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!!!

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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.

The Humming Room by Ellen Potter

Published February 28, 2012.

Author website.

Hiding is Roo Fanshaw's special skill. Living in a frighteningly unstable family, she often needs to disappear at a moment's notice. When her parents are murdered, it's her special hiding place under the trailer that saves her life. 


As it turns out, Roo, much to her surprise, has a wealthy if eccentric uncle, who has agreed to take her into his home on Cough Rock Island. Once a tuberculosis sanitarium for children of the rich, the strange house is teeming with ghost stories and secrets. Roo doesn't believe in ghosts or fairy stories, but what are those eerie noises she keeps hearing? And who is that strange wild boy who lives on the river? People are lying to her, and Roo becomes determined to find the truth. 


Despite the best efforts of her uncle's assistants, Roo discovers the house's hidden room--a garden with a tragic secret.  (goodreads.com)

To start off with fairness this is an MG read, not my forte but if the story sounds intriguing enough I'll snag it.  THE HUMMING ROOM fit this profile.  I keep a special place in my cockle area for things related to THE SECRET GARDEN so when I saw that this book was influenced by it I accepted it for review.  It was definitely a riveting story but the ending was abrupt, a blink and you miss it kind of thing that derailed the rest of the work for me perhaps a little more than what it should have.

Roo is an unfortunate case born to the wrong parents and as a result ends up in the care of her uncle who's more absent than present and keeps his kid locked up in his room for his sake, apparently.  It's a cyclical thing.  Phillip got depressed when his mother died and became bedridden but his father didn't really know what to do with himself and became more withdrawn, making them both more reclusive and fostering an environment of neglect and anti-social behavior.  Crappy situation.

Roo's a spunky little thing and doesn't put up with the crap that's been allowed to foster in this house and, as can probably be predicted, her presence riles things up, disrupts the otherwise fragile order of things.  THE HUMMING ROOM sticks pretty closely to THE SECRET GARDEN storyline so if you know the latter you'll know the steps Phillip takes and ends up with a reintroduction to his father and all of that.

Really it's a compelling story with the scene set magnificently.  The house, which is really an old children's hospital, is given this incredibly creepy air that'll give you the chills just reading it.  I mean how horrifying would it be to live in an old hospital where more children died than lived?  Seriously?  It may be Stephen King's wet dream but I sincerely doubt it's a child's first choice at a play place.  But I think that was the best part of THE HUMMING ROOM, Potter's ability to make Roo's surrounding shine.  Or cake them in cobwebs, as it were.  The setting itself was it's own character, from the personification of the river to the garden, everything was alive.

I felt Jack, the river boy, was ultimately irrelevant to the plot as a whole since the story really centered around Roo, Phillip and Roo's uncle.  He was a means to draw Roo out of her shell which precipitated the events that moved the story forward but he didn't have much else of a function.  Remove Jack from the story and I think it would have worked out just fine.

As for the end, like I said above, it was really abrupt and I felt it was resolved too easily, glossing over what could have been a really good healing period to see between Phillip and his father for a flash forward moment.  It plays into the nice resolution that I think a lot of MG novels have but as an outsider looking in it left me a bit unsatisfied.  I would have liked to have seen more.

Ultimately it's a read with a lot of ambiance that follows pretty closely to THE SECRET GARDEN premise.  It's a good story and you'll end up feeling a lot for Roo, I think, since she really is an unfortunate character and the adults are a little less than understanding towards her (you can start a drinking game for how many times they threaten to send her back to foster care as a means of discipline, effing terrible).  But she's a BIG character that, once she's out of her own shell, will pull others out of theirs as well.  She's goal-oriented and has an uncanny knack for hearing the earth thrive.  Kind of weird but it has it's part in the story.  A good story at that.

Ban Factor: Medium - The banners would actually have to read it but there's a lot of bucking adult instruction going on.  We wouldn't want to give children any ideas that they shouldn't always listen to adults, now would we?

YAckers Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Published September 27, 2011.

Author website.

Around the world, black hand prints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages—not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.


When one of the strangers—beautiful, haunted Akiva—fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?  (goodreads.com)

DAUGHTER OF SMOKE AND BONE ended up being a mixed bag for us YAcks.  I personally went into it thinking I'd love it so hard I'd slather the book in drool.  I was mistaken.  For many the appearance of Akiva was a total buzzkill and Madrigal is something most of us could have done without.  While the consensus was that the writing was pretty and filled with WORDS there was a bit of distance, to one degree or another, but it was supplemented by lovely world-building and some intriguing characters that require more face time in the sequel.  Lucky for Angie she wasn't the lone downer of this book, as she was totally expecting to be.

Steph (one of Sya's minions) was Keeper of the Book this month but seeing as how the YAcks have spawned their own website, we're all congregating over there now.  LOOK!  And just for visiting you get a bonus YAcked book, inadvertently slaughtered by us.  Sorry, THRONE OF GLASS.  You lose.

Ban Factor: High - Anything that bastardizes Christianity is an automatic fire starter.

Blade Song by JC Daniels

Pub date: August 1, 2012.

Author website.

Kit Colbana—half breed, assassin, thief, jack of all trades—has a new job: track down the missing ward of one of the local alpha shapeshifters. It should be a piece of cake.

So why is she so nervous? It probably has something to do with the insanity that happens when you deal with shifters—especially sexy ones who come bearing promises of easy jobs and easier money.

