Mundie Moms

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Book Review & Giveaway: Skylark by Meagan Spooner



Published by: Caroldrhoda Lab
To Be Released on: August 1st, 2012
Source: Book from author to review/giveaway
3 stars: It's A Good Read
Purchase from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | IndieBound

Sixteen year-old Lark Ainsley has never seen the sky.

Her world ends at the edge of the vast domed barrier of energy enclosing all that’s left of humanity. For two hundred years the city has sustained this barrier by harvesting its children's innate magical energy when they reach adolescence. When it’s Lark’s turn to be harvested, she finds herself trapped in a nightmarish web of experiments and learns she is something out of legend itself: a Renewable, able to regenerate her own power after it’s been stripped.

Forced to flee the only home she knows to avoid life as a human battery, Lark must fight her way through the terrible wilderness beyond the edge of the world. With the city’s clockwork creations close on her heels and a strange wild boy stalking her in the countryside, she must move quickly if she is to have any hope of survival. She’s heard the stories that somewhere to the west are others like her, hidden in secret – but can she stay alive long enough to find them?


A well crafted story that's infused with elements of magic, science-fiction and given a dystopian feel, this is a book unlike any other I've read. Skylark takes readers into a dark, dangerous world where magic exists, and nothing is as it seems. 


Skylark follows the story of Lark, a young teenage girl who lives in a world that's been crafted around her. Lark's city was built and runs on the harvested power it takes from it's citizens, something that's deemed honorable. When Lark is finally chosen for her harvesting she not only finds out the shocking truth behind the harvesting, but what she really is and what she's capable of doing. Lark has an fascinating group of characters who make up her world, and throughout her story she'll discover some shocking truths about them, including her own brothers. There's plenty of betrayal, shocking revelations, and a few secrets that she'll uncover on her journey for answers. 


Lark for me was a hard character to really love. Given her circumstances, the world she lives on and all that's going on around her, I had expected her to be a much tougher, and stronger character than she is. It's not bad to get through every tough situation she faced with the help of someone or something else, but I wanted to see her get out some her situations by herself. Had I been able to do that, I think I would have connected with her and liked her more than I did. Instead I found myself more fascinated in both Oren and Kris, the two guys who enter Lark's life, and who both have this air of mystery around them. I liked not knowing everything about them in this book. It kept the story interesting, and more engaging for me as I tried to uncover what it is both of them are hiding.


The world itself is fascinating and unlike anything I've read about before. I like the interesting use of magic, and the dystopian feel Meagan's world had about it. While I enjoyed some the scenes that took place and the elements that Meagan included in her story, there were a few things I felt didn't really fit in with the flow of the book. I won't say what they are to keep this review spoiler free, but, I felt these few minor things could have been excluded from the book or should have addressed a little bit more to make them feel like they fit in with what was going on. Or maybe it was just me and no one will else will be bothered by them at all. 


Over all I felt like this was a good debut from Meagan and I'm interested to see what she does with her storyline. Skylark's ending makes me think they'll be a second book, which I think would be great, because Meagan definitely leaves a few things unanswered she could create another story line with. Either way, Skylark has a fast paced plot line, plenty of surprising twits, and an original plot, that I think YA fans will enjoy. Don't forget to check out my interview with  Meagan from earlier today. 




The Giveaway:
THANK YOU to Meagan, I have a SIGNED copy of Skylark to giveaway! TO ENTER, please fill out the form below. 1 entry per person, US residents only, you must be 13 yrs of age or older to enter (under requires a parent/guardian's permission to do so).


Skylark Blog Tour: Author Interview



For today's Skylark Blog Tour stop, I'm excited to have author Meagan Spooner on Mundie Moms. She's stopped by to answer a few of my questions about her debut, which will be out on bookstore shelves TOMORROW! First, here's a little about her book:



Vis in magia, in vita vi. In magic there is power, and in power, life. 

For fifteen years, Lark Ainsley waited for the day when her Resource would be harvested and she would finally be an adult. After the harvest she expected a small role in the regular, orderly operation of the City within the Wall. She expected to do her part to maintain the refuge for the last survivors of the Wars. She expected to be a tiny cog in the larger clockwork of the city. 

Lark did not expect to become the City's power supply. 

For fifteen years, Lark Ainsley believed in a lie. Now she must escape the only world she's ever known...or face a fate more unimaginable than death. 


To Be Released on: August 1st, 2012

Interview:

Hi Meagan! Thank you for being on Mundie Moms today to talk about your debut, Skylark. Are you able to sum up what it feels like to a published author to a few words or less? I can only imagine how surreal that must feel.

Thank you for having me! Surreal is actually a pretty good word for it. Also, see: amazing, terrifying, humbling, and crazy-making.

What inspired you to start writing Skylark?

The initial glimmerings of the world in SKYLARK came to me first, while listening to a public radio piece on the energy crisis. I was only listening with half my brain, but it did make me think about alternate power sources, and my mind (being what it is) leaped to magic. I think the real inspiration, though, came when I figured out whose story, within that world, I most wanted to tell. I think there's a little bit of the kid I was (and still am deep down) inside Lark... afraid she'll never fit in, uncertain of her strength, always wondering if perhaps there's something else, a little further beyond the places she's gone. SKYLARK is above all else a character story, and for me that was the real driving force behind my writing it. I wanted to see what Lark became.

Do you have a favorite moment or line from your book that you can share with us?

What I wanted was to go back, unlearn what I had learned, make him again just a boy, helping a girl, lost in the wilderness.

But I can't tell you why. I'm not being cagey, I promise! It's just spoiler-y to explain why this is one of my favorite moments in the book. I will say that the heartbreaking things are what stick with me, whether it's in my own writing or in someone else's.

What's something you came to admire about your character, Lark?

Her capacity for faith. I'm not really talking about religion, or anything spiritual whatsoever, when I say faith--but her first major decision in the book, the decision to flee the city she knows for the wild, potentially lethal, unknown land beyond the Wall comes from the fact that she believes there has to be something better out there. And in the beginning, this ends up being tangled up in naivete, as well. But I think she outgrows that as the story progresses, leaving her with simple conviction. And through all the ups and downs, particularly the downs (and there are many) she hangs onto that capacity. Betrayed, lied to, half-starved, stripped of everything she thought she knew--she still gets back up and says, "There's more than this." I think that makes it a hopeful book, despite its dark moments.

What author has been the greatest influence on you as a writer?

Waaay too many to name, but I'll do my best to at least narrow down the list a little and give you three: Lois Lowry, Robin McKinley, Peter Beagle.

If you could give one piece of advice to aspiring writers, what would that be?

Keep moving. The moment you let yourself stop, whether it's that you stop writing, stop critiquing, stop querying, or even just stop reading, you're going to make it twenty times harder to start again later. It takes time to build momentum and build discipline, and when you stop you lose that so quickly, no matter how long it took you to gain it in the first place. The instant you give in to the urge to stagnate, something switches over in your brain and you start treading water. Which, if I can risk stretching my metaphor too thin, will only make you tired--it won't get you anywhere. Always keep reading, writing, learning. Keep swimming. Keep moving. 


Bio:
Meagan Spooner grew up reading and writing every spare moment of the day, while dreaming about life as an archaeologist, a marine biologist, an astronaut. She graduated from Hamilton College in New York with a degree in playwriting, and has spent several years since then living in Australia. She's traveled with her family all over the world to places like Egypt, South Africa, the Arctic, Greece, Antarctica, and the Galapagos, and there's a bit of every trip in every story she writes.

She currently lives and writes in Northern Virginia, but the siren call of travel is hard to resist, and there's no telling how long she'll stay there. 

In her spare time she plays guitar, plays video games, plays with her cat, and reads.

She is the author of SKYLARK, coming out August 1 from Carolrhoda Lab/Lerner Books. She is also the co-author of THESE BROKEN STARS, forthcoming from Disney-Hyperion in Fall 2013

Twitter Tuesday - Andrea Cremer


Two items of happy news from Andrea Cremer. She tweeted the first yesterday and now my answer to "Hey, Sophie, can you point me in the direction of well written erotica?" will be -- wait until October 2013. From the Publishers Weekly annoucement :
Bestselling YA author Andrea Cremer has agreed to do an adult erotic trilogy for Dutton. The author, who is best known for her popular Nightshade series (which Penguin’s Philomel imprint publishes), sold North American rights to three books that will be set within the Nightshade world. Dutton president and publisher Brian Tart negotiated the deal with Richard Pine and Charlie Olsen at Inkwell Management, and Dutton’s Jessica Horvath will be editing. The first book in the series—Dutton said it’s about “the lives, passions, and betrayals of lovers whose very desires invite their dooms”—is scheduled for October 2013.
Andrea's romantic scenes have always been sizzling but now an adult, erotic trilogy? I have to approve of a trend that has some of my favorite authors writing adult stories especially if they are set in a world we know and love.

Then today, her Nightshade, e-novella, Aftermath, is available at both Barnes & Noble and amazon. This is a must-buy for some of us. Guess what I'll be reading during the kids' swim lessons today?

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