Book Review - The Bird Sisters

The Bird Sisters by Rebecca Rasmussen
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is such a sad, sweet, melancholy and beautiful story. Two elderly spinsters are known in their town as the bird sisters, as they tend to injured birds with the help of an ancient medical bag and rehab the creatures with love and devotion. Few people come to their farm to visit, now, and they only have each other in the world, but it wasn't always this way.

During the summer when Millie was sixteen and Twiss fourteen, their eighteen year old cousin came to stay at their farm, where their mother reigned distractedly over the household and their father spent much time obsessing over golf. Millie had a sweetheart. The family had friends, and the possibility of a fascinating future - of travel and adventure for Twiss, marriage and children for beautiful Millie,,seemed laid out before them like a banquet. Til some letters on yellow writing paper changed everything, for everyone, for always.

I loved the authors delicate sense of style in writing. She doesn't use words clumsily or have awkward turns of phrase. Her writing is the equivalent of fine lace tablecloths and china tea sets. It's lovely. And yes, the story is sad some stories, like some lives, are. It's still pretty and humble and human, though. And that makes it wonderful.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Ready Player One

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Wow, what a fun and suspenseful ride this book is! I just loved it!

Set in a future ravaged by energy wars and crises, global warming and overpopulation, the only escape from the horrors of life is Oasis, an immersive Virtual Reality world where you can do or be anything you can dream of. Kids now go to school there. People meet and marry there. Sports tournaments take place there. And now, the creator of Oasis has hidden an Easter egg there, and the player who finds it will inherit his vast estate, including ownership of Oasis. The game is on. But Wade is just a broke high school student. How can he compete with teams sponsored by corporate giants willing to spend millions to inherit billions?

I loved this book so much that I'm trying to get my husband to read it, too. The characters are funny and raw and real, the action, both in and out of Oasis, is exciting and the story is full of suspense.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Dust and Decay

Dust and Decay by Jonathan Maberry
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I like these books. Oh I really do. In fact, I realized halfway through this book that I had developed a serious book-character crush on Tom Imura, be still my little heart. He is a hero like nobody's business, and that's a good thing, because despite how dire the dangers seemed in the first book in the series, they've only gotten worse. Gameland is back in business, and with Charlie Pinkeye and Marion Hammer gone, all he'll has broken loose as other forces vie for his territory.

Benny is growing into his own as a warrior, and into his relationship with Nix, while Chong has developed a sweet, puppy dog type crush on Lilah, who has moved in with his family in the town of Mountainside. Morgie has continued to train with his friends, but doesn't share their desire to get out of town and follow the trail of the jet they've seen in the sky eastward. He, like the rest of town, has that "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" attitude that has left them living in a cage, while the others yearn for freedom. After they set out into the Rot and Ruin, however, their world tips on its axis. All the things they thought they knew about the nature of the world is called into question, and their chances for survival begin to grow smaller and smaller.

I didn't like this book quite as much as the first, but I did really enjoy some of the new characters that were introduced, and I hope we get to see more of them in the future. There wasn't a lot of movement plot wise; they didn't get very far in their journey. There was, on the other hand, lots of action. Unfortunately a lot of it was pretty bloody and gross.

As fort he ending? I was pissed. And I mean, extremely pissed. I won't spoil it for you, but I will say it was unnecessary, and if I hadn't already requested the book from the library, I probably would have stopped reading the series. It was even worse than my anger at a similar point in the Deadline series, which I also loved, probably more than these books. I yelled at the book. I shook it a little... But not too much. I was reading it on my iPad and she's named Precious for a reason. I cried.

I'm still mad at the author. He better make it up to me in the next book somehow...

View all my reviews

Book Review - Germ

Germ by Robert Liparulo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It was the cover of this book that grabbed me, as I wandered through the stacks at a newly built library in a nearby town. I'm a sucker for great cover art, and this one grabbed me right away. Simple title, simple art, and intriguing concept: a mad - as in angry, in this particular case - scientist has created a deadly designer drug that can be programmed with DNA to assassinate anyone, anywhere. It can pick you out of a crowd. It can leap from person to person. It can cross continents as quickly as the common cold. And, as the tag line of the book says, if you breathe, it will find you.

I thought this would be more of a mystery, but it's pure action from the get go. It would make a great action/thriller movie, actually. I can see Daniel Craig as the ivory doctor, Allen, and the big redheaded bearded guy from the TV series Revolution as his bearish brother Stephen. Okay, that may have been in my head the whole time. I won't lie. This May or may not have to do with the fact that imagining Daniel Craig racing naked through the woods at one point was... Well, I digress.

Ahem, back on track.

If you're into suspenseful books with lots of guns, scary immortal assassins, creepy as heck bad guys, Nazis, naked doctors running through the woods and best of all, a fantastic, strong female hero who saves the day and maybe the world, this one is for you.

View all my reviews

Book Review - In The Land of the Dead

In The Land Of The Dead by Jonathan Maberry
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Another short novella in the Benny Imura series, this slots in between books one and two, and is available on the Simon and Schuster website.

One of the reasons this only gets three stars is the spelling and grammar errors. I get it that this is a freebie for readers, but they couldn't find an editor - heck, even an intern - to give it a once-over with a red pen? Seriously? This is a big publishing house, surely someone could have spent an hour on this.

