Crashed

by Robin Wasserman

Dedication: "For David Mayer, Ruth Wasserman, and Philip Wasserman, whom I never knew, but suspect I would have liked."

First paragraph: "When I was alive, I dreamed of flying. Or maybe I should say: When I was alive, I dreamed. Sometimes it was flying; more often it was falling. Or burning - trying to scream, trying to run, but frozen and silent and consumed by flames. I dreamed of being alone. Of my face melting or my teeth falling out."

Review: This is the sequel to the book Skinned. Lia Kahn was in a car crash and her body died but she woke up - in a different body that wasn't even human. BioMax has found a way to take the brain, copy it, and then transplant it into a computer inside a machine that is then controlled by the new "brain". There is a lot of controversy over this procedure. People who don't believe these machines should exist and are trying to do anything to get rid them. Lia has to figure out what is going on and how to stop it before it's too late.

I enjoyed this book but it was hard to get in to. There was a lot of whining and recapping at the beginning. Even though it's been awhile since I read the first book it hadn't been long enough for me to need all the intro that it gave. Once she quit whining about how life sucks and she wishes she could feel like she used to it got a lot more interesting.

Wasserman created a futuristic setting with great moral questions. This book gets you thinking. Makes you wonder what you would do if you had the same options. If you could keep your child "alive" even a little longer, would you? If you had to choose between food, shelter, and no freedom, or complete freedom and struggling for food, and a safe place to live, what would your option be?

Although the book was slow at times it kept me interested enough to keep reading, which is good enough. Also, I don't know if there will be another sequel to this book but it ended in a way that there could be but you aren't left hanging, if there is. An overall good read!

Click Here for Robin Wasserman's Skinned/Crashed Web site.

River Secrets

by Shannon Hale

Dedication: "For all the boys in my family. But especially, triumphantly, adoringly for the one and only Max Stonebreaker Hale"

First paragraph: "Ingridan was an ancient city. Memory ached in its stone arches, crept down its narrow alleys, sluiced through its seven rivers. And its newest memory still burned, raw and sore - a failed war, a nation shamed, and an army dishonored."

Review: This book was the third book of Bayern, following Goose Girl and Enna Burning. It's about Razo's journey to Indigran to create post-war peace with the rival country and allow the two countries to live peacefully side-by-side. In this book Razo has the world thrown at him, including punches, kicks, swords, rocks, tangerine pulp, etc.

Razo really resonated with me. It was like he was my annoying, adorable, gross little brother. He just did things that boys do. He blamed people for farting, he was constantly obsessed with where his next meal was going to be coming from and he found his first friendships in the pastry kitchen.

I think my favorite thing about this book was the that I got to spend more time with Isi, Enna, and Finn. These characters are so lovable and the adventures they take me on are always exciting, dangerous, and super fun-filled.

Shannon Hale did it again. Another book success.

Click Here for Shannon Hale's website for River Secrets.

The Actor and the Housewife

by Shannon Hale

Dedication: "For the Bryner and Bronson clans - sixty grandparents, parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, and cousins - who lent their names to the characters in this book in a completely random fashion and under no circumstance resemble their fictional namesakes. Except for that one. You know who I mean. No, not you, silly, the other one. Riiight ..."

First paragraph: "Becky was seven months pregnant when she met Felix Callahan. She was on her first trip to California that didn't include Disneyland, and by a twist of luck, selling a screenplay."

Review: Becky, an LDS (Mormon) housewife finds herself falling into a friendship with the famous actor, Felix Callahan after a chance meeting in an incredibly unbelievable string of events. This story is about that friendship, her marriage, her family, her religion, and most importantly, her love.

I felt a lot of things about this story while I was reading. First I felt bored. My first reaction was, "This wasn't Hale's best work". Then I got further into the story and I was thinking, "I'm not even halfway through this story but it feels like it should be ending any minute". Then, the story really started and I was captivated. I will admit that I cried my way through several pages (maybe, 20?) and then there was the ending - didn't see that coming.

I could connect so easily with Becky. I felt what she felt and I cried when I knew she was crying, laughed when she laughed. The other characters didn't have as strong of a presence but I still knew them. I was able to really live the story towards the end.

This wasn't Shannon Hale's best work but it was still great. It was a lot different then what she's done before but it was still enjoyable on so many levels. I loved it.

Click Here for Shannon Hale's website on The Actor and the Housewife.

Bones of faerie

by Janni Lee Simner

Dedication: "To Larry: 3333, 4556, 5645. But you knew that, right?"

First paragraph: "I had a sister once. She was a beautiful baby, eyes silver as moonlight off the river at night. From the hour of her birth she was long-limbed and graceful, faerie-pale hair clear as glass from Before, so pale you could almost see through to the soft skin beneath."

Review: Liza lives in a world of post-apocalyptic war between humans and the faerie world. As a result magic has taken over and Liza's father lives by the rule "anything/anyone magic must be destroyed" including her newborn baby sister. The trees and plants are predators, rocks glow, and nothing remains as it was Before.

This book was very intriguing. It was a different take on a post-apocalyptic world then I had ever heard before. Simner did a great job at forming this 1800 setting - dirt roads, simple, poorly put together houses, no electricity or running water - except it happens at some point in the future (Maybe late 2000's?) but not so far in the future that things were much different, well they weren't too different Before.

