• Courage of Falcons, by Holly Lisle ****
  • The Plot Thickens, by Noah Lukeman ****
  • How To Stop A Heart From Beating, Jackie Ballantine ****

Courage of Falcons is the final book in Kait and Ry's fight against the Dragons. There are some quick wins in the beginning of this book but with so much conflict set up in the first two the problems just keep coming. Courage and sacrifice is strong and there are some great little surprises thrown in along the way. A great conclusion and a story of epic fantasy.

The Plot Thickens talks about all of the different elements that come together to form and grow plot. Starting with a firm grasp of character and moving through journey, conflict, context and other elements Noah Lukeman imparts some great knowledge after years of reading submissions. A newer writer would get a lot more out of this than I did but the chapter on Journey was a definite highlight as well as how he explained Conflict.

How To Stop A Heart From Beating tells the story of the McKeen twins, Elaine and Doug, from the point of view of Doug's 9 year old daughter, Solly. Secrets kept by Elaine and Dough have kept a lid on a scandal for years, until Solly befriends the Porpoise People buried in the pauper's graves and begins asking questions about death. Solly's POV is interesting because of what the Porpoise people mean to her and the snippets of adult conversation and action that we can interpret but Solly cannot move the real story along. I wonder how the story would have unfolded if told from the adult's POV. I suspect it would have been more emotional and the insight into the adult characters would have been greater, though the secret would have been uncovered earlier. A nice, interesting read.