The Lost Heir

Wings of Fire #2: The Lost Heir by Tui T. Sutherland
Scholastic Press - January 1, 2013
336 pages

The lost heir to the SeaWing throne is going home at last...
She can't believe it's finally happening. Tsunami and her fellow dragonets of destiny are journeying under the water to the great SeaWing kingdom. Stolen as an egg from the royal hatchery, Tsunami is eager to meet her future subjects and reunite with her mother, Queen Coral.
But Tsunami's triumphant return doesn't go quite the way she imagined. Queen Coral welcomes her with open wings, but a mysterious assassin has been killing off the queen's heirs for years, and Tsunami may be the next target. The dragonets came to the SeaWings for protection, but this ocean hides secrets, betrayal--and perhaps even death.

Okay, I don't read much middle grade fiction anymore (with the exception of Warriors and Survivors, but I've spent so much time with those cats that I don't expect to give up anytime soon). Young adult and adult fiction? Check, check, check. But I was engrossed by this series due to its being written by one of the Erin Hunters. Plus, it was about dragons.

It's easily better than almost all of the middle grade fiction out there. It doesn't minimize violence or plot because it's written for a younger audience, and all of the characters are believable. While they seemed like somewhat charicatures in book one, that was before I realized that each book would have insight into the world of each dragonet so that you get to understand them and their motives much better. I also love the broken prophecy plot; the prophecy wanted a SkyWing, but they got a RainWing instead, the SandWing has stunted growth and the NightWing doesn't have secret powers.

The underwater kingdom seemed real to me for that setting, which was a big thing for me. Tsunami seems annoying at first, but she grows into her own over the course of the book and becomes a more sympathetic protagonist.

A couple minor gripes: the language didn't seem like what dragons would be saying. I know that they're young, but they probably wouldn't use the same language as human teenagers. Also, the awkward capitalization of dragon names is a little annoying. That's all that I can think of.

Grade: A-

Fire Bringer

Fire Bringer by David Clement-Davies
MacMillan UK - October 8, 1999
498 pages

Young buck Rannock was born on the night his father was murdered and into a herd of deer where hunger for power has gradually whittled away all that is true and good. He knows that he must escape to survive. Chased by stags, with their fearsome antlers sharpened for the kill, he begins a treacherous journey into the unknown, and ahead of him lies a shocking and formidable search for truth and goodwill in the shadow of the Great Mountain.
One day he will have to return to his home and face his destiny among the deer to fulfill the prophecy that has persistently given them hope: that one day a fawn will be born with the mark of an oak leaf on his forehead and that fawn's courage will lead all the deer to freedom. Filled with passion and a darkness that gradually, through Rannoch's courage in the face of adversity, lifts to reveal an overwhelming feeling of light, Fire Bringer is a tremendous, spirited story that takes the reader deep into the hearts and minds of its characters as they fight for their right to live in peace.

I tried to read The Sight by David Clement-Davies about a year and a half ago and I needed to stop. I found this one recently and decided to give it a shot because I thought it must amount to a slimmer version with the bigger font, shorter standing, and slightly fewer pages.

I was pleasantly surprised. Fire Bringer took a lot of cliche elements (a prophecy, a great evil, a suspicious birthmark that lets everyone know that you're The Chosen One), but it didn't seem that horrible to me. It wasn't that amazing either; it was just good. Some of the chapters were misnomers, as what was covered in that chapter was only in the first few pages, but that's only a minor gripe.

One good thing is that Clement-Davies isn't afraid of killing deer off. In most books, you know that nobody is really in danger because the author would never even think of killing them off; George R. R. Martin, Erin Hunter, and now David Clement-Davies will let anyone die who you think just HAS to be safe.

I reiterate: the story reuses many old literature tropes, and though it doesn't turn them on their heads, it isn't bad either. The result is something familiar and bland, but it's better than new and terrible.

Grade: B

Talulla Rising

Talulla Rising by Glen Duncan
Canongate Books - April 5, 2012
425 pages

(DO NOT READ ANY MORE UNLESS YOU HAVE READ OR DO NOT INTEND TO READ THE LAST WEREWOLF. THIS IS FOR YOUR OWN SAFETY.)

