Tolkien Estate Disavows Film, RIP Lyra McKee, Once & Future by Amy Rose Capetta and Cori McCarthy, The Undercover Witch by Gina LaManna, Magnificent Devices and Brilliant Devices by Shelley Adina

Welcome to my latest book reviews, everyone! I wanted to get started by saying that, while I'm becoming more disabled by Crohn's and the other diseases I'm fighting, I still plan on doing my best to keep up with my reading and writing reviews for this blog, which will, by the end of the year, have over 700 posts! A lot of things in my life, looking back, have begun because I was bored with what was happening at the time, either sports, (the SuperBowl) when I started this blog in 2005, or high school classes that weren't challenging enough when I was 16, and decided to go to the local community college to train for my nurse's aid certification (It's also important to note that it got horribly tiresome to be bullied and harassed every day for being who I am, so much so that I tried to be invisible, and when that didn't work, I just gave up and let them beat me down, realizing that the light at the end of the tunnel was college, where I knew a change in environment/people would allow me to flourish, learn and grow, which it did. I feel awful that the Theater Dept at Clarke is no longer in existence, so that young women in the future won't be allowed the escape and haven that I found there in TDH.)

At any rate, this statement from the Tolkien estate surprises me, because my understanding is that this film is very complimentary to JRR Tolkein and his friends, among them CS Lewis, who wrote the Chronicles of Narnia.

Tolkien Estate Disavows Upcoming Film

The family and estate of J.R.R. Tolkien "have fired a broadside http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40485522" against the upcoming film Tolkien http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40485523, the Guardian reported. On Tuesday, they issued a statement announcing their "wish to make clear that they did not approve of, authorize or participate in the making of this film," and that "they do not endorse it or its content in any way."

A spokesperson for the estate said the statement was intended to make its position clear, rather than herald future legal action.Directed by Dome Karukoski, the movie stars Nicholas Hoult as the young Tolkien and Lily Collins as his wife, Edith. It explores "the formative years of the renowned author's life as he finds friendship, courage and inspiration among a fellow group of writers and artists at school," and promises to reveal how "their brotherhood strengthens as they grow up... until the outbreak of the first world war which threatens to tear their fellowship apart," all of which would inspire Tolkien to write his Middle-earth novels, according to studio Fox Searchlight. The film will be released next month.

I'm posting this obit because it has become more and more dangerous to be a journalist in this country, and around the world, due in part to the ravings of our insane POTUS, who doesn't like the press because they tell the truth and expose him for the liar/cheater/creeper/misogynist that he really is. So now we have a new band of thugs in Ireland who murdered a 29 year old journalist for exposing who really loses in war/military action...women and children and young men who die before their time, murdered by the old IRA. For shame, Ireland. You can do better, be better than this. 

Obituary Note: Lyra McKee

Irish journalist and debut author Lyra McKee http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40488018 was shot and killed April 18 "while observing rioting in Londonderry's Creggan estate," the Bookseller reported. She was 29. The New IRA has admitted responsibility for the killing. Faber signed a two-book deal with McKee last April. Her first book, The Lost Boys, "exploring the disappearances of a number of children and young men during the Troubles," will be published in 2020, the Bookseller noted.

"We are heartbroken and appalled by the news of Lyra McKee's death in Derry," said Alex Bowler, publisher at Faber. "Lyra was a writer of exceptional gifts and compassion, an inspiring, determined seeker of truth, and the most beloved of human beings. We are honored to be her publisher."

In a tribute posted on Janklow & Nesbit's website http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40488019>, Will Francis wrote: "Lyra McKee was gifted, brave, kind and funny. I'm proud to have been her literary agent. I started working with her after Chrissie Giles at

Mosaic published Lyra's extraordinary piece http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz40488020 about the effect of the war in Northern Ireland on her generation, growing up in Belfast after the Good Friday Agreement. She wrote about the legacy of the Troubles, about a city haunted by its recent past, and did so with tremendous wit and insight. I sold her book... to Faber last year on the basis of a proposal. In that document she wrote about growing up in a 'conflict hotspot' in North Belfast, off the road known as the Murder Mile."

The National Union of Journalists' general secretary Michelle Stanistreet commented: "A bright light has been quenched and that plunges all of us in to darkness... Her death is a major loss to journalism." 

Once & Future by Amy Rose Capetta and Cori McCarthy is a novel presented by James Patterson, which leads me to believe he's got this special imprint with Little, Brown and Company publishers to ensure that new and diverse author voices are heard. That, and his consistent monetary gifts that keep bookstores afloat, and I have to say I'm fast becoming a Patterson devotee. This particular YA novel, written by a lesbian couple, is a science fiction retelling of the King Arthur legend, and it's brilliant.Here's the blurb via Publisher's Weekly: Set in the future, this inclusive, refreshing take on the Arthurian mythos by Capetta (The Brilliant Death) and McCarthy (Now a Major Motion Picture) stars an impulsive teen female incarnation of Arthur who faces a heartless intergalactic commercial monopoly. While escaping the Mercer Company’s flagship, Ketchan-born Ari, 17, and Kay, her adoptive elder brother, crash on Old Earth, where Ari draws an ancient sword from a tree. With that act, she awakens backward-aging Merlin—now a teen—from his crystal cave and gives him his 42nd chance to vanquish Morgana and mentor Arthur’s efforts to unite humanity. Ari takes little interest in the Arthurian cycle until it collides with her personal quest to rescue her imprisoned mothers from Mercer. On Lionel, a medieval recreation planet and sole holdout against the corporation, others, including Queen Gwen, join the team, leading to a political betrothal that turns into something much more. This and other nonlethal stratagems and romances among people of various gender identities and ethnicities drive the plot, alongside desperate battle scenes and a well-rounded round table. A marvelous mythology remix for teens who enjoy action-packed speculative fiction and genderqueer romance. 

I want to point out that adults can get a lot from this book as well. YA has it's collective genre fingers on the pulse of the next generation, so if you want a glimpse into our actual future as a society, you need to read books like this. I loved Ari (a female Arthur), Gwen, Kay and Merlin, but while we are supposed to believe that this is primarily Ari's story, I felt that the real protagonist was Merlin, who is Benjamin Buttoning his way through time, trying desperately to find an end to his reverse aging curse and hoping that this Arthur, number 42, will kill the bad guys (a corporation that resembles Amazon), unify the people of all the planets and bring sane rule of law to the galaxy. I loved that the book has it's roots in TH White's "Once and Future King" which I read as a kid and loved enough that it started me on an Arthurian book binge that lasted for almost an entire year. Though there's an HEA, it wasn't a clean one, and the messy finale made the plot seem all the more viable. The prose was fun and fast, and I'd have to say that this novel deserves an A and a recommendation to those who want to read diverse and imaginative fiction, not the same old retellings.

The Undercover Witch by Gina LaManna was an impulse buy that looked like a popsicle on a hot day kind of book...cool and fruity and not so heavy that it will ruin your supper.  Here's the blurb:

My mother says trouble began the day I was born, but I'd disagree. I think trouble started the day I crashed my broomstick into an undercover cop car.
My name is Ainsley Shaw, and I'm a Guardian Witch. The title sounds fancier than it is-really, I'm a glorified bodyguard for magical people. I love my job, and I'm good at it... most days.
Except today. While I was flying around town on my broomstick thinking about life, love, and the latest episode of The Bachelor, I zoned out and ran smack dab into the taillights of a speeding police cruiser. Unfortunately, the man inside was a human cop, which made explaining how I appeared from thin air in the middle of a crime scene a bit of a challenge.
Now, the police think I'm trouble-not least of all Detective Hotterson, the one responsible for denting my shiny new broomstick. Which means that if I can't find the real bad guys before I'm put in jail, I'll be locked away for a crime I didn't commit.
However, when magic is involved, things are never as simple as they appear...
This is a full length, humorous cozy mystery complete with magic, romance, and suspense. So grab your broomstick, hold on tight, and join Ainsley for the ride!
 

Ainsley is pretty funny, though  her meet-cute with the hottie police officer is a bit 

much. Still, I really enjoyed the zingy dialog and the  swift and easy plot. A definite 

B, with the recommendation that those who want a break from some heavy reading 

will want to pick up this beach read ASAP.

Magnificent Devices and Brilliant Devices by Shelley Adina are books 3 and 4 in her 

Magnificent Devices series. They're excellent follow ups to the first two books in this 

Steampunk series which I heartily enjoyed. Adina's prose is sterling and her plots are 

intricate without being tedious or boring. Her characters are full bodied and smart, and

they develop beautifully over the course of each novel. Here are the blurbs:

An air voyage to remember turns into a disaster no one may survive.
With her orphaned charges, Lady Claire Trevelyan joins the Earl of Dunsmuir’s family on an airship voyage to the Americas. If she can stay out of Lord James Selwyn’s way until her eighteenth birthday, she will be of age and cannot be forced into marriage. What she doesn’t know is that Lord James is in the Americas, too, with Andrew Malvern closing in on him—and the wonderful device he stole. But when a storm cripples the airship and air pirates swoop in like carrion birds, Claire and the children must live by their wits to make their way across a harsh landscape. Will Andrew ever see her again and right the wrong he believes he has done? Will Lord James succeed in his monumental thievery? And how exactly does Rosie the chicken evade the soup pot?
Tighten your goggles, pull on your gloves, and prepare yourself for stratagems and strangeness in the third book in the series, Magnificent Devices!

A lady of resources has the power to change the world--if she can stay alive long enough to do it.

Lady Claire Trevelyan had been looking forward to glittering balls, congenial society, and relief from pursuit during her stay with Lord and Lady Dunsmuir in the Canadas. Well, perhaps not entirely. Being pursued by a handsome airship captain is rather diverting, especially when it appears her erstwhile employer, Andrew Malvern, is becoming much too distracted by a certain blond mechanic.

But a shot fired in the night puts an end to such diversions, and instead plunges her and her orphaned band of children into a fight for their very survival. Between secret conversations at the highest levels of society and skullduggery in the diamond mines, Claire must discover who is behind a series of alarming attempts on her friends' lives--before her mother is compelled to make funeral arrangements yet again.

Thought this is a SPOILER, I have to say I am so glad that Lady Claire is finally rid of the odious Lord James S, who was a misogynist and a creep. That said, the whole triangle with Claire and Malvern and the adopted daughter of a local thug, Alice, gets old, fast. Malvern seems to not know his own heart, and keeps sending mixed signals to both women, which is reprehensible, in my opinion, and makes him worthy of neither. But there seems to be a need on the part of the author to "pair up" her main female characters, or at least for them to have a love interest. Perhaps that is due to the time (19th century) that they live in, with its restrictive mores about women. AT any rate, it's fascinating to watch the street children that Lady Claire is raising doing their best to grow up and find their place in society and the world. I find their attachment to Rosie the chicken hilarious, and the various devices they come up with, despite the attempts of society to use them for ill intent, are also wonderous. I have three more books coming to me in the mail tomorrow, and though I am currently reading another book about Russian and American women during WW1, I don't think I will be able to resist putting it on hold while I catch up with the Lady and her "flock" of London orphans. These tantalizing novels deserve an A, and a recommendation to anyone who enjoys Steampunk or a ripping good yarn.