The Sinister Mystery of the Mesmerizing Girl / Theodora Goss

4 out of 5 stars

Life’s always an adventure for the Athena Club...especially when one of their own has been kidnapped! After their thrilling European escapades rescuing Lucinda van Helsing, Mary Jekyll and her friends return home to discover that their friend and kitchen maid Alice has vanished— and so has their friend and employer Sherlock Holmes!

As they race to find Alice and bring her home safely, they discover that Alice and Sherlock’s kidnapping are only one small part of a plot that threatens Queen Victoria, and the very future of the British Empire. Can Mary, Diana, Beatrice, Catherine, and Justine save their friends—and save the Empire? Find out in the final installment of the fantastic and memorable Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club series.

Forget the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, because now we have The Athena Club. I guess we could call it the League of Monstrous Gentlewomen. Another of the feminist versions of the Victorian time period with plenty of girl power (although the main characters do get justifiably huffy about being called girls when they are full grown women).

Even the female villains outsmart their male counterparts in this particular volume. The women of the Athena Club may sometimes doubt their abilities, but they pull off the caper (with the help of Ayesha of course). Just like most women, they doubt themselves unnecessarily. Plus, they get to rescue Sherlock Holmes!

I know that this series is technically wrapped up with this third book, but it seems to me that there are enough loose threads and unexplored avenues that further adventures could follow, if the author can persuade the publisher to continue. Fingers crossed that there will eventually be another book about the Athena Club!

The Art of Theft / Sherry Thomas

4 out of 5 stars

As "Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective," Charlotte Holmes has solved murders and found missing individuals. But she has never stolen a priceless artwork—or rather, made away with the secrets hidden behind a much-coveted canvas.

But Mrs. Watson is desperate to help her old friend recover those secrets and Charlotte finds herself involved in a fever-paced scheme to infiltrate a glamorous Yuletide ball where the painting is one handshake away from being sold and the secrets a bare breath from exposure.

Her dear friend Lord Ingram, her sister Livia, Livia's admirer Stephen Marbleton—everyone pitches in to help and everyone has a grand time. But nothing about this adventure is what it seems and disaster is biding time on the grounds of a glittering French chateau, waiting only for Charlotte to make a single mistake...

One of the best aspects of my 2019 summer reading list (The Summer of Sherlock) was the discovery of this charming series, the Lady Sherlock series. I’m really enjoying a lot of these feminist revisionist Victorian adventures! The Victorian age as it should have been.

I love Charlotte Holmes as a character and I relate to her when she would rather be at home with a cup of tea and a pastry than out in the world pursuing criminals! I rather favour coffee and popcorn, but it’s the same idea. I have to laugh at her concept of Maximum Tolerable Chins, which is the point at which she restricts her pastry consumption until her clothing fits more comfortably. Been there, done that, my dear Charlotte!

My only disappointment with this book was that it did not deal with the Treadles’ plot line until the very last pages! I really want to know what happens between Inspector and his wife, but it seems that I must wait for the next book.

In the meanwhile, I have to applaud the author for being able to bring Charlotte and Lord Ingram together and then separate them so skillfully, retaining the romantic pursuit and it’s accompanying plot tension into the fourth book of the series. Of course I am also interested in the Livia and Stephen Marbleton situation, but it is Charlotte & Ash who command my attention in terms of relationships.

Ms. Thomas also uses the Maharani’s character deftly as a way to explore colonialism and to introduce a person of colour into the very white, upper-class world that the main characters inhabit.

All in all, I will be very excited when Book 5 is published, hopefully next year.

A Study in Scarlet Women / Sherry Thomas

4 out of 5 stars

With her inquisitive mind, Charlotte Holmes has never felt comfortable with the demureness expected of the fairer sex in upper class society. But even she never thought that she would become a social pariah, an outcast fending for herself on the mean streets of London. 

When the city is struck by a trio of unexpected deaths and suspicion falls on her sister and her father, Charlotte is desperate to find the true culprits and clear the family name. She’ll have help from friends new and old—a kind-hearted widow, a police inspector, and a man who has long loved her.

But in the end, it will be up to Charlotte, under the assumed name Sherlock Holmes, to challenge society’s expectations and match wits against an unseen mastermind.

***The Summer of Sherlock 2019*** 

”With your penchant for diminishing a man to little more than a shell of his former manhood, it never ceases to amaze me that you managed to receive all the proposals you did.”
She had indeed reaped her fair share, including one from his brother, Lord Bancroft, her favorite proposal of them all.
“It’s my decolletage--when gentlemen stare at my bosom they don’t hear a word I say. I strongly believe that if trees sprouted breasts tomorrow they would soon be wearing wedding rings.”
He chortled.

