Sci Fi and Fantasy

The Taker

The Taker is excellent, I’m glad I read it and didn’t just return it to the library because it wasn’t on my original TBR list. It’s not  about vampires, but about people who become immortal through alchemy.  I’ll admit the first couple of chapters had me rolling my eyes about a vampire book that doesn’t have vampires, but it’s better than that. Really interesting and I’m excited about the second book in the trilogy, coming in June. When I finished the book last night, I was left wondering a lot of things – about Adair and Lanore and Luke.

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The Dragon of Cripple Creek

I saw The Dragon of Cripple Creek cover in a recently reviewed spinner on our library website and it looked interesting – so I reserved it. Cute little middle grade fiction book about a girl who is crazy for gold – and what happens when she convinces her dad to take a detour so they can go on a tour of an old gold mine – and she takes a detour away from the group.  She finds gold and a dragon and sets off a modern day gold rush.

… So that’s where gold REALLY comes from. Cool…

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The Apothecary

Sassymonkey sent me an advance uncorrected galley of The Apothecary. She got it at BEA and I was thrilled to get it – even if I didn’t have time to read it when it arrived.

Now, I’m sorry I didn’t make time earlier. It was excellent. I love how awesome Janie and Jin Lo were.  Pip was a great character, too. And I liked the ending a good bit. From truth serums memory loss potions. Brilliant idea.

I can’t wait for the next book about Janie and Benjamin. I sure hope Pip (and Sarah???) are in the next book, too.

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The Cybils Shortlist Challenge – 2012

It’s that time again, time for the new Cybils shortlist – which means it’s time for me to get busy reading all of the books on the shortlist. I’ve already read two from the list of 80 – I thought I’d read this Anna Hibiscus because I griped about the cliff hanger in last  year’s book, but I either forgot to reserve it or I couldn’t get it from my library. (Or maybe I did read it and I forgot to blog it? Or something?)

*There’s a new category this year called “Book Apps” – I haven’t looked at it yet but am going to try to check out all of the shortlisted apps. We’ll see how that goes…*

Book Apps

Be Confident in Who You Are (iTunes link)

BoBo Explores Light (iTunes link)

Harold and the Purple Crayon (iTunes link)

Hildegard Sings (iTunes link)

Pat the Bunny (iTunes link)

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore (iTunes link)

The Monster at the End of This Book (iTunes link)

Easy Readers and Early Chapter Books

Aggie Gets Lost

Dodsworth in Rome

Frog and Friends

I Broke My Trunk

Clementine and the Family Meeting

Have Fun, Anna Hibiscus

Just Grace and the Double Surprise

Like Pickle Juice on a Cookie

The Trouble with Chickens

Fantasy & SciFi (Middle Grade)

A Monster Calls

Breadcrumbs

Dragon Castle

Icefall

The Cheshire Cat: A Dickens of a Tale

The Inquisitor’s Apprentice

Tuesdays at the Castle

Fantasy & SciFi (YA)

Angelfall

Anna Dressed in Blood

Blood Red Road

Misfit

Red Glove

The Girl of Fire and Thorns

The Shattering

Fiction Picture Books

Blackout

Do You Know Which Ones Will Grow?

I Had a Favorite Dress

I Want My Hat Back

Me… Jane

Press Here

The Princess and the Pig

Graphic Novels

Hereville: How Mirka Got Her Sword

Nursery Rhyme Comics

Sidekicks

Wonderstruck

Zita the Spacegirl

Anya’s Ghost

Bad Island

Feynman

Level Up

Page by Paige

Middle Grade Fiction

Darth Paper Strikes Back – 12.17.11

Ghetto Cowboy

Nerd Camp

The Friendship Doll

The Great Wall of Lucy Wu

Warp Speed

Words in the Dust

Nonfiction for Middle Grade and YA

Amelia Lost

How They Croaked

Into the Unknown

The Many Faces of George Washington

The Notorious Benedict Arnold

Unraveling Freedom

Nonfiction Picture Books

All the Water in the World

Bring on the Birds

Can We Save the Tiger?

