Tag: book review

Books, Romance, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: World After by Susan Ee

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: World After by Susan Ee

you can find the book at:

GoodReads
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

goodreads summary:

In this sequel to the bestselling fantasy thriller, Angelfall, the survivors of the angel apocalypse begin to scrape back together what’s left of the modern world.

When a group of people capture Penryn’s sister Paige, thinking she’s a monster, the situation ends in a massacre. Paige disappears. Humans are terrified. Mom is heartbroken.

[..] Meanwhile, Raffe hunts for his wings. Without them, he can’t rejoin the angels, can’t take his rightful place as one of their leaders. When faced with recapturing his wings or helping Penryn survive, which will he choose?

my review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

After reading Angelfall, I had very high expectations for the sequel. And I’m -almost- not wrong.If anything, this book is a page-turner. Like the first book, it has a lot of violence and action. There were definitely a lot of scenes that had me on the edge of my seat. But it all happened at the last 30% of the book.

I did enjoy the development of their family dynamics. Penryn’s mother and her sister page are mainly absent throughout Angelfall, so I liked that they played a more prominent role in the sequel. We get to experience and learn more about their relationship, which is very very complicated. I’m glad the dark humour stayed throughout the book. And the relationship between Penryn and the twins is my favourite relationship in the entire novel. In this book, I felt her struggle more, and it gave her more layers, and she was easier to relate to. Also, the romance doesn’t overwhelm the entire story. It could have quickly been pushed down the route where it was just full-on romance and love triangles and whatnot. Fortunately, that’s not the case here. There’s still that hint of romance, but without distracting too much from the actual conflict.

However, what didn’t work for was the pacing. It just felt too long at the beginning, and I think it’s just that it took a while to really get into the heart of the story. It just felt like a lot of build-ups rather than having its own robust and central plot. The end seemed to be moving towards a more significant conflict, but then it was cut off abruptly. I was also sort of disappointed by the reunion of Penryn and Raffe. The meeting between him and Penryn was anti-climatic. I mean, he thought she was dead, and then it was kind of like

Penryn: yooo I’m not dead
Raffe: k

The scene where he thought she was dead in the first book was so heartbreaking, and then the whole thing where he returned her (supposedly dead) body to her mother even though it could’ve gotten him killed. I guess I wanted the scene to be more emotional…

If the last 25% were the whole book, this probably would have gotten a five-star rating and went straight to the favourite shelf on Goodreads, but unfortunately, the first 75% felt complete filler that could have been sped up a little more. I had to force myself to read and not skim. However, the scenes explaining Paige and what happened to her was fascinating, and the relationship between her and Beliel was really creepy. Overall, it was still enjoyable and exciting, and I can’t wait to read the final book.

Books, Romance, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: Angelfall by Susan Ee

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Angelfall by Susan Ee

you can find the book at:

GoodReads
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

my review:

Rating: ★★★★★

We have declared war on any being that dares to think they can wipe us out without a fight. No matter how celestial, no matter how powerful they are, this is our home and we will fight to keep it.

Six weeks after an attack on earth, the world has been torn apart by a war between angels and humans. Penryn accidentally finds herself watching an angel getting his wings brutally cut off. In trying to help, she is forced to watch as her wheelchair-bound little sister is taken away. Penryn demands that Raffe provides assistance in finding her sibling, and the two natural enemies must work together to outwit danger at every turn.

TO BEGIN WITH, SHOUTOUT TO SIAN FOR TELLING ME TO READ THIS BOOK.FOUR FOR YOU SIAN, YOU GO SIAN.

I’ve read my fair share of angel books, and they’ve all disappointed me. But Angelfall is different in a post-apocalyptic world where Angels have taken over, Penryn is only trying to survive with her schizophrenic mother and sister. Like most books about angels, the main character is usually swooning over these adonis looking people, but no, these angels are brutal and terrifying (and beautiful). Susan Ee’s fantastic debut is one of the best post-apocalyptic YA I’ve ever read, and it blew me away with its perfectly paced blend of action, story, and emotional tension.

