2016

Posted in The Monday Check-In by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

My Monday tradition, including a look back and a look ahead — what I read last week, what new books came my way, and what books are keeping me busy right now. Plus a smattering of other stuff too.

What did I read last week?

All the Winters After by Seré Prince Halverson: Such a beautiful book! My review is here.

Up To This Pointe by Jennifer Longo: Terrific YA fiction with a fresh and unusual setting. Check out my review, here.

Don’t you just love those two icy covers? I went from the far north to about as far south as you can get — and loved them both!

Family reading:

Alert the media! My son liked a book!

My kiddo, who will only read when forced to do so, finished The Giver (for school) this week, and admitted that it was really good AND that he’d be willing to read other books if they’re as good as The Giver! I’m trying not to get overexcited (don’t want to scare him off with my crazy enthusiasm!), but my brain is now going a mile a minute trying to figure out what other books to push his way.

Also, my husband is close to finishing Pride and Prejudice, his very first Jane Austen novel! We had the most adorable conversation in the car the other day about Mr. Darcy and entails and fortunes and reputations and all sorts of other great little pieces of P&P. Oh, the perks of being married to someone who enjoys a good book!

Fresh Catch:

I love my public library! Because my hold request for this book just arrived:

What will I be reading during the coming week?

Currently in my hands:

The Queen of the Night by Alexander Chee: Just getting started — I’ve heard really good things!

Now playing via audiobook:

I completely enjoyed my re-listen to Night Broken, book #8 in the amazing Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of these books and characters.

And now, I’m resuming my audiobook adventures with the Kate Shugak series by Dana Stabenow. Over the weekend, I started book #5, Play with Fire, and based on what I’ve listened to so far, this should be another great installment.

Ongoing reads:

My book group is reading and discussing two chapter per week of both Written in My Own Heart’s Blood by Diana Gabaldon and Emma by Jane Austen. This is an online group, and anyone is welcome to join us — so if you’re interested, just ask me how!

So many books, so little time…

21Feb2016

Book Review: All the Winters After by Seré Prince Halverson

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

I have apparently developed a full-blown Alaska fetish. I just can’t get enough. So when I discover a book that’s an A+ read and is also set in Alaska, I want to do a crazy-feet happy dance of joy.

*stepping away from the keyboard to dance a little bit*

Okay, deep breath. I’m back.

All the Winters After is an absolutely beautiful book about family, loss, love, and new beginnings. All this, and a gorgeous setting too!

Set in Caboose, Alaska — a fictionalized version of Homer — All the Winters After is the story of two sad, lonely people. Kachemak Winkel (Kache — pronounced “catch” — for short) has been away from Alaska for 20 years, ever since the tragic plane crash that took the lives of his parents and brother. Kache has spent most of this time just going through the motions, feeling guilt over his family’s death and feeling not much more of anything, about anything.

When he finally returns to Alaska at the behest of his aunt to see his ailing grandmother, he steps foot for the very first time in his family’s home, a homestead located in the wilderness a short drive from Caboose. Expecting ruin after 20 years, instead Kache finds something more like a museum or a time capsule. Everything from his former life, every knick-knack and family photo, is perfectly preserved. But instead of an empty house, he finds a mysterious young woman living there — a frightened woman named Nadia, hiding out with her dog, caring for the house and lands, who has apparently lived there for the last ten years.

Kache and Nadia cautiously start to become acquainted. Nadia fled the community of Old Believers — a closed community of Russian Orthodox descendants who follow the old ways and old religion — after her arranged marriage to a newcomer turned into a nightmare. Nadia has lived in Kache’s family homestead, wearing the family’s clothes, reading his mother’s books over and over again, and in essence, inhabiting the life and heritage he left behind. It’s a tangled web of emotions that grow between them, as trust and dependence begin to take the place of fear and resentment.

Meanwhile, Kache reconnects with the town, the land, and the memories he left behind, and starts to find a way forward thanks to Nadia’s kind and supportive presence.

I don’t think my simple description does justice to the loveliness of this book. The descriptions of the land, the wilderness, and the wildlife are gorgeous. We go through a full year over the course of the novel, seeing the changing of the seasons and the resulting changes in the landscape, all told with a breathtaking yet simple approach.

The characters here are complex and multi-dimensional. In addition to Kache and Nadia, we also get to know Kache’s aunt Eleanor (known as Snag), who has spent her whole life hiding a big secret and shouldering her own sense of guilt related to the plane crash, and Kache’s grandmother Lettie, who first settled the homestead all those years earlier. Both of these women get the chance to share their own stories, and the various parts come together to paint a moving picture of a family rooted by love but torn apart by secrets and doubts.

I did find a climactic moment toward the end of the book a bit jarring, more like something out of a crime novel than a fitting part of this one, but at the same time, it was clear from early on that a scene like this would have to happen before the end of the book. (Sorry, being intentionally vague here.) Likewise, while the ending made complete sense, I was wishing for something different (as I suspect most readers will be). Still, the stories ends on a positive and hopeful note, and brings the story full-circle in a way that seems just right.

Overall, I simply can’t say enough good things about All the Winters After. It’s a beautiful read about a beautiful place, with fascinating characters and a real emotional depth. All the Winters After is a book that will stay with you long after you finish the final chapter and close the covers. Highly recommended.

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The details:

Title: All the Winters After
Author: Seré Prince Halverson
Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark
Publication date: February 16, 2016
Length: 370 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher

21Feb2016

Book Review: Up To This Pointe by Jennifer Longo

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

You may be thinking, “What on earth are ballet and Antarctica doing in the same novel?”

That’s a very good question, but fortunately, Up To This Pointe, the new YA novel by the author of Six Feet Over It (review), has some very good answers.

Harper Scott has been absolutely certain about her future for her entire life. Along with her best friend Kate, Harper has a plan. Which they call The Plan. And it’s very simple: Work their butts off with constant ballet lessons and rehearsals. Graduate a semester early from high school. Audition for and get accepted by the San Francisco Ballet. Live and work together in their hometown, the best city in the world, being ballerinas and having careers doing what they love best.

There’s a small hitch: Kate is a gifted ballet dancer with the perfect ballet body and innate talent. Harper is a very good dancer who works harder than anyone and pours her heart and soul into ballet — but as she learns when she finally gets the honest talk she should have gotten years earlier, she lacks that indefinable “it” that would propel her into success and acceptance by a ballet company.

When Harper’s dreams come crashing down, she takes refuge by running away, pretty much as far as she can go.

Harper, you see, is a Scott — as in, a descendant of the famous South Pole explorer Robert Falcon Scott. Beyond the name cachet, her mother is a scientist with lots of colleagues who are willing to help out her daughter. And in the blink of an eye, Harper finagles herself into a six-month internship available to high school students, to live and work at the McMurdo Station in Antarctica during the extreme dark of a sunless winter. [Note: As the author points out in the afterword, there is no such internship. High school students would never be permitted to winter over in Antarctica — but hey, this is fiction!]

To Harper, this is a perfect solution. Her whole life has become nothing but emptiness. Her dreams and plans have amounted to nothing. Harper’s despair drives her away from her loving family, the very cute boy she’s only just started to know, and especially, from Kate and a perceived betrayal. She rushes headlong into a commitment that she can’t break until the sun rises again six months later, and meanwhile is thrust into an experience unlike anything she’s ever known.

While the idea of a ballerina at the South Pole may sound funny, Up To This Pointe works, and works well. Harper is a lovely character, with deep commitments, a strong sense of purpose, and absolute love for her family, her art, and her little ballet students who adore her madly. The book gives us a sharp picture of what life is like for an aspiring ballet dancer — the absolute commitment required, the years of training and self-denial, the toll on body and mind — and the risk that what someone devotes herself to all her life may not be what she can end up succeeding at.

The book also give us a fascinating introduction to what life at an Antarctic science station is like during the long winter months, the craziness and even illness that can be caused by winters there, and the unusual friendships and relationships that come from being marooned with a small group of people for so many months on end. Likewise, the beauty of Antarctica is lovingly described… as well as the bitter, piercing cold. The author finds a clever way to include the three most famous Antarctic explorers — Scott, Amundsen, and Shackleton — as almost spirit guides to Harper. Their stories give her hope, courage, and a way forward just when she needs it most.

Author Jennifer Longo has clearly spent a lot of time in San Francisco, as she makes the city a perfect backdrop for Harper’s world. The San Francisco of Up To This Pointe is much more than just famous bridges and crooked streets. It’s the avenues and neighborhoods and cafes and parks that Harper and her friends and family inhabit and love that really bring the city to life.

The writing in Up To This Pointe is both funny and real. There’s a lot of humor here, even as Harper deals with heartbreak and horrible loss. Her pain and inner turmoil are portrayed sensitively and realistically, and because this is a first-person narrative, we’re in Harper’s head with her as she sorts through her sorrow and desires and figures out what to do with herself.

From the book’s opening lines:

The thing about Antarctica that surprises me most? The condoms. They’re absolutely everywhere.

…to descriptions of the Antarctic sky:

Paintbrush strokes of color, flung from a palette of violet and crimson, of green and blue. Vivid, pure color, and it seems to move and shimmer, not like the pearly nacreous clouds; these are ribbons of pigment.

Aurora australis.

This is a really crazy time of year for the southern lights to show.

It’s a sign.

Of something.

… and back again to San Francisco:

Ocean Beach smells like my childhood. Sounds like my future. I breathe the salt and cold and then, nearer the park, the evergreens and cypress and juniper berry and the lawn, new soil. I’m in a tank top. No coat. The fog moves in my hair. I want to hug it.

… Up To This Pointe is a sweet, fun, hopeful and highly readable story of a talented young woman figuring out what home is all about, what a Plan is for, and what matters most.

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The details:

Title: Up To This Pointe
Author: Jennifer Longo
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers
Publication date: January 19, 2016
Length: 368 pages
Genre: Young adult
Source: Library

17Feb2016

Thursday Quotables: All The Winters After

Posted in Thursday Quotables by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome back to Thursday Quotables! This weekly feature is the place to highlight a great quote, line, or passage discovered during your reading each week. Whether it’s something funny, startling, gut-wrenching, or just really beautifully written, Thursday Quotables is where my favorite lines of the week will be, and you’re invited to join in!

NEW! Thursday Quotables is now using a Linky tool! Be sure to add your link if you have a Thursday Quotables post to share.

All the Winters After by Seré Prince Halverson
(published 2016)

I’m in love with this book! If only I didn’t have little things like work and sleep interrupting, I would have finished by now. Amazing characters, fascinating personal journeys, and a to-die-for setting in Alaska all make this a great read. Here a brief description of some of my favorite sights in Alaska:

All along the bench of land above the bay, fireweed spread like its namesake, setting the slope ablaze in the most vibrant fuchsia. In this land known for everything large and majestic — mountains, eagles, glaciers, bears, even its mosquitoes, which Alaskans called the state bird — the tiny, pale state flower popped up everywhere, those delicate sky-colored forget-me-nots with their pinpointed yellow centers, as if the sun had sacrificed a part of itself in order to anoint each one with a sacred droplet of light.

fireweed

Alaska state flower: forget-me-not

What lines made you laugh, cry, or gasp this week? Do tell!

If you’d like to participate in Thursday Quotables, it’s really simple:

Write a Thursday Quotables post on your blog. Try to pick something from whatever you’re reading now. And please be sure to include a link back to Bookshelf Fantasies in your post (http://www.bookshelffantasies.com), if you’d be so kind!
Click on the linky button (look for the cute froggie face) below to add your link.
After you link up, I’d love it if you’d leave a comment about my quote for this week.
Be sure to visit other linked blogs to view their Thursday Quotables, and have fun!

