Book Review: The Innocent Sleep (October Daye, #18) by Seanan McGuire

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Innocent Sleep
Series: October Daye, #18
Author: Seanan McGuire
Publisher: DAW
Publication date: October 24, 2023
Print length: 368 pages
Genre: Urban fantasy
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

For one bright, shining moment, Tybalt, King of Cats, had everything he had ever wanted. He was soon to set his crown aside; he had married the woman he loved; he was going to be a father. After centuries of searching for a family of his own, he had finally found a way to construct the life of his dreams, and was looking forward to a period of peace—or at least as much peace as is ever in the offing for the husband of a hero.

Alas for Tybalt and his domestic aspirations, fate—and Titania—had other ideas. His perfect world had been complete for only a moment when it was ripped away, to be replaced by hers. Titania, Faerie’s Summer Queen, Mother of Illusions and enemy of so many he holds dear, has seized control of the Kingdom, remaking it in her own image. An image which does not include meddlesome shapeshifters getting in her way. Tybalt quickly finds himself banished from her reality, along with the Undersea and the rest of the Court of Cats.

To protect his people and his future, Tybalt must find the woman he loves in a world designed to keep her from him, convince her that he’s not a stranger trying to ruin her life for no apparent reason, and get her to unmake the illusion she’s been firmly enmeshed in. And he’ll have to do it all while she doesn’t know him, and every unrecognizing look is a knife to his heart.

For Tybalt, King of Cats, the happily ever after was just the beginning.

Buckle up! The 18th book in the excellent October Daye fantasy series is unusual, powerful, and a one hell of a ride.

The Innocent Sleep is a big departure from the norms of the series, in two significant ways: 1) It’s releasing only a month and a half after the previous book, Sleep No More, rather than the usual one-year gap between installments, and 2) for the first time in the series, the book’s POV character is not Toby herself, but her husband Tybalt, King of Cats.

As we saw in book #17, Titania has worked her malevolent magic to create a new version of reality — a version where changelings like Toby exist to serve their pureblood families, and those of magical lines that don’t fit Titania’s ideals, such as shapeshifters and other inconveniences, are locked away in skerries or sealed-off courts, dead or non-existent to the rest of Faerie.

For October and Tybalt, this is a problem. Tybalt’s magic allows him to see through illusions quickly, so he knows the truth and that Titania’s world is a lie — but as the King of the local Cait Sidh court, his first duty is keeping his trapped people alive and cared for, an exhausting task leaving him no time to try to rescue Toby.

In Sleep No More, the construct of this false reality leaves Toby and Tybalt separated for much of the book, and here in The Innocent Sleep we get to find out more about what he’s been up to during this forced separation. As we’d expect, he does not take it at all well, and spends much of his time absolutely furious, as well as deathly afraid for his beloved. After receiving dire prophecies from a Seer, Tybalt is forced to do something he’s not at all good at — waiting. The time isn’t right yet for him to intervene, and while everything in him is frantically urging him to rescue Toby NOW, he’s been told in no uncertain terms that doing so will doom them all.

Tybalt’s mind is an interesting place to spend a book. We know he’s madly, passionately in love with Toby — but as a hero of the realm, she’s not a safe or easy person to care for. Through Tybalt’s narrative, we learn just what he experiences every time she goes off to fight or undertake a dangerous quest. It’s fascinating to see this man, who’s a King and defers to no one, show again and again how much he supports Toby’s path in life, even while desperately afraid that one day she’ll meet something or someone she can’t survive.

Tybalt is haughty, is often accused of speaking like someone in a Shakespearean play (which is true), and is fabulously entertaining.

“I am a cat, sir. I always look my very best, even when I don’t, and to so much as imply otherwise is to run the risk of treason.”

I looked back to Simon, summoning every ounce of haughty disdain I could find. I had quite a bit.

That woman can hold a grudge like a cat, and I have very few higher compliments that I can give.

