The Book Magpie's Nest

This book was not as immediate for me as Anna and the French Kiss. Where Anna was easy to relate to, I found Lola near insufferable at the start of this book. I'm irritated by people who choose to represent their personality via physical media, for example what they wear (another example is people who immediate go into a list of their interests/fandoms when you ask them about themselves - it's a similar thing) and a lot of Lola's decisions were so poor that her inner personality came off pretty badly. The book grew on me, mostly because I really like Cricket and began to sympathise with Lola's plight. She still appeared immature for sixteen, but this bothered me less as the story developed.

There's not much to the plot, which is essentially the same as AatFK except genderswapped - boy and girl meet (although in this case they have a little history) but one of them is otherwise involved, shenanigans ensue. I am not bothered generally by Lola's apparent emotional cheating on her boyfriend, largely because it's in keeping with her immaturity. And while I've seen a lot of people say that five years isn't a big gap, I can see why it would seem so at that age - I think age gaps can be significant where there is a significant difference in life "stage" - where one party is at school and the other at college/university or even beyond that, I think that can cause a fundamental difference in expectations and experience. However, the whole romantic plot felt a bit stretched out compared to AatFK, which was just a snick away from being stretched thin in itself. Perkins' writing is bang on, which helps to paper over this somewhat, but pretty much everything after she breaks up with the original boyfriend is unnecessary and makes this sweet book a little tiresome towards the end. One thing I thought the book got absolutely right was the portrayal of Lola's birth mother - that was easily the most touching part of the whole narrative.

I think if you liked Anna, you'll like this, but most likely not as much. I love Perkins' writing and she has the perfect voice for this kind of escapist romance - she's sweet but rarely veers too far into the cheese zone. I just hope that for Isla and the Happily Ever After she tries something a little different because I don't think this plot can stand a third airing.

Ugh. I was so on board with this until the end. So literally the only way that she can stop Juliet from committing suicide is to sacrifice herself? And big ole meanie Sam deserves to die so much more than Juliet because...? I don't know, but after spending all this time with Sam and getting to see her make positive changes in her life, I think it's a total cop-out to make her not have to follow through with these changes. What's the point in teaching her all these things about herself if she doesn't have to change, not really? Her friends won't get the chance to change with her - because she's dead. And surely Juliet is now going to shoulder the blame for Sam's death, thus making her inherent problems even worse - I'd be pretty pissed off if my best friend died trying to save you because you ran out in front of a car. ARGH.

Also it's just plain stupid that there was no other way to prevent Juliet dying. And why was this Sam's responsibility anyway? I'm always reminded of that scene in Buffy, in the episode Earshot, where Jonathan's going to kill himself:

JONATHAN: Stop saying my name like we're friends! We're not friends! You all think I'm an idiot! A short idiot!
BUFFY: I don't. I don't think about you much at all. Nobody here really does. Bugs you, doesn't it. You have all this pain, and all these feelings and nobody's really paying attention.
JONATHAN: You think I just want attention?
BUFFY: No. I think you're up in the clock tower with a high-powered rifle because you wanna blend in. Believe it or not, Jonathan, I understand about the pain.
JONATHAN: Oh right. Because the burden of being beautiful and athletic, that's a crippler.
BUFFY: You know what? I was wrong. You are an idiot. My life happens to, on occasion, suck beyond the telling of it. Sometimes more than I can handle. And it's not just mine. Every single person down there is ignoring your pain because they're too busy with their own.The beautiful ones. The popular ones. The guys that pick on you. Everyone. If you could hear what they were feeling. The loneliness. The confusion. It looks quiet down there. It's not. It's deafening


In short, well written and characterised book let down by the worst ending I could have imagined the author giving it. I'm not pissed off because the ending was sad - I'm pissed off because the ending was morally horrible and rendered the preceding 465 pages completely pointless.

I feel absolutely horrendous even rating this. The three-star rating is only based on what it made me feel. Because (quite obviously) I knew the outcome before the beginning, I read the whole thing with this horrible sense of dread in my stomach. To be honest, I think I just was too young to be capable of dealing with a lot of the stuff in this. Not that I think it shouldn't be read at a young age, I just think the benefit of having seen something of the world might improve my ability to "place" this, as it were.

