This book reminds me of a friend I've lost touch with. Years ago, we'd get together and have a "babble-fest". It was pretty much a free flow of words. We'd start with one subject and just babble. Whatever came into our heads, was spoken unfiltered and uncensored. The next day, we'd be hard pressed to recall the conversation. Sunshine could be the queen of babble. You had to filter through a lot of babble to get the story. The redeeming thing was that it was all rather humourous. I think I'll be reading more of Robin McKinley.

All moody atmospherics - very well done moody atmospherics, which distract from the way the plot, such as it is, is all setup. I respect this writing a lot. I think it’s fabulous, from the tone to the sentence structure. And I spent this entire reread irked that we only get a third of the story and that Sunshine is essentially having an affair. (Pat’s “Does Mel know?” was my favorite line.)

This is a story about trauma, sure. And that doesn’t have a tidy endpoint. But McKinley drops breadcrumbs - the goddess of pain, Mel’s tattoos, the fallout from the fight with Bo, Con’s disappearance, Sunshine doing impossible things - and then the story just ends, and the impression I’m left with is that this isn’t deliberately and exclusively a story about trauma: it’s only about trauma because McKinley didn’t bother to end it.

This was a brilliant counterpoint to Twilight back when I first read it. But it seems I don’t actually like it all that much.

Have you ever had the pleasure (funny!) of listening to a pre-teen girl talk about the events of her day. She’ll bounce from topic to topic with no regard for understanding and throw names at you like you are supposed to understand and know who everyone in her life is. That is how Sunshine starts! I felt like the words should be highlighted – one color for the important stuff I needed to remember & one for just the rambling.

I've put the book aside for now - but will pick it up again later.

2nd Attempt June '09
Nope, can't handle it. I need more story and less rambling about unimportant nonsense! I'm going to have to create an 'Abandoned' shelf because this is the first book I haven't been able to finish!

I am going to do something I never ever do. I am submitting a DNF review. Yes, a Did Not Finish.

I normally refuse to review a book I haven’t finished. I think it’s wrong and unfair to write a review unless you have read it. I’ve always held on this – but this book broke me.

In my defence, this is me here. Seriously, I read 3 LA Banks Vampire Huntress novels and intend to read the rest. I even read LJ Smith’s Vampire Diaries. I got through Cassadra Clare’s over written mess and Yasmine Galenorn’s florid florid prose, I even read through Anya Bast’s interminable sex scenes. I read Vampire Academy that gets a special award for slow start (the story starts at 80% in). I read Terry Goodkind’s Sword of Truth series – ALL of it, every last minute of the drek and that should have been banned by international law. I’m even STILL reading Anita Blake when everyone else has declared themselves done with the fuckery 10 books ago

In short, I have a high high high tolerance for crap books. But this broke me. The very idea of reading another word makes me cringe.

Read More

I've liked Robin McKinley in a low-level way for the past ten years or so. I really liked n  Beautyn, n  The Hero and the Crownn and n  The Blue Swordn, and when I've seen a new McKinley book I've generally tried to pick it up and read it, for old time's sake. I thought I was fairly familiar with her style and tone.

Which is why I was completely unprepared for Sunshine. Who knew McKinley had a dark, experimental, inventive, alternate-universe/vampire novel in her? Who knew she had an engaging, modern, flawed character like Sunshine just waiting to come out and win my heart completely over?

Ever since I first picked it up, I reread Sunshine every few months, and it never ceases to enthrall and delight me. It has become one of my favorite books of all time.

This is my 4th Robin McKinley book and I have yet to fall under the spell of her writing.
And this one has kind of the same problem that the rest of the books had - there are a lot of words here and not a whole lot of anything much storywise.
400-something pages of whothefuckcares for 150-200 pages of something actually happening to move the action forward. There's just a lot of staring off into space and picking at a hole in her jeans going on here.



I mean, it's interesting that she likes to bake. But I don't need to be reminded about her love of baking in her family's restaurant on every other page.
You know what I can do? Bake.
You know what I can't do? Magic.
So why don't you take all that page time you spent telling me about her fucking cinnamon buns, and describe to me what kind of magic she has going on?



