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 Frank and April Wheeler are desperately unhappy. Married for the sake of their children, living lives that they believe are meaningless, in a suburban town full of similar ordinary couples, they are both clamoring inwardly for a change. They believe they are superior to their neighbors and are determined to prove it. April comes up with the genius idea of uprooting and moving to France, where she can work and Frank can find the intellectual fulfillment that he’s always longed for. Unfortunately, this plan sets the couple on a path to their own personal tragedy.
This is a deft, amazing book. Frank and April despair at the ordinariness of their neighbors in the suburbs, lamenting the blandness and sameness of their lives, but the reader knows better. Yates treats us to an inside view of the Wheelers’ closest neighbors, and we learn that one of their friends mistakenly believes he is in love with April, while the other older couple has a son committed to a mental institution. When that son starts to espouse the same views that Frank and April have, we begin to realize that everyone is slightly off-kilter here. Everyone is unhappy and dissatisfied. Frank and April are deluded by their own aspirations into thinking that they’re better than their neighbors, when really they quite simply belong. They believe they’re extraordinary, but over the course of the novel, we realize that they are perfectly ordinary. They fit right in.
It is certainly those ordinary characters that succeed as the huge draw for this novel. Their humanity is overwhelmingly real. Frank, for example, is insufferably arrogant at times, and totally misguided about almost everyone he interacts with, but few people set him straight. Worse, he says one thing and thinks another. He claims to want to go to France and find himself, but it becomes clear very early on that he’s actually quite satisfied with his job. He’s bored but he doesn’t want to disturb the status quo; he believes he is special, but he isn’t going to put forth the effort to actually prove it. Perhaps he knows it isn’t true, even as he’s unwilling to admit it. April seeks to recapture something with her acting and briefly succeeds, only to become an embarrassing failure when she doesn’t actually prove to be as spectacular as she’d hoped. Their lives are empty and they are always seeking, but never finding.
Of course, the book is very well written, and in the one instance that I’d have loved to share passages, the book had to go back to the library. Regardless, I could easily place myself in these characters’ shoes and there wasn’t anything that threw me out of the story. The eeriest part about it is that Revolutionary Road makes us think about our own lives and those of our neighbors. Frank and April are still very relevant almost fifty years on as people consistently search for meaning in their lives. It often seems that we are all on a quest for fulfillment and in that respect, this book’s message is haunting, reminding us to seek happiness in what we have and not what is constantly out of reach.
*I am an Amazon Associate. I borrowed this book from the library.
 After emerging the victorious king of Britain in the first book of the trilogy, Arthur now seeks peace with the many tribes and factions below him. His enemies have not vanished and he often is required to fight them, but he always offers agreeable terms, often allowing the belligerents to keep the land they’d contested for but under his rule. Some of Arthur’s Artoriani don’t understand this policy, and neither does Arthur’s wife, Gwenhwyfar, leading to conflict at home in addition to conflict throughout the country. Arthur’s most determined enemies have not vanished, however, and it is these whom he must face down if he intends to keep his kingdom intact.
I like this trilogy. There is really very little of the associated myths around Arthur, but it’s still easy to see how Hollick has worked with the evidence available to her to make a story that is both familiar and surprising at the same time. Characters who were introduced by the French in the high middle ages have vanished, for example, but Arthur is still plagued by Morgause, still sleeps with his half-sister and bears a child by her, and so on. This world is very rough, portraying a Britain caught between native Britons, Romans, and invading Germans, and gives a wonderful backdrop and feel to the story.
Nothing is easy for Arthur. He is portrayed as quite a brilliant warlord and wins his fair share of uphill battles, but when it comes to emotional matters, he tends to fall apart. Since he is both powerful and attractive, he appeals to many women, but he only loves his wife, Gwenhwyfar. Their marriage is fraught with trouble, just like a real marriage, which is a very nice touch. It’s obvious that they love each other, but some hardships are almost impossible to overcome. Arthur doesn’t hesitate to sleep around but is incredibly jealous whenever he thinks Gwenhwyfar might be attracted to another man, which is uncomfortable for the modern reader but is probably more suited to the time than fidelity on both sides.
