Book Review: Gideon the Ninth (The Locked Tomb, #1) by Tamsyn Muir

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Gideon the Ninth
Series: The Locked Tomb, #1
Author: Tamsyn Muir
Publisher: Tor
Publication date: September 10, 2019
Length: 448 pages
Genre: Science fiction
Source: Purchased
Rating:

The Emperor needs necromancers.

The Ninth Necromancer needs a swordswoman.

Gideon has a sword, some dirty magazines, and no more time for undead bullshit.

Brought up by unfriendly, ossifying nuns, ancient retainers, and countless skeletons, Gideon is ready to abandon a life of servitude and an afterlife as a reanimated corpse. She packs up her sword, her shoes, and her dirty magazines, and prepares to launch her daring escape. But her childhood nemesis won’t set her free without a service.

Harrowhark Nonagesimus, Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House and bone witch extraordinaire, has been summoned into action. The Emperor has invited the heirs to each of his loyal Houses to a deadly trial of wits and skill. If Harrowhark succeeds she will become an immortal, all-powerful servant of the Resurrection, but no necromancer can ascend without their cavalier. Without Gideon’s sword, Harrow will fail, and the Ninth House will die.

Of course, some things are better left dead.

I’ve been hearing about Gideon the Ninth since its release three years ago, and I’ve owned a copy for over two years now… and I can finally say that I’ve read it!.

I have to admit that I’d been feeling rather intimidated about starting Gideon. It’s a big chunky book, and the first few pages are devoted to a guide to characters, their houses, and roles. And when books start that way, I’m immediately wary. Why do I need all this information up front? Just how complicated is this book going to be anyway?

In the case of Gideon the Ninth, the answer is — very complicated. In fact, the word that kept coming to my mind while reading was “inpenetrable” (and that’s not a word I use often in my daily life). Gideon is dense, complicated, and somewhat opaque. I’ll explain, as best I can.

The world of Gideon the Ninth appears to be a dead world, resurrected by the Emperor (also referred to as a god) some ten thousand years ago, powered by necromancy and seemingly built upon the ashes and discards of an earlier civilization that had technology and scientific exploration — perhaps a world like our own? Gideon herself is a resident of the Ninth House (the Houses are all different planets with different powers, from what I understand), and the Ninth House is grim, dark and gloomy and peopled by ancient nuns and servants made of animated bones. The Reverend Daughter of the Ninth House is Harrowhark, a powerful necromancer who can perform amazing and dangerous feats with bones, and who seems to live to torment and dominate Gideon.

When a communication is received summoning the necromancer and cavalier of each house to the First House for a chance to become immortal, Harrow forces Gideon into the role of her cavalier, even though Gideon had been plotting to escape the Ninth House for good to become a soldier. But Gideon has no choice, and soon finds herself on another world, where they and other necromancer/cavalier combos must solve unspecified riddles in order to unlock the mystery of even greater powers.

Look, this book is a lot. I have to admire the author’s creativity and skill at inventing such a complicated, strange world — but at the same time, this book was difficult to get through, and I’m not convinced it was worth the effort. Keeping the many, many necromancers, cavaliers, their powers, and their houses straight was a huge chore, and at some point I just shrugged and stopped trying. The challenges and tests didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me, and I had (and have) so many questions about this world.

That said, I liked many of the characters (or at least found them interesting), and Gideon herself is profane and disrespectful enough to make her someone to root for, even when I had no clue what was actually going on.

I’m glad I finally read Gideon the Ninth, but at some point along the way I lacked the energy and commitment to really try to make sense of it all, so I’m sure there’s a bunch that just went right over my head. Some big, complicated books are worth the painstaking attention it takes to get through them. I’m not sure I’d put Gideon in that category.

Still, there are some great sequences mixed in amongst all the more puzzling scenarios, and the ending seems to set up a fascinating next step for the series. If I didn’t already own the next two books, I’m not sure that I’d rush to seek them out — but since I do, I expect that I will continue the series… eventually. I think I need a break at this point, but before too long, I’ll likely dive back in with Harrow the Ninth.

12Mar2022

Book Review: Tiamat’s Wrath (The Expanse, #8) by James S. A. Corey

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Tiamat’s Wrath
Series: The Expanse, #8
Author: James S. A. Corey
Publisher: Orbit
Publication date: March 26, 2019
Length: 537 pages
Genre: Science fiction
Source: Purchased
Rating:

Thirteen hundred gates have opened to solar systems around the galaxy. But as humanity builds its interstellar empire in the alien ruins, the mysteries and threats grow deeper.
In the dead systems where gates lead to stranger things than alien planets, Elvi Okoye begins a desperate search to discover the nature of a genocide that happened before the first human beings existed, and to find weapons to fight a war against forces at the edge of the imaginable. But the price of that knowledge may be higher than she can pay.
At the heart of the empire, Teresa Duarte prepares to take on the burden of her father’s godlike ambition. The sociopathic scientist Paolo Cortázar and the Mephistophelian prisoner James Holden are only two of the dangers in a palace thick with intrigue, but Teresa has a mind of her own and secrets even her father the emperor doesn’t guess.
And throughout the wide human empire, the scattered crew of the Rocinante fights a brave rear-guard action against Duarte’s authoritarian regime. Memory of the old order falls away, and a future under Laconia’s eternal rule — and with it, a battle that humanity can only lose – seems more and more certain. Because against the terrors that lie between worlds, courage and ambition will not be enough…

I’m not sure how much point there is in my writing reviews of the books in this series at this point. Tiamat’s Wrath is #8, and it’s amazing… but I don’t want to talk too much about the plot, and honestly, if you haven’t read any of the books, none of this is going to make any sense.

