Midnight in Austenland

When Charlotte Kinder treats herself to a two-week vacation at Austenland, she happily leaves behind her ex-husband and his delightful new wife, her ever-grateful children, and all the rest of her real life in America. She dons a bonnet and stays at a country manor house that provides an immersive Austen experience, complete with gentleman actors who cater to the guests' Austen fantasies.

Everyone at Pembrook Park is playing a role, but increasingly, Charlotte isn't sure where roles end and reality begins. And as the parlor games turn a little bit menacing, she finds she needs more than a good corset to keep herself safe. Is the brooding Mr. Mallery as sinister as he seems? What is Miss Gardenside's mysterious ailment? Was that an actual dead body in the secret attic room? And-perhaps of the most lasting importance-could the stirrings in Charlotte's heart be a sign of real-life love?

The follow-up to reader favorite Austenland provides the same perfectly plotted pleasures, with a feisty new heroine, plenty of fresh and frightening twists, and the possibility of a romance that might just go beyond the proper bounds of Austen's world. How could it not turn out right in the end?

I have waited a loooong time for a new novel from Shannon Hale (whom I adore) and Midnight in Autenland delivers! Traditionally speaking, I haven't enjoyed her adult novels quite as much as her fantasy/fiction novels, but I was in exactly the right mood for Midnight in Austenland and I loved it.

Shannon Hale's classic wit and gorgeous word-smithing are all in play here and I enjoyed every word of this ride. I laughed constantly and my heart really ached for Charlotte. Divorce (and all its accompanying heartbreak) can be a heavy subject, but Shannon Hale manages it with a deft hand. I felt Charlotte's pain, but I also grew along with her and cheered right along as she regained feelings of self-worth and confidence. And all this happens in the oh-so-fun atmosphere of Austenland - plus murder mystery!

This book is Northanger Abbey, Mansfield Park, Jane Eyre, and about a dozen Agatha Christie novels all rolled into one...written by Shannon Hale! Come on - haven't I convinced you yet? The mystery is fun and intense with several surprises, some of which I saw coming miles away, some of which I didn't. There's just the right amount of romance here, just the right amount of heart, the perfect amount of mystery and suspense, and more than enough laughs. Go read it. (And if you live in Boise you can come borrow it from me :D)

And if you haven't heard the good news, Shannon Hale is releasing another novel later this year! A sequel to Newbery Honor-winning Princess Academy entitled....

Palace of Stone

Comes out August 21st

*cheers*

Epic Fail

It's a bit fluffy, but I really enjoyed this. I thought the story was sweet and a nice translation of Pride and Prejudice to a high school setting. Much better that Prom and Prejudice, in my opinion. Everything just felt so much more logical and real. This book may be based on a book written in Regency Era Englad, but the teenagers in this book actually acted like teenagers. I'm finding that what I like in a retelling of a classic story is a fresh take. Not every plot line has to be followed with rigid perfection. Not every character has to be included. So, Epic Fail doesn't feel like bad fan fiction, it feels like an original modern story with echoes in a long-time favorite. I liked it. A quick, fun read.

The Lucky One

From Goodreads:
When U.S. Marine Logan Thibault finds a photograph of a smiling young woman half-buried in the dirt during his third tour of duty in Iraq, his first instinct is to toss it aside. Instead, he brings it back to the base for someone to claim, but when no one does, he finds himself always carrying the photo in his pocket. Soon Thibault experiences a sudden streak of luck—winning poker games and even surviving deadly combat that kills two of his closest buddies. Only his best friend, Victor, seems to have an explanation for his good fortune: the photograph—his lucky charm.
Back home in Colorado, Thibault can’t seem to get the photo—and the woman in it—out of his mind. Believing that she somehow holds the key to his destiny, he sets out on a journey across the country to find her, never expecting the strong but vulnerable woman he encounters in Hampton, North Carolina—Elizabeth, a divorced mother with a young son—to be the girl he’s been waiting his whole life to meet. Caught off guard by the attraction he feels, Thibault keeps the story of the photo, and his luck, a secret. As he and Elizabeth embark upon a passionate and all-consuming love affair, the secret he is keeping will soon threaten to tear them apart—destroying not only their love, but also their lives.
Filled with tender romance and terrific suspense, The Lucky One is Nicholas Sparks at his best—an unforgettable story about the surprising paths our lives often take and the power of fate to guide us to true and everlasting love.

