Book Review: Sweet Evil by Wendy Higgins

February 1, 2013 by 6 Comments

Title by Author Sweet Evil by Wendy Higgins
Release Date: May 1, 2012
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: LAPL
Rating: ★★★☆☆ 
Buy It: Amazon | Book Depository

What if there were teens whose lives literally depended on being bad influences?

This is the reality for sons and daughters of fallen angels.

Tenderhearted Southern girl Anna Whitt was born with the sixth sense to see and feel emotions of other people. She’s aware of a struggle within herself, an inexplicable pull toward danger, but Anna, the ultimate good girl, has always had the advantage of her angel side to balance the darkness within. It isn’t until she turns sixteen and meets the alluring Kaidan Rowe that she discovers her terrifying heritage and her willpower is put to the test. He’s the boy your daddy warned you about. If only someone had warned Anna.

Forced to face her destiny, will Anna embrace her halo or her horns? – Goodreads

Review:
With very few exceptions (Unearthly, Angelfall), angel books are usually a big miss with me, but Wendy Higgins’ Sweet Evil was middle of the road.

I’ll start off with what I did like:
• The addictive quality of the book. Seriously, this book was like candy and I read it in one sitting which is pretty rare for me nowadays.
• The angel mythology. It’s so different from other YA angel books so thumbs up for originality!
• Wendy Higgins wasn’t afraid of making her world dark. Perhaps I’m just too used to the fluff and such, but I was really surprised by some of the themes and actions of Nephilim in Sweet Evil. They made sense for the world she created, though, so I’m glad she didn’t shy away from that.
• The chemistry between Anna and Kaiden was pretty good. I did have some issues, but the UST was definitely there.

My dislikes are a little difficult to put into words because, yes, I did enjoy reading the book quite a bit, but I didn’t love it.
• I found the characters to be grating at times — especially Anna who was annoyingly naive and suffered from the always eyeroll inducing “I’m beautiful but I don’t know it” character flaw.
• Kaiden is a typical bad boy (he even has a British accent!), and I’m not too into those personally, but at least his “badness” had a reason. So, not all that much to DISLIKE here, really, I just wasn’t super into him.
• Patti, Anna’s mother, is a trip and I really don’t understand what was going on in her head. At all.
• The other side characters had interesting backstories, but as characters themselves, I found them to be flat. That sounds really odd, I know, but I guess I liked their larger roles in the angel mythology more than I liked them as individuals? We’ll stick with that.

I will read the next book because this one was so addictive, but I do wish the character development had been expanded. I’ll be curious to see how Wendy Higgins handles that in the next installment.

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Book Review: Hallowed by Cynthia Hand

January 28, 2012 by 8 Comments

Hallowed by Cynthia Hand
Release Date: January 17, 2011
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 403
Source: Received ARC from publisher | Purchased copy
Rating: ★★★★★ 
Buy It: Amazon | Book Depository

For months part-angel Clara Gardner trained to face the raging forest fire from her visions and rescue the alluring and mysterious Christian Prescott from the blaze. But nothing could prepare her for the fateful decisions she would be forced to make that day, or the startling revelation that her purpose—the task she was put on earth to accomplish—is not as straightforward as she thought.

Now, torn between her increasingly complicated feelings for Christian and her love for her boyfriend, Tucker, Clara struggles to make sense of what she was supposed to do the day of the fire. And, as she is drawn further into the world of part angels and the growing conflict between White Wings and Black Wings, Clara learns of the terrifying new reality that she must face: Someone close to her will die in a matter of months. With her future uncertain, the only thing Clara knows for sure is that the fire was just the beginning. – Goodreads

Review:
Gutted.

That’s how I felt when I turned the last page of Hallowed. I was struck by how personal the book came across; it had a certain depth I don’t often encounter in most of my YA reads — especially not those with paranormal elements. And yet Cynthia Hand touched on love, friendship, loss, and difficult decisions in a very tangible way.

