the Germans (at least I don’t think so), but there’s no denying the sense of loss regardless.
I really want to see Code Name Verity get some Printz recognition. I think Wein took a lot of risks in her writing style here, and those risks paid off hugely. She really is in a class by herself in terms of artistry. And despite its naysayers, I think it’s incredibly exciting. It’s also undeniably deep, intelligent, and has a lot to say about friendship, which resonated with me on a personal level and has affected others in the same way, too.
Borrowed from my library. Code Name Verity is available now.

Long Lankin by Lindsey Barraclough

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I love scary stories. Love them. The problem is so few actually deliver on the chills in quite the way I hope they will. But Lindsey Barraclough’s Long Lankin? It completely delivers. This is a book I am going to be thinking about for a long time.

It’s 1958, and teen Cora and her younger sister Mimi are sent their Aunt Ida’s home in the village to be watched while their father is away on business. Their mother is sick, and she’s unable to keep an eye on them (this is a thread in the story that won’t be picked up much, but savvy readers will understand what mom’s illness is and understand why she cannot care for her children). Despite knowing that bad things happen when children are under Ida’s care, their father has little choice but to send them away. As soon as the girls arrive, they’re greeted with strange things. There’s a carving above the front door of Ida’s house with a creepy face. They’re not allowed to use that door, either. Always the back door.

It doesn’t stop there, though. Cora keeps seeing things. Keeps seeing people, visions, hearing noises and voices. Aunt Ida keeps a scary photo of a long-dead relative above the bathroom door that not only creeps Cora out, but it is the reason Mimi will not use the bathroom at night. Ida refuses to take the picture down, and she is insistent on limiting the places in her home where the girls can go. All of the windows the house are sealed shut, too. It is sweltering inside all of the time. Of course, this only heightens the tension in the story. It’s a haunted house. Or so we’re led to believe.

Cora and her sister meet a local boy, Roger, and his younger brother, and they take the girls down to the church they’re not supposed to be in. Weird things happen there, too. They think they hear voices. They think they see things. And then there’s the carving “cave bestiam” they’re seeing everywhere. Then there’s the hole in the gate near the cemetery. Seems like it’s a fairly unremarkable thing, but it plays a big role in the story. Oh, then there are the marshes near Ida’s home. The ones that go in and out. The ones she fixates on.

I’ve failed to mention something: there’s been a lot of death under Ida’s watchful eye. Her son died when he was very young. There was also another death while someone was under her care. The details are a little sketchy. So to say that Cora is worried about being under Ida’s care would be an understatement. But the feeling is mutual: Ida doesn’t want to be responsible for more children. Doesn’t want the blood on her hands, should when bad things happen.

Long Lankin offers up all of the pieces of a creepy story. There are the voices. The deaths. The haunted house. But never once is the tale handed over to us as readers. Instead, we’re right there in Cora and Roger’s heads as they work together to piece these things together. All the while, we’re wondering if anything is really happening at all or if this is all in their heads. They’re teenagers after all. And Aunt Ida has a secret past, one wrought with misfortune. Why doesn’t she want people to go to the church? Why does she lock all of the windows? Why the heck won’t she tell anyone what is going on?

The tension in this story builds upon itself, and the writing is incredibly atmospheric. There’s no waiting period to fall into this book; it happens from page one. It reminded me a lot of how Susan Hill builds a world in The Woman in Black and there are a number of similarities between Hill’s novel and Barraclough’s, but never in a bad way. Long Lankin doesn’t fall into the biggest trap of atmospheric writing though: never once does it get in the way of story telling. In fact, it’s never even used as a slight of hand — we’re never led to believe one thing or another about the story via the writing. We’re given every single piece to put together, but because the writing is so strong and begs the reader to be engaged, you never want to put them together. You want to let Barraclough do it. I found myself a little worried about the pay off in this story because I was enjoying the writing so much. About 300 pages in, I had a good grasp on where the book would end and who would come out ahead and who may not come out at all. And while many of my predictions came to fruition, I still found myself with chills through the last 100 pages of the story. Even in the end, I found myself creeped out and haunted by what had happened. That it ACTUALLY went there, rather than backing down when the option presented itself was huge.

The pacing in this book is noteworthy, especially as there are a few passages in the story that could have easily become information dumps and not in a good way. There are a lot of secondary characters, and many of them hold the keys to the back story of Ida, of her home, and of the town’s history. All of these  elements are crucial to the story, but because Barraclough is able to make her story fast-moving, these longer passages that fill Cora and the reader in do not drag or become overwhelming. Not everything that comes up in these passages is all that important, which is crucial to remember when reading through them. The important stuff will reappear. The rest is simply character development of those secondary characters (some who like to ramble and hear their own voices).

