Reading on a Theme: What the Dead Left Behind

We've got five new YA Contemporary books today. All were published this spring, and four are from debut authors! Congratulations debut authors! (And congrats to previously published authors too!)

The teens in these stories are dealing with the grief that comes from the death of a loved one. To overcome their pain, they turn to the things the dead left behind.

A Map:
When Jaycee finds a map her dead brother, Jake, made of the sites he visited on his urban exploration trips, she decides she too will visit these abandoned corners of Ohio. And her friends insist on joining her. I enjoyed the format of Cori McCarthy's book; each of the characters takes a turn telling the story using a variety of media--prose, graphic novel panes, and word art poetry. I also enjoyed the urbex aspect of the book. The abandoned sites (which are all real, by the way) served as a nice metaphor for how thoroughly Jaycee and the others had removed themselves from the world in the aftermath of Jake's death. You Were Here is out March 1st, 2016. Review copy from NetGalley.

 

Guilt:
Daniel and Clover don't really know each other, but they both carry dark secrets; they are responsible for the deaths of people they love. One day, the two meet by chance and their lives intertwine. It's then that they begin to let go of the guilt and move forward. I loved The Secret to Letting Go. I thought Kathrine Fleet wrote the two perspectives very well, and I enjoyed hearing the story unfold from Daniel and Clover. I liked the side relationship between Sam and Amelia, and I especially loved Daniel's grandmother; she was fantastic. This book was full of secrets and mysteries and I loved watching them unfold. The Secret to Letting Go was out February 1st, 2016. Review copy from NetGalley.

Donated Organs:
Six months after Ashley Montiel died in a bike accident, Cloudy, Ashley's best friend, and Kyle, Ashley's boyfriend, make the hasty decision to go see some of the recipients of Ashley's donated organs. The road trip is a way for the pair to come to grips with their grief over Ashley's death. One reason I enjoyed the road trip so much was because I've been to many of the places Kyle and Cloudy visit along the way. I also was a big fan of the kitten. Putting her into the story was definitely the right call. I'm always intrigued by books written by coauthors and Michelle Andreani and Mindi Scott make a great team. The Way Back to You is out May 3, 2016. Review copy from Edelweiss.

 

A Twin Sister:
To Elsie, Eddie has never felt truly gone, so she's never really faced the loss of her twin brother. But the summer she turns sixteen, she meets a group of free divers and discovers the bliss of being underwater. She convinces herself that if she can dive down far enough, she can say goodbye and let Eddie go, but she isn't ready for truths she discovers along the way. Sarah Alexander created a beautiful tone in The Art of Not Breathing. The feelings of sadness, mystery, and possibility pulsate through the book, making it a captivating read. I really liked the first person perspective because it allowed me, as the reader, to discover things along with Elsie, which made the book all the richer. The Art of Not Breathing is out April 26th, 2016. Review copy from NetGalley.

A Best Friend:
With just one year left of high school, Meredith Daniels has her life planned out. Her plans are derailed when word arrives that the village where Nate, her boyfriend of five years, is doing humanitarian work has been attacked, and Nate is presumed dead. Meredith doesn't know how to move on until she starts spending time with Lee, Nate's best friend. Cat Jordan's The Leaving Season explores the theme of knowing oneself. Nate's death forced Meredith to take stock and figure out who she wants to be, always an important theme for young readers. I really enjoyed this book and was particularly happy with the ending. The Leaving Season was out March 1st, 2016. Review copy from Edelweiss.

You Were Here and The Way Back to You reviewed by JoLee.
The Secret to Letting Go, The Art of Not Breathing, and The Leaving Season reviewed by Paige.

P.S. Another Reading on a Theme: What the Dead Left Behind.

The Ruby Prince Blog Tour: Interview with Beth Brower + A Giveaway

A big welcome to Beth Brower! Beth is the author of The Queen's Gambit and The Ruby Prince, the first two books in the Books of Imirillia trilogy. She was gracious enough to answer all our questions about writing, her inspiration, and her awesome new series.

Be sure to enter the Rafflecopter Giveaway below for the chance to win The Queen's Gambit and The Ruby Prince!

About Beth Brower:
 

Like many of my siblings, I would sneak out of bed, slip into the hallway, and pull my favorite books from the book closet. I read my way through the bottom shelf, then the next shelf up, and the shelf above that, until I could climb to the very top shelf, stacked two layers deep and two layers high, and read the titles of the classics. My desire to create stories grew as I was learning to read them.

Subsequently, I spent my time scribbling in notebooks rather than listening to math lectures at school.

