Cassandra Page's Blog, page 17

Review: ‘The Summer I Became a Nerd’ by Leah Rae Miller

On the outside, seventeen-year-old Madelyne Summers looks like your typical blond cheerleader—perky, popular, and dating the star quarterback. But inside, Maddie spends more time agonizing over what will happen in the next issue of her favorite comic book than planning pep rallies with her squad. That she’s a nerd hiding in a popular girl’s body isn’t just unknown, it’s anti-known. And she needs to keep it that way.

Summer is the only time Maddie lets her real self out to play, but when she slips up and the adorkable guy behind the local comic shop’s counter uncovers her secret, she’s busted. Before she can shake a pom-pom, Maddie’s whisked into Logan’s world of comic conventions, live-action role-playing, and first-person-shooter video games. And she loves it. But the more she denies who she really is, the deeper her lies become … and the more she risks losing Logan forever.

I can’t remember how I stumbled across this book, but I know that I bought it for the title — because obviously! Maddie’s a different variety of geek/nerd than I am; I’ve only got a handful of comics and graphic novels, and those I got as an adult. Logan’s geek experience is a lot closer to mine.

Yes, I have LARPed. I’ve never thrown ping pong balls at anyone, though. :p

This explanation is my way of saying that some parts of Maddie’s experience getting to know Logan and his world are eerily familiar to me. But other parts of her world are very unfamiliar, mostly the “American teenager” thing. Maddie is pretty much pathological about keeping her secret identity as a geek, well, secret, basically because she’s worried about toppling from the top of the popularity tree. Maybe time has fuzzed my memories of high school; maybe in Australia it’s a different social structure; or maybe because I was never popular I never realised how much those girls had to work to stay there. But I found the whole thing a bit baffling. Maddie’s woes are definitely self-inflicted, and at times I lost patience with her because of it.

That being said, I quite liked her voice when she wasn’t having a pity party, and I definitely liked Logan and the fact he and his hilariously brash best friend, Dan, don’t put up with her trying to keep them in the role of dirty secret. Logan is a bit of a teenage dreamboat for the geek set; his parents own a comic book and he’s snagged himself a summer radio show at the local college. I also liked what we saw of Terra, Maddie’s country-music-loving best friend; she’s another one who doesn’t take Maddie’s crap lying down.

I enjoyed spotting the various nerdy references, some of which were made up for the story (I assume; see previous comment about not having read that many comics) but some of which were real-world references. The romance between Logan and Maddie is sweet. The plot is a tiny bit predictable, but The Summer I Became a Nerd was a fun read and easily digestible, with a very clear “be true to yourself” message.

 

Review: ‘Fame’ by Lauren K. McKellar

She’s supposed to cover the stories.

Not be one.

Madison Winters has life in the bag. Gorgeous fiancé? Check. Promotion to become editor of the country’s hottest fashion magazine? Check. Limited edition pair of Manolo Blahniks? Checkity-check. Catching her fiancé with his pants down isn’t something she expects. In the space of twenty-four hours, Madison loses it all—not even her shoes will be saved. Swapping sass + bide for sweatpants and Dior for the downward dog is going to be hell. The last thing Madison’s broken heart needs is a run-in with America’s newest playboy. Can she ever recover from this?

Tate Masters has it all—Hollywood’s latest golden boy has washboard abs, a killer smile, and a leading role in the next A-list movie. Until a secret from his past is splashed all over the headlines, and that ‘good boy’ image fast-tracks to the gutter. Now the media hunt is on, and they’re baying for Tate’s blood. One night of wild behaviour sees him wake up next to a gorgeous Aussie brunette—and she’s everything Tate’s afraid of.

Keeping secrets has never been this hard.

I’ve said before that Lauren McKellar is one of my very few one-click contemporary authors. She usually writes some young adult and some new adult, and I knew going into Fame that it wasn’t a tragedy like most of her other stories. What I didn’t realise was that this is adult contemporary. Adult-y adult. Now with more adult.

The chemistry — and, let’s be honest, the raw lust — between Madison and Tate sizzles off the page from the first time they meet. And the sex scenes (is that a spoiler?) are scorching. *fans self*

At first I wasn’t sure about Tate. He comes across as a cheat at the start of the book, and no amount of megawatt smiles and ripped muscles made up for that in my mind. Still, it’s not too long before we discover more about Tate — his reasons for doing the things he does — and soon I was swooning and wishing for a Tate in my life too.

It turns out McKellar does sex scenes as well as she does romance. The latter is her bread and butter. It’s not usually my favourite genre, but the relationship here, as embryonic as it is, is well executed. Tate and Madison discover in each other someone who will let them be real, not pushing them to do anything they don’t want to or judging them.

The other thing that’s worth mentioning is that the book is just downright funny.  Madison attracts the worst kinds of random luck, but at the same time her approach to handling things is kind of hilarious. While she naturally grieves for her failed relationship with Mike and the consequent struggle with who she is, she’s generally quite resilient and doesn’t take BS from anyone. Her disdain for the trappings of “wellness” (a word I rather dislike myself … mostly because it’s just ugly, tbh) had me giggling on more than one occasion. Her banter with not just Tate but her bestie Courtney was hilarious. And I can’t talk about the humour without mentioning Madison’s parents. They only appear in a handful of scenes, but her father — oh my god, what a scream!

The other touch I liked was the shout-out to How to Save a Life with the cameo of Jase, the tattooed bartender from that book. I wanted to give him a hug, like a long-lost friend.

If you’re looking for a sexy, feel-good story, then I can’t recommend Fame highly enough.

cas

Review: ‘Winter’ by Marissa Meyer

Princess Winter is admired by the Lunar people for her grace and kindness, and despite the scars that mar her face, her beauty is said to be even more breathtaking than that of her stepmother, Queen Levana.

Winter despises her stepmother, and knows Levana won’t approve of her feelings for her childhood friend—the handsome palace guard, Jacin. But Winter isn’t as weak as Levana believes her to be and she’s been undermining her stepmother’s wishes for years. Together with the cyborg mechanic, Cinder, and her allies, Winter might even have the power to launch a revolution and win a war that’s been raging for far too long.

Can Cinder, Scarlet, Cress, and Winter defeat Levana and find their happily ever afters?

This series is the queen of fairy tale retellings. But not the evil queen.

Okay, maybe slightly evil.

If you haven’t read the rest of the series, then don’t start with Winter, which is the fourth and final (as far as I know) book in the Lunar Chronicles. Instead you want to start with Cinder, which I reviewed here. The entire series is a five-star read for me, so you should do it. Do it now!

Winter is a huge book, at over 800 pages. I noticed because after an afternoon of binge-reading I had a sore wrist, and — despite my best efforts — my copy was the worse for wear by the time I was done. Some of the pages even fell out! Aaah! I didn’t notice how big it was because of the pacing, though; the story ticked along nicely.

As always, the fairy tale references to Snow White were there but didn’t dictate the story. Most of those references related to the titular character, Winter, but occasionally they were used in reference to her cousin Cinder — for example, Levana’s order that someone bring her Cinder’s heart. The seven dwarfs are incredibly subtle, so subtle I missed it at first, but I think they refer to the number of other main characters (excluding Jaicin, who is the “prince”): Cinder, Kai, Scarlet, Wolf, Cress, Thorne and Iko.

As far as the characters go, my favourite relationship is Cinder and Kai’s, far and away.❤ My other favourite characters are Scarlet, for her sheer, brash defiance of everything and Iko, because Iko! Levana is suitably evil, although doesn’t really muster as much of a defence as I might have liked. But then, in a book with such a big ensemble cast, I’m okay with a little more tragedy-related feels than Winter has. (I’m a fan of Joss Whedon. Enough said.)

Still, if you want a sci-fi series with a fairy tale feel, some kissing and an actual, honest to goodness “they all lived happily ever after” (because it’s a fairy tale retelling and that’s obligatory), I highly recommend this entire series!

 

So I’m on Instagram (and I’m kinda lonely)…

Aussie Owned and Read — where I am a co-blogger — just got itself onto Instagram (@aussie_owned_read), courtesy of the super-enthusiastic Sharon. I’d been thinking I should create myself an account for a while now, because something-something-social-media, and AOR’s involvement encouraged me to jump on the bandwagon.

You can find me @cassandrapage01. I’ve been off crook from work for most of the past week, feeling too unwell to write much of anything. But not too crook to take lots of pics, apparently.

What can you expect to find if you follow me over there?

Definitely some of this…

And a little bit of this…

This (obviously)…

And occasionally, if you’re really unlucky, some of this…

Are you on Instagram? If you leave a comment with your handle, I’ll pop over and stalk say hi to you.

Review: ‘The Hero of Ages’ by Brandon Sanderson

Tricked into releasing the evil spirit Ruin while attempting to close the Well of Ascension, new emperor Elend Venture and his wife, the assassin Vin, are now hard-pressed to save the world.This adventure brings the Mistborn epic fantasy trilogy to a dramatic and surprising climax as Sanderson’s saga offers complex characters and a compelling plot, asking hard questions about loyalty, faith and responsibility.

To all those people who told me Brandon Sanderson is a man who knows how to write a mind-boggling story: you were right and I owe you a coffee. I don’t think I’ve ever read a trilogy with such intricate world-building, with so many layers and plot twists, and bits of what turned out to be foreshadowing in the first book that are only explained in the third.

The amount of plotting Sanderson must do before he starts writing that first page truly blows my mind.

The Hero of Ages is the third book in the series, and it nicely wraps up the trilogy, giving me explanations for questions I hadn’t even realised I was asking — not really. For example, I remember thinking pretty early on in the series that it was strange that burning tin lets an allomancer see through the Mists. It turns out there’s a reason for that. There’s a reason for everything! There’s even a reason for Sazed’s frustrating naval-gazing and waffling on about dead religions (because, oh my god, I wanted to shake him so badly; those waffle-y bits are actually what made me love this book slightly less than the other two).

Given I’ve been fully immersed in this trilogy in the past month, I had enough depth and currency of understanding to see a lot of the plot twists coming this time around. However, I feel a bit like Vin and Elend must have, fighting an all-powerful god like Ruin: like I thought I knew what Sanderson was going to do, but he only let me feel that way so he could lull me into a false sense of security. Then BAM.

That last plot twist is a doozy. I have an epic book hangover, and a need to buy another Sanderson trilogy ASAP.

What Hogwarts Houses Are My Characters?

I was asked on Facebook what Hogwarts Houses my characters would be; apparently this was a thing authors were doing back in 2014, and we all know how cutting edge I am! I’ve been chewing over the idea, because—like Harry, who could have just as easily been Slytherin as Gryffindor—most of my characters could fit into more than one house. Still, I’ve donned the Sorting Hat and done my best!

Isla’s Inheritance trilogy

Isla has elements of Hufflepuff and Gryffindor, and could easily go into either house. However, when we first meet her, she is definitely a Hufflepuff, so that’s where she would’ve been sorted when she started high school. Her loyalty in particular drives her to do some very courageous things, but she’s still more comfortable not charging into danger, given the choice.

Like Isla, Jack has elements of Gryffindor (his chivalry and courage, in particular). However, he is a Hufflepuff through and through. Patience and loyalty are two of his defining characteristics, and his desire for justice has gotten him into trouble in the past.

Sarah is a Gryffindor. Although she is musical, which could have qualified her for Ravenclaw, she is the most honest, determined and forthright of the characters in the trilogy. This causes Sarah to butt heads with Isla at times, when she gets frustrated with her cousin’s reluctance to be as honest as she probably should be.

Lucid Dreaming

Of these five characters, Melaina is the hardest for me to sort. She has traits valued by three of the four houses (she’d make a pretty poor Hufflepuff, all things considered). Still, I’d sort her into Gryffindor, given her tendency to leap into situations and think about the consequences later.

Brad is a Ravenclaw. He’s an educated, intellectual sort of person who is very good at thinking his way through a problem or puzzle to find a solution. That is why he struggles at first, when presented with information that doesn’t fit neatly into his worldview. But once he understands the new “rules” of Melaina’s world, he is able to think his way through them.

Are you a writer? Have you ever sorted your characters? It’s a fun little mental exercise that gets you to think about who they really are, beneath it all. (And special thanks to Belle for suggesting it.)

In case you missed it, on Thursday I was over at Aussie Owned and Read, talking about finding time in a busy life: time to write, blog, review and do the squillion other things I try to get done.

What I really need is a Time Turner…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Advertising Strategies: a Work-in-Progress

Source: Shutterstock

As of maybe six months ago, I’m a fully independent or self-published author, what is sometimes referred to as an “author-publisher“. I like that term, because it conveys the sense that self-publishing is more than just banging out words and then sending them out into the world, all naked and unprepared. There are things one needs to consider, things a publisher usually does. Two of those are editing and book design, and I’ve blogged about those before.

The other thing that a publisher does to a greater or lesser extent (at least, if you’re lucky and they are any good) is advertise your book. In the case of small or independent presses, you may have a small or non-existent presence in bricks-and-mortar stores, so you can’t rely on people stumbling across your work by accident. That’s where advertising comes in.

I’m still feeling my way through the morass, trying to find strategies that work for me and my books. I thought it might be helpful to others (and for my own future reference) to catalogue some of them here.

Book blitzes

These are generally organised to try and raise a bit of word-of-mouth attention when a book first comes out; kind bloggers share promotional content. Sometimes they result in a few adds to peoples’ Goodreads shelves, but I haven’t noticed a huge number of sales as a result. Maybe I’m just not doing them right! Certainly, I wouldn’t do a blog tour with customised posts, as I don’t think the time invested would be worth it. But I would do a book blitz for each of my future releases. Every book deserves a birthday party.

Review: ‘The Well of Ascension’ by Brandon Sanderson

The impossible has been accomplished. The Lord Ruler – the man who claimed to be god incarnate and brutally ruled the world for a thousand years – has been vanquished. But Kelsier, the hero who masterminded that triumph, is dead too, and now the awesome task of building a new world has been left to his young protégé, Vin, the former street urchin who is now the most powerful Mistborn in the land, and to the idealistic young nobleman she loves.

As Kelsier’s protégé and slayer of the Lord Ruler she is now venerated by a budding new religion, a distinction that makes her intensely uncomfortable. Even more worrying, the mists have begun behaving strangely since the Lord Ruler died, and seem to harbor a strange vaporous entity that haunts her.

Stopping assassins may keep Vin’s Mistborn skills sharp, but it’s the least of her problems. Luthadel, the largest city of the former empire, doesn’t run itself, and Vin and the other members of Kelsier’s crew, who lead the revolution, must learn a whole new set of practical and political skills to help. It certainly won’t get easier with three armies – one of them composed of ferocious giants – now vying to conquer the city, and no sign of the Lord Ruler’s hidden cache of atium, the rarest and most powerful allomantic metal.

As the siege of Luthadel tightens, an ancient legend seems to offer a glimmer of hope. But even if it really exists, no one knows where to find the Well of Ascension or what manner of power it bestows.

The Well of Ascension is book two in Sanderson’s Mistborn trilogy, and I would strongly suggest not trying to read it as a stand-alone novel. I reviewed the first book here if you want to decide whether this series is for you. That review also largely holds true for book two. I’ve given this book 4.5 stars as well, though my niggles are different this time around. (I considered a 4-star rating instead for this one, but the plot twists deserved that extra half star!)

Still, let’s recap.