What a pleasant surprise! Of all the Holmes pastiche that I have read this summer, this was by far the most original and entertaining. I loved Charlotte Holmes, a young debutante who sees no future to be desired in marriage and has difficulty mastering the small talk and calorie control that is expected of her. She accidentally scares many people with her observations and has a tendency to eviscerate the men who dare to approach. Despite this, she received numerous proposals, all of which she has refused to her parents great unhappiness.

Charlotte makes a deal with her father--if she reaches 18 without finding a man she wishes to marry, he will foot the bill for her education as she attempts to become the administrator of a girls school. When Charlotte reaches that age and tries to obtain her desire, her father reneges. 

This novel consists of the adventures of a young Victorian woman discovering a way to support herself and remain independent of the men in her life. Part of this is the development of her alter-ego, Sherlock Holmes. With the widow Mrs. Watson by her side (John Watson, as it happens, was killed and buried in Afghanistan). 

Books like this one are wish-fulfillment stories for those of us women who choose to remain single and support ourselves. I wish there had been more of this kind of imaginative history available when I was a much younger woman. As it is, I still enjoyed it a great deal and I can hardly wait to get my hands on the next book.

Half Spent Was the Night / Ami McKay

3.5 stars out of 5

During the nights between Christmas and New Year's, the witches of New York--Adelaide Thom, Eleanor St. Clair and the youngest, Beatrice Dunn--gather before the fire to tell ghost stories and perform traditional Yuletide divinations. (Did you know that roasting chestnuts were once used to foretell one's fate?)
As the witches roast chestnuts and melt lead to see their fate, a series of odd messengers land on their doorstep bearing invitations for a New Year's Eve masquerade hosted by a woman they've never met. Gossip, dreams and portents follow, leading the witches to question the woman's motives. Is she as benevolent as she seems or is she laying a trap. And so, as Gilded-Age New York prepares to ring in the new year, the witches don their finery and heard for the ball, on the hunt for answers that might well be the end of them.

A charming little novella, perfect for the days leading up to the New Year’s celebration. I was surprised at how long a waiting list there was for this book at my public library! I didn’t get my paws on it until late January, well into the New Year. But I still enjoyed this gentle little historical urban fantasy.

Lovely uses of British Isles mythology and some intrigue made it a worthwhile reading experience for me. I will definitely be willing to read the author’s The Witches of New York for the background story.

Dreamfever / Karen Marie Moning

3 out of 5 stars

He has stolen her past, but MacKayla will never allow her sister’s murderer to take her future. Yet even the uniquely gifted sidhe-seer is no match for the Lord Master, who has unleashed an insatiable sexual craving that consumes Mac’s every thought—and thrusts her into the seductive realm of two very dangerous men, both of whom she desires but dares not trust.

As the enigmatic Jericho Barrons and the sensual Fae prince V’lane vie for her body and soul, as cryptic entries from her sister’s diary mysteriously appear and the power of the Dark Book weaves its annihilating path through the city, Mac’s greatest enemy delivers a final challenge.…

It’s an invitation Mac cannot refuse, one that sends her racing home to Georgia, where an even darker threat awaits. With her parents missing and the lives of her loved ones under siege, Mac is about to come face-to-face with a soul-shattering truth—about herself and her sister, about Jericho Barrons…and about the world she thought she knew.

A perfect Friday night read, glass of wine in hand, needing something fluffy & easy after the work week.

Mac gets rescued, overcomes obstacles, and progresses as a human being. I love her bond with Dani, the teenage rebel. And I’m always ready for some revenge!

However, I am weary of the cliff hanger endings.

The Dinosaur Knights / Victor Milan

4 out of 5 stars

Paradise is a sprawling, diverse, often cruel world. There are humans on Paradise but dinosaurs predominate: wildlife, monsters, beasts of burden, and of war. Armored knights ride dinosaurs to battle legions of war-trained Triceratops and their upstart peasant crews.

Karyl Bogomirsky is one such knight who has chosen to rally those who seek a way from the path of war and madness. The fact that the Empire has announced a religious crusade against this peaceful kingdom, the people who just wish to live in peace anathema, and they all are to be converted or destroyed doesn't help him one bit.

Things really turn to mud when the dreaded Grey Angels, fabled ancient weapons of the Gods who created Paradise in the first place come on the scene after almost a millennia. Everyone thought that they were fables used to scare children. They are very much real.

And they have come to rid the world of sin...including all the humans who manifest those vices.

