Dark Banquet: Blood and the Curious Lives of Blood-Feeding Creatures by Bill Schutt
One of the points Bill Schutt makes in his book Dark Banquet: Blood and the Curious Lives of Blood-Feeding Creatures is that there is much we don’t know about sanguivores, or creatures that feed on blood. They are small and rare, shrouded in misconceptions, but also remarkable in the beauty of their evolutions. Schutt, a bat biologist, proves to be an ideal guide in demystifying lives of sanguivores and explaining their impact on our lives.
Beginning with vampire bats, Schutt explores the world of sanguivores, which also includes leeches, ticks, chiggers, bed bugs, and candiru. Among the many things I learned from reading Dark Banquet are that there are three species of vampire bats, the leech Hirudo medicinalis actually received FDA approval as a medical device (not to mention probably much more than I ever wanted to know about the historical uses of leeches), and there is a species of candiru known as Vendellia wieneri. More seriously, these sanguivores evolved for a reason. In describing how they feed, reproduce, and interact with their ecosystem, Schutt also explains why they are so important. Many people think the various sanguivores are scary and/or dangerous, but Schutt elucidates why this should not be the case.
Schutt does assume some degree of scientific literacy among readers. Not as much as I thought, say, Carl Zimmer’s Microcosm requires, but definitely more than something like Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything. (Which is not a knock on Bryson, since I enjoyed his book.) While passionate about his subject, Schutt does not take himself too seriously, writing with ease and humor. (Schutt also uses parenthetical asides even more often than I do, she adds parenthetically.) The illustrations by Patricia Wynne illuminate Schutt’s text as well as often providing additional humor.
Dark Banquet has a mostly a North American and European focus, but then, the narrative begins with a discussion of vampire bats, which are only found in Mexico, Central America, South America, and two Caribbean islands. Still, I can’t help but wish there was more information about medicine and beliefs about blood in other parts of the world, particularly in Part Two, which takes a closer look at blood itself.
Overall, though, this is a sometimes disgusting (okay, so this is a personal judgment coming from someone who admittedly doesn’t like the sight of blood, but how else to describe some parts, like p. 163?), always fascinating glimpse at a few species who don’t receive the appreciation Schutt demonstrates they deserve.
If any of this sounds interesting, in addition to reading Dark Banquet, I highly recommend visiting Schutt’s website. There you’ll find basic information about and color pictures of the creatures described in the book, as well as extras, including a section on blood recipes. Bon appétit.
Book source: public library.
Cross-posted at Guys Lit Wire.
It had been Ellie and Corrie’s idea, going bush for a few days over the Christmas holidays. They gathered some friends and supplies, went camping, and returned to find their homes deserted, their families missing. A fax Ellie finds at Corrie’s house seems to confirm the group’s worst fear: Australia has been invaded by a foreign army. The country is at war.
The fax from Corrie’s dad tells them to go bush again, and, living in the country, Ellie and some others in the group do have the skills they need to survive. After a few harrowing trips into town to do some reconnaissance and check on their homes, they head back out to the place they had been camping when everything went down. But soon they feel the need to do more than just survive. They want to fight the invaders.
John Marsden’s Tomorrow, When the War Began, the first novel in the Tomorrow series, is absolutely riveting. It’s told by Ellie, elected by the group to write down what has happened as a way of “telling ourselves that we mean something, that we matter. That the things we’ve done have made a difference. I don’t know how big a difference, but a difference. Writing it down means we might be remembered.” (p. 2)
Ellie tells us from the beginning that she is recounting events in chronological order and we know from the back cover that the country had been invaded during the original camping trip, so I did not feel impatient as I read this first part of the book, waiting for the action to begin. And there is a lot of action. Marsden writes in a style that is immediate and accessible, making Tomorrow, When the War Began a fast-paced read, exciting and full of tension. Chilling, too, in how realistic and plausible everything seems, how people are forced to change, and with a lingering sense of fear as the group can only hope that all their families are still alive, held with the rest of the town in the Showground. That their actions will make a difference. That they will all survive.
