Big in Japan by M. Thomas Gammarino
Big in Japan was the second book I managed to snag from Library Thing’s Early Reviewers Program. Considering how I felt about the first one, I did not have high hopes for M. Thomas Gammarino’s debut. But this character driven rumination on the relationship between physical desire and spirituality was a delicious surprise. At turns crass and cerebral, Big in Japan captures the distinctive blend of ambivalence and desperation that characterizes the transition from childhood to adulthood.
Big in Japan follows the exploits of twenty-four year old Brain Tedesco, guitarist for the Philadelphia based progressive rock band Agenbite. When the group realizes their independently released debut album is selling
slightly better in Japan than in the States they convince their manager to send them on a promotional tour of Japan to boost sales. As the band tours Tokyo, playing venue after empty venue, they are forced to admit the tour is a failure. But having fallen in love with a Japanese sex-worker named Miho, Brain is too distracted to care. When Brain suddenly quits the band, deciding to stay behind and marry Miho rather than return to Philadelphia, the story kicks into high gear.
It’s risky to place an emotionally stunted character at the apex of a novel, and Brain Tesdesco is nothing if not stunted. At the start of the story he is still living with his parents and working a crappy minimum wage job stocking shelves at a local pharmacy. He has never had a girlfriend, his deep anxiety, insecurity, and social awkwardness having paved the way for rejection after rejection.
The problem with emotionally stunted characters is they’re incredibly difficult to render sympathetically. All too often they’re immaturity and lack of self-awareness make them come off as whiny and annoying. And even though Brain is whiny at times, I never found him annoying. Gammarino imbues him with a naked vulnerability that is endearing and relatable. Even when Brain’s behavior crosses the line from self-defeating into selfish and cruel, I couldn’t write him off as just another man behaving badly. His motivations were far too complex and his psyche too broken for me to turn on him, and that says a lot coming from a person who is always prepared to turn on a character she feels is acting like an idiot. Gammarino deserves a world of credit for creating a character whose humanity is never eclipsed by his moronic behavior.
Brain is also kind of OCD. He is obsessed with order and routine; the kind of guy who has a place for everything and insists everything remain in its place. Initially, Brain is not happy about going to Japan. The trip is a major deviation from his normal routine; a disruption on par with leaving a magazine that belongs on the coffee table laying haphazardly on the couch.
But Brain’s desire for order also translates into a taste for purity. Brain is a virgin, and a typical one at that. He is a total horn dog consumed by sexual thoughts, yet reveres the idea of love. He believes love and sex to be neatly and inextricably linked, one following naturally on the heels of the other. So, it’s no surprise that Brain is automatically taken by the pristine beauty of Japanese women – women so physically and behaviorally different from women back in the States. On page 19 as his band mates discuss the pros and cons of sleeping with easy women, Brain thinks, “Horniness dried you out, made you haggard and ugly. These japanese girls weren’t that. They were so pure.” Drawn in by what he perceives as the unsullied beauty of the natives, Brain begins to view his trip to Japan, its alien language and culture, not as a disruption but as a coming home of sorts. He sees it as a place where his hunger for purity and order can be adequately satisfied.
Early in the story Brain visits the Tokyo National Museum where he comes across a series of scroll paintings of “hungry ghosts.” They are described on page 67 as “…[D]enizens of one of the Buddhist Hell realms. They had mountainous bellies and needle-thin necks that made it physiologically impossible for them to sate their hunger. In each of the scrolls, the ghosts…could be found squatting in latrines, trying and failing to gorge themselves on human waste.”
It quickly becomes apparent that Brain himself is a hungry ghost. His insatiable desire to do and be something more than the anxious, insecure, angry boy that he is leads him to a life of debauchery. He gluts himself on sex until the activity becomes toxic; a mechanical act that he no longer enjoys but can’t bring himself to stop.
This compulsion to internalize that which is poisonous stands in stark contrast to his search for the pristine, though both spring from the same well of insecurity and both shield him in some way. By accepting only perfection Brain kept himself from having to engage the material world, whereas consuming only the profane prevents him from having to fully engage others on an emotional level. It is only as Brain learns to balance the needs of the body with the needs of the mind and spirit that he begins to grow up.
Gammarino’s writing is strong and evocative, if a little self-conscious at times. Big in Japan maintained a sense of urgency throughout that had me rushing to turn each page.
Normally, I’m a serial reader. I finish one book and dive straight into another. I couldn’t do that with Big in Japan. I had to take two days to emotionally process the story before I could bring myself to start a new book, that’s how much it got to me.
Haunting, sad, and unflinchingly honest Big in Japan will leave your mouth watering.
Living With the Dead by Kelley Armstrong
Living with the Dead is the ninth book in Kelley Armstrong’s wildly popular Women of the Otherworld series. In it, we’re introduced to Robyn Peltier, a recently widowed public relations consultant still trying to come to terms with her husband’s senseless death. Luckily, keeping her demanding boss, “celebutante” Portia Kane, out of the tabloids is a great distraction. But when Portia is murdered police zero in on Robyn as their primary suspect. With the help of her best friend, tabloid reporter Hope Adams, Robyn must track down the real killer and clear her name.
Readers of Armstrong’s Women of the Otherworld books expect certain things from the series. For one, they expect the books to be written in first person and told from the point of view of a single character. They expect the story to be told by one of “the good guys.” They also expect a developing romance to play a key role in the story.
In Living with the Dead Armstrong tosses reader expectations to the wind. Rather than tell the story in first person, she tells it in third. And instead of telling the story from the point of view of a single character she rotates between six characters. That’s right, you heard me.
I don’t have any problem with third person in general, but it bothered me in this case because it stood in such stark contrast to the other books in the series. The structure of the previous books are all so similar a reader can pick up any one of them and immediately recognize it as part of the Women of the Otherworld series. Not so with Living with the Dead. Writing this book in the third person is such an unexpected deviation it’s difficult for a tried and true fan to get lost in the story.
Likewise, I don’t generally mind stories told through multiple narrators. I loved the eighth book in the series, Personal Demon, which is narrated by Hope Adams and Lucas Cortez. But, in the case of Living With the Dead, shifting the focus between six different characters does nothing to enrich the narrative. The chapters are short and Armstrong shifts point of view from chapter to chapter. So, we follow Hope for one chapter, then Robyn for the next, and Adele for the one after. The reader is never allowed to stay with any one character long enough to get to know him or her. As a result it’s hard to care about any of them.
The shifting point of view enables the reader to view some scenes through the eyes of more than one character. Unfortunately, having to read the same scene more than once slows the pace and rarely provides any new information or perspective.
Two of the four rotating points of view belong to the villains. Readers know right from the get go what motivates them to commit the crime Robyn is later accused of, and get to follow them as they run from the law. The problem with incorporating the POV of the villains in a thriller is that it kills the mystery. Half the fun of reading a mystery is trying to puzzle out the who, what, and why of a crime along with the heroes. While it is possible to write from the POV of a villain without spoiling that fun, Armstrong simply can’t pull off that gentle balancing act. Within the first few pages we know why Adele and Colm do what they do, and that makes watching Hope, Robyn, Karl and the rest of the crew figure it out something of a bore.
Armstrong has been writing this series for five years. I can understand her desire to shake things up a bit by trying something new, but the risk just doesn’t pay off. Overloaded with characters it’s virtually impossible to become emotionally invested in, Living With the Dead is out of synch with the rest of the books in the series. Devoted fans should not expect fireworks out of this one, and new readers would be better served by starting out with one of the previous books in the series.
Ordering the Storm edited by Susan Grimm
I don’t think it’s too far out to say that most emerging poets have no idea what to take into consideration when putting together a full length or chapbook sized collection of poetry. It’s not a topic most undergraduate or graduate creative writing programs cover. By the time a young poet has enough material to constitute a first collection chances are he or she will still have never met anyone who has published a book. They themselves may have only a vague concept of what they want to say, how they want to say it, or how to draw a particular response out of a reader. Sensing the need for direction in these matters, Susan Grimm asked a number of published poets to write about their experiences putting together collections of poetry. The result, Ordering the Storm: How to Put Together a Book of Poems, offers insight, suggestions, direction, and the shared camaraderie poets so desperately need when trying to assemble a book.
Ordering the Stormis a quick read. At 97 pages I was able to breeze through it in a day. The eleven essays range from the esoteric to the practical. In the opening essay, “Best Foot Forward: Arranging a Poetry Manuscript,” Bonnie Jacobson examines the themes and structures used to organize books by Mary Oliver, Sharon Olds, and John Donoghue among others, and how those structures maximize the emotional impact of the manuscript. In “It’s Simple Really: Just Sit Down at the Desk…” Jeff Gundy describes his own circuitous process of putting together a book.
