Review: Obsidio

Obsidio by Amie Kaufman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars



So.

It's finally happening.

The conclusion to the Illuminae Files.

First came Illuminae, next came Gemina, finally comes Obsidio.

Kaufman, Kristoff, you have taken my money. My review will come, very, very soon.

MY OFFICIAL OBSIDIO PLAYLIST:

"How long I've waited here for you
Everlong..."
-Foo Fighters

"And if I tried to change my life one more day
There would be nobody else to save
And I can't change into a person I don't wanna be..."
-Panic! At The Disco, "Say Amen (Saturday Night)"

"Heavy as the setting sun
Oh, I'm counting all the numbers between zero and one
Happy, but a little lost
Well, I don't know what I don't know so I'll kick my shoes off and run..."
-Sir Sly

"In pitch dark
I go walking in your landscape..."
-Radiohead, "There There"

"Oh, won't wave my white flag, no
This time I won't let go
I'd rather die
Than give up the fight, give up the fight, give up the fight give up the fight..."
-Bishop Briggs

"But no, there ain't no rest for the wicked
Until we close our eyes for good."
-Cage the Elephant

"I always make the same mistakes, 'cause...
I'm bad at love
But you can't blame me for tryin'."
-Halsey

"Who cares if one more light goes out?
Well, I do."
-Linkin Park

"Computers don't know what they can't see
They can't see inside of me..."
-Eve6, "How Much Longer"

"Fuse! This is no apocalypse
Just burn like you don't exist
My idea of fun
Is out there, is anyone?"
-Girls Against Boys, "Park Avenue"

Bonus Track: Daft Punk, "Contact"

MY REVIEW:



I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm okay...nope, it's Kaufman and Kristoff. I am NOT OKAY.

It's the end of The Illuminae Files, but it takes its sweet time getting started. Part of the problem there is that we're trying to introduce two new star-crossed-type lovers - Asha and Rhys. (Okay, seriously, who else thinks Sarah J. Maas when hearing that name now, huh?) Asha and Rhys do provide a few good spins on the usual tropes, especially since they're even more enemized than Kady and Ezra ever were, and there's precious little hope that they'll get together again because they're on opposite sides of the war against BeiTech. Can there be hope for Rhys' redemption? Remember, it's Kaufman and Kristoff, so you'd be surprised. But trying to juggle Asha and Rhys' stories along with the continuing adventures of Kady and Ezra and Hanna and Nik and Ella? It's a delicate balancing act, and surprisingly, our two authors don't pull it off with quite the same aplomb. It feels like this book relies a little too much on longer textual sections at first, with much fewer chat room transcripts and Marie Lu illustrations. Not to mention, after the unexpected twists of Gemina, it almost feels like there's no way Kaufman and Kristoff could top that, and this book would wind up being really the Mockingjay to its predecessor's Catching Fire - still great, but the second book steamrollers all competition with its sheer unexpected awe and some ness.

And, to an extent, Gemina really is the Catching Fire of this series, because it's still my favorite of the three by a good measure.

But that's not to say Obsidio isn't still five-star worthy. Not when there's so much name-dropping of the best of the best in YA, soaring space action, suspense building way beyond this universe, and of course moral greyitude (thanks, AIDAN, and can we make sure he never watches The 100 again? Because he's taking some of Clarke's most overly grimdark moments too seriously - think "I bear it so they don't have to," or "Maybe there are no good guys" - and while we're on that subject, someone ban those lies from falling from my darling bicon's lips in the future, mmmkay? Mmmkay.)

No, but really, the second half of this book is its saving grace, as Kaufman and Kristoff save all the best heart-pounding action for there. Not to mention the parts where they seriously flirt with Deathly Hallows, Mockingjay, and Allegiant territory in terms of deadliness.

Once you reach that one explosion, this will be you. If not, you have no soul.



And now, to Illuminae, Gemina, and Obsidio, I hereby say ave atque vale.

Ooh, I need a hug...



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Review: Shadowsong

Shadowsong by S. Jae-Jones
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I'm...not sure what to say about this book. I mean, I didn't dislike it, but I didn't like it much either. It takes a lot of its predecessor's biggest flaws up to eleven - the gossamer-thin plot comes to mind, as does the romance, for which I feel nothing but a pervasive sense of wrongness. That being said, though, S. Jae-Jones deserves commendation for making it clear that this pair of novels is #ownvoices for bipolar disorder, and for applying trigger warnings as needed at the start of the book, as well as the suicide hotline phone number in case you need it. Still, though, this whole book just feels like a whole lot of sound and fury signifying nothing. But that's only me. Of course, there are many who could very well benefit from knowing that there's a book reflecting their own struggles in some way.

JJ's got another series in the pipeline, and my hopes are higher there. But for Wintersong and Shadowsong, they're really not for me, so I leave this series now with my apologies.

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Review: Purple Hearts

Purple Hearts by Michael Grant
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It's hard to put into words the impact of this, the final book in Michael Grant's Front Lines trilogy. I expected Purple Hearts to be the most harrowing book in the series just from the title alone, and on that front my expectations were met. Over the course of yet another expansive 500-plus-page book, Grant takes us and his soldier girl cast through 1944 and beyond. As battle-hardened as Rio, Frangie, Rainy, Jenou, et al. have become in the last couple of years, the war still has ways of pulling the last vestiges of innocence out of them all. Not only from their wartime experiences, but more than ever, it hits home that an alternate history, nearly identical to our world but for allowing women to fight in the American armed forces several decades earlier than in reality, still suffers from too many flaws. Truly, there's no easy answer to the question of how someone can fight for a country and society despite that same society having it out for them on many levels - more for some than others, because intersectionality, of course.

But still, the war hits hard. D-Day, the Hürtgen forest (so negligibly covered in the history books, I think this might have been my first time ever hearing about it just from reading this book), the Battle of the Bulge, the liberation of Berlin, and the camps. Those hit hardest by far, making it all the more cathartic every time one of our soldier girls (particularly Rainy) takes out some Nazi enemies. And then the passage through the German countryside, where one has to wonder how much blame to place on everyday German civilians who stood by while the Nazis committed all their atrocities.

Many of Grant's past books have been darker than dark, though these have often been tempered by sheer entertainment value (the Gone series especially comes to mind). Even the first book of this series caught my attention just for its high-concept premise, for which I believe I compared it to Pearl Harbor and Agent Carter both. With Purple Hearts, though, it's clear that this book isn't meant for entertainment as much as for education. And not just an extended history lesson either, but a brutal reminder that fighting for one's ideals might well be the one way to keep them from being lost forever. And that it's one's duty to fight for those ideals even if they seem unattainable. Even if your society utterly fails to practice what it preaches, you'd be far better for being among the few who do practice, rather than let the whole thing fall apart just because it's nowhere near close to a more perfect union.

I get the feeling Purple Hearts is Grant's most personal book ever, and it's a shame I'm seeing few people reading it. It's the furthest thing from an easy read there is, but it's all worth it in the end when you finish the last page and realize there's still hope for us after all, somewhere, some way.

No matter what the fascists would have you believe.

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Review: Black Panther: The Young Prince

Black Panther: The Young Prince by Ronald L. Smith
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It took a little longer than I hoped for me to get ahold of this book from the library after I found out it existed, but I'm thinking Black Panther: The Young Prince was pretty well worth the wait. It's not as big a story as the current smash-hit Marvel movie, but that's to be expected when it's a kid-sized adventure showcasing T'Challa as a barely-adolescent prince with his whole future of awesome ahead of him. T'Challa, and M'Baku too. Never would've guessed, based on the movie, that they were best friends growing up, but that's where this book comes in with the story of the damage their friendship takes as they travel to Chicago and find themselves growing apart a bit. Heck, as far as the movie goes, I'm not even sure it and this book are quite in the same universe. I mean, the tech in Chicago could be present-day instead of early-to-mid-90s, which is when I first assumed the book would take place based on T'Challa's and M'Baku's ages relative to their 2016 ages in the movie. But overall, this book eschews temporal specificity in favor of creating a more original adventure, an urban fantasy heavy on dark family conspiracies in a similar style to Shadowshaper, though more tailored to middle-grade readership.

I'm really hoping there's a sequel or two in the pipeline, especially given the book's one flaw - there are just a few too many characters who don't have much to do here, but could easily play bigger roles in future installments. I'm especially looking at Hunter, T'Challa's adopted white brother, whom I actually expected to be this book's villain - and I still think he'll likely be one later on, but Smith could easily subvert my expectations there too.

And also, I just want to see more of T'Challa and all his friends. Not only M'Baku, but Zeke and Sheila as well.

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Review: Ace of Shades

Ace of Shades by Amanda Foody
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Another ARC I've managed to acquire in the course of my duties as a bookseller, so here's my honest review.

