Everneath by Brodi Ashton

I picked up this novel because  the book bloggers I really respect all had great things to say about this. I have never so ardently disagreed.

 In the first page, the main character is pathetic.  "It's so hard to open my eyes!" I am stuck to a boy and he stole everything that made me myself. We spent 100 years cuddling. Hot boy and main character are surprised she has a special power to simply survive. How demeaning. For this I will not name her; she will simply be "the main character." (And also because she is Clary/Bella/Could be anyone). There is also zero introduction which I have never experienced before. It was not pleasant. At first I was convinced I picked up a book from the middle of a series. This has never happened to me before. 

Well in the first scene she wants to go home to her honey after "being asleep" for 100 years. Yeah, that's a great idea.  But lucky for her, only 6 months have passed on "the surface". That is a pretty useless time warp since nothing happened except sleeping/cuddling in the 100 years she was gone. 

When she returns, no one is seemingly happy to have her back. Her dad "tastes" disappointed. Other than the fact the MC is now tasting emotions, her dad is apparently horrid. No one runs to great her when she gets back in school, they just gossip about her being a druggie. Then her honey is, perfectly, in her first class of the day. But aghast! she hasn't thought about what to do now that she has traveled worlds to find him. She gets tongue tied and all she can say is "hi." I honestly don't know if I can stand a few more hours of this torture. 

The writing style is also annoying because the author withholds so much information that the narrator knows. Then sometimes she goes back to explain scene set up after the scene happens. Also, the main character has bouts of memory loss, that is never actually a problem because she remembers everything and it's casually thrown in there after all the memories come back. It's like it was just a clause thrown in there to help the writer get herself out a jamb. This sloppy and confusing. It is also filled with gems like "I heard one of them sigh but I didn't know which one."It's like the author lacks confidence and understanding of language. She added 60% more words to a sentence so that repeats the same idea. The story bounces between a 'now' and 'then' time frames which is both helpful for getting essential details since nothing was provided in the beginning and a waste. Had the story been told chronologically it would have been much better because as I learned how the MC to ended up in her position I did soften to her a tad. It would have also helped the character to make sense. 

Speaking of character that don't involve the female protagonist let's review them. First there is Cole, the bad boy, ever living, emotion eater, rock band guitarist. He is in love with the main character for no discernible reason. Then there is Jack, the wholesome love interest that was the best friend and then the boyfriend. I normally adore this type. Jack will be my exception because he isn't especially endearing, he is just too plain. 

The side characters include Jules, the main character's best friend. This character was treated as simply a role, not a character at all. It was painful. The main character's family, Tommy and Dad, were developed slightly better. The emphasis that the MC puts on them in her mind is not the same emphasis that her actions describe. This sort of illusion is actually dangerous because thinking feelings is not the same as living them out. I will say that the very end of book sort of switches gears in this but for all the wrong reasons and way too late. The only other characters worth noting are Mary, Will, and the MC's English teacher. Mary was actually not bad, but there was a major plot hole connected with her. Maybe it will be addressed in the future but I'll never know. The English teacher was role a filling. But Will, now here is proof that Ashton can write a good character. He has real problems that stem from serious events in his past but he changes over time to combat them. I liked Will. Aston did so much with so little screen time with him.  

Then there are sorts of fabricated problems that feel thrown in like this nugget about a quarter way through: 

"My eyes started to sting even though I wasn't sure if I had recovered enough emotions to cry." What? When did this become a problem? She hasn't had trouble "feeling" anything before. She has been boiling with emotion from the beginning. 

Then there is the MC weird sense of humor. "I smiled at the way he said 'guest' like that was my name or something."

About two thirds of the way through, the main character's father is suddenly a lawyer as well as the major which is revealed in a comment that addresses the way he addresses juries. It's this sort of want to be critical thinking lesson that jars the flow of the book and distracts the reader from the action. 

Good things: 

+Beautiful cover. Like drop dead gorgeous. 

+The author brings up some interesting questions about being famous, like "do famous people always feel like others are waiting for them to perform?" 

+Random burst of good humor like when Cole has a good quip about turning a frown on it's *ss. That was actually funny. 

+The main character also does that thing where she assumes because the rock band is famous on a grass roots level that they are like the famous people she sees on TV. This is a great nuance that adds depth to the main character.  

The ending of this book is suppose to be shocking and true love's glory but honestly the foreshadowing was more like a neon sign than anything remotely subtle so it felt stale. So how I managed through it all thanks to the Good Reads book challenge (only two more for this year's goal!), otherwise it would have been a dnf. 

I realize that this review is pretty harsh but not calling out the problems isn't in the spirit of writing good reviews. I don't actually write well enough to write good reviews but I need all the practice I can get. I give this book one guitar out of five. 

Continue reading →

Delirium Series by Lauren Oliver

Overall I didn't like it. I kept reading because the first book ended and I wanted to see how the main character, Lena, would handle the tragic ending. So I read Pandemonium which was much better than the first book but it's ending twist wasn't surprising at all. The third book I only started because I had it on my on phone. The third book has been the biggest disappointment. Lena's maturity spirals away from her. The best part about the third book is the POV from Hana. Please proceed with caution, as spoilers are present, especially for book one.

The first book, Delirium, sets up a world where at 18, everyone gets a procedure that "protects" them from love. They will not longer love and thus be happier because there won't be any heart break, no coveting, irrational behavior, ect. The author tried really hard to sell this concept and even though I didn't buy it because people that can't love and can't hate wouldn't be able to deal with children and teenagers that can. Also, because without love/hate our society might fall apart because it would destroy our sense of "care about that young child" and it would create a lot of sociopaths. But for the sake of entertainment I decide to ignore this and proceed with blinders. Lena the MC, is just a girl with family problems that worried about getting paired, by the government, and which college she will be assigned. She worries about becoming infected with "love" before her procedure but counts down the days until she will be safe. Her best friend Hana is a little more rebellious and introduces Lena to world that goes against the grain, which Lena balks at but you guessed it-she meets a rebellious boy, Alex. We get a sweet love story that transforms Lena from a blind follower to a "free thinker". Of course they are caught and have to escape. It is entertaining, but not really substantive. The ending is a cliff hanger in which Alex is shot a bunch and left with the bad guys while Lena flees. I was impressed that the author attempt to kill Alex off, but wasn't sure if it would stick. Overall I give this book three empty houses out of five.

The second book, Pandemonium, was my favorite in the series. The book is told in two phases-"Now" and "Then". This was a good choice by the author because it fulfills the readers curiosity about how Lena recovered from book one's ordeal without slowing down the action for the overall book. The Lena of "Then" is contrasted with the Lena of "Now" very well. You never feel like they are two different characters but that these two different phases in life are converging. It builds the drama well. We also get a good look at some new characters. Raven and Tack are handled well and like with Lena's "Now" and "Then" you get a sense of how they developed which is very helpful because we don't know them at all before this book. The only thing I will note is that the editing could have been better. There were some inconsistencies with the character's descriptions, like Tack. Then there is Julian. He only appears in the "Now" section. Julian is a great character. He challenges Lena, he helps Lena, and he is considerate toward Lena. I also liked the plot of this book. The worst thing about this book was the ending. It was suppose to be this great shocking plot twist that CHANGED EVERYTHING. It wasn't, it wasn't even shocking, it was expected. It would have been more surprising if it hadn't happened and honestly probably would have made the third book better. I give this book four riots out of five.  

The third book was a mess. I'm not exactly sure what the plot was suppose to be, so we are going to call it a chronicle of Lena's life and a chronicle of Hana's life. Lena, as a character, acted like a spoiled high school girl and not a hardened warrior. She lost the maturity that she won in Pandemonium. Most of the book was spent agonizing/interacting with the love triangle. When there were scenes with other characters, they did not seem to go with general flow of the story. It's like the author sat down and wrote "the love story" all the way through, then went back and peppered scenes with other characters in.  Julian, I am going to say has some character development but it was glanced over. I have nothing but eye rolling for Alex- there was almost no direct interaction with him, mostly observational which is messy. Think Edward Cullen in New Moon. (I cringed too.) This was emphasized with the POV switch to Hana. Hana's story was interesting and I was most invested in what was happening to her than anything else. She had a lot to deal with and it was interesting to see how she managed despite being warped by a procedure that severely put her at a disadvantage. The ending to this book is left open for both Hana and Lena. The author knows how to write an ending, so I am sure this was done deliberately in hopes of continuing the series. Lena's ending made my eyes roll but Hana's mysterious ending was much more acceptable. I give this book two red birds out five. [Run!]

Is it just me or do these covers give off the "Garden of Eden"  but creepy vibe?

Enjoy!

Continue reading →

Night of Cake and Puppets by Laini Taylor

I am just going to come out and say it: This was fluff. The fluff we were dying to hear about since Days of Starlight and Blood from the Daughter of Smoke and Bone Trilogy. (Woah, that's a mouth full.) Night of Cake and Puppets tells the story of how Mik and Zuzanna finally met. Of course it was perfect and it helped ease the loneliness from the trilogy being over. 

