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books

The Girls of No Return by Erin Saldin

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The Alice Marshall School for Girls is set in a sprawling and remote area of wilderness in Idaho, and it’s where girls who need to escape their past are sent to discover themselves. It’s sort of a last-chance resort, but it’s not anything luxurious or enviable. The girls live in basic cabins, have virtually no rights, and have to endure countless hours of therapy (which in this case isn’t always traditional).

Lida arrives at the camp after something bad has happened in her life. That’s about as vague and as descriptive as it comes, of course, but for good reason. She’s rooming with Jules, a girl who Lida feels doesn’t belong because there’s no way she has a broken past, and she’s also rooming with Boone, a girl who has burned a building down and who Lida learns has earned quite the reputation around school. She’s experienced some of Boone’s terror herself when she wakes up after her first night in her room with a new hair cut. One Boone gave her.

Not much happens, aside from Lida’s settling in, until another new girl arrives at Alice Marshall. New girl Gia’s captured the attention of nearly everyone at camp, but she attaches herself to Lida quickly, and Lida couldn’t be happier. In fact, she’s so happy to have garnered Gia’s attention that she finds herself unable to avoid thinking about Gia. During one of their group therapy sessions, despite keeping the truth about what brought her to Alice Marshall locked up and kept only in her own notebook, Lida feels comfortable enough to let Gia in. To be fair, it’s less about comfort here and more about the fact their group leader forces girls to pair up and spill their Things. But it becomes more about comfort when Gia admits to not having her Thing written down and won’t be sharing it. Instead, she just reads and absorbs Lida’s, and Lida doesn’t question. She accepts.

Lida also finds herself telling Gia something she knows about Boone — something she shouldn’t have spilled — and it’s in this instance everything unravels.

The Girls of No Return can’t be summed up simply or easily because it’s a complex novel about friendship. I don’t really think the flap copy does much for describing it, either. It’s a twisted story, set up in a non-traditional format that is at once perplexing and straightforward. It comes down to the fact as readers, we know as little about Lida as anyone else does. From the beginning, we’re on the outside looking in, despite the story being told from her point of view. We know there’s something wrong with her because she’s at this camp, but we’re never sure what. She doesn’t tell us, and she doesn’t tell anyone else around her. See, even in the big reveal moment with Gia, we don’t get anything. Lida doesn’t tell us what’s wrong with her; we only get to know Gia knows.

But then Gia turns around and uses that knowledge against Lida. First, it’s in the bathhouse. Then, it’s during another group session as payback for an incident involving Boone. In both of these scenes, we finally see Lida’s bricks start to crumble. As she starts to fall apart and her Things start to fall out of her control, we witness Lida understanding why she’s at Alice Marshall and how attending this school for troubled girls is exactly what she needed.

Saldin’s debut is dark, but I found it took quite a while for the threads of the story to come together enough to buy into the premise — as I mentioned, the flap copy didn’t do much for me. It describes the book as dark, but I didn’t believe it for nearly 250 pages. There were elements of darkness, but they weren’t necessarily at the forefront because Lida didn’t want them to be. Whatever she suppressed from herself she also suppressed from the reader. It’s an interesting approach to the story, and I think it’s effective, but I found myself bored through a number of scenes because nothing really happens. Lida’s so removed from everything and she removes the reader, too. While it’s smart and makes the end work well, the book was a little too lengthy to pull it off as strongly as it could have.

Before I go on, I’m going to warn the next few things could potentially be spoilers. I don’t think they are, but I can’t be certain since this is the kind of book that will be read many different ways. The trick to the book is whether you believe Lida or not. She’s not the most reliable narrator, and we know this from the beginning. The book’s not a traditional narrative structure: the end comes first. Or what we think is the end comes first. And then it comes again. And again. And again. So the question becomes what’s really the beginning, what’s really the story, and what’s really the end.

