Review: The Fault in Our Stars

Title: The Fault in Our Stars

Author: John Green
Release Date: January 10, 2012
Publisher:  Dutton
Cover Designer:  Rodrigo Corral
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Contemporary

Summary: Diagnosed with Stage IV thyroid cancer at 12, Hazel was prepared to die until, at 14, a medical miracle shrunk the tumours in her lungs...for now.
Two years post-miracle, sixteen-year-old Hazel is post-everything else, too; post-high school, post-friends and post-normalcy. And even though she could live for a long time (whatever that means), Hazel lives tethered to an oxygen tank, the tumours tenuously kept at bay with a constant chemical assault.
Enter Augustus Waters. A match made at cancer kid support group, Augustus is gorgeous, in remission, and shockingly to her, interested in Hazel. Being with Augustus is both an unexpected destination and a long-needed journey, pushing Hazel to re-examine how sickness and health, life and death, will define her and the legacy that everyone leaves behind.

Review:
The Fault in Our Stars lives up to the incredible hype.

It was lovely that the dedication was to Esther Earl, the Nerdfighter girl in whose memory the This Star Won't Go Out Foundation was founded. While little things like "my best friend was an author who didn't know I existed" can set you off, remember that this book is a work of fiction. Mr. Green has stated several times that Esther and Hazel are nothing alike.

Hazel has cancer, and Augustus had cancer, but this wasn't a "cancer book" as much as it was a book about teenagers with cancer. When it came to characters, the first thing I noticed was that the secondary characters weren't as developed as they were in the author's other novels. In Looking for Alaska, there was the whole gang. In Paper Towns, Q had Ben and Radar. But Hazel and Augustus created a little world that was only for the two of them. I rather liked Isaac, even thought the part he played in the story wasn't as important as I hoped.

There were times I wished that An Imperial Affliction, the book that Hazel and Augustus loved, was real so I could read it. The author, Peter Van Houten, never wrote anything else and lived isolated from the world in Amsterdam. Because they knew so little about him, Hazel and Augustus romanticized him as the great thinker of our time. But things changed. Eventually Hazel referred to Van Houten as "an author we used to like".

The Fault in Our Stars followed Mr. Green's style of being both funny and philosophical, sometimes simultaneously. Hazel and Augusts were humorous in their nerdy, adorable ways, but deeper things lied beneath. One of the recurring themes was death. How everything is a side effect of dying. How thousands die every day, but few are recognized, and why are they the ones to be recognized? How Anne Frank was built a museum and went down in history for being killed in the Holocaust, but the four Aron Franks were not.
Another theme was being a hero. Augustus was obsessed with the idea of a traditional hero. But we were shown that not all of us are going to win wars or save the world. We can be heroes in smaller ways, in the ways Augustus was a hero.

I was not expecting the turn of events. I knew someone was going to die, but I was wrong about who it was. For a while, I even thought the book would end mid-sentence in the style of An Imperial Affliction. As for how it really did end, let's just say that if you care about Hazel or Augustus at all, you're in for emotional pain.

Everything you've heard about this book is true. The Fault in Our Stars is everything from heartbreaking to haunting.

★★★★½

Review: Don't Let Me Go

Title: Don't Let Me Go

Author: J. H. Trumble
Release Date: December 27, 2011
Publisher:  Kensington Publishing
Cover Designer:  Kristine Mills
Age Audience: YA

Genre: LGBT

Summary: Some people spend their whole lives looking for the right partner. Nate Schaper found his in high school. In the eight months since their cautious flirting became a real, heart-pounding, tell-the-parents relationship, Nate and Adam have been inseparable. Even when local kids take their homophobia to brutal levels, Nate is undaunted. He and Adam are rock solid. Two parts of a whole. Yin and yang.
But when Adam graduates and takes an off-Broadway job in New York—at Nate’s insistence—that certainty begins to flicker. Nate’s friends can’t keep his insecurities at bay, especially when he catches Skyped glimpses of Adam’s shirtless roommate. Nate starts a blog to vent his frustrations and becomes the center of a school controversy, drawing ire and support in equal amounts. But it’s the attention of a new boy who is looking for more than guidance that forces him to confront who and what he really wants.

Review:
Gay romance, music, theatre, and a Texas setting all in one book? What's not to love?

I'll confess, I had misgivings before reading because as a homosexual individual myself, I'm wary of LGBT books written by non-LGBT people. (How could they possibly understand, right?) But the author of Don't Let Me Go proved me wrong by showing just what it's like to be a gay teenager, and how it feels to have to fight to have what others take for granted.

One of the elements of this book I loved was the theatrical aspect. Adam had been acting since he was a child, and an off-Broadway job was the whole reason he went to New York in the first place. Even though I'm more of a techie, I smiled at all the mentions of rehearsals and cast parties.
Music played an important part in the story as well. It was something Nate and Adam fell in love over, and many important events took place at Mr. Ratcliffe's music store.

Another fun thing for me was that this book was set in the Houston area! It made it easier for me to see the descriptions in my head, because I knew what was being described. I nearly squealed the first time it mentioned Market Street.

I loved reading about how Nate and Adam's spark of romance grew into the love of a lifetime, then felt sad when it flashed forward to the state of their relationship with Adam in New York. They were very codependent, but I don't think that has to be a bad thing. However, they got more and more dysfunctional as the book went on, to the point where you wonder if they could ever go back to being what they once were.

I wasn't fond of the character Danial at first, but I grew to like his snarky, sarcastic personality, and felt sympathy when we learned the truth about his past.

This book wasn't afraid to show the ugly side of dealing with homophobia, for which I was thankful. I wish it weren't true, but people really are that ignorant, and their ignorance can turn into bigoted hate. It wouldn't have been realistic unless Nate and Adam had dealt with hate, even if not on a colossal scale.

Because of where the near end of the book was heading, I was worried that this would become one of those books with a good but sad ending that keeps me up for days. While the words "Ten Years Later" were a relief, this book will be on my mind for the weeks to come.

Bittersweet and honest, Don't Let Me Go is a terrific work of LGBT fiction. I'm looking forward to more from J. H. Trumble!

★★★★

Review: Girl in the Arena

Title: Girl in the Arena

Author: Lise Haines
Release Date: October 13, 2009
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Cover Designer: Danielle Delaney
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Sci-fi

Tagline: Daughter. Celebrity. Neo-gladiator.
Summary: Lyn is a neo-gladiator's daughter, through and through. Her mother has made a career out of marrying into the high-profile world of televised blood sport, and the rules of the Gladiator Sports Association are second nature to their family. Always lend ineffable confidence to the gladiator. Remind him constantly of his victories. And most importantly: Never leave the stadium when your father is dying. The rules help the family survive, but rules and the GSA can also turn against you. When a gifted young fighter kills Lyn's seventh father, he also captures Lyn's dowry bracelet, which means she must marry him...

