Review of The Blood Red Horse, by K. M. Grant

Audiobooks, Historical, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Blood Red Horse

by K. M. Grant
Performed by Maggie Mash

Recorded Books, 2005. 9 compact discs, 9.75 hours.

Here’s a horse story of the same sort I loved as a kid: We’ve got a horse who’s strong and fast and brave, who narrowly escapes death many times, and loves his master. The horse of the title is named Hosannah, and he belongs to a boy in medieval times who sets out on one of the crusades with Richard the Lionheart.

The story is many-layered. We follow Will de Granville and his horse, but also his friend Ellie who must stay behind in England, and his brother Gavin who is betrothed to Ellie and almost kills Hosannah with his recklessness. The book also takes a close look at a Saracen boy who fights against them and also encounters Hosannah. We see many sides to the conflict, and it’s not portrayed as one side either good or bad.

The narrator wasn’t bad, though I would have preferred a male narrator doing so many male voices. This book is the first of a trilogy about the deGranvilles, and I intend to read them all, but will probably read the rest in print form. Still, it did make an enjoyable way to pass many hours in traffic.

This book is good for those who like historical fiction on an epic scale, battles, or just a good old-fashioned horse story.

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of Zombies vs. Unicorns, edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier

Fantasy, Short Stories, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Zombies vs. Unicorns

edited by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier

Margaret K. McElderry Books, New York, 2010. 415 pages.
Starred Review

When I met Diana Peterfreund, author of Rampant and Ascendant, at the 2009 Kidlit Bloggers’ Conference, she told me about this upcoming anthology, and I was waiting for it eagerly ever since. The premise is too fun! I will use the beginning of the Introduction to present it:

“Since the dawn of time one question has dominated all others:

“Zombies or Unicorns?

“Well, okay, maybe not since the dawn of time, but definitely since February 2007. That was the day Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier began the heated exchange about the creatures’ relative merits on Justine’s blog. Since then the question has become an unstoppable Internet meme, crowding comment threads and even making it to YouTube.

“Here in the real world Holly and Justine are often called upon to defend, respectively, unicorns and zombies. The whole thing has gotten so out of hand that the only remedy is . . .

“Zombies vs. Unicorns. The anthology.”

Yes, Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier, defenders of the reputations of unicorns and zombies, respectively, have compiled an anthology of stories by stellar authors about unicorns and about zombies. Team Unicorn is represented by Garth Nix, Naomi Novik, Margo Lanagan, Diana Peterfreund, Meg Cabot, and Kathleen Duey. Team Zombie presents stories by Alaya Dawn Johnson, Carrie Ryan, Maureen Johnson, Scott Westerfeld, Cassandra Clare, and Libba Bray.

Now, to be right upfront with you, I am firmly and decidedly on Team Unicorn. My first unpublished and probably never-to-be published children’s novel is about a winged unicorn. I like them. And I don’t like zombies. If this anthology had only included the zombie stories, I would not have been even slightly tempted to pick it up.

However, as it was, I’m am forced to admit that some of the zombie stories were quite good. The one by Maureen Johnson I loved. It reminded me of my favorite vampire story ever with an oppressed wife caring for the adopted vampire children of her abusive husband. In Maureen Johnson’s story an unwitting teenager comes to an isolated house to babysit some toddlers who turn out to be zombies. It probably shouldn’t be read by a teen about to go on her first babysitting job, but I enjoyed it.

The unicorn stories, of course, were brilliant! My favorite was “The Care and Feeding of Your Baby Killer Unicorn,” by Diana Peterfreund, which tied in beautifully with her books. You would not have to have read her books to enjoy the story, and I hope it will win her some new readers. My second favorite was “Princess Prettypants,” by Meg Cabot. A girl’s crazy aunt gets her a unicorn for her birthday, and at first she’s horrified at such a baby present, but in the end she finds it quite useful.

I do highly recommend this anthology. Whichever fantastical creature you prefer, you’ll find brilliant stories that look at them in a new and interesting way. The banter between the editors before each story is amusing as well.

Go Team Unicorn!

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of Star Crossed, by Elizabeth C. Bunce

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

Star Crossed

by Elizabeth C. Bunce

Arthur A. Levine Books (Scholastic), 2010. 359 pages.
Starred Review
2010 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #8 Teen Fantasy Fiction

I so enjoyed Elizabeth Bunce’s first book, A Curse Dark as Gold, when my library didn’t order a copy of Star Crossed as soon as it came out (They do have several copies now.), I ordered myself a copy. I was glad I did, because I’m sure I will read it again, especially since it turns out to be the first book of a series.

The fantasy world of Star Crossed is complicated and complex, but Elizabeth Bunce doesn’t lose the reader or blast us with a data dump. She feeds the information to us gradually and skilfully, stringing us along, making us want to know more. By the time the book is done, you look back at an intricate web of history, magic, relationships, betrayals and loyalties, just wanting to find out what happens next.

The book begins with Digger, a skilled thief, escaping from a heist that has gone bad, trying to escape the Greenmen. Her partner, the man she loves, was captured. Now she needs to get out of the city.

While she’s walking by the river, trying to figure out how to get on a boat and leave the city, she gets a lift with a group of young noblemen and women on a pleasure boat. She pretends to be a lady herself, Celyn Contrare, fleeing from the convent school of the Daughters of Celys.

They take pity on her and get her out of the city. She becomes Merista’s lady’s maid and they go to Meri’s family’s castle to get ready for her kernja-velde. Digger does not have magic herself, but she does have the unusual ability to sense magic, and magic is strong on Meri.

Many guests come to the family’s castle, ending up getting snowed in for the winter. One of them recognizes Digger for the thief she is. He won’t turn her in — as long as she does some stealing for him. Digger gets more and more fond of Meri and her family, but is trapped into spying on them. Can she keep them from getting in trouble? What are they plotting? She finds out more and more secrets that she does not want to reveal.

The intrigue in this book has many layers. There was a historic battle years ago where one side was defeated because of a traitor. There is a missing prince who is out of favor with those in power. There are the Greenmen, vigilant in looking for the forbidden use of magic. There are some surprises in Digger’s background. She gets drawn further and further into the plots until it all erupts into a dramatic, exciting, and satisfying showdown. I found myself immediately rereading the last several chapters, simply to enjoy them again and make sure I saw all the threads weaving beautifully into place.

The best part of the book may have been on the last page: “Digger will return in Liar’s Moon.” I hope I don’t have to wait long!

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/starcrossed.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a book I ordered from Amazon.com.

Review of Enchanted Ivy, by Sarah Beth Durst

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

Enchanted Ivy

by Sarah Beth Durst

Margaret K. McElderry Books (Simon & Schuster), New York, 2010. 310 pages.
Starred Review
2010 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #7 Teen Fantasy Fiction

I wonder if admission applications will increase for Princeton now that this book has been published. If I were reading it in high school, I would definitely have put Princeton at the top of my college wish list as a result. I love the author’s statement at the start of the acknowledgements:

“Yes, I went to Princeton. I went because of the trees. Junior year of high school, I walked onto campus, saw the arch of elm trees, saw the massive oaks, and I was sold. Perhaps not the best way to choose a college, but that’s the way it happened. Anyway, that moment changed my life and inspired this book.”

I love the whole premise of an enchantment with a door to a parallel magical world at Princeton. After all, who hasn’t looked at gargoyles and wondered about their secret lives?

The book begins as Lily’s Grandpa is driving her and her mom to Princeton University.

“Normally, Mom avoided car rides altogether, but this wasn’t a normal weekend. It was Princeton Reunions Weekend. Reunions weekend! Lily couldn’t believe Grandpa had offered to take them. He always attended, even in off years like his forty-ninth reunion. It was his “thing,” his once-a-year break from mothering both Lily and Mom. But this year, he’d said that Lily should see her future alma mater.

“Not that she’d even applied yet. She was a junior, three weeks away from her final exams, but Grandpa claimed this place was her destiny. No pressure, though. Yeah, right.”

Grandpa takes her to the Vineyard Club, the most exclusive eating club at Princeton. Grandpa had been a member fifty years ago. The members of the Vineyard Club have been expecting her. They ask her if she’s ready for the Test. If she passes, she is guaranteed admission to Princeton.

“One of the perfect-posture women said, ‘If you fail, you are free to apply with the rest of the applicants. This test is outside the purview of the admissions committee. But if you fail here, you should not expect an invitation to join Vineyard Club. Indeed, you would not be welcome.’

“Success meant her dream come true; failure meant exclusion from this (admittedly nice) clubhouse but still a shot at her dream come true. Yeah, she could totally live with that. No wonder Grandpa was smiling so widely he looked like he might burst. She felt the same expressions spreading across her face. She was smiling so hard that her cheeks ached. She felt as if a hundred birthday presents, including the pony she’d wanted in third grade and the lime green Volkswagen she wanted now, had landed right in front of her. ‘What’s the Ivy Key?’ she asked. ‘What does it look like? What does it open? What do I do to find it? How do I start?’

“At her flood of questions, Mr. Mayfair and several others smiled indulgently.

“‘That’s the test, my dear,’ the man with the book said.”

Lily decides to take a campus tour to get her bearings and maybe learn something about what could be the key, when a boy with orange and black hair (Princeton’s colors) named Tye joins her and says he’s her guard. Then she sees a gargoyle wave at him, and she’s sure it’s rigged. She is NOT going crazy, like her mother. The gargoyle drops a clue.

And after she makes a trip to the library where she discovers something interesting about her father, a monkeylike creature attacks her, but Tye — and some ivy vines — saves her.

I like the scene where she talks to another gargoyle:

“She bent sideways to look underneath the gargoyle for a microphone and speaker. She didn’t see anything. ‘Mr. Ape,’ Lily said in an even voice, ‘are you talking?’ She wasn’t going to let the Old Boys rattle her this time. They’d rigged another gargoyle somehow.

“‘Professor Ape, if you please,’ the gargoyle said in the same soft-as-sand voice. ‘I have tenure.’ He chuckled as if he’d made a joke.

“‘Nice to meet you, Professor Ape,’ she said. ‘So am I talking through a microphone to someone in Vineyard Club, or is this a recording? Are you interactive?’

“The gargoyle sighed. ‘I would appreciate it if we could dispense with all the “you’re joking” and “this can’t be true” and “I must be dreaming” nonsense. Can we simply agree that I’m a magical being from a parallel world and pronounce this lesson done?'”

As Lily’s quest for the key continues, there turns out to be far, far more at stake than just her admission to Princeton. The fate of thousands of people, perhaps the world, is at risk. And she has questions about her father’s death and her mother’s mental problems. Something isn’t right, and it may get much, much worse.

I enjoyed every moment of reading this book, which sadly didn’t last too long, since I kept reading until I finished in the wee hours of the morning. Perhaps it was because I love stories where things that seem magical turn out to truly be magical, where there end up being doors to a parallel, enchanted world. Oh, and I don’t think it’s too much of a spoiler to say that a were-tiger boyfriend sounds so much cuddlier than a cold, hard vampire. I mean, if you’re going for a paranormal romance, I don’t think you could do much better than a were-tiger.

I’m afraid there was one small error that glared at me, though not everyone would notice. The clue the gargoyle drops is a library call number — but it’s wrong. Not that it’s the wrong Dewey Decimal number, but college and university libraries rarely use Dewey Decimal numbers. They use LC (Library of Congress) numbers, an entirely different classification system. Of course I noticed right away that it was a call number, but I also noticed right away that it would never work to find a book in a Princeton library. I checked online today and sure enough, Princeton University Library uses the LC classification system. But this was a very small error in a fantastic book.

Now let’s see if I can talk my son into applying to Princeton.

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Source: This review is based on a book sent to me by the author.

Review of Pegasus, by Robin McKinley

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

Pegasus

by Robin McKinley

G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2010. 404 pages.
Starred Review
2010 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #4 Teen Fantasy Fiction

Robin McKinley is one of my favorite authors, so I was delighted when I heard she had another book coming out, and preordered it immediately. I was not a bit disappointed — well, except that this book is only Part One of a two-part story, and I will have to wait a year to get to read the conclusion. However, I will enjoy the excuse to read Part One several times before the second part comes out.

Robin McKinley is an amazingly skilled world-builder. She draws you in and makes it all seem real. Here is how Pegasus begins:

“Because she was a princess she had a pegasus.

“This had been a part of the treaty between the pegasi and the human invaders nearly a thousand years ago, shortly after humans had first struggled through the mountain passes beyond the wild lands and discovered a beautiful green country they knew immediately they wanted to live in.

“The beautiful green country was at that time badly overrun by ladons and wyverns, taralians and norindours, which ate almost everything (including each other) but liked pegasi best. The pegasi were a peaceful people and no match, despite their greater intelligence, for the single-minded ferocity of their enemies, and over the years their numbers had declined. But they were tied to these mountains and valleys by particular qualities in the soil and the grasses that grew in the soil, which allowed their wings to grow strong enough to bear them in the air. They had ignored the situation as without remedy for some generations, but the current pegasus king knew he was looking at a very bleak future for his people when the first human soldiers straggled, gasping, through the Dravalu Pass and collapsed on the greensward under the Singing Yew, which was old even then.”

The pegasi and the humans made a treaty, and the humans fought off the beasts that were preying on the pegasi. Now, generations later, the members of both species’ royal families are bound together, to keep the treaty strong. Humans are not able to communicate with pegasi, except with the help of magicians and pegasus shamans.

But then Sylvi bonds with Ebon, the fourth child of the pegasus king. And right from the start, they can hear each other’s thoughts.

One might think this was a good thing. But such a thing has never happened before, and the magicians are upset. When norindours and taralians begin making incursions into the country, they blame this “unnatural” bond.

In many ways, this is about a cross-cultural friendship. Sylvi learns more about the lives of the pegasi than any human has ever known. She and Ebon are inseparable — or so she thinks.

Robin McKinley weaves a spell in this book. It all seems real, and the things we learn about pegasus culture fit with the physical details we’re given about them. Their small hands are very weak, so their work is tremendously delicate, for example. When Sylvi gets to see art created by the pegasi, we appreciate that this is something entirely different from anything a human would ever make. We experience it with her.

Again, my only complaint is that the story is not finished. And this volume ends at a terrible place for Ebon and Sylvi. It’s hard to wait for the conclusion, but meanwhile, I’m so glad I’ve gotten to be transported to this magical world.

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Source: This review is based on a book I ordered from Amazon.com.

What Makes a Good Dystopian Novel?

Commentary, Science Fiction, Teen Fiction Review 0

Last night, I finished a dystopian novel that didn’t quite work for me as a dystopian novel. I can’t stress enough, though, that it was a good novel and kept me reading. However, that got me thinking: What makes a good dystopian novel?

My own idea of a good dystopian novel comes from something my then-teenage son said after reading Feed, by M. T. Anderson. Josh said that it was disturbing to read a dystopian novel during the time it was commenting on. He had to read 1984 for school, and it hadn’t hit him as hard as Feed, which talked about our consumer culture taken to the extreme.

Josh said, and I agree, that dystopian novels are written about the present, even when they are set in the future. Or at least I agree that this is true of the best dystopian novels.

Thinking about other dystopian novels I’ve read, I think there’s something of a continuum. Some are written with a dystopian setting because a dystopian setting makes an intriguing setting to place your characters in and see how they react. You can say things about human nature by putting your characters in an extreme setting.

For me, the best dystopian novels do say something about human nature in an extreme setting, but they also present a situation that mirrors present-day trends taken to the extreme. They present a warning about what could happen if things go on as they are right now.

Feed is a prime example of this kind of brilliant dystopian novel. In it, people have gotten a chip in their brain for constant internet access. The Feed knows what they like and what they want to buy and provides personalized shopping experiences. They don’t have to learn as much, because they can just look facts up on the Feed. But we quickly see in the book that this does not work out so perfectly.

The classic dystopian novel, 1984, is another example of a dystopian novel that commented on the time in which it was written. You can judge how well a book does this by how easily you can imagine our own society ending up like this. The propaganda and surveillance in 1984 is all too easy to imagine.

Part of the success of The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins, comes from how it plays on the current fascination with reality TV shows. It shows that maybe we aren’t so different from ancient Rome. It’s easy to believe that if there ever were fight-to-the-death games, that they would indeed become a national obsession and be fully televised. The part about why there were fight-to-the-death games was not quite as hard-hitting, but the whole media circus around the Hunger Games was all too believable.

Another recent dystopian novel, Candor, by Pam Bachorz, didn’t quite have me believing in the technology. Sure, I believed that subliminal messages could completely affect people’s behavior, just not that withdrawal could result in death. However, I did believe that parents would be happy about living in a city where subliminal messages would make their teens behave perfectly. That aspect (and the main premise of the book) was indeed hard-hitting. I have seen many many “Tiger Mom” type parents in Northern Virginia who would embrace that sort of technology without batting an eye. And the dystopian novel Candor, taking current trends to the extreme, is a perfect way of examining that sort of parenting.

I have not yet read Little Brother, by Cory Doctorow, but I believe it also speaks about current trends of giving up our privacy and shows where they can lead.

When I look at the dystopian novels that don’t succeed as well for me, they are still good stories. And the dystopian setting does add an intriguing twist. However, they don’t hit home, because I’m not at all worried about them coming to pass in my lifetime. They make good stories, but don’t disturb me. And my idea of a great dystopian novel is one that disturbs me, that makes me think about my life today.

Matched, by Ally Condie, presents a situation where the Society chooses what your life should be like and who you should marry. The intriguing premise is what happens when a mistake is made and Cassia sees the face of a second boy on her microcard, a boy who is an Aberration and is not supposed to be matched. It’s a good story about not letting your life be controlled by others. However, bottom line, I can’t really imagine that ever happening in America — we are too much individualists. I don’t think we ever would be willing to give that much faith to authorities. Now, it does make an intriguing story, but it doesn’t hit home like some dystopian novels. I’m simply not worried that our society will ever go there.

Among the Hidden, by Margaret Peterson Haddix, was like that for me, too. Although it makes an intriguing story — what would you do if you were the third child in your family in a society that only allows couples to have two children — I can’t quite imagine American society ever submitting to that kind of law. Now, Margaret Peterson Haddix puts in a past crisis so that food is scarce, which makes it more believable, but it’s not something I see as a natural result of today’s trends. So it does make a fascinating story, but I don’t think of it as a hard-hitting commentary about today’s society.

After, by Francine Prose, was closer on the continuum to a dystopian novel that talks about today. I could imagine people giving up their freedom in exchange for safety, but the book didn’t make clear why they were doing that, which made it a little less believable, a little harder to imagine it actually happening.

Uglies, by Scott Westerfeld, is toward the hard-hitting end of that continuum, too. We are obsessed with how people look, so it is possible to imagine everyone getting an operation when they turn sixteen to make them beautiful. They’ve abolished prejudice by making sure everyone looks beautiful. Now, the downside to that ends up being not so much about the operation as about its side-effects and the other things the society is doing to control the people. So it ends up not so much a commentary on our obsession with looks as an intriguing story about what Tally will do in extreme circumstances. The whole thing ends up feeling pretty far removed from our life today, though it is a gripping and exciting story, and it does make you think. But this is more toward the end of examining human nature in extreme circumstances than a warning about where society is going.

What do you think? Do you agree with me that a truly great dystopian novel comments on our society today, or is that just a nice bonus added on top? Is it more important as a device to examine human nature in an extreme setting, or just as a plot technique to increase suspense?

What dystopian novels have I left out? Where do they fall on the continuum of commenting-on-today as opposed to just-an-intriguing-setting? I’d love to hear some reactions in the comments.

Review of A Brief History of Montmaray

Adventure, Historical, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

A Brief History of Montmaray

by Michelle Cooper

Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 2010. 296 pages.
Starred Review
2010 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #3 Other Teen Fiction

With a lonely castle on the front, I expected some kind of medieval romance, but that’s not what I got at all. Instead, I found a historical adventure, with suspense and mystery and danger, and some teens needing to be resourceful.

The book is the diary of Sophia Margaret Elizabeth Jane Clementine FitzOsborne, princess of Montmaray, begun on her sixteenth birthday, as World War II was brewing in Europe.

Montmaray is a fictional island in the Bay of Biscay, off the coasts of Spain, France, and the United Kingdom. Sophia’s Uncle John is king of the island nation — but he is, frankly, insane. Her older brother Toby, the heir to the throne, is going to school in England. She has an older cousin Veronica, and a ten-year-old sister Henry who wishes she were a boy. Their parents are dead, and they live in the castle with the housekeeper tending to their Uncle John.

There aren’t many villagers left on Montmaray, and they don’t have ships come by terribly often. They still try to keep up the trappings of royalty, but Sophia’s aunt wants her to come to England. If she did, who would watch things at Montmaray? But then when some Germans show up, Sophia wants to find out what they’re looking for. And if they don’t find it, what can the royal family do to defend themselves?

It’s very hard to explain this book. I’d heard it described as a romance, which doesn’t really fit, even though Sophia does talk about her crush on the housekeeper’s son. But there’s a lot more here than that. It’s a historical novel that feels real and draws you in. It gives us a delightfully unorthodox situation, quirky and fascinating characters, and a situation that seems all too real. What would you do if you were alone in the middle of the ocean with a kingdom everyone is leaving? When a war begins in Europe, would you be able to keep from taking sides? What if the larger countries don’t care which side you take?

One thing I can tell you about this book: It’s a good read! I highly recommend it.

Wonderful! Looking up the links to this book on Amazon, I just learned that a sequel is coming out in April 2011: The FitzOsbornes in Exile! Huzzah!

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Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of Dairy Queen, by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

Contemporary, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 3

Dairy Queen

by Catherine Gilbert Murdock
read by Natalie Moore

Listening Library, 2006. 5 CDs; 6 hours, 9 minutes.
Starred Review
2010 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #1 Other Teen Fiction

I’d heard a lot about Dairy Queen, but never got around to reading it until I heard that Catherine Gilbert Murdock was speaking at the local MAYALIG (Metropolitan Area Young Adult Librarians’ Interest Group) conference. I had loved Princess Ben, so I definitely wanted to hear her speak, and thought I might as well listen to Dairy Queen, even though I don’t usually like sports novels.

I loved Dairy Queen. In fact, I did something I don’t usually do and when I was close to the end, I couldn’t stand it and brought the CD into the house to finish listening.

In this book we’ve got the classic romantic plot. Boy meets Girl and they can’t stand each other. But they are thrown together and get to know each other, and things change.

However, the classic plot has never before been told in quite this way! We’ve got football and cows and a girl who’s definitely not the usual type to date the high school quarterback.

D.J. Schwenk lately has had to take on most of the work at her parents’ dairy farm. She had to drop out of basketball her sophomore year to do the milking. Her family doesn’t talk: Her little brother hardly at all, and her two older brothers, who are off at college, don’t talk to the family ever since the big fight.

D.J.’s older brothers were legendary football players in their small town of Red Bend, Wisconsin. So D.J. knows a lot about training football players. Their family friend is the coach of the archrival team at Hawley. He tells Brian Nelson that if he wants to play quarterback next year, he should learn how to work this summer — on the Schwenk farm.

At first D.J. and Brian detest one another. D.J. thinks he’s a lazy whiner, and Brian thinks D.J. is just like the family’s cows. But D.J. knows a thing or two about football, and as she spends the summer training Brian, they start talking. Brian’s Mom is a family therapist, so he knows how important it is to talk. D.J., however, neglects to tell him some crucial things — like the fact that she’s planning to try out for the Red Bend football team — and play against Brian.

I was completely hooked by this audiobook. I love romance that’s done slowly — like real life, with misunderstandings and a slow coming together. D.J. and Brian come from very different worlds, and even if they can come together in romance, can their relationship get through facing each other on the football field?

This is a sports novel and a romance and a family story, all rolled into one, with characters you’ll come to love. If you told me this was a book about a girl who joins the boys’ football team, I wouldn’t be interested. But it’s a great story about a feisty girl who doesn’t want to live life as a cow.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/dairy_queen.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.

www.catherinegilbertmurdock.com

Review of Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins

Adventure, Science Fiction, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 1

Mockingjay
by Suzanne Collins

Scholastic Press, New York, 2010. 398 pages.
Starred Review
2010 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #9, Teen Fantasy and Science Fiction

If you’ve read Hunger Games and Catching Fire, it definitely won’t take my review to get you to read the third book in the trilogy. In Mockingjay, the rebellion against the Capitol is in full swing, and Katniss once again finds herself the focus of people’s passions and hopes.

Thank goodness there are no Hunger Games in this book. However, the Capitol has some traps that are extremely similar to things that would be faced in the arena….

Normally, when I was this eager to read a book, I would have bought myself a copy. However, in the case of The Hunger Games trilogy, although they are brilliant and powerful and outstanding books — I rather doubt I will much want to read them again, at least not any time soon. Katniss faces some horrible situations. The psychological warfare used against her is horrifying. Although the book is powerful, it’s not exactly pleasant reading.

I still loved the book. It’s exciting, gripping, edge-of-the seat reading. I’ve come to care about Katniss, and I was very pleased that finally she can live happily ever after at the end of this book. With nightmares, but still.

I also think that Mockingjay contained the best love triangle I have ever read. I honestly didn’t know who she’d end up with until the last several pages. And I didn’t have a gut-level preference. I could see how she truly loved each of them, and how they each satisfied a different part of her. What’s more, Suzanne Collins resolved the love triangle in a satisfying way, which arose from the characters of the three people involved. She could have so easily killed one of them off! But instead, Katniss made a choice, and it was a choice the readers believed and sympathized with.

The author included some surprising moral dilemmas, and resolved them in a subtle way. She writes with power and depth. You can call this action-adventure in a dystopian setting. Exciting reading.

Links: www.suzannecollinsbooks.com
www.scholastic.com/thehungergames

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/mockingjay.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.

Review of The Princess Plot, by Kirsten Boie

Audiobooks, Contemporary, Starred Review, Suspense, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Princess Plot

by Kirsten Boie

Narrated by Polly Lee

Recorded Books, 2009. Originally published in Germany in 2005. 9 CDs. 10.25 hours.
Starred Review

When I checked out The Princess Plot, I expected more of the fantasy tale I usually enjoy, set in a medieval kingdom. This story, however, is set in modern-day Europe, the story of a normal girl who gets embroiled in international affairs. Listening to it made it hard for me to get out of my car when I arrived at my destination!

The narrator did a great job. Since she has a British accent, I was imagining the book set in England. When I reached the end and learned it had been translated from German, that made a lot more sense — the geography of flying to the invented northern kingdom of Scandia fit better. Also, Jenna’s schedule of being out of school with the afternoon off fits with what I know about German teens.

The story is well-done. The plot is a little far-fetched, but the author has you going with it all the way. Jenna thinks of herself as very plain. She’s been brought up by a single mother who’s super-vigilant about Jenna staying safe and protected. So when her best friend wants her to go to an audition for girls their age to play a princess in a movie, she decides to do it without asking her mother’s permission. It seems strange when the producers pick Jenna instead of her friend and insist that she’d be absolutely perfect for the role. It feels strange, but also very, very good.

Then they take Jenna to the Kingdom of Scandia and tell her that she’s going to audition for the role by doing a favor for the princess of Scandia and being her replacement at the celebration of the princess’s birthday. The princess’s father recently died, and she wants to be out of the public eye. Or so they tell Jenna.

The reader knows that the princess has run away, and the regent and his people haven’t found her yet. The reader also knows that the “movie” people are sending Jenna fake text messages from her mother — so her mother does not actually know what’s going on.

We see the plot unfold, little by little. We’re given hints as to why they wanted Jenna. She’s a perfect double for the princess. We see that some North Scandian terrorists have been active lately, and get the feeling it may be connected with that.

The whole thing adds up to a captivating yarn about an ordinary girl — or at least someone who always thought she was ordinary — suddenly finding herself in a foreign country in the middle of a plot that’s way bigger than she is.

A sequel has recently come out, but my library hasn’t ordered it yet, so I will give in and order a copy for myself. I liked the people in this book, and very much would like to read about what happens next.

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Find this review on Sonderbooks at: www.sonderbooks.com/Teens/princess_plot.html

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.

Source: This review is based on a library book from the Fairfax County Public Library.