The Grey King by Susan Cooper
Bingo: I Wish. . . The Grey King just might be my favorite fantasy novel for kids. The fourth book in The Dark is Rising series, it has Will Stanton, the last of the Old Ones, on a holiday in Wales where he meets a strange boy named Bran and searches for a golden harp that will aid the Light in their battle against the Dark. The setting in this book is everything (and is why I picked it for this particular bingo category). Will […]
Greenwitch by Susan Cooper
Bingo: Green Book #3 in The Dark is Rising series, I always loved Greenwitch. In this one, the Drew siblings (Barney, Jane, and Simon) are on holiday in Cornwall with their Great-Uncle Merry, who also happens to be Merriman Lyon, Will Stanton’s mentor from Book 2. Will shows up in Cornwall as well, much to the dismay of the Drews, and it’s soon clear that Will and Merry are on another quest for a Thing of Power to protect the world from the Dark–this time […]
The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper
Bingo: No Money (borrowed from my dad) This year, I was only going to review books I’d never read before, but a few months back another Cannonballer reviewed the entire Dark is Rising series and it made me nostalgic for these books, which I adored as a kid. Plus, I’d never read the final book in the series so I thought I might finally get around to it (I also tried to read the first in the series–The Dark is Rising is the second–but couldn’t […]
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins
Bingo category: Book Club (a whole bunch of them) The prequel to the Hunger Games trilogy, The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes has a young Coriolanus Snow, the future president and villain of the first three books, as its protagonist. I didn’t really want to read it because. . . President Snow sucks. But I requested from my library anyway, just to see what I thought. And here we are. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes takes place 64 years before The Hunger Games trilogy […]
Two Girls Down by Louisa Luna
There are so many mystery series with a similar premise to Two Girls Down: Hardbitten private investigator teams up with disgraced former cop (also a PI) to solve a case the police can’t. That’s not to say I didn’t like Two Girls Down, because I did. This is mostly due to the two main characters, Alice Vega (hardbitten PI) and Max “Cap” Caplan (former cop). Alice is the kind of character who’s fun to read about, because she’s unpredictable (and a total badass). I liked […]
House of Salt and Sorrows by Erin A. Craig
The original “Twelve Dancing Princesses” fairy tale is surprisingly un-gory. Silly me, I thought a modern retelling would be the same. Not so much! If you’re not familiar with the original fairy tale, it goes something like this: there are twelve sisters (princesses, natch) who, every night, sneak out of their castle and dance all night at an enchanted ball. Their dad, the king, wants to know where they go every night so he sends out the call that anyone who can figure out their […]
