Carnival of Souls

By the title Carnival of Souls, you can imagine that this young adult novel, by popular author Melissa Marr, is a bit gritty, indulging in sensationalism and sensuality. But it could have been much worse. For a novel with a carnival where you can buy and sell murder or pleasure, this story is not as graphic as it could be. The main characters do not have sex within this particular story, though they have before, and we're not talking about sex strictly between lovers but also about sex for money. The violence is slightly more graphic with fights to the death.

As far as I know, Carnival of Souls is the beginning of a new series and is not part of the Wicked Lovely books or any other series of Marr's. It tells the intertwining stories of several characters on the cusp of adulthood. Mallory is a 17-year-old, raised by her adoptive witch father in the human world and trained to fight an evil she barely understands to protect something the witch once stole. Aya is a ruling-class daimon, so she could have an easy life, if she wishes, as long as she is willing to breed. But Aya's most terrible secret would be revealed in her child; therefore, the only option left open to her is entering the fights in the hopes she can win a place in The City's governing body. Kaleb is a cur, almost the lowest caste of daimon, forced to hire himself out as assassin or lover just to feed himself and his pack. In the fights, he has a chance to raise his station in life or at least die on his own terms. He's also falling in love with the girl he's been contracted to kill. Daimons rule The City. Witches have been exiled to the human world, where their power remains strong. And these three characters, among others, have been raised on one side or the other to fight a war begun long before their time.

Melissa Marr is quite the storyteller. Her stories are rich in detail and full of life. She mixes fantasy with the real world in a way that fits more into contemporary fantasy than the trendy paranormal genre. But this particular story was, for me at least, a little over-the-top. It's hard to root for a character who kills for hire and prostitutes himself, even if the world is such that he has no other choice. (I think there's always a choice. Isn't death better than selling your soul that way?)

Part of it comes down to there being not enough internal struggle over these big moral questions. It bothers me when so many young adult books are full of questions but no solid answers or no strong delineation between right and wrong. The gray area is dangerous because there are clearly things that are wrong in the real world that may or may not be wrong in fiction, but then there are things that might be wrong in both but that are portrayed in such a way as to be appealing to readers. I'm not saying books make people evil. I think, rather, that our books reflect and support our culture. If sex outside of marriage is okay in our culture, no one thinks twice about it in a book. But reading about it in a book reinforces the idea that it's okay. (Have you read other reviews by me? Big soapbox.) Anyway, I can't recommend a book, even if it is well-written and I enjoyed parts of it, if there's too much moral gray area. If this book were a movie, I'd probably have to give it an R rating.

Moving on...as you know, if you've read past reviews, I'm not a fan of witches. I tolerate them better in fantasy because there, a witch is just another creature of the world. In some cases, though, the use of witches toes the line between fantastical creature and something out of the real world. Again, I don't like the moral gray area. This book is more fantastical than not, but some elements are borderline. If that was the only thing I didn't like about the book, though, it wouldn't keep me from recommending it.

By the way, it seems to be a trend lately for fantastical beings to take credit for real historical events, for instance, the Salem witches. The first time I read something like that, it was kind of cool, smudging the line between fiction and that which we can't explain in the real world. But it's been used enough (say, in the last three books that I've read) that it's not clever anymore.

One last issue I had with the book has to do with the romance, but I don't want to spoil too much. I think it will get better as the series progresses, but at this point, it's a love based on deception and animal attraction. There's also an annoying sexism in The City, where females are viewed as property for breeding. I'm certain the author will have more to say on this subject, as she already has, but readers will have to wait for future books to get any satisfying resolution there.

So, I don't recommend this book for the average young adult fiction reader. But, having given you fair warning, if none of the above bothers you in fiction, I'll just say Melissa Marr knows how to hook a reader. Though I likely won't get a chance to read the rest of this series, I'm still interested in knowing how it turns out.

This first installment is available in September.

Grave Mercy

Here's a good young adult read that just came out this month. You may have already noticed the cover in bookstores: a girl in a heavy, medieval-looking red dress. It's perhaps not a very original cover, but that dress is certainly eye-catching all the same. And once you pick up the book and read the back cover, you will definitely be intrigued.

In Grave Mercy, by Robin LaFevers, Ismae is convent-trained to be an assassin (you read that right) for her god (and father, no less), Death (it just gets weirder and weirder, doesn't it?). In this medieval world similar to ours with a political backdrop that could almost have come right out of history, the handmaidens of Death are sworn to protect the interests of their country, Brittany. Ismae has no reason to love men, having only ever been abused by them, first by her father, then by the man she was forced to marry at only 14. When her turn comes to leave the convent on a mission to protect the young Duchess and see her to the throne, she is well-prepared to take her revenge on mankind, all according to the will and plan of Death, of course. But teaming up with a nobleman named Duval complicates things. The convent wants her to spy on him, and Ismae would rather cut his throat than trust him. If only she could find an ounce of disloyalty in him, she would get the job done and return home to her sisters. But soon, Ismae finds her heart and her duty and her country embroiled in one gigantic mess.

This book was fascinating, yet I had a hard time wrapping my head around the genre. It appears historical but doesn't seem to be trying to recreate any particular historical moment (aside from France being at war with Brittany). It has elements of fantasy: Ismae's father is a god, and she has certain supernatural gifts, like the ability to see Death's marque on her victims or her immunity to poisons. The trappings of medieval religion are there, but the religion itself is all mixed up with a variety of "saints," who are known as gods to true believers, and elements of Christianity. To a Christian like me it ends up feeling very pagan, but because I see it as fantasy, I'm able to put that aside for the most part and enjoy the book. Nonetheless, it's odd.

(This paragraph contains SPOILERS.) The whole weird religious and questionable moral tone of the book drop what might have been five stars down to three and a half, maybe four, so you see that my opinion of the book is still high. There are the unfortunate morality issues. The convent assassins are trained to do whatever it takes to get in close to their victims, including becoming mistresses, if time is needed to discover if a person truly deserves assassination. Ismae, herself, is supposed to act as a mistress, and she ends up sleeping with someone near the end of the book. Yes, she falls in love with him, and I guess our society thinks that makes it okay. And our society's morals aside, that time period was rather bawdy. Think of King Henry and his six wives. Fortunately, this is no The Other Boleyn Girl, and for what's there, it's kept very clean. Still, I will never say it's all good and well when it comes to extra-marital sex. It's just not right.

But if you can ignore the messy religious juxtapositions and mostly just the morals at the end of the book, what you are left with is a solid story full of mystery, danger, political intrigue, subtle but passionate romance, historical detail, and colorful fantasy. Ismae seems like a simple girl to begin with, but she grows up and grows on you. I feel like Grave Mercy is a novel targeted to young adults because it has to be (the heroine is 17) but written for an audience that's a bit older. So, if you are an adult (particularly female) who loves young adult fiction, this book is just right for you!

Grave Mercy is Book 1 of the His Fair Assassin series. Its sequel, out in the spring of 2013, will be about one of Ismae's convent sisters.