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 Ever since Katie lost her mother, she and her father, who restores old paintings, have rattled around in their big house, almost consumed with grief. Nothing is the same without her mother; Katie abandons her friends, her interests, and spends time remembering. As a balm for her soul, Katie gets away by taking a summer job at a nearby estate, digging up the garden and soon enough a mystery to go with it. In the midst of discovering another woman’s story, Katie begins to clarify her own, to reach out and embrace life and love in just the way her mother might have wanted.
It’s easy to explain why I loved Nothing but Ghosts. It is deep and meaningful and poignant, relieved by the mystery and the hint of a love story, written in absolutely stunning language. Kephart’s prose is the kind that you get lost in; almost poetic in its beauty, it had me thinking about certain lines, going back to pick up the pieces of something I’d just discovered, and at times just marveling at how effectively, simply, but gorgeously she gets Katie’s feelings across. There are connections throughout the book and I can’t wait to go back, read it again, and pick up a little on what I missed, because I know it’s there. This is a YA novel, but is easily appreciated by adults, particularly because it is so full of substance.
This book truly gets Kephart’s talent across in its depiction of Katie’s grief. Grief is impossible to define and at times it certainly feels that everyone’s grief is different, every loss is different. Yet somehow in this little novel, Kephart has written the most realistic depiction of grief that I have ever read.
Everything looks like caution afterward, everything inside me feels old and used and cracked, and people say, “Oh, Katie, you’ve handled your mother’s passing so well,” and I think, Handled. Handled? I’m barely breathing, can’t you tell? And somewhere out there Jessie and Ellen are laughing, just the two of them, in the back of an old theater, and they think that I’ve forgotten them, maybe, but I haven’t. I never would – they just remind me of my mother, they just ask about my mother, and that’s not a question I want to hear, even if I knew how to answer.
– p. 132-3.
Caution is a theme that runs through the book, as if Katie needs to step carefully without her mother’s protection, as if she needs to warn off the world because she has been damaged and hasn’t healed enough yet. There are so many meanings within this book that I’m sure someone else will draw something completely new from it that I hadn’t even considered. It’s thoughtful, quiet, but huge in its impact.
The plot itself is intriguing and I didn’t see where the mystery was going. I loved the little touch of romance. I thought a careful, slow romance with a boy heading off to college soon, someone unconnected to her mother, was perfect for this stage in her life. I sat down and read this book in only a couple of hours, it was that addictive, and then I kept thinking about it when I’d finished. For me, this is a hallmark of a great book. So often I put them down and forget all about them, but this one, I’m remembering. I can’t wait to read more by Beth Kephart.
 One day, Bruno comes home to find a maid packing all of his things, even his personal things hidden at the back of his closet. He’s very unhappy and even more so when he discovers that his family is moving away from Berlin, his three best friends, and even his grandparents. At first glance, there are no children near Bruno’s new home, but there are a lot of people who wear striped pyjamas behind a fence. Because Bruno is curious, he wanders away from the house, and his adventure, and all those following, illuminate the mind of a little boy who has no knowledge of prejudice and the true horror to which that prejudice can lead.
I almost can’t talk about my reaction to this book. I sort of want to just say, read this, and leave it at that. That wouldn’t be a very good review, though, and I like to at least pretend that I can write decent reviews. Actually, I do think that if you haven’t read this, it might be a good idea to stop here, because this book is best knowing just what I’ve said and nothing more.
Easily, the best thing about this book is Bruno’s innocent response to everything. He is just a little boy and doesn’t yet understand that all little boys’ lives aren’t exactly like his. This is especially so because his three best friends have very similar lives to his. His parents have kept him ignorant of world events, so he doesn’t know that he is in the midst of World War II. He doesn’t know that he’s moved just outside of a concentration camp or that right now it’s a bad thing that his new friend through the fence is a Jew. In fact, he thinks it’s cool that everyone wears the same clothes, and doesn’t understand that when someone goes missing in the camp, they haven’t wandered off, it’s because they’ve been killed. He doesn’t realize that his father is a high-ranking Nazi and is causing these people to labor, starve, and die.
Bruno’s adorable personality made the book for me. The rest of the characters are shadowy and insubstantial, witnessed only through a little boy’s eyes. Shmuel’s suffering is obvious to us, for example, as people who are well-informed about history, but Bruno doesn’t understand, and as a result his character doesn’t develop very far. As the plot progresses, and Bruno witnesses atrocities and pure human cruelty, he develops hatred for those who perpetuate them, but he still doesn’t grasp the overall situation even as it begins to touch the reader’s heart.
Overall, the beauty and simplicity lies in the fact that Bruno is too young to understand why these things are happening to people who are just like him. His innocence makes the horror almost incomprehensible in comparison, and makes us wonder just how people can be so cruel, thoughtless, and prejudiced against others who are just like us but see the world in a slightly different way.
I loved The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, as much as I can love a book that is about the holocaust if that makes sense, and totally, completely recommend it.
 In October 1899, Elizabeth Holland, one of society’s most fashionable young women, is laid to rest with great ceremony, after tragically falling into a river. What was to have been her wedding day was in fact the date of her funeral. The story, however, is vastly more complicated than that, when the novel speedily backtracks so as to explain just how Elizabeth died. A beautiful, proper society girl, Elizabeth is opposed by her unconventional sister Diana, who refuses to follow the proper rules of behavior. Add in to the mix Penelope Hayes, Elizabeth’s best friend, who is determined to marry New York’s most eligible bachelor Philip Schoonmaker, as well as Elizabeth’s dissatisfied maid Lina Broud and all the pieces are in place for a scandalous tale of love, loss, and revenge.
Reading The Luxe felt a little bit like eating an entire pint of Ben and Jerry’s by myself. This is actually an event that has never happened, but I imagine it would be the same: delicious and addictive, but I feel a pervading sense of guilt about it. The book was a very fun, very quick read, and I loved it for the most part. Everything kicks off with a bit of a mystery as we wonder what’s happened to Elizabeth and why on earth her sister is smiling at her funeral. While the resolution of this particular plot becomes very obvious very early on, it was a great way to snap the reader up and by the time we figure out what’s going on, the rest of the story has us engaged enough for the rest of the book to speed by.
Perhaps the unhealthy part about this book is that it is so scandalous. It felt somewhat different from the YA I normally appreciate because the girls are all so catty, promiscuous, and vengeful. Three of them hop into bed with men without much thought for the consequences; one of them actively uses her sexuality to get her way while tearing down her friend over a man who is, quite honestly, not worth either of their time. I suppose these are reasons that I’ve never been into the Gossip Girl series or really any drama about teenage girls since I stopped being one, because the outright backstabbing as shown here is actually common enough in the real world and I don’t need more of it.
Having said all that, there is no way to avoid that despite its questionable morals, I totally loved my time with this book. I found myself speeding through it and thoroughly enjoying myself. I especially came to love Elizabeth and Diana and I really want to know what happens next in their lives. I also loved the setting of New York City in the late nineteenth century. One of my two favorite books, The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, is also set around this time in New York, and I’ve developed an immeasurable fondness for it as a result. I could just picture these girls heading to the Lord & Taylor on 5th Avenue for fittings!
So, in conclusion, I guess what I’m trying to say is that this book is hugely enjoyable but full of questionable moral standards and teenagers who are not to be emulated. I definitely recommend it to adults, because it’s a whole lot of fun, but I don’t think I’d buy it for a sixteen year old.
 I’m going to be a little different and review these together. They are different books, but they have essentially the same overall plot seen through two different characters. John experiences different things than Zoe does, but the main events are the same and I thought it would be easier on my blog schedule to just combine!
After spending eight years on Huckleberry, John Perry and his wife Jane, a former Special Forces soldier, are recruited to help start a new world on Roanoke. Their daughter, Zoe, doesn’t have as much choice in the matter, but is completely ready herself to move on, with her two Obin companions in tow as always, since she is revered as a near goddess by the Obin race. From the moment the family and their settlers first see Roanoke, they know that nothing is going to be quite what they expected and soon they find themselves embroiled in what may be an intergalactic war. John, Jane, and Zoe must each use their special advantages in order to keep the colony alive and save all of those they love.
First of all, I just loved the way these books worked together. I am actually quite a fan of the same story told from two different perspectives, although it was surprisingly difficult for me to yank myself out of John’s head and place myself into Zoe’s since I read the books in a row. John Scalzi’s brand of prose is very distinctive and while Zoe is certainly a teenage girl (and many props to him and his female test-readers for pulling that off) I have gotten used to the idea that his writing = a man. This is one of the instances in which having a very distinctive writing style worked against the book. I got over it eventually. I loved the way that certain holes left in The Last Colony were filled masterfully by Zoe’s Tale in particular. What’s amazing is that Scalzi didn’t even plan it that way, but rather came back and thought about how things came to be from Zoe’s perspective.
