Sea is a story about a girl named Sienna. Sienna’s mother died a few years earlier in a plane crash. Since her mother’s accident, she has refused to go on an airplane and a part of her hasn’t healed yet. Her father is a psychologist with a humanitarian bent. The story is set shortly after the tsunami. Her father hands her a plane ticket for her birthday with the added bomb shell that they will be going to a remote village in Indonesia to help the kids there grieve after losing most of their family in the tsunami. After some drama, she acquiesces.  Once there, she meets Deni, a very handsome boy who makes her palms sweat.

Although this book has received glowing reviews, I will not be adding to the embers. This novel is Ms. Kling’s first attempt and I feel that she could have written a better novel. Parts of the book were so descriptive it read like a text book, other parts were glossed over. Near the climax of the novel Sienna chooses a path that I cannot believe she would choose. It felt as if Ms. Kling had wanted to take us to a certain part of Indonesia and couldn’t figure out how to get us there. The way the story panned out, didn’t make sense. I don’t want to say more because then I’d have to give a spoiler warning. I also felt that once Sienna falls hard for the handsome Deni, the story really just went off the rails. The rest of the story was spent thinking and obsessing about a boy, whom it was clear, she could never have a future with. If the author would have had Sienna meet and befriend a girl, she may have been able to more believably tell us about the plight of Indonesia after the tsunami. As it is, Sea is nothing more than the obsessions of a fickle, spoiled American girl in a far away country. Not really a book I would consider worth reading. That being said, you’d be hard pressed to find another bad review of this one.

Sea

Heidi R. Kling. Putnam Juvenile 2010, Hardcover, 336 pages, $10.20

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen is an English classic that has been in print for over 200 years. It’s about the exploits of the Bennet family as their silly mother tries desperately to find her five daughters husbands. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is about the exploits of the Bennet family as the silly Mrs. Bennet tries to find husbands for her five, zombie-slaying daughters. You see, zombies have taken over England and the Bennet sisters have pledged to protect England until they obtain husbands, however long that may be. They trained in China under Kung Fu masters. But that’s not part of this story, you need to check out the prequel for all the deets. So basically, the story moves forward like Jane Austen wrote, with zombies added in by Grahame-Smith.

The bits of zombie mayhem add colour and and a level of grossness that this not there in the original. For instance, when I first read Pride and Prejudice, I never felt like vomiting, not true when I read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. I was never scared, but I was definitely shocked, grossed out, and my stomach hurt from laughing. If you’re into zombies and not sure about the classics, this is the perfect way to initiate yourself. If you love the classic and can stand the fact that someone made it a lot less respectable, check it out. Either way, you just may surprise yourself.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

Jane Austen. Quirk Books 2009, Paperback, 320 pages, $3.99

At the start of the novel, Frankie attends a party on the golf course that was put on by a group of boys, one of them being her new boyfriend Matthew. The party was lame, just people drinking beer in the freezing cold. Matthew spent the entire party talking with everyone but her. She wasn’t very upset by this, just bored because she had no one else to talk to. The narrator pops in at this point saying that girls usually had three different reactions to parties dominated by boys. One, the girl may find no value in it and decide to stay home from the next one preferring instead to bake or knit. The second type of girl would pretend she was having fun just so she could hang out at the same party as her guy. And the third type asserts herself into the world of the boys, drinking or playing video games along with them. Frankie’s reaction was different from all three. She dreamed about what she would do if she were in charge. The story tells us how she infiltrated a secret all boy society and took charge.

I loved the way the story was told, the writing was witty, the pacing was good and the characters developed through the book. I honestly could not put it down once I started. Definitely a great read.

The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks

E. Lockhart. Hyperion Book CH 2009, Paperback, 352 pages, $3.45

I thought the premise of the book was good and easily became hooked. Then the book really started to tank. A great idea does not a book make. The book felt like it had been witten with the message first and the plot only there to shove the message in your face. I thought a glaring hole existed when the only characters introduced in the book were alphas and the savage. A society so heavily based on eugenics and caste, and we don’t get to meet any of the lower members? Odd. Also, with such large issues to deal with, the author seemed to disproportionatly focus on femle promiscuity in this horrible new world. Really? That’s the biggest problem? And why are there so many shakespear quotes? I mean, the novel isn’t that thick to begin with. I suppose the constant quotes were included to beef up the page count.

So now that I’ve ripped this book a new one, I will say everyone should probably read it. It is one of those modern classics that pops up from time to time. The premise is interesting, the gently fascist consumerist government model is interesting, and it might be worth it just for the fordisms.

Brave New World

Aldous Huxley. Harper Perennial Modern Classics 2006, Paperback, 288 pages, $7.97

So basically, the story had bad pacing, underwhelming world building, unbelievable characters, boring and unbelievable conversations, and plenty of hitting over the head preaching, which frankly, marred the book’s goodness for me, not to mention the head ache it gave. I fought through the first half of the book (since I keep hearing about this series), but thankfully, it picked up in the second half. Overall though, the book was a waste of my time. I like knowing how a story ends and this one is part of series, so I couldn’t resist reading the plot summaries of the other books on wikipedia. I’m glad I won’t have to waste more time reading the other books to know how unresolved it ends.

Uglies (Uglies Trilogy, Book 1)

Rodrigo Corral (Designer). Simon Pulse 2005, Paperback, 448 pages, $4.50

Alice Munro did a terrific job giving each character a disctinct voice, and the relationships and motivations sublty unfold as the plot carries you along. I think though, that I didn’t really ‘get it’. I think Alice Munro has an incredible ability to fit an entire lifetime in a fraction of the sapce of most novelists, but by the end I had a hard time connecting the stories as a whole, or finding a truth or message to come away with. While the stories mostly involved the same central location, I kept looking for more overlap or cohesion. I didn’t find satisfaction, but that is most likely a problem with my own expectations and not the collection.

I would recommend this book if you love Canadian authors, or if you only have time to read about 40 pages in one sitting.

Open Secrets

Alice Munro. Vintage 1995, Paperback, 294 pages, $8.25

Jessamine is a young innocent 16 year old girl, whose story is set in England at the turn of the 19th Century. She lives alone in part of the ruins of an old Castle with her emotionally absent father. Her father has kept her alone and friendless her entire life. Until one day a man from a neighbouring parish storms in and leaves her father with a gift. The gift is a boy, known as Weed, who has a knack with plants. The boy has startling green eyes, and black hair and appears to be about Jessamine’s age. Jessamine takes care of Weeds and the two eventually fall in love. But Weeds has a secret…

I found myself quickly swept up in the story and anxious to learn all about Weed’s secret. The pacing was good, characters were believable. It didn’t leave me changed or a better person, but it was a good summer read. I imagine since the book is called Poison Diaries #1 that there will be more to follow, if they are again offered for free on the internet, I’ll read them.

The Poison Diaries (The Poison Diaires)

Maryrose Wood. Balzer + Bray 2010, Hardcover, 288 pages, $4.86

Anne Enright’s writing is lovely to read. Her writing is beautifully descriptive, honest, poignant and flows well through a book based on internal dialogue. Then every few pages you get slapped in the face with repeated descriptions of genitals and bodily functions. I think the point was to sharpen the corners and add some stark, raw, contrast, but after the shock value wore out it was really just unnecessary and distracting.

I felt the memory laden writing style worked well for a book based around grief, with a romantic, introspective journey through lives lived and choices made. I am trying to decide whether I liked the constant alterations and midirections as Veronica’s memories unfolded. I felt a real sense and depth of the characters, but most of the time their development was based on memories made up, memories imagined ending several ways, and usually no concrete answer as to what actually happened. While it is true that memory is an ephemeral thing that changes and corrodes as time passes, I’m not sure I enjoyed it as it moved the plot along.

What I took away from this book was an interesting insight into the hardships and complications of living in such a large family, how sharing a past with someone can change you, and how grief can cause you to question your choices. (Also how grief can cause you to become a little bit selfish and self distructive.) By the end I took the good parts of this novel with me and left the rest behind.

The Gathering

Anne Enright. Grove Press 2007, Hardcover, 272 pages, $13.00

Anyway, we start the story with a mystery, and the mystery is slowly revealed through flashbacks and action. There’s enough mystery in the writing to keep you wondering and enough action to keep the tension high. My heart really got going there for a bit. The teenagers were believably written and I liked the main character in this one. And the love interest, yes, I may have fallen in love with him a little as well. In my opinion this one was a great read.

The Dark Divine

Bree Despain. EgmontUSA 2009, Hardcover, 384 pages, $9.70

I enjoyed this book and the continuing saga of the foundation; until I realized I had missed an entire book in the series and didn’t even notice. So I ordered this book from the library, and not really paying attention just assumed the book titled Second Foundation was the second book in the series. Oops. This is book three and I missed book two, Foundation and Empire. I didn’t notice until today, when I went to look up this book and saw the books in order. One of my complaints in the first novel was the continual jumps through time that pushed the plot forward by hundreds of years and made it hard to connect with the characters. When I picked up this book and started reading I didn’t even find it odd that it was hundreds of years in the future and I didn’t know any of the characters. I’m trying very hard not to let my glaring mistake cloud my judgement of the book.

This book only has one major jump forward, so you have some time to connect with each set of characters. The characters this time through were also far better written, more developed, and the second half even has a strong female lead. However, the paradoxical thinking concerning predestination and mind control just seemed redundant and pointless after a while. If everything is predestined, then every choice you will ever make isn’t really a choice. If everything isn’t predestined, than your individual choices and actions matter. Either way though, you won’t ever know the answer. Should I do A or should I do B? What if my mind has been tampered with and I should do the opposite of what I think I should do? Or maybe I should do what I think I should do because if they had controlled my mind they would expect me to wonder if it had been tampered with and do the opposite of what I think I should do. Wow. Those kind of conundrums repeatedly get old fast. I read the synopsis of the second book in the series and it sounded like it had more action and some attempted plot twists. I am debating now whether to go back and read it too.

Second Foundation (Foundation Novels)

Isaac Asimov. Spectra 2008, Paperback, 272 pages, $6.80