Audrey's Guide to Witchcraft by Jody Gehrman

Published: June 30th 2012
Publisher: Magic Genie Books 
Author’s website 
Author’s blog 

Introduction

Audrey is a normal girl until a face appears in her Crème Brulee. This is the same day that her mother goes missing and her mysterious “cousin”, Sadie, appears at her doorstep. Intuition screams that something is dangerously amiss, and strange occurrences abound, eventually leading up the revelation that she is a witch. At 17-years-old, Audrey has to hone her rare abilities, save her mother, protect herself, and fall in love, all the while keeping her normal sister, Meg, in the dark about everything to do with magic.

Story

                This is a Guidebook. The first of many (well, at least two, thus far). She lives in the human world while trying to learn about her witchy abilities in secret. It’s about magic and love-maternal and the boy-crush kind of love. This all happens while going to school and dealing with the high school mean girl, and other everyday girl problems.   

Audrey

                My favourite aspect of Audrey is that she is far from perfect. She has many positive aspects: protective, independent, thoughtful, and funny. She also makes mistakes, such as going off on handsome boys about things that have absolutely nothing to do with them. Inside my head I was freaking out, thinking, Audrey! Stop it! Stop it now! She is snarky, cynical, and at times irrational. Her imperfections make her a believable character and someone you can root for. And she is a baker-you can’t go wrong with a witch that bakes.

Sadie

                The characters are far removed from the danger most of the time, as they are not with the central hub of witches. Audrey has to learn how to use magic to defend herself against the antagonist, and Sadie steps in, even though she cannot adequately tap into Audrey’s special abilities. The moment that Sadie arrives, she is cool, confident, and beautiful. Surrounded by animals, she holds answers and more mysteries that she keeps to herself. By far my favourite character here, I adore the mystifying way she handles herself. Her presence kept me wondering throughout the book.

Meg

                Meg is the little sister who is the foil to Audrey, yet she shares some similarities with Sadie. She is confident, manipulative, ambitious, social, and beautiful. She fronts the suggestively named band Cherry. It sounds like Meg always gets what she wants. However, Meg is a human with no magical abilities. If you do some digging and analyzing, you’ll see that she is arguably the most emotionally complex character in the cast thus far. Not a throw-away character. Not a character that is the “little sister” and nothing more. The family dynamics here are phenomenal.

Believability

Personally, I’m tired of heroines being unrealistically heroic or stubbornly buried in denial. Her mother goes missing and she discovers that she is a witch. After some healthy skepticism, she picks up the mantle to go help her mother fight, or rather, fend off, the big bad, knowing that she can’t possibly offer much help. It’s different from Harry Potter-this is the beginning of her new magical life, and she isn’t going to be killing He Who Must Not Be Named because skill wise, she isn’t there yet. Yes, it’s a little depressing to put yourself in her shoes, and it’s refreshingly realistic. It’s about survival and love.

Ending/Mysteries

                If you read my other reviews, you’ll note that I don’t mind open endings, as long as they don’t end in the middle of something important like a fight or a conversation. Some mysteries left unsolved are fine. In fact, they are awesome if it means that the book will get a sequel and this book does! Even if this book didn’t have a sequel (and I didn’t know it did when I read it), I like thinking about the possibilities that remaining mysteries leave behind. You know, sometimes an author leave these mysteries unsolved intentionally. 

Verdict

I received this book about a year ago, and it is still one of my favourite books, largely, in part, due to the characters, and the way that it is believable. I want more Guidebooks written by Audrey Oliver-it was one of my top three favourites in 2012. I recommend this for a teen book club read as it is relatable without being crass. Yes, it has witchcraft. Good witchcraft! And recipes for chocolate cake and crème brulee! I highly recommend this for girls into the paranormal but are perhaps sick of the overblown paranormal romances that are circulating.

Silent Echo by Elisa Freilich

*ARC from NetGalley-much thanks!

Published: September 10th 2013

Publisher: Diversion Books
Website: Author’s Website

Introduction

For 16 years, Portia Griffin has been mute. Her best friend is Felix, a deaf boy, and together they overcome communication obstacles to lead normal lives. On the first day of school she meets the new boy, Max Hunter, a genius musician. Then she discovers that her voice has returned, only it comes with the terrible power to entrance and seduce. Before she is poisoned by the evil of her heritage, the Greek gods step in to help before Portia ruins her reputation and her love life.  

Mythology

I’ve read Bullfinch's Mythology by choice in high school because, obviously, I am enamoured by mythology. There are some extra bits thrown in, some new names, some new sons of Gods. To make this a work of fiction, new history will have to be written. However, the author also messes with established lore. When the author made sirens Goddesses my heart felt a little bit like it was stabbed with a butter knife. Additionally, it killed me how useless all the other gods are.

I did like how the author made sirens not like mermaids, but a classical siren with wings. This is refreshing, as popular YA fiction tends to make this formula: mermaid=siren, and some try to make them both fish tailed and winged, and it doesn’t always work.

Also, I thoroughly enjoyed how the gods are portrayed in the real world. It focused too much on technology and how old they were, but nonetheless, the reader gets to see how gods live among humans, or not.

Main Character

Portia Griffin is mute, and likes music and birds. Yet she doesn’t have much of a personality, other than “nice”. She has some rapid personality changes. Though these changes are cringe-worthy, and you’ll hate her as a character, they are integral to the story. Unfortunately, once she gets her voice, I wanted her to shut up because the dialogue was terrible. Yes, she is a teenage girl. No, not every teenager is vapid and unable to speak. Her introduction with the gods is so forced. Like, hey, I’m totally a normal girl, and it’s not like I’ve been taking an entire class on Greek mythology, so I’m totally going to mess this up all over the place. Don’t take me seriously, please, k? I’m just going to make a joke of myself because god-oh, sorry, gosh!-I totally don’t know what’s going on.  

  

Love Story

It’s another one of those stock stories where everyone is in love with the heroine. In this case, she is a siren, and it is in her nature to seduce with her voice. Alright. But before this a love triangle forms with the best friend and the new love interest. (This happens so early on that it isn’t even a spoiler.) Like with Bella Swan, everyone loves her because. They just do and the reader has to get over it. Sure she’s “nice”, but so is everyone else in her school. At one point the reader hears that another girl is “nice” but it isn’t enough. Oh, it isn’t enough in this other girl’s case? How fair.   

The love interest is an unexpected explosion of fireworks in the middle of a mall. Everyone around is thinking, Yeah, this is nice, I guess…but why is it happening? They love-love each other within days. Sure, this happens in real life, and it is dumb. Sorry, but it is. It’s difficult to expect a reader to care about their relationship.   

Lyrics, Poetry, Music

A lot of the rhyming is simplistic. I understand that the author had to write a small selection of original poetry for this book, and all poetry is subjective. I just can’t get over how terrible some of the rhymes are. This book focuses on lyrical poetry and music heavily, and I feel that more effort should have been put into it.

I detest Portia’s rapping. Max sings songs that are modern and are not raps…though that hardly makes them tolerable. Here are some versus:

“I’m Mario Andretti,

I’m stuck on the course,

And you, baby, are the Grand Prix.” (This doesn’t even rhyme…not even half rhymes)

“And what about Krispy Kreme-

Why can’t it just be

That iced, glazed, and sprinkled

Has one calorie?” (And this…isn’t grammatically correct)

Writing

Aside from the horrendous lyrics, the writing is alright. The deepest pits of my soul are glowing because this book is in the third-person, not the first-person. Why is everyone so fixated on reading first-person narratives? Is it because first-person narratives are easier to write, so authors are producing them, making readers accustomed to this type of narrative? /Rant.  

This book is too long, and yet crucial moments, like when Portia regains her voice, are skimmed over. Why, book, why?!

The book uses the word “Forasmuch” meaning: “in view of the fact that”.  This book might win the new award I just made up for weird words that are words but no one uses for a reason. 

Verdict

It is an alright book: it has some mythology and some originality. It is too long and the lyrics are painful. The premise was compelling and I find muteness interesting and a topic that I have not explored much. I recommend it to teens who are into mythology, but not fanatics about it because the changes might drive them away. 

Rosebush by Michele Jaffe

Published: December 7th 2010  

Publisher: Razorbill
Author’s website 

Introduction

            Jane was found in a rosebush after being hit by a car. She doesn’t die, but it is apparent that someone is planning to finish the job while she is recovering in the hospital. She’s a spoiled rich kid with spoiled rich friends and of course everyone is pretty much unstable and creepy because that’s what rich people are. Someone in her elitist circle of friends is after her, and she has to figure out who tried to kill her by piecing together flashbacks of her life.

Cover

            The view straight up the model’s nose is so unflattering. Aesthetically, no one could come up with a better position or camera position for the cover shot? It’s funny, because Jane is supposed to be a photographer and she gets this atrocity for a cover.   

Jane

            Ah, the protagonist.

Protagonists don’t have to be perfect, because people are not perfect. In fact, I like ‘em flawed. Give me the damaged, the character-flaws, the mean girls, the naïve, the downright stupid. Perfection is an illusion, and perfect characters are unrealistic.

But Jane is…here, let me make a list:

1)      Boring.

2)      Stupid (“I’m not paranoid or crazy!”-proceeds to rip out IV while laughing manically).

3)      A “people-pleaser” (though there is no indication that she is, other than people saying it).

4)      Whiney.

5)      A boy jumper (going from boy to boy to boy in an unhealthy way).

6)      Shallow.

I could add some more, but I think readers will get the picture.

Because I dislike Jane so much, I didn’t become invested. Therefore, I didn’t care that someone was trying to kill her. Oops.  

David

Then there’s David, Jane’s boyfriend. No. Just no. “Hi, I’m a pot-smoking jerk. The author gives me the semblance of a deeper character, but doesn’t go into it enough to make me a full character. I’m just a-” and I won’t finish that sentence because I have decided not to curse on this blog, but you can use your imagination and stick in a word of your choice.

The parts with his mental abuse make me sick and frustrated, and the author probably intended for that to happen (at least I hope so).

Kate

            Some of Kate’s story was inputted, in my opinion, for the author to announce that she is totally down with certain…hot topic issues. I do like Kate because she has the most realistic depth (at least as far as I can recall), but I see how she is a thin representation of certain things that the author wanted to put into her book. Instead of conveying a character, I see a cardboard cut-out.   

Boys

            The boys in this book are all ridiculously creepy. No normal guys in sight. Don’t expect to find healthy relationships here. Not that the girls are any less insane, but if you consider it, there isn’t a boy in her age range I’d date because they are all, more or less, insane-in-a-very-bad-way.   

Murder Mystery Aspect

            It is a whodunit story, and a “who will do it” story-someone ran Jane over with a car and then they are after her to finish the job. Overall, I liked the different directions that the book pulled me, though I didn’t particularly think that anyone had it in them to actually kill Jane, though everyone is a red herring at some point. There are lots of characters in this book, so there are many aspects to investigate.

            I don’t want to spoil it for anyone, but let me say that I didn’t suspect the culprit because it would have been too obvious. And then the author gives some very lame reasoning for the motive.  

            I do wish people would stop referring to this as a horror novel. Please read something in the horror genre. This is a mystery, and while people lump the two together along with thriller (like Netgalley), they all are vastly different from each other.  

Verdict

Ultimately, it’s teen chick lit. Not that I’m interested in bashing the genre, but it’s not for me. I can’t stand listening to spoiled kids talk about their brand-name bags and shoes, and then complain about their privileges (Oh button, you have too much money and no responsibilities? Poor you!) Yet they go out and smoke pot and drink-while underage, mind you. Unfortunately, this book is little more than rich and entitled kids doing rich and entitled things. Nope, I can’t particularly care if they are trying to kill each other. I recommend this to girls, not boys-can’t see how boys in general would be interested in this-and I recommend this to girls who like chick lit like Gossip Girl.