Best Books of 2014

Resolutions for 2015: blog more! I've missed it. I'm Tumbling now, too. You can find me here.

Before we tick over into February 2015, I didn't want to miss the opportunity to reflect on my Best Books of 2014.

Sinner by Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Young Adult

Here is the Shelfari synopsis (although if you haven't read any of the other books in the Shiver trilogy, it might not mean much): Sinner follows Cole St. Clair, a pivotal character from the #1 New York Times bestselling Shiver Trilogy. Everybody thinks they know Cole’s story. Stardom. Addiction. Downfall. Disappearance. But only a few people know Cole’s darkest secret – his ability to shift into a wolf. One of these people is Isabel. At one point, they may have even loved each other. But that feels like a lifetime ago. Now Cole is back. Back in the spotlight. Back in the danger zone. Back in Isabel’s life. Can this sinner be saved?

There are those actors that we love because they are great at playing a certain type - a certain flavor that pervades every project they do. No matter which of their movies we watch, we know their are certain things we can expect and be entertained by. And then there are those actors who are chameleons, completely rearranging themselves with every new movie they take on. And then there are those actors we love because they've figured out how to do both of those things at once.

That is one of the reasons why I loved Maggie Stiefvater's "Sinner." It feels very much like her style, filled with witty jokes and troubled geniuses, but it's also riddled with sparkles and angst in the best kind of way. This is a story about damaged people trying to find out if they can help each other to be less damaged, but they do "damaged" in a way that is incredibly fun to take part in. As usual, Maggie makes her setting of Los Angeles feel like a living, breathing thing, and makes her characters vivid and complicated and wonderfully unique. Her writing, as per usual, is astounding. Also, it made me cry at two in the morning. It doesn't get much better than that.

Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Young Adult

Here is the Shelfari synopsis: The third installment in the mesmerizing series from the irrepressible, #1 NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Maggie Stiefvater. Blue Sargent has found things. For the first time in her life, she has friends she can trust, a group to which she can belong. The Raven Boys have taken her in as one of their own. Their problems have become hers, and her problems have become theirs. The trick with found things, though, is how easily they can be lost.

Happy is the heart that gets to read TWO Stiefvater novels in one year! This dark, folkloric, mysterious series she's created could not be more different than Sinner. It is also maybe my favorite YA series I've ever read. The characters here are magnificent. It's not often in my adult life that I love characters so much, and feel I know them so well, that I get actively upset or excited about what happens to them. But she's created this vast cast of characters that leaps off the page, and I loved following them through this slow-burning third novel. I love that she has two male characters having a maybe-love story, but it's all simmering just under the surface. I love that she makes the impossible feel real. I love that she reinvents what ghosts are supposed to be like. I push this series on people more than anything else I've read these past few years. So if you haven't read it, YOU SHOULD DO SO RIGHT NOW. You're welcome.

This Is The Story of a Happy Marriage by Ann Patchett
Genre: Nonfiction Collection 

This book is a collection of Ann Patchett's nonfiction essays, collected and revised from the many publications she's written for over the span of her career. The collection includes memoir, travel writing, a speech to a freshman college class, and span a host of topics, all of which delve into her personal life.

As I've gotten older, I have become more and more open - or perhaps just more and more aware - of how much good writing and fascinating stories live in the Nonfiction section. I've come to love reading true stories told well, but almost never do I find myself enthralled by a whole book full of them. That's what this collection did: it enthralled me, not just with its ability to draw me into someone else's life, but by the way Patchett deftly knew what small details were worth including and which ones needed to be left out. As a writer, every turn of the page brings some new amazement: she really nails the framing of each story, creating a world that you can, and want, to insert yourself into.
One of my favorites is an essay about an RV trip with the man that would eventually be her husband, a trip that was both about exploring RV culture and whether or not her relationship with said man was going to work out. Most of the essay is really just about the experience of RV parks, of living in a small space, of nights spent with the window open, thinking about the twists and turns of life...nothing dramatic really happens. And yet, she manages to make it both an incredibly beautiful reflection on life on the move AND a reflection on relationships.

A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness
Genre: Children's Fiction

Synopsis from Shelfari: This is an extraordinarily moving novel about coming to terms with loss. The monster showed up just after midnight. As they do. But it isn't the monster Conor's been expecting. He's been expecting the one from his nightmare, the one he's had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments, the one with the darkness and the wind and the screaming...The monster in his back garden, though, this monster is something different. Something ancient, something wild. And it wants the most dangerous thing of all from Conor. It wants the truth. Costa Award winner Patrick Ness spins a tale from the final idea of much-loved Carnegie Medal winner Siobhan Dowd, whose premature death from cancer prevented her from writing it herself. Darkly mischievous and painfully funny, "A Monster Calls" is an extraordinarily moving novel of coming to terms with loss from two of our finest writers for young adults. This book is jacketed.

Although I'm a fairly sensitive soul, I don't often find myself moved to tears while reading. I can count the number of books that have extracted tears from me on one hand. Well, I COULD count them using one hand, until I read this book. This is a book about a boy in the process of loving his mother: of having to come to terms with losing her, and then having to find the strength to let her go. But that wasn't what made me cry. What made me cry was the way Patrick Ness weaves the story with brutal honesty, but also with a searing compassion that makes it funny as well as sad. It made me cry the kind of tears that are weighted down with the knowledge of recognition: of knowing that this story you're sad about isn't yours, but it holds so much that has or could be yours. I was pulled in completely, and was shown something that my mind and heart continues to return to. It is the best kind of fairy tale: dark, twisted, and beautiful. The language here is lyrical and rhythmic. It manages to be both haunting and occasionally funny. It begs to be read out loud. Also, there are the illustrations. The idea of a book accompanied by pictures brings to mind the kind of children's book that adults aren't meant to read. But it certainly doesn't FEEL like a children's book when you flip through these particular illustrations. It feels more like a work of art. 

The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls 
Genre: Historical Fiction

Synopsis from Shelfari: After her mysterious role in a family tragedy, passionate, strong-willed Thea Atwell, age fifteen, has been cast out of her Florida home, exiled to an equestrienne boarding school for Southern debutantes. High in the Blue Ridge Mountains, with its complex social strata ordered by money, beauty, and girls’ friendships, the Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls is a far remove from the free-roaming, dreamlike childhood Thea shared with her twin brother on their family’s citrus farm—a world now partially shattered. As Thea grapples with her responsibility for the events of the past year that led her here, she finds herself enmeshed in a new order, one that will change her sense of what is possible for herself, her family, her country. Weaving provocatively between home and school, the narrative powerfully unfurls the true story behind Thea’s expulsion from her family, but it isn’t long before the mystery of her past is rivaled by the question of how it will shape her future. Part scandalous love story, part heartbreaking family drama, The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls is an immersive, transporting page-turner—a vivid, propulsive novel about sex, love, family, money, class, home, and horses, all set against the ominous threat of the Depression—.

