A Discovery of Witches - Deborah Harkness

Deep in the heart of Oxford’s Bodleian Library, Diana Bishop – a young scholar and the descendant of witches – unearths an enchanted alchemical manuscript.  Wanting nothing to do with sorcery, she banishes the book to the stacks.  But her discovery has set a fantastical underworld stirring, and soon a horde of daemons, witches, and other creatures descends upon the library.  Among them is the enigmatic Matthew Clairmont, a vampire with a keen interest in the book.  Equal parts history and magic, romance and suspense, A Discovery of Witches is a mesmerizing and addictive tale of passion and obsession that reveals the closely guarded secrets of an enchanted world.  (Back cover)

I’m on a short vacation right now, so I chose to read something very light and escapist.  I don’t want to think about anything too deeply, and this book fit.  I’m a big fan of magic in fantasy literature, so I found this interesting enough.  Another thing that I liked about it was that it dealt a lot with books and libraries.  Magic, books, and libraries – a winning combination. 

Although the book is a hefty 718 pages (mass market paperback), the back cover says about all it actually is.  The heroine, Diana, has been living in denial and suppressing her powerful magical abilities since a very young age.  She turns to the world of academia where she feels that she can accomplish much without needing to use any magic.  But she can’t escape her true nature.  So one day, she finds her hands on an enchanted manuscript.  She didn’t know, however, that for centuries all sorts of creatures have been searching for this tome, having each their own desperate agenda relating to it.  So when she opens the book, other creatures felt its magic as well and soon Diana is being hounded by other witches, daemons, and vampires.  And of course, once a vampire enters the picture, we all know how everything will turn out.  Yep, they fall in love.  Surprise, surprise. 

Matthew Clairmont is your average fantasy vampire.  Around and about him the author uses words like enigmatic, magnetic, tall, dark, mysterious, princely, knight-in-shining-armour, and the like.  You get the drift.  This vampire turns out to be scientist, too.  He is very curious about the genetics behind the different creatures out there – humans, vampires, witches, daemons, etc.  Turns out that the book Diana found may hold the key to his search for the answers he wants.  But of course, there’s a whole lot more they have to deal with.  Suddenly Diana is in terrible danger and Matthew then plays the role of protector.  As their relationship progresses, they find that a lot of things stand in the way of their romance.  Matthew carries a whole lot of history with him – 1500 years of it, to be exact.  Diana has to deal with that.  Then a long-ago covenant made between vampires, daemons, and witches actually forbids inter-species fraternization.  Add to that Diana’s raw magical power spilling out of her uncontrollably, coupled with a troubled past that she has yet to resolve.   So our pair has quite a lot on their supernatural hands. 

What made the book as long as 718 pages?  It was something pretty likeable and interesting, actually.  History, literature, and science.  Since the two protagonists are both scholars, and one of them apparently lived through all 1500 years of history, you get a crash course in those three fields of interest as you follow their tale of “the two of us against the world.”   Although the plot is basic and predictable, I did enjoy going through the crash course.  After all, you’d never get your genetics, physics and chemistry, literature, and history classes spiced up by romance, adventure, and suspense in a university course.  There’s an idea.  Why not throw in a magnetic, brooding vampire and a captivating, intelligent witch into a microbiology lecture?  I’m sure fewer students would be falling asleep as the professor drones on. 

So did I enjoy the book?  Yes.  It fit what I was looking for at the time.  I finished it in two days – all 718 pages of it.  Like I said, it’s light and doesn’t really require much of deep thinking.  You just sit back, imagine yourself in the wonderful world of Oxford, or a medieval castle in France, or surrounded by spectacular books in a great old library.  And oh, don’t forget to imagine yourself surrounded by unnaturally gorgeous peoples.  There.  Plus, I enjoyed the scholarly parts of the story, too.  I tend to read very fast when I’m actually having fun with the book.  So if you think all that’s appealing, then try the book and I hope you enjoy.   

The Red Necklace and The Silver Blade - Sally Gardner

The winds of change are blowing through Paris in the winter of 1789, both for France and for our hero, a striking and mysterious Gypsy boy named Yann Margoza.  He was born with a gift for knowing what people are thinking and an uncanny ability to throw his voice, and he has been using those skills while working for a rather foolish magician.  That work will soon end, however, and on the night of the magician’s final performance, Yann’s life will truly begin.  That’s the night he meets shy Sido, an heiress with a cold-hearted father, a young girl who has only known loneliness until now.  Though they have the shortest of conversations, an attachment is born that will influence both their paths.

And what paths those will be!  While Revolution is afoot in France, Sido is being used as the pawn of a fearful villain who goes by the name Count Kalliovski.  Some have instead called him the devil, and only Yann, for Sido’s sake, will dare oppose him. (Book jacket, “The Red Necklace”)

As the French Revolution descends into nightmare, Yann Margoza, a mysterious and extraordinary practitioner of magic, uses his skills to confound his enemies and help spirit refugees out of France.  If he fails, their fates lie under the blade of the guillotine.  But the question of Yann’s true identity and the kidnapping of his true love, Sido, expose him to dangers that threaten to destroy him.  With Paris on the verge of collapse, Yann must summon all his strength and courage to rescue his beloved Sido and outwit the devil’s own – this time for good. (Book jacket, “The Silver Blade”)

Strongly reminiscent of two other of my favorite books (The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy and The Fallen Angels by Susannah Kells), I immediately fell in love with these two books.  What strange serendipity that all three stories happen to be set in the French Revolution and all three are stories of adventure, intrigue and heroism with a generous touch of romance.  I guess I am a sucker for this kind of story.  The main distinction that differentiates Gardner’s books from Baroness Orczy’s and Kells’ books is that they are geared towards a young adult audience.  Compared to “Pimpernel” and “Fallen Angels” these two are quite light, easy, and fantastical.  There was no element of the magical/supernatural in either “Pimpernel” or “Fallen Angels” (just the most thrilling sly and ingenious cleverness and wit) whereas Gardner’s books held a healthy dose of magic.  In fact, there was a scene in The Silver Blade that I felt bordered on the awkward and incongruous (I won’t relate it here, for fear of giving spoilers), but I enjoyed the story so much that I didn't mind a little deus ex machina.  Why is it so rare to find stories like these nowadays?  I thank the gods that I managed to stumble upon these books at a book sale – there they lay in a random pile of pitiful-looking marked-down books and when I saw them, I didn't even think twice.  They were practically calling out my name.  It was fate, definitely fate – and I only paid a seventh of the original price for them!  Fabulous.

What I liked most about these two books is that although the plot centers on the love story between Yann and Sido, it does not detract attention from the deeper underlying themes that pervade the setting of the tale.  The French Revolution was a brutal episode in human history.  It began with noble ideals – equality, fairness, justice, liberty, and so many other lofty dreams – but all too quickly deteriorated into a violent bloodbath where neither the guilty nor the innocent were spared of the lash of human greed and conceit.  Yann suffered the dilemma of his role as a ghostly, magical rescuer colliding with his longing to be free of the blood-covered Hell that Paris had become and simply be together with Sido.  Added into the mix was the fact that he had to confront the monsters of his own personal history, the origin of his strange abilities, and the fearful enemy that threatened him and all those he loved. I appreciated that the hero of this story was portrayed in such a way as to be cognizant enough of the meaning of responsibility and mindful of the consequences of selfishness – especially since this tale was meant for a young adult audience.   Heavens know that young people (everyone, in fact, not just the young) nowadays need to learn that particular lesson among many others.   I also liked the fact that Sido was not satisfied with being a prettified doll sitting in the lap of luxury and wealth, that she managed to overcome her imperfections and didn't settle with being a typecast figure.  Her character clearly showed that wealth and luxury can be as stifling and restricting as any other prison, and she chose not to let herself be held by those opulent bindings. 

While these books are apparently romance-themed, I appreciated the fact that more than being about romance, they dwelt heavily on adventure and heroism, about taking risks and making excruciating decisions and sacrifices.  The plot was quickly paced and exciting – not a dull moment.  It carried you through the characters’ fears, frustrations, dangers, and joys.  You could witness the unfolding of events of one of the most crucial times of history as you followed their tale.  Just wonderful.  I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to read a well-told tale, and who wants to savor the closing of a book with a full head and a full heart. 

Please also read The Scarlet Pimpernel and The Fallen Angels if you come across them.  Enjoy! 

Click here for Sally Gardner's website.

Hakuouki: Shinsengumi Kitan 2010

Having a hankering for something historical, I decided to give this series a try.  It aired in 2010, and consisted of twenty two episodes.  Samurai drama, a hint of fantasy, wartime Japan, and the indomitable Japanese fighting spirit comprise the series’ main themes.  It first came out as a video game, but soon had an anime series, manga series, and feature films.

