The Bible's Cutting Room Floor by Joel M Hoffman

Title: The Bible's Cutting Room Floor
Author: Joel M Hoffman
Publisher: Macmillan
Rating: WORTHY!

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

This blog is nearly all fiction, but once in a rare while, I take a look at a non-fiction work because it really interests me, and this book is one such exception. To me, the Bible itself is a work of fiction: a collection of fairy tales. The only difference is that there is some factual material included, so I guess it's more like a work of historical fiction or historical fantasy than anything else. There is supportive evidence for many of the factual aspects of the Bible, but none for the supernatural aspects, and the Bible is simply flat-out wrong when it tries to assert, for example, that the universe is only some 6,000 years old or that there was a global flood some 4,000 or so years ago.

One thing about the Bible which most believers simply do not get is how unreliable and contradictory it is, and this is why I was interested in Joel Hoffman's book, which delves into these aspects of it inter alia. The author is quite evidently a knowledgeable scholar who is intimately familiar with the material he discusses, and for as much as I've read on this topic, I confess he raises issues with which I had not been familiar.

The first couple of chapters are an historical overview of Biblical times and a relation of how the Qumran (or Dead Sea) scrolls came to be unearthed. I largely skimmed these because the material is not unfamiliar to me, and they were not what I was interested in. Frankly I was a bit surprised to find the first chapter there at all in that form, but if you want historical details, these chapters are replete with them.

Where this book really shone for me was in the remaining chapters, where Hoffman himself shines relating information, detail, overview, and fascinating snippets with a sly sense of humor and an exert eye. Rather than try to précis the content, I'm going to list the chapter headers here:

1. Jerusalem: An Eternal City in Conflict
2. The Dead Sea Scrolls: How a Lost Goat Changed the World
3. The Septuagint: How Seventy Scholars Took Seventy Days to Get It Wrong
4. Josephus: The Only Man to be a Fly on Every Wall
5. Adam and Eve: Falling Down and Getting Back Up
6. Abraham: Humans, Idols, and Gods
7. Enoch: The Beginning of the End
8. The Big Picture: Finding the Unabridged Bible

The book also includes an appendix with suggestions for further reading, but there is plenty for thought right here. How many people know, for example, that the Septuagint, long considered an authoritative text, is riddled with error - and for good reason?

You will note Josephus is the topic of one of the chapters and his work is cited by many believers as powerful evidence for the existence of a real Messiah named Jesus who was a miracle-working son of a divinity. How many of those people know how unreliable and fanciful Josephus is, and that the passage they love to cite is not an original but a later interpolation?

How many people are aware that Genesis doesn't tell the whole fable of Adam and Eve (a first couple now categorically disproved by modern science). There is another book which was excluded from the Bible, which continues the story.

The central theme here - not necessarily the author's theme, but one to which I subscribe - is that the Bible is not the word of any god. It's an arbitrary collection of tales written and put together by very fallible humans, nearly all of whom were men, and all of whom had one agenda or another. Until and unless people understand that and appreciate it for what it means, they're never going to grasp what the Bible actually is on the bottom line.

I'll Give You Something to Cry About by Jennifer Finney Boylan

Title: I'll Give You Something to Cry About
Author: Jennifer Finney Boylan
Publisher: Shebooks
Rating: WORTHY!

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

Here's another writer who thinks a book is entitled instead of just being titled. I'm in favor of entitlements, but not when it comes to books. I don't know of any entitled books, but I guess I'm fighting a losing battle on behalf of the English language and all who rail in her. Other than that (and the rather odd title itself), this novel started out intriguingly. I mean, what's not to engage the imagination in a Toyota Sienna minivan full of people of assorted ages, all of whom seem to be carrying a sorry-load of pills?

There's "Gammie" (shades of Dana Carvey) who comes armed with Lopressor (aka metoprolol, used for cardiovascular issues, particularly hypertension or high blood pressure). There's a young boy Otis, who carries Luvox (aka Fluvoxamine, used to treat OCD). There's the former son, now daughter Alex, who carries Spironolactone (an antiandrogen) and Premarin (a contraction of "pregnant mares' urine" - a type of HRT, or hormone replacement therapy) as well as stilettos and fishnet stockings(!). Riley, who's driving, has Celexa (aka Citalopram, an anti-depressant). Oh, and he has a prosthetic leg - a victim of cancer, for which he has an unfulfilled script. This is not a recipe written in Heaven, but it is a great recipe for a story!

The end point of that journey, but starting point of the story, is a ramshackle building in Manchester (New England, not Olde Englande) where Riley's estranged wife Junie decided to take a sabbatical to do something (writing) for herself.

Once she's on-board, the minivan heads towards Washington DC where Otis is supposed to play in a band for the vice-president. Road trip!

This novel bounces around between the characters. All is not well between Riley and Junie since they both have a different take on where their marriage is going (or not going). Otis is nervous about his performance. All is not well, either, between Riley and Alex, since he's not really on-board with her gender reassignment, which is why he's baulking at paying for her actual surgery. Right now she's what some people term a 'shemale': to all outward appearances female, including breasts, except for the fact that she still has male genitalia.

For me, Alex's story was the most engrossing and the best written. It really took an uptick, too, when she encountered a Geordie - amusingly while looking at the Liberty Bell! How portentous is that?! Lucas, in some regards, seemed to be a bit of a stalker, but in the end, his intentions were, whilst way too amorous, largely honorable. What really capped this for me was Alex's internal monologue. That, I thought, was brilliantly done.

I was less enamored of Riley and Junie, because their story was - intentionally, I should note - a complete mess, but even that had its moments, particularly when Riley had flashbacks to his younger self, right at the point where he first started becoming involved with Junie. The ending for me was a bit odd, and I enjoyed the part with Alex much more than the part with Junie and Riley.

Having said that, I recommend this novel for its originality and inventiveness, and for the really great character portrayals.

Pinned by Sharon G Flake

Title: Pinned
Author: Sharon G Flake
Publisher: Scholastic
Rating: WORTHY!

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

This is a story of a relationship between your stereotypical high school jock and the hot member of the opposite sex, but in this case, the jock is the girl, and the hot opposite sex character is a guy in a wheelchair. In significant ways, both are handicapped, but the guy isn't handicapped by his wheelchair, he's handicapped by his personality. The girl is handicapped by short-sightedness, and not of the physical kind, either.

It seems that I'm forced into commenting on a completely inappropriate cover once more. Yet again, the cover illustrator appears never to have read the novel, either that or didn't give a damn, because because if he or she had read it or cared about it, they would have noticed that Autumn is a wrestler who has muscles. She's not a muscle-bound type as such, but she does have muscles and definition, and the cover model was so not her it wasn't even funny. This is a pitfall of going with Big Publishing™: they simply do not care, unless it's about how many corners they can cut on their way to how much moo-la they can milk from your novel.