Talulla Demetriou is the last living werewolf. And she is pregnant. Pursued by enemies and racked by the need to kill, she flees to a remote Alaskan hunting lodge to have her child in secret. There, with her infant son in her arms, it looks like the worst is over. Until the door bursts open - and she discovers that the worst is only just beginning...Talulla is plunged into a race against time to save her son. Tormented by guilt and fueled by rage, she is pursued by deadly forces - including (rumor has it) the oldest living vampire on earth. Hopeless odds. Unless, of course, a mother's love for her child turns out to be the deadliest force of all...

This was better than The Last Werewolf. Okay, this was actually way better than The Last Werewolf, but that doesn't take much. It includes none of the main things that I griped about in the previous article; no more sexism, better writing, and only one viewpoint in the entire book.

I love the emergence of the female werewolf that doesn't kill herself after her first kill, because that's a resourceful, brave woman that isn't afraid to take what's hers. Not to mention, she actually has compassion for her fellow humans (or at least some of them), unlike Jake's constant hatred of everyone else that isn't the one female werewolf he happens to come across.

That being said, there's some disturbing stuff in Talulla, and not of the violence variety. In particular is a scene between Talulla and one of her captors, Devaz. I will be scrubbing my brain to rid myself of that entire chapter.

The ending sets it up for a third entry, which will probably focus on (MAJOR SPOILER!)the pack that Talulla has joined(SPOILER END). So we'll see how it goes in that one, because Jake's story was bad and Talulla's good.

Grade: B+

Red Moon

Red Moon by Benjamin Percy
Grand Central Publishing - May 7, 2013
533 pages

They live among us.
They are our neighbors, our mothers, our lovers.
They change.
When government agents kick down Claire Forrester's front door and murder her parents, Claire realizes just how different she is. Patrick Gamble was nothing special until the day he got on a plane and hours later stepped off of it, the only passenger alive, a hero. Chase Williams has sworn to protect the people of the United States from the menace in their midst, but he is becoming the very thing he has promised to destroy. So far, the threat has been controlled by laws and violence and drugs. But the night of the red moon is coming, when an unrecognizable world will emerge...and the battle for humanity will begin.

(Spoiler level: MAJOR!!!)

I really hope they're making a sequel to this.

Not because I liked it.

Because there was no...freaking...ENDING!!!

You know how in the end of Inception, Leonardo DiCaprio spins the top and it cuts out before it lands so you don't know whether he's dreaming or not and you can make that up for yourself and it's open-ended, but in a cool way?

Not this. Not this at all. Instead it leaves all of its characters stranded. Patrick got bitten, but he's given a vaccine that will "help" him, but I'm pretty sure that the shot is supposed to prevent you from getting infected before you're bitten, and once you're bitten there's nothing you can do about it. The president is limping around in the forest with a bloody foot, and Miriam is slinking around in the woods with people after her and...GRR!!!

I'm also pretty sure that Buffalo died three times, and then the same grammar mistake happens again and again of putting an object pronoun after an incomplete comparison (e.g. "more than him" when it should be "more than he".)

Ugh. It was some fun in the beginning, but it was too long not to have an ending.

Grade: D

Chomp

Chomp by Carl Hiaasen
Alfred A. Knopf - March 27, 2012
304 pages

Wahoo Cray lives in a zoo. His father is an animal wrangler, so he's grown up with all types of creatures in his backyard. The critters he can handle, but his father is another story.
When his father takes a job for a reality TV show called Expedition Survival!, Wahoo has to do a bit of wrangling to keep his father from killing the star, boneheaded Derek Badger, before the shoot is over. Things keep getting more and more complicated as Derek insists on using wild animals in his stunts. Then there's Wahoo's new shadow Tuna, a girl with an abusive father who needs somewhere to hide out.
It's anyone's guess who will actually survive Expedition Survival!...

I had to cut a paragraph out of that description because it pretty much gives away a chunk of the story due to the type of lousy publicity that Hiaasen has that decides to spill out over half the novel in a 3 1/2 paragraph description.

I love Carl Hiaasen, especially his YA books about the Everglades: Hoot, Flush, and Scat. I've been waiting more than a few years for the next one, and I can tell you that Chomp sufficiently meets my expectations. Instead of being about saving a species, like burrowing owls or Florida panthers, this is about a  broke wildlife wrangler and his son who take a job for a "reality" show to pay off their debt.

In the usual Hiaasen way, Chomp is enough to make you laugh out loud on several occasions and is filled with nearly caricature characters, but it also has elements that I don't remember seeing in previous YA Hiaasen Everglades books: actual suspense and danger where you legitimately worry about the lives of the characters.

