Book Review: Welcome to Bordertown

From Goodreads:

Bordertown: a city on the border between our human world and the elfin realm. Runaway teens come from both sides of the border to find adventure, to find themselves. Elves play in rock bands and race down the street on spell-powered motorbikes. Human kids recreate themselves in the squats and clubs and artists' studios of Soho. Terri Windling's original Bordertown series was the forerunner of today's urban fantasy, introducing authors that included Charles de Lint, Will Shetterly, Emma Bull, and Ellen Kushner. In this volume of all-new work (including a 15-page graphic story), the original writers are now joined by the generation that grew up dreaming of Bordertown, including acclaimed authors Holly Black, Cassandra Clare, Cory Doctorow, Neil Gaiman, Catherynne M. Valente, and many more. They all meet here on the streets of Bordertown in more than twenty new interconnected songs, poems, and stories.

Yes, yes, this is my second anthology review in as many weeks. Shut up, I've been finding some really good ones.

I'm not quite sure why I didn't pick up Welcome to Bordertown when it first came out, other than A) I was busy with finals and I forgot about it, and B) I'm occasionally really stupid and doubt the awesomeness of authors. Thankfully, Cassandra Yorgey saw that I was blind and showed me the light. Namely, she did this by scoring me a pass to FaerieCon East where I got to meet AND HAVE TEA with Ellen Kushner and Delia Sherman (Guys! Ellen Kushner bought me tea!) so that I would understand their awesomeness, and then she lent me her ARC to read. Now I keep this book next to my bed, beside my Ultimate Hitchhikers Guide, in case of emergencies.

The Good:

Beautiful writing by a ton of authors, many of whom I know and others I am looking forward to reading more from. Welcome to Bordertown really explores and makes use of the best aspects of writing in an anthology. There is a world - Bordertown - that has established rules, geography, history, which must be obeyed by everyone. But working within those rules, writers can do whatever they want. And that leads to a collection of stories as varied as the dwellers of Bordertown themselves. Characters of every ethnicity, gender, species, age, sexual orientation, etc can find a place and a voice in the stories of Welcome to Bordertown - which, by the way, is a great way to make readers feel welcome.

The stories progress in a sort of chaotic order. In the first few stories, we're introduced to this hopeful new world, where the misfits and unorthodox have a place and anything is possible. More stories expose us to everyday life in Bordertown and the risks it poses to its' occupants, both old and new, stripping away some of the promise of Bordertown and turning into a place like any other. Full of dangers. Full of opportunities. Just like everywhere else. Finally, as we near the end, we see the darker side of Bordertown, with its injustices and the people willing fight against them. It's a beautiful storytelling arch, showing us that even with magic and faeries, you can't run away from your problems forever. Happily ever afters must be fought for constantly.

The Bad:

There's not so much Bad in this anthology as there are personal requests. More comics. Fewer poems. More poems. No comics at all. Why is there a motorcycle on the cover?

The Rest:

My standard warning for anthologies applies here: Not all stories are created equal. It is more than likely that readers are not going to like every story in here. But you're going to like an awful lot of them, I promise.

Final Thoughts:

Beyond being great YA, this is just a great book period. I would recommend it to anyone interested in fantasy, and frequently do. I sincerely hope it won't be another 13 years before the next Bordertown book comes out.

My Rating: 5/5 Mushrooms.

Book Review: Boneshaker

GOGGLES AND AIRSHIPS! WIN! Ooo, and a quote from Scott Westerfeld. Shiny!

 From Barnes and Noble:

In the early days of the Civil War, rumors of gold in the frozen Klondike brought hordes of newcomers to the Pacific Northwest. Anxious to compete, Russian prospectors commissioned inventor Leviticus Blue to create a great machine that could mine through Alaska’s ice. Thus was Dr. Blue’s Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine born.

But on its first test run the Boneshaker went terribly awry, destroying several blocks of downtown Seattle and unearthing a subterranean vein of blight gas that turned anyone who breathed it into the living dead.

