The Ocean at the End of the Lane Review

The Ocean at the End of the Lane - Neil Gaiman

2013

 

To be completely honest, I was rather disappointed with this book. I suppose part of it may be due its hype of being the new Neil Gaiman book, plus, I suppose, the hype of Gaiman himself, because I definitely expected better. Admittedly, the only other book of his I've read was Coraline, and that was years ago and also for children, but I'm aware of him and his works and I guess I just expected better, particularly as this is billed as an adult book, though between the language and content, I'm not really sure why. I could see this better placed as YA--it's not like they'd lose the adult market anyway.

Basically, a middle-aged man, returns to his childhood home and flashesback to his childhood, specifically an incident that occurred when he was seven years old. As child, a man boarding in his family home kills himself which somehow unleashes a terror upon the boy and he must turn to a witchy, tri-generational trinity of women (and girl) who live at the end of the lane.

The story was interesting enough, though, in my humblest of opinions, it felt very similar to Coraline,  particularly with the recurring childhood vs adulthood dichotomy. And while I've got nothing against that theme, by the end of the book, it almost felt as though he were beating us over the head with it. By the time we get to the ending, it's like okay, I get it, adults are lame and boring and don't listen to reason and ruin things and childhood is better because imagination and fun! Which is another reason I think this would appeal better to a YA audience. Also, it's suppose to be "horror", and from an adult perspective it really wasn't that scary. Although to be fair, I had also just read Junji Ito's Uzumaki, and that's about as terrifying as it gets.

The main problem I had with the story was that it just didn't feel fleshed out. The entire book is under 200 pages and while quantity is no guarantee of quality, in this case, there just wasn't enough content. The "Acknowledgements" states that this grew from what was originally a short story, and I think it definitely reflects that. Really, it feels more like an intermediate draft between the short story and a full novel...perhaps Neil was getting a little too close to the deadline? The storyline just didn't come off as terribly creative, though it definitely had the potential to be if there had been a greater level of detail. As it was, I felt very little connection to any of the characters nor did I ever get a really good feel for the world it takes place in. Of course, the writing itself was no help, as it, too, seemed lacking.

His sentence structure was rather stilted which ruined the flow--they were either too long, or too short, or oddly broken up, and repetitious. For instance, there is a paragraph on page 18 in which all five sentences begin with the word "It". And I think he may have chosen this stylistically to emphasis the "It-ness" of the subject, but at the same time, it just doesn't flow well. And then there's this lovely sentence (emphasis mine):

"We pushed our way into a clump of trees, and through the clump of trees into a wood, and squeezed our way through trees too close together, their foliage a thick canopy above our heads."

If this had been a singular example, it would probably have been forgivable, but the thing is, it. kept. happening. Later on there's: 

"Lettie walked and I walked beside her" and also "...its shadow perfectly positioned to cast nightmare shadows on the wall..." just to point out a few.

To be fair, the editors are probably also partially to blame, as the point of having editors is to catch things like this. Though I'm wondering, if perhaps publication was rushed just because they knew it would sell regardless of the editing because it's Neil Gaiman (which might also explain that "intermediary" feel I mentioned above).

 Of course, I'm not necessarily turned off of Gaiman because of this. According to my sister, Stardust is quite good, and she is one who's opinion I can trust. I've also flipped through American Gods, which looks to be much better and is on my To-Read list. Really, what I found the most disappointing was that this book could have been so, so, much better because there were some really interesting quotes and ideas that just needed some more depth (and editing). I'll say it again, this book comes off as a draft, not a finished novel. But, I suppose every author has his hits and misses, and this one happens to be a miss.

As short at it was, still not really worth the time it takes to read it. 2.5/5 Fancies.

Read Instead: The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly
                        A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness

Dreams and Shadows Review

Dreams and Shadows - C. Robert Cargill

2013

First, I just want to say that I think we've reached a saturation point in regards to books about fairy/faerie/faery and whatever other spellings there may be. I mean, the whole seelie/unseelie/Tithe thing has be come a bit, at least in my humblest of opinions, overdone. Particularly as most of these books seem to follow similar plot lines.

However, it's a little hard to describe the plot of this book in particular because I feel like it was never quite fully fleshed out and while there was definitely a lot of sequential action, the exact point of the story isn't immediately apparent. Part of me thinks Cargill was just jamming every supernatural creature he could think of--changelings, djinn, redcaps, Sidhe, nixies, angels, Coyote...--into one story and then come up with something for all of them to do. He even references "the La Llorona", which awkwardly translates to "the the Weeping Woman".

Back to the story: a child named Ewan is stolen from his human parents and replaced by dastardly changeling named Knocks, meanwhile a child named Colby runs into a djinn named Yashar and makes some poor choices in wishes. Eventually they all end up together and become embroiled in a violent revenge plot.

In terms of world building, Cargill does a pretty good job. As I mentioned before, stories about Fairy Land, called the Limestone Kingdom in this book, are nothing new, but Cargill still manages to make the world his own. So kudos to him for that. The problem, is that there isn't quite enough plot to support that world. Knocks, as the villain, was probably to best fleshed out character, who's motivations were the most thorough and believable. However, the other aspects, Ewan and Mallaidh's romance along with Ewan and Colby's bromance, weren't really given enough description and time to grow and felt more like rather than showing us Ewan and Colby's deep-felt, decade-spanning friendships, we're simply told, "oh by the way, they're BFFs now." As for the side characters, their motives and actives are also given poor explanation, and where they are explained, the reasons aren't terribly substantial.

That all said, it was an entertaining read. There's a fair amount of disembowelment, dismemberment, decapitation, so depending on how you generally feel about violent books, may or may not be your thing. Personally, I've read so many violent books at this point I didn't really give it a second thought, but I had read some other reviews where people were complaining, so I figure I ought to give a fair warning.

I suppose it's a good read for those fans of Faerie who haven't quite gotten sick of the genre yet. Otherwise, it's nothing to race off to the library for. 2.5/5 Fancies.   

The War at Ellsmere/Zombies Calling Review

DUO REVIEW! Because both of these are short, graphic novels, written by Faith Erin Hicks, that I read over the course of a half an hour, it seemed better sense to stick them together. This is a little tough because I have met Ms. Hicks and she is super fun and super nice so I don't want it to seem like I'm just gushing (even though I am, a bit, because I just love her art), but I also don't want to say less than positive things because she is super fun and super nice. Luckily, she hasn't given me reason to say too many less-than-positive things.

The War at Ellsmere

2008

Juniper (Jun) is the new scholarship student at prestigious (and expensive) Ellsmere Academy. She befriends her roommate, the weird girl, and goes head to head with the bitchy rich girl who is mean to everyone.

Okay, so maybe that description doesn't quite do the story justice. So, We've all seen this plot before. But then, technically, we've see EVERY plot before. At this point, it's all about execution. I always tend to give graphic novels a bit more leeway in terms of literary ability because I feel like they exist in a space where it's slightly easier for me to suspend my belief because of the pretty, pretty art.

I suppose my main beef is that it's so short! There was good build-up, and while the wrap-up was cohesive and mostly comprehensive, I feel like there could have been more. More build up! More character depth! MORE PRETTY PRETTY ART. It seemed this story really just scratched the surface of the characters and the setting and then it was suddenly over. I think there could have been a lot more to it and the ending does seems a little contrived, though Hicks has admitted this herself. But it's a fun, quick, read.

Read-a-Likes: The Dreaming by Queenie Chan

 

 Zombies Calling 

2007

So we jump forward from high school to college in this one. I'll admit, when I first picked this book up, my initial reaction was "Oh god, another zombie book?" Because lets be honest, I feel like zombies have reached a certain market saturation point. But Zombies Calling is fully aware of this and part of the point is that the characters are aware of and utilize zombie-tropes.

