Young Adult Book Review - One – Sarah Crossan

Young Adult Book Review - One – Sarah Crossan

Recommended for literally everyone, ever. Babies? Yeah, why not.

You know how sometimes you start a book and almost immediately you think, ‘this is going to win awards’?

Well, this is going to win awards. This should win awards. This should win all the awards. It’s a stunning, emotional journey in the lives (or is it life?) of teenage conjoined twins starting school for the first time, and if it doesn’t have you weeping at the end then there must be something wrong with you.

Told from Grace’s point of view, we see into the life that she shares with twin Tippi, and the way that what is so alien to everyone else is so normal to them. Where everyone gives them sympathy or is certain that they were be broken apart if given the opportunity, this special bond and connection is all the twins have known, and it would be like cutting out one of their vital organs if they lost the other.

Their family and newfound friends all react in different ways to the challenges of the twins’ condition, from their father’s drinking and unworthiness of the title ‘father’, to the friendships they strike up immediately upon starting school with two outcasts, and the emotional and romantic bonds that begin to form following that. You can’t help but feel the pain that goes with the knowledge that, though they wouldn’t change who they are for a second, it means that they can’t do everything that a ‘normal’ person does, at least without huge challenges. A romantic relationship, for example.

I’ve already mentioned how emotional the story is, and it only gets increasingly so as the story goes on. No spoilers, but use your imagination for the issues that might arise for conjoined twins, and you’ll be on the right tracks.

Underpinning all this is the beautiful poetical and lyrics prose that Sarah Crossan uses to tell the story. It’s essentially one long poem broken into smaller chapters, occasionally broken up with the odd POV from another character, and is unlike anything else I’ve ever read. Would I feel differently about the story if it was written traditionally? I doubt it. Does it make it stand out and feel utterly special because of it? A million times yes.

If I had to place a bet now, I would put this above all others as the main contender for the Carnegie Medal 2016. It’s an emotional powerhouse, beautifully written in it’s own unique style (as far as I’ve ever come across), and does a great job of highlighting an unbelievable difficult situation for people to live in, whilst highlighting how it’s simply the norm for those involved.

I was recommending this even before I’d finished reading it. It’s not just for young adults; it deserves to be read by everyone. The only book that comes close to this on an emotional level for me is A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness, and I’m guessing you know all about that.

If you only read one book this year, it should be One.

5/5

Young Adult Book Review – Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass #4) – Sarah J Maas

Young Adult Book Review – Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass #4) – Sarah J Maas

Recommended for literally everyone ever, though thinking about it I suppose it’s 13+ really

I waited long and hard for this. A whole year pretty much of anticipation and sweating and getting distracted by the amazingness that was A Court of Thorns and Roses and then some more sweating and publishing some more music to showcase my love of the Throne of Glass world (www.youtube.com/bertass if you’ve not heard any of it) and having another son somewhere in the mix too, before finally being rewarded for my diligence and devotion with the publication at long last of Queen of Shadows, book four in the Throne of Glass series.

I needed – like, needed - a fantastic and memorable story to go along with the various bouts of sweaty anticipation etc. outlined above, lest my world come crashing down around me as I tasted the horror of a Throne of Glass book not living up to my expectations.

Was it salty tears of joy that I tasted upon finishing, or salty tears of agony and disappointment?

Well, duh. Joy, obviously. It’s freaking brilliant.

The 650-page beast that is Queen of Shadows is full of action, revelation, twists and emotion with nary a page wasted, as Sarah J Maas once more takes us into the rich fantasy world that she has created and leaves us breathless in anticipation for what is to come in the last couple of books of the series.

The feels, man. The feels.

I’m not going to spoil those feels for you, as you need to feel them fully un-spoilered for yourself, but my whole heart took a huge pounding during this book, more so than with any other despite the agonising deaths that had come before. Everything is up in the air and no-one is safe at any point, barring Aelin/Celaena of course, and so you really don’t know who is going to make it and who isn’t.

