Book Review- Mad Love by Suzanne Selfors

Title: Mad Love

 Author: Suzanne Selfors

Series:  N/A

Published:  4 January 2011

Length: 336 pages

Warnings: romance, sex references,

Source: Library

Other info: Suzanne Selfors has also written other things like Coffeehouse Angel, Saving Juliet and Smells like Dog.

Summary : When you're the daughter of the bestselling Queen of Romance, life should be pretty good. But 16-year-old Alice Amorous has been living a lie ever since her mother was secretly hospitalized for mental illness. After putting on a brave front for months, time is running out. The next book is overdue, and the Queen can't write it. Alice needs a story for her mother—and she needs one fast.

That's when she meets Errol, a strange boy who claims to be Cupid, who insists that Alice write about the greatest love story in history: his tragic relationship with Psyche. As Alice begins to hear Errol's voice in her head and see things she can't explain, she must face the truth—that she's either inherited her mother's madness, or Errol is for real.

Review: Alice Amorous is living a lie. Her mother Belinda is the bestselling Queen of Romance. But it's been a while since she's published anything, and her crown is slipping. Alice tells the publishers a lot of things. She's overseas. She's doing research. Alice doesn't tell the publishers her mother is in hospital being treated for bipolar disorder, or manic depression. And then the publishers start demanding a story or money, neither of which Belinda can produce. Enter Errol, or Cupid. He wants Alice to write his story. But doesn't she have enough to cope with? 

This book handles the subject of  mental illness, which is interesting for me because a family friend was recently diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which I never knew much about. Mad Love presents bipolar in delicate, easy to understand way. It mentions both the scientific facts and traits, and also the way it can ruin family life. I liked the way that all this was presented in dribs and drabs, woven into context. If it had been Alice just saying in one block of text "my mother has bipolar disorder. This is what it is and this is what its like.",  that would be boring and wouldn't let you properly understand it. Mad Love is useful for those who are being forced to cope with those around them suffering.

In my opinion, the plot is not the most outstanding or intriguing. It takes some getting in to, and isn't the thing I normally read and enjoy. I think that if it was just the mental illness part,being really interesting, as a rule pure family life isn't really my thing and I might not enjoy it quite as much. The fantasy element of Errol aka Cupid was something that you wouldn't expect to see tied up with a serious topic like this, but it worked.

I liked Selfor's take on the tale of Psyche and Eros, which is completely different to  the one we're familiar with.

The characters were interesting. Alice has a lot going on in her life, and I liked the fact that she tried to do something to help her mother, even if it was difficult. Each character was different and distinctive, such as the church priest, the older gay flatmate and the girl who is mean at first and turns out ok.  Some of the characters were unlikeable at first, but by the end I understood their reasoning and personalities. 

It was written from Alice's perspective, which made it easier to understand everything Alice was going through. Although I didn't like the fact that at some point she's basically lying to everyone, I could see why she did it.

This is quite an emotional book. I found myself really hoping everything would turn out ok for Alice and Belinda, cheering for them when it did, and getting sad when various things happened, like the ending.

Overall:  Strength 5 tea to a book that mixes myth and reality in perfect measures.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Author website | 

Book Review- Sisters Red by Jackson Pearce

Title: Sisters Red

Author: Jackson Pearce

Series: Sisters Red #1

Published:  June 2010

Length: 324 pages

Warnings: gore (quite a bit at one point), werewolves, sex references, kissing, profanity, a lot of violence, hatchets and knives

Other info: The second book, Sweetly, is expected to be published later this year. Jackson Pearce’s website is here and you can find her on facebook too.

Summary  from Goodreads: Scarlett March lives to hunt the Fenris--the werewolves that took her eye when she was defending her sister Rosie from a brutal attack. Armed with a razor-sharp hatchet and blood-red cloak, Scarlett is an expert at luring and slaying the wolves. She's determined to protect other young girls from a grisly death, and her raging heart will not rest until every single wolf is dead.

Rosie March once felt her bond with her sister was unbreakable. Owing Scarlett her life, Rosie hunts ferociously alongside her. But even as more girls' bodies pile up in the city and the Fenris seem to be gaining power, Rosie dreams of a life beyond the wolves. She finds herself drawn to Silas, a young woodsman who is deadly with an ax and Scarlett's only friend--but does loving him mean betraying her sister and all that they've worked for?

Review: For me, you could split this book into two parts: the extremely hard to get into bit (the beginning), and the fast paced interesting bit (the end). It starts with a wolf attacking a house, ending in the death of a grandmother and a young girl, Scarlett being forced to fight said wolf (known as a Fenris) as younger sister Rosie hides. Seven years later, Scarlett and Rosie are still living at that cottage, and have been training themselves to be able to hunt Fenris, which they do very well. All that seems to happen is they go after a couple of Fenris, get snarled at, kill the Fenris and move on. oh, and we meet Silas, Scarlett’s hunting partner that Rosie falls in love with. Why was this part boring? I’m not entirely sure, but this world just seemed hard to imagine and not very engaging. I was seriously thinking about giving up, but the second one in the series looks good, so I made myself read on. and I'm glad I did because about halfway through, it really picks up.

On Silas’s advice, Rosie tries things completely unrelated to hunting and ends up falling in love with him. Scarlett is just Scarlett, trying to get her sister, her partner and herself to be as good at hunting as they can get. And the Fenris start looking for a new recruit: the Potential, and will continue to murder human girls whilst they hunt for him. Obviously, our little team of heroes have to go and find the Potential, because letting your enemies build their numbers is a bad idea, but it really doesn’t help that they don’t have any idea where to start.

I don’t know how Jackson Pearce did it, but the second half was much more interesting and engaging. I think its because she started to make changes in the different relationships, by getting Rosie to do something completely different, creating something new in the relationship[ between Rosie and Scarlett.

The other significant relationship is that between Silas and Rosie, which of course is romantic. In Sisters Red, I didn’t really mind the romance, probably because it a)drives the plot of the second half and if there was no romance the second half would not be nearly so interesting and b) it adds something else to Rosie’s and Scarlett’s relationship.

The thing I like best in Sisters Red is the relationship between Rosie and Scarlett. It goes from two sisters who do everything together to two sisters who know what they want to do to two sisters in an argument to two sisters who know exactly where they stand in the world.  Its very interesting to watch and very realistic.

In my opinion Silas was fairly boring. All he really did was kill a few Fenris and convince Rosie to do something different to hunting. Oh and—actually won’t talk here because that would spoil it.

The fact that (above spoiler is so) was pretty obvious when Silas first mentioned his sibling. I want entirely sure how it would work,  but it was quite easy to guess which slightly spoiled the story for me, because I don’t like things that are too obvious . Oh well.

I especially like the double narration that continues throughout out most of the book.  It gives both Scarlett’s and Rosie’s views and completely different voices. We learn a lot about the March Sisters, more I think than we would have learnt if we saw it just from one of the sister’s or a third person point of view.  This especially worked after the argument, when we saw both the separate views on it  and how they deal with it in different ways. The separate voices and the easy switch between both points of view adds a lot to both the sisters.

Overall:  Strength 3 tea to Sisters Red, a story for anyone who likes werewolves, romance, strong heroines and family relationships.

Book Review- The Radleys by Matt Haig

Title: The Radleys
Author: Matt Haig
Series: n/a
Published by: Walker (YA), Canongate (Adult), July 2010
Length:352 pages
Warnings: Non graphic sex scenes, references to adultery. 14 upwards.
Other facts: Matt Haig has also written things like the Dead Father's Club and The Last Family in Englan. This has been longlisted for the Carnegie Award 2011
Summary(from Amazon): Meet the Radleys - Peter, Helen and their teenage children, Clara and Rowan, live in a typical suburban English town. They are an everyday family, averagely dysfunctional, averagely content. But, as their children have yet to find out, the Radleys have a devastating secret. In this moving, thrilling and extraordinary portrait of one unusual family, The Radleys asks what we grow into when we grow up, and explores what we gain - and lose - when we deny our appetites.

Review:On a completely unrelated note, this is book 1 of my Parajunkee Challenge. On with the review...
For some reason, the first time I saw this, it was shelved alongside YA paranormal romance. The subtle cover caught my eye, as it was completely different. I really enjoyed this book. The characters were easy to connect with, mostly likeable and believable. I like the originality, as Haig portrays the vampire in a completely different light to what we are used to. The writing was descriptive and well written, interspersed with black humour, my absolute favourite being when discussing what to do about Clara's killing, Helen says "I've brought the spade". The clever subplots underneath the main story all intertwine neatly with eachother and the general plot,which I really like. What the Radleys does fal down on is not being aimed at a certain audience. I know it was published in two seperate editions, but the opening read as a YA novel, whilst some content was, at some points, unsuitable for younger readers. And while I enjoy all the subplots, they slightly detract from the stories of Rowan and Clara, which I think were intended to be the main characters.

Overall: I give this strength 4 tea, as i like all the twists and turns, the ironic look at vampires and the blood by the bottleful.

Nina xxx