Book Description:A searing and profound Southern odyssey by National Book Award winner Jesmyn Ward.
In Jesmyn Ward’s first novel since her National Book Award winning Salvage the Bones, this singular American writer brings the archetypal road novel into rural twenty-first-century America. Drawing on Morrison and Faulkner, The Odyssey and the Old Testament, Ward gives us an epochal story, a journey through Mississippi’s past and present that is both an intimate portrait of a family and an epic tale of hope and struggle. Ward is a major American writer, multiply awarded and universally lauded, and in Sing, Unburied, Sing she is at the height of her powers.
Jojo and his toddler sister, Kayla, live with their grandparents, Mam and Pop, and the occasional presence of their drug-addicted mother, Leonie, on a farm on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. Leonie is simultaneously tormented and comforted by visions of her dead brother, which only come to her when she’s high; Mam is dying of cancer; and quiet, steady Pop tries to run the household and teach Jojo how to be a man. When the white father of Leonie’s children is released from prison, she packs her kids and a friend into her car and sets out across the state for Parchman farm, the Mississippi State Penitentiary, on a journey rife with danger and promise.
Sing, Unburied, Sing grapples with the ugly truths at the heart of the American story and the power, and limitations, of the bonds of family. Rich with Ward’s distinctive, musical language, Sing, Unburied, Sing is a majestic new work and an essential contribution to American literature.
Review: Every once in awhile, a book comes along that just blows me the hell away. One that feels like an elevated experience just reading it, pouring over it, immersing oneself in it. “Sing, Unburied, Sing” by Jesmyn Ward did that for me, and I am still staggered by how fantastic it was. I’ve come to expect nothing less from Jesmyn Ward, one of the best writers out there today, bar none. I’ve read two of her other books, both of which are transcendent and incredibly emotional. The first is the novel “Salvage the Bones”, a story about a rural and poor African American family living in Mississippi as Hurricane Katrina lurches and looms towards them. The other is “Men We Reaped”, a memoir about the numerous black men in Ward’s life who all died far too young, brutal casualties of overt and systemic racism that is all too present in the U.S. When I heard she had a new book coming out, I requested it, and then steeled myself for it as I picked it up.
The first thing that I must mention is the characters and characterization in this novel. We follow a couple main perspectives. The first is Jojo, a thirteen year old boy who has been raised mostly by his grandparents (Mam and Pop), as his mother is addicted to drugs and his father is in prison. He has also taken on the caregiver role to his little sister Kayla, wanting to keep her safe from the ills of the world. Mam is very ill with cancer, and Pop tells Jojo stories from the past in hopes that Jojo can learn from them. The second is Leonie, Jojo and Kayla’s mother. Her boyfriend Michael is getting out of prison soon, and her all encompassing love for him blinds her to most other things. Her drug addiction is fueled in part by the fact that she sees visions of her dead brother Given while she’s high. The final perspective is from Richie, the ghost of a thirteen year old boy who died at Parchman, the prison Michael is at. Richie knew Pop when he was alive, and he has unfinished business with him. Jojo starts seeing Richie on their travels, as Richie knows that there’s a connection there. All of these characters are well rounded and explored, and I got a feel for every one of them (as well as a number of the other characters like Mam and Pop). I understood the motivations of each of them. I was especially moved by Leonie, as while she makes terrible and selfish decisions when it comes to her children, I completely understood why she made those choices, and how factors both within her control and outside of it have made her into the person that she is.
The themes of this book also blew me away. For one, I’m a huge sucker for a ghost story, and this one has the feel of a Southern Gothic novel with the isolation and wide open spaces that still feel claustrophobic. But Ward brings in other ghosts that haunt this country and our culture, as the setting and characters are still plagued by the racism that has so infected this country. From the remnants of Jim Crow laws to the consequences of the War on Drugs to police brutality and violence, the journey that this family takes, physical and emotional, always has the specter of racism hanging over it. Ward doesn’t offer any solutions or answers or happy endings of conclusions to this, and all you can hope for is that this family will continue to survive in face of explicit (Michael’s family) and implicit racism that surrounds them. It’s really the perfect use of a ghost story, as the all too true horrors of our racist culture and society still haunt us, as much as we may hate to acknowledge it.
And the writing is just beautiful. Ward has a serious talent for creating a story and an imagery that leaps and flows in the pages of this book. I felt like I could see everything that was happening in my mind’s eye, and I was so engrossed I devoured this book in a day’s time. Ward is an author who is being called a ‘modern Faulkner’ by a number of people, and while I understand the sentiment (examinations of the American South are a commonality between the two), I think that she easily stands in a league of her own. This book is exactly why, and I urge everyone to give it a try and see why, because nothing I write here will be able to do it justice.
“Sing, Unburied, Sing” is one of the best books I’ve read this year, no question. Please please please go read it and see for yourselves.
Rating 10: I cannot tell you how much I loved this book. A heart rendering story about literal and metaphorical ghosts, family, the South, and Americana.
Book: “The Town Built on Sorrow” by David Oppegaard
Publishing Info: Flux, September 2017
Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Book Description:Welcome to the strange mountain foothills town of Hawthorn, where sixteen-year-old Harper Spurling finds herself increasingly obsessed with the diary of a local 1860s pioneer girl while a serial killer runs unchecked through the area, dumping his victims into the town’s dark river. As Harper’s curiosity leads her closer and closer to the killer, she’ll have to think fast or join the killer’s growing list of victims. Because in Hawthorn, a town built on sorrow, the barrier between life and death is as fragile as an old, forgotten skull.
Review: First and foremost I’d like to give a huge thank you to both NetGalley, for providing me with this book, and David Oppegaard, whose FB post pointed me towards the book on NetGalley in the first place.
We are officially kicking off Horrorpalooza, in which I try and keep my focus (mostly) on horror/scary stories for the month of October! October is my very favorite month because of Halloween, and I intend to honor it with tales to chill your bones and give you nightmares! So let’s begin!
A few years ago I took a horror writing class at a local writing workshop in downtown Minneapolis. My teacher was a man named David Oppegaard, who also happened to be a friend of a friend. Not only did I enjoy his class immensely, I still see David at Halloween and Christmas parties each year, in which we stand over various punch bowls and talk about any and all things. David has written a few books, his previous book “The Firebug of Balrog County” a Minnesota Book Award Nominee (and one that I quite enjoyed). While that one was more realistic/contemporary teen fiction, his newest book “The Town Built on Sorrow” is straight up horror/thriller, with a little historical fiction thrown in for good measure. It’s a combination that works pretty well, and sets up for a dreamy and atmospheric setting.
We follow the storylines of three characters. The first is Harper, an ambitious and driven high school girl living in the small town of Hawthorn. She has been obsessing over the diary of a pioneer girl who was part of the settling party of the town in the 1800s, named Sofie Helle. Right off the bat I thought this was pretty unique, as what YA novels as of late have shown their lady protagonists having a healthy interest in history? Perhaps there are some, but I haven’t read them. The second is Olav, an outsider from his peers at the high school is is also, spoiler alert but not really, a serial killer. The third is Sofie Helle herself, through not only her diary, but also flashbacks to see what the diary never did. Of the three, I probably liked Harper’s the most, just because she did feel like a pretty typical teenage girl, and her interests were of interest to me. And since we know that Olav is bad news, it was rife with tension when we saw her slowly getting to know him and becoming attracted to him. I really liked that aspect of the story, as the suspense about her wellbeing would teeter towards unbearable. I also liked the Sofie story, as the dangers and horrors of the prairie to the untrained interloper can have dire consequences. Right out of the gate a baby is taken and eaten by a wolf, which really got my attention. You know from the get go that Hawthorn is going to have a dark pall over it, and darkness is indeed oozing off the page. It’s definitely a dark, dark book, as death is always just within striking distance, and watching it slowly circle Harper in the form of Olav is distressing. And then when a strange dark form appears in a dark room part way through the book, well, the gothic tension just shuddered and oozed off of the page, and damn was it effective. The blend of real life horror and supernatural horror works well here, and I almost always imagined Hawthorn with a dense fog because of how Oppegaard builds it in the reader’s mind.
But while the atmospheric notes are tight and on point, the characters themselves, likable as some were, kind of fell a bit flat for me. I liked Harper enough but she didn’t really stand out too much outside of her interest in history. Olav gave me the creeps to be sure, but it was definitely rooted in his actions and not in who he was as a person. Sofie, too, is likable enough, but there was little connection to her for me and little investment in what exactly did happen to her. I suppose that I was worried for Harper as I read the book, but only because you are supposed to be.
So while the characters themselves didn’t do much for me, Hawthorn the town was enough of a character in and of itself that the chills there made up for it. I think that “The Town Built on Sorrow” would be the perfect read for a chilly autumn night this Halloween season. So wrap yourself in a blanket, pick it up, and if you live in small town setting or in a place with forest and nature surrounding you, maybe try not to get too freaked out as you read it. I’m sure come Halloween I will get to talk to David about this story, and I know that I will definitely give him props for Hawthorn and it’s demons.
Rating 7: Tense and atmospheric, “The Town Built on Sorrow” weaves three stories together over two time periods. While the characters were kind of flat, the setting was eerie and unsettling.
Book: “There’s Someone Inside Your House” by Stephanie Perkins
Publishing Info: Dutton Books for Young Readers, September 2017
Where Did I Get This Book: I received an ARC of it from the publisher at ALA.
Book Description:Scream meets YA in this hotly-anticipated new novel from the bestselling author of Anna and the French Kiss.
One-by-one, the students of Osborne High are dying in a series of gruesome murders, each with increasing and grotesque flair. As the terror grows closer and the hunt intensifies for the killer, the dark secrets among them must finally be confronted.
International bestselling author Stephanie Perkins returns with a fresh take on the classic teen slasher story that’s fun, quick-witted, and completely impossible to put down.
Review: We’re nearing the end of September, guys, which means that October is just around the corner! For me, that means HORRORPALOOZA is on the way, in which my reading tastes gravitate towards all horror, all the time. I had to get a little taste of that before the calendar turned over, though, as I just couldn’t wait to pick up “There’s Someone Inside Your House” any longer. So I don’t know if it was the waiting and the hype that I built up in my head for it, but I’m wondering if waiting was a mistake. because while there were definitely things I enjoyed about this book, it was something of a let down.
I’ll start with what I did like, though. “There’s Someone Inside Your House” has had comparisons to “Scream”, one of my favorite slasher movies of all time because of how it cheekily deconstructs the tropes and tricks of the slasher genre. While I was reading this book, I one hundred percent could see it in my mind’s eye as a film. It has the right amount of characters, it has the right dynamic for the group that we follow, and it has so many visual moments in it that would translate very well to a movie screen. I also enjoyed Makani, our protagonist and surmised ‘final girl’, as of course this book would need one to play to genre type. She is a fish out of water, but not in the ways we may be used to seeing. Not only has she moved to small town Nebraska from freakin’ Hawai’i (I can totally get her bitterness), she is also a biracial girl living in a town with a majority of white people. Being half black and half native Hawaiian means she gets a lot of ‘but where are you from really?’ questions, and this book deals with that openly and frankly, which is very important. She does, of course, have a dark secret in her past that she fears getting out, and while I was rolling my eyes at this cliche when it was revealed what had happened, I was actually at peace with it, as it wasn’t too melodramatic, yet she also did have legitimate things to be sorry for while having reason to be hurting and traumatized. From characters who are POC to LGBTQIA to socioeconomically different, I feel like Perkins was committed to exploring diversity for this story when other authors may have not bothered.
The slasher killer plot line (so, the main plot line) had some issues that I couldn’t quite wrap my head around. I give props in that while Perkins starts out making us wonder who the killer is (mainly is it Ollie, Makani’s brooding but sensitive love interest), once it is revealed who they are, there are no more questions or twists, or suppositions of coming twists. It was who it was, and that was that. But once it was revealed WHY the killer was doing what they were doing, this book kind of lost me. It’s one thing if you are doing it because you’re a supernatural being that is taking revenge for your deserved but untimely murder (“Nightmare on Elm Street”), or because camp counselors weren’t paying attention and you drowned (“Friday the 13th), or because you’re just one big metaphor for Evil (“Halloween”). Even in “Scream” the trauma of parental abandonment mixed with the need to be famous/notorious worked out as a solid motive. But in this one it’s just so…. not that, and without more background to the killer I couldn’t and wouldn’t swallow it so easily. On top of that, each teenager killed by this person has something cut off and taken away, and it seemed like it was going to build up to one big gross reveal of just what was happening with these absconded body parts…… But then nah, the pomp and dramatics were all for naught, it was maybe just because reasons (note, I will admit that perhaps I’m wrong on this, as when I start getting near the end of a tense book I sometimes inadvertently skim in my anxiety).
While there were a few hang ups I had with “There’s Someone Inside Your House”, I do think that it’s a quick, simple, and totally appropriate book for the upcoming Halloween season. Teens that are craving horror but maybe aren’t feeling something a but denser and darker will probably find a lot to like here, and anything that nurtures kids and teens loves of horror gets props from me.
Rating 6: The characters were fine and I liked the diversity. While the identity of the killer wasn’t drawn out or too twisty turny, the motivation and MO felt flimsy at best.
Book: “The Best Friend” (Fear Street #17) by R.L. Stine
Publishing Info: Pocket Books, 1992
Where Did I Get This Book: ILL fromhe library!
Book Description:Best friends…to the end!
Who is Honey Perkins? She’s been telling everyone in Shadyside that she’s Becka Norwood’s best friend. But Becka’s sure she’s never met Honey before.
Honey systematically moves in on Becka’s life, copying her in every way. But when Becka presumes to have more than one “best friend,” the horrible accidents begin.
Does Honey just want a friend? Becka wonders. Or does she want more—much more!
Had I Read It Before: No
The Plot: The Fear Street Protagonist in this book is Becka, whom we meet while she’s on a date with her snooze of a boyfriend Eric. They’re sitting in his car and she’s working up the nerve to dump him because he’s such a dud, and because he’s really handsy and she’s not too comfortable with it. She finally tells him it’s over, and he says that it’s okay as he tries to keep it together. He takes her home, and says that he’ll see her in school. Becka decides to drive around for a bit to clear her head, and then proceeds to crash into another car.
The next day she’s hanging out in her room with her BFFs Lilah and Trish, telling her about the very minor car accident she was in. Why that even happened, I couldn’t say, because soon they’ve moved their talk to Bill Planter, Becka’s ex whom Becka is still hung up on. Her parents never approved and so she and Bill broke up (I think it was because of that?), but now it’s the holiday season and she’s LONGING for him. As they talk, suddenly a strange girl runs into the room, and starts freaking out in a good way about Becka, throwing her arms around her. Becka is rightfully confused and put off, and the girl says that it’s her former BFF from childhood Honey, who moved away but is now back in town and right next door! Honey and Becka, Becka and Honey, the gruesome twosome who were always together. But Becka has no clue who this girl is, as she remembers Honey, but was never friends with her, and I feel like I’m reliving a scene in “Drop Dead Gorgeous”. Becka and pals decide to play along, but whenever Trish and Lilah try to talk to Honey she ignores them and continues to talk about how much she missed Becka. She even puts off Becka’s mom, Mrs. Norwood, but hugging her and saying how much she missed her. After Honey leaves, Becka, Lilah, and Trish find their fourth grade year book and spot Honey, who they now all remember, but also remember as having no friends. Becka realizes that the parrot pin that Bill gave her is missing from her dresser, the dresser Honey was futzing with. Trish suggests to go ask Honey if she forgot to take if off, and Becka says she will. After her friends leave she’s about to head next door, but then Bill calls asking her if she will meet him at the mall. She says no because her parents will kill her, but you can tell she wants to. She goes next door to confront Honey… But the house appears to be empty! She knocks on the door and looks inside, and sees nothing but darkness.
Some time later, Becka and Lilah are walking home together talking about the Christmas party that Trish is throwing soon. Bill is going to be there, and Becka plans to wear a sexy catsuit just for the occasion. When she gets home she hears a voice in her room, and sees HONEY is in there trying on her clothes. Becka storms in and rightfully asks what the HELL she’s doing, and Honey says that Mrs. Norwood let her in, and that she left but said Honey could wait in Becka’s room. Also, she loves Becka’s clothes and remember how they used to share clothes when they were besties? Becka does not. She asks Honey why the house next door is empty. Honey says that the furnace croaked and they’re in a hotel until it’s fixed. She asks Honey what happened to her parrot pin. Honey…. REACHES OUT TO CHOKE HER TO DEATH??? Or not, she just chokes her for a bit, and then says ‘don’t you remember the gotcha game?’ I’m appalled, as is Becka. Before leaving (FINALLY) Honey says that Becka GAVE her the parrot pin, don’t you remember? Then she leaves and Becka is quite shaken. So she calls Bill, suggesting that maybe they could start seeing each other again, like old times. He says they should sneak off, and she balks at that. Becka hangs up when her Mom returns home with groceries, and Becka asks why she let Honey into the house. Mom has no clue what Becka’s talking about, she hasn’t been home all afternoon.
At school, Becka and Lilah are preparing to go home when Honey rushes up saying she and Honey should walk home together. Becka says no, she and Lilah are riding their bikes home (in December? In “Ski Weekend” it’s implied Shadyside is a days-ish drive from a snowy part of Vermont, how are they biking?). Honey ignores Lilah again and says she should get a bike so she and Becka can ride. Whatever, crazy. As Becka and Lilah are biking they start down a hill…. And Lilah’s brakes don’t work!!! As she’s flying towards a busy intersection!! She’s hit by a truck and flies over the handlebars!! She’s (kind of) alive, taken away in an ambulance, and the police tell Becka that someone cut the brake cable away from her bike. OH WHO COULD IT BE? When Becka gets home she calls Bill, saying she WILL sneak out with him because, honestly, she may not be alive much longer with Honey going full Robert John Bardo on her. She turns around and sees HONEY in the doorway!! SHe hangs up and demands how she got in, but Honey just goes into how sorry she is about Lilah before giving her a literally suffocating hug. Becka says she wants to be alone, and Honey doesn’t leave. Becka starts crying, and Trish comes in, to which Honey whisks her away saying “Becka wants to be alone”. Luckily she leaves too.
On Saturday Bill and Becka are gettin BIZAY in his car with some make outs and heavy petting. After they break for air, Becka complains about Honey, saying that Honey will NOT leave her alone. She doesn’t want to be mean, though, because she thinks that Honey means well (COUGH COUGH). But now that she thinks of it, Honey was asking her about Lilah’s bike, specifically how the brakes worked. ANd she was at the bike rack. She looks out the window and freaks out because she thinks she sees Honey hiding behind a tree. Closer inspection implies otherwise, and Bill thinks Becka’s losing her mind.
On Monday Becka is home sick. Her Mom brings her breakfast and says that Honey volunteered to bring her homework to her after school. BECKA, FOR GOD’S SAKE, TELL SOMEONE ABOUT THIS GIRL. Trish calls that afternoon and asks Becka why she isn’t in the hospital, since she heard she had a complete mental breakdown because of Lilah. When asked where she heard this, Trish says that Honey is telling EVERYONE. Not only that, there will be no adults at the Christmas party that weekend, ooh la la. After hanging up, Becka is living, and then Honey arrives… And she’s cut and styled her hair just like Becka’s. STINE, YOU’RE LIFTING FROM “SINGLE WHITE FEMALE” NOW?! Later that night Honey calls her to reiterate that she’s always around if needed (WE KNOW), and that Trish was totally lying about Honey spreading rumors about her mental health. Which is totally refuted the next day when another girl outside of the group asks Becka how she is doing, mentally. Then Honey shows up wearing Becka’s clothes and the parrot pin and WE GET IT. Trisha and Becka go for a walk outside, and then they see Honey making out with Becka’s ex Eric, and Becka is disturbed by this. Honey sees them and tries to explain, but Becka isn’t having it. Honey runs off, crying probably. When Becka gets back to her locker, ti’s totally trashed. Thinking it must be Honey’s doing, she confronts the little creeper in the bathroom, accusing her of the locker misdeeds, which Honey denies, saying she’s just saying that because she’s mad about Eric. Becka FINALLY goes off on Honey, telling her to leave her the hell alone, and Honey starts crying that they’re best friends before pulling out a GUN!?! Which is just a water gun, another ‘gotcha’ joke on her part, and Becka runs out screaming.
That night at Bill’s house Becka tells him about all the Honey stuff that happened that day, but before the locker moment he asks her if she heard about the random guys who CONVENIENTLY broke into the school and trashed a bunch of lockers. Oh great. So Becka feels bad that she accused Honey of that now, but really, she shouldn’t because Honey is just the worst. She asks Bill if Honey has ever approached him for anything, and he’s kind of….. mum about it. She goes home, and is confronted by her mother… who somehow found out that Becka was out with Bill that night? GEE, HOW DID THAT HAPPEN?! They have a huge fight, and Mom grounds Becka from Trish’s upcoming party. Becka runs upstairs to her room to sulk, and Honey jumps out of the closet, as if that was a perfectly normal place to wait for her. She says she’s sorry for ratting Becka out to her Mom, but thinks that Bill wasn’t right for her. Becka tells her to get out, they aren’t friends, they never were, they never will be, and the only friends she has are Trish and Lilah. Honey slowly leaves, but not before telling her that she broke up with Eric that day.
Good news! Becka’s Dad, who has never actually shown up on page, caves and lets Becka go to Trish’s Christmas party! While there things are going okay, until Honey shows up in the same outfit as Becka. Becka freaks at her again, and makes a big scene. Honey walks away. Later, Trish is at the top of the steps with a cake. Becka sees Honey there…. who then shoves Trish down the stairs! WHO LANDS ON HER NECK ODDLY. While someone calls for help, Honey sees Becka saw her, and says ‘I tried to stop her from tripping but it was too late!’ Becka turns her attentions to Trish, who is still alive but breathing funny, and Honey says to her (Low enough so no one else can hear, natch) that she’s her only friend now. Becka runs, sees the police, tells them Honey pushed Trish, then faints.
She wakes up the next day in her bed with her Mom and a doctor (No Dad again!). They tell her that Trish is alive but has a broken neck (OH, IS THAT ALL?), and that Becka is having a nervous collapse and she should rest. The doctor leaves, and then Mom says she’s stepping out too. And then, just like clockwork, the phone rings. And it’s Honey, who tells Becka that she should come over right away because she has something Becka should see. Becka is going to not, but then hears a voice in the background… Bill’s voice! She rushes over and looks through the kitchen window. She sees Bill and Honey at the table HOLDING HANDS! Becka’s officially done. She storms into the kitchen, grabs a KNIFE, and LUNGES FOR HONEY! About friggin’ time. But she can’t do much because of her fragile (and vague) physical and mental state, and collapses. Bill says ‘I thought you told her I was here!’, and Honey tells him to stay away because Becka is HER friend!!! They wrestle over the knife, and Honey STABS BILL IN THE CHEST. GOOD FUCKING GOD. And THEN, and I cannot BELIEVE it, she PUTS THE KNIFE IN BECKA’S HAND. As Becka slowly starts coming to, Honey tells her that that she won’t tell the police that Becka murdered Bill, but that it was in self defense, because she’s her best and now only friend. To which Becka….. thanks her. THE FREAKING END.
