KANE CHRONICLES : The Throne of Fire (Book #2)

*TEAM A*

~ The Egyptian deification of Darkness and Chaos, Apophis (who also takes the form of a sincerely scary humungous snake)

~ The third most powerful (and evil) magician in the world; Menshikov also fondly termed as ‘Vlad, The Inhaler’. He dresses like an ice-cream salesman but pretty much wants the world to end in chaos, in like four days time.

~ Host of minor Gods ranging from Nekhbet (Goddess of Vultures) to Babi (God of Baboons). I.kid.you.not

*TEAM B*

~ Brother-Sister teen Magician team of Carter and Sadie Kane

~ A griffin with a personality disorder that goes ‘FRE-EEEK’ in response to most calamities.

~ A team of fledgling magicians still undergoing training.

~ BES, the God of Dwarves who scares people by appearing in nothing more than a Speedo.

Yep, a fairly unequal battle there.

The Kane siblings had just won a gruesome round with Set in The Red Pyramid.....only to discover that more evil lurks around the corner. Evil, that makes Set look like a wilful kid who doesn’t want to eat his broccoli. Apophis is soon going to break free from his centuries-old prison. If he succeeds, he will swallow the sun and plunge the world into Chaos. Ergo, *Doomsday*.

Sadie and Carter have a fighting chance only if they can find Ra, the ancient and powerful Pharoah of The Gods. Legend has it that only Ra, The Sun God who battled Apophis on a nightly basis has the ability to vanquish the latter. To recall Ra from his retirement, Sadie and Carter need to lay their hands on The Book of Ra( three separate scrolls, hidden in three different, unknown and obviously dangerous locations ).

And so begins the....yes....I’m going to say it.....rollercoaster ride! (Thank God for tried and traumatised clichés)

The tale is splendid. Choc-a-bloc with action, adventure, mythology and devious and dastardly plots. All the above elements are welded together with Riordan’s trademark wit. As usual, he makes the ancient Gods approachable and infuses them with foibles and flaws. Obscure myths are woven into an urban fantasy that keeps you turning the pages with growing anxiety. Sadie and Carter are a delightful, snarky brother-sister duo. They are extremely likeable and foolhardy enough to carry the story forward.

As usual, I do what I always do after reading a Riordan book. I go into full-on Wiki-Mode and read up on the ancient Gods. I cannot stress enough as to how the author deserves credit for dusting off forgotten stories and repackaging them in a way that retains the essence while giving them a contemporary edge.

Kudos, Mr.Riordan.

Ella Enchanted

*Beware of delusional fairies bearing gifts*

This is the main premise of Ella Enchanted.

Ella, as a child was given the dubious gift of “OBEDIENCE” by the smarmy fairy, Lucinda. Since then, Ella.Must.Obey. She is forced to obey every single command directed at her. And commands range from the perfectly innocuous ‘Ella, stand up’ to the highly dangerous ‘Ella, chop off your head’. So Ella, her mother and their devoted cook, Mandy had decided that this gift (read : curse) should be kept a secret. If the knowledge fell into the wrong hands, Ella would be in grave danger.

But the big, bad world awaits and Ella cannot be cushioned from the nastiness of conniving minds. As she loses her mother, she gains a host of problems. She now has to deal with her scheming father, gold-digging stepmother, obnoxious pair of stepsisters and the new friend she makes: Prince Charmont (or Char, as he likes to be called by friends ). In order to right-the-wrongs in her life, Ella knows that she must seek out the elusive Lucinda and request her to take back the gift.The book follows Ella’s adventures, her fledgling romance and her struggle to obtain a free will.

Ella Enchanted is one of the best fairy tales that I have read and I loved Ella’s character. She is spunky, loaded with the right attitude and is utterly humane in her faults and choices. She’s a far cry from the doe-eyed, self-sacrificing, snivelling-near-the-fireplace, worried-about-their-spun-sugar-hair heroines. You root for her, gnash your teeth at the injustices meted out to her and earnestly hope for her *happily-ever-after*.

Gail Carson Levine is the fairy tale-smith who weaves an ancient tale with alacrity. She also displays an endearing fondness for Tolkien by introducing alternate languages like Elven and Ogreish and a handful of other enchanting gobbledygook.

