Blood Money is a fast-paced story following Azzam after he is outed as an informer for the CIA on his employerSee more reviews on The Best Books Ever!
Blood Money is a fast-paced story following Azzam after he is outed as an informer for the CIA on his employer's shadowy dealings in financing and supplying weapons for acts of terror across the world. Azzam, who knew this day would come eventually, has to flee, but his old boss isn't going to let him get away so easily. Along the way, we meet a diverse cast of characters, including a multi-national group of mercenaries tasked with identifying the mole in Sun Corp's operations. Everyone in the story gets a little bit of backstory, so they're not just Nameless Bad Guys #1-6 or anything. It makes it easier to keep the many characters straight, and also makes the minor characters more memorable.
There were a few plot twists in here that I was not expecting, especially a big reveal towards the end that surprised me and made me go back and see certain scenes from earlier in the story in a different light. There's a lot of foreshadowing and little hints as to the bigger picture in this story, but I definitely did not put the clues together until the end.
This was definitely a book that I could envision as a movie. It has some pretty cool global settings, takes place over a very short period of time, and is constantly on the move. I finished the book way quicker than I had expected, because it was really hard to put down! I definitely wanted to keep reading to find out how everything was going to end.
In places, I did find the writing to be a bit clunky, and the police procedural end of it didn't feel that realistic to me, but it didn't really spoil the story for me, as the plot as a whole was very engaging. The human aspect of the story -- the slow reveals about Azzam's past, for example -- worked very well for me. The author has an engaging, easy to read style, and I look forward to reading more from her in the future....more
The Geneva Option starts out in New York, but by the end of the book, we've been all over the world as Yael AzSee more reviews at The Best Books Ever!
The Geneva Option starts out in New York, but by the end of the book, we've been all over the world as Yael Azoulay, a brilliant rising star at the UN, tries to find out the truth behind a friend's suspicious death and a shady deal with the devil, so to speak. Yael is a pretty awesome lead character -- she's brilliant, beautiful, and can kick your butt. No matter the situation, she almost always keeps her cool, and she will stop at nothing to uncover the conspiracy that sent her on her journey in the first place.
The story that follows weaves together American and international politics, murder, espionage, conspiracy, historically wartorn regions of Africa, genocide, and the very real issue of mining for minerals used in today's high-tech gadgets. If that sounds heavy, that's because it is. The book isn't a light read at all. Aside from the sometimes horrific subject matter, especially once the action shifts to a refugee area in Africa, there's still a lot of information to keep straight -- characters, history, rivalries, conspiracies -- so this isn't an easy reading book for when you want to relax. You definitely have to concentrate to remember who all the major players are, especially if you're going to try to figure out how all of the pieces fit together.
I thought this book and all of its international intrigue was fascinating, but I also love politics and negotiations and world history. Chapters will often derail from the main action to give a thorough history of a new character's background, or an explanation of what this new business does, or what caused a war in that country. It can be a lot of plot details to wade through, only some of which wind up being important in the end. The author has a very dense writing style, and as you read, you start to be able to pick up on what you can skim and what you need to know. It would be more effective and less overwhelming in a novella, or in non-fiction, but as a full length novel, it got to be a bit much sometimes and could drag the pace down.
Also, those of you who know me will know that I'm not a prude at all, but there were a handful of sexual scenes that just seemed gratuitous to me -- they generally didn't further the plot, the information we learned could have been imparted in a different way, one that didn't take Yael and reduce her to a sexy object for the scene. In fact, all of the women in the story fall into two categories: they're either beautiful and sexy and women who are desired by just about every man, or they are older and kind of frumpy and serve mostly as plot devices. I'd love to see more awesome, kick-butt heroines who also don't happen to look like exotic supermodels.
Due to sometimes dark subject matter (genocide, murder, sexual assault, war crimes) and sexual content, I would recommend this book to adult readers. If you're interested, a novella by the author, also focusing on Yael, is available for free, in just about any digital format available. I haven't read the novella yet, but it should be a pretty good taste of the author's style....more
I thought the premise of this book was really cool. Lila dreams up two very real, but very different versions See more reviews at The Best Books Ever!
I thought the premise of this book was really cool. Lila dreams up two very real, but very different versions of her Friday night. In one, she leaves her boyfriend Jay behind to go party with her roommates/best friends; in the other, she lets them go out on their own as she stays in with Jay. But both realities have terrible consequences: in the first, all three girls are drugged, abducted, and brutally assaulted by a group of guys, but Lila is able to intervene to get help. In the second, without Lila there to stop the perpetrators, her best friends are killed.
Lila, when she wakes up for real, finds out that neither scenario ever happened, but is convinced that the night will happen without someone stopping it. From there, the book shifts from the creepy but disorienting dual reality scenario to Lila going all vigilante on the guys in order to do whatever it takes to stop any other girls from being hurt again.
I had mixed feelings about Lila. I thought it was neat to have a main character who was super devoted to her friends, and who was determined to make sure that the bad guys couldn't hurt anyone else. She was also super annoying at times when it came to her long inner monologues. I admit that I did a lot of skimming of her thoughts just to get back to the action, because a lot of it was just repetitive.
The first half of the book was very strong, I thought, as we read about Lila's dream scenarios and follow her as she tries to escape from the guys who have abducted her and her friends. The second half, which was more stake-out and investigating, dragged more, and had the added bonus of Characters Making Stupid, Frustrating Decisions. It's worth a read to see how it all works out, but if you're like me, prepare for some eye rolling at some borderline cliche things.
