Have you ever had that experience where you love a series, but you can't help but notice how the writing has gone downhill? You love the characters, but the books are starting to seem episodic and nothing really changes? I'm looking at you Evanovich.

Well, a couple of my favortie series have gone that way and I wanted to take a moment to commemorate the ones that have thus far avoided what I am now calling the Series Downward Spiral.

Patricia Brigg's Mercedes Thompson Series
Number of books: 8
Status: Ongoing
I love this series. I just finished reading this last one, Night Broken, so I'm still running on the high from that book and probably will be over gushy about this series. I'll try to keep it short and o the point: the major innovation that Briggs brings to the paranormal series population is change. Her characters change, her worlds change. It's a crazy concept, I know.

I'll try to explain without giving too much of the story away. In most series, each book is just more of the same. And in some cases, that's great. You like how the first one went and you want more. But Briggs' worlds have major shifts - one group of supernaturals declares war on the US, another decides to cooperate with the FBI to help boost their image. The characters change, too. Life events have lasting effects and patterns are changed.

I'm being super vague, I know. But if I could make you read one series on this list, it would be this one.

Also, the covers. The covers.

Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire Series
Number of Books: 13?
Status: Ended
Despite the crazy-pants turn the popular TV series True Blood has taken with the series, I will always appreciate the original. Because throughout the story, Sookie, our heroine, just becomes more and more disenfranchised with the whole supernatural institution.

She falls in love with men, but when they do something froggy, she kicks them to the curb. That's what I really appreciate about this series. Sookie doesn't forgive these massively horrible things her lovers do just because she loves them. Love is something that is earned, not given blindly.

It's an authentic portrayal (I mean, minus vampires, etc.) of what a real dating life is. Sookie may be a waitress, but she is not stupid, and she knows exactly who she is, which is really a great way to be. This series is over now, but I love the way it ended. If you haven't read it, I would suggest it. As much as I love True Blood for it's own wacky story lines, only the first season is really similar to the books in any way, shape, or form.



Kristain Britain's Green Rider Series
Number of Books: 5
Status: Ongoing
This series seriously just keeps getting better and better. It started out with Green Rider, which was a true-blue adventure tale with monsters and spies and coups and all sorts of other interesting things. But the subsequent books have broadened the scope of the story to the point where it's this massively intertwined narrative that spans over centuries and countries.

The world building is excellent, the characters are interesting, and the dogged determination of the protagonist to not be involved in any of this shit is truly inspiring.

If I had one major complaint about this series, it would be that each book takes about four years to come out.

FOUR. YEARS.

But that is a trade I am willing to make if they continue to be awesome. I guess.


J.K.Rowling's Harrry Potter Series
Number of Books: 7 Glorious tomes
Status: Ended
Obvi. If I have to explain this, I don't know if we can hang out any more...

All excessive fan-girling aside, this series is truly an example of a dynamic and masterful narrative. In the beginning the stories were simple and clear-cut because the protagonists were eleven and everything is simple and clear-cut when you are eleven. Just ask my nephew.

As the story grows, so do the characters, who look deeper into what is actually going on in their world. Things that were true in the first couple of books are examined with a more jaded eye and turn out to be not exactly what you wanted them to be. And I think that's fantastic.



Meg Cabot's 1800-Where-Are-You Series
Number of Books: 5
Status: Ended
Though this series suffered from originally being planned as a 6 part and ending up as a 5 part, I still count it as one of the best YA series.

To be fair, though, the very fact that it was cut short might have been what saved it. Cabot has a tendency to ride storylines into the ground, and I say that with all the love in my heart because Meg Cabot was who inspired me to write in the first place.

To be honest, the greatness of this series rests in the last book, in which all the characters have changed and conclusions are drawn. I would have liked to read the book between the last two books, because it would have been endlessly entertaining and dealt with a lot of things that interest me - spies, international intrigue, etc - but I understand why the last book was more important.


I will be adding to this list as time goes on, because I know I've left some out. Let me know what your favorite series is and I will check it out!

Hey guys!

Episode Three of Life Narrated is out! I know what you're thinking. Where is episode two? Episode two has been stricken form the record and will, from now on, be referred to as: NOPE.

 But Episode Three is bangin', ya'll.

In this episode, we talk about zombie narratives!

I like this episode for two reasons:

1) before I started researching zombies, I was very uninterested in the genre as a whole. I didn't understand why people like zombie movies and why they were so popular.