Review:
Girl in the Arena had a lot of potential, but the execution was poor. I was expecting a lot better.

I wasn't a fan of the info-dump at the very beginning that went through the history of the neo-gladiator sport, starting in the 1960's. I would have preferred the information to be conveyed little by little as the story progressed.

One of the few things I did enjoy about this book was the concept of gladiators in modern times. People   part of what was known as "Glad culture" lived separated from other people, and often did not marry outsiders. These people were viewed as nearly cultish by some outsiders. What interested me the most was that the rules of the arena were nearly identical to those long ago. No one is forced to fight, but will sign contracts with Caesar's Inc. to fight for a certain number of years, or sometimes a criminal on the death row is sent to the arena. Just like in ancient Rome!
However, I did say almost. I doubt there were hundreds of bylaws confining the original gladiators, and as far as I know, women could remarry as many times as they wanted.

Despite all the information that was given, I don't understand how the sport become popular. Did millions of modern people suddenly find it acceptable? How did it become  lawful? I'm certain there's something in the Constitution against killing for sport. And if the sport was so popular, why did it remain in the U.S. rather than spreading to other countries?

Fighting was not even the main focus of the book. It was mostly about how rough it was for Lyn being a celebrity. There were only two or three battles in the entire book.
I didn't like Lyn at all. She wasn't a distinct character to me. Nothing about her stood out except that she was the daughter of seven gladiators. I also didn't buy the romance between her and Uber. How could you fall in love with the person who killed your father? I couldn't.

I wish the time period had been a little more clear. While there were things we don't have today, such as the Living machine, aside from the Gladiator Sports Association the world of Girl in the Arena was just like today's world. I assumed this book to be dystopian science fiction, but that threw me off.
Speaking of the Living machine, its existence made no sense. How did it work? How did the projections of people eat food? And how did such a machine fit in with the Roman-based culture of the neo-gladiators?

One of the formatting styles of this book annoyed me. Instead of quotation marks, dialogue was indicated by m dashes. I don't see why this was done, as it was unusual and confusing.

The ending was open enough to be followed by a sequel, but apparently this book didn't gain enough popularity for that to happen, and I can see why. On a final note, I very much dislike the cover. I find it more fitting for a TV show poster than a book cover. And the expression of the model seems more pouty than angry to me.

★★

Review: Speak

Title: Speak

Author: Laurie Halse Anderson
Release Date: October 22, 1999
Publisher: Puffin
Cover Designer: Michael Morgenstern
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Contemporary

Tagline: The tough, tender, and darkly funny story of a teenage outcast.
Summary: Melinda Sordino busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops, so her old friends won't talk to her, and people she doesn't know hate her from a distance. The safest place to be is alone, inside her own head. But even that's not safe. Because there's something she's trying not to think about, something about the night of the party that, if she let it in, would blow her carefully constructed disguise to smithereens. And then she would have to speak the truth.

My Review:

I certainly have mixed feelings.
Based on what I’ve been hearing ever since I started reading YA, I’d come to expect something amazing and true and relatable from Speak.
However, this was not the case for me.

One of the things I liked was the writing. It was very simplistic, yet beautiful in an ordinary and everyday sort of way. Because there weren’t definite chapters in the book, it was almost like reading Melinda’s thoughts and feelings in their purest form.

I think that high school was portrayed stereotypically and unrealistically. Yes, it’s not a blast, but it isn’t exactly the worst thing that’s ever going to happen to you. I don’t find it believable that Merryweather High changed their mascot several times in one year. My school has had the same mascot for 30 years, and it will probably keep it for another 30 years.
Maybe this only applies to my school, but I don’t think “cliques” exist. There are divisions of sorts (the athletes, the people in band, the theatre kids, etc.), but not so strong that you don’t associate with people outside your group. Also, not every cheerleader is a ditzy blonde princess. I know that this book was published in 1999, but really?

Thanks to the lovely people on Goodreads who don’t put spoiler warnings in their reviews, I knew the reason for Melinda’s silence long before I read this book. I’ve never had something like that happen to me, so maybe I’m being insensitive, but I think that Melinda really should have told someone. It would have saved her so much pain and loneliness. This is another reason this book would be better for people other than me, because what happened to Melinda is not something I can relate to.

Overall, I don’t have any strong feelings of like or dislike. Speak is a good book, it really is. It just wasn’t for me.

★★½

Review: The Fallen

Title: The Fallen
Series: The Fallen, #1

Author: Thomas E. Sniegoski
Release Date: March 5, 2003
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Cover Designer: N/A
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Paranormal

Tagline: Aaron Corbet isn't a bad kid—he's just a little different.
Summary: 

On the eve of his eighteenth birthday, Aaron dreams of a darkly violent landscape. He can hear the sounds of weapons clanging, the screams of the stricken, and another sound he cannot quite decipher. But gazing upward at the sky, he suddenly understands. It is the sound of great wings, angels' wings, beating the air unmercifully as hundreds of armored warriors descend on the battlefield.
Orphaned since birth, Aaron is suddenly discovering newfound—and sometimes supernatural—talents. But it's not until he is approached by two men that he learns the truth about his destiny, and his role as a liaison between angels, mortals, and Powers both good and evil, some of whom are hell-bent on his destruction....

My Review:
I wanted to like this book. I wanted to believe that Unearthly is not the only good YA angel book out there.
However, I was disappointed once again. I received the first two books in this series, The Fallen and Leviathan, in one volume. I had to make myself finish The Fallen.

The writing was very stiff and stand-offish. I could not connect with Aaron at all. When we’re given back-story about the angels, I almost felt like I was reading the Bible because of the way it was written.
I know this book came long before most of today’s popular YA angel books, but the angel lore hardly had anything original to offer. Aside from a prophecy and a group of evil angels called the Powers, it was almost verbatim to the angels of the Bible. Now, there’s nothing wrong with books based on Biblical legends, but I prefer those legends to be dark and twisted (a la Prophecy of the Sisters).

As for the romance? It was completely unnecessary and did not contribute anything to the plot. The Brazilian girl whose name I can’t even remember was such a flat character. I felt like the author thought he just had to have romance because of the silly train of thought that “all YA books need romance”. Hence, romance that was nothing more than filler content.

For lack of anything else positive to say, I enjoyed reading the few battle scenes in this book. But overall, I don’t regret donating my copy to the library. Reading time has become precious to me, and I’m not going to spend it continuing this series simply to see if it gets better.