I enjoyed the first volume, The Dinosaur Lords, but the second volume The Dinosaur Knights is better. The world is already established, the reader knows the main characters, and the action is already underway. The dinosaurs continue to be awesome and the “rules” of their behaviour in Paradise (our non-Earth setting) are refined a bit. Now it is clear to me why the Tyrannosaurs don’t run amok. What is less clear (and may be fodder for future installments) is who exactly the Creators are and what their aims may be.

There are an awful lot of gritty battle scenes in both books, which generally are not my thing. However, to counter-act that, we have Imperial Princess Melodía joining the rebels and learning to be something besides an imperial princess. This book continues to honour the Bechdel test, as Melodía discovers unexpected female friends along the way. My only reservation is that these amigas seem to be very expendable and Milan eliminates them almost as quickly as he introduces them and never gently. There are fewer sex scenes, which is a blessing, as I don’t care for Milan’s execution of them.

I think the trick to enjoying these books is to go into them with an open mind. Probably it helps for me that I have never read any of George R.R. Martin’s books, to which Milan’s books are compared, most notably on the dust jacket. Milan shares Martin’s willingness to dispose of characters, and a certain gritty, somewhat medieval-like setting. Empty yourself of any other expectations before entering the world of Paradise, and you will be free to enjoy what Milan is offering.

There are a certain number of editing errors which bugged me along the way (‘our’ instead of ‘your’ and similar little glitches that would require re-reading of sentences to figure out what was meant). But over all, these small snafus didn’t ruin the reading experience.

Miss Zukas and the Library Murders / Jo Dereske

3 out of 5 stars

Meet Miss Zukas . . . the very proper, exceedingly conscientious, and relentlessly curious local librarian of tiny Bellehaven, Washington--and one heck of an amateur sleuth! The Bellehaven police are baffled when a dead body turns up right in the middle of the library's fiction stacks. But Miss Helma Zukas--who never fails to make note of the slightest deviation from the norm of everyday life--is not willing to let this rather nasty disruption stand. Her precious literary sanctuary has been violated, and if the local law cannot get to the bottom of this case, Miss Zukas certainly intends to--with the help of her not-so-proper best friend, Ruth, a six-foot-tall bohemian artist with a nose for gossip and a penchant for getting into trouble. But their research project is bringing them a little too close to a killer . . . who'd like nothing better than to write Helma and Ruth out of the story completely!

I’ve been having a grand time of late reading books about libraries and librarians. This first book in the Miss Zukas series was quite enjoyable and an easy, quick read at the end of a long-feeling week.

The book is chock full of librarian stereotypes—enjoyably so, as the author was a librarian at one point and uses them kindly and fondly. Miss Zukas inhabits an area somewhere between Nancy Drew and Miss Marple.  She is no longer so young as Nancy Drew, but still single & overbearingly precise about things, somewhat reminiscent of Miss Marple.  The author also uses her Lithuanian background to supply a family for Helma Zukas, a case of writing what one knows.

I loved Helma’s friend Ruth and their long friendship based on their surnames starting with letters at the end of the alphabet—in school, they were always at the end of any activity requiring a roll call. I found that true to life—sometimes your childhood friendships hinge on these little quirks.

I’ve always been rather puzzled but the concept of a cozy mystery—how can anything involving murder actually be cozy? But this murder mystery will never made you look over your shoulder with any sense of dread (even if you work in a library, as I do).  I would have to say that it gets sewn up satisfactorily and could probably be considered “cozy.”

I will definitely read more Miss Zukas at some point in the future, but it will be awhile. My public library doesn’t have the early volumes of the series, so I will have to interlibrary loan them, as I did with this volume.

The Dark Lady's Mask / Mary Sharratt

3 out of 5 stars

London, 1593. Aemilia Bassano Lanier is beautiful and accomplished, but her societal conformity ends there. She frequently cross-dresses to escape her loveless marriage and to gain freedoms only men enjoy, but a chance encounter with a ragged, little-known poet named Shakespeare changes everything.

Aemilia grabs at the chance to pursue her long-held dream of writing and the two outsiders strike up a literary bargain. They leave plague-ridden London for Italy, where they begin secretly writing comedies together and where Will falls in love with the beautiful country — and with Aemilia, his Dark Lady. Their Italian idyll, though, cannot last and their collaborative affair comes to a devastating end. Will gains fame and fortune for their plays back in London and years later publishes the sonnets mocking his former muse. Not one to stand by in humiliation, Aemilia takes up her own pen in her defense and in defense of all women.

This is a serviceable little historical fantasy. If you are into all things Shakespeare or Aemilia Lanier, this book will be better for you than for others with no interest in either writer. The author takes quite a lot of historical points and then, like one of those children’s connect-the-dots pictures, creates an imaginative narrative that paints a picture that we may not have expected.

