The Foreshadowing by Marcus Sedgewick

Back in the day when we were at the Charybdis (aaah, to reminisce) I read and reviewed My Swordhand is Singing by the fabulous Marcus Sedgewick. I finished the post with the words "Inter-Library Loaning Every Other Sedgwick book I can find". Lo and behold, I followed through *cough* three months later *cough*! Here is the result!

Sasha is from a good, wealthy, patriotic family in England. Or so it appears. With World War I looming and the young men of her world disappearing to the front, conflict begins in her family. Brother Edgar wants to be a commander. Brother Thomas wants to avoid the call. Father Fox is furious with Brother Thomas and Brother Edgar doesn't help much with that. But Sasha has bigger problems. She can see the future in glimpses, where people are going, where they are, how they will die. Of course, as Cassandra of the ancient Greek stories, no one believes her or they shut her out in fear. But when her brother Edgar dies and she sees a horrifying vision of Thomas's fate, Sasha must find the courage to shed what society demands of her and save her brother against all the powers of destiny and fate.

Beautiful. The writing was beautiful, the characters were beautifully executed (erm... not literally), the settings were gorgeous and it felt very poignant. I put so much will into Sasha's search that I was actually tired when I finally put the book down (two in the morning) to go to sleep. And no, it wasn't just the fact that I was up until two in the morning to finish reading it. So many desperate moments and fantastic descriptions. Agh. But I'm gushing.

The negatives. As with My Swordhand is Singing, this is the sort of book and writing style that you either love or hate. But I recommend trying it. You may find that you love it like I did. And if you're interested in war time writing and historical fiction, there is alot of fact put into the plot that will pique your interest.

6 out of 7 lightnings! BOOMKAZAMPOW! Wow, I missed that rating system. Give this book a try. I can't guarantee you'll love The Foreshadowing, but I can guarantee it will be worth the shot.

Still hunting for Sedgewick,

Aella Siofra

Dear gods of the publishing industry,

please do not make me finish In Too Deep of the Elite novels. I'm not sure I can survive another chapter of this. Set me free to do more constructive things such as reading the new Luxe novel with that amazing cover or building paper mache dinosaurs. Instruct me in the ways of rubbing off the aggressive vapidity and *sparkles*.

Thank you for hearing me out,

Aella

I Can't Tell You by Hillary Frank

D0 you haz a pencil?

I haz a pencil.

Do you likez teh girl?

Yes. I likez teh girl. But she hatez meeeee... *sad scribbling*

riting notez be fixing n0?

The above is an Aellafied example of basic conversation in this book. Or lack therof. Jake is in love with his friend Xandra, but due to the recent epic battle with his best friend, the future is looking shaky. And all because of a few misplaced, mistimed, misspoken words. So he decides that the world would just be a better place if he no longer spoke at all. I Can't Tell You follows him through e-mails, notes, writing on walls, and in the margins of science notebooks as Jake looks for the resolution to life, love, and a crazy messy tangle of a friendship breakup that will not let him move on.

I could not remember that this book was about college students. The entire work felt very junior high-high school transition emotionally. So frustrating, because there was so much potential for the very awesome format of this book. But once I got over the awesomosity of reading someone's ever-so-secret confessions of lurrrrve, I realized that it was a recycled plot with no spine that had been shoved into a cooler mold.

So many sexual references. Unnecessary ones that filled in what might have been a place for some quality humor. Ugh. Irritating. Also, it was like all Jake could think about was sex. It seemed almost condescending to males as his thought process was Twilight movie reminiscent, "SexSexSexSex...new pencil.... SexSexSexSexSex". Ugh x2. It kind of killed how much I could have cared for the protagonist and the people that surrounded him.

Overall, kind of a frustrating book with a clever format that could have. been. so. awesome. Note general lame book grumpiness. And that's two negative reviews in a row. Perhaps we should break it up with Paper Towns. That review will be up in two days time! Hint = John Green did not f.t.b.a.

2 out of 7 Confessions of Adoration (eeeeh... February....). Do you haz good book?

Rereading the Year of Secret Assignments,

Aella

Need by Carrie Jones

I stared at this one for a while before picking it up. I thought to myself "It's going to be about vampires, just leave it alone." based on the title and cover (which reminds me of the one for Revelations). But it was just so shiny in all its newness... so I took it home and read it and laughed.

What was cool: I learned the names of a bunch of different phobias.... that I have now forgotten.

What was decidedly NOT: It was pretty much Twilight, but with pixies. In fact, the pixies here strangely resembled the vampires of Twilight. Which I find sad. *laments yet another disappointing faerie book* And really, what is it with authors stealing mythical creatures and demeaning them by making them SPARKLE? The only time I have seen sparkling gold dust used awesomely was in Poison. Oh and the faery drugs from Valiant. *applauds Holly Black and Chris Wooding*

3 out of 7 rousing renditions of that song from Peter Pan that's stuck in my head now.

Regretting that her ipod is all the way over THERE,

Medeia

Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan

I am a self-professed Nick and Norah's junkie. I have read it multiple times and have no idea how it took me so long to pick up Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List. But really... how does one measure up?