In all, a perfect fairytale.

The Dragonfly Pool

Eva Ibbotson’s books do two things for you:

a) They transport you to a place, time and ambience that is redolent with olde-worlde charm and mystique.

b) They make your cynical soul believe that there are people (and especially children) who want to make this world a nicer place to live in.

Ibbotson’s books have always been comfort-food for my soul. She’s another author who finds a place in my travel-bag. You may be in a paradise (or personal purgatory, as the case may be), but dip into her stories and you are immediately hooked.

‘The Dragonfly Pool’ is no different.

It tells the tale of a much-loved and surprisingly unspoilt little girl called Tally. Tally lives in London with her widowed father, Dr.Hamilton and a pair of maiden aunts. Despite her idyllic existence, the shadow of impending war looms heavily over their heads. Hitler is at his despotic worst and The Second World War is imminent.

Around this time, Dr.Hamilton receives an unexpected scholarship for Tally at a boarding school called Delderton. Delderton is located in South Devon countryside and safely ensconced from the dangers of war. After many protestations and misgivings, Tally is parcelled off to Delderton and there she discovers a whole new world…

For Delderton is a progressive school. There are no rules, the students look like a bunch of happy savages, the principal judges people by their reactions to the ancient Cedar tree that stands tall in the school garden, the school cook is a beautiful ex-model and biology lessons could start at four in the morning without any prior warning whatsoever.

And then there is the enigmatic Matteo von Tarlenheim; biology teacher by profession but bandit in appearance. Much loved by the students for cutting a dashing figure and respected for his infinite understanding of the fauna and flora that surrounds them, Matteo is the most popular teacher in school. But Matteo has mysterious foreign roots and his past is soon entwined with Tally and her adventures.

In course of time, Tally and her quickly formed friends are off to Bergania to take part in a folk-dance festival. Bergania is a tiny country in Europe ruled by just king, Johannes who has stoutly refused to assist Hitler. And Johannes has a young son, Karil, who lives the life of a poor little rich boy.In Bergania, adventure raises it’s tantalising head and soon the fates of Tally and Karil and irrevocably entwined.

The story is a splendid blend of nature ramblings, wry humour, touches of darkness and the quintessential overriding message of *being true to oneself*. Ibbotson’s characters are well-etched, be it the Aragorn-like Matteo or the stubbornly optimistic Tally. The palette of supporting characters keep you engaged with their quirks and individual strengths of character. The surroundings vary from a naturalist’s utopia to the despondency of a war-weary landscape. Ibbotson holds the reigns of both worlds deftly and keeps you enchanted till the very end.

Pirates of the Caribbean : On Stranger Tides

A handful of gibbering Anthropoids and the odd cachinnating Cockatoo are of the opinion that the fourth instalment in the Pirates of The Caribbean (POC) franchise is not a patch on the first. Well, d-oh...there’s a reason it’s called an "original"!

As for me, I will always be a fan of the scraggly, irreverent, semi-sozzled, kohl-eyed Captain Jack Sparrow. You don’t need to be a prepubescent tween or a snarky, think-I’ve-seen-it-all teenager or even a high-on-testosterone adult male to enjoy the mad trip. For an armchair traveller like me, Captain Sparrow is the best tour guide. EVER.

So what do we have in this offering?

King George II (Potter fans will recognize a Mr.Dursley under the additional layers of quivering blubber) has forced Capt.Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) to guide an expedition to ‘The Fountain of Youth’. Good ol’Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) has (allegedly) cleaned up his act and is now a well-shod privateer who will head aforementioned expedition. Barbossa has lost his leg and Jack's beloved ship, The Black Pearl. Angered by the loss of the latter, Jack escapes...only to fall into the clutches of the vile and villainous Blackbeard (Ian McShane): scourge of the high-seas, dabbler in dark-arts and father to the luscious Angelica (Penelope Cruz, being delightfully Spanish and shrewish). What ensues is a riotous trip loaded with fang-bearing mermaids, missionaries with six-packs, painfully pierced and tattooed zombies and ol’reliably-unreliable : Captain Jack Sparrow.

The plot may drag in places. The characters may have stilted moments. Old favourite may be absent. New entrants may lack the chutzpah of the veterans. But the Good Pirate holds the movie together with his eccentricities. He cuts a swash buckling, albeit grimy figure as he battles over tumbling barrels....leads doomed mutinies......romances the conniving Angelica....matches wits with the ever reliable Barbossa....and deals with the cool menace of BlackBeard.

In all, not a great flick but a watchable summer one, nevertheless.

The Children at Green Meadows

In and around my building, we now have a golden Labrador with a heart-of-gold, a snappy l’il Poodle, a goose that honks like a Disney villain, an assortment of cats, a Doberman with a mother-fixation, an overweight Pug that manages to project an air of abject hunger, a blink-and-you-miss-it bunch of fat sparrows, hungry crows who always know when it’s lunchtime and an ever graceful soaring eagle. And this is not even counting the regular menagerie I run into when I head off for an evening walk.

I love animals. The above scenario makes me happy. Noah–recruiting-for-his-ark happy. And it reminded me of a childhood book that I used to love and want to live in: The Children at Green Meadows.

I dug it out. The front cover had vanished (which made me a little mad since I really loved the artwork), the pages were dog-eared and it brought back memories of summer holidays and pepper chips.

I could never critique this book. I love it.

A family living in a sprawling house called Green Meadows. A family that has a handicapped ex-army man for a father, a granny that jingles along angrily, a mother whose work never seems to end and a trio of children trying to be patient and wiser beyond their years. A family that loves animals but can’t afford to keep any.

So what happens when the children: Francis, Clare and Sam find themselves looking after the pets of people who can’t look after them for a variety of reasons?

The transformation of moods, surroundings and fate is a beautiful tale for children who love animals. It’s a simplistic story with heart. It doesn’t claim to change your life but it does leave you with a knot in your throat.

I repeat. I love it.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid : The Last Straw

Every once in a while you need a break from wizard boys, sparkling vampires, conspiracy theories, go-nowhere love stories, end-of-the-world page turners and the never ending stream of parallel worlds.

Every once in a while you need to forget that you are a full-blown adult whose literary tastes are mature and discerning and who, to put it mildly is a bit up-yourself.

Every once in a while, you need to escape into the world of a Wimpy middle-school Kid who is high on smarts and low on luck.

It’s time to hold your breath over the unwashed clothes and dodge the well-meaning parents and stumble over the boogers as you venture into the world of Greg Heffley.

Greg Heffley’s astounding schemes and equally mind-boggling failures continue. His chief bête noire in this book is his long-suffering dad. Greg’s father wants to make a man out of his dandelion-blowing son. To achieve this admirable goal, he is intent on sending Greg off to a military academy. This doesn’t sit well with Mr.Wimpy, who was looking forward to a summer of playing video-games and sleeping....snarfing down junk-food and sleeping....hooking up with the pretty Holly Hills and yep, catching up on some more sleep.

The Wimpy Kid series may be considered juvenile and trite. But it’s entertaining and you read it with a constant smile playing on your lips. Sometimes you even snort with glee (well, I did). I say, regardless of your age....pick it up for some instant laughs, dry humour and a cast of characters that is so unbelievably well put together that you can’t help but stay hooked.

Five Flavors of DUMB

An obscure school-band wins the local *Battle-of-the-Bands* and struts about like it’s the next great thing since sliced bread. An equally obscure but diligent student disses the band’s shenanigans in front of it’s groupies and finds herself at the receiving end of an unexpected challenge : Get the band a paying gig within a month and she’ll be it’s official manager with a sizeable share in the band’s future profits.

How does a complete musical-heathen manage a band that’s a worrying mix of:

1) A manipulative, self-absorbed lead singer.

2) A completely gorgeous but utterly talentless piece of eye-candy.

3) An angry girl-rocker with spiky green hair and a barbed wire attitude.

4) A silent guitarist who hides from the world and possibly the other band members too, behind the curtains of his overlong hair.

5) A nerd-boy drummer who plays like a dream but doesn’t fit the hard rock image.

More importantly, how does the aforementioned musical-heathen manage a musical group when she’s DEAF?

THAT single, sole premise had me ordering the book in a flash. Tons of repetitive YA Lit with the same tired, clichéd plot lines later....this book resonated with originality.

Piper Vaughn makes an endearing main lead. She’s deaf but never down. Through a blend of sign-language and efficient lip-reading she gets by just fine. But managing a rock band seems like an improbable challenge. How does an eighteen year old (burdened with enough baggage of her own) pull together a bursting-at-the-seams band and make it work?

The book could have gone wrong in so many ways. It could have been preachy or self-deprecating. It could have started off on a promising note and then ended up in the YA Lit pit of teen angst, unrequited love and peer pressure.

Thankfully, the author stuck to his guns. Sure there’s angst. There’s love. And betrayal. And parents who don’t understand. But the author never veers from the main subject. It’s about a girl. A girl with a condition that she doesn’t consider as a disability. And said girl has to manage a band. CASE CLOSED.

Five Flavours of Dumb holds equal appeal for the ones who know their discerning genres of rock as well as for those who wouldn’t blink an eyelid if Cobain materialized before their eyes.

A minty fresh idea handled with humour, sparkling dialogue and the ability to give you food for thought.

Skunk Girl

Skunk Girl is the emotional journey of a teenager called Nina.

Nina Khan

Nina lives in small-town Deer Hook, population 11,250. In her school, with it’s expected coterie of snobbish cheerleaders, handsome jocks and loving (but sometimes clueless) friends, brown-skinned Nina feels like the odd-one out.

The fact that she is a Pakistani-Muslim and comes from a conservative household means that she’s often envious of the freedom that her friends take for granted. While being a fairly intelligent student herself, she has to constantly face comparisons with her super nerd, Harvard attending sister : Sonia. Nina suffers the secret pangs of being a fairly-hairy teenager and the added shock of discovering a thick strip of soft hair running down the center of her back (ergo, the title). She isn’t allowed out on weekends and is constantly under her parents’ radar, lest she becomes ‘Americanized’ or as her aunt would scathingly put it,”umreecanized”.

So what happens when you throw in an handsome Italian boy called Asher Richelli who despite being wooed by the most popular girl (and Nina’s nemesis), appears to be interested in the go-nowhere Nina?

I liked the book. I really did. Far more than I had anticipated. Coming from a fairly conservative South-Indian family myself, I associated with Nina’s teenage frustrations. And maybe I enjoyed it more for the trips down memory-lane that it took me. I read out snarky sections to my mum and she gave me the cheeky smile cum weary resignation, as we remembered similar incidents.

Many might complain that Nina whined. A Lot. Let me just tell you that it’s NOT an exaggeration. I whined and whinged. An embarrassing LOT! Maybe now, as an adult, I understand where my parents were coming from. Evolved thought-processes have taken their time to settle in. But yep, teendom was an angry canvas of red-faced me, bawling out at the unfairness of it all.

Nina Khan’s story is believable and entertaining. It has a nice vein of self-deprecating humour running through it. The ending could either be termed as realistic or a bit surprising, consider your outlook. Either which way, it’s a story by an author who has immersed herself into her plot and used it to maximum effect.

Girl, 15, Charming But Insane

You can read a multitude of truly bad books and wonder whether your ability to pick a decent read has become non-existent

OR

You can delve deep into your cupboard and unearth an old and reliable favourite and make up for reams of bad plot/prose/characters.

Girl 15, Charming but Insane belongs to the latter category.

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways:

~ The title: It immediately grabs eyeballs. It is quirky, hints at a teen who will rant but in a way that promises to be hilarious and engaging.

~ Main character : Jess. Jess is a dark-haired, slightly (ever-so slightly) overweight Brit teen . She displays typical teen behaviour and rants and rave as one, who is young and mad at the world and it’s uncle, would. But she is also supremely talented and hopes to become a stand-up comedian someday. She’s clumsy, goofy, up for a well-executed prank and has a good heart (outlined by a thin layer of the sarcastic-devil). She hankers after the school’s boy-wonder (Ben Jones); is jealous and proud in equal parts of her beautiful best friend (Flora) and to top it all, comes from a broken family.

~ Aforementioned Broken Family: Jess’s mum is a throwback to the seventies. She is a hare-brained , fighting-for-a-cause librarian. Despite her “men-are-ruthless-manipulative-degenerate-scum-of the-earth” rants, she has a fairly decent relationship with her ex-husband (Jess’ dad). Jess’ dad is an artist living in St.Ives. Although he is wary of expressing sappy-love for his estranged daughter, he shoots a daily horrorscope sms to her. (For e.g. “You will open your wardrobe and find Marilyn Manson roosting there”). It’s an oddly healthy arrangement which seems to work for the trio.

~ Jess’ maternal grandmother: Granny is a blend of old-world fuzziness and homicide-happy bloodthirst. Pulp Fiction is one of her favourite flicks and she routinely scours the papers for grisly murders. She carries her dear departed husband’s ashes around in an urn and it wouldn’t be an odd sight to see said-urn accompanying the rest of the family members at the breakfast table.

~Love Interest: The apple of Jess’s forbidden lust is Ben Jones --- Blonde, blue-eyed and beautiful in a Beckham look-alike way. Luckily, the author has not typecast Ben as a love ‘em and chuck’ em type. He displays a refreshing sensitivity for a high school jock and is a likeable character.

~Best mate (and potential love interest): You have to love Fred Parsons. He is tall, gangly and smart-mouthed. Bearing a resemblance to the humble owl, Fred is Jess’ partner in comedic-crime. He’s witty, prone to mouthing exaggerated dialogue and is Jess’ true port in a storm.

There are several other factors that work together to make this a truly enjoyable read. The droll British humour combined with Jess’ fantastical imagination and over-the-top musings make you smile.

This is a book that makes it to my list of *must-haves* + *must-travel-with* + *must-store-with-ardent-adoration-in-silk-lined-trunk* + *must-possess-in-new-land-after-surviving-the-apocalypse*.

City of Glass (The Mortal Instruments, Book #3)

Okay, first of all...I am a certified wuss. I can’t read a book that has paranormal over (and under)tones in the latter half of the day. All vamp/werewolf/faerie/demon lit. is reserved for daylight hours.

CITY OF GLASS however, was the happy exception. I was ensnared so deeply into the politics of the ShadowWorld, that I could ignore the big yellow streak that runs down my back and devoured the book well into the wee hours of the night.

I believe that when a series progresses from *ho-hum* in the first instalment to *HELL’S BELLS-I-NEVER-ANTICIPATED-THAT!!!* in the last instalment; it’s a winner. When you actually begin to care about the characters and their emotional health; when you hope and pray that there’s a happy ending; when you already start plotting fan-fiction in your head; when you think that it would be kinda cool to run into a particular character in everyday life....then.....then you know that the author has done a slap-up job of creating a parallel world that is utterly believable.

The third instalment of The Mortal Instruments series was all that and much more. The city here, refers to Alicante; the home city of The Nephilim. Jace, Clary and Simon are placed in the eye of the approaching storm and battle out their individual demons as hell LITERALLY breaks loose. There is panic, chaos, unveiling of dark secrets, the breaking of hope and it’s resurrection and some cool (and a tad graphic) action. The worlds of The ShadowHunters and The DownWorlders collide in an explosion that keeps you hooked till the very end.

Clary blossoms into a likeable get-it-sorted heroine. Her amazing rune-etching abilities reach their hilt and she plays her role with aplomb. The author remembers to maintain Clary’s inherent vulnerability. As the battle between good and evil boils over, Clary still frets over her forbidden love for Jace in a manner that never makes you snort with disgust.

Jace is the ultimate emo pinup warrior. The sarcastic, loaded-with-quips-galore hero reveals a more humane and weary side. For all those delusional fans who slaver over the pathetic Mr.Cullen; here’s a hero who is actually worth drooling over. He’s readable and not stuck in a *I-Me-Bella-Me-Bella* bubble that Edward Cullen was floating inside.

Simon remains my favourite character. I am extremely glad about the fact that he wasn’t sidelined and given an unbelievable (and extremely bile-inducing) ending a la Jacob Black.

In conclusion, CITY OF GLASS justifies all the 5-star ratings that peppered it’s GoodReads page. It was sublime, emotional, filled with grisly bits and had an ending which was extremely satisfying and yet paved the way for a sequel/prequel if the author so desires.