This seemed a little disjointed, almost as if it's parts that got sliced from the novel in the editing process. It was okay, but nothing super special.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Love Times Three: Our True Story of a Polygamous Marriage

Love Times Three: Our True Story of a Polygamous Marriage by Joe Darger
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I requested this book from the library because I saw it billed as the true story of the family that was the inspiration for the HBO series "Big Love". I am a huge "Big Love" fan, and a few years ago started reading plenty of books on polygamy and Mormonism because the show got me fascinated with it. How could I resist?

Maybe the charm has worn off a little.

There's nothing wrong with this book, except that it's actually a little boring. The people behind it are just so ordinary; and I do understand that is the whole point of the book. They are trying to say, "Look how regular we are! We could be your neighbours!" and they're right. They are very ordinary. They had pretty ordinary courtships, albeit in plural, and have pretty ordinary marriages, where they fight sometimes and are happy sometimes and have tragedies sometimes and go to PTA meetings and parent teacher conferences and fret over buying Christmas gifts sometimes.

In other words, it's a life just like anyone might have, except there are three wives in the marriage instead of one.


View all my reviews

Book Review - Pure

Pure by Julianna Baggott
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is one of my favourite post-apocalyptic YA reads - and I've read an awful lot of them in the last few years.

Pure takes place in a post-nuclear holocaust future, where everyone who didn't make it into the security of a dome shelter either died, or suffered terrible burns and mutations as a result of the bombs falling.

I really love the world-building in this book, and if you're a fan of that kind of thing, this is worth a read. It's also absolutely fascinating where the author's mind went, in including things like nanotechnology into the scheme of things, to create the kinds of situations... well, I don't want to spoil it for you. You just have to read it.

Fabulous characters, an intriguing setting that just when you think you understand it, veers off completely from what you thought, mysterious sub-plots, a tiny twist of possible romance, and some real jump-out-of-your-skin moments.

View all my reviews

Book Review - 77 Shadow Street

77 Shadow Street by Dean Koontz
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I love Dean Koontz, and it's rare that I give a book of his a three-star rating, but I had so much trouble getting into this book, that I just couldn't push it any higher. I have a rule about books; I give them all a 100 page chance to suck me in. If they can manage that, I keep reading. If not, I feel no guilt for giving up.

By 100 pages I was only slightly invested in this book, and part of that had to do with cats. Koontz writes dog characters so well (his true fans will know what I'm talking about here!) that I was really curious what he would do with a pair of cats. The answer? Not much, really. They barely show up in the book. But when I checked to see if I'd made it past page 100 I was already in at 250+ and at that point decided it'd be silly to stop.

The end of this book is the best part. I just found it so disjointed at the start with introducing so very many characters at once that I had a hard time really involving myself with any of them. What I usually like best about Koontz books are how likeable the characters are and how invested I feel in their personal outcomes. There's a reason the Odd Thomas books make me cry (heck I cry every time I think about Stormy, but... yanno...). I didn't get that here, not until I was much further into the book because there are so many characters. I did wind up feeling close to a few of them by the end, but not the way I normally do in his books.

While this was a solid read, and had some really scary jumpy points in it, and some really tender sweet points in it, I wasn't quite as engaged as I usually am with books by this author, and that made me a little sad. But no less likely to read anything else he publishes, because I'm also that kind of fan.

View all my reviews

Book Review - What Comes Next

What Comes Next by John Katzenbach
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Never underestimate the determination of a former psychology professor, even if he has started to lose his marbles, like Adrian. He's finally gone to the doctor to see what's going on, after having a long conversation one night with s dead wife. It all seemed perfectly ordinary until she vanished, and he remembered she had run her car into a tree some time ago. After learning that he has a rare brain disease that will rob him of his faculties and replace them with hallucinations, he comes home to witness a kidnapping from his own driveway.

But what did he really see? Is the girl out three somewhere, just a runaway as the police believe? Or was she dragged into that white panel van for more nefarious purposes? Adrian is determined to find out, even if he is the only one on the case, though his time is running out, with reality being replaced by conversations with long dead loved ones more and more every day.

This is a great mystery suspense novel, complete with some heartbreak and fascinating characters. Definitely a good read.

View all my reviews

Book Review - The Elevator

The Elevator by Angela Elwell Hunt
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Fabulous, couldn't put it down book full of action. Three women are stuck in an elevator... Sounds boring, doesn't it? Consider that one might be a murderer, or maybe even more than one, that there is a hurricane raging outside and no one to rescue them, that one man has a chance to save them, maybe, if he can survive the storm and get to them in time, and that their lives are, quite literally, hanging in a very precarious balance. Kept me up all night!

View all my reviews

Book Review - Castaways

Castaways by Brian Keene
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a super-fast, super-horrifying read.

I love horror novels, but I kind of hate gore. I think I just like the adrenaline rush of being scared. Usually I have to skim the icky parts (kind of like how I close my eyes in horror movies when it gets too bloody). I was pleasantly surprised when I barely had to skim at all in the first half of this book.

But then, yeah, I skimmed a lot of the last half, which is probably why it was such a fast read!

Castaways is the thinly veiled story of the TV show "Survivor" if all the worst things that could happen to the cast did happen. Tropical storm? Check. Maniac cast member? Check. Crazy half-neaderthal, psychotic, smelly, hairy, underfed cannibalistic violent-killing-machine island natives? Che-what? Yep, sorry, I'm serious - Check.

It's kind of fun to root for the survivors though, and it pays off in the end. Hey, not everybody dies! That's always a plus in a horror novel.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Shadows

Shadows by Robin McKinley
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I was lucky enough to receive an advance reader's copy of this book through my husband's job at the local library system. Sometimes the perks, they rock.

I adored this book.

