Review: The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater (@Scholastic)

Posted on September 17, 2012 by TheHouseworkCanWait

Read and reviewed as part of the Southern Book Bloggers ARC Tour

I’ll be honest. I had absolutely no idea what The Raven Boys was about when I requested to be part of the ARC tour. I just knew a bunch of other bloggers had been raving about how excited they were for it, and about what a great writer Maggie Stiefvater is, so I threw my hat in the ring. And then it arrived in the mail and it was thick, and I had just been in a mini-slump and thought “Oh no. I’ll never finish this in a week.”

And then I finished it in three days (which for some book bloggers is still slow, but with the way my life has been lately, let me assure you that three days is about as fast as it gets). If that tells you anything.

The Plot (from Goodreads)

“There are only two reasons a non-seer would see a spirit on St. Mark’s Eve,” Neeve said. “Either you’re his true love . . . or you killed him.”

It is freezing in the churchyard, even before the dead arrive.

Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue herself never sees them—not until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks directly to her.

His name is Gansey, and Blue soon discovers that he is a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble.

But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can’t entirely explain. He has it all—family money, good looks, devoted friends—but he’s looking for much more than that. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents all the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul who ranges from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher of the four, who notices many things but says very little.

For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She never thought this would be a problem. But now, as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore.

From Maggie Stiefvater, the bestselling and acclaimed author of the Shiver trilogy and The Scorpio Races, comes a spellbinding new series where the inevitability of death and the nature of love lead us to a place we’ve never been before.

My Thoughts

First of all, the synopsis is misleading. It implies that there is a romance in this book between Blue and Gansey, and there is not. There is a hint of romance between Blue and one of the other Raven Boys, but not Gansey. Now, I’m pretty sure that if all the foreshadowing is to be believed, the Blue-Gansey romance will come later in the series, but in this first book, there’s actually very little romance at all.

This book does really well on a few fronts. First, the story itself is really interesting. The complex relationships between the boys and Blue, the intricate supernatural element that they’re exploring, and the interwoven mysteries that play out all kept the narrative moving and my attention occupied.

I also really liked several of the characters, particularly Blue, Adam, and strangely enough, Ronan. I’m not even sure if I was supposed to like Ronan, but I did. Adam was definitely my favorite of the Raven Boys, and I thought the best developed. And Blue was feisty and quirky in a way that let me see how she would really fit in well with the odd group of friends.

Maggie Stiefvater’s prose is engaging and flows nicely. I can see why her books are so popular (and now I’m motivated to actually go read the Shiver trilogy, which has been sitting unread on my shelf for months).

One warning: This book asks some pretty big questions that are not answered in this book. One in particular that I thought for sure would be addressed before the end of the book, isn’t. It’s not a cliffhanger per se, just big questions that remain unresolved. Now I’m thinking that it will probably take the entire trilogy to get answers to some of these, but it took the entire book for me to realize the answers weren’t coming. It didn’t really bother me, but I just want you to be aware.

I did have a few problems with the book that kept me from completely loving it. The first is the shifting POVs. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good multiple-POV book, when it’s done right. And for the most part, this book did it right, with one exception. The villain (of sorts) gets a voice, and while part of me loves the idea of a villain getting to tell his side of the story, I don’t think it worked in this book. It all comes back to my whole hangup with “is this voice necessary?” and his POV was used so infrequently, I didn’t think it was necessary. Interesting? Kinda. Necessary? Probably not. Yes, he lets us in on a few pieces of information we wouldn’t have had otherwise, but I don’t think the story would have suffered without them, or if we had learned them through another method.

Then there’s the fact that I just didn’t really feel connected to Noah or Gansey, and I’m not sure why, but this story really needed me to have a connection with both of those characters to fully succeed. This just might be a problem with my brain, because I haven’t heard of anyone else having this problem. But bottom line, I felt like I really should care about these characters, and I didn’t. Not too much. I didn’t dislike them; I was just sort of apathetic towards them.

Now, will that apathy keep me from picking up the sequel? Definitely not. As I mentioned before, I loved some of the other characters, and the story is fascinating. So while I may not have thought the book was perfect, I still thoroughly enjoyed it. I will be eager to pick up the next one when it comes out to see what happens next with Blue and the Raven Boys.

Content Guide: Contains profanity and some violence

Author Event: C.J. Redwine, Kat Zhang, Sharon Cameron (@cjredwine @KatZhang @CameronSharonE)

Posted on September 14, 2012 by TheHouseworkCanWait

Have I mentioned how much I love living in Nashville? Because I do. Love it, that is. Even though I’m a northerner by birth, ever since we moved here 8 years ago, it’s been home. We tried moving back up north a few years ago, and we made it a couple years up there, but something had changed in us. We weren’t New Englanders anymore. We were Nashvillians.

And then — and then — I learned how many awesome authors live here. I had no idea my city was so rife with talent! It’s amazing and wonderful and I love it.

Last night was no exception. I went to a debut author event at our library for C.J. Redwine, Kat Zhang and Sharon Cameron.

I’ve only read Defiance (LOVED it) and half of What’s Left of Me (greatly enjoying it), but I’ve read some great reviews of The Dark Unwinding as well, plus I’d talked with Sharon briefly and already determined she was awesome, so I was really looking forward to this event.

I showed up 15 minutes late because rush hour traffic is the devil, but it was okay. It was a small gathering (probably because it was a Thursday night and rush hour traffic is the devil) and they were just sitting in a circle chatting about their books. And they all recognized me, and I felt like I was one of the Elite, but really all that means is that they all have decent memories because I’ve seen all 3 ladies within the past month.

But anyway. You don’t want to hear about that. You want to hear what they talked about.

LtR: Sharon, C.J., Kat

They each gave a brief summary of their books, then opened it up to questions. Here’s the highlights.

On the covers of their books:

C.J. said she thought hers should be ALL FIRE. Obviously, it is not, and it is better. But the trailer is all fire, and it is good.
Kat didn’t offer much input on her cover, but she says it didn’t change much at all from the original concept they sent her. But she did a double-take when she noticed the second face on the cover. (DO YOU SEE IT? I didn’t, until Kat pointed it out.)
Sharon said she didn’t care, but she ABSOLUTELY did not want a back-shot of a girl looking over her shoulder. ANYTHING but an over-the-shoulder back-shot. And, well…you can see what happened. (For the record, she loves her cover).

On sequels:

Defiance and What’s Left of Me are both the first part of a trilogy.
The Dark Unwinding at least has a sequel, and Sharon is uncertain if there will be more after that.

On when they write and what their lives look like:

Sharon quit her day job in the spring to focus on writing, but she also runs SCBWI and a non-profit, so she is B-U-S-Y.
C.J. also quit her day job after she sold Defiance, and she writes at night and during her daughter’s naptime.
Kat is in school, and she writes at night and over summer break (and sometimes in between/during class…shhh).

On whether they always wanted to write:

Kat decided to be published when she was 12. She credits the Internet for opening her eyes to the fact that authors were real people. If they could do it, so could she.
C.J. wanted to be a writer since she was teeny tiny.
Sharon was a classical pianist and never dreamed of being a writer, until one day she got an idea for a story, sat down at her computer for 45 minutes to see what it would look like if she wrote it down, and then decided to change her life.

On the creative process for writers:

C.J. recommends protecting the creative process for as long as possible, getting your story out and intact before you show it to anyone.
C.J. struggles with beginnings, and has to write hers over and over until she gets them right.
Sharon agrees, but also amends that there’s no one “right” way to write. She personally doesn’t give her critique partners anything until she’s finished a draft.
Kat wrote What’s Left of Me in high school (!?!?!?!?!) in 10-page chunks. Then she’d print them out and give them to her friends to read the next day. However, she says they weren’t really critique partners, but more like cheerleaders. She wouldn’t do that now, but she’s more willing to give her critique partners and editors rough stuff than C.J. or Sharon.
Kat hates endings and has to rewrite them several times.
Sharon stays laser-focused on one story at a time until the whole thing’s out of her head.
Kat and C.J. both have several stories going at once.
Kat always wants to work on “the other story,” so she makes good use of the Sticky Note feature on her Mac.
C.J. has a bunch of different word processor windows open at once when she’s working, so she can jot down an idea or a scene or a conversation for other stories as they come to her.

On the job of writing, and writing when your well of creativity has run dry:

Sharon forces herself to sit at her computer for 30 minutes to write, even when she absolutely does not feel like it. Normally by the end of 30 minutes, she’s found her inspiration and wants to keep going.
Failing that, Sharon researches for inspiration. She loves research.
C.J. hates research and tends to skim, even when she probably shouldn’t. (I can relate to this.)
C.J. uses Pinterest and music playlists to inspire her.
C.J. also uses the accountability of her critique partners to force her to write. She sets a word count goal and a time limit, lets them know, and they check up on her to make sure she’s working towards that goal.
Kat does a little bit of all of the above.
Sharon says writers should read, read, read within their genre, not only to find out what others are doing, but to get a good idea of structure and pacing.

On the word counts of their books, because I am curious about these sorts of things:

The Dark Unwinding: Sharon actually doesn’t remember, but she thinks it’s in the low-90K range. She underwrites and added material in the editing process.
Defiance: 96.5K. C.J. overwrites and subtracted words during editing.
What’s Left of Me: 82K. Kat also underwrites and had to add.

Thanks so much to these three lovely ladies for talking with us, and for Angela at the Edmondson Library for organizing the event. If you ever have the opportunity to see any of these fabulous authors in person, snatch it up! And go read their books — it’ll be time and money well spent!

LtR: Me, Kat, Sharon, C.J. Please ignore my hair. I don’t know what was going on there.

Throwback Thursday (September 13) – The Princess Bride

Posted on September 12, 2012 by TheHouseworkCanWait

Welcome to Throwback Thursday, a weekly meme hosted by The Housework Can Wait and Never Too Fond of Books!

It’s the nature of book blogging to focus mainly on new releases, but there are thousands of great books out there that haven’t seen the “New Releases” shelf in years. We hope to be able to bring attention to some older titles that may not be at the top of the current bestseller list, but still deserve a spot in your To-Be-Read pile.

You don’t have to be a book blogger to participate! You can put up a Throwback Thursday post on your non-bookish blog; or if you don’t have a blog at all, just use the comments to tell us about a book you remember fondly.

Here’s how it works:
1. Pick any book released more than 5 years ago. Adult, YA, Children’s; doesn’t matter. Any great book will do.
2. Write up a short summary of the book (include the title, author, and cover art) and an explanation of why you love it. Make sure to link back to The Housework Can Wait and Never Too Fond of Books in your post.
3. Link up your post at The Housework Can Wait or Never Too Fond of Books.
4. Visit as many blogs as you can, reminisce about books you loved, and discover some “new” books for your TBR list!

Feel free to grab the Throwback Thursday button code from the sidebar to use in your posts.

Thanks for participating, and we look forward to seeing which books you choose to remember!

My Throwback this week is…

The Princess Bride by William Goldman

“But Lauren, haven’t you already beaten us over the head with your almost fanatical love for this book?”

Yes. Yes, I have. But never for Throwback Thursday.

I’m not going to go into great detail on why you should read this book, because I already did that. And I still stand by all those reasons.

But, if you don’t feel like reading my ranting and semi-crazy argument for why you should read this book, let me just say that it’s fantasy, it’s romance, it’s humor, it’s satire, and it’s action, all rolled into one beautifully fun story. I’ve loved it since I was a kid and I love it today. I love the movie, too of course. But if you think you’ve seen the movie and therefore don’t have to read the book, you’re wrong.

It’s just wonderful, and it deserves its spot as a Throwback.

This is a blog hop! Link up your Throwback Thursday post below!

#SYTYCD Book Pitch – Season 9 Week 8 (@DANCEonFOX)

Posted on September 12, 2012 by TheHouseworkCanWait

It’s Final Four time! I can’t say I’m in love with this top 4, as only one of my favorites is left standing (and since there will be two winners this season — one guy and one girl — I really wanted one of my male favorites to still be in it), but there were still some awesome routines last night.

Interestingly, I guess if you go by the routines I’ve picked for these book pitches, Chehon actually is one of my favorites, because I’ve selected his routines several times. But my heart still misses the ones who were eliminated.

I don’t know if we’ll see anything new next week in the finale — probably a new group routine, but normally the finale is an opportunity to revisit season highlights. But I’ll probably do a final pitch next week, even if it is a dance from a prior week, just so I have an excuse to do one more.

Anyway, here’s my pick for this week.

Song: Leave from “Once”

Choreographer: Stacey Tookey

Dancers: Chehon and Allison (Season 2)

Pitch: A boy and a girl grow up together as part of a small colony on a remote planet. Finally, as teenagers, they admit to the growing attraction they’ve both been feeling. But no sooner has their young romance blossomed than a ship shows up to take the girl’s family back to Earth, a plan that had been in place since before she was born. By the time the ship makes it back at relativistic speeds, everyone who remains back in the colony will be long dead. The girl is forced to make a choice: Stay with the family she relies on, or the boy she could love?

Suggested Author: Diana Peterfreund

What did you think of the final four’s performances? Did any of the routines particularly inspire you? And who do you think our two champions will be?

Past Pitches:

“Counting on You” Music Book Pitch

Week 6 & 7 Book Pitches

The original SYTYCD Book Pitch post

Top Ten Tuesday (September 11) – Books that Made Me Think

Posted on September 10, 2012 by TheHouseworkCanWait

Welcome to Top Ten Tuesday, hosted by the folks over at The Broke and the Bookish!

You probably know what today is, and what happened 11 years ago. I don’t know if that’s why the topic for today is what it is, but I suspect the two are related. Most of the books I read are escapist, because the world we live in is hard enough and sometimes (or a lot of the time) I just want to retreat into a fantasy world.

Occasionally, however, I pick one up that challenges me to somehow change my perspective, to confront an issue I’ve been hiding from or acknowledge a truth that hurts. Books that do this aren’t my standard fare, but through some twisting avenue, some find their way into my hands. So those are the books I’ll be featuring today.

These will be in no particular order, as that seems like prioritizing thoughts, which I can’t do.

[WARNING: Seriousness ahead]

Top Ten Books That Make Me Think (About The World, People, Life, etc.)

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

I have two books on this list that take place during the Holocaust. This one is fiction, the other is not. Neither, interestingly enough, features a Jewish protagonist. This book was quiet, pensive, and detached in how it conveyed the events taking place in Liesel’s small town in Germany during World War II. I didn’t so much read this book as drift through it, and the imagery feels almost dreamlike. But at the same time, it really brought home the feeling of a family living a regular life in the midst of horror, which made it somehow harder to read. This period of human history hurts my heart the way few things can, and this book really brought it home.

The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom

This is the non-fiction Holocaust book, and this one is told from the POV of middle-aged spinster Corrie, who lives with her sister and her elderly father in Nazi-occupied Holland during World War II. The family takes it upon themselves to offer shelter to their Jewish neighbors; they are eventually caught and thrown into concentration camps. This one not only conjured the horrors of war and hate and evil, but also the power of deep faith and love. I’d have a hard time thinking of a book that inspired me more than this one.

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

I don’t read a lot of books about cancer, and I’m blessed that I haven’t had a lot of close personal experience with cancer either. I know many cancer survivors, and of course I also knew people who were taken by cancer, but it’s not a disease I feel I have a strong connection to. However, this book not only made me think about the devastating nature of the disease, but about the almost surreal changes it makes in the lives of those who are taken and those who are left behind. It also made me think about the inevitability of death, and how closely it is tied to a life truly lived.

Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer

I read a lot of post-apocalyptic and dystopian fiction, but this is one of the few that struck me as feeling almost tangible. It made me realize how much I take for granted, and how unprepared I am, and we are, to deal with anything truly devastating happening to our world or our country. It made me think about sacrifice, about perseverance, and about strength. The character I identified with most in this book was actually the mother, trying her best to keep her family safe and provided for even in the midst of seemingly impossible circumstances. I thought a lot about her long after I finished this book.

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

I’ve read a decent amount of books where segregation and racism was a prevalent theme, and while this one was much more lighthearted than many of the others, for some reason it’s also one of the ones that stuck with me the most. Maybe it’s because of the alternating points of view, or maybe it’s because sometimes humor sharpens truth, or maybe it’s just because the story was engaging. The thing that struck me the most, beyond the obvious, was the loving relationship between a black maid and the little white girl she’s helping to raise, and it gutted me when that relationship was somehow made less because of the colors of their skin.

A Time to Kill by John Grisham

I spent a good portion of high school reading every one of John Grisham’s books, and while most of them are just your typical pulse-pounding legal thriller, this one (his first, and in my opinion, best) was different. It raises hard questions of race and prejudice, even in more modern times where we’re supposed to be past segregation and racism. The question posed at the beginning of the book, which it takes the entirety of the book to address, is if there is a crime so heinous as to justify cold-blooded murder, and if anyone is truly impartial enough to make that call. And while the jury in the book does reach a decision, the ultimate decision is left in the hands of the reader.

Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

This book made me want to notice everything. To not drift through life oblivious of what was going on around me, and to make each day count, because who knows when it is the last day. Sam has the benefit — and curse — of getting seven shots at her last day, but I’m guessing most of us won’t have that opportunity. And while she really does manage to make a huge difference in the lives of many over the course of 24 hours, I couldn’t help but wonder how much more of a difference she could have made if she was really paying attention for each day of the preceding few years.

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

This book was hard to read. It’s painful and harsh and doesn’t ever really give you what you want. It raises hard questions of life and souls and worth. Society easily accepts the sacrifice of the characters’ lives for the enhancement of others, and none of them ever think to question if they really are less worthy of life than the people receiving their donations. We only ever get to view the world through the sad and resigned eyes of the donors, who — even at their most desperate — only ever dream of the luxury of a couple more years before they’re asked to die for someone they’ve never met. It’s tortuous, and has stayed with me for a long time.

If I Stay by Gayle Forman

I haven’t written a review for this one yet, because I’m actually still thinking about it. Much like with Before I Fall, this book really made me think about how life can change, or end, in the blink of an eye. But although reading about Mia’s struggle in this book was definitely heart-wrenching and painful, I again felt myself drawn to her flashbacks of her parents. Because while it was obvious she loved her parents, and they loved her fiercely, and that she thought they were amazing parents…I wasn’t so sure. I kept seeing things in their actions that made me wonder if they were hurting Mia in the long run, and now that they were ripped away from her, they would never get a chance to correct it. And that terrified me, because I’m sure I’m making mistakes with my kids, and I hope I get a chance to correct them. It honestly made me examine my decisions and my interactions with my children closer, so that if I were taken from them, they’d still be okay.

The Bible

I debated whether or not to put this on the list, since it’s not really “a book” the way these others are books, but it is words written on paper and bound between two covers and you get the information through reading, and therefore I decided I really should put it on, since it makes me think more than all the other books combined, more often, and about more issues. I’ve read the whole thing cover to cover several times (it takes a while), and new thoughts surface and swirl around each time.

Okay, this was a heavy week and now I’m tired. But thinking is good, and now I’ve thought about all these books again and I feel full of the desire to go out into the world and live life to the fullest and make the world a better place, and also learn more science so I can go cure a disease but not so I can clone people and harvest their organs. Just so we’re clear.

Can next week’s post be something fun and fluffy please?

[Peeks ahead]

Oh good. It is.