M.B. Mulhall's Blog, page 10

“I could drive a truck through that!” – Plot Hole Woes

One of the problems I see with many Indie authors, especially pantsers and those who forgo quality editing, is the glaring, egregious plot hole. If a book takes too long to write and the author isn’t re-reading along the way, things often get forgotten, and that leads to story lines that don’t get wrapped up, questions left unanswered and issues such as characters popping up in your scenes when they were supposed to be across town.

I know not everyone can be a plotter, but it could work to your advantage to make chapter summaries, whether it’s on note cards or in a separate file. Timelines can also help keep plot holes at bay as well as those early beta readers who are reading along as you churn out chapters.

It’s an easy problem to fix, but carelessness and lack of editing can allow stories to get to the public without stitching up the hole. I promise you, it will lead to readers giving poor reviews and being annoyed you left pieces dangling rather than tying everything up all neat.

In a series, there are things that can be left unanswered, but you best make sure you note what they are so you can wrap them up in subsequent books and know that if you leave too much unanswered at the end of book 1, you’ll still most likely get cranky readers.

Tell a complete story. Don’t let readers come back and tell you they could drive a Mack truck through your plot holes.

How do you ensure all your ends are tied up before publishing?

 

Also, I’m running a giveaway on my FB page! Just stop by and comment on the linked post and you could win a copy of one of my books! GIVEAWAY!

Teaser Tuesday – Driven

A couple weeks ago I started on a new project after finishing the rough draft of Errand Girl of the Undead. I find I need to start something new so I don’t immediately rush in to edits, giving me some space from the project which seems to be helpful in the overall editing process.

The new project is a contemporary YA (shocker!) romance, more along the lines of Heavyweight than Tears of a Clown meaning more seriousness, less comedy/bathroom humor.

It’s tentatively titled Driven and is about an 18 year old homeless girl who’s been living on the streets, trying to sell her art to survive.  When she comes to the aid of a little old lady who has fallen off the curb, she finds herself with many unexpected opportunities to get her life back on track, but her past haunts her she doesn’t believe herself worthy of the good things that are being offered.

This is the first chapter, completely unedited. I do have a habit of rewriting the first one or two chapters before finishing a rough draft, so this may be completely different by the time the story is done, but I figured readers and other writers might be interested to see where a story starts and what it ends up as in the end.

Let me know what you think!

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Chapter One

 

“Help, I’ve fallen!”

“And you can’t get up?” The thought flitted through her mind before turning towards the sound of distress. There in the dirty gutter laid the crumpled figure of a little old blue-hair. Bright red bloomed through the woman’s tan pants. Dirt and grime was smudged on her adorably wrinkled face.

“Are you just going to stand there while I lay here, bleeding to death, or are you going to help an old lady up?”

Olivia looked over her shoulder to see who the snippy old bat was talking to, and saw there was no one else there.

“Girly, you look like you’ve been rolling in mud. Do you have dirt in your ears? I’m talking to you.”

“Me?” Olivia pointed to herself to make sure the lady, who may have hit her head on the way down, was truly speaking to her.

“Yes you! Do you see anyone else? Quit dawdling and come help me up.”  Her frail arm waiver in the air, reaching towards Olivia’s frozen form.

“O…kay,”  the younger woman finally said, uprooting her feet from the pavement.  In a few long strides, she was grasping the cool papery hand in her own, bending to wrap her other arm around the lady’s tiny frame.  It wasn’t much of a struggle to help the petite woman to her feet. They to a nearby park bench which the woman sank down on with a long drawn out sigh. Unsure what to do next, Olivia just stood there, towering over her.

“Um, are you alright? Do you live near here?” Olivia kept looking from the woman back to her pile of meager belongings she had left behind when she came to assist.

“I’m not far,” the woman said looking down at her knee, tsking about cleaning out the blood under her breath.

“Do you…uhh, do you think you could make it? Or do you need help?”

“Oh! Help would be lovely dear, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Olivia knew she couldn’t leave the woman to hobble back by herself. Her father would be terribly disappointed in her if she did that.  Holding back a sigh, she motioned that she’d be a minute before turning to jog back to her pack. Slinging it over her shoulder, she took her time walking back, studying the woman as she went.

Even though the frame was small, the woman seemed to radiate a kind of power.  Well dressed, short of the bloody knee, she screamed money: coifed hair, pearls around her neck and rings on her fingers. Laugh lines radiated from the corners of two still bright blue eyes. While her tongue was sharp, the many wrinkles gave her a friendly appearance, like one of those shar pei dogs.

