We are so excited to be a part of the blog tour for Jane, Unlimited by Kristen Cashore, but before we dive into our review we want to tell you what the book is about!
Jane, Unlimited by Kristin Cashore (Website, Blog, Goodreads)Published by Penguin Young Readers Group on September 19th 2017
Genres: Family, Interactive Adventures, New Experience, Orphans & Foster Homes, Social Themes, Young Adult Fiction
Pages: 464
Format: ARC
Jane has lived an ordinary life, raised by her aunt Magnolia—an adjunct professor and deep sea photographer. Jane counted on Magnolia to make the world feel expansive and to turn life into an adventure. But Aunt Magnolia was lost a few months ago in Antarctica on one of her expeditions.
Now, with no direction, a year out of high school, and obsessed with making umbrellas that look like her own dreams (but mostly just mourning her aunt), she is easily swept away by Kiran Thrash—a glamorous, capricious acquaintance who shows up and asks Jane to accompany her to a gala at her family's island mansion called Tu Reviens.
Jane remembers her aunt telling her: "If anyone ever invites to you to Tu Reviens, promise me that you'll go." With nothing but a trunkful of umbrella parts to her name, Jane ventures out to the Thrash estate. Then her story takes a turn, or rather, five turns. What Jane doesn't know is that Tu Reviens will offer her choices that can ultimately determine the course of her untethered life. But at Tu Reviens, every choice comes with a reward, or a price.
“Do you ever feel,” she says to Jane, “like you’re trapped in the wrong version of your life?”
Jane, Unlimited is a unique book filled with alternate dimensions and other worlds, unique and magical, I don’t think you’ll find another story like it. Filled with intriguing characters and a fascinating plot, it was definitely a captivating read and one I can’t wait to delve into again!
About Kristin Cashore
Nonetheless, I am always a happy chucklehead when I take a dip in my telephone bathtub.
So, here's the short tale of me: I grew up in the countryside of northeastern Pennsylvania in a village with cows and barns and beautiful views from the top of the hill and all that good stuff. I lived in a rickety old house with my parents, three sisters, and a scattering of cats, and I READ READ READ READ READ. I read while brushing my teeth, I read while chopping parsley, the first thing I reached for when I woke up in the morning was my book; the only two places I didn't read were in the car and in bed. What did I do then? The one thing I liked even more than reading: I daydreamed.
And so, without knowing it, I was planting the seeds. Reading and daydreaming = perfect preparation for writing.
At 18 I went off to college-- thank you, Williams College, for the financial aid that made this possible-- and it almost killed me. College is hard, man, and the Berkshires are cloudy. A (phenomenal) year studying abroad in sunny Sydney revived me. After college I developed a compulsive moving problem: New York City, Boston, Cambridge, Austin, Pennsylvania, Italy, and even a short stint in London, where my showerhead hung from the cutest little stand that was exactly like the cradle of an old-fashioned telephone. The best phone calls are the pretend phone calls made from your telephone tub.
During my stint in Boston, I got an M.A. at the Center for the Study of Children's Literature at Simmons College. (Thank you, Simmons, for the scholarship that made this possible!) Grad school almost killed me, but I felt a lot more alive than when I was almost being killed in college. The Simmons program is stupendous. It got me thinking and breathing YA books. It got me writing.
Am I getting boring?
Since Simmons, I haven't stopped writing, not once. I've developed a compulsive writing problem that makes my moving problem look like a charming personality quirk. I can't stop! But it's not actually a problem, because I don't want to stop. I've been writing full-time for a bunch of years now, first doing educational writing for the K-6 market and now working exclusively on my novels. It's a dream job, which is another way of saying that when I shop for work clothes, I go straight to the pajamas section.
A few years ago I grew tired of all the moving and dealt with it by, um, moving, from Jacksonville, Florida, to Cambridge, Massachusetts, trading the St. Johns River for the Charles River and pelicans for geese. As a native northerner, it's nice to be back in the land of four seasons. I feel as if I've come home. :o)
And that's my story.
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