Review - The Dust of 100 Dogs

The Dust of 100 Dogs
by A. S. King

I got off to a slow start with this one, and I almost gave up on it. But I'm sure glad I didn't. It turned out to be a terrific read!

300 years ago, the feared pirate Emer Morrisey was cursed with the dust of 100 dogs, forcing her to live 100 lives in canine form before she could be human again and reclaim her plundered treasure. Reborn as Saffron Adams, a seemingly normal teenager from the U.S.A., she casts aside her frustratingly selfish family and heads to Jamaica in search of what she lost in the past.

There's not much more I can say without giving too much of the plot away. But I did really enjoy this one. There was adventure, a touch of history, romance, and revenge. The story is told from three alternating perspectives: Emer's in the 1600s (third person), Fred's in 1990s Jamaica (third person), and Saffron's in 1990s America (first person). Interspersed with these narratives are little sections about dogs and their behaviour, information presumably gleaned from Saffron's past lives in canine form. At first, all this jumping around kind of threw me. The book starts off in the 1600s, then goes to the 1970s and '80s, then bounces back to the 1600s in Paris, then further back to Emer's life in Ireland before jumping into the main part of the narrative when Emer becomes a pirate. I'm not sure that I liked all that time travel, but I'm not sure how else it could have been done.

The only real question that I still have in my mind after reading the book is why Saffron identified more strongly with Emer than with her dog lives. Part of the curse was that she retained all her memories. In the present, Saffron often imagines gory fates for people who annoy her: gouging out their eyes, slicing them to ribbons, keelhauling them... obviously very piratey things. But it left me wondering. If she had lived all those lives as dogs in between, and retained all those memories, why wasn't her instinct in these gory daydreams to tear people's throats out or pee on their leg? Actually, I'm still not sure if the whole dog thing was anything more than a cute little plot device; other than forcing Emer to live as a dog, it wasn't really relevant in any other way (that I could see).

There is an interesting interview in the back of the book (in my edition, anyway) with the author and Leila from bookshelves of doom in which they discuss the nature of young adult literature. I was thinking about this as I was reading the book. What exactly is a "young adult" book? Most of the books I've read recently in that category have been pretty chaste, sweet, and appropriate even for the tweens who might be reading them. This book, on the other hand, is on the opposite end of the spectrum. There is a fair amount of violence, some of it graphic (the first paragraph has Emer cutting out someone's eyeball and rolling it in the sand). There are instances of foul language (foul enough to be bleeped on network TV, anyway). And there is also a rape scene. These things don't bother me, and I know that some teens (and even some children) have already been exposed to such things. However, I might be hesitant about recommending this book to a young teenager. What is "young adult"? Anyone between the ages of 13 and 21? I think the industry needs a better definition.

Anyway, this is definitely a book I'd recommend to older teens (as well as adults). I enjoyed the story, and it was pretty different from anything I'd ever read before.

Plot: 4/5
Characters: 4/5
Pace: 4/5
Writing: 4/5
Originality: 4/5

Overall: 4 out of 5

Let's Make Limericks! (1)

I felt like doing something different this week. I've always enjoyed the challenge of writing limericks, and I thought it might be fun to try writing them about the books I've been reading (or have read, or am going to read). So I thought, why not make a meme out of it?


Here are the rules:

1. Every weekend (yes, this is flexible... choose Saturday or Sunday!), pick a book. It can be one that you're currently reading, one that you've finished, or one that's in your TBR pile.
2. Write a limerick about the book (click on the link if you're unclear on the limerick format).
3. Try not to include spoilers!

Who's up for the challenge? If you decide to do this, please link back to my site and leave a comment on this post. I can't wait to see what everybody comes up with!

Here's mine for this week. I'm still reading The Dust of 100 Dogs by A. S. King, and this is what I came up with:

In spite of her parents' strong pleas,
She wanted to take to the seas
To recover her loot
From that first mate galoot
Who had cursed her and given her fleas.

It's Tuesday... Where are you? (2)

I am in a psychologist's office with a girl named Saffron who's doing her best to keep her plans for the future a secret.

The Dust of 100 Dogs, by A. S. King

This meme is hosted by raidergirl3 at an adventure in reading.

Friday Firsts (5)

The first line can make or break a reader’s interest. Just how well did the author pull you in to the story with their first sentence? To participate in this weekly book meme is extremely easy.

• Grab the book you are currently reading and open to the first page.
• Write down the first sentence in the first paragraph.
• Create a blog post with this information. (Make sure to include the title & author of the book you are using. Even an ISBN helps!)
• Did this first sentence help draw you into the story? Why or why not?

My current fiction read is The Dust of 100 Dogs by A. S. King. The first line is:

With one last, almighty roar, the Frenchman fell to his knees and died.

So far, I don't know what to think about this book. All I know is that, if something interesting doesn't happen soon, I'm probably going to abandon it (and I hate abandoning books). This first line is definitely a hook; so is the rest of the first chapter of the book, with its Caribbean setting and piratey stuff. Unfortunately, it gets pretty darn boring pretty darn fast, and even the flashbacks aren't helping to hold my interest.