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 Misha, an aristocratic young officer in the Russian army, returns to his hometown after the Revolution to discover that everything in his life has changed. Tonya, a nurse from a poor family, is dubious regarding the Revolution which is intended to benefit her and her family. Unexpectedly, Misha and Tonya meet and fall in love. Misha’s situation is so difficult, however, that he eventually is conscripted into the army and must flee Russia. Thirty years later, both Misha and Tonya have survived the world wars, but they have suffered and changed drastically. When they realize that they both may be in Berlin, they struggle to find one another, hoping at long last that they may be able to seize happiness.
I had this book on my shelf for 2 years and 2 months before I read it, which now seems very silly to me. Why did I wait so long? It was surprisingly good and entertaining. The love story of Misha and Tonya is very nice, but the real draw of this book is the atmosphere and the history, at least for me. Both characters spend time in concentration and labor camps, are separated from their families, and devastated by these wars. It’s incredible how difficult it is for them and even more so that they survived; I can’t imagine how hard this must have been for people in reality. As a result, the fictional lives of Misha and Tonya are gripping.
While the prose is merely competent, it fails to matter as the story sweeps the reader away, although it does feel awkward at certain points. The blurb on the front of my copy says, “An epic tale of love, war, separation and hope”, which describes this story perfectly. Each character has loved many others, has lived a life for thirty years, married another, and in general put the pieces together by themselves. They may have been happy that way. World War II, however, destroyed their lives yet again, and with everyone else they loved absent, they find solace only in the idea of each other; that by returning to where they started, perhaps they can rediscover joy in their lives.
Certainly the greatest asset this book has is in its characters, Misha in particular. He is somewhat idealized, an aristocrat who is actually noble and is willing to work with his hands, but he is easy to love. His desperate search, his creativity, and his love for all those around him make him a compelling person. It’s easy to see why Tonya loves him; her character changes more over the course of the novel as she endures hardship after hardship. By the end, I was rooting for them to find each other and finally be happy.
I very much enjoyed this historical novel. I generally prefer an older setting than the 20th century, but it would be hard to go wrong with this lovely, moving work of fiction. It isn’t going to change the world, but it is worth your time.
Amazon UK
 From the back cover:
The seven stories in this collection are brilliant examples of the bizarre and wholly unexpected world that Roald Dahl, ‘that great magician’ (Spectator), made his own. It includes not only the trademark dark humour and other-worldly goings-on of ‘The Swan’ and ‘The Boy Who Talked With Animals’, but also a fascinating short essay on how he started writing, his first-ever story, ‘A Piece of Cake’, and the delightfully surprising title tale of a rich young idler who develops a most remarkable ability. Reading them, you’ll find that people are far stranger than you could possibly have suspected …
Roald Dahl’s voice is one that calls me straight back to my childhood and doesn’t let me go until his stories have finished with me. I adored this man’s works when I was younger. I read them countless times. As an adult, I have sometimes wondered what I would think, whether his bias against many members of society would affect my perception of his work. I am usually adept at pushing this aside. While such views are clearly, clearly wrong and probably adults should introduce these facets into discussion with children, it would be useless to forget the past and ignore the fact that Roald Dahl’s beliefs were shared by many. With this in mind, I greatly enjoyed this collection of short stories.
Actually, my least favorite story was probably the title tale. This one follows Henry Sugar, essentially a wastrel, to his discovery of a little blue book which contains an extraordinary story about a man who develops the ability to see somehow without his eyes, but through sustained and focused concentration. Henry learns this skill himself in order to become more successful at gambling, but when money is easy, he learns that there is more in the world he should be fighting for. I don’t know, but I just wasn’t really crazy about the story. I didn’t feel that Henry really redeemed himself or was any different at the end. I didn’t mind the magical aspects, indeed I expected them from Dahl, so it was mostly just his character that got to me.
I enjoyed the rest of the stories though. I really loved Dahl’s essay on how he became a writer and his first short story. I knew most of his history, but I haven’t read Boy or Going Solo for at least 10 years. I love the way he tells his personal history and this was no exception. The way that he backed into writing is fascinating and makes me think of what we would have missed out on had he never managed to find his way. I love the way he tells history, too. I think it adds a more personal touch to the British history which I am so fascinated by. All this time I loved memoirs and when I was a kid, I didn’t even know what I was reading!
This review has become more of an ode to Roald Dahl than a review. To be honest, these stories are mostly not his best work. They don’t quite match up to his novels for kids. (I’m not sure I want to go into his novels for adults. I’m quite happy compartmentalizing him in the happy childhood box of my brain considering what I’ve heard. ) Still, they are entertaining and were a wonderful nostalgia trip for me. If you loved Roald Dahl’s books, you will probably love these stories, too.
