A Guide to Movie Based Video Games, 1982–2000 by Christopher Carton

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher Pen & Sword in exchange for an honest review.

As a video game researcher, I am always on the hunt for books about games. I love to learn and I was very excited when I saw this book available. The title tells you exactly what you are in store for-a guide to movie-based games created in the pre-2000s era.

I will admit, this book wasn't as entertaining as I'd hoped. I think not being alive when these games came out (for the most part) limited any kind of nostalgic enjoyment I could get out of it. I found some sections interesting (such as the Disney and comedy movie ones) but there wasn't a lot of commentary about the games themselves, which meant that if I didn't care about the intellectual property then there wasn't a whole lot to keep my interest.

Having said that, I think this book is very informative and seems pretty thorough. I imagine anyone who has nostalgia for these games would get a lot more out of it than me, and I am very excited for the next instalment which will cover the games I played myself. I recommend it for anyone who is curious what games exist from this time period, or for someone looking for a trip down memory lane

Overall Rating:

.5

The Other Side of Never edited by Marie O'Regan and Paul Kane

 

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher Titan Books in exchange for an honest review.

This is such a solid premise for an anthology and I was really excited to read it. It feels like there's been a recent trend of 'Peter Pan but creepy', with my absolute favourite Lost Boy by Christina Henry standing out among the crowd. I am pleased to say that The Other Side of Never is a worthy contributor.

As with any anthology, you get the good ones and the not so good ones. I think this starts off a little weak with many of the initial stories being confusingly told or hard to follow. Sometimes a story would end and I wouldn't get what the point was as nothing had really happened, and these were the most frustrating. But after the first few, the quality improved greatly for me and there were some real enjoyable finds here.

I would say my favourites were A School for Peters (kind of disjointed and not the best told, but I liked the idea behind it) No Such Place (a fantastic thematic interpretation of the source material and one of the easiest to follow) and The Lost Boys Monologues (again, disjointed but had some good ideas behind it).

Overall, I enjoyed this anthology a lot and I am looking forward to reading the Alice in Wonderland one even more so now. I do think that in general, this series of anthologies does need a bit more editing. It does seem to be a consistent problem that stories seem either unfinished or near incoherent, and it is a shame when some of them are so enjoyable. Hopefully they will continue to improve

Overall Rating:

Lord of the Fly Fest by Goldy Moldavsky

 

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher HarperCollins UK Audio in exchange for an honest review.

This book is completely different tonally than what I was expecting from the cover. This looks kinda like a horror/thriller, but really it's a straight contemporary in tone. Lord of the Fly Fest is a retelling of Lord of the Flies, shifted to be a YA comedy. Our protagonist Rafi runs a true crime podcast and decides to attend the next big music festival, Fly Fest, to try and interview popstar River Stone. River's girlfriend went missing and Rafi is convinced he killed her, though her conviction looks more like she has a crush on him at times.

As mentioned, this book is pretty much a straight comedy. One of the main model characters is called Hella Badid, the name that made me realise I wasn't getting the horror I wanted. It's also way more like Lord of the Flies than I expected, with characters and some (loose) plot elements being lifted from it. This may sound odd and if it does, that's because it is. The end third of the book tries to ramp up the serious plot developments with increased comical farce, and the result is very hard to get what the author was going for.

Once I got over my disappointment about the lack of horror, this book was fine I guess. It feels a little dated already, making fun of influencers and popstars in a way which feels very 2016. Characters are often clear parodies of real people (Hella Badid, James Charles -> Jack, Harry Styles -> River Stone) and it all feels a bit mean. The main character is mocked mercilessly for running a podcast, even though podcasts are mega popular and tons of influencers either have their own or frequently guest on them.

I will say, I really enjoyed the audiobook. I think the narrator does some fun voices for the characters, and it was a lot more palatable to hear the humour than it would have been to just read it on the page. If you do decide to pick this up, the audiobook might be the way to go.

Ultimately, this book was a fun time but it's a big step down in my opinion from Moldavsky's other work. I also think it needs clearer marketing to avoid disappointed readers

Overall Rating:

Five Survive by Holly Jackson

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher HarperCollins UK Audio in exchange for an honest review.

I have long given up on finding a YA thriller which will genuinely surprise me, and sadly Five Survive is no exception. Having said that, this is a genuinely enjoyable listen and is by far one of the best examples of its genre.

Five Survive is the story of a group of friends on their way to spring break when they get caught in a nightmare situation. After going off road, a sniper shoots out all of their tyres and holds them hostage. Their only hope for escape is for them to correctly identify the secret the sniper wants, and potentially sacrifice that person to the sniper.

As mentioned, this book did not surprise me once. I think it is painfully clear from the first few chapters why the teens are held hostage, as well as a few other 'reveals' from later on. It would be nice if a few of these story elements were masked a bit better because it does undercut a lot of the tension.

The main strength of this book is the characters and the tension they provide from being trapped. Oliver in particular is a super interesting character, and Red herself made for a reasonable enough protagonist. I do think there was scope to develop characters even further. Maddy in particular is very important to the narrative throughout, but we barely learn anything about her despite her being Red's best friend. They never speak independently of the group or really interact properly, which seems super weird.

I had a few issues with the audiobook specifically. Some of Red's inner narration is quite annoying when it is read aloud to you, though I think this would be better in print. Several times the narrator says a line and then the speech tags say a completely different delivery (for example, shouting a line then following it with 'Maddy said quietly') which was just jarring to listen to.

Overall, I think this book would be very much enjoyed by a teen audience but it doesn't have much reach beyond that. In terms of YA thrillers, it is one of the better ones out there. I would probably recommend the text version over the audiobook, just because of the minor narration issues I pointed out

Overall Rating:

.5

Baby by Annaleese Jochems

 

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher Scribe UK in exchange for an honest review.

It feels almost criminal to give a book like this 3 stars because it is anything but average, but I am not sure how else to represent my feelings about it.

Baby is the very weird story of two women who spontaneously decide to run off together. One of them is a 21 year old named Cynthia, who acts more like an 18 year old. This boat is sort of her dream, and most of the book focuses on things from her perspective. Anahera is her older ex-yoga instructor turned mother figure turned inappropriate crush. The book focuses on this very uncomfortable relationship dynamic, as well as what happens when they are joined by a mysterious man who upsets their dynamic.

This book is incredibly unique and not entirely coherent. I think I wanted a more coherent experience to be honest; I love stories about dark female friendships, and this had a lot of promise, but it remains a little too out there and disconnected from reality for any of the unpleasant elements to hit right. Cynthia is a deeply disturbed woman who is emotionally juvenile. You never quite learn what Anahera's deal with, which I think is a real shame. There are hints that Cynthia's viewpoint is skewing things at various points, but it's missing that other side which would really make the horror-esque elements hit home.

The other thing to mention about this book is that it's incredibly disgusting with its description. I get nauseated quite easily and large passages of this book were deeply unpleasant, with no real reason for it. There's a lot of stuff revolving around physical description or bodily fluids that I could have done without.

Finally, the ending was the most disappointing aspect of this book for me. If it had a punchier ending, I think I would have given this book 4 stars despite its flaws. But it just kind of ends with no real bite, and while I get what it was going for, I wanted something more.

Overall, I think there are books which do this concept better (Social Creature springs to mind) but I can't say I regret reading it. It's a bizarre time and I think it will stand out in my memory for that fact alone. Some people will absolutely love this book because it's not the kind of story you can be 'indifferent' to really. If you think you might be one of them, give it a try

Overall Rating:

Dead Lucky by Andreina Cordani

 

I received an ARC of this book thanks to NetGalley and publisher Little, Brown Book Group UK, Atom in exchange for an honest review.

What a great surprise this book was!

Dead Lucky is the story of Maxine, a content creator whose world gets turned upside down when a video of her fellow influencer Xav being murdered on camera is posted online. Her friends don't seem too interested by it but she is worried that there is more to the video than it seems, and so she decides to investigate with the help of her new friend.

I adore thrillers about influencers and I hoped this would be a fun read, but it ended up exceeding my expectations. Dead Lucky is the rare YA thriller which is actually very good, with interesting characters and a fun examination of what it means to be famous as a teenager. The story is split between Maxine struggling to investigate Xav's death while she juggles being famous and unhappy, and segments set in the past when all the characters originally decided to start a video channel. Maxine's struggles seem very genuine, and in fact all the characters as a whole are pretty grounded. This is something many YA thrillers fail at and it was part of what made the book so enjoyable.

The writing style is also a strength of this book, and it is surprisingly funny. Maxine had a strong voice as a narrating character and it made her really likeable.

Overall, I would definitely recommend this book if you find the blurbs of a lot of YA thrillers intriguing, but then find they never live up to those premises. This is a rare exception and is absolutely worth checking out as a result.

Overall Rating: