15. Big Dreams

The book:  Death of a Salesman
The author:  Arthur Miller
The rating:  4.5 stars

Finally, some concrete evidence that I'm not just a philistine who can't appreciate literary genius.  Unlike Streetcar and Master Harold, I found Salesman to be a fantastic piece of work, not just full of some esoteric literary merit, but also extremely readable, relatable, and poignant.  It's always difficult to review a classic, seeing as anything one might think to say has doubtlessly been said many times before, so I'll try to be brief in describing just what makes Salesman a champion amongst heavyweights.

Salesman is a play to which I'd buy a ticket with no hesitation.  Even with only stage directions as guides, the setting has a remarkable whimsy and surrealness to it; the characters walk through walls in Willy's dream sequences yet pay heed to the rules of the set in the real world, tying his character's mind to the setting itself.  It would be a treat to see, to say the least.  It creates an intriguing atmosphere of deception and misconception, something similarly explored in Streetcar, but I personally found Salesman to capture this mood with far greater success.  And of course, such mood ties in with foreshadowing as well... everything in Salesman interconnects, set to characters to tone to theme to plot to reveal, and these interconnections create what can only be considered a literary masterpiece.

But, as I've been apt to say in reviews of classic pieces, this 'literary merit' isn't everything when it comes to a book or play being satisfying.  Despite their objective merits, some are unbearably dry (I'm still looking at you, A Tale of Two Cities).  That said, Salesman is also an incredibly enjoyable tale.  It's not an edge-of-your-seat ride by any means, but it is gripping nonetheless, casually reversing the reader's perceptions of the lives of the story's protagonists as he or she traverses its two acts and requiem.  As the smoke clears, we begin to see the truth in the lives of the Lomans, and that truth carries a powerful message.  In a society that's always striving for bigger and better, it's essential that we realize that we don't have to be the best, the most powerful, the most well liked.  What we consider success doesn't have to be being number one, and Salesman is the poignant account of one man's realization of this fact and two others' failure to do so.

In today's world of participation trophies, helicopter parents, and assurances we can be president someday, Salesman is uncomfortably relatable.  Success isn't some objective state; we don't need to be chasing the American dream.  All that counts is that we chase our own.  Perhaps it is for this reason that I find Salesman to be such a remarkable book.  It's message is just as relevant today - if not more - than it was in 1949, and a book that remains that powerful can't possibly be dry.

14. Somebody to Love

The book:  Eleanor & Park
The author:  Rainbow Rowell
The rating:  3.5 stars

My mother always has had one rule for love, and it's this:  never be in a relationship that you need to be in.  If they can't live without you, it's not love.  Love is not wanting to live without them.

I'll admit, my expectations for Eleanor & Park were a mixed bag.  On one hand, I've heard such rave reviews, the novel has been lauded by all sorts of critics and won all sorts of awards.... on the other, I've always found contemporary fiction romances, with few exceptions, to be infinitely more formulaic than any dystopia.  Boy meets girl.  Boy and girl fall deeply and profusely in love.  Tragedy strikes, but there has never been any love stronger than that of boy and girl, even though they are teenagers and have only known each other for months/weeks/days.

In a way, Eleanor & Park proved all my expectations true, despite their contradictory nature.  Eleanor & Park has a plot that runs deeper than the romance, and Eleanor's situation and struggle is harsh, poignant, and real.  The juxtaposition of the lives of Park and Eleanor is the novel's greatest strength, bringing light to that which simmers beneath the surface of the people who surround us in our own lives.  In addition, the choice of a 1986 setting is inspired, and it creates a world that is the same but different, just a twist away from today.  Walkmen and music, fashion and communication... 1986 is the perfect distance into the past to create something unique.

But the romance... as much as Eleanor & Park tries to play with and mock the 'love at first sight' trope, disparaging Romeo and Juliet as too-quick lust, when it comes down to it, Eleanor & Park takes the same route.  Maybe its my mother's well-intentioned advice that has spoiled romance novels for me, but what Eleanor and Park have does not feel like love.  It feels like fear and desperation.  I don't like you, says Park.  I need you.  Eleanor doesn't like him, she thinks she lives for him.  This isn't healthy... this isn't love, and honestly, it left me more creeped out than swooning over their star-crossed relationship.

I suppose an old pattern has been proven true once more:  only John Green can make me fall in love with a contemporary romance.  Eleanor & Park was enjoyable enough, but I doubt I'll be picking up other of Rowell's efforts in the future.

13. Class and Classics

The book:  Landry Park (Landry Park #1)
The author:  Bethany Hagen
The rating:  4 stars

Landry Park left me with mismatched thoughts.  Overall, the novel was enjoyable.  I was definitely enthralled by its Austen-like premise, but I had a love/hate relationship with protagonist Madeline, and if it makes any sense at all, I felt put off by the world building while simultaneously loving the atmosphere.

As I mentioned back in my review of Legend, I've noticed that an outrageous number of dystopias build the same world... there must be a subconscious undercurrent of today's society that is certain we're gearing up for a war between China and the United States, because that's the story all these authors weave.  Hagen does the same in Landry Park, and after reading down this road countless times before, I was less than impressed with the encroachment of the Eastern Empire onto the American west coast.  I mean, Hagen slates some of these events to begin as early as 2022... for anyone who has taken an international history or international affairs class in the last decade or so, the proposed future!history is a bit difficult to swallow.

In creating a society of futuristic gentry, there's a number of plot holes.  Why is everyone smoking again?  Sure, they didn't know any better in Austen's time, the time period Landry Park is trying to emulate, but what part of a war with China and an energy revolution got rid of the toxic effects of cigarettes?  How did class becoming 'the most important delineator in society' bring whist back from obscurity?  Landry Park is clearly a period piece set in the future, and although the rationale for why some things have reverted to their 18th/19th century form isn't always clear, I immensely enjoyed the atmosphere it created.  Fancy dresses, aristocracy, family intrigue, balls and romance... there's something so incredibly readable about a period piece, and Landry Park uses this atmosphere to its fullest potential.

Now, Madeline.  There were times when I was rather found of her.  The wallflower debutante, the girl who would prefer reading about King Arthur to engaging in frivolous ballroom chatter, the one with dreams of getting an education and being something more than just an heiress... the one with a conscience.  Despite the promise she showed, in the end, I was rather ambivalent.  I was never really convinced of her love for David; their first dozen interactions seemed little more than her being an aloof jerk, almost as if she was a student at the Edward Cullen school of romance, and he returned the favour by being the king of mixed messages.  She lacked agency, and while that lack was an important part of her character and the conflict she had to overcome, it pushed her into the position of being an annoying drag to the plot, rarely concerned with the issues with which the reader was, therefore spinning the narrative in pointless loops away from the parts of the story that were truly interesting.

When it comes to dystopic versions of period pieces, Diana Peterfreund's For Darkness Shows the Stars will always take the cake, but Landry Park is an admirable addition to the genre.  Despite its flaws, the novel truly captures the spirit of such fiction, imbued with the je ne sais quoi that makes readers love Pride and Prejudice and all those other classic tales of romance, marriage, and estates.  In terms of dystopias, Landry Park's world may leave something to be desired, but the other half of its coin makes it a novel well worth reading, and definitely a series opener to keep an eye on.

12. A Rose for Everafter

The book:  A Long, Long Sleep
The author:  Anna Sheehan
The rating:  5 stars

Like Cress, A Long, Long Sleep is a futuristic retelling of a classic fairy tale (Sleeping Beauty, if the title wasn't indication enough).  Unlike Cress, Sleep strays more from the source material, creating a wonderfully subversive tale in an incredibly well-built world that I was, quite literally, unable to put down.

Two things really make Sleep the wonderful novel it is:  its characters and its worldbuilding.  Sheehan's world is incredibly well-imagined with dark, realistic undertones.  In the future, a corporation has its fingers in every facet of life, something that's not too hard for the modern reader to imagine.  Rose was already in a future world before she began her sixty-two year period of stasis; both settings being futuristic from the reader's perspective allows natural exposition that never feels shoehorned, gradually building a believable world and establishing a compelling history that brings society to where it is in the narrative.

In addition, Rose is truly an intriguing heroine.  Throughout the novel, she's incredibly passive.  Awful things happen to her and she keeps them to herself like the college girl who is about to be murdered in a horror flick; the reader is constantly yelling at her through the pages, demanding to know how she can be so stupid.  It seems like sloppy writing at first, an unbelievable protagonist.  At first.

"You just let atrocious things happen to you and don't tell a soul."

That's what Bren tells Rose towards the latter half of the novel, echoing the thoughts in the reader's mind.  These flaws in character aren't blunders on the author's part; they're purposeful, carefully crafted, creating a depth to the storyline and to Rose's past.  Sleep is as far from sloppy writing as you can get.  Everything is so meticulous planned, so carefully construed... when it all comes together, it really is literary magic.