Now it is sixteen years later, and a wall has been built to enclose the devastated and toxic city. Just beyond it lives Blue’s widow, Briar Wilkes. Life is hard with a ruined reputation and a teenaged boy to support, but she and Ezekiel are managing. Until Ezekiel undertakes a secret crusade to rewrite history.

His quest will take him under the wall and into a city teeming with ravenous undead, air pirates, criminal overlords, and heavily armed refugees. And only Briar can bring him out alive.

All I can say is that it was a good thing I waited until my Thanksgiving break to read this book because once I picked it up, it was impossible for me to put down.

The Good:

Where do I start? I'm not used to reviewing books I love this much. Compliments are anathema to my being.

This book is like an action-adventure movie on paper. By which I mean, we get all the thrills, danger, and edge of your seat tension that we love about movies, plus the detailed exposition and character insights that we can only get via books. Plus, mad science.

Let me make it clear that I am not a fan of the zombie-zeitgeist that's taken media by storm over the past years. They're a metaphor which has been played out and overused by people seeking to criticize our capitalistic and apathetic society. However, in Boneshaker, there's no metaphor beating us over the head to be heard. (Okay, well, yes, you can probably find meaning in the sap-drug that's made from the same gas that causes people to become zombies, but Priest doesn't let social commentary get in the way of the story. It's like an optional side dish; you can examine the book for hidden meaning and symbols, or you can choose to enjoy people living in a walled-off city. Your choice. Much like whether or not to eat the carton of rice with your Chinese take-out. Where was I again?) These zombies are only monsters that were created by a disaster that's half man-made/half natural and they want to eat you. All of you. Every last tasty limb. Watching your weight by eating only brains is such a waste of time when you're already dead. I digress.

My point is that Priest has made zombies fun again. I kind of want to hug her for it.

The cast of characters is typical of adventure novels, but still fun. I never had to stop and reread a previous chapter to remind myself who someone was. We never get too deep into who they are, so they remain in this in between space - more filled out than cardboard, but not quite individuals. The main narrators, Briar and Zeke, provide contrasting narratives: Briar's maturity, her world-weariness, and her mama-bear-like focus and determination to rescue her son versus Zeke's youthful exuberance, then faltering confidence in his meticulously planned escapade as it all goes to hell.  There isn't exactly anything new about them except the situation they're in. But still, fun.

The plot is also fairly familiar. Parent has to rescue child from stupid adventure, gets sucked into larger drama that invariably prompts protagonists to save the day, after which parent and child become closer and understand one another better. But this plot takes place a walled off city filled with blighted gas, shambling horrors, and a mad man living in a train station. Like I said. Really fun.


Also, mad science.

The Bad:

Briar has a secret. It's supposed to be a doozy. Unfortunately, I figured it out about halfway through the book. Maybe sooner.

Furthermore, while I enjoyed the premise of the Civil War having lasted for decades longer than it really did, I wish the author had done more with it. I understand that the author probably had her hands full with main plot of the novel, but a bit more focus on the politics, on what else is happening in the world, the factors that have kept the war going on like this, etc, would have been really, really nice filler for world-building.

For that matter, the alternative history of it in general, while enjoyable to me, is a factor that other readers may not enjoy. Suspension of disbelief allows us the understand and accept that things are different in this world, but we're expected to just accept this without ever getting a full or satisfying explanation. I was able to overlook that and enjoy the book despite this (I've been programmed to accept these things by a lifetime of reading Stephen King), but I can understand how other readers may not be get past that.

The Rest:

The writing is not the greatest in the world. My rhapsodizing about Laini Taylor a post or so back? Not gonna happen here. However, that doesn't mean that the writing is bad. As my mother said when I gave her the book, Priest's writing is innocuous; it gets out of the way of the story. And what a story it is.

While this book isn't marketed as YA, I could easily young adult readers enjoying this book, despite the lack of romance and the middle-aged heroine. Teenage girls should be reassured that they can still rock in their old(er) age, in my opinion.