I...wasn't terribly impressed with this one, not unlike Foody's debut, Daughter of the Burning City. Here we have a similarly middling book, not at all outright bad, but certainly a bit overhyped. I think part of the problem with this one was its slow start (though the pace does pick up a hell of a lot around the 100-150 page mark or so), generally muddled storyline, and, for the most part, flat and forgettable characters. Not so forgettable, of course, is Levi, who brings some pretty well-needed black and bi rep both - and while we're at it, I'm going to want to look for someone who can review this book #ownvoices for Levi so I can trade this ARC to them. The funny thing is, though, Levi's memorable nature also owes to him being the one with the strongest similarity to a Six of Crows character - Jesper, to be precise - which is what really makes this book's overall similarity to Six of Crows really clear.

I can't say for certain whether or not I'll be looking forward to the sequels, but for sure I'll be reading them whenever I can. (Though whether or not I'm still working in the bookstore by then, I can't say. Circumstances may change, y'know?)

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Review: Sightwitch

Sightwitch by Susan Dennard
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This time last year, I was expecting we'd get Bloodwitch, but instead, Dennard's pushed that one ahead to 2019 and given us, instead, the novella Sightwitch to tide us fans over. And...honestly, I'm not sure what to make of this one. I mean, it's not a bad little story, and it's a pretty nice change of pace after Windwitch proved disappointing due to its bloated character sheet. While Sightwitch has a smaller character sheet by necessity, it's not much better than the second full-length novel of this series for it. Largely because over its little-more-than-200-page length, we get a lot of not only POV switches (first-person, unlike any of the other books, because they're done in the style of diary entries), but also time switches as well, with frequent flashbacks in the style of Lost or Arrow. With so many switches throughout such a short story, it's very hard to follow the plot. But then again, with the generally Gothic style of this convent setting, that may well have been intentional on Dennard's part. I'll just assume it was...and I'll also hope that some of the more unusual aspects of this book, like the greater use of illustrations, will cross over into the remaining sequels.

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Review: The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza

The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza by Shaun David Hutchinson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"We're bobbin' along in our barrel
Some of us tip right over the edge
But there's one thing really mystifyin'
Got me laughin', now it's got me cryin'
All my life I will be testifyin'
Till I know..."
-Andy Partridge, "I Wonder Why The Wonderfalls"

Seriously, I still find it very hard to believe Shaun David Hutchinson never saw Wonderfalls, not after he wrote this book that feels like the closest thing to a YA equivalent there will ever be. A little bit of Joan of Arc (with sarcastically mouthy inanimate objects), a little bit of Jesus and the Virgin Mary (but don't ever call Elena "Mary," she hates that), and a little bit of current-America political critique (the ways Hutchinson, through his characters, makes a mockery of Der Fuehrer Drumpf must be seen to be believed.)

As is usual for Hutchinson's books (I'm particularly looking at We Are the Ants and At the Edge of the Universe here), it's a Florida-set story, largely contemporary but with genre trappings that grow ever more prominent over the course of the book. Elena may not be a gay teen boy, but she's still certifiably queer (bi, to be precise) and, like Hutchinson's last two boy MC's, has a certain amount of family trouble to be going on with. The cast in general is wonderfully diverse, with numerous races and sexualities represented and included. Bear in mind that yes, there is an instance of a trans girl being deadnamed - and since she never even shows up anywhere else other than this one mention, it's as problematic as you would think.

Then again, though, I also see it as just another sign of Hutchinson recognizing that everyone's problematic in some way or another, and it's not the only thing worth calling out among the cast in this book. Eschatology may be a major theme in this book, but it's not alone, not when it's in company with dissections of toxic masculinity - such as Javi's story arc, in which he falls back on a lot of his immature and entitled ways at first, but eventually does accept that he and Elena will never be a couple again. Also, the backstory of David Combs, the boy whose attempt to kill Elena's love interest Freddie sparks the whole plot. It reminds me a lot of discussions I've seen lately re: school shooters (such as Nicholas Cruz and the Columbine killers), challenging the suggestion that bullying them turned them rotten because too many have leaped from that suggestion to more toxic ones like, say, women having to give (fragile, white) men love just to prevent them going off the deep end.

As with Hutchinson's previous entries, it's pretty morally grey and leaves no easy answers.

I can tell you, though, it's for sure a far more satisfying ending than Ants or Universe, especially because, again, of that cheeky and on-point little allusion to Trump. It got a real laugh out of my friend at work this morning when I mentioned it to her.