Cross-posted at Guys Lit Wire. A film version of Tomorrow, When the War Began is currently in production.
It’s another weird display from Gayle, your artistically challenged YA Librarian. I have to say making this display was quite fun. I haven’t utilized crayons in ages. Now that I’ve discovered glittery crayons my displays may all look like some random kid’s sidewalk chalk drawings. But then again, I think kids have more color sense than I do. And they probably could utilize a banner creating program like PrintShop (old school software) better than me.
So what are the books on display you’re probably wondering. The short list is at the bottom of this post, there’s many many more that could fit this theme. Feel free to add to my list in the comments section as all you wonderful, resourceful people always do.
If you’re as old as me you probably remember the REM song “It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine).” When reading some of the books on this list, I can’t help but think of this song.
I like a good “what if…” scenario book as much as the next person. Watching cable programming about 2012 draws me back to the genre. I know it’s supposed to be make believe and entertaining, but I can’t help but check my cupboards for emergency supplies whenever I read one of these books.
Fever, 1793 by Laurie Halse Anderson
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Atherton series by Patrick Carman
Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
City of Ember by Jeanne Du Prau
Alphabet of Dreams by Susan Fletcher
Gone and Hunger by Michael Grant
Epic and Saga by Connor Kostick
The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness
Encyclopedia of the End: Mysterious Death in Fact, Fancy, Folklore and More by Deborah Noyes
Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Prachett
Life as we Knew It and The Dead and Gone by Susan Beth Pfeffer
Nation by Terry Prachett
How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff
Unwind by Neil Shusterman
Uglies by Scott Westerfeld
In spite of its abrupt ending, I enjoyed Reality Check, Peter Abrahams’ new YA mystery. While the voice occasionally struck me as being more like that of a middle grade novel than YA (and this is definitely a YA novel), it’s very easy to read, with a likable protagonist. I’ll be recommending it to teens, and not just those looking for a mystery.
High school classes are just a means to an end for Cody. He needs to pass his classes to play football, and said classes aren’t worth the effort of trying to get good grades when he finds it hard to comprehend much of what is being taught. Staying eligible is all that matters, especially now that sophomore year is over. Junior year, after all, is when Cody can really catch the attention of college football coaches.
Cody’s girlfriend, on the other hand?
“I got a B in calc,” Clea said.
“Wow,” said Cody. There were two kids taking calc in the whole school, Clea—a sophomore like Cody—and some brain in the senior class. No one thought of Clea as a brain. She was just good at everything: striker on the varsity soccer team, class president, assistant editor of the lit mag; and the most beautiful girl in the school—in the whole state, in Cody’s opinion.
But a real person, as he well knew, capable of annoyance, for example. When Clea got annoyed, her right eyebrow did this little fluttering thing, like now. “Wow?” she said.
“Yeah,” he said. He himself wouldn’t ever get as far as calc, not close. “Pretty awesome.”
She shook her head. “I’ve never had a B.”
For a second or two, Cody didn’t quite get her meaning; he’d scored very few Bs himself. Then it hit him. “All As, every time?”
She nodded. (p. 5)
After a cheap shot injures Cody’s knee and ends his football season, Cody drops out of school and starts working full-time. One morning, the local newspaper’s headline catches his attention: “Local Girl Missing.”
Clea’s rich father has sent her to a boarding school in Vermont, and though Cody broke up with Clea, he is still worried. The next morning, Cody receives a letter in the mail. Clea sent it before she disappeared, and there’s something about the letter that bothers Cody. Is he reading too much into the letter, or is it really a clue? Determined to find Clea, Cody decides to go to Vermont himself in order to find her.
