Cover Crazy: The Far West

Cover Crazy is a weekly meme hosted by The Book Worms on Mondays. The idea is to showcase a beautiful book cover each week.

This week, I'm crazy about...
The Far West, by Patricia C. Wrede

I'm very excited to finally see the cover for the final book in Patricia C. Wrede's Frontier Magic trilogy. There's a lot I really like about it, but there are also a few aspects I'm not quite as crazy about.

I really like how the cover designer decided to keep the cover for The Far West in the same style as the cover for Across the Great Barrier. I wish the publisher would create a new cover for Thirteenth Child to match. The covers for the second two books in the trilogy capture the feel of the trilogy more than the cover for first book (although the  cover for Thirteenth Child does show a different aspect of the story's style). I love the cover for Across the Great Barrier and I think it works really well together with the cover for The Far West.

The one issue I have with the cover for The Far West is the girl on the cover. I can't tell whether the publisher used the same model for the Far West cover and for the Across the Great Barrier cover. If the covers were meant to show different people of course they'd be different models, but I'm fairly certain both covers show Eff. And even if the same person was on both covers, I don't really like the expression of the girl on the cover for The Far West.

On the other hand, there are a lot of elements on this cover that make me very happy. I'm particularly intrigued by the dragon-like creatures in the upper right. I'm pretty sure Wrede's alternate America doesn't have dragons, but it does have quite a variety of other creatures. I really like the placement of the bare trees in the foreground and the mountain range in the back. I love that Eff is holding what looks like a book (is it a magic book??), and my eyes keep going back to the excellently chosen title font and design.


Want to know more about The Far West?

Summary (from Goodreads):
Eff is an unlucky thirteenth child...but also the seventh daughter in her family. Her twin brother, Lan, is a powerful double seventh son. Her life at the edge of the Great Barrier Spell is different from anyone else's that she knows. When the government forms an expedition to map the Far West, Eff has the opportunity to travel farther than anyone in the world. With Lan, William, Professor Torgeson, Wash, and Professor Ochiba, Eff finds that nothing on the wild frontier is as they expected. There are strange findings in their research, a long prarie winter spent in too-close quarters, and more new species, magical and otherwise, dangerous and benign, than they ever expected to find. And then spring comes, and the explorers realize how tenuous life near the Great Barrier Spell may be if they don't find a way to stop a magical flood in a hurry. Eff's unique way of viewing magic has saved the settlers time and again, but this time all of Columbia is at stake if she should fail.

Also, click here to read my reviews of Thirteenth Child and Across the Great Barrier

What do you think of the cover for The Far West?
Leave your thoughts in the comments!

What are you crazy about this week?

Mini-Review: Dealing With Dragons

by Patricia C. Wrede
Age Recommendation: 8-10 (but fun for everyone)
Mass Market Paperback, 212 pages
     and Audiobook, 5 dics
Published July 1st 1992 by Scholastic Inc. (first published September 18th 1990)
Series: Book 1 of The Enchanted Forest Chronicles

Summary (from Goodreads):
"I want to do things. . . ."

Take one bored princess. Make her the seventh daughter in a very proper royal family. Have her run away.

Add one powerful, fascinating, dangerous dragon.

Princess Cimorene has never met anyone (or anything) like the dragon Kazul. But then, she's never met a witch, a jinn, a death-dealing talking bird, or a stone prince either.

Princess Cimorene ran away to find some excitement.

She's found plenty.

My Mini-Review:
Dealing With Dragons was a ton of fun. In a time of rash and impulsive YA protagonists, I loved this book about practical, no-nonsense princess Cimorene. I listened to the audiobook version, and although some of the voices were a little bit silly, overall it was a wonderful audiobook. The story is simple and fun, nothing too complex, yet it is a wonderfully magical and delightfully innocent tale that is simply a pleasure to listen to. I can still hear the voices of Cimorene, Kazul, Therendil (her hopelessly boring fiancé), and Alianora (her best friend, princess of the dragon Woraug as I think back on the story. This was a wonderful way to spend an afternoon, and I will definitely keep it in mind when I come looking for a good book to listen to again.

Review: Across the Great Barrier

by Patricia C. Wrede
Start Date: 12 August 2011
End Date: 12 August 2011
Hardcover, 352 pages
Published August 1st 2011

Summary (from Goodreads):
Eff is an unlucky thirteenth child - her twin brother, Lan, is a powerful seventh son of a seventh son. And yet, Eff is the one who saved the day for the settlements west of the Great Barrier. Her unique ways of doing magic and seeing the world, and her fascination with the magical creatures and land in the Great Plains push Eff to work toward joining an expedition heading west. But things are changing on the frontier.

There are new professors of magic for Eff and Lan to learn to work with. There's tension between William and his father. And there are new threats on the frontier and at home. To help, Eff must travel beyond the Barrier, and come to terms with her magical abilities—and those of her brother, to stop the newest threat encroaching on the settlers.

With wit, magic, and a touch of good pioneer sense, Patricia C. Wrede weaves a fantastic tale of the very wild west.

This book is the sequel to Thirteenth Child. Click for my review of Thirteenth Child.

I will mark spoilers for Thirteenth Child in green.
I will mark spoilers for Across the Great Barrier in blue.

My Review:
For the most part, my feelings about Across the Great Barrier are the same as those for Thirteenth Child. Across the Great Barrier felt very much like a middle book in a trilogy (which it is). It didn't have anything radically new or story-changing in terms of plot, and the story picked up right after Thirteenth Child ended and continued it for the next few years.

