Title: Love in the Time of Global Warming
Author: Francesca Lia Block
Book #: Standalone
Publisher: Henry Holt & Co.
Publish Date: August 27th 2013
Pages: 240
Format: Hardcover
Date Read: September 17th 2013
Rating: ★★ / out of 5
My steady hands frighten me in a distant way, as if I'm watching a movie and feel concern for the main character; her hands show not that she is brave but that she is not afraid to die, that she has already given up that much.
Summary:
Seventeen-year-old Penelope (Pen) has lost everything—her home, her parents, and her ten-year-old brother. Like a female Odysseus in search of home, she navigates a dark world full of strange creatures, gathers companions and loses them, finds love and loses it, and faces her mortal enemy.
(Synopsis taken from Goodreads)
Review:
I honestly was not sure what to expect with this book, which made going through it very exciting. However, it just didn't live up to my expectations from the blurb.
Love in the Time of Global Warming has a lot of very likeabe aspects: A destroyed world, a classic quest, LGBT romance, and a protaganist who does live up to the synopsis as being "a strong heroine who holds hope and love in her hands and refuses to be defeated."
However, all summed up, I just wasn't very pleased with the characters, the story, or the unnecessary profanity.
__________
While it is likeable that the MC, Pen, is strong and determined, I did not find her to be a very likable person. Granted, she's not perfect (no one is), but still. I found it very hard to connect with her: She smokes and does drugs. She makes repeatedly poor decisions. She is very impulsive. She reads dictionaries and encyclopedias for fun (this is not a bad thing, it's just another reason why I didn't find myself relating to her). I also didn't like the way she treated people sometimes, and her tendency to lash out unexpectedly for no reason:
"I'm late," I screamed again.
"It's not my fault. You're late because you ate too much sugar last last night and didn't get up when I told you..."
"You're such a bitch!"
Maybe I am being too harsh on judging her character, but I'm not going to lie. I personally found her to be very childish.
I did like that she was grappling with some very tough inner demons: Is her family alive? How will she find them? How will she survive in this world? As well as the question of her sexuality. I enjoyed the flashbacks she gives us in which we see how she see her best friend, Moira. It is very boy/girl-next-door-ish and just extremely sincere and heart-warming. Unfortunately for her, the feelings were not mutual. As she faces this scary world, she finds out whether or not it is still even possible to find and experience love.
Speaking of love, we come to the romance. While there are some very tender moments later on in the book, there is no denying that it was insta-love in the beginning. Because of this, the heart-warming moments were sadly lost on me. I need to see beginning development in a budding romance for me to like it at all. If it lacks that, I don't see the appeal in any of it. Even if it was more developed, I didn't really find the love-interest very appealing with his smoking habit. That, to me, is very gross.
I was surprised, though, by one of the revelations we learn about for this relationship. I do not want to spoil it at all, but I definitely did not see it coming. It was good, though, except it could have been improved upon a little: (view spoiler).
The side characters were all pretty good, too, except that there is insta-love in their relationships, as well. Really? If the book had been just a bit longer, this all could have been completely avoided.
My largest concern with this book was that the plot was too predictable. Literally every move the characters make is foreshadowed by a "random passage" they read from The Odyssey. Except none of them ever think, "Hey, guys, maybe we shouldn't eat the flowers because we just read that they make us forget and.. aren't we forgetting?" Instead, they are more like, "Ooh, cool passage. I bet it's just a coincidence. FLOWERS."
This is basically how the entire plot progresses. It was very annoying and, for the most part, I had to skip over many sections because I couldn't handle their stupidity and blatant ignorance. The evidence is literally right under their noses and yet they look the other way. On multiple ocassions Pen drags the group along to visit a place from her childhood memories, but none of them ever stop her and say "Didn't the last million times we went inside a building you wanted to see, there was a differnt Greek god/goddess waiting to trap us for and eternity of slavery...?" Nope.
Another thing I found to be annoying, there are these orange butterflies that "appear" whenever Pen is on the right path. Just another way to add to the predictability.
There is also the unanswered question as to why these 4 characters suddenly have powers. No explanation, at all, is given.
Lastly, I just have to say that I think the title of this book is very unfitting. Didn't we learn, by the end, that everything that happened wasn't due to global warming? (view spoiler).
Overall, while I would still recommend this book because there are reasons I think some people will enjoy it, it was just not the book for me.
Quotes:
Why are we here- just us and no one else? Is this salvation or the worst of punishments?
If I once thought I knew heartbreak, now I realize I had. Now I realize where the expression comes from. That area of my chest filled with fissures and erupted fault lines.
I wonder if any love is out there or if what snuggles within the confines of the lime green van is all we will ever know,
"It's funny how you meet people," Ash says.
