"After You," by Jojo Moyes

*Warning* This review containers spoilers for Me Before You. I highly recommend you read Me Before You first before reading this review. It's a great book. Trust me.

I really enjoyed After You - but I kind of wish it didn't exist.

Let me explain. After You is the sequel to Me Before You, a novel that emotionally capsized me when I first read it and will likely do so again when I see the movie version (can Mr. Bates from Downton Abbey just play everyone's dad forever?).

However, one of the things I loved the most about Me Before You was the ending, where Louisa finds the courage to embark upon an adventurous life thanks to her relationship with Will. It was hopeful yet bittersweet, the narrative unravelling into uncertainty instead of a neatly hemmed conclusion. I kind of thought it as the perfect ending.

After You ruins it. Louisa did go on that adventure, but before long her grief caught up with her and forced her home. Estranged from her family and hometown thanks to her involvement in Will's death, Louisa lives in London while working at a tacky Irish-themed pub at an airport. She knows she's not living the life Will wanted for her, and she almost loses that life when she drunkenly falls off her apartment building.

It's a little disappointing to know that Louisa's picture-perfect Paris ending didn't last, but After You does explore the very real consequences of grief and depression. Louisa wants to change her future but feels her new opportunities were bought with Will's life. Just when it looks like she might undo everything Will helped her accomplish - his sullen, impulsive long-lost daughter shows up.

The product of a college relationship that ended badly, Lily's home life is a mess and she's desperate to learn about the family she's never met. Louisa sees an opportunity to honour Will's memory and decides to take Lily in, not really understanding how teenagers work.

While it initially seems like her grief has knocked her back to square one, Louisa's so easy to relate to. In Me Before You, Will guided Louisa as she fought to overcome her limitations and bad habits and grab the life she wanted. Now, Louisa finds herself in a mentor position - to a prickly, unstable teenage girl who seems determined to destroy her own life.

There are a lot of good aspects to this book - the characterization is as strong as ever (especially with Louisa's adorable family), and Moyes has a flair for humorous situations (such as when Louisa is forced to conduct a job interview by Skype in a public bathroom), but throughout the book I couldn't help but feel - this story isn't necessary. Maybe I'm a little too attached to that "perfect ending" of Me Before You, but nothing about this story felt like it had to be told.

To be honest, it felt a bit like an emotional band-aid, as if Moyes regretted the last novel's open ending that left a few characters (Will's parents, for example) in pretty bad places, so she wrote in a Troubled Secret Daughter to give everyone a second chance at happiness before hammering down an unambiguously happy, triumphant ending.

After You wasn't a bad book, per se. It just wasn't a necessary one. It wasn't a sequel that celebrated and built on the first book - it felt almost like a correction for the first one. I enjoyed reading it, and it had some good things to say, but it doesn't outshine Me Before You.
B

"Tapping the Dream Tree," by Charles de Lint

So I'm back to reviewing!

Sort of!

Basically to get myself back in the habit of both reading and writing critically, I'm going to go back to reviewing books - although I might be briefer than I used to be.

I've recently moved back in with my parents, and to while away the hours I started an impromptu Parental Book Club, encouraging my parents to submit books or authors they've always loved and always wanted me to try.

Which is what got me reading Tapping the Dream Tree. Charles de Lint is one of my mother's favourite authors, and she thought this collection of stories would be the perfect appetizer platter to introduce me to his unique brand of urban fantasy.

And to be honest - it was rather refreshing. I burnt out on urban fantasy pretty early after one-too-many novels about a Tough Heroine with a Mysterious Parentage who wears a Leather Jacket and Disrespects Authority and is in a Love Triangle with Two Equally Hot and Morally Ambiguous Magical Boyfriends.

De Lint's stories have a different, folkie, down-to-earth tone, inspired by Celtic and First Nations folklore. Most of them take place in or around the fictional town of Newford, with a revolving cast of recurring characters. Most of the protagonists are artists or musicians - people who, while not explicitly magical, are still open enough to the world's mysteries to be pretty chill about the magical stuff that inevitably goes down. I really enjoyed this - none of the stories get bogged down in "What do you mean magic is real?!" denials or overwrought explanations about rules or worldbuilding. Whether it's a fairy-powered internet search engine, a Ferris Wheel of alternate universes, or the ghost of the teenage free spirit you sacrificed for a happy adulthood, the drama comes not from confronting magic, but from accepting and learning from it.

What I enjoyed the most about these stories is that although characters might reference events from other collections or novels, I never felt lost or left out because I was a de Lint newbie. Tapping the Dream Tree is an effective Charles de Lint taster - each story is a satisfying standalone that still drops delicious hints about his pretty impressive backlist. I may have to try one of his novels, next.
B

"Little Men," by Louisa May Alcott

Yeah, sequels are rarely as good as the original story.

I could pretty much end my review of Little Men (the sequel to the classic Little Women) right there, but despite the fact that Little Men is nowhere near as interesting or well-written as the book that came before it, it is still a remarkably interesting book for its time.

Little Men chronicles the adventures of one year at Plumfield Academy, the school Jo and her husband Professor Bhaer founded at the end of Little Women. You'd think this would be interesting, and it sort of is, and it sort of isn't.

Plumfield is home to 14 students, plus Jo's sons Rob and Teddy (yes, his name is Teddy Bhaer). Four are the main(ish) characters - Nat, former urchin and violin prodigy; Demi, Meg and John's bookworm son; Tommy, the rascally troublemaker; and Dan - the bad boy street kid with a dark past. Yes, ladies, we have been mooning over angsty brooders for more than a century.

Five of the other boys are vague characters who mainly serve as comic relief or mild antagonists (Jack, Stuffy, Franz, Emil, Ned). Three are the token "special" kids (Dick has a crooked back, Dolly has a stutter, and Billy is mentally disabled) who are mentioned very rarely and never without some combination of the adjectives "poor," "feeble," and "valiant."

Strangely enough, the "quadroon" student Jo and Fritz boasted of so smugly at the end of Little Women is nowhere to be found. Suspicious, that.

Lastly, two of the students are girls - Daisy, Demi's twin sister, and "Naughty Nan," who is AWESOME. More on that later.

The main reason this book didn't work for me was the youth of the characters. While the main children are comparable in age to the March sisters at the start of Little Women, they act much younger. Perhaps this is due to the fact that they reside in a school environment where they are constantly reminded that they're children, while the March sisters had to grow up rather fast to survive while their father was away.

Alcott also wastes an awful lot of scenes chronicling the cutesy fan-servicey adventures of the March sisters' children, most of whom are under the age of 5. Lots of tears, chubby fists, and baby talk. Imagine reading a Facebook friend's posts about their two-year-old, only instead of a post, it's like 40% of a novel. So most of the episodes read as very childish.

Little Men, as a whole, feels strangely directionless. It's "a year in the life," separated into little episodes and vignettes, with no real goal or point. The closest the novel comes to an arc is the Bhaers' attempt to tame Dan - a defiant and obviously troubled boy who wants help as much as he fears to ask for it. The Bhaer's conflicting hopes and fears for Dan (hope that he might be brought around, fear that his violence might affect the other children) are powerful, as is Dan's slowly unfolding trust for them. It's the strongest subplot in the novel, and I honestly wish we had more of it.

On the positive side, Plumfield gives Alcott an excuse to rhapsodize at length about how best to educate boys and girls, and her ideas (considering her time period) are bold, progressive, and feminist. For instance, a huge emphasis is placed on individual study - some kids learn at different paces, and that's okay! Rote memorization will not help a young, eager brain to learn (rather laughably, mentally handicapped Billy's backstory is that he literally studied so hard his brain gave out). As well, Alcott preaches a balance between book learning and practical, hands-on knowledge (the boys are encouraged to explore and collect their frogs and snails and puppy dog's tails).

Even better, Jo decides to make Plumfield co-ed by inviting local girl "Naughty Nan" to board with them and study with Daisy (who's at Plumfield to be close to her brother). Jo theorizes that having boys learn alongside girls will encourage them to moderate their behaviour and respect women more. FANCY THAT.

Alcott also demonstrates many feminist themes in her treatment of Daisy and Nan. Daisy fits the more conventional model of Victorian femininity - she's gentle and sweet, loves to cook and clean and pretends to mother her dolls. Nan is the wild child - running and racing and challenging the boys, voraciously interested in science and the outdoors. Neither child is shamed or depicted as the "bad one" for what they want out of life. Nan is "naughty" because of her behaviour, not because of her desires.

