tstl Archives - The Y Logs

Yzabel / August 8, 2019

Review: Tangle’s Game

Tangle’s Game by Stewart Hotston
My rating: [usr 2.5]

Blurb:

Tense tech-thriller based on the growing role of blockchains, encryption and social media in society.

Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.

Yesterday, Amanda Back’s life was flawless: the perfect social credit score, the perfect job, the perfect home.

Today, Amanda is a target, an enemy of the system holding information dangerous enough to disrupt the world’s all-consuming tech – a fugitive on the run.

But in a world where an un-hackable blockchain links everyone and everything, there is nowhere to run…

Review:

[I received a copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.]

A techno-thriller with interesting AI-related themes, although in the end, I wasn’t awed by the story.

Set in a somewhat near future where transactions are handled through blockchain-based contracts and people’s quality of life is dependent on their social credit score as well as on their financial credit score, “Tangle’s Game” tells the story of Amanda Back, a successful investment banker who finally got a complete grip back on her life after an ex-boyfriend stole her money and left her betrayed. Flying back to London, and after an invasive search episode at the airport, she comes home only to realise that said boyfriend has involved her in a dangerous game where a mysterious USB stick and the information it contains is key. The only problem? Amanda isn’t a hacker, or a conspiracy theorist, or a whistleblower, and is probably the last person with the proper connections to do something with said information.

The premise really hooked me in, and I quickly wanted to know more about how this would all unfurl: who were the enemies, how would they try to get the info, what was Tangle’s exact part in that, who could be Amanda’s allies… Most of all, I was interested in Tatsu, the little AI contracted to help her decrypt the contents of the USB stick. I always have a soft spot for AIs, and Tatsu was definitely endearing.

By contrast, though, I never really warmed up to the human characters. Mostly they were “unlikeable” as people (Amanda is pretty much self-centered, Tangle is no better and probably somewhere on the sociopathic ladder…), but that in itself is not a deal-breaker for me—they can be the most rotten pieces of crap in the world, I can still find them likeable as characters, provided the execution goes this way. It wasn’t much the case here, in part because these characters as a whole made problematic decision after problematic decision, in a way that made me keep wondering how on Earth they were still alive. (I’ve been a tabletop RPG player for over 20 years. Trust my experience when I say that “’eceiving mysterious information and just hanging about in one’s own flat—where everybody know they can find you—while trying to come up with ideas about what to do” is a sure way of being assaulted at night by men in black or other unsavoury characters.) I was actually glad when one of the bad guys finally called them on their ability to come up with plans that may work in movies, but never in real life. And that was worth for pretty much the whole cast, not only Amanda, who at least I would’ve expected to be the most clueless.

The last 20% picked up, and with Tatsu still involved by that point, that made me want to read until the end at any rate. The ending itself is fairly open, and leaves much unresolved, but in a way, it also makes much sense: things got mired, then exploded, and now the world’s in turmoil… and the fragile situation at the end, teetering between hope and potential catastrophe, fits that pattern.

Conclusion: 2.5 stars. Mostly I didn’t care much about the human characters, and there were a few plot holes that annoyed me, but I did enjoy the part played by the AI, and the way Amanda (and Tangle, too, after all) considered it.

Yzabel / December 21, 2018

Review: All Rights Reserved

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

Speth Jime is anxious to deliver her Last Day speech and celebrate her transition into adulthood. The moment she turns fifteen, Speth must pay for every word she speaks (“Sorry” is a flat ten dollars and a legal admission of guilt), for every nod ($0.99/sec), for every scream ($0.99/sec) and even every gesture of affection. She’s been raised to know the consequences of falling into debt, and can’t begin to imagine the pain of having her eyes shocked for speaking words that she’s unable to afford. But when Speth’s friend Beecher commits suicide rather than work off his family’s crippling debt, she can’t express her shock and dismay without breaking her Last Day contract and sending her family into Collection. Backed into a corner, Speth finds a loophole: rather than read her speech—rather than say anything at all—she closes her mouth and vows never to speak again. Speth’s unexpected defiance of tradition sparks a media frenzy, inspiring others to follow in her footsteps, and threatens to destroy her, her family and the entire city around them.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.]

Good premise here—a future where, as soon as people turn 15, they are charged for every word they say, and other forms of communication such as many gestures. Pretty much a legal nightmare, in which lawyers have all the power, where people can slap each other with instant lawsuits, and where everything is monitored through cuffs and eye implants, all connected to the ever present Wi-Fi.

In general, I enjoyed reading about this world, for all its chilling technology that may not be far off the corner (such as the Black Mirror-esque “Blocking” tech, preventing people from seeing specific faces, for instance). It was a little hard to follow at times, but it nevertheless made it for a quite unique setting.

I had more trouble with the characters, unfortunately. Speth, especially, struck me as overall rather dumb.While her silence stemmed from a shocking event, it became apparent very quickly that there would be a price to pay—in many ways, literally, as her family gets slapped with lawsuits, her sister is prevented from working, and so on. Yet it took her an extraordinary long while to finally figure out what to do about it all, instead of remaining mute and passive for most of the story. Not passive as in not going out and not doing anything at all, but passive when it came to thinking hard and making decisions about her silence… which, in the meantime, led to several problematic events, one of those being so scarring that I can’t reconcile the shock of it with someone standing her ground for… no reason? Had she been truly convinced of her role, of the importance of her silence, and trying to achieve something meaningful, this sacrifice could’ve been somewhat “understandable”, plot-wise; the way she still behaved at that point (some 60-65% in…), it just made for cruel and unneeded scene.

As another example, one of the characters, at some point, tries to communicate with her in creative ways, pointing at words in a book, and she does… nothing? There was no mention anywhere of people being unable to read, and she can read the warnings on her cuff well enough, so, I don’t know, perhaps pointing at specific words and letting the other character do the math would’ve helped her communicate, and been the smart thing to do. Because the deep issue here is that she doesn’t communicate. At all. She can afford a few shrugs, but conveying everything through just that and glances is, in general, quite difficult, and this leads to exactly the kind of plot twist I mentioned above, because she can only make other people follow her while racking their brains to try and understand what exactly she’s trying to do.

And so, Speth keeps making one poor decision after the other. And when she finally wakes up, there’s been so much destruction in her wake that it’s difficult to suddenly empathise with her.

(Interestingly enough, throughout the whole story, sign language is never mentioned. Are there no hard-hearing/deaf people in this world? Was it banned, as subsversive communication method? Or is it charged, like nodding one’s head. This would’ve made for a formidable loophole.)

As far as characters go, at least I did enjoy the three Product Placers. Although they weren’t too developed, they and their missions were interesting and fun to read about.

Conclusion: Interesting setting, stupid main character. I do have an ARC of the second book, though, so I’ll still give it a chance.

Yzabel / April 21, 2018

Review: Zombie Abbey

Zombie Abbey by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

My rating: [rating=3]

Blurb:

And the three teenage Clarke sisters thought what they’d wear to dinner was their biggest problem…

Lady Kate, the entitled eldest.
Lady Grace, lost in the middle and wishing she were braver.
Lady Lizzy, so endlessly sunny, it’s easy to underestimate her.

Then there’s Will Harvey, the proud, to-die-for—and possibly die with!—stable boy; Daniel Murray, the resourceful second footman with a secret; Raymond Allen, the unfortunate-looking young duke; and Fanny Rogers, the unsinkable kitchen maid.

Upstairs! Downstairs! Toss in some farmers and villagers!

None of them ever expected to work together for any reason.

But none of them had ever seen anything like this.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through Netgalley. ]

A story with Austen undertones… and zombies. (I’ve seen it compared to ‘Pride and Prejudice and Zombies’, but not having read that one, I honestly can’t tell.)
At Porthampton Abbey, a couple of years after World War I, the Clarke family has to contend with the problem of the entail, just like in ‘Pride and Prejudice’—meaning that if one of the daughters (preferably the elder, Kate) doesn’t marry very soon and has a male heir, their family will lose their estate after the death of Earl Clarke. Which is why the latter has invited a couple of potential suitors to stay for the weekend, including an older businessman from London, a duke, and a recently discovered cousin who’s very likely to inherit anyway, considering he’s the only male heir (but here’s to hope he’ll marry Kate, and all will be well in the world). And the story would go its posh, merry way, if not for the strange death of a villager, found half-devoured… A villager whom his widow has to kill a second time with a bullet to the head.

The beginning of this story definitely has its appeal: the Clarkes display a comical mix of common sense (Kate when it comes to hunting, for instance) and quirky, whimsical inability to grasp that other people are not only their servants, they’re, well, human beings with their own lives, too. This was a conflict in itself in the book, with the ‘Upstairs’ people having to realise that they have to pay more attention to the ‘Downstairs’ people. The build-up to the part where zombies actually make an appearance was a little slow, but in itself, it didn’t bother me, because discovering the characters (and rolling my eyes while trying to guess who’d kick the bucket) was quite fun. Granted, some of the characters weren’t very likeable; the earl felt too silly, Kate too insensitive… but on the other hand, I liked where Lizzy and Grace started and how they progressed—Lizzy as the girl whom everyone thinks stupid, yet who turns out to be level-headed when things become dangerous, and Grace being likely the most humane person in her family. The suitors, too, looked rather bland at first, however a couple of them started developing more of a (pleasant) personality. And I quite liked Fanny as well, the quiet-at-first but assertive maid who refuses to let ‘propriety’ walk all over charity.

After a while, though, the style became a little repetitive. The way the various characters’ point of views were introduced at the beginning of each chapter or sub-chapter, for some reason, tended to grate on my nerves, I’m not exactly sure why; and while I don’t have issues with casts of more than 2-3 POV characters, here the focus regularly went back to some action already shown in a previous chapter, but this time from another character’s point of view, which felts redundant.

I also thought that while there -were- zombies, I’d have liked seeing a little more of them. There was tension, but I never felt the story was really scary (for me and for the characters both), and the moments when a character got hurt was usually due to their being too stupid to live and doing something that no one in their sane mind should’ve done anyway.

Finally, I’m not satisfied with the ending: I don’t know it there’ll be a sequel or not, but if it’s meant to be a standalone, then it leaves way too many things open.

Conclusion: 2.5 /3 stars. I’m curious about how the situation at Porthampton Abbey will unfold, and if there were a sequel, that’d be good, because it’d mean the characters could finish growing, too.

Yzabel / January 26, 2018

Review: Paper Ghosts

Paper Ghosts: A Novel of Suspense by Julia Heaberlin

My rating: [rating=1]

Blurb:

An obsessive young woman has been waiting half her life—since she was twelve years old—for this moment. She has planned. Researched. Trained. Imagined every scenario. Now she is almost certain the man who kidnapped and murdered her sister sits in the passenger seat beside her.

Carl Louis Feldman is a documentary photographer. The young woman claims to be his long-lost daughter. He doesn’t believe her. He claims no memory of murdering girls across Texas, in a string of places where he shot eerie pictures. She doesn’t believe him.

Determined to find the truth, she lures him out of a halfway house and proposes a dangerous idea: a ten-day road trip, just the two of them, to examine cold cases linked to his haunting photographs.

Is he a liar or a broken old man? Is he a pathological con artist? Or is she?

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through NetGalley.]

I had liked ‘Black-Eyed Susans’ by the same author well enough, and I thought I’d like this one as well, but unfortunately, it wasn’t the case. As evidenced by the time I needed to finish it, that wasn’t because I had too much work and no time to read, but because it kept falling from my hands and I’d reach something else to reach instead.

It started well enough, and I thought that the story would be a game of cat and mouse between the main character and the suspected killer. However, while I kept waiting for said character to reveal her hand—for instance, to show that she had made this or that mistake on purpose, in order to better turn the tables—such moments never happened. I think this is where it went wrong for me, and I believe the first-person narration wasn’t an asset in this case: with a third person POV, I could’ve been fooled into thinking the ‘heroine’ knew what she was doing, since I wouldn’t have been completely ‘in her head; but with first person, it’s more difficult to fool the reader…

So, well, I wasn’t fooled. In spite of all her alluding to her ‘trainer’ and to how she had taught herself to face various difficult situations, she wasn’t really one step ahead. Perhaps in the very beginning, but this fell down the train as soon as Carl started coming up with new ‘conditions’ along the way, and she was totally taken aback, and… just relented, or protested weakly. That didn’t fit my idea of someone who had planned carefully, or whose plans were unravelling but who still had the savvy to bounce back.

Also, I wasn’t convinced at all by the twist at the end. Something you can’t see coming because there was never any hint of it throughout the story, is not what I call an actual twist, but cheating the reader. (Now, when I read something and I’m all ‘a-ha! So that’s why she did this in chapter2, and said that in chapter 6, and that character did that in chapter 14’, well, that’s a proper twist.)

Conclusion: 1.5 stars. Too bad.

Yzabel / November 14, 2017

Review: The Library of Light and Shadow

The Library of Light and Shadow by M.J. Rose

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

In the wake of a dark and brutal World War, the glitz and glamour of 1925 Manhattan shine like a beacon for the high society set, desperate to keep their gaze firmly fixed to the future. But Delphine Duplessi sees more than most. At a time in her career when she could easily be unknown and penniless, like so many of her classmates from L’École des Beaux Arts, in America she has gained notoriety for her stunning “shadow portraits” that frequently expose her subjects’ most scandalous secrets. Most nights Delphine doesn’t mind that her gift has become mere entertainment—a party trick—for the fashionable crowd.

Then, on a snowy night in February, in a penthouse high above Fifth Avenue, Delphine’s mystical talent leads to a tragedy between two brothers. Devastated and disconsolate, Delphine renounces her gift and returns to her old life in the south of France where Picasso, Matisse, and the Fitzgeralds are summering. There, Delphine is thrust into recapturing the past. First by her charismatic twin brother and business manager Sebastian who attempts to cajole her back to work and into co-dependence, then by the world famous opera singer Emma Calvé, who is obsessed with the writings of the fourteenth-century alchemist Nicolas Flamel. And finally by her ex-lover Mathieu, who is determined to lure her back into his arms, unaware of the danger that led Delphine to flee Paris for New York five years before.

Trapped in an ancient chateau where hidden knowledge lurks in the shadows, Delphine questions everything and everyone she loves the most—her art, her magick, her family, and Mathieu—in an effort to accept them as the gifts they are. Only there can she shed her fear of loving and living with her eyes wide open.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through NetGalley.]

When I requested this novel, I hadn’t realised it was the third instalment in a series; however, it turned out you can read it even without having read the previous ones, since the narrator does summarise well enough what her family is about, and that’s what you mostly need to know as far as background is concerned.

I liked the premise—Delphine’s gift and how it can turn out badly, the family with witchcraft gifts… I also liked how most characters felt like they had a life of their own: they definitely weren’t just plot devices, but had relationships, past experiences (sometimes together, sometimes not), and generally breathed and lived.

A lot of descriptions, too, were vivid, and allowed me to picture the places and scenes quite clearly. I’m definitely not sure about all of the fine details, though (avenue Franklin D. Roosevelt in Paris in 1920… uhm, it was avenue Victor-Emmanuel III, but even without knowing that it doesn’t make sense), so I advise not getting into that with a historian’s mind. Unless those were corrected in the final copy, that is. Anyway, the prose does have its charm, and whether New York, Paris or Southern France in the mid-twentied, it conjures the needed images easily.

I had more trouble with the pacing. For a good half, Delphine doesn’t do that much, to be honest, apart from being depressed because of her gift (which she probably wouldn’t have been if she hadn’t been such a doormat to her brother) and remembering her love story. I don’t know about the format it was told in (a diary), background info was needed here, yet on the other hand, it felt disjointed from the story. Moreover, while in terms of relationships the characters had a life, indeed, their actions and decisions were at times… silly. I could guess the turns and twists, and seriously, Delphine, that vision you had, that made you run away to the other side of the world… it was so obviously opened to many interpretations that it being a misunderstanding was a given here.

The story picked up after the characters arrived at the castle, but at that point I wasn’t ‘in’ it anymore.

Still, I may try the first book, because the parents’ story could be interesting (there’s a duel and a bargain with the spirit of a dead witch, apparently?).

Yzabel / July 13, 2017

Review: Bright Smoke, Cold Fire

Bright Smoke, Cold Fire by Rosamund Hodge

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

When the mysterious fog of the Ruining crept over the world, the living died and the dead rose. Only the walled city of Viyara was left untouched.

The heirs of the city’s most powerful—and warring—families, Mahyanai Romeo and Juliet Catresou share a love deeper than duty, honor, even life itself. But the magic laid on Juliet at birth compels her to punish the enemies of her clan—and Romeo has just killed her cousin Tybalt. Which means he must die.

Paris Catresou has always wanted to serve his family by guarding Juliet. But when his ward tries to escape her fate, magic goes terribly wrong—killing her and leaving Paris bound to Romeo. If he wants to discover the truth of what happened, Paris must delve deep into the city, ally with his worst enemy . . . and perhaps turn against his own clan.

Mahyanai Runajo just wants to protect her city—but she’s the only one who believes it’s in peril. In her desperate hunt for information, she accidentally pulls Juliet from the mouth of death—and finds herself bound to the bitter, angry girl. Runajo quickly discovers Juliet might be the one person who can help her recover the secret to saving Viyara.

Both pairs will find friendship where they least expect it. Both will find that Viyara holds more secrets and dangers than anyone ever expected. And outside the walls, death is waiting…

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through Edelweiss.]

Hmm, not sure about this one. It’s a retelling of ‘Romeo & Juliet’, in a city that is the last one standing while the rest of the world has been invaded by ‘zombies’, where three families share the power, and where the religious order of the Sisters of Thorn has to perform yearly blood sacrifices in order to keep the undead at bay. It has a mysterious plague that makes people rise again after their death if precautions aren’t taken, and in that city, ‘the Juliet’ is actually a warrior bred from birth through magic rituals, with the ability to sense if someone has shed her family’s blood, and the compulsion to avenge said family member in turn (in other words, she still does a few other things than feigning death, thinking Romeo is dead, and promptly killing herself in turn). Also, she’s doomed to turn mad at some point

All in all, why not? This was interesting. The story itself, though, was kind of confusing, and although it did end up making sense, there were quite a few things I would’ve seen developed more in depth. Such as the Night Games, or the Necromancer (who kind of turned up at the awkward moment), or the Romeo/Paris/Vai trio relationship.

I’m not sure about the characters. I sort of liked the Juliet? Because she had that idea that ‘I’m already dead, and Romeo is dead, so I don’t care about dying because it means I can see him again’, yet at the same time she was quite lively and determined and not actively trying to take her own life while moping; her story is also rather sad (stripped of her name/real identity in a family whose beliefs in the afterlife involve having a name in order to be saved… nice). Romeo, though, was kind of stupid, and Paris way too naive; of the power trio there, the one I definitely liked was Vai (with a twist that was a bit predictable, but eh, he was fun to read about, and I totally agreed with the way he envisioned problems and how to tackle them!). As for Runajo… I don’t know. Determined, too, yet there were several moments when I thought her decisions should have her get killed or cast out or something, and she wasn’t because Plot Device.

(And very, very minor thing that probably only peeved me because I’m French, but… ‘Catresou’ sounds just so damn weird. I kept reading and ‘hearing’ that name as a French name, which sounds exactly like ‘quatre sous’—that’s like ‘four pence’—aaaand… Yep, so bizarre.)

Conclusion: 2.5 stars. To be fair, I liked the world depicted here in general, and that this retelling is sufficiently removed from R & J as to stand by itself; however, it was probably too ambitious for one volume, and ended up confusing.

Yzabel / October 6, 2016

Review: Eight Rivers of Shadow

Eight Rivers of Shadow by Leo Hunt

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

Luke Manchett used to be one of the most popular boys at school.
That was before his necromancer father died and left him a host of vengeful ghosts that wanted him dead.
Now everyone thinks he’s a freak.
To make matters worse, the mysterious new girl at school is actually the daughter of his father’s deadliest enemy…
And she’s out for revenge.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.]

Alas, I didn’t enjoy this second instalment as much as I did the first. It lacked the character dynamics, the spark I had felt at the beginning of this series.

I think the main reason is the way Luke and Elza are rather isolated from the others throughout the novel, even from their parents (who apparently don’t even care what their kids do?). Elza’s family pops in on one page only, Luke’s mother is faring better health-wise but still not very present, Luke’s former friends don’t talk to him anymore… So mostly it revolved around two, maximum three people at a time, and in turn, it shed light on the fact those characters weren’t that much developed. It would have been a great opportunity to do so, and it wasn’t used as such, and I found this too bad.

Another annoying thing was the magic itself: here, too, this book provided huge opportunities of developing it, more specifically of showing Luke growing into it and learning more. However, for the most part, he either didn’t want anything to do with it, or bumbled from one mistake to the other (when he was warned about what mistakes not to make!) while more savvy characters saved the day. Not unexpected, sure, but frustrating no matter what. Or perhaps it is my bias towards necromancy speaking?

On the other hand, the novel shows an actual foray into the land of the dead, which is definitely not unexpected where magic of the necromancy type is concerned! This catabasis was very welcome as far as I’m concerned. And ghosts fighting each other. That’s cool. (I would really have wanted to know more about the Widow!)

Also present in this second book: themes that make you think and difficult choices to make, especially when it comes to helping your loved ones vs. the sacrifices you may have to make. Again, this is about necromancy, not kittens and giggles, right?

Conclusion: Still interesting, only I didn’t feel invested much in the characters, and Luke disappointed me both with his magic and with his borderline stupid decisions.

Yzabel / May 23, 2016

Review: The Sign of One

The Sign Of One by Eugene Lambert

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

ONE FOR SORROW, TWO MEANS DEATH.

In the Barrenlands of Wrath, no one dies of old age. Kyle is used to its harsh laws, but the cold-blooded separation of identical twins and execution of the ‘evil twists’ at the Annual Peace Fair shocks him.

When Kyle himself is betrayed, he flees for his life with the reluctant help of Sky, a rebel pilot with a hidden agenda. As the hunt intensifies, Kyle soon realises that he is no ordinary runaway, although he has no idea why. Fighting to learn the hideous truth, their reluctant, conflicted partnership will either save them – or kill them.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.]

2.5 stars. I’m not exactly sure how to rate this novel, because it was entertaining… but nothing I’ve never seen before. I guess I’ve just read too many “dystopian YA” novels to be easily awed?

Good things:
* There’s a romantice arc, but it’s far from being the main focus. The characters don’t act like dumbstruck hormone-governed bodies who’ll place a kiss above the fate of the world.

* The sci-fi background. It could’ve been more developed, sure; however, the “cuckoo” theory was interesting.

* For once the “pocket world” aspect is logical! It’s a dump colony, so it totally makes sense that settlements are gathered in a limited space, and not spread all over the planet. It’s not an entire world that had thousand of years to evolve, and would therefore make me wonder “well what the hell is the rest of this world doing, ignoring what’s happening here?”

* The pacing is fairly even, as in, with a good amount of action vs. quieter moments. Life starts normal, then something happens, then there’s a moment of quiet, then crap hits the fan again… I was never bored reading this story.

Things that didn’t thrill me:

* The world-building: good ideas at its basis, but not really developed later. Although the “normal twin / superhuman twin” idea was nice, I’d have liked to know more about how this all came to be, and how it came one twin developed differently (they’re identical twins, genetically-speaking, so what made the difference, or rather, how is this supposed to be explained?). Or the colonisationg itself: is it a bona fide (small) planet, and what happened to the previous civilisation(s), if any?

* The story is nothing original: tyrant oppressing the masses with the help of his “state police” (the Slayers), executions, a group of rebels fighting against the oppressor… There wasn’t anything out of the ordinary when it came to the Saviour’s government.

* Kyle has his whining moments, as well as his TSTL moments. I mean, come on. When you discover that you’re not supposed to be here, and that about everyone will betray you, it doesn’t take a genius to understand what you SHOULD NOT do. Running to do it is… head, meet desk.

* The aforementioned romance: why not… but also why. It feels like it’s mandatory these days. Here, the story could’ve gone its merry way juste as well without it.

Conclusion: Not a “bad” novel, and I honestly think that, a few years ago, I’d have rated it higher. It was mildly entertaining. It just wasn’t more than that for me.

Yzabel / March 3, 2016

Review: The Painted Ocean

The Painted Ocean by Gabriel Packard

My rating: [rating=1]

Blurb:

When I was a little girl, my dad left me and my mum, and he never came back. And you’re supposed to be gutted when that happens. But secretly I preferred it without him, cos it meant I had my mum completely to myself, without having to share her with anyone. And I sort of inherited all the affection she used to give to my dad – like he’d left it behind for me as a gift, to say sorry for deserting me

So says eleven year old Shruti of her broken home in suburban middle England. But hopes of her mother’s affection are in vain: speaking little English, and fluent in only Hindi and Punjabi, Shruti’s mother is lost, and soon falls prey to family pressure to remarry. To find another husband means returning to India and leaving Shruti behind.

Meanwhile at school a new arrival, the indomitable Meena, dispenses with Shruti’s bullying problems and transforms her day to day life. Desperate for companionship Shruti latches on to Meena to the point of obsession, following her through high school and on to university. But when Meena invites Shruti to join her on holiday in India, she has no idea how dangerous her obsession will turn out to be…

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.]

There were merits to this book, for what it denounced (oppression; rape; manipulative people who drown others in words the better to confuse them; humans demeaning other humans to the point of making them look like animals). Unfortunately, I thought the story overall was too implausible, and the characters not compelling enough for me to really care.

The first half of the novel was decent enough at first, depicting Shruti’s life in England as an 11-year old kid whose father was gone and whose mother was torn between her life with her daughter, and the family’s honour. This is made most blatant through the Uncle Aadesh character, who wants her to go back to India and marry another man, however the price would be to put Shruti in a foster family… and leaver her there. Terrorised by the prospect of being kept away from her mother, Shruti makes bad decision upon bad decision, managing to land herself in, well, a foster family.

And I guess this is where things started to go downhill, because for the whole story, Shruti struck me as a pushover and a not so smart person, which didn’t made her sympathetic nor made me root for her. Meena wasn’t better, mind you: her way of ending the bullying Shruti suffered was efficient but ruthless, and her idea to teach Aadesh a lesson was just mind-boggling (what sane 12-year old girl would come up with that? Why did Shruti not reflect upon that when she was grown-up?). It didn’t reflect so much the life of South-Asian people in the UK than make me wonder why I should care, and this was really too bad, because I wanted to care, and I wanted to read more about Shruti’s experiences… if only they hadn’t been so improbable and/or based on silly decisions on her part. I guess that’s obsession for you: it makes you dumb.

More than anything, what bothered me seriously was Shruti’s voice. It fitted her as a 11-year old girl, even though all the “cos” and “like” and “And I was this. And I was that. And then we did this. And then that happened.” quickly got on my nerves. However, it was definitely weird when she kept that voice as a 18/19-year old woman, and when she went through the traumatising experiences of the second half of the novel, it was… disturbing. Not in a good way: in a “see a child being raped” way. I don’t particularly like reading about that. Rape is terrible enough as it is.

Those same experiences were also too far on the bizarre end of the spectrum: flying to the other side of the world, getting embroiled in such situations, people treating others like slaves, manipulative games… All those kept piling up upon each other, to the point where my suspension of disbelief was all but suspended by a thread, which broke quickly soon after that. If it had been less unbelievable, and more subtle, it would definitely have had a strong impact; but there’s strong, and there’s overkill. I wanted to feel for Shruti, and ended up just wondering why she couldn’t see through anything, why she thought like a kid (using a stolen passport and thinking that’s a good idea? Well…), why anyone would make such decisions, really. The ending was interesting; it would’ve been better if it hadn’t been so rushed—I honestly couldn’t believe how Shruti managed to get where she did, in so few pages (considering how non-savvy she was, she should have died ten times over).

I may have appreciated the story if the bizarre setting had been peopled with characters I could enjoy reading about… but it wasn’t.

Yzabel / February 24, 2016

Review: It’s A Wonderful Death

It’s a Wonderful Death by Sarah J. Schmitt

My rating: [rating=2]

Blurb:

Seventeen-year-old RJ always gets what she wants. So when her soul is accidentally collected by a distracted Grim Reaper, somebody in the afterlife better figure out a way to send her back from the dead or heads will roll. But in her quest for mortality, she becomes a pawn in a power struggle between an overzealous archangel and Death Himself. The tribunal presents her with two options: she can remain in the lobby, where souls wait to be processed, until her original lifeline expires, or she can replay three moments in her life in an effort to make choices that will result in a future deemed worthy of being saved. It sounds like a no-brainer. She’ll take a walk down memory lane. How hard can changing her future be?

But with each changing moment, RJ’s life begins to unravel, until this self-proclaimed queen bee is a social pariah. She begins to wonder if walking among the living is worth it if she has to spend the next sixty years as an outcast. Too quickly, RJ finds herself back in limbo, her time on Earth once again up for debate.

RJ is a snarky, unapologetic, almost unredeemable, very real girl. Her story is funny and moving, and teens will easily connect with her plight. Prepare to meet the Grim Reaper, who’s cuter than you’d expect; Hawaiian shirt–wearing Death Himself; Saint Peter (who likes to play Cornhole); and Al, the handler for the three-headed hound that guards the gates of Hell. This cast of characters accompanies RJ through her time in the afterlife and will do their best to gently shove her in the right direction.

Review:

[I received a copy of this book through Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.]

Cute in some ways, although I really couldn’t get along with the main character, which is my main gripe with this novel: I get that RJ had to start with room to change in terms of personality and actions, since otherwise there wouldn’t have been such a fuss about whether she should be allowed to go back to living… but she was seriously annoying. What she considered witty and snarky comebacks were ridiculous and whiny, and I definitely won’t fault any of the other characters for calling her a spoiled princess. She came off as a brat, which made it very difficult to root for her and to want to see her unfair circumstances changed.

And they were unfair, so at least one could understand why she felt entitled to try and fight that “oh, I accidentally killed you instead of that other person I was meant to reap… Whoops, too bad, let’s move on, welcome to the afterlife, please get in line.” It’s just that after a while, my reactions were to roll my eyes at yet another iteration of RJ blabbing and putting her foot in her mouth when probably anybody and everybody else would have understood *now* was the time to shut up. Maybe it’s just me who can’t stand such characters. Or maybe she was just, well, more annoying than she was meant to be: befitting her personality, but still not something I’d like to read about for 200 pages. It didn’t help that so many people in the afterlife tended to view her as special, as deserving to see her case appealed—I couldn’t see why so many people would side with her. Her success would set a precedent, yet I can’t believe people in general would root for a self-entitled brat without having second thoughts about it. (Granted, some characters were in it for the power struggle and for cashing in favours: this at least felt logical.)

Fortunately, after RJ goes through her “trials”, she does become a more pleasant person to follow—not really because of her actions, in fact, but because her shark was more toned down and felt more “well-placed” than “bratty”.

Another problem, that I don’t know how to describe exactly: the changes she went through seemed drastic and a bit too much on the unbelievable side for me to buy them (from self-centered bully and special snowflake to nice girl who stands up for her friends and does good deeds). However, I think this has much more to do with RJ’s trials, which I felt were too short and handled too quickly. Basically the focus was much more on the “world of the afterlife”, on secondary characters like Cerberus’ handler, on the angel presiding over the tribunal and the antagonistic relationship between him and Death, and this left little room for RJ actually reliving some important moments of her past and figuring out what she had failed to do the first time. Had those been more in the spotlight, had there been more of such moments (or had these three just been longer, with more conundrums for RJ to tackle), it would’ve made her change more convincing. As they were, they ended up an afterthought, a sort of checkpoint, rather than the turning points the blurb made me expect them to be. The desired outcome was so obvious anyway…

Daniel and Madeline were nice characters, too, with Madeline casting a fresh breeze over them all: knowing she was going to die, and nevertheless choosing to live her life on her own terms, in joy and friendship (sorry, the “I’m terminally ill so I’m entitled to be an asshole” attitude doesn’t sit well with me either).

Overall the plot was sweet, though simplistic, with only a couple of twists that I could see coming, to be honest. Like a nicely wrapped gift box whose contents you’ve already guessed. It won’t be more to me than “it’s nice”. I didn’t like the book, I didn’t dislike it, and it’ll likely end up as one of those reads I’ll forget quickly.