Book Review: Ashfall by Mike Mullin

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Book Review: Ashfall by Mike Mullin

In the world of young adult fiction, the sub-genre of global natural disasters is one I find particularly intriguing. When life as we know it is suddenly wrenched away from us, what’s left, and how do we survive? In the best of these types of YA novels, we follow a sympathetic main character on a trajectory from childhood to unexpected early adulthood, as physical survival and the struggle to retain human morality force the character to shoulder responsibility and find his or her untapped strengths and determination.

I’m happy to place Ashfall in the “best of” category. Ashfall is the story of 15-year-old Alex, a normal, somewhat sullen suburban teen boy whose world is swept out from under him:

I was home alone on that Friday evening. Those who survived know exactly which Friday I mean. Everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing, in the same way my parents remembered 9/11, but more so. Together we lost the old world, slipping from that cocoon of mechanized comfort into the hellish land we inhabit now. The pre-Friday world of school, cell phones, and refrigerators dissolved into this post-Friday world of ash, darkness, and hunger.

Alex has refused to go on a family visit to cousins in Illinois and is therefore home alone in Cedar Falls, Iowa when all hell breaks loose – more specifically, when the long-inactive supervolcano located under Yellowstone erupts with spectacular and devasting impact. Civilization dissolves practically immediately as the world is inexorably coated with a heavy layer of ash. Scavenging, looting, mistrust, and violence are rampant among the survivors of the initial disaster, and starvation is lurking right around the corner. Within days, Alex begins to shrug off the last vestiges of his childhood, leaving the questionable safety of his neighbors’ protection and striking out cross-country through a ruined, nightmarish landscape on a quest to reunite with his parents and younger sister.

Along the way, Alex is forced, time and again, to choose between self-interest and doing the right thing. He receives help when he expects none, and chooses to help others, even when doing so imperils his own meager supply of food and water and could mean the difference between life and death. What’s interesting here is that Alex is not portrayed as a selfless hero. The author shows us Alex’s internal struggle, his thought processes, and his decision to be a person who tries to do right. It’s not easy for him, but it’s a sign of Alex’s maturation that he realizes that securing food and shelter will not be enough for him if he has to shed his essential goodness; physical survival without the survival of his humanity will not suffice.

We follow Alex along a difficult and sometimes gruesome path. He meets Darla, a strong-willed, feisty, talented farm girl with her own tragedies to confront and accept. Darla becomes Alex’s travel companion and soul mate, and their deepening trust and affection for one another help give Ashfall much of its heart. What could have been merely an exciting adventure story becomes a much more personal journey toward love, family, and adulthood.

When I picked up Ashfall, I had expected to read a story about physical survival in a nightmarish, post-disaster world. I’m pleased to be able to say that Ashfall provides a deeper, more moving experience than expected.

The sequel to Ashfall, Ashen Winter, is due out in October 2012, and I’m very much looking forward to reading it. I’ve become quite fond of Alex and Darla, and I can’t wait to see how their story continues to unfold.

Wishlist Wednesday

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And now, for this week’s Wishlist Wednesday…

The concept is to post about one book from our wish lists that we can’t wait to read. Want to play? Here’s how:

  • Follow Pen to Paper as host of the meme.
  • Please consider adding the blog hop button to your blog somewhere, so others can find it easily and join in too! Help spread the word! The code will be at the bottom of the post under the linky.
  • Pick a book from your wishlist that you are dying to get to put on your shelves.
  • Do a post telling your readers about the book and why it’s on your wishlist.
  • Add your blog to the linky at the bottom of the post at Pen to Paper.
  • Put a link back to pen to paper (http://vogue-pentopaper.blogspot.com) somewhere in your post.
  • Visit the other blogs and enjoy!

My Wishlist Wednesday book is:

The Diviners by Libba Bray
(release date: September 18, 2012)

From Amazon:

Evie O’Neill has been exiled from her boring old hometown and shipped off to the bustling streets of New York City–and she is pos-i-toot-ly thrilled. New York is the city of speakeasies, shopping, and movie palaces! Soon enough, Evie is running with glamorous Ziegfield girls and rakish pickpockets. The only catch is Evie has to live with her Uncle Will, curator of The Museum of American Folklore, Superstition, and the Occult–also known as “The Museum of the Creepy Crawlies.”

When a rash of occult-based murders comes to light, Evie and her uncle are right in the thick of the investigation. And through it all, Evie has a secret: a mysterious power that could help catch the killer–if he doesn’t catch her first.

Why do I want to read this?

This sounds right up my alley — young adult fiction, New York City in the 1920s, and an occult mystery, written by an author who knows how to mix plot and humor in the most delightful of ways.

I got a huge kick out of Libba Bray’s previous novel, Beauty Queens, a snarky, funny ode to grrrl power. What’s not to love about teen beauty pageant contestants stranded on a deserted island? Chaotic genius, all the way around.

I’ve had the author’s award-winning Going Bovine on my to-read list for some time, so perhaps while I’m waiting for The Diviners, I’ll give that one a spin as well.

My only hesitation: I just read a blurb for The Diviners which mentioned that this is the first in a projected trilogy. Yikes! I’ve more or less sworn off starting new trilogies, but I do like this author, so it may be worthy breaking my anti-series resolution for this one. Proving — as if I needed further proof — that when it comes to books, I am a weak-willed creature.

 

The Monday agenda

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Not a lofty, ambitious to-be-read list consisting of 100+ book titles. Just a simple plan for the upcoming week — what I’m reading now, what I plan to read next, and what I’m hoping to squeeze in among the nooks and crannies.

Continuing with the Monday agenda concept started a couple of weeks ago, it’s time to see how well last week’s reading agenda worked out and sketch out the plan for the coming week.

From last week:

Some Kind of Fairy Tale by Graham Joyce: Done! What a great book. See my review, published 8/12/2012.

Fables, volumes 13 – 17 by Bill Willingham: Done! Also read two Cinderella spin-offs while I was at it. Boy, do I love this graphic novel series. Sadly, I must face the fact that I’m all caught up and now have to wait until the next volume is published in January 2013.

Drums of Autumn by Diana Gabaldon (group re-read): Yup, still going. It’s so interesting to re-read a book and see the nuances missed the first time around.

And this week’s new agenda (drumroll, please…):

Ashfall by Mike Mullin: A young adult title that’s been on my to-read shelf for a few weeks (and which I really must read and then return to the library).

Small Damages by Beth Kephart: I’m hoping to finally get my hands on a copy of this young adult novel this week.

1001 Nights of Snowfall by Bill Willingham: One more from the Fables series, a stand-alone that’s supposed to be a prequel of sorts. Can’t wait.

Drums of Autumn by Diana Gabaldon (group re-read): Chapters 38 and 39 on deck for this week.

After all of this? Maybe I’ll have time to start digging into my stacks of books that have been languishing for weeks or months. So many books… where to start???

That’s my agenda. What’s yours? Add your comments to share your bookish agenda for the week.

Book Review: Some Kind of Fairy Tale by Graham Joyce

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Book Review: Some Kind of Fairy Tale by Graham Joyce

Fifteen-year-old Tara Martin disappeared without a trace on a beautiful spring day when the bluebells were all in bloom. Twenty years later, on Christmas Day, Tara knocks on her parents’ door, still looking like a teenager and with a strange tale to tell. Tara’s reappearance causes relief, joy, and turmoil for the family she left behind, as well as for her former boyfriend Richie, whose life went completely off the rails after he was accused of foul plan in Tara’s disappearance.

Tara’s return is not, perhaps, as she expected:

Twenty years is, after all, a long time. We are not the same people we were. Old friends, lovers, even family members: they are strangers who happen to wear a familiar face.