Penryn is a fantastic heroine, a funny girl who happens to be amazing in combat. Her interactions with everyone else is so entertaining and hilarious. Raffe is not your usual broody YA main character. [ps agnostic angels was something I was not expecting!]. He’s so intriguing and funny it’s impossible not to be drawn to him anyway. His relationship with Penryn develops slowly and naturally as they struggle to find shelter and to survive in bleak circumstances, all against a dark backdrop of war and all kinds of unspeakable horrors.

Readers who are uneasy with gruesome books should be warned that there are some pretty intense scenarios, although they are well done and mostly appear in the aftermath.It’s exciting to find an author who writes such dark and vivid imagery and doesn’t shy away from the gory scene.

I have a few minor complaints, mostly about Penryn’s failure to ask enough questions, as this seemed entirely out of character for someone who tries to guess whether she can keep someone alive long enough to be of use to her. I also wish we’d learned a bit more about the war. (also, I heard this went from a 5 book series to 3…why?!!)

The action-packed story, funny dialogue, unforgettable characters all make for an incredible read. The twists and turns of this story are greatly done.

Books, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige

by Zaheerah1 Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige

you can find the book at:

GoodReads
Amazon
Barnes and Noble

my review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

[Edit 18/12/2015: I should note that i’ve actually researched more in FFF and I definitely have no intention to continue the series]

At first, I wasn’t sure about reading this book due to the shady things. However, for this review, I’ve put all that aside, and this review is based on Paige’s work.

“Dorothy Must Die” is a dark twist on the Oz classic where Dorothy has become a power-hungry fascist leader with the Scarecrow, Lion, and Tin Man as her evil henchmen. Then comes Amy “trailer trash” Gumm. She lives in Kansas, with her drug addict mum, and no future and only a rat name Star as her companion. Her life is terrible until a tornado comes, blowing her trailer straight out of her world and into Oz. And this isn’t the Oz she had grown up learning about. It’s more post-apocalyptic than a fairytale beginning. And Amy must team up with Revolutionary Order Of The Wicked, and trained with one mission in mind, Dorothy must die…

The setting for the novel is so beautiful, it deserves to be visualised. It is such a dark, twisted version of Oz. This book is so dark. The characters are so angry, with good reasons. So many have been sacrificed at the whim of Dorothy and her evil gang. And none of them has a choice, and they can’t stand up against the power of those with magic.

I love the portrayal of Dorothy, she becomes so twisted. It takes brains and manipulation and power to get as far as she did in the land of Oz. She commands her minions, the Tin Woodman, the Scarecrow, Glinda. Dorothy may be vain, but power gets to people’s head, and she turns evil. Her character is sheer madness. And it’s understandable why she hates Amy so much.

Dorothy’s face was burning with aggrieved rage. “I am the only one. There can only be one.”

My gut twisted. I understood. We had the same story. It was like we were wearing the same dress to the prom. Dorothy thought her landing here was fate—that it made her special. Another girl from Kansas meant that it was just a regular occurrence and that she wasn’t special at all. Or—worse—that I was here to take her place.

Amy is such a realistic character, she does heroic actions but realises her stupidity in some things. She’s not entirely lovely nor entirely mean. And she has a matter of running away, which is understandable. When she finds herself in Oz, she does the thing where every reader yells at the main character for not doing: she walks away.. or well tries to, but that’s destiny for you. There is romance, but it’s light. Amy has a crush on the hot fighter guy, but the romance is very light and understandable. It didn’t bother me. The plot takes priority.

Overall, since this is the first in the series, there’s going to be a lot of world building and development and not the best resolution. But it was an exciting start.

Books, Romance, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: Doon by Carey Corp and Lorie Langdon

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Doon by Carey Corp and Lorie Langdon

you can find the book at:

GoodReads
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Book Website

goodreads summary:

Veronica doesn’t think she’s going crazy. But why can’t anyone else see the mysterious blond boy who keeps popping up wherever she goes? When her best friend, Mackenna, invites her to spend the summer in Scotland, Veronica jumps at the opportunity to leave her complicated life behind for a few months.

But the Scottish countryside holds other plans.

