The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness

Warning!  Do not read this story until you’ve read A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night!

My review of A Discovery of Witches: http://ineedanotherbookcase.blogspot.com/2015/04/a-discovery-of-witches-by-deborah.html

My review of Shadow of Night: http://ineedanotherbookcase.blogspot.com/2015/04/shadow-of-night-by-deborah-harkness.html

Once again, before beginning, for anyone who hasn’t read A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night, I recommend brushing up.  The books are very detail heavy and hold one long continuous story.  For anyone who hasn’t read either…this is not the starting point you are looking for.

After returning from 1590 Elizabethan London, the setting of Shadow of Night, Diana Bishop and Matthew Clairmont are back in the present, ready to finally uncover the mysteries contained in Ashmole 782.  They return to Matthew’s home in Sept-Tours, France with Diana nearing her due date.  As this wonderful moment of their life approaches, Diana, Matthew, along with their friends and family, must prepare for the dangers that arrive as they delve into the secrets of Ashmole 782, both within the Congregation, the council formed from all three supernatural groups, and without.  As secrets are uncovered, prepare yourself for the electrifying end of this expansive tale.

In A Discovery of Witches, the reader is introduced to Diana Bishop, alchemic historian and witch, and Matthew Clairmont, biochemist and 1500 year old vampire.  Together they pursue Ashmole 782, an ancient and mysterious tome sought after by witches, vampires and daemons for centuries.  Diana, reluctant to use her magic, has spent her life trying to push aside that part of her life.  However, with the appearance of this tome and Matthew’s romantic advances, she (as well as the reader) is brought into the world that she had spent her life trying to stay apart from.

In Shadow of Night, Diana and Matthew, in an effort to find some clue to the location of and mystery to Ashmole 782, travel back in time to 1590 Elizabethan London.  While searching, Diana also seeks out a fellow witch to help her understand her powerful, and dormant, magical abilities.  As they search for both tome and tutor, Matthew must reconcile his past life, a life that gives Diana a deeper understanding of Matthew, and his current, more mature mentality.

Finally, in The Book of Life, this uninterrupted trilogy comes to an end, as Diana and Matthew are once again in the present day, and the events surrounding Ashmole 782 come to a close.

In The Book of Life, the final installment of the All Souls Trilogy, there is a lot of new, but not unwarranted, information being thrown at the reader.  Events of the previous book have provided Diana and Matthew with new information that can only now be acted upon due to modern technology and, because of this, we get to see Chris again.  For those who don’t remember, Chris is Diana’s academic BFF introduced in A Discovery of Witches, and his small, but complex, character from the first book is fleshed out and he becomes an enjoyable secondary character.  And Chris is not alone in this, many other characters reprising their roles as they are brought to the foreground.  In the race to discover what secrets Ashmole 783 hides, there are no holds barred as a number of other characters take on life and import.

With the exception of the final section of the book (don’t worry, I’ll get to that) Harkness still writes with a loving attention to detail.  The world, events, and people will have you in rapture. Beautiful attention is paid to even the tiniest detail, and the complexities of the human (or otherwise) experience is wonderfully done.  Events of the prior books, and the time travel within, are given deeper meaning and brought to a neat and tidy close as the saga ends, leaving few loose ends for fans to wonder over.

Then there’s Diana.  Wow.  Finally, the culmination of all the witchy experiences the readers have seen as she traversed this timeline and, I’ve gotta say, it was definitely worth it.  To say I was 100% fine with how Diana and her powers turned out would be dishonest, but what I wanted would have been too strong a deviation from her already established character.  Given everything that the last two books, as well as prior events in this book, it’d be hard to find a reader that is legitimately disappointed.   

All notes of the fantastical and fictitious aside, the moral of this story is a timeless one that readers will, if current trends are to be believed, not tire of for generations to come.  Two lovers who shouldn’t be together are together and, despite the odds and opposition, they will fight tooth and nail to be true to themselves.

The primary downside of this book is the decrease of originality and life that the previous two had.  While this is definitely a strong book, it’s clear that it’s not quite as strong as the previous two (some weakness are overcome by the fact that this is a concluding piece, allowing for more possible points of merit than its predecessors).  Harkness loves history, which is made clear throughout the series and, while history has some play in The Book of Life, the strongest genre in this book is that of fantasy and fiction, rather than history.  Though entertaining, The Book of Life lacks the same level of scenic beauty and literal detail, many of the story’s subplots bordering cliché and trope-like.

