thirdasstlibrarian

[thirdasstlibrarian]

How to Deal with Social Distancing

I’ve had to deal with extreme isolation before before when a family member was very sick. It’s not quite the same thing as a pandemic, but I’ve still got some tips for how we can stay safe and still stay sane, so I’m coming back to this very-rarely-used-tumblr with them.

Keep in touch with people. Just because you can’t see them doesn’t mean you can’t socialize with them. If you usually need in-person socializing, I strongly recommend using facetime or a skype group chat - it’s still not quite the same, but it’s more similar than texting or messaging. Texting, messaging, etc is also good in addition/instead of that, if that works better for you!

Do fun activities. There are a lot of games you can play online - a group of friends of mine and I often play +cards against humanity on Saturday nights (totally free), and I’ve spent countless hours on Steam with some friends (Don’t Starve Together, Terraria, and Borderlands 2 are all a lot of fun - Civ can also be great if you’re patient).

Comfort matters. If you can afford it - and I know a lot of people can’t! - don’t feel guilty about spending a little extra on something that will make you happy - maybe that’s a comfort food, or a game, or a six pack of your favorite beer. Whatever. If it’ll help your mental health and not break the bank, that matters.

Avoid the 24-hour news cycle. My personal rule for news consumption is this: if something isn’t giving me helpful new information, it shouldn’t be increasing my anxiety - my being too overwhelmed and upset to function doesn’t help anyone. My friends and I have a channel dedicated to the pandemic on our discord so people can avoid it if they need a breather.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Alex Claremont-Diaz

I was going to include this in my book review of Red, White, and Royal Blue, but it got long and personal, so I decided it belonged on its own.

The main character of the book, Alex, realizes partway through that he is not, in fact, straight. That realization hits very, very close to home for me, because it's uncanny how similarly it tracks with my experience.

Like Alex, I grew up in a liberal, accepting household. His initial hesitance to come out to his family never seems to be based on fear, which is about where I was, too. I know that sometimes people let you down, but my parents didn't, and neither did his.

Like Alex, I had (and have) queer friends - even friend groups that initially seemed mostly-straight have turned out to be much more queer than we realized at the time.

Like Alex, there are things about my adolescence onward that are, in hindsight, pretty fucking queer. Looking back, I want to shake myself and say, "good fucking god, what do you think that means?"

Like Alex, several of the people closest to me literally said "oh, I know," when I finally came out to them - including a friend who I dated in college.

Like Alex, there was definitely part of me that kind of did know, was pointedly avoiding the subject, and justified it by saying that it didn't really matter because I had a boyfriend or wasn't looking to date anyone, anyway.

There's not really a great reason for me to have not figured it out when I was a teenager. I just… didn't.

And I feel like that's not an experience I've really seen represented in fiction. There's always a reason - fear of rejection, feeling alone in their experience, always having relationships feel wrong in some way and then realizing it's because they're gay, having no inkling at all until meeting that one special person… and while those are all really important stories to tell, they're not mine, and reading about an experience that I can actually identify with is something I really needed, and I love this book for it.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Red, White, and Royal Blue, by Casey McQuiston

Red, White, and Royal Blue, by Casey McQuiston

Rating: 5 stars | Genre(s): New Adult, Romance

Nothing will stop Alex Claremont-Diaz from being the way he is.

That's a good thing, because the son of the first female president of the United States is really easy to love. He's smart, sarcastic, and prone to occasional bouts of extremely poor judgment - at one point in the story, he even comments that being in way over his head is his comfort zone.

By the end of the first chapter, Alex’s ongoing feud with Prince Henry of Wales has resulted in the public destruction of a $75,000 wedding cake. His mother and her chief of staff inform him in no uncertain terms that they will be releasing a joint statement with the English monarchy dismissing the incident as an accident and claiming that Alex and Henry are actually "close personal friends" - and that it's on Alex to make it believable, complete with photo ops and a talk show appearance with Henry. Neither Alex nor Henry are particularly thrilled with this plan, but after a few private conversations, Alex discovers that while Henry's public persona may have "the personality of a cabbage," the real Henry has a sense of humor, loves ewoks, and watches the Great British Bake Off before going to bed. Within a couple months, they're flirting via text, reaching out for emotional support, and... well, you knew that this wasn't going to be a platonic bromance, right?

Good. Because it isn't. The enemies-to-lovers trope is a classic for a reason, and it's executed amazingly here.

There are a lot of other things to love about this story, too. McQuiston's cast of characters is genuinely diverse. Alex is half-Mexican and queer. Henry (the most significant character apart from Alex) is white and queer. After that, it's a little difficult to say out which supporting characters are the most significant, but by my interpretation, more than half are women, several are people of color (including Alex's sister June), and at least one is queer. (Really tough to parse this one, both because of which characters to count and some strong hints that a character whose orientation is never explicitly defined is queer as well.) Struggles with mental illness are also an underlying but consistent presence throughout the story.

So it's not just that a wide variety of identities are represented - it's that many of those identities are reflected in more than one character. As importantly, identity is explored primarily through characters' experiences rather than exposition, and even when characters face bigotry, they aren't defined by trauma or the hate of others. Most of what we're seeing is just people living their lives while being who they are, and there's a lot of power in that - especially if you find yourself identifying with some of them, as I definitely did.

McQuiston also strikes a great balance between wish fulfillment and realism. While the book's version of 2016 ended in the election of Democrat Ellen Claremont as the country's first female president, political realities around racism and homophobia still complicate Alex's relationship with Henry in some significant ways, and the Claremont re-election campaign faces a number of dirty attacks. The United States has not turned into a liberal utopia - it's just better in a way that feels attainable, which helps the story feel cathartic rather than a depressing "what if."

My only caveat here is that if you don't like sex scenes, this is definitely not the book for you - while the scenes aren't particularly graphic, there are a lot of them.

Five days ago, I hadn't read this book at all. I'm now on my third reread - this is only the second book I've ever finished and immediately gone back to read again. I can't recommend it highly enough.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Poem: Mariana by Alfred Lord Tennyson

Credits: Josephine Cardin | chanmar

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Graceling, by Kristin Cashore

Graceling, by Kristin Cashore

Rating: 4.5 stars | Genre(s): Fantasy, Young Adult

Katsa’s eyes don’t match: one is bright blue, and the other is green. This heterochromia is the trademark of a graceling - someone born with a special talent. Gracelings are rare, and their talents often defy logical comprehension: there are mind readers, fighters, people who can sense storms... they differ from person, and even gracelings with the most innocuous talents can leave the general population feeling uneasy.

Katsa’s grace first showed itself when she was eight. When a visiting cousin made her feel threatened, she hit the man in the face with so much force that she drove the bones of his nose into his brain and killed him. Rather than send her away, her uncle, who was king of the Middluns, let his spymaster teach her to control her power. When she turned ten, he started using her to kill and maim subjects who offended him.

The novel opens when Katsa is eighteen, and she’s rapidly getting tired of being her uncle’s muscle.

There’s so much to like about Graceling. The overarching issue is a classic one - most of the rulers in the Seven Kingdoms, including the Middluns, are deeply selfish, corrupt, and at times downright inhumane. Katsa’s attempts to break free of that, as well as come to terms with her grace and her humanity, provide a creative lens with which to view that struggle through, as do her relationships with the people she cares about.

At her core, Katsa is a very compelling protagonist. She places a high emphasis on her own independence and freedom: she’s quite clear from the start of the book that she will never marry and never have children, and she never wavers from that. Marriage and motherhood are never portrayed as something bad - it’s just not something that she wants. That’s a really refreshing mindset to see in a main character, particularly a women - even in this day and age, it’s rare to see a female character so adamently opposed to marriage and motherhood. 

The supporting cast is no less wonderful; Katsa’s cousin Raffin is his father’s heir and would like nothing more than to meddle with herbs and potions all day, Katsa’s easygoing friend Prince Po of Lienid has his own secrets about his fighting grace that he keeps close to the chest, because if they’re revealed, it would probably ruin his life.

It’s also worth noting that it’s implied in Graceling and confirmed in the sequel, Bitterblue, that Raffin is gay, and while physical appearance isn’t described in that much detail, it’s also strongly implied that the Lienid - who are clearly the fairest and healthiest of the seven kingdoms - are not white. It’s possible to read them as being vaguely white-Mediterranean in appearance, but it’s a bit of a stretch.

The first time I read Graceling, I immediately reread it - it’s the only book I can remember reacting to in that way, and there’s a reason for it. Cashore does a wonderful job with her debut novel.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

A Ring of Endless Light, by Madeleine L’Engle

A Ring of Endless Light, by Madeleine L’Engle

Rating: 5 stars | Genre(s): Fantasy, Science Fiction, Young Adult

This has been one of my favorite books for about as long as I can remember. It’s ostensibly a coming of age story for young adults, but that’s not quite an accurate characterization of it. I think that pretty much anyone of any age from any background could read A Ring of Endless Light and take something meaningful away from it, because it really explores on spirituality and the human experience in an optimistic and an unflinchingly realistic way. 

The book revolves around a teenage girl named Vicky Austin. She and her family are visiting her grandfather on Seven Bay Island, just as they do every summer - but this time, they’re staying for several months, because Vicky’s grandfather is dying of leukemia.

It opens on a heartbreaking note: Vicky is attending the funeral of an old family friend, who died of a heart attack while trying to rescue someone who went out sailing in a storm. Death is a pretty significant theme throughout the book - Vicky has to deal with the specter of it in several different forms, and it’s never easy or simple.

But while A Ring of Endless Light is heart-breaking at points, it’s also very life-affirming. The pain and suffering that people suffer is never minimized, but neither is their capacity for joy and love. Vicky’s summer is spent reconciling those two impossible sides of the coin, including fielding the romantic interests of an old friend, a rich and unstable boy she first met the previous year, and a friend of her brother’s from the research institute he’s working in for the summer.

Her relationship with each is very different, and each boy has his own demons to contend with. Her brother’s friend probably provides her with the most distraction, though - he’s conducting research with wild dolphins, including attempts to psychically connect with them, and he asks her for help.

It’s a beautiful book. Everyone should read it.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Asylum, by Madeleine Roux

Asylum, by Madeleine Roux

Rating: 3 stars | Genre(s): Horror, Paranormal, Young Adult

I initially picked this book up because I’d heard it was very similar to Ransom Riggs’s ‘Peculiar Children’ series, which I really enjoyed. Having read it, I think that most of the similarities are very superficial, but I still enjoyed Asylum a lot.

In it, Dan - a teenager who was adopted after being shuffled around foster homes throughout his childhood and doesn’t really fit in at his high school - attends a summer magnet program at a New Hampshire college. He’s thrilled to be there, and makes quick friends with two other teens: Abby and Jordan. Their summer, however, quickly descends into chaos when they discover some disturbing things about the building the school is housing them in. It used to be an asylum, and the last warden they had before it was closed decades ago experimented on patients in some pretty gruesome ways... and he shares Dan’s name.

It’s a solid premise, and overall, Roux does a good job with it. The story definitely has a creepy feel, particularly if you read it at night. One character starts having visions of the asylum from when it was still in operation, and another becomes obsessed to the point of possession with some photographs they find from when the asylum was still in operation. It’s eerie to read about, and as the plot unfolds, it also starts to make a lot of sense - the creepy things happening to them aren’t happening at random. I also liked the addition of the photographs - they definitely added to the mood she was trying to create.

However, there are also definitely aspects of the book that fall a little short of the mark.

For example, there are things about the main characters that come across as completely genuine. Dan’s excitement at being in the magnet program, his crush on a girl he meets, and his insecurities ring true to me, both of his age group and of his particular situation. However, I also felt that Dan and both of his friends came off as a little generic, which made it hard for me to identify with them. Their struggles often didn’t seem quite believable - while Roux says all the right things, there’s not as much depth to Dan’s struggles with an anxiety disorder or Jordan’s dealing with homophobic parents as I would have liked.

And, while I didn’t have so so much difficulty believing that they were housed in the asylum dormitory rather than a modern dormitory because of summer repairs, I did find it weird that the asylum was pretty modernized in general but still had a huge, multi-room basement still cluttered with remnants of the old asylum. Sure, it was behind a locked door, but still, they never cleared it away?

Still, while there were a few things that didn’t seem quite thought out, none of them were glaring enough that I couldn’t suspend my disbelief while I was reading. And, while none of the characters had the depth I would have liked, they were fairly likeable regardless. The story itself is strong, and I enjoyed the way it unwrapped.

This isn’t an example of amazing, knock-your-socks-off literature, but if you like the genre, it’s definitely worth a read.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Review of The Haunting of Maddy Clare, by Simone St. James

The Haunting of Maddy Clare, by Simone St. James

Rating: 4 stars | Genre(s): Historical Fiction, Paranormal, Mystery

It’s nearing Halloween, so creepy paranormal books seem like they should be the theme of the hour. As is my wont when it comes to scary stories, I started reading this particular book just before I meant to go to bed. Instead of going to bed, I was up for two more hours finishing it and had to sleep with a lamp on.

When the book opens, it’s shortly after the end of World War I, and Sarah is trying desperately to make ends meet. When she gets offered a temp job as an assistant to someone claiming to be a ghost hunter, she takes it, though she doesn’t believe they’ll find any real evidence to support his ghost story.

Once they start their investigation, she quickly changes her mind. The women who knew Maddy Clare say that something terrible happened to her when she was a girl, something which ultimately led to her suicide. The ghost of Maddy Clare is very real, unstable, and looking for vengeance.

At its core, this is really just a classic, well-done ghost story. Sarah is a heroine that’s easy to relate to - she’s quiet and reserved, but she’s not really shy, and she’s certainly not timid. She’s strikes the perfect balance between having a nuanced and distinct personality and being sensible enough that you never want to scream “Don’t go in there!” at her.

St. James also really sinks you into the time period through both her descriptions of the setting and the characters themselves; both Sarah’s new boss and his friend are clearly still struggling with the aftermath of serving in the war, and Sarah herself has significant struggles dating from that time as well. Additionally, there are a lot of small touches here and there regarding gender relations that felt very fitting for that era.

And that’s just the backdrop. Maddy Clare herself is absolutely terrifying to both the characters in the novel and the reader; she terrorizes people in deeply personal and invasive ways, and she’s utterly apathetic about harming bystanders in her quest for vengeance. Every interaction they have with her reinforces the feeling that she’s wholly other - she’s so detached from the world that there’s absolutely no reasoning with her, which is part of what makes her so terrifying even as her backstory begins to come out.

It does have its weak points; while Sarah’s clear attraction to her love interest does sell the romance overall, there are a few points in which it feels a bit rushed and one early sex scene in particular that’s a little unbelievable. I also wished that the two men had been developed a little more, and I didn’t feel like the malicious attention Sarah faced from people as a result of her involvement in the case always made sense.

Those were fairly easy to overlook, though, and at the end of the day, it’s a very enjoyable and creepy book.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

3 Short Reviews: Redwall, Arrows of the Queen, and Heir Apparent

If I try to write a long review for every book I’ve ever read, I’ll never finish... so how about some short ones instead?

Redwall, by Brian Jacques Rating: 4 stars | Genre(s): Fantasy, Young Adult

Redwall is a timeless tale of good vs. evil, of underdog vs. tyrant - as told through rodents. The villains are an army of rats, stoats, and ferrets who want to take over a monastery, which is inhabited by peace-loving mice, squirrels, and a badger. The monastery needs a genuine warrior to lead them, but the warrior monk mouse who founded their abbey died many, many years ago, and the location of his sword has been lost to the ages.

There’s so much to enjoy about this book. While at first glance, the world is pretty simplistic, that’s actually pretty deceptive - there’s a clear and pretty intricate history to Redwall Abbey laid out in this book, and the antagonist also has his own very fearsome reputation. Additionally, there are clear cultural differences between the various species in the series that bring the story to life. It’s a really well-done introduction to what’s become quite an extensive series of books, and I highly recommend it.

Arrows of the Queen, by Mercedes Lackey Rating: 2.5 stars | Genre(s): Fantasy, Young Adult

Arrows of the Queens is centered around a young teenage girl named Talia. She lives in a very insular community that tends toward misogyny, polygamy, and child brides, and Talia is dreading being married off. She finds a white horse that she recognizes as a Companion, or a partner of one of the magical lawbringers of the land, called Heralds. She decides to take it back to the nation’s capital, and eventually realizes that the Companion wasn’t lost at all - it was looking for her, and it has Chosen her to be one of the most powerful Heralds in the land, second only to the queen.

Arrows of the Queen is the first book of the Heralds of Valdemar trilogy as well as the first of the many books Lackey has written about Valdemar. There are a lot of great things about the series as a whole, but you can tell this is the first book; there are certain things about the mythology that aren’t quite as well thought-out as they might be, and the writing is a bit choppy. Additionally, Talia herself is a little too perfect as a character - there aren’t really any flaws that make her easy to empathize with. While the Valdemar series overall has a lot of strong books, this isn’t one of them.

Heir Apparent, by Vivian Vande Velde Rating: 4 stars | Genre(s): Fantasy, Young Adult

A teenage girl named Giannine receives a girl certificate for a virtual reality arcade for her birthday, and she chooses to be fully immersed in a medieval-fantasy scenario where she has been named the heir of the kingdom over her estranged father’s three trueborn sons. She’s only supposed to be in the game for half an hour, but when protesters break in and damage the machine, the company loses the ability to get her out using normal methods. She has to beat the scenario and survive to be crowned queen - but her character keeps getting killed, and her time is running out.

Heir Apparent isn’t an example of great literature, but it is an example of fun literature. Giannine is a snarky protagonist that it’s very easy to get attached to, and the virtual reality game itself is one that many modern-day fantasy fans would absolutely love to get their hands on. The premise doesn’t disappoint in execution, either - the flexible nature of the game means that a character who kills Giannine in one life might ally with her in another if she makes slightly different choices, and vice versa, so figuring out who’s being genuine and who wants her dead is a constant struggle. It’s an incredibly engaging book, and I really recommend it to any fantasy or video game fans.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Review of The Circle of Magic Series, by Tamora Pierce

The Circle of Magic, by Tamora Pierce

Rating: 4.5 stars | Genre(s): Fantasy, Young Adult Includes:

Sandry's Book

Tris's Book

Daja's Book

Briar's Book

As with the Old Kingdom books, I’ll likely review each book individually at some point, but I want to talk about the quartet as a whole first. (Just this quartet, though - I’m not going to touch on the later Emelan books here. That’s a topic for another day.)

Tamora Pierce has published 28 books. I’ve read 27 of them, and while changing standards for YA books has meant that many of her more recent books are longer and more detailed (including the sequels to these), this little unassuming series continues to be one of her strongest pieces of work.

The books revolve around four children who find themselves in need of a new home following some truly heartbreaking and/or horrific events. A mage finds each of them and brings them to Winding Circle temple, where they discover... well, that they each have really, really unusual magic.

At its core, the Circle of Magic quartet is a refreshingly humanizing set of books. There aren’t any larger than life villains; there are certainly people who the children and their teachers clash with or who even put them in danger, but none of them (with one possible exception) are really portrayed as evil at their core. They’re immature, selfish, judgmental, reckless - but not evil. That doesn’t excuse their faults, and Pierce generally doesn’t go out of her way to redeem them, but she keeps the tenor of the series rooted strongly in the complicated, messy thing that is humanity.

It’s beautiful, it’s heart-breaking, and it makes the characters some of the most absorbing and relatable of all of those that she’s written. While the ages of the children’s teachers aren’t all explicitly stated, I don’t think that more than one or two of the central characters are within a decade of how old I am right now on either side, but I see myself and my own struggles in them as clearly as I did when I first picked these up.

I particularly love two of the children: Sandrilene fa Toren is a very, very high-ranking noble who has absolutely no qualms about facing down anyone, even if she’s not very good in a fight, and Briar Moss is an incredibly insightful and proud boy who spends most of the series trying to make sense of his significant shift from belonging to a gang on the streets to living in a temple community as a mage. That’s entirely based on my personal experiences, though - Daja and Tris are both equally developed and sympathetic characters, and I’m sure that many people feel more drawn to them.

And here’s the thing: I think that there’s someone for pretty much everyone. The characters run the gamut in practically every respect you can think of; they’re from a wide range of economic and cultural backgrounds, and two of the children as well as two of their teachers are people of color. Another of the children is regularly described as fat. It’s impossible to ignore any of these things; Pierce doesn’t beat you over the head with them, but they all come up pretty regularly.

More importantly: these things matter. All of them have a direct impact in how the characters interact with the world and how the world interacts with them in ways that are sometimes obvious but often hidden beneath the surface. All of the children but Sandry are judged and even bullied repeatedly throughout the series over these issues, sometimes by each other - and it makes them so accessible in ways that are pretty damn unusual.

My biggest complaint about these books doesn’t really have anything to do with them at all; it has to do with the sequels, which didn’t always quite live up to the wonderful groundwork Pierce laid here and which were part of why I dinged the rating a bit. If we’re just looking at this series, I can’t recommend them highly enough.

[thirdasstlibrarian]

Review of The Old Kingdom Series, by Garth Nix

Old Kingdom Series, by Garth Nix

Rating: 5 stars | Genre(s): Fantasy, Young Adult Includes:

Sabriel

Lirael

Abhorsen

Clariel

“The Creature in the Case”

“To Hold the Bridge”

It seems fitting to start off with this, since I've used it as a theme to this blog. I'll likely review each book individually at some point, particularly since I do like some books in the world significantly more than I like others, but I want to look at the series as a whole first, because I love these books as much as I did when I discovered them as a teenager.

While most of the books include some scenes in Ancelstierre, a quasi-UK circa the early twentieth century, the bulk of the series takes place in the Old Kingdom, which is separated from Ancelstierre and its world by a wall.

And in the Old Kingdom, the dead don't stay dead. Necromancers constitute a consistent, menacing presence throughout the series, and only the Abhorsen can use both controlled charter magic and the corrosive free magic favored by necromancers to walk in death and "keep the dead down."

Most of the stories can stand alone and are told from completely different points of view, with the exception of Abhorsen (which is a direct sequel to Lirael). However, Nix excels at keeping each telling fresh, and each introduction to the world and its magic system compliments rather than repeats those in the other stories, whatever order they're read in.

There are a lot things about these books that I love; the protagonists are compelling, the villains in each story are unique rather than repetitive, and the plots are engaging.

However, the thing that really brought me in and keeps me coming back is the world-building. It's completely unlike anything else I've read - Nix combines two conflicting magic systems, foresight, a broken monarchy, and the constant struggle between civilization, the dead, and ancient creatures left over from the founding of the world current order seamlessly. The detail he gives to necromancy and death in particular is absolutely fascinating.

While the world itself is intricate and none of the minor characters throughout the series feel like props, each story has a very small core group of characters that dominate the narrative and the reader's emotions. And by small, I mean small - in Sabriel, there are really only three characters who get significant development, and one of them is a cat. (Well, sort of.) I personally feel like it helps me identify with the main characters, most of whom I really love and none of whom I dislike; however, it does mean that if you do dislike one of the main characters, you'll likely dislike the book.

And, while the villains all have very different pasts, personalities, and plans, none of them with the possible exception of Kerrigor have particularly different objectives - they pretty much want to destroy the bloodlines and sink the world into chaos. I do feel like they're each pretty well-developed and they're certainly memorable, but if you're looking for shades of grey in your villains, this might not be right for you.

Otherwise, though, I strongly recommend these books - and even if you do typically like ambiguity in your villains, you should try them anyway.

Oh, and if I couldn't work in the Clayr's library (which is literally the best library I've ever read about), I'm going with Abhorsen, Belgaer/Asterael, and the Third Precinct.