Book 10 The Forgotten Girl

Title and Author: The Forgotten Girl, by David Bell (Uncorrected Proof)

Illustrator: none
Publisher: New American Library, part of the Penguin Group
Expected Publication Date: October 7, 2014
Genre: Mystery
Target Audience/Age Group: Adult
Part of a Series? No
Will the Reviewer Keep It In His/Her Library? Maybe

We were excited to get a mystery because several of us like that genre. This one has a somewhat mundane plot revolving around the disappearance of a high school kid many years before the events in the book. The high schoolers are all grown now, with kids of their own. 

Jason Danvers moved back to his hometown after losing his job in New York City. His best friend, Logan, was the kid who disappeared. Jason's sister Hayden shows up one night asking Jason & his wife to look after her teenage daughter for a couple days, but she doesn't come back to retrieve the child. Jason's good friend Regan is also involved (it's nice to see a man and woman be friends without sexual or romantic tension.) 

The mystery is non-existent. Really. At least not to anyone who's read much or watched any TV. It's harder to describe the characters. They aren't cliches, though their actions are. The author makes you understand them and even care about them because they are complex, like real people. Logan's mother is a good example. It's widely assumed she knows what happened to Logan and is hiding him. I won't tell you if she did or not, but you really understand her when you've finished the book. 

I gave this book the MMWR test. It flunked because it was obvious what happened to Logan. It passed because I cared enough about the characters to read the middle. I'd try another book by this author because he writes people well.

Book 9: Slave to Sensation

Title and Author: Slave to Sensation, by Nalini Singh

Illustrator: none
Publisher: Berkley Sensation, part of the Berkley Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Group
Publication Date: 2006
Genre: Horor Erotica
Target Audience/Age Group: Adult
Part of a Series? yes
Will the Reviewer Keep It In His/Her Library? No

This was a book no one in the group seemed interested in reading because it's fantasy erotica, a genre that holds no appeal for our members. There are other books no one wanted to read, but since we committed to posting something about every book we'd acquired at Comic-Con, we divvied the unwanted up among the members for review and comment.

Slave to Sensation has a heroine who is part of a group trained to be emotionless who gets involved with a guy who's a were. In a twist, he's not feral, he's feline. Whatever the animal, he's incredibly hot and sexy. A serial killer is running loose, heroine goes after it. So does the cat. Lots of steamy sex. You've read it all before.

Book 8: Half A King

Title and Author: Half a King, by Joe Abercrombie (Advanced Reader Copy)

Illustrator: none
Publisher: Del Rey
Expected Publication Date: July 18, 2014 (it's available now)
Genre: Fantasy
Target Audience/Age Group: Young Adult
Part of a Series? Maybe
Will the Reviewer Keep It In His/Her Library? No

The first three pages set the scene beautifully. Prince Yarvi has one good hand but since he lives in a society where two good hands are required to hold sword and shield, he isn't respected or valued. He's somewhat happily training to be a minister–until his father and brother are killed. Suddenly he's supposed to become king and rule people who think little of him. Think Vikings.

He has an uncle who is a great warrior. Can you see where all this is leading? I could. From page 20 (the start of chapter 4) I turned to page 229 (chapter 35) to give the book the MMWR test. It flunked. Everything I thought was going to happen clearly had. There were a few characters who evidently became friends of the hero in whatever happened to him in between the beginning and the end, but they weren't engaging enough to make me read the middle.

Book 7: The Return of Comic-Con Mad Libs

Title and Author: The Return of Comic-Con Mad Libs

A San Diego Comic-Con Exclusive

Illustrator: Unknown
Publisher: Price Stern Sloan, part of the Penguin Group
Genre: Humor
Target Audience/Age Group: All ages
Part of a Series? Sort of. There was evidently one published last year.
Will the Reviewer Keep It In His/Her Library? Yes

Is there anyone who doesn't know what Mad Libs are? Called the "World's Greatest Word Games" one fills in the blanks with words called for, like ADJECTIVE ___________________. These words are then inserted in a story. The results can be hysterically funny.

The nice folks at the Penguin Booth passed these out on Wednesday and Thursday, and they were among the best swag at the Con.

Here's an example. The story is Comics at Comic-Con; the blanks were filled in by random society members.

Plural Noun: Rutabagas

Adjective: Piratical
Noun: Ninja
Adjective: Moronic

Adjective: Creepy

Occupation (plural): blacksmiths

Adjective: Ugly

Noun: Warrior

Noun: potato chip

Adjective: Musical

Noun: Petunia

Verb Ending in "ING": Snoozing

People come to Comic-Con for all sorts of Rutabagas. All your favorite movies, TV shows, and piratical video games are there. But hey, what about the comics? After all, it's called San Diego Comic-Con, not San Diego Ninja-Con. You will get way more than the recommended moronic dose of comics at Comic-Con. All the biggest publishers are in attendance. Bring a/an creepy stack of your favorite issues, and you can get them signed by the authors. If you stop by Artists' Alley, you'll find the most popular blacksmiths drawing some of their ugly work. You can pick up a sketch of a beloved superhero, an obscure warrior from a forgotten comic, or even a portrait of you or your best potato chip dressed as a level-one-hundred orc warrior. After that, stop by a panel to find out the latest news about the most musical comics. Will there be another civil war? Will the universe be destroyed by an ancient omnipotent petunia? You'll have to go to the panel to find out! But get there early, or you'll be snoozing the panel through a crack in the door.

OK, so this one wasn't as funny to an adult as it would be if goofy kids picked the words. MAD LIBS aren't aimed at grown-ups anyway. 

Book 6: The Midnight Queen (Uncorrected Proof)

Title and Author: The Midnight Queen, by Sylvia Izzo Hunter

Illustrator: Unknown
Publisher: The Berkley Publishing Group, part of Penguin Publishing Company
Expected Publication Date: September 2, 2014
Genre: Fantasy
Target Audience/Age Group: Children
Part of a Series? Probably
Will the Reviewer Keep It In His/Her Library? No

This book will look different in its final version. There are place holder pages for maps and it will probably have illustrations.

I liked it, but not enough to read it from cover to cover.  There's this thing I do that drives my son crazy–if a book begins to drag, I turn to the end and read the last couple of chapters. If it's pretty obvious what happened between where I stopped reading and the end of the book, the book flunks the MMWR test and I don't go back and read the middle. About a third of the books I read get tested. Not many books pass, I'm sorry to say. This one flunked.

That doesn't mean it isn't an interesting book. It is. I liked the characters. Graham Marshall is a scholarship student at a college for magicians who should have been expelled for his part in rule breaking. Instead he has to spend his long vacation (like our summer, I guess) at a professor's house in the country. The prof has three daughters; the middle daughter is trying to teach herself magic.

It seems to take place in a version of England where kings and queens still rule, not just reign. There's political plots revolving around a missing princess, the king's daughter by his first wife. I didn't follow it all because I skipped the middle. The details weren't important for understanding the end.

The society seems to acknowledge all the ancient gods, Greek, Roman, Celtic, Breton, etc. I found all that confusing.

I did like Graham Marshall and the Callender daughters. Ms Hunter does a good job bringing characters to life. I cared about them, which is why I turned to the end instead of just quitting it. 

Book 5: Vampires of Manhattan

Title and Author: Vampires of Manhattan, by Melissa De La Cruz

Illustrator: none
Publisher: Hachette Books
Expected Publication Date: September 9, 2014
Genre: Romantic fantasy
Target Audience/Age Group: Adult
Part of a Series? Probably
Will the Reviewer Keep It In His/Her Library? No
First line: The alarm went off like an air-raid siren at midnight, and the hand that shot out of the bed slammed the snooze button so hard the side table shook.

The subtitle "The New Blue Bloods Coven" implies this book is related to another series by this author. It is. Reading that other series is not essential to understanding this book but it probably helps a lot. The author writes enough about the characters so the reader can follow what is going on, but I bet subtle nuances of characters and their actions are lost without a knowledge of those previous books. 

Evidently those earlier books were written for young adults while this book is aimed at adults. That makes sense because the people who read and enjoyed them are older now, probably grown up, like the characters in this book.

There was a big war against Lucifer and this book takes place 10 years after it ended. I'm not sure how the world is structured, but there are vampires, werewolves, demons, angels and humans. I couldn't follow all the ins and outs of everything, but the characters kept my interest enough that I read the book all the way to the end.

At first I thought it was just another book where the women were all defined by the men they fell in love with, but that isn't quite the case. Two of them rebelled against their positions, one to the detriment of the whole society. I never did figure out exactly what the venators did; they aren't quite cops but act like them in some ways. 

Bottom line, anyone interested in this book should read Melissa De La Cruz's earlier books. If you like them, read this one to see what became of the characters.

By the way, GHPALS gives a shout out of support to Hachette in their fight with Amazon. 

Book 4: My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish

Title and Author: My Big Fat Zombie Goldfish, by Mo O'Hara

Illustrator: Marek Jagucki
Publisher: Square Fish, an imprint of Macmillan
Genre: Science fiction
Target Audience/Age Group: Children
Part of a Series? Yes
Will the Reviewer Keep It In His/Her Library? No (My kids are too old.)
First line: Yesterday my big brother, Mark, turned into a real-life actual evil scientist.

This was a fun book. The narrator's older brother is evil. Really evil. His approach to his science homework reveals his mad scientist tendencies and the younger brother tries to rescue the poor victim of the experiment. A monster is created. The monster gets loose and out of control. It goes to school and chaos results. Younger brother, and his good friend, put all to right.

The book is fun. The illustrations are funny. We like the flip art at the bottom of the pages–the fish actually jumps out of its bowl.

We can see children all over the world trying to bring their dead goldfish back to life after reading this book. All it takes is a 9-volt battery. The text doesn't explicitly state the size battery, but the picture clearly shows the proper size. You do need both terminals to touch the fish, if we know our science.

We were reminded that we have yet to try to start a fire with a battery like Bear Grylls did on his show last week. The gum we bought didn't have a foil wrapper like it used to, but the Goldfish Crackers we bought the day we read this book did. Wonder if that's really a coincidence.