The Teahouse Fire

by Ellis Avery

When Uncle Charles decides to commence missionary work in Japan, his niece Aurelia is taken along, leaving her dying mother back home in New York City. Aurelia soon runs away, even though she is unable to speak Japanese and knows little of the culture, and soon joins the household of a tea ceremony master as a servant. The master’s daughter Yukako takes Aurelia under her wing, and as Aurelia’s puppy-like adoration grows with time into a deep love – nearing obsession – for her mistress. As Japan modernizes, the tea house faces extinction unless it can convince the rapidly Westernizing society that the ancient traditions of tea ceremony hold a place in the heart of Japan.

I went back and forth about how I feel about this book. It had a great plot idea. Using the eyes of an American girl makes it easier for the reader to enter in the world of the Japanese, and it’s a bit of a cheat for the author, too – any tendencies toward exoticism in Avery’s depiction of the Japanese can be “hidden” behind Aurelia’s 19^th-century thoughts. The clash of cultures, both on the personal level, like Aurelia and her new Japanese surroundings, and on the world stage with the conflicts brought about by Westernization gave the author a lot of interesting ideas and attitudes to with which to weave a great story.

Avery’s decision to mix Japanese into the narrative wasn’t very successful. If one knows little or no Japanese, it can be confusing, and I think it didn’t aid the process of drawing me into the world of the book because I would have to interrupt the narrative to think “Wait. What does that mean?” It was interesting to see how Aurelia processed the foreign tongue, and slowly made it her own.

The biggest problem in the novel, by far, was Aurelia’s relationship with Yukako. Aurelia’s constant, obsessive love and attention to her mistress was disturbing, to be honest. You know some guys just don’t feel comfortable around gay guys because they’re convinced the moment they let their guard down, the gay guy is going to try to jump their bones? It’s an irrational, silly fear – obviously just because someone is gay does not mean they’ll be attracted to *every* member of the same sex – but let’s face it: it’s out there and many people have it. This book does not help that misconception at all. Aurelia nurses a crush on Yukako for years, and the moment Yukako does ‘relax’ around her, Aurelia does try to kiss her and pull her mistress into her arms, even though it’s clear Yukako is not interested.

Also, the epilogue was contrived and stupid. It tied things together too neatly in order to create an unbelievable happy ending. Homosexual relationships may have been more acceptable in the 1920s, but I'm pretty sure that interracial relationships were not, given the anti-immigration laws passed during that decade.

The language and imagery of the book was beautiful. I loved Avery's descriptions of silk kimonos and the minutae of the tea ceremony. I could taste the grassy matcha, feel the smooth surface of the lacquered boxes, and imagine the delicacy of the flowers used in the tea room. If the book had just had these lovely images, and had left the disturbing, obsessive one-sided relationship of Aurelia/Yukako out, I'd have been so much happier with the novel

Guardian of the Flame (Book 3 in the Seven Wonders series)

by T. L. Higley

When I first heard that Christian fiction author T. L. Higley was writing a series of book centering on the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, my first thought was “How do you work the Christian angle into a story that predates Christ and doesn’t directly involve Biblical figures?” The first two books of the series focused on the Colossus at Rhodes and Pyramids of Giza; this latest addition stars the Lighthouse at Alexandria.

The Guardian of the Lighthouse protects the ships steering in and out of the harbor from her perch high above the city. Yes, you read that correctly; the guardian is named Sophia, an educated woman who has held the position since the death of her husband many years ago. She is wealthy and powerful, a friend to the beautiful Queen Cleopatra, but instead of living in splendor Sophia hides at the top of her lighthouse, isolated from the rest of the world. When Julius Caesar and his Roman legion sweep into the city, Sophia is forced to accept a group of soldiers into the Lighthouse as her “guests.” They are led by the handsome Bellus, a soldier who fascinates Sophia because he is learned and witty, constantly refuting her belief that all Roman soldiers are brutish killers. Unfortunately, she’s already harboring several refugee scholars, who are working to complete the invention her husband created before he died. If they’re found, they’ll be killed or forced to work on machines of war for Caesar. As conflicting loyalties and her own desires wage within Sophia, the city of Alexandria also prepares for war as Julius Caesar and Cleopatra consolidate their power over the greatest nation of Egypt.

