Review: Exiles by Ashley Saunders & Leslie Saunders

Exiles by Ashley Saunders & Leslie Saunders
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I picked this up when it was a monthly selection for Amazon First Reads.  I almost always grab the sci-fi/dystopian selection if there is one.  This is a YA dystopian set in Los Angeles in 2052 after a massive earthquake devestated much of the city.  The population is divided into Fortunate and Unfortunates, which by the name you can deduce are those who have means and those who are barely surviving.

Twins Jade and Crys were plucked from their Unfortunate lives at 12 by billionaire genius Damon Yates who wanted to give kids a better chance at life.   He created an academy to foster Unfortunate children and turn them into Fortunate members of society through his elite academy by becoming their guardian and creating a safe space for them to learn and grow.  Fast forward a few years, when the twins are 18, Jade has left the safety of the academy and become a sort of leader of the Exiles, while Crys is the beloved adopted daughter of Yates.  When Crys best friend turns up dead, she immediately points a finger at her sister, but she uncovers something much more sinister that pionts to her beloved father figure.  To find the truth, Crys has to team up with the Exiles that she loathes and rethink everything she knows.  Jade has always suspected something was wrong at the academy, its why she left, she's just hoping it isn't too late to save her friends and get her sister back.

I enjoyed this.  It was a bit slow in the beginning as the story sets up, but the action really picks up toward the end.  There is a good discussion about class dynamics when it comes to wealth vs poverty and an even better discussion about technology and how it can be used for good and then quickly be weaponized.  I thought the science was well presented and you can tell the authors did their homework on the technology.  I would have liked to see a bit more character development.  There are alot of characters to keep track of, and I often find when the cast is so large character development tends to suffer especially in a shorter book such as this one.  The writing style was a bit choppy.  I often felt like I missed something, but it wasn't there which can lead to the reader being confused about what is going on which impacts the pacing when you have to go back and reread pages to figure out if you skipped something.  

Overall I enjoyed this, and I've already started on book two.  I'm looking forward to finding out where the story goes and how everything plays out.

View all my reviews

Review: The Stranded by Sarah Daniels

The Stranded by Sarah Daniels
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was provided an ARC of this book via Netgalley.  Thank you to Sourcebooks Fire for the opportunity to review this book.  As always all opinions expressed are my own.

This was a solid debut in a new dystopian YA series.  I don't think I've ever read a book that takes place on a cruise ship that wasn't a luxurious vacation setting.  The description of Snowpiercer meets Hunger Games caught my attention immediately, as I loved The Hunger Games, and while I've only watched a few episodes of Snowpiercer I find it compelling.  The author does a good job laying out the dystopian world and the dire circumstances that the inhabitants of the Arcadia find themselves in.  Similar to the previously mentioned titles, something bad happened and refugees have found themselves surviving on the Arcadia, some having more privilege and opportunity than others, and everyone is doing their best to make it to the next day.  

This is told from 3 POVs, Ester who is training to be a medic and hoping to attend medical school on dry land.  The top trainees in her class will be sent to school onshore to continue their training as part of the agreement they've made with the Federated States.  Ester is loyal to a fault and trusts everyone to do what they are supposed to and not break the rules.  Nik, is part of the rebellion, he's tied to Ester but she doesn't know it yet.  Then we have Hyland, the ship's head of security and a ranking officer of the Federated States.  He has a personal vendetta against the residents of Arcadia and will do anything to achieve his goals.

This has a solid plot.  I did find the pacing a bit too slow for my tastes, but it does pick up towards the end as things start to happen.  I feel like this would have been better with 2 POVs vs 3, I don't feel like Hadley's POV offered us anything that we didn't learn in conversation with the other characters.  I do feel as if there was a bit of repetition of information that caused the pace to drag here and there, but by the end I was completely invested in the rebellion and what comes next.  I do think the character development lacked a bit.  I'm hoping we get to see more development of the characters and players in the next installment.  

This is a bit on the dark side, but it is dystopian so it is to be expected.  There is violence and mention of blood thought it isn't overly graphic.  I think it would be great for an older teenage audience, I'd let my 14 year old read it.

I'm looking forward to seeing where Ester and Nik and story takes us in the next installment.  I think this story and the author have a  ton of potential and I'm looking forward to what they have instore for us next.

