Tag: 7 Rating

Serena’s Review: “Deeds of the Disturber”

32139Book: “Deeds of the Disturber” by Elizabeth Peters

Publishing Info: Atheneum Press, 1988

Where Did I Get this Book: the library!

Book Description: Can fear kill? There are those who believe so but Amelia Peabody is skeptical. A respected Egyptologist and amateur sleuth, Amelia has foiled felonious schemes from Victoria’s England to the Middle East. And she doubts that it was a Nineteenth-Dynasty mummy’s curse that caused the death of a night watchman in the British Museum. The corpse was found sprawled in the mummy’s shadow, a look of terror frozen on the guard’s face. What or who killed the unfortunate man is a mystery that seems too intriguingly delicious for Amelia to pass up, especially now that she, her dashing archaeologist husband, Emerson, and their precocious son, Ramses, are back on Britain’s shores. But a contemporary curse can be as lethal as one centuries old and the foggy London thoroughfares can be as treacherous as the narrow, twisting alleyways of Cairo after dark when a perpetrator of evil deeds sets his murderous sights on his relentless pursuer… Amelia Peabody!

Review: In this, the fifth book in the series, we step away from our tried and true formula and experience a few completely new settings and approaches, to varying levels of success. Obviously, there’s no way for any book in this series to get a failing grade when you have Amelia Peabody as your narrator, but there were also a few storylines that weren’t favorites of mine.

First off, it’s clear that this is going to be a completely different type of mystery when the book opens with Amelia, Emerson, and Ramses returning to London after their most recent adventure. I was both excited to have a change-up in setting, but also a bit worried about how well some aspects of the series would hold up under the stifling conventionalities of British society. I guess I shouldn’t have worried too much as Amelia has never been one to let trifling little things like “propriety” or “niceties” hold her back from doing what she wants!

So, of course, we start off with a murder, a mystery, and a general unwillingness by Emerson and eagerness by Amelia to become involved. I feel like there is a bit of a pattern to one of the challenges of this series. Of course, to be a mystery, you must have a good number of suspects, which means introducing a whole new cast of character into each book. And, for some reason, this is now the second book in the series where I just couldn’t keep some of the suspects straight. It was just a lot of British noblemen with different relationships to each other, to the museum, and to the Amelia/Emerson family. I actually had to flip back and forth a few times to try and remind myself. There’s a failing somewhere in here, but I’m not sure if it’s just on me or whether more could have been done to really fix each character in the minds of readers and serve as reminders when they show up the next time. All in all, however, I did really enjoy the primary mystery in this novel, and by the end (once I had the cast mostly figured out) the story came together in a very unexpected, but fun/wacky way that is typical to the series as a whole. I also very much enjoyed Amelia’s exploits in dress-up in this book and her ventures out and about in London sans Emerson.

However, there were a few plot lines that I wasn’t a huge fan of. First off, Ramses needed something to do for large portions of this book, and sadly, that something came in the form of two cousins. While there were humorous bits with these two (particularly the girl and her obsession with sweets and theatrics), I wasn’t enthralled overall. I’ve bought in on the one child character, but these two were clearly just foils for Ramses, and I wasn’t very interested in the resolution of his conflict with them (or surprised by the real story behind their antics).

The second plot line…I have really mixed feelings about. I do appreciate the fact that Peters decided to throw a bit of a wrench into Emerson’s and Amelia’s relationship, as it can come of as too perfect at times, especially in this, the fifth book. However, it was hard to read about it when the reader knows that there has to be misunderstandings and some explanation behind everything and things could just be resolved in characters would just sit down and talk about it. So, while I guess it is realistic that they might behave the way they did, it was frustrating to read about, particularly with regards to Emerson. There were a few points where I feel like he was even a bit out of character with how mum he was on his involvement in the situation. He’s been presented as a very frank character, and I wasn’t completely sold on the way he chose to handle things. Or, maybe, I just bought in too fully to Amelia’s perspective on the whole thing!

Those two qualms aside, I did very much enjoy this next book in the series. Turns out that you can still have a fun Egypt-related mystery taking place in the heart of London! I wouldn’t want this to be too much of a trend, however, since I do miss the culture class and history that comes with the usual setting. But as the next book is titled “The Last Camel Died at Noon,” I feel fairly confident that we’ll be back on track soon!

Rating 7: Still highly enjoyable, though featuring two plot points that weren’t my favorite.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Deeds of the Disturber” is included on these Goodreads lists: “Regency and Victorian Mysteries”, and “Mysterious London.”

Find “Deeds of the Disturber” at your library using WorldCat.

Previously Reviewed: “The Crocodile on the Sandbank” and “The Curse of the Pharaohs” and “The Mummy Case” and “Lion in the Valley”

Kate’s Review: “Labyrinth Lost”

27969081Book: “Labyrinth Lost” by Zoraida Córdova

Publishing Info: Sourcebooks Fire, September 2016

Where Did I Get This Book: The library!

Book Description: Nothing says Happy Birthday like summoning the spirits of your dead relatives.

I fall to my knees. Shattered glass, melted candles and the outline of scorched feathers are all that surround me. Every single person who was in my house – my entire family — is gone.

Alex is a bruja, the most powerful witch in a generation…and she hates magic. At her Deathday celebration, Alex performs a spell to rid herself of her power. But it backfires. Her whole family vanishes into thin air, leaving her alone with Nova, a brujo boy she can’t trust. A boy whose intentions are as dark as the strange markings on his skin.

The only way to get her family back is to travel with Nova to Los Lagos, a land in-between, as dark as Limbo and as strange as Wonderland…

“Beautiful Creatures” meets “Daughter of Smoke and Bone” with an infusion of Latin American tradition in this highly original fantasy adventure.

Review: So I am kind of switching it up for my second Horrorpalooza review! While I know that Serena is usually the user to do fantasy novels, when I got “Labyrinth Lost” by Zoraida Córdova, I thought that it was going to be more horror based. I mean, the main character is a bruja, which is a kind of witch for this story and it’s purposes, and I did say that witches are going to count in this Horrorpalooza. So while this is less horror and more a remix of “Alice in Wonderland”, I am going to count it as a win because this is the kind of Witch-esque Mythology that I really enjoy: powerful, matriarchal bonds that sustain a family with just as much love as magic. Also, scary demons. Plus, it’s always a plus to see YA books with a POC protagonist, as books for kids and teens (and really all people) should be telling the stories of many different experiences.

So we will start with the good. “Labyrinth’s Lost” takes a concept we’ve seen before (teenage witches) and makes it it’s own unique tale. Alex is a bruja, the most powerful bruja of her generation, and the magical systems that Córdova created for this story are always interesting and taking from Latin American traditions. There are some pretty good source notes at the end of this book where Córdova explains what parts come from tradition, and what parts were invented for the story, and I think that it is valuable to learn about this background. Too often to do you see people using Latin American imagery of spirits and the dead, especially around Halloween, and this book shows the importance of some of this imagery and why it isn’t just spooky makeup. I also loved the magical world of Los Lagos, as it does harken to Wonderland but still maintains its own character and ambiance. The magical system of cantos as opposed to spells also gives a new spin on traditionally Western ideas of witchcraft, and I liked that every chapter started out with a passage from the family Book of Cantos. These Bruja communities are portrayed as incredibly tight knit, and the camaraderie and love was very apparent. I also like that the distinction is made that all brujas are witches, but not all witches are brujas. They are not necessarily interchangeable and one cannot make assumptions about brujas just because they are a kind of witch.

Alex is a fairly realistic protagonist, and while she does teeter towards the trope of ‘chosen one who rejects her power’, I think that there is enough reason given that she may not want to have this power in the first place so as not to be twee or stereotypical. To be an Ecantrix means to have a dangerous power that is hard to control, and given that Alex partially blames herself for the loss of her father, her petulance is excusable. I also greatly appreciated that not only is our main character a Latina girl, she is also bisexual, and her love interest is her best friend Rishi. Rishi gets to come along on this adventure with Alex and the mysterious brujo Nova, and I was pleasantly surprised to see how natural Alex and Rishi got on. Her bisexuality was always treated as just a fact of her being, not as a novelty that needed to be pointed out and doted on.

But with these positives do come a few negatives. One of those is really just out of my own personal preferences: I have a really hard time with fantasy fiction. Sometimes it really grabs me, and other times it’s harder to keep me interested. While I liked a lot about “Labyrinth Lost”, I did find the stuff inside Los Lagos to be far less interesting to me than her life in the real world. I think that had the magic stayed in an urban or real world setting it would have held my interest. but once new lands come into play, I’m really not all that invested unless that world is called Middle Earth or Fantastica. So when we got to Los Lagos, I found it easier to put down. I did like the villain, The Devourer, as she was menacing and seductive all at once, a being that has started to take over Los Lagos and in doing so has made it start to crumble under her oppressive force. She was good, but I wanted more of her.

And then….. the dreaded love triangle.

giphy3
Will this madness never cease? (source)

“Labyrinth Lost” is book one in a series (what is it with YA Fantasy books seemingly always packaged as a series?), and even though Alex is very much devoted to Rishi, by the end of this book you just get the feeling that Nova is going to be a threat to this relationship in the near future. After all, even though he does things in this book that should be pretty hard to forgive, he’s being set up as the tragic antihero that is hopelessly devoted to Alex. I really don’t like love triangles, and I had hoped that we were getting away from that, but apparently not. Plus, this book ends on a blatant cliffhanger, making it totally unable to stand alone, and I hate it when books end like that. It just galls me.

All of those complaints aside, I really do think that “Labyrinth Lost” is a really fun read about magic and brujas. I will probably keep going in the series, though I don’t know how long the wait is going to be. I’m not really in any hurry, which is both good, and bad.

Rating 7: A very unique twist on witches and Wonderland with diverse characters, though some of the plot progression left me colder than I would have wanted.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Labyrinth Lost” is included on these Goodreads lists: “Great YA Novels About Latinas!”, and “LGBT Sci-Fi/Fantasy YA”.

Find “Labyrinth Lost” at your library using WorldCat!

Serena’s Review: “The Copper Promise” Part 1: “Ghosts of the Citadel”

19847375Book: “Ghosts of the Citadel” by Jen Williams

Publishing Info: Headline, December 2013

Where Did I Get this Book: the library!

Book Description: It is said that the Citadel is haunted, and that anyone foolish enough to enter will never return. When a mysterious nobleman offers them a small fortune to explore its depths, sellswords Wydrin and Sebastian decide they can afford to be a little foolish – it’s a chance for adventure, riches, and they might even have a tale or two to tell in the tavern afterwards. But they will soon discover that sometimes there is truth in rumour…

Review: A few days ago, poor Kate was having to hear the long tale of woe from me regarding my latest book choice “The Copper Promise.” I remember specifically mentioning that I couldn’t quite put my finger on what the problem was that I was having with the book itself since it featured many of my favorite elements (a spunky heroine, a team adventure, strong high fantasy setting, etc). But for some reason the pacing felt off.

Well, the other day I was doing a bit of research into the book itself when I had a big “Aha!” moment: This book is a compilation of four novellas that were bound together to make the book “The Copper Promise!” It was really a light bulb moment, and now, with this in mind, I am going to move forward with reading/reviewing the book as it was originally published as four separate but serialized stories.

Right off the bat, it was a much more enjoyable experience re-approaching this series as novellas. Read on its own, “Ghost of the Citadel” is an action-packed, snappy-paced adventure story featuring three misfit characters. Tonally, this novella is closer to some of the fantasy of old that was much more campy and poppy. The world-building features classic monsters, fabled wars between mages and gods, and a mysterious Citadel that is the temptation (and seemingly always the death) of adventures throughout the realm.

Our adventures feature Wydrin and her partner Sebastian, a well-established mercenary duo on the look out for their next job. And a fallen lord, Aaron Firth, whose family was murdered and was run off his lands after suffering gruesome torture at the hands of his captor.

As this was a shorter novella, readers are thrown into the action with very little back story for any of these characters. We know a bit more about Firth from a prologue featuring him, but we pick up Wydrin and Sebastian straight from the tavern. I’m intrigued by the hints of backstory for them both. Sebastian heralds from a mountainous realm where he was once a member of an illustrious knights force, but was discharged for unknown reasons. Wydrin seems to have a simple reputation for being one of the best mercenaries out there Wydrin is the type of character who is right up my alley, so I was a bit disappointed by lack of backstory (even hints!) that we were given for her, other than that she is great at her job. Firth was honestly my least favorite character, but I feel like the series is setting him up for a redemption arc, of sorts, so I will wait to see what comes of that in the next three stories.

The story ends on a cliffhanger, so beware of that. But the cliffhanger, and the arc of the story itself, all feels so much more natural when read as an individual novella rather than a section of one book, so I strongly recommend trying to find the ebooks and reading the series in that version.

Rating 7: Once I got myself figured out, an enjoyable first installation for this 4-part novella series!

Reader’s Advisory: 

“Ghosts of the Citadel” isn’t included on any lists on its own, but compilation “The Copper Promise” is on these lists: “Best Fantasy Books by Women” and “Fantasy Standalone Novels.”

Find “Ghosts of the Citadel” at your library using WorldCat!

 

 

 

Joint Review: “Double Down”

27818091Though we do tend to read different genres, there is sometimes overlap in the books that we pick up and devour. When this happens, we decide to do a joint review, giving our thoughts through our own personal lenses of what we look for in reading material. A few weeks ago, we reviewed the first book in Gwenda Bond’s “Lois Lane” series, and now we’re back with the sequel!

Book: “Double Down” by Gwenda Bond

Publishing Info: Switch Press, May 2016

Where Did We Get this Book: The library!