Barraclough’s story is told through multiple voices: Roger’s, Cora’s, and Aunt Ida’s. The bulk of it is through Cora and Roger, and their voices are unique and distinct. There’s the outsider — Cora — and there’s the insider — Roger. Cora has never had these experiences and has no knowledge of this world, whereas Roger has grown up here and has a handle of what strange things happen. Ida, who offers her perspective much less than the other two (she is, of course, the adult and this is a teen novel), gives us even more insider information than Roger can, as she’s been the victim of the haunts. She’s been the victim of great loss, too.

Ida is, without doubt, my favorite character in the novel, too. She’s broken and aching and miserable, and she’s not afraid to BE that way, even if it means Cora and Mimi get treated kind of crummy. Ida’s got every right to behave that way, and as the story unravels and we learn more about who Ida is, we understand this first hand. She blames herself for the terrible things that have happened to other people in her life. She’s ready to blame herself for what would inevitably happen to the girls in her care, too. And when the world starts spinning out of control, when the dead are no longer resting because they just can’t, she gets an incredibly satisfying payoff at the end. Here’s a spoiler (skip down to the next paragraph if you don’t want it): Ida will get to die in this story, but it is so what she deserves, and I don’t mean that in a cruel way. She’s so heavy with guilt and anxiety that the only way she can escape the misery is through death. The only way the family can end the haunting is through her death. The only way that Lankin can maybe rest is through her death. And she gets to be the hero who saves Mimi, too. Where she couldn’t save her own son or the girls’ aunt, she gets to save these two. While it seems obvious to me the spirit of Lankin will never die, despite being put back into the graveyard through the fence in the final scene, what Ida does at least saves this story. And that was the reward. It was the good enough. Because the thing is: I don’t want a clean ending in my scary stories. I want the possibility to still be there lingering, even if these characters aren’t the ones who will be touched again.

There are a couple of missteps in the book, but neither of them impact the plot. The first revolves around Aunt Ida: there are hints at her marriage and being married to a guy she wasn’t necessarily interested in being married to. This leads to a flashback in her narrative, and I didn’t think either the storyline about her relationship nor the flashback were necessary. They could have easily been taken out and the story would have been a little tighter. The other problem was that there were a lot of secondary characters, both those in the present and in the past, and they could be tough to keep track of. Fortunately, most of them do not matter to the story and instead are purposeful distractions. They aren’t red herrings, but they sort of serve the purpose of throwing the reader a little bit of a loop so the story isn’t completely predictable. 

Long Lankin was one of those rare books I was able to read almost entirely in one sitting, despite being over 450 pages long. It captured my attention and kept it. Even when I could see what was coming, I did not care. And I didn’t see ALL of it coming, either. Barraclough pulled enough punches and offered up enough clues to keep me questioning whether my thoughts were right or were going to be twisted. That it also scared me in the end was a huge pay off. I wanted to feel a little haunted and a little crooked, and I was. Though the bulk of this book has no gore because the chills rely on tension and on the spiritual haunts, there is a physical threat in this book and there are somewhat gruesome scenes, particularly in the end. Readers who like scary stories will absolutely want to read this one, as will fans of horror tales that work within the haunted house/haunted town/ghost realm. This IS creepy, rather than more humorous, so it’s not for readers unwilling to let themselves be scared. These aren’t paranormal creatures. These aren’t the sorts of creeps you’re expecting, and perhaps that’s what makes it chilling. Fans of Hill’s novel (not the movie) will love the atmospheric writing and the weaving of many similar elements into the tension building (especially the marshes! Oh the marshes!). Barraclough’s book taps into the notion of death and life, of what it means to finally be at rest, and really, of what it means to be scared at all. Without doubt, this is a book that I am going to remember for a long time. It is an impressive debut and I am so looking forward to what Barraclough offers next.

Review copy received from the publisher. Long Lankin came out Tuesday!