So you have a baker who finds herself chained up in a room with a vampire and they escape their captors due to some spoilery magic stuff. Over the course of the book they awkwardly bond and perhaps even grow to have a romantic relationship at some point. I'm completely unsure about that last part because while she is apparently attracted to him at times, she describes him as ugly. Usually, if you're interested in someone romantically, you don't personally find them repulsive. Just saying.
So, that ending was...I don't know. Weird.



There actually could have been a really good story, but McKinley decided to focus all of the energy on everything that wasn't of the least bit of interest to me.
There are all kinds of paranormal creatures in this world, including the vampire that Ray befriends. So, maybe some in-depth vampire lore?
Forget it. Let's go on about how squishy the dough feels.
Ray's father? How did this super-wizard family simply disappear from the face of the earth?
Nah. Let's discuss some chocolate cake recipe she came up with last year.
What about the reasons behind her mother's decision to leave her father and basically go into hiding?
Nooo. Let's talk about how her biker boyfriend is nice and really good at not really being too talky or bothering her about stuff.
WHAT?



There's a cool story set in an interesting world here, and that's maybe why I was so frustrated when it was over. It could have been such an amazing book, but it wasn't because it skipped over the interesting bits in favor of all the mundane garbage. It was like picking up a book about a famous battle, but instead of hearing about the action, the author mainly recounts what sort of soap the soldiers used, the kind of linen their boxer shorts were made of, and if they liked the noises the tent flaps made at night.
And I get that there are readers out there that are interested in that sort of war story.
But that reader isn't me.



Sunshine isn't my jam, but I can't in good conscience say that it is badly written. Ten billion fans of this author's work can't all be wrong. It just isn't the type of story I personally enjoy.
So.
If you're a fan of McKinley, then you already know how her stories tend to wander around, and you'll probably love this one.
If you haven't read any of her books yet but dig that sort of thing, this book will be right up your alley.
But if you're an action-oriented reader like I am, this story might just test your patience.

Sunshine is definitely worthwhile if you like vampire lit, though this is a bit of an odd one. :)

This urban fantasy novel starts with a bang, one of my favorite beginnings in a fantasy novel. Rae "Sunshine" Seddon is kidnapped by a gang of vampires, chained to the wall in an abandoned, isolated mansion, and left as a victim for another vampire, Constantine, who is also chained up nearby (the gang even cuts Sunshine so the blood will make her harder for Constantine to resist). But resist he does, even as daylight comes, though it’s a near thing, and they know the vampire gang will be returning when night falls.

Then Sunshine begins to remember some near-forgotten magical skills taught her many years ago by her grandmother. It’s a game-changer - but her odd (and very secret) alliance with Constantine may also bring Sunshine into situations where she’s faced with dangers she’s never known before.

I knew nothing about this book when I bought it - this was back in the day when I was auto-buying everything Robin McKinley wrote, a time that has now, sadly, ended for me as her stuff's gotten progressively weirder over the years. But this one is only semi-weird, and definitely worth reading if you're interested in vampires and urban fantasy, except without the smokin' hot sexy vampire. Okay, there is a rather sexy scene, and Constantine the vampire is a very cool character but also, undeniably, vampirish, in a not-really-sexy kind of way.

I loved what McKinley did with the main character and her magically gifted family and with vampire lore in this novel; I just wished she'd dug a little deeper into the world-building and the family history. And there is (as typical with McKinley) one of those murky, bizarre nightmarish scenes where you're not sure exactly what's going on except that it's highly strange. The story doesn't wrap up with a nice bow either, which left many fans hoping, in vain, for McKinley to write a sequel or at least another book in this world.