Ladies and gentlemen, what can I say? Hail...to...Hiaasen! (If you don't get that reference, brush up on your controversial musicals)

Grade: A

The Catswold Portal

The Catswold Portal by Shirley Rousseau Murphy
Roc Hardcover - April 7, 1992
405 pages

There is a door in an artist's garden: an elaborate carved passageway into a realm ruled by a dark sorceress queen. There entities strange and wondrous roam the Netherworld--yet none as astonishing as the shape-shifting Catswold...
Raised by the old witch Mag, Melissa discovers a perilous secret. She has more than one form--human girl and magical cat--and once inhabited two worlds. And it is her destiny to return to a mystic realm of wonder and terror, to do battle for her people's liberation and the crown that is rightfully hers.
A man beset by tragedy, painter Braden West is intrigued by the calico cat who has charmed her way into his studio. But his "guest" is more than she seems, and Braden's very existence will be radically altered as he follows Melissa from the Hell Pit into the dread perils of an evil ruling court, thrust into the heart of a magical conflict with more at stake than he could have possibly imagined.

(Spoiler level: Moderate)

About a few hours after I closed the book, I was about to sit down to eat dinner when a scary thought hit me.

Melissa...was...seventeen. Braden was, what, twice her age? All those scenes. Eeeeeeeeeew.

Anyway, on to the rest of the review. This is supposed to be a prequel of sorts to the Joe Grey Mysteries by Shirley Rousseau Murphy, which I also enjoy but don't review here because I started reading them so long ago. It's technically a prequel in that the Catswolders are supposed to explain how Joe Grey and Dulcie can talk. It's not a prequel in that it was actually written before Joe Grey, and the word "prequel" is a term for a book that is written after another but takes place before. It's also not in that it doesn't take place where Joe Grey does and has none of the same characters.

There are two protagonists here: Melissa, who is Catswold (meaning that she's a cat shapeshifter) and living in secret for seventeen years. Then there's Braden, who is just a human trying to live a normal life after his wife got hit by a car. Melissa is perilously boring, so I kept anticipating another Braden chapter; unfortunately, they were few and far between.

The antagonist, an evil queen, is also pretty lackluster. As a whole, in fact, the fantasy Underworld is pretty basic. Fortunately, Murphy keeps things moving pretty fast. Sometimes too fast, but anything to distract you from how regular the world is.

Grade: B-

Black Beauty

Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
Jarrold & Sons - November 24, 1877
281 pages

"We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words."

When his beloved owners are forced to sell him, Black Beauty leaves his life as a young, carefree colt behind him and embarks on a working life of misery. Cruelly treated by his new masters, Anna Sewell rails against animal mistreatment in this poignant tale of a horse whose spirit can not be broken.

Can I express to you how much I love this novel adequately? I don't think so, but I'm certainly going to try.

You may have noticed, loyal blog readers, that this book has been in my "Currently reading" section for quite a while. It's not because I disliked Black Beauty, as the above paragraph clearly shows, but rather because I got bogged down reading several other books.

As a self-described "3/4 animal-rights activist", I wholeheartedly agree with the particular messages that Sewell is trying to send. While I eat poultry and keep a pet, I am fully against the mistreatment of horses, especially by using a whip to drive a horse past its breaking point. Even though I already felt this way before, Black Beauty is enough to change the majority of people.

Grade: A

The Last Werewolf

The Last Werewolf by Glen Duncan
Canongate Press - March 1, 2011
293 pages

Meet Jake. A bit on the elderly side (he turns 201 in March), but you'd never suspect it. Jake is a werewolf, and after the unfortunate and violent death of his one contemporary, he is now the last of his species. Although he is physically healthy, Jake is deeply distraught and lonely to the point where he is actually contemplating suicide--even if it means terminating a legend thousands of years old. It would seem to be easy enough for him to end everything. But for very different reasons there are two dangerous groups pursuing him who will stop at nothing to keep him alive. In Jake, Glen Duncan has given us a werewolf for the twenty-first century--a man whose deeds can only be described as monstrous but who is in some magical way deeply human.

