Saturday, February 16, 2013
Wednesday, February 13, 2013
Wednesday Words: Required Reading
For the past couple days, nearly a week, I've been in a reading slump. I finished a book and while there are plenty around and on my shelves from me to pick from, I didn't. Or was it couldn't? It's hard to say. I read the descriptions, but just nothing felt like what I was in the mood for.
Not that I knew what I was in the mood for. I knew I wanted something different that would make me think and challenge me, but not so difficult that I'd get annoyed.
It was actually a recent video by Lauren at 365 Days of Reading that made me very nostalgic for my college and grad school days. As an English major and a library school student, I was constantly reading required texts. Some fiction, some nonfiction, but more often than not, even if I didn't necessarily like them, they made me think about the book rather than having already wasted energy on trying to decide what to read.
Luckily, today the Universe gave me a little bit of assigned reading. The faculty book club at my school will be discussing Bill Bryson's memoir The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid next month, and my copy came in the mail today. Plus a bunch of the freshmen I work with either just started or are about to start Romeo & Juliet, which despite the fact that I used to live in fair Verona, I haven't read myself since I was 14. I'm kind of grateful that now I don't have to think anymore about what I'm going to read for the next week or so, only when.
Has this ever happened to any of you, or am I being exceptionally weird here? These are non-rhetorical questions, ladies and gents!
Comments welcome, and, as always, happy reading!
Not that I knew what I was in the mood for. I knew I wanted something different that would make me think and challenge me, but not so difficult that I'd get annoyed.
It was actually a recent video by Lauren at 365 Days of Reading that made me very nostalgic for my college and grad school days. As an English major and a library school student, I was constantly reading required texts. Some fiction, some nonfiction, but more often than not, even if I didn't necessarily like them, they made me think about the book rather than having already wasted energy on trying to decide what to read.
Luckily, today the Universe gave me a little bit of assigned reading. The faculty book club at my school will be discussing Bill Bryson's memoir The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid next month, and my copy came in the mail today. Plus a bunch of the freshmen I work with either just started or are about to start Romeo & Juliet, which despite the fact that I used to live in fair Verona, I haven't read myself since I was 14. I'm kind of grateful that now I don't have to think anymore about what I'm going to read for the next week or so, only when.
Has this ever happened to any of you, or am I being exceptionally weird here? These are non-rhetorical questions, ladies and gents!
Comments welcome, and, as always, happy reading!
Monday, February 11, 2013
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Brave and Bold: Scarlet
Feiwel and Friends, 2013
*A HUGE thanks to MacMillian for sending me an ARC of this novel!*
In early 2012, I was lucky enough to win a copy of Marissa Meyer's debut novel Cinder, a sci-fi retelling of a fairy tale posing the situation of what if Cinderella were a cyborg. I read it, completely loved it, and have been insisting to everyone I know that this is a series that is not to be missed.
So when I was selected as a winner of an ARC of Scarlet, the next installment in The Lunar Chronicles, you can bet I knew how fortunate I was. There simply aren't words to express how much I have wanted to, needed to know what happened next. No second-book slump here for Meyer - people who loved Cinder will absolutely not be disappointed.
There's a whole new country and cast of characters joining those readers already met in book one. Scarlet lives in the European Union, not too far away from Paris, and her beloved grandmother is missing. But despite her best efforts, no one seems to care. No one, that is, except for Wolf, a street fighter who is as mysterious as he is lethal, and he may know who took the old woman. For some bizarre reason, it's believed Scarlet's grandmother could have information about the long-lost Lunar princess, but Scarlet knows Grandmere is just a farmer...right? Meanwhile on the other side of the planet, Cinder is trying to come to terms with the truth about her past, teams up with an American ex-soldier Captain Thorne to get out of New Beijing, and is determined to figure out a way to stop the evil Queen Leavana and keep Emperor Kai from making the worst mistake of his life.
Action, suspense, twists and turns with dashes of romance and tension here and there, this book has it all. Meyer has so masterfully merged these two story lines together in a way that it's still very easy to keep track of this large cast of characters and the plot. It will be interesting to see how this will hold up in the remaining two books of the series Cress (due out in 2014) and Winter (2015), but I have no doubt it will continue to be remarkable. It's agonizing to think that we'll have to wait so long to know how it ends, but I was lucky that my wait for this installment was two months shorter than a lot of others'.
As I've said on this blog before, sci-fi usually isn't my forte, but this series makes me reconsider that stance. This is sci-fi for the fantasy lover, with strong girls, charming princes, and a lot of action that makes it impossible to stop reading until you get to the final page. This is a five-star book in my mind, no doubt about it.
Comments welcome, and, as always, happy reading!
Marissa Meyer's Website
Marissa Meyer on Twitter
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Wednesday Words: Plot Point for Point
There's an old saying in the literary world that there are only ten original plots. Characters, settings, languages, and genres change, but when you strip a story down to its bare bones, it will fit into one of these boxes that has existed for hundreds and hundreds of years. I don't actually believe this, but let's roll with it, shall we?
That can be a good thing or a bad thing, depending how you look at it.
On the one hand, as a writer I'm kind of annoyed. I'd like to think my great idea is mine and it certainly becomes a big part of me as I dedicate hours and give pieces of my soul to it. Of course on the other hand, I guess some of the pressure is off then because I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel.
Except I am, because I want my wheel to be so fabulous that someone will be my agent and it will get published.
Anyway! Similarities between stories feels like an inevitability. But I recently read a book that I totally loved, but couldn't help but notice a lot of similarities that it had with another book I adore. Protagonists shared more than a few personality traits in common, not exactly the same setting but close enough in that they both had fish out of water in a beautiful place thing going on, complicated relationships with family and friends, and a romance that is fought against because it's a bad idea for reasons X, Y, and Z, but that doesn't matter because these characters have to be together (and frankly, you see it coming from a mile away). There were even even multiple characters across the spread with a deep love for the same band (though I'm not going to penalize anyone for loving The Beatles - I'm fine with that trait being among all people, fictional or not).
So the question becomes this: when this happens, when two books are so alike, where do you draw the line? Is it cute, or redundant, and can you ever read the second one with fresh eyes or are you always comparing it to the one you read first?
These are non-rhetorical questions, people! Comments welcome, and, as always, happy reading!
That can be a good thing or a bad thing, depending how you look at it.
On the one hand, as a writer I'm kind of annoyed. I'd like to think my great idea is mine and it certainly becomes a big part of me as I dedicate hours and give pieces of my soul to it. Of course on the other hand, I guess some of the pressure is off then because I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel.
Except I am, because I want my wheel to be so fabulous that someone will be my agent and it will get published.
Anyway! Similarities between stories feels like an inevitability. But I recently read a book that I totally loved, but couldn't help but notice a lot of similarities that it had with another book I adore. Protagonists shared more than a few personality traits in common, not exactly the same setting but close enough in that they both had fish out of water in a beautiful place thing going on, complicated relationships with family and friends, and a romance that is fought against because it's a bad idea for reasons X, Y, and Z, but that doesn't matter because these characters have to be together (and frankly, you see it coming from a mile away). There were even even multiple characters across the spread with a deep love for the same band (though I'm not going to penalize anyone for loving The Beatles - I'm fine with that trait being among all people, fictional or not).
So the question becomes this: when this happens, when two books are so alike, where do you draw the line? Is it cute, or redundant, and can you ever read the second one with fresh eyes or are you always comparing it to the one you read first?
These are non-rhetorical questions, people! Comments welcome, and, as always, happy reading!
Sunday, February 3, 2013
Pick a Side: Prodigy
Prodigy by Marie Lu (Legend #2)Putnam, 2013
In her debut novel and the first book in a planned trilogy, Marie Lu taught readers in Legend that looks can be deceiving The Republic of America demands excellence and has little tolerance for those who cannot live up to high expectations. But insisting on perfection and being perfect are hardly the same. This theme of never being able to take anything at face value continues in the electric second installment of this saga, Prodigy.
June, the Republic's favorite daughter, and Day, their most wanted criminal, have managed to escape Los Angeles and are in search of the Patriots and help. Unfortunately, everything comes with a price and the Patriots are willing to help June and Day for a high cost: they want the two of them to help assassinate the new Elector, a young man named Anden who has just taken his dead father's place as the leader of the Republic. But as the plan gets underway, June learns that Anden is nothing like his father and could actually be just what the nation needs for a new beginning. Meanwhile, Day questions everything he thought he knew - including June - and is will stop at nothing to get his little brother back.
This sequel had me on the edge of my seat from start to finish. Lu continues to be a master of the dual-narrators (this time, Day's chapters are in blue ink while June's are in black) and seamlessly weaves the two voices together. I could see why Day thought the things he did and why the answers June desired suddenly weren't as black-and-white as we had once believed. Anden was a huge part of this, too. I wouldn't go as far as to say Lu introduces love triangles (yes, plural - Day realizes little Tess isn't really such a little girl anymore), but she brings in very realistic questions about the nature of relationships and allegiances. Just like the political situations of the story, love is hardly simple, either.
In my review of the first book, I mentioned that my biggest complaint was a lack of understanding of the exact geography and situation of the Republic of America, the Colonies of America, and the Patriots and how they all fit together, and in this novel all of those questions were finally answered in a way where the puzzle made much more sense.
Prodigy has action, suspense, and plenty of plot twists and turns that would be surprising but never in an unrealistic sort of way. Secondary characters from book one are flushed out even more, and the stakes are raised once again as I must patiently wait for the finale that will come in book three. A five-star sequel in this blogger's opinion.
Comments welcome, and, as always, happy reading!
Marie Lu's Website
Marie Lu on Twitter
Saturday, February 2, 2013
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