Where Did I Get this Book: e-ARC from the Edelweiss
Book Description: Nahri has never believed in magic. Certainly, she has power; on the streets of 18th century Cairo, she’s a con woman of unsurpassed talent. But she knows better than anyone that the trade she uses to get by—palm readings, zars, healings—are all tricks, sleights of hand, learned skills; a means to the delightful end of swindling Ottoman nobles.
But when Nahri accidentally summons an equally sly, darkly mysterious djinn warrior to her side during one of her cons, she’s forced to accept that the magical world she thought only existed in childhood stories is real. For the warrior tells her a new tale: across hot, windswept sands teeming with creatures of fire, and rivers where the mythical marid sleep; past ruins of once-magnificent human metropolises, and mountains where the circling hawks are not what they seem, lies Daevabad, the legendary city of brass–a city to which Nahri is irrevocably bound.
In that city, behind gilded brass walls laced with enchantments, behind the six gates of the six djinn tribes, old resentments are simmering. And when Nahri decides to enter this world, she learns that true power is fierce and brutal. That magic cannot shield her from the dangerous web of court politics. That even the cleverest of schemes can have deadly consequences.
After all, there is a reason they say be careful what you wish for . . .
Review: In addition to my e-galley, I nabbed a copy of this while Kate and I were sneaking around early exploring the exhibit hall. I really knew nothing about it beyond the fact that the cover was beautiful, and it had a blurb that referenced ‘The Golem and the Jinni,” which is a historical fantasy novel from a few years ago that I absolutely adored. So I went into this one with practically no expectations, and wow. I mean…wow. S. A. Chakraborty is a new author to sit up and pay attention to!
First off, the description above is a bit misleading. Yes, we do follow the story of Nahri, a street con woman who finds herself to have a mystical heritage and one that is paramount to the future of a vast and complicated fantastical world where djinn, marids, and many, many others roam and war with each other. However, chapters alternate between her adventures and those of Ali, a young, second son of Ghallan, the current ruler of Daevabad. Ali has been trained as a warrior to serve as a general, essentially, for his older brother when he takes over. But Ali is also a deeply religious young man, and when he looks at his family’s dealings with the shafit (half human, half djinn), he sees only oppression and wrong doings.
There is so much to praise about this book. It is atmospheric, bringing to life large swaths of the Middle East. We travel from the streets of ancient Cairo, to the foothills of what is likely Persia, across desserts and great rivers, and finally, into a fully-realized magical realm that seamlessly blends creative magical elements (like bizarre illnesses, strange creatures, and fantastical architecture) alongside traditional, historic middle eastern touches. And Chakraborty has peopled this world with an equally diverse and well-drawn cast of characters. Yes, there are magical beasts, liked winged lions. But there are also various types of humanoid-beings. The djinn are a fire people. There are the rumored Marid, a water people. And, the most powerful of all, a people of the air. Among these, roam the shafit, whose complicated history with the djinn sits at the heart of this story.
This history is perhaps one of the most impressive parts of the story. Not only is it complicated enough that I was still fitting pieces together towards the end of the book (in this case, this is a compliment, as it was complicated for important reasons, not due to poor writing, which is often the case behind lasting confusion), but the author successfully challenges readers at every step to evaluate and re-evalutate and AGAIN re-evalutate who are the heroes and villains in each version of history we hear. And the best part: this is never made clear. I love this nuanced take on storytelling, as I feel it reads the most honest to true history. The stories are told by the winners, and often the winners have contributed their own atrocities to succeed in the first place. And in this book’s case, we have such a long history presented, that the winners of one historic conflict, are the losers of the next. One side is oppressed at one point, only to oppress the other at the next, while that oppressed group now holds the keys to peace going forward. There are no simple “good guys” and “bad guys” in this story. And by the end, I’m firmly rooting for three different characters who all fall on one extreme, the middle, and the other extreme of a very complicated spectrum.
And this brings me to my last point. All of this history and world-building is supported by an amazingly strong cast of characters. To support this kind of ongoing conflict that is constantly questioning the morality of one group’s choices or the other, you must have sympathetic and interesting characters to make you care. Nahri is the exact type of heroine I love. She’s well-rounded, has a distinct personality, is sassy, but also knows when to bend, and, importantly, she is flawed. Ali, the second protagonist, is also incredibly strong. He had more work to do as he took me by surprise, but I found myself equally enjoying his earnest and often naive view of the world he lives in and the role he is expected to play. And then lastly, we have Dara, a djinn warrior of legend who befriends and protects Nahri. Even by the end of the story, we’re not sure who exactly this character is. But the sweet romance that begins to develop between him and Nahri is the exact sort of slow burn love story that I like, and I’m curious to see what will happen with this particular character and plot line moving forward.
I honestly can’t recommend this book enough. As I said, I picked this up because it sounded like “The Golem and the Jinni.” Turns out, I loved it even more than that one. For those looking for a smart, complicated, fantasy novel set in a unique environment, definitely check out “The City of Brass.” Now I’ll just frantically stare down the calendar while I wait for the sequel!
Rating 10: The best kind of surprise. I honestly have zero criticisms for this book, and that’s a feat on its own!
Book Description:We could blame everything that happened on Marco. He was the one who heard about the downed submarine. He was the one who thought we should check it out. And everyone knows that if Marco’s up to a challenge, I’m definitely there.
Everything was going fine. Until the explosion. An explosion that blows us millions of years back in time. Back to the age of dinosaurs. Now Tobias, Cassie, Marco, Ax, Jake and I are fighting for our lives with every step we take. But that’s not our biggest problem. Our biggest problem is we have no idea how to get back to our own time ..
Narrator: Everyone!
Plot: I’ve been looking forward to this one! I have very clear memories of reading (and re-reading!) it as a kid and always having a blast. I mean, dinosaurs, what’s not to love?
As I started putting together this review, I noticed that the plot description above is written from Rachel’s perspective. Kind of an interesting choice. Often the default main character is Jake, and, as we will soon learn, Tobias would make the most sense as a primary character for this book specifically. But we have Rachel here. Don’t know if that means anything, but worth noting!
As the plot describes, the Animorphs here about a nuclear sub sinking off their local coastline. As dolphins they help the divers locate the sub, but as they are retreating, it suddenly goes off and blows them all into unconsciousness. When they wake up, they begin to notice some strange things. It was stormy originally, and now it’s bright sunshine. The water is more clear, even after a bomb going off? And…there’s a massive volcano on the shoreline. All of this falls to the background when a gigantic sea creature shows up with obvious plans to eat them. And it succeeds, managing to gobble down Rachel and Tobias before the others can react. The rest of the manages to escape and make it to land. At this point in the book, the story lines split between the main group (Jake, Cassie, Marco and Ax) and Tobias and Rachel (who obviously manage to escape by Rachel’s quick thinking to morph a grizzly and literally tear her way out).
Jake, Cassie, Marco, and Ax all grieve the loss of Rachel and Tobias. It hits Cassie the hardest, feeling that she’s lost her best friend. But they have bigger problems when they notice a wide trail cut through the forest with some massive footprints along with it. The whole mystery is solved once and for all when a T-Rex shows up and chases them. Marco almost gets eaten and is only saved by Ax managing to slash up the T-Rex when it was distracted and taking it down. Cassie goes into survival mode at this point, focusing on the practicalities of their situation. She instructs the others to cut shoes for themselves using the T-Rex hide and to make a fire to cook some of the meat for them to eat. They camp out for the night, scared and still grieving Rachel and Tobias. The fact that they have discovered where, and when, they are and realized that the blast must have opened a Sario Rip that threw them to the past is of little comfort.
Meanwhile, after the injured sea monster beached itself, allowing Rachel and Tobias to escape to land, the two are wandering around looking for the others. Tobias’s wing was broken when he was swallowed and for some reason morphing doesn’t heal it as it usually would. But he does have all the dino knowledge and is able to name the sea creatures and figure out that they are in the late Cretaceous period. (He read about and played with dinosaurs when he stayed with his drunk uncle who would yell at him if he was noticed). Rachel’s feet get very cut up by walking barefoot, but in good old Rachel fashion, she doesn’t complain. They spot smoke from a fire (the other Animorphs’ fire) and start heading towards it, only to be surrounded by a group of pack-hunting dinosaurs called (according to Tobias) Deinonychus. So, raptors, essentially.
Tobias is able to quickly understand these other predators’ plan of attack and tells Rachel to head for the forest where the raptors will lose their visuals on each other. Then he has her throw him up in a tree, run, and morph grizzly. He manages to drop onto a raptor that passes beneath him and acquire it. Then, getting lost in the morph, he runs to join the pack that has now surrounded grizzly!Rachel. He attacks Rachel and kills the raptor leader before coming to himself. He manages to force another raptor to allow Rachel to acquire it and then they both escape. Rachel is grumpy and not pleased at all by the fact that Tobias attacked her. They wander through the night.
Jake, Marco, Cassie, and Ax sleep through the night in shifts. After it gets dark, they notice a huge comet in the sky. Using his science knowledge, Ax estimates that the comet will get very close, but won’t hit Earth. In the early morning, they see a flash of light on the horizon, but before they can think much about it, they get caught in a stampede of long-neck herbivores being chased by yet another T-Rex. This time Jake almost gets eaten, ending up partially swallowed and only managing to escape by morphing tiger and slashing up its throat from inside. This injures the T-Rex enough that they are all able to sneak up on it and acquire it one by one. Ax then informs them that the flash of light was artificial, and they wander towards it. They come across a massive ravine and large valley that shocks them with its contents: a small alien civilization! They morph bird and fly down to check it out.
Meanwhile, Rachel and Tobias run into yet another dinosaur predators, a Spinosaurus. It tries to attack them, but as they go to fight back, an alien creature intercedes, stuns the dinosaur, and tells them that they can’t hurt it as it, and everything on this planet, belongs to them. The alien isn’t too nice, so Rachel attacks it in her raptor morph only to have it disintegrate essentially. It turns out that the alien is made up entirely of ants. Its evil ant alien friends show up in a ship and start shooting at Rachel and Tobias. They flee and end up jumping off the same ravine cliff that the others are now circling as birds. Tobias manages to snag the wings of a passing flying dinosaur and use it as a living hang glider, slowing his and Rachel’s decent. They land on a force field that is projected above the alien city. The bird-morphed others happily reunite with Rachel and Tobias.
Their happy little reunion is interrupted by the strange crab-like aliens who live in the city in the valley. They call themselves the Mercora, and through them the Animorphs learn about what exactly is going on. The Mercora had recently settled on this planet after fleeing their own which was destroyed. The ant-aliens that Rachel and Tobias ran into are a scavenger race called the Nesk that dislike all other sentient species and are trying to wipe out the Mercora. At the present, the two species are at a standoff. The Mercora are a very peaceful race, but they do know the Nesk have powerful weaponry, so the Animorphs devise a plan to sneak into the Nesk base as dinosaurs and steal a bomb to set off that would hopefully close the Sario Rip and jump them back to their time.
The team set off the next morning. Tobias and Rachel morph their raptors, and the rest go T-Rex. Cassie struggles getting the morph under control and kills a triceratops. She has a bit of a break down, but gets it together just in time. They manage to get the bomb, but not without alerting the Nesk who chase after them. They only barely escape when the Mercora show up in a ship and whisk them back to the city. The Nesk abruptly leave the planet; they suspect this is because they are intimidated by thew “new powerful friends” of the Mercora. But they aren’t willing to let the Mercora win. Tobias sees a flash of light go off near the comet and knows what has happened. The Nesk have blown the comet closer to Earth and it will now hit in a day or so, exactly on the Mercora city. The Mercora ask the Animorphs for the bomb they stole so they can fly it up and repel the asteroid. The group votes. Rachel and Marco are against it and the others are for it (though Tobias whispers something to Ax, and the two of them don’t argue much about the whole thing, just quietly agree).
After the Mercora have left with the bomb, Tobias confesses that he had Ax rig the bomb not to blow. Jake and Cassie are furious, but Tobias explains that this has to happen for humanity to exist. The time period is right and there is no evidence of the Mercora people, so the asteroid that hit had to have hit the city. Ergo, it is this asteroid and it has to happen. They fly through the night and then switch to dolphin and swim out to see right before it hits. They all expect to either die immediately or have to suffer through the slow death of the planet.
Instead, the blast closes the Sario Rip and the group fast forwards through time, seeing the dinosaurs die off and humans evolve. They witness first hand the vast difference in time spent on Earth: the dinosaurs were around for 140 million years, and humans have been there for less than 1 million. Upon return, none of them have their dinosaur morphs and more.
Our Fearless Leader: Jake’s big moment comes when he’s yet another member of the team that almost/partially gets eaten by a dinosaur and he manages to take down the T-Rex, thus allowing them all to acquire this morph. Ax also spends some time in one of his chapters admiring Jake’s leadership abilities, specifically his knowledge that making no decision when presented with tough choices is the same as making a decision itself. Towards the end of the book, Jake also acknowledges a sense of gratitude for Tobias making the decision to rig the bomb not to explode. He’s angry at him, but knows that Tobias has saved him from having to be angry at himself. Already in the series we have seen how heavily these tough choices are weighing on him, so this is at least one that he doesn’t need to carry. But I will ding him for not putting 2 and 2 together in the first place and being one of the only two members of the group to vote to give over the bomb sincerely. Yes, it’s a tough choice, but the pieces aren’t that hard to put together and Cassie isn’t known for her clear thinking on things like this.
Xena, Warrior Princess: Again, poor Rachel always seems to take a beating in these Megamorph stories. She gets eaten alive, has to chew her way out, gets her feet torn to shreds repeatedly, and then has her own quasi-boyfriend attack her when he’s in morph. With all the time devoted to Rachel and Tobias’s adventures, we really start to see how these two work together. Rachel, of course, drives forward with action, while Tobias is more prone to thinking things through. What makes the difference, however, is that Tobias admires Rachel’s drive, whereas many of the others see it more as a liability. The two work well together.
Also when they’re fleeing the Nesk base and it’s looking bad, Rachel turns back to help the others. She’s in one of the smaller morphs, but her reasoning is this:
<Exactly,> I agreed grimly. <Maybe if they’re shooting at me, one of the others will get away.>
This is a perfect example of the best side of Rachel’s “go for it attitude.” It’s not all gusto; much of the time it’s a legitimate desire to save others at the expense of her own safety.
A Hawk’s Life: I have to think that Applegate was trying to make things up to poor Tobias who was literally written off the page as sleeping through most of the action in the first Megamorphs book. Here, he really comes into his own. Not only does he know the most about the time period and the dinosaurs in it, but he also proves to be the one best able to adapt to and understand his new circumstances. He quickly evaluates the hunting style of the raptors that come after him and Rachel and is able to think of an effective counter plan. And then, most importantly, he’s the first one to really put together the pieces of where things are likely heading, even before they attack the Nesk and they blow the comet towards Earth. He’s dropping warnings everywhere, even making sure to warn the others not to tell the Mercora that they’re from future Earth when they first meet them. And he steps up in the most major way when he puts into motion the plan to rig the bomb not to explode. He knows the others will be angry, and he knows that he is single-handedly dooming an entire species to die. I’ve said it before, but as the series progresses, and especially as Jake begins to stagger under the weight of leadership, Tobias is a natural second choice. In some ways, I think he would have been the strongest leader from the beginning. Jake’s connection to Cassie does lead him down some questionable paths at times, where as Tobias is almost always thinking clearly and practically, without losing his own empathy.
Peace, Love, and Animals: After Tobias, Cassie also adapts best to the new world. She knows the most about surviving in the wild and is the one that ends up mostly leading the second group of characters. Jake steps back when it’s clear that Cassie knows a lot more about the necessities like making fire and finding food. She is also the character to be most upset by the loss of Rachel and Tobias. Jake and Marco refer to this in their chapters, but at every point, Cassie is feeling the loss most keenly. This just reinforces my view that Cassie is at her best when her character is focused on her friendship with Rachel. This relationship reads true and has a lot of depth. Plus, when they reunite, we get this fun moment:
We were all treated to the utterly bizarre sight of an osprey attempting to hug a dinosaur.
When she breaks down after killing the triceratops, she and Marco get into quite a spat about violence, humanity, and survival. They both take it pretty far. Marco doesn’t hold back, at one point scornfully telling Cassie to “get over it.” And Cassie’s reasoning is also questionable under close evaluation. She says some good things about humanity and our ability to look beyond simple survival. But as a nature lover, I’m always put off by her inability to understand, and more importantly, respect the circle of life and all of that. She too regularly demonizes any/all killing, even that of animals who do it to stay alive. I still haven’t forgiven her for getting mad at Tobias for eating the baby skunks. #NeverForgive #NeverForget
Not surprisingly, she’s also one of the two who votes for giving away the bomb. But she also recognizes what Tobias has done when he confesses his plan. She thanks him even, but then says she’s not sure if she was sincere or sarcastic and that she’s not sure he knew either. Which, why Cassie?? Why to be a jerk to someone who saved you from having to make a tough call on your own.
The Comic Relief: Marco doesn’t have many big moments in this book. He makes his requisite number of jokes, and then probably most notably gets into that argument with Cassie. His stark pragmatism just doesn’t mesh with her more empathetic approach to life. He and Rachel are also firmly on the same side about not handing over the bomb to the Mercora. Seriously, these two. Is there ever a major decision that they’re not on the same side of? Even Tobias and Rachel have found themselves on opposite sides (recently the argument re: using the oatmeal against the Yeerks, but even there Rachel and Marco were on the same side). I think Marco and Ax get the fewest chapters in this book. But Marco had a lot of action in the first Megamorphs, so maybe that’s just fair.
E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax has some pretty big moments, the first of which is taking down the T-Rex single-handedly. But immediately afterwards, he is very emphatic, even scared, when informing the others that this was just a fluke, that they shouldn’t expect him to be able to do it again. He also becomes increasingly exasperated with their expectation that he should know every alien species in the universe. The Nesk and the Mercora are millions of years ahead of the Andalites even, so how could he know? I have to imagine that it’s his close friendship with Tobias that makes him trust his judgement enough to go against Jake’s decision and rig the bomb. For someone who is so ruled by authority figures, this is a pretty major move that is never really acknowledged in the book.
Best (?) Body Horror Moment: Just the sheer volume of swallowed alive experiences in this book! Rachel and Tobias are the only ones to go full hog, as it were, and end up in the stomach, so the descriptions of being burned by the stomach acid and crushed by the massive stomach stones of the dinosaur are pretty had with this one. But Jake also ends up halfway down a T-Rex throat and essentially gets vomited back up. And Marco also ends up in a T-Rex mouth at one point, though he has the best (if you can even ever say that about something like this) go of it, never making it further than between the teeth.
Couples Watch!: Obviously, we get a lot of good Tobias/Rachel action with the two of them paired off for much of the book. Rachel doesn’t comment on it much, but Tobias makes a couple of mental remarks about his admiration for Rachel, both her perseverance when she’s getting cut up by the saw glass and has a hawk clawing up her shoulder, and the fact that she manages to look great while doing it.
Cassie and Jake don’t have much. When they first discover the Mercora city, Cassie wants to morph bird and explore it on her own because she doesn’t want to lose…anyone else. Marco rightly calls her on the fact that she’s probably a bit less concerned about him and Ax.
If Only Visser Three had Mustache to Twirl: Visser Three isn’t even in this book! It’s kind of strange, but also a welcome change up from the usual where he always appears in the last third of every story. Instead, the villains of this are the Nesk (yes, they run away from more T-Rexes than anything, but they’re just doing their due predator diligence). It’s kind of funny that the Nesk end up being ants. It’s like K.A. Applegate was just trying to think of the worst thing and, obviously, ants!
Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: Obviously the poor Mercora have a rough time of it. As a people, they seemed very decent, which just underscores how hard the decision is to let them die. But, bizarrely, it’s the very last scene when we’re flash-forwarding and the team witness the last T-Rex wandering, thin and alone, and then finally falling down that gets me the most. One of the Animorphs even mention that even though they were attacked repeatedly by T-Rexes, they were most sad for these amazing creatures that were so confident in themselves and their place on Earth. I don’t know why, but it was making me tear up. I think I have too clear an image of all of this from that one Fantasia skit about the dinosaurs.
What a Terrible Plan, Guys!: Well, again, Tobias has 2 for 2, with the best plans! (This one, and his well-thought out plan to save the Hork Bajir back in his own book). There aren’t too many out and out “terrible” plans though. I disagree with Cassie and Jake’s vote and their lack of foresight on that one, but it’s not a bad plan in and of itself. Probably the worst plan is why they all didn’t think of trying to get some dinosaur morphs earlier in the book. That, and why they didn’t just spend most of their time in bird morph which would have been an easy way to avoid most of the bad dinosaur interactions.
<Yeah. Right.> I waited for him to laugh at his own joke. Only he didn’t laugh. <Dinosaurs?>
<Yeah. Dinosaurs.>
<Oh, man. Tobias, we are gonna need some better morphs.>
Yes, Rachel! Now why didn’t you all just do this??
Favorite Quote:
Best summation of the craziness of their lives:
<Okay, everyone just keep moving like we’re dinosaurs.>
<Which thanks to the fact that our lives are totally, completely INSANE, we actually are,”> Marco said.
Scorecard: Yeerks 4, Animorphs 9
No score change! This is the first book where the Yeerks aren’t even around!
Rating: I liked this Megamorphs book better than the first. I mean, you really can’t go wrong by adding dinosaurs. It’s also a refreshing change to not have the Yeerks and Visser Three involved. Plus the morality questions raised in this book, and the fact that time travel like this always opens up its own can of worms. Did they always go back in time and do this and that’s why humanity existed? I also liked the fact that the group was split up in more interesting combinations this time around. Not having Rachel wandering around with amnesia and Tobias literally sleeping the whole time are pretty big improvements on their won. Not the best Megamorphs, from what I can remember, but definitely not the worst!
Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all! But I’ll give a one sentence conclusion and you can take from that what you will!
Book: “Girls Made of Snow and Glass” by Melissa Bashardoust
Publishing Info: Flatiron Books, September 2015
Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from ALA 2017
Book Description: At sixteen, Mina’s mother is dead, her magician father is vicious, and her silent heart has never beat with love for anyone—has never beat at all, in fact, but she’d always thought that fact normal. She never guessed that her father cut out her heart and replaced it with one of glass. When she moves to Whitespring Castle and sees its king for the first time, Mina forms a plan: win the king’s heart with her beauty, become queen, and finally know love. The only catch is that she’ll have to become a stepmother.
Fifteen-year-old Lynet looks just like her late mother, and one day she discovers why: a magician created her out of snow in the dead queen’s image, at her father’s order. But despite being the dead queen made flesh, Lynet would rather be like her fierce and regal stepmother, Mina. She gets her wish when her father makes Lynet queen of the southern territories, displacing Mina. Now Mina is starting to look at Lynet with something like hatred, and Lynet must decide what to do—and who to be—to win back the only mother she’s ever known…or else defeat her once and for all.
Review: “Snow White” fairytale re-tellings have had quite the resurgence it seems over the last few years. And many of them, like “Girls Made of Snow and Glass,” are attempting to re-imagine this classic tale into something new and different. Not an easy feat. To add to this, this novel was also marketed as somehow connected (based on??) the smash Disney hit “Frozen,” as well. Which in turn was based on yet another fairytale, “The Snow Queen.” In all honesty, I picked this one up with a bit of trepidation, worrying that all the elements listed above, plus the fact that I knew it had LBGT elements, would combine into what could only be described as a hot mess. But I’m not to proud to admit when I’m wrong, and while I would consider this one a home run, it did manage to pull all the elements it committed to.
The story follows to young women: Mina, a young woman without a heart, who never the less seeks out love, hoping to find it in a King with a young daughter. The daughter, Lynet, is our second main character, a young woman created in the image of her own dead mother. Chapters alternate between these two main characters, and while each of their stories plays out in different manners, what’s at the heart of their struggles is the same: the meaning of family, what is love, and how they, as women, must make hard choices in order to navigate the world in which they live.
Honestly, in many ways, this book took the best advantage of the opportunities to respond to a fairytale that is completely based on woman vs. woman competition due to beauty. There is a lot to unpack there, both with the relationships formed between women, as well as the value on beauty above all else that society, and women themselves, place upon young girls.
I was honestly very surprised with the direction that this story went at different points in the book. Obviously, it was refreshing to read a version of the “evil queen” who was sympathetic, who had made tough decisions to protect herself and what she wanted, and knew that it was wrong that she is being punished for it. Lynet, too, was more than the simpering, often one dimensional princess character that is often found in these stories, and hers the romance containing LGBT elements. For all the hype around this aspect of the series, however, I did find this romance to be a bit underfed. Lynet’s story is only half of the book after all, and Mina’s romantic storyline read as more fully developed. This is unfortunate, but I applaud the author’s intentions in this aspect.
My primary criticism of the story was the writing style. Perhaps it simply wasn’t the type of writing I prefer, but at times it read as a bit middle grade and simplistic for a young adult novel. Especially for a young adult novel that was trying to do and say some big things about found families, the wide varieties and intrinsic value of loves to be found in the world, and the challenges that women face when trying to control their own lives without being punished for it. For all of these large and complicated topics, for being based on not one but two action-packed fairytales, at times I just found myself to be bored. A couple of scenes in the middle, specifically, should have jumped off the page, but somehow seemed to wilt, leaving me under enthused.
But, these criticisms aside, “Girls Made of Snow and Glass” did an excellent job of reimaging a fairytale that has almost be “reimagined” to death at this point. Just when you start to think that there isn’t much more that can be done with a story like this, an author comes along and proves you wrong. If you’re a fan of fairytale retellings, and especially if you’re looking for better representation in your fantasy fiction, check out “Girls Made of Snow and Glass” and enter the giveaway below to win a copy for yourself!
Giveaway is for an ARC of “Girls Made of Snow and Glass” and is open to U.S. entrants only. Giveaway ends on Tuesday, November 7.
Congrats to @melissadougher for winning this giveaway!
Rating 7: Fantasy fiction with a lot to say about found families and feminism. Come for the familiar, stay for the new!
Book Description: Charlotte is learning to control her emerging magical prowess under the secret tutelage of Magus Hopkins. Her first covert mission takes her to a textile mill where the disgruntled workers are apparently in revolt.
But it isn’t the workers causing the trouble. The real culprits are far more extranormal in nature.
Review: The second novella in Newman’s “Industrial Magic” series see Charlotte still learning to control her powers in the hopes of avoiding life in the restrictive, but privileged, Royal Society. Her brother, however, has been recently admitted to the Society, and is beginning to run into problems of his own. There is something going on at the textile mill that he has been tasked to oversee. He recruits Charlotte to work undercover and discover what is going on. But what she finds is more than he expected, or either of them wanted to know. “Weaver’s Lament” raises all the stakes, and I found myself enjoying it even more than I did the first!
Charlotte, as ever, is an excellent protagonist. She’s capable, curious, and still a bit naive about the Royal Society and, especially, the role her brother is now playing by being involved within it. I had a fairly good understanding of her motivations and character from the first book, and this one simply built upon what we already knew. More and more, we understand why she resists joining a society that in many ways would elevate her to a life of riches and success. But her characterization wasn’t one of the stumbling blocks I found in the first story.
After reading the first book, most of my confusion and qualms came from not understanding who I was supposed to be rooting for among the cast of secondary characters. Charlotte’s own confusion here didn’t help. But as this story moves along, I was relieved to see that, while Charlotte may still have the wool pulled over her eyes, we, as readers at least, are beginning to understand the roles these other characters play in her life. Specifically, we begin to see the true colors of her brother Ben and Mage Hopkins, the member of the Royal Society who has been training Charlie over the last several months. At the same time, as we begin to understand the motivations, priorities, and loyalties of these two men, we are still seeing them through Charlotte’s eyes and her perspective is very much colored by her experiences and wishes. She wants her brother to be the same man he was when he left, and even her evaluation of the man he was then is forever seen through the lens of her love for him as a sibling. Mage Hopkins, too, is both the man who is training her as well as her greatest liability for being turned in to the Royal Society should he ever suspect that her training is not enough to keep her from going “wild.”
The primary mystery was also very compelling. Not only did it expose more tidbits of knowledge of how the magic system in this world works, but we saw how the Royal Society uses its magic in industrial work like the textile mill. But the other half of the story is the more human one: Charlie’s shock and horror at the conditions of the mill workers and, at best, the complacency of those in power to the situation. At worst, she finds active participation and collusion.
We also learn more about what it means for an untrained mage to “go wild,” as Charlie struggles to hold herself and her power in check. But even as she discovers the price that comes with remaining free, she, and the reader, begins to question the truth behind any of it. There were a couple surprises wrapped up in this aspect of the story that added new layers to the fantasy aspects of this world. I’m excited to see where Newman is going with all of this.
There’s a lot going on in a very short book, but I thoroughly enjoyed every aspect of it. My only criticisms would come down to a writing style that at times felt stunted, perhaps due to the constraints of the shorter page count. But this by no means hindered my reading experience, and I would highly recommend both this book, and the previous novella, to any fans of historical fantasy fiction or steampunk fantasy.
Rating 8: It’s always thrilling when a second book out performs the first, and here we really see Newman coming into her stride with this series!
Reader’s Advisory:
“Weaver’s Lament” is a newer book and isn’t on any Goodreads lists, but it should be on “Gaslamp Fantasy.”
“Weaver’s Lament” does not yet have a library catalog entry, but request it from your local librarian!
Publishing Info: Algonquin Young Readers, August 2017
Where Did I Get this Book: the library!
