"Eb & Flow" by Kelly J. Baptist

I'm... not sure what to say to that.

"A fascinating look at a life and culture adjacent to yet far different from my own"? No, that sounds like the sort of thing you'd say in a literary analysis paper, even though it is true.

"It

    made

        me

            think

in verse for a while"? 

Also true, but not the point.

 

This is the story of two kids, Ebony (Eb) and De'Kari (Flow; it's a nickname), who get in a fight at school because Eb (allegedly) accidentally spilled barbecue sauce on Flow's shoes (which [allegedly] aren't "just shoes"). Then they both get suspended, because fighting is illeeeeeeeeegal, and basically told to figure out what the heck was up with that.

They try. Not everything's fixed by the end -- the sheer amount of home life problems here would make that unrealistic -- but it does end on a more hopeful note.

 

I appreciated it greatly when one of the teachers actually called out the serendipity of the main characters' nicknames being similar to "ebb and flow". The age-old trick of fixing a plot hole by going "hey look, a plot hole" strikes again.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: a relatively stern T for swearing and such.

4 stars. This was better than I thought.

 

Favorite lines:

 

"and I almost choke on a hunk of corn bread.

Corn bread be doin' that, if you breathe wrong while eating it."

    Page 21. (I think their corn bread must be different from the corn bread I've eaten, because I've never had that happen to me.)

 

"Who knew

the clicking sound

of Legos snapping together

is

so

cool."

    Page 43.

 

"I give him the biggest stank face."

    Page 121. 

(Endnote: It's like two-thirds of the way through the book before anyone comes up with the idea of just washing the dang shoes. I'm not shaking my head at it for being lazy writing, though, because I didn't think of it either until Flow had his realization.)

Mini-Reviews 1: And now for something slightly different

This is a collection of three short reviews of books, because I don't have enough to say to make a macro-review out of any of them.

Airborn by Kenneth Oppel

This may seem like a steampunk book, but it's actually more of a hydrogen-punk book. Or, if it is steampunk, we never actually see any steam. (It does mention ornithopters a couple times.)

The cover blurb makes it sound like the book is about trying to find a bunch of mysterious flying angel-bird-things. It isn't. The book is actually about an airship  (with its passengers) which gets attacked by pirates.

The hydrogen substitute that keeps the book's airships aloft is called "hydrium". My brain could not seem to wrap itself around that word; it kept saying "hygrium" (which doesn't mean anything) or "hydrargyrum" (which is Latin for mercury).

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: A stern T for some swearing and mildly suggestive material. Nothing untoward is ever actually going on between the main character and love interest, but adults keep thinking it is. This could be a fairly fun videogame in the right hands.

3 stars. The thing that made it get T was also annoying enough to me that it didn't get 4.

Tags for this one: 3-star, adventure, a kissing book, rated T, steampunk

A Royal Guide to Monster Slaying by Kelley Armstrong

I think this was a bit below my general reading level. This could have been a really good book if it had been YA instead, and the main character was actually doing monster slaying instead of monster befriending.

Which... I can understand books about monster befriending, too. But this one should have at least been honest about its subject. Out of like ten, one monster is ever actually slain in this book.

I really shouldn't complain about the book being written for people a lot younger than me when I am looking for books in the kids' section. Oh well.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for fantasy violence and spiders. If you made the slaying an actual integral part of the story, I might play a videogame of this. But as it now stands? Not really.

3 stars. Not terrible, just boring.

Tags for this one: 3-star, adventure, fantasy, rated T

 

 

 

The Threads of Magic by Alison Croggon

 

Meh.

 

Which basically describes my feelings on this entire book. 

T.

3 stars.

Tags for this one: 3-star, fantasy, lame, rated T

(Endnote: This is also a place that occasionally spawns macro-reviews when I discover I have more to say about a book than I thought I did.)

"A Tale of Two Cities" by Charles Dickens

This is an essay I wrote for a literature class, but it's not part of my first completed quest.

 

A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

 In A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens argues that the French Revolution was a bad idea. He also shows that nobody, no matter how insignificant, is unable to make a difference. This is demonstrated in the climactic death of Sydney Carton, as well as by how even seemingly unimportant characters are brought together throughout the story to factor into its plot.

The French Revolution and its repercussions (mainly the Reign of Terror) are a constant menace throughout A Tale of Two Cities. In early stages, its motto was “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, or Death;” Dickens repeatedly states that as a reminder of the destruction that followed in the Revolution’s wake with the Reign of Terror. Charles Darnay, as an aristocrat (albeit one who forswore aristocracy before the Revolution and left for England), is targeted by the Revolutionary extremists (personified by the Defarges). Dr. Manette, having been a prisoner in the Bastille and thus a hero in the eyes of the Revolutionaries, is able at first to use his influence to protect those around him. However, the irrational nature of the Reign of Terror and its orchestrators ends up rendering him relatively powerless to assist Charles Darnay in his plight. Dickens portrays the French Revolution as something that, while it did remove the corrupt reign of the aristocrats, did not actually make life better in France.