The Innocent Sleep has an interesting problem at its core, which is that the plot itself isn’t moving the overall series story forward. This book covers the same time period and events as the previous one, and it ends at the same point as well. This means that we already know the outcome of the central crisis, which lessens the dramatic impact. On the other hand, it is fascinating to see how Tybalt experiences these events, and to learn more about what he’s been doing all the time he’s off-page in Sleep No More. The author does a great job of weaving the books together whenever Toby and Tybalt are in the same scene, so that the dialogue and stage-direction matches completely — but now we understand how all of this looks and feels to Tybalt, which is really fun.

I truly can’t wait to see what happens next in the series. Alas, I’m afraid we’re now back to waiting a year for a new book!

The Innocent Sleep includes a novella at the end, as is typical for the October Daye series. This one, Doubtless and Secure, is about Dianda and her life as ruler of Saltmist in the Undersea. It’s good, but very long. It’s always interesting to get these side-stories filling in the blanks of other characters’ lives — someday, I’d love to see a whole collection of Toby-verse stories!

4Sep2023

The Monday Check-In ~ 9/4/2023

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.

Life.

Happy Labor Day! How did it get to be September already?

And why is my three-day weekend already almost over?

What did I read during the last week?

Books read earlier; reviews posted this past week:

With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo
Whalefall by Daniel Krause
Sleep No More (October Daye, #17) by Seanan McGuire (and let me just say for the millionth time that I love this series!!

Books I read this past week:

The Bookstore Sisters by Alice Hoffman: A short story that feels more like a teaser for a full novel. It was a quick, enjoyable read, but I wished there had been more to it.

White Bird by R. J. Palacio: Powerful middle-grade graphic novel. My review is here.

A Scatter of Light by Malinda Lo: Just didn’t live up to my high expectations. My review is here.

Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood: An okay read. My review is here.

Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo: After finishing With the Fire on High, I needed more by this author! Books written in verse don’t usually appeal to me, but this story of sisters, loss, and connection is powerful and beautifully written — I’m glad I finally read it.

Pop culture & TV:

My husband and I started season 2 of The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem (Netflix) this week. He’s not a binge-watcher, so this may take a while… but I’m still happy to be watching.

I finally remembered that I’d been meaning to get back to Good Omens, and since it had been so long, I decided to start over from the beginning. I’ve just finished season 1, and plan to start season 2 this week.

I also watched a silly romance on Netflix — Love, Again, which features a lot of Celine Dion music (and Celine herself), an improbably plot, and Sam Heughan of Outlander (which, yes, is 100% why I watched it). Not a bad way to pass an evening with nothing else demanding my attention.

Fresh Catch:

No new books this week.

What will I be reading during the coming week?

Currently in my hands:

The Innocent Sleep (October Daye, #18) by Seanan McGuire: I’ve held off as long as I could! The next book in the series releases in October (appropriate!), but I needed it NOW.

Now playing via audiobook:

The Breakaway by Jennifer Weiner: I’ve really enjoyed the last few books I’ve read (or listened to) by this author, so I was excited to start her newest. I’m currently at about 50%, and really loving it!

Ongoing reads:

My longer-term reading commitments:

Only one at the moment, and the end is in sight!

Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons: This has been my book group’s discussion book since June, and our last chapter is this week!

We’ll have two long-term reading projects (one a classic, one Outlander-related) starting late September/early October, but meanwhile, maybe I’ll figure out some other books to place on the ongoing list.

So many books, so little time…

3Sep2023

Book Review: Sleep No More (October Daye, #17) by Seanan McGuire

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Sleep No More
Series: October Daye, #17
Author: Seanan McGuire
Publisher: DAW
Publication date: September 5, 2023
Print length: 368 pages
Genre: Urban fantasy
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

October is very happy with her life as the second daughter of her pureblood parents, Amandine and Simon Torquill. Born to be the changeling handmaid to her beloved sister August, she spends her days working in her family’s tower, serving as August’s companion, and waiting for the day when her sister sets up a household of her own. Everything is right in October’s Faerie. Everything is perfect.

Everything is a lie.

October has been pulled from her own reality and thrown into a twisted reinterpretation of Faerie where nothing is as it should be and everything has been distorted to support Titania’s ideals. Bound by the Summer Queen’s magic and thrust into a world turned upside down, October has no way of knowing who she can trust, where she can turn, or even who she really is. As strangers who claim to know her begin to appear and the edges of Titania’s paradise begin to unravel, Toby will have to decide whether she can risk everything she knows based on only their stories of another world.

