More Books than Time

Book Reviews - Romance, Fantasy, Science Fiction - By an Adult for Adults

Maggot Moon Sally Gardner Science Fiction Dark Urban Fantasy

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Maggot Moon is hard to classify. The protagonist is Standish Treadwell who cannot read, cannot write, isn’t bright. Yet he foils a plot to claim a lunar landing by his totalitarian country.

Very Dark

I noticed two reviewers on Amazon were upset at the violence and hatred that poured through Standish’s teacher, the local neighborhood snitches and the secret police. There is a reason for this.

This book is aimed at young adults but it is  more suited to older teens and adults. A teacher murders a student by beating him to death; Standish’s mother has her tongue cut out; Standish and his grandfather are slated to go to the “maggot farms” the next day. Standish has a best friend Hector who disappears along with his parents from their next door home. The regime ensures Hector’s father will cooperate by cutting off Hector’s fingers, one at a time. They shot his mother immediately.

Maggot Moon is not just “dark” it is Stygian, dealing with horrible happenings and horrible plots with complete matter of fact acceptance.  It is that matter of fact telling that makes this so terrible.  Standish, with mismatched eyes and not too bright knows it is a matter of time before the authorities come for him too.  He is living on borrowed time.

Standish learns that the facility behind his house, hidden by a very tall wall capped with broken glass, is a fake moon surface. The scientists, the “moon explorers”, the people who built the facility, will all be murdered when the fake lunar landing is done. We learn the graves are already dug.

Bravery

In the face of this Standish decides to jump out in full view of the television cameras – and the machine gun armed guards – with a sign that says “hoax”. His reason is simple. No one should believe that such a horrible country can deliver something so wonderful as a moon landing. And no one should fear the regime’s threats to launch missels from the moon.

Standish may not be bright but he is brave. He knows he has no chance to survive, but of course, he won’t survive even if he stays home meekly waiting to be collected for his one way trip to the maggot farm.

Interesting Characters

Standish, his best friend Hector, his grandfather, his grandfather’s love, Hector’s parents are interesting people that we feel like we could like had we met them in person. Sally Gardner does a good job with the characterization.

Overall

Sally Gardner built an all-too-believable society and her novel builds upon the initial horror, until it is almost pure terror, but the other ingredients are grace and love.

I recommend this for adults, not for children.

The 5th Wave Rick Yancey Dark YA Science Fiction Alien Invasion

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What do you think of when you think “alien invasion”?  Independence Day?  Ender’s Game?  The 5th Wave will remind you of all these yet it is unique.

Alien horrors intent on destroying humanity? Check.
Young people fighting to save the earth? Check.
Now take this, multiply the drive to kill off humanity ten fold and throw in an ill-fated romance.  Unique, yes?

Really Rotten Aliens

What makes this book so good is the sheer viciousness of the alien plans and the preview we see of what the aliens will face when (if) they finally exterminate humans. The extermination plans are diabolical. First an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) that wipes out all electric signals. That weakens earth’s nations and hobbles the armed forces. Then a giant tsunami that floods everywhere. That kills about 3 billion people. Then a plague to kill 97% of the rest.

That still leaves about 100 million human beings. The aliens, the Others, don’t want to hurt the planet, so they can’t drop an asteroid or set off nuclear weapons. As the book begins the Others are killing off the remnant off one by one with the fourth wave and are preparing for the fifth wave.

Spoiler Alert!!

The most evil of all their plans is their death camps. They bring in busloads of kids, reassure them, kill off about half immediately, then train the remaining half to do the killing. This is the fifth wave.  This is the part that doesn’t make much sense;  I can’t see why they would use kids and I sure didn’t understand why they blew up their own main base.

Puzzling Future Problems

The aliens will have a problem and we see glimpses of it in the main male character, Evan. You see, the aliens have no bodies. They gave their physical forms up when they left their home planet 10,000 years ago. They downloaded themselves into human minds to complete their work. Evan is one such human / alien meld and he finds being human all too tempting. He tells Cassie that most of the Others feel being human would be beneath them. Yet they must take on bodies to affect the physical world and finish the extermination.

I kept wondering what the aliens will do. If they have no bodies and they don’t want to be human, then do they continue to download themselves into human infants? Aliens die when their host body dies. How will they reproduce? If they intend to stay pure mind and not take on bodies, then why do they need to kill of humans? What use would they have for trees or animals or food?

The other point that puzzled me was the purpose of the fifth wave, human kids killing off humans. The fourth wave, Silencers or Others who look and act like humans, were effective killers. Why enlist little kids? Unless the Others were so twisted that it pleased them, I didn’t see a reason to switch from using Silencers to using fully human kids.

5 Stars but With a Catch

Overall I liked this book and look forward to a sequel. Yancey is an excellent writer who knows how to tell a story and enlist us in his characters’ lives. I felt like I was Cassie, alone, cold, frightened, driven to survive. I didn’t feel so much empathy for the second male character, Ben Parish who was at the boot camp learning to kill people. The whole boot camp section just didn’t make a lot of sense to me. In fact I put the book down for an evening because I got a little tired of it, a few too many cliches.

The first half with Cassie was excellent, 5 stars without a doubt. The second half with Ben was weaker and we had a bit too much of a miracle ending. So give that second half 3 stars for the Ben sections and 5 for Cassie.

Truly YA Fiction

Many of the YA fantasy fiction novels are classified as YA only because the characters are young. The 5th Wave is written for older teens. Adults will enjoy it as I did, but we’re more likely to look askew at the basic premise of aliens becoming human to kill off humans and we’ll be skeptical of the whole boot camp section.

If you can put aside your natural skepticism and take the book’s premise as valid you will enjoy this.

The Selection, Strange Semi Dystopian Fantasy with Romance by Kiera Cass

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I liked The Selehttps://amzn.to/3RDkkXYction although I did not like the characters.  How odd is that?  I found the heroine, America Singer, whiny and all too immature.  Her two love interests, Aspen, a lowly Six, and Maxon the prince were OK, but I found it impossible to believe that Maxon could be as clueless as he was described.  (I could believe that Aspen was a sexist jerk.)

The Intriguing Parts

The most interesting parts of the book were the caste system, which was downright puzzling, and the idea that a big country (apparently a combination of the US, Canada, Mexico and part of Central America) could be governed by a king with a tiny lot of ministers.

The caste system allocated people to jobs by caste, into which one was born.  Apparently a woman could marry up and join the higher caste, but if she married someone below then she moved down.  People in castes Five, Six and Seven are poor with unpredictable livelihoods.  Eights are wanderers, homeless people.  Sixes and Sevens go to school while higher castes are home schooled / private schooled? / tutored.

The really goofy thing is that Fives are all artists. Huh? That makes no sense whatsoever. Sixes are servants. Fours work in factories or farm. I can go along with servants and factory workers being hereditary roles but artists? You either have artistic talent or you do not. The heroine’s brother has zero interest in art or music and wants to be a scientist. So in our mythical country he can’t be a scientist, however talented and good he might be, but he can be an artist, however untalented?

The government part was stupid. No congress or Imperial Senate or even a House of Lords, no governors, just the king and his family rule the country. No way, that simply would not work. There are hints that the Twos have political clout but no details.  When I read dystopia I want details:  How does it work, who gets what and why does it hold together.

I found it incredible that Prince Maxon would be so unaware of the realities in his country that he did not realize the lower castes went hungry. Then he announced that the girls in the Selection would get a lower allowance with the difference going to feed the poor for oh, maybe a week or two. He made an appeal on television for the upper castes to donate, but how long will that last?

Lots of Pretty Clothes and Hunky Guys

I think one reason I enjoyed this was that I read it when traveling in the evenings after long days of yucky business meetings.  Something light, fluffy and with lots of clothes and hunky guys filled the bill.

Another reason was that the book reminded me so much of two books I enjoyed, A Posse of Princesses by Sherwood Smith and The Hunger Games. The girls compete as in The Hunger Games but losers don’t die, they actually get rewarded with higher status. The winner gets to marry our clueless friend, Prince Maxon.

Just as in A Posse of Princesses the contestants include the requisite selfish beauty, Celeste, the narrator/heroine, the heroine’s good friend. What we don’t have are any of the other characters or real interesting relationships. The characters act like sixth graders at their first school dance.

I enjoyed this while reading it, but as I was writing this review it struck me how incredibly silly it was and how very poorly written. None of the characters were believable and the dialogue was horrible. I will probably read the sequel, The Elite but I’ll wait for another business trip where I need something brainless with pretty clothes and hunky guys.

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Faerie Wars Chronicles Ruler of the Realm, Faerie Lord Herbie Brennan YA Fantasy

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The Faerie Wars Chronicles started off with a bang with Faerie Wars and its sequel The Purple Emperor. Both were excellent with interesting characters, fast plots, evil villains, well-written dialogue and conflicts that felt real.

You can read my reviews here:

The Faerie Wars by Herbie Brennan YA Fantasy Fiction Book 1 Chronicles

The Purple Emperor Faerie Wars Chronicles Herbie Brennan YA Fantasy Review

Sadly the next two books in the series, Ruler of the Realm and Faerie Lord were disappointing and did not come close to the fun and enjoyment of the first books. Both were boring, with little character development and even less plot tension. Both were unconvincing and worst of all, left me feeling like I really didn’t care what happened next.

The whole series is aimed at younger readers but the first two books were satisfying for me, and based on reviews on Amazon, many adult readers enjoyed them too. These next two books have all the shortcuts we expect in YA fiction that can turn off adults. The characters just do things without drawing out why they act as they do. Wonderful results happen to save the day, without any reason as to why.  Very likely younger readers will enjoy these two novels although I did not.

Ruler of the Realm

Ruler of the Realm wasn’t bad, just not very good. I did not enjoy reading it.

Just Blah

It felt pedestrian, with the characters acting out a script vs. acting like real people. For example, Henry, the hero from our world, is kidnapped by the aliens also known as demons, and implanted with a device to control his thoughts and given false memories. He believes he has been turned into a demon and ordered to produce a faerie/demon child with the Purple Empress Blue. Really? Henry has taken biology classes in high school and should know it doesn’t work this way. Even had he been changed into a demon he cannot produce a demon child. That may seem like a trivial point that only a pedant would care about, but I have a hard time believing that someone as smart as Henry would fall for a lie like that.

The Good Parts

The only good parts of the book are the settings, which are well done and the ending. Brennan introduces several parts of the Faerie World that we’ve not seen before and gives excellent descriptions.  When  you’re in the desert you feel hot.

Not to spoil it for readers, but the finale is excellent with Blue managing to overcome the demon king by herself. What I do like with Herbie Brennan’s books is that they stand on their own without cliffhangers in between novels.

Overall Just OK

Ruler of the Realm dragged. So Henry is back in England and confused. Yes, and why should I care? The previous two books gave you a reason to care, but Ruler of the Realm does not.

I managed to finish this but it was a close call.

Faerie Lord

I did not get past the first 30 pages or so of Faerie Lord then skipped to the end. I was glad that they rescued Hodge but that was about the only thing I liked in the book.

Based on Amazon reviews, I am in the minority not liking this. Maybe I tried to read it too soon after the first two books and just had enough of the series.

I see there is a fifth book now, The Faeman Quest, with Henry and Blue’s daughter Mella which I will not read.

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All Else Confusion Gentle Romance by Betty Neels English Countryside Novel

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I mentioned in my last post how much I enjoyed romance novels by Betty Neels. They are gentle, friendly, easy reading with interesting characters. Sometimes the plots are a bit contrived, but that is true for most romance novels – it’s even true for romance in real life!

All Else Confusion uses one of Betty Neels’ more difficult plots, where the couple, Jake and Annis, marry before discovering or realizing they are in love. These are difficult because the author has to give some plausible reason for the marriage, has to provide some incident that shows to one or the other (or both) people that they really are in love, has to have some tension or challenge.

Plot Difficulties

If you think about it, there are four main variations on this plot.

  1. He thinks it’s convenience.  She knows she loves him.
  2. He thinks it’s convenience and so does she.
  3. He knows it’s love but she does not.
  4. They both know it is love but for some reason neither realizes the other feels the same way or is afraid to say something.

There are sub variations of course.  One of them could love the other but not know it, or one could have extremely good reasons to get married that cause the other to assume there is no love, etc and etc.  The main problem with these plots is turning the corner from “convenience” to “love” and giving a good picture of both characters and their feelings.

Character Limitations

Betty Neels tells the story from the female perspective and in some of her later novels she does a better job showing the man’s point of view and emotions than she does with All Else Confusion. She wrote All Else Confusion after she had been writing novels for over 10 years, but it reads like it was one of her earliest, more tentative stories from before she developed her sure voice.

In any case, we never get a sense of Jake’s true emotions. Does he love Annis from the beginning? Or only after they are married, and if only afterwards, what caused the change?

Overall OK Story

Overall I’d rate this as in the bottom half of her novels.  I did read it to the end but I don’t desire to read it again.  It was a little too simplistic and without the emotional depth that make romance novels so enjoyable.

Trust Me On This Screwball Romantic Comedy Novel Jennifer Crusie

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Jennifer Crusie describes Trust Me on This as a screwball comedy, with lots of plot twists and turns, mistaken identities, unexpected romances. It wasn’t that complicated a story. I enjoyed it, but it’s one of those books where things just happen and the characters never come alive.  Crusie wrote plenty of plot but not a lot of story.

Trust Me on This is a cute story with two parallel romances plus a plot to trap a fraudster and another plot by the main heroine, Dennie Banks, to bump her journalism career up a few steps from women’s page to more serious interviews.

3 Stars

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Romance Novels – A Royal Pain by Megan Mulry, Always and Forever by Betty Neels

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It would be hard to find two romance novels as different as these.

A Royal Pain

A Royal Pain is about a modern American girl Bronte Talbot who is dead set on having a hot temporary boyfriend with lots of sex and no commitment. Bronte seems to believe this is what she is supposed to be doing as a modern career minded female, especially after a disastrous romance. I never got the impression that Bronte truly wanted the no-strings-attached relationship as much as she felt it was what she deserved and would be safest.

I didn’t care much for this. I read about two thirds through then skimmed the rest as Bronte got tiresome and so did her romance with the British doctoral student who turned out to be a duke and second cousin to the Queen of England. I’m not a fan of this lifestyle or beliefs and attitudes and it was hard to give a darn for the characters. Frankly the dialogue and plot weren’t enough to overcome the sleaze factor.

The dialogue deteriorated into a string of F-F-F-F because apparently we were supposed to admire Bronte’s liberation from good English and her use of profanity. She was shallow, superficial and totally selfish. Example, she thought she might be pregnant and resented her fiance’s suggestion she not drink and even more resented his disapproval when she blithely mentioned the morning after pill. Really? You are going to get married yet you think your fiance is controlling because he suggested you skip the wine? Grow up Bronte!

The minor characters were stereotypes. Max’s mother is stuck up and not at all happy with Max’ choice of bride. Bronte’s friends are shallow just like she is. All in all, it was a boring, annoying novel and one I cannot recommend.

Always and Forever

Always and Forever by Betty Neels is classic Betty Neels. She wrote gentle, books with interesting characters.

Like all her books Always and Forever  has no sex scenes. There is tension and attraction but it is not in your face or in your bed. The characters don’t sleep around and they display all around good moral standards, not talking about others, not gossiping, not taking advantage or mooching, not giving into jealousy or envying others their good fortunes.

Always and Forever finds Amabel running her mother’s bed and breakfast while her mother is in Canada visiting her sister and her sister’s new baby. It’s obvious that Amabel and her mother are not well off, but they have enough to live on. One guest is Oliver Fforde who arrives with his mother during a bad storm. Although Amabel is not the type of girl he normally dates something about her lingers in his mind and Oliver seeks her out several times.

Amabel’s mother returns along with her new husband who instantly dislikes Amabel but is prepared to allow her to stay provided she works for free in his new nursery business and takes care of the housework. The final straw, when her new stepfather plans to kill her cat and dog, sends Amabel to visit her older aunt near York. There she finds work in a trendy gift shop.

Oliver visits her a couple times, although he isn’t sure why. He isn’t aware that he is attracted to her kindness, good cheer and steady character. Unfortunately the girl he has been dating discovers Amabel and prevails on her employer to fire her. Oliver finds her in the nick of time.

A few more mishaps ensue, but all happen without excessive drama. Once you accept that characters like these two exist, and accept the coincidental meeting, the story proceeds in a believable way that is most enjoyable.

I’ve always enjoyed Betty Neels’ novels. Yes, it is difficult to believe there are that many rich, single, successful Dutch doctors who desperately need wives, and yes, it’s a bit fortuitous how often the wife they need turns out to be our English heroine. But if you can get by that plot device the books are easy reading and fun and the characters are admirable. None of her characters is nasty or vindictive – although they may be tempted – nor are they saintly or too good to be true. I was delighted to find that her books have been reissued and intend to read them all.

What the Lady Wants, Romance Romantic Novel Jennifer Crusie

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What the Lady Wants is a light romance, cute with some funny moments. The hero is a private detective who helps his client Mae solve a murder, find a diary and fall in love.

I am on a bit of a Jennifer Crusie kick right now. I read a couple of hers and enjoyed them enough to look for more.  I found this one at the library. It’s the lightest of the three I’ve read so far, all fluff. Cute fluff, funny fluff, but fluff. I prefer books that have a little bit of meat to them. This a Harlequin romance, so we’re not looking at War and Peace, but…

It’s cute and a very fast read; at 155 pages we’re talking an early evening. There are some explicit sex scenes (it is a Harlequin after all) and some good dialogue.

Three stars.

Here are my reviews of her previous books.

Anyone But You review is:  Anyone But You, Romance Novel by Jennifer Crusie Romantic Comedy

The Cinderella Deal review is:  The Cinderella Deal, Romantic Comedy by Jennifer Crusie

Anyone But You, Romance Novel by Jennifer Crusie Romantic Comedy

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Jennifer Crusie specializes in fun romantic novels with plenty of character interest and good old fashioned plot. Anyone But You begins with Nina, a 40 year old recently divorced lady, picking out a perky puppy from the shelter. Luckily she spots Fred, an older beagle basset mix who is on his last day of life, before she can pick out a puppy. Fred is not perky. He is morose, fat and a little shy of love.

Nina lives in a 3 story older home converted into flats with a fire escape running outside the window. Nina decides to teach Fred how to climb down the escape to do his business by the dumpster in the back yard. Of course she meets her neighbor Alex when Fred gets mixed up on which window to climb back into and curls up next to Alex on his couch instead of with Nina on her couch.

The Plot and Characters

The plot is cute, funny, and what saves it from being contrived is the characters have real issues. Nina is worried about getting old and fears getting involved with Alex because he is so much younger. Plus Nina works for a specialty publisher that is slowly going broke due to publishing far too many serious, boring books. Nina has to decide how important the age gap is and she takes a huge risk on a funny, sexy novel that she knows her boss will deplore.

Alex is an emergency room doctor from a family of all doctors, all of whom specialize, make tons of money and all of whom what Alex to follow their career path. Alex is happy being an ER doctor, thank you very much, but he is tempted to specialize to earn the income he thinks Nina wants.

The two main minor characters, Charity and Max, have serious life challenges they must acknowledge. The characters do work things out but there is no magic wand. Each must decide something and take action that leaves them exposed and at risk.

Deja Vu All Over Again

I read Anyone But You within a week of reading The Cinderella Deal. You can read my review of The Cinderella Deal here:

The Cinderella Deal, Romantic Comedy by Jennifer Crusie

I was struck by how Crusie reuses the same plot elements, even similar minor characters, yet manages to make the story fresh and interesting. Let’s see the parallels:

Book begins with girl finding a pet. Yes.
Girl initially believes boy is completely unsuitable. Yes.
Boy is a professional, not rich but comfortable. Yes.
Girl and boy live in the same apartment house. Yes.
Girl has career difficulties. Yes.

Overall I found The Cinderella Deal a little more intricate novel with more complex secondary plots but I enjoyed the characters in Anyone But You more.

Romance Novel

Anyone But You is published by Harlequin, the imprint notable for steamy scenes more than literary quality. Anyone But You has about 10 pages of steam and is well written.

Recommendation

Anyone But You was a fun book that I enjoyed enough to continue to get more books by Jennifer Crusie. I give it four stars.

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The Purple Emperor Faerie Wars Chronicles Herbie Brennan YA Fantasy Review

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The Purple Emperor (The Faerie Wars Chronicles) begins immediately after the end of Faerie Wars. As the title implies, Herbie Brennan has turned this into a several book series, with five books as of May 2013.

Excellent Sequel

So often a series bogs down in book 2. The first book moves fast, with intriguing characters and setting, interesting challenges and threats. The second often spends extra time setting up new characters and side plots to explore later, with the main plot or characters suffering from slow pace. The good news is that The Purple Emperor breaks that jinx; it is as good or better than the first book. I have a reserve in for the third book and look forward to reading it.

Character Development

I mentioned how interesting the villains were in my blog review for Faerie Wars. (You can read that blog post here: The Faerie Wars by Herbie Brennan YA Fantasy Fiction Book 1 Chronicles.)

The villains are truly villainous, rotten to the core and happy with themselves in their vileness. Book 2, The Purple Emperor spends more time on these amazing villains and we get to know (but not love) Brimstone, Lord Hairstreak, and Chalkhill. I actually developed a mild fondness for Chalkhill, the cowardly, despicable former glue factory owner, cat killer and now symbiotic host to a talkative Wyrm.

The younger characters, Pyrgus, Henry and Blue develop as would real people and we get to know Pyrgus and Blue’s younger half brother, Comma better and meet the forest Faerie Nymph. Pyrgus seems to become less central to the action during the story and Harry gets a more prominent role. All three continue through the typical coming-of-age struggles, but what sets The Purple Emperor apart from so many YA fantasies is the coming of age part just happens. It’s the background, the normal side effect from teens having to act as adults in the grown up world. There is nothing boring or pretentious here, just a good story with plot and tensions that force three young people to mature.

Setting

Brennan has some wonderful settings that could be built into the story more. We go from England to the Faerie capital city to the deep forest, back to the city, in the palace, in Lord Hairstreak’s mansion in the woods. Brennan could capitalize on these a little more.

Plot

Just like its predecessor, The Purple Emperor moves fast with challenges, surprises and traps. Brennan has mastered the YA fiction plot elements and spends just the right amount of time on each one. Yet the book has more nuances and layers that make it enjoyable for adults too.

Overall

I liked this book very much, even more than the first book. Brennan wrote a tight story with fascinating characters, dastardly villains, interesting settings and intriguing moral problems. Adults and older teens will enjoy the full novel while younger teens will like the fast plot and good-guy/bad-guy story.

5 Stars.

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