I'm a big fan of good YA literature, particularly dystopian, and this is a cross between dystopia and fantasy that lures you in with the promise of magic, a new society, and plenty of teenage angst.

Maggie lives in a world without magic. Oh, magic used to be out there and nearly destroyed the world once upon a time, but thanks to some gene-splicing and vigilant army units, the use of magic has been eradicated. Or so the happy society believes. But when her new stepdad moves in, a guy from the old world, where magic users still proliferate, Maggie starts seeing strange things.

Mostly, what she sees are shadows, demonic shapes with too many legs and too many eyes and a way of blocking out even the brightest sunlight. They cluster around her stepfather. They climb the walls of his backyard shed-turned-office. They loom over the dining table on family nights. When Maggie finally comes clean about what she sees, it's just in time for her world to be thrown into chaos. Her long-time best friend, a tall skinny Japanese import with a massive secret and her new crush, a darkly mysterious college student from the same country in the old world as her stepdad vie both for her attentions and to save her, from magic? From herself? From the new world order? Ahhh, you'll have to read it yourself to find out :)

I loved this book and highly recommend it. Couldn't put it down, super entertaining and fun.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Dead Air

Dead Air by Deborah Shlian
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This audiobook kept me company in the hospital until I got to disc 4. If I had downloaded this for pay I would have been furious; but this was checked out online from the library. You see, disc 4 got steadily faster and faster and no adjustments to my playback speed on my iPod could make a difference. Halfway through, I was listening to a chipmunk on speed. Much past that it wasn't understandable at all so I had to skip the rest of that disc. Whether or not that affected my enjoyment of the book and the plot I'm not certain, but I felt it best to disclose that I missed a big chunk of the middle of the book.

This mystery is a bit outdated, though it takes place on a college campus in the era during which I was in college, so I enjoyed it. I didn't realize at first that this was an older book, so I was a bit confused as to why things had to be so complicated for the main character. Couldn't she just look X up on the net? Get on Wikipedia for pete's sake! Why are you so unreachable for your boyfriend, can't he call your cell? Why is the hospital using such an outdated paging system? Hah! Once I figured it out it made much more sense. Sheesh but it was harder to solve mysteries before modern technology existed.

All in all it's a serviceable mystery with a decent plot and some good characters. That said I had the big baddie figured out from his first appearance and kind of thought the main character was a little dim for not making the connections herself. I like mysteries better when I'm surprised and this was a tad predictable. It does, however, serve up some decent entertainment as a middle of the road read. Good to kill some time with when you're bored silly.

View all my reviews

Book Review - The Distant Hours

The Distant Hours by Kate Morton
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was one of those books that, once I finished it, I couldn't read anything else for a while because I was so caught up in the world of the book.

There's a creepy old gothic castle, a trio of delightfully eccentric spinsters, mysteries that date back to WWII, a fascinating bookish heroine who discovers family secrets she never dreamed of, love, deception, selfishness and generosity. And it is beautifully woven into a narrative that moves seamlessly through several different eras and the minds of many wildly different characters. I re read some passages just because I found the writing so delightful. For me, it was a vacation in a book, and a fantastic escape.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Hunger

Hunger by Michael Grant
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The Gone series began with the vanishing of all adults - everyone aged 15 or over - leaving behind only children, babies to be cared for, and a handful of pre-teens with sudden, unexpected responsibilities they aren't exactly ready for. When a fight broke out between the two factions in town - those from the private school on the hill, as it were, and the townies from public school - it nearly became a war. After the dust settled, the kids realized that while living on chips and candy had been fun, they'd let the fresh food rot on the shelves, and were now down to making meals out of a jar of gravy or relish.

They were hungry. And angry. And looking for someone to blame. Those who they had trusted responsibility to seemed to have disappointed them. And it was time for a rebellion.

Meanwhile, Caine had not recovered, as the ipso facto leader of the Coates Academy (private school) kids from his humiliating defeat. His time under the mine with "The Darkness" - possibly the cause of the curses these kids have had to bear - has infected him with a madness that seems unrelenting. His second, Drake, with his mutation of his whip hand, also granted by The Darkness - has only grown more evil and power hungry while Caine has been partially disabled by the invader in his mind. They hatch a plot which at first seems to be to torture the Townies (in reality, it is in service to their master, The Darkness) which Sam and Astrid will have to work hard to overcome.

This follow-up stays true to the original book; I wasn't bored at all. It's entertaining and a quick read, and again is well-written and makes you forget it's a YA book.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Salem Falls

Salem Falls by Jodi Picoult
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Some people have all the bad luck.

Jack seems to be one of them. Though he was born to wealth and priveledge, he was falsely accused of rape by one of his students when working as a high school teacher and soccer coach. On the advice of his lawyer, he took a plea bargain in the case, serving only eight months compared to the many years he would serve if convicted. But what he lost was formidable; his career, his best friend (the cop who arrested him), his mother (a woman's advocate who would not abide someone who would hurt women in her family), his home, and even his pride, thanks to the tougher guys in prison with him. When he gets out of prison, he picks a small town at random to start over, and things begin to look up; he finds a job, and is taken by his beautiful boss, and even makes a friend in her father.

But once word gets around town about his past, a vindictive teenager decides to do the unthinkable, and once again, Jack finds himself falsely accused.

I like Picoult as an author, and there isn't one of her books that I haven't really liked. This was no exception. While I didn't find it as absolutely riveting as some of her others, I was still drawn in and enveloped in the world she created. Like most of her books, this is very character driven, and her precisely drawn people of all sorts that populate the town will affect you; some will anger you, some make you sad, some make you reflect. The wonderful thing is, though, how very poignantly they make you feel for them, and that's the real beauty of this piece.

That, and the fun of the courtroom drama. If Picoult ever decides to go law and order, Grisham better look out!

View all my reviews

Book Review - The Fox Inheritance

The Fox Inheritance by Mary E. Pearson
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was... Well, it was a book. Yeah.

It started off interesting enough. The concept, in fact, was one I found fascinating; after a serious accident, the brains of three young people were downloaded to preserve them and somehow keep them alive. One had an artificial body created for her. Two sat on a shelf for more than 200 years before someone did the same for them. The trouble is, they were awake and aware and trapped the whole time. Imagine what that might do to a mind, and how they might adjust whee given a body again?

That said, the storytelling is slow in places, trips over itself (a bot who it just said can't breathe taking a deep breath for instance) and loses all momentum about three quarters through. The characters lose focus, are not so bright for minds that are supposed to be brilliant... I just had so many problems. Everything fell apart in the second half, but three stars for a unique concept and interesting beginning.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Tricks

Tricks by Ellen Hopkins
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Brilliantly written with remarkable prose and a-little-too-good poetry (to believe it was written by the teens in the book, anyway!), Tricks is a dark book about the descent into prostitution as told by a varied group of young men and women who wind up on the streets of Las Vegas, with little to trade for their livlihoods other than their bodies.

Tricks exposes the dirty little secret that it isn't just bad kids from bad families who wind up on the streets. Sometimes it's good kids from good families, sometimes it's borderline kids who have a tragedy. Sometimes their parents push them out there, even if they don't want to be. Every kid's story is different, and heartbreaking, and very real.

I cried a couple of times during this book, and teared up at least a dozen times more. I got angry, and felt my heart break, and felt elation in some cases. You can't help but feel for these very poignant characters; they are so true to life, and so young that it just grabs you right around the heart.

This is a great read, but isn't for the faint of heart.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Heart and Soul

Heart and Soul by Maeve Binchy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

While this book was a slow starter, it had a nice payoff in the end.

Heart and Soul centers around a Irish clinic that treats patients with heart disease, helping them to learn to live with their condition, rather than dying from it - dietician Lavender holds cooking workshops, trainer Jimmy puts them through their paces in the gym, Dr. Decklan monitoring their health, nurses Fiona and Hillary minding the patients, clerical Anya working her behind off in every way, and administrator Clara overseeing them all.

The chapters are divided into the stories of different characters, so that you are changing perspectives off and on. The book starts with Clara, and while I can't remember the exact order, I do know that I was pretty bored until Anya's story was picked up in Chapter 4. I was considering giving up on the book, to be honest, but once I got into the tale of this lovely Polish immigrant and her troubled background, I was hooked!

The story is very character driven, and there seems to be someone to relate to for everyone who might read this book. There are some hints that several characters are reappearing after being highlighted in other books Binchy has written, but I haven't read enough of her recent work to have known who they were or what the connections might have been. It didn't detract too much from the story, but did pique my curiosity. If there had been more information about the other books, I probably would have picked them up to see the background, but I can't seem to find much info on that. If you have any - let me know!

By the end, I was very wrapped up in this story and stayed up late to finish it. Though parts of the book dragged, overall I really enjoyed it.

View all my reviews

Book Review - The Walking Dead: The Road to Woodbury

The Walking Dead: The Road to Woodbury by Robert Kirkman
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

After recently finishing the first book in this prequel series of The Walking Dead, I was really excited to move onto the next; more learning about the history and motivation of characters, more in-depth analysis of the community at Woodbury and how exactly the people there became complacent to the horrors The Governor perpetrated.

Imagine my disappointment when this book turned out to be extra gory and extra violent with no real payoff in the character development department, leaving me with more questions than answers.

This book was okay. I liked some of the new characters that were introduced, but in the end I felt like it went in circles a little bit too much. Instead of introducing new conflicts with the new characters, there was much repetition and lots and lots of gory, zombie slaughtering scenes. I'm not sure if I'll go on to check out others in this series as now I just feel like I wasted a good lot of the time spent reading this.

Why then, does it get three stars instead of a lower rating? I still appreciate an intelligently written horror story. I liked the few surprises that I got, and really enjoyed the first 100 pages or so. At that point I was ready to go 4 star or higher. But the rest of the book left me so unsatisfied that I had to drop the overall rating to a 3.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Dark Life

Dark Life by Kat Falls
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Well, this was another one of those stay-up-til-2 to finish books, where I'm so wired after the ending that I figure I might as well stay up a little longer to pen a review!

In the aftermath of global warming, the earth is almost - but not quite - the vision of WaterWorld we've all worried about since we saw the Kevin Kostner movie. No? That was just me that had those nightmares? Okay, well then. At any rate, almost the full surface of the world is water, with some land peppered here and there (Colorado Islands anyone?) overstuffed with millions of people living in one-room apartments in tiny towers. Except for the pioneers. Homesteaders get 100 acres if they work it for five years. The only catch is, the land is underwater - at the very bottom of the sea.

There is some very fun world building going on in this book, which probably is terribly inaccurate all over the place when it comes to science, but since I know nothing about scuba diving, let alone what it would take to engineer an undersea house (or casino, as the case may be), I just went with it and enjoyed the ride. And a very interesting ride it was, too, full of novel ideas and gorgeously described landscapes that tickled my imagination.