The writing is solid, the connections are original, plenty of famous names appear in the pages, but I didn’t find it to be un-put-down-able, if you know what I mean. I appreciated the girl power messages throughout, as Amelia struggles to become mistress of her own life and forges important friendships that help her (and her friends) in this regard. And it’s true that many a talented woman has had to use the men in her life to get her work out into the world. Aemilia “just happens” to run into or be related to an extraordinary number of co-operative men in this regard. Will Shakespeare turns from charmer to jerk (an entirely possible scenario, but one that I really didn’t care for).

Two things annoyed me—occasionally, a character would start a sentence with “marry” as a signal I guess of the time period. However, the rest of the time, they spoke like 20th or 21st century people. Easier to read, yes, but then let’s dispense with the odd “marry” and stay in one vocabulary or the other. Plus, there is one scene where a horse is described as “pulling a face” when mounted by a corpulent rider. Horses can roll their eyes, snort, grunt, sigh, many reactions—but I don’t think that “pulling a face” is one of them. The author is a horsewoman and should know better (or her editor should).

A good book and I’d be open to reading more of this author once I’ve made a bigger dent in my TBR list.

Magic Burns / Ilona Andrews

4 out of 5 stars

Down in Atlanta, tempers – and temperatures – are about to flare…

As a mercenary who cleans up after magic gone wrong, Kate Daniels has seen her share of occupational hazards. Normally, waves of paranormal energy ebb and flow across Atlanta like a tide. But once every seven years, a flare comes, a time when magic runs rampant. Now Kate’s going to have to deal with problems on a much bigger scale: a divine one.

When Kate sets out to retrieve a set of stolen maps for the Pack, Atlanta’s paramilitary clan of shapeshifters, she quickly realizes much more at stake. During a flare, gods and goddesses can manifest – and battle for power. The stolen maps are only the opening gambit in an epic tug-of-war between two gods hoping for rebirth. And if Kate can’t stop the cataclysmic showdown, the city may not survive…

Is it just me, or have the writing team here taken a page from Shakespeare, specifically The Taming of the Shrew? With the main character being named Kate, I have to wonder. Curran has obviously been cast in the role of Petruchio, tormenting the unwilling Kate, who is stubbornly resisting him.

This is a story line of some antiquity and it continues to entertain us to this day. I do look a bit askance at it, as it would seem to reinforce that male belief that “no” just means “be more persistent.” Despite these reservations, I did enjoy the story and will undoubtedly be picking up the third book in the series (remembering, after all, that this is entertainment and fantasy and not a blue print for life).

I do enjoy Kate—her self-reliance, her strength, and her determination to succeed. Like all of us, she sometimes lacks a bit of perspective on her life, but she is as honest as she is able to be. I thought the introduction of the child, Julie, allowed the authors to let Kate reflect on her own life, thereby giving the reader some background without it just being a huge info dump.

Most enjoyable and I will anticipate book 3 with pleasure.

Demon / John Varley

4 out of 5 stars

The satellite-sized alien Gaea has gone completely insane. She has transformed her love of old movies into monstrous realities. She is Marilyn Monroe. She is King Kong. And now she must be destroyed.

It strikes me, as I finish up Demon, that John Varley’s trilogy is in many ways a mirror-image of Arthur Clarke’s 2001, a Space Odyssey. While both stories begin with humans exploring alien technology in the outer solar system, Clarke’s is all about the computers, space travel, and alien technology, while Varley’s is all about human relationships. Clarke’s aliens are aloof and cold, leaving behind technology just in case humans manage to develop into something interesting; Varley’s Gaea is intensely interested in humans—luring them to her world, sometimes with very convoluted methods, and using their films to express her insanity in this final volume of the trilogy.

About mid-book, Conal (a man from Earth with all of the prejudices associated) and Nova (a woman from a lesbian society on a human made satellite) have an argument/discussion which I think articulates Varley’s view of things rather well. Conal came from a society in which males were privileged and Nova came from one which demonizes men. They are thrown into a situation where they will have to co-operate and they must work out their differences and an interesting discussion on in-groups and out-groups ensues. Conal realizes that Nova’s choice of wardrobe (or lack thereof) is really none of his business (and shouldn’t affect how he relates to her) and Nova realizes that you don’t have to be a lesbian female to be a worthy companion. I re-read this particular section 2-3 times, just because I enjoyed it so much—it fit so well into the action, without feeling overly preachy (at least to me).

Needless to say, this whole series passes the Bechdel test with flying colours, very refreshing in a works from the 1970s and 1980s. The whole Gaean world, with its odd plants and animals, is interesting and fun to explore and has its own internal logic that made perfect sense to me as I read it, despite its oddity.