Amazon | IndieBound | Powell’s | Amazon UK
 Isidore, the Duchess of Cosway, has never met her husband, and at 23 years of age, she is getting impatient. In Duchess by Night, she goes to the country’s most scandalous house party because she knows that will lure him back to her. She is tired of being a virgin, of being single, and wants to start a family and feel like a real wife. Her scheme works and Simeon Jermyn, the Duke of Cosway, returns to her side, only to suggest that they annul their marriage. She is clearly not the woman he expects and after spending years learning to calm himself and avoid all temptations, her passionate nature is simply too much for his restraint. Isidore can’t let that annulment happen, not after all her years of waiting and when she likes the duke so much, and decides to break through Simeon’s barriers at any cost.
I feel that Eloisa James has hit her stride in this installment of the series. I have moderately liked the two out of three that I have read of the series, but this one was stunning and made me seriously long for the last two stories. I finally felt that the love story here was given the time it deserved. No one changed beyond expectations, the main characters’ interactions sparkled, and I grew even more attached to the secondary characters; Jemma, her husband the Duke of Beaumont, and the Duke of Villiers. They were properly behind the main storyline but I felt that each of their characters has been growing and changing in an impressive manner and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
One quirk that I’ve never come across in romance before is the couple’s lack of experience. Isidore has not slept with or even kissed any other man. Shockingly, neither has Simeon kissed or slept with any woman. The scene in which they both share their first kiss is amazing. It was also a fantastic change of pace to have the characters figuring out what to do in the bedroom. It’s awkward and adorable and best of all, furthers their relationship more than you’d find in most of these books. I liked Simeon better for his lack of rakeish behavior, actually. Romance novel heroes have a reputation. They are men who have experienced all there is, who are experts at the seduction of women. This one? The first time for these two is the epitome of embarrassing. I had to love both of them more after that.
I really have to revise my opinion of these books. If the last two, This Duchess of Mine and A Duke of Her Own live up to the promise in this book, this may become one of my favorite romance series. Simply put, I loved it. I can’t wait to get my hands on the last two of the series.
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 Even though Honour is not nearly as beautiful as her two older sisters Grace and Hope, she has always been nicknamed Beauty, a contradiction she frequently shrugs off. Beauty loves learning and reading and takes great pride in the books she owns; she can own quite a few due to the wealth of her father. While her sisters meet potential husbands, Beauty reads. All this changes when their father’s fleet is lost at sea. Not only has his wealth vanished but so has Grace’s fiance. The family moves inland, away from the city, to a small town on the outskirts of an enchanted forest. When Beauty’s father inadvertantly meets a beast, he must promise to remain forever unless one of his daughters is willing to take his place. Beauty knows her duty and heads into the forest for the confrontation of her life and the making of her future.
I’m very excited about fairy tale retellings these days and I have informally decided that Robin McKinley is the queen of that special feel which only fairy tales have. She hasn’t let me down yet, and she certainly didn’t in this one. When I was a little girl, Beauty and the Beast was one of my favorite movies. I love it now because it’s a love story which does not, for once, revolve around beautiful people, but rather personalities. Beauty must be strong enough to face the Beast and tame him, but he must have an extraordinary personality for her to see past his hideous appearance and love him. I love this dynamic, sucker as I am for romance, and McKinley does it SO. WELL.
I’m assuming everyone knows how the story goes, so I’m not going to try and avoid spoilers, especially because my absolute favorite part was the ending. As we all know, when Beauty admits that she loves the Beast and wants to marry him, he becomes human again. Her shock at his newly attractive appearance – and insistence that she couldn’t marry him, he wasn’t her Beast – was a splendid and moving scene. I could completely believe in this love story and I adored the ethereal feel which Robin McKinley is so, so good at. Yes, I’m in love with this book, and I’m not really ashamed to admit it!
A couple of little things also swept me away in the telling of this story. I loved that the Beast’s library was full of books from the future. It fit in with the magical setting and allowed Beauty plenty of distraction. I think this is meant to be a medieval or early modern world, so books in print would be quite rare at that time. Secondly, I love that Beauty became beautiful as she fell in love and the story went on. She seems young in the beginning, but as time goes on she grows up and grows into her body, which I think is a wonderful physical representation for the growth of her feelings and love towards the Beast.
