My foray into Harry Potter fan fiction

Watching the last Harry Potter movie last week (so good until the end when they screwed up the epic fight scene, seriously what the hell was that ?!), I was ever reminded of the complete lack of chemistry between the actors playing Harry and Ginny. At first I thought this was just fairly bad acting from the pair of them...then I thought maybe they're attempting to tell the unwritten story of Harry Potter? This is how I think it went. 

Harry Potter: epilogue
It had been a difficult week for Harry. Killing Voldemort, saving the wizarding world, making peace with Snape…it all paled against what he had to do next. Sometimes when the war is over, things that could be settled on the battlefield would now have to go through the Human Rights Courts. First the Nuremburg trials, now the Wizengamot. Now seated in the witness box, Harry found his eyes surveying the crowd. His glance found Hermione looking tense but supportive, swept over Ron who looked confused, meeting Ginny’s who returned the stare and appeared to mouth something. Harry flinched and looked away, closing his eyes involuntarily.
“All rise for the case of Potter versus Weasley”, came a disembodied voice. “The allegations are as followed; Sexual assault, conspiracy to commit sexual assault and finally attempted rape. Will the accused stand”?
Looking dazed, as though she still couldn’t comprehend what was going on, Ginny stood up.
“How do you plea, Miss Weasley”? asked the newly appointed head of the Wizengamot, Chief Justice McGonagall. Ginny’s lawyer sprang up.
“If it pleases the court”, Ginny’s lawyer said, then stopped. She looked around and appeared to clutch at some empty air. “Damn it! I almost caught it that time”!
“Defence Counsel, Lovegood, kindly remember that you are representing your client against a very serious charge” said Chief Justice McGonagall. Harry had no idea why the Courts would have appointed Luna Lovegood. Not only had she not graduated, but she had never displayed the slightest interest or aptitude for wizarding law.
“I apologise Chief Justice”, replied Luna Lovegood, looking slightly abashed. “My client pleads not guilty”.
Harry stared at his shoes, wondering at the brazenness of the girl he had once considered dating.
Harry’s lawyer patted him comfortingly. “Don’t worry”, said Susan Bones, “We’ll win this case. She doesn’t have a leg to stand on”.
“When were you first made to feel uncomfortable by the defendant”? asked Susan Bones to Harry.
Harry took a deep breath, trying to get to his happy place. He was on his Firebolt flying free in the sky. He felt himself calming down. He stared ahead of him and tried to keep his voice steady.
“I was staying with my friend, Ron Weasley, at his house the Burrow”, Harry began. “I was just walking down the stairs when I was stopped by Ginny. She offered to tie my shoe laces. I tried to say no but she was too fast. She knelt down and I felt…violated. Like she was undressing me with her eyes. I thanked her and tried to put the incident behind me”.
Luna stood up. “So at no time did you vocalise your discomfort”? How was my client to know that anything was amiss”?
“Later on”, Harry said, ignoring the interruption, “I began to have dreams about her. Whenever I tried to sleep I would have flashbacks of the incident, remembering how powerless I felt. It made it really difficult for me to devote all my energies to destroying Voldemort, and thus saving the entire wizarding world”.
There was a sympathetic murmur from the crowd. Chief Justice McGonagall actually shook her fist in Ginny’s direction before remembering that she was supposed to be impartial.
“But the worst thing was, once I got to back to Hogwarts. From that point on it felt that everywhere I went she was following me, joining every activity I did. She even took my place on the Quidditch team. It was like she was trying to capture my essence”, or to engineer a situation where we would be alone together. And one day she succeeded”.
“I went to the Room of Requirement to dispose of my potion's book which at that point I suspected was filled with dark magic. And when I turned around there was Ginny. She ordered me to close my eyes and such was my fear of her that I obeyed. And that’s when the groping started”.
Harry bowed his head, trying to force himself to go on. He tried going back to his happy place, flying his firebolt during a Quidditch match. But this time Ginny was there, flying after him.
Chief Justice McGonagall looked at Ginny with disgust. Ginny tried to find her lawyer, but Luna had left ages ago, intent on capturing some nargles .
“In the absence of the defendants lawyer, this Court moves to convict the defendant on all charges. She is to be sentence to 15 months imprisonment in Azkaban. Hopefully when she comes out it will be with a new awareness of the rights of others to live their lives unafraid and unmolested”.
The Court erupted in a deafening haze of applause. Even Ron joined in before he realised what he was doing. Harry felt a weight lift of his shoulders. Finally the most traumatic event in his life could be put to rest.

Will Ginny escape from wizarding prison? Find out soon…

Food and the hungry author

                                                 Food and the hungry author

   A lot of books mentioned food. This is because, regardless of what a character is doing they eventually have to eat. That is unless you are a very bad author who wishes to kill their character through neglect… Some authors intertwine food within a plot until food is essentially one of the supporting characters. Others ignore food, or act like it’s a distasteful topic. This seems a shame because cooking is an art form, and any book which ignores food seems to deliberately deprive itself of an area of analysis. Even if an authors writing an adventure novel and the characters are constantly running around, defying death, saving the world etc…food is still important. A notable example of this is the Percy Jackson series and his obsession with eating blue food. It was just a fun fact to know about the characters. Having said that, some of my books on the list may be judged as unfair, and people are more than welcome to submit their own opinions of suggestions. This is a blog after all, not an online diary. If you were lame and into puns when you read this you may write down a reply that determined to make me eat my words. Good luck with that.