It took me a while to ease into the story, which jumps around the heads of its main narrators: Sophia, Cleopatra, and Bellus. In the beginning, their stories are connected – Sophia is Cleopatra’s former tutor, for example - but their lives don’t really overlap, and until these various plots start integrating the novel doesn’t flow smoothly.   As Sophia is gradually pulled from her self-imposed isolation she becomes less of a tyrannical harpy, which is good because she is a REALLY difficult character for much of the book, making it hard to emphasize with her. Other characters remain distant throughout the novel. In the final chapters I didn’t feel like I had seen any change in Cleopatra’s character, for example, even though the political machinations around her would have surely affected her. The characters’ internal thoughts are often dry, but their interactions with each other were often fun. Sophia’s verbal sparring with Bellus, or her motherly grumbling with her servant Ares often led to some of the best scenes in the novel. 

Overall, I’d say this is slow reading. It’s not a slow novel – stuff is constantly happening, what with political intrigue, secret inventions and bloodthirsty soldiers running everywhere – but the characters are constantly analyzing events, and I think this helps create the drag on the story.

Now that Christian angle I was so curious about was pretty forced. A Jewish scholar named Sosigenes introduces Sophia to the teachings of his One True God, which is fine and dandy. Sophia was a woman who sought knowledge, after all.  But the historical inaccuracy of Sosigenes’ “Judaism” pretty much killed this story arc for me. To my knowledge conversion has never played a big role in Judaism, and certainly it would not have done so at this time in history, but Sosigenes is very actively proselytizing his faith. Instead of an honest depiction of an ancient conversion from pantheism to Judaism, we have anachronistic Christian conversion, which is a pity, because I would have been extremely interested in reading how a woman like Sophia would fit herself into the Jewish traditions of the day. 

 I love the idea of a book series revolving around the Seven Wonders. I did enjoy the book enough that I may pick up the other books in the series. If you are a Christian who likes romance and aren’t a stickler for historical accuracy I do think this would be a good book for you. (That may seem like a terribly narrow niche market, but there are a lot of women I know who fall into it.) 

Why is it so hard to find a good spot to read?

My current school schedule has me on campus all day Monday and Wednesday, with three long breaks.   Two are for one hour, and the last one is two and a half hours long. So ever since the first day of classes, I have been on a quest to find a nice place on campus to read.

Since I live in California, the weather is usually gorgeous, and I try to read outside when I can. The main quad of the campus and the cafeteria are off-limits because they are just far too noisy. There are benches scattered all over the school, but during peak hours (10 am – 3 pm) it’s nearly impossible to find any empty one to sit on. I guess I could share a bench with someone – they’re pretty wide - but I always think it would be awkward, like I’m intruding on *their* private space.

The library would seem to be the obvious solution. But my college library was planned to minimize student time inside it, I think, because the chairs are horribly uncomfortable and the temperature is slightly warmer than chilly. It’s that disagreeable feeling that makes you pull on a sweater, and then ten minutes you’re too warm so you take it off, and ten minutes later you’re cold so you put it on again. It’s a thoroughly unpleasant place to spend an extended period of time.

Lately I’ve just been going back to my car. There’s a comfort in the privacy of my own little cubicle, isolated from the rest of the campus. But a Honda Civic is small and cramped, and staying hunched in the back seat makes me feel like a fetus all balled up inside Mommy. I want to stretch, and there’s literally nowhere for my arms and legs to go. I end up getting out of the car and walking off cramps anyway.

The other spot I like, but can never seem to snag, is down in the main campus center. There is an overhanging walkway where students eat and hang out, and underneath is a quiet little ledge that you can sit on. The noise from everyone else doesn’t seem to sink down to this ledge, so you can read quite peacefully. The last few weeks, though, there’s someone else occupying it whenever I walk by.

Hush, Hush

by Becca Fitzpatrick

So how many of us, after reading Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series, threw the book across the room and declared “I could write that book better than she did?”

A lot of us, yes?

But how many of us actually turned around and actually wrote our own paranormal teen romance? Not quite so many, right?

Well, it is my personal theory that this gut reaction is exactly the impetus that led Becca Fitzpatrick to write her debut novel, Hush, Hush. 

We have two students in high school, Patch and Nora. Patch is a tall, dark and handsome transfer student who meets Nora when they are assigned to sit together in their biology class. (Seriously? Since when was biology the class to pick up chicks?) Nora, our clumsy, bookish heroine, finds Patch mysterious and sexy. She’s attracted to him, but she knows she shouldn’t be because

A/ he’s a douche

B/ he’s dAnGeRoUs

 It turns out Nora, despite being skinny and rather nerdy, is like candy to all the hot guys in her school. In addition to Patch’s sexual harassment flirtations, Nora has attracted the attention of Elliot, another transfer student with a mysterious past. Soon, she feels like she’s being stalked…even when she’s alone in her own bedroom. Torn between her desire for Patch and her fear of his status as a fallen angel (which she figures out with the help of Google, naturally), will Nora make the ultimate sacrifice for love?*

* No, really. Do you think she will?

If this book was, in fact, written in response to Twilight as I suspect, then Becca Fitzpatrick succeeded because Hush, Hush is a superior novel in so many ways. 

First of all, Nora has friends. In fact, she has a best friend, called Vee, and they do everything together - Shopping, homework, talking about boys, you name it. When Nora is with Vee, she acts like a normal teenager instead of some preternaturally mature mini-adult. It also gives Nora credibility as a lovable heroine because you can see this friend trying to protect her, making sacrifices on her behalf, and if Vee thinks Nora is this great, maybe it’s reasonable for these guys to find her so special, too.

Second, the characters think about sex. A lot. I mean, they’re freaking teenagers, and they have hormones oozing out of every pore. The chastity of Edward Cullen is frankly bizarre, and it is a relief to see a hero and heroine so aware of their desire to do it, even if they never actually get that far.

You’ll notice that I don’t really talk about the whole supernatural arc this book. That’s because it really doesn’t come up for the first two-thirds of the book. You’ve got this gorgeous guy who knows stuff he shouldn’t and seems to alternate between horny and threatening, and it’s pretty obvious something spooky is happening. But Nora is just uncertain enough of things that there’s a possibility that she’s just going crazy. Once the Big Reveal has taken place, however, the action suddenly ramps up and minor characters suddenly become major villains. It’s not unexpected but it’s very sudden. The mythology behind the angels/fallen angels in this book is weak and a bit confusing.

The writing is decent. I was constantly reminded of the plot of Twilight as I read it, but Fitzpatrick can actually write decent dialogue and create realistic character relationships.  Like I said at the beginning, it is as if the author took the first few chapters of Twilight and spun it in her own direction, successfully creating her own story and universe.  It's not a rip-off by any means.  But I do think that if one read the first novel in Stephanie Meyer's series and Hush, Hush back-to-back you'd pick up on more than a few parallels. 

The ‘hero’ Patch is a manipulative bastard who plays mind games with Nora, sometimes playfully teasing her and otherwise outright threatening her. Nora suffers from Dumb Horror Chick syndrome; she knows that she shouldn’t open that door/look behind that shower curtain/fall in love with that jerk but she does it anyway. Patch’s personality change towards the end of the novel isn’t very convincing, given how he’s acted for the previous three hundred and fifty pages. I think fans of Twilight and supernatural thrillers will enjoy this very much, but I don’t think it has a lot of crossover appeal. 

PS – The ARC (advance reader’s copy) I read does not have the same ending as the final published version of this book. I think only a few sentences were changed, but I haven’t seen a the hardcover in stores yet so I haven’t confirmed.  