Aelin truly becomes the Queen she has always been over the course of the book, and remains one of my favourite-written characters from any series I have ever read. Her relationship with all the other characters develops considerably by the time the story is finished, from those we’ve seen her interact with before, to those we know she has done but we haven’t personally seen yet. She gets her revenge on some, and she befriends others that she wouldn’t dream of befriending before. She establishes the main players in her court, and she rains hell on those that would oppose her. I’d follow her into the fires of hell, though I’d have to wait in line behind those already protecting her.

Elsewhere, we have the alpha-male-off that we’d always wanted between Rowan and Aedion, both devoted to her in different ways, but equally committed to protecting her life. Chaol is perhaps the most changed of all of them, fully on the side of the rebels opposing the king now, but bearing the scars of watching so many good people die and seeing his friend and prince, Dorian, consumed by the demon prince that now vies for control of his body. It’s not a happy reunion between Chaol and Aelin, to put it mildly, and the tension that builds between them as they disagree on the best way to help Dorian is heartbreaking, as is the state that we saw the prince in.

There are several new characters, notably the highly-skilled guard and lover of Chaol, Nesryn Faliq, and Lysandra, former rival of Aelin from her time in the Assassin’s Guild. Both are strong, brave, and fun to spend time with, and more great examples of strong heroines in the fantasy genre that Maas’ excels at writing. You don’t need to look far to find strong female characters for girls and boys to look up to in the Throne of Glass world.

We also get to meet Arobynn, King of the Assassins, and Aelin’s former master. He’s as cunning and deceitful as we’ve been led to believe, and its great watching the battle between him and Aelin play out as she seeks her revenge on him. And it’s not just Aelin who wants revenge…

The witch Manon and her Thirteen are also still there, growing increasingly frustrated under the command of humans, and as deadly and dangerous as ever, but they grow in a way that’s unexpected and promising to make their role in the final two books even more exciting and unpredictable.

I’ve always thought that the dialogue between characters is one of Maas’ biggest strengths, but she’s also fantastic at misdirection and twists, particularly so in this book. Aelin has plenty of tricks up her sleeve to fool both her enemies, her friends and us as readers, and there’s one particular twist that will throw everything you know about the Throne of Glass series on its head. If, as the characters themselves point out, it’s not just another lie…

So, are there any criticisms? Well, the length doesn’t bother me one bit. The more the better to be honest. I read one review that complained about the text going on too often about how wonderful Aelin is, and though I agree that the characters and narration do praise her a lot, I spent the entire book thinking about how wonderful Aelin is so it kind of just mirrored exactly what I was thinking at the time and didn’t bother me in the slightest. I can’t fault the dialogue, the world-building, the twists and turns, the interaction between the main characters…I just enjoy it all so much I can’t find faults to pick.

I have to wait another year for Book 5, and to be honest I almost feel like I need it this time to recover from everything that’s happened. A Court of Thorns and Roses 2 will come along and keep me going in the meantime, I’ve no doubt, but until then I’ll have to make do with analysing everything that’s happened and creating more music to go along with it. Queen of Shadows is a 650-page epic that will enthral you as much as anything else she’s written before, and it’s another brilliant addition to the series.

My favourite modern fantasy series just got even better.

5/5

Graphic Novel Review - Saga Volume 5 - Brian K Vaughan (Author) & Fiona Staples (Illustrator)

Graphic Novel Review - Saga Volume 4 - Brian K Vaughan (Author) & Fiona Staples (Illustrator)

Recommended for Adults

There’s not much I can say about Saga that hasn’t been said before; it’s one of the most exciting, well-written, and humorous comics available today, and every time a new volume comes out it instantly becomes the most essential item on my reading list. Volume 4 is no exception, though it does come with more sorrow than ever before.

Marko and Alana are still trying to hide away with baby Hazel, Alana trying to eke out a living with a virtual theatre/television show while Marko tends to their daughter. The strains in their relationship are starting to show by now, and with the addition of Alana’s drug taking and the threat of another woman befriending Marko, things aren’t exactly losing rosy for their relationship.

Elsewhere, there’s a new royal baby robot being kidnapped by a disgruntled insane janitor forming the bulk of the rest of the story, with a welcome return at the end for Marko’s ex-wife, Gwen, and her companion, Sophie. The storytelling is fast-paced with Brian K Vaughan’s trademark witty dialogue, and Fiona Staples truly wonderful illustrations, and the volume ends all too quickly, as ever.

