Give Me a Sign

I saw Anna Sortino's Give Me a Sign at work the other day and was intrigued. Give Me a Sign is about Lilah, a 17 year old girl who suffers from hearing loss. She feels like she's caught in the middle between hearing and Deaf - too hearing for the Deaf community, but too hard of hearing for the hearing community. With summer approaching, she reaches out to a friend she met a few years previously at Gray Wolf, a camp for kids who are Deaf or blind, to see if she can work as a counselor at the camp for the summer. While there, she is immersed in Deaf culture, ASL, and maybe even finds some time for romance with Isaac, the cute Deaf counselor who is helping her learn ASL.

Give Me a Sign is a really charming young adult book. I liked all of the characters - they were a very diverse and fun bunch. I also liked how everyone grew through the story - characters learned from their mistakes and even in some cases changed their views (like Mackenzie, the hearing YouTuber who hadn't really realized that how she branded herself on the channel was hurting people in the Deaf community).

I really liked how Sortino wrote the dialogue, omitting words that Lilah either couldn't hear (orally) or didn't understand (in ASL), and spelling them out when they were finger spelled for her. 

While the plot line about the camp needing money wasn't great, I did like the interaction Lilah had with the potential donors - it was a great way for Sortino to show the kinds of insensitive comments and questions that people with disabilities (in this case, specifically those who are hard of hearing or Deaf) are asked. I hope that hearing people who read Give Me a Sign will at the very least be more aware of 

I also really liked the message that Sortino had in the book: it is okay to be yourself and ask for or use the accommodations that you need. This was best showcased through Lilah's younger brother, who was told by a doctor that he needed a cochlear implant. Lilah says to him that it is okay if he wants one, but he should be the one to make that decision for himself. I think that is a very important message that everyone needs to hear - no one should feel pressured into doing something just to fit into what the world wants you to be.

I also liked how Give Me a Sign showcases the importance of summer camps for children, especially children with disabilities, are. Having a place where other people are like you, and have similar experiences to you, can be a huge help for people who experience the world in different ways from the majority. It can be a really nice bonding experience, having other people your age who can relate to your experiences!

Overall, I really enjoyed Give Me a Sign, and I am looking forward to whatever Sortino is working on next!!!

Tress of the Emerald Sea

 

Tress of the Emerald Sea sounded like such a fun read, that I ended up getting it when I was last out book shopping. 

Tress is a window washer who lives on a tiny island on the verdant spore seas. She has no interest in adventure; all she wants to do is live her life and visit with Charlie. Charlie is the Duke's son, who pretends he is a gardener whenever Tress is around so they can hang out (even though she knows who he really is).  But when the Duke sees them together, he takes Charlie on a tour of the kingdom to find an eligible bride.  But when the Duke returns with his heir and daughter-in-law, Tress is flabbergasted to find that the heir in question is NOT Charlie.  After some prying, she discovers that Charlie was sent to the Sorceress of the midnight sea.  He was captured, but no one seems interested in paying his ransom.  And so Tress, in her methodical way, sets out to rescue him.

Tress of the Emerald Sea was such a delight to read.  The tone of the book is very whimsical (thanks to the narrator, Hoid); it reminded me a lot of Stardust by Neil Gaiman (and the cover of the book compares it to The Princess Bride, which seems apt as well).  Tress is a wonderful character who I really enjoyed spending time with.  She also meets some really interesting characters (Fort, Ann, Salay, and Huck) who I really liked too.  They were all delightful people to spend some time with. :)

The setting of Tress of the Emerald Sea was really interesting as well.  The moons of the planet dump spores onto the planet.  The spores activate with water, and do different things depending on their colour (the green ones, for example, became vines).  Unfortunately the human body is full of water, so if the spores come into contact with you, they can kill you.  But the spores can also be sailed on, so humans have built boats (with silver protections, because silver kills the spores) to sail around the world.  

I've now read a couple of novels and novellas by Sanderson, and haven't been disappointed yet.  Tress of the Emerald Sea was another fantastic story by him, and I am excited to one day read more. :)

Street Freaks

I was really looking forward to reading Street Freaks by Terry Brooks.  I've enjoyed many of his fantasy books, and was really interested in seeing what he could do in a science fiction setting.  

