Saturday 31 December 2016

TheDaisyDeer's Best Books of 2016


2016 has been an interesting year for me in reading. When I look back on the year it's a bit disappointing that there aren't any stand-out books for me (if you've been around for a while you might notice that I don't have a 'best overall novel' this year).
But at the same time when I go back to my blog or GoodReads and see everything together, it appears that actually that I've had a very good reading year: I read more books this year than last, I read a wider variety and began looking at things like poetry and graphic novels, I had my first full year working with NetGalley and became a reviewer for Unbound Publishers as well.
And there have definitely been stories I have fallen in love with too. Quite uncharacteristically of me, I've shed a few emotional tears over books in 2016, and I've nearly thrown my kindle across the room in frustration at how stupid some novels are.
Overall, though there might not be one particular book that I instantly remember as being the best thing I read in 2016, there are a whole host of novels that I loved and are more than worthy to be gracing bookshelves everywhere. Here are the best books that I read (but were not necessarily released) in 2016:

.oʇoɥd s'Daisy Leigh-Phippard
Novel with the Best Story read in 2016:
29559052
Empire of Storms
Sarah J. Maas

Novel with the Best Writing read in 2016:
17262384
A Monster Calls
Patrick Ness

Novel with the Best Entertainment read in 2016:
28696452
This Savage Song
V.E. Schwab

Best New Discovery read in 2016:
561371
The Penelopiad
Margaret Atwood

Best Fantasy Novel read in 2016:
26236443
A Gathering of Shadows
V.E. Schwab

Best Sci-Fi Novel read in 2016:
28587880
Sleeping Giants
Sylvain Neuvel

Best Dystopian Novel read in 2016:
27433569
Wolf by Wolf
Ryan Graudin

Best Historical Novel read in 2016:
28930418
Salt to the Sea
Ruta Sepetys

Best Contemporary Novel read in 2016:
624641
The Dreamers
Gilbert Adair

Best Romantic Novel read in 2016:
28587801
The Winner's Kiss
Marie Rutkoski

Best Classic Novel read in 2016:
839731
The Burial at Thebes (Antigone)
Sophocles, translated by Seamus Heaney

Best Mystery/Thriller Novel read in 2016:
28933383
Crooked Kingdom
Leigh Bardugo

Best Graphic Novel read in 2016:
3106983
Persepolis
Marjane Satrapi
Read my summary of Persepolis here!

Best Poetry Collection read in 2016:
27803255
Give Me a God I Can Relate To
Blythe Baird

Best Review Copy [not otherwise mentioned] read in 2016:
30840109
Falling Awake
provided by NetGalley & Vintage
Alice Oswald


Image Sources:
Empire of Storms - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29559052-empire-of-storms
A Monster Calls - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17262384-a-monster-calls
This Savage Song - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28696452-this-savage-song
The Penelopiad - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/561371.The_Penelopiad
A Gathering of Shadows - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26236443-a-gathering-of-shadows
Sleeping Giants - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28587880-sleeping-giants
Wolf by Wolf- https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27433569-wolf-by-wolf
Salt to the Sea - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28930418-salt-to-the-sea
The Dreamers - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/624641.The_Dreamers
The Winner's Kiss - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28587801-the-winner-s-kiss
The Burial at Thebes - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/839731.The_Burial_at_Thebes
Crooked Kingdom - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28933383-crooked-kingdom
Persepolis - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3106983-persepolis
Give Me a God I Can Relate To - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27803255-give-me-a-god-i-can-relate-to
Peter and Alice - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17347724-peter-and-alice
Falling Awake - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30840109-falling-awake

Friday 30 December 2016

Crystal Storm

29589436

Book Title: Crystal Storm
Author: Morgan Rhodes
Series: Falling Kingdoms #5
Date Started: December 26th 2016
Date Completed: December 15th 2016
Genres: Fantasy, Romance, Adventure
Quality Rating: Three Stars
Enjoyment Rating: Four Star
Final Rating: Three stars
Review:

As the fifth instalment of the Falling Kingdoms series, things are started to pull together. The characters are gravitating towards each other and everyone's endgames are starting to be revealed. But while Crystal Storm jumped the story forward, for me it stumbled back in terms of character development and relationships.

This book was quite predictable, but then again I've never read the Falling Kingdoms series for its plotline, I've always been much more interested in its characters. But it'd be nice to have a few little twists here and there like the previous books. In fact a lot of what didn't work for me in Crystal Storm is to do with the standards the series has set itself so far, so I can't be too harsh; Gathering Shadows and Frozen Tides especially were always going to be a tough act to follow. But where the rest of the series has felt well done with a few little errors slipping through, Crystal Storm felt like there was a huge rush to get the book done so a lot of things were left to slide in. There's an awful lot of telling instead of showing in this book, and when there's so many characters we know so well to interact with one another this really shouldn't be the case, especially when Rhodes has be able to imply things without directly telling us before.
Another little thing I want to mention was the way that abuse was dealt with. On the surface, there's a great, strong picture given about how wrong it is. But saying 'I'd never let anyone raise a hand to me, I'm too strong' and leaving it at that doesn't give a good representation of how other people's actions supposedly dictate your strength or weakness. How other people act say things about them, not you. I'm very sure this wasn't the message that was intended, but it troubles me that it only half dealt with the issue. I find this a bit in the feminist side of the story as well: everyone's very quick to say that the women are as strong as men, but are also very quick to insult men for being men, and are then happy submit to masculinity. As a whole, these aren't huge, glaring problems because it the vast scheme of things it works in the story and supports the characters and their values, but it's still a little detail that I think gets out of hand in a lot of fiction quickly if its not addressed.

What frustrated me the most about this book was that there's so many stupid pieces of dialogue, or silly predictable plot twists, or even tiny little actions that are so cliched and out of place just for the sake of having a 'funny' response or a forced interaction between characters. Don't get me wrong, these little things definitely happened in the previous books but they weren't every other page. In Crystal Storm it felt like Rhodes was doing whatever felt the most dramatic regardless of the continuity she'd painstakingly built up over the series. She sacrifices her own story for sounds cool and I just think it's a shame. In this book especially, the instances of this became much bigger plot holes and empty logic just to get into tense situations or play with our heart strings. But unfortunately it brought me so out of the story I wasn't getting that emotional response anymore.
While everyone's paths have crossed, and we're building up to the ending from here on out, Crystal Storm honestly felt... stagnant. Though the story did progress, we didn't actually move that far over the whole book - you can count the locations on one hand - and events didn't have the weight to it like in the previous books. In all fairness, some things had to be cleared up before we get into the final chapters of the series, but perhaps it was a bad, bad idea to bring everyone together so soon then. When I saw everyone ending up in the same place, I immediately thought that this is it, things are really going to speed up now. Instead, I'm still waiting for that final catalyst to go off as everything goes to hell.

I've mentioned that I felt Crystal Storm took a stumble backwards in terms of characters for this book; the most obvious example of this being that I don't think the characters were really themselves. I sympathise with Rhodes at having to write so many characters that we've grown to know so well in the same place at the same time (again, was that sensible?), but in favour or creating some honestly unnecessary dramatic tension we have characters acting like people they're not. And the consequence of this was that they're losing their lovability; I'm finding it harder and harder to look at them as real people. In fact, in the few days it's taken me to get to writing this review I completely forgot that we lost some people in this book. That's not a good sign.
This series follows multiple narratives, but it's a lie to say that it's not the Cleo and Magnus show. Unusually, this is something that's developed as the readers have made clear their preferences and it's really nice to see that Rhodes is giving us more of them as a result. I, personally, love both Cleo and Magnus - on their own and together. However, some of their relationship dramas in this book were just for the hell of it, let's be honest. (Slight spoilers: there's no reason to 'curse' Cleo past the sexual tension; there's no logic behind them keeping their relationship a secret; there's no point in suggesting a love triangle with Jonas other than to have the angsty arguments). I have no problems with romance being included - hell, Cleo and Magnus is a couple that I definitely indulge in - but because I like them as characters so much I want it to feel genuine, not cliche tension to tease your readers.