Every Christmas, my Dad gives me a pile of books. This was the first one that I grabbed off the pile in 2014, and it ended up being one of my favorites. It's atmospheric as hell. I felt myself being sucked in from the very first page by the two rich worlds the author created: the tangled Florida orange groves and stately house Thea grew up in, and the pine-wooded, mountainous North Carolina girls' camp she finds herself outcast to. Both settings were ones I found myself happy to get lost in for hours at a time, sucked in by the fascinating details and the deft way she made each place an important character in Thea's story. The story revolves around a mystery that takes its time revealing itself. We are given to understand, early on, that Thea gets sent away to camp because she's done something bad, very bad (which, for a girl in the 1920s, can safely be assumed to have to do with sexual misconduct). Instead of finding out about it all at once, the story takes us back and forth between her childhood memories and her present time at the camp, weaving the two together so that they blur beautifully, but never totally merge. I loved the finely-woven relationships: between twins, between girlfriends, between parent and child, between young girl and inappropriate lover. I loved the way this author told us volumes about these relationships without stating it explicitly, through hand gestures and things done unsaid.

The Walled City by Ryan Graudin
Genre: Young Adult (Thriller)

Synopsis from Shelfari: There are three rules in the Walled City: Run fast. Trust no one. Always carry your knife. Right now, my life depends completely on the first. Run, run, run. Jin, Mei Yee, and Dai all live in the Walled City, a lawless labyrinth run by crime lords and overrun by street gangs. Teens there traffic drugs or work in brothels--or, like Jin, hide under the radar. But when Dai offers Jin a chance to find her lost sister, Mei Yee, she begins a breathtaking race against the clock to escape the Walled City itself.

I'm going to shamelessly love on my critique partner Ryan here--which I don't feel bad doing, both because she's fabulous and because this book is, too. The Walled City is a beautiful read: breathlessly fast paced, but also rich with setting detail. I don't quite know how she made such a filthy, scary place enjoyable to spend hours in, but she did. Her three main characters, all of whom have their own point of view in the story, weave together beautifully to create a tapestry of what it might be like to live in such an unforgiving place. It's intense, but also thoughtful. It's a story of hardship, but also a story of hope. I dare you to put it down once you've gotten to the end of page one!

The Secret Place by Tana French
Genre: Mystery

The sensational new novel from “one of the most talented crime writers alive” ( The Washington Post ) The photo on the card shows a boy who was found murdered, a year ago, on the grounds of a girls’ boarding school in the leafy suburbs of Dublin. The caption says: "I KNOW WHO KILLED HIM." Detective Stephen Moran has been waiting for his chance to get a foot in the door of Dublin’s Murder Squad—and one morning, sixteen-year-old Holly Mackey brings him this photo. “The Secret Place,” a board where the girls at St. Kilda’s School can pin up their secrets anonymously, is normally a mishmash of gossip and covert cruelty, but today someone has used it to reignite the stalled investigation into the murder of handsome, popular Chris Harper. Stephen joins forces with the abrasive Detective Antoinette Conway to find out who and why.

I actually listened to this book in the car, and loved it so much that I then went out and bought the book so I could pick it to pieces for inspiration. This mystery about an Irish boarding school is magnificently well told. It's scary how well she captures the teenage voice--there are those that thing she made her teen characters too mean and image-focused, but I disagree. I think she captured nicely the intense cliquey-ness, the desperate need to belong and to be seen, that is the cornerstone of high school experience. She bounces seamlessly between the detectives, who both have something to prove on this case, and flashbacks from the girls' perspectives, revealing information just when you need it. Her writing, as always, is just beautiful to read, and her mystery was insanely well done: I had no idea who did it until the very end. If you're a mystery lover, this is a must-read.

Book Review: This Is The Story of a Happy Marriage

By : Ann Patchett
Genre: Nonfiction Essays

A synopsis from Goodreads: "Blending literature and memoir, Ann Patchett, author of State of Wonder, Run, and Bel Canto, examines her deepest commitments—to writing, family, friends, dogs, books, and her husband—creating a resonant portrait of a life in This is the Story of a Happy Marriage....As she shares stories of the people, places, ideals, and art to which she has remained indelibly committed, Ann Patchett brings into focus the large experiences and small moments that have shaped her as a daughter, wife, and writer."

As I've gotten older, I have become more and more open - or perhaps just more and more aware - of how much good writing and fascinating stories live in the Nonfiction section. I've come to love reading true stories told well, but almost never do I find myself enthralled by a whole book full of them. That's what this collection did: it enthralled me, not just with its ability to draw me into someone else's life, but by the way Patchett deftly knew what small details were worth including and which ones needed to be left out. As a writer, every turn of the page brings some new amazement: she really nails the framing of each story, creating a world that you can, and want, to insert yourself into.

These essays showcase the beauty and confidence you can find in any of Patchett's books, as well as a beautiful honesty. One of my favorites is an essay about an RV trip with the man that would eventually be her husband, a trip that was both about exploring RV culture and whether or not her relationship with said man was going to work out. Most of the essay is really just about the experience of RV parks, of living in a small space, of nights spent with the window open, thinking about the twists and turns of life...nothing dramatic really happens. And yet, she manages to make it both an incredibly beautiful reflection on life on the move AND a reflection on relationships.

It's difficult to pinpoint what is so wonderful about these essays, and exactly why they kept me up late at night. All I know is that I find myself continually returning to them, trying to figure out how she invents such beauty without inventing any of the facts. If you love good writing and you're interested in studying someone who knows how to write nonfiction like a champion, pick this up.

Book Review: A Monster Calls

A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness

Inspired by an idea from Siobhan Dowd
Illustrated by Jim Kay

Syopsis from Shelfari: "The monster showed up just after midnight. As they do. But it isn't the monster Conor's been expecting. He's been expecting the one from his nightmare, the one he's had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments, the one with the darkness and the wind and the screaming...The monster in his back garden, though, this monster is something different. Something ancient, something wild. And it wants the most dangerous thing of all from Conor. It wants the truth."

I loved this book for so many reasons. 

First, because it made me cry. Although I'm a fairly sensitive soul, I don't often find myself moved to tears while reading. I can count the number of books that have extracted tears from me on one hand. Well, I COULD count them using one hand, until I read this book. This is a book about a boy in the process of loving his mother: of having to come to terms with losing her, and then having to find the strength to let her go. But that wasn't what made me cry. What made me cry was the way Patrick Ness weaves the story with brutal honesty, but also with a searing compassion that makes it funny as well as sad. It made me cry the kind of tears that are weighted down with the knowledge of recognition: of knowing that this story you're sad about isn't yours, but it holds so much that has or could be yours. I was pulled in completely, and was shown something that my mind and heart continues to return to. 

