Reactionary Reading: Shade & Shift
However, I recently wrote a review for both Shade and Shift by Jeri Smith-Ready and for some reason I couldn’t get the tone of the review to capture how much fun I had while reading the books.
So I’ve decided to publish my reading notes. Yep, that’s right—I take notes as I read. Typically I use those notes to help guide me when I’m writing reviews, but sometimes (I think) my notes are really, really amusing and very in-the-moment. They include everything from favorite quotes to my gut reactions to tangential musings, and sometimes provide absolutely no context to what is actually happening in the book. Suffice it to say, they are kind of random.
But BE WARNED! I have gone through and redacted major spoiler information. (Yep, just like the government does.) If you’ve read the books, or if you don’t care about being spoiled, feel free to highlight the redacted portions so you can read the text. (It’s like a game! Sort of.) But there might still be minor spoilers involved. So if you’re the type that hates knowing things before you read, DO NOT PROCEED. And please keep in mind that this is all in good fun and are just my thoughts and opinions.
All right, now that the disclaimer is out of the way, let’s get this show on the road!
May I present, my reading notes.
p. 33: For some reason, I’m finding the fact that Logan is all proud of his Irish heritage and the fact that Zachary is Scottish, really hilarious. I don’t know when or why, but at some point in my life I decided that the Irish and the Scots don’t like each other and that they’re constantly feuding. So the Logan/Zach heritage business is highly funny and makes competitive sense to me.
p. 60: I really have no idea if I’d want my dead boyfriend to just be dead so that I could mourn and move on, or to stick around so that I could still be with him. Geeeeez.
p. 69: I also have no idea if I could get my ass out of bed to work on a school project two days after my boyfriend had died, even if a dude with a Scottish accent was involved. I’m thinking no.
p. 80: I think I like Eowyn mucho. And the whole thing with Zach switching his teacup with Aura’s so she could have strength? So super sweet.
p. 106: Yeah, I really don’t think I’d be okay with my dead boyfriend hanging out with me in the middle of his funeral. It’d be all too . . . antithetical. I think my mind would explode. My heart def would.
p. 110: You know, I really like that both Aura and Megan have after-school jobs.
p. 119: Oh praise God. I’m glad Gina is there to voice the way I feel about the dead boyfriend ghost business. I don’t feel bitchy and coldhearted anymore.
p. 132: “Back at the bookshelf, Eowyn flipped up one of the posters and pinned it to the frame of the shelf, which contained old, leather-bound, musty-looking books, the kind that make you want to roll around in them. (Well, that make me want to roll around in them. but I’m weird.)” I’M SO LIKE THIS ABOUT BOOKS. *bounces*
p. 156: Maybe I didn’t make up the animosity between Ireland/Scotland! Or maybe the animosity is just a Logan/Zach one and Logan is using any information he knows about the two countries to fuel it. I guess that’s possible.
p. 182: Relationships are so fucked up.
p. 185: Hey there, female masturbation scene. (!!!!)
You know. I’m a little tired of the Logan side of this story. I really want to know more about Aura’s mom’s missing journal entries and how she knew Eowyn . . .
p. 190: Oh good! The birthday twin business is going to be talked about. I have been waiting for this.
p. 192: Holy shit. Every minute four hundred babies are born. That is insane. And gross. And incredible. *Googles to verify* Oh hell, every website says something different. I will just TRUST Jeri Smith-Ready and her editors.
p. 194: Zach really is the most patient—and most honest—guy ever.
Zach: ” . . . but he didn’t tell me to join your research project. That was my idea. . . . So was falling for you.”
Aura: ” . . . Falling for me?”
Zach: “Come on, you’re not blind.”
And then he just lets it go and moves on! It’s the most low-key declaration of feelings ever made. Which I love, actually.
p. 210: Oh good. SPY DAD! I’m actually really excited to meet him.
p. 214: OMG. Zach and his dad (Ian, whom I might be in love with . . . this remains to be seen) are yelling at each other in deep Scottish accents. I can only imagine Craig Ferguson and James McAvoy yelling at each other. Not that those particular actors would ever play father/son (since they’re only like ten years apart) but, I think they may be the only Scottish actors I can identify with certainty as Scottish off the top of my head. (OH! Sean Connery. But maybe he’s too old at this point?) Anyway. I like it the thought of them yelling at each other in deep Scottish accents.
p. 219: Alright. Now I’m uber-curious about Aura’s mom/dad situation. Time for theories!:
- Aura’s mom met a ghost, fell in love, somehow had ghosty sex, and then had Aura, which caused the Shift. So, Aura’s dad is a ghost. Maybe he’s a famous ghosty. No, that would just be too much.
