Starlet’s Man by Carla J. Hanna

Starlet's Man by Carla J. Hanna(Cover picture courtesy of Goodreads.)

“If you live courageously, you have scars.” -Beth, Starlet’s Man

From the award-winning author of the Starlet Series, comes Starlet’s Man, a story about a boy becoming a man amidst the mixed-messages in Hollywood culture. Discover why the Starlet Series took Gold and Silver medals in the Readers’ Choice 2014 International Book Award Contest.

Lights, Cameras, and Lies. High school student athlete, Manny Biro, is caught between the boy he should be and the man he wants to become.

Everyone around him accepts the Hollywood life. He doesn’t. Manny wants no part of acting. On the surface, his childhood best friends seem to have it all: money, power, success. Between the lines, they are all confused. Alan is a messed up want-to-be director focused on pushing scenes to their sexy potential. Beth is an athlete driven to escape from a dark past. Janet is Manny’s kid sister caught up in fashion and trends. And Marie is a lonely actress exhausted by the culture that makes everyone’s favorite stories.

[Full disclosure: I received a free paperback in conjunction with the blog tour in exchange for an honest review.]

One of the things I really didn’t like about Manny in the beginning of the first book (this is a prequel) was his self-righteousness.  He criticized everything about Hollywood but proceeded to act like he was a part of that culture by fooling around with different girls and such.  I wasn’t really sold on him being Lia’s love interest at first but he did grow on me as the books went along.  However, in this prequel we get a really good look into his mindset while he was transitioning from boy to man

In the beginning, Manny is a pretty confused young man.  He sort of likes his friend Beth, who he trains with in the mornings.  At the same time, Liana Marie will always hold a special place in his heart even though she seems to be in love with her current costar Evan.  And all of this takes place in a catty environment where publicity is more important than doing what you actually feel like so even if he and Liana finally admitted their feelings for each other, Lia’s bosses would not be happy with her dating a no-name.  This, understandably, puts Manny in a very brooding mindset and leads to some of the stupid decisions I’ve alluded to as well as some of his hypocritical self-righteousness.  Do I particularly like him at this point in his life?  No, but he is an interesting character and it really does make me appreciate how much he’s changed by the second and third books in the series.

My only real complaint about this prequel is that the plot is a little disjointed.  Sometimes it feels like there are random scene changes that I had a hard time keeping up with and it certainly wasn’t because of formatting issues or anything like that.  I think that sometimes Carla Hanna pared down her writing a little too much and should have left in some more descriptions of the different locations and the transitions between locations.  It does make for a fast read but I really would have appreciated a little more description so I wouldn’t have to deal with the occasional confusion.

The plot, however, is pretty good.  It starts out with Manny learning about the kerfuffle over Lia’s last movie and it goes through her filming of Constantine’s Muse and all the screwed up things that come along with it as I saw from her perspective in Starlet’s Web.  Her trials and tribulations are always at the forefront of Manny’s mind but he has his own things to worry about: money, Alan’s gossip blog spreading lies about his love life and his growing willingness to admit to Lia that he really does love her.  It’s by no means a straightforward journey but that’s probably in part why I loved Starlet’s Man so much.  Life isn’t a straightforward plot line and neither is this book.  Manny has his ups and downs but finally comes through as a caring young man who is no longer the messed-up, self-righteous boy we meet in the beginning.  It’s a satsifying journey.

Since this is a prequel you can absolutely read it before you read the main series but as a matter of personal preference I’d recommend reading Starlet’s Web first because I just like Liana more as a character.  Manny is interesting enough and grew to be a better person, but being introduced to his self-righteous younger self so soon could turn you off a wonderful series.  But if you like reading the prequels first, go ahead!  This is a good book.

I give this book 4/5 stars.

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The Shattered Court by M. J. Scott

The Shattered Court by M. J. Scott(Cover picture courtesy of NetGalley.)

Entangled in a court ruled by tradition and intrigue, a young witch must come to terms with newfound power and desire—and a choice between loyalty and survival.…

The royal witches of Anglion have bowed to tradition for centuries. If a woman of royal blood manifests powers, she is immediately bound by rites of marriage. She will serve her lord by practicing the tamer magics of the earth—ensuring good harvests and predicting the weather. Any magic more dangerous is forbidden.

