Tag: rating 3 star

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

Book Review: How I Found You by Gabriella Lepore

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on Book Review: How I Found You by Gabriella Lepore

you can find the book at:

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Author website

my review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

Sixteen-year-old Rose comes to the sleepy village of Millwood to spend her summer holiday with her aunt and uncle while her parents work in Africa. For Rose, she’s expecting the same quiet summer as she always so it’s surprising when two brothers suddenly showed up and make themselves comfortable in her family home, and no questions asked from her other family members.

I’ve heard good things about Lepore so I read this book with good thoughts, and I certainly wasn’t disappointed yet there were a couple of flaws. I really enjoyed her new take on witches and the plot was a great combination of intense moments, an evil prophecy, and a continuous threat of a supernatural being that looms over the character.

However, there were also some scenes that confused me. The character of Caicus felt messy at some points, he sort of alternated from being shady and a nice guy rather than going through the process of being more open to others – although I did find it cute how he really did enjoy being with Rose’s family in the end. Also, the great reveal when Rose realises they’re witches I felt happened a bit too early. I feel like more could have happened to add the mystery of the two brothers.

Overall, I’m sort of in the middle with this book. On one hand, I really enjoyed the characterisation of Rose and the witty conversations between Caicus and Oscar. However, I just didn’t connect with the story, especially when it came to the history of witches, and towards the end, it felt really rushed. Despite this, I did enjoy the book enough to know I’ll be reading more Lepore’s books!

Format: Kindle, 269 pages
Published October 17th 2015 by Oftomes Publishing (first published July 16th 2012) ASIN: B016TD0AJ2

Books, Graphic Novels

BOOK REVIEW: Poorly Drawn Lines: Good Ideas and Amazing Stories by Reza Farazmand

by Zaheerah1 Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Poorly Drawn Lines: Good Ideas and Amazing Stories by Reza Farazmand

You Can Find the Book At:

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Amazon
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Author Website

GoodReads Summary:

Life is weird. Embrace it.

A bear flies through space. A hamster suffers a breakdown. Elsewhere, a garden snake is arrested by animal control and jailed for home invasion, while a child marvels at the wonder of nature as worms emerge from the ground and begin looking for vodka (as they always have). These are common occurrences in the world of Reza Farazmand’s wildly popular webcomic, Poorly Drawn Lines. […] This eponymous collection brings together fan favorites with new comics and original essays to share Farazmand’s inimitable take on love, nature, social acceptance, and robots.

My Review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

~ARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review~

If you’ve been on the Internet for any length of time, you’ve probably seen a Poorly Drawn Lines comic and didn’t even know what it was. Poorly Drawn Lines is definitely weird.

It’s a very short, and a moderately funny read. I really liked the art style, but some of the jokes felt repetitive. It was funny the first few times but then got stale real quick. There’s not really a plot to summarize. It’s a collection of comics, some already available online, some for the book alone, as well as strange short stories from unnamed narrators that often veer off into a strange direction.

Poorly Drawn Lines is not all laugh-out-loud funny. Some of the comics aren’t funny at all, some are very confusing. Overall, I still enjoyed a few of the comics. Here are some of my favourites:

Screenshot_2015-09-30-20-32-59 Screenshot_2015-10-03-00-14-26 Screenshot_2015-10-03-00-15-12

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

BOOK REVIEW: The Bone Season (The Bone Season, #1) by Samantha Shannon

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: The Bone Season (The Bone Season, #1) by Samantha Shannon

you can find the book at:

GoodReads
Amazon
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Author Website

goodreads summary:

The year is 2059. Nineteen-year-old Paige Mahoney is working in the criminal underworld of Scion London, based at Seven Dials, employed by a man named Jaxon Hall. Her job: to scout for information by breaking into people’s minds. For Paige is a dreamwalker, a clairvoyant and, in the world of Scion, she commits treason simply by breathing.

It is raining the day her life changes for ever. Attacked, drugged and kidnapped, Paige is transported to Oxford – a city kept secret for two hundred years, controlled by a powerful, otherworldly race. Paige is assigned to Warden, a Rephaite with mysterious motives. He is her master. Her trainer. Her natural enemy. But if Paige wants to regain her freedom she must allow herself to be nurtured in this prison where she is meant to die.