   Also, in an effort to double my readership from one, this blog is collaborating with my friend Chloe, an awesome cook and historian J The plan is that she’ll create recipes based on my reviews. And then we’ll eat them. Hopefully only the ones from the best mentions. The recipes created from the worst mentions shall be served to our enemies.

So here is the best and the worst food references in literature.

Best:

A list of books which mentioned food would be incomplete without a mention of Joanne Harris. When her characters aren’t talking about food, they’re eating it or spying on their enemies through scrying chocolate…I have read others of her books, but without food, they didn’t stick together that well. Five quarters of the Orange was excellent, and Chocolat and its sequel the Girl with the Lollipop Shoes remain two of my favourite books. Thankfully, Joanne Harris has realised that people prefer reading about food in the French countryside rather than paedophilia in the Victorian era. However, I do think she’s gone off into the deep end in Blackberry Wine, which is narrated by a Wine Bottle. 

(Chloe) Joanne Harris is the queen of seductive food descriptions. What's wonderful about her books is that the food isn't just a sideshow but an integral part of the book: in the case of Blackberry Wine it's a character in itself!
Blackberry Wine is an interesting novel about how things can be simpler than they seem, which is not usually the way in novels! Given that the narration is carried out by a bottle of blackberry wine I have paid homage to it with a recipe for blackberry and orange cordial, as I'm not really at the stage of wanting to ferment my own wines (which I wouldn't drink anyway). (I have made cheese though).
Paying my due respects to Chocolat requires, of course, something in chocolate. Being seductive about chocolate is easy, of course, but in Chocolat Harris shows that pleasure can involve pain and sacrifice, symbolised effectively by one character's love for chocolate and sweets despite the diabetes which is causing her to go blind. I made rich, seductive Beacon Hill cookies – not very French, admittedly – to use up some egg whites I had in the freezer.
Five Quarters of the Orange is my favourite Harris book – I am after all a historian (supposedly) and the book is set partly in occupied France. Although I should perhaps make something with oranges – a Moorish orange salad, or a sweet-tart sorbet or even, I chose instead to celebrate the cherry. An odd choice? Not really. In several books Harris' characters make references to a homemade cherry liqueur which involves preserving cherries in sugar and kirsch.

The last Chinese Chef: Nicole Mones: So many evocative descriptions of food that I almost don’t know where to start…so I’ll start with the plot line. This is a book that relied heavily on imagery and good writing to mask a lack of plot or character development. Therefore, even though this book was actually a really relaxing read, I probably wouldn’t read it again, because the two main plot lines peter out towards the end and it seems like there’s no real resolution. Having said that I did enjoy it, just mostly from a food basis.  And this is just a minor point, but one of the main characters is a food critic, yet she’s really excited by candy corn. Couldn’t figure out whether that fact annoyed me or not since candy corn is the most disappointing item in the world of sweets.

(Chloe) I haven't read The Last Chinese Chef but I have read Fuschia Dunlop's foodie memoir Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper, which made me crave all sorts of Chinese food which I have never actually eaten. Fuschia's memoir is all about authentic Chinese food and eating experiences – including the eating of endangered animals, which I thought was a pretty brave thing to admit to. Based on the reviews, The Last Chinese Chef is about a woman's journey where she discovers a lot about true Chinese cuisine and its complexities and variations. Inspired, I made Fuschia's fish-flavour aubergines, which is apparently one of her favourite recipes. Fish-flavour does not actually mean there's fish in the dish; it refers to the aromatics, which are traditionally used in fish cookery.

As The Last Chinese Chef is about an American food writer in China, I made that Chinese-American classic General Tso's chicken.

Harry Potter series; J K Rowling created a world with a lot of holes in it. A notable example is the fact that ostensibly 50% of wizards are married to muggles and yet wizards know nothing about them. Also, am I the only one who thought that Arthur Weasley sounded like he was really bad at his job? He knew nothing about muggles yet had spent twenty years working in a department which oversaw interactions with them… anyway this has nothing to do the food in the series which sounded excellent. Butterbeer, Berty Botts every flavour beans, and chocolate frogs all sounded cool, and HoneyDukes is one of the main reasons why I was left disappointed on my 11^th birthday. That, and I can’t do magic and stuff…

Marsha Mehran. Pomegranate Soup-Three Iranian sisters, recovering from the Revolution have decided to open a restaurant in rural Ireland. Unfortunately  the local lunatic has decided that their shop would be the perfect place for a disco. The obvious answer that given that the piece of space they’re debating is in the middle of nowhere why would either of these endeavors be a good idea? Alternatively, given the price of land in Ireland, he could have just bought some land outside of town to make into a strange retro disco arena. However, in terms of food, this book is awesome. It even has recipes at the back, which books which are based around food should always do.

Meet me at the cupcake café: Any book which is about cupcakes will appeal to me. Every recipe in the book sounded delicious and made me wish this café had opened in real life. 

Books I haven’t read but sound like they would have good food in them:

Like Water, for Chocolate.  A Mexican epic, which I shall buy soon.

(Chloe)I have actually read Laura Esquivel's 'Like Water for Chocolate', which is a book both passionate and frustrating. The descriptions of food and emotions (of course the two do more or less blend into one in this magical realist work) are powerful and convincing, but unfortunately the choice Tita makes towards the end of the novel really frustrated me. She sacrificed the happy life she could have had for a secretive double life. I know the point was that passion conquers all, but I must not be a very passionate person because it truly didn't convince me. My heart really ached for Dr John and I cast the book aside in anger when it was finished.
I made that classic Mexican dish, the mole, which features in the book along with the obligatory square of dark, bitter chocolate. Chocolate doesn't feature in the novel as much as you might think from the title; it alludes to the idea of being 'like water for chocolate' when melting chocolate in a bain marie – i.e., boiling, full of anger and passion. This is appropriate given how everyone in the novel is continuously either full of hatred or full of desire.
Unsurprisingly I chose not to make the Chabela wedding cake – given that it required 180 eggs and gave all the guests food poisoning! However I have honoured it with a recipe of Mexican wedding cakes, which are very similar to Russian teacakes

Diana Abu-Jaber. Crescent-Middle Eastern food is awesome. I look forward to reading this.

Worst: Stieg Larsson; His characters really didn’t eat that well. By the end of the trilogy you were wondering whether Billy Pan was a friend of his. They definitely got a fair bit of publicity out of this series, thus forever answering the age old question of what should you eat whilst on the run for a triple homicide…In terms of quality of writing, the girl with the dragon tattoo series was great though. It kills me that there were meant to be 10 and that the fourth is written but will probably never be published because of disputes over the will. 

(Chloe) For a quick snack, Mikael and Lisbeth could have noshed on goat's cheese and radish smorbrod, the Scandi version of the French tartine, an open-faced sandwich. Lighter and fresher-tasting than cured fish, it would not only have sustained them but is quick to make and eat...you can even eat it one-handed, tapping away at the computer to track down evildoers. After a long evening of restoring justice, a dish of Swedish meatballs would do the trick – if there's no time to cook anything (or the safe house or hiding out at doesn't have a stove!) they can be picked up at IKEA (the largest IKEA store in the world is in Sweden!). For dessert, I thought of a coffee granita to satisfy Mikael's coffee cravings as well as an homage to the Swedish summer (one of those strawberry-filled Swedish midsummer cakes would have worked too), but for a busy man on the go – or on the run – throwing some chokladbollar in a pocket is probably a better idea. Recipes: goat's cheese and radish smorbrod; Swedish meatballs and potato salad; chokladbollar.

M.L.N. Hanover: This series is slightly intriguing. A college drop-out learns that her uncle has died, leaving her with both a substantial inheritance and a dangerous task. Kind of been here before, so it’s not a particularly adventurous beginning. However, it’s disappointing to have read three books in this series, without any background becoming apparent. Her family are Christian and don’t like her that much, we get it. Anyway, the reason this book is one the list is because the protagonist lists everything she eats, and I meant everything. An extra 10,000 words is added to this book, due to the main characters annoying habit of listing everything she ate. Unless, this is the authors’ subtle way of letting us know she has an eating disorder, or suffers from OCD, it’s irritating so knock it off. 

(Chloe) For the demon book I'm going to make devilled chicken thighs! with devilled potatoes and devil's food cake...maybe

