Parenthetical

This post by fantasy author Jim C. Hines is excellent. (Also brave.) Click through for more like this.

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I wrote this review when I read the book back in the spring, but as I talk about some spoilers below, I wanted to wait until it comes out. Which is tomorrow! I think Karen Healey is one of the best current YA authors, period — up there with Melina Marchetta and John Green. Don’t [...]

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Happy second round of Nerds Heart YA! After much deliberation, Allegra of My Library Card Wore Out and I chose Toads and Diamonds by Heather Tomlinson as our winner. It was a tough call, of course, as I loved many things about Tall Story. But ultimately we decided Toads and Diamonds had more “kid appeal.” [...]

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Ben (short for Benevolence), the only child of the King of Montagne’s younger brother, is an indulged wild child, raised well clear of palace life — until she becomes heir when her beloved parents and the King are all killed. Princess training and responsibility do not suit her, but with the neighboring kingdom of Drachensbett [...]

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Carina Chocano’s New York Times article “A Plague of Strong Female Characters” gets at most of my issues with this trope: “Strong female character” is one of those shorthand memes that has leached into the cultural groundwater and spawned all kinds of cinematic clichés: alpha professionals whose laserlike focus on career advancement has turned them [...]

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A lesbian retelling of Cinderella. The Cinderella components are all pretty straightforward at first: dead mother, wicked stepmother and stepsisters, dead father, drastic change in circumstances. The fairies, in this case, are British-style — otherworldly long-lived beings who trap humans when they wander to the wrong part of the forest — which added an enjoyably [...]

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“Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love. It did not end well.” So begins this lushly imagined tale of “forbidden love, an ancient and epic battle, and hope for a world remade.” The real story opens with Karou, blue-haired and tattooed Prague art student. She is the human foster child [...]

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Akata is a derogatory Nigerian word for an African-American — like Sunny, who moved from New York to Nigeria with her Nigerian parents a few years ago, when she was nine. One day she sees a frightening image of the future in a candle, and discovers that she is a witch born to Muggle parents [...]

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I’ve been trying to figure out how to write this post for a couple of days now. Thankfully, my friend Deborah mostly did it for me for Kirkus, beautifully. I have been a Diana Wynne Jones fan as long as I can remember, since the hilarious Lives of Christopher Chant wandered into my life — [...]

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Ever since the Cybils ended, I kept thinking I’d go back and review all the books I read for the Science Fiction & Fantasy panel. But it’s been like a month now, and I’m clearly not going to do that. (Note to self: next year, review as I go, even though I can’t post them [...]

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