To read more about Hush, Hush, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters

by Jane Austen, Ben H. Winters

First off, I have just got to say that I think Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters deserves to win Cover of the Year award. I just love it. There’s a poster of it hanging on my wall. It’s so cool. I just love the tentacle face.

Plot description of Sense and Sensibility, courtesy of Amazon.com:

In her first published novel, Sense and Sensibility, Jane Austen presents us with the subtle portraits of two contrasting but equally compelling heroines. For sensible Elinor Dashwood and her impetuous younger sister Marianne the prospect of marrying the men they love appears remote. In a world ruled by money and self-interest, the Dashwood sisters have neither fortune nor connections. Concerned for others and for social proprieties, Elinor is ill-equipped to compete with self-centered fortune-hunters like Lucy Steele, while Marianne's unswerving belief in the truth of her own feelings makes her more dangerously susceptible to the designs of unscrupulous men. Through her heroines' parallel experiences of love, loss, and hope, Jane Austen offers a powerful analysis of the ways in which women's lives were shaped by the claustrophobic society in which they had to survive.

In the monster update, the Dashwoods are now sent to live on an island full of mysterious steam vents and aquatic horrors. Sir John is now a semi-retired adventurer who kidnapped his wife from her Islander tribe and forced into marriage; she is forever scheming of ways to escape to her homeland. Sub-Marine Station Beta, located under the sea protected by a huge dome, is the center of English society.  Sea witches devour their husbands and cast curses that cause tentacles to sprout from the faces of their victims. The evil menace of angry swordfish and enraged octopi must be fought off every few pages.

While the first Quirk Classic, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, was only about 15% new content, S&S&SM clocks in at a whopping 40% tentacle-curling action. That’s a lot less Austen, so I was a little worried that it would hurt the story. I think that having more of the story reworked made ‘sea monster’ insertions flow more organically from the text. It was less obvious exactly where Austen ended and Winters began, because the Verne-esque additions still matched the sound and style of the original story. 

Unfortunately, I just didn’t find the book that entertaining. I mean, part of the problem is S&S itself. I always thought it was a novel with serious pacing issues, with too much pining and sighing for absent lovers. When they were adding in the scales and the tentacles, I don’t think enough judicious cuts were made to Austen, so even with several fights added for variety the plot still drags.  The end, too, seems hastily cobbled together and gets rather messy as pirates and Lovecraft references compete for attention.

The critique of Britain’s colonialism through the characters of Lady Middleton, Mrs. Palmer and her mother – all of them Pacific Islanders forcibly removed from their homes and brought to England as the wives of their captors – was a little too cheeky for my tastes, but it was an interesting idea to bring to the story. In fact, I think that would be my summarizing statement: there were a lot of interesting ideas brought into Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. You will probably get a laugh or two out of the book, but overall the story lacks unity and development. It lacked the freshness of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, but whether this is due to rushed production, a weaker Austen source, too many attempts to touch on undersea mythos or a combination of the above is something I just can’t decide.

To read more about Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.

The King’s Rose

by Alisa M. Libby

Catherine Howard is a member of one of the most powerful families in England, but she spent most of her life far from the King’s court in London. At Lambeth Palace she enjoyed more freedom and romantic liaisons, but now that she is fifteen her family has decided that the time has come for Catherine to be useful. She is brought to court to join the Queen’s ladies-in-waiting, but when Henry VIII falls in desperate lust with young Catherine, his fourth wife is quickly brushed aside.  One royal wedding later, Catherine Howard is the Queen of England, but her position offers her little comfort or power. Her former acquaintances flock to her, threatening to reveal the indiscretions of the past if Catherine does not provide them with positions at court. Her family continues to control her actions, especially through Jane Rochford and the Duchess of Norfolk. Worst of all, Catherine has fallen in love with Thomas Culpepper, and their flirtation could bring the wrath of the king down on the entire court.

