Review ~ Dead Is a Battlefield by Marlene Perez

This book marks the beginning of the Jessica Walsh era - Jessica takes over as heroine of the Dead Is series from Daisy Giordano. Psychic Daisy and her sisters are the Walsh's next door neighbors, and Daisy's boyfriend Ryan is the best friend of Jessica's older brother Sean. Jessica doesn't have psychic powers, but she does have a strange new tattoo that just appears without the use of needles. She learns she's a virago, a supernatural warrior-woman destined to guard her hometown of Nightshade, California.

I wondered if I would like this series as much with Jessica in charge as I did with Daisy. I did, pretty much. The ending was a little rushed, but I imagine some of the confusion will be further cleared up in the next volume, Dead Is a Killer Tune.

While battling an outbreak of a strange infection and an even stranger ant farm, Jessica develops a crush on the new lead singer of local band Side Effects May Vary: her fellow Nightshade High student Dominic Gray. But Dominic seems to have a split personality when it comes to Jessica; sometimes he seems into her, and sometimes he's all over Selena Silvertongue. What's up with Dominic? Will Jessica survive the danger - and Flo's virago workouts - long enough to find out?

Dead Is a Killer Tune is due out September 4, 2012.

When I read Beauty Queens by Libba Bray, the Maroon 5 song "She Will Be Loved" ("Beauty queen of only 18...") kept getting stuck in my head. I couldn't read this book without repeatedly singing "Love is a Battlefied" by Pat Benatar.



Fortunately, I like this song. It reminds me of when I was a little girl in the '80s. In She's a Rebel, Gillian G. Gaar wrote, "Female performers rarely experienced the attacks that groups like N.W.A., 2 Live Crew, or Judas Priest did, though their work was scrutinized by organizations like the PMRC, who, in analyzing sexism on MTV, gave Pat Benatar's 'Love Is a Battlefield' video a negative rating, citing: 'one performer fights with her ornery parents then leaves home to become a hooker.'"

I purchased Dead Is a Battlefield at my brick-and-mortar Barnes and Noble and was not compensated for this review in any way.

My Besties - Favorite Books of 2011, That Is

Looking over the books I read this year, I was surprised by how much YA I read and how little paranormal romance. In part, I blame Amazon Vine - I keep choosing YA books as my twice-monthly free items. My TBR pile going into 2012 has several PNR paperbacks, but I'm in no particular hurry to get to them. I do feel that if I give the genre a bit of a rest, I'll only appreciate it more when I do get back to it.

Not all of these were published in 2011, but this is the year I read them. Here they are in alphabetical order.

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray. The whole thing is a delicious send-up of pop culture and sexism. My favorite character is Adina, Miss New Hampshire, a journalist embedded in the pageant. She's a smart, Jewish feminist - sort of a teenage Emma Goldman. I also like lesbian, comic-book-loving Miss Michigan (Jennifer), the transgendered contestant (I won't give it away) and Indian-Californian Valley Girl DJ-wannabe Miss California (Shanti).

Dead Reckoning by Charlaine Harris. This is the 11th Sookie Stackhouse book. (Only 2 more to go - .) Loved it! Whether or not Eric actually ends up mated to the vampire queen of Oklahoma, Sookie's turning away from him. Bill's vampire "sister" is out of the picture once again...dare I hope Bill and Sookie will get back together in the series' last two volumes? I'm glad Sandra Pelt is finally out of the way, and I thoroughly enjoyed the Alcide scene (though I'm not sure how Sookie was able to resist the temptation!). If I were Sookie, I think I'd use the cluviel dor to wish Bill hadn't been sent by Sophie Anne, or at least that he hadn't lied about it.

The next book is going to be called Deadlocked.

Dream Lover, edited by Kristina Wright. A collection of diverse, elegantly erotic tales of paranormal romance. Given my personal preference for wolf tales, it may come as no surprise my personal favorite in this collection is Alana Noel Voth's "Moongirl Meets the Wolf Man." Full review here.

Family by Michael Ostow. The young protagonist of this unusual novel-in-verse, Mel, is one of those tragic young adult characters, the likes of which inspired Meghan Cox Gurdon to write her controversial Wall Street Journal essay "Darkness Too Visible." Yet it ends on a hopeful note. Full review here.

Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones. A charming and delightful story, a witches' love story appropriate for all ages. I saw the anime version first (yes, with Christian Bale as the voice of Howl). The plots aren't exactly the same, but they both involve a good deal of green slime, and both are utterly charming. I recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good fairy tale.

