Title: The Sword of Summer (Magnus Chase & The Gods of Asgard #1)
Author: Rick Riordan
Publisher: Disney - Hyperion Books
Published: October 6, 2015
Number of Pages: 528
Genre(s): Mythology, Fantasy, YA
Date Read: November 1, 2015
Acquired: Walmart
Summary:
Magnus Chasehas just turned 16, but he's not like most other 16 year olds, Magnus has been living on the streets of Boston, on his own for the last two years since his Mother died. Well actually she didn't just die, she was killed, by inexplicable wolves. So Magnus hates wolves with a passion now, and really who could blame him. For many teens who've just turned 16 their looking forward to a birthday party with lots of their friends, and maybe learning how to drive. Magnus is just looking for his next meal and to stay out of trouble. Magnus doesn't get what he wants though because apparently turning 16 triggers something, something that he doesn't understand, some sort of destiny. Somehow he ends up on a bridge fighting a fire giant for a barnacle covered sword, while being defended by his two homeless friends who are wielding a make way for ducklings sign and a toy store bow and arrow, after listening to an Uncle he hasn't trusted since long before his Mom was killed.
After his fight on the bridge Magnus finds his way to the einherji where the strange things just keep on coming, and the more answers he gets the more confused he gets. The aforementioned homeless friends come to rescue him, and it turns out they've been protecting him from unseen enemies all along, and they're not really homeless humans either, one is a deaf elf and the other is a fashion conscious dwarf who turns to stone in the sunlight. They set off on a quest to find Frey's Sword of Summer and keep Surt from releasing Fenris Wolf and starting Ragnarok. Will they succeed?
Review:
I have been waiting for a Rick Riordan Norse mythology series since The Kane Chronicles (KC) so when this was first announced I was freaking out and I have been so excited for it. I followed all the progress updates on Facebook, I gleefully and eagerly counted down the days until the release date. I was jealous that my friend Rachel got her copy before me and resisted the urge to ask her for spoilers beyond telling me exactly HOW Magnus is related to Annabeth (it had been circulating for months that he was going to be her brother so I HAD to know whether he was or not and I was impatient). I hurried to finish the book I was reading when it was released and then the book that I had gotten while reading that book (Chess Queen Enigma) so that I could get myself a copy of Magnus and read it. So to say I had expectations and high hopes it putting it rather mildly. But oh man did it ever live up to my expectations. Once I got it it was near next to impossible to put it down. I would think about reading it while I was at work. I loved every single page of it, it hooked me right from the beginning and just stayed awesome all the way through.
Rick Riordan just has a thoroughly enjoyable writing style, he's informative and educational while being highly entertaining. His humour is spot on and perfectly irreverent which I love. My favourite chapter title in the book for example is the one where is breaks the fourth wall "Hearthstone passes out even more than Jason Grace (Though I have no idea who that is)". I was really looking forward to seeing how Riordan would make Magnus stand out from Percy Jackson/Heroes of Olympus (PJ/HoO) and the KC because he did so well at keeping those two mythologies from being too similar even though they were both dealing with the same type of character really (modern teenagers with ties of some sort to mythological gods/goddesses). In PJ/HoO, you'll recall, the kids were all children of first the Greek and then the Roman aspects of the Greek/Roman pantheons (Thanks for catching that I typed Freek instead of Greek the second time there Google) while in the KC the teens were descendants of Egyptian magicians who could channel the auras and powers of the Egyptian pantheon. What he does with Magnus and his companions definitely stands on it's own from the previous two series and perfectly fits the Norse mythology.
As with his other two previous series the world of Norse mythology is well woven into the modern world, this time in Boston instead of a borough of New York. I'm sure given Magnus's connection to Annabeth that as the series goes on we'll get more and more references to people and events from the other series' especially PJ/HoO and I am really looking forward to that. I don't know how many books Riordan has planned for this particular series but I plan to read all of them.
--Ren
Title: The Chess Queen Enigma (Stoker & Holmes, #3) [ARC]
Author: Colleen Gleason
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Published: October 6, 2015
Number of Pages: 351
Genre(s): Mystery, Sci-fi, Steampunk, YA
Date Read: October 25, 2015
Acquired: Goodreads Giveaways
Summary:
It is my great pleasure to introduce you this evening to one Miss Alvermina Holmes, daughter of Sir Mycroft Holmes, niece of the esteemed detective Sherlock. She would prefer that you call her Miss Holmes, or if you must use the familiar, Mina. Mina is every bit a Holmes, she is following in her uncle's famous footsteps as a master of deductive reasoning (although she still has much to learn). May I also introduce you to her associate Miss Evaline Stoker, sister of Mr. Bram Stoker, oh yes, and she's a trained vampire hunter. Together they form the team of Stoker & Holmes, under the guidance of the indomitable and infamous Miss Irene Adler they endeavor to become a crime fighting force to rival the likes of Holmes and Watson.
