Keeping the Castle, Patrice Kindl

We were walking in the castle garden. The silvery light of early spring streaked across the grass, transforming the overgrown shrubbery into a place of magic and romance.

Seventeen year old Althea lives with her widowed mother, young brother, and two ungrateful stepsisters in the crumbling Crawley Castle, a wreck of a building built by her great-grandfather. Althea has to support them; in short, she has to marry a wealthy man. But there are few of those around in their small Yorkshire town of Lesser Hoo. Althea sets her sights on Lord Boring (yes, that's actually his name). There's one problem: Mr. Fredericks, his cousin and business manager, keeps getting in the way. And he has plans of his own...

On the jacket, the book is described as "a book as frothy and fizzy and light as a champagne cocktail- think I Capture the Castle meets Pride and Prejudice!" It was definitely similar to I Capture the Castle, though less so in my opinion to Pride and Prejudice. I enjoyed Althea as a character, except for on pages 8-9, when Althea claims that it is "scientifically proven that a woman's small brain is not capable of understanding much beyond matters of the household." Grr. I don't get why that was included at all.

Keeping the Castle is definitely very "frothy, fizzy and light", though I wouldn't know about the champagne cocktail part. Very light romance/comedy, I would say. I liked it, though I didn't love it. I'm certainly glad that I checked it out from the library (and didn't buy it.)

Read Keeping the Castle

• if you liked I Capture the Castle
• if you like historical fiction
• if you like light romance
• perhaps if you like Jane Austen
• if you like Patrice Kindl

261 pages.

Very Good! I would recommend this book!

A New Order of Books

I know that Amazon is bad for the business of book companies and independent publishers, but I can't help ordering a lot of books there. For example, The Diviners is priced at $19.99, but on Amazon you can get it for 8 dollars cheaper. And even though I wait with anticipation for the books to arrive, it's such a wonderful feeling when the package arrives in the mail and you open it up and...books! (Admittedly, that happens when I get a review copy too, but on a less grand scale.) I do try to go to Orca as often as possible, but lately they've been getting very stingy with how much they're giving me for my used books. Don't get me wrong; I love independent bookstores too, but I don't think Amazon is all bad.

The Vanishing Act, Mette Jakobsen

It was snowing the morning I found the dead boy. The island with its two houses and one church was covered in a layer of snow.

It was Erin Morgenstern's blurb (she's the author of The Night Circus, one of my favorite books) which got me interested in this book. This is what she says: "This book is a precious thing. I want to keep it in a painted box with a raven feather and sea-polished stones, taking it out when I feel the need to visit Minou on her island again. The best stories change you. I am not the same after The Vanishing Act as I was before."

I don't think I loved it that much, but I certainly did enjoy it, and it's a very enchanting book. It's the story of Minou, who lives on a tiny snow-covered island with her philosopher Papa. The other inhabitants of the island are Boxman the magician, No-Name, his dog, and Priest the priest. A year before the story begins, Minou's mother disappeared. Minou knows that she isn't dead, despite her shoe being found washed up. Then one day, Minou finds a dead boy washed up on the beach. Her father lays him in her mother's room. Can Minou's mother's disappearance be explained by him? Minou will not accept that her mother is dead and using Descartes, is determined to find out what happened.

I thought this was a very interesting one, with an interesting premise. I love stories like this; however I didn't love this one, though I really liked it. I thought Minou's parents were interesting: her father is a philosopher-type, and he's interested in proofing everything with logic and reason, whereas her mother is more interested in the imagination. Two very different people, and then you have Minou, who tends more to reasoning and logic, but also the imagination.

This book definitely feels like a fable, and I'm very glad that I got it from W.W. Norton. I didn't love the writing style, but it was sweet and simple. Not nearly as good as Erin Morgenstern's writing style though. Still, I would definitely recommend it. I've included both the US and UK covers, as well as the Australian (original) cover. I think I like the British one best (the one on the left.)

Read The Vanishing Act:

• if you like The Night Circus
• if you like magic realism and/or fantasy (you could classify this as either)

217 pages.

Very Good! I would recommend this book!

Rereading Harry Potter

Today and yesterday, I've been rereading my favorite bits from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I hadn't reread any of it for a long, long time, and once again, I found myself immersed in J.K. Rowling's amazing writing, especially when compared to the stiff boring writing in her new book The Casual Vacancy, which is also on my reading list, but I doubt I'll finish.

I realized again how much I just love Harry Potter. It's not one of my all time favorites, but pretty close. It has humor and dark elements to it. I also recently watched this, and though the movies aren't nearly as good as the books, it was still interesting.

Now I'll probably want to reread the entire series from Book 1, when I have the time. Hopefully I'll get to them soon.

The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman

There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife. 

