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Saturday, December 12, 2015
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Monday, November 30, 2015
Saturday, November 7, 2015
Thursday, November 5, 2015
Wednesday, November 4, 2015
Saturday, October 31, 2015
Friday, October 30, 2015
Wednesday, October 21, 2015
Sunday, September 27, 2015
Monday, September 21, 2015
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Monday, September 14, 2015
Sunday, September 13, 2015
Friday, August 28, 2015
Monday, August 24, 2015
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Thursday, June 11, 2015
Friday, May 29, 2015
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
Thursday, May 14, 2015
Tuesday, May 12, 2015
How to Love by Katie Cotugno
★★
Reena
Montero has been obsessed with Sawyer LeGrande for most of her life. His
parents are her parents’ best friends, not to mention owning a restaurant together.
Reena’s love has always been unrequited until one day she and Sawyer finally come
together like she believes they were always meant to. Suddenly, Sawyer leaves
town without saying anything to an unknowingly pregnant Reena. Later, Reena is
a busy single mom studying to get her degree and leading a life where she
barely thinks about Sawyer. Of course, this means Sawyer reappears in town and
Reena has to deal with the conflicting emotions his presence stirs in her. She
hates him for just leaving her without saying anything but she can’t deny she
still has feelings for him. Can Reena allow herself to forgive Sawyer enough to
let him be a father to their daughter? Can she forgive him and allow herself to
love him again?
This
book is exactly what I thought it would be. I wanted a cute little romance to
get me through to my next dark read and this did the trick. It wasn’t great or
memorable by any means but it was easy to get through. I really thought Reena
could have been a more empowering single mom. She really relied on others more
though than really showing growth into the position herself. She was more of a
MTV Teen Mom than what the reality is for many teen moms. Like I said though,
the book was cute enough but the characters are one-level and all too
forgetful.
Monday, May 11, 2015
The Circle by Dave Eggers
★★★
Mae
Holland has finally got the career she’s been waiting for. Her closest friend
Annie has helped her to get a customer service job at The Circle, the most
powerful internet company in the world. Mae is immediately drawn in by the
amazing campus with all sorts of social activities for the people at The Circle
to go to and “zing” about. As Mae gets deeper into the company though, more and
more problems seem to develop. Her relationship with her parents becomes estranged
and her former-ex-now-close-family-friend no longer wants anything to do with
her. She also begins seeing this mysterious stranger named Kalden everywhere
even though according to her Circle searches, no one by his name even works at
the company. Finally, Mae is roped into being “transparent”, a program that has
her wearing a camera around her neck so anywhere in the world someone can tune
in and see what she’s doing. This program is also pushed on political figures
and other ordinary citizens as The Circle tries to get more and more people to
forgo a private life and become “transparent”, allowing others to watch. As the
Circle becomes more and more powerful, Mae begins to wonder if everyone warning
her about The Circle may be right….I thought this book was really clever. It doesn’t take the reader long to see that the Circle is a take on both Google and Facebook. Google especially is known to have an amazing work campus and other amazing things that normal civilian jobs are missing (a slide to go downstairs, are you kidding?). The book also presents some very intriguing arguments. For example, with the ranking system and the way the social media is used, it’s easy to see why so many in the book become dependent on it. What seems exhausting or superficial at first appears to be a strong comfort system later on with thousands, if not millions of users able to get in touch with Mae in seconds to help comfort her or make her feel heard. How many of us use social media to vent and feel comforted by others? There is also an amazing bit in the book where one of the creators of the Circle pushes his reason in believing everyone should use cameras to record every second of their lives. He believes that in allowing someone become “transparent”. By recording a kayaking trip or climbing Mt Everest, we are allowing others to learn what those experiences are like even if they are not able to do them. He believes it is a shame, if not a crime, to hide information or to deprive others from accessing information. I thought that was really interesting. Should we view information as such? Something it is our duty to share with others? And where is the line between withholding and over sharing?