The second downside of this book is the pace towards the finale.  Harkness has spent well over a thousand pages using loving detail to fully immerse the reader in this world and yet, when we come to the most crucial events, the concluding events that this entire story has been building up to…it’s rushed.  Any jumps in time taken previously were typically followed, at some point, by a summary of events that took place during that period, typically amounting to “this is why these events weren’t important for me to spend time on, you’re welcome” and the story was better for it.  However, nothing like that happens here.  Events, plans, and travels are rushed over and it feels more like Harkness is just trying to get to the end.  If it were any a number of other authors writing this, then I most likely wouldn’t have any problem with this but, since this is Harkness, I’ve come to expect a certain level of detail and care that just isn’t present.

All in all, it was an enjoyable end to the series.  While it wasn’t my favorite installment in the trilogy (though I had hoped it would be), it also wasn’t my least.  If you’ve read A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night you would be a fool to even consider skipping this book.  And to everyone who read this review knowing nothing about the prior two, if you’re a lover of words, fiction, fantasy, romance, vampires, witches, or history, then this is a must read.

Rating: 4/5

Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith

Grasshopper Jungle is set in modern, poverty stricken Ealing, Iowa and narrated by Austin Szerba.  Sex and sexuality, adults, bullies, [censored], and sex. Austin and Robby, retrieving some items placed on the roof of the local mall by a group of bullies, decide to slip into “From Attic to Seller Consignment Store” where they see [censored], [censored], [censored], and [censored].  While in the store, the group of bullies break in and [censored].  As they sneak out, making sure to avoid the group of bullies, they see [censored], setting off a strange chain of events that [censored].

You’re probably wondering why I did that to the story’s summary. Spoilers are one of my biggest pet peeves, whether it applies to books, movies, games, anything.  Hate ‘em.  Don’t want ‘em near me, don’t wanna look at ‘em. I wish all spoilers would just die.  Okay, that last bit might be a bit of an exaggeration, but it irritates me to no end when I read the back of a book or the inside sleeve of a book gives away crucial information.  If I could go on and on about how much I hate spoilers, I would, complete with an extensive multimedia presentation.  However, I won’t because I’m talking about Grasshopper Jungle right now.  The reason I bring up my disdain for spoilers is because of what would have been ruined for me in this book had I known about it prior.  Nothing that would have destroyed my experience, but it would have taken away something special.  In keeping with that I have made the summary I normally include short and vague.  I want all you potential readers to have that same moment I did.  To best describe that moment, I’ll say this:  I never saw anything but the title of Simon Pegg’s The World End before I watched the movie.  My feelings of unadulterated bewilderment and pure glee when “the shift” happened (I’m hoping this is explanatory enough) in that movie perfectly mirror my reactions when I read this book.  Now that I’ve finished the book and read the back (basically, now that I’ve looked at even the most precursory information about this book) I see it’s actually not that a surprising a shift (much like World’s End wasn’t if anyone saw even a single trailer or looked at the movie posters).  However, I went into this book with only my experience of his earlier books—Ghost Medicine, Passenger, In the Path of Falling Objects—playing into what I expected out of this book (If I’d remembered Marbury Lens I may have seen it coming).  So, if possible, I’d like to give you the same experience I had.  Smith is great at writing captivating coming of age stories, and Grasshopper Jungle is that and more.  For first time Andrew Smith readers, this book is as excellent a place to start as any.

Now that I’ve finished belaboring that single part, I’ll actually get into the actual review.  Sex. Boom, the reader’s hooked.  This is a great coming of age story that, among the many factors to come, isn’t afraid to be in the head of an adolescent boy and elaborate on all of his thoughts.  A few of those thoughts aren’t even about sex.  Along with Austin’s many mixed feelings towards sex and sexuality, his overall attitude towards friends, romantic interests, adults, and bullies are dead on and I would challenge any reader to say that they can’t find a single instance in the story where they aren’t taken back to a similar moment in their own adolescence. [As this is a male character and I’m male, I can’t speak from experience, but I’d wager that this also applies true to females as well.]  The narrative style is that of first person train-of-thought for 10^th grade Austin Szerba, and I can’t imagine any other form being this captivating.  There’s always the issue that train-of-thought writing might sound too manufactured or it might be too erratic, but Smith has succeeded in spades.  Also, did I mention that Austin is very, very horny?

As a science fiction, Grasshopper Jungle is almost required to speak to some real modern day issue by way of its sci-fi narrative.   Grasshopper Jungle addresses sexuality in a way that isn’t typically addressed in YA fiction outside of novel solely dedicated to that topic.  This helps pull the topic from sensitive subject matter and makes it part of normal conversation so, regardless of the quality of the story (which is exceptionally high), the impact this book has and will have gets it major points in my book.  It’s clear in every one of his novels, but Smith has an interestingly profound understanding of what it is to be a teenage boy.

The quips and overall comedic tone in here are great.  They’re not forced, they’re clever, they’re fun, and they’re plentiful.  I started with a small list of lines that I thought about including here, but after I’d accumulated a couple dozen from the first forty pages alone (out of nearly four hundred) I realized that the list might exceed the length of the rest of my review.  Not a page will go by that you don’t chuckle, at the very least.  They also make sense, working with the established voice of the story and making the reader enjoy the act of reading while not pulling them out of the story.  Hell, forget quips, it’s all funny, the whole damn book.  And in every single chuckle and thoughtful moment of the book, there are hardly any “book” moments, and when I say “book” moments, I mean events that could only happen in a book.  Thinking them over, I could see them all happening in real life (well…with some obvious exceptions).  There’s a life in this book, making it more than a story and making it incredibly clear that no one could finish this book being worse off.

The premise of the story (and yes, this will be vague) is one we’ve all heard before.  Important/relevant older figure has store with strange odds and ends.  Kids break in.  Kids find things hidden away off main store floor.  Kids witness object’s misuse.  Chaos/plot ensues.  It’s a solid angle that works and Smith puts his own flourish on it.  The characters, primarily Austin and Robby, are also constructed incredibly well, coming off as intelligent and self-aware while being believable as teenagers, not appearing as teenage puppets worked by their adult and experienced creator. 

“The shift” that I referred to earlier—the cause of my vagueness and, most likely, your irritation towards how unhelpful my review is—results in one of the mostly calmingly surreal stories I’ve read in a while.  There is no loss in teenage awkwardness, no overselling of certain emotions, and the ending is a blast.

I’d recommend this book to anyone who enjoys slice-of-life stories, science fiction, and chuckles, as well as anyone dealing with, or trying to understand, teenager-hood.  Actually, I’d recommend this to anyone of any age who likes a good, fun story.  This is, at least, one of my top five YA novels.  Now, while you go read Grasshopper Jungle, I think I’ll go check out Alex Crow…

Rating: 4/5

Fade to Black by Tim McBain & L.T. Vargus

Jeff Grobnagger is just a normal guy who suffers from seizures.  While not visibly odd or alarming outside the normal, in reality, Jeff is transported to a strange realm, where he is finds himself reliving the same dream over and over again: arriving hanging upside down, being chased by a mysterious figure, and getting killed.  During one such seizure he wakes up and meets Glenn, a man who, through his own struggles, Jeff comes to find might have some connection to what’s happening to him.  While he initially blows him off, choosing to keep to his normal, introverted lifestyle, after almost being killed in real life, Jeff decides that working together might not be a bad idea. Jeff finds that his strange dreams might somehow be connected to the same astral projection obsessed cults that Glenn has been looking into to find his missing daughter.  What he uncovers will leave him questioning everything he knew about life, assuming he doesn't die in the process.

Fade to Black had a lot of potential.  It touched on genres that I like to read but, due to what I can only assume is lack of editing, experience, or both, it really fell short.

There are four key problems I found with the story.  The first three are mostly prevalent in the first half, occurring in the second half occasionally, while the fourth was prevalent throughout but mostly in the second half.  First, the transitions between ideas and events were weak to nonexistent.  Given that this story is told from first-person perspective, Jeff’s, the narrative is told in a very train-of-thought manner, and I don’t think the authors made a bad choice in that.  However, the transitions made the story very jarring, pulling me out of the story and making it hard for me to build up any steam.  I could mostly tell how events led to one another without clear transitions, but I shouldn’t have to stop and think about the how.  This problem is almost solely in the first half but, because of that, it draws even more attention to itself.

Second, and this one is minor, is that the sentences are a bit too simple at points.  Short and compact sentences are one thing, able to express a lot with a little, but the short sentences here would serve much better as compound or complex sentences, able to add to the flow of the story.  It’s not a huge problem, but it’s prevalent enough that they feel like ideas for sentences/paragraphs that were never finished.  This isn't an issue for most of the story, but because it can be found throughout the story, it has the same problem as the transition issues in that I kept being pulled out of the story.

Third, events in the beginning of the story happen way too fast.  Events crucial to the story happened out of nowhere and for reasons that weren't fully explained.  Many of these crucial events in the first fifty or so pages of the book are important to the story, yet were never fully integrated into the book and since they weren't explored or introduced fully enough, I had trouble believing in their authenticity.  It seemed like the authors were saying “here is some important information, accept that it’s important and lets move on.

The fourth and final key problem is that, at about the halfway mark in the book, there’s a notable shift in dialogue and theme that, at times, crosses into the territory of outlandish and inane.  I can appreciate what is being aimed for but, at the same time, the way it’s gone about seems almost a caricature of what was trying to be written.

The length is also an issue.  As this is part of a larger series, I can only wonder whether all this was originally part of a longer story that got split into multiple books, especially with the way this book ended, more an interruption than a cliff-hanger.  It almost seems like it should be Part I of a larger book.  The problems I listed above could have been easily fixed by increasing the size of the book.  It seemed as though the authors wanted to finish this in two hundred pages, when three hundred or so would allow for more impressive and consistent sentences, better transitions between sentences and paragraphs, and made the flow of events and ideas seem much more natural.  As for the twist(s) at the end, due to the lack of density in the story and Glenn’s MacGuffin status, they weren't that surprising.  It’s a problem to lose the story in the details, but without enough it feels like it’s incomplete. 

Glenn is an interesting character.  He was a bit of a clichéd “elder who has wisdom for younger main character” type of character, but I still liked him, or at least I wanted to like him.  He had a cheery personality, was a very warm person, and, though he seemed a bit manufactured and a bit of a MacGuffin, his problem in the story mixed well with the main conflict of the story, giving him an authentic reason to be helping Jeff. 

Ms. Babinaux is even more of a MacGuffin, serving only to provide information and move the story along, without much explanation behind her purpose.  (She is one of the events crucial to the story I mention in my third key problem)  There’s a difference between making a character mysterious and leaving them underdeveloped.  The few times her personality does show through you can tell she’s got a sarcastic, secretly-terrifyingly-angry sort of thing going on.  And then at the end of the story we’re essentially told to ignore the little development made on her character because she’s actually the opposite of how she seems.

Jeff’s flashback/recollections of events with Allie come as a bit out of place, suddenly appearing with no clear connection to the overarching story.  After the first two—these moments come without much transitions—they work with the story, but only because I became aware that these events were relevant.  She’s initially thrown in out of the blue.  I know that this story is told in a very train-of-thought manner, and I know that, in real life, that type of thinking can be very random, one thought not even tangentially related to another somehow triggering it.  But that’s harder to accept in a story.  Thinking about her and what his life was and what it’s become is a way to establish and build Jeff’s character for the reader.  It’s also, arguably, the most important facet of the entire book.  Given how this plays a much larger role in the overarching story, it shouldn't have a weak introduction.

Though I clearly have a number of problems with the book, I don’t hate it. While not what manifested itself in the book, the potential for a good story and good storytelling is there.  The story has potential and I'm curious to know what happens next.  However, since this book and its sequel were published in the same year, I don't see how any large corrections could've been made.  The time just wasn't there.  Maybe the corrections were made but, based on the information I have, it's not worth finding out.  Above all else, an editor would do wonders here. I’d say that anyone who’s read any of the Odd Thomas series by Dean Koontz and/or The Marbury Lens series  by Andrew Smith, and liked the theme, might like this. I recommend skipping this book, though keep an eye on the authors.  The potential is there.

Rating: 1/5