Body Count: 1??? Bill died but I think that Lilah and Trish are okay???
Romance Rating: 5. Bill has his problems but he seems okay, even if Becka is only willing to sneak around with him.
Bonkers Rating: 9. This is the darkest and most fucked up “Fear Street” ending yet!
Fear Street Relevance: 7. Becka lives on Fear Street and so does Honey, and the final showdown is there.
Silliest End of Chapter Cliffhanger:
“Becka gasped and hit the brakes. Her car slid hard into the other car. She closed her eyes against the crunch of metal and shattering glass.”
… And it turns out she was fine and the most damage was a broken headlight. What’s the point?
That’s So Dated! Moments: At the Christmas party the song on the CD player is Bruce Springsteen’s “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town”, and I think that was kind of dated even for it’s original publication! Unless this is a bunch of hipsters, which it very well could be.
Best Quote:
“‘What a night you had,’ Trish said, shaking her head. ‘First you wreck Eric. Then you wreck the car.’ Lilah laughed. ‘You should be a writer, Trish. You have such a way with words.'”
Yeah, that witty banter is sure to win a Pulitzer some day.
Conclusion: “The Best Friend” is truly the most disturbing “Fear Street” book I’ve read so far, and I’m kind of impressed that Stine was willing to do what he did with it. Apparently people were so incensed by this book he offered a contest to write the sequel, in a ‘well if you think you can do better, DO IT!’ kind of play. Up next for us, though, is “The Cheater”.
Book: “DC Bombshells (Vol.4): Queens” by Marguerite Bennett, Laura Braga (Ill.), Mirka Andolfo (Ill.), and Marguerite Sauvage (Ill.)
Publishing Info: DC Comics, June 2017
Where Did I Get This Book: The library!
Book Description:The explosive creative team of writer Marguerite Bennett (BATWOMAN) and artists including Laura Braga (Witchblade), Mirka Andolfo (Ms. Marvel) and Marguerite Sauvage (Faith) bring an all-new chapter in the acclaimed alternate-history saga inspired by the hit DC Collectibles in DC COMICS: BOMBSHELLS VOL. 4: QUEENS.
Technology and terror form an unholy alliance in a world at war, and only the heroines known as the Bombshells can shut it down!
As World War II rages around them, Batwoman, Catwoman and Renee Montoya take a journey to Africa to get help from an old ally: Vixen, Queen of Zambesi and co-founder of the Bombshells.
But they’re not alone. The lethal Cheetah has her claws out, and she’s digging them directly into a forbidden site: the dwelling place of the mechanical gods, whose incredible powers could spell triumph for the Reich and the destruction of all that the Bombshells hold dear.
Now Vixen, her fellow Bombshells founder Hawkgirl and the rest of the squadron must face their biggest threat yet! Can this brilliant but beleaguered African queen count on the support of a fellow royal-Wonder Woman-to turn the tide?
Find out in DC COMICS: BOMBSHELLS VOL. 4: QUEENS. This volume contains the debuts of Vixen and Hawkgirl-and the secret origin of the Bombshells! Collecting issues #19-24.
Review: As you all know, I really really REALLY love the “DC Bombshells” series because damn does it give my favorite superheroines something to do. There is something so organically feminist about this series, and it keeps the thrills, action, humor, and pathos balanced out expertly. Seeing some of the best and brightest DC ladies at the forefront is a delight, and whenever a new one comes out I can’t wait to read it. We are now on Volume 4, and after an action packed Volume 3 in which the Nazis were dealt a severe blow by our Bombshells, we’ve moved the action to North Africa and been introduced to Vixen and Hawkgirl! Also mechanical animals and Cheetah, aka the woman who killed Batgirl and Renee’s adopted son Jacon!
I sometimes get worried when new characters get brought into the fold in comics, especially since sometimes I have a hard time keeping track of characters as it is. But with “Bombshells” I am always excited to see which classic heroines will show up next and in what capacity, and Vixen and Hawkgirl were no exception. Vixen (aka Mari) was especially great, as we got to see her stand up to Hitler and steal his dog Blondie, as well as see her in a position of power as the Queen of Zambesi. She and Hawkgirl (who is delightfully tech minded and a very clever inventor) also helped found The Bombshells, so we got to see them interact with the team they created, as well as interact with each other as confidants, partners, and lovers. I think that ultimately the relationships between the women in these stories are the strongest parts of them, and these two fit right in in that regard. I liked seeing more interaction and background between Kate (aka Batgirl) and Renee as they faced their past relationship and the death of Jacon, but I have to admit that I’m kind of not digging the fact that Kate seems to have completely forgotten about Maggie back on the home front. Sure, Batwoman and Renee Montoya have a shared past and a shared pain, but Maggie is Kate’s present.
Speaking of Maggie, we got a fun story back on the homefront with the Batgirls again. I had thought that they were going to be a one-off story, seeing as so much is going on with the Bombshells in Europe, but I really liked seeing them and Lois get some more time to shine. I think that my favorite aspect of it is the way that their presence is handling some familiar storylines. And with that, I give you a
I think I mentioned that Harvey (eventually Two Face) Dent was in the previous Batgirls storyline as a mayor who was promoting an “America First” agenda. Well, he eventually got over that and had become an ally to the Batgirls, with self reflection and redemption on the mind. But given that Harvey really does have to turn into Two Face, I braced myself for it, and indeed, it does happen in this collection (won’t say how, but it does). Ever since I read the classic “Long Halloween” story arc, I’ve felt so incredibly bad for Two Face and the road that he takes, and I was worried that it was going to happen here as well. After all, Batman couldn’t help him in that universe, so my hope was slim. But in this one….. he doesn’t take the road to villainy, at least he hasn’t yet. Because while yes, he’s been horrifically scarred and has had something of a fall from grace, The Batgirls have done what Batman never could: they have rallied around him and affirmed that he is still Harvey Dent, imperfect but trying to be better Harvey Dent, and that they are going to support him and be there for him. And it seems that because of this, he’s MAYBE going to stay on the side of good, and remain their ally and friend. Cheesy? Maybe. But I think that it’s also a testament to the power of empathy and understanding towards those who have experienced trauma, something that Batman just couldn’t ever pull off the way that a bunch of awesome ladies can. The last panel of the Batgirls embracing him got me like
But all that said, I was a bit disappointed seeing that the big problem to overcome this time around was a group of mechanized animals from another planet. I liked the Zambesi setting to be certain, but it felt like a whole lot more conflict crammed into a story that is already rife with conflict. Plus, given that it’s more ‘Nazis want to get their hands on otherwordly weaponry’ stuff, it kind of feels like more of the same. The good news is that we get a couple returns here, including Wonder Woman, Lex Luthor, and Supergirl, all of whom I dearly missed in the last collection. I just wish that we could have seen more Wonder Woman and Supergirl (seriously, Kara was barely in this), before the last fourth of the book.
So while this is the weakest “Bombshells” collection for me so far, it’s still incredibly strong and I can’t wait for the next one. And I think I only have to wait a little while longer for that!! “DC Bombshells”, you still got it!
Rating 8: While I enjoyed the new characters quite a bit and the Batgirls story was heartwarming, I wasn’t totally sold on mechanical animal fights, and wish that Wonder Woman and Supergirl had been in it more.
Book: “The Last Days of Jack Sparks” by Jason Arnopp
Publishing Info: Orbit, March 2016
Where Did I Get This Book: The library!