Eh, not for me, I don't think. I was expecting a creepy tale but it just didn't engage me. The writing was okay, but nothing special, and it just didn't grab me. I also accidentally spoiled the ending for myself which sounds utterly bizarre and doesn't make me feel like continuing at all. I might give it another go some time - it's not like I hated it - but I have so much other reading material at the moment that I don't feel inspired to continue with things I'm not too keen on.

Also, what was with the use of ellipses? They were everywhere and I found them really distracting.

I adore you, Ruby Oliver.

We are incredibly similar. I generally hate when people say that, but as someone who has been through a (very) similar panic-related badness, it's nice to have a book about the "us's" of the world. People who don't or can't deal with things sometimes, until all the not-dealing makes your brain explode.

I'm not saying I'm necessarily GLAD I can relate. But I can.


Anyway, I was quite afraid to read this book. I had so madly loved the last three books, (deeply, madly loved them), loved the arc that Lockhart had given Ruby, that part of me really wanted to leave it at the happy ending of book three. Particularly given the subtitle and blurb for this book, I was definitely prepared for some horrible stuff to happen.

The book is, as with all of the others, incredibly well written. There is not much enjoyable young adult fiction out there, and still less of it is actually well written. Lockhart's other books aren't up to much, in my opinion (in particular, the Frankie Landau-Banks book is a piece of fecal matter of epic propotions, but that's a story for another day), but these are... pretty masterful. If you ever, ever want to know what it really feels like to have panic attacks, read these books. If you ever, ever want to know what it's like to have bouts of anxiety so intense that you feel like it might be better if you just died on the spot, read these books. Ruby is one of the most believable protagonists I have ever read, and I mean in terms of all of the fiction I have read. She feels really real. Like I've mentioned, she is in large parts very similar to me. The parts of her that I don't see in myself I see in other people I've known. Other girls that I've known. That the experience of teenage girls is - for once - believably represented, is pretty important, given there are so many completely unrealistic and fantastical representations.

What is possibly even rarer is the accurate depiction of a teenage boy in Noel. Wonders never cease. Too much teenage fiction, especially for girls, seems to neglect the fact that boys aren't either meat people or gay - that they are PEOPLE JUST LIKE WE ARE. Obviously it's a bit harder for me to analyse his experience in terms of my own, but from what I've heard from the menfolk in my life, it seems fairly representative. He's believable. He's not perfect, he's not just a dick either, he's a bit messed up, but he's genuine, and he really likes Ruby, despite the crazy, because... because she's real. Because she is Ruby, and nobody else. I'm fond of Noel. I was routing from him from the start, before we knew whether we were "supposed" to (there's probably a better way of putting this, but it's very late so it stands).

That's not to downgrade the importance of the secondary characters in this book, because they are so amazing. I want to be friends with Meghan in real life because I think she might be the nicest person ever in a really blunt, yet oblivious, sort of way. Hutch is just amazing, even if he has horrible taste in music. And Nora... I'm glad SHE got the ending she deserved. I also love how these are all people I could actually imagine being real. SO MUCH young adult fiction is obviously written by adults who can't remember what being a teenager is like - or who don't know how to portray them in anything other than broad brush strokes. Lockhart... gets it right, at least in this series.

About half way through the book (it's not long, only about 220 pages) I was, obviously, desperate to know how it was going to end, and I was (again) becoming apprehensive. There were really only two set ups I could see Lockhart going for:

1. Gideon is the preferable boyfriend because he is stable and steady and nice to you and interested all the time and... yeah, whatever. Gideon seemed like he might have been interesting up until he opened his mouth in this book and turned into a muffin. A total, complete, muffin. I don't think he was satisfying as a character after the way he is in this book - everyone has problems. Everyone has things wrong with them. Gideon doesn't, and he doesn't feel real, and ultimately, not worthy of Roo, not really. Which is weird. I wonder if I really think that - that flaws ultimately make you a more "real" or better person? I don't think that's exactly what I'm saying. I just don't think he had enough of a personality in either direction, and that's not what Roo - or most people - really needs. Thankfully, this was not the direction in which Lockhart took it.

