Category: Reviews

Book Reviews: The Ascendance Trilogy

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews, Young Adult3 Comments

I had an excellent time reading The False Prince by Jennifer A. Neilson, so I went very quickly on to the rest of the Ascendance Trilogy: The Runaway King and The Shadow Throne. This continued to be a very entertaining series—although the trilogy developed a few issues too. Unavoidable spoilers ahead for the first book!

Book 2 opens with Jaron (Sage) trying to convince his council and his country of his fitness to rule, while neighboring countries are rumbling about war. One of the most immediate threats is from a band of pirates who are allied with an enemy nation. Jaron sets out in disguise to infiltrate the pirates, and to find an old enemy.

The story is exciting, and there are enough twists and turns and obstacles (some Jaron anticipated, and others not) to keep the pace going. Some characters from the previous book return and grow in complexity, including Imogen (the girl Jaron cares for) and Amarinda (the princess he’s betrothed to). Continue reading “Book Reviews: The Ascendance Trilogy” →

Book Review: Sisterhood Everlasting

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews1 Comment

I recently reviewed the first four books in Ann Brashares’ Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series, and today brings me to the final book, Sisterhood Everlasting.  Spoilers ahead–not so much for this book, but for the previous ones, as is unavoidable when talking about much later events in the characters’ lives.  You’ve been warned.  I also warn you that this book is not as light as the previous ones (but I promise the ending is, mostly, a happy one).

Sisterhood Everlasting picks up ten years after the previous book, with the four girls about to turn 29.  Carmen is living a glamorous, high-speed life as an actress in Manhattan, engaged to a news executive none of her friends like very much.  Lena is an art teacher in New Jersey, a quiet homebody who avoids risks professionally and romantically.  Bridget lives in San Francisco with her long-time boyfriend, but can’t seem to put down roots or settle into a career.  And Tibby moved away to Australia with her boyfriend Brian a few years before, and has fallen strangely out of touch. Continue reading “Book Review: Sisterhood Everlasting” →

Book Review: Return to the Hundred Acre Wood

On By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, Juvenile, Reviews10 Comments

I always take a rather dim view of new authors writing sequels to classic fiction. Sometimes it works, but I’m always suspicious—so Return to the Hundred Acre Wood by David Benedictus proved to be a pleasant surprise.

It might have helped a great deal that he began with an Exposition, a kind of foreword, of the author speaking to the characters about the possibility of a new story (Eeyore is sure it will all turn out wrong). The author concludes that he can really only guess and hope that he will guess right–and the characters promise faithfully to help him get it right.  And this at least makes me feel that he has a good firm grasp of the size of the shoes he is attempting to fill, which makes me feel much better on the whole subject. Continue reading “Book Review: Return to the Hundred Acre Wood” →

Book Review: To Hold the Sun

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews2 Comments

To Hold the SunWhen I started reading To Hold the Sun by Chas Watkins, I have to admit I wasn’t quite sure if it was memoir, self-help, or fiction.  But the copyright page tells me “this is a work of fiction.  Any resemblance…” etc, so technically it’s a novel.  But I found I liked it much better viewed as self-help, or perhaps philosophy.

The plot is essentially the old fable, a student goes to the master and says, “Teach me your wisdom.”  This particular students is an investigative journalist who is vaguely dissatisfied with his life, sent on an assignment to the Caribbean island of Roatan, there to interview Paul, a practitioner of “the art of happiness,” as well as of handstands. Continue reading “Book Review: To Hold the Sun” →

Book Review: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews, Science Fiction8 Comments

If you’re around here a lot, you may have noticed that I have a thing for stories about people who are rejected, not for their deeds, but because they are somehow different.  The Phantom of the Opera, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, and the Creature of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

I can’t remember the last time I read Frankenstein…college, maybe?  Not as an assignment, just around that time.  My chief memory was that I enjoyed the book, but I hated Victor.  I recently reread the book, and…yeah.  Really good book.  Hated Victor.

Victor Frankenstein, already a dying man as the story opens, imparts to the reader the tale of what laid him low.  After an idyllic childhood in his native Geneva, he went off to college and pursued an obsession with the “natural sciences.”  This culminated in an experiment in which he successfully gave life to a creature he fashioned.  Victor is horrified by the Creature’s ugliness the moment he comes to life, and flees the laboratory.  The Creature disappears and Victor, with a shudder, goes about his life–until his young brother is murdered, and Victor realizes the Creature is to blame.  More tragedies later, Creature and creator confront one another at last, and in an extended story-within-the-story, the Creature relates his experiences.  (Unlike the movie version, he’s extremely eloquent.)  He sought acceptance and instead was met with rejection, until at last he turned with rage upon his creator.  And from there we enter what could almost be a Shakespearean tragedy, with the body count rising and the “hero” falling apart in mind and body. Continue reading “Book Review: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley” →