Unsearchable RichesChristian. Veg*n. Writer. Wife.

Richard Stearns is the president of World Vision, the organization through which I sponsored a young girl in the DR until I was fired.

I feel bad for stopping my sponsorship; where’s my faith? This is a hard book to read. It asks hard questions, and paints two equally miserable pictures: that of the poor and defenseless, which most Christians are desensitized to as we are bombarded with stories and photographs of their struggle, and a more chilling problem, the apathy that this desensitization has lead to, especially within the church.

What astounded me was not the plight the world faces. Satan is real, and he is in the world. It was the potential that could be done if Christians would wake up and do something. My ‘power word,’ or motto, for the past few years has been ‘believe,’ which is a great word. This year, I decided ‘do’ would be the word. Now I’m painfully aware of how little I am active in meaningful ways. The money that could be raised if regular church attenders all tithed boggles my mind.

But it can’t stop there. Churches have turned their faces from the pain outside their doors. It’s not intentional. Someone has to minister to believers, wouldn’t it be the Church? But something like 98% of a church’s resources are recycled internally. The book spends a lot of time plaining the problems of the poor, but it’s the problem with the church that made me weep.

I see myself in that problem, and the challenge now is to figure out how to become active. This is a hard book not because of what it says, but what it requires. You cannot avoid a response. I need to figure out what mine will be.

Technically speaking, the book does a nice job of laying out the materials. It opens with Stearns’s personal story, which is our ‘way in’ to the problem. In the middle, he acknowledges that statistics can be numbing, but proceeds to rely heavily on them. Conversely, too many stories of plights - there are so many - can have the opposite effect; we can feel manipulated and be turned of. The balance is a hard one to walk, but the book does its best. And while each chapter builds on each other, the recap is concise. You could open to any chapter, and read only one, and come away with enough to act, though I recommend getting the whole picture.

I waited a long time for this book. It seems from the moment Diana said ‘killer unicorns’ on her blog, time slowed down. Then, the gorgeous cover. It was all too much. I pre-ordered it (I never do that except with, say, Joss Jackson’s latest) so I could gobble it up as soon as I got home from Kentucky.

I didn’t gobble. I took a couple bites, rolled them around, and then ate the rest at my leisure. Don’t get my wrong, I enjoyed the book. But it had some hurdles.

First, the opening of the book. I don’t know why, and I’m sure it’s just me, but the first chunk of the book almost felt like a parody of itself. I have no good reason to think this. I just had that feeling as I read it. It wasn’t tongue-in-cheek. I think it’s because the character is smarmy about the unicorns herself and disbelieving and blech about it, and I think I was just sort of channeling Astrid’s feelings about it. I’m not sure; I just know I was a bit dismayed by it. (The cutesy chapter titles did not help this. They were vaguely amusing but to me just contributed to my sense of mocking, which I know wasn’t Diana’s intent.)

Also, it was slow. Till the girls assemble at the cloisters, you’re a good ways into the book. Diana writes well so it’s not too bothersome, and most people probably wouldn’t care, but I was thinking, can we get on with it?

I had trouble telling the other hunters apart. When we first meet them, we get enough of a sketch, but then things happen and I’m left thinking, wait, which one was that? I had NO CLUE unless it was Astrid, Cory, or Phil. (BTW, I LOVED Cory. Loved her, I tell you.)

Once we got moving, the story was great. I liked the plot, the action and the intrigue (if you can call it that) were dispersed nicely. I don’t know about you, but when I see a middle-aged, trim, dour WASPy man who runs a big ole company, my first thought, thank you entertainment media, is BAD GUY. Diana didn’t have a lot hiding on that reveal, but how she exploits it is really fun.

As Astrid comes to terms with the unicorns and her scientist-fighter dichotomy, the teasing quality went away. We had theme going on; it’s hard to be mocky at that point. So, was my not-taking-this-seriously feeling imagined, or should I give major props to Diana for immersing me in Astrid’s feelings? She is apparently very good at that, and works hard on it, so I’m fairly sure that it’s the latter, even if it worked against her a bit.

