Book Review #3

Even though I didn't get to put up a post this week that announced my agent-getting in large, bold letters, I feel an odd sort of relief. I had put so much pressure on it. I was checking my email every other minute, keeping my phone turned up, re-reading everything for errors that wouldn't matter anyway. Now, I'm not nearly as stressed. Which is a nice feeling. So, despite being rather depressed last night (I had really, really liked this agent), this is all I will say on the subject. I thought I'd post some inspirational, go-get-em blog. But nope. I'm moving on. Moving on to:

Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale

As always, it will be subjected to the rigorous 5 Steps of Doom: Summary, What I Liked, What I Didn't Like, The Overall Mood Said Book Left Me In, and The Overall Rating. The Overall Rating will be based on my highly selective Sara's Scale of Suck or Soar, as follows, lowest to highest:

Level 1: This is How Not to Write a Book
Level 2: What Editor Read this and said "Hmm, Let's Publish it"?
Level 3: My Faith in Writers is Wavering Precariously
Level 4: This Doesn't Suck
Level 5: I'd Read the Sequel
And the coveted Level 6: Fan-FREAKING-tastic. Buy at All Costs.

Summary: (I liked the way I did the Summary for To Catch a Pirate, so I think I shall keep it up.) Lady Saren and her maid, Dashti, are locked in a tower for seven years because Lady refuses to marry Lord Pure-Evil (*name changed to emphasize his dis-likability*). Lady is beyond emotionally unstable and begins to go insane (or could have been insane before, as we don't know too much about her. Book is from Maid's POV). Lady was secretly sending letters to Lord Much-Cuter (*name changed to emphasize his likability*). Lord Much-Cuter visits, Lord Pure-Evil visits, wolf attacks, guards die, food runs low. Maid takes charge as Lady is completely nuts, both escape and find Lady's kingdom completely gone. Everyone dead. *sad moment* Maid drags Lady to the land of Lord Much-Cuter, thinking Lady will be not crazy when she sees her "true love." Lady doesn't get not crazy, refuses to tell Lord Much-Cuter who she is. Lady and Maid take jobs in Lord Much-Cuter's palace, work for awhile. Maid becomes a scribe to Lord Much-Cuter. Lord Pure-Evil, who had destroyed Lady's kingdom, is slowly seizing all of the kingdoms around and eventually comes to Lord Much-Cuter's. Maid is forced by Lady to pretend to be Lady, discovers Lord Pure-Evil's secret, uses it against him, falls in love with Lord Much-Cuter. Lies, animals, songs, revelations, and so on and so forth.

What I Liked: I like Shannon Hale. Her voice is very reminiscent of the older fairy tale gurus, Hans Christian Anderson and others. The story was very cute. I'll give it that. I really did enjoy reading it, and quite a few times I wanted to keep reading to find out what would happen.

What I Didn't Like: The MC. I swore she was twelve. The entire book, I thought I was reading about someone who hadn't reached adolescence yet. When I found out she was supposed to be eighteen -- eighteen! -- I laughed. There was no WAY this MC was a believable eighteen. She was far too out of touch with her feelings to be eighteen, far too uncertain of herself. She was very aware of the world and how to survive in it, but when it came to her feelings for Lord Much-Cuter (whose real name was Khan Tegus), her ignorance was almost annoying. When she became obviously in love with him, she was still saying things like "When my lady and he are wed..." and "I will stay on to care for their children..." Um, no you won't. You'd be burning with jealousy each time their children cried for you. Then, toward the climax, she'd have sudden bursts of emotional trips and explain how she felt about things. REALLY felt about things, not the glazed-over "I am a maid, I am nothing compared to my lady," crap she had going before. These trips were so drastically different from the beginning of the novel I almost couldn't picture it as the same person. I think it also bugged me that she was far, far too patient with the annoying and self-centered Lady Saren, who went from a sniffling, Lord-Pure-Evil-will-kill-me, Lord-Much-Cuter-will-kill-me, everyone-will-kill-me little blob to a sniffling, life-is-going-to-kill-me little blob. For the love of all that is good and decent, someone slap her! Please! It took me to the end of the book to realize she may have had an actual mental problem, but even then I wasn't sure. She was painfully annoying either way.

The Overall Mood Said Book Left Me In: Cute. It was just a cute story. Everything was wrapped up, every loose end tied, and hope left for the future. So yeah, just cute.

The Overall Rating: Level 4: This Doesn't Suck. I had no problem with writing/style, no problem with plot. If the MC had been believable and Lady Saren had been less OH MY GOSH annoying, I would've really really liked it. But it was lacking feeling due to the MC's constant incistence that she was nothing compared to her lady, she doesn't matter compared to her lady. Grow some, Dashti, and tell Saren to shut up.