Our Lady of Syntax

The problem with reading mostly YA novels coupled with a strangely engrossing angel sci fi/fantasy series is that I've been going through books way faster than I can write about them, and thus I am once again woefully behind in my book logs. Consider this my valiant attempt to catch up.

I've grouped The Alleluia Files and Angelica together in one book log because they, like every other book in the Samaria series, are more or less the same story with a different cover and different character names. Normally I'd find such repetition on the part of an author to be irritatingly lazy, but in this case I find the consistency to be weirdly comforting. There's the angel/mortal couple who start off hating each other and end up being perfect for each other; the clearly defined villain; the narrowly averted peril of one of our favorite characters; the new piece of the puzzle concerning the god's relationship with technology; and a little bit of good old fashioned angel sex, usually just coyly alluded to. The good guy wins, the bad guy gets his comeuppance, and I'm left wondering why I can't put the damn things down. It's baffling, I tell you.

As I heard her slog across the floor toward my desk--where she'd unveiled her makeup caddy in all its glory--a sigh of resignation escaped my lips. Yeah, I loved her. I couldn't help it. She was my brother.

Regan is a perfectly ordinary teenage girl with an older brother who is anything but. By day, he is the brilliant student and reluctant athlete his parents and classmates know as Liam. But at night, Liam transforms into Luna, the beautiful young woman that is Liam's true self. Regan is the only person who knows that Liam/Luna is transgendered. She is Liam/Luna's only confidant, letting her dress in her room in the middle of the night, buying the women's underwear that Liam could never buy, helping her cope with the psychological fallout of her double identity. At the same time, Regan wants desperately to have a normal life of her own, cultivating a relationship with her Biology lab partner, Chris. When Regan's need for normalcy conflicts with Luna's need to embrace her true identity, their relationship is strained to its very limits.

I wanted to like this book. I really did. As a sensitive portrayal of a transgendered teen, Luna is truly groundbreaking... and maybe that is why I didn't enjoy it as much as I wanted to. It's a bit like a really well done after school special: the issue is handled with great compassion and sensitivity, but so much energy and space is dedicated to the issue that the characters and plot get sort of neglected. The relationship between Regan and Chris gets increasingly interesting toward the end, but even then we never learn much about Regan as a character beyond her fraught relationship with Liam/Luna, and Liam/Luna herself has little personality outside of her gender identity struggles.

That Luna exists at all is a great sign for the future of YA literature. I'm just excited for when we get to the point where transgenderism can simply be one aspect of multifaceted characters and stories, rather than the only thing that matters.

Words are teeth.
And they eat me alive.
Feed on my corpse instead.

This is the suicide note left by David Kirby after his advances are rejected by Cass McBride, the most popular girl in school. David's brother Kyle, driven over the edge by David's death, decides to make Cass pay for her part in David's suicide: he kidnaps her and buries her alive. The story alternates between the points of view of Cass, Kyle, and the police detective trying to find Cass before it's too late.

This is a fast read that grabs the reader and doesn't let go until the last page. Through Kyle's and Cass's points of view, we learn about the history that drew each character inexorably to this horrifying end, and we sympathize with each character's predicament even while deploring their actions. Cass's struggle to outwit her captor and stay alive is particularly harrowing and rife with truly scary moments. Because this is such a fast read, I'd recommend taking this one out of the library or waiting until it comes out in paperback in September.

This is an utterly depressing book about the end of the world, and it is wonderful. I bought this, in hardcover no less, on penmage's recommendation and I couldn't be more impressed.

Life as We Knew It takes the form of a diary written by a teenager named Miranda. At first, this diary is almost frustratingly ordinary: Miranda writes about school, spats with her friends, an Olympics-bound ice skater from her hometown on whom she has a fangirl crush. News coverage of an asteroid that is going to hit the moon is only given glancing, grudging notice as the subject for several homework assignments. Then the asteroid hits the moon hard enough to change its orbit, and Miranda's world falls apart.

The sudden change in the moon's gravitational pull causes tidal waves, earthquakes, and massively increased volcanic activity, killing millions; the ash generated by the volcanoes, in turn, causes extreme climate change almost overnight. Miranda's fast-thinking mother stockpiles supplies as soon as the extent of the catastrophe becomes apparent, but as the outside world becomes more and more hostile, Miranda and her family realize that their only hope is each other--and a rapidly dwindling supply of food and other necessities.

