Review: The Jane Austen Escape Room Book

Illustrated by Marjolein Bastin

Available now from Andrews McMeel Publishing

Review copy

Marjolein Bastin, known for her art featuring nature, has previously illustrated all of Jane Austen's novels. Now, her art is used to create a puzzle book featuring characters from Pride and Prejudice. (The original edition is under copyright by a German company; I could find no credit for the author of the text.) I've experienced many Pride and Prejudice spin-offs, and as someone who loves puzzles, this one intrigued me.

The title refers to an escape room, and many of the puzzles are similar to an escape room's in nature, such as holding paper up to a light to see a hidden message. However, no one needs to escape a room in the story. Instead, Elizabeth Bennett must escape a ploy to ruin her reputation. Can she discover who tried to ruin her and why, and convince Mr. Darcy to still consider marriage?

The text doesn't try very hard to sound like Austen, except for some dialogue. It also doesn't use paragraph breaks between speakers, which I hated as a stylistic choice. But the text is fine for setting up the puzzles, and sometimes contains clues.

The puzzles vary in difficultly. There's one that requires solving a simple subtraction problem at the easy end. On the difficult end I would put one of the more complicated math problems or the more involved cipher on the newspaper. There's at least one puzzle that isn't difficult but is tedious, involving choosing the right set of three recipes from a group of eight. Printing them in various handwriting-style fonts, with the recipes arranged at all angles looks beautiful, but is a pain to read.

If someone does have too much trouble, the answers are always given at the beginning of the next puzzle. There is also a solutions section in the back, as well as a newspaper page with more hints.

My largest issue with this book is the layout. Some puzzles have additional material in the back. These are all perforated pages that can be pulled out of the book, although only one of them actually needs to be pulled out to be solved, so I'm not sure of the purpose of doing them this way. You have to figure out on your own to flip to the back ... which also requires flipping past the solutions while trying not to look. Worse though is that the extra hints are included between the ending and the solutions. I had no idea they were there until I was done with the book. The introduction mentions referring to an appendix, but I thought that meant the same section as the extra material. Due to placement, I don't think they'd be very helpful to many puzzlers.

The art in The Jane Austen Escape Room is beautiful, and I enjoyed looking at it. But I didn't love the puzzles. Sometimes I would've preferred more instructions, because I was often left thinking, "Surely, I'm meant to do more than just look at this clearly labeled map?" (No, that was all I needed to do.) My favorite puzzle was actually the final seating chart one. There are only 18 puzzles, so I could get far more puzzles for my money in a puzzle book without the Jane Austen framing. The framing was cute, but executed fairly indifferently. I feel like this book won't quite satisfy Austen or puzzle fans, beautiful though it is.

Review: U Up?

By Catie Disabato

Available now from Melville House

Review copy

I am a firm believer that protagonists do not have to be likeable. For me to be interested in their story, there must be something intriguing about them, but they don't have to be likeable. U Up? has a protagonist that tests my patience. Eve is relentlessly self-centered, judgmental as hell, and the sort of lesbian who throws around a slur every two seconds like her personal reclamation is activism. (It's a trait that made me wince multiple times a page, on average.) Reading her stream-of-conscious narration was often hellish.

This narration is only broken up by text messages. The poor decision was made, either by publisher Melville House or author Catie Disabato, to print a full-screen of text messages every time instead of just the new texts, often wasting entire pages with repeated texts. In other words, it isn't much of a relief.

In U Up?, Eve is on a rampage because it is the anniversary of her best friend Miggy's suicide and her other best friend Ezra is ghosting her after telling her that he broke up with his girlfriend the night before. Everyone they know tells her to cool it and let him lick his wounds in private, but she's determined that something must have happened to him since he's not answering her calls, and their friendship is extra special.

Oh, and Eve can talk to ghosts. The cover copy mentions that she texts her dead friend Miggy, but I thought that meant she sent texts to the void, saying things to a friend who could no longer speak back. No, she holds conversations with her dead friend Miggy, who also thinks she should cool her jets. Ezra's ex Nozlee can speak to ghosts too, and she and Eve were actually buddies back in New York before they met all their LA friends, because they met in witch school. 

Since U Up? is more literary fiction than speculative fiction, this aspect of the novel tends to recede into the background even though it is the most fascinating thing happening. It's an underbaked element that I kept wishing would be explored more, until it becomes integral to the climax.

I enjoyed the end of the novel more than beginning, partially due to the nature of story about the protagonist going on a journey means that Eve is more bearable by the end. But also because the end has a bunch of weird ghost stuff and that's the best part. 

I found Eve to be a very believable character, but she grated on me too much for me to vibe with her story. I might've enjoyed the full on crazy ghost version of this story, but the one I got dragged for far too long.

Review: The Wakanda Files: A Technological Exploration of the Avengers and Beyond

By Troy Benjamin
Available now from Epic Ink
Review copy

I love the Marvel Cinematic Universe, so I eagerly dived into The Wakanda Files: A Technological Exploration of the Avengers and Beyond. The conceit of The Wakanda Files is that Shuri has ordered the publication of Wakanda's intelligence files regarding the Avengers technology. Through this conceit, various aspects of all the MCU movies so far are explored.