This is the best YA I’ve read since Laurie Halse Anderson’s Wintergirls. And since a while before that.

I am this book’s perfect reader. A love of Shakespeare, knowledge of the theatre, a love of fairies and pirates, and a lifelong desire to dye my hair COBALT BLUE. Clearly, Beatrice Shakespeare Smith is my literary kindred spirit. There is that accidental-trouble thing going on, too.

The book is purely delightful. The characters are all larger-than-life, though I admit to getting the three boy fairies (the little ones) confused with each other. The plotting is first rate, you can chart out the rising incidents, and each chapter ends with the stakes firmly higher than they were. The emotional conflicts deepen apace. And the end is, simply put, perfect, because it’s a reversal of what Bertie thought she needed in the beginning. And there’s the where-do-I-belong theme that is one of my favorites.

Books like this are why I read YA and why I try (and fail) to write it. I’m TRYING to think of a complaint. I mean, no book is perfect. Okay, the tango scene, which is the book’s editor’s favorite scene according to an interview, did nothing for me. I appreciated it MORE for the scene that followed with Nate. But, then, I am probably one of the few readers not caught in Ariel’s web.

TEAMNATE forever and ever. How can you NOT prefer him over that silly ulterior-motive laden fairy? And besides. Fairy. I’ll take a nice stubbly pirate any day. (Not least of which because when he forgets to shave, Toady works his pirate groove really well. So much so I fear to let him near a dock.)

PERCHANCE TO DREAM, the second book in the Theatre Illuminata series, debuts May 2010. (Is yours pre-ordered yet? Mine is.) I’ll be giving away a copy of ELS at the beginning of the month so you can see what the fuss is all about. I loved it that much, I’m sharing. But no, not my copy. That one’s going on the keeper shelf.

I intended to review more books than I did last year, so I’ll be doing some short reviews to catch up a bit. Also, if you check out my booklist page, you’ll find a list of what I’ve read with a link to its review where applicable.

TRICK OF THE LIGHT was won on Marjorie Liu’s blog and sent to me by the author. I have heard a TON of good things about Thurman’s other series, and great things about this first book in a new series, including its twist at the end.

The book reminded me a LOT of Lilith Saintcrow’s Kismet series, so if you like that (as I do), you should like this. Heaven and Hell interplay, a smart-mouth, kick-butt heroine, tension, action. The mythology is fun, sometimes head-scratching (to a Christian). The plot unfolds at break-neck speed (which I always appreciate), and the characters are all nicely developed.

The plot centers around a McGuffin on which the fate of the world rests (don’t they all?). What I like is that Trixa, the protagonist, never pretends she’s some good guy working to save the world. She’s upfront about her agenda and her willingness to play ball with anybody.

My gripe is the hype. (see what I did there? I’m rolling my OWN eyes at it.) It was a fun, contemp fantasy read. To me it didn’t totally demolish genre strongholds (in fact, as mentioned, it snugly fit into most of them). It didn’t make me weep in its profound commentary on anything (and yes, sometimes fun contemp fantasy reads can do that to me). So what was so great about it that the entire blogosphere was buzzing?

Oh, right, the twist at the end. I’m not tooting my own horn, but I saw it coming. There are a billion clues that virtually scream it, not least of which involve names and titles. (This assumes you are a big nerd like me and know something about mythology.) I was more surprised about Griffin and Zeke.

Another nitpick is that, dang, Trixa repeats herself a lot! Since it’s first person you can get away with more rambling than you can in other POV’s (in my experience) as it gives it that personal feel, but if she told me ONE. MORE. TIME. how Zeke is the way he is, I was going to steal the darn Light of Life myself and blast her with it. Thurman does an adequate job of showing, so all that telling grated me for its lack of necessity, and then grated me more with its redundancy.

My favorite character was Leo. Just a tidbit.

Overall opinion of this book is that it’s fun, quick, worth checking out if you like the genre at all. And you’ll love the twist at the end. You will. I loved it even though I saw it coming. It was satisfying to see it play out!

