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The Magpie Lord by K.J. Charles
My friend Memory, who is a total book enabler, talked a lot of positive talk about The Magpie Lord earlier this month. I stared at the cover for a few days and then finally took the plunge and bought it once my other friend, Jenny (also a book enabler[1. She also has a podcast! Go listen to her podcast, it is awesome.]) started talking it up, too. Turns out I am very susceptible to peer pressure! Current feelings about this book can be accurately represented with this gif: HOLY HELL was this book fun! It has a lot of things I like in it, all wrapped up in a big…
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The Chaos by Nalo Hopkinson
I really wanted to like this book more than I did! The first third of the story is kick-ass: contemporary setting with wonderful characters, strong protagonist voice, and mysterious foreshadowings. Then the rest of it happened, and I lost the plot. Part of the problem is that the first third is so VERY strongly rooted in contemporary YA language/style. It’s Real Life and it’s totally convincing. And then the Chaos incident happened and things got weird.