I found my answers to everything in the chapter preceding the final one. I felt like I pulled together the resolutions and quite liked how I was able to connect them, but then the final chapter came along. While many who don’t pick up on the clues may find the last chapter to be the right conclusion, I thought it was too much. It over explained, and for how little we actually get spelled out throughout the book, I was a little let down. Does it fit Lida? Definitely. Did it work with everything she learned from Boone? Sure. But it was laid out a little too nicely for me. It almost detracted from the darkness of those final few scenes in the book. (This is the definite spoiler area, so skip down to the next paragraph if you’re sensitive to that) — it works out exactly as Boone laid out in her discussion with Lida about how she can always write her stories the way she wants to if she’s not accountable to anyone else. It’s all a game of possession, one between friends and one between stories. Boone would know a lot about that, seeing she’s one who has that same possessive magic as Lida but in a more physical, rather than mental, way. So by starting the book at the end, the reader is twisted and reconsiders everything and whether or not it was the real story or the story Lida simply wanted to tell. The faults are everywhere throughout the book in leading to that sort of reading and interpretation (including the changing relationships among all the girls, the changing relationship between Terri and Lida, the cutting in and of itself). Moreover, the idea of trust and betrayal work even more in that sense. My disappointment comes in not the actual conclusion but in the fact I felt tricked and strung along for a long time here. I almost feel like I was cheated out of story. Had the last chapter not happened, I’d have been more satisfied. Not because it’d resolve any more answers, but it would have maybe left more questions open.

What stood out to me throughout the book was Saldin’s writing — it’s strong, and she is able to paint a portrait of rural wilderness in a way I haven’t read in a long time. Setting plays a large role in the story, and Saldin offers it to us in the best way possible. Not only that, but she weaves in metaphors that, when you catch them, settle earlier, fragmented bits of story right into place. There are no shortcuts here.

Character development and the relationships among the girls rang true to me. It’s not outright cattiness, but it’s more subtle how they get to one another. The relationship between Lida and Gia reminded me a lot of Grace and Mandarin in Kirstin Hubbard’s Like Mandarin, though in Saldin’s book, there’s less a question about which side of the road either girl stands on when it comes to friendship vs. romantic interest. It’s not just hinted at; it’s laid out blatantly (there are a series of lines about how a place like Alice Marshall makes girls interested in other girls).

It’s not a short book nor a quick read, and though I think this will find a readership among girls who like stories about friendship, it’s not a mean girls story. Flap copy says this one would appeal to fans of Cut or Speak, and while I agree with that, I don’t think it’s going to appeal as broadly as those two books do. This is much more literary, much slower of a build, and much less conclusive than either McCormick or Anderson’s books. It reminded me a lot of Nina de Gramont’s Gossip of the Starlings, particularly in style, and of Jo Knowles’s Lessons from a Dead Girl. Hand The Girls of No Return to readers who like a challenge.

Review copy received from the publisher. The Girls of No Return is available now.

So You Want to Read YA?: Kimberly’s Picks

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When I think of the best fiction, my mind tends to group it into three categories: Theme (big ideas or important concepts), Writing (beautiful, experimental, or all-around outstanding), and Plot (twisty, heart-tugging, clever, or just plain fun). I think certain readers weigh certain categories more heavily than others when they pick up a novel for pleasure reading. So with that in mind, I’ve picked a few YA books that exemplify each of those categories – and two that are stellar examples of all three. I’ve placed an emphasis on genre fiction since that is, after all, my area of expertise.
Theme
The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart
For the budding (or already budded) feminist, you can’t go wrong with Frankie. It’s well-written and fun, too, but to me, it stands out as a book that matters. For readers who like their fiction with meaning, this is a good choice.
Chaos Walking by Patrick Ness
This could just as easily have been in the writing category due to its representation of Noise, but the way Ness addresses the Big Ideas of war, violence, and evil makes it best suited for this category. I don’t think I’ve ever read a novel that better tackles these thorny topics.
Feed by M. T. Anderson
A smart satire about a future world where everyone is plugged into their “feed” 24/7. Feed predates the dystopia glut by a few years, and it shows. Rather than throw together a hodgepodge future with no real basis in what’s going on in the current socio-political world, Anderson’s future is believable and thought-provoking.
Writing
Has there ever been more beautiful writing than that found in Daughter of Smoke and Bone? For those who may be worn out on plot-heavy books with mediocre writing, Laini Taylor is the perfect antidote.
Alice Hoffman’s YA
I love Alice Hoffman’s writing. Every single one of her novels is beautifully written, evocative, and completely captivating. I love how moody they are, and how she can infuse so much meaning into her novels with just a few words. Her YA books are short but pack a tremendous punch. I began with Incantation, a historical novel about the Spanish Inquisition, and moved on to The Foretelling and Green Angel in quick succession. More poetic in style than Taylor, Hoffman’s writing is consistently outstanding.
Smekday makes the list in the writing category despite the fact that it is very different in style from Taylor and Hoffman. Aliens taking over the Earth has never been funnier (truly – other authors have tried and failed). Funny writing can be just as difficult – and impressive – as beautiful writing. Rex’s inclusion of art (ok, technically not writing, but related) adds a lot to the novel too.
Plot
 
