Shadow and Bone

Title:  Shadow and Bone

Author: Leigh Bardugo

Publisher:  Square Fish (2012)

Genre(s): Fiction, Young Adult Fiction, Fantasy, Adventure

Length: 356 pages

Synopsis:  Ravka is a country at war.  For the last hundred years, battles have raged at the borders, and even with the help of the Grisha, those with fantastical abilities to manipulate matter through their use of the Small Science, there seems to be no way to bring an end to the fighting.  For Mal and Alina, the war is just another fact of life.  Orphaned by the battles, they had nothing when they came to live among the other war orphans at Duke Keramsov’s estate, but they found in one another the comfort and companionship they needed to survive.  For Alina, childhood friendship has begun to grow into something deeper as the two set out to serve together in the First Army, while Mal seems more interested in the beautiful Grisha girls that attend the charismatic Darkling, leader of the Grisha Second Army.  But when a terrifying encounter in a land of perpetual darkness known as the Shadow Fold reveals powers she’d never imagined she possessed, Alina is sent away from Mal to train among the Grisha.  Alone and afraid, she soon finds herself trapped in a web of political maneuvering orchestrated by the Darkling himself.  Her powers could hold the key to bringing about the end of Ravka’s suffering, but is she willing to pay the price?

My Rating: 4 Stars

My Opinion: There’s a lot about this book that I like.  In fact, most things about this book I enjoyed.  It’s a beautiful departure from the more typical western European underpinnings of most fantasy.  Set against a fantasticized Imperial Russia, the glittering world of the Grisha and the war-torn borders make sense together while still providing a stark juxtaposition for one another.  The world is richly imagined; Bardugo knows everything about this place, from court fashions in dress to the rationing pattern of sugar.  Occasionally, the details feel almost excessive, but usually that serves to highlight the excesses of the royal court.  The characters, on the other hand…  I felt the world Bardugo has created deserved a little better.  I didn’t want Alina to be another YA heroine sucked in by the alluring and apparently immortal tall-dark-and-handsome fellow.  I wanted Mal to be as complex and multilayered as Alina seems to believe.  There are peripheral characters that show the kind of exquisite nebulosity of which Bardugo is capable: Genya, the Queen’s pet Grisha, whose true allegiance is hard to fathom, who buries her real feelings beneath the perfect mask she’s created of her face; David, the Fabrikator who provides weapons both for and against our heroine, whose actions still make sense in the context of his world.  I wanted the main characters to have these same shades-of-grey struggles, to get a sense that there’s more to them than love triangles or conquer-the-world plots.  But the richness of the world and the other characters gives me hope.  I’m going to hunt down the next title in this trilogy, Siege and Storm, as soon as I can!

Shadow and Bone

The Lies of Locke Lamora

Title: The Lies of Locke Lamora

Author: Scott Lynch

Publisher: Bantam Books (2006)

Genre(s): Fiction, Fantasy, Adventure

Length: 499 pages

Synopsis:  Locke Lamora is very clever.  Even as a child, orphaned and taken in by one of Camorr's gang-masters, he was outwitting both his peers and his masters and getting himself into trouble in the process.  When he finds himself under the tutelage of Father Chains, a con man with a group of elite young thieves as his students, he finally finds an outlet for his quick wit and silver tongue.  Before long, he's risen to the rank of garrista, leader of his own little gang of thieves, the Gentlemen Bastards.  But Camorr is a dangerous city, even for the cleverest thieves, especially now that the mysterious Gray King seems to be targeting just such men.  As much as he's learned and as skilled as he's become, Locke Lamora still has a tendency to forget one thing: sometimes, he's just too clever for his own good...

 

My Rating: 5 Stars

My Opinion:  Ladies and gentlemen, put down whatever you're reading and go find this book.  Sometimes I wonder whether a book is really worth the 5 star rating I'm giving it... I tend to give them the benefit of the doubt if I can't pinpoint something wrong with it...after all, I have my personal tastes, and I don't expect every book to cater to them.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with this book.  It has earned every one of its five stars several times over.  The characters are charming, with their own preoccupations, skills, and flaws.  The setting is fascinating; there's a sense that, descriptive as Lynch is, he's barely scratched the surface of the world he's created.  It's a certainly a gritty place; the language might make the most verbose sailor blush, but it feels right for these people and this place.  Lynch pulls no punches.  His writing sweeps the reader along, through comedy and tragedy, tenderness and violence.  Cliched though it may be, I laughed, I cried, and read faster and faster, anxious to find out what would happen.  I will definitely be picking up another tale of the Gentlemen Bastards; the sequel, Red Seas Under Red Skies, was published in 2008, and the next book, The Republic of Thieves, is due out in October of this year.  I highly recommend this book.  It is, by far, one of the best books I've read in quite some time, and for a book reviewer, that's saying something.

Retribution Falls

Title: Retribution Falls

Author: Chris Wooding

Publisher: Spectra (April 2011)

Genre(s): Young Adult Fiction, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Steampunk, Adventure

Length: 480 pages

Synopsis: Led by a feckless captain, the crew of the airship Ketty Jay has led an aimless existence; smuggling and petty crime are their daily fare, drowned in liberal amounts of alcohol to lessen the weight of past troubles.  They are a diverse lot with only one thing in common— they have nowhere else to go.  When powers beyond their imagining step in to frame the crew for an appalling crime, captain and crew realize they have a choice.  They can run and hide as they have been doing all their lives, hoping their pasts never catch up, or they can turn and make a stand together, though all odds are against them.

My Rating: 4 Stars

My Opinion:

Chris Wooding’s steampunk adventure is a fun little book.  For fans of steampunk, it’s got something for everyone: clockwork, airships, magic, monsters.  Wooding has a flair for description and unexpected twists of plot that read almost cinematically.  He brings his readers along for the crew’s elation when a harebrained plan turns out unexpectedly well and tosses a bucket of ice water over them as fortunes take a sudden turn for the worse.  The forward momentum never lags even when his characters are lost and confused and uncertain where to turn.  That being said, the book is not perfect.  Occasional lapses in tone are distracting; for characters that deal in innuendo and subterfuge, there are a few graphic details that seem out of place in their description, though not in their nature.  The cast of characters, though it functions well as an ensemble, leaves a bit to be desired in the way of individuals.  A few are compelling and well rounded, dealing out backstories that make readers ache with compassion.  The rest fall flat, contributing occasional one liners or professional expertise as needed.  In his attempts to differentiate these supporting characters from one another, Wooding ends up repeating their distinguishing features over and over until one-dimensionality is inevitable.  For the most part, though, this doesn’t detract from the novel’s plot-driven dash from start to finish.  Wooding’s created a vibrantly imagined reality with room for exploration.  Though it borrows heavily from fantasy and steampunk conventions (the parallels with Joss Whedon’s television series Firefly are occasionally a little close for comfort), I am curious to see what other stories it may hold.