Reviews

Thursday, July 24, 2014

Book Review | "Beyond Jealousy" by Kit Rocha

This week's review is a day late (oops!)- I have a good excuse though! I took yesterday to finish up my camp NaNoWriMo draft and didn't want to type anymore when I finally had time to type my review.
Anyway, today I'm reviewing "Beyond Jealousy" book #4 in the "Beyond" dystopian romance series by Kit Rocha. I have reviews here on the blog over the last two novellas released in this series and I mention my thoughts about the first three full-length books in various wrap-ups on my Youtube channel which are still available to watch.

Before I get into my review, here's the book's description from Goodreads:
Beyond Jealousy (Beyond, #4) She’s been looking for the perfect man. She found two.
When Rachel Riley sacrificed a life in Eden to protect the O’Kanes, she earned her place in the powerful Sector Four gang. But the former crime princess is tired of being everyone’s sweet little sister . It’s time for her to get wild, to embrace her fantasies as only an O’Kane can—with a delicious exiled soldier and the gang’s wickedly sinful tattoo artist.
A saint...
Lorenzo Cruz is a warrior, taught by his commanding officers in Eden that involvement equals distraction. Emotion is a liability, and desire a sin. In Sector Four, he finds decadence, shameless sex—and his own dark urges. No battle strategy prepared him for how Rachel makes his heart race…or the way his rival for her affections sets his blood on fire.
...and a sinner.
Ace Santana has a dirty reputation and a mind to match, especially where his new lovers are concerned. He’s eager to help Cruz embrace his dominant side, and to explore the lines between pleasure and pain with Rachel. But corrupting them quickly becomes an obsession, a need he can’t deny—and a love he never imagined.
 
Three hearts on the line means a hundred ways their ménage a trois could go wrong. After all, even O’Kanes do forever two-by-two. One of them could be the missing piece that makes them all whole…or a temporary diversion destined for a broken heart

Okay, so this love triangle has been building since the first book when it was still just Ace and Rachel, but it was easily the most difficult to write well. It's a very complicated poly-amorous relationship that could easily have been all sex and no substance. I think the ladies behind the Kit Rocha name did a really good job of writing a story that would make their fans happy...for the most part. 
I didn't buy Ace and Cruz's feelings towards each other the way Rachel was interpreting them. It never felt like they had feelings for each other that weren't platonic. In fact, I felt like they loved each other like brothers, and because of that, their was a definite competitive feel I got that *spoiler* disappeared towards the end so their story could wrap up the way people would want it to. I mean, their competing with each other has been beaten into readers' brains since Cruz showed up, I felt like the ending was too neat considering that.

Ace is a character I've been looking forward to reading about for a while, but I didn't sympathize with him so much. I felt he needed to suck it up, every other paragraph was him saying he would mess everything up so why not do something on purpose, or how he was the platform for Cruz and Rachel to develop their relationship...

The book definitely leaves off on a cliffhanger that will have fans of the series dying to read the next book, which is set to be out soon, but as of now has no official release date. 
I definitely think if you've enjoyed the series so far, you should check it out, but it's my least favorite of the stories I've read in this universe so far.

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Review | "Cats, Scarves and Liars" by Kathryn White

My review this week is over a book that I won on Goodreads, published earlier this year.
My quick thoughts were: I liked it, it was quirky, but it definitely wasn't perfect.
Here's the Goodreads description:

Cats, Scarves and Liars Meet Peppa Grove.

Peppa is just your average Australian young woman, really. 23 years old, widowed and owner of a cat who can speak perfect English. (But no one will believe her about the cat.) Why is she being stalked by one of the customers from her job at the City South Post Office? What secrets does the mysterious Ivory Black know about Peppa and her past? What does he know about the strange murders that are happening all over Adelaide? And was it really necessary of him to steal her boyfriend's scarf?

Cats, Scarves and Liars is a quirky, offbeat tail tale from a unique Australian writer. You'll laugh, you'll cry you'll discover the meaning of life. (Actually, we lied about that last part.)



So as the cover states, this is meant to be an offbeat thriller, and it is!
Peppa is quirky, though a little immature and simple minded at times. The storyline is zany and out there, similar to "The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" (perhaps a controversial opinion) but in an obviously different genre.  It was a quick read, and I'm glad I got the chance to check it out.
That being said, I had three issues that I find worth bringing up here. 
There were a decent amount of typos. Most being spelling and word order. That's a line edit, and it doesn't take away from the story, but it is noticeable. 
The storyline gets pretty predictable rather quickly. I was barely into the story when I guessed how things would play out, which were more or less correct. 
The book description gives away some major plot developments that don't pop up until much later in the book (which is only around 180 pages long to begin with).

