#TBT Review: Cleopatra's Daughter is No Princess

 

#TBT and Thursday Trailer

Title:  Cleopatra's Daughter

Author: Michelle Moran 

Genre:  YA

Release Year:   2009  #TBT Review

Publisher: Random House

 

Swoon Worth Historical Details!

 

Of course, I had a TFIOS related post planned for today, and of course, my day job got in the way as did my general life job with those I love and the house I can't keep clean.  But, I do have my day planned around TFIOS tomorrow! 

Not here on my blog, but out there at the movie theater with my 14 year old daughter.  How cool that we now enjoy the same books and can bond over a John Green cry-fest.  I reserved her for this since Divergent when she went to the premier with her friends instead of with me.  And before Divergent, it was something else.  So, this time, I was like no way.  I am seeing TFIOS on the first day and she is going with me and she is going to wear the Okay, Okay shirt I ordered online.

So, today it is #TBT Review of Cleopatra's Daughter by Michelle Moran--currently at the awesomely amazing price of 1.99 on Kindle and Nook! 

If you have not read much historical fiction or none at all, this is the perfect book to get you started--who has not heard of the clandestine affair of Cleopatra and Marc Antony?  Who has not been awed by the Roman Empire when watching the movie "Gladiator"? 

Summary from Publisher:

The marriage of Marc Antony and Cleopatra is one of the greatest love stories of all time, a tale of unbridled passion with earth-shaking political consequences. Feared and hunted by the powers in Rome, the lovers choose to die by their own hands as the triumphant armies of Antony’s revengeful rival, Octavian, sweep into Egypt. Their three orphaned children are taken in chains to Rome; only two– the ten-year-old twins Selene and Alexander–survive the journey.

In Which I Attempt to Not Get All Wrapped Up in the History of Rome

Set against the demise of Egypt in 30 BC, the children of Queen Kleopatra VII and Mark Antony fear a sure death and are taken as orphans to the heart of the Roman Empire. Although forced to participate in a Roman parade bound by gold chains as prisoners, the twins, Alexander Helios and Kleopatra Selene, are treated as royalty while living with Octavia (sister to Caesar). 

In reading Cleopatra's Daughter, you will be swept into the Roman Empire. No one can deny the size and power of the empire at its height. But there is another side to Rome. The side of narrow streets, smoke, mud, pungent smells, and riots. People die, slaves are guilty, girls marry old men, women belong to men, and anything said may be misconstrued as traitorous--all of these issues are relevant to the plot of Cleopatra's Daughter.

To Selene, Rome is nothing like Alexandria, her home in Egypt--a home of beauty, marble, exquisite design, and a great love affair. A home Selene hopes to return to, but whether she ever will depends on Augustus Caesar.

She can only hope to be seen as useful through her artistic and architectural skills and enter a love match with someone who is not older than her father at his own death.

I wouldn't call it a historical romance, although it does have that element making it all the better for a person like myself who thinks anything with even the slightest hint of romance is pretty great:

   "Well?" Juba stood over me when we were finished.
   "They're fine, " I said shortly, dusting my hands on my tunic and rising.
   "A perfect job," Vitruvius complemented. "And very handsome sculptures, Juba. Are they all Roman?"
   "Only the Venus is Greek. For some reason, I was drawn to her face."
   I looked across the Pantheon to the statue of Venus. Perhaps it was my own vanity that made me think I reconginized her. But the nose and possibly the light, painted eyes were similar to mine. I caught Jubal looking at me.

I'm rooting for Juba. A broad-shouldered 20 something year old prince with the form of a Greek god from Numidia and who is one of Caesar's right hand men. The one who is always looking out for Selene and the one who may have a genuine interest in all the issues Selene is drawn to.

But Selene has fallen for a Roman, a young Apollo.

Will she marry either one? Will she be allowed to return to Egypt? Will she be accepted as an architect? Will she be able to help all other slaves and freedmen? Her fate, as well as the fate of an entire empire...well, it's in Caesar's hands.

Minerva

Thursday Trailer: Every Day is YA Splendor

#TBT and Thursday Trailer

Title: Every Day

Author: David Levithan

Genre:  YA

Release Year:  2012  #TBT Review

Publisher: Ember (Randomhouse)

Swoon Worthy Language

One of my biggest pet peeves is YA that is not original. Even worse is YA with a clunky feel to it--as in unrealistic dialogue, a lack of transition, generic writing schemes.

