Yzabel / March 10, 2015

Review: Masters of Blood and Bone

Masters of Blood and BoneMasters of Blood and Bone by Craig Saunders

My rating: [rating=4]

Blurb:

Holland’s a man who’s good with death. Good at death.

When his daughter goes missing, he finds himself pitted in a deadly game against the Gods themselves. Powerful enemies surround him—a changeling, a mage, and a god who wants to destroy the world.

With silver bullets in his gun and death on his mind, Holland aims to set things right…or die trying.

For the captors of Holland’s daughter, death is not only on it’s way, it’s in their very possession as Holland’s daughter isn’t just a girl…in fact, she’s barely mortal at all…

She’s Ankou, Death’s daughter, and she’s not an easy mark.

The battleground has been set, the world’s at stake, and all Hell is about the break loose.

Review:

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

This was a strange tale, full of darkness and eerily fascinating, bordering at times on grotesque regarding the way some characters were depicted. A tale of gods walking the Earth, of legendary characters come back to life, of cruel deeds from the past done for a vision that was already corrupted before it ended. A tale of craziness, of people bigger than life, of exaggeration and little things all thrown together, in which mages escape from books bound by cursed sorcery. It’s man at at its crudest, at its maddest, and also man at its greatest level, full of love and ready to shake the whole world to find the one person that matters.

I thoroughly enjoyed Holland as a character. A no-nonsense man, who knows when to kill but also when not to, who doesn’t particularly enjoy it but will not shirk away from this “duty” of his when needed. Physically, he was far removed from the typical protagonist—no rippling abs here—but he had a strong charisma of his own. I felt he was poised between his condition of someone who can see the dead, and someone who’s just trying to give his daughter a normal life, even though said daughter.

Ank, too, wasn’t what I had expected her to be, and that was for the best. The blurb was a little misleading, presenting the story using an angle that isn’t exactly the one I found while reading, and at first I believed she would be the helpless kidnapped kid, but… no. Due to her nature, she wasn’t as close to humanity as Holland, yet even though this made her harder to get attached to, it still was logical in her case. And let’s not forget The Book.

The novel also puts an interesting twist on several mythological characters (the God, the mage, what one does, what the other did). I admit that at times, I wasn’t sure why they acted the way they did; however, it was also made clear that they were mad, so this worked for me in the end. The place of the “final battle” was a tad bit cliché, but depicted in prose that made it look almost magical, if corrupted—the way the novel tackled other themes and people, mixing beauty and darkness.

On the less bright side, I may have wanted just a little more in terms of characters, as I could only really “feel” Ank and Holland; although the nature of the others made this understandable, I guess this is just one of those cases when I would’ve liked to get to know the enemy some more. And a few things in the writing tended to grate on my nerves, especially the sometimes heavy use of “…”. If you don’t mind those, good for you; I just get easily annoyed (visually) with that. That’s a somewhat minor point, though.

Yzabel / February 28, 2015

Review: The Death House

The Death HouseThe Death House by Sarah Pinborough

My rating: [rating=3]

Blurb:

Toby’s life was perfectly normal . . . until it was unravelled by something as simple as a blood test.

Taken from his family, Toby now lives in the Death House; an out-of-time existence far from the modern world, where he, and the others who live there, are studied by Matron and her team of nurses. They’re looking for any sign of sickness. Any sign of their wards changing. Any sign that it’s time to take them to the sanatorium.

No one returns from the sanatorium.

Withdrawn from his house-mates and living in his memories of the past, Toby spends his days fighting his fear. But then a new arrival in the house shatters the fragile peace, and everything changes.

Because everybody dies. It’s how you choose to live that counts.

Review:

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

I resent the comparison with The Fault In Our Stars, because The Death House was more readable: Toby, for all his faults, wasn”t so insufferable, probably because he behaved like a somewhat surly, but all in all normal teenager. And Clara was enjoyable, with a positive look on what happened to her, even though she knew how all the kids at the Death House were doomed to end.

I wouldn’t deem this the best novel ever. It left me wanting for more explanations. However, as a character study, at least for the main ones, it fairly hit the spot for me. The children and teenagers in that strange house all had to cope with their fear (and prospect) of dying in their own ways, andI thought we got to see quite a few interesting examples. Ashley, the believer kid who finds strength in the Bible and tries to share it with others. Toby, retreating into himself and pretending he doesn’t care, yet still takes very much care of the younger ones. Louis, both extremely intelligent, though still a child in many ways. Will, all innocent and carefree, thus hiding his fears from himself. Clara, who had to live to her parents’ expectations, and oddly enough was somewhat “freed” by the house. Jake, disguising his own fear behind his bully attitude.

Those were interesting portrayals, and through their interactions, we got to see how days and nights were spent in that microcosm that so much looked like a boarding school of sorts, yet was anything but—shadowed as it was by the mysterious sanatorium that none of the kids ever got to see, only hearing about it, only knowing one of them had been taken there when they discovered that child’s belongings being gone in the morning. And the presence of the Matron and the other silent nurses only made the pressure worse.

True, not much happens in terms of plot-twists during the largest part of the novel. It was still a nice read nonetheless. The ending was a 50/50: part of me expected it to be different, more original… but at the same time, the other part thought it couldn’t (and shouldn’t, anyway) have been otherwise.

I didn’t rate this book higher because in the end, too many things weren’t explained, and they kept bothering me, try as I might to ignore them. The “Defective gene”, for starters, was rather sketchy. How came the kids displayed so many different symptoms, and what was it suppose to lead to? Would it turn them into monsters of sorts, as was hinted at a couple of times? The kids were isolated like freaks, carried away in vans by men in dark suits, as if to protect the world from them; in my opinion, this would have warranted more than a few vague hints about the exact nature of the Defectiveness.

The same applied to the nurses and to their behaviour, especially considering a specific twist. Why would they hide it, and try to hush it? Out of fear it would go public? An actual reason would have been nice here.

Also, most of the twists were fairly obvious. It may be just me, I don’t know. I just guessed pretty early where they were leading.

One aspect of the book I can’t decide about were the other kids. While the characters I listed abover were indeed interesting, the rest were more like cardboard figures (even Tom, who got to share Dorm 4 with Toby and the others), which was weird in such a close space where I would’ve expected everyone to know everyone else. However, this fitted Toby’s tendency to close his eyes on his surroundings, and increased the feeling that each child was on his/ her own, and that at the end, they couldn’t afford to care about the others, only themselves.

Overall, I was leaning towards “I like it”. However, the lack of explanations, and the somewhat bland figures of the nurses and some of the kids, left me feeling that something was missing.

Yzabel / December 16, 2014

Review: Soulminder

SoulminderSoulminder by Timothy Zahn

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

For Dr. Adrian Sommers, a split second of driving while distracted leads to tragedy—and obsession. His family destroyed, he devotes his entire being to developing Soulminder, a technology that might have saved his son as he wavered on the edge of death. Sommers’s vision is to capture a dying person’s life essence and hold it safely in stasis while physicians heal the body from injury or disease. Years of experimentation finally end in success—but those who recognize Soulminder’s possibilities almost immediately corrupt its original concept to pursue dangerous new frontiers: body-swapping, obstruction of justice, extortion, and perhaps even immortality.

Review:

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

3.5 stars.

Mostly I liked the dilemmas that the Soulminder invention itself presented: a tool born from a dream, from a ruined family, in the hopes of helping other people, but whose use quickly gets perverted for recreational or even oppressive means. The aime behind the Soulminder project was almost too innocent, so much that I could only see it getting twisted at some point or other.

The novel explores some of those aspects (there would be more) through a series of “chapters” that read more like connected short stories. Soulminder and its creators, especially Sommer, remain a connecting thread, but they’re not necessarily the main protagonists. This structure was surprising at first, but I quickly got used to it, as it allowed me to see the whole project through different sets of eyes: its scientists’, its doctors’, its patients’, those of people trying to abuse it, too…

The downside was that a lot of characters felt flat, not developed enough. Perhaps understandable for minor characters who did not appear a lot; less forgiveable when it was Sommer and Sands themselves, as red threads, who did not manage to make me more invested. At times, their duo may have read too much like a convenient device, one unknowingly opening doors to abuse so that the other could point out what could go wrong (and was proved invariably right). On the other hand, I took quite a liking to Frank Everly, whose take on security matters and efficient, though jaded views made more vivid in my opinion.

Soulminder is also one of those weird kinds of books that you quickly get tired of, in that you don’t feel like reading more than a few pages at once… and then you find yourself getting back to it half an hour later, wanting to read more no matter what. I have no idea what this is called, or if it even has a name, but it’s how it felt for me.

This said, I still enjoyed it as a whole.

Yzabel / October 23, 2014

Review: The Secrets of Life and Death

The Secrets of Life and DeathThe Secrets of Life and Death by Rebecca Alexander

My rating: 3

Summary:

In modern day England, Professor Felix Guichard is called in to identify occult symbols found on the corpse of a young girl. His investigation brings him in contact with a mysterious woman, Jackdaw Hammond, who guards a monumental secret–She’s Dead. Or she would be, were it not for magic which has artificially extended her life. But someone else knows her secret. Someone very old and very powerful, who won’t rest until they’ve taken the magic that keeps her alive….
In Krakow in 1585, Dr John Dee, the Elizabethan Alchemist and Occultist, and his assistant Edward Kelley have been summoned by the King of Poland to save the life of his niece, the infamous Countess Elisabeth Bathory. But they soon realize that the only thing worse than the Countess’ malady, is the magic that might be able to save her…
As Jackdaw and Felix race to uncover the truth about the person hunting her, it becomes clear that the answers they seek can only be found in the ancient diary of John Dee’s assistant, Edward Kelley. Together they must solve a mystery centuries in the making, or die trying.

Review:

(I got a copy courtesy of Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.)

I should have read and reviewed this book sooner, but as things go, more and more book piled up. As usual, you might say.

The Secrets of Life and Death was an entertaining story, loosely based in part on the half-history, half-legend surrounding the infamous Elisabeth Bathory. It weaves two different narratives, the first one set in modern England, the second one focused on John Dee, told in first person by his assistant Edward Kelley. People who read my reviews should know by now that I’m usually partial to time/space shifts; I enjoyed those here, for they provided enough information while gradually bringing everything together, even though I’d have a few qualms regarding the last installments of Dee & Kelley’s adventure (in the end, I thought they tended to drag a little).

I also quite liked the modern part, two of its characters being “revenants” of sorts: people who should’ve died, but whose death could be foretold. As such, a witch managed to get to them just in time to place them within protective sigils, making them dependent on that magic to keep “surviving”, yet still providing them with what they call “borrowed time.” It’s probably not the most original concept ever, but it’s definitely not a rehashed take on “people coming back from the dead” either. Also, the magic described throughout the novel was intriguing and interesting: the revenants are weak in more than one way, unable to go far from their sigils, and the reasons to create them are both humane and rather selfish. That’s a greay enough area to my liking.

Two things I found fault with, though. The first was the romance, which felt stilted and forced. The attraction between Jack and Felix came too fast (which is why I won’t consider this a major spoiler), and developed in awkward ways. Understandable? Perhaps. However, in my typical way of perceiving things (in other word, “guys, there are more pressing matters of life and death to tackle here”), it didn’t register as absolutely necessary to the story. As for the second point, it’s more minor: I’d just would’ve liked more explanations about how Saraquel managed to speak to Edward (and here I’m not saying more, because that would be a spoiler).

3.5 stars nonetheless, and a story I’d easily recommend: not the best ever, but still worth reading to spend a good afternoon/evening.

Yzabel / October 13, 2014

Review: Soulless

SoullessSoulless by Amber Garr

My rating: [rating=1]

Summary:

When it comes to death and love…only one is guaranteed.

Four decades ago Nora died. A tragic event for someone so young; however, four decades ago Nora was also given a second chance to walk among the living.

A Death Warden with a mysterious past, her job is to escort the newly expired towards the light, battling with the Soul Hunters who want the freshly dead to help with their own evil purposes buried in the dark.

When Nora’s charges suddenly become targets, she realizes that the hunters are after far more than just souls. A shift in power between good and evil threatens to change everything, risking the lives of the only family Nora has ever known.

Devastated and angry, she’s forced to face the man she once loved – a man who chose darkness over her – in order to find the answers she needs to stop the horror from escalating. Yet, while a lost relationship still haunts her broken heart, a new Warden with secrets of his own will enter the mix and quickly alter everything Nora believed to be true.

Death is unavoidable…but sometimes, so is love.

Review:

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

Interesting premise and world (Death Wardens vs. Soul Hunters), but characters that turned out too difficult to stand, at least for me.

The story reads fast, and getting into it was quite easy. We’re quickly introduced to what being a Warden entails, and to what Soul Hunters do. Granted, their names kind of make it obvious; still, it’s good to see such things explained through active scenes, and not just in passing. Even though this could have become an info-dump, it didn’t (or if it did, not in a way that felt like I was having tons of information dumped on me).

However, I had the constant, nagging feeling that something was off. I suspected that the “something” was the characters. Some two thirds in, it just didn’t work anymore at all.

Nora is almost sixty: she died at eighteen, then spent fourty years as a Warden. Despite her long experience, though, she behaves like a teenager in more than one way, from moping about her mysterious death (understandable if it’s just happened, less interesting if it was ages ago) to letting her “hormones” lead the ball (she’s dead, by the way, so why would she still have hormones anyway?). That’s a specific pet peeve of mine, but I think it’s a justified one: when using characters that are older than they look, they must also act older, otherwise we might as well be shown a regular 18-year-old heroine.

While it seems that she’s going to be a leading character, the one with experience, compared to the younger one she has to teach, she actually becomes rather passive. Sure, she trains to fight. Sure, she’s given a charge of her own. Then she turns into the girl who has to be protected. You’d think that fourty years later, she wouldn’t need that so much. I wanted to see her actually teaching things to Jason; I got Jason jumping in front of her to save her.

Jason: nice character at first sight, a soldier who actually enlisted because he wanted to become a medic and thought he’d learn useful things in that regard in the army. Yet also a cliché (cowboy, ranch, manly man of manliness).

Then came the testosterone and jealousy contests. Apart from a couple of Elders, the few other female characters are, of course, girls who intend on seducing Jason:

A pretty, young girl with bright red hair and matching lips jumped forward. Her eagerness irritated me even though it shouldn’t. She stepped into the circle, eyeing Jason like a piece of chocolate cake with whipped cream and a cherry on top. Biting her bottom lip seductively, I rolled my eyes.

Ensue staring, dark glares, fighting in as revealing clothing as possible to grab the guy’s attention, and bodies getting too close to each other during training. Slut shaming wasn’t 100% in the open, but it definitely kept swimming under the surface. (Also dangling participles here and there, as you can see from the quote.)

This is one of those instances in which the romance clearly ruined the game for me. I’m not fond of love triangles in general, but that’s because they’re usually cliché, and tend to take over the actual plot. While the stakes could have been alluring here, after a while, it was very difficult for me to go past the typical “bad guy in black vs. manly soldier ex-cowboy”—complete with jealous, passive-aggressive domineering attitude:

He paused, something else balancing on the tip of his tongue. “Did you say Sani and Theron saved you?”
I shivered with the memory, and Jason held me tighter. His heavy arm felt like an iron clamp, gluing me to his side forever.

Guys, there’s a bigger problem looming on the horizon, and actually the horizon is getting very, very close because the book’s ending soon. Can we focus?

Add a bit of ain’t-telling-you-nothing (as in, some characters definitely know a lot more, yet refuse to spit the information out until, obviously, it’s much too late for that). I just don’t like that, since it creates an artificial delay in readers getting said information, while we all know we won’t get it anyway due to the character-rendered-unable-to-speak trope. (I swear, I can feel that one coming from miles away.)

In short: a good idea for a story, with themes that usually grab my interest (death, reapers), yet characters that grated on my nerves too much for me to enjoy it, and probably also a plot dealt with too quickly (there would have been more room for it without the girls competing over the guy, for sure). 1.5 stars.

Yzabel / September 18, 2014

Review: Afterworlds

AfterworldsAfterworlds by Scott Westerfeld

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

Darcy Patel has put college and everything else on hold to publish her teen novel, Afterworlds. Arriving in New York with no apartment or friends she wonders whether she’s made the right decision until she falls in with a crowd of other seasoned and fledgling writers who take her under their wings… Told in alternating chapters is Darcy’s novel, a suspenseful thriller about Lizzie, a teen who slips into the ‘Afterworld’ to survive a terrorist attack. But the Afterworld is a place between the living and the dead and as Lizzie drifts between our world and that of the Afterworld, she discovers that many unsolved – and terrifying – stories need to be reconciled. And when a new threat resurfaces, Lizzie learns her special gifts may not be enough to protect those she loves and cares about most.

Review:

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

Pretty interesting premise, but in the end I found the execution wanting, and the stories not that interesting, unfortunately.

I really liked the beginning: Darcy having to navigate her way in New York, meeting published authors as well as other “debs” like her (people whose book was to be published in the upcoming months), having to take editing and rewriting tasks into account… The first pages of Lizzie’s story were gripping, too, and I appreciated how we’re shown the final version of Darcy’s book, running parallel to her own editing of the first draft, with all the pitfalls that were in it (exposition chapters, huge info-dumps…) and were then removed. As someone who likes writing, too,
I couldn’t help but find this comment about the YA scene and authors’ jobs quite interesting. The book is full of little allusions to similar themes: Darcy obviously wrote her novel during NaNoWriMo 2012, the Darcy/Lizzie hint at “Pride and Prejudice” is totally acknowledged, the authors debate about what’s more important (plot? characters? conflict? setting?), and so on.

However, a lot of aspects in “Afterworlds” were problematic.

For starters, I’m not sure YA readers not specifically interested in writing would “get it”. Clearly it’s going to be a hit-or-miss here.

Also, the characters weren’t that impressive. Those from Darcy’s novel were rather bland in my opinion, and what I may deem “typical YA cut-outs”. Yamaraj: the mysterious love interest without much of a personality. Jamie: the best friend who, in Darcy’s copy-editor’s own terms, “has car, lives with father”, and not much more. In fact, Darcy’s novel would have deserved to stand on its own, because it would’ve allowed the author to properly develop its world and characters, and make it the gripping idea it seemed to be in the beginning. (I’m still convinced that opening scene in the airport is a proper attention-catcher.)

Darcy was definitely annoying: totally immature, without any sense of responsibility (she missed so many deadlines, such as the ones for college applications, lease renewal, and her writing was two inches from going the same way), jumping to conclusions, thinking in terms of the world revolving around her… Defects I would’ve happily forgiven, if she had learnt from them, but she didn’t. And in the end? In the end, Little Miss Lucky still got lucky, still landed an astonishing deal, still managed to waltz out of problems without that much of a hitch. All things that are potential insults at actual writers, the large majority that doesn’t land an agent after just a few weeks of querying, nor a $300,000 book deal for his/her first novel. I’m all in favour of selling dreams, but those were too much a matter of dumb luck, not of work and personal improvement. I didn’t root for Darcy at all. (I was also rather miffed at her plot taking a “let’s focus on the love relationship” turn. There were so many other things it could have focused on…)

Mostly, I felt that this book had great potential in being a pretty good parody, but couldn’t make up its mind about being one or not. Why a parody? For all the jabs at YA novels, at their shortcomings, elements I tend to notice as well when I read such stories. “Afterworlds” could be an excellent critique of the current market—a market I personally find saturated with cookie-cutter themes and plots (the same old kind of love interest, the same trend of characters whose questionable decisions put them in the too-stupid-to-live category…). Unfortunately, the way it is, it fell into the exact pit traps it (unconsciously or not?) denounced.

A note as well about a few questions raised throughout Darcy’s narrative. There was an interesting discussion about culture appropriation, and how Darcy’s use of Yama, an actual deity from Hindu mythology, amounted to erasing Hinduism, or at least part of it, from her world, by not openly acknowledging him as part of this religion. I found this point very valid. And yet, at the same time, Darcy herself represents a removal of cultural heritage: she’s of Indian origin, but apart from her surname and physical description, she’s the typical “white protagonist”. (She’s not religious, her family isn’t particularly religious either, they all behave like standard Americans in novels… In other words: why make her from a different culture, if it’s not to use it? Was it just for the sake of having a non-white protagonist… or, on the contrary, to point at how many other novels appropriate various cultures, only to “whiten” them?)

The underlying critique is definitely present, and something I can’t help thinking about, wondering if it was on purpose, or totally accidental. I don’t know how to take this novel, except with a grain of salt. I’m giving it 2 stars because of the parody it could be, one that made me snicker and nod my head in acknowledgment. But story-wise, I think it should either have been made a stronger read (as it was, it became boring rather quickly), or have gone all the way as a more obvious means of denouncing the many problems going rampant in the YA publishing industry. If it’s one, I’m not sure that many people will realise it, unfortunately (and especially not younger readers—not because they’re young, just because they may not have the necessary reading background to see the critique I mentioned).

Yzabel / September 8, 2014

Review: Flesh Failure

Flesh FailureFlesh Failure by Sèphera Girón

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

London, 1888: Agatha drags herself from a shallow grave to roam the fog-shrouded streets of the dark city, trying to piece together what happened. Her new friends, the ladies of the night, live in terror of Jack the Ripper, while Agatha persistently searches for what she discovers she needs to stay alive: electrical charges.

As her memory grows stronger, the hazy images from her past come into focus, but questions remain. Do her answers lie in the shadows of the streets, the hidden corridors of London Hospital, or someplace far more frightening?

Review:

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

An enjoyable take on the theme of animating the dead, woven with bits of historical events such as the Ripper’s murders. Agatha wakes up buried in the woods, and has to claw her way out of the earth. Only helped by brief flashes of memory, she goes on her own quest to find out what happened to her, why she recalls herself as different-looking, and who created her.

I’m going to confess to a total lack of impartiality here: I love stories on the theme of reanimated humans, creatures who start out as “monstrous” and have to find their way in the world, for all the questions they raise about our own humanity. This short novel may not have been perfect, but it still made me think about that no matter what. In spite of Agatha’s smell and scars, there were people who natueally came to help, fed her, gave her clothes, let her sleep in their home. They weren’t perfect people either, they had their flaws, they may end up rejecting her after a while, but the fact remains: there’s still goodness in human beings.

The novel deals with a certain kind of symbolism, too. Seven days for Agatha’s “rebirth”. Electricity as a conductor for life, but also as a means of destruction, just like fire can keep you warm, yet burn you to a crisp if you get too close. Though not exceptional, such symbols still remained interesting.

A few things didn’t sit too well with me. First, some editing blips (a character’s name is known before she’s properly introduced) and redundant mistakes (“then” instead of “than”) that became annoying after a while, and were likely not typos. There were also a couple of happenings that I can’t make up my mind about, because they’re a bit too close to Shelley’s story. The encounter with the blind man was one of those. I honestly don’t know if I liked this or not, if it was typical retelling homage or closer to a copy of the original scene. Then there was Agatha’s behaviour: I thought she could have questioned it more, especially when it came to her cravings for blood and how she responded to them. (If looking at Shelley’s story—and there’s no way a reader can’t see the parallels here, they’re totally on purpose—the “monster” started quite innocent, his gradual descent due to his trials. Agatha, on the other hand, seemed to start as a monster already, and maybe she was a little too inhuman, so there wasn’t that much character progress to have. That’d be my major complaint, and why I’m not rating it higher.)

The ending felt too abrupt, as if the story suddenly had to be wrapped up right now. However, it fits with what happens in the last paragraphs, so even though I would’ve liked to read more, writing it that way was actually logical.

Readers who aren’t so keen as I am about this kind of story may not find it more than “OK”, but in my case, it still struck a chord, and after the first slow pages, I got into it fairly easily.

Yzabel / July 21, 2014

Review: How To Date Dead Guys

How To Date Dead Guys - Blog Tour

 

 

 

 

How To Date Dead GuysHow To Date Dead Guys by Ann M. Noser

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

College sophomore Emma Roberts remembers her mother’s sage advice: “don’t sleep around, don’t burp in public, and don’t tell anyone you see ghosts”. But when cute Mike Carlson drowns in the campus river under her watch, Emma’s sheltered life shatters.

Blamed for Mike’s death and haunted by nightmares, Emma turns to witchcraft and a mysterious Book of Shadows to bring him back. Under a Blood Moon, she lights candles, draws a pentacle on the campus bridge, and casts a spell. The invoked river rages up against her, but she escapes its fury. As she stumbles back to the dorm, a stranger drags himself from the water and follows her home. And he isn’t the only one…

Instead of raising Mike, Emma assists the others she stole back from the dead—a pre-med student who jumped off the bridge, a young man determined to solve his own murder, and a frat boy Emma can’t stand…at first. More comfortable with the dead than the living, Emma delves deeper into the seductive Book of Shadows. Her powers grow, but witchcraft may not be enough to protect her against the vengeful river and the killers that feed it their victims.

Inspired by the controversial Smiley Face Murders, HOW TO DATE DEAD GUYS will appeal to the secret powers hidden deep within each of us.

Review:

(I received a copy of this book from the publisher, Curiosity Quills, in exchange for an honest review, as part of the related blog tour. Thanks a lot for allowing me to take part in it.)

How To Date Dead Guys was a nice read, light enough and even funny in parts, while also more serious in others. The problems Emma ran into, trying to cover up for the several guys she accidentally brought back from the dead, sometimes made me smile. At the same time, the novel also provided interesting (if typical) questions about “what would you do if you had a second chance at coming to terms with something you couldn’t finish before your death?” Every single one of the drowned men left something behind them, something unfinished, whether it concerned themselves, a relative, or a lover; and those stories were all touching in their own ways. I couldn’t help but agree with them, with their choices to “make it right” or at least try to see what had become of their loved ones.

Emma as a protagonist was fine enough: painfully shy at first, but gaining confidence as she grew into her powers and was also forced to come up with lies to hide what she had done—this with a hint of being tempted in the future by this same power she’s acquired. It’s not the main focus of this first installment in the series, but I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss her desire to keep the Book of Shadows even though it put her in this mess for starters. (First one guy, then another, then three, and all with their own issues? Definitely a mess.) I also liked Jake a lot: infuriating at first, and seemingly a jerk, but one with a heart of gold, who opened Emma’s eyes on more than one thing. He wasn’t even so much a jerk, in fact, than a sociable guy who enjoyed life and took it as it came to get the best out of it, even in death. The outcome of his own predicament was a bit predictable, but cute nonetheless.

And I guess the cuteness factor is one of the things that made me like this book (that, and necromancy—let’s face it, it is necromancy, and I’m always partial to such magic). Even though the novel sometimes bordered on the “too cute”, it was enjoyable. Sure, it might seem cheesy, and yet I just want to say: “So what?” Sometimes we need twee plots and characters. Sometimes we need twee plots and characters. Sometimes I like myself such a book, and considering I had a hard time putting it down for long, I’d say it quite reached its goal.

It’s also light on the romance: there are several men involved, so it stands to logics that Emma wouldn’t get into a relationship with all of them. She’s not immune to their different personalities, their qualities, their quirks, but she manages to remember that nothing can come out of this (them being obviously doomed to become dead again at some point), and in my opinion, such budding relationships, condemned from the beginning, actually helped her grow as a person, going from fickle, almost teenager-like “first attraction” feelings to a deeper understanding of life and love.

On the other hand, I found a couple of things too exaggerated (everyone blaming Emma for Mike’s death was like kicking the proverbial puppy, and Chrissy seemed just so terribly superficial and “me, me, me” that she became tiring—good thing she doesn’t appear much). Moreover, I found the plotline a little too over the place, in that it wove the stories of all those guys, along with Emma’s, Abby’s, Walker’s, and a few others, but didn’t seem to have a really definite plot. The part about the murders came a little too late to my liking, and almost felt like a kind of afterthought, as if the novel suddenly had to be more serious than it had been up until now. There are some hints here and there, but the characters just don’t seem that bothered about them, except perhaps for two (who don’t voice out their suspicions, though, so they’re only proved right later).

I’m giving it 3/3.5 stars “only” because of that, but I’ll still recommend it if you’re looking for a light read that is sometimes fun, sometimes mellow, and sometimes sad.

You can get this book from:

Yzabel / July 20, 2014

Review: The Girl From The Well

The Girl from the WellThe Girl from the Well by Rin Chupeco

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

You may think me biased, being murdered myself. But my state of being has nothing to do with the curiosity toward my own species, if we can be called such. We do not go gentle, as your poet encourages, into that good night.

A dead girl walks the streets.

She hunts murderers. Child killers, much like the man who threw her body down a well three hundred years ago.

And when a strange boy bearing stranger tattoos moves into the neighborhood so, she discovers, does something else. And soon both will be drawn into the world of eerie doll rituals and dark Shinto exorcisms that will take them from American suburbia to the remote valleys and shrines of Aomori, Japan.

Because the boy has a terrifying secret – one that would just kill to get out.

The Girl from the Well is A YA Horror novel pitched as “Dexter” meets “The Grudge”, based on a well-loved Japanese ghost story.

Review:

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

Not so much “terribly scary” for me in the end, in that I don’t scare easily, yet fascinating nonetheless for its depiction of ghosts, the appearance they have after death, and the imagery it conjured. I could fairly easily picture Okiku, the murderers she targeted and got revenge on in place of the dead children, said children literally latched onto those men’s necks and linked to their limbs by spirituals cords… And the woman in black… well, all right, that one I’d definitely attempt to draw someday, although I’m not sure I could do her justice. I think the way the story was told, too, contributed to this: somewhat cold and detached, and special, because it’s a strange mix of omniscient and first person point of view (the story’s told by Okiku herself, who’s able to observe other characters and their reactions, and sense their thoughts and feelings). In any other story, it probably wouldn’t have worked for me; here, it did, because it seemed to fit with the ghost’s paradigm. I don’t know if other readers in general would like it, but as far as I’m concerned, it partook the fascination I had for this novel, through descriptions that were just the right length and just suggestive enough (all the more for the intended YA audience), without falling into the realm of “too much”.

The Girl From The Well is loosely based on a well-known Japanese legend, that of a servant girl who worked for a lord, and was tasked with keeping ten precious plates; she was tricked into believing she had lost one of them, and was put to death for her “carelessness”. As a result, she became a vengeful spirit who drove her former lord to death—and the number 9 sends her spirit into a frenzy. This was nicely reflected in the book, in that Okiku tends to count whatever she sees (people, items…), and the accursed number indeed makes her react violently. Forever detached from both human world and and elusive afterlife, she can only watch, in between enacting revenge throughout the world on people who’ve killed children, but were never punished for their bad deeds. The Smiling Man, especially, was of quite a scary persuasion—I find smiles way more frightening than other expressions whenever such characters are concerned.

However, this isn’t exactly Okiku’s story. Hers was already written, already told, and this is more a “what would happen some three hundred years later, how would such a vengeful spirit evolve with time.” Partly to her own surprise, she finds herself drawn to Tarquin, a boy with strange tattoos, and whose fate is doomed to be a dark one if what plagues him isn’t destroyed in time. (Note: there’s no romance involved—a very welcome element in my opinion. It would just’ve been weird and misplaced in such a story.) Odd things happen around Tark, his own mother has been locked in an institution and has tried to kill him several times, and he just doesn’t understand much to what’s happening. But other people slowly start to notice the presence that haunts him, those people being mostly Okiku and his cousin Callie, and it’s up to them to try and understand what his problem his, and how to solve it, which involves going back to his roots.

On the downside, I wasn’t too convinced by the characters in general, in that they seemed more driven by the plot than people with their own lives. Okiku’s involvement was also somewhat problematic, since she was mostly a watcher and didn’t act as much as I expected her to. I think I would’ve liked her nature as a vengeful spirit to show through more than it did; for instance, one of the vengeance scenes made me feel like it had been put there as some kind of reminder, and not really as part of the plot. There was also one huge blunder that could’ve been easily avoided if only one of the characters had spoken out loud about a specific event, yet didn’t for… no reason? I don’t mind characters making honest mistakes, but not when the latter are the product of unexplained reasoning.

Overall, I had a hard time putting this book down, and remained fascinated, though with hindsight, those aspects I mentioned prevented me from rating it higher. (3.5 stars)

Yzabel / March 24, 2014

Review: Death Whispers

Death Whispers (Death, #1)Death Whispers by Tamara Rose Blodgett

My rating: [rating=0]

Summary:

Almost fifteen-year-old Caleb Hart is a Cadaver-Manipulator in the year 2025. When teens receive a government-sanctioned pharmaceutical cocktail during school, paranormal abilities begin manifesting… making the teens more powerful than the adults.

After Caleb discovers he has the rare, Affinity for the Dead, he must do whatever it takes to hide it from a super-secret government agency whose goal is exploitation.

Caleb seeks refuge in his new girlfriend, Jade, until he realizes that she needs as much protection from her family, as he does from the government.

Suddenly, Caleb finds that hiding his ability while protecting Jade and his friends is a full time job; can he escape the government, protect Jade and lose the bullies that are making him miserable?

Review:

DNFed at 42%. I can’t trudge through it any longer, not without booze, and I guess this is a sure sign I shouldn’t go on.

I wanted to like this story so, so badly. You can’t imagine. Necromancy is exactly the kind of magic (or, more generally, power) that fascinates me, for all the possibilities it offers and questions it raises, and from the blurb, I thought I would love this story. Even the acronym for Caleb’s ability (AFTD – Affinity For The Dead) got my attention.

But I just can’t, for the following reasons:

Juvenile prose, for starters. Granted, the narrator is supposed to be 13-14, However, the jumbled thoughts, run-on sentences and limited vocabulary still made it hard to go through the story. Some sentences were also really weird:

“Mom liked to notice me growing by saying my eyeballs were “taller” than whatever random day she had noticed before.”

Huh?

Too much useless dialogue and everyday life scenes. Those needed serious trimming. I don’t demand action and only action, but I really don’t need to know about every breakfast food, teenage thought, phone (sorry, pulse) conversation, and so on. There’s a fine line to tread between “characters who’re still schooled yet are never seen in class/doing homework” and “detailing every school day”. Here, it was just too much of the latter. On top of it, Caleb’s observations weren’t particularly interesting.

Annoying characters, especially Jonesy. Jonesy wasn’t funny nor clever. He was just the kind of moronic teenage boy who’s probably going to earn a Darwin Award someday. From the start, I just couldn’t stand him. With such friends, who still needs enemies?

And then, then: Too Stupid To Live characters. The whole lot, adults included.

The premise seems to be about Caleb not wanting to end up like the one guy who had exactly the same abilities as him (basically, this would mean being stripped of all his freedom and human rights, and be used as a government tool). So why, why does he have to blab about it to everyone, and show off his power? In the most idiotic ways possible?

He faints in biology class due to “hearing” all the dead frogs. However, he doesn’t want the two school bullies to think he’s a sissy. What does he do? Take them to the local cemetery and raises some random bloke from his grave.
The guys are bullies. They never miss an opportunity to taunt him. Worst people ever to show off to.

He raises a dead dog in the middle of the street. With plenty of witnesses around.

“A cop’s interest in our lives couldn’t be a good thing, whatever angle you look from.”

Oh, really?
Then why did you tell said cop about his being AFTD?

“Garcia looked at Mom thoughtfully. […] I decided to man-up, I wasn’t little anymore.
I broke the silence. “I have Affinity for The Dead.””

A cop. Not a bad guy overall, but still, someone whose duty involves reporting people like Caleb:

“If I find out you’re a Cadaver-Manipulator, we are lawfully bound to report that to the proper authorities.”

And it’s not only Caleb. It’s everyone.

Jonesy doesn’t seem to grasp the basic concept of “talking about Caleb’s abilities could mean the government finding out”. Of course, he flaps his mouth in front of Caleb’s parents and the cop:

“Jonesy piped in, “I still wanna know what happened to the dog.””

(Caleb did a mental facepalm; so did I.)

The two bullies? They don’t rat Caleb out. Seriously, if I had been a villain, and disliked some guy like they seemed to dislike him, I’d have used that golden opportunity to get rid of him.

His parents: they’re supposed to be the growns-up. His father’s the one who mapped up the whole human genome, thus paving the way to the tests and injection that would later awaken latent abilities in teenagers. Like Parker (the first AFTD). Like Caleb. I expected much more from them. They didn’t deliver.
Example: they want to test his abilities. The best course of action they devise is to take him to the cemetery to talk to his great-grandmother, and potentially, raise her from her grave (by the time it happens, they already suspect he’s not just the basic AFTD kid who can merely see and talk to ghosts).

“Mom began, ‘We’ve thought about it and decided that after this whole mess is over,’ her smile said the mess wasn’t my fault […]”

I’m sorry to break the news to you, Caleb, but yes, it is. It is your fault. At this point, you’re too stupid to be left running free, because who knows what harm you could do, considering the dumb ideas you and your pals could still come up with?

A wonder he hasn’t been discovered/ratted out already. I won’t find out on my own, though. I’m giving up.