Library Book

A College of Magics

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A College of Magics

By Caroline Stevermer

Tor

ISBN: 0765342456

4 stars

Faris Nallaneen is heir to the Dukedom of Galazon.  Until that time, her uncle rules in her place.  To get her out of his way, he ships her off to the College of Greenlaw.  Fortunately for Faris, the school’s specialty, magic, is something she will come to be very practiced in.  When she is unexpectedly called home, Faris’s life becomes incredibly complicated, not only will she miss the school which had become home to her, but an incident involving magic will send her on a mission that will prove difficult both emotionally and physically.

This is a beautifully written book.  It’s witty, sarcastic, and there’s enough adventure to give it a fairly wide scope.  The politics are also interesting and become the story rather than the magic even though this is a story about magic — it’s the more the politics of the magical system and how the people and the world function.  It did start off a bit slow but Faris, who does her best to be unlikable, is actually likable and I kept reading to find out what would come out of her mouth next.  She’s stubborn, caustic, but funny and won’t put you off even if seems to be her mission in life.

I was, however, put off slightly by the College of Greenlaw and how they teach magic, which they don’t actually do.  In fact, they ignore it altogether and tell students explicitly if they are caught practicing magic they will be expelled.  It’s all theory but nothing practical and I didn’t understand how the magic worked.  There is almost always a system; here it’s basically if you think it’s so, it’s so.  Which is fine but there’s nothing, well, magical about it.  It feels like it’s missing something.  Faris was frustrated by the system and so was I.  I kept waiting for an explanation but none came.  There is magic performed though and it’s interesting when it happens but it’s theoretical and feels like a mere thought as opposed to something magical.

There is a bit of a love story and it develops nicely without becoming an overwhelming element.  It’s slow and fits with the story; it’s not forced at all.  I don’t want to ruin anything but it doesn’t end on a happy note and I was glad to see that since I feel that authors want to provide that easy ending sometimes.  Faris sticks to her beliefs and it was nice to see a character do that without letting the love story become the reason for change.

I know my library has several of Stevermer’s books and I think I’ll be checking out a few more to see if she lives up to my expectations.

Teaser Tuesdays

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Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading.  The idea is to give everyone a look inside the book you’re reading.

Play along: Grab your current read; Open to a random page; Share two teaser sentences from that page; Share the title and author so that other participants know what you’re reading.

My teaser this week is from The Burning Times: A Novel of Medieval France by Jeanne Kalogridis.

“They moved steadily down out of the hills, the English, more than five thousand men, all told: lancers, foot soldiers, the much-dreaded archers with their bows the height of a man.  Dark locusts spilling out in irregular swarms, they had been on the march for months and no longer bothered with the precise lines of formal battle; nor did they need to.” (256)

What are you teasing us with this week?

DNF — The Clouds Beneath the Sun

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The Clouds Beneath the Sun

By Mackenzie Ford

Doubleday

ISBN: 978-0-385-52911-2

DNF

I began reading The Clouds Beneath the Sun by Mackenzie Ford and was very hopeful I would enjoy the book.  It was set in Kenya in the 1960s on an archeological dig.  The main character, Natalie Nelson, is a woman trying to escape her life in England, the suspicious death of her mother, a father who is blaming her for her mother’s death, and a failed love affair with a married man.  She lands in Kenya and is instantly taken in by a discovery in the gorge where the dig is taking place.  Shortly after the discovery, a colleague is murdered in the camp. Being the only person to see anything that night, Natalie gives testimony that will put her life, and the lives of her colleagues, in danger.  She also risks closing down the dig when tensions flare with the neighboring Maasai tribe who have granted permission for the dig to take place on their land.

The story began a bit slow but found its footing, and then somewhere between a new find and a love triangle, it faltered again.  I kept trying to find something of interest but it seemed as if I was watching the story take place in my peripheral vision instead of being invested in it.  I would pick up the book and after a few pages put it down again.  This went on for several days and then I began to realize that I was starting to write a DNF post in my head each time I looked at the book and that was when I decided it wasn’t going to work out.

Am I giving up entirely?  No, I’m not.  I think it was just the wrong time for this book.  It will go back to the library, but I plan to re-visit it in a few months and see how I feel about it then.

The Mosaic of Shadows

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The Mosaic of Shadows

By Tom Harper

Thomas Dunne Books/St. Martin’s Minotaur

ISBN: 0-312-33867-8

3 stars

The Mosaic of Shadows had a perfect setting, Byzantium, a mystery which I was willing to accept under the guise of historical fiction, and some interesting characters.  Unfortunately, the story fell a bit flat for me.

In Byzantium in 1066, an assassin narrowly misses the emperor with an arrow.  Knowing the implications if the emperor were to die, the palace wants the assassin found.  Demetrios Askiates, a man known for uncovering mysteries, is called to the palace and given orders to uncover the assassin’s plot and catch the would be killer.  Demetrios, whose usual cases have to do with finding lost items, ends up in an unknown world dealing with princes, slaves, and mercenaries.  When an army summoned by the emperor appears at the city’s walls, the hunt for an assassin takes on a new urgency.

The setting of this book was wonderful but the characters, with the exception of one, weren’t so wonderful.  Demetrios is in over his head and doesn’t seem like a person you would hire for this type of job unless you wanted him to fail.  He has a family but they’re mostly an afterthought and the love interest is barely thought of until she’s needed.  All of this made Demetrios rather unappealing.  He was supposed to be a solver of mysteries but he was more like a bumbling detective you would hire to find a cat in a tree.  I wanted to like him but I couldn’t find his redeeming value.

Some of the more interesting characters didn’t get developed as much as I would have liked.  The Varangians, who guard the emperor, are known for their fierce devotion and fighting abilities and the captain of the emperor’s guard, Sigurd, was a character I would have liked to have seen more of.

The ending, however, was exciting and I was glad that I stuck around for that.  Unfortunately, the mystery part of the story didn’t feel much like a mystery for me.  The person who “did it” was a person I wanted to see gone anyway so it’s wasn’t much of a surprise when his association with the killer was revealed.

This is the first book in a series and I don’t know if I will be following up with the others.  However, if I find out that the Varangian guards are featured, I may change my mind.

Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void

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Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void

By Mary Roach

W.W. Norton & Company

ISBN: 978-0-393-06847-4

5 stars

Space is not my thing; neither is watching the NASA channel.  Most days I don’t have any interest in space travel or NASA but this book may have turned that around for me.

Packing for Mars is about the strange research that goes into sending someone into the void.  Humans are not suited for the journey, will never adapt to it, and need to be prepared for every possible contingency.  What I tend to think of when I hear NASA is the monstrous budget and Roach sheds light on why and how that money is spent, and oddly, most of it is spent on the ground testing every piece of equipment that will be hurled into space on a metal tube attached to a rocket.

Astronauts are an odd bunch, and most who own up to that title, never actually spend any time in space.  Most spend their days endlessly testing things like space suits and tools rather than flying a spacecraft.  In addition, it was interesting to read about some of the first thoughts NASA scientists had about space and the affect on the human body which included — will blood still flow in a man’s veins without gravity (The use of the word man is intentional.  Woman weren’t being considered for astronaut positions at the time.), will the digestive system still function without gravity, and what will those astronauts eat after all?

A large portion of this book is devoted to bodily functions.  I wouldn’t recommend reading this book while eating unless of course you have ambitions involving space travel, then I would say you must read this while eating to get any vomit reaction you might have under control.

Bizarre simulations are something NASA excels at.  They use monkeys, cadavers, and even living and breathing people to find out how g-forces, food additives, weightlessness, and isolation will affect a person in space.  Some of the isolation simulations recounted here are quite amusing and also disconcerting as I would have to seriously consider why anyone would want to undergo some of these tests, and maybe even their commitment to sanity, for a chance to look down at the earth from space.

The best part of this book — the footnotes.  I never thought I would ever say that considering I mostly skip footnotes but Roach has a very engaging and funny style that makes you laugh at some of the odd things that actually go on at NASA.

If you’re interested in space, or not, this book is a fascinating read that will have you laughing and thoroughly disgusted at the same time but all in a good way.  I highly recommend it.