Top 10 Authors who’ve committed crimes against fiction

Top 10 Authors who’ve committed crimes against fiction

    I like to think that I’m generally a positive person, fun and easy going. So, why did I yesterday flip out when a friend of mine (the one with the unicorn fetish) started talking about a new author she had heard about…Lindsey Kelk? My blood pressure rose a few million degrees as I realised that the reason I recognised her name was because I had had the misfortune of reading one of her books….I heart New York. This book is possibly the worst book ever. It has an empty-headed heroine, a ridiculous storyline, strange and bizarre supporting characters, and of course the endless fashion name dropping which comes with any booked geared solely at women.  The first chapter ends with our heroine peeing in a designer bag her boyfriend got her, having just assaulted her best friend on her wedding day. Possibly the worst maid of honour ever. In fairness to her, she had just found out that her boyfriend was cheating on her with his tennis partner; and that her best friend and her now husband had continued to play doubles with them without thinking to mention this new development to her. First unbelievable fact; whose BEST FRIEND, who isn’t particularly close to the boyfriend, doesn’t mention that the boyfriend is seeing someone else? Secondly, whose reaction to this is to fly to New York with no friends, money, employment prospects? Maybe as a holiday but definitely not forever. The sad thing about this heroine is she only seemed to have two people in her life, her boyfriend and her best friend. While these two may be the closest to her, it’s impossible to believe they’re the only people she knows in the world…Thirdly, we get to the part where the first person she meets offers her a place to live, the hotel receptionist. Fourthly, we get to the fact that without much trouble and within fifty pages of actual dialogue (some books, once you cut out the meaningless description and fashion tips, are surprisingly empty), the heroine ends up dating both an investment banker and a lead singer of a famous indie band. It’s fiction, I should probably let it go…..but why can’t some authors go beyond cookie cutter characters? Is it so much to ask? Just to add to my anger, she ends up getting a job with a company writing a blog about her life as a single women in New York, like that idea’s never been done before, and like she’s the only foreigner in New York who’s single. I have a weird issue with blogs, which is funny because I’m currently writing one; the internet is great and one of the greatest things invented ever. However, my position is that the internet has no place in fiction. I have yet to see any case where a character using the internet instead of working out clues on their own isn’t a massive let down. Part of the reason why the House of Night series became so abysmal is because the characters began using the internet, watching glee and following people on twitter whilst hiding in the sewers, fighting for their lives. It’s clearly a stupid combination. I would be delighted to be proven wrong, but I don’t think a single series of books has been improved by having access to the internet. Imagine the Harry Potter series, if Dumbledore had left Harry Potter an email detailing how to destroy and identify Voldemorts (still feels weird to write his name, but it’s okay he’s definitely dead now, by all accounts he died in 1997 and Harry Potter is currently 32 years old..) horcruxes instead of making him look at pensieve memories. Although, we get to another point of asking, excusing the obvious answer, why did Harry never go to see Dumbledore with problems? Why did he try to figure out everything by himself even when it made no sense? Also, while we’re on the topic, why did Dumbledore not just tell Harry everything he knew immediately, rather than making him see him on several different occasions, feeding him information gradually and in convenient chapter sized chunks? So many mysteries…..

List of authors convicted and sentence in Ariadnes Literary Court of Law (which is currently under construction in an unknown location).

Lindsey Kelk; Crime for writing the worst book in the history of the world. Punishment; having her book thrown in the bin, and 2 years community service to read non-picture books before trying again.

Sunny-What can you say about such a disturbing author? Please can you have a plot line which doesn’t revolve around a Mary Sue character who sleeps with people to gain their powers? Punishment; A less grievous offence than Lindsey Kelk is reflected by the Courts lenient decision to have her be forced to introduce a well-rounded character into her series.

Sara Craven-I’m not sure that a Mills& Boon writer can be counted as an author in life……but for the purpose of the Court she is. Crime. Having written more than one book where the heroine is raped by the hero but is made to feel bad for her actions and end up marrying him. Punishment; That this author should never be allowed to write again, particularly not in erotic fiction given her own, disturbed views on female sexuality.

Patricia McKiliip-Was tricked by Amazon into thinking this was a good author. Made the mistake of buying five of her books only to find that all were terrible.  The few that weren’t just rewrites of fairytales, an increasing practice in the book world which is getting incredibly irritating; when Hollywood fails to come up with any movies which aren’t sequels or remakes, who in the literary world thought that was a good trend to follow? Od Magic is terrible with a plot line which makes no sense and no sign that it was in the middle of a trilogy, the only mitigating circumstances this Court accepts. Sentence; I got burnt on this one. The sentence is only a verbal warning, in that I will warn anyone who asks against this author.

Lyndsay Sands-Like Sunny she has been mentioned in this blog before. Her crime was to write the worst vampire series ever. Punishment; to be buried up to her neck in sand, for no reason except that her last name is Sands and she wrote a terrible vampire novel. Hmmm, put like that, this sounds slightly unreasonable. Her lawyer could probably find the grounds to appeal this sentence, if he’s not too busy with a shovel.

Alyson Noel-For her incredibly original reverse twilight story which was clearly ‘inspired’ by many other peoples work. Sentence; this Court can only marvel that no one in the real world has filed any claims against her.

Gabriella Poole-Reason for sentencing. For books that are essentially a vampire novel, but which become a book about incubi halfway through, with  a Mary Sue character who’s only ‘flaw’ is being poor…Sentence; because the books looked by the third one that there might be a plot line, and despite the gimmickiness of having a boarding school which relocates every term to a different country as well as the conspiracy theory perpetuated throughout the book that every famous person is possessed by an incubi, Gabriella Poole gets a suspended sentence. Only after the fourth book of her series, will her fate be decided. On the blog only obviously, because sadly this Court has very little legitimacy in the non-fiction world.

The sentencing for the next three authors has been delayed because of problems with paperwork. Will come soon!

Twists on traditional genres

Interesting new authors in the fantasy genre: 

Many authors contribute nothing new to a genre. Their plot lines travel down comfortable, well-established paths, creating no significant ripples in the literature pool-wanted to use the world ripple now stuck with the word pool... maybe lake would have been a better word? Anyway……here are some authors who’ve tried to create new ways of doing, to a varying degree of success.

