Book Review- Black Swan Rising

Title: Black Swan Rising

 Author:  Lee Carroll

Series:  Black Swan Rising #1

Published:  3^rd August 2010 by Tor Books

Length: 400 pages

Warnings:  one non-graphic two paragraph sex scene, vampires, fairies.

Source: Library

Other info: Lee Carroll is actually two people-Carol Goodman and her husband Lee Slonimsky. Book 2, the Watchtower, was published earlier in the year

Summary : New York jeweller Garet James has her fair share of problems: money, an elderly father, a struggling business. One day she comes across an antiques shop she’d never noticed before. The owner possesses an old silver box that’s been sealed shut. Would she help an old man and open it, perhaps? She does...and that night strange things begin to happen. It’s as if her world – our world – has shifted slightly, revealing another, parallel place that co-exists without our knowledge: the world of the Fey…

Garet learns that one of her ancestors was 'the Watchtower': an immortal chosen to stand guard over the human and the fey worlds – a role that she has, it seems, inherited from her mother. But the equilibrium between these two existences is under threat. The 16th-century magician and necromancer Dr John Dee has returned, the box has been opened and the demons of Despair and Discord released. In a race against time and impending apocalypse, it is Garet who must find Dee...and close the box.

Review: Garet James opens a box that had been soldered shut for an old man. She doesn't think anything of it. Why should she? But then her gallery is broken into, her father is shot,  she meets Oberon, King of the fairies, and is told that that old man is John Dee, opening the box in order to summon Despair and Discord to the world. As well as this, she meets vampire Will Hughes, and falls in love with him.

It all starts very quickly. We don't get much introduction to Garet-we learn more about her and her history as we progress through the story.

I like the many twists and turns throughout the story. The action doesn't seem to slow down, it kept going on and on.

 I liked the huge range of characters in this-vampires, fairies, dragons, demons, mermaids and gnomes. I especially liked the little fire fairy Lol. However I didn't like the fact that after some of the characters had been introduced, they didn't seem to come up again. Hopefully the things they did will be relevant and they themselves will crop up again in the sequel.

The romance in itwas your typical vampire human relatoinship with the added bonus that quite a bit of blood was shared (it's annoying when a vampire falls in love with a human but doesn't drink his/her blood.) It got a bit confusing though when towards the end Madame Dufray was brought in. It was suggested that, in a past life, Garet wasMadame Dufray. However this wasn't properly explored or explained, and I'd like to read more about Will and his past interactions inthe sequel, The Watchtower.

It's in first person, Garet's POV, and we got a good idea of how she feels.

My favourite thing about this is how everything cleverly fits together regarding the relationships, even if it wasn't very well explained.

Overall:  Strength 4 tea to a book that mixes up various different fantasy elements in an interesting way.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Carol's website which includes a bit about Black Swan Rising| 

Waiting on Wednesday #19 Flame of Surrender by Rhiannon Paille

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly bookish meme hosted by Breaking the Spine where we show off books that we want to read but have not been published yet. 

Title:  Flame of Surrender
Author: Rhiannon Paille
Series: The Ferryman and the Flame #1
Release Date: 1 November 2011
Link to / Summary from Goodreads: The boy who follows death meets the girl who could cause the apocalypse. 
Krishani thinks he’s doomed until he meets Kaliel, the one girl on the island of Avristar who isn’t afraid of him. She’s unlike the other girls, she swims with merfolk, talks to trees and blooms flowers with her touch. What he doesn’t know is that she’s a flame, one of nine individually hand crafted weapons, hidden in the body of a seemingly harmless girl. 
Nobody has fallen in love with a flame until now. She becomes Krishani’s refuge from the dreams of death and the weather abilities he can’t control. Striking down thousand year old trees with lightning isn’t something he tries to do, it just happens. When the Ferryman dies, Krishani knows that he’s the next and that a lifetime of following death is his destiny. 
And Kaliel can’t come with him. The Valtanyana are hunting the flames, the safest place for her is Avristar. Krishani can’t bear to leave her, and one innocent mistake grants the Valtanyana access to their mystical island. They’re coming for Kaliel, and they won’t stop until every last living creature on Avristar is dead. She has to choose, hide, face them, or awaken the flame and potentially destroy herself.

Why I want it: The first line of the summary. The characters implied. Yes yes yes.  ((And on a complete sidenote, it’s released on my birthday.)

What are YOU waiting on this week?

Book review: TimeRiders by Alex Scarrow

Title: TimeRiders

Author: Alex Scarrow

Source: Library

Publisher and Published: Various, various times (according to goodreads. The book is downstairs

at the moment and I'm too lazy to get it)

Warnings: Blood, cannibalist mutants, violence, mild profanity

Summary from goodreads: Liam O'Connor should have died at sea in 1912. Maddy Carter should have died on a plane in 2010. Sal Vikram should have died in a fire in 2029. Yet moments before death, someone mysteriously appeared and said, 'Take my hand ...' But Liam, Maddy and Sal aren't rescued. They are recruited by an agency that no one knows exists, with only one purpose - to fix broken history. Because time travel is here, and there are those who would go back in time and change the past. That's why the TimeRiders exist: to protect us. To stop time travel from destroying the world...

Review: Right when they were about to die, three teenagers were asked if they to go with an old man, called Foster, or die. The first one is Liam who is aboard the sinking Titanic and has 90 seconds left to live (according the same old man). So he follows the him and wakes up in New York, 2001. But of course he doesn't know that. Then we get Maddy on a plane. Which will blow up in 90 seconds. Foster really pressurises these people doesn't he? She follows too. Sadly, we aren't told about Sal's experience. They are introduced to each other etc. and we discover that Foster is from "Never-neverland". How enigmatic. They also meet their team mate, Bob, an artificial human. They assigned roles, Sal the observer, Maddy the analyst, Liam the guy who

actually gets to time travel and Bob the support unit. I think that's the end of the basic character introductions.

I like how the team are based during 9/11 to distract the attention away from themselves. It's quite an interesting concept and it's probably true, people in the local shops would be more focused on the mass destruction around them. Other aspects of the book that many people believe don't make sense actually do. Depending on what theory you use. To make sure I don't give out any spoilers, I'm going to use the concept of autoinfanticide (if you don't understand, think of the child self as the information that the antagonist needs to know to change history: what he needs to change). If you went back in time and killed yourself as a baby you would no longer exist and "you" that existed at the time you killed your child self would not exist and you would not have been able to kill yourself. The Novikov self-consistency principle agrees with this statement and says this can't possibly happen. The parallel universe/alternate timelines says you can do this, great for you. The nonexistance theory doesn't work with this book. The destruction resolution I don't think would work and temporal modification negation theory does work. The delayed effect of the shifts if a form of the delayed ripple effect.

The characters don't change much (apart from Bob. He changed a lot). I found that really disappointing as the characters need to progress in sci-fi to make it more realistic. The "Tuesdays" weren't described much which is a shame because they would have made the book more interesting. I wish that Sal had written more in her diary and the Maddy's feelings were shown a bit more. I love the idea of an alternative future (though in this case, it's the past).

Rating: 4 Really good but you need to do some research to understand some things.

Book Review- The Vampire Blog by Pete Johnson

Title: The Vampire Blog

 Author: Pete Johnson

Series:  N/A

Published:  7 June 2010

Length: 240 pages

Warnings: vampires, gore, kissing,

Source: Library

Summary : Marcus was convinced that vampires don't exist—he was very wrong. On the night of his 13th birthday, he is faced with a bombshell when his parents tell him that he is actually half-vampire and is about to go through his vampire changeover period. As Marcus secretly blogs about the horrors of his new fangs, bad breath, and cravings for blood, he is unaware that his life is in serious danger

Review: On his thirteenth birthday, Marcus is told that his parents are half vampires and that, joy of joys, he'll become one too. He really doesn't want to be one, and spends part of his time denying that he is one. And then strange things happen, yes, even stranger than discovering you.re about to be a half vampire, and Marcus ends up in even more danger than he first thought. 

The writing in this is ok. I liked the way that Marcus responded with witty remarks to everything. His personality change from disbelieving and denying to accepting is interesting to watch, if not the most original. The way he handles everything with sarcasm and cutting remarks add to  his personality. However, I can't really connect with Marcus, possibly because I'm not a thirteen year old boy turning into a half vampire.  

The supporting characters are interesting  with individual, if extremely odd, personalities. Joel is really your average friend to have a laugh with, and the parents are your standard I'll try and do what's best for you ones. Even if they are guiding their son through transformation into a half vampire. Tallulah, the weird girl, while I started off hating her, as the story progressed she seemed less insane and more likeable and I feel really bad for how she ended.

Like I said, I couldn't reall feel that much connection to Marcus, or indeed any of the characters. This book was a bit predictable and I guessed what would happen at the end about 2/3 of the way through. However, it's an original take on traditional vampire myth, and done well.

Overall:  Strength 3 tea to a book more for the boys looking for something they can relate to, rather than the standard brooding romantic vampire boys of today.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Author website | 

Mini review- Sample Chapters- Princosa by B. M. Donnelly

 Title: Princosa
Author: B.M.Donnelly (her other writings and art here)
Summary of book: Cresenda is a perfectly normal farm girl until an accident with an enchanted wand leaves her magically gifted, on the run from assassins and battling desperately to save her world. Left with a companion who hates her and government plotting to destroy her will she ever be able to rid herself of her powers and return to normal life?
What I reviewed: First three chapters
Source: Author
Review: It begins in a cave, with what is obviously the villain of the series speaking to her pet snake about a wand that she wants to get hold of. This actually reminded me a lot of Harry Potter,  whether this is good or bad is up to you. The scene then changes to a town, with a group of girls, one of which then harrasses a stranger, called Villiam, until he goes home with her. He agrees, but says he can't stay long, saying that it's dangerous. The three chapters I read ends there.
In that short amount of time, we get a clear view of the characters and personality, and the situation, because of the amount of detail in the writing. Cresenda is a girl full of sass, who seems to be a strong heroine. Villiam is an okish character, not really my kind of man, but an interesting character with a bit of mystery surrounding him.
The writing style is very descriptive, in third person like most fantasy books, which does a great job of world building. However like you get with very detailed prose, sometimes it slows the story down a bit. From the dialogue you get a good sense of the characters, all of which seem real people, with full personalities, even the ones who I think will turn out to be fairly minor in the grand scheme of the book.
On a side note, Cresenda's introduction stated her clearly as a human. There's a talking lizard. I wonder what other fantasy creatures will turn up...
Overall: Strength 3 tea to this opening of what could be a very very good fantasy book once done.

Summer Reading Update 2/In my Mailbox

And again… listed  in pink is what I got this week…it’s kind of an In my Mailbox

READ

• Teeth, Vampire Tales  (review here)
• The Bell Jar (review here)
• How to Be A Woman (mini review here)
• The Vampire Blog (review to come)
• Lord of the Flies (review here)
• Acadia (e-book) (review here)
• Vampire Doll vol 1 (review to come)
• Dead Streets
• Mail vol 2
• Black Swan Rising (review coming)
• Haruhi 3
• Haruhi 4
• Haruhi 5
• Much Ado About Nothing manga version
• Johannes Cabal the Necromancer  (review coming)
• Montmorency (reviewcoming)
• Tantalise (review coming)
• A Study in Scarlet graphic novel (review coming)

READING

• The Invention of Murder
• Zombies of the World (e-book)

ON MY PILE TO BE READ

• Descended by Blood (e-book)
• Catalyst (e-book)
• Quest of the Demon (e-book)
• Dr Faustus
• Empire of the Rising Sun
• Pride and Prejudice
• To Kill A Mockingbird
• Carrie
• Pegasus and the Fight for Olympus
• Skin Hunger
• Halo
• Spooks-the Apprentice
• Monster Island
• Wish Me Dead
• The Undertaker’s Gift
• Godchild
• Think of a Number
• Crescendo
• The Divine Comedy
• The Resistance
• Undead and Unwelcome
• Mercy
• Periodic Tales
• Life as We Knew It
• Virals
• Death-At Death’s Door (bought)

NOT GOT YET

• Hetalia 1
• Texas Gothic
•  Angel Sanctuary

ALSO REVIEWED THIS WEEK

Nina

• Nekropolis
• Divergent

Katy

• Mostly Harmless
• Tins

Think I’m doing ok so far? 

Book review: Tins by Alex Shearer

Title: Tins

Author: Alex Shearer

Source: A library... (I don't really know what to say here...)

Length: 252

Published: 2006

Publisher: Macmillan Children's Books

Warnings: Severed body parts....? Is that really that bad....?

Summary: Fergal has a unique hobby. He collects the tins without labels from the bargain basket in the supermarket; it's his idea of a gamble as you can never tell what's inside. This seems like a harmless thing to do until he finds a finger inside a tin, and he gets caught up in something more sinister.

Review: To explain most of his actions and his appearance, Fergal is said to be "clever". Really now. Attempting to eat the finger is clever, is it? Never mind, I'll stop raving.

The first part of this book was mildly funny, I love how Fergal plays out scenarios and says things in his head: it's quirky and to be honest we all do that occasionally and makes him a loveable character. His childish perception of the world allows his to become overexcited by some things and work methodically the with others. His friend Charlotte is just like him, although slightly less freaked out by what she found in her tin, which probably encouraged Fergal be more rebellious, and right into a big mess near the end. I think that she came a bit too late into the book, but that's probably just my opinion.

The plot itself was either too predictable, or too unrealistic. I found that although the was a cliffhanger at the end of almost ever chapter, you could easily guess what happened in the next or something completely implausible happened. I also thought the way the pair dealt with the situation their was ridiculous and Charlotte acted really stupidly. And she's supposed to be clever too.

Rating: 2

Book Review- The Bell Jar by Syvia Plath

Title: The Bell Jar

 Author: Sylvia Plath

Series:  N/A

Published:  1963

Length: 224 pages

Warnings: alcohol, implied sex, suicide attemts

Source: school LRC

Other info: Sylvia Plath has also written

Summary : Esther Greenwood is brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented, and successful, but slowly going under-maybe for the last time. In her acclaimed and enduring masterwork, Sylvia Plath brilliantly draws the reader into Esther’s breakdown with such intensity that her insanity becomes palpably real, even rational-as accessible an experience as going to the movies. A deep penetration into the darkest and most harrowing corners of the human psyche, The Bell Jar is an extraordinary accomplishment and a haunting American classic.

Review: This is the story of Esther Greenwood. She starts off in the city, having won a contest giving her a job in New York. At some point she is diagnosed with neurosis, and goes to a treatment centre. There’s not really any other way to describe this...just life in and out of the city with a mental illness...

 Part of my Book Club’s summer challenge was to pair up with someone and challenge them to read a book of your choice (I had Narcissa read Divergent). She challenged me to read this. I didn’t know what to expect, because my edition had no blurb, and the cover doesn’t help, and all I was told was “It’s very good’”. And it was.

I really felt for Esther and all that she went through, and believe me, she went through a lot.  The start was very good-telling you how Esther thinks of things, her surroundings, her situation and so on. it then goes on to describe how she gets out of town, tries to deal with Buddy, her childhood sweetheart who turns out to be not as good as she thought he was, how she copes with life and so on. It was very easy to connect with her, and also to imagine how she felt at every part of the story. The first person narrative made it easy to understand how she felt, and easy to follow her thoughts. You got a clear sense of her personality from her narration, dialogue and actions.

I didn’t like Buddy that much. He seemed to manipulate Esther and I feel sorry for her, with how he led a double life behind her back. I liked Joan a lot, and it seemed like Esther had a real friend in her. The other characters weren’t that important, but had clear personalities and influenced Esther a lot.

I didn’t like the way it ended. Not because ************ dies, even though it was really sad, but because it just seems to end suddenly. I didn’t understand what was happening in the final scene, and that’s just really the only weak point in the book.

Overall:  Strength 4 tea to a book that really pulls you in, even if you don’t think it looks very interesting. Because it is.

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Author website |