But first she’ll have to survive this one, as Titania demonstrates why she needed to be banished in the first place—and this time, much more than Toby’s own life is at stake.

Who would think that the 17th book in a fantasy series could still make a reader gasp, cry, and want to beg the author for mercy on behalf of the characters? I suppose it’s not truly a surprise when it comes to the October Daye series — this is a series that delivers heart-stopping plot twists and emotional upheavals consistently (while also having plenty of humor and moments of absolute delight). The author doesn’t let the characters (or the reader) get comfortable for long, and books 16 and 17 in the series are prime examples.

Going back a book for a quick minute, book #16 picks up after our hero Toby (a literal hero of the realm) finally finds true happiness and marries the love of her life. And then her world takes a horrifying turn, devastating things happen, and life as Toby knows it will never be the same.

Without going too far into plot details, the 16th book ends with a terrifying twist that left me practically sobbing on the floor and screaming NOOOOO. So it’s not a surprise when book 17, Sleep No More, picks up the story where it left off, ready to tie my guts into knots once again.

Have I mentioned how much I love these books? Honestly, I do, even though they wreak havoc on my state of calm.

In Sleep No More, October is imprisoned within a false world in which nothing about her former life remains true, and what’s more, she has no idea that the world she now inhabits isn’t where she’s always been. In this world, she lives according to the rules for all changelings (half-human, half-fae) — her purpose is to serve her family, especially her pureblood sister. She’s happy with her lot. She loves her sister August, and knows that she has an important role to fill. So long as she keeps her head down, does what she’s told, and doesn’t offend any purebloods, she’ll have as good a life as an unimportant changeling can aspire to.

But cracks in the façade of a perfect life appear. Toby begins to experience things that don’t make sense, and soon people show up who insist that this isn’t the real world. Even as Toby begins to recognize the elements that don’t add up and starts to discover her own true nature, she clings to the false world where she’s loved and protected. Eventually, though, she can’t deny the truth of the situation, and along with trusted allies, sets out to save the world (again).

For fans of the series, this book is powerful, scary, upsetting… and also a totally compelling read. It should be pretty obvious that the 17th book in a series is not a good place to start, but I’m happy to take this opportunity to once again recommend picking up book #1, Rosemary & Rue!!

In a truly unusual move, the next book in the series, The Innocent Sleep, will be released in October. Two books within two months! These books typically come out once a year, so this is totally exciting. Stay tuned! I’ll be back with thoughts on The Innocent Sleep very, very soon.

*Up next in series: The Innocent Sleep (release date 10/24/2023)*

Side note: At certain points in the story, I kept flashing to a bit of dialogue from the Buffy episode The Wish:

Anyanka: You trusting fool! How do you know the other world is any better than this?
Giles: Because it has to be.

2Sep2023

Book Review: Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Love, Theoretically
Author: Ali Hazelwood
Publisher: Berkley
Publication date: June 13, 2023
Length: 389 pages
Genre: Contemporary romance
Source: Library
Rating:

The many lives of theoretical physicist Elsie Hannaway have finally caught up with her. By day, she’s an adjunct professor, toiling away at grading labs and teaching thermodynamics in the hopes of landing tenure. By other day, Elsie makes up for her non-existent paycheck by offering her services as a fake girlfriend, tapping into her expertly honed people pleasing skills to embody whichever version of herself the client needs.

Honestly, it’s a pretty sweet gig—until her carefully constructed Elsie-verse comes crashing down. Because Jack Smith, the annoyingly attractive and broody older brother of her favorite client, turns out to be the cold-hearted experimental physicist who ruined her mentor’s career and undermined the reputation of theorists everywhere. And that same Jack who now sits on the hiring committee at MIT, right between Elsie and her dream job.

Elsie is prepared for an all-out war of scholarly sabotage but…those long, penetrating looks? Not having to be anything other than her true self when she’s with him? Will falling into an experimentalist’s orbit finally tempt her to put her most guarded theories on love into practice?

Love, Theoretically is author Ali Hazelwood’s third novel… and I think I’ve reached the point of diminishing returns. This book on its own may be fine — but after reading the previous two, I can’t help but feel that Love, Theoretically is just more of the same.

Main character Elsie Hannaway is desperate for a good job in academia — one that allows her to focus on research, earn a steady paycheck, and have the health benefits she so desperately needs she she can afford her insulin supply. Her job as an adjunct professor keeps her finances unstable and her nerves fried, not to mention her reserve of patience absolutely tapped out dealing with the neverending flimsy excuses of slacker undergrads.

Being one of two finalists for a prestigious post at MIT is a dream come true, except one of the members of the selection committee is Jack Smith, the brother of a man she’s been fake-dating as well as someone who’s been ruthless in his criticism of her branch of physics. It seems likely that he’ll torpedo her candidacy, but despite his clear mistrust, he ends up showing her unexpected kindness.

Inevitably, these two supposed enemies are forced to acknowledge their mutual attraction and actual feelings, although there are plenty of barriers to break through before they get there. Elsie has spent her life trying to please everyone, pushing her own needs to the back of the priority line in order to give others what they want from her. She’s never her authentic self (doesn’t even admit to her best friend that she actually hates the art films they watch together), until Jack calls her on her lack of honesty and forces her to be true to herself while she’s around him.

Elsie and Jack have immediate chemistry… and, well, it’s clear from the start where this is going. As in the author’s previous books, the love story is well-established-professional-who’s-maybe-evil vs rising-star-needing-a-break-and-to-break-free-of-internalized-obstacles. (OK, from what I’ve read online, Ali Hazelwood started out writing ReyLo fanfic, and it shows… although I have only the barest of familiarities with that particular ship).

Perhaps I might have appreciated this book more if I hadn’t read the others, but I struggled with a been-there, done-that feeling throughout this particular reading experience. Yes, the particulars of the plot are different, but the overall dynamics are very much aligned.

It didn’t help for me that Jack, while ostensibly empowering Elsie to recognize and express her own desires rather than fit herself to everyone else’s, comes off as domineering and controlling. Further mucking things up for me is that Elsie’s character never actual seemed to make sense — I understood what I was told about her people-pleasing nature, but just didn’t buy it.

Love, Theoretically isn’t a bad read. It goes by quickly and kept my interest. It just didn’t seem to offer much new — so yes, it was fine, but perhaps I’ve just read enough by this author at this point. I don’t think I’ll need to read more of her books, unless she does something completely different and moves away from the love-amongst-scientists theme.

2Sep2023

Book Review: White Bird by R. J. Palacio

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: White Bird
Author: R. J. Palacio
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers
Publication date: 2019
Length: 224 pages
Genre: Middle grade
Source: Library
Rating:

Soon to be a major motion picture, starring Helen Mirren and Gillian Anderson!

Inspired by her blockbuster phenomenon Wonder, R. J. Palacio makes her graphic novel debut with an unforgettable, Sydney Taylor Book Award-winning story of the power of kindness and unrelenting courage in a time of war.

In R. J. Palacio’s bestselling collection of stories Auggie & Me, which expands on characters in Wonder, readers were introduced to Julian’s grandmother, Grandmère. Here, Palacio makes her graphic novel debut with Grandmère’s heartrending story: how she, a young Jewish girl, was hidden by a family in a Nazi-occupied French village during World War II; how the boy she and her classmates once shunned became her savior and best friend.

Sara’s harrowing experience movingly demonstrates the power of kindness to change hearts, build bridges, and even save lives. As Grandmère tells Julian, It always takes courage to be kind, but in those days, such kindness could cost you everything. With poignant symbolism and gorgeous artwork that brings Sara’s story out of the past and cements it firmly in this moment in history, White Bird is sure to captivate anyone who was moved by the book Wonder or the blockbuster movie adaptation and its message.

I’ve never read Wonder (am I the only person left who hasn’t?), and hadn’t heard of White Bird before either, until I went to a movie theater over the weekend and saw a trailer for the film adaptation of White Bird… and just had to know more about it. Luckily, my library had a copy available to borrow immediately, and I read the whole book over the course of a day.