Things I loved

A little slice of a big  world. Despite the fact that almost the entire story is set in or immediately around Luthadel, there is a sense of a much bigger world out there, one that has an impact on Luthadel and the fate of the former empire. Still, I liked the narrower focus — sometimes, fantasy novels that involve army-scale warfare start to read like a book on military tactics. That is never the case here, which is — to me — a good thing.

A cast of characters who aren’t black and white. We gained a sense in the first book that even the Lord Ruler, the tyrant demigod who ruled for 1000 years, might not be 100% evil (maybe 90%? 85%?). On the other side of the coin, Kelsier, the supposed hero of the piece, had grand ideals but was just as brutal in his own way. That trend continues in the second book. Elend is sweet but idealistic to the point of foolishness, while Vin is highly competent but torn and indecisive. We get to see snippets from a much broader range of characters in The Well of Ascension, giving us a greater sense of what motivates them, why they think they are the good guy. My most unexpected favourite is Breeze, the lazy and manipulative soother who somehow turns out to be very sweet, in his own way.

The plot twists and turns (like a twisty turny thing). I thought I had a pretty good idea of where the second book might go, and in some ways I was right, but in others … yeah, there were some massive reveals in The Well of Ascension that I did not see coming. I love it when that happens!

40 Revolutions Around the Sun

Source: Shutterstock

Off and on at the blog I mention Chuck Wendig — not only have I read, reviewed and thoroughly enjoyed a bunch of his books (the most recent of which was Aftermath, his first Star Wars novel), but I love his writing advice posts and his hilarious, often profanity-riddled style.

One thing about Chuck is that he and I were born only a few days apart. That’s right, we’re practically twins! And this week he posted an epic list of 40 things that he has learned after four decades of life. You should go read it.

Yes, this is my round-about way of telling you I also turned 40 this week.

Earlier this year, I felt vaguely uneasy about my impending birthday. I mean, 40. I wouldn’t be able to say I was in my 30s anymore — as though that one day between 39 and 40 would make a huge difference, be somehow transformative. But it’s all a bit of a lie that revolves around us humans placing significance on certain things, like round numbers, multiples of ten: a number we’ve chosen to obsess over presumably because of our (traditional) number of fingers.

When I was a kid and the various adults in my life would ask me, on the day of my birthday, whether I felt any older. I’d always feel like the answer should be yes, but it was always no.

I do feel older now, but it’s a feeling that’s been creeping up on me for a while. I have a smattering of silver hairs that I’m rather fond of, mainly because they are politely behaved; in contrast, I also have a handful of weird, crazy white hairs that refuse to obey trivial things like gravity. My knees have have started to crunch like a pepper grinders when I walk up stairs. And my optometrist assures me that bifocal glasses are in my near future (she’s mean like that).

Still, there are upsides to being 40; to me, they are mostly about having a better sense of perspective. I was talking to a friend today about how when you’re in your teens and 20s you (and by “you”, of course, I mean “I“) care way too much about what others think. Not just people who are dear to you, but random strangers. People you go to school with or work with but to whom you’re not close. There are probably sound evolutionary reasons for it — if you’re too different from the herd, you might get driven out, be unable to find a mate.

(Hehe, she said “mate”.)

Although I doubt I’ll ever be able to completely dismiss others’ unsolicited opinions, they don’t mean as much to me as they used to. If someone thinks my comfortable shoes are daggy, or raises an eyebrow at my geeky t-shirt, so what? If they don’t like a book I wrote and leave a negative review, then eh, they are entitled to their opinion.

So was turning 40 traumatic? No, actually, it was kinda cool. I had a variety of tasty meals with different groups of friends and family over the course of this week, got to catch up, had a few laughs. I didn’t put too much pressure on myself to have an EPIC BIRTHDAY EXTRAVAGANZA — setting too-high expectations and then being disappointed is another thing I’d like to think I left behind last decade. I got hugs and warm wishes from people that mattered.

