Four Secrets by Margaret Willey + Giveaway!

Published October 1, 2012.

Author website.

"To you the idea to kidnap Chase Dobson might seem like a mistake. But to us... we were just trying to stop him from being so...evil. We just...we had to stop him. No one helps kids like us. Not at my school. We aren't the important kids. We knew it wouldn't stop unless we stopped it ourselves." 

Katie, Nate, and Renata had no farther to fall down the social ladder. But when they hit bottom, they found each other. Together, they wanted to change things. To stop the torment. 

So they made a plan. One person seemed to have everyone's secrets—and all the power. If they could stop him... 

But secrets are complicated, powerful things. They are hard to keep. And even a noble plan to stop a bully can go horribly wrong.  (netgalley.com)

The most prominent issue I had with FOUR SECRETS was the age of the three protagonists and the talked-about antagonist.  They're all supposed to be in eighth grade but I kept finding that I had to remind myself that these weren't kids in high school.  Just the extent of the issues they were having, how they spoke about it, how they carried it out it, just seemed so far beyond someone still in middle school.

Granted have it set their freshman year in high school and I probably wouldn't have batted an eye.  Not much of a difference age-wise in the slightest but the association is different.  In my mind there's a pretty big gap between middle school and high school and the voices I kept reading, at least to me, were high school age.  I just wasn't convinced they were middle school, especially when body sizes came into play.  All except Renata were described as large, either in stature or bulk (and by bulk I mean muscle).  It just didn't fit for me and it was a point of contention throughout and every time I was reminded of their ages it wrenched me out of the story a little bit.

But other than that it was a really good, pretty fast, read told from the perspectives of four different people, Chase excluded.  I could wholly empathize with the feelings of the social worker whose job it was to get to the bottom of why these kids kidnapped their classmate.  Because they entered into some kind of pact they wouldn't talk and she ended up getting the creative runaround from all three of them.

Nate told his view in story form, referring to the people involved by assigned fantastical names and set in a scene that only vaguely alludes to what actually happened.  Yeah you can get what he's saying but his was the portion of the book I liked the least.  I was over his method of storytelling pretty quickly and while I'm sure it helped him to cope with the situation he was seeking solace in a fantasy world instead of coming to terms with what happened.  He frustrated me the most.

Renata you see very little of within her own viewpoint, told, or rather shown, through her drawings.  Otherwise you get a picture of who Renata is by the way Nate and Katie describe and talk about her.  That would have been annoying to me if it weren't such a perfect way to get across Renata's personality.  She is very much a background girl that doesn't speak very often but when she does, whether it's actually with her vocal chords or with her drawings, it's so poignant you can't help but listen.  She's described as incredibly small and for most of the book that's the image I had in my mind: someone who was frail, tiny and needed rescuing when in fact she was exactly the opposite.  Next to the social worker I think I liked Renata the most.

Katie is the most prominent voice in the story aside from the social worker and its through her you learn the most information in a manner that won't have you trying to put puzzle pieces together.  Her method is very straight forward and when she started the second "rouse" journal I grunted in agitation.  I WANTED her to reveal what happened because I knew it wasn't what the situation looked like.  I think that was pretty evident from the beginning.  But there wouldn't be a story if that happened so I bided my time reading Katie's story broken up by lunches and homework and recreation time.  She was the most readable in terms of figuring everything out.

All three were hard-set in their ways when it came to not breaking this pact.  For the life of me I couldn't figure out why and while it worked out in the end I don't feel there was proper punishment doled out for the responsible parties.  The story resolved itself nicely enough but it was a little on the abrupt side and lacking in satisfaction.  I wanted more.  Comeuppance, maybe.  A knock off one's high horse, if you will.  The story resolved itself within one book which is a plus all around but there's a little bit more there, even if it's just ten or twenty pages.

While not my favorite Carolrhoda Lab book that's not to say it wasn't a good read.  FOUR SECRETS has points of view for every type of reader of a multitude of ages telling a story about bullying and how NOT to go about remedying it.  I don't want to give away the ending but through the eyes of the social worker you can see just how hard the gears are grinding, what's up against these kids and just how thin of a wire they're all walking on.  Bullying sucks, sure, but there are ways to go about fixing it that won't land someone in jail.  There's an air of noble cause and valiance in the book as well that may sway towards, in my eyes, the wrong way of fixing things but there is a balance there and Willey does a good job of playing both sides of the game.  It also goes to show that everyone has secrets, even the most perfect of people, and sometimes they're far darker than bad hair days.

Ban Factor: High - Kids taking matters into their own hands and being OKAY with going to juvenile detention?  Le gasp!

Giveaway Time!!!

Want to win my ARC?  Then just fill out the form below for your chance.

• Open to US residents 13 years of age and older only.
• One entry per person per email address.
• Duplicate entries will be deleted.
• Entrants must be a follower of Bites via one of the following mediums: GFC, RSS, Goodreads, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr.
• Giveaway ends October 23rd at midnight AZT (3 am EST).

YAckers Review - Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan

Published September 11, 2012.

Author website.

Kami Glass loves someone she’s never met . . . a boy she’s talked to in her head ever since she was born. She wasn’t silent about her imaginary friend during her childhood, and is thus a bit of an outsider in her sleepy English town of Sorry-in-the-Vale. Still, Kami hasn’t suffered too much from not fitting in. She has a best friend, runs the school newspaper, and is only occasionally caught talking to herself. Her life is in order, just the way she likes it, despite the voice in her head. 

But all that changes when the Lynburns return. 

The Lynburn family has owned the spectacular and sinister manor that overlooks Sorry-in-the-Vale for centuries. The mysterious twin sisters who abandoned their ancestral home a generation ago are back, along with their teenage sons, Jared and Ash, one of whom is eerily familiar to Kami. Kami is not one to shy away from the unknown—in fact, she’s determined to find answers for all the questions Sorry-in-the-Vale is suddenly posing. Who is responsible for the bloody deeds in the depths of the woods? What is her own mother hiding? And now that her imaginary friend has become a real boy, does she still love him? Does she hate him? Can she trust him?  (goodreads.com)

UNSPOKEN was September's YAck pick.  I had to gracefully bow out since that was during my time of state transition so I have absolutely nothing of value to add about this one.  But you should still check out it's YAck over here.  The response appears to be rather positive.  Except for my evil twin.  I wouldn't expect any less.

Ban Factor: Unknown - I didn't read it.  I have no idea.  Since it deals with head voices and words like 'eerily' I'm going to hazard a guess it might be on a few radars.

The Curiosities: A Collection of Stories by Maggie Stiefvater, Tessa Gratton and Brenna Yovanoff

Published August 1, 2012.

Three Author Websites.

From acclaimed YA authors Maggie Stiefvater, Tessa Gratton, and Brenna Yovanoff comes The Curiosities: A Collection of Stories. 

- A vampire locked in a cage in the basement, for good luck. - Bad guys, clever girls, and the various reasons why the guys have to stop breathing. 

- A world where fires never go out (with references to vanilla ice cream). 

These are but a few of the curiosities collected in this volume of short stories by three acclaimed practitioners of paranormal fiction. But The Curiosities is more than the stories. Since 2008, Maggie, Tessa, and Brenna have posted more than 250 works of short fiction to their website merryfates.com. Their goal was simple: create a space for experimentation and improvisation in their writing—all in public and without a backspace key. In that spirit, The Curiosities includes the stories and each author's comments, critiques, and kudos in the margins. Think of it as a guided tour of the creative processes of three acclaimed authors. 