Illustration of Maya Hansen's badge

There's also a fun gimmick. The Wakanda Files also includes a Kimoyo bead–shaped UV light. Some pages have Shuri's commentary written on them, which can be revealed by the UV light. It is a pretty small beam that needs to be held close to the page, but the words can be read even in full light. I also like that effort was put into ensuring the small Kimoyo bead light wouldn't be lost. It magnetically attaches between two other Kimoyo beads, and a clear plastic slip case ensures that everything is kept together.

Troy Benjamin's writing is pretty workmanlike, given the point of view of the text, but it does pay attention to detail. It is also accompanied by cool illustrations and renders made by a variety of artists and studios, including a pull-out on the Iron Man suit.

Blurred screenshots of the Hulk

However, The Wakanda Files does have one big failing. When it includes photos from the movies, it applies a heavy Gaussian blur over them. It looks terrible, especially when those photos are huge and cover half a page or more. I suppose the intention was to make them look like the illustrations, but they don't. They just look back. This is a huge detraction in an expensive table book meant to be nice to thumb through.

This odd decision keeps me from recommending The Wakanda Files. The text isn't interesting enough to make up for the horrible quality photos.

Review: Archivist Wasp

By Nicole Kornher-Stace
Available now from Big Mouth House (Small Beer Press)
Review copy

ARCHIVIST WASP has been showing up on a number of Best of lists, so I had very high hopes.  It has a great name, a striking cover, and comes from the imminently cool Small Beer Press (founded by Gavin J. Grant and Kelly Link).  The opening certainly caught my attention.  Wasp, in a fight to the death, decides to stop the cycle of violence and spare her opponent.

In the end, however, I didn't really like ARCHIVIST WASP.  I thought it meandered too much and combined two stories that didn't really fit together.  I kept waiting for an ah-ha moment to bring the story together, but it didn't happen. Wasp shows a lot of personal growth over the novel, but it was hard to connect the event happening to the changes in her character.  The prose of the novel flowed smoothly, but how the characters decided to move from point A to point B often seemed more a function of what Nicole Kornher-Stace wanted to happen next than anything to do with actual motive. 

The two main characters are Wasp and a ghost who convinces her to go on a journey to the underworld with him, to find a companion he left behind in life and needs to find in death.  The ghost is driven to find her for closure.  Wasp is driven to find her because once the quest gets going she's invested, mostly.  (She helps him at first for medical attention.)

Wasp eventually returns home for her big triumph.  ARCHIVIST WASP is yet another novel where a man uses religion to keep a bunch of dangerous girls down.  It's a familiar story in feminist science fiction, and one not given enough space to breathe.  Too much of the novel is about the quest that has nothing to do with the religion or how people are treated in Wasp's present and it only coincidentally gives her the key to fighting back.

Meanwhile, how did this world get from the ghost's day to Wasp's?  In the ghost's day, the big issue was the ethics of human experimentation, not the ways religion is used to oppress.  There is a huge commonality about people being used as weapons, and yet that thread never seems to get teased out.

ARCHIVIST WASP is stylish, with an underworld that requires you to travel by means of the things that aren't quite right.  For me, it needed another draft to really help the disparate elements cohere.  As it is, I think ARCHIVIST WASP is a case of style over substance.  If only the characters were as fleshed out as some of the nightmare landscapes.

Review: Shadows of Sherwood

The first Robyn Hoodlum book
By Kekla Magoon
Available now from Bloomsbury
Review copy

I love the concept of a futuristic Robin Hood story, with many of the main roles being women instead of men.  Robyn Loxley is a girl living in the rich sector of Nott City when her parents are disappeared by the Sheriff (also female in this story).  She barely manages to escape, and has to figure out how to live life on the margins with the help of some others who have been managing: Laurel, Scarlet, and Key.

It's right up my alley, but SHADOWS OF SHERWOOD never quite gelled for me.  Robyn's parents apparently followed a moon lore, an old religion that seems like magic.  It's a good way to add a folklore tie to the story, but I felt like the dystopia and fantasy elements didn't mesh very neatly.  The moon lore mostly seemed like a way for convenient things to happen.

There's also use of villainous point of view, which I find is difficult to pull off well.  The Sheriff's passages give some hints about Governor Crown's dastardly deeds but otherwise add little to the story.  Since this is a Robin Hood retelling it is particularly egregious, because everyone knows where the story is going.  Even younger readers can be assumed to know at least one version of the story, if only the Disney movie.

I think the class conflicts were done well, which is important since they are a central part of the legend.  Robyn has been part of the upper class and is now learning how bad everyone else in the city had it.  Rescuing her parents is a top priority, but she's learning that innocent bystanders could get hurt in her activities against the Sheriff - which leads her to question how she can help.

SHADOWS OF SHERWOOD has some nice heist scenes and an appealing cast, but it left me cold.  I'm just not sure the biggest departures from the traditional story worked for me.  It felt like a separate story welded on that didn't quite fit.  Does Robin Hood need a prophecy?  No, not really.

Review: The League of Unexceptional Children

First in a series
By Gitty Daneshvari
Available now from Little, Brown BFYR (Hachette)
Review copy

Gitty Daneshvari, author of the School of Fear series, is back with the first in a new series: THE LEAGUE OF UNEXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN.  While I love the premise, I think this will be the only book in this series I try.

THE LEAGUE OF UNEXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN posits that children who are unremarkable, forgettable, utterly average make the best spies.  Very few notice them in the first place, and no one remembers them.  (The book promptly deflates its own premise by having the children accompanied by an adult, because there are many places where unaccompanied twelve year olds are quite noticeable.)