Book Description:The fate of the world is in the hands of detective of the supernatural R. F. Jackaby and his intrepid assistant, Abigail Rook. An evil king is turning ancient tensions into modern strife, using a blend of magic and technology to push Earth and the Otherworld into a mortal competition. Jackaby and Abigail are caught in the middle as they continue to solve the daily mysteries of New Fiddleham, New England — like who’s created the rend between the worlds, how to close it, and why zombies are appearing around. At the same time, the romance between Abigail and the shape-shifting police detective Charlie Cane deepens, and Jackaby’s resistance to his feelings for 926 Augur Lane’s ghostly lady, Jenny, begins to give way. Before the four can think about their own futures, they will have to defeat an evil that wants to destroy the future altogether.
Review: “Ghostly Echoes” did a nice job of tying together all the pieces methodicly laid out in the previous two books. More than that, it gave us some much needed history for many of our main characters, as well as, importantly, the villain. The stage was set, and all that remained was whether or not Ritter would be able to balance the light tone and quirkiness at the core of the series with this more serious plotline. The answer is mostly! While there are spots that I believe could have been improved or more fleshed out, I’m happy to report that I finished this book, and this series, pleasantly satisfied.
There was a lot to get done in this book. The supernatural world has been exposed to the general public, once and for all. The series “big bad” is gearing up to make its move. And there are two romantic plotlines that needed to be handled, both with fairly large obstacles standing in there way. Charlie is still a wanted man for this actions back in book one that exposed his identity as a shapeshifter. And now, in a city that is spooky at the barest hint of the strange, his position and future are all the more uncertain. And Jenny, while making great strides forward with her ability to function more fully in the living world, is still, well, a ghost.
After learning that his wife is a supernatural being who has been operating behind the scenes for years in the service of her villainous leader, the governor of New Fiddleham is not messing around. But with this new found belief comes fanaticism, and Abigail and Jackaby are horrified to see the city’s jail cells filling up with all manner of innocent, supernatural beings. It’s a literal witch hunt. I very much enjoyed this portion of the story. Many of the side characters we’ve met throughout this series were either already familiar with the supernatural world, or, for whatever reason, more open-minded to the positive aspects of these beings. Here, we see the negative side of humanity when confronted with beings they don’t understand, and I think this balance added a healthy dose of realism to a series that could, at times, veer into the twee with its characters.
I also very much enjoyed the exploration of the two main romantic plotlines to the story. Jenny and Jackaby’s relationship has been later to the show, and while I’m still not convinced that this was a necessary addition, I was pleasantly surprised with the way this played out. Importantly, Jackaby’s utter cluelessness wasn’t undercut by his being turned into a second romantic hero. While I may still have preferred the series to have left his character single in the more traditional “Sherlock Holmes” manner, I was satisfied with what Ritter did with him here.
Abigail and Charlie, however, have been slowly building towards this point throughout the series. They have had to confront not only the challenges of Charlie’s public image issues, but also explore the balance between their personal and professional lives. It was fun seeing these two work together on a case in this book, witnessing the fact that they work together not only as romantic interests, but as equals who respect what the other brings to the table.
The larger story, that of the Dire King himself, was also very intriguing. The fae world was blown out and we see that up to this point we, and the characters, have mostly been operating in a tiny slice of this strange and complicated world.
The story concludes on a bitter sweet and more serious note than I had expected. But I found this to be particularly refreshing. When I picked up this book, it took me a bit of time to again slip into the particular tone of this series. All four books have been written in a rather simple style, often playing with words and phrases in a comedic way. This style, while fun, also tends to undercut more serious moments in the story, and knowing that this was the conclusion to the series, I was a bit more put off my this lightness when dealing with these more serious issues. However, Ritter doesn’t shy away from consequences in this book, light writing tone or no light writing tone.
All in all, I very much enjoyed this book and the series as a whole. Definitely check it out if you enjoy re-imagingings of Sherlock Holmes type characters, and historical fantasy. The writing style is on the lighter side, however, something that may read as strange to fans of adult fiction. But keep an open mind! For all of its quirkiness, there are real monsters hidden in this text!
Rating 8: A great conclusion to a unique, creative series!
Book Description: Ax and the Animorphs are about to have a huge problem. It starts when they decide to morph mosquitoes in order to slip by some unsuspecting Yeerks. It ends with them stuck in Zero-space with no idea how they got there, no way to get back to Earth…and no oxygen.
Luckily, an Andalite scout ship finds them before it’s too late. But now Ax is finally with his own people. And he doesn’t know if he ever wants to go back to Earth…
Narrator: Ax
Plot: And we’re back with another Ax book! And surprising no one, we open with a scene of humor and horror as it appears that Ax has now become confident enough to morph human and wander around the mall all on his own! Seriously, it’s like the Animorphs are his parents and he’s now this toddler who’s been set loose on his own. It’s just irresponsible! Of course, Ax is found in one place and one place only: the food court where he attempts to get a job to fund his Cinnabun habit. But by “clearing tables” he hears “eat everything on the table, regardless of whether or not the person who bought it is done with it.” The whole thing ends with Ax causing a huge scene and needing to be bailed out by Marco who zeroes in on the commotion and has a sinking suspicion about who could be behind it.
Our real story then begins when the Animorphs get wind that the Yeerks might be up to their hospital infestation plans once again. And really, one has to wonder why the Yeerks don’t always use this plan, it just seems like such an easy way to create new Controllers. Erek, our friendly residential Chee, is the one to alert the Animorphs of this particular danger: an upper level man in the Secret Service will be in the hospital and the Yeerks are planning something.
They all decide to scout out the hospital, taking up a rotation of seagull morphs to keep an eye on things. During his shift, Ax sees Human!Visser Three show up at the hospital. It turns out that the Secret Service man has slipped into a coma and is now unusable as a Controller, so Visser Three decides to acquire him instead. But before he can, Visser Three, who is now at LEVEL RED suspicion of all animals he ever sees, spots a few seagulls outside, decides to morph a Kafit bird (the Andalite homeworld bird that we saw in “The Andalite Chronicles”) and attacks them. Ax and Visser Three go on a chase of that ends with them both back in Andalite form on a rooftop ready to go to battle. Visser Three, in his typical cowardly manner, chooses to flee the scene rather than fight Ax. Ax has many emotions about once again failing to avenge his brother.
At this point, the Animorphs decide that their best option is to essentially copy Visser Three’s plan (which was to acquire the DNA of the Secret Service man so that he could pose as him and gain access to every secret ever). So what if one of the Animorphs was to morph him, walk into the Secret Service, and then morph and prove that there is an alien invasion happening! After the usual debate about the ethics of morphing humans, the team decides to go ahead with the plan, except they know that the Yeerks are now on high alert. Cassie’s animal knowledge comes to the rescue again and she suggests that there may be another way to get the DNA of this man without being human and acquiring it in the usual manner. They will all morph mosquito and get blood that way.
The team all morph mosquito and are in the midst of biting the man when…poof! They are suddenly somewhere else! Specifically, floating around in space and not fully formed? Panicking and without air, Ax frantically thought speaks towards the Andalite ship he can see in the distance. They are caught in its wake and he calls to them to save them. He blacks out, only to wake up in the medical bay of the Andalite ship surrounded by some very confused Andalites and concerned Animorph friends. An Andalite scientist is going crazy with their appearance, suggesting that it is a miracle of science, proof that the theory about extra mass going to Z-space when one morphs a tiny animal must be true! And that the passing Andalite ship had somehow sucked Ax and the Animorphs through as it passed their “mass” in Z-space.
The Captain and T.O. (technical officer) of the ship order the human Animorphs to stick to their room and call Ax to the main deck. They then inform him that their ship is en route to the Leeran home world where a massive battle between the Andalites and the Yeerks is brewing. They don’t have time to return the humans, and Ax is now a member of the ship’s crew and must follow their orders. Ax is both thrilled and afraid to know that he will now be in the midst of a real battle.
But as the ship begins to descend, he and the T.O. realize that something is wrong. They are landing behind the Yeerk lines where they will be completely at their mercy! It turns out that the Andalite Captain is a traitor! The Captain attacks the T.O., cutting off his tail. Ax panics and frantically tries to warn the other Animorphs. Turns out, they’re already in the room in fly morph, having disregarded Ax’s (and the Captain’s) orders to stay in their room. Cassie begins to de-morph while on the Captain’s shoulder, providing a distraction. Ax tries to fight him, and is saved when the T.O. recovers enough to shoot and kill the Captain with a Dracon beam. Knowing that the ship is doomed, the T.O. orders Ax and the Animorphs to flee, and sets the ship to auto-destruct in a hope to do as much damage as possible.
They all morph fly and flee the scene. As they run, Ax mourns the loss of so many Andalite warriors and grapples with his new reality where Andalites can be traitors and join up with the Yeerks willingly. The rest of the Animorphs struggle to forgive Ax for so quickly abandoning them once he was back among his own people. But their anger takes a back seat when they see the rest of the Andalite forces retreating, seemingly accepting that the battle is lost. This isn’t good for the Leeran home world or for the Animorphs themselves. As was explored a few books ago, psychic Yeerk Controllers would spell doom for the Animorphs’ cause.
As they flee the battlefield once again, they realize that Tobias is missing. It seems as if he disappeared before their very eyes. Frantic and scared, the group tries to orient themselves and decide on their next steps. As they work through it all, Ax stumbles upon a theory for why the Andalites retreated as quickly as they did. Leeran is made up of almost entirely water, with only one large continent. The Leeran people live in their oceans and don’t need this continent, but it is paramount to the land-based Yeerk invasion to use as a base of operations. Ax theorizes that the Leerans and Andalites plan to blow up this continent, striking a critical blow against the Yeerk forces that are all now gathering on the planet in their seeming victory.