A brief taste of what you get in this bite sized novella: backstory of Zuze and Karou's friendship, scuppy wishes, dual point of view with Zuze and Mik, and a romantic setting for the backdrop. 

While I enjoyed Mik's point of view, Zuzanna's point of view is so alive and vibrant it's all I wanted. I would read another novel told from Zuzanna's  point of view. Zuze reminded us just how old our characters are. Karou always seems much older but Zuze has more youthful tone. Zuze also makes me fall in love with Prague. 

I give this short, 5 out of 5 puppets because it did exactly what it was suppose to do. I do not recommend this story as a stand alone. 

Continue reading →

The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson

Taken from Good Reads

This book is about a princess trusted with special destiny in a fantasy world. Sounds boring already. The characters could have been so stale. The gender role bashing could have been eye roll worthy. The culture blending could have been so fake and over done. But it wasn't.

From the first page Carson ignored pretenses practically required for writing this kind of story. Young princess in an arranged marriage that isn't prattling about how unfair life is and how she wants true love? My hopes soared. A princess that isn't a size zero and has trouble with over eating?  Normal sibling rivalry? I got scared in the next chapter I would be let down because everything good was in chapter one. 

No. Nothing let me down, well...nothing serious.

Spoilers may exist from this point on-Read at your own risk.

The first showing casing of Elisa's intelligence comes when she takes her sister's advice. The sister she doesn't like. The sister that is better at politics than Elisa. More than two thirds of young adult heroines would never do that. They have to be free and learn from their mistakes and yada yada yada. 

The attitude that Elisa has toward her arranged married and Alejandro is jaw dropping-ly appropriate. She doesn't balk at it, she doesn't have false expectations about insta love, and she is clear about her desires. She tells her husband/acquaintance  right off the bat-"I don't want to be intimate tonight." 

What a novel idea, communicate with words your feelings/preferences/control instead of acting crazy. Since Alejandro isn't a scum bag, he completely respects that. 

There is no insta love with anyone. Love isn't even central to the story-plenty happens without it, like war council, kidnapping, battles, losing important people. 

Oh and a mystical god gave her a belly jewel that makes her special and appropriately, she is pious, yet struggles with her faith. Some people think that makes this Christian Lit. I'm going go with no, while they might have a lot of common elements I am sensing Carson is just accurately portraying someone that had something supernatural happen to her in which her society has an explanation that works. The religion portrayed in this book has common themes with Christianity but I would not say parallels it. 

I also love how Elisa isn't an island. I mentioned this before, but Elisa doesn't ignore everyone's advice and just do in heart what she feels is best without reasons to back it up. She listens to the people that she respects and she learns without having to make disastrous mistakes. Yet, you never feel that Elisa is a puppet because she makes her own choices after mulling things over plus she has character growth over the course of the novel. She starts out self centered and then starts caring about the people around her more. She learns about her own abilities and their limits. She makes mistakes because she isn't experienced and some have disastrous results. This makes her worthy of role model status.

Now the other characters are not as well developed.  Rosario, her nurse, Cosme, Humberto...they are multi-faceted but I don't think they get the depth they deserve. Hopefully in future novels this will change. Alejandro did get a fair amount of depth but without true exploration. This is actually a good choice on Carson's part  because there wasn't time in Elisa's life to truly get to know him. Elisa, and the audience, learned that he was complex but that was it. 

Major Spoiler- I think Humberto's death was appropriate. Too often love interests are saved by the author just because they are love interest. The world is cruel, war is brutal, and killing your enemies' treasured ones is effective. Not killing them removes the horribleness of war.   

Now, Elisa started off the novel overweight but then she goes through a tough physical trial and slims down. A lot people also had a problem with that because she changed herself. That is ridiculous. Elisa grew as a human being to have more self control and endurance and people are mad about that? Elisa is stronger for this change, not weaker. I applaud Carson for this realistic choice.

Some of the bad things-a few haired brained schemes worked when they shouldn't have but this fantasy so I'll let it go. The antagonist were not super developed and there should have been more time spent developing them, especially individual leaders. {SPOILER} And finally, after being made Queen Regent over the land Elisa carves off a part for a new country and makes a new Queen. Woah. No way is the Quorum going to be peaceful about that or the public.

 NO SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT.

I will be reading more of this series, I will be reading more from Carson, and hopefully if just gets better. I will give this book 4.5/5 roses for good writing and refreshing characters.

Random selection from Google

Continue reading →