Book 71: Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

I keep waiting to read the Southern Gothic urban fantasy YA novel that's going to really knock my socks off. I thought that maybe it would be this one! But nope.

It starts off well enough: Lena is the new girl in Gatlin, South Carolina, and the niece of the notorious recluse - the town's very own Boo Radley. Ethan, a basketball player who's desperate to escape this town after graduation, is immediately drawn to her. Weird stuff keeps happening around Lena: massive thunderstorms out of nowhere, shattered windows, and then it becomes clear that Lena is the same girl he's been seeing in a reoccurring dream for ages and also they can hear each other in their minds. Obviously, it's love.

There's a lot of stuff here that I like, mostly related to the two of them attempting to figure out what their connection is and piecing together their families' histories. Lena's uncle has lots of secrets, as does Ethan's grandmother and great-aunts. I was bored by a lot of the high school drama though, and much of the suspense of the book came from characters deliberately keeping information from each other, and while that was always for Reasons I was frequently unconvinced by them. And then we got to the final climax, and I found it both underwhelming and also frustrating, because of course this was another first book to a series, rather than a complete story. I get why people want to read series of books, and why they're so common in YA in particular. But sometimes I just wish that a story could be done in one book.

Grade: C

Book 70: The Stepsister Scheme by Jim C. Hines

I wanted to like this book a lot more than I did.

It feels like it should be right up my alley: a story about Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White working together to thwart evil and rescue Cinderella's prince. But for whatever reason the writing never grabbed me, and the characters felt flat. I'm not sure if this is an example of a YA novel that just really isn't for me; it's totally possible that I would have loved it if I had read it when I was thirteen. But unfortunately it didn't leave an impression on me as an adult.

Grade: C

Book 69: The Grand Sophy by Georgette Heyer

What a delightful book.

Somehow I made it to this point in my life without reading any Heyer, and it was clearly time to remedy that. I went into this book knowing that it was a foundational text in terms of regency romance tropes and plots and characters, and it was so lovely reading it and seeing exactly how and why it works so well, now and then.

The titular Sophy returns to England from many years on the Continent to stay with her aunt's family while her father travels to Brazil. Her mother died many years ago and she had been on her own, more or less, from a young age, and has the desire to break lots of rules and the charm and intelligence to pull it off. She completely takes over the household and manages to break some engagements and create others, and by the end of the book everyone is happier and better off for it. She is a truly wonderful character.

The one caveat about this book is that it was written in 1950 and is set during 1816, and it includes a plot point involving a Jewish moneylender which is historically accurate in terms of characters' views at the time but which also took me aback. I wouldn't recommend not reading it because of it, but there is definitely no softening or omission of antisemitism in England during the Regency in this book. Even with that plot point, I enjoyed this book immensely though. It was the perfect vacation read.

Grade: A 

Book 68: Cycler by Lauren McLaughlin

I have no idea what this book is trying to be, or what story it thinks it's telling, but what I do know is that it didn't work for me at all.

Our protagonist is a sixteen-year-old girl named Jill, who basically turns into a werewolf for four days every month right before her period, only instead of becoming a beast she becomes a boy named Jack. At first the transformation was only physical, but over time Jack develops his own agency and cognitive individuality. So of course what Jill and her mom (and, to a lesser extend, her dad who lives a secret weirdo life in their basement) decide to do is lock Jill up when she becomes Jack and then hypnotize herself when she becomes Jill again so she doesn't remember being Jack at all. "Problem" solved!

In case it's not clear from the above, the gender identity politics and concepts of this story are a fucking mess. What I could never really tell is whether the book is away of this fact, and is planning on addressing them and delivering some message about all of us being a combination of male and female identities and so forth. It became even less clear to me when Jill's crush turns out to be bi, and she flips out about it, and also Jack is obsessed with Jill's best friend and actually seduces and sleeps with her without her knowing that Jack is also Jill. As if all of this wasn't questionable enough, the book is of course the first of two, so while by the end of the book Jill's boyfriend and best friend both know that Jill has a secret, it's totally up in the air about whether the author will stick the landing, or even what landing that would be. And I'm certainly not going to waste my time reading the next book just to find out.

Grade: D

Book 67: Almost a Scandal by Elizabeth Essex

Man, this book is basically everything I want from a regency romance, start to finish.

Sally Kent is the only daughter in a family of naval officers who grew up on her father's ship. When her younger brother Richard refuses to report as a midshipman and runs away to be a pastor, she impersonates him and joins the crew herself. Her plans to remain on the ship and serve as a midshipman undetected are complicated by the presence of one of the lieutenants on the ship, Mr. Colyear, who is a dear friend of her older brothers and seems quite suspicious of 'Richard Kent.'

The setup is fantastic and would always draw me in, but the development of the story and the characters are absolutely wonderful. Sally is an incredible heroine, and the progression of her relationship with Col is pitch perfect. There's a depth to the depiction of life on a ship during the height of England's naval powers that made it easy to be swept away by the story. And characters, both major and minor, are much smarter and more perceptive than they can be in stories involving cross-dressing and deception, and as a result the entire plot feels much more realistic and satisfying than it might otherwise. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and will definitely be reading more by this author in the future.

Grade: A

Book 66: The Cowboy's Christmas by Carolyn Brown

I finally hit a book I would not finish! I bought this last fall because any romance novel that involves a secret baby and an internet romance finally becoming real life and Christmas is going to be worth a shot for me. Cowboy romance isn't a surefire trope for me, but I like it well enough. However, none of the conflict made any sense, I didn't really like any of the characters, and overall it just didn't work for me. And then the main character was gross about what would be appropriate for her baby boy to do when he was nine or ten years old (certainly not write in a journal, since that's just for girls!) and I was done. I'm sure there's an audience for this book, but I am not it. 

Grade: DNF

Book 65: Cut & Run by Madeleine Urban & Abigail Roux

After finishing the Lymond Chronicles, I needed to read something completely different. A contemporary m/m romance between FBI agents who get thrown together to catch a serial killer and hate each other while also feeling an uncontrollable attraction fit the bill nicely.

This was the sort of romance that was almost comforting in its predictability. There's the one agent who seems super uptight and like he would never break rules, but he has a secret tragic past! And the other agent is unpredictable and blase, but actually he's great at his job! The case itself is both hopelessly convoluted and also incredibly obvious; while I don't mind being able to solve a mystery in a book long before the characters do, it makes it a bit harder to believe that they're actually competent at all. There's a bunch of hurt/comfort and the sex is fine, but the POV shifts mid-chapter happened a bit too frequently and without any real pattern, and the entire thing could have been tightened up and shortened without losing anything. Nothing to write home about, but fine for what it is.

Grade: C