Problematic Summer Romance - Ali Hazelwood

It's coming up for the second anniversary since I lost a very dear friend to cancer, she's a constant gap in my life and since she's gone I've found it hard to read anything particularly challenging or that would provoke any kind of complex emotions. Having spent quite a long time picking up and putting down 'Problematic Summer Romance' I feel that phase might be at an end.

Or it might just be that I'm not a fan of where Ali Hazelwood seems to be going with her writing, or it could be both things. I still think most of Hazelwood's books are a solid choice if you're looking for a fairly fun romance, but I didn't finish 'Deep End' - the kink element wasn't for me, it went to a charity shop, and Bride wasn't my think either (werewolves really not my thing either it turns out).

'Problematic Summer Romance' has a 23 year old main female character very much in love with the 38 year old best friend and super wealthy business partner of her older brother. The main problem seems to be the age difference between them and potential power imbalance that imples. The reason it's taken me a couple of weeks to actually finish this is that it never at any point felt like a massive problem, partly because the older brother and entire friendship group are all extremely supportive.

Plenty of romance writers keep on churning out essentially the same thing so kudos to Hazelwood for trying different things, but this book feels overworked to me - too much thought has gone into making things just problematic enough, but not so much as the reader might really take issue with any of it. Perhaps unfortunately Maya is a convincing 23 year old and a little bit annoying with it. The academic setting which bought the earlier books to life is missing as well, along with the close female friendships - and altogether it fell a little flat for me.

It's still a solid book - a definite three and a half stars, easy summer reading for lazy afternoons kind of thing. There are engaging characters, characters from earlier books that it's fun to catch up with, and the descriptions of Sicily are lush but whatever I pick up next is going to be very different. 

A Sorceress Comes to Call - T Kingfisher

The current phase of moving things around and making space is coming to an end - there will be another big push later this summer, but right now it's hot and I'm bothered by the heat so all the hard work of shifting things can pause for a bit. When it does start again, the main job will be to make some sense of the books that haven't gone into storage. Right now, they've been shoved into gaps as they've become available, and there's no sense to it all (but having floor space again is nice, so...).

There's also a certain amount of pressure to read some of the books that are hanging around and pass them on. When I started blogging a very long time ago books were an escape from work, or the lack of work, depending on circumstances. Now my work is books, it's very much not that and consequently a harder to motivate myself to sometimes. I also find that for work purposes, it's enough to read a bit of a lot of books that I wouldn't normally pick up to get a general sense of them - enough, at least, to know what people want when they're asking for more of the same. 

For someone who's never really had much love for contemporary fiction this is an odd place to be in, but sometimes a book surprises me, and so it was with A Sorceress Comes to Call. T Kingfisher's (a pen name for Ursual Vernon) back catalogue is popping up all over the place now in the UK, she's been on my radar for a while as a horror/fantasy writer that I'd heard good things about, I've even managed to collect a few of the more specifically fantasy titles - but this is the first one I've read.

I loved it, and those other books have moved right up the pile to be read. A Sorceress Comes To Call is inspired by the Brothers Grimm Goose Girl tale, the main protaganists are Cordelia, a 14 year old girl, and Hester, a woman in her early 50s with a bad knee. Cordelia's mother is the thoroughly wicked sorceress who sets out to marry a rich man so that she can trap an even richer man for her daughter. Hester as the rich man's sister is set on foiling her plans and rescuing the child. 

The genius of the book is that it manages to be simultaneously dark with a sense of real danger and a creeping bit of horror, and also really funny. Hester and Cordelia are perfectly flawed, human heroines, frightened and unsure as well as determined and capable of showing incredible fortitude and bravery. The Sorceresses powers fully underscore the banility of evil. All the characters are well drawn and convincing, but most of all I really appreciated the middle aged nature of so many of them. 

It was also thoroughly refreshing to read a fantasy that doesn't place romance at its centre. I'm not knocking romantasy, but it feels so ubiquitous right now that not encountering it here was something of a relief. T Kingfisher is not particularly like Terry Pratchett, but there's a comparison to be had in in the way they both lace together humour and an anger at injustice and abuse. The vibe is different, but I think if you were a Pratchett fan you would find much to enjoy here. 

A Forgery of Fate - Elizabeth Lim

After nearly three years of marriage, my husband is finally moving in with me. We've sold his house and are trying to breathe in enough to fit our lives into my 1-bedroom flat. A lot of my books have moved into my mothers garage. Packing them up has been both easy - the sheer quantity of them had become overwhelming, it's a relief to not have teetering piles of books everywhere (although more have to go) and really not easy. What should stay, what do I refer to regularly, what am I likely to want to read or re-read in the next couple of years, and what can go to the charity shop?

Answers to all those questions and more are slowly resolving themselves. The next steps are exciting ones, but oh, is the process ever hard on the back? And where do all the tiny cuts and bruises come from at the end of each day?

Meanwhile, I really need to round up on the proofs I've been reading and dispose of some of the work related books I'm unlikely to revisit. A Forgery of Fate is just such a book, although I absolutely will be revisiting Elizabeth Lim.

She's one of a growing number of authors who straddles the young adult and fantasy boundary. At work her hardbacks tend to be classified as Young Adult, which I think they are, but when they come out in paperback they get reclassified as SFF. I find this annoying. I'd like to live in an ideal world where the boundaries were more distinct. 

In this world I'd say A Forgery of Fate is definitely YA, but good writing is good writing and it cuts itself off from a sizable chunk of potential readers if you market purely as teen. Billed as Beauty and the Beast meets the Little Mermaid, and delivering on its promise, I really enjoyed this one. 

Truyan Saigas has a reasonably happy childhood until her father disappears on a sea voyage, her mother falls apart, and she and her sisters are forced to grow up fast. Truyan has a particular gift though, she is an artist, a gifted forger, and it's just possible that she can paint the future. Her gift bring her to the attention of the mysterious Lord Elang, who may be a demon or may be a dragon and that's when it gets really complicated for Tru.

The magic and mythology here is compelling, and the world building is truly fabulous. Tru negotiates helping her family, making new friends and enemies, overcoming her past, falling in love, and making some very hard decisions with grace. The peril, especially at the outset feels real, the resolution is deeply satisfying, and I never found her an annoying heroine to read - which I often do when young girls are chosen to save the world. 

In short, a satisfying and enjoyable book for anyone from 14 upwards (age classifications are hard, but there'a an emotional depth to this book that makes me think very young readers would miss a bit too much nuance).