Night Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko

Many and profuse thanks to my buddy Bookmonkey for recommending this totally awesome series way back whenever he did. It was months ago. Check out his blog, there's a lot of awesomeness over there.

Night Watch is kind of the Russian version of The Dresden Files, but better. (Please don't kill me, Dresden fans. He's awesome too.) It follows Anton Gorodetsky's life as a low-level operative of the Night Watch, the organization of good-guy magic-users devoted to foiling the plots of the Day Watch, the bad guys. They have a careful truce set up, so that for every good deed THEY do, the bad guys get to do one EVIL deed, and vice versa.

So, they don't do all that much good. What makes them the good guys, again?

That's what the book is about. It's totally frikkin awesome. There's some navel-staring toward the end, but for the most part it's action, magic, chase scenes, and murders! It's divided up into three separate parts with some time in between each one, so we get an overview of a slightly bigger picture, three major events happening in sequence. We see some of the consequences of actions further down the road that we (or I, at least) never saw coming. It's like life, like that.

In a book with a theme like this, you expect to get a lot of Dark, Broody, Controversial characters (i.e. characters with no redeeming qualities whatsoever), and there is some of that, but I really like these characters and I like how all of them have legitimate reasons for their actions. Not just excuses or "I have to have motivation for my villains" reasons, REAL reasons. Of course, Anton is my favorite, and in no small part because he's one of the few characters who doesn't want to take part in the dance and the compromises, who doesn't just assume things are they way they should be because someone else tells him they are.

This is a book about subtlety. And it's about plots, and intrigue, and mysteries. And also about hurling fireballs. And a note on the translation: Absolutely flawless. I never would've guessed that it was originally in Russian, there's no awkwardness at all, and the writing isn't only competent, it's amazing.

Really, there wasn't a thing about it that I didn't love. There are three sequels, which I'll be reading as soon as possible: Day Watch, Twilight Watch, and Last Watch.

Buy Night Watch

Shades of Green by Rhonda Parrish

So, I'm a little shy today, because I got this book for review from the author, so it's a fair bet she's going to be reading the review shortly. Of course I'll be my usual honest, nitpicky self, not to worry. I was afraid I was going to have to be scathingly rude and snipey, but I'm shy because I liked it, so I'm a bit giggly, and I'm shy because I'm still going to be nitpicky right in her face. Am I allowed to criticize when she's published and I'm not? I'm going with a resounding "yes." This entire blog is me criticizing published authors, so I think my opinion on that should be obvious. But that's probably an essay of it's own.

Anyway, the book. It's a novelette, which means it could be considered a very short novel, but it has the structure and scope of a short story. It's about the a girl who is the last swamp elf in the world and lives with the big lizard people (the Reptar) who hate her guts. She meets a human, falls in love with him, and has to choose between him and causing the destruction of the entire Reptar race.

First, the sniping. There are a lot of what I consider simple mistakes in the first ten or fifteen pages: "as you know, Bob," fantasy names that sound made up, etc. There just seem to be too many words on the pages, when those sentences could be much more streamlined and get to the point a lot faster. I don't want to have to sit and decipher oddly phrased sentences when we could be getting on with the plot. I also think the Reptar are too human--just humans wearing crocodile suits, really. I would expect a reptilian culture to be noticeably different from a primate culture, just for starters. They wouldn't build things the same way. But that was less important as the story went on.

After about twenty pages, I was far too interested to continue making notes. Rhonda's strength definitely looks to be in the area of plotting, (Twists! Reversals! A totally unexpected ending, but still a square peg in a square hole!) and worldbuilding to a slightly lesser extent. A lot of it is pretty standard fantasy fare; some of it is fascinating. The Reptars have a post-technological society centered around a magic stone that seems to be alive in some way. It kind of creeped me out, but it's supposed to be benevolent. I'm terribly curious. It reminds me of Interstellar Pig, and oh, how I love Interstellar Pig...! Also, I thought the romance was done really well. It rang true.

You can read the first chapter at Rhonda Parrish's site, as well as see a bigger picture of the cover. (I'm not crazy about most of it, to be honest, but I love the Reptar in the background and you can't see his teeth in my little picture.) Keep in mind that it gets much better than the first chapter, after the plot picks up. If you like it, you can buy it here, or go here to browse her other work. (More stories set in this 'verse, surely?)

Gladiatrix by Russel Whitfield

Some other reviews led me to believe I was going to hate this and deride it mercilessly for being utter crap, but I don't and won't. I kind of loved it, and I'll tell you why.

It's not because of the historical accuracy. That obviously wasn't a concern here. The story was based on one image, and focused on what might have happened to achieve a moment like that. This is a highly stylized, highly fetishized, highly modern-opinion-ized version of Rome.

It wasn't because the heroine was likeable, because she wasn't. There's not anything likeable about her at all, really, except maybe her perseverance. But she's interesting. I'm not asked to like her, only to understand her.

It was because this is a really great pulp action novel. Blood, sex, violence, exotic locations, intrigue. The writing flows well and isn't too stylized or self-aware, and it's no chore to read. It's not a timeless work of literature or one of my favorite books, but it'll only take one afternoon to read. Embrace the glorious VIGOR of it, the intensity that's so serious as to be a bit silly. It's liberating. It's the perfect vacation book, whether you're on vacation or not. A bucket of popcorn wouldn't be amiss, either.