The interpersonal relations between the characters also make Sleep a standout.  It's a fairy tale retelling; the blurb itself promised me wakeup-kissing and princely analogs.  I'm a bit rustier on my Sleeping Beauty than on my other fairy tales, but I was pretty sure there was something about the prince who saves her being someone she was supposed to marry in childhood.  At least in the Disney version, maybe?  Yeah, it's been a long time since I saw Sleeping Beauty, but it was something like that.  Throughout the book I was expecting Rose and Bren to fall hopelessly in love, or for Xander to somehow return and for them to fall hopelessly in love, or for Otto and Rose to fall hopelessly in love.  No matter the couple, I anticipated some hopelessly-in-loveness going on.  Sleep defied my every expectation.  It's a love story, but not a hopelessly-in-love story.  It's about lost love and unrequited love, familial love, false love, and beginnings of love.

All in all, Sleep is a very subversive novel; it's not your typical fairy tale, and that's not just because of its stass tubes and Europan aliens.  It sets itself apart from the genre in terms of characters, themes, and relationships, and if the promised sequel ever hits shelves, the continuation of Rose's adventures will also be hitting the top of my reading list.

11. Science and Faith

The book:  Relativity
The author:  Cristin Bishara
The rating:  4 stars

I should have felt a strong connection with Relativity's science-geek protagonist, Ruby Wright.  I'm the girl who got weird looks in tenth grade writing class for spending silent reading pouring over Brian Greene's The Hidden Reality; I'm the girl whose best friend refused to go anywhere with her for weeks after she dragged her to a university lecture on the Casimir effect in grade eleven.  I'd be a tremendous hypocrite to say that teenagers can't know the things that Ruby knows or like the things that Ruby likes.  But despite our parallels, I didn't feel that connection.  Throughout Relativity, the thought that Ruby was just a caricature of a teenager niggled at the back of my mind, and it was an idea that proved impossible to shake.  I felt an immense sense of secondhand embarrassment during all text-messaging scenes, the kind you get when your grandmother tells you she got an account on The Facebook, but even discounting those, so much of Ruby seems to be lifted from an extremely unimaginative stereotype of what a teenager is.  Angsty, lusty, rebellious, precocious, self-centered... our intelligent protagonist hates pink and all things girly, while her evil stepsister is well-dressed and vain.  Also, for someone who's so into math and science, you'd think that Ruby would be more cognisant of the distinction between a theory and a hypothesis, that she would know that the 'law of averages' does not exist, and that she'd be the slightest bit familiar with a Caesar cipher.

Honestly, I'm being far too critical.  I'm thrilled that a YA author chose to make a science-loving protagonist, and my standards are probably just too high since it hits so close to home.  So lets stop dwelling on the negatives and let me get to the parts of Relativity that I loved.

First off:  the premise.  Science fiction is not written enough for the young adult market (aside from dystopians, but I can't complain about those), and so Bishara definitely brings something fresh to the table with Relativity.  While its definitely a difficult plot to pitch -- I consistently was treated to raised eyebrows when I responded to "what's that book about?" with "a girl who is traveling through parallel universes" -- I loved the incorporation of science into the setting.  Sure, the end result of allowing Ruby to explore the 'what-ifs' of her existence could have been done just as easily by some magic MacGuffin or faery sidekick, but the use of sci-fi instead of fantasy is a welcome change.

The settings themselves are also superb, the slight (or drastic) shifts between the universes, impeccable.  Bishara works in some wonderful juxtaposition between the homes in which the other Rubies and her other families live; between the high schools; between Ennis and O Direain as wholes.  While the plotline itself isn't exactly novel (as I wrote before I started reading, "If this book ends with the 'twist' that her original life was best all along, I will have just wasted 288 pages of my life"), the setting and premise make the familiar trek well worth the journey.  For those familiar with Christopher Booker's idea of the seven plots of fiction, Relativity fits the "Voyage and Return" plot to a T.  To quote for those unfamiliar:

...hero or heroine... travel out of their familiar, everyday 'normal' surroundings into another world completely cut off from the first, where everything seems disconcertingly abnormal. At first the strangeness of this new world, with its freaks and marvels, may seem diverting, even exhilarating, if also highly perplexing. But gradually a shadow intrudes. The hero or heroine feels increasingly threatened, even trapped: until eventually (usually by way of a 'thrilling escape') they are released from the abnormal world, and can return to the safety of the familiar world where they began.

