Mackenzie Blue by Tina Wells

In Mackenzie Blue, Mackenzie, Zee to her friends, is starting grade seven. This means a new school, but she'll be attending it without her BFF (that's "best friend forever" for those of you who don't speak "text"). Alli has recently moved to Paris. While she still has contact with Alli through email and texting, it's not the same. Zee misses her terribly. Luckily she met Jasper over the summer and on the first day she runs into, literally, Chloe, a new girl from Atlanta. Things are looking up for Zee until her diary is stolen and parts of it start appearing on the chalkboards around school.

Aimed at 8- to 12-year-old girls [aka tweens], Wells presents a delightful novel featuring a pretty typical seventh grader. I think tweens will be able to relate to Zee because of her anxieties over a new school, the loss of her diary, upcoming puberty, as well as trust issues with new friends and classmates. Despite all of Zee's anxieties, the story is pretty upbeat and fun to read.

I like books that are a little quirky or present the story in a slightly different manner. Therefore, I really enjoyed reading the texts, emails and the diary/notebook entries.

I absolutely loved the art work. Pencil sketches/drawings are my favourite medium. I also loved that the artist included some doodles on the diary/notebook pages that could have been drawn by a seventh grader. Very cool. [Note: This ARE doesn't include all of the art work.]

Apparently this book is the first in a planned series. Mackenzie Blue and the Secret Crush is the next book. I think it'll be fun to follow Zee's further adventures. [Note: This ARE doesn't include the first chapter of "Secret Crush".]

Recommended for tweens.

Head over to HarperCollins Canada for more information on this book.

Best of 2008

I thought I'd try something different this year and assemble a "Best of 2008" list. Other people do it so why not me, eh? Anyway, I still have a few reviews to post for books I read this year (I hope to get them done by year end, but I might not), but I think I'm ready to assemble my list. Note that these are books I read this year and not necessarily published this year.

[It's no coincidence that there are a lot of books from HarperCollins on the list. That's because I have received some awesome books from their First Look program as well as the The Reading Group on Facebook.]

In no particular order, here's Daisy's Best of 2008.

Hitman: Forty Years Making Music, Topping the Charts, and Winning Grammys by David Foster
When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson
Broken by Daniel Clay
Starclimber by Kenneth Oppel
Downtown Owl: A Novel by Chuck Klosterman
Fuzzy Navel by J. A. Konrath
The Last Oracle by James Rollins
Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
Belong to Me by Marisa de Los Santos
The Post-Birthday World by Lionel Shriver
Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri
Remembering the Bones by Frances Itani
The Double Bind by Chris Bohjalian
Ines of My Soul: A Novel by Isabel Allende
Crooked Little Vein: A Novel by Warren Ellis
The Luxe by Anna Godbersen
Bound by Sally Gunning
Promise of Wolves Dorothy Hearst
The Paris Enigma by Pablo De Santis
The Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill. [Technically, I read this one last year, however, I wanted to mention it here because it's a recent Canada Reads pick. Besides, it's one of the best books I've ever read and it makes the list an even 20].

Enjoy.

Attachment by Isabel Fonseca

I generally finish every book I start. There are, of course, exceptions and unfortunately Attachment is one of them.

In the book, Jean opens an "erotically charged" email intended for her husband, Mark. Apparently, it's from his lover, Giovana. Instead of confronting him, she poses as her husband and corresponds with Giovana via email. I thought that sounded like a great premise and showed some promise, but the story didn't resonate with me. I've read about a 1/3 of it and I struggled with every page. I just didn't really care about the characters; nor did I find the story engaging. That's not to say it isn't well written, it is. It's just not for me.

One of the things that sort of bugged me in the book were the few graphic bits about sex. At the risk of sounding like a prude, I found them gratuitous and jarring against the other parts of the book. As much as I didn't care for those parts (they really were few and in between), they would not have stopped me from reading the book had I been enjoying it in the first place.

While this book wasn't my favourite, shall we say, I really don't think it deserves the harsh criticisms that I found on Amazon. In my opinion, no author deserves such treatment.

I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone I know, but I'm sure there are lots of people who would enjoy it. You could do a whole lot worse. Different strokes for different folks, as they say.

Unholy Business by Nina Burleigh

In Unholy Business: A True Tale of Faith, Greed & Forgery in the Holy Land, Nina Burleigh tells us how the James Ossuary goes from being the artefact that proves the existence of Jesus Christ to being the "the fraud of the century". She details the items, the players on both sides of the forgery, the procedures used for examination and more. She brings to light the corruption and forgery that infiltrates all levels of the antiquities market. From the high-end museum display pieces to the low-end items that are on sale for tourists, only a few people in the world know what's real. Even then, they don't always agree.