I do dislike Mae as a character, her naivety and eagerness to be a tool made her vastly uninteresting when one can read about figures like Tris or Katniss fighting against the roles they’re being forced into. I initially thought that’s what I would be seeing from Mae. I was eager to see her team up with others to try to fight the Circle, instead of eagerly involving herself more and more. She also shows that she’s pretty much a terrible friend as she all but forgets Annie and the problems Annie goes through. She also doesn’t seem to think about what she’s hearing and use the information to compare to other things she’s learned. We see figures that challenge the circle being brought down by various scandals that happen out of nowhere and she never even considers Circle involvement.
In closing, this was a very clever book by Dave Eggers. By looking at where companies like Google or Facebook could go, he forces us to start considering where we draw our own individual lines. Eggers constructed a great corporation “baddie”, but could not construct a strong enough protagonist, which is a shame since he made her a female in a time when we are seeking stronger female literary characters. Dave, you’ve made a good antagonist, now maybe flesh us out a real protagonist.
Wednesday, April 22, 2015
Friday, April 17, 2015
The Love Song of Jonny Valentine by Teddy Wayne
★★★
Jonny Valentine is a very self-aware pop-star protagonist.
At 11, he completely understands that his fans love him for the carefully maintained
image his manager-mommy Jane and all of his “people” carefully craft. Jonny is still only 11 thought trying to navigate
a very grown up world without a father or any close friends. His only guidance
comes from Walter (his bodyguard), Nadine (his tutor), and Jane. Suddenly his
absent father starts trying to teach out to him in the midst of a tour that
could make or break Jonny’s career. His momager (No?) would never let him talk
to his dad, he’s not even allowed to post on his own twitter. Jonny can’t
imagine letting his dad go though when the possibility of getting him back is
so close.
I was immediately interested when I heard about this book
last year. I heard that the character was supposed to be similar to Justin
Beiber and I thought it would probably be a great commentary on celebrity
status in America and how absolutely absurd it is that we take them so
seriously. Instead, I got roped into a
story about a tween fruitlessly masturbating and wondering when the conflict
between the momager (I’m keeping it) would come to a boiling point so we could
reach a resolution in that weird relationship. This book seemed to have a large
source of themes to discuss. Jane’s control over Jonny is scary and strong and
the book dances around the subject and has other characters actually concerned
about Jonny’s well-being. However, when Jane actually does harm to herself and
Jonny’s career, it never truly resolves in the wake of Jonny’s daddy drama.
Jonny also touches on the mobs of fans that are “in love” with him without
really knowing him and how lonely it is to be a celebrity, again though the
topic is only touched on at a superficial level. The one message the book does
a great job discussing, the farce of celebrity lives, is force-fed to us while
we are busy digesting the other topics. Jonny’s people fake an entire
relationship and “back to the beginnings” trip for him all for public approval.
Jonny is whipped back and forth wildly between these scenarios and struggles to
understand what he feels compared to what he’s supposed to feel. He also
struggles to act the appropriate way while still being a hormonal time-bomb on
the brink of puberty (as evidenced by his delight of his first pube, something
I now wonder if every male in my life was as proud of). As much as I hate to
say it, The Love Song of Jonny Valentine
should probably has been planned into a series of books to really get a good
dig in our society instead of just a singular book lobbing a bunch of
complaints in such a fast and hectic way. Jonny Valentine was a brave book and
I really hope Teddy Wayne continues to write in the same voice and continues to
pursue important ideas like these. Maybe next time though Teddy; flesh them out
a bit more for me?Thursday, April 16, 2015
Wednesday, April 15, 2015
The Wicked Girls by Alex Marwood★★★★
The hardest thing about the past is learning to forget it, for some this means getting over bad parenting and terrible exes. For Kirsty Lindsay and Amber Gordon, the past is a little bit more difficult to outrun, despite their individual efforts. One day during the last summer of their childhood, they meet and become fast friends. By the end of that day, the two have taken part in an unspeakable crime. After being charged with the murder, the two 11 year olds are separated and told they can never have contact with one another again.
Twenty-five years go by and the two change their identities and try to hide the awful past they share. Kirsty is married and the mother of two. She works as a journalist investigating others’ secrets while hiding her own, even from her husband. Amber has become the managing cleaner at an amusement park in a local seaside town. Their lives are brought together again in the wake of a series of vicious murders. Kirsty and Amber are shocked to find each other again, but they’ll be even more shocked as the murderer strikes too close and risks uncovering their history for everyone to see.