Anyway, I will now stop my endless rambling and just tell you that you really ought to read Robin McKinley if you haven’t before. I missed her as a child and I regret this so much! I’m loving my discovery of her books and I hope that you would, too. Highly, highly recommended for anyone who loves fantasy or fairy tales.
Available via IndieBound, Powell’s, Amazon, and Amazon UK.
 Miss Anne Jewell is a teacher at Miss Martin’s School for Girls. She is beautiful, beloved by all of her friends, but has a son, David, by a man who was not her husband and is thus branded by society. When Joshua, a cousin of her son’s father and a great help to her, offers to take David and Anne to Wales for a month of summer vacation, Anne can’t refuse for her son’s sake and hesitates when she is treated as a guest rather than as the servant she considers herself. Sydnam Butler is a war veteran, missing an arm and an eye and scarred down half of his body. Now he is steward for his friend’s estate and dreams of buying a small property from him, believing that no woman will love him when children run in fear of his face. Both Anne and Sydnam must heal and understand in order to embrace the feelings that they unexpectedly discover for each other.
Mary Balogh, please welcome yourself to my favorite authors list. I loved this book. It’s not at all what I’d expect from a romance novel. It’s not all passion and sex; that’s fine sometimes, but when it comes to emotional intensity, this book completely astonished me. Both of the main characters are very scarred, Sydnam on the outside and Anne on the inside from the rape which led to David. Here they must overcome the belief they share and learn that they are good enough and that they can love and be loved. They become friends first and developing attraction comes later. It’s so refreshing to read a novel without stunningly beautiful main characters. I didn’t realize how great that would be until this book came along.
Somewhat surprisingly, I also loved David’s part in this novel. He is a child but it’s easy to see his influence on not only his mother but on Sydnam, forcing Sydnam to break a little out of his shell and try to be different. There is a little subplot rotating around Sydnam’s artistic ability and how he can learn to paint again with his left hand, something he thought he would never do. No one is allowed to remain comfortable in this book, everyone has to take a step outside of their comfort zone and learn to compromise to be with other people, which is what love is all about.
Oh, I can’t gush enough about this one. Even the sex is quite subdued if that’s what puts you off romances. This is an emotionally satisfying, moving read that I think is worth a try by everyone.
Available via IndieBound, Powell’s, Amazon, and Amazon UK.
 In 1940, Greek geologist Athos was digging in a war-stricken Polish city when a small boy emerged from the mud; no one realized that he was alive until he started to cry. Jakob was only seven years old and his entire family had been taken and probably killed by the Nazis. Athos decides to risk his own life by taking the boy home to Greece, where they settle, hide, starve, but begin to know each other and develop a relationship and education. We follow Jakob into adulthood, watching him write poetry that reflects their haunted past as well as their uncertain future.
This book may have been slightly too literary for me. I loved the idea of the story but I’m never all that fond of books told in abstracts. Perhaps I read it too soon after The English Patient, which I still haven’t found the words to review; both books are similar in their slow exploration of the effects of war on people’s psyche and in their meandering focus on people rather than plot. I’m not sure I’m always in a mood for such a read. A week later, however, I find myself pondering this book, wondering about Jakob.
Jakob’s transition from lost and lonely boy to educated, confident, loving man is quite a fascinating one. We first witness Jakob’s life, then the life of another man who is significantly influenced by him and by the war. There are multiple threads running through the novel; perhaps the most important, I felt, were the bonds of love. Jakob loves Athos; he loves his wives; he loves his parents and perhaps most especially, he loves his lost sister Bella, who he manages to carry in his heart throughout his life.
I was a bit perplexed by the addition of the second character in the final 100 pages of the book. I wasn’t as interested in him as I was in Jakob. I can see the parallels between them and I understand the effect of showing the significance Jakob had after his death, but I felt there were unanswered questions and I wanted the answers. This book would be better read with other people in order to think and discuss more closely its literary significance. I’m sure there is a great deal here that I am not picking up on my own. I’m planning to read it again and see what I can find the next time.
Available via Indiebound, Powell’s, Amazon, and Amazon UK.
 Mercy Thompson is an auto mechanic. She’s also a shape shifter and lives next door to a sexy werewolf, Adam, in a world where supernatural creatures are being forced out of hiding due to advancing science. When a new, teenage werewolf who isn’t affiliated with Adam’s pack shows up in Mercy’s shop, she finds herself in the middle of both a werewolf war and a love triangle as she goes back into her own past for some answers.