But after researching quite a bit, I started to see deeper meaning in it. I started to see the lines of connection between the African zombi, to the Haitian zombi, to George Romero's Night of the Living Dead, to all the iterations of the theme since. I couldn't believe they were all connected.

This is why I find anthropology so fascinating, because you find connections where you don't expect there to be one.

2) We had a guest star on the show! Even though we were using a crappy Skype setup, we still managed to have the lovely and talented @Loolabette on to talk about zombies! It was fun!

I am very encouraged by our progress on the technology front and I'm hoping to have more guest stars in the future. Unfortunately, she's kind of hard to hear, but we're still working out the kinks. If anyone has any suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments.

Now, without further ado, here is Episode Three of Life: Narrated:  https://soundcloud.com/lifenarrated/life-narrated-3-zombie

PS - Every time we say Boris Karloff, pretend we're saying Bela Lugosi.

I started this blog to talk about literature (HA!) and writing and I've been doing just about everything but. So let's get back to the original purpose.

Books!

In honor of Awards Season I'm going to post the top 10 books I read in 2013. Excluded from this list are Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and Five Flavors of Dumb, both of which I talked about in this post about music in books, and both of which would have made the top 10 with flying colors. Note that this list is pretty heavy on the Young Adult because that's what I write. Soooo.... heads up.

Top 10 Books I Read this Year:

1) Daughter of Smoke and Bone (2011) by Laini Taylor

Fantasy YA
There are few books that leave me completely bereft of all feeling and sense. But this was definitely one of them. It started off standard enough, and then morphed into this allegory of epic proportions that took me days afterwards to untangle. The world building! The characters! The backstory. I like this book so much, I wanted to dress up as the main character for Halloween.

What was most extraordinary about this book was the way the story started out so mundane, then took off into flights of fancy without the reader noticing. The writing was fantastic and expressive without being noticeable, which is the goal, really.

I mean, how many books can make you question the very nature of good and evil? I didn't read this book for a long time after I'd gotten it because books about angels are beyond boring to me, but this was different. Very different. Because there are no angels and no demons and nothing is very clear cut. You love the bad guys as much as the good guys and there are points when you really don't know which is which.

There are some very valid criticisms about the pacing and the way the second half of the story barely fits the first, but it works well anyway. I feel like if you create a world fascinating enough, you can be forgiven a lot of things. Just ask Robin McKinley.

Also this book suffers from what I like to call "Where the hell are your parents?" syndrome. None of this would have happened if someone had bothered to write in some parental figures.

I didn't read the second of this series because the third is not out yet and I wasn't about to be caught up in that book gap. I am eagerly awaiting the third book so I can read them all in one sweep. And spend the rest of the week in bed...


2) Girls of Riyadh (2007) by Rajaa Alsanea

Contemporary NA
The way this book is written is part of it's charm, and the other is it's subject matter. Naturally, I would read this book because all the girls in the book attended the university I taught at. I knew these girls. I taught these girls. I saw a hundred dramas like this play out every day. 

 Written in the style of a series of emails from a cheeky writer, Girls of Riyadh is the story of four Saudi girls and their very unique struggles.

It's no secret Saudi women have it tough, but sometimes I think people don't realize the extent. People see from the outside the money and the pampering and don't really grasp the situations these girls are put in. I think one of the greatest parts about reading an international author is that you see a slice of the world you have never even contemplated.

The tone and voice in this is fantastic and the world painstakingly accurate. The best part about it, though, is that it doesn't leave you with a feeling of pity for these girls and their restricted lives. It leaves you with a sense that they're going to be alright. Even after everything, they'll come out on top somehow.  

The book was written in Arabic (obviously) and I would love to read it in it's original form one day. There are probably layers of meaning that were lost in translation.



3) The Fault in Our Stars (2012) by John Green

Contemporary YA
This is a story about kids with cancer. When I heard that, I didn't want to read it. My life has a lot of intense things in it already, why would I want to read about something so inherently sad as kids with cancer?

But John Green is a new kind of storyteller, and as he says in the book: "You have a choice in this world, I believe, about how you tell sad stories."

I don't know why I like this book so much. It couldn't have been all writing, but I can't think of anything else that would have drawn me to this book. I'm actually going to bring this up in the next episode of Life: Narrated, our podcast, so that maybe we can parse it out as a group.

John Green is such an awesome guy (if you haven't seen his Crash Course and VlogBrothers Youtube channels, you are MISSING OUT) and I love everything he stands for. He also has a knack for making me read about things I wouldn't normally touch with a ten foot pole.



