Magic Under Glass by Jaclyn Dolamore Official Book Trailer

Want to win a hardcover of MAGIC UNDER GLASS by Jaclyn Dolamore plus more prizes?  See http://fabulousfrock.livejournal.com for details!

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Vanity and Vexation: A Novel of Pride and Prejudice

                

Kate Fenton

  

I couldn't really recall what books I was planning to borrow from the library for Everything Austen and I'd stumbled on this book online while idly perusing sales on Bookcloseouts (50% off certain fiction titles, I eventually resisted, I am so strong), so I picked it up there. Vanity and Vexation was originally published as Lions and Liquorice in the UK and renamed for US publication. I suppose Vanity and Vexation was a closer approximation to Pride and Prejudice than Lions and Liquorice was, although Lions are briefly mention in the book (name of a pub), as is liquorice (in a conversation between the hero and heroine). I'm going to add this to the #everythingausten pile as number 4 of the 6 Austen related works I've read and watched this year.

The Premise: This is another of those modern-day Jane Austen retellings I seem to love, this time with Pride and Prejudice and gender reversals. Lizzy Bennet's alter-ego is Nicolas Llewellyn Bevan, a suspense/thriller author and part-time journalist, who lives and writes in North Yorkshire. His Mr. Darcy is Mary Dance, the director of a Pride and Prejudice production which has taken over his town: "Tall, dark and arrogantly handsome - not to mention distinguished, powerful and rolling in money. Mr Darcy? No, that's just the woman director of Pride and Prejudice…'"  Nicolas' neighbor John is a blond-haired, blue eyed, boyscout who is the Jane equivalent, and the star of the production, actress Candia Bingham.

An Excerpt of Vanity and Vexation

My Thoughts: This is sort of chick-lit but the writing is heavier than the typical chick lit. The characters are more moody than fluffy, and do a lot of smoking, drinking (so much drinking!), swearing and occasionally, having sex. It's also very British (or should I say Welsh, because Nick is Welsh?), peppered with words like Dettol and talk of Bank Holidays. The writing is intelligent without being overbearing (I hit a few vocabulary words I didn't know, like "Hogarthian" and "anodyne", but it didn't interrupt the flow of the story).

I thought the role reversal idea was very clever and had a lot of fun identifying the alter-egos to Jane Austen's original cast. Mr. Bingley and Darcy and Jane and Elizabeth were easy. Side characters were identified relatively easy as well, like Mr and Mrs Bennet in the local bar owner and his wife, Lydia in a 17 year old teen named Christopher, and Caroline Bingley as a lead actor in the production, but there were some characters I am still not quite sure about. Was Lady Catherine de Burgh's alter ego, Mary's father, a hotshot Hollywood producer? Or was it Sir Gerant Price-Evans? And although Nicolas' friend Charlie seems obvious as Lizzy's best friend Charlotte Lucus, he spends much more time talking to his ex-wife Caroline about what's going on than to Charlie. 

I liked the way Fenton translated the problems in Pride and Prejudice into modern times. Nicolas does not need Mary for money, but her connections as a director who could option his book for the screen is another matter. The modern translation for whisking away Lydia and Darcy finding her and marrying her to Wickham is also smartly done - I think I was more concerned for Nick and others in the debacle in this book than I ever was for Lydia. That particular part of the book, actually, the last 100 pages really grabbed me.  The first two thirds I read in a day, but with some putting it down and picking it up again.

The romance between John and Candia (the Jane and Mr. Bingley characters) was rather sweet and stayed true to the original with love at first sight at a dance, but while the Nick and Mary (Liz and Darcy) romance followed the basic path that was in Pride and Prejudice, and it had it's moments, it was not the same. First, I wish there were more scenes from Mary's side of things to show her interest in Nick. Maybe it's because this book was in the third person but following Nick that we only see the beginning of his infatuation, but not hers. Secondly, there's really never any true animosity between them. Nick never starts off with a bad impression of Mary Dance. She seems aloof but not enough for him to dislike her the way Lizzy Bennet dislikes Darcy at first.  And Mary/Darcy never really does the infamous misstep in pointing out the inferiority of Nick/Lizzy's connections and his feelings despite his better judgement, not quite in the way Mr. Darcy does. It's more like they do like each other, Mary thinks Nick doesn't dress very well, and isn't sure they're well suited but still wants him. Other factors strive to separate them, like the misunderstanding caused by the Wickham character, and Nick's discovery of Mary's role in keeping John and Candia together.  Like I said, it had it's moments, especially in the second half of the book, but it wasn't quite as delicious.

Another thing that bothered me was that this book suddenly changed after chapter 12. Suddenly the writer decided to go in a completely different direction, hits reset on character names, and the style is suddenly more relaxed. The style was an improvement but I did not like having an explanation for the switch. How annoying! 

Note: I'm beginning to notice how many P&P related chick lit seem to have a writer or journalist as a main character (Austenland, Pride and Prejudice and Jasmine Fields, Me and Mr. Darcy, Vanity and Vexation), or an actor or director (Austenland, Pride and Prejudice and Jasmine Fields,Vanity and Vexation). Hmm.

Overall: A clever idea and fun to spot the gender role reversals and modern take on the Pride and Prejudice plot. Not a bad weekend read, but not without it's flaws, including an iffy switch-up 12 chapters in, and a romance that was lovely but doesn't quite live up to the original.

Buy: Amazon | Powells

Other reviews:
I couldn't find any in the blogs I follow, but here's the author's notes on this book.

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Beast form

I found out today through scifiwire that Alex Flinn's book Beastly is coming out in movie form in July 2010. Looks like it could be a bit cheesy, but I may watch it on DVD. I like the Beauty and Beast retellings.. From hitfix.com:

"Kyle Kingson (Alex Pettyfer) has it all – looks, intelligence, wealth and opportunity – and a wicked cruel streak. Prone to mocking and humiliating “aggressively unattractive” classmates, he zeroes in on Goth classmate Kendra, inviting her to the school’s extravagant environmental bash.  Kendra accepts, and, true to form, Kyle blows her off in a particularly savage fashion.  She retaliates by casting a spell that physically transforms him into everything he despises. Enraged by his horrible and unrecognizable appearance he confronts Kendra and learns that the only solution to the curse is to find someone that will love him as he is – a task he considers impossible.  

Repulsed by his appearance, Kyle’s callous father banishes him to Brooklyn with a sympathetic housekeeper and blind tutor. As Kyle ponders how to overcome the curse and get his old life back, he chances upon a drug addict in the act of killing a threatening dealer.  Seizing the opportunity, Kyle promises the addict freedom and safety for his daughter, Lindy (Vanessa Hudgens) if she will consent to live in Kyle’s Brooklyn home.  Thus begins Kyle’s journey to discover true love in this hyper-modern retelling of the classic “Beauty and the Beast” story.

Vanessa Hudgens and Alex Pettyfer star in "Beastly" Daniel Barnz (“Phoebe In Wonderland”) directs for CBS Films, the film division within CBS Corporation (NYSE: CBS.A and CBS).  The project commenced principal photography in Montreal on June 13, 2009. Susan Cartsonis (“No Reservations,” “What Women Want”) is producing through her company, Storefront Pictures.  Roz Weisberg is co-producing.  In addition to his role as director, Barnz wrote the screenplay, which is based on the Alex Flinn novel of the same name."

Beastly Teaser Trailer

Beastly

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In other news, Dear Author has posted about cheap kindle deals and how to search for them on Amazon. If you don't have a kindle, don't despair, because Amazon now has a Kindle for PC beta up. I downloaded it, and although it sometimes seems like they don't have all the kinks out yet (like it made me come back later to register my Amazon account, and it's having problems synching right now), it seems to do the job.

Wild's Call

Some free books right now:
1)  The Wild's Call by Jeri Smith-Ready (distant prequel to the Aspect of Crow trilogy)
2)  The Angel Experiment (Maximum Ride, Book 1) by James Patterson
3)  My Soul to Lose by Rachel Vincent
4)  The Demon Awakens by R.A. Salvatore
5)  Trading in Danger by Elizabeth Moon
6)  A Kiss of Shadows by Laurell K. Hamilton
7)  Starfist: First to Fight by David Sherman
Plus I see all the free harlequins from their 60th anniversary celebration.

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Ok, yes it's true, whenever I travel and happen to see a bookstore, I KINDA go in. The Husband and I went on a roadtrip to Boston last weekend to go visit a couple of our friends who live up there (they just bought a place! I'm jealous of their attic which I can see being remodeled into a cool library). We also eat a lot on these trips, but since this is a *book* blog..I give you Harvard Bookstore:

Harvard Bookstore

This bookstore was pretty nice.. small compared to The Strand and Powells, but I liked the selection. It has a used and remainder book section in the basement (scifi/fantasy was only 2 shelves, no dedicated romance section, but the used copies seemed to be good condition copies and there was a good used YA section), and the new books upstairs.

Harvard Bookstore basement

The staff was also pretty friendly. I was looking for Kristin Cashore's Graceling and I couldn't find it. I ended up just buying a couple of bookmarks, but when I left the store, what do I see? Graceling on display in their window, with a sticker that says signed by the author!  I popped back inside where the girl at the desk found me a autographed copy of my own AND said Kristin Cashore was doing an author event there November 24th at 7pm. Anyone in the Boston area who wants to see Kristin Cashore read from Fire should go. I have a volunteer who promises to go to Harvard Bookstore and get a book signed for me. Since I already have Fire signed (from BEA), I'm going to make him get Bitterblue when it comes out, heheh. Here's the haul from the trip (I was good):

Graceling, stamp bookmarks, Harvard bookstore

The bookmarks I bought are made out of stamps laminated together. I liked the fish ones from Manama, Dependency of Ajman, and the other ones are Boris Vallejo(!!) stamps from "Batum". The Boris Vallejo ones tickled my fantasy reading sensibilities. If you're interested in the sheet set it came from, click here.

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Heroes at Risk

                

Moira J. Moore

Slowly going through the review backlog, whoohoo! :) As with the last book, I bought this one.

The Hero series so far:
Book 1: Resenting the Hero (livejournal | vox)
Book 2: The Hero Strikes Back (livejournal | vox)
Book 3: Heroes Adrift (livejournal | vox | wordpress)

Excerpt of Heroes at Risk (it's the only one I could find)

****** mild spoilers for the rest of the series, go read my earlier reviews if you aren't up to this book yet *****

The Premise: This is the fourth book in the Heroes series. Shield Dunleavy (Lee) Mallorough and Source Shintaro (Taro) Karesh are back on the mainland (they henceforth only refer to Flatwell as "that damned island") and have to face their old life and friends again, which leads to some awkward situations because their relationship is not really clear. Meanwhile High Scape has gone from being a hotbed of disaster to a cold spot, but the people of High Scape have taken to a new trend - dabbling in magic. Some particularly misguided citizens are murdering "lucky" people so they can use their ashes for these spells. Of course, Lee's first thought is that her handsome partner is prime pickings for another kidnapping.

My Thoughts: This was a good one. I don't know what it is, but I love to analyze these characters, especially Lee, and we get a lot of fodder for discussion when Lee as usual gets everything all wrong by assuming things in her own blind way. Oh god do I want to shake this woman! Of course, if she was the type of person who was better at reading people (or even as half as good as she thinks she is), I don't think this series would be as fun. As people have commented on my earlier review, she's the ultimate unreliable narrator.  I was amused that in this book Lee's faults such as this one, are pointed out to her face, much to her irritation. I agreed with Lee that it was rude, but I think she should listen to some of these criticisms sometimes.

The primary relationship I love to observe is of course Lee and Taro's.  I'm going to point at Angie's review where she said it perfectly with "it's always a treat to watch them circle each other once more, to attempt to navigate the treacherous waters that lay between their opposing natures and meet somewhere in the middle". After the events of the last book where the Pair reach a new plateau in their relationship, some may think that everything is settled, but this is Lee we're talking about. She as usual makes her assumptions about Taro and when they're back in High Scape, she bases her actions on these assumptions. It's a little telling how Lee shields herself from grief by doing things like this, but she's emotionally inexperienced. Taro's reaction to this is so Taro as well - he gets emotional, but his reaction seems to bounce harmlessly off Lee's Impervious Wall of Logical Assumption. Watching things come to a head was one of the reasons why I love this series.

While I'm obsessed with gleaning meaning from every interaction between Taro and Lee, the story is really not primarily focused on their relationship. Lee spends a lot of time in the city trying to learn about the new trend in dabbling with magic. She questions why it's considered illegal if it is supposed to be all fake anyway, and her discoveries raise some interesting questions about whether magic is real and what it means for Sources and Shields. This intersects with some of the other odd discoveries that she and Taro have made over the past few books regarding their powers and their world. I'm not sure where the author is going to take this, but I sense she has a plan, and I'm really curious to see how it all comes together. Moore introduces a new group of people in High Scape who seem to know a lot about magic and hold a lot of power, and meanwhile there has been a shift in rulers which suggests that their world is on the cusp of change. I think I'd be most happy to see some sort of change in the expectations that are put on Sources and Shields. Throughout the series, there have been questions about how Things Are Done regarding for example, the role of the Triple S in politics, if Sources and Shields are allowed to have a relationship, and whether it's fair that Sources and Shields never have to pay for anything or never get paid.

A not on the cover: I love the colors and I like how Lee looks, but this is not what Taro looks like in my head. He doesn't look good to me here.

Overall: Possibly my favorite book in this light fantasy series so far. I'm loving Lee and Taro's relationship, and the way the series is unfolding has me very interested in where it's all going.

Buy: Amazon | Powells

Other reviews (all good!):
Angieville - A lovely review. She writes what I want to say but better!
The Book Smugglers - Thea gave it a 7
See Michelle Read - also a positive review

Interview with Moira J. Moore at Angieville

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The Way of Shadows (The Night Angel Trilogy)

                

Brent Weeks

This book languished on my nightstand for a few months. My husband bought this series after realizing it's about assassins and he recommended it to me after he finished. The 645 page length was daunting though so I didn't get around to reading it until I was threatened, err, reminded that my husband wanted to lend it to a friend and I better read it before he gave it to them.

The Premise: The first book in the Night Angel trilogy, this is an epic tale about the citizens of Cenaria, but the focus is on Azoth, a street urchin who lives on the streets with a ragtag band of other children. His group all hand in most of their earnings to Rat, one of the "Bigs" of their group, who leads through terror. Azoth rashly provokes Rat who decides to use him as an example and Azoth's only hope for survival (and protect his two friends, Jarl and Doll Girl) is to apprentice under Durzo Blint, the best wetboy (an assassin with a magical edge) in the city. Durzo is never afraid and Azoth wants to never be afraid again. That's how the book begins, but it becomes bigger and more complex as we meet new characters and see the intricate interactions between them their ramifications on the fate of Cenaria.

Excerpt of The Way of Shadows

My Thoughts: How do I describe this book? It starts off sort of simple and then becomes more complex as you go along. At first when I got a sense of the city, I wasn't that impressed by the world building. II felt like it wasn't something I hadn't seen before: the groups of street children, the idea of Guilds, the corrupt king and unrest while a neighboring land populated by evil magic-doers plots to invade. It reminds me of a lot of other fantasy, but that was okay, because after the world building foundation was in place, the characters and the plot were so unique fascinating my earlier quibbles were forgotten and I enjoyed the book. The author also introduces some new-to-me magical aspects which are peppered throughout the story.

The Way of Shadows begins as a coming of age tale. Azoth has nothing to protect himself or his two friends, the young, mute Doll Girl and the smart but small framed Jarl, and he dreams desperately of leaving the streets and apprenticing under the number one wetboy in the city, Durzo Blint. Azoth's dream is an almost impossible one, but he does manage to catch Blint's attention and Durzo promises to teach him only if he passes a test. I was really engrossed by this part of the story - wanting Azoth to pass his test and to destroy Rat, but it is also probably one of the most violent parts of the book. The abuse against children, by other children, while adults may know what's going on and do nothing, was really hard to read. It gave me chills, but it sets up the story so you know not to expect things to go the way you want them to.

The second part is the apprentice-ship phase where Azoth becomes someone else--Kylar. He trains and grows up and so do his friends and enemies. The focus of the book shifts a little and we get introduced to the points of view of some other characters. Brents starts setting the characters up like pieces on a chessboard. Friendships and actions that occur in this phase may be small and seemingly insignificant but have greater repercussions later on. We also get a lot of interesting characters and begin to learn about their motivations and secret griefs. I particularly liked Durzo Blint who avoids morality and emotional connection. Finding out why and whether it really works for him is part of the fun. Azoth/Kylar's training as a wetboy was fascinating but not glamorized. The book doesn't shy away from the darkness of the job.

The final part of the book is Azoth's final trial to become a full-fledged wetboy. The one thing you should keep in mind if you read this book is DO NOT expect things to go the way you think. At first the twists are minor, but the further you get into the story, the more you realize much of the book is set up for more and more surprises and turns. I think this author has an evil streak, because characters I had begun to like as suddenly killed off while characters I hated kept being despicable and unchecked. Each of the characters only knows his or her little part of the story and often acts without knowing that they're doing the wrong thing for the overall picture. If you really connect to a character you may get disappointed at what happens to them, but ultimately I thought that the book did end in a hopeful place despite all the things that go wrong. Of course, this book is LONG. I was 200 pages from the end and wondering how we weren't already at the end, because the sh*t was hitting the fan and I couldn't see how there were 200 pages to go. Usually in fantasy the ending happens shortly after a battle, but in The Way of Shadows, the author was not done, things kept coming, more and more twists showed up, I couldn't believe it. While I could appreciate the twists, if I can find any fault, I'd say they did start to feel improbable just by how often a new one was thrown in.

Overall: An gritty epic fantasy tale with more twists than a bag of pretzels. It didn't quite wring me out and I thought it was ultimately hopeful and worth the read, but it was a roller coaster. I'm very curious where things will go now.

Buy: Amazon | Powells

Other reviews:
Hello, Ilona Andrews liked it! (link has Andrews' thoughts plus an interview with Brent Weeks)
Un:bound - Haglerat called it a wonderfully rich traditional fantasy
Tempting Persephone - also liked it and recommends it
Fantasy/SciFi Book review - loved it
Fantasy Book Critic - Highly recommended
My Favourite Books - also a positive review
Giraffe Days - a mixed review

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Heroes Adrift

                

Moira J. Moore

This is (for some reason) one book I read last year but didn't review. I just read Heroes at Risk and wanted to review it, but it felt like I was skipping this book, so here goes: a review from my memory to fulfill my OCD completest tendencies. This is another series I'm addicted to where you have to get used to the heroine (and narrator) to enjoy it. She can be really obtuse about herself while simultaneously making observations about other people. Check out my reviews of book 1 and 2 if you're interested in trying it out.

The Hero series until now:
Book 1: Resenting the Hero (livejournal | vox)
Book 2: The Hero Strikes Back (livejournal | vox)

The Premise: This is the third book in the Heroes series which is about a Shield and Source Pair who protect the populace from natural disasters by channeling them away. Dunleavy Mallorough (Lee) and Shintaro Karish (Taro) have been mysteriously called to court in Erstwhile by the Empress. Lee doesn't like it, and soon she's proved correct for this reaction because the queen tasks the Pair to find one of her heirs, who was hidden away on Flatwell, one of the Southern Islands. Lee and Taro go there, only to discover that Flatwell doesn't recognize Pairs the same way that the mainland does. This means Lee and Taro have to actually earn their own money while trying to find this lost relative!

Excerpt of Heroes Adrift

******** possible mild spoilers of the earlier books from this point ********

My Thoughts: I really enjoyed this one, probably because when push come to shove, Lee and Taro really worked together in this book. They're both miserable, and only have each other. It's hard, particularly for Taro, because Flatwell people see him as plain and useless, not as vibrant and beautiful as he was always seen in the mainland (and in other books). The role reversal was amusing, and Lee becomes the stronger, more admired part of the Pair, much to her and Taro's astonishment. Meanwhile, poor Taro begins to question his usefulness, because in Flatwell, his skills as a Source and his pretty manners are seen as unmarketable. Only stubborn Lee continues to see him as he was seen on the mainland, which says a lot about their relationship.

This book was a little bit of a breather for me in terms of getting annoyed at Lee. I think that Lee has a habit of not speaking her thoughts out to people (because Shields are supposed to be stony), and just letting them talk, which leads to misunderstandings. I often think "Why don't you SAY that!", but no, she doesn't, she assumes they should logically realize what she's thinking and then she's surprised when they come to their own decision, because of their "talk".  Thankfully, in Flatwell, the people are a bit different from the mainland--they're less interested in what Taro and Lee are up to, and so Lee doesn't get into those situations so much. The focus is much more on just the two of them, and the results are delightful.

You could say this is sort of a transitional book, but I think the mission this Pair is on may have repercussions later on in the series. I feel like Moore is very subtly putting it into the readers heads through Lee that there's beginning to be a shift in the political climate in this world. There's also a lot of questions about if things being done the way they are now are the right way to do things, particularly in regards to Sources and Shields.

Also: This may be my favorite cover for this series so far.

Overall: A really interesting installment where Lee and Taro's roles get a little twist and there are some juicy developments in their relationship.

Buy: Amazon | Powells

Other reviews:
Angieville - a positive review
The Book Smugglers - 7-Very good

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I haven't posted in a while. Looks like it was just a week, but feels like longer. I think I was having a bit of a reading/reviewing slump. I have about three books to review and I'm just slogging through those slowly, but the reading is getting better - I'm now into the first of the Brent Weeks Night Angel Trilogy. This is a series my husband gave me to read a few months ago and I'm finally reading it (See? I DO eventually try to read books you suggest)! At first I liked the pacing, but the world building wasn't wowing me, but now I've encountered a few surprises and the plot has lots of entangled threads so I'm enjoying it more and wanting to know what happens next. It's a long book though (over 600 pages).

To tide people over, here's some pictures!!! A friend and book blogger came to visit me this weekend and we had the best grill corned ever. I am usually really meh about corn, but she would not SHUT UP about it for more than 30 minutes so we went to Cafe Habana in SOHO and tried it.  They cover it in a mexican cheese that's similar to parmesean, and a bit of chili powder and a squeezed lemon finishes off the taste. Very tasty actually:

Cafe Habana grilled corn

And then I nagged people into going to The Strand bookstore because I don't think I've been there in over ten years (even though I really don't live very far from NYC). I was reminded why I wasn't impressed by the Strand. They have a sort of smallish SF section in my eyes, and the romance section is 2 bookshelves in the basement. Two bookshelves that aren't all romance. We had a little WTF moment over this. But on the other hand, I thought the YA section was awesome.

The Strand: view of shelves on the 1st floor

In the YA section I peered at the ARCs for sale there and got a couple ($2 each!). Note how the Nicole Peeler book was mistakenly shelved as young adult. It's not YA. Gateway has a romance between an asian girl and a white boy, which is why I got it (and I like Sharon Shinn). The Strand YA section was VERY nice, although I found it rather confusing that they had young adult broken into subgenres. It was hard to find things quickly by just author.

Strand spoils

We also went to the Met and then ate again at a cantonese restaurant, and then went for drinks (I had a delicious non alcoholic midori soda. SO tasty), but I think people may get bored of my millions of pictures of food (it's what we do when we get together. Eat).

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Lost in Austen
by Emma Campbell Webster

This is a book I picked up at Powell's during my Portland trip and is one of my 6 things for the Everything Austen challenge (3 down 3 to go).

 

The Premise: This is a Choose Your Own adventure story where you are Elizabeth Bennet, and "your mission is to marry both prudently, and for love". You start out with high Intelligence and Confidences points, low Fortune, and no Accomplishments or Connections and throughout the book, decide what path you want to take to increase these numbers.

 

My Thoughts/Overall: This isn't meant to be read end to end, so it could be a really quick read or a really long one, depending on what choices you make and whether you want to keep trying once you fail. I kept trying to see where all the different paths could take me, which made the book longer, but after I got the general idea, I put the book down. Basically, you could end up with any of the heroes in every Jane Austen story, so there are a lot of familiar names and storylines intertwined with the Pride and Prejudice one.  Of course, Elizabeth is meant to be with Darcy, so any other marriage tends to end up in failure, and if you know P & P, you know what decisions Elizabeth should take to marry him.

 

As a bit of entertainment, this book works, and there are pretty line drawings throughout to illustrate the text, but it didn't really keep my attention the way another book would because it's really just a clever presentation of all the Jane Austen books I already know. It's amusing to see how the author managed to interweave all the Austen books into Pride and Prejudice so you could meet Mr. Knightley or Captain Wentworth, and she throws in some curves like falling and breaking your neck or having a scandalous affair (points where you need to go back and try again), but it's ultimately not interesting enough to keep reading for more than a few minutes at a time. It felt like it belonged in the "coffee table" book category - meant to be picked up every so often, flipped through to provide brief pleasure, and then put down again.

 

Buy: Amazon | Powells

 

Other reviews:

Austenblog - thought it was very entertaining

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Cast in Silence (Elantra)

                

Michelle Sagara

This is one of my reads this weekend during the 24-hour read-a-thon. I bought this a while ago but hadn't had the time to read it until now.

The Premise: This is the fifth book in the Chronicles of Elantra series which is a fantasy set in the city of Elantra, where Kaylin Neya, a member of one of the arms of law, called the Hawks, lives. Kaylin is the focus of a lot of attention because of mysterious symbols written all over her body, which have been there since her birth, and for the amazing things she can sometimes do. In this installment, the story continues shortly after the events in Cast in Fury when a message makes it's way to Kaylin, demanding her help with something that's disrupting the fiefs.

Book 1: Cast in Shadow
Book 2: Cast in Courtlight
Book 3: Cast in Secret (review - LJ | vox)
Book 4: Cast in Fury (review - LJ | vox)

My Thoughts: By this book, the characters surrounding Kaylin have been introduced, but we get some surprising background into Kaylin's past when someone she knows from the fiefs shows up on Kaylin and Severn's patrol with a message from the fieflord Barren. I don't remember if it was mentioned in any of the earlier books in this series, but we discover that Kaylin spent time in Barren in between leaving Nightshade and before joining the Hawks. Exactly what she was doing there is slowly revealed in this book. I liked that I was learning some new back story about Kaylin, and we also get surprised by a different view of Lord Nightshade. I think I got part of my wish after reading the last book, which was to learn more about Kaylin and her powers. Each of the books in this series has delved a little into the different people of Elantra, and this time we're circling back to the fiefs and to the characters and their pasts. I'm a big fan of the way Sagara writes her cities and the characters in them. It always feels like there's a lot interesting things that the reader wants to know more about, so I'm glad that in each successive book, we learn something new. I also wanted to see more relationship development between Kaylin and the other characters, which we do see, however, don't expect much romance in this one. Although the book is published by Luna, an imprint of Harlequin books, the romance in this series is very low and usually only faintly hinted at. In this installment there is even less than that.

When this series first came out, I think I read the first book like it was candy. I loved the idea. When the second book came out, I loved it even more than the first (it's my favorite of the series). Then in the third and fourth, I started to have some problems (which I brought up in my earlier reviews): there were too many times where people either berate Kaylin for asking some obvious question about the world that she should know the answer to, or would just NOT tell Kaylin something because it was some taboo to talk about and again, Kaylin is just an idiot for asking. Meanwhile, Kaylin (and the reader) have no idea what the other character was going on about. In this book, thankfully, we don't have another situation where the story would have ended 100 pages earlier if someone had answered Kaylin's question, but we do have the usual - "Kaylin, I don't know how you've survived for so long" comments. Sometimes I agreed because I know Kaylin is not supposed to be blabbing certain things to certain people, and she just can't help letting secrets slip out, but other times, I just found that old chestnut exasperating. I know this is supposed to be part of her character (I'm pretty sure, because this is not a trend I see in other Sagara novels), but it still annoys me a lot. I hoped it would improve, but while Kaylin has grown over the course of the series, she's still considered in need of  learning, so I suspect it won't for the next few books.

The other (bigger) problem I had, (and I suppose it's connected), is that so much is conveyed through dialogue and I often had trouble understanding it. Someone would say something loaded with meaning, and it would completely go over my head. But I knew it meant something because of the reactions of the other characters. So I'd reread it. And still not get it. I didn't realize how often this happened until the read-a-thon when I noticed that my reading speed was about 30 to 40 pages an hour, when my usual reading speed is more like 60 to 100 pages an hour. I just kept having to reread pages and it had a significant impact on my pace. I'm not sure if it was just because I was getting tired from reading hours on end, but I think that the way the dialogue is written lends itself to needing rereading for understanding.

Overall: My feeling are mixed. I love this author. I think that this book is very well written, especially in terms of world building, actual writing style and characters. I will keep reading to find out how things play out for Kaylin, however, with the repeated problems in understanding the dialogue and with how Kaylin's character is treated, my enthusiasm for this series is dropping. I hope the next installment renews it.

Buy: Amazon | B&N

Other reviews:
Dear Author - gave it a B

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