Sarah Chorn's Blog, page 47

The Macro Monday that was Neither Macro Nor Monday

Well, we had an extended weekend here in the US of A, and I took advantage of it. My husband and myself put the kids in the car, and explored some of Utah’s back country. Say what you will about this state, but it is absolutely beautiful, and very diverse. It’s almost summer here in the valleys, but up in the high back country, there’s still snow and no leaves.

Anyway, it was relaxing and wonderful and here are two photos from it.

A Green and Ancient Light – Frederic S. Durbin

About the Book

A gorgeous fantasy in the spirit of Pan’s Labyrinth and John Connolly’s The Book of Lost Things.

Set in a world similar to our own, during a war that parallels World War II, A Green and Ancient Light is the stunning story of a boy who is sent to stay with his grandmother for the summer in a serene fishing village. Their tranquility is shattered by the crash of a bullet-riddled enemy plane, the arrival of grandmother’s friend Mr. Girandole—a man who knows the true story of Cinderella’­s slipper—and the discovery of a riddle in the sacred grove of ruins behind grandmother’s house. In a sumptuous idyllic setting and overshadowed by the threat of war, four unlikely allies learn the values of courage and sacrifice.

320 pages (hardcover)

Publishing on June 7, 2016

Published by Saga Press

Author’s webpage

Buy the book

This book was sent by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

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A Green and Ancient Light was pretty much the book I really needed to read right now.  It is one of those slow, deliberate reads that has an easy flow and kind of sucks you under. The book itself is magic, and that magic is felt in every single page.

The book is written in a sort of interesting way. Names aren’t used, and the author doesn’t nail down the location this takes place, or the war we are focused on. My ideas about location/wars change as the book progresses. I think World War II is a good guess, but as for location, who knows?

The point here is stated at the start of the book. This is the story of a young boy, and in truth he’s telling a story a lot of young people can relate to, or tell in one way or another about their own childhood. It isn’t really about him, but about childhood in general, so many of the aspects of the novel that bring out specific people, places, and events, are hinted at or completely avoided to drive this point home. For example, people are referred to as a letter and a bunch of dashes, like R—-. It took some getting used to, but not as much adjusting as I thought. I ended up really sinking into this book a bit more for it, I think. I wasn’t being told a story about other people, I was being told a story about people I might know, in places I might have visited.

A Green and Ancient Light, as I said, is the story of a boy who is sent away to live with his grandmother in a remote area during a war. His father is a soldier, and he worries and misses his family, but the relationship that grows between him and his grandmother is nothing short of incredible. You can feel the sort of awkward discomfort at the start of the book, but the spell grows and things happen and quickly the two of them become something more than grandmother and grandson, and a real warm kinship bond forms.

That’s something about the book that I loved the most – the relationships. Not just between the grandmother and grandson, but between neighbors, and everyone in the community. Grandmother has a spitfire personality and has delightful observations that bring humor and deep insight into the heart of situations. She respects her neighbors, but also knows how to play them. Her moral compass is straight and well defined, and directs her grandson through treacherous situations well. I had nothing but respect and admiration for her, and she was so incredibly real.

The grandson is likewise wonderful, a young boy in a troubled time stuck in a place that quickly becomes magic. The spell is woven over readers through some absolutely incredible writing on the author’s behalf. Everything is described in perfect detail, from the hidden Garden of Monsters, to the garden his grandmother grows around her house. This is a safe place that is part of the world without actually being part of the world. It has a real frozen-in-time feel, and it’s so incredibly easy to see how a young boy would be enchanted by the place, and the events that transpire stand out, but not overly so because this place just feels so damn magical in the first place.

The plot is kind of slow going, but honestly I didn’t really notice that at all. This book didn’t feel long enough – not because of any flaw on the authors part- and that’s mostly because of the incredible writing, and how real everything about this book felt. I wanted it to go on forever. Isn’t that the true mark of a fantastic book? You never want it to end? And when it ended, it almost brought me a physical pain. This book is magic. The words are magic. The characters are magic. I wish I could read it for the first time over and over again.

This is one of the best books I’ve read all year.

 

5/5 stars

SPFBO 2016: Round 1 Mini Reviews

Alright folks, here you have my round 1 mini reviews, with the winner announced at the end. Enjoy (or something).

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It Takes a Thief to Catch a Sunrise – Rob J. Hayes

This book was quite fun, told from the perspective of two thieves who have a long history together. Their voices are incredibly individual, and their history together is felt in just about every aspect of the book, giving it a rich feel and a dynamic, memorable relationship which is kind of rare in books like this. Their dialogue and banter keeps the book from ever feeling too heavy. There are a lot of twists and turns, and a very strong ending that leaves enough room for Hayes to revisit this world, which I encourage him to do. This book is incredibly well written, and will appeal to fans of caper stories, like Scott Lynch. Hayes has an easy way about him, like he’s comfortable with his writing and the story he is telling, and I could tell that he genuinely had fun writing this book. That enjoyment was felt in every page. Excellent world building, a delightful plot, it’s the characters that shined like diamonds in this novel.

Rating: 4/5 stars

Award: The Most Entertaining

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Blackbird – L.E. Harrison

The premise of this book interested me. I’m a sucker for books that take landscapes I’m familiar with, and makes them something magical and interesting. Nothing really does that more than a set of shapeshifters hidden away somewhere in Maine. So, I’m interested. My biggest problem with this book was the start. It felt a bit complex, and hard to get into. It took me a while to figure out how the story was being told. Once I got into the groove of it, I found myself enjoying the book overall, but as I said before, it’s complex, and at times it felt a bit unnecessarily complex, and that bogged things down. There were some editing and formatting issues which could have probably made it easier for me to figure out what was going on and who was doing what, where. Regardless, it’s an interesting story and a good premise for a book. It’s easy to enjoy, and I could tell that Harrison really visualized and had a clear picture of the story she was telling. Steeped in magic and lore, there is a lot here to love, however, the style of the narrative and the plot itself will either hit or miss with readers.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Award: The Most Complex

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A Lonely Magic – Sarah Wynde

If I’m going to be honest with you, this was a book that I really wasn’t expecting to like, and I ended up surprised. The world is absolutely fantastic, incredibly unique and full of some of the most memorable magic I’ve run across in an SPFBO book. The world is likewise interesting, set in a secret location deep under the ocean where watchers go up to the surface occasionally to check on human progress. The magic is pretty fascinating, but Fen is really the aspect of the novel that sticks out for me. Fen, the protagonist, comes from a rough past, and the book really starts when she’s forced to choose how to die. This thrusts her into this unique situation where she learns she has magic, and has to learn to navigate an underwater world. The pacing is a bit off. The start of the book, about the first quarter of it, moves sort of slow and plodding. It picks up quickly after that. Wynde really filled the novel full of just about everything she could imagine, packing it full of all those details I love. This is the obvious first book in a series, and I have dock some serious points for a cliffhanger ending, but otherwise, this book was riveting despite some minor issues I had as things progressed.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Award: The Most Unique

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Glyphbinder – T. Eric Bakutis

Glyphbinder gave me some issues. The idea behind the book is really interesting, but right off the bat I noticed some editing issues that nagged at me. The first bit of the book, which sets the stage for everything that happens later, is kind of chaotic. Not only is it actually chaotic, but it’s written in a way that was hard for me to really understand. It felt a lot more wordy than it really needed to be. This is epic fantasy with heart, but it’s also a story about a chosen one (in some respects). The magic is interesting, and the protagonist, Kara, is easy to like but in the end there was some division between the story and its ability to really hook me. Is it good? Yes. Are there editing issues? Yes. But this is epic fantasy with heart, and that says something important right there.