I loved that this book had a male narrator. So many main characters in YA fiction - even the post-apocalyptic sort that I favor - tend to be females. And I know it's because that is who tends to read the stuff, like it or not, but Ty was charming and had a very real and exciting story to tell. I hope there are more in store in this underwater colony, as I'm eager to re-visit the depths, and the fascinating characters there.

The only point I found vaguely unsettling was the way Ty called his parents "Ma and Pa..." sure, they're pioneers, and it hearkens back to Little House on the Prairie and all that, but this is the future, right? I don't think kids are time traveling backwards in terms of their verbiage. It struck me as a little weird; one "off" note in an otherwise lovely piece.

View all my reviews

Book Review - The Walking Dead: Rise of the Governor

The Walking Dead: Rise of the Governor by Robert Kirkman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

While I've never read the graphic novel series, I've been hooked on the Walking Dead TV series since the premiere, and when I learned that a couple of prequel novels had been published, detailing the story of the Governor and his people, I couldn't wait to plunge right in!

Brian and Philip are brothers. While Brian is the elder of the two, Philip is the natural leader; larger both in physical size and in leadership presence, he even refers to his brother with the diminutive nickname of "Sport". When the apocolypse hits, widower Philip heads home to check on his parents, along with his 7 year old daughter Penny. Instead of Mom and Dad, he finds his big brother cowering in fear, and snatches him up to join his team, supplemented by two of Philip's high school friends, Bobby and Nick.

Together, this rag-tag team of men - along with the tempering influence of a small girl - have to outrun, outgun and outlive zombies and violent survivors, while Philip tries to find a place where he can create a life for his daughter so that she can grow up with some sense of peace.

I was really fascinated by the character development in this novel. I had long wondered what had driven The Governor to become the man he was in the series, and this was a very reasonable and sympathetic story. Yes, I really did grow to have sympathy for the man! His backstory is horrifying and I began to see how exposure to tragedy after tragedy and heartbreak after heartbreak could scar him in the directions that it did. There's no question that he becomes a very warped man in the end, but along the way there were many times it could have gone another way, should circumstances have been a little bit different.

The atmosphere in this book was very true to the Walking Dead series that I'm such a fan of, including the dark language and violence. It isn't for the faint of heart. In fact, there were moments where the ick of it all turned my stomach and other moments where my heart raced and my eyes filled with tears. It is a very graphic tragedy, and it's all laid bare on the page, sometimes quite starkly.

If you're a fan of the Walking Dead series you'll probably love this book. It's also a very good stand-alone book for zombie lit fans, and there is absolutely no reason why you have to know anything about the series to enjoy these books. For fans, there will be a lot of ah-hah moments where lightbulbs go off, so perhaps they'll like it on a different level, but it's fully realized on it's own as well.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Cemetery Girl

Cemetery Girl by David J. Bell
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was one of those books where I have to yell at it while reading because I know the character that I like is going to make a big huge mistake.

They never listen to me *dramatic sigh*

Caitlin went missing when she was just 12 years old. Her dad sent her to walk their rambunctious dog in the park across the street, and the dog came home alone, trailing his leash and unable to explain what he witnessed on that fateful day. It's been four years, and Tom and Abby's marriage has fallen apart as they grew to live in the distance of a family missing a member in different ways. Abby found religion, and a devious preacher that fills her mind with ideas to write off her daughter as dead and move in with him instead. Tom never stopped fighting to find Caitlin and pushed the police to follow every lead. Because of his work, suddenly their daughter is returned, but she is not the girl that left the house happily walking a dog four years ago, and it throws everyone into a spiral of despair and trauma.

I really related to Tom, and not so much to Abby (mainly because she seemed to be to be kind of deluded and sheep-like). I didn't like some of Tom's decisions, and had to yell at him a lot. The same with Caitlin, who I didn't really understand sometimes, but could certainly sympathize with.

The mystery in this book isn't so much about where Caitlin went, but about what happened while she was gone, and how far her father would go to find out the "truth" of her missing years. He becomes obsessed with knowing, even when it's made clear to him that moving on will probably be easier if he doesn't know all the details. He does some icky, risky stuff and hurts people he loves and ultimately probably causes more damage than he intended. I know he had good intentions, but this just illustrates how when an obsession takes someone over, harmless as it may seem, it can ruin their life.

A good book, decent plotting and relatable characters.



View all my reviews

Book Review - Backseat Saints

Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I have gone back and forth multiple times over my star rating for this novel. And here is where I tell you why:

First, Backseat Saints is the story of what it means to live in a marriage "made of swords." It is about the cycle of domestic violence and how it is passed down through generations. And, fundamentally, it is about a woman who is afraid that it has come down to killing her husband before he manages to beat her to death.

The main character in Backseat Saints bothered me a little. She was somewhat unsympathetic, which means that the author wrote her extremely accurately, because she was described as the kind of woman that other women had little time for or interest in. As the prettiest girl in her high school, she hadn't gotten along with the cheerleaders, or the loser-drinker girls either. She had a hard time throughout her life maintaining female friendships, until an elderly neighbor took her under her wing and treated her like her long-lost daughter or granddaughter.

Because I had a hard time liking her - even if it was obvious why she came by the personality she did, growing up in the house she did - I had a hard time liking her very much, although I did really like the way she loved her sweet, 3 legged dog. Fat Gretel - the dog - was probably my favourite character in the entire book. The problem was, there were other characters I just didn't like much either - I hated her husband, her father was pretty vile, and her mother was difficult to relate to and not terribly likeable either. The story, on the other hand, was compelling and kept me reading. But I didn't feel like I left this book wanting more - I was kind of glad it was all over, to be honest. And I didn't leave feeling like I'd left characters behind that I'd love to visit again, hence the lower rating.