The story itself is, as always, a very interesting one. More and more problems occur from almost the first pages of the books onwards as the Roanoke colonists realize just how very much trouble they’re in. Both of these books are very quick reads; they’re on the short side and it’s difficult to put them down. By now I love all the characters and I have them firmly in my head, but they still develop here. This is especially so for Zoe, who is a teenager and changing faster than you can imagine with all the pressure placed on her. She learns so much about the world but I didn’t find any of it to be too much, if that makes sense. She develops but in a more realistic way given her extraordinary lifestyle.
I love these books. I’m a little sad that we’ve left these characters behind, probably for good. I adored the entire series and I highly recommend it, even if you don’t like science fiction. I know I didn’t. These are still fantastic books, with strong characters, an exciting plotline, and plenty of laughter and emotional intensity.
The Last Colony | Zoe’s Tale
 Quite simply, every bit of praise you’ve heard for The Hunger Games is true.
Katniss Everdeen has essentially been the provider for her mother and sister ever since her father’s death in a mine explosion. They live in poor sector 12, which has little to recommend it, but must still send two 12-18 year olds to fight in the Hunger Games every year. When Katniss’s sister is selected against all odds, Katniss takes her place in the Games, knowing that it’s almost certainly a death sentence since only two contestants from sector 12 have ever won the Games. But Katniss has already survived against the odds; can she do it this one more time?
I loved this book from start to finish and it’s rarer and rarer that I can say that these days. After everyone else in the book blogging world loved it, I just had to buy a copy and I am so glad that I did. I simply sped through this book. I spent two hours in the library with it waiting for something and then when I got home, I just sat down and read until I was finished. It was that good. It’s an adventure story, an almost-love story, an exciting edge-of-your-seat thrilling race against the odds. It’s hard to explain exactly why it’s so fantastic, but it completely rocks.
Part of it is certainly that I loved Katniss. I can’t imagine not feeling sympathetic to her character, especially for women. She’s tough because she’s had to be, but she is really just a teenage girl somewhere in there and it comes out sometimes. I loved the softer bits of her personality amidst the rough exterior that she has to develop just to survive; that is certainly evident most of the time. She’s not the only great character, though; Peeta certainly is and I’d love to hear more about Gale in the next book, Catching Fire. The other contestants don’t have much personality to them bar one, but really, they hardly need it. The book is only so long and they’re all out to kill each other anyway.
I think it’s probably the plot of this one that has made it so amazingly popular, though. Not only is Katniss fantastic, but she’s constantly fighting for her life in so many ways. The reader never knows what’s going to happen next. Some of the events herein are truly heartwrenching while others are exciting and still others gave me a huge grin. There is so much here. I mean, how many adjectives can I possibly use to describe it without sounding like a thesaurus list?
In short, this is a fantastic book. It does have a cliffhanger, so if you don’t like that, by all means wait until the third book of the trilogy is published. I hear Catching Fire has an even more frustrating cliffhanger, but you won’t find me waiting. I’ll be buying it the day it comes out.
Amazon | Powell’s | IndieBound | Amazon UK
 Ever since Leslie’s life spiralled out of control and she was raped by her brother’s friend, with his permission, she is desperate to reclaim control of herself and her body. She sees a tattoo as the way to do that, laying a mark on her skin that is for her benefit alone. But the tattoo design she chooses is not that simple and instead links her to the king of the Dark Court of the faerie, Irial. Isolated from her friends, especially Aislinn who cannot tell Leslie about the world she now inhabits, Leslie finds herself in a dark place which harbors the unlikeliest heroes.
While this book is definitely considerably darker than Wicked Lovely, I found myself enjoying it just as much if not more. I like darker stories and I completely admired Leslie, who sometimes makes wrong decisions but certainly has her heart in the right place. After what happened to her, almost anyone would be damaged, and I thought that she was for the most part on the right track, strong enough to attempt to save herself but still vulnerable enough to also inspire the best in others. This creates for some fascinating character dynamics revolving around Leslie and her friends.
Many of the characters from Wicked Lovely return, like Seth, Keenan, and Aislinn; Niall returns for a very important role, which I was happy to see since I hadn’t learned much of his character before. I love when books take minor characters and flesh them out in such ways. This is definitely more of a sequel to Wicked Lovely than I had initially expected. It’s very interesting to see the characters from the first book through the eyes of others who don’t know about the world they inhabit or the deals they’ve made to continue the status quo. Leslie discovers the faerie world for herself but in a completely different way from Aislinn for obvious reasons. Her journey is more painful but more affecting as a result.
I’ve also come to really appreciate the world that Melissa Marr has created. The faerie court is fascinating and multi-faceted. Seeing another of the courts in close detail like this has really broadened the perspective that Marr has given to the series and I can’t wait for it to expand even further. I’m really looking forward to going back for more with Fragile Eternity to see how these characters develop and interact in their future.
These books are wonderful. I definitely think they can be appreciated by adults as well as their target YA audience. If you want to spend some time in a faerie world, look no further.
IndieBound | Powell’s | Amazon | Amazon UK
 Tally can’t wait to be a pretty. Her best friend has already turned 16 and had the operation. Against all the rules, Tally sneaks into New Pretty Town and visits him, promising to do nothing to risk remaining an ugly forever. In that short summer, Tally meets Shay, another ugly who shares Tally’s birthday. The two become fast friends, but Shay, disturbingly, does not want to be a pretty. When Shay sneaks away just before their birthday, Tally is forced to go find her or never become a pretty; but after all that she discovers, does she really want to be one?
Uglies was such a fascinating book. I’m very into YA dystopian novels. Actually, I like most of them, but adult versions can get very depressing. This one reminded me in some ways of The Giver, a fantastic book that I’ve read countless times over the years. Both kids learn that their perfect, happy society is not at all what it seems in the end and that maybe they don’t want to conform to their society’s expectations of them.
Since I knew something was “wrong” with pretties, or at least something wasn’t good about them, I do have to confess I found myself frustrated with Tally for being so excited about the transition. I didn’t know what it was, though, and as I was impatient to find out, I found myself racing through the book. It’s a fairly quick read, I got through it in an evening, but the desire to know did not outweigh the pleasure that I found in these pages. Tally becomes a wonderful character, growing and changing and becoming more interesting. I love when this happens and when it’s believable. She makes mistakes and she learns from them. I’m not sure any of the secondary characters enjoyed a similar level of personability or character development, but there isn’t enough space with the dynamic, fast-moving plot.
I loved the little details about Tally’s world and how it has changed and I hope that in the following books, we get to learn more. It’s great when she finds old magazines and finds people who aren’t pretties being defined as beautiful, when she travels through the old rusted city and rides the roller coaster, or the orchid that eradicates all other plant life. Her own world is interesting too, with walls that can produce any movie she’d like, the endless parties in New Pretty Town, and the suburbs where all of the older pretties live. Again, I hope it in the next few, we can explore a little more outside this particular settlement.
Uglies was an interesting, thoughtful, but exciting and at times intense read. I think it can be appreciated by adults and young adults alike. There is enough here to ponder over while still providing a compelling story. I recommend it and I really look forward to the rest of the series, since this one ends in a cliffhanger!
 The orphan Moth has grown up in Calio, a city so high up on the mountains that it’s nearly in the clouds, watching Skyknights and dreaming of flying in a dragonfly of his own. As a peasant orphan, though, all Moth can do is work at the aerodrome and dream while he lives with his elderly friend Leroux and Leroux’s pet kestrel Lady Esme. Leroux often tells tales about the land beyond the Reach, an sea of fog nearby that never seems to end, which only grow more fantastical as the old man gets sicker. Moth’s friend Fiona is also an orphan but lives with her rich grandfather, the Governor of Calio. Neither are content with their lives, but are soon to find that the tales Leroux told are much closer to the truth than either of them would have imagined.
This book took a few pages to absorb me, but once I was hooked, I was really hooked and the pages flew by. This is certainly a hallmark of YA fiction; kids have limited attention spans, so the story has to be great and fast-moving to compel them to keep reading. Once Moth and Fiona go through the Reach, this is certainly the case with this book. We don’t know much about anyone who is helping them or anyone who is chasing them, so there is a lot of mystery surrounding their journey, especially given that they are hardly sure of what they are going to find.
The characters were also very sweet. Both of them are young teenagers. Fiona is an uncertain girl who, with unconventional red hair, believes that not only is she ugly, but that everyone in her life will leave her. Her parents’ death left her with deep scars. Moth is still a child at heart, which plays a big part in his actions in this book, convinced that everything can work out and even though he knows he isn’t going to be a Skyknight, his head is full of dreams. Both of them are orphans, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have people who love them. I think Fiona’s grandfather turned out to be one of the surprise great supporting characters in this book. Most of the rest are similarly noble, kind, and care for Moth and Fiona, willing to put their lives on the line for these two. Even the evil characters, for the most part, are ambiguous and not purely evil. Moth is particularly talented in bringing out the good in people with his innocence and his soaring ambition.
I thought the world was well done as well. While not terribly different, in that there are regular fantasy beings like dragons, mermaids, and centaurs, Marco adds some clever new ideas into the mix and I never felt like I was reading something that has already been done. I don’t want to spoil it for anyone, so I can’t give too many details away, but I did like the world and I hope that we will see more of it in the rest of the series.
I definitely enjoyed this YA fantasy novel. It was a touching journey for me as well as the two main characters. I would recommend it to both adults who might be in the mood for something fast-paced and exciting as well as for young adults.
Starfinder is available from Amazon, Powell’s, and Amazon UK.
Thanks to TLC book tours and author John Marco for sending me a copy of this book.
 This is book four of the Ranger’s Apprentice series and titled The Battle for Skandia in North America.
Having just barely recovered from his dependence on mind-numbing drugs thanks to Skandian slave drivers, ranger’s apprentice Will is convalescing in an isolated cottage with Evanlyn, the Araluen princess in disguise. They are waiting for the thaw to complete their escape to Araluen. When Evanlyn goes to find food and never returns, Will forces himself to follow her. Meanwhile, Halt and Horace are still searching for Will and Evanlyn. On their search they find suspicious signs of Temujai activity and realize that the whole of Skandia is in danger.
Like the rest in the series, this book is a lot of fun, and perhaps more so than the others. The characters have developed enough that they have much more emotional pull on both readers and each other. The relationship between Will and Evanlyn, for example, has really changed quite a bit from the beginning and continues to do so over the course of the book. I’ve found that all the characters have grown in believable ways and I feel a lot of sympathy towards them. They work best all together and I was very pleased to see that happen in this book.
The plot is, as usual, fast moving and exciting, if a little predictable. Just the first chapter is enough to start building the suspense and getting the book on a roll. I read this for the Read-a-Thon and it was perfect. It is very easy to sit and read though and I suspect would hold the attention of more reluctant readers, too.
I also thought the value of cooperation and learning from other people was really emphasized in this book. Obviously, this is still YA, but I think it’s better to show Skandians learning from Araluens after all this time rather than having them retain hostility. I really liked how diplomacy worked in this novel; the relations between the nations are developing just like those between characters.
So far, I have really enjoyed this series. I like the plots, I really like the characters, and overall I think they’re a lot of fun. I can’t wait to see where the series goes next.
Buy this book on Amazon .
 Aislinn can see faeries. She has always been able to see them. Her grandmother has spent her entire life admonishing Aislinn to keep this a secret from them, though, regardless of how many people they poke, pinch or shove or how scary they look. Faeries are dangerous. One day, however, a faery king begins stalking Aislinn and she can no longer avoid them. With the help of her friend Seth, who conveniently lives in a metal train car which fairies can’t enter, she is determined to find a way to get them to leave her alone.
Wicked Lovely is utterly enchanting. Each character is drawn in a sympathetic and intriguing fashion; the only one I didn’t like was the Winter Queen, but I don’t think I was supposed to like her. Even Keenan has a certain appeal to him and a reason behind his behavior. He’s not your average villain. I most liked the relationship between Aislinn and Seth. At some point, it feels as though you have to pick sides, and I knew which side I was on. I loved how Aislinn developed from a girl who feels she must hide in corners, away from faeries, into a girl who could face them head-on and take advantage of whatever situation she’s placed in. She changes a lot but never in a way that feels unnatural; I knew she had it in her and was just waiting for it to come out.
The faeries are so different than anything I’d expected. Creepy, but really interesting at the same time. I’d love to learn more about the fey court and I hope it’s expanded on in the rest of the series.
The story was wonderful, too. The viewpoint switches, which creates suspense, but the chapters are short enough that I wasn’t left wondering what had happened to a certain character for too long. This is one of those books that I sped through because I just had to know what happened. I knew that it was part of a series, and worse a series that I can’t continue for a few months, so I was afraid it would end on a cliffhanger. It didn’t. It wrapped up in a wonderfully satisfactory way, but not so much that there isn’t story left to tell. I know I’m looking forward to the next book in the series, Ink Exchange, and particularly Fragile Eternity, which I believe picks up these storylines again.
I’d definitely recommend this one to fantasy and YA readers, as well as anyone else who thinks it sounds intriguing! I loved it.
Buy Wicked Lovely on Amazon.
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