All of the contributors toss out ideas on how to go about arranging a book of poetry. There’s the classic method of fanning all your poems out on the floor, and crawling around on your hands and knees until the pattern of the book begins to take shape. Some suggest grouping poems with similar themes, subjects, images, or turns of phrase into individual sections. Others suggest weaving poems with seemingly disparate tones or subjects together throughout the book. Above all, they remind the reader that no size fits all. Each manuscript is its own entity and will require its own individual tending. What worked for your first book may not work for your second.
What really struck me was how many of the contributors spoke of creating a dramatic arc, building tension, and moving the action along; terms more often heard when speaking of prose. But it makes sense that a poet would have to take those things into consideration when assembling a book. After all you want to keep the reader riveted and you want them to walk away from the book having gained something. It goes to show how green I am that I’d never thought of a book of poetry in those terms before.
Though reading about each contributors individual process gave me ideas of how I might want to approach the puzzle of assembling a collection one day, the essays themselves, their organization and presentation also provided insight into my own preferences. For instance, I found the essays presented in a straight forward and linear fashion the most helpful. I also preferred the essays where contributors talked specifically about their own process to those in which the contributors discussed the process of poets other than themselves. I like personal stories and I like writing that follows a linear path. As I was reading it occurred to me that if I were to assemble a collection of poetry the work would have to be intensely personal and it would have to flow in a linear manner, poem to poem in a kind of narrative that was no interrupted by sections. That would be my preference.
Ordering the Storm is a must have for any poet with aspirations of putting together a book of poetry. It offers poets a number of ways to look at and approach the task of assembling a book; of disassembling, re-arranging, and rebuilding a problematic manuscript. Most of all it provides new poets with a sense of comfort. Knowing that there are other poets in the world, even highly successful ones, who are just as confounded by the task of writing a book as you are makes the green poet feel a little less alone in the struggle.
Silk by Caitlin R. Kiernan
After writing four negative reviews in a row, I promised myself I wouldn’t write another until I found a book I could say something nice about. I wasn’t expecting Caitlin R. Kiernan’s Silk to be that book. Once perched at the top of my “to read” pile, months of unhampered spending pushed Silk to the middle of the stack as I heaped new purchases on top of it. After being disappointed by my latest urban fantasy / paranormal romance / sci-fi adventure reads I decided I needed something different and Silk fit the bill. I hauled it from the heap and discovered a diamond.
Birmingham’s grunge and goth scene may be flooded with posers, but Spyder Baxter is the real deal. A schizophrenic loner with her own novelty shop, Spyder is the definition of “eccentric.” Young scensters follow at her heels whenever she steps out with her girlfriend Robin and best friend Byron. She may be the unofficial patron saint of alienated youth, but Spyder has a secret. There is something evil lurking in her basement and she is the only person who can keep it from getting loose and destroying everything she loves.
After months of bitching and moaning about flat characters it was refreshing to read a book over flowing with fully fleshed out, three dimensional characters. Kiernan is well aware that showing trumps telling when it comes to characterization. Instead of telling the reader that her heroine Daria Parker has a bad temper, she offers several scenes in which Daria goes off on her junkie boyfriend. Instead of telling the reader Spyder is mentally ill we get to watch her down her meds every morning.
Character is everywhere in Silk,from the exposed brick facades on the run down buildings of downtown Birmingham to the contents of each characters pockets. Kiernan knows that people are built out of details. On page 7 Kiernan introduces us to Daria Parker. The first two paragraphs tell us worlds about the town itself as well as Daria’s place within it.
“Daria sat by herself on the sidewalk, fat spiral-bound notebook open across her lap, back pressed firmly against the raw brick, pretentiously raw brick sand-blasted for effect, for higher rent and the illusion of renewal, the luxury of history. The cobblestone street was lined with old warehouse and factory buildings, most dating back to the first two decades of the century or before and sacrificed years ago for office suites; sterile, track-lit spaces for architects and lawyers, design firms and advertising agencies.