Street Freaks opens with Ash Collin's life imploding: his father sends him a message to get out of their house moments before bots storm the place.  Ash manages to escape and make his way to Street Freaks, the place his father told him to go should anything happen.  There he meets several kids who have all been "tweaked" in some way: Holly is a powerful cyborg who was reconstructed after an accident, TJ was born in a test tube and engineered to be the perfect soldier, Jenny has tanks that filter her blood, Woodrow, a boy whose entire body is robotic after a wasting disease almost killed him, and Cay, a synthetic girl created as a pleasure robot.  The group quickly takes him in, shielding him as best they can from the powerful group trying to find him, all the while helping him try to get to the bottom of why they are after him.

I wanted to like Street Freaks.  I really did. But I really, really didn't.

Most of the plot progressed through people simply refusing to tell Ash things right now.  The first time that happened, okay, whatever.  But by about the fifth time it happened, I'd really had enough of it.  It's one thing if the group put things together as they discovered them through hacking or whatever.  But people repeatedly just not wanting to tell Ash things got real old real quick.

Ash was also not the most interesting character.  He was naive and often very childish.  People repeatedly told him to grow up, and some of the things he failed to realize seemed really silly, especially after the book kept telling us he has an amazing memory - like how did he fail to put some of these things together?  He wasn't exactly unlikable (most of the time - I'll get back to that).  He was just super bland and uninteresting.  

The plot had some issues as well.  I knew (or at least very heavily suspected) fairly early on who was probably the bad guy.  And they were the bad guy.  But not in a super interesting way either.  More in the "I'm going to monologue for ten pages and explain everything" kind of way.  Which really shouldn't have been that surprising, as most of the book felt like explanation rather than action.  I was willing to forgive this at the beginning, as it takes place in a new world and everything was explained (though this felt a bit too on the nose - I would have preferred that we see how more things work, rather than being told about them).  But I was thoroughly sick of it as the book went on and continued in this vein.

There was also an unnecessary romance plot-line as well involving Ash and Cay.  Ash fell in love with her at first sight.  He was told (by some of the others, but even Cay herself) that she was built to be attractive to men (and women who are attracted to women), so he should get over this because it's not real and she's not interested anyway.  But he continues to try to pursue her, even after she repeatedly tells him to stop.  It was very cringe-worthy to be reading this over and over again.  But even more cringe-worthy when it eventually kind of works (at the end of the book she realizes that he actually does see her as a person, so she immediately loves him too).  

So unfortunately, I do not recommend this book.  I kept hoping it would get better, especially after the initial heavy-handed worldbuilding was out of the way.  But sadly, that was not to be.

Rogue Angel: Bathed in Blood

I picked up Bathed in Blood many years ago, after finding out that Joseph Nassise had worked on the Rogue Angel series.  I didn't realize it was book 53 in the series though! Nor did I realize he had written more than just the one book in the series.  But that's okay, Bathed in Blood catches you up on the basics as you need them fairly well.

Annja Creed is an archaeologist and TV host of Chasing History's Monsters.  While in a small Slovakian town filming about Elizabeth Bathory, the Blood Countess, Annja rescues a girl dying of blood loss that she finds on the side of the road.  That quickly thrusts her into a conspiracy when she discovers that many women have gone missing around the small town in the last few years.  But the police seem to have been covering it up, and the locals are all tight-lipped.  It's up to Annja to get to the bottom of things!

Overall, I enjoyed reading Bathed in Blood.  It's a fairly fast-paced read that is largely entertaining.  And as I already mentioned, it does a good job of filling you in on the things you need to know from previous books, so it was fine that I read this and not any of the other books in the series first.  Annja is a great protagonist who was good at getting herself both into and out of trouble as she was investigating the missing women. The plot also keeps you guessing at times - I expected a different character to be one of the bad guys, and was caught off guard by the reveal (although I don't know if it would have been possible to see that one coming as this bad guy wasn't obvious at all before the reveal). 

I think my biggest complaint is that the other characters never really got any development.  The bad guys felt a bit one dimensional, and most of the characters that Annja knew from previous books only got cameos and so didn't develop either.  I also felt that the bad guys did some silly things at times (and admittedly, one of those times actually makes more sense once you realize that the character you're led to believe is a bad guy actually isn't), but that didn't deter from my enjoyment of the book at all.

All in all, this was a fun, fast-paced read.  I'd be up for reading more of the Rogue Angel series in the future if they're anything like Bathed in Blood. :)

The Finnish Way: Finding Courage, Wellness, and Happiness Through the Power of Sisu

I randomly saw The Finnish Way: Finding Courage, Wellness, and Happiness Through the Power of Sisu at work along with another book on sisu. I was intrigued, so decided to give them a read. I started with Katja Pantzar's The Finnish Way, which tells of Katja's journey to and embrace of Finland's culture, most specifically sisu.

Sisu is a Finnish term that roughly translates to perseverance or grit. In the book, Pantzar examines a myriad of activities that she has engaged in since moving to Finland that help her build her sisu muscle, so to speak. Pantzar looks at winter swimming, saunas, getting out in nature, healthy eating, year-round cycling, movement as medicine, and embracing minimalism.

While the topic of sisu was interesting, I didn't think Pantzar's delivery of the material was particularly engaging. In every chapter she spoke with a few individuals who were experts on the topic she was discussing; the way she introduced them felt rather like she was bragging about having met them. There was also a lot of repetition in the book; winter swimming and year-round cycling came up A LOT through the other chapters. And I'm not really sure why the book was arranged the way it was; movement as medicine surely should have been one of the first chapters (along with nature therapy) as they formed the basis of Pantzar's whole book.

So while I did learn a bit about sisu, I think a different book on the topic would be a better introduction.

Court of Ravens and Ruin

I picked up Court of Ravens and Ruin at a thrift store the other day. And after a particularly trying week, I decided to give it a read, since it was a short book that looked fairly eaay to read.

Court of Ravens and Ruin is about Reyna, a redheaded, runemarked human who can craft gold fae magic staves. Reyna and her closest friends are kidnapped by the prince of another fae court because the prince wants Reyna's help. But his mother discovers them in the court and demands that the three runemarked humans from the gold court be immediately put to death; in an attempt to save her life, the prince binds Reyna to him, meaning they are now to be married. 

I really liked the worldbuilding in Court of Ravens and Ruin. Based off of Norse mythology, the fae courts are built around the world tree Yggdrasil. To travel between the courts, you have to travel along rivers that run along the tree. 

I also liked the magic of Court of Ravens and Ruin. Runemarked humans can create the magic staves that the fae use to wield their magic. This makes them extremely rare and valuable. There are five different fae courts, and all of them have their own unique runemarked humans (and their own staves). So if the runemarked of one court are found outside of that court, they are put to death to strike a blow to the other court. So even though life in a fae court is difficult, even for the runemarked humans, leaving is often impossible.

Unfortunately, I did not like Reyna at all. She was argumentative just to be argumentative, even in situations where staying quiet and doing what she is told would have been the far wiser course of action. By about halfway through the book, I found it a wonder that the Shadow Court fae hadn't put Reyna or her runemarked friends to death yet (her friends were being held and threatened with dearh as leverage to get her to cooperate). 

I also found the book a little all over the place in terms of audience. When I started reading it, I thought it was a YA book, in terms of writing. But it had some really mature elements to it that made me think maybe it's more suited for adults? I'm really not sure.

The book also ends on a cliffhanger, which kind of made me want to read more. But by that point I found Reyna too unlikeable, so I most likely will be giving the rest of the series a pass. 

Starlight

After hearing that I went out snowshoeing one really cold weekend, someone at work recommended that I read Starlight, Richard Wagamese's unfinished final novel.  Starlight is a love letter to the land, and the person who recommended it to me thought I would like it since I like being out in nature.

In Starlight, a woman and her daughter flee an abusive situation and find their way to the town where Frank Starlight lives.  Starlight is a farmer who takes beautiful pictures of animals thanks to his connection to the land - he is at home there, and the animals feel that connection thanks to his movements and silence.  Starlight takes them on, providing boarding and wages in exchange for the woman to clean his house, which was a bachelor pad thanks to only Starlight and Eugene Roth, his friend and helper on the farm, living there.  The four of them slowly become a family, spending more and more time out in the woods and learning Starlight's ways.

It's really unfortunate that Starlight was unfinished.  It ends rather abruptly (the publishers include a note on how they think the book was going to end, based off of a novella Wagamese wrote which was his source material for Starlight, and off conversations he had with friends about the novel), and reads very much like the early draft it is.  Despite that, it has some absolutely beautiful passages, specifically describing the natural world.  

The one aspect I wasn't fond of were the two men tracking the woman.  The person who recommended Starlight warned me that the beginning is a difficult read, but once I got through that, it would be better.  But the two men continued to track the woman through the entire novel (the abrupt ending was when they finally found her and were going to go after her).  As the book stands, I felt it would have been better without that stuff, being instead the healing journey of the woman and girl on the land.  But the book is unfinished, so had Wagamese been able to finish it, this part may have been a lot more rewarding.