I really liked the character of Gwenhwyfar; I believe she’s my favorite in the series. She is a strong, independent woman, but she also loves her husband and sons and makes space for everyone in her life. She makes mistakes, mostly driven by emotion, but they only make her more human. I definitely preferred her viewpoint and I am looking forward to more with the final book in the trilogy, Shadow of the King.
Pendragon’s Banner is an excellent continuation to a series about King Arthur that has an authentic feel to it, with great characters and a plot that will have its readers turning pages rapidly. Definitely recommended for fans of historical fiction and Arthurian legend.
Interested to hear more? Visit these other great sites on this blog tour:
The Tome Travellers Weblog (10/12)
A Reader’s Respite (10/12)
Carla Nayland’s Historical Fiction (10/13)
Enchanted by Josephine (10/14)
Fumbling with Fiction (10/14)
Found Not Lost (10/15)
Nan Hawthorne’s Booking the Middle Ages (10/15)
Jenny Loves to Read (10/16)
The Review From Here (10/17)
The Courtier’s Book (10/18)
Chick Loves Lit (10/19)
Love Romance Passion (10/20)
He Followed Me Home… Can I Keep Him? (10/20)
The Impasse Strikes Back (10/21)
S. Krishna’s Books (10/22)
Books Like Breathing (10/23)
Passages to the Past (10/24)
Virginie Says (10/25)
Readaholic (10/25)
Reading with Monie (10/26)
Rundpinne (10/26)
Books & Needlepoint (10/27)
Capricious Reader (10/27)
Books are my Only Friends (10/27)
A Sea of Books (10/28)
Bloody Bad (10/28)
Revenge of the Book Nerds! (10/28)
Booksie’s Blog (10/28)
Devourer of Books (10/29)
Peeking Between the Pages (10/29)
Starting Fresh (10/29)
Historical Tapestry (10/30)
Book Soulmates (10/30)
Susan’s Art & Words (10/30)
Steven Till (10/31)
Café of Dreams (10/31)
I am an Amazon Associate. I received this book from the publisher for review.
 Batuk is a fifteen-year-old Indian prostitute. She was sold into prostitution by her father at only nine years old, after a less than idyllic, but still relatively happy childhood. Batuk’s path to prostitution is devastating, more so what she has to endure each and every day at the hands of strange men, but writing is her salvation. She writes about her life, makes up stories, and in general endures far beyond what any child should ever have to.
It’s incredibly hard to write about this book. Child prostitution is a difficult and horrible subject. Obviously, it should never happen and it is completely wrong. But it does happen, and James Levine has tried to imagine what that life would be like for a little girl. Batuk has been betrayed by everyone and endures the worst kind of humiliation each day of her life, yet she is portrayed as a hopeful child, still vivacious, making the best of a bad situation whenever she can. The story is even more moving because the reader knows that there are girls like this out there, and Batuk feels real.
It is Batuk herself that is the novel’s greatest triumph. It’s difficult to believe that this girl was written by a man because she does feel genuine in every way. She tries not to think about what is happening to her even as her words give it devastating clarity. She puts up a facade and retains hope even though the reader can sense her unhappiness in nearly every line. She does what she must to make the experience bearable while using the rest of her scarce free time to write stories and remember her past. It would be impossible not to feel for her and wish she could escape this life and go back to the countryside where she was at least an innocent.
It’s difficult to say that I liked this book, because it’s so difficult to read. It’s short, but it’s so moving and heartrending. I think it’s important to read, however, if only so we’re forced to confront ourselves with the horrid reality of what might be for real young girls. The author interviewed child prostitutes and based his book on their stories. It’s fiction like this that inspires us to make a difference, and for that reason I do recommend The Blue Notebook.*
*I received this from the publisher for review. This is an Amazon Associates link.
