Book Review - The Monstrumologist, by Rick Yancey

Man-eating monsters! Grave robbers! Senseless violence! Worm infestations! Victorian manners! This Printz honor book is purported to have it all, and indeed it does. In fact, I’d argue that it has almost a little too much. Despite the occasional slouching towards gratuitousness, though, this is an extraordinarily fun book if you like monsters and don’t mind some gore.

The book is presented as a three-volume diary of one Will Henry, who served as the young apprentice to a New England “Monstrumologist,” Dr. Pellinore Warthrop, in the late 19th century. The folios recount a particular instance when a new “project” landed on Warthrop’s doorstep: a marauding pack of anthropophagi, a huge, cunning, and merciless variety of predator that normally resides in Africa. Ever the dutiful assistant, Will Henry follows Dr. Warthrop (along with a mysterious English colleague of the doctor’s) from their macabre laboratory to a lonely cemetery, a stinking asylum, and even into the bowels of the earth hunting the monsters, even as innocent bystanders are ruthlessly torn apart and eaten during the search. The mystery of the anthropophagi, however, may lead a lot closer than the distant savannas of Benin.

The ambiance of the story is perfect, and there is a wonderful interplay between the affected gentlemanliness of Warthrop, the distinctly Dickensian Will Henry, and the truly nightmarish scenarios they inhabit. The resulting mood of the book is slow-burning and genuinely tense, without ever (in my opinion) getting boring. The prose does get a little flowery when Will Henry ruminates on the nature of his mentor, or tries to make sense of the horrific things he has to experience. Then again, that makes sense, given the idea that this story is supposedly a journal transcription. Besides, I’m a vocabulary nerd, and Yancey’s writing is evocative and beautifully constructed, so I can forgive the frequent journeys into exposition.

This is not a book for young or squeamish readers, though. Even forewarned as I was, the level of gore in the book surprised me. I don’t necessarily have a problem with the depictions of the anthropophagus attacks, as their ferocity lent a sense of bloody urgency to the gothic atmosphere of the story. But some of the other scenes- the fate of Hezekiah Varner, the lingering over the deaths of young children, and the weird fixation on literal and metaphorical virgin sacrifices, for instance - seem to veer into the territory of shock for shock’s sake, which always strikes me as a little lazy (and has me mourning the current state of horror cinema).

That being said, though, Yancey treads the line between fun and over-the-top very well. While things occasionally get ridiculous, the entire story is deadly earnest, and there are plot reasons (or, at least, solid thematic writing) behind every bit of violence. I had a great time reading it, and while I’m not lying awake at night, I’m still thinking about some of the climactic moments. This is a great read for horror fans, teen or adult, that aren’t afraid of being revolted.

Verdict: 4 / 5

Book Review - A Confusion of Princes, by Garth Nix

I’ve been on a distinct science fiction jag lately, and I’ve noticed that hard sci-fi is starting to pop up more often in YA lit, which makes me extremely happy. I’ve never read Nix before, but Sabriel has been on my to-read pile for quite some time. Even without his name attached, though, I would have jumped on this one; after hearing it summarized by a fellow librarian, I practically ripped an advance reader’s copy out of her hands. While I did have a few issues with its execution, A Confusion of Princes was every bit as fun to read as it seemed like it would be.

The story follows Khemri, a newly inducted Prince of a vast galactic empire. Contrary to the life of luxury he had imagined princehood to be, Khemri finds himself on the bottom rung of a vast and deadly society of millions of Princes, all of whom share the superhuman gifts of his biological, technological, and psychic engineering. Even his supposed immortality is no protection from the cutthroat political environment he is thrust into. However, someone high above him in the Imperial hierarchy has a plan for Khemri, which puts him onto a fringe world populated by normal humans. Khemri fights to return to his princely legacy, but his befuddling entanglement with a human girl named Raine is better preparing him for what he’ll face upon his return than he realizes.

The book is written from Khemri’s point of view, and therefore plunges the reader into Nix’s version of the galaxy without too much in the way of introduction to its particulars. As such, it took me a few pages to take in the lingo and understand what it was referring to. Once I got past that particular hurdle, though, I loved the worlds that Nix built. The balance of world-building, hard sci-fi details, and interpersonal drama is deftly achieved, making for an exciting bit of galactic escapism. The characters aren’t quite as nuanced as I prefer; in fact, the only character that gets any exploration at all is Khemri, and he follows a fairly predictable arc throughout the story. Even so, he’s a perfect protagonist.

My only problem is that Khemri is a little too perfect. It’s certainly not outside the bounds of the story, since his many psychic and technological powers are an integral part of the story. However, I did feel a little buffeted by Khemri’s constant ability to do everything perfectly and concoct ingenious workarounds to every challenge. It seemed to flatten his character out a little, and because the story is told in the first person, some scenes seemed to revolve around conveniently invented plot devices. The problem is somewhat compounded by the story's pacing. Over half of the book is spent on Khemri’s training in the ways of being a Prince. These sections are fascinating in their own right, but they relegate the main story to a comparatively cramped section of the book, forcing Nix to depict a lot of action in a short space without the benefit of much explanation or introspection.

Thankfully, Nix does hit all of the right notes to make Khemri’s story both sympathetic and thrilling. Meanwhile, the convenient badassery of the hero is an easy problem to forgive, considering the genre. While I wish we would have spent a little less time following Khemri’s awesome exploits of awesomeness and more time on his relationship with Raine or the differences between the Empire and their human thralls, I was still caught up by the story and thoroughly impressed with the slick, detailed universe that Nix creates. While adult fans of hard sci-fi might want something more from the story, this is a great read for general science-fiction fans, and perfect for teen readers who are looking for action and adventure.

Verdict: 4 / 5

Book Review - Erebos, by Ursula Poznanski

Erebos is an entry in the “takes place in an online game” genre, which has been around for a while but is seeing a recent resurgence. It’s apparently getting enough hype from its original German publication to justify an English translation. I did a lot of vacillating while reading this; I came close to hating it in the beginning, got hooked somewhere in the middle, and finished it feeling content but vaguely dissatisfied. It does a lot of things very well, but could probably do some other things better.