This is one of those books that you feel like you should read, and should plow all the way through, because it is an important kind of story, but it wasn't, for me at least, one read with much passion or interest.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Subgirl

Subgirl by Samantha Adkins
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I'll add a small disclaimer here that the author is my friend, however I have reviewed her books and those of other friends before and give unfailingly honest ratings. If a book deserves a two star review it gets it, and if it deserves a five it gets it.

I loved Subgirl.

Jordana Simkins is a bit of a prodigy. She finished university early and at just 12 years old is ready to become a substitute teacher. A cranky school board member and her own fears are the only things standing in her way... well, that and a room full of kindergarteners!

The characters in this book are a lot of fun. I adored Jordana's parents, as well as her best friend Emily. They are quirky and real and are people I'd like to know in real life. Adding to the fun are the authors choices of names for various characters, like Ms. Hairpin - it's a comical little bit of silliness that is sprinkled throughout and really makes the book charming.

The author's teaching experience is also apparent, because life in a kindergarten classroom couldn't be more accurate, including the various archetypes of five-year-old that plague teachers and parents alike - the know-it-all, the shy kid, the kid who is just a little bit lost. We've all run into them from time to time and here they are accurately portrayed, and it's fascinating to see how the 12 year old protagonist deals with all the challenges.

This is a great book for the YA field, and I can see now why it has a band of rabid young fans who are chomping at the bit for installment number two. The prose is lyrical enough that this would also be a great read-aloud book for families, and has enough interest for adults to be a great selection in a mother-daughter book club.

P.S. Sam, if you're reading this, don't think I missed the nod to Julia and Levi in the names of the students - loved it! <3

View all my reviews

Book Review - 1st to Die

1st to Die by James Patterson
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

1st to Die is the lead title in a series dubbed "The Women's Murder Club" about - surprise surprise - a group of women who get together to solve crimes. When I first heard about the premise, I pictured a bunch of blue haired old biddies into everyone's business - sort of like Murder She Wrote x 4, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover that these were younger women - a cop, a coroner, a journalist and a DA - who are smart and funny, and who seem to share my taste in music (at least the cop does!).

There is a serial murderer on the loose who takes his victims during what should be the happiest times in their lives - their wedding nights. His crimes are brutal and savage and have the whole city stumped, until one intrepid police inspector pulls together her girlfriends to solve crimes over hot wings. In the meantime, she gains a hot and charming new partner, and an illness that threatens to destroy her career and take her life.

I found the characters compelling, but I had most of the plot twists figured out from very close to the start, which is why I only rated this one three stars. This happens to me a lot; I read so many mysteries I get a feel for it early on, but I always still hope for surprises. Despite that, I enjoyed getting to know the characters and following their chase of their suspect. I think I'll be checking out the next one of these soon.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Pathfinder

Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Oh, I really really LOVED this book.

This shouldn't be a surprise. Ender's Game, also by Orson Scott Card, is one of my top novels I've ever read (I tend to recommend it to everyone, including random strangers I meet who seem like they might possibly be readers. You never know.) It did surprise me, though, probably because of the fantasy element.

So here, let me come clean: Generally speaking I really *really* don't like fantasy novels. My husband, on the other hand, loves them. He often reads a really good one and then tries to get me into it, and I just fail at reading fantasy. I get bored. I don't like it. Unless it's the Lord of the Rings trilogy or something very similar, I couldn't be less interested.

So, when I learned that this was a sci fi and fantasy hybrid, I was nervous. I really like sci fi, particularly dystopian fiction, and that appealed to me, but swords and dragons and that sort of fantasy? Uh oh. I was worried.

I shouldn't have been.

I fell in love with Rigg from the very first chapter, and couldn't have put it down if I'd tried. I also adored Loaf and Leaky, two lesser-seen characters that I couldn't stop telling my husband stories about. In fact, I went on and on so much about the book that now he's reading it too, partly just so my references start to make sense.

Much of this book is about time travel and paradoxes, which I found particularly interesting since Card comes at the subject matter from a very different perspective than most writers who take on the subject. Instead of shying away from anything that could cause a paradox, he embraces it and strides right through the ideas that are typically dismissed as impossible, making it all seem perfectly reasonable and making you wonder what drugs the other writers were on because clearly only Card has it right.

This is a fun novel, a can't-put-it-down novel and a terrific book to devour when you are stressed and need to escape for a little while. I can't wait for the second book in this series - it is on my shelf as we speak and will be broken into very shortly!

View all my reviews

Book Review - Breakaway

Breakaway by Michael Betcherman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I was skeptical about this book, and it really was a fun and pleasant surprise!

Nick's dad, a former pro-hockey player, is in jail for murder, and Nick is playing detective - trying to find the bald man that framed his dad while keeping up with high school and his own hockey team, not to mention a girlfriend and a group of supportive guy friends who are up for helping him as much as they can. Of course, he has obstacles of his own to overcome, including a new player on his hockey team who is more about keeping his own stats up than helping his team win games, and a new college-age suitor who has an eye on the girl he adores. Meanwhile, Nick is being put up by his dad's former manager and his wife, who seem a little too good to be true, and perhaps are.

This book is geared toward adolescent boys, and as much as I love YA fiction, I wasn't sure this would be one for me, particularly because I don't know much about hockey and it is such a strong element in the book. However, I absolutely loved it! The characters are well-written, the suspense is intriguing from the start, and the mystery of the murderer kept me interested throughout.