Heist Society by Ally Carter
So many readers crave a simple fun read, and Heist Society is a perfect example. The banter is funny, the heists are clever, and twists are legion. Really, what more do you need?
Mary Quinn mysteries by Y. S. Lee
Historical mysteries are perennially popular in the adult fiction world, so Lee’s stories about a teenaged girl detective in Victorian England are a perfect fit. The series provides just the right amount of female empowerment, twisty plots, and historical details to satisfy.
All Three

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
When adults who don’t read YA ask me for a recommendation, this is nearly always the one I give them. It’s got lots of big ideas, some lovely experimental writing, and a fantastic plot – the trifecta of fiction excellence – plus it’s a pretty mature YA novel. Although the protagonist is on the younger end of the YA spectrum, the novel itself is a good bridge from adult to YA.   
His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
I’m sure this is a surprise to no one. I’m always careful who I recommend this series to, since the concepts it addresses are such hot-button issues, but for the mature reader, there is no greater example of what YA fantasy (or fantasy in general…or fiction in general, for that matter) can do than The Golden Compass and its sequels.

Red Glove by Holly Black

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I mentioned in an earlier post how much I dug White Cat, the first book in Holly Black’s Curse Workers series. Red Glove is its follow-up, and while it’s not quite as fun as the first in the series, it’s still a worthwhile successor. Be warned, there are spoilers for White Cat in this review.
In White Cat, Cassel learned that he was a transformation worker and that his two older brothers had been using him as a hit man, then modifying his memories so he would forget about it all. H also learned that Lila, his childhood love and the girl he thought he killed, he had actually transformed into the titular white cat. Now Lila is back in human form, and his mother – ever the meddler – cursed her to “love” him. Cassel is torn between his love for Lila and his knowledge that her love for him is false. Soon, though, he has bigger problems on his plate.
Cassel’s older brother, Philip, is murdered, and the Feds try to recruit Cassel to help them solve the crime. Their only clue is a woman wearing red gloves caught on a security camera – hence the title of the book – and Cassel fears it could be a woman he knows. Not only are the Feds knocking on his door, the mob is too, and Cassel attempts to play both sides in order to stay alive.
One of the things I liked best about Red Glove is its willingness to embrace hard consequences. It seems like a lot of YA SFF books that deal with issues of violence and corruption do so in a sanitary way: the teens are negatively impacted, but they’re never really harmed and always manage to dig themselves out of holes. That’s not the way it works here. Cassel’s actions from White Cat reverberate in Red Glove in very serious ways. The body count is not small, and Cassel realizes just how big it actually is the further we move in the book. Furthermore, he begins to realize how complicit he is in the body count’s size, whether he wielded the killing blow or not.
I also liked the way Black didn’t take her characters down the predictable path. This is particularly true for Lila, who so often does the opposite of what Cassel (and the readers) want her to do. But her actions are always true to her character, which comes into much better focus here than in White Cat. (In White Cat, she was mainly someone for Cassel to feel guilty about. In Red Glove, we begin to see her as an actual person: very ambitious, clever, a little bitter at being worked, and willing to use whatever – and whoever – she needs to get what she wants.)
Like White Cat, Red Glove ends with an opening. I wouldn’t call the ending of either book a true cliffhanger. The main plot is resolved, but Black then adds a little something on to the end to make us want to pick up the next book. It’s nicely done in both books, and I’m happy to report I was able to get my hands on Black Heart to see how the trilogy finishes out. This series has been such an unexpected pleasure, I imagine the concluding volume will be a treat as well. (Although now that I actually research the title a bit, I can’t tell if it’s the concluding volume or merely the third entry in a longer series. Does anyone know?)