The story revolves around Nick Dunsmore, a student in a London school. Nick notices that his friends and acquaintances are beginning to act strangely and are increasingly missing from class, and eventually discovers that a secretive package is making the rounds among them. When Nick is finally inducted into this mysterious club, he finds that the package contains a burned CD of an online multiplayer game called Erebos. It is like no other game that Nick has ever played before; it comes with very strict rules about secrecy, and seems almost able to read his mind. Furthermore, the game begins to assign him incomprehensible tasks in the real word in order for his character to climb the ranks. It soon becomes clear that Erebos may be part of a grander, more sinister design. By the time Nick realizes this, it may be too late to save his fellow addicted gamers.

The first half of the book covers Nick’s introduction to the game and his increasing infatuation with it, and thus takes place mostly in-game. At first, the transitions between Nick going about his daily business and his character Sarius exploring the game world are a little jarring, as there is very little in the way of segueing between the two. The descriptions of Sarius’s adventures are initially a little overblown; it’s hard to imagine anyone but a gamer being interested in stamina meters, world exploration, and hotkeys. Eventually, though, I found myself as hooked on Erebos as Nick was. The progression operates as seamlessly as playing an actual game. Once I was accustomed to the lore and rules, I slipped easily into the game world and eagerly followed each encounter. This, along with the escalating grimness of the game’s hold and demands on its players, makes for a exciting and suspenseful read.

Once I made it through the climax to the end, though, a couple of problems came back to the surface to haunt me (minor spoilers ahead). Even with all of the work that Poznanski puts in to explain how sophisticated the Erebos A.I. is, it still strains the limits of credulity. There are simply too many plot holes in the way of explaining how the game could maintain such a level of surveillance on its players, or how it was so difficult to see through its supposed omniscience as a player spent more time with it. The plot resolves itself admirably well, but ends a little too neatly. I was particularly bothered by the lack of consequences, especially considering that Nick is sort of a hard character to like in the first place. He uses the game to ruin the relationship of the girl he likes, and in the end… he gets to date her. The old boyfriend seems no worse for wear, despite enduring a false rape accusation by another girl. Meanwhile, the girl who actually levied the accusation on the game’s behalf is all smiles and “man, that was intense, huh, LOL” at the end. Not only is this unrealistic, but it actually imparts an unhealthy and even dangerous message, in my opinion. Even the fates of the villains at the end are left ambiguous, in favor of a satisfying but irrelevant explanation of which person was behind which username in the game (including the antagonist, repulsive nerds that apparently just wanted to be Nick's friend the whole time, or something).

I think I was bothered by all of this because I sense a missed opportunity. There could have been a much deeper exploration of what obsession can do to impressionable people, I think. As a result, the mass downplaying of consequences was disappointing. Even so, the book is adept in pulling a reader in, just as the titular game apparently is. It is nicely paced, and the central mystery is compelling. I wasn’t totally blown away, as there are better books about massively multiplayer online games out there. But this one gets a solid recommendation for gamers, fantasy fans, and readers who like action-heavy mysteries.

Verdict: 3 /5

Book Review - The False Prince, by Jennifer A. Nielsen

This is exactly the kind of fantasy I used to love when I was a kid: no-frills action with a charming rogue protagonist. Nielsen has done something admirable with this book, eschewing the high fantasy tropes that would work so well with an audience accustomed to wizards and dragons, and instead focusing solely on royal intrigue. I enjoyed this book because it falls within the spectrum of gritty fantasy, which is my genre of choice. It’s unfortunately hampered by a few major problems, though, even if those problems are only an issue for readers outside the target audience.

The story itself is pretty straightforward, and neatly summarized in the book’s blurb: Sage, a wily orphan, gets noticed by a passing nobleman, Lord Conner, and is recruited against his will for a scheme to take the throne of Carthya by deception. Unfortunately for Sage, he’s not the only orphan Lord Conner notices. There are three potential princes, but only one throne. Sage and his two new companions have a short amount of time to convince Lord Conner that they are the best fit for the plan, and it is painfully clear what will become of the two boys he does not choose. Sage, however, has a plan of his own- one more dangerous than even Lord Conner’s, but one that will hopefully keep all three of the false princes alive.

The plot certainly delivers on its premise, with a sense of urgency that is expertly maintained throughout the book. I sped through this book, due to its ability to keep me turning pages to find out what happens next. However, some of the methods Nielsen uses to keep the action going are used rather clumsily, and sometimes fail entirely. The main characters are surprisingly inconsistent; they are written as layered and unpredictable, but are prone to saying and doing things that are wildly out of character in order to move the story along. A pivotal scene in which Sage gains the upper hand over one of the other boys revolves around an event that makes no sense at all, either in the mechanics of the scene or in the motivations of the characters. There’s a twist near the end that helps bring the story to a close, but it’s a twist that’s easy to see coming and has enough drawing-room justification to feel too tidy.

It also must be mentioned that the book is written in the first person with Sage narrating, but as we get to the climactic scene at the end, we suddenly switch to omniscient third-person narration for a chapter. I understand that Sage's dramatic entrance at this point is the book's big payoff, but instead of sticking with him the whole way or alternating perspectives throughout the story, we have only this one third-person chapter. Maybe I’m being snobby, but that’s egregiously bad writing. Especially considering that it comes on the heels of a chapter-long flashback.

So, there are some definite flaws in execution, and the story’s resolution is a bit too convenient to be memorable. In the interest of fairness, though, this book is meant for a middle-grade to younger teen audience, who won't care a bit for these problems. Experienced fantasy readers will find this book unremarkable, but the suspense is ratcheted up to a nice level, the world-building is decent, and the pace is quick and enjoyable. This would be a good choice for newcomers to the genre who would like some human drama and intrigue in their fantasy books, and I would recommend it without qualification to younger readers looking for fantasy adventure.

Verdict: 2.5 / 5

Book Review - A Monster Calls, by Patrick Ness

Conor began having the nightmare soon after his mother first began her treatments. It was always the same nightmare, with the same monster waiting inside. So, when the other monster came calling outside his bedroom window, Conor wasn’t surprised or impressed. However, this monster was different. It claimed to be as old as time, and had come to tell Conor three stories. After the third story, Conor will then have to tell his own story: the truth he is hiding, at the expense of everything, in exchange for his life.

