The Daring Dime

Okay, before you start expecting this to be a serious entry…it’s not. Don’t even bother. This is a very, very goofy, I-probably-haven’t-had-as-much-sleep-as-I-need type entry. But, hey, it actually has SOME barring to my topic manner! Really, it does! That’s why I’m not just putting it in my live journal.

See, I was reading Justine Larbalestier’s blog. (One of several author blogs I’ve recently been reading….all of which have been effective in making me determined to read their books….this is a sneaky, sneaky marketing move, let me tell you…) And one of her readers asked about book signing etiquette.

This post really doesn’t have much to do with her answer, but it’s worth reading anyway. That, and the Maureen Johnson blog post she links to. (I’m reading one of her books right now. Yes. Because of the blog. Sneaky, I tell you!)

But, anyway, it reminded me of a funny story.

See, last November, when this blog was merely a twinkling in my eye (that IS the right phrase, right?) I went to the Fantasy Fest. See, my county’s library system—the Douglas County Library system—has a Fantasy Fest every year in November that is a celebration of all things Fantasy and Sci-Fi. Last year, for example, they had (among other things) human chess, face painting, henna, and—the highlight of EVERY year—they have some fantasy authors come in to talk about their work and answer questions, as well as sign books. Kevin J. Anderson and Rebecca Moesta were actually the authors last year. They signed my book. They took my check even though they normally don’t. I’m terrified they’re going to find this blog, see my not-quite-positive review of their book, and…remember who I am. ._. They used to live in Livermore, California and noticed my name, and then I [nervously] said something about how my Mom’s name being Rebecca, too, and how her maiden name was Haley, and that’s why my name is Haley, and…yeah, I certainly did everything I could to make sure they REMEMBERED my name, and now I desperately wish I HADN’T.

Anyway, where was I? Oh. Yes. Book signing.

Well, last year, I decided to go to the Fantasy Fest ahead of my friend and my brother—my brother was working that night, and I had missed the author Q&A the previous year, and I was desperate to make sure I didn’t miss it again. The year previously it wasn’t TOO bad that I had missed it, but that’s because I won the short story contest that year and nothing else really mattered in my mind at that point. (Yes. I’m tooting my own horn. It’s my blog, I can do that.)

They DID get there late, too. At one point I saw my friend Hannah outside of the door when someone had come into the room, and I was desperately trying to call her in without bringing attention to myself. (Impossible, I had decided to sit right at the front of the room. As I said, I somehow managed to make myself far, far too memorable to Mr. Anderson and Ms. Moesta.)

So, anyway, Jeremy (my brother) and Hannah were then left to their own devices while I was in the author Q&A. Most of you don’t know them…those of you that do know that it’s very, very bad to leave them alone together. They’re like-minded in many things. And neither of them have a possible future as a writer to maintain.

So, Hannah and Jeremy, unable to find me (even though I was RIGHT THERE), decided that I “must be dead.” Hannah thought it’d be funny if they went around the library asking if anyone had seen “our dead friend.”

Jeremy: I would give money to see that.

Hannah: Do you have any money?

Jeremy: *sadly* No…wait! *reaches into his pocket* One of the pairs of pants a tthe dry cleaner’s had a DIME in the pocket!

(At the dry cleaner’s he works at, they get to keep anything left in the pockets that’s worth less than $10. Including money. He always manages to have cash on hand, because people are always leaving cash in their pockets.)

So, Hannah asked the question, and Jeremy gave her the dime. They then decided that this dime was, in fact, the ‘Daring Dime’. Dare someone to do something, they do it, they get the dime.

As you can imagine, this just fostered their imaginations even more. (They also decided they were vampires, and ‘kidnapped’ me when I came out of the author Q&A—including dragging me into the stairwell.)

Then, they had a brilliant, brilliant idea. See, I had (nervously) joked to them that “They have tons of best sellers. Tons. I want to get a book signed by them to see if their skill and talent will rub off on me so I can become a Super Writer.”

That gave them an idea. They told me about the Daring Dime. And Hannah declared that she would do that dare—but she had the dime!

So, of course, I had to dare Jeremy to do something so he would get the dime. (They were trying to get me to do something, but I had gone there thinking in terms of being a WRITER, and I was NOT hurting my chances of getting into the industry. Oh no, I was going to do that by giving my name to a pair of popular authors and then giving their book a 7.5/10.) So, I dared him to hug a guy in a werewolf costume. (This, by the way, was worth my career. Maybe.)

So, now he had the dime. Hannah was now free to do their wonderful plan.

Hannah gets in line for the book signing...

Walks up to the authors…

And asks for a sample of their DNA so she can “fuse it with my own and become a Super Writer.”

Kevin J. Anderson: You mean like a strand of my hair?

Rebecca Moesta: Well…one more couldn’t hurt. [Mr. Anderson is, well, balding a little. That's what she was refering to.]

Kevin J. Anderson: Oh, well, that’s true. *takes out a strand of hair and gives it to Hannah*

The sad thing is, I think SHE LOST THAT STRAND OF HAIR. She could’ve started a collection.
Not that I would do that. Considering I might actually, you know, be doing this for my REAL job some day. But still, it’d be cool.

I should note that I don’t recommend this. I’d bet money (more than a dime) that if you asked Neil Gaiman that, he’d just call security on you. Or punch you. He doesn’t seem like the sort of guy that would do that, but those are the dangerous ones. Those British guys you don't EXPECT to be violent, but then suddenly are.

Wait, I just said something else that’s going to get me in trouble with the industry, didn’t I?

Nuts.

EDIT: Wow. I leave even MORE spelling mistakes and weird grammar stuff in my posts when it's in the morning. hopefully it should be a little better now.

50 Book Challenge #1: Stardust

For those of you who didn’t notice the meter, I finished my first book in the 50 book challenge! Only….49 more to go. Whew.

The book I read is Stardust by Neil Gaiman. I’ve heard it was originally released with illustrations by Charles Vess, but the book I got from my library is an edition published without the art (darn!).

I started reading this book because a friend of mine is a big fan of Gaiman. He’s been trying to convince me to read one of Neil Gaiman’s books for a while (often combined with trying to convince me with setences like “He worked on the dub script for Princess Mononoke!”), but I had been putting it off for a while because…well, the last time he suggested a book, I actually didn’t like it that much. (I’m not saying which book it was because I have a feeling I would be burned at the stake by sci-fi fans if it ever got out.) But then I saw MirrorMask, and I actually enjoyed it, so I figured I’d give him a try.

One thing I can say is...

I’m so, so glad I’m not reviewing this book.

It’s not that I didn’t like it. I actually did. But trying to define how I felt about the book with words is…confusing. It was odd…when I first started reading the book, I kept asking myself “When am I supposed to start really liking this? When am I supposed to run up to Patrick and say ‘THANK YOU FOR OPENING MY EYES’?” While I never quite went that far, all of the sudden, half way through the book, I said to myself (almost without thinking) "I really like this book."

"What? I like the book? When did I decide that? What's going on?"

I don't know if I can say it's my 'favorite book ever.' None of the characters in the book grabbed me like Gen from The Thief or Pippin from Lord of the Rings. I don’t think I’m going to start obsessing over every detail of Tristan Thorn’s life and try to search for the hidden details about the character’s back-story like I do at times with my favorite works. (I'm a stickler for characters with deep back-stories.) Although, this isn’t that sort of book anyway. It’s more of a fairytale, I suppose.

One with a faint…bitter mood to it? Overall it’s happy, at times almost innocent. (Well…maybe not innocent. Gentle? Yes, gentle sounds better.) But there’s this bitter, almost cynical undertone in the book. Even though the book has a fairly happy ending, the last emotion mentioned in the book (in the last sentence, actually) is sadness. Although I guess not all fairytales are completely happy. We just think they are since Disney movies generally are. (I’m a Disney fan, just so you know, so I’m not bashing them.)

Or maybe I’m just seeing things. Who knows? Overall, I liked the book, and will probably read another one of Neil Gaiman’s books.

I just hope I don’t have to review one for a while if they’re all going to leave me as befuddled as this one did.

( ======= )
1 / 50 : 2.0%

As for the next book I'm going to read? Well...um...I don't know, actually. I was going to read House of Leaves, but it's nearly due at the library and someone has it on hold. So today I'm going to go to the library to turn in my books (and pay off some overdue fines) and...well, I guess I'll just grab whatever looks good? (That almost amounts to judging a book by it's cover, doesn't it? Oi.)

Edit: The counter looks really...wonky in my main posts, doesn't it? But not on the side bar. Hm. I might have to fiddle with it.

Another edit: Oooookay. For some reason the graphical counter isn't working at all in the main body of the post...I think it's something with the layout of the blog and the transperency of the graphic, but I'm not sure...so for posts, I'm just going to use the text counter, and keep the nice looking counter on the sidebar.