I think the thing that I loved the most about this book is that its focus is so small, almost claustrophobic. We never learn about the catastrophic damage and death tolls in the rest of the world, except through the same word of mouth that Miranda hears. Our world, like Miranda's, narrows from her school and town, to her house, to one floor of the house, and, finally, to a single room. The writing is incredibly compelling, and, if it seems a wee bit polished and adult for a 16-year-old's diary, I can forgive that in view of the sheer power of the story.

This is right up there with The Book Thief when it comes to books that you should all go out and buy immediately even though they're still in hardcover. Have I steered you wrong thus far? I think not.

Holy crap, you guys. Read this book. READ IT NOW.

The Book Thief is phenomenal. It almost made me cry on two different forms of public transportation this week, and then it actually made me cry as I finished it at lunch today, sitting in the crowded cafeteria and ineffectually wiping at my eyes with a napkin.

I don't know where to begin talking about this book. I could tell you that it's the story of Liesel Meminger, who is sent at the age of nine to live with foster parents in Molching, a tiny town in the heart of Nazi Germany; that she and her new family hide a Jewish fist-fighter named Max in their basement; that the book is narrated by Death; that it is ultimately about the power of words to save and to destroy. I could tell you about Liesel's papa's accordion, or her best friend Rudy's lemon-colored hair, or how Max whitewashes Mein Kampf and then writes his own story over it.

Or I could give you a brief sample:

The last time I saw her was red. The sky was like soup, boiling and stirring. In some places, it was burned. There were black crumbs, and pepper, streaked across the redness.

Earlier, kids had been playing hopscotch there, on the street that looked like oil-stained pages. When I arrived, I could still hear the echoes. The feet tapping the road. The children-voices laughing, and the smiles like salt, but decaying fast.

Then, bombs.

...but really, you should just read it for yourself. Read it now. Trust me.

Well, this is it. The last of the Song of Ice and Fire series that has been written so far. Now I'm just going to be biting my nails until the next one comes out like everyone else.

After getting off to a somewhat rough start, A Feast for Crows sucked me in just as thoroughly as its predecessors. It was, however, an infinitely more frustrating read. While for the most part it lacked the Terrible Plot Developments that so infuriated me in previous books, it was chock full of cliffhangers that, for the most part, won't be resolved until the sixth book in the series, who knows how many years down the line. Because of the author's (frankly questionable) decision to divide the fourth and fifth books geographically--that is, book 4 tells the stories of the characters in the north, while book 5 will deal with the characters in the south--many of my favorite characters weren't featured at all, and those who were won't be featured in the next book. This makes the many life-or-death cliffhangers infinitely more nerve-wracking than if I just had to wait until the next book for resolution.

I find myself suddenly at loose ends with regards to what to read next. After a month spent living in this fully-realized world with characters to whom I've become way more attached than is probably healthy, I can't imagine that anything else is quite going to live up to these books. I'm halfway tempted to go purchase the whole series for myself and reread them all from the beginning, but I should probably wait until book 5 has a release date. Right now I'm tear-assing my way through Valley of the Dolls, which has made for... a strange transition, to say the least. After that... well, thanks to tax refund + new job I'm once again in the position to buy books and have my biggest worry be where to put them after I've finished, so if anyone has any stellar recommendations for books that will make me miss my subway stop, I'm all ears.

This book pissed me off.

Not because it was a disappointment after the first two awesome books in the series (it wasn't), not because the writing or plot or characterization lacked anything (in fact, I think it's the strongest of the series so far), but because the author kept doing terrible things to characters I love. I kept finding myself writing furious e-mails to mary_wroth and "innocenteexpres that began "THAT MOTHERFUCKER." By about 2/3 through the book I was constantly reminding myself not to get to get too attached because anyone could die, or worse (oh yes, there are worse things than death in these books...) at any moment. It did not make for a restful read. It would not be an exaggeration to say that I dream about these characters and their stories on a fairly regular basis, so every time some awful new catastrophe struck one of my favorite characters I felt a sting of betrayal.

As I wrote to mary_wroth the other day: Hi, my name is Melanie. I get overly involved in novels.