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Review: The Final Six

The Final Six by Alexandra Monir
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It's only been a few weeks since I heard about this book, and the hype built up for it pretty quickly, especially given that it's #ownvoices for having an Iranian-American main character. Well, one main character is Iranian-American. The other is Italian. Both Leo and Naomi, however, are uniquely awesome and awesomely unique. As for the storyline, it reminded me a hell of a lot of Nyxia - a sort of Hunger Games and Divergent meets Illuminae, following a group of teenagers competing for primo spots in an interstellar colonization mission. The stakes here, however, are far, far higher than in Nyxia. For one thing, we're on Earth throughout most of this book, seeing exactly how poor shape the planet is in after numerous floods and tidal waves and earthquakes. For another, the trip off-planet doesn't begin till the end of this book - and by that time, that's when Monir starts deploying cliffhangers aplenty. Not unlike Nyxia, or especially Truly Devious, there's so much cliffhangage that a veritable ton of plot threads don't get resolved here and are clearly being saved for Book 2. But you know what? Despite that bit of a flaw, I still give The Final Six a five-star rating, rounded up from a 4.5, because of its blazing fast prose and absolutely lovable lead characters, as well as the great diversity of cast in general. Trust me on this, you're going to need this book immediately if you haven't picked it up yet.

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Review: Restore Me

Restore Me by Tahereh Mafi
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It's a new Shatter Me novel, starting a new trilogy, no less.



Like Iron Gold, Restore Me - the latest in one of my favorite trends in YA and SFF and combinations thereof, the continuation of a series that reached its logical conclusion some years back - is more of a 4.5, but I'll round it up to a 5. Like with Iron Gold, Restore Me experiments with more POVs than any of the main novels of the original series - though Mafi only gives us two POVs as opposed to Brown's four. Those two POVs, Juliette and Warner, alternate long chapters throughout this book. Long, mostly. Not always. But often. And many times, when the chapters are shorter, it's because Mafi's employing some kind of weapons-grade cliffhanger, a very tantalizing hint about some dirty secret underlying Juliette's and Warner's post-apocalyptic life. These cliffhangers often take long enough to resolve that the novel tends to have a disjointed feel - quite appropriate given that the whole point of Restore Me is upending the balance left at the end of Ignite Me, the one book where Mafi didn't have Juliette's narration filled with numerous strikeouts. The strikeouts return here, in old diary entries, but they still make sense for making us return to Juliette's distressed POV.

I've seen a few readers complain that Juliette's and Warner's character arcs regress too much in this book - and since there's a fair few parallels between them and Mara and Noah in The Becoming of Noah Shaw, I don't blame people for making these comments. I also don't blame people for objecting to a certain blatant display of transphobia, in which an already-villainous character cements that status by doing just about everything transphobic you can think of - misgendering, deadnaming, the works. To Mafi's credit, though, said transphobic villain is called out immediately by just about every other character in the scene - including the trans woman she mocks, who tells her in Spanish, unless I miss my guess, something along the lines of threatening to take her body to her room and dismember it.

There are numerous pluses to Restore Me, though. Among them, the usual fast-flying prose, not unlike any of Mafi's previous novels. The aforementioned balance-upending for Juliette and Warner, proving that there's still so much more that they don't know about each other - and alongside that, some blowing-open of Mafi's world-building skills to King's Cage levels. Seeing more people coming in from around the world, we get racial representation all over the place - and many new characters make heavy use of their native languages, leading to a number of multilingual conversations using English, Spanish, Arabic, and more all at once. Mafi even throws in a few nods to present-day racial issues, to illustrate how the apocalypse essentially forced all those issues aside and led to a less bigoted world - though, unfortunately, not un-bigoted, as attested by the scene of transphobia. And going back to the balance-upending and character development, Adam makes it clear that he's recognizing the error of his ways and wants to redeem himself. He doesn't get to do much in this book, but there'll be two more, so I'm counting on Mafi to give him a little more attention further down the line.

My favorite parts of the book, of course, are the scenes between Juliette and Warner - maybe not quite as iconic as their love scenes in Books 2 and 3, but still pretty powerful stuff, especially given that it's erotic but not explicit. (Certainly not to circa-2016 SJM levels, lol.) Kenji, of course, is my absolute favorite character, and since I'm hearing rumors that he might be bi, this reader also hopes Mafi will give me a little on-page-confirmed rep to make this book officially #ownvoices reading for me.

And then there's that cliffhanger. Quite an Aveyardian one that still, nearly twelve hours after I finished the book, has me totally scratching my head.

Two more Shatter Me books? You know I'm ready to snap them up. I'll be buying them the second each one hits shelves!

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Review: Nexus

Nexus by Scott Westerfeld
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Westerfeld, Lanagan, and Biancotti bring the Zeroes trilogy to a pretty action-packed conclusion in Nexus - not quite on the same one-year cycle as the first two books, more like almost a year and a half after Swarm. Which, given the second book's massive cliffhanger, was a pretty aggravatingly long wait.