The mystery element of Reality Check does take a while to develop, but in the meantime, Abrahams fleshes out Cody, making him sympathetic and giving readers a great deal of insight into his character. I particularly liked how Cody doesn’t think of himself as a smart guy. Unlike many of the sleuths in children’s and YA mysteries, who are obviously bright and/or overachievers, Cody is an average guy—below average, academically—who gets involved in the investigation because of how much he cares for Clea. And where Cody’s poor grades and decision to drop out are concerned, the tone of the narrator is pretty matter-of-fact; they’re not presented as negatives or something to be ashamed of, just as part of who Cody is. (Okay, and the story wouldn’t work if Cody was in school, because then he couldn’t go to Vermont in the middle of a semester.) Once the mystery surrounding Clea’s disappearance emerges, it is suitably suspenseful and the motivations of the main players’ plausible. While I don’t think this is a great book, I did like it and would also like to see more YA books similar to it.
Among the reviews: The Compulsive Reader, Oops…Wrong Cookie, Reading Rants!, The Undercover Book Lover.
Book source: library.
Today’s One Shot World Tour travels to Southeast Asia. For a complete roundup, visit Chasing Ray.
Here are four mostly English-language books from the Philippines. The first book, and the only novel, is the weakest, so I probably shouldn’t start off with it, but I’m going in the order in which I read the books.
Tonyo’s family is poor. His mother becomes an OCW—an overseas contract worker—in Hong Kong with the hopes of earning more money for her family than she could have earned in the Philippines. And while she is able to send home money and gifts for the family, Tonyo is forced to drop out of school to take care of the chores his mother had previously been responsible for, and his father turns into a drunkard, beating Tonyo and making life miserable for Tonyo and his younger siblings. Tonyo decides that his only course of action is to find his mother in Hong Kong and bring her back home.
Carla M. Pacis’ writing in OCW: A Young Man’s Search for His Mother is smooth and easy to read, the story fast-paced with short chapters. Which makes its idealism and the depiction of most of the secondary characters that much more glaring and disappointing. On Tonyo’s first day alone in Manila, he’s robbed by three street kids, who then allow him to tag along with them and basically become part of the gang as they rob people and sell drugs. But despite all the robbing, heroic Tonyo manages to avoid the temptations the other boys fall prey to and his only desire is to find his mother. From this point on, practically every person he meets is goodhearted and helps him out on his quest. And don’t get me started on the ending.
The publisher says OCW is for intermediate grades to high school, but I think it’s most suitable for upper elementary readers, in the US, in terms of reading level, and there’s nothing inappropriate for that age level. Despite my criticisms, OCW is still noteworthy in that it tackles a subject rarely discussed in America, albeit in what is probably an unrealistic manner. A much better offering from Pacis can be found in Bagets: An Anthology of Filipino Young Adult Fiction.
Full disclosure: I have never been a fan of short stories. But I enjoyed many of the stories in these last three books, and actually finished all the English-language stories, something I don’t think can be said about any of the American anthologies I’ve picked up. Part of it probably comes down to length—the longest story in any of these anthologies was still under 20 pages, and many of the stories were around 10 pages or shorter. But there was also something pleasingly straightforward about the stories, a focus on story and a lack of pretension that I liked.
Bagets, which Pacis co-edited with Eugene Y. Evasco, is a collection of 16 stories, eight written in Filipino and eight in English. Pacis also wrote an introduction to the second half of the collection, the English-language section, called “From Behind the Bookshelf: Literature for Young Adults in the Philippines.” In it, she writes, “The genre of literature for young adults (YA) is still in its infant stages in the Philippines—even younger than its sibling, children’s literature—and not yet fully understood or integrated into the academic and literary circles.” (p. 87) In addition, “No subject is taboo or inappropriate in young adult literature. In the US and UK today, the line between YA and adult literature is almost invisible in terms of the themes and subject matter that authors choose. This is not the same with Filipino YA literature that can be characterized as being conservative.” (p. 89)
Pacis’ contribution, “There Was This Really Fat Girl…,” is one of several stories about prom night. Ana is overweight and has her eye on a prom dress that won’t look good on her unless she loses weight. It’s a brief story, but contains more toughness and harsh truths than did OCW.
The other two stories that deal with a prom are, respectively, the one I consider to the the strongest in the collection and the one that is my favorite. “Cinderella and the Night of the Prom” by Rachelle Tesoro I liked the most because of its bursts of sarcastic humor and several unexpected twists as Darlene relates the details of her prom night with the date a friend arranged for her. The standout, “Sweet and Tender Hooligans,” by Mae Astrid Tobias, is the only story written from a male perspective, and it’s also about the oldest protagonist, a college student named Martin who falls in love with a childhood playmate. Ann Louise is one year younger than Martin. Her strict mother does not want her to date, but Ann Louise has a boyfriend at school.
I don’t know how Ann Louise managed to convince me to play along, but I did. Together we arranged conspiracies to hide her relationship with Baseball Guy from her mother. Every time they arranged to go out, I would be her cover. (p. 147)
Even on prom night.
Other than the final story, “Girl Meets Girl” by Agay C. Llanera, in which Anya wonders if she is falling in love with another girl, there was a rather disappointing lack of diversity in Bagets. All the stories are contemporary realistic fiction and felt similar in authorial style and voice, as well as in terms of the characters and conflicts. I think part of the reason “Sweet and Tender Hooligans” stands out is because it’s written in a different style than the other seven stories. The pace more measured, the narration more deliberate and careful, and the span of time it covers is longer. As for the characters and conflicts, the female narrators seemed largely interchangeable, all from seemingly well-off families. (They all actually reminded me of Vicenza from Melissa de la Cruz’s Fresh Off the Boat.) Which is, perhaps, a bit harsh, because the stories were well-written overall. Perhaps the key is to not read all the English language stories in one sitting, like I did.
Neither Nine Supernatural Stories, edited by April Timbol Yap and Lara Saguisag, nor Afraid: The Best Phillipine Ghost Stories, edited by Danton Remoto, were put together for teens, but both can easily be read by teens interested in the supernatural. Nine Supernatural Stories and Afraid include the most diversity in style and setting. While Afraid is comprised entirely of ghost stories, the stories in Nine Supernatural Stories (only seven of which are in English) are not necessarily scary or suspenseful. This said, Afraid is a weaker collection than Nine Supernatural Stories because, even though the stories are all set in the Philippines, many will seem familiar, or at least predictable, to anyone who has read their fair share of ghost stories.
The best story in Nine Supernatural Stories is the first one, “Beggar of Description” by Adel Gabot. This is a slowly building story with fantastic writing, like
He wore tattered, blackened clothes that were more hole than fabric, held together by grime. Old and thin, the man had long, wet oily hair plastered to his head like a greasy shawl. He was veined with light brown lines where the rain had eroded the dirt on his skin. I suppose I should be thankful that the downpour had washed him off a little. He clung to the bars at the back of the jeepney, leaving grease marks on them. (p. 8 )
The other story I found noteworthy was Emil M. Flores’ “Ghosts of Infinity.” If there is no mystery series featuring Arturo Ganigan, NBI, there really should be. I would read it, at any rate, because of how much I enjoyed the rather hard-boiled writing style and the entertainment factor of this story (at least, until the ending, which got a little crazy).
I borrowed all four books from the library, so I don’t know how readily available they are in the US. But if you can get your hand on them, give them a try, even if you don’t usually like short stories. You may be surprised.
Now that Liar by Justine Larbalestier has a brand new cover (which is still not perfect, but nevertheless an improvement over the previous one), let’s talk about the story itself. Because it’s trippy, twisty, clever, and one of the most unforgettable books I’ve read so far this year.
Micah is a liar. Her father is a liar. Her entire family are liars. So is it any wonder that she is a liar, too? She’s gotten into trouble before because of her lies and earned a reputation as a liar, but that hasn’t stopped her from continuing to lie. When her classmate (and secret boyfriend?), Zach, is killed and Micah’s lies start to unravel, she swears that she will stop lying. She will tell us the truth.
Or is that a lie, too?
Micah narrates her story in short bursts that flash from past to present and back to the past again. Despite not being told in a linear, straightforward fashion, Larbalestier has crafted (and I really think this is the best word to describe what she’s done) a novel that’s still relatively comprehensible from page one. Except where the lies are concerned. The lies that Micah tells, and has told, the ones that she admits to, are described so realistically and plausibly that it’s impossible to figure out what she otherwise lied about, and so it’s up to the reader to decide for themselves what really happened.*
The story is divided into three parts, and when the latter stages of Part 1 dragged, I did wonder where the story was going and about the rave reviews I’d read. Then came Part 2, and, in a word: wow! The experience of reading a novel with a narrator who is known to be a liar is different, I think, from reading a novel in which the narrator is revealed to be unreliable. When you know from the beginning that the narrator lies, and that the lies are not white lies of the no-really-your-hair/dress/[fill-in-the-blank]-is-nice variety but outrageous ones, you read that much more closely, trying to parse truths from untruths. And yet, at the start of Part 2, Larbalestier shocked the hell out of me with what she did, and she made it totally work. It turned Liar from a somewhat intriguing book to utterly unputdownable.
It’s the cleverness of the plot and structure that makes Liar so attractive to me. It’s dark and, once Part 2 started, I was enthralled by the story. I’m still trying to decide what I believe to be the truth about Micah, but this only makes the book more memorable to me and actually makes me like and appreciate it even more.
Liar will be published on September 29. This review is based on an ARC sent by the publisher.
* On her website, Larbalestier writes, “I deliberately wrote the book to be read in at least two different ways. You may think you know what kind of book it is and what kind of person Micah is, but you’ll find other readers will disagree with you completely. There is no one right way to read this book.”
If you leave a comment, please do not include spoilers! I will delete all comments with spoilers. Thank you.
In response to the Liar cover controversy, I’ve seen several reactions along the lines of “I’ll buy the Australian version instead of Bloomsbury’s.” And this got me thinking.
According to Bloomsbury, Liar has an initial print run of 100,000. Assuming 1) Bloomsbury can’t/won’t change the print run; and 2) a significant number of people do, in fact, decide not to buy the Bloomsbury edition, what will this mean for Justine Larbalestier? If Liar does not sell through (or sell enough), will this have an effect on her future novels? 100,000 is a big print run, and booksellers base their orders on how well an author’s previous books sold. So if a significant amount of stock is returned, will this mean a bookstore won’t carry (as many copies of) Larbalestier’s future novels? Call me cynical, but I’d find it hard to believe that bookstores will take a customer boycott into consideration when looking at their sales numbers. Anyone who knows more about this subject want to chime in?
Now, on to the continuation of Monday’s book cover post. In the new in 2009/Asian-American category, here’s Sharon Shinn’s Gateway, coming in October.
ETA: J.A. Yang’s Exclusively Chloe is also about a Chinese adoptee, which must be this year’s trend.
Micol Ostow’s Fashionista, part of the Bradford Prep series, will be published on August 25.
There are also at least two more 2009/Asian in other countries books. The cover for Julia Donaldson’s Running on the Cracks is completely underwhelming, but I’d like to read it anyway.
I’m not sure whether to include graphic novels or not, but here are two from 2008/(part) Asian in other countries.
If you need a break from all the serious cover talk, you can make your own debut YA cover (instructions at 100 Scope Notes). Here’s mine:
Original image here.
About the Books
Gateway by Sharon Shinn (Penguin/Viking): While passing through the Arch in St. Louis, Missouri, a Chinese American teenager is transported to a parallel world where she is given a dangerous assignment.
Exclusively Chloe by J.A. Yang (Penguin/Speak): In the public eye since she was adopted as a baby from China by her Hollywood celebrity parents, sixteen-year-old Chloe-Grace, longing for a “normal” life,” undergoes a transformation with the help of her mother’s stylist and finds not only the life she wanted but an important key to her past.
Fashionista by Micol Ostow (S&S/Simon Pulse): [no LC summary yet]
Running on the Cracks by Julia Donaldson (Henry Holt): After her parents are killed in an accident, English teenager Leonora Watts-Chan runs away to Glasgow, Scotland, to find her Chinese grandparents.
Ten Things I Hate About Me by Randa Abdel-Fattah (Scholastic/Orchard): Lebanese-Australian Jamilah, known in school as Jamie, hides her heritage from her classmates and tries to pass by dyeing her hair blonde and wearing blue-tinted contact lenses, until her conflicted feelings become too much for her to bear.
Skim by Mariko Tamaki, illustrated by Jillian Tamaki (Groundwood): Wiccan goth teen Kimberly Keiko Cameron sinks into a growing depression after her classmate’s ex-boyfriend kills himself, sparking a school revolution that forces all the students to redefine themselves.
Emiko Superstar by Mariko Tamaki, illustrated by Steve Rolston (DC/Minx): Emiko is a teenager on a quest to find herself who goes from suburban babysitter to eclectic urban performance artist.
My first reaction to the Liar cover controversy: That’s shameful. An eye-catching cover, to be sure, but to use the picture of a white girl who blatantly does not match the narrator’s description at all? So. Wrong. Even more so now that I’ve had a chance to read the book.
My second reaction to the Liar cover controversy: Well, hell, it’s not as if it’s unusual for Asian-American characters to have their race obscured on book covers. Granted, not whitewashed like this, but hidden nevertheless. This might sound really callous and I sincerely don’t mean to diminish the importance of the original discussion or of Bloomsbury’s deplorable actions, but there you go.
(OT: Although it’s not Asian-American, you may also want to take a look at what Candlewick did to the cover of Sorceress by Celia Rees.)
Anyway, in response to this post about the representation of African-Americans on recent book covers, Tanita Davis wondered about covers with Asian or Hispanic-looking characters. Here’s what I’ve got for the Asian-American part of the question.
2009
For the purposes of comparison, L. “looked at about 775 children’s and YA book covers for books that have been released or will be released this year. 80% of them had people on them. A full 25% of all book covers had white girls pictured on them, and 10% had white boys. Only 2% of the titles I looked at had African American boys or girls pictured on the covers – a sad state of affairs.”
I’m taking a different tack here than L. for the first part of this survey. I DID NOT LOOK AT A SAMPLE OF 2009 BOOK COVERS. I haven’t culled book covers with Asian faces, but am showing the covers of books with Asian-American protagonists instead. If anyone wants to do what L. did for Asian and/or Asian-American characters, I would love to see your results. For now, here are the five books with Asian-American (ergo, does not include high fantasy or Asians in Asia in other countries) protagonists:
Oh, look. The only cover with an entire face on it is an illustrated cover. And you know what really sucks? The only three 2009 photographic covers I can think of with an Asian model are two fantasy novels and book 3 of the Poseur series, and the latter kind of pisses me off because do you see an Asian face on the cover of the first two (published in 2008) novels?
It’s not like Melissa Moon is a new character, just introduced in this installment. She’s been there from the beginning, and it kind of feels like they didn’t want to put her on the front cover earlier, but now that the series must be selling enough for them to publish book 3, it’s okay to finally show an Asian. I mean, the cover copy of book 1 mentions four girls, yet who’s the one missing from the cover? (Click on cover at right to see full-scale image.) The Asian girl.
The fantasy covers, for the record:
This does NOT excuse their actions concerning Liar, but I feel compelled to point out that Book of a Thousand Days is also from Bloomsbury.
And I give a pass to Penguin’s My Most Excellent Year paperback, since T.C. and Alé’s faces are also obscured.
I hesitate to conflate the three categories (Asian, Asian-American, and fantasy) because I don’t keep track of the non-Asian-American books. However, since I mentioned the two fantasies above, there is one other book I can think of with a photographic cover. Frankly, though, the first thing I notice whenever I see the Secret Keeper cover are the girl’s eyelashes. And if we’re including fantasies, there’s the new Moribito cover.
2008
As I could only identify five novels first published this year with Asian-American protagonists, I went back and included novels from 2008 in this survey.