(Spoiler rate: Minor)

First, the sexism. There are fewer female werewolves (called "Shes") than males (well, I suppose that since Jake is the last werewolf and he's a man, there would be fewer Shes). I thought that there was going to be some completely scientific explanation for it, such as the metabolism of women doesn't hold up with the werewolf virus or something like that. Nope! It's because women are so much more sensitive. They'll make their first kill and stay up all night crying about it, then swallow a silver earring to kill themselves. Great.

Second, the actual writing. First of all, there are some downright confusing sentences where nothing makes sense. Either a word or proper punctuation was missing to make it simply wrong. Second, I counted multiple instances in which there was a period missing. Third, there was the use of language. I have nothing against obscenities in literature when it advances the plot or is used for characterization purposes. I get it, people talk like that. It doesn't mean that every time that you come to a human body part you have to use one of the "terrible c-words" to describe it.

Third and finally (and this is more of a minor aggression than the sexism and writing above), about three-quarters into the novel, maybe more, the book switches viewpoints. While we were hearing all of Jake's thoughts up until then. For the next part, we hear about Talulla, who I'm just going to say is someone very special to all characters involved. No major spoilers here. I'm fine with multiple viewpoints, having handled everything in A Game of Thrones, but the problem is that if you are in a first-person novel and switch the viewpoint, you have to tell the reader right away. I was about two pages in when I realized that it was no longer Jake's thoughts. Everything made sense again.

There is a sequel, however, to The Last Werewolf. It's called Talulla Rising. Since it's about Talulla, it solves the sexism and (I hope) the viewpoint problems. Talulla is also a much more sympathetic protagonist than Jake is. No matter how much of a train wreck The Last Werewolf may have been, it was still an exciting romp, and with a change of personality, the sequel will be on my list.

Grade: C-

Homer's Odyssey

Homer's Odyssey: A Fearless Feline Tale, or How I Learned About Love and Life with a Blind Wonder Cat by Gwen Cooper
Delacorte Press - August 25, 2009
287 pages

Once in nine lives, something extraordinary happens...
The last thing Gwen Cooper needed was another cat. She already had two, not to mention a phenomenally underpaying job and a recently broken heart. Then Gwen's veterinarian called with a story about a three-week-old eyeless kitten who'd been abandoned. It was love at first sight.

{Spoiler level: Minor)

I'll tell you right away that if you are a cat person and read this, your immediate impulse after closing the book in completion will be to run out to your nearest humane society and adopt a special needs cat. It doesn't even have to be eyeless; it can be plain blind, or three-legged, or deaf, or even those little two-legged cats that have to have wheels to move around. So just keep that in mind when you're reading; resist the urge to get a special needs cat on impulse.

Onto the story! Now, you may have noticed that it said "three-week-old eyeless kitten". Homer had a horrible eye infection and was brought into the vet's office. The couple who brought him showed interest in keeping him until the vet said that she was going to have to remove his eyes if he wanted to live. They no longer wanted him. The vet performed the operation and stitched up his eyes. She then asked around if anyone wanted the cat. Gwen Cooper didn't want one, but she came over to see him and then adopted him.

You have to care something about cats to really appreciate Homer's Odyssey, or you'll find yourself without any kind of feeling for the blind, eyeless kitten. I personally laughed and cried at all of Homer's exploits and what he did for Gwen and the other cats he lived with.

Another thing that you have to know is that the novel may make more sense to you if you actually live with cats. One angry Amazon reviewer said that he felt it was illogical that Gwen would know what Homer was trying to say from his meows. I've owned a cat for nearly five years now, I know what she's trying to say most of the time. My cat was also one when I got her, and so if you raise a cat from its very kittenhood, you'll have an even closer bond and know what everything's about.

So the bottom line is: if you love cats and have owned one at least sometime in your life, you will find this book wonderful, but if you either are indifferent to cats or have never owned one, you may not appreciate it. And if you think cats come from Satan, why would you even pick up this book? The cat takes up three-quarters of the cover!

Grade: A

The Storm: Dogs of the Drowned City

The Storm: Dogs of the Drowned City by Dayna Lorentz
Scholastic Press - June 1, 2011
224 pages

When a hurricane forces his family to evacuate without him, Shep the German Shepherd is confused. Where is his boy? Will he ever return? And what will Shep do in the meantime now that the extra bowls of food -- not to mention all those tasty things he found in the big cold box -- are gone?
Then another dog shows up at Shep's window and convinces him to escape. There's food outside, and a whole empty city to explore. Shep just wants to go home...but the adventure of a lifetime is just beginning.

{Spoiler level: Minor)

This book goes ridiculously fast. You have to pay attention to what happens, because things happen in a matter of sentences and names are thrown at you at the speed of light. If you aren't 110% focused on what's happening in The Storm, something will happen and you'll be like:

Did he die? Who's that? And then you'll flip back a few pages.

Oh yeah. That's who we're talking about.

Not that all of that's a good thing. It's much better than the alternative, which would be slugging along at such a horrible place that you skip fifty pages and you still understand everything that's going on. I think I actually did that in The Tommyknockers at one point, but then decided that I should read the whole thing in order to give it a proper review.

I did have a bone to pick with The Storm. Shep used to be a fighting dog, but you don't get a lot of information about the bloodshed. It could have been a great opportunity to show people the horrors of dog fighting, but alas, it wasn't. All you hear is that there were puppies and old dogs, an old dog taught Shep about the Great Wolf and the Black Dog, Shep always killed his opponents quickly and with mercy because he didn't want them to suffer, and the dead dogs were never properly buried. He treats the cage and fighting as horrible, but readers are never shown those horrors. I suppose it's because this could be classified as middle grade.

Apart from that, it's a quick read with some well-developed characters (and others that you don't really get to know because there are so many, but that's like Warriors) and a strong plot.

Grade: B+

The Jungle Book

The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling
Macmillan Publishers - 1894
97 pages

(Spoiler level: Minor)

One thing that I bet you didn't know about The Jungle Book is that it isn't all about Mowgli. There are other stories too. And the Mowgli stories are nothing like the Disney movie. There's no King Louie; the monkeys (or Bandar-log) have no leader because they are uncivilized.

Mowgli's Brothers: A lost human is taken in by wolves and named Mowgli. When the wolf leader Akela is toppled by the lame tiger Shere Khan, Mowgli gains fire from a human village and uses it to scare Shere Khan away. Interesting take on the life of animals in India. Sometimes a little boring. B+

Kaa's Hunting: Mowgli is taken by the Bandar-log, or the evil monkeys, when he's being taught about the jungle by Baloo. I love anything that portrays evil monkeys, and this one is a nonstop adventure the whole way through, unlike the previous one. A

Tiger! Tiger!: Mowgli is found by humans after leaving the wolf pack. When his brother tells Mowgli that Shere Khan has returned, Mowgli comes up with a plan to drive him out for good this time. Sometimes meandering and confusing, it brings a satisfying end to the Mowgli trilogy. B

The White Seal: Kotick, a white seal, searches across the world for a land where humans will not be killing his kind. A great case for the animal cruelty that results from hunting for animal skins. A

Rikki-Tikki-Tavi: A mongoose named Rikki-Tikki-Tavi must kill Nag and Nagaina, a pair of venomous cobras that want to kill the British family he lives with. This is probably one of the more popular stories, and it's simply meh. It's good, but not outstanding. B+

Toomai of the Elephants: Blech. The low point of The Jungle Book. An elephant trainer is taken on the adventure of his life by Kala Nag. Not only does it perpetuate the idea that elephant trainers are good, it focuses very little on Kala Nag's inner thoughts, which is quite a stylistic departure from Kipling's norm. D

Her Majesty's Servants: Animals of the British Army discuss their various lives while a British soldier who understands animals listens in on their conversation. Interesting take, but it could get confusing at times with a lack of "the horse said", etc. A-

Overall Grade: B+

If it weren't for the horrible and ridiculous "Toomai of the Elephants", the grade would be higher, so skip that if you can.

The Wild Road

The Wild Road by Gabriel King
Del Rey - March 1, 1999 (first published 1997)
460 pages

Secure in a world of privilege and comfort, the kitten Tag is happy as a pampered house pet--until the dreams come. Dreams that pour into his safe, snug world from the wise old cat Majicou: hazy images of travel among the magical highways of the animals, of a mission, and of a terrible responsibility that will fall on young Tag. Armed with the cryptic message that he must bring the King and Queen of cats to Tintagel before the spring equinox, Tag ventures outside. Meanwhile, an evil human known only as the Alchemist doggedly hunts the queen for his own ghastly ends. And if the Alchemist captures her, the world will never be safe again...

First off, I have a deep and unrelenting hatred for the typographic choices of this novel. The copy I got from the library was only 380 pages, and so I thought that it was going to be a quick read. This was made even more likely by the table of contents and other opening stuff being in 13-point Goudy Old Style, which is large with great spaces in-between. Then I got to the actual story, which was in 11-point Times New Roman and I think had spacing of 0.8. I would rather this book be 700 pages and a readable font.

The "spring equinox" part is, safe to say, ridiculous. While that might have been a good starting point for the book, so much is mentioned of the cats walking around for months doing nothing that the whole idea of the impending equinox is thrown out the window.

And then there's the whole language issue. While the cats love the minced oath "stuff", e.g. "stuff off!", they will use pretty much other word as it was intended, some of them frequently. At first I was taken aback by the use of the kitten Tag's use of the word "damn", as it didn't really seem like something a cat of his age would say. Then I got to all the "stuff off" and thought that it was just a personality thing and they'd be unlikely to use any real obscenity. Then the characters Sealink and Mousebreath, who would swear like sailors at every given opportunity, started saying "stuff", and at that point I was just plain confused.

That's not to say that I hated the book. I would pick it up day in and day out. However, the urgency was more to finish, and not to see what happened, if that makes sense. It wasn't like, say, Tailchaser's Song or Watership Down, where I desperately cared about everyone and needed to make sure that they were okay. I wanted to finish, that was all.

Grade: B

Varjak Paw

Varjak Paw by SF Said
David Fickling Books - 2003
255 pages

Mesopotamian Blue cat Varjak Paw has never been Outside before: he and his family have always lived in the isolated house at the top of the hill. But Varjak is forced out of the city when the sinister Gentleman and his two menacing cats take over his home. With help from his mystical ancestor, Jalal, Varjak manages to overcome challenges such as self-survival and a threat from menacing gangland cats, and he ultimately discovers the terrifying secrets behind the Vanishings. But can he save his own family from their fate?

(Spoiler rate: Moderate)

I literally read this book in about an hour and a half. I was watching a rerun of Best Week Ever early in the morning when there was an outage and I was left with nothing to do. That's when I saw that the next book on my list was Varjak Paw. Naturally, I picked it up and began reading. With 255 pages, big font, and pictures, it didn't take me very long. To put it simply, for someone older, this is definitely a library read (meaning, of course, that it's so short it's not worth owning.)

The characters are rather highly developed to the point where you greatly care about them. My favorites were Holly and Tam, two female cats that Varjak meets on his journeys. Ginger and Sally Bones are less well-developed, but the stories behind them are rather rich.

Sometimes there is repetition of details as if we are being presented with it the first time. I can only assume that this is a result of editing, where something was introduced in one chapter and the chapter before that was changed to include this piece, but the chapter afterwards was never fixed. I've always been careful to make sure that there's no repetition in my works. As an example, we are presented with the fact that Holly's eyes are the color of mustard in one chapter and then the next as if it is new.

And then there's the deus ex machina at the end. Varjak is sent out by the Elder Paw, his grandfather, to find a dog to save his family from the Gentlemen. The problem is that there's no way for the dog, Cludge, to come up, because he can't climb and there's something about how the house is structured that the dog can't jump. So Varjak is fighting the Gentleman and his two cats on his own and you think that he's about to use the skills that Jalal taught him to kill the Gentleman.

Nope.

Cludge wants to climb for his friend Varjak, so he learns how to climb and comes up in just the nick of time to kill the Gentleman. What the what?!? Dogs don't just learn how to climb in ten minutes because they feel bad about letting their friends down!

Up until that point, I was feeling pretty good about Varjak Paw. Oh well.

Grade: B

The Tygrine Cat

The Tygrine Cat by Inbali Iserles
Candlewick Press - April 8, 2008
256 pages

Alone and lost, a young cat named Mati is struggling to be accepted by a colony of street cats in the bustling marketplace of Cressida Lock. What Mati doesn't know is that he is the last of a vital, age-old breed and that a mysterious feline assassin named Mithos is close on his trail. With his enemy nearing, can Mati learn to harness his ancient powers --- before a deadly feline force destroys both him and his newfound friends and takes the spirit of every cat on earth?

One of the things that I absolutely adore about this book is the design. Mati is the last of a cat dynasty that comes from the Middle East, and both the main font (Weiss) and the chapter heading font give you that Arabic feel. The cover (though very low-resolution in this view) is amazingly detailed, giving you images of nearly every cat that's important to the story.

As for the story itself, it's better than most, though nothing Tailchaser. Iserles says that she got the idea from flipping through a book of cat breeds and thinking about two rivaling cat dynasties. The idea is excellent, but the execution is merely good.

When Mati first washes up on Cressida Lock, there are three cats that meet him right away: Binjax, Ria, and Domino. Binjax and Domino are mighty important to the story, but Ria just sort of disappears by part 2. Another character, a Siamese named Fink, exists only to hate Mati for a couple of chapters. I don't know what got left of the cutting-room floor, but these characters are half-baked.

The novel takes an entirely different tone halfway through. In the first half, Mati is struggling for acceptance with the Cressida Lock cats, but in the second half the assassin Mithos finds him and begins chasing him. The story is instantly much darker and quite a bit better, at least in my opinion. If there had been more in that tone and less in the previous one, I would have liked The Tygrine Cat more.

Still, it's not a bad book. In fact, it's a pretty good one. There were some genuinely suspenseful parts to it, and the primary character Jess had a rather interesting story to her where you weren't sure which way you wanted it to work out.

It was a pretty good book, but not extraordinary.

Grade: B+

Tailchaser's Song

Tailchaser's Song by Tad Williams
DAW Books - November 21, 1985
333 pages

Fritti Tailchaser is part of a group of cats called the Folk in the Meeting Wall Clan. Mysterious disappearances have been happening across the Clan, including Tailchaser's crush Hushpad. When the issue is brought up at a meeting, a group of cats are sent to go to the Royal Court to notify Queen Sunback of the disappearances. However, the cats forget Hushpad as soon as they leave, and so Tailchaser goes out to find her by himself. When Pouncequick, a kitten who sees Tailchaser as a role model, follows the cat, he finds himself playing caretaker as well.

You may have asked yourself why I included this as a classic. The answer is simple: to fantasy and animal fans, Tailchaser's Song is the Watership Down of cat books. Everyone who reads anthropomorphic cat books thinks of Tailchaser. I can definitely see elements of Tailchaser in the Warriors books: two-part names (Stretchslow, Pouncequick, Sunback, and Firefoot especially were Warriors-esque) and Clans in particular are similar. The adventure is high and engaging, and I could not put this book down. I even read it in the car to finish it one day.

Grade: A

Duncan, Son of Sagira

Duncan, Son of Sagira by E.C. Holley
Amazon CreateSpace - May 28, 2012
280 pages

Legend has it that there was a cat named Sagira that possessed five magical powers. At first she was worshipped, but then she was hunted down. Before she disappeared, she had five children: three queens and two toms. Each of them had one of her powers and went on to create generations of cats with these powers of Sagira. The children of Sagira were feared, and so cats were killed by humans. An organization of purebreds was established to kill the children of Sagira and stop this war. Now the children hide, and none has ever had more than one power of Sagira...until Duncan.

I don't normally read self-published books. This came up as an Amazon recommendation and I decided to check it out, interested. The world is deeply engrossing and richly imagined. Of course, there comes a major fault with self-publishing: typos. There were no grammatical errors that I can think of outside of dialogue, which of course you get a free pass for since someone (especially a juvenile of any species) may actually speak that way, but there were a few instances of misspellings, misitalicizings, and forgetting to break into another paragraph. These made me pause for a second before continuing, and these little blips were infrequent enough that they didn't disturb my enjoyment too much.

Grade: B+

The High-Skies Adventures of Blue Jay the Pirate

The High-Skies Adventures of Blue Jay the Pirate by Scott Nash
Candlewick - September 25, 2012
368 pages

Captain Blue Jay is the captain of the Jolly Robin and leader of a band of fearsome pirates who fly in an airship across Thrushland, pillaging. Captain Blue Jay has always had an affinity for eggs, and when he captures one that hatches into a Brantas goose, a species long believed to have magical powers and even be a god. Blue Jay can use this to his advantage when he faces off against the treacherous crow Teach and his brother Bellamy.

My chief complaint with this novel is how short it is. It's not just the 368 pages; the font is large, there is great spacing between them and frequent pictures. If this had been longer, it could have been thrilling. However, I'm going to have to label it as merely "above average". While I have to disagree with the use of crows as antagonists, I'm pleased with the choice of having a blue jay antihero, and of course I can't disagree with the use of anthro at all in any work, from short story to novel. Not to mention, as much as it shortened the page length, the pictures were stunning.

Grade: B+

Fenrir

Fenrir by M.D. Lachlan
Pyr - January 1, 2011
441 pages

Let me give you the basic setup, i.e. what the book is for the first twenty pages or so before Lachlan just rips everything established to shreds. The Vikings are in Paris and they're setting fire to everything. They say that they want the Count's sister so that they can marry her to their ruler Helgi. The Count doesn't know what to do, so he calls Jehan of St. Germain, a blind and crippled confessor, to help him. Meanwhile, his sister Aelis is running away because Munin and Hugin are after her. Then there's the Easterner Leshii, who happens to be hanging out with a man named Chakhlyk (I don't remember, it's something crazy like that). Chakhlyk also happens to be a werewolf. Then there's the Viking chieftain Ofaeti.

I'm just going to get this out of the way: Chakhlyk = Sindre. This is never explained in the book. First he's called Chakhlyk by Leshii, then Aelis calls him the wolfman, and then all of a sudden (without him telling her his name, mind you) she starts thinking that he's called Sindre. It took me a few chapters to realize he was Chakhlyk/the wolfman. That was part of the overarching problem with the book: it's trying to be mysterious and just ends up being confusing. The last chapter has LITERALLY NOTHING to do with the rest of the book. This is the second book in a trilogy and I was told that you could understand this just fine without the first book. Something tells me even with the first book I wouldn't know what was going on. The one saving grace was that it was only 441 pages instead of double that.

Grade: D

Tales from Watership Down

Tales from Watership Down by Richard Adams
Hutchinson - March 1, 1996
198 pages

The author of Watership Down has penned a sequel of sorts. It is a collection of short stories in three parts: the first part are traditional stories of the rabbit trickster El-ahrairah. The second part are more stories of El-ahrairah and his faithful companion Rabscuttle, although these are on their way home from the Black Rabbit of Inle. The third and final part follows the rabbits on the Down in events after what happened in Watership Down.

I was thrilled to see that this was mostly stories of El-ahrairah. The few stories that were mentioned in the original were delightfully whimsical, and the stories in Tales are the same way. The first part also includes a story by Blackavar, a rabbit rescued from Efrafa, about a ghost rabbit. However, it is also ruined by a nonsensical story by the jester-type rabbit Bluebell. In the third part, I started off with a grin upon seeing that Hyzenthlay, my favorite character from the original because of the fact that she is a strong doe, becomes elevated to co-Chief Rabbit with her mate Hazel as opposed to remaining stuck in the "First Lady" type position. I was, however, less than thrilled to see that Blackberry is rarely mentioned and is only once called upon for his intelligence. This book still holds almost as much of the magic as the first. Almost.

Grade: B+

Days of Blood & Starlight

Days of Blood & Starlight by Laini Taylor
Hachette Book Group - November 6, 2012
513 pages

Warning: This is the sequel to Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor. My synopsis and review may involve things that are not spoilers to people who have read the first book, but would be to people who have not. If you have not completed Daughter of Smoke and Bone, do not read the following until you have finished it.

Karou had loved the enemy and had sorely paid the price for it. Now they were dead: Brimstone, Yasri, Issa, and Twiga. Karou has gone to Thiago's army, even after what the White Wolf did to her previous self as Madrigal. In the wake of Brimstone's death, it is now Karou's job to resurrect the dead chimaera as revenants so that they may be able to defeat the seraphim for once and for all. But Akiva is waging his own war, this one for redemption.

Can I just start by saying that I absolutely detest the character of Akiva? I don't know what makes me loathe him so, but I cannot stand him at all. Karou needs Ziri, her "little Kirin shadow" from when she was Madrigal. The other characters, however, were wonderful. The dark, sarcastic senses of humor from Karou's friend Zuzana and Madrigal's friend Haxaya were outstanding. There were brief flashes to three escaped chimaera: Sveva, Sarazal, and Rath. Nothing truly important happened to them, so they had better become a large part of the third book in the trilogy, or I will wreak havoc. And nobody wants to see my havoc. The strong Karou plot was weakened by side Zuzana and Sveva/Sarazal/Rath side-plots, and the Akiva plot only built up steam about two-thirds of the way in. While the characters (especially the chimaera) are much more outstanding than its predecessor, the plots of Days of Blood and Starlight left me wanting something thicker.

Grade: B