Naked Nutcracker

Soooo, I was totally gonna do this post pre-Christmas, but life has interfered so I guess it will now be a post-Christmas post to extend the holiday cheer.  The book is Winterspell by Claire Legrand and is supposed to be a take on my beloved The Nutcracker.  How did this book stack up to expectations?  Well to find out, read on, but first, as always SPOILERS AHEAD!

Clara Stole is the older daughter of the mayor of New York City and life is not going so well.  Her vibrant, brave, wonderful mother was murdered a year ago and her father has fallen into depressed grieving state.  This has given the mob/gang Concordia even more leverage over the mayor and his affairs.  Clara is left to try and manage her family affairs, and even though her strange godfather Drosselmeyer has been teaching her to fight, and equipped her with knives, Clara cannot find the courage to use this to fend off the unwanted advances of Dr. Victor, or the threats of other members of Concordia.  At Drosselmeyer's unique toyshop, Clara spends time learning fighting skills, and talking to the strange statue of a metal man in the shop.  On Christmas Eve, Clara and her beloved little sister Felicity attempt to keep their father's stock up, help host the annual party.  The party is interrupted by strange, hybrid, giant rat like creatures.  Drosselmeyer uses his strange silver blood to bring to life his clockwork toys long enough for him to partially free the statue from its curse.  Clara discovers that her mother was killed by these creatures and is thoroughly confused and angry.

 Controlling these creatures is a fairy who then proceeds to kidnap Clara's father.  In the aftermath of the chaos, some of the people of Concordia tell Clara if she does not recover her father, they will hurt Felicity.  Clara jumps with the statue-come-to-life into a magical door and arrives in the magical land of Cane.  After some more fighting and strange occurrences, Clara finds out that the metal man is really the cursed prince of Cane, who goes by the name Nicholas.  He was cursed by a human/fairy named Anise and using her mixed blood can control all the metal.  The world of Cane has become twisted and dark, constantly being built and torn down and rebuilt.  As we wander through more chaos we learn that humans had hunted the fairies because they did not understand their magic and when a human king slept with a fairy and had a half-breed baby, that baby grew up to have untold power.  To help the humans, beings called mages (the ones with the silver blood) would bond with the current rulers to help them with their magic.  Anise, not only slaughtered the royalty, but the mages as well, she then took her revenge on all the humans that hunted fairies and has turned them all into terrified second class citizens.  More stuff happens and Clara discovers that her beloved mother was actually a mage of Cane, who escaped to our world when she was sentenced to death for trying to unite fairies and humans.  This makes Clara the only other mixed blood being and gives her, her own special powers.  Nicholas wants to use her to retake his kingdom, and totally betrays her trust.  Clara hooks up with the half fairy queen Anise and finds that she is actually very lonely and wants Clara to stay with her as a companion and partner.  More stuff and things happen and Clara along with her friends save the day and the kingdom and her father.  She goes home to make things right, and then comes back to Cane to be with Nicholas.  And that is the story of Winterspell.

I am a bit prejudice when it comes to the premise of the book as I ADORE the Nutcracker, and to be honest, no story is going to live up to the original, so there was that.  A couple of things really struck me in this book.  The biggest one being how much time we spent with Clara's skin.  She started the book horribly uncomfortable and embarrassed about her own body...which considering the era, and the creepy Dr. Victor I could understand...but then we spent about a third of the book with Clara in various states of undress, in a whole lot of compromising, and/or sensual situations.  I get that being on the cusp of womanhood means lots of exploring, and confusion, and experiencing, but seriously what it actually added to the story, or Clara's character development was in no way proportional to the amount of pages spent on it.  I feel that there was some opportunities missed considering the source material.  There were some definite references to The Nutcracker, Drosselmeyer being the biggest, but also the Prince trapped as a statue/toy, some of the scenes I think tried to tie in some of the various nutcracker dances, but it was missing some of the magic, and some of the creepy dread that the book and ballet both put across.  I also thought the book which clocked in at over 400 pages could have done with some editing and been a much sleeker, more entertaining read at around 250.