Full disclosure: I won this book from Lynn in a contest; she is one of my favorite peeps on the interwebs. Some of the best writing advice going over at her blog.

I’ll be honest. This was not my favorite book. I’m a moderate sci-fi fan, but I wanted to read this one because it’s Lynn’s and it sounded interesting, and it was. Lynn knows her stuff, even if this book just celebrated its 10th anniversary and was her first published novel.

400p is not that bad, especially for a sci-fi novel. But to me it had three separate parts, the ‘hello! let me show you around all this cool alien future world stuff!’ which put me half to sleep, not because it wasn’t fun or well-thought out, but because that sort of thing always near puts me to sleep. The chapter where we meet Ana, for instance, was a struggle for me, even with the banter.

The second section was the majority of the book, the oh, here’s the story part. I enjoyed it. I loved the medical stuff, the Core, the who’s going to bite it and who’s not, what do we do?! Great suspense, the characters take on real shape for me here. I enjoyed this part a lot.

But the book wasn’t over when that was. I know a lot of the stuff I’m griping about here is in part because it is the first book in a ten-book series. There’s a lot to lay out. But the third section reminded me of recent movies, where you think it’s over, and then, bam! no! and then, you think it’s over, and then, bam! no! I had to check when it DID end that there really weren’t more pages hiding. This effect made the ending it did have, well, OBVIOUSLY anti-climactic, but somewhat trite.

I had two other problems, Duncan Reever and Cherijo. Due to it being an already complete series (the last one comes out in August), I know certain things about Reever’s role in the future books, so it was sort of disconcerting to me to find out he starts completely on the opposite side of where in my head he ought to be. Also, there is one scene, and anyone who has read the book knows which one, that made me uncomfortable because in the rest of the book, I don’t think it was clarified well enough, from Cherijo’s perspective, of what and how and WHY that scene was, and it sort of makes me curious how Reever does end up where he does in the series and how Cherijo works through it.

My problem with Cherijo is that she’s kind of Mary Sue. Given her background, that’s almost unavoidable, but then, she is a fictional character and I know Lynn does character sheets and all that; she’s not the most organic of writers, so to me it is unavoidable. All the characters love her or hate her, and Rogan’s particularly ridiculous reactions to her made my eyes roll. On the flip, the Jorenians’ total acceptance based on Kao seemed equally ridiculous, even if their culture makes it sensible.

Now that I’ve griped, what did I love? There was a lot to love! And let’s be honest, I was harder on this book than I am on others because Lynn’s blog is what encouraged me to keep writing as many as five years ago, and I consider her somewhat mentory in that she answers my emails when she can *G* So yes, I nitpicked a little.

The worldbuilding is, as per Lynn’s usual, AMAZING. Frankly, to me this is Lynn’s strongest suit as a writer. I’d read her stuff just to see what she can come up with. The different species, K2, the moon, all of it is well built. The medical stuff is authentic and compelling. The plot is nearly seamless (that ONE scene! argh). My favorite thing, however, is its commentary on humans and our prejudices, prides, attitudes (particularly Americans). It’s not whumping on the head, but due to the world of the book, it’s unavoidable.

I am interested in reading the next book, Beyond Varallan, because I’m interested in a lot of loose ends - what’s really going on with Maggie, what’s really Cherijo’s deal, and, okay, I’ll admit it. I want to know how Duncan Reever ends up where he does. I do. So maybe that one wasn’t a bad thing. Also because I think Cherijo’s character gets ironed out (did I mention this was a ‘first’ novel?) and even if the book is episodically spotty, each section was cool on its own, and it did all flow together well. I just snooze during intro stuff. It’s me, not the book. (The one thing I really could care less about? Joseph Grey Veil and whatever he’s up to. As far as villains go, he isn’t very compelling. But he didn’t need to be in this one.)

So, sure, I have complaints. But it makes me want to read the next book, so I’d say mission accomplished, no?