Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Another Faust

Author: Daniel and Dina Nayeri

Age: YA

This is the other YA book that I checked out on my last library trip. I went there specifically to get Ophelia, and I just happened to pick this up too. I'm glad I did. I haven't read the original Faust, so unfortunately I can't compare it to that. But it's the same basic selling-your-soul-to-the-devil story, only set at a modern Upper East Side high school. It's Gossip Girl meets the Cullen family from Twilight with some Screwtape Letters stirred into the mix. The Faust children are five teenagers who live with their strange and beautiful governess, Madame Vileroy. They are boldly ambitious, seeking wealth, fame, power, and beauty, and Madame Vileroy gives them special gifts to help them achieve their goals. They're what Blair Waldorf and Chuck Bass would be like if they had superpowers.

Christian, the athlete, can steal...by touching another person, he can take some of their energy...their strength, their coordination. He makes himself stronger by simultaneously weakening his opponent. Valentin, the writer, can lie...he can rewind time and start a scene over if it doesn't play out to his liking. He can experiment with dozens of possible futures and choose the one that works to his advantage. Victoria, the perfect student, can cheat...she can read people's minds. She manipulates conversations in order to make the other person think about what they don't want to say out loud...and then she hears it anyway. Belle is beautiful. Everyone who sees her is drawn to her. But when they get too close, they are repelled by her scent...she smells like cheap perfume covering up something rotten. Bice' is Belle's twin sister. She's different from the others. Bice' can hide. She can freeze time. And while everyone else is frozen, Bice' studies...and studies and studies. She seems to be trying to learn every language in the world.

The teenagers have sold their souls to the devil for these skills, and as the book progresses, Madame Vileroy gives them additional gifts, making them more powerful. But pesky little shreds of humanity keep poking up...hints of love and guilt. Have they all made their deals willingly, or were some of them tricked? And if they could do it all over, would they make the same choices?

I enjoyed this book. I think I read it in a day (it's been a long day, and I can't remember now if I started it this morning or last night). In my book-reading week, it's sort of the yin to Ophelia's yang. It's not as well written (in terms of diction and dialogue) but the story is more interesting. I suppose I shouldn't complain too much about the dialogue; it is intended for teens, after all, and I guess that's what they sound like. "Um, like, don't you think he's like hot?" "Um, like, no, that's like totally gross." But if you can get past that, the story will draw you in. And it's got a moral, which isn't something you generally find in the post-Twilight sexy darkness and evil genre. Occasionally the moralizing is a bit heavy-handed, but for the most part it's sufficiently subtle. It's a book that I think teens would benefit from reading...especially teens who go to the sort of fiercely competitive high schools where being the most beautiful or the most athletic or having the highest GPA are the only things that matter.


Recommended for readers who like: Twilight (for the fun powers, not the love story...this isn't really a romance); Gossip Girl; The Screwtape Letters; City of Bones; A Great and Terrible Beauty; Diana Wynne Jones; the Daughters of the Moon series

Monday, September 27, 2010

Ophelia

Author: Lisa Klein

Age: YA

I know, it seems like all I've reviewed lately have been young adult books. I was thinking about this when I went to the library a couple days ago, but I came home with two YA books anyway. It just seems like adult books are so often about one of two types--boring 20somethings with boring office jobs, or bitter menopausal divorcees. I've lived through the first one, and I quit that job, thanks...and as far as the second one goes, I'd rather just cross that bridge if or when I come to it. But I know that's not really ALL that's out there...so I'll try to come up with some good adult books to review soon.

Ok, here goes...Ophelia. Honestly, it was a bit of a disappointment. Not that there was anything too wrong with the book itself...it's just that I've always found Ophelia intriguing, and the book wasn't exactly what I was expecting, or hoping for, I guess. But it was pretty standard historical fiction, well-written (at least gramatically, if not necessarily in terms of plot...but more on that below), and if you like Shakespeare and/or Shakespearean-era historical fiction, you'll probably like it.

It wasn't as dramatic or as tragic as I would have expected from a book about a play about a tragedy. For starters, Ophelia doesn't kill herself...she pulls a Juliet and fakes her own death. That's not a spoiler; it's on the first page. According to the author blurb, Lisa Klein is a former professor of English who "has always been dissatisfied with interpretations of Ophelia and, since Shakespeare is not alive today to write stronger female characters, she has taken it upon herself to breathe new life into Ophelia's story." I take issue with several points here. For one, the implication that Shakespeare didn't write "strong women." Okay, if by a "strong woman" you mean a woman who pays her own rent, runs her own business, and still finds time to squeeze in a half hour on the treadmill every day...then no, Shakespeare didn't write strong women. But he certainly wrote vivid female characters. After all, if Ophelia wasn't interesting in her own right to begin with, no one would have written this book, would they. Second, all right, I can see that maybe committing suicide when your dad gets murdered by the love of your life, who also happens to have gone crazy, may not be the strong woman answer. But real women still do it, even in this enlightened era of property-owning and treadmills. But I can see that in a book for teens it's probably better NOT to write something that romanticizes suicide after your boyfriend ditches you. (Although that begs the question of why Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet are taught to teenagers at all.) Third, if the strong woman answer is, apparently, to fake your own death using a poison that makes you appear to be asleep, well, that's what Juliet tried, isn't it. And who wrote Juliet? Oh yeah, Shakespeare.