This would be a great book for boys who tend to be reluctant readers, as the characters are relatable and real, and the writing manages to balance between easy to read and fascinating.

*This book was received at no cost through the GoodReads First Reads program.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Helpless

Helpless by Barbara Gowdy
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

After having finished this book last night before bed, I'm still not sure how I feel about it.

Helpless is a novel about child abduction. It tells the tale from the inside, from the helpless to solve the mystery mother's point of view, from the helpless because she's locked in a basement child's and from the helpless to control himself/helpless in the face of loving a man abductors.

I think the book was trying to throw a wedge of sympathy into my heart for the abductors, but every time I started to feel a twinge of that emotion, the rage and horror at what he'd done rode up in a big monster truck and demolished that little wedge in no time flat. Then it lingered around to make me mad at the author for trying to manipulate my emotions and mad at myself for reading this book.

So, while at times the writing was quite brilliant, I had so many issues with the subject matter that it was overshadowed in my mind by the ick-worthiness of the story.



View all my reviews

Book Review - Entwined

Entwined by Heather Dixon
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

If books were a colour, this book would be pink. Not baby pink, and certainly not neon, but that perfect rosy shade that totally flatters your complextion when you wear it and actually looks sophisticated.

I'll admit to something here - I chose this book based on the cover. Sometimes a cover totally, completely enraptures me and this one did so brilliantly. I didn't care what it was about and didn't read the blurb, I just wanted to be the princess on the cover. Yes, I'm actually a grown-up woman, I swear! But really - princess!

Okay, down to business. This book is a retelling of the classic fairy tale of the twelve dancing princesses. If you know that fairy tale, you sort of know the meat of this story, but I found this re-telling to be brilliant.

Azalea is the eldest of 11 girls, in a cash poor royal family somewhere between mideval battles and railroads (I'm guessing it's around the Edwardian period in history, based on clues like pistols and newspapers and the like.) Her pregnant mother dies giving birth on Christmas, and her father, the king, declares a year of mourning - black clothing, no going outdoors except on royal business, no playing, no music, and certainly no dancing.

Azalea's mother loved dancing, and so do all the girls. In fact, she taught them dancing regularly, and dancing seems to be one way they can remember her, now that their father has locked away everything their mother ever touched, away from the sight of the girls. They try sneaking to the ballroom in the dead of night, but after being caught, they are locked out. If only they could find a secret place to dance and remember their mum... and then Azalea is told of secret passages that pepper the magical castle, and her curiosity is piqued.

This is a fun story. It has plenty of suspense and some interesting romances, with everything very G rated (this would be a great read-aloud book for young families). It manages to have a very classic fairy tale feel without going overly Disney on the story - there are real threats, and even some blood. Still, the violence isn't gory, and it doesn't take over the story.

Highly recommended for the princesses (and princes!) at heart.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Lighthouse Nights

Lighthouse Nights by Jake Vander Ark
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book was really a bright spot.

I'd gotten to the point where I was reading many books that were slow-moving and just not all that compelling, and then I picked up this slim little volume and all that changed.

Jules and her boyfriend Trevor help people die. Only people that really want to die; they troll a suicide chat room looking for the lost and downtrodden, make a "pact" to die with them, then rob the corpses blind once the other party has departed. It's a good living, and after all, they have their own American dream to pursue. All of it seems pretty easy to deal with, until Jules comes across one guy who doesn't want a suicide pact; instead he wants to convince her to live.

The lack of capitalization in this book is an interesting choice. I suspect that the author was inspired by ee cummings, since the poet is mentioned in the work. If you're a reader of authors like Cormac McCarthy, or spend a lot of time on the internet (hah!) you won't notice after a while. It gives the novel a very casual feel, just like the chatrooms the characters spend so much time in.

I found this book to be a fascinating little slice of work and look forward to reading more by the same author. It's very intersting; he went to college down the street from where I went - him at the Art Institute of Chicago, on whose steps I often ate my lunch while attending Columbia College. And his writing, which is brash and unashamed, sometimes vulgar and sometimes in-your-face and full of the truth of life is unlike much that I've read since my student days in the creative writing program there. There must be something about that city, those schools, that inspires such work :) It reminded me very much of student readings, but only of the very best of those. You know, the guy in your class that you're always jealous of, because you know he has "it" and his work shows it. That's Jake Vander Ark, and his work shows it, too.

*This book was received at no cost through the GoodReads First Reads program.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Horns

Horns by Joe Hill
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Before I read this book (though after I read Heart Shaped Box, Joe Hill's debut novel) I learned that the author is Stephen King's son. Cool! I love Stephen King! I thought it was pretty awesome of him that he was using a nom de plume instead of cashing in on his dad's fame, but from what others told me, they were disappointed in his writing, because he doesn't write like his dad.

It's true. This does not read like a Stephen King novel. If you expect his kid to write knock-offs of his dad's work you're going to be disappointed. If you're a Stephen King fan, you may actually not be interested in his style, characters or plotlines.

That said, if you're a fan of books by Chuck Palahniuk, you'll probably LOVE Joe Hill's style, characters and plotlines. Seriously. He's not derivative, but he's very similar stylistically and in a good way. Being as I'm a big fan of both those authors, it probably doesn't come as a surprise that I really liked this book.

What would happen if you woke up after a drinking binge one day to discover horns growing out of your forehead? Even worse, what if people were so affected by those horns that they'd tell you their deepest desires, looking for approval for their sins, and somehow couldn't remember either talking to you or the fact that you were suddenly be-horned?