Boneshaker also marks the beginning of the Clockwork Century series. While I normally gripe about book series - so long, more books to buy, what will I do with my dashed hopes if the series starts to suck - Boneshaker and its sequels have so far been immune to those issues. Despite being over 400 pages long, I read this book in less than a day, and since they're all first released in paperback I've been able to easily afford the sequels on my college student budget.

Final Thoughts:

Before it is anything else, I think that this book is fun. It's quick, it's exciting, it has equally quick, fun, and exciting sequels. It takes a bunch of pop-culture curiosities, like zombies and steampunk, and throws them in a pot, and gives us some tasty book-chili. Not everyone likes chili. Not everyone likes the same type of chili. Few people want to eat chili every day. If you like zombies, walled-off secret cities, mad science, and fierce heroines, don't mind liberties being taken with history, and just want to read something slightly mindless without being stupid or crude, give Boneshaker a ride. And even if you don't like the book, go follow Cherie Priest on twitter anyway. She posts pictures of cats.

My Rating: 4/5 Mushrooms

Book Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone

See this cover? This is a nice cover. I like this cover.

From Goodreads:

Around the world, black hand prints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grown dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages—not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.

When one of the strangers—beautiful, haunted Akiva—fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

In this particular case, it's more than appropriate that I start the review with a Goodreads description, as it was on Goodreads that almost all my friends recommended this book to me. Given the sterling recs I'd been given, when the birthday B&N gift-cards came around, it was a no-brainer to pick this one up. I'm thrilled to say I wasn't disappointed.

The Good:

The writing, as promised, was beautiful. Taylor has a way with words that makes you want to wallow in them, without succumbing to overly ornate purple prose. Writing like this makes me think of foods - maybe my mom's fruit parfaits - which are delicious and I can enjoy them everyday, guilt-free. Okay, yes, Laini Taylor writes like my mom's fruit parfaits. Let's go with that.

The world is enthralling. The more I read, the more I wanted to know. Even had I hated the story, I would probably read the rest of the series just so I could know more about how everything worked. Luckily, the story is pretty cool. The mechanics for the price of magic are maybe not the most original, but they're presented in a way that is fresh and emotionally wrenching. And Taylor's theology - the chimera versus the seraphs -is a delightful twist on familiar religious lore. It makes my theology and cosmology loving heart happy.

Sweet Ceiling Cat, the characters. I love the secondary characters. I want more of all of them. These characters are vibrant and real - at least, as real as secondary fictional characters can be. But you don't have to guess about Brimstone's disapproval or Zuzana's delightfully charming threats of violence and mischief as they are integral to the characters personalities, ascending the realm of 'quirks' to being a part of who that characters is. As for our protagonists....

Karou is perhaps my favorite YA protagonist since Katniss. She's strong and smart, but heavily flawed and we know it. She's self-centered and cruel at times, ungrateful and indecisive. These aren't "I'm so clumsy" traits to make her relatable. These are real, difficult obstacles for her to overcome in herself. But for as awful as they could be, these traits make me like her more. When she's kicking ass, she's not some untouchable Wonder Girl. When she's torn between wanting to hang out with Zuzana while Brimstone is sending her on another extraordinary errand, you can appreciate that she really is just a teenager caught between worlds with absolutely no middle ground. Her complaining and self-centeredness is made sort of forgivable by merit that, while it isn't necessarily harder than any other teenagers life, it is so other that there is no one she can talk to about it. There is no one else like her, no one to understand. At the end of the day she is always alone. Until Akiva.

 I don't know how to feel about Akiva. He feels a little like every romantic interest. I'll leave him up to the interpretation of others and withhold my own judgment until another book.

The Bad:

The writing in the second part fell apart at points. Maybe it's just me, since I haven't seen this complaint elsewhere, but after all the gorgeous, luxurious writing of the first half, certain chapters and scenes in the story of Madrigal seemed almost clinical and detached. It was, in a word, disappointing.

The Rest:

I won't put the romance under The Bad, because honestly, it's one of the best and most believable 'love at first sight' stories I've ever read. But I really wish it hadn't consumed so much of this first book. It felt like the plot had suddenly been jerked hard toward the second star on the right and straight on til morning. It was super dark and then abruptly sunshine and puppies and twu luv! It felt like the romance became its own, almost separate story, tangential to the original plot.