There isn’t quite enough of Izabel this time round, because you could make a whole book featuring nothing but Izabel and it’d be wonderful, but Alana’s slow descent into drug use as she gets fed up with how her life is panning out is the most captivating part of the story, and goes a long way to making up for the lack of Izabel. The ‘other woman’ storyline for Marko is nothing new, but it all ties in brilliantly to show the strains of his and Alana’s relationship.

It’s doubtful that Saga will be displaced as Image Comics’ no.1 comic anytime soon, and I’m counting the days until Volume 5 comes out.

5/5

Graphic Novel Review - Dragons Beware! - Jorge Aguirre

Graphic Novel Review - Dragons Beware! - Jorge Aguirre (Author) & Rafael Rosado (Illustrator)

Recommended for Older Children/Young Adult/Adults

I received a free of this title from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks!

Young Claudette, her brother Gaston and Princess Marie set off on an adventure to retrieve her father Augustine's magical sword, Breaker, from the belly of the fearsome dragon, Azra. They'll face multiple foes along the way, including Marie's evil wizard grandfather, Grombach, and his army of gargoyles; will they find the sword and defeat the dragon, or will they meet their doom?

Well, I won't spoil it, but what I will say is you will laugh your arse off during their quest, because this is a fantastically funny fantasy graphic novel that I didn't want to put down. It's full of pop culture references, from a certain famous Marvel shield making a vomity appearance, to multiple Death Star attack run nods (yeah, I saw what you did, and I LOVED it), which gives it an edge of over other funny children's graphic novels that I've read recently. The humour is silly but witty, and with a nod to the audience that it knows full well it's being daft and doesn't care, and it's exactly the type of humour that I love in a book like this.

The illustrations are great, and they invoke fond memories of similarly-styled texts that I've read before (though I can't put my finger on which ones exactly at the moment) - all three of the main characters eccentricities are perfectly brought across, and to a very high standard.

This is the second book in the series (following Giants Beware!) and I'm certainly going to try and get hold of a copy. The library doesn't appear to have it, so both of these are going straight on my monthly requests for the librarians to order in, because I'll be pushing these at the new monthly comic book club that I'm hoping to set up.

Worth been checked out by all ages from about 7 upwards, and it's pushed into 5* territory by its pop culture references - seriously, if they aren't Death Star run references in the last battle then [insert forfeit but just don't make me do it].

5/5

Graphic Novel Review - Monster Motors - Brian Lynch (Author) & Nick Roche (Illustrator)

Graphic Novel Review - Monster Motors - Brian Lynch (Author) & Nick Roche (Illustrator)

Recommended for Older Children/YA/Adults

I received this book through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks.

You know how sometimes a book tries to do something different, like re-telling a classic story using reanimated-motors rather than a monster? Yes? Then read Monster Motors, because it does it ever so well. No? Then read Monster Motors, because it does it ever so well.

Mechanic Vic Frankenstein buys a junkyard in Transylvania to set up a repair business, and immediately comes across the not-too-insignificant problem of a vampire cadillac called Cadillacula, who wants to suck the gas out of all the other cars, and be evil and stuff. He'll have to reanimate a truck of his own if he's going to stand a chance at stopping this evil...

Later on, he'll team up with Minivan Helsing and his team to stop an even greater threat, when a lightning strike accidentally reanimates all the other cars in the junkyard and sends them on a cannibalistic spree across town. Not quite the simple life repairing cars that Frankenstein had in mind.

Monster Motors is split into the two separate stories described above, and it's definitely the second (The Curse of Minivan Helsing) that is the strongest. Not to take anything away from the first about Cadillacula, because it's perfectly good fun, but the jokes and subtle humour in the second are far better, and genuinely laugh-out-loud in places. The idea of 'Minivan Helsing' for starters is genius, and in places the script seems to acknowledge the sheer craziness of everything with a knowing wink to the reader, without ever actually breaking the fourth wall, which is a technique I've always been fond of.

