My Lady Jane » Book Review

My Lady Jane was a strongly hyped book written by three well-known YA authors. I believe it was also an Owlcrate book for the month of May. I was feeling a little apprehensive going into the book because while I was familiar with all three authors, I couldn't say that I particularly adored their previous works.

Cynthia Hand is the author of the Unearthly trilogy, Brodi Ashton is the author of the Everneath trilogy, and Jodie Meadows is the author of the Newsoul trilogy and The Orphan Queen series. I've read the first book of both the Unearthly and Everneath trilogies, but the love triangle didn't inspire me to continue. I read a brief sample of the first Newsoul book and chose to stop there.

Thankfully, My Lady Jane didn't suffer any of those issues.

Tudor England

For most of us, the historical setting will be very familiar. Who wasn't fascinated by King Henry the VIII's various marriages and break from the Catholic Pope? It was one of the few times my class perked up during our history lessons. Even though our focus is on Lady Jane (made obvious by the title), we are initially introduced to Edward. From then on, our perspectives switch between Jane and Edward.

Edward is a teen boy who doesn't focus too much on his kingdom. All of his work is done through his privy council and his advisors, including Lord Dudley. He enjoys the company of his half-sisters, Elizabeth and Mary, and his cousin, Jane. Even though Edward wonders what it would be like to marry Jane, he is convinced by his advisors to marry her off to a Gifford Dudley, and to allow Jane's male heirs to be Edward's successors should he not be able to provide his own heir.

Most of that seems to be historically accurate as far as I can surmise from my AP History class and brief research. Now comes the interesting part...

Magic?

In this version of history, magic exists. More precisely, shapeshifters exist. Naturally there are two factions. Those who are shapeshifters and those who are not. They do have precise terminology within the novel itself. But it has been a little while since I've read the book and I've already returned it to the library so I can't recall them offhand.

We learn that Edward's father could turn into a raging lion if he was displeased. Edward and Jane spent much of their time as children wishing and practicing to be a shapeshifter themselves. The addition of these fantastical elements does allow a historical fiction book to appeal to a wider range of readers. It also allowed certain tweaks to be made to our version of history.

Romance

I did mention that Edward had considered what it would be like to marry Jane. However, there is NO love triangle in this book which I was deeply appreciative of. Instead, we get to see the romance between Jane and her new husband Gifford develop. This is actually one of my favorite tropes in historical romance novels. For whatever reason, I do love to see a marriage of convenience or a marriage of hatred to turn into a marriage of true love and affection.

This romantic story did not disappoint. I adored Jane as a character. She was intelligent and smart, focused and driven. I enjoyed her sense of humor and nothing fazed her for too long. Her interactions with Gifford were sweet and I was really rooting for both of them throughout the novel.

We also get to see romances develop with other key characters as well, but I'm feeling a little too lazy at the moment to expound upon that further.

My Rating & Why

I did really like this book. Even though it is close to 500 pages, I could read it relatively quickly. My only complaint is that it felt too juvenile. I would say that it fell closer to the middle-grade end of the spectrum rather than the mature YA that I was expecting.

The romance is VERY PG. The plot is quite simple even for someone unfamiliar with the historical time period. While I enjoyed the sense of humor from the characters as well as the omniscient narrator, it didn't set the book apart for me in any way.

Daughter of Smoke and Bone » Review

This book, written by one of my favorite authors, did not make a great impression the first time around.  Although you don't know it at first, this first book in Laini Taylor's Daughter of Smoke and Bone trilogy [spoiler]truly starts in medias res.[/spoiler] There is a lot going on, as well, and it's difficult to get a grip on during the first read-through.  The first time I read the book, I made a lot of incorrect assumptions, like [spoiler]that we were dealing with insta-love. We're not.[/spoiler] I also disliked our main character, Karou, thinking she was a tiresome, self-impressed hipster chick, which she kind of was (in the first book), but when you know all of her backstory, Karou becomes immeasurably more likable. Unfortunately, it takes a while for that backstory to come into play.

What made me push through Daughter of Smoke and Bone was the wealth of positive reviews for the book and my enjoyment of Taylor's short story collection, Lips Touch: Three Times.  I decided I wasn't giving the series the good ol' college try and made another attempt.

I am so glad I did.  Because, while I'm hesitant to call the Daughter of Smoke and Bone trilogy something like a 'masterpiece,' it is most definitely an 'achievement.'  Laini Taylor's imagination is just insane.  It's a pleasure to dive into and swim through.  She writes well, treating us to surprising little similes and turns of phrase that are so rarely found in YA these days.