Joss loves zombie movies and has the "rules" of the genre memorized. Which is lucky for her because suddenly there's a zombie outbreak on her college campus and now she and her friends have to try to stay alive, using the "Rules" of zombie movies that Joss knows.

It's a pretty simple story and delivers exactly what it promises.As with The War at Ellsmere, the story has a decent amount of build-up, but then the ending sort of rushes on, right after a great deal of exposition about what it all means. This is her first (formally) published book (Ellsmere was second), and she says her main goal with this book was so that she could have some tangible piece of accomplishment at the time, and so with that in mind she met her goal.

I would definitely say that she has improved as a writer and an artist, and if you're interested in getting in to her work, start with her graphic novel Friends with Boys, which is a later work of hers and reflects how she has stylistically grown.

I'd say 2.5/5 for both, but toss in an extra .5 for the art so 3/5 Fancies.

Summer of the Mariposas Review

Summer of the Mariposas - Guadalupe Garcia McCall

2012

 

So I'm taking a Young Adult services class in the fall and figured I might as well start reading some YA books. I know I've previously mentioned my disdain for the genre in general, but I might possibly want to be a YA librarian, which means I'll have to read YA books, so now's the time to decide whether I can stomach it on a regular basis.

Well, mixed things about this book. Odilia is the eldest of the five Garza sisters who live near the Mexican border in Texas. When they discover a corpse in their swimming hole, they decide the logical thing to do is smuggle it into Mexico and return it to the family. Things take a fantastical turn as they encounter a good mix of Mexican folklore in witches, warlocks, el chupacabras, and demon-vampire owls, an Aztec goddess, and La Llorona.

First off, in the Land of Teenage Angst and Heterosexual Love-Triangles, it's nice and refreshing to find a book about five sisters and their interdependence on each other.The focus is very much on female relationships, between the sisters, between them and their grandmother, and between them and their mother. They are also guided by La Llorona and the Aztec goddess Tonantzin, both of which are shown (at least in the book) as maternal figures. So points for that.

Unfortunately, I wasn't terribly impressed. The idea felt a little forced, in that it's hard to believe that 5 teen and preteen girls find a corpse and their immediate thought is "Let's not only touch it, but carry it all the way into Mexico!" I'm pretty sure most people, particularly young people, see a corpse in the pool they've been swimming in, and their first thought is "I need to go take a 5-hour shower." Admittedly, Odilia, the oldest at 15-is, who's point of view it's told from, has her reservations and only agrees to the quest after La Llorona appears to her and explains that this is one of those divine test type things and she'd damn well better go (perhaps not in those words exactly). So, it's billed as a modern Mexican re-telling of the Odyssey, which is a bit of false advertising because it really isn't. At all. There's two fairly blatant references to the Odyssey (a possessive witch named Cecilia, and an androgynous, blind prophet named Teresita), and that's about it. I mean sure, it's a quest, but it's hardly a re-telling.

There was also a  lack of subtlety. They meet this prophet and she's all "These things will happen. Here is what to do about it." And then those exact things happen. And when a whole bunch of other mystical hoo-ha happens, we're given the explicit meaning behind everything. And sisters have this tendency to continually forget that they were told EXACTLY what was going to happen, and then act all surprised when it happened. Odilia appears to have some modicum of logic as she sort of figures things out first, but then her sister completely disregard any warnings she has. And maybe if that happened once, okay, they're all under 14, we can give them a break. But it continually happens. I mean, yeah, they're kids, but I really think that maybe after they've been violently attacked twice by some mythological creature, they might start to err on the side of caution--particularly if they were told about it in the first place.

Plot issues side, McCall does have some excellent, poetic passages. However, it occurs sporadically here while the brunt of the novel is unremarkable description and awkward teenage dialogue like

"'Oh boy, it's getting deep out there!' Velia said. 'What makes you think Mama knows anything about Tonantzin coming to save us? Because, I'll be honest, I didn't know what the heck was going on when the goddess showed up.'
'Whatever,' Juanita retorted..."