White Bird is a middle-grade graphic novel, with the bulk of the story set in occupied France during the Holocaust. The framing device is a contemporary story about a boy named Julian (who apparently is a character from Wonder). Julian’s grandmother speaks to him about kindness and helping others, and shares her own story with him for the first time.

In the tale within a tale, Sara is a young girl living a charmed life with her parents in a small town in France, where she attends a lovely school, has good friends, and is very happy. The family is Jewish, but doesn’t fear for their own safety at first, even as the Nazis invade France. They live in the free zone, and feel secure knowing that they are French citizens. Even as Jews are restricted in their movements and forced to wear yellow stars, Sara’s parents don’t feel a need to escape, until suddenly it is too late.

At school, Sara sits in her assigned seat beside a boy called by the nickname Torteau in all her classes. Having survived polio, the boy is mocked and treated cruelly by their classmates due to his twisted legs and reliance on crutches. While not actively mean to Torteau, Sara isn’t friendly either — she mostly ignores him, until one day she drops her sketchbook and the boy returns it to her.

When Nazis arrive at school one day and order all the Jewish children to come with them, Sara hides instead, and it’s only a matter of time until she’s discovered — but Torteau finds her first, shows her a secret tunnel out of the school, and brings her to hide in his family’s barn. The boy’s name is actually Julien, and he and his parents become Sara’s protectors for years to come, keeping her hidden, safe, and cared for while the world falls apart around them.

I won’t say more about the plot, but it’s powerful, heartbreaking, and lovely. The graphic novel’s art style is simple but affecting, and mixes in Sara’s sketches and dreams with her day-to-day experiences in a way that lends a magical feel to key scenes.

The author includes a great deal of historical notes at the end that are informative and yet easy to digest, and this section seems like it would be very accessible and helpful for younger readers who are new to reading about the Holocaust.

Themes of love, loyalty, friendship, taking a stand when witnessing wrong-doing, and helping those in need are strongly depicted without being preachy or heavy-handed.

White Bird is a powerful, moving reading experience that actually brought me to tears at certain points — not something I typically expect when I pick up a graphic novel.

I highly recommend this book, and plan to check out the movie version when it’s released. Meanwhile, having finally tasted this author’s storytelling, I hope to read Wonder in the near future as well.

1Sep2023

Book Review: A Scatter of Light by Malinda Lo

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: A Scatter of Light
Author: Malinda Lo
Publisher: Dutton Books for Young Readers
Publication date: October 4, 2022
Length: 325 pages
Genre: Young adult fiction
Source: Purchased
Rating:

Award-winning author Malinda Lo returns to the Bay Area with another masterful coming-of-queer-age story, this time set against the backdrop of the first major Supreme Court decisions legalizing gay marriage. And almost sixty years after the end of Last Night at the Telegraph Club, Lo’s new novel also offers a glimpse into Lily and Kath’s lives since 1955.

Aria Tang West was looking forward to a summer on Martha’s Vineyard with her best friends—one last round of sand and sun before college. But after a graduation party goes wrong, Aria’s parents exile her to California to stay with her grandmother, artist Joan West. Aria expects boredom, but what she finds is Steph Nichols, her grandmother’s gardener. Soon, Aria is second-guessing who she is and what she wants to be, and a summer that once seemed lost becomes unforgettable—for Aria, her family, and the working-class queer community Steph introduces her to. It’s the kind of summer that changes a life forever.

After absolutely loving Last Night at the Telegraph Club, I was excited to read author Malinda Lo’s next novel, which promises (per the synopsis) a more contemporary story plus more about Lily and Kath, whose love story was so powerful in Telegraph. Sadly, A Scatter of Light lacks the impact of the previous book and felt like quite a let-down.

In A Scatter of Light, main character Aria plans to spend her summer partying with her best friends before starting college at MIT in the fall. When a boy she hooks up with shares nude photos of her online, she’s the one who gets blamed and shamed. Suddenly, her invitations from her friends’ families are revoked, and her parents decide she’ll spend the summer with her grandmother Joan in California.