The issue for me was that Daneshvari never convinced me that Shelly and Jonathan are completely average.  Shelley's wacky outfits are described in detail, as is her habit of just making up sayings and otherwise saying nutty stuff and trying to take it back.  She's funny, and quirky.  She has an easily recognizable schtick.  She's more Stargirl than Jane Doe.  Jonathan seems a bit more uninteresting on the surface, although surely a kid wearing khakis isn't an identifiable trait with the current school dress codes.  Daneshvari makes it clear that unexceptional kids are not losers, yet doesn't support it well with the text.  Most people (that is, the average) are at least kinda good at one thing.  Shelley and Jonathan seem to have no talents aside from being easily overlooked.

The plot centers around a kidnapped Vice President.  The current league members might be compromised, so Shelley and Jonathan are recruited.  They fail their training, but are sent out into the field anyway.  However, they aren't alone: they're teamed up with a pair of exceptionals from Britain.

I like the central message of THE LEAGUE OF UNEXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN: everyone has something to offer.  The book is lightly humorous.  Maybe I'm overthinking it, but I just don't think it hangs together.  I'll always love books about kid spies, but this one is a miss for me.

Review: If I Could Turn Back Time

By Beth Harbison
Available now from St. Martin's Press
Review copy

It's hard to remember now why I picked up IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME.  I think it was the promise of time travel, which I tend to enjoy.  But the blurb hints at one of my major problems with the book.  IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME falls into that old pattern of successful, self-made woman figures out what she really needs is to be emotionally honest and find her soulmate.

In the end, I think IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME did some interesting things, but they tended to be too little, too late.  The execution of the beginning didn't grab me.  When Ramie wakes up after her disastrous 38th birthday party as a seventeen year old, she falls into a tendency to repeat information over and over as if the reader might've forgotten a detail from the previous two pages.  The timeline also doesn't quite work.  Ramie is clear that the first time she lost her virginity was six months after her eighteenth birthday, but that she and the guy broke up at their graduation party a few days after her eighteenth birthday.

The biggest problem is that all of the interesting stuff is rushed and crammed into the ends of the novel.  IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME starts to complicate things and introduce the idea that Ramie is driven and motivated and wouldn't be happy as just a housewife having children.  Her career doesn't get completely jettisoned, which I definitely appreciated, but the actual romance ended up being just a sketch of an idea after her romantic life was built up so much.

IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME has some interesting ideas, but I just couldn't get invested.  Does any almost forty-year-old woman really think that her high school boyfriend might've been the one?  I don't think Ramie was fulfilled at the beginning of the novel, but I was never convinced that focusing on her high school romance was a good focus for reflecting on her regrets.

Review: Love is Red

Book on of the Night Song trilogy
By Sophie Jaff
Available now from Harper (HarperCollins)
Review copy

The comparisons to NIGHT FILM and THE SHINING GIRLS drew me in.  Both were creepy literary gems, and if LOVE IS RED was half as good I was sure to love it.  I'm not sure that I do.

LOVE IS RED opens with a rape scene, which was not the best first impression.  Half the novel (maybe a little over half) is told through the killer's point of view using the second person.  The second person point of view was an interesting choice of literary technique and I thought it worked well to add a bit of tension to his sections, that such a killer could be watching you.  However, his sections were hard for me to read.  I liked that he focused on his victims' emotions over his bodies, but that aspect was still there.  And unlike THE SHINING GIRLS, I never really felt we got to see the victims as people in their own right.  They remain the archetypes the killer has marked them as.

The other narrator is Katherine Emerson, a young woman living with a roommate and her roommate's son.  She's recently met and started dating David, a perfectly nice man, but she's also started sleeping with his best friend Sael after a sexually charged encounter where they didn't realize they had any acquaintances in common.  LOVE IS RED does not hide that one of these men is the killer and that Katherine is his ultimate planned victim.  I thought which was the killer was obvious, which does mean Sophie Jaff was good at characterizing them clearly.  At the same time, it meant the book was jumping through some unnecessary hoops.

The fantastic elements of LOVE IS RED are rather quiet at first.  The killer describes emotions in synesthetic ways and believes he is reliving a grand purpose, but it takes awhile for the narrative to start showing that he isn't just delusional.  Ghosts start to show up, and more of the past is revealed (mostly through the device of excerpts from a manuscript between chapters).  I definitely felt like a lot of the worldbuilding was left for future books in the Night Song trilogy.  I had an idea of the concepts that were in play, but not specifics.  I'm unsure what the stakes of the story were, beyond Katherine's life.  If you're going to hint at a battle through the centuries, then I at least need some idea of what will happen if either side wins.

I did like that LOVE IS RED wrapped up the serial killer plot and left the romance at a reasonable ending point.  There are a lot of threads left dangling for the next book, but this one can stand alone.  I also liked the way the theme of motherhood became increasingly important through the story.  It is seeded at the beginning, so it doesn't feel unnatural when it takes a larger part in LOVE IS RED. 

Jaff's writing is often lovely, but it left me dry.  LOVE IS RED approaches feminist themes, the way women are discarded in particular, but never seems to have a coherent point of view to express about them.  The serial killer passages actively turned me off most of the time, and Katherine wasn't a much more compelling narrator.  The first moment between her and Sael is incredibly charged, but their chemistry throughout the book leans to hard on that single interaction to carry it all.  The relationship with David never has a moment half as magnetic.  Her job as a critic might as well never have been mentioned.  Her relationship with Lucas, her roommate's son, is cute.

But I kept waiting for Katherine to seize control of her narrative and stop being a victim in waiting and waffling between two not particularly compelling dudes.  I'm not sure that ever quite happened.

Review: The Girl at Midnight

By Melissa Grey
Available now from Delacorte Press (Penguin Random House)
Review copy

I was drawn in by the name and cover of THE GIRL AT MIDNIGHT.  Both are just this side of generic, but with a spark of personality.  That's a pretty good summation of the book too.  If you're looking for a plot with lots of twists and turns (or even just a small surprise), this is not the book for you.

Debut author Melissa Grey writes with a lot of charm, which will serve her well as she grows further into her voice and starts to take her plot and characters in their own direction.  THE GIRL AT MIDNIGHT is a perfectly likeable book.  It's an easy read that will probably take most readers a single afternoon.  There's some action, some magic, some romance.  It's got all the ingredients for a good time even if it doesn't break the mold.  Homemade chocolate chip cookies might be the best, but there's a place for Chips Ahoy! too.

Echo is a seventeen-year-old thief who lives in magic-hidden cove of a public library with the Ala, both of them working for the Avicen, a race of bird-like people.  They're at war with the Drakharin, a race of dragon-like people.  Then Echo comes across the means to find the Firebird, a prophesied being that can end the war.  Echo shares narrating duties with Caius, the Dragon Prince; Dorian, his captain of the guard; and Ivy, her friend.  I wish the narration had been more focused.  It seems strange for some of the characters to take over for one or two chapters before fading back into the background.  It also might've given the book a bit more surprise if we were getting detailed points of view from both sides of the conflict.

I think Echo was the weakest point of the main characters.  She's got a dark past, a quirk of collecting words, and is an impossibly good thief.  She's mostly motivated by a desire to belong with the Avicen, to prove her place despite being a human.  But she just didn't have as much personality as the others.  She's a quirky YA fantasy heroine.  Caius is a leader, seeking what is best for his people even at cost to himself.  (And we'll just go with that whole wants peace thing and ignore that he tortures and kills Avicen in his first appearance.)  Dorian makes a moral mistake at the beginning of the book that haunts him, as do his unrequited feelings for Caius.  Ivy pays the price for being at the wrong place at the wrong time, but stays firm to her beliefs.  Jasper, who shows up late in the story, is mostly after something pretty and shiny.

I feel like the world of THE GIRL AT MIDNIGHT needed a lot more development.  Why are the Avicen and Drakharin at war?  What rift is so great that requires centuries of fighting and can only be ended through magical intervention?  Not even Caius, leader of one of the armies, knows.  (I did like Echo pointing out that peace talks hadn't even been attempted.)  I felt like Grey got away with the reveal of the firebird because it was obvious what was coming more than it actually making any sense.  It also adds a somewhat creepy dimension to the main romance.  (Speaking of the romance, Echo's boyfriend basically disappears from her thoughts halfway through, which I guess counts as a breakup.)

THE GIRL AT MIDNIGHT is the start of a trilogy.  I honestly think it stood fine as a story, and I doubt I'll read the sequels.  The war and romance were adequately resolved for me.  I had fun reading THE GIRL AT MIDNIGHT, but it just never differentiated itself from the pack.

Review: Bon Appétempt: A Coming-of-Age Story (with Recipes!)

By Amelia Morris
Available now from Grand Central Publishing (Hachette)
Review copy

I avoid memoirs as a rule of thumb, but I was intrigued by BON APPETEMPT because it promised cooking misadventures and author Amelia Morris's "ill-fated twenty-something job at the School of Rock in Los Angeles."  I think I shall continue avoiding memoirs, because they make me feel like I'm judging someone's life in a bad way.

If you came for the School of Rock story, it lasts about a chapter and can be summed up thusly: Aging musicians rarely show up to work on time, bum money from people, and eventually Morris was fired for someone with the administrative and accounting experience to keep people in line.  Fascinating.  As for the cooking, Morris doesn't reach that life interest until halfway through the memoir.  I can't even imaging that fans of her book-turned-blog Bon Appétempt are that interested in a litany of jobs she worked for a bit in her twenties while she and her boyfriend to find something steady to make ends meet.

It doesn't help that BON APPETEMPT is so very dry.  Morris is find at expressing when she's angry at someone, like her mother and grandmother for not immediately supporting her impending marriage.  She's less good at other emotions, which lends little vibrancy to the central relationship of the memoir, that of her and her husband.  She's led a fairly normal life, which doesn't give the memoir much color, and doesn't have the voice or perspective to make that life compelling. 

The recipes are awesome, and their connection to the chapters goes stronger and better integrated as BON APPETEMPT goes on.  However, she sometimes doesn't even say if a recipe turned out well.  Why describe how you made something if you're not going to include the best part, the delightful food porn of flavors and texture and deliciousness that made this recipe a must have in your life story?  Maybe I should just look it up on the blog?

This one if for die-hard fans of Amelia Morris's blog.  For everyone else, just check it out from the library and photocopy the recipes that appeal to you.  I do like the book trailer (shot and edited by her husband Matt), and it makes me wish I liked the book more:

Review: Amity

By Micol Ostow
Available by now from EgmontUSA
Review copy
Read my Micol Ostow tag

I've read several books by Micol Ostow, many of them quite sweet and cute.  Her recent books, FAMILY and AMITY, have been a change of pace.  AMITY plays off of the Amityville Horror legend, with a strange house and disturbed kids.

The narraction switches back and forth between Connor (ten years ago) and Gwen (present).  Each has their own issues.  Connor is a sociopath, and Gwen sees things that aren't there.  The only person Connor loves is his twin sister, so he doesn't resist the sinister house much.  Gwen, on the other hand, fights hard because the house can't quite infect her brain chemistry.  I thought the combination of real-world mental issues with paranormal horror was an intriguing touch.

The thing is, I just didn't find AMITY scary.  In a book, there's no creepy music or jump scares for cheap thrills.  The tone and imagery have to carry it.  I remember one image, of a ghostly figure outside the window and Connor reaching to touch it, to welcome it instead of being afraid.  But the images that were meant to be scary just faded from my mind.

AMITY is an extremely quick read.  It is a little under 400 pages long, but took me less than an hour to read.  (I'm fast, but not usually that fast.)  It's a good enough way to pass the time, but don't go in expecting to be very scared.  The juxtaposition of time and point of view is interesting, and the plot offers a few twists.  Overall, Ostow has done better before.

Review: The Diamond Thief

By Sharon Gosling
Available now from Switch Press (Capstone)
Review copy

THE DIAMOND THIEF is a British import and one of the first books from Switch Press, a new YA imprint from Capstone.  It switches between the points of view of Rémy Brunel, a trapeze artist and thief, and Thaddeus Rec, a policeman.  Both of them are after a diamond - Rémy to steal it and Thaddeus to recover it.

I loved the premise of THE DIAMOND THIEF and was very fond of the characters, although I think the whole book could've been from Rémy's point of view.  My favorite character was probably J, a younger urchin who befriends both protagonists.  But I thought that the book was a little lacking.  It is historical fiction with a bit of steampunk and of fantasy, with no real limits on what was possible in the world.  There was magic and impossibly advanced science with little explanation of how either worked.

Going back to the characters, I love the idea of two basically good people working at cross purposes with each other.  Thaddeus is almost impossibly good, a truly honest cop who will sacrifice himself to save others.  Rémy is a bit more complicated.  She steals to survive and understands that there are shades of grey in the world, but at the same time she, too, will sacrifice herself to save others.  She understands that there are more important things in the world than her individual happiness.  

I don't know.  I liked these characters so much, yet there world lacked a snap to pull me in.  I felt like the plot was a pretty basic progression from point A to point B, and the romance a touch tepid.  I liked Rémy and Thaddeus individually, but they were pretty quickly passionately in love with each other for little reason.  It's hard for me to remember the specifics of THE DIAMOND THIEF already, because there weren't many memorable details (aside from J).

I think THE DIAMOND THIEF will appeal to younger YA readers who like circuses, thieves, and curses.  Older YA readers who think that sounds interesting would do well to look into PANTOMIME by Laura Lam.

Review: The Wrenchies

By Farel Dalrymple
Available now from First Second (Macmillan)
Review copy

There are two brothers who kill a shadow and find an amulet.  One of those brothers grows up to write a comic called The Wrenchies.  There's a world where shadowmen have killed almost everyone, and the best fighters who oppose them are a group of young'uns called The Wrenchies who read a comic called The Wrenchies.  Then there's young Hollis, who reads a comic called The Wrenchies and then falls into the world of The Wrenchies.  Confused?  Welcome to THE WRENCHIES.

Honestly, I feel like I should read THE WRENCHIES again to better sort how things fall into place as the novel progresses.  At the same time, I haven't, because I don't really desire to read it again.

Farel Dalrymple's art is well suited to the world of THE WRENCHIES, fading and decaying and under siege.  I do wish there was some variation in style to help keep separate worlds apart visually.  At the same time, that works for how the layers and locations of the story blend together.  But really, I just found that I didn't like the art much.  There was something off-putting about it to me, although it was so close to what I usually like.  There is a deliberate ugliness, but not one that worked for me.  Plus, I found all the red noses distracting.

As for the story itself, it will appeal to fans of post-apocalyptic literature.  There are a lot of characters to keep straight, and it can be hard to remember who has died.  I definitely felt like I never had a great grasp on Hollis's age.  His looks told me one thing, but his behavior and voice made me peg him as younger.  (I definitely liked him better when I decided he was younger than I first thought, although I felt weird about him being the questing hero in a gory story that in some ways boils down to drug addicts vs. zombies.)  I feel like the book could've spent more time developing Sherwood as well, since Sherwood drives most of the plot, even if he isn't the one of a heroic quest.

THE WRENCHIES just never grabbed me, although it was full of ideas I found intriguing.  It's wonderfully layered and complex, but not interesting enough for me to really try to unpack what lies beyond the surface.  I'm just not the right audience for this graphic novel.

Review: Girls' Night Out and Devil Doll

I reviewed five Shebooks back in January, and I mostly enjoyed them.  I've read a few since, including the two I am reviewing in this most.  I must say that they continue to be high quality, but priced a bit high for me.  I know Amazon gives greater royalties at the $2.99 price point, but it took me one lunch break to read both of these stories.  That's not much reading for $6.  It might be a better option for slower readers.

Girls' Night Out: a mystery by Kate Flora
Available now from Shebooks
Review copy

The blurb for the novelette is simple and enticing: When the man who date-raped a friend is found not guilty, the women in her book group decide to take matters into their own hands.  The story opens with the friends moving a body, letting the reader know the plan has gone wrong.