Like Thirteenth Child, Across the Great Barrier is very character-driven, as is somewhat to be expected. All of the characters have wonderful stories of their own, and they all seem so real. I'd happily read books focused on any one of them. There are many of the same characters from Thirteenth Child, and a handful of new ones as well. Eff becomes much more independent, and is finding her place in the world (all that character development in Thirteenth Child paid off). She continues to grow and develop as the book goes on, and it is wonderful to see her growing into her true character. I wish I could have read more about Lan and William, but they're both away at school, which is a little disappointing, since I'm still rooting for Eff and William to get together. Maybe in the next book. Even though we don't get to see much of Lan, there are a few great chapters where Eff and her family go to visit him at school (not saying why; it's a big spoiler) and it's easy to see how much he's changed and gain so much insight into his character.

An interesting theme present in both Thirteenth Child and Across the Great Barrier was the development of the Rationalists. For those of you who haven't yet read either books, the Rationalists are a group of people who have decided to stop using all magic because they view magic as a crutch. This is a problem in the eyes of many non-Rationalists because magic is needed for settlement protection spells and the like  to keep out the magical and dangerous wildlife. (Spoilers for Thirteenth Child until the next paragraph.) In Thirteenth Child, the Rationalists apply for a settlement of their own, and eventually receive one. Eff's sister, Rennie, elopes with Brant Wilson, a dashing young Rationalist, and goes to live in their settlement. Eff visits Brant and Rennie once in Thirteenth Child and once in Across the Great Barrier, and it's fascinating to see how the Rationalist society changes between the two books. In Across the Great Barrier, they've become much more extreme, even going so far as to advocate bringing in mirror bugs to wipe out all traces of magic in the settlement (Spoiler for Across the Great Barrier, highlight to view). I loved looking at how Rennie changed throughout the books because of her magical upbringing and the fact that she came to the settlement for Brant rather than for the ideals of Rationalism. She didn't choose to become a rationalist, and the life shapes her as much as being a thirteenth child shaped Eff. I can't wait to find out how her story continues in the next book.

Like in Thirteenth Child, it seemed like the big "problem" (the Medusas in this case) (spoiler for Across the Great Barrier, highlight to view) was not the point of the story. The point was the characters, all of which were wonderfully written. Tthe plot followed much of the same pattern as that of Thirteenth Child: Eff starts out in town learning things, she goes out west, she finds some big problem, and she figures out how to solve the problem because of all the things she's learned throughout the book. But since the plot is mostly a vehicle for the character development, I didn't mind the formulaic-ness off it at all. 

Overall thoughts: Across the Great Barrier is an extension of the narrative in Thirteenth Child. I liked reading them together because they read like one continuous story. All the characters are so real, it's amazing. I definitely want to read the third book in the trilogy, The Far West, which is apparently scheduled for 2013. I will be rereading the first two at that time, because I think its more valuable to read them together than apart. I really enjoyed Across the Great Barrier, and found it very unique, not at all like other books coming out now.

Review: Thirteenth Child

by Patricia C. Wrede
Start Date: 9 August 2011
End Date: 12 August 2011
Paperback, 344 pages
Published April 15th 2009

Summary (from Goodreads):
Eff was born a thirteenth child. Her twin brother, Lan, is the seventh son of a seventh son. This means he's supposed to possess amazing talent -- and she's supposed to bring only bad things to her family and her town. Undeterred, her family moves to the frontier, where her father will be a professor of magic at a school perilously close to the magical divide that separates settlers from the beasts of the wild.

With wit and wonder, Patricia Wrede creates an alternate history of westward expansion that will delight fans of both J. K. Rowling and Laura Ingalls Wilder.

My Review:
I first read Thirteenth Child a year ago, last August. I remembered the main plot points when I picked it up again, but it was good to go back and reread it. I think I even enjoyed it more the second time around.

Thirteenth Child is not a plot-driven novel so much as a character-driven novel. The entire story revolves around Eff and how she develops and changes because of what happens to her over the years. In fact, the big "problem" (the mirror bugs) (spoiler, highlight to view) doesn't show up until more than halfway through the book, and Eff needs all the character development of the first half and the skills she's acquired in order to solve the problem. Some readers might take some issue with this, as it's easy to say not much actually "happens" but when one looks at the novel as more of a character study than a story driven by the need to know what happened next, it's a lot easier to appreciate and enjoy.

As this is a character-driven novel, the depth in all of the characters was great. Eff especially felt so real, and I could easily imagine her as a real person (and a friend of mine). It was so clear to see how all the people around Eff affected her worldview and created the challenges she much overcome to grow as a person. Wrede gave all of her characters great depth, and they all came alive for me because of it. I could really understand all of the characters, not just Eff, which made this book special, as the supporting characters often don't get as much depth as the main character.

The alternate history aspect was one of my favorite parts of Thirteenth Child. As mentioned in the summary, Thirteenth Child takes place in an alternate version of American - or rather, Columbian, as it is called - history. I enjoyed it even more than I had the last time I read Thirteenth Child, since I've now taken American History. Wrede does a very clever job of creating a history that is recognizable, but ultimately unique to Eff's magical world.

(Spoilers of what doesn't happen in the next paragraph, but no spoilers of what does happen.)
On a side note, I was both disappointed with and appreciated that Thirteenth Child was not a love story. I spent the entire book waiting for Eff and William to fall in love, but they never did. If I remember correctly, I spent the whole time waiting for them to get together the last time I read it too. I like that Wrede kept Thirteenth Child different from all the other books out there by not having them fall in love, and I get that it would have drastically changed Eff's character - very important in a book so grounded in character - but it would have been very sweet. I hope Eff and William do fall in love in future books.

Overall thoughts: Thirteenth Child was a wonderful middle-grade novel taking place in an alternate American history and chock-full of magic, but expect a character study rather than an intense plot.