Sunshine by Robin McKinley Summary and Reviews
|
List Price: Our Price: $7.89 You Save: $16.06 (67%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.27 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of Sunshine
Book Review: "Sunshine" is dim
Summary: 2 Stars
Robin McKinley's latest book reads like she was on a crash diet while she wrote it. Food, food, food, and more food; the lead character lives and breathes foods. Robin McKinley is an able writer, and it's intriguing to see her shift from monsters and spirits to vampires. But unfortunately the execution leaves something to be desired.Rae Sneddon (known to everyone as "Sunshine"), who makes cinnamon rolls at her stepfather's bakery, is kidnapped by a gang of vampires one night when she goes out to an old lakeside cabin. She's stuffed into an evening gown and chained in a decrepit ballroom, near a hungry vampire who is also trapped there. But he doesn't eat her. Instead, Con sticks it out, asking her to tell him stories and anecdotes, and she tries to oblige.
Sunshine draw on her own magic to help herself and Con escape during the day. After he vanishes, she tries to go back to her old life. But a mysterious wound, suspicious SOF officers, and the revelation of impending global doom (because of vampires) draws her back to Con, when both of them are threatened by the vampire who chained them together in the first place...
McKinley shifts her territory here. Instead of more generic medieval fantasy, she goes in for contemporary vampire/fantasy; she has the skill to make any scene at night absolutely bloodcurdling. The problem is, between the spellbinding stretches of intriguing, dark, sensuous material, there are much longer stretches of baking, whining, historical infodumping, un-erotic semi-sexual interludes with Con and Mel, and thinking about the personal quirks of customers.
The backdrop is intriguing, if underused; the rather poorly-defined world of vampires, werewolves, demons, and other "Others" is given a fresh twist, and the possibility of them taking over human civilization is genuinely chilling. Rae's blossoming magic (fuelled by sunlight) is an unusual twist, and one that I wish had been explored further.
Rae isn't a particularly engaging heroine; she seems more like a dissatisfied middle-aged woman than a young, inexperienced one. There really isn't anything likable about her. Con is intriguing, an enigmatic walking corpse, but McKinley doesn't let us in his head. Many of the promising characters (like Rae's mom or her biker boyfriend Mel) aren't explored in full; they're both extremely interesting, but left on the backburner in favor of even more baked goods.
"Sunshine" is an interesting read, but not a very fulfilling one. Enough loose threads are left dangling for a sequel, but hopefully one that's tighter and sharper than this one.
Book Review: 300 page long ad for an upcoming series
Summary: 1 Stars
"Beautiful Writing"? You've got to be kidding me! This writer is repetitive in the extreme in her use of phrases and her character details. Reading this book it's as Yogi Berri said, "I'ts Deja Vu all over again". The main character is a baker, and by page 100 you're already sick of hearing descriptions of her great cinnamon rolls. By 300, you're well past apathy into utter boredom.The world the author creates here, sadly, is potentially extremely interesting. The Vampires have a backstory that is eluded to, and at seems at least as interesting if not more so than the interview with a vampire world. Yet, the clues and hints that are given at page 100 are barely extrapolated on by the end. I don't mind not being given the answers. I like mysteries. But, to keep momentum you have to supply more and more questions. Here you begin with 10 questions and end with 9 questions.
Yet, the book ends with a whimper. There's no twist, or new interesting angles. The card on the table on page 1 are the same as whats there at the end. It simply feels like a come-on to buy the next books in some series. Avoid.
Book Review: A "Partly Sunny" Book
Summary: 3 Stars
I finished this book in a few days. It was a quick and enjoyable read. The language was a bit to reminiscent of Joss Whedon's Buffy slang for my liking, and I found most characters beyond Sunshine and Constantine to be one-dimensional. This novel felt like it was setting itself up to be yet another vampire series, a la Laurel Hamilton (of whom I'm not a big fan). If this book remains a stand alone, I think I will respect it a bit more for it's willingness to leave a few strings untied and left up to the reader's imagination.As for plot, it was a bit lacking beyond the vampire/mystical reality. I felt that the author used the bakery as a way to pass the time instead of using it to give Sunshine some depth. There are some very striking moments in the novel, usually centering on Sunshine's developing bond with Constantine. The secondary characters, such as Sunshine's family and boyfriend, feel more like blips in the story or, when they actually play a small part, they are carbon copies - bland and practically useless.
One major problem with the writing was that I found myself skimming or practically skipping pages and being able to still know what's going on. The narrative was too often a stream of consciousness or overly tangential with unneccessary background information that did little for the storyline.
If you're looking for a book that's a quick read with progressively increasing elements of mystical reality, then this book is worth it. Otherwise, I'd keep scanning the shelves.
Book Review: A Departure from the Norm
Summary: 4 Stars
Even for die-hard McKinley fans, this is a book you either love or hate. We're all used to her great fantasy books and her retold fairy tales, which is why this venture into sci-fi seems so...drastic.
I wasn't so sure at first that I would like Sunshine, but I quickly found that I couldn't put it down. The story draws you in, and her quirky characters and unique style adds to it. True, "Beauty and the Vampire" has been done before, but never quite like this. This vampire isn't bad-boy or sexy, at least not in the traditional way. This romance isn't anything out of fairy tales, that's for sure.
So yes, it takes some getting used to. But if you've read McKinley before you'll recognize her style, and of course, her uniqueness. In the end I was left wanting more, and that's a sure sign of a great book.
Book Review: A Hollywood blockbuster, angora sweater of a book
Summary: 5 Stars
Well depicted vampire alienness; tons of bad guys' blood; deft light romance; and a plot, world, and characters in a comforting weave but with dozens of threads that you'd like to follow. The protagonist/narrator's fuzzy chatterbox maunderings are overlong, but they do improve texture and pacing and are easy to skim. Genre afficiandos may miss the more prominent sex and fleshed-out backstory of "regular" vampire romances.