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 Apparently, my recent burnout only applies to historical fiction, not history. I’ve no idea why this is. Perhaps I’m just craving some truth! In any case, I definitely needed an escape from the Tudors. My nanowrimo novel is set in the late Victorian period in England, so I was thrilled to discover a biography of Daisy Greville, Countess of Warwick in the library yesterday. When my parents were visiting, we went up to Warwick Castle, and they have a large exhibit based on one of her house parties, complete with wax figures of all the guests from Madame Tussauds in the rooms that they stayed in. The brief explanations of the personalities were not enough for me, so I thought it would be exciting to learn about this woman who was simultaneously a political figure and the mistress of many of the period’s important men, and I was right. It seems like a life in contradictions, but she straddles a fascinating divide between an ignorant aristocracy and an aristocracy campaigning for the rights of ordinary working people.
That novel is going fairly well. I’m ahead of the curve at 17,603 words. I haven’t written anything today yet, but I hope to a bit later on. We had Sky TV installed today and we’ve been busy playing with it rather than getting anything else accomplished. I’m a little less involved with the novel than I was a week ago, but I’m still finding my daily quota easy to meet, and I hope that continues.
One bookish thing I’m very excited about participating in this holiday season is the Book Blogger Holiday Swap. I can’t wait to find out who I’m buying a gift for. If you want to sign up, you have until November 12th, so don’t wait!
Finally, I’d better get back to my novel, but have a wedding picture:
The rest can be found here. Have a good week everyone!
I am an Amazon Associate.
 Todd Hewitt is nearly thirteen years old and has never seen a woman. He knows what women look like, though, because he can see them in other men’s thoughts. The ability to see thoughts – words and images – is called Noise, and all the men in his town have the same ability. The Noise, a disease passed on by the Spackle, aliens who previously inhabited Todd’s world, isn’t just limited to men, as all animals can talk, including Todd’s slightly stupid dog, Manchee. On Todd’s thirteenth birthday, he will become a man, the last boy in his town to do so, but before that can happen, Todd encounters a pocket of silence that leads to his expulsion from Prentisstown and causes him to question everything he’s ever known.
This is a book that has been hyped throughout the blogosphere endlessly. I know I bought it because so many book bloggers I trust had read and loved it. I think my expectations made the book less of an experience for me. I simply knew it was meant to be amazing, so perhaps it’s not a surprise that it wasn’t. That isn’t to say I didn’t enjoy it, because I did, but it hasn’t immediately catapulted itself onto my list of all-time favorite books. The rest of this review might contain slight spoilers, so I wouldn’t suggest reading it unless you’ve completed the book.
The best and the worst thing about this book is the pace. It’s Todd’s frantic flight from his entire life, a girl and a dog in tow, with terrifyingly bad men behind them. The sense of urgency is overwhelming and is constantly pushing the reader to read on, to read faster, to find out what happens next. While this ability to absorb me is a great thing in a new era of books that only half-heartedly interest me, it also harmed the book’s impact, perhaps because I did read it so quickly. I did get attached to Todd and Viola and Manchee, but all of the tragedy within the book simply did not have the time to emotionally hit me. Something else happened so quickly that the characters couldn’t dwell on their losses or problems, so I didn’t really feel them the way I was supposed to. In addition, the many tragedies made the book feel somewhat emotionally manipulative. There is no respite from it at all.
There is still a lot to love here, though. The concept of the Noise is just fascinating and while the men of Prentisstown can’t be excused for what they did, it’s so easy to see how this could drive someone mad. Todd is an incredibly loveable character despite what he’s driven to do over the course of the novel. I even enjoyed the deliberate misspellings because I felt they revealed a lot of his childishness and innocence; they gave him part of his voice and I honestly don’t think the book would be the same without it. Best of all, I think, was his relationship with Viola, even though he’s obstinate as only a boy could be at the beginning. At first he sees Viola as a foreign object, then as a woman, and finally as a person, just like him, and I think the transformation of his thinking and their interactions was my favorite part of the entire book. If you read this blog you know I’m all about the relationships between characters and this is a great one.