Second, because it had the feel of the best kind of fairy tale: dark, twisted, and beautiful. The language here is lyrical and rhythmic. It manages to be both haunting and occasionally funny. It begs to be read out loud. 

And third, there are the illustrations. The idea of a book accompanied by pictures brings to mind the kind of children's book that adults aren't meant to read. But it certainly doesn't FEEL like a children's book when you flip through these particular illustrations. It feels more like a work of art. These images are like a nightmare brought to life in ways that are both incredibly beautiful and a little disturbing. I have no idea what method the illustrator used to create these striking and textured images, but they literally took my breath away with every turn of the page. The monster reached out to me from the pages like things I've only encountered in dreams, the kind that feel both incredibly detailed and cloudy at the same time. This book reminded me of something that has continually pulled me towards work in illustrated publishing, but that I often ignore in fiction works: images can weave among the words, enhancing and giving them new life.

A beautiful, moving, one-of-a-kind read that I won't be forgetting in a hurry.

Book Review: The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls

Genre: Adult Historical Fiction (set in the South in the 1920s)

This is a beautifully rendered, atmospheric gem of a book about a young girl learning who she is without her family. There were many things that surprised and delighted me about it. But first, here's a synopsis from Shelfari:

"A lush, sexy, evocative debut novel of family secrets and girls’-school rituals, set in the 1930s South. It is 1930, the midst of the Great Depression. After her mysterious role in a family tragedy, passionate, strong-willed Thea Atwell, age fifteen, has been cast out of her Florida home, exiled to an equestrienne boarding school for Southern debutantes. High in the Blue Ridge Mountains, with its complex social strata ordered by money, beauty and girls’ friendships, the Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls is a far remove from the free-roaming, dreamlike childhood Thea shared with her twin brother on their family’s citrus farm — a world now partially shattered. As Thea grapples with her responsibility for the events of the past year that led her here, she finds herself enmeshed in a new order, one that will change her sense of what is possible for herself, her family, her country. Weaving provocatively between home and school, the narrative powerfully unfurls the true story behind Thea’s expulsion from her family, but it isn’t long before the mystery of her past is rivaled by the question of how it will shape her future. Part scandalous love story, part heartbreaking family drama, The Yonahlossee Riding Camp for Girls is an immersive, transporting page-turner — a vivid, propulsive novel about sex, love, family, money, class, home, and horses, all set against the ominous threat of the Depression — and the major debut of an important new writer."

What I loved about this book, in no particular order:

1. It's atmospheric as hell. I felt myself being sucked in from the very first page by the two rich worlds the author created: the tangled Florida orange groves and stately house Thea grew up in, and the pine-wooded, mountainous North Carolina girls' camp she finds herself outcast to. Both settings were ones I found myself happy to get lost in for hours at a time, sucked in by the fascinating details and the deft way she made each place an important character in Thea's story. This aspect of the writing reminded me very much of Charles Frazier's Nightwoods - the highest compliment a book can get, in my world.

2. The story revolves around a mystery that takes its take revealing itself. We are given to understand, early on, that Thea gets sent away to camp because she's done something bad, very bad (which, for a girl in the 1920s, can safely be assumed to have to do with sexual misconduct). Instead of finding out about it all at once, the story takes us back and forth between her childhood memories and her present time at the camp, weaving the two together so that they blur beautifully, but never totally merge.

3. The heroine herself. Thea felt to me like a real teenager: she's sometimes fragile, sometimes strong, often confused but also steadfast. She was full of all the contradictions that we all carry, but wrapped in the notion that she is defined by her family. I loved watching her slowly come to realize that there was both pain and real freedom in knowing that she is her own entity, separate from the people who 'own' her. She was not a wilting flower, and she was not afraid to make mistakes. 

4. The finely-woven relationships: between twins, between girlfriends, between parent and child, between young girl and inappropriate lover. I loved the way this author told us volumes about these relationships without stating it explicitly, through hand gestures and things done unsaid.

And, of course, the writing itself: it is lyrical and lovely, does a wonderful job with dialogue, and generally feels as if it's been sewn together by a masterful hand.

It may be early to call this, but I'm going to go ahead and say it: this is going to be one of the most surprisingly magical and memorable reads of my year.

Best Books of 2013

Before we get any further away from 2013, I've got to recap my favorite reads of the year. The general theme within my favorites can probably be summed up as: dark, lyrical, and full of everyday magic.

The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater
YA Dark Speculative Fiction

Synopsis from Shelfari: Gansey has it all—family money, good looks, devoted friends—but he’s looking for much more than that. He is on the hunt to find Glendower, a vanished Welsh king. Legend has it that the first person to find him will be granted a wish—either by seeing him open his eyes, or by cutting out his heart. Blue Sargent, the daughter of the town psychic in Henrietta, Virginia, has been told for as long as she can remember that if she ever kisses her true love, he will die. But she is too practical to believe in things like true love. Her policy is to stay away from the rich boys at the prestigious Aglionby Academy. The boys there—known as Raven Boys—can only mean trouble. When Gansey and his Raven Boy friends come into her life, Blue realizes how true this is. She never thought her fortune would be a problem. But she was wrong.

This book, Part 2 in the four-part Raven Cycle, offers some of Maggie's strangest, most complex, and most accomplished storytelling yet. It strikes a perfect balance between all of my favorite things: a subtle, mostly unspoken, angst-ridden romance; complex characters that are both horrible and wonderful; a strong mystery and a world full of speculative elements built up in a way that makes it all feel very REAL. I enjoyed a whole host of things about this book, but here are some of the highlights:

1. It is incredibly atmospheric. You fall into her descriptions of teenage male bonds and of rich kid high school parties, and they all feel richly drawn and very true. She didn't shy away from painting her world in honest details: her characters swear. A lot, but not gratuitously. She talks about drugs, but they aren't some racy prop meant to prop up the drama. She makes a conscious choice not to shy away from the rougher edges of teenage (particularly wealthy teenage) life and problems, and her book is all the better for it. 
2. It involves the ability to take things out of dreams. There is a character who can take things out of his dreams. While this could easily become overdone, this author's deft touch makes it dark and tangible and pleasantly haunting. I've wanted for years to describe what it feels like to wake up from a dream and feel like it's followed you into waking--Maggie does it in ways I could never have imagined. 
3. This book is beautifully written. It is what I would like my writing to be when it grows up.

Paper Valentine by Brenna Yovanoff
YA Dark Speculative Fiction

Synopsis from Shelfari: A girl haunted by the troubled ghost of her best friend finds herself sucked into a darkly mesmerizing string of murders, in which a serial killer who leaves a paper-heart 'valentine' on his victims' bodies draws ever closer.

This book shares some of the same qualities as Maggie's Dream Thieves--it is dark, atmospheric, deals with taut issues of friendship and love, and delves into a well-drawn (but by no means overdone) love story. I love the way Brenna does the Seemingly Broken, Bad Boy with a Good Heart. As a love interest, Finny is endlessly fascinating. Brenna has a mastery of spare detail that makes his interactions with the main character feel both very true, and very real. Her characters are always complex, and not always lovable, but she finds ways of making you love them, even when they're a total mess. It's the murder mystery and the way she deals with ghosts that really intrigued me. I was drawn into this book from the very first page.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
Adult Speculative Historical Fiction

Synopsis from Shelfari: The circus arrives at night, without warning. No announcements precede it. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not. Within nocturnal black and white striped tents awaits a unique experience, a feast for the senses, where one can get lost in a maze of clouds, meander through a lush garden made of ice, stand awestruck as a tattooed contortionist folds herself into a small glass box, and gaze in wonderment at an illusionist performing impossible feats of magic. Welcome to Le Cirque des Rêves. Beyond the smoke and mirrors, however, a fierce competition is underway - a contest between two young magicians, Celia and Marco, who have been trained since childhood to compete in "a game," in which each must use their powers of illusion to best the other. Unbeknownst to them, this game is a duel to the death, and the circus is but the stage for a remarkable battle of imagination and will.

I can't quite describe how deeply and immediately I loved this strange and beautiful book. She creates an incredibly unique and richly-drawn world in The Night Circus: I can't imagine anyone reading this book and not yearning to be amongst the crowd experiencing all the wonders it holds. The book features many characters and side stories, but they all end up being woven together beautifully, in ways that make you feel as if you're reading the work of someone who TRULY knows what they are doing. I particularly liked the slow burn of the love story between two young magicians brought up to be rivals, but who fall in love through the magic they create: whose tricks meant to thwart the competition actually turn into a kind of magical love letter, written in a language only they can truly understand. This book feels like the product of Pride and Prejudice marrying Lev Grossman's The Magician, and then holding hands with Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. This book created the kind of awe and absorption that reminded me why I love to read.

All That Glows by Ryan Graudin
YA Speculative, History-tinged Fiction


Synopsis from Shelfari: Intense and electric, this is the ultimate tale of forbidden love. Emrys, a spirited and charismatic Faery Guard of the British monarchy, is sent to London to guard Richard, the bad-boy prince of England, from assassins and paparazzi. Despite her status as a guard of the royals, Emrys struggles with her feelings as she tries to not fall in love with the charming prince. But when an ancient Fae murders the king, Richard’s father, and starts attacking the other royals, Emrys must risk everything to hunt through London’s magical dark side in order to protect her charge—and the boy she loves.

While this book by my fabulous critique partner Ryan Graudin doesn't officially come out until Feb. 11, I'm excited to call it one of my favorite books of this year! All That Glows is a YA Historical Fantasy that tells the story of a modern-day prince guarded by the young fairy who has to protect him from all of the forces that threaten his life, and the powerful pull that threatens her heart. I've read this story several times over the course of its budding life and have remained sucked in by how atmospheric her descriptions of both London and the fairy world. She makes you feel like you're there, walking the darkened streets of London. Even in scenes of violence and darkness, she makes you want to step into the pages and be there with her characters. She deftly weaves bits of Arthurian legend into the trials of a modern-day prince, giving readers a window into what it might be like to be a royal, and crafting a beautifully-drawn fairy world that exists parallel to it. The strength and beauty of Ryan's writing definitely make her a writer to watch!

The Great Gatsby
Literary Fiction

Synopsis from Shelfari: The exemplary novel of the Jazz Age, F. Scott Fitzgerald's third book, The Great Gatsby (1925), stands as the supreme achievement of his career. The story of the fabulously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan, of lavish parties in West Egg, Long Island, at a time when The New York Times remarked, "gin was the national drink and sex the national obsession," it is an exquisitely crafted tale of America in the 1920s that resonates with the power of myth. A novel of lyrical beauty yet brutal realism, of magic, romance and mysticism, The Great Gatsby is one of the great classics of twentieth-century literature.

While this isn't the first time I read Gatsby, it was the first time I had the privilege to teach it. From the day I first introduced them to the America of the 1920s to the day we held a dramatic reading of the 'hotel scene' in our classroom, I got to watch my students collectively fall in love with Fitzgerald's novel in a way I've never seen students do before. It reminded me what I've always loved about this beautiful novel: the powerful, stunning sweep of the language, the magnetic pull of its opulent, devastating world, and the subtle exploration of what it means to try to something lost and to define your life by your love for someone else. This is the ultimate exploration of the American Dream and whether it exists in life, or only in our country's imagination. If I had to read one book every year for the rest of my life, I think this would probably be it.

Book Review: The Night Circus

I've discovered that the first week of a teacher's summer break can be a restless, wily thing. I'm so used to having one million things to do that both body and mind had forgotten how to cope with relaxation time. Every time I sat down, I felt guilty. Surely I should be DOING something. I couldn't even write, my mind was so fractured. It seemed to want to run around, trying to cover as much ground as it could.

Now, it's not that I'm complaining. It's just that my beginning-of-summer frame of mind made it difficult for me to find the right book to read. I needed something smart and articulate and emotionally weighty, but also something that would grip my mind and hold onto it.

The Night Circus gave me all of that. In fact, it gave me more. I was fairly bowled over by this beautiful, surprising novel. It was so many of the things I love in a story: lyrical and a little eccentric, with a captivating voice and a lot of stop-and-write-it-down worthy one liners. It also has love and travel and magic, a combination I'm bound to get excited about.

At its heart, The Night Circus is about a grand competition constructed by two long-time rival magicians who have different opinions about how magic should be done. It is based in our world (circa 1890), but also creates its own world within the confines of an strange and beautiful circus created as a backdrop for the game. As the magicians' two players grow older and the circus they've helped create becomes more complex, they fall in a love that wreaks all kinds of beautiful havoc on everyone involved. The story spans so many lives and years, weaving together a multitude of narrative threads in a way that is riveting, and which feels effortless. Not only that, but the author uses second person in a really interesting way: she makes the reader a part of the circus by putting them within it.

Another thing I love about this novel is the way she makes her setting a character. The circus almost jumps off of the page, so tangible and lovely that I slowed down my reading so I couldn't delay finishing it.

This book isn't like anything I've ever read. But if I had to draw comparisons, I'd say it had me thinking of Mr. Norrell and Jonathan Strange, with a sprinkling of Jane Austen and the same magical allure as Harry Potter, although it was very different than all of those.

This is one of those books that's next to impossible to describe, really, other than to say it's one of the best books I've read in a while.

Music I'm Writing To: "Lifeforms" by Daughter

The Joys of Audio: Reading Edition

I've always loved audiobooks. Mom and I used to go 'shopping' for them at the public library; we'd scour the Mystery shelves together, her because she loves mysteries, me because I wanted to love whatever she loved. I discovered some fantastic books this way. At thirteen I got very sick and spent several months chained to a couch, knitting really ugly scarves with my one good eye and listening to audiobooks. My poor eyesight meant I couldn't really read, so it was good to feel that there was still a way for me to ingest stories.

There's nothing like being read to; it makes me feel like a little girl again. I clean to them, drive to them, and sometimes fall asleep to them. A book read really well can make a story come alive. Even so, my audiobook love often strikes me as something of an old lady habit, but more and more books I've read and want to read are being respun into audio, read by interesting people - especially in YA. Here are some of the best audiobooks I've enjoyed in the last few years. I read them all first, and I can tell you that these renditions are well worth taking the time to enjoy.

The Scorpio Races by Maggie Steifvater (read by Steve West & Fiona Hardingham). I loved this book when I read it, and I loved it even more when listening to it. These readers evoke all the atmosphere and sense of place the book does so well. I liked it so much I listened to it more than once...in a row.

American Gods by Neil Gaiman (read by George Guidall). I listened to this before bed (a very relaxing way to wind down) and was completely captivated by this guy's reading voice. It is deep and kind of craggy, perfectly suited to this story.

A Walk In The Woods by Bill Bryson (read by William Roberts). This book is very funny, but it was William Roberts' rendition of it that made me laugh so hard I almost wet myself. He brings Bill Bryson's dry humor to life and turns interactions between Katz and Bryson into comic gold.

Dark Matter by Michelle Paver (read by Jeremy Northam). I feel that I should just be able to say 'Jeremy Northam' and leave it at that...he performs this book so, so well. He takes its creep factor and turns it up several notches (in a very good way). Don't listen to it before bed or on dark car rides, though. Trust me.

His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman (read by a long list of great-sounding people). I listened to these on a very, very long car ride. They made me fall in love with Pullman's world all over again.

Current song obsession: "War" by Gossling

Book Review: The Space Between

The Space Between by Brenna Yovanoff
Genre: YA Speculative Fiction

Since I've been writing query letters and think this book's jacket cover is pretty near pitch-perfect, I'm not going to try and reinvent it:

"Everything burns in Pandemonium... a city in Hell made of chrome and steel, where there is no future and life is an expanse of frozen time. That's where Daphne lives. The daughter of a demon and a fallen angel, she wonders what lies in store for her. Will she become a soulless demon like her sisters? Or follow in the footsteps of her brother Obie, whose life is devoted to saving lost souls on Earth? All she wants is to find a place where she belongs. When Obie saves a bleeding, broken boy named Truman from the brink of death and then suddenly goes missing, Daphne struggles between her demon instincts and her growing--yet achingly unfamiliar--feelings for Truman. As Daphne and Truman search for Obie, they must navigate the jealousies and alliances of the violent archangels who stand in their way. But Daphne also discovers, unexpectedly, what it means to love and be human in a world where human is the hardest thing to be."

I'm not usually one for angel/demon stories particularly, but I fell into this one headlong. One of the things I loved was what one reviewer called Yovanoff's 'moral ambivalence'. She delves into some pretty dark territory, and she doe it deftly and absorbingly without fear of touching on what some would consider taboo areas for YA lit. Truman drinks, smokes, swears and self-destructs in a variety of ways, and yet I still cared about him. I think I cared about him more because he was, to me, a very realistic portrait of a teenage boy in trouble. I loved the dark fantastical elements, too: demon girls with metal teeth and worlds that burn. This story is creepy, no doubt about it. It's creepy and dark done incredibly, enviably well, in ways that made me WANT to stay up until 3AM with ugly things.

I also loved this book for one of the same reasons I loved Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races: because the love story was so engrossing without being the main event. While the tension between Daphne and Truman is palpable, it's never really spoken or overtly underlined. Everything is subtext and longing expertly portrayed. The yearning jumped off the pages, creating a connection that I didn't want to step away from.

In short, I loved it.

Five Best Books of 2011

This year, I thought I'd challenge myself to slim down my "I loved this book so much" list to just five titles. These are the books that absolutely rocked me this year.

The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: YA Urban Fantasy
Because: This book is beautifully written, incredibly atmospheric, filled with visceral landscapes and expertly-developed mood. Stiefvater makes the island of Thisby into a character that wraps itself around you like a cloak that you never want to take off. If you're going to try out a YA in 2012, try this one.

***

I'll Be There by Holly Goldberg Sloan
Genre: YA (I suppose, though only because it has some teenaged characters)
Because: This is an amazing book. So amazing that I don't even want to tell you what it's about: this is a story that's better appreciated without any foreknowledge. I fell in hard and fast love with this lovely, affecting, magical piece of fiction. If there was one book I could make everyone I know read, this would be it.

***

Dark Matter by Michelle Paver
Genre: Historical Mystery/Ghost Story
Because: This is one of the best ghost stories I've ever read: vivid, historically fascinating, well developed, and fantastically creepy. I had the pleasure of reading this book (with many lights on) first, then listening to the audiobook read by Jeremy Northam... and WOW is that the BEST audiobook I've ever had the pleasure of enjoying. I've listened to it three times: if that isn't a glowing endorsement, I don't know what is. Don't forget to keep your light on.

***

Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion
Genre: Dystopian/Urban Fantasy
Because: This book about a zombie with heart is at once funny, philosophical, moving and suspenseful.   This book managed to take two things I'm not wild about (zombies and futuristic, end-of-the-world stories) and make me a little bit wild about them. I just loaned this to one of my fantastic creative writing-class seniors, and now several of them are reading it. It's spreading (just like the zombie plague)!

***

Just My Type by Simon Garfield
Genre: Nonfiction
Because: This is the one book I loved this year that I haven't blogged about: it's a book all about FONTS! Now wait. Because you start shaking your head, hear me out a sec. This book is fantastically fascinating. It gives us what amounts to a character study of some of history's most important and game-changing fonts: where they came from, how they developed, and what quirky cast of artists and cultural heroes made them unique and significant. This book is a veritable treasure-trove of well-written tales to keep any word nerd entertained for days.

Book Review: The Hunger Games

So I finally read Suzanne Collin's The Hunger Games. I have a thing about not wanting to hop on massive reading trends, but it felt like it was time. People kept looking at me and saying, "You haven't read The Hunger Games yet? Really?" So I figured it was something I needed to check out. Especially with the movie coming out, which I'm hoping they haven't completely overdone.


I won't recap the story for you: check out the movie trailer and you'll have a good idea. I'm not hugely fond of the dystopian drama, but I definitely stayed up way, way too late to finish this very engaging read. The premise is fascinating and the world that Collins has created is one that's easy to get hooked by. I found myself actively rooting for the characters and wide-eyed at the horrible scenarios they find themselves in. The writing isn't mind-blowing; that isn't to say that it is bad (it's certainly not), or that it bothered me. That's to say that I've read several YAs this year that, writing-wise, blow this one out of the water. A lot of the dialogue felt stilted to me. But I love that Katniss, the main character, doesn't spend most of her time dreaming of boys (although look at the boys in the trailer... when I was 16, they would have been ALL I thought about). She is a kick-ass survivor, and I like that in my heroines.

This is an incredibly engaging series, no question. I am currently ripping through the sequel and can't wait to sit through the movie with ten billion tweens.

Book Review: The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin
Genre: YA mystery with a touch of paranormal

I swallowed this book whole while down in Charleston and then got to go and see Michelle Hodkin speak about how she ended up writing this, her first novel. She was working as a lawyer in New York and happened upon a woman who was suing the owners of an abandoned house after said house collapsed on, and almost killed, her daughter. Hodkin referred them to someone who might be able to help them and went about her business. A long time later, she found herself wondering what had happened to the pair, so she Googled them and couldn't find one scrap of information. She kept asking herself what could have happened to them; this book is her fictional answer to that question.

The book opens up telling the reader that the main character is probably a killer, then sends us back in time to when she woke up in the hospital with no memory of the house collapse that killed three of her friends. The family pick themselves up and move from New England to Miami, hoping to give Mara a fresh start. But from the moment Mara starts attending her fancy new school, her PTSD--and the extremely sexy, extremely aggravating boy who seems to pop up everywhere--continue to haunt her. Until she starts dreaming about the night of the accident and realizes that she might not just be a victim; she might also be a killer.

First of all, look at that cover... outSTANDING. It sets the perfect tone for this fast-paced, surprisingly funny mystery thriller. This is a deliciously creepy story. I love the way Hodkin uses the horrors of PTSD to explore a young girl's search for meaning in a world that, for her, just isn't making sense. Her narrative voice is one of the best things about this novel: fresh, acerbic, witty and well crafted. And then you've got Noah, whose British accent and wayward rebelliousness make him a character after my own heart. Hodkin makes their relationship crackle with a sexual tension so taut that it almost leaps off the page at you. I tried not to rip the pages as I followed Mara through some pretty bizarre circumstances, trying to figure out whether what she was seeing was real or imagined.

I will say that there were moments where the love story bordered on becoming too big a focus: I'm not a fan of the whole "he is so pretty and suave, how could be possibly like me?" scenario. But overall, the connection between Mara and Noah makes for a fun ride. Be prepared for a mother of a cliffhanger ending, though: good thing she's got the sequel coming out in 2012. I'll be pre-ordering that one!

If you're not sold on this book yet check out the book trailer, which is definitely the best I've ever seen:

Book Review: I'll Be There

This is the first year since 2006 that I've been in the States for Thanksgiving, and I find myself grateful for a lot of things. For my family, who believes I'm capable of greatness even on the days when I refuse to change out of pajamas. I'm thankful for the collection of close friends and confidants who have urged me to keep on writing stories. I'm thankful that I have a place to live, good food to eat, and an individual espresso maker.

And, this week, I'm thankful for I'll Be There by Holly Goldberg Sloan.

Genre: YA, I suppose (although I only think it falls under that umbrella because it has several young people in it)

In a nutshell: beautiful, gripping, thoughtful, and heart warming. 

First of all, look at this cover... I think it's the best one I've seen in years. If I could ask this cover out on a date, I'd think about it.

I don't often say I'm "thankful" to have discovered a particular book, but this one is very special. It is about two brothers who have nothing to cling to in life but each other until they move into a small town where a chance meeting changes the course of their lives. Sam, the oldest brother, goes into a church to hear some good music only to hear Emily singing terribly, so nervous that she latches onto his face in the back of the crowd to get through it. This is very much a story about connection: what happens when we reach out and touch each other's lives, even in seemingly small ways.

This is one of those rare reads that I am desperately trying to get everyone I know to read. It is so, so lovely and heartwarming despite its moments of terrible sadness. It made me cry, and it made me laugh loud enough to wake people. It made me so, so anxious to know what happens that I stayed up to some unacceptable hour to finish it. But I didn't want it to end, either. The relationship between the two brothers, Sam and Riddle, is touching and haunting. In fact every relationship in this book is pretty lovely to discover. The book has us skipping between all the character's thoughts, so we get to have access to pretty much every important perspective. The young voices are crafted so thoughtfully and so believably. And although there are things that made me angry and upset, I never found this story depressing. There is so much that is uplifting in it, and the sad moments only make those richer.

I know I haven't really told you what this book is about. I don't want to ruin it: you should get to experience it for yourself, and I highly recommend that you do. 

Book Review: The Scorpio Races

The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Young Adult urban fantasy

Those who know me understand how passionately I feel about Maggie Stiefvater's work, so I was excited to crack her newest book open. The story is set on the island of Thisby where every year magical, killer water horses climb out of the sea and roam the beaches in search of human flesh. My friend Tori likes to call them 'horse nymphs', but trust me when I say they're much more awe-inspiring than they sound. It's tradition that the locals try and tame these beasts and ride them in a deathly festival called the Scorpio Races. Puck decides to ride her own, non-magical horse in order to keep a roof over her family's heads. Sean races because it's in his blood: he's described as having 'one foot on land, one foot in the sea'. This story is about what happens when two people with a lot to lose choose to race--and fight for--each other in a world that's as beautiful as it is deadly.

If I could only use one word for this book it would have to be atmospheric. That's the thing I loved most about it: the island of Thisby is a character on its own, one that influences and affects each character profoundly and in different ways. The descriptions of setting are stunning, so visceral that you really do feel like you're there. It makes you want to be there, even if it does have demon horses. Stiefvater uses townsfolk and local lore in a way that makes Thisby jump off the page. I don't know how she does it--only that, as a writer, I wish I did.

The magical element is taut and unique. I was a huge horse girl when I was younger, so I loved reading the race descriptions and all the talk about bits and snaffles.

There are a lot of YA novels that go very, very heavy on the hunky, sexy love angle; I can really only take so many pages of heavy petting. But the love story here is beautifully crafted and totally understated, which made this story special for me. So much of what goes on between them happens in subtext as they quietly edge their way towards a relationship. I love that neither one of them had to give up who they were in order to be together. There was definitely sexy tension, and it was powerful without being anywhere near overpowering. This book is, above all, about connection, not just between two lovers but between family members, human and nature, man and beast.

The writing is, as always, beautiful, and the narrative voice is strong and sure. This is a unique and lovely book; if you're into YA, it isn't to be missed.

**Update 5/4/2014: I have now listened to the audiobook version of this novel an embarrassing number of times and recommend it very highly. If you're into being read to, it's a real gem.**
  

Book Review: Those Across The River

Those Across The River by Christopher Buehlman
Genre: Horror (with historical southern flavor)

I've never waited so anxiously for a debut novel to come out. I read about it earlier this year on Charlaine Harris' blog and fell in love with its title. It's got to be up there with The Sun Also Rises and The Sound and the Fury in the "best-sounding titles" awards: read it out loud. Are you in love with it yet? And then I saw the amazing cover and there was no going back for me.

It's about professor Frank Nichols, who leaves academia under a cloud of scandal after absconding with his co-worker's wife and moves down to an old family home in backwoods Georgia. He intends to write a book about his great-grandfather, a Civil War soldier and slave abuser whose ruined plantation stands somewhere in the woods. But Frank is haunted by memories of his time in the Great War. And the more he learns about what lies in the woods, the more he comes to realize that the town is as haunted as he is. Except the things in the woods have a score to settle, and it's Frank who is going to pay the price...

Let me start by saying that this book is geeeroSS in places. It's a horror novel, people: body parts do fly (and land with lots of squishy splats). But it is so well written and engrossing that I found myself not really minding the gross.

To say this book is atmospheric is putting it mildly. Buehlman invokes the sound and feel of the 20s with grace and believability and paints a funny and affecting portrait of the small southern town of Whitbrow. I love the playful affection in Frank's relationship with his young muse, Eudora, and how Buehlman uses the lighter elements to make the nasty bits all that much more affecting. This is a classic horror novel in the sense that its true creep-factor lies in what you can't see; Buehlman leaves just enough to the imagination to keep you up at night, in a good way.

The narrative voice is unique, lyrical, and haunting with a lot of surprisingly funny moments. It's one of the most original werewolf stories--or any story, really--I've read in a while in the way it is crafted. The fine craftsmanship is the thing I both loved and sometimes felt frustrated by.

Buehlman likes to do single-line paragraphs.
Which sometimes is haunting.
And sometimes lovely.
And sometimes breaks up the flow of the story.
Because it creates big pauses.
Like this.
And this.

This book is not warm and fuzzy. But if you like mystery, horror, history, and damn fine writing, you should most definitely give it a whirl.

Book Review: Warm Bodies

Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion
Genre: let's call it Adult Literary Dystopian Love Story?

I'm planning a trip down to Charlston over my birthday weekend to finally meet my lovely critique partner and to go to YALLFest. The list of authors attending this YA-focused shindig is fairly spectacular and nerd-girl spasm inducing, but there were a few I didn't recognize. I was intrigued enough by Isaac Marion's premise (and, judging by his author photo, his ability to blend lumberjack chic with artistic flair) to go out and pick it right up. Be warned: gushing is about to ensue, because I fell a little hard for this book. And not (just) because of the lumberjack chic.

Warm Bodies is told from the perspective of R, who is a zombie... I know, I know. More zombies? Really? More guts and deadness? I don't usually go in for these things, and yet I keep giving you guts and deadness. Whatever. Just keep reading. He's living in a rapidly deteriorating world where human civilization is dying out and R is struggling to shake off his undead apathy. Like the rest of the zombies who live in the airport, R can barely form sentences or move with anything approaching grace, but inside he's alive with beautiful thoughts about being free. And then he meets Julie, the beautiful live wire whose boyfriend's brains he's just eaten, absorbing his memories and last living thoughts. Julie and R have some strange kind of bond that makes him want to care about living. Julie's passion starts to bring him to life - quite literally - and they set out to make something of the world they thought was lost.

There are a couple of things that made me fall in love with this novel. First, there was R himself. I wasn't sure I could love a zombie narrator. I mean, he eats people... not something I normally condone, although writing about shape shifters has kind of liberated my literary moral compass. There are a couple of gross-out moments that make you want to close one eye. But Marion's narrative voice makes you care. I loved R's well-crafted inner voice, filled with a thoughtfulness and a yearning that makes him easy to connect to. By the end of the novel you're fist-pumping for this guy, wanting what he wants, wanting to see him get a second chance at living.

For me, this book is magical realism at its best. It doesn't try to make sense of the nonsensical elements; it simply hands them to you as truth without making a big fuss about it in a way that reminds me of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's stuff. You've got a stark, dystopian world - scenarios that we've seen before - peppered with surreal memories and connections that rope you in. In absorbing Julie's boyfriend's brain R becomes inextricably linked with Perry; using shared memories and dreams, they find a way to connect with Julie and bring both men to life. Sound trippy? It is. This is one of the most original stories I've ever read, infused with wit and a subtle exploration of the power and beauty of language.

And then there's the writing, which is truly lovely. The rise and fall of it is pitch-perfect, with each passage blending into the next, melting on the tongue. This is one of those books that makes me despair  that I'll never be able to write so beautifully, but that does a good job in inspiring me to try.

I feel like R: I'm a little bit lost for words on this one. This zombie needs another cup of coffee.

Book Review(s): The Last Werewolf & Ship Breaker

I just got back from a tropical island, which means I just spent a lot of time reading. I mean, I did other stuff, too. I swam with giant turtles. I sailed in a very small series of circles. And I got a marginally nice tan. These books are also worth a mention.

The Last Werewolf

by Glen Duncan

This story is about a man who realizes he's the last werewolf left alive and he's feeling pretty apathetic about it. He's planning to end his life at the next full moon unless the men who hunt him find him first. But almost as soon as he decides that life is no longer worth living, a series of events--and a beautiful woman--change his mind. This is not your typical paranormal story. This is like nothing else I've ever read. The writing, for one, is completely unique and beautifully crafted. Duncan's sharp sense of humor and way with words is so astounding that I found myself rereading whole pages, nodding emphatically, smiling to myself like I'd just discovered a secret no one else knew about. I had nothing in common with his characters, but he found a way to make me feel connected to them on some fundamental level.