Isis by Douglas Clegg. The most beautiful part of this eerie tale is Clegg's description of what the Cornish call the Isle of Apples (Avalon), the land of the dead. But just as J.K. Rowling warned in "The Deathly Hallows" in The Tales of Beedle the Bard, those brought from the land of the dead do not belong in this world. Iris should have listened to the old legends.

Juliet Immortal by Stacey Jay. O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou some guy named Dylan? It's because in this immensely imaginative novel, Stacey Jay manages to turn everything we think we know about the world's most famous pair of impulsive teenage lovers on its head. At the risk of sounding like a young adult instead of an adult reviewer reading a YA book, OMG, this novel is SO good! Come to think of it, it's both YA and PNR.

Steamlust: Steampunk Erotic Romance, edited by Kristina Wright. There's a good reason why I keep reviewing Cleis Press titles - the publisher consistently puts out high-quality anthologies. I believe the key to good steampunk is the same as the key to good erotic romance: the beauty is all in the details. Fortunately, Wright's editing instincts do not fail her, and Steamlust is full of glorious details. Full review here.

The Inquisitor's Apprentice by Chris Moriarty. It's sort of like The Prestige mixed with Harry Potter mixed with the Disney musical Newsies, but with more Jewish characters. Its protagonist is 13-year-old Sacha Kessler, who lives in the tenements, circa 1900. Magic is technically illegal in America, but still widely practiced, and one day Sacha learns he can see magic. This rare talent leads to his new job as an inquisitor's apprentice.

The Sacred Book of the Werewolf by Victor Pelevin. A Hu-Li is a werefox, but she's so much more than that. She's 2,000 years old, one of a sisterhood of werefoxes from ancient China. These foxes are a kind of energy vampires, using prostitution as a cover to feed off the sexual energy of men. Through a kind of hallucinogenic effect they produce with their fox-tails, A Hu-Li and her sisters never actually have to touch these men. A Hu-Li is, in fact, a 2,000-year-old virgin. For the first time in her extremely long life, A Hu-Li is faced with the prospect of falling in love.

What I'm reading going into 2012: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I read a few of these short stories in grade school, but not at all since then. I'm enjoying them.

The Best Parts of Breaking Dawn (Pt. 1)

I saw The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Pt. 1 earlier today. Be prepared for spoilers if you haven't read the book/seen the movie yet.

Everyone seems to either love this series or hate it, but I love it. I wasn't so into the first third of Stephenie Meyer's first novel, but by the end I was Team Edward, and I devoured the last three books in huge chunks. I think I read Bree Tanner the first week it was out. I've been waiting to see the fourth movie brought to the big screen since - forever, it seems.

My verdict is this: see it twice. See it once to enjoy the story and then once again just to take in the visuals. Director Bill Condon has made a lovely spectacle of Meyer's fourth novel - and how could he not? What could be more visually striking than a vampire wedding, glamorous with sinister undertones?

Bella's dress is gorgeous, with a criss-cross pattern in the front and an impossibly delicate gauzy fabric holding the pearl buttons in place in the back. Equally well-done was Bella's eye makeup, a blend of smoky colors. I'd award it Second Best Eye Makeup in a Vampire Series, because frankly I still can't get over how True Blood's makeup artist does Jessica's eyes. I love Kristen Stewart's chestnut Bella hair color, but you have to admit, Deborah Ann Woll's "Jessica red" is very striking.

The best hair of Breaking Dawn Part 1 belongs to Taylor Lautner as Jacob and Julia Jones as Leah. Their characters go through a lot of emotional pain and suffering in this installment, but it never dulls the luster of their thick, perfectly straight, blue-black hair. They must have either an indigenous beauty secret or a werewolf one.

P.S. Taylor Lautner, I predict, will play Tane in the movie version of Beauty Queens.

The eyes have Bella, but the best-looking lips (other than Robert Pattinson's, of course) in the wedding scene belong to Bella's Forks High classmate Angela, played by Christian Serratos.

Sarah Clarke, as Esme, deserves an award for her mother-of-the-groom dress. The combination of platinum sequins and plum accents neither washed out her pale skin nor made her look too matronly.
It makes sense: literary Esmes are well-known for their fashion sense. Consider only Esme Squalor of A Series of Unfortunate Events, with her stiletto heels that were, literally, stilettos.

The Most Reformed Character award surely goes to Rosalie, as played by Nikki Reed. Rosalie pissed me off in New Moon. Yet, as soon as I saw her ferocity in guarding pregnant Bella, she won me over. What an ode to sisterhood! Rosalie is like a feminist vampire super-shero, avenging sexual assaults and standing up to fight for Bella's reproductive freedom.

That should totally be a spin-off comic book series. Somebody run that idea by Stephenie Meyer, please. Said comic book should contain lots of gratuitous shirtless Emmett. (Why not? Boys always put girls with giant boobs in their comic books.)

Images:
Deborah Ann Woll: Thomas Attila Lewis, Creative Commons
Christian Serratos: © Glenn Francis, www.PacificProDigital.com
Nikki Reed by David Shankbone, Creative Commons
Femme Fatale: http://cococorsola.tumblr.com/post/6573247130/made-this-for-another-blog-but-posting-it-here

Beauty Queens of Only 18 and Misery

I said that after I finished Justin Cronin's epic post-apocalyptic vampire novel The Passage, my brain would need a break from lengthy dark fiction. It's huge - and only the first third of a trilogy! Cronin, I think, intends to be to scary vampires what James Fenimore Cooper was to American Indians.

I said that my next book would be the more lighthearted Beauty Queens by YA author Libba Bray. Not entirely lighthearted - it does begin with the plane crash that strands the survivors, all contestants in a teen beauty contest, on a tropical island. But there is plenty of lip gloss and stilettos and snark.

About a third of the way in, I love this book. My favorite character may be Adina, Miss New Hampshire, a journalist embedded in the pageant. She's a smart, Jewish feminist - sort of a teenage Emma Goldman. I also like lesbian, comic-book-loving Miss Michigan (Jennifer) and Indian-American Miss California (Shanti). The whole thing is a delicious send-up of pop culture and sexism. The young characters are learning that their bodies are instruments as well as ornaments.

Sometimes when I see the cover sitting on the table, I think of the Maroon 5 song, "She Will Be Loved." Its lyrics begin with, "Beauty queen of only 18..."

Between the link I shared (previous post) about Adam Levine's superhero underpants and snatches of that song stuck in my brain, it's no wonder I had a sex dream about Levine last night. (Plus I dream about Adam Levine a lot, far more than I dream about Christian Bale. It's just like that Maroon 5 song "Can't Stop." I half suspect Levine is my Jungian animus.) Fair warning: I dream dirty:

I (my teenage self, about the same age as the characters in Beauty Queens) was in a sort of hotel that doubled as a 24-hour movie theatre, on a road trip with my Aunt Susan. In the morning, Susan told me to get ready to leave, so I went into the bathroom, and Adam came in after me. Soon we were dry humping - like Justin Timberlake and Cameron Diaz in Bad Teacher, only face-to-face. I was pleasantly surprised to find out his dick (through his black jeans) felt much, much bigger and fatter than I would have imagined. I told him that when I was home from this road trip (out from under the watchful eye of Aunt Susan, that is), we would have actual sex.

It's not actual sex, but the common consensus on YouTube is that the Maroon 5 video "Misery" is masochist porn.



Some of what the skinny blonde girl (she's Anne Vyalitsyna) does might be acceptable in the context of an S/M relationship. Some of it is just plain mean. I have sorted some of her acts into the categories of Go and No Go. I couldn't decide on one of them.

Go:

-Shoving him up against a chain-link fence

-Lip-biting

-Twisting his arm behind his back

-Ear-biting


Borderline:

-The knife play


No Go:

-Head-butt

-Kick in the face

-Pushing him through a plate-glass window

-Throwing him off the roof

-The shoulder-fired grenade and the Molotov cocktail. I know Israelis use "to take up arms" as slang for sex, but in actual practice, firearms are not sexy. Blades are a little more so.

But that's just my personal comfort level. If you and your partner are comfortable with head-butts and face-kicks, I'm not judging you.

I'm being somewhat facetious, of course. Remember what I said in "How to Play a LoveGame in 5 Gaga Steps:"

"You’ve flirted with the BDSM look; now you might choose to kick the kink up a notch. You could try leather restraints, leashes, a body harness, a straightjacket, or another type of full-body restraint...If you’d like to try restraint play for the first time (or the first time with a new partner), use common-sense safety and comfort measures. Establish some boundaries and agree on a safe word that stops all play, no questions asked. Keep an eye on the person who’s restrained, and never cover up both the nose and mouth, especially when using a gag. Play delicately around the joints, face, neck, and other body parts that can easily be injured, and realize that holding one position for a long time can cause fatigue and discomfort."

Hmm, that gives me an idea. Maybe I should write "How to Play a LoveGame in Maroon 5 Steps."