The year is 1889 and our intrepid young heroines have been tasked by the Crown to act as diplomatic escorts for a foreign Princess as she attempts to restore the relationship between her country and England by returning a letter that will lead to a loss chess piece, a white queen. On the eve prior to their assignment to escort the Princess of Betrovia, Evaline gets drawn into a mystery involving her friend Pix. Inevitably everything goes bottoms up, the letter ends up stolen and Mina and Evaline are called in to track it, and the queen down. Mina deduces that their adversary in this endeavor is someone they have faced before, their own Moriarty if you will, a criminal mastermind known only as the Ankh. What, if anything does the Ankh and the missing chess queen have to do with Pix's mysterious client? And is everyone around them really who they appear to be?
Review:
I must preface this review by noting that the copy of the book that I read is an uncorrected advanced reader's copy that I received from the publisher via Goodreads Giveaways. Therefore, without having a finished copy of the book in hand I cannot say for certain whether or not any of the problems I had with this book actually appear in the final version of the novel. Overall, I really enjoyed this book. I love books that take characters we know and love (or historical figures in the case of Bram) and give them bigger and more complex lives than we saw them have in their own stories. In this instance those beloved characters serve as background characters to give the two main characters a reason for existing, but I love that. There are things that Mina Holmes and Evaline Stoker can do that Sherlock and Bram could not as characters.The steampunk meets urban paranormal fantasy mashup intrigues me as well, you can't have a character called Stoker without having vampires. This is the 3rd book in the Stoker & Holmes series, but it is the first one that I have read. I went to the public library last night and borrowed the other two.
I'm betting that many of the problems I had with this book stem from the fact that I didn't read the first two before reading it. The story felt rushed to me over all, and like there were too many side plots that the author had to hastily try and fold into the main plot...which caused the main plot to get sort of diluted. The Dylan story line, that felt out of place for me, but that one I definitely expect is because I haven't read the first two books yet. Wedging the vampire portion of the plot (the Pix storyline) into the puzzle of the chess queen seemed unnecessarily contrived, it seemed more like its purpose was setting up the 4th Stoker and Holmes book rather than driving the plot of this book. And the actual enigma of the chess queen? I feel like that was the one storyline in the book that didn't get as much attention as it should have, it just to me any way felt like that investigation was just happening whenever they didn't have something else on the go. And the last thing that bothered me? The something else on the go usually related to men. I feel like Mina and Evaline shouldn't be concerned about men or what men think of them etc. but Evaline spends time telling us how jealous she is of another female friend of Pix's and also trying to sort her feelings out for him. Mina spends quite a lot of time trying (and failing miserably) to deny that she has feelings for Inspector Grayling (the Lestrade to her Sherlock). I'm telling you, if I am picking up a novel called a Stoker and Holmes novel, I am NOT picking it up for the relationship dramas of young Victorian ladies, I am picking it up for kickass vampire hunting a damn good mystery...and I just feel like both of those things were somewhat afterthoughts in the novel.
Enjoyable read, just not 100% what I was expecting. Won't stop me from reading the rest of the series though.
--Ren
Title: The Fault in Our Stars
Author: John Green
Publisher: Dutton Books
Published: January 1, 2012
Number of Pages: 313
Genre(s): YA, Realistic Fiction
Date Read: February 9, 2014
Acquired: Waterloo Public Library
Summary:
Hazel Grace Lancaster is dying. This is not a secret. This is not new. Hazel has been dying since she was born, as have we all been. Because dying is a side effect of living. But if you really want to get technical, Hazel is actively dying whereas the rest of us are passively dying, and she has been actively dying since they found the cancer in her body. Her cancer has always been terminal, she's never had an X chance of surviving, there's never been a surgery to take the cancer out, because it's not that kind of cancer. She has accepted all of this with a grace befitting a girl whose middle name is Grace, she has accepted that she will cease to be sooner rather than later, and she just wants to get out with as little bit of a mess as possible. She doesn't want to be a grenade in the lives of the people who she loves and who love her.
She thinks she has a choice. Right up until the moment that Augustus Waters walks into her life, she is right. But Gus changes everything. They suddenly find themselves together on a whirlwind journey that only leads to one inevitable ending. Absolute and complete heartbreak.
