Jove Boyd is an ordinary Australian teen, except that water has always behaved erratically around him, and there has been a recent spate of suspected gang related activities in his small town that increasingly seem to be directed at him.

When Tia Favon, the hot, new girl at school protects him from a fire-wielding creature, his suspicions are confirmed. Now he must leave everything that he knows behind to escape with Tia and her father, Auster, and discover the truth about the world – and about himself.

Jove: The Human Chronicles introduces a world in which other species hide in the places that humans cannot find them. Each one controls an element, but they can’t match the technology that humans have invented. To balance the world, the species have created a being who wields all of the elements – fire, water, wind and earth. He is the Incarnate.

For a debut novel, Aarts has built up a pretty complex world here. There are five different species, each with their own cultures and values. None of them are deeply explored in the first novel, but the glimpses we get of them make it obvious that all of their societies are intricately woven. Each of the four species that are not human, seem set to be explored in more depth in later novels, and it will be interesting to see how Jove will react to them.

The characters are what keep this novel moving. Jove is for the most part an average teen, perhaps a little sweeter and with a firm handle on his morals. Tia, while older than Jove, has a cheerfully optimistic personality. They make a good team; neither of them getting bogged down in angst, but meeting their heavy obligations head on. It’s refreshing too, that romance isn’t a central aspect to this story. Tia isn’t willing to put her duty aside for it, and Jove respects that. The most compelling character, however, is one of the sea-dwellers called Maré. He brings a great sense of fun to the novel.

While the characters were easy to spend time with and the world was exciting to visit, the pace could have used work. Without the threat of immediate danger for much of the novel, I didn’t feel a sense of urgency about Jove’s situation and obligations.

I’ve always been partial to stories about the elements, and this one has some fantastic fresh ideas on elemental lore. So, if you’re a fan of The Last Airbender or Captain Planet this may well become your new favourite series.

 Jove: The Human Chronicles – A.J. Aarts

 Book Pal (August 27, 2013)

 ISBN: 9781742843254

Lisa Smith’s delicious hazelnut cookie recipe.

Ingredients:

• 150 gram flour
• 150 gram butter
• 150 gram finely chopped hazelnuts
• 100 gram sugar
• 1 teaspoon all spice
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Whole hazelnuts
• 1 egg yolk
• 2 tablespoons milk

Instructions:

1. Preheat 350 and prepare baking sheets.
2. Combine the first, six ingredients in a large bowl, until well mixed.
3. Create teaspoon sized balls of dough and allow baking for 10-12 minutes. Let cool.
4. In a cup mix the milk and egg yolk, and paint over each cookie. And press a whole hazelnut on top of each cookie. Enjoy!

What pulled me in was the bright red lips, the funeral flowers, and obviously that the cover picture is upside down. But it’s been sitting on my bookshelf for almost three years (how horrible am I?!) and it’s finally time to get my review up! I can even say I regret not reading Putting Makeup on Dead People much earlier, but what can ya do?

Donna Parisi is still dealing with and trying to overcome the loss of her father, who passed nearly four years ago. Since his passing, Donna’s life doesn’t seem to have a sense of direction or purpose. She spends each day going through the same routine, and her days are starting to blend together. While all of her fellow classmates are excited to leave and go to college, Donna doesn’t feel that way. She’ll just be attending the local college her brother attended and her mom is pushing her to go.

Putting Makeup On Dead People starts in a way not very many books I’ve read, start; at a funeral. But while everyone around her is crying for the loss of their fellow student, Donna is more detached than anything else. Sometime after the funeral, she returns to the Brighton Bothers Funeral Home out of curiosity. She knows it’s weird to be interested in dead people, and it’s not something her friends or girls of her age are thinking about, but still she can’t resist. It’s the first thing that’s piqued her interest in a long while.

Donna is offered a flyer to a college for mortuary school as well as a job at the funeral home by one of the Brighton brothers. Going against her mother, and all the expectations revolving around her, Donna fills out the form and sends it off. With her new interest, her new job and even her first love, Donna’s life is changing for the better. Things seem to be going Donna’s way and she’s regained a purpose in her life that was lost four years ago with her father’s death. She knows what she wants in life.

I looked forward to the end of each chapter hoping to find another journal entry about Donna’s encounters with dead people, and their funerals while working for the Brighton Brothers. Some of them were just so hilarious! You would think that a book about mortuary science would be depressing and sad, but Jen Violi did a good job staying away from that. The book didn’t focus so much on the actual process or the people who died, but instead on Donna and the job she wanted to do. Violi did an amazing job keeping the story on the bright side of things, and keeping it light.

I really enjoyed Putting Makeup on Dead People. I went into reading it with absolutely no expectations, and enjoyed it so much more than I thought I would. The characters were real, the story was down to earth, and overall this book was definitely like nothing I’ve never read before!

Mandy has already treated us to the recipe for her gorgeous cake pops. But we thought you might like to see what they look like when you make them for a crowd. Just like a bunch of chocolate lollipops, they make great table decorations.

Made for a wedding

Who needs flowers!

Marianne has a new novel coming out in May, called PEACEMAKER and it’s been listed on BuzzFeed’s Most Anticipated SFF and Fantasy books for 2014.