The Y Logs

Yzabel / August 20, 2014

Review: The Fault in Our Stars

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

My rating: [rating=1]

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.

Review:

I’m not at ease with cancer stories. That illness itself makes me shudder; I might go as far as to say I’m even mildly phobic about it. But I still wanted to check this book, after reading so many good reviews about it, and after I was told that it wasn’t so much about vivid descriptions of cancer itself. So, when it popped up at the library near my parents’ home, I seized the opportunity.

Well, I might be a horrible, callous person, because I just don’t get the whole tear-inducing, heart-wrenching hype around this novel. Or maybe whatever passes for a heart in my chest cavity was too busy rolling its metaphorical eyes at all the pompousness, which for me totally ruined the story. It made me wonder if a thesaurus was harmed, raped and defaced in the process. When using Big Words, the least one can do is to us Big Words That Actually Mean What They’re Supposed To Mean. (Definition of hamartia: the error in judgement that causes the hero to achieve the opposite of what s/he meant, leading to the actual tragedy. Not just any character flaw.) This is not how I, of all people, could be touched, not when I’m too busy wondering who the hell talks like that.

Hazel struck me as pretentious, and incredibly judgemental when it came to a lot of people around her. Gallows humour I could definitely take, understand, and appreciate—but this wasn’t humour. This was just demeaning. The way she spoke of the support group and of Patrick, as if his life had no value? Disgusting:

“…the relief that he escaped lo those many years ago when cancer took both of his nuts but spared what only the most generous soul would call his life.”

I sure couldn’t empathise with her attitude towards her parents at times (how dare they show feelings and cry; or wake her up at 5:30 in the morning to prepare and board the plane to go to Amsterdam; or send her to support group, instead of allowing her to basically be already dead in
her everyday life). Even her attitude towards her teachers, when she attended morning classes.

And the “metaphors”. That whole thing with the eggs and breakfast foods and me going “can we get to some actual point, and not some stupid rambling about a topic that I wouldn’t even tackle if I were completely wasted?” Or the hurdles:

“And I wondered if hurdlers ever thought, you know, This would go faster if we just got rid of the hurdles.”

That’s not philosophical. That’s idiotic.

The love-at-first-sight trope seldom works for me, and it didn’t work here either. It turned the narrative into something rather cheesy, especially with all the pompous dialogues. (Seriously, I’ve met my share of university teachers and educated people in general… and we just don’t talk like that, certainly not without preparing our speeches first. So teenagers, no matter how smart? Sorry, I just can’t believe it.)

Somehow, it reminded me of some of the stuff I wrote when I was 15-16, and found recently at the bottom of a cardboard box. I remembered those “pieces” as witty, smart, full of deep meaning. I remembered writing them with such goals in mind. I was good at writing, too; I always had top grades in French and Literature classes. Then I read those again—now, that is, 20 years later—and I realised how full of myself I was at the time, and how my Big Words And Sentences were in fact just so shallow. The characters here, and their way of talking and being, left me with the same feeling. They never seemed to leave the surface level. Now that I’m done with the book, I still don’t know what Hazel likes (apart from An Imperial Affliction and her favourite TV show), what else she used to do before being diagnosed, and so on. She’s defined by 1) her illness (though said illness looked kind of like a ploy to elicit emotion, rather than anything else) and 2) Augustus, and… What else? I have no idea.

I think it could’ve been a great story… only without its pretentiousness, without its flat characters, and without its tendency to take the reader by the hand to put his/her nose into the supposed deep meaning hidden within the pages. When you feel like a novel is trying to manipulate you, is when suspension of disbelief shatters.

Yzabel / August 19, 2014

Review: Engines of War

Doctor Who: Engines of War by George Mann

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

“The death of billions is as nothing to us Doctor, if it helps defeat the Daleks.”

The Great Time War has raged for centuries, ravaging the universe. Scores of human colony planets are now overrun by Dalek occupation forces. A weary, angry Doctor leads a flotilla of Battle TARDISes against the Dalek stronghold but in the midst of the carnage, the Doctor’s TARDIS crashes to a planet below: Moldox.

As the Doctor is trapped in an apocalyptic landscape, Dalek patrols roam amongst the wreckage, rounding up the remaining civilians. But why haven’t the Daleks simply killed the humans?

Searching for answers the Doctor meets ‘Cinder’, a young Dalek hunter. Their struggles to discover the Dalek plan take them from the ruins of Moldox to the halls of Gallifrey, and set in motion a chain of events that will change everything. And everyone.

An epic novel of the Great Time War featuring the War Doctor as played by John Hurt.