Book Description:Jack Sparks died while writing this book. This is the account of his final days.
In 2014, Jack Sparks – the controversial pop culture journalist – died in mysterious circumstances.
To his fans, Jack was a fearless rebel; to his detractors, he was a talentless hack. Either way, his death came as a shock to everyone.
It was no secret that Jack had been researching the occult for his new book. He’d already triggered a furious Twitter storm by mocking an exorcism he witnessed in rural Italy.
Then there was that video: thirty-six seconds of chilling footage that Jack repeatedly claimed was not of his making, yet was posted from his own YouTube account.
Nobody knew what happened to Jack in the days that followed – until now. This book, compiled from the files found after his death, reveals the chilling details of Jack’s final hours.
Review: I’ve probably mentioned it before, but I don’t find stories about demonic possession particularly scary. I think that there are certainly elements to them that can be creepy, but movies like “The Exorcist” and “The Exorcism of Emily Rose”, while well done, don’t get my fear levels on the rise. The book “A Head Full of Ghosts” is probably my favorite exorcism related book, but even that one is filled with ambiguities instead of solid fact and over the top devilry. And then there is, of course, “My Best Friend’s Exorcism”, but that one is in it’s own little category since it’s so 80s candy coated and about the power of female friendship. So when I picked up “The Last Days of Jack Sparks”, I figured that it would at the very least be entertaining. Little did I know that I was going to be basically freaking out on an airplane while reading this book. And then once again while walking down a dark hallway at two in the morning days after the fact. Yep. “The Last Days of Jack Sparks” has sufficiently messed me up, y’all.
This story is built on the premise that notorious journalist Jack Sparks died while working on a new book, and that we are reading his writings around the time of his strange death. So right out the gate, we’re pretty certain that we are dealing with an unreliable narrator. Sparks is an established addict, narcissist, and sanctimonious prick, so having him as a narrator is maddening but also absolutely perfect. It’s made even better because throughout the book we are also given other perspectives from those that he interacts with, in footnotes from Sparks’ brother Alistair, transcripts of conversations, and personal diary entries. The moment that I realized that I really couldn’t trust anything that ANYONE was saying, it blew my mind. This set up made it all the more paranoia inducing, as I really didn’t know what to believe from anyone involved. It also made it so that clues that were given throughout the story could harken back in multiple formats and through multiple lenses, and seeing the puzzle pieces come together in different layers was mind boggling for me.
Sparks himself is a fabulous component to the story. Yes, he’s absolutely terrible for much of the narrative, as an egomaniacal, pretentious and abusive liar, but as he slowly starts to fall apart you see the other parts of him bit by bit, which makes him feel all the more human and relatable. I went in thinking that I was going to be just fine with him getting his comeuppance, but as he becomes more desperate and as his identities fall away I ended up being really attached him him, as rotten as he can be at times. I also liked other characters in this book, specifically Sherilyn Chastain, a combat magician who Sparks sort of teams up with on one of her cases involving a houseboat haunting in Hong Kong. She not only provided a centered and badass female voice in all of this, she was also a way for Arnopp to really delve into some deep philosophy about faith, belief, and the supernatural. While some of the other characters felt a little trope-y, such as Sparks’ love interest/flatmate Bex with her cool girl persona, I did feel that Arnopp had a place for each and every one of them.
And finally, this book is pretty darn scary. This is coming from a self professed snob when it comes to demon possession stories. I think that this one had a lot of other factors within it that made it feel unique from the others in the genre, and given that it also bent genres a bit into some science fiction principles it felt all the more creative. The imagery of a dark apartment with a silhouette in the corner is always going to set me on edge, and Arnopp really knows how to make this scenario complete and total nightmare fuel. His use of social media like youtube and twitter and things like that really gave it a modern horror flair as well, as while I was skeptical at him just describing a video would be scary, I was totally wrong. It was terrifying, especially since it totally sounded like one of those weird unexplained viral horror videos that pop up occasionally. I also really liked, and perhaps this is a bit spoilery so tread carefully, that the entire premise of this book is that the Devil (or whatever demon Sparks is dealing with) really hates having the spotlight taken off of him/it when on a serious dramatic tear.
“The Last Days of Jack Sparks” was a freaky and fun read that I cannot recommend enough. If it can make this skeptic towards the genre cheer, think of what it can do for those of you who always love your possession stories.
Rating 9: A tense, creepy, disturbing, and fresh feeling horror novel for the social media age. It had me on the edge of my seat and I think that it’s must read for horror fans.
Book Description:New York Times bestselling author of THE GOOD GIRL, Mary Kubica is back with another exhilarating thriller as a widow’s pursuit of the truth leads her to the darkest corners of the psyche.
“The bad man, Daddy. The bad man is after us.”
Clara Solberg’s world shatters when her husband and their four-year-old daughter are in a car crash, killing Nick while Maisie is remarkably unharmed. The crash is ruled an accident…until the coming days, when Maisie starts having night terrors that make Clara question what really happened on that fateful afternoon.
Tormented by grief and her obsession that Nick’s death was far more than just an accident, Clara is plunged into a desperate hunt for the truth. Who would have wanted Nick dead? And, more important, why? Clara will stop at nothing to find out—and the truth is only the beginning of this twisted tale of secrets and deceit.
Told in the alternating perspectives of Clara’s investigation and Nick’s last months leading up to the crash, master of suspense Mary Kubica weaves her most chilling thriller to date—one that explores the dark recesses of a mind plagued by grief and shows that some secrets might be better left buried.
Review: I have many anxieties in my life, some that are realistic, others that are unrealistic. Or at the very least not worth worrying about. One of those anxieties is becoming unexpectedly widowed. I’m the person who can’t sleep too well at night if her husband isn’t home, especially if I’m expecting him home and he is late to return. Because OBVIOUSLY it isn’t that he’s just running late or finding that time has run away from him. Obviously he’s dead.
So reading “Every Last Lie” kind of made me confront my anxieties on that at least a little bit, so it has that going for it. Mary Kubica is one of those authors that I really, really want to like, mainly because I really enjoyed her book “Pretty Baby” and the subversion of expectations that we were given. I wasn’t as thrilled by “Don’t You Cry” (if you remember) just because it was less a subversion of expectations and more a tangle of unnecessary twists and turns. But I was willing to give “Every Last Lie” a chance because overall, I like the author. Unfortunately, this was less of a “Pretty Baby” experience and more of a “Don’t You Cry” experience.
Note: I am going to try avoiding spoilers here, but I can’t really critique it without saying at least a little bit of how scenarios kind of play out. So even though I’m avoiding specifics, you may want to skip this review if you want to read it.
“Every Little Lie” is told through alternating perspectives. The first is Clara’s perspective as she’s trying to piece together what happened to Nick, finding potential clues to suggest that maybe her husband didn’t die by accident and that perhaps he was murdered. The other is Nick’s perspective in the weeks leading up to that fateful car ride that sets the plot in motion. I will give this book credit where it is due, I really enjoyed this structure. It allowed for the reader to be able to see the clues that were presented in ways that Nick and Clara couldn’t see them, and I liked picking up on truths that one or the other weren’t privy to. It’s good when these books find fun and interesting ways to reveal the solution to the reader, and I definitely felt like Kubica did a bang up job in terms of pacing and reveal. It also made it for a fast read, and a pretty entertaining one in the moment.