16Feb2016

Shelf Control #23: The Color of Magic

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to the newest weekly feature here at Bookshelf Fantasies… Shelf Control!

Shelf Control is all about the books we want to read — and already own! Consider this a variation of a Wishing & Waiting post… but looking at books already available, and in most cases, sitting right there on our shelves and e-readers.

Want to join in? See the guidelines and linky at the bottom of the post, and jump on board! Let’s take control of our shelves!

My Shelf Control pick this week is:

Title: The Color of Magic
Author: Terry Pratchett
Published: 1983
Length: 210 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

In the beginning there was…a turtle.

Somewhere on the frontier between thought and reality exists the Discworld, a parallel time and place which might sound and smell very much like our own, but which looks completely different. Particularly as it’s carried though space on the back of a giant turtle (sex unknown). It plays by different rules.

But then, some things are the same everywhere. The Disc’s very existence is about to be threatened by a strange new blight: the world’s first tourist, upon whose survival rests the peace and prosperity of the land. Unfortunately, the person charged with maintaining that survival in the face of robbers, mercenaries and, well, Death, is a spectacularly inept wizard…

How I got it:

I picked up a copy at a used book store — where else?

When I got it:

It’s been years. I’d forgotten that I owned a copy until I took inventory last summer!

Why I want to read it:

Discworld feels like a big gaping hole in my reading life. I loved Good Omens, and I’ve loved all the other little tastes I’ve gotten of Terry Pratchett’s writing. Discworld is so vast that I’ve let myself feel too intimidated to ever actually get started, but I think I need to just jump in and give it a try. I’ve gotten lots of different advice about suggested reading orders for the series, but I figure I might as well start right at the beginning.

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link below!
And if you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and have fun!

For more on why I’ve started Shelf Control, check out my introductory post here, or read all about my out-of-control book inventory, here.

And if you’d like to post a Shelf Control button on your own blog, here’s an image to download (with my gratitude, of course!):

15Feb2016

Top Ten Tuesday: The soundtrack of my reading life

Posted in Top Ten Tuesday by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic has to do with books and music, and since the suggested approach didn’t really call to me, I thought I’d put my own spin on it.

My TTT list this week is about my reading habits, as described by 10 songs:

1) The Sounds of Silence: There’s nothing I like better than having a quiet room to read in. No music, no TV, no people… just me, a book, and maybe some birdsong or rain sounds coming in through the windows.

2) Forever Young: I’m a fully grown adult, but I keep coming back to YA fiction. There’s something so immediate and emotional about YA books, isn’t there?

3) Time Warp: Time travel books are always a favorite.

4) Walking on the Moon: I love to read anything about space travel, whether sci fi, or non-fiction about the space program, or even astronauts’ memoirs.

5) Thrift Shop: Nothing better than a used book store for spending a few hours lost among the stacks! My best finds are all from used book stores.

6) Time After Time: I do love to re-read! If I really and truly love a book, then once is never enough.

7) (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction: I try, and I try, and I try, and I try… but sometimes there’s no choice but to DNF.

8) Let the Sunshine In: One of my very favorite things to do is read outdoors on a sunny day. A blanket in the sun, or sitting somewhere on the grass, with clear blue skies and the sun on my face… bliss!

9) All You Need Is Love: Because even though I don’t read much in the romance genre, I’m still a sucker for a great, momentous, unforgettable love story.

10) Where Do We Go From Here?: Okay, this one might be a stretch — but if you’re a Buffy fan, then no doubt you’ve watched the season 6 musical episode (“Once More With Feeling”) a time or two (or a couple of dozen times, if you’re like me)… in which case, you absolutely know this song (and maybe sing along???). So where do we go from here… is what I ask myself every single time I finish a great book and just can’t imagine what to read next.

