Book Review: Anansi Boys

Recently it's been a bit more convenient for me to get to my Maryland library system than the DC one so I've gone back through my ever-too-long to-read list and grabbing a few things from the early parts of it. I can actually specifically remember where this recommendation came from, back in the livejournal days I wrote about a book I had just read which was a collaboration between Gaiman and someone else and I thought it was pretty bad. It was a failed tv pilot involving people from alternate worlds but the catch was that every single one of them was essentially the same person, literally a group of chosen people that was all the same person. I mentioned that if this was my first exposure to Gaiman I wasn't sure what the fuss was all about so a friend of mine kindly posted a few recommendations for his best-loved books and they've sat on my list ever since.  

Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman

Book Review: The Shattering

It's probably a good thing that the two books I had to read right after Death Watch (or get more library fines) were two that I had been interested in for a while and this one was the one I was more interested in. I've read Karen Healey's other work, Guardian of the Dead, and absolutely adored it since it's a modern day urban/low fantasy that completely understands how important setting is to a story and I've really wanted to read her next work and just didn't have a chance until now. It's also set in New Zealand (although instead of being centered around a college in a big city it's in a small town) and I have no idea if the two stories are connected or not but I wouldn't be surprised either way.


The Shattering by Karen Healey

Summary: When Keri's brother suddenly and mysteriously commits suicide she's naturally shaken and suspicious about everything and her suspiciousness leads her to fellow classmate Janna and out of towner Sione who both also had older brother's die under mysterious circumstances. Armed with nothing more than hunches and records of the town they begin to realize that there is something truly sinister going on in their west coast town. 

The Good: I really like the plot here, a "main character(s) against a greater power" conflict is fairly common in fantasy (and this is urban fantasy/magical realism) but the greater power is slightly different than usual and I thought it an interesting and quite sinister take. Just as great are the characters, Keri, Janna, and Sione are all viewpoint characters and they're all honest enough that it wasn't jarring to see one scene from one characters point of view and then see it again from another's (and thanks to the fact that Keri was first person and the other two were third person it was easy enough to tell them all apart). There was romance which, even though it ended up being crucial in the end, there were plenty of other relationships as well and in addition, they characters had other problems completely unrelated to the main plot! They cussed, people never let their teenaged characters cuss!* I really loved this whole book and while I don't think we'll have another book related to it, it wrapped up quite well, I wouldn't be unhappy to see some short stories of the characters or see them show up in other stories.   

The Bad: Of the three leads I found Sione the least relatable since a lot of his internal problems had to do with self-esteem (which I never sympathize with as much), and considering relatively small reason is why I didn't sympathize with him as much I think that says how realistic I found Keri and Janna. It was a bit convenient with how easy it was to work magic in this book, would have been nice to have known a little bit more about how it worked, but it never turned into a deus ex machina and it was understandable why the characters didn't know any more. 


In short, I was completely satisfied with this book and plan on buying my own copy (along with a copy of GotD, I have a lot of buy these days it seems) sometime. I'm also sure that if I had read it back in 2011 it would have gone on my favorite books of the year list and would have no trouble recommending it to fans of YA fantasy or even realistic fiction.    




*which, let me tell you publishers, you might not like the idea but teenagers cuss, a lot, having recently been one I can attest to this. And I am noting this specifically since I've seen several authors, I think including this one, say they have to fight to keep it in so let me say, Yay I'm happy it was in since yes, it helped flesh out the characters. 

Book Review: The Night Circus

I'd seen this book around for a while before I read it, the bookstore at my college had it proudly displayed with a lot of other books which I walked past frequently, and I had heard a lot of good things about the book online but what drove me to try it out was a combination of seeing some cosplayers say they were going to try and make cosplays from it (and they planned on outfits from other books I liked so I knew we had similar tastes). I think I saw someone say that it read a lot like a YA book despite the fact that it's adult fiction which also made me curious. I was sad about one thing however, the copy I got at the library was a large print edition and yet the print was still much too small for me to read without glasses, I remember when I could read those books without my glasses back in high school.....

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

I love the papercut look of the cover and I love how the image is a reference to a clock mentioned in the book, I just like when covers go the extra step to reference a detail from a book instead of having a generic cover. That image is the one for the hardback and the paper back one is also interesting, it still has the clock in the middle but also has silhouettes of Celia and Marco on either side, it works equally well and I think it's a rather clever way to change the cover but still make it obvious that it's the same book. 