They get to the ocean, morph shark, and promptly run into some Leeran!Controllers. Luckily, they realize that they can essentially bite the Yeerk right out from the Leerans’ heads without killing the Leerans themselves. The newly freed Leerans direct them to a Leeran city where they meet up with some more Andalite leadership. This time, Ax presents the group and insists that Jake is his Prince and the one whom he will be taking orders from going forward. The Leeran/Andalite forces have run into a problem with their plan; the remote detonator on the bomb beneath the continent has been failing to activate for the last several hours. Someone will need to go down and manually arm it. The Animorphs volunteer. At this point, they have also lost a few more of the group, who also seemed to just disappear out of nowhere. Before sending them off, the Andalite scientists theorize that these disappearance may be some sort of “snap back” that is flinging them back either to Z-space (where they are now dead) or hopefully all the way back to Earth and their original mosquito morphs. It is likely that it will happen to them all. With this happy thought in mind, the remaining group sets off.
Some hi-jinks and battles ensue, but ultimately it is down to Ax and Jake racing through an underwater tunnel to get to the bomb in time, both worried that they will “snap” away before completing their mission. Jake disappears, and it is up to Ax. When he reaches the bomb, the Yeerks are there too. He manages to arm it and relays back to the Andalites not to wait, but to set it off now, with him next to it. Luckily, he snaps away right as it goes off.
And suddenly they’re all back in the hospital, biting the Secret Service man while in mosquito morph. No time has passed at all, and they all re-appeared at the same time, regardless of when they snapped away from the Leeran planet. Bizarrely, mosquito!Ax’s bite wakes up the Secret Service man from his coma, and the Controllers in the room flee, not knowing what to do. The story quickly wraps up with Ax making peace with the fact that sometimes your people aren’t the same species as you, and that’s ok. And he needs to go eat more Cinnabons immediately.
E.T./Ax Phone Home: This is a big book for Ax and his emotions/loyalties. Finally back among his own people, he goes through a lot of emotional legwork from the beginning to the end. Not only is he confronted, again, with the fact that the Andalite high ups want him to take the fall for giving the humans their morphing abilities (to save the legend of Elfangor), but he has to figure out his own connection to humanity, and the fact that the Andalites are also a flawed species.
It’s pretty clear at this point that arrogance is the primary downfall of Andalites. Not only can Ax not even comprehend the fact that one would be a traitor, but the Yeerks themselves are seen here to construct their entire strategy for taking over Leeran by counting on the fact that the Andalites don’t play well with others, and thus they and the Leerans, while on the same side, seem to be fighting separate wars with the Yeerks. So it goes a long ways for Ax to see the Captain turn traitor. Not only does he now have a more healthy understanding of the strengths and, importantly, weaknesses of his own people, but he sees the full advantages of working together with his human friends during their war on Earth.
At the same time, he is constantly worried about striking a balance between becoming close and comfortable on Earth, but not losing himself or his Andalite roots. After Jake snaps at him to get it together when they’re all essentially wandering around aimlessly on the planet after the ship self-destructs, Ax manages to find a kind of peace with things. But even that peace is difficult.
I felt strangely at home. As though, despite Prince Jake’s anger and Marco’s sneering and Rachel’s outright suspicion, I belonged with them. For some reason at that moment, even with the images of death aboard the Ascalin fresh in my mind, I saw myself far away, in a very different body, eating delicious cinnamon buns with a mouth. I wanted to be back there. I wanted to be back on Earth. Captain Samilin had sold out to the Yeerks. Was I selling out to the humans?
The really big moment for him is when they meet up with the Andalites again in the underwater city. Ax steps up to the plate this time, claiming Jake as his one and only Prince. It’s a big moment for him, and for the whole team’s relationship with him.
Our Fearless Leader: Jake shows his leadership skills a lot in this book. Notably, he finds a way forward amidst much fear, anger, and confusion once they find themselves essentially alone on a strange, alien planet. Rachel and Marco are furious at Ax. Tobias and Cassie don’t know what to think but are each too passive to move forward. Jake has to find the middle ground and re-focus the group on moving forward and not spiraling into finger-pointing and more suspicion of Ax’s motivations and loyalties. We also see, for the first time, Jake not reject the “Prince” title when Ax introduces him to the Andalite leaders in the underwater Leeran city. He knows that is important for Ax to have this moment cementing his loyalties and that the Andalite commanders will not respect a human “Prince” who would immediately undermine his own followers. He’s also the last Animorph to snap away and gets the farthest with Ax in the mission to defuse the bomb.
Xena, Warriar Princess: As we saw in Ax’s last book, Rachel and Marco were the slowest members to warm up to Ax, so it’s not surprising when they both react the mostly strongly at his abandonment once he’s back with his people. They are both very harsh with their language, but I can see their perspective in this situation. Add to this the fact that Rachel doesn’t handle unknowns well. At her core, she’s a weapon that needs to be aimed, and if she doesn’t have a target, she will drive herself mad with inaction. Whatever one thinks of the harshness of her reaction to Ax, the one time she really pushes him and he reacts without thinking by striking at her neck with his tail blade, she’s unflinchingly brave, not batting an eye lash and standing firm behind her opinion. This show of bravery and strength does strike a chord with honor-obsessed Ax, even while he is hurt by her ongoing anger and distrust of him.
A Hawk’s Life: As Ax’s closest friend, it’s no surprise that Tobias comes to Ax’s defense after everything goes wrong on the Andalite ship and Rachel and Marco come after him. Even earlier, while they’re still on the ship, he sends Ax a private thought speak message to consider carefully who is people really are. This doesn’t hit home with Ax until later, but Tobias’s quiet support and nudging of Ax is clearly important. But, again, poor Tobias gets side-lined early in the book, this time being the first to be snapped away. There’s no winning for a hawk who just wants to be a part of the team!
Peace, Love, and Animals: Cassie’s animal knowledge is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing in that she’s always the one to think of an animal morph that will accomplish a seemingly impossible goal (bats to fly in a safe room, moles to tunnel to the Yeerk pool, and here, mosquitoes to get DNA). It’s a curse that often these same solutions are almost always completely horrifying. Not only is morphing a mosquito, like all bugs, pretty disgusting, but the knowledge of WHY they’re doing it….to literally suck the blood of some random guy is equally gross. She also is the one to put together the dots that they should use a shark morph on the Leeran home world since they knew from Marco’s last book that the Yeerks had planned on using sharks in their invasion.
The Comic Relief: Marco is almost as harsh as Rachel in his attitude towards Ax’s quick abandonment of them on the Andalite ship. Marco, especially, values loyalty and it is clear that he views Ax as having failed a very important test in this instance. I will harp on it once again, but it’s always interesting to see how often Marco and Rachel end up on the same side of things when the bigger questions are being asked. Yes, they bicker and tease each other. But philosophically, they are the most alike in their approach to this war and when it gets serious, we often see them united in their opinions.
Best (?) Body Horror Moment: The description of their experience in Z-space is pretty bad. Not only is the entire concept disturbing, as was discussed when Ax first clued the team in on what happens to the “extras” when they morph small things, but while they are floating around out there, Ax describes being able to see through everyone essentially. Like some type of gross kaleidoscope, with random organs and body bits all mashed together and see-through. Not to mention the suffocating thing. It’s all pretty bad.
Couples Watch!: Not a lot here except for the fact that Tobias being the first one to get zapped away doesn’t do anything to help Rachel calm down. She was described as alternating between crying and raging after they first noticed he was gone. I think she gets snapped away as well before they even realize what might have been happening. At first, they’re almost sure that Tobias must have been shot and killed.
If Only Visser Three had Mustache to Twirl: Visser Three is only in the first part of the book, but he does bring up a couple of interesting points. One is the fact that now that all of the Animorphs know what his human morph is, you’d think he’d change it. Seems pretty silly to keep walking around with one he knows they can spot. Second, with the kafit bird, Ax is sure this is a sign that Visser Three has been to the Andalite home world and is very upset by it. The fact that the Andalite Captain is later revealed to be a traitor I think is meant to justify this concern. But how does it work with Alloran’s original morphs that he had before he was taken over by Visser Three? All Andalite warriors practice their morphing ability by getting a kafit bird morph, so Alloran would have this one. So wouldn’t Visser Three, too? Without needing to go to the Andalite home world? Also, the fact that Visser Three is a complete coward is no surprise to us, but Ax is very disturbed by the fact that Visser Three ran away from their fight on the roof.
Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: You have to feel bad for Ax. The poor guy is trying so hard and the hits just keep coming from every angle. You can’t blame him for losing his head when he gets back among his own people, but then these early errors of dismissing his friends so quickly bite him in the butt in the worst way when the Captain turns into a traitor. Then he’s got to deal with his friends who are furious with him, while questioning everything he thought he knew about his people. It’s a lot.
What a Terrible Plan, Guys!: Most of their “main mission” plans are good in this one. Mainly, that the rest of the Animorphs ignore Ax and the Andalites and barge onto the bridge in fly morph. It would have been the end of the series if they’d followed orders like good, little soldiers. But, at this point, they’ve been fighting this war for a while so it makes sense that they wouldn’t sit back and be content to stay out of things just because some Andalite higher ups said so. But the original plan with the mosquitoes and proving there is an alien invasion happening thing has all of the usual flaws of these ideas. I mean, if they ever wanted to really go through with this whole concept, there are easier ways to do it.
Favorite Quote:
Of course, Ax’s naive evaluations of his own ability to pass as human are always great for laughs.
I am very good at passing for human, if I say so myself. I have learned the customs and habits perfectly so that I seem entirely normal.
“Do you want to order something?” the human said to me.
“I require money so that I may exchange it for the delicious cinnamon buns,” I explained.
The human blinked his eyes. “So … you do want to order, or you don’t?”
Obviously this was a less-intelligent human. “I wish to perform labor, lay-ber, lay-burrr, and to have you give me money. Then I wish to use that money to acquire delicious cinnamon buns. Bun-zuh.”
Also, a good example of Jake’s leadership skills when he’s talking Ax out of it when he’s essentially breaking down after the deaths of all of the Andalite warriors in the ship.