The Bone Season introduces a compelling heroine and also introduces an extraordinary young writer, with huge ambition and a teeming imagination. Samantha Shannon has created a bold new reality in this riveting debut.

my review:

Rating:★★★☆☆

 

The novel follows Paige, a dreamwalker in 2059, her ability alone makes her a criminal. But when she accidentally kills someone, she is sent to a prison-like place which is controlled by creatures called Rephaim who want to use the voyants abilities for their own gain. She is assigned to a keeper called simply “Warden”, a mysterious man who takes a deep interest in her. (lmao you can already tell can’t you?)

I know this sounds stupid, but I feel really guilty for not liking this book as much as I should have. For the past two years, in every trip to the bookstore, I always saw this on the shelves and really wanted to read it.

The author creates a fantasy novel that is already familiar and fundamentally over complicates it by throwing in new words for things that already existed making it such a long-winded read that’s so overly descriptive, it all sounds original. The book, primarily, is a massive info dump, making it difficult to read. The novel prioritises action over a plot that makes more sense and better character development.

The characters were too dull in my opinion. You could probably kill them all off, and I wouldn’t care at all. They lacked any sort of personality or development that was built gradually. It felt as if the author only included such moments at the time it felt appropriate and useful to the plot.

Despite all the cons in this book for me, what really dragged it down to three stars was the romance. So forced and completely unnecessary, with no decent development at all. It literally comes out of nowhere. Paige gets captured by the Rephaim and is told that she is part of Bone Season XX. The Rephaite catches people and saves them for every 10 years to compete in this unique contest to see who gets to be their exclusive servant. Paige is then picked by the Warden to be his individual slave. And their romance is literally stretched throughout the novel, the gradual development just didn’t feel realistic because of the situation. It is a master/slave type of a relationship, which felt so disbelieving and was slightly uncomfortable to read.

Paige as a character was completely weak. People hail her as such a strong woman, but the author has literally only created a character with one good quality, the power everyone is using her for, and even she doesn’t realise it fully. She just felt too predictable. Also, I did like her growing relationship with Seb. His character was interesting since he was the only one of the leading group with no ability, but it’s a shame it didn’t last long.

I will probably read the next book in the series. Hopefully, the info dump had lessened, but the prospect of an eight-book series does not excite me at all, maybe the sheer number of books is what made it felt stretched out.

Overall, I think the writing is well done, and the action scenes were exciting and thrilling, but the plot and characters were all over the place, and the flashbacks which tried to give insight just took too long, and some scenes felt non-contributing to the book or could have been shortened.

Books, Contemporary, Romance

BOOK REVIEW: The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katarina Bivald

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katarina Bivald

you can find the book at:

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Amazon
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Author Website

goodreads summary:

This is a book about books. All sorts of books, from Little Women and Harry Potter to Jodi Picoult and Jane Austen, from to Stieg Larsson to Joyce Carol Oates to Proust. It’s about the joy and pleasure of books, about learning from and escaping into them, and possibly even hiding behind them. It’s about whether or not books are better than real life.

It’s also a book about a Swedish girl called Sara, her elderly American penfriend Amy and what happens when you land a very different kind of bookshop in the middle of a town so broken it’s almost beyond repair.

Or is it?

my review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

~ARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review~

Sara worked in a bookstore in Sweden and over time became friends with Amy, an elderly American who lived in Broken Wheel, Iowa, creating a bond of friendship over their love of books. So when Sara loses her job and is invited to Broken Wheel, Sara takes that chance.

But not everything has a fairy tale ending. Upon entering Broken Wheel, Sara learns that Amy has died and Broken Wheel isn’t at its best. No jobs, few businesses, Broken Wheel reeks of hopelessness. With the help from the townspeople, Sara decides to stay and starts up a bookstore in memory of Amy.

Sara is easily an identifiable character for me, a shy woman who escapes real life into the world of literature and this book was great to read. Filled with charm, and a weird (but loveable) array of characters, this book was a joy to read. Although the romance was light, it was still a story of love: love for books and friendship, this truly is a wonderful read.

However, the beginning of the book was intriguing to read; the responses to the friendship of Sara and Amy was interesting but as the book progressed, it did lose a bit of charm and felt like it was dragging on far too much. I wanted to care about the inhabitants of Broken Wheel, but a select few were often flat and blurred together.

Overall, the bookish element is enjoyable and satisfying to read as it’s pretty much constant and there was a load of lovely moments, including Amy’s letters to Sara..

Books, Contemporary, LGBTQIA, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: This Is Where It Ends by Marieke Nijkamp

by ZaheerahLeave a Comment on BOOK REVIEW: This Is Where It Ends by Marieke Nijkamp


you can find the book at:

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Author Website

goodreads summary:

Told over the span of 54 harrowing minutes from four different perspectives, terror reigns as one student’s calculated revenge turns into the ultimate game of survival

my review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

~ARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review~

Initially, I’m very iffy when it comes to books with multiple POVs. But for this story’s case, it suited. TIWIE is a novel that gripped me at every page, portraying an all too realistic scenario, one that no one can ever imagine occurring happening in their lifetime, but has already occurred 15 in the US alone this year (source: Wikipedia).

In 54 minutes, every student and teacher present in the auditorium of Opportunity High School, Alabama, is fighting for their lives against one boy, one of their own. What was frightening about this story is that it can happen everywhere. But there’s a difference between hearing about that and being thrown into such situation.

This book follows a few different characters during the hour that the shooting takes place. Each character is so completely different and so important in their own ways. I think the central aspect which I really enjoyed was the diversity of the characters. There’s a scene where Tomas is worried for Fareed and how, his faith and heritage, may portray him as a threat to the police officers was a touching moment for me because of how real it was. I really hope more authors begin to write about marginalised character because, honestly, I’m all for seeing more Muslim characters in novels.

However, I do believe the psychology behind the perpetrator’s act was a bit foolish. It boils to the simple “He was evil,” and that’s it. We never really find out why Tyler did it— he goes from being a supportive brother to someone who beats and abuses his sister. It’s too simplistic, and I think that was a fatal flaw in this novel, along with missing out a chance of looking at the psychology of teen shooters and focusing more on the cheap thrills.

Overall, it was an exciting read. Though some scenes felt strange, I don’t want to judge because who on earth would know what they’d do in this situation when they don’t know what else is going to happen?

 

Science Fiction & Fantasy, Young Adult/ Teen

BOOK REVIEW: Concentr8 by William Sutcliffe

by Zaheerah1 Comment on BOOK REVIEW: Concentr8 by William Sutcliffe


you can find the book at:

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Amazon
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Author Bio

goodreads summary:

In a future London, Concentr8 is a prescription drug intended to help kids with ADD.

Soon every troubled teen is on it. It makes sense, doesn’t it? Keep the undesirable elements in line. Keep people like us safe from people like them. What’s good for society is good for everyone.

Troy, Femi, Lee, Karen and Blaze have been taking Concentr8 as long as they can remember. They’re not exactly a gang, but Blaze is their leader, and Troy has always been his quiet, watchful sidekick – the only one Blaze really trusts. They’re not looking for trouble, but one hot summer day, when riots break out across the city, they find it.

What makes five kids pick a man seemingly at random – a nobody, he works in the housing department, doesn’t even have a good phone – hold a knife to his side, take him to a warehouse and chain him to a radiator?

They’ve got a hostage, but don’t really know what they want, or why they’ve done it. And across the course of five tense days, with a journalist, a floppy-haired mayor, a police negotiator, and the sinister face of the pharmaceutical industry, they – and we – begin to understand why …

my review:

Rating: ★★★☆☆

~ARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review~

Concentr8 takes us into London, where the increase of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children and adolescents have reached epidemic levels. Concentr8 has been used by the government as a form of social control until the use of Concentr8 was abolished, wiping out the availability of its supply to the public. A group of teens kidnap a random worker from the Mayor’s office for hostage although it is clear that they don’t know why they did it or what they actually want by doing it.

Personally, Concentr8 had the potential to be so great, but it really wasn’t a readable novel. The multiple POV change too quickly for my liking, and at some points, I didn’t know if it was really that necessary to capture the perspective of every other character in the story. I hoped it would give a clearer picture, but it just didn’t work.  The narrative voices all sounded alike and would have been better off with one or two POVs rather than the mashup we got.

However, this book does have some strong points that are interesting to read in a YA novel. The psychology of nature versus nurture is a longstanding debate and this novel really work with the issues of ADHD and Ritalin. It’s a quick read, with an intriguing premise and well-imagined story, but it could have been executed better for me. Still worth a read though, for anyone interested.