This is a retelling of a lesser-known fairytale (Maid Maleen) that I have been meaning to get my hands on for some time. I finally found a copy while perusing a new used bookstore in Sedona, AZ (where the parents and in-laws live) and read it over the end of last year.
 
The Premise: Dashti is a mucker girl who gets a job as a lady’s maid on the very day that her lady is imprisoned in a tower for seven years. This is because Lady Saren refuses to marry Lord Khasar, claiming a prior engagement with another nobleman – Khan Tegus. While Lady Saren’s father shouts and the other maids run away, Dashti vows to stay beside her lady. The two girls are holed up in a small tower, and Dashti begins a journal detailing their days. Both Lady Saren’s suitors come by: Lord Khasar to taunt and torment them, and Khan Tegus to speak, but Lady Saren commands Dashti to impersonate her with Khan Tegus. As months go by and turn into years,  the food supply dwindles and Lady Saren settles into a dark depression. Only Dashti’s no nonsense attitude and faith in her gods keeps her from losing all hope herself.
 
My Thoughts: This is a epistolary novel told through Dashti’s entries in her journal, which she names “The Book of A Thousand Days”. From the get go, Dashti proves to be a heroine familiar with having to persevere when times are tough. She is a mucker – used to a nomadic lifestyle that depends on things beyond human control. She’s weathered a few hardships before selling her last animal for a job in Lady Saren’s household.  When Lady Saren, a young girl like Dashti herself, is put in a tower by her own father, Dashti is the only servant willing to take care of her lady.
 

    My lady was squeezing my arm so tightly now, my fingers felt cold. One of her cheeks was pink from his slap, her brown eyes red from crying. She reminded me of a lamb just tumbled out, wet all over, unsure of her feet and suspicious of the sun.
She’d be alone in that tower, I thought, and I remembered our tent when Mama died, how the air seemed to have gone out of it, how the walls leaned in, like to bury me dead. When Mama left, what had been home became just a heap of sticks and felt. It’s not good being alone like that. Not good.
Besides, I’d sworn to serve my mistress. And now that her hair was fixed and her face washed, I saw just how lovely she was, the glory of the Ancestors shining through her. I felt certain that Lady Saren would never disobey her father lightly. Surely she had a wise and profound reason for stubbornness, one blessed by the Ancestors.
“Yes,” I said. “I’ll stay with my lady.”
Then her father up and slapped me across my mouth. It almost made me laugh.

I liked Dashti a lot. Not only does she have skills for survival, but she also knows how to write and how to sing mucker healing songs. She’s self-sufficient, unlike her lady, who falls apart inside the tower. Dashti is the one looking at how much food they have and rationing it, worrying about the mice, cleaning, fetching water, and going about the day to day tasks of survival. Faced with a problem, Dashti doesn’t sit around – she does something. She’s just as worried as Lady Saren is that they may not survive, and yes, every so often she cries and despairs, but she picks herself up and carries on.

Day 528
Today I thought I would like to die, so I went into the cellar and smacked a few rats with the broom. It helped some.

As much as Dashti has skills that her lady does not, Dashti considers herself a servant and of a lower class than her lady. The class boundaries are very clear in her mind, and while others would think ill of Lady Saren for her uselessness in the tower, Dashti does not. Dashti believes in the gods and that the gentry have the mark of the Ancestors on them. It is Dashti’s job as a servant to obey and make her lady’s life easier. In many ways, Dashti’s unwavering belief make her something of an innocent, but I found her faith and heart endearing. It made her character very pure of heart, which fit well within the fairytale structure of this story.
 
