When Dimple Met Rishi

When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Dimple is adamantly opposed to a traditional life and settling down. She sees romantic relationships as a threat to her plans for using her coding skills to design an app that would change people's lives by helping them manage their chronic illnesses. Rishi believes in traditions to the point of suppressing his own passion for creating comic art (graphic novels) in favor of following in his father's engineering footsteps. He's totally on board with the idea of an arranged marriage to the daughter of friends of his parents. Dimple? Not so much! Despite a less-than-auspicious first meeting, their attraction builds, and the two turn out to be a better team than either could ever imagine.

This character-driven YA romance is absolutely delightful, and the narrators make it even better! I'd been seeing this book mentioned over and over on #AskALibrarian on Twitter on Thursday mornings, and decided to see what all the fuss was about. I'm so glad I did. I loved it!

For readers' advisors: character doorway is primary. Some swearing, no violence, a tasteful fade-to-black first-time sex scene, and lots of kissing/petting. Main characters and their families are Indian-American. Another character is, I think, Hispanic? I forget exactly. The obnoxious "Aberzombies" are rich white kids.

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Rebel Mechanics

Rebel Mechanics by Shanna Swendson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It's 1888. The American Revolution never got off the ground, so the British still rule the colonies. Specifically magisters do--British nobility with magical abilities. A new revolution is brewing, however, this time fueled by young inventors called Rebel Mechanics who believe that non-magical machines are the key to overthrowing British oppression and achieving freedom.

Verity Newton's mother has died after a long illness, so Verity travels from New Haven to New York City in search of a governess position in a wealthy household. The teenager manages to land one on her first day, due in part to transportation assistance from the Rebel Mechanics, who waste no time in recruiting her as a spy for The Cause. Her position as a governess to the governor's grandchildren allows her access to intelligence from the highest ranks of society. Eye-opening experiences convince her of the importance of passing on information to the rebels even as she keeps her own secrets and discovers that not all magisters are alike.

Love love love this book!! I'm so glad the second one has just come out so I don't have to wait to dive back into this reality. I just wish the next book were available on audio already because this one was great fun to listen to. Well-written characters, a story that made me thankful for a long commute, and fantastic world-building.

For readers' advisors: story, character, and setting doorways are all strong. It's marketed as teen fiction, but it works for adults, too, especially fans of steampunk, alternative history, and urban fantasy. Since it's aimed at a YA audience, there is some kissing but no sex, bad language, or graphic violence. It would likely also appeal to fans of Patricia C Wrede's Frontier Magic series.

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Paladin

Paladin by Sally Slater
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Lady Samantha of Haywood has always been a tomboy, but after a demon kills her mother, she decides to become a Paladin--a demon-slaying warrior. There are no female paladins, however, so Sam practices in secret for two years, then runs away from home, chops off her hair, disguises herself as a boy, and invents a new heritage in order to begin her training. She is assigned both a mentor and a roommate. The first is her hero and the man who saved her life. The second is a half demon/half human whom the other students taunt and fear. After the trio save the training fortress from a demon attack--the first in its history--they are sent on a quest to learn more about a new fighting force rising in the East, the Uriel. Their orders are to capture the leader of the Uriel and bring him to meet their High Commander, but all is not as it seems, and new information shifts allegiances.

I'm so glad this is the first in a new YA fantasy series! I absolutely loved it and stayed up way past my bedtime because I couldn't put it down. Sally Slater did an outstanding job building the relationships between Sam, Tristan, and Braeden, and I can't wait to read the next book.

There were a few puzzling things here and there, such as how Sam managed to keep her sword practice truly a secret in a castle full of servants, why she thought her father didn't care about her in the slightest, and how she could hope to maintain her masquerade while traveling when her companions would know she never had to shave and did have to (presumably, unless on this world reproduction is different) deal with menstrual cycles which are never mentioned, but these were minor in comparison with the overall arc of the story.

For readers' advisors: Most YA fiction has story as the primary doorway, but this book was more about character development and world-building, although plot was also strong. There was a small amount of swearing (mostly "shite"), and a some sexual innuendo (primarily during the scene when Tristan decides Sam needs to "become a man" and drags both trainees to a brothel...which doesn't go so well). Otherwise it's a pretty "clean read." This would be an excellent read-alike for fans of Tamora Pierce, particularly her Alanna the Lioness series.

Many many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read a free Advance Reader Copy in exchange for my honest review.

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Shadow Scale

Shadow Scale by Rachel Hartman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Dragons loyal to the Comonot are battling those of the Old Ard who want to depose him and return to the days where humans were food. They claim exposure to humans taints dragons, making them impure and in need of having their memories excised. Seraphina, Queen Glisselda, and Prince Kiggins know they must gather allies to help them battle the dragons of the Old Ard in order to save the humans of Goredd, so the Queen sends Seraphina as her emissary to nearby kingdoms to persuade them to provide assistance. The journey has another purpose, however: Seraphina has read of a sort of mind-net that was once created to defend against dragons in a former time, and she resolves to seek out her fellow ityasaari (half dragons) to learn whether such a thing is possible today.

Things do not quite go as planned, of course, and Seraphina learns that another half-dragon, Jannoula, who has the ability to invade and take over the minds of other ityasaari, is searching for the same people Seraphina hopes to find. Jannoula plans to use the mind-net for her own purposes, although uncovering all the twists and turns in her devious plot will be a long, frustrating challenge for Seraphina. One by one, she watches her friends fall under the spell of Jannoula, unable to save them until she learns the secret of unlocking her own mind-fire.

There are so many things to adore about this book, but I think the saving grace for me was that it was so easy to immerse myself instantly in the world Hartman has created, no matter how little time I had to read--including sometimes just the couple of minutes it took to heat my lunch in the microwave. I had to be creative in order to carve out a few minutes (or a whole half an hour!) here and there when I could read, and with Shadow Scale, I could pick up right where I left off and be transported immediately into the world of the story. Rachel Hartman's world-building skills are outstanding.

My second favorite thing was the character development, particularly of Jannoula. You really got to see and feel sympathy for how she came to be so twisted, and you understood the guilt Seraphina felt for her inadvertent role in that. I also loved the variety of characters and relationships, including that they were so seamlessly woven into the fabric of the story.

I also appreciated that not everything was tied up with pretty little bows at the end. Don't get me wrong--I LOVE happy endings. In this case, though, it felt so much more real for some things to be left a little more open-ended. In a war, people are injured and die, and not just "the bad guys." This story takes place during wartime, with some battles occurring far from a traditional battlefield.

Many thanks to NetGalley for the free Advanced Reader's Copy of the ebook for this fantastic sequel to Seraphina!

For readers' advisors: setting, character, and story doorways are strong. Language, too, given the many words Hartman has invented. There is no sex, and if I recall correctly, any swearing uses made-up words or phrases. The violence is not at all graphic and mostly happens "off-screen." It's LGBT-friendly.

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Seraphina

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

All her life, Seraphina has had to hide the truth about herself, believing she is a monster. Still, musical talent like hers cannot remain hidden forever, so eventually she takes a risk and applies for the job of assistant music mistress to the court composer. This role brings her to the attention of the royal family, including Prince Lucian Kiggs, Captain of the Queen's Guard. Against her will, Seraphina finds herself drawn into the spotlight as she helps Kiggs uncover the truth of his uncle's murder. Her connection to her Uncle Orma, a scholarly dragon living incognito in his saarantras (human body), gives her a unique perspective, as does her connection to the other half dragon/half humans she once thought were only visions in her mental garden. Seraphina fights to protect her secrets even as she races against the clock to thwart assassination attempts on the royal family and the Ardmagar, ruler of the dragons, on the 40th anniversary of the Treaty between the Goreddi people and dragonkind.

Hartman does an outstanding job of world-building. I do wish I'd realized sooner that there is a glossary at the end of the book. The vocabulary level is quite high and includes words Hartman invented, so there were many times when I discerned the meaning of a term purely through contextual clues. Ostensibly this is a young adult (i.e. teen) fantasy novel, but adult fantasy readers should enjoy it every bit as much, if not more than teens.

I will now be impatiently awaiting the next book in the series, Dracomachia, which is scheduled to come out some time later this year (nothing more specific than "2013" so far).

For readers' advisors: setting and story doorways are primary, although character and language are not far behind. All swearing is made up (St. Masha and St. Daan!), and there is no sex or nudity, just a couple of kisses.

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