Flying the Dragon by Natalie Dias Lorenzi

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Skye has never met her grandfather. She’s never met her aunt, uncle, and cousin Hiroshi either. But when her grandfather gets sick, all four of her relatives move to Skye’s town from Japan for Grandfather’s course of treatment. While Hiroshi and his family don’t live with Skye, he still intrudes into her life far more than she would like. She’s forced to be his translator in school, which causes some of the other kids to make fun of her; her father is suddenly embracing his Japanese heritage, throwing out foreign phrases in front of her friends and cooking new foods; Hiroshi is hogging the attention of her Grandfather, who she is finally getting a relationship with for the first time; and, worst of all, she is now required to pass an intensive Japanese test if she wants to be able to play on the all-star soccer team. Hiroshi, on the other hand, has to deal with fitting into both a new school and a new country, figuring out the nuances and slang of the English language, and coming to terms with the fact that his beloved grandfather–and best friend–is gravely ill. His grandfather, the man who taught him everything he knows about rokkaku, Japanese kite flying/fighting, the hobby that Skye seems to be trying to horn in on, just as Hiroshi is trying to prepare for the rokkaku battle at the annual Washington Cherry Blossom Festival.

Flying the Dragon was a lovely middle grade novel that tackles cross-cultural conflict between family members who gradually also become friends. The novel alternates chapters between Skye’s and Hiroshi’s perspectives, and each character is developed enough that the duel narratives each have their own unique voice. Usually when I read a novel with multiple perspectives, I immediately gravitate towards one narrative, breezing through the other sections until I return to my ‘favorite.’ Not so with Flying the Dragon, as Hiroshi and Skye’s struggles were both compelling, their personalities both entrancing. In different ways, the two both feel caught between cultures: Skye not sure whether she should accept her Japanese side (years ago she rejected her given name, Sorano), and Hiroshi not sure whether he can ever feel comfortable in America, where people don’t eat rice for breakfast, teachers are called by their last name, and people don’t sleep in mats on the bedroom floor.

It was definitely refreshing to read a book that concentrated on the family bond, rather than on the friend bond. While the worlds of most middle grade students do revolve around their friends, and much of middle grade literature reflects this, the family relationship is just as important to many kids. The back story of Skye’s father’s break with his family was touched upon but not stressed, a fact which I liked, as it did not take the focus away from the children’s struggles. And the bond between Hiroshi and his Grandfather was absolutely wonderful to behold. I really enjoyed this sweet, heartwarming read.


Disclosure: Finished copy received for review from Charlesbridge Publishing.

A Midsummer’s Nightmare by Kody Keplinger

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Whitley’s parents divorced a few years ago, and after her dad said living with him wouldn’t be ideal, she’s split her time so that she lives with mom during the school year and dad during the summers. Whitley lives for those summers — her dad lives in a sweet condo and he’s such a reprieve from her mother who spends far too long whining and generally being a pill.

Things this summer, though, aren’t the same. When dad comes to pick Whitley up, he breaks the news: he’s no longer living in the condo. He’s got a new woman in his life. He’s also got two new step-kids. And as if things could be any worse, it turns out that one of those new kids happens to be Nathan, the boy Whitley slept with at a big graduation party just weeks ago.

Not awkward at all.

When Whitley gets to her dad’s new place, she’s angry. She’s unhappy with the new arrangement, but she’s doubly unhappy because she can’t get a second of her father’s time. This was going to be the summer he helped her figure out what she should do with her life and what she should study in college. This is the last summer before she’s officially on her own as a college student. But now, dad’s too busy with his job and things are downright uncomfortable living with Nathan and his little sister Bailey, who keeps pestering Whitley to take her shopping.

Whitley takes to partying it up in small town Hamilton, Illinois, much like she did back home with her mom. Except now it’s a much smaller stage and when word gets out that the local TV news anchor’s daughter is getting around and getting sloppy drunk, the evidence shows up on Facebook and mars not only Whitley’s reputation, but also her father’s. When Whitley tries to reach out to her older blood brother — who lives across the country and is happily married — she can’t get the time of day. The time she finally does, she learns the awful truth of what happened between her parents and why her mother and father divorced in the first place. This nugget of knowledge doesn’t help her in the situation, but it wakes her up to the truth of everything she’s come to believe about the adults in her life. And it definitely helps her reassess her situation and her own life choices. And Nathan, who she thought she’d screwed things up with permanently, may be one of the greatest people she could ask for in her life.

A Midsummer’s Nightmare showcases a real growth in Kody Keplinger’s writing — as much as I liked her first book, The Duff, I found this one to be much more emotionally engaging with richly developed characters and plenty of plot to tease apart. Whitley is not an easy character to like. From the start, she’s introduced to us as a party girl who doesn’t seem to have much going for her. She’s angry and frustrated. She’s got a reputation for sleeping around and doesn’t care. But as much as it’s easy to dislike her because of this, she pretty quickly garners sympathy. It’s obvious that she’s behaving this way out of self-preservation, rather than out of a desire to be a bad girl. We know early on that there’s something has happened with her parents and her life isn’t easy at home. As unfriendly as Whitley is throughout the beginning of the story, her hurt is palpable and begs the reader to pay attention. She tries really hard to get people to pay attention to her through good means — she calls her brother and she repeatedly tells her dad she wants to talk with him — but when those methods don’t work, she finds herself turning to drinking and partying because that at least wakes people up to her. It’s not healthy, but she’s stuck and this is her way of unsticking. I found myself really liking Whitley, even if she didn’t want herself to be a likable character (because she doesn’t).

Much of what Whitley tells readers from the start has us believing her mother is a selfish, childish woman and her father — who is a pretty big deal anchorman for the local tv news — is a sort of saint. So when he breaks the news that he’s got a new lady in his life and a whole new family, Whitley feels shattered. She didn’t want this. Her dad didn’t ask her for permission (though it’s obvious to us as readers he doesn’t need to, we feel her anger with her). And when Whitley realizes that her father’s putting in extra hours at work, rather than spending time with her, she starts to suspect there’s more to him than she’s believed. The truth, as she learns, is that her father hasn’t been a great guy. That he’s made huge mistakes when it comes to his personal life. The next paragraph is spoiler territory, so proceed with caution (or skip to the paragraph after).

The moment when Whitley learns her father and mother divorced because her father cheated on her mother, my heart sank for her. This information changes her. Even though it seems small, Whitley’s beliefs about her father shatter. The man she once saw as a cool guy who did no wrong was suddenly a cheater in her mind. I’ve talked a little bit before about my own family, about my father and our complicated relationship. When I was younger, I learned that the reason my parents divorced was this same reason: my father cheated on my mom (with the woman he then married soon after). Learning this about a parent is a big deal, as it’s one of those moments when your beliefs about the infallibility of adults changes. For Whitley, this information gives her great perspective into why her mother is so hurt, and it gives her insight into why her father was always the kind of guy he was. He was immature and irresponsible — not the laid back, cool dude she thought he was. I give Keplinger major kudos in how she tackles this sensitive topic. It’s here we see a huge shift in Whitley and it’s here we identify with her strongly as a character who hurts, rather than as a character who is “bad.” This isn’t overplayed nor is it overplayed as a plot element; it’s well-played and made me sympathize so much with Whitley. In that moment I completely got her and her situation. It was a real awakening for her, and it pushed her forward in the way it needed to. I’d argue this is where she learned she was an adult herself.

The other element that shook this story up was the relationship between Whitley and her new step-brother Nathan and the relationship between Whitley and her new step-sister Bailey. Things are strained between Whit and Nathan because of their sexual encounter early on. While she fixates on this and worries about the impact that decision has on their relationship as step-siblings, Nathan moves forward. He’s incredibly mature but not in a manner that makes him a perfect guy. He admits to making mistakes — including losing his virginity with Whitley in the manner he did. Over the course of learning to navigate their new family, the two of them come to find out they care about each other in a way that’s much deeper than a one night stand. There’s a real and sweet connection between them, and they learn that their futures are entangled in more than one way. Keplinger does a great job not making this sappy nor overly sentimental — that wouldn’t be true to Whitley. Instead, it’s real and it’s potentially rocky.

My favorite relationship to watch in A Midsummer’s Nightmare was the one between 13-year-old Bailey and Whitley. Bailey tells Whit from the start she’s so excited to have an older sister. She wants someone to look up to and to model. Because she’s so angry and hurt, Whitley screws this up from the start. Rather than seeing the potential in being a role model and in being a sister, she hurts Bailey repeatedly. But Bailey loves her so much, she continues to give her new chances. It was really reminiscent of the other relationships in Whitley’s life — despite uncovering the bad things and the dark things, there is always a chance for redemption, and that’s exemplified through Bailey. When Whit lets down her guard and allows herself to be loved and to share love, the relationship between the two of them only becomes stronger.