Sure, at times, Nexus moves a little too fast for its own good, and adds a few too many characters for its own good - some of whom are, deliberately, repeats of some of the first book's original Zeroes. Multiple Bellwethers, multiple Crashes, etc. At least we don't get multiple Scams, that would've annoyed me to no end. But I'm actually glad we get a lot of Bellwether's side of things in this book, because while he was always flat and underwritten to me before, here he hits rock bottom and has to claw his way back up. Finally, he validates his presence for me.

Perhaps the best part of the book is that it ends with a surprisingly happy ending. Sure, it's a bit bittersweet, but not as lethal as I expected. A breath of fresh air and hope going forward, even though we won't be seeing any more from the Zeroes. Unless Westerfeld et al. decide to reboot the series in the future the way Westerfeld's doing with Uglies now? Je ne sais pas.

But for now, I hereby bid the Zeroes trilogy vas ir...anoshe.

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Review: Sandman Slim

Sandman Slim by Richard Kadrey
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I first tried reading this book a few years ago, and for whatever reason, I couldn't get into it at all at the time. Looking at the dates, I think it might've been some kind of lingering reading slump after reading Jasper Fforde's Shades of Grey, for which I'm still dying for the sequel...but I digress.

More recently, my friend Harry at work put an official Staff Pick tag on Sandman Slim and he convinced me I should give this one another try.

So I did.

And I found I loved it a hell of a lot more the second time around! I flew through it now, enjoying so much how irreverent and darkly whimsical it was - and of course, now being a fan of Fox's Lucifer really helped me get a better feel for this book's black-comedy horror-show urban-fantasy tone.

Now I know I've got a long way ahead of me to catch up on this series, and it's gonna be a hell of a lot of fun too! :D

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Review: City of Endless Night

City of Endless Night by Douglas Preston
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Okay, so perhaps this book doesn't quite reach the heights of a few of the more recent Pendergast thrillers, but it's more on a level with The Obsidian Chamber - not exactly perfect, and a little slow at times. But at least it dispenses with some of Obsidian's more outlandish and silly plot elements in favor of a more straightforward mystery closer to the vein of White Fire. Not really as world-class as that book was, but it's a good exercise in keeping the reader on their toes the whole time. Maybe we could've done without the whole subplot involving the priest trying to fancy himself the second coming of Savonarola with his burning, because it was more of an unnecessary distraction than anything else. But the main mystery subplot is unpredictable and wild and nothing short of Preston and Child at their best, even if only for two thirds of the book instead of the whole thing. Here's hoping that the next Pendergast novel gets back up to White Fire or Crimson Shore levels of awesome, but for now, City of Endless Night is a more than serviceable return to the world of our favorite alien-looking hypocrite lecteur.

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Review: Reign of the Fallen

Reign of the Fallen by Sarah Glenn Marsh
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The fact that a book like this exists - a YA fantasy with not only bloody disgusting, bloody awesome necromancy driving its core story, but also a bisexual lead and several other queer characters besides - is great enough.

The fact that I kept on reading even when one of my near-instant faves bought the dust and my ship wound up torpedoed just as I was afraid it would be? (Because my ships so rarely sail, and this is no exception.)

Sarah Glenn Marsh, you are a bloody genius.

Sure, the story gets a little slow in the middle third, after the big death and before the big climax and setup for the inevitable sequel. But that's not too much of a hassle. Not when Marsh gives us so many lovable and relatable characters to go around. Especially Odessa, who, while she develops a bit of a potion addiction, never loses more than, oh, maybe twenty percent of her "muchness," as the Mad Hatter would say. She's simply too unique and memorable a lead to miss.

Hopefully the sequel will be along soon, whatever it may be called. And I'm also hoping this series won't wind up being yet another addition to YA's weird duology trend.

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Review: Magicians Impossible

Magicians Impossible by Brad Abraham
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This first Brad Abraham book I've read, it reads like a bit of a combo of Lev Grossman's The Magicians - unsurprising, given its title and the fact that it's a bit of a fantasy parody, though more urban than high, and far less grimdark - and Joe Hill's Horns, particularly with the flashback scenes to our hero's adolescent amateur stunt work. But I found Magicians Impossible to be better than either of those books, especially because Abraham gives us characters far easier to root for, a hero who shows genuine emotion quite a few times, and a strong supporting cast you can't help but love, even when half or more of them are perpetual assbites snarking their way through the story. What really helps this book for me, though, is the high level of both action and blood. I mean, it's not for nothing Pierce Bloodydamn Brown recommends it, and now, so do I. Chalk up another one I'll be happily hand-selling at work!

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