Some parts of the story were a little hard to grasp - vegetables vines and fruit trees attacking humans - but the rest was pretty easy to get into. I loved the courage that Liza was able to gain throughout the story. Her character was really able to develop throughout the story and her personality flourished. The Liza at the beginning of the story was one of my less favorite characters but by the end I had really grown attached.

I really enjoyed this book and how different it was then a lot of the books I've been reading lately.

Click Here for Sumner's Bones of Faerie website.

Austenland

by Shannon Hale

Dedication: "For Colin Firth. You're a a really great guy, but I'm married, so I think we should just be friends."

First paragraph: "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a thirty-something women in possession of a satisfying career and fabulous hairdo must be in want of very little, and Jane Hayes, pretty enough and clever enough, was certainly thought to have little to distress her. There was no husband, but those weren't necessary anymore. There were boyfriends, and if they came and went in a regular stream of mutual dissatisfaction - well, that was the way of things, wasn't it?"

Review: Jane has a secret - she's very in to (some people might call it obsessed) with Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Or more specifically Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice made into the BBC double DVD movie. The Pride and Prejudice starring the all too handsome and charming Colin Firth. Her obsession has been a measure for all past relationships and it takes a forced lunch with a dying great aunt to make her realize that she is self sabotaging. Because of her obsession she is given a chance to live her dream or maybe a nightmare? Three weeks submerged into the 1800's to take part in acting, romance, dancing, a ball, and maybe more ...

The characters in this book were very well developed. While I couldn't completely relate with the book or the submerging yourself in another time due to some suppressed fantasy I enjoyed it all the same. I loved that the main character struggled with the idea of Austenland. How even though she was very into Mr. Darcy, she wasn't sure she could be in to the acting and becoming someone else. That was something I could relate with. But I rejoiced with her as she made her self fit in and become a part of the story.

There were other characters in the book that I came to love as well. I think that maybe they were a bit obvious and I predicted a lot of things but that is sort of how it goes in a story about romance. You figure either everyone will end up a miserable horrible life, or they will live happy with their ending. I always choose happy - that's just how I am.

This book was so good. I have never been obsessed with Jane Austen's work but I have enjoyed it when I've read it and I thought that Hale's book really did her justice. Hale used the Colin Firth fantasy to her advantage and it really worked out. I would definitely suggest this book to the hopeless romantics, the starry-eyed dreamers, or even just someone who is looking for some laughs and a new take on Jane Austen without the zombies.

Click Here for Shannon Hale's official website on Austenland

P.s. Just a side note on my admiration for Shannon Hale. I love that she can write several books without the stories all being basically the same like some authors. I have been able to read several of her books over the last few weeks/months without feeling like I'm repeating and I love it.

Enna Burning

by Shannon Hale

Dedication: "For the Bryner Sisters (perhaps you've heard of us) Melissa, Katie & Jessica"

First paragraph: "The woman bore a scorch mark from her chin to her brow. The vision in her left eye was still blurry, as though she were looking through a scratched pane. She had been walking away from the burning for a few weeks by now and so supposed the eye would never heal, even if she lived long enough to give it time. Closing her bad eye, she squinted to see where she was going. There was a patch of greenness on the horizon that stretched into the east. A forest. Perhaps that would be far enough away."

Review: As always Shannon Hale has written an amazing story. Enna's brother, Leifer, has found a way to control fire. After his discovery he starts to change. Enna fears for him but soon realizes she may need to use it in order to save her country, Bayern, who is at war. She struggles with the knowledge of fire but has her friends to support her along the way.

This book is a pseudo sequel to the book The Goose Girl. It has all the same great characters, is set about 2 years after The Goose Girl, but it is told from another character's perspective. I really enjoyed the chance to get to better know another character from a great story.

Hale has a real knack for getting you into the story. They way she writes draws you in and allows you to surrender to an alternate reality. I believe her greatest feat is the reality she gives to things that are impossible. She gives wind a voice, and yet, it still reminds me of wind - it isn't human. It's simple. I love that.

Enna Burning is a fun, adventurous story about friendship, love, and discovering who you are.

Click Here for Shannon Hales website. This link will take you to her page about Enna Burning.

The Graveyard Book

by Neil Gaiman

First paragraph: "There was a hand in the darkness and it held a knife. The knife had a handle of polished black bone, and a blade finer and sharper than any razor. If it sliced you, you might not even know you had been cut, not immediately."

Review: Nobody, also known as Bod, Owens has been raised and educated by ghosts. His home is the graveyard and his parents are ghosts and his friends are ghosts and his life is surrounded by ghosts. He's learned to haunt, to dreamwalk, and to fade. Now he wants to learn about the living but it will come with all the dangers of the world - including the man who killed his family and wants to kill him as well.

I loved this book. It may be a little dark for younger children but the world that Neil Gaiman is able to create is imaginative, abnormal and completely unique. The things that popped up during Bod's adventures were unpredictable and enjoyable.

I think my favorite part about this book was how smart Bod was. He was afraid when the need arose but he was always so practical about things. He thought things through and seemed to have others' interests at heart in almost every adventure he went on.

If you or your kids are looking for a good book to read to get into the Halloween spirit this is definitely the one I would pick for you.

Click here for The Graveyard Book website.