Beauty and the Werewolf

I knew when I started reading Mercedes Lackey's Beauty and the Werewolf that there was a very good chance I wouldn't really like it.  A friend of mine at work read it and told me the main character is pretty annoying.  When I first started reading, I thought Isabella (or Bella for short) wouldn't be too bad. I mean, she was taking care of her stepsisters and seemed to have a good relationship with them (which is very much at odds with a fairy tale type story, especially one set in the land where the Tradition pushes your life into a tale for good or ill).  But then Bella gets bitten by a werewolf and the king sends her to live in seclusion with said werewolf for three months in case she was infected.  And that's when she starts getting really whiny and annoying!  Whenever she distracts herself in some fashion, she wasn't too bad.  But whenever she stopped to think, she'd just start feeling sorry for herself.  It was really annoying to read that sort of thing over and over again for the first half of the book.

Another issue I had was with the villain.  It was super obvious who it was pretty much from the beginning.  I kept hoping that I was wrong, that something would happen and the villain would turn out to be someone else.  But no such luck. 

I feel like I should give a bit more of the plot here, but there really isn't much to say.  The beginning is a bit Red Riding Hood, where Bella goes to visit a wise woman in the woods (conveniently named Granny), who trains her in herb lore and the like.  The werewolf attacks her on the way home.  Then, as I already mentioned, she is sent (or "kidnapped" as she keeps calling it) to the home of Duke Sebastian, the werewolf who bit her.  The house is full of invisible servants who can only speak by writing things on chalkboards.  The only other human in the house is Eric, Sebastian's half-brother (unacknowledged by their father) who works as the Gamekeeper and keeps everyone off the land so Sebastian won't accidentally kill someone should he break free.  Bella had a couple of run-ins with him before coming to the house.  So now Bella has to adjust to being away from her household and family, learning to live with Sebastian and Eric (again, for only three months if she doesn't become a werewolf herself).

I gave this book only 2 stars out of 5 on Goodreads.  I originally gave it a 3 because I like Lackey's writing style.  But this is not one of her better books.  The Tales of the Five Hundred Kingdoms overall has been kind of hit and miss, and in my opinion this was the worst of the misses.  The plot was too predictable in most regards (I think the biggest mystery for me revolved around the invisible servants, and that didn't really develop throughout the book) and I couldn't stand Bella through a good chunk of the book (as M- says in her review of the book on Goodreads: "the heroine is a spoiled manipulative child with flagrant Mary-Sue tendencies," which is unfortunately quite true).  Unless you're a super dedicated Lackey fan, you'll probably want to give this one a miss.

Hart's Hope

I first heard about Hart's Hope when I started reading Orson Scott Card's How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy (which I haven't actually finished reading!)  I was looking for help with worldbuilding at the time, so I was just reading that chapter.  Card started talking about drawing the city of Inwit (which ended up inspiring me to start drawing maps again) and later making the magic system for the book (magic comes from blood and sacrifices).  The whole thing sounded really interesting, so I ordered Hart's Hope to give it a read.

I started reading it over the July 1st long weekend.  I first tried reading another book, The Brides of Rollrock Island by Margo Lanagan, which I unfortunately lost interest in rather quickly and decided not to continue with.  So I started reading Hart's Hope instead.

When I first began reading, Hart's Hope was really promising.  Already interested in the setting, the characters of Palicroval, his friends (Sleeve the wizard, Zymas, and the Flower Princess) and Asineth (Queen Beauty) were all really interesting.  I was enjoying it (although, I must add, I don't approve of what happens in the beginning to Asineth.  That was terrible!!!!)

But then the book sort of changed.  Rather than follow all the characters I was liking so far, it started following another one, Orem.  It went through Orem's childhood and birth, and followed him for the rest of the story.  And while Orem is a really important character in the story, he was very boring.  I was less than half way through the book when I first considered putting it down.  And that feeling stayed with me for a good long while as I struggled to keep reading.

In the end, I did persevere.  And I'm glad of that.  I decided to keep reading for three reasons.  The first was that I took a quick look on Goodreads and was intrigued by some of the ratings; a few people really, really liked it, and I wanted to know why.  The second reason was that somewhere around the middle, I started to notice that the book was written in second person.  But there was no indication of who the narrator was.  So of course now I was curious and wanted to find out, all the while trying to figure it out based off the way they talked about the different characters (btw, I was wrong about who it was).  And finally, I really felt like Hart's Hope was going to pull a Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time on me.

Let me explain that last one.  When I first tried playing Prince of Persia: the Sands of Time, it was the same night I tried out Ninja Gaiden Black.  And to me, Ninja Gaiden was a much better game in many, many ways.  Years later, when I finally went back to Prince of Persia, almost the entire time I was playing it I kept thinking "I could be playing Ninja Gaiden instead."  But then the ending of Prince of Persia happened and I was completely wowed by it.  So, based off of the reviews and the second person narrative, I was expecting to be wowed in a similar manner.

Hart's Hope didn't exactly wow me like Prince of Persia did.  But the ending did pick up quite a bit and I found that I enjoyed the book overall. This is a rather dark fantasy tale, a power struggle in a really neat world.  Unfortunately the middle of the book is quite a slog to get through so this book lost a lot of points with me there.

Kindle Book: The Great Gatsby

So when I heard The Great Gatsby was going to be a movie starring Leonardo DiCaprio, I decided I had to read the book before seeing it.  I didn't read it in high school, and having seen the trailer during Christmas, I thought I had plenty of time to read the book.  Of course, time ended up disappearing on me and here I am, finishing the book about a week after the movie's been out.

As soon as I started reading The Great Gatsby, I knew it was going to be a bit of a struggle; this book is not written for me.  But I persevered, and managed to finish it.  I could tell right from the beginning of the book that it was building to something, so that helped me persevere.

The Great Gatsby is the story of one summer in New York.  Nick Carraway moves next door to Jay Gatsby, an incredibly wealthy but mysterious man who throws outrageous parties.  As the summer unfolds, Nick slowly realizes just what it is that Gatsby is after.

I gave The Great Gatsby 2/5 stars on Goodreads because like I said, this book really wasn't for me.  I had a hard time wanting to read it (I only did because it was short and so I could go see the movie, which I'm hoping I'll like better).  It was an alright story but I much would have preferred reading something else.

Library Book: The Queen in Winter

After reading To Weave a Web of Magic, I immediately started reading The Queen in Winter.  It has stories from three of the four authors of the other book (replacing Patricia McKillip with Sarah Monette) so I was ready to be wowed.  Unfortunately that really wasn't the case.  Sure, I enjoyed these stories, but overall I thought that To Weave a Web of Magic was better.

This time Lynn Kurland's story "A Whisper of Spring" opens the volume.  This is the story of how Symon won the hand of Iolaire from her father, the Elf King.  Well, that happened after he helped her escape from Lothar's clutches.  I really liked that Iolaire wasn't passive; she managed to escape from her cell by herself.  I liked some of the characters (like Symon's father, who was hilarious) but overall this story was just okay, especially after Lothar was bested (which just sort of happened in a rather anti-climatic way).

Next up was Sharon Shinn's "When Winter Comes."  I was expecting to enjoy this one, having really liked all of the other stories I've read by Shinn thus far.  "When Winter Comes" takes place in her Twelve Houses world, which is somewhere I am completely unfamiliar with.  It is the story about two sisters trekking across the land.  One was kicked out of their house mecause she had a mystic baby.  The other sister chose to go with her.  So together they are looking for a safe place to raise the baby in a world which is deadly to mystics.  The premise was alright, but I found this story sort of plodded along until it came to an end.  The story was somewhat predictable and all around just ok.  Of the three Sharon Shinn stories I've read so far, this one was definitely my least favourite.

Claire Delacroix's "The Kiss of the Snow Queen" came next.  When I first started reading it, I really didn't like it.  I think it had a lot to do with the main character sort of waffling about what to do for a loooong time.  But once her decision was made, the story suddenly got a lot better.  "The Kiss of the Snow Queen" is sort of a retelling of "The Snow Queen."  Gerta is a seer, who is bethrothed to a horrible man.  Her and her father (the king) were forced out of their land by the Cath Palug, a nasty cat thing that killed her father's best warriors.  Gerta summons a sorceror named Cai to help.  she is also hoping that if he bests the Cath Palug, she will be given to him instead of to her bethrothed.  Unfortunately the Cath Palug bests him; she watches (through her mirror) as the cat drags him away.  Meanwhile a shadowy being enters Gerta's room and talks her into journeying to the Cath Palug to save Cai.  This being calls himself Loki; he is one of the Fallen Angels.  Loki himself is at odds with the rest of the story.  He speaks in a modern way, which ends up quite funny, particularly when he speaks to Gerta, who often calls him on his speech (ie "You speak nonsence again").  The two of them make quite the pair; overall it is their interactions that made this story pretty good.

The final story is Sarah Monette's "A Gift of Wings."  The beginning of this story was hard to get through; there are a lot of weird names of people and places (and no map to help keep it all straight!)  I found out after reading it that "A Gift of Wings" takes place in her world Meduse (where her Doctrine of Labyrinths books take place).  Once you get passed all that though, "A Gift of Wings" is a super good story.  It's about Maur, a wizard who was cripled in a war (both his hands and his magic), and Agido, a soldier who loves him. The story is about them learning to trust each other again in the wake of that war.  This is compounded by the fact that Maur was also hurt by the people who were supposed to be helping him heal, and so he is cold to Agido because he is trying to protect himself from being hurt like that again.  The story also has a murder mystery thrown in, which was interesting but a bit hard to follow (once again because of the names).  Agido is blamed for the murder, so she and Maur have only a few days to prove her innocence before the watch shows up. 

So overall, The Queen in Winter was an alright read.  I think it would be better if you are more familiar with some of the worlds the authors are writing about (particularly for Shinn's and Monette's stories). 

