"Zombies vs. Unicorns" ed. by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier

Summary: A collection of short stories about zombies and unicorns.

Musings: For fans of fantasy, sci-fi, and the bizarre in-between, the arrival of Zombies vs. Unicorns has been hotly anticipated.  Like any collection in which the stories are written for a specific purpose (i.e. none of the stories had been written or published previously), there are some hits and misses in the book.  And, despite my excitement over the topic and many of the contributing authors, I don't think I would recommend the anthology as a whole, though I might suggest specific stories.

I think the easiest way to break down my thoughts is by categories:

1) Zombies vs. Unicorns: I had the mistaken idea going in that the stories would actually be about zombies and unicorns, not simply alternating stories about each.  It makes sense that the two fantasy beings don't exist together--you'd really have to stretch to make up a dozen stories or so about the two--but I still did long for a zombie and unicorn showdown.

2) Zombies: As a whole, I thought the zombie stories were stronger, though when looking at my favorite stories, none of them were zombie stories.  As Larbalestier points out in the introductions to some of the stories, there is simply a lot more that can be done with zombies, particularly with their mythology (where did they come from, what is a zombie like, how can a zombie be destroyed).  "The Children of the Revolution" was probably my favorite, especially if you think of it as a snide, sarcastic look at what Angelina Jolie is doing with so many adopted children.  However, by the end, the zombie stories had mostly melted together into depressing end-of-the-world anguish, despite the "love story" aspect of some of them.

3) Unicorns: There were highs and lows in the unicorn stories.  Those that stuck to a traditional fantasy medieval-ish setting were the worst ("The Highest Justice," "A Thousand Flowers").  I began to think that there just wasn't enough you could do with unicorns to make a decent story.  However, Diana Peterfreund completely changed by mind with the great "The Care and Feeding of Your Baby Killer Unicorn," which managed to use the unicorn in a believable modern setting with an interesting protagonist.  Also fabulous was "Princess Prettypants," which delightfully answers the age-old question, "What would you do if you received a unicorn for your birthday?"  (My favorite line?  Young brother Ted saying, "I wasn't going to say anything because I thought you were cool, Liz.  My cool big sister.  But now that I know you don't like unicorns, I don't think you're cool at all" [292-293].) There was more fun and lightness in the unicorn stories as a whole, and they often provided a welcome break from the gloom of the zombie stories.

4) The "edginess": Zombies vs. Unicorns is marketed as young adult, but I was surprised by some of the "edginess" (it's a terrible designation, but it's the best I can think of) of the stories.  There's strong language, sexuality, drug and alcohol use, and gore.  I don't think any of it's necessarily inappropriate for a teenage audience, but it was stronger content than I had expected.  It also felt like some of the stories were trying hard to "push the boundaries" by being "dark" and including things like bestiality and masochism when it just didn't seem that necessary.  One after another, they just didn't pack an emotional punch.

5) The length: Even though it's a collection of short stories, the stories often seemed way too brief.  Characters felt incomplete or the story fell short of being fully realized.  I've read completely compelling stories that lasted only a few pages, but perhaps some of the authors in this anthology are too accustomed to writing full novels to achieve similar narrative success in a shorter format.  In fact, I felt several of the stories would have done better as a full novel.

6) The romances: A lot of romance in the stories, especially the "I've longed for you forever but we just haven't been able to say it" kind. A little tiresome.

7) Female protagonists: The protagonists of all but one story are female.  I don't know if this is because all but two of the authors are female or because the intended audience is largely female.  Or some other unknown reason.  Just something I noticed.

8) GLBT characters!: Happily, three of the stories had gay main characters just as a matter of course; their sexuality was part of their identity but not a central part of the story.  I love that I'm seeing that more often.

Although I was Team Unicorn going in, I felt my allegiance switching to Team Zombie half-way through (those early unicorn stories were just so bad!).  However, now that I'm finished, I feel completely sick of zombies and still relatively intrigued by unicorns, so I'm Team Unicorn to stay.

"Super Sad True Love Story" by Gary Shteyngart

Summary: Lenny Abramov has been in Rome for a year, working for his employer in the Post-Human Service division, which seeks to extend (rich) clients' lives permanently.  In Rome he meets Eunice Park, a young Korean-American woman, and instantly falls in love.  When Lenny and Eunice return to the United States, they move in together, but the world is falling apart around them: "The country is crushed by a credit crisis, riots break out in New York's Central Park, the city's streets are lined with national Guard Tanks on every corner, the dollar is so over, and our patient Chinese creditors may just be ready to foreclose on the whole mess" (inside flap).

Musings: Super Sad True Love Story has received a lot of critical praise and hype recently, and I was drawn to Shteyngart's classification as a modern absurdist and satiric writer.