Aria loves Joan, but she’s resentful at her friends’ betrayal, as well as the fact that her divorced parents — her father a writer, her mother an opera singer who’s mostly absent from Aria’s life — seem to be punishing her for something outside of her control. Joan is an artist and a free-spirit who lives in a lovely, airy cottage in a rural Marin setting, but Aria will have absolutely nothing to do there.

Until… she arrives at Joan’s, and meets Steph, a young woman just a few years older than Aria who does gardening work for Joan. Aria feels an immediate spark around Steph and doesn’t understand why. She’s straight… isn’t she? Running into Steph again soon afterward, she begins meeting some of Steph’s friends, and soon is included in their social circle. Aria ends up spending the summer with this group of lesbians, attending music festivals and the annual Dyke March, and although Steph is in a long-term relationship, it seems clear that Aria’s attraction to her is returned.

Set in 2013, the timeframe has a backdrop of the legalization of gay marriage. For Aria, this means that the possibilities she sees are both new and much more open than they were previously. Ultimately, though, I’m not sure how much this element truly matters. The novel is about Aria, her family dynamics, and her intense crush on Steph — it’s very much about Aria’s internal world, and there’s very little that seems to cross her consciousness that isn’t about herself or her feelings.

I really wanted to love this book, but couldn’t. Aria is selfish in many ways, especially in her pursuit of Steph, who she knows from the outset isn’t available. It’s a positive for Aria that this summer helps her understand who she is, but the cheating element is a huge turn-off, as is the fact that even when there’s a crisis with Joan, Aria can’t seem to shift her focus away from Steph.

It was a little difficult to understand Aria’s interests and passions as well. She’s headed for MIT and her academic passion is astronomy. She spends the summer sorting through her late grandfather’s academic records, including VCR tapes of his astronomy lectures. At the same time, she reconnects with her artistic side, with Joan’s encouragement, and begins painting for the first time in years. There seems to be an attempt to meld her artistic and scientific sides through imagery and thoughts about light, but none of this really gelled for me.

The synopsis and blurbing for this book do it no favors, promising that we’ll see Kath and Lily… which really only happens through information shared by Aria’s mother’s cousin, not by seeing them in person. Yes, it’s a “glimpse”, as stated, but I expected… more? Something else? There seemed little point in including them specifically, rather than addressing the social dynamic via new characters.

All that being said, A Scatter of Light is a fast read that held my attention, but overall, I found too much of the plot — as well as Aria herself — frustrating or troubling.

31Aug2023

Plot peeves: Make it stop!

Posted in Bookish Thoughts by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

We all have our pet peeves when it comes to books, and I’ve certainly shared a bunch over the years. Most recently, I’ve been noticing two plot points that keep cropping up in fiction, and I say:

I mean, really…

Ready? My two most recent plot peeves are:

1) Killing the old people: Can we please have a book with a heartwarming intergenerational connection where the older person doesn’t end up dead? It’s gotten to the point that it’s utterly predictable: Introduce a wise / sassy / artistic / ahead-of-their-time / crotchety-but-secretly-nice / awe-inspiring older person — usually with a phenomenal sense of style and/or glamorous past — and I can pretty much guarantee that we’ll be attending their funeral by the end of the book. I can think of at least three or four instances where I’ve come across this plot within the past year, and more beyond that. STOP! Let them live!!

2) Interview surprises: Okay, I’m now up to three cases of the interview surprise — you know this one already, I’m sure: The main character has (select one) a random hookup, an embarrassing drunken escapade, an uncomfortable-yet-sexy tension with an inappropriate person… and wouldn’t you know, the very next day the main character shows up for a VERY important interview and… voila!… there’s that hookup (or whatever) right there at the interview. Ugh. Awkward! My current read started with a weird encounter with a date’s relative in the first chapter, a thought about the next day’s super important, life-changing interview at the end of that chapter… and guess who’s on the crucial interview selection panel the next night? Nooooooo!!

Please, please, please…

Whew. End of rant. Thanks for listening!

What about you? What plot points are you SO over right now?

31Aug2023

Book Review: Whalefall by Daniel Kraus

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Whalefall
Author: Daniel Kraus
Publisher: MTV Books
Publication date: August 8, 2023
Length: 336 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Purchased
Rating:

Whalefall is a scientifically accurate thriller about a scuba diver who’s been swallowed by an eighty-foot, sixty-ton sperm whale and has only one hour to escape before his oxygen runs out.