I graduated with a degree in literary studies, and have spent several years working on the novels that keep pounding on the doors of my mind, as none of my characters are very patient to wait their turn. I currently live in Orem, Utah, with my wonderful chemist husband, and books in every room of the house. 

Website | Instagram | Goodreads| Facebook

Describe your book series in six words or less.

Hmmm. To quote a character, “Your journey still lies ahead.”

Your characters do a lot of traveling in The Queen's Gambit and The Ruby Prince. Can you tell us a little about your journey as the writer?

At sixteen, I wrote down the following title in one of my writing books: The Queen’s Gambit. The phrase intrigued me. I knew at some point I would write a novel based on that name. There was an image of a young queen in my mind. She looked a bit solitary, and good, and determined. And there she stood, in the back of my mind, for many years. 

I worked on other books, other stories, other tales more flushed out, with characters properly filling their spaces. Still, in the back of my mind was always this young queen that I’d had a glimpse of. More than a decade later, while working on another trilogy {pirates, anyone?} I saw the image of this queen in my mind so clearly. As if I was watching it unfold like an old map, I began to see the expanded vision of the story around her. There lay the castle, and there the city of Ainsley. The entire country of Aemogen spread itself out. I wandered the halls of Ainsley Castle until I had wandered into all the loyal and idealistic characters that surrounded the queen.
 
With the images and color of Aemogen flooding my mind, I began looking for the threat, the reason for needing a gambit. One morning, as I was weeding a map of middle earth, {I was the head gardener of a private estate in the mountains called Rivendell for the last seven years} I saw a young man wander into Aemogen. He was lithe but strong; graceful, but shadowed. I did not know him, nor had ever heard his name. But as I looked further afield to see where he had come from, the entire continent spread out before me. And there lay Imirillia; fierce and wild, with all the alluring lines of a great desert empire.

I threw myself into the story, writing on my lunch break, scribbling at stop lights, pulling my laptop out after long days at work to write whatever I could manage before falling asleep. As I gardened, I watched the characters. I observed the small things they did. More than any book I’ve worked on, these characters knew their story, and were relentless until I got it right.   
   
I wrote The Queen’s Gambit, The Ruby Prince, and the upcoming Wanderer’s Mark together, finishing my first draft of the entire journey on 11/12/13. The last three years have been spent revising, editing, stepping away, coming back, and going at it until I thought I could not do it again. But I did. 
 

In The Ruby Prince we journey with the characters to Zardabast, which is vastly different from Aemogen. Was it fun to take your characters to a new setting? What do you love best about creating your own world? What do you find most challenging?

It is a universal experience, first to be a native, and then to be a stranger. I learned things about myself sitting on the windowsill of my upstairs bedroom, window open, leg swinging out—and other things writing early in the morning in an apartment in Rio de Janeiro, watching the flower market open below. It’s a tremendous thing, to unwind the mystery of yourself, or someone you know, both in the familiar and then the strange. And so, I was interested in what happened when you take two characters, place them in their own world and then the world of another. Even more than I wanted to see it, it seemed my characters had already lived it somehow, and the path was unalterable. I just tagged along.

I loved the culture differences between Aemogen and Imirillia—the stories and sayings, the beliefs and expectations. I love weaving cultural idiosyncrasies into the details, or hearing the cadence beneath and old saying of the country. “Irony is the province of every culture,” Wil tells Eleanor. And I love each culture dearly.

What was most challenging? Trusting them, the characters, when they surprised me. When I thought it was going to be this way. And when they so emphatically did that. But then I would realize that was exactly what they would have done—under that strain, or uncertainty, or moment of wonder—and this would not have done at all.  

The Books of Imirillia remind me of some of my favorite classic fantasies. What are some of your favorite fantasy books? (And why do you love them?)

Yes. Probably because some of the classics were very, very, deeply rooted. Here are a few of the fantasy books that took hold of my heart early {and forever}.

I adored The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. It instilled in me a love of ships and exploration and an ensemble crew so firmly that I have a ship’s wheel {a real one} and a brass spyglass {a real one} in my living room. And Eustace. I was so moved by the scene when Eustace, as a dragon, has all his layers ripped away by the lion. That moment filled me. It made me shake. It astounded me. I knew that I wanted to write stories where the inner landscape was as complicated and detailed as the outer. Later, I fell in love with The Horse and His Boy, and it’s contrasting culture. I can still feel the day inside me when I read, “For in Calormen, story-telling (whether the stories are true or made up) is a thing you're taught, just as English boys and girls are taught essay-writing.”