Book Description: Lois Lane has settled in to her new school. She has friends, for maybe the first time in her life. She has a job that challenges her. And her friendship is growing with SmallvilleGuy, her online maybe-more-than-a-friend. But when her friend Maddy’s twin collapses in a part of town she never should’ve been in, Lois finds herself embroiled in a dangerous mystery that brings her closer to the dirty underbelly of Metropolis.

Kate’s Thoughts:

I think that a YA series is a great platform for Lois Lane to really shine. It’s pretty tempting to just make her a damsel in distress when she’s serving as a counterpart to Superman, or to just push her aside completely. So if you’re coming to this series looking for solid Lois characterization, this is going to be the series for you! If you’re coming into it looking for an original and well plotted main story that only strengthens her character, well….. Maybe not.

I think that is what frustrates me the most about this series. I read it because I want to see Lois shine more on her own, and shine she does, but at the same time I find myself wanting to get back to the scenes with SmallvilleGuy. I WANT LOIS TO STAND ON HER OWN, but in this series she isn’t completely able to do that. Sure, she is a new coming of Veronica Mars in her own way, and I love how she is written, but in terms of the mysteries that she gets to solve without Clark, they aren’t very strong. In this one we get a strange mystery involving her best friend Maddy’s twin sister Melody, and a secretive conspiracy involving the mayor’s office, the former mayor (who happens to be her friend James’s disgraced father), and human cloning. This plot line was boring and didn’t interest me at all, which isn’t good seeing as it was the main storyline of the book. However, I was definitely invested in her progressing relationship with SmallvilleGuy, and the side mystery that the two of them were working on, involving a mysterious internet handle who claims that they have knowledge of a mysterious flying man. For Lois this could mean finding out what happened to her and her father one night long ago in rural Kansas. She doesn’t know what it means for SmallvilleGuy, of course, but is glad that he’s interested too. This was a mystery I could sink my teeth into, because it puts both Lois AND Clark in a dangerous position, even though we’re only seeing it from Lois’s point of view. It legit felt like some “X-Files” malarky going on, and I was living for it. Especially since Lois fears that her father may be in on it, which I thought was a perfect plot point to introduce. Sam Lane has been contentious in various iterations, and I think to make him a potentially shady government being is a very clever direction to take him in. This storyline also set up for some potential future storylines as the series goes on. One involves a mysterious source who just signs their correspondence with ‘A’. And the other was short and sweet: while Lois and SmallvilleGuy were in a virtual reality world, being represented by their own created avatars, a mysterious, silent avatar was following them around occasionally. An avatar that looks like a bat.

giphy
My face when the book I’m reading may be teasing an unexpected Batman arc. (source)

Damn do I love Batman and all his broody shenanigans. The thought of teenage Bruce somehow interacting with Lois Lane, even if it’s just for a little bit, really, REALLY makes me giddy.

I’ve just kind of come to terms with the fact that I am reading this series because it’s a spot on Lois portrayal that I really, really like. It’s not terribly innovative and had it been about an original plucky high school reporter I would have jumped ship awhile back, but it’s my girl Lois and she keeps it centered. She’s ambitious and whip smart without being cruel or vain, and has realistic flaws that make her interesting. I could read about this Lois Lane all day long, and I am still wanting to see more.

Serena’s Thoughts:

When I started this series, I agreed with Kate’s first thought: that YA is a great vehicle for a Lois Lane story. And, while I still am very much enjoying the novelty of getting to read a Lois Lane centric series, I’m not as sure that this is really true for me any more.

I agree with much of what Kate said regarding the central mystery of this story. The biggest failure in this book for me was this plot and its “believablility” issues. Look, we know this is based on a Superman story, so going in I have “bought in” to the world where an alien being has arrived on earth and has all of these amazing ability. But…that’s really supposed to be the only fantastical difference between this world and our own. The first book featured virtual reality; this is easy to get on board with as it feels like we’ve been one step away from this in reality for the last decade. But this book used cloning as its central plot device. And, look,  cloning is something that has actually happened in our world! It shouldn’t be so hard to believe! But the explanations, science, and plot devices behind it always felt weak, through me out of the story, and for a plot dealing with “twin bonds,” clone tanks, and a mob boss, I was surprisingly bored through a lot of it.

I also second what Kate said about the secondary mystery that Lois and SmallvilleGuy were involved in being much more interesting. There were actual stakes involved in this. I never really cared about Melody, the only connection readers have to her is that she is Maddy’s twin sister (and frankly, I’ve never particularly been super attached to Maddy herself!), but heck yeah I’m invested in sneaky government agencies trying to discover the identity of the flying man!

This is the central problem that I’m coming to see with this series. There’s just no way to balance the primary and secondary characters properly. SmallvilleGuy is firmly a secondary character. His plots are secondary, his page time is secondary, and, I’m sorry, that’s just not going to work in the long run for most readers when the series is being sold based on the strength of  Lois Lane, whom everyone knows through her connections to Clark Kent/Superman and the other classic DC characters. There is no way to write unique, original characters who are going to stand up as more interesting or more worthy of their more central roles in the plot when you have a character like SmallvilleGuy lingering on the sidelines with all of this previously established history and backstory. It’s just an impossible situation. It’s not that Maddy, Devin, James, or any of them are bad characters; they’ve just been plopped into a losing battle. I found myself almost skimming through large chunks of the story, just to get back to the Lois/SmallvilleGuy action, and this isn’t good.

Going back to what I originally said, I at first thought the idea of a YA Lois Lane book had a lot of good things going for it. But I’ve now come to realize that what I was really excited about was just the idea of a Lois Lane book all told. The YA aspect of the series is starting to feel like an anchor, rather than a boost. The action and stakes never feel like they have any true threat, which is another factor contributing to my general boredom/lack of interest in the central mystery, and you just can’t put Clark Kent on the sidelines and expect original characters to carry the show. When readers know the truth of the matter, it’s easy to start feeling impatient for Lois to get there too. And I start looking at this series, and due to it being YA, I just see a never-ending line of books before we get any kind of resolution in this area, unless Bond commits to fully re-writing history (which frankly, I’d be more than ok with!) Just get them in the same room and working together!!

So, ultimately, I found this book fairly frustrating. And largely this has to do with the fact that parts of it are so good! I love Lois herself, the characterization is spot on perfect for me.

tumblr_mbpu07y8u11rrw561o4_250
Oh, Lois…(source)

 

And SmallvilleGuy, too! But right there, if your two, let’s face it, MAIN characters are both so strong, it’s tough to read a series where one of them is sidelined and the other spends most of her time on plots that have very little at stake and with characters who just can’t stand up on their own. I shouldn’t be more interested in a flying bat machine that literally gets 4 sentences worth of page time than in Lois’s actual highschool friends. Can we just have a massive time jump and start writing the series from Lois’s perspective while at Daily Planet with Clark??

Serena’s Rating 6: I just love Lois and SmallvilleGuy so much that I’m finding it harder and harder to appreciate the other aspects of this series. But, of course, I’ll continue reading, because there’s no way I’m NOT supporting a “Lois Lane” series!

