2/2/20: taking bets now as to whether or not this reread ends with me reading DARK DAWN. #idontreadlastbooks #issues
There seems to be some confusion o2/2/20: taking bets now as to whether or not this reread ends with me reading DARK DAWN. #idontreadlastbooks #issues
There seems to be some confusion on the YA/not YA nature of this book, so let the record show, in response to the question, "Are your books YA or not?" on his website FAQ, Kristoff replied:
THE NEVERNIGHT CHRONICLE is a different beast. The protagonist is a sixteen year old girl. Does that automatically make it YA? My editors say “Definitely not, and who the hell let you out of your cage? Get back to work”.
These books are about an assassin. They are, as you may expect, somewhat violent as a result. They also have sex scenes (and now I have to contemplate the fact that my mother is going to read them *shudders*). I’d rate them MA (or NA if you prefer) and describe them as “crossover books”. But they’ll be found in the adult Fantasy section of your bookstore.
Sometimes you stumble across a book, and, for whatever reason, your expectations are low. Could be the harlequin mask on the cover, could be a previous series by the same author that you were wholly uninterested in, could be a billion different things that are individually insignificant, but cumulatively . . . You turn up you nose.
O, gentlefriends . . . Do not do unto yourselves the same disservice I almost did unto mine . . . self . . . o.O
NEVERNIGHT by Jay Kristoff is . . . exquisite.
I almost didn't read it. Indeed, the release date sneaked up on me, tapped me on the shoulder, and waved hello on Monday afternoon, and I joked to a friend that I should at least update my status on Goodreads and pretend to be reading it . . . Six hours later, it was ten pm, and I was 40% in.
The first chapter was baffling. Told from two seemingly different perspectives, it chronicles two very different firsts, but uses almost the exact same words. I was internally shouting, "WTF is this?!" but I was curious enough see where it led, and the further I got, the closer the two scenarios spun toward completion, and then it was over, and I saw what he'd done . . .
In Jabberwocky, Lewis Carroll turned the English language on its head. He used nonsense words that were decipherable because of his expert manipulation of sentence structure and other, real words that made the meanings of his imaginary words obvious.
For the first time since I really understood and appreciated what Carroll had wrought, I felt the same kind of glee as I read about a girl losing her virginity and a girl taking her first life. One experience held the potential for the creation of a new life, the other bringing an irrevocable end to a life, and yet . . . He used . . . The same words.
[image]
Riddikulus writing skills aside, the story was also fantastic.
What's my #1 complaint about assassins in YA fiction?
You: You may have mentioned something about reluctant assassins a time or three.
Me: Damn right.
You: Not a problem here?
Me: *laughs maniacally*
People often shit themselves when they die. Their muscles slack and their souls flutter free and everything else just…slips out. For all their audience’s love of death, the playwrights seldom mention it. When the hero breathes his last in the heroine’s arms, they call no attention to the stain leaking across his tights, or how the stink makes her eyes water as she leans in for her farewell kiss. I mention this by way of warning, O, my gentlefriends, that your narrator shares no such restraint.
Duly noted, Mr. Narrator, sir.
And lest you be scared off by visions of graphic and violent death . . . I won't lie, that is part of this story. But only part:
She’s dead herself, now—words both the wicked and the just would give an eyeteeth smile to hear. A republic in ashes behind her. A city of bridges and bones laid at the bottom of the sea by her hand. And yet I’m sure she’d still find a way to kill me if she knew I put these words to paper. Open me up and leave me for the hungry Dark. But I think someone should at least try to separate her from the lies told about her. Through her. By her. Someone who knew her true. A girl some called Pale Daughter. Or Kingmaker. Or Crow. But most often, nothing at all. A killer of killers, whose tally of endings only the goddess and I truly know. And was she famous or infamous for it at the end? All this death? I confess I could never see the difference. But then, I’ve never seen things the way you have. Never truly lived in the world you call your own. Nor did she, really. I think that’s why I loved her.
*goosebumps*
Mia Covere's tale reminded me a bit of Arya Stark's: a girl whose family is destroyed by politics and hands grasping at power, stumbles into a follower of a most murderous god(dess), and becomes his apprentice. But Mia is more than just a girl . . . She's a girl with a shadow dark enough for two.
You: WTF does that mean?
Me: READ THE BOOK.
And how many Guardians of the Galaxy fans do we have? B/c the coolest part of that movie was the black market space station that was the HEAD OF A CELESTIAL BEING, am I right?
Well, Mia grew up in Godsgrave, which just might be where the rest of the body fell . . . Okay, it's probably a different being entirely, but the concept is the same, and it's friggin' awesome:
To the north, the Ribs rose hundreds of feet into the ruddy heavens, tiny windows staring out from apartments carved within the ancient bone. Canals ran out from the hollow Spine . . .
My only words of caution are that, if you haven't already cottoned on, there is SEX in this YA novel, which isn't as uncommon as it used to be, but isn't yet unremarkable. And I'm not talking fade-to-black acknowledgment of sexual congress, I'm talking burn-your-ears, think-interesting thoughts-about-the-hands-that-penned-them sex scenes.
FYI.
Kristoff calls Mia an assassin who is to death what a maestro is to a symphony, but I felt the same way about Kristoff's manipulation of words and language. Whether Mia slipped into a room like a knife between the ribs or we met a man whose face was more scar than face, this reader felt like she was being spun and tossed by a master. In NEVERNIGHT, Solis might be the Shahiid of Songs, but it was Jay Kristoff who made me dance to the music of his story in ways I've rarely been moved. O so ridiculously highly recommended.
First things first--I've been asked eleventy billion times where FLAMECASTER falls in the works-of-Chima lineup: it's a spinofReviewed by: Rabid Reads
First things first--I've been asked eleventy billion times where FLAMECASTER falls in the works-of-Chima lineup: it's a spinoff from her Seven Realms series.
You: Should I read Seven Realms before reading FLAMECASTER?
Me: That's a complicated question. Technically, you don't need to. BUT. I think you should. B/c reasons:
1. It's my favorite (finished) YA fantasy series, so EVERYONE should read it.
2. I have an OCD compulsion to read everything in order.
3. There's something that happens at the beginning of FLAMECASTER that won't have the impact it should, if you haven't read Seven Realms.
You: What is this thing?
Me: I'LL NEVER TELL. But later I will dance around it like a zombie from Thriller (b/c still traumatized and can't help it).
You: Is there anything special about this spinoff?
Me: YES. I'm so glad you asked. This book takes place twentyish years after the events in Seven Realms, and the main characters in FLAMECASTER are the children of the main characters from Seven Realms.
HOW COOL IS THAT?
You: SO VERY COOL.
*high fives*
And now is when I'm going to get exceedingly vague.
That thing I mentioned? The one that I warned I'd be dancing around? Yeah, it's . . . so very awful.
It's almost as bad as the Bad Thing that happened in Morning Star, and the Bad Thing that happened in Morning Star is my current reigning Worst Thing to Happen in a Book EVER.
And this Bad Thing influences so much of what comes after that I can't talk about any of it. What I can tell you is:
1. There are dragons.
2. There are pirates.
3. It's funneh:
If I killed the bastard now, Ash thought, none of these lords would lift a finger to stop me. But then they’d turn around and execute me, because, you know, precedent.
B/c, you know, precedent. *giggle snorts*
4. The new characters will keep you in a near constant state of panic trying to figure out who's good and who's bad (which is a good thing b/c TWISTY and unpredictable).
5. There's a villain so contemptible that he/she/it joined the Most Vile Villain ranks with Umbrage.
And most importantly, I loved it. Unless the Bad Thing happened to make it easier for blah, something, blah blah, something to happen, in which case I will do much violence to quench the fire of my RAGE.
[image]
*laughs nervously*
BUT.
I'm hopeful that's just my paranoid, hyperactive imagination running wild, and this time next year, I'll be back to let you know, b/c Chima has proven with FLAMECASTER that her success with Seven Realms wasn't a fluke--she is awesome--and my YA fantasy monster is sated. Highly recommended.
I ended up loving this book, but only b/c I stuck with it. I took an inordinate amount of time for me to really get into it, but now that I did I cannI ended up loving this book, but only b/c I stuck with it. I took an inordinate amount of time for me to really get into it, but now that I did I cannot wait for the sequel. EXCELLENT ending. ...more
The first time I saw my sister after I finished reading THRONE OF GLASS by Sarah J. Maas, she was in the middle of reading theReviewed by: Rabid Reads
The first time I saw my sister after I finished reading THRONE OF GLASS by Sarah J. Maas, she was in the middle of reading the latest book from one of her favorite series.
I did not care. I pestered, cajoled, and harassed her until she downloaded the THRONE OF GLASS sample chapters and read them.
She stopped reading her book and read ToG until the wee morning hours when she finished it.
*lap of victory*
A few months later, my mom came to visit for a long weekend. Her first night here, she asked me for something to read. I gave her THRONE OF GLASS. She stayed two extra hours to finish it. My MOTHER.
And they aren’t the only ones I’ve pushed/thrown/shoved THRONE OF GLASS at. Why? Because it’s stupendous, that’s why.
Celaena Sardothien is an assassin trained by the King of the Assassins. Caught (after potentially being betrayed—you can read all about it in The Assassin's Blade, which I HIGHLY recommend), she is sentenced to hard labor in a salt mine until she dies for an indefinite period of time. After a year, she is offered a way out--all she has to do is defeat twenty-three other candidates in a competition to be the King’s Champion.
That’s all. Just beat a multitude of bigger, stronger men after spending a year as a slave in a work camp. No big.
And it isn't for Celaena b/c Celaena is just that good.
SIDE RANT: I’ve read a lot of reviews for this book, and the most common complaint is that Celaena is too girly to be a believable assassin.
I say N-O-N-S-E-N-S-E. No one bats an eye when Gin Blanco (Elemental Assassin by Jennifer Estep) starts baking. What’s the huge difference between a love of cooking and a love of pretty things?
I’m not seeing it. In fact, a love of clothes and a preoccupation with appearance is more consistent with being an assassin, in my opinion. A love of cooking is more of a choice of hobby whereas a desire to look pretty is characteristic of the narcissistic personality type that would be required to kill indiscriminately (unless, of course, it’s a child or a Terrasen) <------Celaena’s hard limits.
Whatever. I like Celaena. She’s alternatingly badass and hilarious. I don’t know which version I prefer—the one that takes on her chauvinistic opponent in a sword duel without bothering to unsheathe her sword, or the one that shrieks at billiard balls for refusing to go where she wants them to go.
But Celaena isn’t the only thing THRONE OF GLASS has going for it, not by a long shot. Both of the potential love interests are seriously swoonworthy, and the big bad(s)—sometimes it/they seem to operate in a committee-like fashion—are a well-crafted target for your contempt. There are exotic foreign princesses and magically summoned monsters, and there are just enough hints-of-things-to-come to keep your nails chewed to nubs while you wait for your next fix, I mean next book.
If you’re a lover-of-Fantasy, THRONE OF GLASS should be at the top of your to-read list. The only problem is that right now it’s a six book series, so we won’t know how it ends until 2017. Here’s to delayed gratification. *wink*
Have you ever discovered a new book, by a new author, and absolutely LOVED it, so you go out and immediately buy the next bookReviewed by: Rabid Reads
Have you ever discovered a new book, by a new author, and absolutely LOVED it, so you go out and immediately buy the next book the author writes, and it's not quite as good as the first one, but it's still pretty good, so the next time a new book is released by that same author, again, you go out and buy it immediately, only this time it's not very good at all, and you start to think maybe the author is a one hit wonder?<------that's a REALLY long, yet (mostly?) grammatically correct, sentence.
That's also really NOT what happened here. In fact, it was pretty much the reverse.
I discovered Tiernan's SWEEP series probably 10 years and inhaled it (all 15 installments). It was okay, but the most I can say about it is that it was entertaining. Then I found her BALEFIRE series, which was thankfully much shorter (only 4 installments) and it blew SWEEP out the water.
So when I stumbled across IMMORTAL BELOVED, I was like, "Ooohhh . . . that looks interesting."
And it was fantastic.
Nastasya, Nasty to her friends, is an immortal. No one is sure where the first immortal came from, but they can be found among every race and nationality. As is usually the case, they are not truly immortal--if you cut off their heads, burn their bodies, and scatter their ashes, they will not survive, but that's a rather specific set of circumstances, so I don't begrudge them their "immortal" status.
They also have the ability to learn and use magic.
If you know anything about Tiernan, then this is not a surprise. Tiernan excels at writing all things witchy, and IMMORTAL BELOVED is no exception. But Nasty avoids her magic, b/c she learned at a very young age how dangerous it was for her to let others learn of her abilities.
Why is it dangerous . . . ? I think you know where I'm going with this--READ THE BOOK *winks*
But Nastasya can no longer avoid her magic when she leaves the life she's been living in London, and the friends she's been living it with for the last hundred years, behind.
This book . . . is a very emotional story to read. Nasty has money and beauty and immortality and a collection of friends who have all of those things as well, and . . . they're pretty damn awful to tell the truth. Nasty leaves without a word after Incy, her best friend, uses magic to break the back of a rude cabbie . . . b/c he can. B/c he was angry that the cabbie dared to call them out for their juvenile behavior. So he . . . broke the poor man's back . . . left him in a puddle on the street beside his cab . . . used magic again to prevent the man from calling out for help . . . and then went clubbing.
YEP. Incy's kind of a bastard.
And while Nasty is shocked and horrified by Incy's behavior--she had no idea he could use magic that way--she allows herself to be steered towards the bar that the rest of her crew are headed for, starts drinking, and does not one thing to help the man.
The next day, she wakes up hungover and completely disgusted with herself, and decides that something has to change. She has no idea how she became the person she currently is, but she's terrified of what it might mean for the rest of her very long life.
So she runs to the states.
She'd met a women about 80 years ago, you see, who told her simply to come if she decided she wanted more out of life.
So she does.
From there she enters a kind of rehab for immortals. It's hard and it hurts, but Nastasya has reached a place where no matter how bad it is with River and the other immortals at the retreat, she can't stand the thought of being anywhere else either . . . so she stays.
This book would be an excellent story even without the paranormal elements. Nasty doesn't need to be an immortal or capable of magic for her story to draw you in, make you feel her agony and despair and determination to change, be better, be MORE. But she is . . . and that only makes things more interesting . . .
And then there's Reyn . . . the Viking GOD. Well, okay fine, he's not really a god, but he's several inches over six feet of blond Viking warrior, and that's good enough for me.
And they HATE each other. It's fantastic. Nastasya and Reyn achieve the kind of slow burn combustibility that's only possible when legitimate dislike is present, and it's HOT.
So the characters are awesome. And despite what I said earlier about no one really knowing where immortals came from, the world-building in this series is VERY cool. It's a mix of mythology and paganism, and I loved it. AND b/c even the youngest characters are as old or older than your grandparents, and no part of this story takes place on a high school campus, this is one of those YA novels that even readers 10+ years out of high school can enjoy. IMMORTAL BELOVED is an excellent first installment to this excellent trilogy. I recommend it to anyone who likes witchy UF and hot Viking gods....more
I don't care how cliché it is, I love Jane Austen.
I've read Pride and Prejudice half a dozen times. I've read Emma at least tReviewed by: Rabid Reads
I don't care how cliché it is, I love Jane Austen.
I've read Pride and Prejudice half a dozen times. I've read Emma at least twice that, and I've read Sense and Sensibility and Mansfield Park a time or two as well. We won't even get into how many times I've watched their movie counterparts, b/c that could be embarrassing.
Know what I haven't read and/or watched numerous times?
Persuasion.
*sighs*
YES, I admit it. The first time I read this book, I had never read Jane Austen's Persuasion. I'm pretty sure I'd seen the BBC miniseries or movie version, but it had been looooooong ago, and who cares, anyway?--Having seen the movie (perhaps) at some point in the indefinite past doesn't make me any less of a fraud.
*hangs head in shame*
There's good news though. Chances are you haven't read Persuasion either. In fact, a lot of you are probably wondering why I'm blathering on about Jane Austen to begin with . . .
YEP. Thought so.
But there is a reason (there is always a reason), and that reason is Diana Peterfreund's For Darkness Shows the Stars is a sci-fi/post apocalypse/dystopian retelling of . . . wait for it . . . Jane Austen's Persuasion.
And it is FANTASTIC.
Elliot North lives in a world devastated by genetic modification. A Luddite, she is a member of the lone surviving intelligent people group of the wars that followed the general population's discovery that their genetic tampering had doomed their offspring to existing in a diminished capacity.
Having shunned the treatment, the Luddites and their own offspring were unaffected, and when the dust settled, pious souls that they were, they took it as their sacred duty to shelter and protect the Reduced.
That the Reduced provided free labor on plantation-like properties . . . well, that was just a byproduct of the whole nasty situation.
BUT several generations later, the Reduced began to infrequently give birth to non-Reduced children. A few generations after that, and while still a rare occurrence, the number of non-Reduced children was steadily increasing.
Kai is one such child, and Elliot's best and only childhood friend, but he left the North estate four years ago to try and build a better life for himself.
There are Post-Reduction settlements, you see, where non-Reduced people live free of Luddite interference/persecution/enslavement.
Elliot was meant to go with him, but she was all that stood between her dangerously idiotic father and the people, both Reduced and Post Reduction, who depended on her family's estate for their survival.
So she did not go.
But he has never left her thoughts.
For Darkness Shows the Stars is a deliciously painful story of love and loss, of misunderstanding, of evil in the world and triumph over that evil. It's a story of hope and adventure. And it's also a cautionary tale that details the dangers of two very different extremes.
This is the third time I've read this book, and I've loved it a little more each time. For Darkness Shows the Stars is one of those rare books that I unreservedly recommend to EVERYONE.
"Marilla!" Anne sat down on Marilla's gingham lap, took Marilla's lined face between her hands, and looked
4.5 stars
Anne, my lovely, I feel restored.
"Marilla!" Anne sat down on Marilla's gingham lap, took Marilla's lined face between her hands, and looked gravely and tenderly into Marilla's eyes. "I'm not a bit changed—not really. I'm only just pruned down and branched out. The real me—back here—is just the same. It won't make a bit of difference where I go or how much I change outwardly; at heart I shall always be your little Anne, who will love you and Matthew and dear Green Gables more and better every day of her life."
Full RTC.
Pre-review:
You know what? I've been wanting to reread these books for probably a decade, and I'm still (inexplicably) battling my ever present book funk, so I'm just gonna do it.
Gilbert Blythe, you were my first and best book boyfriend. See you soon ;)
The first time I read WICKED LOVELY by Melissa Marr I did not like it. It was too dark. I was too young to catch the deeper connotations that Marr was communicating. If it hadn't been published in that weird in between time when I was pretty current on all the interesting series in my preferred genres (and therefore desperate for reading material), I probably never would've read the second book.
But it was, and I did . . . And it remains my favorite YA series about Fae.
Aislinn, like all of her female ancestors, has the Sight. She can see through faery glamour, magic used to either make the Fae invisible to humans entirely or to make them appear to be human themselves.
There are many rules her grandmother taught her to ensure her safety, but they're all extensions of a single concept: keep the secret.
Faeries don't want to be seen, and if they discover a human who can see them that human will be lucky to simply have their eyes gouged out.
Like I said. Dark.
But that by itself isn't unusual . . . and I love Fae, sooooo . . . what was my problem?
This time around, I finally figured it out. B/c despite improving with the reread, I enjoyed it for the authenticity, for the underlying message I had previously overlooked, for the anticipation of what I know will come next . . . not for this story. Not for these characters.
Aislinn and Keenan . . . Not a huge fan of either of them at this point. Donia, yes. Niall, also yes, but not nearly as much as I will in INK EXCHANGE. Seth . . . meh. For now, at least.
Part of my dislike of the main characters (Aislinn and Keenan) is superficial--I don't like their names. #sorrynotsorry Maybe you can completely overlook MEH to blergh names, but I can't. A rose by any other name and all that.
By itself that would never be enough to make me turn my nose up at a book, but when I have other issues with those same characters . . . it compounds.
And with Keenan, especially . . . He embodies the capriciousness that categorizes the Fae, but he lacks the whimsicality, the charisma, that endears the "good" version of Fae to me. Instead of liking him for his Faeness, I was irritated by his narcissism.
There wasn't anything specific about Aislinn that I that disliked, but there wasn't anything I did particularly like either.
As for Seth . . . I'm not even remotely attracted to this incarnation. I got over my fascination with über pierced Bad Boys who may or may not have a pet snake (*rolls eyes*) when I was in high school.
BUT.
Marr is a true scholar when it comes to fairy folklore, and the aforementioned authenticity is fantastic. It's not limited to the physical descriptions of various types of Fae, she weaves the rules for dealing with Fae, the practices, the consequences, the temperaments (Keenan excluded), ultimately creating a captivating Fae world overlapping our own.
This setting, the WICKED LOVELY world, is so well-established in this first installment that, in hindsight, it's not at all surprising given new main characters, I loved the next book.
Beyond that, Marr gives us a heroine who despite being backed into a corner, despite escaping the Fae free and clear being an impossibility, grabs the reins of her power, making the best of a situation she wants no part of, but can't escape.
Aislinn accepts the world as it is and makes it work for her.
I may not have connected with her, but I respected her.
SO. While I consider this first installment to be significantly weaker than those that follow, it isn't terrible, and I still highly recommend it to anyone who loves the Fae.
Jessica ❁ ➳ Silverbow ➳ ❁
>
Books:
best-series-ya
(41)
Loading...