 There was some great stuff in the book as well.  I did enjoy that fact that Clara had to develop her own courage for her own reasons.  Even though she had all the training from Drosselmeyer, she did not know how to utilize it in her daily life and had to work at being courageous.   I also very very very much appreciate Anise and Nicholas as multi-dimensional bad and good guys.  Anise, while very cruel, is also a product of her birth and circumstances.  She is constantly trying to make the world into a place where she can be happy, to this end, her fascination with Clara as a potential equal and partner is very understandable and adds a great dimension of soul to what could easily be a cold, cruel baddie...also she has the coolest costumes.  On the flip side Nicholas is not your typical, heroic goody goody good guy.  He is the first to admit he has an extreme hate of fairies that was taught to him from a young age.  He is also able to be ruthless to the beings he feels he needs to use to regain his crown.  I think (and I love this) that in the very end, why Nicholas is "good" and Anise is "bad" is when they both had to choose, weather to continue the hate and cruelty, or to try and bring the country together, Anise could not get past the hate, while Nicholas asked for help and admitted that he had to at least try and be better.  This idea that it is decisions that make a person good or bad and not their inherent nature is a good one.  Overall there were good parts and not so good parts.  The book was a little slow, and a little long for my particular pace and I wanted more magic and less naked.  I give this book a 6 out of 10 sugar pipes.  Happy Reading Everybody!
What story do you know will never be adapted to your liking?  Do you think I'm prudish for not wanting to read 46 almost naked, almost sexy fun times scenes in a non sexy fun times book?  How do you feel about holiday stories after the 25th?

Don't Let The Stars Define You

Fate vs. Free Will, Destiny vs Decisions, Luck vs. Hard Work.  These are all themes that are very prevalent in literature across the ages.  It has been the big question through out time, and discussed thoroughly in many a book both fiction and nonfiction.  Did a person get where they were because the stars fated it so, or because he made a certain decision...or did he make that certain decision because he was destined too...or was it all luck?  The book Jepp Who Defied the Stars by Katherine Marsh, is a book that explores these questions in great detail. As always SPOILERS AHEAD!

Jepp is a dwarf who was born and lived in the late 16th early 17th century Spanish Netherlands.  He had the good fortune to grow up in the inn of his mother, protected by the villagers from the harshness that he would have experienced almost anywhere else.  He is sheltered, loved, and even taught to read in this little bubble of the village and the inn.  Jepp's only real sorrow is he does not know who his father is and no matter how much he begs nobody will tell him a thing.  One day a noble stranger appears and offers to take Jepp to the court of the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain to be a court dwarf.  He promises Jepp all kinds of comforts and books and a new life.  Jepp and his mother both see this as an opportunity and off Jepp goes with the man he calls the Don.  They arrive at the palace and Jepp is placed with the other three court dwarf's, Lia the young, sweet and beautiful dwarf, Maria the older, regal, often drunk dwarf, and Sebastian, the comically important dwarf.  Jepp also meets the giant Robert, and Pim the jester/master of ceremonies and the Infanta's favorite.  Hendrika is introduced as the dwarf's keeper, making sure they are taken care of and on occasion disciplined.  She seems to have a weird reaction to meeting Jepp, but he finds so many things odd that he takes little note of it.  At some point all of the dwarf's get their horoscope drawn for them based on their dates of birth and Jepp is encouraged as his is very well favored.  As Jepp gets used to court life he realizes that he is just there for the amusement of the court, he is well taken care of, but humiliated on a regular basis.  During this time he falls in love with the sweet Lia and does everything he can to be around her.  Pim also takes a not so innocent interest in Lia which results in Lia falling pregnant.  This of course

causes a great stir, especially when Lia refuses to reveal the father to anybody but Jepp who has already figured out that Pim attacked Lia.  Jepp tries to help Lia run away but is taken back to the castle when Lia goes into labor before they can escape the city.  Lia and the baby die and Jepp is packed into a cage and sent away.  Jepp arrives at the island fortress of Tycho Brahe, an eccentric noble who has a thing for the sciences, especially astronomy and astrology.  Jepp is again looked down on as a stupid bit of entertainment, but this soon changes when Tycho's daughter Magdalene catches him in the library after hours and discovers how smart he is.  He is eventually given a position in Tycho's library as a scholar and is finally starting to be happy.  Magdalene is the one who drew up Jepp's horoscope and they have many spirited debates over fate vs free will.  Eventually the two fall in love and wish to be married, but Jepp still has the ghost of his father hanging over his head.  Tycho releases him, telling him to only come back for his daughter if he can find his fortune. Jepp returns to his mothers inn only to learn that she had died a year ago from a fever.  Jepp also learns that the woman who raised him was not his real mother, that the man Jepp calls Don brought him to her to raise.  Jepp goes back to Infanta's castle, determined to find his real parents.  Turns out that Hendrika, the dwarf's keeper, and Don's older brother were Jepp's real parents and that he was sent away as his father was already married to another woman at the time.  Hendrika and Jepp reunite and Jepp heads to visit the Don to see if his father ever acknowledged him.  Jepp's father had left him 3000 gold pieces but Don, who was the executor of the will spent it all, leaving nothing for Jepp.  Jepp heads out to find work, determined to make his own fortune, even if it takes forever.  Luck is with Jepp however in the form of the man who took Jepp to Tycho in the first place, he found a stash of gold in Don's apartments and tracked down Jepp to give it to him.  Magdalene shows up to marry Jepp regardless and they head out to start their life together.

 This was an interesting book on many levels and there was a lot I enjoyed about it.  I think the part I liked the best was the historical context.  The author wrote this piece of fiction around little tidbits of true history.
Tycho Brahe was a real eccentric noble who made minor contributions to science.  Infanta Isabella was a real royal who regularly kept dwarf's for her own entertainment.  All these little tidbits were strung together and filled out by the author to create a compelling story.  This is a YA book...and sometimes it read exactly like a YA book, complete with teenage angst, identity issues and miscommunications, other times it read a little older, with some of the situations being a bit older, such as rape, pregnancy and marriage.  This is not to say it is not appropriate for the teenage crowd and in fact I am encouraged to see books like this featured in the YA section.  It has a bit more heft and substance then a lot of the YA books I have read, it is just

something that for the younger half of the YA crowd, some explanation or guidance might be needed.  I liked the format of the book, the story being told to us by Jepp, who for the first and second parts of the book told us his story as he traveled to then an unknown place, the only problem was sometimes big events where telegraphed which made me by turns anxious and a bit disappointed when the events finally happened.  I really loved visiting Tycho's fortress, the descriptions of the various oddities and little touches of eccentrics were a lot of fun and now I want to go visit. I like the various relationships in this book, and how Jepp fell in love with two completely different type of women.  First the sweet, mysterious,haunted dwarf Lia and then later the bold, smart, forward, "normal" sizeed Magdalene.  The only real complaints I had was sometimes Jepp seemed to be written as a 13 year old girl.  A lot of his moonings and angstyness had a girlish flavor to them that I have never witnessed in a teenage boy, this kind of took me out of the story a bit on occasion.  The other complaint is that on occasion events took on a very convenient turn, especially at the end, like the author just wanted to move on with the story.  Over all though I enjoyed this book and read it pretty quickly.  It was nice to have a story about a different kind of person without adding all the magic and vampires and stuff that usually accompanies it.  I would recommend this for anybody who likes a good story, who remembers what it was like being different as a teenager, has a interest in 17th century Spanish Netherlands, or wants something to read with their teens. I give it 7 out of 10 horoscopes.