I Feel Better with a Frog in My Throat

Planting the Wild Garden

The Case of the Vanishing Golden Frogs

Thunder Birds: Nature’s Flying Predators

Poetry

Cousins of Clouds

Dear Hot Dog

Emma Dilemma

Requiem: Poems of the Terezin Ghetto

Self-Portrait with Seven Fingers

We Are America

YA Fiction (gosh, I almost typed YA Saves, lol)

Anna and the French Kiss – 1/8/2011

Between Shades of Gray

Bunheads

Everybody Sees the Ants

Frost

Leverage

Stupid Fast

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The Throne of Fire

I just don’t like the Kane series as much as either of the two Percy Jackson series. They’re good but not Percy Jackson good – which is why it took me a week to read The Throne of Fire.  It must have something to do with the Kane siblings because I really do like Egyptian mythology – more than I like either Greek or Roman mythology.

Next book – I’m not reading it anywhere near reading The Heroes of Olympus series. Maybe that will help?

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Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

Oops! I finished Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children ages ago and forgot to write about it. How I could have forgotten is beyond me. It took me so long to get to it, after wanting to read it for – forever and then it was so freaky good, freaky being an understatement here.

TW wouldn’t read it – the photos freaked her out. I can see why. This is a book that could give you nightmares, if you’re inclined to nightmares about freaky people (which I’m not.)  What brilliant idea to take these odd photos and write a story, about kids (mostly), around them. Super smart. Interesting plot. I’m dying to know what happens next – though I’m a bit troubled by Jacob and Emma. I almost didn’t want there to be a sequel because I’m not super comfortable with their relationship.

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Reckless

Reckless. Confusing. It reads like a sequel but it’s not a sequel. I didn’t like that. I didn’t like it that I felt like I’d missed out on a ton of stuff – when I hadn’t. I’m a stickler for reading books in a series in order. This one made me feel like I was reading out of order and that made the whole book less enjoyable.

It wasn’t just me, either. TW thought it was a sequel (though she doesn’t have a problem reading out of order), too.

Now there is a sequel coming to this book and while I’d like to read it, I’m afraid it will just make me feel even more like I’ve missed the first books in the series.

Gah. Jacob had been going to Mirrorworld for 12 years… why didn’t the story start there, with the first time he went in?  Grrrr.

(By the way, I really did like the book – I liked the fairy tale magic and how it was woven into the story. Nicely done.)

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Ship Breaker

People who write in library books should be shot. DEAD. Seriously.

Some idiot wrote in the copy of Ship Breaker I picked up from the library. They didn’t just make a couple of notes or underline a few passages – they marked up the entire book. Going so far as to write down the name of the character speaking in the margins. Who does that? Who even NEEDS to do that? The writing made it incredibly difficult to focus on the story – my eye kept getting drawn to the recap written in the margin. Or the extra stupid rephrased question. Or the name of the character.

Anyway, enough of that.

Ship Breaker was… not bad, all things considered (see above).

I feel like I’ve read a similar story – or met similar characters but I can’t quite put my finger on the story or the characters I’m thinking of. It will come to me – probably in a dream (or the next time I come across a marked up library book.)  

I found myself more interested in the supporting characters than I was in Nailer. Or even Nita.  For instance, I’m fascinated by Tool and would love to see his story in another book.  I want to know more about Pima and her mother. Even Lucky Strike. And Robertson? Reynolds? (What is her name?) The woman on the Dauntless, the one who was the patron of Knot – what’s HER story?

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Pod

Pod was… depressing.  Obviously. A story about aliens who take over the world has got to be depressing.

On the other hand, it was pretty fascinating. Not so much the would you eat your father part (or your dog) – that’s something that would obviously have to come up. More the what were those aliens doing? Seems to me they were cleaning the earth of contaminants.  Reducing the population without completely eradicating the population. Leaving the bikes but taking the pollution-creating vehicles.

Fascinating. Really.

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