Plus, the story's just fascinating. Talk about characters with interesting baggage.

But there were moments when Duncan's voice was so clever (and so aware of the fact) it made my teeth hurt a little. There are moments when I wanted to pull this writer (or, really, this narrator) and say, "really? We get that your smart. Do you need to rub it in my eye with a stick?". This book has moments of pretentiousness, for sure. Which I hate to say, because I loved it enough that it was worth those moments of eye-rolling.

Verdict: A little violent and raw around the edges with beautiful writing and moments of clear, mesmerizing brilliance.

Ship Breaker

by Paolo Bacigalupi

This YA book is about a young boy in a dystopian world. Life is pretty brutal on the beaches off what used to be New Orleans where he lives breaking down ruined ships for their precious metals. He doesn't have much to look forward to. Until he and a friend find a beached cruise ship, and half dead rich girl, and the opportunity to change their lives forever.

This is a beautifully written book. You've got a fast-moving plot that never stops churning, and a set of characters that are rich and interesting to follow around. The world that Bacigalupi describes is not a pretty world, but he manages to fill the story with hope and friendship. Unlike a lot of other YA novels I've read lately, it doesn't rely on its more fantastical elements and a cloying love story to tell a gripping yarn. This is a book that boys won't roll their eyes reading and that girls will love just as much, I think.

The verdict: Unique, well crafted, and well worth a read.

Book Review: Dark Matter

Dark Matter by Michelle Paver (2010)

Genre: Mystery/Horror

Dark Matter is a work of fiction based on a real-life expedition to the Arctic undertaken by four young Englishmen in the 1930s. The main character, Jack, is desperate to scramble out of near-poverty in London, so he joins in with three guys who are planning to 'overwinter' for a year at a desolate place called Gruhuken. At first, Jack is amazed and delighted by the isolation and strangeness of the Arctic. But as mysterious circumstances pull his pals back to the mainland, Jack is forced to survive alone in their cabin and endure the endless winter night. But Jack isn't really alone. Something walks the black, snowy hills, an angry echo looking for vengeance...

This books is fantastic on two fronts. First, it's delightfully creepy. It's just scary enough that it makes you cringe, but not so much that you can't sleep for a week afterwards. It's not often that I come across a truly surprising and affecting ghost story, one that makes me smile and cringe in the same chapter. There's very little dialogue, but the epistolary narration gives the whole thing an intimate, haunted feel. Jack's a great character, both pragmatic and sensitive, and he makes a compelling narrator from start to finish.

The other thing I loved was all the detailed research. You can tell Paver's done her homework when it comes to life in the Arctic, and the result is a brilliantly-realized story that feels like a true window into what it would be like to endure weeks on end of never-ending darkness. Paver's writing is poetic and well-paced and she's crafted interesting, complex characters.

Well worth a read, even if you're a wimp like me.

Added 12/4/2011: I've just listened to the audiobook version, read by Jeremy Northam. Twice. It's good. SO SO GOOD. It enhanced my enjoyment of this story tenfold.

Book Review: The Dark And Hollow Places

The Dark & Hollow Places, by Carrie Ryan, is a YA-classified dystopian thriller/romance and the third and final book in a series. (I reviewed the other two books here and here.) I've had a bit of a reading dry spell these past few weeks, so I was really excited to get my hands on this one.

Set in a post-apocalyptic world where zombies are not-so-slowly weeding out the living, Annah struggles to live by herself in the crumbling remains of what used to be New York City, waiting for her love to come back and find her. But when he comes back with her long-lost twin sister in tow, everything she'd hoped for is thrown asunder and she has to try and figure out if living is worth fighting for.

I loved this book for the same reason I liked the others: strong, lyrical writing, a heart-stopping pace, and taut love stories that have to survive in the face of absolute destruction. I also really liked that Annah is damaged (she fell into a pit of barbed wire that has left her significantly scarred) and self-conscious, but also incredibly strong. I loved getting to see the zombie issue from the eyes of Catcher, an equally-damaged Immune (having been bitten by zombies without being turned into one) who won't let anyone close to him. There's something about watching to human train wrecks colliding and finding a way to rescue each other that I find irresistibly enthralling and Ryan has done it beautifully here. There were some syrupy sermonizing moments that put me off in the first two, but they are few and far between in this installment.

Although Annah and her sister are 'protected' by their manfriends, they do a lot of kick-ass surviving all on their own. I like that, instead of having Catcher save Annah, Ryan lets Annah have the courage to fight and save herself. It's that terrified-girl-does-her-own-rescuing that helps to set this series apart.

Best Books of 2010

As I delve into my reading list for 2011, I realize I never posted my favorite reads from 2010. I feel this is an oversight that should be rectified immediately.

Stolen

by Lucy Christopher

A haunting, tortured, beautiful story about a girl who is kidnapped from the airport and taken to live in a remote Australian desert by a boy she comes to both love and hate. This is a special, rare read that stuck with me for weeks after finishing it.

The Dead-Tossed Waves

by Carrie Ryan

This is the second book in Ryan's 'zombie romance' series. While I didn't think I could ever get into a zombie story, hers are so well paced and well written that I wanted to unhinge my jaw and swallow them whole. I preferred this installment to her first because it combines several of my favorite things in fiction (love triangles, secret longing and thwarted dreams) and delivers them with breakneck speed.

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell

by Suzanna Clarke

I listened to this period/fantasy on audiobook - twice - and loved it. I'm a fan of dry, British, Jane Austen-style language and am also a fan of history and of magicians in general. All of those things combined? Awesome.

The Magicians

by Lev Grossman

Combine Harry Potter, A Separate Peace, and something else literary and angsty, and you have this fantastic fantasy for grown-ups. The main character, Quentin, is fun to follow around as he tries to figure out the key to magic and to the meaning of his life. A book to treasure.

Linger

by Maggie Stiefvater

I love this writer. Love. Her. This second book in her Wolves of Mercy Falls series got some flack from avid lovers of her first, Shiver, but I loved it just as much. If anything, I thought this second book showed greater talent and a richer storyline. I loved getting the story from four perspectives, and that each character was raw and damaged in their own ways. Stiefvater has one of the most unique voices in YA fiction.

Bird by Bird

by Anne Lamott

A classic for anyone who wants to be a writer. I'm amazed it took me so many years to discover this.

Eat Pray Love

by Elizabeth Gilbert

I was loath to read this book, as I don't tend to sway towards things labeled 'spiritual nonfiction', but this book came into my life right when I needed it. I think Gilbert is a brave and eloquent writer and that her journey has a lot to say about the importance of finding the balance in every woman's life.

The Graveyard Book

by Neil Gaiman

Beautiful. Go read it. Right now.