There are many possible messages to be derived from A Tale of Two Cities, but the one that stood out to me is “nobody can’t change anything”: the ability of everyone, no matter how uninfluential, to do some good in their lives.  For most of the book, Sydney Carton appears to be a lesser version of Charles Darnay; he is worse than Darnay at pretty much everything and essentially living (albeit fairly contently) in his shadow. However, when Darnay is arrested by the French revolutionaries during the Reign of Terror, Carton is instrumental in orchestrating Darnay’s rescue. This culminates in his sacrificing himself to save Darnay by impersonating him in order to be executed in his place.

Repeatedly throughout the book, seemingly minor characters reappear to add to the story. The nephew of the Marquis de Evrémonde, who is featured in one chapter near the beginning of the book and then appears to fall out of the story, is actually Charles Darnay. John Barsad, with one short cameo as a witness at Darnay’s initial trial for treason against England (of which Darnay is innocent), returns in the employ of the French government as a spy. Mr. Cruncher, a graverobber whose most notable appearance involves digging up a coffin in the early part of the story and discovering it to be empty, appears near the end of the book. There, the fact that the coffin was empty serves as the final straw to convince Barsad to help with the plan to save Darnay. Other characters also disappear from the narrative for a time, only to resurface again at unexpected moments. This contributes to the book’s message about the ability of even apparently irrelevant, unimportant people to have an effect on the world around them.

In conclusion, A Tale of Two Cities makes its point about the ability of seemingly insignificant people to nevertheless affect matters in some way. It also demonstrates that the French Revolution and subsequent Reign of Terror, contrary to their original purpose, actually made life worse for everyone in France.

I'll rate this a soft T for guillotining and other such unpleasantness.

 

4 stars. I went into it dreading the Dickensian-ness of it (the book is by Dickens, after all), but it was a lot better than I expected.

 

(Endnote: It's not part of my first completed quest because I was reading this for school anyway and reviewed it because of that, even though it's not on the list I'm using for the quest.)

"Alliana, Girl of Dragons" by Julie Abe

Take standard vaguely-European setting of Cinderella, plus the basic plot. Add medieval Japan to setting and stir until mixture is about 3/4 Japan and 1/4 Europe. Wrap mixture around Cinderella plot. Increase magic in story from 1 to approximately 4 (of 7). Trim off end. Serve warm over rice.*

It's a decent, Japan-flavored Cinderella retelling, in other words, albeit one that could have used a bit more denouement. It feels like the author was intending to have a specific climax for the story, wrote it, and then got slightly lost because she hadn't actually thought about what would happen after it. It felt kind of rushed.

 

And, yes, there are dragons involved. One of which Alliana does end up riding on a couple times. That's not really a spoiler because, c'mon, look at the cover.

 

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for jerkfaces and some scary scenes. I'm pretty sure not many people want to play through the opening depressing-ness of a Cinderella story, though, so this would have to overcome that hurdle if it was made into a game.

End-dissing aside, it was a good book. Had the denouement been up to the same standard as the rest of the book, it might have been the latest addition to the ranks of 5-star-rated books. But as it now stands... just 4, thank you.

(*Endnote: You don't actually need to do this step.)

"The Planet Thieves" by Dan Krokos

I will admit that I picked this book up off the library shelves solely because its title made me go, "Who steals a planet?" The answer: these guys.

Don't get me wrong, this isn't a book about people who go around stealing planets for fun and profit. Basically, Earth is at war with some aliens because they both want to colonize a planet. And the humans built a giant teleporter machine thing (coughMacGuffincough) to yoink the planet away from its star and dump it in orbit around the Sun. 

And then the spaceship carrying it gets attacked by the aliens and captured. And the aliens kill everyone on the ship except for the captain (who's gravely wounded) and a bunch of trainees the spaceship was also carrying. So the trainees (who are all about thirteen, because this is junior fiction) have to try to kick the aliens back off the ship so they don't get at the giant teleporter and use it for nefarious purposes. (Like, y'know, its actual purpose.)

This was a much better treatment of "kids are the only ones who can save the day" than in most books. Instead of the adults all being lame and short-sighted, the adults are all dead. Well, except for the captain, but he's mortally wounded and basically just picks out the most competent trainee to be in charge now.

Toward the end of this, I started to suspect that this was intended as the first book in a series, what with |another race of hostile aliens showing up out of the planet that the humans and first set of aliens both want to colonize and forcing the humans to ally themselves with the first set of aliens in order to not get epically destroyed|. Turns out, I was correct. Not sure if I liked this enough to seek out the second book, though.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for laser fights. This one would make a fairly good videogame; it has the necessary Overarching Quest and isn't mostly made of characters reacting to events.

I'm giving The Planet Thieves 4 stars. Not my new favorite book, but it was an enjoyable read.

(Endnote: The spiky purple gloves are stolen from an enemy alien wizard-y person. They're called Rhadgasts. Without fail, my brain read that "Radagast" every. single. time.)

"Countdown" by Deborah Wiles

This is a historical fiction book set in October 1962. How do I know this? Because that's when the Cuban Missile Crisis happened, and the book revolves around said crisis. 

Learning the history (via the book's events and also because there were historical-tidbit interludes between chapters) was fun, but the actual plot was kind of lacking. Which is the problem with slice-of-life-esque books; they don't usually have much.

Now, not every book needs that to be good. With 65% certainty, this book was written primarily to teach kids about the 1960s, in which case: good job! If you moved it to now and replaced the Cuban Missile Crisis with some similarly stressful incident, though, the book would just be kind of lame.

What I'm trying to say is, the history and not the plot is the backbone of this book. I do like learning the history of the last century, though, and it's easier to get people to read a novel than a "History of the Cuban Missile Crisis" book (and to read one, for that matter).

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: A very soft E10+. Nothing untoward, really, but realistically portraying the fear of a nuclear attack (as the book does) might be too much for younger kids. That said, it would make a pretty boring videogame.

 

This can have 3 stars, for being just OK.

 

(Endnote: Among other things, the book mentioned several Oldies that I know and like, as well as the TV show Combat!, which is my mom's favorite TV show in the history of TV shows. That was fun.)

"A Song Called Home" by Sara Zarr

I'm not completely sure what I was expecting, but this wasn't it.

It's Christian fiction, but there's nothing on the cover or anything to suggest that. And I was expecting actual serious drama, not drama caused by angst and by both of the main characters having Chronic Bad Decision Syndrone.

 

(Spoilers in the next couple of paragraphs, mild enough that I'm not going to bother tagging them.)

Basically, the entire book is about two girls, Louisa "Lou"/"Lu"/"El"/"Belle" (our protagonist) and Casey (her older sister) struggling to adjust to their mom getting remarried and to figure out what place their new stepdad has in their lives. Which they do, eventually. But not before Casey angsts a lot, Lou angsts to a lesser degree and learns to play the guitar, and various other things happen. Lots of drama, mostly, enough of which falls enough under "school drama" that it merited that post tag.

 

I was fairly happy that the main characters did warm up to their stepdad eventually, and that he was a genuinely nice person. The book wasn't my favorite, but that bit did give me the feels. (I think that's the first time I've ever said "the feels" on this blog.)

 

Of the two characters with Chronic Bad Decision Syndrome (you guessed it, Lu and Casey), Casey had it worse. And it only flared up occasionally in either of them, but it was consistent enough to meet the criteria.  And in fairness, they didn't cause all the problems for themselves. Only about half to two thirds.

(To have Chronic Bad Decision Syndrome, a character must repeatedly cause avoidable problems to happen anyway as a direct consequence of choices they make when they are mentally and situationally capable of making a non-problematic choice.)

 

I would like to give this book the Librarymouse Literary Award for Failing at Christian Fiction. Properties that qualify it for this award include theological quality (not great, there's prosperity gospel in there, but at least they do talk about forgiveness and other such concepts a couple times, and Louisa does pray occasionally), un-Christian behavior by characters (mostly minor ones, but come on, that {T-ish "non-binary" guy} was completely unnecessary) and a general lack of, y'know, presence of faith in the book. What I mean by that last one is that while it does get mentioned a couple times, the characters' Christian faith doesn't really factor into anything in the book. And while that's sadly true of some real people's faith, it's (to put it mildly) suboptimal.

Were this a videogame, I'd rate it: E10+ for alcoholism (the two main characters' original dad), angst, and that guy in the content warning above (who would be easy to miss for younger people).

And this book can have 2 stars. I didn't like it much; the characters' Chronic Bad Decision Syndrome and all the angsting, combined with content warning tag guy and various other factors, make a rather unappetizing smoothie.

(Endnote: While reading this, I repeatedly yelled things like "There will be repercussions for that, I can hear them with my metagaming ears" and "Can you just make a good decision for once in your life?" and other such. This may have caused several of my family members to look askance at me when I yelled at a book at odd moments.)

"Minecraft: The Village" by Max Brooks

 

Here we have the (apparently) final book in this (apparently) trilogy. As you might have guessed from the title, this is the part where the main characters find a village.

It did get a bit heavy-handed on the "war is bad" message; the pillagers (which show up in this) do kind of lend themselves to that sort of thing. They are a Minecraft monster whose entire purpose is to go around attacking villages for no reason, after all.

Unlike some Minecraft books (I'm looking at you, Winter Morgan), the big challenge the characters face actually is a big challenge in normal Minecraft. Instead of making a huge deal out of something that can be survived by A: running away and hiding or B: keeping your head and not being a noob, this has... a pillager raid. Those are hard, even if you've built a wall around your village beforehand; pillagers have a knack for finding the unforeseen weaknesses in your defense. (Or just for being really annoying and falling down holes where you can't get at them, but the ones in this book don't do that.)

 

I don't have tons to say about this one. Guy got competent, Summer no longer annoys me, and the villagers act like villagers. (And the pillagers act like slightly-smarter-than-in-real-Minecraft pillagers.)

This is a videogame. It's called Minecraft and rated E10+.

 

Despite it being Unsubtle™ on its anti-war and "renewable resources are better" messages, I'll still give this one 4 stars.

(Endnote: This book's setting apparently now has the Village & Pillage, Caves & Cliffs Part 1, and possibly Some Others That I'm Forgetting updates as well.)