Library Book: To Weave a Web of Magic

I decided to read To Weave a Web of Magic because of Lynn Kurland.  One of her books caught my eye at work; unfortunately the book wasn't the first in the series. So I did a bit of research on her work and found that she had written a short story related to that book both in To Weave a Web of Magic and in The Queen in Winter.  I was originally planning on reading only Lynn Kurland's and Sharon Shinn's stories (Kurland's being "The Tale of the Two Swords," and Shinn's "Fallen Angel;" I've read a short story by Shinn before and really liked it).  In the end I decided to read all four stories.  And I'm glad I did; I liked them all!

The first story is Patricia A. McKillip's "The Gorgon in the Cupboard."  I've never read anything of McKillip's before, so I really didn't know what to expect.  "The Gorgon in the Cupboard" was a quirky story about a painter looking for his muse and finding her in Medusa, who starts talking to him out of one of his paintings.  Along with inspiring him and his painting, Medusa pushes him to see beyond his painting to the women who model for him and his friends as the people they really are. 

Next came Lynn Kurland's "The Tale of the Two Swords."  This story had a framing narrative; an eight year old boy wants an adventure, but agrees to having his father tell a story instead.  And so his father tells him and his two siblings the tale of how the king and queen of the land met.  The girl, Mehar, ran away from her father and an unwanted arranged marriage.  Gil (short for Gilraehen) is the crown prince of the land.  He saw his father killed and was himself wounded, having to flee the battle against his uncle.  The two meet at the king's hidden castle; Mehar was going there for help, Gil was hiding while his people regrouped.  The two start to fall in love, even though their love cannot be; Mehar is below Gil's station and Gil is betrothed.

The third story was Sharon Shinn's "Fallen Angel."  I've read one of her stories before and enjoyed it, so I was looking forward to "Fallen Angel."  And it didn't disappoint.  This is the story of Eden, a Manadavvi woman who falls in love with a forbidden angel named Jesse.  As a Manadavvi woman, Eden is a society girl, waiting for her father to choose her husband for her.  And Jesse is a free-spirit and a troublemaker, exactly the kind of person she should not fall in love with because she knows they can never be together.  But Jesse shows her how shallow her life is, how boring, and makes her want to be free, like him. 

The final story was "An Elegy For Melusine" by Claire Delacroix.  Delacroix is another author I am unfamiliar with. Her story is about Melusine, a half-mortal Fey who strikes a bargain with a mortal man named Raymond.  She wants to be free of her mother's curse, and so needs a mortal man's love so she can live forever in the fey world.  Of course, Melusine did not bargain on love.  And it is that love that is her undoing.

All four stories in To Weave a Web of Magic were excellent.  I enjoyed reading everything, and now I'm really looking forward to The Queen in Winter, which features stories by three of these four authors.

Faeries of Dreamdark: Blackbringer

I bought Faeries of Dreamdark: Blackbringer in the bargain section of Chapters a few years ago.  I don't honestly remember when, but I'm sure the premise intrigued me.  But not enough to read it right away. And so it's sat in my closet until just recently, when I am trying to actually read some of these books that I bought on a whim.  Most of them I'll probably read once then send on their way for someone else to enjoy.  I fully expected to do that with Blackbringer.

And then I started reading it.

I think I read pretty much all of it last night.  I started it earlier in the day.  Then last night I was going to go play Terraria, but decided at the last minute to continue reading this instead.  And I was blown away by how good it is.

Blackbringer is the story of Magpie Windwitch and her clan of crows.  They travel the world hunting the demons who are being released by the stupid humans ("mannies") who find their prisons (One demon granted some mannies three wishes, so now everyone is clamouring to get some wishes of their own; unfortunately most of the demons aren't as benevolent as that one happened to be).  Then Magpie finds a boat where a prison has been opened but there is no other evidence of the demon, not even the dead mannies who are usually left in a demon's wake; all that is left are their shoes.  And so Magpie must track the most deadly demon of all right into the faerie home of Dreamdark.

Blackbringer was written for a younger audience, so it's an easy read.  Easy, but so very good. It's got faeries fighting demons, magic, adventure, everything!  I actually fell in love with the book (i gave it a 5 on Goodreads and even marked it as a favourite) and bought the second one in the series from Amazon as soon as I finished reading.  I can't wait to read more from Dreamdark!

Library Book: Fallen Angel Volume 1

I stumbled on the Fallen Angel series when I was researching Supergirl a few months ago. Fallen Angel was written by Peter David, the same guy who wrote the Supergirl series featuring Linda Danvers as Supergirl, a series I really enjoyed. I was excited to find Volume 1 at the library, giving me a chance to check the series out.

I don't really want to say much about it though. Volume 1 is very much an introduction, leaving more questions than answers. The story focuses on Lee, aka the Fallen Angel. She has weird mind powers and is both ridiculously strong and resilient. She has moved into the corrupt city of Bete Noire as a force of justice and someone the desperate can turn to. Unfortunately her presence is also disrupting the city's balance of power.

I enjoyed reading rt his volume, but like I said I now have more questions than answers. The library doesn't have the second volume, so I'll have to look into getting it myself sometime.