strange and random happenstance

I Died for Beauty by Amanda Flower
Published by: Berkley
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"When a blaze takes both a neighbor's home and his life, Emily Dickinson and her maid Willa have a burning desire to crack the case in this new historical mystery from Agatha Award-winning author Amanda Flower.

Amherst, 1857. The Dickinson family braves one of the worst winters in New England's history. Trains are snowbound and boats are frozen in the harbor. Emily Dickinson and her maid, Willa Noble, have never witnessed anything like it. As Amherst families attempt to keep their homes warm, fears of fire abound.

These worries prove not to be unfounded as a blaze breaks out just down the street from the Dickinson in Kelley Square, the Irish community in Amherst, and a young couple is killed, leaving behind their young child. Their deaths appear to be a tragic accident, but Emily finds herself harboring suspicions there may be more to the fire than meets the eye. Emily and Willa must withstand the frigid temperatures and discover a killer lurking among the deadly frost."

I love the trope of famous authors turned sleuth.

The Other March Sisters by Linda Epstein, Ally Malinenko, and Liz Parker
Published by: Kensington
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 368 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Giving all the "Little Women" the stories they deserve at last, this imaginative historical novel and companion to the much-loved classic draws Meg, Beth, and Amy March from behind the shadow of Jo - Louisa May Alcott's alter-ego and the "author" of Little Women - as vibrant and unforgettable characters grappling with societal strictures, queer love, motherhood, chronic illness, artistic ambition, and more.

I’m sure you believe you know their story from reading that other book, which told you an inspiring tale about four sisters. It told you a story, but did it tell you the story?

Four sisters, each as different as can be. Through the eyes and words of Jo, their characters and destinies became known to millions. Meg, pretty and conventional. Jo, stubborn, tomboyish, and ambitious. Beth, shy and good-natured, a mortal angel readily accepting her fate. And Amy, elegant, frivolous, and shallow. But Jo, for all her insight, could not always know what was in her sisters' thoughts, or in their hearts.

With Jo away in New York to pursue her literary ambitions, Meg, Beth, and Amy follow their own paths. Meg, newly married with young twins, struggles to find the contentment that Marmee assured her would come with domesticity. Unhappy and unfulfilled, she turns to her garden, finding there not just a hobby but a calling that will allow her to help other women in turn.

Beth knows her time is limited. Still, part of her longs to break out of her suffocating cocoon at home, however briefly. A new acquaintance turns into something more, offering unexpected, quiet joy.

Amy, traveling in Europe while she pursues her goal of becoming an artist, is keenly aware of the expectation that she will save the family by marrying well. Through the course of her journey, she discovers how she can remain true to herself, true to her art, and true to the love that was always meant to be.

Purposefully leaving Jo off the page, authors Liz Parker, Ally Malinenko, and Linda Epstein draw inspiration from Alcott's real-life sisters, giving the other March women room to reveal themselves through conversations, private correspondence, and intimate moments - coming alive in ways that might surprise even daring, unconventional Jo."

What annoyed me most about the most recent adaptation of Little Women was making Beth nothing more than the reason for Jo to write her book. More sidelined and marginalized than any adaptation I've seen. Which is why this book is so needed. The other sisters need to tell their tale!

Season of Fire by Cidney Mayes
Published by: Crow Quill Publishing
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Kindle, 372 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A dazzling romantic fantasy featuring a slow-burn friends to lovers romance, a secret society of witches, and the perils of London's high society.

In a world of rigid expectations and dazzling balls, twenty-three-year-old Rose Worthington would rather manage her family's country estate than participate in London's high society. When her latent magical abilities begin to flare - shattering glass and scorching walls - she struggles to conceal her powers. But she can't hide from Lady Nightingale, the mysterious leader of a secret society of witches, who offers Rose a way to control her powers and navigate the perils of society.

As whispers of witch hunters prowling the streets grow louder, Rose must navigate the treacherous world of the social elite, hiding her powers from those who seek to destroy her kind. She shouldn't be pining for Philip, childhood friend left behind in the country, or spending so much time with Lord Alexander Crawford, the season's most eligible bachelor.

Torn between love and loyalty, Rose's attempts to prove herself within the Nightingales lead to a dangerous mistake. With her newfound sisterhood at risk and witch hunters closing in, she must decide who she can trust - and how far she's willing to go to protect her magic before it's too late."

I love historical fantasy... Make it Regency and I'm even happier. But anything British I'm good with.

The Otherwhere Post by Emily J. Taylor
Published by: G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The New York Times bestselling author of Hotel Magnifique returns with this stunning dark academic fantasy full of deadly magic and dangerous secrets, perfect for fans of Divine Rivals and A Study in Drowning.

Seven years ago, Maeve Abenthy lost everything: her world, her father, even her name. Desperate to escape the stain of her father's crimes, she lives under a fake name, never staying in one place long enough to put down roots.

Then she receives a mysterious letter with four impossible words: Your father was innocent.

To uncover the truth, she poses as an apprentice for the Otherwhere Post, where she'll be trained in the art of scriptomancy - the dangerous magic that allows couriers to enchant letters and deliver them to other worlds. But looking into her father's past draws more attention than she'd planned.

Her secretive, infuriatingly handsome mentor knows she's lying about her identity, and time is running out to convince him to trust her. Worse, she begins to receive threatening letters, warning her to drop her investigation - or else. For Maeve to unravel the mystery of what happened seven years ago, she may have to forfeit her life."

Sometimes truth is worth every sacrifice. 

A Night in the Lonesome October by Roger Zelazny
Published by: Harper Voyager
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 272 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Boldly original and wildly entertaining, A Night in the Lonesome October is a darkly sparkling gem, an amalgam of horror, humor, mystery, and fantasy featuring a Who's Who from Victorian horror and mystery. Zelazny's last book prior to his untimely death is considered by many to be the best of the fantasy master's novels.

Under cover of the murky London gloom, a knife-wielding gentleman named Jack prowls the midnight streets with his faithful watchdog Snuff - gathering together the grisly ingredients they will need for an upcoming ancient and unearthly rite. For soon, after the death of the moon, black magic will summon the Elder Gods back into the world.

But Snuff and his master are not alone. All manner of participants, both human and not, are about with their ancient tools and their animal familiars in preparation for the dread night. It is brave, devoted Snuff who must calculate the patterns of the Game and keep track of the Players - the witch, the mad monk, the vengeful vicar, the Count who sleeps by day, the Good Doctor and the hulking Experiment Man he fashioned from human body parts, and a wild-card American named Larry Talbot - all the while keeping Things at bay and staying a leap ahead of the Great Detective, who knows quite a bit more than he lets on.

Some have come to open the gates. Some have come to slam them shut.

As the hour approaches - let the Game begin..."

A true classic.

The Spy Wore Silk by Andrea Pickens
Published by: Oliver-Heber Books
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Paperback, 350 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The most skilled of Merlin's Mauraders, Siena must unmask a traitor lurking among an exclusive club of book collectors. Armed with only her wits, her blades, and her sultry body, she joins the gentlemen at a country house party. But her prime suspect, disgraced ex-army officer Lord Kirtland proves as enigmatic as he is suspicious-and sinfully sensuous.

Kirtland's instincts tell him the enticing "Black Dove" is hiding more than a luscious body beneath her fancy silks. Yet as he starts to plumb her secrets, a cunning adversary lays plans to destroy them both. To live, Siena must end her tantalizing dance of deception and desire-and decide whether to trust her head or her heart."

This is an edge of your seat romantic thrill ride in Regency England!

A Slash of Emerald by Patrice McDonough
Published by: Kensington
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 336 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A trailblazing female medical examiner in 1867 London and a skeptical Scotland Yard detective investigate a string of art world murders in this dark, atmospheric, historically rich mystery for readers of Andrea Penrose and Deanna Raynourn.

London, 1867: Among the genteel young ladies of London society, painting is a perfectly acceptable pastime - but a woman who dares to pursue art as a profession is another prospect, indeed. Dr. Julia Lewis, familiar with the disrespect afforded women in untraditional careers, is hardly surprised when Scotland Yard shows little interest in complaints made by her friend, Mary Allingham, about a break-in at her art studio. Mary is just one of many "lady painters" being targeted by vandals.

Painters' sitters are vanishing, too - women viewed by some as dispensable outcasts. Inspector Richard Tennant, however, takes the attacks seriously, suspecting they're linked to the poison-pen letters received by additional members of the Allingham family. For Julia, the issue is complicated by Tennant's previous relationship with Mary's sister-in-law, Louisa, and by her own surprising reaction to that entanglement.

But when someone close to them commits suicide and a young woman turns up dead, the case can no longer be so easily ignored by 'respectable' society. Layer after layer, Julia and Tennant scrape away the facts of the case like paint from a canvas. What emerges is a somber picture of vice, depravity, and deception stretching from London's East End to the Far East - with a killer at its center, determined to get away with one last, grisly murder..."

Two of my loves, art and murder, combine for the perfect read.

Something in the Walls by Daisy Pearce
Published by: Minotaur Books
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 304 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Unbearably tense, utterly propulsive, and studded with folklore and horror, Something in the Walls is perfect for anyone who loves Midsommar and The Haunting of Hill House.