Love – A few pages into the book and I found myself smiling like an idiot. If you’re at all familiar with Tucker Avery that’s understandable, right? He is my favorite forever and I was so elated to see his return on page. Their relationship remains genuine and sweet and I appreciated the natural progression of it. They do hit some road bumps in this book, and there are some shifts that occur that made me sad, but it’s all a part of growing up. Though they both matured, together and individually, they still have ways to go. Lucky for us, Hand has an excellent foundation setup for them and I’m looking forward to seeing their evolution.

Friendship – Guys, Christian is the loveliest! I’ve had a soft spot for him since the first book, but this one just made me adore him all that more. He knows what Clara is going through and, whether he has feelings for her or not, it doesn’t change the fact that he’s someone she can fully rely on. Hand did an amazing job in showing their deepening friendship, how Christian brings out some of the best in Clara when she needs it, and making it all feel real. Yes, some love triangle aspects are part of the book, but Hand keeps it all from being contrived by making the reader truly feel and understand the emotion and conflict that Clara experiences.

Loss – This book made me cry! The book carries a heavy feeling of sorrow throughout and there were multiple times when my heart ached so much. I felt overwhelmed and drained and yet Hand also managed to show the strength that one displays in these situations. I wish I could mention certain things, but they would be spoiling the story, so I’ll just say that Clara’s loss, while definitely sad, included so much love. It was heartbreaking, but also beautiful.

Despite the obvious supernatural element — which is also handled very well — the real highlight of Hand’s writing is how she tackles human emotion. The highs, the lows, and everything in between rings true and allows us, the readers, to form a personal connection with her characters. I can’t wait to reunite with them in book three.


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Book Review: Angelfall by Susan Ee

January 2, 2012 by 8 Comments

Angelfall by Susan Ee
Release Date: May 21, 2011
Publisher: Self-published
Pages: 255
Source: Purchased Copy
Rating: ★★★★★ 
Buy It: Amazon | B&N

It’s been six weeks since angels of the apocalypse descended to demolish the modern world. Street gangs rule the day while fear and superstition rule the night. When warrior angels fly away with a helpless little girl, her seventeen-year-old sister Penryn will do anything to get her back.

Anything, including making a deal with an enemy angel.

Raffe is a warrior who lies broken and wingless on the street. After eons of fighting his own battles, he finds himself being rescued from a desperate situation by a half-starved teenage girl.

Traveling through a dark and twisted Northern California, they have only each other to rely on for survival. Together, they journey toward the angels’ stronghold in San Francisco where she’ll risk everything to rescue her sister and he’ll put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies for the chance to be made whole again. – Goodreads

This is one of those books that I could write “OH MY GOD” over and over again and I still don’t think it would be sufficient enough to capture my excitement over it. And to think I almost missed reading it! I’m completely embarrassed to say that I’m one of those readers that will, 99.9% of the time, look past the self-published/indie books in favor of novels from the big publishers. Shame on me, I know, so thanks to all the good buzz happening on Goodreads, I snagged this for my Kindle and absolutely fell in love.

Susan Ee effortlessly made Angelfall a gripping, addictive read from the very beginning. It opens six weeks after the arrivals of angel on Earth and their massive destruction on the world and humanity. After having holed up in their condo, Penryn, along with her sister and mother, attempt to make an escape to a safer location. Immediately, Ee was able to set the scene by evoking the feeling of fear. A single feather falling from the sky turns Penryn’s blood cold and things go from bad to worse as a fight between several angels happens right in front of them. Even worse yet, Paige, Penryn’s sister, is taken away and her journey to find her depends on one very injured angel, Raffe.

As far as characters go, Ee has a winning combination with Penryn and Raffe. They‘re an unlikely duo, forced to work together in order to reach their own goals. They each lost something in the fight and they share the same determination to get it back. Though there is an initial mistrust between them — and a lot snark involved — they do come to be a great team together. There is a hint of a romance between the two, but it wasn’t overdone. Underneath all their back-and-forth bickering, there’s a sweetness and growing trust between the two. I can’t wait to see that continued in the following books.

Individually, Penryn is brave and kickass, but it never felt contrived. There’s nothing more annoying than a heroine that can do it all, so it was good to see layers and depth to her character. Her relationship with her schizophrenic mother was realistic and, of course, her love for her sister really resonated with me. As for Raffe, there’s a certain amount of arrogance about him, but he’s mostly just charming. Though he didn’t lose his sister, his own plight is just as heartbreaking and it would be impossible not to feel for him after what he endures.

While there was a tiny degree of predictability at first, Ee still took her story to unexpected places. As someone who attended Catholic school for most of my life, I was especially surprised to see her take on the darkness of angels I had come to be (somewhat) familiar with in my education. There were names I recognized and they were definitely “harbingers of doom, willing and able to destroy entire cities” in this book. I do wish I had been able to experience more of the destruction, rather than just the aftermath, but Ee did a great job making the angels intimidating beings. In addition to that, there was some dark and terrifying imagery and, towards the end, there was a sci-fi twist that only gives the series a different edge from the norm.

Angelfall is easily one of my favorite books of 2011 and I’m so thankful to the powers of Goodreads for bringing it to my attention. You can preview the first five chapters here and the book’s awesomeness in its entirety can be yours for only 99 cents on your Kindle or Nook (or computer or reading app of choice). 99 cents! There’s no reason at all to pass up on this deal because I think the quality is worth so much more. I can only keep my fingers crossed for its success and count down to getting my hands on a physical copy once they’re released.


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Book Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

September 15, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor
Release Date: September 27, 2011
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Pages: 432
Source: ARC from Comic-Con
Rating: ★★★★★ 
Buy It: Amazon | Book Depository

Around the world, black handprints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil’s supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherworldly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she’s prone to disappearing on mysterious “errands”; she speaks many languages—not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she’s about to find out.

When one of the strangers—beautiful, haunted Akiva—fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself? – Goodreads

Review:
Perfect. The end.

Okay, in all seriousness, Daughter of Smoke and Bone is one of those amazing reads that make it so incredibly difficult to try to review. On the surface, the book has some familiar elements that we’ve seen before: angels and devils, forbidden romance, star-crossed lovers, magic, and secrets…Sounds like a few different books out there, right? But, no, you have not read a book quite like this one. Laini Taylor wove the familiar into something so refreshing and unique, leaving me in awe.

I don’t know what it says about me, but I knew that this was a Favorite — with a capital ‘F’ — once there was a mention of “inessential penises” (page 22 of the ARC). There were several other scenes that Taylor infused with the perfect brand of humor but, in addition to that, she was a master with her world building and words. Prague and “Elsewhere” came alive.

While Daughter of Smoke and Bone has a love story, an ancient battle, and many other things taking place, at its core it’s a story about the discovery of Karou’s identity. She’s brave, quirky, and a bit of a badass, but she’s also very vulnerable; she doesn’t feel whole because her background is a mystery to her. Enter Akiva and the chain of events that revealed who she is. It definitely took me by surprise!

In my experience, side characters often feel so unnecessary in most of my reads because they’re there and then gone without even skimming the surface of who they are. Here, even with the quickest glimpses of some of them, I felt that Taylor created layered personalities. Everyone from Zuzana to Brimstone and the rest of Karou’s family, to Razgut, Chiro, and Thiago… A lot of time wasn’t spent with all of them, but attachments and opinions were formed and I had a very clear and vivid picture of who they were.

And then there’s the romance. I honestly get shivers just remembering it! I was quickly on board with the idea of Karou and Akiva, but then it got even better as secrets were revealed and it was just…almost too much. Unexpected. But brilliant and beautiful and so very swoon-worthy. Who knew “Hello” was such a sexy word?

This is a book whose ending I looked forward to with dread because I wanted more. Usually after I finish a book I immediately find a spot for it on my shelf. Not the case with Daughter of Smoke and Bone. It’s been over a month since I first read it and I’ve been unable to move it from my bedside table. I’ve needed it close by for revisits and, though I’ve obviously read other books since then, Karou’s story is one I have not been able to let go of. Taylor’s words, her world, and characters have lingered and I’m aching to experience it all over again in the next two installments. This is not a book you want to miss!

Want a signed copy? Yep, it’s giveaway time! Laini Taylor is making an appearance here next month, and I’ll be attending the event, so I thought I’d share in the awesome and offer a signed copy for you all. Read on!


Open internationally, the giveaway ends at midnight PST on October 17, 2011. The signing is the following week and the winner has 48 hours to reply to my e-mail or another winner will be chosen. Extra entries are available but not required.

Giveaway is closed!
Winner will be announced soon.

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Book Review: A Beautiful Dark by Jocelyn Davies

August 6, 2011 by Leave a Comment

A Beautiful Dark by Joceyln Davies
Release Date: September 27, 2011
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 320
Source: Netgalley
Rating: ★★★☆☆ 
Buy It: Amazon | Book Depository

Skye never questioned the story of her life. Her Aunt Jo adopted her after the death of her parents when she was just a child, and together they flip through memories the way some people flip through photo albums.

She never questioned if the stories were true.

Until the night of her 17th birthday, when the arrival of two strangers intrudes on her cozy life. Polar opposites, like fire and ice, Asher is dark and wild, while Devin is fair, cold, and aloof. Skye has no idea what they want—only that their presence coincides with the beginning of some shockingly strange events. Events that Skye, if she dares to think it, might be responsible for causing.

High up in the mountains of Boulder, Colorado, Skye finds herself caught in the middle of an ancient battle, one that began untold millennia ago. Torn between unpredictable Asher, whom she loves, and the infuriating Devin, who she can’t stay away from, her fate is murky as a starless night. And as the secrets of her true identity are revealed, Skye realizes that her destiny may reside in the Heavens—or somewhere darker. – Goodreads

Review:
I’ve read my fair share of angel books this year and one might think, “Steph, you need to take a step back.” However, I’ve enjoyed quite a few of these titles, so I can’t help but be cautiously optimistic that the newest one will be as good as my favorites involving this particular element. A Beautiful Dark was only so-so for me, but it’s definitely a title that will appeal more to other readers.

Set in Colorado, Skye lives a pretty normal life. Though the death of her parents is still fresh in her memory, she has a great set of friends and interests to keep her busy. Come her seventeenth birthday party, though, everything starts getting messy, starting with the appearance of two guys, Devin and Asher, who are seemingly following her around. Cue the revelations, some teenage angst, and our fairly formulaic story kicks off!

If it annoys you when multiple boys are vying for the main character’s affections…this is a book where you’ll experience just that. It was pretty eyeroll worthy and, to make matters worse, I couldn’t even root for anyone because all three boys (yes, three) were bland. We had the bad boy, his opposite, and even a best friend thrown in there. And that was all that there was to them. We’ve seen these characters before. It was only at the very end that I thought that two of them had the potential to become multi-dimensional characters, but that will remain to be seen in the following books.

So what did I like about this book? It was entertaining and I think Jocelyn Davies has an interesting angel mythology story going on here. I liked that Skye didn’t magically fall into her abilities and that she was very much put off by it all. As a matter of fact, when the book concludes, she’s still trying to figure things out. The cliffhanger at the end also brings an interesting twist to the series and the characters can only develop from here on out. I do wish there had been more of that growth in this one, though.

Overall, this was an enjoyable read but it lacked that special something for me; it didn’t bring offer anything that I haven’t already seen before. I think it would be a great book for someone who is only just now dipping their toes in the genre.

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