But plotting aside, I didn’t really care for either Clara or Nick. I didn’t feel like I knew that much about Clara as a person outside of the trauma that she was experiencing and what it was doing to her mental state. Sure, that makes sense that we are only going to see that side of her in her chapters, but even in the chapters that Nick had before the car accident we only got a partial view, and it wasn’t a very telling one. Nick was a bit more interesting, seeing Clara’s views of him alongside the truths about him was a very good way to get to know him as a character. But ultimately, he wasn’t terribly interesting, and just fell into pretty familiar tropes of a desperate man with a lot of secrets. And then you add into that a lot of really odd red herrings that never felt satisfying, as they never led anywhere. I know that red herrings usually don’t, but there were so many things in this book that I wanted to have SOME sort of resolution, only to find that there is no resolution in sight for a good deal of them as we turn the last page. And some of them, I felt, really needed resolution for me to be satisfied with the story. I was left saying “Well what about ______?” too much to be happy or at least okay with how things ended up.
I still fully intend to keep giving Mary Kubica a shot, because there is a lot of potential there. And “Pretty Baby” was proof that I do like stuff that she has done, and can like it again. It’s just too bad that this one fell flat. I keep hope alive that the next will be better.
Rating 6: A quick and entertaining enough read, but none of the characters really grabbed me and I wasn’t terribly invested in how it all turned out. Especially when many problems were left unresolved.
Book: “First Date” (Fear Street #16) by R.L. Stine
Publishing Info: Pocket Books, January 1992
Where Did I Get This Book: The library!
Book Description:Dying for a Date
Chelsea Richards is shy, lonely, and looking for love. She would give anything to finally go on a date. Soon there are two new boys in town, and both ask her out.
Too bad one of them is a crazed killer. Poor Chelsea. Will her first date also be her last?
Had I Read It Before: No.
A NOTE: It was suggested to me that there may be some people who want to read the “Fear Street” series without being spoiled, but also want to know what my thoughts on this books are. Since these recaps are basically a rundown of the whole plot, I’m going to try and meet in the middle. I thought of putting a quick opinion at the front of these posts, but it kind of upset the flow of the narrative. SO, what I’m going to do instead is suggest that those who don’t want to be spoiled for a specific book scroll down down down to the end of this post, and look for my final paragraph, which I will put in bold lettering and which will give my final and non spoiler-y thoughts. Okay. On we go!
The Plot: We start our story at a random Make-Out Point, with a girl named Candy and a black haired leather jacket clad boy named Joe. Candy is stoked that they’re parking and making out together, and Joe is starting to feel smothered by her. She also reminds him of his mother, who he doesn’t remember fondly. He suggests they leave the car, but drops his wallet. Candy finds it, sees his license, and sees that it says his name isn’t Joe, it’s Lonnie. He says it’s a fake license. Then, after an inner monologue about how he’s actually twenty and how he’s feeling smothered, he leads her off and kills her. He then sees a sign for a town called Shadyside, and decides that sounds like his kind of town.
Meet Chelsea. Chelsea plays the sax, has recently moved to Shadyside with her parents, and has a very ‘dry witted’ mother who works in a nursing home with dear old Dad is running his new restaurant. Chelsea works there too, but feels lonely, and laments that she is short, pudgy, ugly, and too shy to get anyone to notice her. She lives on Fear Street, which is ‘creepy’. Her Mom tells her that she’ll adjust and make friends, and then goes off to work. Chelsea decides to go to the house of her only friend in town, Nina. But when she arrives at Nina’s house, Nina and her boyfriend Doug are already on the way out. Poor lonely Chelsea! To make matters worse, on the way home a car of rowdy (read: misogynistic) boys drives up and cat call her. Which then progresses to them grabbing at her, throwing a cigarette at her, and chasing her. She hides in some bushes until they go away, and she wishes she could meet a nice boy. I’m feeling very uncomfortable at this blatant display of rape culture. Ah, the 90s.
At school the next day a shy new boy named Will is seated next to Chelsea. She notices how cute he is with his black hair and dark eyes(?!), but once again laments how SHY she is and won’t talk to him. That evening while working at the coffee shop that night (diner, coffee shop, it’s interchangeable in this book), and daydreaming about Will, another boy with black hair and a leather jacket comes in, running into Chelsea. He sits down, and she thinks about how tough he looks (‘tough’ is the adjective used a few times on this page). They proceed to have an awkward conversation, he says his name is Tim Sparks (but everyone calls him Sparks), and he asks her out to a movie. Brazen, that Sparks. But before she can answer him fully, her Dad says that she needs to attend to restaurant business. Sparks looks PISSED AF, and storms out of the restaurant without his hamburger. Chelsea is kind of sad that he went away, even though she doesn’t know if she would have gone on a date with him because he’s so ‘dangerous’ looking. Then she thinks about Will again, hoping that HE will be her first date. But before she can pine for long, a group of young men enter the diner, try to rob the place, hit Chelsea’s Dad on the head with a lead pipe, and run off.
Poppy Richards is alive, but taken to the hospital where he is declared in ‘serious but stable’ condition. Mrs. Richards tells Chelsea to go home and wait, and to stave off a panic attack Chelsea invites Nina over. Nina comes by happily… but has boyfriend Doug in tow, which means all of her attention is on Doug and not on her friend who is scared to death for her Dad. Some friend you are, Nina! While Nina and Doug make out, Chelsea thinks about Sparks. He sure ran off fast when her Dad showed up. Was he casing the joint? Was he in on the robbery?
Meanwhile Joe/Lonnie/whoever is out for a walk, thinking about class struggle in Shadyside (those snoots in North Hills!) and how much he resents his mother for leaving him to his own devices with a drunken father while taking his sister instead. That’s admittedly messed up. Then he strangles a kitten. Goddammit. We’d gone so long without animal death.
So with her father in recovery for awhile, Chelsea is left to man the diner with Ernie the line cook as her only back up. And Ernie is ever around when he’s needed, let me tell you. As Chelsea daydreams about Will (who has smiled at her and said ‘good morning’ as well! Progress!), two toughs walk into the restaurant right before closing (at 7? odd hours) and start giving Chelsea a hard time. And where is Ernie??? WHO KNOWS. She thinks that they are going to rob the place, but they start sexually harassing her and asking her when she gets off work. Before they can do anything else, Sparks walks in and they back off, leaving. She pours him a cup of coffee, and says that they seemed scared of him, to which he replies ‘they should be’, and ‘it’s dangerous around here’. Now Chelsea is scared of him too (though honestly it seems to me he’s just really bad at flirting). Ernie FINALLY makes his presence known just in time to say he’s leaving, and Chelsea and Sparks are alone. She pours him another refill, and he hightails out of there. She’s both disappointed and relieved he’s gone (girl, get it together), and closes up BY HERSELF before going to see Dad at the hospital. Sparks goes home, laments not asking her out, and trashes his place in a rage.
At school the next day Chelsea and Nina are talking. Nina is mad at Doug for talking to Suki Thomas (YASSS SUKI!!!), and then randomly a giant dog runs past them and out the doors, never to be mentioned again. Chelsea tries to tell Nina about Sparks, but then Nina sees Doug and runs off to meet him. Bitch. Luckily, Will is there, and he and Chelsea start talking! He asks her if she wants to go for a walk, and she says yes. They go for a walk in the woods, and Chelsea is thrilled that she’s going for a walk with a boy, ALONE. He falls behind, and when she turns he’s wrapping a length of GRAY CORD IN HIS HAND?! He says that he just randomly found it, and then asks her to go on a SECRET date with him, and to not tell anybody about it. Though this should be setting off alarm bells, Chelsea is SO EXCITED!!!
Chelsea tells her Mom about her date, and Mom tells her that Dad is now in a semi private room at the hospital. Good news on both fronts. At the diner that night Sparks comes in, and they continue the Dance of the Awkward Flirts, in which Sparks says that he’s a drop out, she says that she’s in the band, and he asks if she plays the tuba. Which insults her because OBVIOUSLY that must mean he thinks she’s fat. When she asks him about work he gets defensive, lies about having an interview at the mill that has been closed for years, and then he asks her out that Saturday. That’s the night of her SUPER SECRET DATE, so she says no, and he leaves, looking angry. Dammit, Sparks. You are so emotionally stunted and so obviously NOT the killer.
It’s date night! Will is taking Chelsea to the movies, though not in Shadyside for some reason, but Waynesbridge. He says he’s had this car forever, but he doesn’t know how to work the defroster. When she asks him about it, he says it’s because he’s a klutz. RIGHT. He almost forgets his wallet in the car, and when she hands it to him he yanks it back in a suspicious manner. She forgets all about it though, and after the movie they go a parking on River Ridge. They can see over the town, and he suggests they go for a walk. He beckons her to the cliff to look at the view, but she balks and says she’s afraid of heights. So they go walking again, and he falls behind and PULLS THE CORD FROM HIS POCKET, READY TO STRANGLE HER. I give Stine credit for not trying to keep up the ‘is it Sparks or is it Will?’ mystery. Before he can strangle her, though, another car shows up. Thank God for horny teenagers. But then Chelsea suggests they go back to her house, as they will be alone. Not so shy anymore, eh Chelsea?
They get to her house and start to make out on the couch. Will pulls out the cord again but Chelsea declares she’s making hot cocoa and walks to the kitchen, blissfully unaware that her cold feet have saved her from death again. Will tries to sneak up behind her and strangle her, but then the doorbell rings!!! COCK BLOCKED AGAIN, JERK! Chelsea goes to the door and sees Nina there, sobbing over her boyfriend. For once it’s good that Nina thought only of herself, because Will gives up and runs out the backdoor.
The next day Will calls and Chelsea asks where he ran off to. He claims he called to her a ‘goodnight!’ before leaving, and asks her out for that evening. She says she can’t, but then suggests he meet her after her shift the next night. He says it’s a date. Then the doorbell rings, and Chelsea is face to face with an FBI agent named Martin. Agent Martin tells her that they are looking for a young man with curly black hair and a good build who may be new to the area. When she asks if he may be dangerous, and he says yes, she rats on Sparks, because OBVIOUSLY he’s the one who it has to be! She tells him everything about Sparks and he thanks her, telling her to be careful. At school the next day she and Nina talk about Will and Chelsea can’t wait to see him that night.
At the diner, Chelsea is worried that Sparks may come in, and is jumpy throughout her whole shift. As it gets close to closing, Ernie disappears AGAIN, and Sparks comes in right at the last minute. Drunk as a skunk, and unfortunately he’s an aggressive drunk who keeps asking her to come here. She freaks and runs for the kitchen, and Sparks follows trying to tell her he was just joking. He manages to burn his hand pretty badly on the stove, and while he’s writhing in pain Chelsea calls Agent Martin and asks if he will come and also send an ambulance. After Sparks is taken away, Chelsea is relieved to see that Will has finally arrived.
They got back to her house, and snuggle on the couch. Chelsea admits that she didn’t keep their date a secret, and that she told Nina all about it. That’s a big wrench in Will’s plan!!! But no matter, he’ll just kill them both. He tells Chelsea to invite Nina over RIGHT NOW so he can meet her, and Chelsea does so straight away. Nina is game. But then the phone rings, and it’s Agent Martin telling Chelsea that Sparks isn’t the guy that they are looking for…. and Chelsea FINALLY puts two and two together. WILL IS THE ONE THEY’RE LOOKING FOR! She tells Martin that he’s in the house with her, and he tells her to just get out and go. She starts to, but remembers that Nina’s coming over! She runs out hoping to intercept Nina or the FBI, but unfortunately she intercepts Will. She tells him she knows who he is, and he attacks her with the cord, wrapping it around her neck until she struggles no more. He assumes she’s dead, and remembers that Nina is coming too, she he drags Chelsea’s body into the house and waits. When Nina arrives he makes small talk, and then attacks her with the cord. He chases her into the kitchen when she pulls free, and hits her with a vase. BEfore he can deal any fatal blows, he gets yanked back, and sees that CHELSEA IS THERE! He has another ‘BUT I KILLED YOU’ moment that Stine and Verhoeven alike are so fond of, and Chelsea fights him off long enough for the FBI to show up and arrest him. Chelsea explains that she plays the saxophone, and can hold her breath for a looooong time.
Chelsea goes to visit poor Sparks in the hospital. His hand is pretty messed up but he’s expected to make a full recovery. After some awkward apologies on both ends, Sparks asks her out on a date. And she says “It’s bound to be better than my FIRST date!”
I mean, probably, but that’s a low bar, Chelsea. (source)
Body Count: 2. Poor Candy right out the gate and that poor sweet kitten. And probably countless other girls off page.
Romance Rating: Uh, 1. Because Will/Joe/Lonnie/Whoever was trying to kill Chelsea the whole time and Sparks is kind of a prick.
Bonkers Rating: 4. The random robbery at the beginning was pretty crazy and unexpected, I suppose, but otherwise it wasn’t very shocking.
Fear Street Relevance: 5. Chelsea lives on Fear Street and we once again get some references to what a kooky place it is. But Will isn’t even from Shadyside, much less Fear Street!
Silliest End of Chapter Cliffhanger:
“She gasped when she saw an enormous, hulking man in a dark trench coat on her stoop. His face was nearly pressed against the glass of the storm door, staring down at her with the coldest eyes she had ever seen.”
… And then it’s the pretty decent and sweet Agent Martin. The only guy we can fully trust in this book who isn’t incapacitated.
That’s So Dated! Moments: Sadly, this was one of the updated “Fear Street” books, and because of that the really dated things were taken out and replaced with new things (a movie starring Will Ferrell… but also the Quaid Brothers, so huh?). But there was one thing: a reference to watching music videos on MTV. May they rest in peace, those music videos.
Best Quote:
“‘Frankly your looks are great. It’s your personality I’m not crazy about,’ her mother said, doing her impression of a stand-up comic.”
DAMN, Mrs. Richards!!
Conclusion: “First Date” was pretty lame and predictable, though some of the characters I had a soft spot for. Up next is “The Best Friend”.
Book Description: One man’s thrilling journey through an enchanted world to find his wife, who has disappeared after seemingly committing an unforgiveable act of violence, from the award-winning author of the The Devil in Silver and Big Machine. Apollo Kagwa has had strange dreams that have haunted him since childhood. An antiquarian book dealer with a business called Improbabilia, he is just beginning to settle into his new life as a committed and involved father, unlike his own father who abandoned him, when his wife Emma begins acting strange. Disconnected and uninterested in their new baby boy, Emma at first seems to be exhibiting all the signs of post-partum depression, but it quickly becomes clear that her troubles go far beyond that. Before Apollo can do anything to help, Emma commits a horrific act—beyond any parent’s comprehension—and vanishes, seemingly into thin air.
Thus begins Apollo’s odyssey through a world he only thought he understood to find a wife and child who are nothing like he’d imagined. His quest begins when he meets a mysterious stranger who claims to have information about Emma’s whereabouts. Apollo then begins a journey that takes him to a forgotten island in the East River of New York City, a graveyard full of secrets, a forest in Queens where immigrant legends still live, and finally back to a place he thought he had lost forever. This dizzying tale is ultimately a story about family and the unfathomable secrets of the people we love.
Review: Victor LaValle is one of our most under-appreciated dark fantasy/horror writers today, and I say this with conviction. Everything I have read by him I have really enjoyed. I was sufficiently creeped out by “The Devil in Silver” and deeply fascinated by his Lovecraft deconstruction “The Ballad of Black Tom”. And now I come to his newest book, “The Changeling”. Changelings, as I’m sure you may know, were a superstition that people back in the day had, in which a fairy or other kind of creature would kidnap a child and leave an imposter, or ‘changeling’, in it’s place. This concept no doubt led to a lot of abuse, cruelty, and murder towards children over the years, specifically those with developmental disabilities. Nowadays we just think of them as folklore, seen in books like “Outside Over There”, or as metaphors like in the movie “The Changeling” with Angelina Jolie. But LaValle has taken the changeling myth and given it a new, dark story that I deeply enjoyed.