Wanderlove by Kirsten Hubbard

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Bria’s just graduated high school, and the future lies open ahead of her. Except, she doesn’t quite see it. She feels stuck. Lost, even. Everything she’s ever felt passionate about is no longer making her feel what she once felt; that excitement has faded. Then one day she runs across a brochure advertising the Global Vagabonds and decides this no strings attached adventure to Central America is exactly what she needs.

When she gets there, though, the Global Vagabonds aren’t what she expected at all. It’s guided group tours — not what Bria wants at all. Not to mention, Bria’s decades younger than anyone else on the trip. She wants what the girl she sat beside on the plane has ahead of her: a trip of backpacking, adventuring, exploring, and without set agendas. After a trip to one of Central America’s most famous market places, Bria takes up a boy on an offer to visit their camp (away from the Global Vagabonds’s reserved housing).

Turns out, throwing caution to the wind and leaving the pre-planned activities of the group was the best thing that could happen to Bria.

Wanderlove is a story about travel, but more than that, it’s a story about finding yourself. As readers, we know something’s going on with Bria to make her lose her passion in art and in the open future ahead of her, but we’re not told what happened. It’s not until she’s ditched her tour group and hooks up with Rowan (and his sister) we get to know what’s going on. Bria’s boyfriend, the one who encouraged her to apply to one of Southern California’s most renowned art schools, dumped her. And he didn’t just dump her; he left her high and dry after she was accepted to the art school and he wasn’t. Art school was his idea, and she applied so she could stay close to him. Bria explains these things to Rowan and the reader slowly, and as she does, we begin to understand why she’s lost so much of her passion. When Toby dumped her, she lost her sense of self and her plans for the future. All of the things she’d planned — all the things revolving around him because she’d given so much for him — just fell apart.

Wanderlove focuses primarily on Bria and Rowan, and both characters are private, reserved, and quite thoughtful. The thing is, those characteristics manifest so differently in each of them. Bria is afraid to make commitments, while Rowan refuses to make commitments because he’s been burned in the past. In traveling together, though, they learn to trust one another and they come to understand the baggage one another carries. There’s a real breaking down to build back up again, and it’s vital to both characters. What I liked so much was that both were hurting, and neither of them took it upon themselves to say they were hurting. They didn’t lay their problems out for one another left and right. It’s a very gradual process of learning to trust and learning to work through. Moreover, it’s also a very gradual process of learning to love themselves and learning that maybe, it’s okay to love one another, too. Yes, there’s romance and yearning in both Bria and Rowan — something you’d expect because of their isolation and their shared interest in traveling — but it’s by no means an instant chemistry. Instead, they have to work toward it, and both characters are reluctant to make any moves with one another. It’s careful and tenuous, and in being that way, I found myself rooting for them to end up together.

I think the line in the whole book that stood out to me, and one that I think will stand out to most readers is one Bria utters: “My problems might be superficial on a global scale, but they’re real to me.” In a field of contemporary YA literature with heavy issues, it was refreshing to read a story where the main character’s biggest problem is simply feeling lost and sad after a relationship she’d invested so much time into. Rowan’s baggage is a bit heavier, but this isn’t really his story. It’s Bria’s. So many readers will relate to her because she’s real and she’s having a hard time dealing with issues that face typical teen readers.

Setting is one of the defining characteristics of Wanderlove. Hubbard writes Central America with expertise, and it was easy to fall into and love the world. It’s lush and vibrant, and it’s the ideal setting to allow Bria to grow. It inspired Bria to reconnect not only with herself, but also with her art. She brought a sketchbook with her on her trip, and it’s not until she’s in the landscape that she’s able to finally pick up her pencil again and sketch. Her eyes are open to the world around her and she realizes she can grasp it with the artistic talent she has inside her — the experiences here and the art she can make belong wholly to her. At the onset of her time with Rowan, Bria is warned by Rowan’s sister that he can experience bouts of wanderlove. While this worries Bria, the truth is that she discovers she and Rowan share this sense of desire to love and appreciate the world around them.