I'd recommend this book for mature teens and up. Aside from cursing and alcohol use, there is a lot of violence (in general and specifically against women) and talk of sexual assault, which could be triggering for readers. ...more
In honor of the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who, BBC Books has reissued/redesigned/reawesomed a series of eleveSee more reviews at The Best Books Ever!
In honor of the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who, BBC Books has reissued/redesigned/reawesomed a series of eleven books -- one for, you guessed it, each Doctor. The Silent Stars Go By follows our current Doctor, Amy, and Rory, as they try to get back to Leadworth for Christmas. As usual, though, their TARDIS trip is more than a bit... off.
Instead of present day England, the trio winds up in the far, far, far future on a planet colonized by Morphans, people who are distant descendants of humans as we know them. It wouldn't be a Doctor Who story if trouble didn't almost immediately ensue, of course, and that happens when Rory goes back to the TARDIS to get something and the trio gets split up. Most of the first half of the book involves a lot of running and hiding and trying to explain why they have suddenly shown up on this planet; the back half involves a lot of running and hiding and fighting alien monsters, and then finally solving the mystery. In other words, just another day in the life of the Doctor and his companions.
The author really nails the voices of Amy, Rory, and the Doctor. I could hear their voices in my head when I was reading the dialogue. There's one particular dramatic monologue by the Doctor that I could practically envision Matt Smith acting out, it was just that spot on with his voice, speech patterns, etc. There are also lots of recurring jokes and humorous moments in the story, both in the banter between the characters, and in some rather witty verbal misunderstandings from the Morphans.
There were some parts where the book dragged a little, particularly in the sections which only focused on the Morphans. And like any Who story, the final conclusion and how the Doctor works out the problem felt rushed and a little convoluted, but if you're a Who fan, you're probably used to that. I don't think you need much prior knowledge about the show to read this book and understand it, but the book's real strengths -- the dialogue and relationship between Amy, Rory, and the Doctor -- have more meaning if you're familiar with the characters already. There is some violence of the scary-alien-monster kind, but otherwise, this is a very clean read....more
In honor of the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who, BBC Books has reissued/redesigned/reawesomed a series of eleven books -- one for, you guessed it, eachIn honor of the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who, BBC Books has reissued/redesigned/reawesomed a series of eleven books -- one for, you guessed it, each Doctor. Earthworld focuses on the Eighth Doctor and his companions Fitz and Anji. What's just supposed to be a quick pop back to Earth -- real Earth -- turns into a trip to New Jupiter, where, of course, trouble ensues.
Fitz and Anji, both new characters to me, were both ones I'd love to spend more time with. Fitz grew up during WWII and fancied himself to be a singer when he met up with the Doctor in the 60s. Anji meets the Doctor and Fitz in 2001 for what was supposed to just be one adventure. They've got pretty rounded-out personalities of their own, and can carry their own storylines well. You miss the Doctor when he's not on screen, so to speak, but Fitz and Anji are both pretty fun to read about anyway.
The book reads just like an episode of the show, which, of course, is the point. The Doctor and his companions, predictably, get separated and all wind up with their own issues and puzzles to solve, and everyone has to rely on their own strengths and intelligence to make sure that they get a happy ending. Some of my favorite parts of the story revolved around the often humourous, close-but-no-cigar interpretations of Earth throughout history that the people of New Jupiter have made. These were responsible for lots of laugh out loud moments on my part.
The book's downfall is really the same as the show: the Doctor often makes completely wacky leaps of logic, and you don't always know how things progressed from point A to point C. Things get very fast paced at times, and scenes switch rapidly between our three main characters. That all can make the plot hard to follow at tines, but it's also true to the source, so I can't really ding the book for that.
This book, and I suspect all books in the series, work best if you have a functional knowledge of Doctor Who, though you certainly don't need to be an expert. I'm more familiar with New Who than the original eight Doctors, but a quick Wikipedia read filled me in more on what Eight got himself up to, and Fitz and Anji's backstories. (And even that was kind of unnecessary, I was just overly curious.) Like the show itself, the book is a fairly clean read, with some violence and sexual innuendo. ...more
Reconstructing Amelia tells the story of a grieving mother trying to piece together what really happened when See more reviews on The Best Books Ever!
Reconstructing Amelia tells the story of a grieving mother trying to piece together what really happened when her daughter died. The story flips between the past and present, and incorporates traditional narrative, emails, blog posts, Facebook posts, and text messages to tell its story.
I felt like this story really used its different modes of storytelling well. You learn just enough from each of them, and then they're backed up or expanded on by the narrative sections that follow. Each section is dated so you know when you're flipping back and forth in time. The text messages in particular are heartbreaking, especially as Amelia starts to be viciously bullied by people at school. Amelia can be a hard character to invest in -- you already know that she's dead, and there's no changing that outcome -- but you can't help but feel for her as she deals with how complicated her life suddenly gets at school.
There aren't really that many likeable characters in the book. You feel sympathy for Amelia, but also wish that someone, anyone, would have equipped her to stand up for herself better. Sylvia, Amelia's one and only real friend, is kind of self-centered and a jerk to her, which Amelia acknowledges but still stands by her anyway. Most of the other kids at school are just horrific, especially once one group turns on Amelia. The adults aren't much better, either, and many of them seem content just to stir the pot, so to speak.