Amber and Kirsty were definitely refreshing female roles to read about in a world of Ana Steeles and Bella Swanns. It was great to see moments of strength in two very complex figures. What was also very interesting is that their individual strengths were shown in different ways...
[Possible Spoilers!!]
The girls both had their faults but had character traits readers could see and want to emulate. Their likeability created a great internal struggle against the knowledge that they had done something so terrible early on in their lives. This also created a great debate topic on the subject of child murderers’ treatment in society. Such a strong steam engine of a book was really wasted on such a bland ending though. The murderer was somewhat obvious and the ultimate outcome to the conflict, while heartwarming…wasn’t terribly surprising. The Wicked Girls had such a strong lead, if only the ending was as great as the rest of the book.
Sunday, March 29, 2015
Identical by Scott Turow
★ ★
Paul and Cass Giannis share everything with each other. They
go everywhere together and learn how to do everything like each other to be the
“perfect twins” This sharing even includes knowing what happened the night
Dita, Cass’s fiancé is murdered. Cass goes to jail for the crime and is
released 25 years after pleading guilty. Dita’s brother isn’t so sure that it
was Cass that deserved to serve the jail time. Suddenly, Paul finds himself being
dragged under the spotlight with court mandated DNA testing while Evon Miller
and Tim Brodie are hired to track down Cass and anyone else who may have been
at the scene. What these two find shocks them as different secrets come out and
more and more suspects are revealed. Suddenly no one is sure which the Giannis
brothers share more, secrets or guilt.
Identical was a
very frustrating book. It was based around such a great idea but the
storytelling is really what made me end up not liking the read. The author kept
switching how he referred to the characters. (First name or last name? Pick
buddy.) This made it very hard to keep up with names I was already having
trouble pronouncing/memorizing. There was also the massive confusion that Dita
was short for Aphrodite which I didn’t catch on to until about halfway through
the book. Did he tell me and I missed it? I have no idea. That’s pretty much
how I felt about most of the book. If there were any questions I had after
parts, I’d try to reread and still end up feeling like I had no idea why this
was in the book. A prime example is Evon’s relationship with her ex-girlfriend.
We were forced to watch the dissolution
of their relationship without there ever being an underlying theme or anything
to tie it back to the story. I was really worried this book was going to throw
me off my book goal as I was dragging through it. I genuinely believe that if
it weren’t for being able to audiobook this while I drove, I would have never
made it through. The twist is very interesting and isn’t easy to see coming,
but the brilliance of it is lost in trying to get to the end to see it.
Friday, March 6, 2015
Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King
One morning, a crowd gathers
outside a job fair hoping for a break in the struggling economy. Out of the quiet fog that morning comes a stolen Mercedes and an
awful massacre that no one saw coming. Months later Bill Hodges, the retired
detective who had once tried to solve the case gets a mysterious letter in the
mail. A person claiming to be the driver is taunting Hodges, goading him into
using his father’s service weapon one final time to take his own life. Instead,
Hodges sets out using the letter and an unlikely group of people personally involved with the "perk" in
various ways to begin hunting down the Mercedes Killer. They better hurry
though, what he’s planning next makes his last stunt look like just a Sunday drive.
One of my favorite parts of reading
King is the fantastic talent he has to create strong female characters with
weaknesses. Janey is a very strong woman for being able to say what she wants
and what her limitations are. Holly is also wonderful for being able to start
as such a twisted character and grow into well-rounded and likable person
(having seen her parents, this is actually impressive).
Mr. Mercedes is well-paced and is a book that you genuinely are disappointed to put down when real life demands it. I would not say this is one of Stephen King’s best works but it’s definitely one a King fan should check out, if only for the little Easter eggs that King always leaves us.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
One morning, a crowd gathers
outside a job fair hoping for a break in the struggling economy. Out of the quiet fog that morning comes a stolen Mercedes and an
awful massacre that no one saw coming. Months later Bill Hodges, the retired
detective who had once tried to solve the case gets a mysterious letter in the
mail. A person claiming to be the driver is taunting Hodges, goading him into
using his father’s service weapon one final time to take his own life. Instead,
Hodges sets out using the letter and an unlikely group of people personally involved with the "perk" in
various ways to begin hunting down the Mercedes Killer. They better hurry
though, what he’s planning next makes his last stunt look like just a Sunday drive.