Oh, and did I mention? Jo sees Nan's interest in science, biology, and medicinal herbs and encourages her to study to be a DOCTOR. IN 1871 NEW ENGLAND. Because JO MARCH-BHAER IS AWESOME. I just about flew up out of my chair reading that part.

So while Little Men doesn't tell as interesting of a story as Little Women did, it's still a fascinating look into the mind of a 19th century feminist and her idea of what the ideal school would be like. While some of her ideas and themes are problematic when seen in a modern context (especially her depiction of disabled people), the amount of stuff she got right is still encouraging.
B

"True Pretenses," by Rose Lerner

The Chick: Lady Lydia Reeve. A genteel lady whose family has traditionally held a high political interest in the town of Lively St. Lemeston.
The Rub: Now that her father's dead, her skittish younger brother  is content to let that interest lapse in order to pursue his own desires. And Lydia has no money of her own to maintain her family's influence.
Dream Casting: Isla Fischer.

The Dude: Asher Cohen, a.k.a. "Ashton Cahill." A Jewish con artist on the run with his brother and partner in crime, Rafe.
The Rub: Rafe is tired of their life and wants to go straight, so Ash needs to concoct a truly lucrative swindle to give Rafe safer life options than the army.
Dream Casting: Mark Ruffalo.

Romance Convention Checklist:

• 1 Inconvenient Inheritance
• 1 Inconveniently Dead Parent
• 1 Stolen Baby
• 1 Plot-Propelling Urchin
• Several Fake Names

The Word: You know what time it is? TIME FOR ANOTHER ROSE LERNER NOVEL! To set next to In For a Penny, Lily Among Thorns, and Sweet Disorder, we have True Pretenses.

Our novel opens on two brothers, Ash and Rafe, in the midst of escaping after a successful swindle. Orphaned, impoverished, and Jewish, they've eked out their outcast existence through theft, trickery and clever con artistry. However, Rafe (the younger brother) has tired of the game and wants to go straight. His protective older brother, Ash, reluctantly agrees, with one caveat: they must perform one more swindle, to set Rafe up properly for his new life of law abidance. 

Ash travels on ahead to the town of Lively St. Lemeston (the same setting from Sweet Disorder) and discovers low-hanging fruit ripe for the plucking: Lady Lydia Reeve. Her highly political father, Lord Wheatcroft, held a heavy interest in Lively St. Lemeston before his sudden death, but his son Jamie now balks at the idea of continuing the tradition. Lydia's determined to hold onto their family's interest until her brother comes to his senses, but the only funds at her disposal come from a trust that will only be released upon her marriage. 

I'll be honest - the set-up to this novel doesn't make a whole lot of sense. It's kind of confusing - at first, the brothers plan to offer Lydia access to her trust through a sham marriage to Rafe (in exchange for 3000 pounds) but then Ash wants Rafe and Lydia to marry for realsies because they're so cute together and it'll keep Rafe out of the army. What?

Um, WHAT?

Thankfully, before that ridiculousness can happen, Rafe and Ash get into an argument that ends with their estrangement, leaving Ash to offer himself to Lydia instead. The plot is probably the weakest part of the novel, and the weakest of all Lerner's novels to date. After the initial set-up, the rest of the book is virtually conflict-free until the too-sudden Black Moment at the end. Ash and Lydia get along famously about 99% of the time, with the other 1% devoted to depressing self-examination. 

So why did I keep reading? Despite the fact that there is relatively little drama between Ash and Lydia, their individual characters and habits are fascinating - Lydia's, especially. She is very much a conservative, devoted to maintaining the traditions of the past, suspicious of change, and almost pathologically afraid of showing weakness or negative emotion of any kind. At the beginning of the book, her methods of expression are all but muzzled by her refusal to utter anything that might possibly reflect badly on her father or brother. She has been raised to cater to the needs of others while repressing her own. It becomes a relief to talk to Ash, someone who cannot judge her since his social status is virtually nonexistent.

Ash is a more nebulous character, but perhaps that's intentional. His Jewish identity is important to him (sex with random ladies is a worry because how does one explain the lack of a foreskin?), but otherwise, he's afraid to define himself as anything other than "Rafe's brother." Finding and committing to an identity is a new experience for him. He's a con man without an emotional off-switch. His success at conning developed from his ability to empathize with and draw closer to the rubes he fleeced, leaving him incapable of trusting other people's emotions - and his own, least of all. Does he really enjoy Lydia's company? Or is he just desperate to be liked, because likeable people get what they want? The only emotional stability he's ever preserved is his love for Rafe, and without him, he's adrift.

The enormous status gulf between Lydia and Ash is also entertaining as it allows for a thorough examination of privilege. Ash was no Dickensian urchin - his past involves theft, graverobbing, fencing, and sex work. The contrast between the protagonists is especially potent because their childhoods were superficially similar - both Lydia and Ash were motherless children unfairly thrust into parental roles over their younger siblings. However, the vast difference in their upbringings and environments invites interesting comparisons, most especially in how they've learned to lie to other people.

At the same time, even as Lydia's pampered upbringing is contrasted and compared, her own feelings of dissatisfaction, grief and loneliness are not invalidated just because she's wealthy.

While True Pretenses is not the strongest of Rose Lerner's novels when it comes to plot, it's still a refreshing, pleasantly entertaining read.
B

"The Winner's Curse," by Marie Rutkoski

The Protagonist: Kestral Trajan. The daughter of Valorian's most celebrated general, she's under extreme pressure to either marry or enlist in the military. Her life is hard.
The Rub: But not quite as hard as those of the slaves she owns. Awkward.

YA Tropes Checklist:

• Parents Who Just Don't Understand
• 1 Poor Little Rich Girl
• 1 Boy From the Wrong Side of the Tracks Chains
• 1 Airhead Best Friend
• 2 Underappreciated Musical Talents
• 1 Romantically Lacklustre Rival
• 2 Villains Who Want to Bang the Heroine
• Love Made Me Do It

The Word: I underestimated this novel. Blame it on the woozy, swoony prom-dress cover. Poor little blond girl in a ball gown, whatever shall you do? What love triangles shall you muck up? What doorways will you adorably trip through to be caught by the hero? This cover is terrible, no doubt about it. However, The Winner's Curse pulls fewer punches and hides sharper edges of commentary than I would have guessed. 

Kestral is the pampered-but-unsatisifed daughter of a successful Valorian general living in the occupied Herrani capital city. Ten years ago, the warlike Valorians conquered the artistic, sophisticated Herrani and the survivors of that war now work as slaves in the houses they once owned. 

While out walking, Kestral accidentally winds up at the slave auction, where a slave named Smith is being sold. Intrigued by his spirit and misery that seem to mirror her own, she defies her better judgement and purchases him at an exaggeratedly high price. Despite being remarkably snarky, defiant, and disobedient for a slave, Smith (whose real name is Arin) becomes almost like a friend to Kestral, as they each learn more about each others' people. 

However, unbeknownst to Kestral, Arin is an agent for the underground Herrani revolution working to overthrow the brutal Valorian yoke and restore Herrani freedom once and for all. Can these two crazy kids overcome their teeny tiny ideological differences?

I was quite impressed by the way this novel handled slavery. Kestral is depicted as someone who, while uncomfortable when confronted by the realities of slavery, continues to benefit from it. Ideologically she recognizes that slavery probably sucks, but she can't imagine a life without it and often catches herself ignoring or downplaying it in order to make herself feel better. When we live in a world where fruit is picked by underpaid migrant workers and sneakers are made by child labour and iPods are assembled by starving factory workers - are we any different?

When Kestral's freed nanny-slave Enai dies, Arin mocks her grief by demanding if she even knew who Enai's real family, real children were. Kestral doesn't - she was too afraid to even ask. I appreciated that the author never made the heroine a naive saint who was always good to her slaves. People who contribute to an abusive system still possess the capacity for individual good, and the capacity to eventually wake up and overthrow the abusive system. But that capacity doesn't whitewash their flaws. 

I also loved that Kestral wasn't a super-heroic Katniss character who is miraculously adept at scaling walls and killing bad guys. Instead of being a warrior, she's a strategist - an underused role for women in YA. I really appreciated this - she uses her power in more subtle and original ways.

Rutkoski uses a deft hand that highlights points of insight without getting mired in rhetoric, and the story moves swiftly and smoothly, but I could perhaps have preferred a little more depth to the worldbuilding and the history. Instead, the author uses coding (the Valorians are Romans, the Herrani Greeks) to do her worldbuilding for her, and that felt like a cheat.

All in all, a surprisingly solid read.

B

"City of Dragons," by Robin Hobb

Reviewer's Note: This is going to be a little different from previous fantasy reviews, simply because I read this book a bit of a while ago, and I wasn't able to review it due to work, NaNoWriMo, and general Life Stuff.

So I'm running on memory!

So the first book of this series, Dragon Keeper, didn't wow me, but Dragon Haven blew me away with how easily it fixed the problems with the first book, advanced the plot, and developed the characters. My expectations were pretty high for City of Dragons.

Unfortunately - it's a bit of a filler book. Scratch that, it's entirely a filler book. The plot moves forward a couple of inches, but otherwise, it's entirely a set-up to what is presumably the final book in the quartet, Blood of Dragons.

The dragons and their keepers have finally reached the fabled Elderling city of Kelsingra. The only problem? A wild, uncrossable river stands between them and their destination, and the only dragon who has successfully crossed it is Heeby, the first dragon to master flight. If the other dragons want to reach the city and unlock its secrets, they'll have to force themselves to learn to fly or remain trapped on the rain-drenched shore. This is especially difficult for the arrogant, intractable dragon Sintara. Her first attempt to fly ended very badly and she's too proud and vain to admit that she's terrified of trying again.

Another issue arises regarding the fate of Kelsingra. Alise wants to preserve the Elderling city exactly as it is, to research it and finally discover the secrets of the Elderlings and why they disappeared. On the other side of the issue, Rapscal and some of the other keepers want to actually use the city and its contents rather than protecting it like a dead relic. On top of that, once the existence of Kelsingra becomes publicly known, it'll only be a matter of time before treasure hunters descend to try and wrest it from their grasp to sell it piece by piece.

Hobb also grooms more characters to become future antagonists (such as the Duke of Chalced and Alise's Evil Gay Husband Hest) and explores more on the theme of female sexuality, but otherwise, the story doesn't progress terribly far. I'm still looking forward to the final book, but perhaps my expectations will be more tempered this time.
B

"Untold," by Sarah Rees Brennan

The Protagonist: Kami Glass. A budding investigative reporter whose sleuthing uncovered the fact that her town is full of resentful sorcerers waiting for a good excuse to come back into power.
Her Angst: She has no true idea who's a sorcerer and who's not, and no longer knows who to trust. On top of that, Jared is giving her the cold shoulder for breaking their magical bond.

The Secondary Cast:

Jared: An entitled, navel-gazing, self-absorbed whiny loser with low self-esteem who deals with this by being a dick to everyone. He's supposed to be attractive for some reason?

Ash: An entitled, navel-gazing, self-absorbed whiny loser with low self-esteem who nevertheless finds healthy ways to deal with his issues and other people. Why is he not the hero?

Angela: Kami's best friend who's coming to grips with her crush on Holly.

Holly: Friend to both Kami and Angela, who's struggling to come to grips with Angela's sexual orientation - and maybe her own?

Lillian: Ash's mum, Jared's aunt, and official Head Bitch In Charge of Sorry-in-the-Vale. Determined to hold on to her crown by any means necessary.

Rob: Ash's dad, Jared's uncle (?), who's determined to return sorcerers to power and make the humans of Sorry-in-the-Vale his rightful serfs.

YA Angst Checklist:

• I Know Way Too Many People Who Are Suddenly Okay With Human Sacrifice
• Child-snatching
• ANGST ANGST ANGST
• Why can't all these people see I'm acting like a Giant Tool because I'm starved for Love?
• Emotional Independence
• Bad Moms

The Word: I'd heard the hype about Unspoken, but I didn't truly get it until I opened the book and fell headfirst into a richly layered gothic fantasy that's serious, but not too serious to take itself too seriously. If that make sense. It used time-tested YA tropes, but in a fresh, self-aware way that made them entertaining instead of tiresome.

Needless to say, I was excited about the sequel. Untold picks up where Unspoken left off - that is, In A Very Bad Place. Kami's investigations from the previous novel uncovered the fact that the Lynburns are sorcerers and her town of Sorry-in-the-Vale is riddled with other magic-using families. Even worse, Rob Lynburn (Jared's uncle, Ash's father) had been secretly recruiting these local sorcerers in order to forcibly return the town to the Old Ways - the human-sacrifice kind.

So on top of coming to grips with the fact that people she's known her entire life are suddenly okay with murdering people, Kami has to stop Rob and his cronies from fulfilling their promise to sacrifice a human on the Winter Solstice to solidify their rule over the town. This means Kami and her friends have to team up with Lillian Lynburn, who stands in opposition to Rob - not because she opposes the murder of peasants, but because they are her peasants and that's rude. Yeah, Lillian's the worst.

I did enjoy this book, really, but it does suffer from a pretty severe case of middle-book-itis. It's heavy on character development, and really, really light on plot. The book layers on the description and the internal monologuing and the angst, but most of the novel is just a countdown to the Solstice.

Oh, and angsty tantrums from Jared. So many angsty tantrums. I put up with Jared in the previous novel because Kami was such a strong character and didn't put up with his pressuring. At the end of the previous novel, Kami actually severed their magical bond because she was (rightly) terrified about what it was doing to her emotional health and independence. Well, that action sends Jared spiralling into an insufferable, whiny, self-loathing angst-spiral for the rest of this damn book and I just couldn't stand him. He spends a good 70% of the novel being a total asshole to people who care about him while crying that "nobody wuvs me, I am so dark and unwuvable and broken, I cannot handle the feels!"

GET OVER YOURSELF, JARED.

The novel beats the dead horse that is Jared's Tortured Feels over and over, but at least other characters (like Ash and Holly) also get some spectacular development. Untold spends time examining the pieces on this particular chessboard rather than making any significant plays, but thankfully (most of) the characters (who are not named Jared) are interesting and multifaceted enough to hold my attention.

Yeah, it's a middle book, but it keeps a firm enough hold on the reigns to keep me excited for the final novel.
B

"The Lady's Secret," by Joanna Chambers

The Chick: Georgy Knight. She works her fingers to the bone as an assistant to a theatrical troupe - even though the blood of an earl runs through her veins.
The Rub: A chance to prove her true parentage comes up - but it involves dressing as a boy and waiting hand and foot on a super-hot aristocrat.
Dream Casting: Gwyneth Paltrow, circa Shakespeare in Love.

The Dude: Lord Nathan Harland. A cultured dandy who discovers, to his cautious delight, that his mysterious valet is secretly a woman in disguise.
The Dude: Even as he means to toy with her, he discovers he's starting to love her - in earnest.
Dream Casting: Cillian Murphy

The Plot:

Georgy: I need to find evidence of my parents' marriage! I'll disguise myself as a valet!

Nathan: What an awesome valet you are! Your neck rubs are oddly erotic and for some strange reason I'm cool with that!

Georgy: *caught taking a bath*

Nathan: OH THANK GOD YOU HAVE BOOBS. I am TOTALLY cool with that. But secretly.

Georgy: *caught breaking into Nathan's friend's study*

Nathan: I am less cool with that.

Nathan and Georgy: *knock boots*

Nathan: Cool cool cool.

Georgy's BFF: OMG, you totally ruined a lady.

Nathan: Not cool! Let's not just throw silly words around!

Georgy: *leaves in heartbreak, almost gets killed by Crazy Murderer*

Nathan: OMG, Georgy, don't ever leave me, lets get married and have gender-norm-defying babies!

Georgy: Cool!

Nathan: HOORAY!

Romantic Convention Checklist:

• 1 Heroine In Pants
• 1 Bout of Gay Panic
• 2 Actual Gay Dudes Who Are Occasionally Panicked
• 1 Evil Mum
• 1 Awkward Erection
• 1 Carriage Accident

The Word: Full disclosure, Joanna Chambers and I are Twitter buddies. I bought a copy of her novel thanks to a great review and because I followed her on Twitter, but - then I kind of forgot about it. It's harder to remember the books I have on my Kobo since they aren't staring at me every day the way my aggressive paper books do.

Anyhoo - Georgiana "Georgy" Knight and her brother Harry have spent the better part of their lives trying to prove their parents were married. Their mother was a humble actress, but their father (now deceased) was the younger son of the Earl of Dunsmore. When the eldest brother died, the title should have fallen to Harry, but all evidence of their parents' scandalous marriage had been hushed up years ago by their disapproving grandfather, so the earldom went to a cousin instead. Then their mother was murdered by an anonymous cutpurse mere hours after applying to the Dunsmore family for help.

Harry's continued their search for legitimacy since then, but now he knows they have to be discreet about it. The impostor Earl of Dunsmore clearly can't be trusted.

While Harry's searching the countryside for parish registers, Georgy seizes an opportunity to infiltrate Dunsmore's household when she learns his close friend, Lord Nathan Harland, is looking for a new valet to accompany him to Dunsmore's for a house party. Posing as a man, she gets the position, but serving the sophisticated Lord Nathan proves to be more of a challenge than expected. The duties of her position bring her into shockingly close proximity with him, and Nathan is an extremely intriguing, attractive man with hidden depths.

I love clotheshorse heroes. Nathan is someone who puts a lot of care (or else hires an expect willing to put a lot of care) into how he looks, as well as someone with an appreciation for beautiful things. Not because they are valuable - but because he likes to look at them. Like his valet George. He finds out about Georgy's true gender quickly enough (albeit not before he gets a confusing boner during a neck massage) and then he becomes fascinated by the mystery of her deception.

Of course, Nathan is a very privileged character, and Chambers makes pleasingly dramatic hay from the distorted power balance of the master/servant (in disguise!) pairing. Nathan is initially interested in Georgy as an object of mystery, an object he feels entitled to puzzle out and manipulate because a) she's a servant and b) she's a lying servant. However, he soon starts to care about her as a person, someone of worth. But Georgy isn't a fake valet - she performs all the same tasks and duties, and now Nathan has to reconcile how much he cares about her with what he's made her do and see in her line of work. Which is quite interesting. It doesn't resolve in any serious way (Nathan doesn't really come to care about any of his other servants), but it's an interesting dynamic.

Chambers' writing style is simple and elegant, describing the sumptuous luxury of Nathan's lifestyle (and Georgy's servitude in it) with clean, beautiful phrases. However, the villain is clearly telegraphed from the beginning, and the "twist" at the end even more so. I also felt Nathan and Georgy missed a few opportunities to go deeper (emotionally) into the power dynamics of their relationship. Otherwise, though, The Lady's Secret is a charming romance with an interesting cross-dressing twist.
B

"The Girl You Left Behind," by Jojo Moyes

The Protagonist: Sophie Bessette. The owner of a little hotel called Le Coq Rouge in a small French town under German occupation in WWI.
Her Angst: Her artist husband's away at the front, and the only reminder of him is his portrait of her - a painting the local German  Kommandant covets.

The Other Protagonist: Liv Halston. A widow in 2006 still living in a grieving fog four years after the death of her husband.
Her Angst: The only reminder of him is a portrait he bought for her in Europe - a portrait she's being ordered to return for being looted in WWI.

The Word: How much is a painting really worth? Jojo Moyes, who blew me away with Me Before You, examines this in The Girl You Left Behind.

The title refers to the name of a portrait painted by Edouard Bessette, a minor student of Matisse who is away fighting during the Great War. His wife, Sophie, has not seen her husband for two years - two miserable years spent in a French village occupied by the Germans. Her only solace is The Girl You Left Behind, one of Edouard's portraits of her. Both the portrait and Sophie catch the attention of the Kommandant of her village. When Sophie learns that her husband has been sent to a horrific war camp, she decides to make the Kommandant a trade in exchange for her husband's safety.

Almost a hundred years later, in 2006, Liv Halston is living a similarly sad and narrow life. Mired in grief, drowning in debt, her life is devoted to preserving her deceased husband's house, even though she can no longer afford to live in it. She, like Sophie, takes comfort from The Girl You Left Behind, a beautiful painting of uncertain provenance that her husband bought for her during their honeymoon.

She manages to break from her comfort zone long enough to meet and fall for Paul, a shy but righteous ex-cop who works for a company that rescues looted works of art - until he sees The Girl You Left Behind on her bedroom wall and recognizes it as a painting thought to have been stolen by the Germans during WWI. Awkward. Now the artist's descendants are demanding the painting be returned, but Liv refuses. In order to save the only joyous thing she has left from her marriage, she sets out to discover what really happened to Sophie Bessette during the war.

The novel reminded me a bit of the film The Monuments Men, which argued that great works of art transcend war and time and the paltry label of "just paint on canvas." They are more then mere objects, mere possessions. Liv holds onto a lot of things in her life, to her social and emotional detriment. She still lives in her dead husband's enormous, empty, cold house. She still lives in her grief. She doesn't socialize and has few friends. Her attachment to her painting, however, is different, because it's not a cold object. It's a connection to life, and not just hers - Sophie's, too. Her search for evidence, any evidence, that the painting's transfer of ownership was legal draws her out of her own isolation and and into the mystery of Sophie's life, and the myriad things they have in common.

For Paul, he has to learn the hard way that morality rarely comes in black and white. He used to be proud of his work, returning stolen portraits to war victims and their descendants, and at first he cannot understand why Liv refuses to part with The Girl You Left Behind. What about the Bessettes and what they suffered? Shouldn't the situation be cut and dry? However, lately all the people he meets at his job are disaffected grandchildren eager to recover their family's paintings in order to sell them for the millions they're now worth.

Okay, I'll admit, this aspect of the novel bothered me. It's not like a few restitution-seekers (like the ones claiming The Girl You Left Behind) wind up being soulless philistines who only want a quick cash grab. Every restitution-seeker depicted in the book is depicted that way, to the point where I wondered if the author was trying to send a message condemning restitution in general.

The rest of the book is lovely. While not quite as heart-wrenching as Me Before You, the novel is filled with small, startlingly beautiful details - like when, in Sophie's time, the villagers bury their valuables to hide them from the Germans but are foiled when the clock beneath the rutabagas begins the chime the hour. Moyes has a deft hand with description and throw-away details of human absurdity.

The Girl You Left Behind tells a lovely story about how two women in different centuries can share the same experience thanks to a single piece of art. It's also a telling examination of when holding onto something is an act of bravery, and when it's an unhealthy act of desperation.
B

"Good Omens," by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman (HarperTorch, 2006)

The Primary Cast:

Crowley: A Fallen Angel who wears dark glasses and drives a Bentley.

Aziraphale: An Angel (unfallen), who collects antique books and wears a bow tie. Friends with Crowley.

The Secondary Cast:

Anathema Device: A young witch, and descendent of a woman whose book of prophesies has accurately predicted every major event in her life.

Newt Pulsifer: An apprentice witchfinder, for no particular reason than he has nothing better to do with his life.

Adam Young: The 11-year-old Antichrist, who's more concerned with climbing trees and playing games in the hedge than de

Fantasy Convention Checklist:

• 1 Inexplicably-Empowered Child With World-Destroying Powers
• 1 Bigoted Witchfinder
• 1 Rather Open-Minded Witchfinder
• 1 Book of Entirely Accurate Prophesies
• 4 Bad Little Kids
• 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse
• 4 More (Albeit Less Effective) Horsemen of the Apocalypse
• 1 Talkative Nun

The Word: I'm not the hugest fan of Terry Pratchett - I read one of his Rincewind books and thought the humour was just too over-the-top for my taste. Neil Gaiman has also been hit or miss for me. Loved 1602, Stardust and Coraline - disliked American Gods. 

So what would it be like to read a book written by both of them together? Amazingly, rather pleasant. Gaiman tones down Pratchett's goofball humour and Pratchett lightens up Gaiman's moody navel-gazing, and the result is a pleasant, often funny, if a bit overlong novel.

So the end of the world is apparently nigh - the Antichrist has just been born, which means in a few years' time the world will come to an end as the armies of Heaven and Hell duke it out for Best Afterlife Ever. However, two small, insignificant peons in these supernatural armies are not as excited for this splendid event. Aziraphale (an angel) and Crowley (a Fallen angel) have become friends during their petty squabbling over the souls of humanity, and they've rather come to like the human world. 

On top of that, thanks to the incompetent machinations of a group of Satanic nuns, the infant World-Destroyer is accidentally switched with another baby and sent home with the wrong family, where he grows up without any supernatural influence, Good or Evil. However, the Apocalypse waits for no one, and as events ratchet up towards the end of the world, Crowley and Aziraphale - with the help of some kooky characters and a book of disturbingly accurate prophesies - have to keep the world in one piece as much as possible. 

Good Omens is extremely cleverly written, with almost non-stop humour from start to finish. For the most part, the novel trots along at a nice clip as the narrative lightly tip toes along, across, and around weighty issues such as Free Will versus Fate, Good versus Evil, Human Nature, and the catchiness of Queen songs. The plot is rather slow-moving (the whole story takes about a week, all told) and is more of an excuse to cleverly skewer pop culture, religion, politics, and other subjects inappropriate for the dinner table.

That being said, the novel does begin to overstay its welcome about three quarters in. I actually found it difficult to keep track of some of the characters, since many of them (Anathema and Newt, to name a few) are almost entirely superfluous to the plot. The pacing could have been tightened in many places, and around the end a lot of the humour feels more like padding than plot. 

All in all, though, Good Omens is a quirky, funny read with a great deal of imagination and wit - even if it's a little short on story.

B

"Thieftaker," by D.B. Jackson (Tor, 2012)

The Corpse: Jennifer Berson. The young daughter of one of Boston's wealthiest citizens, she's found dead in an alley after an anti-Parliament riot.

The Gumshoe: Ethan Kaille, professional thieftaker and semi-secret conjurer.

The Suspects/Secondary Characters:

Abner Berson: Jennifer's father, and the head of one of Boston's most prominent families.

Cyrus Derne: Jennifer's fiance, who can't explain his whereabouts during her murder.

Mister Trevor Pell: A young minister with spellcaster's blood who is sympathetic to Ethan's magical investigations.

Sephira Pryce: A criminal queenpin who masquerades as Boston's first and most respected thieftaker. She does not take kindly to Ethan nosing in on her usual clientele.

Ebenezer Mackintosh: An anti-Parliament rebel prone to inciting violent riots against Parliamentary representatives.

The Word: Ethan Kaille works as a thieftaker in pre-Revolutionary War Boston. It's a risky living, made riskier by the fact that he's a conjurer - an aspect of himself he keeps (poorly) hidden thanks to widespread fear against magic users. And Sephira Pryce - Ethan's popular and much more ruthless competitor - ensures he never lands the truly wealthy clients.

Until Abner Berson, one of Boston's richest landowners, asks Ethan for help. His young daughter Jennifer was murdered on the night of a deadly riot against Grenville's Stamp Act. Berson would like Ethan to recover a priceless brooch that was stolen from her corpse - but what he really wants is to find out who killed her.

Against his better judgement, Ethan takes the job, and it doesn't take long to discover why Berson hired him: Jennifer was killed with magic. And the conjurer responsible really doesn't want Ethan interfering in his plans.

Juggling genres can be a tricky thing, but Thieftaker does an admirable job. Jackson combines a relatively unusual historical period with a sparingly-developed fantasy element. I enjoyed how the novel briefly explored both sides of the American colony situation and mined the natural conflict of that period for tone and drama. Broad, efficient strokes are used to describe and explain Ethan's powers and their influence on his circumstances in a way that develops him and the world around him without cluttering the storyline or slowing the pacing - a common flaw in crossgenre mysteries.

That being said, the interesting setting and magic worldbuilding are used to tell a fairly straightforward mystery that grows more repetitive as Ethan pursues the case despite escalating opposition. The mystery itself - as well as the revelation and payoff at the end - seem pretty small potatoes in comparison to the other things that Ethan and his allies have to deal with, but perhaps as the series progresses both aspects of the narrative will be able to balance out.

Thieftaker is a solidly-paced whodunnit with a lot of interesting window-dressing. Provided the author can learn to balance the different genres a little better, the rest of the series looks promising.
B

"One Perfect Rose," by Mary Jo Putney (Ballantine, 1997)

The Chick: Rosalind Jordan, a.k.a. Marguerite St. Cyr. The stage manager for her adoptive family of travelling players.
The Rub: Although her family is loving, she does long for stability and security.
Dream Casting: Anna Torv.

The Dude: Stephen Kenyon, Duke of Ashburton, a.k.a. "Stephen Ashe." When he's diagnosed with a terminal illness, he rides off on his horse to find the adventure he'd previously been too staunch and duty-bound to pursue.
The Rub: He quickly falls in love with fair Rosalind, but what kind of a future can he give her when he doesn't have one himself?
Dream Casting: Christian Bale.

The Plot:

Shady Doctor: You're dying!

Stephen: Poop. Screw this! *rides off on his steed*

Rosalind: You saved my brother! How can I repay you?

Stephen: You can't. I'm dying.

Rosalind: Poop.

Stephen: But you can marry me and have security!

Rosalind: Sure!

Stephen: ... I'm also a duke. *marries*

Rosalind: Double poop.

Non-Shady Doctor: Turns out you're just being poisoned!

Stephen: Yay! I mean, poop. I mean - what do I mean?

Rosalind: I means you're going to live. With me!

Stephen: HOORAY!

Romance Convention Checklist:

• 1 Orphan with a Mysterious Past
• 2 Estranged Siblings
• 1 Loving Adoptive Family
• Several Thousand Shakespeare References
• 1 Shady Doctor
• 1 Awesome Doctor
• 1 Poisoning

The Word: I seem to be saying, "I've burned out on romance" with more and more frequency. Trusted authors are disappointing me, new authors are boring me.

Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that my over-reading in romance over the last couple of years has refined my tastes in the genre - my tastes and standards have become pretty specific and exclusive and rule out a huge chunk of the genre itself. Which makes me sad - and more than a little nervous since the vast majority of my TBR pile is taken up by romance novels.

People have suggested I take a break, but I love the romance community and industry, and I also don't want to over-read in the other genres I'm enjoying now (YA especially), because I know I'm a person who, when she enjoys something, wants to do and read nothing but that special something until I grow absolutely tired of it. My iTunes account is full of songs I've listened to thousands of times that I can't bear to hear anymore.

Long story short - I was underwhelmed by Putney's One Perfect Rose, for no real reason than I think I'm growing apart from romance.

Rosalind was a foundling child who was rescued and raised by a quirky, loving family of travelling actors. While not a great actress herself, she works as their stage manager as she helps them perform Shakespeare in remote English villages. She comes complete with a Mysterious Aristocratic Past and a Dead Asshole Husband, but to her credit, she behaves like a relatively cheerful and rational person about her baggage.

While travelling to their next gig, Rosalind's brother Brian falls into a river and is rescued from drowning by a mysterious, wealthy gentleman named Stephen Ashe. The players take him in to help him recuperate from his own injuries and he and Rosalind develop an emotional connection.

Stephen Ashe, however, is really Stephen Kenyon, the Duke of Ashburton. He's also dying of liver disease. Furious at both his diagnosis and at how he believes he's wasted his life clinging to duty and propriety, he fled his privileged life and home to try and wring some last passion from life before his comes to an end. While he's quickly coming to care for Rosalind, he's unsure of how to proceed with her now that his days are numbered.

Both protagonists are empathetic, more or less sensible people who are refreshingly honest with each other (mostly) and there's some interesting conflict and drama. There's nothing that could really qualify as bad until the last third, when the author tries to forcibly inject the hero with a spiritual awakening using ghosts and past lives in a really goofy, ham-handed way.

However, I found myself growing bored and annoyed with the use of obvious tropes (Orphan with a Past! Daddy Issues!) and the romanticized perfection of just about everyone who isn't a villain (is no one on the protagonists' team allowed to be hurtful or have flaws?) and the repetition of certain words and phrases that are too familiar and overused in the genre to inspire the romantic longing I'm sure the author intended.

I did enjoy a measure of comfort reading throughout part of it, and the hero and heroine are such genuinely nice, reasonable people, so I would recommend it - but you may want to get a second opinion from someone who's more engaged with the genre than I am, at the moment.
B

"Written On Your Skin," by Meredith Duran (Something, Date)

The Chick: Mina Masters. A beautiful young entrepreneur who makes a living convincing rich young men that she's a harmless blond ditz - until her mother goes missing and the British government thinks she's in on it.
The Rub: She's unable to fully fool Phineas Granville, the man who's looking for her mother, so she might actually have to be honest with him. But can she trust him?
Dream Casting: Romola Garai.

The Dude: Phineas Granville, Earl of Ashmore. Recently retired from the spy service, his despised former superior wants him back to help pry answers from a very reluctant witness - Mina Masters.
The Rub: He met her before, in Hong Kong, and he nearly lost his head over her. Can he trust himself not to lose control over her again?
Dream Casting: Benedict Cumberbatch.

The Plot:

Phin: Hello, I'm totally not a spy!

Mina: That's good, because I'm totally not a canny seductress who's only pretending to be an idiot!

Phin: *poisoned*

Mina: *saves*

Phin: Thanks! *flees*

4 Years Later...

Mina: Hey, I'm being unfairly imprisoned by your government! You owe me!

Phin: LOL NO.

Phin's Evil Boss: LOL YES.

Phin: FINE. Wait, you're not stupid!

Mina: Wait, you're not evil! Let's find my mum!

Phin: But now that I love you, I can't put you in danger!

Mina: LOL NO. *uses herself as bait, catches traitor*

Phin: Well ... okay, then. Fine. But will you at least marry me?