The felt-tip business end of her pen hovered uselessly over the page, over the verse she’d begun almost a week ago now. A solid hour staring stupidly at her own cursive scrawl, red ink too bright for blood, and she was no closer to finishing, and the cold – real Christmas weather – was beginning to numb her fingers, working its way in through her clothes. Daria closed the notebook, snapped the cap back on her pen, returned both to the army-surplus knapsack lying on the concrete.”
Kiernan manages to paint a vivid picture of the Birmingham that exists within the novel, a town well on its way to gentrification that still hasn’t lost its sense of history or its seedy under belly. She also uses location as a way of developing character. Seeing Daria sitting alone on the sidewalk outside of a warehouse, the reader automatically identifies her as an outsider. By watching her try, and fail, to write new song lyrics we discover she is an artistic type – a singer and musician. Her hovering pen and her decision to quit writing for the day hint at her own precarious place in the world; an inability to move forward that is echoed by the pretentiously down-trodden buildings around her that can’t quite decide if they want to be upscale lofts or run-down squats. By the end of the first scene I felt such a kinship with Daria Parker that I would have followed her into any story. Kiernan gives all her characters the same thorough and honest rendering, creating an intimate world of complex people.
As you can see, Kiernan has a way with words. Her language is so evocative it’s practically a form of teleportation. From the very first sentence I felt like I was in the story; I could hear the streetlights as they flickered to life and see the cracks in the sidewalk.
Silk is littered with intriguing descriptions and turns of phrase. On page 171 she describes a character who has been slapped as having “palm-print impressions framing his face like the tailfeathers of kindergarten turkeys.” On page 180, as Byron struggles to find the right key on an over-burdened keyring to fit a particular lock, when he finds it Kiernan says it slides in “cocksmooth.” I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t think to associate sex with the physical act of unlocking a door. It’s that unexpectedness coupled with Kiernan’s insight that makes her comparisons so remarkable.
Published in 1998, Silk has a distinctly post-grunge, Generation X vibe to it. Daria, Spyder, and Niki trip through the novel on a wave of uppers and downers that make the reader wonder how much of the story is real and how much is imagined. Though Kiernan builds great tension throughout the book, it ends with a sigh rather than the bang I was hoping for, and that’s my only complaint.
Silk is hypnotic. Kiernan’s engaging characters, evocative language, and Southern Gothic flavor will suck you in faster than the baddies in Spyder’s basement. You can bet I will be running out and buying the rest of her books ASAP, and this time I’ll make sure they stay at the top of my “to read” pile.
The Late, Lamented Molly Marx by Sally Koslow
I acquired The Late, Lamented Molly Marx through Library Thing’s Early Reviewers program. If you haven’t already, I insist that you go sign up right now. It’s a wonderful thing. The way it works is publishers send the good folks at Library Thing advanced review copies of their upcoming titles, and Library Thing gives the books away to site users in exchange for reviews. Each month a list of books available through Early Review is posted on the site, and registered participants can browse the list and request the ones they’d like to read. The requests are entered into a lottery and the randomly chosen winners receive advanced copies.
I requested The Late, Lamented Molly Marx because it sounded interesting. Molly Marx has everything a woman could want, a husband with a thriving medical practice, a beautiful daughter, and a great job as a freelance stylist. It isn’t until Molly is found dead on the bank of the Hudson River that it becomes apparent how un-charmed her life truly was. As Molly adjusts to the afterlife she can’t help but peek in on the people she loved as they struggle to solve the mystery of her death, and get on with their own lives
This was my first foray into chick lit, or women’s fiction, or whatever you call books marketed specifically to single, employed, middle-class, twenty and thirty something females. I studiously avoided the genre for years because I bought into the idea that chick lit was vapid fluff featuring superficial heroines. And, guess what? I was right!
The world of Molly Marx is all expensive bistros, Upper East Side duplexes, high fashion, interior design, and weekends abroad. All of the primary characters are rich and beautiful; they have high end, well paying jobs and never want for anything. They are sexy, glamorous, and shallow as rain puddles.
Intellectually, I understand why chick lit is popular. Like most mainstream literary fare it is pure escapist fantasy. Chick lit lets the reader experience what it’s like to be rich and powerful, graceful and fawned over, envied and ass-kissed. But, I guess I’m an anomaly because I’ve never had any interest in the rich and fabulous. Those aren’t the kind of people I want to spend time with, on or off the page. I prefer starving artist types; people who find a way to fit four roommates into a studio apartment just so they can afford to live in Manhattan; Salvation Army shoppers who aren’t necessarily into vintage clothing but can’t afford to shop at Old Navy, let alone Saks; Full-time college students who work full-time jobs, handle full course loads, and somehow manage to log hours at a required internship to boot. It’s true that challenge builds character, which might explain why the people who populate Molly’s world are so boring.
The biggest offender is Molly herself. Molly is completely passive. In life she never acted on her 
own desires, choosing instead to allow others to act upon her. She married her husband, not because she loved him, but because he was the first man to ask her. She moved from Greenwich Village to the Upper West Side, not because she wanted to, but because her mother-in-law wanted them nearby. She had a child, not because she wanted to, but because her husband thought it was time. Indecisive and naïve, Molly is more comfortable allowing others to make decisions for her than taking the time to figure out what she really wants.
She isn’t much different in death. Narrating the story as a disembodied spirit passing time in the Duration, Molly is able to watch over her nearest and dearest as they go about their lives, but is forbidden to interfere. She must remain passive, observing the aftermath of her own death, unable to ease the pains and shames it brings to light.
This makes Molly a problematic narrator. Though her voice is strong and punchy, her inability to act makes her a non-entity in her own story. More than once I wondered why Koslow chose to write this book in first person. She could have told the story just as effectively in third person for all the insight Molly’s perspective brings to the book. It’s difficult to invest in a character that spends her entire life and death acquiescing to others to such an extent that it robs her of her personality. And although I’m willing to concede that might be the whole point, it doesn’t make for very absorbing reading.
I never warmed up to the supporting characters either. Molly’s best friend, Brie, the heterosexual who dates women, is a fashion model turned lawyer who makes more money in a month than most people make in their whole lives. Molly’s husband, Barry, is an overly entitled, emotionally distant, compulsive philanderer. Lucy, Molly’s fraternal twin sister, is plain by comparison and her “sturdy” body makes her a shoe-in for the role of jealous frump. Each one is a caricature of a caricature, so flat and predictable it’s hard to care about them.
Pace is a problem in The Late, Lamented Molly Marx.It gets off to a slow start, taking nearly two hundred pages to find its rhythm. The story revolves around the investigation of Molly’s mysterious death. However, Koslow is never clear about what makes it mysterious. It seems as though Molly was involved in an unfortunate biking accident, and the reader is never told what led the police to proclaim her death “suspicious.” As a result, the investigation never feels particularly pressing. I had a hard time understanding why the lead detective became so emotionally invested in a case that seemed so banal.
The combination of a dull protagonist and weak plot makes the book drag. Tack on an ending that manages to be overly tidy while failing to answer any questions, and you can understand why I won’t be picking up another piece of chick lit any time soon.
Ravenous by Sharon Ashwood
Holly Carver is a witch on the rise. Despite a freak childhood accident that rendered her unable to perform “Big M” magic, she and her business partner, the lethally handsome and chronically undead Alessandro, have managed to eek out a nice living exorcising haunted houses and helping people find lost objects. She has a great boyfriend, lives in a house that has belonged to her family for generations, and is eager to start business school in the hopes of one day expanding her business.
But when dead bodies start popping up all over campus, Holly has to put her life on hold. Called in to help with the investigation, Holly and Alessandro can tell these are more than just run of the mill sorcerer or vampire attacks. Someone is trying to start a war, and it’s up to them to find out who. But, it’ll take more than “little m” magic to find the culprit…or for Holly to resist Alessandro’s charms.
I’m not a huge fan of romance novels, but I picked up Sharon Ashwood’s Ravenous, the first book in the Dark Forgotten series, because it sounded more action adventure, urban fantasy-esque than paranormal romance.
And, yes, I admit it, I liked the cover art. Pretty, leather-clad chick crouching against an urban landscape dangling a dagger from her hand? What’s not to like? In his fiction writing guide, Cunning & Craft, author Peter Selgin wrote, “What readers of fiction most want to learn about is people,” and that is definitely true for me. I picked up Ravenous because I wanted to learn more about the woman on the cover; wanted to reach below the surface and see what kind of woman lived beneath that outer vestige.
