Looking for Alaska by John Green

I really feel like I should hate this book.

I mean, come on. It's pretentious. It has characters which don't resemble real people in the slightest but are quite clearly characters. It has the typical 'nerdy boy falls in love with beautiful but troubled girl' cliché. There are so many reasons I should hate it.

But I don't.

John Green is an author I have avoided for a long time. This is partially because as I understand it, his books follow the pattern of 'quirky teenagers do fun things and ponder life for a while before unexpected tragedy hits and then they ponder some more', and also partially because I swore I would never read The Fault in Our Stars. So far, this pattern has rung true. But hey, I was feeling curious.

Looking for Alaska was pretty much what I expected. Fortunately it was so well-written that I couldn't bring myself to hate it, despite its obvious faults. I plan to read a few more John Green novels out of sheer curiosity so it will be interesting to see how long this tolerance lasts. Also, this book surprised me with the actual event since it wasn't what I expected (though it probably should have been) but not with the reason for it which I guessed fairly early on, making the second half drag somewhat.

One thing I do want to raise though-Alaska. She is the perfect example of the shy, awkward guy's dream girl. Beautiful but bitchy, mysterious and tempting. I am so sick of people like her in fiction. It's the standard 'save the damsel' dream and it needs to stop. Alaska is an even more perfect example because she dies before the main character can figure her out, thus preserving the mystery girl fantasy. 

Ultimately, Looking for Alaska is not the kind of book I approve of but I couldn't help but find it strangely entertaining. It's well-written, the characters are mostly likeable (if not realistic) and the plot is palatable enough. Should you read it? Eh. I won't advise it but I won't hold it against you if you do

Overall Score:

.5

Teeth by Hannah Moskowitz

What a strange, fascinating little book.

Teeth has been described as a modern day fairytale and yes, I suppose that's an apt enough description for it. The book starts with the main character, Rudy, moving to an island where they have magical fish which can keep people alive and it only gets weirder from there. He befriends a merman fishboy by the name of Teeth and the rest of the story is about the problems of that friendship. Well, I say 'befriends'. The relationship is actually hinted to be much stronger than that and one of the stranger parts of the book is the fact Rudy seems to lack any concern about being in love with a fishboy. Well, that and the fish rape.

Yeah. There's fish rape in this. Just go with it.

Anyway, my point is Teeth is a weird book. It's surprisingly dark in parts by which I mean, the darker side doesn't really mesh well with the rest of the story. Having said that, the story on the whole is really dark so maybe it's the writing style which doesn't work so well. Either way, I enjoyed the darkness but something wasn't quite right. Also the main character was never quite horrified enough by what was happening to Teeth so maybe that was part of the issue too.

This is a dreamy little book though and one I think it's very easy to enjoy if you like that sort of thing. The characters are more realistic than most tend to be in this style of fantasy/fairytale and that is quite impressive in itself. The blurb is a little vague but essentially, if you love fantasy stories with a fairytale-esque feel then I see no reason why you shouldn't enjoy this book

Overall Score:

.5

Pink by Lili Wilkinson

Oh, this book had such potential.

I like its concept, I really do. There are plenty of books about the shallow popular girl embracing who she really is and becoming different. I suppose that really this is just another story about a girl in high school finding her place (maybe that's why it disappointed me) but the protagonist Ava is already a gothic lesbian who is super alternative and hip. Rather than tell the story of someone realising they're gay, this story focuses on someone who is a lesbian trying to work out whether that's what they really are. I like the idea that it's just as okay for someone to change their mind and want to be like a stereotypical teenager as it is for someone to decide they want to be different. There's nothing wrong with wearing pink and being 'popular' if that's who you really are. Or at least, I think that's the message the book started off with.

Oh book, why did you have to let me down?

Here's my main problem with Pink-Ava is a goddamn idiot. Okay, so she changes schools so she can start again and find herself. That I can sort of accept for the sake of the book. But after that it's all downhill. She suspects she's not 100% lesbian so what does she do? Decide that straight away she's going to try to get a boyfriend at her new school. Without a trace of guilt or even a second thought spared for her current girlfriend who she claims to really care about but apparently not enough to care about cheating on. Sure, when she eventually does cheat she reacts with mild horror. But it's not like it was a surprise! She's been planning to cheat for about 50 pages by that point and only now is she thinking of her girlfriend???

Another part of Ava's plan is to get in with the popular kids. Miraculously, she manages it on her first day with three of the most popular girls in school taking her under their wing. So far so good. But oh no, all the popular kids are in the musical and force her to audition! After embarrassing herself at auditions, Ava decides that is it and she must resign herself to hanging out with the losers of the school...despite the fact that actually, none of the popular kids care that she failed her audition. Seriously, no one mocks her for it, her new friends aren't bitchy in the slightest and yet for some reason she acts as though they're being the stereotypical bitch squad of the fictitious high school world.

