Review: More Than This

By Patrick Ness
Available now from Candlewick (Llewellyn)
Review copy

A boy is in the ocean, tossed about and eventually bashed upon the rocks.  He then wakes up in his childhood home in England, not America.  From there, he begins to piece together who he is and what's going on.  Every time he dreams, he sees his memories.  Thus, he remembers that his name is Seth and assumes he's in hell.

You see, something terrible happened to Seth's younger brother back when their family lived in England.  Seth has felt guilty his entire life.  He's also struggling with memories of his friends and his secret boyfriend.  Then his ruminations are interrupted when he comes across two other people.

I flip-flopped back and forth between really liking MORE THAN THIS and being meh about it.  I felt that as more was explained, the book became sillier and less appealing.  But then Ness partially saved it by upping the ambiguity about whether the supposed explanation for what was happening was correct.  And honestly, I prefer to believe that it isn't, because it really doesn't make much sense.

However, there were several aspects that worked wonderfully.  The flashbacks are all top-notch, particularly the ones dealing with Seth and Gudmund's relationship.  Regine and Tomascz are good characters, although noticeably less developed than Seth.  (How can they not be, when the entire first part of MORE THAN THIS is his inner monologue?)  They both have their own traumas that they are working through.

MORE THAN THIS is an unusual book, with some sections that are very philosophical and others that are horrific.  It's wonderfully written, as can be expected of Ness.  I don't think it's his best book.  However, while it might be messy, but it is also ambitious, and I always respect ambition.  I think the best parts of MORE THAN THIS outweigh its weaknesses.

Review: Hushed

By Kelley York
Available now from Entangled
Review copy

When I wrote about MADE OF STARS, I mentioned that I'd long been interested in Kelley York's first book, HUSHED.   What then pops up on Netgalley but HUSHED, with a new cover?  I seriously couldn't resist the bonkers summary.  Archer has been killing people to protect his best friend Vivian, because he once failed to protect her when they were younger.

I'll admit that I never quite warmed up to Archer.  There's a real sense of unreality to the premise, but the book was written more realistically than I expected.  Archer definitely has psychological trauma, but I never really fell into the revenge fantasy.  Maybe I'm just maturing.  It didn't help that I had very mixed feelings about the Archer and Vivian friendship.  Vivian eventually becomes outright villainous, but at the beginning she was much less manipulative than I expected.  She's a little shallow, but that's a minor character flaw comparatively.  Archer, meanwhile, is a full blown Nice Guy.  He thinks that if stays by Vivian's side (and kills enough people), then she'll realize he's been the perfect guy for her all along.

However, I liked Evan quite a bit.  Evan is the catalyst in HUSHED.  He's a new student at the local university who first meets Archer when he's alone on campus.  Their budding relationship forces Archer to look more critically at his relationship with Vivian.  It also starts him towards the realization that you can't just kill people.  Evan isn't just an instrument of the plot, however.  He has his own interests and family, and his ethical dilemmas about Archer become increasingly important as the story moves on.

I didn't love HUSHED as much as I expected, partially because it wasn't as campy as I was expecting.  It suffers a little from wanting to have its cake and eat it too, to portray Archer's crimes as real, unjustified crimes and still have him be the hero of the story.  It's pretty entertaining and there is interesting psychological and character work, but it's a little rough.  There are definable, understandable reasons for Archer and Vivian's behavior, but there was something about the story that kept me separate from them instead of buying in.  The sweet romance between Archer and Evan was a nice counterpoint to the murder and associated darkness, and it was easy to see how that would affect Archer so deeply.

In the end, I still thought HUSHED was worth reading.  It was certainly different from the other books I've been reading lately.

Review: The Real Boy

By Anne Ursu
Illustrations by Erin McGuire
Available now from Walden Pond Press (HarperCollins)
Review copy

I think I have a weakness for stories about magician's apprentices.  Not that Oscar is a real apprentice.  He works in the basement of a magic shop, chopping and storing herbs, and other menial work.  He knows herbs and cats, but not people.

Then Oscar is thrust into the task of running the shop by himself, interacting with patrons and offering the right bit of magic to solve their problems.  It's not his strong suit.  Luckily, a fellow apprentice, Callie, agrees to help him understand people and run the store.  Although it is not said in the text, since THE REAL BOY is set in a fantasy land, Oscar is somewhere on the autism spectrum.  I thought this was well done, but I'm not sure whether it would work as well with the intended audience.

I do enjoy the fable-like style of THE REAL BOY.  Oscar and Callie live on the only island in the world with magic, but they soon discover that there are consequences of magic.  They also learn that things aren't always what they appear to be, nor are people.  On the other hand, I had issues with how the plot plays out.  It doesn't make much sense when you think about it, even if it makes sense with the themes of THE REAL BOY.

The pictures by Erin McGuire are terrific.  They leave the characters' ethnicities ambiguous, so that kids can see themselves reflected in the pictures.  They also match the descriptions in the text well.

I thought THE REAL BOY was wonderful, but I'm not sure that its appeal will come across fully to younger readers.  It's not quite as accessible as BREADCRUMBS.

Review: Third Lie's the Charm

Third book of The Liar Society
By Lisa and Laura Roecker
Available now from Sourcebooks Fire
Review copy
Read my review of The Lies That Bind

Lisa and Laura Roecker bring their series The Liar Society to a close with a book that racks up the body count while delivering humor, romance, and mystery.  Be warned: minor spoilers for the first two books follow.

Kate Lowry has destroyed the Brotherhood, and she's feeling good about that, even if it didn't turn out exactly how she planned.  Now she just has to destroy the Sisterhood and her revenge for her best friend Grace's death will be complete.  Then she ignores a call in the pursuit of her goals, and another classmate ends up dead.  Kate has a new case to investigate in addition to her continued plans of sabotage.

I love Kate, who has a very masculine character arc.  She's willing to give up love in order to pursue vengeance.  And, well, if multiple guys are going to pursue her, she is going to worry about it when there aren't dead bodies on the ground and she's going to mock any and all displays of testosterone.  Kate is in way over her head, but she's been that way from the start and refuses to give up now.

I've just had so much fun with this series.  It is completely over-the-top with the almost all powerful secret societies, but that's part of what makes it so fun.  That craziness is anchored by the great heroine and her complicated relationships with friends, boys, and other classmates.

THIRD LIE'S THE CHARM did have some structural issues.  Things fall into place way too simply at the end of the novel because this is the end of the series and things have to wrap up.  There's a detour to a bizarrely short camp that is funny, but in the end could have been more relevant.  The plotting just isn't as neat, which is a shame since that's been a strength of this series.

But the characters and their interactions are as wonderful as ever, which makes the book worth it.  THIRD LIE'S THE CHARM and its two predecessors are excellent choices for young adult mystery fans.

Review: All the Truth That's in Me

By Julie Berry
Available now from Viking Juvenile (Penguin Random House)
Review copy

I love the cover for ALL THE TRUTH THAT'S IN ME.  It's stark, striking, and a beautiful fit for the contents within.  Judith and her best friend disappeared from their village four years ago, and Judith recently returned with half of her tongue cut out.   Her friend's body was found years ago.  Now Judith faces all sorts of suspicion, but can't respond.

I fell into the rhythms of this book almost immediately.  ALL THE TRUTH THAT'S IN ME is told from Judith in the first person, although many of her words are directed towards her crush, Lucas.  Her words are immediate, but have a poetry to them.  It's also an interesting head to be in - Judith's experience has aged her in some ways, but it's also kept her isolated from society since she was twelve.  It's a hard head to be in, because life has not been kind to Judith.  However, things begin to change for her.

ALL THE TRUTH THAT'S IN ME was a tense read.  As things change, I wasn't sure if everything would turn out alright or if it would only get worse for Judith.  Judith has to calculate the risks of what might improve her life and her control of it, and what might make it worse for her.

I found that the setting enhanced the story.  Although no specifics are given, it is presumable colonial America.  Religion has a great deal of power in the story, and there are local elements that aren't friendly with the townspeople, who have limited access to firearms.  Much of the difficulties Judith faces are because it is assumed that she is no longer a virgin.  And the townspeople seem to be simple archetypes at first, but many turn out to be more developed.  I particularly liked what Julie Berry did with the pretty, popular girl who is Judith's romantic rival.

ALL THE TRUTH THAT'S IN ME is an intense historical about a young woman's coming of age in adversity.  It's a book unlike any others I have read this year, powerfully feminist and told in beautiful language.