Although there’s drinking, drugs, and sex in this book, it’s purposeful. It gives us insight into Whitley and her need for something to protect her during this time of transition. For me, this book is really all about transitions — there’s a huge family transition for Whitley’s father, as well as Nathan and Bailey. There’s a huge transition for Whitley here, too, and she’s gearing up for leaving the high school world and entering college (where there’s a hugely unknown future awaiting her). With this many characters experiencing transition in one place, there are bound to be actions that are selfish and self-protecting, and Keplinger nails this. A Midsummer’s Nightmare will appeal to readers who have ever gone through major family changes and those who are hesitant and worried about the transition from the isolated and “safe” world of high school to college. Whitley’s got a great voice and she’s never once too smart for herself. Readers who liked Keplinger’s other titles will like this one. This isn’t a fluffy story, and it’s one that will likely resonate for many who have ever wondered where the boundaries between childhood and adulthood lie. For me, this was a story of Whitley realizing she was right in the midst of that huge life change, and without doubt, I see many readers readily identifying with her.

This book impressed me, and I’m really eager to see where Keplinger goes next. I love watching writers grow and I love watching their story telling skills continue to improve.

Previously: 
Review of Kody Keplinger’s The Duff
Review of Kody Keplinger’s Shut Out

Review copy received from the publisher. A Midsummer’s Nightmare is available now!

Guest Post: Fair Coin by E. C. Myers

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Matthew Jackson returns for a guest review of the YA fantasy/science fiction novel Fair Coin by E. C. Myers. Jackson has been sporadically guesting for us for a while now, most notably his series on Horror Lit 101. An avid reader and reviewer, he reviews adult fiction for BookPage, is an entertainment journalist at Blastr.com, and will have a short story published in the forthcoming issue of Weird Tales Magazine. You can visit him online at his tumblr and Twitter. (Full disclosure: he also happens to be my boyfriend, and I am proud to say that I have significantly increased the number of YA books he reads.)  

I’m not one of those reviewers who groans at genre classifications. Sometimes I think we have too many of them, and sometimes it frustrates me when readers refuse to venture outside of their “paranormal romance” or “urban fantasy” or “contemporary YA” comfort zones, but overall genres are fun for me. That’s all by way of saying I’m a devotee of numerous genres, but it still makes me happy when I find a truly genre-bending book that manages to cleverly blend conventions while going its own way. It makes me even happier when the book in question is shelved in the young adult section, an area which – in the age of countless paranormal melodramas and dystopian rebellion adventures (neither of which I mean any offense to, by the way) – could use all the genre-bending it can get.

Sixteen-year-old Ephraim’s life is plunged into chaos when he comes home one day to find his mother slumped over the kitchen table after a suicide attempt. That’s problem enough, but things get even more harrowing when he discovers why his mother tried to kill herself: earlier that day, she was called to the hospital to identify the body of her dead son. A boy who looks just like Ephraim is dead, and among his belongings (which Ephraim’s mother brought home from the morgue) is a mysterious coin.

Curious and scared, Ephraim takes the coin and accidentally discovers that it seems to grant wishes. The wishes start small, little experiments to test the object’s power. But as the wishes grow, and as Ephraim learns what the coin is capable of, he realizes that every time he changes something voluntarily, something else involuntarily shifts along with it. There’s more than simple magic going on, and as Ephraim tries to hold it together with his best friend, his crush and his mother, he realizes that unless he can come to understand what the coin really is, everything will fall apart.

I’ve talked about this before, and I’m never really sure that I’m making sense when I say it, but I like stories that unfold. There’s nothing wrong with a predictable, direct tale if it’s told well, but my favorite stories are always the ones that feel like every chapter is a discovery rather than a signpost on some big story map. It’s more fun when the story is revealing itself to me rather than pushing me on to the ending. Of course, I want to get to the ending, but I want to feel like I’m experiencing something along the way. Fair Coin is that kind of book. Myers deftly and gracefully weaves fantasy, science fiction, mystery, romance and teenage uncertainties into one tight, compelling package. It’s a page turner that also packs real weight into every chapter, and that’s always a worthy book.

If I have a complaint, it’s the dialogue, but I’m not necessarily blaming Myers for that. His prose is direct yet vivid, his pacing is wonderful and his story is fascinating, but the dialogue never quite feels real to me. There’s too much exposition packed into the mouths of the characters in places, and the human moments sometimes stumble a bit over clumsy lines. But in all fairness, that might just be me. It might ring completely true to teen readers, but even if it doesn’t, the dialogue doesn’t get in the way much.

Fair Coin might not have the same kind of instant appeal that some YA genre novels pack, but if you’re willing to make the leap it’s worth the investment. It’s a tale that twists genres without breaking the rules of any of them, told with fire and confidence and a sense of humor. E. C. Myers has quite simply done something wonderful here, and if you’re frustrated with predictable genre fiction you’ll be glad this book exists.

Finished copy received from the publisher. Fair Coin is available now.