I wouldn’t be able to come up with a list of 40 things I have learned, partly because Chuck stole all the good ideas already. But there are a few things I’d add, random pieces of advice I’d give to younger-me if I could:

Unfriend or otherwise cast off toxic, judgemental people from your life. They aren’t worth the stress and grey hairs, and they definitely aren’t worth the crazy, gravity-defying white hairs.

Be prepared to make sacrifices to do the thing you want to do. I’m not much of a risk-taker and I’m definitely not saying you should quit your job to write your magnum opus, but maybe you could watch a little less TV?

Find something physical that you like doing and then actually do it. Regularly. Even though my knees were mostly fine till I started karate, I’ve felt a lot better about myself since I joined.

Wear sunscreen. It’ll mean less wrinkles (and also less chance of skin cancer) when you’re older.

Be kind to yourself. All those people who say that one day you’ll look back on photos of yourself when you were young and realise you were hotter than you thought at the time ARE RIGHT. The bastards.

In case you missed it, earlier this month, over at Aussie Owned and Read, I blogged about Four Awesome Writery Rewards for Good Behaviour.

Review: “Mistborn: The Final Empire” by Brandon Sanderson

In a world where ash falls from the sky, and mist dominates the night, an evil cloaks the land and stifles all life. The future of the empire rests on the shoulders of a troublemaker and his young apprentice. Together, can they fill the world with color once more?

In Brandon Sanderson’s intriguing tale of love, loss, despair and hope, a new kind of magic enters the stage — Allomancy, a magic of the metals.

After devouring and enjoying Elantris, I decided to pick up the first book in what may be Brandon Sanderson’s most famous series: Mistborn. And I can see why so many people recommended it to me. Holy wow.

Things I loved

The unique world-building. Instead of traditional wizardly magic, or magic that takes a formless power and shapes it via one mechanism or another, Sanderson based the magic in his world on the idea that some people can consume or “burn” certain metals and alloys to achieve defined effects. I’d love a glimpse into Sanderson’s mind, that he was able to come up with something like this! But I’m not sure you could convince me to swallow a lump of iron, no matter what the supernatural outcome…

A variety of characters that I grew to love. Despite what the blurb suggests, Kelsier and Vin aren’t trying to save the world alone — they are part of a crew of thieves contracted to do a “job”: overthrow the government. Even though some of the crew were crazy-impulsive (Kelsier), others were vain (Breeze), others were surly (Marsh), and some made cynicism an art (Vin), I loved all of the main cast to one degree or another. The fact that these characters — all of these characters — have flaws makes them seem more real.

Of all of them, Vin is the one that experiences the most character growth, probably followed by Kelsier and the nobleman Elend. This are the book’s three main characters (each sharing the POV at one point or another), so that’s to be expected.

The sense of a larger story. Because this is the first book in a trilogy, there are a lot of things left unresolved, most of them in the backstory. It gives the world a sense of depth and makes me eager for the next instalment. For example (note: very light spoilers follow), what happened to the Lord Ruler at the Well of Ascension? What’s the go with the ancient, apparently amorphous bad guy known as “the Deepness”? How is said amorphous, gloomy bad guy connected to the amorphous, gloomy mists that shroud everything come nightfall? Are the ash mounds really volcanoes that will erupt and kill us all?!

The plot twist. It’s one of those ones where you feel like you should have seen it coming afterwards, but that isn’t blindingly obvious beforehand. (At least, it wasn’t to me.) Nuff said.

Things I struggled with a little (especially at first)

The talking. A lot of time, the characters are talking, plotting and scheming. Sometimes they are confiding or manipulating too. This was often levied with humour or with emotion, but early on in the book I found some of the crew’s planning sessions a bit of a slog.

The metal magic. Once Kelsier explained how the metals work to Vin, I was fine. But there’s one scene from his point of view before that, where he’s doing all sorts of things with different metals, and I got really, really lost.

Other observations

There is no sex (there’s barely even a kiss); however, there is quite a bit of violence and some fairly grisly corpses. I wasn’t bothered but YMMV.