April Reviews

April as a month was kind of a lot. We started it by welcoming a new friend into life, and ended it saying goodbye to another. Because of that I can't say my headspace was the most conducive to writing reviews, but I sure did read books and I sure did try to have coherent thoughts about those books!

So let's not waste any time:

When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead

This book was one that the students at work were going to reach for class, and the teacher (who I'm friends with) said it was so good I had to read it. So I borrowed a copy from work and read it in like a day. Two sittings with like twelve hours between them, if you want to get specific about it.

When Miranda starts receiving notes from someone claiming to be from the future, she's pretty sure it's a joke. Her favorite book is A Wrinkle in Time, but she knows when fiction and real life are different. But things keep happening, coincidences that she doesn't understand until after they happen. The notes say that the person is trying to save someone's life, and Miranda could be the only person to make sure it happens.

Oh man, why is it that every time I read a middle grade book it blows my mind way more than I thought it would. I mean, See You in the Cosmos and The Thing About Jellyfish? Incredible. Middle grade really does know how to deliver. And this book sure did. It jumped all over the place, placing strings like a police board, bringing pieces together that would've never connected, until it forced me to step back and understand what was happening. It blurred the line between reality and science fiction beautifully, creating a world where anything is possible in a very realistic way.

I literally just finished reading this book like two minutes before I started writing this review, so I'm still a little jumbled and in the 'holy shit what' headspace you get after you read a reveal or the character puts all the pieces together a second before you do. Miranda's a smart character, and so many of her decisions are smart and deliberate, and I loved her moment of reckoning with her own kindness.

Adults in middle grade books are always portrayed with such simultaneous clarity and naivitay. Miranda's mom and Richard and her teachers and Jimmy and the laughing man were all fully formed individuals both in the story and Miranda's mind. Miranda was curious and honest, and she had all sorts of clever insights and observations. I loved getting to follow her thoughts throughout the book.

There was also a lovely inclusionary aspect with Julia's race and Annemarie's epilepsy, and how these characters were more than their features. Miranda befriended a whole array of people, and while I don't know that 'you can be friends with everyone' is supposed to be quote, unquote lesson for this book, it definitely was an important part of Miranda's personality and decision making.

I will probably have more insightful things to say about this book after my brain has had time to digest it, but also maybe not. I really loved reading this book though.

Similar to The Science of Breakable Things by Tae Keller and Out of my Mind by Sharon Draper

A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L'Engle

The book I read before this, When You Reach Me, references A Wrinkle in Time a lot, and since I had never read it before, I figured that'd be as good a book as any to follow it up.

It was a dark and stormy night, and Meg Murry's house has just received a most peculiar visitor. Mrs. Whatsit brings more than just wind to the door, and soon Meg, her little brother Charles Wallace, and their friend Calvin are on a trip through space on time, to save Meg and Charles' father, and perhaps the entire world.

Maybe it's because it's such a famous book, or because so many people had been so aghast when they heard I'd never read it before now, but it was almost....I don't know, disappointing? Like it had been so hyped in my head that I had expected more from it. Instead, everything felt rushed in a way that I generally try to avoid in middle grade books, and I never really felt like I was really in the book.

The overall story is very interesting, and there really are so many different and cool parts that, when I made myself step back and think them over or picture them, I could appreciate. Bu things changed so suddenly in the story, and I felt like I could never catch my bearings. And maybe that was the point, with all the hopping around and traveling Meg, Calvin, and Charles Wallace did. But the emotions felt a little choppy too, like Meg's suddenly mood swings and the way all the characters seemed to ricochet from emotion to emotion with a clear trajectory. A lot of the things I was interested in reading more about felt skipped past, while things I didn't really care about were lingered on.

Maybe I read this book too late. It is a book for children, after all, therefore it's not really meant for me. I just feel that books for children, especially ones lauded as classics and so widely read, should appeal to a broader audience. Children can be difficult to please and are very smart, and writing for children definitely isn't easy.