2008 was a better year in terms of cover representation. Well, it was a better year in terms of sheer quantity of YA books with an Asian-American protagonist to begin with. By my count, there were thirteen novels if we’re using the criteria from my Asian-American protagonists in YA fiction booklist page: “This list includes recent immigrants, hapa characters, graphic novels, books by non-Asian American authors, and books with multiple narrators. YA fiction only; no children’s books, no biographies, no YA books in which an Asian-American teen is an important part of the book but not the main character/narrator (except, as noted, when a book has mulitple narrators, and one of them is Asian-American).” If we include Poseur and The Good, The Fab, and The Ugly, that’s fifteen books.
As for the covers… Well, you can’t tell if the girl on the She’s So Money cover is Asian, and, seriously, what does a guy have to do to get a complete face on the cover of a book? But I think, overall, better than 2009 in terms of the number of covers with recognizably Asian faces.
Again, I don’t keep track of these two categories, so besides Climbing the Stairs (which has an Asian-looking design, but not a recognizably Asian cover model) and Moribito: Guardian of the Spirit, I can’t think of other Asians in Asia in other countries or fantasy novels that may have an Asian cover model.
This said, I like the cover of the Climbing the Stairs paperback currently shown in the Penguin Spring 2010 catalog.
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I’ve never done a book challenge before, but I’m going to do this one. If you’re looking for books, try this list (sadly, I’ve only read 10 of the 47 books listed. Or can I say 10.5 since I did start A Step from Heaven?).
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Taking a cue from L., here’s what the books shown are about:
If you keep your expectations in check, My Soul to Take, the first novel in Rachel Vincent’s Soul Screamers series and the new Harlequin Teen imprint, is a fun, enjoyable paranormal mystery.
After sneaking into a club with her best friend, Kaylee Cavanaugh’s attention is diverted by a young woman. She’s pretty, yes, but there’s something about her that leaves Kaylee full of dread and with a terrifying urge to scream. Kaylee is “absolutely certain that something was not right with that girl.” But, apart from perhaps imbibing a few too many drinks, nothing appears to be wrong with the girl. Fortunately for Kaylee, the need to scream abates without any sound escaping her, and, maybe best of all, without scaring off Nash Hudson, one of the hottest guys in school, whom she ran into at the club.
The next morning, however, Kaylee learns that the girl she saw died later that night. And a few days later, the same thing happens again. Kaylee has no idea what’s wrong with her, but Nash seems to know more than he should. Nash may be able to provide some of the answers Kaylee is looking for, but not all of them. Such as, why are seemingly healthy girls suddenly dying from unknown causes throughout the city?
As a protagonist, Kaylee is, well, similar to a lot of the main characters in YA urban/paranormal fantasies. Really, there isn’t much that distinguishes her from them. (You know, apart from the, er, thing that sometimes makes her want to scream.) Likewise, most of the secondary characters are not fleshed out, but come across as stock characters. And it sometimes seems as if Vincent decided to kill two birds with one stone with Nash’s character by having him fulfill two roles, Provider of Explanatory Dialogue and The Love Interest. The romance between Kaylee and Nash is perfunctory, and I actually think the story could have worked just as well without it — meaning not without Nash, but without the Kaylee-Nash romance — but I’m hoping that this, as well as the development of some of the other secondary characters, will improve in the next two books.
What elevates My Soul to Take are the novelty of its mythology and the suspense angle. While the setting is pretty generic, I very much enjoyed Vincent’s re-imagining of folklore. I found this aspect of the worldbuilding clever and well done. Vincent also builds tension into the story efficiently and organically, and the mystery is actually suspenseful, leaving readers guessing. It’s not filler or merely an excuse for Kaylee and Nash to spend time together. But with this said, I’m still not invested in their romantic relationship thus far.
My Soul to Take will be published on July 28. The second book in the series, My Soul to Save, is scheduled for January 2010, and book three, My Soul to Keep, for June 2010. A free prequel is available at the Harlequin Teen site and the eHarlequin store.
** quoted from ARC; ARC received from the publisher **
HarperCollins recently added their Winter 2010 books to their catalog site, so we have a a WoW extravaganza today.