When Lady Saren’s suitors pay them a visit at their tower, Dashti begins to realize why Saren refuses to marry Lord Khasar and prefers Khan Tegus. While Khan Tegus is likable, Lord Khasar is terrifying. Lord Khasar is a power hungry ruler who wants to take over all the Eight Realms. In this fairytale retelling, Lord Khasar is very clearly the bad guy while Khan Tegus is the Prince Charming of the tale, but the story puts a little twist to both the concepts. There is both a romance and a vanquishing in this story, and I don’t want to go into it and spoil anyone’s fun, but I have to say that both had me cheering.  I think that the structure of the story, as a series of journal entries, forces the narrative to sometimes focus on the mundane details over action, but I never found myself bored. Instead I was charmed by Dashti’s voice and her evolution from an ordinary lady’s maid into someone who could be the Hero of the story. I couldn’t predict what way the story was going to go, but I loved the way it unraveled.
 
I also loved that this story had a Mongolian influence. The Eight Realms and the Gods as Dashti knows them are clearly from Hale’s imagination, but the clothing, the animals and landscape, and many other details are very Asian.  There are also a lot of charming drawings that pepper the text which underline that these characters have Asian features. I really enjoyed reading a story that was so steeped in this sense of place.
 

 
Overall: This could be my favorite Shannon Hale story. I like a lot of Shannon Hale’s stories, but The Book of a Thousand Days had such an endearing heroine: a maid with a big heart who is determined to take care of her lady. It was heartwarming to see such a good character get her happy ending. This hit the right “fairytale” note while mixing in fantasy and Mongolian inspired story elements. I’m calling it a keeper.
 
Buy: Amazon | Powell’s | The Book Depository
 
Stephanie’s Written Word – positive
SFF Chat – positive
My Favourite Books – positive
need_tea – B
christina-reads – positive
temporaryworlds – 5 out of 5 stars

Shannon Stacey has gotten a bit of buzz online amongst the romance reviewing community since she debuted with Exclusively Yours, which was published as an ebook by Carina Press, Harlequin’s e-only imprint. Now, her books are going to be in print too (from HQN). I stumbled on Exclusively Yours on netgalley a few months ago and requested it based on the good reviews. I’m always on the lookout for good contemporary romances and this seemed to have a great premise.
 
The Premise: Keri Daniels is a journalist, who unfortunately, has a boss obsessed with the reclusive author Joe Kowalski. Joe Kowalski happens to be Keri’s high school boyfriend – the guy she dumped when high school ended. Keri would like nothing more than to never see Joe again, but when her boss finds out Keri’s long held secret, it’s either get an interview or lose her job.  Now Keri is back in her hometown and living her worst nightmare. Joe says he will answer her questions, but for a price. All she has to do is join him on the Kowalski family camping trip, and for every day she survives with his siblings, their spouses, his parents and a rowdy bunch of Kowaski offspring, she can ask one question. Keri was never a camping sort of girl, but now she has to spend time with a family that has every cause to dislike her, especially Joe’s twin sister, Terry, her one time best friend who now holds a monumental grudge.
 
Read an excerpt of Exclusively Yours here
 
My Thoughts: With the premise of Keri’s ex-boyfriend being in the position to make Keri really suffer on the camping trip, I was expecting a lot of back-and-forth friction between the ex-lovers, but this story surprised me. Other than his idea of the camping trip, Joe seems rather forgiving of his ex-girlfriend that broke his heart and sent him into such a dark depression that he took to drinking. In fact, he looks at Keri with much the same appreciation as he used to in high school and is pretty much a nice guy about the whole breakup. The rest of the Kowalski’s are pretty zen as well. Except for Terry, who has her own reasons to be angry at Keri,  no one seems to hold a grudge. This was a little weird, as I was expecting SOME resistance to Keri, and maybe some hurt feelings on Joe’s part, but it was also refreshing to have a not-so-predictable plot.
 
Instead of the expected drama of Keri’s inclusion to the Kowalski camping trip, much of the story focuses on the personal dramas of Joe’s siblings amongst the woods and ATVing. His sister Terry is dealing with hurt feelings because her husband moved out. She can’t help herself from reliving her husband’s departure and wondering what went wrong. She’s in no mood to deal with Keri, her once best friend that phased her out, then broke her brother’s heart. You can’t help but feel like Terry is taking out all her pain on Keri, just because she is a convenient scapegoat, and this would be right. Terry’s complicated situation and the way she acts out was well done. I didn’t particularly like Terry, but I understood why she acted the way she did, and I liked the secondary story of her marriage woes (I had quibbles with how this was resolved, but nothing major). While Terry has her problems, Joe’s brothers also have theirs. Kevin is a bachelor and bar owner who just got out of a bad divorce. Mike is a family man with four boys and who doesn’t want any more kids, but his wife Lisa, wants one more. This leads to some spectacular spats.
 