Okay, it wasn't that bad, but it certainly felt that way at times. Probably because I'm the enemy of all romance.

Final Thoughts:

If there isn't more of Brimstone in the next book, I'm going to riot.

The sequel, Days of Blood and Starlight, is due out November, 2012.

Rating 4.5/5 Mushrooms

Book Review: Reckless

Spooky AND pretty! I like it!

For years, Jacob Reckless has been secretly disappearing to another world, a world behind a mirror, a world for which his father abandoned his family. The mirror world is Jacob's escape from reality. It's a place for treasure hunts and magnificent quests. A world where witches haunt the forests and giants and dwarfs roam. A world locked in a deadly war.

Jacob's secret seems safe, until one day his younger brother Will follows him, with disastrous consequence. Faced with a curse that is quickly turning Will to stone, the Reckless brothers are thrust into a race against time to find a cure before Will is lost forever.

Inspired by the Brothers Grimm, master storyteller Cornelia Funke introduces a lush, enchanting world where fantasy meets reality. Reckless is a thrilling adventure, a tale of heroism and loyalty, filled with danger, mystery, and magic--with fairy tales and legends re-imagined as never before. - Goodreads

I've been eagerly awaiting the release of Reckless ever since I saw - and missed my chance to acquire - ARCs at BEA last May. Cornelia Funke is one of my favorite authors and in the first book of this new series, she hasn't disappointed me.

The Good: Funke maintains her well earned reputation for world building, blending European history with an abundance of fairytales, making this new world eerily familiar and frightening. Like the Ink series, Funke has taken a typical tool for crossing into new worlds - in this case, a mirror - and made it her own, wrapping it in its' own mystery.

One of my favorite tricks from Cornelia Funke is how she lets us into the minds of the major players, and even some of the side ones, to help reveal motivations and back stories piece by piece. I loved how she did it in the Ink World Series, and it's no less effective in Reckless. Everyone has their own voice and their own small but crucial part to play, and Funke let's us see the world through their eyes. It's confusing sometimes, but it pays off in establishing the roles and species of the characters, and the world through their eyes.

The story unveils slowly, but compellingly. While I enjoyed the first couple of chapters, I didn't realize how deeply I was hooked until I tried to put it down. It's a long book, which can get irritating if, like me, you've got a lot of other books to read. But it's a surprisingly quick read for its size, and I've been quietly longing for the next book since I finished it months ago.


The Bad: I have no idea when the sequel is coming out and I need it like Emma needs Nutella.

The Rest: Cornelia Funke's writing style tends to lean slightly towards info dumps, but 1) I kind of like info dumps if they're done well, and 2) Cornelia Funke can write good info dumps. Be warned, this is the first book in a series, so if you just want a stand alone book to wallow in before putting it down and moving on, hold off on this one.As a reader, I was drawn into the characters just enough to become invested in their futures and intrigued by their pasts and mysteries, but the book drops off just as those mysteries become even more devious and compelling.

Final Verdict: If you like fantasy and cliff hangers, this is a book for you. If you don't like cliff hangers, wait for the rest of the series to be published and then lose yourself in another fabulous Funke world.

Rating: 4.5/5 Mushrooms

School 33

Last Friday, my schools' art club paid visits to some of Baltimore's art galleries. I shared my experience at Maryland Art Place yesterday. Today, spotlight on School 33.

OMG COLOR

School 33 is a community art gallery which not only exhibits individual artists, but allows the community to become involved in the gallery as well. None of the students knew this going in, so imagine our surprise when we found out we got to contribute to the gallery.

The gallery, by local fiber artist Melissa Webb, was titled The Temporary Nature of Ideas.

"As a fiber artist, I love the process of making… of obsessively crafting an object, a costume, or an installation… then combining the fruits of these efforts to create entirely new realities through the use of performance and audience participation.  I tend to construct detail-oriented, otherworldly scenarios that can be viewed and interacted with in a casual manner, and where the performers are encouraged to react and improvise.