Or maybe it’s all the other missing kids that Kit discovers while working the case, or the way her gut keeps screaming she’s gotten in over her head. Or maybe it’s because if she fails—she’s dead.
If she can stay just one step ahead, she should be okay. Maybe she’ll even live long to collect her fee…  (netgalley.com)

BLADE SONG is a bit out of my normal reading repertoire but at the moment I'm all about branching out and I've been following Shiloh  since she unabashedly spoke her mind about the Sirengate debacle.  So throw all of that together and I wanted to read something by her and see what she was all about author-wise because I already thought she was pretty cool as a person.

JC Daniels is the pseudonym for Shiloh Walker who writes romances, among a bunch of other books.  It looks like she writes PNR under her Walker name as well as her Daniels name and I just don't know enough about her to know why she pseudonymously writes.  But needless to say my first Walker book was a Daniels book simply because the blurb appealed to me and it's right up my alley for some adult PNR (because the YA stuff makes me a touch homicidal).

Kit is your kick ass heroine that smarts off right from the get-go and at least has the know-how to realize she should really keep her mouth shut most of the time she allows it to open.  She's part Amazon that allows her to call her sword at a moment's notice even if it's not in the area and it also gives her some other heightened senses that help her out in tough times.  Her childhood was total crap and I really liked the way Daniels interspersed Kit's PTSD with her current job, sending her reeling into her past.  Not that PTSD is a good thing but it's authentic to the character.  For instance Kit spent a lot of time starving and injured in a pit at the hands of her grandmother.  When her and Damon come upon similar pits in the Everglades Kit starts flashing back.  I just felt those flashbacks were authentic.  I bought them and it added a new vulnerable depth to Kit that gave reason to her kick ass attitude.

I was a little less than thrilled with her speech.  I felt that her dialogue and slang was, at times, reaching and it grated on me a little bit but not enough to stop reading.  The story was fast-paced and entertaining enough that it carried me through what I didn't care for and let me just enjoy the story for it's entertainment value.  I'm finding I can do this more with adult books than YA, probably because I'm starting to burn out on YA, I think.

The writing itself was on the simple side in terms of words on the page and at times redundant but I still felt Kit was a fully fleshed out character.  I found her as real as could be, right along with all of the secondary characters that Daniels introduced, from the witches to the cats and even to the humans that she ended up interacting with.  They were barely there and when they were they were serving a purpose but they were fully realized.  I didn't feel like they were puppets in a show, merely there to serve Kit.  They helped her, as much as she needed it, but they all were ultimately their own entity.

I was less than thrilled with the romance.  There was a bit by the way of sexy times but it was an antagonistic relationship that you could see coming from the beginning.  And the way Damon kept referring to Kit as baby girl made me want to strangle something.  From what I got Kit wasn't all on board with that pet name either.  The progression of the romance was exceedingly fast for what ended up coming to fruition but ultimately I think the two actually work together.  They both antagonize and compliment each other in equal measure; neither are dependent on the other, both are a bit possessive (Damon a bit more so which I found off-putting) and both could hold their own.  So I was less than thrilled with it but I didn't wholly not like it either.

You know it's a good foray into adult PNR.  It satisfied a craving that I had for something different yet similar (how . . . vague of me) and not nearly as angsty as I've been getting with the YA crowd.  It was a good deviation from my otherwise norm.  It's definitely gritty and doesn't shy away from the themes it presents so if you're a bit weaker in the will area BLADE SONG might not be for you.  But if you're keen on some violence, a kick ass chick with some issues, a nominal amount of sexy times and a good set-up for the next book, BLADE SONG is your bag.  I didn't love it but I'll keep my eye our for more, that's for sure.

Ban Factor: High - Is that a joke?  Did you read the last paragraph?

Faking Faith by Josie Bloss

November 8, 2011.

Author website.

Dylan Mahoney is living one big unholy lie.


Thanks to a humiliating and painfully public sexting incident, Dylan has become the social pariah at her suburban Chicago high school. She's ignored by everyone--when she's not being taunted--and estranged from her two best friends. So when Dylan discovers the blogs of homeschooled fundamentalist Christian girls, she's immediately drawn into their fascinating world of hope chests, chaperoned courtships, and wifely submission.


Blogging as Faith, her devout and wholesome alter ego, Dylan befriends Abigail, the online group's queen bee. After staying with Abigail and her family for a few days, Dylan begins to grow closer to Abigail (and her intriguingly complicated older brother). Soon, Dylan is forced to choose: keep living a lie . . . or come clean and face the consequences.  (goodreads.com)

ALBATROSS set the bar pretty high when it came to Josie Bloss books so when I had the opportunity to review FAKING FAITH I jumped at it.  While it definitely didn't disappoint it didn't have the same impact for me as ALBATROSS did.  The latter had excellent timing (I'd just read TWILIGHT and it's anti really spoke to me) plus I connected with it on a deeply personal level.  FAKING FAITH was good; it was eye-opening but it took a pretty big suspension of disbelief to really get into the plot.  A teen faking her way into a fundamentalist Christian home?  I'm pretty sure they would have been able to sniff her out almost immediately.