Review:
Oh. My. Gods. John Green what have you done to me!? Oh but does this book ever live up to all of the hype about it. Mr. Green you are as spectacular an author as you are an entertainer sir, and you are an exceptional entertainer in my eyes so draw your conclusions on how I feel about your writing from that statement.
I had seen John Green's book in the Library, while shelving them, but I had never bothered to pick one up and read the dust jacket. And then I came across the YouTube Mental_Floss list show. Well that show is right up my alley, educational and entertaining, and hosted by John Green. As I worked my way through the playlist I said to myself, before he ever mentioned his books in the videos, "Gee I wonder if this is the same John Green who wrote those YA novels everyone is talking about." Well of course he's the same John Green. Still didn't make me pick up his books, but it did drive me to his other videos (CrashCourse is AMAZING and I watched all of the humanities videos in under a month, omg.). It was as I was working my way through CrashCourse US history, with all the hype building for the TFiOS movie, that I decided that I should check out his books. So I put The Fault in Our Stars on hold at the WPL, and while I was waiting I went out and bought Looking for Alaska (which is now on the to-be-read shelf of course, because my hold came in).
TFiOS arrived this past Thursday at the library, and obviously, since I am now writing this review I have finished reading it. I started it Friday night and I devoured it in three dedicated sittings in between bouts of watching Olympic Slopestyle (YES THAT IS ONE WORD, AND A REAL WORD GOOGLE, NO I WILL NOT HYPHENATE IT!) Snowboarding and Luge; and working on job applications, with a little smattering of John Green on the side because the last video for Crash Course US History was posted. I knew a little of what I was getting myself into having been watching John Green videos lately and having watched the trailer for the movie, and being brutally honest, I didn't think I was going to like it, like at all. I am not usually a Realistic Fiction fan. I am all about the escapism of literature, but at the same time, one of my favourite things about literature is well written, intelligent, sharp witted, and insightful characters. This book is chock full of those types of characters. Hazel and Augustus, even the names, especially his, conjure to mind images of old scholars in tweed jackets with leather patches on the elbows. They are not that image, they are young and they are funny, and they are dying. They are fully aware of the tragedy of their circumstances and they both have a deliciously black sense of humour. Which I can fully appreciate. My own family, myself included, is known for our wickedly dark sense of humour.
This is not a happy book, there is no happy ending, there is tragedy and there is death, but as I said throughout it all there is humour. I think it is a truly special thing when a book that is essentially all about dying, death and the tragedy of lost love can still have a current of humour running from cover to cover. More than once I found myself moved to near tears (that is not to say your book could not induce tears in someone else Mr. Green, but I am one of those silly over emotional people that has an easier time crying over tiny things rather than big things, and your book is a very big thing indeed Sir.), but for every one of those moments there were two where I was laughing loudly, smiling, or snorting to keep myself from laughing at something that was probably meant to be serious.
This book resonated with me, I am not a cancer kid, but I have been affected by cancer many times over. We lost my father directly after a cancer operation four days before Christmas in 2002. Before that there was my Grandmother, before that my Uncle Jim, and even before that there was my Mother's sister, for whom I am named, but who I have never met, because she was a cancer kid, she died when she was 9. Since I am being honest, all of that was why I didn't want to read this book initially, because I didn't want to read about a young girl who had to face the awfulness that is cancer. But that is in the end what makes this book so good, Hazel handles the awfulness with a complete and devastating honesty. And I am emotionally devastated having finished this book. Because every page makes you think, and every page makes you thankful for the people and the things in your life that you love and that love you.
So maybe it's the combination of the sheer emotionality of this book, combined with the feeling I always get about the Olympics, but I am sitting here bereft feeling both simultaneously like an insignificant speck upon the Universe, but also a complete and utter triumph because I am here, and I am living, and I am able to sit here and contemplate the way a fictional book has impacted my worldview, and that's not something that everyone can do. Sometimes we need to be reminded of that in order to remember that some of the things we take for granted every day are actually a BFD.
What am I trying to get at then? GO AND READ THIS BOOK. That is what I am trying to get at. It is just so well written, and moving, and powerful. And you need to read it. Now. Or you know not, really in the end it's up to you, but I think you should read it and I think everyone should read it. It should become required reading in high schools.
Now if you'll excuse me, I am going to try and decide what book to read next, and watch some more Luge! Well after I write the summary anyway, because I wrote the review first...