I selected "Girls' Night Out" because the blurb reminded me of Fern Michael's Sisterhood series.  I must have good instincts, because that is exactly what I was reminded of.  Local district attorney Jay Hanrahan date raped Ellen Corso - and was found innocent.  Ellen's book club decides to take matters into their own hands and give Jay a taste of his own medicine.

"Girls' Night Out" is a fun bit of black comedy.  It's pretty slight, but it is a fun bit of comeuppance.  I'd certainly try a full-length novel by Kate Flora based on this work.  She's got a nice, wry humor.

Devil Doll: a friendship gone awry by Bonnie Friedman
Available now from Shebooks
Review copy

"Devil Doll" reminded me of one reason why I don't usually read memoirs.  I really felt for Catherine (name changed?) who has quite a bit of her personal life exposed in this memoir, in addition to author Bonnie Friedman's generally low opinion of her.  It can't be nice to have yourself immortalized negatively in a true story.

Bonnie and Catherine were fast friends when they studied abroad, but years later Bonnie dropped her without a word.  "Devil Doll" explores why.  Their relationship had strange ups and downs, including Bonnie sleeping with Catherine's husband, with her permission.  Neither woman comes off very well.  Catherine has a bit of a superiority complex, while Bonnie is judgmental and capricious.  It's well written, but not that enjoyable.

Review: V is for Villain

By Peter Moore
Available now from Disney Hyperion
Review copy

I am a huge sucker for superhero books.  When I heard about V IS FOR VILLAIN, I knew that I had to read it.  And it definitely scratched some of my superhero itches, like a complicated relationship between the protagonist and his arch-nemesis.   At the same time, I was never quite convinced of the world.

Brad Baron lives in a world shaped by superheroes and their battles with Phaetons.  The superheroes were all created decades ago, and the newest ones are generally legacies.  Both Brad's father and brother are famous heroes.  Phaetons are created when people try to mutate their genes themselves -- it often goes wrong.  Brad has super genes, but only for intelligence.  That means he can't keep up in the Academy, which focuses on physical powers.  He gets shunted off to the A-track.  (A is for alternative.)

The Academy, and by extension the world's, focus on certain powers just never quite worked for me.  What can I say, some of my favorite superheroes are the ones without powers.  And Brad, in his rise to villainy, shows pretty thoroughly just how dangerous someone can be without physical powers.  Surely there were others before him?  Decades of people with powers, why no supervillains that aren't Phaetons?  Plus, quite a bit of worldbuilding is done through expository footnotes that quickly get boring.

At the same time, I found the characters very believable.  Brad and his friends have pretty radical ideas about what it means to be a hero -- albeit radical for their society.  They're in favor of things like bringing people to trial instead of killing them on the spot.  But Brad also has a nasty streak of entitlement.  Layla, the head of the alternative kids, may or may not be interested in Brad.  Either way, she definitely has her own agenda, which I appreciated.  I also liked Brad's meat-head hero brother, Blake.  Brad and Blake care about each other, because they're brothers, yet they deeply irritate each other as well.

I thought the characters' feelings, motivations, and relationships were terrific and wish the world had worked as well for me.  Although, since I'm talking about character, Brad came off as very average in intelligence to me.  I might have bought him as a little smarter than the other characters, but not as a super genius.  Luckily, he had other qualities to make up for it.

This tale of a boy's rise to villainy has some moments that shine, but it's a bit too didactic to give the through-the-eyes-of-the-villain premise much weight.  Superhero and dystopian fans might find things to enjoy about this novel, but I'd just check this one out from the library instead of buying it.

Review: Knightley and Son

April is National Poetry Month, and Clear Eyes, Full Shelves celebrates every year with a novel-in-verse week.  Sunday started their third-annual Verse Novel Week.  Be sure to check it out, especially my guest review of THE CROSSOVER by Kwame Alexander.

By Rohan Gavin
Available now from Bloomsbury
Review copy

Darkus Knightley is the son of Alan Knightley, a detective who has been in a coma for years.  Darkus has been studying the record of his dad's cases, eager to help him when he wakes up.  But Knightley's cases weren't quite normal, and they drove him to a breakdown.  It is not the best future for Darkus.

I loved the idea of KNIGHTLEY & SON, father and son detective tackling strange cases, including the current one, involving a bestselling self-help book.  (It's clearly modeled after THE SECRET, but it is somewhat more sinister.)  The execution never quite won me over.  Based on the premise I wasn't expecting many female characters, for instance, but Darkus does have a stepsister who is smart, resourceful, and often notices the few things he misses.  So she gets sidelined for most of the book, despite being a character who would clearly add something to the mix.

The father-son relationship didn't quite work for me either.  Knightley keeps falling asleep due to the effects of his coma.  That gets him out of the way too and leaves most of the book to Darkus alone.  When they do work together, Knightley is reluctant to involve him.  That's responsible parenting, but I was expecting to see them work together as a detective team.

Then, there was Darkus himself.  He strives to be totally logical, like his father.  This has the effect of having him behave entirely unlike most human beings.  He also comes off as rather stilted.  It's a deliberate choice on the part of the character, but it's a ridiculous one.  Maybe I would've rolled with it when I was the age of the intended audience, but maybe not.  The book does seem to realize it's a silly choice that Darkus needs to grow out of, but then it also realizes his name is silly.  That doesn't change the effect of reading it.

