My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.
Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below.
The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Volumes 5 & 6 by Beth Brower A & A
Above are the covers you get with the paperback versions of the books, just to illustrate that you can't judge a book by its cover. Or maybe you can. Maybe these covers say exactly what you are getting - a journal of a fictional character by an author whose not afraid to trust her writing, and her Emma M. Lion to entertain you with everyday life in a fictional London of 1883.
These books just keep getting better. With every book we get a new character or two, and we get deeper into the lives and secrets of the characters we've come to know and care for. Emma has hinted at a tragic past, and in these books we get to know Emma and that past far better. In each, the growing cast of characters make their quirky appearances dragging Emma into all sorts of misadventures, and deepening friendships. The books begin to get a little thicker as the plot, such as it is, gets Emma more and more involved with life with in Str Crispin's and social duties imposed on her by her aunt.
My daughter compared these books to Anne of Green Gables, with a young woman constantly getting into and then out of trouble, with the help of her friends. It has been many years since I read Anne of Green Gables to my kids, though I have DVDs of the old PBS series, which I love, and rewatch every five or six years. While Emma has many things in common with Anne, heck, they're both orphans, and they both love books, but their lives and settings are very different. Still, if you love Anne, I think you'll fall in love with Emma as well.
Next post, I will attempt to sum up the series as a whole.
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