Way to Pull a George Lucas, Mr. Card

Ender in Exile by Orson Scott Card

You know how franchises sometimes make another movie or a spin-off of something just because the original is wildly popular and want to keep the gravy train rolling? And the newly created entertainment is just a shadow of the original and you wish it wasn't created in the first place? If you're not quite certain what I'm talking about just refer to Episodes I, II, and III of Star Wars and the joke that was the fourth Indiana Jones movie. Or read Ender in Exile.

Now, I am a huge fan of Ender's Game. Seriously, I read that book at least once a year, and right now am rereading the Ender's Shadow series. And so when Ender in Exile came out, of course I had to get it. And while it was nice to extend my time with Ender, and getting to see him grow a little older (sort of), there were numerous issues with book that led me to not enjoying it as much as I hoped:

1. Valentine (Ender's sister) has become exceptionally whiny and overbearing.
2. Part of what made Ender so wonderful was his ability to love and understand before ultimately destroying something. In Exile, his characterization is a shell of that. It's fairly one dimensional.
3. The climax of the story is completely abrupt and random.
4. Exile is supposed to directly follow Ender's Game, in fact, there's even some overlap. However, if you hadn't read the Ender's Shadow series (I have) or the Speaker for the Dead series (I haven't, but plan to), which are both divergent continuations of Ender's Game, you will get massively confused. Kind of like reading that sentence. Card assumes his readers have detailed knowledge of those two series and refers to events that occur in them constantly. But his reference to the events are not clear and would be impossible to follow if his readers actually read Exile right after Game, without reading the original follow-up series.
5. Too much talk, very little action. I've become very aware of this trap since Twilight, and Card fell into it. And the brief moment of action, the climax, was so jarring from the rest of the novel because there had been no set up for that flow.

So do yourself a favor, don't watch Episodes I, II, and III of Star Wars, the fourth installment of Indiana Jones, and don't read Ender in Exile. Stick with the originals.

Review of "With the MD...At the Altar?"

Title: With The M.D...At The Altar? (Curse of Raven's Cliff)
Author: Jessica Andersen

This is the first book in the series called Curse of Raven's Cliff, and I must say, "With the MD...At the Altar?" has got to the the stupidest title ever. Looking at the title and the cover gives you the impression of a hokey category romance where the girl is obviously putting out so she can snag herself a rich doctor husband. Nothing can be further from the real story. This book is actually a medical crime mystery set in a gothic seaside town complete with mysterious lighthouses, haunted monasteries, and curses.

The heroine is the town doctor trying to battle an outbreak among the townspeople, some of whom turn very violent and murderous. Enter the hero, also a doctor, but who works for the CDC. He has arrived to help the heroine figure out what's causing the epidemic and find a cure. He and the heroine also have a history - they used to be an item when they worked together in rescue medicine in various developing countries in the past.

The mystery was interesting, the writing was solid, but the characters were so bland that if you notice, I don't even remember their names and have to refer to them as "hero" and "heroine" for this review. The hero is supposed to be this hotshot hot stuff, but he had no personality whatsoever. I also found both the hero and heroine's motivations to be contrived and forced, and when I finally found out what the reasons were that had kept them apart all these years, I was like, "so what? That's been the problem this whole time? Eh." Also, when they finally got together for teh secks, I was was so bored that I actually skipped ahead. No chemistry to speak of between these two.

And, because this is part of a series, the mystery wasn't resolved, which pissed me off. Hello, who was the killer?! I devote time to read through this book and get no payoff? Blah!

Grade: B-

Sound familiar?

I don't know about you, but the heroine in this new book by Susan Elizabeth Phillips sounds like it's been modeled after Jennifer Aniston.

How did this happen? Georgie York, once the costar of America's favorite television sitcom, has been publicly abandoned by her famous husband, her film career has tanked, her father is driving her crazy, and her public image as a spunky heroine is taking a serious beating. What should a down-on-her-luck actress do? Not go to Vegas ... not run into her detestable former costar, dreamboat-from-hell Bramwell Shepard ... and not get caught up in an ugly incident that leads to a calamitous elopement. Before she knows it, Georgie has a fake marriage, a fake husband, and maybe (or not) a fake sex life. It's a paparazzi free-for-all, and Georgie's nonsupporting cast doesn't help. There's Bram's punk-nightmare housekeeper, Georgie's own pushy parent, a suck-up agent, an icy studio head with a private agenda, and her ex-husband's new wife, who can't get enough of doing good deeds and saving the world--the bitch. As for Georgie's leading man, Bram's giving the performance of his life, but he's never cared about anyone except himself, and it's not exactly clear why. Two enemies find themselves working without a script in a town where the spotlight shines bright ... and where the strongest emotions can wear startling disguises.

