Scarlet Reads

Eyes Like Stars - Lisa Mantchev

Eyes Like Stars - Lisa Mantchev 5/5

Blurb from FF -

All her world's a stage.

Bertie Shakespeare Smith is not an actress, yet she lives in a theatre. She's not an orphan, but she has no parents. She knows every part, but she has no lines of her own. That is, until now.

Enter Stage Right

NATE. Dashing pirate. Will do anything to protect Bertie.

COBWEB, MOTH, MUSTARD SEED, and PEASEBLOSSOM. Four tiny and incredibly annoying fairies. BERTIE'S sidekicks.

Ariel. Seductive air spirit and Bertie's weakness. The symbol of impending doom.

Bertie. Our heroine.

Welcome to the Theatre Illuminata, where the actors of every play ever written can be found behind the curtain. They were born to play their parts, and are bound to the Theatre by The Book - an ancient and magical tome of scripts. Bertie is not one of them, but they are her family - and she is about to lose them all and the only home she has ever known.

Not much to say except I love this! It's an original idea with some quirky plotlines - I love the occasional passage written as a script rather than prose. The writing sometimes seems a bit simplistic but it is YA. Bertie is a fantastic character, even down to her blue hair and is the star of the show so to speak. We start out with Bertie narrowly averting yet another disaster and being asked to leave the theatre where she has spent her entire life. In order for her to stay she needs to come up with something that proves she is vital to the existence of the theatre. Throw in two love interests - Nate the pirate and Ariel the tempremental element - mayhem & destruction with the fairies, my favourite characters throughout the book, some very bad ideas, Mrs Edith the wardrobe mistress and a very bad situation involving The Book (basically the essence of the theatre) and you have a great story. I've already pre-ordered the next book, Perchance To Dream, which comes out in May

Comfort Food - Kate Jacobs

Comfort Food - Kate Jacobs 2/5

Blurb from Fantastic Fiction

"Shortly before turning the big 5-0, boisterous party planner and Cooking with Gusto! personality Augusta 'Gus' Simpson finds herself planning a birthday party she'd rather not - her own. She's getting tired of being the hostess, the mother hen, the woman who has to plan her own birthday party. What she needs is time on her own with enough distance to give her loved ones the ingredients to put together successful lives without her.

Assisted by a handsome up-and-coming chef, Oliver, Gus invites a select group to take an on-air cooking class. But instead of just preaching to the foodie masses, she will teach regular people how to make rich, sensuous meals - real people making real food. Gus decides to bring a vibrant cast of friends and family on the program: Sabrina, her fickle daughter; Troy, Sabrina's ex-boyfriend; Hannah, Gus's timid neighbor; and Carmen, Gus's pompous and beautiful competitor at the Cooking Channel. And when she begins to have more than collegial feelings for her sous-chef, Gus realizes that she might be able to rejuvenate not just her professional life, but her personal life as well. . . ."

This was a birthday present from someone who really should know what sort of books I like to read by now but as I didn't want to seem ungrateful I started (and finished) this today.

I've previously read The Friday Night Knitting Club by Jacobs which I thought was okay but I'm thinking I won't be rushing out to get any of her other books. I really struggled to enjoy this book, I didn't really "get" any of the characters and it all just seemed a bit too convenient - especially the ending where everything got tied up with a neat, pretty bow. It's a nice, light read but not my cup of tea and all too predictable in parts.

The Magicians - Lev Grossman

The Magicians - Lev Grossman 4/5

Blurb from Fantastic Fiction -

Quentin Coldwater's life is changed forever by an apparently chance encounter: when he turns up for his entrance interview to Princeton he finds his interviewer dead - but a strange envelope bearing Quentin's name leads him down a very different path to any he'd ever imagined. The envelope, and the mysterious manuscript it contains, leads to a secret world of obsession and privilege, a world of freedom and power and, for a while, it's a world that seems to answer all Quentin's desires. But the idyll cannot last - and when it's finally shattered, Quentin is drawn into something darker and far more dangerous than anything he could ever have expected...

I quite enjoyed this one, not the best written book in the world but it was a little bit different to all the other adult Potter-esque books available out there!

One minute Quentin - depressed, obsessed with his best friends girlfriend and the Fillory books by Christopher Plover - is on his way to an interview for Princeton and the next he's at Brakebills College of Magical Pedagogy wondering what on earth he's going to do in the real world after graduation. The first 2 parts of the book are fantastic, following his progress through college and the trials they all go through. I loved the special fourth year project where they all had to fly to Antarctica and the surly professor waiting for them at the other end (and yes, you find out why he's like that) It's once Quentin and his friends Eliot, Alice Janet, Josh and Penny are in the real world that things seem to start going spectacularly wrong and also where the book goes off the rails a bit. The group end up in Fillory on a quest but this section seemed rushed and there was sometimes too much detail crammed into certain sections. The ending was quite obvious really but still left things complete.

Thumbs up for The Magicians, as long as you're not expecting anything highbrow and a big improvement on his last book

Nightlife by Rob Thurman

Nightlife - Rob Thurman 4/5

Blurb from Fantastic Fiction

In New York, there's a troll under the Brooklyn Bridge, a boggle in Central Park, and a beautiful vampire in a penthouse on the Upper East Side. Of course, most humans are oblivious to this, but Cal Leandros is only half-human. His father's dark lineage is the stuff of nightmares - and he and his entire otherworldly race are after Cal.

He and his half-brother Niko have managed to stay a step ahead for three years, but now Cal's dad has found them again. And Cal is about to learn why they want him, why they've always wanted him...

This has been on my wishlist for a while so I'm glad that it didn't turn out to be a disappointment. Mention boggles, trolls & vampires all in one book and I'm usually sold so this book was a bit of a hidden gem. It started off a bit slow and I almost put it down for something else however I didn't, which turned out to be a good decision. Lots of fairly original ideas which can be hard to achieve these days and one of the starring characters is Robin Goodfellow. What's not to like about this book? Actually all the characters were likeable in good & bad ways and I enjoyed how they developed over the course of the book. Can't really say much more without giving major spoilers as to what Cal's big secret is!

Despite being on a book diet I've bought books 2, 3 & 4 and pre-ordered no. 5 - oops I've also ordered his standalone (so far) novel, Trick Of The Light