★★

Review: Looking for Alaska

This review is going to contain spoilers. I always try to write spoiler-free reviews, but this time I couldn't. The spoilers will be marked, but read at your own risk.

Title: Looking for Alaska

Author: John Green
Release Date: March 3, 2005
Publisher: Dutton
Cover Designer: N/A
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Contemporary

Tagline: First friend. First girl. Last words.
Summary: Miles Halter is fascinated by famous last words and tired of his safe life at home. He leaves for boarding school to seek what the dying poet Francois Rabelais called the "Great Perhaps." Much awaits Miles at Culver Creek, including Alaska Young. Clever, funny, screwed-up, and dead sexy, Alaska will pull Miles into her labyrinth and catapult him into the Great Perhaps.

My Review:

Mr. John Green, once again you have impressed me.
Well, it's not really "again" because this was his debut, but it is for me because this is his second novel I've read.

Culver Creek was nothing like I expected, and I mean that in a good way. When I think of a boarding school, I usually picture a grand old mansion in the northeast with a regal history and vintage furniture in every room. Instead, Culver Creek was in Birmingham, Alabama, and everything about it was southern. It was a very unique take.

I felt that the "before" section of the book dragged a little. There were many scenes showing Miles hanging out with Alaska and the Colonel and getting to know them. I just wanted to get on with the story.
But when the story did move on, I wasn't ready for it at all.

*spoilers* I already knew that Alaska was going to die because the summary on the publication page mentioned a "fatal car accident", but when it did happen I was not prepared. I actually cried for the first twenty pages of the "after" section, because I could really feel Miles' pain and grief as he tried to adjust to life without Alaska. *spoilers*

There were a few parts of the book that weren't huge aspects, but I couldn't stop thinking about them. For example, Alaska's theory that imagining the future is a kind of nostalgia. I never would have thought of it, but now I realize how true it is. And if that wasn't enough:

"If people were rain, I was drizzle and she was a hurricane."

That, ladies and gentlemen, is perfection. One of the best sentences I've ever read.

I also have something very important to point out. I've seen more than a few reviews on Goodreads stating "all of John Green's novels are basically the same story told over and over again". This is not true.
I have read Paper Towns, and it was uniquely different from Looking for Alaska. The plots of the two books contrasted, as did the characters. Yes, Miles and Quentin have some similar personality traits, but not enough to dub them "the same character". Alaska and Margo are like that as well: they have things in common, but are two different characters. I actually liked Alaska more than I liked Margo.

Even though there were one or two things I didn't like about this book, the things I did were so good that it's more than worthy of 4.5 stars. Looking for Alaska, you deserved every bit of your Printz Award.

★★★★½

Review: Elsewhere

Title: Elsewhere

Author: Gabrielle Zevin
Release Date: August 10, 2005
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Cover Designer: Nancy Goldenberg
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Magical realism

Tagline: Is it possible to grow up while getting younger?
Summary: Welcome to Elsewhere. It is warm with a breeze, and the beaches are marvelous. It’s quiet and peaceful. You can’t get sick or any older. Curious to see new paintings by Picasso? Swing by one of Elsewhere’s museums. Need to talk to someone about your problems? Stop by Marilyn Monroe’s psychiatric practice.

Elsewhere is where fifteen-year-old Liz Hall ends up after she has died. It is a place so like Earth, yet completely different. Here Liz will age backward from the day of her death until she becomes a baby again and returns to Earth. But Liz wants to turn sixteen, not fourteen again. She wants to get her driver’s license. She wants to graduate from high school and go to college. And now that she’s dead, Liz is being forced to live a life she doesn’t want with a grandmother she has only just met. And it is not going well.
How can Liz let go of the only life she has ever known and embrace a new one? Is it possible that a life lived in reverse is no different from a life lived forward?

My Review:
Reading this book was a little like talking to a close friend. You know them very well and you don’t do anything amazing, but you could talk forever and will never grow tired of their company.

I loved the concept. Just the idea of living your life backwards until you’re a baby again felt so exotic and intriguing. The world building was excellently done as well. Elsewhere was similar to Earth. People lived in houses and drove cars and had friends and family. Yet at the same time, it was too different to be mistaken for Earth. I’ll admit that I had misgivings when a new gallery of Picasso paintings is mentioned near the beginning of the book. I thought that Picasso would have already been born on Earth again! But after some research, I realized that Picasso still would have been in Elsewhere at the time of Liz’s death, and I praise Gabrielle Zevin for putting the effort into making every little detail accurate.

Elsewhere is written in third-person present tense. It was very different to read from the perspective in Gabrielle Zevin’s other novel I’ve read (All These Things I’ve Done was in first-person past tense), but I really liked it. A few times the point of view jumped from one character to another, but instead of being confusing it gave us better insight on what was going on.

I’m not a fan of talking animals stories, and I’m not much of a dog person. But I didn’t mind the fact that dogs could talk in this book. I especially liked the one chapter told from the point of view of Lucy, Liz’s pug on Earth. It was interesting to see the story interpreted by a dog, and it only took me a couple pages to realize that a human wasn’t the narrator.

If I could only use one sentence to describe Elsewhere, it would be this: It was such a good book. To me, just that simple statement sums it up. Even though you can tell how the book will end just by reading the synopsis, it was a fresh and pleasant story without any of that over-the-top romance I despise.

 ★★★★

Review: Unearthly

Title: Unearthly
Series: Unearthly, #1

Author: Cynthia Hand
Release Date: January 4, 2011
Publisher: HarperTeen
Cover Designer: Sasha Illingworth
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Paranormal

Tagline: In the beginning, there's a boy standing in the trees....
Summary: Clara Gardner has recently learned that she's part angel. Having angel blood run through her veins not only makes her smarter, stronger, and faster than humans (a word, she realizes, that no longer applies to her), but it means she has a purpose, something she was put on this earth to do. Figuring out what that is, though, isn't easy.

Her visions of a raging forest fire and an alluring stranger lead her to a new school in a new town. When she meets Christian, who turns out to be the boy of her dreams (literally), everything seems to fall into place—and out of place at the same time. Because there's another guy, Tucker, who appeals to Clara's less angelic side.
As Clara tries to find her way in a world she no longer understands, she encounters unseen dangers and choices she never thought she'd have to make—between honesty and deceit, love and duty, good and evil. When the fire from her vision finally ignites, will Clara be ready to face her destiny?

My Review:
After the double disappointment of Hush, Hush and Halo, I came to the conclusion that there are no good YA angel books out there. After hearing about Unearthly, I wanted it to prove me wrong.
I’m so, so glad to say that it did.

Clara was such a good protagonist. She was a little selfish, but she knew it, so it didn’t make her unlikable at all. I liked how she already knew she was part angel, so there wasn’t a big part of the book dedicated to Clara finding out about her true identity. I liked all the side characters too. Clara’s mother was over a hundred years (though she didn’t look older than forty), and I was really glad to see that she was wise like someone who had been around for a long time and seen a lot, but didn’t act too old.

The angel lore was simple and clearly explained, which was a good thing! I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: you do not need to come up with a great big complicated magic system to have a good paranormal romance. Clara and her little brother were quarter angels, called Quartarius, and their mother was a half angel, Dimidius. All the part angels have a “purpose”, which is the task for which they were born to complete. They are also smarter, stronger and faster than humans, but that part is obvious.

As for the romance...I loved how it had so much buildup! Months pass, MONTHS, before Clara as much as kisses anyone. (I won’t say who!) It also meant that the story moved along a little slowly, but I would much rather have that than insta-love. Clara even says that she's "not going to become one of those girls whose boyfriend treats her like crap and she still fawns over him."
Dear Clara, how I wish every female protagonist in paranormal YA could say that.
Another thing I want to point out is that even though the summary makes it sound like there’s a love triangle, I wouldn’t really say that. I can’t explain why without giving away spoilers, but while there were two boys involved, I didn’t think of it as a love triangle.

Especially if you’ve also been disappointed by previous YA angel books, don’t hesitate to read Unearthly. It’s given me hope for future books of its sub-genre. I just wish I didn't have to wait until 2012 for Hallowed!

★★★½

Review: The Death Catchers

This is the review of an uncorrected advance copy. Changes may have been made in the final book. 

Title: The Death Catchers

Author: Jennifer Anne Kogler
Release Date: August 16, 2011
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Cover Designer: N/A
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Paranormal 

Summary: On her fourteenth Halloween, Lizzy Mortimer sees her first death-specter. 

Confused at first, Lizzy soon learns from her grandmother Bizzy that as Death Catchers, they must prevent fate from taking its course when an unjust death is planned-a mission that has been passed down from their ancestor, Morgan le Fay. Only, Lizzy doesn't expect one of her first cases to land her in the middle of a feud older than time between Morgan le Fay and her sister Vivienne le Mort. Vivienne hopes to hasten the end of the world by preventing Lizzy from saving King Arthur's last descendant-humanity's greatest hope for survival. It's up to Lizzy, as Morgan's earthly advocate, to outwit fate before it's too late.

My Review:
The first good thing I have to say about this book concerns the setting. Small towns are nearly a cliche in paranormal YA, but I think Crabapple stood out. Sitting on the edge of the gloomy Pacific, it was an eeire and quaint little town, almost a little European in some ways.

Even though Lizzy, the protagonist, admits that she's "not reading's biggest fan", there's a literary building block discussed at the beginning of each chapter, since the book is a letter Lizzy wrote to her English teacher explaining why she didn't turn in her paper. As a writer myself, I enjoyed this aspect of the book.

But, there were weaknesses too. The one that bothered me the most was in the mythology. It strayed so far from the Arthurian lore everyone knows. You could argue that there's no such thing as THE version of King Arthur's story because there has never been one accurate source, but I still felt like the author just used a few concepts to make up her own mythology that was only loosely based on Arthurian lore.

Another weak point was the lack of physical description. When it came to describing the town and other characters, it was good for the most part. But not in Lizzy's case. What color was her hair? Her eyes? Was she tall or short? Did she wear glasses? We never find out what she even looked like. I also thought it was unusual how close Lizzy was to her seventy-something grandmother. Of course it's normal for someone to talk to and spend time with their grandmother, but being with her more often than you did with your best friend? I didn't buy it. I have another criticism, but it's spoilery so I'll leave it out.

The romance was an upside—it was very realistic. Of course there was tension and kissing and things like that, but it was all more of a side element. Even after Lizzy starts "officially dating", she tells her best friend that "We're not in love." They were just two people trying to see if a romantic relationship would work for them.

To me, The Death Catchers had an equal amount of good and bad, but others who wouldn't be bothered by the things I mentioned might like it better. In any case, it gets bonus points for being a stand-alone and for not having the face of an angsty-looking teenage girl on the cover.

★★★

Review: Violet Eyes

Title: Violet Eyes
Series: Once Upon a Time

Author: Debbie Viguié
Release Date: February 23, 2010
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Cover Designer: Cara E. Petrus
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Fairy tales

Summary: When a storm brings the dashing Prince Richard to her family's farm, Violet falls in love at first sight. Richard also gives Violet his heart, but he knows his marriage is destined to be an affair of state, not of passion. For the king and queen have devised a contest to determine who will win their son's hand in marriage.

To be reunited with her prince, Violet must compete against princesses from across the land. It will take all of her wits—and a little help from an unexpected source—if Violet is to demonstrate the depth of her character and become Richard's bride.

My Review:
I’ll admit that “The Princess and the Pea” was never one of my favorite fairy tales. In fact, I always thought that the whole concept was rather silly. But I ended up enjoying Debbie Viguié’s retelling.

Very much unlike the original story, Violet is not a princess, but a lowly farmer’s daughter, and a country girl through and through. However, she is determined to marry Prince Richard, so she enters the competition along with dozens of princesses to compete in a series of challenges for the honor of marrying the prince. The challenges are ridiculous things, like telling which of two single threads is silk or cotton, or walking across a lawn barefoot to see how much the princesses’ delicate feet will bleed. As Violet makes friends and enemies, she discovers that there are real challenges hidden amongst the silly ones, and she must figure them out if she wants to marry Richard. This book wasn’t completely unlike the original tale, but all I’m going to say is that Richard can only marry a “true” princess.

Despite the short length of the book, I didn’t feel that it was lacking plotwise. I also liked to see how Violet interacted with her new friends, all of whom were were well-rounded characters considering they had so little time to develop. The challenges within the challenges were strategically placed, but I still figured out most of them right away.

There was one thing that stopped me from liking the book a lot more than I did. When I read in the summary that “Violet falls in love at first sight”, I really, really hoped that line would turn out to be misleading. But it didn’t. Richard takes refuge at Violet’s family’s farm for a few days after he becomes ill from getting caught in a thunderstorm, and by the time he leaves he and Violet are declaring “undying love” for each other! (And that’s not even the cheesiest thing Richard/Violet says to Violet/Richard.) I used to be more tolerable about this sort of thing, but my standards have risen. I cannot stand insta-love at all.

Aside from the disappointing romantic aspect, I liked this little book. It was pretty much mindless entertainment, nothing special, but a great quick read.

★★★

Review: Invincible Summer

Title: Invincible Summer
Author: Hannah Moskowitz
Release Date: April 19, 2011
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Cover Designer: Cara E. Petrus
Age Audience: YA
Genre: Contemporary
Tagline: Some girls are addictive.
Summary: Noah’s happier than I’ve seen him in months. So I’d be an awful brother to get in the way of that. It’s not like I have some relationship with Melinda. It was just a kiss. Am I going to ruin Noah’s happiness because of a kiss?
Across four sun-kissed, drama-drenched summers at his family’s beach house, Chase is falling in love, falling in lust, and trying to keep his life from falling apart.

My Review:
The first thing I want to say is to NOT judge this book by its cover. It’s a great cover, but it doesn’t fit the book at all. The girl in a bikini lying on the beach gives the impression of a fluffy summer romance, which this book most definitely was not.

I heard about the Camus quoting before I started reading the book, and I thought it would bother me. But it didn’t. In fact, I really liked it, and now I’m curious to read more of Camus’ work. This could just be a personal view, but I didn’t think it was unusual for the teens to quote Camus in everyday speech at all. I saw it as no more abnormal than the way my family always quotes TV shows and movies.

The writing was so real and honest. There was a lot of heavy swearing, but I liked that! Teens swear in real life, so it would be short of the truth to not have them swear in fiction. I was so compelled that I was up until 3 a.m. reading this book. And unlike most of the time, I wasn’t reading because I couldn't sleep. I couldn't sleep because I was reading.

In the beginning, when you’re reading about a barbecue the McGills are having with their beach house neighbors, the Hathaways, everything about the scene and setting gives off such a happy and content feeling you know it’s going to become something you’ll look back on with nostalgia later in the book. The dialogue between Chase and his siblings made me laugh out loud at times because they sounded like conversations I would have with my siblings—though my family is nowhere near as dysfuctional as the McGill’s.

I really don’t know what more I can say about this book. Invincible Summer was not completely a happy story, but it was a realistic, beautiful and intense one that needed to be told.

★★★★½

Review: We Hear the Dead

Title: We Hear the Dead

Author: Dianne K. Salerni
Release Date: May 1, 2010
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Cover Designer: Marci Senders
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Historical fiction

Tagline: Maggie Fox didn't mean to create a new religion...
Summary: It starts as a harmless prank...then one lie quickly grows into another. Soon Kate and Maggie Fox are swept into a dizzying flurry of national attention for their abilities to communicate with the dead. But living a lie is sometimes too much to handle, even if you have the best intentions.
Based on a true story, We Hear the Dead reveals how secrets and lies can sometimes lead you to what's real and what's right. And how sometimes talking with the dead is easier than talking with the people around you.

My Review:

Okay, admit it...how many of you glanced at the title and cover and thought this book was a paranormal romance set in the Victorian era? I know I did, at least until I read the summary. But this book was more interesting than anything supernatural would have been.

It was about Maggie and Kate Fox, the two girls who were responsible for the creation of spiritualism. However, they were frauds! It all started when they were children. Their niece Lizzie was visiting, and Maggie and Kate didn’t want her around. They made rapping sounds and talked to the “ghost” that was making them, just as a prank to scare Lizzie away. But it goes on for several nights, and their parents call the neighbors to come see, then the neighbors tell their friends, and before you know it, Maggie and Kate are hosting spirit circles. Only two people know that they’re frauds: Leah, their older sister (and Lizzie’s mother) who takes control of the deception as soon as she finds out, and Calvin, their close friends who helps them perform tricks such making the “spirits” play the piano or shake the table.

Now, I’m very, very picky when it comes to historical fiction about real people. If the facts aren’t accurate, I can’t take it. Luckily, We Hear the Dead was very historically accurate! Also, despite being 448 pages long, this book went by pretty fast. I often glance at the page number at random times while I’m reading, and in this case, I would be on page 100...then seemly a few moments later, I would be on page 146!

I guess you could say this book was told form alternating points of view, but it didn’t alternate very often. The sequence is about seven chapters from Maggie’s POV, then one from Kate’s (those numbers are not 100% accurate, but you know what I mean). I had absolutely no trouble distinguishing between the voices of the two girls, but I wish there had been more chapters from Kate’s POV.

Another thing I would have changed about this book was the fact that few side characters disappeared from the story when they were no longer needed. One of them was David, Maggie and Kate’s older brother. He was around a lot in the beginning of the book, but after Maggie, Kate, Leah and their mother moved from Hydesville, where the rapping began, to Rochester, he never appeared again, and was only mentioned once more. There was another character who "disappeared", but I can't say more than that without spoiling the book. I know that back in the 19th century people didn’t keep in touch much, but it still bothered me.

Entertaining and clever, We Hear the Dead was a well-written piece of historical fiction, even if there were a couple things I didn't like. The author has gotten me interested in the Fox sisters, and I’m definitely going to check out the list of sources and further reading she included in the back of the book.

★★★½

Review: Luna

Title: Luna
Author: Julie Anne Peters
Release Date: May 26, 2004
Publisher: Little, Brown
Cover Designer: Alyssa Morris
Age Audience: YA
Genre: LGBT
Tagline: N/A
Summary: From as early as she can remember, Regan O’Neill has known that her brother Liam was different. That he was, in fact, a girl. Transgender. Having a transgender brother has never been a problem for Regan—until now.
Liam (or Luna, as she prefers to be called by her chosen name) is about to transition. What does it mean, transitioning? Dressing like a girl? In public? Does Liam expect Regan to embrace this decision, to welcome his sex change?
She’s always kept her brother’s secret, always been his confidante, but now Regan’s acceptance and love will be put to the test.

My Review:
Luna is Julie Anne Peter’s most well-known book, and I’ve read so many glowing reviews. Because of that, I think I was expecting a groundbreaking novel of YA LGBT. But, that was not the case.

Even though it’s not told from her point of view, this book is the story of Luna, a girl who was born into the body of a boy named Liam. Liam has always known that he was really a girl, but he has to hide his true identity from everyone except Reagan, his sister. One day, Liam tells Reagan that Luna cannot be hidden anymore, and he starts what he refers to as his "transition".

Before I start criticizing, I want to say that this was a very, very good transgender awareness book. It’s so sad that what I’m about to say is true, but people are even more prejudiced and hateful toward transgenders than they are to homosexuals or bisexuals. You should absolutely read this book if you don’t know or understand much about transgender people.

There was the same simple, cherished writing in Luna as there was in Keeping You a Secret and Between Mom and Jo, so what really didn’t work for me was the characters. I could not connect or identify with Reagan at all. I also thought that Liam was very selfish! I know that he didn’t have an easy life, but he should have been more considerate of Reagan’s feelings. For example, in one part of the book Reagan promised to babysit for the neighbor’s, but also promised to go to a party with her new friend. So she asks Liam to babysit in her place. But when she returns from the party, Reagan finds that Liam had gone through the neighbor’s clothes and got caught! She looses her job because Liam “had no control” over Luna! In the beginning of the book I wished that it was told from Luna’s POV so that we could get inside the mind of a transgender teenager, but later on I was glad it wasn’t, because otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to fully see how Liam’s self-centered actions affected Reagan.

Another qualm I have is with one flashback scene that involves Liam as a toddler, playing in a kiddie pool on a summer afternoon. I suppose it was a necessary part of the book because it showed that Liam knew from a young age that he was really a girl. But in that scene, Peters crossed the fine, fine line between honest and vulgar.

While I was a little disappointed with Luna, overall it was an excellent awareness book, and just because of that I feel that it deserves to be a National Book Award Finalist.

★★★

Review: The Adoration of Jenna Fox

Title: The Adoration of Jenna Fox

Series: Jenna Fox Chronicles, #1

Author: Mary E. Pearson
Release Date: April 29, 2008
Publisher: Henry Holt
Cover Designer: Meredith Pratt
Age Audience: YA

Genre: Sci-fi

Tagline: Who is Jenna Fox?

Summary: Seventeen-year-old Jenna has been told that is her name.  She has just awoken from a year-long comma, and she's still recovering from the terrible accident that caused it. Her parents show her home movies of her life, her memories, but she has no recollection. Is she really the same girl she sees on the screen?
Little by little, Jenna begins to remember. But along with the memories come questions—questions no one wants to answer for her. What really happened after the accident?

My Review:
I discovered this book on one of my libraries’ blogs two years ago, way back when I first started reading YA. I don’t know why, but after reading the summary I came to the conclusion that this book was a contemporary amnesia-themed novel and didn’t consider reading it. But a few months ago, I was at the library and I saw it shelved in science fiction! That alone was reason enough to make me pick it up.

The Adoration of Jenna Fox was slow in places, because Jenna regained her memory and grew re-accustomed to the world slowly. But the slow pace allowed a lot of character study. Some parts of the book are written in very short sentences, there are whole pages in which each sentence is only three or four words long. I wasn’t bothered by it, because to me it wasn’t any different from reading a book in verse, but I’m pointing it out because it might bother some people.

I predicted the twist long before it was revealed, but knowing beforehand why the Fox family lived in California instead of Boston, why Jenna couldn’t eat, why no one would answer her questions, did not make me loose interest at all. The biotechnological aspect was fascinating, and it made sense from a scientific viewpoint. However, I wish that we could have learned more about the disasters. Fifteen years prior to the time the book takes place, a huge earthquake in Southern California killed tens of thousands of people. Then came an epidemic that wiped out a quarter of the earth’s population, and then six years of what was called the Second Great Depression. And that’s all we’re told. I wish those nearly-apocalyptic disasters had been explained better.

A few reviewers said they felt that the author was preaching from a pro-life stance. But, while medical ethics play a huge part in the story (things like “How far is too far?”), and Jenna makes a pro-life decision near the end, I wouldn’t say it was preachy at all. If Pearson even was trying to be an influence, she was very, very subtle about it. There were no undertones.

The end of the book was a glimpse into the future, two hundred and sixty years later. It was a good, conclusive ending, but I thought it was beak, and even a little...lonely. I can’t explain why without giving away spoilers, but the ending just gave off that kind of feeling.

While I wasn’t missing out on anything amazing, I really shouldn’t have waited two years to read this! The Adoration of Jenna Fox was a thought-provoking and very intriguing novel. Also, even though I’ve seen several people say that it’s “science fiction for people who don’t like science fiction”, I don’t think you’ll enjoy this book if you don’t like sci-fi. But, if you’re a hopeless sci-fi geek like yours truly, read this book.

★★★½

Review: How I Live Now

Title: How I Live Now
Author: Meg Rosoff
Release Date: August 5, 2004
Publisher: Wendy Lamb Books
Cover Designer: Nick Stearn
Age Audience: YA
Genre: War Fiction
Tagline: Every war has turning points, and every person too. 
Summary: Fifteen-year-old Daisy is sent from Manhattan to England to visit her aunt and cousins she’s never met: three boys near her age, and their little sister. Her aunt goes away on business soon after Daisy arrives. The next day bombs go off as London is attacked and occupied by an unnamed enemy.
As power fails, and systems fail, the farm becomes more isolated. Despite the war, it’s a kind of Eden, with no adults in charge and no rules, a place where Daisy’s uncanny bond with her cousins grows into something rare and extraordinary.
But the war is everywhere, and Daisy and her cousins must lead each other into a world that is unknown in the scariest, most elemental way.

My Review:
Based on the reviews I read before reading this book, I didn’t come to expect much of a story, and checked this book out from the library out of curiosity. But it was actually very good.

The characters were all likable and three-dimensional. Daisy’s cousins seemed like real people to me. I really liked Daisy too. Her voice had a perfect blend of wit, sarcasm and selfishness for a teenage girl who has to move across the ocean and live with unknown cousins to get away from her sort-of-evil stepmother. Daisy did have anorexia, but unlike some reviews state, it wasn’t one of the central focuses of the story.

The part of the story in which Daisy and her cousins live on their farm without adults or rules was a lot shorter than I expected. Daisy and Piper, her youngest cousin, get sent to live with an army wife, and then later they end up living in a barn which was being used as an army barracks. This was my favorite part of the book, because it was where it really became a survival story. Daisy was constantly planning to escape back to the farm. At the risk of sounding spoilery, it gets VERY intriguing.

I think that Daisy and Edmond’s relationship was a little rushed. Even though it’s a while before Daisy starts to think of Edmond in a romantic way, they start having sex only about a week after their first kiss. I also thought it was a little weird was that Daisy’s other cousins were completely fine with her and Edmond’s relationship. I know that there are several countries today that allow courtship and marriage between first cousins, but I don’t think the UK, where this story took place, is one of them. Shouldn’t their relationship have been viewed as at least somewhat unusual to the people who knew about it?
But wait, it gets weirder. I myself did not have any issues with their relationship. There was not one point in the book where I thought that Daisy and Edmond should not be together. Like I said before, there are a lot of countries in which it’s legal, and while the offspring of first cousins is likely to be physically or mentally impaired, there’s not as big of a risk as most people think. I also read a lot of historical fiction, and in the past cousin marriage was the norm. I could go on about this for hours, but I’m moving on.

One thing I’d like to point out is that even though people on Goodreads have shelved this book as sci-fi, it wasn’t very sci-fi-y. You could say the war was like an apocalypse, but it wasn’t, really. Honestly, I don’t know what genre this book is! Because my organized mind would go crazy if I didn’t label it, I settled for “War Fiction”. Even though that’s probably not a real genre.

Overall, this was a sweet, weird and multi-layered little book. It’s not something that I’d recommend to strangers, but if you’re not squeamish about first-cousin relationships, I think you’re going to like it.

★★★

Review: Between the Sea and Sky

This is the review of an uncorrected advance copy. Changes may be made in the final book. The cover shown below may be changed or altered before the book's release.

Title: Between the Sea and Sky
Author: Jaclyn Dolamore
Release Date: October 25, 2011
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Cover Designer: N/A
Age Audience: YA
Genre: Fantasy
Tagline: She comes from the sea; he comes from the sky. 
They'll fall in love somewhere in between. 
Summary: For as long as Esmerine can remember, she has longed to join her older sister, Dosinia, as a siren—the highest calling a mermaid can have. When Dosinia runs away to the mainland, Esmerine is sent to retrieve her.
Using magic to transform her tail into legs, she makes her way unsteadily to the capital city. There she comes upon a friend she hasn't seen since childhood—a dashing young man named Alandare, who belongs to a winged race of people.
As Esmerine and Alandare band together to search for Dosinia, they rekindle a friendship...and ignite the emotions for a love so great, it cannot be bound by sea, land, or air.

My Review:
Finally, a mermaid book that I can give a positive rating to! Do you know how happy this makes me? You probably haven’t realized this, since I haven’t liked any of the other mermaid book I’ve read, but mermaids have always been one of my favorite mythical creatures. I remember when I was 9 or 10 I believed that a clan of mermaids lived in a nearby lake (true story).

I liked how the author paid good attention to mermaid mythology, you could see it in the way the mermaids lived and their social standings. At first, I picured the winged people as looking a bit like angels, but the imagery later on showed me that I was quite wrong. I also loved how Alan was not a “mysterious new stranger”. He and Esmerine had known each other for years, so their romance had a lot of buildup.

Near the end of the book, when Esmerine had to decide where her loyalties lay, I was worried that she would make the wrong choice—or that either choice would be wrong! But I loved how things turned out. I couldn’t have asked for a better ending.

And the best part? This wasn’t even a paranormal romance! Somehow I expected it to be, so I was pleasantly surprised when I found out it was a fantasy. Now, I like paranormal romance just as much as the next person, but I love fantasy.

Also, the author said that she liked to think of this book as a cross between a Jane Austen novel and a Studio Ghibli film. I never thought of it before, but now that I do, this book would make a perfect Studio Ghibli fim! I think I’m going to call Mr. Miyazaki right now and ask him to buy the movie rights

Delightful and imaginative, Between the Sea and Sky is a charming novel that fans of romance, mermaids and fantasy will love.

★★★½

Review: Where She Went

Title: Where She Went
Series: If I Stay, #2
Author: Gayle Forman
Release Date: April 5, 2011
Publisher: Dutton
Cover Designer: N/A
Age Audience: YA
Genre: Contemporary
Tagline: N/A
Summary: It's been three years since the devastating accident...three years since Mia walked out of Adam's life forever.
Now living on opposite coasts, Mia is Julliard's rising star and Adam is LA tabloid fodder, thanks to his new rock star status and celebrity girlfriend. When Adam gets stuck in New York by himself, chance brings the couple together again, for one last night. As they explore the city that has become Mia's home, Adam and Mia revisit the past and open their hearts to the future—and each other.
Told from Adam's point of view in the spare, lyrical prose that defined If I Stay, Where She Went explores the devastation of grief, the promise of new hope, and the flame of rekindled romance.

My Review:
I don’t know how Gayle Forman does it! She always comes up with such beautiful titles. “Where She Went”. Those three words sound like lyrics from a sad song, don’t they?

This book takes place three years after If I Stay. Like its predecessor, the actual book takes place over a very short time, a few days in this case, but there are many flashbacks. Except this time, we’re reading from Adam’s POV. I was happy to be reading about the characters that I came to love in If I Stay again (actually, one of them had changed so much that they weren't the character I knew and loved—but I'll get to that soon). When Adam first saw Mia again, I was so excited that it was almost like I was the one meeting my long-lost first love after three years apart!

However, I’m sorry to say that I didn’t like this book as much as the first one.
You see, one of the things I liked the most about If I Stay was that it wasn’t very emotional. But in Where She Went, Adam was no longer the sensitive, supporting boyfriend and all-around great guy that he was in If I Stay. He was an angsty, heart-broken rock star. Between his flashbacks of missing Mia and his accounts of how horrible life as a rock star is, there was so much emotional whining in this book. This is dislike is more of a personal thing than an actual problem with the book. I’m sure most people won’t mind that aspect, but I minded Adam’s melodrama very much.

I was very happy with the ending. At first Adam began saying things that made me worry, but it all turns out well in the end. I’m so glad that Mia and Adam’s suffering is over, and they can be happy now. I’m also glad that Mia helped Adam rediscover his love for music.

While I did like Where She Went, If I Stay was better. If you don’t mind lots of emotion and angst, you’ll probably like this book better than I did. But even if you do, you should still read this if you’ve read If I Stay and you want to see what happened next.

★★★

Review: Wither

Title: Wither
Series: The Chemical Garden trilogy, #1 
Author: Lauren DeStefano
Release Date: March 22, 2011
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Cover Designer: Lizzy Bromley
Age Audience: YA
Genre: Sci-fi
Tagline: What if you knew exactly when you would die?
Summary: Thanks to modern science, every human being has become a ticking genetic time bomb—males only live to age twenty-five, and females only live to age twenty. In this bleak landscape, young girls are kidnapped and forced into polygamous marriages to keep the population from dying out.
When sixteen-year-old Rhine Ellery is taken by the Gatherers to become a bride, she enters a world of wealth and privilege. Despite her husband Linden's genuine love for her, and a tenuous trust among her sister wives, Rhine has one purpose: to escape—to find her twin brother and go home.
But Rhine has more to contend with than losing her freedom. Linden's eccentric father is bent on finding an antidote to the genetic virus that is getting closer to taking his son, even if it means collecting corpses in order to test his experiments. With the help of Gabriel, a servant Rhine is growing dangerously attracted to, Rhine attempts to break free, in the limited time she has left.

My Review:

To be honest, I had HUGE expectations for this book. But for some reason, I put off reading for a long time. I don’t know why. But as soon as I started reading it, I was thinking things like, “WOW! Why haven’t I read this already?!?”

I was drawn from the first page, when the book opens with Rhine in the dark back of a van, captured by people called Gatherers who kidnap girls and sell them off as brides. Everything about this book was intriguing, from Rhine’s history to Housemaster Vaughn’s experiments to find an antidote for the virus. It got pretty creepy at times, but I thought it was a good kind of creepy.

I loved the relationships between the characters, especially between Rhine and her sister wives Cecily, Jenna and Rose. At first she doesn’t care about them at all, but she becomes friends with Rose, and later Jenna, and soon enough she thinks of them all as sisters. I found Cecily to be a little annoying in the beginning, but I warmed up to her as she matured. She was the youngest sister wife, and didn’t really know what was going on.
And then there was their husband, Linden. Rhine loathes him at first for taking her away from her home, but she almost starts to sympathize with him as she discovers that he is just as much of a prisoner as she is.

There’s one thing I want to point out, and it is that even though the summary makes it sound like there is a love triangle in this book, I wouldn’t say there was. Rhine becomes very good friends with the attendant Gabriel before she even starts to feel attracted to him, and she knows she doesn’t want to be like a true wife to Linden. Rhine wasn’t looking for a romantic relationship. Her purpose was to escape and go home to her brother Rowan.

The writing was very good. There were lovely descriptions, but they didn’t slow down the book and were not overly wordy. Come to think of it, Wither was actually quite slow-paced, but I wouldn’t have had it any other way. The slow pace let you take in the dystopian world better than you would have been able to if the book had been fast-paced.

This book easily could have gotten 5 stars from me, but here’s the reason it didn't: the scientific aspect didn’t make much sense. I know this is science fiction, but still. Why did the virus kill men and women at a different age? Unless there is a separate virus for each gender, it should kill them both at the same age. Also, the polar ice caps are huge! If they melted, not even North America would be saved from a watery grave.

Other than that one little criticism, I loved dark, suspenseful Wither. This is a book that I’m going to shove in all of my friend’s faces and say, “Hey! Have you read Wither? If you haven’t, READ IT. NOW.”

★★★★½

Review: Clarity

Title Clarity
Series: Clarity, #1
Author: Kim Harrington
Release Date: March 1, 2011
Publisher: Scholastic Press
Cover Designer: Danielle Delan
Age Audience: YA
Genre: Paranormal
Summary: Clarity "Clare" Fern sees things. Things no one else can see. Things like stolen kisses and long-buried secrets. All she has to do is touch a certain object, and the visions come to her. It's a gift. And a curse. When a teenage girl is found murdered, Clare's ex-boyfriend wants her to help solve the case—but Clare is still furious at the cheating jerk. Then Clare's brother—who has supernatural gifts of his own—becomes the prime suspect, and Clare can no longer look away. Teaming up with Gabriel, the smoldering son of the new detective, Clare must venture into the depths of fear, revenge, and lust in order to track the killer. But will her sight fail her just when she needs it most?

My Review:
First of all, I don’t like the cover. It’s misleading. It specifically says in the book that Clare is a red-head, but the cover model has blonde hair. Even if not for that, I’d still say it’s quite generic.

I really liked the paranormal aspect of this book. Instead of being something not human, Clare and her family were just humans with supernatural abilities. Clare was a great character too. She was strong and sarcastic, but not rebellious. I also liked how both male love interests were 100% human—at least as far as I know—and Clare was unsure about her feeling for both of them.

The mystery was great. I’m usually very good at predicting, which is why I don’t often read mysteries. But in Clarity, the plot kept twisting and turning. You think you know who did it, then the evidence points to someone else. Although I came very close, I didn’t even predict who the murderer was!

But this book was not without its flaws. Why was Clare labeled as a “freak” and had no friends, but Perry, who had supernatural abilities too, was popular? Why did Tiffany have to be such a stereotypical mean girl? Can’t we have a unique, layered female antagonist for once? And why did Clare’s mother agree to let her teenage daughter investigate a murder? I know she wasn’t entirely your typical parent, but she seemed too sheltering to allow that.

Overall, Clarity was a quick, fun paranormal mystery. It’s not the next groundbreaker of the YA market, but I liked it. I don’t think the story needs to be continued, but since there were some questions left unanswered, I’m going to read Perception when it comes out in 2012.

★★★

Review: Brother/Sister

This is the review of an uncorrected advance copy. Changes may be made in the final book.

Title: Brother/Sister
Author: Sean Olin
Release Date: June 9, 2011
Publisher: Razorbill
Cover Designer: N/A
Age Audience: YA
Genre: Contemporary
Summary: Will and Asheley have a troubled past. Their father left them when they were little, and their mother has just been carted off to an alcohol treatment center. Now, they have the house to themselves, and an endless California summer stretching out before them. Through alternating perspectives, they tell the story of how and why their lives spun violently out of control—right up to the impossibly shocking conclusion you'll have to read for yourself to believe.

My Review:

For some reason, when an ARC of this book was handed to me by the people at the Penguin booth at TLA, the first word that came into my mind was “incest”. I mean, doesn’t the title “Brother/Sister” sound at least a little suggestive? And the tagline was “Just give them a chance to explain…” That sounds quite suggestive too. But I wouldn’t say this book was incest-themed.

No, it was not incest-themed, but Will and Asheley did have a very close relationship. Maybe a little too close. At first, Will just seemed misunderstood to me. He got angry easily and was very antisocial, not wanting to be around anyone except Asheley. Considering that he and Asheley had had pretty rough lives, I didn’t blame him. But then…he just goes insane. Seriously insane. All rational thinking gone, just “Oh, that person pissed me off. I’m going to kill them!”

The book is told in alternating points of view. From what it seemed, Will and Asheley were telling their story to the police. At first I had trouble distinguishing their voices, but they became unique to me later on. Will is full of paranoia while Asheley is more innocent and trusting. As the book progresses, they start explaining the same events differently, so you start to wonder which one of them is right.

The summary clearly states that the ending was shocking. At first, I thought “Wait, there was no ending!” because the book ended mid-sentence. But then I re-read the last page a times, and I understood. Even now I haven’t quite absorbed the conclusion, because it means that everything I was led to believe earlier in the book was wrong.

While I was very intrigued, I can’t say I liked this book. Brother/Sister was not my cup of tea, but I still would recommend it to those who can handle the rough stuff. Also, I think that this book would be excellent if adapted into a made-for-TV crime movie.

★★