I've heard some people compare this book to Pretty Little Liars and Gossip Girl, in terms of rich girls behaving badly, so if you like those sorts of stories, you may want to give this one a chance. I'd probably add a dash of Desparate Housewives to that description, as there are plenty of adults behaving badly, as well. All of the action in this story is completely over the top -- whether it's an remotely accurate portrayal of life at an expensive Brooklyn private school or not, I couldn't tell you. The book does make me incredibly glad that I lived out my teenage years before social media as we know it today really even existed. There was enough meanness over email and IRC and AIM to go around; I couldn't imagine living in the days of Instagram and mass texting and Facebook.
I did enjoy trying to figure out what really happened to Amelia. There were some plot twists that I guessed, and some others which I still wonder where they came from. Also, there were some plot lines that I felt didn't really go anywhere. The subplot regarding Amelia's father seems to go nowhere for a while, and then it goes somewhere but in a way that felt hasty, like the author realized too late that she wanted to connect the storylines. There's a supblot regarding a man who Kate met once, years ago, which seems like it's going to be important but just trails off. I was astounded at the fact that the detective assigned to Amelia's case allows Kate to accompany him when he's interviewing people. I don't think that could ever possibly be proper protocol, although it makes for a more interesting story And while I know I reviewed an ARC and maybe, hopefully, this has been fixed in the print version, but there's a string of emails that date to 1997, and they're attributed to a Gmail address, only Gmail didn't start its service until 2004. This unreasonably annoyed me, but I suspect the average reader will be able to overlook it. I wasn't a fan of the epilogue, as it was a little too neat and "let's wrap up all these loose ends" for me, since the story itself just sort of ends abruptly once Kate learns the truth of what happened. I probably would have liked the ending a little better if it had been more open ended.
This story includes a lot of sexual content, as well as some drinking and talk about drugs, bullying, strong cursing, and talk about suicide and self-harm. I think this book is being marketed as adult fiction, but I think that more mature teens would be fine reading this, though I'm guessing they may not care as much regarding some of the plots involving Kate....more
Reboot takes place in a dystopian world where almost all of the United States has been destroyed and everyone See more reviews at The Best Books Ever!
Reboot takes place in a dystopian world where almost all of the United States has been destroyed and everyone who is left has settled in cities in Texas. People who die -- either from a plague-like disease, or murder, or natural causes, it doesn't seem to matter -- often Reboot after death. They're not zombie-like, though: they're stronger, faster, almost invincible, and are generally seen almost as super soldiers as they will follow orders with no question.
Wren, our main character, is one of the most feared Reboots: the longer you take to Reboot after you first die, the better you are as a Reboot. Wren took 178 minutes to come back, the longest out of any Reboots at her facility. She has the best track record, and her trainees are always the best. So of course she takes a chance on Callum, who isn't exactly the type of newbie she usually takes on. She sees him as a challenge -- no one else can make the low-numbered Reboots into good fighters, but maybe she can.
We follow Wren as she trains Callum and tries to make him less human and more like her -- dangerous, efficient, deadly. In between all of that, Wren tries to deal with other suspicious issues going on in the Reboot compound, as well as her feelings for Callum, which surprise her as she's always held herself so far apart from the other Reboots. They don't like her, she doesn't like them, and she's been a Reboot for so long that she never had any sort of relationship before dying.
Overall, I liked this book. I liked that Wren and Callum's relationship wasn't an instalove situation and instead it was allowed to grow as they got closer and Wren tried to examine her feelings for him. There was a lot of action and the fight/battle scenes were all written very well. There's a pretty robust cast of supporting characters, both humans from HARC and Reboots, who you get pretty invested in over the course of the story. Wren has some pretty great character growth over the course of the story as she begins to question everything she'd ever been told by HARC.
There were a few things that I wish were better. The romance aspect sometimes seemed at odds with the very dark, gritty world of the Reboots -- it felt a little fluffy for me and didn't always mesh with the tone of the rest of the book. Also, Wren and the other higher-numbered Reboots are so often described as having no feelings and really just being soulless machines. But Wren definitely has feelings: she might be conditioned to kill without question, but being that the whole story is told in first person from her perspective, we definitely get to see her thoughts and feelings the whole time, and she's got a lot of them. Also, the way Callum was written, I kept picturing him as a much younger teenager, as he just came off as very innocent -- kind of the anti-bad boy, really, which was a refreshing change of pace from that trope, but also confusing for a little while.
Reboot sets things up very well for a sequel, although things ended well enough that it stands on its own. I would definitely want to check out the next book in the series! There is a lot of violence (shooting, fights, etc.), talk about drug use, some sexual content, and making out. Due to the violence, I'd probably recommend this for older readers....more
On reflection, Maya's Notebook is a quiet story punctuated by big moments of loudness. The story is written frSee more reviews on The Best Books Ever!
On reflection, Maya's Notebook is a quiet story punctuated by big moments of loudness. The story is written from Maya's perspective as she writes about her life in a journal. It's half told in the present day, following her arrival in Chile, and half told as flashbacks, going back to Maya's childhood and upbringing, all the way up to meet with the present day. Telling the story out of order like that can be somewhat annoying, but overall it works here as we are let in, piece by piece, to the turmoil in Maya's life that caused her to be sent all the way to Chile.
I had a somewhat hard time getting into the story at first, but once I got used to the writing and got a little more immersed in Maya's world, it was a fairly fast read. The writing can sometimes be overly flowery, and Maya's dialogue doesn't always ring true for the way her character is described, but I chalk some of that up to differences in translation, as I believe the book was originally written in Spanish. The story can be slow at times, especially when Maya is in Chile, putting her life back together, and even the fast paced scenes back in Las Vegas are told with the advantage of hindsight, as Maya reflects on what happened to her. They're tense, but you know that she makes it out relatively okay, or she wouldn't be telling her story to the reader now.
Maya is an interesting character -- she's only around 20 or so in the present day section of the book, but her personality fluctuates wildly in maturity. Sometimes she is stone cold, sometimes she's oblivious, sometimes she acts out in inappropriate ways, and sometimes she's exactly like a giddy teenager, for example, when she falls head over heels in love with a guy who is passing through Chiloe, her small Chilean town. In other books, I'd probably be annoyed by this, but for Maya, who has had an unstable childhood and some very complicated teenage years, her acting out and mood swings make sense from a psychological standpoint. You do find yourself rooting for Maya, and for all of the people she grows to love in Chiloe, as she slowly becomes less stubborn and lets people in to her life.
I would probably classify this book as adult fiction with a young adult main character, or at least recommend it for more mature readers. This is both due to the subject matter and the pace that the story is told at. I don't mean to underestimate teen readers, but the tone and feel of the book feels much more "adult/general fiction" than young adult or new adult. There is a lot of violence, drug/alcohol use/abuse, and sex/prostitution in the story, so it isn't terribly appropriate for younger readers....more
(A note: I'll be referring to A with neutral pronouns -- they, their, themself -- as in the book, A explicitly says that they feel neither male nor fe(A note: I'll be referring to A with neutral pronouns -- they, their, themself -- as in the book, A explicitly says that they feel neither male nor female, and I don't think falling in love with Rhiannon would change that, despite the summary using 'he' to refer to A.)
This is one of those books where the more I think about it, the more I find that I have problems with it, which is disappointing. Let's break it down like this:
Things I Really Liked: * David Levithan's writing is magical. I've read other books of his before and am always amazed at the way that he weaves words together. There's something very lyrical about his writing, and very honest and real. A's narrative voice was often almost otherworldly -- so while A didn't necessarily sound like a 16-year-old, it made sense for a being which has no fixed body. A has lived in thousands of different lives, so it works that their voice is different than you would otherwise expect. * The story is instalove, in respect to the fact that A sees Rhiannon and immediately knows that they love her, but I didn't have as hard of a time with it as I usually do. With A's otherworldly, not quite human sort of voice, and the fact that A has experienced thousands of lives and glimpses of relationships, so I had less of a hard time believing that they could instantly see Rhiannon and know that they want to be with her. * The characters, by sheer virtue of the fact that A wakes up in a new body every day, are diverse. A finds themself temporarily inhabiting people of all genders, ethnicity, sexualities, religions, etc., and for the most part, A (and the writing) is not judgmental about the situations they find themself in. While it can come off a little after-school-story-ish (today we're learning about undocumented workers! today we're learning about being transgender! today we're learning about severe depression!), overall, the situations and different lives are handled relatively sensitively and in an easy to understand way. * I liked that we never get an answer as to why A changes bodies every day, or what they could do to stop it, or what would even happen if they did. If you're a reader who's frustrated by not knowing how everything works, or who likes a little explanation with their pseudo-science-fiction, this will probably frustrate you. If you're like me and can just go "okay, A switches into a new body every day for no real reason" and move on, then you'll be fine.
Things That Made Me Give This Book Some Side Eye, Sort Of Like This:
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* So A is basically stalking Rhiannon, once they realize they looove her and don't want to be without her. A shows up at her school and engineers way to be around her before they finally decide to tell Rhiannon the truth. A comes off as well intentioned but Rhiannon is justifiably creeped the heck out by a) the impossibility of it all and b) the fact that A keeps showing up to be with her. When Rhiannon expresses some reservation about all of this, A turns into the "Nice Guy" who is all "woe is me, why doesn't she love me back, why have I been friendzoned!!" which got a little grating at times. * A is so consumed by their instalove for Rhiannon that they basically abandon their ethical/moral code that's kept things running smoothly for 16 years of body switching. A starts making their host bodies skip school, miss family trips, go to parties, lie to their families, and otherwise engage in activities they may not usually do, just so that A can go spend time with Rhiannon. It's kind of hard to sympathize/root for A alll the time whenever they are putting their host's bodies and lives through all sorts of trouble. * Like I said before, the book is pretty open and accepting of all the people that A inhabits, but there were a few exceptions that made me cringe. A temporarily inhabits a very obese teenager, and while A speaks with empathy for just about every other person they inhabit, A comes across as nothing more than grossed out this time, which made me uncomfortable. Also, the tone the book takes towards the subplot involving Nathan, one of the people whom A inhabits, was a bit frustrating/judging. Nathan and his family are probably on the slightly more extreme end of evangelical Christianity and are not portrayed in the best light. Without spoiling anything, comparing Nathan's subplot to A's makes A look very hypocritical at times, in a way that I don't think was really intentional. * The ending was a little too deus-ex-machina for me, in that it wrapped the story up but didn't really satisfy much, or answer some of the questions I still had. It worked, but also hinges on the reader being okay with A kind of manipulating another person's life to get the results A wanted.
There is talk of depression, self-harm, drug and alcohol use/abuse, and frank talk about sexual orientation and identity, although nothing of the above is ever really super graphic or inappropriate. Even if you think this book may annoy you for the reasons it sort of bothered me, I would still recommend reading it on the strength of David Levithan's writing alone. It's an interesting take on a love story, and while problematic in places, is still probably worth a read. ...more
Alienated was a fun read told in the dueling perspectives of Cara and Aelyx. While at first, Cara isn't too excited about playing host to an alien excAlienated was a fun read told in the dueling perspectives of Cara and Aelyx. While at first, Cara isn't too excited about playing host to an alien exchange student, she warms to the idea; meanwhile, Aelyx is excited to go to Earth but not to stay with Cara. It's clear from the outset that he's got some ulterior motives, and it takes most of the book for the truth to come out, and when it does, there's bound to be drama.
This was a fairly quick read for me. Alienated isn't non-stop action; for much of the book, it's just interpersonal drama as Aelyx adjusts to life on Earth and as Cara's friends and community start to turn against her for welcoming an alien into their lives. I thought the anti-L'eihr sentiment was actually really well done, especially the way it slowly escalated, and, let's face it, it would probably be what would happen in the real world if aliens made contact and wanted to try living among us. It was also interesting to see things from Aelyx's perspective on how he viewed people from Earth, and knowing his thoughts and biases off the bat really helped with his character development as the story went on.
I liked the romance between Cara and Aelyx. It takes its time, and the development makes sense, especially as Cara is slowly abandoned by most of the other people in her life because she refuses to stop taking part in the exchange program. I did feel like I wanted to know more about L'eihr and their life and customs; outside of some information given by Aelyx as he's telling Cara about his world, it really takes until the end of the book to get a better glimpse at their lives. Fortunately, things are set up for a sequel where we will hopefully learn more about the L'eihrs. I'm curious to see how the next book goes, given how things are left off in this one, so there is a lot to look forward to. With much of the character establishment out of the way already, perhaps the next book will be a little more action and a little less talk....more
Author Gregory Spatz has assembled a collection of dense, intricate short stories in Half as Happy. While yourSee more reviews at The Best Books Ever!
Author Gregory Spatz has assembled a collection of dense, intricate short stories in Half as Happy. While your average short story just gives you a sketch of who the characters are, or maybe feels like it could be part of a large work, Spatz's stories feel fully realized. His writing style is rich with detail and flows in an almost stream-of-consciousness sort of way, which can get a bit overwhelming at times, but which serves the narrative voice of the story very welll.
While some of the characters aren't even given names, you still feel like you wind up knowing them, warts and all. Even when you get little backstory on the characters, you feel like you know what makes them tick -- at least, as well as the characters themselves know, which oftentimes isn't that well. The characters are not often ones who have a great deal of self awareness, and if they do, that doesn't mean they understand the other people in their lives any better.
The people Spatz writes about are not exactly people in peak condition. They are dysfunctional, desperate, delusional. They are cheaters and liars, they are seeing their relationships crumble before their eyes. They are grief-stricken or ill or on the cusp of divorcing. Not one story focuses on people who really have their act together. A number of the stories felt far too close to home for me sometimes: the lonely soon-to-be ex-spouses, each looking on at the other post-break-up with a degree of desire for the life the other now has; the young couple moving into a new home to try to recapture a connection that they've lost. The characters may be lost and dysfunctional, but they are very, deeply human.
All of the stories save one ("The Bowmaker's Cats") are set in a realistic, fairly straight-forward contemporary world. "The Bowmaker's Cats" has a touch of magical realism about it as you find yourself wonder what, exactly, happened, what does it all mean, when you get to the end. The rest of the stories show you snippets of lives, relationships gone wrong, things taken too far. It's a fascinating look at less-than-perfect people, many of whom you still find yourself rooting for anyway.
Enter the Rafflecopter below for a chance to win Half as Happy to experience Spatz's detailed, sometimes disorienting, worlds for yourself. Open to anyone who can receive mail at an address in the US. Due to some sexual situations in the book, please enter only if you are 17 or older....more
Looking for the perfect person to have by your side during the zombie takeover? You're definitely going to wanSee more reviews at The Best Books Ever!
Looking for the perfect person to have by your side during the zombie takeover? You're definitely going to want Layla! She's a medievalist who appears to specialize in weaponry, she knows her way around swords and guns and hand-to-hand combat. Unlike a lot of other heroines who have inexplicable strengths and talents when it comes to zombies, Layla's whole life has been the study of weaponry. She's a bit of a reluctant leader, but she's a badass nonetheless, and doesn't ever let herself get too sappy or blinded by her guy problems. There's a romance side-plot but it never really takes over for the main action, and the choices Layla makes are strong and realistic.
The Harvesting isn't quite your typical zombie story. The first half focuses on Layla and the residents of Hamletville, as they band together to try to survive. There's a good mix of zombie killing and interpersonal drama as you get to know about Layla and her past, and get to know the other residents of the town. The second half takes the zombie story and plunks it down into a much broader paranormal setting as Layla and her friends go out of the frying pan and into the fire, so to speak. The focus shifts away from zombies and more onto some other supernatural beasties (vague so as not to spoil), with a good dose of folklore, forest spirits, and more.
I wasn't sure at first how I felt about this not being strictly a zombie story, but the more I think about it, the more okay I am with the idea as presented in the book that humanity is never alone, and that the zombies eating through most of the human population gives more room for these spirits, other creatures, etc., to breathe and walk in the world.
If you go into this expecting it to be 100% nonstop zombies, you may be disappointed. There are a lot of human stories here, not just about survival and head shots, and the mixture of Russian and other folklore with zombies and paranormal/fantasy creatures makes for a somewhat different read. But the action never lets up -- even the quiet at-home scenes still serve to advance the plot and are still plenty tense.
My only quibble is with the last chapter, which really seems more like a preview of the second book in the series than a final chapter. Layla's story hits a high point and you wonder what's going to happen next, and then all of a sudden the book shifts to focus on completely new characters. It was really jarring and I was wondering if I missed something. I kept looking for some sort of symbolism in these new characters, like perhaps they represented alternate universe characters of Layla and friends, but if there was a parallel, I totally missed it.
Because of sexual situations and a lot of violence/gore, I would recommend this book to mature readers. The Harvesting is a pretty interesting, unique take on zombies and the series is off to a great start....more
Dark Tide is a mystery following Genevieve, a former Londoner who quit her high-powered sales job to follow heSee more reviews at The Best Books Ever!
Dark Tide is a mystery following Genevieve, a former Londoner who quit her high-powered sales job to follow her dream and move out onto a houseboat to get away from it all. She also leads a bit of a double life -- in order to more quickly achieve that dream, she takes up a second job dancing at a gentlemen's club. The book bounces back and forth between the present, where Genevieve is dealing with the fallout from discovering the body of a friend from the club, and the past, as we follow Genevieve as she manages her two jobs and all of the chaos that happens when the two accidentally wind up mixing.
The jumping back and forth in time can be somewhat confusing. At least in the ARC I reviewed, there weren't always clear indications of when these time shifts were happening, so sometimes I'd move into a new section thinking "but so-and-so wasn't at Genevieve's boat" or otherwise being confused. Those sort of shifts in narration are almost always tricky, so it would have been nice even if there was just a nice little line divider or something other than some extra spacing.
Genevieve is an interesting character who can be difficult to like at times. On one hand, she is determined to get her way and live her dream -- she is going to live on this houseboat and she is not going to let anything stop her. She is educated and is pretty no-nonsense. On the other hand, she can be frustratingly naive -- she seems to have no idea what she's gotten herself into at the club she dances at, and I feel like a lot of her problems in the "present day" part of the story could have been avoided if she'd been more truthful and less stubborn. The way she's written, she just comes across as very disconnected, so sometimes it's hard to sympathize with her, even when bad things are happening.
I did like the look at Genevieve's dual life -- her all-business persona when she was dancing at the club, compared with her more laid back lifestyle with her fellow house-boat friends at the marina. And it was neat to try to put the pieces together to figure out what was going on, who was after Genevieve, etc. There were a few aspects which were obvious, and some which I didn't see coming. One character, I was suspicious of from the first time he appeared -- fortunately, I wasn't completely right with my guesses on that one, but he still wasn't acting entirely out of the goodness of his own heart. I was a little bit unsatisfied with the ending -- I didn't buy the romance aspect to the story, and the ending really hinges on that, so other readers may not be annoyed by it.
This book does have a fair amount of violence (to people mostly, and one animal), drinking/drug use, and sexual situations (though nothing described too graphically). Elizabeth Haynes' previous novels, Human Remains and Into the Darkest Corner, have gotten pretty excellent reviews, and I'm hoping to check those ones out in the future too....more
Prisoner B-3087 is a middle grade/early-YA book which is somewhat based on the true story of Jack Gruener, calSee more reviews on The Best Books Ever!
Prisoner B-3087 is a middle grade/early-YA book which is somewhat based on the true story of Jack Gruener, called Yanek in the story, who survived ten different concentration camps during World War II. The story is told with a very straight-forward narrative. It doesn't linger on the atrocities he endures in great or lurid detail, but it doesn't ignore them or try to hide them. By the time Yanek begins to be shuffled from camp to camp, he is well aware of the death that surrounds him. He's still determined to survive and even in the most dire of situations, he doesn't lose hope. He shows a lot of strength, faith, and bravery when many others simply couldn't continue living in the brutal conditions of the concentration camps.
I think the biggest drawback was that it was hard to connect emotionally with Yanek, because the story is told in such a detached, simple voice. Here's a young boy who endures unspeakable trauma, but the book seemed for the most part to be lacking in the emotional hook that I would have wanted to see. This may be a case of me being too old for the book, though -- I would be interested to see how someone who is in the book's target audience feels about this. As an adult reader who's spent a lot of time reading about and studying this time period, I expected more, but the same may not be true for a young reader.
I think this book would be best for pre-teens/early teens or less advanced readers who are interested in reading stories about this time period but who perhaps may not be ready (for whatever reason) for the more dense historical texts. For readers who haven't had much exposure to WWII/the Holocaust, it may be best to have a parent read along to help facilitate discussion, or to read it when your child is studying that time period....more
One Plus One Equals Blue was adorable and a little heartbreaking. Basil is a loner, having been homeschooled uSee more reviews at The Best Books Ever.
One Plus One Equals Blue was adorable and a little heartbreaking. Basil is a loner, having been homeschooled until he was old enough for middle school, and then not making any friends because everyone else treats him like he's weird. He's used to having no friends, so when Tenzie comes along and immediately starts trying to push her way into his life, things start to get frustrating for Basil. Without giving away too much, we follow Basil as he tries to navigate having this new, outspoken friend who doesn't seem to care about the social conventions and cliques at school. Things get even more difficult whenever Basil's mom, who has been living in California, returns to stay for a while. Basil is conflicted about these changes in his life, and as the saying goes, he needs to "use his words" to do something about it, a task that he struggles with.
I did have to keep reminding myself that the characters are 11 and 12 years old. They kept making choices that I thought were ridiculous and dangerous, with only a little bit of awareness of how these were totally bad ideas, Tenzie in particular. Basil appeared to have more common sense, but didn't know how to say no to Tenzie. I am being vague so as to not spoil anything, but seriously, Basil lets Tenzie talk him into some really, super ill-advised activities and I just kept waiting for things to end horribly. (They don't, fortunately.)
There are a lot of small lessons in this story about drawing boundaries in your life -- Tenzie is a pushy friend, Basil's mom is pushy, and Basil's grandmother lets it all happen, for one reason or another. I was concerned for a lot of the story with how things were going to end. It would have been really easy for this book to wave its magic wand and make everything all better, but not address any of the issues in Basil's or Tenzie's lives. It addresses some, but not all, of them, and I was pretty pleased with the ending. (I actually skipped ahead to read the last few pages at one point because I was getting really worried that I was going to have issues with the ending.) Everyone learns a lesson, although some of them are more subtle than I would have preferred. I guess it's age-appropriate to keep the lessons less heavy handed, and could make for good discussion afterwards, "why do you think Basil's mom does X" or "why do you think Basil did Y? what would you have done?", those sorts of things.
As a side note, the way that synesthesia is worked into the story is very well done. It's not a defining characteristic for either Basil or Tenzie, but it does inform the way both of them see and interact with the world. Their methods for coping with the synesthesia helps highlight the differences between Basil and Tenzie. It's not a major focal point of the story, though, so if you're looking for a book which solely focuses on this, then this is not it....more
Elegy for Eddie, set in the early 1930s, follows private investigator Maisie Dobbs as she tries to unravel tSee more reviews on Short & Sweet Reviews!
Elegy for Eddie, set in the early 1930s, follows private investigator Maisie Dobbs as she tries to unravel the seemingly accidental death of Eddie Pettit, a gentle man who took care of horses and did random tasks for factor workers and men in the market from time to time. Being a mystery novel, of course, his death is anything but accidental and Maisie finds herself involved in a complex inquiry that touches closer to home than she'd first thought.
Like many mystery novels, this is a more recent entry in a series, however, it's perfectly easy to get into without having read any of the previous novels. For the most part, the reader gets enough information on Maisie and her past that even the recurring characters seem familiar from the very start. So it's easy to jump into the action as Maisie investigates Eddie's death, navigates her own personal life, and deals with the way the investigation bleeds over into her own world.
Maisie is an interesting, although not always entirely sympathetic, character. She's a woman who came from nothing to wind up with her own private investigation firm, thanks largely to an inheritance from the man who mentored her. In this book, Maisie really seems to struggle with being between two worlds -- she hasn't forgotten what it was like working as a maid in a big house, but she knows just what wealth will help her accomplish. She sometimes acts with her heart in ways that are with the best of intentions, but which aren't always well received by people for various reasons. It annoyed me because she can come off as somewhat self-righteous and a know-it-all, but fortunately these traits are addressed within the plot and her actions improve over the course of the book.
The mystery itself takes lots of unexpected twists and turns and winds up in a place I hadn't expected at all. I don't think it's a spoiler to say that Eddie's death is much more complicated than even Maisie had thought. It's pretty cool to watch her as she starts to untangle the mystery, and as always, interesting to read a crime novel that doesn't take place in a contemporary setting.
This book is a very clean read, with most of the violence taking place off of the page, and no profanity that I can recall. It's a fun read that manages to mix crime-solving and personal drama in equal measures. Feel free to pick up the series with this book, or go back to the beginning of the series to get a better, more rounded picture of Maisie and her friends....more
Perception starts out normally enough -- there's a young, beautiful girl who has an equally beautiful brotheSee more reviews on Short & Sweet Reviews!
Perception starts out normally enough -- there's a young, beautiful girl who has an equally beautiful brother. They are pretty, and wealthy, and do all the things that pretty, wealthy people do. I'd kind of forgotten what this book was about at first, I just knew it was next on my list of stuff to read, so I was kind of annoyed by Zoe's entitled attitude, until we realize that she is a GAP, a Genetically Altered Person. These people are typically incredibly wealthy, have every opportunity possible in life, are genetically designed to be as beautiful and smart and appealing as possible, etc. GAPs all live inside a walled-off city, so they don't have to mingle with the naturals, people who can't afford the GAP procedure (or object to it). So at least there was a reason for her attitude, although it is hard to have your main character be someone who looks at the "household help" with revulsion.
I really liked the worldbuilding that Strauss does in this book. It's set in the somewhat distant future, and though it doesn't exactly paint the prettiest picture of society, I could see it that sort of misuse of technology by very powerful and wealthy people as something that's plausible. While Zoe starts out as being very closed-minded and judgmental towards non-GAP people and lifestyles, she does come to grow and change over the course of the book, which makes her easier to like.
I would have liked to get more background on Zoe and Liam and their relationship. Her search for her brother is what drives the plot, but we really only see them together in one scene of the book. We're told that they're really close, and we believe it because we believe Zoe, but I think it would have been nice to see them interact a little more.
One thing I was not expecting was the emphasis on science vs. religion. It felt heavy-handed sometimes, especially when Zoe and Noah discuss their differing points of view. I wouldn't call this Christian fiction, since it's not the focus of the story, but it's close when it becomes clear how many of the people associated with the science end of the story are bad guys. Fine if that's your cup of tea, but I just wasn't expecting that to be the backbone of the story.
Otherwise, I feel like this book has the same sort of issues that I feel happen all the time in YA books: somewhat obvious villains, uber-fast-moving romance, some stilted/unrealistic dialogue, at least one moment that makes you go "WAIT WHAT?!", etc. At least Noah isn't the bad boy type who treats Zoe like crap, and although he does make some questionable decisions in the back half of the book, he at least has the self-awareness to know that what he's doing is pretty weird. They weren't showstoppers of issues -- I still enjoyed the story -- but just know they're there.
