Fluttering Butterflies

Here at YA Galley we have very strong opinions about book covers. They matter. A lot. A good cover beckons the reader, and is also an indication of how much value the publisher places on the novel. We are more likely to pick up an book that has a  great cover with engaging art and high quality printing. We spent our meeting this week looking at recent galley covers and discussing what we liked, and what we didn't like.  Good Covers on the right were simple, had good color schemes, a focus on one object, weren't too overwhelming, had contrasting colors, no faces, depth, and a smooth font.   Bad Covers on the left had people posing, which included girls in long flowing dresses, couples kissing, and half-faces, had garish colors, cheesy bling, and bad illustration.   We really liked some of the books on the left, but the covers were definitely a detraction. Some of the books with great covers were actually not that wonderful, but the covers were so much more appealing t...

by Sarah Beth Durst Eve is a girl placed in a special witness protection program that concentrates on people like her who can do magic.  They protect her and other strong magic-weilders from a mysterious serial killer who has been targeting people like them.  However, Eve cannot use her magic without blacking out and having visions of the Magician and the Storyteller, and she has no memory of her life before the witness protection, except for a few flashes here and there.  Often, when she blacks out, she'll lose days, weeks, or even months of her memories.  All she knows is that she is very important to the people trying to catch the serial killer, and they need her to remember her past. The plot developed slowly, but not in a bad way.  It took a while to figure out what was going on, but figuring it out was interesting.  The memory loss was done pretty well, and the characters were consistent and distinct.  Three of the characters - Aiden, Topher, and...

by Elizabeth Knox Canny is 16 years old and lives in a world "very like our own" in 1959.  She is a mathematical genius, remembers pretty much everything, and has the unique ability to see "Extra," which she later discovers is part of an intricate magic system that only some can use, mainly the Zarenes.  The Zarenes are a family that live in Zarene Valley, and Canny stumbles upon them while traveling with her older brother, Sholto, and his girlfriend, Susan, on a research project of the 1929 coal mine explosion that happened near the valley.  The only Zarenes that live in the valley are between five and thirteen, plus Iris, Cyrus, Lealand, and Ghislain.  Canny spends a lot of time wandering around, lying to her brother, and discovering the secrets of the valley and her past.  After quite a lot of this, the end happens.  And it's not because she figures anything out.  It just happens.  Canny comes up with various ways to do what she wants, most of ...

by Kit Grindstaff This book was published in April 2013         I was looking for some magic and fantasy so I picked up The Flame in the Mist. The cover was well done and it seemed to reek of magic. So far so good. I launched into Jemma's world where she and her family live in a castle and rule over the land. They love to eat rotten food and spoiled milk, and every week make an offering to Mordrake and Mordrana, their family ancestors. Using magic they summon up evil things like bats, spiders, and monsters. However Jemma hates the weekly ceremonies and falters at doing anything evil. Obviously, she is different.         I read one fourth of the book before I skipped to the last page, read the last paragraph, and declared the book finished.         The plot moves a bit too quickly and awkwardly, using sleeping, escaping, and sneaking around heavily and repetitively in the plot. Too ...

by: Sylvia Lewis This book has a pretty good start.  Ellie is a girl that seems to make everyone she touches sick.  She has no friends and she's fine with that.  Then a new kid, Nate, comes.  They becomes friends, as you might have guessed.  Then Nate tells Ellie that there are more people like her and that she actually works with life.  He works with death which is why he knows about this.  Everything is going well until things happen with Nate's family -- his father worked in a secret organization of these special people.  Then the end comes and is rather silly.  The book was doing pretty will with the viviomancer-necromancer thing but then this secret organization ends up being pretty stupid. This book is a 2.5 .  It had a good potential but the characters and plot weren't complex enough.  It was too simple.  It was sort of like a souffle that is growing and growing but then because the baker forgot to add something it simpl...

By: Ursula Dubosarsky I have to start by saying that this cover is beautiful.  The golden, orange, and brown tones of the cover melt together and form a watercolor that fits the book perfectly.  While the cover is a rather simple scene -- a path leading to two people off in the distance, the overall picture is beautiful.  The way the leaves border the top make it seem as if we are peering into one single moment shared by the two people off in the distance.  This is exactly what the book is like.  It is a short book with about 150 pages.  It is a glimpse into the life of eleven school girls in Australia during the Vietnam War.  The writing style matches the beauty of the cover.  Ursula Dubosarsky writes from the eyes of the school girls, Cubby in particular.  Cubby seems to be a little scared and confused.  Although it never states her confusion or her fear clearly the writing brought it out so that I felt it rather than saw it in Cubby. ...

by Trish Doller . Available September 2013        I picked up this book feeling wary, because I previously read Room by Emma Donoghue. I found Room to be a masterful, realistic, and respectful way of portraying a kidnapping from the victim's perspective. After reading that book, I didn't know if Where the Stars Still Shine would rise to the challenge and give a unique look at a kidnapping case or if it would disappoint me. More on this later.        When Callie was just in kindergarten, she was kidnapped by her loving yet domineering and slightly off-kilter mother. She's now 17, reunited with the father who she barely remembers, and must transition to her new family and life. She learns independence, new responsibilities, learns to make decisions for herself, and faces the issues from her past. She especially learns what a respectful, loving relationship is all about... By getting hooked up with a boyfriend and having lots and ...