Ravenous turned out to be a good reminder of why one should never judge a book by its cover. Ashwood has populated the world of the Dark Forgotten with flat characters. Not one of them possesses even an ounce of personality. Holly is a witch who comes from a long line of powerful witches, and hopes to become a successful paranormal investigator. In 334 pages that’s all we find out about her. Ashwood does not bother to give her interests outside of those related to her magical abilities. Holly has no hobbies, no individual quirks, and no friends aside from those she accumulates through the murder investigation.
The same is true of the hero, Alessandro. He is draped in vampire cliché from the moment he steps foot on the page; he’s foreign, lethal, breath-takingly gorgeous, and covered from head to toe in black leather. That’s as deep as his character ever gets. About half way through the novel we learn Alessandro is a musician, that he plays numerous instruments and can sing in seven different languages. But, we never get to observe him enjoying a piece of music, playing a guitar, or singing a song. We never so much as hear him hum a tune under his breath. If Ashwood had bothered to bring this aspect of his personality to life through action it would have done wonders to flesh out his character. As is, they’re nothing but words on a page, as flat and featureless as Alessandro himself.
It’s a shame the people who populate the realm of the Dark Forgotten are so, well, forgettable, because Ashwood has actually succeeded in creating a compelling world. In it, vampires, werewolves, and supernaturals of all stripes have been integrated into human society. They own homes, have respectable jobs, and are issued social security numbers. While there are definite advantages to fitting in to human society, like not having to hide or pretend to be something they are not, supernaturals must also deal with the discrimination leveled at them by prejudiced humans. Additionally, supernaturals strive to preserve their own ancient traditions and customs in a modern world. It’s a scenario ripe with conflict, and I hope Ashwood will explore some of the more explosive possibilities as the series moves forward.
But, is having an interest in the world itself enough to make me continue on to the next book in the series? Probably not. I need to have people, people who captivate and surprise me, who I can relate to and sympathize with, and the world of the Dark Forgotten just doesn’t have them. Ashwood’s prose may be solid, she may be a talented writer, but without three dimensional characters she’s got no moral and emotional center for the reader to latch on to. Strong characters are what breathe life into a written work, and Ravenous is, like the murder victims chronicled within, dead on arrival.
The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall by L.J. Smith
I was twelve when the first book in The Vampire Diaries tetralogy was released back in 1991. I was immediately taken with the pretty, popular, and strong-willed Elena Gilbert, as well as her two vampire suitors, the sensitive Stefan and his womanizing brother Damon, not to mention Elena’s loyal friends Meredith, Bonnie, and Matt. Reading The Vampire Diaries was a transformative experience for me. I found Smith’s deliberate and well paced prose incredibly appealing. I also found her ability to make the simplest physical interactions between characters sensual without becoming sexually explicit, very admirable. When I wrote my senior thesis during my final year as an undergraduate Creative Writing major, I listed Smith as one of my primary influences as a writer.
Smith went on to write three more YA trilogies with a supernatural slant, as well as the successful Night World series, before withdrawing from the writing world one book short of completing the Night World series. Twelve years after the publication of her last novel and eighteen years after the publication of the last volume of The Vampire Diaries, Smith is back with the fifth installment, The Vampire Diaries: The Return: Nightfall. Though Nightfall is the first book in The Return trilogy, the series picks up right where Dark Reunion left off, making them the continuation of a series rather than a stand alone trilogy.
It must be noted from the get go that I have not picked up a YA novel since I was sixteen. Coincidentally, I outgrew YA fiction around about the same time Smith stopped writing it. As a result, I don’t really know what appeals to the YA audience these days, and can’t even guess at how a reader in the appropriate age demographic would respond to this novel. I can only evaluate it as a grown woman and long time fan that still possesses a great deal of love for the series.
It having been such a long time since I’d read the first four books, before starting Nightfall, I hauled out my first edition paperbacks and re-read the entire series to refresh my memory. My response this time around was less favorable than when I was twelve. I found it very difficult to like most of the characters. Elena is incredibly selfish and manipulative. I couldn’t figure out why I identified so much with her when I was younger. Of course, I realize the series is all about how Elena goes from being your stereotypical “mean girl” to a caring, selfless, and ultimately noble person, but that doesn’t change the fact that she remains almost entirely unsympathetic through the first two books. Stefan’s insistence on blaming himself for every negative thing that happens to the people he loves struck me as narcissistic. I liked Damon up until he forced Elena to exchange blood with him by threatening to kill her little sister, thus resulting in a metaphorical rape scene that is later referenced as the night Elena “succumbed” to him. I thought Bonnie was too sensitive and Matt was a door mat. Don’t get me wrong, all the characters have redeeming qualities. I just felt their flaws outweighed their virtues, making them difficult to like. The only character I didn’t have to work at liking was Meredith whose occasional “mean girl” tendencies and biting sarcasm were eclipsed by her level-headedness and compassion.
The writing, however, held up. Simple and descriptive, spare and deliberate; every scene, sentence, and snippet of dialogue advanced the plot. There wasn’t an ounce of fat to trim. Every single word in those books needed to be there. There are precious few writers in the world who can construct such tight stories, and it’s the primary reason I loved Smith’s books.
That said, twenty pages into Nightfall I knew something was wrong. Dark Reunion, the fourth book in the series, ends on the morning of June 21, 1992, and Nightfall picks up seven days after. Yet, all of a sudden there is 2009 technology in a 1992 world. Damon carries a hand held video recorder. Stefan has a personal computer. Everyone has a cell phone and they all make video calls to each other on a regular basis. None of these devices were readily available in 1992. If they had been, the first four books would have been significantly different since many of the most frightening scenes occur because one character can’t get in touch with another.
There is nothing I hate more than authors who disregard their own timelines or world rules. I think it’s the hallmark of a lazy writer. After seething for a while, I came up with an idea that I thought might explain the sudden time shift. I went down to my local Barnes and Noble and picked up a copy of the most recent edition of The Vampire Diaries. And there it was, just as I’d suspected – the years had been removed from all the diary entries in the reissued texts. On the final page of Dark Reunion, the diary entry Bonnie writes is simply dated June 21st, instead of 6/21/92 as in my first edition paperback.
I can understand Smith and HarperCollins wanting the books to appeal to today’s teens and thinking the only way to do so is by making the books as modern as possible. But disregarding the original timeline only hurts the series. First, it makes the books inconsistent. Assuming Smith hasn’t made any major changes to the original texts, having the characters go from possessing no modern tech devices in the first four books to having tons, is jarring. It changes the tone and alters the 
intensity of the dangers the characters face. Second, assuming that YA readers won’t read anything that isn’t set in the present is absurd and shows a marked lack of faith in young readers. If they can suspend disbelief long enough to accept that vampires walk freely among us, surely they can acknowledge a time when cell phones and the internet were not part of everyday life. Young readers can be drawn into a well written story even if it doesn’t take place in the present. I don’t see anyone rushing to modernize Little Women, The Secret Garden, or The Outsiders, and I’m pretty sure those books remain popular. Third, it totally disregards their other target demographic, pre-existing fans of the series; those of us who are already invested in the story and already familiar with the timeline. Making such a dramatic changes disregards the continuity of the series and the intelligence of the readers.
Though that was the first, unfortunately it was not the only problem I had with Nightfall. At 592 pages, Nightfall is a bloated novel. Though Smith has always written epic fiction, none of her previous books contained so much unnecessary material. There are entire scenes that do nothing to advance the plot, reveal character, or add depth to relationships. For instance, the first half of the book contains multiple love scenes between Elena and Stefan that reveal nothing the reader doesn’t already know. They serve no purpose other than to bog down the narrative. There is lots of unnecessary dialogue and redundant description, both of which are very uncharacteristic of Smith. I figure she could have cut a good 250 pages without sacrificing anything essential. The deliberate plotting, tight prose, and good pacing I’ve come to expect from her are completely absent here.
The story itself is simple – seven days after returning from the dead Elena Gilbert has forgotten everything she ever knew. She can’t talk, write, and can barely walk. She doesn’t recognize her friends and is completely reliant on Stefan. Elena’s return super-charged the already mystically saturated Fell’s Church, turning the town into a beacon of power that can be sensed by supernaturals across the globe. New beings with bad intentions begin flocking to Fell’s Church. When a handful of pre-teen girls start making uncharacteristically bold sexual advances on the men in town, Bonnie, Matt, and Meredith know something’s up and enlist the help of Stefan, Damon, and Elena to get to the bottom of it.