Another influence, one of the most significant, was the books of my beloved Lloyd Alexander. Beginning, of course, with the Chronicles of Prydain. Reading them over and over and over. Starting when I was young enough to prefer The Book of Three or The Black Cauldron, to growing into Taran Wanderer so tightly, I claimed it as talisman for my own coming of age. And then, when I found the three Westmark books in my junior high library, I gave myself to them, admiring the perfect balance of the word-smithing, the array of unforgettable characters, and a story that struggled inside the soul as much as out. I have reread those books so many times the spine of my original Kestral disintegrated.

Finally, I'm fascinated by this book closet you write about in your author bio. Can you tell us a little bit more about it? 

I have many siblings, and all the kid’s bedrooms, save one, were upstairs. There was a hallway. Two rooms on the left. Two rooms on the right. A bathroom. A laundry chute {allowing some of the more reckless siblings to repel three floors into the basement.} And in the middle of it all was The Book Closet. It smelled like the back aisle of an old bookshop. The shelves were three feet wide, a foot deep, the highest being taller than any child on tip toes could reach. There was a direct correlation between shelf level and reading level. The bottom shelf held the picture books—Max the Great Detective, Sammy the Seal, Hansel and Gretel. The second shelf up was where you found The Mouse and The Motorcycle, Maniac Magee, The Boxcar Children. And so on. The highest shelf housed all the Dickens, the Steinbeck, the Hawthorn. I remember staring at the stylized paperback covers of Jude the Obscure, and The Ox Bow Incident. Turning them over in my hand. Wondering.

The more experienced shelf explorers learned the secret for longevity when searching among the books. You would climb up so your toes were gripping the first or second shelf, then scoot enough to the side that you could lean your back against the doorframe. There you could comfortably peruse the higher shelves. Sometimes you would be searching among the shelves—all stacked two books high and two books deep—looking for that particular novel. You were in the mood to read Daddy Longlegs or Carry On, Mr. Bowditch. If the book could not be found in the closet—and you had engaged a younger sibling to be the second witness that it was indeed missing—it was up to you to hunt down the offending sister or brother.

It was The Book Closet that taught me the art of the literary gamble. Of holding a book you’d never read, and, without asking anyone, taking it to your windowsill, or into the reading nook you had made in the top of your own closet, and opening to the first page ready to jump off the cliff of another book wondering what voyage the book would take you on and if you would land. It was an idyllic patron saint of discovery and I thank my parents for it. 

Thanks Beth! It was such a pleasure chatting with you. Interested in Beth's books? Find out more about the books below and be sure to enter the Rafflecopter Giveaway.  

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About The Books of Imirillia

The Queen's Gambit by Beth Brower

Published January 2016

Genres: Fantasy

Amazon | Goodreads

 

“THE RULES OF WAR HAD BEEN CHANGED.
QUEEN ELEANOR WANTED TO KNOW WHY.”

Eleanor, the young queen of Aemogen, is confronted with the greatest threat her country has ever faced: surrender Aemogen’s sovereignty to the treacherous Imirillion Empire or endure a devastating and impossible war. Now she must decide if she will forfeit her people’s liberty or fight.

When Wil Traveler, the disenchanted Imirillion soldier, wanders into her country, Eleanor takes the gamble of asking him to train her ill-prepared men for war, despite suspecting he may be a spy.

Battling questions of war and conquest, Eleanor fights to protect her people as Wil challenges her way of life, all the while keeping the secrets of his violent past a mystery.

 

  The Ruby Prince by Beth Brower

Published April 2016

Genres: Fantasy

Amazon | Goodreads 

THE CITY OF ZARBADAST WAS A DRAGON SLEEPING IN ITS OWN EMBERS.

Queen Eleanor's gambit worked. Aemogen, for now, has been spared from the ruthless Imirillian army. But Eleanor is still a captive, and Prince Basal is taking her into the North. As Eleanor is swept through the deserts of Imirillia to the magnificent city of Zarbadast, she begins to understand the contradictions Basal must negotiate beneath the reign of the sadistic Emperor Shaamil.

Having returned home, Prince Basal again finds himself at war with his own conscience. Under the scrutiny of his father, the pressure of his brothers, and a fierce loyalty to his own people, Basal doubts his ability to fulfill his impossible promise to Aedon: to help Eleanor escape.

In a rich telling of culture, ritual, and choice, The Ruby Prince draws on the complexity of what honor means to both Eleanor and Basal, who find themselves together, yet set against one another, in the enigmatic court of Zarbadast.  

  

 

Pair It With: The Chapel Wars and The Last Boy and Girl in the World

In today's Pair It With I've brought together two books that remind me of each other in terms of their overall feel. This is definitely a case of, "If you like this book, I think you'll like this one too." But, more than that, both The Chapel War and The Last Boy and Girl in the World feature teen girls dealing with the possibility of losing something big, something that helps define who they are. Holly and Keeley must grapple with how to save this big thing and what it will mean if they can't.

The Chapel Wars was one of my favorite books of 2014, and The Last Girl and Boy in the World comes out on April 26th. 

The Chapel Wars by Lindsey Leavitt

Publisher / Year: Bloomsbury - May 2014

Genre: YA contemporary

Source: My local library

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Holly Nolan's grandfather left her his Las Vegas wedding chapel in his will. Grandpa Jim also left her a letter to deliver to Dax Cranston, the grandson of his mortal enemy, the owner of the chapel next door. On top of mourning Grandpa Jim and dealing with a budding relationship with Dax, the Rose of Sharon chapel is in financial straits. For Holly the chapel is more than just a job. It's family, it's home, it's her grandfather's legacy, and she's desperate to save it.

This is my favorite of Lindsey Leavitt's books, and that is saying a lot because I quite enjoyed Princess for Hire and Sean Griswold's Head. (I haven't read Going Vintage, yet.)

The Chapel Wars is a deceiving little book. You think that it's going to all light and cute, but it deals with so much and so many emotions. Holly's desperation to save the chapel is tied up with her grief over her grandfather's untimely death, her inability to imagine herself doing anything else, her need to support her family, and her pain over her parent's recent divorce (who, by the way, both work at the wedding chapel...awkward). I really loved the way this book dealt with Holly's grief, the time that was spent on Holly's relationships with her siblings, especially James, and how the death and divorce affected them all.

Holly's romance with Dax is fraught with barriers as well. They are the grandchildren of mortal enemies and, thus, afraid to tell their families about the relationship. Also, their chapels are direct competitors. Regular teenagers have plenty to negotiate when it comes to relationships but Dax and Holly have all that plus so much more. I loved their banter. I loved Holly's obsession with counting and her love of Las Vegas. I love that Dax is complicated, hurting, and nuanced.

The Chapels Wars was one of my favorite books of the year in 2014.




 

The Last Boy and Girl in the World by Siobhan Vivian

Publisher / Year: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers - April 26, 2016

Genre: YA contemporary

Source: Review copy from Edelweiss

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Keeley Hewitt lives in the small town of Aberdeen. After a particularly wet spring, several flood warnings and evacuations, the governor declares their town unsafe. A dam will be built upstream flooding the town to create a reservoir that will protect the residents living downstream from further flood damage. Now Keeley, her family, and the entire town must pack up and move.

Like The Chapel Wars, The Last Boy and Girl in the World is a deceiving little book. It seems to dangle the promise of a light and fun read, but instead it delivers unexpected depths. (No pun intended.) Keeley must wrestle with the potential loss of her home and what it means to be a loyal daughter and friend. At the same time, her longtime crush suddenly sees her, and she has a job with the sheriff's son, a boy she can't stand. There are no easy answers to the problems that plague her, and Keeley finds herself making one mistake after another. 

I've been in the mood for a book that looks at a tough situation and doesn't take the easy way out. That is exactly what Siobvan Vivian does in The Last Boy and Girl in the World, and I appreciate it so much. There is, of course, something fun and delightful about a light and fluffy read, but a book that digs a little deeper, as this one does, can be so satisfying.

Some readers may find Keeley difficult to like. She miscalculates at almost every step, but I think that her heart was in the right place. Sometimes it takes a long fall for us to see where we went wrong. All these things made Keeley feel more real.

I have been wanting to read a book by Siobhan Vivian for some time now, so I jumped at the chance to review The Last Boy and Girl in the World. It definitely lived up to my expectations. 

Series Salute: The Red Rising Trilogy by Pierce Brown

In our Series Salutes we bid farewell to a great series with a write-up of the series as a whole.

I love when I discover a series at the very beginning and ride it out to its conclusion. There's just something so satisfying and fun about knowing that you are taking the ride with the author and thousands of other readers. It's doubly exciting when the first book in a series is the author's debut novel, and the series gets hot. 

I read Red Rising just before it came out, and I have this remarkable book to thank for the creation of our Connections Series. Red Rising was our very first Connections post and the reason we came up with the idea in the first place. Seeing the trilogy come to an end causes me to reflect on some of the earliest days on this blog.

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Audible | IndieBound 

About the Books

Darrow lives underground mining the material that will one day make the surface of Mars habitable for humans. But, the truth is, Mars has been habitable for hundreds of years. The Golds, the highest of the social classes, have kept this knowledge from the Reds. Darrow is chosen by a rebel Red force, transformed into a Gold, and trained to infiltrate the highest levels of government. 

 

In Red Rising Darrow must survive the command school that trains the most elite Golds on Mars. In book two, Darrow has risen through the ranks to become a member of Augustus's guard, but life at the top is tenuous, both for Darrow and for Augustus. So much of Darrow's mission hangs on him preserving his cover, but the cost of those lies adds up. In the conclusion, Morning Star, Darrow must scramble his way back to the top after hitting rock bottom in Golden Son. He and his allies take the fight to the highest reaches of government in hopes of creating a whole new world.

Why I Love Them

 

I could tell from the very beginning that Pierce Brown's series had the potential to become something special. I really like all three books, but I think the first may be may favorite. A big part of that is because I can't help it, I love a good Battle School type book. The Institute is packed with twists (so many that I did not see coming) and high stakes (be prepared for violence). Darrow is young and innocent and believes his mission to be fairly black and white, but what's right and wrong gets increasingly more muddled as Darrow gets to know his Gold classmates. 

  

As Darrow moved beyond The Institute to the larger world in Golden Son and Morning Star, I continued to be impressed with how well Pierce Brown is able to hold onto the tension that he created in the first book. The number of reversals in these books are harrowing. Things change in a breath. At one moment it seems all is lost and then Darrow has another trick up his sleeve or a bout of good fortune. There are so many moments of extreme tension in this book. Pierce Brown is so good at pouring on the anxiety.

One of the best things about the series is the about this series is the fantastic world-building. The color-coded caste system allows room for a whole range of different types of people. The Obsidians are particularly interesting. Another big influence for Brown is Roman myth and legend. The Golds, especially, are deeply indebted to Ancient Rome. And, as an amateur classicist, I absolutely love this. Other mythologies, such as those of the Norse, come into play as well. It all done in a way that is very clever and very passionate. Also, it's fun to read about characters who bounce all over the solar system from Mars to the moon to the asteroids and the gas giants.

  

The cast of characters in this series is immense. Huge really. They can be difficult to keep track of, but that is all par for the course when reading an epic science fiction or fantasy series. But frankly, I don't care who the other characters are as long as Darrow and Mustang are also in the scene. I just really love Darrow and Mustang together. When they are together, it feels like they can conquer the world. 

Finally, I really enjoy Pierce Brown's writing style. It's somewhat stylized, and the dialog, especially, is so well done. All my favorite scenes are the quiet ones where Darrow and Mustang or Darrow and Sevro are talking. The dialog (and the great slang) makes the characters seem like they belong to another world. They are not, in any way, today's teenagers transported to space.

P.S. Red Rising here. And Golden Son here.

Introducing: The Queen's Poisoner by Jeff Wheeler + A Giveaway

We've got a beautiful new book to share today, and we have five copies to giveaway! That's right, FIVE! Enter the Rafflecopter Giveaway below. But first introducing ...

The Queen's Poisoner by Jeff Wheeler

The debut novel of The Kingfountain Series promises readers total immersion in a beautiful and deadly new world in which a young boy must accept an impossible destiny.

As usurper of the throne, the rule of King Severn Argentine’s is already highly contested. To keep his power, King Argentine rules with an iron fist and destroys any opposition. In a failed coup attempt the Duke of Kiskaddon loses his son as a permanent prisoner to the king to ensure his loyalty.

THE QUEEN’S POISONER follows the Duke’s young son Owen on his journey for redemption and revenge as he figures out how to survive the court of Kingfountain. In order to keep his head and gain the merciless king’s favor, Owen must delve deeper into the world of mystery and secrecy that surrounds him. Readers will be clamoring for the next installment of The Kingfountain Series. 

Published by 47North

Out April 1st, 2016

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Audible | Goodreads

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I don't know about you, but I can't stop staring at that cover. The Gothic tracery, the purple cloud, that glow. It's just so pretty. The Queen's Poisoner sounds like a great pick for fantasy fans. Also, the audiobook is narrated by one of my favorite narrators: Kate Rudd. Now that I know that, I don't know how I could possibly consume The Queen's Poisoner in any other format.

 
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jeff Wheeler took an early retirement from his career at Intel in 2014 to become a full-time author. He is, most importantly, a husband and father, and a devout member of his church. He is occasionally spotted roaming among the oak trees and granite boulders in the hills of California or in any number of the state’s majestic redwood groves. He is the author of The Covenant of Muirwood Trilogy, The Legends of Muirwood Trilogy, the Whispers from Mirrowen Trilogy, and the Landmoor Series.

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