It's too bad I despise Jennifer Aniston, because if it weren't for that, I would totally read this book!

Review of "The Lost Tomb"

Title: The Lost Tomb
Author: David Gibbins

So, in the space of one week in this crazy book (a sort of DaVinci Code meets Raiders of the Lost Ark), the hero, Jack, and his merry band of protagonists went here and found these:

1. St. Paul's shipwreck off the coast of Naples, along with priceless wine amphoras and ingots that were, of course, historical breakthroughs.
2. Emperor Claudius' intact and complete library at Herculaneum, miraculously preserved from under the pyroclastic flow of Vesuvius' eruption in AD 79.
3. The actual skeleton of an actual Vestal Virgin sitting on a throne underneath Palatine Hill in Rome, in what is strongly hinted at to be the Lupercale, aka the cave where Remus and Romulus were nursed by a she-wolf.
4. Boudica's tomb in London (Boudica the British warrior-queen), with intact skeleton and intact artifacts from the Iron Age surrounding her, along with the actual cylinder containing the long-lost Gospel of Jesus Christ himself.
5. The actual location of Jesus' tomb underneath the Holy Sepulchre church in Israel.

Forgive me if I seem to be rolling my eyes literally and figuratively as I list these items - each discovery becoming more and more fantastic as the story develops - but come on. Look, I realize this is a fictional novel that's supposed to be fun and fantastical, but there comes a point where it becomes so fantastical as to be ridiculous and unbelievable and makes my head explode. What a real archaeologist wouldn't give to discover and experience even a fraction of what Jack and Company discovered and experienced in one week - which is exactly my point. They discovered all five of those things listed up there, in one week?

I also feel like we flitted and hopped from one fantastic location to the next, from one great discovery to the next, without taking the time to savor the discovery. I would've loved to spend a few more chapters exploring Claudius' library at Herculaneum and see the characters do some actual archaeology instead of stealing artifacts in pursuit of a treasure. No digging, no sifting, no wall profiling, no cataloging, no attempts at preserving the provenance of the artifacts - things essential to good scholarship and good archaeology. I understand these things probably would make for a boring novel, but at least make an attempt at reality. It seems to me like Jack took shortcuts everywhere he went in his single-minded pursuit of the solution to the mystery by diving through tunnels and sewers and then tomb-raiding some of the sites. No attempts were made at doing meticulous science and research. These ticked me off.

But what really ticked me off, though, was the treatment of the villain, who we don't actually meet until several chapters on. And then he doesn't appear again until near the end. For a large part of the book, until all is revealed at the end, the villain's motivations were unconvincing and bewildering at best, contrived at worst. What's more, Gibbins kept referring to the villain's "henchmen" - can you say trite cliche, anyone? Who uses "henchmen" anymore outside of comic books? I kept imagining the villain at the end going, "If it weren't for those pesky kids...!" in the manner of Scooby Doo.

When we finally see what's contained in the Gospel of Jesus, it does help to explain why the villain doesn't want the contents revealed and would do anything to hide it from the world. I also understood how this Gospel would change the course of the Catholic church. Having said all that, the contents were still kind of...lame. That's what Jesus chose to reveal? It made sense as far as motivation for the characters, but as far as Jesus revealing some great, great truth about the world, it was...meh.

Aaand this is why this book took me almost four months - four - to finish. I'm a fast reader and never take this long to finish one book. But wow, this was really hard to get through. And I love archaeology mysteries, so that's saying a lot. I felt like the dialogue was just prop - Gibbins had lots of lazy writing, like the extensive reliance on italics to convey awe or delight or disbelief. He also peppered his narrative with cliches to convey feelings. Seriously, how much more can Jack's heart "pound" with excitement?

But, I will say this. Going to the sites and reading the background history of each was a delight, and loads of fun. I did love that part. The book opens on the eve of the Vesuvius eruption and for Gibbins to put the reader right there, in the heart of the action, was brilliant. I enjoyed reading about Boudica's rebellion and the history of St. Lawrence Jewry in London, I loved imagining what the Villa of the Papyri looked like in AD 79 and picturing in my head the Lupercale. It was great to pretend how I would feel if I discovered the long-lost Latin library as an archaeologist. I enjoyed reading aboout the warring monks inside the Holy Sepulchre. These things were what saved the book. The armchair archaeologist in me really enjoyed those parts of the story, and were the main reason I picked up this book in the first place. I only wished there were more of them.

Grade: C

Tried and True

She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb

I actually read this book several weeks ago. However, due to the lack of a computer or internet, I haven't been able to post my thoughts on the novel. And since so much time has passed since I read the book (and I've reread several books in between) my exact thoughts are a little fuzzy.

I can say this: this book was good and a much more enjoyable read than I Know This Much is True. And in retrospect, I don't think I Know This Much is True is as well written as I had originally believed.

The main character, Dolores Price, experiences several traumas in her childhood (leaving it vague so you'll take the time to read it) and grows up to be a fat and angry young woman. It is a lot easier to like, or at least sympathize for, the main character. And despite her faults, of which there are plenty, you still root for her. The rest of the novel follows her through her attempts to heal herself and fix her life.

Lamb also has some plot twists that he seem to like to use over and over. Mainly someone being "crazy," sexual assault, the therapy process, family. And it's interesting to me that this novel precedes I Know This Much is True, because he explores each of these themes far better in the eyes of his narrator than in his second novel. It seems as though his recent novel (his third) also explores these themes, which makes me wary of stepping into his work again. Thus far, his first attempt at weaving and exploring those paths have been good, the second alright. I doubt I'll read the third, cause as far as I'm concerned, he's beating a dead horse.

I just can't help but wonder what Wally Lamb has been through in his own life.

Favorite Books

1. Fiction: Ok, we already know my favorite book of all time is Ender's Game, so I'll pick a different book. Carrie by Stephen King. It was the first Stephen King novel I read and it led me to read only Stephen King for a period in middle school. Except for Nightmares and Dreamscapes, which I kept under my bed because it scared me so badly. It was easy to (sort of) connect with a character that gets picked on and mistreated, who falls for a boy she could never have, etc. And then she turns all evil and gets sweet revenge.



2. Nonfiction: I like memoirs a lot, so this one is tough. So I'm gonna stick with the last memoir that I read that really struck me: The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls. Thoroughly depressing from an adult standpoint, but an excellent portrait of resilience in children. Also it's not an overly "woe-is-me" memoir, as Walls points out the things that were good and happy despite the hard times her family was constantly entrenched in.


3. Autobiography: Errr....I hate autobiographies. But I do have Mark Twain's on my to-read list. Only because he's brilliant and witty.

4. My choice: So a couple of weekends ago I went frantic because I couldn't find these books I used to read in middle school. And gloriously, they were found (in a random box, in a random room) and out of nostalgia I've started reading them again. Before there was Twilight and Stephenie Meyer, there was The Last Vampire by Christopher Pike (6 books) and Secret Circle (3 books) and Night World (9 books) by L.J. Smith. Vampires! Witches! Werewolves! Soulmates! Smith's work tended to be more chaste, while Pike's series dealt with more heavy duty stuff as in AIDS and sex. So yeah, I didn't pick a single book for this option, but each of these books are short enough for several to be read in a single day.

REVIEW: Vince Flynn's Extreme Measures

DESCRIPTION:

In the continuation of Vince Flynn's popular Mitch Rapp series, rogue al Qaeda operatives enter the U.S. with the intention of suicide bombing some high-value, low-security targets. Mitch actually plays a backseat to a newish character, family man Mike Nash.

REVIEW:

Although I highly enjoyed this book, I have a feeling that if it weren't for the fact that (a) it had quite a bit of humor in it, and (b) the protagonist ISN'T Mitch Rapp, I'd probably forget about it in another few weeks. As it was, I really, really enjoyed reading about new hero Mike Nash. The touches of family life Flynn included in the book were very entertaining. It really made this particular story stand out and gave the new character of Nash his own distinct identity apart from Mitch.

As for the story itself, it was vintage Flynn through and through. Fast moving and tight, it had great villains and awesome supporting characters. I loved the way he got into the minds of the terrorists and even moreso loved it that the lead female antagonist wasn't a ho (unlike one of Brad Thor's characters). I liked it that she was redeemed in the end. Really enjoyed her story arc.

Speaking of arcs, I was a tad disappointed that Flynn didn't move Mitch's arc any. After his Separation of Power, I've been in constant search for the return of the Donatella Rahn character. Sadly, my wait must continue. I did like it that CIA director Kennedy has become less cool and more flappable with age, though. And that she went out on a date.

I think what I enjoyed most about this novel is the way it presented such a complete picture of what happens in my town, Washington, D.C. Flynn has an amazing eye for detail, from the streets and landmarks in the story, to the way the Senate chambers operate and how the Judiciary Committee meeting room is totally secure. I did not know that.

I'm happy to say that Flynn, unlike Brockmann and Thor, did not disappoint and continue to be on my AutoBuy list. Extreme Measures dazzled and, more importantly, entertained.

KARMELA RATING SYSTEM (out of 4):