It's in the second story, again, where the characters really start to standout. To start with, it was only the delightful robot Igor that I had found memorable, but with the arrival of Minivan Helsing and crew, you've got Minivan himself, his daughter, some self-admittedly treacherous crewmates, Frankenstein's own monster truck, and Frankenstein himself becoming funnier and more likeable. I'd see it as the ingredients all properly falling into place, just like Neil Morrissey joining Men Behaving Badly; good beforehand, excellent afterwards.

The illustrations are great, with a very cartoony feel to fit the story perfectly, and I'd happily get people to read this in the library. If the next story is as good as The Curse of Minivan Helsing then I'll be delighted!

4/5

Monster Motors is out on 16th June 2015 through IDW Publishing

Graphic Novel Review - Exquisite Corpse - Pénélope Bagieu (Author & Illustrator)

Graphic Novel Review - Exquisite Corpse - Pénélope Bagieu (Author & Illustrator)

Translated into English by Alexis Siegel 

Recommended for YA/Adults

I received an advanced reader copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks,

French graphic novel author and illustrator Pénélope Bagieu isn't well known in the UK (this is her first English-languge release, I believe) but based on this quirky and charming tale of a young girl falling in love with a reclusive author, her recognition deserves to grow enormously.

22-year old trade rep Zoe is fed up with her job and her life with an abusive boyfriend, so when she happens upon reclusive author Thomas Rocher she finds her mood greatly improving. However, everything is thrown upside down when she learns the incredible truth; Thomas supposedly died several years earlier! 

There's a charm running throughout this book that reminds me of French art-house flicks that I've come across before, with the love story of an unlikely couple played out with warm humour. Zoe is desperately in need of something new and exciting, as is Thomas if he's to find inspiration for his next novel. Thomas' editor (and ex-wife) is also around to throw a spanner in the works, and it seems unlikely that there's going to be a happy ending (I won't spoil whether or not there is one, and for whom). Zoe has a bit of manic pixie girl about her, Thomas is clearly batshit crazy on a liberal-arts level, and ex-wife Agathe is suitably snotty to her former love's new squeeze, and the way they play off each other is very well written indeed. The illustrations are offbeat and quirky and fit the text well; in short, everything is very well done and blends together beautifully. I also had to smile at the ending, with it's mini-twist giving a satisfying conclusion.

If I had one complaint, it's that it almost flies by too quickly. leaving me utterly charmed but finished in about 20 minutes. No, I don't know how it could have been extended, but perhaps then it's to the author's credit that I feel like I'm left craving more. I'll certainly be using this as an example to people in the library for a quick and easy introduction to graphic novels that aren't all about superheroes.

Credit as well to the translator, Alexis Siegel, because without a good translator it wouldn't have worked so well.

A lovely (quick) story that left me with a glowing smile!

4/5

Exquisite Corpse is published on 5th May 2015 by First Second Books

Book Review - Pop Babylon - Imogen Edwards-Jones & Anonymous

Book Review - Pop Babylon - Imogen Edwards-Jones & Anonymous

Recommended for YA/Adults

I love the Babylon series. They're informative, funny, well-written, and always about areas that I know are going to have interesting stories. Pop Babylon is no exception, as you can well imagine the tales of celebrity-excess that are brought up within it's pages, as we follow the fictional (but based on real events told to the author by those in the business) year in the life of a band manager, as he tries to put together a new boy band to rise to the top of the charts.

Imogen Edwards-Jones has to be one of the best authors for getting me to pick up a book and then wondering where the hell the time has gone, as I always find myself completely glued to the text and desperate to know what real-life story is going to be re-told next. With Pop Babylon, she confirms a lot of what we expect to be true (the alcohol, the drugs, the groupies etc.) with a lot that we might not have realised about (what tricks you need to get your band to be signed) and breakdowns of the costs of working in the music business. Whilst I was mainly reading it to see just how shocking the stories of rock and pop excess were going to be, info about the breakdown of how profits are divided and shared amongst all relevant parties was both interesting and shocking when you learn just how little some pop stars actually earn for their work.

The Babylon series is so different from a regular non-fiction account as they really do read like stories themselves. I'm always eager to pick up another Babylon-account (I'm eyeing up Restaurant Babylon on the shelf as I type), and I'm forever putting them out on display in the library to encourage others to try.

You can't go wrong with something like this.

5/5