The Weight of Feathers Blog Tour: Review + Giveaway

The Weight of Feathers by Anna-Marie McLemore

Release Date: September 15, 2015
Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin (Twitter Tumblr Facebook)
Rated: YA 14+
Format: Hardcover
Source: Publisher
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The Night Circus meets Romeo and Juliet in this stunning young adult novel about two teens who fall in love despite the almost impossible odds against them.

The Palomas and the Corbeaus have long been rivals and enemies, locked in an escalating feud for over a generation. Both families make their living as traveling performers in competing shows-the Palomas swimming in mermaid exhibitions, the Corbeaus, former tightrope walkers, performing in the tallest trees they can find. 


Lace Paloma may be new to her family's show, but she knows as well as anyone that the Corbeaus are pure magia negra, black magic from the devil himself. Simply touching one could mean death, and she's been taught from birth to keep away. But when disaster strikes the small town where both families are performing, it's a Corbeau boy, Cluck, who saves Lace's life. And his touch immerses her in the world of the Corbeaus, where falling for him could turn his own family against him, and one misstep can be just as dangerous on the ground as it is in the trees.

The Weight of Feathers was a book I knew I just HAD to read. When I interviewed Mackenzi Lee, this was one of the books she was most enthusiastic about. When I heard there was elements of magical realism in it, I knew that this book was going to be different and special. I haven’t read many books with magical realism in it, but the most prominent one I remember is Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel García Márquez. For those who don’t know, magical realism is the acceptance of magic in the normal world. Pretty interesting, eh? Exactly what I thought. Right from the get-go you do get a sense of entering a world just slightly different to the one we live in. Anyway, I couldn’t put this one down–Anna-Marie McLemore’s debut was so unlike anything I’ve ever read.

I was a little alarmed when I heard that this book was kinda like Romeo and Juliet because insta-love is an absolute no-no for me. But oh my gosh, this romance made me have little butterflies fly around my stomach and flutter around my heart, because it’s BEAUTIFUL. Both Lace and Cluck are such likeable characters and their blooming affection for each other is just so captivating. Of course, two rival families can only mean trouble, so this book was an emotional roller-coaster of all the feels. ALL THE FEELS PEOPLE.

One really interesting aspect of this book (other than the whole magical realism thing) is the duality of languages used in this book. The Palomas are a Spanish-speaking family and the Corbeaus are a French-speaking family. I only understand French, but I loved reading these languages side-by-side. Not only do you start seeing the similarities but you also start to get an idea of cultural context, which only makes the story more richer in detail.

Anna-Marie McLemore’s The Weight of Feathers was magical. An absolutely stunning read, this novel was so wonderfully written I found myself never wanting the story to end. Enchanting and wholly ingenious with a delicious mystery that ends in a shocking twist, I can’t wait to read more from McLemore–this is definitely a book not to miss.

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ANNA-MARIE MCLEMORE

Anna-Marie McLemore was born in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains and grew up in a Mexican-American family. She attended University of Southern California on a Trustee Scholarship. A Lambda Literary Fellow, she has had work featured by the Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West, CRATE Literary Magazine's cratelit, Camera Obscura's Bridge the Gap Series, and The Portland Review.  The Weight of Feathers is her first novel.

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PRAISE

“McLemore’s prose is ethereal and beguiling… The enchanting setup and the forbidden romance that blooms between these two outcasts will quickly draw readers in, along with the steady unspooling of the families’ history and mutual suspicions in this promising first novel.” —Publishers Weekly

“Readers beguiled by the languorous language—a striking mix of French and Spanish phrases, wry colloquialism, lush imagery, and elevated syntax—will find themselves falling under its spell. The third-person narration alternates between Lace and Cluck, doling out twists and building to a satisfying, romantic conclusion.” —Kirkus Reviews

“In this tale of magical realism, the magic is so deftly woven into the fabric of the story… Told with skillful poetic nuances, this Romeo-and-Juliet story of forbidden love will entice fans of Maggie Stiefvater’s Raven Cycle who wished for a little more romance.” —School Library Journal

“Anna-Marie McLemore's debut novel is a very imaginative modern-day romance akin to Romeo and Juliet and is infused with the whimsy of magical realism.” —RT Book Reviews

“An air of mysterious fantasy enshrouds the whole book, pulling the reader through it as if in a spell. McLemore is a writer to watch.”—The Guardian

“You've never read a love story quite like this one. Anna-Marie McLemore has created in entirely imaginative world and rich characters that will pull you in as if she's spinning magic herself.” —Bustle

“With prose as magical as its characters, The Weight of Feathers is an exciting debut.” —Paste Magazine


“McLemore’s debut novel has ties to Romeo and Juliet, David Almond’s mythical Skellig, and the real-life performances of Cirque du Soleil.” —Booklist

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EXCERPT


             The feathers were Lace’s first warning. They showed up between suitcases, in the trunk of her father’s station wagon, on the handles of came-with-the-car first-aid kits so old the gauze had yellowed. They snagged on antennas, turning the local stations to static.
             Lace’s mother found a feather in with the family’s costumes the day they crossed into Almendro, a town named for almond fields that once filled the air with the scent of sugary blossoms and bitter wood. But over the last few decades an adhesive plant had bought out the farms that could not survive the droughts, and the acres of almonds dwindled to a couple of orchards on the edge of town.
             The wisp of that black feather caught on a cluster of sequins. Lace knew from the set to her mother’s eyes that she’d throw the whole mermaid tail in a bucket and burn it, elastane and all.

             Lace grabbed the tail and held on. If her mother burned it, it would take Lace and her great-aunt at least a week to remake it. Tía Lora’s hands were growing stiff, and Lace’s were new and slow.

             Her mother tried to pull the tail from her grip, but Lace balled the fabric in her hands.

             “Let go,” her mother warned.

             “It’s one feather.” Lace dug in her fingers. “It’s not them.” Lace knew the danger of touching a Corbeau. Her abuela said she’d be better off petting a rattlesnake. But these feathers were not the Corbeaus’ skin. They didn’t hold the same poison as a Corbeau’s body.
             “It’s cursed,” her mother said. One hard tug, and she won. She threw the costume tail into a bucket and lit it. The metal pail grew hot as a stove. The fumes off the melting sequins stung Lace’s throat.
             “Did you have to burn the whole thing?” she asked.
             “Better safe, mija,” her mother said, wetting down the undergrowth with day-old aguas frescas so the brush wouldn’t catch.
             They could have cleaned the tail, blessed it, stripped away the feather’s touch. Burning it only gave the Corbeaus more power. Those feathers already had such weight. The fire in the pail was an admission that, against them, Lace’s family had no guard.
             Before Lace was born, the Palomas and the Corbeaus had just been competing acts, two of the only shows left that bothered with the Central Valley’s smallest towns. Back then it was just business, not hate. Even now Lace’s family sometimes ended up in the same town with a band of traveling singers or acrobats, and there were no fights, no blood. Only the wordless agreement that each of them were there to survive, and no grudges after. Every fall when the show season ended, Lace’s aunts swapped hot-plate recipes with a trio of trapeze artists. Her father traded homeschooling lesson plans with a troupe of Georgian folk dancers.
             The Corbeaus never traded anything with anyone. They shared nothing, took nothing. They kept to themselves, only straying from the cheapest motel in town to give one of Lace’s cousins a black eye, or leave a dead fish at the riverbank. Lace and Martha found the last one, its eye shining like a wet marble.
             Before Lace was born, these were bloodless threats, ways the Corbeaus tried to rattle her family before their shows. Now every Paloma knew there was nothing the Corbeaus wouldn’t do.
             Lace’s mother watched the elastane threads curl inside a shell of flame. “They’re coming,” she said.
             “Did you think they wouldn’t?” Lace asked. Her mother smiled. “I can hope, can’t I?”
             She could hope all she wanted. The Corbeaus wouldn’t give up the crowds that came with Almendro’s annual festival. So many tourists, all so eager to fill their scrapbooks. That meant two weeks in Almendro. Two weeks when the younger Paloma men hardened their fists, and their mothers prayed they didn’t come home with broken ribs.
             Lace’s grandmother set the schedule each year, and no one spoke up against Abuela. If they ever did, she’d pack their bags for them. Lace had watched Abuela cram her cousin Licha’s things into a suitcase, clearing her perfumes and lipsticks off the motel dresser with one sweep of her arm. When Lace visited her in Visalia and they went swimming, Licha’s two-piece showed that her escamas, the birthmarks that branded her a Paloma, had disappeared.
             Lace’s mother taught her that those birthmarks kept them safe from the Corbeaus’ feathers. That family was el Diablo on earth, with dark wings strapped to their bodies, French on their tongues, a sprinkling of gypsy blood. When Lace slept, they went with her, living in nightmares made of a thousand wings.
             Another black feather swirled on a downdraft. Lace watched it spin and fall. It settled in her hair, its slight weight like a moth’s feet.
             Her mother snatched it off Lace’s head. “¡Madre mía!” she cried, and threw it into the flames.
             Lace’s cousins said the Corbeaus grew black feathers right out of their heads, like hair. She never believed it. It was another rumor that strengthened the Corbeaus’ place in their nightmares. But the truth, that wind pulled feathers off the wings they wore as costumes, wasn’t a strong enough warning to keep Paloma children from the woods.
             “La magia negra,” her mother said. She always called those feathers black magic.
             The fire dimmed to embers. Lace’s mother gave the pail a hard kick. It tumbled down the bank and into the river, the hot metal hissing and sinking.
             “Let them drown,” her mother said, and the last of the rim vanished.

THE WEIGHT OF FEATHERS by Anna-Marie McLemore.  Copyright © 2015 by the author and reprinted by permission of Thomas Dunne Books / St. Martin’s Griffin.

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Giveaway time!
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One (1) SIGNED finished copy of The Weight of Feathers!

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Must be 13+ to enter.
This is a publisher-sponsored giveaway: I am not responsible for any lost/damaged packages.
This giveaway will run until the 1st of October (ends at 11:59 pm).
Only I and the publishers will see your mailing address.

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Thank you so much to Michelle at St. Martin’s Press for having me on the blog tour and for sending me a copy for review!

7 comments:

  1. I love the cover. I speak both English and Spanish, so I will definitely enjoy reading this book. The review sounds great and I'm adding this one to my TBR list.

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  2. I want to read this book because of the review posted here. It sounds like a book I will love and can't put down.

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  3. I LOVE GGM and magic realism! I will definitely check this out, see if our library has it.
    Love the excerpt too!

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  4. It definitely sounds interesting and that cover is just beautiful! :)

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  5. It definitely sounds interesting and that cover is just beautiful! :)

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  6. I love books about the circus and magic, so this sounds great, especially with the darker tones. I adore the cover too! ~ Danielle D.

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  7. I'm obsessed with the cover art. I'm so intrigued.

    -Rosie
    @rkgutmann
    literaryhedonist.com

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