Tag Archives: book reviews

Jaguar Sun by Martha Bourke

Posted by melydia on February 17, 2012 None comments

Jaguar Sun by Martha Bourke: When already awkward teenager Maya discovers she’s become a shapeshifter – a socially shunned minority of people who can turn into animals – she fears her life is over. Little does she know this is the least of her worries, as she is destined to play a pivotal role in the upcoming end of the Mayan calendar. (Yes, Maya is Mayan. It’s a little silly, but easily overlooked.) I sped through this book in a couple days. Maya is quite entertaining as a narrator, reminding me quite a bit of myself as a teenager. Her best friends, the ever enthusiastic twins Lyssa and Damian, are tons of fun as well. The only part I wasn’t so keen on was the romance, which was overly melodramatic, but I probably would have appreciated it more before I got old and cynical. The ending was a bit anti-climatic, somewhat clumsily clearing the way for the next book, but until then the action was well paced. In short, a quick, fun read. I’ll have to keep my eye out for the rest of the series.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

All Her Father’s Guns by James Warner

Posted by melydia on February 7, 2012 None comments

All Her Father’s Guns by James Warner: Cal is a venture capitalist obsessed with guns and hopelessly in love with his Romanian dominatrix of a therapist. Reid is a British-born graduate student in the Department of Theory at Berkeley, studying the socialogical implications of cinematical errors in Casablanca. Reid also happens to be dating Cal’s daughter. In addition, Cal’s ex-wife, Tabytha, is running for Congress on the ultra-crazy-conservative ticket and attempting to squeeze Cal for all he’s worth. When Reid is laid off from Berkeley he turns to Cal for employment. From there it’s a strange ride through blackmail and abortion clinics, politics and illegal arms deals. It’s fun, it’s strange, and it’s a little bit silly at times, but it all works out in the end. Reid turned out to be much more likeable than I’d expected, and the ending was surprisingly satisfying. I look forward to reading more from Warner.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Posted by melydia on February 3, 2012 1 comments

The Help by Kathryn Stockett (unabridged audiobook read by Jenna Lamia, Bahni Turpin, Octavia Spencer, and Cassandra Campbell; 18 hrs on 15 discs): Aibileen and Minny are housemaids in 1960s Jackson, Mississippi, who work for old friends of Skeeter (whose real name is Eugenia, but pretty much no one calls her that). Skeeter is the only one of her friends who didn’t drop out of college to get married, and is now back home after graduation, trying to figure out what to do with herself. She longs to be a writer, and with a little encouragement from a woman at a large New York publishing firm, she decides to write a book. She’s unsure of a topic until her friend Hilly’s “Home Help Bathroom Initiative,” encouraging all white families to get a separate “colored” bathroom installed in their homes for the help. According to Hilly, African Americans are genetically different from whites and carry special diseases. The idea that the very same person who cooks your food and cleans your bathroom would be so dirty as to require their own little stall out in the garage just baffles my mind. The double standard doesn’t end there, though. The white ladies of the Junior League regularly raise money to help “the poor colored children of Africa” and yet turn their noses up at the idea of helping the poor colored kids of Jackson. In secret, Skeeter and Aibileen write a book about life from the point of view of the help, conducting interviews with numerous maids around the city, all the while knowing about the very real danger if the wrong people find out. Meanwhile, Minny is dealing with a tarnished reputation due to her lying former boss (Hilly), an abusive husband, and the strange secretiveness of her new employer, Celia. This book is touching, maddening, hilarious, sad, and ultimately uplifting. Now I want a sequel. I want to know what happens to Minny, Aibileen, and Skeeter. I want to know how Mae Mobley turns out when she grows up. In short, this was an excellent book and completely unforgettable. Highly recommended.

A note on the audio: Unfortunately I have no idea which actress voiced which sections, so I’ll have to refer to them by their character names: Skeeter, Minny, Aibileen, and The Narrator. They were all so excellent, but I was especially impressed at how well they did at sounding like each other: Aibileen did a passable Skeeter and they all managed to give the same inflection to Celia. Aibileen’s voice for Mae Mobley as she got older was impressive as well. Skeeter wasn’t so good at Aibileen or Minny, but I loved her Mrs. Stein. The Narrator would have been fine on her own, but was so overshadowed by the others that her section stuck out a bit. All in all a great audio production.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly

Posted by melydia on January 31, 2012 None comments

The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly (unabridged audiobook read by Steven Crossley; 11 hrs on 10 discs): 12-year-old David mourns his dead mother, resents his new stepmother and baby half-brother, and suddenly finds that books have begun whispering to him. One night he journeys to a strange land, a land of fairy tales and dreams. But these aren’t your modern, Disney-fied fairy tales. These are the old cautionary fables, full of monsters and violence. I spent much of the first part of this book wondering why it hadn’t been made into a movie, but once David enters the other land, there is more than a little bit of disturbing, violent imagery. Even so, it’s a captivating story, full of classic motifs and new characters, scary monsters and thrilling adventure. Not one I’ll soon forget.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke

Posted by melydia on January 27, 2012 None comments

Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clarke: Just as man is about to achieve space flight, a group of alien ships appear over every major city in the world. The aliens, whom the human race refer to as The Overlords, bring peace and prosperity to the entire planet over the course of the next hundred years. The Overlords are mysterious and secretive, never revealing their true purpose – until one day they announce that the current generation alive will be the very last of mankind ever. It’s a difficult read, though admittedly not quite as depressing as, say, On The Beach by Nevil Shute, but sobering nonetheless. Another interesting facet is the view of the future from the past: here, for example, it’s the mid-1970s and we still haven’t reached the moon. But I wouldn’t mind the near-instantaneous travel, where people living in Australia can attend a dinner party in South Africa. So while this isn’t what one might consider a rolicking adventure, it’s a fascinating look into one possible first contact scenario. One final note: at the beginning of my copy is a disclaimer that the views held within this novel are not held by the author. Which views, however, are not specified, so I am left to speculate. Does it refer to the polygamy of men? The passive submission to the Overlords? Something else? Hard to say, but in all honesty it added to my enjoyment of the book, because I paid more attention to the subtle clues of what, if anything, the author is disavowing.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Jennifer Government by Max Barry

Posted by melydia on January 24, 2012 None comments

Jennifer Government by Max Barry: In a world where capitalism is so prized that you take your employer as your last name, Hack Nike accidentally finds himself part of a marketing scheme to sell sneakers by killing customers. I suppose one could see this as a cautionary tale against over-privatization (the NRA is basically a bunch of guns for hire, schools are run by toy companies where new Barbies are part of the curriculum, etc.), but I was too amused by the absurdity of it all to take it too seriously. Jennifer Government is, as her name suggests, a government agent attempting to catch the people behind the sneaker shootings. At the same time, Hack’s somewhat unstable girlfriend Violet attempts to make a fortune selling a nasty new computer virus, stockbroker Buy Mitsui makes a random act of kindness that drives him to ponder suicide, and Billy Bechtel attempts to go on a skiing holiday and somehow ends up as a hired assassin. The whole thing is positively silly, but a lot of fun nonetheless. If you like satire in the vein of Catch-22, you’ll probably enjoy this one.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Hounded by Kevin Hearne

Posted by melydia on January 20, 2012 3 comments

Hounded by Kevin Hearne: Atticus looks 21 years old, but is actually closer to 21 centuries old, thanks to a deal with a certain god of death. He runs a small bookstore in Arizona in between dealing with a number of gods, werewolves, vampires, witches, and other unexpected characters. The basic idea is that every deity from every religion actually exists, though Atticus mostly has to deal with those of the Celtic variety, since he is Irish himself. In this tale, Atticus must face Aenghus Og, an angry god who has been after him to retrieve a certain magical sword for centuries. I got a huge kick out of this book. Atticus is snarky and sarcastic, and the constant play on mythological archetypes never failed to entertain. I would not hesitate to read the rest of the series. If you’re a fan of The Dresden Files, you’ll probably enjoy this one as well.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Prestige by Christopher Priest

Posted by melydia on January 13, 2012 1 comments

The Prestige by Christopher Priest: I’ve wanted to read this ever since seeing the movie in the theaters. It is the strange tale of two rival magicians at the turn of the 20th century as they each attempt to uncover the other’s secrets so they can better them. It is told more or less as a collection of diary entries by the two men, with some extra bits around the edges about a couple of their descendants in modern times. I enjoyed the mystery of the magician’s life and indeed was tempted to start over from the beginning when certain things were revealed later, to see if I could pick up earlier hints that I had missed – which is saying something, since I find few books have re-read value. I did not like the ending, however, which was abrupt and very bizarre, leaving all kinds of threads dangling. Maybe the author was leaving the way open for a sequel, but it left me cold and disappointed. That said, there is a possibility that, were I to read it again, I would understand more and not feel like there was additional things left to be explained. But I don’t know. The ending aside, I had a great time devouring this book, and it made me want to read more about Victorian age magicians.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

Posted by melydia on January 6, 2012 1 comments

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho: A shepherd boy in southern Spain dreams of finding his fortune at the Pyramids in Egypt. Shortly thereafter he meets a king who convinces him to journey to the Pyramids because this is his Personal Legend. So this is the story of the boy’s pursuit of his Personal Legend. One of the rules of writing that is repeated so often it’s almost a cliche is “show, don’t tell”. Well, this is one of those books that demonstrates that not all rules must be followed. Pretty much everything is told here: the characters’ innermost thoughts and intentions, everything that happens and the reason for it, and the outcome of all actions. And you know what? That’s just fine. This is a fable, and it’s clear from the start that you are being told this story rather than experiencing it along with the characters. I did find it a bit preachy at times, when “follow your dreams” and “never give up” might as well have been blinking neon lights, but by and large it was a pleasant little tale which I’m sure many people (less cynical people than I, that is) would find quite inspiring and uplifting.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Revenge by Mark Young

Posted by melydia on January 3, 2012 None comments

Revenge by Mark Young: Travis Mays walks away from his life in the police force after a sting operation ends in tragedy. He moves from central California to middle-of-nowhere Idaho, where he teaches criminology at a Washington university to fund his life as a recluse in a small cabin. One day he signs up for kayaking lessons; his guide is the lovely Jessie White Eagle, a Native American of the Nez Perce tribe whose brother has recently gone missing. What follows is a rather twisty tale of murder and deception. I understood the killer’s beef with Mays, but a whole lot of plot hangs on the chance meeting between Mays and White Eagle. If Mays hadn’t signed up for those lessons that day, quite a bit of this story would not have happened. Anyway, I enjoyed this one more than I’d expected, zipping through chapters with ease. It helps that the author has experience both as a cop and a journalist. Sure, I didn’t know what all the lingo and acronyms meant, but I gleaned enough from context that it didn’t distract me, and indeed added to the realism. My only real complaint was how much difficulty I had keeping the various characters straight. There are a lot of players here and all of them are interconnected, often in convoluted ways. I also wish there was more information on the Nez Perce, though instilling an interest in further learning is never a bad thing in the book. All in all, if you’re looking for a decent thriller, this is worth picking up.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

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