So, in short, The Knife of Never Letting Go* didn’t totally blow me away and it’s not my favorite book of the year, but I seriously enjoyed it and I’m anxiously awaiting the return of The Ask and the Answer* to the library so I can continue the story.
*I am an Amazon Associate and earn a small referral fee if you purchase through these links. I purchased this book.
 Anna and Charles Cornick are just settling in to their new life together when Charles’s father, Bran, the Marrok of all the werewolves, sets up a meeting with all the European werewolves to discuss revealing their existence. Charles finally convinces Bran to send him in his father’s place, so Charles and Anna head to Seattle, prepared for a confrontation. The other werewolves are not going to be pleased with Bran’s plans, particularly not the Beast of Gevaudan, Jean Chastel, who used to openly kill and eat human beings, and rules France to some extent after killing all the other Alphas, or the British werewolf Arthur who believes he really is King Arthur. When a pack of vampires attack Anna on a shopping excursion, the risks escalate and Charles must find the culprit before Anna dies and the Marrok’s plans for peace are ruined.
This is another enjoyable urban fantasy from Patricia Briggs. I felt that this was an improvement over Cry Wolf. There is a lot going on with the plot that is really interesting in context of the universe. Revealing the werewolves’ presence could have a huge impact on all the characters in both this series and the Mercy Thompson series, so it was very interesting to see what happened there. And of course that is certainly not enough, there are also death threats, mysteries, and murders sprinkled throughout the book, leading to one very intriguing and totally unexpected conclusion. If not brilliantly written, Hunting Ground is definitely well-plotted. The villains are all suspicious in their own way, but the overarching deal and the meanings of some of the events early on do not become clear until the end. There is also a nice tie-in with everyone’s favorite Arthurian legend since the British werewolf believes he is actually King Arthur reincarnated. This is a neat addition to an already complex world, but it doesn’t feel too out of place.
The relationship between Anna and Charles continues to develop in a lovely and believable way. They have learned to trust one another, mainly, but there are still small pockets of tension, just like any other real relationship. Anna continues to come into her own, realizing her strengths and beginning to break out of the super-submissive mode by recategorizing just what she is. Meeting her first fellow Omega wolf helps her a lot in this respect and I really look forward to seeing what she does next.
I definitely am enjoying this series. It may still take a backseat to Mercy, but it is another urban fantasy series to watch from Patricia Briggs.
I am an Amazon Associate.
 Rose and Lissa are best friends. Lissa is one of the Moroi vampires, while Rose is a dhampir, learning to become a guardian and protect Lissa from the Strigoi, the evil vampires. Convinced that someone was out to get Lissa, the two fled St. Vladimir’s Academy, living on their own and evading capture. That only lasted so long, however, and now the girls are back at school. Sexy dhampir guardian Dimitri found the girls and while acting as guardian for Lissa, begins to train Rose to become a far better guardian than she was before. In the face of a new danger, can Rose keep Lissa safe while denying her newfound attraction for the older Dimitri?
Vampire Academy is a fun start to what appears to be a promising YA series. For once, it isn’t particularly Twilight-esque and I appreciated its originality with the two different kinds of vampires and the dhampirs as the guardians of the Moroi vampires. It’s a well done world. I always enjoy books set in boarding schools. They provide such a terrific setting with all the characters in one place, with a reason for them to be parentless, and I find that I often wish I could go there myself (Hogwarts is the best example of this). While I don’t think I want to attend St. Vladimir’s Academy, the setting worked perfectly and allowed all of the young drama to take a strong hold on the characters and their actions.
Rose is by far the strongest character in the book. She is a vibrant teenager that visibly grows over the course of the book. She is a bit promiscuous, but I like that she learned over the course of the novel how to be a better guardian and became much more of an adult. Her priorities straightened out and her development was impressive and fluid. I really liked her crush on Dimitri. I think most teenage girls have an older man that they decide they love, so it humanizes her and gives the story an interesting direction to take for the next few books. I’m really looking forward to seeing where it goes. Lissa is a weaker heroine, in part because we see her only through Rose’s eyes. She seems to be loyal and kind, but it’s harder to get a grasp on her personality, although I loved her scenes with Christian when Rose was spying on them.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book. It’s great YA urban fantasy and I’m looking forward to continuing the series.
I purchased this book. I’m an Amazon Associate.
 I have been very lazy with my Library Loot (hosted by Eva and Marg) posts lately. The reason is because I’ve been using my husband’s computer. It’s more powerful than my laptop and our flat is so small that I don’t need the portability, plus typing at the desk is better for my wrists. My camera, however, uses an SD card that I can just plug into my laptop and get the pictures from, so I’ve long lost my camera cord, and that means I can’t get pictures onto this computer directly from it. This computer does not have the slot for the SD card. I’m generally too lazy to wait the ten minutes it takes to start up my laptop, upload the pictures, and then turn the thing off again right away. So, I’m just using some cover pictures from Amazon today. I hope no one minds! This post covers a couple of trips. Links on the pictures go to LibraryThing, in text go to Amazon through my Amazon Associates account.
From the big library:
   
- Nocturnes, Kazuo Ishiguro – I already finished all the stories in this and am in the process of writing my review. Ishiguro is one of my favorite authors and now I’ve read all of his books but The Unconsoled, which I have on my TBR pile. This collection was not as good as the novels, but I’ll leave the rest for my post.
- My Invented Country, Isabel Allende – This is for the Women Unbound challenge. I loved one of Allende’s later memoirs, so I’m looking forward to this.
- The Tale of Murasaki, Liza Dalby – Same as above! This is historical fiction, which I’m a little tired of, but hopefully medieval Japan will be different enough to captivate me.
- The Borgia Bride, Jeanne Kalogridis – I got this out a couple weeks ago, before I realized I was tired of historical fiction, and it’s pretty big. I may need to renew it.
And the smaller library:
  
- The Dark Rose, Cynthia Harrod-Eagles – I waited for this second volume in the Morland Dynasty series for months in York and never got it. Just found it on the shelf here, and was thrilled!
- Wild Swans, Jung Chang – Another for the Women Unbound Challenge.
- Brave New World, Aldous Huxley – I’ve been wanting to read this for years.
Have you taken anything interesting out of the library lately?
 Living in seventeenth-century China, Peony has never left her family’s home. Her mother has kept her inside to maintain her virtue and modesty as she prepares to marry out to a stranger. Peony is nearly sixteen, and on her birthday, her father has planned a performance of her favorite play, The Peony Pavilion. As the only child, Peony has been educated beyond what her mother deems appropriate, and as a result has a great appreciation for literature. On the night of the play, Peony accidentally meets a handsome young poet, immediately falling in love with him. In despair over her approaching marriage to a stranger and consumed by obsession for the play and her poet, Peony’s life spirals into a haunting struggle through the nebulous underworld and culminates with her quest to give Chinese women a voice.
I’ve been looking forward to this novel since it came out and was pleased to finally have the opportunity to read it. Lisa See didn’t let me down; while not as masterful as Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, which I read before blogging, Peony in Love* is a romantic story about the struggles of women in China with an abundance of fascinating historical detail and a healthy dose of fantasy. Peony dies in the first third of the novel (this is revealed on the back cover, so I don’t consider it a spoiler) and enters a world of Chinese mythology, where Lisa See uses her research on those beliefs to elaborate on how Peony can still communicate and influence those she loves. We know her ending cannot be totally happy, but her story is still compelling and absorbing.
My favorite aspect of the book was how it mirrored The Peony Pavilion in many ways but also reflected real historical events. I have never read the play, but enough is described in this novel to make it clear that Peony is essentially trying to become Liniang and get her Mengmei to bring her back to life. It was fascinating and maddening to realize that many young women did actually die of “lovesickness” in this way. Basically, it’s believed that they became anorexic, which is horrifying, to both gain control over their lives and because they supposedly believed that true love would save them. Even though this sounds a little far-fetched, it’s easy to relate to Peony and sympathize with her. She’s fallen in love and believes that now she is forced to marry a stranger. I loved the details of her preparations for marriage (except the repeat footbinding!) and the ceremonies enacted before and after her death. This is a part of the world and a period in history I just don’t read enough about.
Better yet, I liked how the novel emphasized the role of women in China and how it has been eroded throughout the centuries. The Three Wives’ Commentary on the play actually exists, as did the writing groups and female poets in the novel, and I’m incredibly intrigued by them and want to learn more about the movement. This is why I love historical fiction! Not only did I get a great story, but I also got a peek into unfamiliar history and a strong desire to learn what’s true and what’s fiction. Peony in Love is definitely recommended.
*I am an Amazon Associate. I purchased all books mentioned in this post.
 This companion novel to Oryx and Crake takes the reader into the pleeblands, exploring the effect that Crake’s super virus had on the ordinary people. Toby and Ren both spent a time as God’s Gardeners, a religion devoted to worshipping God through plants and science, but later leave the group through events out of their control. Toby, an older woman, is working at a spa when the catastrophe happens, and manages to stay alive through eating the edible treatments. Ren is a young woman working as a trapeze dancer in a sex club, thankfully locked into a controlled room and saved from the virus. As these women attempt to survive, they wonder if their friends have survived, and reflect on the paths their lives took before they ended up here.
Whereas it was difficult to relate to any of the characters in Oryx and Crake, it’s amazingly easy here, and I feel comfortable saying that Ren and Toby put a human face on this dystopian world. They are the marginalized members of society, but they are still real women forced to confront women’s issues. Toby is driven to the Gardeners after her boss basically rapes her and then decides that she is his, probably intending to kill her. When Ren joins the Gardeners, she is just a young girl at the mercy of her mother’s mercurial temperament, and later suffers from unrequited love with a man who really does not deserve her. In a totally alien, if well-described, world, Ren and Toby are easy to relate to and bring the suffering home in a way that Oryx and Crake fails to do. Ren was actually my favorite, if only because we watch her grow up. Even though she eventually ends up in one of the elite high schools, she’s still dealing with issues every teenager understands:
I saw the temptation. I saw it clearly. I would come up with more bizarre details about my cultish life, and then I would pretend that I thought all these things were as warped as the HelthWyzer kids did. That would be popular. But also I saw myself the way the Adams and Eves would see me: with sadness, with disappointment. Adam One, and Toby, and Rebecca. And Pilar, even though she was dead. And even Zeb.
How easy it is, treachery. You just slide into it. But I knew that already, because of Bernice.
– p. 195
This is truly a wonderful novel. I felt the dystopian world was a bit less clear here, perhaps more ridiculous without the inside view, but because I’d read Oryx and Crake, I didn’t have many questions. Rather, the novels worked in tandem, and I really think it helped to read one right after the other. I don’t think it’s necessary, but it provides a complete and intriguing picture. Some of the same characters appear, and actually had bigger parts than I’d expected, plus some bigger issues are clarified. If I had to choose, though, I’d choose this one. I’m all about great characters, and Ren and Toby win the day for me. I must admit, however, that I generally skipped over the God’s Gardener homilies and songs, but I didn’t find it deterred from the plot.
I loved The Year of the Flood* and I highly recommend it.
*I am an Amazon Associate. I received this book from the publisher for review.
 Humanity has been devastated by a virus and Snowman, formerly known as Jimmy, is perhaps the only human to have survived, for all he knows. With him are his friend Crake’s perfect creations, people genetically modified to become more perfect than ordinary human beings. They have better ways of sustaining themselves, go into heat like animals to avoid difficult romantic situations, and can even purr to heal injuries. Snowman, however, is having a much more difficult time surviving, and juxtaposes his struggle to find more food with his personal history, his love affair with Oryx, and how he found himself to be alone.
This is only my second Margaret Atwood novel, and after loving The Handmaid’s Tale, I’m really wondering why it took me so long to read another. I adore dystopias and Atwood has created another intriguing world here, if not quite as plausible. When Jimmy was a child, the Corporations ruled supreme, essentially acting as one big government. The world outside of the Corporations was unimportant, the people only used as test subjects and cash cows as medicines were infused with illnesses to keep the market booming. If any worker betrayed insider secrets, they were killed. This was the world of Jimmy’s childhood, and while he wasn’t brilliant enough for a high position, his best friend Glenn, later known as Crake, certainly was. It is Crake who sets out to change everything and puts in motion the events that destroy the world as everyone knows it.
While I couldn’t say I actually liked any of the characters, which was the book’s weakest point, it was hard for me to tear myself away from this book. I was fascinated by the development of the plot; we know early on that the world has changed drastically, but finding out just how and why was riveting. I didn’t like Jimmy/Snowman all that much, due to his escapades with women and his irritating obsession with Oryx, but I loved the curiosities of his world. His struggle to find more food allows us to relate to him even as we dislike him, but it also serves the purpose of guiding us through more of the world.
For me, the best part was the Crakers, the genetically altered beings that Crake created. What I liked about them was that even though they were modified to escape supposed human foibles, they still exhibited that humanity. This was mainly through their acceptance of a god-like story featuring, as expected, Oryx and Crake. Even though they’re reportedly hard-wired to miss out on all mistakes, they are still people and it’s almost as though we can see their mythology evolving. Snowman doesn’t know how else to explain it to them and they latch on remarkably easily. Fascinating stuff, and that really cemented the entire book for me.
Atwood is a remarkable author. Oryx and Crake* has convinced me that I really need to get reading more of her work. I certainly recommend this, especially to those who enjoy dystopias and science fiction.
*I am an Amazon Associate. I borrowed this book from the library.
 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.
Yesterday, I said I was starting my participation in NaNoWriMo today. And I have officially begun. I wrote 2000 words this morning, so I’m off to a good start. If anyone would like to add me as a buddy over there, please do – my username is medievalbookworm. I’m writing a historical romance novel for two reasons; I always thought I could, and I know how it will end, which has always stymied me in the past when writing longer works of fiction. If I know the ending, surely I will be able to somehow get the novel there. I just want to see how it goes and that involves choosing the easiest genre (for me) to write. Although to be honest I wouldn’t be surprised if mine was the tamest romance ever – I prefer the ones without explicit scenes, believe it or not. I don’t particularly want anyone to read it, but I’m happy that it’s moving along nicely and I found it fairly easy to write. In fact, I might even write more later, as the feeling is surprisingly exhilarating.
In other bookish news, I have plenty to read these days. I have a library loot post coming up this week with several weeks’ worth of loot, but my most exciting find was Kazuo Ishiguro’s new short story collection, Nocturnes. How can I resist Ishiguro? He’s one of my favorite authors and I had a moment of absolute glee when I saw it in the new book section. I don’t think these stories are going to stay unread for very long. I also finished Ash by Malinda Lo last night and I unexpectedly adored it, so I’m for once looking forward to writing a review. I was feeling frustrated with my reading last week, but I think all I needed was a change of pace, reading what I want to read rather than what I need to review. I think if I intersperse reading that I choose with the review copies, things will go much more smoothly. In all honesty I don’t have very many books for review – I’ve stopped requesting at all and only accept if I think a book will be very good – so this should not be a challenge. So, today I’m going to be reading Nocturnes and Heart’s Blood by Juliet Marillier, and after I’m finished with them I will try and go back to read a review copy.
I’m not sure which books will be ahead this week; I’m just going to see how I feel. What are you planning on reading this week?
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