All of this is leading to a big old Beth rant. It really irritates me when historians try to impose modern values and ideas on past civilizations. I'm annoyed by the standard historical fiction/fantasy heroine...the one who's better educated than anyone else she knows, who loves to climb trees and wrestle boys and hates to be indoors, who's abyssmal at needlepoint, who's always disguising herself as a knight in order to have adventures, and whose only friends are males because women are just too stupid and petty and don't understand her or appreciate her! Oh feminist writers, don't you see what a disservice you're doing us, under the guise of telling the heretofore untold stories of womankind? What you're saying is that only women who live like men have stories that are worth telling. How is that different from saying that only stories about the lives of men are worth telling? And all right, many royal women did receive educations similar to those received by men. So if you're writing about one of those women, then it's factual and I won't complain. But why do you think that we modern readers will only be able to relate to stories about women who can read and do math? Why don't you ever give us a chance to relate to them because they, like us, try to live up to their parents' expectations, argue with their siblings, fall in and out of love, and bear children? Don't you think there were ANY interesting women in all of history who actually liked sewing? And the whole all-other-women-hate-me-because-I'm-beautiful-and-interesting thing...where does that come from? Yes, we women are a petty, gossipy, jealous group. But we usually manage to make a few female friends anyway. My theory is that writers, lacking sufficient creativity, are copying Scarlett O'Hara. But here's the thing...girls didn't hate Scarlett because they were jealous and dumb...they hated Scarlett because Scarlett wasn't very nice! (Remember when she stole her sister's fiance?) And men didn't love Scarlett because they were somehow more enlightened...they loved her because she was hot. And one more thing...I don't really think that women in history spent nearly as much time bemoaning their lot as historical fiction writers would have us believe. If they all really hated their lives THAT much, don't you think they would have revolted sooner? And it's just so heavy handed. Sure, you can show us that this girl has to marry this nasty old man her father has chosen, and we, as modern, enlightened women, can think to ourselves, "Oh, that sucks, glad that's not me!" You don't have to go on and TELL us, "She beat her breast and tore her hair and cried out to the night sky, 'Why must I be bound to do as my father orders? Why are women not free like men? Why, oh why, don't I get to live in some future wonderful enlightened era where I could marry or not marry as I pleased?'"

Now that I've got that out of my system, I will say, to be fair, that this book doesn't do quite as much of the above as I initially feared. Ophelia ends up at a convent where she meets lots of honest-to-goodness, in-any-century strong women, and she finds some good friends and some good role models. So that's cool.

As I mentioned before, Klein was an English teacher, and that's very apparent. The dialogue is all very Shakespearean. I can't make up my mind about whether it's contrived or clever, but either way she is very good at it...puns and double entendres and whatnot. It's clear that she's spent a lot of time reading Shakespeare.

The book is divided into three parts. The first part is Ophelia's life before all the tragic stuff happens, her childhood and how she falls in love with Hamlet, which is sweet. The second part details the events covered by the play. The third part is what happens after, which is that she ends up at a convent. Not a spoiler...like I said, it comes up on the first page of the story. I liked the first part okay and the third part the best. Those are the parts where Klein makes up her own story. I wasn't really a fan of the middle part. Klein pretty much just copies out the play, word for word, without really shedding much more light on what happened and why. She doesn't even attempt to explain Hamlet's or Gertrude's motivation. And I can see that to the audience, and to Hamlet himself, Gertrude's actions are supposed to be a bit of a mystery. Does she really love Claudius? Was she overcome with lust? Is she in league with Claudius, or does she honestly believe he's innocent? Is he holding something over her, keeping her in line because she's terrified of him? Is she making a personal sacrifice, marrying a man she doesn't love because she thinks it is best for her country? Interesting questions to ponder, at least according to my high school English teacher...and, okay, to me too. But I feel like if you're going to write the backstory to the play, and you're going to write about Gertrude, then you need to pick one. You at least need to make it seem like Gertrude has some reason to do what she's doing. And Klein doesn't do that.

I also have problems with how the Hamlet-and-Ophelia story progresses. It's like, they're both totally in love, and then all of a sudden they have the whole "Get thee to a nunnery" scene, and Ophelia gives up on him. He's yelling at her, and she turns into one of my high school classmates--"What's he SAYING? I don't get it!"--even though two chapters ago they were doing the double-meaning banter and loving it. I personally wouldn't class myself much higher than moderately strong, on the strong woman scale, but if the love of my life apparently went crazy, I would fight a little harder. I wouldn't just go, "Oh, that's it then, better fake my own death." I would seek him out and at least try to have one more conversation. And okay, he's crazy and he's not paying any attention to her anymore, so she's done with him, I can see that. Or they're both still in love but he's bent on revenge and he knows it's a dangerous path, so he breaks it off with her, I can see that. But not just, oh, I'm confused, I guess I won't ever talk to him again because it isn't in the play. I can't see that.

The thing is, it kind of fails as a tragedy because not one of the characters to whom tragic things happen ends up being all that likable. Ophelia's actually pretty likable, but she survives. And that's okay, I guess...I'm a fan of happy endings. But even if the author's going to give her a happy ending, she can still make the middle part sad. And it's hard to feel that, to really feel any grief for Hamlet, because it seems like Ophelia's done with him anyway, and like he's not really good enough for her.

But I did really like the third part of the book, where Ophelia's at the convent. I'm not a historical expert, but from what I do know of the era I like the depictions of both court life and convent life. Also, Ophelia goes through this whole "How have I sinned to bring this tragedy upon everyone I've loved?" soul-searching phase, and I like that. It seems like a much more believable response for a girl of her society than the "hating needlepoint, why must men define me" thing. Plus there's even some strange visions and stigmata incidents.

So there you have it. Lots of ranting, I know. It might seem like I hated it, but I don't think I did. I didn't love it. But I am still interested in seeking out Klein's other books and reading them. So it wasn't all that bad.

Recommended for readers who like: The Royal Diaries series; Hamlet; Philippa Gregory



Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Catching Fire

Author: Suzanne Collins

Age: YA

This is book two in the Hunger Games trilogy. If you haven't read the first book yet, then don't read this review...there may be spoilers!

When the book opens, life is going okay for Katniss. She and her mother and sister have moved into a nice house in the Victor's Village, and they finally have enough to eat, not to mention other pleasant amenities like hot water. Her relationship with Gale is still uncertain, and she doesn't see much of Peeta either since the cameras have left, even though he lives nearby. But Katniss doesn't get much time to catch her breath. She and Peeta are about to embark on their mandatory victory tour of the other districts when President Snow drops in for a surprise visit. He tells Katniss that he's not convinced she's in love with Peeta, and that her little stunt in the last Games has agitated the other districts to the point of revolt. If she can't convince the President that her feelings for Peeta are real AND manage to quell the incipient rebellions, not only her life but the lives of everyone she loves--especially Gale--will be in danger.