4) Such a Rush (2012) by Jennifer Echols

Contemporary YA
This was the first book I'd read by Jennifer Echols and I was really impressed. The main character she created was easy to relate to and likeable, while still making all the wrong choices. It was frustrating in a way, but very believable. She is unapologetically who she is, and the story addresses a lot of those annoyances that happen when you are being female and breathing - unwanted male attention, the uncomfortable line between a male boss' flirting and something more, etc.

The emotions are so well written and the situations very true to life, that it's easy to imagine this playing out somewhere nearby. The main setting is an airport, where the main character works, and you go through her training to be a pilot.

One of the best things about this story and pretty much all of Jennifer Echols' books is it gives you a look into a unique setting. Most YA or NA books are about girls wanting to be fairly typical things - doctors, lawyers, writers, rock stars, etc. Very rarely do you see a female character who wants to be a pilot.

Getting this glimpse into another life is fascinating to me and I was ready to sign up for flight lessons by the end. 


5) Shadow and Bone (2012) by Leigh Bardugo

Fantasy YA
Shadow and Bone has a distinctly Russian flavor to it, but is set in a fantasy world with all sorts of crazy magical rules.  I think what I liked best about this book was the way the world building was so seamless. How Russian folklore and culture was so interwoven with this fictitious place.

Or maybe it is the way the story pulls a 180 on you so quickly you hardly know what happened, or if it actually happened.

You are put in the unique position of not knowing if the character's drastic actions are called for. I literally would not have known what to do in a similar situation.

The author spares no one in her descriptions and keeps the blood and guts in the arena of war. She brings the shadows alive with her expertly created atmosphere and edges the book almost into the realm of horror. Besides that, she uses magical mechanics and political intrigue to drive the story, which is unique for a YA book. I'd really like the third book to come out now, please.


6) Fangirl (2013) by Rainbow Rowell

Contemporary NA
Okay, let's be honest. What writer hasn't indulged in even a paragraph of fan fiction? Sometimes a world and it's characters are so extraordinary that it's hard to leave them alone and not wonder what they would do in other situations. I think, as a writer, I would be ridiculously flattered to have someone write fan fiction of my work.

That being said, this is the first book I've ever read where fanfiction is acknowledged in it's entirety. The online community, the fan art, the shipping, the slash. The main character in this book is a popular fan fiction writer who is dealing with the realization that college professors don't really like fan fiction. (That part, truthfully, was a little hard to swallow: you turned in a piece of fanfiction as a school assignment? How old are you?)

The characters are very real and resemble people you've met before - warts and all.

The author is great at capturing a specific era - you should read her other books that pretty much all take place in the late 90s. It's strange to have a book set in a recent past that is so different from our present. 


7) Seraphina (2012) by Rachel Hartman

Fantasy NA
Seraphina was such a great exploration of what it means to be human. Taking place in a world where dragons can take human form, it's clear that having the human shape is not all that is required to have humanity.

Dragons, as a race, are mathematical and severe; emotionless. But have made peace with the humans for expediency's sake (or maybe because they aren't as into the whole emotionless thing as they pretend to be?)

And the political tension between the dragons and the humans is mounting, bringing up issues of discrimination and otherizing. 

The main character is stuck between the world of the dragons and the world of the humans. She believes (and has ample evidence) the human world would not accept her if they knew everything about her, but she knows the dragons view her as an abomination.

It's heartbreaking to observe her existence at the beginning of the novel. Even her own family seems to be uncomfortable around her, and the person she depends on the most (her uncle) is a dragon who cannot show emotion without fear of a lobotomy. She is constantly negotiating between her human feelings of abandonment and love with her uncle's complete lack of emotion.

I honestly can't wait for the sequel (if there will be one?). The author creates a world that starts of simple, if weird, and grows in complexity with every passing chapter. The implications of the world they live in makes me want to know more about everything and see the story through.


8) The Historian (2005) by Elizabeth Kostova

Academic Thriller (is that a genre?) Literary Fiction
This book is really long. Really, really really long. I listened to it while I was doing data entry at work and so I had to tune in and out. I don't feel like I missed anything.

That being said, this book was definitely worth the read. It's an academic thriller. If you've ever had fun in a library looking shit up - or get stuck on a Wikipedia Choose-Your-Own adventure when all you wanted to know was one simple thing - this book is for you.

It's a literary search for Dracula, who may or may not exist, and it's very good. The book takes place throughout time and place, but visits two of my very favorite cities: Budapest and Istanbul. Both were rendered in great detail with some real atmosphere. I missed those cities so badly that I wanted to hop on a plane and be back drinking palinka in a Hungarian bar, or smoking shisha in a Turkish teahouse.

It's pretty slow moving in general, so settle in for the ride - but I promise, it's worth it. Have a repetitive task to do? Might I suggest the audio book?

9) The Rising (2013) by Kelley Armstrong

Fantasy YA
Kelley Armstrong has been a favorite writer of mine for some time. She has several series, most of which are interlacing stories in this supernatural world she's built.

This series (and the Darkest Powers series, which came before) are YA tie-ins to her adult books, and I really love the idea. If you've read her other books, there's a bit of dramatic irony going on, but if not, you still get a thrilling story. This year, the last of the Darkness Rising series came out and did not disappoint.

This book avoided the tropes of the genre with grace and style, leaving us with a heroine who was an acknowledged leader among her peers, but who's also smart, daring, and capable. As a side note, she is also Native American, though I can't speak to her authenticity in that capacity.

Armstrong is good at making rules and sticking to them, which is surprisingly uncommon in the fantasy genre. Her characters are well-formed, and in this series in particular, she went for the long lost supernatural creatures you've never heard of. I could almost feel her encouraging you to get on google at one point.

It's well written, as always, and both this and the Darkest Powers series are fantastic reads.

10) The Gathering Storm (2012) by Robin Bridges

Fantasy/Historical YA
Set in Imperial Russia, this book calls on both the supernatural world and the very historical world of the Romanovs. This juxtoposition of history and fantasy carried the story pretty far, though it did falter occasionally. I am very much looking forward to reading the others.

It was a bit confusing - everyone seems to have similar names, but hardly the author's fault when she's dealing with historical figures. It was also confusing because you don't really understand even the stated intentions of the people in the story, let alone the unstated ones.

I liked it, but I can see that it wasn't the clearest of books.






Honorable Mentions:

As a concession, these two books are some of my least favorites, NOT because they were bad, but for other reasons.

Wild Seed (1980) by Octavia Bulter

Science Fiction

This book. This. Book.

Okay, I'm not saying this was poorly written, because that would be a sin against writing - OED forgive me. Ms. Butler is a fantastic writer. And seeing a science fiction book starring people of color is a rarity.

But. BUT.

There was a lot about this book that I just couldn't take: rape, incest, child marriage, eugenics, general creepiness, etc. I got about 2/3 of the way through before I had to tap out.

I really liked the world building and the magical rules, and I was hoping to run across something to hope for before I got totally burnt out on all the horribleness, but it never happened. The main character was strong and did what she had to do to survive, but I can only take so much. If you have managed to get through this book, more power to you.



*The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900) by L. Frank Baum

Children's Literature
This is one of those books that I've always meant to read and when I finally did I was sorely disappointed.

The fantastical elements of the book were very well done, but the rest was very childishly simple. And while I understand it's a children's book, that doesn't mean it has to be childish. Obviously, it was written some time ago, so it's reasonable that it would be like this.

I guess what I really was disappointed in was missed opportunity. Dorothy is waltzing through this land and literally leaving a heap of bodies in her wake without so much as a wrinkle of her pretty brow. Dorothy the Witch Killer seems almost psychotically detached from the deaths she causes.

Not only that, but every land she gets to, she ends up killing and/or usurping the leaders and leaving her own friends in their place. She's literally setting herself up as Empress of Oz. That was the story I wanted to read.

Missed opportunities, man.


That's my list - tell me yours! Suggest books for me to read!   

As anyone who knows me personally will tell you, I am a big fan of music. I've done marching band, jazz band, bell choir (not a joke, wish it was), and I was even a mobile DJ for four years. Sometimes I will go days without taking the earphones out. And to tell you the truth, as much as I love reading, I think one of the failings of the written word is that it's just not as expressive as the spoken (or rather, the sung).

That being said, books that try to incorporate song lyrics into their narrative drive me crazy. It never comes across to the reader the way you want it to, and usually it comes off as bad poetry. I have never read a stanza of a song written in a book (even songs that I've actually heard) and thought it was a good idea.

If it's supposed to be sentimental or romantic, it isn't. Trust me. Even books that I love that have lyrics in it make me roll my eyes and skip over the stanza entirely. I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm just saying I've never seen it. If I was that editor, I would have said NOPE.

So, I've had this dilemma of loving music, but not when it's involved in books. I've read a lot of books about rock stars, and being backstage with the band, and all these trappings around what people imagine go on in the music industry, but there are only a handful of books that I've read that give you a visceral, immediate recollection of what it's like to experience music.

These books do not have stanzas of song lyrics in them. They just describe to the point of painful accuracy what one might feel while listening to music - or the experience of going to a live show. In no particular order, they are as follows:

Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John:

Young Adult Contemporary
I start the list off with this book because it's seriously unique. The main character is deaf. Not profoundly deaf, but with enough hearing loss that it makes her an unlikely heroine for a novel about a band. You can go to the publisher's description here, but what I will add is that this book is full of characters that you know in real life. Real people with real hang ups and blind spots. You spend a large amount of time hating on characters you realize later are just absent-minded, not cruel; or terribly shy instead of aloof. It ends in a triumphant blaze that left me wanting to run a mile while rocking out to Nirvana.

The way the main character talks about music - and remember she can't actually hear it - is all about the expressions on people's faces, the bass vibrating through the floor, the electric energy of the crowd, the way the musicians move with their instruments. It's a whole new way to experience music that I, for one, had never thought of.

This book also happens to be a good look into the life of someone who not only can't hear you, but also who doesn't see that as a disability, even though everyone around her does. I think it's refreshing that what this character wants, more than anything, is not her hearing, but for people to stop treating her like she's disabled. She's fine with being deaf, and that's a powerful change.

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist by Rachel Cohn and David Levithan:

Young Adult Contemporary
It goes without saying that the book is better than the movie, but I had to say it anyway. Written in two different voices, by two different authors, this book is pure word magic. It's like a glimpse into the inner workings of a date that is going off the rails over and over again and just won't end. It will remind you, in different places along the way, of every date you've ever had, good and bad.

Nick is a straight boy in a gay band and Norah is the angrily responsible daughter of the music industry, silently judging the entire city. I feel like there needs to be a new verb for what she does - hate-partying? Rage-clubbing?

The inner monologue of both characters make it well worth reading, and ends up sounding more like epic poetry - poetry written on a bathroom wall, but still poetry.

As a side note, I listened to this for the first time as an audio book performed by two people, and it was really fantastic. I typically prefer to read, but these two actors were on point.

War for the Oaks by Emma Bull:
Adult Fantasy
This is an odd book. It's one of the few I would actually call urban fantasy (or magical realism?) because the weaving of the modern landscape and the creatures that crawl through it is seamless. Themes of mortality and what it means to be human pervade.

But so does awesomeness.

It starts out being just about a band, but with other weird things going on in the background. Soon it turns into a story about a literal war. This was kind of a surprise to me as I apparently didn't even glance at the title before I read it. Or maybe I didn't think they were serious?

But before you get to all the truly epic battle scenes, the book is littered with grand descriptions of the band playing on stage and the crowd reacting to them; the crowd enraptured by them; the crowd creating a new nation for them. You feel like you are there at the best concert you will ever not hear.

Come for the rock and roll, stay for the fairies.


Dirty Little Secret by Jennifer Echols:

Young Adult Contemporary
Echols has a knack for making characters who have lives I want to read about. In this story we have Bailey, who has grown up on the bluegrass circuit with her younger sister. Her younger sister is tapped to become a mega country star with the caveat that Bailey can't continue to perform. From these characters and their life, you get a peak into the world of a child prodigy who grew up to be a real person. A real angry person.

I think what I like best about this book is all the interesting tidbits you get about the music industry - the fact that it's more common than you think to be forced to perform from a young age with the hopes of being discovered. What it really means to have perfect pitch. All the little things she mentions that are signs of a professional musician, or of an amateur. What parents will give up and sacrifice in order to get just one of their children into the spotlight. And what it does to the one left behind.

Despite the emotional undercurrent, everyone in Bailey's new, illicit band, are consummate professionals, which is not something you read about teenagers these days. It's kind of refreshing. When the band is playing, it's all talk of chords and solos and the thousand infinite messages between bandmates that pass with just a nod. If you've never played with a band, this is what it's like.

This book is also full to the brim of complex and relate-able characters who are neither bad nor good, and the right decision is far from obvious.



If you don't already have these on your To Be Read list, I suggest you add them, cause they are all fantastic, I-can't-bear-to-put-it-down books. And if you're a music lover - like myself - you will definitely find the story hitting home.