A Tale of Two Impulse-Buy Reads (Double Book Review)

If my contemplation of the following reading experiences goes to show two things, they are 1) you never know when an impulse-bought book will knock the feet right out of from under you, and 2) you don’t have to be a hot psychotic man to infect me with empathy for your capital-“C” Crazy against all reason; it can work for psychotic girls, too.

Part One: My View through the Mountain Door

I picked this one up from the store’s shelf on a whim, because I had book money and this book’s cover was fetching and its premise was Greek mythological. As it turns out, it’s a take on mythology unlike any I’ve encountered before.

The Book: “The Door in the Mountain” by Caitlin Sweet.

Genre: YA Fantasy

Blurb: Lost in time, shrouded in dark myths of blood and magic, The Door in the Mountain leads to the world of ancient Crete: a place where a beautiful, bitter young princess named Ariadne schemes to imprison her godmarked half-brother deep in the heart of a mountain maze, where a boy named Icarus tries, and fails, to fly … and where a slave girl changes the paths of all their lives forever.

My Thoughts: So, wow. That happened. I hadn’t expected the ending to be so abrupt; hadn’t realized beforehand that it wasn’t the end at all – that “The Door in the Mountain” was only book one, with a sequel to follow. That surprise discovery left me reeling, but I’m glad there will be more. Though the story was strange and dark and often uncomfortable, I find that I am not all opposed to a continuation of the excruciating magic.

The idea of everyone (or, well, most everyone) being godmarked – born with special powers (blessings, curses, sometimes combinations of both) from the various deities – was an inventive touch, as were the recreations of such notorious folk as Icarus, the Minotaur, and others.

The royal family of Crete was all kinds of messed up, dancing drunkenly back and forth over the line between sympathetic and repulsive. I can’t even imagine what sort of twisted things they’ll get up to in the next book. I expect I shall stare in fascinated, cringing horror.

I didn’t fully understand the bond between Chara and Asterion – the enigmatic slave girl and the boy who was both prince and bull – but you know what? I’m okay with that. Loyal friendship is chosen, with or without reason beyond that one heart has determined to love the other. Princess Ariadne might have learned an important thing or two from them, rather than follow in her parents’ venomous footsteps.

The book’s over, and so help me, I wasn’t ready for it to be. You can be sure my eventual purchase of Book 2 will be more than random whim.

HSYRT? (Hey, Should You Read This?): Clearly, it left a mark on me, but you know yourselves better than I do. If what I’ve described sounds like a tale you’d like to experience, get thee to a purveyor of books!

<<<>>>

Part Two: So Good, Such Evil, Much Wow

This tale starts much as the one before. Same bookstore trip, gift card bucks to spend, another cover that called me, this time with a fairytale premise I could hardly resist. Thus did I soon enough find myself devouring the artistically edge-weathered pages of…

The Book: “The School for Good and Evil (#1)” by Soman Chainani.

Genre: Middle Grade Fantasy

Blurb: The first kidnappings happened two hundred years before. Some years it was two boys taken, some years two girls, sometimes one of each. But if at first the choices seemed random, soon the pattern became clear. One was always beautiful and good, the child every parent wanted as their own. The other was homely and odd, an outcast from birth. An opposing pair, plucked from youth and spirited away.

This year, best friends Sophie and Agatha are about to discover where all the lost children go: the fabled School for Good & Evil, where ordinary boys and girls are trained to be fairy tale heroes and villains. As the most beautiful girl in Gavaldon, Sophie has dreamed of being kidnapped into an enchanted world her whole life. With her pink dresses, glass slippers, and devotion to good deeds, she knows she’ll earn top marks at the School for Good and graduate a storybook princess. Meanwhile Agatha, with her shapeless black frocks, wicked pet cat, and dislike of nearly everyone, seems a natural fit for the School for Evil.

But when the two girls are swept into the Endless Woods, they find their fortunes reversed—Sophie’s dumped in the School for Evil to take Uglification, Death Curses, and Henchmen Training, while Agatha finds herself in the School For Good, thrust amongst handsome princes and fair maidens for classes in Princess Etiquette and Animal Communication.. But what if the mistake is actually the first clue to discovering who Sophie and Agatha really are…?

The School for Good & Evil is an epic journey into a dazzling new world, where the only way out of a fairy tale is to live through one.

My Thoughts: This one kind of left me breathless. You don’t go into a fairytale expecting it to surprise you; the genre’s biggest claim to fame, love it or leave it, is its overall predictability. But for every plot point I saw coming, there were a dozen others that twisted and writhed and looped around anything I might have guessed, causing me to question right along with the characters: Just who is actually Good/Evil here, anyway??

These characters, man. Talk about humanity! Dumb and clever, admirable and horrid… and that’s just Sophie, though the same description could easily apply to much of the rest of the cast! Chances are I’m talking particularly about Sophie, though, given that she might possibly be my favorite. She drove me crazy, but doggone it, I couldn’t help rooting for her to get her act together – partly for her own sake, and partly for Agatha’s, bless her irrationally loyal heart. Agatha may or may not tie for favorite.

I’m sure I’m neither the first nor the last to compare this duo to Glinda and Elphaba from the musical “Wicked”. Yeah, I know, it was a book first, but I couldn’t get past more than a few pages. So as far as my head canon is concerned, this is the “Wicked” novelization Gotham deserves.

HSYRT? (Hey, Should You Read This?): For anyone in the readersphere complaining that there aren’t enough stories out there centered around female friendships and helmed by dynamic antiheroines, this is a series starter I’m telling you to check out.

Such are my thoughts on the books. Have any of your own? Share below!

Between a Rock and a Hard Sky (Jack and the Genre-nauts, Act 8)

“Welcome, one and all,” says Will Scarlet, with a broad smile and a bow, “to Will & Allyn’s Interactive Theatre!”

“Every Saturday,” says Allyn-a-Dale, “Will and I and our friends from the story world of ‘The Outlaws of Avalon ’ trilogy—”

“Coming one of these days to a book retailer near you!”

“—Will take at random two of the suggestions gleaned from you, our gentle audience, and incorporate them into… well, the sort of tomfoolery Will calls entertainment.”

“So make yourselves comfortable,” says Will, “as we now present to you: ‘Between a Rock and a Hard Sky’!”

<<<>>>

[The curtain rises on a backdrop of a semi-distant mountain. Allyn-a-Dale as Jack Snow, along with Annabelle Gray and Sir Wilbur Lamb of INSPIRED, stride along the stage floor’s treadmill with all the haste of a team on a mission.]

Allyn/Jack [grumbling ]: Why couldn’t Hatter have had sense enough to not try to take the load of the sky from Loki?

Annabelle: Well, one, he didn’t exactly know it was Loki. And two, they don’t call the Hatter mad for nothing.

Sir Wilbur: There’s got to be someone we can find to free Hatter. A titan, a god… a demigod, even. Annabelle, you know the Greek myths best of us all. Where do you recommend we search?

Annabelle: We could try the garden of the Hesperides. As Atlas’s daughters, they might know where he is. Of course, there’d be the dragon to deal with.

Allyn/Jack: No more dragons! I had my fill of the creatures in Act 3.

Annabelle: Okay, what about Heracles? We could maybe get him to hoist the sky just long enough for Hatter to slip out from underneath. That is, if he’s not too busy laboring for King Eurystheus—

Will/Hatter[’s voice from offstage ]: Guys! Wait up!

[The treadmill comes to a stop, as do the players upon it. All three turn in surprise as Will Scarlet as the Mad Hatter jogs in behind them.]

Will/Hatter [panting ]: Finally. I’ve been chasing after you for a good twenty minutes!

Allyn/Jack: How did you get free??

Will/Hatter: Hmm? Oh, I remembered I had a couple Wonderland mushroom pieces in my pocket. One bite to make me big, another bite to shrink me back down to size faster than the sky could fall. I rolled out of the way a split second before I’d have been pinned again. Ta-da! Also: Atlas.

Sir Wilbur: He returned to the mountaintop?

Sure. Let’s pet that.

Will/Hatter: No, I mean I picked up an atlas of local attractions on the way down the mountain. [displays oversized scroll ] All sorts of neat tourist traps, ‘round here! Wanna hit up the Aegean Petting Zoo? They’ve got baby selkies all the way from Scottish mythology, not to mention the Minitaur!

Annabelle: Minotaur, dude. With an “o”.

Will/Hatter: No, Minitaur – like, a teeny-tiny bull-headed man. It’ll be adorable. Let’s go see! [runs offstage ]

Allyn/Jack [calling after him ]: And then the North Pole? Hatter?… [heavy sigh ] I’m never going home, am I?

Sir Wilbur [placing a hand on Allyn’s shoulder ]: We’ll see to it you get there in the end.

Annabelle: True that, Jack! We lately-named Genre-nauts are always there for our friends.

[The three walk off after Will, no sooner disappearing than the mountain backdrop begins to rise, revealing inch by inch the rocky double-ramp wall seen in the last act. And at the top ramp’s apex, struggling under the weighted curtain of the sky, is none other than Will Scarlet.]

Will/Hatter [shouting desperately ]: Guys! Don’t fall for it! He’s not me – I’m still trapped! IT’S LOKI, GUYYYS!

<<<>>>

“Aaaand SCENE!” says Will.

“Thank you to audience members Miranda McNeff and Kelton de la Cruz,” says Allyn, “for providing us with the inspiration ‘selkies’ and ‘Minitaur’.”

“If you enjoyed yourselves,” Will says, “(or if you didn’t, but you totally did, right?), don’t forget to leave suggestions for future productions in the comments! Words or phrases we’ve got to include, a prop to use, a prompt to run with… anything goes! ‘Til next time, friends: Will and Allyn out!”

A Trick of the Titan (Jack and the Genre-nauts, Act 7)

“Welcome, one and all,” says Will Scarlet, with a broad smile and a bow, “to Will & Allyn’s Interactive Theatre!”

“Every Saturday,” says Allyn-a-Dale, “Will and I and our friends from the story world of ‘The Outlaws of Avalon ’ trilogy—”

“Coming one of these days to a book retailer near you!”

“—Will take at random two of the suggestions gleaned from you, our gentle audience, and incorporate them into… well, the sort of tomfoolery Will calls entertainment.”

“So make yourselves comfortable,” says Will, “as we now present to you: ‘A Trick of the Titan’!”

<<<>>>

[The curtain rises on a rocky wall stretching all across the stage. At the wall’s mid-height, two ramps diverge – the one leading higher obscured with a hazy screen covered in faux-cloud fluff, the one leading lower being approached from the ground level by Allyn-a-Dale as Jack Snow, Will Scarlet as the Mad Hatter, and Annabelle Gray and Sir Wilbur Lamb repping for the characters of INSPIRED. At Scarlet’s insistence, everyone is wearing ancient Greek-style tunics, while he’s adorned his top hat with golden laurels.]

Annabelle [walking in the lead with Allyn ]: So. Jack Snow, chosen Santa Claus, huh?

Allyn/Jack: That’s right.

Annabelle: Chosen by whom? The Man in the Moon, like a “Rise of the Guardians” deal? Wait, you’re not any archetypal relation to Jack Frost, are you?

Allyn/Jack: Not to my knowledge. And I don’t know that anyone in particular chose me. It was simply my destiny.

Annabelle: Huh. I’d always thought of Santa Claus as a sort of primordial force; like Tom Bombadil.

Allyn/Jack: [gives Annabelle baffled look ]

Annabelle: How else do you explain him? As far as my headcanon’s concerned, Bombadil’s like the Santa of Middle Earth. Say, did I hear you guys have been to Middle Earth?

Will/Hatter: Of course we have. Where do you think we recycled this mountain set from? But eyes ever onward, Genre-nauts! We’re in Greek mythological territory, now. Where are we headed first, Navigator Gray?

Annabelle: I figured we’d check out Atlas.

Will/Hatter: Oh, we’re going to consult a map? How unpredictably practical.

Annabelle: Not an atlas. The Atlas – titan of astronomy, bearer of the sky! Also said to have taught human sailors the art of navigation, which would account for why we’ve named directional charts after him.

Sir Wilbur: Bearer of the sky? How does that work?

Annabelle: We’ll see at the top of the mountain. Going up!

[As the group ascends the lower ramp, the cloud screen slowly rises. By the time they reach the wall’s midpoint, it’s gone altogether, revealing Gant-o’-the-Lute at the upper ramp’s top, standing braced beneath a weighted curtain of all the skiest shades of blue.]

Sir Wilbur: The whole of the sky, borne up by that little fellow?? [calls ahead ] Pardon me, but is that as heavy as it looks?

Lute/Atlas [cheerfully ]: Oh, no. Far heavier. Give it a try?

Annabelle: Don’t do it, Wilbur! It’s a trap! He’ll try to escape!

Lute/Atlas: I’m not escaping, I’m showing off. Borrow my place, if you think yourself such a Hercules.

Will/Hatter: I’ll do it!

Annabelle [aghast ]: You’re mad!

Will/Hatter: I admire your grasp of the obvious. C’mon, Atlas, let’s trade off!

Lute/Atlas [eyes shining blue to gray to green in wicked amusement ]: As you will. [hefts the curtain up to the height of Will’s shoulders ] Ready?

Will/Hatter [stepping in beside Lute ]: Ready.

[When Lute dances aside, Will and the curtain promptly collapse.]

The Hatter wheezes, “It’s not as easy as some make it look.”

Allyn/Jack: Oh, no!

Sir Wilbur: Are you hurt?!

[Both rush forward to haul ineffectively at the curtain, which does not budge.]

Will/Hatter: Oof! [struggles ] How… [gasps ] do you even… [grunt ] This weight is impossible!

Lute/Atlas [laughing ]: Quite impossible, yes. But then, so am I! And I count it no burden to shoulder the sky, for I love it with all of my being.

Will/Hatter [panting hopefully ]: You’ll be eager to return to your post, then?

Lute/Atlas: Oh, I am most responsibly at my post, my darling dupe. I only agreed to hold up the sky for Atlas long enough to have my fun in finding a gullible replacement.

Annabelle: Wait – “hold up the sky for Atlas”? If you’re not Atlas, then who—??

Lute/??? [blowing Annabelle a kiss ]: Call me Loki. [vanishes behind the curtain of the sky ]

Annabelle [gaping, while the others continue straining to free Will from the weight of the sky, to no avail ]: That… is not Greek mythology.

<<<>>>

“Aaaand SCENE!” says Will.

“Thank you to audience members Chelsea de la Cruz and Beth de la Cruz,” says Allyn, “for providing us with the inspiration ‘Rise of the Guardians’ and ‘Bombadil’.”

“If you enjoyed yourselves,” Will says, “(or if you didn’t, but you totally did, right?), don’t forget to leave suggestions for future productions in the comments! Words or phrases we’ve got to include, a prop to use, a prompt to run with… anything goes! ‘Til next time, friends:  Will and Allyn out!”