» Here's what real female athletes look like: Ashleigh Nelson, Hayley Jones, Dina Asher-Smith and Annabelle Lewis «

A brief word on genderism in track

» Why is it that men are fully covered whereas women are filly covered? Men have long shirts, and shorts down to their knees, whereas the women are wearing skimpy tank tops and what amount to swim trunks? Just asking.«

This novel is all about Autumn Knight and Adonis Einstein Anderson Miller. I am not kidding you with the names. I think there's a scientific study and an interesting paper to be published about the use of exotic names in the African American community if it's tied-in with how that particular group has been treated over the years since Africa was "discovered" by the so-called civilized world, but this is merely a book review, so names aside, let me say up front that despite some issues, I loved this novel.

I am not black, so I don't doubt for a minute that I may well be missing some insights here which color (so to speak!) my perspective, but the bottom line is that this is purely a novel about two people who have a relationship. Race, creed, ethnicity, etc., doesn't enter into it, so that should never be an issue with regard to the validity of any given reviewer's take on it. I mean a story is either worth the reading or it's not, right, regardless of the actual content or the characters? This one was worth it.

It's a really short and easy book to listen to (and presumably to read). The short chapters alternate between Autumn's PoV and Adonis's, both told in first person. My problem was that I listened to it as an audio book rather than read it, and while I felt that Autumn's voice was nailed all the way to the bone by Bahni Turpin, Adonis's voice was ruined by Dominic Hoffman. He sounded far more like a high school teacher than ever he did a high school student. This definitely shaded my view of this novel because this character had no credibility for me.

Worse than that, Adonis was presented, in the writing itself, as a snotty, superior, self-centered, and arrogant jerk. He had no redeeming qualities that I could see, and not only did I not like him, I could find no reason at all why someone like Autumn would like him, let alone claim to be in love with him and follow him around like a timid puppy. This, for me, stole ruthlessly from her role as a strong female character, and I could not for the life of me figure out why Sharon Flake would do this to her. I do, however, want to read more of this author's writing after enjoying this, which is why I moved on to The Skin I'm In. The author's name may be Flake, but she's no flake when it comes to writing chops.

I fell in love with Autumn Knight, not just the beautiful name, but also with her voice and her attitude, and with her perspective. She is a strong woman, and not just physically. She was always up (apart from one understandable instance of complete despair), positive, and confident. She's adaptable and motivated, and has plans for her future. That's why I was thoroughly intrigued by the stark contrast between this (what might be thought of as her baseline personality) and her complete lack of motivation when it came to her 'disability' - which is that she was a very poor reader.

This in itself would not be a problem if she'd maintained her usual positive attitude towards it - and towards fixing it, but with this particular issue, there was a huge disconnect. She was in sorry denial about the utility of reading, which made me even more curious to find out how this story panned out. Autumn's ambition, despite her wrestling cred (yes, I said wrestling - how cool is that?) is to open a restaurant, yet no one, not even her teachers, seem to put two and two together and seek to motivate her by reminding her that her restaurant ambitions are going to be deep fried if she doesn't learn to read a whole lot better than she can manage right now.

What bothered me about Autumn was her stalking of Adonis. If this had been reversed, with Adonis behaving as Autumn did, and vice-versa, I think a lot of people would have had issues with his stalking her, especially if she were in a wheelchair. So why wasn't this an issue presented the way it was? Gender equality cuts both ways: it's not just a benefit for women, it's also a responsibility. This 'what's sass for the goose is sauce for the gander' approach wasn't appreciated. What did shave-off the rough edges of it for me was that Autumn's personality was sweeter than honey, but make no mistake: her behavior was still stalking.

I'm not one of these reviewers who demands character growth in a story. Indeed, some of the best stories are about people who refuse to grow or to change for one reason or another. Adonis's lack of growth was as much a part of his character as was his arrogance and perfectionism. He was bound far more by that then ever he was by his wheelchair. I like to think that this story wasn't really about him, but was about Autumn, and for those who demand it, she did change admirably.

So I recommend this novel. It was fun, endearing, and enjoyable - at least the Autumn chapters were. Who cares about Adonis?!

Ricochet by Mary Jo McConahay

Title: Ricochet
Author: Mary Jo McConahay
Publisher: Shebooks
Rating: WORTHY!

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

This is a very short memoir (only 46 pages) but is packed with feeling and intensity. It's related by a print journalist who is resident in Guatemala. She covers wars and insurgencies throughout the area, but this story focuses on the El Salvador civil war, and the fighting going on during an election which the right-wing won and which then went on to rule the nation despite its association with callous death squads.

The narrator is friends with another journalist by the name of Nancy, whom she's known for years and with whom she's very close. The two take up residence in a nice, comfortable hotel along with a gaggle of other journalists from all over the world. In the past this pair has covered stories together, but here, though they share a room, they venture out individually and at risk of their life to cover potential stories for their US newspapers.

There is a stark contrast between their air-conditioned hotel life and real life (and death) out on the dusty, blood-stained streets. They're surrounded by shooting, bombs, and suffering, which hits hardest at the non-combatants - the families, the young children, the moms and dads, the siblings. The narrator seems able to compartmentalize this horror to an extent, but Nancy reaches a point, after a journalist friend is killed in a border crossing misunderstanding, where she cannot stand the idea of seeing another dead body, yet she remains in El Salvador to teach children how to be photographers (in between the times they must spend scavenging at the city dump).

The narrator doesn't believe Nancy will give up her reporting life, but she's wrong, and despite set-backs and a horror story, her friend makes a success of her newly-chosen avocation.

This kind of story is not normally my cup of tea (tequila?) but in this case, I have to say that I am so glad I read it. It's gritty and immediate, and regardless of the details: of how much is related exactly as it happened and how much is a filtered recollection, it's nonetheless as real as it's disturbing, and as depressing as it is heartening. I recommend this memoir.

Remnants of Passion by Sarah Einstein

Title: Remnants of Passion
Author: Sarah Einstein
Publisher: Shebooks
Rating: WORTHY!
pub. Shebooks

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

Go Shebooks! It doesn't take an Einstein to figure out that this is a good idea, but it helps to have one on board, especially if it's Sarah Einstein. The only thing which might have tripped-up this publishing plan was poor reading material, but that's quite evidently not a problem from the sampling I've done, and which I'll review over the next couple of days.

This particular volume is a collection of shorts (no, not those kind of shorts!) with general observations on life - or at least something which resembles it - and it's hard to tell if they're memories or fiction. I hope not all of them are memories! When I say shorts, I really mean it, since this is only 37 pages long, so it's a good, solid read, and in nice bite-sized pieces.

A Meditation on Love is a memory of a trip to a summer-of-love style event where young people (and some not-so-young) free themselves from societal restraints and constraints and enjoy each other, and music and food, and comfortable, unpretentious clothes. This story amused the heck out of me because it seemed so realistic.