Dylan screwed up royally, against the advice of her friends and her little inner Jiminy Cricket screaming at her that her uber-hot douche boyfriend was all wrong.  She ends up being a social pariah in a way I thought was a bit forced: in a drunken stupor she blows off her friends for this boy.  Instead of recognizing the act as just that, a drunken idiocy, her friends take it to heart and things escalate from there.  Blowing off happens, shunning occurs and then Dylan's relationship blows up in her face and she's all alone.

For some insane reason she retreats to the world of fundamentalist Christian girl bloggers and their seemingly far simpler way of living.  I can half understand something like that.  They live such an isolated life, free of cell phones and high school and all the other machinations of the modern age.  What Dylan doesn't really comprehend until she takes on the persona of Faith and visits her online friend's farm is that that kind of living comes at a price and she effectively shatters pieces of a family with her ignorance of their world and her insistence of hers.

It's very Lifetime movie-esque and your standard friend make-ups happen at the end.  Dylan realizes her life isn't terrible and sometimes simpler isn't better.  But what kind of bothered me, and I'm going to play devil's advocate here, is how the fundamentalist life is portrayed as ultimately wrong.  Yes, Abigail's father was a controlling dick that reveled in being the master of his domain.  Beau, Abigail's intended, is a creeper that needs to have his junk cut off and the women are 100% subservient to the men, subject to doing only womanly duties and being married to someone her father chooses only.  Yeah, those things suck.  But this is a belief system.  In this world we live in now we view it as wrong.  Women are strong, independent beings that can make our own choices in life.  I mean the Crusades were fought because one set of people felt another set believed the wrong thing.  Bam!  War.  What happens if this kind of structure is what's holding these people together?  What if releasing them into the greater world is what unravels them?  Is their belief system still wrong?  Yes, Abigail was clearly not looking forward to her life with Beau but she stood by her convictions.  This was what was right FOR HER.  Dylan didn't understand that.  Hell, I don't understand it.  But it's HER choice.  She is actively making it even with Dylan sitting there offering her help on a silver platter.

The book painted really good juxtapositions between Dylan's and Abigail's family.  Yes, the fundamentalist Christians are extremes (arranged marriage?  really?  NOW?) but they are a cohesive family unit.  The children were far better behaved than many "normal" children, they ate meals together, the survived together.  They functioned as a unit.  Dylan's family had every freedom of the modern world but they barely knew each other.  Family time?  Right.  Sure they sat at the same table to eat cereal but there were always laptops and smartphones involved.  Dylan even points these polarities out and it's something she came to really love about Abigail's family despite their faults.  As a result Bloss really begs the question: which is the correct life?  Or is it something in between?

FAKING FAITH is a novel that will definitely make you think.  It paints the extremes as very extreme but neither are without their pros or cons.  You see the happiness of both and you see the pitfalls of both.  There is a slant, of course, but I'd think it'd be hard to write something like this without swaying at least a little.  It's a good contemporary with it's crux centering around the pervasive notion of the internet and how is can ruin people.  How running and hiding from your problems only manifests all new ones.  How the only way to fix things is to confront them head on.

Like I said, very Lifetime but still a good story if you can tuck back the notion that Dylan can lie her way into someone's home like that to begin with.  Another extreme but I don't think it was handled too absurdly.  Her obsession with the online culture was portrayed far better, I think, but the plot needed Dylan to immerse herself in it wholly. And she did.  At least it worked out in the end.

Ban Factor: High - This book basically destroys the ideal life of the religious right, read: banners.  No likey.

I'm adding FAKING FAITH to my Summer Blast Giveaway so if you want a chance to win it be sure to enter!

Love Drugged by James Klise + Giveaway!

Published September 8, 2010.

Author website.


Fifteen-year-old Jamie Bates has a simple strategy for surviving high school: fit in, keep a low profile, and above all, protect his biggest secret--he's gay. But when a classmate discovers the truth, a terrified Jamie does all he can to change who he is. At first, it's easy. Everyone notices when he starts hanging out with Celia Gamez, the richest and most beautiful girl in school. And when he steals an experimental new drug that's supposed to "cure" his attraction to guys, Jamie thinks he's finally going to have a "normal" life.


But as the drug's side effects worsen and his relationship with Celia heats up, Jamie begins to realize that lying and using could shatter the fragile world of deception that he's created-and hurt the people closest to him.  (goodreads.com)

LOVE DRUGGED was kind of a sad book to read.  Not that it actually made me sad but it was sad to see a boy so uncomfortable with himself that he'd be willing to pop unknown pills and suffer through some horrifying side effects just to be "normal."  But I guess it's true, isn't it?  Even the author admitted in his blurb at the end, that if given the chance when he was Jamie's age he would have taken Dr. Gamez's wonder pills and see if they helped.  The fictional character and the real one can't be the only ones.  In a world where being gay is okay only depending on where you live and who's around you, I can see it being double hard for a teenager, who's just trying to fit in, to want to do everything he can to blend in with the crowd.  It just hurts to read that Jamie took such drastic measures to do it.

Jamie is a compelling character and I was definitely right there, sitting on his shoulder, begging him to not get involved with those pills.  They were ultimately far more hurtful than just having some scary physical effects.  Honestly I'm not surprised the story went where it did.  When you have people that believe that treating homosexuality is akin to getting rid of allergies, it puts their moral stance firmly into perspective.  So when the poo smacked against the rotating device I can't say I was surprised.  I'm kind of shocked that Jamie didn't see it coming but really, he was a bit involved in convincing himself that the pills were working.

What I didn't really understand was why Jamie's parents were the way they were; idea people that got good starts and then fell flat on their faces, ending up being, for the most part, fiscal screw-ups that just couldn't get their shit together.  I wouldn't be so hung up about it if it weren't such a prominent part of the story.  And I'm still unsure as to why.  Them being that way ultimately didn't serve a purpose, it didn't hurt or hinder them as characters.  But Klise was insistent that they were less than stellar financially and they ended up in this position because they couldn't get it together.  Maybe it was a round about way of focusing blame?  If they hadn't moved there Jamie would have never come across those drugs?  Or maybe it was a means of helping him, that final step.  Maybe if they were more stable, Jamie would have felt even greater pressure to be "a man" and wouldn't have found himself.  I don't know.  I'm still trying to sort it out.

I liked LOVE DRUGGED.  It was a strong read that pulled me from one cover to the other.  I was always afraid that Jamie would get found out or he'd get outed outside of his control or the situation would just get away from him entirely.  The plot was always right there in teetering on the edge of everything collapsing.  It did that for most of the story, actually.  And as a result it was only a matter of time before it came crumbling down.  It's a story about a teenager finding himself, and doing some really drastic things to do it.  Sure, it can be just like so many other stories out there.  But it's not.  It's so much more drastic than that.

Ban Factor: High - A book that deals with homosexuality and acceptance.  Whoa!  That's way too damaging for such young eyes!

Giveaway time!!!

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

• 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, Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, Tumblr.
• Giveaway ends June 14th at midnight, EST.

YAckers Review: Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins

Published March 2, 2010.

Author website.

Three years ago, Sophie Mercer discovered that she was a witch. It's gotten her into a few scrapes. Her non-gifted mother has been as supportive as possible, consulting Sophie's estranged father--an elusive European warlock--only when necessary. But when Sophie attracts too much human attention for a prom-night spell gone horribly wrong, it's her dad who decides her punishment: exile to Hex Hall, an isolated reform school for wayward Prodigium, a.k.a. witches, faeries, and shapeshifters. 

By the end of her first day among fellow freak-teens, Sophie has quite a scorecard: three powerful enemies who look like supermodels, a futile crush on a gorgeous warlock, a creepy tagalong ghost, and a new roommate who happens to be the most hated person and only vampire student on campus. Worse, Sophie soon learns that a mysterious predator has been attacking students, and her only friend is the number-one suspect. 

As a series of blood-curdling mysteries starts to converge, Sophie prepares for the biggest threat of all: an ancient secret society determined to destroy all Prodigium, especially her.  (goodreads.com)

I went into this one a little apprehensively.  A boarding school book???  I screeched to my fellow YAckers.  Surely you hate me so.  Alas, not true and I was pleasantly surprised at the lightheartedness HEX HALL spits forth.  Almost in the vein of Mari Mancusi with her BLOOD COVEN series, just not nearly as satirical.  Sophie has a great, spunky little voice, the bitches are extra bitchy and there's a dude named Archer.  I'm pretty sure he was born with suede patches grafted onto elbows.  Cal was my guy.  If there's more of him that's a pretty surefire way of getting me to read on in the series.

Find out what the rest of us YAckers had to say over at Melissa's blog, Book Nut, as she was our Keeper of the Book for this past month.

Ban Factor: High - Magic, demons and teen-level sexy times in a musty basement.  I can hear the squealing already.

Cate of the Lost Colony by Lisa Klein + Giveaway!

Published October 12, 2010.

Author website.

Lady Catherine is one of Queen Elizabeth's favorite court maidens--until her forbidden romance with Sir Walter Raleigh is discovered. In a bitter twist of irony, the jealous queen banishes Cate to Raleigh's colony of Roanoke.  (goodreads.com)

Every once in a while I'll come across a nice book.  Just something that when you finish reading it you go, "that was nice."  Something that isn't overly thrilling or phenomenal but it definitely wasn't bad either.  It was nice.  CATE OF THE LOST COLONY was a nice, pleasant read that had a good voice I could get hooked into, just interesting enough of a plot line to be engaging and a satisfying ending.  Nice.

Cate is a fallen child once of nominally prominent parents who are both dead and have left her with relatives that look at her as nothing more than a burden.  When Queen Elizabeth calls her to court to be a Lady, Cate's life starts looking up, until the love interest comes along.

Cate isn't too much of a character that steps outside of the society's role for a woman.  She's well-educated, as someone of her standing would be, but she's also timid, she falls in line and she's everything a well-meaning Lady should be.  I didn't find any of her actions prior to her exile to be out of character for the setting and actually it was quite nice to NOT read something like that.  Usually you end up with a character that totally bucks the system despite how unnatural it looks and how unlikely it should have been.  Enter Ralegh (spelled without the 'i' in the story) and she gets a little more brazen, gets a little bit more of a mouth but really it was only in a situation where she knew she pretty much had nothing left to lose.  She was smart too.  Really, I liked Cate.  She was real and I believed every ounce of her curious character.

I loved her even more for how she handled the relationship with Ralegh.  It could have gone so many ways, many of which would have had be ripping out my hair and screaming into a pillow.  I still have a full head of hair.  That should be telling.  The relationship culminates, officially, at the end of the story and it ends up being REALISTIC.  Dear god, I loved it.  I do not want to spoil but I was definitely going YES!!! reading it.  I couldn't help myself.  It was another testament to Cate's strength, and her weaknesses, and I loved it.

Klein painted such a vivid picture of the time that I could see every little piece of story going on as it unfolded before me.  From the wrinkles at the corners of the queen's eyes to the conditions in the Indian camp, I saw, felt, breathed it all.  Again, it was real and oh so nice.  Nothing was glamorized or romanticized, although Cate's head was a little bit in the clouds before she got to Roanoke but that balloon was quickly burst once winter came.

The ending also made an intriguing possibility to the mystery behind Roanoke and why or how all those people disappeared.  Not going to spoil but this ending totally made sense.  Men and their pride, let me tell you.  And no, it has nothing to do with a demon virus.

So yeah.  It was just a nice book.  Not too heavy on action or suspense or romance.  But there was enough of all of that to string the plot along in a good, easy read that was intriguing until the end.  I really don't think anyone would be disappointed in CATE OF THE LOST COLONY, especially if you like historical fiction.  A well-built world with heinously realistic characters, the past will pop right off the page the second you start reading.

Ban Factor: Low - No sex, no swearing and there's a virgin queen.  Unless banners have something against Native Americans (which they very well could), this one should be on the safe list.

Giveaway time!!!

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

• 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, Twitter or Facebook.
• Giveaway ends May 10th at midnight, EST.

Werewolves: The Occult Truth by Konstantinos

Published September 8, 2010.

Author website.

How does one become—or kill—a werewolf? Where do our modern shapeshifting stories come from? Are werewolves real? The truth is much stranger than fiction.

Werewolves investigates the centuries-old myths and compelling evidence surrounding these enigmatic beasts of literary fame. Explore four types of werewolves—involuntary, voluntary, other-dimensional beings, and astral—plus Native American beliefs, ancient legends from cultures worldwide, true stories of sightings, and scientific theories. From shamanistic practices and curses to drug-induced hallucinations and serial-killer werewolves, this book will tantalize readers. Also includes authentic rituals for werewolf transformation! (goodreads.com)

I reviewed another of Konstaninos's books, VAMPIRES: THE OCCULT TRUTH, a couple years ago and I just re-read it to see what I felt of that title against what I feel about WEREWOLVES.

The tone is the same, which I really liked. Konstantinos approaches the subject as a skeptic and isn't ashamed about it. He brushes aside the more frivolous, Hollywood aspects of werewolf lore and delves pretty deeply the hardcore legends from a bunch of different cultures, including European, Native American and some Asian cultures. It was interesting reading about werewolf aspects that I didn't know much, if anything at all, about before. He has a definite sway as to which werewolf mythos he believes in which is fine. In reality it's the one that makes the most sense but it's a point that he brings home, however subtly, from the beginning.

Konstantinos's voice didn't have any of that dryness I mentioned in the VAMPIRES book, another good thing. I think WEREWOLVES was more succinct and to the point than its predecessor and didn't spend as much time dwelling on the technical. That might also be because there wasn't too much technical to delve into since werewolves are even more mythical than vampires.

As with VAMPIRES, WEREWOLVES does contain letters from his readers detailing their "experiences" either with or as werewolves but they're pretty much as clear as footage of Bigfoot or an acid trip. They really only lent further credit to Konstantinos's theory that werewolf experiences are more psychological than anything.

What really bothered me about WEREWOLVES, though, and it doesn't appear that I had this issue with VAMPIRES, was Konstantinos's constant name-dropping of his own books. That got really grating. It felt like it was at least once a chapter he was mentioning another of his titles, VAMPIRES especially. It just seemed . . . tacky. And a cheap way to advertise and try to hook people into his other books. I've only read the one and I did like it but I was put off by WEREWOLVES by his advertising.

Overall another good reference book for people on the more serious track of werewolf myths and legends. There's nothing TWILIGHT-ish about this one; it's just a journey into myth history. But it's enlightening all the same. As someone that really isn't into werewolves all that much, it was interesting reading about all the different types and their histories. It all goes so far beyond what Hollywood has taken upon itself to show us that it's barely recognizable. But just beware of his name-dropping. It happened enough that it really started to grate on me.

But i Love Him by Amanda Grace + Giveaway

Published May 8th, 2011.

Author website.

Ann was a smiling straight-A student and track star. But after she meets Connor, it all changes. She surrenders everything to be with him, and by graduation, her life has become a dangerous high-wire act. One mistake could trigger Connor's rage, a senseless storm of cruel words and violence damaging everything--and everyone--in its path. (goodreads.com)

At the beginning I was really afraid that I wasn't going to be able to finish because of Ann's voice. Just this very submissive, rationalizing, excuse-making person telling this story and that was ALL of the story (meaning no sidebars or alternate lines, just pure domestic violence for 90% of it), I didn't know if I could take it. Not because it was so hard to read but because it was so infuriating. Weakness angers me and to read about girls and women in this situation really irks me because they just lay down and take it. I don't understand why. Of course there's a psychological reason and all of that, personal history and whathaveyou. But how can a person get to such a low point that they equate love with physical and verbal abuse? I can sympathize but I'm nowhere near empathizing. I seriously don't think I'm capable because it's a notion that's so far from my logic center that I can't comprehend.

And this is coming from someone that has had domestic abuse in her family (an aunt), someone who died from that abuse. I support groups that advocate for abused women and children. But it doesn't mean I don't look at it and go "why do you allow this?" I can't help it. Why do these women see themselves as so worthless?

And you really see it in Ann. And Connor's mom. It's a cycle you knew would be there, Connor growing up in a violent home where his father railed on him and his mother, where he protected his mother as opposed to the other way around. This was built as a means of garnering some level of understanding or sympathy for Connor, to show him as something more than just an abuser. He has a history. This may explain why.

Except for me it's making excuses for him. It's removing his choice to stop the violence and making him, really, not all that responsible for his actions. I can't accept that. Throughout the book Connor was so adamant to not be like his father but he fell right into the trap. He didn't HAVE to hit Ann. He didn't HAVE to devalue her like he watched his father do to his mother. But he did. After caring for his mother the whole time, he CHOSE to inflict the same pain on Ann. Sorry, but that's what I believe. Being a wife-beater isn't a genetic disorder or a heredity disease. While I'm not denying passing on personality traits, flying fists, to me, don't fit in that realm. Punching is not an involuntary biological reaction. Insulting someone isn't an involuntary biological reaction. People CHOOSE to do these things.

Ann is a very lonely girl. When her father died her mother basically retreated into herself and shut Ann out. Ann says that her mother had barely acknowledged her in years, no hugs, no I love yous, nothing. That is a terrible way to be raised and it's really no wonder she fell into the first relationship she came upon with a guy. And she fell hard and fast. Someone that starved for affection? Connor was the perfect sponge for her. Too bad he was a douche. But even with all of that, I still don't understand why she stayed.

The story is told backwards, according to the information in the back of the book, in order to get a better perspective on the situation. Grace/Hubbard claims that stories like this in chronological order can get people victim-blaming because you get to see the events unfold and you can pick out where the relationship went wrong. When it's backwards that moment becomes unclear and you can't really see where it went too wrong. Is there one major moment? No. But Connor's possessiveness and control issues at the beginning should have been a clue. Except that's what Ann wanted, to some extent. Connor loves her after a month? Yes! Finally, love! Any love! I'm not saying she asked for any of this but someone that starved for attention probably wouldn't see what the real deal was until it was far too late. And that was the case with Ann.

It wasn't a bad story but I have a hard time connecting with these types of tales to begin with, as I said above. They interest me but the overarching story and the voice really need to hit right for it to blow me away. I really wasn't blown away by BUT I LOVE HIM but it's definitely an eye-opening book. No one should have to go through this and I hope any woman that reads it takes something away from it. Some little sticky note of a sign that she can reference later. It was difficult to see Ann get beaten over and over again but for me it was even harder to watch her sit there and take it. I still can't stop asking why. Even though it didn't strike me as hard as others on a purely personal level, I'd still recommend BUT I LOVE HIM to pretty much anyone. It's still a good book.

Ban Factor: High - A teen girl gets the snot beat out of her. This topic is far too graphic for banner children.

Giveaway time!!!

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

• 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: RSS, GFC, Goodreads, Twitter, Facebook.
• Giveaway ends April 4th at midnight, EST.

YAckers Review: Liesl & Po by Lauren Oliver

Published October 4, 2011.

Author website.

Liesl lives in a tiny attic bedroom, locked away by her cruel stepmother. Her only friends are the shadows and the mice—until one night a ghost appears from the darkness. It is Po, who comes from the Other Side. Both Liesl and Po are lonely, but together they are less alone.

That same night, an alchemist's apprentice, Will, bungles an important delivery. He accidentally switches a box containing the most powerful magic in the world with one containing something decidedly less remarkable.

Will's mistake has tremendous consequences for Liesl and Po, and it draws the three of them together on an extraordinary journey. (goodreads.com)

Ultimately it ended up being a lovely story but it just felt something was missing. And really I think it was. The characters just weren't built up enough and the story didn't reach it's full potential. But it was still nice. I enjoyed reading it and so did my fellow YAckers. But I think our mindset was so fixed on YA that we kept forgetting this was a middle grade story. Read our thoughts over at our substitute Keeper of the Book's place, Laura at A Jane of All Reads.

Ban Factor: Medium - It's got magic in it but it's almost as light and fluffy as Cinderella so it would depend on how smart the reading banner was. Which is an oxymoron.

Escaping Titanic by Marybeth Lorbiecki, illustrated by Kory S. Heinzen

Pub date: February 1, 2012.

Author website.

Commemorate the Titanic's disastrous voyage with this harrowing tale of survival. Follow the true story of young Ruth Elizabeth Becker as her awe of the mighty Titanic turns to horror when she is separated from her mother and siblings. (netgalley.com)

I think I've reviewed all of two picture books in my three years of blogging so forgive me if this comes across as a little too short. I just don't know what to say about it!

Well, I loved the illustrations. At times they were both beautiful and goofy, capturing the majesty of the Titanic along with the people sailing on it. But I couldn't help but think that for a story that really is so serious, the expressions on some of the faces were a little too cartoony and goofy. One panel showed one of the stewards coming into the room and telling everyone to get their lifebelts on. But instead of a serious face, he looks a bit cross-eyed. Yeah it makes the scene lighter and I know it's a picture book but still . . . it almost seemed . . . inappropriate. I don't know if this is something typical of a picture book, to lighten up a more dramatic scene with untoward facial expressions so as not to frighten the children reading it but it felt a little off.

The story itself was succinct. It would be a bit morbid to think that the girl was doing anything but surviving the end of the story so you knew it was coming but that doesn't mean there wasn't a tense moment where she was left on a ship as she watched the rest of her family get lowered in a lifeboat. And then when the lifeboats are rescued you wonder if she's going to find her family. For about half a second. The story is really in the illustrations, the words acting merely as captions to supplement the visuals. It's not that they're bad; there's just more to be garnered from the drawings.

As a childless 28-year-old female reading a picture book, I've come across better. The story's a little dry and the illustrations are a bit bipolar but it was still enjoyable to this Titanic nut. From the POV of a child reading this, I can definitely see how they would really enjoy the pictures and how the small story itself would suck them right in, how they would hinge on every word and wonder if the girl was going to make it out okay. Damn jadedness. Personally I was more interested in the information about Ruth at the end of the story. How she never told anyone that she was a Titanic survivor until 1982 when the wreckage started getting poked at and she came forward about it. That's a long time to sit on something like that.

So really, there's something for everyone. A great story for the kids and a little bit of extra information for the adults reading it to them. Plus some great pictures for all.

Ban Factor: Low - Seriously. Unless they take issue with the mention of people's screaming death throes (although watered down a bit in the book), there's nothing wrong with this one.

In Trouble by Ellen Levine

Published September 28, 2011.

Jamie and Elaine have been best friends forever, and now they’re finally juniors in high school. Elaine has a steady boyfriend, and Jamie could have one—if she'd just open her eyes and see Paul. But Jamie has a bigger problem to worry about.

Then Elaine gets "in trouble"—something they thought only happened to "other" girls. Are there any good choices for a girl in trouble? (goodreads.com)

Carolrhoda Lab does it again with another gripping story that I get to gush about. Although I will say this is probably my least favorite out of the CL books I've read. I still think very highly of it but I do feel it was lacking something that the other CL books had, mainly depth.

The situation that Jamie and Elaine go through is terrifying. Hell, it's terrifying now, let alone 60 years ago where you were either biblically virginal or a whore, irrespective of what happened to you to get into that "in trouble" position. Elaine's problem was really front and center and while it pulled me in, it also pushed me away from Jamie a bit, and it was her story. So a bit of a flaw in the story-telling. You could really feel for Elaine through Jamie. You could feel her impossible situation but at the same time you could feel Jamie's helplessness when it came to helping her friend. Elaine was a bit lost when it came to the other half of the problem and I know I got frustrated right along with Jamie when Elaine just couldn't see the forest for the trees.

And then things start opening up about Jamie. The little flashes seen throughout the story come to light and things start to click into place. That horror that was projected onto Elaine comes right back around to Jamie. Her situation's different, though. Jamie had more support and options. But here's where I think the story starts to fizzle, when it really gets into Jamie's problem.

Jamie attempts to terminate her problem on her own which results in some terrible moments in the story and I will say I had some tears but the story reached a point where it just zoomed by and before I knew it it was over. It left me wanting more and I think considering the situation of the plot, it would have rendered that. Instead there's a fade to black moment, some skimming and the end of the story. It's Jamie's story but as a reader I was never privy to Jamie coming to terms with her decisions. She made them, yes, but any repercussions she had were skipped over. I think the story could have been so much more had those issues been drawn out more.

IN TROUBLE really is a good story and a quick read but I think it's quickness does more against it than for it. That depth that I think is required for such a topic is absent and the focus is really on the wrong person. And then the story ends far too abruptly to have any real resolution. But it's still good. I liked what I was reading. I could connect with Jamie and I felt everything she did. But overall IN TROUBLE lingered on story elements that should have been shorter and dashed by moments that should have been more drawn out. I ended up feeling a little robbed at the end. I wanted more, especially for the topic. Yes, it sucked what women had to go through back then when they got "in trouble" and it's because of that that I don't feel it should have been glossed over when it got to be Jamie's turn.

Still, I'd recommend to read IN TROUBLE. Just keep in mind going in that for the topic, the story doesn't go very deep.

Ban Factor: High - Teen pregnancy. That's all you need to know. Context doesn't matter. It's all about premarital sex and teen babies.

Contagion by Joanne Dahme

Published October 5, 2010.

Rose Dugan is a young and beautiful woman living in Philadelphia in the late 19th century passionate about keeping Philadelphia’s water reservoir clean and healthy. But when Rose starts receiving threatening letters, warning her to convince her husband to shut down his plans for a water filtration system or else, things take a turn for the worse. A conspicuous murder and butting heads cause Rose to search for the culprit, the truth, and a way to keep the people of Philadelphia safe from contagion in more ways than one. (goodreads.com)

I almost gave up on this one. Am I glad I stuck it out? Meh. It was okay. What had me wanting to put it down originally was the language. Names were heinously overused in dialogue and for me, that really stands out. People don't say each other's names when talking to each other that often. It just ends up sounding stilted and it was used so much that it grated on me enough to want to walk away. Plus the plot was really lagging at the beginning. It didn't seem to be going anywhere and it was heavily involved in the intricacies of water filtration. Good on the author for knowing her stuff, but I think far too much of that knowledge was transferred to the page unnecessarily. There were points where it really bogged down the plot and I started not wanting to pick up the book again when I put it down.

But once Nellie died, everything picked up and the suspense held me to the page enough that I wanted to keep reading. Just barely. Another pervasive irk was the insistence of people's clothing. Regardless of the POV, both Rose and Sean were exceptionally detailed about what people were wearing. Again, good on the author for being historically accurate, but again I think it was a little too much knowledge transferred to the page for my liking. I got the images the first time around. By the 25th time, I was over it. But the plot, once it picked up with Nellie's death, I was able to push aside these issues that I had and it kept me engaged in the story.

For all of the rather useless information that was dumped throughout, Dahme definitely knows how to write suspense. I absolutely wanted to know if Sean had ulterior motives and if Patrick really was the slime that he appeared to be. I really did want to find out who was behind Nellie's death and whether Patrick's faithful housemaid was just a bit touched or if she was really dangerous.

Really, the best part was how Dahme connected something as innocuous as water filtration to something sinister. It's so subtle yet so horrifying but absolutely believable. In people's bids for power and money, I wouldn't put it past them to make sacrifices out of others. It's been done before and I have no doubt it'll be done again. So while Dahme was heavy-handed with the water works information at the beginning, it did serve a bit of a purpose later on in the story. I think it would have been just as effective without so much but since she's heavy into Philadelphia's water treatment herself, I think it's only natural that it would be front and center in a story like this.

The most infuriating part of the story for me was Rose's insistence at defending her husband despite all of the evidence overwhelming him. Maybe it was a voice of the time, which I do believe. But I'd like to think that even women who were bred to stand by their man would exhibit some kind of independent thought. And since we get to be in Rose's head for half the story, you'd be able to see if something like that cropped up. But how she'd melt at a touch from her husband and forget her worries made me want to scream. I couldn't stand it. It did get very bad towards the end and really colored my vision of Rose but keeping the time in mind, I'm wondering how many options she actually had.

The ending I found both too easy and nominally satisfying. It's a decent juxtaposition. I don't want to spoil it so I'll just say that it wrapped up really abruptly and I think it gave Rose an easy way out. It saved her from actually having to fight and stand up to anyone. That bothered me. But at the same time she did stand up to people, as much as a woman of that time could. So can I really fault her for not being stronger? I don't know. But I was, in some part of me, satisfied with the ending. It rounded out the story nicely and left Rose's life open. It ended in a good spot.

Overall, the suspense was good and if you stick with the plot, it will pick itself up pretty nicely. The story had it's pitfalls but the plot was good enough to just cancel all of that out. Not one of my favorite reads but I'd recommend it just to see how good suspense can be.

Ban Factor: Low - Another historical set in one of the prissiest times in American history. They're really digging if they find something they contest in this one.

Stories for Nighttime and Some for the Day by Ben Loory

Published July 26, 2011.

Loory's series of forty short stories, with their stripped and finely-tuned prose, weave seamlessly between the dream world and reality, between light-hearted anecdotes and nightmarish fables. In Loory's world, trees walk and talk while an octopus lives in the next door apartment. Televisions sing opera, men find invisible crowns, and books without words are best-selling novels. His tales introduce the reader to people living among monsters, skydiving moose, Martians that keep house, and quiet men who write poetry, all finding themselves in bizarre and sometimes terrifying situations. Despite the great diversity of these stories, the characters are tied to each other-and the reader-by the familiar emotions of fear, desire, and the consequence of action. Not always as it seems, these strange characters and places invariably show us ourselves, leaving us to question the limits of human morality, perception, and truth. (netgalley.com)

The blurb there really pulled me in. A collection of short stories with a little bit of horror, a little bit of sci-fi, a little bit of everything. It sounded right up my alley. And it really wasn't bad but it left me wanting. Not necessarily more stories but more out of the stories that were already in there.

There's a thin thread of similarity among all of the stories - there's something not right about them. Whatever it is, the ending will twist. The degree of that twist isn't always the same but they're strung together by a hint of the macabre in each. That I really did like. There wasn't a story in this anthology that I didn't like.

Kind of in that same vein they were so short that I think that was a big reason why I couldn't find one that I didn't like. All of them had enough to pull me in and hold on to me, with endings that were more often than not abrupt but still provided a punch. But at the same time they were so short that, for a lot of them I felt like I couldn't get too much out of them. There were some that did well as short stories, written succinctly and that the voice did it a service. One that really stands out in my head is with a little boy crawling through a water tunnel trying to find the end and getting stuck. The ending to that one is phenomenal.

But by the end of STORIES I was a little done with the writing. It's a very simple type of style that I think works really well in small doses and fit many of Loory's shorts but reading one after another in the same tone just got a little boring for me. While the subjects of the stories differed, the voice was the same in every single one of them. Aside from the short I mentioned above, not too many others really stood out to me because the voice blended them all together. I would have liked to have seen different tones for the different stories in STORIES. I think it would have made them pop a little more and differentiated each a little better.

But I would really recommend this one. It's short and to the point and really, the shorts are pretty good with some really good twists. But the voice just got to me after a while. I was looking for something different by the end. I know a lot of people like that simpler way of storytelling, straightforward and to the point with zero fat, and like I said above, it can fit, but it was a bit of an overkill here. I would have liked either a shorter book or a greater tonal variety. But still, read it. The stories are great and all are some level of creepy. Just keep your eye out for the voice. The one lone voice throughout the anthology. You might be better able to stomach it than I could but even if not, I'm sure you'll still like what you're reading.

Ban Factor: Medium - The creepiness in these stories is of the subtle variety so it would take your smarter than normal banner to pick up on that. Never say never.