It's sort of hard for me to judge YA books because I'm not great at trying to frame it through my teenage-self (actually, I stopped reading YA while I was still a teenager, so I guess, pre-teen self?). I'm sure there are some teens who'll be welcome to the books expository nature. Plus, it's a quick enough read and it's a great introduction to Mexican/Aztec folklore for those who familiar with it. There is a glossary in the back of the Spanish words used throughout. And as I mentioned before, it's certainly a better alternative than the majority of the cookie-cutter paranormal/dystopian romances out there. 

3/5 Fancies.

 

City of Dark Magic Review

City of Dark Magic -- Magnus Flyte

2012

Okay, so I am about 7ish books behind right now which is less than ideal because I've already had to return a few of the books I haven't reviewed yet, so forgive me if I'm a little more vague. My classes finally ended this past weekend, and as I'm sure many of you can relate, the last month of classes is always a massive, panicked scramble. Anywho, let's get caught up, shall we?

I wasn't really sure for a while if I wanted to read this book or not because on the one hand, the whole bit about Prague, and Beethoven, and seeeeecrets and mysteriessssss was seemed up my alley, but the other bits about a sexy prince and a sassy dwarf and a devious U.S. Senator felt a bit hokey. But Meg Howrey was one of the co-authors and since I did rather enjoy one of her other books, I figure I ought to give it a shot.

So, first off, Magnus Flyte is actually Meg Howrey and Christina Lynch. And I get the feeling this isn't a great big secret because I found out about this book on Howrey's website. But anyway, it seems like they're trying to amp up the mysteri-ocity with the whole, "Magnus Flyte can be quite elusive and shuns the public eye" thing, except that only really works if you're Lemony Snicket and your main demographic is twelve-year-olds (my childhood ended the day I found out Lemony Snicket isn't real).

But enough about that. Sarah Weston is a musicologist with an oddly acute sense of smell. She is summoned to Prague to replace her professor/mentor after he "falls" out of a window helping the royal family organize their collection of rare sheet music manuscripts, some by Beethoven himself, as they turn the Royal Palace into a museum for the masses.So, she goes to Prague and mysterious things abound...such as bloody corpses appearing over wells and missing crucifixes and other some such that seem to revolve around a drug that causes you to hallucinate history (essentially) and the question of how this, Beethoven, Weston's professor, and some ex-CIA-turned-senator are all related.

So, as I mentioned above, this book had somethings working for it, but also many things working against it. It definitely moved quick, though almost too quick in some parts (see: the end). While it was enjoyable during the reading, it felt more like an action movie that's entertaining to watch, but not terribly cohesive and ultimately unmemorable. Of course, that could have been inferred  by the fact that the front-cover blurb is from Conan O'Brien. I mean, nothing against Conan, he's written some of my favorite Simpsons episodes, but when you're using him to sell a book, I feel like you're not targeting the literary market. My other issue, which isn't a huge deal, but it's billed as a dark and fantastical story, but really it's more reminiscent of a Cold War thriller with alchemical elements and a good dose of Beethoven references. And then the main plot sort of resolved itself and things kept...happening...and I wasn't quite sure why until some new, seemingly random plot point cropped up with not enough time to resolve it which makes me think this is going to be the first in a series. And while the ending wasn't tacked on, and made sense within the frame of the novel (kinda), it felt very rushed.

But, like I said, there were things I liked. As a massive Beethoven fan, it was nice reading a book full of Beethoven references. Sarah herself never seemed all that fleshed out, I mean her sense of smell was a character trait, but liked that she was a sexually independent female character and was a little annoyed by the slut-shaming I saw in a few other reviews. Being a dedicated academic and enjoying casual sex are NOT mutually exclusive, as some people seem to think. So it had that going for it.

Ultimately, it was one of those gripping books that draws you in for the duration, but leaves you wanting something more substantial afterwards.

2.5/5 Fancies