Author: cherylmahoney

I'm a book review blogger and writer. I have published four novels, The Wanderers; The Storyteller and Her Sisters; and The People the Fairies Forget; and The Lioness and the Spellspinners. All can be found on Amazon as an ebook and paperback. In my day job, I'm a Marketing Specialist. Find me on Twitter (@MarvelousTales) and GoodReads (MarvelousTales).

Book Review: This Is Not the End

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews, Science Fiction1 Comment

I don’t read a lot of real-world teenager stories, but I was super-intrigued by the premise of This Is Not the End by Chandler Baker–mostly because of the one sci fi element in the mix!

As she approaches her eighteenth birthday, Lake’s life is completely centered around the perfect trio of her, her boyfriend Will and her best friend Penny.  But then a car accident kills both Will and Penny in one afternoon, and Lake is left alone–for now.  Because in this near-future world, science has found a way to bring back the day.  Strict regulations mean each person can bring back one individual, and they only have one chance at it–choose someone to resurrect on their eighteenth birthday, or waive the right forever.  So now Lake has to choose, a decision growing only more complicated as she learns new things about her friends–and about her brother Matt, a quadriplegic for the past five years, who has his own agenda in the question.

This was a fast read, very engaging and full of mysteries that kept me turning pages.  Lake is likable and sympathetic, and the characters around her are well-developed.  Will and Penny in particular, despite dying early in the story, are very vivid, both through Lake’s feelings around them and the flashback sequences that take us through Lake’s relationships with them.  I liked Penny a lot, and would love to read a story with a heroine like her.  It’s overall great, smooth writing, with an unusually clear setting too, for a contemporary story. Continue reading “Book Review: This Is Not the End” →

Blog Hop: Classically Horrifying

On By cherylmahoneyIn Blog Hop3 Comments

book-blogger-hop-finalToday’s Book Blogger Hop question is: Both Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Marry Shelley’s Frankenstein are considered classics. Have you ever read either of them?

I’m not a reader of horror, but I am a reader of classics, so I’ve read both these books.  I was not greatly impressed by Dracula, in all honesty.  It was not nearly as frightening as billed (though a friend who read it alone at night said atmosphere made a difference…) and I was deeply (deeply) bothered by the notion that a character could lose her soul against her will (cursed by Dracula, more or less).  I was also left wondering how we ever got from Stoker’s vampires to the Twilight romantic variety (I’ve been told Anne Rice is the bridge).

I like Frankenstein a lot.  It’s also not too horrifying, in the sense we typically mean horror now, but I found it much more engaging than Dracula.  I hated Victor and felt great sympathy for the Creature (for most of the book), but the key point there may be that I felt strongly about both of them, so I had a heavy investment in the story.  Frankenstein figures slightly in my Phantom of the Opera retelling (another classic Gothic horror, actually).  The Phantom has a copy on his bookshelf, alongside The Hunchback of Notre Dame.  Both are probably very unhealthy reading for him…

Have you read either of these classics?  How did you feel about them?

Classic Review: Merlin Dreams

On By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, Juvenile, ReviewsLeave a comment

I’ve been thinking vaguely of rereading this one soon, and rereading my review has convinced me of it!  A fun note I’m not sure I knew when I wrote this–the author Peter Dickinson was married to Robin McKinley, a long-time favorite author of mine.  I love connections like that!

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There’s an old legend that Merlin never died–that he’s imprisoned beneath a stone somewhere on the moor, sleeping through the centuries.  And while he sleeps, what might he dream?

This is the frame-story for Peter Dickinson’s wonderful book, Merlin Dreams.  He tells eight stories, eight dreams of Merlin beneath his stone.  Between each story Merlin half-wakes, remembers his life or senses what goes on above him, then drifts back into sleep…and has another dream.

I’m fascinated by the frame story, and the short stories are excellent too.  Several have a vaguely Arthurian flare, although I don’t think any retell an actual legend.  But there are dashing (and not so dashing) knights, brave damsels and many unexpected heroes.  There’s a king, fallen from honor and strength who needs a little girl to show him the way back.  Another little girl befriends a unicorn in the woods, only to be threatened by men who want to exploit the opportunity to hunt a unicorn.  Two stories feature tricksters who put on shows for country folk they hold in contempt, only to be undone by their own tricks.  There’s a young prince who fights a dragon, and another, particularly ugly young man, who fights a sorceress.  And woven throughout, Merlin remembers his own life, and strange fragments of other scenes and stories. Continue reading “Classic Review: Merlin Dreams” →

2017 Reading Challenges: Halfway Update

On By cherylmahoneyIn Ruminations2 Comments

The end of September must mean time for a challenge update!  I’ve moved forward pretty well in most challenges, with sporadic focus on them…but that’s been enough for most.

PictureNewbery Medal Winners
Goal: 20 Newbery Medal Winners, halving the number remaining
Host: Smiling Shelves

I’m right on track here, with five new ones added–a good amount for a quarter.  I didn’t have great success with the books, though.  I particularly disliked the main character in MC Higgins the Great (he thinks it’s fun to jump girls walking alone–not okay) and particularly disliked the writing style of The Dark Frigate (written in 1923, but reads like 1823 and not in a good way).  The others were better, but cross fingers for some stand-out good ones in the last quarter?

  1. Kira-Kira by Cynthia Kadohata
  2. The Whipping Boy by Sid Fleischman
  3. Last Stop on Market Street by Matt de la Pena
  4. Good Masters, Sweet Ladies by Laura Amy Schlitz
  5. Crispin: The Cross of Lead by AVI
  6. King of the Wind by Marguerite Henry
  7. Joyful Noise by Paul Fleischman
  8. The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron
  9. Miracles on Maple Hill by Virginia Sorenson
  10. The Wheel on the School by Meindert De Jong
  11. A Visit to William Blake’s Inn by Nancy Willard
  12. The Cat Who Went to Heaven by Elizabeth Coatsworth
  13. I, Juan de Pareja by Elizabeth Borton de Trevino
  14. MC Higgins the Great by Virginia Hamilton
  15. The Dark Frigate by Charles Boahman Hawes
  16. The Summer of the Swans by Betsy Byars

Continue reading “2017 Reading Challenges: Halfway Update” →

Book Review: Cold Summer

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews, Science Fiction, Young Adult1 Comment

I love a good time-travel novel, especially because people have come up with so many different ways time-travel can work, and so many different challenges that arise.  Cold Summer by Gwen Cole was not the most unusual, but it had an interesting premise.

Kale has always disappeared–his friends and family have simply treated it as his way, to apparently go off for a few days at a time.  But at seventeen, the disappearances are happening more and more frequently, and only a trusted few understand why.  Kale is a time-traveler, unable to control his slips back into the past.  To make matters worse, for the past six months Kale has only gone back to one place: World War II, as a soldier on the front lines.  In the present he’s suffering from PTSD and a growing estrangement from his life.  Meanwhile, next door neighbor and childhood friend Harper has recently moved back to town, dealing with her own family crises.  Something begins to kindle between Harper and Kale, even while Kale’s time-travel threatens to tear him out of his present-day life for good.

This was a little bit like The Time-Traveler’s Wife-light (with 100% less nudity!)  Kale slips through time suddenly, uncontrollably and apparently randomly, until his recent ongoing secondary life in World War II.  The challenge of living two parallel lives was intriguing, especially with one as intense as the front lines of a war. Continue reading “Book Review: Cold Summer” →