This is not an easy story to read, for a number of reasons. The grim allegory that forms the core of the story reaches beyond fantasy, and moves well into the realm of magical realism. Readers who are looking for a tidy metaphor or a believable plot will be left wanting. The subject matter itself, as one might expect, is heartbreaking.

There is beauty amidst the rubble, though, and the interesting thing is that it’s a different beauty for each reader. Ness narrates and crafts dialogue with elegant skill, and combined with Jim Kay’s haunting illustrations, the story hums with foreboding. The book is affecting even if you know where everything is heading, as most adult readers will. This is a slim book that seems aimed primarily at younger teens, and anyone with even secondhand experience with illness or grief will see the story for what it is and anticipate the ending well in advance. It’s a testament to Ness’s talent that, despite this, I had butterflies in my stomach while reading it and couldn’t stop thinking about it when I wasn’t.

As such, I confess to being a little taken aback at reviews of this book that stridently claim this ambiguity of intended audience is somehow a bad thing. I guess I understand, since I’m in the business of categorizing books and determining their eligibility for fitting a reader. Still, it’s not as if there is any issue with truth in advertising here. This book is therapy for kids dealing with grief, a possible revelation to kids that aren’t, and a powerful (if familiar) fable for anyone else. I can’t think of any higher praise than to state that a book successfully imparts different messages to different readers.

Oh, and for the record, I didn’t cry at the end, but it was a close thing.

Verdict: 5 / 5

Book Review - Notes from the Blender, by Trish Cook and Brendan Halpin

I’m a bona fide genre enthusiast, so I’ve been trying to expand my reading out into general literary fiction, both in adult and YA titles. This one seemed like a safe bet: an odd-couple story, replete with quirkiness and devoid of any sci-fi gimmicks. I never really got enthusiastic about it, but it ended up being a decent, enjoyable read.

Declan is a fairly typical suburban teenage boy, but ever since the death of his mother, he has hidden behind a thorny exterior. Immersed in Finnish death metal, porn, and violent video games, he gleefully cultivates a loner persona, though he’s secretly as insecure and desperate for affection as any other teenage boy. He'd love to get the time of day from popular girls like Neilly Foster, who he’s pretty sure isn’t even aware of his existence. Neilly, meanwhile, has problems of her own. Her dad is getting remarried, and she just found out that her boyfriend cheated on her with her best friend. Worst of all, she recently walked in on her mom cavorting with a secret paramour. Who, by the way, happens to be Declan’s dad. When their twitterpated parents decide to drop another bomb on them- everyone’s going to move in together and be a nuclear family- Declan and Neilly decide that their lives might as well be over. However, as they prepare for their impending forced relocation, they discover that they might have more in common than meets the eye. All that remains is for Neilly to get over her preconceived notions of who Declan is, and for Declan to be able to consider sharing a roof with Neilly Foster without his thoughts immediately heading into the gutter.

I liked this book immediately. The authors handle the teen voice pretty well (at least as far as a rapidly aging person like myself can tell), and the two protagonists are charming and likeable. This book uses the familiar trope of alternating first-person perspectives each chapter, but the transitions are seamless. Declan and Neilly are strong and distinctive enough characters to ward off any confusion at the narrative jumps. Most importantly, there’s a humor and sweetness about this story that stays consistent from beginning to end.

There’s also a predictability to the proceedings, though, and that kept me from getting too excited about it. I also ran into a few minor annoyances as I read. The heavy emphasis on the characters being straight edge, or at least taking a dim view of drinking and drugs, felt a bit preachy to me. It fit well with the story, especially with Declan, where it is actually a pretty interesting bit of characterization. But it gets thrown into Neilly’s chapters, too, and no real effort is made in the plot to make it a shared outlook or experience between the two of them. That makes it an organic bit of character development, true, but it also has a whiff of “just say no” when presented this way in a teen novel. Speaking of Declan, even though I liked his chapters the best, the masturbation jokes got a little tired. Yes, teen boys are eternally horny, and yes, it doesn’t take much to rev up the ol’ internal sexual fantasy machine. Some of the humor derived from that angle flew into American Pie territory, though, which didn’t really do anything for me.

All in all, while I didn't think this one was much of a standout, it was competent and enjoyable. It works in the way you would expect it to, and provides interesting characters and a positive, funny story. It's a solid choice for those who like upbeat teen slices of life, or quirky romances.

Verdict: 3 / 5

Graphic Novel Review - Level Up, by Gene Luen Yang and Thien Pham

This trim little graphic novel has been picking up some buzz, much like everything else that Gene Luen Yang does. Plus, the cover looks like a classic Game Boy. Win. Seriously, though, I was pleasantly surprised by this graphic novel. What looked like and began as a familiar story about a disillusioned young person finding solace in video games turned into a quirky, profound morality play about coming to terms with your family and creating your own destiny.

Dennis Ouyang is on the verge of being kicked out of college. Pushed to succeed since he was a small child, Dennis has instead devoted himself to the video games he was entranced by as a child, and found solace in after the early death of his father. However, his lack of motivation and direction attract the attention of four cute, domineering cherubs, who insist they have arrived to help Dennis achieve his destiny. Dennis goes from slacker and college dropout to medical school student, back on the path to achieving the goals his father had set for him. But is that path really the right one for Dennis? Whose well-being are the angels really looking after?

I don’t want to give too much of the story away, but Yang works with a very familiar theme and still manages to produce an original, heartwarming tale. Despite the cover design, video games are only an ingredient, adding spice to a savory mix of dry humor, magical realism, and introspection. Video games are a consistent theme, though, and effectively shape both the format of the book and the plot itself. Most impressively, though, Yang writes deftly about growing up as an Asian-American teen, something he has done quite well before, and yet does so with a universal approach that makes the issue understandable and sympathetic to just about anyone, regardless of ethnicity.

Pham’s art is rough and cutesy, but honestly, it’s perfect. The panels are always drawn and laid out in exactly the right way to convey the humor or sadness in that particular part of story. The caricatures are simple enough to forgive any inconsistency, but vibrant enough to carry a genuine emotional impact. It took me a few pages to get on board with the art style, but I loved it once I did.

