Sunshine

Rating:
Summary: Oddly Unfinished
Review: Rae Seldon is the baker of Charlie's, a coffeehouse in a small town. She's twenty-five, and her life is full, but nothing special. SHE is nothing special.

Or so she thinks.

That all changes, and very shortly we find our plucky heroine in a dress not her own, without shoes, and chained to the wall of an abandoned house. And there's a vampire in the room. And even her ordinary life, she discovers, holds secrets that may be the key to her survival...

This is a better book than you might think, despite the Reed Business reviewer throwing around dangerous words like "Buffyesque" and "the inchoate idiom of Britney" (and my own semi-mocking use of "plucky"... sorry about that). McKinley's superior prose stylings make Rae an engaging and eccentric heroine, worth spending time with. The novel is a good one, but some flaws had me ending it puzzled and unfulfilled. (That feels almost traitorous, honestly, as she's been one of my favorite writers since I was twelve, and until now never failed to deliver.)

First things first: kudos to McKinley for mature, challenging world-building. She creates a environment (complete with it's own unique slang) I don't think I've ever seen before, where demons, vampires, and such ilk are publicly known of but considered the scourge of society -- the Others. In this world parents try to tattoo ward signs on newborn babies to protect them, and no one knows what it's like to talk to a vampire because no one ever walks away alive. The SOF officers (a kind of FBI for the supernatural) are the ones who knock on your door when the Weres are out, and your own landlady may not be what you think... McKinley's world holds a wonderful array of surprises and chills.

And while "ordinary girl with ordinary dreams comes into a mysterious and fantastic heritage" may not be the most original of plot lines, McKinley handles it with a grace and skill that initially had me on the edge of my seat. And she makes up for that slight predictability with other aspects -- most noticeably her take on the vampire world. With McKinley, vampires are not the languishing and beautiful dark lovers of Anne Rice novels. They are nothing close to human -- a different species of creature altogether, and her portrayals of them are satisfyingly alien and mysterious.

But there are some problems with the book. Since McKinley's created this world practically from scratch it's understandable that she has a lot of explaining to do -- but couldn't that aspect have been smoothed out a bit? For instance, the Voodoo Wars. If she deliberately left that background vague, that's cool, because I got what I needed from most of the narrative. So I had to wonder why she didn't use that same trick with so many other elements of the story, instead of dumping paragraphs of exposition between, say, a question posed and Rae's answer. It often took so long to get from Point A (the question) to Point B (the answer) that I had to go back and re-read point A to understand B. Help?

The real problem of the book happens at the beginning of Part Three, in my opinion. The involving, fast-paced narrative comes to a screeching halt. Stuff happens, sure, but none of it really seems to heighten the tension or complicate the plot. It's more of a "and this happened, and then this happened" thing until the big battle at the end. Characters are introduced, or their involvement deepens, but they ultimately lack satisfying resolution (Mel and the goddess of pain being the big ones -- who ARE these people?). And some interesting questions from the very beginning -- why did Bo stick Con into this particular form of torture, and what did it get him? how do they "be what they are" differently and what are the consequences of that? -- are left unanswered.

I wanted to love "Sunshine," I really did. A hundred pages in I wanted to call up all my friends and tell them to READ THIS BOOK, but that would have meant putting it down. I very much liked Robin McKinley taking on an older, more mature heroine with a life I could relate to -- this book has a wonderful blending of the familiar and unfamiliar. And I still adore Rae, whose culinary expeditions remind me of "Like Water for Chocolate," another favorite. There are bits of lovely cleverness scattered throughout, signature McKinley whimsy that has made her one of my absolute favorites. And I've never read a vampire book quite like this, quite so engaging and somehow believable. I didn't want it to end, but when it did I felt faintly cheated. Too much was left unexplored -- I felt like I was given tantalizing glimpses of people and relationships before the door was shut in my face. If there's a continuance -- and I'm hoping for one -- that may change, but until then, from such a wonderful writer, I expect more.

Rating:
Summary: I couldn't put it down
Review: Rae is a baker unaware of her latent talents. One night, she makes a bad choice, pushing her to embrace her heritage and question everything she took for granted.
I couldn't read this book fast enough. I can only hope like so many others that there will be a sequel. Though I loved this book on it's own I felt betrayed at the end as she left us hanging.
If you like Robin McKinley or vampire stories this one is for you.

Rating:
Summary: Good First Attempt
Review: I just finished this book and found it a bit slow moving and failing to keep my interest. I was lost on some of the names/terms McKinley was using without any background as to what/who they were etc. Mainly though, the narrative is constantly halted by Sunshines interpretations of her world, which gets to be a little redundant. I found myself skipping pages at various points. These aside, the storyline is interesting and Mckinley takes the vampire novel in an original direction.

Rating:
Summary: A beautiful vampire story
Review: I am an avid fan of all types of fiction novels (mystery, horror, sci-fi, romance, etc.), but I have a special affinity for novels about other worldly creatures especially vampires and lyncanthorpes. I have been reading these types of novels for years, and have quite a collection. I can truthfully say that I immediately fell in love with this story and the characters. I could not put this book down and was quite saddened when I knew I was near the end. This truly is one of the best vampire novels I have ever read, and even if you are not a vampire fan, you will still fall in love with this story and the various characters. I am keeping my fingers crossed and hoping for a sequel.

This story centers around Sunshine whose parents own a coffeehouse in a not so great section of town. This coffeehouse contains quite a few interesting and likeable characters, from those who also work at the coffeehouse, to those who visit and make it their home away from home. Being in a bad section of town this coffeehouse picks up quite a few characters, some of whom are not quite human. In this world of Sunshine's (which is right after a huge war where there is a fear that vampires will take over the world in the next century), there's quite a bit of magic. It's a world where everyone owns a magic charm or ward either on their person, in their house and even on their car. These wards guard against many types of things, but mainly the threat of vampires who are considered enemy no. 1.

Take this one sweet girl who decides to take a drive to a lake at night, and ends up chained next to everyone's biggest fear, a vampire. What follows next is how her life changes from that night on. I am not going to give any more of this story away. I just hate reading a review where too much of the story is given away before you have even bought the book. I will just say I highly recommend this book to all.

Rating:
Summary: WOW
Review: I have read numerous vampire novels and this is one of the best. A unique voice and character. Read it, love it.

Rating:
Summary: Careful...
Review: Although this is an excellent book, mine was shipped to me missing about 40 pages toward the end. It seemed like a printing or binding error from the publisher. Check near the end pages 320 to 360 if you buy the book. Amazon will take excellent care of your refund or exchange. It was an awesome book when I did get to finish it.

Rating:
Summary: A "Partly Sunny" Book
Review: I finished this book in a few days. It was a quick and enjoyable read. The language was a bit to reminiscent of Joss Whedon's Buffy slang for my liking, and I found most characters beyond Sunshine and Constantine to be one-dimensional. This novel felt like it was setting itself up to be yet another vampire series, a la Laurel Hamilton (of whom I'm not a big fan). If this book remains a stand alone, I think I will respect it a bit more for it's willingness to leave a few strings untied and left up to the reader's imagination.

As for plot, it was a bit lacking beyond the vampire/mystical reality. I felt that the author used the bakery as a way to pass the time instead of using it to give Sunshine some depth. There are some very striking moments in the novel, usually centering on Sunshine's developing bond with Constantine. The secondary characters, such as Sunshine's family and boyfriend, feel more like blips in the story or, when they actually play a small part, they are carbon copies - bland and practically useless.

One major problem with the writing was that I found myself skimming or practically skipping pages and being able to still know what's going on. The narrative was too often a stream of consciousness or overly tangential with unneccessary background information that did little for the storyline.

If you're looking for a book that's a quick read with progressively increasing elements of mystical reality, then this book is worth it. Otherwise, I'd keep scanning the shelves.

Rating:
Summary: Promise unfulfilled
Review: Though I generally love Robin McKinley, I fear this novel didn't live up to my expectations. As far as adult-type novels go, McKinley's Deerskin did a much better job of exploring some of the darker themes behind maturity and independence and growth. While Sunshine had to its advantage an interesting world to explore and the potential for interesting characters (especially in both Mel and Con), it failed to fully develop either its characters, setting, or plot. One cannot help but think how much better this book could have been ...

Rating:
Summary: A rich taste of . . . cinnamon and blood
Review: I have read many fictional and nonfictional (folklore) stories on vampires and vampirism. I found this to be a wonderful book to read. McKinley's writing is always lush and captivating. She doesn't just write one action sequence after another; she writes of the world in which the action takes place and where consequences are complicated. The pace tends to be a bit slower than most modern reads, but my feeling is why rush a good thing. I know that McKinley doesn't tend to do sequels, but I really hope she is planning one or more for this novel because I want to know more about Sunshine, Con, Mel, Sunshine's Grandmother, her mother, and almost everyone else who was providing Sunshine with her "moral/spititual" support.

Rating:
Summary: Great Story, Hope there's more
Review: A girl coming to grips with her heritage.

Basically, that's what I felt this book was all about. Reading the inside flap is what gripped me. But instead of a romantic love story between a girl and her vampire. It's more of how a young women has lived all her life, in her mothers design. Not thinking about her father, or that side of her family and the relations (or No relations) with them.

And that it's his blood that has given her abilities that she didn't even realize she has. Or how, if it had been known, she would have been trained, and everything that she did (to rescue her and the vampire and for that matter, the rescue of the world that she lived in) was not *do able*.

Because she didn't realize this, she was able to do things, that no one else had ever been able to do before.

I would love to find out more of what happens with her and the S.O.F.
With her and the Part Bloods in her neighborhood.
With her and Mel. (who, in my opinion, is really a WIZARD, and HOW did he get into a biker pack? and WHY is he on his own, mostly, now, and WHY is he there with her?) --which I think, her fathers family might have set up people (Mel?) to keep an eye on her, and what about her landlady?