The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie (Nicola)
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley
The Buckshaw Chronicles, Book 1
Pages: 292
First Published: April 2009
Genre: mystery, cozy, Gothic
Rating: 4.5/5
First sentence:
It was as black in the closet as old blood.
Reason for Reading: At first, the title grabbed me. Then I read the publisher’s summary and was very excited to read this mystery.
Comments: Flavia is an 11-year-old girl who lives in a run-down ancestral home in a tiny village in England with her Father, two sisters and a few servants. Flavia isn’t your ordinary 11yo, she has taken over an ancient chemistry studio in the house from a former ancestor and her whole world revolves around chemistry. Her speciality? Poisons. Early one morning Flavia stumbles upon a dead man lying in the cucumber patch and that is just the beginning of a series of events that Flvaia becomes involved in as she finds herself matching wits with the local Inspector who has her father under suspicion of the murder.
What an incredibly, deliciously, devilish mystery. This is like nothing I’ve read before. A pure joy to read. The characters were all entirely eccentric from the main protagonist down to the secondary and minor characters. The mystery is both what I would call a cozy and a Gothic mystery. It is a cozy in the sense that it is very Agatha Christie in presentation, lots of mental deduction going on and no gory details, plenty of suspects to choose from and each a nuisance in their own way. On the otherhand Bradley presents a very Gothic feel to his mystery with the old run down buildings and other old English settings, such as a school bell tower, Flavia’s macabre interest in poison and the equally devilishly (though not life-threatening) pranks that she and her sisters play on each other. Characters appear suddenly at windows and loom out of the fog. It really is just splendidly atmospheric writing but completely cozy for those who like their mysteries clean and intelligent rather than soaked in blood.
I only had one small problem and I can’t really say for sure whether it was the author or just myself. The novel’s narrator is an 11-year-old girl and I don’t think it was completely maintained throughout. I’m sure it is difficult to write an adult novel in a child’s voice and it is not something that one reads everyday. At times I often forgot it was a child telling the story until a word or phrase would bring it back to my mind; I also often forgot the narrator was a girl until she mentioned wearing a dress or such. This was something that irked me a little bit, but otherwise I am full of recommendations for this book. I think a wide variety of mystery fans are going to enjoy this book and there are already two further volumes in the series planned for future release! I think Flavia de Luce may just become a future British TV series as she is just that compelling; I’d love to see her come to life on the screen and can’t wait to read her next mystery!
The Dragon of Trelian (Nicola)
The Dragon of Trelian by Michelle Knudsen
Pages: 407
Ages: 8+
Finished: May 18, 2009
First Published: April 14, 2009
Genre: children, fantasy
Rating: 3.5/5
First sentence:
Calen tried not to look down.
Reason for Reading: YA fantasy about dragons? Need I say more!
Comments: Calen is the apprentice to the rather surly palace mage, Serek. One day while loitering about instead of gathering herbs he meets the Princess Meglynne out for her daily jaunt in peasant clothing. They become friends and she shares her darkest secret with him. She has a young dragon hidden nearby! But as the dragon is reaching adolescence Meg is having strange experiences, she can feel what the dragon feels when she is away from him and she seeks Calen’s help in gathering knowledge about dragons from the mage’s library. Together they explore this strange phenomenon but meanwhile the kingdom is under a secret attack from the inside that Meg and Calen accidentally discover on their own. Will they be able to out the traitor before all is lost?
I have to admit this started slowly and I wasn’t immediately taken with it. I kept having feelings of deja vu which leads me to say the plot is rather cliched and I knew what was going happen before it happened throughout the entire book. But, that said, I’m not saying this was not worth the read. The story does pick up eventually and Calen and Meg are two very likable characters. I enjoyed them both and found their relationship with each other to be on an equal footing, neither was the smart one, which is always refreshing to see. In fact, this is probably one of the best male/female relationships I’ve read in a children’s book lately. They are very natural with one another, the boy/girl issue is never raised, they are equal people and there is no romance. Very enjoyable dynamics between the two.
As I said, the plot didn’t really grab me, it was just ok. But then it was enough to keep me reading the full 400+ pages! The last two chapters are full of foreshadowing that there is no doubt that there will be a sequel. The plot does end nicely and a sequel is not called for to finish the plot but as the foreshadowing reminds us there are plenty of loose strings that could do with tying up. I’m recommending this one for ages 8-12 as I don’t think it will hold the interest of teens. (But that doesn’t include adult readers of children’s books!) While not quite living up to my expectations, a good enough book, and I’ll certainly be waiting for the next book to read more about Calen and Meg.
Faery Rebels: Spell Hunter (Nicola)
Faery Rebels: Spell Hunter by R.J. Anderson
Pages: 329
Ages: 10+
First Published: April 28, 2009
Genre: children, YA, fantasy
Rating: 4.5/5
First sentence:
“I only want to go out for a little, little while,” the faery child pleaded.
Reason for Reading: I have a fondness for faeries in fantasy as long as they are not cutesy and when I saw the title of this book that combined the words “rebels” and “hunter” with “faery” I was very intrigued. Also the picture of the very pretty yet so serious faery on the cover also helped to pique my interest. I received a review copy from Harper Collins Canada.
Comments: In the Oakenwyld lives a faery realm which is slowly dying out. They lost their magic hundreds of years ago and no one remembers exactly how. A sickness is slowly killing them all off one by one. They do not reproduce but only replace themselves with a baby upon death. These faeries are selfish, friendless and joyless. They also have no culture, no art, no seekers of knowledge and as far as they are concerned it has never been any different. But Knife does not accept this. Why are the faeries so terrified of humans? When she accidentally meets one and nothing bad happens she, who has always been somewhat of a rulebreaker, decides to find out the truth about humans and faeries and perhaps save the Oakenwyld faeries from extinction.
Honestly, I’m amazed at how much I enjoyed this book. I have to admit I was expecting a more juvenile book than what this actually proved to be. Not that I don’t enjoy a good juvenile book by any means. Perhaps it was the cover or the publisher’s age range of ten plus but I was pleasantly surprised to find a very in depth, layered story that will be enjoyed by those aged ten on up through young adults. The two major characters, Knife and Paul, are sixteen years old and there is a romantic element that is pure and self-sacrificing. The faery character, Knife, is a very headstrong and a forceful, determined female to be admired and yet very feminine when her heart strings are pulled both in friendship and love. The faery world is very intriguing and the mythos created very full and believable yet with plenty of room for expansion should a sequel be in the works.
I couldn’t put this one down and read it within a 24 hour period. The book has a complete satisfying ending for the central main characters, yet for the world in which they live there are threads left hanging which makes me wonder if a sequel is in the works which may be set in the same world but focus on different protagonists. That would certainly make for an interesting series. Anyway only time will tell! This is the author’s first novel, though she has written picture books previously, and I’ll be waiting to see what she has for us next. Recommended!
ETA - My oops, the author has not previously written picture books. The is her first ever published book!
The Winner Stands Alone (Nicola)
The Winner Stands Alone by Paulo Coelho
Pages: 343
Ages: 18+
First Published: Apr, 7, 2009
Genre: literary fiction, realistic fiction
Rating: 4/5
First sentence:
The Beretta Px4 compact pistol is slightly lager than a mobile phone, weighs around seven hundred grams, and can fire ten shots.
Reason for Reading: I have never read a Paulo Coelho book before and honestly really had no interest in them when I read descriptions of the plots. But bloggers continue to wax eloquent about how wonderful his books are that I knew I would have to give in a read one some day. So when I saw he had a new one coming out, the plot actually piqued my interest so I thought I’d give it a go.
Comments: I’ll start off by saying this is a difficult book to summarize as there are many different layers a reviewer may want to concentrate on. On the surface the plot concerns Igor,a wealthy Russian man, who is obsessed with his ex-wife; it is actually this obsession along with other things that drove her to run off with another man. He promised her once that if she ever left him he would “destroy worlds” to get her back. Now two years later, he follows her and her new husband to the Cannes Festival and starts to randomly serial kill for her sending her text messages that he has “destroyed another world” for her each time. The book also then, is set in the glamorous world of over excess inhabited by the rich, famous, celebrity, hangers-on and wannabes. It is this world that is examined ,through the characters, that show how vapid and meaningless, on the inside, is this life of grandiose over indulgences on the outside.
The narrative is often from the point of view of Igor but alternates with other characters who have been affected in some form whether small or dramatically by his actions of murder. We follow the lives of actresses trying to make it, models, street jewelry sellers, actors, directors, producers, models, haute couteur designers, Igor’s ex wife, people related to the deceased and those who have not yet been affected but will soon be.
The writing is absolutely beautiful. Descriptions and details are a joy to read, the characters are deep and multi-layered, even those of minor importance. Not having read any other Coelho, I can’t compare this to his other work but from plot descriptions I feel this may be somewhat a different kind of story than what he usually tells. I was amazed by the religiousness of the writing. I had no idea. It was beautiful. Coelho writes of a world where it is simply assumed God exists and his characters are naturally Believers. I have a slew of quotes from this book that hit me hard and made me think. If Paulo Coelho’s other books are also like this I most certainly will be reading them in the future. I leave this review with such a quote:
Someone’s spirit, however, has no name; it is pure truth and inhabits a particular body for a certain period of time, and will, one day, leave it, and God won’t bother asking, “What’s your name?” when the soul arrives at the final judgement. God will only ask: “Did you love while you were alive?” For that is the essence of life: the ability to love, not the name we carry around on our passport, business card, and identity card. The great mystics changed their names, and sometimes abandoned them altogether. When John the Baptist was asked who he was, he said only, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness.” When Jesus found the man on whom he would build his church, he ignored the fact that the man in question has spent his entire life answering to the name of Simon and called him Peter. When Moses asked God his name, back came the reply: “I am who I am.”
Hell’s Horizon (Nicola)
Hell’s Horizon by D.B. Shan (aka Darren Shan)
The City Trilogy, Book 2
Pages: 389
Ages: 18+
Finished: May 4, 2009
First Published: Mar 5, 2009 UK & Apr. 3 2009 CAN
Genre: urban fantasy
Rating: 5/5
Reason for Reading: next in the series. Received a review copy from Harper Collins Canada.
First sentence:
In room 812 of the Skylight Hotel a woman lay close to death.
Comments: The summary of this book is going to be very hard to understand if you haven’t read the first book. You can read my review of Procession of the Dead for a fuller understanding of the story without any spoilers. This second book starts off with completely different characters within The Cardinal’s Troops, his own personal police/security force. The plot runs parallel with the first novel with very few crossover’s until the end. The theme centers around a vicious killing of a young woman and Al Jeery, Troop member, is personally assigned, by The Cardinal himself, to solve the case. The case becomes personal to Jeery as he finds loved ones crossing paths with his investigation. This book also delves deeper into the mysterious Incan group of blind men in white robes, has more of a mystical element to it and centers on the mysterious but feared and dreaded hitman/killer/torturer Paucar Wami first met in book one.
A quick-paced read that ultimately reads like a mystery thriller for 3/4s of the book. Second books in trilogies are always compared to the first as we have expectations set up for us and while I certainly do describe this as a dark, violent urban fantasy, I found this not as dark, not as mafioso, not as violent (but don’t get me wrong it is plenty violent!). Comparisons aside, this was a fantastic read, the mystery angle really shocked me having read a lot of Shan’s books I didn’t expect that angle coming from him. It was very well done. The characters are just as eccentric, as expected, from the victim’s cross-dressing rich brother to the octogenarian pimp who always knows the word on the street. Those characters make it sound seedy but it’s not, I don’t remember any s*x scenes at all!
I’m hardly doing the book justice as it is just such an intricate book and since it runs parallel with the first one there are crossovers which are infrequent to start off with but rush to a head at the end. Now that I have read the final words of book one and the final words of book two, I just can’t wait for the two to meet up with each other in the final book, City of the Snakes, due Mar. 2010 in UK, which means a month or so later for me here in Canada.
I can’t find these books available new on amazon.com, so am thinking they haven’t been published by an American publisher, which means you Americans may not find them on the shelves of your local bookseller. If you like urban fantasy these books really are a MUST read and I can’t recommend them highly enough. You must find a way to buy them. My links above with take you to amazon.ca where you can easily purchase them. If price+ship doesn’t work for you there , here’s a place American’s can order direct from the UK and receive Free Shipping, The Book Depository. The mass market pb’s are only $9US, but you’ll have to wait for Sept. for this one to be published in mmpb. The Trade PBs are reasonable enough especially considering, you pay no shipping from the UK. PS - I get no money from that link. It’s free advertising for them, I just want you to read these books!
Follow Me (Caribousmom)
She entrusted me with her version of this story late in her life. In fact, it’s a long story when all the pieces are added together, and it begins many years before my father jumped from the pedestrian bridge, when my grandmother was young and set out to follow the Tuskee River north. She confided in me because she wanted me to understand, as she put it, how one thing led to another. But I had to promise never to repeat what she told me to anyone. She would be furious to hear that I’m about to break my promise. I’d like to hope, though that by the end she would forgive me. - from Follow Me, page 7 -
Sally Werner is only sixteen years old in 1946 when an unexpected sexual encounter with her cousin Daniel results in the birth of a baby boy. On impulse, Sally abandons her baby on her parents’ kitchen table and flees, heading north along the fictional Tuskee River in Pennsylvania to seek a bigger life and leave her shame behind. Sally Werner recreates herself many times - changing her last name along the way (from Werner to Angel to Mole to Bliss), and starting her life over again each time fate delivers a bad hand.
More than sixty years later, the story of Sally’s life is retold by her granddaughter and namesake who has the benefit of pitting her grandmother’s story against another version…that of her biological father who one day sends her a package of tapes which reveal his side of the story.
There’s her side of the story, there’s mine, we’re lichen, our stories, the way they relate, they remind me of lichen. Lichen, you know, is made up of fungus and algae, it’s really two plants in one, the fungus is a parasite, it draws the carbohydrates from the algae, but the algae don’t seem to mind. I like to cite lichen as a prime example of symbiosis. Doesn’t every story involve symbiosis in a way, a relationship of dependence between two parts? Your mother’s story, what she knows, it’s a partial version, but so is your grandmother’s. - from Follow Me, page 313 -
Follow Me is a magical tale of one woman’s life and how her decisions impact others long after she is gone. Thematically, it is a novel about the selective process of memory and how history is defined by who is telling the story. Like the river which parallels Sally Werner’s life, Follow Me is filled with secrets and murky half-truths and things are never entirely how they first appear.
Joanna Scott is a gifted story teller. Her prose flows smoothly and the interconnected lives of her characters are revealed from several viewpoints. Embedded in the story of Sally is a larger story - that of the struggle of single women faced with unplanned pregnancies and the shame that often accompanies them. Sally is not a wholly likable character, and yet I found myself admiring her resilience and determination. Her mistakes, her desire for forgiveness, her effort to make things right again - all resonated with me.
My only complaint with the novel was its length. At times I felt impatient for the story to unravel faster. I wanted the secrets revealed sooner. Follow Me is a leisurely story. It meanders. But despite my impatience, I turned the final page with admiration for Scott’s writing, as well as a deeper understanding of her characters.
For readers who enjoy literary fiction, family sagas, and character-driven novels - Follow Me will appeal.
Recommended.
Probable Claws (Literary Feline)
I am not a cat. Beyond the obvious - no fur, no whiskers - I’m not and have never been as fastidious as your average feline, and I’m certainly not the clean freak that my own Musetta is. [from the prologue]
Probable Claws by Clea Simon
Poisoned Pen Press, 2009 (ARC)
Crime Fiction (MYS); 255 pgs
My favorite computer moments, however awkward, are when I have a cat sitting on my desk, another cat lying across my chest and arms and a dog at my feet. There is just something comforting in being surrounded by my fur friends. It might come as a surprise then when I tell you that I haven’t always been a fan of animal related mysteries. No, that isn’t quite true. I had not really tried enough to form that solid of an opinion. What I had read had not impressed me much and so for quite a while, I shied away from them.
And then I was introduced to Clea Simon’s Theda Krakow series. It was impossible not to fall in love with Musetta, Theda’s beautiful and playful tuxedo cat. What I like most about this particular series is how natural the cats are in the book. The cats are natural and realistic, which fits well with this series. They behave just like my cats. There are moments when I find myself nodding, “Parker does that!” Or light is shed on a behavior I might not have understood before.
Another aspect I like about the Theda Krakow series is how character driven the books are. Theda is a freelance reporter and music critic in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Theda’s personal and professional lives are woven together in such a way that they are integral parts of the mystery; the club music scene and her involvement with the cat community, included. In Probable Claws, the line is even more blurred as Theda’s career and relationships suddenly are put into precarious positions. What begins as a suspected poisoning of cats at her friend Violet’s shelter soon escalates into murder, and Theda becomes the number one suspect. Could shelter politics be behind everything? Or is a simple case of jealousy or greed?
Animal shelters carry a heavy burden in our society, and Clea Simon touches upon some of the difficulties they face. While her novels focus on cats, the issues also apply to other pets, such as dogs as well. In Probable Claws, the author addresses the problem of over population and euthanasia. With over population, it is difficult to maintain a no kill stance and yet many shelters are trying to go that route, limiting euthanasia only to hard to place animals. But what exactly constitutes a hard to place animal? This too is under scrutiny and a serious issue to consider.
Theda is in the thick of things in Probable Claws and she comes across as strong but vulnerable. So much in her life seems to be going downhill all at once and the author captures Theda’s internal struggle of trying to stay in control despite the odds. Many of Theda’s friends make an appearance in Probable Claws, including her boyfriend Bill and one of my favorite characters, Violet. The reader gets the opportunity to know fellow reporter Ralph a little better in this novel. Although he isn’t the most likeable guy, I found myself feeling sorry for him as the novel progressed. But only a little.
Probable Claws, the fourth book in the series, is the best yet. The mystery is tightly woven and the tension builds as the story unfolds, resulting in a climax that was both exciting and satisfying. Theda grew as a character in this book, and I look forward to seeing where the author takes her next.
You can learn more about Clea Simon and her books on the author’s website and on her blog, Cats & Crime & Rock & Roll.
Other books in the series:
Mew is For Murder
Cattery Row
Cries and Whiskers
Stealing Athena (Teddy Rose)
Captivating!
Stealing Athena is about two influential and custom defying women in history. Both caught between the conventions of their time and trying to help the men they loved.
At 21, newlywed, Mary, the countess of Elgin used her charm and influence with the Ottoman Empire to gain permission for her husband Elgin to deconstruct what was left of the Greek Parthenon and bring it’s amazing sculptures back to England, during the Napoleonic wars.
Two millennia earlier, Aspasia, courtesan to Perikles and philosopher, used her charm and influence to get Athens to allow the building of the Parthenon and all of its amazing monuments.
The flow of the book going from one time and place to the other was weaved in perfect synchronization by Karen Essex. Her descriptions of both the construction and deconstruction of the Parthenon made me feeling like I was there, witnessing it for myself. Essex poet pose made me race through the pages, but not wanting the book to end.
This is historical fiction at its finest! Highly recommended!
5/5