The work becomes fully realized through this continuous interaction between the performer, the viewer, and the surrounding environment. I am interested in removing the separation between the viewer and the work of art, as well as between the audience member and the performer.  I want to enable others to become directly involved with the work, and to give them a role in determining the ultimate outcome of each piece.  This concept is evident in The Temporary Nature of  Ideas, a series of large-scale, “living” installations that I began in 2009. Viewer / participants, using provided materials, are invited to delve into the process of making with me, and to be a part of the growth taking place over time within the space." -Melissa Webb

Walking into the gallery was initially overwhelming. There was so much to look at, so many contributions from the artist and from the public to take in and interpret. Without a chance to breathe, we were shuffled into an adjacent room, where buckets of cloth, yarn, and netting lined one wall, with hot glue guns on the other. The floor was strewn with pillows for us to sit on while we worked. We were supposed to make something, to use the cloth to express an instantaneous, fleeting idea.

Though it wasn't said, it felt like we'd been shown just a glimpse of the gallery to inform us what we were creating for, but then left to our own devices and our own ideas. It was slightly staggering and most of my art club companions were sharing looks of confusion; our college does not offer courses to deal with spontaneity. But at some point we all got swept up in creation. There were plenty of ideas, tenuous and incomplete, and by the end, all but the most uninspired of us had something to add to the gallery. 

My little contribution (pictured left) got me into a discussion with the artist herself, about ideas that come out of nowhere and the bits and pieces of our lives and experiences that somehow coalesce into something coherent. By the way, Melissa is really nice. Just FYI.

I will refrain talking about my piece in this blog, but if anyone is really curious, leave a comment and I'll explain there.

As it was, this exhibit was unusual, unexpected, and totally worth the hot glue I spilled on my jeans. I'm a little sad that I won't get my little doll pictured here back, but there's a wonderful sense of satisfaction in contributing and knowing that others can see and enjoy your creations.

The Temporary Nature of Ideas closes this week, on the 30th. There's a free closing reception Friday October 29th, 6-9pm. But please check out upcoming exhibits. The gallery is free and open to all ages.

The exhibit gets an B+. It's a little cluttered and confusing, but getting to contribute adds a lot to the experience.

The gallery gets a B-. While the mission is fabulous and the galleries interesting, the building is tight. And whereas the Maryland Art Place is impossible to find because of the surround structures, School 33 is impossible to find because the last thing you'd identify the building as would be an art gallery.

Critically Yours,

Maria D.

Maryland Art Place

Friday of last week, my colleges art club visited two Baltimore art galleries: Maryland Art Place and School 33.


Maryland Art Place is a small gallery on Market Street, hidden between Rams Head Live and Power Plant Live, two of the largest, most popular clubs in the downtown (though they're moving to a larger, more visible location in a few weeks. More on that next month). The gallery is small and at times slightly sterile, but unorthodoxly charming. Their current exhibit, Art and Film, seems at first like a very stereotypical modern art exhibit. However, by the end, it was probably my favorite of the galleries we saw. The first two rooms of the gallery are devoted to Glenda Wharton, an animator whose film, "The Zo and the Invisible Friend" was at this years Sundance Film Festival. On display were 16 original cells from the movie.

Glenda Wharton's style reminded me of a more sophisticated version of the drawings in one of my favorite children's books, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. Her illustrations provoke gut reactions; the imagery is not comfortable or especially beautiful, but it is captivating. The movie is hypnotic, keeping your eyes glued to the screen even as you're dragged through a nightmare. It's a fabulous show for fall, evocative of the decay and gloom we naturally associate with the shortening of days. The fact that Halloween is also fast approaching adds a disturbing appropriateness to the show.

The rest of the gallery is devoted to the videos of four other artists. Sadly, we had to move on to the next gallery before I got to really see them, so I don't have much to say. However, the one video I did get to see some of was LoopLoop by Canadian filmmaker, Patrick Bergeron. On a trip to Seoul, Korea, Bergeron videotaped a train ride through the city. The video loops sections of the ride over and over again, focusing on the details revealed in the video that were missed in real life. His concept statement and the video itself were maybe not art, but they were certainly interesting and thought-provoking. How much life do we miss while trying to survive?

The exhibition gets an A from me. It was interesting, thought-provoking, mostly unpretentious, and I want to go back.

The gallery itself gets a B. While I love the curator and the space is nice, it's nearly impossible to find. I'm eager to see the space they're moving to.

Tomorrow On the Blog: School 33. With photos!

Aesthetically Yours,
Maria D.

Where Is October Going???

I had PLANS for blogging this month. They were GLORIOUS plans! Things of BEAUTY and PERFECTION! They are obviously not to be.

This semester midterms are not at the middle of term, but instead are terrible things that stretch from the 4th week of school to the week before finals start. The online writing lab won't send back ANY of my assignments with edits and one of my teachers is grading us in part on whether we follow instructions of the lab editors. The on campus student writing lab is never open anymore, and the new libraries grand opening has been pushed back AGAIN I've heard, so I have no where quiet to study. This is not including my work with the BVAF, my continuing job quest, and personal work on Nevermore and other assorted projects. And I lost my good hat with all my pins and buttons from BEA. Someone kill me now, please.

I'm going to try VERY HARD to do at least SOME of what I was planning in these last two weeks of October. I was such a good idea and I was looking forward to it SO much. *sob* I DO have an editorial I was planning to submit to the school paper, but which I can also publish here. And I have some movies and books I've been meaning to review. And I wanted to tell you all about my very first RPG. But OH GOD WHERE HAS THE TIME GONE???? WHERE???????

Hopelessly Yours,
Maria D.

ETA - the library, at least, is still opening as scheduled. And I just found out that it's a Green building! Totally eco-friendly! And it has a cafe! And seats that haven't been jizzed on! Oh happy day!

Book Review: Zombies Vs Unicorns

In February of 2007, the YA world was rocked when writing rock stars Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier got into the mother of all absurd arguments. Lines were drawn, sides were taken, the YA community was ripped in half as everyone rushed to proclaim which team they were on in the epic battle to decide which was cooler: zombies or unicorns.

Since then, fans have eagerly awaited the release of the Zombies vs Unicorns Anthology, a book which would, hopefully, settle the matter once and for all. Holly(Team Unicorn) and Justine(Team Zombie) spent months collecting the creme de la creme of YA authors to their sides. And on September 21, 2010, readers will at last get to see the final battle in print.

But I've got an ARC sitting all nice and tidy and signed on my shelf. Why yes, I am pretty darn smug about it.

I struggled with this review for a bit, trying to decide how I wanted to go about it: did I want to review each story individually or the book overall? Of course, I've decided to do a little of both.


The Good:

There are no bad stories in this anthology. None. Readers are free to discern which stories to read based on interest, author, and team preferences. Of course some stories shine more than others. "Love Will Tear Us Apart" by Alaya Dawn Johnson seems to be a Team Zombie favorite, while Diana Peterfreund's "The Care and Feeding of Your Baby Killer Unicorn" - a spin-off of her Rampant series - is raking in the praise from Team Unicorn. When I said that Holly and Justine had used the creme de la creme for this anthology, I wasn't kidding. Sure, the individual stories have trip ups - Carrie Ryan's "Bougainvillea" has some pacing and organizational issues, while Meg Cabot's contribution to Team Unicorn irritated me (though I consider that a reflection of my own personal tastes since I haven't liked anything by Meg Cabot) - but the anthology starts strong and finishes the same.

The Bad:

Sadly, the only part of Zombies vs Unicorns that consistently detracted from the book was Holly and Justine's introductions of stories. In the forward, their bickering was amusing. It set the tone, and reminded readers that this was done in fun. But from the first story on, I noticed a trend: Holly would talk about the merits of the story while Justine would toot her proverbial horn in favor of Team Zombie and leave it at that. This was still funny for the first few introductions, but three stories in, it lost it's charm.