I won't say more than that about the plot, because I don't want to give anything away. If you've already read The Hunger Games then you're dying to read this anyway, and if you haven't already read The Hunger Games, you're not supposed to be reading this review yet! I will say that Collins doesn't disappoint. Some people think this book starts out slower than the last, and I suppose I can see that, but by the latter part of the book you will be absolutely glued. So schedule your reading time accordingly.

At the end of my review of The Hunger Games, I mentioned that I don't like the sorts of trilogies where the author basically writes the same book three times. Maybe it's too early for me to think about this, because I haven't read the third book yet, but the second book is framed in a similar way to the first book. However, in this case I think it really works. Like I said, I don't want to give too much away, but we have certain expectations about how things work after the first book, and then in the second book Collins builds on those so that the twists are that much more effective.

One of the things I mused about while reading this book was why people continue to have children even when they will be raised in an environment that is less than ideal. Katniss, and Haymitch too, apparently, have planned never to have children. They don't want to be responsible for exposing any more human beings to the suffering and terror of their lives. But it seems that their view is unique. Why is that? Why do people continue to have children even when those children will be raised in slavery or poverty or in a war zone? Is it simply a matter of irresistible desire and a lack of effective contraception? Or is it something more than that? Is it, perhaps, a result of the hope that emanates from the innocence of an infant...the hope that maybe this time something will change, that somehow this generation will get things right? After all the centuries in which we've been proven wrong, do we really believe that? Or do we, more pragmatically, come to a decision that even though the future isn't likely to be different, it's worth the risk to enjoy a bit of hope for even a few a short years. Perhaps we understand--as Katniss must, or she wouldn't work so hard to keep herself and the people she cares about alive--that in spite of all the misery, life is worth living.

See my review of The Hunger Games for recommendations of similar books.

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

A Note or Two from Beth

A note on the ages--generally, I'm classifying the books based on what section of the store you would find them in. If you haven't already noticed, YA books usually have little or no sex, whereas adult books often (although not always) have quite a bit more sex. If the amount of sex in a book is a factor when you're deciding what to read, you can always ask me for more clarification. I won't judge.

Also, when I recommend other books at the end of a review, I don't recommend anything I haven't read myself. The ultimate goal is to have reviewed everything I ever mention on this blog, and link all the reviews back and forth to each other. But until I reach that point, feel free to ask me about any of the books I've recommended.

The Morning Gift

Author: Eva Ibbotson

Age: YA/Adult

A note about Ibbotson (author of A Countess Below Stairs) before we begin--her books are very similar. I've found that when I finish one of them I'm left craving more, but if I actually read two in a row it's not satisfying because they're just too much alike. Of course each story is different, but the types of characters and the general flow of the plot are always the same. I like each of the ones I've read well enough to think they're all deserving of a read, but I would put some space between them. For this reason I was planning to wait a while before reviewing another of her books (since I just did A Countess Below Stairs) but then I really wanted to read this one this week. So here you are.

Quinton Sommerville is an adventurous paleontologist. He's also independently wealthy (his estate overlooking the sea in northern England was painted by Turner!) and a highly eligible bachelor. Ten years ago he studied in Vienna under Professor Berger and became close to the kind Berger family. Now, in 1938, he's returned to Vienna to receive an honorary doctorate, but the Bergers have disappeared.

Ruth Berger is supposed to be in England. She's part Jewish so her family has to leave Austria. She's been accepted at a university in England and she has a student visa, but her train out of Austria is stopped by Nazis and she's taken off because of her involvement in a few student demonstrations. She hides until she knows her parents have left for England themselves--she doesn't want them to stay behind on her account.

Quin finds a despondent Ruth alone in the Berger's otherwise deserted apartment. He has to help her (she is beautiful, after all, and besides Professor Berger is an old friend), but all of his pleading and bribing at the immigration offices get him nowhere...until someone suggests that he marry Ruth so that she can travel on his British passport.

Quin and Ruth agree to keep their marriage completely secret. Although Quin is undeniably attracted to Ruth, he knows she is in love with her stepcousin Heini, a concert pianist. Ruth feels indebted to Quin and is determined never to ask him for anything again. They make plans to avoid one another completely and let Quin's lawyer handle their divorce. But then Ruth ends up at Quin's university, taking his course, and it becomes harder and harder for them to avoid one another.

Ibbotson doesn't tell her stories from the point of view of one or two characters. This book features a whole cast of supporting characters, each with their own agendas: Leonie Berger, Ruth's mother, who just wants her daughter to be happy, whatever the cost; Heini, Ruth's demanding fiance, who depends on Ruth to look after him so he can focus on his music; Verena Plackett, the brilliant daughter of the university president, who has decided that she and Quin would make a perfect society match; and Quin's cranky Aunt Frances, who raised him and is horrified by his determination to donate his estate to the National Trust because he has no desire to produce an heir.

Like A Countess Below Stairs, this book features a refugee society consisting of people who enjoyed success, wealth, and prestige in their native land but are now reduced to poverty and unemployment. It's an interesting phenomenon. I wonder how long it really takes for people in such a position to go from gratitude simply to be alive to bitterness at what they've lost.

The book also deals with the theme of the great artist who believes that because he is talented all others must exist only to serve him. Those of us who know artists personally, or read about them on celebrity gossip blogs, realize how sadly truthful this characterization is. It is disappointing, however, that none of the characters never seem to fully realize what a jerk Heini is. They know they don't like him, but they really are so blinded by his talents that they can't quite figure out why.

It's an enjoyable read. As I warned you with A Countess Below Stairs, Ibbotson is almost too precious at times--which is why I wouldn't read her books back-to-back. It's mostly the heroines who annoy me. Can't a girl be likeable without having to be all goodness and light all the time? If not, there's not much hope for someone like me. But I like her heroes, and those are who we women really read these sorts of books for anyway, right? No one's on Team Bella, after all. And what's hotter than a secret marriage?



Recommended for readers who like: A Countess Below Stairs; WWII romance; historical fiction; happy endings

Friday, September 17, 2010

I Capture the Castle

Author: Dodie Smith

Age: YA/Adult (see discussion below)

Believe it or not, the author is best known for writing 101 Dalmations. This is her first novel. I found it in a bookstore several years ago and was intrigued because the recommendation on the cover is from J.K. Rowling. She says, "This book has one of the most charismatic narrators I've ever met." I have to agree. The book starts with what is, I think, my favorite opening sentence in literature: "I write this sitting in the kitchen sink." How could you not be intrigued by that? The story is told in journal form--the journal of Cassandra Mortmain, a seventeen year old girl who lives in a rundown old castle in 1930s England. Cassandra is delightful. She's quite a bit Anne of Green Gables--lots of imagination and love of nature--although perhaps not as good or as cheery as Anne.