Review:

(I got an ARC through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

I very seldom read “fan” books—i.e. featuring characters from TV shows/movies. I think the last one I read was an X-Files novel, some 20 years ago, and not even its original edition/language. So keep in mind I may not be the best person to judge such stories, and try to consider them from my point of view as a reader in general.

Also, it doesn’t help that I’ve only seen one season of Doctor Who. I love the series, but never managed to go further, because of reasons. Shame on me. Whatever. I was spoiled about a few things, and not spoiled about many others. However, I can at least give an opinion about that, and I’m happy to report that the present novel isn’t of the crumbling-under-spoilers kind. If, like me, you’ve only seen the first season, or not many more episodes, then you already know that there was a Time War; that the Doctor is a Time Lord, and that they do regenerate upon death; that he had an important role to play during said war; and that the Daleks are, well, the Daleks.

You don’t need to know more to read and enjoy Engines of War, and it won’t spoil the whole series for you either. Which you may consider either a good thing (like I did), or a bad thing (if you’re a seasoned Whovian who wants a lot more). Although I admit I didn’t catch a few references to events that happened in episodes I didn’t see, I don’t think it’s really a problem. This lack of background is specific to me anyway, and the story functions well even if you don’t know anything about those events.

Here, the Doctor meets a new companion, Cinder (or, rather, Cinder does meet the Doctor), a young woman from Moldox. Her planet and surrounding solar system was attacked and ravaged by the Daleks, and she’s been part of a doomed-to-fail resistance movement since childhood. When their paths cross, she jumps on the opportunity to leave this dying world, but soon comes to realise that it’s not so easy as to just go away and find another place, because the latest Dalek-made weapon is one that would totally change the fate of universe, both in space and time, if it were to be deployed.

This book reads fairly easily, and much like an episode from the series. I wasn’t always completely happy with the writing, which was sometimes a bit too “tell-not-show” to my liking, but such occurrences were actually quite sparse. There are plot hooks and cool concepts (the possibility engine, the time-wiping weapon), there are twists, we meet with a Doctor who’s more jaded and hardened than the one I got to know (the Ninth one), yet still displays a lot of the “Doctor-isms” I liked on TV. The author managed to make scenes very easy to visualise, including the TARDIS’s and other sounds—not so easy to do without falling into the realm of ridicule. The Time Lords are shown as just as fearsome as the Daleks, in their own ways. And Cinder is a resourceful companion for the Doctor, not just some girl tagging along. She has a reason to leave, a reason to fight, has picked useful fights along the way, and her humanity is an important anchor for the Doctor, one that deeply contrasts with Rassilon’s cold, distanciated views.

This wasn’t the best novel ever, but it sure was worth the few hours it took for me to read it.
3.5 stars.

Yzabel / August 16, 2014

Review: Tell The Wolves I’m Home

Tell The Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

1987. There is only one person who has ever truly understood fourteen year old June Elbus, and that’s her uncle, the renowned painter, Finn Weiss. Shy at school and distant from her older sister, June can only be herself in Finn’s company; he is her godfather, confidant, and best friend. So when he dies, far too young, of a mysterious illness her mother can barely speak about, June’s world is turned upside down. But Finn’s death brings a surprise acquaintance into June’s life-someone who will help her to heal, and to question what she thinks she knows about Finn, her family, and even her own heart.

Review:

Overall I liked this novel. It is a story of pain, of love, with both touching and tense moments, and the way it tackles the theme of AIDS works well within the chosen context (1987). I was only 8 in 1987, yet I still remember that people were scared and didn’t understand what it was all about. I still remember asking my own mother, frightened, “Mom, will I get AIDS, too?” The whole fear and rejection permeating this novel, the way people considered this disease as “gay-only”… it all ties up within that scare, and some of the characters’ reactions are thus rendered mean not out of sheer nastiness, but fear, ignorance, and misunderstanding. As annoying as those are, they remain, well, human.

Indeed, the characters weren’t particularly likeable—there were times when I just wanted to slap them. Greta for being cruel instead of saying from the beginning what she really felt and wanted. June for being so self-centred and oblivious to other people around her, focused on Finn, Finn, Finn only—good thing she grows up a little in that regard. The absentee father, and the mother who was quick to judge. Part of me didn’t like them, yet part of me also found them flawed in a human way. They acted out of loneliness, out of love, out of jealousy—all too human, again.

I must say that I really liked Toby, who had to remain hidden and would have ended up alone in his grief. He seemed so lost, and his feelings shone through that loss with an acute honesty, underlined by genuine smiles and spontaneity. I perceived him as someone who had had to pay for one mistake, didn’t have much luck, who finally found true love, only to lose it again, and be shunned in the process. I don’t think he deserved that. Nobody does.

However, I think that the portrayal of AIDs in general, how it was perceived at the time, is a strength, but also a weakness in this story. While it made sense to me as an adult who remembers that period, I think it wasn’t properly exploited in a novel for younger people who didn’t live at that time. When you read this book in “my” light, it’s quite accurate in showing the irrational ways some people reacted; when you don’t have the necessary hindsight, it actually doesn’t do much to dispel all those “only gay guys get AIDS and OMG don’t touch them they’re dangerous!” notions. In that regard, I wish Tell The Wolves Are Home had gone further, shown more obviously how things changed for some of the characters, instead of relying on hints. Usually, I’m not too fond of novels that lay it thick; here, it may not have been thick enough, and the complex dynamics within the Elbus family (Finn included) weren’t fully exploited.

In fact, in my opinion, it would have needed to be more openly confrontational sometimes. Somehow, the characters didn’t really faced the consequences of their choices when it cames to shutting out good people out of their lives just for having AIDS. Somehow, they got away with too many shitty decisions, and this with barely some sliver of guilt. No, it’s not OK to threaten to kick your brother out of your life and deny him his nieces just for being in love, for being unlucky regarding sickness—nor to force the poor bloke he’s living with to stay in the cellar, pretending not to exist, while the girls believed Finn lived alone. How callous can people be? I really wish Danni would have been called on her bullshit there.

(Also, I could say the same for some triggers in it—that they’d have needed to be shown in a different way. Like, Toby and June smoking together, doing things together in secrecy. I got how Toby must’ve felt lost, and some people, when they’re like that, stop thinking and don’t always make the best decisions. June’s narrative should’ve made this obvious, yet didn’t. In turn, it just made it seem like he was potentially getting her into drugs, rape-inducing/paedophiliac situations, and so on. The girl being only 14 may explain her lack of insight; still, it’s a slippery slope, and could probably have been avoided.)

Still 3 stars for me because in the end, I liked it, I liked its depiction of the way everyone reacted to that specific disease in that specific era, no matter how ugly and stupid their reactions. But I’m not too happy about how some aspects panned out. Maybe because it’s YA—maybe it’s too focused on the “misunderstood teenager” side, instead of really going the whole way, that is, the mislabelled people whose “crime” was to have hit an unlucky spot and fallen sick.

Yzabel / August 15, 2014

Review: Accession

Accession by Terah Edun

My rating: [rating=1]

Summary:

Sixteen-year-old Katherine Thompson wasn’t trained to rule a coven. That was her sister – perfect, beautiful Rose. But when a mysterious plane crash kills off the heir presumptive of the Sandersville coven she has no choice.

After stepping in to fill her sister’s shoes, Katherine realizes she didn’t have a clue – faery wars, depressed trolls and angry unicorns are just the beginning.

For centuries, her family has served the high Queens on both sides of the Atlantic but it is a well-known rule that mid-level witches stay away from high-level Queens.

But when Katherine’s youngest cousin vanishes without a trace in the Atlanta court and no one wants to investigate, Katherine decides to step into the darkness on her own. She will soon discover that nothing, in a queen’s court, is as it seems.

Review:

(I was given a copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

This was a fast read, but I’m afraid to admit that’s because I ended up skimming after a while: I couldn’t stand the telling-not-showing style. Actually, I was this close to DNFing, and only finished because I felt I had to write a review.

There was definite groundwork here for an interesting world (the witch queens of the original thirteen colonies, having to maintain political balance between various factions of supernatural creatures…). It is a rich world, with a lot of tensions, differences between the Queens and how they rule their respective territories, alliances that may be toppled at the slightest change, diplomatic conundrums to keep in mind, and a potential political assassination (Rose’s death was pitched as an accident; I so can’t believe that).

However, I think this setting wasn’t exploited in a way that would have made the reading pleasant, mostly because of the pacing and the writing style—two aspects that tie into each other, in my opinion. I started sensing this problem in the first two chapters, and it got confirmed later, as more and more information was dumped onto the reader in the middle of scenes. For instance, there’s this one scene where the Queen is sentencing a secondary character, and while it should have been filled with tension, it got slowed down by Katherine remembering information about other courts and other events: it wasn’t uninteresting, but it definitely dragged the plot down. Other similar scenes suffered the same fate.

Also, Katherine’s character just didn’t appeal to me, both in personality and in how almost everything was introduced. She had a tendency to just voice out loud whatever went through her head, especially when she was alone, which looked really weird (this coming from someone who tends to think out loud, so if I find it bizarre, then it sure means something). She acted in immature ways, wasted time in useless bouts of dialogue. Worst, most of the time, I was told she was this and that, felt like this or that, supposed this or that character thought this or that… A lot of telling, and too little showing. It coincided with a few plot points coming out of the blue: we’re told she’s not popular at school, is picked on by teachers and at best ignored by a lot of pupils… but then, around the 25% mark, we suddenly learn she had a boyfriend six months ago. I think he should have been introduced sooner, since it was kind of important (all the more because of some big reveal later on).

As mentioned above, the writing consisted in much more telling than actual actions showing the characters as they really were, and I caught quite a few similes that looked pretty strange and useless:

“Their massive trunks were so wide at the base that the trees looked like the round teepees of the Native American shamans who came to Georgia once a year to renew the sacred 1850 concord of Coven-Shaman Relations.”

Some sentences/paragraphs I had to read three times in order to get their meaning:

“I guess I can’t ever call life in Sandersville boring again, Katherine thought wryly as she ignored an itch in her eye that she firmly told herself she’d deal with later. She didn’t want to draw attention to her presence in the room now. Besides, it was more than an itch. As long as she ignored the sensation it would wait and simmer, like an itch at the corner of her eye. That itch that represented more than a space of skin in need of being scratched, it was the patch on her mind and heart that was holding closed a dark well ready to burst open with the rush of emotions boarded up behind its cap.”

And the one mistake I really, really can’t deal with:

“The gator’s mouth might as well of been a flimsy stick…”

This book would have needed a couple more rounds of editing.

Conclusion: I skimmed, I unfortunately got bored, I didn’t really get a sense of a plot, and the writing style irked me in no time.

Yzabel / August 15, 2014

Review: Dear Daughter

Dear Daughter by Elizabeth Little

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

‘As soon as they processed my release Noah and I hit the ground running. A change of clothes. A wig. An inconspicuous sedan. We doubled back once, twice, then drove south when we were really headed east. In San Francisco we had a girl who looked like me board a plane to Hawaii.

Oh, I thought I was so clever.

But you probably already know that I’m not.’

LA IT girl Janie Jenkins has it all. The looks, the brains, the connections. The criminal record.

Ten years ago, in a trial that transfixed America, Janie was convicted of murdering her mother. Now she’s been released on a technicality she’s determined to unravel the mystery of her mother’s last words, words that send her to a tiny town in the very back of beyond. But with the whole of America’s media on her tail, convinced she’s literally got away with murder, she has to do everything she can to throw her pursuers off the scent.

She knows she really didn’t like her mother. Could she have killed her?

Review:

(I got an ARC through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

Dear Daughter was a compelling enough story, but I admit I thought I’d like it more. There were several moments in which the pace dragged down and the story didn’t seem to progress much, and the characters didn’t exactly “fill” those moments either.

Though Jane Jenkins isn’t exactly a likeable protagonist, because of her demeaning attitude, I still liked her in general: she calls other people on their crap, sure, but she does the same when she’s concerned, which is enough of a redeeming feature in my eyes. I can’t say I smiled at all her quips (some were really not great); nevertheless, she was mildly amusing. Also, I tend to appreciate characters that aren’t necessarily nice and kind. Jane had her manipulative streak, tempered by the fact she had been in prison for ten years, and sometimes this made her a little rusty, thus not perfect at her own game. Sometimes, she was clever. At other times, she realised she had made some huge blunder… and she considered it as her own, not pinning it down on someone else, even though her tone might make it appear so.

The Ardelle setting was interesting, too: derelict twin little towns, founded during the Gold Rush yet doomed to die with it, with five old families pretending that everything was nice and dandy, except every closet has its skeleton, of course. I could feel the desperate “I hate this place, but I still can’t leave” atmosphere. No matter what, I wanted to read about them, be on the ride with Jane as she uncovered bit by bit who they were, their relationships, and how they may have factored in her mother’s death.

The mixed media approach, with snippets from blogs, Wikipedia, etc.: I like this format, though I can’t tell all of those excerpts always added a lot to the story.

On the dowside, at times the secondary characters just seemed too helpful for the sake of being helpful. Jane’s identity as “Rebecca” may have fooled them, sure, but it wasn’t so perfect, and I would have expected more ruthlessness, more distrust than what was shown, more tension, in a way. Even the cop’s presence didn’t make things that exciting (also, random vague love/sex interest that wasn’t really interesting in my opinion).

