Review of The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne, by Jonathan Stroud

Adventure, Audiobooks, Children's Fiction Review, Science Fiction, Starred Review 0

The Outlaws Scarlett and Browne

by Jonathan Stroud
read by Sophie Aldred

Listening Library, 2021. 12 hours, 19 minutes.
Review written February 26, 2023, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

Hooray! Jonathan Stroud has a new series out about teens doing exploits in a world not quite like our own. I was already a devoted fan of his Lockwood & Co. series, which is now a Netflix series and gaining new fans. (Hooray!) This one has much the same feel, the same cleverness and banter between the characters and is wonderful in every way. I’m kind of glad I didn’t get this first book read as soon as it came out, because now I only need to wait a couple months for the next one.

Scarlett McCain lives in Britain in the far distant future, after the Cataclysm and the Great Dying. Britain is now a set of islands with fortified towns and a wilderness in between. There’s a lagoon where London used to be.

The book begins as Scarlett pulls off a bank robbery. She needs the money to pay back some folks who will kill her if she fails. Everything goes smoothly, but in the wilderness she comes across a bus that has met with a horrific accident, and all the passengers were eaten by wild beasts. She stops to see if they left any valuables, planning to leave before dark.

In the bus, she hears a sound coming from the toilet. Sure enough, a boy comes out. He’d locked himself in while the others were being eaten. His name’s Albert Browne and he’s naive and awkward, and Scarlett doesn’t quite have the heart to leave him to try to make it to a town on his own. So she takes him into her care, planning to get him to the nearest town.

The next day, though, they get chased by men with dogs and guns. Scarlett’s never known anyone to be so persistent after a bank robbery. But just before she escapes by jumping into a river (after pushing Albert in), one of the gunmen laughs and asks why she thinks they’re chasing after her. Turns out there’s much more to Albert than meets the eye.

The book is full of more exploits. And danger. Albert has heard that the Free Isles — which lie in the London Lagoon — will take anyone, despite blemishes or oddities. But it’s not easy to get there, and they’re still being chased.

Fair warning: The book is full of violence and gore. Another terror is the zombie-like “tainted” who eat human flesh. The animals are all more fearsome than in our day, too. One of the terrors of the Thames is the river otters that can devour the unwary. Scarlett does some killing, but it does feel warranted.

Also in that future day, instead of individual religions, there are Faith Houses that offer all religions humans have ever observed. And they are wary of the evolution that has happened to the animals and have strict rules against any blemishes or deviations in people in order to live in the towns. I’m never thrilled to read a book where the villains are powerful religious people, because that’s not how religion should be. However, then I had to reflect that in the Gospels themselves, the villains are powerful religious people. Scarlett and Browne are being tracked by the most powerful people of their society, and the reader is rooting for them.

Sophie Aldred does a wonderful job reading this one. I always love an English accent, but on top of that, she puts so much personality into Albert’s voice. We hear his naivete and his earnestness, his wonder at the wider world and just how annoying he must be to Scarlett. Though I’m tempted to preorder the next book, I think I’m going to check out another audiobook instead. This is just wonderful.

jonathanstroud.com

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Review of The Stolen Heir, by Holly Black

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Stolen Heir

by Holly Black
read by Saskia Maarleveld

Hachette Audio, 2023. 10 hours, 10 minutes.
Review written February 24, 2023, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

Oh my goodness, Holly Black has done it again! The Stolen Heir begins a new duology set in Elfhame. (Yay! We only have to wait for one more book!) These events happen eight years after the trilogy The Cruel Prince, The Wicked King, and The Queen of Nothing. So those who were children in the earlier books have grown. You don’t have to have read the trilogy to enjoy this book, but why not? It made me want to go back and reread them.

This book features Suren, who was once the child queen of The Court of Teeth, but bridled and manipulated by Lady Nore of the Court of Teeth. She was then betrothed to Oak, the young heir to Elfhame, as Lady Nore planned to use her to take over Elfhame.

Now Suren is in exile in the human world. She scrounges a life in the forest and spies on the human family with whom she spent the first seven years of her life, before Lady Nore stole her back and tormented and abused her. Without glamour, she’s a thing of horror to humans, with the teeth of a predator.

Oak, on the other hand, has been living a life of luxury at court. He’s beautiful, smooth and well-spoken, makes everyone at ease. Although like all the Fae, he can’t lie, he does know how to deceive and manipulate.

Suren thinks she’s at least safe in her lair in the woods. But then one day a storm hag comes hunting for her. She’s rescued by Oak and his knight and their prisoner — someone who wears the very bridle that once controlled Suren.

They tell Suren that they are going to the Court of Teeth to recover Mab’s Bones, which Lady Nore has acquired and is using to create deadly creatures and wield power. Suren is Lady Nore’s one vulnerability, having been given the power to command her. But because of that, Suren is now in danger. Lady Nore’s simplest way to stop the vulnerability is to kill Suren.

Suren agrees to go on the quest. The storm witch coming after her has convinced her that Oak is right and her life is in danger unless she commands Lady Nore to stop. But she quickly realizes that Oak isn’t telling her everything.

What follows is another story from Holly Black full of twists and turns that keep you guessing. What is Oak not telling Suren? And what is she keeping back herself? And how, exactly, do they feel about each other? As they travel on the journey, Suren must also confront the trauma of her past and think about how she wants to go forward.

The book is full of danger, schemes and counterschemes, and unexpected actions that weren’t part of the schemes but are consistent with the complex characters. Suren has been told all her life that she’s worthless and useless, so we’re pulling for her as she tries to come into her own — and figure out what that means.

The book ends in a satisfying place — and yet an infuriating one, because the story is by no means complete, and we’re dying to know what happens next.

blackholly.com

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Review of So This Is Ever After, by F. T. Lukens, read by Kevin R. Free

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

So This Is Ever After

by F. T. Lukens
read by Kevin R. Free

Simon & Schuster Audio, 2022. 9 hours, 33 minutes.
Review written December 27, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

So This Is Ever After is simply a whole lot of fun. The book begins when there’s supposed to be a Happily Ever After — after Arek defeated the Vile One by fulfilling the prophecy, assembling a band of allies, infiltrating the castle, and chopping off the evil king’s head.

What Arek hoped would happen after that was that things would slow down and he’d get a chance to confess his love to Matt, his best friend and the mage who fought beside him on the quest.

But they don’t want to leave the throne empty for just anyone to take over, and Matt urges Arek to put the crown on his head and take the kingship for a few hours while they go rescue the rightful ruler — the last princess of the royal line, who’s locked in a tower.

Well, they do find the princess in a tower — but she’s so dead, she’s become a skeleton. And Arek discovers, much to his discomfort, that he’s magically bound to the throne. He can’t abdicate, or it will kill him. And then he learns that he has to bond with a soulmate by his eighteenth birthday only four months away. He doesn’t want to tie Matt to him unless Matt is willing, but when he awkwardly tries to find out, the door gets totally shut. So instead, Arek asks Matt to help him find a soulmate in four months.

What follows is a comedy of errors. Yes, it does feel contrived for Arek to do everything exactly wrong. Arek isn’t particular about whether his soulmate is male, female, or neither, so he tries to woo each one of his friends in turn — with comical results that always seem to throw him toward Matt.

This is a totally fun, light-hearted story about what happens after the quest is done and you’re stuck ruling a kingdom. It helps if you have tried-and-true friends by your side.

ft-lukens.com

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Review of All That’s Left in the World, by Erik J. Brown

Audiobooks, Science Fiction, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

All That’s Left in the World

by Erik J. Brown
read by Barrett Leddy and Andrew Gibson

HarperAudio, 2022. 10 hours, 6 minutes.
Review written October 21, 2022, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review
2022 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #6 General Teen Fiction

All That’s Left in the World is about two teenage boys trying to figure out how to go on in a post-apocalyptic world after everyone they loved died in a superflu epidemic.

The author’s note says that he signed the contract for this book in March 2020 — so he had no idea how realistic it would feel. But the illness in this book is much, much worse than Covid-19, and civilization in America has completely broken down.

At the start of the book, Jamison is in a mountain cabin that has its own electricity and well water. Andrew is in the woods in big trouble because he stepped into a bear trap. He needs help. When he sees the cabin, he tries the door, expecting anyone who lived there to be dead. Jamie almost shoots him, but instead ends up giving him antibiotics and helping him recover.

But after they’re settling into life in the cabin and getting used to each other and Andrew’s leg is much better, a group comes and steals their food, trying to get them to join their settlement. Andrew takes off to where he was going before — following rumors that the European Union is going to bring help to Reagan National Airport. He tries to sneak away so Jamie won’t stop him — and Jamie ends up coming after him.

What follows is a road trip novel with lots of danger. Some of the people they meet along the way are helpful and kind, but most are the opposite. (I wish I didn’t believe there’d be so many guns in post-apocalyptic America!) Just when I’d think they had things in a good place, some new danger would find them.

So there’s lots of tension, and there’s also romance. It’s the kind I like best, very slow and gradual, and you can understand why they like each other. Andrew knows he’s gay from the start, but Jamie has had only girlfriends in the past, and is confused by his developing feelings for Andrew. But it’s all handled really well, and the reader just hopes against hope they’ll be able to make it to somewhere safe.

I read a novel in late 2020 where the whole population caught a bug, and knowing so much about pandemics by then, I thought it was completely unrealistic. (Viruses don’t spread instantly, for example.) With this one, which took place after most people had died, I wish I didn’t feel like it was believable, but unfortunately it very much seems like it could happen like that.

Of course, there are things I would have done differently if I were writing a post-apocalyptic novel, but this author had me believing the story all along, and worrying about how the boys would survive and figure out they loved each other.

For something as disturbing as this scenario, this was an awfully satisfying novel.

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Review of What My Bones Know, by Stephanie Foo

Audiobooks, Nonfiction Review, Starred Review, True Stories 0

What My Bones Know

A Memoir of Healing from Complex Trauma

by Stephanie Foo
read by the author

Random House Audio, 2022. 10 hours, 3 minutes.
Review written December 22, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review
2022 Sonderbooks Standout:
#1 General Nonfiction

This book is amazing. It’s full of helpful information about healing from complex trauma, and it also tells a compelling story about a resilient person trying to cope with awful things in her history.

Stephanie’s a journalist. So when she got a diagnosis of Complex PTSD, she documented her journey of trying to cope and trying to heal.

Once we find out what her childhood was like, the listener of this audiobook isn’t at all surprised by her diagnosis. Her parents subjected her to horrific abuse — and then abandoned her when she was a teen. That she came to have a functional life and successful career is amazing.

But Stephanie was thrown by her diagnosis. She began reading about C-PTSD, which develops from chronic trauma over a long period of time that a person has to deal with on a daily basis and never feels safe. Her reading told her that C-PTSD has permanent negative effects on people’s lives, and she became afraid that she was incapable of good relationships or a happy life — that everything she did would be destructive.

And there were some low points in her journey and some unhelpful therapists and methods of therapy. But the book progresses to where she came to understand and make peace with her background and learned ways to connect with others and build a meaningful, happy life. In the audiobook, she includes recordings from very helpful sessions she had with an expert on C-PTSD. The book builds to her wedding — where she realized she’d built family and community, and then to the time of the pandemic — where she learned that the coping skills she’d learned as a child were actually superpowers when faced with an actual crisis. They aren’t all bad.

And all of this was fascinating storytelling, combined with deep insights about life and coping and building relationships and healing. A truly wonderful book. You’ll get something out of this no matter what your background.

stephaniefoo.me

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Review of Little Thieves, by Margaret Owen

Audiobooks, Fairy Tale Variant, Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Little Thieves

by Margaret Owen
read by Saskia Maarleveld

Macmillan Audio, 2021. 14 hours.
Review written October 31, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review
2022 Cybils Finalist, Young Adult Speculative Fiction
2022 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #1 Teen Fantasy Fiction

Oh, this book is so, so good! I listened to it while on a road trip four hours away to New River Gorge National Park and found myself looking forward to spending more time in the car, almost more mesmerized by the audiobook than I was by the stunning autumn leaves. The narrator did a wonderful job weaving the spell, and I was hooked from the very beginning.

The book begins with a dark tale:

Once upon a time, on the coldest night of midwinter, in the darkest heart of the forest, Death and Fortune came to a crossroads.

They’ve come to the crossroads to meet with a woman and her four-year-old child. The mother believes her child is bad luck. The woman was a thirteenth child, and this child is her thirteenth. So that is how Vanja gets Death and Fortune as her godmothers.

But then we fast forward twelve more years. Vanja is wearing the face of a princess, and she’s planning a jewel heist at the house party of another noble family.

We learn that for a year, Vanja has been masquerading as the princess whom she once served, using the princess’s enchanted pearls that give her a beautiful appearance and play on the desires of those who look upon her. She’s betrothed to the margrave of Boern, but he has been away at war for a year, so she’s had charge of his castle.

As she pulls off the elaborate jewel heist, at the end of the first chapter we read:

Once upon a time, there was a girl as cunning as the fox in winter, as hungry as the wolf at first frost, and cold as the icy wind that kept them at each other’s throats.

Her name was not Gisele, nor was it Marthe, nor even Pfennigeist. My name was — is — Vanja. And this is the story of how I got caught.

I saw on the flap that this book is a retelling of “The Goose Girl,” and for a little while, I was faintly horrified to find myself sympathizing with the horrible maid who stole the princess’s life, a princess I came to love in Shannon Hale’s version, The Goose Girl. But this is a very different retelling! I think it’s kind of funny that now two of my favorite books came from that fairy tale, but in such different versions.

In this version, the truly terrible villain is actually the margrave the princess was traveling to marry.

And as Vanja pulls off her jewel heist as the Pfennigeist, she learns that the margrave is coming home. And he’s called in the Order of the Prefects of the Godly Courts to uncover the Pfennigeist. And on her way back to the margrave’s castle, she runs afoul of another of the Lower Gods and gets cursed to slowly turn into a statue of jewels by the full moon — unless she makes up for all she has taken.

Of course, that may not be the worst thing, because now that the margrave is back, he wants to get married quickly. And what are these monsters that keep coming after his bride?

But oh, there’s so much more — I’d better not try to tell all the threads woven together and then skillfully unwound.

I will say this is a very loose retelling of the fairy tale, with many more details woven into the story. Instead of being an actual goose girl, the deposed princess works in an orphanage which in German (or something like it) is called Gosling House. A junior prefect who comes to investigate the thefts is named Conrad, and yes, a dead horse is important to the plot by the end.

Besides being a very loose retelling, it’s also much darker than Shannon Hale’s retelling, but after all, we’re pulled into sympathy with the villain of that tale — she hasn’t been treated well by the nobility, including sexual assault by the margrave when she had the appearance of a servant. (Nothing sexual is onstage, but there are some innuendoes and some dark moments.)

But oh my goodness, how well the plot is woven!

I thought of it as an alternate-reality medieval Germany, since they use a Germanic language and The Goose Girl is a fairy tale from the Brothers Grimm. So then I was pulled up short when same-sex relationships and transgender people are seen as entirely normal. Kind of pulled me out of the medieval Germany vibe. But then I laughed at myself. It was a world where the religion involved tribute to the Lower Gods, including gods of place and the gods of Death and Fortune. So without our same Scripture, why wouldn’t same-sex relationships be seen as normal?

But oh my goodness, the plot of this book is wonderful! Vanja’s set up with lots of problems — She also wants to gain enough money to get out of the Blessed Empire so she won’t have to serve one of her godmothers for the rest of her life. But she also needs to evade justice for her thefts and break the curse so she doesn’t get turned into a statue and continue to hide her true identity and stay alive despite the monstrous attacks and also try to avoid marrying the margrave.

Yes, it’s complicated, but magnificently so.

Oh, and the title? It comes from a proverb from the Blessed Empire:

The little thief steals gold, but the great one steals kingdoms;
and only one goes to the gallows.

margaret-owen.com
fiercereads.com

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Review of Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World, by Benjamin Alire Sáenz, read by Lin Manuel Miranda

Audiobooks, Contemporary, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World

by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
read by Lin Manuel Miranda

Simon & Schuster Audio, 2021. 10 hours, 3 minutes.
Review written April 30, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World is the sequel to Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe and yes, you should read them in order. So if you haven’t read the first book, please don’t read more of this review as it may give you some spoilers.

If possible, I loved this second book even more than the first. It’s from Ari’s perspective as he navigates his senior year of high school. He’s accepted that he’s in love with Dante, and he’s figuring out what that means.

But why I loved this book so much is that Ari also learns to develop many meaningful relationships. In the first book, Dante was his first friend. But now, as well as being in love with Dante, he develops deep friendships with some fellow students, with his parents, and with some teachers. All of those relationships help him get through when hard things hit.

And it’s definitely not all sun and roses. Some major life events happen that are hard to face. Ari goes to visit his older brother, who is in prison. And Ari and Dante have been accepted into colleges far apart from one another, so they both have anxiety about what comes next.

Also, the book is set in the 1980s during the height of the AIDS epidemic. Both Ari and Dante are coming to terms with what it means to be a gay man in a culture that hates them.

But they encounter beautiful people in their journey, and all the difficulties they face in this book are faced with a community of supportive friends, which makes all the difference.

benjaminsaenz.com/

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Review of A Magic Steeped in Poison, by Judy I. Lin

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

A Magic Steeped in Poison

by Judy I. Lin
read by Carolyn Kang

Listening Library, 2022. 11 hours, 12 minutes.
Review written September 19, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

The first thing I need to say about this book is that it’s one of those where the story doesn’t finish at all. In fact, it ends right at a point where things are looking bad for the main character. However, the good news is that the second volume is already out, and the literature says it’s a duology. So I plan to finish the story soon.

But the story is a good one — magical and imaginative, all about magic inherent in tea as well as the skills of the person making and pouring the tea.

The book begins as Ning is preparing to go to the capital city to compete to be the court shennong-shi — the best in the art of wielding the magic of tea. The winner of the competition will be granted a favor from the princess. And Ning thinks this is her only chance to save her sister Shu, who is desperately ill, having been poisoned with the same tainted tea that killed their mother.

Shu was the one who trained to be their mother’s apprentice in the arts of shennong-shi. But Ning learned many of those skills, as well as some of the art of their father, a physician.

When she gets to the palace, there’s plenty of contempt among the other competitors for girls from a rural province, but Shi befriends another like herself. She encounters a handsome stranger who turns out to be part of the imperial family — the part that is in rebellion to the emperor.

Besides the competition, which is full of creative and challenging ways for Ning to use her gifts, the book is full of court intrigue and danger. Ning wants to find out who was responsible for the poisoned tea that killed her mother. And then she needs to combine her physician skills with shennong-shi to save a life. But her skills may put her in grave danger.

I’m glad I listened to this audiobook, because I wouldn’t have known the correct pronunciations for many words, and the narrator did a nice job pulling me into the story. The original magic made this a fantasy tale that stood out, and Ning’s a character who’s resourceful and unstoppable. This book left her in a bad place, and I very much want to read on and discover how she gets out of it.

judyilin.com

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Review of All Boys Aren’t Blue, by George M. Johnson

Audiobooks, Biography, Teen Nonfiction, True Stories 0

All Boys Aren’t Blue

A Memoir-Manifesto

by George M. Johnson
read by the author

Macmillan Audio, 2020. 5 hours, 12 minutes.
Review written November 9, 2020, from a library eaudiobook

In this book, George Johnson talks about what it was like for him growing up Black and queer, even in a loving and supportive family.

His storytelling style is interesting and engaging, though a little repetitive in spots. He had me on the edge of my seat when I listened to him tell about getting his teeth kicked out when he was five years old. His stories of his family, especially his grandma, are warm and loving.

When he talks about sexual coming-of-age, he gets way more detailed than what this middle-aged heterosexual white woman wanted to hear. But this book isn’t written for heterosexual middle-aged white women. It’s written especially to other Black and queer folks to find out they aren’t alone. He even talks about how little information he had about gay sex and how he hopes he can help others go beyond trial and error with a few less errors.

I’m glad this book is out there, and even for those not in its target audience, it’s a story of a boy growing up as an outsider and finding his way with the help of community.

iamgmjohnson.com
us.macmillan.com/audio

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Review of Girl, Serpent, Thorn, by Melissa Bashardoust

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Teen Fiction Review 0

Girl, Serpent, Thorn

by Melissa Bashardoust
read by Nikki Massoud

Macmillan Young Listeners, 2020. 10 hours, 6 minutes.
Review written December 12, 2020, from a library eaudiobook

Girl, Serpent, Thorn is a modern fairy tale rooted in Persian folklore. The story is told from the perspective of Soraya, twin sister to the young shah, but who is kept hidden from all outsiders. She has been cursed to be poisonous to the touch. If anyone touches her, they die instantly. She is even deadly to insects. So she travels the palace in secret passageways and wears gloves at all times.

But then she meets a young man who’s not afraid of her. When she finds out a way she may be able to remove her curse, he is willing to help her. There’s a little problem, though – She would have to put out the royal fire that protects her family.

I thought most of the book would be about Soraya trying to lift her curse, but it turns out there’s a lot more that happens, because there are consequences.

The narrator brought the story to life with her lilting accent.

I did enjoy this tale, and loved the Persian flavor. The story was a little convoluted for me – I didn’t completely buy Soraya’s motivations at every point. And there seemed to be coincidences at others. And I wondered at how easily she found out a couple of things – like how to discover an old criminal in hiding, long ago condemned to die.

But the concept – a princess who had been cursed to be poisonous, wondering if that makes her a monster – that concept was worth building a fairy tale around.

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