 Catherine Howard has grown up in the country, a relatively insignificant member of an incredibly powerful family. After the death of her cousin Anne Boleyn, the Howard family fortunes fell to some extent, but in 1540, things are about to change. Catherine’s uncle, the duke of Norfolk, brings her to court at age seventeen, when she is at her most beautiful, white-washing her reputation and placing her before the king. Catherine is no innocent but King Henry VIII falls in love with her, convinced that she is his rose without a thorn. When the members of her past come to court intent on blackmail, Catherine’s road to tragedy is assured.
This story is a familiar one for many Tudor enthusiasts, and clearly I’m no exception. I was looking forward to reading Haeger’s portrayal of this young queen. Considering Catherine probably slept with a variety of men, I would think it would be difficult for her to be a sympathetic character, but Haeger makes it look easy. She creates a Catherine that readers will wish had a different ending. Despite her sexual experience, Catherine does seem innocent and naive at times, completely a pawn for her powerful uncle and the Howard family strategy to gain favor. Once she’s gained the eye of the king, there is no looking back for this girl. Her downfall is indeed tragic because Haeger’s Catherine wishes in every instance for something different. When she finally settles into her role as queen and begins to hope she can be good for Henry and for the country, that hope is snatched away from her by her past.
While most of the third person narrative is focused on Catherine, we do occasionally get glimpses into the other characters’ heads, particularly that of Thomas Culpeper. The other characters are not quite so well-defined, but each of them feel intriguing and real, and this is a Tudor world that feels largely authentic and familiar. I enjoyed the rich descriptions, especially of Catherine’s dresses, and felt I could picture all of the players moving about the court, ambitions intact. The plot unfolds in a sensible way; virtually everyone who is interested in Tudor history will know that Catherine was beheaded by Henry VIII, so the book opens on the night before the execution. It then returns to the time when everything began to change for Catherine and the author can explain how she got to that point in her own way. It’s very well done and the book is a pleasure to read. Perhaps my only qualm with it is that Catherine never seems bothered by the fact that she sleeps with every man who looks at her twice. She does it out of boredom, but surely she must worry about pregnancy at the very least. No one seems to lament the loss of her virginity except as it pertains to the king, which did seem strange to me since surely any other nobleman would like his wife to be a virgin, but it’s only a minor part of the story.
Overall, I would recommend The Queen’s Mistake to Tudor enthusiasts and other fans of historical fiction. It’s a well-written peek into the past, with sympathetic characters and an engaging sense of history.
Do you want a copy of your own? Leave a comment here saying you’d like to enter and you can win one of two trade paperback copies from the publisher. This contest is only open to those with a US address and will be open until November 11th. Good luck!
I received this book from the publisher for review. I’m an Amazon Associate.
 Anna Latham, an Omega werewolf still adjusting to her status and history of abuse, has arrived in Montana with her would-be mate, Charles. Charles’ pack is controlled by his father, Bran, the Marrok, or basically the alpha of all the werewolves. As Anna is adjusting to life in a new pack, with new trust issues, and a new mate that she has to get to know, trouble crops up in a nearby forest. Somehow, it’s related to an extremely old werewolf in Bran’s pack who believes he is going a little insane and needs to be put out of his misery. Charles and Anna must do their part to sort out the trouble before the public catches on to the werewolves’ presence while adjusting to new life together.
I can’t really imagine reading this book without having read the short story “Alpha and Omega” in the On the Prowl anthology (my review). It picks up directly afterwards and I can imagine the reader feeling lost without having already been acquainted with Anna and Charles and all that had happened. Similarly, someone who hadn’t read the Mercy Thompson series would have missed out on the connections between books. I don’t know how well this stands alone, but as someone who is a fan, this is a great start to a spin-off series.
It’s not quite as engrossing; Anna is not nearly as compelling as Mercy, for one thing, and Charles still feels a bit stiff. But it’s easy to warm to these characters as they warm to one another, and Anna’s ongoing struggle with her past is handled in what I considered a believable way. Anna has to learn to trust Charles and he has to learn not to do anything to betray that trust. I really felt that they both grew in this novel, so even though they’re not my favorites, they are still likeable and convincing.