13 to life-Shannon Delany

This book is probably one of the best I’ve read this year :) It won the first text novel competition in 2008-although I didn’t know this when I first read the book. The premise of the book is a new kid at a school in a small town…which admittedly is not the most original start off point. However, the central heroine Jessica differs in that she doesn’t react immediately and positively to this new guy-Pietr, and in fact is obsessing over a jock. Coupled with the fact that she’s clearly suffering trauma from an unexplained event which only gets revealed halfway through the book, and you’ve got an original twist on a conventional theme. Pietr and his family are first generation Russian-Americans, who’ve been brought to this town under shady circumstances, which is a useful segue into a debate of nationhood versus ethnic background, which was interesting without pulling down the story. Jess is a wannabe journalist whose burning desire is to get out of her small town the second she graduates. She manages to be feisty without being irritating and to be knowledgeable without coming across as a complete know-it-all. There are some things in the book which she describes without being fully aware of their implications-an example of this is the Sophia storyline although time will tell if my hunch is correct on this. Jessica has spent the entire year being a martyr while those around her wait for her to implode.  Meanwhile her best friend/someone she feels incredibly ambivalent about starts crushing on Pietr despite the fact that he’s only got eyes for her. . . The positives of this book: Their relationship feels natural and unrushed, plus there’s quite a lot of background action. The downside of this book is that there are lots of unanswered questions but then again it is a trilogy.

Diana Peterfreund-presents a series starring unicorns as you’ve never seen them before. I tried giving them to my friend who’s obsessed with unicorns…but she refused to read them as they conflict with her world view of unicorns as pure and beautiful. Or in other words, gay horses with spikes on their heads. Anyway, this series features killer unicorns, and the girls who are pledged to destroy them. These books are interesting both because of the original stance taken on the role of unicorns, or the clear amounts of research the authors done into exploring different folk lore surrounding unicorns. Another positive is the amount of in-fighting within the organisation which felt realistic in a situation where no one is fully aware of their role yet. The downside is the loose link with the Catholic Church as well as a French pharmaceutical company. Neither of these organisations seemed to be either necessary or a logical affiliation for a unicorn company to be part of. In addition, it still seems unclear why unicorn hunting goes down through families when you have to be a virgin and many of the girls would die in battle. I also find the hierarchical system a bit off. Another downside is that the character development in these books is less strong than it should be-after 800 pages I should know these characters well, or at least care about them. Instead I mainly relate to the main character and many of the side characters remain two-dimensional, or like props. However, this series is enjoyable, has a very interesting plot line and represents an original interpretation of unicorns and their role in society.  

Rick Riordan-Percy Jackson series

Very good series! The premise is of a boy who’s been chucked out of every school he’s ever been too, because strange things always seem to befall him… Finally when he’s 12 it’s discovered that he’s the son of Poseidon with the role to play that will either destroy the world or save the world. It is slightly similar to Harry Potter (the Prophecy, Camp Halfblood versus Hogwarts, two friends, the fact that both of them have the physical appearance of black hair and green eyes) but there are important differences as well. The Gods play a larger role in these books than the senior teachers in Harry Potter which is a substantial improvement since one of my main gripes with the Harry Potter series is that most of the time they could have talked to someone with more knowledge instead of having to figure it out on their own. This along with the Time Turner was my main fault with the Harry Potter series. I would recommend this series because they’re light-hearted, fast-paced with a lot of witty dialogue. Plus he’s writing two more series, one still based in the Camp Half-Blood universe and the other one with the cast of Egyptian Gods, which look really fun. 

Firelight-Sophie Jordan 

Sort of similar to twilight except that the main character, Jacinda, is a draki. The draki are humans who can change into dragons. They've been hunted for centuries because of their abilities, which have been rapidly declining over the centuries. Until Jacinda, there hasn't been a firebreather in generations.

What was good about this book: The classification of dragons into different subspecies was good, and indicated that the author had actually thought about her world before putting it into a book. There was a backstory that played a role in subsequent events. The ending was interesting enough that it made you want to read the sequel.

What was wrong with it-it just felt like reading twilight again, with some subtle differences. He saves her life, he's wanted by everyone but only shows interest in her, he's a hunter and therefore the person she should be the most afraid of....etc. What saves it from being a complete knock-off of twilight is that at no point was there any mention of playing baseball, even though one of the final scenes of the book is going out to a family hangout spot. Meh.  

Judgement: I like the dragon shapeshifting idea. I'll see if the sequel manages to avoid too many twilight overtones. However, it is a fun read, and fairly original in conception is not in execution.

Authors to avoid in the fantasy genre:

Sunny-tagline-if I wanted to read porn I would buy it-I’ve only read one short story by Sunny (part of the anthology, “On the Prowl” but since all that happens in 40 pages is her hooking up with two different guys in order to “acquire their powers”-sort of like Rogue after dark-I think this judgement can stand. There is no character development, no dialogue of any type and except for a long-winded chase in the forest and two extended sex scenes nothing else happens in this story. An author to avoid……unless you’re into werewolf porn, in which case I w

won’t judge you. Much.

A review on angel-based novels.