When she saw Olivia approaching, she got to her feet, listing to one side.  Olivia sped up to get to her, where she wrapped an arm around the frail back to steady the woman who was doing a fine impression of a wobbly top winding down.

“Woah there.” Olivia adjusted her stance to help keep the woman on her feet. “Are you sure you’ll be okay to walk?”

The woman waved her off. “Of course I’m sure. I’m old but hardly helpless.”

Olivia raised a brow but said nothing as they started off down the sidewalk.

It was slow going, but after a couple of blocks, a quaint Victorian came into view.  It was white with bright purple trim that should have looked garish but ended up giving the home a welcoming kind of charm.  There were flower boxes at each window, a riot of bright blooming colors. A waist high black wrought-iron fence surrounded the lush lawn and disappeared behind the back of the house. The wrap-around porch was graced with wooden rockers painted in vibrant blues and greens and yellows.

Olivia thought it looked like it came out of a fairytale, the kind of place where wishes would be granted and comfort could be found for the night. A sharp pang sparked in her chest at the thought of a night of comfort and safety. She shook her head slightly to get the thoughts out.  It wouldn’t do her any good to think of things that couldn’t be.

They reached the gate and the woman gestured for Olivia to open it. It swung away from them with silent grace, no rusted squeaking to announce their arrival. As they made their way up the cobblestone walk, the front door opened and Olivia found herself staring at a mirror image of the woman clinging to her arm. They were practically identical down to the orthopedic shoes they wore, the only difference being in the color of their outfits.  The styles were the same but the woman at the door wore pastels rather than the neutral tones her sister donned.

“Oh Tude! What happened to you?”

“Tude?” Olivia questioned, looking down at the woman she was still supporting.

“It’s actually Gertrude, but that’s such a mouthful, don’t you think?” The woman patted Olivia’s arm and let go, walking up the stairs with a surprising amount of spring in her step.

Olivia’s eyes narrowed as she began to realize the woman had played her. She watched the pastel lady fawn over her not-so-injured sister, unsure of what to do next.  When they turned for the door, Olivia was surprised by the wave of disappointment that washed over her.  While she wasn’t expecting any kind of compensation for helping, a thank you would have been nice.  Her head hung as she moved to head back towards the park.  It was almost 5pm, maybe she could catch some commuters on their way home to buy some of her pieces so she could get something to eat.

“Aren’t you coming in, dearie?”

The voice caught Olivia off guard and she nearly tripped over her own feet to turn to face the speaker.  Pastel lady was holding the door open, waving her inside. Gertrude was nowhere to be seen.

“Why?” Olivia asked, suddenly suspicious.

The woman’s eyes widened. “Why, for dinner of course.  It’s near time and it’s the least we can do for helping poor Tude get home.”

“I’m not sure she really needed my help…”

“Oh, of course she did dear.  We’re just a couple of frail old spinsters who need assistance with a multitude of things, like finishing all the food I cooked for dinner. Please, come join us.”  The woman’s warm voice and smiling eyes chipped away at Olivia’s wary nature. Her growling stomach sealed the deal.  She couldn’t remember the last time she had a home cooked meal.

“I guess I could…”

“Of course you can dear, now come inside and get washed up. We don’t allow for dirty hands at the dinner table.”

Olivia climbed the steps and tried to peer inside the dark interior before stepping over the threshold.  She couldn’t see much, but the wafting scents of cooked meats set her mouth to watering.  She followed her nose, no longer caring that she had been tricked.  Food won out over pride.

Buying Betas

One of my great writing buddies, Patricia Lynne, wrote a blog post yesterday about the difficulty of finding good beta readers (Insecure Writer’s Support Group). Within the comments, someone recommended offering gift cards, free books or free iTunes songs in exchange for someone reading your early work.

Needless to say, this idea did not sit very well with me. It felt very much like the authors who were paying for 5 star reviews. How do you know you’re getting honest feedback and not just people looking for free stuff? Are there honest people out there who will really follow through in order to receive their “gift”? Of course, but there are also those who will decide “Meh I don’t want to finish this so I’ll just tell them it was great so I can get my gift card.”

One of the great things about the writer community (it seems Indie or traditional) is that writers help each other.  They offer to be beta readers for one because they know when they need a reader for their own work, that author will turn around and be ready to read for them. It’s a “I’ll scratch your back if you scratch mine” kind of relationship, but not only that, most authors love to read so they’re are excited to be able to read an early version of something and get to brag about it to others.

A beta reader should take their job seriously because others are depending on their honest feedback.  It’s not just a chance to read a book; someone is depending on your response and comments and suggestions. If you don’t think you’ll have the time or that the book won’t interest you, thank the author but decline.  I guarantee they would prefer to be turned down in the beginning than wait and wait for a response from you that will never come or a comment much later saying you decided you didn’t have the time for it.

Beta readers should be those who love to read and are willing to put in the time to help make your book better.  If you’d like to reward them in some way, you can promise them a mention in your acknowledgement  pages. An avid reader would love to see their name in a book!

How do you attract your beta readers?

Villains, revisited

It’s been a while since I talked about the literary characters we love to hate (What Makes for a Good Villain & ABC’s 123′s of Nano: V is for Villain).   I’m going to revisit the idea of fleshing out your villains.

Far too often I’m reading stories of our heroes and heroines battling some great evil, be it the wizard from a foreign land or the bitchy girl who wants everyone at the school to bow down to her, but I have only a vague understanding of why these villainous entities are doing what they’re doing. Greed? Lust for power? Fulfilling a prophesy? Because they’re bored and are troublemakers?

I want to know what’s going on in their heads. Were they treated poorly growing up and therefore trying to take revenge on those who held them down? Were they groomed all their lives to take over some evil empire? Did they have abusive childhoods?

I would love to see a story written from both the hero’s and the villain’s point of view, maybe done in alternating chapters, so we can really get a feel for why things are happening. I’m trying to remember a series I read not long ago that included a novella from the “villain’s” POV that gave us a great look inside how he has been trying to please his father his entire life and how he fell in love with the girl he captured and it was great to see that even though he was doing “bad” things, there was still a human side to him.

Aha! It was Tahereh Mafi’s Shatter Me series! The novella was from Warner’s point of view and it gives the reader some great insight as to why he does what he does.

Writing about the villain’s backstory could make the reader come to care more about them, but they don’t have to have a “human” side.  Show the reader why they’re inhuman. What caused them to be that way, whether they’re an alien species we’ll never quite understand or if they’ve been corrupted by an evil influence that has left them not caring for anyone but themselves.

Let the reader in and let them know the motives behind things.  It makes for a more well rounded story.

Do you feel like learning about a villain’s backstory and motives would make a book more interesting?

Keep it Concise

I belong to a writing group. They’re a good group of folks and we’ve started to meet more frequently (from monthly to weekly) so we can get through more of our stories and people could hear the progression, etc.  It’s been great in a lot of ways, but one of the downfalls is that there are a couple folks who feel they need to recap their entire story each week before launching into the new stuff.

I don’t mind so much when we’ve got new folks, but even then, people need to learn how to keep it concise and get on with it.  This is were taglines, loglines or elevator pitches come in handy.

What’s the difference?

I’ll explain.

Elevator pitch: Imagine you’re waiting in an elevator to go to a meeting and the agent of your dreams walks in. It’s just the two of you and you have a few brief moments to pitch them your story and get them interested.  You’re not trying to close the deal and get them to sign you, you’re trying to get them interested to want to know more. The pitch should be 30-60 seconds long and it should end with a “call to action” or a question so you know they were listening and gives them the opportunity to ask questions.  Something along the lines of “Does this seem like something you’d be interested in representing?” could work.

Tagline:  Whomever is doing your marketing tends to be the one to come up with the tagline.  They are typically a short phrase to describe the plot. It’s a catch phrase to catch the attention of potential readers rather than an agent. Good example I found is for the movie Jaws: You’ll never go into the water again.

Logline: These are used to get the agent’s attention. They’re a one line synopsis that should tell what the story is about.  For example (keeping with Jaws): A sheriff must find and destroy a killer shark that terrorizes a summer resort town.

Loglines are also handy for social media purposes, especially Twitter.  They are short enough to get the already waning attention of those following you.  Also, there are often contests running on Twitter that are based on your 140 character loglines.  I’ve participated in a few and gotten agent requests to read my work.

In today’s society, people are used to a quick info dump.  Everyone is in a hurry and are often distracted or (gasp!) bored before you get done explaining about your baby (aka manuscript).  One of these short marketing ploys can help you gain their interest quickly and have them focusing their attention on you rather than the shiny thing moving past them in the other direction.