Rating: 2.5/5 stars

Award: The Most Heart

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Duel of Fire – Jordan Rivet

Duel of Fire is going to have some issues that people will recognize right away. They can all be summarized by the word “trope.” There are lots of tropes in this book. It’s a coming of age tale, centered around a young woman who is really good at certain things. She gets involved in issues that are basically above her pay grade and she has to learn to navigate through this newly large, treacherous world. There are some obvious romantic interests that are developing, and the climax of the novel is easy to smell from a mile away. But. Rivet did a great job at telling this story that I think I’ve read before in new ways. She doesn’t use 40 words when she only needs twelve. The characters are interesting, if a bit lackluster. This book doesn’t stand on its own, and is the obvious setup for the rest of a series, but it’s a solid setup with strong writing, an interesting plot, and characters you can really cheer for.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Award: Best Comfort Fantasy

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The Last Kinmark – Josh Brannan

If you’re interested in reading an epic fantasy that grapples with all sorts of deeper moral questions in a fascinating secondary world, then you really need look no further. The Last Kinmark has just about everything every fan of epic fantasy looks for in their books. This is setting the stage for something lush and complex, absolutely sprawling, and fantastically different than anything I’ve encountered before. There were some infodumps, and some pacing issues. Things don’t really get going until you’re into the book a bit. The biggest issue I had was that sometimes the flipping between storylines was quite jarring, and some characters felt like they had a bit more development than others. I could have used more details, more depth and color, but for what the author is trying to do – play with big themes and ask important questions – the effort is obvious and a firm foundation has been laid.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Award: The Most Epic

 

 

The winner is: 
It Takes a Thief to Catch a Sunrise – Rob J. Hayes

 

A Buggy Macro Monday

Our internet has been having issues recently. We’ve had a guy out to fix it, and apparently the issue is “well known” in our area and it’s attributed to “bad wiring somewhere.” Comcast can’t figure out where the bad wiring is, so they are trying to hunt it down and fix it (ha ha ha). Long story short, we keep losing our internet and it’s making putting up regular posts difficult because it’s so unpredictable.

I have a lot going on, and almost none of it I want to actually talk about, so this will be short and sweet.

Here is today’s Macro Monday. I’m not that fond of this shot, but macro photography is very, very, very, very hard for me right now, so I’ll take what I can get.

Over Your Dead Body – Dan Wells

About the Book

John and Brooke are on their own, hitchhiking from town to town as they hunt the last of the Withered through the midwest— but the Withered are hunting them back, and the FBI is close behind. With each new town, each new truck stop, each new highway, they get closer to a vicious killer who defies every principle of profiling and prediction John knows how to use, and meanwhile Brooke’s fractured psyche teeters on the edge of oblivion, overwhelmed by the hundreds of thousands of dead personalities sharing her mind. She flips in and out of lucidity, manifesting new names and thoughts and memories every day, until at last the one personality pops up that John never expected and has no idea how to deal with. The last of Nobody’s victims, trapped forever in the body of his last remaining friend

303 pages (paperback)

Published on May 3, 2016

Published by Tor

Author’s webpage

Buy the book

This book was sent by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

—

I have absolutely loved the evolution of the John Cleaver series. Each book seems to surprise me in ways that surprise me (har har). Dan Wells is a fantastic author, and he managed to get into the head of someone like John Cleaver, and bring him to life so brilliantly. But his books are also never stale. John always faces an interesting dilemma, and Wells really gets into his psychology quite brilliantly.

Over Your Dead Body is a bit different than The Devil’s Only Friend. The Devil’s Only Friend has a large cast, and a wide ranging plot that felt kind of chaotic and scattered at times. Over Your Dead Body was smaller, more intimate, and in some ways that intimacy made it all the more horrifying.

Over Your Dead Body, in some ways, brings the whole John Cleaver series back to its twisted roots, and kind of twists them a little bit more. John and Brooke are on their own, hitchhiking across the country, trying to find the last of the Withered while dodging the FBI. In the process of all this, John runs into a serial killer who is killing all the ways that he dreams of killing.

