I am large, I contain multitudes

It's hard to describe Marcus Sedgwick's "Midwinterblood" in any other terms other than possibly one of the most amazing books I've read in a long time. Pardon me for being blunt. I tried coming up with some sort of cute/interesting intro to lead up to my review but nothing seemed to fit. There is absolutely no way to introduce it outside of it being amazing. At this point I'm not even sure how to describe the plot of the book and what happens without spoiling massive quantities of it; everything is connected to everything else in some deep way. The best way to describe it would be with a small quote from the book:

It cannot be... that when our life is run, we are done. There must be more to man than that, surely? That we are not just one, but a multitude. (p. 250)

So it is that on a small Scandavian island where the mythical Dracula orchid grows, Eric and Merle, two souls in love, find then lose each other over and over and over again. Seven different stories weave together their tale of love surviving through the ages, through vampires and magic and war, going back to a time unrecorded by history. Only at the very end does the whole story become completely clear.  Only then do you see the end that is really the beginning.

~The Stacked Librarian

P.S. The title of the blog post is a Walt Whitman quote. It's from "Song of Myself." If you like Whitman, definitely read this book!

X-men Style Dystopia

Juliette, the main character in Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi, reminded me a lot of Rogue from X-men.  She can't touch anyone because she drains the life out of them.  The local leader of the new dictatorship wants to use her abilities to dominate the world.  Juliette just craves normalcy and human contact, which she thinks she may never have.  Enter Adam, Juliette's new cellmate.  He doesn't despise her and says he wants to help her, but can she trust him? 

The writing style is unique and takes a little getting used to.  It's a little like a journal with crossed out and changed words.  Juliette is very descriptive and some of the language she uses to describe things is almost poetic, which makes for an interesting read.  And near the end of the story there are more moments that will remind you of X-men.