Overall, I was pretty entertained by this book and wouldn't mind checking out the later books in the series to see what happens to Zoe and her quest for truth. There is some violence and one very brief medical/surgery type scene. There is romance but it never goes any further than kissing....more
* The relationship between Alex and Becca. Alex is a nice, sweet,See the full review at Short & Sweet Reviews.
Here are some things that worked for me:
* The relationship between Alex and Becca. Alex is a nice, sweet, caring guy. No more of this Bad Boy nonsense, Alex is the guy you'd take home to mom and who all of your friends would coo over. If there's a "favorite book boyfriends" question in the Best of 2013 meme at the end of the year, you can bet Alex will most likely be on it. I like the fact that Becca doesn't go from zero to "I can't live without you" upon meeting him. She develops a perfectly normal crush on him, one she spends a lot of time trying to ignore. (Obviously, that doesn't work.) There are some other aspects of their relationship that I'd LOVE to talk about more but they're spoilers. * Becca's anger at her father Jocelyn, and her over-protectiveness of her brother. It's interesting to watch how both of these things grow and change and mature over the course of the book. * Becca is a great leading character -- she experiences conflict, she is passionate about things, she has opinions, and she's just starting to try to find herself now after she realizes that she doesn't have to live her life solely for her brother anymore. She's a bit of a tough nut to crack, as she's spent her whole life having to be strong for her brother and mother, so the times when she does allow herself to get close to someone, or express her real emotions, are pretty poignant.
Here are some things that didn't work for me:
* Almost everything is super predictable. I guessed two of the major plot points way before we ever got there in the book. Now, I'm not the most observant reader, I prefer to not try to guess at future developments while reading. So if I guess something quickly and early on, that means it's way obvious, which could be frustrating for readers who are pros at guessing plots. * A lot of the characters are very one-note. There's the bubbly new best friend, the wise older woman, the funny/quirky bickering sidekick-types, the gruff and unreasonably angry guy, etc. Most of their personalities don't get fleshed out much more than that in this book - I was really hoping for something unexpected where the villain would be someone you didn't expect, but not so much. * There is SO much telling rather than showing. SO MUCH. It's inevitable, in some ways, as Becca and Ryland are new to this whole universe of Holders so they need to have a lot explained to them, but I found the long info dumps to be the places where I wanted to start skimming, which is bad, because it's all info I probably need to know as a reader in the first place.
Overall, I enjoyed reading this book and will be checking out future books in the series. It is a mostly clean read, with some profanity, violence, and kissing scenes....more
This book is definitely unlike anything I have read before. It bills itself as a memoir, and it truly isSee the whole review at Short & Sweet Reviews!
This book is definitely unlike anything I have read before. It bills itself as a memoir, and it truly is - the fictional memoir of Isabella, Lady Trent, and her first encounters with dragons, which have been a life-long fascination of hers. The entire book is written in Isabella's voice as she talks about her childhood, meeting her husband, and their perilous journey to study dragons, at a time where women, especially women of high society, weren't encouraged to engage in scholarly pursuits. This is a book about dragons, yet, but first and foremost, it is a story about a young woman bucking tradition in order to follow her passions.
I think that's an important point to make and remember, because if you go into this book expecting it to be high fantasy about dragons, you'll be disappointed. There is plenty of adventure, and danger, and of course, many encounters with dragons, but there are also long passages about society's expectations of women, or about Isabella's thoughts and reflections on her various experiences. I don't want to say that the story is dry, but rather that it isn't always fast-paced.
I did, however, really enjoy the book. Reading something that's actually written in the style of a memoir was different, and made the book really feel like it was part of a much larger universe. I found myself really wanting to read the other books that Isabella talks about in her narration, both books which shaped her love of dragons and her own writings which had been previously "published". Also, I can't help but want to read future "memoirs" about Isabella. This book only covers her early life, so I was left with questions about how she managed to defy society's expectations in order to become a respected scholar, or how she got the title of Lady Trent. You don't get a complete picture of Isabella, rather you get a much older Isabella's reflections on her younger self. And in case you haven't gathered already, Isabella is a real firecracker of a character -- she certainly knows how to play the game and fit into what society expects of her, but when it comes down to it, she also quietly yearns to challenge those expectations. ...more
Ana is a character who is absolutely devoted to her family and friends. She was written very realisticallSee the full review at Short & Sweet Reviews.
Ana is a character who is absolutely devoted to her family and friends. She was written very realistically, and you could really feel her pain when her family was pulling apart, and her grief when she thinks that they are all dead. She is a normal teenage girl who, despite her new status as apprentice to the Grim Reaper, still has to worry about going to classes and maintaining relationships with her friends, on top of her new duties of Soul Collector.
The cast of characters here is very rich and well developed, including Ana's school friends and Zig, a fellow Soul Collector who helps teach Ana many of her duties. We don't get to see much of Grim/Ernest, but I suspect he'll play a larger role in the following books in the series. Each character plays a different role for Ana in her new life, and it was a refreshing change of pace to read a book where the character has so many supportive people in her life. There are ups and downs, of course, but overall Ana has a great bunch of people surrounding her, and it's easy to see why she's so devoted to them.
As more elements were introduced into the story, I felt that it got a little convoluted, and there were a lot of minor characters to keep track of, which made it a little difficult to be able to put this book down for a bit and be able to pick it up quickly without backtracking. I did feel like the writing was maybe a little overly wordy, and there were some awkward or stilted phrasings that I wished had been smoothed out in editing, but nothing too bad. Aside from some physical violence, death, and kissing/making out scenes, this is a very clean read. ...more
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