So, are you curious now?  (goodreads.com)

I LOVE YOU, CAROLRHODA LAB!  DON'T EVER CHANGE!

NetGalley noted the pub date for this book as today but Goodreads is showing back in August.  Considering Goodreads has the bump-up date for Meagon Spooner's SKYLARK I'm going with the Goodreads date for accuracy.

Okay, so book?  Andrew Karre is a publishing genius, never pandering to a wave or reading fad.  He's his own dowsing rod of incredible works, sniffing them out like a nifler and finding precious, precious gold.  Instead of lifting debuts out of the publishing ashes this time he's taken the minds of three already-established authors and exposed their twisted brains in bound book form.

Stiefvater, Gratton and Yovanoff have been experimentally writing as the Merry Fates for years now, stretching their writerly fingers beyond the scope of each of their perceived comfort zones.  The end result in THE CURIOSITIES is a peek behind Oz's curtain, complete with handwritten cliff notes and StiefTonOff (I need to copyright that) doodles to compliment the shorts scattered throughout.  They banter back and forth about each others' writing styles, throw comments about and generally boost each other up as they dip their toes into unfamiliar, and oftentimes murky, water.

The style of each author emerges almost immediately and you get an almost intimate sense of what each is comfortable writing and what was really a stretch into no-man's land.  It got to a point in THE CURIOSITIES that I didn't need to read who the short was written by, they were that distinct from each other.  You get to see some of their prompts and how each author sometimes interprets something as simple as a single name and even when they reach beyond their zone they all cling to something familiar, something stylistic that grounds them in the unknown.  They wax writer-like about drawing blanks, building a story from a single image or a single sentence or even a snippet of some weird dream.  It's a true look into the heads of authors without the classroom lessons of writing.  All you're getting are real world examples and they're so much more poignant.

Maggie is consistent Maggie even when she's trying to be Brenna or Tessa.  I will admit I was not thrilled with her Ballad of Faerie series.  While her writing was beautiful I felt it was more author than character and as a result I stepped away from her Wolves of Mercy Falls series, not wanting to read more of the same.  But what with her story in KISS ME DEADLY and now all of these it's only a matter of time before I pick up another Maggie book.  I just like her shorts far too much.  Her voice is so much more than just her and her range as an author is astounding.  She can flit in and out of genres as if she were skipping despite how taxing some of those stories were to write.  I am coming around again.

Tessa has a thing for grim fairy tales without really broaching into horror.  She plays at the line with her freaky dolls and pokes brownies in their eyes just for shits and giggles.  She takes a fey world and by sheer will of style turns it into something not only eerily dark but captivating and something wholly other, spinning metaphors into pure gold.  I love it when she dredged up barely touched lore and adds her platinum touch to it.  THE SUMMER ENDS IN SLAUGHTER is one such example that blends lore and darkness and Tessa touch into something that's captivating, drawing you in and not letting you look away.

Brenna prances across that horror line and plays with the dead, dressing them up in decaying dresses and stringing them up like marionettes to put on a show.  NEIGHBORS blew me away to the point of speechlessness.  The opening blurbs even warn about the stereotypical twist.  You know what's coming as you read but you don't because Brenna, in all her twisted horror glory, twists the twist and while you may see one you won't see the other.  By god I loved it.  I need more Brenna stories in my demented, horror-loving life.

THE CURIOSITIES is not only an excellent collection of short stories meant as a glimpse into the legwork of writers but an amazing introduction to the authors StiefTonOff.  See the genius that is Andrew's editing skills in compiling this novel of awesome and then read the expansive minds of three authors with rather set comfort zones shatter their own walls and wander into the wild.

Ban Factor: High - From vampires to fairies to a libido-laden dead teenager there is a veritable smorgasbord of screech-worthy banstuff in here.

Distant Waves by Suzanne Weyn

Published April 15, 2009.

Author website.

Four sisters and their mother make their way from a spiritualist town in New York to London, becoming acquainted with journalist W. T. Stead, scientist Nikola Tesla, and industrialist John Jacob Astor. When they all find themselves on the Titanic, one of Tesla's inventions dooms them...and one could save them.  (goodreads.com)

For the first half of DISTANT WAVES I was wondering what the hell this book had to do with the Titanic.  It was mentioned once or twice in off-hand remarks, and not by name, and a couple of the people that were on board made appearances within the story but other than that it was a story that centered around Spiritualism, a mother defrauding people with her mystic "skills" and her daughters' lives as a result of this woman's charade.  The story in and of itself wasn't bad.  I actually found it pretty interesting and I liked Jane but don't give me 'A Novel of the Titanic' and not have the ship make an appearance until halfway through the book.  That's going to make me cranky.  I don't like to be cranky when I read.

Once the Titanic did show up it played its role like it does in any other story about it; you're reading the melodrama occurring on it all the while just holding your breath to see how the main event is going to destroy everything nice that's seemingly going on.  I didn't like how the sisters got onto the boat.  It was just far too contrived for my tastes and I really don't think the people letting on passengers would have let stowaways slip by.  Considering the ship and all the hype it should have been something the White Star Line was prepared for.

The ending pretty much murdered what was otherwise and interesting story.  I'm okay with authors taking liberties with history but to take major events and alter their causes for the sake of the story is really bothersome.  To the point where I was audibly going 'what???"

All sense of immediacy was gone as the iceberg was approaching.  No one seemed to be all that worried about it from those watching it head right towards the ship.  Then Tesla tests his magical mystery machine and supposedly breaks the ship.  It didn't REALLY hit the iceberg.  Excuse me?  And as the ship sank?  Poof, gone.  The major cataclysmic event was literally blinked out of the plot.  Gone.  Ground zero happens, people start running around a little confused, poof Jane is being rescued by the Carpathia.  I'm not even talking about a sentence to say it sank.  An element happened that actually eliminated the sinking from the story and skipped right to the rescue.  Infuriated would be a good word to describe me.  How do you have 'a novel of the Titanic' and just skip the sinking?

The individual elements of DISTANT WAVES were good; I liked the Spiritualism aspect, how historical people were factored into the plot, all of the characters were likable on some level and it even got a hint steampunky.  But I think the Titanic itself ruins this story of the Titanic for me simply because it was so bastardized.  The author actually altered history to serve her plot.  No.  Me no likey.  If that kind of thing doesn't bother you then you might just like DISTANT WAVES.  Like I said it's a pretty good story.  But the Titanic is killer.  No pun intended.  Too much was changed in a story that was only supposed to be historical fiction, not alt history or the like.  It's unfortunate but that's the way it is, I guess.  Titanic in one book and the rest of the plot in another, yes.  Both would have been good.  But they just didn't mix well, like a recipe whose ingredients didn't quite mesh.

Ban Factor: Low - An historical fiction centered around the Titanic.  One can hardly pick a more prudish time in our history.  The Spiritualism might offend but that's assuming they know what the word means.  One mustn't overestimate the banners.

Bad Glass by Richard E. Gropp

Pub date: September 25, 2012.

Author website.

Something has happened in Spokane. The military has evacuated the city and locked it down. Even so, disturbing rumors and images seep out, finding their way onto the Internet, spreading curiosity, skepticism, and panic. For what they show is-or should be-impossible: strange creatures that cannot exist, sudden disappearances that violate the laws of physics, human bodies fused with inanimate objects, trapped yet still half alive. . . . 