I loved this book. Burleigh's writing and storytelling abilities make this work accessible, fascinating and easy to read. A number of the players' names start with "G" and I got them mixed up a few times, but other than the story is quite easy to follow. I particularly liked her examination of what the ossuary, if it's authentic, means to the various religions. I was raised in the Catholic church and found this section interesting and enlightening. I also loved her descriptions of the various cities in the Middle East. Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and others; I could really picture the cities as she described them. Also, Burleigh's detailed descriptions of the procedures used to prove authenticity were easy to understand and intriguing.

I appreciate the tremendous amount of research and travel to gather the information. I especially loved that she didn't just quote other people's work. She travelled extensively and walked and talked with the collectors, archaeologists and other antiquity specialists to put together a comprehensive piece of work.

Highly recommended for those interested in religion, archaeology or museums. It might make you look at museums and their displays in a whole new way.

Dreaming Again Edited by Jack Dann

Dreaming Again, presented by Jack Dann, is an amazing collection of short stories in the speculative fiction genre from Australian authors. From science fiction, fantasy and horror, these short stories are diverse and imaginative. Dann precedes the collection with a nice introduction explaining the premise of the book. The back of the book says it best: "Breathtaking in scope, originality and imagination."

I've read quite a few short stories before, but almost everything else about this book was new for me. First there's the Australian authors. I haven't knowingly read any that I can think of. Also, I don't read much speculative fiction. In fact, I could probably count the number of such books I've read on one hand and those were all science fiction. I can't remember ever reading any fantasy (except if you count Harry Potter, which I don't because to me he's real) or horror. It's not that I didn't enjoy the few that I read it's just that I tend to gravitate towards other genres.

I really enjoyed reading this book. In fact, at times I didn't want to put the book down and couldn't wait to see what the next story was about. The stories were diverse with unique characters and story lines. The three subgenres(?) were well represented. Dann's selection of stories and editing of the book were superb. One of the first sentences in the first story gave me an indication of what I was in for "...I had regrown my left foot...". I knew right then and there this book was going to be different from any other book I've read.

My favourites include:
The Constant Past, The Forest, This Way to the Exit, Empire, Lost Arts and many more. That's enough for now. I could be here all day listing them. I also have a list of those I'd like to reread.

Definitely recommended. Even if you think you might not like speculative fiction, I'd say this book is still worth a try.

The Paris Enigma by Pablo De Santis

It's 1889. The Eiffel Tower is just about complete and the Paris World's Fair is set to begin. The Twelve Detectives, an elite group of crime investigators, is preparing to meet for the first time at the fair. They will be presenting a display of their craft to the world. When one of them becomes ill, he decides to send his assistant, acolyte as they call him, in his place. His name is Sigmundo Salvatrio and used to work with his father in the family shoe store. That is, until he become a student of Renaldo Craig, the founding member of the Twelve Detectives. Now, he carries with him Craig's cane, for the exhibit and a secret message for Arzaky, another one of the detectives. The detectives and acolytes are called into action when a series of murders takes place.

The Paris Enigma is a fantastic mystery from Argentinean author, Pablo De Santis. It's wonderfully written, filled with great characters and is a joy to read. There was a mystical,
whimsical, philosophical and fantasy-like aspect to the whole book that I quite enjoyed. Not like any other mystery I've read. The fact that it was written from the point of view of one of the acolytes rather than one of the detectives, made the story appealing, since the acolytes were supposed to take a back seat to the detectives. Some of the detectives didn't even talk to their assistants.

I admit it was a little hard to keep track of all of the detectives and acolytes and I sometimes got them mixed up. I also had some trouble remembering which acolyte belonged to which detective. It wasn't all that bad, though, and certainly didn't get in the way of my enjoyment of the book.

De Santis's writing is superb. There were many times I put down the book to record a favourite quote or passage. I've included three here. They might not make sense out of context, but I wanted to make note of them.

From page 189:
Everyone knew that the important stuff was what was said in the corners, not in the center of the room.

From page 193:

The first audience members leave the theater chatting and laughing, eager to abandon the world of fiction and reenter the real, where they fell at home. The last ones to leave, on the other hand, have to be forced out by the ushers or the lights going up or the silence that follows the applause. If it were up to them, they would remain there in the imaginary world the performance offers them. These last stragglers came out without saying a word, grieving over having to abandon the Mermaid's island. They didn't know their place in the world outside; in the real life the seats aren't numbered.

From page 205:
Science no longer strives to collect answers, but rather to obliterate the questions.

I'd definitely read another book by this author.

Highly recommended.