Review: The Traitor's Kiss

I received a free copy of this book through the Goodreads First Reads program. While I had originally hoped to be getting one with completed cover art - how could I not? It's gorgeous! - I unfortunately was met with a far more underwhelming gray ARC cover when I opened my package. Oh, well! It was still one of my more anticipated YA debuts of the year, so I was pretty excited to crack it open. 

While the end result was a lot more disappointing than I had anticipated, I'm still glad I gave this book a chance. Here's why!

The Traitor's Kiss, by debut author Erin Beaty, follows Sage Fowler, the rebellious ward of a prominent family. Bound by duty, they keep her on as a tutor, only to submit her to be judged by a nearby matchmaker when she turns sixteen. After her interview goes awry, she's enlisted instead as the matchmaker's apprentice, serving as a ledger keeper and judge of character for her preening charges. As the country prepares for the Concordium - a gathering in the capital in which wealthy brides will be matched with their future spouses - the army prepares for war, as unseen enemy raiding parties from nearby Kimisar are spotted in the forests. When Sage's world collides with that of a charismatic army soldier, enlisted in protecting the valuable entourage from harm's way, she must keep her background a secret, in order to stay as invisible as possible. However, she's not the only one keeping secrets.

It sounds like a lot of fun, right? It was! At least for the first half of the novel. While there was some troublesome YA tropes that arose early that the fast-paced plot couldn't shake, I was enjoying the way the story was flowing.

One of the most notably different aspects of the novel from others in its genre was the significance of army movements and military strategy within the narrative of the novel. Its inclusion was so remarkable, that I felt persuaded to look up whether the author had participated in military service... and she had! Beaty has a Navy background, and is very effective in translating this kind of tactical description to paper, and I was on board.

Still, even while only halfway through the novel, it was hard to really sink into what I was reading, without ruminating on some of the accusations other Goodreads reviews had been leveling at the novel long before I'd even gotten the chance to crack open the cover. From accusations of racism, whitewashing, and even anti-feminist characters, there was a lot of ground to cover in the critical reading of a YA novel.

Here's what I found: 

• While quite a few on Goodreads argue that it succumbs to the "dark skinned aggressor" trope, there are actually quite a few PoC within the main cast, including the primary love interest... it's just that the ways they're described are a little strange. Like, lots of references of how dark their skin/hair/eyes are, but not many mentions of any other notable aspects of their biological makeup. It did come off a bit as tokenism, but then again, there are plenty of YA novels that fulfill that generic qualification, too. However, the aggressors themselves are only partially fulfilling the cliche they're accused of: while the background army of antagonist characters are described as dark-skinned, the primary villain and his retinue are white. 
• The idea of whitewashing - or deliberately stripping uniquely culturally-referential stories of their ethnic roots - can 100% be chalked up to a tragic marketing job. Here's the root of it: in the original marketing copy, they list the book as a "Mulan retelling." Naturally, anyone who hears this, then gets a white main character, will be justifiably upset, being that the story of Mulan is firmly enmeshed within the Chinese cultural canon. The problem is, anyone who reads more than 50 pages will immediately find that it's not that kind of story. Nor is it "for fans of Jane Austen," as the revised Goodreads blurb might suggest, or even a "Jane Eyre retelling," as it's apparently been seen elsewhere. Overall, the whole thing just screams of a lazy marketing job, and as the authors are rarely responsible for the promotional material, I can't fault the story for the sins of its PR team. 
• The anti-feminist claim is a little trickier to handle, because of how obvious the purported "girl hate" was, as well. I think by this point, we're all a little tired of main characters making it so clear how they're "not like other girls," even though being like other girls isn't necessarily a bad thing at all, unless you write it that way. It sucks when you've created a cast of numerous female characters, and just coincidentally, not many of them manage to get along. And, of course, even our main character's beneficial qualities immediately fall to the wayside, once there's a hero involved. It's annoying that these are all such pervasive tropes of a genre that primarily caters to young women, and I don't think readers are wrong to ask that authors knock it off.