Compared to the drama going on among the people around them, the drama between Keri and Joe feels relatively tame. The biggest issue starts off as the conflict between Joe keeping his secrets (a mysterious engagement, his subsequent shunning of the limelight), and Keri needing a juicy story. But as the story continues Keri realizes that she has the same choice to make as before: whether she should choose Joe and her hometown, her career and L.A. Along the way of course, there is also the sexual tension they have to contend with, and much of the camping trip involves the dance between two obviously attracted people. Joe sees Keri and feels just like he felt about her in high school, and Keri feels like getting involved with Joe again would just be a big mistake. I liked the relaxed banter and the adult way that the hero and heroine acted throughout the book, and their obstacle to a happy ending felt more realistic than some of the others I’ve read in contemporary romance.
 
Overall: An enjoyable contemporary romance with humor and likable protagonists. I would say that it was a nice romance but the sense of family (their shenanigans and tribulations) and the well developed secondary characters brought Exclusively Yours up a notch from the average ‘fun romance read’. I’m interested in reading the next in the Kowalski series – this time about bar owner brother Kevin.
 
Buy: Amazon | Powell’s | The Book Depository
 
Buy ebook: Amazon (kindle) |  B&N (eBook)
 
Other reviews:
Monkey Bear Reviews – B-
One Good Book Deserves Another – 3.5 stars (out of 5)
Dear Author – B-
Pearl’s World of Romance – 10 out of 10

My Thoughts: It was very interesting to read about life in the corporate world that’s so different from mine. Not only do I know nothing about Marketing or Client Services, but the corporate culture in Ellie’s life sounds so different. Just the fact that there were a lot of young people in Ellie’s office blew me away (there is a serious dearth of people my age where I work), but that there is a social life among them? I’m jealous. I loved the concept of the barkadas – circles of friends and how they tied into the story. How social the work culture seems! I also enjoyed the glimpses of life in Manila like the food and the torrential rain that are a part of life there. Peppered throughout the story are Filipino words that I usually could guess the meanings of within the context. I wish there was a glossary, but I didn’t *need* it.

Ellie and Don belonged to the same barkada at work before they started dating. When Don breaks up with Ellie, it’s very painful for her, and it’s made more so because Don is still within her circle of friends, and he was there first. With Ellie’s feelings on her sleeve, things are very awkward with Don, Ellie, and their work barkada.  I really felt for Ellie during the breakup and it’s aftermath. I think most people have experience with a bad break up. The fallout amongst friends and the little dramas that play out afterwards felt very realistic (the dialogue felt particularly spot on as well). Ellie’s situation conjures up those feelings of denial, depression, and bargaining that are part of the grief process, although I wondered and worried about Ellie. She just wouldn’t get angry at Don nor would she accept her relationship with him was completely over, but this is obviously the crux of the story.

Ellie has to get herself out of her post-breakup rut and regain control. So she makes some changes like moving to a job in Client Services. She takes some trips alone, and makes friends with Lucas, the cute guy with Rock Star hair. Lucas at first doesn’t seem like Ellie’s type. He’s tattooed, a smoker, and agnostic, and office gossip has him dating one pretty girl after another and fathering a lovechild. For a nice Catholic girl, he hits everything on Ellie’s no-no list, but the more she gets to know Lucas, the more she realizes that her first impressions were wrong. They have a charming relationship with the sort of easy conversations you only have with your very best friends. A year later and Ellie is more like her original self:

“Ellie the Free Spirit was the girl [Don] fell in love with, the kind of person he kept comparing Ellie the Girlfriend to, and apparently by being away from him I was restoring myself to that state.”