One of the many things I liked about “The Changeling” is that it really kept me guessing as I read it. While it’s true that at the end of the day I knew that yes, this HAD to have supernatural elements to it, it also made me think about the very real issue of post-partum depression and the pressure on new parents, mothers in particular, to be great at it right from the start. If this book had been about an untreated mental illness and the tragedies that can happen because of it, LaValle would have told a sensitive and thoughtful story about tragedies that we just don’t like to talk about or acknowledge. Even though it was fantasy, so many elements of it felt incredibly real and plausible, from the horrors of modern technology making us less safe than we can imagine, to the struggles new parents face from family, society, and themselves. He also does a great job incorporating themes of race and gender into this story, with racism and misogyny being underlying and indirect villains towards Apollo and Emma alike. So many real world horrors come into this book and yet all have a dreamy sort of air about them, and it left me feeling under a spell as well as on edge.
There is also a lovely theme in this book that has to do with books and storytelling. Apollo is not only a book dealer, he is greatly attached to a copy of the book “Outside Over There”, one of the few things that his father left for him before he up and vanished. Apollo’s love for this book about a girl who needs to save her baby sister from those that stole her away may seem a bit on the nose for the story, but the other themes of paternal abandonment and parental failure and anxiety are also present. Apollo’s father wasn’t there for him, much like Ida’s father is away. Apollo’s love for his child blinds him when things may not be what they seem, just as Ida’s love for her sister blinded her. Parental failings and anxieties both in “Outside Over There” and “The Changeling” dance between the pages, as Ida has to grow up fast when her mother isn’t there for her emotionally and Apollo has to grow up fast when his mother can’t be there for him physically. Even New York becomes a dreamy fairy world you can’t quite trust, just like the world of Outside Over there, which Ida falls into when she starts her journey going out the window the wrong way. And there are fair reminders in this book that trolls are no longer just mystical creatures that want to eat up children, but are very real dangers in a world where your life is online for the entire world to see. That kind of felt heavy-handed at times, but overall it was just another clever way to update our fairy tale for an NYC setting.
I think that if I had a quibble with it, it would be that it was mostly from a male point of view. I would have liked to have seen some of Emma’s journey as well. I understand that revealing her secrets was another subversion of fairy tales and the roles that women are held to (damsels or witches), but I think that her own path would have been highly enjoyable to read.
A haunting and breathtaking story, “The Changeling” is dark and sad, but also hopeful and vibrant. If you want a modern and dark fairy tale, this book should be one that you put on your ‘to read’ list.
Rating 8: A complex and dark fairy tale, “The Changeling” is a beautiful and striking work of dark fantasy/horror with a modern twist and a relevant commentary.
Where Did I Get This Book: An ARC from the publisher at ALA.
Book Description:The story of a young woman whose diabolical smarts are her ticket into a charmed life. But how many times can someone reinvent themselves? You be the judge.
Imogen is a runaway heiress, an orphan, a cook, and a cheat. Jule is a fighter, a social chameleon, and an athlete. An intense friendship. A disappearance. A murder, or maybe two. A bad romance, or maybe three. Blunt objects, disguises, blood, and chocolate. The American dream, superheroes, spies, and villains. A girl who refuses to give people what they want from her. A girl who refuses to be the person she once was.
Review: I mentioned a book on this blog this summer called “The Talented Mr. Ripley”. It’s a deeply unsettling thriller about a man named Tom Ripley who befriends a wealthy playboy, only to kill him and take on his identity. It’s super messed up and a very fun read, and I think that many of the more recent psychopaths as protagonists characters owe a lot to Patricia Highsmith, who created the character. So when I started to read “Genuine Fraud” by E. Lockhart, it didn’t take long for me to pick up on the fact that this book is a genderbent version of that story. Throw in a little bit of timeline tweaking that starts at the end for good measure, and you have the newest novel from the author of “We Were Liars”, with more coastal scenes and protagonists that you aren’t sure that you can really trust.
I do like it when YA authors experiment with structure and plotting, so to see that it started at the end was a great way to start this book. We start with Jule, who has taken on the identity of her best friend Imogen, a flighty heiress who was as aimless as she was charming. We don’t know what happened to Imogen, only that she is dead, and Jule is pretending to be her. Just as it seems she’s about to be arrested for some sort of crime (fraud? something worse?), we go backwards in time. And then we go further backwards. As we go back more and more, the pieces start to come into place, not only about who Jule is, who Imogen was, how they found each other, and how everything went wrong… plus the collateral damage along the way. We kind of get a sense for Jule and who she is, but she is definitely the definition of unreliable. Things that are said about her may not be the truth, and certainly things she tells other people probably aren’t. The backwards structure was a really neat way to get some of the facts, foreshadowing to events that happened before the moment that you are reading about. You forge thoughts and attitudes towards characters, but then as you shift backwards through the story your attitude changes and you see them in completely new ways. The more I see this device, the more I come to appreciate it, to be sure. It also made it so that I had a hard time putting this book down, needing to take any down time to keep going to find out what happened. It was such a fast and engrossing read that I consumed most of it in one sitting, and then stayed up probably far too late, battling sleep, just to see how it all turned out. There is no denying that the pacing and the little smattering of clues throughout the pages made this a very fun read.
But the problem that I had with it is that it is most certainly borrowing a lot from “The Talented Mr. Ripley”. I’m sure that it’s meant to be an homage to this classic story of obsessive friendship, identity theft, and murder, but there were a number of parallels that felt more like lifting plot points instead of honoring them. The close friend who has always been suspicious of the interloper. The lover who is being played like a harp. The parent who reaches out because their child has ditched responsibility in favor of carelessness. An incident in a boat with an OAR (my God, this basically played out the same way in “Ripley” as it did here). The list goes on. For the target audience, that isn’t going to really make much of a difference. For them Imogen won’t be Dickie Greenleaf and Jule won’t be Tom Ripley, but in my mind I couldn’t separate the characters in this book from the ones that they appear to be modeled after. I think that perhaps if it had been made a bit more clear that this was, in fact, a genderbent retelling with a different structure I would have been more thrilled by it, but instead it was frustrating because I would always be thinking ‘well that was just what Highsmith did’.
All that said, it’s undeniable that “Genuine Fraud” was an entertaining read. Definitely the kind of book that will keep you guessing and keep you completely obsessed with it. I would be curious to see if Lockhart will be following it up with other stories about Jule. After all, since this is an homage to Tom Ripley, it’s important to note that he had a whole series dedicated to him and his exploits. I’d probably read more about Jule, just as I’ve always meant to with regards to Tom Ripley.
Rating 6: An addictive thriller that I ate up quickly. However, it feels less like an homage to “The Talented Mr. Ripley” and more like a copy in some ways.
Book: “Sing, Unburied, Sing” by Jesmyn Ward
Book: “The Town Built on Sorrow” by David Oppegaard
Book: “There’s Someone Inside Your House” by Stephanie Perkins
Book: “The Best Friend” (Fear Street #17) by R.L. Stine
Book: “DC Bombshells (Vol.4): Queens” by Marguerite Bennett, Laura Braga (Ill.), Mirka Andolfo (Ill.), and Marguerite Sauvage (Ill.)
Book: “The Last Days of Jack Sparks” by Jason Arnopp
Book: “Every Last Lie” by Mary Kubica
Book: “First Date” (Fear Street #16) by R.L. Stine
Book: “The Changeling” by Victor LaValle
Book: “Genuine Fraud” by E. Lockhart
The Library Ladies 