I very much enjoyed this book. I liked this version of AU America; every urban fantasy has a slightly different twist on it and this one is great. It makes perfect sense to me that werewolves, vampires, and the like are about to be outed via modern science. If we can cure diseases, surely we can investigate other physical phenomena. Since most urban fantasy gathers werewolves into packs like this one, it was a wonderful move to set Mercy slightly outside the pack. She turns into a coyote but shares few of the advantages that werewolves have; she is not necessarily more human than they are but she is one step outside of their society while still being in it enough to be a part of the action.
Mercy herself is a great character. She is brave, a bit stubborn, and clearly a tomboy, but still has a romantic heart and is very easy to relate to. I had a soft spot for her the minute I learned she’d majored in history. She’s determined to get to the truth of the mystery she’s unearthed and she doesn’t back down when threats emerge. I think her struggles with the men in her life only enrich her character more; we learn about her history and simultaneously can witness for ourselves just how much she’s grown and changed.
The plot rockets along in this short book, which comes in under 300 pages; there were a couple of times when I felt that Mercy was explaining a little too much but as something of a set-up for the world, I’m used to it in the first book of a series. I’ve been reading a lot of these lately. By the time I hit the middle, I needed to know what happened, and by the end, I didn’t want to give it up.
I can’t wait to read Blood Bound. I immediately went and ordered it online and now I’m just waiting impatiently for it to arrive. I really, really enjoyed this book. I can’t wait for the relationships between the characters to deepen, for another story to start, or to learn more about the world. If you like urban fantasy, I highly recommend giving this series a shot.
Buy it from Amazon, Amazon UK, Powell’s, or IndieBound.
 Charles Boutin’s defection to the other side is a serious blow to the Colonial Defense Forces. As a top military scientist, he had access to many of their secrets. As a genius, he’s capable of equipping the enemy with more sophisticated technology than humans, even the genetically modified humans in the forces, can handle. Luckily (or unluckily depending on your perspective) Boutin managed to preserve his consciousness on a computer, something that had never before been accomplished. And so Jared Dirac is created from Charles Boutin’s DNA, a clone which they hope will provide them with answers. When Jared wakes up, he is a newborn like every other newborn Ghost Brigades soldier, but as his experiences in war add up, he finds Boutin’s emotions, memories, and personality emerging, making him both dangerous and essential in the war effort.
Does anyone remember how I said I didn’t like science fiction? John Scalzi has blown holes in that theory. I read this in three hours on a train and the time simply flew by. I often comment on characters in my reviews because I think great, well-developed characters are more or less essential to my enjoyment of a book. I don’t like exclusively plot-driven works. Thus, this book, in which discoveries that relate to the plot are made only when the main character changes enough to trigger his memories, worked perfectly for me. Jared was fantastic. I loved reading about his development from essentially nothing, into this relatively submissive guy called Jared, and then into someone much closer to Charles Boutin. There is plenty of plot here, but there are also great characters and great human emotions that, to me, made this book. There is also a tie-in character from Old Man’s War which very quickly enabled me to build on that book with this one.
There is something else I like about this series that others may not. Scalzi is a little bit merciless with the killing of characters. I may be weird but I love this. I like the unpredictability of it, especially in fantasy or, apparently, science fiction. It makes the world real for me. I can grieve over characters I’ve become attached to but the unpredictability often makes the book that much more exciting for me and elicits more reaction from me. There are no guarantees here. I read enough fiction where endings are assured and I like those in their place, but sometimes I just want something I’m not expecting. Scalzi delivers just that.
Even more amazing for me and science fiction, I like the world he’s created. It’s strong and well-developed. I know which aliens are which and what they’re good at. I understand the technological advancements that have been made. For the most part, we’re acquainted with all these details in Old Man’s War, but with the focus on the Special Forces/Ghost Brigades in this novel, we become more familiar with the oddities of the new developments in body technology. This isn’t at all overwhelming, though. I was astonished by this personally, but I was actually interested in how the science was going. I want to know where it’s going next!
I love this series. I can’t wait to read The Last Colony and Zoe’s Tale. If you are in general cool with the concept of alternate worlds, I highly recommend this series.
The Ghost Brigades is available from Amazon and Amazon UK.
 This one is too hard to describe, so I’m going to go with the publisher’s website:
Johnny Truant, wild and troubled sometime employee in a LA tattoo parlour, finds a notebook kept by Zampano, a reclusive old man found dead in a cluttered apartment. Herein is the heavily annotated story of the Navidson Report.
Will Navidson, a photojournalist, and his family move into a new house. What happens next is recorded on videotapes and in interviews. Now the Navidsons are household names. Zampano, writing on loose sheets, stained napkins, crammed notebooks, has compiled what must be the definitive work on the events on Ash Tree Lane.
But Johnny Truant has never heard of the Navidson Record. Nor has anyone else he knows. And the more he reads about Will Navidson’s house, the more frightened he becomes. Paranoia besets him. The worst part is that he can’t just dismiss the notebook as the ramblings of a crazy old man. He’s starting to notice things changing around him . . .
This book is a little strange. Well, a lot strange. This synopsis doesn’t mention that sometimes, the words are scattered in weird shapes across the page. The word house is always colored blue. When Navidson climbs a ladder, for example, the words assemble themselves into a column, forcing you to turn the book to the side and read upwards. When the book references other articles, they are sometimes displayed as cut-outs within the text. There are prodigious numbers of footnotes and about a third of the book is pseudo-academic, breaking apart and analyzing the Navidson movies, which are at the heart of this whole mess. This book is supposedly post-modern at its very finest. I have to confess, I’m not a fan of post-modern. Creepy, yes, science fiction, more and more, stories within stories, yes. Reading a pseudo-academic text when I have enough academic texts to read? Not so much. I can totally see how it builds upon the story and adds to the general atmosphere, but not for me.
This book, originally distributed through the internet and popular through solely word-of-mouth, has now been picked up and published for the world to read. I can see how those who like experimental, questioning, thinky reads can sink deep into this one. I like thinky reads, but I don’t like experimental when I have to turn the book upside-down or try to catch all the clever references in the text to get what’s going on. More, I didn’t like Johnny Truant. Whenever I saw his font, I groaned internally. He’s not even close to a productive member of society. He spends most of the book panting over girls he can’t have, watching his life go to nothing, and complaining that a book has changed his life and scarred him forever. I didn’t find his scary scenes creepy because I didn’t care if something ate him. I would have been happy. I’m discovering more and more that I don’t really like scummy characters who make no efforts to redeem themselves. His life story explains to some extent how he got where he is, but maybe I’m just too much of a goody-goody, because I can’t get into these characters’ heads and I struggle a lot with feeling for them or caring what happens to them unless they make some effort to better themselves.
What I did like, and what I liked a lot, was the story of the Navidson record. I was creeped out by the house and its endless black hallways. I was interested in the development of the relationships between Navidson, Karen, and all the men who help them investigate their strange house. I was perplexed myself by the house and what it all meant. This storyline and discovering what happened to Navy, as he’s nicknamed, was what kept me reading this book until the end when otherwise I’m sure I would have given up. I would have preferred this book to be stripped of all its post-modern, fancy, academic trappings and to just be a regular science fiction novel about a house. It probably wouldn’t have achieved its cult fame that way, but I do think that it would have made a much better story and a more arresting read. Is that just me? Probably.
I was glad I liked some of this book – it didn’t look likely for a while and I abandoned it for about three weeks in the middle of reading – but I can’t honestly recommend it. My fiance also read it and he is the one who urged me to read it myself (it was my book to start with), so obviously it does appeal to some. Just not to me.
Check it out on Amazon and Amazon UK.
 When Josh was almost killed by a bomb in Rome, it triggered a sequence of past-life memories from which he cannot escape. He realizes that he has been reincarnated and nearly two thousand years ago, he was a priest named Julius in love with a Vestal Virgin named Sabina. He feels a need to find her and save her, but he doesn’t know how. On a trip to Rome, his feet land him at an archaeological site where Sabina lies buried, leading to a murder, an investigation, and a desperate search to figure out what his memories are telling him and why.
This was a racing read and I had a hard time putting it down. I originally won it to participate in By The Chapter, so I decided I would read it over the space of the week. That definitely did not happen because I am not a patient person. By the time I was halfway through I just had to know the ending, so I ended up finishing it in two days instead of five. Oops. It’s certainly addicting.
While Josh’s version of reincarnation sounds interesting, I don’t think I’d like to experience it in the same way that he does. It sounds painful and I certainly wouldn’t want to long for a woman who had been dead for many years, knowing that I was looking for her in every face I saw. It was quite curious how many people had been reincarnated, but I suppose we’d have to take it as a matter of course. Many, many people have walked this planet before. I thought the list of sources at the back even more interesting. I had no idea that anyone studied this, and while I don’t believe it myself, I almost want to pick up one of those books just to learn more.
I don’t want to give anything away, but I did feel let down by the ending of this book. While some loose ends were tied up, it felt like something of a cop-out and diminished the appeal of the rest of the work. Despite that, I’d still love to read The Memorist, which is the sequel to this book. I think the ride to the ending mattered more to me in this case.
This book is available from Amazon and Amazon UK.
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