It sort of reminded me of Mara, Daughter of the Nile... Mara is a cut above, though, better history and focused on absolutely delicious intrigue.

Buy Gladiatrix

Breathers: A Zombie's Lament by S.G. Browne

Andy is a zombie, in a world where zombies are well-known but not accepted. He still has all of his faculties intact, but he is dead and decaying, and zombies are second-class citizens if they're citizens at all.

This is a really interesting zombie book, thoughtful, quirky, original, and gross, on every page. It's written in that modern men's Nick Hornby fiction style, which I don't always like, but in this case it makes the story very clear and accessible. It's easy to start reading, and hard to put down. (The book design has a lot to do with that too... Great cover and overall design, the physical act of reading was pleasurable.)

But, lest you think it's all whining and introspection, let's not forget Andy's new friend Ray and that tasty, er, venison, he's been serving.

I'm not sure I'd say I "liked" the characters, plot, etc., but it was definitely worth reading. There are two conflicting ideas coming from the text and I'm not sure which one is the intended (or even unintentional) Aesop. Are zombies just people like us, or are they total monsters that need to be killed for our own protection?

I hate the ending a little bit, but it's not out of the blue, and it certainly isn't disappointing. Browne doesn't rely on his premise to carry the book, he definitely puts in the effort and writes the whole way through, which I think is fantastic.

World War Z (reviewed last week) was the book that piqued my interest in zombies, and is without compare for zombies on a global scale, like Breathers is for the personal scale. Breathers also reminded me of The Reformed Vampire Support Group (reviewed last August), although RVSG is firmly YA and Breathers is firmly adult. Browne also has an (unrelated) new book called Fated coming out in November, and I'm super excited.

World War Z by Max Brooks

I heard a lot about this one on the interwebs a while (like, months) ago, and apparently put it on my automatic holds list at the library because, lo and behold, when I wasn't thinking about it at all, there it was. I then proceeded to dawdle over it for more months, piddle around with the first chapters for three or four days, and then down the entire thing in an afternoon.

World War Z is composed of interviews with/statements made by various survivors of the zombie apocalypse. The research that must have gone into this is mindblowing, because it really has a worldwide scope. There are interviews with soldiers from all over the world, civilians, doctors, everyone, through the whole course of the war. Max Brooks must know everything about everything by now.

There are a few recurring names, but no "main characters," and the book benefits from that immeasurably. This isn't "small group gets trapped in Sav-A-Lot with zombies outside," or "young soldier gets caught up in a zombie war," or what-have-you. It's ALL of those. It's kind of an immersive experience, terrifying in its realism. Everyone's affected, and there's nowhere to run.

I was impressed with the range of human behavior included in the book. There were brave people, cowards, good leaders, bad leaders, greedy jerks (to put it tactfully), and selfless heroes. That tends to tell me Mr. Brooks was actually writing a story, not a pamphlet for some agenda, which is always a danger in any book that deals with politics.

World War Z is thorough, gripping, realistic, intense, and a resounding success. Not to mention the words that are rapidly becoming the highest praise I can give a book: well-written.

Buy World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War

Elemental Masters series by Mercedes Lackey

Intro

I'm aware that my posts have been erratic for a while. We're hopefully back on a weekly, weekend post schedule now.

Way back in September I gushed about The Fire Rose and how much fun it was. I mentioned that it was the first of a series. Well, I finally finished the rest of them, and instead of taking up five more reviews I'm doing them all at once. It's a little on the long side, just to warn you.

The Fire Rose (awesome!) was written in 1994. Then, in 2001, Lackey started the Elemental Masters series, which is the same series, but without The Fire Rose listed as number one. So... I have no idea what's up with that, but at any rate, each book retells a classic fairy tale, but set in the 1800s (I think) in England, and centered around various elemental magicians. Some characters have cameos in multiple books, but each book stands alone and has a different set of protagonists and villains.

Another warning: Two of these books are awesome, including The Fire Rose. Two of them are enjoyable. Two of them are hideously awful and should never have been published, and I can't believe the same author wrote all six.

The Serpent's Shadow

This is one of the enjoyable ones, a very loose rendition of Snow White. (It's not like Beauty and the Beast, where the recognizable elements ARE the plot. The recognizable elements aren't as significant to the story in Snow White.) It stars a half-Indian lady doctor, Maya, who is also a magician. She was a fantastic, strong woman with anything BUT a stock character profile. She had a unique perspective on things and a pragmatic attitude that I found refreshing. The plot involves a lot of Indian mythology, and that put an interesting light on things without overwhelming the story.

Lackey spends a lot of time ranting about the anti-feminism of the time period, and even though she has a point, it was really frustrating because it's not like I can do anything about it. It was two hundred years ago. Stop ranting at me and tell a story, for Pete's sake!

The Gates of Sleep

Sleeping Beauty! Perhaps the one fairy tale in which the heroine does the absolute LEAST! Surely that'll make a great heroine-centered book, right? Well, no, not really.

The first 120 pages of the book could have been cut and it wouldn't have mattered, because NOTHING happens. The whole thing is a long, boring ramble on the social conditions of the time and how terrible it would have been to be poor back then. Another situation which I am powerless to rectify, and also, not a first act of a story, which, when that annoying interlude is removed from my mind, was still horrible. The first event is a mother's baby being taken away without her even getting a chance to get used to the idea, when that kind of urgency was totally uncalled for, and the next interesting thing that happens (120 pages later) is the same child being taken away from her new parents without being given any inkling of the danger she's headed for.

And, when the curse finally takes effect on the girl, her guardians go into fits. What did you THINK would happen when the woman you've been hiding from this entire time got her hands on the EXACT THING she wanted? HELLO?! The stated reason why they didn't come to rescue her at the beginning was that "as long as we didn't hear anything, we assumed the witch hadn't figured out how to curse her." So, they just waited to hear something. Um, okay.

I didn't really hate the characters, but I didn't like them either. They were all so unremarkable that they might as well not exist at all. I enjoyed the book more than I'm letting on, and the villains were fantastic (and the book was freakishly similar to Hotel Transylvania for some reason). Read it if you're a completionist, love Sleeping Beauty, or just like this series and want to look at some of the intricacies of the magic system Lackey's created, but otherwise you won't miss much if you skip it.

Phoenix and Ashes

Awesome! And yet, I have no idea why. I keep a book journal, and my notes are basically "I love it! I'm enjoying it so much!" for half a page. Fantasy and/or romance fans, definitely read this one.

It's a fairly faithful retelling of Cinderella, but there's a little bit of a role reversal here. The Prince needs saving almost as much as Cinderella does, and to me, she was the strong one in the relationship. Not that I don't like strong men, because I do, and this Prince is no weenie, but there's just something different about this romance. It's not just a marraige of equals, if you'll pardon the pun, but a place where two separate, damaged people come together and make a whole relationship. The Prince isn't the kind of romantic hero that I swoon over, but at the same time I really love and respect him and I can actually cheer on the princess even more, be more invested, because I'm not jealous of her. :)

I think the two things this book has in common with The Fire Rose are 1) the special romance at the heart of it, and 2) how it stays true to the fairy tale, but isn't bound by that fairy tale. The rest of the books either kind of wander off to do their own things or wander WAY off and are just in the same territory. These two fantastic ones take the immortal heart of the story and go from there, rather than taking the trappings and trying to force a new story into them.

The Wizard of London

Skip this one, if you have the power. (I, too, have felt the urge to finish terrible books just because I started them, and to start them just because I've read the rest of the series. I feel your pain, completionists, especially where this book is concerned, and I support you in your coming time of trial.)

This is one of the most mindnumbingly boring books I've ever read, and I've read The Grapes of Wrath. It's based on "The Snow Queen," a very odd and confusing fairy tale to be sure, but that doesn't have anything to do with how boring this book is because the book doesn't seem to have a thing to do with the fairy tale.

What it does have to do with is two special kids in a boarding school and their animal companions. Two sickeningly average special kids in a boarding school and their sickeningly average animal companions. Seriously, the majority of the book is the two little girls doing... Well, not much of anything. It's SO day-in-the-life that MY life was infinitely more interesting, and it took me about three weeks of two or three chapters a day to get through this beast.

I did like the new things Lackey incorporated into the magic system, how it's all very systematic but still complicated, but still a lot of elements just seemed stuck in there to take up space. I also liked how sensible the characters (mostly the kids) were, always telling someone else where they were going and when they'd be back, etc., but at the same time, they keep foiling the villains' plans and the plot never goes anywhere.

SPOILER:

I kid you not, the villain is defeated by two small children overwhelming him with the power of love. Um, okay. END SPOILER.

The one character I liked never stuck around longer than a few pages. (And it's not the woodland spirit you might be thinking of if you've already read it. It's the husband.) The depths that were available were never plumbed. I kept reading hoping it would get better, but it never did. Skip it.

Reserved For the Cat

It's based on "Puss in Boots." You guessed it--talking cats! Woohoo!

I love talking cats!

Anyway, the basic story is that a Russian ballerina comes to England and pretends to be a famous Russian ballerina, at the behest of the talking cat.

This book was fun. It wasn't mindblowing and the writing wasn't magnificent, but I did enjoy it. I had a good time trying to figure out who the prince was going to be (it could have been one of three or four people at one point,) and there were machinations! I also love machinations.

It's pretty standard stuff, so don't let it preempt something awesome on Mt. TBR, but if you love ballerinas, talking cats, and/or machinations...

Conclusion

Surely, if Ms. Lackey can write glowing tomes of happiness, she shouldn't also write (or at least publish) horrible piles of drivel. Or even enjoyably average novels. I just don't get it. But I'll keep reading all her stuff, because I'm pathetically addicted to her glowing tomes of happiness...

Reasons by Tracy Fabre

Thanks to Stimulating Conversation and StoneGarden.net for this one!

Delphi Brent was seriously injured in a hit-and-run when she was a teenager in Colorado. Ten years later she plans to return to spend the summer with the Laughlins, old friends of her family, only to have her parents reveal that it was the Laughlin boys who were in the car that hit her. She goes anyway, and finds herself falling in love with one of the brothers.

The premise held a strange fascination for me, for no apparent reason, but even being interested in the outcome I found myself skimming a lot of the book. The characters all seemed very similar, and hardly did anything but talk to each other about whatever character happened to be absent. The characters and conversations were very realistic, to the point where their conversations weren't any more interesting than the conversations I could be having in the real world.

I think Tracy Fabre does a little bit more telling (as opposed to showing) than she should. We're told about the characters, but they don't really do very much, and we never get much of an insight into their thoughts or emotions. Kind of like a real conversation, only without even visual cues to give us a hint. The story just kind of meanders slowly to the end, with a few little surprises but no big ones.

Basically, the book was very realistic, so I was bored, which is more of a reflection on me than the book. I do recommend it though, if this is the kind of book you like.. It's got a very calming, Midwest small town atmosphere, and the romance is gentle and not overblown. This would be a nice book to take out to a small town and read out in a field somewhere... Mm...

See Tracy's website for information about her upcoming new release, Sending Rupert Home.

Buy Reasons

Enemies and Allies by Kevin J. Anderson

I've heard Kevin J. Anderson get a lot of flack on the interwebs... To hear some people tell it, he's the most horrible writer in the entire world and is singlehandedly responsible for ruining a gazillion franchises. Dune? Star Wars? LibraryThing only seems to show that he wrote one Dune novel, but a lot of Star Wars. Well, I won't speak for those, because I haven't read them, but I liked this Superman/Batman story.

This is a novel about the first meeting of Superman and Batman in the 1950s. The classic story is that Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne were on the same cruise ship and hijinx ensued; this is different, the two of them conducting parallel investigations into Lex Luthor and his business.

The writing isn't mindblowing, but it doesn't get in the way when you're reading and it's not hard to pay attention to, so it's a fast read. There were a few annoying things, like Luthor gets called "the bald industrialist" WAY too many times in narrative, and Lois Lane got sidelined into hero-bait as usual. There some to be a lot of story elements lifted from other things, James Bond stories and Watchmen and a few other things I recognized, but those seem to be homages rather than theft. They aren't major story things, just elements.

There isn't any wildly new material here as Superman and Batman go, but prose always touches on ideas that graphic novels don't. The psychology of the three main characters was what really fascinated me. Batman is done well... He seems a little bit out of focus for some reason, but he's the Batman of the Christian Bale movies and that's my favorite attitude for him. Clark has this arrogance and almost simple-mindedness about him that's a very interesting and legitimate interpretation, and his intrinsic sweetness kept me invested in him as a hero. Luthor, though, was perfect. Frightening and fascinating, supremely arrogant but with the intelligence to back it up, a real predator.

So, not brilliant, but satisfying to me as a fan. It works as an action story, but underneath that there's an engaging discussion of two of America's most well-known superheroes. The book doesn't take itself too seriously, but it takes a campy subject and writes a legitimate story.

So far my absolute favorite novel based on "real" superheroes is Batman: Rise of Sin Tzuby Devin Grayson and Flint Dille, which I reviewed here, and my favorite new superhero novel is Heroby Perry Moore, reviewed here.

In other news, I went to see Avatar on Friday and there's a review forthcoming this week. Woo!

Buy Enemies & Allies

Archangel by Sharon Shinn

This book is crap. But it's really good crap. By the end of this review I'll probably be ranting about it and hating it again, but before I get to that I'll tell you to read it.

So, the basic idea is really kind of complicated. It's a fantasy world in which angels (winged beautiful-voiced people) chaperone the spiritual lives of the humans. Gabriel, an angel, is about to become the new Archangel, but he has to find and marry a particular human woman before that happens.

The worldbuilding and plot are the best parts of the novel, and they are stunning. It's not like anything else I've seen, and it's mesmerizing. There are unique fantasy elements, the barest hints of sci-fi that really throw a whole new light on everything you learn about the fantasy stuff, there are complicated social and political relationships, not to mention a host (ha, pun) of befuddling characters. The plot, aside from the romance aspect, is an edge-of-your-seat-er.

Gabriel is an arresting character, especially since he's not your run-of-the-mill protagonist. He is so arrogant, but it's not annoying. He really is right. I just like him. With him, you know you're safe, because he'll be just, and he'll also be compassionate.

And then we have Rachel, his intended. At least I think her name was Rachel, I started calling her "Superbitch" halfway through and never stopped. I have never read about a protagonist so annoying, unpleasant, pigheaded, vindictive, and selfish, much less all of those in one package. At first I didn't mind and kind of liked it, because she had good points and I admired her nerve, but it grate and grated and finally I snapped. I hate her. I hate her!

She never sees that half of her problems are caused by her own selfishness. ALL of the other characters revolve around her, and yet she never stops complaining about how terrible her life is. She's never happy, even when she gets exactly the things she wanted, and she lashes out at people just for existing. She tortures all of the other characters just to see them squirm, when all they've ever done is try to help her. She never learns, never repents, only gets worse and worse. Describing her is like describing a VILLAIN, for Pete's sake! If I can't stand her, I can only imagine what all the poor characters were going through sharing a book with her for months on end. And then the romance, which was interesting, was not satisfactorily finished.

She was almost enough to make me stop reading the book on more than one occasion, and the sequel, Jovah's Angel, apparently takes place far in the future and she's not in it, or I definitely wouldn't be reading that one. The worldbuilding, though... That's amazing, and wanting to understand this world is what kept me reading, and it was worth it, if only marginally. As long as she's gone, and there's not another one like her, I don't see any reason why I shouldn't love the sequels.

Be warned, there's some heady religious subject matter here. I was satisfied in terms of being interested and never outraged, but there's still a lot I'd like to know. It's sort of wavering on the line between pro-religion and atheistic, and it's really hard to tell which view actually comes out on top.

Trust your own judgement on this one. If liking the characters is a big part of your reading pleasure, skip this one. If you like worldbuilding more, check it out. If you like Poison Study you'll probably like this.

Buy Archangel

Superpowers by David J. Schwartz

Five college kids get superpowers for no reason and decide they should be superheroes. The basic gimmick is that it's real people having a realistic experience with superpowers.

I wanted SO hard to love this, but I didn't. Why does "realistic" have to mean boring and annoying? The second page gives us this fantastic quote: "This isn't some snooty book where people nobody likes do things nobody cares about for reasons nobody can figure out. That's what they call literature." It'd be an even better quote if it didn't exactly describe this book!

I didn't like any of the characters. The ones I liked in the beginning got more and more boring, and the ones I disliked in the beginning got worse and worse. At first I kind of wanted things to turn out well for them, but by about halfway through I just never wanted to see them again. Plus, there are a lot of characters and they're all the same. They're written in the exact same style and their backgrounds are the same, so it's really hard to keep each of their arcs coherent.

There are a lot of POVs and that puts way too much distance between the reader and the action, or lack thereof. MINOR SPOILERS: There's no supervillain. There's no villain at all. At this point every superhero novel is experimental and this is a good choice for what Schwartz was trying to do, but what he does instead doesn't work. The novel starts on May 19, 2001, and you can guess where it's headed... The lasy 75 pages consist of "9/11 was sad," over and over and over. That's true, but when that's all you do for 75 pages it gets old fast, and it doesn't actually constitute a climax. 9/11 WAS sad, and if you're going to use it in a book it should make me feel something besides boredom. END MINOR SPOILERS.

Like so many literary novels, there were a million interesting places this story could have gone, but it didn't go to any of them. It got bogged down in "nobody's perfect," and even more than that, "everyone is terrible." Thanks a lot, literature.

Superheroes are about setting an example, an ideal to reach for. They're about inspiring people to try harder and be better. They aren't supposed to be realistic.

Skip this book and read Hero instead.

Buy Superpowers

Vampire of the Mists by Christie Golden

The Fickle Hand of Fate is a year old! The anniversary was actually ten days ago, but I had no idea I'd been blogging for so long. Woo!

This week, through sheer happenstance, I bring another video game novel for your reading pleasure. This one is the first novel of a series based on the D&D game Ravenloft, and any bias I had toward video game novels is now completely gone, because this book is amazing too. I promise you don't need to know anything about the games to appreciate it, I sure don't, so read on!

Jander Sunstar is a golden elf from Evermeet, and he's been a vampire for 500 years. The day after the woman he loves is killed and he swears vengeance, he is magically transported to the secret country of Ravenloft which is ruled by the mysterious Count Strahd von Zarovich (read: Dracula.)

This is a seamless blend of gothic horror and high fantasy, combining the best elements of both. Jander is at once tragically villainous and sympathetically heroic, and his story is so subtle. The core of the novel is his relationship with Strahd, the flaws in both of them and how they're trying to manipulate each other, the sympathetic parts of each of them and why they do the things they do. But still one is firmly the hero and the other is firmly the villain.

You know, I never really understood why vampires whine the way they do. I knew, but I didn't understand. Now I do. The speed with which time passes for (and passes by) Jander is striking... One day he's talking to a young woman and the next time he leaves the castle he meets her child. He didn't even realize it had been thirty years, and every time he looks around someone else he knew is dying. There are so many things he loved that were taken away when he became a vampire, like the colors that you never see at night. All you see are shades of gray, and eventually that's all you see morally as well as physically. I understand how terrible it must be now, and at the same time Strahd and Jander are truly frightening.

I was frustrated for all the right reasons reading this book: I was desperate to know what was coming and unable to figure it out. I would have plot epiphanies and await events eagerly, only to discover the characters were going in a completely different direction that was even better. Every element is in its place.

There are a lot of recommendations I could make, because Vampire of the Mists falls on a cross-section of so many things (just like Ravenloft does.) You've got Dragonlance etc. for the heroic fantasy, Dracula, Interview with the Vampire for the love/hate vampire relationship thing... There are also a lot more Ravenloft books. I hear the quality varies with the author, but there are some big names. Several more by Christie Golden, some by Tanya Huff, Laurell K. Hamilton, Gene DeWeese... Several more feature Count Strahd. Jander features in short stories collected in the books The Best of the Realms and Realms of Valor, both of which I will be trying to find in the near future.

Buy Vampire of the Mists

Batman: The Rise of Sin Tzu by Devin Grayson & Flint Dille

Okay, so, this is the novelization of a Batman beat-em-up video game from 2003. You're well within your rights to expect it to suck, right? I sure did, but hey, it was a Batman novel, and I'm working on a superhero story right now, so I figured what the heck. I'm glad I did, because it was so good.

Basically the story is that a previously unheard-of villain, a mastermind of war known as Sin Tzu, is going to conquer Gotham City. He's bored, he needs a challenge, and he chooses Batman's city. He leads all the criminals in Gotham as their "general," with three well-known Batman villains as his "captains." As I understand it, the video game is basically you (as Batman, Batgirl, Robin, or Nightwing) beating up enough bad guys to get to the boss battle with each captain, finally culminating in the battle with Sin Tzu.

In light of that, the authors don't pay so much attention to the fighting itself, but delve into the thoughts of the characters. Not just "Why are we fighting this battle?" but "Why do we fight at all?" Each chapter is written from a different 1st-person POV, including all the Bat-family and multiple villains, with several from Sin Tzu's perspective, and the result is a subtle, many-faceted look at the six hours the book covers. It's intense. The pacing is excellent, everything is orchestrated perfectly.

They really get the Batman-ness perfectly. Everything I love about Batman is there, all the characters' motivations and relationships are pitch perfect. Another great thing was that I never wished it was a graphic novel... The story is exactly suited to its medium, the story couldn't have been told like this any other way.

Apparently certain parties who will remain unnamed (because I don't know who they are) were hoping Sin Tzu would be a hit like Harley Quinn was and make the leap into mainstream continuity, but he never did. If I had anything to say about it he would have!

I've only looked at one or two other Batman novels, (The Ultimate Evil is the one that comes to mind,) but I didn't finish any of them because they just didn't get it. If you like Batman, definitely try to find this book!

ETA: Hey guys, look what I found! More Sin Tzu!

Buy Batman: Rise of Sin Tzu

The Fire Rose by Mercedes Lackey

Mercedes Lackey is an old pleasure of mine that I'm only just rediscovering. She's most famous for her Valdemar books, a series with gazillions of books usually in trilogies, but she's written a lot of other things.

I pulled an all-nighter to finish this book, and I was doing Wiggles of Happy the entire time. I found myself alarming my cat by squealing incoherently as I turned pages.

What we have here is a brilliant gaslamp (steampunk but fantasy instead of sci-fi) reinterpretation of Beauty and the Beast. Rosalind Hawkins is left destitute by the death of her father, and has to travel across the country to take a tutoring job offered by the mysterious Jason Cameron. When she arrives she discovers that there are no children for her to tutor, and instead she will be translating old magic books for Jason because he has suffered a debilitating injury and is unable to read them himself.

Rose is a marvelous heroine, feminine and intelligent and vulnerable and resourceful. Jason is fascinating too, mysterious and larger than life, and undeniably sexy despite (or because of) his realistic flaws. The story is written mostly in third-person from Rose's point of view, but some sections switch to Jason's or Jason's secretary, Paul du Mond's. It was jarring the first few times, but I discovered that it allows the characters to plot individually and for us to know what's being planned without the characters knowing. The plot delivered on every promise it made, but using the plans characters made that were at odds, I never knew who was going to come out on top. There was a perfect blend of romance, mystery, and action.

The Fire Rose was immensely satisfying, detailed, and an utter joy to read. It is the first of Lackey's Elemental Masters series, all of which feature reinterpreted fairy tales in the same time period and system of magic, but not the same protagonists. I'd love to hear more about Rose and Jason, but I'm also looking forward to book 2, The Serpent's Shadow.

Some other Beauty and the Beast stories I found were Beast by Donna Jo Napoli, Beauty by Robin McKinley, Beastly by Alex Flinn, Belle by Cameron Dokey, and Rose Daughter also by Robin McKinley. These tend more toward "retellings" than "reinterpretations..." if you know of any more, let me know!

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Wicked Game by Jeri Smith-Ready

Eh. Don't like it.

The main selling point for this novel is its new, interesting idea, and it IS new and interesting. Ciara, our reforming con artist protagonist, becomes the marketing rep for a vampire radio station. The vamps are OCD a la the old legends where you could keep them out of your house by scattering seeds or hanging a net, (they'd be distracted by counting the seeds and untying all the knots until sunrise,) and each one is mentally trapped in the time period when he or she died. That's why they have the radio station... Each one is a DJ with a show centered around the music that was popular when they were alive.

It's a really good idea! And it started off great, interesting and unexpected with a host of interesting characters, but then it just dwindled off into nothing. The good characters, (Monroe, Franklin, and Gideon) were the ones that got NO face time, the romance was well-paced but lacked a certain spark, and the plot was wibbly. Difficult to figure out what the plot was even supposed to be, and it was painfully predictable when it WAS there. It couldn't decide if it was a romance, a vampire fight or a "huge companies are evil" plot, so none of the plot elements worked, especially since the Designated Vampiric Villain seems nicer than the good guys and was only trying to defend himself. The magnificent idea Ciara has to save everybody really doesn't work, either.

I wound up hating all the characters that got any attention. I was rooting for the bad guy to just take 'em all out because they were all such jerks! Ciara started out strong and interesting, but the more we learned about her the more boring she got, and about halfway through the book she suddenly turned into an idiot and started letting everyone walk all over her.

I read a lot of good reviews for this one, but I didn't enjoy it.

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Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman

I'm so on the fence about this one, it's not even funny. Do I love it? Do I hate it? I'm not sure. I do love the book design though, I'll start on a positive. Take a look at that cover. I dare you not to love it.

This is the story of the infamous villain Doctor Impossible as he plays out another scheme to control the Earth. Odd-numbered chapters are told from his perspective and are absolutely riveting, while even-numbered chapters are told by Fatale, a cyborg superhero on the team that's trying to track him down. Her chapters are flat and boring.

Literary novels like this are like watching train wrecks in SLOW MOTION. I have a feeling that it's not going to have a satisfying ending, just literary claptrap in which we all see how terrible the illness or social issue or dog dying is, but there's no resolution or hope or even much conflict, just exploring the issue. Things take forever to happen and all it is is long internal monologuing about the angst of it all. And yet, you can't look away.

Doctor Impossible was the reason I sat through the boredom. I lived for his chapters. He's the only sympathetic character in the book, and although I think that was the point, it didn't endear me to the other half of the story. Doctor Impossible was witty, intelligent, brave... "Savvy" is the word. He knows the story is going to play out exactly like it always has and nothing's going to change, but he keeps on trying, he never gives up.

All the heroes were boring, flat, and annoying, and it was like pulling teeth just to sit through their scenes. They tried to work up some mystique and suspense, but I just didn't care, with the possible exception of Blackwolf (a Captain Ersatz of Batman, so I had to like him) and Mister Mystic (who got just enough attention to make me want more, but not enough for me to know if I actually liked him.)

SPOILER ALERT:
The heroes don't do much but complain and fight amongst themselves, but somehow they still beat Doctor Impossible. It's just not fair.
END SPOILERS

Really, I just don't know. I was frustrated and enrapt for equal parts. If this sounds remotely like something you might potentially be interested in, read it, think about it, let me know what you decide. Most of the reviews I've read really haven't understood what the book was trying to say any more than I did, and some of them are just mistaken. It's not a parody of superhero literature by any means.

Anyway. Read it, read Hero, read Watchmen.

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Dracula's Brood, compiled by Richard Dalby

Mmm, vampires.

This is a collection of 24 vampire stories published shortly before or after the publication of the infamous Dracula in 1897. Some of them influenced Dracula; others were influenced by it.

I was amazed by how much I enjoyed this anthology. There were no stories I disliked, and only a few that didn't impress me. I tend to think of that time period as a little bit one-note with all the stories being the same, but there's an astonishing variety here. The disembodied finger gave me doubts and the man-eating trees destroyed my conception altogether.

I will emphasize that this variety is all about ideas. The stories in this anthology could've all been written by the same person stylistically, and I found that I liked that... There's no getting caught up in verbal acrobatics and a writer frantically trying to "find their own unique voice." It makes it a lot easier to get lost in the story for the story itself.

Fingers and trees aside, there's a lot of classic vampire stuff here. Back then "vampire" still meant "horror story," and these stories are actually scary, while still containing that essential vampireness that we still love today. A special effort has been made to include stories that aren't reprinted often, so there's new material here even for the most hardcore fan. (Some of these haven't been reprinted since they were first published, over a hundred years ago!) There's even a tasty poem translated from the original Romanian.

I recommend this anthology first to any short story writers and horror writers in particular, because there's a lot they could pick up about pacing, technique, etc. that is still just as useful today as it was back then.

For vampire fans (and I mean fans of vampires altogether, not just any book with vampires in it. You know who you are,) you should definitely read Dracula, then move on to The Penguin Book of Vampire Stories or The Dracula Book of Great Vampire Stories, both of which have plenty of the classic short stories like The Vampyre and Carmilla and Dracula's Guest, and then settle down to savor Dracula's Brood, one story at a time. It doesn't look like it's in print anymore, so get it while it's here and cheap.

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Review: The Host by Stephenie Meyer

If you like Stephenie Meyer's writing but the Twilight series puts a bad taste in your mouth, The Host is for you. It was written for adults, and the complexity and realism reflect that.

The plot is taken from your basic bodysnatcher sci-fi story, but in this book, it's not about resisting the takeover. The takeover has already happened, and the protagonist, Wanderer, is one of the bodysnatchers. Unfortunately, the body she snatched, Melanie, is not happy with her. Then, to make things worse, Wanderer starts falling in love with the memories of Melanie's lover... and he may still be out there to find if they can work together.

The characters here have much more depth than in Meyer's young adult fiction. They have a certain intrinsicness, like they would exist without the framework of the story, and the breadth of the work allows for a deeper exploration of themes like sibling love and romantic rivalry. I also loved how both sides of almost every argument are totally understandable, and Meyer doesn't shy away from shades of gray. Each story question involved me totally.

At first the science fiction elements of the story were a bit eclipsed, but by the end I had the same sci-fi feeling I mentioned in my last review. The feeling that there are things out there that are totally other, but fascinating. And while many of the themes are stock sci-fi themes, they're treated with appropriate sobriety. The ending is amazing.

I like Twilight, but I have a lot of problems with Stephenie Meyer's work (or lack thereof). I've heard from some Twilight fans that they had trouble getting into The Host, which I take to mean that it is indeed a more rewarding read. It is her best work by far.

One of the best bodysnatcher movies I've seen is the 2007 release The Invasion, but no books are coming to mind. Recommendations, anyone?

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Review: Inamorata by Joseph Gangemi

Does this book really exist? I can't find it through the publisher, fewer than 100 people have it listed on LibraryThing, the website for the author listed inside the book is nonexistent, you can only get it through Amazon from their authorized sellers and then only in paperback and for a penny, and googling is fruitless. It was only published in 2005! And all that's a pain, because I want someone to discuss it with! What's the deal?

Warning: very minor spoilers may follow.

Inamorata is a Gothic horror/mystery/romance/something, but set in the 1920s during the height of the Spiritualism fad. The viewpoint character is one Martin Finch, a college student who becomes part of a study financed by the Scientific American which offers a prize of $5,000 dollars to anyone who can prove "psychic phenomena" to the satisfaction of the board of judges. Martin's job is to help prove the candidates to be tricksters and does so with great ingenuity, until they discover Mina Crawley, a medium with unexplainable talents. Martin quickly becomes fascinated with her.

The investigation, and "Margery" as she was called in the papers, were both real. Gangemi goes deeper into the story, exploring the possibilities and the people involved to great dramatic effect. A word of warning: it's got some upsetting and graphic content, including a graphic surgical operation, implied abuse, drug use, and "Lets see how outraged we can get Fate's feminist sensibilities" content.

It was very upsetting. Most of the characters were too realistic for me to like, except the lawyer near the end of the book. (You'll know him when you see him.) I considered setting it down several times, but I HAD to know how it was going to end! I HAD to know what was going on!

I never found out. It's the MOTHER of all ambiguous endings. It seems like the answer is just beyond my fingertips... there were so many hints, so many clues, but I can't put them together.

If you like the Gothic feel, historical fiction/romance, ghosts, you'd probably like this one as long as you don't mind the upsetting parts and the ambiguity. If it sounds interesting, please read it and then come tell me your theory!

The one thing I really wanted to read when I finished this... besides a full explanation of what happened... was a real history of spiritualism or study of it in that time period. Here are a few, and here's a list of related books.
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Review: The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier

This is one of the few books I’ve literally not been able to put down and had to read in one sitting. Its premise is one I had never seen before, as of last year when I read it and still, and that’s pretty rare where fantasy novels are concerned.

The odd-numbered chapters of this book deal with a place simply called “The City,” where dead people live until they are forgotten on Earth. At one time the city was huge, and no inhabitant could ever dream of meeting everyone who lived there. But now the city is shrinking, and no one knows why. The even-numbered chapters tell the story of a woman named Laura Byrd who is trapped in Antarctica, alone at a research station with no means of communicating with the rest of the world. She slowly withdraws into her own thoughts, and most importantly her memories.

Kevin Brockmeier weaves these two stories together masterfully, constantly dropping hints but never revealing too much of the story at one time. Each clue slowly makes what is happening more clear, making for a gripping read. Even if you guess the story like I did, as it unfolds you're drawn more and more into the surreal experience of listening to Laura’s thoughts as if they were your own, and you want the story to be complete.

Each character is fully formed with all the good and bad qualities of any other person you would meet on the street, and their strange situations only make that more clear. I didn't find them personally compelling as individuals, but that wasn't quite the point.

The important thing to remember when you pick this up is that it's not your typical fantasy book or thriller. It's more literary. The plot moves slowly and it's very introspective, without a lot of "fantasy." Be prepared to sit and think, or just sit and drift. Read it when you've got some time on your hands, especially if you're inclined to stop and process while you read.

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Review: Capote in Kansas by Kim Powers

I have a small predilection for all things Capotean. (Is that a word? It is now.) I've read all the books about/by him I could find and seen at least three movies about In Cold Blood. I wrote a long paper on him last year. He just fascinates me. So I was understandably excited about reading this novel, a fictional account that focuses on his relationship to Nelle Harper Lee.

I was a little disappointed, honestly. It wasn't a bad book, it just wasn't as good as it could have been. The first half seemed like just a list of historical events, without much fiction to keep it interesting, and then the second half seemed mostly fiction without many facts to ground it. Powers warns in his author's note that he has long been preoccupied by the wonders of Capote and Lee, and it's apparent that this book is an ode to his preoccupation.

Truman and Nelle are done very well. They match the images I have of those two authors almost exactly... unfortunately that's not such a good thing. Nothing in the book made me consider them in any new light. The same goes for the storyline and events. The most interesting things are the things that can be found in any biography, and no new food for thought is presented.

This might do well as an introduction to the subject, or a summary or general reminder. The facts are mostly straight and it isn't a chore to read. But I would recommend reading the real novels and biographies. Why go to a secondary or tertiary source when the primaries and secondaries are incredible in their own right?

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