It was incredibly hard to come up with a pithy title for this blog post. I think most people will agree that I have not succeeded :( In general, most angel books seemed to have become completely disassociated from Christianity or any religion at all, which while not necessarily bad does result in a lot of the books feeling like they're missing something. The advantage of writing about angels is that there's a lot people know about them already. An author can use their exisiting knowledge to construct an angel-filled world which is both relateable and different. Sadly a lot of authors have instead used their creative power to create an entity known as the kinky angel, which makes about as much sense as a vegetarian vampire. Anyway...

Angel-based novels: The greats and the atrocious

Awesome!

Sharon Shinn: Archangel series: I cannot stress enough how great this series is. It starts in a world which is colonised by people escaping the destruction of earth, and on the way genetically modify angels to watch over everyone and to keep the peace. As a means of doing this, one angel is appointed as Archangel for 20 years; furthermore, in order to prevent any possible apartheid between angels and humans, all angels must marry humans-any union between two angels would result in monster children. The world is divided into 3 angelic holds and the ethnic groups are the Edori, the Jansai, the Mandivvi, Luxor, and angels. Their God, known as Jehovah, watches over all of them, and makes sure humans have desirable mates through “the kiss”, which lights up when people meet their soul mate-or perfect genetic mate. However, fast forward 200 years, and the latest archangel is corrupt, and has permitted the mass enslaving of the Edori by the Jansai and the merchant classes, and the next candidate to become Archangel manages to be both anti-social while being socially conscious. His tenure will begin in 6 months time when he’ll lead the Gloria (a ceremony to let Jehovah know that their world is at peace in order to prevent him taking action against them)-and he’s yet to discover who his wife will be. The world Sharon Shinn has built is believable, the plotline is consistent, and the character’s are vividly drawn and appealing to read about. I would recommend this book to anyone. However, I have not enjoyed the four books which have followed. They’re better than average, but think this book was fine on its own.

Angels Unlimited: I’m aware that these books are sort of aimed at an age group where 13 is thought to be ancient…I may have been given the recommendation to read this book by a 7 year old who told me that the coolest girl in the class was reading them. And I may have been 15 at the time, overhearing this conversation between the 7 year old and her mother… Anyway, moving rapidly on. This series starts when Melanie gets run down by a joy rider on her 13^th birthday. She then rapidly ascends to Heaven to discover that Heaven is an awesome city by the sea where everyone comes from different time zones and can all effortlessly speak all languages. Sounds awesome J But she also finds out that angels are locked in an eternal battle against the powers of darkness (also known as PODs). Each book is about her being on a mission to save the world, one individual at a time. The books send her all through time, from 1920s America, Ancient Egypt and Ancient Rome, Feudal Japan, Victorian England, colonial West Indies, as well as the 22^nd century and her own time, where she gets to see the impact of her death on her friends…This series is very enjoyable, her best friends Lola and Reuben are great and keep her out of trouble, and her arch-nemesis who sort of becomes her friend, Brice, is very funny, with a great back story.

Not so great:

Eternal-Cynthia Leigh Smith: A book about a guardian angel who’s also in love with his ward. As such, when it’s time for her life to end, he intervenes. With the result that her destiny changes and she winds up being a vampire. Not the best night out. As punishment, he gets stripped of his post, and she gets whisked away to learn how the ways of being a vampire. Miranda, his ward is a pretty shallow vampire, and there aren’t any memorable characters from this book; so really, the less said the better.

Blue Blood Series-Melissa De La Cruz: These are hard to categorise because on the one hand they’re vampire novels, but on the other hand her premise is that vampires are actually fallen angels and as such are gorgeous and twisted (I blame Twilight for this…lame). The series is centred around a girl called Schuyler Van Alen and her school which is essentially a school for vampires and rich normals. The clichés pile up when you realise that the lives of these supposedly eternal beings revolve around designer clothes and holidays. Drinking blood and the many murders that happen in this series are overshadowed, by descriptions of clothes and parties, since those things are a bit of a downer to a socialite. Blue Blood was a promising start to the series, but it went rapidly down hill, in Masquerade, Revelations, and the Van Alen Legacy. I get the feeling that the author was commissioned to write more books for the series, and used spread the existing plot line more thinly against more books. A severe criticism would be the ridiculous cliff hanger between Masquerade and Revelations which was one of the most annoying ever. Although if that doesn’t put you off the constant incest might.  

Atrocious category:

Angel’s Guild-Nalini Singh: her main fault is that she got the balance wrong. In an ideal paranormal novel, I feel a balance of 80% plot and 20% sexual promise or actual sex scenes is good. However, this series clearly decided to go another way. In a world where angels rule and vampires exist to serve them the main character, Elena has had a traumatic childhood and has now become a guild hunter. I describe in this way because both these facts are mention every 10 seconds or so. Not much happens in this book except for Elena meeting the archangel of New York, Raphael who decides he wants her immediately. He then goes temporarily crazy, so she has to shoot him. Thankfully, this does not discourage them from hooking up and doing the “classic thing” of letting sex do their talking for them. As an afterthought there is a plotline about the doings of other archangels and one of them wants to raise the dead… but this surprisingly only features in the last 30 pages of the book. There are some interesting things about this book, but it felt disappointing to have the heroine vacillate between fear and lust, with no emotional payoff or plot development.

A dating advert which effectively summarises all vampire novels.

A dating advert which effectively summarises all vampire novels.

Single girl looking for hot, controlling vampire/socially awkward mage/maverick demon hunter/unapproachable shape shifter. Normals need not apply.

Activities include uncovering ancient conspiracies, discovering old spell books, and saving the world from destruction.

Must haves include a talking cat, psychotic family members and a memorable catch phrase.

Despite the break-out success of twilight, vampire inspired novels and tv shows have been with us always and will probably continue to remain in vogue even after the twilight movies are thankfully over and done with.

This is a list of 10 vampire themed books, ranging from the good, to the terrible.

Anne Rice-The Vampire Chronicles:

Why they were great: Written in the 1980s, Anne Rice explores the vampiric nature at its bleakest. Unlike subsequent authors, where there’s effectively no downside in being immortal, Anne Rice’s characters demonstrate how depressing and lonely it can be to live forever. My favourite character in the series was probably Lestat followed by Marius. The fact that vampires only gained gifts over time rather than developed them immediately was also good. Plot line wise each book could probably be read as a stand alone novel. Anne Rice has a seductive style which draws the reader in, and the fact that each of the books are effectively autobiographies of the vampire in question is a nice touch.

Claudia Gray-Evernight series-

Why they were great: This series departs from the usual vampire formula in ways that I won’t go into because they’re a huge part of the story. It’s a refreshing take to the genre. Unlike other vampire related novels, this actually had a well rounded cast of characters, and more than one storyline going on. It starts out seeming like it’s going to conform to vampire stereotype of a boarding school filled with hot but pale people and a guy who seems hostile and unapproachable….but it develops in a completely different direction and for that, well done :) 

Karen Chance-Cassie Palmer series-

Why they were great: Well rounded characters, a world that’s been thought through, great dialogue, awesome action scenes and a heroine that you would like if you met her in real life. The series in a way starts in the middle of events, since so much has happened beforehand; despite this, the flashbacks you get during the series are fun, and you never feel short-changed, plot-wise. However, to get into this series you have to know going in that there will be a lot of fight scenes and a lot of technical information in the first book. I enjoyed both these aspects but my sister did not. You get the feeling that the author planned this series really well, which is always a plus. I also enjoyed the concept of vampire rankings, with level 1 being the strongest and level 7 the weakest Master level, but the level you need to achieve before making other vampires. In addition, the different roles that the vampires play, the war mages play and the demonic realms, faerie realms, and the Olympic realms makes the universe big with the potential to grow even more. Also there are going to be 9 Cassie Palmer books, and after 4 they’re still going strong!

Karen Chance-Dorina Basarab series:

I prefer the Cassie Palmer series to the Dorina Basarab series partly because I don’t like Dorina’s room mate, and also I prefer the books being set in Las Vegas compared to New York. Dorina Basarab is a dhampir, which is someone who’s half vampire, half human. In this world, most dhampirs are prone to bouts of insanity and are usually killed early on. However, Dorina Basarab has managed to reach 500 without being killed. In a way this is a minus point, since she’s reach 500 and yet still seems to be of equal maturity to Cassie who is 24 in human years. To me this is quite irritating. However, this series is fun because you’re able to see the Cassie Palmer universe from a different angle.

Rachel Caine-Morganville Vampire series-

I like this series. The central character Claire is likeable even though essentially every other page describes her as smart or mentions her love of classroom text books. Her flat mates are cool, and all have different hang-ups or problems which actually play a role in the subsequent storylines. The town is completely run by vampires, which makes you wonder why they bother advertising for students for their university from the outside given that they don’t seem to need the money and aren’t allowed to attack them... But, I would definitely recommend this series. 
Not great but good:
L.J. Smith-the Nightworld.
These books are good. The reason why they're not great is because they don't have much to do with vampires, and all essentially have the same plot line, however, after book 6 (there are 9 out so far, with a 10th one coming, except it's been on hold for about 10 years...) they start to go in a new direction, towards an ancient prophecy which will result in the end of the world, unless 4 key people are found to stop it. I really enjoyed these books, they're fairly short with sweet and simple storylines. Essentially the perfect series to read for escapism.
Not great, but not offensively bad:

Charlaine Harris-True Blood.

I enjoy this series. The characters are again well rounded, and the fact that they’re essentially murder mysteries with a few supernatural elements thrown in is refreshing. However, I do prefer the TV series to the books and have been finding Sookie increasingly difficult to relate to as time goes on. I like that it’s set in the Southern States as well as the premise that this is what the world would be like if vampires had ‘come out of the coffin’. However, to an extent they should remain in the fantasy realm as I wasn’t that crazy about Hurricane Katrina making an appearance. Then again, it was interesting. Definitely love Eric, not so into either Bill, Sam or Quinn.

House of Night-

Started out great. The first two books were awesome even if she did come into her powers a bit too easily-they were just handed to her, which blocked of an avenue for character development.  She becomes less likeable as time goes on, partly because she acquires another boyfriend with every book, without getting rid of the previous boyfriend. It gets to book 3 and she has 3 guys she could effectively call her boyfriend. Her cast of friends, who are the most two-dimensional characters, seem both annoying and not people anyone would be friends with. It feels like their entire existent is to fill an imaginary quota. The creation of arch-enemy, turned accomplice, turned friend, Aphrodite helps the other books, but she is only one person and not even she can prevent the decline of this series. 
Red-headed stepchild, Sabrina Kane series-Jaye Wells:
An interesting twist on the vampire genre-vampires are the product of a union between Adam and Lilith, his wife before Eve. Hence, vampires can only be destroyed by apple wood, or juice… Anyway, it has some really fun characters, such as the side-kick which looks like a furless cat. However, the series didn’t really work for me. Have read two out of three of them, and still considering whether I should read the third.  
Terrible:

Twilight-1-3 would probably be in the top 10, but Breaking Dawn pushes the entire series down:

Twilight-1 to 3 of the twilight books were excellent in the sense that they were very readable and you found yourself really rooting for the characters. To me the books started becoming bad with the evolution of Jacob-referred to by reviewers from Amazon who gave the book eclipse a one star rating as a rapist in training-from boy next door to viable competition for the heart of Bella. Breaking Dawn itself is probably one of the worst books I’ve read in my life. 754 pages where it just gets worst, with all conflict or potential conflict eliminated to give one of the most sham happy endings ever. This ranges from Bella’s mother being completely cool with her marrying Edward out of high school for absolutely no reason, to the birth of Renesme, which apart from anything else would have made the book bad. However, this is not forgetting the completely unnecessary book in between from Jacobs perspective; the amount of crummy blonde jokes and the creepy creepy relationship between him and Bella’s daughter for absolutely no reason except to make sure that absolutely everyone had a happy ending. If the series had ended at eclipse, the ending would have been mature with the message that not everyone could be happy all the time, and that a love triangle always results in sadness for at least one of the participants. But instead of allowing her characters to grow, Stephenie Meyer just created an additional character to fill in the blanks of her storyline. Then there’s the fact that being a vampire has no downside, as long as you’re male essentially. Male vampires can have kids because even though their saliva is venomous, as are their tears, their sperm is fine? Why? It made no sense… But I guess it made about as much sense as male shape shifters just adding on a ton of muscle and ageing to be 27 whereas the one female shape shifter becomes menopausal… driving home the message that the best time to have children is at the age of 18. The needless additional characters who turn up at the end in order to prepare for the absent battle, the idea Stephenie Meyer had that it should be a battle of words rather than blows, which still conveniently kills off the one vampire who she had no feelings for whatsoever. If you compare this to J.K.Rowling who killed off key characters when it was consistent with the storyline, I know which writing style is the one with literary integrity and the one you should aim to cultivate. Breaking Dawn ended the series in a way which made you feel that starting the series was a complete waste of time and energy, which is really the worst insult you can level at an authors work. 

Alyson Noel-Ever More, also to be known as the ugly sister of twilight. 

This book sucked, and made you wonder why no author has tried suing her for plagiarism. The bare bones of the novel is twilight but in reverse-Wow! The plot line is a re-hash of L.J.Smith’s Soul Mate, the goth best friend could be a take of Eve from the Morganville Vampire series, but that could be pushing it. The lame central characters, and the unbelievable dialogue……that’s all Alyson Noel. 

Lynsay Sands-Argeneau Series.

Actually the worst vampire series I’ve ever encountered. In this series becoming a vampire doesn’t just preserve your age, it makes you younger? Why?! That’s just stupid. An entire family of vampires looking for love and you get to follow them doing this. In fairness, I’ve only read one of the books in this series and I may have read a particularly bad one; the Accidental Vampire. However, just from that one book you can criticise the dynamics of this particular universe. Firstly, the idea that vampire blood is like a youth potion, which is never explained. Secondly, the idea that there is no down side to being a vampire-you can eat normal food, you don’t sleep in a coffin, you can have kids etc. Thirdly, even in terms of a romance novel it fails epically. The idea is that your soul mate is someone you can’t read the thoughts of. Given that all these vampires are doing is looking for an absent quality, it would seem that it would be incredibly easy to find a soul mate. Instead these vampires are all single and looking for no reason whatsoever.
Chloe Neills-Chicago Land Vampires:
After three books there is no evidence of any semblance of a plot line. However, not nearly as bad as Lynsay Sands because at least this series doesn’t make you angry. The story centres around a 28 year old who gets made into a vampire after an attack. However, beyond her being a vampire with strangely advanced powers, with a best friend who finds out that she’s a witch in chapter 2, literally nothing else happens.

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Hey! I've decided to start a blog! This blog is set up to a) Review Books, Tv, Music, Food, Recipes, Oddities etc b) Engage in active promotion of time travel in order to bring back the 90s. c) Have not yet decided....Anyway hope this blog helps some and amuses others.........:)