What was your musical theme this week? Share your link, please, and I’ll come check out your top 10!

If you enjoyed this post, please consider following Bookshelf Fantasies! And don’t forget to check out my regular weekly features, Shelf Control and Thursday Quotables. Happy reading!

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Do you host a book blog meme? Do you participate in a meme that you really, really love? I host a Book Blog Meme Directory, and I’m always looking for new additions! If you know of a great meme to include — or if you host one yourself — please drop me a note on my Contact page and I’ll be sure to add your info!

15Feb2016

The Monday Check-In ~ 2/15/2016

Posted in The Monday Check-In by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

In real life:

I’m very happy it’s Presidents Day! Who doesn’t love a day off?

What did I read last week?

All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders: A witch and a mad scientist and the end of the world? Just as awesome as it sounds. My review is here.

The Chocolate Thief by Laura Florand: Not my usual cup of tea, but I didn’t hate this romance that I read for my book group. Check out my thoughts on this book, here.

It’s All Your Fault by Paul Rudnick: A funny, quick YA book about celebrity life, family, and doing the unexpected. My review is here.

Elsewhere on the blog:

I wrote a post with follow-up news, information, and links related to two books I recently reviewed, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot and The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult. Check it out, here.

Pop culture goodness:

My son and I have been slowly working our way through my Buffy boxed set, and this week we finished season 4, with the awesomely weird “Restless” episode. So many priceless moments, including:

… and this treasure:

“Try not to bleed on my couch…”

Fresh Catch:

One new book thanks to Book Depository:

Three new YA releases all arrived at the library at once:

And a friend just back from Israel brought me this:

That’s Pride and Prejudice, in Hebrew. No, I’m not going to attempt it any time soon, but my husband was just about to give up on it in English, so the timing is perfect.

What will I be reading during the coming week?

Currently in my hands:

All the Winters After by Seré Prince Halverson: I’ve really been looking forward to this one — so glad to finally be starting it!

Now playing via audiobook:

I listened to about 15% of Liar Temptress Soldier Spy by Karen Abbott, and then quit. It seemed like an interesting topic, but the audiobook just didn’t hold my attention well enough. So…

I’m now very happily listening (again!) to the audiobook of Night Broken, book #8 in the amazing Mercy Thompson series by Patricia Briggs. I love these books so much! And I’ll be soooo ready for #9 when it comes out in a few weeks.

Ongoing reads:

And we’re off! My book group is reading and discussing two chapter per week of both Written in My Own Heart’s Blood by Diana Gabaldon and Emma by Jane Austen. This is an online group, and anyone is welcome to join us — so if you’re interested, just ask me how!

So many books, so little time…

14Feb2016

Take A Peek Book Review: It’s All Your Fault by Paul Rudnick

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

“Take a Peek” book reviews are short and (possibly) sweet, keeping the commentary brief and providing a little peek at what the book’s about and what I thought.

Synopsis:

(via Goodreads)

My name is Caitlin and up until forty-eight hours ago I had never:

Tasted alcohol, kissed a boy, sang in public at the top of my lungs, kidnapped anyone or—WHAT? STOLEN A CONVERTIBLE?

Now I’m in jail and I have no idea what I’m going to tell:

The police, my parents, the mayor, all of those camera crews and everyone on Twitter.

I have just noticed that:

My nose is pierced and I have—WAIT? IS THAT A TATTOO?

I blame one person for this entire insane weekend:

My famous cousin.

Who is also my former best friend.

Who I have HATED for the past four years.

Who I miss like crazy. NO I DON’T!!!!

IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT, HELLER HARRIGAN!!!!

My Thoughts:

Be prepared to giggle, snort, and perhaps even LOL. It’s All Your Fault is a quirky, silly story of opposites exploding… and then giving each other exactly what they need.