Every Day is none of the above. Every Day is beautiful prose. Every Day is David Levithan. Every Day is falling in love with language. Every Day is YA splendor.

By the way, "Swoon Worthy Language" means that the words themselves, the writing, is something I have fallen for in this book.  Not that the novel is straight up romance.

Even though I do not enjoy every aspect of the novel (in regards to how it seems that the author is inserting his personal views of the world--viewpoints that are basically humanistic in nature and that I do not agree with at all), I can not help but to love how Levithan writes. I aspire to write like this.   For this I give the book 4 hearts. 

And because of this, I have also been inspired to create a book trailer--my first attempt. Really. I hope you enjoy it! I tried to capture the essence of eternity, of falling in love.

50 Second Synopsis



"A" is continually reborn--every day.  " Every day a different body.  Every day a different life.  Every day in love with the same girl."  For as long as he has existed, the only truth "A" has known is he is himself, but yet he is someone else.  He has no long-term connection to humanity.  Only momentary habitation.  For eternity.

every day

 

A Review in Quotes

 

“This is what love does: It makes you want to rewrite the world. It makes you want to choose the characters, build the scenery, guide the plot. The person you love sits across from you, and you want to do everything in your power to make it possible, endlessly possible. And when it’s just the two of you, alone in a room, you can pretend that this is how it is, this is how it will be.”  

 

“It would be too easy to say that I feel invisible. Instead, I feel painfully visible, and entirely ignored.”  

 

“A sound waiting to be a word.”  

 

“The ocean makes its music; the wind does its dance. We hold on. At first we hold on to one another, but then it starts to feel like we are holding on to something even bigger than that. Greater.”  

 

“But there’s something about her—the cities on her shoes, the flash of bravery, the unnecessary sadness—that makes me want to know what the word will be when it stops being a sound. I have spent years meeting people without ever knowing them, and on this morning, in this place, with this girl, I feel the faintest pull of wanting to know. And in a moment of either weakness or bravery on my own part, I decide to follow it. I decide to find out more.”   

 

“We have defied the day as it was set out for us.”

 

 

Minerva

The Tearings Will Tear Your World Apart

Today's Thursday Trailer!

The Tearings by VC Repetto

Released by Evernight Teen, November 2013

 

 

The guy sitting at the next table coughed. It was an ugly, wet sound that made me look up from the exam sheet in front of me.

 

Fabulous. The last thing I needed was to get sick before the swim match.

 

He sniffed and wiped his nose with his stiff, already less-than-fresh sleeve, then lowered his hand back to his pencil and paper. Too bad for the person who'd have to pick that particular sheet up.

With this, Dear Readers, The Tearings begin.

Filled with 1950's black and white imagery that bring to mind the slightly creepy fascination of medical and scientific experimentation of a bygone era, the trailer will keep you bizarrely intrigued right up to that final moment--with a final seizing of  your own fascination. 

A human arm, sinewy with veins of virus poison jutting out and the entire almost monster-like arm turning red with infection--with plague.

I Am Legend, anybody?  The Walking Dead?  A new story of a new virus for all you world-going-down-plague-style loving readers and screen enthusiasts. 

 

P.S. Of interest to many of you may be the fact that VC Repetto enjoys submerging her brain in Victorian Gothic novels.  The Tearings is only her debut novel, and if she reads dark, Gothic-y material, then you can almost be certain she will emerge with her own work of "moldy lace and gas masks," two things she enjoys in Victorian Gothics.

 

Summary from Evernight Teen:

From the moment the black vans appear to take the sick away, Maya knows there is something wrong. She seems to be the only one to question the sudden disappearances at school and the masks everyone is forced to wear to keep from catching the new disease spreading through the entire United States.

Even when word of the new “healing centers” reaches the public, no one dares to ask what is happening. But when Maya catches the disease, the one they call The Tearings, and is taken to one of these centers along with her mother, the truth becomes all too clear. She is separated from her family and forced to work, becoming one of the more fortunate ones who is not sent to the testing wings.