- Maybe Aura’s mom had sex in one of those monolith cave thingies. And that caused the Shift. Hmm. But how shall that explain the Zach/Aura thing about them being the only ones borned on their respective minutes? Hmmmm. HMMMM.
p. 222: OMG. Ian and Maria (Aura’s mom’s name) had met before:
Ian: “We were once in the same place together. The circumstances of our children’s births, I believe, are connected by an event that happened to us—an event I cannot, for security reasons, elaborate upon.” O_O
OMG OMG OMG. HERE WE GO.
p. 245: YODA PUPPET!
p. 14: WHAT WHAT WHAT. Oh this changes things.
p. 26: Yeah, I’m still far more interested in the Zach/Aura/Shift origin story and the backstory re: their parents than I am about Logan…
p. 29: Zachary is the nicest, most understanding guy ever.
p. 46: Oh, I like angry Zach. And Aura needs to hear it.
p. 89: I wanna go to Ireland…
p. 104: Wait. Zach and Logan can’t be around each other since Zach is all ghost-repellant. And while I like the idea of the three of them working together on the thesis, it isn’t possible…right?
Oh nevermind. Aura worked that part out.
p. 111: I am so freaking intrigued by the Ian/Maria connection at Newgrange I can hardly freaking stand it.
p. 132: I really, really like Megan. Between the yoda puppet and the umpire joke, I think I want her to be my bestie.
p. 135: Yay! My Scots vs. Irish competition idea is still intact!
p. 151: Ok. Where is Eowyn? WANT. EOWYN.
YAY EOWYN!!!!
p. 161: If the light in the cave on the winter solstice can make a wish come true, what if Aura’s mom’s wish was to have a baby?! And Aura is some sort of divine conception sitch?! Which means she is like Jesus! Oh boy.
p. 163: OH HAI, FIONA!
p. 173: I want to punch Mickey in his stupid ass face.
p. 176: KIIIIIIIIIILT!!!!!!
p. 177: Oh how I loathe Becca and her slutty, slutty sluttiness. Although, let’s be honest, if I were Becca and at prom with Zach, I’m sure I’d be all kinds of slutty, slutty, slutty too.
OMG, and it only got worse with that bathroom scene! I hate girls. Girls are awful, horrible bitches.
p. 192: Awe, Dylan.
p. 195: Haha. Scotty, beaming. I might be Team Dylan.
p. 205: I am SOOOOOO TEAM DYLAN.
p. 207: Is it bad that I think it’s funny Aura is hungover after just three beers?
p. 223: Okay. I’m super Team Dylan. But I don’t want Aura to hurt him. And that’s the only way that’s going to end….Dylan needs to go hook up with that Amy chick.
p. 249: LITTLE LION MAN!!!! ❤
p. 251: Spooky, investigative scavenger hunt. Hell. Yes.
p. 272: Oh holy shit. I think Aura’s dad is a ghost. Or maybe he turns corporeal and he and her mom had sexy times before he turned back to ghost. Either way. WHAT.
OH I THINK I AM RIGHT.
p. 277: I AM RIIIIIIIGHT.
p. 293: Oh no. Was Zach shot?!
Oh ok, he wasn’t. Whew!
p. 318: These two are far more vocal about sex and feelings than I ever was at their age. I mean, of course, they’re fictional, so of course they are. But. Still.
p. 326: Wait. Did she just give him a hand job? Or did they have sex?
Ok. After the re-read, I have determined: Hand Job.
And then I think they had sex?
Oh, nope. They had no sex.
p. 349: Awe. I actually really loved the Logan concert. I thought I’d hate it and his diva-ness, but it was really cool.
p. 358: 🙂
p. 367: SUCH a good last line!!!!
Tune In Tuesday: More 90s Jams
More 90s you say?
I’m good with that.
Let’s keep last week’s theme up and turn to the soundtrack of Baz Luhrmann’s FREAKING FANTASTIC 1996 film version of Romeo + Juliet. People, this soundtrack holds up.
First and foremost, it features Radiohead’s “Talk Show Host” as Romeo’s theme throughout the film. As much as Radiohead probably wouldn’t like this, this incredibly gorgeous, haunting song was my introduction to their music.
And now for something a little less moody just plain fun: The Cardigan’s “Lovefool,” which played on the radio all the dang time and annoyed the hell out of my mom, and is still awesome.
TGIF: The Reviews I Didn’t Write
Well hello there.
This week, Ginger at GReadsBooks has asked:
Another group of books I’ve never really written about on this blog are books that aren’t considered YA. For example, I recently read Kathryn Stockett’s The Help and Lev Grossman’s The Magicians. While I probably wouldn’t have reviewed The Help, as I’m glad I read it but don’t necessarily have much to say about it, and I actually do have thoughts on The Magicians . . . but I’m not sure if it necessarily fits in with the tone and audience of this particular blog? But, then again. It’s MY blog. So maybe you’ll see a review of The Magicians on here in the next week or so. Who knows!
Review: Shade and Shift
Titles: Shade and Shift
Author: Jeri Smith-Ready
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Release Dates: May 4, 2010 (Shade);
Love ties them together. Death can’t tear them apart.
Best. Birthday. Ever. At least, it was supposed to be. With Logan’s band playing a critical gig and Aura’s plans for an intimate after-party, Aura knows it will be the most memorable night of her boyfriend’s life. She never thought it would be his last.
Logan’s sudden death leaves Aura devastated. He’s gone.
Well, sort of.
Like everyone born after the Shift, Aura can see and hear ghosts. This mysterious ability has always been annoying, and Aura had wanted nothing more than to figure out why the Shift happened so she can undo it. But not with Logan’s violet-hued spirit still hanging around. Because dead Logan is almost as real as ever. Almost.
It doesn’t help that Aura’s new friend Zachary is so understanding—and so very alive. His support means more to Aura than she cares to admit.
As Aura’s relationships with the dead and the living grow ever complicated, so do her feelings for Logan and Zachary. Each holds a piece of Aura’s heart…and clues to the secret of the Shift.—Goodreads
After hearing soooo much about these books (and the Scottish slice of mancake that is Zachary) I finally, finally, finally read the first two books in the Shade series by the Twitter-loving Jeri Smith-Ready.
After finishing Shade, the first book in the series, I was actually sort of . . . not in love with the book the way I wanted to be. Don’t get me wrong, I liked it, but I wanted Logan to just freaking pass on already and let Aura get on with her life (preferably with Zach, the most patient teenage boy ever written). And then I felt bad for feeling like that because if MY boyfriend up and died, and I had the option of having him around forever as a ghost, I really don’t know what I would ultimately want. Anyhow, by the end of Shade I actually found myself much more interested in the storyline regarding Aura and Zach’s project on The Shift than I was the love story aspect.
And then I read Shift. And holy cow did this book change things for me. The second book in the series deals much more with the idea of The Shift and the logistics of how and why it happened, thus satiating my desire for that—and you learn more about Aura’s mother, who died when Aura was three, but left behind a very frustrating journal, full of missing pages, describing her time in Ireland about a year before Aura was born. In just this regard, I enjoyed Shift way, way more than I did Shade.
But onto the love story aspect. Logan is still around in Shift and actually plays a big role in helping Aura and Zach with their project as there are some DISCOVERIES that are made because of Logan. And though Aura still struggles with her feelings throughout the book, because who wouldn’t, I actually liked the way Smith-Ready handled it. It’s very obvious that Aura is torn, and that if Logan was still alive she would absolutely be with him, and wouldn’t have thought twice about Zach. (Feel free to argue with me about that in comments.) But because Logan isn’t alive and needs to pass on, Zach is definitely on Aura’s mind a lot. However, she doesn’t really pursue him until she resolves her lingering feelings for her lingering ghost of a boyfriend.
Alright, so other things in these books:
I have to talk about Logan’s siblings, specifically Dylan. Although I do like Mickey and Siobhan, I adore Dylan and he really, really stood out in Shift. About halfway through, Aura decides to ask Dylan to go to prom with her, and though that seems a little weird (I mean, he’s her dead boyfriend’s little brother) he ended up being the best prom date EVER. Dylan is definitely the stand-out character for me.
However! I also really love Megan, Aura’s best friend and girlfriend of Mickey. Megan is the kind of girl who would have no qualms about getting in a fist fight to defend her friends. She’s kind of a hard ass, but she’s really funny and has a Yoda puppet (!!!) and is just an all-around incredible friend.
And now we discuss the music, which plays a huge, huge role in this book. So huge, in fact, that Miss Smith-Ready has playlists for the books on her website. You should check them out because they are great. Logan’s family, the Keeleys, are all uber musical (except for Dylan) and before Logan died were in a very successful Irish punk band. So, music is discussed a whole bunch. And there is a reference to Mumford and Sons. And I want to borrow Smith-Ready’s iPod and steal all her music.
Oh! You also need to know that Zach wears a kilt to the prom. It’s AWESOME.
Overall, these books are solid and actually very different in tone than are a lot of YA novels. Smith-Ready is great at crafting characters who are flawed, but still loveable (i.e., Mickey. And Logan. And, actually, Aura.) And though Zach is the most “perfect” of the characters, he’s not a YA male who is so perfect that he could never actually exist. (There’s hope for us accent-lovin’ ladies yet!) So yeah. I like these. And I’m VERY excited to read Shine!
Bethany Larson 