--Ren
Title: The Taker (Book One of The Taker Trilogy)
Author: Alma Katsu
Publisher: Gallery Books
Published: September 6, 2011
Number of Pages: 464
Genre(s): Paranormal Romance, Urban Fantasy, Historical Romance
Date Read: February 1, 2012
Acquired: Wal-Mart
Summary:
Luke is working what starts off as a quiet night shift in the ER of a small town Hospital in rural Maine. That quiet relaxing shift ends when the Deputy shows up with a murderess; an ethereal waif with a mass of blonde curls, slight, beautiful, and covered in blood. Luke is immediately and inexplicable intrigued by this girl, but not because she is a murderer, he can't pinpoint why, and then she starts to tell him her story. The story starts with an admission that, yes, she did kill her companion, but it wasn't murder, he had asked her to do it. He being Jonathan St. Andrew, Luke doesn't believe that it is a coincidence that the man shared his name with the town they are in.
Lanny, that's the name of the beautiful killer, convinces Luke to help her escape the hospital by beguiling him with her sordid tale. With her story she takes him back over 200 years, to her birth and early life with Jonathan as the children of the founding generation of St. Andrew, Maine. How she loved him all of her life, and he never loved her back; the multitude of ways they hurt each other until she was sent to Boston. In Boston Lanny finds herself ensnared by a hedonistic group led by a charming, sado-masochistic, madman who falls in lust with Lanny's beauty and capacity for "perfect love". As they run for the Maine-Quebec border crossing Lanny's story changes to Lanny's story about this man, Adair's story, and from then on the three tales are interwoven. Lanny is trapped with Adair, forced to entrap Jonathan; has she trapped Luke the same way 200 years later after killing Jonathan?
Review:
What drew me to this book first was the striking cover; every time I went into the store it sat there on the shelf calling to me. Finally I caved and picked it up to read the summary on the back. My first thought was "Oh another vampire novel, sounds interesting enough." and with that it was promptly put into the cart and brought home. Where it then sat on the pile for a month or so calling to me as I read other books. I was in the process of trying to read The Thirteen Hallows, but I was having trouble keeping engaged, and I realised the reason was that I REALLY wanted to be reading The Taker, so I gave in and put the Hallows on hold to take it up.
To be honest I wasn't entirely sure how I felt about it as I started reading it, and that uncertainty stayed with me for most of the books. Be warned that this is actually a very dark book, with quite a few morbid parts. It markets itself as a romance, a love story, but I really don't like those labels for this. None of the love in this book is healthy in any way, shape or form. You've got Lanny's obsessive love for a self-centred, arrogant golden boy who takes her for granted and strings her along for her entire life; KNOWS that he is doing it BUT STILL CONTINUES to do because she's his only friend. Then you've got Jonathan, the aforementioned golden boy who claims to love Lanny, but not enough to actually rectify the way he treats her. Adair claims to love Lanny, but I feel like he is completely amoral and incapable of love, he feels covetous of her beauty and her capacity to love, he doesn't love her but he desires her and wants to posses her. She in turn sort of falls for him for a time in what screams to me a clear cut case of Stockholm Syndrome until she rationalises herself out of it. And then there's Luke, who toward the end of the novel fancies himself in love with Lanny, even though he's only known her for a few months and most of the things he knows about her tell her that she's not exactly the delicate damsel in distress she appears to be.She needs him, and he needs her, but again I can't see anything healthy in their relationship and I definitely can't see the type of love that warrants giving this novel the label of romance. The interplay in these relationships is complex and intriguing, definitely keeps you thinking, I just really dislike it when a book tries to present itself as something it is so clearly not.
That all being said it did deliver as promised by the advanced review on the back, even if it couldn't be honest with itself, you can always count on a reviewer to point out the truth, it's a showcase of the dark side of romantic love; that is a statement I can agree with. I don't have any personal experience with the dark side of love, thankfully, but I feel safe in saying that Katsu's relationships in this novel definitely have crossed the boundary into that realm.
I think it's a bit of a breath of fresh air in that regard. Yes it's dark and twisty (like Meredith Grey always claimed to be!) and I frequently found myself highly disturbed by the fact that I was enjoying the book. Because of the content of the book I keep finding myself saying out loud, "I'm not entirely sure if it's all right to find this interesting or not..." and then I'd have to set the book down and walk away from it for awhile and work through what I'd just read in my head. With the exception of Luke none of the main characters deserve sympathy from the reader, Lanny comes close because of the circumstances and context surrounding her behaviour, but for the most part it's really hard to give her sympathy. What Katsu did amazingly well here was to create characters so utterly undeserving of sympathy that you can't actually help but feel sorry for at certain times and then that leaves you shouting "ACK NO S/HE'S AN ARSE I SHOULD NOT BE FEELING SORRY FOR THEM!!" and banging your head against the desk...or maybe that's just me, I have a tendency to get REALLY into whatever I'm reading...
How do you feel when you find yourself feeling sympathy for a character who you know doesn't deserve it?
--Ren
