Teen Tuesday and Audiobook Review: Her Radiant Curse by Elizabeth Lim

Image: Penguin Random House

Her Radiant Curse by Elizabeth Lim. Unabridged e-audiobook, ~ 13 hours. Narrated by Mirai. Books on Tape/ Listening Library, August, 2023. Review of e-audiobook borrowed from public library.

Happy Tuesday! It looks like it'll be another beautiful day here in northern NJ. It'll be slightly hotter and not as breezy, but I hope you enjoy the day and get outdoors in nature today. Teen Tuesday features Her Radiant Curse by Elizabeth Lim. Two sisters, Channi and Vanna, are devoted to one another, but in their village, Vanna is adored and Channi is reviled. 

When Vanna was born and their mother lay dying, their father took Channi to the Demon Witch as a sacrifice. The king of the serpents saved Channi's life, but the Demon Witch cursed her with a snake face. The only way to break the curse is for Channi to bring Vanna to the Demon Witch before her seventeenth birthday, which Channi will not do. As Vanna's birthday approaches, their father, intent on enriching himself, has a contest for possible suitors to win her hand. When the cruelest, most vile suitor wins, Channi intervenes, challenges the man's champion, and when she beats him, she finds the man's attention is now drawn to her.

This layered and rich epic fantasy unfolds slowly. The world-building is vivid and based on Chinese folklore. Her Radiant Curse is a prequel to the Legends of Lor'yan duology, and, while it does stand alone, knowledge of the duology does enhance enjoyment of the prequel.

New-to-me narrator, Mirai has a wide range of convincing voices for the many characters and her performance was utterly engaging. 

Teen Tuesday and Audiobook Review: Soul of the Deep by Natasha Bowen

Image: Penguin Random House

Soul of the Deep by Natasha Bowman. Of Mermaids and Orisa series #2. Unabridged e-audiobook, ~11 hours. Read by Betide Badaki. Books on Tape/ Listening Library, September, 2022. (Review of e-audio borrowed from the public library.)

Teen Tuesday features Soul of the Deep by Natasha Bowman. This sequel to Skin of the Sea picks right up and, to avoid any spoilers, I will be vague. The mermaid Simidele has made a promise in order to save the ones she loves and leaves them without explanation. She is now bound to the god Olokun, who in turn made a promise to release Esu, but he reneges on that promise. Without Esu forever binding the ajogun, these malevolent beings begin wreaking havoc on land and in the sea, threatening the entire world.

Both of these books are steeped in West African mythology and the world building is lush, vivid and cinematic. I continue to prefer reading books like these with my ears for the melodic delivery and proper pronunciation. 

Teen Tuesday and Audiobook Review: Beasts of Ruin by Ayana Gray

Image: Penguin Random House

Beasts of Ruin by Ayana Gray. Unabridged e-audiobook, ~15 hours. Read byKeylor Leigh Benjamin Charles and Yinka Ladeinde. Books on Tape/ Listening Library, July 2022. 9780593414774. (Review of e-audiobook borrowed from public library.)

Teen Tuesday features Beasts of Ruin by Ayana Gray. This sequel to Beasts of Prey begins immediately with Koffi awakening a prisoner of Fedu, god of death and Ekon reeling from the secrets he learned and hiding from his former warrior brothers. Koffi must find a way out, but first she needs to learn about her powers as a duraja. Ekon must learn to trust his instincts even if it means going against his training. 

Readers of Beasts of Prey will re-immerse themselves into the lush and magical world building and the cliffhanger ending will leave them panting for the next installment. Suspense, betrayal, twists and turns abound. This summary was kept deliberately vague to avoid spoiling the first installment.

I read Beasts of Prey as an arc with my eyes and was utterly entranced. I chose to read Beasts of Ruin with my ears and was disappointed. While I found the two female narrators to be fine, the voice actor for Ekon kept making his voice break, which sounded stilted and artificial.

Teen Tuesday and Audiobook Review: Rivals by Katharine McGee

Image: Penguin Random House

Rivals by Katharine McGee. American Royals #3. Unabridged e-audiobook, ~12 hours, 37 minutes. Read by Brittany Presley. Listening Library/ Books on Tape, May, 2022. 9780593584408. (Review of e-audiobook downloaded from the public library.)

Happy 'I'm melting' Tuesday! The heat continues in NJ, and while not as bad as other places in the U.S., it isn't conducive to the yard work I have on my to-do list! We had a little excitement in the neighborhood yesterday. My neighbor finally broke ground on her addition, and thanks to the previous owner's un-permitted and shoddy work and faulty marking by the gas company, the backhoe hit the gas line. Talk about starting a project with a bang! Here's hoping the rest of the work goes smoothly.