Main character Caitlin is the very definition of a goody-two-shoes: homeschooled, impeccably dressed in polyester blazer and white knee socks, and part of her family’s musical act, the Singing Singleberries. Caitlin is a good Christian girl who eats wholesome food, never swears, drinks or smokes, and yet has crippling anxiety attacks that stop her in her tracks.

Caitlin has been estranged from her cousin Heller, her previous best friend, for the past four years, during which Heller has become one of the top teen stars in America. Heller starred for years in the kid TV show Anna Banana, playing a simple small town girl with a secret identity as a supermodel. (Hello, Hannah Montana!) Now Heller is about to become a major movie star, as the first movie based on the epic Angel Wars book trilogy is about to premiere… but Heller needs to stay clean, sober, and out of trouble long enough to make it through the publicity juggernaut required to launch the movie.

To say that Caitlin (who Heller sneeringly refers to as K-Bop) and Heller are like oil and water is an understatement:

“K-Bop’s parents are named Calvin and Carol and they have eight hundred children who all have names starting with C, like Cucumber and Cockatoo and Colostomy…”

“I only have eight brothers and sisters and my parents like the letter C because it stands for Caring, Cooperation and our Creator.”

But it’s Caitlin to the rescue! Caitlin is recruited to be glued to Heller’s side for the premiere weekend, to keep her in line, keep her from generating any more bad press, and to make sure the screaming Angel Wars fans have the time of their lives, putting to bed all the nasty gossip about Heller’s bad habits and making sure her movie career moves forward without a hitch. Of course, Caitlin is convinced that she’s there to save Heller’s soul, but hey, how hard could it be?

What follows is a comedy of capers and pranks, as Caitlin’s good intents collide with Heller’s need for mischief — and ultimately, both girls know that sooner or later they’ll have to face up to the events of four years earlier that drove a wedge between them and kept them separated ever since.

Along the way, there are crazy fans, daring escapes, a raid on a cupcake factory, and silly scenes galore, such as Caitlin trying to convince a table full of Hollywood teen stars to drink wholesome glasses of milk or Caitlin teaching Heller to substitute the names of New Jersey towns every time she has the urge to swear.

“You’re at one of your filthy nightclubs, or at a degenerate Hollywood party. Someone approaches you and offers you an illegal substance. What do you say?”

Heller thought about this, furrowing her brow.

“Go Teaneck yourself, you Dunellen piece of motherfucking Mount Kittatinny!”

“HELLER!”

The book pokes gentle fun at crazy, obsessive fandom, the YA trilogies that dominate books and movies today, and their almighty influence over the entire world, not just the entertainment industry. (There’s even a judge whose three daughters are named Katniss, Bella, and Hermione.)

It’s All Your Fault is a girl-power delight of wild adventure, personality clashes, and Hollywood backstage shenanigans. Heller and Caitlin are fun, well-developed characters who break out of their molds and display real humor and strength that go beyond their one-dimensional outer appearance. This is a light, silly, sometimes hilarious read, very quick and enjoyable, and is sure to make fans of teen movie and book franchises giggle in recognition.

Note: For more by this author, check out my review of Gorgeous.

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The details:

Title: It’s All Your Fault
Author: Paul Rudnick
Publisher: Scholastic
Publication date: January 26, 2016
Length: 294 pages
Genre: Young adult fiction
Source: Library

13Feb2016

Book Review: The Chocolate Thief by Laura Florand

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Let’s be perfectly clear: This is not my usual kind of read.

My lovely online book group picked The Chocolate Thief by Laura Florand for our February group read. Don’t get me wrong — I have nothing against chocolate! And if you don’t believe me, just send me some and see if I eat it.

I do have a problem, though, with romance novels, and The Chocolate Thief belongs firmly on the romance shelf.

All that being said, I will admit that I didn’t hate The Chocolate Thief, and actually, once I accepted that I was reading this book and sticking with it, I kind of got sucked in — at least, enough to read for a couple of hours straight this morning so I could see how it all turned out.

Enough preamble.

In The Chocolate Thief, 20-something American businesswoman Cade Corey has come to Paris to see if she can make a dream come true. Cade is the youngest generation of the Corey chocolate dynasty of Corey, Maryland. Think Hershey — Corey is a multi-billion dollar corporation that thrives off of its 33-cent chocolate bars sold at Walmarts and in supermarket checkout lines across America.

Cade’s dream is to launch a line of gourmet, high-end chocolate as a flagship enterprise for Corey, but to make it happen, she needs a Parisian chocolatier to sign on to the scheme, agree to let Cade buy him for millions, and then mass-produce his type of chocolate, stamped with his name, as part of the Corey brand.

Cade gets a nasty awakening when she pursues the #1 chocolatier in Paris, Sylvain Marquis, and is given an angry and emphatic NO. (Or “non”, I suppose). Not one to give up, Cade eventually ends up breaking into Sylvain’s laboratoire, fingering all of his chocolate-making supplies, leaving chocolatey fingerprints everywhere, and winding up covered by gourmet blogs as the mysterious “Chocolate Thief”.

Needless to say, it doesn’t hurt a bit that Sylvain is gorgeous and manly and has beautiful hands. Cade falls hard. He falls right back. The chemistry grows and the heat rises. And it goes pretty much where you’d expect it to go.

Okay, my thoughts:

Well, as I said, I did read all the way to the end, so clearly, it’s a compelling story. Of course, there are things that bugged me. Such as Cade stubbornly running around the city in heels while thinking about how much her feet hurt. Or having to describe every outfit she wears and how much makeup she puts on. Or the fact that Sylvain’s early refusal and dismissal of Cade seems to be the key to what keeps her coming back. Or looking at every attractive woman as competition.

There are positives: I liked that the main character is a successful professional who’s devoted to her family and to the family business. I liked that she and Sylvain are both outwardly cool and confident, but have lurking insecurities underneath — she, that men only want her for her money, and he, that women only want him for his chocolate.

They spend a lot of the book mistrusting each other’s motives and getting either hurt or angry, when if they’d only talked a bit more, they’d have reached an understanding (and happiness) a lot sooner.

The writing is a bit bumpy. Lots and lots (and lots) of decadent, sensuous descriptions of the flavors of chocolate, the way it melts on the tongue, the scents and textures of every food, every piece of clothing, every touch of skin. These bits are all quite delicious (sorry…), if occasionally overdone. By the time I was further in the book, it was like — enough already! We get how good the chocolate smells. Can we get on with the plot?

Where was I? Yes, the writing. Some bits just made me groan, and not from ecstasy:

Long, phallic eclairs in shades of coffee, chocolate, and pistachio stretched in rows like some nymphomaniac’s dream.

Okay…

Chocolate melted on her tongue, melted into her body. Its warm, rich sweetness combined with the pounding adrenaline until she felt … the closest she could think of was aroused. Desperately, intensely aroused, as if someone could come out of the shadows with his sorcerer eyes glinting and lay her down on the dark counters and …

Is it getting hot in here?

This clunker just did not work for me:

She had hunted him. She had tethered herself out there like some kid goat to his Tyrannosaurus rex.

Wait, what? Goats hunt T-Rexes? Not sure this makes the least bit of sense.

The plot is a fairly standard romance arc — two beautiful people, intense instant attraction, lots of tingly bits leading up to hot sex, misunderstandings and obstacles, and finally, the HEA you know is coming at the end. Sorry, that’s not a spoiler — that’s just how these things go.

Speaking of hot sex — there’s quite a bit, including two especially… um, let’s say VIVID… scenes, one on the marble countertops of Sylvain’s workplace, and one quite memorable escapade taking place during the ascent of several flights of stairs.

Do I recommend this book?

Well, that depends. I actually had fun reading it, despite not being a fan of the genre, and despite the muscle strain I developed from all the eye-rolling. The Chocolate Thief isn’t a book I would seek out on my own, and I probably would have stopped after a chapter or two if not for not wanting to bail on a book club book. But, it wasn’t unpleasant to read, I did end up getting caught up enough in the story to want to see it through, and overall found it pretty fun. Especially all the chocolate. Yummmmmm.