Naomi loves and is in love with Ely, and Ely loves Naomi, but prefers to be in love with boys. So they create their "No Kiss List" of people neither of them is allowed to kiss. And this works fine - until Bruce. Bruce is Naomi's boyfriend, so there's no reason to put him on the List. But Ely kissed Bruce even though he is boring. The result: a rift of universal proportions and the potential end of "Naomi and Ely: the institution." Can these best friends come back together again? (Summary from Goodreads)

It absolutely kills me when best friends break up. Even in books. And being familiar with the pain of that situation, this book was all the more poignant for me. The characters felt incredibly real. I would not doubt the existence of Gabriel, the oh-my-fey-he-is-so-beyond-beautiful doorman or Bruce 1, jilted high school lover and bloomingstalker type. I doubt other authors could have made them so human and believable, while maintaining a quirkiness that kept me caring.

The plot had a good deal of the unexpected. Even though it was short I found myself doing a lot of this: "No he didn't. Oh oh oh he did! And what about.... *gasp* ack! the elevator! I can't even believe...." while my study hall looked on in amused/frightened silence. Not to mention a great deal of laughing out loud (no. kill the acronym. kill it.).

But now for the disappointing factors. Unfortunately, they existed. When the story is written in Naomi's voice there are these really irritating little figures in hearts and spiders and eyes that take the place of real words. Frustrating. It's like trying to have an IM conversation with someone who can only think in pictures and leaves you dying under a flood of emoticons. Thankfully, her voice was not the only POV. Secondly, I was a little upset with unanswered questions. There would be all this build-up and then one resolving scene that kindasorta explained things, but left a lot of emotional character baggage to deal with itself. Meh.

So ultimately... 5 out of 7 reserved Starbucks seats. Not as awesome as Nick and Norah's *bookswoon*, but still solid. I will always look forward to Rachel Cohn and David Levithan writing together.

Hunting for Fluffy,

Aella

I'm getting really sick of this whole vampire thing

Warning: I have not read any of the previous Morganville Vampire books. Though not for lack of trying. Just wanted you to know that all I know about this series is what the (strangely convenient) synopsis in the front told me.

Synopsis of the synopsis (for those of you, like me, who didn't know there was a difference between the Vampire Kisses and Morganville Vampires series... until just now when I told you): The story's about a girl named Claire who's apparently some sort of prodigy. Her parents wouldn't let her go straight to MIT, she's only 16 after all, so they shipped her off to a smaller university in the middle of Texas. That happens to be infested with vampires. Good call, guys.

And now there's a war going on between two vampire groups. One (Claire's side obviously) wants to keep things the way they are and not eat humans (... well, for the most part) and the other wants to make them the prime food source (as opposed to donated bags o' blood... yumm).

I wasn't enthralled by this one. I just didn't get any of that"This is so damn COOL" feeling where you want to just devour the book. It was more of the "I don't have any books to read... oh wait... there's that one with the vampires" kind of deal.

Speaking of books I wasn't enthralled by, theres a new... what was that series again? Oh right Blue Bloods. It's called Revelations and it has the best cover in the whole series. But that's really all I can say for it. Which is saddening. Basically if you loved/hated the first two Blue Bloods novels, then you'll love/hate the third. Nothing really new here. 4.5 out of 7.

What I'm finding about vampire books is that they have to be either really hardcore vampire-centric (real I'm-going-to-reach-into-your-chest-and-tear-out-your-heart vampires) or a new and completely innovative approach (like Peeps and The Last Days), in order to make an impression on me anyways. The middle ground is just disappointing.

Re-reading Poison 'cause faeries pwn vampires anyway... and so does Chris Wooding for that matter,

Medeia Senka

Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before by David Yoo

Albert is a loser by choice. During his freshman year of high school, he realized that there was no chance of him ever becoming remotely "cool" so he just... opted out. He doesn't really do much other than watch TV and play games with the neighborhood whippersnappers who worship him as a god. When summer rolls around, his parents give him the choice between taking more classes than he did during school to prepare for college or getting a job at the local inn. It's at the inn that he meets Mia for the first time.

Mia is the typical girlfriend-of-jock-king.

Or...maybe not. For one thing, she broke up with Ryan Stackhouse at the beginning of the summer. For another, she doesn't seem to mind talking to Albert, unlike most other people on the planet. Mia draws Albert out of the glass bubble he's put himself in since freshman year and he helps her get over her boyfriend of three years. And then the near-impossible happens! They hook up and go back to school as a... something. Things seem to be going pretty well for Albert... until Ryan Stackhouse is diagnosed with cancer. *girlfriend-stealing ensues*

This book was another one of those laugh-out-loud funny types. At times it felt like Yoo laid it on a little too thick, but for the most part I was cracking up over this one. Here we run into another protagonist that is unique and endearing. It reminded me of a book I read once, Someday This Pain Will Be Useful To You by Peter Cameron, but I liked it MUCH more. Five and a half enormous frogs. In jars. Oh yes. Wait, half a frog is kinda icky...

Looking for a better rating system than partial frogs,

Medeia