There is trouble in the Dells. The last king had been controlled by the human monster, Cansrel, and between the two of them they made a mess of the kingdom. Now there are factions who want to take the kingdom away from young King Nash and war is on the horizon.

Monsters are terribly beautiful.  They are shaped like any other animal of their species, but they come in vibrant colors.  Monsters stun their prey with their beauty, and then take over their minds, making the prey that much easier to catch.

Fire, Cansrel’s daughter,  is the last human monster.  She is beautiful beyond words with hair the color of fire.  Her appearance instills great passion in all who see her.  Non human monsters want nothing more than to consume her and humans either love her or hate her.

King Nash sends for Fire so that she might interrogate strangers, assassins and supposed supporters to find out who the enemy is, what they are planning, and how to keep the country from falling apart.  But, Fire is not like her father.  She hated what Cansrel did with his power and she is afraid that if she uses her power, she will become like him.

But, first she has to get to King City.  Imagine how hard that is when there are monster raptors dropping upon her from above, because they really, really want to eat her.  Then there are the humans in the army surrounding her who really, really love her, or really, really hate her.  (Imagine the love to be like that seen at a rock concert.  Uncontrolled hysteria.  Not everyone is effected that way, but enough are to become a problem.)  It is a good thing that she has a guard of 20 people who know how to control their own minds.

Fire by Kristin Cashore is a companion novel to Graceling (a 2009 Teens’ Top Ten winner). You can read either one first.  But, I expect that if you read one, you will really, really want to read the other.

Here we are at the last week of the tournament and we have Ninjas vs Fairies.  Who would have thought that these would be the final two?  I thought for sure that the vampires would have a go of it…

Anyway.  I would expect ninjas and fairies, both, to be hyper aware of their surroundings.  Both are committed to the effort of being unseen.  Ninjas may have a greater level of concentration and determination, whereas fairies might be a bit flighty.  Then again, fairies have magic on their side.

Who will win and be the final one standing in the Read Beyond Reality Tournament?  Cast your vote and find out next week who won.

YALSA reports that more than 11,000 teens voted for the 2009 Teens’ Top Ten and here is the list in order of votes:

1.  Green, John Paper Towns
2.  Meyer, Stephenie Breaking Dawn
3.  Collins, Suzanne The Hunger Games
4.  Clare, Cassandra City of Ashes
5.  Hopkins, Ellen Identical
6.  Gaiman, Neil The Graveyard Book
7.  McMann, Lisa Wake
8.  Cast, Kristin & P.C. Untamed
9.  Lockhart, E. The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks
10.  Cashore, Kristin Graceling

Of the 10, I have read four and enjoyed them all.

Last week Fairies and Zombies won their battles and now square off against each other.

Fairies and zombies are animated by magic, but fairies are able to use theirs. Fairies are tricky and zombies are decidedly not tricky. They are determined to get to what ever it is they have decided to get to for what ever reason they started. They are unlikely to be distracted from their goal. I think that fairies are flakes. They may start out towards their goal, but are easily distracted. If they forget what they are doing the zombies may overwhelm them.

However, fairies are fleet of foot, whereas zombies are plodding. This could go to the fairies.

As usual, state your opinions, read the opinions of others, and then go vote.

Our winners from week one are back. Who will win between ninjas and vampires?

Both have good tracking skills. Both are persistent. Did you know that there is vampire lore that says that they are unable to cross running water? Well, it has been said that ninjas can walk on water. With the help of tools. Some people say that it would never work, but even so, they could still swim across (unlike vampires). Or they could use a tube or a reed to breath underwater and do a sneak attack that way.

Of course, this all falls apart if the vampire steers clear of water. What is another argument? Vampires are fast. Ninjas are not anywhere near as fast. So, a point to the vampires. Ninjas can function outside during daylight hours. Depending on who’s lore you are working with, some vampires can, others can’t. Assign your own point values…

I don’t know. Who do you think will win in ninjas vs vampires? Again, state your reasons, read the opinions of others and vote.

Has anyone looked at the booklists?

Hmm.  I am thinking that this is an unfair fight.  What chance do the undead have against visitors from outer space?

Zombies are already dead and have a single minded, slowly determined method of going after what they want.  Aliens might be completely flabbergasted at the sight of these undead things approaching them and may not think that anything is amiss until it is too late.  The image I have in my head of zombies at this moment is similar to Homer Simpson going after donuts.  But with less saliva.

What if the aliens have something similar to zombies where they are from and have figured out a solution to the problem?  They could even cure the zombies.   On the other hand, they might just fight the zombies from space and not get dirty.  It’s also possible the aliens won’t survive getting to the battle due to our environment, or will quickly succumb a la H. G. Wells.

Maybe the zombies would win.  I don’t know.  What do you think?

State your reasons – read the reasons of others, then vote, but remember the booklists.

I don’t know a lot about fairies, and most of what I think I know about robots I picked up from movies and TV shows.  So with that as my background, here are my initial ideas.  Robots usually do not have flesh, but instead are made of some sort of metal.  Fairies do have flesh and some of them can’t touch iron.  While there are those robots who have weapons there are also those fairies who can alter the environment and use it as a weapon.  Some robots and some fairies (possibly most?) can fly.

Robots might be governed by laws (see Isaac Asimov for those), but fairies might all be rogue.

Who do you think would win in a battle of robots vs. fairies?

State your reasons,  read the reasons of others and then vote.  If you are interested in reading some books about the contenders, check out our tournament booklists.

Kyra’s family was excited before the Prophet and his Apostles arrived at their home.  Everyone thought that the Prophet was coming to announce that Father had been Chosen to become an Apostle.  No one was prepared for what the Prophet said.

Kyra and her family are part of the Chosen Ones.  They live on the compound with the the other families of the Chosen.   Father has three wives and 21 children with two on the way.

Thirteen year old Kyra was not excited to hear that the Prophet was coming.  In fact, on page one she plotting what she could do with his body if she killed him.  So before he speaks, she is almost sure that her wishing for his death will condemn her family.  But, so too will her sneaking on board the Ironton County Mobile Library on Wheels and checking out books.  Possibly worse than the books are her feelings for Joshua, a boy who is just couple of years older than her.

What is it that the Prophet says?  The Prophet says that he had been “thinking, praying… and talking with God” (p. 24) and that Kyra is to be the seventh wife of her Father’s sixty year old brother.

The chosen one by Carol Lynch Williams is the story of Kyra struggling against the possibility of marrying her Uncle.  But what can Kyra do in a community run by a horrible Prophet?  Can she outrun the God Squad?  Can she and Joshua be together, or will she have to marry her cruel Uncle to save her family?

Dwyer, West Virginia is a dying town in the Appalachian Mountains that offers little opportunity now that most of the easy coal has been mined out of the mountains.  The most cost effective way of getting the coal out now is mountaintop removal mining where they blast the mountain to get to the coal.  Remy Walker’s family has lived there for generations and one of the mountains, the one he and his dad live on,  is named Walker Mountain after the first people to live there.

Remy recently graduated from high school and has agreed to follow his girlfriend when she moves from Dwyer to go to college in Pennsylvania.  Remy is an auto-mechanic and should be able to find work near the college so that they can afford to have an apartment off campus.  He won’t be moving to go to college, he just doesn’t want to be away from Lisa because he loves her.

Remy only needs to tell his dad that he is going to move away and then he and Lisa can start their life together like they have been talking about for a long time.  But when Remy meets an artist and she reminds him how fascinating the mountains are, Remy needs to decide if his love for Lisa is greater than his love for his home and his heritage.  Does he have to “get up, get out” (p.5), like they say in school, or can he have a happy life on Walker Mountain?

Funny how things change by Melissa Wyatt reminded me of what it felt like to be Remy’s age and to have such an important decision in front of me.