So yes, just by the little blurb on the dust jacket you may know how Relativity will turn out, but the interesting premise and engaging adventure make the journey much more important than the destination.  I'll definitely be checking out Bishara's future efforts, in this universe and in all others.

10. Crescendo

The book:  Cress (The Lunar Chronicles #3)
The author:  Marissa Meyer
The rating:  5 stars

Sometimes, I feel as if reading has lost its luster for me.  Every book I read is pretty okay, but none are as amazing as the ones I've read in the past, and I wonder if it's not the books that are changed, but me.  Then I read a book like Cress, and my faith in literature is restored.  Books haven't changed--I just haven't been reading the right books--and Cress is most definitely one of the greats.

Rave reviews tend to be a bit dull, so I'll try to keep my praise brief.  Cress ties POV to pacing in a unique and effective way, with not one, not two, but with at least eight alternating perspectives.  It's not a big cycle, though--Cinder, Kai, Cress, Cinder, Kai, Cress, Cinder--or anything like that.  The reader never knows from whose perspective the next chapter will come, and this keeps the reader engaged and enthralled.  I'm particularly partial to ensemble casts, and Cress embraced this concept with bells on.  Each novel in the Lunar Chronicles series adds a few protagonists to their growing roster, but still keeps our heroes from the books of yore.  This results in a diverse cast that never overwhelms the reader.  It's like that picnic game that elementary school kids like to play:  the first person is bringing an aardvark, the second is bringing an aardvark and a banana, the third is bringing an aardvark, a banana, and a crystal ball... while you're unlikely to be able to remember a list of 26 items from the get-go, after going through the entire game, you will probably still be able to recite the list days later.  We became well acquainted with Cinder, Kai, and Iko in Cinder, as well as a slew of supporting characters, and then with Scarlet and Wolf in Scarlet, and Cress raises Thorne, Cress, and Dr. Erland to prominence.  I've never read A Game of Thrones, but it's kind of how I imagine the A Song of Ice and Fire series to be (except without copious amounts of death).

My other literary weakness is retellings; I adore them.  I feel that it can create an even richer world, drawing on the reader's knowledge of the source material, and playing off it or subverting it in a new environment.  Each novel in the Lunar Chronicles is a sci-fi retelling of a classic fairy tale, and Cress, as you might have guessed by the title, is based loosely upon the story of Rapunzel (if you're like my dad and don't understand the connection, cress and rapunzel are both types of leafy greens).  I'll admit, each time I caught a parallel between Cress and Rapunzel I felt a bit proud of myself (and I couldn't resist comparing Thorne to Tangled's Flynn Ryder).  Cress struck a great balance between old and new, never dwelling too much in Rapunzel or too little to make the premise pointless.

The setting was also phenomenal.  Meyer's worldbuilding is among the best in the business, and I'd love to spend a day wandering her future Earth with its cyborgs and androids, cultures and countries, even with Luna shining up above.  The Eastern Commonwealth is a delightful smorgasbord of culture, although it's arguably less prominent in Cress than it was in early installments, as Cinder and her gang are now on the run.  I'd say the most standout setting is the Sahara and the African cities, with their mix of old and new technologies and their intermingling of Lunar and Earthen traditions.  The world is so incredibly engrossing; the only shadow on the horizon as I read Cress was that the trilogy would soon be over, and I'd be forced out of Meyer's remarkable world forever.

Over the entire time it took me to read Cress, I was positive it was the series finale.  I'm not sure why I had it in my head that the series was a trilogy, perhaps just because so many are, but I had no doubt in my mind that this would be the end of the line for Cinder and the gang.  When I was at 91% complete, I was getting a bit miffed; after all this, the conclusion's going to be a disappointment; there's no way Meyer can wrap all this up in the last 9%.  And then the reader gets their first glimpse of Princess Winter, and I think:  Hey, it's Snow White!  Too bad she's not going to get her own book, and really, what is Meyer doing introducing new characters so late in the game? We're not going to get the chance to get to know them.

And then I turned the last page, and my paradigm shifted in the best of ways.  Cress wasn't the end--it was just the crescendo--and I absolutely cannot wait to see what Meyer has in store in Winter, what might be the last book in the series?  Maybe?  I guess we'll see in February 2015.