Well, to answer that question, I've been reading a book! :D "the War of the Flowers" by Tad Williams, to be exact. And when I read a really fascinating book, you know what happens, right? A book review! Yaaay!
WAR OF THE FLOWERS
So basically, we have our main, Theo Vilmos, and his band the Mighty Clouds of Angst or something like that. He doesn't have any idea where he's going in his life, or even why he's alive. His girlfriend is pregnant, and when he gets home, he finds out that she had a miscarriage. He, of course is devastated, but doesn't really know how to express it, and things don't get better when Cat, his girlfriend, decides to dump him becuase he's a good-for-nothing. He moves back in with his mother, who he's felt has always been a bit distant with him. One day, he finds a pamphlet about pancreatic cancer in his mom's mail, and he realizes that she's going to die soon. During the next few months, they work together on her sickness, and she starts to slowly slip away. One day, before she goes to sleep, she tells him that she's sorry for not loving him like she should have. He's terribly confused. When she dies, he has to deal with all the forms and paperwork. He finds a mysterious key and a note. He goes to his great Uncle Eamonn Dowd's bank/deposit, "inherits" an old mysterious notebook. He reads it, a tale of a place called Faerie, apparently told from the point of view of his great-uncle. He sells his mother's house and moves into a quiet cabin in the woods and reads the notebook, being more fascinated by the moment. One night, before all this, a group consisting of the Lords Hellebore( which I think is a really cool name :D)Thornapple, and Foxglove with their mysterious accomplice, the Remover of Inconvenient Obstacles. They summon some weird spirit and send it to the Mortal World. It kills a dude and uses his body, much like a zombie. 'Kay, so Theo is minding his own business, when all of a sudden, a police guy shows up, reporting the deaths of the people who bought his house. That's just the beginning. ONe night later, he finds a weird light in the kitchen, and it turns out that its a sprite ( a mini fairy) with a snappy mouth. Suddenly, Theo sees this weird dude at his door, trying to break it down. It climbs in through the bathroom window, its flesh all rotten and nasty. Applecore, the sprite, opens up the portal and they barely make it though. Then the rest of the story goes like this: (sorry, i'm too lazy to write out all the details) They make their way to Tansy's house, Theo falls in a river along the way, THey tell him what's going on, and he needs to get to the City to do something, they go to the station, and the dead thing is still chasing them and kills their idiot escort also taking his body, they make it on the train. They are stopped by the police slug dudes, nearly get caught if it weren't for Poppy, the girl they met earlier. (Poppy Thornapple, that is) She acts like a total you-know-what with Theo, and she thinks that he's just using her, kicks them out of her car. They make their way around the City. DEcide its not safe to go to Foxglove House, beg their way into Daffodil house, meet Cumber Sedge, the mortal research dude. THey perform a bunch of tests on Theo, since he's a mortal. Meanwhile, trouble is brewing. One day, they call him to their throneroom or whatever it is, and tell him he's not really a mortal- He was the last of the line of the Violets, one of the seven ruling families that was destroyed earlier. He is the only one left, switched with Eamonn Dowd's neice (anna vilmos, Theo's "mom")'s baby. He goes and explores the city a bit more, and this one goblin comes up to him and gives him a card, some sort of invitation to a hideout under a bridge. He is called to yet another conference, this time, between the 6 family leaders. He watches it all from a little TV thing. Tansy comes in, dismisses the guard, and sits with Theo to watch the screen. Hellebore, Thornapple, and Foxglove aren't here yet, and this guy shows up with a mirror/TV with Hellebore's face on it. He talks about killing eveyrone, etc, you know, world domination. THen out of nowhere, Tansy takes a cloth, probably with chloroform or something similar, on it, and tries to knock Theo unconscious. THen a dragon comes out of nowhere and incinerates the entire Daffodil house, and parts of the city. THeo leaves Tansy to die in the inferno, remembers that Applecore is gone, goes to her hotel place and finds Cumber there, saves him, and when they get out, they're chased by the dead spirit thing in a new, equally disgusting body, and eventually lose him. They take refuge with the goblin under the bridge. They want to use Theo as a part of their revolution. He agrees, and they go and help Streedy Nettle with his task, etc. which is actually duplicating a ticket for one person and one creature, with the help of a diversion. Then they go back and Button, the goblin, has a weird stick with him. Anyway, so they see Hellebore's public message, showing Applecore, trapped inside a bell jar. They rush in to save her, and its a trap. The Remover, who is actually Eamonn Dowd in spirit, tells him the story of how he got here, how Theo got here, etc. Then the Trio of Evil (as i call them) come in, shoot The Remover's body, and kidnap Theo and Cumber. Etc, they get Applecore back, then they see a rebellion from the goblins, Button breaks the stick thing, the grims ride in on their unicorns and slaughter the dragons. Hellebore's pretty darn mad. They drive, picking up Theo's half brother, aka his switch, the Terrible Child, to this one place in the city, called Midnight, where everything is Old growth, scary, creepy etc. In the middle of a huge lake, is a mound with a pit. The bodies of the King and Queen lay there, in a giant blob of energy. Hellebore chants something, and kills Tansy and throws him in. THe bloody undead thing is still chasing them XD and Theo falls into the water, where he's caught by a nymph, and the Irrha, the dead thing, instead kills the Terrible Child, throwing him straight into Hell, then jumping in after him. His friends come save him, end of story, happily ever after. Oh yeah, and he stays in Faerie.
MY REVIEW
Overall, the concept and the creatures are really imaginative, and I love big words!! :D even if I don't really use them XD. The plot seems a bit generic though, and there's quite a bit of swearing, so definitely not a good book for little kids. It seemed like the story dragged on a bit near the middle, but it was a fairly satisfying ending, everything wrapped up and fit nicely :)
So I'll give it an A- or a B+