Lady Sophia Kendall, thirty-second in line to the throne, is only days away from finding out if she will be blessed—or perhaps cursed—with magic. When a vicious attack by Anglion’s ancient enemies leaves the kingdom in chaos, Sophia is forced to flee the court. Her protector by happenstance is Lieutenant Cameron Mackenzie, a member of the royal guard, raised all his life to be fiercely loyal to the Crown.

Then Sophia’s powers manifest stronger than she ever imagined they would, and Cameron and she are inextricably linked in the process. As a witch unbound by marriage rites, Sophia is not only a threat to the established order of her country, but is also a weapon for those who seek to destroy it. Faced with old secrets and new truths, she must decide if she will fight for her country or succumb to the delicious temptation of power.…

[Full disclosure: I requested and received a free ebook copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]

It was the cover that attracted my attention and the blurb that piqued my interest but in the end it was M. J. Scott’s amazing writing that made me fall in love with the book.

In The Shattered Court, Scott has created a beautiful fantasy world full of mystery and magic, intrigue and innocence, loyalty and betrayal.  It’s definitely a world of duality where nothing is as it seems, particularly toward the end of the novel.  The way Scott set up the whole magic system in Anglion is just brilliant.  There are four known types of magic, you see, but women (especially royal women) are only allowed to practice earth magic, which seems to be one of the weaker magics in general.  Air magic and especially water magic are forbidden and knowledge of them is extremely limited.  In the neighbouring kingdom of Illvya things are quite different but the royal family restricts knowledge of the other kingdom almost as much as they restrict the trade with it.

Enter into this world our protagonist Lady Sophia, who prefers the name Sophie.  She’s about to turn 21, the age when all witches’ powers will manifest or not when there is an attack on the royal castle in Anglion.  Since she was in the lower town gathering magical supplies with the Crown Princess’ own bodyguard, Cameron Mackenzie, she is whisked away to the country where it’s safer.  So not only does she not have the proper Ais-Seann ceremony on her 21st birthday, she does something rather unconventional that really is problematic when you consider the fact that she’s supposed to be properly bound in a marriage ceremony instead of on a ley line with a mere third son (the aforementioned Cameron).  When she gets back to court and discovers who lived and who died in the vicious attack that destroyed much of the palace, her life is forever changed.  Suddenly, Sophie isn’t sure who to trust, even though she was utterly devoted to Eloisa, the Crown Princess.  Now that she’s manifested and moved up in the line of succession due to a number of deaths it seems that everyone at court wants a piece of her.  And trust me when I say that things quickly get complicated.

Although Sophie is sort of the main focus of the story we also get to see things from Cameron’s point of view.  Of all the characters I think it’s Cameron that undergoes the biggest change throughout the story.  He goes from being Eloisa’s lover to being a sort of outcast in court for his actions.  He also loses his overbearing father who constantly pushed him to take advantage of his role as Eloisa’s lover to advance in court.  But when Sophie and he are accidentally and inextricably bound, things get a heck of a lot more complicated than he would have liked.  Cameron moves up in the world but learns that he and the woman he loves are in more danger than he ever dreamed possible.  I don’t want to give away too many spoilers but let’s just say his new love leads him to change his loyalties pretty quickly and make some very hard decisions, particularly toward the end of the book.

The plot is quite fast-paced.  We’re introduced to Anglion and the two main characters and then the attack on the castle happens just as we’re getting our bearings.  While there are some slower parts, Scott never really lets up with the tension because there’s always a sort of unseen threat lurking in the background.  Who was behind the attacks?  And who is unhappy enough with Sophie’s unconventional bonding that they would actually threaten her life?  As Sophie and Cameron struggle to unravel the mystery of who essentially bombed the castle, they’re faced with a whole host of other dilemmas as they start to make certain powerful people uncomfortable with all of their digging.  Again, I don’t want to give away some of the plot twists because they’re awesome but let’s just say that more than one person would happily silence Sophie or Cameron (or both) in a heartbeat.

So here we have a vivid, rich fantasy world populated by complex and interesting characters.  If The Shattered Court just had that going for it I would have fallen in love with it but with the plot twists and the constant tension throughout the narrative there was no doubt that I would love this book.  The cliffhanger ending was good because it resolved some of the initial questions in the story but left a lot of new questions to be answered in the second book.  And believe me when I say that I’m very eagerly awaiting the next book even though this first book won’t actually be published until April 28th of this year.  Yes, it was just that good.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

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Frostfire by Amanda Hocking

Frostfire by Amanda Hocking(Cover picture courtesy of Goodreads.)

Bryn Aven is an outcast among the Kanin, the most powerful of the troll tribes.

Set apart by her heritage and her past, Bryn is a tracker who’s determined to become a respected part of her world. She has just one goal: become a member of the elite King’s Guard to protect the royal family. She’s not going to let anything stand in her way, not even a forbidden romance with her boss Ridley Dresden.

But all her plans for the future are put on hold when Konstantin– a fallen hero she once loved – begins kidnapping changelings. Bryn is sent in to help stop him, but will she lose her heart in the process?

[Full disclosure: I asked for and received a free ebook copy from Amanda Hocking’s publicist after I realized I had been approved for the second book on NetGalley without reading the first.  This is, as always, an honest review.]

One of the things that really intrigued me in the Trylle series was the trackers.  More specifically, why the lowborn trolls with few talents would ever want to protect the rich and ungrateful nobles of their world and bring back their changeling offspring.  What drives them to become trackers when they could probably quite easily assimilate into the human world?  And what about the inner workings of tracking?  How does one go about it?  What’s a good success rate?  What is the training like?  These weren’t questions that made the ending of the Trylle series unsatisfying but they did leave Amanda Hocking a lot more room for expansion, which is how this spin-off series came about.

If you’re expecting to see lots of the characters from the original trilogy, you’ll probably be disappointed.  We meet Flinn briefly and there are mentions of the reforms of Loki and Wendy in their tribe but they don’t feature at all.  Instead, we focus on the Kanin tribe of trolls which are of course the same species but have a very different culture while keeping the same essential troll traits: changeling children and a ridiculously rigid societal hierarchy.  Trackers are employed to find changeling children once they come of age and yet they’re still looked down upon.  The only real difference in Kanin society is that there’s an elite group of trackers called the Hogdragen that guard the royal family specifically.  It’s a great honour to become one and that’s really where our story begins.

Bryn wants nothing more than to become a member of the Hogdragen.  She always has to work extra hard to prove she’s worthy not only because she’s a female tracker (and that’s exceptionally rare) but also because she’s half Skojare, a more water-loving breed of troll.  Even amongst the lowly trackers there’s a hierarchy and half-breeds are definitely at the low end of it, even if her parents were both high-ranking members of society who gave up the titles of Markis and Marksinna out of love.  When the tracker she admires, Konstantin, tries to kill her father the Chancellor quite randomly and then disappears.  Several years later, Bryn meets Konstantin while out to bring back another changeling.  He’s not quite the villain she always thought he was but she’s still hungry for vengeance.  And that’s really what I love about her character: even when she is attracted to someone she doesn’t let it get in the way of her mission.  Yes, she does start to doubt whether or not Konstantin is the awful traitor that everyone (including her) thinks he is, but that’s because she’s never blind to reason and she’s very good at reading people.  Konstantin is ambiguous, not evil and it’s really that mystery about him that sets the events of the story in motion.

What I really loved about Bryn as a female lead is that she’s capable of lying and of actually keeping her mouth shut.  Sometimes her emotions overrule her but in general she actually keeps her mouth in check when it’s necessary.  No popping off state secrets willy-nilly or anything like that, as some YA heroines seem to do with alarming regularity.  She’s so focused on being professional that even when she’s attracted to her boss Ridley she tries her best to keep things platonic.  Of course it doesn’t always work but she recognizes that any relationship between them would be stupid and improper and so she really does struggle to keep her feelings in check.  What a novel, mature idea!  She actually acts like she’s a 19 year old, not a 13 year old.

The pacing isn’t always the most fast-paced but in general the intrigue within the different courts and between different people is more than enough to make you keep turning the pages.  And when there’s not intrigue, there’s plenty of action.  Although Frostfire isn’t constantly exciting in an action movie way, it is always interesting.  So much so that this “I’ll just read a couple of chapters” book became a one-sitting book.  At just over 300 pages it’s not a particularly long book but it suits Amanda Hocking’s relatively fast pace quite well.  When you think about it, she does pack a lot into this little book and the cliffhanger at the ending is satisfying but definitely leaves you wanting the next book, Ice Kissed.

Even if you haven’t read the Trylle trilogy, you will enjoy Frostfire if you’re intrigued by the blurb or this review.  I’m not a big fan of some of Amanda Hocking’s other series, but when it comes to trolls she’s definitely a master.  She’s clearly put quite a bit of effort into world-building and that really shows in the Kanin Chronicles even more so than it does in the Trylle series.  I really can’t wait to see what happens when Bryn encounters some of the other tribes of trolls in the second book.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

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Lazy Sundays: The House of Black and White (Game of Thrones Episode 5.02)

Warning: spoilers ahead!

When I said last week that there were changes from the books I really had no idea that this second episode would change certain things so drastically.  So my thoughts on the episode in no particular order:

1.  Once again, go Jon Snow!  Watch out for those knives in the back you’re going to attract as Lord Commander.

2.  Poor Brienne, poor Podrick.  What are they going to do now that Sansa has rejected their help?  Sure, they’re going to follow Sansa and Littlefinger but how long until they get caught or some other misfortune befalls the almost comically unlucky pair?

3.  Ooh, Bronn and Jaime are taking a guy-bonding road trip to Dorne!  I wonder what the Sand Snakes and Ellaria are going to think of that when they of course discover the conspicuous duo.

4.  What marriage proposal is Littlefinger talking about when Sansa questions him about his raven scroll?

5.  I think Daenerys did the right thing with ordering the former slave’s death for killing that master before his trial but she’s going to take a lot of flack for that.  Everyone’s going to turn against her now, just like in the books.

6.  Yay, Jaqen H’gar is back!  And Arya’s finally been accepted into the House of Black and White to become a Faceless/Nameless woman.  I hope those scenes aren’t as boring as I found them in the books.

7.  Are we going to meet the Sand Snakes yet?  So far we’re two episodes in and we’ve got exactly one mention of them when Ellaria was threatening Prince Doran.

8.  Kevan Lannister is not like his brother Tywin but he apparently does have that Lannister steel (and misogyny).  Grand Maester Pycelle also sure doesn’t seem happy about Qyburn being named Master of Whisperers.  Mace Tyrell, being of course Mace Tyrell, seems perfectly content with Cersei’s empty flattery.  He doesn’t care where the order comes from as long as he gets some recognition.

9.  Poor Shireen.  She really does have a horrible mother and I thought it was so cute to see her teaching Gilly how to read just like she taught Ser Davos.

10.  Ah, poor Tyrion.  Still drinking, still indulging in self-pity.

So what did you guys think of episode 5.02?  I thought it was a pretty solid episode and I’m kind of happy with the Jaime and Bronn trip to Dorne.  It’s a huge change from the book but I think it will certainly make things more interesting.

Who’s Coming to Book Expo America 2015?

It’s official: I’ve booked my hotel and my plane ticket so I am going to attend BEA in New York on May 27-29.  I’ll actually be arriving a little before the conference on a Monday and leaving on a Monday at the crack of dawn but the main reason I’m coming is for the conference.  I’m so lucky that the hotel I’m staying at is just 0.4 miles from the Javits Center where the conference takes place.  So here’s what my schedule looks like:

May 25: Arrive and get my bearings, maybe go for a walk in the downtown area.  Try to find Central Park (which is apparently fairly close to my hotel).

May 26: Metropolitan Museum, here I come!  Plus maybe a little shopping.

May 27: BEA Bloggers’ Conference pretty much all day.

May 28: Regular Book Expo America, probably mostly wandering around and trying to get my bearings.  The only panel I really want to see is the Tor panel where John Scalzi’s speaking.

May 29: Continue with Book Expo America on the last day.  I have nothing planned for this day at the conference right now but I’m sure that will change once I find out about more of the events.

May 30: Do the tourist thing: I’m hoping to see the Empire State Building and/or the Statue of Liberty.  Maybe hit up another museum on Museum Mile.

May 31: (Hopefully) go see a taping of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.  Tickets aren’t available quite yet but I’ve bookmarked the site and am eagerly awaiting the announcement for when tickets are available for that particular day.  I know they go fast but I’m really hoping to get one.

June 1: Leave in the middle of the night for home.

Is anyone interested in meeting up with me at the conference?  I’d love to meet my fellow readers as well as authors and other bloggers.

And if you’re not coming to Book Expo America, don’t worry!  I’ll be posting daily articles about my experiences at the conference and at the end will probably provide a tips for next year article even though it’s in Chicago and not New York for 2016.  I’m just so excited for BEA 2015 and the closer the date gets, the more excited I become and the more time seems to slow down.

So who would like to meet up at the conference?