Teaser Tuesdays

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Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading.  The idea is to give everyone a look inside the book you’re reading.

Play along: Grab your current read; Open to a random page; Share two teaser sentences from that page; Share the title and author so that other participants know what you’re reading.

Today I start Mockingjay by Suzanna Collins.  When I put this book on hold at the library, I was number 48 in the queue.  I figured I wouldn’t get a chance to read the book until next year considering how slow my library can be with popular books, but then something miraculous happened — my hold came in!  So today, Mockingjay.

“I run my fingers through the thick layer of bubbles in my tub.  Cleaning me up is just a preliminary step to determining my new look.” (59)

What are you teasing us with this week?

The House on the Strand

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The House on the Strand

By Daphne Du Maurier

ISBN: 0-8122-1726-8

University of Pennsylvania Press

5 stars

Time travel and the 14th Century…what more can one want in a book?  OK, a lot more, but let’s go with these two as the starter for this one.

Richard Young is staying at his friend Magnus Lane’s home in the English countryside.  Magnus is a chemical researcher at the University of London and has concocted a drink, that when taken, will transport a person to the 14th Century.  The one catch is that the traveler cannot touch any person while on the trip or they will be instantly hurled back to the present rather painfully.  Richard, while waiting for his wife and step-sons to arrive, agrees to take the potion and report back to Magnus with the results.  The potion has the same affect on Richard as Magnus and they compare their trips to the past observing the daily lives of the people who used to live in the same area where Magnus’s house is.  Richard becomes fascinated with the past so much so that he keeps returning to see one particular woman that he has become obsessed with.  His sense of reality takes a turn and he starts to have trouble deciphering the past and the present which frightens him but not enough to stop him from taking what is left of the potion like some madman believing he can change the outcome of the past.  The results of his actions make the present a terrifying place for both Richard and his family.

Time travel in books can sometimes go bad but Du Maurier does something that makes it work — she makes it unbelievable.  That might sound odd but stick with me.  For a good portion of the book, Richard isn’t sure what he’s seeing and he isn’t sure he should believe it.  When he starts to believe, things go off track in his life making him wonder if what he thinks he believes is true.  Even when some historical research proves that the people he saw and observed on his trips were real, he still isn’t sure what to think or believe.  Life becomes difficult for him on so many levels and it seems as if you’re watching a man on the brink of madness.  How Du Maurier does this is fascinating and makes the whole idea of time travel so fantastical and terrifying at the same time.

Richard was not a person I liked at first.  I didn’t dislike him either but he’s a selfish person and one who doesn’t seem to think, or care, much for his family which is truly annoying.  Magnus however was a character I would have liked more of.  His ambiguity makes it work though because you get back to the idea of Richard slowly falling into the depths of madness without Magnus around.

There is so much to like about this book.  The fantasy element is done well, and even though you’re not sure if it truly exists outside of Richard’s mind, it works and is believable.  There are rules and consequences to the time travel and I like that.   A free system wouldn’t work here and Du Maurier creates a system that fits perfectly within the confines of the story.  The characters all have some sort of flaw that makes even the annoying ones likable, to a degree.  You do in the end sympathize with everyone which I wasn’t prepared to do half way through the book.

I will be adding more of Du Maurier’s books to my list.  Her writing is wonderfully descriptive and at the same time sparse, as if she’s giving you time to ingest it all.

Teaser Tuesdays

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Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading.  The idea is to give everyone a look inside the book you’re reading.

Play along: Grab your current read; Open to a random page; Share two teaser sentences from that page; Share the title and author so that other participants know what you’re reading.

I’m reading non-fiction but the opening is wonderful so that’s what I’m sharing today.  It’s a bit longer than usual but that makes it all the more fun.

From Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void by Mary Roach:

“To the rocket scientist, you are a problem.  You are the most irritating piece of machinery he or she will ever have to deal with.  You and your fluctuating metabolism, your puny memory, your frame that comes in a million different configurations.  You are unpredictable.  You’re inconsistent.  You take weeks to fix.” (15)

What are you teasing us with this week?