“The Bible says that in the beginning was the void, and it hasn’t escaped me how fast the Lord moved to take care of His own particular vacuum—dividin...more“The Bible says that in the beginning was the void, and it hasn’t escaped me how fast the Lord moved to take care of His own particular vacuum—dividing day from night, spitting out vast oceans, carving out competing continents that would one day have the power to blow each other up. What an inspired series of creations to keep the devil of boredom at bay. No wonder God kept seeing that it was good.”
So begins the story of Fleur Robins.
Fleur Robins is called creepy child, poor child, little monster, odd duck, space cadet and assorted other synonyms for "weird" by almost everyone who notices her existence and tries to figure out whether she is gifted, autistic, simply hopeless or hopelessly simple. Fleur’s imagination contains many worlds because—as she explains life as the fifteen-year-old narrator of The History of My Body—positioning her body and mind “just this side of the lurking pit of nothingness” requires constant vigilance and ingenuity.
Whenever the void looms too large for her to handle, Fleur flaps her arms, bangs her head, pinches herself, emits strange noises and makes oddly literal pronouncements that simultaneously appear to miss the point and contain cosmic truths. No school will take her. An alcoholic mother loves her, but spends her days drunk or asleep. A mean-spirited father dislikes her, but fills his days with a pro-life crusade while filling an entire nursery wing of the family’s large house with children rescued from the “devil abortionists.” An odd-duck household/nursery staff cares for her, but is too busy to overtly save her from the void.
Fleur is her own teacher. She makes lists, keeps diaries, consults the dictionary frequently, and assembles the often-confusing puzzle pieces of information from others to make sense of the external world. She listens to the voices of her heart and her infinite imagination to define her internal world and to explore far-flung probabilities beyond the ken of “normal people.”
When she’s told that a woman who walks down the street every day in a bathrobe has lost her mind, Fleur falls into a figurative pit considering the ramifications:
"What kind of God would let people lose their minds? And was there some kind of cosmic Lost and Found where He kept them? I tell you, it gave me a serious case of the heebie-jeebs, thinking of God feeling so empty and alone that He needed to steal people's minds to stuff into His own unfillably huge one."
In her wise, superbly crafted debut novel, author Sharon Heath connects a series of highly improbable events into a tightly knit story about a self-taught young girl who believes her coming of age is a wonderful example of the butterfly effect: or, as Fleur came to understand nonlinear systems, a personal development with a sensitive dependence on initial conditions. Potential events spin off in all directions when Fleur finds a dying baby bird in the garden; while those that ultimately manifest as her body’s history could never have been predicted, they represent a meaningful synchronicity if not harmony.
Fleur’s phases of growth (incarnations, to her way of thinking) unfold as a metamorphosis out of the chaos of her childhood. Her progress isn’t ugly duckling to swan. It’s more like a butterfly transitioning from egg to larva to pupa to adult, or like the unfolding of the beloved David Austen roses she tended on the grounds of the childhood home of her first incarnation.
In The History of My Body, Sharon Heath masterfully combines darkness and light, tragedy and comedy, and the sublime and the ridiculous into a dazzling and beautifully ironic dance of opposites that create an unusual and endearing protagonist with an unforgettable tale to tell.
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"In Red Storm Regime," authors M. J. Goodnow and Marie Pacha spin out a dramatic galaxy-wide saga of conquest and hope in which the destinie...more"In Red Storm Regime," authors M. J. Goodnow and Marie Pacha spin out a dramatic galaxy-wide saga of conquest and hope in which the destinies of gods and goddesses, masters and slaves, and the disparate worlds of the Damanites and Interrans rest within the untested hearts of eight scattered children seeking eight swords, eight powerful forces of nature, and - ultimately - justice.
Readers will enjoy the authors' complex world building and the intricate plot. (less)
“Cinderella is one of the most recognized stories around the world. The themes from the story appear in the folklore of many cultures. Sources disagre...more“Cinderella is one of the most recognized stories around the world. The themes from the story appear in the folklore of many cultures. Sources disagree about how many versions of the tale exist, with numbers ranging from 340 to over 1,500 if all of the picture book and musical interpretations are included.” — "History of Cinderella"
In her debut young adult novel "Cinder" (Feiwel & Friends, January 3, 2012) Marissa Meyer has taken an eleven-hundred-year-old story and wrapped it in the tattered fabric of a future society called New Beijing. Cinder has a suitable resume: persecuted heroine, deceased parents, ungrateful and nasty stepfamily, dirty clothes, and–since she is a cyborg–a very important electromechanical foot.