For readers who enjoy romances with aloof, strong but secretly fragile men and the powerful but secretly looking for love women who break through their defenses, well, this might be just about perfect.

Overall, it’s sweet and romantic and full of the sights of Paris and an absolute walllowing in flavors. Not a bad choice for a quick and light read. And if you just want to get to the… um… vivid bits:

There in his arms. Yielding to him. Pulling at him. Yielding. Her mouth, her tongue, her body that flexed to him and grew softer and softer, as if all strength failed her, even as he grew stronger and stronger, too hard, hard to bursting with himself and his power over her.

… turn to chapters 13 and 18. You’re welcome.

Word to the wise: Stock up on chocolate before reading The Chocolate Thief, and splurge on the good stuff.

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The details:

Title: The Chocolate Thief
Author: Laura Florand
Publisher: Kensington
Publication date: July 31, 2012
Length: 303 pages
Genre: Romance
Source: Library

13Feb2016

Take A Peek Book Review: All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

“Take a Peek” book reviews are short and (possibly) sweet, keeping the commentary brief and providing a little peek at what the book’s about and what I thought.

Synopsis:

(via Goodreads)

From the editor-in-chief of io9.com, a stunning novel about the end of the world–and the beginning of our future

Childhood friends Patricia Delfine and Laurence Armstead didn’t expect to see each other again, after parting ways under mysterious circumstances during high school. After all, the development of magical powers and the invention of a two-second time machine could hardly fail to alarm one’s peers and families.

But now they’re both adults, living in the hipster mecca San Francisco, and the planet is falling apart around them. Laurence is an engineering genius who’s working with a group that aims to avert catastrophic breakdown through technological intervention into the changing global climate. Patricia is a graduate of Eltisley Maze, the hidden academy for the world’s magically gifted, and works with a small band of other magicians to secretly repair the world’s ever-growing ailments. Little do they realize that something bigger than either of them, something begun years ago in their youth, is determined to bring them together–to either save the world, or plunge it into a new dark ages.

A deeply magical, darkly funny examination of life, love, and the apocalypse.

My Thoughts:

What a weird and wonderful book!

All the Birds in the Sky mashes together magic and crazy science to create a whole that’s odd and unique and utterly engaging. We first meet the lead characters Patricia and Laurence as outcast kids — bullied, friendless, and with home lives that just scream abuse. When they finally meet, they provide each other with refuge and support, but ultimately part ways until a seemingly random reconnection as adults.

The story switches perspectives between both characters, showing us the life of Patricia the witch, cursing and healing people, always being cautioned against the #1 sin for witches, Aggrandizement… and Laurence, the genius mad scientist working on anti-gravity and the possible salvation — or destruction — of the planet.

The writing is often quite funny, although the subject matter can get pretty heavy, what with the impending end of the world and all. The witches and the scientists have plans to save everyone, but each plan may also bring the apocalypse. Patricia and Laurence battle their own factions as well as each others’ in order to avert disaster, even while dealing with their own inner turmoil and competing interests and emotions.

This book truly brings together science fiction and fantasy in a way very few do. As the author said in an introduction to the book on the io9 website, “A young witch and a wild science genius—the characters in my new novel All the Birds in the Sky don’t even belong in the same book together.” Read more from this piece, here.

If you enjoy oddball fiction with a science-y, magical flair, check out All the Birds in the Sky!

PS – Bonus points to Charlie Jane Anders for making excellent use of San Francisco — not just the obvious tourist attractions, but all the odd little corners and neighborhoods that make SF so SF!

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The details:

Title: All the Birds in the Sky
Author: Charlie Jane Anders
Publisher: Tor Books
Publication date: January 26, 2016
Length: 316 pages
Genre: Science fiction/fantasy
Source: Purchased