Crystal Storm was a genuinely enjoyable read but it's not the standard I expect from Rhodes these days. A long series where hype grows is a hard thing to keep up and I commend her for where the books are going, but this particular instalment was a bit of a let down when so much of it was powered with cliches that we know Rhodes has the ability to avoid.

Image Source - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29589436-crystal-storm

Wednesday 14 December 2016

White as Snow

362592

Book Title: White as Snow
Author: Tanith Lee
Date Started: November 26th 2016
Date Completed: December 12th 2016
Genres: Fantasy, Romance, Historical
Quality Rating: Three Stars
Enjoyment Rating: Three Star
Final Rating: Three stars
Review:

Hearing that White as Snow was inspired by a blend of fairytale and Greek mythology was enough for me to pick it up and these elements were definitely the highlights for me, but unfortunately the rest didn’t hold up. I don’t want to say the book doesn’t have other merits - it definitely does - but things were so slow it was hard to keep my enthusiasm up.

Finally, I have found a retelling of a fairytale that actually keeps the magic of the original. I have nothing against modern or other unexpected twists in retellings, but reading stories I’m very passionate about get ruined because the writer doesn’t understand the atmosphere and point of fairytales is not something I particularly enjoy. You can tell that Lee understands fairytales, and definitely favours the darker originals in her work. I’ve been looking for something exactly like this for a very long time, it’s just such a shame the pacing wasn’t up to scratch to keep me involved; from the writing-side of it, I loved it. But I couldn’t keep myself engaged with the story and characters.
Likewise, extensive world building is something I really respect and value, especially when it’s elaborating and developing a pre-existing idea, but White as Snow gets very slow very quickly. The main storyline doesn’t even start until halfway through the book because there’s so much time given to setting up characters. Some of this works, the rest is just unnecessary and frankly boring.

If you ever needed a book detailing the cruelty to women in medieval times then this is more than enough. While I’m glad it included some things, at times it was quite sickening to actually read. It’s important that we show sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse etc, but I struggled to keep coming back to the book when I knew there was going to be more and not a lot of redemption in response.
For arguably such a small novel, there are an awful lot of elements and little storylines introduced throughout that are then left behind not long after. The story spans such a huge time period that it’s understandable that elements are no longer relevant to the characters, but for a reader it became harder to latch onto a story that left behind stories you wanted to explore and placed them with new and unfamiliar ones. I personally really liked the wood folk, for example, and would’ve liked to see them carried on for a little longer, but they fade out at the halfway point and are never really mentioned again. A lot of the reason I found it hard to enjoy this book was due to the almost disjointed nature of the plot line.

With all good retellings, White as Snow has a twist on the original; we don’t only follow Coira (‘snow white’), but also her mother Arpazia (or the ‘wicked queen’). Needless to say, Arpazia has more than enough exposition to explain her well-known evilness and I honestly enjoyed her story more than Coira’s. But - and there’s a big but - sharing the protagonist space between both Arpazia and Coira made it very hard for me to find a place to read from: I feel like we were jumping between the women but not really exploring either of them that well. Pacing got complicated later in the book when both their stories were going on and felt like it dragged even more as a consequence. Additionally, both Arpazia and Coira are distant, detached characters - understandably - but it makes it hard to latch onto their narratives when it doesn’t feel like they’re really in them either.

I loved the sound of White as Snow, and I did like what I read but every time I put it down I found it hard to think of reasons to pick it back up. The story, while vivid and mystical, was slow the point of dragging, and the characters so far removed due to their circumstances that they were hard to engage with. The more I read, the lower the rating went in my head and while I loved this book to begin with, sadly it wasn’t the most enjoyable thing for the all 300 pages.

Image Source - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/362592.White_as_Snow