Angieville

Retro Friday  is a weekly meme hosted here at Angieville and focuses on reviewing books from the past. This can be an old favorite, an under-the-radar book you think deserves more attention, something woefully out of print, etc. Everyone is welcome to join in at any time! I include roundups from participating bloggers in my post every week. I had never read anything by Lynn Kurland prior to picking up Star of the Morning . I had never even heard of her before, due to the fact that she writes primarily historical romance and I just rarely find myself reading in that genre. But my eye caught on the cover as I walked through the romance aisle at Borders to get to the fantasy/scifi section. And something made me pause. It's always that dangerous pause that gets you, isn't it? If the book can just get a toehold on my attention, I'm so often a goner. I reach out, picked it up, and read the back and wondered. It's a fairly dreamy, idealized cover and not exactly my favorite. ...

I had forgotten how into the first book in the Nine Kingdoms series I was until I got five pages into this second volume and instantly remembered. Oh, right. This story totally rocks. The first volume, Star of the Morning , ends in utter chaos. Nothing is resolved, everyone's in peril, and I remember closing the book in disbelief at the audacity of ending a book in such a way when the sequel would not be out for another year. I wasn't too upset, of course, because the book had been so dang enjoyable. I even wrote an email to Ms. Kurland asking if she had sat back and basked in evil glee after typing the last word. She responded and commiserated with me. She, too, was in utter despair after ending it that way and had to spend some good time recuperating before she could continue. That made me feel somewhat better. Fortunately, The Mage's Daughter picks up right where its predecessor left off. The chapters alternate between Morgan of Melksham's story as she struggles to...

Best reads of the past month: Eva Underground by Dandi Daley Mackall Until I read this book, I knew next to nothing about the modern-day Communist occupation of Poland. Mackall's book takes place the year I was born and it follows a young woman named Eva who leaves her home and friends in Chicago to follow her father to Poland where he joins the underground movement. Sharing a tiny room with her father in a house full of rebels, Eva learns that sometimes life takes you by the throat and hurls you bodily into the middle of a war zone. She learns there are things in that war zone worth fighting for, that her life can be bigger than it was, that the seed of a plum can hold the spirit of a nation. A wonderful read about a harrowing and fascinating period in history. Star of the Morning by Lynn Kurland I came across Kurland in a collection of short stories including a favorite of mine--Sharon Shinn. Up till now, she's written mostly romance novels ( not my cup of tea) so I approac...