Gold Star Review: Fox Forever

Fox Forever
by Mary E. Pearson
The Jenna Fox Chronicles, book three

Book Description:
Locke Jenkins has some catching up to do. After spending 260 years as a disembodied mind in a little black box, he has a perfect new body. But before he can move on with his unexpected new life, he’ll have to return the Favor he accepted from the shadowy resistance group known as the Network.

Locke must infiltrate the home of a government official by gaining the trust of his daughter, seventeen-year-old Raine, and he soon finds himself pulled deep into the world of the resistance—and into Raine’s life.

Review:
What an amazing end to the trilogy. I've loved Jenna Fox's story from the start and Pearson ended Jenna and Locke's story masterfully. The entire series has been thought-provoking, emotionally intense, and impossible to put down. The final book lived up to its predecessors without fail. Locke's journey was both exciting and introspective. It's sort of impossible to thoroughly review this book without giving spoilers for books one and two, but I do need to say that the bad guys get their due, Locke finds the love he truly needed, and Jenna finally finds the closure that her life had been lacking. All around an amazing story and Pearson deserves a GOLD STAR not only for this book, but for the entire trilogy.

The only other trilogy that I've read that I feel is as strong as this one is Neal Shusterman's Skinwalker Trilogy. If you haven't read those, go pick up Everlost right now!

Review: Scarlet

Scarlet

by Marissa Meyer

The Lunar Chronicles, book two

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Book Description:

Cinder, the cyborg mechanic, returns in the second thrilling installment of the bestselling Lunar Chronicles. She's trying to break out of prison--even though if she succeeds, she'll be the Commonwealth's most wanted fugitive.

Halfway around the world, Scarlet Benoit's grandmother is missing. It turns out there are many things Scarlet doesn't know about her grandmother or the grave danger she has lived in her whole life. When Scarlet encounters Wolf, a street fighter who may have information as to her grandmother's whereabouts, she is loath to trust this stranger, but is inexplicably drawn to him, and he to her. As Scarlet and Wolf unravel one mystery, they encounter another when they meet Cinder. Now, all of them must stay one step ahead of the vicious Lunar Queen Levana, who will do anything for the handsome Prince Kai to become her husband, her king, her prisoner.

 

Review:

I loved Cinder so much that I was actually a little nervous to read this book. However, I need not have been worried! Meyer manages to blend both storylines so well that both Cinder and Scarlet become and stay compelling heroines. This gives me great hope that the series will continue to be EPIC.

 

Anyway... Cinder's storyline continues to be intriguing and at the moment heartbreaking. In the chapters that alternated (one for every two or three Scarlet chapters) interspersed into the larger story, we get to see Cinder escape from prison and continue to learn more about her back story. As much as we learned here, I can't wait for the next book (Cress, 2014) to find out even more - what Cinder can do, who can help her, how exactly she became who she is today.

 

Scarlet's story not only brought in new characters, but also added dimension to Cinder's tale. We find out more about Queen Levana's plans and what she has in place on earth. Wolf's character is both there for his overall "hunkiness" and to help move that plotline along rather nicely. You can really see Meyer's talent as a storyteller and worldbuilder. Things that seemingly have no connection end up building upon one another to create a more fleshed world.

 

A fantastic addition to the Lunar Chronicles series.

Review: A Confusion of Princes



A Confusion of Princes

by Garth Nix



Book Description:
You'd think being a Prince in a vast intergalactic empire would be about as good as it gets. Particularly when Princes are faster, smarter, and stronger than normal humans. Not to mention being mostly immortal.

But it isn't as great as it sounds. Princes need to be hard to kill—as Khemri learns the minute he becomes one—for they are always in danger. Their greatest threat? Other Princes. Every Prince wants to become Emperor, and the surest way to do so is to kill, dishonor, or sideline any potential competitor. There are rules, but as Khemri discovers, rules can be bent and even broken.

Soon Khemri is drawn into the hidden workings of the Empire and dispatched on a secret mission. In the ruins of space battle he meets a young woman called Raine, who challenges his view of the Empire, of Princes, and of himself.

But Khemri is a Prince, and even if he wanted to leave the Empire behind, there are forces that have very definite plans for his future. . .

Review:
I have to say, sadly, that I was disappointed in this book. I LOVED all of Garth Nix's other books and so I was *super* excited when I found out this one was on its way. I loved the premise and I thought it was going to be amazing.

Unfortunately, though the premise is indeed intriguing and I liked the setup of the book very much, I found myself completely losing interest just over halfway through. I made myself continue, though, and found the ending to be quite good. It was sad that really it was the introduction of romance into the story that seemed to derail it for me...

I wish it could have been what I hoped.

Review: The Drowned Cities

The Drowned Cities

by Paolo Bacigalupi

 

Book Description:

In a dark future America where violence, terror, and grief touch everyone, young refugees Mahlia and Mouse have managed to leave behind the war-torn lands of the Drowned Cities by escaping into the jungle outskirts. But when they discover a wounded half-man--a bioengineered war beast named Tool--who is being hunted by a vengeful band of soldiers, their fragile existence quickly collapses. One is taken prisoner by merciless soldier boys, and the other is faced with an impossible decision: Risk everything to save a friend, or flee to a place where freedom might finally be possible.

 

Review:

I had heard how great Ship Breaker was...it won awards, even... but I just hadn't had time to read another dystopian book in the last year or so that wasn't already high on my priorities list. Well, I'm gonna have to make time to go back and read it now, because the companion book was stellar.

 

 

This book is set in a dark, war torn dystopian United States (well, what's left of it, that is...). It is gritty and violent and compelling. There is no romance and really little hope. Yet... you read continuously searching for the seeds of hope and finding little hints that it may yet be there to find.

 

 

Reminiscent of the darkest portions of The Hunger Games, Bacigalupi is an author for those readers who do not want their gritty future tied to romance... this is for a more hard core, action seeking science fiction reader. 

Review: Partials

Partials
by Dan Wells

Book Description:

The human race is all but extinct after a war with Partials—engineered organic beings identical to humans—has decimated the population. Reduced to only tens of thousands by RM, a weaponized virus to which only a fraction of humanity is immune, the survivors in North America have huddled together on Long Island while the Partials have mysteriously retreated. The threat of the Partials is still imminent, but, worse, no baby has been born immune to RM in more than a decade. Our time is running out.

Kira, a sixteen-year-old medic-in-training, is on the front lines of this battle, seeing RM ravage the community while mandatory pregnancy laws have pushed what's left of humanity to the brink of civil war, and she's not content to stand by and watch. But as she makes a desperate decision to save the last of her race, she will find that the survival of humans and Partials alike rests in her attempts to uncover the connections between them—connections that humanity has forgotten, or perhaps never even knew were there.

Review:

Feel like you are tired of dystopians, yet? If so, I'd say give Partials a chance and see if it restores your faith in the genre. I love dystopians, really love them, but with the influx to the market right now, it is easy to get burnt out! I'm finding myself having to be much more careful in my selections and having to space them out between books from other genres to give myself a mental reboot. However, I really, thoroughly enjoyed Partials and would read a sequel from this author in a heartbeat!

This book had a great premise and followed through with realistic fallout. I loved how not only had the human population been decimated by a virus (that they essentially unleashed upon themselves after creating the Partials superhuman army...), but that they then also had to deal with their inability to reproduce successfully and how their society dealt with the prospect of dying out. There were LAYERS of things going on here!! LAYERS, people.

Kira was a great heroine. She was tough, she fought for what she believed in...she made dumb mistakes and she was scared sh!tless sometimes, but she also inspired change! She was a gamechanger. She thought outside the box. In a word, she was awesome. I would take Kira on my side against the world, any day!

Full of action, great observations of people and not only how they react singly to important events, but as a group, with a really strong main character... Partials is a dystopia I recommend to all that love the genre. It makes my top three dystopians list!