CBR3 Book 86: "Daugther of Smoke and Bone" by Laini Taylor (Read-a-thon 2011)

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Page count: 422 pages
Rating: 5 stars
Date begun: October 23rd, 2011
Date finished: October 23rd, 2011

"Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love. It did not end well."

These are the opening words of A Daughter of Smoke and Bone and from the various rave reviews I'd read from the book, I thought I had some idea what to expect from the book. I didn't. Yes, this book is paranormal fantasy, and it's certainly partly geared towards a young adult audience, but it absolutely isn't Twilight or The Vampire Diaries or Vampire Academy or Wicked Lovely or any number of other successful romantic fantasy novels for teens. It's so much more, and I'm not even sure I can do it justice in a review - but I'll try.

17-year-old Karou is an orphan, living in Prague and attending an art college. Her friends know that she's secretive, and exotic, with her bright blue hair and tattoos, and they enjoy the wonderful creatures she draws on her ever-present sketchpad and the fanciful stories she tells about the places she supposedly visits in her spare time. They don't know that all her stories are true. When not being an art student, Karou runs errands for Brimstone, the seemingly monstrous creature who raised her, together with a host of other chimaera, half humanoid, half beast beings who have always been there for her, but refuse to tell her where she's actually from. Brimstone trades teeth from humans and every sort of animal known to man for wishes that can grant pretty much anything if they're big enough, and Karou has been all over the globe (the magic door in Brimstone's shop can take her anywhere) fetching everything from elephant tusks to snake fangs for him.

Lately, when she's off on her errands, she's noticed burned handprints over the doorways she uses to get back to Brimstone. She also has an encounter with a beautiful, but terrible angel, who tries to kill her when he realizes that she works for Brimstone. Desperate to figure out what is going on, Karou tries to spy on Brimstone when he walks through another door in his chambers, and she discovers a whole other world, but before she really gets a chance to explore, Brimstone catches her and throws her out. Before she has time to go back and beg his forgiveness, one of the tiny creatures who works for him, ends up at her window, dying of burns. The doorway to Brimstone's is on fire, and Karou is cut off from the only family she has ever known. When she encounters Akiva, the vengeful angel again, she no longer knows what to think, but it seems he might hold the answers to who she really is, and what has happened to her loved ones.

There is a love story in A Daughter of Smoke and Bone, where mortal enemies are inexplicably drawn to one another, and the romance was enough to take my breath away. There is also masterful storytelling and Laini Taylor does an amazing job with the world building. It helps that Prague, the initial location for the book, is a magical place even before you introduce paranormal elements. This was the last book I read during my Read-a-thon, and you'd think I'd be tired after reading for most of a weekend, but I couldn't put the book down.

Karou is a wonderful protagonist, mysterious, independent, inquisitive, strong and brave, yet also clearly a 17-year-old, who's not always nice, but can use the small wishes she gets in Brimstone's shop for petty things, like giving a girl she's jealous of a constant mono-brow, or giving her ex-boyfriend an itch in a really inconvenient place while he's nude modelling. She also uses her wishes for silly, frivolous things like turning her hair permanently blue, or removing tattoos she got on impulse. She's searching for the truth about her origins, not really happy when Brimstone and his associates keep them from her. However, when she finally does discover the truth about who she is, and where she came from, she understands why they kept the truth from her.

I don't want to say much more about the plot, because there are several twists and turns that should be not be spoiled. Readers should be aware that the story is by no means complete, and it ends on a big and emotionally gutting cliff hanger, which when I first put the book down made me like parts of it less. However, nearly a month after finishing the book, I'm still thinking about it all the time, and wanting desperately to find out what happens next. So I'm just going to recommend the book to as many people as I know, making sure they also read the book, and can share the painful wait for the next installment with me.

CBR3 Book 85: "Unclaimed" by Courtney Milan (Read-a-thon 2011)

Publisher: HQN Books
Page count: 432 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: October 22nd, 2011
Date finished: October 22nd, 2011

Unclaimed is the second book in the series of the Turner brothers, the first brother's story was told in Unveiled. While this book can be read completely independently, there is back story about the hero, Mark in the previous book, and his story has more resonance if you start the series at the beginning.

Sir Mark Turner was knighted by Queen Victoria because of the book he wrote encouraging chastity. He is London's most sought after bachelor, and followed by misty eyed young maidens and eager reporters everywhere he goes. Sick of the attention, and the impression everyone has of him, Mark seeks refuge in the village where he grew up.

Jessica Farleigh is a courtesan, and desperately wants enough money to free herself from ever having to charm another patron. When a former lover offers to pay her to tarnish Sir Mark's reputation, she's happy to oblige, but she's on a strict time limit. What she thought was going to be simple, as all the men she's ever encountered were huge hypocrites, turns out to be quite the challenge. Sir Mark doesn't just preach chastity for gentlemen, he believes his own teachings. Yet he is instantly smitten with Jessica, believing her to be a widow fallen on hard times, and enjoys how vastly different from the prim, young virgins who normally get paraded in front of him.

While a virgin, and believing a man should control his desires, Mark doesn't deny the attraction he feels towards Jessica. He freely admits that he lusts for her, he just doesn't intend to act on any of the desires he feels. He's a good and honest and principled man and a very interesting hero in a romance. Jessica starts out detesting Mark, who seems to have everything handed to him on a platter, yet as she gets to know him, she realizes the reasons for his principles, and having to seduce him and discredit him in order to gain her own freedom and happiness gets harder and harder.

While not quite as engrossing as Unveiled, Unclaimed is still a very enjoyable read, and I like that Milan takes the time to really flesh out her characters. They're not just stock characters, they are complex and multi-faceted and all her characters TALK to each other. So many romances are hampered by situations that seem easily resolved if the main characters just communicated more, and that's never the case here. Milan's next book is about the third Turner brother, intriguingly named Smite, and I'm looking forward to reading it.

CBR3 Book 84: "Snuff" by Terry Pratchett (Read-a-thon 2011)

Publisher: Harper
Page count: 416 pages
Rating: 3.5 stars
Date begun: October 22nd, 2011
Date finished: October 22nd, 2011

Sam Vimes has been dragged away from the job he loves as the Commander of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch by his well-meaning wife, Lady Sybil, who feels he should get some air and familiarise himself with the estates they own. It doesn't take long before Vimes discovers a dead body and that all manner of foul play and injustice can take place in the idyllic country side, just as much as in the city. Determined to find the killer and set right those things that are wrong, he also needs to see if he can get his hands on a decent bacon sandwich, and possibly find some elephant dung for his precocious son to examine.

While always enjoyable, some Discworld novels are better than others. This is not one of Pratchett's best, and while he takes familiar characters out of their normal haunts, so that they can discover new things about themselves and others, too much of the plot of Snuff felt like a retread of previous novels in the series. In this book we learn that goblins are people too, Sam Jr is obsessed with poo because he is a small boy, and we are Vimes is and always will be a driven police man, and strongly dislikes being a Duke. His manservant is all sorts of awesome, too. Glad he got more to do in this one. Sadly, Pratchett has Alzheimer's, and while I hope he still has excellent and brilliant and original books in him, I'm not sure how many more he is capable of creating.

CBR3 Book 83: "Chime" by Franny Billingsley (Read-a-thon 2011)

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Page count: 368 pages
Rating: 5 stars
Date begun: October 22nd, 2011
Date finished: October 22nd, 2011

This is the first book I read during this year's Read-a-thon, and I first heard about it and discovered Franny Billingsley's books through Raych, a fellow Cannonballer (whose reviews and blog I now follow slavishly).

Briony Larkin has a big secret. Briony is a witch. It's her fault that her stepmother died three months ago, and it's her fault that her twin sister Rose isn't quite right. Briony can see and talk to the Old Ones (spirits in the swamp around the village), and she mustn't let anyone know that she's a witch, or the town council will try her and hang her. She must above all, remember to hate herself, and not let anyone close, and she must always take extra good care of Rose, or her secret may be revealed.

Staying aloof and lonely proves more difficult when Elric Claybourne, and his father, a city engineer come to town. Elric has been thrown out of university, and will stay in the house of Briony's father. He's charming and handsome and oh so friendly, and doesn't seem to understand that Briony can't and doesn't want to have any friends. Rose has a terrible cough, and Boggy Mun (the leader of the Old Ones) say that she could die from the swamp cough, like so many of the town's children before her, unless Briony manages to successfully stop Mr Claybourne and the other engineers from draining the swamp and building a train line through it. How can she explain to the town council what the Boggy Mun has said, without revealing her secrets and risking her life?

Chime is the second Franny Billingsley book I've read this month, and I'm so glad I discovered her. The cover of the book is awful, and makes it look like some sort of turn of the century Gossip Girl rip off, which it so isn't! Like The Folk Keeper, Chime has a strong yet lonely heroine, who needs to learn to accept help and friendship from others to discover how awesome she is, and that she deserves happiness, joy and affection. While with a slight supernatural twist, Chime is mostly a historical novel, where the heroine has to go discover her true worth, and is rewarded with love as well. The budding relationship between Briony and Elric is very sweet, but I especially loved the depiction of Briony's relationship with her twin sister (who clearly has Asperger's syndrome), and both her deep affection for her and need to protect her and wanting her troublesome sibling to just drop dead. This is a wonderful book, who everyone should read, and I plan to buy any other book by Billingsley immediately upon release.

CBR3 Book 82: "Queen of Kings" by Maria Dahvana Headley

Publisher: Bantam
Page count: 448 pages
Rating: 2 stars
Date begun: October 17th, 2011
Date finished: October 21st, 2011

What if Cleopatra didn't die after Mark Anthony was defeated? What if she made a deal with a powerful goddess instead, and became an immortal, blood-sucking creature (who can shape shift into a giant serpent or a lion at will) determined on wreaking her vengeance on Emperor Augustus and the Roman Empire instead? Sounds like it should be a pretty fun book, doesn't it? Well, I'm sorry to say, Queen of Kings is not a lot of fun. It's an interesting idea, and Maria Dahvana Headley has obviously done a lot of historical research, but the book she's written is surprisingly dull, considering its subject matter, and I have absolutely no interest in reading any more in what promises to be a series, with the immortal Cleopatra as protagonist.

As I said, the premise is intriguing - when Mark Anthony's troops in Egypt are defeated, and he receives a message (sent by Octavian, the future Emperor Augustus of Rome) that Cleopatra is dead, he kills himself. Cleopatra, determined that Egypt will not be defeated, uses a dodgy translation of an ancient spell to summon Sekhmet, the lion-headed godess of cheerful things like slaughter, pestilence and chaos. In an attempt to save Mark Anthony and her beloved Egypt, she makes a pact with the goddess, but loses her soul and becomes a blood drinking monster, forced to do Sekhmet's bidding. Octavian/Augustus, who is both attracted to and despises Cleopatra, soon realizes what she has become, and turns into a paranoid lunatic to escape her vengeance. He takes her children with him to Rome, and hires witches and powerful spell casters to try to battle her.

The book is told from multiple points of view, from Cleopatra to Mark Anthony to Augustus to a whole bunch of other people, and sometimes switches around so fast that it gets confusing. I picked up the book because of the premise and the cover quote by Neil Gaiman (after all, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke, also recommended by him, is all kinds of awesome), but finished it mainly out of stubborness and the hopes that it might get good as the story progressed. Really, she's a vengeful vampire who can shape shift, how do you make that boring? Tastes may differ, some people on Amazon at least seem to have really liked this book. I found it dreary, and would recommend others to stay away from this book. There's so much better paranormal fantasy out there.

CBR3 Book 81:"Cold Fire" by Kate Elliott

Publisher: Orbit
Page count: 528 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: October 10th, 2011
Date finished: October 16th, 2011

This book is the second in a series, set in a really intricate and complex world. I would therefore in no way recommend you start with this one, and if you haven't read the first book in the series, Cold Magic, skip this review entirely to avoid both spoilers and confusion.

In a very long blog post at the start of the year, I tried to outline as much about the world in Kate Elliott's Spiritwalker trilogy, and the plot of the first book in the series, without spoiling too much of the main events.

This is the sequel, and the first chapter actually recounts the events of the final chapter of Cold Magic, something I've seen other reviews complaining about. Myself, having not read the previous book since January, I was quite grateful to be reintroduced to the world and the characters without having to pick up and reread the whole previous book.

Catherine "Cat" Bell Barahal and her cousin Beatrice "Bee" Hassa Barahal are on the run from powerful mages and all sorts of people who want to get their hands on them. Bee has prophetic dreams, that can both provide useful information to a number of ambitious factions, including that of the deposed general Camjiata (a bit like Napoleon), but also marks her out as a target for the Wild Hunt, where creatures from the Spirit World hunt down and kill people in the normal world. Cat seems to have escaped her arranged marriage, just as she's discovered that she has the potential of maybe loving her haughty but brilliant husband, has the ability to walk as easily in the Spirit world as in the normal one, and needs to discover the identity of her real father. When she does, she sort of wishes she hadn't. He places a binding on her, so she can't tell anyone who he is or what he's asked her to do, and then sends her to find a powerful magic user, or he's going to kill Bee when the Wild Hunt next rides.

The previous book was set in an alternate reality version of Europe, Cold Fire explores more of the world map, and most of the action takes place either in the Spirit World, where Cat discovers more about her heritage, or in an alternate version of the Caribbean, where the powerful cold mages of Europe have no dominion, and there are zombie like victims of the salt plague, and equally dangerous, ambitious and powerful fire mages hold sway. Cat meets her husband Andevai again in the most unlikely of locations, and slowly, while trying to figure out a way of saving her cousin and outwitting her supernatural father, comes to know and understand him better. Much more of the various political factions of the world are explored, but not that much happens in this book. The action is slow to start, there is a lot of putting pieces into play, but I suspect Elliott is mainly establishing plot points to be finished off in the last volume of the trilogy. Because I'm interested in Cat, Bee and Vai as characters, I will read the next one, but I hope it has more plot, and less "look at this shiny world I built with all it's similarities, yet differences to the real historical world".

CBR3 Book 80: "The Folk Keeper" by Franny Billingsley

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Page count: 176 pages
Rating: 4.5 stars
Date begun: September 30th, 2011
Date finished: October 10th, 2011

Corinna Stonewall is prickly, aloof, stubborn and vindictive, her hair grows two inches every night, and she has many secrets. Raised in an unkind environment in a children's home, she cut off her hair, pretended to be a boy and learned the skill of the Folk Keeper, someone who keeps the cave-dwelling, fierce and destructive goblin like creatures from souring the milk, harming farm animals and making food rot. Only boys can be Folk Keepers, so Corinna has to pretend to be Corin to gain the power and independence she so desperately craves.

One day, the dying Lord Merton comes to the children's home, wanting her to take over the Folk Keeper duties at his estate at Cliffsend. At the estate by the sea, Corinna is irresistibly drawn to the ocean, makes friends for the first time, and finally discovers who she is, and why she's never really fit in anywhere else.

The Folk Keeper is not a very long book, and the whole thing is written as Corinna's journal, chronicling first her duties as Folk Keeper in a little town and revealing her miserable childhood and the reasons for her abrasive personality, and later her discoveries at Cliffsend, and the slow changes her new life brings out in her. Corinna is a wonderful character, even in the beginning of the book, and she is so strong and self-reliant that as the book progresses and she learns that she can occasionally trust and rely on others, and her personality gradually softens and her life becomes happier, you cheer for her.

There is a romantic element to the book, but the most important aspect is a young, lonely girls process of self discovery and finding a place of acceptance and belonging. It's recommended audience is from 10 upwards, and I wish I'd had wonderful fantasy stories like this when I grew up.