The plot itself is a bit of a race to the finish; there is hardly a dull moment and a lot is packed in here with the mystery, resolution, and the relationship drama. The story itself is not really much of a mystery, but more as a way for Anna to develop while providing a bit of suspense outside of love. A lot of the book also fills in pack dynamics which are missing more from the Mercy Thompson series; for example, the concept that the inner wolves mate choose mates without the human side’s consent. This is what happened with Bran and his mate Leah, something I had wondered about, and happens with Anna and Charles almost instantly. Luckily for the latter, their human sides fall in love too, but it’s interesting that this isn’t always the case.
Anyway, I really enjoyed Cry Wolf .* Perhaps not great literature and I wasn’t immediately racing to read the next one, but I’m looking forward to it.
*If you buy through this Amazon link, I will earn a small commission fee.
 During one of the Marquis of Raceworth’s house parties, he is startled to learn that a dowager duchess is waiting for him to attend her. Uncertain what an older woman would want from him, he doesn’t expect to discover that the duchess is young, beautiful, and convinced that he has a set of famous pearls which belong to her mother. Race does own the pearls but is convinced they belonged to his grandmother and are now his. His conviction doesn’t stop him from becoming extremely attracted to Susannah, and the more they search for the pearls, the more he realizes that they are not what matters most to him.
This is such a fun, sweet book. Since I’d read A Duke to Die For, I already really liked the hero and I was pleased to see many of the secondary characters appear again. The central couple, Race and Susannah, served as a wonderful pairing. Susannah is slightly older than the average romance heroine at thirty, and she is a widow. Better yet, she was forced to marry after being caught in a scandal with a man she believed she loved. So not only is she interesting, but so is her background, and makes a lot of her actions in the book more believable. She doesn’t have much to lose by getting involved with Race, unlike your conventional romance heroine, so the romance’s quick pace feels slightly more realistic. She’s also very independent, which I appreciated; we never feel like she needs Race to do anything, she’s fully capable of doing it all on her own.
I really liked the side plot with Gibby. I almost hope he finds someone in the third book of the series, he’s such a sweet older man and it seems a shame that he only loved Race’s grandmother. I also liked the frame story with the pearls, I thought it was a clever way to bring the main couple together and then cause conflict between them. I loved that Race sent Susannah little improper notes; he’s not at all in denial over the way he feels and he wants her to know it.
Overall, I really enjoyed A Marquis to Marry*. I liked both the main characters, I liked their journey to love, and I’m looking forward to Morgan’s story in the next book!
*I am an Amazon Associate. I received both books mentioned in this post from the publisher for review.
 Everything is getting harder for Aislinn, the Summer Queen. She’s finding it harder and harder to resist Keenan, her king, who it seems she is naturally inclined to lust after. Keenan loves Donia, the Winter Queen, and vice versa, but with such opposing natures, these two struggle to make any kind of relationship work. Aislinn still loves Seth and wants to be with him, but he is a human in a faery world and it’s hard on both of them. Aislinn has lost most of her human friends and finds it hard to separate herself from the faery world, making everything more awkward for Seth, who can feel her separation from him. He determines to take drastic measures in an attempt to be with Aislinn forever, not realizing the potential consequences of his choice.
Much of Fragile Eternity is spent on the characters agonizing over one another. A natural, and easy, pairing would have been Aislinn and Keenan, the Summer royalty, who are almost doomed to love one another given the eternity that they are forced to have. Yet both Aislinn and Keenan love elsewhere, hurting both each other and their lovers equally. They can’t stop being drawn together even though they don’t love one another. It is a difficult time for all four people, and Marr explores the tough choices that they have to make with some finesse, even if it feels frustrating. I know I had trouble returning to this book because the relationships were so well drawn and so painful. It was hard to know where the book was going to end up.