Dean Walker, an aspiring photographer, sneaks into the quarantined city in search of fame. What he finds will change him in unimaginable ways. Hooking up with a group of outcasts led by a beautiful young woman named Taylor, Dean embarks on a journey into the heart of a mystery whose philosophical implications are as terrifying as its physical manifestations. Even as he falls in love with Taylor-a woman as damaged and seductive as the city itself-his already tenuous hold on reality starts to come loose. Or perhaps it is Spokane's grip on the world that is coming undone.  

Now, caught up in a web of interlacing secrets and betrayals, Dean, Taylor, and their friends must make their way through this ever-shifting maze of a city, a city that is actively hunting them down, herding them toward a shocking destiny.  (netgalley.com)

BAD GLASS is something different.  In a good way.  It's part horror, part apocalyptic, part science fiction and fantasy, hitting on every thread that each of those genres can unwind.  I had moments reading this book that actually made my stomach churn.  Of course I was eating lunch at the time and vomiting all over the lunch room table at a place I've worked at less than a week would certainly leave an impression.  Not a good one.  I really like where I work so I breathed through it.

In terms of character I felt it was a little thin.  I didn't really have any motivation to care about any of the characters and when things really started to happen I felt more like I was watching the news than I was invested in reading a novel.  The emphasis of the story was on Spokane.  It was the antagonist here, as the blurb says, hunting them.  Literally.  I LOVED Spokane and I talk about it as if it were a fleshy type of character.  It was the most dynamic thing here, morphing itself to engulf the more static characters.

Taylor was your typical hard ass, stand-offish girl that leads by example.  Not unlikable but she wasn't anything I warmed to.  Then her character took a major shift towards the end and I don't think it quite fit.  It was too out of character and felt more like a contrivance to catapult the story forward than anything else.  I didn't mind per se because I was still interested in the story but it was a point of contention.  I'm not a fan of characters deviating for the sake of plot.

Amanda is one character one day and then goes off the deep end the next without much segue, throwing another shock factor into the spokes of the plot.  Charlie was endearing, being the youngest of the group.  He was the techie, helping the rest of the gang keep in contact with the outside world all the while continuously searching for his parents whom he KNOWS are still in town.  Floyd is hung up on the death of his brother, Mac's a clingy dick from the beginning and Dean himself wants to believe he dissolves into the town with the rest of them but I didn't buy it.  He's there for less than a week, put through all kinds of shit for the sake of his art but won't simply walk away when things get really bad (and everything will gladly get out of his way to walk and once he gets out of Spokane all the craziness will stop but nooooooooo).  He sacrifices his life for Taylor, whom he's known A WEEK but will not return the affection nor even much of a hint that it's reciprocal, because he just can't leave her.  No.  I don't buy that either.

I don't buy it as much as I don't buy Taylor's character shift.  Dean's very presence beyond the first few days felt forced, his reasons for staying insubstantial at best.  Eventually it stopped being about his photography and started being about Taylor, again a stand-offish girl that would barely look at him.  I'm going to keep driving right past that tag sale and move on to the next one.

Spokane on the other hand was a living, breathing character consuming all the others, eventually literally.  The things that happen within the city, whether they just happen to the surroundings or to the people themselves, were so incredibly vivid that I could almost feel all of the panic and worry and wonder at what was going on.  From the weird bodily mutations to nature bucking it's own trend, I believed it all.  It was the most vivid part of the story.  If it weren't such an integral part, if the story focused more on the characters than on the surroundings, I would have lost interest pretty quickly.  But I kept reading for Spokane.  I wanted to see what the hell was going on with it.

I almost expected the ending to crap out.  I don't know why but I was anticipating the whole thing ending up being a dream.  It was alluded to.  I'll spoil it for you: it's not.  Thank god.  I would have been so incredibly pissed off I don't know what I would have done.  You get an answer but it leaves a lot of whys hanging out there and you still don't REALLY know what's going on by the time the story ends.  You have an idea and I think it's enough to satisfy the curiosity that the plot brews but there's definitely room for more.

BAD GLASS is, atmospherically, a great blend of horror and apocalyptic, the latter really just on the edge of the world about to go to hell in a Pinto.  There are some truly terrifying moments and the way Gropp wrote all of the changes it really plays with your mind and you won't know what to think about everything that's happening.  You'll start to second-guess things and you'll be trying to figure it out right from the moment Dean gets into the city and starts seeing these things first hand.  It's light on character development but the city itself is such a huge personality in the book that it'll just overwhelm everything else.  Really I don't think there's room for much else in terms of the other characters.  And I'm okay with that.

Ban Factor: High - Swearing, m/m sex, drug use and the world going to hell.  Not a good combination for the banners.

Dreaming Anastasia by Joy Preble

Published September 1, 2009.

Author website.

Anastasia Romanov thought she would never feel more alone than when the gunfire started and her family began to fall around her. Surely the bullets would come for her next. But they didn't. Instead, two gnarled old hands reached for her. When she wakes up she discovers that she is in the ancient hut of the witch Baba Yaga, and that some things are worse than being dead. 

In modern-day Chicago, Anne doesn't know much about Russian history. She is more concerned about getting into a good college--until the dreams start. She is somewhere else. She is someone else. And she is sharing a small room with a very old woman. The vivid dreams startle her, but not until a handsome stranger offers to explain them does she realize her life is going to change forever. She is the only one who can save Anastasia. But, Anastasia is having her own dreams...  (goodreads.com)

I got to just about under halfway before I put DREAMING ANASTASIA down.  I couldn't invest myself in it.  It's not that the writing was bad or it wasn't interesting.  I just felt it was a bit . . . ridiculous.

As if I haven't read absolutely ridiculous books in my day.  Or currently.  The majority of what I read is inherently ridiculous.  But I just wasn't feeling DREAMING ANASTASIA.  I don't think it's anything I can specifically put my finger on.  I don't believe my move had an influence because I was reading other books just fine.  So can't chalk it up to not being able to invest myself in the story.  I just felt all of the little pieces that knit the story together were one contrivance after another.  From Anne being a descendant of this brotherhood explaining her dreams and weird powers that randomly manifest when the shit hits the fan to the shit itself embedding itself in the fan blades I wasn't buying it from the beginning.  It felt more like a finely fit cluster of puzzle pieces than something organic that grew into its own story.  That every piece of the DREAMING ANASTASIA story was meticulously crafted and set in place, as if strategizing a chess game where the mover of the piece is the one in control as opposed to the piece itself.  I felt led along and each element in the story was displayed to me as if I were at a museum exhibit.

It's not inherently a bad thing.  Like I said, there was nothing wrong with the writing.  I liked the dialogue between all of the characters.  That in and of itself felt genuine.  It was absolutely action-packed right from the beginning and the Romanov history was definitely an interesting aspect of it all.  I just wasn't connecting with it.

Ban Factor: High - Fairy tales come to life and chicks with magic powers.  Someone's got some devil in 'em.

Funhouse by Diane Hoh

Published July 1, 1990.

Author website.

When the Devil's Elbow roller coaster goes off its track and several teenagers are hurt, everyone thinks it was just an accident. So no one listens when Tess says she saw someone tampering with the track. 

But one person knows it's true. That person is playing a deadly game - and is going to make sure Tess doesn't stand in the way. Tess soon finds she's being terrorized, with threatening notes, menacing phone calls, slashed tires, and nasty pranks. When another "accident" occurs in the Funhouse, Tess is sure that she was the intended victim. Who is committing all these horrifying acts? And why? 

Tess is just beginning to realize that the Funhouse can scare you ...to death.  (goodreads.com)

There are few things more awesome than cheese and FUNHOUSE certainly fit that mould nicely.  Not only that but I love reading un-updated works if for nothing more than the outdated styles of dress.  Boys in cutoff jeans?  Ha!  But I remember it.  Most of it would probably be pretty innocuous to the younger readers now simply because the descriptions aren't too detailed but every once in a while you'll get the little nugget of nostalgia that'll have you going 'yup.'  Love it.

FUNHOUSE combines two of my favorite things: horror and boardwalks.  Thanks Lost Boys.  You rear your mulleted head once again.  There just always seems to be something sinister underlying a carnival-like atmosphere.  I'm pretty sure it's the clowns.  Are the looking at the same cover I am?  So going in it had the proper ambiance for me to be nice and cozily happy.

The thing about a lot of these old school cheesy YA horror books is that there really isn't any supernatural involved; they're mostly thriller but the way they're written it could go either way.  This particular novel utilized pseudo-flashback pieces that involved a diary and insinuated at maybe a haunting.  Personally I think that's just enough to pull it all together.

Another common theme in the cheese is the novel having at least one character that you desperately wish would get hit by a bus.  They're just total shitbags that you can't help but wonder why they have friends at all.  Trudy was that person in FUNHOUSE.  She's just an all around nasty, negative human being that any normal person would probably drop like a bad habit.  But I guess because she's rich and all their daddies work together she's automatically lumped in with the rest.  Sucks for the rest of them.

Tess is the kind of heroine that I wish I saw more of in today's YA.  She has Sam (her perhaps/maybe-boyfriend) constantly trying to protect her but she's so adamant that she can take care of herself that I couldn't help but go yeah!  Granted she takes it to a point of it being a fault, especially when the events start getting drastic and her life appears to really be in danger but she wants to stand on her own two feet.  She don't need no man to protect her!  Yes!  Aside from that she is strong, wanting to solve the mystery behind all of these events even in the face of doubt and ridicule.  Everyone else things it's a string of unfortunate accidents (of course) but Tess knows better.  There are too many elements going on for any of it to be coincidental.

Hoh is one of the better old school YA horror writers.  She doesn't pander to her audience and just lets the story tell itself.  None of the dialogue feels contrived and the characters feel real to me.  Of course there's a bit of the melodrama going on and the entire plot centers around a bunch of rich kids but they're not obnoxious about it.  They don't flaunt their parents' wealth.  It's not a motivating factor in the story; they all just are and who their parents are just happen to be who their parents are.  It's not a card to play, which I liked.

FUNHOUSE is a great addition to my cheese library and one I'll probably re-read at some point in the future.  There's a classic feel to it, aside from the fact that the roller coaster is named The Devil's Elbow.  How . . . threatening?

Ban Factor: High - Teenagers are ruthlessly targeted by some unknown entity for deliverance of dire pain.  Oh no.  We just can't have that.  It's too much for them to take.

Hana by Lauren Oliver

Published February 28, 2012.

Author website.

The summer before they're supposed to be cured of the ability to love, best friends Lena and Hana begin to drift apart. While Lena shies away from underground music and parties with boys, Hana jumps at her last chance to experience the forbidden. For her, the summer is full of wild music, dancing—and even her first kiss. 

But on the surface, Hana must be a model of perfect behavior. She meets her approved match, Fred Hargrove, and glimpses the safe, comfortable life she’ll have with him once they marry. As the date for her cure draws ever closer, Hana desperately misses Lena, wonders how it feels to truly be in love, and is simultaneously terrified of rebelling and of falling into line.  (goodreads.com)

I had to go back over my review of DELIRIUM because for the life of me I can't remember much of anything from that book.  Apparently I really liked it (loved it is more on par there) and I was desperate to read more of the story. It's funny how tastes can change in such a short amount of time.  My DELIRIUM  review was posted about a year and a half ago.

That's not to say I wouldn't still like DELIRIUM if I read it again because my tastes don't change THAT drastically but having read far more like stories since I think I'd look at it with a different eye.  Yes, I'm still a fan of ROMEO & JULIET except I now know it's true point, and it's not all about star-crossed lovers.  I'm still a fan of non-douchey boys and even Oliver's writing.  But within the time since I've read DELIRIUM one major issue has been brought to my attention that would completely throw a wrench in the reality of the story - children growing up unloved by parents.  Really this would create a society of feral children.  Children can subsist in the mechanics of parenthood like feeding, changing, etc.  But love is a pretty huge factor in a kid's developmental years.  Just look at all those orphans in eastern Europe.  Removing love from society is far more detrimental to its well-being than it is beneficial.

So that's what I went in to HANA with, this reformed view of Oliver's word tickling my mind.  It wasn't a bad story but because I couldn't remember what really happened in DELIRIUM I had a hard time placing HANA so that was a nagging factor throughout.  Personal, obviously.  By the end I kind of remembered where it was because Hana encounters Lena after she received the dog bite so I have a vague idea of what and when.

Ultimately it was nice getting into Hana's head a bit and see her basically being scared straight.  She doesn't want to be cured but at the same time the thought of being caught rebelling is far too horrifying for her.  She's a really dynamic character that I do wish I'd seen more of in DELIRIUM (I'm assuming I didn't because she isn't really mentioned in my review but I do remember her).  I think there's more of a struggle there for her, more of a tear, than what Lena had.  Really I think she would have made a better MC than Lena.  Maybe I would have remembered more of DELIRIUM if that were the case.  It wouldn't have been so "standard" a story that way.  Not to mention there are so many other ways to approach someone like Hana because she's all aspects of the world: rebel and conformist.  She doesn't draw a hard line in the sand and it's really a struggle for her.  I would have liked to have seen her through her cure, to see if it really took, what her brain was like afterwards.

I enjoyed HANA, obviously.  I wasn't as thrilled with the writing as I appeared to be with DELIRIUM, especially the lack of contractions.  A lot of 'I am''s going around that annoyed me.  But it was a good glimpse of Hana and provided her with so much more depth.  I haven't read PANDEMONIUM yet but I hope she's in there more and it doesn't just focus on Lena.  And from HANA alone I was able to suspend my disbelief enough in the world to keep reading because I think everything else fit and there was an obvious care and craft to the world itself.  It didn't appear to be thrown together in a blender and spit out.  I can't say if that would hold true if I re-read DELIRIUM or tried to get into PANDEMONIUM though.

Ban Factor: High - Those kids rebelling against the system.  Can't have that, children thumbing their noses at adults.  Breeds malcontents!

The Infects by Sean Beaudoin

Pub date: September 25, 2012.

Author website.

Seventeen-year-old Nero is stuck in the wilderness with a bunch of other juvenile delinquents on an "Inward Trek." As if that weren't bad enough, his counselors have turned into flesh-eating maniacs overnight and are now chowing down on his fellow miscreants. As in any classic monster flick worth its salted popcorn, plentiful carnage sends survivors rabbiting into the woods while the mindless horde of "infects" shambles, moans, and drools behind. Of course, these kids have seen zombie movies. They generate "Zombie Rules" almost as quickly as cheeky remarks, but attitude alone can't keep the biters back. Serving up a cast of irreverent, slightly twisted characters, an unexpected villain, and an ending you won't see coming, here is a savvy tale that that's a delight to read -whether you're a rabid zombie fan or freshly bitten-and an incisive commentary on the evil that lurks within each of us.  (netgalley.com)

There really isn't much that Sean Beaudoin can do wrong.  His novels have a definitive signature that screams THIS IS SEAN BEAUDOIN.  It usually involves some level of noir, exceptional find-fuckage and a snarky cynicism that is like the brand of Sean on all of his books.  THE INFECTS fit nice and snugly into this mould although I have to say it's the least mind-fucked of the SB books I've read.  In fact it was downright tame in comparison to the likes of FADE TO BLUE.  But that doesn't mean it was bad.

Yes, THE INFECTS is a zombie novel but it's not your standard zombie novel.  It's not really a world-wide pandemic of zombie proportions and the zombies have a habit of evolving, thinking, picking the more favorable pieces of your body to eat as opposed to just chomping at random.  There are different levels of infected, from the full-on zombie to something a little more human to a lot more human to total meat sack meal.  This isn't a simple zombie novel despite the humor that Sean involves.  Yes, it's funny, but he's taken zombie lore and expanded it to something a bit more terrifying than just having to deal with your regular ol' shambling zombies.

Of course THE INFECTS has all the seriousness of a Simon Pegg movie, background events being carried out in a rather hilarious background humor fashion while the SERIOUS things happen in the foreground.  Never mind the guy running around with a severed arm in his mouth.  WHAT'S FOR LUNCH?  It is truly a Sean Beaudoin novel for that reason, along with the demented reality that takes it that many more steps away from being grounded.  It's not just a chicken restaurant but it's what everyone thinks of when they think of a chicken restaurant, the menu showcasing full servings for fried random chicken parts and a chicken surprise pack with some kind of unhealthy gravy mess.  It is as much of a satire as a satire can be even moving beyond the restaurant.  LIFE has elements of the familiar with added doses of ridiculous to elevate the story into the absurd but still managing to keep it relatable.  Everyone wants to survive the Zomb-A-Pocalypse, right?

Nick/Nero is the spearhead of the group, much to his chagrin.  His only objective is getting to Petal.  People just happen to want to follow him around while he completes it.  He's not comfortable with it but he makes due.  With Sean's books you don't necessarily have likable or unlikable characters; they either are characters or aren't.  It's all in the way they're written, that satirical pulp style that makes caricatures of everything, to one extent or another.  So you'll either think the characters are too far out there (like the twins) or they're readable (pretty much everyone else).  Unless they get killed.  And Sean has no qualms about putting the kibosh on the pulses of any of his characters.  So be warned: if you favor one more than the others, it'll probably end up with some teeth in its neck.

Reading this, though, I couldn't help but think there was some kind of message here, about over-processed and genetically engineered food, unhealthy eating habits, complacency in what we're being forced fed.  Messages aren't something I picked up on in other Sean books so it took me aback a bit.  Couple that with the relatively toned down (for him) style and I think it was a bit different from what Sean usually writes.  Not as wild and with more of a purpose, however slight.  Still incredibly enjoyable but veering off the path a little.

THE INFECTS is not your typical zombie novel, filled with atypical zombies and anti-heros and an ending that will make your head spin.  Sean's snark is not for the faint of heart and the satire is for those only able to take big blasts of the absurd at a time.  The level of mind fuck is lower than in previous books with the story being far more straight forward and the characters being more contoured and easy to grasp.  The subtleties of it are what will make you laugh, hidden in a well-timed background element in a greater scene.  It forces you to pay attention because you'll miss snippets of gloriousness if you're just reading it for what the surface provides.  If you like trippy, off the wall tales riddled with snark that will make you laugh and gag in the same sentence, you'll most likely love THE INFECTS.  It brings with it the familiarity of the zombie trope but Sean just comes right on in and fucks it all up.  But in a good way, like always.  And that's why I keep reading him.  Not only is he a fantastic storyteller but his voice is so epically unique that you can't help but latch onto it and drool love all over it.

Ban Factor: High - Zombies, lesbians, zombie sex, rabid fried chicken . . . what's in this book that the banners WON'T throw a shit fit about?

Sleepless by Thomas Fahy

Published August 11, 2009.

Author website.

SOMEONE ELSE WILL DIE SOON she tells herself. 

SOMEONE ELSE WILL DIE AND I WILL BE RESPONSIBLE. 

A few days after the first time you walk in your sleep, you kill someone. That's how the end begins. 

Emma Montgomery has been having gruesome nightmares. Even worse, when she wakes up, she isn't where she was when she fell asleep. And she's not the only one. One by one the students of Saint Opportuna High start having nightmares, and sleepwalking. And the next morning one of their classmates turns up dead. 

Something is making them kill in their sleep. Emma and her friends need to band together, to keep themselves awake until they can figure out what's behind the murders--before anyone else dies.  (goodreads.com)

There's a reason that NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, despite all of it's cheesiness, is, at its very core, frightening: because Freddie attacks people in their dreams, in their sleep, when they're at their most vulnerable.  SLEEPLESS also tapped into that inherent attack method and it's why I think, even despite my ultimate disconnect with the story, it's still scary.  Sleeping is something a person just can't not do.  You have to sleep but that's also where you're being attacked and there's nothing you can do to prevent it.  Anyone that doesn't think that's scary to at least some degree is lying.  Liars!

Don't get me wrong; I liked SLEEPLESS.  But there was something there keeping me from really connecting with the story, most likely the way it was told.  It was third person limited and flipped between Emma and Jake throughout the book but it wasn't necessarily the POV that did it.  I think it had more to do with the mechanical, almost dry execution of the story that kept me at bay.  It kept me interested but I've been interested in newspaper articles too.  It was more of a recounting of events with little effort at trying to make me scared.  For a horror novel that's a pretty big deal.  I WANT to be scared when I read horror.  That's why I read it.  Yeah, it's masochistic but quite frankly I liked being scared.  If horror doesn't scare me then it's failed it's most integral part.  I couldn't even feign frightened.  Yes, the things happening to the kids was scary but I didn't feel it.  I just read the story and carried on.

The New Orleans event laced throughout the book dragged on a bit too long without coming to its useful point.  I get the technique but I don't think it worked to the story's advantage here.  Of course it kept me reading but I was more annoyed with it toying with me than anything else.  I wanted to know HOW it was relevant and it kept teasing me for chapters.  I was irked.  It ultimately wove itself in but it didn't end up being what I thought it could be.  It slid down a more more cliched route that ended up being a bit contrived.  No vengeance or cover-ups or anything like that.  The ending was really ho-hum and a bit of a disappointment.

I liked Emma and Jake as characters.  They were both probably the best parts of the book.  They were just really well-fleshed out characters that I felt came alive on the page.  I believed their actions, their words and how they made everything unfold around them.  It worked.  I think SLEEPLESS could have been an amazing horror story if the rest of the elements around Jake and Emma were as finely tuned as they were, not to mention the story would have been better if it ended up being something BIGGER than what it was.  Again, disappointment, but Jake and Emma were good, with Emma taking the lead despite everything going against her.  She was the glue of the group, making things happen instead of waiting for them to happen.  If I knew I was about to kill someone in my sleep I'd like to think I'd take the same initiative and do something about it instead of just cowering in the corner.  No cowering for Emma.  Always a plus.

I think someone not as attuned to horror would find SLEEPLESS far scarier than I did but seeing how desensitized to it I am it fell kind of flat in the scare department.  I wish it were scarier for me because it would have been amazing!  I liked almost everything I was reading.  All that was missing was me being scared.  But it had just enough elements (like the execution of the voice) going against that amazingness to bring it down to something that was decent to read but didn't instill the horror like it should have.  It will make you think twice about sleeping, and watching slides, I'm sure but the ending didn't lend itself to anything greater than another teen horror cliche.  I liked it but that's about it.

Ban Factor: High - Kids are dropping dead all over this novel, not to mention there's some boob grabbing of the unmarried variety as well.  The banners would squeal.

In Too Deep by Amanda Grace

Published February 8th, 2012.

Author website.

Carter didn't rape me. People at school think he did. Suddenly, new friends are rushing to my side, telling me that Carter hurt them, too. They say he's getting what he deserves. 

Maybe I don't want to fix this. 

Sam is in love with her best friend Nick, but she can't seem to tell him. So she decides to flirt with golden-boy Carter Wellesley, hoping Nick will see it and finally realize his true feelings for her.

On Monday, everyone at school is saying that Carter raped Sam. He didn't, but Sam can't find the words to tell the truth. Worst of all, she's afraid she'll lose Nick if he finds out what really happened. 

As graduation approaches, Sam discovers that living the lie isn't as easy as her new friends make it sound--and telling the truth might be even worse.  (goodreads.com)

I thought I was going to get pretty enraged by IN TOO DEEP because I have some pretty strong feelings about girls crying rape but it wasn't too bad.  I think ultimately it was all handled really well, the protagonist went through a sufficient level of guilt and it wrapped itself up realistically so I really don't have any complaints.

IN TOO DEEP tackled all the relevant avenues that it could potentially go down, I think, from claimant guilt to what's happening to the guy to his future to her future to the repercussions to outward reactions in the face of the lie's reality and a bunch of things in between.  But it doesn't touch on how a lie about rape ultimately undermines a claim of rape.  In fairness it wasn't relevant to the plot but at the same time I do wish it was touched upon.  It's hard enough for women that were raped to come forward.  When a woman cries rape for her own gain it undermines the claim for all, making people that little bit less trustworthy of the next woman to claim she was raped because the last person they knew lied about it.  There is just no winning for anyone when rape is claimed when it didn't really happen and while IN TOO DEEP does touch upon most of it I do think it would have been just that little bit stronger if it broached undermining as well.

Irrespective of the lie it is pretty awful what Sam goes through when people believe it, especially at the hands of Carter's friends who believe his story blindly.  If it were true they'd still be doing the same thing and while it was rough to read something like that I think it's unfortunately accurate.  Rape is belittled constantly when it has actually happened so it's no surprise that Sam suffered the things she did at the hands of the buddies of her supposed rapist.

It's hard to say that Sam is a likable character because she cried rape and then perpetuated the lie due to peer pressure and a need for vengeance but I didn't dislike her.  I didn't find her reprehensible or a disgusting human being.  She's a girl that was scorned by an incredible douche bag.  That doesn't make what she did right but I think it explained enough to make me believe it, especially when the other girls bring in their own stories.  Yes, Carter was a douche and yes even I, reading this, felt just a little bit of joy seeing the high and mighty knocked from his pedestal.  But rape is a devastating tag and not even the biggest of douche bags deserve to have that kind of lie haunting them for the rest of their lives.  It only succeeds in ultimately turning the douche into a victim and garnering him sympathy.  Kind of the adverse effect.

I found the end wholly satisfying because everything worked out how I felt it should for everything that had happened.  For a while there I was a little afraid that it would tank, that I'd end up with another ACCOMPLICE that had me raging.  It didn't.  All of the repercussions you'd expect to happen do and it feels right.  Lessons are learned at great cost and life goes on for all.  Sickly sweet need not apply.  The end is rather ugly but it's deserved and what's even better Sam knows it and accepts it.

IN TOO DEEP delves into an aspect of a dark event that I don't think too many people do.  Everyone's always so focused on the real act of rape that they don't consider what an unsubstantiated accusation can do to someone.  I like it for it's difference in that regard.  That's not to impugn rape but look at it from another angle where things aren't what they seem.  The Duke lacrosse scandal is probably the most prominent example of something similar to IN TOO DEEP.  It's a good read and immensely satisfying, as odd as it sounds.  I'm a fan of characters suffering realistic repercussions for their actions.

Ban Factor: Medium - Reading would need to be involved in this one to find the references to high school sex and drinking.  On the surface it might not set off too many alarms although they may be intrigued to see how a liar suffers.

Hanging by a Thread by Sophie Littlefield

Pub date: September 11, 2012.

Author website.

The quaint little beach town of Winston, California, may be full of wholesome townsfolk, picturesque beaches, and laid back charm, but Clare Knight is about to uncover something underneath its thriving demeanor. Someone is hiding something, and it's as gruesome as the townsfolk, and their stately homes, are stunning. Amanda Stavros, fellow classmate and resident of Winston, is gone and there's no sign of her ever coming back. Everyone says she was taken and murdered, but where's the evidence? Why isn't there a single ounce of proof? And why is everyone okay with this, except for Clare? 

Luckily—or as it's been turning out, unluckily—Clare possesses a gift, an ability to see visions from the clothes she works with. And since her clothes come solely from the townsfolk, Clare has become privy to some startling and disturbing memories of these townspeople. Will she uncover who killed Amanda Stavros? Or is she just moving herself up in line to be the next victim of Winston?  (netgalley.com)

Every once in a while I'll come across a book that'll drag me in not necessarily based on the blurb but the setting.  Winston, California reminded me a lot of Santa Cruz.  A bit more sedate, not as hippie-esque, but still a reminder.  Within the context of the story it lies south of Monterey and is three hours south of San Francisco, which makes it a little less than two hours away from Santa Cruz.  Sold.  I just love the area that much that a LOCATION will pull me into a book.  Premise need not apply.

Lucky for me HANGING BY A THREAD was actually a really good book and a welcome addition to a sorely underrepresented thriller market in YA.  Yes, it has slightly supernatural elements: Clare sees people's histories when she touches clothes, something her mother has brow-beaten into her as being bad while her grandmother (also a gift-holder) doesn't feel the same way, leaving a lovely rift in the family.

So while Clare's mom did her best to eliminate this "gift" from her daughter, it's left Clare a bit conflicted.  She's started seeing things in some random clothes she picked up.  And they're horrible things.  And she just doesn't know what to do about it.  The town has a murder mystery that's going to end up destroying it and Clare just might have it in her to solve it.  Except for the fact that she wants nothing more than to fit in in a new, and small, town.  What would her new friends think if they knew about what she could do?  Call her a freak?  Probably.  So not only is she torn about how to use her gift at home, she doesn't even know if she should be herself socially, if people will accept her for it.

I loved Clare.  I loved that she was so passionate about design, that she was so goal-oriented about making her passion work for her and how, at sixteen-years-old, she already as a small "business" selling her wares in her new home.  Her new friends love her style and all she wants to do is make the history of her family (and the supposed haunted house she lives in) go away and she does a pretty good job of it.  It also helps that most of the people she comes in contact with don't put as much emphasis on her family's past as she does.  Really she's just such a wonderful character that it was impossible for me to not immediately get on her side about everything.  And then the crap really started hitting the fan and she didn't have all the answers and actually had to do work herself (loved that! kind of rare in YA, unfortunately) I could actually feel her being torn about things, I could feel her desire to help but at the same time warring with herself about just what she could do.

Her love interest, Jake, I was less than impressed with.  He's set up to have a bad reputation from the beginning which, I think, is a fairly obvious red herring to some extent but he really didn't do much to put the kibosh on any of it.  He was temperamental, snapped at Clare a lot, gave her the cold shoulder after little more than a comment he wasn't thrilled with.  I did like the fact that Clare argued with herself over liking him, about how she shouldn't because there was something off about him.  At least she realized it but ultimately it didn't stop her which kind of irked me.  He did turn out to be a good guy but if it were me just the things he said and how he acted in the beginning would have been a total turn-off and not something I would have pursued.

HANGING BY A THREAD offers its own unique blend of supernatural and thriller to deliver a story that'll keep you sucked in from the beginning.  Balanced out by Clare's will to just have a normal life, it gives the story just enough grounding to keep it something believable as opposed to launching it into outer space.  It won't take very long before you start trying to put the pieces together and try and solve the mystery right along with Clare.  Even if you're not big into supernatural elements, Clare's ability isn't an overwhelming force in the story.  It serves it's purpose and it could have gotten out of control but Littlefield did an excellent job of reigning it in and keeping it relevant to the plot and making sure Clare didn't lose focus of it.  Of course the story wouldn't be what it is without Clare's gift but it moves things along without leading them along.

Just like YA needs more horror, it needs more thriller as well.  A story that focuses on THE STORY, where the main motivation, the main theme, is the thriller aspect.  Not romance, not angst, thriller.  HANGING BY A THREAD delivers not only all of this but blissfully leaves behind the love triangle for something, you know, more interesting.

Ban Factor: Medium - Banners would actually need to read the book to find anything objectionable, like teen murder and pre-marital kissing.  So this could rightly fly under the radar.

Three Delays by Charlie Smith

Published May 18, 2010.

Author website.

Billy Brent and Alice Stephens are star-crossed like all great lovers. Their need for each other drives them from Istanbul to Miami, Venice to Mexico. After years of encounters and escapes, they lose themselves deep in a desert wilderness, searching for a way forward, only to learn that sometimes the trail simply forks.  (amazon.com)

I scratched this one very early on, like a couple dozen pages in early on.  Really, I'm okay with literary.  I can handle it.  But there comes a point in literary where it stops being good to read and starts being a showcase of the author's perceived awesomeness and that's where my eyelids start to sag.  If I wanted to gaze at a naval I'd pick at my own.  Thanks.

Perhaps it was the incessant use of 'waked up' that made me want to murder puppies.  Yes, technically it's correct.  And technically it makes my ears bleed.  I don't know if this was the author trying to be quirky and use a little-used form of 'to wake' to make his writing stand out as OMG EDGE AND AWESOME.  Or if this was a means to showcase the inherent quirkiness of the MC, except it made Billy sound like a pretentious douche.  Either way I just couldn't take it.  After about five instances of the MC being 'waked up' I stopped. I don't care how awesomely quirky it makes anyone look.  I don't care if it's technically right.  It either makes one sound completely uneducated (who actually uses waked up for past tense? personally I'm on board the woke up train) or like a self-aggrandizing dick.  The former would be okay if the MC were actually uneducated.  He's not.  He's traveling Europe, getting high, existentially pondering life and spending SOMEONE'S money doing it.  Which files him into the latter category.  Gross.

Or maybe it was the meandering drug-induced hazed of a "plot" I kept trying to get involved in but it just seemed far too all over the place for me to keep track of.  Billy's trying to get back together with Alice despite the fact that she's married (what a stand-up guy) and his buddy contracted malaria or something and was hospitalized so the poor guy (the MC, not the sick friend) had to hop himself up on his own and there was a lot of drugs and stuff.  I didn't really see much of a point to it all and I certainly wasn't seeing any "star-crossed lovers" going on here.  Just Billy trying to harass some chick into leaving her husband for him.  The relationship looked pretty one-sided where I stood.

Nope, just wasn't into it.  The instances of 'waked up' were enough for me to DNF it but if that weren't a problem the spirograph plot would have kicked me out eventually.  I just didn't give a rat's ass about Billy and Alice was just a voice on the phone at the time I stopped.  Plus whatever plot there was seemed more focused on drugs and Billy dissecting his own thoughts than anything else.  Blah.  Not for me.

Ban Factor: High - Just for the drugs alone.  There are a lot of drugs.

YAckers Review: The Cry of the Icemark by Stuart Hill

Published April 1, 2009.

Author website.

The Icemark is a kingdom in grave danger. Its king has been killed in battle, its enemy lies in wait, and its fate rests on the shoulders of one girl. Thirrin Freer Strong-in-the-Arm Lindenshield, a beautiful princess and an intrepid warrior, must find a way to protect her land from a terrible invasion. She will forge an extraordinary alliance of noble Snow Leopards, ancient Vampires, and ferocious Wolf-folk. She will find unexpected strength in her friendship with a young warlock. And she will lead her allies to victory with her fierce battle cry: "Blood! Blast! And Fire!"  (goodreads.com)

Nicole was our Keeper of the Book for this month and she led us woefully astray.  She was the lone brave soul that was capable of venturing to the end of this tome for the rest of us gave up after varying amounts of pages ranging from five to 300.  None of us had too much of an issue with the plot per se but it couldn't seem to get out of its own way and Thirrin just wasn't that likable of a character.  In fact she was a bit of a snatch.  And she's barely fourteen.  Doom on her.

See what we had to say in full on our super awesome website.

Ban Factor: High - Blissfully Christianity free and filled with talking animals, werewolves and vampires, among other woodland creatures.  Not to mention a temperamental teen.  It's all too much!

Beyond by Graham McNamee

Pub date: September 11, 2012.

Author website.

Jane is not your typical teen. She and her best friend Lexi call themselves the Creep Sisters. Only Lexi knows why Jane is different from anyone else: Her own shadow seems to pull her into near-fatal accidents. Jane is determined to find out why these terrifying things happen, and to overcome her shadow enemy. Her sleuthing with Lexi connects her own horrors to the secret history of a serial killer.  (netgalley.com)

Hooray for YA horror!  Love it.

BEYOND taps into an aspect of horror that involves genuine creep factor.  It's not about how much gore the scary thing can create but just how scary it can be in and of itself.  Personally a shadow, YOUR shadow, that tries to kill you is pretty high up there.

Jane has been subject to a slew of horrific "accidents" all of her life, the most recent of which involve her shooting a nail out of a nail gun and into her head.  All because of her shadow.  Death has surrounded her her entire life.  Literally her entire life.  She was a still born that was resuscitated.  And for as long as she's known her shadow has been there trying to get her to kill herself.  I don't want to give too much away because I think the reasons behind all of these incidents are truly creepy and give new meaning to a near-death experience.  It's not all bright white light and happiness for some people.

Jane's a solid character that you can immediately get on board with as a reader.  Despite all of her insane accidents, and despite the rumors attached to her as a result, she leads a relatively normal life in terms of her own views of it.  She's not paranoid or overtly macabre.  She's grown so used to being so close to death that she's developed a nonchalance about it.  Almost a boredom.  She wants it gone already.   She wants to lead a REAL normal life, not just one where she tries to toe around a piece of her that's actually trying to kill her.

Lexi is the objective third party in the equation.  She fills in the gaps with Jane's lack of vision thanks to her sleep deprivation.  She serves a purpose, really.  I didn't like her nor dislike her.  I really didn't feel much either way.

But kudos to no love triangle and really no relationship at all!  Much to Jane's chagrin but that plays too much into the plot so I won't divulge.

BEYOND is another good addition to the YA horror market, adding in a decent ghost story where there's definitely a hell of a lot of room for it.  It'll make you look twice at your shadow and wonder what it's doing behind your back.  The notion of it thinking at all is pretty horrifying if I'm honest.

Ban Factor: High - Horror gets filed automatically high.  In this instance it's thanks to a killer shadow, a nail in a brain and a creep that buggers boys.

After the Snow by SD Crockett

Published March 27, 2012.

Author website.

Fifteen-year-old Willo was out hunting when the trucks came and took his family away. Left alone in the snow, Willo becomes determined to find and rescue his family, and he knows just who to talk with to learn where they are. He plans to head across the mountains and make Farmer Geraint tell him where his family has gone. 

But on the way across the mountain, he finds Mary, a refugee from the city, whose father is lost and who is starving to death. The smart thing to do would be to leave her alone -- he doesn't have enough supplies for two or the time to take care of a girl -- but Willo just can't do it. However, with the world trapped in an ice age, the odds of them surviving on their own are not good. And even if he does manage to keep Mary safe, what about finding his family?  (goodreads.com)

There are very few stylistic things that'll keep me from reading a book.  One is stream of consciousness.  Holy crap, even though we may not thing COMMA our natural thought process still involves pauses and full stops.  Let's use some punctuation.  Another is phonetic voice.  And I'm not talking about a few lines of dialogue; I mean the whole damn book written phonetically.  Personally I think it lends to a very clunky, awkward reading experience that's slow and labored and ultimately has me focusing more on how to say the words I'm reading than the story itself.  This is the only reason why I won't read BLOOD RED ROAD.  I don't care how good it is.  I can't read phonetic voice.  This has been a personal preference for over a decade now and thankfully it's very rare when I come across it.

Imagine my surprise when I open the pages of my ARC for AFTER THE SNOW.  I had zero indication that this could have been phonetic.  Had I known I would have absolutely passed on reading it for review.  It's just not a style I can swallow.  And AFTER THE SNOW is in a very southern voice so after a couple of pages Cletus made his way into my head and wouldn't get out.  I couldn't get past the voice.  In the couple dozen pages I tried to read I can't even tell you what happened.  I don't rightly know.  But the language is so embedded in my brain that I can't get rid of it.

The best example of why I just can't read this -

But he's my dad, like I said, and you got to respect your dad I reckon. My mum got dead when I been a baby still scrieking in my ass rags. That happen a lot up in here when the snow been deep and your breath freeze in the air. But Magda live with Dad now, up in our end of the house. Magda's in charge of the little kids, and I don't envy her that job. If it been me, I'm gonna bash them all.  (ARC page 6)

No.  Just . . . no.  I'm sorry.  No.  Not only is it incredibly stereotypical but it's overwhelming.  I can't read an entire book written like this and be expected to focus on anything other than the pronunciation of the words themselves.

So it's a DNF for stylistic reasons.  It could be the greatest story in the world.  I can't get past the phonetic voice.  Based on how popular BLOOD RED ROAD is I'm guessing a lot of people can.  Have at it, I say.

Ban Factor: Unknown - I could barely get past the words as they were written let along figure out what the hell was going on in the plot.

Jane and the Damned by Janet Mullany

Published September 28, 2010.

Author website.

Jane Austen 

Novelist . . . gentlewoman . . . Damned, Fanged, and Dangerous to know. 

Aspiring writer Jane Austen knows that respectable young ladies like herself are supposed to shun the Damned--the beautiful, fashionable, exquisitely seductive vampires who are all the rage in Georgian England in 1797. So when an innocent (she believes) flirtation results in her being turned--by an absolute cad of a bloodsucker--she acquiesces to her family's wishes and departs for Bath to take the waters, the only known cure. 

But what she encounters there is completely unexpected: perilous jealousies and further betrayals, a new friendship and a possible love. Yet all that must be put aside when the warring French invade unsuspecting Bath--and the streets run red with good English blood. Suddenly only the staunchly British Damned can defend the nation they love . . . with Jane Austen leading the charge at the battle's forefront.  (goodreads.com)

I was a little apprehensive to read JANE AND THE DAMNED after my failed attempt at EMMA AND THE VAMPIRES.  One, I hadn't read the blurb in a while so I was under the impression that it was a JANE EYRE remake and two, I haven't been thrilled with the writing style of books set in this era so it was setting itself up to fail for me.  It ultimately didn't and I enjoyed the plot but it had its faults and a lot of that hinged on the writing itself.

I didn't know why this story was about Jane Austen.  You'd think there'd be some kind of relevance to it but it rightly could have been some made-up character created strictly for the book and it wouldn't have made a bit of different.  So I was haunted by the question, "Why the hell is this Jane Austen?" throughout, making it a touch distracting.

That's not to say I didn't like Jane.  I did.  She was a very strong woman that, although reluctantly, embraced her vampirism and used it to fight the French when they invaded (a point to be dealt with in a moment).  She stood her own as a fighter and even as her fellow Damned looked down upon her as not only a fledgling but an orphaned one (her maker having abandoned her and she was adopted by another) she stood tall, pulling off feats that eventually made them proud.

The writing didn't really lend itself to telling the story well, though.  I felt the progression was jerky and I often found myself shoved out of the story due to a ragged transition from one scene to the next.  The language was trying a bit too hard and while I never found it stilted it lent to the crappy transitions that kept pulling me out of the story.

That's not to mention that as I was reading I had a niggling feeling that Napoleon's army invading Britain just didn't sound right.  Did it make for some good drama?  Of course.  Jane wouldn't have been able to become the fighter she did without someone to fight so steadfastly against.  But it didn't seem right.  Love the interwebs as it verified my unsettled thoughts: Napoleon was never actually able to get past the Royal Navy to fight on British land.  Talk about taking gross liberties with history to serve the plot.  It only puffs up the question as to why it had to be Jane Austen as the lead in this story.  I have a big problem with that.  Adding vampires to Jane Austen's life is one thing.  I was entertained by all of that.  But why bastardize history so much?  I don't get it.  Wait, I do get it: it served the plot.  And yes, this book is a work of fiction.  But holy crap Napoleon's army never invaded Bath nor took London.  It's a contrivance of epic proportions that I still just don't understand.  Too many questions and not enough answers.

I did finish JANE AND THE DAMNED, much to my surprise.  I enjoyed it and I ultimately came to like Jane and Luke together but Jane is a little too bi-polar for me.  She changed her mind about accepting her vampirism as often as she changed dresses and it was rough going trying to keep track of where her brain was in terms of not only her vampirism but her love of Luke.  It wavered too much for my liking.  She turned out to be a really strong heroine in terms of fighting capabilities and standing on her own but she ultimately had too much negative about her that, for the most part, cancelled it out.

I was entertained so the book served its purpose in that regard but it's incredibly historically inaccurate, I still have no idea why Jane Austen was the focusing character and the writing leaves a bit to be desired.  If you're looking for a light, entertaining read reminiscent of Austenian works with a bit more fangs and blood and don't have much else to read JANE AND THE DAMNED will probably whet your appetite.  Just don't expect it to do much else.

Ban Factor: High - Vampires and they're shown as hedonistically as possible to make it all the worse.  But our dear Jane has arguments with conscience that might appease the banners, however slightly.