Sarah Rees Brennan

I loved this book.

I don't really have to give any other justification for why I'm rating it highly, but I suppose I can give a bit of an explanation... because equally, I can see why others might not enjoy the book. Elliott, for a lot of the book, comes across as an over-snarky, entitled little snot. You root for him, because you can see his motives of wanting true peace in the otherlands rather than a revolving door of battle... but he's a snot.

But I sympathized with him on a deeper level, show more as someone who loves and loves deeply, who tends to shy away from connection and from popularity. (And fairly uninclined to fighting myself! Though I do firmly believe there are some people who deserve... certain treatments... in the world.) There were moments throughout the book that punched me in the gut... Elliot's breakup with Serene inspired an almost fight-or-flight reaction from me as I read it on the bus home. Even later in the book, there's a passage (page 401 in my copy) that felt like a punch in the jaw, or a passage torn straight from my own feelings.

"Everyone Elliot had ever wanted to love him had loved someone else better: had wanted someone else more."

I deal with my own abandonment issues - though not to the same degree as Elliot; both of my parents and a step-parent have remained in my life to some degree, and cared about me. But I have always dealt with issues of self-worth, of fear of abandonment, of... trying to do my best for the people I care about, and having the words come out wrong, and everything turn to ashes, spilling out of my mouth and into my hands. So I saw some of myself in Elliott. (Even the arc of his relationships mirrors mine, in a way that I'll be keeping private.)

If it weren't for the sense of fun that runs throughout the book - yes, there is fun running underneath all the grief and under Elliott's self-pity - it wouldn't have been a fun read whatsoever. But I did greatly enjoy picking out the occasional reference to media I'm familiar with. There are overt references to bands that told me Elliott has great taste in music - Pink Floyd, the Beatles, Fleetwood Mac, even the Sex Pistols, and I'm sure others that I'm forgetting - and a few literature references, with Narnia ("always Christmas and never central heating") and Alice in Wonderland coming to mind as I type this.

The book loses a couple of points for a few obvious cliff-hangers (the end of the "age fifteen" section being the most blatant of them) that feel left-over from when the book was written serially. But it's not enough for me to properly dock the book.

4.5 stars. show less

This book is a delight. Every one of the characters acts like a real person: no one is perfect, and no one is all bad. There's a lot of sexual diversity. Het? Check. Gay? Check (MORE THAN ONE). Bi? Check (MORE THAN ONE, OH MY GOD). There are also open relationships and, though he is a very minor character, a sex worker you will love as soon as you meet him.

Our main characters are...
Elliot, a prickly pacifist. Serene(-Heart-in-the-Chaos-of-Battle), an elven warrior experiencing serious show more culture shock in the patriarchal human society. Luke, Mr. Perfect Von Perfectface (at first glace).

You'll get to see these characters mature through the magical equivalent of high school/boot camp, and experience all the mistakes, heartbreak, and triumph inherent to adolescence in all realms.

There are fleshed out nonhuman cultures, terrible people with good qualities, good people with terrible flaws, and two worlds that feel as real as ours.

If you like YA, fantasy, romance, adventure, humor, queer lit, and/or any combination there of, you absolutely need to read In Other Lands. show less

When I first heard this book was being published, I was super excited. I had read the previous web version of the book, Turn of the Story, and I loved it; generally I love Brennan's work in general, so getting to read a cleaned up take of this with a new version of the ending and all? I was STOKED.

And like. This book did not disappoint in the least. Here is the story on Elliot Schafer, the author-described Grouchiest Boy in Fantasyland. Elliot comes over to the Borderlands from England, and show more he's already a package when he gets there - snarky and pushy and stubborn and questioning everything. He asks right after he gets there about whether the border camp that he and his young compatriots just crossing the wall into the Borderlands whether they're being made into child soldiers. And as he grows, his insistence on questioning how things are done in order to help make the world better stays strong. I love this cranky boy.

But then, I really love everything about this story. Luke forms tight bonds with Luke Sunborn, the golden-haired golden child of a storied human Borderlands warrior family (and his sister and mom are quite something) who can't understand why Elliot doesn't see him the way everyone else does; and Serene, an elven fighter from a matriarchal culture where the gleeful upending of gendered stereotypes never fails to delight. And that's without getting into the rich and varied cast of secondary characters. The world of the Borderlands feels alive, playing on tropes of fantasy characters in a knowing and unique way.

I could blather on a long time about this, but the book is laugh-out-loud funny, thoughtful about violence vs. diplomacy and what cultures value, concerned with how people grow in their own right and in their relationships, both friendly and romantic... it does so much right. I loved it to bits, and the only reason I'm not sure it's my favourite read of the year is because I more or less had read it before. But it is amazing. If you like fantasy, then you should read this. Hands (and wings and fins) down. show less

Even though Unspoken sucker-punched me with the ending, I really liked this book -- maybe even more-so because of the ending. No neat and tidy, kissy kissy ending, but one that makes you say, "Wow, I didn't see that coming! Now where's it gonna go?"

Suppose you had an invisible friend. (I did. His name was Rudy, and he would come visit me whenever I was taking a bath. I last heard from him over 50 years ago, but it does make me look twice at any Rudys I meet, and wonder if he was the cad that show more deserted a 4 year old. But I digress.) So, suppose you had an invisible friend, and the two of you shared your thoughts from the instants you were born. And suppose your name was Kami, your father was half Japanese, and you lived in a little English village, called Sorry-in-the-Vale. Having an invisible friend you could talk to in you head wasn't common amongst the other villagers, (in fact they thought you quite peculiar for being able to do so.) But, you're bright, articulate, inquisitive, and want to be a reporter. You've got a loyal friend, endearing family, and a mind that wants to squirrel out any news story it can, since you run the school newspaper.

So when the Lynburn family that buit the singularly creepy stone mansion on the hill eons ago returns after being away all of your lifetime, you smell a story. And indeed, there may be one, but first you have to get past all the creepy things that happen: animals being sacrificed in the woods, someone's attempt to kill you, and other weird stuff. Plus there are the Lynburn cousins, two boys your age, one clean cut and preppy, one Marlon Brando in The Wild One delinquent to contend with. But you've got the voice in your head to comfort you, laugh with -- until it turns out that bad boy cousin has a voice in his head, too, and guess what? It's you.

Bad things continue to happen in Sorry-in-the-Vale. Kami and her merry band of misfits try to find out what's happening. And it's a good reading ride, snazzy Gothic, in a YA blend. How cool is that?

Since I've been snookered, I'll pick up book two in the series when I get a chance. After all, I really liked some of the dialogue. show less