Kate’s Rating 7: The main plot and mystery isn’t very interesting, but Lois’s side mystery with SmallvilleGuy and the government’s hunt for the flying man has me fully invested.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Double Down” is included on these Goodreads lists: “YA Superheroes (Not Comics/Graphic Novels)”, and “Fiction Featuring Lois Lane”.

Find “Double Down” at your library using WorldCat!

Kate’s Review: “Mother, Mother”

17262187Book: “Mother, Mother” by Koren Zailckas

Publishing Info: Crown, September 2013

Where Did I Get This Book: The library!

Book Description: Josephine Hurst has her family under control. With two beautiful daughters, a brilliantly intelligent son, a tech-guru of a husband and a historical landmark home, her life is picture perfect. She has everything she wants; all she has to do is keep it that way. But living in this matriarch’s determinedly cheerful, yet subtly controlling domain hasn’t been easy for her family, and when her oldest daughter, Rose, runs off with a mysterious boyfriend, Josephine tightens her grip, gradually turning her flawless home into a darker sort of prison.

Resentful of her sister’s newfound freedom, Violet turns to eastern philosophy, hallucinogenic drugs, and extreme fasting, eventually landing herself in the psych ward. Meanwhile, her brother Will shrinks further into a world of self-doubt. Recently diagnosed with Aspergers and epilepsy, he’s separated from the other kids around town and is homeschooled to ensure his safety. Their father, Douglas, finds resolve in the bottom of the bottle—an addict craving his own chance to escape. Josephine struggles to maintain the family’s impeccable façade, but when a violent incident leads to a visit from child protective services, the truth about the Hursts might finally be revealed.

Review: It is times like these that I thank the heavens that my mother is a wonderful, funny, awesome person who raised me well with a lot of encouragement and love. Sure, my teenage years, like most teenage years, were trying for both of us, but she and I have a very good relationship now, and I know that I am lucky for that. Because there are some people who have mothers like Josephine Hurst, and that scares the bejesus out of me. Josephine Hurst is one of the most twisted villains I have encountered in fiction this year, and like the other villains that have shook me to the core it’s because of her plausibility. She is the classic narcissist parent, who coddles and smothers and brainwashes one child (the neurotic and eager to please son Will), and torments the other (the tortured and lost Violet). I had gone into this thinking that it was going to be something kind of soapy and cartoony like either Kathleen Turner in “Serial Mom” or Marcia Cross on “Desperate Housewives”, but then when it was a really upsetting and scary book about the dangers of narcissistic parenting I was a bit taken aback. Though I suppose I should have expected something along those lines from the woman whose memoir, “Smashed: The Story of a Drunken Girlhood”, was about her tumultuous teenage years on booze. Still, how I hoped for a campy Bree Van de Kamp-Hodge revisit.

giphy12
Shady lady. (source)

I will say this much, this book was super upsetting and very terrifying to me because of how relentlessly evil Josephine was, and not in a fun way. Watching her manipulate her children and husband and wage psychological warfare against them was just hard to read. It’s told from two perspectives, that of Will, the doted on and pampered child, and that of Violet, the black sheep who Josephine psychologically abuses. The overarching mystery in this book is a pretty clever one, in that you don’t realize that it’s a mystery until about half way through, and that is of the oldest child, Rose. Rose ran away from the family shortly before the events started, and Zailckas does a very good job of slowly revealing why things may not be as they seem in not just this situation, but in many other situations in this book. We get the perspective of Violet, who resents her sister for leaving, and Will, who has been convinced that his oldest sister is basically evil, and I wanted to smack and shake both of them and protect them from this horrible woman who is raising them. I’ve seen and heard about narcissistic parents in the lives of my friends and acquaintances and family, and Josephine is written very, very convincingly. Even though I wanted to shake both Will and Violet for different reasons, I not once said to myself ‘well that just wouldn’t happen’, because Josephine was incredibly real. I definitely enjoyed the Violet sections more, but that may have been because the Will sections were a bit too disturbing to me. Will is the child who is loved and praised and coddled, but you also see just how far gone he is, and how screwed he is going to be because of his connection to his horrible and abusive mother. That said, I also think that the Violet parts showed a more well thought out character, as Violet, though she rebels against her mother with her fascination with Eastern religion and philosophy, is also completely controlled and dominated by her. Violet had the strongest voice of the three children, and I really felt for her and invested in her.

However, I kind of guessed a couple of the big twists pretty early on in the story, and I don’t know if it was because I read too much thriller fiction or because Zailckas didn’t parse out the clues in a very tricky way. I had a harder time with some of the red herrings that were thrown in, as they were only there to distract but then had no explanation or payoff. I also wish that we had a little more dichotomy between Josephine and Beryl, the mother of Violet’s friend Imogene and the positive female influence in her life. We got to see Beryl a little bit, but I wanted more juxtaposition between them. I also felt that Beryl was almost too two dimensional in her portrayal, both a compassionate maternal angel and a literal martyr, as she is suffering from terminal cancer. I think that had we seen more of her and had she had more depth it would have felt more sincere. And without giving away any spoilers, I wished for more closure than we got. I know that life doesn’t always have closure, and I know that rarely do awful people really get what they deserve. But sometimes I am desperate for it, and when it doesn’t happen the way I want it to I have a harder time accepting it.

“Mother, Mother” is a solid thriller mystery and most of the characters are well thought out. But I warn you, it is very upsetting, and it tends to have a bit more emotional baggage than it can carry. Koren Zailckas captures narcissistic personality disorder very well, and should you dare read this, be ready to feel all the ick.

Rating 7: While some of the parts are hard to read and some of the plot twists and diversions are unnecessary, “Mother, Mother” paints a haunting portrait of a horribly abusive mother and her suffering children.

Reader’s Advisory:

“Mother, Mother” is included on these Goodreads lists: “Narcissistic Mothers”, and “Gillian Flynn Read Alikes”.

Find “Mother, Mother” at your library using WorldCat!

Joint Rev-Up Review: “Fallout”

23110163Though we do tend to read different genres, there is sometimes overlap in the books that we pick up and devour. When this happens, we decide to do a joint review, giving our thoughts through our own personal lenses of what we look for in reading material. In anticipation of the new Lois Lane book, “Double Down”, we go back to the first in the series, “Fallout”.

Book: “Fallout” by Gwenda Bond

Publication Info: Switch Press, May 2015

Where Did We Get This Book: The library!

Book Description: Lois Lane is starting a new life in Metropolis. An Army brat, Lois has lived all over—and seen all kinds of things. (Some of them defy explanation, like the near-disaster she witnessed in Kansas in the middle of one night.) But now her family is putting down roots in the big city, and Lois is determined to fit in. Stay quiet. Fly straight. As soon as she steps into her new high school, though, she can see it won’t be that easy. A group known as the Warheads is making life miserable for another girl at school. They’re messing with her mind, somehow, via the high-tech immersive videogame they all play. Not cool. Armed with her wit and her new snazzy job as a reporter, Lois has her sights set on solving this mystery. But sometimes it’s all a bit much. Thank goodness for her maybe-more-than-a friend, a guy she knows only by his screenname, SmallvilleGuy.

Kate’s Thoughts

Does this book sound familiar to you? Well it should, because it was one of our recommendations on our “Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice” review. And you probably remember that we both love Lois Lane and will stand for her until the end of time. Given that I’ve been a Lois fan since I was a child, I was really really REALLY excited to see that the roving reporter was getting her own YA series set in modern day Metropolis. Because if anyone needs her own series, it’s Lois Friggin’ Lane! Especially given how the New 52 Comics have treated her character….

giphy9
Seriously. Screw you, DC. (source)

So I will just get one thing out of the way right off the bat: if this book hadn’t been about Lois Lane, and had just been an original character getting into a strange undercover reporter position, I probably would have found it pretty meh. The main character is snippy and snappy in an aggressively quirky kind of way, her friends are tropes, and the story isn’t really anything new or original when it comes to YA mysteries. But since it’s Lois Lane who is being sarcastic and slick and since we’re in a DC universe with ridiculous storylines abound, I am FULLY ON BOARD! Lois is portrayed as an intelligent and ambitious teenage girl without being a mean girl, which is a very nice thing to see. I think that it would be tempting to equate ambition with cruelty and coldness (especially when that ambition is coming from a female), but Bond makes her kind and caring as well as filled with a drive to succeed. And she isn’t perfect, either. She does have a bad temper at times, and she is impulsive to the point of being dangerously reckless. And as a teenager this totally works, as so many teenagers think that they are completely invincible, so why not teenage Lois? Especially when ADULT Lois goes through life feeling the same.

It’s also nice getting a bit of insight into Lois’ home life and personal life. We get to see her sister Lucy, her mother Ellen, and her father Sam, and really the only other memorable portrayals of these three characters, for me, were on “Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman”. And in that Lucy disappeared after half a season, Ellen was a vague narcissist, and Sam was introduced when he showed up to Christmas celebrations with a sex robot (they say fiancee, but we know what she is). So seeing Lois have a more at home and healthy relationship with both her sister and her parents helped make her feel like a real teenage girl. Her friendships, specifically the ones with Maddy and “SmallvilleGuy”, also really add to her character as well. While Maddy is kind of the typical ‘rebel girl’, her friendship with Lois fleshes her out, and their compassion towards Anavi (the girl getting harassed by the cartoonly evil Warheads) is also very humanizing. Lois is a character who has never, within the canon, made friends too easily, and that makes her nice relationship with Maddy all the more sweet and satisfying. Her friendships with the other reporters at The Scoop are fine, with kind and geeky Devin and snooty and broody James rounding out the group. I was worried that one of these guys would be presented as a possible love interest for Lois, which I wouldn’t be on board with in this story. It’s mostly because I think that Lois is a strong enough character to stand on her own, and doesn’t need a love triangle to make her life more complicated. “SmallvilleGuy” is complicated enough. And as for “SmallvilleGuy”, well……

giphy10
(source)

As a Lois and Clark shipper until the day I die, it was great. Plus, by having him be an online pen pal, Clark doesn’t steal any spotlight from Lois, and the two of them can have their wonderful interactions without changing their origin stories too much.

Though the plot is a little predictable and the villains kind of boring, overall “Fallout” is a great intro story to this new Lois Lane series. “Double Down” will be next, and hopefully Lois Lane will go on to shine again. She deserves that.

Serena’s Thoughts

While my heart will always belong to Teri Hatcher as the one, true Lois Lane from “Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman,” I did plow my way through all 10 seasons of “Smallville.” And, in many ways “Smallville” is the YA version of “Lois and Clark,” dealing with highschool/college age Lois and Clark (I like to pretend that the early seasons of Lana don’t exist). For all the other silliness and angst-ridden nonsense of the show, I always liked Erika Durance’s Lois. She had the same spunk and independence that I came to associate with Lois Lane, while also dealing with issues that would confront the character at a younger age. So really, “Fallout” plays the same role to the more classic examples of an adult Lois Lane from the comics.

Like Kate said, all in all there’s nothing super special about the plot. If anything, I spent most of my time wondering how exactly the mechanics of the video game they were all playing really worked. Some type of virtual reality World of Warcraft? It sounded fun, if anything. But yes, the characters were nothing special. The bullies were typical bullies, most of the friends fell into fairly predictable roles, and the adults were often as ridiculous as one comes to expect from much of YA fiction these days.

What made the whole thing special were the connections to the comics. As a longtime fan, it was so exciting seeing familiar (and often very overlooked side characters) finally get a time to shine. Not only Lois, but her father, mother, sister and Perry White. My fangirl heart was all a-flutter each time a new familiar face made an appearance.

And Lois herself was great. She reminded me a lot of the Lois character from “Smallville,” modernized but still familiar with her drive and often insane recklessness. And, obviously, any interaction between her and “SmallvilleGuy” was too previous for this world.

The story was predicable, and the ending had many convenient pieces falling into place in just the right way at just the right time, but the novelty alone really saves this book. All Bond needed to do was get Lois and Clark right, and I would be sold. And she succeeded at that. I’m exited to see where “Double Down” takes these characters!

Kate’s Rating 7: The plot itself is a bit contrived and the original characters have some room to grow, but Lois Lane shines in this teenage origin story. It’s a solid start to what could be a very fun and satisfying series.

Serena’s Rating 7: Samesies.

Reader’s Advisory

“Fallout” can be found on the following Goodreads lists: “Ladies of DC”, and “Superhero YA!”.

Find “Fallout” at your library using WorldCat!

Kate’s Review: “All the Missing Girls”

23212667Book: “All the Missing Girls” by Megan Miranda

Publication Info: Simon & Schuster, June 2016

Where Did I Get This Book: The library!

Book Description: Like the spellbinding psychological suspense in The Girl on the Train and Luckiest Girl Alive, Megan Miranda’s novel is a nail-biting, breathtaking story about the disappearances of two young women—a decade apart—told in reverse.

It’s been ten years since Nicolette Farrell left her rural hometown after her best friend, Corinne, disappeared from Cooley Ridge without a trace. Back again to tie up loose ends and care for her ailing father, Nic is soon plunged into a shocking drama that reawakens Corinne’s case and breaks open old wounds long since stitched.

The decade-old investigation focused on Nic, her brother Daniel, boyfriend Tyler, and Corinne’s boyfriend Jackson. Since then, only Nic has left Cooley Ridge. Daniel and his wife, Laura, are expecting a baby; Jackson works at the town bar; and Tyler is dating Annaleise Carter, Nic’s younger neighbor and the group’s alibi the night Corinne disappeared. Then, within days of Nic’s return, Annaleise goes missing.

Told backwards—Day 15 to Day 1—from the time Annaleise goes missing, Nic works to unravel the truth about her younger neighbor’s disappearance, revealing shocking truths about her friends, her family, and what really happened to Corinne that night ten years ago.

Like nothing you’ve ever read before, All the Missing Girls delivers in all the right ways. With twists and turns that lead down dark alleys and dead ends, you may think you’re walking a familiar path, but then Megan Miranda turns it all upside down and inside out and leaves us wondering just how far we would be willing to go to protect those we love.

Review: Oh look, ANOTHER book that involves a missing person or persons! The good news is that once this is done we’ll kind of move away from that theme, at least for awhile. Because let’s be fair, this theme is totally a no brainer for the thriller and grit lit genre. So our most recent missing person story is “All the Missing Girls” by Megan Miranda. This one almost made my highlights list in June, and even though it was eeked out at the last minute I still put it on request, because the buzz is that this could become another huge runaway hit. And yeah, I guess I agree with that. But unfortunately, it fell short of other grit lit books that I have read. Yes, it has a very cool frame in how it’s told, as Miranda decides to tell the main arc of the story backwards. We start at Day 15 of Annaleise’s disappearance, and work out way back to Day 1, peppering flashbacks to Corinne’s disappearance as well. A pretty strong gimmick, but the problem with gimmicks is that sometimes that is all a product has going for it. And sadly, I think that if “All the Missing Girls” was told in linear order, it wouldn’t stand out.

Nic is the standard main character in this genre: she’s emotionally a mess, she is stuck in a past that she tries to escape, and she can’t see past her current, bad situation, which them causes harm to those in her new life. It’s a character archetype in these stories that is getting a little old. I mean, the moment that she said that she had a handsome, smart, wonderful fiance named Everett I knew that poor Everett was going to be run through the ringer thanks to her shenanigans. I don’t know what rule has been written that says that these damaged women need to treat everyone who cares about them like crap, but Nic holds fast to it. Sometimes it’s done well and you can see the flaws in their loved ones who just don’t (or won’t) understand them, but in this one I just felt bad for Everett because Nic is a trainwreck. She has a strained relationship with her brother, she is still hung up on her ex boyfriend Tyler (who is ALSO a walking trope as the puppy eyed ex boyfriend whose candle still burns bright for his lost lady love), and she misses her frenemy Corinne in spite of the fact that Corinne was just the worst. Protagonists like this are so hard for me to like, because while I like that these women aren’t perfect and are complex and can be complete messes a la the guys in “True Detective” or something, it’s getting a little old.

giphy1
And honestly, “True Detective” had gotten a little old by season 2. (source)

But as far as the structure go, gimmicky as it may be, it did make the story more intriguing. I kind of had to wrap my head around it, as going backwards but revealing the truths about Corinne in a forward time was kind of a mind twister, but once I got the hang of it I did enjoy this creative choice. It also allowed us to find out the past after we got to see the present and future, and in doing so it did give some of the revelations a stronger reveal and emotional punch. It also was fun seeing that you think that you know what the solution is because you started at the end, but then as you move backwards you realize that no, you’re totally off base and so wrong. I am kind of curious if Miranda wrote it out in order first, or if she always started at the end and worked her way back to the beginning. It couldn’t have been easy, and so I do have to give her props for sticking the landing. I just wish that the story itself was stronger, to match the strong storytelling choices.

There was also a lot to explore when it came to Nic and her relationship with her father. Her Dad is suffering from dementia, and Miranda did a very good job of portraying someone who loves her father and hates to see him that way, but also gets easily frustrated and upset with him even though she knows that he can’t control his lapses. As someone who watched her mother and aunts have to deal with their dementia-ridden mother, and how hard it was, I really appreciated that Miranda showed multiple sides to how this can affect family members. While the dementia could have just been used as a plot device (and it was to an extent), it was handled with enough care that it didn’t feel cynical or clunky.

“All the Missing Girls” serves mostly more of the same, but the plot structure was pretty neat. I don’t know if I’d pick up another book by Miranda, but who knows how I will feel if another one comes out and it sounds promising. Give this a whirl if you want a new way of reading a mystery, but don’t be shocked if it feels all too familiar.

Rating 7: The way the story is framed is definitely cool and intriguing, but with weaker characters it feels like the story relies too heavily on the gimmick.

Reader’s Advisory:

“All the Missing Girls” is included on these Goodreads lists: “Women with Moxie”, and “Great Discussion Starters”.

Find “All the Missing Girls” at your library using WorldCat.

 

Kate’s Review: “What She Knew”

25817531Book: “What She Knew” by Gilly Macmillan

Publishing Info: William Morrow, December 2015

Where Did I Get This Book: On audiobook from the library!

Book Description: In her enthralling debut, Gilly Macmillan explores a mother’s search for her missing son, weaving a taut psychological thriller as gripping and skillful as The Girl on the Train and The Guilty One.

In a heartbeat, everything changes…

Rachel Jenner is walking in a Bristol park with her eight-year-old son, Ben, when he asks if he can run ahead. It’s an ordinary request on an ordinary Sunday afternoon, and Rachel has no reason to worry—until Ben vanishes.  

Police are called, search parties go out, and Rachel, already insecure after her recent divorce, feels herself coming undone. As hours and then days pass without a sign of Ben, everyone who knew him is called into question, from Rachel’s newly married ex-husband to her mother-of-the-year sister. Inevitably, media attention focuses on Rachel too, and the public’s attitude toward her begins to shift from sympathy to suspicion.

As she desperately pieces together the threadbare clues, Rachel realizes that nothing is quite as she imagined it to be, not even her own judgment. And the greatest dangers may lie not in the anonymous strangers of every parent’s nightmares, but behind the familiar smiles of those she trusts the most.

Where is Ben? The clock is ticking…

Review: Yeesh, as I started listening to this book I noticed something of a theme in the books I’ve been taking on lately. So many missing people and/or children! I think that had it been one or two books that had this theme I would have been less likely to notice it, but given “What She Knew” (and another one I will be reviewing at a later date), my total number of missing persons/children books in the past month will be at five. Grim, grim stuff. So the theme continues with this book, one that I had on my list for awhile and just so happened to find on audiobook download at my library. But the difference between this book and the other ones I’ve read is that this one not only deals with a missing child, but the toxic shame culture that has risen when it comes to how we perceive other’s parenting and how we express our displeasure about it. Specifically, via the Internet. Why this summer alone there have been two very high profile cases of tragedies involving children, those of Harambe the Gorilla and the Walt Disney World alligator attack. In one instance an animal was killed when a child fell into it’s enclosure, and in another instance a child was taken and killed by an alligator, which led to Disney killing more alligators in the search for the culprit. And boy oh boy did people take to the Internet to blame the parents, saying that if they had just been paying closer attention, all of this could have been avoided. I kept thinking about these cases and others as I listened to this book, as one of the most villainous culprits in this book is parent-shaming. Macmillan pulls no punches when she shows the insidious cruelty of the shame centered Internet.

