CBR2 Book 59: "Naamah's Curse" by Jacqueline Carey

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Page count: 576 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: June 12th, 2010
Date finished: June 13th, 2010

WARNING! CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR NAAMAH'S KISS!

For those who may not have heard of her, Jacqueline Carey is the author of two completed fantasy trilogies, and currently working on a third, set in a world which bears similarities to our own. Looking at the map in the front of her books, the geography bears striking similarity to that of our world, but the countries bear different names.

The main characters from her first two trilogies were from Terre D'Ange, the land of the Angels, loosely based on Renaissance France. To quote from her books: "Elua was born when the blood of Yeshua ben Yosef, the son of the one God, mingled with the tears of the Magdelene and was carried in the womb of Mother Earth. With Elua's peaceful wanderings and the one God's rejection of him, seven angels then rejected God to become Elua's companions on Earth. These angels and Elua himself then founded a nation (Terre D'Ange) and comingled with humans before leaving. D'Angelines are the people from their descent. The D'Angelines live after one precept: "Love as thou wilt". They are all strikingly beautiful in different ways, and really open about sex.

As Carey kept writing, she showed her readers more of her fantasy world. The heroine of her third trilogy, Moirin mac Fainche, is the daughter of a D'Angeline diplomat and an Alban priestess. Alba is a mix of Pictish Britain and Celtic Ireland, pretty much. Moirin's people worship the great bear spirit, but as she is half D'Angeline, she is called on adventures, and to find out what that side of her heritage means. Moirin's travels take her across the sea to Terre D'Ange, and much further again, to the great Chi'in Empire (China), where she has to help the Emperor save his daughter, who is possessed by a dragon. It may sound lame, but it's really not! She falls in love with a half-Tartar (Mongolian) peasant boy, the assistant to the scholar she is traveling with, but he is accidentally killed while they are saving the princess. The old wise man she is with, uses Moirin's limited healing powers and his own, to sacrifice his own spirit, and Bao is brought back, at the cost of his Master's life. After his resurrection, Bao and Moirin are also forever connected, as half of Moirin's soul, always connected to the great bear spirit, seems to be lodged in Bao.

Unable to deal with this, and the death of his beloved Master, Bao leaves Moirin, to find out about his own heritage, in the Tartar lands. At the start of Naamah's Curse, Moirin is sick of sitting around waiting for him, so she goes in search of him. This means we get to see Carey's version of historical Mongolia, a real treat for me as I visited the country last year. Moirin does find Bao, and their reunion is glorious, but the book wouldn't be very long if Moirin got her happy ending a quarter of the way in. Moirin is abducted by Vralian priests and taken far away from Bao. Vralia is pretty much Russia, and the priests there worship in a variation of the Greek Orthodox Church. The priests have heard of the shocking customs of the D'Angelines, and this bishop believes if he can "cure" Moirin of her sinful, and lustful ways, and make her a convert, his religion will spread far and wide - to become the only true religion.

By the time Moirin escapes, she realizes that Bao is no longer in the Tartar lands, and as Moirin has been kept in warded chains that drown out their connection, he has traveled in the opposite direction from where she is, and has become captive of the legendary and deadly Spider-Queen of Kurugiri (located approximately where Tajikistan is today). So Moirin obviously has to set off to rescue him, impossible a task as that may seem at first.

Jacqueline Carey's books are always a treat, and Naamah's Curse was no exception. Her language is rich and descriptive, and very evocative. Some readers may be a bit put off by the graphic descriptions of sex in her earlier trilogies, but Moirin, not being a courtesan, as her first protagonist, or a young, beautiful man, as her second protagonist, does not have nearly as much sex and the books are amazing fantasy adventures that I would recommend to anyone. If you've never tried Carey's books, and are curious, I would recommend either starting at the beginning of this trilogy - with Naamah's Kiss, or going back to the very beginning and reading Kushiel's Dart (probably still her best book).

CBR2 Book 58: "Hush, Hush" by Becca Fitzpatrick

Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Page count: 400 pages
Rating: 2 stars
Date begun: June 10, 2010
Date finished: June 11, 2010

Hush, Hush has an absolutely gorgeous cover. It drew me in, it intrigued me, it convinced me that I had to read the book. Sadly, it is a poor imitation of another book with a gorgeous cover that enticed me a few years ago, Stephenie Meyer's Twilight. I will freely admit that I'm still not entirely sure what made me read and re-read the first three Twilight-novels like an addict in frantic need of a crack-fix (I suspect there may be something soaked into the pages that makes your judgement weaken), but nonetheless, my inner fourteen-year-old took control, and I was hooked. So very hooked. Until Breaking Dawn came out, and I was cured. There are limits to how much I will suspend my critical faculties.

Hush, Hush is the story of Nora Grey, whose father was mysteriously killed a year or so back, and whose mother is mostly absent as she has to work lots to support them. Nora is sensible and studious, and has a bitchy friend who seems not to actually like her very much. I was never entirely sure why Nora and Vee were friends, but judging from her other actions in this book, Nora is just a sucker for punishment. One day, Nora is unexpectedly partnered with the new and mysterious kid in school, Patch Cipriano, in biology. He is in turns enigmatic, rude and downright threatening, and while Nora tries to get her biology teacher to let her switch places, she has no such luck. Nora is both attracted to and slightly scared by Patch, and things start getting weird and dangerous, and Nora is not entirely sure she isn't losing her mind. It suddenly seems like she's being stalked, she keeps having what appear to be strange hallucinations and near death experiences, new slightly-ominous dudes transfer to her school, and everything seems to circle back to the mysteries surrounding Patch.

Nora was an annoying, inconsistently written character. She is calm and sensible one moment, and TSTL (too stupid to live) the next. While supposedly smart and independent, she kept making some idiotic choices. Time and time again. Patch was actually a genuinely intriguing anti-hero, once more was revealed about him. Nora is a complete twit for continuing to seek him out, especially after it's been revealed to her by more than one person, Patch included, that he is really dangerous for her to be around. That's not his fault though, and in another story, he could probably have been quite cool.

As well as the obvious likenesses to Twilight, this book reminded me of another angel love triangle book I read and reviewed some months ago, Fallen. Both books are derivative of Meyer's book, and while I will freely admit that I understand why so many people hate and are disturbed by the Twilight-saga, I found the books very entertaining ( the fourth one is hugely entertaining in an entirely different way), and they continue to be a guilty pleasure of mine. Sadly, this also leads to a lot of inferior attempts by other writers to become the next Stephenie Meyer, of which this, and Fallen, are examples. They are not awful, I finished both books, but neither delivered what their lovely covers promised.

CBR2 Book 57: "A Kiss in Time" by Alex Flinn

Publisher: HarperTeen
Page count: 400 pages
Rating: 3 stars
Date begun: June 9th, 2010
Date finished: June 10th, 2010

Yet another fairy tale retelling, this one a modernised take on Sleeping Beauty. Talia is a spoiled and bored princess who since she was old enough to understand what people said to her, has been told that she must avoid spindles, because of a spell placed on her during her christening. Talia doesn't actually know what a spindle is, as all such things have been banned from the country, but on her sixteenth birthday, as she is wandering through the palace trying on dresses to find the perfect one for her birthday ball, and she finds an old lady who lets her play with her interesting spinning device - and just like that, Talia and the entire kingdom of Euphrasia (right next to Belgium) fall asleep and the country disappears off the map.

Three hundred years later, spoiled and bored American teenager Jack is on a three week, all expenses paid tour of Europe. Of course, he doesn't actually appreciate how lucky this makes him, and mainly wants to go back home. He and his friend escape from the scheduled tour and when looking for a beach, fight their way through the thick hedge surrounding Euphrasia, and find the royal palace instead. Jack finds the sleeping princess, and is struck with the overwhelming urge to kiss her - even though in real life, this would be a massively creepy and inappropriate thing to do. His kiss wakes Talia, and as the spell specified that only true love's kiss could wake her, Talia deduces that the oddly dressed gentleman must be her true love, whether he wants to be or not.

The rest of the kingdom also wake up, and Talia's parents are not exactly happy, realizing that their kingdom is 300 years behind the times. They blame Talia, who is understandably a bit put out, as the spell was clearly inescapable, and she would have had an easier time avoiding spindles in the first place if she'd actually been shown what one looked like. She forces Jack to take her with him, and soon they are on their way back to the US. Jack wants to bring Talia mainly to piss off his parents, who he feels do not care for him and are never there for him, and Talia just wants to see the world, after having been extremely sheltered for the first sixteen years of her life.

Both the protagonists start out as quite unlikeable, spoiled and self-centered, but over the course of the story, they force each other to view the world in different ways. Jack introduces Talia to modern technology, airplanes, cell phones and hot dogs, while Talia, from a time where modern technology couldn't effectively make it perfectly possible to get through life without actually ever talking to anyone else, shows Jack that by listening to the people around him, and maybe talking to them instead of shutting them out, he may learn something, and possibly sort out some of the things that have frustrated and annoyed him.

I got A Kiss in Time because I absolutely loved Alex Flinn's modernised take on Beauty and the Beast in Beastly (coming soon to a cinema near you in what looks like a not very good adaptation starring yer-girl out of High School Musical and yer-man out of that Alex Ryder-movie Stormbreaker that no one ever remembers). While I didn't in any way dislike A Kiss in Time, it was nowhere near as good, and struggles a bit to make the story plausible. The change in the characters happens a little bit too fast, and a little too neatly, for it to be entirely satisfying. But it was by no means bad, and a more than adequate way to spend a few hours.

CBR2 Book 56: "The Book of A Thousand Days" by Shannon Hale

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Page count: 320 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: June 7th, 2010
Date finished: June 8th, 2010

The Book of a Thousand Days is a retelling of the Grimm fairytale Maid Maleen, set in a world inspired by medieval Mongolia. Dashti is a young maid who is bricked into a tower with the Lady Saren, who is being punished by her father because she refused to marry the suitor he picked for her, Lord Khasar. Lady Saren has to stay in the tower for seven years, or until she relents. There is food placed in the basement for them, and ample provisions, but no door or windows in the tower, only a small hatch for disposing of their waste.

Dashti keeps a journal of their days in the tower, Lady Saren cannot even read or write. She is timid and sullen and eats far too much. While Dashti at first is amazed at the amount of food they have, it quickly becomes clear that with the rats in the basement and the quantities Lady Saren eats, they will never survive for a full seven years. Both of Lady Saren's suitors show up outside the tower, the cruel Lord Khasar to taunt and threaten them, and the kind Khan Tegus, who has never actually seen Lady Saren, only corresponded with her in letters. Saren is too scared to talk to either man, and makes Dashti do it for her. Tegus helps the women by giving them a cat, who manages to keep the rat population down, while Khasar throws fire into their hatch and nearly kills them.

After about two and a half years, their food has nearly run out, and Dashti realizes that they must try to escape, or they will starve to death. Since the rats have loosened the mortar in the basement, they managed to remove enough bricks to escape, and discover that everything around them, including the city Lady Saren's father ruled, has been razed to the ground by Khasar. They seek shelter in the neighboring country, ruled by Khan Tegus, and get work in the kitchen as scullery maids. Khan Tegus believes the Lady Saren is dead, and is set to marry another, to cement his alliance against the evil Khasar, who is determined to conquer all the countries in the area.

Unlike in the original fairytale, where the noble maiden herself is the smart and resourceful one, the heroine of the tale here is the servant. Lady Saren is weak, and scared, and fairly useless throughout the story, and makes Dasthi do everything for her, including talking to her suitors. As the story progresses, it becomes clear that she was never treated well by her family, and may be a bit simple, but she was still frustratingly whiny, and I wanted someone to slap some sense into her several times throughout the book. Dasthi was raised on the plains, and is a "mucker", a kind of healer who can sing away aches, pains and even help with injuries. When a friend of Khan Tegus is hurt, she is called in to help, and once it's discovered that she can read and write, she is promoted from scullery maid to scribe, and gets to spend much more time around Tegus, who she has fallen helplessly in love with.

Khan Tegus is nice, and honourable and everything the prince in a fairytale should be. He feels guilty that he couldn't do more to save the Lady Saren, who he believes died when Khasar destroyed her father's kingdom. He does not love his betrothed, but will marry her for the sake of his people, to strenghten their forces against the evil man threatening them. Lord Khasar is a cruel and evil man, and a very convincing villain. Lady Saren finally tells Dashti why she is so scared of him, and why she refused to marry him, and it suddenly does not seem so implausible that someone would choose seven years of imprisonment in a light-less tower rather than marry him. Obviously, this secret is what is needed to defeat him as well, and Dasthi not only saves her mistress and her beloved Khan, but the kingdom and everyone in it.

The Book of a Thousand Days was a lovely, little story, with a very sensible and brave heroine. After travelling in Mongolia last summer, it was a lovely surprise to me that this book was set in an are so obviously modeled on it, something I had no knowledge of when I bought the book. The different customs and traditions added an exotic element to the story, which made it even better. I highly recommend the book to anyone who likes fairy tales.

Not dead, just lazy

I couldn't help but notice, when I logged onto the blog today, that I have not posted anything since the beginning of June. It may seem as if I haven't read anything at all in the last month, but anyone who's ever met me knows that I would actually have to be dead to stop reading. I've read lots, as a matter of fact. Having counted, I read 13 books, and re-read one in June, I just haven't blogged about them.

At first I was busy finishing the year at my school, and clearing out my desk and getting ready to move to a new work place in August. Then my husband and I went to Dublin on holiday, and once I fell out of the habit of blogging every book, it was so very easy to not start up again. I was very determined that I was NOT going to stop blogging just because I completed the Cannonball Challenge for this year. Hence there will be rather a lot of posts coming, with reviews of many of the books I read in June. For those of you who actually still check this blog occasionally, and possibly even follow it. Now, won't that be exciting?

My big plans for this summer are to learn to drive (have had one lesson so far - very scary - and I suspect it's going to take many lessons and rather a lot of money before I have my license), and read even more than I did last summer. I'm currently spending a lot of time watching my husband play Red Dead Redemption, which is also fun. I will also endeavour to keep blogging, a bit more regularly for the rest of the summer.

CBR2 Book 55: "His at Night" by Sherry Thomas

Publisher: Bantam
Page count: 432 pages
Rating: 4.5 stars
Date begun: June 3rd, 2010
Date finished: June 3rd, 2010

Miss Elissandre Edgerton is a truly desperate woman. Living isolated from the world, she has to devote her life to the care of her bedridden aunt, constantly terrorised by her uncle. The one time she tried to leave, guilt brought her back within the day, and her aunt's situation greatly worsened. The only thing she has as a comfort is a travelogue describing the island of Capri, her uncle has purged the house of all other English language books. She needs to get herself and her aunt away, but sees no way of ever escaping.

Lord Vere is a man of few words, but society in general believes him to be a half-witted idiot who can and will prattle on for ages about the most inconsequential of subjects. This cover serves him well as an agent of the Crown. It also keeps the matchmaking mamas of the ton away, even though he is extremely wealthy and very handsome. Elissandre's uncle, Edmund Douglas, is suspected of selling artificial diamonds. Vere and his agents create an excuse to stay at his house when he is away, and for the first time in years, Elissandre sees a slim chance at escape.

Three days later she has managed to get caught in a compromising situation with Lord Vere (who was only trying to prevent his younger brother from being lured into said situation) and they need to be married as soon as possible. She successfully removes herself and her aunt from her uncle's oppression, but her joy is short-lived. Lord Vere believes her to be a duplicitous, manipulative social climber and detests her, and as soon as her uncle discovers what she has done, he threatens both her and her new husband with grave harm, if his wife is not returned to him swiftly.

I read a lot of lighthearted, humorous romances, which chiefly divert and entertain - they are excellent comfort reads. Sherry Thomas does not write fluffy romance. Several of her books deal with estranged couples, full of resentment towards each other, learning to see the other in a new light and rediscovering the love they once had for one another.

Elissandre and Vere both have deeply troubled pasts, and a lot more emotional baggage than your run of the mill romance protagonist. While it seemed like a brilliant idea to Vere to play the idiot to cover up his covert activities, twelve years of hiding his true self from everyone but a select few, is taking its toll. He is nearly constantly playing a role, hiding his brilliant mind from all who care for him, including his beloved younger brother.

Elissandre has been forced by her uncle's cruel whims to always play the cheerful, dutiful and grateful niece, she has an arsenal of brilliant smiles to hide her inner despair, always with the knowledge that the outside world never suspects what a monster her uncle is. To escape his clutches, she is willing to do almost anything, even marry complete stranger who she believes to be an oafish moron, who clearly detests her for entrapping him. The couple's slow realization that the person they married is not what he or she appears to be, and their discovery of what they can be for the other, is beautiful.

Romances frequently have some form of antagonist, who creates problems for the couple, and slow their progress to the Happily Ever After. His at Night has a true villain, and features some scenes of pure, shocking violence very unusual for the genre. There are scenes of real menace throughout the book, and it is not difficult to understand Elissandre's profound terror of her uncle.

There is also a minor subplot in the book featuring Lord Frederick, Vere's younger brother. Sherry Thomas introduced him in her first novel, Private Arrangements, where he lost in love to Lord Tremaine. In His at Night he finally gets a Happily Ever After of his own. After four novels, Sherry Thomas is now one of the authors whose books I will not only buy, but pre-order.

CBR2 Book 54: "Ten Things I Love About You" by Julia Quinn

Publisher: Piatkus Books
Page count: 384 pages
Rating: 5 stars
Date begun: May 26th, 2010
Date finished: May 26th, 2010

WARNING! CONTAINS MINOR SPOILERS!

The Earl of Newbury needs to father an heir as soon as possible, or the nephew he hates, Mr Sebastian Grey, will inherit the title and accompanying fortune. He needs a fertile woman of good family, and Miss Annabel Winslow, eldest of eight children, is rumoured to be so fertile the birds sing when she's near. While her aunt was fortunate enough to marry a Duke, Annabel's mother did not make as favourable a match, and the Winslows face poverty if she does not find a wealthy husband. Her wealthy grandmother has offered to sponsor her for a season, and now her most ardent suitor appears to be the Earl of Newbury. While Newbury may have been considered a great catch in her grandmother's day, Annabel is not very enthusiastic about the idea of marrying him.

Mr Sebastian Grey is not actually that bothered about inheriting his uncle's title (although the money would be nice). As he is in a state of limbo with regards to his social status, he is invited everywhere - after all, he may be a wealthy Earl one day. Of course, if his uncle does remarry and produce an heir, he is an ex-army officer of indeterminate income - not as eligible a catch for the young ladies. That he has a rather substantial source of income is something he'd rather not reveal, as his deep, dark secret is that he is the writer of a series of wildly popular Gothic novels under a female pseudonym.

Due to a series of unfortunate coincidences, Sebastian and his uncle are suddenly rivals for the hand of Miss Annabel. The more time Sebastian spends in Annabel's company, the more taken by her he becomes. And with every moment spent in Sebastian's company, the prospect of marrying Lord Newbury, even to save her family from poverty, becomes less and less desirable to Annabel. Should she follow her heart and doom her family, or marry sensibly, and be miserable for the rest of the Earl of Newbury's life (as her grandmother points out, he will almost certainly die before Annabel does)?

Ten Things I Love About You is a much more enjoyable read than The Secret Diaries of Miss Miranda Cheever, and much more like Julia Quinn's other novels. It features a lovely heroine and a very likable hero, and the reveal that Sebastian was the author of the lurid Gothic romances that played a central part in What Happens in London filled me with delight. The central couple in What Happens in London, Sir Harry and Lady Olivia also feature in this novel, and it also seems to set up Sir Harry's younger brother, as well as Annabel's cousin Louisa for romances of their own in the future.

The only thing that didn't really work for me in the book, was the "villain", so to speak. There is no good reason for Lord Newbury's hatred of Sebastian, we are given no explanation except spite as why he is so loath to have Sebastian inherit. He is very one-dimensional and feels out of place in what is otherwise a very fun and fluffy read.