But there are at least parts of this story that are truly fantastic - the first few chapters are AMAZING - and shouldn't be missed. At least if you're interested in vampire lit. :)

The beginning of this book reminded me a lot of Nancy Baker's Kiss of the Vampire where a young woman is abducted and jailed with a vampire. This time the young woman akes her living cooking cinnamon rolls in a family run coffee shoppe. She has a close group of friends and a likable boyfriend and seems very content with the way her life is going. Then she's abducted by vampires and chained up with only a hungry, dying vampire for a companion. The writing is different from McKinley's lyrical, breathtakingly beautiful style ALA Deerskin and Beauty. This book was more modern both in slang and subject matter and I stumbled over some of the narrative at first.

As the story progresses and our heroine "Sunshine" has plenty of time to reflect on her past we learn she possesses some inherited magical power that increases when she's in full sunlight.

Though the beginning grabbed me I'm sorry to say I can't say the same about the rest of the book. Midway through it became a real struggle to finish and I ended up doing some major skimming to get to the end and ended up feeling "eh" about the whole thing. Odd as usually adore McKinley's work but I guess they can't all be winners.

A fun novel about baking and vampires.

This was an interesting read. Though my overall reaction was not as enthusiastic as I was hoping it would be, I enjoyed a number of individual aspects of this book:

-There were countless wonderful turns of phrase I loved spoken by the main character Rae/Sunshine (my ereader isn't cooperating at the moment or I'd include some of the quoted sections.)

-Rae was wonderful. I loved her chosen profession, and just how important feeding people was to her, and how much of her perception of herself was tied into being a baker of cinnamon rolls, muffins, breads and other nummies.

-I also really liked how antithetical Rae's magical heritage was to her.

-The vampires are scary here. They are not cute, they are not dark and dreamy, they are not anything but terrifying. That is a major plus for me.

-I liked how Rae, the main character, actually suffered from PTSD after her encounter. When does that ever happen in most paranormal stories? Heroines usually just quip their way to happiness and normality after their encounters with various beasties. Rae experiences several months of pain and fear. Really nice details here.

-Rae's voice was terrific and I liked her sarcasm and crankiness.

I did find, however, that I get kind of tired partway through the book, and just wanted to get to the confrontation and the end of the story. I found myself skipping and skimming my way through parts three and four of the story in an effort to find out how Rae's situation is resolved, or, at least her immediate situation. The author does leave the ending kind of open, which I liked. I could imagine Rae doing any number of interesting magical things, while also inventing new bakery treats.

I liked this book, but didn't love it. But I will be checking out more of McKinley's work on the strength of this book.

My friend lent me this book, and I liked it for a while. Vampires and baking... I liked the coffee shop, and I was intrigued by the woman's first encounter with the vampire, Constantine.

But the author seems to care so little for the relationships between the people that it bothered me. We hear over and over how tempestuous the relationship between Sunshine and her mom is, but I don't think we ever see them talk in scene, let alone argue. Then there is the whole business of dating a cook and lusting after a vampire, which she does not seem to feel conflicted about or even really to notice. And... and...

And then there's the business of what the rules are to this world of hers. She sets some up, but then she keeps making up new ones all the way through, so people are always saying things like, "I've never heard of that kind of magic!" even as it's happening. So it seems like pretty much anything is possible. And there are no surprises at the end.

This was the most painful book I have ever read.

It wasn't because of grisly content or cringe-worthy scenes.

Oh, no. I wish.

Sunshine was nearly unbearable because the author didn't know when to make the main character shut the hell up.



The reader is so bogged down by Sunshine's internal ramblings of ultimately unimportant details that you're completely taken out of the story itself. You're stuck reading 5 pages worth of absolute crap that has nothing to do with why there is a vampire sitting in her bedroom in the middle of the night.

By the time you're actually brought back to the real story, you have basically forgotten what it's about and why you give a damn. I think I could've gotten more coherent ramblings from a drugged out mental patient, honestly..

Taking away all of the mind-numbing tedium, the core of the story I liked and I did grow to like Sunshine herself even if she has the worst ADD I've ever encountered in anybody, real or fictional.

The end felt as though it was unfinished and teases at the possibility of a sequel, which will most likely never be written.

If you're gonna read this, take your Ritalin.