Mina: Sure!

Phin: HOORAY!

Romance Convention Checklist:

• 1 Control Freak Hero
• 1 Fake-Stupid Heroine
• 1 Awesome Shampoo Company
• 1 Evil Boss
• 1 Eviller Traitor
• 1 Train Chase
• 1 Mystery-Solving Locket

The Word: I haven't had a whole lot of luck with Meredith Duran. There's no doubt that she is a magnificent writer, but I just haven't been able to personally connect with her writing style.

I still had Written On Your Skin in my TBR pile, so I decided to see if third time was the charm.

Written On Your Skin happens at roughly the same time as its predecessor, Bound By Your Touch, and it involves Phin Granville, Sanbourne's Dark and Angsty and Possibly-Substance-Abusing Friend.

Four years ago, in Hong Kong, Phin was a spy for England who was trying to find proof that a devious criminal named Collins was selling weapons to Irish rebels. He collapsed after being dosed with hemlock by an unknown accomplice of Collins and rescue came from the last place he expected - Mina Masters, Collins' (supposedly) bubbleheaded stepdaughter. He recovered (barely) in time to flee, but was forced to leave Mina behind to face the consequences of her rebellion.

After the incident with Phin, Mina finally managed to extricate her mother and herself from Collins' clutches and build a life for them in New York. Four years later, her mother goes missing during a visit to England, right around the time Collins escapes from prison. When Mina goes to the authorities she winds up imprisoned "for her own protection" by England's spymaster, Ridland, who believes she secretly knows where Collins is hiding.

Desperate to escape and find her mother on her own, Mina decides to contact Phin and call in the favour he owes her for saving his life. Unfortunately, Phin is now out of the spy game and immediately suspects Mina of being one of Ridland's pawns in an attempt to hook him back into the shaken and stirred lifestyle.

Like Duran's previous novels, the writing style is lush, thoughtful, and thorough. It makes for a fairly leisurely pace as Duran picks apart our protagonists layer by layer through reams of emotionally byzantine dialogue. To Duran's credit, neither character turned out as expected. Based on Phin's brief appearance in Bound By Your Touch, I was expecting Phin to be the dark, messy addict who's hanging onto sobriety by the wispiest of threads. Instead, he's a man so addicted to and ashamed of the absolute control he requires in his life that he occasionally resorts to opium to loosen his iron hold on his own choices - but not to the point of addiction. He's ashamed of the deeds he committed while spying for the crown, ashamed of the cartography skills that landed him his spy gig in the first place, and too ashamed to maintain contact with his dead mentor's innocent wife and daughter.

Mina is the opposite. She refuses to be caged or cowed ever again, and she'll leap at any opportunity, no matter how risky, to protect herself and her mother from the vengeful men of the world. She's a very impulsive heroine, but Duran also makes her informed and experienced so that she never comes across as a TSTL idiot who needs to be saved all the time. However, she is quite a handful before she comes to trust that Phin's a Good Egg.

On the positive front, I connected far more with these characters than in previous Duran books. I loved their witty, evasive dialogues, the intimate description. These are meticulously crafted characters, brought out piece by piece by piece, and my main pleasure from this novel was in learning more about them, and how they fight to negotiate between Phin's controlling nature and Mina's impulsive spirit.

However, on the negative front, I couldn't connect at all with the story itself. Despite the fact that it deals with spies and traitors and bombs and poison, the pacing is ridiculously slow and drawn out. I like character development and dialogue, but there needs to be some external action as well and I found myself frequently bored throughout this book.

Honestly, while I connected much more with the characters in this novel, Written On Your Skin is still very much a mixed bag.
B

"Counting by 7s," by Holly Goldberg Sloan (Dial, 2013)

The Protagonist: Willow Chance. A 12-year-old genius who loves cataloguing plants and medical disorders.
Her Angst: When her parents are killed, she loses her direction and doesn't know how to regain her zest for life and discovery.

The Secondary Characters:

Dell Duke: Willow's incompetent, sad sack school counsellor. He initially hopes to use Willow's genius to make himself look better, but after she's orphaned, he finds himself (somewhat unwillingly) roped into looking after her.

Quang-Ha: Another patient of Dell's - a rebellious and angry teenage boy who lives in a one-room garage with his mother and sister.

Mai: Quang-Ha's determined, take-no-prisoners sister - and Willow's newest best friend.

Pattie: Quang-Ha and Mai's mother who runs a nail salon, and believes that certain colours are luckier than others.

Jairo: A lonely, unfulfilled cab driver who's inspired by Willow's excitement and curiosity.

Angst Checklist:

• Obsessions
• Poverty
• Foster Care
• Grief
• Uncertainty
• Low Self-Esteem
• Creativity

The Word: Willow Chance is weird.

Very weird.

She has a genius-level IQ. She has a prodigious memory for details (particularly numbers, scientific concepts, and medical disorders). She is a person of colour with white adoptive parents. She's obsessed with the number 7, afraid of germs, and cultivates several rare plants in her enormous jungle of a garden in her parents' yard. She doesn't have too many friends.

And when she's twelve years old, her parents die - suddenly, horribly - and Willow is left alone. Although grief shocks Willow out of her weird behaviours and into a kind of numb paralysis where she doesn't care whether things are arranged by sevens or not, the weirdness manifests itself in the people around her instead - the outcasts and oddballs and misfits who take Willow in, and discover that all their jagged, mismatched pieces fit together in an oddly harmonious, yet utterly unique way.


The novel rests on a solid foundation of well-drawn characters  - before she became an orphan, Willow lived her life exactly as she saw fit. She never hid her desires or her ambitions or her feelings from anyone, and her vivacious, information-hungry presence initially unnerves the supporting characters - like her counselor, Dell, or the other kids receiving counceling, Mai and Quang-Ha.

When her overwhelming grief saps this life-force from Willow, the seemingly-random people around her who have hidden their strangenesses and their impossible dreams and their secret talents away (often for years), find themselves blooming in her presence, as their strange gifts turn out to be just what Willow needs to help move on from her tragedy.

Counting By 7s is weird - and also a celebration of the weirdness that everyone has the potential for.

The main thing I noticed about Counting By 7s was how balanced a read it was. The novel dances between the absurd and the realistic, exaggeratedly comic scenarios and intimate moments of emotional poignancy, deus ex machina developments and plot points that expand outward from pre-established circumstances. And all in an extremely organic, tempered tone throughout the novel. It takes an incredibly deft hand to make all these disparate elements fit together using an array of different viewpoints without coming across as contrived or cutesy.

That being said, there were a few problems with the ending that gave me pause. I get that they were meant to fit into the absurdist aspect of the novel, but without an actual explanation the development made little sense.

Counting By 7s is a sweet, swift read - but a profound and profoundly enjoyable one, for all that.
B

"The Hidden Heart," by Laura Kinsale (HarperCollins, 1986)

The Chick: Lady Tess Collier. Just returned from South America, she's determined to follow her dying father's wish and marry well.
The Rub: Unfortunately, she's fallen in love with a poor ship's captain named Gryphon Frost.
Dream Casting: Michelle Dockery.

The Dude: Gryphon Arthur Meridon, Sixth Marquess of Ashland, a.k.a. "Gryphon Frost." A penniless adventurer, he's tasked with helping Lady Tess find a suitable husband.
The Rub: Gryphon wants Tess for himself, but after losing love too many times, is his heart willing to take the risk again?
Dream Casting: Chris Hemsworth.

The Plot:

Tess: Hello! I'm an aristocrat raised in the wilds of the jungle!

Gryphon: Hello! I'm a secret aristocrat who's become a penniless sea captain when my family was murdered by pirates!

Tess: Awesome! I love you!

Gryphon: Sweet! I love you too---

Random Pregnant Villainess: I'M CARRYING YOUR BEHBEH.

Tess: GTFO.

Gryphon: :(

Six Months Later

Tess: Welp, I married an Obvious Abusive Pedophile instead. Looks like I learned my lesson! Make-up sex?

Gryphon: NO.

Tess: How about make-up sex on A DESERTED ISLAND?

Gryphon: .....okay.

Tess: That was awesome! I can't wait to start our happily ev---

Gryphon: Oh look at the time, it's I Never Really Loved You O'Clock!

Tess: Are you fucking kidding me?

Stephen the Pedophile Husband: Time for an action-filled climax! *kidnaps*

Gryphon: HANDS OFF MY WOMAN! *kills Stephen*

Tess: Don't send him to jail! He's really a Secret Marquess!