Love Story's initial focus seems to be a critique of modern America, particularly the proliferation of technology.  Individuals are glued to their apparati (essentially advanced cell phones), devices which allow everything from constant shopping (primarily at sexually explicit stores) to the ranking of other individuals (in areas such as "personality" and "f*@kability").  People stream their life and feelings for the public at large, and books are mostly a thing of the past--"printed, bound media artifacts."  Sound familiar?  And, for me, the problem was it all did sound too familiar.  Not only are those concerns something that are, essentially, the concerns of many real people today, they're also concerns that are familiar topics for YA dystopians.  It was like reading a Feed or Uglies with older main characters.  But, of course, reading about teenagers hooked to media is one thing, but reading about older characters just seems, well, pathetic.  And though that may be the point, it also made it difficult for me to enjoy the book.

Lenny himself drove me crazy, as he seemed reminiscent of other modern male protagonists.  He's pathetic and unattractive, hopelessly obsessed with Eunice, desperate to be loved, and dull.  Eunice is facing the demons of an abusive father and needy family, but she hides so much of herself that it's hard to feel much for her.

I felt bored through much of the first two-thirds of the book as Lenny and Eunice push and pull without changing, growing, or moving forward in any meaningful way.  However, after the crisis that occurs, I began to warm to the novel some.  Perhaps it was my familiarity with the post-apocalyptic genre, but I became more interested in what would happen to the country and the characters.  In this section I felt that Shteyngart was also able to show that our reliance on technology and constant need to be connected is both problematic and an undeniable part of our lives.  Writing about people who committed suicide after all apparati lost connection, Lenny recalls, "One [young man who committed suicide] wrote, quite eloquently, about how he 'reached out to life,' but found there only 'walls and thoughts and faces,' which weren't enough.  He needed to be ranked, to know his place in the world.  And that may sound ridiculous, but I can understand him.  We are all bored out of our f*@king minds.  My hands are itching for connection" (270).

The book is very crude and explicit sexually, which even I found somewhat distracting.  Again, there's probably a point in that, but it got a bit lost.  In terms of political messages, I liked that it presented a United States that is no longer a superpower, with individuals not ready to accept that.  Like much of the novel, the scenario is only too plausible in the near future.

Super Sad True Love Story is an interesting book with plenty to discuss, though I don't know that it's deserving of the amount of praise it receives.  In particular, I thought it was sad that a book like this can receive so much recognition while YA novels that address similar issues are often overlooked by critics because of the intended audience.

"The House at Riverton" by Kate Morton

Summary: At age 99, Grace recounts her days as a maid at Riverton Manor and her relationships with the two sisters who lived there: Hannah and Emmeline.  Ever since those days Grace has held onto the sisters' secrets, and now that her life is ending she feels the need to release them for the first time.

Musings: The House at Riverton is not typical fare for me, and although the novel's characters and basic conceit have certainly be done before, I still found myself interested in the intrigue, scandal, and secrets that tore apart a family of the noblesse.

As a maid, Grace is able to observe the family members without being noticed, but as time goes on, she also is taken into Hannah's confidences.  Grace is a devoted servant who gives up much to serve Hannah, and because of that, she sometimes seems to lack personality herself.  In fact, when Grace finally learns a huge secret about her own history (a secret, of course, that had been obvious to the reader for awhile), she reacts strongly then promptly forgets about it and her life seems mostly unchanged afterward.

There's a long time building up to the "scandal" that has been alluded to for most of the novel, and the relationships at the scandal's core are fairly ordinary and unsurprising.  The book concludes at a decent pace, but I found, once finished, that I had very little to say about the book.  I would suggest it to those looking for a historical mystery and with some elements of romance, but it's certainly not a standout.

"Those That Wake" by Jesse Karp

Summary: Mal is not one to turn down a fight, and he doesn't think much about his new foster parents.  But when he gets an unexpected phone call from his estranged brother late one night, he sets out to find him.  Instead, he discovers a strange building, empty except for floors fulled of unmarked doors.

Laura has been raised by doting and supportive parents, and she's surprised when, the morning of an interview, her parents keep out of touch while on vacation.  When she finally does discover them, her parents don't recognize her any more.  In fact, no one Laura knew remembers her.

Mal and Laura find themselves thrust together with two others--Remak, an agent for a research organization, and Mike, a jaded high school teacher--as they try to discover what is happening to the country and why they are being singled out.

Musings: Those That Wake is an unexpectedly engrossing dystopia that, while not earth-shattering in its secrets and world-building, is fast-paced and different enough to entertain even over-loaded dystopian readers.  The protagonists, Mal and Laura, are sympathetic characters, despite their opposite upbringings.  They're reminiscent of the good girl/"bad" guy pairing of Connor and Risa in Unwind, though Mal's "fighter" persona is more fully realized in this novel.

Mal and Laura are a little older than typical young adult protagonists (both are 17), and because they are more mature, the book reads somewhat different than others of the genre.  Mal's troubled upbringing and the callousness of his mother seems real, as do the gritty details of his various physical fights throughout the novel.  Laura, in being both over-protected and well-prepared by her parents, also seems like a real suburban teenager.  Perhaps the least likely aspect of their characters is the ease at which they grow to like each other, but there's no overt romance to shadow the story.

The mystery of what has brought these people together forms the central focus of the novel, as it should be.  It's clear there is a connection among various forces, specifically in New York City, which is causing problems not just for the main characters but for the entire world.  It felt a lot like the idea of "the Pattern" in Fringe, and I particularly liked that aspect of the novel.

Like in many mysteries, dystopias and horror movies, the truth behind the weirdness of what is happening in Those That Wake is somewhat less exciting than the weirdness itself.  Much of the science-fiction explanations in the novel are based off the concept of groupthink (to use a 1984 term), and, although well-explained, I first thought the ideas a bit far-fetched.  But then I remembered an article I had read in the New York Times in which a social scientist, Dr. Nicholas A. Christakis, reported that “Your happiness depends not just on your choices and actions, but also on the choices and actions of people you don’t even know who are one, two and three degrees removed from you...There’s kind of an emotional quiet riot that occurs and takes on a life of its own, that people themselves may be unaware of. Emotions have a collective existence — they are not just an individual phenomenon” ("Strangers May Cheer You Up, Study Says" by Pam Belluck, 12/4/2008). Like the researchers discussed in the newspaper article, Those That Wake explores the ways in which we, as humans, are subconsciously affected by those around us.  The connection between the science fiction and real science made the novel even more interesting.

The main enemy in the novel, "big corporations," was a bit vague for me.  However, I enjoyed the pacing and characterization of the novel and would recommend it to others.

Those That Wake will be published in March 2011.

E-galley received by the publisher through Net Galley for my honest review.

"The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" by Rebecca Skloot

Summary: In this nonfiction piece, Skloot examines the personal stories, science, and history surrounding the HeLa cells.  The HeLa cells were the first "immortal cells," as they were capable of indefinitely reproducing in culture.  Although these cells are in labs around the world and have been used to develop treatments for and research into the world's most deadly illnesses, few people knew the truth about who the HeLa cells came from.  Henrietta Lacks was a poor black woman dying of cervical cancer in the 1950's when her cells were taken without her knowledge, and her family has struggled with their mother's history ever since.

Musings: This book has been getting a fair amount of press recently, and after reading it myself, I believe the discussion is completely warranted.  Skloot has done an excellent job of weaving together the personal stories of the Lacks family (particularly Henrietta's daughter Deborah) with an understanding of cell biology and a timeline of the development of cell research over the last sixty years.  Henrietta's story is intriguing both for its ordinariness and for its heartbreak.  Uneducated and pregnant by her cousin at fourteen, Henrietta nonetheless raised her children through hard work and determination.  But when she died young of cervical cancer, leaving her children with abusive relatives, many of the children entered a downward spiral they are still trying to emerge from decades later.

Going in, I assumed the book would be an exposure of an African American woman abused and exploited by the white medical system, much like in the infamous Tuskegee syphilis experiment.  However, the real story turned out to be much more nuanced.  Through a history of case law and scientific codes, Skloot shows that it was not illegal for doctors to take a person's cells and use them in research--it wasn't illegal in 1951, and it's not illegal today.  And though Henrietta died of cervical cancer, it wasn't through a lack of medical care on the part of John Hopkins, the hospital she entered.  Nevertheless, there are more subtle instances of racism at play, particularly in the education of Henrietta's family.  Her children only learned that their mother's cells were being used around the world decades after their mother's death, and throughout the years, despite becoming minor celebrities because of the HeLa cells, the family members never really understood what had happened.  They didn't understand the concept of "cell," let alone the complex biology behind what was being done with the cells.  They were pulled among scientists who wanted information from them to study HeLa better, journalists who wanted information for their own pieces, and people out to make--or convince them to make--money off of HeLa.  Through it all, the family continued to suffer, both physically and mentally.

The uncertainty of what happened to her mother had a large impact on Henrietta's daughter Deborah.  In one of the most interesting sections of the book, Deborah travels with Skloot as they investigate the family's history.  Deborah wavers between giddy excitement and terror as she learns more in a few days than she had in so many years.

Although the Lackses' family history is the backbone of the story, Skloot's sections on advancement in scientific research are no less researched or less interesting.  These chapters of the book are also filled with the histories of the doctors who made these advancements possible.

I was shocked by how quickly I finished the book and how difficult it was to put down.  It's a fascinating look at the history of one part of science from the focal point of one woman and her cells.

P.S.  This is the 83rd book I've read this year, which means I've officially surpassed my total read (82 books) from 2009!

***This book qualifies for the POC Reading Challenge.

"How Did You Get This Number" by Sloane Crosley

Summary: A collection of humorous essays by Crosley.

Musings: I had really enjoyed Crosley's first book, I Was Told There'd Be Cake, in large part because I identified so strongly with her mid-20s uncertainty and frustration.  In How Did You Get This Number, Crosley is a little older and the stories a little less unified.  The essays are primarily reflections of her travels or of childhood events, and while there's still plenty of humor, it's a bit less biting and a little more somber.

I still loved Crosley's ability to self-deprecate and expose the idiosyncrasies and obsessive tendencies we all have yet try to hide from others.  Her first essay, "Show Me the Doll," about a spur of the moment decision to visit Lisbon, was great.  Traveling to Europe is very popular with my age group and is constantly romanticized, but Crosley shows that being an impulsive jet-setter is not enough to ensure you have a good time.  I also appreciated her second essay, "Lost in Space," where she discusses being diagnosed with a severe temporal-spatial deficit as a child.  Although I don't have nearly the difficulties that Crosley does, I think I certainly share some of that deficit, so it was nice to know my inability to follow directions or read a map may not be due solely to me being an idiot.

The other essays were a little less successful, often suffering from poor pacing.  In several Crosley interposed current experiences with childhood experiences, but I found the connections forced.  She also wanders off into philosophical musings that were difficult to follow and lacked lasting significance.  I found this especially true in "It's Always Home You Miss," a generalized essay about New York City taxis.

As someone approaching the end of her 20s herself, I was a bit disconcerted to see some of the spunk I loved in Cake missing in this book.  But, perhaps it's just necessary to adjust to changing understandings and expectations as one ages.

"Lamb" by Christopher Moore

Summary: The book's subtitle is "The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal," which is a pretty appropriate summary.  Biff, sarcastic but intensely loyal, retells the childhood, ministry, and death of his best friend, Joshua (the English translation of Jesus' Hebrew name).

Musings: Retellings of older, well-known stories are common place in modern literature, but the life and death of Jesus is one area that rarely gets expanded upon in fiction form (at least to my knowledge) for obvious reasons.  Yet clearly there's plenty of opportunity for interesting stories.  What was Jesus like with his family and friends?  How did he grapple with knowing he was the son of God?  What did he do during all those "missing" childhood/young adult years that the gospels don't speak to?  Clearly these are questions that can be addressed reverentially, but they can also be addressed in a more absurdist and even lighthearted way.  People who take their religion very seriously would undoubtedly be offended, but they'd probably never bother picking up a book like this.  So Moore begins with what I thought was a compelling conceit: tell the entire history of Jesus (Joshua) through the lens of a wise-cracking but devoted friend. 

Biff's called an asshole at the beginning of the novel, and the description is pretty apt.  Everything's a joke to him, and he has no problem lying or stealing for personal gain.  Joshua might attain enlightenment after studying at a strict monastery for years, but Biff confesses he mainly learned how to sleep with his eyes open.  But, Joshua is his best friend, and if Biff has one goal in life, it is to stand by and protect Joshua.  However, although he believes Joshua is the son of God, that doesn't necessarily translate to following all of his teachings or being especially pious.

And so it's Biff who brings spark to the story but who also keeps the novel from feeling complete from beginning to end.  The story's funny and the anachronisms are great, but, really, all the book is is the story of Jesus with some ribald color commentary.  Biff really doesn't grow or change as a person, and by the time Joshua's crucifixion occurs, I was looking for more characterization and empathy in Biff.

I did, however, enjoy learning about Joshua's growth and decision making.  Lamb addresses Joshua's difficult journey to accept his role as the son of God and the decisions he had to make along the way.  Especially fascinating was the way in which Joshua changed his stance from God's, marking the change from the Old Testament's emphasis on rules, wrath, and the divinely chosen to Joshua and the New Testament's focus on compassion, forgiveness, and salvation for all.  All sons must decide in what ways they support or challenge their fathers' views, and I enjoyed reading about Joshua's experience with that.

In the note at the end, Moore notes that the people most likely to understand the biblical references are the people least likely to read the book, but I do think some level of familiarity with Christianity is helpful.  From what I've heard, this is not Moore's best work, and the conceit stretches thin, but it was an enjoyable read.