The Beautiful Creatures movie, based on the first book in the Beautiful Creatures series by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, is out in New Zealand now. I haven’t read the books but I went to the movie today and loved it so much that I immediately want to go and get all the books in the series. The cast and the story was great so I highly recommend the movie.
I’d be interested to know, if you’ve read the books and seen the movie, how do they compare?
A Necklace of Souls by R.L. Stedman (NZ)
In the Kingdom of the Rose only the power of the Guardian’s necklace can keep the people safe from the forces threatening to destroy it. In a hidden kingdom a mysterious Guardian protects her people with the help of a magical necklace. But evil forces are also seeking the power of the necklace, and as the Guardian grows weaker these forces threaten to destroy the kingdom. With the help of her best friend, Will, and the enigmatic N’tombe, Dana, the rightful heir, must claim the power of the necklace and save her people. But the necklace takes a terrible toll on whoever wears it – a toll that Dana may not be prepared to face. A NECKLACE OF SOULS was the winner of the Storylines Tessa Duder Award for unpublished young adult fiction in 2012.
Seven Wonders: The Colossus Rises
The day after twelve-year-old Jack McKinley is told he has six months to live, he awakens on a mysterious island, where a secret organization promises to save his life – but with one condition. With his three friends, Jack must lead a mission to retrieve seven lost magical orbs, which, only when combined together, can save their lives. The challenge: the orbs have been missing for a thousand years, lost among the ruins and relics of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. With no one else to turn to and no escape in sight, the four friends have no choice but to undertake the quest. First stop: The Colossus of Rhodes … where they realise that there’s way more at stake than just their lives.
The Book of Doom by Barry Hutchison
Heaven has lost the most important object in existence and getting it back is gonna be Hell … The second hilarious book in Barry’s AFTERWORLDS sequence – comic fantasy perfect for fans of Pratchett and Douglas Adams. There’s panic up in Heaven. They have mislaid the BOOK OF DOOM – the most important object in existence. Oopsy. They think Satan might have stolen it, the sneaky little devil, so to save the world – plus, you know, quite a lot of embarrassment, fifteen year old Adam and his angelic guide Angelo are sent to retrieve it. Sadly directions aren’t Angelo’s strong point and they soon find themselves just as lost as the book, wandering through Afterworlds such as Valhalla and Hades and encountering some colourful characters along the way… Can the hapless pair make it to Hell and back?
Timmy Failure: Mistakes Were Made by Stephan Pastis
Take eleven-year-old Timmy Failure – the clueless, comically self-confident CEO of the best detective agency in town, perhaps even the nation. Add his impressively lazy business partner, a very large
polar bear named Total. Throw in the Failuremobile – Timmy’s mom’s Segway – and what you have is Total Failure, Inc., a global enterprise destined to make Timmy so rich his mother won’t have to stress out about the bills anymore.
Fearless by Cornelia Funke
After saving his brother, Jacob Reckless faces death from the fairy’s curse burning in his heart. In search of a cure he returns to the Mirrorworld, where he is reunited with Fox, a beautiful shape-shifting girl. He has one more chance: a golden crossbow, with the power to both save and destroy life, buried in a dead king’s tomb beneath an invisible palace. Jacob must cross continents, face monsters and men – including a dangerous rival – and learn what it means to stay alive.
A Winter’s Day in 1939 by Melinda Szymanik (NZ)
Taken from their home, forced to leave their country, put to work in labour camps, frozen and starved, Adam and his family doubt that they will ever make it out alive. Even if they were to get away, they might freeze to death, or starve, or the bears might get them. For the Polish refugees, the whole of the USSR becomes a prison from which there is seemingly no escape.
Zom-B City by Darren Shan
How many survived the zombie apocalypse?
Where do the living hide in a city of the dead?
Who controls the streets of London?
B Smith is setting out to explore…
What do you think the world would be like if you fell asleep right now and woke up in 100 years time? Would the world be incredibly technologically advanced or would it be ravaged by an apocalyptic event? Would people be more tolerant of differences in race, ethnicity and sexuality? Karen Healey shows us her version of a future in earth in her latest book, When We Wake, about the first person to be cryonically frozen and successfully revived.
Sixteen-year-old Tegan is just like every other girl living in 2027 – she’s happiest when playing the guitar, she’s falling in love for the first time, and she’s joining her friends to protest the wrongs of the world: environmental collapse, social discrimination, and political injustice. But on what should have been the best day of Tegan’s life, she dies – and wakes up a hundred years in the future, locked in a government facility with no idea what happened.
Tegan is the first person to be cryonically frozen and successfully revived, which makes her an instant celebrity – though all she wants is to rebuild some semblance of a normal life … including spending as much time as possible with musically gifted Abdi, even if he does seem to hate the sight of her. But the future isn’t all she hoped it would be, and when appalling secrets come to light, Tegan must make a choice: Does she keep her head down and survive, or fight for a better future?