Newly-minted child psychologist Mina has little experience. In a field where the first people called are experts, she's been unable to get her feet wet. Instead she aimlessly spends her days stuck in the stifling heat wave sweeping across Britain, and anxiously contemplating her upcoming marriage to careful, precise researcher Oscar. The only reprieve from her small, close world is attending the local bereavement group to mourn her brother's death from years ago. That is, until she meets journalist Sam Hunter at the grief group one day. And he has a proposition for her.

Alice Webber is a thirteen year old girl who claims she's being haunted by a witch. Living with her family in their crowded home in the remote village of Banathel, Alice's symptoms are increasingly disturbing, and money is tight. Taking this job will give Mina some experience; Sam will get the scoop of a lifetime; and Alice will get better, Mina is sure of it.

But instead of improving, Alice's behavior becomes increasingly inexplicable and intense. The town of Banathel has a deep history of superstition and witchcraft. They believe there is evil in the world. They believe there are ways of...dealing with it. And they don't expect outsiders to understand.

As Mina races to uncover the truth behind Alice's condition, the dark cracks of Banathel begin to show. Mina is desperate to understand how deep their sinister traditions go - and how her own past may be the biggest threat of all."

I love small little towns that time has forgotten but that haven't forgotten their dark rituals...

The Wildest Things by Andrea Hannah
Published by: Wednesday Books
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"In this sapphic Snow White retelling, if Snow is to save her kingdom from being ravaged by the Blight, she'll have to kill the Evil Queen's daughter...if she doesn't fall in love with her first.

When her glass coffin unexpectedly shatters, Snow White awakens to anything but a dream. The land is rotting. The animals have mutated. In the twenty years that have passed since Snow bit into the poisoned apple, the kingdom of Roanfrost has transformed from a luscious wild land to a blight-ravaged nightmare. In search of answers and a way to restore her kingdom to its former glory, Snow sets out on a dangerous journey that will test the strength she never knew she had.

Friends will become foes.

New alliances will form.

The Queen with the blood red lips will stop at nothing to seize her power as well as her heart.

If Snow has any chance to survive and restore not only her kingdom, but all of Garedenne, her only option is to become the Seasonkeeper and access the life-giving magic that will heal the plague. But the path to becoming the Seasonkeeper is more treacherous than she could ever imagine - because the wild things have awakened and Snow's darker impulses yearn to set them free."

If Snow White stared in Annihilation. 

Big Name Fan by Ruthie Knox and Annie Mare
Published by: Kensington
Publication Date: February 25th, 2025
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"When two A-list celebrities famous for their on-screen chemistry as TV detectives (think: sapphic Mulder and Scully, or queer Rizzoli and Isles) are reunited to investigate a real-life Hollywood murder, fans who have been 'shipping the leading ladies for years might just get the ending they've always wanted...

Bexley Simon and Sam Farmer aren't detectives, but they play them on TV. Well, played, past tense. The iconic cult hit that was Craven's Daughter ended five years ago, and their friendship died along with it. Fans were disappointed that the pair's legendary chemistry went unfulfilled - and crushed that the actual spark between actresses Bex and Sam didn't pay off, either. The network never intended for two women to get romantic, in life or onscreen, despite the fans. But the bigger tragedy was the loss of their dear friend, makeup artist Jen Arnot, whose accidental death cast a pall over the series' last episodes.

Now the network has decided on a reunion special, and Bex and Sam are thrust together once more as hosts of a rewatch podcast that will feature favorite episodes. Their first guest - a megawatt star who played a murder victim early on - drops a bombshell. Among the millions of pixels of fanfic written about the show online, one truly prolific author, known in the fiction world as the show's Big Name Fan, was an insider, almost certainly someone from the cast or crew.

As the podcast moves along - and the spark between Bex and Sam threatens to burn down the studio - the pair realize they're faced with two actual mysteries: Who is their Big Name Fan? And was Jen's death an accident, or did someone want her dead? Sifting through clues as they question cast and crew, the duo will need to separate fact from fiction as they make their personal partnership into unmistakable canon..."

I love that this is a mysterious romantic twist on the ubiquitous trend of stars doing rewatch podcasts.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Ally Malinenko, Amanda Flower, Andrea Hannah, Andrea Penrose, Annie Mare, Cidney Mayes, Daisy Pearce, Emily Dickinson, Emily J. Taylor, Linda Epstein, Patrice McDonough, Roger Zelazny, Ruthie Knox, Snow White

Winter by Marissa Meyer
Published by: Feiwel and Friends
Publication Date: November 10th, 2015
Format: Hardcover, 832 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy

Kidnapping Kai on his wedding day was basically a declaration of war against Queen Levana. But Kai needed to know the whole truth about Levana, and more importantly, about Cinder; that she is Princess Selene, the true ruler of Luna. The rebels, Cinder, Iko, Cress, Thorne, and Wolf, need to get to Luna to broadcast Cinder's identity, foment a rebellion, and rescue Scarlet. After their plan is formed they return Kai to his now decimated palace where he declares his continued allegiance to the alliance with Luna and his desire to still marry Levana. The wedding is rescheduled for ten days later. In Artemesia, the capital of Luna. Just as they had planned. They are going to use Kai's ship as a Trojan Horse and sneak right into the capital. Levana had thought of this outcome and was prepared, but so had Cinder and her friends, enough distractions and they have escaped Levana's grasp once more. Winter has also escaped Levana's grasp, with the help of her guard Jacin and Scarlet, her death was faked and they were able to escape the capital. The two groups meet at Wolf's mother's house in the outer sectors. Maha Kesley offers them shelter, but they know any illusion of safety won't be long lived.

They are now not just outlaws but have an entire moon's worth of soldiers actively hunting them. As rebellion begins to take hold Cinder and Wolf are captured by Levana. But with Winter using her natural charisma to enlist help for Cinder out in the outer sectors there is still hope. What's more, by putting Cinder on trial Levana made a major mistake. Cinder was able to capture Levana's true face. Using her cybernetics Cinder was able to document not just Levana's biggest secret but the travesty of her own trial. Escaping from certain death once again the rebels marshal their forces and plot their final assault. They need to attack the palace head on with their forces from the other sectors, forces that Levana has tried to kill by releasing the letumosis virus. If Levana thinks that victory will be that easy, she is sadly mistaken. Using stealth and forces within the palace as well as those without Levana just might be defeated. But in the end it will come down to just Levana and Cinder in a room. One will be victorious and the other will be dead. Can Cinder get her happily ever after for herself and her friends or was it all just a glamour?

The Lunar Chronicles for me has been a ride of smooth freshly paved concrete and Illinois highways that peter out into dirt roads. There was the perfection that was Cress and the low point of Scarlet. But through it all it has been an overall enjoyable ride. The end of the journey was just a little bumpier than I would have liked. Winter was overlong and many chapters felt like the wheels where just spinning and there was no forward momentum. I'm not saying I wasn't satisfied by the ending, everyone ended up exactly where they should, it was just rough getting there. There was just too much toing and froing. They're in the palace, they're out of the palace, they're captured, they're free, they're in danger, they're safe. Over and over and over again. Exactly how many times do you have to break into a palace only to have to break out again only to have to break in again in one book? Many many times if Winter is the benchmark and with many different subsets of characters. There's literally only so much stalling I can take, which is exactly what every setback felt like. Stalling. It's like Meyer didn't want the end to happen too quickly so she threw in so many obstacles it was almost laughable. This ending was a long time coming. At times it felt like it wasn't going to come at all.

Also, while I admit that everyone ended up where they should, perhaps there should have been some repercussions? Yes, yes, I know this is a retelling of a Fairy Tale so a Fairy Tale HEA is expected, but wouldn't there have been more weight to the story if not everyone got an HEA? In particular I'm thinking about Wolf and his non-transformation transformation. When Wolf and Cinder are captured Wolf is forcibly turned back into one of the Queen's Guards. But more than that he's not just reprogrammed, he's remade into an even more wolfy mutant wolf solider. Snout elongated, mouth widened, my grandmother what big teeth you have, the whole Big Bad Wolf makeover. All that bio-engineering to make him not the Wolf Scarlet and the rest of them knew and loved. It is stressed over and over again that Wolf has been changed so dramatically that he is no longer who he was but just one look at Scarlet and it's all fine!?! It's like all that extensive surgery actually didn't change his appearance much at all. Say what!?! Pages and pages about how he's different and then it's all fixed with a kiss. This is the most Fairy Tale aspect of the entire book and I think that if some reality had been brought to bear just in this one instance the book would have been elevated. Wolf and Scarlet die for the cause? That makes much more sense.

But overall there were a lot of things that just didn't make sense as this series drew to a close. Not just the repetitive nature of the story or the fact that EVERY SINGLE PERSON gets an HEA, but there's The Hunger Games aspect. What I have loved about The Lunar Chronicles is that it took stories that were well known and loved and gave them an entirely new spin. Cinderella is a cyborg but also a space princess! How much more out of the box and original is that? And then when we meet all the wealthy residents of Artemesia they're just extras from The Hunger Games who happened to also be residents of The Capital, in that series and this. Um, what!?! This really just threw me for a loop. I've always touted this series as inventive and original and then in the entire structure of Luna it became a rip-off of another dystopian series. Instead of districts we have sectors, many devoted to the same purposes as those in The Hunger Games. Oh, and the Capital residents, glamours and gaudy clothing and wild looks aplenty. I seriously thought that Caesar Flickerman was going to do a play-by-play of Levana and Kai's wedding. And what baffled me most of all? This wasn't the Luna that we saw in Fairest! This is an entirely new and entirely derivative Luna! WTH people! I just couldn't get beyond this and I still can't. Why, just why!?!