Tangled by Carolyn Mackler (HarperTeen, 12/09)
Jena, Dakota, Skye, and Owen are all at Paradise—the resort in the Caribbean, that is—for different reasons, but in Paradise their lives become tangled together in ways none of them can predict. Over the course of four months, through four voices and four stories, what happened in Paradise will change them all.
In this extraordinary novel, the Printz Honor–winning author brings us her most accomplished work yet. Tangled is a story of the secrets we keep, the risks we take, and the things we do for love.
Because it’s Carolyn Mackler (moving from Candlewick!) and I like the cover. That blurb by Daniel Handler doesn’t hurt, either, and this is coming from someone who only made it through the first book in The Series of Unfortunate Events.
The Body Finder by Kimberly Derting (HarperTeen, 3/10)
Violet Ambrose can find dead bodies. Or at least she can sense those that have been murdered. She locates them by the echoes they leave behind…and the imprints they leave on their killers. As if that weren’t enough to deal with during her junior year, she also has a sudden, inexplicable, and consuming crush on her best friend since childhood, Jay Heaton.
And now a serial killer has begun terrorizing Violet’s small town…and she realizes she might be the only person who can stop him.
Filled with suspense, a gripping romance, and deadly consequences, The Body Finder is an impressive debut novel that’s impossible to put down.
Let’s see, psychic powers + trying to stop a serial killer + romance = must read!
must read! + what?! this got postponed until next year? = is it March yet?
A Conspiracy of Kings by Megan Whalen Turner (Greenwillow, 3/10)
Charlotte blogged about this last month, but it’s worth mentioning again because 1) it’s a new Eugenides book!, and 2) the HC site has a different description.
Sophos, heir to Sounis, doesn’t look like much of a prince. At least, according to those in power. At least, to those who do not know him or the size of his heart and the depth of his courage, loyalty, and love. But Helen, Queen of Eddis, knows him, and so does Gen, the queen’s Thief, who is now King of Attolia. Gen and the queen believe that Sophos is dead. But they also believe in hope, especially since a body was never found. So when Sophos is discovered in Attolia, climbing a lamppost, peashooter in hand, the obvious question becomes: where has Sophos been all this time?
Forget-Her-Nots by Amy Brecount White (Greenwillow, 3/10)
just sounds so quietly charming. Also, flowers.
Delicious and magical, here is a debut novel about a new (and slightly misunderstood) girl at an exclusive boarding school. Laurel has always loved flowers, but when a class project calls for research into the Victorian language of flowers, she makes a potent discovery. Her affinity for blooming things is actually age-old magic, passed from one generation to the next-a bittersweet gift from her beloved mother, who’s recently died-and it gives Laurel the power to make people fall in and out of love. Laurel’s introduction to the secret society of flowerspeakers is rife with complications and mishaps-especially when her classmates convince her to use her magic at the prom. This evocative coming-of-age story lingers in the air much like the fragrant blooms that determine Laurel’s fate so mysteriously.
A Golden Web by Barbara Quick (HarperTeen, 4/10)
Alessandra is desperate to escape—from her stepmother, who’s locked her away for a year; from the cloister that awaits her if she refuses the marriage plans that have been made for her; from the expectations that limit her and every other girl in fourteenth-century Italy. There’s no tolerance in her village for her keen intelligence and her unconventional ideas.
In defiant pursuit of her dreams, Alessandra undertakes an audacious quest, her bravery equaled only by the dangers she faces. Disguised and alone in a city of spies and scholars, Alessandra will find a love she could not foresee—and an enduring fame.
In this exquisite imagining of the centuries-old story of Alessandra Giliani, the world’s first female anatomist, distinguished novelist Barbara Quick gives readers the drama, romance, and rich historical detail for which she is known as she shines a light on an unforgotten—and unforgettable—heroine.
And from the adult side, woohoo! The Devil’s Star by Jo Nesbø (Harper, 3/10).
Waiting on Wednesday was created by Jill at Breaking the Spine.