Anyway. There's a lot to be said for the skills of an author who can piss me off that much and still keep me reading. I'm having sort of a hard time getting into the fourth book in the series, partially because there are a bunch of new characters to get to know when all I really want is to find out what became of all the cliffhangers in A Storm of Swords, partially because I'm reluctant to become too attached to the few of my babies who remain alive and relatively unscathed, and partially because this is the last book that's been written of the series (Book 5 is due out sometime in 2008, I think), and I'm reluctant for what I'm sure will be an excruciating waiting period to begin. It's also hardcover, and weighs a ton, so I'll probably only be reading it at home instead of dragging it around everywhere as I did with the first three books. To tide me over, I've got innocenteexpres's copy of Archangel, which is way better than any sci-fi/fantasy romance novel about angels has any right to be.

I've been thinking about reading Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series for a while now. I gave up buying books back when it became clear that my crappy temp pay was unequal to supporting my reading habit, and, with four books clocking in at well over 800 pages apiece, I figured the series would at least keep me busy for a while. mary_wroth loaned me the first two books in the series a couple weeks ago, and their condition alone--beaten up, dog-eared, and clearly well-loved--spoke well for their contents.

I was a little dubious at first--I haven't read high fantasy since high school, and the political intrigue between ancient Houses is every bit as complex as that of Frank Herbert's Dune series, the various members of the various feuding royal families difficult (at least for me) to tell apart. But the writing behind the intrigue was good enough to suck me in, and the history and politics became clearer before long. This book had a sneaky way of gaining momentum and dragging me along in its wake. At first I just read it in fits and starts on the train to and from work; then I started reading it during lunch instead of eating at my desk like I usually do; finally it took me hostage and demanded my every free moment. I devoured the last 300 pages or so this weekend in a marathon that kept me housebound from Saturday morning until I finally went out scavenging for food late this afternoon--and even then I brought the book along with me to read as I ate.

This book has everything: lords and ladies and warfare and all that nonsense, sure, but also incest and psychopathic thirteen-year-olds and desert warrior queens and bastards and an acid-toungued dwarf and wolves. Best of all, and unusual for this genre, the writing is actually good. Not just good, but almost eerily addictive. I'm glad I had the second book, A Clash of Kings, to begin as soon as I finished the first; if I'd been reading them as they came out and had to wait for the next one, I'd be going nuts right now. Luckily the dealer of this particular crack lives all of six blocks away, and I have three more books and probably 2500 more pages of said crack to consume before my supply runs out. Oh yeah, and an upcoming HBO miniseries, apparently, which could be a triumph or a complete disaster, though I suppose I'll watch it either way.

I'm not usually a huge fan of short stories. I want character development and plot and fictional people I can love like friends, and there's just not time for that kind of attachment in short stories. But a couple days ago I found myself growing thoroughly sick of rereading Harry Potter for the zillionth time, and I had this book of short stories by an author I'd never heard of that the lovely Miss Hilary loaned me ages ago, and I figured if nothing else it'd make for good subway reading.

I didn't expect to fall in love.

These stories are amazing. Sad and funny and hopeful and so real it hurts. The characters are people I know, or have known, or wish I knew, awkward and confused and perfectly imperfect. When I finished the book over lunch today, it was like saying goodbye to a friend I've known my whole life. I loved it so much I might have to go buy my own copy.

An excerpt that made me gasp out loud yesterday:

"Love is an entity unto itself. There are patches of it all over the place. It's not really tangible but it's there, pools of it. Blue pockets, swirling like eddies. People don't meet because they both like Burmese food, or because someone's sister has a friend who's single and new in town, or because Billy's nose happened to crook just slightly to the left at an angle that made me want to weep." Lynn leans toward me again. "People don't fall in love with each other," she says. "They just fall into love."

(...)

"Some people are lucky enough to bump into each other in the middle of a path of love," she says, feeling it necessary to clarify her point. "On the express line at Grand Union," she grins at me, her eyes sparkling, "on a mountaintop in Wyoming . . . My advice, Lilith, is just don't fall into one alone. It's devastating." She looks at me concertedly to make sure I'm understanding this. "It wells in you," she says, "and there's no outlet. No place for it to go."

(...)

"It aches," Lynn says, rubbing. "It aches."
--"Accidental Love"