They find themselves transported to a land that defies explanation. Doon seems like a real-life fairy tale, complete with one prince who has eyes for Mackenna and another who looks suspiciously like the boy from Veronica’s daydreams. But Doon has a dark underbelly as well. The two girls could have everything they’ve longed for…or they could end up breaking an enchantment and find themselves trapped in a world that has become a nightmare.

my review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

I started reading this book because I felt like it promised originality. However, originality doesn’t equal a good story. The setting is unusual, but it just doesn’t make sense, and you often find yourself rolling your eyes so much that they might as well just stay in the back of your head.

Doon, the magical land in which Veronica (no, sorry, Verranica as said by Jamie MacCrae, but he’s for another paragraph) and her best friend MacKenna end up in is literally one big mess. I initially thought it was Scotland of the past, but it’s literally one big contradiction, a mashup of the modern world with the mindset of the past world. People have been travelling to Doon throughout history, from our world to theirs through a magical bridge every so often. As a result, Doon has modern conventions such as toilets, showers and as well as sushi and pizzerias. Despite the fact that they’ve come in contact with contemporary society, the people of Doon still firmly believe in their past life, with their mindset firmly ingrained with their previous views and are still willing to burn witches at stakes. The setting is a mess and was difficult to understand with its different behaviours and severe lack of sense. I would like the background to make sense and for its people to follow guidelines of reasonable practices.

Now let’s begin with the characters:

Veronica: (see also Verranica )
She’s the dictionary definition of innocent. She’s beautiful (as said by MacKenna like ten million times), without even knowing it. She’s a hopeless romantic despite having the worst life possible. She’s a walking tragedy and is so irritating. She swoons over Jamie’s eyes and his locks of hair that ALWAYS seems to fall over his eyes. Despite, him completely ignoring her and being outright hostile the second he meets her, she cannot help but be upset in her attraction to him. Her soulmate! She later gives him up, only to start moaning about it five seconds later. ¬-¬ She is wholly devoted to boy Jamie, regardless of how much he acts like an idiot and how much he professes to hate her.

Mackenna: Vee’s best friend since infancy, it seems. Naturally, they are polar opposites. Mackenna is the practical musical-addicted who doesn’t realise how beautiful she is. (I see a running pattern here). She is meant to be humorous, a stark contrast to Vee’s impracticality…it didn’t work for me. She comes off as more annoying than entertaining. However, the development of her and Jamie’s brother, Duncan, was much more believable.

James MacCrae:
From the second Veronica and Mackenna enters his foreign land, where he is the crown prince, and despite this being Scotland, he still looks like an emo boy. Despite knowing that he is Veronica’s Calling, (a commonly acknowledged moment in Doon to mean you’ve met your soulmate), Jamie denies it, and continue treating Vee like crap. He tells her one thing, says another. He says words intended to turn her away and is absolutely angry (and blames her) when she does run away.

Duncan MacCrae: I actually liked him a lot out of all the characters. He was so kind compared to the rest of them in this book that I really have nothing wrong to say about him at all. He just wants to protect his home, and his romance with MacKenna is somewhat understandable. Their characters interact well together, and so I can see them falling for each other.

The secondary characters were unoriginal, lacking in any complexity. Everyone is black or white. There is no complexity within any of the main characters, and much less with the secondary. The plot shows no sense of urgency to the imminent danger that the land of Doon is in. Apart from villagers disappearing, a few dead bodies thrown in, there is no intrigue, no feeling that something terrible is going to happen.

Reading the sequel is nowhere near the forefront of my mind right now, but that ending had me shocked! Maybe I’ll pick it up, but that’s a maybe.

Books, Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: The Fault In Our Stars by John Green

by Zaheerah1 Comment on BOOK REVIEW: The Fault In Our Stars by John Green

you can find the book at:

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Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Author Website

goodreads summary:

Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel’s story is about to be completely rewritten.

my review:

Rating:
★★☆☆☆

(This review is a reposted one from my old GoodReads Account but my opinion on this book has changed making it a 2 instead of a 5 )

My initial reactions to this book were pretty similar to the rest of Green’s fans. I enjoyed the story and characters, and it was an exciting read in the end. I liked how it was about coming to terms with the fact that your life will almost never rise above insignificance. However, three years have passed since I first read TFIOS and my view on the book has changed considerably. TFIOS isn’t a bad book, but it’s standard and very similar to the other works of Green. And I understand why so many readers would have had such an emotional response to the book. Books about death are often upsetting & thought to provoke- looking back on this, I didn’t find it either.

I don’t believe in Hazel and Augustus the same way anymore. Their dialogue is contrived and ridiculous. Augustus was just created to spew a plethora of metaphors.And there’s the other problem I have with Augustus and Hazel: their romance feels like a plot construction far more than it feels like a real passion. In Green’s other books, although I didn’t enjoy them, I understood the romance. Augustus Waters just shows up in Hazel’s cancer support group and stares at her, and she just swoons at him. That’s almost as bad as Bella Swan falling in love with Edward Cullen even though he apparently hates her. Green attempts to play it cool by having Hazel recognise that she’d be creeped out if it were an ugly guy staring at her, but that doesn’t make their love affair any less sudden, but the plot won’t work if they aren’t in love, so it happens.

Also, Hazel is not a believable character, we learn nothing about her. She just hates Support Group and loves Augustus for reasons that were never adequately announced throughout the book. The idea that he spends money just so he can act out a metaphor that doesn’t do anything but make him look like a pretentious idiot.

But the strength of The Fault in Our Stars is that it refuses to offer false comfort regarding a subject matter that we all know doesn’t have a happy ending. We are all going to die, but we live our lives pretending that words like “forever” or “always” have meant something to us. Maybe that’s why it worked so well with so many readers, it did for me at first.

I guess this book would have been better for me to read if it had been about what happened to Peter Van Houten and his life in Amsterdam with Hazel and Gus coming to see him or Hazel with her actual terminal cancer. It would have been better to read Hazel’s cancer to conflict with her ability to be with Gus, rather than give her a weird miracle drug.

And that’s why The Fault in Our Stars no longer impacts me as much as it did the first time reading it.

Books, Short stories

BOOK REVIEW: Killing the Dead By Marcus Sedgwick

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Killing the Dead By Marcus Sedgwick

You Can Find the Book At:

GoodReads
Amazon
Author Website

GoodReads Summary:

Set in a girls’ boarding school in Massachusetts a haunting and sinister story YA story for World Book Day from prize-winning author Marcus Sedgwick. 1963.

Foxgrove School near Stockbridge, Massachusetts. One of the oldest and finest academies in the country – but what really goes on behind closed doors?

Nathaniel Drake, the new young English teacher, Isobel Milewski, the quiet girl who loved to draw spirals, her fingers stained with green ink, Jack Lewis, who lent Isobel books – just words, just ink on paper, Margot Leya, the girl with those eyes – who are they, what part have they played in killing the dead?

Follow the dark, dark path Into the dark, dark woods To the dark, dark bridge. By the dark, dark water. Linger. Let the ghosts of heaven tell their story.

A stylish and creepy story for World Book Day from prize-winning author Marcus Sedgwick.

My Review:

Rating: ★★★★☆

Set in girls boarding school, Killing the Dead is a sinister YA story released for World Book Day 2015.

It is an enjoyable read – one that throws in a little paranormal atmosphere.Sedgwick managed to fit such an enthralling cast of characters into such a short book, bringing to life the private school for girls well for a limited word count and it was pleasing to read. The story begins with just one view and then as the story progresses, more and more points of view are explored so you could not guess what the climax of the story was going to be. The way in which information was revealed reflects one of the main themes of the story – spirals. However, I did guess that Margot had something to do with it. (Why would a ghost haunt you unless you’ve done something to piss it off?)

However, I feel as though I still didn’t understand some parts of it. There were individual mysterious sections that felt too vague, to the point where I didn’t know what was supposed to be happening and had to re-read that part. Overall, I did enjoy the book. It’s quick and easy, and a good creepy story from Marcus Sedgwick. I might look into his other books. 🙂