Cassandra has one of those endearingly zany families for which I have an enormous soft spot--perhaps because I like to think I come from one myself. She lives with her father, Mortmain, who is a temperamental writer; her stepmother, Topaz, an artist's model who is several years younger than Mortmain and enjoys communing with nature in the nude; her beautiful but unhappy older sister Rose; her younger brother, Thomas; and Stephen, the (breathtakingly handsome) orphaned son of the family's former maid, who is in love with Cassandra and keeps plagiarizing poetry to tell her so.

Cassandra's father, Mortmain, wrote a very successful book over a decade before the story opens. In the early years after the book came out he made a lot of money from it, and the family enjoyed their new wealth. They took a forty year lease on the castle, made repairs, and furnished it beautifully. But Mortmain has not written anything since--no one knows why--and their income has dwindled into nonexistence, as none of them really have any marketable skills. Most of the family's possessions have been sold, and they can scarcely afford to eat. Just when the situation seems really desperate, Rose wishes on an ancient carved head--either an angel or a devil; they can't tell--high on the kitchen wall.

Enter the Cottons: Simon and Neil, two brothers from America. Simon has just inherited Scoatney, the nearby manor house, and is also the Mortmains' new landlord. As Rose is a devoted student of Austen, she immediately decides to solve the family's financial problems by making Simon fall in love with her.

I read this book for the first time when I was in my early teens, and ever since I have listed it as one of my very favorites. I thought that I had re-read it several times since then, but when I read it this past week I realized that I didn't actually remember very much of it, and it must have been many years since my last read. I loved it the first time I read it, but I think I actually appreciated it more this time around. It's not one of those neat and tidy, cliched romantic comedy love stories--and that's what I wanted when I was a teenager. I remember feeling disappointed in that regard. It's much more a story of unrequited love--for many of the characters, for truly evenly requited love is rare. I understand that now (oh how wise I have become in the past decade!) and I love the book that much more for its honesty. Cassandra herself says that she only likes the sorts of books where the characters are so real and messy that they get under your skin and you can't stop thinking about them even after you've finished the book. And that's how this book is. But it's not a bad thing, because the characters are so likable that you won't mind having them dancing around in your brain.

It's also a story about the joys and pitfalls of sisterhood. I like how Smith captures that strange point in life when siblings are beginning to grow up, and the simple connection of being sister or brother, built-in playmate and best friend becomes more tenuous and more complex--that point when a person realizes that their siblings are adults, individuals--and that they may or may not actually be likable as such.

You will recognize Pride and Prejudice as the jumping off point, of course, but the characters and the plot twists are all their own.

Note: They made a movie of this book in 2003, but I've never seen it. If you have and it's not any good, then someone messed up somewhere--don't hold it against this book.

Recommended for readers who like: Jane Austen; the Bronte sisters; Anne of Green Gables; The Wedding Date; Hilary McKay




Wednesday, September 8, 2010

The Hunger Games

Author: Suzanne Collins

Age: YA

This is one of those books that you literally can't put down once you get started, so clear a day or two for it. I read it in one day and I honestly spent the entire day in bed. I read, and I fed my baby, and that was it. It was a pretty great feeling, because I love reading SO much, but with all the exhaustion in the later months of my pregnancy and then the new mom sleep deprivation, I'd been in this can't-finish-a-page-without-falling-asleep state, and I'd been having a really hard time making it all the way through anything. (I haven't read Catching Fire or Mockingjay yet because I'm scared of how useless I'm going to be once I get into them...so, I'll review those for you soon, and in the meantime, no spoilers, please!)

The book is set in a future North America where there is a wealthy Capitol and twelve outlying districts that are under the Capitol's harsh control. It's like the story of the Minotaur in Greek myth...every year each district has to send two tributes, a boy and a girl, to the Capitol to compete in the Hunger Games. They're basically human sacrifices, but it's somewhat more complex...the Hunger Games are a reality TV show in which the twenty-four tributes compete against each other for survival in a harsh environment. The last tribute alive wins--they get to live, and they also receive money and food for themselves and their district.

Katniss comes from the poorest district, District Twelve, and has grown up in one of the poorest families within that district. Her mother has been absolutely useless ever since her father died, and Katniss has learned how to hunt illegally in order to provide food for her family. She has a sweet little sister named Prim who she would do anything for. The book opens on the day of The Reaping, the day that the tributes from each district are chosen. Each child between the ages of 12 and 18 automatically has their name entered once into the drawing--once for each year, and it's cumulative, so an older child has a greater chance of being chosen; however, if they enter their name more than once they are paid in food. Katniss has entered her name many times over the years...it's the primary way she obtains food for the year. It's Prim's first year to be entered, so her name is only in once...but she is chosen. Since Katniss is an older sister, she immediately volunteers to go instead of Prim. Then the male tribute is chosen, and it's Peeta...a boy whom Katniss doesn't know very well, but who once saved Katniss' life by giving her bread when her family was starving.

Katniss desperately wants to survive and win the Hunger Games. It's not likely; the richer districts take the competition seriously, and their tributes are professionally trained. But she does have some mad hunting and wilderness survival skills, and beyond that she's worried about what will happen to her family if she's not around to look after them. Competing against Peeta adds another twist--she doesn't want to kill the boy she feels she owes her life to, and then he goes and tells the cameras that he's in love with her.