A number of things have changed in YA literature since Smith’s last novel hit the shelves. It is now acceptable to openly address matters like sex, pregnancy, and sexual orientation. It’s more acceptable for teenage characters to curse. Topics that had to be tip toed around back in 1992 are now fair game, and Smith does her best to throw each and every one of them into Nightfall. Characters who never so much as uttered the word “darn” in previous books shout “hell,” “slut,” and “bullshit” in Nightfall. Though the words themselves are not particularly shocking, they are out of character for the kids using them.
Sex plays a key role in Nightfall. There are several scenes in which barely dressed pre-pubescent girls proposition Matt while rubbing suggestively against him. These graphic scenes leave the reader feeling so dirty, showering at the end of each chapter is well advised. In the first four books the act of exchanging blood is used as a metaphor for sexual intercourse. In Nightfall, the metaphor is made blatant when it is explained that vampires don’t actually have sex because bloodlust takes the place of sexual desire. This was hinted at in the previous books, but by refraining from stating it outright Smith allowed the reader the choice of taking the metaphor at face value or imagining that there was more to the act than what was being stated outright. Over-clarifying the metaphor not only robs Damon and Stefan of their sex appeal, but it robs the reader of their fantasies. Before, a reader could imagine Damon or Stefan having sexy fun time with Elena. Now, that option is off the table. It removes the idea of consensual sexual intercourse within a committed relationship from the story, replacing it with the aforementioned pre-pubescent advances which ultimately paint sexuality as a dangerous thing. This marks a drastic change in tone. In the first four books tact, subtlety, and imagination were king. Controversial topics were handled delicately and that sensitivity was very attractive. It indicated a willingness on Smith’s part to trust her readers to piece together what was going on without having to be told outright. Nightfall, on the other hand, is all about getting in your face. The garish sexual displays and over-explanations rob the series of its sensuality.
Many readers and reviewers have stated that Smith tossed all the character development she built in the first half of the series out the window in Nightfall. I wouldn’t go that far. Nightfall contains plenty of solid character development that’s in line with the previous books. Take Matt for example. In Nightfall he finally gets sick of being a push over and begins standing up for himself. Bonnie is still determined to be brave in the face of danger, and we get to witness her failures and successes. Elena sacrificed her life in The Fury, and played guardian angel to her friends in Dark Reunion. Since she spent four volumes becoming a better person, it makes sense that she would return to Earth as a living angel, at least temporarily.
But there are a number of irregularities, and some character back-tracking. For example, at the end of Dark Reunion it’s indicated that consummate villainess, Caroline, is on her way to mending her rift with Elena, Bonnie, and Meredith. Yet, Nightfall opens with Caroline making a deal with a demon to “get back” at Elena. Her motivation is skimpy at best. On page 10, Caroline explains “I’m just so tired of hearing about Elena this, and Stefan that…and now it’s going to start all over.” But, for all intents and purposes Elena is still dead. The only people who know or can know she is alive are the people who saw her materialize in the woods. Since no one can know she is alive, Elena can’t over shadow Caroline the way she used to, therefore Caroline doesn’t have anything to fear and her sudden shift back to mega-bitch makes no sense.
Damon’s struggle to come to terms with his noble side continues in Nightfall. We see him show concern not just for Elena, but Bonnie, Meredith, and even Caroline, referring to them collectively has “his girls.” We see him save Bonnie from certain death more than once, not because anyone forced him to, but because he wants to. The only problematic aspect of his character arch is his sudden decision to actively start pursuing Elena again even though he seemed to have given up the quest and accepted her love for Stefan by the beginning of The Fury.
Both Caroline’s and Damon’s decisions to go after Elena are instances in which Smith sacrificed character continuity in the name of plot. Rather than allowing her villains the redemption they were well on their way to earning in Dark Reunion, she turns them back into “bad guys” to keep things interesting. This is what readers are railing against when they go on about the demolition of character in Nightfall. These particular choices feel forced and are not in line with the character development that took place in the original books.
Overall, Nightfall was a let down. I wanted to adore this book the way I adored its predecessors, but the choppy prose, changes in tone, and disregard for the original timeline prevented me from doing so. I could have accepted everything else if only the writing and continuity held up. Fans across the Web are hailing this book as the worst in the series. Even Smith herself admits Nightfall is not her best novel. I hope Smith will take in the criticisms and listen to what her fans are trying to tell her. The bad reviews aren’t meant to insult. They are the pleas of frustrated fans trying to remind Smith why they loved her work to begin with, and hoping she will bring wayward elements back in line with the original text as the series progresses.