But even when you try to clear aside all of the controversy and enjoy the story for what it is, I still had some niggling doubts of my own, that were unfortunately exacerbated by a very disappointing third act, complete with its own insane handful of plot twists (Like, I'm talking Belzhar-levels of disappointment with those plot twists). And I feel vindicated by the fact that I'm clearly not the only one who thinks so: scroll through at least half of the reviews on Goodreads left by people who read the book, and you'll see that the majority agree that the book takes a significant plunge about halfway through. 

While it was a decent way to pass the time, and easy enough to overlook some of its more cringe-y conventions, I don't think I'll be recommending it to any of my friends or anything. It's probably the kind of book I would have liked a lot more back in middle school... but that was a decade ago. 

Final Verdict: Controversy has seemed to rob this book of a fighting debut author chance, but even with its fast pace, interesting world-building, and unique military focus, unfortunately, it's true downfall is a disappointing second half and overly-cliched main characters.

Have you ever been disappointed after judging a book by its cover? Do you look at Goodreads reviews before reading a novel? Let me know, in the comments below!

Review: Love Letters to the Dead

Can a recommendation from a non-blogger or YA amateur really yield effective and enthralling bookish results? Or will it be just another dud doorstop in the teen contemporary stack? 

It's always interesting to see recommendations from people who don't specialize in reading YA books. Doing so can yield fairly varying results: they'll say, "it's pretty good for its type," which means nothing, or they'll say, "It's a great guilty read!" in which case I'll most likely love it, but it is in no way a really great book. There are very few that truly mean they love a book when they say they don't usually love YA... and those few are usually indoctrinated John Green followers (God love you people, but damn).

But here's the part where I haven't learned my lesson yet: I thought I could trust Emma Watson's judgement when she tweeted about how much she enjoyed the novel Love Letters to the Dead, by Ava Dellaira, because she does actually have some experience in the field, having starred in notable teen hipster fave, Perks of Being a Wallflower. Additionally, since that same sense of approval was corroborated by some of my favorite book blogs, I even managed to put aside my natural tendency to stay as far away from contemporary as possible.

Unfortunately, I was disappointed, again. Darn it.

Love Letters to the Dead details the life Laurel, a teen girl on a new path after her sister's untimely death makes things too complicated at her old school. Told in an epistolary format, through the letters she writes to dead celebrities like Kurt Cobain, Amy Winehouse, and Amelia Earhart, the novel explores themes of self-discovery, young love, and coming to terms with grief, all leading to the grand revelation that Laurel might be keeping secrets even from the letters she can never send.

I'll shoot it to you straight: LLttD was the same kind of overly-saccharine, dramatized teen novel that I've come to associate with everything annoying about the teen contemporary genre. The narrator's seemingly relatable tone, is completely displaced with terrifyingly possible teenage experiences, that instead of granting the dignities those realities deserved, lost all nuance through their Lifetime Original Movie treatment.

Exploration of sexuality, sexual abuse, divorce, first loves and first times, romanticized alcoholism, death and grieving, drug use... pick one. Or two. At least not all of them. Every single one of these topics - some tropes, some too real, some which need to be explored in the contemporary genre further - were fit in to the novel at the severe expense of its reality.

Because of the somewhat direct approach to all this heavy subject matter, I wasn't surprised to see that one of the first names listed on the acknowledgement page, also highlighted in a blurb on the cover, was Stephen Chbosky himself. The things is, Perks of Being a Wallflower contains much of a similar tone to LLttD, but excels far better in the execution, because he chooses to focus more strongly on the voice of the narrator than the story the character is supposed to be telling, which makes it a lot more believable, and a lot less like an emotional circus.

The novel romanticizes the most extreme dramatics of youth with little-to-no real world ramifications. It has a happy ending, when for most people caught in those situations, there wouldn't be. It encourages the inflection of dangerous behaviors and mindsets into a confusing time, when there's really no need for that much self-destruction.