Seth’s choice, about halfway through the book, made sense even though I wished it hadn’t come to that. His journey into the world of Faerie was the best part for me. He was finally at peace with his choice, becoming more than frustrated ball of love for Aislinn, and Sorcha is a great addition to the cast of characters. She’s strong, interesting, and simply feels mythical. She adds immeasurably to a book that is largely about tortured lovers by giving the story another outlet. Besides, I always love great worldbuilding and Seth’s journey was a stellar opportunity for Marr to engage in it. I was really looking forward to learning more about the world and I wasn’t at all disappointed.
Overall, I’m not sure this one lives up to Wicked Lovely or Ink Exchange. I think it’s telling that I had to put it aside and take a break from all the angst, and then I dreaded going back to it because I didn’t want the characters to be so unhappy or tortured anymore. To some extent this has always been true of this series, but I really had a hard time here. It also ends in a cliffhanger and the next book isn’t out until 2010. So, I’ll be biting my nails until then! I do plan to continue but next time, I’m going to approach Marr’s books with a totally open and relaxed mind, rather than one which didn’t really need more stress.
This was my first book for Carl’s RIP IV Challenge! I’ve actually completed the challenge now.
 This haunting graphic novel depicts the Holocaust through the eyes of Art’s father, a Polish Jew called Vladek who suffered greatly but survived the concentration camps. Starting with the meeting of his father and his mother, The Complete Maus carries their story through to the end of the horrors, juxtaposed with Art’s present-day life and struggle to appease his elderly father while recording his history before it’s too late. By using animals to represent groups of people (Nazis are cats, Jews are mice, French are frogs, and so on), the author strengthens his allegory and makes this book into an unforgettable and horrifying piece of art.
I hesistated for a few weeks before writing this review. Another review is surely excessive because I’ve seen tons out there. Still, my thoughts wanted a place, and when it comes down to it, this graphic novel hasn’t left me alone yet.
Perhaps what’s most striking about this particular tale is that Vladek is an ordinary old man. In some way, Holocaust survivors are expected to be supernaturally brave, intelligent, and in essence heroes. They are that, but they are also normal people thrust into the worst situation imaginable and forced to cope or die or both. Vladek has undoubtedly been shaped by his experience but not in the best ways. He hoards food, he hoards money, because his world is still uncertain and he knows what deprivation is like. This irritates everyone around him but the saddest part is that he is so normal. It brings home to us the fact that ordinary people were suffered and died for no reason. Vladek is startlingly like my grandpa and that makes the real story even more horrifying than it would have been without the frame. It reminds us how lucky we are, as does Art’s constant struggle with his guilt over his role in his father’s life.
As I’m sure many others have, I have heard a lot of Holocaust stories over my lifetime. I was taught about it in school, given books about it, and chose on my own to read about it on numerous occasions. That doesn’t lessen the impact of this one. Since this one is set in Poland, and there is a lot of running around and hiding before Vladek and Anya are caught, I felt it was a little different than others. The fact that it’s a graphic novel also made a difference. Even in cartoon form, seeing the wasted bodies of the mice is upsetting. The few real pictures added just make a huge impact, reminding us that these were real people.
Overall, this graphic novel is carefully crafted and deeply moving. I don’t want to say something so horrifying is “good”, because that is impossible. Rather, its power and stunning capacity to portray humanity and inhumanity through selected text and drawings makes it worth noting, remembering, and reading.
 When Molly Lane dies, two of her friends meet outside a crematorium to express both their remorse and their view of Molly’s last days. Clive Linley and Vernon Halliday are a pair of extremely successful men who at one point or another had an affair with Molly. Molly died in what they consider a horrible way; she just started to lose it suddenly, became ill, and required her long-suffering husband to nurse her. Clive, the most famous composer of his age, and Vernon, editor of a top newspaper, make a pact after Molly’s death that rebounds against them in a way they’d never expected.
On the back cover, this is described as “a sharp contemporary morality tale, cleverly disguised as a comic novel”, and I can’t say it better than that. The comedy to me appears to come from how ridiculous these men are, how they are so wrapped up in themselves that they can’t hear and don’t care about the outside world at all. By the end of the novel, they have each truly become like Molly, lost to the world without realizing what has happened to them. They’ve been overtaken by an illness, and that illness is, according to Ian McEwan, the ills of public society and the selfishness that it takes to ignore the needs and wellbeing of fellow humans while taking care of number one. The disturbing thing is that neither of them realize it; what they’re doing is so normal to them that they don’t understand what’s wrong. They think they’re adding to society when really they’re just adding to the problem.
Anyway, in that way, this novel is so deep in so few pages that it’s hard to say whether or not I liked it. This is one of those books that I want a class on. There’s a lot here to pick at and just writing that paragraph above has helped me clarify it in my mind. I think I could write a paper on it. It’s less than two hundred pages long, so it didn’t take me very long to read, but it packs in so much thought-provoking material in with the ridiculousness of the situation. The worst part is that, when dissected, the behavior of neither of the characters is ridiculous. They’re doing what has been done countless times before and that is eerie and worrying, especially given the extreme dislike I felt for both of them by the end of the novel. Really the problem with the novel is that it isn’t a very good story. The story and the characters exist only to prove McEwan’s point, which is a strong one, but it doesn’t work very well at a surface level.
In conclusion, there is a very good reason that Amsterdam won the Booker Prize. It’s a truly haunting commentary on society that still manages to be slightly ridiculous enough to make it interesting. I haven’t even touched on all the issues here, but I can tell I’m going to continue thinking about this for some time to come. It isn’t as good as a book as Atonement is, in my humble opinion, particularly because it is shallow in everything but its overall meaning. I still think it’s worth a read.
 As a child, Alexandra Solarin’s father is shot in front of her eyes at a chess tournament in Russia. The mysteries surrounding his death don’t begin to explain themselves until Alexandra is much older. As an apprentice chef, she has now given up on chess, but the game hasn’t abandoned her. Her mother, Cat Velis, throws a birthday party and invites not only Alexandra but several of her irritating neighbors, Alexandra’s aunt Lily Rad, her best friend Nokomis Key, and her last chess opponent, Vartan Azov. The truth behind her parents’ past is revealed to Alexandra bit by bit as the next stage in the game plays itself out against elaborate backdrops with hugely prominent characters holding pivotal roles in the search for the purpose of the Montglane Service.
Unfortunately, I was not a fan of The Eight, the first book in this duology. I knew I wasn’t going to like The Fire and I continued to put it off, but I did agree to review it, so I had to read it eventually. Waiting did not help me to like it any better. My biggest problem with it was that the book was very difficult to follow, particularly for me, since I don’t really like puzzles. The story alternates between two time periods and I had some difficulty figuring out just why. It’s hard to maintain the threads of the story across time and there seems to be little to no purpose for all the famous name dropping. It does give background as to why the chess pieces are where they are, but I’m not sure that was entirely necessary for the story.
I already mentioned it, but I don’t like books that involve puzzles or riddles. It’s always irritating when the characters solve a riddle and say, “Of course!” and proceed to explain the meaning behind it; I’d have never had a clue, so I was happy that they were explaining, but the entire book seemed like a huge complicated mess to me. I dislike puzzles that are impossible for me to solve. (This isn’t confined to books; I also dislike video games with excessive use of puzzles, although somehow straight puzzle games are fine). I think it would have been even worse if I hadn’t read The Eight. I would not recommend starting with this book, it would be too confusing. It’s hard to care about the characters; even Alexandra wasn’t particularly appealing and fell totally flat, which is never good with a main character.
In short, I felt like this book was a disaster for me. I don’t like this type of book and even the historical sections didn’t appeal. They just felt tacked on, especially with the historical characters that are included purely for name dropping, and took away from the more suspenseful plot with Alexandra and her many friends. I have no interest in reading books of this kind. Overall I would say that if you enjoyed The Eight or The Da Vinci Code, give this a shot. If you didn’t, don’t.
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