An Escapade and An Engagement by Annie Burrows.

The characters in this book are flawed in many ways but, perhaps worst of all, they’re inconsistent. They behave very differently in different parts of the book without established growth to justify the change in behavior. One example: about halfway through the book, the heroine learns that she is commonly known as a cold “Ice Queen”. I was surprised to learn that the other characters felt this way about her, because I had just slogged through 100 pages of this woman screaming, begging, crying, fluttering, sneaking out of windows, and passionately kissing inappropriate men, all with great feeling.

The hero of this book is mean, illogical, revoltingly high-minded, snooty, controlling, and irritating. The heroine is worse. She is described, of course, as a vision of perfect loveliness. And also as “a flighty little piece.” She is pouty and simpering. She never fully understands the consequences of any of her actions until a man explains them to her. She is annoying and stupid. I hate her. I can’t tell you any more without sounding like a child having a tantrum (if that ship hasn’t already sailed), so here are some quotes:

“And here they were, just inches away, and her utter perfection had just literally taken his breath away.”

“She mellowed a little. How could she not, when he was demonstrating such faith in her fashion sense?”

“Over the next few days she found she was glad Harry had bruised her face.”

“‘I beg your pardon,’ she said. ‘I have finished crying now.’ … He almost gasped with admiration. She must have an inner core of steel.”

And we can sum it up in the hero’s own words:

“‘Smuggled letters?’ He looked at her, aghast. ‘I am beginning to feel as if I have walked into some kind of badly written play.'”

Truer words were never spoken, sir.

Graceling by Kristen Cashore

This book is: A YA fantasy novel, the first in a series, about a girl with a supernatural gift for killing.
Other elements: Right vs wrong, romance, friendship.
Read it: If you like YA fantasy, if you enjoy ass-kicking women, if you liked The Hunger Games.
Overall rating: 8/10

I really like reading YA fantasy, even though I’m in my mid-20’s. (Mid-to-late 20’s? Where do you draw the line? I’m clinging to “mid” for now.) YA fantasy is comforting – usually good things happen to the good people and bad things happen to the bad people, for the most part. It’s free of things like vivid descriptions of how clothing in different lands shows different parts of breasts (ahem, Robert Jordan). It also tends to be simpler overall, unlike some epic fantasy series which can become extremely, sometimes overly, complex. Not to hate on those books, I enjoy them too, but sometimes they’re just not what you want.

I’ve read enough fantasy that I have certain pet peeves that I take as a sign that a book is going to be bad in a way only a fantasy book can be bad. This book was guilty of one of these right away and it took me quite a few pages to accept that I liked the book anyway. The sin? Weirdly-colored eyes. Bad fantasy novels love characters with weirdly colored eyes. (Even good fantasy novels use this sometimes.) In this case, I forgave it.

Other elements: Pets, parenting a special needs child, math.
Read it: If you’re interested in psychology, if you appreciate excellent first-person perspective.
Overall rating: 7.5/10

I started reading The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time once before and either it didn’t grab me or I had to return it to whoever I’d borrowed it from (I don’t remember). This time, however, I was able to read it all the way through and I was glad.

This novel is written from the first person point of view of Christopher, a 15-year-old boy who tells us he has “Behavioral Problems.” It sounds to me like he has Autism or Asperger’s, but the book never mentions a diagnosis. I don’t know much about Autism or Autism-spectrum disorders, but Christopher was an interesting character. I think Haddon’s approach of writing the book from Christopher’s perspective was what made this book remarkable. Christopher’s way of looking at the world is fascinating.

Christopher was prone to going off on long mathematical tangents, which bored me. They made sense for the character, but I really hate math. I skimmed these parts.

One of the more interesting characters in the book was Christopher’s father. I really liked how I, as the reader, witnessed the same moments with the father as Christopher did, but I could read them differently.

Not all of the peripheral characters – like Christopher’s mother or the neighbors – were anything special, but it didn’t keep me from enjoying the book. I’d call it solidly good. If it sounds interesting to you, it’s probably worth your time to read it.