REVIEW: Crystal Doors

Crystal Doors
by Rebecca Moesta and Kevin J. Anderson
Publisher: Little, Brown
Book Review Format

Gwen and Vic are fourteen-year-old “twin cousins”—that is, cousins who happened to be born on the same day—who have been living with Vic’s father since the tragic deaths of Gwen’s parents and the disappearance of Vic’s mother. When Vic’s father, a scientist, starts to fear that they may be in danger, he attempts to open a door to another world using mysterious crystals—but accidentally sends only the cousins, leaving him behind. Now stuck on the beautiful island of Elantya, Gwen and Vic try to figure out how to get in contact with Vic’s father and get back home—but before they can do that, they’ll be swept into a war between the island and an evil aquatic race known as the Merlons.

The first book of a trilogy (what else?), Crystal Doors starts out strongly. The protagonists are charismatic and entertaining. Also, while both have faint hints of archetypes in their personality, they have enough charm and personality to stand on their own. Gwen is an intelligent, strong female character who is the mature voice of reason of the cousins and has a tendency to get a bit too worried about everything being ‘logical'. Vic, on the other hand, is snarky, laidback, and gets by with a mix of luck and ingenuity that tends to kick in at the last minute. Their personalities bounce off each other well, and their unique skills and ways of thinking are proven quite handy in the adventures they encounter.

The pacing in the first half of the book also goes at a fast pace, urging you to keep reading with great word building and a good plot. Although Elantya is reminiscent of other island utopias that crop up in fantasy frequently (I don’t think it’s an accident that its name sounds like Atlantis), the country’s position as a gateway between worlds and a well thought out social structure helps it to stand out among other fantasy worlds. The magic system in the book is also well thought out—the crystals mentioned in the title not only serving to open the doors between worlds, but also being used for other magic in the book. I particularly liked how the crystals were used to make ink for magic scrolls, and how the scrolls were used throughout the books. Magic in fantasy has a can at times be almost all-powerful, so the carefully thought out rules about what can’t and can be done with magic in Elantya help to keep the question “why aren’t they just using magic??” from ever coming up, and keeps the action intense.

Ironically enough, however, that’s exactly what slows down the pacing about half-way through the book: the action. While the first half of the book has a few intense moments, most of it is spent on building the intricate world and magic system, so when the book suddenly ratchets up several levels in intensity, which feels incredibly jarring. Not only is it intense, it’s also nearly nonstop for the rest of the book—you barely have a chance to mentally collect yourself until the heroes are thrust into another battle or dangerous situation. Also, some of the battles serve little purpose in the plot other than to show what a threat the Merlons are, so it almost feels as though the plot has been put a standstill during the constant battling. It’s not that the battles aren’t exciting. They are. One particularly memorable passage is a desperate struggle against voracious flying fish appropriately called ‘flying piranhas’—which are probably one of the most impressively terrifying creatures I’ve read in a book. No, the problem is that there’s so many action scenes all at once that it bogs everything down. It probably would have been better to have the battles spaced out among the world building, or to shorten one of the battles.

Another weak point of the book is the characters. Although Vic and Gwen are strong characters, almost all of the other characters populating the book feel like characters we’ve seen before. The snobby prince? Check. The quiet psychic girl? Check. The Amazonian warrior? Check, and complete with animal skins. The absent-minded professor? There are two!

The use of archetypes would have been fine if the characters had been fleshed out more, and there is some character development throughout the book, but the characters have very little unique characteristics that help them remain very remarkable. It’s quite possible that these characters will be expanded upon in the next book. In fact, Lyssandra (the psychic girl, and one of the first characters introduced) starts to be fleshed out more towards the end of the book, so it’s quite possible. But for this book, the character development for the characters is weak enough that it feels as though Vic and Gwen are two real people trapped on an island with the ghosts of literary characters that have come before.

There also are a few moments where the characters make illogical choices to further the plot, or the foreshadowing in the book is just too obvious. If a vessel that contained an important shipment was sunk mid-voyage by Merlons, would you put a class of beginning students and a few teachers out to sea on an ancient vessel, with very few weapons and a collection of (mostly) weak spells? If your answer is “yes,” I hope you’re not working in education. Also, a big secret behind one of the characters is actually fairly obvious if you’re paying attention while reading.

All in all, Crystal Doors is by no means a bad book. It doesn’t do anything that’s going to change the genre as we know it—nor do I think it tries to. It’s a fun fantasy story with a cleverly thought out world that seeks merely to entertain. If you’re looking for a deep, thought-provoking tale that’s the equivalent of a feast, you’ll probably be disappointed. But it makes for a fine literary appetizer.

Rating: 7.7/10

50 Book Challenge

Recently, while I was on Live Journal, I glanced over at the community spotlights and noticed a community called 50bookchallenge. It's basically a community that challenges you to read 50 books in a year--about, oh, one book a week or so. While it's a stretch, since I'm basically unemployed at the moment (this blog is my job, and it doesn't pay well...or....at all), I decided to go ahead and give it a go.

Actually, the person who created the challenge hasn't accomplished it yet, so obviously there's no pressure if you don't make it. But I'd certainly like to try it out. (Plus, I can count school books and books I review here in my total, AND it gives me extra blog post. I win!)

So, here's how it's going to work. As I said above, I'm counting books I read for school and books I read for reviews, as well as books of my own choosing. I'm not going to count manga--unless I get short for time, and decide I need it to help keep my running total going along.

For books I read that aren't reviews, I'll give you a summary of the book and my own personal thoughts on it--less professional than my real reviews, more chatty. I don't think there's much of a point to review a book that's been out for years (or even centuries!), but I thought you might find my thoughts interesting. (Plus, it helps me feel like I'm working!)

To help you (and me) keep track of where I am, I'm going to be using a meter:

0 / 50 (0.0%)

Right now it's "0" because i haven't finished any books this year. (I actually DID read some books at the end of last year that I was planning on reviewing--actually, I hope to have one review up tonight, but I'm not making any promises, just in case.)

Currently, I'm reading Stardust by Neil Gaiman, so I'll count that as my first book. After that, I have the ominous-looking tome that is House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski. I have a feeling I'll be reading that book while I'm reading others because it's a bit notorious for being very...different. But, my friend Patrick said that if I read through it and finish it, I can force him to read a book of my choosing, so I'm determined to get through it ASAP.

I think I'm going to go see how much I can get done of Stardust now, since I'm starting a week into the year. Regardless, I'm going to take a break and post up a review for you all (unless some unforseen event happens that prevents me from posting it up).

Oh! And I almost forgot--if you have a suggestion for me of a book to read, by all means, leave a comment in my journal and let me know! I love discovering new books.

Wish me luck!

Book Review Format

Well, well, it looks like you just stumbled upon the entry that explains the format for my book reviews!

For this blog, almost all of the books I’m going to be reviewing are books that fit into the fantasy or sci-fi genres. These reviews are going to be a little tricky—unlike video games, anime, or even movies, you can’t really section out certain qualities that make the book good. There’s no animation, cinematography or music to assault your senses, no controls that allow you to effect what happens. It’s just you and the pages printed with the author’s words. In a sense, books are a much intimate form of entertainment.

Rather than muddle up my reviews with nitpicky ratings for stuff like “editing” or “characters” or “use of words”, I decided it’d be better to simply write out my review, and give you one ‘overall’ rating (from 1-10), that expresses my opinion on the book.

As for the sorts of thing I think makes a good book…Obviously the main thing that’s important is the plot. If you don’t care what happens, what motivation is there to keep reading? Pacing and characters also effect this too—I have a higher tolerance for slow pacing than some people (my favorite book is Lord of the Rings, after all), but a book that drags on and on will start to seem more like a chore than entertainment. Likewise, if you don’t find yourself interested by the characters (or if the characters are weak archetypes), you’re probably not going to care about learning more about them, or reading about their adventures. And, of course, writing style is important.

Also, while I try to be as objective as possible, I’m only one reviewer. My tastes in books are going to find their way into my reviews. So you know where I’m coming from, here’s a summery of my…

Personal biases: One of my biggest things is characters. I want to read about interesting, likeable characters and watch them grow. If, for whatever reason, I have a hard time connecting to the characters of a book, I have a more difficult time enjoying the book. For example, I can’t stand Gone with the Wind, no matter how much of a classic book it is. The only character I like in that book dies in the end, and I kept wishing Scarlett would be attacked by enemy soldiers.
Actually, because of my love for characters, I have a tendency to like fantasy books slightly more than sci-fi books—this isn’t an absolute rule, I just feel that at times, sci-fi books focus too much on technology, and not on people. When sci-fi has great characters, though, I LOVE it.

My favorite books: The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis, The Queen’s Thief series by Megan Whalen Turner, any and every Star Wars book written by Timothy Zahn, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen