September 2012 - The Y Logs

Yzabel / September 25, 2012

Review: Revamp

My rating: [rating=4]

Summary:

FOR THREE DAYS, IT WAS DARK.

News reporters scrambled. This was the biggest story to come along in weeks.

They called it a blackout.

The last one was in New York City in 2003, but this one was different, special, because the grids in six major cities across the country had been fried, kaput, see-you-next-Sunday. Everyone with some jurisdiction blamed each other, and when there was no one left to blame, terrorism rode in on its gallant steed.

It was the media’s fault. They were so busy stuffing fanatical Muslims with a penchant for Allah and decapitations down the American citizen’s throat, that they never saw it coming. I guess I shouldn’t be too hard on them.

They were partially right.

It was terror after all, but a whole new kind. And when the lights came back on, things had changed.

The dark had brought us visitors.

Review:

(Book provided through Read It & Reap in the Shut Up & Read group, in exchange for an honest review.)

I found this book fairly enjoyable; I dont have a lot of time to read non-academic books these weeks, but if I had, I’d probably have read it in two or three sittings only (it’s a long novel).

The pace was fast enough, the events unfolding in a way that made me want what would happen next. Emma’s reactions regarding the existence of vampires seemed logical enough to me: she didn’t accept it too easily, trying to find more realistic explanations, but she also wasn’t too retentive about it, confronting the ‘revelation’ to her own experiences in order to check if this could be true or not.

There were highly tense scenes, made easy to picture oneself thanks to vivid descriptions. That’s usually the kind of thing I expect from my vampire novels—to show the gruesome nature of the beasts underneath, even though they still seem human on the surface. And yet, the book also tackles an interesting aspect of the duality of such creatures, for throughout the story and at the end, they were, all in all, still close enough to humanity to reproduce exactly the same old schemas (shortages, class divisions, the ‘rich’ hoarding all the good blood while the ‘poor’ had to stick to the vampiric equivalent of junk food…). I liked that the author decided to explore such aspects, because from the start, I thought that such a takeover by vampires couldn’t go smoothly, and that the mighty bloodsuckers were sooner or later run into the conundrum of “now that we’ve gotten rid of the humans… what do we eat?” In fact, I’d have been disappointed if it hadn’t happened.

I liked the flashbacks used to explain what had happened to some of the characters. I usually have no problems following those, and they were probably a better method to involve us readers than simply have said characters tell them in a dialogue or long-winded first-person explanation. And I liked that Emma’s ‘romance’ with Cooper was only a budding one, a few potential hooks here and there: it leaves room for more, while still being believable.

I have a couple of gripes with the story, though. First, I’d have liked to read more about the blackouts themselves: they seemed mysterious enough in the cover blurb, but reading about them after the events was a bit anticlimatic (considering the blurb, that is). Also, I’ve wondered a lot about Emma’s reaction regarding her family: she’d sometimes think about the boyfriend she had left on campus… but what about her mother who probably lived a few miles only from where her daughter now had to live? Why didn’t Emma try to discover what had happened to her mother—or, at least, why not show her thinking about it a little more often (even if only to conclude “she’s a vampire or dead, and I shouldn’t think about it anymore”). And I’m really not sure either about the last vampire the hunters off at the end: sure, it tied with something mentioned at the beginning of the novel, but… I don’t know, it just came as kind of “what the hell?…” to me.

But no matter those, I liked the story. I don’t know if there’s a second installment in the making. I think this one works well as a standalone, as the main issues are solved at the end; at the same time, there are still enough elements left to development for a second book to be welcome too. If there’s going to be one, I’ll definitely be interested in reading it.

Yzabel / September 12, 2012

Cover Reveal: Reaping Me Softly

A few weeks ago, I read and reviewed Taste by Kate Evangelista, and quite liked it. Now her next novel, Reaping Me Softly, is to be released in a few weeks, and its official cover is finally revealed, courtesy of AToMR Book Blog Tours:

Story:

Ever since a near-death-experience on the operating table, seventeen-year-old Arianne Wilson can see dead people. Just as she’s learned to accept her new-found talents, she discovers that the boy she’s had a crush on since freshman year, Niko Clark, is a Reaper.

At last they have something in common, but that doesn’t mean life is getting any easier. All while facing merciless bullying from the most powerful girl in school, Arianne’s world is turned upside down after Niko accidentally reaps the soul of someone she loves. This sends them both into a spiral that threatens to end Arianne’s life. But will Niko break his own Reaper’s code to save her? And what would the consequences be if he did?

Release: October 30, 2012.

Also check Kate’s blog: http://kateevangelistarandr.blogspot.fr/2012/09/cover-reveal-reaping-me-softly.html

Yzabel / September 11, 2012

Review: When Love Is Not Enough

When Love Is Not Enough by Wade Kelly

My rating: [rating=4]

Summary:

A six-year downward spiral into a world of lies and deception leads to the end of one man’s life when self-discovery crosses the line between being the perfect son or following his heart.

Jimmy Miller never intended to lead a double life starting the day he fell in love with Darian, but his parents’ divorce, fighting in school, and constantly keeping secrets for his closeted best friend and protector, Matt, force his hand. Jimmy finds the demands too great to withstand and ends it all prematurely, leaving behind an angry best friend and a shattered lover.

Matt and Darian cling to one another in the aftermath of their loss, forging a new friendship immediately tested by the truths of their relationships with Jimmy that are hidden in the pages of Jimmy’s journals. Will Matt and Darian discover what truly happened to their friend? And will this tragedy birth something beautiful between them as they learn the balance between life, family, and friendship when love is simply not enough?

Review:

(Book provided by the author through ARR #455 in the Makinc Connections group, in exchange for an honest review.)

I hesitated a lot about which mark to give this book, pondering a 3 at first. I have a few gripes with it… but all things considered, it was a beautiful story that got me hooked no matter what, more complex than it seems, and so I settled on 4 stars.

Part of me perceived the characters and their reactions as often too angsty, too over-the-top, and at first sight too skewed. I thought I may not like this novel in the end. The author tackles a lot of issues in it: violence at home, broken parents-children relationships, homosexuality, rape (left unseen), lies bordering on cheating… Do so many things happen to people? Was it believable? Wasn’t it just, well, ‘too much’?

Then I thought some more, and realized that those plot points, what went in the characters’ lives, were precisely why I liked the book in the end: it made me wonder, it made me try to question people’s motives and reactions, try to understand why such event would lead to such reactions. And this was quite interesting.

There were moments I didn’t get Jamie. I didn’t get Matt. I didn’t get Darian. Why would Jamie keep everything separated, everything hidden? Why wouldn’t he just leave, give the finger, and steer his own life as soon as he was legally of age? Why would Matt be so hell-bent on one night stands? Why would Darian fall into Matt’s arms like that? I couldn’t get those. In a way, their reactions made me angry. That said, as soon as I started thinking more about them, they actually made sense, too.

– Jamie, desperate to be accepted for who he was, yet also knowing deep inside (without admitting it to himself) that it just wouldn’t happen; trying to balance out everything, to keep everything in little boxes because this may have been the only control he felt he could have on his life. I wondered why, after everything he had been through, one conversation would prompt him to commit suicide; but the very nature of that talk, as well as the people involved, had a shattering potential, and I can understand why someone like Jamie would suddenly make a terrible decision after that, after realizing openly that all his efforts were in vain.

– Matt: acting that way, I suppose, because not involving himself, not committing himself, removed the dreaded possibility of having to come out to his family. As long as he kept things like that, he wouldn’t have to make the choice, to cross the line, and could go on pretending that he was ‘just like the others’, like what other people expected him to be. In that regard, he too was caught in the same trap as Jamie, that of feeling he had to conform and hide who he truly was inside. In spite of assuming his being gay, he only assumed it far enough from home to be of no consequence to his official life.

– Darian: so desperate, alone, a young man who from the start had been robbed from half his close family, and was so frightened of losing his newfound happiness that, paradoxically, trying to escape those feelings could have destroyed him. And then Jamie was gone, making Darian’s worst fear come true, in a much cruel and ironic twist. But in spite of his frailty, of his inability to cope, he was still strong in many other ways. Strong in how he assumed who he was from the start. Strong in how he admitted he was afraid, and made the choice to not give in, even though this meant running straight into someting that a lot of people would deem as shocking. He was a beautiful soul, a person with a heart of gold, plenty of love to give freely, and the ability to commit himself fully to the one he loved, without conditions.

As I wrote above, I had some gripes with the book, and I can’t not just mention them, because even though I enjoyed the story, they may be a turn-off for a different reader:

– A couple of inserts were really, really weird. I’m thinking more specifically about that part where Darian reads from a book to Jamie, and we get the whole details about the title, author, the book being on Goodreads, an excerpt from the real text… Although I usually enjoy cameos, that one was too much like some kind of ad, that temporarily made me go “what the heck?” and broke my train of reading. I recovered quickly, but it was seriously weird.

– Matt’s speech in the end. It was spot-on, sure, yet it was also too much of a literal sermon. That too made me quirk an eyebrow and wonder if it was so necessary to present it this way.

– Not so much a gripe as a “I would have preferred if…”: Darian and Matt’s relationship. It evolved too quickly to my taste. It was beautiful, and it sort of made sense in that both of them were drawn together by the very pain that might have destroyed them had they stayed along… but I think I’d have liked it more if it had been closer to budding friendship, with love developing from there, and not the way it had started.

I suppose my review might come off as bizarre and unbalanced: a story that made me angry, confused, with characters whose reactions felt flawed at first, with an episode that destroyed my suspension of disbelief, with a sermon… and I’m still giving it such a high mark?

That’s precisely because it made me angry—and I’m not prone to a lot of feelings while reading, so any author who proves able to elicit something in me like that get to have bonus points. And in spite of the other flaws I mentioned, the way the story managed to captivate me is something I definitely can’t ignore.

(Bonus points go to Jamie’s mother, too, for being one of the craziest bitches I’ve seen in a novel so far. What’s most mind-shattering is that in the real world, there *are* people like her, who should clearly not be left running a family, yet are such skilled manipulators that nobody ever notices how screwed-up they are. I hated that woman, really.)

Yzabel / September 9, 2012

Review: City Of Pillars

City of Pillars by Dominic Peloso

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

Men in Black… An Ancient Manuscript… A City that Isn’t Supposed to Exist…

No matter how paranoid you are, you’re not paranoid enough!

An innocent man accidentally comes into possession of an ancient text. Soon he is being chased to the ends of the earth, pursued by shadowy forces who seem intent on getting the book back and eliminating all evidence of it. As he attempts to stay alive and translate the mysterious document he uncovers horrific and ominous details of an ancient, worldwide conspiracy. But the question is, can he find the answers he seeks before he loses everything?

City of Pillars charts one man’s journey into madness, past the narrow confines of Western notions of reason and scientific reality. As he decodes more and more of the secrets of the City of Pillars, he is pushed farther and farther outside the bounds of traditional society and is forced to discard his morality piece by piece to stay alive. He is forced to answer the question:

How far am I willing to go to uncover the truth?

Review:

(I got this book a few months ago through Goodreads’s giveaway/first reads program.)

I hesitated a lot about which mark to give it. I’d probably put it at 2.5/5; for want of half-stars to give here, I’ll leave it at 2 for now. It wasn’t an unpleasant read, it has its good sides, but I think that having had to read it in little chunks wasn’t a good choice; it’s the kind of story that would probably be better enjoyed in one or two sittings only.

Being an old reader of Lovecraft and similar tales, of course a plot about men in black, a mysterious city, and a mysterious manuscript leading to it was bound to catch my interest. It alludes to the lost city of Irem mentioned in the Quran, as well as to HPL’s “The Nameless City” (which was inspired by that very Irem too). The story revolves around Mitchell Sinclair, a money-hungry American lawyer whose life is turned upside down when he is accidentally handed out an old manuscript. The events set in motion by this mistake force him to take action and to overhaul his life, in search for the truth hidden behind those pages written in several languages, some of which are clearly dead tongues only spoken by a chosen few. In his quest, Mitchell travels to several places around the world, experiences dire circumstances, discovers his own ruthless ability for survival, and has to reevaluate his relationship to his own humanity.

Basically, the plot itself was interesting, especially the part where Mitch gets chased by the mysterious men in black; but in some parts, the narrative becomes a little slow. Also, the paratactic style used most of the time, along with a few shifts to present tense whose interest I didn’t really see, tended to grate on my nerves after a while: although it worked well for action scenes, it was annoying for the more descriptive ones, making them dry. I also felt frustrated at the whole mystery, that I’d have liked to see unveiled some more.

Bonus points, though, for chapter titles matching the Sefirot. I always enjoy my little dose of esoteric allusion outside of the direct text.

Yzabel / September 6, 2012

Review: The Plot Against America

The Plot Against America by Philip Roth

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

In an astonishing feat of narrative invention, our most ambitious novelist imagines an alternate version of American history. In 1940 Charles A. Lindbergh, heroic aviator and rabid isolationist, is elected President. Shortly thereafter, he negotiates a cordial “understanding” with Adolf Hitler, while the new government embarks on a program of folksy anti-Semitism.

For one boy growing up in Newark, Lindbergh’s election is the first in a series of ruptures that threatens to destroy his small, safe corner of America — and with it, his mother, his father, and his older brother.

Review:

Hard to review, this one. I’m quite keen on Roth’s works in general, but I wasn’t so convinced here. I still found it enjoyable—just not as much as others of his novels.

What I liked:
* The “what if…” aspect (that’s why I had picked this book, after all). I have such a soft spot for these, especially when they involve American history and WW2.
* The way the story was told, through the eyes of a child. I think it allowed the author to toy (no pun intended) with a point of view that was both innocent and terribly lucid at times, in its ability to feel the raw intensity of events.
* The convincing narrative. I felt that the events unfolding in the story might indeed have happened, have been possible. It’s not totally far-fetched, on the contrary. And that’s precisely what makes it frightening.

What I liked less:
* The rushed half-assed end, and the impersonal way in which it was told. I found it really jarring, compared to the narrative style in the rest of the novel.
* Actually, Roth could’ve gone further with this story, and do more with it than (view spoiler)
* The fact that past that point, the author seemed to have lost sight of what exactly he was aiming at.