They can be difficult to come up with, but are a worthwhile endeavor.  Go ahead and practice on me.  What’s the logline for your work in progress or work you’re trying to pitch to agents?

 

Book Review – Where the Stars Still Shine

Title: Where the Stars Still Shine

Author: Trisha Doller

Genre: Young Adult

Source: Net Galley

Goodreads Rating: 4.29

My Rating: 4 stars

Summary (from Goodreads):

Stolen as a child from her large and loving family, and on the run with her mom for more than ten years, Callie has only the barest idea of what normal life might be like. She’s never had a home, never gone to school, and has gotten most of her meals from laundromat vending machines. Her dreams are haunted by memories she’d like to forget completely. But when Callie’s mom is finally arrested for kidnapping her, and Callie’s real dad whisks her back to what would have been her life, in a small town in Florida, Callie must find a way to leave the past behind. She must learn to be part of a family. And she must believe that love–even with someone who seems an improbable choice–is more than just a possibility.

Reaction:

Quite the powerful story about a teen who finds herself back with a family she barely remembers while her mother rots away in a jail cell several states away.  It’s obvious from her flings with boys and the way she acts around her father that Callie wants to be loved but doesn’t really know what that means or how to go about being loved/showing love.  She struggles between trying to stay loyal to her mother and to her own longing for a place to finally call home where she will feel safe.

The occasional flashbacks to what happened to Callie as a child are gripping and emotional and those who have been abused/molested may want to pass on the story for that reason. Her nightmares and reactions to certain sexual situations go to show she is struggling with demons and when she finally admits out loud what happened, reactions of other characters range from anger to disbelief but also cause bonds and relationship dynamics to change.

A great read covering some heavy topics. Characters come off as very realistic and you’ll definitely come to feel for them. Heart wrenching and beautifully written.

Book Review – Elite

Title: Elite

Author: Rachel Van Dyken

Genre:  New Adult/Contemporary

Source:  NetGalley

Goodreads Rating: 4.24 stars

My Rating: 3 stars

Summary (from Goodreads):

When I won the annual Eagle Elite College Scholarship lottery, I was thrilled. After all, my grandma had just died and I wanted to take care of my aging grandpa — he couldn’t be a farmer in Wyoming forever. And graduating from Eagle Elite meant opportunity.

But I wasn’t counting on meeting Nixon.

Nor was I counting on the rules of the Elect.

1. Do not touch The Elect.

2. Do not look at The Elect.

3. Do not speak to The Elect.

And worst of all? Don’t discover the secret they hide, because in the end, you may just realize… it’s about you.

*This is a New Adult Book, blood, violence, cursing, sexual references, and drug use. Not recommended for those under 17.*

Reaction:

A familiar story although I admit I didn’t catch on to the Romeo/Juliet bit until later in the story.  It’s a decent read and you wonder why Nixon is being such an a-hole, but as secrets are spilled and things are revealed you realize that there’s a method to his madness and you come to like him a bit instead of hating his behaviors, but the bullying and sexual harassment is pretty abhorrent and a bit of a turn off. I wish Trace had fought back more.  The fact that the “kids” ran the school seemed quite unrealistic and honestly it was a bit ludicrous that all the adults would bow and scrape to them.  Not a horrible read but I wouldn’t put it at the top of my list.

What the Trope?!

The good ole dictionary tells us:

trope  (trp)

n.

a : a word or expression used in a figurative sense : figure of speech

b : a common or overused theme or device : cliché tropes>

If you’re a frequent YA reader, you know there are some very common tropes making the rounds, especially these days. Let’s list a few:


1) Absentee Parents

I’m not sure why this is, but there are sooooo many young adult novels out these days where the parents are non-existent, dead or deadbeat (meaning they don’t count anyway). Is it because then the characters can’t come and go as they please? That they can’t be staying out all night at underground raves or so no one questions why they come home covered in blood and ichor? Probably, but I think having the parent/guardian around to question these things makes the stories a bit more believable. That’s not to say I can’t enjoy a story sans authority figures, but it’d be a nice change to see them come back into style.

2) The Love Triangle

Alright, I admit I’m guilty of using this one myself, but it started as a joke, I swear! Haha. I think since the release of Twilight, this has probably become of of the most common, overused tropes in the genre. Yes it’s good for creating some tension and having the reader be annoyed if your MC doesn’t end up with who they want (poor poor Jacob), but there are other ways to keep your reader turning the page. Think outside the box.

3) Holy crap, I’m really a >fill in the blank

Perhaps this started with  Harry Potter and his secret “Woah, I’m a wizard?!”, but there are tons of books out there where the MC is a fae in hiding, or a  *cough*Shadow*cough* Hunter, or some other kind of magical fantasy type of persona.  This goes along with “Powers will reveal themselves on your  16/17/18th birthday, so be prepared for your whole life to change!” tropes.


4) Female Main Characters

While I get there are really only two options here, female MCs way out weigh male MCs and while this isn’t an awful thing, I’d love to see it balanced out a bit more.  I think young female readers would enjoy seeing a romance from the boy’s point of view and it’s not like they don’t have their own set of insecurities and issues.  Even it out folks!

5) Mary Sue, at your service

The Mary Sue character is perfect and everyone loves her. She can do no wrong. She’s the most beautiful, the friendliest, the smartest, the perfectly perfect all-around-amazing character that no one in the book can hate.  She’s the character us “normal” folks want to push off a cliff just to see if she’ll land scratch-free.


6) The Bitchy Popular Girl

If you don’t have the girl everyone loves (see above) you’ve probably got the bitchy “Queen Bee” that everyone (but the MC) bows to, treating her as if she rules the school/town/whatever even if she treats them like annoying little peons she wouldn’t go out of her way to walk around. She’ll typically get knocked down a few pegs before the book ends as people open their eyes and see her for what she really is! Or, ya know, they grow a backbone and tell her off.

7) The Bad Boy with a Heart of Gold

He wears black, has tattoos and drives a motorcycle. He’s been to juvie or kicked out of several schools. He’s the hottest thing around and is rumored to have slept with the entire cheerleader team…at the same time.  But deep down, he’s wounded, nursing a broken heart or mourning the loss of a loved one.  He secretly takes care of disabled younger siblings or works 3 jobs to support his family since his mom/dad/both parents ran out on them.

8) Love at First Sight, Touch or Smell (I’m looking at you, Edward)

I was a teen, I remember infatuation and those heady feelings of first love, but this soulmate bullshit that keeps popping up in YA books drives me bonkers. WE WERE MEANT TO BE AND NEVER SHALL WE BE TORN APART! Yeah yeah, until you go to college and your first frat party where 5 guys hit on you and make you feel all “special”. Heh

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Those are just a few of the popular tropes in Young Adult literature these days. Some of them I can live with. Others? I won’t even give some of them a chance anymore. Some of them are unavoidable, but if you’re going to use them, try to throw a twist in there at least, be a breath of fresh air for the reader.

What are some of your most hated YA tropes? Which are you still a sucker for?

Book Review – Starry Nights

Title: Starry Nights

Author: Daisy Whitney

Genre:  Young Adult/Fantasy

Source:  NetGalley

Goodreads Rating: 3.84 stars

My Rating: 2 stars

Summary (from Goodreads):

Seventeen-year-old Julien is a romantic—he loves spending his free time at the museum poring over the great works of the Impressionists. But one night, a peach falls out of a Cezanne, Degas ballerinas dance across the floor, and Julien is not hallucinating.

The art is reacting to a curse that trapped a beautiful girl, Clio, in a painting forever. Julien has a chance to free Clio and he can’t help but fall in love with her. But love is a curse in its own right. And soon paintings begin to bleed and disappear. Together Julien and Clio must save the world’s greatest art . . . at the expense of the greatest love they’ve ever known.

Like a master painter herself, Daisy Whitney brings inordinate talent and ingenuity to this romantic, suspenseful, and sophisticated new novel. A beautifully decorated package makes it a must-own in print.

Reaction:

I wanted to love this story: Paris, famous art work coming to live, romance, etc. but it was lacking the spark to keep me interested. I found I couldn’t connect with Julien and didn’t care what happened to him or the girl in the painting. I felt like Paris wasn’t painted in the gorgeous kind of light that would make me want to go back and see it all over again.

I always try to finish books to see if they get better or find out what happens, but I decided it wasn’t worth it to me to finish this one when I had so many other things waiting on my pile.  It wasn’t awful, but the magic just didn’t pull me in. Maybe you’ll find you like it more.

My Top Ten Books You Should Read Someday

I dread the question: What’s your favorite book ever?

I read so much (typically between 100-200 books a year), that it’s hard to 1) remember everything 2) pick just one! It’s like someone asking me which of the three is my favorite nephew.

If figured I could probably handle a top ten list of books I love that I think others should read (if they haven’t already). I know I’m going to probably miss some good ones, so maybe there will be a follow up! Haha.

The numbers do not represent the order in which I prefer them, they’re just there to help you count.

Drum roll please!

10: Daughter of Smoke and Bone 

Beautifully written, the book transports me to Prague and Marrakech–two places I know very little about– and spins an extraordinary tale of teeth being used to make wishes and leading a double life. I found it to be a really unique story and one that pulled me right in.  The sequel was quite enjoyable as well.

9: The Fionavar Tapestry 

Okay, so maybe I’m cheating a little because this one is a trilogy, but I like to look at series as one long book broken up into smaller ones, so to me, it counts as one!  I’m not normally a huge fan of high fantasy (sorry, definitely not a LotR mega fan) but Kay is different from most fantasy authors in that he doesn’t front load his world building, but rather weaves it in as the story progresses so you learn as you go instead of cramming it all in there at the beginning before actually getting to the plot.  This series takes place in contemporary Canada and Fionavar and is an interesting twist on Arthurian Legend.

8: To Kill a Mockingbird

Admittedly, I’m not a big fan of “classics” because I typically find I can’t relate well and then they bore me, but this book stuck with me since I first read it back in high school. I like to suggest this one to non-readers too since it’s one of the very few book to film adaptations where the movie may actually surpass the book. If you don’t read, watch the flick, Harper Lee probably wouldn’t mind.

7: The Fault in Our Stars

I adore John Green. I think I’ve fallen in love with everything he’s written, but TFiOS trumps them all, for me at least  His writing is so real. Always an emotional roller coaster, which you love to ride but also want to get off of because you’ve run out of tissues and your eyes are all red and puffed up making it hard to read the pages. Amazing characters fighting the dreaded C word…you’ll love them and hurt for them.  It’s worth the pain.

6: The Master and Margarita

Russian lit isn’t for everyone, but this one is comical and Bulgakov does an amazing job of weaving one story inside the other.  The Devil comes to St. Petersburge and wants to throw a party, but he needs a queen for the night.  Enter Margarita who makes a Faustian deal to save her “Master” who is imprisoned for writing a book about Jesus from Pontius Pilate‘s PoV. You don’t have to be religious to enjoy it, although if you know the story of JC and Pilate you might understand things a little more, but there’s a lot of humor with a giant talking cat and people getting naked. Good stuff!

5: Graceling

This book is part of a different kind of series. The second in the grouping, Fire, seems to be a bit disconnected from the first book until you read the third in the series, Bitterblue which does a great job bringing all three together. So good that I had to go back and re-read the first two to see how I missed connections.  A great fantasy series with strong female characters. Cashore spins her story well and I love that it was a different take on a series, bringing together two worlds you didn’t even know were connected.

4: Break

I don’t remember how I came across Hannah Moskowitz’s debut book, but I’m so glad I did. She has a unique writing style and the idea behind this book, that Jonah wants to break every bone in his body because they grow back stronger and he needs the strength to deal with his sick brother, is pretty damn amazing.

3: The Stand

Yes I know, it’s like a billion pages long, but King is pretty brilliant in the way he keeps so many story lines going and how he ties everything all together.  No movie or mini-series will ever do this book justice, there’s just far too much information and little tidbits that won’t come across well in film form. M-O-O-N spells why you should read this book.

2: Going Bovine

A dark comedy where a teenaged boy finds he’s got a disease and goes on a journey with a lawn gnome.  Sounds odd, I know, but it’s funny and touching at the same time.  I wouldn’t doubt you’d need tissues somewhere along the way.  Libba Bray does literary comedy quite well, something I feel is lacking in many of today’s novels.  Another of her books, Beauty Queens, is also great for a laugh.

1: A Song of Ice and Fire (aka Game of Thrones)

For someone who doesn’t like high fantasy, I cannot get enough of this series.  Martin absolutely amazes me to be able to carry on so many complicated story lines that remain interesting and exciting and keeping the reader guessing as to how things are going to work out.  I don’t think I’ve ever hated a villain more than his Theon Greyjoy, yet now, he’s trying to get readers to feel sorry for the guy and it might just work.. You know it’s great writing when he kills off all the characters you love yet you STILL keep reading! It’s one of the series where you want to know the ending, to see what happens, but at the same time you want it to go on forever so you can continue to be in the lives of your favorite characters.

What are some of your favorite reads?