Summary: A magicians duel can take many shapes and can take years to finish so the onlooker might find it rather boring at first. But not in this case where the Cirque de Reves is the stage for Celia and Marco, two young magicians bound at a young age by their parent/mentor in a fight to the death simply to see whose student is better. Both of them grow up knowing about the duel but knowing nothing about it and have no choice but to go along as fate slowly draws them together collaborating more often than fighting, a choice that could bring disaster to both of them. 

The Good: I don't often come across stories that follow characters for years as they grow but I like the concept since so many times I'll come across stories where all kinds of big, world-changing events occur from start to finish in the space of a week. The Night Circus neatly averts that as it takes years to set up the titular circus for the duel and then the duel itself lasts years, that extended period of time makes the plot feel more "real" and it was easier to become attached to characters after seeing the grow up. The characters were interesting and sympathetic, the descriptions were amazing (I can only wonder what a movie version would look like if it had the budget and a screenwriter clever enough to make the story fit two and a half hours, it simply wouldn't work as multiple films or a serialized story in my opinion) and this is all made even more impressive when you realize that this was Morgenstern's debut novel. I enjoyed it quite a bit and highly recommend it to anyone who has ever enjoyed a fantasy story, be it high fantasy or urban fantasy, before.

The Bad: This book contains both timeskips and some out of order sequences so if you don't pay attention to the dates at the beginning of the chapters it's easy to get confused, I got particularly annoyed at one subplot which was introduced rather early on and I completely missed the fact that it was set 20 years later on. On a related note, the story starts when the two leads are quite young and doesn't finish until they're in they're in their late 20s at least so there is a lot of time when not much happens in the story. There is character development and there are some subplots which move along for sure but I wonder if the pace might be too slow for some people.


Another really strong book, something I won't be able to say next week (in case anyone was getting bored by all of my praise of late) and one I could easily recommend to half a dozen people I know. I'll have to keep an eye out for Morgenstern's next book whenever that will be since I liked how she did practically everything here and would like to see more of that.   

Book Review: The Cabinet of Earths

Another book from the Enchanted Inkpot giveaway, I'll admit I was a bit confused when I got this package since the return address was, if I recall correctly, the Slavic department at UNC Berkly. I figured out what was going on quickly enough but it was an amusing moment none the less.

The Cabinet of Earths by Anne Nesbet

It took me a little while to recognize what scene, and characters, were being shown on the cover but I love the art on it regardless. It's very true to the book and has a lovely amount of detail on it and is certainly eye-grabbing.

  
Summary: In order to help her mother recover from cancer, Maya and her family have moved to Paris and Maya is less than pleased about this.  But her unhappiness soon turns to curiosity as Paris turns out different than she expected with strange relatives and seemingly magical houses and then to alarm as her relatives seem to have sinister plans for her younger brother.

The Good: The setting was very neat both because of how it was described with tons of detail and because I come across fewer stories set in Paris (well, France in general) so it feels fresher to me vs another fantasy story set in Generic Small Town America (TM) or England. I also liked how magic worked it's way into the story since it's not another story with magic and wizards on every corner but with magic hiding off in a corner yet very obviously present at the same time. It feels more like magical realism (believe I have the right term here) than urban fantasy and I don't see much of that genre so that was rather nice. 

The Bad: This was a book I wanted to like, thought I would like, and gave it a fair shot but in the end it just didn't grab me at all. I think part of this is that the book feels more like a middle grade book (which are aimed at late elementary school to middle school) vs a young adult book (late middle school to high school) and just didn't have as much "crossover appeal." By that I mean, Maya is young and feels young, she's not as creative about her situation as a slightly older character might be and is more easily manipulated which, when you know how the story is going to end (since books with a genuinely tragic ending are rarely, if ever, published for this age group) and you stop caring about what the character does you stop caring how they get to that point as well.


So in the end this is another book I'll be donating to the local library once I get back to school with the hopes that other people enjoy the story more than I did. It's not bad, it's just not as enjoyable if you don't regularly enjoy middle grade books. And, unrelated to the review, again I am taking next week off so that I can try and reset my schedule so I can get back in the habit of blogging (on time) the week after. The schedule isn't changing, that will probably come late August, September for sure, I'm just trying to adjust a few things on my end in the meantime.  

Book Review: The Book of Blood and Shadow

I won this book in a twitter contest hosted by Random Buzzers (one of your standard, retweet this tweet and we'll choose winners from that pool) which was rather nice since I've read Robin Wasserman's Skinned trilogy and, since one of my big problems was that it went on too long, I was curious to see how she would do with a one book story instead. With that in mind, onto the review!

