Die for Me

So I'm trying to get back into book blogging. We'll see how it goes.

In the City of Lights, two star-crossed lovers battle a fate that is destined to tear them apart again and again for eternity.

When Kate Mercier's parents die in a tragic car accident, she leaves her life--and memories--behind to live with her grandparents in Paris. For Kate, the only way to survive her pain is escaping into the world of books and Parisian art. Until she meets Vincent.

Mysterious, charming, and devastatingly handsome, Vincent threatens to melt the ice around Kate's guarded heart with just his smile. As she begins to fall in love with Vincent, Kate discovers that he's a revenant--an undead being whose fate forces him to sacrifice himself over and over again to save the lives of others. Vincent and those like him are bound in a centuries-old war against a group of evil revenants who exist only to murder and betray. Kate soon realizes that if she follows her heart, she may never be safe again.

To be honest, I only picked up this book because I was bored. I never expected to even remotely like it. I thought that it would be just like any other paranormal romance out there. In some aspects it was, but in some surpassed my expectations.

I think this was the first book in while that I read in which I liked both the main character and the romantic interest. Kate did turn on the waterworks a bit too much for my taste, but she wanted to take it slow with Vincent. She wasn't declaring her love for him after knowing him for two days, as is common in most YA paranormals these days. She also had to fight for his love, an aspect that's hardly ever shown.

Vincent was fine. I didn't really love him, but neither did I hate him. There were some parts of his character I didn't like, but overall he was fine. He actually seemed human: he had his flaws and such, and made mistakes. I could understand why Kate fell for him. Sure, I was really turned off by their first meeting and Kate's descriptions of him, but as they got to know each other, their relationship progressed beyond that, to a deeper level. He brought out the good qualities in Kate and helped her get over her parent's deaths.

In fact, there were really only two major problems I had with this book: Vincent's stalking Kate, and part of the mythology.

In books, there have been several cases where the romantic interest sees the MC, falls in love with her, and stalks her, all before they've even met. And the main character never really feels creeped out or whatever about it.  I know that if I found out that someone had been watching me like that, I would have been seriously put off.

Also, the fact that revenants are so starkly good and that their enemies are so starkly bad annoyed me. I like books where the good/bad sides aren't so clearly defined like that, where there's more gray instead of just black and white. This also made the villain a cardboard, cliched cutout. One of the reasons that the Mortal Instruments series is so good, for me at least, is that I could sympathize with Valentine. He was as real and fully developed as the rest of the characters. Here, it just wasn't there, and it weakened the book.

But other than the villain, the secondary characters were all as fleshed out and real and Kate and Vincent. I liked the fact that the whole book was more than just Kate and Vincent, it was also Kate and the rest of the revenants, Kate and her grandparents, Kate and her sister. She had healthy relationships with them, and those relationships didn't wither and die when Vincent was around.

This book was actually really good. I liked it more than I thought I would.

Shatter Me

Juliette hasn't touched anyone in exactly 264 days. 

The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette's touch is fatal. As long as she doesn't hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don't fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color. 

The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war-- and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she's exactly what they need right now. 

Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior. 

In this electrifying debut, Tahereh Mafi presents a world as riveting asThe Hunger Games and a superhero story as thrilling as The X-Men. Full of pulse-pounding romance, intoxicating villainy, and high-stakes choices, Shatter Me is a fresh and original dystopian novel—with a paranormal twist—that will leave readers anxiously awaiting its sequel. (from Goodreads)

So this isn't going to be an actual review. It's going to be mostly scrambled thoughts, because there were things I adored about this book, and yet there were things I couldn't stand. 

For one thing, at the end of the book, I felt that Juliette was getting a bit too Mary-Sueish. Not anything she did, really, but hearing about how pretty she was over and over again got kind of repetitive. We've already heard it enough - do we really have to hear any more about it?

 Beyond that, it was mostly Warner and Adam that annoyed me. Adam didn't really stand out in a good or bad way. He was just...there. But the ending left me with too many questions about him. They're probably going to be answered in the sequel, but I don't think that there should be that many questions about just one character. And then there was Warner. I actually liked him more than Adam, but, like with Adam, there were too many unanswered questions about him.

But on the flipside, I really liked the style this was written in. Short chapters, written almost like a journal - it was a great way to get into Juliette's thoughts. 

Juliette herself for the first 3/4 of the book wasn't bad, either. In fact, this book was shaping up to be one of my favorites. I liked how we could see her changes from an almost-insane person to a kickass girl. But then...

I can't exactly say what made this book fall flat for me, but there was definitely something. 

No rating. This book was too mixed-up for me. 

Revamping

I'm going to revamp 'The Magic in Writing' a bit. Book reviews and blogging have started to feel more like a job than something to do for fun. It's still going to have book reviews, but it's also going to have updates on my writing projects and random blog posts.

Bloodrose

The Ultimate Sacrifice.

Calla has always welcomed war. But now that the final battle is upon her, there’s more at stake than fighting. There’s saving Ren, even if it incurs Shay’s wrath. There’s keeping Ansel safe, even if he’s been branded a traitor. There’s proving herself as the pack’s alpha, facing unnamable horrors, and ridding the world of the Keepers’ magic once and for all. And then there’s deciding what to do when the war ends. If Calla makes it out alive, that is.

In the final installment of the Nightshade trilogy, New York Times bestselling author Andrea Cremer creates a novel with twists and turns that will keep you on the edge of your seat until its final pages. A dynamic end to this breathtaking trilogy. (from Goodreads)

I can't really write a proper review for this, but I'll leave you with this: All I'm going to say on this book is that it went totally opposite of how I wanted it to, but I think that the ending was the best one. Oh, and that this is the first time since The Sweet Far Thing that I have felt like crying after the book finished.

I am definitely going to read Cremer's future novels.

Torrent

When Gabi and Lia finally learn to surf the river of time, they realize they must make hard choices about life and love in the third and final book in the River of Time series. 

Gabi and Lia Betarrini have learned to control their time travel, and they return from medieval Italy to save their father from his tragic death in modern times. But love calls across the centuries, and the girls are determined to return forever—even though they know the Black Plague is advancing across Europe, claiming the lives of one-third of the population. In the suspenseful conclusion of the River of Time series, every decision is about life … and death. (from Goodreads)

If I heard Gabi call Marcello 'my man' one more time, I swear I was going to shred the book into confetti and use it at a party or throw the book across the room. And it's a library copy. (But it was kind of funny when Marcello was talking about 'his men,' meaning his knights. If you looked at it using the same meaning Gabi used, Marcello would be gay. If he was, that would have solved a lot of my problems with this book.)

So after two weeks of  being in ancient Italy stalking and staring at Marcello lustfully, the Big Moment comes. Gabi, of course, has decided that she's in wuv with Marcello Mr. Italian Hottie. But oh no. Not the casual hookup type. No. The OMG-I-want-to-marry-you-now type of love. (If you even consider that love, not lust.) -____- She's seventeen. Because, see, the medieval Italians married at seventeen, so Gabi should be able to marry then, too. 

*spoiler for first and second books* (highlight to view) And Gabi kept telling us how her father was soooooo overprotective and would grill any boy she brought home. Yet with one look at Marcello and a word from his wife, poof! he decides Marcello is okay. *end spoiler*

There was so much purple prose in this book about Marcello Gabi's one true love, it wasn't even funny. So many people complained that Halo by Alexandra Adornetto had purple prose, but this book was far worse. Far, far worse. 

And the plot was so predictable that it wasn't funny either. I was guessing every turn. And why couldn't Marcello just disappear forever?

When my second favorite character was killed off so Marcello could be with his true wuv, I couldn't stand it anymore. I stopped reading. 

There was a point in the book when I thought this book was actually good. But I underestimated the author's need for Marcello. 

After I accidentally saw the last line, I read the last chapter and gave up on the book. I have better things to do than read about pansies getting rescued by men drenched in purple prose for the entire freaking book. 

It's amazing how good the first book was and how things went all downhill from there. 

Note: The author says that she's considering a spinoff series about Lia and Luca. I might read them, even after the way these books turned out, because Luca is still my favorite character and I'd like to read more about him. 

Cascade

Mom touched my underdress—a gown made six hundred years before—and her eyes widened as she rubbed the raw silk between thumb and forefinger. She turned and touched Lia’s gown. “Where did you get these clothes?”

Gabi knows she’s left her heart in the fourteenth century and she persuades Lia to help her to return, even though they know doing so will risk their very lives. When they arrive, weeks have passed and all of Siena longs to celebrate the heroines who turned the tide in the battle against Florence—while the Florentines will go to great lengths to see them dead.

But Marcello patiently awaits, and Gabi must decide if she’s willing to leave her family behind for good in order to give her heart to him forever. (from Goodreads)

This book was slightly short of a letdown. The first book in this series, Waterfall, was great. I really enjoyed it. But there were so many things wrong with this book. 

So Waterfall took place in 1332. Yet three months later, when they return to Italy, it's 1342. How on Earth did no one catch that mistake? It was one of the first things that I noticed about this book. 

Secondly, this was the first book I've read in a while that I seriously considered the MCs to be Mary Sues. They could speak fluent medieval Italian, had perfect weaponry skills, had every man in sight hitting on them, oh, excuse me, every hot man, were constantly being called beautiful, and nothing really bad ever happened to them. Or if it did, one poof later and they were fine.

I also like heroines to be slightly kickass. They don't have to be Katniss or Katsa style, but they should be able to fight off whatever's pursuing them without always being saved by the guys. No. Just no. Whenever Gabi was in a scrape, Marcello would just show up and save her. 

I don't know if the publisher is a Christian publisher. It didn't say anything about it on the book. I'd have liked to know if it was, because the religious aspect of this book was just getting to be too much. At the beginning of Waterfall, Gabi was barely religious, didn't even know if she believed in God. By the end of book two, there wasn't a chapter that went by where there wasn't some sort of prayer or plea. I know that this is medieval Italy, but Gabi's a modern character. Her internal thoughts aren't medieval.

One of the biggest mistakes had to do with Gabi's mother (who, conviently, was just as Mary Sue-ish as her daughters). She had to get a docorate in anthropology as well as archaeology. I've been fairly interested in archaeology for a while now, and archaeology is a branch of anthropology. 

It seems the author needs to do a bit more research. 

This gets two stars because of the time travel and ancient Italy. Oh, and Luca. He's still my favorite character (not that there are many characters I still like).

Waterfall

What do you do when your knight in shining armor lives, literally, in a different world? 

Most American teenagers want a vacation in Italy, but the Betarrini sisters have spent every summer of their lives among the romantic hills with their archaelogist parents. Stuck among the rubble of the medieval castles in rural Tuscany, on yet another hot, dusty archaeological site, Gabi and Lia are bored out of their minds...until Gabi places her hand atop a handprint in an ancient tomb and finds herself in fourteenth-century Italy. And worse yet, in the middle of a fierce battle between knights of two opposing forces. 

Suddenly Gabi's summer in Italy is much, much more interesting. (from Goodreads)

This book lived up to my expectations. It was a perfect afternoon read that I finished in a couple of hours. 

I liked the fact that Gabi, when she was in Italy, never lost sight of her one goal - to reunite with her sister. Even when Mr. Italian Hottie distracted her *coughcough* that was still her main goal. So I liked that part.

The historical part of this was also portrayed well. Even though it got a bit confusing at times - with questions on Italy's two political parties - there never was an info dump.

There were only two problems that I saw, and they were really minor ones. One, there was never a description of what Gabi herself looked like until the end. Two, Gabi just suddenly knew what year she traveled back to without asking anyone. I know she's an archaeologist's daughter, but that seemed to me a bit too excessive. 

But those were minor problems. 

My favorite character was probably Luca. He was just so real and non-cardboard, unlike Lady Rossi. She was a pretty standard, cliched character. 

I also really liked the time traveling aspect of this book. It's not something done well often in YA fiction today, and so that was a really nice aspect to this book. 

It was pretty good.