The story revolves around Chizuru, the daughter of a western-trained doctor who abandoned her.  As she travels from Edo to Kyoto in search of her father, she is assaulted by monstrous vampire-like soldiers and is saved by members of the Shinsengumi (Kyoto's police force).  It just so happens that the Shinsengumi are also on the hunt for her father, so they keep her with them.  Chizuru then begins to get to know the members of the group and soon becomes unwilling to separate.  She also discovers that her father created an “elixir” that was designed to create a superior soldier for the Shinsengumi.  This elixir’s formulation is based on the blood of a special race they called oni who possess extraordinary abilities such as rapid healing and heightened fighting prowess.  However, the elixir was a failure – whoever ingested it turned into uncontrollable blood-lusting monsters called Rasetsu.  The Shinsengumi needed to find Chizuru’s father to get him to make an antidote or to improve on the said elixir. 

Perhaps the best thing I could say about the series is that the events were pretty much historically accurate.  The series was set during the time when the Shinsengumi is drawn into the shogunate’s efforts to ward off the impending dominance of a new government and western culture.  I liked how it showed the despair of the soldiers as they watched the slow but inevitable death of the samurai culture – swords give way to guns, and so on.   The series focused more on this theme rather than on the more fantastic aspect of the story, i.e., their battles against the oni and the Rasetsu.  I’m also pretty thankful that they didn’t give the story any corny romantic “harem” angle even though it was the story of a young girl surrounded by incredibly handsome young men who are likely to fall all over themselves falling in love with her.  No such thing – what a relief.  And it also had an appropriately moving and tragic ending.  Well, given the fact that it is about war and a dying culture, it would have been pretty unlikely that nobody would die.  Good thing it didn't have a cheesy happily ever after ending – it gave the whole thing more credibility. 

The art was good and clean but I wouldn't call unique or remarkable.  The pace and plot development of the story was good, and the characters were interesting, if a bit underdeveloped.  I wasn't bored, but I wasn't on the edge of my seat wondering what would happen next, either.  I appreciated the series, but wouldn't say it’s among the best I've seen.  Still, you might want to give it a try.  

More information on Hakuouki: Shinsengumi Kitan

Nation - Terry Pratchett

I don’t even know how or where to begin.  This is seriously one of the best books I’ve ever read in my life.  Thank all the gods that I was born at such a time that I am able to read this story.  Terry Pratchett is just… well, there are no words.   This novel is quite the departure from the other ones he wrote.  Although it does have his signature humor and irony, this story is so much more emotional, deep, and thought-provoking.  I loved every word.

“Nation” is set in an alternate world, but quite similar to ours in many ways.  They have kings, princesses, pirates, bureaucrats, island tribes, and even seriously vicious harridans of grandmothers.  I imagine the story happened during a time comparable to the heyday of Christopher Columbus or Ferdinand Magellan, where the European nations were clamoring for claim on “newly discovered” lands, and the sciences were turning the “civilized world” on its ear with its new logic and new discoveries. 

On one of the obscure little islands in the middle of the Great Pelagic Ocean, a boy named Mau was about to row a canoe back to his home island, having completed the trials he needed to pass to qualify for manhood.  At the same time, a girl named Ermintrude (139^th in line to the throne) was aboard a ship called The Sweet Judy.  Then the great wave struck.  Mau’s entire village – including all the island’s dwellers – was wiped out.  It also brought The Sweet Judy crashing onto Mau’s island.  It left Mau and Ermintrude the only two people alive. 

Thus begins a story of survival, friendship, family, respect, politics, religion, and science.  Oh, yes.  I don’t know how Sir Pratchett managed it, but he definitely put all of that into one incredibly enlightening novel for young adult readers.  The book deserves every award and acclaim it got, and it ought to get more.  Every human being should read this book.

I loved all the characters.  Of course, Mau and Daphne (Ermintrude – the book explains how it changed) were my favorites, but you get to love them because their characters developed through their interactions with each other and with the rest of the cast – they learned and they grew because they were not alone.  Mau’s strength and determination was admirable, but I love him just as much for his doubts, his insecurities and uncertainties.  Daphne was just as impressive in her own way.  I love how easily she was able to adapt and let go of her stiff, elitist upbringing because of her open-mindedness and cleverness.  There ought to be more characters like her – young ladies who actually think and act, rather than moon over boys all day.  Even the villains were perfectly villainous – First Mate Cox and Grandmother.  One of my favorite scenes was when Daphne’s father finally gave Grandmother what was coming to her.  I wanted to applaud and cheer and maybe do a cartwheel if I could. 

One of the most striking aspects of this novel for me is that it questions god and religion at the same time that it questions science.  As Mau struggles to cope with the grief of losing his entire family he questions the gods that his race has worshipped since time immemorial.  Even as the voice of his ancestors clamor and scream in his mind, he resists, rebels, and tries his best to reconstruct the history of his people, and piece together the reason behind the existence and the demise of the only life he had ever known.  In the meantime, Daphne grapples with the contradictions she encounters as she tries to survive in a world so vastly different from her own – trying to find a resolution between what she knows to be logical and scientific and what is mystical and spiritual.  How does she rationalize the voices in her own mind, teaching her and guiding her?  There was so much she needed to learn, and she needed to find her own place in a world where she is an alien, a ghost – despised and feared.   For me, more than any other book about religious belief and faith, this book has so much more to learn from.  When much is taken, something is returned.  Isn’t that the central tenet to every religion?  Karma, Do unto others, etc., etc.  Even science itself – For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction (Newton).  Where can we draw the lines between god and magic, magic and science, god and science?  Aren’t they all different words for the same thing?  Seems like it to me.

The ending was – well, I don’t want to spoil it for you.  I thought it was appropriate, given the circumstances.  Let’s just say that many things went well, and there was plenty of hopefulness to go around, which is always a good thing.  I wish more people will get to read this wonderful book.  We all deserve to learn from it.  

A Great and Terrible Beauty - Libba Bray

I found this book at a used-book store, which is kind of regrettable in a way.  That’s because at that time, I wasn’t aware that it was the first of a trilogy of books, and the other two of the series were nowhere to be seen then.  If I knew it then, I would not have bought this book – because it’s excruciating to think that I might not be able to find the other two anytime soon!  This was such a good read, and the ending, though it did provide enough resolution, left me sorely hanging and hoping against hope that I might find the other two in the series just as cheaply someday.  Searching for them at used-book stores would be similar to the proverbial needle in a haystack.

(You must understand: new books here in my country do not come cheap, and only the very rich have the luxury to put in special orders and such.  Having books readily available to you at any time is as much a dream for a lot of people as is, let’s say, winning the lottery.)

The story is set in Victorian times and centers on Gemma Doyle, a 16-year-old English girl who was born and raised in India.  Her mother refuses to let her go to London to have a “season” but doesn’t give any good reason for her refusal either.  Now Gemma, being too headstrong and stubborn for a Victorian girl, argues openly with her mother and runs away from her and into an Indian marketplace.  As she roams around lost, a vision comes to her – she sees her mother’s suicide – a choice to take her own life rather than end up a victim to a monstrous, dark and malevolent creature.  As Gemma recovers from her vision, she finds that it was not just a dream.  Her mother’s death marks the beginning of her “adventures” as she finally is sent to a finishing school in England, makes new friends and enemies, begins to discover the range of hidden ability she possesses, and uncovers more and more of the horrible truths that her mother tried so hard to hide from her.

I loved the character development the most.  Each of the characters’ personalities was revealed subtly, gradually, and they were all portrayed in such a way that no one was a stereotype, or a flat character.  And you felt that such people could have really existed in such a time and place, and still do exist even now.  The characters were the zeitgeist of their era, facing the conflicts that the times presented, and their interactions with each other and with their environment, their struggles with the demands and “norms” of the society that they lived in, molded them and made them distinct, recognizable, and believable.  Gemma, is of course, central to the story.  She is depicted as a girl who rejects the stifling standards set for girls during those times when girls are meant to be groomed to be wives to the wealthiest husband they could manage to catch.  She even entertains an attraction to the mysterious Indian boy who has an important connection to the inexplicable things that are happening around her – unthinkable in Victorian England!

The novel plays on themes of friendship, bullying, feminism, coming-of-age, the first stirrings of sexual awareness, and the repressive and elitist standards of society in general.  These universal themes give the whole story the feeling of timelessness, no matter that it may be set in a time and place long gone. 

The pacing of the novel was also well-rendered – nothing had been revealed too quickly or too slowly. It will carry you on a sustained eagerness to know what happens next until the very last page.  I also very much appreciated the author’s ability to create good imagery.  You could almost see the somber faces of the girls in the annual class pictures, could almost hear the susurration of corset and crinoline, could almost smell the candle smoke.  Add to that a heavy dose of magic, murder mysteries, and alternate realms, and you have a winner of a book.

I highly recommend this book to everyone but most especially to teen-age girls.  They should be reading such rich and relevant material and not the current trend of popular literature that could only be best described as vapid and shallow.  This book is well-worth reading, and I can only hope I can manage to find the two others in the series, “Rebel Angels” and “The Sweet Far Thing.”  Check it out: http://www.randomhouse.com/teens/gemmadoyle/