It isn’t exactly a surprise where the story goes from here, but it is nice and satisfying the way it does.

Overall: This was a short and sweet chick lit that charmed me with it’s whimsical main character, easy dialogue, and feel-good romance. As a bonus, the Manila setting gave me a glimpse of another culture, and I’m always hungry to learn about places I haven’t been.

Buy: Amazon (kindle) | B&N (eBook)

*****

The Premise: Kimberly Domingo grew up in privilege. A fixture of the Country Club, she was raised alongside two daughters of her mother’s college circle, Chesca and Isabel, who became her closest friends. In high school, she got what she wanted by being direct (and intimidating), and at work, she got ahead easily with the same directness and ambition. She was the girl people loved to hate. The only person that can trip up Kimmy is Manolo, an on-again, off-again fling she’s had since she was fifteen. Unfortunately, Manolo’s M.O. seems to be: make Kimmy melt, then disappear. Then Kimmy met Zack. They were supposed to get married, but Zack broke off the engagement, leaving Kimmy the object of scorn and rumor. Unable to deal with it anymore, Kimmy left the country. Now, many months later, she’s back for her her best friend’s wedding. This time though, Kimmy thinks she knows how to get her life back in order – by cutting off the toxic friends that put her in the position she found herself in months ago.

As a fairytale retelling with a cyborg Cinderella, and set in “New Beijing”, Cinderpromised to deliver a story containing some of my favorite themes. I’ve had high hopes for this one so when I saw a contest for an ARC, I made sure I signed up. This review is based on an ARC copy I won from the publisher.
 
The Premise: It’s now 126 T.E. and in the teeming city of New Beijing, Linh Cinder is a talented mechanic who works out of her stall at the Weekly Market. While she’s a teen-aged girl, not your typical store owner, she’s also a cyborg, and thus the property of her stepmother Adri,  who uses Cinder’s income to run the household and keep her two daughter’s Pearl and Peony in relative comfort. Adri has no love for Cinder, and the feeling is mutual. Cinder’s life is not easy, but even the limited peace she has is gone when the plague comes to her home. While things are at their lowest point with her step-family, Cinder finds herself entangled in international politics and in the life of Prince Kai, heir to the Eastern Commonwealth. Somehow this is all tied to her own past and the ruthless Lunarians poised to take over the planet.
 
Download the first 5 chapters in Kindle format here
Download the first 5 chapters in eBook (nook) format here
 
My Thoughts: This story starts off very well. It begins with Cinder at her usual stall in the market, a space that is obviously her own.  I loved the way Cinder’s skill as a mechanic and her ostracization as a cyborg are incorporated with the sights and sounds of the New Beijing marketplace. When Prince Kai arrives, incognito and carrying an android for Cinder to work on, he has no idea that Cinder is part machine. Cinder, faced with a cute boy that every girl in the city has a crush on, isn’t eager to reveal something that she’s vilified for on a constant basis. It was a great opening scene and the tension of secrets between the two characters added something to the whole meeting. Another great dose of drama is added when there is an outbreak of letumosis nearby, and the reader is made aware of this deadly and horrifying disease and how its victims are treated.
 
That was all on the first chapter. I was happy with just the thought of a story that contained Cinder, the prince, and letumosis, but the story becomes much larger in scope. Beyond Cinder and her step-family (whom we are introduced to soon after Cinder and the prince), are world-wide machinations. It isn’t long before Cinder’s world is upended and she is involved in a frantic see-saw between trying to save a loved one from letumosis and trips to the palace where she continues to run into Prince Kai and discovers surprising things about both herself and the Lunarians. All the while, Kai has his own problems. His father has the plague too, and the diabolically evil Queen Levana wants the seize power through marriage to an inexperienced young monarch.
 