There are several fun scenes in KNIGHTLEY & SON, including a shining moment for Tilly, the stepsister.  I wish it had been more of an ensemble story (the pieces are all there!) instead of focused on Darkus, but the detective working alone isn't an unknown trope.  I would give this to a 10-12 year old who likes mysteries and conspiracies.  There is series potential.

Review: Stolen Songbird

First book of the Malediction trilogy
By Danielle L. Jensen
Available now from Strange Chemistry (Angry Robot)
Review copy

I think Strange Chemistry is putting out some great books, but STOLEN SONGBIRD, one of their newest releases, didn't quite work for me.  Cécile de Troyes dreams of making it as a singer - but then she is kidnapped, married and bonded to a troll prince, and forced to sink or swim in an unfamiliar, violent and political realm.  Understanding her new husband and his motivations might help her survive, or it might lead to both of their deaths.

STOLEN SONGBIRD contained many plot elements that I love.  There are political machinations and people hiding their true feelings for instance.  And debut author Danielle L. Jensen comes up with some interesting complications.  Tristan, Cécile's husband, and the other trolls cannot lie.  Thus, the brewing rebellion has at least one big weakness.  Also, the bond between Tristan and Cécile means that they can feel each other's emotions.

Even with these pluses, I found myself unentranced by STOLEN SONGBIRD.  There was nothing that made me hate the book, but I felt like I had to force myself to keep reading it when there were other books I wanted to read more.  I feel like Jensen never pushed the elements of her story to their full potential.  For instance, the bond turns out to mostly end up warning Tristan whenever Cécile gets hurt.  There's no sense of intrusiveness or an invasion privacy, despite both of them being unwilling to bond.  Given that there's a strong element of romance, it's also strangely sexless.  They never seem to feel lust.

I feel like STOLEN SONGBIRD had potential.  If it were a little tighter and more development given to Tristan and the implications of the bond, it might've worked better.  Or perhaps if more time had been spent on the rebellion than the tepid romance.  As is, STOLEN SONGBIRD was a fairly generic YA fantasy novel.  Although it was about trolls, which are an underused fantasy race.

Mini-Middle Grade Reviews on a Monday

The True Blue Scouts of Sugar Man Swamp
By Kathi Appelt
Available now from Atheneum BFYR (Simon & Schuster)
Review copy
Read my review of Keeper

The eponymous scouts are Bingo and J'miah, raccoon brothers keeping an eye on the Sugar Man Swamp from an old, overgrown DeSoto.  They're to wake the Sugar Man, a Yeti-like figure, if the swamp is in trouble.

It quickly becomes apparent that the swamp is in trouble.

Kathi Appelt weaves together a tale of humans, animals, and cane sugar in a sweet, down-home voice perfectly suited to the material.  It's so beautifully descriptive that I wanted illustrations even as I was happy that everything was left to me to imagine.  It's funnier and less dark than her other books, although it still touches on important issues.  THE TRUE BLUE SCOUTS OF SUGAR MAN SWAMP is definitely worthy of that National Book Award Finalist medal on its cover.

Listening for Lucca
By Suzanne LaFleur
Available now from Wendy Lamb Books (Penguin Random House)
Review copy

LISTENING FOR LUCCA is the tale of Siena, who has just moved to a beach house with her parents and younger brother Lucca, who doesn't talk.  She quite likes their new hometown, but she and Lucca both suspect that their house is haunted.

I really enjoyed LISTENING FOR LUCCA.  This is a quiet, simple book.  The fantasy elements are likewise quiet - these are fairly passive ghosts.  Thus, LISTENING FOR LUCCA reads almost like a contemporary.  The family is well realized, both agreeing to let Lucca talk in his own time and individually worrying about how to convince him to talk.

I suspect lots of readers will identify with Siena, who struggles with fitting in and being a patient big sister.  I think this novel will appeal to fans of Mary Downing Hahn.

In Search of Goliathus Hercules
By Jennifer Angus
Available now from Albert Whitman & Company/Open Road Media
Review copy

Henri is a normal nineteenth-century boy until he goes to live with his aunt.  There he starts to realize that he can speak to insects.  But he runs away to the circus to escape his aunt's sinister neighbor, Mrs. Black, who might know his secret.

I liked how this story combined a mystery about Henri's father's disappearance, the mystery of Mrs. Black's motive and powers, and an adventure about life in the circus.  There is, of course, a search for a large insect known as the Goliathus Hercules as well.

In the end, I had niggling questions remaining about how some of the magic worked, but I did like IN SEARCH OF GOLIATHUS HERCULES.  Few books are so passionate about the insect world, and Jennifer Angus clearly knows her subject.

Magic Marks the Spot
Book One of The Very Nearly Honorable League of Pirates
By Caroline Carlson
Illustrated by Dave Phillips
Available now from HarperCollins
Review copy

I do enjoy books about pirates!  MAGIC MARKS THE SPOT tells of Hilary Westfield's journey to become a pirate, complicated by the facts that she's a girl and the daughter of an admiral.  I have always enjoyed girl-crossdresses-as-a-boy stories, but that is not this one.  Hilary is determined to do it all as a girl.

MAGIC MARKS THE SPOT is a very fun story, filled with a search for treasure and mysterious thieves and unexpected magic.  I'm not sure it's a great start to a series, because it stands very well on its own.  There are no loose ends here.  The only real problem is that the chapters end with bits of letters and newspaper articles.  This would be a nice way to catch up with what's going on with other characters, except at least half of the letters are in a little cursive font on a darkened background.  It's hard to read as an adult who was taught cursive - I can definitely see it tripping up kids.

The Savage Lands
Book Three of Tarzan
By Andy Briggs
Available now from Open Road Media
Review copy

I read the original TARZAN by Edgar Rice Burroughs back when I was a kid and Disney's Tarzan came out.  I must say, I never was a real Tarzan fan.

In many ways, I like the idea of a rebooted Tarzan, with modern technology and such.  In execution, Andy Briggs' THE SAVAGE LANDS didn't do anything more for me than the original.  I did like that Jane is very active in the series.  Why, the first thing she does is save a man with a well-timed machete swing.  You can certainly try this book with the young action/adventure fan in your life.

Review: Day One

By Nate Kenyon
Available now from Thomas Dunne Books (Macmillan)
Review copy

DAY ONE takes a familiar premise (man vs. machine) and centers in on the very beginning.  John Hawke is interviewing James Weller, a tech mogul who left his former company under acrimonious circumstances and claims that he has a doozy of a story to tell.  It's strange that he would tell it to Hawke, a disgraced journalist (and hacker, of course).

I thought DAY ONE did a terrific job with the horror elements.  Several scenes are terrifying, and the expanse of the antagonist is daunting.  Even the coffee makers have turned against humanity, under the control of Doe.  I did feel that the protagonists sometimes made terrible decisions.  For instance, they decide that the best way to travel through New York is the subway tunnels.  They had a few reasons for that, but none of them make up for forgetting that subways tunnels are full of trains.  Who sets themselves up to be stuck in a small, dark area with a massive, fast machine that doesn't like you?

Some of that may come from the fact that I never really liked Hawke.  I thought that some of the other members of his party were more interesting.  Hawke is driven by the need to get back to New Jersey, where his wife and son might be in danger from their neighbor.  Obviously, everyone understands the need to be with and protect family.  But I just had to grit my teeth every time Hawke made a justification for not moving away from a scary guy who clearly has creepy designs on his pregnant wife.

Basically, I liked the action but thought that the attempts to make me bond with the protagonist fell flat.  I never cared about his redemption as a family man, I cared about these people escaping murderous technology!  I'd stick to checking this one out from the library.

Mini Reviews: Some Cybils Reading

Anton and Cecil: Cats at Sea
By Lisa Martin and Valerie Martin
Illustrated by Kelly Murphy
Available now from Algonquin BFYR (Workman)
Review copy

Written by veteran adult author Valerie Martin and her niece Lisa Martin, ANTON AND CECIL: CATS AT SEA is a charming tale of two brothers who both end up traversing the sea.  Cecil is an avid sailor, but Anton is press ganged to catch rats, and Cecil must find him.

Animal fantasy can be done in several ways, and I liked how it was employed in ANTON AND CECIL.  The cats are sentient and can talk amongst themselves and with other animals, but can't actually talk to humans.  I thought this one was a fun little read, and given that there is a subtitle, suspect that it might be the beginning of a series.  I'd welcome more books about these brothers.

The Last Enchanter
Book Two of the Celestine Chronicles
By Laurisa White Reyes
Available now from Tanglewood Press
Review copy

THE LAST ENCHANTER is the sequel to THE ROCK OF IVANORE, and I definitely wished that I had read that first.  I picked up most of the details, but I was confused about some bits, like why Marcus wasn't invited to court with his brother Kelvin, since he should be in line for the throne as well.

However, I still enjoyed THE LAST ENCHANTER.  I wish the storyline about Lael, a childhood friend who tags along with Marcus when he sets out to warn his brother about an assassination threat, was better incorporated.  It seemed like an attempt to shoehorn in a female character and a romance.  I'm always up for more female characters, but it could've been a touch smoother.

THE LAST ENCHANTER is a good pick for young fans of traditional fantasy, with the caveat that the series should be read in order.

Mickey Price: Journey to Oblivion
By John P. Stanley
Available now from Tanglewood Press
Review copy

Mickey Price and several kids under thirteen, each with their own talent, are suddenly recruited for a space camp.  There is, of course, something else going on - the reader will enjoy being suspicious with Jonah, one of Mickey's fellow campers.

Perhaps the biggest flaw in MICKEY PRICE: JOURNEY TO OBLIVION is the unnecessary frame story, where a grown-up Mickey tells the book to his kids.  It's awkward when the book switches back to the frame, and makes little sense, because the story changes point of view fairly frequently.

 Kids into space will probably enjoy this one.  There's lots of information about the space program, somewhat outdated since the book is set in 1977.

The Alchemist War
Book One of the Time-Tripping Faradays
By John Seven
Illustrated by Craig Phillips
Available now from Capstone
Review copy

I'll admit to being very disappointed that there wasn't an actual war between alchemists in THE ALCHEMIST WAR.  The title and cover promise more action than the book delivers.  The beginning, with Dawk and Hype causing accidental mayhem, is fairly lively.  Then it settles into a simple mystery about alchemy, with several time jumps that don't last long enough to actually add interest.

THE ALCHEMIST WAR isn't terrible, but it's very much aimed at beginning readers.  I think the subject would've been better served with a bit more depth.  Author John Seven does set up a villain for future entries in the series, which might add more conflict to the story.

(Side note: I found it very out that the chat-type communication the future people engage in has identifying names at the end.)