And in the end, the saddest thing of all was that my predictions for the character Winter came true. When Scarlet came out I bemoaned the fact that with all the new characters being added in each volume that by the time we got to Winter's story she would be entirely sidelined. And she was. And this just makes me pissed. Why? Because this book is overly long and filled with all this unnecessary padding and somewhere, deep down in its heart, is this amazing story that is only Winter's. The way Meyer has updated the story of Snow White is exquisite, from the fake death in the menagerie to Levana handing her the apple dosed with the letumosis virus, each and every aspect of this book that is only Winter's story is perfection. There's an elegance and a sadness to her story that captures the bittersweet nature of looking back on Fairy Tales when you think you've outgrown them. The way she doesn't use her power because it's against her core beliefs but is making her insane, the natural charisma that makes the Lunar people drawn to her. I just wanted a book about Winter. No one else. She deserved her own story. She has spent her life in the shadows, tortured by Levana, the least she deserved was not to have the new Queen, Cinder, do the same thing. But such is life. No one, not even fictional characters I have come to love, get what they deserve.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Backlog Bonanza, Caesar Flickerman, Cinder, Cress, Dystopian, Fairest, Fairy Tales, Glamour, HEA, Levana, Luna, Marissa Meyer, Scarlet, Snow White, The Hunger Games, The Lunar Chronicles, Trojan Horse, Winter, Wolf

Cress (The Lunar Chronicles Book 3) by Marissa Meyer
Published by: Feiwel and Friends
Publication Date: February 4th, 2014
Format: Hardcover, 560 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

Cress has spent most of her life in a small satellite looking down on Earth. Gently circling the planet as a shell spying for the Lunars... that's the only apparent use she is, being a shell means she is devoid of magic and is repulsive to her own people. But all that time alone with all that computer equipment has made her into a wicked hacker with romantic tendencies. She dreams of one day being rescued by the people on the planet she has fallen in love with. In fact, lately there is one person in particular that she would really like to be rescued by, Captain Carswell Thorne, Cinder's accomplice in escaping the Commonwealth Prison.

Cinder. Cress has taken an interest in her. She helped Cinder to warn the Emperor Kai that the Lunar Queen Levana was planning on murdering him after they marry and she became Empress. Because of this help Cinder sees Cress as another ally in her fight against Luna and the Queen in order to get back the throne that is rightfully hers and stop Kai's wedding. Therefore Cress is to be rescued from her satellite prison by the dashing Thorne! Cress is living her fantasy for real. Only things don't go quite to plan when her Lunar handler Cybil arrives unexpectedly. The result is that Thorne and Cress are falling out of the heavens on a collision course with Earth, while Scarlet is captured by Cybil, and Cinder is left with Cybil's pilot as well as an injured Wolf. Cinder decides that the time has come to return to Earth and seek out Dr. Erland, who revealed so much of her own secret past to her. In one way or another everyone is headed to northern Africa... though for Cress and Thorne it will be a far more dangerous journey through the heart of the desert, that's if they survive making their way through Earth's atmosphere without burning up... but Cinder's plan of stopping Kai's wedding is still firmly in place... it's just changed a little.

One of my first memories of school relates to Rapunzel. I was in nursery school at Saint Andrew's about a block away from my house. I was four years old and my favorite television show was Shelley Duval's Faerie Tale Theatre. What I liked so much about the show was that it wasn't the sanitized Fairy Tales that the books I had at home depicted. These weren't all happily ever afters. The "Little Mermaid" episode which aired when I was much older is to me the epitome of how this show stuck to the original versions. Poor Pam Dawber from Mork and Mindy died because her love didn't love her.

But at this time I was obsessed with Rapunzel. It had so many things that fascinated me. I wanted Rapunzel's hair (this was around the time it was deemed that because I chewed my hair that it was going to be short till I could behave, these enforced haircuts lasted until about 4th grade and I was never to have that rope of hair). Then there was the tower in which she was trapped, I kind of wanted to live there, and then the prince, rather dubious in my opinion in that he never tried to rescue her but visited all the time (enough times to get her pregnant) but more realistic, because, well, it's a girlfriend you only have to deal with when you want to. But what I loved was the fact that the prince is then blinded and wanders alone in the desert, revenge for his behavior AND just the kind of macabre thing to capture the imagination of a young Wednesday Addams in the making. I always thought of how horrid it would be to not only be blinded, but to have the grains of sand working their way into your eyes and irritating them more. As you can see, I really thought a lot about this story. Rapunzel is just so weird and odd and yet, everything about it made it unforgettable.

Back to why this relates to school. I remember one day spending all this time drawing this picture of Rapunzel in her tower letting down her hair and I raised my hand to ask the teacher a question. My question was if she could spell Rapunzel for me so I could put it on my picture so that everyone would know what it was even if they hadn't heard the story. Firstly she didn't know the story, and secondly, she could obviously not spell it. She spelt it wrong on my drawing, something I can never forgive. I remember sitting there at the little table and I know I had an arched eyebrow on my face. I couldn't believe that someone didn't know this awesome story. This was my first experience with the ignorance of adults, and in particular, educators, wherein it felt like I had to explain everything to them. I've had many great teachers in my life, but I can easily say the ignorant far outweigh the awesome.

Of course you're now thinking, ok, she's a little too attached to a girl named for, basically, lettuce, and this relates to this new interpretation how? Because Marissa Meyer nailed it! That little four year old me that has never died was fist pumping the air. Marissa got it! She totally got the story, the twists, the turns, the dark, the funny, the everything! This was it! This was the story I loved brought into a new form but keeping ahold of me in the same way that that episode of Faerie Tale Theatre did all those years ago. I loved Thorne as the "prince" he has the right "ladies man" douche bag personality, that gets redeemed through his suffering. Oh, and Cress, Cress was so wonderful as the naive princess in the tower not wanting do die before experiencing her first kiss. When the book opened on her in that little satellite going around the earth, my breath was taken away with how perfect of a modernization of the tower this was. The isolation yet coupling that with intelligence and knowledge, gave me a heroine I could really route for.

Yet in a series it isn't how the one book succeeds, but in how it succeeds in connection with the whole arc. How Cress tied into the ongoing plot while adding depth to the story made me sqwee with joy. All these little things tying together, the realization that the louche Thorne introduced in the second book would turn out to be Cress's prince. I came to realize that Marissa has really been playing an amazing long game with an impeccably plotted series. All these weird little things are tying together in ways I couldn't have imagined. Scarlet left me cold, but coming into this installment, everything in Scarlet was important, I kind of view it now as the second book was just a glut of prologue to get us to this amazing next chapter.

Everything came together. All the characters were important and Marissa balanced them all perfectly so that unlike in Scarlet, I wasn't just wanting waiting for Cinder to reappear, but I was interested in all their fates and how they were able to work as a team to pull of an amazing heist. Plus there's just little gems that you wouldn't get unless you're a dork, like me, and obviously Marissa, are... for example, did you know that in some of the versions of the tale instead of rapunzel the father gets rampion from the witch's garden? Which happens to be the make of Thorne's ship! Ok, I have to stop my giddy gushing. I was just so pleasantly surprised that now I don't know how I shall be able to wait till the final volume comes out next year. The hint we had of the Princess Winter, like a crazy Cheshire Cat/Alice/Snow White mash up... now please.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Charles Addams, Cheshire Cat, Cinder, Cress, Faerie Tale Theatre, Marissa Meyer, Mork and Mindy, Nursery School, Pam Dawber, Rapunzel, Scarlet, Shelley Duval, Snow White, The Lunar Chronicles, Winter

Cress (The Lunar Chronicles Book 3) by Marissa Meyer
Published by: Feiwel and Friends
Publication Date: February 4th, 2014
Format: Hardcover, 560 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

Cress has spent most of her life in a small satellite looking down on Earth. Gently circling the planet as a shell spying for the Lunars... that's the only apparent use she is, being a shell means she is devoid of magic and is repulsive to her own people. But all that time alone with all that computer equipment has made her into a wicked hacker with romantic tendencies. She dreams of one day being rescued by the people on the planet she has fallen in love with. In fact, lately there is one person in particular that she would really like to be rescued by, Captain Carswell Thorne, Cinder's accomplice in escaping the Commonwealth Prison.

Cinder. Cress has taken an interest in her. She helped Cinder to warn the Emperor Kai that the Lunar Queen Levana was planning on murdering him after they marry and she became Empress. Because of this help Cinder sees Cress as another ally in her fight against Luna and the Queen in order to get back the throne that is rightfully hers and stop Kai's wedding. Therefore Cress is to be rescued from her satellite prison by the dashing Thorne! Cress is living her fantasy for real. Only things don't go quite to plan when her Lunar handler Cybil arrives unexpectedly. The result is that Thorne and Cress are falling out of the heavens on a collision course with Earth, while Scarlet is captured by Cybil, and Cinder is left with Cybil's pilot as well as an injured Wolf. Cinder decides that the time has come to return to Earth and seek out Dr. Erland, who revealed so much of her own secret past to her. In one way or another everyone is headed to northern Africa... though for Cress and Thorne it will be a far more dangerous journey through the heart of the desert, that's if they survive making their way through Earth's atmosphere without burning up... but Cinder's plan of stopping Kai's wedding is still firmly in place... it's just changed a little.

One of my first memories of school relates to Rapunzel. I was in nursery school at Saint Andrew's about a block away from my house. I was four years old and my favorite television show was Shelley Duval's Faerie Tale Theatre. What I liked so much about the show was that it wasn't the sanitized Fairy Tales that the books I had at home depicted. These weren't all happily ever afters. The "Little Mermaid" episode which aired when I was much older is to me the epitome of how this show stuck to the original versions. Poor Pam Dawber from Mork and Mindy died because her love didn't love her.

But at this time I was obsessed with Rapunzel. It had so many things that fascinated me. I wanted Rapunzel's hair (this was around the time it was deemed that because I chewed my hair that it was going to be short till I could behave, these enforced haircuts lasted until about 4th grade and I was never to have that rope of hair). Then there was the tower in which she was trapped, I kind of wanted to live there, and then the prince, rather dubious in my opinion in that he never tried to rescue her but visited all the time (enough times to get her pregnant) but more realistic, because, well, it's a girlfriend you only have to deal with when you want to. But what I loved was the fact that the prince is then blinded and wanders alone in the desert, revenge for his behavior AND just the kind of macabre thing to capture the imagination of a young Wednesday Addams in the making. I always thought of how horrid it would be to not only be blinded, but to have the grains of sand working their way into your eyes and irritating them more. As you can see, I really thought a lot about this story. Rapunzel is just so weird and odd and yet, everything about it made it unforgettable.

Back to why this relates to school. I remember one day spending all this time drawing this picture of Rapunzel in her tower letting down her hair and I raised my hand to ask the teacher a question. My question was if she could spell Rapunzel for me so I could put it on my picture so that everyone would know what it was even if they hadn't heard the story. Firstly she didn't know the story, and secondly, she could obviously not spell it. She spelt it wrong on my drawing, something I can never forgive. I remember sitting there at the little table and I know I had an arched eyebrow on my face. I couldn't believe that someone didn't know this awesome story. This was my first experience with the ignorance of adults, and in particular, educators, wherein it felt like I had to explain everything to them. I've had many great teachers in my life, but I can easily say the ignorant far outweigh the awesome.

Of course you're now thinking, ok, she's a little too attached to a girl named for, basically, lettuce, and this relates to this new interpretation how? Because Marissa Meyer nailed it! That little four year old me that has never died was fist pumping the air. Marissa got it! She totally got the story, the twists, the turns, the dark, the funny, the everything! This was it! This was the story I loved brought into a new form but keeping ahold of me in the same way that that episode of Faerie Tale Theatre did all those years ago. I loved Thorne as the "prince" he has the right "ladies man" douche bag personality, that gets redeemed through his suffering. Oh, and Cress, Cress was so wonderful as the naive princess in the tower not wanting do die before experiencing her first kiss. When the book opened on her in that little satellite going around the earth, my breath was taken away with how perfect of a modernization of the tower this was. The isolation yet coupling that with intelligence and knowledge, gave me a heroine I could really route for.

Yet in a series it isn't how the one book succeeds, but in how it succeeds in connection with the whole arc. How Cress tied into the ongoing plot while adding depth to the story made me sqwee with joy. All these little things tying together, the realization that the louche Thorne introduced in the second book would turn out to be Cress's prince. I came to realize that Marissa has really been playing an amazing long game with an impeccably plotted series. All these weird little things are tying together in ways I couldn't have imagined. Scarlet left me cold, but coming into this installment, everything in Scarlet was important, I kind of view it now as the second book was just a glut of prologue to get us to this amazing next chapter.

Everything came together. All the characters were important and Marissa balanced them all perfectly so that unlike in Scarlet, I wasn't just wanting waiting for Cinder to reappear, but I was interested in all their fates and how they were able to work as a team to pull of an amazing heist. Plus there's just little gems that you wouldn't get unless you're a dork, like me, and obviously Marissa, are... for example, did you know that in some of the versions of the tale instead of rapunzel the father gets rampion from the witch's garden? Which happens to be the make of Thorne's ship! Ok, I have to stop my giddy gushing. I was just so pleasantly surprised that now I don't know how I shall be able to wait till the final volume comes out next year. The hint we had of the Princess Winter, like a crazy Cheshire Cat/Alice/Snow White mash up... now please.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 2 comments  

Labels: Charles Addams, Cheshire Cat, Cinder, Cress, Faerie Tale Theatre, Marissa Meyer, Mork and Mindy, Nursery School, Pam Dawber, Rapunzel, Scarlet, Shelley Duval, Snow White, The Lunar Chronicles, Winter

Fables: Snow White by Bill Willingham
Published by: Vertigo
Publication Date: December 24th, 2013
Format: Paperback, 168 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"With Castle Dark now back in the hands of the Fables, mysteries both young and old begin to challenge the residents of Fabletown. Bigsby and Stinky set off from Fabletown in Rose Red's blood-fueled sports car to track down the two abducted cubs. Unfortunately for Snow White, besides suffering the trauma of having two of her cubs go missing, a long forgotten secret uncovered in Castle Dark threatens to sabatoge her and Bigsby's marriage.

This volume also collects the backup adventures of Bufkin and Lily from issues #114-121, as well as their full length adventures found in issue #124.

Collected here are Fables issues #114-123 (back-up stories only) and issues #124-129."

As to series starts to wind down (wailing, sobbing, and gnashing of teeth here) we once again get an amazing entry in this series (serious thanks to NetGalley for the ARC). Though amazing, it is heart wrenching... but then again, the best stories are. I can't wait to see how this all ends!

How to Betray a Dragon's Hero by Cressida Cowell
Published by: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: December 24th, 2013
Format: Hardcover, 416 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"In Hiccup the Viking's misadventures, the stakes have never been higher, and it's friend versus foe to decide the fate of the world. In this, the penultimate title in the amazing story arc that began with How to Train Your Dragon, Hiccup is faced with a personal dilemma against the backdrop of an impending battle and the possible destruction of everything he knows."

Yeah dragons!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Big Bad Wolf, Bill Willingham, Cressida Cowell, Fables, How to Train a Dragon, Oz, Snow White

Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall by Bill Willingham
Published by: Vertigo
Publication Date: November 6th, 2012
Format: Hardcover, 144 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy
(different edition than one reviewed)

The adversary has run the Fables out of their homelands. Snow White is one of the refugees. She has helped establish a colony on the island of Manhattan as a safe haven. Hoping to form a unified front, Snow is sent to negotiate with the Arabian Fables. Yet the appearance of a women as envoy offends the Fables she has been sent to treaty with. She is able to save her life by acting as Scheherazade, and filling the nights with stories of the Homelands the Fables hope to one day return to.

Snow dwells much on her own shadowed past, from Snow's earliest days in her marriage with Prince Charming, and what really happened to those dwarves, her fleeing with her sister Rose and how their kindness brought back a diabolical witch, who would eventually become one of their greatest allies, Frau Totenkinder. Snow's eventual husband, Bigby, The Big Bad Wolf, also makes a few appearances. From foxes using guerrilla tactics and pies to thwart the enemy, to how the happiness of the Frog Prince was forever shattered by the Adversary, Snow beguiles away the nights and saves her life for one more day. Eventually she returns home, alive, but still without a true alliance, that will take a few hundred years more to get right.

For years people have been telling me to read the series of Fables comics by Bill Willingham. Me, being a contrarian, kind of ignored this, despite the fact that their essence of retelling and twisting of old fairy tales is right up my ally. I finally broke down and have since been devouring them at a most prodigious rate. They are very hit or miss for me. The overall worldbuilding I find fascinating, as I do the conceit of storybook characters living amongst us. Most of my gripes revolve around the art and sometimes the narrative not quite coming together right.

Also there is all this backstory, this history that exists, what with the character being basically immortal, that we have yet to see. That's where this volume comes in. Not only does it start to flesh out the world and show the connections or first meetings of many of the characters, it helps explain so much of what has been going on in the comics. This history was always there for the writers, but until now we where ignorant of it. The fact that Frau Totenkinder is really the witch with a certain house made of candy, whose hunger for children had more to do with her magic and her desire to appear young, then in thinking that children where delicious snacks. Also, the first seeds of Snow White and Prince charming falling out of love are all here.

But the story that really made this collection work for me was that of Ambrose, The Frog Prince. He has always been a melancholy little character as a janitor, known by the nickname Flycatcher. Back in the homelands he had his happily ever after, even if he still had a nervous disposition to occasionally revert to amphibian form... which leads to a tragic turn of events when the Adversary arrives... poor Flycatcher.

Yet what drew me to this volume more than anything else is the art. Instead of having the regular mundane drawings reminiscent of Prince Valiant, or the like, they had many artists and let them have free reign. The emotion and depth to which theses works of art, because they are works of art, add to and enhance the story makes me want to beg Willingham to do this for every issue. James Jean's work, whose covers have always stood out, looked amazing complimenting Flaycatcher's tale. Tara McPherson and Esao Andrews also deserve special shout outs as well, even if Tara's drawings of people with heart shaped holes in them freak me out a little! Going from this back to the normal run of the mill issues is like the biggest let down in the world. You see the heights to which they are able to reach, only to have them go back to the same old same old... sigh, it breaks my heart.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 2 comments  

Labels: Bill Willingham, Esao Andrews, Fables, James Jean, Prince Charming, Snow White, Tara McPherson, The Frog Prince