The Origins of My Problems With Fidelity tells a story of a sexually-confused high-school girl and her brief (no, not those kind of briefs) encounter with a fellow teen who may or may not have been a lesbian.

Self-Portrait in Apologies is exactly that; a series of apologies to people from the writer's past (real or fictional I know not), and it's both hilarious and sad, comfortable and discomfiting.

Fat is so mixed-up (to put it politely) that I can barely describe it, but it revolves artfully around the fact that there are two kinds of 'fat' when you're a woman: overweight, and pregnant. It's a sad story that really makes you want to go hug this girl and take care of her properly, even as you know you'll most likely be rejected by her if you make any such effort. I was in adoration of the segment relating the narrator's trip to the lesbian conference and the bizarre antics experienced there. This seemed so real to me that it tapped into my own recollections of various encounters I've had, and observations I've made. It's nice to feel that at least sometimes, I wasn't completely off-base with my views even if I was off the reservation!

I loved the honesty and the free-wheeling nature of this collection. It's warm and thoughtful, interesting and moving, and it decidedly has something to say. and I recommend it to both male and female readers who are looking for some honest and thoughtful entertainment.

Isis, Vampires, and Ghosts - Oh My! by Janis Hill

Rating: WORTHY!

This is from an advance review copy for which i thank the publisher

Errata:
p? "...we can assist you release your sadness..." should be "...we can assist you to release your sadness..."
p11 "...sorry your family has been effected..." should be "...sorry your family has been affected..."
p14 "...I'm taking your torque and cramming it..." should be "...I'm taking your torc and cramming it..."
p17 "...Goddess' Light..." should be "...Goddess's Light..." since we're talking about the property of only one goddess here.
p "...you near silent cynicism...' should be "...your near silent cynicism..."
p29 "...find out how to his crucible..." isn't right! Maybe it should be "...find out how to destroy his crucible..."
p29 "...over power..." should be "...overpower..."
p52 "...Branwyre growled something that was obviously fowl..." should be "...Branwyre growled something that was obviously foul..."
p77 "...effected..." should be "...affected..."
p85 "...regain consciousness too..." should be "...regain consciousness to..."
p86 "...ass' rectum..." should be "...ass's rectum..." since there is only one ass here.
p100 "...the Priestess of Isis were..." should be either "...the Priestesses of Isis were...", or "...the Priestess of Isis was..."
p127 has an extra letter 'o' at the start of a line beginning "o I sat tentatively...".
p133 "..tagging alone." should be "tagging along."
p136 "...under the shops eaves." should be "...under the shop's eaves."
p182 "...Word Domination..." probably should be "...World Domination..."
p187 "...wrecking further havoc..." should be "...wreaking further havoc..."
p199 "...postulate to..." maybe "...pontificate to..."?

This is book one of the "Other World" series and it begins with Stephanie Anders attending the funeral of her loved and hated sister Estella, whose stated wish, evidently, was to have her funeral conducted at the apparently oddball 'church of Isis'. Stephanie is a bit freaked by this, but is willing to put up with it for a couple of hours to get this over with and move on with her life.

Just a word on a small point of order here: 'Isis' is actually the Greek name for an Egyptian god whose name is unknown. The name that the Egyptians gave to her means 'she of the throne', and it's thought to have been pronounced as something like 'Aset', or 'Iset'. Why we're using Isis here goes unexplained.

Stephanie is of the considered opinion that the acolytes in this church are weird from the off, but that's nothing compared with what she's about to learn. She thinks it's more weird when she's escorted down, down, down deep into a cavern beneath the church to view her sister's body and that very body sits up and greets her with, "Hey sis, 'bout time you showed up."

Unwillingly and disbelievingly, Stephanie learns from the sisters of Isis (the Isisters?!) that her sibling is actually dead, even though she appears to be quite alive. She's told that the only thing which is keeping her pinned to her life on Earth, is the fact that her soul is 'stained' with a kind of 'essence of vampire'.

The vampire leader, Branwyre (great name for a vampire, BTW!), has a hold on part of her soul - a hold which is of course weakest in daylight hours and strongest at night. This hold must be broken before the next full moon three weeks hence, so that Estella can pass on to the after-life, otherwise Branwyre will be strong enough to possess Estella which can't be good. This isn't exactly what Stephanie was expecting from this funeral!

There's an element of Harry Potter here, in that Estella will be safest in Stephanie's company because of the blood tie between them - so she can't abandon Estella to the sisters and walk away from this. There's also a bit of ass-backwards folklore of "the night is darkest before the dawn" variety, which is of course, patent nonsense. The night is darkest when there's the least light which, absent a severe storm and a power outage, is at midnight when the sun is at the exact opposite side of Earth from you, but at least it explains why these two have to hang out together.

Stephanie has those three short weeks in which to find the ceremonial crucible belonging to Branwyre and employ it to bind Branwyre and thereby save her sister. During all that time, Branwyre is going to be fighting her tooth and nail to prevent this, and as if that wasn't bad enough, she's actually going to have to live under the same roof as a sister whom she resents intensely and for very good reason.

overall, I liked this novel, but there were some issues with it which I felt left the edges a bit rough. one was the record-breaking 17 spelling and grammatical errors (my previous record was twelve). Janis Hill needs to recruit me as a beta reader!

Another example of sneaky problems occurs at the end of chapter six, where Stephanie finally arrives at a motel and gets a room in which she ties up Estella and surrounds her with ring of salt so that when Branwyre's spirit shows up that night and starts to animate her, Stephanie won't be at risk, and the vampire won't be able to escape in Estella's body.

Now she has him restrained physically as well as magically, he is quite literally bound to answer her questions truthfully, so she asks him where the crucible is being kept, and eventually he spits out an address, but she fails to follow up on that and ask him exactly where at that address the crucible is located. That was probably done to play out the story, and keep Stephanie at risk, but it makes her look at bit dumb that she didn't think to narrow it down. I like Stephanie and don't like to think of her as dumb.

There was also some cheating going on here, too. I had understood that Branwyre, when bound, could be only truthful yet (as we discover) he lied about the crucible's location. This was rather glossed-over in the story-telling. I don't mind cheating characters; people in real life cheat after all, but when a writer cheats a reader, that's a different matter. OTOH, maybe I missed something here. The author does go on a lot about speaking loosely, so maybe it could be put down to her poor wording of the question.

I should also say a word about this novel's cover. I don't normally do covers since the author typically has little or no influence on how they look (unless they self-publish), but I have to question the utility of this particular cover in regard to its appeal (or otherwise) to any given readership demographic.

For me it doesn't make any difference because I don't judge a book by its cover (! I'm all about the writing), but for others who do consider the cover, this one seemed to me to be out of step with the playful and sarcastic tone of the writing. Jade Zivanovic's art is beautiful - don't get me wrong. It's really good, but it just doesn't match the tone of the writing. Is Jade Zivanovic an awesome name or what? She's a fellow blogspotter, although I don't know her.

Both the cover artwork and the tone of the writing seemed out of step with the whimsical title, too. The cover looks like it belongs on a Gothic horror story, not here! The title looks like it belongs with a story aimed at a much younger readership, so there's a sort of demented ménage à trois going on here between title, cover and interior! Or in this instance, I guess more like a mélange à trois! For me, I'd like to have seen something a little more amusing or comical in the cover illustration - not slapstick, but less foreboding than this one is - with a title that's reads a bit more maturely.

I have to say that I began to go off this story somewhat when the ghost showed up, and he uses the word "left" way too often, but even this was turned around, so it became readable again, although even then, the endless insulting (which wasn't really that amusing to begin with) became really annoying after too many repetitions. I didn't get why Roxanna - the Isis sister who is supposed to be guiding Stephanie, was being so completely useless to her. Why, for example, didn't she advise Stephanie to bind the ghost to herself before the night came on?

It became truly annoying that neither Roxanna, the 'priestess', nor Estella were helping Stephanie. I know that people can be obnoxious, either purposefully or ignorantly, but frankly, this was too much to swallow. I know that this was somewhat excused by the fact that this situation was new and different, so no one really knew what was going on, but there was so much, even within those constraints that those two could have done to help out, and which they failed to do.

They were far too passive, leaving literally everything to poor Stephanie, without making any real effort to lift a finger or even trying to go the extra mile for her. She had to squeeze everything out of them like getting blood from a stone, and this felt completely unrealistic to me.

Estella was depicted from the beginning as being, shall I say, socially challenged, so her lack of utility was not a surprise, but the 'priestess' was supposed to be an example of goodness personified, yet she was effectively no better than Estella. No one expects gods to help - they are consistently useless in fiction or out of it - so I wasn't surprised by how pathetic Isis was, but Roxanna could have been a lot more forthcoming, otherwise what exactly is it about her that defines her as 'good'?!

On this topic, you I have to ask why 'priestess'? Why not priest? We really need to work on removing this stealth genderism from our vocab! I keep hoping that female authors (not 'authoresses'!) will take the lead in this and push it in their writing, but so few of them seem willing to step up, and instead simply parrot vocabulary designed by men for men, women need not apply. Writing with a more gender-neutral approach doesn't require stridency or harsh agendas (harsh isn't what strong women do anyway, not in my experience). It can be done with subtle changes to the way we write, like using 'priest' instead of priestess, 'actor' instead of 'actress', mater instead of mattress (that last one might be a joke).

Yes, I know that 'priest' isn't exactly gender neutral, but that's not because it's an inherently masculine word, like 'male', or 'tomcat', or 'bull'. Priest is a gender-neutral word that has been artificially imbued with masculinity by dint of the fact that priests traditionally were only male, women need not apply. There's no reason it cannot be reclaimed. So there! Take that Bembridge Scholars!

I do have a problem with the ultraviolet aspect of this story. We're told that it's the ultraviolet emissions from the sun to which the vampires don't react too well (this trope has been used before in stories, notably in the Underworld series of movies), yet we're also told that moonlight can help to "bind" Branwyre. The problem with this is that Moonlight, which does contain ultraviolet emissions, doesn't contain much (which is why you can't get a tan from Moon-bathing!), so here's the problem: if there's so little coming off the Moon that vampires can wander out on Moonlit nights with no problem, then how does it bind them? If there is enough to bind them, why isn't it a problem for them on such nights?

In related news, we're also told that Stephanie is going to have a really tough time binding Branwyre one night because of the heavy storm clouds hiding the Moon, yet clouds do not stop UV light from reaching the Earth (which is why you can get sunburned on a cloudy day). This is what happens when writer devotes too much time to honoring a god and nowhere near enough time honoring science! We're talking about UV light, but the story is written as though we're talking about visible light. UV light isn't visible to the human eye! The visible light you see from a so-called 'black light' isn't the actual UV, it's just visible light that's emitted with the UV.

But enough griping. I started out liking this novel, got a bit disillusioned with it in the middle where it seemed to miss its stride a bit, and very much liked it again at the end. I think it could have done with being a bit shorter and a bit more briskly-paced, but in the end, the overall story was good and fun, and entertaining, so I have no problem in recommending this.

Legends of Red Sonja by Multiple Authors

Title: Legends of Red Sonja
Author: Multiple Authors - see list below
Publisher: Dynamite Entertainment
Rating: WORTHY!

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

Writers: Meljean Brook, Blair Buttler, Nancy A. Collins, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Devin Grayson, Mercedes Lackey, Marjorie M. Liu, Leah Moore, Tamora Pierce, Rhianna Pratchett, Nicola Scott, Gail Simone (and there are actually several redheads amongst these writers - although some may be strawberry blonde or just have plain cheated, but who's counting?)

Artists: Jim Calafiore, Doug Holgate, Jack Jadson, Cassandra James, Valentine de Landro, Tula Lotay, Carla Speed McNeil, Naniiebim, Phil Noto, Mel Rubi, Nei Ruffino, Noah Salonga

» List of writers and illustrators «

I was not a fan of Red Sonja, especially not after seeing the god-awful Brigitte Nielsen & An old Schwarzenegger movie, but when I saw that this was not only available, but also written by female writers, I was curious to see what kind of a take they would put on it. As it happens, I wasn't disappointed which was a really nice feeling to be left with after reading this!

The result was still rather exploitative in that Sonja is routinely depicted wearing what your average Brazilian woman might wear to the Copacabana (or might have worn before Brasil got its rear-end handed to it on a large platter by the immensely impressive German team in the World Cup this week, but at least they offer a token explanation for it: she can move faster with so little to restrict her!

This story, which might well have been titled "The Dirge Dozen" is actually reminiscent of Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales in presentation, or perhaps it's more like a "Duodecameron": framed by the over-arching story of a hunt for Red Sonja by a dozen men and women (although the women appear as only a token brace as far as I can see), we're treated to a series of flashbacks to her previous adventures.

All of these rogues in this sorry band of twelve have a history with Sonja - and a sad history at that; now they've joined together seeking revenge under the flimsy guise of seeking justice for her slaughter of their prince (who had evidently and very foolishly expected rather more from Sonja than her provision of guard duties).

Everyone they meet on their trip has a tale to tell, all of them different at the beginning, but all of them the same in the end in that those who cross Sonja are lucky if they're onlysorry for it, and those who need her aid receive it aplenty.

The question here though is: is this team of villains stalking Sonja, or is she stalking them?

Beautifully illustrated and very well written, this proved to be a pleasantly surprising and really rewarding read, and did it actually turn me into a fan of Sonja's.

Enchanted by Alethea Kontis

Title: Enchanted
Author: Alethea Kontis
Publisher: Harcourt
Rating: WORTHY!

Enchanted is the beginning of a trilogy of which I read book 2 (Hero before I read this one. It really doesn't matter. It turns out that you do not need to have read this volume before reading the second, but it does help a bit. Unfortunately, there was nothing on the cover of the other book or in the fly-leaf blurb which gave any indication that it was a sequel, so there was no way to tell until I got it home from the library and started paging through it.

This is pastiche of fairy tales re-written, featuring a huge family which lives in a home that looks a lot like a shoe. All of the female children are named after days of the week, but the male children have regular names like Peter and Jack. I spit on the ground at yet another trope cliché "adventurous" male named Jack - honestly? Can we not use our brains here? Must it be always Jack? Must we have the boys names so macho? Why not just name them Dick 1 and Dick 2 and have done with it?

I don't know why the author chose to pursue such a genderist approach to the nomenclature, but volume two was a good romp with a really strong female character as the main protagonist, so I'm willing to allow her more leeway here than I normally would. It turns out that it's actually a big advantage from the writer's PoV in my having read the second before the first!

The second volume is about Saturday, but this novel begins with the first day of the week: Sunday, who is given to keeping a diary, which she writes while squirreled away in a hidden part of the forest near her home. One day, she's interrupted in her pursuit by a talking frog. Yes, she does kiss it (twice!), but no it doesn't instantly turn into a prince either time. Unlike your common-or-garden fairy tale, It's not that simple in Enchanted.

The nursery rhyme from which the daughter's names and personalities are taken is this:

Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace,
Wednesday's child is full of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go,
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child works hard for a living,
But the child who is born on the Sabbath Day
Is bonny and blithe and good and gay
(from wikipedia)

I can see where you could get a few interesting stories from that rhyme.

We also get the Magpie rhyme:

One for sorrow
Two for joy
Three for a girl
Four for a boy
Five for silver
Six for gold
Seven for a story never to be told
Eight for Heaven
Nine for Hell
Ten for the Devil himself.

There are some annoyances/oddities in this volume. One is that the author mentions that one of the girls visits dead Tuesday's grave, which is situated miles from their home. I don't get that. Why is it so far away? Why isn't the grave in the family's back yard or at the local church? This made no sense to me.

Another bizarre-ity was the author's somewhat inconsistent approach to her writing style. On page three, she uses the grammatically correct "...to whom..." as part of the frog's speech, which seemed to me to be almost laughably pretentious, since people don't actually speak like that. Granted if the frog is a prince, then maybe he would, but it's still pretentious; however, it wasn't that alone which got to me, it was the combination of that on page three and then the phrase "chaise lounge" on page 4 which triggered my gag reflex!

She has the technically correct 'whom' in speech but then a page later gets the phrase wrong? Yes, I know it's typically American to use this phrase, but it's incorrect. The phrase is from the French, chaise longue, same letters, different spelling and it means, quite literally, a long chair, but why go to the trouble of getting 'whom' correct and then not care about using an authentic phrase instead employing a lazy (if not ignorant) Americanism? It struck me as inconsistent. But what the hell? Moving right along.

It turns out that Sunday can't reconstitute the prince because he was under a special curse which only the cursing fairy could lift, and curiously enough, while Sunday is otherwise occupied, the term of the curse ends and the curse lifts. The author does a rather appealing job of describing how it is to return to humanity after spending a year or two as an amphibious creature of the froggy persuasion, but at least you can say he has delectable legs...No? OK.

Determined to track down Sunday, the prince succeeds only to discover that the household in which she lives is one which would probably hate him if its members knew his true identity, due to events in the past, to the nature of which we're not party. In his anonymity, he receives kindness from Seven, the mistress of the tower house, and then makes his way to his castle, where - once he's recognized and admitted, he declares that there will be a triple ball - at which Sunday, once she learns of it through her mother, declares that she will most certainly not be in attendance, so we know exactly how that's going to go!

She does of course attend, and she does meet the prince, but of course she recognizes him not! He doesn't reveal his self immediately either, preferring to see if she can like him as a man as opposed to an ambiguous ambidextrous amphibian. Chapter 11, when they first meet and dance is one of the most moving pieces of writing that I've ever read. Kontis outdoes herself there. I recommend the novel for that alone.

And that's all I'm going to reveal of this one! This novel as a very worthy read, and I'm now looking forward to the third volume in this series.

Hero by Alethea Kontis

Title: Hero
Author: Alethea Kontis
Publisher: Harcourt
Rating: WORTHY!

This novel, I learned after I had picked it up from the library and got it home, is book 2 of a series. There's nothing on the cover to indicate this. Fortunately, it appears that you can read this volume without having read the first one; at least I got into it without too much trouble. It appears to be a mash-up of fairy tales, and its predecessor, Enchanted which I also review, is even moreso. There is a third novel in this series titled Dearest which I've not yet read, but which I plan on doing so as soon as I get a chance!

The main protagonist is Saturday, one of several sisters named after days of the week. All of her sisters seem to have a magical power, but Saturday does not. She does, however, have a charmed sword, which helps heal her when she's sick or injured, and which gives her vigor and strength when she uses it, but only if she can remain in contact with it. This wonderful weapon doesn't seem to avail her much, however, when she's picked up by a giant bird and delivered to the mountain lair of an evil witch who is seeking revenge on the lone male sibling in this family, Jack Woodcutter.

Yes, indeed! So why did the witch pick up Saturday Woodcutter? Well, the witch is blind and not too smart! So now Saturday has to perform three impossible tasks and then reveal to the witch where the eyes are that Jack cut out of her head. Saturday's sword is confiscated by the witch, so she's not exactly at her best. Fortunately, she does have Peregrine, a guy who is also a prisoner, and who is on Saturday's side. The witch has him in a dress because she thinks Peregrine is her not-so-dead daughter. He's also apparently cursed with a need to let his feminine side have free reign. I loved this reversal of what have become tediously tired roles in YA fiction, especially in the dystopian and fantasy genres.

The relationship between Peregrine and Saturday is remarkable, unusual, and most welcome. Indeed, everything about this novel is most welcome because it is such a departure from the norm. Peregrine, rather than being the studly, hair-in-his-eyes, muscular paragon of manliness in run-of-the-mill YA literature, takes a back-seat to the somewhat androgynous Saturday, who is strong (and in many ways), and represents a huge spit in the eye of your typical weak, boring, and clueless YA teen female main character.

Peregrine and Saturday get to know each other as they interact in the endlessly winding cavern tunnels of the giant mountain in which both are held prisoner. They're accompanied by Betwixt, an unpredictably morphing chimera who is one of the more amusing characters here and who is also a prisoner. Indeed, it would seem that every character in the mountain lair is a prisoner, even the Lorelei - the evil demon witch - herself.

The witch has an escape plan which Saturday unwittingly switches into high gear, but even as the witch sets about quickly moving her plan forwards, Saturday begins to learn two important things: first that she's not as bereft of magic as she has grown up believing herself to be, and second, that if the witch succeeds in her plan, it will most assuredly bring about the end of the world.

I have a new strong, female character to add to my collection: Saturday Woodcutter, who is a breath of fresh air. This is the kind of woman we need far more of in YA fiction. She's feisty, can-do, strong - not merely physically, but mentally, and she's amusing, interesting, and engaging. I couldn't have asked for a better main character.

I highly recommend this novel and look forward to reading more volumes in this series.

Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

Title: Les Misérables
Author: Victor Hugo
Publisher: Diamond Book Distributors
Rating: WARTY!

Graphic novel illustrated by TszMei Lee, edited by Stacy King

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

Written in 1862 and covering a period of seventeen years, ending thirty years before the date of publication, Les Misérables tells a miserable story which has some of its roots buried in actual events. Unfortunately, this was a miserable presentation of a French classic which made little sense to me.

For inexplicable reasons, this French tale was rendered as a Japanese manga in every sense of the word, meaning that instead of starting at the beginning, at the top of page one, on the left, and proceeding through incrementing pages to the end, it began at the "end". Actually it doesn't even start on page one, but on page fifteen. In order to make sense of it you not only have to read this starting at the end, but also you must read the panels backwards, too - right to left - just like a real Japanese manga.

This made absolutely zero sense to me, especially since I was reading this in ebook form. Seriously? It was actually confusing because I started reading it at the beginning as any westerner would do. Page 302 (the printed page number) appeared on page 42, and 281 was on page 63 while page 283 appeared on page 61! It was only as I realized that the story and the frames were out of sequence that I discovered what had been done. Yes, the comic does explain this in some detail if you're into reading the small print, which I am not. I honestly didn't expect to have to read the instructions on how to read the novel before I read the novel!

» Indeed! «

I have no idea why English language comics are presented in this way. It's insupportable, and especially so in ebook format. I mean, if you're going to be completely ass-backwards about it, why not start reading the panels at the bottom instead of the top?! Why not print the thing in Japanese? It makes just as much sense to me as what was done here, but the real question to be answered is: do they genuinely want to get the classics out? If so, then why are they robotically trying to recreate something from one milieu and hammering it blindly into another, hoping it will eventually "fit"? I honestly don't buy that this is the right way to go about it.

That said, the graphics were not bad - no color, simply line drawings (but I did not get at all the grey gingham patterning). The story wasn't entertaining to me, not even read backwards. Actually reading it the way I did begin to read it, made it seem much more of a dramatic (if a little confusing!) story than it did when I started reading it as it was intended to be read. Go figure!

I'm sorry to say though, that overall it was neither particularly gripping nor impressive. I know Hugo's novel was a lot more text than this rendition of it is capable of reproducing, but it seems to me that Hugo's text could have had a better outing than this. So in view of all this, I cannot recommend this graphic novel.

Rocket Girl by Amy Reeder

Title: Rocket Girl Times Squared
Author: Amy Reeder and Brandon Montclare
Publisher: Image Comics
Rating: WORTHY!

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

This one was definitely an oddity. I am not sure I followed the story at all in terms of really getting a good handle on what was going on, but there was something about the story - or perhaps more accurately, about the artwork - which kept my interest, which accounts for the 'oddity' portion of my assessment!

» Standard super-hero girl open crotch shot.... «

I found myself far more charmed by Rocket Girl's antics and acrobatics as depicted in the images than ever I did by the plot and the story. which is quite a new feeling for me! As I said, the story didn't make a heck of a lot of sense. It was told in a parallel universe kind of a way where things in 2013 in the story bore little relationship to things in 2013 in our time-line, but there was so much jumping around in the timeline that I got lost. I think this would make a better movie than a comic book, so hopefully the big screen is where it will go.

» I can't read those news headlines! How do the newscasters do it? «

"Rocket Girl" is actually a police officer in the NYTPD (the NYC teen police) which I found really a stretch to swallow. If there was any explanation given for why the NYPD has a teen police, I missed it. But whatever she was supposed to be, she was so irreverent when in the past that the police were trying to hunt her down. Probably handcuffing a couple of officers together wasn't a good idea after all?

» Rocket Girl goes head-to-head with the NYPD.... «

Rocket girl makes her mark though, and I found myself becoming more and more fascinated by her even as I got more and more lost in the plot (and that's lost not in a good way). Actually, one of the fascinating things was where the fuel came from to actually power the eponymous rockets. But I decided to let that one slide.

» I think Rocket Girl is about to take off! «

There was one charming scene where the locals (who by then had become really fond of her fight against police corruption) helped her out of her very distinctive outfit and squirreled her away in street clothes. It felt like a cross between Sue Storm hastily dropping her clothes and turning invisible to elude fans in the Fantastic Four movie, and Spider-Man being supported by the passengers on the El train he saved in Spider-Man 2 (original trilogy)!

In short, despite my confusion, I ended up really liking this graphic novel and I honestly can't give you a good reason why. Call it faith with a rocket! So I am actually looking forward to the next installment (and to greater enlightenment).

Pinocchio Vampire Slayer by Van Jensen

Title: Pinocchio Vampire Slayer
Author: Van Jensen
Publisher: Top Shelf Comix
Rating: WORTHY!

Illustrated by Dusty Higgins

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

How can you not love a comic with a title like this? Well, I wondered exactly that as I read the opening sequence - recapping the original story of Pinocchio (with some additions). I wondered, is this necessary, and then I wondered, if it is, does it have to be drawn this scrappily? It looks like it's been Xeroxed twenty times, and it made the text harder to read than it needed to be. I thought, until I enlarged the page - something which I wouldn't have been able to do in a print book! - that they'd misspelled Miranda rights as 'Meranda' rights. They hadn't.

I don't appreciate the wasting of page space, either. There's no reason why these images couldn't have been made brighter and occupied more of the page than the 60% they do occupy (surrounded by funereal black). I saw that they were trying to achieve some sort of ebony wood-grain effect, but it didn't work and only served to highlight the fact that they seem to have sadly missed out on the very real fact that trees are precious. We're privileged to have them, and shouldn't be abusing them by wasting paper so. Also, on a point of order, too, Shrek was an ogre, not a troll!

That said, once the actual story started, the illustrations were dramatically better (although still too wasteful of the page) and the writing was excellent. This is yet another good reason not to read prologues! Just jump right to the main story: it incorporates the whole Pinocchio story, but in ways you might least expect it, as Pinocchio and some allies stalk (or is is stake?) across Europe seeking out vampires, and slaughtering them mercilessly as indeed all vampires, especially ones named Edward, should be slaughtered.

Pinocchio has a love interest, but she's nothing to be ashamed of! Quite the contrary, in fact, which made a very pleasant change for me. I likes me some strong female characters. The story is intelligent and engrossing, and it amused me and made me want to read more of this (but no more of those prologues, please!). I didn't get to read the complete story, but if the rest of it is anything at all like the first half (or whatever portion it was that was included in the volume I read!), then it's going to be good. I'm happy to rate this a worthy read.

Alex + Ada by Sarah Vaughn

Title: Alex + Ada
Author: Sarah Vaughn
Publisher: Image Comics
Rating: WORTHY!

Illustration and some writing: Jonathan Luna

DISCLOSURE: Unlike the majority of reviews in this blog, I've neither bought this book nor borrowed it from the library. This is a "galley" copy ebook, supplied by Net Galley. I'm not receiving (nor will I expect to receive or accept) remuneration for this review.

This is a remarkable graphic novel which follows a path which is not new (it has some elements of the movie Bicentennial Man in it), but which hasn't been explored, to my knowledge, in quite this way before. The writing was sparse and interesting, and the graphics were clean and simple without being brain-dead. For some reason I kept thinking of Sim-life while I was reading this; I'm not sure why because the two aren't really alike. I guess the one was reminiscent of the other in some way in my weird brain!

I loved the start of this where the humdrum life of Alex is depicted in a series of frames as he tells his house to get him set up for the day, one word at a time. Alex has nothing to look forward to, and seems oblivious to the attentions of other humans in his life. The most "exciting" thing in it is a news item which catches his attention whereby we learn of the demise of the Nexaware corporation after an AI attack resulting in 34 deaths. No one knows how it happened or why (although I have some solid suspicions on that score!), but from that point on, legislation was enacted to prevent AI's going beyond the simplest of stages. I loved the newscaster's comment: "Your thoughts - literally - when we return."

On Alex's birthday, he gets a call from his grandmother. She's freaking hilarious and shameless, going on about her, um, personal android.... Contrary to his grandmother's attitude, Alex seems oblivious to, if not shy of attention from the opposite gender. At this own birthday party, he completely fails to register the interest of a woman he's known for some time.

He even gets bored with his own party and leaves early with a trumped-up excuse, but when he arrives home he discovers that his grandmother has bought him an unexpected present - an android - and a top of the line model, at that. Since it's female, it ought to be a gynoid, and I am a bit disappointed that a female writer didn't at least work that into the conversation. but you know how this works, right, in a male-centric world?

The transition from page 57 to 58 was weird for me. The two pages are laid out in exactly the same way; obviously there are different images in each frame, but the images all show people sitting on two facing couches, so it looked animated when I clicked the next page - like the people were moving. You don't get that with a print comic! It was reminiscent of one of those books where you flip the pages rapidly, and the static images on the bottom corners appear to move.

But I digress! This novel explores a question which we, as a race, are actually going to have to explore for real before so very long, as machines become ever more intelligent: at what point does something deserve to be treated as human?

Indeed, the issue is already upon us in a variety of ways as we realize that existing organisms in the natural world have intelligence, often at a level beyond that which we've typically been willing to credit them. Animals such a the great apes, sea-born mammals such as the cetaceans, as well as canines and even some birds. Do we extend protections to them, and if so, when and how much? And if we're going to do that, how will this reflect upon current policy relating to human fetuses? From all of this bloom questions bristling with thorns, and offering no easy fruit for the picking.

Alec's initial reaction to his android is to send the XS (a designation chosen advisedly?!) back to the supplier, but in the end, he cannot. She already seems too human to him even with her limited programming. Alex cannot let this go and after an hilarious evening when he finally introduces "Ada" (nice choice of name) to his friends, he starts to explore online forums where he eventually meets with someone who reveals to him an interesting secret about his android - a secret, I think, that is only the start of the changes that are to come.

I hated the ending as much as I adored it. It spoke as portentously as it did heart-warmingly of a newly-dawning day, but at the same time, it stopped the story right there and left me wanting to read more (which is coming - at least I hope it is, otherwise there will be riots - if one guy can riot). It can't get here soon enough for me. I loved this story, and loved that it's being told (largely) by a female writer, a gender which is sadly under-represented in graphic novels.

The Unidentified by Rae Mariz

Title: The Unidentified
Author: Rae Mariz
Publisher: Harper Collins
Rating: WARTY!
Errata:
p134 "Eating these are even better than the hype." should be "Eating these is even better than the hype."
p256 "DIY Deopt" should be "DIY Depot"

I had a lot of mixed feelings reading this, but in the end, I decided that for an assortment of reasons, I cannot rate this as a worthy read.

This novel is yet another YA first person PoV told by a female, and normally I hate these, but in this case, it's different enough that it's not even irritating that it's told in FPoV. See? It can be done! I just wish more YA authors could figure it out, but more than that I wish they could figure out that you can tell a story in third person and not be arrested for it. This is speculative rather than dystopian, so that was a pleasant change, too, but from there onwards, it was rather downhill.

The story starts out really slowly. Far too slowly; it takes forever for anything to happen and even when it does, it feels like nothing is happening. Some editing would have made a noticeable difference there, but even that couldn't have saved what was, in the end, a flat and limited story.

It's set in the future of course, and it's related by a fifteen-year-old named Katey Dade, whose school network handle is "Kid". Her mother addresses her as 'Kiddie' which is not only demeaning, it's really annoying. The school network is where life happens even as the students attend classes very much like today's students do. This school doesn't mind texting - indeed, it encourages it, because the sponsors use the network to push sponsored events and challenges.

This school isn't like any high school you've ever attended. It's a mall which has been converted into a school and which is now completely sponsored by corporations. The students' entire day revolves around working towards becoming a really good corporate drone. Students have to work their way through school by showing what they can contribute to business plans, come up with inventions, engage in trend-setting and produce new ideas in advertising, and if they're really lucky, they can become sponsored themselves - which is the sign that you've arrived in the big time. Or is it so lucky after all?

Kid doesn't think so, and rather than cultivate huge "friends" networks and pursue corporate sponsorship and agendas, she's happy to be a really average student and genuine friends with only two people: Aria (like Maria without the 'M') with whom she's been close friends forever, but who turns slowly into every bit as big of a bitch as the recognized school bitches, and Mikey, the standard trope loser guy who is best friends with the girl but who never gets her (trust me, he doesn't want her - not if he's smart).

One morning at school Kid witnesses what she thinks is a suicide or a murder, but it turns out it was nothing but a stunt - a dummy pushed over a balcony carrying a message signed by "The unidentified". This is the first problem - that in a busy school watched over by corporate big Brother, no one saw the people setting up this stunt. I simply did not buy that. It wasn't credible.

Kid takes a real interest in who pulled off this stunt and why, and it's her very interest in this which undermines her "plan" to stay corporately anonymous. A security corporation offers her sponsorship, and begins taking a real interest in her - as does hot guy Jeremy Swift, who is also (very conveniently) sponsored by this same security business.

Mariz tries hard to distinguish her writing and give it a sufficiently futuristic look and feel, and for the most part she succeeds, although at times she tries too hard and it falls flat. I mean is it really necessary to put the registered trademark logo after the word 'notebook' every single time she uses it? Mariz apparently doesn't know that you can't trademark a commonly-used word like that.

Everyone has a notebook, and everyone has an 'InTouch' device - her word for a cell phone. Why the two are separate I have no idea. That seemed to me to be a failure in her futuristic planning. There is a definite feel of George Orwell's 1984 to this novel, and some reviewers compared it with Jennifer Government and Feed which I've also reviewed - and negatively. This is something which isn't so far-fetched that you could never imagine it happening, so it has that going for it, too.

The big problem for me was Kid herself, as the main character. She offered nothing to make herself stand out as a main character worth reading about. She was average all the way, which was the real problem. As such she wasn't a shaker and a mover. She didn't initiate things. Things happened around her, which she observed and related, but she was not actor. She was an actee, a narrator, rather like the oddly redundant sports commentators, who make a career out of doing nothing more than simply telling you what you're seeing. How bizarre is that?

When Kid actually has a chance to shine, she fails. The worst of these instances came during an Unidentified "event", the leader of The Unidentified, someone Kid knows, starts beating-up on Mikey, her best (male) friend, and she does nothing! She doesn't help Mikey directly, nor does she film the attack for use as evidence later. All she does is what she's done the whole novel: stand and narrate (oh, and keep asking "Why are you doing this?" - something which she fails to figure out for herself). Afterwards she continues to pursue the leader guy as though he's her friend, too. She harbors not a shred of anger or resentment towards him.

Another example is when her best friend betrays her and she's completely unmoved emotionally. It just did not ring true, not for a fifteen-year-old. Kid is as cold and plastic as you can get. She would be an ideal corporate drone, and that's the real problem with this story. She's a poseur - presented as a rebel or as an anti-establishment figure, or even as a revolutionary, when she's precisely the opposite. She's a milquetoast, just like Walter Mitty, but she's nowhere near as entertaining.

Contrary to what the blurb says (blurbs nearly always lie, don't they?) Kid doesn't make things happen. She doesn't take charge. She doesn't even come up with good ideas or plans. She doesn't plan and she has no idea. This would have made a much better short story than ever it did a full-length novel.

Jennifer Government by Max Barry

Title: Jennifer Government
Author: Max Barry
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday
Rating: WARTY!

This is a really short novel which is vaguely reminiscent of William Gibson's approach to writing dystopian futures, mated with Jasper Fforde's humor, and delivered by a midwife named Monty Python to add just a soupçon of crazy. You'd think that would be a delight, wouldn't you?

Set in a world pretty much owned (even moreso than now) by commerce, no one has a life except as a hair on the ass of big business. So pervasive is this ownership that your last name is taken from the corporation for which you work. If you switch jobs you have to change your "family" name. Thus, Jennifer Government works for...yes! the government! John Nike (one of two) is a vice president for Nike. Hayley MacDonalds goes to MacDonald's corporate high school.

The two Johns (named that way advisedly, I presume) cook-up a scheme to promote their new brand of Nike shoes: assassinate ten buyers of the shoes to give this brand some street cred. They persuade one of their employees, Hack Nike, to sign a contract for the, er contract, but he has second thoughts, and goes to the police. They tell him that they would be willing to take over the contract. He's happy to have them do this, but in turn, they contract it out to the NRA, who end-up killing more than the allowed quota. Jennifer Government tries to nail the Nikes for this crime.

I'd like to know how the hell Barry got away with this without being sued to his shoes by Nike, without being grilled by MacDonalds, and without being shot a stern email from the NRA. I guess he's fairly low profile (I'd never heard of him before I happened upon this audio book in the local library). I guess, also, that if you sneak the word 'satire' into the book somewhere near the front, if not right on the cover, then you get a bye?

I didn't like this. While some small pieces were amusing, it was overall rambling and nonsensical, and most importantly, it didn't deliver on the contract the author makes with the reader, to deliver an engrossing and entertaining read.

Frozen by Erin Bowman

Title: Frozen
Author: Erin Bowman
Publisher: Harper Collins
Rating: WARTY!

Note that this novel has nothing to do with the Disney movie, Frozen, which I review here. As I mentioned in my review of the preceding volume to this one, I don't do covers because unless they self-publish, the author typically has nothing to do with the cover design, but once again I have to observe that the cover demeans the female protagonist by diminishing her with respect to the male. Respect to the male, but none to the female! The tag-line for this volume, "A world built on lies in bound to collapse" will make a great epitaph for this series.

So after I thoroughly panned the first in this trilogy, Taken, why oh why would I go back for more in volume two? Well this was a library deal. I happened upon vol 2 on the new shelves (that doesn't mean that it's actually new - as in a brand new release - just that it's a new addition to the library's collection). I wanted to read it because it was Erin Bowman and I'd enjoyed Plain Kate and Sorrow's Knot. That was my first problem! Erin Bowman did not write either of those novels, it was Erin Bow, man! Luckily (as it seemed at the time) I realized that the one I had was volume two, and not a stand-alone, so I went looking for the first volume on the regular library shelves and amazingly it was there! I was thrilled, misremembering fool that I am!

Then, of course, I actually read volume one and discovered what a god-awfully godawful piece of godawful trash it was; however, since I had number two (I use that term advisedly) available, I decided to at least skim the thing and see if matters improved. They didn't. Volume one was rubbish, but at least it had one or two points of interest along the way through the stinking landfill that was its "plot". Volume two doesn't even boast that. It's nothing but nothing - a tediously boring road-trip with absolutely no noteworthy events to break-up the monotony.

Here's how bad this is right from the off: Gray's mind (what little this loser has) is wandering as he wanders through the endlessly wandering frozen forest. He recalls those halcyon days in the village he couldn't wait to bust out of: Claysoot, where he used to drink tea. WHAT? This village was cut off - nothing ever came in, and nothing ever left, and they have tea? From where? If the author has brain cells, she clearly sent them on vacation when she wrote this.

Here's an example of this clunker-fest on page 31: Gray recalls the tracker devices implanted in his skin, when "...one was unknowingly injected...." The author is seriously in need of a good editor.

In this tale, Gray and his two love interests, Emma and Bree, are traveling with some other nondescript rebels to one of the other test villages; one which was ripped straight from district 13 in The Hunger Games. Can you say "Rip-off artist"? Plundering Collins, Rowling, and others to scrabble together this cut-rate attempt at a dys-trope-ian trilogy is as pathetic as it is depressing.

As they meander through the forest, they discover another village wherein survives a young boy. His dog growls viciously at them, but then it's suddenly scampering around like the camp pet. Huh? It gets worse. When Gray's twin bro Blaine arrives in camp, with an Order prisoner in tow, the dog suddenly gets vicious again whenever either of them is around, including biting Blaine. It's so pathetically obvious that this Blaine is a forgery that it's sad, yet no one realizes it for several more days. At this point, Gray kills forged Blaine, but they leave the other guy Jackson, alive.

That was all I could stand of this bone-headed crap. It's warty. Period.