"But I want to, now."
I can't look at him; I can tell our gaze might light something on fire.
Non sum qualis eram. I am not what I once was. Written boldly on his body.
I say to the air, all I have of my father's ghost, "I'm sorry."
On My Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/461732860
Title: The Girl Who Owned a City
Author: O.T. Nelson / Dan Jolley
Book #: Standalone
Publisher: Graphic Universe
Publish Date: January 1st 2012
Pages: 126
Format: Paperback
Date Read: September 15th 2013
Rating: ★★★★★ / out of 5
Pick a path you believe is right, and stick to it. That's what mom and dad always said. That's all I'm trying to do. But right or wrong tonight?
I don't regret anything.
Summary:
My parents are gone, so I'm responsible for my little brother Todd. I have to make sure we stay alive. Many kids are sick or starving, and fierce gangs are stealing and destroying everything they find. Lots of people have given up, but here on Grand Avenue, some of us are surviving. Because of me.
In a world like this, someone have to take charge.
(Synopsis taken from Goodreads)
Review:
I read the novel this is based off of in middle school and I don't think I ever really appreciated it. Now, though, I really have to go back and re-read it. If it is anything like this, it will have a very strong, determined, kick-ass protagonist!
The story isn't too fleshed out in this graphic novel, so I can't go into too much depth on the story itself. What story we do get, though, is very good.
__________
Lisa is struggling with a lot. After the entire world was struck by a virus- killing everyone over the age of 13- she is alone, surviving with her younger brother. She does this very well. Right away, she takes action. While other kids clear the stores off all the candy and sugary-drinks, she takes the canned food and non-perishable items. She grabs medical supplies and water. She searches the homes further out, isolated, and targets the warehouses.
When violent gangs start becoming a major threat, she rallies together the kids on her block. As a group, they carve out their own safe place in this new, ruined world.
My favorite part of this graphic novels were the graphics themselves. Very vibrant and detailed, yet still keeping a cartoon-ish feel. I really want to check out more from this artist!
Overall, this was a great graphic novel! I just hope the story it is based on lives up to it.
Quotes:"Nothing makes stealing okay."
Pages:
To come!
On My Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/719829205
Title: The Color of Water
Author: Kim Dong-Hwa
Book #: 2nd of Trilogy
Publisher: First Second
Publish Date: June 9th 2009
Pages: 320
Format: Paperback
Date Read: September 15th 2013
Rating: ★★★★★ / out of 5
A man who becomes enchanted by the flower's fragrance stays only for a fleeting moment, but a man who comes because of love stays for a lifetime.
Summary:
When Ehwa goes to the town festival, she meets a handsome young wrestler named Duksam who’s eager to catch her eye. After he wins the festival wrestling championship, he and Ehwa begin to meet, sneaking spare moments to be together. But a shadow falls on their romance when Master Cho sends Duksam away and asks for Ehwa’s hand in marriage himself It is then that Ehwa discovers the pain of heartbreak – and that love is always complicated.
(Synopsis taken from Goodreads)
Review:
As we see Ehwa grow older in this second volume, we also see her explorations and discoveries in the world of love and sex. While slightly less innocent than the first book, Ehwa is still a very relate-able protagonist and a very remarkable young woman. Her and her mother's romances are heart-warming and fragile things, and we see them connect in a new way as they both test the waters in the possibilities of true love.
Overall, I would very much so recommend this series! I think it is a very good coming-of-age story.
Pages:
To come!
On My Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/719467752
Title: X-Men: Misfits
Author: Raina Telgemeier & Dave Roman / Anzu
Book #: 1st of Series (discontinued)
Publisher: Del Rey
Publish Date: August 11th 2009
Pages: 192
Format: Paperback
Date Read : September 16th 2013
Rating: ★★★ / out of 5
I guess we all feel a little different from the people around us.
Summary:
High school student Kitty Pryde has always been the odd girl out. A mutant, she was born with strange superpowers, magical talents that make her the class freak. But Kitty’s world is changed when she’s invited to study at Professor Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters, a special home for mutant teens. There’s just one catch: Kitty’s the only girl at the all-boy school, and she ends up just feeling like a freak all over again.
Then Kitty meets Pyro and the ultra-hot bad boys of the Hellfire Club. They’re the school’s elite–handsome, rich, and totally above the rules. Now Kitty seems to have it all: a dreamy boyfriend, super-cool friends, and the chance to develop her extraordinary talents. But why is her heart telling her that something is wrong? Will Kitty ever find the place where she belongs, or is she doomed to be a misfit forever?
(Synopsis taken from Goodreads)
Review:
I enjoyed this story, even though it does have some flaws. There were certain aspects of it that I really liked: Kitty it a pretty sassy MC, these people have super powers, and some of the scenes were hilarious.
Unfortunately, there were some problems I had with it. The relationship between Kitty and Pyro was completely rushed and definitely a case of insta-love. I don't know if that is simply how relationships work in manga, because most of them are pretty short books, but I would have liked more development and substance between the two of them, besides just her being the only girl and him being a very pretty face.
There is also the question raised as to why Kitty is the only girl. Surely, they have found other girls with super powers? I heard the next book was supposed to be about other girls coming to the school, but why only now?
Sadly, there will not be a sequel to this book. I would have liked for there to be, because I really liked some of the friends Kitty makes, the ones that aren't stuck-up mental cases. There is also a hint at a more real relationship for Kitty with one of the characters, and not that rubbish she had with Pyro.
Overall, I can't say that I would completely recommend this, especially with such an open ending and no future books to follow. However, it would be a nice, quick read for you to check out from your library!
On My Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/720963482
Title: Of Beast and Beauty
Author: Stacey Jay
Book #: Standalone
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Publish Date: July 23rd 2013
Pages: 391
Format: Hardcover
Date Read : September 15th 2013
Rating: ★ / out of 5
The girl's misery and rage slipped away, and the secret sank like a stone,
deep,
deep,
deep
inside her, until the truth was as forgotten as hope and beauty and all the other things given to darkness.
Summary:
In the domed city of Yuan, the blind Princess Isra, a Smooth Skin, is raised to be a human sacrifice whose death will ensure her city’s vitality. In the desert outside Yuan, Gem, a mutant beast, fights to save his people, the Monstrous, from starvation. Neither dreams that together, they could return balance to both their worlds.
As secrets are revealed and Isra’s sight, which vanished during her childhood, returned, Isra will have to choose between duty to her people and the beast she has come to love.
(Synopsis taken from Goodreads)
Review:
The beauty of this story's writing style was not completely lost on me, yet it had no effect. I wasn't really impressed by the writing. I wasn't captured by it, or by the characters and their struggles. Not by the romance, or the tender moments between Isra and Gem. Not by the past that haunts Isra and the death that haunts Gem. Not either by the mysteries of Yuan. Nothing really made it easy for me to connect to the story. For the most part, I just skimmed through.
What didn't help with my inability to connect to the characters was the pace of the story. I really just wanted it to be over after every page. There were moments when everything was sped up too fast, including the relationship that develops between Isra and Gem. Weeks go by that they spend together, but were just told that. All of the sudden, five weeks have passed and then they just start having all these tender feelings. Then, other times the pacing will be so slow that I just skim through tens of pages at a time. And, reading through the last part of the book was a drag. There's some info-dumping and stuff and blah, blah, blah.
I can see where this story parallels with the classic Beauty and the Beast, but there were also parts that were lost on me. While I like how Gem and Isra's roles were reversed with Beauty and the Beast's, I didn't really understand the Bo's role. I assume he was supposed to be the authors version of Gaston.. but why was he actually likable at times? He is supposed to be completely repulsive and instead I found myself liking him for some parts. Yes, there are parts of him that repel me, but overall he wasn't that bad. The author shouldn't have made him like that.
Then, what's also lost on me, was why they were going to kill Isra before she had children? Isn't that the whole point, continuing the royal blood line? It was once stated in the book that the couldn't risk loosing their king and queen because then the royal line would be lost. But, if they were just going to have someone who married into the line, marry someone else and then have kids who continue the line, there won't be any blood relation to the original line... so if they lost both their king and queen at the same time, with no children to take their places, they could essentially just find someone else to start a new line. Right?
There is also the fact that the MC is blind, but pages would go by that I would completely forget she was. I don't know if that is necessarily good or bad, but I thought it would have been nice to constantly be reminded of her blindness to the point where I almost felt blind myself.
Overall, just because I didn't enjoy the story, doesn't mean I won't recommend it. I really see the potential in it, though this story just wasn't for me.
Quotes:
And what good is a voice when so few will listen.
The loss of hope is the worst kind of loss. I don't want to be the cause of that in someone, even if that someone is a monster.
She lifts her face. Her eyes aren't empty now. They're swimming with misery and pain. This girl wouldn't run through the garden laughing like a child. The death of her father cut that part of her away and left her bleeding inside were wounds hurt the most.
On My Goodreads:
Title: The Color of Earth
Author: Kim Dong-Hwa
Book #: 1st of Trilogy
Publisher: First Second
Publish Date: March 31st 2009
Pages: 312
Format: Paperback
Date Read : September 14th 2013
Rating: ★★★★★ / out of 5
I came hoping to see those eyes, but instead I return with my heart, leaving behind only flowers.
Summary:
Ehwa grows up helping her widowed mother run the local tavern, watching as their customers – both neighbors and strangers – look down on her mother for her single lifestyle. Their social status isolates Ehwa and her mother from the rest of the people in their quiet country village. But as she gets older and sees her mother fall in love again, Ehwa slowly begins to open up to the possibility of love in her life.
(Synopsis taken from Goodreads)
Review:
Despite the fact that this book is sexual graphic, which I would normally not like in a YA book, there is something to innocent and timeless about this story that I fell completely in love.
Overall, this is the perfect coming of age story, as well as one for first loves.
Pages:
On My Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/719415145
Title: The Dark Unwinding
Author: Sharon Cameron
Book #: 1st of Series
Publisher: Scholastic Press
Publish Date: August 27th 2012
Pages: 336
Format: Hardcover
Date Read : September 13th 2013
Rating: ★★★★¼ / out of 5
I had thought to save myself, but of all the ridiculous lies, that had somehow been the true one. Leaving Stranwyne, destroying Stranwyne, was going to destroy me instead. There would be no saving of anyone at all.
Summary:
When Katharine Tulman’s inheritance is called into question by the rumor that her eccentric uncle is squandering away the family fortune, she is sent to his estate to have him committed to an asylum. But instead of a lunatic, Katharine discovers a genius inventor with his own set of rules, who employs a village of nine hundred people rescued from the workhouses of London.
Katharine is now torn between protecting her own inheritance and preserving the peculiar community she grows to care for deeply. And her choices are made even more complicated by a handsome apprentice, a secretive student, and fears for her own sanity.
As the mysteries of the estate begin to unravel, it is clear that not only is her uncle’s world at stake, but also the state of England as Katharine knows it.
(Synopsis taken from Goodreads)
Review:
I was interested in reading this book, but it was on the back burner until I was accepted to review an ARC of the sequel. At that, I decided I best be getting on with it!
__________
The story is what I found most interesting. It is obvious that Strawnyne, Katharine's Uncle's estate, is more than it seems. There is something going on that our MC has come to root out, fix, and be on her way. However, she realizes that something this good doesn't need fixing.
Unfortunately, I found a large part of the story boring, which is why I was hesitant to give it closer to a 5 star rating. It was really only the last few chapters that had me on edge.
Katharine, our MC, was definitely strong willed. She came to Stranwyne with a mission and, guilty conscious or not, was set on getting it accomplished. In the beginning, I found her to be too.. a typical, well-off lady:
"As soon as you have begun the tea, please inform the house keeper that I will require a man to deal with my trunk. It was left at the front doors. Have it taken to my room immediately, if you please, and you may tell her that I will do my own unpacking."
The woman released the sugar bowl and squinted. "Who the devil are you?"
However, of the many things Katharine comes to realize, it is that she has changed her opinion of this place by the end of the book:
By quarter till seven, the mirror showed the girl I had been when I first came to Stranwyne. Though I knew I would never really be here again.
The romance was good, too. Very slow and definitely no sign of insta-love. Actually, I'm pretty sure it's safe to say that both the love interests despise each other in the beginning. Later, though it does not get too steamy, they do come to discover their feelings for each other and steal a few kisses.
One of the things I loved most about this book were all of the side characters in their relation to Mr. Tully. He himself was a very touching, sweet, child-like character, but seeing how all the other characters treated him and acted around him was very sincere.
And then, there's Davy...
Overall, I felt this to be a very well-done historical fiction, with some steampunk, romance, and mystery! Definitely check out this and the sequel, coming out September 2013!
Quotes:
What kind of women must she have been, and why had I been the one to tear down everything she had struggled to build?
He put his hands in his pockets. "You are showing unexpected talents, Miss Tulman. I wonder how far that streak might go."
I lifted a brow. "I'm quite certain I am equal to anything you might have in mind, Mr. Moreau."
Why had life singled me out for drudgery and isolation, and to be the instrument of others' unhappiness? But my one boon, my saving grace, had always been my own mind, where I was free, where I could do as I would, without interference.
Males were strange creatures.
"Little things become big things," he told me incessantly, and on Thursday we would the clocks systematically, rhythmically, and in the attempt to coax my uncle's smile, I more often discovered that he had coaxed my own.
I wondered if my uncle could hear my broken parts inside, as he had with my father; I wished he could fix them.
Because my uncle had a different way of thinking, a view of the world they did not understand, and money that others wished to spend. For this they would lock him up in a cell without even proper examination. Lock him up like a specimen.
"Well, it will not be the same, Katharine. Not for all of us... Not for me."
He wouldn't let me win, as I thought a gentleman might have, only laughed when I complained, telling me that I had no complaint, as he'd never been a gentleman.
On My Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/611472564