When We Wake has everything a great science fiction story should have – mystery, action, actual science, a future world, cool technology, and a main character who you route for right from the start. Karen keeps you guessing and her writing is fast-paced so you want to keep reading so you can find out how it ends.
It’s a sign of a great character when you connect with them as soon as they start talking. Karen hooked me in from the first paragraph and I wanted to know everything about Teegan and the insane situation that she finds herself in. You empathise with her because you know how strange and difficult it would be to adapt to a different world. The more you find out about her and the sort of person she is, the more I liked her. She’s the sort of person who won’t be pushed around and told what to do. Even though she’s told by the army and various religious groups that her life doesn’t belong to her she does everything to prove them wrong. She’s not concerned about making a spectacle, even when she’s being broadcast to millions of people around the world. Other people try to force their morals and ethics on to Teegan, but she has her own strong opinions and no one is going to change those.
One of the things that really stood out for me in When We Wake was the way that Karen brought the future society’s moral and ethical views into the story. Many science fiction stories (especially for teens) don’t delve into these aspects of future worlds so it made Karen’s feel fresh and different. Through Teegan you see how the future society’s views of religion, ethnicity, and sexuality have changed, and how, even with massive climate change, people still aren’t looking after the planet. Like today’s society, many of the people in charge of this future earth have questionable morals and ethics, and it’s these that shape the story.
5 out of 5 stars
John Green is one of my favourite authors and I’ve loved everything he has written. His latest book, The Fault in Our Stars, was one of my favourite books of 2012 and was named the best book of the year in Time Magazine. As well as an author, he’s one half of the awesome VlogBrothers on YouTube.
John is a fairly under-appreciated author here in New Zealand (bookshops have only just started stocking his books and he has written 4 books since 2005) and I really think everyone should read at least one of his books. If you read one you’ll be hooked on his funny, moving stories and memorable characters.
I have a copy of two of John’s earlier books, An Abundance of Katherines and Paper Towns, to give away. To get in the draw all you have to do is enter your name and email address in the form below and tell me the name of John’s first book. Competition closes Monday 25 February (New Zealand and Australia only).
Thanks to everyone who entered. This competition is now closed. The winner was Kirsten.
When We Wake is the fantastic new YA futuristic thriller from New Zealand author, Karen Healey. Cryogenics, questionable morals and ethics, government secrets, and a kick-ass character are only some of the things that make When We Wake stand out.
When We Wake by Karen Healey is available now at libraries and bookshops from Allen and Unwin.
If you’ve read my review of Life in Outer Space you’ll know how much I loved it. Life in Outer Space is Melissa Keil’s debut YA novel and Melissa was lucky enough to have it published as part of the Ampersand Project. I’m incredibly thankful to the Ampersand Project and Hardie Grant Egmont for publishing Melissa’s wonderful story, as I still can’t get it out of my head. Melissa kindly answered some of my questions about Life in Outer Space.
Thanks – that is very flattering (in an odd way!) Sam’s voice was really the catalyst for the novel – one of those weird writing moments where one second he wasn’t there, and then he just was. In the back of my mind I was always aware that I was writing the experience of a person who I had never been, but I chose early on not to let it hamper me. I did make some conscious decisions about certain ‘boy’ things – the way he would interact with his friends, for instance (and writing conversations between teenage boys was lots of fun!) But Sam always felt like a real person to me, and his voice was the driving force behind the story.
I guess there are little parts of me in all of these people; Sam’s befuddlement about the world around him was quite familiar to me in high school! I never had Camilla’s confidence or self possession, but perhaps a little of her optimism. I guess in a weird way I even relate to Adrian social awkwardness – but to me they were always people in their own right.
I definitely have no musical abilities (I have mastered a few chords on guitar, but that’s about it). I do have a talent for storing useless trivia. I suppose writing was my ‘hidden’ talent for a long time; I was with my writing group for almost a year before I worked up the courage to actually bring some writing to workshop. It took quite a bit of prodding to send Life in Outer Space out to a publisher! If it wasn’t for my writing group, I think my ‘hidden’ talent would have remained hidden for quite a while longer.
Wow, that is a very cool thing to be thinking about. One of the things I love doing when I’m writing is creating ‘mood boards’ for my characters – I have pages and pages of images of the clothes that they wear and the minutia of their bedrooms, right down to their jewellery and books – but in all my research, I’ve never found a real-life person who I think is right for either Sam or Camilla. I have her voice and face so clearly in my mind that it’s hard to equate her with anyone in the real world – I guess she would have to be an unknown! With, you know, musical ability, and great hair.
Never ignore the quiet, bespectacled person in the corner; they’ll always turn out to be the most fascinating (and gorgeous) person in the room. Or they’ll turn out to be an insane serial killer. But most often, the first one.
Absolutely. I spent a lot of time ‘researching’ (read: procrastinating) by hanging out at the places they visited in the book and just imagining them chatting. It really did feel like they were with me all the time – I was that vague-looking person standing in the middle of the Astor Theatre or Minotaur just staring into space, usually with a note book in hand.
As a film buff with wide and weird tastes, that is a very hard call. My favourite movies come from pretty much every era; I love those great Film Noir movies of the 40s and 50s, and I am a little obsessed with contemporary superhero movies. And I love Star Wars, though the first film was made before I was born. Even though I was a teenager in the 90s, I do have a soft spot for the teen movies of the 80s (The Breakfast Club gets a periodic re-watch every few months). There is something in the tone of 80s teen movies that I really wanted to capture; I love that the good ones can take what are, on the surface, stock characters, and imbue them with personality and warmth and heart.
Or directors cut? There were a few! One of the bits I had to lose was the scene where Sam asks Allison to the dance. In the first draft, right before he asks her, he mentions that he sometimes tries to frame uncomfortable conversations as pieces of a screenplay – I had a lot of fun writing that ‘screenplay’ dialogue between them, but it really was superfluous to the plot so didn’t make the final draft. And because these characters were always nattering in my head, I have lots of half-finished scenes which were only ever intended to be for me, for the purposes of character building and fleshing out the time between chapters – for instance, at some point in the book, Sam mentions in passing that he spent a few hours on the phone with Camilla talking about the screenplay of Alien – I may have this conversation between them somewhere in my notes as well.
I’m still on a high after the announcement of all the awesome YA authors who are coming to the Reading Matters Conference in Melbourne from 30 May-1 June. Reading Matters is a conference that I’ve wanted to go to for years because they always have a great line-up of authors and everyone raves about it. I’m incredibly excited that I get to experience it this year, especially since the author line-up is totally awesome!
The very cool Adele Walsh and the rest of the wonderful team at the Centre for Youth Literature at the State Library of Victoria announced the first few guest authors late last year, including Myke Bartlett, Libba Bray, Gayle Forman and Alison Croggon. The rest of the authors were announced on Friday and they’re even more exciting because they include some of my favourite Aussie authors, including:
They’ve also got some great international authors coming too, including Keith Gray and Raina Telgemeier.
I can’t wait to hear all of these authors talk about their books and have my favourite books become even more special by having the author’s signature in them.
To find out more about Reading Matters, to book, and to view the full list of authors and their bios, check out http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/reading-matters.
Ever since I’d read that Melissa Keil would be the first author to be published as part of The Ampersand Project I was curious to read it. The goal of the project is to help debut YA authors get published. Life in Outer Space sounded wonderful and exactly my sort of book. I was lucky enough to get to read it back in December and I fell in love with it from the first line. I loved it so much that I’ve read it twice, and I loved it even more the second time around.
Sam Kinnison is a geek, and he’s totally fine with that. He has his horror movies, his nerdy friends, World of Warcraft – and until Princess Leia turns up in his bedroom, worry about girls he won’t. Then Camilla Carter arrives on the scene. She’s beautiful, friendly and completely irrelevant to his plan. Sam is determined to ignore her, except that Camilla has a plan of her own – and he seems to be a part of it! Sam believes that everything he needs to know he can learn from the movies. But perhaps he’s been watching the wrong ones.
I love absolutely everything about Life in Outer Space! It’s full of cool characters that you want to be friends with, great dialogue, pop culture references galore, and hilarious moments that will have you laughing out loud. Reading Life In Outer Space made me feel like I was at a comic book convention or a book conference, because I felt totally surrounded by people who were just like me.
Melissa’s characters feel totally real and you can imagine seeing them walking down the street or waiting outside the cinema to catch a movie. Sam’s voice is so authentic that I’m sure Melissa has a teenage boy trapped inside her. Sam is an incredibly likeable character, from his extensive knowledge of movies and his ability to relate them to real life, to his loyalty to his friends. He’s got a great sense of humour, but he’s also quite awkward. He says that ‘everything useful I do know about real life I know from movies,’ and I love the way that he proves this frequently throughout the book. All of the other characters stand out too, especially Sam’s friends. Adrian is the clown of the group, Mike is Sam’s gay best friend, Allison is their tom-boy female friend, and then there is Camilla. Camilla is the cool new girl who arrives at Sam’s school at the start of the story and quickly becomes part of his group of friends. She has an unusual name, a British accent, a tattoo, she’s from New York, she has a great smile, and she’s objectively attractive, all of which means she scores highly in Sam’s ‘mental social scorecard.’ Not only this, but she also knows a lot about movies and she wants to be friends with Sam. I found myself falling for Camilla and I just wanted Sam to hurry up and kiss her.
Melissa’s writing is witty, heartfelt and incredibly funny. I clicked with Sam straight away and I loved his point of view. I loved Melissa’s description of characters through Sam’s eyes, like this one of Sam’s dad,
“My father likes Harvey Norman, the Discovery Channel, and for some reason, lizards. He last smiled in 2008, which is one of the few things we have in common…My dad also looks like me – i.e. sort of like a storm-trooper. And not the cool Star Wars kind.”
The dialogue is witty and I had to put the book down a couple of times because I was laughing so hard at some of the conversations between Sam and his friends.
I loved all of the pop culture references in Life in Outer Space. I’m a huge movie geek so I loved all of the references to Sam and Camilla’s favourite movies and their debates about the merit of different movies. Everything from Superman and Star Wars to Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Night of the Living Dead gets a mention. Every time they would mention a movie I hadn’t seen I wanted to write it down so I could add it to my list of to-be-watched movies.
Life in Outer Space will make you think, feel, laugh and leave you wishing that Melissa’s characters were real.
5 out of 5
The theatre can wait. First there’s a mystery to solve, not to mention a world to save . . .
Kingsley Ward and Evadne Stephens are the Extraordinaires and they should be the toast of the town – but their juggling and escapology act is failing, and Kingsley is to blame. His wolfish side is breaking free, ruining performances and endangering those around him. The secret to controlling this wildness lies in his mysterious past. Was he really raised by wolves? Who were his parents? What happened to them?
The discovery of Kingsley’s father’s journal promises answers, but when it is stolen the Extraordinaires uncover ancient magic, a malign conspiracy, and a macabre plot to enslave all humanity. What begins as a quest to restore Kingsley’s past becomes an adventure that pits the Extraordinaires against forces that could shatter the minds and souls of millions.
I’m a huge fan of Michael Pryor. His Laws of Magic series was brilliant and his latest series, The Extraordinaires is set to be even better. I reviewed the first book in the series, The Extinction Gambit here on the blog and I’ve been eagerly awaiting the second book.
The Subterranean Stratagem is out 2 April from Random House Australia.
Sometimes a story can come along at exactly the right time. It can mirror something that is happening in your own life and really strike a chord with you. Back to Black Brick is a story about a grandfather who has Alzheimer’s Disease and his grandson, Cosmo, who tries everything he can to stop him losing his memory. My nan has early stage dementia so I can completely understand how Cosmo feels. Cosmo, however, does something that I can’t do – he travels back in time to meet his grandfather as a young man.
Cosmo’s brother Brian died when he was ten years old. His mum hides her grief and Cosmo lives with his grandparents. They’ve been carefree days as Granddad buys him a horse called John and teaches him all he knows about horses. But the good times have to come to an end and although he doesn’t want to admit it, Cosmo knows his Granddad is losing his mind. So on one of the rare occasions when Granddad seems to recognise him, Cosmo is bemused that he gives him a key to Blackbrick Abbey and urges him to go there. Cosmo shrugs it off, but gradually Blackbrick draws him in… Cosmo arrives there, scared and lonely, and is dropped off at the crumbling gates of a huge house. As he goes in, the gates close, and when he turns to look, they’re rusty and padlocked as if they haven’t been opened in years. Cosmo finds himself face to face with his grandfather as a young man, and questions begin to form in his mind: can Cosmo change the course of his family’s future?
Back to Black Brick is a captivating story about families, the secrets that they keep, and the pain they hold inside. Sarah Moore Fitzgerald wraps this all up with plenty of mystery, a dash of history, and time travel. It’s a time-slip story but quite different from similar stories I’ve read. When time travel is involved the characters generally have to think about how their actions in the past will affect the future, but Cosmo does everything he can to try and change the future. He wants to try and stop his grandfather’s memory from fading when he’s older, so he tells him about things that he’ll need to remember for later in life.
As soon as I heard Cosmo’s voice I knew I would really like this character. Cosmo is a loner who has been affected by the death of his brother, the abandonment of his mother, and his grandfather’s worsening condition. From the first few paragraphs you know how much Cosmo loves and admires his grandfather. He wants to do everything he possibly can to help stop his grandfather losing his memory and would hate for him to have to go into a home. So when Cosmo gets the chance to meet his grandfather as a young man he believes this is his chance to change the future and make things right.
There were several things that I really loved about Back to Black Brick. I thought the characters were very well developed and you felt like you were part of their gang. I especially liked the way that you could see the personality traits mirrored in both the young and old version of Cosmo’s grandfather, Kevin (like the ‘Ah, fantastic’ when he’d drink tea). The other thing that I loved about the story is the way that Sarah explains how the time travel happened and the way that Cosmo’s visit to the past affected the future. I like the way that this explanation rounds off the story but still leaves you with a sense of mystery.
4 out of 5 stars
My Best Friends Are Books 