If Holly had mirrored Justine's behavior once or twice and simply said "Team Unicorn" over and over again, or better yet, if Justine had talked about the merits and pitfalls of a story beyond 'it has unicorns, it sucks' or 'it has zombies, it rules', - I think there would have been a much stronger sense of equality between the anthologists. As it was, I began entering each story wanting to hit Justine with something or hoping that Holly would on my behalf.

The Left-overs: 

Maureen Johnson, "Children of the Revolution" has MORE than made up for my disappointment with "Law of Suspect" in the Vacations from Hell anthology. Congrats.

My Rating: 4.5/5 Mushrooms

Team Unicorn Forever,
Maria D.

What Are You Reading 4/5

It's Monday! Time to implement my schedule, starting with What Are You Reading, a meme hosted by One Person's Journey and which I found out about and filched from Emma. (I am the epitome of original.)

This week I've been reading a couple of things. First, since I'm coming out of spring break, I've been reading Vacations from Hell, an anthology of horrific vacation tales, written by five young adult authors. Libba Bray, Cassandra Clare, Maureen Johnson, Claudia Gray, and Sarah Mylnowski.

So far, I've only read two of the 5 stories all the way through; Maureen Johnson's Law of Suspects and Libba Bray's Nowhere is safe.

These stories show what a mixed bag anthologies can be quality wise, and also the differences in writing that can appear when comparing an authors short stories to their longer works.

Maureen Johnson: Law of Suspects

Personally, this story left me feeling room temperature. It was an excellent premise in my opinion; trapped in the French country side, the victim of a cursed story, with no clue who the murderer will be. The idea of it excited me then and now. It's one of those stories which I think someone else could flesh out into a full novel. But I digress. Overall, I liked the idea. Execution, however....

I like Maureen Johnson's voice. Devilish is one of my favorite YA books, and I recommend The Bermudez Triangle to everyone. But it's a voice that doesn't always work in every situation. It fell a little flat in this one. Whenever I was getting involved in the suspense, something, a throwaway sentence or just the phrasing of the narrators thoughts, would rear up and drag me back out, and I'd hope she died. Maybe this wouldn't have bothered me as much if the story were longer and I had more time to get used to the main character. Also, do make outs have to be in EVERY short story? Are they really THAT necessary? Or am I just not feeling the love? Discuss.

I really liked the ending though. Overall, good bones of a story. Needs a hell of a lot of elbow grease to make it as awesome as it could and should be.*

Moving on the Libba Bray.

Libba Bray: Nowhere is Safe

This was the first story I read, even though it's at the end of the book. This story had a lot of modern day Poe and Lovecraft feeling to it. She even named the main character after Mr. Poe (a giant plus in my book). Basic premise is that four friends from high school go backpacking across Europe the summer before they start college. However, when the group moves off the beaten tourist track, they find themselves involved in the centuries-old practices of a town on the brink of destruction.


Yes, it's a plot you've probably seen a dozen times on SyFy channel, but Libba Bray pulls it off with a lot of class and genuine fear. The dynamic of the relationships between friends, watching them shift and deteriorate as the situation gets more extreme, is fascinating and powers the story nearly as much the plot. Also, I loved reading about a male protagonist, and a multi-ethnic one to boot (YA authors, more of this please). The romantic drama was appropriate; mentioned often enough to establish it, but not so often we want to hit Poe for not making his move.

The twist at the end, when we discover the villains, is a little predictable but not in a way that hurts the story. The ending itself is mostly satisfying in how it ties things up, but makes me want to hear more about Poe and his adventures.

My biggest complaint was the writing itself. It's not bad by any means, but I love Libba Bray and am used to the shining, sterling quality of The Gemma Doyle Trilogy and now Going Bovine. In Nowhere is Safe, you can tell that it was rushed, especially when paired with her longer works.

This gets to the roulette aspect of anthologies. It's hard to tell what you're getting. Even if you know and like the authors whose works are included, there's no guarantee that they'll hold up quality wise to other stories you've read by them. Some authors excel at short stories while other need 400 pages to really make it work and express themselves completely. And it's hard to know whether an author will fall into one category or another until you read both types of writing.

I just started Cassandra Clare's story. When I get around to finishing all the stories, hopefully I'll sit down and write a full review.

The other book I started reading this week is A History of Violence by John Wagner, illustrated by Vince Locke. More on this later in the week. Until tomorrow.

Planning your untimely demise,
Maria D.

*MJ, if you ever find this blog and read this post, I still love you long time. Promise.

Review: Pet Sematary

A few weeks ago, I stumbled into a Starbucks with free books. After a moment of stunned ogling - and eyeing the suspicious old man 'sleeping' by the shelves - I squealed like some sort of silly young person and rushed over to see what they had. My attention was immediately caught by a collection of Stephen King paperbacks. 'Hey, I don't own Pet Sematary yet! I want to read that and the public library is still out for my blood.' Don't ask about the library. Just. Don't.

I'd been warned about Pet Sematary. When I began my Stephen King obsession, back when I was a comparatively younger and far more mature Maria, mom let me know that it was an amazing book which was too tragic for her to finish. I decided then and there that someday, somehow, I would read this book. Flash forward 13 years, and viola! it is within my grasp (and I have a few weeks before school starts up again in which time I can read it).

By the time I got to Pet Sematary, I'd read a LOT of King. I had what I considered to be a fair idea of what I was getting into.

I should never have doubted my mothers warning.

Pet Sematary tells the story of the Creed family. Doctor Louis Creed, his wife Rachel, and their children, daughter Ellie and son Gage. When the family buys a new house as part of their relocating for Louis' new job, the never suspect that they are purchasing a path to immortality...and Hell.

What was so tragic to me about this story is that, unlike in The Shining, or really any other King novel, this is a fairly normal family. There is no marital strain. Louis is a good father and husband. Rachel has her weird thing about death, but it's nothing that puts considerable strain on the marriage. Ellie is a happy and well adjusted little girl and Gage is a happy, sweet and silly toddler. They have a pretty house. Louis has a good job. They have a sweet elderly couple as neighbors. There are no irredeemable stains on this group of people. They are good. And by the first chapter, you know that they will be destroyed.

Inevitable. It's a word I couldn't help but think of constantly as I read. Everything that happened to Louis and his family seemed so inevitable. While reading, I had the constant sensation of being in a movie theater, watching the protagonist open the door which led to a murderer or monster. There were so many other, better choices available for the characters to make. And yet, reading, you knew that in the end there were really no other choices to make but the awful ones they did.

Stephen is at his best with Pet Sematary. The writing captures everything - every emotion and every moment - with crystal clarity. And even when you want to stop, when you think you can't take anymore, he keeps you reading. With the same surety that Louis and his family sink into chaos, you'll keep reading. It spirals in towards its' inevitable conclusion, just like the graves. And as you get closer to the end, that spinning, that inevitability, will make you feel as though you're losing your mind with Louis.

The history of the sematary itself was fascinating as well. A flaw of Kings' is that he rarely gives an explanation in his novels for why something supernatural is the way it is. Don't get me wrong; conjecturing your own explanation can be great fun, and I usually enjoy it. But King can at times become a little too J.J. Abrahms. Here, however, he strikes a perfect balance. He draws on the history of his setting and the supernatural traditions of the Native Americans to create an evil that rivals any Judeo-Christian demon. The Wendigo is something which is used not nearly enough in horror. Native American stories and spiritual traditions are still sorely overlooked sources of inspiration for novels or any genre.

Final thoughts: I loved this book. It was not an easy read. It was hard and uncomfortable and so very sad. But it was wonderfully done. I'm probably going to be like my mom, who read it, loved it, and has no desire to ever read it again. I'm okay with that. But I hope to get other people to read it. It's too good a story and such excellent writing; it would be a waste to exclude it from your to-read pile.

My Rating: An easy 5 out of 5 Mushrooms



Inevitably yours,
Maria D.