I can’t really think of anything bad to say about this book, other than that it’s short and the story resolves itself fairly quickly. It’s a good read for graphic novel enthusiasts and reluctant readers who are inclined towards video games, but honestly, it’s a good read for just about anyone.

Verdict: 4 / 5

Book Review - Zoe's Tale, by John Scalzi

John Scalzi personally coerced me into taking an autographed copy of this book from him, under threat of being hunted down by Wil Wheaton. No, seriously, that's a true story. I’m glad he did; even though this probably wasn’t the best starting point for the Old Man’s War series, it’s a tight and fun read that promises even better stuff from his other books.

Zoe’s Tale is a retelling of the previous Old Man’s War book, The Last Colony, from the perspective of teenager Zoe Boutin-Perry. A small group of pioneers are chosen to establish a new colony on a fringe world, with Zoe’s parents plucked from a quiet agrarian community and chosen to lead the expedition. Things go awry from the very beginning, though, when the world they arrive at is revealed to be a different world than the one they were supposed to settle. The colonization mission is revealed to be a ploy, culminating in a confrontation with a vast, heterogeneous armada that seems dedicated to preventing human colonization of the galaxy. Zoe is unfortunately caught in the middle of this intergalactic chess game, along with the people she cares about. However, her unique status as a demigod/treaty provision for the fearsome Obin race allows her to do something about it, if she can summon the courage to do so.

It became clear to me fairly early on that I would have liked this book a lot more if I had read The Last Colony beforehand. This book seems to place a lot of emphasis on filling holes and explaining plot points in that book, and there are a lot of deleted and extended scenes meant for readers that are already familiar with the series. That makes Zoe’s Tale a great companion book, but for a first-time reader like me, it didn’t quite hit the mark. I read somewhere that this book goes a long way in fleshing Zoe out so that she doesn’t seem like a deus ex machina in the previous book, but unfortunately, all that extra focus makes a lot of the rest of the story seem a little too convenient. The bad guys are mysterious, ill-defined, and ultimately irrelevant. The introduction of a crucial alien character near the climax, while heavily foreshadowed, feels a lot like a deus ex machina, itself. Worst of all, there is a lot of world-building done in the beginning, and most of it is promptly ignored once Zoe’s story gets going (since the ideal reader of this book already knows that stuff), which makes for some baffling inconsistencies.

While that sounds harsh, it doesn’t necessarily make for a bad standalone book. Zoe is a great character, and exhibits the right mix of teenage insecurity and adult intelligence. The book is a nicely paced, genuinely exciting space opera, which is all I really wanted from it. Since the book is narrated in the first person by a teenaged protagonist, there is a dry humor and whimsical flightiness injected into the proceedings that nicely complements the serious nature of the plot, making it a true “alternate perspective” tale. Even though I wasn’t on board the whole time with the setting and how the story progressed, things move at a nice clip and are punctuated by some extraordinarily well-written scenes, particularly near the end.

I left the book with a definite feeling of regret that I didn’t read the original Old Man’s War books before trying this one. Even so, the characters and lore are affecting enough that I’m eager to jump into Scalzi’s other books. I wouldn’t recommend using this one as an entry point, like I did, but I’d definitely recommend it to sci-fi fans that are already familiar with Scalzi's work.

Verdict: 3 / 5

Book Review - My Favorite Band Does Not Exist, by Robert T. Jeschonek

I gave this one a try solely from the cover and from the basic plot gimmick: a hoax band that might actually exist. It was clear right from the outset, though, that there is considerably more to this book than meets the eye. So much so, in fact, that I really don’t know what to make of it. It’s a weird cross of speculative fiction, YA romance, and bizarro, with a heaping spoonful of magical realism and dash of pulp fantasy homage. I think I liked it, but it was kind of a mess.

The story is told through three different viewpoints. Idea Deity is a boy on the run from his family, and suffering from a condition wherein he believes he is a character in a novel, being manipulated by a malevolent author. As a release valve for his anxiety, he has created a fake band called Youforia and maintains their web presence, effectively nurturing an online following for an indie band so obscure that they don’t actually exist. Meanwhile, Reacher Mirage, the lead singer for the band Youforia, is driven to distraction by the news about his band that keeps leaking out onto the Internet. Determined to keep the band a secret until he is ready to play in public, he is confounded by reports of the band's doings that nobody else should know about. The third perspective is told through a tattered fantasy book called Fireskull’s Revenant, which both Idea and Reacher happen to be reading. As that story draws to a climactic confrontation, Idea and Reacher are slowly pulled together in a meeting that could save them both.

This book is utterly confusing at the outset. Jeschonek does not give the reader much time to get accustomed to the quirks and idiosyncrasies in Idea’s world before shifting to Reacher’s much odder one. Furthermore, it’s not particularly clear until later that the sudden jump to reading a chapter in the book-within-a-book, Fireskull’s Revenant, is a narrative device that will continue throughout the story. I almost gave up in the first third of the book, because the technicolor mishmash of existentialism and bizarre characters was a bit much to handle.

With a little perseverance, I broke through to a place where I started to get into the story. As the characters and their disparate worlds began drawing together, the pace evened out a bit. Still, once I got to the end I was left feeling a little unsure about what I had just read. I think I understood what Jeschonek was going for, and I liked the themes and the unique concept, but I’m not sure how successful he was at translating it all into a readable story. Still, there’s an eclectic, punk-rock aesthetic at play, here. This book would be worth trying if you’re looking for something way off the beaten path, or are in the mood for some weirdness without venturing into full-on bizarro territory.

Verdict: 2.5 / 5

Book Review - Why We Broke Up, by Daniel Handler and Maira Kalman

I picked an ARC of this book up from an unmanned pile sitting outside a film screening, and it ended up being a pleasant surprise. It took me a few chapters to get comfortable in the story. Something about the characters and the writing gnawed at me for a while, but I couldn’t put this book down after getting acquainted with the charcters, and ended up loving it despite a somewhat disappointing ending.

The author of this book is better known to many as Lemony Snicket, the creator of the Series of Unfortunate Events books. This book is a little less ostentatious, but does use a storytelling trope that is currently popular in teen lit: revolving the narrative around the description or progression of a physical object. In this case, it’s a box of bottle caps, flyers, and other mementos. The story is presented as a letter by Min Green, written to her ex-boyfriend Ed Slaterton and dumped on his porch with a box of detritus from their short and tempestuous relationship. The letter details each object in the box, placing them within a timeline that chronicles the unlikely meeting and courtship between odd, “arty” Min and the co-captain of the school basketball team. Each object is rendered in detail by artist Maira Kalman, though the ARC is sadly incomplete in this regard. Min narrates each description as a stepping stone through her first serious relationship to its inevitable (in her estimation) demise.

My first moments as a reader with Min were irritating, but as a testament to Handler’s talent, it was because she is a fully realized character right from the beginning. Min is replete with a smug, quirky bravado that only an intelligent but insecure teenager can appreciate. As the narrator of the letter/book, her exaggerated mannerisms and dramatic flourishes dominate each page. By the tenth run-on sentence and third unnecessary use of the word “whatnot” in the first two chapters, I was rolling my eyes.

Once I got accustomed to Min, though, the payoff for powering through was quite nice. She even acknowledged how pretentious and silly it was to throw “whatnot” around with such reckless abandon, eventually. The character that emerges as the story of her breakup unfolds is complex, sympathetic, and realistic: a teen girl who embraces eccentricity in order to bridge the awkward gap between childhood and adulthood, falling in love for the first time with someone she had no reason to even talk to. Despite her cleverness, she lets passion distract her from the signs of impending doom (like any teenager in love for the first time would), and is completely blind to the prospect of something beautiful that’s been in front of her the whole time.

Handler and Kalman’s grab bag of tricks keeps things interesting. Even without the benefit of the complete art, the introduction of each “chapter” with a rendering of an object from Min’s box keeps the whole affair from seeming too much like a checklist. While some of the supporting characters feel a little shallow and underexplored, the dialogue is snappy and the streak of jaded irony that all of them seem to share creates a consistent, humorous set piece. I was particularly amused by the constant references to obscure cinema; Min tends to compare everything in her life to her favorite scenes from a variety of arthouse foreign films, all of which she discovers through a well-loved reference book on the subject. I read over half of the book before it dawned on me that all of those references to classic films, actors, directors, and musicians were completely made up. The thing is, since Min is as much a hipster as any knit-capped twenty-something you’d find in real life, I had just assumed that they were real people and things that I just hadn’t heard of. Whether this was something Handler intentionally chose or just did for the sake of storywriting convenience, it felt like a gentle dig at being indie for indie’s sake, which fit perfectly into the dry humor and sweet vulnerability that suffused the rest of the book.

The only hiccup for me was with Min’s erstwhile love, Ed Slaterton. There isn’t a whole lot to his characterization, other than some brief hints at a tragic home life and the obvious revelation that teenage boys, even the good-hearted ones, are generally fuckups when it comes to relationships. Ed’s bemused normalcy does paint a nice contrast to Min’s over-the-top quirkiness. Also, it’s actually refreshing to have all of the theatrics of Min’s letter and box of memories lead to something as simple and time-tested as two kids who are crazy about each other, but lack the experience to keep from burning too quickly and trusting too blindly. Still, the story builds to a somewhat abrupt and underwhelming conclusion, realistic though it might be.

The book was a slow starter for me, but I was hooked once I got a few chapters in. It will be a mainstay recommendation for YA romance, and it’s a great read for anyone who doesn’t mind an emo sensibility and has a thing for Juno-esque “I’m precocious as hell but still an awkward girl that gets in over my head” protagonists.

Verdict: 4 / 5

Book Review - The Shattering, by Karen Healey

Is this a story about teen suicide? A murder mystery? A dystopian parable? A paranormal tale about plucky young people holding off the forces of evil? A realistic take on coming out of the closet? Well… yes. The Shattering is undoubtedly an engaging read, but there’s a lot of competing themes to contend with.

The story opens with Keri, a Maori girl who has lived her entire life in the idyllic New Zealand seaside hamlet of Summerton. Her older brother Jake has recently committed suicide, leaving her in a frustrated limbo of rage and grief, and straining the bonds of her family. However, her childhood friend Janna comes to her with a shocking assertion: Jake was murdered. At Janna’s request, they meet with an online friend and former summer fling of Janna’s, Sione, who has deduced that not only do the three of them have firstborn older brothers that have committed suicide, but that the trend spirals unsettlingly outward. Each year, a firstborn older brother from somewhere in New Zealand or Australia visits Summerton, and is subsequently reported to have killed themselves shortly afterward. Determined to put an end to what they are convinced is a serial murder spree, the trio bumps up against a force much more powerful and insidious than a lone killer, which weaves through the entire town and is tied to everyone who lives in it.

I didn’t know a whole lot about this one when I started. I guess I was expecting something like Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher after reading the blurb, but the story took a hard left in the first few chapters. Once the pace really started to ramp up, it changed directions again as the neo-Pagan elements came to the fore. Out of nowhere, everything stopped for a minute to ponder on the complexities of being gay in a small town, in an almost completely internal conflict. Finally, after the intense, rapid-fire climax, we slide right back into the suicide motif that started everything off. Quite frankly, this whirlwind of themes is extremely disorienting. All of them fit nioely into the story, adding dimension to the characters and making for a story that is never boring. However, the sheer number of ideas pretty much ensures that none of them get explored very deeply. I left the story feeling vaguely dissatisfied, as a result.

Other than a slight case of multiple personality disorder, though, the book is a fairly engaging read. The upshot of all these themes is that the story remains fresh and occasionally surprising from cover to cover. The character work is great, with a multicultural cast of sympathetic characters that are unapologetically flawed and believable. Healey also did some interesting stuff with the setting, here. For all that the story takes place in a beautiful coastal tourist town, there isn’t much in the way of flowery descriptions. The closest the narrative comes to describing the backdrop is a vague trance that occasionally overcomes Summerton’s visitors, leaving them ensnared by a picturesque beauty that is never really depicted in detail (which makes perfect sense as the plot begins to thicken). Meanwhile, the reader is immersed in various words, rituals, and articles of clothing in the Maori and Samoan cultures, and bombarded with New Zealand and Australian geography. The result is an understated but real and comprehensive introduction to the setting, delivered almost wholly through the somewhat jaded eyes of the characters themselves.

Ultimately, I wasn’t really blown away by this book, but I did enjoy following the various narrative twists and turns. There are a lot of moving parts, but if you aren’t particular about your story focusing on one thing at a time, the parts make for a decently fun read for a wide swath of YA readers.

Verdict: 3 / 5

Book Review - Underdogs, by Markus Zusak

I don’t know what it is with me and omnibuses… omnibusseses… omnibi? Anything that’s packaged as a complete set, be it made up of novels or comics, tends to attract my attention these days. This particular omnibus appeared to me out of nowhere, and didn’t do anything for me at first. Somewhere between when I started it and when I finished it, though, it crept up on me and became one of my favorite recent reads. It’s a meandering, quirky coming-of-age story that is funny and heartbreaking by turns, and will definitely touch a chord in anybody who has been a teenage boy before.

This is a collection of Markus Zusak’s first published works, before his recent fame for writing The Book Thief. The trilogy, comprised of The Underdog, Fighting Ruben Wolfe, and Getting the Girl, is narrated by a teenager named Cameron Wolfe. Cameron is the youngest son in a blue-collar family trying to make ends meet in an Australian suburb, and the books are a mesh of his stream of consciousness and his poetic writings as he attempts to navigate through his daily existence. The first book, The Underdog, introduces the Wolfe family and follows Cam through an aimless period in his young life where he tries to reconcile who he wants to be with the reality of who he is. Fighting Ruben Wolfe offers a bit more of a linear story: feeling like they should somehow contribute to the family, which is facing increasingly dire straits, Cam and his older brother Ruben get mixed up in clandestine, amateur boxing. As they fight, though, Cam realizes that Ruben is fighting for something other than money, and that he might be fighting for something deeper, himself. The third book, Getting the Girl, brings the themes of the first two into a familiar focus: first love and its consequences, which refines and changes everything that Cameron thought he had knew about himself.

At first, I wasn’t so impressed. I have a consciousness that streams just fine on its own, and so I tend to get annoyed by fiction that doesn’t have a point. But the Wolfe family makes an indelible impression, and Cam in particular is intensely likeable in all his quiet nobility and earnest insecurity. Once I got accustomed to the tone of this particular slice of life (which, with all of its Australian mannerisms and references, took me a bit to do), the narrative began to solidify a little, first into an exploration of the fraught relationship between close siblings, and then into a time-tested story of love and frustration. The character development is particularly excellent, and gets more nuanced throughout the books. Fighting Ruben Wolfe’s themes of sibling rivalry and family bonds build directly on Cam’s observations from The Underdogs, while the messy relationships in Getting the Girl spring from the character development in Fighting Ruben Wolfe. Taken as a whole, the story arc is subtle, and brilliant.

Getting the Girl particularly resonated with me. It could have easily been another entry in a somewhat crowded genre: horny teen boy learns a lesson about healthy relationships! As funny and enjoyable as books in that vein can be, they don't usually do too much for me. Perhaps it’s because most of those stories only touch the surface of what it’s like to have an adult’s sex drive but a child’s impulse control, and I don’t harbor any particular nostalgia for the situations that arise from that. But Zusak’s take on this particular form of teen angst struck home. While reading this, I occasionally mused that girlfriends and mothers should give these books a spin to gain some insight into the teen boy’s brain. Cameron struggles with the conflict between his hormones (sex with any female that looks his way, and proving once and for all that he isn’t a loser) and his heart (the little-boy desire of wanting to be nurtured and loved, and the manliness of being perceived as honorable and chivalrous). The results are the same insecurity, shame, and tendency towards self-defeat that almost every boy has to go through while growing up, and find inventive ways to cope with. His sexual fantasies are constant, and he accepts their inevitability. He also can’t help but fall in love at the drop of a hat, desperate to find something noble that gives those fantasies meaning, which makes him even more self-conscious. And best of all, this is not a motif that show up fully formed in the third book, even though the story itself stands alone. Rather, it is the result of Cameron’s character growth up to that point. It is beautifully understated, and cathartic to read, at least for me.

The only complaint I have with this book is the same complaint I have with every omnibus edition I read, and it has to do with the cognitive dissonance of reconciling the chapters of a collection to actual standalone books. As I mentioned, my infatuation with this book was a slow burn, since I was a little nonplussed by The Underdog and didn’t warm up to it until well past the halfway mark. If I were reading the standalone novel instead of this compilation, I don’t think I would have hung around for the following books, and that would have been a terrible loss. But as always, I can’t decide whether that speaks to a failure in the writing, or with me being psyched out by reaching the end of the “book” even though I have hundreds of pages left to read in the volume I’m holding. Suffice it to say that the first book is considerably more freeform and light on actual plot than the other two, so it pays off to stick it out if that bothers you.

But besides that small issue, this is a fantastic little smorgasbord of coming-of-age vignettes. It effortlessly brought me back to my own struggles with my self-worth as a young man, and it has the mark of a truly great read: the more I ruminate on it after finishing it, the more I love it. I would particularly recommend this to teen guys, who I suspect would not object to a little stealth introspection hidden amongst a tale of girls, fighting, and making fun of stupid little yappy dogs.

Verdict: 4.5 / 5

Book Review - Thirteen Reasons Why, by Jay Asher

This book has been attracting buzz for a while, especially since the impending film version was announced. I am characteristically late to any sort of hyped material, but I think that serves me well; it allows me to approach the “best ever” anything with a healthy dose of cynicism. In this instance, though, I was completely blown away. After finishing Thirteen Reasons Why, I promptly placed aside all of the baggage and special considerations that come with “dark YA” and “teen readers.” This is one of the best books I’ve read this year, irrespective of genre or intended audience.

Thirteen Reasons Why has two narrators. The first, Clay Jensen, is a teenage boy who finds himself in possession of a package of seven mysterious audiotapes. Listening to the first tape reveals them to be recorded messages from the second narrator: Hannah Baker, a classmate that Clay knew and liked, but had committed suicide a few weeks prior. The tapes turn out to be Hannah’s last message to thirteen people she claims were in some way responsible for her death; each side of the tapes holds an anecdote about a single person, all of which connect into a series of events that took Hannah to her fateful decision. Following a map that had been surreptitiously placed in his locker, Clay follows in Hannah’s footsteps as she traces the stories across the various landmarks of their small town, listening to each tape and dreading the moment when his name will appear. As the various threads of Hannah’s story come together through the tapes, Clay must come to terms with his own feelings about what happened to Hannah and the repercussions of why it happened.

Stylistically, this book is pitch-perfect. The format is unique without being gimmicky, and is fine-tuned with a perfect amount of suspense. I found myself walking along with Clay, trapped in the thrall of the tapes and waiting with curiosity and apprehension for the next one. When I wasn’t reading the book, I was thinking about it, processing the previous chapters and anticipating the forthcoming ones. The story is compelling enough to keep readers turning pages, with no stumbling blocks in the narrative and no extraneous plot elements.

Regarding the content itself, it’s fairly obvious at first glance that the story is dark and heavy. But Asher handles the complexities inherent to a story about suicide (specifically, attempting to explain suicide) masterfully. I read a couple of other reader reviews, and was dumbfounded at how many people commented on how they didn’t buy the depiction of Hannah Baker, or didn’t agree with how Asher wrote her particular reasons for what she did. I was especially astounded by some reviewers who claimed experience with suicide attempts, and blasted her motivations as “unrealistic.” I didn’t know that there was such a thing, outside of some extreme exceptions, as a “realistic” motivation for ending one’s own life. Generally speaking, a friend or loved one’s suicide is fraught with mysterious motives, and when reasons come to light, they never justify or even explain why that person would do something so drastic.

The anger, though, I do understand. I was occasionally angry with Hannah Baker, in the way I would be angry with a real person for killing themselves. I’ll even confess to having an internal ideological war. Hannah’s tapes are calm, collected, and focused. They are full of dark humor, and of pointed accusation. They depict a teen who knew what she was doing, and knew the impact it would have on the people who listened to the tapes. The parent part of my psyche spent some time wagging its finger at the librarian part, insisting (with some logical cause) that this book paints a somewhat glamorous picture of a suicide victim using her death to exact revenge on her perceived tormentors, which is not the healthiest message to send.

However, I can say with some confidence that that’s ultimately not what gives this book its emotional power. Yes, the tapes have their share of graveyard humor and practiced vengeance, which gives the story a lot of its readability. But revenge isn’t the point of the tapes. I was fortunate enough to meet Jay Asher and get my copy of this book signed, and with his autograph he penned a key phrase from one of Hannah’s tapes: “Everything affects everything.” That, I feel, is the central theme of this book. As Clay makes his way through the tapes, Hannah makes it perfectly clear that the decision to kill herself was hers alone, and came from her “giving up,” not from any one person or event pushing her to it. As the various events recorded on the tapes come together to form a connected story, Clay is made privy to how each small thing affects other small things in her life, creating ripples that cascaded into unintended consequences. Everything affects everything. The story becomes less about explaining why a teenage girl might commit suicide (which will never resonate as “realistic” or “good enough,” honestly), and more about examining how we treat others in light of the fact that we can never know what someone is going through at any particular time, and how we might be helping or hurting without intending to or even thinking about it. This theme has interesting applications all throughout the story, from the sweet and tidy ending to the implied-but-unexplored effects that the tapes might have on the other people on Hannah’s list. I suppose I could construct a lot of interesting arguments about why other people (fictional or otherwise) who go through the same things or worse are often able to cope just fine, but that’s not really the point. In another story, maybe everything affects everything in different ways. Who knows.

Though, I do find it ironic that the common complaint with the book seems to be that many readers can’t sympathize with Hannah because they don’t really know anything about her other than her suicidal thoughts, don’t think that the common high school problems depicted are worth the melodramatic result, and aren’t satisfied with only hearing her side of the story. Guys? There is a scene in the book that deals specifically with that (the peer communications class), and according to the author’s afterword, it was drawn from a real-life incident. Just saying. I realize that it’s easy to dismiss Hannah’s story as “childish” and “unbelievable” due to it being fictional, but I interacted with more than one suicidal friend in my teen years. It was believable to me. Petty problems never seem petty to the person who has to deal with them, and in case you’ve forgotten what being a teenager is like, there is no such thing as a petty problem to someone who is often experiencing powerful emotions and complicated interpersonal interactions for the first time, without the life experience and biological capacity to see things with a longer view. To be fair, though, Hannah’s tapes do smack a little bit of self-righteousness (another reminder: teenager!), and it is easy to get caught up in this being a story about suicide instead of a story about how callously people can treat other people, due to them thinking such treatment isn’t that big of a deal.

Anyway, that’s a lot of philosophizing on a fairly simple idea. Wheaton’s Law: don’t be a dick. Frankly, though, you don’t need to have any aspirations toward deep self-reflection to enjoy this book. It has believable and achingly sympathetic characters, an engaging premise, and wonderful execution. The tone and content is perfect for older teens, while the format and suspenseful pace is the equal of any adult thriller. And I’m confident that even readers who don’t like the book will think about the story and the themes it conveys long after they finish it. I’m wary of what will happen once Hollywood finishes wrapping its flailing appendages around this story, but the book has my recommendation for anyone and everyone, with absolutely no reservations.

Verdict: 5 / 5

Book Review - The Future of Us, by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler

This kind of book is not my usual choice, but I had the good fortune to meet the authors and get an autographed advance reader’s copy. Turns out, this is right up my alley, and I just didn’t know it yet. While not particularly profound, it is a quick, smart, and satisfying read.

This book’s concept is largely unchanged from the random conversation between the authors that I’m sure it came from. It’s 1996, and Emma’s best friend Josh comes over with one of those America Online CD-ROMs we all once got in the mail and promptly put in the microwave for their pyrotechnic value. Or, you know, used them as coasters, or whatever the rest of you did with them. Anyway, as Emma prepares to venture into the Interwebs, she notices a blue-and-white login box. Thinking this part of AOL, she enters her password again, which leads her to some strange website called Facebook. Further exploration with Josh reveals what seem to be versions of themselves from fifteen years in the future, with everything one would expect from a Facebook page: photos, banal status updates and... naturally... relationship status. Suddenly endowed with the ability to know her future and take steps to change it, Emma begins fiddling with her own future based on the scraps of info she can pull from her future self’s Facebook wall. Josh, on the other hand, fears what such meddling could do to their lives, both in the future and in the here-and-now.

This book grabbed me for a very specific reason. I am 31 years old, and therefore was the exact same age as these characters at the exact time it takes place. It’s like a cultural love letter to my youth. Furthermore, I spent the nineties dealing with the unrequited love of a close friend or two (as I imagine many of you have, as well), so I found the dynamic between Emma and Josh painfully realistic. My personal biases aside, though, this is a pretty neat story. Time-travel stories are fraught with peril, in that they invite science nerds to point out everything logistically wrong with them, but this one is believable. It keeps the “how” vague, because honestly, “how” doesn’t matter. The characters matter, and this story stays focused on them, with split-perspective narration between Emma and Josh that works well and keeps the book moving. There is a strong theme of not being so caught up in tomorrow that you neglect today, but it’s a theme that is inherent and not delivered heavy-handedly. This is a book that’s easy to get caught up in; I devoured it relatively quickly.

The only problem I had with the book has to do with the same reason it resonated so easily with me. I’m not entirely sure what the audience is for this book. Because it’s marketed as YA, it has to do some heavy lifting in terms of setting. Today’s teens don’t remember the 90s, and so there are constant shoutouts to the fads and pop culture of the time. Some of this works (the music, in particular), but most of it feels awkward and gratuitous, and makes the time-travel aspect seem a little gimmicky. On the other hand, while The Future of Us is tailor-made for those of us who actually grew up in the 90s, it doesn’t quite go deep enough to tap into that thirty-something sensibility. There are a couple of great scenes in the book that show how mutable the future is, but instead of really throwing a curveball like it could have, the story ends on a tidy, sweet, and predictable note. Honestly, I think Asher and Mackler could have done a lot more with this story (with everything about it intact) if they had aimed it at adults instead of the YA market.

But for what it is, it’s fantastic. This is a quirky little romance that’s perfect for socially networked teens, and it’s a cultural paean to those of us who actually got those CD-ROMs in the mail, once upon a time.

Verdict: 4 / 5

Book Review - Glow, by Amy Kathleen Ryan

This is definitely a case of the right book hitting me at the right time. I’m currently neck-deep in an addiction to the video game Mass Effect 2, which has precipitated a definite sci-fi jag in my entertainment tastes. This rich little dollop of YA sci-fi, which I got to read as an advance reader's copy and will be published in September, is just what I was looking for. It had a couple of procedural issues, which kind of makes me want to knock a point off depending on my mood, but this is a great start to what promises to be a fun series.

The first volume of the Sky Chasers series introduces Kieran Alden and Waverly Marshall, a young couple aboard a huge starship called the Empyrean. The Empyrean and its sister ship, the New Horizon, left an ailing Earth over forty years ago, carrying the hope of creating a new world and saving the human species from extinction. Kieran, being the first baby born to the original Empyrean crew and an all-around golden boy, is first in line for the ship’s captaincy. Everyone expects that he and Waverly will get married, and she does love him, but she has her doubts about whether she really wants to marry him, or if she is merely succumbing under the moral imperative to procreate. Her realtively sedate troubles are violently interrupted by the appearance of the New Horizon, which is supposed to be years ahead of them. An unexpected turn of events separates Waverly and the other Empyrean girls from everyone they’ve ever known, where they must find a way to escape a desperate captivity that is insidiously disguised by good intentions and comforting lies. Meanwhile, Kieran finds his capacity for leadership truly tested, when Seth Ardvale, a rival for Waverly’s affections, decides that Kieran isn’t fit to lead. Facing an increasingly dangerous mutiny and with no adults available to step in and take charge, Kieran is forged into a leader that might save them all, or might take them further down the path to annihilation.

So, I need to address two things right away. First, more and more teen books have characters with names like Kieran, Waverly, Brayden, Madison, et cetera, and my irritation with this is proof that I’m officially getting old. Second, I really wish everybody would stop trying to market new books as “The Next” version of whatever recently made piles of money. Yes, this actually is a fantastic readalike for The Hunger Games, but it doesn’t change the fact that repeatedly bleating “OMG THE NEXT HUNGER GAMES” is marketing at its most crass, and it makes my eyes twitch.

Okay, with that out of the way: this is solid sci-fi, and a fantastic teen book. It definitely places more emphasis on action and character development than it does on space and starships, but it does what it does very well. Of particular note is the interesting way in which it handles religion. A few chapters in, I was ready to dismiss this one as another version of the same story I’ve read plenty of times: religion bad. Being no fan of religious fundamentalism myself, I’m pretty okay with that, but it’s a somewhat tired trope. But then Ryan pulled the rug out from under me: secularism bad, religion good? Wait, no, religion still bad, maybe? Turns out, religion and secularism in this book’s universe are as good or as bad as their adherents. Gee, what a concept. And this not only makes for intriguing character motivations, but deftly sets up the framework and dominant theme for the rest of the books in the series. This, more than anything else, has me excited about how the next books will turn out.

The only problem I had with this book is that it had a whole lot of story tell in a fairly short amount of time. Like I said above, Glow is action-packed, and things move along briskly and with satisfying tension. Trouble is, the story occurs over several months, and it’s somewhat disorienting trying to reconcile the dialed-up pace with the apparently missing chunks of story time. The problem is exacerbated by the split in the narrative; once Waverly and Kieran are separated, the book follows their individual stories in different chapters. Each story could conceivably have its own novel-length treatment, but they are combined into a slim multithreaded plot in which they chronologically overlap. The process leaves certain elements feeling unexplored, or even artificially rushed.

The book also ends with a massive cliffhanger, making no bones about being the first part of a series. However, the two story halves each get a respectable climax, and the cliffhanger comes at the end of some dramatic falling action, letting Glow stand alone quite well. I think there are a few too many things to pick at to call Glow a complete success, but I personally loved it. The story is exciting and satisfying, the setting is a fresh take on a familiar concept, and the utopian themes and realistic motivations are a breath of fresh air in an expanding field of teen sci-fi where the bad guys are bad because they’re just bad, man, and it’s up to the teenagers to make everything all right.

That, I think is my favorite thing about this book: it isn’t at all clear who “the good guys” are, or what the best course of action for the teen protagonists is.

Verdict: 5 / 5