This is a fun, trippy, scary, gory, intriguing, and entertaining book. It has some spectacular gore... which I mostly skimmed, I have a weak stomach (what, in a Palahniuk fan? I know, I know!!). It has some fascinating characters that reveal some truths about human nature and the human condition as a whole. There are some wonderful moments about secrets in families, and some hilarious rolled-my-eyes bits of dialogue. While some of the characters and scenarios were a bit cliched, there's a root to them that makes them cliche, the way they pop up over and over in literature and in life.

Overall, an interesting book. Definitely kept me intrigued to the last page.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Mercy

Mercy by Jodi Picoult
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Allie has a pretty good life. She has a husband - the town sherriff and clan head of the Scottish clan that inhabits her small town - that she adores to the point of worship. She lives in a town so pretty that tourists mistake the houses for a recreation/tourist attraction, and where she has her dream job - owning her own florist shop. She has a lovely mother-in-law who she is great friends with. Everything seems peachy until a distant cousin on her husband's side drives into town one day with a corpse in his truck, and admits in front of most everyone that he's just killed his wife.

On the same day Jamie - the distant cousin - arrives, so does Mia, a drifter and traveller who becomes Mia's assistant as she and her husband seek to sort out the tale of the wife, dead from a mercy killing because she was dying of an incurable cancer. The four lives intertwine in ways that will make you clench your teeth, and maybe your fists, and shake your head.

I discovered Jodi Picoult a few years ago thanks to my local book club and have been slowly making my way through some of her older titles. This book was pretty good - but not as much of a stunner as her later books are. The plot stumbles here and there and has moments of either too much or too little exposition. There's also some terminology used in some places that I found mildly offensive and I had to wonder if she would use the same terms today, twenty years later.

Overall though, this is a solid book. Picoult's strong suit is always her characters, and I can't find fault with those here. They are detailed and drawn precisely to the point where you'd swear they were someone you actually knew. You fall for them, particularly Allie if you're like me, and you become invested in their lives, which keeps you reading through the murky bits.

Definitely a good book, and quite a throwback for me since it's set in the early 90's. A friend pointed out to me how funny-odd Seinfeld is now, because with cell phones so much of the storyline would be pointless - there are several points like that in this book, as well.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Lies

Lies by Michael Grant
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

After really loving the first couple of books in the series, I found myself almost indifferent to this one. Yes, everyone is still stuck in the FAYZ - Fallout Alley Youth Zone - under the invisible dome with the nuclear reactor at the center, where everyone over the age of 14 vanished one day, leaving kids to fend for themselves. Yes, they're still starving. Yes, they're still infighting. No, no one has made any progress on either diplomacy or finding an exit or anything else for that matter.

I just felt like there was no story progression, and I was sincerely depressed by the "stuck" quality of the main characters. While one of the major threats was removed in the last book, it appears to be back again here, which really means no progress was made. I felt, in some ways, like the plot took a step backward here instead of progressing, and I found myself less inspired to go on with the series. (As such, I'm taking a break rather than plowing through them all as I usually might do).

My overall reaction? Meh.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Gone

Gone by Michael Grant
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When you were a kid, did you ever fantasize about what the world would be like if all the adults suddenly vanished? I know I did! Unfortunately for the kids of Gone, the adults - everyone over the age of 14 - do vanish, in one moment, and leave them behind to deal with survival, both for themselves and the infants and toddlers that are suddenly in their charge. The struggle inevitably leads to a fight for power and control between two factions, one led by a bully from the private school in town, one led by an unassuming natural leader from the public school.

Along the way, things get strange when kids develop powers, possibly due to the nuclear reactor in town, or maybe a meteorite that hit the area several years ago, or maybe a strange power that lives in a gold mine and calls itself "The Darkness", or maybe the green scary thing with teeth. I think it's a combination of all of the above, but the answers aren't found in this, the first novel in a series.

I found this to be a fun, quick read. I love the character of Astrid, or "Astrid the Genius" as she's known among the kids in this community, because she's smart and charming, which makes her a hero in her own way (along with the tender way in which she looks after her four year old autistic brother). I like that the book is smart and engaging in the way that makes you forget you're reading a YA book.

Were there a couple of moments that made my brows arch and my suspension of disbelief stretch a little thin? Yeah. But that happens to me often; I'm a bit of a realist. However it wasn't to the extreme and wasn't to the point where I didn't really enjoy the book.

When you get to the last eighty pages or so, be prepared to plow through to the end; you won't be able to put it down!

View all my reviews

Book Review - Caught

Caught by Harlan Coben
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I didn't discover Harlan Coben until late last year, and as I ease through his books (I have quite a selection waiting for me now on my eReader) I find myself wishing I'd found him years ago.

This is a solid mystery/suspense novel. It's captivating, kept my attention, and had a wonderful twist at the end that I wasn't expecting. Yay, a surprise! Too often I figure out all the twists way before the end, so I always try to point out the spectacular reads where I don't.

There is a cloud hanging over the head of a group of men who were freshmen suitemates at Princeton decades earlier. A college scandal, swept under the rug, seems to have spawned new scandals that are decimating lives left and right. One intrepid reported, instrumental in one of those scandals herself, is determined to get to the bottom of the crisis, as well as figure out why a young girl from her son's graduating class at the high school has disappeared. Is it connected? Is one of the men responsible for her disappearance? Or perhaps it's the mastermind behind all the scheming?

This was fun. It isn't literary or profound, it's just entertaining and fun and a fast-paced read. I really liked it.

View all my reviews