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Book Review: Point by Thomas Blackthorne (series, #2)
Summary:
Mysterious cutter circles are showing up in the Britain of the future. Thirteen teenagers gather in a circle, then slice the wrist of the person next to them all the way around the circle. The MI5 recruits a neuroscientist to help figure out the circles before they reach epidemic proportions. Meanwhile, her boyfriend, Josh Cumberland, finds himself sucked back into his old special forces unit when a civilian job reaches a mysterious end. Are the two events connected?
Review:
I received an ARC of this book through the Angry Robot Army, and I sort of wish I’d noticed it was the second in a series. I just dislike reading books out of order. Also, I think perhaps if I’d read the first book in the series, I wouldn’t have been so misled by the cover.
In case you can’t see the cover, it says, “Britain, tomorrow. The latest craze: cutter circles. Thirteen kids. Each has a blade. On a signal everybody cuts. What else is there when life has no point.” This makes it seem like this will be a book about depression and suicide in a post-apocalyptic world, right? In fact the people committing suicide have been brainwashed by music in an emotiphone to further a political power move. Which has…..nothing to do with real suicide or depression.
There’s nothing wrong with being a political intrigue book, but I am a bit disturbed at how Blackthorne utilizes psychology, psychiatry, and neuroscience in the book. He makes it look like in the future we’ll be able to just….program people out of it or to do whatever we want them to do. The brain is much more complex than that, and I just don’t like the message that such a plot device sends.
When looking at the book as the political espionage it actually is, as opposed to a book about mental illness in a dystopian world, it’s not a bad book. I have the feeling that those who enjoy political intrigue books will enjoy it. Josh is your typical wounded hero, and I did enjoy the scenes of him training. Blackthorne creatively incorporates reality tv into the plot-line that many readers will enjoy. The characters aren’t flat, but also aren’t particularly well-rounded. That’s ok, though, because the focus of the book is the action and political intrigue.
Overall, the book seems to be an average future political intrigue action flick…in written form. I recommend it to fans of that genre, but others will probably be bored.
3 out of 5 stars
Source: ARC from publisher
Book Review: Truly, Madly by Heather Webber (ARC, Feb 2010)
Summary:
Boston socialite Lucy Valentine isn’t too keen on running the family’s matchmaking business while her mother and father take a necessary trip out of country to let a scandal settle down. You see, she lost the family’s genetic ability to see auras that has led to their matchmaking success. When she was a kid, she was hit by an electrical surge that removed her ability to see auras and replaced it with an ability to see lost objects when her palm touches the owner’s palm. When a potential client shakes her hand, and she sees a dead body wearing his ring, she gets caught up in a bit more adventure than she ever thought her ability would lead her into. It doesn’t hurt that she manages to enlist the aid of the hunky private investigator whose office shares the matchmaking business’s building.
Review:
I was excited to discover a book set in Boston that has nothing to do with the Irish mob or the Kennedy’s. Unfortunately, I have this problem with reading about the modern wealthy. I simply can’t identify, and it tends to irritate me unless the book is all about how they’re a serial killer or something. Lucy is decidedly in with the Boston wealthy. Her family owns a building on Newbury Street; they employ a driver; and she has a trust fund. Of course she refuses the trust fund, but she’s still living in a cute, perfect cottage on her grandmother’s land in the South Shore. She calls her grandmother by her first name, “Dovie,” and her mother “Mum.” *shudders* I cringed every time she said either.
On the plus side, once I manage to overlook the whole poor rich girl scenario, the plot is good. It is full of twists and turns that have a slight supernatural bent without going full-tilt building an entirely populated other world of faeries, sprites, vampires, etc… that is seen in a lot of paranormal fiction. Lucy’s attraction to Sean, the PI, is believable and progresses at a good rate. The main mystery actually managed to surprise me with the ending, so that’s a major mark in its favor.
I also enjoyed the little life details Webber put into the story, Lucy’s cat’s activities, exactly what T lines are nearby where the action is happening, etc… However, I did not like Lucy’s personality quirk of doing math problems in her head when she was nervous. I don’t know what it is with romance writers lately having their characters do some annoying thing when they’re nervous, but to me it screams that Webber couldn’t figure out a better way to signal this emotion to the reader.
On the whole, it was a fun mystery plot with a dash of paranormal set in Boston marred by the choice of making the main character part of the wealthy elite with an annoying, unnecessary personality quirk. If you enjoy paranormal and wealthy characters, you will enjoy this book.
3 out of 5 stars
Source: Received from publisher, St. Martin’s Paperbacks, through LibraryThing‘s Early Reviewers program
Projected Publication Date: February 2010
Book Review: The Carousel Painter By Judith Miller (ARC)
I was quite excited to be the recipient of my first ARC (Advanced Reading Copy). I hadn’t realized when I put myself on the list that The Carousel Painter was published by Bethany House, a Christian publishing group. I actually read a lot of Bethany House books when I was growing up, so I am quite familiar with the genre, but since deconverting from Christianity at 20, let’s just say, Christian fiction isn’t my first reading choice. However, I’d made a promise to the publisher, so I decided to give it a fair shot. Not to mention, this would be a great exercise in being a fair critic.
Summary:
After her father dies, leaving her without family, Carrington Brouwer moves from France to Ohio to stay with her friend Augusta Galloway while looking for work in the late 1800s. Augusta’s father owns a carousel factory, and Carrie sees an opportunity to put her painting skills to good use. At the pressure of the women of the family, Mr. Galloway hires her, even though she will be the only woman working in the factory. Carrie must deal with the prejudices and fears of the men and their wives, as well as of the community, while addressing her own problems with pride and God. She also must deal with Augusta’s suitor, Tyson, who makes inappropriate moves on her and attempts to pin the theft of Mrs. Galloway’s jewels on her.
Review:
Miller possesses writing talent on the sentence level, for sure. The sentences flow well, and the dialogue is relatively believable. She shows forward-thinking for her genre by giving Carrie an independent spirit and not condemning it. At first I was excited that she seemed to be offering a relatively unique storyline to her genre.
However, the addition about half-way through of the plot-line of Carrie being a suspect in the theft of Mrs. Galloway’s jewels is a widely used one. The good Christian must suffer and have faith her innocence will be proven in the end. It was incredibly predictable. Plus it simply felt out of place and jarring given the beginning of the story.
I was also bothered by Carrie’s quirk of giggling when she’s nervous or upset. It’s such a misogynistic stereotype–the giggling female, and it simply did not fit with the rest of Carrie’s character.
I did appreciate, and I think fans of the genre will too, that Carrie’s faith and God were not the focus of nearly every single the page. Carrie growing in faith is part of her life and is addressed as such, but it is not the focus of the story. It’s simply a fact about her that comes up periodically. I know when I was into Christian lit as a teen, I would often wish they’d just tell me the story for once instead of preaching all the time. Yet I also know that fans of Christian lit will expect at least a little bit about God in the story. I think Miller struck this balance well.
Overall, it’s a step in the right direction for the genre, but Miller could have done a much better job writing a believable, unpredictable storyline while pushing the envelope against misogyny.
2.5 out of 5 stars
Source: ARC from publisher via LibraryThing‘s Early Reviewers program.
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This work by Amanda Nevius is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
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