Stephen King is one of my favorite
authors and I thought this book was a pretty good fit among the others. In his
later novels, King has steered away from his movie monster villains like
Pennywise and Christine. Aside from Flagg, he tends to stick with villains that
are normal everyday people hiding severe emotional and mental problems. He has
gone from creating monsters for us to be afraid of to pointing out the monsters
that already walk among us. Brady (not a spoiler) was a very typical character
in this way. Not especially charming, he’s exactly what one imagines now when
they ask themselves what a typical serial killer is like. He has an unhealthy
relationship with his mother and is oddly intelligent; it’s just misdirected.
Hodges is a very interesting role
for King since his protagonists usually rise from everyday people. It’s
refreshing for him to create a detective thriller. It’s nice to watch Hodges go
from a very low point to being a character happy and on the chase. It gives the
reader a glimpse into what Hodges might have been like in his prime.
King also carefully navigates the typical detective thriller tropes. Early on
he establishes that Hodges gets no pleasure from drinking, even though he
thought retirement might give him the opportunity to embrace alcoholism. Hodges also mentions his
previous divorce and his estrangement without dwelling on it and causing an
unnecessary side plot.
One of my favorite parts of reading
King is the fantastic talent he has to create strong female characters with
weaknesses. Janey is a very strong woman for being able to say what she wants
and what her limitations are. Holly is also wonderful for being able to start
as such a twisted character and grow into well-rounded and likable person
(having seen her parents, this is actually impressive).Mr. Mercedes is well-paced and is a book that you genuinely are disappointed to put down when real life demands it. I would not say this is one of Stephen King’s best works but it’s definitely one a King fan should check out, if only for the little Easter eggs that King always leaves us.
Dark Places by Gillian Flynn
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
There are certain books that are impossible to put down once the first chapter is over. For some reason, every book Gillian Flynn writes falls into this category. This book was delightfully frustrating. It is told between three main points of view. Flynn is excellent at changing these perspectives as soon as you start getting answer, inevitably leaving you with more questions and an ache to keep going. Libby was a fantastically flawed character that you can’t help but root for, despite her constantly proving to you how many flaws she truly has. Flynn made a character that you truly saw grow during the course of the novel. I rarely get attached to main character but I loved Libby Sticky Fingers and I’m genuinely sad the novel ended because I won’t get to read about her stealing anymore. Ben was another wonderfully complicated character and the entire book you bounce between complete conviction of his guilt and feeling genuinely sorry for him. As all the reviews say and the title suggests, this is a very dark book. However, if you’re familiar with Gone Girl or Sharp Objects, you’ll be ready for the gore and sexual context as these aren't themes Gillian Flynn has shied away from previously. All in all, a great read. This was not my favorite of her books, but I am really glad I finally got the book from my library to read.
Dressed: A Century of Hollywood Costume Design by Deborah Nadoolman
★ ★ ★ ★
I was surprised by how huge this book was when I ordered it from the library. It was the perfect thing to curl up in bed with though. It was nice to see familiar beauties like Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe and Brigitte Bardot wearing costumes that they’ve made iconic. It was also really interesting seeing little anecdotes from more modern movies like Grease, Pulpfiction, and Moulin Rouge. I’ll admit that while I read every caption, I skimmed the pages looking for the movies I recognized to learn more. This is the sort of book you see people buy more for its collector’s quality than anything else. This is the perfect book for a living room end table or a coffee table to add a little bit of class. And like I said, there’s some real joy in looking back throughout the history of movies told by as told by the clothing.Death of the Black-Haired Girl by Robert Stone
★
Maud Stack, a bright student at a New England University, has been having an affair with her professor Steve Brookman. Upon finding out his wife is pregnant, Steve decides it’s time to end the relationship with Maud. This leads Maud to drunkenly visit her professor’s house in a night that ends in her death. No one is sure who killed her and conflicting eyewitnesses aren't helping the case. Did Brookman push Maud or did he try to save her? Was Maud’s murder a crime of passion or an attack of retribution for an article received as insulting to the religious?I was so absolutely disappointed with this book. The title makes you think it’s going to be something like the Girl with the Dragon tattoo. I know that it isn't a fair assumption to male, but you’d think if your title centers on the murder of a female character in your book….that your book would be more devoted to that murder. Maud isn't made to be a likeable character at all as she drunkenly stumbles home, knocks her dad off the wagon, and then makes a scene at her professors. It’s completely unfathomable as to why so many people are distraught after she does finally die. Then instead of focusing on trying to find the killer, the book focuses on red herrings that even the characters don’t even seem to find worthwhile to pursue. This book honestly felt like a waste of my time. If you decide to read it, I hope you find something likable in it because I really didn’t.