Tara tells an impossible tale, of a romantic man on horseback, travels to a different world, and what to her was a six-month stay in a land both strange and beautiful. Tara’s brother Peter is determined to figure out the truth of what happened to Tara, and enlists the aid of his wife, his former best friend Richie, and a retired psychiatrist to sift through the conflicting threads of her story.

Graham Joyce is a gifted writer whose words and tempo are lilting and lovely. He has a talent for taking the every day and making it mysterious, adding a rhythm to the routine occurrences within a family that bring in the larger world and its unknowability. Characters are sharply drawn and defined, including Peter, a tired but devoted family man, passionately in love with his wife, hurt by the loss of his friend, joyful yet resentful of Tara’s return; Mrs. Larwood, the elderly neighbor who may in fact have her own tale to tell; and Richie, stuck in the past, alone and loveless, having put his life on hold once Tara disappeared.

I had expected Some Kind of Fairy Tale to be a more or less traditional tale of a mortal crossing over into the land of the fae. As it turns out, it is and it isn’t. The changing points of view within the story heighten the mystery, and make it impossible to come to any one particular conclusion — although the end of the story certainly made one explanation seem more likely than others.

Each chapter begins with a quote, and I found these entirely delightful, so much so that I’d like to collect them all and refer back to them time and again. A favorite: “When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talent for abstract, positive thinking.” (Albert Einstein)

The author’s previous novel, The Silent Land, is one of the most exquisite pieces of fiction I’ve ever read. Some Kind of Fairy Tale did not have the same impact on me and I wouldn’t rate it quite as highly, but it is quite lovely in its own right and I can recommend it whole-heartedly.

Graham Joyce warns us of the shifting nature of the narrative and the truths contained therein early on:

Of course, everything depends on who is telling the story. It always does.

It’s entirely possible that I don’t entirely understand what really transpired in this haunting tale. Then again, maybe we’ll all understand it differently, and I think that’s as it should be.

 

Running away to the circus

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In honor of an outing tomorrow with my kiddo to see the current Ringling Brothers extravaganza, I thought I’d do my own brief version of a salute to circus books. Here’s a smattering of a few I’ve read in the last few years:

Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen

This tale of love, memory, and violence, set in a Depression-era travelling circus, features unforgettable characters, and is a real treat for the reader. Perfectly captures the sights, sounds, and smells of the circus, with a plot that grabs hold and doesn’t let go.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

I’m among the minority of readers who didn’t love this book. The descriptions of this mysterious, phantasmagorical circus are breathtakingly beautiful at times, but the plot just didn’t come together well enough to sustain the imagery.

Mr. Vertigo by Paul Auster

This strange tale of a boy who is taught to fly by a master magician is quite a puzzle. I read it, enjoyed parts, but ultimately didn’t quite know what to make of it.

Last but not least, always a favorite in my house:

If I Ran The Circus by Dr. Seuss

Who doesn’t love this fantastical trip through the backyard circus, as imagined by a boy with a day on his hands and only his own creativity to fill it? My son and I never fail to find fresh details to giggle over, whether it’s the Spotted Atrocious, the Harp-Twanging Snarp, or good old Mr. Sneelock.

The Circus McGurkus! The cream of the cream!
The Circus McGurkus! The Circus Supreme!
The Circus McGurkus! Colossal! Stupendous!
Astounding! Fantastic! Terrific! Tremendous!

So what did I miss? Any other circus-themed fiction to recommend? Add your thoughts below… meanwhile, we’ll be dreaming of high wires, trapezes, and itty bitty clown cars.

My poor, overcrowded bookshelves

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Time for a survey of the state of my bookshelves. The results ain’t pretty.

Here’s a typical set of shelves in my house:

Is it getting a bit crowded in here?

 

Notice, if you will, the double-stacking, the books crammed in at the top, the lack of any discernible rhyme or reason for book placement. I tend to shelve books these days by feel. Look, there’s still an inch of space — let’s see if this skinny one will make it!

My frustrated inner librarian shudders with dismay. How about organizing by genre? By author, maybe? Or by color scheme? Nope, it’s all about fit. Stuff ’em in there, and if they don’t fall out onto the floor, we’re done.

I suppose these books should feel fortunate that they actually have a shelf to call home. Here’s where some other books live in my house:

This pile has accumulated another 10 books or so since the picture was taken.

 

This poor stack is homeless. These are the various books that I continue to amass without having a place to put them. All the stuff that I consider my “next-in-line” books — although many of them have been “next-in-line” for months. So there they sit on top of a dresser, in a pile that grows and grows…

 

 

 

 

Spoils of war

See these bags of books? These are my lucky finds from last year’s public library sale. Quick aside: Awesome event! Twice a year, the friends of the public library organize a HUGE used book sale (500,000 items for sale, or so they say). Everything is $5 or less (paperbacks typically $1 or $2), and all proceeds benefit the public libraries.

Typically, I score big at these events. The bags in this picture hold about 60 or so “new” used books that I found at the sale last fall… still sitting in the paper bags they came home in. I want them, I love them, I intend to read them, DON’T EVEN THINK OF GIVING THEM AWAY!!! But my shelves are full to bursting and I have no place to put another book, much less three bags full.

So what’s a poor, overcrowded booklover like me to do?

A ray of hope has arrived! All is not lost! Due to various people coming and going in my house, lots of changes and reorganizing, suddenly, this beautiful thing appeared:

Miracle of miracles!

An empty wall!

Of course, much debate ensued. My husband sees a guest room perhaps, or maybe even a room to rent. My son envisions a game room, with electronics and Legos everywhere.

Me? It’s obvious, isn’t it? IT’S MY READING ROOM!

I don’t know if I’ll succeed in claiming the whole room, but that wall is mine. I’m picturing wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. Oh, the fun I’ll have! I can see it now, organizing my various and sundry tomes by whatever method catches my fancy.

It’s time to be bold, stake my claim. Tape measure in hand, I’ll map out what’s mine. No one can stop me!

I feel a trip to Ikea beckoning in the not-too-distant future. My epic quest begins!

I’ll be back to let you know if I slay the dragon.

 

Fairies on the brain

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November can’t come soon enough.

For a brief period in my youth, which at the time felt like an eternity, I took piano lessons. These lessons were not successful; the lack of success most likely attributable to my lack of talent or my avoidance of practice time, take your pick.

Each week, I’d show up for my lesson at my teacher’s house and sit on the piano bench, waiting for her to stop chatting with my mother. Those five minutes or so of waiting were always my favorite part of the lesson, because… the wall next to the piano was filled with floor to ceiling bookshelves. Right at eye level was the fairy shelf — my piano teacher had what seemed to me a HUGE collection of the color-coded fairy books. The Blue Fairy Book, the Red Fairy Book… as an adult, I’ve learned that there are twelve volumes in all (including lilac! who knew?), collected and published by Scottish scholar and anthropologist Andrew Lang.

These books fascinated me. The covers were lovely, and I enjoyed just looking at them, perhaps touching the spines with a finger or two. I wasn’t ever actually allowed to take them home with me, but my mother, a full-fledged booklover herself, would take me to the library and help me find whichever pink or blue or rose book of fairies that had caught my eye.

I loved how involved, mysterious, and dark the stories could be. I was fascinated by the contrast to the “prettified” versions of fairy tales that were so much more familiar, thanks to Disney and about a thousand or so picture book versions of pretty princesses, handsome princes, and magical kingdoms. I got a secret thrill from discovering just how gross some of the fairy tales truly could be — I seem to recall people baked into pies and thrown into fires, body parts hacked off, iron spikes (boy, does that sound like a horror movie description or what?).

Perfect for horror fans

To be fair, I must admit that I did love the enchantments and romance of the fairy tales as well, and never stopped rooting for a good Happily Ever After.

While I eventually grew out of my obsession with fairy tales, they’ve always retained a special little corner of my heart. I still enjoy picking up a nicely illustrated collection or reading a new translation.

For now, I won’t even go into all the myriad fairy tale retellings that I’ve read and enjoyed over the years… another topic for another day. I will, however, give a quick shout-out to a collection that I found weird and very entertaining, My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me, edited by Kate Bernheimer and featuring forty new takes on classic fairy tales, written by an amazing array of authors including Neil Gaiman, Francine Prose, Kelly Link, Joyce Carol Oates, and more.

Perhaps my childhood experiences with fairy tales and my ongoing fascination with them explain why I found the discovery of an upcoming volume quite so exciting. I just happened to stumble across a listing on Amazon for Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm: A New English Version, due out in November… and written by Philip Pullman! New Brothers Grimm! Written by the author of The Golden Compass! Brilliant!

(Excuse all the exclamation points. My, but I am being a tad exuberant about this.)

Can. Not. Wait. My preorder has been placed. I know what I’ll be reading in November. Who else is in?

If you love YA like I love YA…

Posted in Fun and Whimsy by

… check out this fantastic infographic flow chart, courtesy of the Lawrence, Kansas public library teen staff:

You can check out the full chart here. Thank you, Lawrence Public Library!

A few quick glimpses of their fabulous work:

Go visit the library site to see more. It’ll make you smile, I promise.

Book Review: Deadlocked (Sookie Stackhouse, #12)

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Book Review: Deadlocked by Charlaine Harris

Oh, Sookie. I think it’s time to say good-bye. Twelve books in, the Southern Vampire series has run its course and then some.

Things I know after reading Deadlocked:

– where Sookie shops for groceries
– how she likes to dry her hair
– whether or not she shaves her legs each day
– how much thought she puts into what she wears
– how she makes sweet potato pie
– that she applies make-up more heavily on days when she’s feeling down…

I could go on and on… which is what Charlaine Harris does in this book. Endless, endless detail about the minutiae of Sookie’s life. If only we were spared even a few of her countless showers, this book would have been a lot shorter.

Not to say that there aren’t plot developments — but not really enough of them, or ones weighty enough to sustain an entire novel. Clearly, the author is trying to spin out the story until we get the final book in 2013. However, I do feel that Deadlocked, with a bit of pruning and editing, could have encompassed a good wrap-up and spared us the year of waiting we’ll now have until the next book comes out.

So what do we get? A mystery that’s not very mysterious, a bunch of werewolf drama, fae intrigue and plotting, a random phone call from an ex-lover, and some very slow-moving changes in Sookie and Eric’s relationship. That’s about it. If I understand the end correctly (and I think I do), then the stage is set for what I’ve believed for some time will be the series finale and Sookie’s happily ever after. I won’t go into detail, because that would be a bit spoilerific. I guess I’ll have to wait a year to find out if I’m right.

Sookie, it’s been a fun ride, but I won’t be sorry to see your story brought to a conclusion, at long last. It’s really time.

Look at all the pretty!

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I simply must pass along this piece from Tor showcasing Barnes & Nobles’s new leatherbound classics* series. These are beautiful! Must get many.

*Classics, like beauty, apparently being in the eye of the beholder, this collection of classics includes not only the Brothers Grimm, Arabian Nights, Jane Austen, and Charles Dickens, but also Stephen King, Michael Crichton, and Douglas Adams. Not that I’m complaining.

And here are some of the gorgeous volumes that fill me with book lust:

At $18 a pop (mostly), and considering the heftiness of some of these volumes, I’m not going to be rushing right out to buy them all. But maybe as special treats, here or there? Perhaps I need to start dropping hints now to my various and sundry family members who always tell me “I never know what to buy you” when my birthday rolls around…