Review: Queen of the Night by Leanne Hall

Queen of the Night by Leanne Hall
(This Is Shyness #2)
Reviewed by Maggie: March 31, 2012
Published February 27, 2012 by Text Publishing
Goodreads • Buy at Fishpond or Text • Kindle



Almost immediately after finishing the first book and leaving Shyness, I found myself thinking, "We have to go back!" This Is Shyness (and okay, Wolfboy) pulled me into its trance with its strange, enchanting lullaby and I awoke from the dreamy, all night adventure with a contented smile. When you have a night that special, that magical, it's safer to keep it encased in your memory. There, it's protected and lives forever. But would you rather have one perfect night with Wolfboy or risk shattering that memory for another chance to see him? Me, I'd take that risk every single time and I'm so glad Leanne Hall did as well with Queen of the Night.

Queen of the Night picks up 6 months after Nia left Jethro a note with her number -- 6 months where they haven't seen or spoken to each other. Why am I calling them by their given names instead of the names they gave themselves? Like Jethro says,

"I look at Nia. I can't think of her as Wildgirl now that she's in front of me. That name belongs to that first night."

I love this. It simultaneously acknowledges what was, what isn't now, and what can be. Hopefully. There is a lot of hope and longing in this book, and it isn't just Nia and Jethro's. It's also Paul's, Wolfboy's friend and Wildgirl's dance partner from Shyness. Nia may have left Wildgirl behind with Wolfboy, but she took Wildgirl's take-no-prisoners attitude with her. After 6 months of radio silence from Wolfboy, she says,

"I thought I'd have to wait until I finished school and moved out to change my life, but then I decided to start changing it immediately. [...] I'm sick of being patient, so here's my new theory: boys can go to hell. I'm going to focus on my schoolwork and get the best grades possible. I don't need anyone or anything to interfere with that."

See, girls? This is how you deal with rejection, not with blank pages in your life. Jethro has also recalibrated his life without Nia. However, that doesn't stop him from remembering Wildgirl's advice and reconnecting with Ortolan and his niece, Diana. It also doesn't mean that he's stopped thinking about Wildgirl.

"It seems to be getting more difficult to forget Wildgirl the more time passes by. That's the opposite of what's supposed to happen."

In contrast to Nia and Jethro's mutual longing, you have Paul. Paul broke up with his girlfriend months ago, but unlike Nia and Jethro, he refuses to even try to move on. Also unlike Nia and Jethro, Paul's girlfriend has directly and knowingly rejected him. Unable to accept reality, Paul seeks assistance from the ever present shadier elements of Shyness. Paul retreats further and further into another type of darkness and away from himself. When the story starts, Paul is beyond Jethro's help and thus Jethro finds himself calling once more for Nia -- and actually hitting send after dialing the numbers.

I absolutely loved this book. Whereas Shyness skewed more toward the fantastic, Queen of the Night is an equal blend of reality and dream, hope and disappointment, light and night. It doesn't try to recapture the lulling enchantment that was so special about Shyness, but rather walks you back hand-in-hand while fully conscious. And reality? It can be just as magical and unforgettable as a dream.

Rating: 5/5 stars.

This concludes our week in Shyness. We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. And Leanne?

YAA Confessions: I'm a Fictional Band Groupie

Just an example of how our brains are hard-wired over here at YAA: we went from browsing this Etsy store to "Personalized? Obviously we're getting a YA band name!"  

Fresh in our memories and hearts we naturally thought of Wolfboy's band from Leanne Hall's This is Shyness/Queen of the Night.  (Sorry 'bout your band name, Adam Wilde.)

Ta da! Our version of YAA BFF secret bat signal bracelets and a tribute to our Shyness/The Long Blinks fandom all in one:

If you need us, we'll be working at the merch table at Wolfie's next show.  See you there.

YAA Soundtrack: This Is Shyness/Queen of the Night

By Noelle

I know you might be shocked, but the very same girl who sends you 6am tweet updates to remember to vote in the DJ Duel likes to make soundtracks for her favorite books too.  You never saw that coming did you.  Now not every book merits a full-fledged soundtrack---that's what our DJ Duels are for--but if you scroll through my favorite books on Goodreads, chances are I have a soundtrack for them in my iTunes.  And like any music-obsessed person, I live to force my favorite songs on others.  Ask my sister.  I once circled the block three times so she would "get to" (sister mandated air quotes right there) listen to the entire song playing on whatever mix CD I was playing over her conversation attempts.

Ahem. Yup, I'm that person. 

Buuuuut, just in case there are any other playlist aficionados out there who enjoy making and listening to book-themed soundtracks, YOU'VE COME TO THE RIGHT PLACE!  I will occasionally be posting links to playlists from my personal soundtrack collection.