This one is hugely psychological. Brooke, for one thing, shares her mind with thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of dead people who each remember how they have died and who pop up at the most random times, sometimes they are fairly harmless, but other times they are completely detrimental and absolutely dangerous, as is witnessed at the start of the book.

This often leaves John off kilter a bit. He never really knows who he is talking to, so he’s on edge, and they are in an unpredictable situation which also throws him off his axis a bit, too. This is John in the least controlled environment I’ve seen him in yet. Then suddenly Brooke starts manifesting the personality of the only person that John has ever loved. And compiled with this is a truly horrifying plot where they are on the run, hunting the last of the Withered, and he’s tracking a demon who is reading his mind and killing people the ways that he wants to kill people – basically living out his dreams.

This entire book is one psychological mind trip, where half of you feels horrified and the other half is just transfixed with all these moral and emotional dilemmas that seem to slam into John and Brook with a relentlessly quick pace. Wells has a way with writing where he manages to convey deep ideas and powerful emotions with as few words as possible, which makes his books so surprisingly powerful and quick to read. The twists and turns happen on an almost constant basis.

The book moves quickly, and while the plot is interesting, the personal and interpersonal problems faced are just about as captivating as the plot, if not more so. This book is dark, and Wells really managed to get into the heads of Brook and John with a depth that I haven’t really seen for a few books.

Over Your Dead Body was one of my favorite books in this series so far. And that’s really saying something because every book seems to impress me more than the last. This one, though, really went further than the previous books. It’s full of twists and turns, and it’s oh-so-dark. It’s also intimate and personal, and Wells seems to decide to take a bunch of chances, and his chances all pay off big time.

I think it is essential to read previous books in the series before you hit this one, but it is absolutely worth your time. There are very few series that get into my head the way that this one does. Wells is a spectacular author, and he deals with these tough, often misunderstood topics, with poise, ease, and a bit of grace. Over Your Dead Body is a captivating blend of intimate and shocking, but at the end of the day it is absolutely unforgettable.

 

4/5 stars

The Bread We Eat in Dreams – Catherynne M. Valente

About the Book

Subterranean Press proudly presents a major new collection by one of the brightest stars in the literary firmament. Catherynne M. Valente, the New York Times bestselling author of The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making and other acclaimed novels, now brings readers a treasure trove of stories and poems in The Bread We Eat in Dreams.

In the Locus Award-winning novelette “White Lines on a Green Field,” an old story plays out against a high school backdrop as Coyote is quarterback and king for a season. A girl named Mallow embarks on an adventure of memorable and magical politicks in “The Girl Who Ruled Fairyland—For a Little While.” The award-winning, tour de force novella “Silently and Very Fast” is an ancient epic set in a far-flung future, the intimate autobiography of an evolving A.I. And in the title story, the history of a New England town and that of an outcast demon are irrevocably linked.

The thirty-five pieces collected here explore an extraordinary breadth of styles and genres, as Valente presents readers with something fresh and evocative on every page. From noir to Native American myth, from folklore to the final frontier, each tale showcases Valente’s eloquence and originality.

336 pages (hardcover)

Published on December 31, 2013

Published by Subterranean Press

Author’s webpage

Buy the book

—

I don’t know how I managed to live with myself before I read a Catherynne M. Valente book. I know that sounds dramatic, but this woman has come to be the person who defines how I judge exceptional writing. I can’t praise her mad skills enough.

So basically she’s one of my absolute favorite authors, and you all should read her stuff.

I got The Bread We Eat in Dreams as a deal on my kindle, knowing next to nothing about it. I saw that a Valente book was $1.99 that day, and I jumped on it – no more information necessary.

I’ve been digging short stories and novellas recently. They seem to fit into my chaotic life a bit better. I can break them up and devour them bit by bit, as is convenient for me. I don’t have to find good stopping points, they just naturally occur. It’s nice. So when I realized that this book was full of short stories, I was pretty thrilled.

If you’re familiar with Valente’s work, you’ll probably recognize some of these stories/novellas/poems. You might have read them before, or seen them somewhere. However, there are plenty here that are new, so don’t let that take you away from this collection.

The Bread We Eat in Dreams is a varied collection of work, from biopunk (uh, is that a thing?) to fairytale retellings. In typical Valente style, you can easily read these stories/novellas/poems for the sheer elegance and perfection of her writing, as for the story itself. What thrills me the most about her writing is that she’s so good at making the complex easy to absorb, and she’s marvelous at taking what you think you know, and spinning it on its head. Furthermore, she’s one of the only authors who can confuse me, and make me beg for more.

More. I just want more. I’ll take anything Valente writes. I can’t get it fast enough.

The Bread We Eat in Dreams covers a huge amount of ground. There is the story of the coyote who becomes king, a twist on Little Red Riding Hood, a futuristic world, dystopian settings, societies ruled by women and so much more. The book itself covers just about everything, but in true Valente fashion, it leaves you thinking deep thoughts, and gives you seeds of new ideas to plant in your soul.

While these stories span the gamut of topics, her writing does as well. Some stories start out subtle and then hit you over the head with their powerful emotions and their obvious plot. Some stories are obvious at the start, but it’s really the details that wow you. Regardless of how she’s writing, Valente welds words like a carpenter welds a hammer – they are a tool and a weapon, and she’s one of the most skilled individuals with her craft in the market today.

If you haven’t read Valente, but you’re curious about her style, and what she’s all about, The Bread We Eat in Dreams is an absolutely fantastic place to get a feel for her. Just be prepared to lose a few hours of sleep to this book. It is almost impossible to put it down after you pick it up. If you’re a seasons Valente reader, this is still a fantastic work to pick up. It’s some of her best writing, all kept in one neat and tidy location that is easy for you to access.

I really have been enjoying short stories and novellas recently, and collected works of this nature have been my bread and butter this year, but hands down, The Bread We Eat in Dreams is one of the best ones I’ve ever run across. This isn’t a book you own. This is a book you cherish.

 

5/5 stars

The Our Words Book Club – Otherbound by Corinne Duyvis

Last week I launched the Our Words Book Club, where I will read and discuss one book (which deals with disabilities in the plot/characters/both) as I read it. The first book is Corinne Duyvis’s Otherbound, chapters 1-9. I’d love to get a discussion going, and it took a really long time to write all of that post, so hop on over there to get my various book thoughts about chapters 1-9 of Otherbound.

The discussion itself is more of me just thinking out loud about the first nine chapters than anything too formal, but I’m having fun with it and it’s definitely making me read the book deeper than I otherwise would.

If you’d like to join the read-along, then check out the schedule here. It’s not too late to join!

The Witches of Echo Park – Amber Benson

About the Book

Unbeknownst to most of humankind, a powerful network of witches thrives within the shadows of society, using their magic to keep the world in balance. But they are being eliminated—and we will all pay if their power falls…

When Lyse MacAllister’s great-aunt Eleanora, the woman who raised her, becomes deathly ill, Lyse puts her comfortable life in Georgia on hold to rush back to Los Angeles. And once she returns to Echo Park, Lyse discovers her great-aunt has been keeping secrets—extraordinary secrets—from her.

Not only is Lyse heir to Eleanora’s Victorian estate; she is also expected to take her great-aunt’s place in the Echo Park coven of witches. But to accept her destiny means to place herself in deadly peril—for the world of magic is under siege, and the battle the witches now fight may be their last…

304 pages (paperback)

Published on January 6, 2015

Published by Ace

Author’s webpage

Buy the book

This book was sent by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

—

The Witches of Echo Park is a book that kind of has me stumped. The publisher sent me this first book in the series along with the second book. I read this one, and I’ve just kind of sat on it, wondering what to say about it. On the one hand, I loved it. It’s a unique, well written spin on what could easily have been a completely typical urban fantasy. On the other hand, I spent a good chunk of the book waiting for something to happen.

I loved the writing style. Benson has a high quality writing that felt both restrained, and lyrical. That really stuck out to me. Most (not all) urban fantasy I run across is written a lot more straightforward, with a fast moving plot and punchy dialogue. This book is written in such a way that makes you pay attention, and there are details everywhere. Benson really put a lot of effort into writing this novel and ensuring that every single detail, every minute point was mentioned for her readers. That might be overwhelming for some readers, but for those who enjoy the minutae, like myself, you’ll dig it.

This has the added benefit of making her world really come to blazing life. Not only Lyse, and her cohorts, but the city of Los Angeles as well. It’s a city I’ve never been to, and I’ve only seen the common images that most everyone has seen on the news, but Benson made LA appear far different, far more homey than the large, sprawling metropolis that it really is.

Mixed into this is a magic system that is, on the surface, exactly what you’d expect it to be. There are witches, and the witches have spells and skills, and agendas. It’s all there. And thrown into the middle of it all is Lyse, who has no idea that magic is real, and that witches are just as real. And my first thought when I saw this plot developing was, “Fantastic. Another book about a girl learning her true nature.”

Benson manages to avoid many of the pitfalls I expected her to fall into. The Ah ha moments were genuine. The discovery – both of self and the true nature of the world itself – was complex and believable. Nothing felt really campy, and nothing felt too predictable. Lyse was delightfully ignorant, and her reactions were fantastically real.

So, there was a lot here to love. However, on the flip side, have you ever read a fairly short book that felt like it was about a thousand pages long? That’s how this one felt. That sounds horrible, but it’s true. I sat down to read The Witches of Echo Park, and I can generally burn through a book that size in a day without any problems at all. This one took me about a week to get through. And the thing is, it didn’t take me that long because I disliked it. I actually really, really enjoyed this book and just about everything about it. What took me so long was the pacing. For example, early on things are being organized so the coven can meet Lyse. I thought this would be a jumping off point for the rest of the novel. Instead, that whole event didn’t actually take place until the halfway point, and the time before then is spent jumping from character to character to establish stories, details and whatever else.

There is some intrigue, plenty of plot twists, but it is absolutely the first half of the book that felt like it took so long. The second half is where the story has been established and things get going, but you absolutely have to put in some time and effort to get to the point where things take off. That being said, the ending was well done, and the culmination of events left me hungry for the next book, but oh that restrained pacing almost did me in.

And the benefit of all those details, and all that restrained pacing and attention to just about everything (even things you wouldn’t imagine are important) was a second half of a novel that impressed the hell out of me. It also makes me think that the second book in the series might be far different than the first, as just about everything that could be established, has already been done. I am excited to give the next book a read and see if it’s more plot, more action, more motion forward and less restrained, controlled pacing. I want to see what an author as talented as Bensen can do when she really just lets go, and goes wild.

So, The Witches of Echo Park was complex, surprising, and restrained.

 

3/5 stars

The Macro Monday That Wasn’t

I’ve been dealing with some chronic pain issues related to my Ehlers-Danlos. Well, to put it correctly, I’ve been dealing with Ehlers-Danlos, and the associated chronic pain has taken me out of the game in any real way for a while now. Instead of working on new photos (physically, I’m completely unable right now), I’m regurgitating old ones because I’ve been almost completely nonfunctional. This disease is horrible, folks. To put my life in perspective right now, I’m more familiar with my heating pad than I am with my own family right now, and I just saw the lidocaine patches my doctor prescribed me, and started bawling. I mean, copious tears.

So, Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it.

Anyway, this isn’t a new photo. This is actually an older one, and it’s probably my best known photo because it’s been on several state news shows, and it was even featured on National Geographic.

This is a photo of the Supermoon rising over the Wasatch Mountains near Silver Lake, Utah in 2014. The official title is “Minimalist Moonrise.” Enjoy!

The Walls Around Us – Nova Ren Suma

About the Book

On the outside, there’s Violet, an eighteen-year-old dancer days away from the life of her dreams when something threatens to expose the shocking truth of her achievement.

On the inside, within the walls of the Aurora Hills juvenile detention center, there’s Amber, locked up for so long she can’t imagine freedom.

Tying their two worlds together is Orianna, who holds the key to unlocking all the girls’ darkest mysteries…

What really happened on the night Orianna stepped between Violet and her tormentors? What really happened on two strange nights at Aurora Hills? Will Amber and Violet and Orianna ever get the justice they deserve—in this life or in another one?

In prose that sings from line to line, Nova Ren Suma tells a supernatural tale of guilt and of innocence, and of what happens when one is mistaken for the other.

336 pages (hardcover)

Published on March 24, 2015

Published by Algonquin Young Readers

Author’s webpage

Buy the book

—

The Walls Around Us was one of those random audiobooks I picked up from the library on a complete whim. I knew nothing about it, but it looked interesting and so I gave it a shot.

This is a young adult book, but it works really well as a crossover novel due to some of the heavy concepts that are dealt with here. In fact, despite the fact that this is a young adult book, the writing is so fantastic that my old, jaded soul fell into it incredibly easily. So, if you’re one of those people who thinks, “Young adult? I better move along.” Don’t let that deter you.

The Walls Around Us is a modern day thriller told from the first person perspectives of two different women. Amber is a young woman is incarcerated for a rather horrible crime. Violet is a ballet dancer whose best friend has been convicted of a crime that is just as horrible as Amber’s. Their lives quickly become interwoven through threads of past and present. It seems like Suma is telling two different stories, until you realize that she’s not.

I am always really reluctant to read a novel written with two (or more) different first person perspectives. It’s a huge gamble for the author to write like that. The voices have to be completely and absolutely different to reflect two different characters, and their own unique perspectives, and it’s rare that I run across a book that manages the different voices well enough to make them work for me. However, The Walls Around Us really worked in that regard. You get the internally conflicted Amber, who has had a good life until everything went so wrong. You understand how the juvenile detention center has carved its mark on her soul. You actually sympathize her, and it’s so real and interesting that her chapters quickly and completely absorbed me.

On the other side, you have Violet, who took a while for me to warm up to. However, I quickly learned that that’s part of the magic of her character. Violet is standoffish, and she’s aloof, and that’s just who she is. It’s a protective barrier that she raises to keep her inner demons from overwhelming her. Who she is, is very different than who she shows. It’s really fantastically done. It’s so rare that I’ve run across a character whose inner conflict has been so well drawn. I actually felt like her inner conflict was my inner conflict, and it quickly got to the point where I felt so much anxiety in some of her chapters that I had to take a break from it all.

It’s hard to review this book without giving away too much, which will ruin the entire experience of reading it. I can, however, say that the plot is incredibly fast moving, intricate, and quite shocking and absorbing. This book takes twists and turns that I didn’t expect. I truly enjoyed how seamlessly Suma wove together two storylines that seemed so separate from each other at the start. There were a lot of humanizing moments, and if there’s one thing that Suma handles well, it’s emotions. She punched me in the feels quite a few times as I listened to this book.

The audiobook is completely recommended. It has two different narrators, for each perspective, which just helped highlight the differences of the two women, their individual voices, and their storylines more than if I had just read the book. That really helped the book itself come alive for me.

The writing is spectacular. Intricate and flowing, without a single word wasted, and the voices and characters are so completely dynamic. It shocked me how much Nova Ren Suma could pack into one book, and I liked how well she kept me hooked and engaged. She uses emotions like a carpenter uses a hammer, and it’s delightful in a dark sort of way.

The Walls Around Us really wowed me. I went into this expecting entertainment, and I left it reeling. This is the kind of book that I look for. This is one of those books that you treasure.

 

5/5 stars