This is me, trying to read more books for grown-up people. :D Which just proved to me that I like romance for young adults much better. I read The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks a few years ago and it made me cry like a baby. Don't remember much more about it than that, though. I never saw the movie. While looking at things on IMDB the other day, I ran across a trailer for the movie based on The Lucky One and thought it looked interesting. Typical me, what did I do? Get the book from the library.

And without the sweetness that was present in The Notebook, The Lucky One really fell flat for me. Flat all around. The characters had no dimension and seemed to be stock characters from every bad romance novel ever written. Logan, the strong silent type - what's his face (can't even remember his name now) the ex-husbad, complete sleazebag - Elizabeth, the lonely girl - grandma, the comic relief (she really wasn't that funny either)... etc...

There was almost no conflict driving the plot. It was so dull. I kept asking myself, "where is this going and why?" because I had no hints from the book. I felt irritated when I suppose I should have been feeling emotionally touched. It wasn't working for me. Part of me wonders if it's because this is a romance book written by a man. I'm not anti-men, heaven forbid, but I don't think that men's brains work quite the same way as women's brains. I just didn't get the feeling that Nicholas Sparks knows what woman want to know about in a love story. It's not just about getting physically involved as soon as possible. Women want to feel loved and cared about. They want friendship. And those are the things we want to read about. At least, those are the things I want to read about.

I haven't read any other Nicholas Sparks (besides The Notebook) so I can't say if this is typical of his writing, but I can promise you that I won't be wasting any more time reading his books.

Hourglass

Goodreads summary:
One hour to rewrite the past . . .
 
For seventeen-year-old Emerson Cole, life is about seeing what isn’t there: swooning Southern Belles; soldiers long forgotten; a haunting jazz trio that vanishes in an instant. Plagued by phantoms since her parents’ death, she just wants the apparitions to stop so she can be normal. She’s tried everything, but the visions keep coming back.

So when her well-meaning brother brings in a consultant from a secretive organization called the Hourglass, Emerson’s willing to try one last cure. But meeting Michael Weaver may not only change her future, it may change her past.

Who is this dark, mysterious, sympathetic guy, barely older than Emerson herself, who seems to believe every crazy word she says? Why does an electric charge seem to run through the room whenever he’s around? And why is he so insistent that he needs her help to prevent a death that never should have happened?

Full of atmosphere, mystery, and romance, Hourglass merges the very best of the paranormal and science-fiction genres in a seductive, remarkable young adult debut.

I planned on avoiding this one; I really did. I read a lot of reviews talking about paranormal romance and cheesy love triangles, but I gave in. I blame it on the time travel plot.

Which is hands down the best part of this book.

Oooh I so loved the time travel and the plot. It was a great convoluted mess that made perfect sense in the end. Myra McEntire's plot was intense and mysterious and fascinating - a completely new twist on time travel that I've never read before. Her language and descriptions were also beautifully done. And I loved Emerson as a main character. Strong and intelligent and brave.

But... (you knew that "but" was coming, didn't you?) it's true: the romance is annoying and the love triangle is unnecessary. I liked the second boy better than the main boy too, which was enough to make things really irritating. The romance is too sudden, too "electrical" (gag me), too predictable. But I have to give credit to Myra McEntire's overall plot, because while I thought the romance happened way to fast, she eventually shows that there was actually a reason for it. A reason that made perfect sense. A reason that made me think, "Ok... that was kind of brilliant." Which was how I felt about the book as a whole because as things went on they got better and better and by the time I closed the book I thought, "Ok... that was really brilliant."

I enjoyed this book, but I know a lot of people didn't (and won't). Hopefully I've given you enough information on it so you'll know whether or not it's a book that you will like. :D

Prom and Prejudice

Goodreads summary:
After winter break, the girls at the very prestigious Longbourn Academy become obsessed with the prom. Lizzie Bennet, who attends Longbourn on a scholarship, isn’t interested in designer dresses and expensive shoes, but her best friend, Jane, might be — especially now that Charles Bingley is back from a semester in London.

Lizzie is happy about her friend’s burgeoning romance but less than impressed by Charles’s friend, Will Darcy, who’s snobby and pretentious. Darcy doesn’t seem to like Lizzie either, but she assumes it’s because her family doesn’t have money. Clearly, Will Darcy is a pompous jerk — so why does Lizzie find herself drawn to him anyway?

Will Lizzie’s pride and Will’s prejudice keep them apart? Or are they a prom couple in the making? Whatever the result, Elizabeth Eulberg, author of The Lonely Hearts Club, has concocted a very funny, completely stylish delight for any season — prom or otherwise. 

Sounds a little cheesy but kind of fun, right? I kept seeing this title on YA book blogs, and I am such a P&P fan that I was worried this book would ruin the story, but curious at the same time just to see how it turned out.

There were lots of things that I liked and one major thing that I didn't.

First off, it was a cleverly realized setting. The major plot points from Pride and Prejudice and major characters transferred over to contemporary times surprisingly well. I particularly loved that Elizabeth was a professional concert pianist in the making. Music plays a big part in the plot and some of my favorite piano pieces (hello Rachmaninoff - love everything by him) were mentioned in detail. So, my inner music nerd was very happy about that. And it was just fun reading this, anticipating my favorite moments from the original and seeing them reinterpreted.

But my big problem (and the thing that kept me from really loving this) was the dialogue.

Elizabeth Eulberg attempted the impossible. She tried to take Austen's witty and clever dialogue and turn it into something modern. She failed miserably, and mostly because she tried to take exact sentences from the original and rework them by changing just a word here or there. She kept the sentence structure and a lot of the original wording, but would throw in random things like "cellphone" "jerk" "BFF" or "email". It was a colossal flop, in my opinion. The end result was waaayyyyy overly formal sounding. Not in the least bit natural or casual. Ugh. It was so hard to read the dialogue that it really ruined the book for me. I wish that Elizabeth Eulberg had just done her own interpretation of the dialogue, instead of trying to keep it so close to the original.

And the other issue I just can't get over is that an inconsequential thing like prom is never going to create the same compelling emotions as marriage and true love.

So, fun - but nowhere close.

The Girl Who Chased the Moon

Summary:

Emily Benedict has come to Mullaby, North Carolina, hoping to solve at least some of the riddles surrounding her mother’s life. But the moment Emily enters the house where her mother grew up and meets the grandfather she never knew, she realizes that mysteries aren’t solved in Mullaby, they’re a way of life: Here are rooms where the wallpaper changes to suit your mood. Unexplained lights skip across the yard at midnight. And a neighbor, Julia Winterson, bakes hope in the form of cakes, not only wishing to satisfy the town’s sweet tooth but also dreaming of rekindling the love she fears might be lost forever. Can a hummingbird cake really bring back a lost love? Is there really a ghost dancing in Emily’s backyard? The answers are never what you expect. But in this town of lovable misfits, the unexpected fits right in.

Delightful! And delicious. :D This is a perfect light, for-fun read. What really took me by surprise in this book is the brushes of magic. I was expecting it to be all contemporary and to find logical explanations for everything. Instead, Sarah Addison Allen left me just a bit enchanted, wishing something magical would happen in my life.

This book follows the stories of two women (with intertwined lives). I liked that it combined a teenager's story of finding answers about her mother's past and an adult woman's story of reconciling her past with her hope for the future. So in a way, it's both an adult and a YA book. I liked all the characters really, and though this feels like a fluff read, some of them are going through very real and serious problems. In some of the flashbacks we have to face depression, cutting, suicide, and teen pregnancy. Instead of turning this book into a downer, though, these elements help ground a story that would otherwise be a bit too fanciful and sickly-sweet. Sometimes I felt like the plot got a bit soap-opera-y, but then I decided that with a book like this, the trick is to not overthink it and just enjoy the ride.

Which I did. And now I want to make a cake. Mmmmm.... I promise this book will make you crave cake.