Henry VIII’s fifth queen, who was married to him for less than two years, is given a sympathetic portrayal in Alisa Libby’s novel. Catherine’s biggest fault is that she’s a teenager. She lacks the cleverness to navigate the complicated adult world of Henry’s court, and her inexperience in worldly affairs means that she cannot be a true political power. Her family makes it clear that if Catherine cannot hold the king’s attention, they’ll drop her like a stone…as they did with her cousin, Anne Boleyn.

This reminds me of something I liked about the book. When she is in moments of stress, Catherine is often haunted by the ghost of Anne Boleyn, although whether this phantom is the spirit of Anne or just a hallucination brought on by Catherine’s panic is never quite clear. I thought that Anne’s life would be something that Catherine would naturally fixate on, given the parallel lives the two women led, but this is the first novel about Catherine that really brought that into the narrative. It also highlights Catherine’s uneasiness with her position; while Anne was groomed for her role and motivated by her own vaulting ambitions, Catherine never particularly desired the throne.

Like Anne, Catherine also desperately needed to provide Henry VIII with an heir. Since she was young and healthy, there was no reason she shouldn’t bear a son, but as the months go by and Catherine still isn’t pregnant what little power she possesses begins to slip away. She’s clearly trapped, and even the extreme measures she takes to buy time only serve to condemn her to her ultimate fate. She’s a very tragic figure, this Catherine Howard; by all accounts she was utterly average and didn’t have the intellect, cunning, or ambition to survive the Tudor court. Yet at the end of her brief life, she was able to pull herself together enough to make a ‘good end’ on the scaffold, when more experienced courtiers descended into madness.

I think this is the third or fourth book about Catherine that I’ve read this year, and so far it is my favorite. I think it would appeal really well to a teen audience, since the readers would identify with Catherine’s struggles, but there’s enough drama and intrigue to delight adults too!

To read more about The King’s Rose, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.

Winter’s Child (Once Upon a Time Series)

by Cameron Dokey

Winter’s Child is the newest addition to the teen Once Upon a Time series, a collection of fairy tale retellings. The series began in 2002 and has been printing two or three stories every year since. The stories selected for transformation range from traditional tales like Snow White and Cinderella to more unusual choices, like The Magic Flute and the lives of Pocahontas and Anastasia. Winter’s Child sets out to re-spin Han Christian Andersen’s The Snow Queen.

Grace and Kai have been best friends forever – how could they avoid it when they grew up next door to each other? They played together by day and in the evenings, Grace’s grandmother would tell them legends about the Winter’s Child, an immortal princess from the land of ice and snow cursed to undo the damage wrought upon the world when her mother smashed a cursed mirror filled with fear and released its damaging shards throughout the world. When the old woman dies, Grace and Kai have only each other for companionship, but Kai’s marriage proposal – a perfectly logical step – is shot down by Grace’s desire for freedom. When the Winter Child shows up, Kai eagerly decides to accompany her on her quest. Grace immediately sets out to follow them, and finally experiences the adventure she’s been craving.

The book is set up into thirteen ‘stories,’ following the format set forth in the original Snow Queen. Grace, Kai and Deidre the Winter’s Child alternate as storytellers. The first half the book sets the stage very well; Deidre’s life is told in the fantastic style of fairy tales while Grace and Kai live in a gritty poverty.  The Christian elements of Andersen’s tale have been removed, too, grounding Kai and Grace in a difficult world with little hope of divine intervention. But it gets a little awkward around Kai’s departure, because the Winter Child is a radical departure from the Snow Queen. Whereas the Snow Queen is a beautiful enigma whose motivations are known only to herself, Deidre is a teenager who has been lonely for many years, trapped in her sixteenth year until her quest is complete. She acts just like a teenage girl with her first crush. She’s giddy, she’s hopeful…she’s not sad. Over and over, we’re told her name is ‘Sorrow’ and that names match their owners perfectly, but she rarely seems as icy or as unhappy as we’re told she is.

When Grace is following Kai and the Winter’s Child, the story gets a little disconnected. An old woman tries to distract her, and she is captured by a band of thieves. These are both part of the original tale, so they had to be included, but we rush through the scenes so quickly that it feels like they were added to complete a checklist of important points from The Snow Queen. The ending, too, wraps up too quickly and too neatly, with a last-minute character addition to ‘fix’ the developing love triangle. 

This is the first book I’ve read in the Once Upon a Time series, and it intrigues me enough that I want to check out more of the series. Although the plot has its weak points, Winter’s Child is true to the fairy tale genre and a fun way to re-imagine The Snow Queen.

To read more about Winter’s Child, buy it or add it to your wishlist click here.

A Prisoner of Versailles (Darkness to Light Series, Book 2)

by Golden Keyes Parsons

This is the second book in Golden Keyes Parsons’ Darkness to Light series, and in my opinion is not a book that can stand alone. I read the first book in the series, In the Shadow of the Sun King, earlier this year, and much of the action from that story is referenced here. However, there isn’t a lot of explicit plot rehashing, so while you can follow the narrative thread of A Prisoner of Versailles without reading the first book, much of the character history/development will be lost. 

WITH that caveat out of the way, on to the review! A Prisoner of Versailles picks up life with the Clavells as they prepare to leave Switzerland and journey to the New World. Unfortunately, a spy has been reporting their plans to King Louis XIV, who just isn't ready to give up on Madeleine. Whether his love for her is truly the affection of their youth or a stubborn insistence to get what he wants could make an interesting debate. His soldiers interrupt their preparations and force Madeleine and her oldest son Philippe to return to the court of Versaille as 'forced guests,' and Madeleine must slide back into her flirtatious court manners to protect her family. But even her charms cannot protect Pierre Bovee, the man who rescued her husband despite his own love for Madeleine, from the wrath of the Sun King...

Like 'In the Shadow of the Sun King', Parson's sequel follows the conventions of much Christian fiction. The main characters, all of them Huguenots, insist on sticking to their beliefs when it would be so easy to give in and conform to Louis XIV's demands to 'convert' back to Catholicism. This determination and dedication is admirable. Madeleine is the only exception; misfortunes pile up around her and she angrily turns her back on God, but even this is smoothly remedied by the end of the book. 

I think that’s the major problem with this Darkness to Light series, and Christian fiction in general. From a literary standpoint, it really helps kill the suspense when you know your main characters will always eventually be saved from doom by the grace and goodness of God.  When a major character from the first novel was killed off early on, I thought, “Oh boy! There might be some drama in this one!” but the rest of the story followed a predictable course, with all the major plot lines neatly tied up with Godly intervention whenever needed.

I saw the book described as a 'religious historical romance' and I think that sums it up rather succinctly.  It's very definitely written for a Christian audience, and will appeal to those historical fiction fans who like a little faith mixed in with their reading.  I read it in a single day, so it is very fast-paced, and fans of the first book will delight in continuing the adventures of the Clavell family.

Cleopatra’s Daughter

by Michelle Moran

            Cleopatra Selene was raised as a Princess of Egypt, and for ten years enjoyed the wealth and beauty of Alexandria under the rule of Queen Cleopatra. But now her mother is dead, and Selene and her siblings are the prisoners of Octavian. After he murders her oldest brother, Caesarion, Octavian decides to take the other children back to Rome as his “guests”, to be raised in the household of his sister. En route, Selene’s youngest brother Ptolemy dies of a fever, so the only relative she has left is her twin brother, Alexander Helios.

            The twins are kept busy in their new home, with classes in the morning and entertainments in the evenings. Selene’s talent with drawing eventually leads to an apprenticeship with a master architect, a highly unusual position for a girl, even a royal one. She and Julia, Octavian’s only daughter, become friends and happily study, shop, and watch races with Alexander and Marcellus, Octavian’s heir to power.  But Selene’s life is far from stable; her position in Octavian’s political chessboard is unclear. Will she and Alexander one day return to Egypt, married off or killed?   Meanwhile, all of Rome wants to know the identity of the mysterious vigilante called the Red Eagle, who is undermining Octavian’s rule by freeing slaves and leaving scathing indictments of the government posted all over town. In a Rome seething with political unrest, can the young prisoners of Octavian hope to find peace?

            Michelle Moran’s greatest strength has been her ability to conjure up the sights and sounds of ancient cities, and plant the reader square in the middle of them. The excitement and clamor of Rome’s marketplaces is vivid. I can smell exotic spices from the East and bright fabrics flutter in the wind. The roar of the crowd as they watch a trial of two hundred slaves fills my ears. But not all the scenes depicted could claim the glory of Rome. The choking smoke of a burning building makes me cough. The piteous, weak whimpers of dying infants that have been abandoned are heartbreaking. The evocative language of this book is just wonderful, even if the scenes aren’t.

            I did not enjoy the plot quite as much as I did in Moran’s previous two books. There were two main reasons for this. First, while there is a romantic thread running throughout the story, Selene’s eventual match seems to come out of nowhere. There were little hints in the narrative, so I came to suspect who she would end up with pretty early on…but the way she and her man came together was so sudden it felt a little squashed onto the end. Second, the story ends when Selene is fifteen years old. That’s fine and well, but in the Afterward she mentions that Selene married and ruled Mauretania for twenty years. Dude, I want to read THAT story! It sounds fascinating. (Psst – sequel!!!) But the fact that I want to keep reading about Selene beyond the end of Cleopatra’s Daughter is a pretty strong indicator that these little problems did not get in the way of drawing me into the story.

            Because the heroine is very young, Cleopatra’s Daughter is being marketed to both an adult and teen audience. Some of the scenes might be a bit graphically violent for younger teens, but I think of them have become so acclimatized to violence that it won’t bother them overmuch. As for historical fiction/historical romance fans, this is one of the books you must pick up this fall. It’s entertaining and exciting and a great escape!

Hannah: Daughters of the Sea, Book One

by Kathryn Lasky

Plot Description from Amazon.com:

Daughters of the Sea tells the story of 3 mermaid sisters who are separated at birth by a storm and go on to lead three very different lives. Book 1 is about Hannah, who spent her early days in an orphanage and is now a scullery maid in the house of rich, powerful family. She is irresistibly drawn to the sea and through a series of accidents and encounters discovers her true identity. Hannah realizes that she must keep the truth a secret but she also knows that soon she will have to make the choice - to be a creature of the land or the sea.

Hannah is a fantastic re-imagining of mermaid mythology. Normally, one reads of a fish girl who chooses to go on land to pursue true love or adventure, but in Kathryn Lasky’s new book the situation is reversed, with a ‘normal’ girl feeling irresistibly pulled toward the sea. 

The story has the same mythic/magical rhythm as a classic fairy tale, and Lasky created beautiful imagery with her words. She also provided an extremely memorable villain in Lila, the daughter of the wealthy household in which Hannah works. Lila is unbalanced and cruel, and she has an unnatural, unhealthy attachment to her white cat Jade. Her bond with the feline mimics Hannah’s own relationship with the sea, but while Hannah draws strength from the ocean Lila seems to veer toward anger and madness. I finished this book in a single sitting. I’m many years out of the ‘tweener’ audience this book was written for, but I thought it was quite an enjoyable read. 

I did have a huge pet peeve with the book, though: see that description from Amazon.com I posted at the beginning? There is no indication in the plot of this book that Hannah is part of a mermaid family.  If the book cover didn’t tell mention that this was the beginning of a series, I think I’d be left unsatisfied at the end. Why was Hannah on land in the first place if she was a mermaid? How did that happen? Sure, we’re told in the plot summary that Hannah is one of three sisters separated at birth, but that isn’t actually in the narrative of this book! So even though I really liked Hannah I was also a bit irritated. The next book in the series better have some answers!

(Also, the cover is weird.  The story is set in the early 20th century, but the girl standing in the puddle looks waaaaaaay too modern.  But that's not the fault of the author.)