Book 205 of my science fiction & fantasy reading project.

Heretics of Dune / Frank Herbert

2.5 out of 5 stars

Leto Atreides, the God Emperor of Dune, is dead. In the fifteen hundred years since his passing, the Empire has fallen into ruin. The great Scattering saw millions abandon the crumbling civilization and spread out beyond the reaches of known space. The planet Arrakis-now called Rakis-has reverted to its desert climate, and its great sandworms are dying.

Now, the Lost Ones are returning home in pursuit of power. And as factions vie for control over the remnants of the Empire, a girl named Sheeana rises to prominence in the wastelands of Rakis, sending religious fervor throughout the galaxy. For she possesses the abilities of the Fremen sandriders-fulfilling a prophecy foretold by the late God Emperor...

I do love the Dune universe, but I usually limit my re-reading to the first three books. The fourth book, God Emperor of Dune, is definitely the worst of the bunch, in my opinion, and yet I’m glad I read it long, long ago so that I knew what the main characters in Heretics were talking about! (Not enough to re-read God Emperor, mind you.)

Things I like in this book? Miles Teg, beloved Bashar and Atreides descendent and his interesting development in the last chapters. Yet another Duncan Idaho ghola, but this one seems to have a better grip on existence than the last several hundred of them. Plus, more insight into the world of the Bene Gesserit. Sheeana, the little minx on Arrakis/Rakis who has defied the Priesthood and has ridden the great sand worms, because really what is a Dune book without sand worm riding?

Things that make me scratch my head: The extreme weight given to sex in this book—really? I mean sex is nice and all, but it can be lived without fairly easily. Although individual people can be yanked around by their gonads, I don’t think whole societies can be warped or controlled through sexuality. Except now that I say that I’m thinking about modern marketing and imagining that people’s consumerist lives are definitely manipulated by sexuality in advertising. Hmmmm…. I suppose it’s the opposite of most of the dystopia books, where the human sexual drive provides the cracks that start the destruction of the evil order. In the Dune universe, it is resistance to sexuality that is rebellious.

Then there’s the whole issue of the Bene Gesserit and the Honored Matres being two very influential groups of women, bent on controlling the universe through sex. Mr. Herbert did not have a very flattering view of women, did he? When the men in the novel have sex, well they are just fulfilling a natural drive. When the women indulge, they are manipulating bitches. Quite a double standard. I suppose Heretics passes the Bechdel test, as there are lots of prominent named female characters who talk to one another (an awful lot) about issues besides men. Although most of the political issues that they talk about usually devolve at some point back to trying to figure out the (nominally male) God Emperor and how to escape from his Golden Path. So in a way, they are still talking about men—although they are focusing their lives on trying to escape from his plan, which I can fully understand.

All of the political and social machinations that made the original so interesting (to me at least) are back in Heretics, so that is something to be thankful for. I have only the vaguest of memories of the events of Chapterhouse Dune, but it is currently in my TBR pile from the public library, so I will likely continue on to the bitter end. Having read a couple of Brian Herbert’s prequels, I think I will skip his efforts to finish his father’s series.

Book 204 of my science fiction and fantasy reading project.

Dinosaur Lords / Victor Milan

4 out of 5 stars

A world made by the Eight Creators on which to play out their games of passion and power, Paradise is a sprawling, diverse, often brutal place. Men and women live on Paradise as do dogs, cats, ferrets, goats, and horses. But dinosaurs predominate: wildlife, monsters, beasts of burden – and of war. Colossal planteaters like Brachiosaurus; terrifying meateaters like Allosaurus and the most feared of all, Tyrannosaurus rex. Giant lizards swim warm seas. Birds (some with teeth) share the sky with flying reptiles that range in size from batsized insectivores to majestic and deadly Dragons.

Thus we are plunged into Victor Milán's splendidly weird world of The Dinosaur Lords, a place that for all purposes mirrors 14th century Europe with its dynastic rivalries, religious wars, and byzantine politics…and the weapons of choice are dinosaurs. Where we have vast armies of dinosaur-mounted knights engaged in battle. And during the course of one of these epic battles, the enigmatic mercenary Dinosaur Lord Karyl Bogomirsky is defeated through betrayal and left for dead. He wakes, naked, wounded, partially amnesiac – and hunted. And embarks upon a journey that will shake his world.

Reasons to love The Dinosaur Lords:

1. DINOSAURS. Yup, they're part of everyday life on the planet of Paradise.
2. A chance to actually use that French/Spanish/Latin that you've studied in school.
3. All the fun stuff included in high fantasy epics--battles, personal vendettas, romances, escapes and captures, death, lies, and sometimes truths.