Gryphon: I'm sorry, but my manly manpain can't take any more love or emotions.

Tess: Um, I had your kid. I think my uteruspain outranks your manpain.

Gryphon: But---

Tess: And I was kidnapped. And locked in a CELLAR. Cellarpain, kidnapped pain > manpain.

Gryphon: ...I'm cured!

Tess: HOORAY!

Romance Convention Checklist:

• 1 Secret Peer
• 1 Band of Pirates
• 1 Evil Gay Pedophile Villain
• Several Tropical Storms
• 1 Shootout in a Cellar
• 1 Loyal Butler
• 1 Murder Trial

The Word: Lady Tess is the only daughter of the Earl of Morrow, a noted botanist and adventurer who's spent the last ten years of his life (and Tess's) exploring South American rainforests. While he lies dying of a fever, his final wish is for Tess to return to England and marry.

However, the Earl's friend, Mr. Taylor is worried for Tess' wellbeing. It's going to be hard enough for her to re-adapt to England's stifling social customs after ten years gallivanting about the rainforest and performing amateur taxidermy (for reals), but with her enormous fortune she will also be a tempting target for scoundrels and fortune hunters. Mr. Taylor decides to hire Gryphon Frost, the man captaining the ship destined to return Tess to England, to pose as a gentleman and help Tess separate the marital sheep from the goats.

This poses a significant problem for Gryphon, as he's half in love with Tess already. Unfortunately, he's broke and Mr. Taylor's willing to pay top dollar, so he signs on to nurse a six-month-long boner and help Tess find the upper-class man of her dreams.

Gryphon, of course, is hiding a Dark Past worthy of a Gilbert and Sullivan musical - if Gilbert and Sullivan were clinically depressed. The grandson of the Marquess of Ashland, Gryphon was only a boy when his mother, father, uncle, and sisters were brutally murdered by pirates while returning to England from India. The captain of the accompanying ship, a man who married a cousin of Gryphon's family, refused to rescue them in order to obtain the marquessate for his own son.

While Gryphon mourns his old life and his family, after his one teenage attempt to return to Ashland nearly resulted in his own murder, he knows he has little to no chance of proving his identity seventeen years after the fact. Falling in love with a wealthy aristocrat like Tess only pours salt in the wound.

Especially since his feelings are reciprocated. Like him, Tess was born into the peerage but spent most of her life outside of Society's ken, and relearning the rules and strictures is a struggle. However, to please her father's ghost she continues to receive titled suitors - like Stephen Elliott, the current Marquess of Ashland who casually invites Gryphon to his Whips, Sticks, and Pedophilia Club after a single night's acquaintance.

Eventually, Tess and Gryphon admit their love for each other, but before they can seal the deal a Random Pregnant Villainess shows up and casts our two lovers adrift. The rest of the novel follows our protagonists as they make their long, slow, circuitous way back to each other.

The plot pretty much loses all structure at this point. For the next several hundred pages, Tess and Gryphon ping pong between several continents and their own impenetrable angsts, as dangers of varying degrees of melodrama (tropical storms, misunderstandings, murder trials) rise up to swat them in new directions. The novel is definitely an example of an epic romance, encompassing months and years of our protagonists developing, reuniting, breaking up again, and rushing back to save each other, and all of it in interesting and well-described situations and settings (Brazil, Tahiti, England).

Thanks to the aimless plotting, the novel's enjoyment rests solely on our characters and here's where the novel succeeds - and stumbles. Tess is a fairly interesting heroine. Yes, she's naive and a bit of a doormat when Gryphon mistreats her, but she knows how to get angry and knows how to take care of herself in dangerous situations, which is more than I can say for Olympia and even Leda. There's a particularly hilarious scene where Tess, upon discovering an intruder in her house, flees to the shore, jumps into the ocean and swims to Gryphon's ship.

Gryphon, on the other hand... Well, he starts out adorably enough. Kinsale is a master at writing bumbling lovestruck heroes and Gryphon is no exception. Unfortunately, after the initial event that separates him and Tess, he develops severe Philophobia and repeatedly sends Tess away because Love and Attachment Cause Pain, and His Heart Can't Take It Again, blah blah blah. Much like the hero of this novel's sequel, Gryphon neglects and mistreats Tess (and eventually their child, which was extremely hard to swallow) in order to drive her away. I realize these sorts of heroes often think they're acting in the best interests of the heroines, but it's their manpain and their mantears they're really concerned about and I lost patience with Gryphon after the first two times he shoots Tess down.

So what, really, did I think of The Hidden Heart? It's a solid debut, with delicious backstories, unconventional locations, and lots of drama. The foundations of Laura Kinsale's writing are all here. There's a lot of room for improvement - but thankfully, as we already know, Laura Kinsale does.
B

"The Universe Versus Alex Woods," by Gavin Extence (Red Hook, 2013)

The Protagonist: Alex Woods. A pretty ordinary young man, all things considered - apart from his epilepsy and the scar he has from being struck by a meteor.
His Angst: An avid scientist with a coolly logical method of analysing situations, he has to come to terms with the fact that with humanity, sometimes there is no correct answer.

Secondary Cast:

Ellie: A foul-mouthed punk teenager who helps out at Alex's mum's shop.

Dr. Weir: An astrophysicist who arrives to study the meteor that struck Alex, she and Alex develop a strong friendship and she serves as his scientific mentor.

Dr. Engleby: Alex's neurologist, and a godless Buddhist who believes in meditation. Another character who helps develop Alex's scientific curiosity.

Mr. Peterson: A tough old coot who befriends Alex and introduces him to the works of Kurt Vonnegut.

Angst Checklist:

• Dealing with epilepsy
• I've just discovered I'm an atheist but my mother thinks she's psychic
• Being Different versus Fitting In
• Unorthodox Parenting
• The value of scientific reasoning
• Ladies Don't Like It When You Use the C-Word
• Assisted Suicide
• Diet Coke versus Weed

The Word:  Our story starts at the end - when 17-year-old Alex Woods is pulled over by the cops at the border to Dover. He's caught with a buttload of weed and an urn full of cremated human remains - and that's not even what the cops are really angry at him for.

To explain how he got to this point, however, Alex takes us back to when he was ten years old and miraculously survived being struck on the head with a meteor. Over the next seven years of his life, he struggles with epilepsy, develops scientific reasoning, rejects organized religion, discovers the works of Kurt Vonnegut, and befriends a cantankerous war vet named Mr. Peterson.

The Universe Versus Alex Woods is a marvellously pleasant book - Extence writes with an arch sense of humour not unlike J.K. Rowling's as Alex observes the foibles of his schoolyard bullies, his clairvoyant mother, and his other friends and neighbours from his curiously detached perspective. The supporting characters are all very colourful and well-developed, particularly Mr. Peterson, with whom Alex develops a unique friendship.

That being said, while Universe is pleasant, it's not precisely memorable. The novel doesn't really have a plot beyond the vaguely interesting and somewhat-connected events that take place over seven years that gradually lead up to the Actual Event that lands Alex in so much trouble. Sure, Alex is an epileptic and he got conked on the head by a meteor, but most of his life is pretty ordinary. While his scientific pursuit of the meaning of life may very well resonate with many readers, I kind of wish the narrative had been more focused around a particular goal. Instead, Stuff Kinda Happens, Mostly By Accident, while Alex observes, analyses, and eventually deals with it. It's not terrible, but it's not terribly profound or interesting, either.

The novel does have its funny moments, mainly at Alex's expense. Alex is a supremely logical character - fascinated and motivated by scientific theory and reasoning, he's perpetually surprised when the world around him (more specifically, the people in it), refuses to adhere to the same sort of predictable, rational order. As his friendship with Mr. Peterson demonstrates, no matter how old you are or how much experience you have, the universe can still surprise you.

The Universe Versus Alex Woods is a gentle coming-of-age tale with a decidedly scientific bent, and a solid read, even if the plotting could have been stronger.
B

"Openly Straight," by Bill Konigsberg

The Protagonist: Seamus Raphael "Rafe" Goldberg. A high school student who's off to spend his junior year at an all-boys boarding school. He also happens to be gay.
His Angst: While he's fine with being gay, he's tired of having his homosexuality define everything about him, so he decides to keep it  on the DL at his new school. But what happens when he develops feelings for a classmate?

Secondary Cast:

Claire Olivia: Rafe's best friend who is not happy to be abandoned in Colorado while he's off in New England.

Albie: Rafe's roommate at boarding school. Weird, sloppy, but a good friend.

Toby: The skinny, openly gay BFF of Albie.