Teen Tuesday features Rivals by Katharine McGee. This is book three of the American Royals series, so as usual, I will be a bit vague in my summary. Even though the main characters in this series are older teens, the alternate history aspect and storytelling from multiple points of view are just plain fun. 

Beatrice is settling into her new role and about to host a week-long event called The League of Kings. Samantha seems to be settling down nicely with Marshall and Jefferson is starting college. There's plenty of court intrigue, high fashion and backstabbing to keep listening, and a "wait, what?" ending that will leave fans of the series panting for the next installment.

Ms. Pressley continues to keep the delivery breezy and fun. She employs a variety of voices and accents. While you can jump into this series at book three, why miss all the soap-opera-ish fun? Here's a link to my review of American Royalty. Happy reading.

Teen Tuesday and Audiobook Review: Cinder and Glass by Melissa de la Cruz

Image: Penguin Random House

Cinder and Glass by Melissa de la Cruz. Unabridged e-audiobook, ~10 hours. Read by Lauren Ezzo. Listening Library/ Books on Tape/ Penguin Random House, March, 2022. (Review of e-audio borrowed from public library.)

Happy Tuesday! It's going to be a lovely day today! I hope you get outside, get some exercise, then sit in the shade with a good book. I took Boo for a medium-long walk, went to yoga class, and will be heading into the garden with an audiobook soon.

Teen Tuesday features Cinder and Glass by Melissa de la Cruz. This is a lush and lovely retelling of Cinderella set in the late 1600s at Versailles during the reign of King Louis XIV. Cendrillon's hopes of becoming a lady-in-waiting in King Louis' court are dashed when her beloved father suddenly remarries and dies soon after. Her stepmother assumes ownership of the chateau and Cendrillon is reduced to a life of servitude. She had hoped her godmother would eventually marry her father. Cendrillon wonders why she doesn't visit. She's isolated and lonely. So when the king decides to have a ball in order to pick 25 maidens for his son, Prince Louis to court, Cendrillon decides to attend.

Setting aside Cendrillon's infuriating naïveté, something teen readers won't notice, but this old lady did, fans of fairy tale retellings will love it. This fast-paced romance may have familiar trappings, but there is plenty to delight, with plenty of court intrigue along the way. The narration was well-paced and engaging. 

Teen Tuesday: Field Notes on Love by Jennifer E. Smith

Image: Books on Tape/ Listening Library

Field Notes on Love by Jennifer E. Smith. Unabridged e-audiobook, ~8 hours. Read by Anthony Mark Barrow and Karissa Vacker. Listening Library/ Books on Tape, March, 2019. 9781984843128. (Review of e-audiobook borrowed from public library.)

In this dual narrative, the POV shifts between Hugo and Mae. Hugo is one of a famed sextuplet living in Surrey, England. He is often overshadowed by his siblings and seeks to strike out on his own. The problem is that they all have a scholarship at a local university and his parents aren't in the position to pay for Hugo to go elsewhere. Besides, he loves his sibs. 

A more pressing problem happens when Hugo's girlfriend dumps him shortly before their planned train trip across the United States. He'd still like to go, but all the tickets and hotels were booked in Margaret's name and are non-transferable. So, Hugo advertises in search of another Margaret Campbell who would be willing to step in and share the trip.

Mae's full name is Margaret Campbell. She lives in upstate New York with her two dads. She's a budding filmmaker and is going to be heading to LA for college anyway, so she answers the ad after her beloved grandmother encourages her to live a little.

The two make an instant connection, but all is not smooth training.

This one was fun, as all Jennifer E. Smith romances are. Romance is definitely not my genre. But I don't mind reading Smith's because the romances are smart, featuring characters that are usually endearing and relatable. I've always wanted to go on a cross country train ride, so that was a draw as well. 

The two mc's were so interesting, especially Hugo. His family, especially his sibs, were a hoot. There were some holes that distracted, like Mae's dads easy agreement to send their daughter off on a train to college. I was all about moving my (4) kid(s) in when they went off—not hovering—just moving them in, scoping the situation out and saying goodbye. Were I going to say goodbye at a train station, I'd insist on meeting this roommate she's apparently going off with. Still.

I expected the audiobook to add to the charm since Hugo is a Brit and the narrator is as well. And it did. Mostly. It's just that his American accent for Mae was an utterly atrocious mix of Boston and Brooklyn. (Picked Brooklyn for the alliteration, I don't know from borough accents.) It was a generic and mildly insulting New York accent with some Bostonisms thrown in. And she's from somewhere upstate - Hudson Valley, a totally different New York accent. So, no, that got annoying and distracting. And it certainly did not reflect Mae's narrator voice at all. She did a passable job with her British accent when voicing Hugo.

I definitely recommend reading this one with your eyes. I have a ton of Smith fans and romance fans at my school, so I don't expect this to sit. Nor should it. Your romance fans will gobble it up.