I really liked Cinder’s character. She is a girl who doesn’t have many supporters but she makes the best of what she has. She knows how to fix things, she has a realistic attitude, and she’s rather scrappy when things go south. I adored all the little reminders of her cyborg status like readouts and her leg compartment that liberally peppered the story. Kai struck me as a generally nice guy trying to do the right thing under trying circumstances. There are brief sections of this book told from his point of view.  Overall, he’s not as well fleshed out as Cinder, but his frustration at his father’s sickness and the way the Lunarians are exploiting the situation is palpable.
 
There’s an obvious intent for there to be a romance between the two characters but the romance is not quite there yet. I had the impression that there was an instant like between Kai and Cinder, but that’s as far as it goes. With the weight of the world on their shoulders and with moments in each other’s company, it was a stretch to believe Kai would have any interest in Cinder being at his ball. Thankfully, the book didn’t try to sell me on a full-blown love between the two, which saves things somewhat, but it does skirt on the edges of disbelief without really going over. I think that the real romantic development is being saved for later books. I hope that the characters can spend more time with each other before the romance really happens.
 
Actually, a lot of this story felt like it was set up for later books. There are several ongoing threads that deal with Cinder’s past and her true identity which obviously won’t be resolved in this book. Unfortunately, there was a bit of frustration with having Cinder kept ignorant until the book’s climax. I could see where the story was manipulated there. I think that with the intent for this to be the series, it also necessitated that the Cinderella formula wasn’t adhered to in Cinder and the introduction of the ultimate bad guys – the Lunarians, in particular their evil queen. As bad guys go, I much preferred Cinder’s stepmother, who misdirects her anger and grief at her losses toward Cinder. Andi was a villainess with a motivation I understood. The Lunarian queen is just felt evil for no reason. Yes, fairy-tale bad guys are usually like that, and taken from that perspective, she is typical, but I wish Cinder could have stuck more to the original than it did.
 
I also was hoping to have a better sense of place in this story than I did. Other than the marketplace introduced all the way at the start of the book, there was little to show that the story was set in New Beijing. The only thing to indicate where everyone lived was their names. Even while preparing for the ball, the ballgowns sounded western: satin and tulle, big and fluffy, rather than silk and embroidered. I felt like the author had a missed opportunity in not making New Beijing a presence in the narrative.
 
Okay, so I have my complaints about this story, but none of them were deal breakers. There were things that I think affected my enjoyment of the middle part of the story, even though Cinder is well written and flowed well. I just found the middle part of the story not as compelling as the beginning and the end. There were parts that dragged because I felt like I could see what was going on behind the curtain. The ending was a good one though – it sealed my like of Cinder’s character and I enjoyed how the fairytale elements showed up. We’re left with plenty to look forward to in the sequels. Cinder continues with Scarlet (inspired by Little Red Riding Hood), Cress (Rapunzel), and Winter (Snow White). I will be interesting to see how the series plans to keep Cinder’s story within the frame of stories meant to be about other characters.
 
Overall: I loved the premise of a cyborg Cinderella so much that I wanted this story to really wow and excite me the way the premise did. The execution was good, but it didn’t thrill me like I wanted to be thrilled. The beginning and the end were great, but the middle suffered under the weight of being set up for a series and I had several qualms with the setting, romance, and antagonists. In the end, I liked Cinder, but it wasn’t a home run. I’d recommend this with reservations.
 
Buy: Amazon | Powell’s | The Book Depository
 
Other reviews:
The Book Smugglers – 6 (Good, recommended with reservations)
Good Books and Good Wine – loved it
Books and Things – 3 and a half stars (out of 5)
Pirate Penguin reads – positive
Giraffe Days – 4 giraffes (out of 5)
The Cozy Reader – a perfect score
On the Nightstand – “highly readable blend of science fiction and fairytales”
The Canary Review – 3 canaries (out of 5)
The Book Pushers – C+
Inkcrush – “It would have sucked me in big time when I was a teenager. I liked it as an adult.”
 
Other links:
“Glitches” — a short story that prequels Merissa Meyer’s CINDER

The Premise: Anya Kalinczyk is a Lantern, a special type of Elemental with an affinity for fire and the ability to consume spirits. Her day job is as an arson investigator for the Detroit Fire Department, but on occasion Anya gets a call from DAGR (the Detroit Area Ghost Researchers) and uses her abilities to help people with their ghost problems.  Detroit is a place of unrest. Low employment and crime drives more people out of the city every day while ghosts seem to overrun it. Keeping up with a rash of arson as well as with driving out malicious spirits is wearying work, and other than her fire salamander sidekick, Anya is very alone. Now, a serial arsonist is leaving mysterious symbols with his work, and the spirits have begun to talk of something big coming. Something big and associated with fire, and with Anya’s special abilities, she may be the only one able to stop it.
 
My Thoughts: I’ve been interested in Embers for a very long time, but it’s been one of those books that I’d planned to read if I ever ran into a copy and it took a while for that to happen. When I finally had a copy in my hands, I fell easily into its pages. Anya’s life is a fascinating one. An ex-firefighter, Anya now spends her days in the charred hulks of buildings investigating whether or not a fire was actually arson. Every so often she gets a call from DAGR, a ragtag group of mediums and ghost hunters when there is a particularly stubborn spirit that needs removing. By her side is Sparky, a fire salamander that only she can see (who stole the show every page he was on).
 
Unfortunately for Anya, her life is a weary one, especially lately. The calls for DAGR are becoming more frequent as their usual methods aren’t working like they used to. Every spirit she consumes takes it’s toll on her, but this isn’t something DAGR’s leader Jules seems to grasp. And while Sparky is a lovable and rambunctious supernatural pet, Anya is isolated from human connection. Her abilities and Sparky aren’t things Anya can exactly explain to a your Everyday Joe, and letting people near her always seems to end in someone getting hurt. The closest thing she has to a friend is Katie, the DAGR witch (and baker by day) that Anya sees only occasionally, and then there is Brian, a sweet and geeky guy who Anya always pushes away.
 
Sparky is the only constant companion Anya has ever had, but her loneliness is just one facet that makes Anya human. She’s not your kick-ass urban fantasy heroine, she’s just a tired woman trying to make things right. Right now, making things right looks like finding and stopping the supernatural arsonist terrorizing Detroit. But with Anya lonely and tired, she is also vulnerable, and the lines get a little blurry. I felt like Anya wandered into a gray area in a way that I found surprising and yet so-human, and this was a strong point of the book – the meeting of opposing sides that were fascinated with each other. I don’t think I can recall the last time I read a book with such a sympathetic bad guy. I liked it! The only wish I had was that Brian, Anya’s possible romantic interest, could have had as much character development as the arsonist.
 
Overall: In the end, I was pretty satisfied with this urban fantasy. The investigation parts were straightforward but Anya and her opponent had a deliciously conflicting relationship that upped my enjoyment. It’s obvious too that Anya has a lot to learn about who she is as a Lantern and that she needs to drop her walls when it comes DAGR, so I expect more character development and world building to come. This is a promising start to a series and I can’t wait to see what’s next.
 
I have also been informed that the author has an alter-ego: Alayna Williams. More books for me to check out.
 
Buy: Amazon | Powell’s | The Book Depository
 
Other reviews:
Tez Says (a bit spoilery) – positive
Scooper Speaks – positive
Angieville – “exactly what I was hoping it would be”

So I have never read Maggie Stiefvater before. Despite the lovely trailers and generally good reviews, I just haven’t been interested in the teenagers and werewolves or the teenagers and the faerie. But, killer seahorses? I am interested in that. I picked up a copy of The Scorpio Races as BEA, and still, for some reason or another, I held off on reading the book until the reviews started to trickle in and everyone whose taste I trust loved this book. Finally, finally, I started to read it, and was so happy to find that it lived up to all the hype. I loved this one.
 
The Premise: Every November on the wild and remote island of Thisby, there is a race. Every year, tourists and locals watch riders race deadly water horses known as the capaill uisce on a small strip of beach. And every year, someone dies. The Scorpio Races can mean a lot of money if you are lucky and skilled enough to win, but injury, or more likely, death, occurs for the not-so-blessed. For three of the last four years, Sean Kendrick has won the race for his employer, Benjamin Malvern, the most wealthy man on the island. Sean’s father died at the races, but Sean has worked at the stables since he was ten and is the island expert when it comes to the capaill uisce.  This year, Puck Connolly has also decided to join the race, even though she never had an interest in the races nor any love for the creatures responsible for her parents’ deaths. No interest until her brother Gabe announced his intention to leave the island, making Puck desperate for any excuse to keep him around. Puck has no experience, no capall uisce, and no idea what she is in for.
 
My Thoughts: The Scorpio Races begins with a prologue where Sean Kendrick is a ten year old boy who watches as his father is trampled in the annual races. The images of crowds of men and flesh-eating capaill uisce, then his father’s body lying on the beach are violent and memorable. Sean’s reaction, that fear was his father’s mistake, lingered in my mind long afterward. Clearly, Thisby is not a place for the weak of heart.
 
The island is a harsh and unyielding locale, and those who live on Thisby are no strangers to death and heartache. People often move to the mainland, where work is safer and more profitable. Sean lost his mother to the mainland, and his father to the Races, and has been working at the Malvern stables ever since. A man of little words, Sean keeps to himself but is respected for his way with the uisce and for being the returning champion. There is only one living thing he really loves: Corr, the water horse that he rides for his employer. On another part of the island, Puck Connolly elks out a meager living with her older brother Gabe and younger brother Finn. Her story has a similar tale of loss – both her parents were out fishing when they were killed by the uisce. Puck just wants to keep what’s left of her family together, but making a decent living is hard, and Gabe wants to leave. That’s when desperation takes over and Puck announces she’ll be riding in the Races.
 
The story takes its time, alternating viewpoints between Sean and Puck. Usually, I am not a great fan of alternating viewpoints but in The Scorpio Races it was done very well. I loved how this place is reflected in Sean and Puck’s characters and in so many people in Thisby. This wasn’t a story where I’m told something is dangerous but nothing dangerous ever happened. No, here, people die, bad things happen, and you hold your breath while reading because the story is often a hairbreadth away from something awful. The capaill uisce are the real deal. Yet, these terrifying creatures are a part of Thisby – the only place in the world where these creatures come to shore. Sean muses that it is because this is the only place where they are loved. I think that Stiefvater succeeds in creating an atmospheric setting, one that feels magical but also very real and dangerous, but also made me believe people would pick the island and flesh-eating water horses over safety.
 
As Sean and Puck prepare for the races, their reasons for wanting to win become more serious, and both have big obstacles in their way. I won’t get into these reasons or obstacles, but let me say: I couldn’t decide who I wanted to win more. And as they meet and get to know each other, I don’t think Sean and Puck know who they want to win either. Along the way, they’ve begun an attachment that is of the quiet but deep variety. Theirs is a romance of little words but their gestures speak volumes. A single touch or a family dinner carries great meaning and had me swept up in their relationship. When Sean does speak and make his move, it hits you like a ton of bricks.
 
All of this atmosphere and quiet romance and struggle culminates in one thing: the Scorpio Races themselves. This is the part of the story where I was feverishly flipping the pages, and it is over quickly, but oh, is it awesome. I finished off this story with a mix of elation and contentment.
 
Overall: The Scorpio Races is quiet perfection. It was one of my top reads of last year (honestly, it ties for number one). This is an incredibly well-crafted tale set in a fierce and beautiful island, with just the right touch of the otherworldly and steadfast characters that persevere. It’s a story that is thoughtful and gradually builds up it’s characters and relationships, and it’s not for those that require instant gratification. My kind of story.
 
Buy: Amazon | Powell’s | The Book Depository
 
Other reviews:
Angieville – “perfect”
Chachic’s Book Nook – “One of my favorite books read this year”
The Book Smugglers -  8- Excellent and leaning toward 9
Escape In a Book – 4 (out of 5)
Jane of All Reads – positive
Book Harbinger – “in the running for my favorite book of the year”
 
Book Trailer: