The Unread Authors Blog

Welcome to the Unread Authors Blog, a group blog designed for participants in the Unread Authors Challenge to post their reviews and thoughts, and for anyone to read and comment on them!

The challenge asks its participants to read at least six books in six months (September 2007 to February 2008) by authors whose work they have never previously read. New members are welcome at any time.

For the full rules and guidelines, go here; to join the challenge, follow the directions in the "rules" post.

For an updated list of participants in the challenge, with links to their blogs, click here.

A few guidelines for using the blog:

• Participation in the blog is NOT REQUIRED from challenge participants. If you have a review or thoughts about the books you are reading for the challenge, feel free to post them here, or cross-post them from your other blog. Polling indicated that the majority of participants would like a challenge blog, but if you would just like to lurk, read, and leave comments, that is MORE than fine.
• To become a co-author of this blog (and gain the ability to post), leave a comment below this post that contains your name, blog, and email address (to avoid acquiring spammer friends, I suggest writing out the punctuation marks. Example: myemailaddress AT gmail DOT com.). You should receive an email soon inviting you to join the blog.
• Please label all your posts with your name and any other relevant labels (for instance, your challenge "To do" lists should be labeled "lists"). Reviews should always be labeled by the name of the unread author, as well as your own.

I look forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on their authors, many of whom are as new to me as they are to you!

Alentejo Blue - Wendy's Review

She wore her black slingbacks and a white cotton dress with blue flowers that matched the paint that framed the door. Alentejo blue. here she was, in a picture, in a moment, setting out for the rest of her life. -From Alentejo Blue, page 131-

Monica Ali's novella - Alentejo Blue - is a collection of moments lived by its vast array of characters. The Alentejo region of Portugal -located in south-central Portugal and known for its tiny, medieval villages - is the perfect setting for Ali's book, which seems to be a collection of interconnected, short stories. Ali is adept at exploring her characters' inner lives. The reader is gradually introduced to the inhabitants of the fictional town of Mamarrosa: Joao, an old timer who has seen the days of Communism and remembers the revolution of the peasants; Vasco, the baker whose obesity and compulsion with eating hides his painful losses; Teresa, a young woman who longs to break away from the village of her birth; Sophie and Huw, an engaged couple whose holiday to Portugal uncovers the deeper issues of their relationship; Elaine, a middle-aged English woman seeking meaning in her tired marriage; Stanton, the alcoholic writer living a shallow existence; and the Potts family, living a dysfunctional existence far from their home in England. As the novella unwinds, the reader glimpses the connections between characters and the main themes evolve.

There is a theme of "old" world vs. "new" - highlighted by the elderly, traditional members of the village vs. the youth and tourists. Change is in the air, but it is unclear whether it will be for the best, or will simply disrupt the flow of village life.

So we stay as we are and watch the shadows lengthen and smell the evening loaves being baked and fell the sun slipping low, blushing over our necks like the first taste of wine. -From Alentejo Blue, page 94-

Ali's lyrical prose transports the reader into the countryside of Portugal.

The plains spread out on either side. Here and there a cork oak stood grieving. The land rose and fell in modest dimensions. Now and again a gleam of machinery, glittering drops of water on an acacia, a giant eucalyptus shedding its splintery scrolls. Field upon field upon field, wheat and grass and fallow, on and on and on, and in this flat composition there was a depth, both sadness and tremulous joy. -From Alentejo Blue, page 163-

This novel was listed as a 2006 New York Times Most Notable book - and I think it is deserving of that honor. Ali is a gifted writer with great understanding and sensitivity to her characters - picking up Alentejo Blue was like relaxing into small town life, chatting with the neighbors and observing the ebb and flow of the days beneath a Portugal sun. I will be reading more of Ali's novels in the future.

Highly recommended; rated 4.5/5

Wendy's Challenge List and Wrap Up Post

I completed this challenge today! I read five (5) books from my original list and one (1) book from my alternates list.

I enjoyed all the new authors I read, rating 4 of the 6 a high 4.5/5 (highly recommended), and 2 of the 6 a 4/5 rating (recommended).

My favorite part of the challenge was adding to my "new to me" author list. For a long time I was stuck in a rut of only reading those authors I was familiar with...in 2007, I decided to branch out and try to read more new authors. This has really expanded my reading, and added to my favorite authors to choose from.

I would definitely participate in this challenge were it to be offered again. Thank you Ariel for hosting a fabulous reading challenge!!

******************************************************

I'm very excited to participate in this challenge. All six books I chose are already on my TBR pile...this is the perfect excuse to knock a few book off the mountainous heap of literature spread out across my bedroom!

My six challenge books are:

1. Alentejo Blue, by Monica Ali (finished February 22, 2008; read my review)
2. The Blackwater Lightship, by Colm Toibin (finished November 9, 2007; read my review)
3. Doctor Zhivago, by Boris Pasternak (finished November 24, 2007; read my review)
4. What the Dead Know, by Laura Lippman
5. The Good Earth, by Pearl Buck (finished November 28, 2007; read my review)
6. The Night Watch, by Sarah Waters (finished February 12, 2008; read my review)

Alternates and Extras:

Stones From the River, by Ursela Hegi
A Woman in Jeruselum, by AB Yehoshua
The Lizard Cage, by Karen Connelly
All Aunt Hager's Children, by Edward P. Jones
The Emperor's Child, by Claire Messud (finished December 12, 2007; read my review)
A Bend in the River, by V.S. Naipal

STRIPPED - Brian Freeman

http://iyamvixenbooks.blogspot.com/2008/02/stripped-brian-freeman.html

The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley

After nearly three weeks of reading, I have finished the 876 page epic tale that is “The Mists of Avalon” by Marion Zimmer Bradley. While it was not one of my original selections, it does qualify as my 6th and final selection in Sycoraxpine’s “Unread Author” challenge.

(you can read my entire review, here)

Thanks so much for hosting this challenge; I'm very much looking forward to the next round, later in the year.

THE NYMPHOS OF ROCKY FLATS - Mario Acevedo

http://iyamvixenbooks.blogspot.com/2008/02/nymphos-of-rocky-flats-mario-acevedo.html

Done!

I finished A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray the other day, and, being far too lazy to post here, am just going to link you.

That, of course, means I have completed the challenge! ^^ Yay! I had soooo much fun, we really should do it again.

~Nicole

My Final Author was Philippa Gregory

Philippa Gregory wasn't on my original unread authors list for this challenge, but she is a new-to-me author, and I just finished reading her historical novel The Other Boleyn Girl. I've reviewed it here, and I expect I'll be reading more of Gregory's books.

This is my sixth - and final - book for this challenge. I'll link to a wrap-up post on my book blog shortly. I look forward to participating in another round later this year. Thanks, Pour of Tor!

HOUNDING THE MOON - P R Frost

http://iyamvixenbooks.blogspot.com/2008/02/hounding-moon-p-r-frost.html

Marked

[Original Post on WORD for Teens]
Marked
By P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast

Thanks to She Who Loves Books for lending me another vampire novel!

Zoey Redbird lives the normal teenage life - her two biggest worries are the huge geometry test tomorrow and her crazy ex-boyfriend who's intent on winning her back. Oh, of course there's the minor factor of the fact that vampyres run the city and a person could be Marked as a vampyre-to-be any second now, but that's not for Zoey to worry about. She couldn't possibly get Marked, right? Right?

Um, wrong. Very wrong.

Not only is Zoey Marked to be a vampyre, but she has been chosen by the goddess Nyx to be her eyes-and-ears in the world. Once she arrives at the House of Night - the school that teaches you how to be a vampyre, properly - she finds out that things aren't just 'Turn into a vampyre and drink blood'. Some people survive the Change into a vampyre, and some don't. Oh, don't forget that the beautiful Aphrodite, leader of the Dark Daughters, has it out for her because her Aphrodite's ex-boyfriend has a crush on Zoey...

I liked this book from page one. It was different - even the way the spelled vampyres was different. Around chapter two, I was going What does this have to do with anything? but everything was pulled together later on in the book. The characters had their flaws, but some, like Aphrodite, seemed to be entirely made of flaws and was missing a benefit to their character, which is really annoying. Characters with only flaws are just as annoying as perfect characters.

Grade: A-

The Night Watch - Wendy's Review

'I go to the cinema,' said Kay; 'there's nothing funny about that. Sometimes I sit through the films twice over. Sometimes I go in half-way through, and watch the second half first. I almost prefer them that way - people's pasts, you know, being so much more interesting than their futures.' -From The Night Watch, page 110-

In The Night Watch, Sarah Waters has created tension and mystery by peering backwards into the past - beginning in 1947 and regressing back in time so that the end of the novel is actually the beginning of the story. This structure is at once unsettling and fascinating.

The novel spins around four Londoners and their significant others and explores the impact of war on relationships. The reader is introduced to each character - Kay, Helen, Viv and Viv's brother, Duncan - immediately following WWII in the year 1947. Each character carries secrets and is struggling with events in their history which are undisclosed to the reader. As the novel progresses, Waters carefully unwraps the past, drawing the threads of the characters' lives together to create a stunning expose about sexuality and the tenuous nature of love amid the historical significance of war.

One of the aspects of the novel which touched me was the exploration of the repercussions of war on youth.

How long did they have to go on, letting the war spoil everything? They had been patient, all this time. They'd lived in darkness. They'd lived without salt, without scent. They'd fed themselves little scraps of pleasure, like parings of cheese. Now she became aware of the minutes as they passed: she felt them, suddenly, for what they were, as fragments of her life, her youth, that were rushing away like so many drops of water, never to return. -From The Night Watch, page 357-

Waters' prose - nuanced and full of empathy for her characters - is a bit like reading a narrative poem. Her descriptions set the reader into the novel, revealing the beauty of the human spirit amid the horror of night-time air raids and causalities. The story is a beautifully rendered, character driven look at World War II from 1941 to 1947.

The Night Watch was shortlisted for the Booker and Orange Prizes - and it is easy to see why. This was my first Sarah Waters novel, but it will not be my last.

Highly recommended; rated 4.5/5.

The Bookseller of Kabul Offers Unflinching Look At Afghanistan (A Review & A Giveaway!)

(Image from Barnes & Noble)

There are some countries I am content to "see" only through books and movies. Afghanistan is one of them. Often books about a country make me want to visit, but The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad had the exact opposite effect. Although the culture she describes is fascinating, I prefer to learn about it from the comfort and safety of my living room couch.

Seierstad is a Norwegian journalist who entered Kabul in 2001. She had been in Aghanistan for six grueling weeks, following Northern Alliance commandos through mountians, desert and steppes as they moved against the Taliban. After the grimy adventure, she happened upon an oasis in the country's capital city - a bookshop where she found it "refreshing to leaf through books and talk about literature and history" (ix). Although the books were interesting, she found their owner, Sultan Khan, to be an engaging storyteller, a veritable "history book on two feet" (x). Seierstad made him a proposal: If he allowed her to live with his family temporarily, she would write a book about him. He agreed. Thus, began her 3-month visit with a family she describes as typical in some ways, not in others.


As Seierstad began her stay, she observed the pecking order in the Khan Family: Sultan ruled his multi-generational family (his household included his mother, his sister, 2 wives, and his own children) with an iron fist. His sons did not attend school, but worked in their father's bookshops, despite their own dreams. Women had even less choice - they remained home, cooking, cleaning and waiting on the men. Sultan's word was law. No one dared oppose him. The man, himself, was an enigma. He had risked his life to save books from destruction by Kabul's religious fanatics, and considered himself open-minded on the subjects of education and women's rights. Yet, he denied his own children opportunities to learn and made sure all of his women were kept in their proper places.