The Book of Blood and Shadow by Robin Wasserman

  I actually didn't have this cover on my copy, it was an ARC with a plain black cover with the title in a red script, and while this cover isn't exactly to my taste it's certainly a good and very interesting cover. I love the detail in her eye and it's rather eye-catching.

Summary: When Nora is assigned to translate some old letters instead of the rare book her classmates are working on she's initially rather unhappy, although any chance to be away from her parents who aren't stay together "for the sake of the children" but for the memory of her dead brother is welcomed. And then she discovers that while the book talks about a mysterious, mystical device called the Lumen Dei, her writer actually dealt with the machine and are much more valuable. So valuable in fact that centuries later there are still groups of people out there willing to do anything to get their hands on them and while some of them view Nora to just be in the way others want to capture her as well.

The Good: This is a very tightly plotted book and pulls off the remarkable task of making it not only believable that Nora is able to find and translate all of the letters, most of which have been hidden for at least four centuries, but also that the letters have remained hidden for so long. It's very hard to make that set-up look natural, and considering the story rests upon that it's critical to the story at large, and it's pulled off perfectly at here and never once did one of those revelations jolt me out of the story. And, despite my nitpicks later, the story felt well paced with no revelation coming too quickly or taking too long. Nora wasn't the most memorable lead I've seen but she was strong and well-fleshed out so I certainly liked her, I just don't know how much I'll remember about her (as opposed to the story itself) in a few years time.

The Bad: As I had been afraid, this book still felt too long by the end, my copy clocks in at 430 pages, but again I'm not really sure where to cut it down. It's both long and dense, I felt rather exhausted by the end of the story and feeling like I would have liked it to be a little shorter. Other than that there weren't many problems with it and certainly no major problems that stood out to me. It was a little exasperating at times that Nora had no idea she was about to be betrayed, which was clearly obvious to me as a reader, and likewise it was also frustrating to see that none of the characters seem to realize they were being manipulated at certain points, especially since none of them were portrayed as dumb. I felt like Adriane's characterization was a little flat compared to some of the other side characters but again that wasn't a major issue in the end.


I really liked this story a lot more than I was expecting to and I plan on buying a copy of the book for myself in the future (I'll donate the ARC to the free basket at my library's bookstore, since book has already been out for over six months I don't feel like that'll be a problem and since you can't sell an ARC there's not much else I can do with it). A very strong story and one of my favorite books of 2012 so far (mind you I haven't read many but that doesn't stop it from being a favorite within the category).   

TV Series Review: Supernatural (season one)

And it's back to the tv shows! Ever since I started this blog and started making a real effort to try out more American/British tv shows (that weren't animated) I've been amazed at just how much stuff is out there and just how much time it's going to take to try out everything that catches my eye. And for that reason I'm quite grateful to Netflix Instant, since I have quite a few friends who love Supernatural it was invertible that I would try out the show someday and I was quite happy that I didn't have to resort to renting one DVD at a time from Netflix (which, while it isn't the worst way to watch a show is not my preferred way). In any case, onto the review!

Supernatural

 Summary: Sam and Dean Winchester were raised by their father after their movie died under mysterious circumstances while Sam was just a baby and grown up learning the family business, killing demons. Sam wants nothing to do with any of this but when Dean shows up at his apartment telling him that dad hasn't been home for a few days he's drawn back in, especially when he learns that their dad was on the trail of the demon that killed their mom.


The Good: Regardless of medium I'm always curious to see how American-set shows deal with the supernatural since the US doesn't really have it's own mythos to draw from. There is an eclectic collection of urban legends and tall tales that are uniquely USian and parts of European fairy tales are often weaved in as well (less often someone will draw inspiration from one of the many Native American mythologies). All the influences Supernatural uses fit well and managed to feel like a cohesive, American, mythos of sorts. The episodes were very well paced (very formulaic but still well paced) and none of the episodes felt like misses. Both Dean and Sam showed some character growth and overall this show kept my attention and was interesting to watch, I fully plan on continuing.

The Bad: The season did however end on a cliffhanger (not as bad as Grimm's admittedly, not by far) and, when I think about the season as a whole, very few of the episodes related back to the overarching "we're trying to find the demon that killed our mom" plot that is supposed to tie it all together. I have been told that the first five seasons are supposed to make up an ever larger arc (it sounds like what the first five seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer did) which would explain it but I do like each episode in a show to have some connection to a larger plot if there is one and, despite the fact this show is very episodic, there is one. Also, perhaps it's just because Netflix would pause at the worst moment each time and buffer, but was it really necessary to have a "PREVIOUSLY ON SUPERNATURAL" segment at the beginning of each episode? I'm of the opinion that recaps should only be used when shows have multiple plot lines running and need to remind the viewer what is important this week, something that was not a problem at all on Supernatural and simply annoyed me every single time.

The Audio: The theme I remember best from the show is the one used to close the credits with, the show didn't have many other themes I found distinct and had an even shorter than usual clip for the title card. I was more interested in the visuals than the sound but I thought everything worked well on that end.

The Visuals: I don't know if someone on the production staff took issue with bright colors or such (I kid, I know it was on purpose) but the colors are much less saturated than normal and everything looks a bit gray. It's a distinctive look, much more distinctive than American tv shows look, and for a show about demons and such it works. Other than that note, don't have much else to say about the visuals of the series, there wasn't a lot of CGI used which I thought helped but that's because I'm rather picky about CGI.


So again, I plan on watching at least the next season (I'm aware I probably just committed myself to the next four, don't expect me to be done with this before November), it just won't be for a little bit since I have a few other things I want to try first.  

Anime Review: Moyashimon

I plan on someday getting around to just about every anime that has aired on the noitaminA block in Japan and so when I heard that the show Moyashimon was getting a sequel this summer I decided this was the perfect time to watch the original show. The premise was a quirky one but I hadn't tried it out before since it wasn't licensed, although the manga was at one point and Funimation streamed the live-action tv drama version a couple of summers back, but by this point it looks like it probably won't be licensed in the US (unless this was the "classic" anime license that Funimation hinted at in an ANNCast from a few weeks back). In any case, there's still enough time before Moyashimon Returns for people to catch the original show so let's get on with the review so I can explain just what this show is about.

Moyashimon: Tales of Agriculture

Summary: Tadayasu Sawaki has been able to see microbes floating all around him since he was young and by now it's a normal, if annoying, part of his life. But when he and his best friend Kei Yuuki head off to college they find out that his skill is quite valuable indeed and, as the sons of a yeast maker and a sake brewer respectively, find themselves dragged into the schemes of Professor Itsuki and his students.

The Good: I had forgotten that Wandering Son was not the first noitaminA show to have a transgender character (actually, Paradise Kiss probably was) and I thought that character was very well done. I had remembered hearing there was one before, and from the snippets I had read about reviews of the live action series I had guessed who it was, but there were some very good visual foreshadowing to tip off the viewers. Actually, the show had a good sized cast and managed to give several of them much more character development than I would have thought possible in 11 episodes. The show was also paced well, I've heard that they had to skip some things to get to the point they did but I thought that everything flowed well and that none of the events took too long or were too rushed. I will say though that I feel more confident recommending this series knowing that there's a second half coming since the show really needs more time.

The Bad: It's clear that the show didn't have a really good place to end so they chose the end of an arc and made it work as well as they could (and after the credits make it clear that they really want a second series). The show does provide a bit of closure, the characters have started to grow and move on but the ending still feels rather abrupt and there doesn't seem like there was any way to fix that. Tvtropes has also pointed out that, for a college set at an agricultural university the story doesn't seem to like some of the newer, "green" advances in technology which is a bit odd when you think about it*.

The Audio: While both songs were a bit odd, especially the ending song, neither of them really stuck with me and I listened to both of them the full 11 times. The voice acting was fine, I especially liked how all the microbes had different voices (even the ones that were just variations and not something completely different). Overall there's not much to discuss here, although for an 11 episode show that doesn't put the characters through a roller-coaster of emotions or through scenes requiring dramatic music that's not especially surprising.

The Visuals: The show continues with the un-official noitaimA tradition of having a really weird looking opening/ending sequence (in this case a live-action/CGI mash-up opening and closing) but aside from that everything looks rather normal. Some of the character designs are a bit odd (both body-type wise and the fact that an awful lot of characters have blonde or a reddish-orange hair color) but nothing that would throw a non-newbie anime viewer. There's actually not that much else to mention here, everything remained consistent and there weren't any scenes that merited extra fluid animation or such so the visuals were never pushed to the animators limits, everything just worked in a very quiet way.


While not one of my favorite noitaminA series it's a cute little series and I would recommend it to people who like more comedy/slice of life titles, just be prepared for some really disgusting descriptions of how fermentation works (I normally watch anime while eating lunch/dinner and found that was not a great idea for this show, I didn't even know humans ate that much rotten food).



*full disclosure, I'm minoring in green technology at a school that's got a fairly good department in it so I have to raise an eyebrow when the characters can't get a biofuel tractor running, in my town the school's buses use so much biofuel that we use the oil from I think every fast food place in town. So I'm quite biased here, although I am willing to cut them a bit of slack since it has been a little while since the original manga was published.