Book Review - "Transcendent"

I recently finished Transcendent, Tales of the Paranormal by

1.	Rita J Webb	2.	Melanie Marks
3.	Lani Woodland	4.	Wendy Swore
5.	Melonie Piper	6.	Heather McCubbin

...and Evan Joseph.

From the back cover:
Discover the secrets of a siren, fly with a hawk girl over the mountains of Montana, and flee supernatural party-crashers as the décor comes to life in this magical journey through paranormal stories.

Along the way, watch for ghosts in a haunted house, or ride through the moonlight with a stranger. Save a comatose boy who has lost his soul, and don’t forget to bring your garlic and wolfsbane—you never know when the shadows will snag you.

Transcendent includes eight stories of magic, love, death, and choice by some of the newest names in young adult fiction. 

It's been a long time since I've read an anthology, and I'd forgotten how much I enjoy them. In fact, it was through an anthology that I discovered one of my favorite authors of all time, Anne McCaffrey, and her amazing Dragonriders of Pern world.

One of the great things about an anthology is you get to taste the writing of a variety of different writers. You can experience their writing styles, world building, imagination, and characterizations. It's can be tough to do a good job of that in a short story, so my hat goes off to everyone who succeeds.

Transcendent reminded me a little of Stephen Spielberg's TV show Amazing Stories from the 1980s. My family loved most of the episodes and even recorded them on tape. Here's a clip from one of our favorites called Mummy Daddy. Seriously, it's hilarious!

Well, I could see the various short stories in Transcendent being made in a TV series. Some of the stories would start out quite normal and turn into the bizarre, and I'd be turning the pages to see what happened next. Other times I knew right from the beginning that something was afoot.

The story of the hawk girl is written with almost hauntingly beautiful language, and the party that goes awry due to the décor is hilarious and creepy all at the same time. I think perhaps my favorite was the story of the boy who gets struck by lightening and ends up trapped in his iPod.

A couple of asides . . .
1. A couple of weeks ago, the charming Ali Cross, author of Become, did a blog critique for me. On New Years Day, I'm going to post her comments and redecorate. She had some great suggestions that some of you may be interested in, so I hope you'll drop by.

2.  I met my goal to finish the latest edit of WIP #1, and the full manuscript is in the hands of an editor. My oldest son is working on a book cover should I decide to self-publish.

I'm not the least bit excited.

(And if you believe that, I've got this bridge I'd like to sell you . . .)

Farewell, Anne McCaffrey

I just heard that author Anne McCaffrey has moved on to her next great adventure. This woman is one of my favorite authors of all times, having created worlds and characters that will forever be a part of my life. Her use of language has always amazed me, and as a writer I would love to have a fraction of her talent.

I discovered her when I purchased an anthology of Hugo winning short stories. That's when I was first introduced to the world of Pern and met the amazing Lessa and F'lar, Ramoth and Mnementh, their friends (and enemies), and the wonderful Masterharper Robinton (see picture at the end).

The short story captivated me, and I wanted more. After a few years and having read the story several times I decided to see if Anne had written anything else. Low and behold, she had expanded the story into a full novel, and there were even three books so far in the series!

I felt liked I'd died and gone to heaven. There are many more books now than three, and I read (or listen) to the series every couple of years.

But Anne didn't stick with just Pern and the people's battle to save their world from thread (and each other). She created the wonderful world where people whose bodies cannot support them but whose minds are fully functional (shell people) can still have a full life by taking on the body of a ship as in The Ship Who Sang or cities in The City Who Fought (the brain) and pairing them with an ambulatory partner (the brawn).

She tapped into the power of the mind with the Talents in the Rowan series where people who can do telekinesis, telepathy, empathy, etc. were employed in all parts of society. Imagine space travel, not in a space ship with fuel, but in a pod that is thrown mentally by one Talent (or teams of less powerful Talents) and caught on a different planet by another Talent.

Her worlds included one where Earth is taken over by others and our people sent out in the universe as slaves. On one world where a variety of species, including humans, are planted to colonize it, the groups work together in what becomes the beginning of a plot to take Earth back in the Freedom's Landing series. The first book is this series is one of a handful of books that, when I finished it, I flipped it over and read it again.

Her creations included the world of crystal communications and crystal miners in The Crystal Singer series. One of my favorite stories is the second book in that series.

She created the Petaybee universe with a sentient planet, the dinosaur series, the unicorn girl (Acorna) series, and the list goes on. She has scores of titles she wrote alone but a long list of collaborative efforts as well.

Someone bought the rights to make a movie of Dragonflight, the first of the Pern books. I'm sorry that Anne didn't live to see it made. I hope whoever holds the rights will do more than sit on it and--more importantly--will do it right.

Thank you, Anne, for not sitting on your talents. Thank you for putting yourself out there and taking a risk, so the rest of us could enjoy the fruits of your wonderful imagination, awesome imagery, and the characters who became our friends.

Masterharper Robinton by artist Robin Wood

You'll be sorely missed.

Blogging Challenge Favorite Zs

*wipes brow*

Wow, I made it. And those of you who have been kindly making the rounds and commenting ... thank you. I thought I would end this A to Z challenge with some my personal favorite Z words.

The guy it's easy to hate.

Zeniff

from Greg Park's Earthsoul Prophecies

The guy you have some sympathy for

and kinda wish you could like, maybe.

Zane

from Well of Ascension, Book 2 of Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn trilogy 

Hero

Zorro

Antonio Banderes and Anthony Hopkins were both hot as Zorro.

Scrabble

Zarf

I learned this word from my father and confunded my kids for years using it as a password.

(wonder what it is?)

When hot coffee became a fad a bazillion years ago,
they created these cup holders to keep the drinkers from burning their hands.
What's the modern equivalent to these beautiful old zarfs?

It's that outer thingy ... uh ... zarf ... that keeps you from burning your hands



And my very favorite Z?

Bronze Fir e Lizard

Zair

from Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern

Robinton, Masterharper of Pern, and his loyal friend Zair



 Anne McCaffrey is a wonderful writer. I love her use of language without sounding pretentious. She's been quite a proliffic writer as evidenced by her list of books here. I'm thrilled to hear they may finally be making the first book into a film!

Anne is obviously one of my writer idols.
What about you? Which writer(s) would you love to be like?