Jay Gardiner has given himself a fool’s errand—to find the remains of his deceased father in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Monastery Beach. He knows it’s a long shot, but Jay feels it’s the only way for him to lift the weight of guilt he has carried since his dad’s death by suicide the previous year.

The dive begins well enough, but the sudden appearance of a giant squid puts Jay in very real jeopardy, made infinitely worse by the arrival of a sperm whale looking to feed. Suddenly, Jay is caught in the squid’s tentacles and drawn into the whale’s mouth where he is pulled into the first of its four stomachs. He quickly realizes he has only one hour before his oxygen tanks run out—one hour to defeat his demons and escape the belly of a whale.

I can promise you that you’ve never read a book like Whalefall before! I’ve seen some comparisons to The Martian, and that’s pretty fair… more on that below!

In Whalefall, our protagonist is 17-year-old Jay, a teen wracked by guilt over his fractured relationship with his deceased father. Mitt Gardiner was revered in the Monterey dive community, but as a father, he inspired fear in his son. Mitt’s focus was 100% on the ocean and its mysteries, but his fury at the encroachment of humans and his dissatisfaction with daily life made him a man whose anger and bitterness cost him job after job.

While Jay’s older sisters were mostly immune to Mitt’s moods, Jay spent all his life as the focus of Mitt’s obsessions, forced out on dives from a young age, forced to parrot back Mitt’s teachings and support his ill-thought-out pipe dreams and get-rich-quick schemes. After a terrible confrontation, Jay left home and spent the last years of his father’s life, as Mitt deteriorated due to mesothelioma, living with friends and refusing to see his father.

We learn about Jay’s history and the torturous relationship with Mitt through flashback chapters, interwoven with the “now” of Jay’s story. As the book opens, Jay is heading for Monastery Beach, a dangerous area on Monterey Bay, to search for his father’s remains. Preferring to die at sea than in a hospital bed, Mitt committed suicide there by throwing himself off a boat while loaded down with dive weights. Jay has convinced himself that if he can retrieve Mitt’s bones from the Bay’s floor, he’ll find some sort of peace or redemption.

He definitely doesn’t believe in closure. People aren’t doors. They’re whole floor plans, entire labyrinths, and the harder you try to escape, the more lost inside them you become.

Using shoddy, second-hand gear, Jay heads into the water, at first allowing himself to marvel at the undersea world and its beauty, his father’s words echoing in his mind. Disaster strikes soon enough: Jay ventures across the edge of an undersea canyon that leads to true depths, is awed by the sight of a giant squid, and realizes too late that the squid is being hunted by a sperm whale. Caught up in the squid’s tentacles, Jay is pulled into the whale’s mouth, and then swallowed.

As the chapter headings show us, Jay’s oxygen tank will sustain him for no more than an hour. As each chapter passes, we see the tank’s readings decrease. He’s in a seemingly hopeless situation — how could a small human possibly manage to escape from a whale’s belly? And yet, Jay looks around and determines not to give up… at least, not until he has to.

As the situation deteriorates, and possibly due to the dangerous levels of nitrogen and methane, Jay begins to hear his father’s voice. Is it real? Is it in his mind? Is the whale channeling Mitt? Doesn’t matter — this voice reminds him again and again of incidents from his past, and through these memories, Jay is given hints of knowledge that he can use.

Depending only on what he has with him, as well as the weird flotsam floating in the whale’s stomach, Jay begins to fight a seemingly unwinnable battle to save himself. And little by little, as his father’s voice guides him, Jay begins to find an inner peace with his past as well.

The descriptions in Whalefall are brutal and terrifying. Jay’s body goes through unimaginable degrees of punishment, from acid burns to bone-breaking compression due to the whale’s stomach’s peristalsis, to the painful pressure damage caused by the whale’s sudden dive for the depths. Readers with weak stomachs and/or an inclination toward claustrophobia might want to think twice before starting this book!

So how is the story of a teen inside a whale similar to The Martian, the story of an astronaut stranded on Mars? In both cases, a person in an apparently hopeless, fatal situation finds a way to survive through science, knowledge, and a McGyver-ish ability to take what he has and use it to his advantage. For Jay, that means using neoprene, a squid’s beak, Brillo pads, batteries, and more to create tools, first aid supplies, and other devices necessary to last just a little bit longer and try to find a way out before his air is gone.

While a harrowing tale of danger and escape, Whalefall is also a deeper story of love, regret, and the complicated power of parent-child expectations and disappointments. Mitt is not a nice guy by any means, yet it’s his presence that enables Jay to survive, and as we learn through Jay’s memories, there are kernels of value buried deep in Jay’s subconscious that let him see that life with Mitt wasn’t only the nightmare he remembers.

I first heard about Whalefall thanks to Tammy at Books, Bones & Buffy, who featured it months ago as a Future Fiction pick. Thank you, Tammy! Don’t miss her review, here.

Whalefall is a tense, addictive read that’s impossible to put down once started. I did wish to know more about what happens next at the end, even though I recognize that that’s not the point of the story. (Can’t help that I’m super practical and curious…)

I’m so glad that I decided to read Whalefall. I loved the Monterey setting, the references to Steinbeck, the glimpses of lives devoted to the sea, and the depiction of the power and mystery of whales and other deep-dwelling creature. More than anything, this story of survival and desperation is a look inside a young man’s pain, longing, and regret, and these elements — the personal and the thriller — come together to make a compelling whole. Highly recommended.

30Aug2023

Book Review: With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: With the Fire on High
Author: Elizabeth Acevedo
Publisher: Quill Tree Books
Publication date: May 7, 2019
Length: 400 pages
Genre: Young adult fiction
Source: Library
Rating:

With her daughter to care for and her abuela to help support, high school senior Emoni Santiago has to make the tough decisions, and do what must be done. The one place she can let her responsibilities go is in the kitchen, where she adds a little something magical to everything she cooks, turning her food into straight-up goodness.

Still, she knows she doesn’t have enough time for her school’s new culinary arts class, doesn’t have the money for the class’s trip to Spain—and shouldn’t still be dreaming of someday working in a real kitchen. But even with all the rules she has for her life—and all the rules everyone expects her to play by—once Emoni starts cooking, her only real choice is to let her talent break free.

I’m going to stick to a quick take on With the Fire on High: I loved it.

Told with beautifully descriptive language, this first-person story follows Emoni through her senior year of high school. She navigates college essays, caring for her toddler, and thinking about her future while also working part-time to help her abuela pay the bills. Emoni never regrets her daughter Emma, but she does dream of using her astonishing gifts with food to someday have a career as a chef, maybe even open her own restaurant.

Her charter high school adds a culinary arts elective that seems tailor-made for Emoni, even when her more practical side thinks it might make more sense to take an extra study hall instead and really get her grades up. Even once she starts culinary arts, she has doubts — why must she follow the instructor’s detailed recipes when she’s itching to put her own spin on the flavors?

Emoni is a strong, sensitive character who hasn’t had it easy. She’s had to learn responsibility the hard way and embraces her role as a mother, even while sometimes despairing that she’ll ever be able to work, study, and find a way to explore her dreams. She loves her family, her neighborhood, her hometown of Philly, but she’s also still a teen who loves her friends and maybe even is interested in the cute new guy who just transferred to her school.

I loved the writing in this book, and loved Emoni’s openness and vulnerability. She has doubts and worries, but also knows what’s right and where her priorities need to be. She’s loving and generous, and having ended up pregnant as a high school freshman, she’s learned to hold her head up even when the world seems to want to drag her down into shame.

I listened to the audiobook, narrated by the author — it was wonderful. I’ve been hearing great things about this author’s books for years, and now I see why. I will definitely be reading more by Elizabeth Acevedo, and recommend With the Fire on High wholeheartedly!

29Aug2023

Top Ten Tuesday: Water, water, everywhere…

Posted in Top Ten Tuesday by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Water — as a topic, title, book cover element, or whatever we want.

I decided to keep it simple and feature ten books I’ve read that have Water in the title: