Book Review: "City of Bones" by Cassandra Clare (Mortal Instruments Book 1)

I'm normally not drawn to given books just because they've been adapted to film. But when customers at my workplace started asking me about the Mortal Instruments series a couple of months ago, wanting to read it before they saw the movie, I figured I'd better do some research of my own. And while I initially feared that City of Bones would be just another generic teen romance, it was actually a fun and creative read.

Clary is so normal that she's bordering on boring, as is often the case at the beginning of books like these. Her father died before she was born and her mom is a talented but sometimes flighty artist. With her uncle Luke and her best friend Simon, Clary is pretty content with her life. But everything turns upside down the night she sees three people her age kill a blue-haired demon in a nightclub storage closet. The weird thing is, nobody else seems to have noticed it but her. 

The next thing she knows, Clary is swept into the world of the Shadowhunters, to whom she has some unknown connection. Her mother goes missing, crocodile demons are attacking her in her own kitchen, and one of the Shadowhunters she saw at the club, Jace, keeps popping up wherever she goes. To try and find out who she is and what's happened to turn her normal life into such a wreck, she joins the Shadowhunters at their New York Institute and learns more about their purpose, tradition, and history. The upshot of their investigation is that Clary is somehow of Shadowhunter lineage, and that an evil Shadowhunter long thought dead is regaining his power. 

Together with their Shadowhunter friends and a tagalong Simon, Clary and Jace face down Foresaken humans, various demons, vampires, werewolves, and even crash a party at the home of New York's most prestigious warlock. All the while feelings between Clary and Jace continue to grow, even as their situation becomes more and more dangerous. Because Valentine, the turncoat Shadowhunter, is looking for a relic that will allow him to raise a Shadowhunter army that will destroy all demons and ruin the fragile peace that exists between worlds. Clary is the only one who can find it first. 

Buffy pretty much takes the cake as the quintessential teenage demon slayer, but Clary gives her a good run for her money. I feel like a big part of why City of Bones didn't feel stale or predictable even though it was another paranormal teen book is that the Shadowhunter back story is so meticulously thought out and presented with so much interesting detail. Clare has thought up a whole alternate existence for the Human Race, with flair and creativity. This would also encompass three other Shadowhunter novels set across the pond in London: Clockwork Angel, Clockwork Prince, and Clockwork Princess. Clare has put a considerable amount of time and effort into thinking about this world of Demons and Shadowhunters, how they interact and get along with humans in everyday life, why they haven't been discovered, and the Shadowhunters' role in all this. And that effort is what makes this book really shine in its genre. 

As far as the romantic interest goes, you have the sexy, mysterious and hilariously cocky Jace vying (though he'd never admit it) against the sweet, open, determined Simon, whom Clary's known for almost her entire life. A pretty standard conflict, right? Except that - plot twist! - one of them turns out to supposedly be Clary's older brother! Sound familiar? 

Despite the solid amount of action that appeared in a near-continuous stream, I sometimes felt like nothing was happening in the big picture of the story line. In retrospect though, I think a lot of that feeling was because of how the puzzle in the plot was laid out: All the pieces that Jace, Simon, Clary and the others uncover have to context at all, to the point that I as a reader didn't even know that some things would have any connection whatsoever to the main story line, like the vampire battle. It wasn't until the very end of the book, when Clary figures out where her mother's hidden the artifact (independent of any of the challenges they've just faced) that the other things they've discovered actually come to mean anything. I'm not sure if this was intentional or not on Clare's part, but as adrift as I sometimes felt in the narrative, I did find myself wanting to read more. I don't plan on seeing the upcoming City of Bones movie adaptation, but I may eventually read the rest of the Mortal Instruments books. (I cheated and took a look at their blurbs, and they all sound just as creative as the first book.) 

If you like vivid story lines and characters, action, and paranormal adventure, and if you don't mind romantic tension without a lot of actual romance, pick up a copy of the first book in Cassandra Clare's Mortal Instruments series. City of Bones, along with a plethora of other Shadowhunter books, are available now at your neighborhood independent bookstore. The film adaptation of City of Bones was released in August. 

Veterans Day 2013 - Military Books

The brave men and women who choose to serve their country by entering into military service have a long record of being honored and emulated by characters in print. In celebration of Veterans Day, please enjoy this list of military fiction titles, which includes both classics and more recent writing, brought to you by indie bookstore Powell's Books in Portland, OR.


(Photo courtesy of Friends of Ocee Library)

Book Review: "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" by Ransom Riggs

This YA fantasy novel has been in my "To Read" stack for a while, and I recently got around to reading it despite all the other books clamoring for my attention. And now I'm chastising myself for having waited so long to pick it up. It's a combination of historical fiction and fantasy, with just enough horror to make your toes curl in your slippers. I can see why Riggs's first novel has been getting so much positive press, and I'm about to add to it.

Average 16-year-old Jacob adores his grandfather, even as the rest of the family shies away from his strange stories and the cabinet that he keeps well-stocked with all manner of weapons. Ever since he was little Jacob has loved the tales of his grandfather's childhood on an island in Wales after fleeing the Nazis in Poland. He even showed Jacob photos of his fellow orphans, strange children with strange abilities under the strange care of one Miss Peregrine. Of course as he grows older, Jacob inevitably comes to doubt the truth of his grandfather's tales. The photos that once fascinated him become nothing more than badly altered pictures, and the "monsters" that his grandfather left the island to fight lost their literal interpretation and are assumed to be Nazis. But the night that his grandfather is killed, Jacob sees a horrible creature in the shadows and realizes that everything he'd come to rationalize away was the truth. With his dying breath, Jacob's grandfather tells him to find the bird in the loop on the other side of the old man's grave. That Jacob will be safe there.

Following these cryptic clues proves unfruitful, even with the guidance of his therapist, who believes that following up on his grandfather's dying words will allow Jacob to find closure. In a last-ditch attempt to find something, anything, Jacob convinces his parents to allow him to travel to Wales, to the island where Miss Peregrine lived with her brood of peculiar children. But when he reaches the rocky island and ventures out to what remains of the orphanage, there's not much left for Jacob to discover: a Nazi bomb hit the building the night his grandfather left, destroying it. But Jacob pokes around anyway, just to be sure he can learn nothing more. His interest earns Jacob attention from one of the girls in his grandfather's photos, who mysteriously appears there. Jacob chases her through a bog and into an ancient cairn, and when he emerges he's in 1940, on the night that the bomb hit the orphanage. There he meets the children from his grandfather's photographs, as well as Miss Peregrine, who explains to Jacob that she has protected them all in a time loop against Hollows and Wights, the creatures that killed Jacob's grandfather and the monsters that he left the island to fight all those years ago.

Now Miss Peregrine and the other children, all of whom have different superhuman abilities, are in danger and Jacob is the one who has brought them into harm's way. Luckily, he's also the one who can save them: Jacob, like his grandfather, has the ability to see Hollows. The others cannot. When Miss Peregrine is kidnapped like other peculiar matrons in other time loops, Jacob and the children must fight to get her back and find out what the Hollows are planning to do with so many powerful peculiars in their custody.

Riggs's writing style is engaging and entertaining, and I was sucked into his world from the very beginning. Jacob is a very empathetic character who struggles with some big mental challenges: mentally unstable relatives, deaths of family members, and even wondering if you're going crazy. He's confused and uncertain, even about things like which side of Miss Peregrine's time loop he'd rather be on. But instead of feeling melodramatic and overblown, the situation felt really genuine to me as a reader. I got the feeling that Jacob was just trying to stay on top of events as they occurred; he's brave and creative because he has no other choice, not because he's always known he was meant to be a hero or anything like that. This made Jacob a much more interesting character to me, and one for whom I genuinely came to care.

Another great touch in this writing was the fact that Jacob was unsuccessful in following he's grandfather's clues. He went to the old orphanage in Wales as a last desperate attempt to convince himself that there was nothing else to be found, that he was just going a little bit crazy from stress and trauma. It's only after Jacob finds himself in the loop and in the company of Miss Peregrine that he realizes what his grandfather's clues meant. That arrangement of events was really a great surprise, considering that most times there are cryptic clues given and then the story gets bogged down in solving them all before the action can commence. It was a great twist of events to have the character follow a very different trail of breadcrumbs than the one that was laid out for him (and us). I can see how some people might consider this "cheating" on Riggs's part as a writer, gearing up for a quest or mystery and then backing out. But personally, I found this take very innovative.

I've always been a fan of multimedia projects, both in my own work and in others' projects, particularly when the worlds of art and writing can intersect. Riggs takes his storytelling to the next level by adding photographs, the ones Jacob's grandfather shows him, to the book itself. It's a nice touch to see what Jacob is seeing, but what really amazed me was learning that the photos used in the book are real. They were gleaned from mountains of random old shots by dedicated collectors and enthusiasts, of which Riggs was just one. Here I've included three photos of peculiar children and one of Miss Peregrine herself:

     

  

Overall this story was well thought out, innovative, and I'm genuinely interested to read the sequel when it comes out in January. In the mean time, if you like tastefully supernatural coming-of-age stories with a hefty dose of adventure and just enough horror to make you check your closet before going to bed, or (as was suggested to me by Rae from Parallel Worlds Magazine) you're a Doctor Who fan, I highly recommend picking up a copy of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs. It's available now in all of its glory at your local indie bookstore, and its sequel Hollow City will be available in January. Check with your friendly neighborhood bookseller to pre-order!

World Book Night 2014

It's time to start thinking about World Book Night again!

For those of you who don't remember of who have maybe never heard of WBN before, here's an overview: Every April all over the world, publishers and authors team up with bibliophiles everywhere to try and promote books in low-reading demographics. They do this by publishing special editions of a variety of books, sending them to volunteers, and having them passed out for absolutely FREE to total strangers. Each year a different lineup of books is selected. Here's the 2014 list:

The Zookeeper’s Wife by Diane Ackerman

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain

The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

After the Funeral by Agatha Christie

The Ruins of Gorlan: The Ranger's Apprentice, Book 1 by John Flanagan

Hotel at the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford

Hotel at the Corner of Bitter and Sweet (Large Print edition) by Jamie Ford

The Lighthouse Road by Peter Geye

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell

Wait Till Next Year by Doris Kearns Goodwin

Catch-22 by Joseph Heller

The Dog Stars by Peter Heller

Hoot by Carl Hiaasen

Pontoon by Garrison Keillor

Same Difference by Derek Kirk Kim

Enchanted by Alethea Kontis

Miss Darcy Falls in Love by Sharon Lathan

Bobcat and Other Stories by Rebecca Lee

Young Men and Fire by Norman Maclean

Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin

Waiting to Exhale by Terry McMillan

Sunrise Over Fallujah by Walter Dean Myers

Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson

The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

When I was Puerto Rican by Esmeralda Santiago

Cuando Era Puertorriqueña by Esmeralda Santiago

Where’d You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple

Where’d You Go, Bernadette (Large Print edition) by Maria Semple

Wild by Cheryl Strayed

Presumed Innocent by Scott Turow

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

This Boy’s Life by Tobias Wolff

100 Best-Loved Poems edited by Philip Smith

 As you can see there's a wide variety of subject matter available, and even Spanish language and large print editions, to help get everyone reading.

Here's how the giving works: If you want to hand out twenty books to random strangers this April, which I can tell you is a LOT of fun, start out by going to the WBN website here. Just pick out three books that you'd like to give out, and apply to be a giver. Their guidelines are very concise and helpful. If you're chosen to be a giver WBN will contact you via email. Your books will be sent to a community location (that you select through WBN) where you can pick them up, usually the week before WBN. Then, on April 23rd, go out and help spread the magic of books! You can sign up to be a giver until January 1st.

Book Review: "Defy" by Sara B. Larson

Love and conflict: it seems like you can't find the one without the other in most books. Of course we wouldn't want it any other way though. Being able to hope, ache, and follow the characters through their struggles is what allows us to form a bond with them, share in their triumphs and feel their pain.

Well, there's plenty of both romance and conflict in Defy, a new YA fantasy novel by Sara B. Larson. The book's general themes are listed as "Identity, princes, adventure stories, magic, and conspiracies." And that's a fair assessment of the book's key elements, but not of the plot itself, which is more imaginative than the one-word assessments imply.

Alexa and her twin brother Marcel are raised on the border of two warring countries, until their parents are killed in a raid. In order to stay together, Alexa becomes Alex, and both join the army. They rapidly move up the ranks until both find themselves in Prince Damian's elite personal guard. But when the war escalates, and Marcel is killed protecting the prince, Alex is left alone with her secret.

The next assassination attempt at the castle results in Prince Damian being taken captive, along with Alex and her fellow guard Rylan. But all is not what it appears: Prince Damian, outwardly a spoiled and entitled pain in the rump, has actually been working with those on the other side of the war to help end the violence. But Rylan, who has always been there to support and stand beside Alex, doesn't trust Damian or his motives. And the longer the three of them are stuck in close quarters together, the greater the risk of Alex's secret being revealed. Which, of course, happens eventually. Spoiler alert: Both Damian and Rylan already knew. Now in the midst of a daring plan to bring peace to her country and install Damian as king, Alex has to face down her feelings for both the men who love her: Damian, powerful and full of secrets; and Rylan, steadfast and protective.

While the agony of choosing between two people who have declared themselves to you is nothing new for a YA novel, it can be written very successfully. In my own writing, I've found the trick to be in making sure I don't treat the premise as something that's tired and overused; if in my mind I make it something new and novel, my writing turns out exciting too. Despite the exciting premise of this book, the setup for Alexa's character and the potential for her to be a Katniss Everdeen-like heroine, Larson's YA debut falls flat. When I was reading it, I felt like she didn't really sell some of the roles being played. For example, when Damian first starts opening up to Alex when she's guarding the prince's suite, there's no real prelude to it. No reason for him to suddenly do a personality flip from the spoiled brat he played to the sentimental, caring person for whom Alexa comes to have feelings.

This kind of unrealistic character is highlighted by the fact that Alexa's character is so very well developed. She's incredibly empathetic, with realistic fears for her country and her future, even as she feels helpless to impact any of it. Her only choice, she feels, is to continue the charade and hope that the situation improves sooner rather than later. And I felt those things for her too, by knowing her thoughts and seeing the story through her eyes. She is strong, capable, and earns herself a prestigious place as a prince's personal guard through her own abilities with a sword, instead of with stereotypical feminine wiles. Unfortunately, this strong character goes all to bits and pieces as soon as she figures out that two boys like her. Instead of a sword-slinging female warrior she degenerates into an emotional puddle of lovelorn insecurities, which I felt was completely unlike the character she was made out to be in the beginning of the novel. Thankfully she redeemed herself a little in the end when it came time to choose between Damian and Rylan, but I was still disappointed in this depiction of a woman becoming powerless and governed by her feelings alone when a love interest (or two) was introduced. The author set this up perfectly for a series that will eventually culminate in Alexa and Damian being together, but I'm hoping that in the mean time Alexa will have a chance to redeem herself as a strong female protagonist with some backbone.

Larson attempts to broach some serious topics through Alexa, like rape, war, and loving your country even when you don't necessarily agree with what its leader is doing. And during a period of change and confusion like adolescence, these are issues that many adolescents are working their own way through. But unfortunately like Damian's trite character, the language of the book is lacking to give depth and significance to these themes. Instead the social commentary aspect comes off as overly simplistic, becoming more a motivator for Alexa to succeed (which is still important) than a real topic to be addressed in its own right. Opportunities to open discussions about feminism, sexuality, and loyalty are, I felt, wasted in Larson's rush to reach the climax of the romance instead of further developing the story at large.

If you're looking for a fairly engaging but unsubstantial read to keep you entertained for a stormy weekend, and you liked the Twilight books, consider picking up a copy of Sara B. Larson's YA debut novel Defy. It will be available at your local independent bookstore starting on January 7th.

Best-Known Books Set In The States

Business Insider has come out with this awesome map of the US, with each state represented by what they've determined to be the most well-known book that took place there. And while I'm ashamed to admit that my home state of Washington is still so closely associated with Twilight, I think this is a pretty accurate list. Check it out!

Book Review: "Seven for a Secret" by Lyndsay Faye

I'm a strong proponent of the old caution to never judge a book - to read or not to read it - by its cover. The same advice should be applied to book titles, too; after all, The Name of the Rose is not about flower gardening. But at this point I have to make a confession: I picked up Lyndsay Faye's latest novel, Seven for a Secret, solely because of the title. It references a children's rhyme that's always been intriguing to me, about counting crows and what their numbers mean. 

As misguided as my motivations for picking up this book may have been, I haven't for a second regretted it. This is actually Faye's second mystery centered around main character Timothy Wilde, but it was a wonderful and entirely understandable stand-alone novel as well. It's 1845, and New York City is abuzz with three things: the Democratic party, abolition, and Irish immigration. As a member of the newly formed Copper Stars, Wilde is sworn to uphold the law. But when that means compromising his own moral code, he's willing to overlook legal routes in the interest of protecting common citizens. When a wealthy black woman comes to him for help finding her kidnapped sister and son, that will mean bending the law possibly even farther than he can justify in order to solve the case. 

Lucy Adams's family, free blacks from Albany, has been taken by blackbirders. Since slavery was illegal in New York but not in other parts of the country, many escaped slaves made for the empire state. However, they weren't safe even after reaching the north. A landmark court case had determined that slaves who were recaptured and identified must, as stolen property, be returned to their owners in the south. Unscrupulous whites looking to turn a quick profit would capture free New Yorkers of color and claim that they were escaped slaves in court. Although free, for all intents and purposes blacks had no legal rights, and so were nearly always carted away to be sold into slavery at a tidy profit. The conscienceless people who were responsible for this practice were known as blackbirders. 

What starts as a simple kidnapping case gets complicated fast. Wilde rescues Lucy's family with the help of his vice-ridden brother Valentine, another copper star, and the Adams family hides in Valentine's house until Mr. Adams is due to return to New York. But when Timothy Wilde comes to check on the family, he finds Lucy dead in Valentine's bed and Delia and Jonah missing yet again. 

In a race to uncover the truth behind the murder and keep suspicion away from Valentine, Wilde enlists the help of a craggy Dutch cohort and a group of free black vigilantes who were close with the Adams family. Wilde follows the case deep into the Democratic party and its immigrant constituency, through an old case of his and into the ethical gray area of racial tensions of the time. The closer he gets to uncovering the truth about Lucy Adams, her murder and her family, the more of his own life and career he risks. 

Faye takes an immensely complicated time in American history and uses it to build an incredible story of suspense. The subtleties of the politics of the time are presented with precision and detail, clearly laying out the conflicted nature of Wilde's position: he's a copper star with a sworn duty to protect New Yorkers, which he really takes to heart, but the law prevents him from standing up to people like blackbirders who prey on a particular portion of the population. Wilde doesn't believe in slavery, but during that time blacks competed directly with Irish immigrants for any kind of work. The Irish, as whites and therefore voters, made up the majority of the Democratic party that funded the Copper Stars. So being an abolitionist detective trying to solve the murder of a black woman at the expense of the party's image put Wilde in a very risky position. 

I simply cannot overstate the skill with which Faye wove all the threads of this marvelous, engaging story through to the end. There are enough references to the first Timothy Wilde mystery, The Gods of Gotham, that Faye can establish how the previous story line impacted Wilde, but characters from the first book who reappear are re-introduced with context. That way, I could understand the closeness of the relationships without having to see them form for myself. 

Another aspect of the times and setting to which Faye pays admirable attention is the language. She begins the book with a dictionary of "flash," the idiomatic slang of the lower classes. She stays true to this vernacular too, switching back and forth between flash and "proper" English as the situation and company in the setting dictate. It's frankly a fascinating language, and it brings a wonderful color to the dialogue. 

Most of us are not experts on the early history of New York City and the nuances of race relations there. Faye takes this courteously into account, and builds lack of experience with this into Wilde's own reactions to and discoveries. As a result he's constantly being reminded of the cruelties and inequalities to which even free blacks were subjected. Examples include admission of a black man's testimony in court (it was worthless) and blacks being barred from voting unless they owned a practically unobtainable amount of property. Every time he makes an egalitarian assumption that proves mistaken, Wilde reacts with shock at the way "free" blacks are treated, which reflected my own fascination and horror at the situation.

By virtue of the complex story line and detailed historical accuracy, I think that this would make an amazing book club read. Faye and her husband even put together a recipe for the Wildes' secret punch that you might drink at your book club meeting! If you like political intrigue that has more adventure and suspense than mayhem and gore, and are fond of colorful characters whose complex relationships play seamlessly into the plot, consider picking up a Timothy Wilde mystery by Lyndsay Faye. The Gods of Gotham and Seven for a Secret are both available now at your local independent bookstore.