Whenever a writer takes on a retelling of a classic, I get nervous. I probably shouldn’t, since so much of the media we enjoy these days’ takes it roots in just this type of storytelling. Regardless, when I originally heard the description of For Darkness Shows the Stars as a post-apocalyptic retelling of Austen’s Persuasion I was not immediately sold. Nevertheless, this book made a believer out of me. So much so that I’ve already downloaded the accompanying short story to my Nook and I’ll […]
I want to be Persis Blake when I grow up.
Here’s how I would break down 2014: BDF and ADF. That’s Before Diana Peterfreund (January – June), and After Diana Peterfreund (July- today). Back in July, while shopping for books to bring on vacation, my favorite book-seller recommended For Darkness Shows the Stars to me. She promised I would like it, and I was helping support a local author, so I picked it up AND IT WAS AWESOME. A futuristic, dystopian re-telling of Jane Austen’s Persuasion, I ate it up and told everyone I knew about […]
What if the Scarlet Pimpernel were a teenage girl in a dystopian future?
4.5 stars Set in a different part of the same post-apocalyptic world as For Darkness Shows the Stars, this book is more of a companion novel than a sequel. The two islands of New Pacifica are Albion (think a futuristic pacific islander England) and Galatea (sci-fi revolutionary France). In Albion they have democracy and happily genetically alter their bodies to be their very best selves. Princess Isla is the regent of Albion until her toddler brother comes of age, because while they are big on genetic engineering, […]
Science fiction young adult Jane Austen. It’s good, I promise
Laziness makes me resort to the Goodreads synopsis once again: It’s been several generations since a genetic experiment gone wrong caused the Reduction, decimating humanity and giving rise to a Luddite nobility who outlawed most technology. Elliot North has always known her place in the world. Four years ago Elliot refused to run away with her childhood sweetheart, the servant Kai, choosing duty to her family’s estate over love. Since then the world has changed: a new class of Post-Reductionists are jumpstarting the wheel of […]