First up is my soundtrack for Leanne Hall's This Is Shyness series. For this soundtrack I picked songs I thought had a Shyness-vibe of the settings (the streets, the clubs etc) or the people (the Kidds, the dreamers etc.) and as you will be able to tell, I'm unable to resist a good title pun/nod.  I'm weak, people.  You're lucky I couldn't find a Tarsier song.

You can listen to the playlist on Grooveshark by clicking here or check out the tracklisting and liner notes below:


1. Nightcall - Kavinsky: Like I could even resist---it starts with a howl, how perfect is that?
2. DLZ - TV on the Radio
3. Howlin' for You - The Black Keys: OH YES I WENT THERE.
4. Your Lips Are Red - St. Vincent
5. What You Do To Me - Blackroc feat. The Black Keys
6. Breaking it Up - Lykke Li
7. You Know What I Mean - Cults
8. Sleepyhead - Passion Pit
9. Eye - The Smashing Pumpkins
10. Wolf Like Me - TV on the Radio: OH YES I WENT THERE x 2.
11.  Midnight City - M83

Thanks for listening! Hope you had fun with my This is Shyness/Queen of the Night soundtrack.  How'd I do?  Do any of you make your own book-themed playlists?

YAA Art Projects: This Is Shyness

By Noelle

In my original Goodreads review for This Is Shyness, I mentioned that while I was reading it, it evoked a distinct visual style in my mind:

Do any of you visualize scenes of books while you’re reading them? I often do and while I was reading This Is Shyness, my visualization was in the neo-noir, graphic novel style.

Well, I kept thinking about it afterwards and when I read Queen of the Night I could no longer resist the urge to give it a go...and this is what I came up with:

(click for larger)

Introducing the Wildgirl and Wolfboy of my imagination! That Queen of the Night quote was one of my favorites of the series and I thought it summed up Shyness perfectly.

I drew this in Adobe Illustrator and had so much fun making it.  Thanks to Leanne Hall for creating such a fascinating world in Shyness.

Review: This Is Shyness by Leanne Hall

This Is Shyness by Leanne Hall
Reviewed by Noelle and Maggie: March 26, 2012
Published August 2, 2010 by Text Publishing Company
Goodreads • Buy at Fishpond or Text



Long has paled that sunny sky: Echoes fade and memories die. 
--Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass


This Is Shyness starts off like a typical YA story, with an underage girl trying to sneak into a bar with some friends, who then spots a broody, hot guy at the end of the bar. And then he howls. This begins a madcap, all night adventure involving tarsiers and kids hopped up on sugar. Oh, and it takes place in a town where the sun doesn't rise.

Noelle: One definition of surreal is: “marked by the intense irrational reality of a dream.” That about sums up this book perfectly. There’s a dream-like quality to the entire book and it works much like a dream on the reader, lulling you into accepting as fact all of the bizarre and quirky fantastical elements of Shyness without batting an eye. I got swept away by the weirdness, submerged in the surrealism.  My acceptance gave my reading experience a Through the Looking Glass feel, whimsical, strange, unsettling but enchanting. 

Maggie: It felt like Graffiti Moon + Before Sunrise after Hayao Miyazaki has run it through whatever magic machines they have at Studio Ghibli. It is delightfully odd and surreal, yet grounded in the very real emotions of Wolfboy and Wildgirl. I loved Wolfboy, by the way. I expected the brooding, howling hot guy in black to be a stereotypical alpha male who pulls the tabs off his Foster's with his teeth. Instead, he's the guy who thinks "I'm not sure if I'm looking at her too much or too little" while grasping his beer glass. 

Noelle: Oh, Wolfie.  And Wildgirl is such an excellent heroine too.  Unable to stand up for herself the way she wants to in her everyday reality, Wildgirl is delightfully self-assured and no-nonsense in Shyness.  It's almost as if all of the broken rules in Shyness free her to be herself.  She's looking for an adventure and she'll get it too.  Luckily, the reader gets to go along for the ride. 

Maggie: Definitely. And even though it takes place in Wolfboy's world, it requires Wildgirl's "real" world knowledge, like the layout of the housing flats. What I love about that is that it anchored Shyness. Instead of an alternate world, it felt like another, hidden layer of Melbourne -- one that I'd be able to find if I looked hard enough. 

Noelle: Yes! I thought the power lied in that much of the world of Shyness was based in reality with just a few masterful tweaks.  The small details really made the magic.  Okay, the sun never rising might not count as a small detail, but still.  The setting might get trippy at times but the truth behind Wolfboy and Wildgirl's emotions is what made it so believable. 

Maggie:  A book that combines the headiness of an all night adventure with the imagination of a dream.  Rating 4/5 stars. 

Noelle: A fallen suburb where the sun never rises, a boy who howls, a girl who wants to escape if just for one night, shady people, shady places, shady pasts. Um, hell yes.  Leanne Hall makes magic. Rating 4/5 stars. 


Programming note: The world of Shyness stayed with us long after we were finished reading and ended up inspiring us in many different ways.  Which ways you ask? Stick around the blog this week to find out!