“Now, listen up, Ax. I know you’re feeling bad. For lots of reasons, probably. But you feeling bad doesn’t let you off the hook. Look, we got Andalites shooting at Yeerks. We have no humans in this fight except for us. Maybe you’re not the big expert, but you know more than we know. So snap out of it.”
Scorecard: Yeerks 4, Animorphs 9
A point for the Animorphs! This is a big win, not only just saving an entire species/planet, but the fact that Leeran Controllers would have most likely spelled the end for their own fight back on Earth.
Rating: I always loved this book. Ax’s struggles are completely relatable. As are the rest of the Animorphs’ feelings of anger and betrayal. It’s good stuff. On top of that, we get another look into the ongoing war between the Yeerks and Andalites outside of Earth and a fun, new location for our story to take place. Not to mention, Ax’s adventures in human morph and his dry, analytical, and hopelessly naive narrating voice are always a fun time.
Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all! But I’ll give a one sentence conclusion and you can take from that what you will!
Publishing Info: Bloomsbury USA Childrens, July 2015
Where Did I Get this Book: audiobook from the library!
Book Description: Society girls from New York City circa 1890, Dacia and Lou never desired to know more about their lineage, instead preferring to gossip about the mysterious Romanian family that they barely knew. But upon turning seventeen, the girls must return to their homeland to meet their relatives, find proper husbands, and—most terrifyingly—learn the deep family secrets of The Claw, The Wing, and The Smoke. The Florescus, after all, are shape-shifters, and it is time for Dacia and Lou to fulfill the prophecy that demands their acceptance of this fate… or fight against this cruel inheritance with all their might.
Review: I’ve read a few of Jessica Day George’s books, mostly her fairytale retellings. I’ve enjoyed them for the most part, even if the middle grade tone read as a bit simplistic for my taste. But when I stumbled upon this original fairytale type story featuring some of my favorite things (sisters/cousins! shapeshifters! Romania!), I knew I’d need to dive right in.
The story alternates perspectives between two American-born heiresses, Dacia and Lou. Their mothers both emigrated to New York from Romania, and now it is time for the girls to travel back to this homeland and meet their maternal family, a family that is old and has many secrets. The chapters are broken up with short interludes, either letters written between the two characters when they are separated, journal entries, or news entries.
While not everything worked for me in this book, Dacia and Lou as characters were a definite highlight. Both girls have distinct story arcs, and I appreciated the fact that neither was allowed to wallow in the stereotypes of the characters type they are originally introduced as. Dacia starts the story as a confident, independent young woman, constantly testing the boundaries that are set upon her and fearless in the face of others’ disapproval. Lou, however, is more thoughtful, reserved, and cautious with the route she takes through life. Through the story Dacia’s confidence, or over confidence, is shaken and she must confront who she believes she is and make serious adjustments. Lou, on the other hand, comes into her own, discovery her own inner strength.
And, importantly, each girl takes turns supporting or being supported by the other. In the beginning I worried that this was going to follow a typical path where Lou would be “brought out of her shell” by her brilliant, shining cousin. But I was pleased to see their roles swapped, and by the end, each girl has learned more about herself and come to see the value in the others’ original approach to life.
I also very much enjoyed the setting. While we don’t get a lot of detail about the city and countryside of Romania, there was enough to highlight its cultural differences to Paris and New York, the girls’ other points of reference. The family history, hierarchy, and creativity of the actual shapeshifter types was also a pleasant surprise. We don’t only have wolf shifters, but bats and another mysterious type that we discover halfway through. It was refreshing to find a shapeshifter story that expanded upon many of teh tropes we are used to seeing. George introduces a complicated history for the Florescus family, one that is intimately connected with another ancient family, the Draculs. And before you guess, I will say that this second part doesn’t necessarily play out the way you would expect!
For all of these pros, there were a few points of this story I found myself struggling with. One was, again, the writing style. While Dacia and Lou are interesting, their narrating voices often read as younger than they were presented to be. The general tone of the book, again, read as very middle grade. This would be fine if it weren’t for the fact that in other ways the story is very adult. There are some very serious scenes dealing with sexual violence, battles, and straight up murder. This gruesomeness and darker tone jarred with the light and rather simplistic style of writing that surrounded it and often through me off balance as I was reading.
I also struggled with the villain of the story. He was just evil. And crazy. And while yes, this is what we expect from villains, his sheer and utter madness often left me unable to take him seriously. Many of his plans dealt with inflicting harm or reigning in the power of people who were much stronger than him. Some of his threats didn’t make any logical sense if you thought about it. So, yes, he was meant to be a crazy character. But the fact that everyone around him reacted to his madness seriously at times read as very strange. His threats were so completely empty and the solution to the whole problem so easy that it very much undercut any actual urgency for the final act.
The ending was also a bit unclear. There seemed to be several loose ends that were left hanging, and I can’t find anywhere that this was ever meant to read as more than just a standalone. The storylines that we did get wrapped up were closed all too quickly and easily. And I felt that there were many important scenes that were only referenced but left off the page, which was very disappointing.
So, while I did enjoy the main characters and the unique take on shapeshifter mythology, I was left a bit disappointed by this read. At this point, I think it is probably best to just admit that George’s writing style is not to my taste and leave it at that. However, if you enjoy light (for the most part??) historical fantasy that is set in a unique locale and features two awesome ladies, this still might be the book for you!
Rating 6: Two strong characters and an interesting magic system weren’t enough for me to get past some of the strange plot choices in the end and an off-putting writing style.
Where Did I Get this Book: audiobook from the library!
Book Description:After a human uprising was brutally put down by the Elders—a primitive and lethal form of the Others—the few cities left under human control are far-flung. And the people within them now know to fear the no-man’s-land beyond their borders—and the darkness…
As some communities struggle to rebuild, Lakeside Courtyard has emerged relatively unscathed, though Simon Wolfgard, its wolf shifter leader, and blood prophet Meg Corbyn must work with the human pack to maintain the fragile peace. But all their efforts are threatened when Lieutenant Montgomery’s shady brother arrives, looking for a free ride and easy pickings.
With the humans on guard against one of their own, tensions rise, drawing the attention of the Elders, who are curious about the effect such an insignificant predator can have on a pack. But Meg knows the dangers, for she has seen in the cards how it will all end—with her standing beside a grave.
Review: GAHHHHH!!!! What is it with the number of series that have failed to stick the landing recently?! (“Recently” being my own recent reading history, mind). I guess I really should be reading the writing on the wall a bit better. Just like the Gemma Doyle series, Bishop’s “The Others” series has slowly, steadily, agonizingly determinedly, been working its way down the sad decline into the land of boredom and “who cares.” That “Etched in Bone” finally lands this decline at the very bottom and adds a nice kick in the butt right at the end for your effort…maybe shouldn’t be surprising.
Me, about this series. If that’s harsh? I’m not sorry. (source)
There will be some spoilers in this review, because I’m definitely talking about the ending for this one!
It’s on the record that I didn’t love “Marked in Flesh,” either. But the one thing that it did deliver was the massive, destructive climax that had been building up between the Humans First and Last movement and the Others for the last several books. Shit went down. Cities were systematically wiped out. And because most of the human characters (other than all the special ones that seemed to live in Lakeside) were truly awful people, there was some sick joy in watching them go.
“Etched in Bone” opens shortly thereafter with the powers-that-be conferring together and still asking their one driving question: “How much Human do we keep?” To determine this, a select few travel to Lakeside to witness this hybrid example of Other/Human life being lived in harmony, all due to the changes brought about by Meg. With the massive damage dealt in the last book, this one had a problem right from the start: is it really credible that any humans would still be holding to these crazy views? Literally thousands of lives have been lost and the Others didn’t even blink an eye. It was hard to buy in the last several books that people could be willfully this stupid, but it got to a point of complete ridiculousness here.
And, as always, the villain character was the worst of it all. It seemed that he was evil purely for evil’s sake, and the fact that anyone would still buy his crazed philosophies after witnessing the prior destruction and knowing the thin knife’s edge that human life as a whole balanced upon was just too big an ask of my imagination.
On top of this all, the previous book also fully cracked the rose-colored lens through which I had been reading this series. It’s no surprise that I (and I believe many fans of these books) have been following the series primarily out of a love and interest in the two main characters, Simon and Meg. As their relationship has floundered (more on that) and more side characters have been introduced, the series’ flaws have begun to show more and more. Specifically, its very stereotypically gendered roles. References to the “female pack” that before were a funny little quirk, now read as supremely uncomfortable in light of the fact that all of the women, aside form a sassy elderly woman character, exist in very narrow confines. None of them are in leadership roles, and their friendships and lives are littered with pitfalls of silliness.
Beyond this, the series’ other main weakness has been a penchant for info-dumpy chapters full of mundane details. In my last review I complained about the pages devoted to stock piling toilet paper, and nothing has changed here. In the first few chapters, we’re already enduring pages and pages full of characters (not even the main ones!) discussing the ins and outs of Lakeside’s economy and trading. It’s just…dull.
And then. AND THEN! Simon and Meg. I knew I was going to be disappointed right from the beginning. In the end of the last book, it seemed that there were a few steps being taken in the right direction. Meg asked Simon to go skinny dipping, very PG skinny dipping of course, but still. But here, in the second chapter of the dang book, we have Simon recounting how that pretty much went nowhere and that, while he was potentially interested in Meg that way, he wasn’t willing to risk there friendship. And then Meg gets her own chapter and what do you know? She thinks the same! And so on and so on. Any progress that readers thought they saw in the last book was immediately walked back, and for the majority of this book, it was business as usual.
Until the end. And what do we get? What do we get for sticking through 5 damn books of packing lists and excruciating infodump conversations? We get one, very brief scene where Meg and Simon agree to try to make something work. And a kiss. IT’S ONE SCENE AT THE END OF THE BOOK!! There is no build up. There is no follow through. No relationship learning and stumbles. Nothing.
Not only do we get absolutely nothing out of this scene, but this same chapter could have been tacked on to the ending of any of the 3 books that came before it and you wouldn’t have noticed. We’ve all been going along trusting that this slow burn relationship was just that, a slow burn relationship. Instead, now, we realize we’ve been tricked the whole time. It wasn’t a slow burn, it was nothing. “Slow burn” implies we are building towards something. This book makes it very clear that either Bishop didn’t know what to do with these characters’ relationship (and hasn’t for the last several books) or never cared to begin with and just tacked it into a series where her main interest was writing about the minute details of the world itself, only to be dismayed by fan reaction and throw in this final scene as some attempt to quell readers.
At this point, anyone who is reading this book has read the ones that came before it. If you did enjoy those, maybe this one won’t be as frustrating for you, as much of the actual plot is lather, rinse, repeat with the conflict between dumb, evil people and the Others who are bizarrely still enamored by Meg (her special snowflake status has reached a peak, if you’re curious). But I have a hard time seeing many longtime fans being satisfied with this conclusion. I know I’m not.
It was an audiobook, so I couldn’t do this. But I would have if I could have! (source)
Rating 2: Not only did this book continue to trot out the tired themes of the previous books, it failed to provide any resolution for the one part of the story that had retained any of my interest throughout.
Book: “City of Miracles” by Robert Jackson Bennett
Publishing Info: Broadway Books, May 2017
Where Did I Get this Book: Blogging for Books
Book Description:Revenge. It’s something Sigrud je Harkvaldsson is very, very good at. Maybe the only thing.
So when he learns that his oldest friend and ally, former Prime Minister Shara Komayd, has been assassinated, he knows exactly what to do — and that no mortal force can stop him from meting out the suffering Shara’s killers deserve.
Yet as Sigrud pursues his quarry with his customary terrifying efficiency, he begins to fear that this battle is an unwinnable one. Because discovering the truth behind Shara’s death will require him to take up arms in a secret, decades-long war, face down an angry young god, and unravel the last mysteries of Bulikov, the city of miracles itself. And — perhaps most daunting of all — finally face the truth about his own cursed existence.
Review: It’s no secret that I absolutely adored “City of Stairs” and “City of Blades.” In both books, Bennett established a seemingly endless world full of wonder and madness. He also accomplished the rare feat of producing a second book that I believe was even better than the first! It seems that resting on his laurels is simply something Bennett is incapable of doing, as “City of Miracles” is a perfect closely act for this trilogy.
It’s been 13 years since the events of “City of Blades,” and Sigrud lives a lonely, tired existence on the edge of society, waiting and waiting for a call from his former partner and friend Shara to call him back to the fight. To the world. To anything. The call finally comes, but not in a way he could ever have wished for: Shara has been assassinated. With this news, and the consuming grief and rage that has driven him throughout his life, Sigrud comes to live once again, blazing his way through the world hoping to servce justice for his friend’s senseless murder. Along the way, he finds new purpose in protecting Tatiana, Shara’s adopted daughter, and a girl who is tangled up in much more than Sigrud can imagine. Once again, the Divine is at work in the world. And once again, Sigrud will rampage through anything and everything in his way to protect and avenge those he loves.
What made “City of Blades” stand out from the first book in the series, was the added gravitas of subject matter that was layered upon an already fantastical story and world. The fantasy elements, the miraculous, even the Divine, served only as platforms upon which Bennett explored the deeply complicated history, purpose, and definition of warfare and what makes up the mind of a solder.
“City of Miracles” is excellent for following in this pattern. We have all the boundless creativity that can now be expected of this author and this world: Divinities of Night itself, steampunk-ish tramcars that trek across arctic mountainscapes, magical clothes and wondrously impossible buildings. But through these flashes of fantasy action and detailed world-building, Bennett is telling a much more grounded story.
Sigrud’s life is one of tragedy. The villain’s life is one of tragedy. The villain’s parent’s life is one of tragedy. It is all circular, and death follows death, vengeance and justice doling out the same misery and atrocity they work to revenge. Through Sigrud’s own life, and those he works to aid in this book, we see this pattern replay itself endless. Where is the live between justice and simply committing more crimes? At what point does the power gained through grief justify more grief itself to perpetuate its own existence? The the book before it, this story challenges its readers to think beyond common storytelling tropes. We’ve re-defined the soldier through a woman whose seen the damage and power that warfare brings. And here we’re redefining the avenging hero as more than the white knight we’re always given.
I was also pleasantly surprised by the inclusion of characters from previous books and the ways their stories were tied into the narrative of this book. Further, the new characters who are introduced were intriguing, particularly Ivanya, a character we met oh, so briefly back in book one but who plays a critical role in this story.
The author also cuts out quite a lot of work for himself with this story. It’s the final book in a trilogy, so our main characters’ story lines must all be tied off and resolved, any lingering questions about their pasts drawn to a close. But he also takes it upon himself to provide much needed information on the years that came before the first book itself. The ending is bittersweet and perfect. It closes in small moments and fantastic explosions (both literally and figuratively). These characters’ stories may be ending, but we’re left with a wide open world of possibility stretching out ahead.
I’m not sure if the author has any plans of revisiting this world, but if he is, the groundwork has been lain for a continuation, and I would be the first one in line at the bookstore. I can’t recommend this book, and this series, enough! If you enjoy fantasy with complicated heroes and challenging ideas, definitely check these out!
Rating 9: An excellent conclusion to an excellent trilogy. Fun, fast-paced, and challenging its readers at every turn!
Publishing Info: Scholastic Paperbacks, April 1998
Where Did I Get this Book: own it!
Book Description: What’s tasty, good for you, and only takes sixty seconds to make? Oatmeal. And it’s making the Yeerks more than a little crazy. Now Rachel, the other Animorphs, and Ax have a new weapon against the Yeerks. Sounds good, right?
Narrator: Rachel
Plot: Now unlike the last few, I have very clear memories of this book and I think it’s for a pretty basic reason: it absolutely terrified me reading it as a kid. Where battles with aliens were something purely out of fiction and thus not threatening, this book is a perfect example of the more mundane aspects of the Animorphs’ missions and the truly horrifying, easier to comprehend dangers that these missions brought down upon them.
The story starts with mainly Marco and Rachel attempting to convince Jake that the group should be allowed to use their abilities for purely selfish reasons: to attend the opening of new Planet Hollywood in their town. Notably, Lucy Lawless, or Xena herself, would be in attendance. Jake only signs on, however, when he hears that Shaq will also be there. Oh, Jake, and you’re basketball-obsessed heart. Of course, they all go in bird morph. But while there, Rachel notices a man getting ready to commit suicide by jumping out of a skyscraper. She and the group swoop in and just barely manage to glide him to be dropped into the nearby river. There he proceeds to get stuck in the mud on the bottom of the river necessitating Rachel’s morphing dolphin to save him once again. (It should be noted that this is the second cold open for a Rachel book where she saves the life of someone. Last time it was the boy in the crocodile pit.)
Back home, Rachel hears from her mother, who is a lawyer, that the man’s family is looking to have him committed to a clinic: he’s claiming there is an alien parasite called a Yeerk in his head. Rachel and the team know they have to check it out. After flipping a coin, Rachel, Marco, and Jake are chosen to infiltrate the mental hospital in cockroach morph. After a brief run-in with a tarantula (Tobias’s bird powers come in for the save once again), the group makes it in and locates the man, a Mr. Edelman. To speak with him, Rachel demorphs and then poses as a human-morphed Andalite to figure out what is going on. Edelman reveals that the Yeerks have encountered a human food substance that is highly addictive to their species and, after prolonged ingestion, causes the Yeerks to go mad. But with this madness, the Yeerk is also freed of its need to consume Kandrona rays. So now Controllers like Edelman are stuck with a mad Yeerk in their brain that never needs to come out. Edelman is typically in control of his body again, but, as Rachel sees while they are talking, the Yeerk breaks through in brief moments to spew nonsense, thus leading to his family’s questioning his sanity. What’s most surprising, however, is what this addictive substance is: instant maple and ginger flavored oatmeal.
After joining back with the others, the group debates the morality of using an addictive substance (even though it’s just oatmeal, as Marco and Rachel continue to point out in increasingly loud voices). In the end, they decide they can’t ignore an opportunity like this to do massively damage to the Yeerk invasion. Now all they have to do is break into the Yeerk pool once again.
Tobias, of course, knows of an entrance from his days of spying. Together, they all morph fly and attempt to follow a Controller in (this time through a backroom in a McDonalds). Once through the door, however, it becomes clear that the Yeerks have upped their security game. Some type of bio weapon is triggered by the presence of DNA that has not been submitted into the program and they barely manage to escape a fatal gassing. With their typical point of entrance now lost to them, the group needs to get creative. Cassie suggest digging their way in using a mole morph.
What follows is a perfect example of the least glorious aspects of what life as an Animorph would really be like. One by one the group takes turns morphing mole and digging through the earth. They make very slow progress and it takes them a week to get very far at all. Not to mention, each shift is horrifying in its own way: alone, beneath the earth, digging blindly ahead. By the end of the week however, their tunnel hits a bat cave. From there, the group morph bat and plan on heading home to re-think their approach. But on the way out of the bat cave, they sense another exit, once that leads to the Yeerk pool.
But again, the increased Yeerk security kicks in, and flying security bots quickly injure several members of the group, including Rachel who falls into the Yeerk pool itself. She manages to time her demorph to angle herself below one of the piers sticking out over the pool so that she can remain hidden and keep her head above water. She then has to do something she swore never to do again: morph ant. But from her time with the allergy, she remembers that the ant morph did fairly well in liquid. This time as an ant she is able to essentially “walk” on the surface and escape the pool.
Once out, she sees that Ax has been captured and demorphed. Even worse, Visser Three is coming. She manages to find Marco and Cassie, both hiding in sheds around the perimeter. They frantically try to think of a plan, and happen to hear a Controller mention removing “oatmeal contraband” from another person. They reference a storage shed where they have confiscated over 200 pounds of the stuff.
Visser Three arrives and immediately orders that all exits be sealed and everyone be searched systematically. Rachel, Marco, and Cassie frantically come up with a plan to use the oatmeal as a type of bargaining chip. Elephant!Rachel crashes through walls and into the storage shed, where Gorilla!Marco grabs a barrel of the oatmeal, throws it into the Yeerk pool and threatens to blow it up with a Dracon beam, thus infecting hundreds of Yeerks, unless Visser Three lets them all go. Visser Three decides that a few hundred of his compatriots is a price he is willing to pay. Elephant!Rachel thinks to change this equation by charging him and throwing him into the pool as well. Visser Three quickly changes his mind. But as the group begins backing towards one of the exit tunnels, Visser Three begins to morph. At the same time, a team of Hork Bajir charge down the very tunnel they were trying to climb through. Throwing caution to the wind, Rachel shoots the barrel of oatmeal, then aims the Dracon beam at the ceiling and yells to the others to morph mole. Then, not knowing who survived or how long it will take, she slowly digs her way back up to the bat cave (having to stop to hollow out a human-sized hole to not get caught with the two hour limit). One by one they all return.
Lastly, back at home a few days later, Rachel’s mom returns home from work telling a crazy story about how Mr. Edelman escaped from the mental hospital after a “talking grizzly” showed up and told him to run and hide and enjoy what freedom he could make for himself.
Xena, Warriar Princess: Again, we hear a lot about the pressure that Rachel puts on herself to be strong. Part of it is her conviction that she won’t let fear rule her life, a sentiment that we heard Jake discuss just in the last book. But she also confesses to not being able to admit her fear, and to understanding what part she plays for the group.
Everyone in a group has a role to play. At least that’s how it always works out. My role was to say, “Let’s do it. Let’s go. That’s what we came here for.” But I was tired. And I’d had a really, really bad few days digging down to this stupid cave.
So I said, <Let’s do it. That’s what we came here for.> Sometimes it’s hard to get out of a role once you’ve started playing the part.
Her and Jake probably most clearly see the role that they play for the group. The rest definitely have their contributions, but they don’t seem to feel these roles in such a strong (or burdensome) way as Jake and Rachel do. Marco, probably, is the next closest thing, knowing that they count on him to lighten the mood and joke his way through anything.
There are some good moments with Rachel’s home life, with her sisters and mother. There’s also a reference to the fact that her house is still under construction after she halfway destroyed it by accidentally morphing elephant while allergic back in her book.
There are several examples in this book of the pros and cons of Rachel’s tendency to jump without looking. Part of the reason that so many of her books open with her saving people is that she doesn’t question whether it is possible or wise, she just does it. But on the other hand, while in the Yeerk Pool, her first instinct is to simply morph grizzly and attack. It is Marco and Cassie who come up with the plan to use the oatmeal to create a stalemate, obviously a much better idea. But then when Visser Three calls their bluff, Rachel again acts before anyone else, throwing him in the pool. She also blows up the tunnel they’re in. Too much thought about these actions, too much hesitancy about the possible negative outcomes, would have resulted in disaster for the entire group. I really liked seeing the balance of how this inclination of hers was not only a bad thing (as it is often reduced to), but can also be their saving grace when the others might have hesitated.
Our Fearless Leader: During the debate about using the oatmeal, Jake makes a connection to the Civil War and the idea that that war, too, could have been ended sooner if the North had simply compromised and let a few people remain slaves. He also says that he makes all of these decisions by asking himself whether he is ok or not with it happening to Tom.
A Hawk’s Life: Tobias is the first to raise the question about the morality of using the oatmeal. This seems to be in line with his more thoughtful approach to the war. After they thoroughly discuss the matter, he agrees to use it. But as a character, Tobias needs to fully think through any course of action they are about to take, even if, in the end, he will always side with the plan that means bringing more of the fight to the Yeerks.
He’s also the last one to arrive back to the bat cave in the end.
“You scared us to death! Where have you been?” I yelled at him.
<I was worried about you, too, Rachel,> he said, with a smile in his silent voice.
This is why they work; he understands her.
Peace, Love, and Animals: Like in book #9, Cassie is the one to realize that they can use a specific type of animal morph to solve a problem that seems impossible. She came up with the bat morph then, and the mole morph this time.
For a moment no one said anything. Then Cassie said, <Well . . . there is one way.>
<I take it back!> Marco said. <I take it back! I can tell by your tone, Cassie, I really don’t want to know.>
When they’re debating the morality of using the oatmeal against the Yeerks, Cassie confesses to not knowing what is right and wrong anymore. This, more than anything, scares Rachel about how this war is changing them all.
The Comic Relief: Not surprisingly, Marco sides with Rachel immediately about using the oatmeal. If anything, he is even more appalled by the fact that the group is even debating not dealing such a direct hit to the Yeerks. Once again, we see that, of them all, he is the most pragmatic about this fight. Where Rachel is more inclined to go for it simply because she will always choose action, Marco only sees the cost/benefit of a mission. He is also even more exasperated by the fact that the “drug” they are debating is oatmeal.
E.T./Ax Phone Home: Ax saves all of their lives by immediately recognizing the danger of the bio sensor when they first try to infiltrate the Yeerk Pool as flies. He’s also good for some Yeerk biology lessons, but only so much…
<Yes,> Ax said. <Yeerks have mouths. Or what humans would think of as mouths. Actually, if I remember my exo-biology classes, and sadly, I sometimes ->
<Fell asleep,> I said. <Yeah, we know. You didn’t like exo-biology class.>
There’s also a comedic interlude at the mall (of course) where the group watches in horror/awe as Human!Ax consumes not only an entire massive Cinnabon, but the paper plate it was sitting on as well.
Best (?) Body Horror Moment: When they’re breaking into the mental hospital as cockroaches and run into the tarantula, Rachel gets jumped by it. She only escapes when Tobias swoops down and carries it off. Unfortunately, it doesn’t let go of her leg, so it gets ripped off. Even worse, it is implied that Tobias eats the spider…so…did he eat her leg??!
Couples Watch!: Early in the book, Rachel wakes up in the morning to do homework and opens her window for Tobias. Apparently, he comes by most mornings like this. They discuss their upcoming plan to go to the Yeerk Pool and Rachel admits to being afraid. It’s a quiet little scene that really highlights these two’s relationship and how special it is in that Rachel can be open and vulnerable with Tobias about feelings that she never shows to the rest of the group.
If Only Visser Three had Mustache to Twirl: When it is announced that Visser Three is coming to the Yeerk Pool, Rachel runs into a Controller who blatantly makes up an excuse to get the heck out of there. So at this point, even among the Yeerks themselves, it’s pretty clear that Visser Three is batshit (ha!) crazy and it’s best to be elsewhere when he shows up. It’s also no surprise that he pretty quickly decides that sacrificing 500 or so Yeerks to the oatmeal threat is worth it, but then once it’s his own skin on the line, he quickly changes his tune.
Adult Ugly Crying at a Middle Grade Book: That last scene where they are all tunneling back to the surface. Man, it’s just horrifying if you really think about it. Earlier in the book, it was already made clear how terrifying the tunneling was with claustrophobia and being so alone. So here, to crash a tunnel down on yourself, not knowing whether your friends were hurt or killed, and then tunneling ever upwards, for hours, long enough that you need to stop and dig out a hole to morph back to human, still underground, all alone…It definitely freaked me out as a kid and still does now.
What a Terrible Plan, Guys!: While the mole morph is a good idea in theory, I’m not sure how they were thinking this was actually going to work. They all stock up on oatmeal at their homes, but what were they really going to do? Pull down mini bags of it through the tunnel and then try to somehow aim it above the Yeerk Pool and hope that it makes it all the way down? Seems like there are a few pretty big holes in this plan and the only reason they succeed is because first they completely fail at their original plan. This seems to be a pattern.
Favorite Quote:
A more serious quote from when they’re debating the morality of using the oatmeal:
Cassie suddenly laughed. It was a cynical laugh. I didn’t know she was capable of a cynical laugh.
“And all the rights and wrongs, and all the lines between good and evil, just go wafting and waving and swirling around, don’t they?”
And a more fun quote:
“You know,” Jake said in a conversational tone as we waited for Tobias to acquire the bat, “from the point where Edelman said ‘maple and ginger oatmeal,’ I should have known this was going to end stupidly.”
“Instant maple and ginger oatmeal,” Cassie said.
“Battles that involve oatmeal are just never going to end up being historic, you know?” Jake went on. “Gettysburg? No major oatmeal involvement. The Battle of Midway? Neither side used oatmeal. Desert Storm? No oatmeal.”
Scorecard: Yeerks 4, Animorphs 8
I’m giving them both points. Yes, the Animorphs strike a pretty major blow. But it can’t be ignored that the Yeerks have really wised up, what with the bio detectors, the security bots, and Visser Three’s systematic shut down and search of the Yeerk Pool.
Rating: For as wacky as the whole madness-by-oatmeal thing is, this book has some legitimately tense moments. It’s also one of the few books that takes place over almost an entire week (they usually seem to take about a day or two), so it was a nice touch of reality, that many of these missions weren’t glamorous or non-stop action. We continue to see Rachel’s decline as the pressure she puts on herself to be brave becomes increasingly hard to bare. Though I do like that this book highlights the ways that this aspect of her personality saves the group at times as well. I doubt any of the rest would have been brave enough or thought quickly enough to blow the tunnel up on themselves.
Note: I’m not going to rate these books since I can’t be objective at all! But I’ll give a one sentence conclusion and you can take from that what you will!
Book: “City of Brass” by S. A. Chakraborty
Megamorphs #2: “In the Time of Dinosaurs”
Book: “Girls Made of Snow and Glass” by Melissa Bashardoust
Book: “Weaver’s Lament” by Emma Newman
Book: “The Dire King” by William Ritter
Animorphs #18: “The Decision” by K.A. Applegate
Book: “Silver in the Blood” by Jessica Day George
Book: “Etched in Bone” by Anne Bishop
Book: “City of Miracles” by Robert Jackson Bennett
Animorphs #17: “The Underground by K.A. Applegate
The Library Ladies 