View all my reviews

Review: Rise of the Red Hand by Olivia Chada

Rise of the Red Hand by Olivia Chadha
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I received an ARC of this book via Edelweiss+ in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed this.  It has all of the elements of a book that I like, dystopian setting, cool tech, believable science, and interesting characters.  

The pace was a bit slow for my liking.  Given the fact that this contains all of the elements I like in a sci-fi/YA dystopian book, there wasn't a ton of action.  There is a lot of set up to get to the action parts which takes most of the book.  There is alot of information to process, but not alot of action to accompany it and when it finally does happen it sort of happens all at once and doesn't stop.  This also has an unnecessary romance which the story didn't need.  It is a bit of an insta-love situation and barely on page to begin with, so I really don't feel it added much to the storyline.

Onto the plot...We follow a few different characters trough the book Ashiva, Riz-Ali aka Kid Synch, and Taru.  Ashiva a smuggler for the Red Hand, the rebel group in the South Asian province where the population is split in to two distinct population sets.  Those deemed genetically worthy by the AI that runs everything live in luxury while those deemed unworthy scrape by however they can.  The Red Hand works to protect the weak and the poor and is working to overthrow the government.  Riz or Riza as he is mainly known throughout the book is the son of a prestigious political figure, but he hasn't taken well to the genetic implants that the wealthy all have.  He is also a hacker and finds himself allied with the Red Hand while trying to uncover information about his late uncle.  Taru is Ashiva's adopted sister, and while she has been protected for much of her life inside the Red Hand, she wants to do more to help.  The three of them each play a vital role as a fever begins to spread in the province, and the government begins targeting the poor population.  They aren't sure who they can't trust to save the innocent, but they have to work together to find a way to stop the government from annihilating the people they care about.

I believe this is part of a series, but I thought that this installment closed nicely.  While there may be more to the story, it didn't end on a cliffhanger.  If there are more books in this series, I look forward to reading them.  

I appreciated the glossary of terms at the end of the book as it really helped me to understand some of the terms and world used by the characters throughout the book.  It was at the end of the ARC copy, but I hope it is mentioned in the table of contents or is moved the the beginning of the final version as I wish I had seen it beforehand.  

View all my reviews

Review: The Grace Year by Kim Liggett

The Grace Year by Kim Liggett
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was provided an advanced copy of this book via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.  This book comes out September 17, 2019.

I really enjoyed this. I'm debating between 3 and 4 stars. I found the plot really intriguing and I had a hard time putting this down. Everyone is going to have a different reaction to this misogynistic society and the message this book delivers. There is quite a bit of violence in this book, yet the main character never gives in. There are quite a few parallels to real life in this book and it is quite disturbing.

This follows Tierney, a young girl about to leave her home for a year for her grace year. In her society, which is called the county in the book, as girls turn 16 they are sent away to an encampment in the woods to rid themselves of sin and magic. When they return, those selected to be wives of the eligible men prior to their departure are married and the rest are sent off to become laborers of some kind. Tierney is your typical "not like the others" girl. Her father has raised her unlike other girls in town to have some survival skills and thoughts of her own. Women in the county are basically property and basically just there for men's whims. They are supposed to be silent, pretty, have children, and if they stray from the acceptable norm they are punished. Punishments can be a whipping, banishment, or death. Their society is based on the Adam and Eve theory that because Eve sinned women are the root of all men's sin, and men couldn't possibly be responsible for their own actions.

When Tierney and her group get to the grace year camp, she tries to get the girls to build things that will help them survive. Most of the girls aren't interested. As their stay progresses the girls start acting funny which is easily explained by them all coming into their magic. Tierney isn't convinced and is quickly ousted from the main group. She is exiled from the camp and must figure out how to survive on her own. Outside of the camp, there are poachers just waiting for the girls to leave the safety of the gates. Not only does Tierney have to deal with potential violence from the girls at camp, but she has to evade being captured and killed by the poachers. During a particularly brutal attack Tierney finds and unlikely ally in one of the poachers. During her recovery she gets to know him and they uncover what is really going on with the girls at the camp. Determined to save as many girls as she can before they return home, Tierney becomes a bit of a rebel. She decides she will take whatever punishment awaits her when she returns home, but she is determined to change the future for future girls.

What is never really explained is why the women were ever sent on grace years to begin with. I would have liked a little origin other than because of Eve’s sin. Overall, I really enjoyed this gritty and gruesome tale.


View all my reviews

Review: Extinction of All Children by L.J. Epps

Extinction of All Children by L.J. Epps
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This is a decent start to a trilogy. It has quite a few of the typical YA dystopian tropes. The main character sticks up for what she believes in and finds herself learning that there is more to the oppressive government that she lives in than she knows. The story follows Emma Whisperer, the last child to be born and live to turn 18. Emma lives in Territory L, which is where the poor live, and no one is permitted to have children because the President determined poor people cannot afford to take care of children. If you break the law you are jailed and your baby is killed after birth. Emma is not a supporter of many of the President's laws and doesn't understand why the people have put up with the President for so long when democracy used to rule in the past. Emma is honored at a ball and when she is given an opportunity to give a speech, she says what is on her mind instead of the propaganda President wants her to say. For her disobedience, Emma is jailed for 30 days and during her sentence she learns why her family has be so oppressed, why the laws are so strict, and makes some friends and enemies during her stay. The President gives her an ultimatum to end her jail time, become a guard and take back her traitorous words or stay in jail for standing up for what is right. Emma has more than befriended one of the guards and they decide that if Emma becomes a guard, they can fight for what is right from the inside. When they learn the President wants to make a fool of Emma and hurt her family, they decide to run for one of the other territories. The book ends with a bit of a cliffhanger but it isn't too terrible.

I found this fairly predictable and that the characters lacked development. Emma wants to go up against the President but she has no idea what she stands for and she never thinks things through. I'm all for a character making decisions in the heat of the moment, but Emma is portrayed as kind of a dumb, immature girl who keeps making bad decisions and doesn't think about the impact to her family or anyone else until someone points them out to her. Then she has guilt about what she's done or is going to do after the fact. I hope that in the next two books she grows as a character and if she is going to be the leader of some sort of revolution she grows up and starts thinking things through just a bit. I also couldn't get into the love triangle, it felt awkward. The writing was a bit redundant and repetitive at times.

Overall this was OK. I have the other two books in the series and I liked it enough to continue on with the series.

View all my reviews

Review: Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve

Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I had never heard of this series before, but I saw the movie trailer and I knew I had to read the book. I enjoy YA, sci-fi, steampunk, and dystopia and this is a good mix of all of those. The plot is unique and the pacing was really good.

This is set in a futuristic dystopian setting where towns and cities are mobile and the only way for them to survive and grow is to cannibalize other smaller towns for parts and fuel. You heard me mobile cities. The main town that we follow in Mortal Engines is London and it is on tracks. I had a clear picture of London, Big Ben and all moving around on giant tank tracks kind of like a bulldozer with a big garage at the bottom with big metal saws and cranes for tearing apart its prey. The people of the city are broken up into a kind of caste system where they each have jobs to keep the city running. The higher class live on the top tiers of the city while the lower class live and work in the bowels of the city.

As with most YA sci-fi/fantasy there is a rebel faction and a political villain. There are actually a couple of villains here. I really loved the characters and the two different perspectives of Tom the apprentice historian who has thought that London was a great place and those running London were great moral characters who were doing the best for their people. As Tom is in the wrong place at the wrong time and comes to learn that all is not what it seems, he is pulled into a rebellion against London and determined to do the right thing for London and those London is after. Then there is Katherine, daughter of the head historian, who has been raised as a somewhat naive lady of London. She isn't privy to some of the dastardly deeds her father has committed in her past, but as she comes to learn the truth she is willing to right those wrongs.

I switched back and forth between the ebook and the audio and recommend both equally.

View all my reviews

Review: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
Narrated by: Wil Wheaton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really loved this. The mention of so many of my favorite movies, songs, and old games was so nostalgic for me. As a child of the 80's so many of the references were spot on and I loved it. Wil Wheaton did an awesome job as the narrator. One critique on the audio is that I could hear the turning of the pages on the edition I had, every so often I could hear the swishing of a page turning. It didn't take away from the experience or the book content.

This was such a fun story from beginning to end. I love dystopian story lines, and while at the heart of it this one isn't terribly unique and the plot is fairly convenient, I was sucked in from the beginning. Cline puts such a unique spin on it and I couldn't get enough. I loved all of the 80's pop culture references and all the techy, gamer lingo. At the heart of the story we have Wade, a struggling teen who doesn't really have much in the ugly real world of 2044. In Oasis though he can be whatever he wants to be, and like everyone else Wade is tirelessly trying to solve the mystery of keys that the Oasis game designer left behind. Wade has been at it for years in an attempt to win the prize, which will get Wade out of his pretty dire circumstances. When Wade finally solves the first of the puzzles his avatar becomes famous and he finds himself on an arduous journey through cyber-space. He makes some great friends and some even greater enemies as the best gamers continue to close in on the final puzzles and try to claim the final prize.

I highly recommend this if you are a fan of the 80's, you are a gamer, you like sci-fi, and you like nerdy techno jargon. Cline did an amazing job of blending pop cculture with science fiction and humor. I laughed so many times throughout this book. My 10 year old loved it as well, and while there is some content I would have liked to have kept him from a little longer it wasn't too mature or graphic. I'm thinking back to my Tandy 1000 days, when life was simple and Space Invaders and Oregon Trail were the best games out there.

I'm using this to fulfill one of my reading challenge prompts, A book you borrowed or that was given to you as a gift.  I borrowed the audio from the library, and I actually did read a chapter of the physical book which was also borrowed.

View all my reviews

Review: Restore Me by Tehereh Mafi

Restore Me by Tahereh Mafi
Narrated by Kate Simses (Narrator), James Fouhey (Narrator)
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I'm using this for my Popsugar Reading Challenge Prompt for a book published in 2018.  I've been waiting for this book for a while and I really liked it.  I loved the original books and their companions and I can't wait to see where the rest of the series goes.  The audio book was a great option.  I kept pushing off the e-book because of time commitments, the audio was a great option for me. I thought the narrators did a good job with Juliette and Warner and the rest of the characters.

This picks up just weeks after Ignite Me ends, Juliette is now the Supreme Commander of North America and in charge of Sector 45. She has Castle and Warner by her side to help her through the politics and day to day leadership that comes with the end of a war, but she is overwhelmed. She doesn’t quite know what she’s doing and the rest of the Reestablishment isn’t quite sure what to make of her. They send emissaries in the form of the children of the other Supreme Commanders to get to know her and attend a summit being hosted by North America. She learns new information about her past and Warners’s past. Juliette isn’t pleased by what she learns and her power surges out of control. The ending is a total cliffhanger, but we learn some pretty interesting information. I’m anxious to learn where we are headed next.

Mafi’s writing is exceptional. It is lyrical and poetic, and I love the way she tells stories. There are parts of this that are significantly more adult than the past series. There is more violence and intimacy, and the writing is beautiful. This book is significantly more character driven than plot driven. There is a plot twist at the end, so I suspect the next book will be more plot driven. There isn’t much world building; I suspect this is because the world doesn’t play much into the story quite yet. This almost feels a bit like an origin story.

The characters are so broken in this. It makes them feel different than what I remember from the first series. They grew in the first set of books and they were strong at the end of Ignite. Here they have let the trauma set in and they are broken and insecure again. It is like they are starting over and letting all of that self doubt back in. Juliette doubts all of her abilities, Warner is a mess, they have communication issues, and their relationship suffers. I do like how we get excerpts from Juliette’s journal to give some perspective on her inner monologue and Warner addresses his anxiety issues. Kenji is now the comic relief, which I appreciated, he was really funny and the story needed that. We don’t get much Adam in this, and when we do he is also broken. I do like some of the new side characters. As a fan of the original series, I really enjoyed this new installment and I’m looking forward to the remaining books. I suggest keeping an open mind when reading because it isn’t the same, but it is still good and fans will still enjoy it.

View all my reviews

Review: Our Dark Duet by Victoria Schwab

Our Dark Duet by Victoria Schwab
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I have to say I was kind of stunned by the ending, but it was perfect and the book was excellent. I listened to it on audio and just couldn't put it down. Victoria Schwab is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. Her writing is dark, emotional, and just fantastic.

We pick up several months after we leave Kate and August. Kate is in Prosperity, a city rumored to have no monsters, but Kate has become a monster hunter. She has found herself a group of friends who have named themselves the Wardens and they hack into the city's systems at night and help Kate fight what goes bump in the night. Kate finds a new monster, unlike anything she has ever seen before, dubbed the Chaos Eater, and it infects Kate. Kate fights the monster's need to invoke fear and chaos into the humans around it so it can feed for the entire book. The monster flees to Verity and Kate follows. Meanwhile, August has take up Leo's role as head Sunai in the FTF in the fight against the monster population in Verity. He is at war within himself to be the monster his brother wanted him to be, the monster the people need him to be, and the human he wanted to be. We also get to know Soro, a new Sunai, who while a monster provides some great non-gender representation. Soro is referred to with they and their throughout the books, and there is a section when August asks if Soro is male or female and Soro says they just are. I really liked that especially since this is YA. I would have loved to see more of Soro and Ilsa in the book, but they probably could have novels of their own.

August and Kate have been thinking about one another since they parted ways and when they are reunited, August is not the same. She challenges him at every step to be the boy she once knew, while he challenges her as he always did to make more rational decisions. With both of their worlds unraveling the friends must find and battle this new monster, Sloan the monster from their past that Kate thought she killed, and Alice her own personal nightmare.

I loved the characters in the series. I loved Kate and August throughout the series. The development of the characters, family ties, and friendships among all the characters was excellent. I loved the life lessons in the book.  I would have liked a bit more on the Chaos Eater and the Wardens.  Overall, I really loved the series, and I'll be looking to add these books to my permanent collection soon.  Therese Plummer did an awesome job with the audio!

Review: The New Dark by Lorraine Thomson

The New Dark by Lorraine Thomson
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  This book will be released on November 1, 2017

I requested a copy of this because it sounded really interesting and I will say it has alot of good plot elements and ton of potential. I felt a bit mislead by the summary.  It unfortunately just didn't deliver for me, I felt there were many things that were under developed and I just didn't engage with the writing style. The writing was a bit disjointed for my taste and I often felt like I missed something. I found myself going back to see if I skipped a page or missed a paragraph where something happened only to find that the information was simply not there and you had to infer what happened. Fortunately there normally enough context clues to figure out what was going on, sometimes I was just left confused.

I like dystopian settings, and this has an interesting twist where people are living in city environments and in the wilderness fending for themselves but there are mutants. I would have loved if the mutant aspect was explained, the author mentions viable and unviable children but never really explains what that means and how mutants came to be. Typically in dystopian or post-apocalyptic books, there is some long forgotten event that caused society to be in whatever situation they are in, but the main character Sorrel often speaks of her grandmother who lived in the Before time and taught her about things Before. It would have been nice to get an explanation about what occurred the transition from the Before to the After only recently happened and there are people living in the present time that actually know what happened.

Onto the story, the story begins in the town of Amat, a wilderness community where the people live off the land and get on pretty well. Our main character Sorrel is a presented as a brooding teen, when her village is attacked by mutants. The town is destroyed, most everyone is killed, and Sorrel just barely escapes. Sorrel's little brother is taken by one of the mutants and she is determined to go after them and avenge those she's lost. She also hopes to find some of her townsfolk alive, especially David, the boy she likes.  David and Sorrel's relationship is a plot point that was misleading in the summary.  They are described as boyfriend and girlfriend.  I have to disagree.  While they do clearly like each other, they aren't actually in a relationship.  They say a few words to each other in the beginning of the book, but then they spend the rest of the book trying to get back to each other.  Everyone is trying to keep them apart, but they were never actually together.  But I digress...

Sorrel ends up in this creepy cult town with the people called the Free. They are led by Martin, who made my skin crawl, I think he was supposed to have that effect. The Free believe that everything Martin says is law and that he can do no wrong.  It is pretty creepy.   I give Thomson credit for the icky feeling I got when I read this part of the story since it definitely delivered on the creep factor.    David along with everyone else the mutants left alive are sold into slavery by the mutants, while Sorrel's brother Eli is being well cared for by his new mutant protector. Sorrel eventually escapes Martin and the Free with the help of, Einstein, a mutant the Free were keeping captive and torturing. Sorrel and Einstein end up in the town of Dinawl in an attempt to find David and Eli. As you can imagine, she finds nothing but trouble and she also finds a resistance movement. Still fueled to find those she loves, she puts her trust in the resistance movement and begins to fight for the future.  Sorrel has a birthmark and it resembles something from the Before so she decides to something akin to Katniss and the Mockingjay from the Hunger Games.  The face of the revolution and the change that needs to happen to overthrow the corruption in society.  That part was fine but nothing we haven't seen before.  I found Sorrel to be irritating and immature, and I just don't see her being a revolutionary that saves the world as she is.  She has alot of growing up to do yet.