I hadn't read The Graveyard Book before, because the plot just never sounded interesting. I was wrong. I think Gaiman just really has a gift for language, especially in fantasy. The protagonist is Bod, short for Nobody. As a toddler, his family was killed, and he found his way to the graveyard, where the ghosts adopted him. He's grown up there. Bod has all sorts of adventures in the graveyard...but if he leaves, he will be in danger from Jack, the murderer of his family.

This was a very suspenseful one. It wasn't as good as Stardust, but almost. As I said, Gaiman's writing style is so amazing. It's hard to describe. You really have to read it to understand. Maybe I'll read Coraline now. Anyway, The Graveyard Book has the same feel of Stardust, though it's a very different story.

I liked the character of Bod. He's adventurous, and always getting into trouble, but he usually learns something from his experiences. Thanks to Zoe for finally motivating me to read it. If you loved Stardust, definitely try The Graveyard Book.

Read The Graveyard Book:

• if you like Neil Gaiman
• if you like fantasy
• if you like books set in graveyards/cemeteries

307 pages. 

 

Outstanding Book That Will Stay On My Bookshelf For Rereading (jf I own it)!

The Wicked and the Just, J. Anderson Coats

Tonight at supper, over capon and relish, my father ruined my life.
He smiled big, scrubbed his lips with the end of his cloak, and said, "We're moving house." 
"Thank the Blessed Virgin!" I sat up straighter and smoothed my kirtle. "I'm weary to thimbles of Coventry. Will we be back at Edgeley Hall in time for the Maypole?" 
"No, sweeting. We're not going back to Edgeley. We're moving to Caernarvon."
"What in God's name is that?"
"It's a town in Wales."
I'm in my chamber now. I will never speak to him again. Unless he buys me a new pelisson for the journey.

Sorry, for the long excerpt, but I thought that it fit the best. This book is set in the late 13th century, mainly in Wales. Cecily is forced to move to Wales, to the town of Caernarvon, rather than going back to Edgeley Hall. Wales has been occupied, and the Welsh people are discontented and starving. Gwenhwyfar knows all about it. She's one of them, and is forced to work in the house that might have been hers. She thinks of Cecily as "the brat."

I got a review copy from Harcourt, and I enjoyed this one, though I doubt it was that historically accurate (in the 13th century, they spoke Middle English.) But can you really enjoy a book if you dislike the main character? Cecily is stuck-up and nasty to the Welsh people, and for about the first 100 pages, I really hated her. She does start to realize the oppression in the town, and she's not all bad, but really, she mercilessly punishes a boy (who turns out to be Gwinny's brother) just because he looked at her. Come on. Cecily does get better, it's just a slow process. You have to stick with her.

Still, this one was really suspenseful, and I wanted more of Gwinny. She's a really great character, though I kept wishing that she would tell Cecily that the boy was her brother. That might have helped. Maybe. I enjoyed the historical setting despite its probable inaccuracies, and look forward to reading more from J. Anderson Coats.

Read The Wicked and the Just:

• if you like historical fiction
• if you like books set in medieval times
• if you like books set in Wales

336 pages.

Very Good! I would recommend this book!

Rereading Princess Ben by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

How many times I have wondered what my fate might have been had I accompanied my parents that rainy spring morning.

I'm having memories right now. Princess Ben was the very first book that I ever checked out at the NOVA library, way back in sixth grade. (It seems so long ago, doesn't it? And yet, just yesterday at the same time.) I'm kind of tearing up; in fact, I am. I wasn't actually thinking about that when I checked it out again; I just wanted to reread, but then I realized...

Anyway, Princess Ben is a good, if very easy fantasy. It's the story of Princess Benevolence, or "Ben". Her parents and the king die on the aforementioned rainy day, assassinated, though her father's body is never found. Ben, the niece of the king, is left under the tyrannical thumb of Queen Sophia. She is the heir to the kingdom, as Sophia failed to produce any children. Sophia locks Ben, starved and miserable, into a tower, where Ben discovers a secret room with a magical book of spells. She begins to learn sorcery. But there is a mortal threat to the kingdom, and Ben must save herself and her country.

Having just read Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac, I was kind of annoyed at the typical "orphan" story-line. But the book wouldn't really have worked otherwise. I enjoyed Ben's character the second time around, and I was really mad at Sophia for how plain awful she was towards Ben. I remembered the basic plot from two years ago, but not the details, so it was almost like I was reading the book afresh. Catherine Gilbert Murdock is also the author of Dairy Queen, a very different novel. If I remember correctly, it's about a girl who plays football and lives in the countryside. I really don't remember the specifics. Maybe I'll reread that too.

Read Princess Ben:

• if you like fantasy
• if you like Catherine Gilbert Murdock

344 pages.

Very Good! I would recommend this book!