2. The other direction I thought was possible was that she might just go for Ruby leaving school having learned all these wonderful lessons about friendship and relationships, but not really getting what it was that the other three books make it seem like she wants. Mostly because I thought this would do a great disservice to Noel. To have had him continue just to be a dick for no reason, or to have had some way of explaining it without allowing either of them to be truly happy, would just have been a bit of a cop-out. Noel's character build up had been so good over the other books that for them not to be close again, after everything, would have made me incredibly sad. Also, it would have seemed kind of off for Ruby, as well, to suddenly not want to have Noel in her life. Also, narrative-wise, it would have felt too much like an anti-climax. I don't know, this is probably very unenlightened of me. But, as Ruby would say, "it's just how I feel".

I NEVER imagined what actually happened.

I won't waste it. But safe to say the last thirty or so pages of this book are entirely heart-breaking and uplifting in equal measure. Really. I mean, it's so completely unexpected the way she brings everything back together, into the happy ending that I can't imagine anyone not wanting for Ruby (not to be egotistical after I, you know, compared myself directly to her, but I assure you it was unintentional) but the route that she takes is so god damn sad that I actually felt like I'd been punched in the stomach when I read it. The "Tums" scene is easily one of the best things Lockhart has ever written. I have no idea how she manages to go from hilarious to gut-wrenching in so few words, but there is literally not a wasted word in this section of the book. I bow down to you, Lockhart. You have written some crap, but this is wonderful.

I have one complaint about this book, and it's a complaint I know many people who've read it share. What in the heavens happened to Ruby's mother? I've always found her hard to like, I have to admit, except for in patches in the first book, but in this book she was unbelievably vile. She DOES bully Ruby's dad (and everyone else), among other things. The bits with the meat were horrible as well. I mean, despite having been vegetarian for about a year, I don't GET vegetarianism. But the way that Ruby's mother goes out of her way to make her daughter miserable for telling the truth is nothing short of disgusting. I also hate how she goes away, and comes back, and none of her issues are ever addressed - when Ruby has to go through the wringer addressing EVERYTHING. All of this is made even worse by the state that Ruby's dad has gone into following his mother's death (NOT what makes this book so heartbreaking, FYI) and Ruby's mother just LEAVING RUBY TO DEAL WITH THAT. She's a horrific woman and I hope she falls off the house boat and drowns.

But mostly, this book was everything I could possibly ask for. I'm going to miss Ruby, but I'm glad she got the ending she deserved. CANNOT RECOMMEND ENOUGH!

Christ, this is the dregs! WHY IN GOD'S NAME did I like these? Review to come with some of the "highlights".

This book was incredibly stressful and I am not okay.

For fuck's sake, an easy four stars - I am born to love neurotic teen girl characters since I was/am one myself - but then the dog. The fucking dog. Literally the one thing I will never, ever forgive the author for. 999/1000 it is a cheap ploy to get to the reader's emotions that adds nothing to the plot and THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT THIS WAS. I hate it. I beyond hate it. Genuinely, fuck your dog-murdering ways.

If Beth doesn't get eaten by angry snakes at some point after this book finishes, then the world knows no justice.

"the biggest secret of all was the world itself."

Is there any point at all in anything that happens in this horrible book?

EDIT: I think the best description I can come up with for it is it's like a crap Wasp Factory that's about four times as long.

Oh, puhlease. The twists really let this book down, along with the weird, sappy romance. I so enjoyed the first 150 or so pages when Karou and Zuzana were interacting, but the latter half was just dull as ditchwater. The twists were both predictable and stupid and blatantly there purely to set up for a sequel, particularly the second one. Not terribly impressed, but the writing was really nice.

EDIT: It also bugs me in books like these that the character with actual personality and a decent grip on reality (Zuzana) always has to be peripheral or a sidekick, whereas the main character always has to be strong and perfect and beautiful and brave... and as dull as a really dull thing.

Does the walker chose the path, or the path the walker?

Maybe I should invent a shelf for books where I almost cried, or books where I couldn't breathe for a few seconds while reading it. This was not what I expected, and far better for it.

Edit: probably won't be watching the film though. Don't think I could take Lyle van de Groot seriously as Jack.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Easily my favourite of the Gaiman I've read so far - I think his style works much better when he's not trying to be overly pretentious and involve too much philosophising in his work.