I can't tell whether this book was made FOR Tumblr, or from it. The entire thing screams for daisy chains and high waisted acid wash denim with a gauzy crop top and a pink-toned Insta filter. There's no way in hell my sister is getting her hands on this book. It would be of no benefit to her... I'd rather buy her another Rainbow Rowell instead.

Final Verdict: A rose-tinted, over-dramatized account of teenage experiences that are all too real and all too dangerous, but are inflicted without restraint and without comprehensive ramifications in a slapdash narrative. Would not recommend to any teenager.

Review: Jennifer, Gwyneth & Me

Alright, so this is a little bit of a late post... make that quite the late post. So I read this book during Recruitment way back when, and never got around to saying much about it. Mainly because I didn't have all that much to say. 

Who hasn't gazed into the glossy state of celebrity, as documented by tabloids, gossip blogs, magazines, and more, and not dreamed of being a member to that exclusive faction? I mean, even if you never outright admitted to yourself, "I wish I was a celebrity," there are celebrities you admire... for me, it's Kate Middleton, Mindy Kaling, Emma Watson, and Lauren Conrad, whom I all admire for various reasons. If I see them on Facebook's trending topics list, chances are I'm clicking over.

Well, in Jennifer, Gwyneth and Me, Rachel Bertsche takes celeb obsession to a new level... by crafting a lifestyle plan for her own edification, for the purposes of gaining greater insight into Hollywood talents, like Gwyneth's cooking, SJP's fashion sense, Jen and Ben's marriage, and Beyonce's, well, everything. Cue the shenanigans.

To be honest, I could probably take the easy route here, and pinpoint my dislike of this nonfiction account on the principle of disdain for a dangerous cultural practice - namely, star-stalking - but lets be real: the culture of celebrity is deeply entrenched in modern media. Like I mentioned earlier, I have a ready-and-available list of celebrities I admire, based strictly on the scant amounts of information I've been able to glean on their personalities from a very select source of a very biased, and often unhealthy, media.

We connect to celebrities, and use them as a source of self-projection, building up a sort of dependent relationship, where we consider them close to us, and yet, they don't know us at all. This can take a significant emotional toll on us individually, not to mention on the public consciousness: remember the immediate reaction when Robin Williams died?

(And it wasn't just him, for me: I distinctly remember my mother sitting me down six years ago, in 2008, to break the news to me that Heath Ledger had died. Even just a month and a half ago, I was in the middle of a quick lunch amidst Recruitment workshops, when I got the text from my sister, The Cheerleader, about Joan Rivers' death, with the accompanying sentiments, "I wanted to make sure you heard it from us first.")

However, my dislike for the nonfiction book stemmed more from the fact that I felt like the advice I was being given - detailing how to achieve the lifestyles of those I only read about in magazines - were things I HAD already read in the pages of magazines before. From work-out advice, to cooking tips, to figuring out how to balance work and, well, the rest of your life, the instruction was generic.

Overall, and I know this might sound a little crazy, I felt like the book would have been more successful in a blog format. The personal nature of some of her experiences - including her pregnancy struggle - would seem a lot more intimate and believable than out-of-place,  and the lifestyle plans would seem more easily replicable, as evidenced by their varying degrees of success/failure.

Mainly I feel like it just would have lent the narrative more veracity; sure, you can say that you changed for the better because of this new lifestyle plan, but without concrete information on how and why these things worked for you, your readership strictly relies upon your individual testament. Where are the recipes you enjoyed the most? What workouts were most worth your time? What sort of outfits did you come up with? These are the sorts of individual stories that would have made up a more cohesive overall narrative in the blog format.

Final Verdict: Accessible, but not interesting; Jennifer, Gwyneth and Me takes celeb culture into a slightly more realistic territory without making it something you can totally replicate, relying on generic lifestyle advice and a slight disconnect in the intimacy of the narrative for an overall work that doesn't really give that much of a glimpse into how the famous folk live.