This novel owes a debt of gratitude to many that went before it. There is a nod to Anne McCaffrey’s Pern books (if you are present at the hatching of one of the large carnivorous dinosaurs, it will bond to you and you alone). The quotes from various texts at the beginning of each chapter were very reminiscent of Frank Herbert’s Dune series, although this world is much less complex. And there is a distinct Robin Hood vibe to the last chapters of the book wherein the Rob, the “Irish” bard, and Karyl Bogomirksy, the old campaigner, take a group of peasants and unwilling nobles and try to forge them into a fighting force to stand up to the Dinosaur Lords.

Still, I found some aspects of the book jarring. Every now and then, in a pseudo-Medieval setting, a blunt, modern term would slap me out of the narrative. Usually something just a bit too coarse for the rest of the writing. There was only one sex scene, which was described much more towards the porn end of the spectrum than I would have expected—if you haven’t seen your lover for months, there is urgency yes, but there is still affection and tenderness that was completely missing from this depiction. Unfortunately, there is a rape in the latter stages of the book and I found it more realistic than the supposedly loving sex.

However, this novel passes the Bechdel test with flying colours! There is a whole bevy of strong women who surround princess Melodía, who is herself seeking a way of making her life more meaningful. Instead of just letting life slip by in a series of pleasures and entertainments, these women are seeking to influence their society. They have sexual agency and a fair bit of freedom and are making the most of it. Bonus points!

I can definitely see where those who are not dinosaur aficionados would be somewhat confused (although that is what those chapter headings are there to help with) and if you resolutely resist using any language except English, you will encounter difficulties. Some interest in Medieval vocabulary is of utility to the reader as well (i.e. knowing that a sackbut is a trombone-like instrument and that Parasaurolophus had a long crest which presumably gave it’s call a trombone-like quality, hence calling this species of Hadrosaur a Sackbut).

I think every dinosaur lover has dreamt of being able to see these marvelous animals in the flesh (and not in Jurassic Park, either!); this book allows us to indulge this dream a bit. The dinosaur masters, who care for the war-dinosaurs, obviously love their charges and have fond relationships with them. I think many of us will insert ourselves imaginatively into that role!

I look forward to the second installment of the tale, The Dinosaur Knights.

Midnight Blue Light Special / Seanan McGuire

4 out of 5 stars

 

***Wanda’s Summer Festival of Reading Fluff***

Verity is ready to settle down for some serious ballroom dancing—until her on-again, off-again, semi-boyfriend Dominic De Luca, a member of the monster-hunting Covenant of St. George, informs her that the Covenant is on their way to assess the city's readiness for a cryptid purge. With everything and everyone she loves on the line, there's no way Verity can take that lying down.

Alliances will be tested, allies will be questioned, lives will be lost, and the talking mice in Verity's apartment will immortalize everything as holy writ--assuming there's anyone left standing when all is said and done. It's a midnight blue-light special, and the sale of the day is on betrayal, deceit...and carnage. 

“…I collected all the knives I’d thrown at the various dart boards—it was a surprisingly high number, given how little time I’d had, but I guess stress makes me stabby…” (Verity Price)

The Covenant of St. George has come to Verity’s city to check on the progress of their member, Dominic De Luca (Verity’s kinda sorta boyfriend). There aren’t many men out there that wouldn’t be intimidated by Verity’s physical skills and cryptid knowledge, so she’s anxious that he may choose a side and that it won’t be hers. When Verity is kidnapped by her Covenant cousin, Margaret, choices will have to be made.

Once again, Verity’s colony of Aeslin mice make the book for me—they are a delightful creation, offering intelligent humour during the course of the book. For example, when the city’s cryptids are planning their offensive, it’s agreed that the mice could be excellent spies.

“The family has coexisted with Aeslin mice for generations, which brings us to the one possible flaw in this plan,” said Uncle Mike. “We don’t know for sure that this Margaret woman doesn’t have a colony of her own.”

“If we encounter heretics while on the search for our brave Priestess, we will smite them down with the Fury of a Thousand Angry Rolling Pins!” squeaked the High Priest of the mice.

In short, this is a delightful second book of the series and I would highly recommend it to fans of the urban fantasy genre.

The Just City / Jo Walton

3 out of 5 stars

"Here in the Just City you will become your best selves. You will learn and grow and strive to be excellent."
Created as an experiment by the time-traveling goddess Pallas Athene, the Just City is a planned community, populated by over ten thousand children and a few hundred adult teachers from all eras of history, along with some handy robots from the far human future—all set down together on a Mediterranean island in the distant past.

The student Simmea, born an Egyptian farmer's daughter sometime between 500 and 1000 A.D, is a brilliant child, eager for knowledge,  ready to strive to be her best self. The teacher Maia was once Ethel, a young Victorian lady of much learning and few prospects, who prayed to Pallas Athene in an unguarded moment during a trip to Rome—and, in an instant, found herself in the Just City with grey-eyed Athene standing unmistakably before her.

Meanwhile, Apollo—stunned by the realization that there are things mortals understand better than he does—has arranged to live a human life, and has come to the City as one of the children. He knows his true identity, and conceals it from his peers. For this lifetime, he is prone to all the troubles of being human.

Then, a few years in, Sokrates arrives—the same Sokrates recorded by Plato himself—to ask all the troublesome questions you would expect. What happens next is a tale only the brilliant Jo Walton could tell.

My second book this year in which the Greek gods play main roles as characters (the first being Kraken Bake by Karen Dudley).

Unfortunately, for me, I preferred the playful Kraken Bake to The Just City. Now I’ll confess at this point that I probably have read some Plato during my university education, but I don’t remember it at all. It made no impression on me. So I am not the target audience for this novel.

I do like the idea that the god Apollo decides to become human in order to learn things that mortals grok better than he does. And I can appreciate the messages of choice and consent which Walton emphasizes during the course of the book. I was amused when Socrates gets dragged into the whole situation and how much of a shit disturber he turns out to be. One person’s Utopia is another’s Dystopia. Who needs to consent to do what, and who gets to make the rules? Is biology destiny, as the women once again get stuck with the child care? What counts as intelligence—can machines become intelligent? How will we recognize when they do?

With apologies to Jo Walton (whose books Among Others and My Real Children were amazing), I just found this book overly serious and the messages really, really obvious. Serious issues were discussed very seriously. And, being based on Platonic dialog, there were copious discussions of things. I prefer a little more action and light-heartedness.

The Evening Chorus / Helen Humphreys

4.5 out of 5

Resigned to living out the Second World War in a German POW camp, James Hunter, an English officer, begins studying a pair of redstarts near the camp. His interest in the birds captures the attention of the Kommandant and gives James cause to fear for his life. Meanwhile, back in England, James's young wife, Rose, falls headlong into a passionate affair with another man. When James's sister, Enid, is bombed out of her London flat, she comes to stay with Rose, and the two women form a surprising friendship that alters the course of both of their lives.

What a beautifully written book! Under normal circumstances, I avoid books about World War II like the plague. By and large, they do not appeal to me. But how could I resist a book in which one of the main characters, James, a POW in Germany, studies a pair of Redstarts (those are birds, for the non-birders out there) as a way to see himself through the war.

Birds are one of the ways to my heart and this book wiggled its way in quickly. I found it amazing how well I felt I knew the various characters and how strongly I felt for each of them despite the sparseness of the writing. There are no extraneous words, no awkward phrases, just gracefulness.

There were so many contrasts: James watching the birds while the German guards watched him. The freedom of the Redstarts compared with the confinement of the prisoners. The misinterpreted kindness of the Kommandant with the brutality of some of his men. The real lives of both Germans and POWs compared with their current posting.

The women, Rose and Enid, are no less interesting and all of them find some solace in the natural world. Since the outdoors and bird watching have been responsible for healing many of my own wounds, I guess I am predisposed to find this book uplifting. Because I could see something wonderful the next time I go out looking—and isn’t that something worth living for?

The Invention of Wings / Sue Monk Kidd

3 out of 5 stars

Hetty "Handful” Grimke, an urban slave in early nineteenth century Charleston, yearns for life beyond the suffocating walls that enclose her within the wealthy Grimke household. The Grimke’s daughter, Sarah, has known from an early age she is meant to do something large in the world, but she is hemmed in by the limits imposed on women.

Kidd’s sweeping novel is set in motion on Sarah’s eleventh birthday, when she is given ownership of ten year old Handful, who is to be her handmaid.We follow their remarkable journeys over the next thirty-five years, as both strive for a life of their own, dramatically shaping each other’s destinies and forming a complex relationship marked by guilt, defiance, estrangement and the uneasy ways of love.
As the stories build to a riveting climax, Handful will endure loss and sorrow, finding courage and a sense of self in the process. Sarah will experience crushed hopes, betrayal, unrequited love, and ostracism before leaving Charleston to find her place alongside her fearless younger sister, Angelina, as one of the early pioneers in the abolition and women’s rights movements.

Inspired by the historical figure of Sarah Grimke, Kidd goes beyond the record to flesh out the rich interior lives of all of her characters, both real and invented, including Handful’s cunning mother, Charlotte, who courts danger in her search for something better.

I think this book and Gone With the Wind would be like matter and antimatter—if you sat them side by side on the shelf, I would expect that they would mutually annihilate each other! Despite being written about the same society and set during the same time period, they could not be more different.

Gone With the Wind is told exclusively from a white, southern view point. The Invention of Wings is told by two, equally important narrators, one white and one black. While Scarlet O’Hara is beautiful and knows how to play the society game, Sarah is plain, awkward, and has a speech impediment. Scarlet’s life revolves around various men, but Sarah refuses to lose herself in the role of wife. Scarlet is all about survival on her own terms, while Sarah is devoted to the causes of abolition and women’s rights.

It was my feeling that the chapters devoted to Sarah were the best ones. The chapters recounting Handful’s side of the story were good, but not as heartfelt. For a more authentic description of the black experience of slavery, I would recommend Octavia Butler’s Kindred, which I often had to set down for a while to get my breathing and heart-rate under control—her descriptions were that harrowing. As an African-American writer, Butler was willing to be absolutely unflinching in her descriptions. I am sure there are plenty of other African-American authors out there who have done similar things in their fiction, I just haven’t read them yet. [I am often reluctant to read about how terribly human beings are willing to treat each other, avoiding WWII, slavery, and genocide in my reading].

I was interested to learn that Sarah and her sister were historical figures that Kidd was curious about. They had that perfect combination: some historical records, but nothing too constricting. There was room to work with the facts available, to fill in the blanks, so to speak.

This book probably deserves more than 3 stars, but it is about subject matter that doesn’t thrill me, hence my “I like it” rating, rather than anything higher.

Wizard / John Varley

4 out of 5 stars

Book 2 of Varley's Gaea trilogy.

Wizard...returns us to the awesome interior of Gaea, the world-sized alien first encountered in Varley's monumental bestseeler, Titan.

Gaea's discoverer, Cirocco "Rocky" Jones, is now herself an inhabitant, plotting wizardry in the remote highlands between two of Gaea's brains. Gaea is old, perhaps dying. Wearily, she assures her usefulness to Earth by performing tawdry miracles.

Enter two pilgrims: Chris'fer, late of San Fransisco. And from the Coven on the dark side of the moon, Robin, small, nine-fingered, female with snake...

Probably around 3.5 stars, but rounded up to 4.

Wizard picks up where Titan left off in its exploration of the nature of sexuality. Gone are the frequent references to other works of science fiction, although the Greek mythology links are of course maintained. This novel is unusual in that the majority of its main characters are women, with earth-guy Chris thrown in as the token male to be used to contrast everything with. Also introduced in this second book is Robin, a young woman from an all-female space colony (known as The Coven). And yes, it is that kind of coven—women looking to establish their own matriarchal society, free of the influence of men, who are envisioned by the women of the Coven as bogeymen. It was slightly predictable that Chris & Robin would be thrown together on Gaea so that we could watch them work out their prejudices with each other.

This is very much a quest tale—both Chris and Robin have genetic anomalies that are disrupting their lives in major ways and they have come to Gaea to see if they can be healed. An audience with the Goddess reveals that there’s no such thing as a free lunch (Robert Heinlein would be pleased) and that the two must get out into the world of Gaea and be heroic if they expect any assistance. Their need to go do something is helped along when Cirocco (the Wizard of the title) and Gaby (one of the main characters from the first volume) offer to take them along on a long trip around the edges of Gaea, along with 4 of the centaur-folk known as Titanides. The reader is never allowed to forget that the Titanides have a very complex sexual life which they are absolutely pragmatic about—none of the human hang-ups concerning this essential part of life—and some of them (including one of the travel party) sometimes become enamoured of humans. Chris gets to be the lucky (?) recipient of this attention as well.

It definitely passes the Bechdel test—there are more than two women (humans), who talk to each other about many things besides men. Despite this, our lesbian witch, Robin, does take one shot at the heterosexual side of the street. Token guy, Chris, gets pushed into leadership in several places where he is just not qualified—a nod perhaps to our society where, in hospitals, people ask for (male) unqualified interns when well-qualified female doctors are on the scene. By and large, it is a feminist novel—however, Varley makes everything hinge on Chris in a way that, to my way of thinking, gives him undue influence, especially in sexual terms. Thankfully, he actually realizes it in several places in the book, making me like him better for it.

There’s lots of action and danger as the travelers make their way around Gaea, which kept me reading just to see what happened. I realize that sexuality was being explored, but it really did seem to keep taking over everyone’s attention when they probably would have been better off looking for the next cliff/predator/large unfriendly body of water. Nevertheless, I enjoyed it and will definitely read the last book in the trilogy.