So, yeah. This'll be a short review because I didn't really enjoy it, but it's got fun parts and is very whimsical.

Similar to The NeverEnding Story (1984) dir. Wolfgang Petersen

Lost in the Never Wood by Aiden Thomas

I've been excited for this book ever since Thomas announced it's impending release. I loved Cemetery Boys and was eager to see what else Thomas could make me cry about.

Wendy Darling hasn't been the same since she and her brothers disappeared five years ago. Wendy came back, but John and Michael didn't, and her lack of memory haunts her as much as her still missing brothers do. Now children are going missing again, and the town's eyes are on Wendy, including a mysterious but familiar boy she finds in the middle of the road. Peter Pan, a make-believe boy from her childhood stories, has come to ask for her help to save the missing children from his shadow. But helping Peter means confronting what happened five years ago, and going back into the woods, where Wendy may find more than just her missing memories.

I love a good retelling. There's that ridiculous phrase about how there's no such thing as original stories anymore, and, like, while that's cynical nonsense, I do also love the idea of leaning into it and taking pieces from an old familiar story and making them your own. And this book was such a compelling retelling.

I loved anxious Wendy, dealing with the fallout of something that crushed her whole family. She grew up too fast because of it, and this book does a really good job of straddling the fantastic and the realistic. It's heartbreaking, both in content and in writing style, and was such an emotional treat.

This version of Peter was so great. He had the carefree attitude of many retellings, along with the darker shadow we often see in the grimdark retellings, but he also made flower crowns with children and bought ice cream with Wendy and sometimes only had a single working braincell, the absolutely loveable dumbass. He wanted to help children, and in doing so he often neglected his own needs and wants. He and Wendy's relationship gave them both the opportunity to grow and accept what they had been through. And I loved their silly moments as much as the serious ones.

That being said, there was some heavy stuff in this book. Wendy suffers from severe anxiety, and there is quite a bit of blood and injuries. It's more than manageable, if very sad, but there were still moments where I had to walk away for a second because Wendy's sweating and trouble breathing were getting to me (anxiety is! The! Worst!). The book was also very long, but with everything that had to happen in the plot, the page count is necessary.

Overall I really enjoyed this retelling, and am excited to see what Thomas will do next!

Similar to Dark and Deepest Red by Anna-Marie McLemore and The Last Bus to Everland by Sophie Cameron

Sweet and Bitter Magic by Adrienne Tooley

Apparently I can only ready fantasy novels if they're about lesbians. Sorry not sorry.

Tamsin was cursed to live without love, siphoning bits and pieces from the village in return for her magic. Wren has more magic than she knows what to do with, an untrained source who can't leavr her ailing father. But when a terrible curse is brought down on the land, the two unlikely allies must team up to take down the dark witch responsible. But doing so reveals things that both girls would rather keep hidden, including the possibility of something between them.

The world building in this book was really interesting, and I sort of wish that we'd gotten more than just little snapshots of it. The coven history and hierarchy are touched on, and the world Within passed through, but so much of it felt hidden away. But I suppose that's the price you pay when creating a world, and fantasy books are notoriously long as it is.

The characters were interesting. I wasn't super compelled by either of them, but I did enjoy Tamsin's journey from being bitter and incapable of love to her tentative blossoming feelings for Wren. To be unable to love is such an interesting and unique curse, especially as a punishment for what she'd done.

Wren struggled a lot with her family and trying to find the courage to go off and be her own person while still caring for her ill father. The plague, which caused people to lose their memories, seemed to cure her father's physical sickness, which was wild to me, and also had the unfortunate side effect of making me think he was faking just to keep Wren there, which made me not like him.

There weren't too many other notable characters in the book, at least not until we got to the world Within, where the witches and sources were. Like I said earlier, would've loved more time there. That creepy bone witch? Amazing, tell me more about her gross rotting deer thing. And Marlena! Trying not to spoil things, but she was a fascinating character, especially with her fractured relationship and complicated ties to her twin. We love a complex familial relationship.

Anyways, overall I didn't love love this book, but I still had a lot of fun with it.

Similar to Of Fire and Stars by Audrey Coulthurst and There Will Come A Darkness by Katy Rose Pool

Fragile Remedy by Maria Ingrande Mora

I'm not usually big on dystopian fiction, but I've been trying to branch out my genres a little bit, so I gave this one a whirl.

Nate is a GEM, a genetically engineered human designed to help the ailing population of a futuristic city survive. He's living in hiding outside the city, but he's dying--a failsafe built into GEMs, to keep them tied to the city they serve through the Remedy they need to survive. When Nate's smuggled supply of Remedy disappears, he has to decide if he's going to stay with the people, the boy, he loves, or save his own life by joining the very organization threatening everything he loves.

This book was. A lot. But it was also really good. It tackled things like drug addiction and human trafficking through the lens of a world fallen to rubble. There's violence and desperation and death, but there's also found family and love and the very human desire to keep the ones close to you safe. Everyone is desperate because the world has made them so, but they're desperation comes from love.

The characters in this world were so good, from Nate to little Pixel to Reed and Sparks and Brick. Even Alden, with his addled and complicated love, was trying his best. I really, really liked Alden and Nate's relationship and all the folds and rifts and complications it contained. Reed thought they were together, but Nate only had eyes for Reed. Alden was a lot of things, but in the end he was still Nate's best friend. He tried, in his own terrible way.

The worldbuilding was interesting, but I definitely followed along for the characters. All the tech and genetics and history was interesting, but really only in how it pertained to the characters. But honestly that's how it is with dystopian fiction; the world is a depressing potential future, and we tend to look to the survivors rather than the landscape of ruin and death.

I cried while reading this book, and part of that can be attributed to timing, but I think part of me needed this book, needed a family of scrappy kids trying too hard to build a life for themselves in a world fighting against them. They had hope because they had each other. And that's all that matters.

Overall, I liked this book more than I expected to.

Similar to Uglies by Scott Westerfeld and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

This Golden Flame by Emily Victoria

This book had the unfortunate timing of being read while I was processing my grief over losing a friend. Ergo I don't think I enjoyed it as much as I could have, and I can't hold that entirely against the book.

Karis is a captive of the scriptorum, working as an acolyte for a government that separated her and her brother seven years ago. All she wants is to find him again, but when she finds an automaton in a cave, everything changes. Alix isn't like the other automatons, he's able to think and behave without orders, and, most importantly, he's alive, while the others have lain dormant for years, since Alix's father and creator destroyed the heart controlling them two hundred years ago. Karis and Alix are thrown into a mess of pirates and revolution, trying to find their place in a world much bigger than them, and ultimately learning to fight for something beyond themselves.

Karis is aroace, and that was such a cool thing to read. Books almost always have some sort of romance in it, whether it's the main concept or a subplot, and while that's all fine and good, it was kind of a relief to read from the perspective of someone who explicitly doesn't feel that way. It was validating, and Karis' platonic relationships with the other characters were never made to be comparative or less than the romantic background relationships that cropped up.

The world building was extensive, and I think I got a little lost sometimes in all the language and prose. Part of that was my trouble focusing, and overall I was able to follow the story without too much stumbling. The scriptwork was interesting, and seeing how it was used by other nations and creatives beyond the rigidity of the scriptorum was very cool. I would've loved to see more of that, but I also understand that the book was long, and spending more time on a pirate ship isn't completely plot conducive for a rebellion story.

Both Karis and Alix were dealing with internal dilemmas of purpose and belief, and it was neat to see that as a unifying concern from two very different protagonists. The overall cast was pretty neat, with Zara's pirate crew and the other script workers that worked with her.

This is just gonna be a short review, but this book was a very Greek-feeling rebellion story with giant robots, and that was a pretty dope concept.

And that's it! Hopefully next month has a variety of books and more coherency in the reviews.

Keep writing, friends!

Sam

Literary recommendation: Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Media recommendation: Shadow and Bone (2021) the Netflix series is actually a very good time