There’s a great metaphor in the setting, as well: Bria’s breaking away from her group and the comfort and security of a planned out route is, of course, symbolic of learning how to explore. It’s important for her to have this time to figure it out on her own, and she does. Even though she spends much of the story with Rowan, she retreats to her sketch book to have this exploration. She still has something wholly her own, and when this is compromised, we get to not only see her true colors, but Rowan’s, as well. Although it could be easy for Bria to become a girl dependent on a boy — remember, the story starts because Toby breaks up with her and suddenly, her plans for the future that was once developed around him are shaken — she’s not. She’s an independent spirit, and she never strays from it. I think that’s what made the romance so satisfying. It was on her own accord the entire time.

One more element worth mentioning is that this book also includes sketches. Bria’s got her sketchbook, but we actually get to see it. Hubbard provides not only the story in the book, but also the illustrations. There aren’t a lot, so it’s hardly a graphic novel, but the illustrations gave the setting and the story that much more impact. I feel like I got to know Bria even better because of the sketches. It was like peeking right into her private thoughts.

Wanderlove will appeal to readers who love travel stories, as well as those who appreciate contemporary ya stories but don’t necessarily want to read one dealing with heavy issues. Bria is an average girl, and never once is that a bad thing. Readers who like character-driven stories will find Bria’s one worth watching. Kirsten Hubbard impressed me with her debut novel, Like Mandarin, and I have to say she impressed me just as much with Wanderlove. She’s one to keep an eye on, as her writing and her story telling are compelling, engaging, and easy to relate to, both as a teen and as a female. Will this story work for male readers? Some, maybe. But I don’t think there’s anything wrong in saying Hubbard has a knack for tapping into the female mind and tinkering with some of the issues girls feel they’re alone in having. She does it well.

Review copy received from the publisher. Wanderlove will be available March 13.

A Pair of Cybils Reviews

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Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake
Cas Lowood kills ghosts for a living. Well, he doesn’t really make money at it, so I suppose you’d call it more of a hobby, or a compulsion. His father was a ghost-killer when he was alive, and since his death, Cas carries his deadly athame, the tool used to kill the dead. Cas and his mother have just moved to a new town, and Cas is determined to kill the local ghost, Anna dressed in blood, a teenage girl who was murdered many years ago. Only things with Anna aren’t quite what they seem, and Cas slowly begins to not only sympathize with her, but to fall in love with her as well. He also picks up a couple of good friends who learn about his unusual vocation, and they serve the dual purpose of assisting Cas in his quest to kill Anna as well as adding some interest to the story.
I’ve discovered that I’m not the audience for ghost stories, but Kendare Blake’s book made a valiant effort to change my mind. I thought the pseudo-romantic relationship between Cas and Anna was intriguing, and I appreciated that Blake didn’t shy away from high stakes (there’s a nice body count). The climax was unexpected, but made sense in retrospect. It’s a different sort of ghost story than the norm, and it mostly worked for me.
My main problem with the book was pacing: some parts just really dragged. For these chunks of the novel, it seemed like the troupe of characters wasn’t doing anything in particular, just kind of flailing about. It gets a bit dull to read about after a couple of pages. But then it would pick up nicely and I’d be hooked for another twenty pages, until it got a bit dull again. So overall, it’s a good book, but not an outstanding one.
Angelfall by Susan Ee
The angels of the apocalypse have descended on Earth, and teenage Penryn has become caught in the middle of it. Her wheelchair-bound younger sister has been kidnapped by the angels. She must team up with another angel, Raffe, in order to rescue her. Along the way, the duo experience a significant amount of peril and intrigue, plus some romance (naturally).
I’m kind of flabbergasted by all of the positive feedback Angelfall has received, because I was very unimpressed. I think the skeleton of a good story is there, and I dug how gruesome Ee dared to be near the end of the book. But for most of the book, I was doing some serious mental eye-rolling, and it’s mostly due to the writing – it doesn’t pass muster. The book is full of awkward phrasing, clunky sentences, and cliched dialogue. Part of the reason I had a hard time getting through most of it is because it felt like a romance novel with some fantasy trappings for the first three quarters (rather than a fantasy novel with some romance). The dialogue between Penryn and Raffe tries to be clever repartee, but it just comes across as ridiculous. And I say this as a reader of romance. 
Aside from the writing, I had problems with the world-building and development of ancillary characters. Put all of these lacking elements together and you quickly realize that no amount of fast-paced action can save this book.