cyphomandra (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
cyphomandra) wrote2020-12-30 03:48 pm
cyphomandra) wrote2020-12-30 03:48 pm
Everything else I read in November
Giants Beware! Jorge Aguirre, Rafael Rosado (Chronicles of Claudette v1)
Princeless, v1, Jeremy Whitley and M Goodwin
Tom’s Midnight Garden, Philippa Pearce, graphic novel adaptation by Édith
The Obsidian Mirror, KD Keenan
Silver in the Tree, Emily Tesh
Drowned Country, Emily Tesh
For the Honour of the School, Winnifred Darch
Cicely Bassett, Patrol Leader, Winnifred Darch
Margaret Plays the Game, Winnifred Darch
Skin and Bone, TA Moore
How to Howl at the Moon, Eli Easton
Wonderscape, Jennifer Bell
A Separate Peace, John Knowles
The Magpie Lord, KJ Charles
Tris' Book, Tamora Pierce
Giants Beware! Jorge Aguirre, Rafael Rosado (Chronicles of Claudette v1). Claudette is a determined giant-slayer who drags her best friend Marie (who wants to be a princess) and her little brother Gaston (who wants to be a pastry-chef) out looking for one. Funny, inventive and well-characterised, rather French in style as well as names. Kids loved this - both read it independently and have demanded the sequels.
Princeless, v1, Jeremy Whitley and M Goodwin. Adrienne is a feisty black princess whose father tricks her into being imprisoned in a tower (as is conventional) on her 16th birthday; she escapes and, with the aid of her twin brother Devin (a quiet and artistic disappointment to the King) and Bedelia, a half-dwarven blacksmith’s daughter who yearns to make practical armour for women, sets out to free her other six sisters. This is mostly set-up and punchlines, and it’s best not to look to closely at any of the backdrops, but it moves along at a fast clip. Kids flipped through this but were unconvinced; possibly a bit too wordy.
Tom’s Midnight Garden, Philippa Pearce, graphic novel adaptation by Édith. I’d been thinking about the book but my copy is in a box somewhere. This is a faithful adaptation (I’m not sure who if Édith adapted it as well as illustrating) and the illustrations work well, especially the contrast between the expansive, rural-set dream garden, and the present day (England in the 50s) suburbia. Kids not interested but to be fair I did accidentally leave it in the kitchen until it was due back.
The Obsidian Mirror, KD Keenan. Sierra is abruptly sacked from her PR job for a microchip manufacturing company, and equally abruptly a mysterious feather and a shape-shifting coyote turn up and embroil her in a fight to save the world from environmental destruction. I liked the use of Meso American myth as well as other non traditional urban fantasy tropes (Sierra is helped by a voudoun priestess); I didn’t like the obvious plotting, the wavering point of view (too many “this would look cool in cinema if I pulled back” moments) and the very clunky romances.
Silver in the Tree and Drowned Country, Emily Tesh. I re-read Silver (and wondered for the first time if the title were a Susan Cooper reference) before Drowned and it worked really well that way; with my first read, I found Silver himself not all that knowable as a character, as well as being absent for sizeable chunks, and although this starts with that rather irritating cliché of the characters having broken up off-stage between books, I felt it did work. This book has a barren fairyland and a stubborn unexpected investigator, and it’s a smooth, enjoyable read.
For the Honour of the School; Cicely Bassett, Patrol Leader; Margaret Plays the Game, Winnifred Darch These are in a 3-in-1 and all, as is probably obviously by the title, about being an honourable school girl and playing the game. They’re competent school stories; Darch avoids most excess melodrama, and she is good at adults, especially the nasty relative the girls in Honour end up living with, who is all smooth niceness on the surface. Honour also has a visit to Rouen early in the book which is obviously based on real life and both interesting and entertaining (the obligatory chalking of the suitcases at Customs, the food, the curfew). She’s also interested in education (and was, herself, a teacher), so there are day schools, experimental schools (vegetarianism, flowing robes, pupil councils), and a secretarial sixth training students for employment. I’ve only read a few of hers (Heather at the High School was the first day school GO book I read) but would cheerfully seek out more.
Skin and Bone, TA Moore. Second in the m/m mystery series about Cloister, a sheriff’s deputy with a fantastic K9 partner (Bournville) and Special Agent Javi Merlo, who is grudgingly admitting he might possibly have feelings. The case kicks off with a bang, when a truck tries to run Cloister down just after he finds a seriously injured missing woman, but it slows down and gets a bit convoluted as the story progresses, and sometimes the relationship feels similarly stalled. Bon remains an excellent dog.
How to Howl at the Moon, Eli Easton. Shifter romance with the twist being that it is set in a town largely comprised of dog shifters, who are either born that way or become that way by becoming “quickened” - dogs who have gained the ability to become human, usually by forming a close bond with a human. This is possibly shading a little closer to bestiality than most shifter books, but Easton’s first book in this series has the sheriff being a born shifter, descended from at least three generations of border collie; he investigates Tim, a new arrival to the town who is actually a gardener/plant designer fleeing a bad relationship but comes across as a dodgy potential marijuana grower, and in order to get closer to him pretends to be a stray dog that Tim has hit with his car. It hits a lot of the obvious beats but with reasonable style.
Wonderscape, Jennifer Bell. Three kids investigating a mysterious explosion find themselves nearly five hundred years in the future in the Wonderscape, a virtual reality game that they must find their way through to have any hope of returning home. Many of the characters in the Wonderscape are historical figures, but the puzzles and the energy save this from being too didactic, and it’s a lot of fun. The gaming aspects are solid - it reminds me a bit of Tad Williams’ Otherland series, which I’m very fond of and which never seemed to get the same traction as his standard fantasy stuff.
A Separate Peace, John Knowles. Classic WWII American boarding school/loss of innocence/slashy subtext novel that I’d previously avoided. I can see why it’s well thought of but it didn’t grab me. What it reminded me of, strongly, was Stephen King’s Hearts in Atlantis (the novella), which now I want to re-read.
I also re-read KJ Charles’ The Magpie Lord (still excellent! As always has more horror than I remember, I’d forgotten the hair curse), a book for Yuletide, and listened to Tris’ Book by Tamora Pierce (great) as audio.
Princeless, v1, Jeremy Whitley and M Goodwin
Tom’s Midnight Garden, Philippa Pearce, graphic novel adaptation by Édith
The Obsidian Mirror, KD Keenan
Silver in the Tree, Emily Tesh
Drowned Country, Emily Tesh
For the Honour of the School, Winnifred Darch
Cicely Bassett, Patrol Leader, Winnifred Darch
Margaret Plays the Game, Winnifred Darch
Skin and Bone, TA Moore
How to Howl at the Moon, Eli Easton
Wonderscape, Jennifer Bell
A Separate Peace, John Knowles
The Magpie Lord, KJ Charles
Tris' Book, Tamora Pierce
Giants Beware! Jorge Aguirre, Rafael Rosado (Chronicles of Claudette v1). Claudette is a determined giant-slayer who drags her best friend Marie (who wants to be a princess) and her little brother Gaston (who wants to be a pastry-chef) out looking for one. Funny, inventive and well-characterised, rather French in style as well as names. Kids loved this - both read it independently and have demanded the sequels.
Princeless, v1, Jeremy Whitley and M Goodwin. Adrienne is a feisty black princess whose father tricks her into being imprisoned in a tower (as is conventional) on her 16th birthday; she escapes and, with the aid of her twin brother Devin (a quiet and artistic disappointment to the King) and Bedelia, a half-dwarven blacksmith’s daughter who yearns to make practical armour for women, sets out to free her other six sisters. This is mostly set-up and punchlines, and it’s best not to look to closely at any of the backdrops, but it moves along at a fast clip. Kids flipped through this but were unconvinced; possibly a bit too wordy.
Tom’s Midnight Garden, Philippa Pearce, graphic novel adaptation by Édith. I’d been thinking about the book but my copy is in a box somewhere. This is a faithful adaptation (I’m not sure who if Édith adapted it as well as illustrating) and the illustrations work well, especially the contrast between the expansive, rural-set dream garden, and the present day (England in the 50s) suburbia. Kids not interested but to be fair I did accidentally leave it in the kitchen until it was due back.
The Obsidian Mirror, KD Keenan. Sierra is abruptly sacked from her PR job for a microchip manufacturing company, and equally abruptly a mysterious feather and a shape-shifting coyote turn up and embroil her in a fight to save the world from environmental destruction. I liked the use of Meso American myth as well as other non traditional urban fantasy tropes (Sierra is helped by a voudoun priestess); I didn’t like the obvious plotting, the wavering point of view (too many “this would look cool in cinema if I pulled back” moments) and the very clunky romances.
Silver in the Tree and Drowned Country, Emily Tesh. I re-read Silver (and wondered for the first time if the title were a Susan Cooper reference) before Drowned and it worked really well that way; with my first read, I found Silver himself not all that knowable as a character, as well as being absent for sizeable chunks, and although this starts with that rather irritating cliché of the characters having broken up off-stage between books, I felt it did work. This book has a barren fairyland and a stubborn unexpected investigator, and it’s a smooth, enjoyable read.
For the Honour of the School; Cicely Bassett, Patrol Leader; Margaret Plays the Game, Winnifred Darch These are in a 3-in-1 and all, as is probably obviously by the title, about being an honourable school girl and playing the game. They’re competent school stories; Darch avoids most excess melodrama, and she is good at adults, especially the nasty relative the girls in Honour end up living with, who is all smooth niceness on the surface. Honour also has a visit to Rouen early in the book which is obviously based on real life and both interesting and entertaining (the obligatory chalking of the suitcases at Customs, the food, the curfew). She’s also interested in education (and was, herself, a teacher), so there are day schools, experimental schools (vegetarianism, flowing robes, pupil councils), and a secretarial sixth training students for employment. I’ve only read a few of hers (Heather at the High School was the first day school GO book I read) but would cheerfully seek out more.
Skin and Bone, TA Moore. Second in the m/m mystery series about Cloister, a sheriff’s deputy with a fantastic K9 partner (Bournville) and Special Agent Javi Merlo, who is grudgingly admitting he might possibly have feelings. The case kicks off with a bang, when a truck tries to run Cloister down just after he finds a seriously injured missing woman, but it slows down and gets a bit convoluted as the story progresses, and sometimes the relationship feels similarly stalled. Bon remains an excellent dog.
How to Howl at the Moon, Eli Easton. Shifter romance with the twist being that it is set in a town largely comprised of dog shifters, who are either born that way or become that way by becoming “quickened” - dogs who have gained the ability to become human, usually by forming a close bond with a human. This is possibly shading a little closer to bestiality than most shifter books, but Easton’s first book in this series has the sheriff being a born shifter, descended from at least three generations of border collie; he investigates Tim, a new arrival to the town who is actually a gardener/plant designer fleeing a bad relationship but comes across as a dodgy potential marijuana grower, and in order to get closer to him pretends to be a stray dog that Tim has hit with his car. It hits a lot of the obvious beats but with reasonable style.
Wonderscape, Jennifer Bell. Three kids investigating a mysterious explosion find themselves nearly five hundred years in the future in the Wonderscape, a virtual reality game that they must find their way through to have any hope of returning home. Many of the characters in the Wonderscape are historical figures, but the puzzles and the energy save this from being too didactic, and it’s a lot of fun. The gaming aspects are solid - it reminds me a bit of Tad Williams’ Otherland series, which I’m very fond of and which never seemed to get the same traction as his standard fantasy stuff.
A Separate Peace, John Knowles. Classic WWII American boarding school/loss of innocence/slashy subtext novel that I’d previously avoided. I can see why it’s well thought of but it didn’t grab me. What it reminded me of, strongly, was Stephen King’s Hearts in Atlantis (the novella), which now I want to re-read.
I also re-read KJ Charles’ The Magpie Lord (still excellent! As always has more horror than I remember, I’d forgotten the hair curse), a book for Yuletide, and listened to Tris’ Book by Tamora Pierce (great) as audio.
no subject
I regret to inform that Tesh's title is Silver in the Wood, but I can't see how there are not elements of Susan Cooper in those books, especially with the shout-out to the quartered circle in the first one and then the entire, well, drowned country in the second.
no subject
(oh, and if you haven’t seen it I stumbled over a New Yorker interview with Susanna Clarke talking about her fondness for Charn, the interviewer having written her own book about her entanglement with Narnia - https://www.google.co.nz/amp/s/www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/09/14/susanna-clarkes-fantasy-world-of-interiors/amp)