In addition to having a very engaging plot, and interesting characters, this book--like good sci fi should--provides excellent perspective on the condition of modern life. No, we don't actually watch people kill each other on TV...yet (but the ancient Romans sure loved their gladiator fights, so it's not much of a stretch to imagine modern or future people enjoying similar entertainment). What do we watch when we watch reality TV? We watch people give birth, get married, learn the results of paternity tests (I always think that Maury is our current equivalent of the Colisseum), raise children, and undergo plastic surgery. We watch people fight; we watch marriages fall apart. We watch people search for love, we watch them embarrass themselves, and we watch them break down. We see all of the intimate details of people's lives. I'll be the first to admit that I watch a buttload of reality TV. I recently watched Kourtney Kardashian butter Khloe in an attempt to soothe a bad bikini-wax burn. (Yes, my brain was screaming WTF??? but I still found myself unable to change the channel). Why do we find these shows so fascinating? I think it stems, at least in part, from the isolationism of our modern culture. Most of us don't give birth in front of a few dozen supporters from the community anymore...but we still have the desire to share that moment, so we watch it on TV. (I love the birth shows; they always make me cry.) We just aren't that close to our friends or our neighbors these days, so we need our relationships with the people on the TV. But in many ways I think it's sick...it's the same morbid curiosity that forces everyone to slow down in hopes of seeing gore when they pass an accident. Why do we need to watch someone get silicone implanted in their chest? Why do we need to watch a couple's hate destroy their family? What is WRONG with us that we watch?

And on the flip side, what is wrong with us that we want so badly for others to watch us? Put a camera in front of ANYONE, and they'll tell you ANYTHING about their personal life. Why on earth would someone want to be filmed giving birth and then have that film shown to millions of complete strangers? I was watching Ochocinco: The Ultimate Catch the other day (I told you I'm a bad reality TV addict, but my husband actually got really into this show, too, so there) and one of the girls had to choose between staying for two more weeks of filming, and possibly--possibly--getting the chance to date this football player she doesn't even really know, or going home to see a dying grandparent who has 48 hours to live. In the end she chose the grandparent, but it was actually a big decision for her, a hard choice. (Not only that, but she was a single mom--she actually had a CHILD who she'd left behind to go on this ridiculous show.)

So when you read this book, don't be shocked that people would create such a show, or that everyone would watch. If The Hunger Games were on our TVs, we would all be glued. Because we're human beings, and that means that we have a great potential for good, but it also means that we have the same potential to be base and vile. And reality TV brings out the worst in us.

When you're writing sci fi, how do you create an interesting, believable future? I think you have to draw from what people have done before, and what they do now. And that's what Collins has done here...blending ancient and modern, human sacrifice and reality TV. Obviously this book is immensely popular right now, and books can be popular for one of two reasons...they're either actually that good, or they're bad, but in a mass-appeal sort of way (i.e. most of the population thinks they're that good). In my opinion, The Hunger Games falls squarely into the first category. I think you'll like it.

If you like this, you may also like: The Uglies series (Uglies, Pretties, Specials, Extras); Ender's Game; Fahrenheit 451; Brave New World; 1984; Cleopatra's Daughter (this last one is historical fiction, not sci fi). I like good sci fi but I certainly don't consider myself a sci fi expert, so those of you who know sci fi better than me are welcome to add more suggestions.

A note on The Uglies series: I'll have to write a full review on these one day, but for now I'll say it's got a very interesting premise (good social commentary like I talked about before)...but after I read several of them I felt like I'd just read the first book over and over again. Writers, a series is when you have such a long, complex story to tell that you can't possibly do it in just one book; it needs to be drawn out over several (e.g. the Harry Potter series). Writing the same book three times without managing to further the plot at all, and just slapping a slightly different cover on each of them--a la Stephenie Meyer--is not called a series, it's called milking a cash cow. So, you're warned. (The Hunger Games trilogy may do the same thing, like I said I haven't read the rest of the books yet...but I certainly hope not.)

Monday, September 6, 2010

City of Shadows

Author: Ariana Franklin

Age: Adult

Esther Solomonova just wants to start over. She's a Russian Jew who's survived two pogroms (as evidenced by the scar on her face) and now she's managed to make her way to 1920's Berlin, a city full of people wanting to start over and make new identities for themselves. She finds a job working for Prince Nick, another Russian who pretends to be a member of the overthrown aristocracy, but who's really just an opportunistic and conniving businessman. He owns a chain of nightclubs which cater to other Russian ex-pats, complete with enormous stuffed bears to add a sense of home. A steady income is hard to come by these days, especially for a Jewish woman, so she's willing to put up with some of Nick's more outrageous money-making schemes. Like Anna, this woman whom he's found in an insane asylum and whom he wants to present as the missing Grand Duchess Anastasia...even though she doesn't speak a word of Russian.

Esther gets stuck living with and looking after Anna as they groom her to pose as Anastasia. It's not an easy task, as Anna is high strung and demanding...and to make things even more complicated, Anna claims that someone is trying to kill her. Sure, Anna is delusional, but people around her keep dying, and Esther starts to wonder if someone really is after her. Soon Esther finds an ally in homicide detective Siegfried Schmidt, who becomes even more drawn to the case after someone close to him is murdered, too.

As the situation in Germany deteriorates, and as Esther and Schmidt become more convinced that the killer is hiding within the ranks of the rising Nazi party, it becomes a race against the clock. If they can figure out who Anna really is, they can determine why someone wants her dead...and then they can find the killer--unless he finds them first.

In addition to being a well-written and enthralling murder mystery, this is one of those books that really makes you grateful for what you have. Franklin brings the setting to life, and 1920's Germany during hyperinflation is a terrifying place, where the danger of starving or freezing to death is very real. Sometimes when you study the dates and the facts in a history book, you can feel distanced from them, and you can forget that the horrifying events happened to real people, people like you who were just trying to make an honest living, look after the people they loved, and feed their families. A book like this brings it all vividly to life, making me remember why I love studying history.



Recommended for readers who like: all those CSI-type mystery shows; 19th century European history; the myths surrounding Anastasia and Anna Anderson

Marie, Dancing

Author: Carolyn Meyer

Age: YA

If you've ever wished you were one of the beautiful dancers in Degas' paintings, this book will make you think again. It's the story of Marie van Goethem, the model for Degas' sculpture La petite danseuse de quatorze ans (Little dancer age fourteen). I'll start by warning you that it's an incredibly sad book. Nothing wrong with that, as long as you're in the mood for it...but if you need something cheery to read, try A Countess Below Stairs. This is based on a true story (really, as much of Marie's life as was recorded has been incorporated into this book) and history is often heartbreaking.