The sixteen-year-old Cinder is legally bound by law to her stepmother Adri who, like many humans, views cyborgs as second-class citizens. As a talented mechanic, Cinder plies her trade out of a booth in the city market when she is not stuck at home maintaining the family’s equipment from cantankerous netscreens to a constantly broken-down hovercraft.
While Cinder works, Adri and her two human daughers Peony and Pearl are busy creating wondrous gowns for the upcoming ball. They hope to dance with Prince Kai, and would be shocked to discover that their ragamuffin servant actually met the handsome prince when he stopped by her booth with a broken android in need of repair.
Cinder is too practical to admit that she might be smitten with the prince even if the prince might be smitten with her. Such things are forbidden. Why would the prince risk his reputation being seen with a cyborg, much less dancing with her? Her practicality reminds her that even if she dressed herself up in fancy clothes and came to a ball it would be obvious to everyone she was out of place.
Meyer adds danger and intrigue to her story with a deadly plague and an invasion threat from the independent empire on the moon, both of which hit Cinder very close to home. Billed as Book One of “The Lunar Chronicles,” this appealing mix of fairytale and science fiction reads well. Cinder is an appealing, if a bit grease-stained, protagonist who uses intelligence and skill to navigate through the undertain tides of princes, plagues and stepmothers.
Truth be told, I wanted a fairytale ending and wondered as I read the final line if the novel ended with a very muted happily ever after because of an impending sequel. Nonetheless, Marissa Meyer spins a fine tale that will probably make you forget the last version of the Cinderella story you read. (less)
Reading Raymond Khoury’s The Devil’s Elixir can be hazardous to your sleep cycle! You won’t be able to put the book down until you reach the last page...moreReading Raymond Khoury’s The Devil’s Elixir can be hazardous to your sleep cycle! You won’t be able to put the book down until you reach the last page.
Once again, Khoury pairs up FBI agent Sean Reilly and archeologist Tess Chaykin whom long-time Khoury fans already know from their tangled and dangerous destinies in The Last Templar and The Templar Salvation. In this high-energy thriller, Reilly and Chaykin shift their focus from Templar and Vatican mysteries to a potentially more dangerous secret extracted and resynthesized out of the South American rainforest.
Eusebio, the priest who learned about a psychoactive alkaloid from a tribal shaman in 1741, viewed the “sacred brew” as a catalyst that could lead a seeker toward mystical enlightenment. Álvaro, his Jesuit brother at the mission, called the drug the devil’s elixir. In the hands of a present-day drug lord named El Brujo the drug represents not only a belief-changing experience but a chance for unlimited profits with a potion more powerful than meth, cocaine and heroine combined.
Reilly is is drawn away from New York into the high-body-count world of drug cartels and kidnappings when a former girlfriend calls to report her life is in danger. Former DEA agent Michelle Martinez’s story is so compelling that Reilly packs his bags and heads for San Diego immediately. Soon, his life will be at risk as will Chaykin’s. One way or another, sparks fly when Reilly and Chaykin are involved in a case. This time out, there are a couple of additional complications, one being that Reilly never told Chaykin about his earlier relationship with the “seriously hot” Martinez.
Khoury’s story moves briskly with alternating chapters from the perspectives of El Brujo, southwestern FBI operatives, the drug lord’s foot soldiers, Reilly and Chaykin. This approach heightens the intrigue by showing the reader thrills, chills and plot twists that the primary characters have yet to discover. Reilly is a strong-willed, indefatigable FBI agent who gives everything he has to keep his loved ones safe while keeping the devil’s elixir out of the black market supply chain. At the same time, his conscience constantly asks him whether the ends justify his means.
Readers new to Khoury’s fiction may think as they finish each chapter in The Devil’s Elixir, “certainly things can’t get any worse than this.” Those who have read The Last Templar and The Templar Salvation know things never get better until the story’s over because following a Khoury plot is similar to riding a snowball through hell.
The Devil’s Elixir is a delightfully breath-searing ride. (less)
Joyful, profound and accessible, "My Yehidah" gently inspires seekers on a journey into their deepest dreams through the magical power of wr...moreJoyful, profound and accessible, "My Yehidah" gently inspires seekers on a journey into their deepest dreams through the magical power of writing, art and imagination. "My Yehidah" is the young explorer's perfect companion in living rooms, classrooms and camps.
If a powerful genie or wizard were to transform me into a child again, I think that with this book, I would soon learn how to transform myself back into an adult--assuming I wanted to. Using "My Yehida" as a catalyst, children (of all ages!) will discover that one's imagination is infinite and that the universe itself is more accessible.(less)
"A long time ago there lived a poor woodsman. One day he was walking in the forest when a man came out of the trees and hailed him. 'Good day,' ...more "A long time ago there lived a poor woodsman. One day he was walking in the forest when a man came out of the trees and hailed him. 'Good day,' the man said. 'And how are you doing today?'
"'Very poorly,' the woodsman said. 'My family and I have not eaten for three days, and if I do not find food for them soon I fear we will all die.'
"'I can help you,' the main said. 'But you must promise to give me the first thing you see when you return home today.'"
All long-time readers of fairy tales are familiar with stories that begin like this, or similar to this, and they all involve people who are down on their luck who are mysteriously offered a great boon. The boon isn't free because it involves a bargain that may change the lives a family throughout time forever.
Just stories, of course, with morals in them about getting something for nothing, being too quick to give away something not clearly specified, and trusting anything that happens at crossroads, boundaries and other undertain places.
In Lisa Goldstein's wonderful contemporary fantasy "The Uncertain Places," protagonist Will Taylor looks back on the events that occurred after his college roommate Ben introduced him to Livvy Feierabend in 1971. Will is smitten with Livvy; Ben is smitten with Livvy's sister Maddie. Livvy and Maddie live with their mother Sylvie and younger sister Rose in an odd and rambling house in the Napa Valley.
Will notices on his first trip to Napa that Sylvie is rather scattered. On subsequent visits, it becomes more and more obvious that the house and the family are, in ways that cannot be pinned down, also scattered as though they aren't quite living in the here and now, or that if they are present in the here and now, that the line between the family's house and vineyard on one hand and their secrets on the other hand is not altogether well defined.
Will and Ben slowly discover that stories they always believed were "just stories" might be more than that. How exactly did the Brothers Grimm come by old fairytales about woodsmen and witches in their famlous books of "Children's Tales" published in multiple editions beginning in 1812? Growing up, the Feierabend sisters were not allowed to read fairytales. How odd. But Will finds out why, and that "why" has to do with the kinds of fortune and fate that befall those who find themselves confronted by friendly helpers in the uncertain places.
The consequences of decisions made in such places are forever. There's good fortune, to be sure. But it comes at a price, one that Will doesn't want Livvy to pay. All of this happened in California during the rather abnormal times of the 1960s and early 1970s, and Will narrates the events that followed the weekend when he became smitten with Livvy Feierabend as though he's telling a fairytale that contains fairy tales.
Will's telling of the story is one of the novel's greatest strengths, but also a lingering weakness. Looking back, as he is, Will places Ben, Livvy, Rose, Maddie and Sylvie into the world of "once upon a time," and this adds to the ephemeral nature of "The Uncertain Places." The Feierabend sisters' world is vague in all the secret ways magic and boundary areas are vague, and that makes them all the more plausible and delightful.
The flasback structure of the novel also blurs the impact of the story because there periods of normal reality in between the odd events Will is telling us about. Readers who are more accustomed to constantly forward-moving plot might say, "get back to the story." While these gaps filled with normacy are not large, they are somewhat distracting.
Nonetheless, the novel sparkles like stars and faerie lights in the woods and old secrets on the cusp of revelation, and is highly recommended for all lovers of fantasy whose ancestors didn't make long-term bargains with those they met in uncertain places.(less)
Melissa Studdard's joyfully written "Six Weeks to Yehidah" takes us into ten-year-old Annalise's magical dreamscape where thoughts become th...moreMelissa Studdard's joyfully written "Six Weeks to Yehidah" takes us into ten-year-old Annalise's magical dreamscape where thoughts become things and light manifests in sparkling colors that live and breathe and speak.
An inquisitive child by nature, Annalise prefers the woods and fields to staying indoors. So when she finds herself on a grand adventure with sheep that learn how to talk, she is more than ready to explore each new wonder than to worry overly much about the strange and happy world that rises up around her as she skips from cloud to cloud.
While the book is categorized as "young adult," it might be more suitably labeled as "children's literature" based on its dialogue and plot. Even so, the book is filled with deeply spiritual symbolism and tongue-in-cheek hero's journey references that adults will enjoy while reading this well-crafted story to their children.
Like the classics that have come before it, "Six Weeks to Yehidah" will delight readers of all ages, each finding something new in it every time they rediscover Annalise's story. (less)
Like the mentors and magical helpers who guide seekers through unknown worlds, author Elizabeth Clark-Stern captures readers in her well-woven net of ...moreLike the mentors and magical helpers who guide seekers through unknown worlds, author Elizabeth Clark-Stern captures readers in her well-woven net of spell-binding words and hauls us on board a book of dreams.
In “Soul Stories” we discover two novellas about two young girls—each with an absent mother and a strong father—who must find within themselves the wisdom and courage to understand the harsh realities of the adult world. Each girl has a wonderful guide. In “Safari to Mara,” Mara rides a zebra named Lo Lo into her future. In “Aria of the Horned Toad,” Beatrice rides a toad named Custard into her present.
In the heat of the African plains, Mara finds solace in the land that cradles the Masai. In the heat of central Texas, Beatrice finds solace in a river of dreams that flows unseen through the streets of Austin. Mara feels abandoned. Beatrice feels unwanted. Their souls cry out to be filled with love in Africa where going on safari might mean watching cruel nature take its course and in Austin where coming home at dusk might mean staring at a mother’s empty chair at the dinner table.
In “Safari to Mara,” Clark-Stern immerses readers in a dazzling landscape of predators and prey where life and death manifest as an infinite dance. It’s a lot for Mara to absorb and comprehend. In “Aria of the Horned Toad,” she serves readers a thirst-quenching eye-opener of well-shaken reality and make-believe. It’s a difficult puzzle for Beatrice to put together.
In her Masai world, Mara is on the cusp of womanhood where she is expected to prepare for marriage. She has other ideas. She seeks a future wide enough for larger dreams. In her Austin neighborhood, circumstances force Beatrice to shoulder adult-level responsibilities before she is done being a child. She is willing to do what’s required of her, though she seeks a here-and-now where children can be loved and safe.
These extraordinary stories are for dreamers and for those who want to become dreamers. They speak to the pure child in us. They can be read to children on dark and stormy nights and spun into tall tales around summer campfires where the dark forest around us encourages us to believe the veil between reality and dream is thin veil.
Wherever they are read, told and re-told, the disparate yet similar stories in “Soul Stories” are a joy to the ear that hears the spell-binding words and to the mind’s eye that sees Clark-Stern’s beautiful, deeply moving worlds. (less)
During the 1960s, high school English teachers carefully served from the literary canon a poesy stew of skylarks, nightingales and albatrosses with a ...moreDuring the 1960s, high school English teachers carefully served from the literary canon a poesy stew of skylarks, nightingales and albatrosses with a few leaves of grass for seasoning. Contemporary poems howling through the streets in their underwear were adjudged unsafe in the classroom. We were left to discover the likes of Ginsberg and Ferlinghetti after school—at which point, our imaginations became enlightened.
Paul Watky’s collected poems in “Telling the Difference” (il piccolo editions from Fisher King Press, 2010) are an explosion waiting to happen that today’s students will only discover in a state of reality where lesson plans and outlines are prohibited even though Watsky prohibits nothing.
When yin and yang, sacred and profane, and laughter and tears are encouraged by the poet to sit side by side—perhaps even hold hands—in his work, the result is poetry that’s unsafe at any meter. In the book’s acknowledgements, Watsky notes that he is grateful to his wife and sons “for putting up with what poetry puts people through.”
Let this acknowledgement serve as a warning to the reader that “Telling the Difference” has the power to unleash the imagination at the borderline of chaos and enlightenment. Bound together, uneasy laughter and joyful pain have great power whether they are borne by a pet crayfish named Cumbersome “all tarted up with dust bunnies,” diver ants who’ll chew up “the fortuitous drunk passed out in the wrong place, Granny when she falls and can’t get up,” or a girl tied to “the nearly-wiggled-out pin of a fragmentation grenade.”
Watsky’s has organized “Telling the Difference” into four sections, “”Temple of Kali,” “The Closest,” “What People Learn,” and Piglet Mind,” bookended neatly in between a prologue called “All Good Things” and an epilogue called “Twins Discuss Heaven.” When the prologue suggests that saying “all good things must come to an end” is mere consolation like the “dummy nipples proffered between feeds,” the book’s stage is set for multiple associations between the transitory and the infinite. In the epilogue, George says “I believe in outer space. There isn’t room for heaven” and Simon explains that if heaven were real, we “would see Grandpa Seymour flying around in his coffin.” What else is there to say?
In reality, Watsky says a lot within the illusory confines of this 81-page collection. He speaks volumes about Bluejay’s warning in “Toad Fever,” a man who smashes walnuts with his manhood in “The Magnificent Goldstein” and the danger of words in “Language Fallen into the Wrong Hands.”
“Telling the Difference” is a wondrous, no-boundaries delight. However, if your hands are the wrong hands for a volatile serving of unsafe words, please remember that you’ve been warned that Watsky will put you through heavens, hells and hoops you didn’t know existed.
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D. J. McIntosh begins her planned Mesopotamian Trilogy with the page-turner "The Witch of Babylon" about a prospective royal treasure trove ...moreD. J. McIntosh begins her planned Mesopotamian Trilogy with the page-turner "The Witch of Babylon" about a prospective royal treasure trove that may have been hidden away when the city of Nineveh fell in 612 B.C. Written in the ancient-secrets-modern-adventures style of fiction pioneered by Katherine Neville in "The Eight," McIntosh's story focuses on New York antiquities dealer John Madison's sudden involvement in a ruthless treasure hunt for gold and gems in war-torn Iraq in 2003.
John's late brother Stephen, a specialist in Assyrian archeology, may have been holding an engraving saved from looters at Iraq's National Museum. After Hal Vanderlin purportedly steals the engraving, Hal dies of mysterious causes, giving opposing groups of treasure hunters the impression that John either has the artifact or knows how to find it.
Like other novels in this genre by Neville, Dan Brown and Raymond Khoury, "The Witch of Babylon's" plot only makes sense to readers as a series of experts throughout the story continuously discuss (and sometimes lecture about) the relevant myths, history and arcane wisdom. This trademark of the genre can, at times, make readers wonder if they're reading ancient history or modern fiction. In spite this back-story information, McIntosh keeps her plot moving. John Madison, who has had no time to come to terms with his brother's death in an automobile accident, is always in danger; he can never be quite sure which of the other players in this deadly game are the good, the bad, or the ugly.
"The Witch of Babylon" features interlocking plots within plots from ancient Nineveh to Baghdad to New York City. The ancient history, which involves one of the Bible's minor prophets, is just as compelling as the modern tragedy of antiquities looting in war-torn countries. Like his late brother, John believes the engraving belongs in a museum. Most of the other characters only see dollar signs and will kill anyone who gets in their way. (less)
Gwendolyn Greer Field has woven together the lives of the career-oriented Elizabeth Bishop and her old friend Annie into a compelling and complex psyc...moreGwendolyn Greer Field has woven together the lives of the career-oriented Elizabeth Bishop and her old friend Annie into a compelling and complex psychological and spiritual coming of age story. Bishop, who plans to leave her increasingly empty high-profile New York City job visits Annie in a small town because Annie's life is falling apart and she needs help.
Annie's husband Arthur committed suicide a year earlier, plunging what had appeared to be a perfect home into a world of secrets and doubt. Annie's fourteen-year-old daughter, Betsy--who was Arthur's favorite-- blames Annie for the family's ills. Her eight-year-old brother, Sam, who was ignored by Arthur, is less overt about his feelings.
Without realizing it, Elizabeth steps into a minefield of doubts, secrets and mysterious undercurrents, many of which cannot seem to be openly discussed. The cast of characters also includes Arthur's former best friend Jackson, whom Annie despises for reasons she will not say, and Luke, Elizabeth's high-school boyfriend whom she hasn't seen or heard from in years.
"The Butterfly's Kingdom" focuses primarily on the multiple conversations between these characters as they try to understand each other and their complicated relationships. Elizabeth, who went to Annie's side as a rescuer not only has to come to terms with who her old friend has become, but with the fact that she herself also needs to be rescued from whatever sent her away to New York in the first place.
Field allows her characters the time and space to get to know each other and discover where their lacks of trust begin and end. While the conversations are therapeutic and demonstrate that all of those involved need to confide and trust each other more than they do, they also show that a temporal solution isn't going to fix all the discordant lives.
"The Butterfly's Kingdom" is also about spiritual journeys. While the spirituality has a clear Christian focus, it should resonate well with readers from many faiths.
This beautifully imagined book has a pervasive editorial flaw. The characters' conversations all follow the same pattern: When one character makes a pithy and revealing statement about another, the statement is followed by "you're not mad at me for saying this, are you?" or by "do you know what I mean?" This device for transitioning from the pronouncement back into give-and-take dialogue is overused throughout the book and tends to blur the characters' personalities because they all do the same thing.
Nonetheless, this book of mysteries and secrets provides a thoughtful plot, issues that many readers may be experiencing in their own lives, and beautiful spiritual images and analogies en route to a satisfying conclusion.
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