Over all though, I liked it. It wasn't exactly a thriller in my opinion, but then again, I don't know if it was supposed to be. It's a light book that's quick to get through. It's quirky enough that you can almost entirely look past some of the character faults (a few characters seem borderline deranged). 
Looking at the book's prices, I would recommend reading it in ebook format, especially if you just want to try it out, but it's available in print both on amazon and the book depository if you're interested.

Sunday, July 13, 2014

A Break From Booktube?

This post is going to be about something I've been contemplating for a while, and that something is maybe it's time for me to stop booktubing for a while.
I've been uploading videos since January of 2010 when I was sixteen years old, and three and a half years later, I'm still doing it. My videos are shorter now, and with fewer spoilers while giving more insight (in my opinion, at least), but the problem is, I don't get the joy out of doing it that I used to.

Now, this decision isn't due to any one thing. It was a culmination of different things that I've noticed.
In 2010, when I began making videos, booktube was still fairly new. It wasn't even called booktube at the time. There were just a handful of people making videos.
Along the way, many people stopped, a few made other channels, but a lot of the channels I watched in the beginning don't exist anymore.
This isn't supposed to be a post about nostalgia, but I'm using that as a point that I saw the evolution of booktube. I've always been a bit on the fringes of the community, which perhaps hurt me in the long run as far as channel growth and making friends goes, but it also allowed me to be a sort of outsider watching things change.
Booktube has become a large community now, and I love that. I love that there was a booktube panel at Vidcon, and I love that so many people are sharing their love of reading. However, as with all things, the massive positives that come with growth are accompanied by some negatives. It's a fact of life.
There have been cliques formed within the community, and it's sort of become like other Youtube sects, that you have to be friends with the big guys on campus to feel like you matter.
I am in no way trying to villainize anyone or claim that people don't deserve their subscribers. I would just like to point out that, as nice as book lovers are, it's not as equal a playing field as some would like to make it seem.
That alone, wouldn't bother me. I began noticing that shift over a year ago, and I have very clearly kept making videos. And this isn't supposed to be a "rant" about booktube either, so I'll move on.

Another negative to a growing community is the amount of new attention that comes in. A.K.A. the 'haters' or 'trolls'. They're all over the place, and I won't say they weren't around before, because they were. There was a period around six months after I began making videos when many people quit due to hateful comments. However, I've noticed there have formed fan bases, and like many fan bases, there will be those who will belittle or insult anyone who isn't their favorite. This has absolutely nothing to do with the booktubers that these people enjoy watching. I know they would never condone such things, and the hate comments aren't a problem normally. You can always brush it off as someone who happened to find booktube and is just trolling for some fun. What bothers me is when clear fans of reading make fun of or insult other book lovers. That just creates drama and tension that don't need to exist and furthers the separation between the "popular" content creators and the "less popular" ones.

The last reason is probably the most relevant: I don't have time to prioritize something I don't enjoy doing anymore. I'm nineteen, to sound like every commencement speaker: I'm on the cusp of life. There are things to be learned, and plans to be made that will end up taking over a lot of my time. Between potentially moving soon and working on my writing so I can eventually (hopefully) be a published author. I love reading, I prioritize reading, but making and editing videos has begun to feel like a chore. And to piggyback off the last paragraph, I've begun to feel like "Why should I have to put up with hate and continue to put time into doing something that I'm not enjoying?".

I don't know how long of a break I'm taking yet. It could be a week, a month. I may never post another booktube video, or I may begin a new channel like some others have been doing recently, or I might cave and film a video this Friday. I just know I need to be away from creating for a while. I still love reading, I still love booktube and I'll continue to keep watching. I'll also be keeping up with this blog, but I won't be posting videos. For a little while, at least.

Wednesday, July 9, 2014

June Wrap Up

Book Review | "Dream Student" by J.J. DiBenedetto

I was sent an ebook copy "Dream Student", the first book in an already completed series, by the author. In exchange for a review, and my quick thoughts are that: it was a really fun story, pretty original (I haven't read too much that deals with dreams) caught somewhere within the realm of a realist fantasy which I think becomes more apparent as the series continues. However, the writing execution wasn't the greatest (not that unexpected considering the series is the author's first published work and writing is a skill that takes so much practice to get good at), and therein lie most of the problems I had with the book.
 As always, here's the Goodreads description:

Dream Student (Dreams, #1)What would you do if you could see other people’s dreams? If you could watch their hidden fantasies and uncover their deepest, darkest secrets…without them ever knowing?

Sara Barnes is about to find out. She thought that all she had to worry about was final exams, Christmas shopping and deciding whether she likes the cute freshman in the next dorm who’s got a crush on her.

But when she starts seeing dreams that aren’t hers, she learns more than she ever wanted to know about her friends, her classmates…and a strange, terrifying man whose dreams could get Sara killed.

“Dream Student” is the thrilling first installment of the Dreams series.


So like I said, I had some technical issues with this book. The writing was a little unnatural and at times seemed abrupt and rushed. Very much like a first draft. There were unnecessary tangents and some inconsistency with details at times.While other times there were word choices that could be misconstrued if someone didn't just read the book for a quick story. (Ex. She wants to control the relationship, the way her boyfriend comes across at first.)
I felt like there were quite a few moments in the book that were intended to serve as an extra push that this could be realistic and that Sara has a real life regardless of the story arc, but they just kind of seemed out of place sometimes. 
I couldn't get behind Sara if I tried to analyze her as a character. She is supposed to be this very intelligent girl, and she reasoned through certain things like she was either half a step from being deranged or like a six year old. At one point she actually blames herself for certain events that occur because she helped a friend. I can understand the reasoning, but the wording of her feelings make it seem like she regrets her actions. 

Like I said, the storyline is fun and makes me want to continue the series eventually, but the writing isn't the best so I would recommend going into this without the intent of analyzing or thinking too critically. If you can look past the execution, the plot saves things a bit.

Wednesday, July 2, 2014

Review | "Cryptic Spaces: Foresight" by Deen Ferrell

This week's review will be over another book I won in a giveaway on Goodreads a few months ago. "Foresight" is the first book in the young adult fantasy/science fiction series "Cryptic Spaces" and it's, so far, the only book released.
It's a complicated storyline, so here's the Goodreads description:

Foresight (Cryptic Spaces, #1)
Willoughby sees patterns where others don't. His brilliance in mathematics allows him to uncover puzzles hidden in plain view. When a carved symbol leads him to the barbershop of Antonio Chavez, he finds himself in a world where nothing is as it seems. His friend, Antonio, is far more than a mere barber. Captivated by the famous and beautiful Sydney Senoya, he learns of a musical talent that can reach beyond the living. His new friend, James Arthur, proves to have strange healing powers. Even feisty T.K., their crew liaison on the company yacht, has startling secrets to hide. Determined to uncover the truth behind the supposed seer, Nostradamus, the team finds itself lost across the corridors of time, fighting for their lives. Does Willoughby alone, have the skill to save them?

 If that synopsis made sense to you, congratulations, because to be completely honest, I reread it multiple times before I started the book and still had no idea what the storyline was about going into it. That being said, I liked the book. I gave it three stars, but it would be closer to 3.5 in my opinion. There were obviously some things that bothered me, so I'll get into those.
Right off the bat, I noticed some detail inconsistencies/moments in the books that didn't fit with the storylines (a big example is a much older character wanting a much younger character to kiss her). There were a lot of characters to keep track of, having not only multiple protagonists but multiple villains as well, all of which starts to make more sense towards the end, but in the beginning, it can cause the reader some confusion. 
I noticed a lot of filler dialogue that didn't seem natural and there were phrases that were a little nonsensical (i.e. "graceful as a stuffed avocado") which solidifies the Alice in Wonderland throwbacks that I was seeing in the book, but also made for some eye-rolls while I was reading. 
The main climax of the book seemed very abrupt and all of a sudden the storyline split into multiple perspectives, making it seem like two different books in a series rather than one storyline that flows together. The ending was a little campy with all the different elements that were thrown into the book. 
Overall though, I liked it- yes, it was very clearly the first book in a series. The entire reason the action seemed so abrupt was due to the fact that so much time needed to be spent building the sci-fi/time travel elements as well as letting the reader get to know the team. It was a fun read, but there's a pretty big cliff-hanger ending, so I'm not sure I would recommend reading this unless you're fairly certain you'll want to stick with the series.