Okay, so Ava joins the loser squad and continues to mope for most of the book even though a) she still hangs out regularly with the popular kids and b) the loser squad is awesome. Ava mopes and mopes until the third act of the book starts and suddenly everyone is a bitch!

No, really.

Queen Bee girl starts playing the part (which seems really weird and out of place given how nice she is for the rest of it) and her girlfriend Chloe also dials up the bitch and makes unreasonable demands so the plot can justify Ava cheating on her. The whole thing is very messy and feels totally wrong since these aren't the characters we've been reading about the whole book. After everyone goes briefly mean, in rolls the (kinda) happy ending and almost everything is resolved/reverted to the status quo.

I say almost everything because surprise surprise, Ava doesn't actually get with the blatant loser love interest that she pretended not to be interested in the whole time even though she clearly was and he clearly liked her which explains why he was being so weird and distant and erratic. Nope, Ava actually insists that since she doesn't know what she wants, she just wants to be friends with the guy until she's figured out whether she likes boys or girls.

Erm, bisexuality is a thing book. Stop acting like she has to make some big choice, she's entitled to like both! It's actually more common than you think.

Anyway, I would like this ending except for the fact that Ava hasn't been able to make up her goddamn mind the whole book and so it just comes across as her being incredibly indecisive, as well as leading the guy on. She waits until he's confessed his love and she's confessed hers before saying that she doesn't want to be with him and even after he says he doesn't care if she changes her mind later, she still says no. This is a perfectly understandable course of action but my problem is with the execution. Instead of seeming smart and practical, Ava just seems to wimp out.

Ultimately, my main problem with the book is that at the end, Ava hasn't really learned anything. Sure, she fixes all the problems she caused (plus a few she didn't) but ultimately she's in the same position at the end that she is at the start. She still doesn't have a solid friendship group, she still hasn't figured out her sexuality and she's still moronic in all her basic decisions. Honestly, I could accept her being an idiot so long as by the end, she realised how idiotic she was. Instead we just have a story about an idiot who doesn't grow and doesn't really do anything remarkably worthy of a whole book.

I feel like I've been very harsh throughout this review so I would like to say that I didn't hate this book. The side characters were interesting and pretty varied, a welcome change from the usual cookie-cutter losers in high school fiction. I liked that the popular people weren't all bitchy and vapid. Sadly though, I couldn't help but be annoyed by it more than I liked it. In the end, its merits did not cancel out its faults.

Overall Score:

.5

The Hit by Melvin Burgess

Melvin Burgess is one of those authors I've always meant to read but somehow never got round to doing so. Many of his books are about intriguing, flashy topics and The Hit is no different. It's the tale of revolution and a little pill called Death that can give you the best week of your life on the condition that you die at the end of it.

It's an interesting enough idea (though Burgess admits it wasn't his) but sadly this book is lacking. While it's entertaining enough, the characters feel very...flat. They have personalities but a third person narrative combined with no focus on their emotions makes them seem very distant to the reader. This could be because the characters weren't Burgess's either but until I read another of his books, I can't really say whether this is the case.

Also the main guy Adam is just an asshole. I found it very difficult to root for him or even care about what happened to him much because he was such a douche. Lizzie was slightly more compelling but again, underreactions to her situation made it hard to relate to her. Less detailed characters could be acceptable if the plot was strong enough to carry the book but honestly? It's decent enough but you get the feeling it could have been so much more. A lot of the book is people talking about the revolution and how things are going to go/have been going with the occasional angry mob mentioned in the background. With the exception of the opening scene, the characters are never actually in an angry mob. The only people actively involved in the revolution are side characters and their role is very small in comparison.

The writing style too was annoyingly simplistic. I did wonder if maybe it was aimed at the younger side of YA fiction but the bleeped-out swearword on the front and the frequent mentions of sex/drugs suggest otherwise. Perhaps the simplicity is just the author's style, I don't know.

All in all, The Hit didn't wow me. Maybe the fact it wasn't the author's story made it suffer but either way, it fails to deliver the excitement the blurb promised. Is it bad? No. But the whole thing feels very meh.

Overall Score:

Gerald's Game by Stephen King

Holy crap.

Let me get this straight. I have read a lot of Stephen King books. He's one of my favourite authors and his particular brand of weird just appeals to me. I can honestly say that Gerald's Game is the one book of his that has actually managed to scare me and I mean, really scare me.

I'm not entirely sure why this is. On the surface, this is a simple tale. A woman gets handcuffed to a bed during sexytimes but things quickly go awry when her husband dies, leaving her trapped and alone. What follows is tense survival mixed with psychological horror and a dash of the supernatural. Along with trying to escape, the protagonist Jessie must also cope with trauma from her past and a mysterious figure who visits her at night.

This book made me tense in a way I rarely feel with books. I read almost half of it in one sitting it was that engaging, and the only thing that made me put it down was sleep. There's not really much else to say about this book. It's told in King's usual style and there are a lot of his trademarks present so if you like his work then you'll probably like this. One thing to warn you about though is how brutal this book is. It deals with a very sensitive topic in a graphic way which could make it hard to read for some people. There is also a very graphic violent scene near the end which I actually had to read in chunks it was so disturbing. These parts only add to the book for me (horror should be horrifying after all) but it is worse than most of King's stuff and it might be too much for some people. If you're not into that sort of thing then I suggest looking up spoilers before reading to make sure you can stomach it.

My only other comment is that the ending does drag somewhat. I'm very glad for the bit after the main story and the light it casts on the plot but I guess for some people it might 'ruin' the horror a bit. Overall though I found it very hard to find fault with this story. One of King's best.

Overall Score:

.5

Biggest Flirts by Jennifer Echols

Another bit of summer fluff here...or is it? Well yes, it is. But it's very good fluff. I was somewhat torn throughout reading this book. On the one hand, it is so very close to basically having an Idiot Plot. On the other hand, the author just about saves it.

Okay, so the blurb of this book is a little misleading. There are quite a few pages before we even get to the yearbook titles thing and really, the story isn't about the titles at all. But I understand the author is making this a series and the yearbook titles are the glue holding it together so I'll let that slide. Really, this book is a romance pure and simple. It is about nothing more than the relationship between Tia and Will and, while this would usually be a bad thing, remarkably, it works.

A lot of this is down to Tia's character I feel. She is immensely likable, outgoing and free from all the petty insecurities/complaints most female YA characters sadly have. In short, she's just fun.

Will is equally well-crafted. He's not quite as likable as Tia perhaps but he's definitely well-rounded and seems realistic. In fact, all the characters in this book are extremely well done. My only complaint is that side characters didn't get more of the limelight but given that the sequels are apparently going to focus on them, that could be excused.

Sadly this book's plot is what lets it down. Will and Tia can't be together because Tia doesn't want a boyfriend for almost justifiable personal reasons. They flirt, get together, break up for 180 odd pages and while it is handled far better than it could have been, it's still not entirely thrilling. I was also startled by the abruptness of the ending which just came out of nowhere. Again I'm torn though because would dragging it out longer really have been much better?

Overall, Biggest Flirts is one of the better attempts at YA romance I've seen. It's fun, the characters are engaging and while there is some hints of an Idiot Plot, the characters themselves do not actually behave like morons. As far as fluff goes, you could do a lot worse.

Overall Score:

.5

Tease by Amanda Maciel

Suicide is a popular topic for YA fiction. You know what else is a popular topic? A pretty girl's fall from grace. Tease tells the story of Sara Wharton, a typical high-school bitch who may have accidentally bullied a girl called Emma to death and now must deal with the consequences. Sadly, this sounds far more interesting in principle than its execution.

Okay, so really Tease is split into two stories-the present where Sara is dealing with the consequences and the flashbacks to the past when the bullying was actually occurring. I have to say, the chapters set in the past are far more interesting than the other half of the book. The present-day chapters deal primarily with Sara's lack of guilt (which I'll come to later), the potential lawsuit she faces and her falling for the outcast boy. None of these are particularly engaging or indeed, interesting. The popular girl falling for the outcast boy once she herself becomes an outcast is way overdone and frankly, Some Girls Are already did it much better. In this book it just sort of happens, with little resistance or development. The chapters set in the past however are the real story and I found myself skimming the present chapters to get back to the far more varied past.

My other main issue was with Sara's character. As I mentioned before, present day Sara has almost no remorse for what she's done. In fact, she doesn't even think she's responsible in any way. This doesn't really change by the end of the book and, while I can see the reasons behind the depiction, it does have the unfortunate side effect of not making her particularly likable. I hate to refer to Some Girls Are again but that book has a perfect example of how a character can be an unlikable person and yet still be sympathetic and ultimately good beneath it all. Sara...not so much. Her breakdown at the end doesn't feel genuine and it doesn't really excuse 200 odd pages of bitter denial.

Those two factors aside, Tease is an okay book. It isn't groundbreaking and doesn't really bring anything new to the table but it's told decently and the other characters are somewhat interesting. I can't help feel that there are many other books which have done this better though and if I'm honest, you should probably read one of them instead

Overall Score:

 

Insurgent by Veronica Roth

No matter how good a book might be, if it's the middle book of a trilogy then it is very likely that the whole thing will just feel like a setup for the exciting final. Now Insurgent manages to avoid this to some degree (or at least better than some series do). It has its own plot and while admittedly a lot of it is setting up for what seems like an inevitable war in the third book, enough happens that it isn't boring. Unfortunately it's not particularly memorable either. A lot happens but it isn't stuff which has a great impact on the overall story. The first third of the book is running away, the second third is trying to get something and the final third is the realisation they can't get something only for it to turn out to not matter anyway.

I had some problems with book Tris which I mentioned in my first review and sadly they only seem to grow more numerous with this book. Firstly, Tris is suffering from gun phobia after killing her best friend in the first book. This is perfectly understandable but it does mean that Tris becomes a teensy bit more useless in terms of things she can do. She also turns suicidal for a while which could work if it was handled better. Sadly all it does is make Tris seem whiny. And even more useless.

Okay, so one thing I did like about the first book was that it didn't have the dreaded love-triangle found in the majority of YA fiction. Is this still the case? Well...it's hard to tell. Technically there isn't a love triangle but there are a few hints towards Tris and Uriah (yes, I know he has a girlfriend but still) and they usually follow scenes where she's had some kind of dispute with Four.

Ah yes, Four...what happened to you? I'm not sure what it was but he seemed a lot flatter and less likable in this book. Aside from being far too harsh on Tris, he just seemed douchier in general. For me to root for him as a love interest, he's going to have to have some serious development occur in the third book.

Overall, Insurgent is basically the same as Divergent. It's an interesting enough story, not really amazing but probably worth it if you like this sort of thing. My only main problem was with the ending which was treated as some big twist despite the entire book building up to it and it basically already being revealed. I shall read the final book but only to see how it ends. So far I can't say I'm enamoured with the series.

Overall Score:

Divergent by Veronica Roth

Okay, I admit it-I'm a bad book blogger. I went to see Divergent before reading the book...and I'm very glad I did. The movie Divergent is a refreshing take on the YA genre with a female protagonist who isn't afraid to kick butt and a romance that takes a backseat to the far more pressing matters of mass extermination and the threat of war. Sadly, the same cannot be said for the book Divergent.

 Tris is a girl who has grown up living in a world where everyone gets neatly sorted into groups based on their key personality traits. Unlike everyone else though, Tris is divergent which means that the test which does the sorting doesn't work on her. Instead she gets to choose her faction and spend the rest of the series wondering if she made the right choice.

It may sound like your standard YA dystopian stuff and for the most part, I guess it is. While movie Tris was pretty badass and had better things to focus on than her lovelife, book Tris sadly does not. Instead we get page upon page of her fretting about Tobi-I mean Four, the cookie cutter brooding bad boy of this series.

Don't get me wrong, Divergent is not a bad book. It still has a fairly engaging plot (which admittedly drags a bit) and the heroine does have to make some tough choices which are a lot darker than those found in say, Twilight. It's just a disappointment after seeing a movie which was a breath of fresh air to then go and find out that the book is more of the same. I would definitely recommend the movie but if you want to know whether you should check out the book, really I'd say it's up to you. There is nothing particularly special here but if you like dystopias then I see no reason why this one is any worse than any of the other hundreds upon the shelf. At least it spares us the grief of a love triangl-

Oh wait. There's a sequel. What are the odds we'll escape it the second time?

Overall Score:

 

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

Oh, I was so excited to read this book.

I'd heard great things about it. It's so rare to find a genuinely funny book and all my friends had raved about it, I was so sure I would love it. It sounded exactly like my cup of tea with a humorous narrative style and playfully absurd characters. And to be fair, it is both of those things. It did make me laugh at times, it made me smile a lot and I can't say I didn't enjoy reading it.

I just wish it had more substance.

I can hear the cries of anger now. 'But that's not the point! It's meant to be a funny book, you're not supposed to take it seriously!'. And okay, I get that. But I'm sorry, a book, a movie, anything should still have something to say. You should still finish it feeling like you've gained something simply from experiencing it. Can I honestly say I gained anything from Hitchhiker's?

Let me make this clear, I don't hate this book by any means. It was enjoyable, it was fun and it killed some time. But about three-quarters of the way through I realised it wasn't going to turn out to be the clever thing I'd been hoping for and that, coupled with a lack of a proper ending, meant I just couldn't love it. I'm sorry sci-fi fans. I know I should know better. But this book simply wasn't for me.

Overall Score:

.5