About Laini Taylor's style — it's very distinct.  It's distinct to the point where if I read a piece of hers without her name attributed, I'm very certain I could identify it. That's really remarkable, when you think about it. (Remarkable on Taylor's part, not mine :P) So many authors struggle with finding a distinct voice, and Laini Taylor just nails it. Really, the only author I can think of that Taylor shares similarities with is Holly Black, and even then, there are strong differences between the two.

Taylor's style mixes dreamy elements of fantasy with modern settings — romance and humor sprinkled throughout.  There are, of course, Taylor's signature similes and unusual turns of phrase aplenty, although these are much thicker in her short stories than in her novels.  And then, there is always a dark undercurrent of aggression, greed, and sexual violence. I'll get to those issues more in my review of Days of Blood and Starlight, but for now I'll just say that Taylor most definitely has a strong thematic message throughout her body of work.

Anyways, about the actual book.  It opens with a blue haired girl, Karou, being attacked by a vampire.  When I first read the book I was all, "NO! Not another vampire book!" But it's a false alarm — Karou's ex-boyfriend is a street performer/tour guide who dresses like a vampire. Karou, her faux-vampire ex-boyfriend, and her close friend, Zusana, all live in Prague — a nicely exotic setting.  Karou and Zusana are art students and I'd now write that Karou lives a pretty normal life... only she doesn't.  She is replete with mystery.  She knows martial arts, keeps a knife in her boot, speaks tons of languages, never seems to dye her perfectly blue hair, and good luck follows her everywhere.

We find out the answers to all of these mysteries soon enough, but I found it overwhelming to take in at first.  Laini Taylor has created an immense story and it's a lot to take in.  This is unquestionably my main complaint with the book, but I couldn't tell you how to fix it.  I'm not sure that Taylor didn't do the best job possible easing us into her huge concept.  It was confusing as all hell at first.

Another weakness of the story lies in the *first read-through* of the romance.  When reading the romance for the first time, there are so many misconceptions because the backstory is just not there.  [spoiler]You don't even know that there IS a backstory.[/spoiler] So, when I first read the book, I thought, this is intolerable!  It isn't, actually — it's just way more palatable and intriguing once you know more about what's going on in the story.

Overall, Daughter of Smoke and Bone is a very good beginning to a great series.  There are definitely some issues with how the immensity of information is introduced, but don't ask me how Taylor could have done better.  I give this first book in the trilogy four stars.



 

The Madman's Daughter » Review

This book made me want to tear my hair out! I usually don't mind when what I read is bad or silly, but The Madman's Daughter had such promise! It made the novel's eventual failure so disappointing.

The story is of the gothic style, nodding the kind of romantic horror embodied by Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. I loved this homage, especially in the beginning, with Juliet Moreau, our protagonist, creeping about a medical academy after hours, cleaning up after surgeries. There's an early scene where she euthanizes a rabbit that some medical students were using for vivisection. She puts the animal out of its misery by chopping it's head of with a surgical axe. It's great stuff.

I also loved the early middle of the book, when Juliet tracks down her family's former servant and her childhood friend, Montgomery. He's been in hiding with her father, who fled England, almost a decade earlier, due to grotesque allegations. Juliet learns from Montgomery that her father is living and working on an sparsely-populated island off the coast of Australia. Juliet insists that Montgomery take her to her father. Montgomery, Juliet, and Balthazar, a peculiar assistant to Dr. Moreau, getting on a seedy ship and sail to Australia. On the voyage, the ship picks up a half-mad castaway, a gentlemanly man called Edward. Juliet takes a liking to him, and decides to take him under her wing.

However, once the party arrives at the island, the story unravels. What had been a tight plot unfurls into madness — not the compelling kind. The characters have the same confrontations over and over again. Juliet worries over the same issues a gazillion times. And then there was the love triangle. What can I tell you about that love triangle? It was exceedingly tiresome and immature, and made me lose all respect for every character involved and for the author. It wasn't just bad writing. It was pathetic writing.

I sound harsh. I realize this. But, the early part of the book was so very good. I'm just aghast at the turn the novel took for the worse.

I will read the sequel and the final book after that. I think it would be a pity not to. I am also holding onto the hope that Shepherd will turn this series around and live up to the kind of writing I know she's capable of.