The mystery to this book was pretty stellar, even though it occasionally treaded a bit towards the unhinged. There was twist after twist after twist, and since I was listening to it it wasn’t as easy to keep up with it. I couldn’t really skip back that easily, so I would just have to say ‘okay, I guess I remember this stuff’ and hope that I actually did. I think that sometimes when trying to throw out red herrings, Macmillan just went a bit overboard. First the person who did it would be Person A, then it would be Person B, then it would be Person A again, but then no wait, it’s Person C! Just a few too many flip flops for my taste. The benefit of the flip flops, though, is that I was taken by surprise as to how it all shook out, which is always a good thing when it comes to my reading materials.

The characters in this book ran the gamut from run of the mill to pretty complex. I really liked Rachel, the harried and terrified mother of the missing Ben. She was a well done picture of someone who is terrified that she has lost her child forever, and yet is willing to pull out all of the stops and kick down all of the doors in London to find him. At times I wanted to shake her and tell her to, for the love of GOD, listen to the professionals who are trying to bring your child back to you, but I am pretty sure that was the whole point. Her relationship with her older, controlling sister Nicky was one of the strongest things about this book, as they blatantly love each other fiercely, but lock horns over under the surface conflicts that aren’t apparent until later. That said, these under the surface conflicts are the product of a very out there plot twist that didn’t feel necessary. I know that it was supposed to instill doubt in the reality of their relationship (and I will leave it at that), but there were a lot of less ridiculous ways that Macmillan could maintained the doubt, in my opinion. It kind of baffled me.

I also found the parts that centered on Detective Inspector Clemo to be a bit superfluous. I liked him enough as a character, and it was nice seeing the police side of the investigation and the hindrances that they faced in this situation (probably pretty realistic hindrances), but the troubles in his personal life and his emotional problems just didn’t quite do it for me. I know that the way that it was told (as sometimes therapy transcripts were used to tell his side of the story) was just another way to make the reader wonder what was happening, but I found myself hoping that these parts of the story would go faster. It was a good dichotomy to show the police approach versus the proactive approach Rachel wanted to take, so that aspect was appreciated.

I listened to this on audiobook, and both a male and female narrator were used depending on whose side of the story was being told. Penelope Rawlings covered the Rachel parts, and Dugald Bruce-Lockhart covered Clemo. Sometimes they kind of had different cadence and voice styles for the same character, which was a little distracting, but overall I thought that they both did a good job. Rawlings especially conveyed Rachel’s desperation very well.

“What She Knew” was a good book to listen to in the car, and I enjoyed it for what it was. It’s a good story to add to the lady centered thrillers that have exploded in popularity, and I think that fans of the grit-lit genre should definitely give it a try!

Rating 7: This was a pretty tight thriller with a lot of good twists, but there were so many that it almost gave me whiplash. The narrators did a good job, and the story was satisfying, though some parts were stronger than others.

Reader’s Advisory:

“What She Knew” is included on these Goodreads lists: “Female Psychological Thrillers/Suspense”, and “Book of the Month Club Picks”.

Find “What She Knew” at your library using WorldCat!

Serena’s Review: “Unmade”

18309803Book: “Unmade” by Sarah Rees Brennan

Publishing Info: Random House, September 2015

Where Did I Get this Book: the library!

Book Description: Kami has lost the boy she loves, is tied to a boy she does not, and faces an enemy more powerful than ever before. With Jared missing for months and presumed dead, Kami must rely on her new magical link with Ash for the strength to face the evil spreading through her town.

Rob Lynburn is now the master of Sorry-in-the-Vale, and he demands a death. Kami will use every tool at her disposal to stop him. Together with Rusty, Angela, and Holly, she uncovers a secret that might be the key to saving the town. But with knowledge comes responsibility—and a painful choice. A choice that will risk not only Kami’s life, but also the lives of those she loves most.

Review: I finally got around to picking up the last book in the “Lynburn Legacy” trilogy. And, while I was left a bit cold by the second book in this series, I am happy to report that “Unmade” pulled the series back from the edge and ended on a solid note.

But first, before I go into any details about the book itself, can we take a moment to be aghast together at this cover? For the sake of discussion, here are the three covers in the series:

 

Obviously there was a huge shift between the first book and the second. My guess is that the first cover was coming across as “middle grade” and the publishers thought to “age it up” by switching cover art. But to this? Generic back-of-girl-walking-into-distance artwork? At least the first was interesting and unique. The second two just look like every other book on the shelf. I’ve never been a fan of the titles of these books, either. They say next to nothing about what the story is (what genre is this? what time period? what’s unique here?). And this problem is only exasperated by these generic covers. And what’s worse, by the time we get to the third one, the generic cover actually makes no sense! There is absolutely zero reference to the ocean or to Sorry-in-the-Vale even being anywhere near the ocean in these books. While the second cover at least draws feelings of mystery and suspense with a creepy woods (there is at least a creepy woods in the story), the third cover looks like something from Spring Break: Hawaii!! It’s truly awful. I have many feelings re: book covers, and usually I’m good at tamping it down, but this time…

aubreyplazano
(source)

But, enough of that, on to the review! Kami and co. start off this book in a pretty low spot. Rob Lynburn has taken control of the town, Jared is missing, presumed dead, and Kami sharing a sorcerer/source bond unwillingly with Ash. It’s all very awkward and uncomfortable. First off, I commend Brennan for “going there” with the darkness in this book. It doesn’t pull any punches with the horror of what the Lynburn legacy of magic and might stands for, and the type of rule that Rob hopes to usher back in. With that, however, comes a challenging hole to be dug out of. I was concerned that some type of magical out was going to appear, but for the most part I was satisfied with the direction this story took in its final third. While I’ve always wished for a bit more explanation into the magic system (it seems like people just “have” powers and can then do anything. Harry Potter has spoiled an entire generation to fantasy reading where we expect to hear about our characters “learning” their magic!), over all I the expanded ideas with regards to connections between sorcerers and sources was entertaining and interesting.

As I’ve said in my previous two reviews, the characters are what drive this story and the reason I kept returning to the series. Kami is such a healthy, balanced teenage girl protagonist. She struggles with not only the fantasy elements of the story, but problems that many teenagers face: shifting relationships with parents, connections with siblings, evolving friendships, and, of course, romance.

The romance is probably the weakest element of this story for me. By the end of the second book, I thought things had been largely resolved in that area and I was looking forward to a story more closely focused on plot than on the romance angst. Unfortunately, it is made a thing again. And really, because it had been seemingly resolved in the second book, it felt like hoops and out-of-character behavior had to be used to create drama in this department, a writing trope that I never appreciate. At this point in the story, especially when there were serious events going on in life, the relationship angst felt contrived and I almost was rooting for Kami to just slam the door in Jared’s whiny, mopey face once and for all. Alas, she did not. Ultimately, this also resolved itself in a surprisingly satisfying manner by the end of the book, but I feel like a lot less page time could have been devoted to the whole plot line to begin with.

There are moments of this story where the dialogue is laugh-out-loud in its witticisms, but I’ll be honest, there were a few parts that were cry-worthy as well. All in all, it was a very satisfying conclusion to a solid trilogy in the YA fantasy genre. If any of these elements are up your alley, I definitely recommend checking out this series!

Rating 7: A satisfying conclusion full of witty and fun characters!

Reader’s Advisory:

“Unmade” is included on these Goodreads lists: “Diversity in Young Adult and Middle Grade” and “What a Wonderful World – A Celebration of Imaginative World-Building.”

Find “Unmade” at your library using Worldcat!

Previous review: “Unspoken” and “Untold”

 

 

 

 

Kate’s Rev-Up Review: “Finders Keepers”

22453035Book: “Finders Keepers” by Stephen King

Publishing Info: Scribner, June 2015

Where Did I Get This Book: The Library!

Book Description: “Wake up, genius.” So begins King’s instantly riveting story about a vengeful reader. The genius is John Rothstein, an iconic author who created a famous character, Jimmy Gold, but who hasn’t published a book for decades. Morris Bellamy is livid, not just because Rothstein has stopped providing books, but because the nonconformist Jimmy Gold has sold out for a career in advertising. Morris kills Rothstein and empties his safe of cash, yes, but the real treasure is a trove of notebooks containing at least one more Gold novel.

Morris hides the money and the notebooks, and then he is locked away for another crime. Decades later, a boy named Pete Saubers finds the treasure, and now it is Pete and his family that Bill Hodges, Holly Gibney, and Jerome Robinson must rescue from the ever-more deranged and vengeful Morris when he’s released from prison after thirty-five years.

Not since Misery has King played with the notion of a reader whose obsession with a writer gets dangerous. Finders Keepers is spectacular, heart-pounding suspense, but it is also King writing about how literature shapes a life—for good, for bad, forever.

Review: The flashback to the “Bill Hodges Series” continues with the middle book, “Finders Keepers”. I got my grubby little paws on this book shortly after I had listened to “Mr. Mercedes” on audiobook, but couldn’t wait for the CDs to arrive so I just grabbed the print book. Sorry, Will Patton, I was just too anxious to dive right in. The upside with reading this book in print form was that I basically devoured it once I had it in my hand. I read faster than Will Patton speaks, after all. Eager was I to fall back into the world of Private Detective Bill Hodges and his assistants Jerome and Holly. Eager was I to revisit that horrible and evil Brady Hartsfield, who was left beaten and practically brain dead by Holly in an effort to stop him from blowing up a concert of teenage girls. Eager was I.

So it was too bad that “Finders Keepers” kind of let me down.

It certainly wasn’t the writing. King brings some more great suspense to this narrative, building layer upon layer of serious tension. He starts out with a horrific murder, and doesn’t let the action or intensity die down. Morris Bellamy is like a male and more expansive version of Annie Wilkes, his obsession with his favorite writer pushing him over the edge into violence and madness.He is a very clear threat, and I definitely felt a lot of fear for poor Pete Saubers, a boy whose family is falling into financial ruin and is looking for a miracle. So of course he’s going to take that money that he finds, any empathetic reader would understand it. Had this been any other Stephen King book, I probably would have loved this and bought into it 100%. The problem for me is that this is Book 2 in the Bill Hodges Trilogy. And Bill, Holly, and Jerome do not make an appearance in this book until about one third of the way, and to me that is just far too long to bring these characters back when it is supposed to be the middle part of a Bill Hodges Trilogy. It kind of felt like that King had a new fun idea, and then, knowing he wanted to write more Bill Hodges stuff, decided to throw both themes together to kill two birds with one stone. He did it in a believable way, even connecting the Saubers family to the Mr. Mercedes massacre (Mr. Saubers was one of the victims, left with a permanent limp and few job prospects because of it), but it still felt cobbled together. Perhaps this could be written off as a good way to show that Hodges and Holly and, to a lesser extent, Jerome have started their own detective business together (called Finders Keepers), but it still was a bit too long to keep them away for the sake of the new characters.

And plus, I feel that this story as a whole has just as much to do with Brady Hartsfield as it does with Bill Hodges. Hartsfield has a small role in this, but being something of a vegetable lying in a hospital bed makes it kind of difficult to give him much to do. Given all the weight he was given in the first one, I was expecting a bit more from him, especially since it was pretty clear from the get go that there was more to his story. I think that if this series was more than just three books I would have been a bit more forgiving with not focusing on him as much. I would have felt like there was plenty of time. But with three books in this series, to barely have Hodges’ nemesis, and to keep Hodges and his gang out of it for the first third as well, it just doesn’t feel right.

But there are things here that I really did like. Jerome’s sister Barbara, relegated to role of potential victim in “Mr. Mercedes” gets to do a bit more in “Finders Keepers”. She’s the friend of Pete Saubers’ sister, who is worried about her brother and her family. Barbara is the one who prompts her to go see Hodges about what’s going on in her life. I like the fact that King is trying to have more diverse people in his books as of late, and Jerome and Barabara Robinson work very well as characters and as helpers to Bill Hodges. Perhaps the greatest accomplishment of this book, however, is the progression of Holly Gibney. When we met Holly in “Mr. Mercedes” she was a nervous, unstable wreck who was conquered by her demons. But in “Finders Keepers”, her new found freedom and purpose (and friend group of Hodges and Jerome) has helped her bloom into a confident and savvy detective in her own right. True, she still has some of her hang ups, and her less extreme personality quirks are still quite present (being too literal and lacking any kind of filter), she is far more in control of her nerves and feels a lot better about herself and her life. I love Holly, and she brings her own bit of diversity to the story, being a character who has mental disabilities and may be on the spectrum. King still writes her tenderly and with a gentle touch, but never condescends to her as a character either. Her character development is really the best damn thing about this book, and her friendship with Hodges is very satisfying.

And then there is the fact that Brady Hartsfield seems to be gaining some strange powers…. I thought that this was a real world King story, not necessarily a supernatural one. That isn’t to say that I was irritated with this. I like that King decided to go back to his roots, ALL the way bak to his first book, “Carrie”.

“Finders Keepers” wasn’t as strong as “Mr. Mercedes”, and something of a disappointing distraction from the Hodges/Hartsfield story that is at the heart of this series. But distracted or not, my girl Holly Gibney got some time to shine in this one, and that was worth it. Up next I will take on the last of the trilogy, “End of Watch”.

Rating 7: A solid mystery on it’s own, but it feels like a strange, out of place add on to the overarching story of Bill Hodges. Frankly, it needs more Brady Hartsfield. But Holly Gibney really shined bright.

Reader’s Advisory: 

“Finders Keepers” is included on these Goodreads Lists: “Quirky Books”, and “Stephen King’s Non-Horror Books”.

Find “Finders Keepers” at your library using WorldCat!

Previous Reviews in this series: “Mr. Mercedes”