Marie is the middle child of three daughters living with their mother in Paris in the 1880s. They used to be a happy family, but after their father passed away their mother fell apart, and the only thing that keeps her going now is absinthe (which, as it turns out, is not as fun as it looks in Moulin Rouge, kids). All three girls are dancers at the Paris Opera, where they make barely enough money to survive, and certainly not enough to keep funding their mother's drinking. However, Marie loves dancing and would never dream of doing anything else. Like many of the older dancers, Marie's sister Antoinette brings in extra money through her affairs with wealthy patrons of the ballet. She urges Marie to do the same, but the thought disgusts Marie. 

Things seem to be going better for Marie for a while--Monsieur Degas pays her to pose for a sculpture, and she meets Degas' friend Mary Cassatt, an American artist whom she very much admires. Better still, Mary Cassatt's carriage driver is a childhood friend of Marie's, and when the two are reunited they begin to fall in love. But then a wealthy young patron seeks to make Marie his mistress, and this drives a rift between Marie and her boyfriend. Meanwhile, Antoinette's greed results in tragedy for the entire family. Marie is forced to choose between love and happiness for herself, and doing what's best for her family...especially her sweet little sister Charlotte, who is a talented dancer.


This is really what life was like for young ballerinas. As if the incredible toll on their bodies from long days of dancing wasn't enough, they were basically prostitutes. In Degas' painting L'Etoile (The Star) you can see a man waiting just backstage for the dancer. (Google the painting if you're not familiar with it.) 

When the sculpture was first exhibited, the response was mostly unfavorable. Viewers thought it was ugly. In the book, when Marie hears their response, she is hurt. But the truth is, most of her life is ugly. The story of the lives of Degas' dancers reveals a startling juxtaposition between the beauty of the dance (and the paintings) and the harshness of their off-stage lives. No wonder Degas found them so fascinating.

 
Recommended for readers who like: The Royal Diaries (Carolyn Meyer wrote Isabel and Anastasia); Meyer's Young Royals series; Dear America; Moulin Rouge; Les Miserables

  

Shadow of the Hegemon, Shadow Puppets, Shadow of the Giant

Author: Orson Scott Card
Age: YA/Adult 
(Is there really any age for Card's books? Aren't they just sort of for everyone?)














These are three separate books but I read them all one right after another, so they're all sort of blended together in my mind like one enormous Ender's Game/Ender's Shadow epilogue. So I'm writing about all three of them together.

Shadow of the Hegemon comes first, and it picks up right after all the kids have been returned to earth (except Ender, of course). It seems like life is going to go back to "normal" for Ender's friends...living at home with families, going to school...which sounds pretty boring. But Bean's old enemy Achilles is still around, and the silly Russians (oh those silly Russians) somehow get hold of him, decide he's either (a) not crazy or (b) not so crazy that he can't still be useful, and put him in charge. With the Russians' help, Achilles kidnaps all the members of Ender's Jeesh except Bean, who, being Bean, figures out what's coming just in time to get away before Achilles blows up his house. Petra, being Petra, manages to get a message out to Bean. But in order to rescue them, Bean needs allies, so he reluctantly turns to Ender's older brother, Peter. Crazy old Peter who wants SO badly to rule the world. So the other kids get freed, but Achilles manages to hold on to Petra and take her with him as he hops from country to country, changing alliances with dizzying speed and pitting everyone against each other until pretty soon the whole world is at war. Bean keeps trying to rescue Petra, and all the kids keep trying to make themselves useful to their respective nations, although the stupid adults, being stupid adults, refuse to accept that these genius Battle School-trained kids, having saved humanity and whatnot, might actually have some military strategy skills.

Shadow Puppets comes next, and then Shadow of the Giant. Like I said, the books flow together...it's all basically the same plot, Battle School kids being geniusy and trying to get adults to trust them enough to put them in charge of their respective militaries, and all the different countries fighting each other, and Peter trying to restore some actual power to the position of Hegemon and teach everyone how to get along and stop trying to do the exact thing they worked so hard to keep the Buggers from doing, namely destroying humanity. And Achilles and Volescu (the evil doctor who created Bean) being evil and sneaky and causing problems for everyone. I don't want to write more detail than that because if I write specific things about the plot of the second book it will give away the ending to the first book, and so on.

I think I liked the first one, Shadow of the Hegemon, the best. It comes right after Ender's Shadow and so the kids are still actually kids, and I think it's more like Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow in that way. In the later books they're all falling in love and wanting to make babies, which is interesting in its own way, but it's kind of weird to think of all the little Battle Schoolers growing up.

I'll start with what I didn't like. I don't think Card is particularly good at romance. And he's a guy and he's good at all the war stuff, and that's what you really read the books for, so that's okay, he gets points for that. But I think some parts of the books would play out differently if they'd been written by a woman, and since I am a woman, I can't help thinking about that. Like I said, I don't want to write any spoilers here, so I'll just say this: I think he could have done with creating more female characters. It's like he doesn't want to create anyone new who wasn't in Battle School, so he's got ALL these guys, and then there's just Petra, and it seems like poor Petra has to be everything to everyone, and I like her a lot, but that's got to be kind of taxing for her.

I also didn't like what he did with Peter. The Peter of Ender's Game has so much potential to be so interesting. He's all jealous and evil and so ambitious and he wants to rule the world, and he's also rather a genius himself, what with all the Locke and Demosthenes stuff. And then it's supposed to be like Bean has to choose between Achilles and Peter, and they're supposed to both be awful choices because they're both so ambitious, but Bean's got to go with the lesser of the two evils, or something. But Peter just doesn't seem that evil. Peter doesn't seem that...anything. He's just there, and he's got the job he's got because he's supposedly smart, but then he doesn't really do anything smart, he just relies on Bean for all that. And okay, yes, rely on Bean for military stuff, because that's what he's good at, but isn't Peter supposed to be good at shaping opinions and political maneuvering and charming people? That's what I thought. But apparently not. He doesn't even really want to rule the world. He just wants to make everyone get along for the good of humanity. He's just...blah. And not really believable as a world leader. And he used to be one of my favorite characters, so that makes me sad. 

And I don't want to say anything more about that, because I don't want to spoil anything, and maybe I've already said too much. Once you've read these you can email me or something and we can talk more.