Horns by Joe Hill
★ ★ ★ ★
Ig “Ignatius” Perrish, the son of a famous musician and brother of a famous talk show host was really going places. He has a job in London that he’s moving for and a wonderful girlfriend named Merrin. Then one day, the police show up and arrest Ig. It turns out he’s suspected of murdering Merrin, whose body was found showing signs of sexual assault. Months later, Ig is a drunk and overwhelmed by grief. Everyone thinks he killed Merrin, except for his brother.
Ig’s downward spiral finally culminates in a night where he gets more drunk than usual and does some very sacrilegious things. The next morning he wakes up with what he thinks is a throbbing headache. When he looks in the mirror, he sees a pair of horns protruding from his head. Like any normal person, Ig decides to go see a doctor about his new look. On the way, he discovers that his horns make people confess their darkest desires and temptations. Finally, Ig decides to use his powers to find Merrin’s killer…no matter the cost. Even if that cost is his soul.
I really loved the idea behind this book. I thought the idea behind the “confessions” was actually very clever and thought-provoking. If the people you knew had to be honest about what they thought of you, could you handle it? I kept putting myself in Ig’s shoes and wondered how I’d handle hearing what my parents and significant other thought of me.
I really recommend this book to anyone that wants an interesting read. The book does have explicit language and very adult themes/situations. Some people may find problem in how religion is handled as well. This book could be really enjoyable for anyone able to keep an open mind.
Ig’s downward spiral finally culminates in a night where he gets more drunk than usual and does some very sacrilegious things. The next morning he wakes up with what he thinks is a throbbing headache. When he looks in the mirror, he sees a pair of horns protruding from his head. Like any normal person, Ig decides to go see a doctor about his new look. On the way, he discovers that his horns make people confess their darkest desires and temptations. Finally, Ig decides to use his powers to find Merrin’s killer…no matter the cost. Even if that cost is his soul.
I really loved the idea behind this book. I thought the idea behind the “confessions” was actually very clever and thought-provoking. If the people you knew had to be honest about what they thought of you, could you handle it? I kept putting myself in Ig’s shoes and wondered how I’d handle hearing what my parents and significant other thought of me.
I really recommend this book to anyone that wants an interesting read. The book does have explicit language and very adult themes/situations. Some people may find problem in how religion is handled as well. This book could be really enjoyable for anyone able to keep an open mind.
The Innocent Sleep by Karen Perry
★ ★ ★ ★
Karen Perry wrote this book with a great deal of skill. By taking awhile to reveal some events, she lets you fall into a sense of false security that you know what’s coming. That’s when she reveals that there’s more to the story than what you thought you saw coming. I enjoyed this book. Parts moved very slowly, so I was a little caught off-guard when things sped up out of nowhere. The reveals were very interesting though and made it very difficult to put the book down for work. For those attempting to read the book and having a hard time, I highly recommend sticking with it for this. Now I’m not a huge fan of cliffhangers, so I wasn’t a huge fan of the end, but it seems like many of the other reviewers appreciate the freedom in choosing to believe what they want at the end of this book. This is a good read for those who are looking for a good book to read. However, if you’ve got a pretty extensive to-read list, I’d say throw this somewhere on the bottom and get to it when you have time.
Watching You by Joseph O'Loughlin
★ ★ ★ ★
I should start by saying that Watching You is not the sort of book I usually read. For starters, the #7 after its name really made me pause before starting. I hate starting a series in the middle and was worried that I’d have no idea what was going on or that I’d feel I was really missing out. For anyone with the same concerns, there aren’t any plot holes that you’re going to trip on by not reading the first six. The character of Joseph O’Loughlin does reference events that I assume happened in the past books, but the references are done in a way that you understand enough about what happened and how he feels to be able to understand the situation. They come off as more of a nod for the past readers but they don’t have much of a bearing on the current story. Second, I’m not a huge “detective stories” kind of reader. I picked this up because it was on a list about stalking books and the title seemed to keep that theme. It was surprising delight to find that this book had both. All in all, I really enjoy this book. It was one of the few books that I was genuinely sad to put down when I had to go to work or force myself to sleep at night. The twists at the end really caught me off-guard, as I assumed early on that I knew exactly what was going on. Michael Robotham does a great job of letting the reader know enough of what’s going on to assume they know everything, which is not the case until the last couple of chapters. I’m tempted to even try out the rest of the series now.
Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith
★ ★ ★ ★
Grasshopper Jungle is a book that you’ll only survive if you’re extremely open-minded. Even then, it’s not quite a guarantee that you’ll enjoy it.Austin is the main character and the self-appointed person in charge of keeping track of history in Ealing, Iowa. Austin has a wonderful girlfriend named Shann and an amazing best friend named Robby. Robby and Austin spend most of their days skating around Grasshopper Jungle and dealing with their sexuality. Robby is gay and Austin has absolutely no idea what he is. Except horny. Austin is horny very often. One day, Austin and Robby get beat up by the usual group of homophobes and accidentally begin the end of the world. And this is how the world ends…not with a bang but with genetically modified insects resembling a cross between grasshoppers and praying mantis. The bugs have bulletproof exoskeletons and are roughly 8 feet tall (before they start molting and growing), Like normal insects though, they’re only interested in two things….eating and procreating.
I actually really enjoyed this book. I didn’t take it seriously though so the multiple conversations about semen and naming one’s balls didn’t really faze me. If I tried to look at the book as the piece of literature it kept being passed off to me as, I could see the attempted metaphors between the bugs and teenage boys going through puberty. The book did have moments of being really clever. For some reason though, the cleverness had to be drowned in commentary about erections. It was also an interesting tool to jump from the modern parts to connect them to brief historical facts that connected different characters related to Austin or characters that lived in his periphery. It was also really interesting to watch the outbreak happen, I was just confused that Andrew Smith chose to be bold and take chances with all of Grasshopper Jungle except for the ending.
After I'm Gone by Laura Lippman
★ ★ ★ ★
One day Felix Brewer started his morning like many men do. He kissed his wife and daughters goodbye, headed out the front door, and mysteriously disappeared. As time goes by, Felix’s daughters grow and his wife, Bambi struggles to give her daughters all the designers and events she thinks they deserve. Felix’s mistress, Julie, takes the coffee shop he left her and turns it into a successful inn and an attempt at a restaurant as well. That is, until Julie disappears. Everyone assumes she left to join Felix. Then her body is found with a bag containing her passport, barren and completely void of stamps. Now Roberto “Sandy” Sanchez is trying to find out what exactly happened to Julie. And as he discovers all the secrets and twists that have been a part of all the lives of the women left behind…maybe he can find the killer and where Felix went too.This book was a random add for me. I just saw it on a list somewhere and thought it was worth giving it a try. I’m so glad I did. This book had a lot of elements that I really enjoyed. I love books that switch between multiple points of view and this book manages many transitions amongst a very diverse cast of character without ever becoming confusing or causing a “now who was this again” headscratch. This diverse cast makes it very easy to connect with different characters and creates many different opportunities to view the same conflicts from different angles. Laura Lippman also managed to create a story that shows development in all of her characters, despite the large amount of them. Even better, the majority of her characters were strong and wonderfully flawed women.
I’m not usually a huge fan of mysteries, but this book was refreshing in that there were other goals in the story besides just figuring out who killed the stripper. This is a really good book for those of you who are looking for a good book but don’t really have an idea of what to read. You can trust this book not to waste your time.
The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes
★ ★
Years ago, Kirby was viciously attacked while playing with her dog at the beach. A man cut her throat and left her to die, leaving behind only a cigarette lighter to identify him. Somehow, despite all the odds, Kirby managed to survive. Years later, she begins using her internship at a local newspaper to begin hunting down her would-be killed with the help of Dan Velasquez. Dan used to be the ex-homicide reporter that covered the case and he reluctantly begins to help her pursue a killer straight out of time.
This was such a weird book. It was great at building characters you could connect with, like the shining girls and the scenes that featured there were by far the shining moments of the book. The rest falls rather flat. Harper is neither a compelling serial killer, nor one that inspires sympathy. It’s never really made clear why the house is sending him after these girls or how it even time travels in the first place. The unnecessary romance is also remarkably uninteresting. It was a great premise and there author obviously has talent in writing strong female characters, the rest of the book just needed that same amount of spark
Death at SeaWorld: Shamu and the Dark Side of Killer Whales in Captivity by David Kirby
★ ★
One night I was sitting on my couch and trying to find something to watch on Netflix. I had heard a lot about this documentary called Blackfish so I thought I’d give it a try. Now, as a kid I LOVED Free Willy so it was understandably a little hard for me to watch the movie and see how harmful SeaWorld actually was to their whales. It was also very eye-opening to be reminded that the whales weren’t performers or animatronic showstoppers. With all the tricks that you see performed in front of you, it can be all too easy to forget that these are really animals and therefore they’re uncontrollable and unpredictable. Watching the footage of the different whale incidences made me go on to Wikipedia to find out more about Dawn and more about the other dangerous attacks that had happened prior. I was shocked to find that Wikipedia actually had a list of different whale attacks and even listed the number of incidences for each whale, including Tilly. If this had happened so often, why hadn’t I heard about it? So I went onto Google and tried to find more information. That’s how I found Death at SeaWorld.This book was well-researched and provided many more eye-opening looks into the many incidences that have happened in the parks. It makes you question why, if there are so many attacks or problems in the parks, why we haven’t heard more about them. It helps to open eyes to see how corrupt a company SeaWorld is. Now, don’t get me wrong. The book is very obviously biased. It does its best to represent SeaWorld fairly at first but with Dr. Naomi’s (from the Humane Society) story taking up such a large part of the second half of the book, the bias quickly sets in. The book also goes into FAR too much detail about various people’s childhoods and college experiences to show you how they got into their line of work. The amount of detail is wholly unnecessary and could have been summarized better to provide the same effect. It was a very educating book but, with a bit of editing it could have remained a consistently interesting book as well. Instead, this book has amazing moments where you can’t put it down and then pages where it’s all you can do not to skim to get to the good stuff again.
Above by Isla Morley
★ ★
Blythe has been kidnapped and wakes up in an old missile silo. The man who kidnaps her, a survivalist, has these crazy theories that the world is about to end and has saved Blythe to spare her the sure disaster of the apocalypse. Blythe fights to escape her prison to no avail. Her captor thinks that he is saving and only reports ruin from is visits to the surface. Blythe struggles to keep her sanity and struggles to raise the child she conceives and gives birth to in captivity. She tries to forget the world above so the child never realizes the reality of their situation. Eventually, a chance at freedom changes everything Blythe knew to be true.
I read a lot of kidnapping books. I really do. There’s something about watching these amazing characters (both real and fictional) overcome a horrifying experience and remain strong and determined to be free that really speaks to me. I’d yet to read a kidnapping book that I was disappointed with. Then I read Above. Now I really enjoyed the book at first. I loved the twist that Blythe’s captor was a survivalist. It was interesting that it was a different reason than the one’s I usually saw in books like this that led to Blythe’s capture. But things quickly went downhill near the end . It’s hard to say more without spoiling it. I just didn’t like the turn the book took. I respect that Isla Morley tried to do something different. Sometimes though, it pays off to stick with the norm.
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