Category Archives: books/book review

Review of The Beatrice McIlvaine Adventure Books 1&2, by Bruce McCandless III

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I won a copy of Beatrice at Bay through Goodreads. And since it happens to be the second book in the series, the authors (Bruce and Carson MacCandles) were kind enough to send along book one, Beatrice and the Basilisk

I admit that I don’t usually bother reviewing children’s’ books here on the blog, even when I read them. But the Beatrice McIlvaine Adventures impressed me, the second one more than the first. So, I’m giving them a place on the blog, even if the reviews are brief.

Description of Beatrice and the Basilisk:

12-year-old Beatrice McIlvaine has a problem. It’s not sixth grade math. It doesn’t involve boys. This problem is bigger than that, and it has a nasty bite. As Beatrice steels herself to fight a threat to the precarious existence she leads with her single mother and a troubled little brother, she finds she has friends in unexpected places. A modern parable about love, family, and killing giant flying reptiles, Beatrice and the Basilisk is short (8,000 words) but not entirely sweet. And there’s a lesson in there somewhere–if you can see through the dismal night sky, and beyond those dangerous teeth…

Review:

As an adult, I had to look over the hows and whys of the story, but otherwise I enjoyed it. (I even got a little teary.) I fully expected my young one to enjoy it. And in fact, she later came back to tell me she’d read and enjoyed it too.

Description of Beatrice at Bay:

Beatrice at Bay is the second installment of the Beatrice McIlvaine Adventure Series, which follows the feisty, freckled, and somewhat telekinetic Texas high schooler Beatrice as she makes her way in a world full of increasingly sophisticated threats. The series started with Beatrice and the Basilisk, a modern-day fairy tale that resonated unexpectedly with readers young and old. While Beatrice was twelve then, she’s fifteen now, and facing different challenges: a potential step-father; her own immense but uncontrollable powers; the weird kids sitting the in the plumber’s van outside; and—possibly most importantly—the end of the world. Can Beatrice channel her troubling destructive energies in the service of something greater than herself? Who can she trust at a beautiful school for gifted kids that isn’t quite what it seems? And what’s up with this Lester White Bull kid creeping on her Instagram feed?

Review:

I have to admit to being very surprised by this book. Whenever I get my hands on a random book I plan to pass to my children, I always give them a quick read just to be sure they’re age and message appropriate. I don’t usually expect to enjoy them much. I’m a 43 yo woman, after all, and this is an upper middle-grade book. (The protagonist is 15.) This time I did though. I thoroughly enjoyed the story, diversity, and plotline. However, I have to admit given the current pandemic it was a little too on the nose! I hope there will be more Beatrice adventures in the future.

midnight curse

Book Review of Midnight Curse (Disrupted Magic #1), by Melissa F. Olson

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In 2017, I purchased a copy of Melissa F. Olson‘s Midnight Curse from Amazon. It is yet one more book I unearthed when I went through all my ebooks recently.

Description from Goodreads:

Scarlett Bernard is used to cleaning up messes. As a human who cancels out any magic around her, Scarlett’s job is to keep the supernatural world hidden—at any cost.

But on the eve of the Vampire Trials, a two-day tribunal that allows the otherworldly community to air their grievances, Scarlett receives a blood-soaked message from Molly, her estranged former roommate. Molly, a vampire, had been living with twelve human college students…and in one terrible night, she slaughtered them all.

Scarlett believes Molly’s been set up, but no one else in the Old World agrees with her. Meanwhile, the true perpetrator is determined to make sure Molly goes on trial for the massacre—and the penalty is death.

With less than two days to prove her friend’s innocence, Scarlett calls on former LAPD detective Jesse Cruz to help her dig into Molly’s past. But no one—Molly included—wants Scarlett and Jesse to bring the terrible truth to light.

Review:

I really quite enjoyed this. I admit that I didn’t know that this is actually the first book in a spin-off of sorts to a previous trilogy. (Well, it’s all the same characters, but apparently three years later). So, it would more honestly be labeled book four, in my opinion. But it’s readable on its own. I could follow the plot no problem, but I did feel I was missing quite a bit of history between the characters.

I liked Scarlette’s character a lot, enjoyed Jesse, and appreciated the side characters. The world is effortlessly diverse and the plot kept me interested until the end. Admittedly, the plot hinges on the abuse of women and I am just soooo tired of this always being the plotline. I have asked repeatedly, is this really the only plot available to authors? But that’s my biggest complaint. I’ll absolutely be looking for more by Olson.

Book Review: We Were Eight Years in Power, by Ta-Nehisi Coates

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I won a copy of Ta-Nehisi Coates‘ We Were Eight Years in Power a while back. But it has been sitting on my shelf for too long. I read it now in my ongoing attempt to further educate myself.

Description from Goodreads:

“We were eight years in power” was the lament of Reconstruction-era black politicians as the American experiment in multiracial democracy ended with the return of white supremacist rule in the South. Now Ta-Nehisi Coates explores the tragic echoes of that history in our own time: the unprecedented election of a black president followed by a vicious backlash that fueled the election of the man Coates argues is America’s “first white president.”

But the story of these present-day eight years is not just about presidential politics. This book also examines the new voices, ideas, and movements for justice that emerged over this period–and the effects of the persistent, haunting shadow of our nation’s old and unreconciled history. Coates powerfully examines the events of the Obama era from his intimate and revealing perspective–the point of view of a young writer who begins the journey in an unemployment office in Harlem and ends it in the Oval Office, interviewing a president.

We Were Eight Years in Power features Coates’s iconic essays first published in The Atlantic, including Fear of a Black President, The Case for Reparations and The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration, along with eight fresh essays that revisit each year of the Obama administration through Coates’s own experiences, observations, and intellectual development, capped by a bracingly original assessment of the election that fully illuminated the tragedy of the Obama era. We Were Eight Years in Power is a vital account of modern America, from one of the definitive voices of this historic moment.

Review:

Sooooo, I basically think every American should read this book. It’s eminently more engageable than I’d expected and I learned quite a lot. It’s not that I’d never encountered aspects of what Coates covered, many of the topics I’d studied in college 9at least shallowly). But that was a long time ago. He prompted me to think about things from angles I hadn’t before and does it all while centering it in and around his own experiences as a Black man in America. Which humanizes and relevantizes some of the histories that can feel out of reach due to the distance of time.

Admittedly, as Coates himself admits, he falls between an essayist and a memoirist (his own). So, the book doesn’t touch on intersectionalities of gender and race. Which is a shame, considering several of the essays touch on the politics around the dissolution of the family unit (or the fear, politicization, paternalism of it) and resulting female-led households. But I still think the book accomplishes what it set out to do. Absolutely, especially given current events, pick this one up people.