So, what did I like? Lots of stuff. I don't think Card is all-fantastic all the time (see above), but he has his flashes of genius and those are worth reading for. I like how he draws from history to imagine what the various countries will do and who will be ambitious and how they will attack each other and what their various allegiances will be. Based on what we know of the present, it all seems like a realistic future, which is what really makes for good science fiction. I like to watch all the plotting and strategizing by the various genius characters. I don't know anything about military tactics but it all seems believable and intelligent to me. He does actually introduce one new female character, an Indian named Virlomi (and maybe she's not entirely new, maybe she was briefly mentioned before but if so I don't remember her). And Virlomi's rise to power and what she does when she gets there is interesting.

It's intriguing to go from having all these little genius kids from all these different countries working together to save the planet, and then wonder what will happen as a result of their education and their joint history when they get back to earth. It seems...necessary somehow to finish their story. And Card does it well. And he's also got to try to figure out what circumstances and what tactics would bring about a lasting world peace, and I think he does that pretty well, too. 

The other thing I really like is that every now and then, in between all the plotting and battle scenes, some of the characters have deep religious and philosophical discussions. Those are my very favorite parts of the books. Card is Mormon, and I'm Mormon, so I guess it makes sense that his religious ideas would appeal to and resonate with me, but I feel like he has a way of expressing really deep thoughts so succinctly. He helps me make sense of things I've been puzzling about in my own mind, and he does it in a way that seems so obvious, and at the same time, provokes more thought. I want to make a quote wall of Card's wisdom from these books.

These sequels haven't entered my own personal literary hall of fame the way Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow have, but they're certainly worth a read.

Recommended for readers who like: Ender's Game; Ender's Shadow; good quality science fiction; the game of Risk














American Wife

Author: Curtis Sittenfeld

Age: Adult

Lest you think that I spend ALL my time reading teen vampire romances, I thought I'd write about an actual adult novel. American Wife is inspired by the life of Laura Bush. The Laura character's name is Alice Lindgren.

The book is divided into four parts. In the first part, Alice is a teenager in a small town in Wisconsin. She finally gets a chance to go on a date with the boy she's been in love with for years, and as she's driving to meet him and he's driving to meet her, one of them runs a stop sign and she plows into his car and kills him. Something like this actually happened to Laura Bush...what a crazy thing to try to recover from. So obviously teenage Alice is left reeling from this, and her life just gets messier, resulting in an illegal abortion. (Unlike the car accident, there's no evidence that Laura Bush ever had an abortion, but despite her husband's politics she is publicly pro-choice.)

In the second part of the book, Alice is in her late twenties, working as an elementary school librarian and spending her summer making papier mache characters with which to decorate the library. She's single (not having had much success in romance) and getting older. She meets Charlie Blackwell (the Dubya character) at a friend's barbecue, and doesn't expect to like him, but somehow she finds herself falling for him. He's from a wealthy family so he's never really had to work, and he's trying (without much success) to get into politics. But he's also funny, and handsome, and he actually really likes her. Now she just has to figure out how to stand his crass, overbearing family.

In part three, Alice and Charlie are entering middle age, and they're having problems in their marriage...mostly brought on by his alcoholism and general uselessness (he wants to buy a baseball team?). 

Finally, in part four, Charlie has cleaned up, found a purpose, and is the president of the United States. I liked part four the least. The rest of the book is so good, and then it just seems to devolve into the standard "BOO Iraq war" rhetoric. That's right, Charlie's gotten himself into a messy war in Iraq, and Alice doesn't approve or agree. It might seem unlikely that a couple with so many political differences could end up together, and stay together, especially when the husband has a career in politics, but for the most part Sittenfeld makes it work. One of the things I liked the most about the book was how it made me think about marriage...how two people can make a relationship last for decades, how they can deal with ups and downs and disagreements and stay in love, and how one spouse can make sacrifices to support the other's dreams. 

But I don't like books that make me feel like I'm being politically manipulated. Don't get me wrong...I'm not advocating war, and I think books with a general anti-war theme are good and necessary. But if I wanted to read long complaints about the Iraq war I would just spend some time on msn, instead of reading a novel.


On the whole, though, the first three parts of the book are good enough to make up for the fourth and make the book worth reading. In a country where it seems that everyone has to be rigidly divided into Democrat or Republican, it's hard to figure out what motivates Sittenfeld. The book is so pro-abortion and anti-Iraq-war, but at the same time she portrays the Bushes with so much sensitivity, making them so human and relatable that you can't help but like them. (At least I can't...but I never really hated them in the first place, so I'd love to hear what other people think of them after reading this).

If you've read Prep, you'll already know that Sittenfeld's genius is in creating characters that are so plausible, so utterly human and open and real. I don't know anything about the Bushes except what's available to the general public, and I don't think she does either, but she draws from their public personas and creates a very likely portrayal of what's going on underneath. I don't know them personally, but after reading this book I wish I did, and I feel like if I were to get to know them, and they were exactly like Alice and Charlie, I wouldn't be surprised.


The one flaw, I think, in her creation of the characters is that she chooses to place the Blackwells in Wisconsin instead of in Texas. I feel like the Bush's policies and personalities are so tied to their Texan-ness that it's hard to imagine or believe the same sort of people would come out of Wisconsin.



Recommended for readers who like: Prep; biographies of historical figures; honest books about the complexity of marriage

A Countess Below Stairs

Author: Eva Ibbotson

Age: YA/Adult 
(The author's books are usually included in the YA section at stores, but Eva Ibbotson has said she wrote them for adults. They're just not as explicit as your typical adult romance novel. And they're MUCH better written.)

Post-World War I England. Anna is a beautiful Russian countess who barely made it out of Russia alive after the Russian Revolution. Her father was killed, but she and her mother and younger brother escaped to England, where they moved in with her old British nanny. A kindly benefactor is paying for her younger brother to attend school, but Anna and her mother are near destitute. So to support the family she decides to hide her identity and become a maid for an aristocratic British family. Anna's a hard worker, and besides, the whole plan seems terribly romantic to her.

Rupert is the new Earl of Westerholme. He never thought he'd be in this position; he was the second son, but his older brother was killed in the war. Now he's come home to find his family's nearly out of money and may lose their ancestral home, and it's all his responsibility. Luckily, he has a solution: to marry the beautiful nouveau-riche heiress Muriel, who volunteered at a hospital during the war and nursed him back to health after he was wounded. With her money, he can keep his home, look after his aging mother, and continue to provide jobs for all the family's loyal and devoted servants. Plus, Muriel's hot.


Muriel also has a plan. She's a staunch supporter of the eugenics movement (particularly the handsome Dr. Lightbody) and she has high hopes for using her prestige as an earl's wife, and the earl's beautiful home, to further the cause. (If you don't know what eugenics is, look it up...pretty scary stuff, and, not to go all conspiracy-theory here, but it's all still out there, just under different names).


So far, so good. Problem is, once Rupert brings Muriel home to meet his family and friends, he starts to realize she's maybe not all that nice--especially after she offends his best friend's crippled little sister, who is the most darling child on the planet. And there's that beautiful new maid, who's mysterious, intriguing, and so kind-hearted that she's has made the entire household fall in love with her.


Will good triumph over evil? Will Anna's true identity be revealed? And what has happened to Anna's family's jewels, which they entrusted to a servant to smuggle out of Russia...a servant who hasn't been heard from since?


You should know that all of Eva Ibbotson's books, and all of her heroines, are incredibly sweet, to a stylized extent. Melodrama-heroine, Disney-princess sweet. But that's not a bad thing. In a world where happy endings are less and less common, grown-ups need their own Disney fairytales sometimes, too.


This is seriously one of my favorite books EVER.



Recommended for readers who like: happy endings; handsome earls; books about the British aristocracy; the sort of books that make you squeal with delight

Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side

Author: Beth Fantaskey


Age: YA


Jessica Packwood has always known she was adopted from Romania, but she's grown up as a normal American girl and she wants to have a normal senior year. All that changes when she finds herself being stalked on the first day of school by Lucius Vladescu, who claims that her birth parents were vampires, and her adoptive parents took her from Romania to save her from the angry villagers (not to mention rival vampires) who wanted her dead. Not only that, Lucius also thinks he's a vampire, and he claims that they've been betrothed since they were infants and that they must marry and unite their two warring families to bring peace to vampiredom. What's worse, Jessica's crazy hippie parents actually back up his story and invite him to move in, so that he can make Jessica fall in love with him and convince her to marry him.

OK, yes, this is exactly the sort of teen fluff book that my husband mocks me for reading...and it's about vampires, which makes it even worse (at least in his eyes). Those of you who have come here looking for more serious books can ignore this post...but I know that some of you secretly, or not-so-secretly, love this kind of stuff too. This book is decently funny, the romance is pretty hot, and in a sea of Twilight wannabees, here's what makes this book worthwhile: the vampire is GOOD.


Like, I like him even better than Edward good. (Blasphemy, I know!) Yes, I know Edward is ideal in many ways...but Lucius is everything a dark hot vampire should be, and Edward isn't. Lucius is arrogant, sometimes cruel (so that his flashes of kindness are that much more unexpected), has a sexy Romanian accent, and he's actually SCARY. Plus, in my mind, he doesn't look ANYTHING like Robert Pattinson. So I'm sorry Edward...but Lucius is my new vampire crush.


And there's also the added perk that Jessica is already a vampire (or turning into one as she hits vampire puberty) so you don't have to wade through several volumes of her whining about how much she wants to be a vampire.




Recommended for readers who like: Twilight; teen romance; hot scary evil undead boyfriends who have their own castle

Cleopatra's Daughter

Author: Michelle Moran

Age: YA

You know how the story of Marc Antony and Cleopatra ends...with their Romeo-and-Juliet-style suicides. But what happens to their three children, the twins Cleopatra Selene and Alexander Helios, and their little brother Ptolemy? Augustus Caesar takes them back to Rome with him and gives them to his sister Octavia to raise. (Octavia has to be one of the nicest women in history. I mean, if your husband left you for another woman and started a war with your brother, would you take his children with his mistress into your home and raise them like your own kids?)

Slavery is a central theme in the book. Caesar keeps many of the royal children of various conquered nations as slaves in his household, and Selene and her siblings realize that it's only luck and Caesar's good temper that has kept them from becoming slaves themselves. As the book transports you to a time and a place where simple survival is the daily goal, you find yourself asking, "Who is really free? Or happy, if happiness is tied to freedom?" Certainly not the common slaves, who are often severely mistreated by their masters. Not the royal slaves in Caesar's household, either...they may have better food, lodging, and education, but they miss their homelands, and can't help but remember that Caesar killed their parents. Not the poor free people of Rome, who are abused by the wealthy. Not the aristocratic wives of cruel husbands. And not the cruel husbands, who struggle to avoid incurring Caesar's wrath. Definitely not Caesar's family, who are subject to his daily whims, and those of his jealous, plotting wife Livia. Not even Caesar himself, as he lives in constant fear of assassination.
 
As Selene grows up in Augustus' Rome--an exciting and terrifying place--she makes friends, develops a crush on her foster brother Marcellus (Caesar's heir), attends gladiator fights, misses her parents, studies architecture (she is warned to find a way to make herself useful to Caesar, if she wants to survive), and tries to solve the mystery of the Red Eagle, a rebel who stands up for the slaves and may start a revolution. But will she be able to overcome her tragic past to find happiness, love, and fulfillment? Or is she doomed to meet the same miserable end that seems to await just about everyone associated with the Julio-Claudian family?
   
I went through an enormous Cleopatra phase in my early teens, and at that point I read a biography about Cleopatra and her children called (aptly) Cleopatra's Children, by Alice Curtis Desmond (which I am planning to re-read and review for you at some point). From what I remember of that, it seems like this book is as historically accurate as it can be (i.e. with the limited information we have about what happened to Cleopatra's children). So--good factual framework, the fictional parts (which the author points out in a note at the end of the novel) are interesting and plausible, and there's just a bit of romance--everything I require from historical fiction.




Recommended for fans of: historical fiction; Egypt; Rome; The Royal Diaries series; I, Claudius; Suetonius; Philippa Gregory and the TV series Rome (although be warned that as this is young adult fiction it features MUCH less sex than the last two)