The book shifts its focus constantly, highlighting different members of the family, who in turn represent various sections of Afghanistan society. Trying to sort out the names and relationships of all the individuals will make your head spin, which must echo the reality of living with a dozen or more people in a cramped city apartment. There is Rasul, Sultan's eldest son, who resents having to work for his demanding father. He takes his anger out on his aunt, Leila, who is only 3 years older than him, but the lowest creature on the Khan Family food chain. Then there is Mansur, also crushed under the thumb of his father. He desires only to get an education and see the world, but his future has already been carved for him. Leila's is the most tragic situation - as Sultan's younger sister, she is the family's slave, working tirelessly for the men who torment her. When a young suitor sends her love notes, she becomes excited, but terrified. If Sultan finds the notes, she will be beaten as contact between unrelated men and women is strictly forbidden. Her marriage will be treated as a business deal between the men of her family and her fiance's - she has no say in the matter. As these decisions are made, she feels "how life, her youth, hope leave her - she is unable to save herself. She feels her heart, heavy and lonely like a stone, condemned to be crushed forever" (282).


Through the various members of the family, we are given an intimate and troubling portrait of Afghanistan. The country emerges as a weary land, sagging under the plague of endless war and greedy leaders. With the possible exception of Sultan, all members of the Khan Family appear deeply unhappy with their lots in life. Afghan men, especially, are portrayed as cruel hypocrites - men like Sultan welcome progress on one hand while holding their wives' and daughters' heads under the water with the other. To me, and I think to Seierstad, this dichotomy is one of the most intriguing and odious things about Afghan culture.


I found this book to be many things - fascinating, compelling, disturbing, heart-wrenching, depressing - but it offers an unparalleled look inside a society that is notoriously closed to outsiders. Like all glimpses into other cultures, the book helped broaden my world view, and like any trip abroad, it made me realize once again how blessed I am to live in The United States of America. For this, if for nothing else, it is worth the read.


Grade: B


**Don't forget - I'm giving away my copy of this book. All you have to do is leave a comment on this post and I will enter you into the drawing. I will draw a name on February 25, so entries need to be in by midnight on the 24th. Good luck! Only comments on Bloggin' 'Bout Books (not Unread Authors challenge blog) will be considered.

Glass Houses

[Originally Posted on WORD for Teens]
Glass Houses (The Morganville Vampires - Book 1)
By Rachel Caine

She Who Loves Books lent me this novel as well. I believe she has a vampire fetish... it's just my guess, though, seeing as she also lent me Marked and Vampire Academy. But hey, it's just a guess!

Glass Houses is - you guessed it - a tale about the Morganville vampires. Morganville, Texas - a place in the middle of nowhere where the worst thing you have to worry about is Monica, the school pretty-girl and bully. Or so super smart, advance placement sixteen-year-old Claire Danvers believes.

After an attempt on her life by Monica, Claire flees the college dorms and searches out a new home. The Gone with the Wind meets 'Munsters' home isn't exactly what you would call the friendliest looking place, and the people that live their are even weirder.

Eve, the Goth girl, is the first one to invite Claire into the house - and the first one to warn her about the vampires. Shane is the lazy, handsome boy of the house, and Micheal has a tendency to vanish into mist when the sun comes up. (Literally.)

So when the vampires begin hunting out Claire, it's this assortment of odd friends that have her back. But will they remain long enough to keep her alive?

I did enjoy this book immensely. Some of the characters were a bit two-dimensional, without much emphasis or thought, but she hit it right on the dot with Monica and her gang. Claire reminded me a bit of Bella from Twilight without the 'I love a vampire' bit. All in all, it was a good book, full of action and just a tad of romance, but the characters could have been a bit more fleshed out. And, besides, she left the book in a cliffhanger - and that's just not nice!

Rating: B+

Glass Houses

[Originally Posted on WORD for Teens]
Glass Houses (The Morganville Vampires - Book 1)
By Rachel Caine

She Who Loves Books lent me this novel as well. I believe she has a vampire fetish... it's just my guess, though, seeing as she also lent me Marked and Vampire Academy. But hey, it's just a guess!

Glass Houses is - you guessed it - a tale about the Morganville vampires. Morganville, Texas - a place in the middle of nowhere where the worst thing you have to worry about is Monica, the school pretty-girl and bully. Or so super smart, advance placement sixteen-year-old Claire Danvers believes.

After an attempt on her life by Monica, Claire flees the college dorms and searches out a new home. The Gone with the Wind meets 'Munsters' home isn't exactly what you would call the friendliest looking place, and the people that live their are even weirder.

Eve, the Goth girl, is the first one to invite Claire into the house - and the first one to warn her about the vampires. Shane is the lazy, handsome boy of the house, and Micheal has a tendency to vanish into mist when the sun comes up. (Literally.)

So when the vampires begin hunting out Claire, it's this assortment of odd friends that have her back. But will they remain long enough to keep her alive?

I did enjoy this book immensely. Some of the characters were a bit two-dimensional, without much emphasis or thought, but she hit it right on the dot with Monica and her gang. Claire reminded me a bit of Bella from Twilight without the 'I love a vampire' bit. All in all, it was a good book, full of action and just a tad of romance, but the characters could have been a bit more fleshed out. And, besides, she left the book in a cliffhanger - and that's just not nice!

Rating: B+

Glass Houses

[Originally Posted on WORD for Teens]
Glass Houses (The Morganville Vampires - Book 1)
By Rachel Caine

She Who Loves Books lent me this novel as well. I believe she has a vampire fetish... it's just my guess, though, seeing as she also lent me Marked and Vampire Academy. But hey, it's just a guess!

Glass Houses is - you guessed it - a tale about the Morganville vampires. Morganville, Texas - a place in the middle of nowhere where the worst thing you have to worry about is Monica, the school pretty-girl and bully. Or so super smart, advance placement sixteen-year-old Claire Danvers believes.

After an attempt on her life by Monica, Claire flees the college dorms and searches out a new home. The Gone with the Wind meets 'Munsters' home isn't exactly what you would call the friendliest looking place, and the people that live their are even weirder.

Eve, the Goth girl, is the first one to invite Claire into the house - and the first one to warn her about the vampires. Shane is the lazy, handsome boy of the house, and Micheal has a tendency to vanish into mist when the sun comes up. (Literally.)

So when the vampires begin hunting out Claire, it's this assortment of odd friends that have her back. But will they remain long enough to keep her alive?

I did enjoy this book immensely. Some of the characters were a bit two-dimensional, without much emphasis or thought, but she hit it right on the dot with Monica and her gang. Claire reminded me a bit of Bella from Twilight without the 'I love a vampire' bit. All in all, it was a good book, full of action and just a tad of romance, but the characters could have been a bit more fleshed out. And, besides, she left the book in a cliffhanger - and that's just not nice!

Rating: B+

CITY OF MASKS - Daniel Hecht

http://iyamvixenbooks.blogspot.com/2008/02/city-of-masks-daniel-hecht.html

Superb ghost story!!

To Catch a Pirate

[Original Post on WORD for Teens]
To Catch a Pirate
By Jade Parker

She Who Loves Books lent me To Catch a Pirate a few days ago and, I must say, she has great taste in the topics of books. Vampires and pirates. Nice combination, if I do say so myself.

To Catch a Pirate follows the tale of Annalisa Townsend. The young girl is traveling with her father with treasure given to her father by the king himself for the use of building a palace or something on an island when the pirates attack. Sent to the ship's hold to hide, Anna is discovered by the pirate's right hand man, James Sterling. Anna is told to be silent and, when James reaches for her necklace - the only thing she has left of her mother- she speaks, telling him to take anything but the necklace.

He steals a kiss instead.

Years pass, and Anna is hunting down James Sterling and the captain of his ship, for she needs the treasure that he and his mates stole to prove that her father is not a traitor. She does catch him, and almost everything goes as planned.

Except for the little itty bitty 'I've fallen in love with the pirate' bit. Of course, it's only after this that her plans disintegrate into little pieces.

You can't not love this book - it's about pirates, for pete's sake! Everybody loves pirates. It had a pretty good plot line, but the characters were a bit weak, and I couldn't picture everything as well as I normally can.

Rating: B++

Angus, Thongs, and Full Frontal Snogging

[Original Post on WORD for Teens]
Angus, Thongs, and Full Frontal Snogging: Confessions of Georgia Nicolson
By Louise Rennison

Do you know how hard it is to read a book and try not to laugh in the dead silence of a classroom?

Well, it's hard. Very hard.

Angus, Thongs, and Full Frontal Snogging: Confessions of Georgia Nicolson is one of the funniest stories I've ever read. Georgia's 'diary', so to speak, starts off with the telling of how what was supposed to be a fun costume party turned into a nightmare. Honestly, it might have been her idea to go dressed as an olive, but her best friend didn't do anything to discourage her.

The further the story progresses, the harder it is not to laugh. Georgia has a mad cat named Angus who has the tendency to attack the neighbor's poodle, a little sister who's favorite bathroom is the corner of Georgia's room, and the guy of her dreams works in a grocery - and he is, as Georgia so aptly puts it, is a 'Sex God.'

Georgia's escapades with levitation and finding out that her school janitor poses for dirty magazines has to be some of the best material I've ever read. It's well written, the characters are loveable, and it was soooo hard not to laugh out loud.

Grade: A+

Neotopia: The Enlightened Age

[Original Post on WORD for Teens]

Neotopia: The Enlightened Age
By Rod Espinosa

Normally I don't read manga books, or anime stories, or graphic novels, or whatever you want to call them. They just aren't my thing.

But, since the YA Literary Challenge says we have to have a graphic novel, well, I just had to read a graphic novel!

Neotopia: The Enlightened Age follows the story of Nalyn, who is pretending to be the Grand Dutchess of Mathenia. Ki-Ek, Nalyn's dolphin friend, and Nimn, a faerie, are the only two beings who know who she truly is. The story starts off with Nalyn running into Philios, who is flying around in a jet-pack. After having the jet pack destroyed, something happens - it is alerted to them that another country is attacking.

I mean, the book was alright. The plot line was okay, but not very original, and the characters were likable. I found it a bit boring and had to struggle to get through it.

Grade: C

~Nicole

Welcome... to me!

Warning: Insanity has arrived.

'ello! I DOTH HATH ARRIVED! Or... something like that...

'tis Nicole from WORD for Teens. Just wanted to alert everybody that I am, indeed, alive, kicking, insane, and ready to participate!

Yeah...

~Nicole

Apologies and a question

Hi, everyone! I hope that you have been enjoying the challenge. It certainly looks like everyone has been reading some amazing books; I am filled with admiration.

I wanted to write and apologize for my unwilling absence from the challenge; I can only say by way of excuse that I have been caught up in the horrors of dissertation-finishing and job-getting (in addition to my normal work of teaching) since September and have been desperately missing my blog life. Hopefully the mad frenzy of activity will be over soon.

So here is what I need to ask: I still have a lot of unread authors to read, and I am overwhelmed by sadness at being kept (boo to work!) from participating in this challenge as I would have like to, so I was thinking of making this a regular (or at least periodic) challenge. Would anyone be interested in joining me if I held another round of unread-author-reading from, say, July to December of this year? Let me know what you think.

Laura's Challenge Wrap-up

Thanks to Ariel at for sponsoring the Unread Authors Challenge! For this challenge -- the first one I've completed in 2008 -- I read 7 books by new-to-me authors:

1. The Yacoubian Building, by Alaa Al-Aswany (completed 9/19/2007 - review)
2. Ex Libris: Confessions of a Common Reader, by Ann Fadiman (completed 9/19/2007 - review)
3. When the Emperor was Divine, by Julie Otsuka (completed 10/12/2007 - review)
4. Wide Sargasso Sea, by Jean Rhys (completed 11/16/2007 - review)
5. The Art of Mending, by Elizabeth Berg (completed 12/14/2007 - review)
6. Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe (completed 1/17/2008 - review)
7. The Secret River, by Kate Grenville (completed 2/3/2008 - review)

Favorite book: Oh, this is a close one. I loved Ex Libris, but as a collection of essays it's really quite different from my other selections. So I will cheat and choose The Secret River as another favorite.

Least favorite book: The Art of Mending. I found this book to be a bit trite and cliche.

What I learned: I read more "unread authors" than familiar ones. When I started the challenge, I thought I might list other new authors in my challenge post. However, it quickly became apparent that I'd be listing almost every book I read. While I do read multiple works by certain authors -- Jane Austen & John Steinbeck, for example -- I usually don't read series, and I don't tend to get on a "kick" reading a certain author's entire oevre.

This was a fun challenge that helped clear out my TBR stack a bit. Thanks Ariel!

Laura's Review - The Secret River

The Secret River
Kate Grenville
334 pages


Set in Australia in the early 1800s, The Secret River is the story of William Thornhill, a London riverboat driver sent to Australia after being convicted of a crime. He is accompanied by his wife Sal, who acts as his "master" as required by law. During his twelve month sentence he finds work on a riverboat and, after serving time, buys his own boat and becomes an independent businessman running goods on the river Hawkesbury. Like many "emancipists" of that time, he also stakes his claim to a large parcel of land. The only problem is, the native people claimed it years before. The white settlers demonstrate remarkable hubris, assuming they have a right to the land and shoo-ing the startled natives away.

William embraces life as a free man, but Sal longs for home. When he buys a 100-acre parcel, he extracts a promise from Sal to stay for five years. She believes they will then return to London, but William never takes his part of the bargain seriously. Sal notes each passing day by marking a tree with a knife. "The unspoken between them was that she was a prisoner here, marking off the days in her little round of beaten earth, and it was unspoken because she did not want him to feel a jailer. She was, in a manner of speaking, protecting him from herself." (p. 150) The book's title comes from this and other unspoken secrets between the couple. As time passes, more and more goes unspoken: the size of the native camp on their land, the details of atrocities between whites and native people, the prejudiced and often violent behaviors exhibited by their neighbors. But Sal is no fool, and is well aware of the escalating tensions and the danger to her family.

Grenville keeps a low- to medium-grade tension running throughout the novel. Some of the tension comes from the very act of survival in the Australian wilderness, and the stress between William and Sal. But the primary conflict is direclty with the native people. While William demonstrates a growing awareness of the natives as human beings, as it says on the book jacket, "to keep his family safe, he must permit terrifying cruelty to come to innocent people." The book's denouement portrays the Thornhills' lives years after this "terrifying cruelty." It is somewhat disappointing, as it's unclear how he and Sal resolved their differences. But the outcome is probably quite true to that period in history. This is a memorable book, well deserving of its Commonwealth Prize and Booker Shortlist recognition. ( )

My original review can be found here.

THE DOLLMAKER -Amanda Stevens

http://iyamvixenbooks.blogspot.com/2008/02/dollmaker-amanda-stevens.html

Princess Academy by Shannon Hale

I've finished my fifth book for this challenge, finally reading one of Shannon Hale's young adult fantasy novels. Princess Academy was delightful! You can read my full review here. I will definitely be reading more of Hale's books.