Ben: A huge, taciturn, but surprisingly insightful and empathetic classmate who develops a strong friendship with Rafe - but will it turn into something more?

Bryce: Ben's roommate and close friend who suffers from a mental illness, which reveals the "tolerant" attitude of Rafe's boarding school might only be policy-deep.

Steve: The Alpha Male of the boarding school, whom Rafe initially looks up to. Appears easygoing and tolerant on the surface, but he may not be as nice as he seems.

Angst Checklist:

• My Parents are Embarassing
• Sexual Identity
• One's Identity Apart from Sexual Identity
• Creative Expression
• Boyfriends
• Boys Who Also Happen to be Friends
• Lying versus Omitting 
• Homophobia
• Mental Illness
• Inspiring Teachers

The Word: This is my first piece of Book Expo swag - I received it from a sales rep from Scholastic during the BEA Blogger Con Happy Hour and I started reading it nearly right away. 

Rafe is tired of being the That Gay Guy. Don't get him wrong, he's fine with his sexuality. More than fine. His parents are crazy supportive of him - with perhaps a little bit too much emphasis on the crazy. They make such a big deal about his sexuality that sometimes Rafe worries that other people in his hometown of Boulder, Colorado see him as THE GAY DUDE first and the actual dude second. 

For his junior year, Rafe decides to attend a boy's boarding school in New England. There, where he can be hundreds of miles away from Boulder, hundreds of miles away from his rainbow-flag-waving parents, he hopes to have an opportunity to get to know other guys as a person and not as a label. However, Rafe discovers the line between being discreet about his sexuality and being back in the closet is blurrier than it sounds - especially once he starts crushing on a classmate. 

Openly Straight definitely raises some interesting questions about being gay and how big a part it plays in a person's identity. Konigsberg does an excellent job conveying how, even in a tolerant community, Rafe still feels set apart because he is gay. He doesn't have any close guy friends. People still make assumptions about him based solely on his sexuality - and even when those assumptions are harmless or positive, they're not based on getting to know him, but on his label as "The Gay Kid." Rafe doesn't have a problem with people knowing he's gay - he just doesn't want it to be the first thing people know about him. 

That being said, Rafe is an extremely privileged character. Sure, he's gay - but he's also white, his parents love him to pieces, he has an awesome best friend in Claire Olivia, and his family is wealthy enough to ship him off to Massachusetts on a whim. The novel does make a few attempts to acknowledge just how well off Rafe is (such as when he encounters closeted kids while on a speaking engagement), but there are many moments in the novel where he comes off as selfish and whiny. Oh, your parents love you too much? How awful for you. Although there's definitely an argument to be made that even gay kids who are accepted still have problems integrating their sexual identity into their everyday identity, I often found it hard to sympathize with Rafe and his revelation at the novel's end seemed too obvious. 

The most fascinating aspect of this novel is the almost-not-quite-romance between Rafe and his classmate, Ben. Ben identifies as straight, but views everyone equally and tries to keep an open mind about everything. His growing and stereotype-defying bond with Rafe, and the honesty with which he expresses himself, depicts exactly the sort of attitude Rafe wants to experience from the world at large - even as Rafe becomes increasingly worried about his own honesty in their relationship. 

While the novel is intelligent and raises a lot of interesting questions, I admired it more than I liked it. As I mentioned previously, Rafe is a bit of a spoiled character and I don't think the narrative does enough to remind us how fortunate he truly is. As well, the writing style is short and to the point - which, while serviceable, is not really a style I personally enjoy. That being said, I definitely recommend it in terms of interesting discussion and an original story.
B

Review Round-Up: "The Sweet Dead Life," "The Governess Affair," and "The Third Angel"

Okay, let's look at the facts. I read a lot of books, and I recently spent some time away when I didn't have time to update my computer. The result is a bit of a review and post backlog, so, in the spirit of efficiency, I will be combining these three books in one mega-review in order to clear my schedule and start reading the truly monstrous number of books I lugged home from Book Expo America.

The Sweet Dead Life, by Joy Preble (SoHo Teen, 2013).

This was a novel I'd actually picked up last year at Book Expo 2012 but hadn't read yet. A slim but weird tome, it benefits from having a truly hilarious voice in its POV character, Jenna Samuels.

The novel starts out with a typically dark-YA situation. 13-year-old Jenna and her stoner older brother Casey have been scraping the bottom of the barrel to make ends meet. Their father walked out on them five years ago, and their increasingly depressed mother no longer goes to her job, leaves the house, or puts on clean clothes.

Oh, and Jenna's also suffering from a mysterious, debilitating illness that no doctor's been able to diagnose. When she collapses in a seizure, her brother rushes her to the hospital - but because he's also stoned out of his gourd, he crashes the car and dies.

Or not. Suddenly he turns up in the hospital - miraculously alive, healed, acne-free, and accompanied by a sudden new purpose in life and a mysterious mentor named Amber. Apparently, Casey was not destined to die this year, so the Powers That Be have imbued him with angelic powers and sent him back to protect his sister and save their family - since their father's disappearance, their mother's depression, and Jenna's illness might be the result of nefarious design instead of simply bad luck.

The plotting of this story is a little hit-or-miss (and it gets downright science fictional at the end), but beneath it beats an entertaining, sympathetic heart as Jenna enlivens the story with her hilarious observations about Texas, Mexican food, nosy angels, and how much she loves and depends on her brother more than she'd like to admit. A solidly entertaining story.
B

The Governess Affair, by Courtney Milan (2012).

I chose a novella to read on my plane ride over to Book Expo America - mainly because I knew I would want to dive into my swag books as quickly as possible.

The prequel to Courtney Milan's Brothers Sinister series (this story involves the parents of the future protagonists), our hero is Hugo Marshall, a coal miner's son who dragged himself up from nothing and currently works as an unofficial Fixer of Problems for a spoiled and cruel Duke.

His boss is in dire financial straits thanks to being on the outs with his purse-string-wielding duchess, and if Hugo can clean up the Duke's messes enough to merit a reconciliation, he'll win 500 pounds and be able to start his own business empire.

His plans are stymied when Serena Barton, a former governess, sets up camp outside the Duke's townhouse to shame him with a silent protest. Serena was forced to keep silent when the Duke assaulted her and shattered her future, so now she's determined to use that very silence to blacken his name with scandal.

Hugo knows it's up to him to "fix" this very real threat to the Duke's tempestuous marriage and his own dreams of success, but the more he interacts with Serena, the more he comes to love and admire her - and recognize the desperation of her own situation.

This is one of the stories that's a little difficult to review. BEA is so hectic and I was always putting this book down and picking it up again in so many different states of mind that I didn't really have a consistent reaction to it. The writing style is strong and lyrical, which I appreciated, and has an entertaining and complex heroine who, while practical, is not afraid to take a risk when her back is up against the wall. Unfortunately, I found Hugo to be a little two-dimensional. His motivations seemed pretty flat and standard (Make Money and Be a Man) and were pretty quickly changed as soon as he meets Serena.

While this wasn't an unpleasant read, it wasn't a particularly memorable one.
B-

The Third Angel, by Alice Hoffman (Three Rivers Press, 2008)

Alice Hoffman's books have been so consistently good to me that they've turned into emotional comfort reads - even if the way their characters' crises sometimes mirror my own makes them rather, uh, painful comfort reads.

The cleverness of The Third Angel's conceit lies in the fact that this novel can be read backwards and forwards, thanks to the interconnectedness of all three stories and heroines. Divided into three parts, the first part takes place in the 1990s and concerns Maddy, an embittered attorney visiting London to celebrate her sister Allie's wedding - while secretly pining for Allie's fiancé, Paul.

The second part of the novel revolves around Frieda, a girl in the 1960s who overcomes the pain of her parents' divorce by declining university to work as a hotel maid in London. There, she falls in love with a drug-addicted musician and discovers her own hidden penchant for song writing.

The third and final part takes us back to the 1950s, where 12-year-old Lucy is forced to accompany her father and new stepmother to London when she would much rather stay back in New York, read her novels, and grieve for her recently deceased mother. In spite of herself, she falls in love with London and winds up an accomplice to a secret affair between her stepmother's wild sister and her forbidden lover.

All three characters are connected - Lucy grows up to be Allie and Maddy's mother, and Frieda is the mother of Paul, Allie's fiancé. As each story brings us further back in time, the revelations in each story inform and give context to the tales that came before, making the novel extremely re-readable. Despite the rather unusual setting, the novel is still chockful of magical realism (symbolic herons and ghosts!), deeply romantic and complex female characters, and fantastic setting detail.
B+