I found the plot to be dragging far-fetched and flimsy in places. The clue to Ardelle/Adeline was a rather light one, and I would have found it more believable if Jane had had just a couple more hints about it, thus justifying more strongly her going there. I was given the impression that some huge secret loomed above the town, yet in the end, the aforementioned skeletons were rather… bland, and not so unexpected. This was a bit of a letdown for me. I think the most problematic part, though, was Jane’s own lack of certainty regarding her mother’s murderer: she never appeared as so stoned/drunk/whatever as to prove to me she may genuinely not remember. I don’t know, but the mere adrenaline shot of murdering my mother would most certainly put me out of any drunken stupor I might be in. Either you know or you don’t, and in this case, the mystery of “did she or didn’t she?” seemed like an unfounded device.

The ending… I don’t know about the ending. Somehow, it fits bith the narrative’s tone, yet it made me fell “so, she did all of this for that?” Not very satisfying here.

This novel had its strong points, and my liking Jane’s narative voice helped a lot in my enjoyment of it. Nevertheless, I’m putting it in the “OK-to-good” category, not more.

Yzabel / August 13, 2014

Review: Fiefdom

Fiefdom: A Kingdom Novel by Dan Abnett

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

The last of humanity has taken refuge in hibernation at the poles, hiding from the giant invading insects that have conquered the Earth. Defending these outposts against bug attacks are genetically engineered dog soldiers, loyal and unquestioning to the Masters’ voices in their heads. At least they were, but things have changed on the Earth. The Masters voices have gone and a new peace has arrived in the northern hemisphere. The legend of a masterless rogue soldier from the distant South has spread, and in the new Fiefdoms of old Germany something very dangerous is about to happen.

In a not-too-distant future, amongst ruins in the the ancient city of Berlin the Aux’s live in clans, fighting amongst themselves. Their ancient enemey, Them – giant marauding insects, are a folk memory. Young Evelyn War however will be the first to realise that this quiet is not what it seems, that the Auxs themselves, having been bred for hand-hand combat in a war long-thought to be over, and now idling violently in peace in the subways and collapsing buildings in Europe, must set aside their petty hostilities if they are to face the battle to come. Evelyn is the only one to see the oncoming storm, but the clan leaders and her elders do not believe her warnings, and time is running short.

Review:

(I got an ARC through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

My review comes a little late, I should’ve read this novel in June or July, and posted back then. Ah, well…

Mixed opinions on this one. It’s set in the world of the comics Kingdom, but decades after their events. I never read the comics, so I probably missed a few interesting things, or didn’t “get” everything right; I honestly can’t tell. On the other hand, since I approached the novel with an unknowing eye, at least I can tell what would work for new readers, and what wouldn’t. Or so I hope.

The setting is definitely a post-apocalyptic one. At some point, “Them” (giant insects of sorts—possibly alien?) came to Earth; to hunt them down, the humans engineered dog-human hybrids, the Aux, powerful fighters meant to obey the voice of their “Masters”. One of them in particular, Gene the Hackman, became quite the legend, to the point that every tale told by the Aux today, gathered in packs in the old Berlin underground stations and tunnels, start with a recap of what he did. The weather changed (or was changed), leading to a “Time of Ice” that made Earth too cold for the insects, and drove survivors underground. I think this is the gist of the background story behind this world, and if it indeed is, then the book is clearly understandable from a new reader’s point of view.

I wrote “mixed opinions” earlier on, though, because Kingdom also has a deterrent potential, depending on what you’re looking for in it. So I’m going to proceed in a “what I liked/disliked” fashion, and let readers decide if this would be their cup of tea or not.

What I liked:

* The Aux live according to a pack mentality loosely based on dogs’. Not wolves, for a change, but dogs. Their mythology, their beliefs, have evolved along such lines. They display attitudes and personalities of fierce warriors, with both male and female being sent to “scrap” (kill the insects), but deep inside, there’s still talk of “Masters”, of “keeping Them off the lawn” (in a way, that was almost cute). It’s indeed as if they were dogs given a human voice to speak of what their owner expected of them, and they don’t take kindly to those who go “feral”, start forgetting their duties.

* The names: every Aux has a name reminiscent of a famous writer/poet, sometimes being exactly the same, sometimes not, but always with a hint of what they stand for: Ezra Pound, Evelyn War, Makewar Thackeray, and so on. This brought a smile to my face more than once, although I’d have liked to know why they had such names.

* The Berlin setting. I like underground stations in general, but I don’t know Berlin, so I was both in familiar territory and in one a little different from the usual Anglo-Saxon cities I read about in novels. The third person narrators are Aux, and they see everything through their own eyes, obviously. I liked that little game of reading a description and piecing things up to determine what was its original function. The station plans, for instance. Or the “voice of the Master” that is actually an old recording of which tunnel each train had to run in.

* The Aux mythology, their tales of Gene the Hackman who walked the earth to kill “Them”:

Gene the Hackman, top dog, him done the great Walk Around. Not for him the darkness, not for him the cold, not for him the Time of Ice. Gene the Hackman, him got whet. Gene the Hackman, him got whet and walked the Earth and him killed Them.

He’s a role model for them all, but the tale-teller, Edward Leer, had a way to use his Gene stories to weave new tales, and adapt them to the pack’s current predicament.

* The Aux speech patterns. They talk in mangled, broken English that fits well with their origins: simple words (just like the ones you’d use to order dogs around), a lot of playing on words (get wet/get whet—although that one doesn’t work with the “hw-” feature in my own accent), yet that also gave every dialogue a strange musical lilt. It enhanced the oral quality of their culture, as well as their existence as warriors bred for one thing only, and now living as if the threat was still here, while slowly losing their ways. (Once-revered Hearers, those who received orders from the Masters, aren now despised, just like those who believe in their words.)

What I disliked:

* I never got a clear idea of what the Aux looked like. At first I imagined them 100% human-looking, only with a pack mentality, but this seemed a little too… clean? to my liking. They have hands and legs (they wear gloves, trousers, can use crowssbows…) so they don’t have paws, but are their faces hybrid of dog and human, or not? I could never tell.

* Things got repetitive after a while, with the pack moving around looking for alliances and getting into various fights. The story ran in circles, much like them, which in terms of matching patterns did fit, but wasn’t so interesting in terms of plot.

* This included the broken English, a make-it-or-break-it deal in my opinion. It was pleasant to my “mental ears” in the beginning, but in the end, I wished the characters sometimes used different expressions for a change, not always “time to get whet” or “there’s strength in numbers”.

* I still don’t know if it’s a standalone stories, or the beginning of a series. The story took its sweet time to get to the ending. Then, once said ending was here, I thought it was too abrupt, and both too open and too closed at the same time: we can easily imagine what will come next, and it seems like there aren’t that many possibilities left for the Aux.

* I would’ve enjoyed more details about the world. The Aux never talk about packs outside Berlin, in other cities. We don’t know if the Masters are still here, nor how the Hearers managed to listen to them (was it some different chemistry in their brains?). What is this “Auxtralia” mentioned once? (It sounds like Australia, but that would be way too far considering the Berlin setting.) Why did they have writers’ names, was it some tradition initiated by the Masters? I guess someone who’s read the comic books will have some of those answers, but I didn’t, and I was a little frustrated.

Overall, though I kind of enjoyed this book, I wasn’t awed. I liked its atmosphere, but not so much its plot.

Yzabel / August 8, 2014

Review: Blood Crown

Blood Crown by Ali Cross

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

Androids have claimed power over what remains of the human race. They rule without remorse. They are the Mind and humans exist only to serve them.

But it wasn’t always so.

Before the android uprising, select droids, called Servants, were pivotal in engineering a new human race with nanotechnology enhanced DNA. The Blood Crown theorum was to be humanity’s crowning glory and the key to their survival in deep space.

But Serantha, Daughter of the West, was the last female to receive Gifts from her Servant and when the Mind mutinied, she was hidden away, and presumed dead.

Without Serantha there is no hope of the Blood Crown being realized so Nicolai, Son of the East, abandons his crown to join the rebel forces. He might not provide the future for his people he had once dreamed of, but he will not go down without a fight.

When Nicolai discovers Sera among a small compliment of kitchen staff, everything changes–but Sera’s Gifts were never completed and she is ill-equipped to face a legion of androids determined to wipe her, and every other human, out of existence.

Their only hope is the Blood Crown–but even if Serantha and Nicolai can realize their potential it may be too late to save mankind.

Review:

(I got a digital copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

This book throws you directly into the action, with little info dumping in the beginning: we learn information as the plot goes, and this is a method I tend to like. I found it easy enough to understand the premise of the story (the hope of enhanced humanity through nano-technology, the androids rebelling against their creators and taking control…). And the mastermind behind the android faction was devious enough to my liking. A little on the boasting side, yet with a tendency to keep a contingency plan on the side, and screw with the heroes’ minds a little more every time. I like that.

However, there were a lot of things I didn’t quite know what to make of, and those contributed to make me consider Blood Crown as a little sub-average, when I would’ve wanted to enjoy it more (from the blurb, I really hoped I would).

First, there were three points of view, but I felt that only Sera’s was really useful. Nicolai’s tended to rehash things the reader has already learnt, only with his opinion about it. Not completely uninteresting, but clearly unneeded. Archibald’s… Well, the way he saw Sera was sweet, and highlighted the possibility of feelings within machines, the “can an artificial intelligence be like a human or only copy it”; unfortunately, his scenes were often pretty short, made of waiting for events to happen, and not really useful either. Too bad; his presence could’ve been made better.

Sometimes, the characters’ actions were also hard to understand. Both Nic and Sera tended to jump into situations without thinking them through, not always because they lacked time, but because… I don’t know? And then I didn’t see any point to Nic’s lies, pretending he didn’t know who Sera was, when just explaining everything would’ve been so much easier and faster. For what reason? A very insignificant one, considering the big picture and what was at stake. It led to mistrust on Sera’s part, and to misunderstandings of a kind I don’t like: those that are here only to create artificial tension, not because they’re logical. In a way, the Mind’s apparent lack of logics (making humans cook food nobody would eat) seemed more believabe, in a “we’re superior to humans but in fact we imitate them because we want to be like them, only better, oh the irony” way.

I remain divided about the West/East thing: those terms don’t make much sense to me in space, and seemed a remnant of some USA & Eastern block thing, minus the Cold War. The ships’ names (New Oregon, New California…) and the Eastern peopel’s names (Nicolai, Natalya, Karenina…) definitely gave a very open feeling about that. Part of me is saying “sure, why not?”, while another still can’t really fathom it. Some thousand years later, in space, would we still care much about that? And what about the rest of the world? Where were people from Asian, African, or any other descent?

The pace was good enough until around 60-65% of the story… then it fell into too much romance. I didn’t mind the romance itself in hereas I do in other novels: both Nic and Sera had been kind of “programmed” for that from the beginning, with their symbiants acting to put them together, so, OK, not cool in terms of personal freedom, but not out of the blue either. Only what should’ve been a part mounting towards climax wasn’t, because both heroes were busy being romancy. At that point, I got bored.

In conclusion: interesting premise and good ideas that weren’t developed enough, and didn’t do it for me in the end. More like 1.5 stars.

Yzabel / August 6, 2014

Review: Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer

Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer Complete Edition by Van Jensen

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

This puppet may not be a real boy… but he just might be a real hero! When bloodthirsty monsters invade Pinocchio’s hometown and kill his father, Geppetto, Pinocchio discovers a new benefit to his magical nose: telling lies produces a never-ending supply of wooden stakes to combat the vampire hordes! Will Pinocchio be able to defeat these horrors, avenge his father, and save his friends? Now, for the first time, the complete trilogy is collected together in a single deluxe softcover edition. Jensen (Green Lantern Corps) and Higgins (Knights of the Living Dead) present a captivating blend of comedy, horror, romance, and adventure, rooted in the original Italian novel, but brought – as if by magic – to new life.

Review:

(I got a copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

As honest a review as possible, since it was a preview that contained about half the graphic novel, and I have no idea how it’s supposed to end.

I quite liked it. Its premise felt somewhat weird, but all things considered, it was actually fairly logical: killing vampires with wooden stakes… Well, here’s a puppet with an endless supply, for as long as he can tell lies, and lies are easy to come by. So why not?

The drawing style isn’t a favourite of mine, but it was dark, sharp and raw, and in my opinion, this fit with the mood of the comics. The plot’s rooted in the original tale, with characters out of it and somewhat changed (the cricket’s a ghost, the fairy’s kind of dying, Master Cherry creates weird weapons…) and events that clearly aren’t the nice ones a lot of us got used to when reading more childish retellings (or watching the Disney version). Pinocchio became a vampire hunter after Geppetto was killed by such a monster, and while this places the story’s theme in the traditional revenge-type category, it worked for me. It also deals with related themes such as the matters of letting go, of trying to find a balance, a new life, and how those things aren’t so easy to achieve. Also, being human might not be such a boon after all.

The story had several twists and turns, and possibly some more in the part I didn’t get to read. I won’t place buying the complete volume on my priority list, but I’ll possibly do that at some point or other, if only to see where the characters will go from there (the excerpt ends on quite a cliffhanger).

Yzabel / August 3, 2014

Review: Blackout

Blackout by Tim Curran

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

In the midst of a beautiful summer, in a perfectly American suburban middle-class neighborhood, a faraway evil is lurking, waiting to strike the unsuspecting residents.

First come the flashing lights, then the heavy rains, high winds, and finally a total blackout. But that’s only the beginning…

When the whipping black tentacles fall from the sky and begin snatching people at random, the denizens of Piccamore Way must discover the terrifying truth of what these beings have planned for the human race.

Review:

(I got an ARC of this book through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

3.5 stars, not sure yet if I’ll round it up to 4, but nonetheless a story that I enjoyed reading. I’m not familiar with this author, but I’d definitely check more from him later on.

Blackout focuses on a series of strange disappearances and occurrences in the suburgs at night. After people went about their day and evening the normal way (BBQ with the neighbours, one too many drinks), the night turns out to be a long, nightmarish one. Darkness fills the sky. Lights remain turned out. No phone, no internet. Nobody knows what’s going, except that one by one, the inhabitants vanish, as if out of thin air. Or maybe not? Maybe it has something to do with the eerie lights in the sky, or with the creepy black cables dangling from above, coiling in seemingly harmless masses, until someone touches them, that is.

The characters in this story are of the Everyday Joe type: the sexy wife who feels her beauty capital running out; the sturdy, protective husband; the political activist prone to ranting about the people in charge’s lack of response; the narrator, a normal guy in so many ways; an old lady going on dementia, but with surprising bolts of insight at time; a mother and her children. Cliché in a way, sure, yet also easy to place, a set of characters in which, somehow, a lot of people could find a bit of themselves.

The setting, the way things happened, were quite stifling, and in spite of the place itself being a town, it felt as if everyting was going on behind closed doors. The people couldn’t escape, even by car, and every attempt was sure to be met with something, whether gruesome outcome or within-an-inch escape. This kept on enhancing the fact that they were on their own, and made it seem less and less likely that help would come. Feelings of pressure and horror were in for me here, and I was glad for my nerves I mostly read it during the day, not at 2 am. Also, nobody gets a free pass here, with death looming above everybody.

I would’ve liked to see a few more happenings, I think. A few more confrontations between the characters, which in my opinion would really have cranked up the stifling factor up a notch—I sometimes felt that tension arosen leading up to more cracks in the facade, but then one of the involved characters would be removed, and the tension fell down. Probably a matter of personal preference here. Probably also due to the story’s length (it’s a novella, after all).

Overall, a fairly decent story that falls both in the horror and science fiction genres. It’s not the most original one, it didn’t blow my mind, but I liked reading it.

Yzabel / July 31, 2014

Review: Deadly Little Sins

Deadly Little Sins: A Prep School Confidential Novel by Kara Taylor

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

It’s August and Anne is back in New York City for the summer, but she can’t escape the memories of the terrible things that happened at the Wheatley School last spring— and the possibility of being expelled looming over her. When an unexpected— and suspicious— turn of events gets Anne sent back to Wheatley, she’s determined to figure out what happened to her favorite teacher and only adult ally at the school: Ms. Cross.

After a shocking, gruesome murder with connections to the Wheatley School occurs, Anne is convinced there’s more to Ms. Cross’s sudden disappearance, and that her favorite teacher is in danger. But after an ugly breakup with Brent and a new, inexplicable distance between her and Anthony, Anne isn’t sure who she can trust. And even worse, Anne discovers evidence that someone at Wheatley is covering up what really happened to Ms. Cross— someone who will stop at nothing to keep Anne from learning the truth in this engrossing, unputdownable read.

Review:

(I got an ARC from NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

Still a page-turner for me: there was something quite compelling to it no matter what. Unfortunately, I didn’t like it as much as I did the previous two books.

I felt Anne had lost some of her intensity, and that her needing to juggle with her school work, friends and investigation looked less like a conundrum, and more like her detaching herself from everything, not caring anymore. The daily scenes with friends, frenemies and people who didn’t like her at school were mostly gone. Her “love life” made me wonder what the point to the whole (slight) triangle was, after all. Of course her character couldn’t get unscathed from the previous series of events, but this wasn’t the Anne I knew and had grown to love.

The mystery this time also seemed less satisfying, perhaps because it was less tied to Wheatley’s daily life and occurrences than those in the other books? It answered some questions, which isn’t bad, yet it also left a few other strings hanging. For instance, what about Alexis’s part in here, what happened to her afterwards? She’s one of those unpleasant characters with a past that explains some of their reactions and attitude problems, and it would’ve been interesting to see her part of the story given an ending as well. However, it’s like her arc was just dropped and never picked up again. Same with Anthony’s[Anthony’s (hide spoiler)], who barely appears anyway. And some characters were clearly introduced for the sake of being plot devices, like the rio of boys and their freshman girl target. This could have developed into more, yet never did.

Speaking of the ending, the big reveal and how it unfolded was sort of rushed; and what happened after, the offer made to Ann, was rather unrealistic. It hints at a potential new series, one that would happen on a whole other level, but I’m not sure if I’d appreciate that or not. Part of my interest for the series was the boarding school setting, so with this potentially removed, I don’t know…

I’m torn, really. I liked this series a lot, and I sort of liked this third installment as well, but it left me terribly unsatisfied, compared to the others, and way too flat. 2 to 2.5 stars here.