I liked Megan Whalen Turner’s The Thief, but I didn’t love it. I think I liked Thick As Thieves better, but I don’t really remember too much about The Thief.

Set in the same world as the Queen’s Thief books, Thick as Thieves chronicles the journey of Kamet, the slave of the Mede nobleman, Nahuseresh. When he hears that his master has been assassinated, Kamet knows that his own life and the lives of all of Nahuseresh’s slaves are in danger. Can he flee to the kingdom of Attolia for safety, or is that destination a trap where even greater danger awaits?

Lots of palace intrigue, plots and conspiracies, plans within plans, ambition and power-seeking— all combine to make Thick as Thieves an exciting and compelling read. Wanted Kamet to escape not only from the Mede emperor but also from his own pride and ambition that kept him from trusting the very people who were obviously his friends and helpers. Kamet is a flawed protagonist; he knows his own faults. However, surviving a life of slavery has required him to deceive others and find ways to maintain his own self-respect despite mistreatment and subjugation. Feigned humility is a tool for survival as a slave; real humility and trust in the goodness of others are not wise or needed for life as a slave.

Thick as Thieves helped me to think about what it means for a person to be enslaved and thought of as a piece of property. What would such a life do to one’s sense of self, to a person’s decision-making abilities, and above all to the slave’s faith in God or other people or his own ability to live a life of freedom and integrity? What does a person who has lived a life of slavery do with freedom? It’s true that some of us don’t want freedom when it is offered to us. We prefer the “devil we know” to the possibilities that lie before us. What if we are tricked into freedom? Will we be able to deal with the choices and the loss of comfort that freedom entails?

A good book for adults and for older middle grade students. I always like a book that makes me think.

Nine orphan children live on an island. When the green boat brings another young child to the island, the oldest one must leave. Then, the next oldest one cares for the new little one, until it’s his or her turn to leave. That’s how it’s been for as long as anyone can remember. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. Life is good on the island, almost magical. And it will continue to be good and nourishing and life-giving as long as the children follow the rules and care for one another.

I think this book is supposed to be about our world and how we live in it. We live in a world that is beautiful and full of wonder, but we’re sort of trapped on this island Earth. We don’t really know how we got here, and we don’t know where we are going when we leave. We have a set of rules, handed down by tradition or codified in books (the Bible) and stories, and we have books that give us intimations of what the world beyond this one might be like. But we don’t really know. At least from a Jewish point of view, we have the Law, and we’re not sure why we have many of the rules that are in the Law. But it’s important and life-giving to follow them anyway.

This story is also about growing up. We all have moments when we want to be like Peter Pan and never grow up, but we really have no choice. We must leave childhood and the innocence of the island and enter into adulthood. We learn the important lessons of childhood, and we take those lessons into adulthood. That grown-up life is an unknown territory, and some of us go into it with alacrity, anxious to know what’s out there in the great big world. But others enter into adulthood kicking and screaming, metaphorically speaking, longing to just stay in the simple, joyful, idealized world of childhood.

Opinions are going to be divided on this book, mostly because of the way it ends. It’s probably not a spoiler to warn you that not all of the questions you may have as you read Orphan Island will be answered by the ending of the book. In fact, you will probably be filled with multitude of questions by the end of the novel. Will there be a sequel? I almost hope not. I still remember when the writers from the TV show LOST tried to tie up the loose ends and answer all of our questions; it wasn’t pretty. I really believe that this is a book that should stand on its own with all the questions left for the reader to resolve and answer. Maybe that way some child somewhere will imagine his or her own ending, his or her own answers. That’s not such a bad thing at all. In fact, it may be the purpose of the book.

I liked it. Please come back and let me know what you think after you’ve read it.

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This book may be nominated for a Cybils Award, but the views expressed here are strictly my own and do not reflect or determine the judging panel’s opinions.

Aventurine the adventurous dragon meets a food mage and gets turned into a puny, thin-skinned human girl, but she still has the heart of a dragon. She still believes that she is the fiercest creature on the mountain or in the city of Drachenburg. At least, most of the time she believes it, until she looks down at her pitiful human body. But never mind, the food mage also introduced Aventurine to the wonderful, delicious, scrumptious flavor of chocolate, and Aventurine is willing to go anywhere and do almost anything for another taste of chocolate delightfulness.

What a romp! Chocolate and dragons and an independent girl/dragon and a testy chocolate maker and lots of political intrigue and, did I mention, chocolate? Aventurine is impetuous and somewhat foolhardy, but she does grow and mature as the story progresses. And the characters around her—Marina the chocolatier, Horst the chocolate house proprietor, Silke the marketer, and all of Aventurine’s dragon family—are well-rounded and interesting in and of themselves. Even the minor characters are fun. Aventurine’s brother, Jasper, studies philosophy. Her older and practically perfect sister, Citrine, writes epic poetry. Greta, the selfish and manipulative townswoman who tries to turn Aventurine into her own personal, unpaid maid, is hilarious.

The entire book is only 244 pages, well-edited, and well paced. Kudos to Ms. Burgis for a fun and rollicking adventure with heart, a chocolate heart, of course.

What others say

The Book Smugglers: “In the tradition of the best middle grade storytellers—such as Diana Wynne Jones, Catherynne M Valente—The Dragon with a Chocolate Heart is a story with multiple layers. Hot-tempered and fierce, Aventurine experiences loss, anxiety, and fear just as she has to deal with questions of power and identity and to find a new family and friendships.”

The Reader Dragon: “First off, if you ever plan on reading this book, make sure you have chocolate nearby, because you’re going to get the munchies! There is oh-so-much talk of chocolately goodness throughout the entirety of this book, that I guarantee you’ll be craving sweets in absolutely no time at all.”

Pages Unbound: “However, Aventurine’s journey is not just about embracing her spirit and the things that make her unique. It’s also about finding the strength to be vulnerable and to allow others to carry her at times.”

An interview with Stephanie Burgis about dragons and chocolate at Cracking the Cover.

Amazon Affiliate. If you click on a book cover here to go to Amazon and buy something, I receive a very small percentage of the purchase price.
This book may be nominated for a Cybils Award, but the views expressed here are strictly my own and do not reflect or determine the judging panel’s opinions.

York, Book One, The Shadow Cipher by Laura Ruby.

This middle grade alternate history and steampunk-ish fantasy had a few awkward phrases and descriptions, and I’m not at all sure that all the loose ends were gathered together by the end of the book. (Understandable, since it’s the first book in a series.) However, Ms. Ruby tells such an absorbing and delightful story that I can forgive a few minor bobbles.

“The city had many nicknames: Gotham. Metropolis. The Shining Starr. The Big Apple. The City That Never Sleeps. These nicknames were not always accurate.”

The main character, the protagonist, of this novel is the City, New York City. But it’s a New York City changed and perhaps improved by the benevolence and inventiveness of the Morningstarr twins, Teresa and Theodore, during the first half of the nineteenth century. The Morningstarrs “performed architectural and mechanical wizardry to make New York City the most dazzling city in the world . . . the gleaming metropolis of the future.” Then, they disappeared, leaving “their land and property to a trust in the city’s name” and “a parting gift: a sort of puzzle, or treasure hunt.” The Morningstarr twins were definitely imaginative and eccentric, and for the next hundred and fifty years and more after their disappearance in 1854, people searched diligently for the clues that would lead them to the fabled Marningstarr treasure. But no one found it.

Enter Tess and Theo Biedermann, also twins, but in the present day, twenty-first century. They live with their family in a Morningstarr building, one of the six buildings left in the city of those that were planned and built by the Morningstarrs. Unfortunately, for the sake of history and for the Biedermanns, there’s an evil real estate developer and millionaire, Darnell Slant, who wants to buy up all of the Morningstarr buildings and make them into over-priced cracker box apartment buildings. Can Tess, Theo, and their new friend, Jaime, solve the Morningstarr cipher/puzzle and find the treasure and stop Darnell Slant?

It sounds fairly standard: evil real estate developer, a puzzle to solve, a race against time. However, the alternate history and steampunk elements of the plot and setting keep it fresh and interesting. The pacing is good, for the most part, and I didn’t really know what to expect most of the time. There are echoes of and allusions to Newbery award winner The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin and New York City history and the movie National Treasure, probably other cultural artifacts, too. Those are the ones I noticed and appreciated.

And the book includes some interesting philosophical speculation, especially in regards to life and technology and puzzle-solving. Is the process of solving a puzzle or playing a game its own reward? Or is it the winning or the treasure at the end that counts? Is any treasure worth any cost? How do you go about counting the cost when you don’t know what the treasure is? What does it mean to “be yourself” and to “believe in yourself”? Does faith in some object or journey create its own fulfillment? What is the difference between living beings and non-living artifacts of technology? Can a machine come to have life and agency? Can it respond to its environment and make decisions? How?

York was a book well worth the time spent reading its 476 pages. Fans of steampunk or New York City or puzzling and ciphers or alternate history adventure would do well to check it out.

Educator’s Guide to York from Walden Press.

Review of York at Charlotte’s Library.

Amazon Affiliate. If you click on a book cover here to go to Amazon and buy something, I receive a very small percentage of the purchase price.
This book may be nominated for a Cybils Award, but the views expressed here are strictly my own and do not reflect or determine the judging panel’s opinions.

This middle grade fantasy about a spooky house that allows certain “special” people to travel through time and space didn’t quite work for me. I’m trying to figure out why.

1) I think it’s it’s a little too creepy, spooky for my tastes. An older man/ghost, Horatio, takes on ten year old Amelia as a protege, telling her how special and intelligent and wonderful she is. He takes her to places that only Horatio and Amelia can go and shows her wonders that only she is special enough to appreciate. And he takes her to a special feast and gives her special “memory-food” that only Amelia can enjoy. There’s nothing sexual or pharmaceutical involved, but it all feels borderline icky and drug dealer and exploitative.

2) The rules of the “calendar house” and the creatures (not ghosts, not really human either) who own the calendar houses are nebulous and unclear to me. Horatio tries to explain to Amelia, hoping that she will become his apprentice and build her own calendar house, but since it turns out that Horatio is a liar sometimes, I couldn’t get a good fix on what was and wasn’t true about the world he and his fellow memory eaters live in.

So, I read the whole thing. And the premise is intriguing, at the very least. Certain houses are built to be calendar houses, with various features corresponding to the seasons, the days of the week, the number of weeks in a year, etc. And these houses are full of magic, enabling the builder to travel through time and space to other eras and climes. But there is a price to be paid for privilege of time travel. Is Amelia willing to “steal time” from others, including her own family, to give herself the ability to go anywhere and experience all sorts of times and places?

Anyway, that’s my take. I didn’t like Amelia very much; she was, for most of the book, a very spoiled and selfish child. And I liked Horatio even less, not that the reader is supposed to like him, I suppose. Amelia’s cousins, who also come into the story, are rather flat characters, tow boys and a baby who never really came alive for me. (However, the baby is named Lavender, which I thought was a lovely name.) There’s nothing overtly objectionable about this book, but as I said, I found it to be kind of disturbing and icky.