Bullied by the guards to the point of death, she meets David Summers, the enigmatic young Captain who appears to loathe his position of power in the camp and who seems as drawn to Maya as she is to him.

When Maya suddenly becomes the disease’s only survivor, she must put her trust on David to find a way to escape the camp and get the truth, and the cure coursing through her veins, out to the world.

14+ for Violence and Adult Situations


Novel Excerpt from Evernight Teen:

 

My throat was raw, throbbing, and dry.

 

Panic rose immediately.

 

I was sick. I’d caught it.

 

I dug my nails into my hands and tried to get a hold of my galloping fear. Maybe I’d just slept with my mouth open during the night. That could be it, right? It didn’t need to be the worst thing imaginable. Except, I knew it was.

 

In seconds I was bolting up out of bed and running to the mirror hanging from my closet door. It hurt to open my mouth. Patches of red and fuzzy white had spread across my tongue and palates, making me wince when I touched them.

 

Sudden tears made my vision waver. Whatever this super-flu was, I had it.

 

I brushed my tears away with violence. There was no time for that right now. I had to think. My first instinct was to run into Mom’s room and tell her, but I made myself stand still for a few seconds more. Once she knew, she’d call the ambulances; there’d be no stopping her. They’d take us away to the health centers, so this might be the last few minutes I had to face this without needles poking at me.

 

As much as I tried to convince myself that allowing the ambulances to take me to the centers was a good thing, I couldn’t stop my stomach from clenching at the thought of riding in those black monsters that patrolled the streets. I wanted to stay home.

 

On impulse, I grabbed my cell off my night table and pressed one of the speed dial buttons.

Derek picked up on the fourth ring. “Maya?”

 

“Hi.”

 

“Is everything okay?”

 

I hesitated. This was it. Once I told someone, there’d be no stopping this. “I woke up with a sore throat.”

Author Website and Blog 

Book Page-Evernight Teen

VC Repetto on Twitter

VC Repetto on Goodreads

VC Repetto on Facebook

Princess of the Light Finds Her Purpose

 

Thursday Trailer

 

Princess of the Light by N.N. Light

 

Release Date: August 26, 2014

 

And the best part of all this?  Enter to win a book poster signed by the author!

 a Rafflecopter giveaway

 

Summary from Publisher:

Miriam Miller likes the simple things in life: a good book, close friends, and a healthy relationship with God. But, destiny comes calling, and her neat, little life turns upside down.

Ethanial, an angel of God, has been sent to reveal Miriam's true calling -– she is the Princess of the Light, the woman chosen by God Himself to vanquish the demons intent on infusing the world with evil. And her first assignment: restore the soul of a homeless man known only as The Walking Man.

Enter Joe Deacons, a man intent on stealing her heart. But as Miriam embarks on her journey to save the Walking Man and fulfill her calling, it becomes clear that Joe isn’t what he appears to be. Miriam must decide: Is she willing to risk her soul to save those she loves

Author Bio:

N.N. Light was born in Minnesota and later lived in Southern California only to eventually move to chilly Ontario, Canada where she married her beloved husband, Mr. N.

She is blissfully happy and loves all things chocolate and bookish.  She is also an avid enthusiast of music, movies, art, sports, and baking.
 

Webpage: Princess of the Light

Blog: Princess of the Light @ Wordpress

Twitter: @NNP_W_Light

Pinterest: NNLight

Goodreads: Princess of the Light @ Goodreads

 

http://anaiahpress.com/

 

 

Dear Readers,

Truly amazing how media kits from publishers can make the entire world of YA blogging as simple as copy/paste. But I am not content with just doing this--I must write something or then this is not a personal blog, right?

Though I have not read Princess of the Light, I can tell you I judge whether or not I will promote a work of fiction by the level of professionalism presented by either the author or publisher (but mainly the publisher)--meaning the effort they have placed in creating a top-notch product, in reaching out to the ordinary blogger like myself, and in utilizing social media.

Second is whether or not I like the cover art, the premise of the work, and the writing itself--all of which basically points back to the professional quality of the entire package.

As for Anaiah Press, I also like that I favorited a tweet by one of the agents and that this person actually DM-ed me about submitting my manuscript if ever I should have one ready that fits what they are looking for:)

This press is active, this press is in the now, and this press cares about their own authors and all of the potential authors, and the regular bloggers of the world.

As for the book, yes, it has a highly Christian theme, but it sometimes seems to me that YA needs the diversity of Christianity on its shelves.

I mean, pretty much every single teen in my classroom usually includes religious beliefs whenever I assign a journal topic such as "personal autobiography" or "what do humans need." Ok, it may be that because I live in a region with a high Catholic following that many of my students write about church or about needing to have faith in God--not that any of them do not question their faith or never find themselves doubting their faith--because in their journal writing a good number of them will bring some of these ideas out.

Either way, the best YA makes a connection with the YA readership, so if the readership in my classroom is largely Catholic, then wouldn't some of these students probably have interest in reading novels with a protagonist who views the world in terms of Christian spirituality on some levels?

On a side note, this week I read a YA with several of the characters seriously angry at God and with one finding a small sense of peace on the steps of a mosque. One may argue well that the diversity in this un-named YA is that the novel is exposing readers to other major world religions. This is true--this is adding diversity--but on the other had, where are the books where teens find peace at the steps of a Baptist church? 

P.S. What sounds better than a book where good battles against evil? This is one archetypical pattern that never gets old. This is what Princess of the Light promises to bring--so that there is enough for me to want to read it.



Fictionally Yours Siempre,

Minerva

 

 

Perfect Chemistry When Opposites Attract

 

 

 

#TBT and Thursday Trailer: Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles

Original post from 2010 on my first blog:

So, here is a very fun book trailer for one of the many books I've been reading lately--Perfect Chemistry by Simone Elkeles. I haven't gotten very far yet, but so far I enjoy the alternating points of view in the chapters and I like the Spanish phrases and lingo. It's about time Latino culture is part of a mainstream book.

 

I especially love the book cover, don't you?

Summary (from author's webpage):

A modern tale of star-crossed lovers with a fresh urban twist.

 

At Fairfield High School, on the outskirts of Chicago , everyone knows that south-siders mixing with north-siders can be explosive. So when Brittany Ellis and Alejandro “Alex” Fuentes are forced to be lab partners in chemistry class, this human experiment leads to unexpected revelations – that Brittany's flawless reputation is a cover for her troubled home life, that Alex’s bad-boy persona hides his desire to break free from gang ties, and that when they’re together, life somehow makes more sense. Breaking through the stereotypes and expectations that threaten to keep Brittany and Alex apart, Perfect Chemistry takes readers to both sides of the tracks in a passionate love story about looking beneath the surface.
 

Looking Back, 2014

 

Dear Readers,

 

Perfect Chemistry was first published on Decemeber 23, 2008 (which happens to the exact day and year that my husband turned 35) and is indeed an enjoyable read for the weekend, but it may not be one to literally keep you glued to the page. 

 

The summary is spot on regarding plot and the ideas of "stereotypes and expectations."  The one minor criticism I have is that it relies too much on the stereotypes and almost "Disny-fies" these stereotypes. 

 

I live in a region of Texas with notorious gang activity in certain areas, and Alex Fuentes is too good of a guy to be classified as a gangbanger.  BUT I like that Alex represents something positive (although if he really looked like a true gang member and acted like one, there is no way Brittany would be with him--many gang members are usually really hard core, and they don't leave their chola girfriends).  It is true, though, that you practically have to be killed to get out of a gang as shown by Elkeles.

 

I like his guts, his bad boy-good boy image, and the Perfect Chemistry between Alex and Brittany. 

Maybe too perfect in a story all neatly wrapped up with a semi-predictable ending and with a bad boy gone good and a good girl finding someone beyond her everyday, privileged experience.

 

Just as in 2010, I still truly appreciate the fact that Simone Elkeles has made it a priority to include Latino characters and Spanish lingo for that growing spectrum of young people of Latino origin who are buying YA books. 

 

About 97% of my high school students are Mexican American.  And of the ones that are reading--well, they are reading John Green or Veronica Roth.  They are not reading enough of those authors bringing more diversity to mainstream YA. 

 

So for this, I bump up the book from 2.5 stars to 3.5 stars.  Thank you, Simone Elkeles.

 

Fictionally Yours Siempre,

 

Minerva