But trust me, this is a fabulous series, and #8 — the 2nd to last novel!! — is as excellent as I’d expected.

In this book, the underground begins to fight back against the overwhelming might of the Laconian Empire. Against the backdrop of intrigue and rebellion and intergalactic battles, we once again become immersed in the lives of the featured characters — including our beloved core crew, but also a couple of new lead characters who are surprising and who take the story in unanticipated directions.

The plot shifts between the various systems connected by the ring gates and the capitol buildings of Laconia. As the battles range, the dangers mount — but the most dangerous force is the ancient alien civilization that the Laconian High Consul has been intentionally poking. (Don’t poke the bear!!) The humans have wars to wage, but it’s this other force that ultimately may bring humanity to its demise.

Stakes are high, and the action is dramatic, but once again it’s the more intimate stories of the characters that touch me and intrigue me and, in some cases, leave me gasping and wiping my eyes.

It’s a rare talent in the world of sci-fi fiction that can strike at such an emotional level while still keeping the plot and action tearing along at an incredibly fast pace. The Expanse series continues to keep this balanced approach going, even this deep into the storyline, which is probably why I love it so much.

That, and I just adore the characters.

Once I started, I simply couldn’t stop, and tore through this hefty book as quickly as I possibly could (while still taking time for work and sleep). I do intend to enforce a break for myself at this point… must read other books before racing ahead to the end of the series!

When I do continue…

Next up for me will be the novella Auberon, a 78-page novella that takes place either during or after the events of Tiamat’s Wrath. (It’s listed as #8.5 on Goodreads, but I haven’t wanted to look too deeply into the plot details before I read it.)

And after Auberon… it’ll be on to the final book in the series! I’m really not ready for it to end.

27Jun2021

Book Review: A Single Thread by Tracy Chevalier

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: A Single Thread
Author: Tracy Chevalier
Publisher: Viking
Publication date: September 17, 2019
Length: 336 pages
Genre: Historical fiction
Source: Library
Rating:

1932. After the Great War took both her beloved brother and her fiancé, Violet Speedwell has become a “surplus woman,” one of a generation doomed to a life of spinsterhood after the war killed so many young men. Yet Violet cannot reconcile herself to a life spent caring for her grieving, embittered mother. After countless meals of boiled eggs and dry toast, she saves enough to move out of her mother’s place and into the town of Winchester, home to one of England’s grandest cathedrals. There, Violet is drawn into a society of broderers–women who embroider kneelers for the Cathedral, carrying on a centuries-long tradition of bringing comfort to worshippers.
Violet finds support and community in the group, fulfillment in the work they create, and even a growing friendship with the vivacious Gilda. But when forces threaten her new independence and another war appears on the horizon, Violet must fight to put down roots in a place where women aren’t expected to grow. Told in Chevalier’s glorious prose, A Single Thread is a timeless story of friendship, love, and a woman crafting her own life.

A Single Thread is a quiet, low-key historical novel that I probably never would have picked up on my own, so I’m glad my book group picked it for our June read.

Set in 1932, Violet Speedwell’s story unfolds as she settles into her new independent life in Winchester. At age 38, Violet is a spinster, one of the many women left alone after losing a loved one during the Great War. Still grieving her lost brother and fiance, Violet felt crushed by the demands of living with her embittered mother, and moved to Winchester to create distance and find a new path for herself.

In Winchester, she works as a typist at an insurance office, and happens by chance to discover the society of “broderers” — the embroidery group who create beautiful cushions and kneelers for the cathedral. Although Violet has never embroidered, she’s fascinated by the group’s work, and longs to create something of beauty of her own, as a way to leave her own mark on the world.

Joining the broderers, she not only becomes absorbed by her new craft, but also finds friendship and a sense of belonging and purpose. She also meets Arthur, one of the cathedral’s bell-ringers, a kind older man who cares for his fragile wife, yet seems to share a mutual attraction with Violet.

Over the course of the novel, we see Violet emerge from her loneliness and grief and start to make a life for herself, finding new hope and meaning in the community she’s chosen.

Violet’s story is lovely in its own quiet way. An action-packed plot this is not — and if this weren’t a book group book, I’m not sure I would have made it past the early chapters, with all their details on cathedrals and embroidery. I’m glad I stuck with it. A Single Thread is a gently, lovely read, and while the ending was perhaps a little too rosy to be entirely believable, I found it overall to be a thoughtful, graceful experience.

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21May2021

Book Review: Golden Child by Claire Adam

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Golden Child
Author: Claire Adam
Publisher: Hogarth Press
Publication date: January 15, 2019
Length: 304 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Purchased
Rating:

A deeply affecting debut novel set in Trinidad, following the lives of a family as they navigate impossible choices about scarcity, loyalty, and love
WINNER OF THE DESMOND ELLIOTT PRIZE – “Golden Child is a stunning novel written with force and beauty. Though true to herself, Adam’s work stands tall beside icons of her tradition like V.S. Naipaul.”–Jennifer Clement, author of Gun Love
Rural Trinidad: a brick house on stilts surrounded by bush; a family, quietly surviving, just trying to live a decent life. Clyde, the father, works long, exhausting shifts at the petroleum plant in southern Trinidad; Joy, his wife, looks after the home. Their two sons, thirteen years old, wake early every morning to travel to the capital, Port of Spain, for school. They are twins but nothing alike: Paul has always been considered odd, while Peter is widely believed to be a genius, destined for greatness.
When Paul goes walking in the bush one afternoon and doesn’t come home, Clyde is forced to go looking for him, this child who has caused him endless trouble already, and who he has never really understood. And as the hours turn to days, and Clyde begins to understand Paul’s fate, his world shatters–leaving him faced with a decision no parent should ever have to make.
Like the Trinidadian landscape itself, Golden Child is both beautiful and unsettling, a resoundingly human story of aspiration, betrayal, and love.

Golden Child is an absorbing, heart-breaking book about a family’s life in Trinidad, about opportunities and tragedies, and about choices that should never be made.

The Deyalsinghs are a Hindu family living in rural Trinidad, far from city life and its conveniences. The water supply comes and goes, homes must be barred and gated to keep out the roving bandits and gangsters who are a constant threat, corruption is everywhere, and everyone knows everyone’s business. The father, Clyde, works hard to provide his sons with a better life than the one he had, while mother Joy’s extended family provides assistance and financial help as long as they are able.

The sons, Peter and Paul, are twins, but Paul was deprived of oxygen at birth and has been labeled “slightly retarded” all his life (although as we get to know Paul, this clearly seems to be a false label). Peter is brilliant and shines academically, but Paul struggles to keep up — yet Joy insists that the boys must stay together. A kind priest takes an interest in Paul’s education and offers to tutor him, yet Paul is constantly aware that he’s not good enough, that he’s a burden, and that his path will be different than Peter’s.

As the book opens, Paul has failed to come home one afternoon. With evening approaching, and all the danger night brings, Clyde begins a frantic search for him. We learn that there was a break-in at the house only weeks before, and that the bandits left frustrated at not finding money in the home.

From here, we flash back to the boys’ birth, early childhood, and years of school, seeing how the family grew and changed. We’re shown snippets of different times of the boys’ lives, and through these scenes, come to understand Peter and Paul’s connection to one another as well how very differently their family, schoolmates, and teachers view the two boys.

Finally, we come back to Paul’s disappearance, learning that he has been kidnapped and is being held for ransom. In alternating chapters, we follow both Paul’s experience and Clyde’s efforts to free him. I won’t divulge how it works out, but it’s harrowing and frightening and absolutely awful to read about what Paul goes through.

It’s a little challenging to write further about this book without revealing the resolution, so I’ll just share some overall thoughts.

The structure of the book was an obstacle for me in terms of feeling invested. The opening, as the family realizes that Paul is missing and Clyde goes out to look for him, doesn’t provide enough information — I didn’t get a good sense of who this family is, what their background is, and how they fit into the world around them. It was only in part 2, as we go back through the family’s story, that I became more engaged with the characters. I get that this structure is a deliberate decision on the part of the author and editors, but in my experience, it was awkward and made me feel not particularly interested in the book as a whole. I’m glad I stuck with it, though, as it does pick up and become more cohesive once the background is provideed.

The depiction of life in Trinidad during the period in which the book is set is well-drawn, with an unvarnished portrait of a land that can be beautiful, but whose people prey on one another, where the economy offers few opportunities, and where grift and connections and playing along with the power structure can be the difference between life and death.

The characters are all sharply distinct, although Peter’s inner life is left unexplored. Clyde and Paul are the two most developed characters, and the more we get to know them, the more painful the book becomes to read.

Overall, Golden Child is a moving depiction of a time and place that I hadn’t previously known much about, with characters I ended up caring about and an ending that left me feeling gutted. It’s a tough read emotionally, with beautiful language as well as an overwhelming sense of sorrow.

Golden Child was my book group’s pick for May. I don’t know that I would have come across it otherwise, and as always, I’m grateful to my book group for broadening my horizons! There’s a lot of food for thought and lots to discuss and debate, and I’m so looking forward to hearing other opinions on this disturbing, powerful book.

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12Feb2021

Audiobook Review: Meg & Jo by Virginia Kantra

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Meg & Jo
Author: Virginia Kantra
Narrators: Shannon McManus, Karissa Vacker
Publisher: Berkley
Publication date: December 3, 2019
Print length: 400 pages
Audio length: 13 hours 46 minutes
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Library
Rating:

The timeless classic Little Women inspired this heartwarming modern tale of four sisters from New York Times bestselling author Virginia Kantra.
The March sisters—reliable Meg, independent Jo, stylish Amy, and shy Beth—have grown up to pursue their separate dreams. When Jo followed her ambitions to New York City, she never thought her career in journalism would come crashing down, leaving her struggling to stay afloat in a gig economy as a prep cook and secret food blogger.
Meg appears to have the life she always planned—the handsome husband, the adorable toddlers, the house in a charming subdivision. But sometimes getting everything you’ve ever wanted isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
When their mother’s illness forces the sisters home to North Carolina for the holidays, they’ll rediscover what really matters.
One thing’s for sure—they’ll need the strength of family and the power of sisterhood to remake their lives and reimagine their dreams.

Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents.

And a Little Women retelling wouldn’t be nearly as convincing if it didn’t start with that memorable opening line!

Dangle a Little Women retelling in front of me, and naturally I’m going to read it. And while Meg & Jo has been on my TBR for a while now, I finally got the motivation to dive in thanks to my book group, since this is our February pick.

In Meg & Jo, the March sisters are all grown up and living their own lives. Meg has settled into married life with her husband John and their adorable two-year-old twins, staying put in the family home town in North Carolina. Jo moved to New York years back to pursue a journalism career, but after being laid off from her newspaper job, she’s working as a prep cook at a fancy restaurant while secretly writing a food blog. Beth is in school studying music, and Amy has an internship in the fashion world.

Meg & Jo is narrated in alternating chapters by (obviously) Meg and Jo, and it’s their stories that are the focus of this book. (Beth and Amy are still there, mostly in the background and in their occasional appearances as they visit home, but they’re not POV characters in this book.)

As the book progresses, we learn that neither Meg nor Jo is truly leading their best lives. Meg is a stay-at-home mom, and her husband gave up his teaching and coaching job to work at a car dealership so he could better support their growing family once they found out Meg was pregnant. Neither one is entirely happy. Sure, they love each other and their children, but Meg pressures herself to do it all as payback for John working so hard, not realizing how she’s shutting him out and denying him the opportunity to be a true partner. Meanwhile, John is working at a job that means nothing to him, and can’t bring himself to talk to Meg about it. The communication problems between Meg and John are the central challenge they face.

As for Jo, her blog is doing well, but she’s frustrated. She likes working in the restaurant, but it’s not exactly advancing her writing career. As the story progresses, she falls into a romantic relationship with Eric, the renowned chef and owner of the restaurant, but secrets and a lack of clear intention seem to doom the romance before it can really bloom.

Complicating Meg and Jo’s separate lives further is family drama back home. The March parents live on the farm passed down through Abby’s (Marmee’s) side of the family. Abby runs the farm and the home herself, while her husband Ashton seems to devote all his time to his calling, serving as chaplain and counselor to military vets. When Abby becomes injured, her farm duties fall to Meg — and once Meg takes over, she starts to realize the precariousness of the farm’s future.

As the sisters return home for their mother’s recuperation and for the holidays, they come together to support and love one another. Secrets are revealed, there are plenty of surprises, and ultimately, there are promises of future happiness for Meg and Jo.

So… did I enjoy Meg & Jo? Yes, for sure! It took some getting used to, but seeing the March family transplanted into modern-day lives was quite fun and for the most part, really engaging. I did want to give Meg a good shake from time to time — it was so obvious to me that her attempts to take the household burdens off of John were actually alienating him. The book does a good job of showing how she was modeling her approach to doing it all on what she saw in her own parents’ marriage and internalized as the way things should work, and I was actually proud of Meg when she finally started to understand that accepting John as a true partner was the key to their future happiness.

Jo could be pretty clueless about certain things, and OF COURSE keeping her blog a secret was going to come back to bite her. I had a hard time believing some of the fallout, good and bad, once her secret came out. I did like her relationship with Eric, although I would have liked to see it given a little more time to grow before the big blow-up.

Beth and Amy seem to be basically true to their Little Women depictions, although (150-year-old spoiler alert!) Beth is alive and well in Meg & Jo! I held my breath for about half the book, waiting for her to develop a horrible illness, but thankfully, the book didn’t go there. Beth is gentle and sweet, very shy, and is committed to her musical career. Amy is spoiled, flighty, and impulsive, just as you’d expect.

One of my favorite parts of the book is Amy calling Jo out on trying to put them all into boxes, reminding Jo that in real life, people aren’t just one thing. I loved that their argument started over Pride and Prejudice – Jo sees Meg as Jane, and herself as Lizzie — but what roles does that leave for Beth and Amy? Amy rightfully resents that Jo can’t see her as anything but the pampered, entitled child she once knew. I loved the coming to terms that starts to occur between the sisters.

Another big difference between Little Women and Meg & Jo is how the March parents are depicted, especially the father. In Little Women, Mr. March is largely absent, off in the war and doing God’s work. They miss him terribly, but know he’s following an important path and never seem to resent him. In Meg & Jo, Mr. March comes off as kind of a jerk, at least when it comes to being a husband and father. Yes, he has a calling to tend to the men and women who are suffering after giving so much to their country — but he absolutely neglects his family in order to do so, leaving his wife and children to manage on their own and taking no responsibility for their financial or physical well-being.

Meg & Jo is a little longer than it needs to be, and some interludes at the restaurant and on the farm could have been tightened up a bit. I’m glad I listened to the audiobook rather than reading a print copy, since that helped me feel less like the story was dragging (and I could listen at a faster speed when it was!) The audiobook has different narrators for Meg and Jo, but honestly, their voices are very similar, so if I picked up in the middle of a chapter, it wasn’t obvious from the narrator whose chapter I was on.

As a Little Women fan, I was happy to experience Meg & Jo and see the author’s vision of a modern-day March family. While the story is a little light-weight at times, I enjoyed the characters and their challenges, and it was amusing to see how their 19th century lives could be translated to the 21st century. A follow-up, Beth & Amy, is due out this spring, and I will definitely be reading it!

17Jan2021

Audiobook Review: The Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Giver of Stars
Author: Jojo Moyes
Narrator: Julia Whelan
Publisher: Pamela Dorman Books
Publication date: October 8, 2019
Print length: 388 pages
Audio length: 13 hours 52 minutes
Genre: Historical fiction
Source: Purchased
Rating:

From the author of Me Before You, set in Depression-era America, a breathtaking story of five extraordinary women and their remarkable journey through the mountains of Kentucky and beyond.
Alice Wright marries handsome American Bennett Van Cleve hoping to escape her stifling life in England. But small-town Kentucky quickly proves equally claustrophobic, especially living alongside her overbearing father-in-law. So when a call goes out for a team of women to deliver books as part of Eleanor Roosevelt’s new traveling library, Alice signs on enthusiastically.
The leader, and soon Alice’s greatest ally, is Margery, a smart-talking, self-sufficient woman who’s never asked a man’s permission for anything. They will be joined by three other singular women who become known as the Packhorse Librarians of Kentucky.
What happens to them–and to the men they love–becomes an unforgettable drama of loyalty, justice, humanity and passion. These heroic women refuse to be cowed by men or by convention. And though they face all kinds of dangers in a landscape that is at times breathtakingly beautiful, at others brutal, they’re committed to their job: bringing books to people who have never had any, arming them with facts that will change their lives.
Based on a true story rooted in America’s past, The Giver of Stars is unparalleled in its scope and epic in its storytelling. Funny, heartbreaking, enthralling, it is destined to become a modern classic–a richly rewarding novel of women’s friendship, of true love, and of what happens when we reach beyond our grasp for the great beyond.

Over a year ago, I wrote a post questioning whether we really needed another book about the Depression-era Kentucky pack hours librarians, after having read the excellent The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek. A variety of sources had identified concerns about he similarities of this book and The Giver of Stars, which was published later in the same year.

At the time, I wasn’t sure that I wanted to read another book on the same historical subject, particularly given some of the questions raised. However, I finally got around to The Giver of Stars after all, and I have to admit, it’s really good.

In The Giver of Stars, we’re introduced to the small town of Baileyville, Kentucky through the eyes of Alice Van Cleve, a young Englishwoman recently married to Bennett Van Cleve, the son of one of the wealthiest and most influential local men. Alice’s starry-eyed approach to marriage is shattered by the absolute lack of affection from Bennett and his constant deferral to his father, in whose house they live and who controls every aspect of their lives.

At a town meeting, a local woman introduces the idea of starting up a pack horse library as part of a WPA project spearheaded by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. While many townsfolk (mostly men) are scandalized, Alice is quick to volunteer, needing to find a purpose and an occupation to take her away from her domestic unhappiness.

The librarians, led by outspoken Margery O’Hare, ride up into the mountains on their mules and horses to deliver books and magazines to the families living there. The job is strenuous and difficult, but rewarding. The women of the library are clearly changing lives with each contact and each delivery.

Alice’s father-in-law is not one to tolerate disobedience, and he takes a particular dislike to Margery’s flouting of traditional feminine roles, painting her as an evil influence to anyone who’ll listen. Mr. Van Cleve owns the local mine that employs much of the adult male population of the area, and he has his own doubtful interests to protect, especially once he suspects Margery of promoting pro-union activism and helping the mountain folk to find ways to thwart his intended mine expansion. His anger becomes more and more dangerous to Alice, Margery, and the existence of the library itself.

The Giver of Stars is an absorbing read, with unique characters we come to care about a great deal, and a nice mix of focus on their personal lives with the bigger picture drama of life in Baileyville and its gossip, natural and man-made dangers, and good-old-boy politics.

The audiobook is lovely, with narration by the talented Julia Whelan, who brings the characters to life, but also beautifully narrates the more descriptive passages about the Kentucky landscapes and the quality of life in the hills.

So, I hereby take back my skepticism about this book! While there are some similarities to The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek (apart the most obvious, the choice of general subject matter), there was nothing that particularly jumped out at me while I was listening the The Giver of Stars enough to be disturbing or distracting.

Yes, I guess we really did need two books about pack horse librarians! Both are terrific. My main recommendation would be to read them with some time in between, so each can be appreciated on its own merits. I’m glad I finally gave The Giver of Stars a try!

19Nov2020

Book Review: The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Turn of the Key
Author: Ruth Ware
Publisher: Gallery/Scout Press
Publication date: August 6, 2019
Length: 337 pages
Genre: Thriller
Source: Purchased
Rating:

When she stumbles across the ad, she’s looking for something else completely. But it seems like too good an opportunity to miss—a live-in nannying post, with a staggeringly generous salary. And when Rowan Caine arrives at Heatherbrae House, she is smitten—by the luxurious “smart” home fitted out with all modern conveniences, by the beautiful Scottish Highlands, and by this picture-perfect family.
What she doesn’t know is that she’s stepping into a nightmare—one that will end with a child dead and herself in prison awaiting trial for murder.
Writing to her lawyer from prison, she struggles to explain the unravelling events that led to her incarceration. It wasn’t just the constant surveillance from the cameras installed around the house, or the malfunctioning technology that woke the household with booming music, or turned the lights off at the worst possible time. It wasn’t just the girls, who turned out to be a far cry from the immaculately behaved model children she met at her interview. It wasn’t even the way she was left alone for weeks at a time, with no adults around apart from the enigmatic handyman, Jack Grant.
It was everything.
She knows she’s made mistakes. She admits that she lied to obtain the post, and that her behavior toward the children wasn’t always ideal. She’s not innocent, by any means. But, she maintains, she’s not guilty—at least not of murder. Which means someone else is.
Full of spellbinding menace and told in Ruth Ware’s signature suspenseful style, The Turn of the Key is an unputdownable thriller from the Agatha Christie of our time.

The Turn of the Key is my book group’s pick for November, and I suppose I’m glad to have been “forced” to read it. I’ve been hearing about this book and author Ruth Ware for a while now, so it’s good to know what all the fuss is about!

From the start, we know that there’s something off about the main character. We meet Rowan as she reaches out by letter to a lawyer she’s heard about, one who might be able to turn around her hopeless case. Rowan is in prison, awaiting trial for murdering a child left in her care. And while Rowan admits that she’s done plenty wrong, she insists that she didn’t kill the child.

From here, she relates her strange story, starting with the advertisement for a nanny. A wealthy couple is offering a huge salary for a live-in nanny for their four children at their Scottish estate. To Rowan, this is simply too good to be true. The money involves a huge step up for her, she’s ready for a change, and as we later learn, she has other reasons for wanting the position too.

It’s a weird set-up. The house is a huge, beautiful old Victorian, but the back half has been totally converted into a sleek, glass-walled modern structure. The estate encompasses acres of woods and trails that the children are free to roam about unattended. The children range from toddler to teen, and seem like a handful, but Rowan is enchanted.

Less enchanting is the smart-house design. Everything is run via an app called Happy, that controls all lights, locks and unlocks doors, interfaces with phone calls, replenishes the grocery list, plays music and audiobooks, and so much more. There are cameras everywhere. Creepy!

The parents, Sandra and Bill, are strangely hands-off, to say the least. Upon hiring Rowan, they depart on a business trip the very next day. Suddenly, Rowan is left alone with children who don’t know her (and seem very hostile), a house she doesn’t know how to operate, and only a thick binder left behind by Sandra to offer her instructions on the daily routines and needs of the children.

There are so many red flags that honestly, if I were in Rowan’s shoes, I’d be heading for the hills. Being left alone with children I’ve just met for weeks? Living in an isolated old house? The creaky floors and strange noises? The scary walled garden? The impossible-to-figure-out house app and Sandra’s remote surveillance? No thank you very much.

Still, we also suspect early on that Rowan has secrets. What was her real reason for wanting this job? Why does she hesitate when someone calls her by name? Why does she hide her necklace and just seem so damned awkward all the time?

I had a lot of guesses about Rowan’s secrets, but I was wrong. I was slightly more on target with some of my guesses about the murder — I mean, I got that wrong too, but I figured out some of the “hows” at least!

The ending is pretty abrupt and perhaps a little manipulative, and there’s an ambiguous line thrown in right before the end that has me wondering what happened to Rowan after she finished telling her story.

Overall, I was only partially engaged; hence my 3-star rating. Granted, I’m not a thriller fan in general, so take my responses with a grain of salt. Still, I thought there was something stilted about the set-up, and felt that Rowan’s actions didn’t make enough sense going along. She displays a temper toward the children that made me go in some really dark directions which turned out not to be true — which is a relief, but then why such strong displays of anger? For a childcare professional, Rowan’s anger issues seem really inappropriate and probably should disqualify her from working with children.

Also, it didn’t feel rational to me that a person would show up and take this job in the first place with no adjustment period, and the smart-house aspects are creepy without really adding to the plot. Likewise, the awful garden is in the mix as a danger sign and huge clue… except in the end, it doesn’t really have anything to do with what’s going on, except for being yet one more thing to freak out the main character.

Rowan’s letters from prison make her sound pretty unhinged, so learning that she’s not as unreliable a narrator as we’re led to believe makes me feel like I was being handled, rather than tricked by a clever story.

I don’t know. I was engaged and needed to see how it all turned out, but never particularly connected to any of the characters or cared about them as individuals — not even the children, who didn’t seem particularly realistic.

So yeah, just a 3-star read for me. *Shrug*. Kind of disappointing, considering that I have another book by this author on my shelf. Here’s hoping I have better luck with the next one!

PS – I keep having to stop myself from referring to this book as The Turn of the Screw… and I assume that’s an intentional nod to the classic. New nanny, strange and potentially haunted house, weird children… although the Henry James version doesn’t include invasive smart devices and apps!

14Nov2020

Audiobook Review: Mythos by Stephen Fry

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Mythos: The Greek Myths Reimagined
Author: Stephen Fry
Narrator: Stephen Fry
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Publication date: August 27, 2019
Print length: 352 pages
Audio length: 15 hours 26 minutes
Genre: Myths & legends
Source: Purchased
Rating:

Rediscover the thrills, grandeur, and unabashed fun of the Greek myths—stylishly retold by Stephen Fry. This legendary writer, actor, and comedian breathes new life into beloved tales. From Persephone’s pomegranate seeds to Prometheus’s fire, from devious divine schemes to immortal love affairs, Fry draws out the humor and pathos in each story and reveals its relevance for our own time. Illustrated throughout with classical art inspired by the myths, this gorgeous volume invites you to explore a captivating world, with a brilliant storyteller as your guide.

Stephen Fry’s book on Greek mythology is an absolute delight, and his narration of the audiobook is a perfect showcase for his wit and humor.

From the creation myths through the age of the Titans and the Olympians, Stephen Fry treats us to story after story that never fail to amuse. It’s a wonderful accomplishment, breathing fresh life into stories that many of us have heard repeatedly since childhood. In Mythos, even the most familiar of tales feels fresh, and there are plenty included that I’d never heard of before.

Of course, it’s all very funny too, and is kept at a very light and entertaining level. This isn’t an academic study — it’s storytelling, and it works beautifully. I also really appreciated the little nuggets of linguistic origins tucked in amidst all the gods and demigods and nymphs — the narrator always points out the modern day words and places that are related to the Greek names of the figures in the myths. As a word geek, I found it just so much fun!

Stephen Fry’s versions of the stories are light-hearted and told for maximum entertainment, and every so often there are some absolute gems, such as this line from the story of King Midas:

Everything around him glinted and glittered, gleamed and glimmered with a gorgeous gaudy golden glow but his heart was as grim and grey as granite.

After listening to the audiobook, I couldn’t resist treating myself to a physical copy of the book, and I’m so glad I did — it’s beautiful. The text is of course wonderful, and there are illustrations throughout that add to it and make it a book I’ll be happy to open at random and flip through from time to time for years to come.

This is one instance where I feel confident in saying that you’ll be missing out if you only read the print version, because Stephen Fry’s narration is just so terrific. So, if you enjoy mythology told with flair, absolutely give a listen to this great audiobook!

*I can’t wait to listen to the next in the series!*

1Nov2020

Graphic Reaction: Good Talk by Mira Jacob

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations
Author: Mira Jacob
Publisher: One World
Publication date: March 26, 2019
Length: 349 pages
Genre: Graphic memoir
Source: Purchased
Rating:

Mira Jacob’s touching, often humorous, and utterly unique graphic memoir takes readers on her journey as a first-generation American. At an increasingly fraught time for immigrants and their families, Good Talk delves into the difficult conversations about race, sex, love, and family that seem to be unavoidable these days.
Inspired by her popular BuzzFeed piece “37 Difficult Questions from My Mixed-Raced Son,” here are Jacob’s responses to her six-year-old, Zakir, who asks if the new president hates brown boys like him; uncomfortable relationship advice from her parents, who came to the United States from India one month into their arranged marriage; and the imaginary therapy sessions she has with celebrities from Bill Murray to Madonna. Jacob also investigates her own past, from her memories of being the only non-white fifth grader to win a Daughters of the American Revolution essay contest to how it felt to be a brown-skinned New Yorker on 9/11. As earnest and moving as they are sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, these are the stories that have formed one American life.

I can’t think of a more timely book to read this week — on the eve of a monumentally important election — than Mira Jacob’s Good Talk. In this graphic memoir, the author shares conversations between her and her six-year-old (and later, eight-year-old) son, her husband, her in-laws, her parents, her friends, and all sorts of other relatives and acquaintances. Through these conversations, she explores what it means to have brown skin in America, and how she hopes to help her mixed-race child navigate a world that still doesn’t know how to stop treating people as others.

From her son’s early obsession with Michael Jackson up through the 2016 election, she navigates the strange and treacherous landscape of race in America, using drawn characters against photographic backgrounds to highlight a variety of conversations that are funny while also sad, startling, and infuriating.

This is a quick read, but so lovely and warm and powerful. I will definitely want to read more by this author!

16Sep2020

Book Review: The Remaking by Clay McLeod Chapman

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Remaking
Author: Clay McLeod Chapman
Publisher: Quirk
Publication date: October 8, 2019 (paperback publication 9/15/2020)
Length: 320 pages
Genre: Horror
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

Inspired by a true story, this supernatural thriller for fans of horror and true crime follows a tale as it evolves every twenty years—with terrifying results.
Ella Louise has lived in the woods surrounding Pilot’s Creek, Virginia, for nearly a decade. Publicly, she and her daughter Jessica are shunned by their upper-crust family and the Pilot’s Creek residents. Privately, desperate townspeople visit her apothecary for a cure to what ails them—until Ella Louise is blamed for the death of a prominent customer. Accused of witchcraft, both mother and daughter are burned at the stake in the middle of the night. Ella Louise’s burial site is never found, but the little girl has the most famous grave in the South: a steel-reinforced coffin surrounded by a fence of interconnected white crosses.
Their story will take the shape of an urban legend as it’s told around a campfire by a man forever marked by his boyhood encounters with Jessica. Decades later, a boy at that campfire will cast Amber Pendleton as Jessica in a ’70s horror movie inspired by the Witch Girl of Pilot’s Creek. Amber’s experiences on that set and its meta-remake in the ’90s will ripple through pop culture, ruining her life and career after she becomes the target of a witch hunt. Amber’s best chance to break the cycle of horror comes when a true-crime investigator tracks her down to interview her for his popular podcast. But will this final act of storytelling redeem her—or will it bring the story full circle, ready to be told once again? And again. And again…

Are you ready for a ghost story? How about a ghost story within a ghost story within a ghost story?

Welcome to the weird and chilling world of The Remaking, now out in paperback, in which an urban legend refuses to die, no matter how many times the story is retold.

In 1931 in the lumber-rich town of Pilot’s Creek, Virginia, a mother and her nine-year-old daughter are burned at the stake by vengeful townspeople (men, of course). For years, it’s been an open secret that Ella Louise Ford can cure what ails you, and her young daughter Jessica appears to be even more gifted. But witches living in the woods can only be tolerated for so long, and when Ella Louise’s treatments are suspected of causing a tragedy, the men of the town want the witches to pay.

In 1951, an old man tells ghost stories around a campfire, always coming back to the story of Jessica Ford, the Little Witch Girl. Ella Louise was buried in an unmarked grave somewhere deep in the woods, but little Jessica was buried in hallowed ground, in a reinforced coffin with cement filling in the grave and a fence of crucifixes to keep her in. Now, legend has it that the Little Witch Girl wants out, and she just needs someone to help her find her mother.

In 1971, a man who heard the ghost story as a child is determined to make a movie about Jessica — a shlocky horror film called Don’t Tread on Jessica’s Grave, filled with standard horror movie tropes, and starring an eerily perfect young actress named Amber. But something happens on set, and it’s the legend behind the movie that makes this a story that becomes a horror cult classic.

In 1995, Amber is a drug-dependent has-been who never had a career after her early disaster, but who instead has found fame of sorts on the horror convention circuit. When an up-and-coming director decides to make a remake of Jessica’s story, Amber seems like the perfect choice to play Ella Louise — until on-set tragedy strikes again.

And finally, in 2016, a podcaster who debunks urban legends decides to tackle the story of the Little Witch Girl and prove it’s a hoax once and for all… but is he ready for what he’ll find in the woods?

I realize I’ve just outlined the entire book, but trust me, you have to read it to get the full creepy experience. The story of Ella Louise and Jessica starts with tragedy. Ella Louise is different, a disgrace to her society parents, and it’s implied but never explained that she became pregnant with Jessica as the result of a sexual assault on the night of her debutante ball. But rather than being supported as a crime victim, she’s shunned by her parents and the town, and makes a new life for herself and her daughter, out in the woods where no one can harm them.

I had a hard time getting over the origin story of Ella Louise and Jessica, because it’s so harrowing and awful. But from there, we see how the tale takes on a life of its own… and how something that may be just a story has doomed the town and everyone connected with it. Is it truly a witch’s curse, or is it the story that haunts the town and brings destruction to everyone who encounters it?

Amber’s tale is chilling in very different ways. Forced into pursuing her big break by a mother who never realized her own dream of stardom, Amber is way too young to be able to handle the horror of shooting Don’t Tread on Jessica’s Grave. From the movie’s storyline to seeing herself transformed through makeup and prosthetics into a burned corpse, this is clearly something that will scar her forever — and that’s before she has a nearly deadly encounter in the woods.

Jessica had become a cinematic ouroboros. A serpent devouring its own tail, coiling round and round for an eternity. The longer I imagined that snake infinitely spinning, the more its scales slowly took on the shape of celluloid frames. The sprocket holes along either side of the film strip formed scales. When this snake shed its skin, the translucent husk would be fed through the projector. The images trapped within each scale caught the projector’s light and made their way to the big screen. Jessica filled that vast canvas, reaching her hand out to me.
This film would never end. It continued to play on its own endless loop. Jessica’s story would be told over and over, forever now. She found a new audience.
Fresh blood.
That was exactly what Jessica wanted.
To find new blood.

A ghost story, a consideration of urban legends, a look at the need to endlessly remake movies into something new for each generation — The Remaking provides so much to think about, even while being a chilling, creepy, intensely haunting read.

Much like the endless remakings and retellings of Jessica’s story, The Remaking will be sticking with me for a long time!

And now, if only someone would make a movie version of The Remaking, so Jessica’s story could live on…

The Remaking was released in paperback this week. Check out this perfect cover: