Book Review - Lies

Lies by Michael Grant
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

After really loving the first couple of books in the series, I found myself almost indifferent to this one. Yes, everyone is still stuck in the FAYZ - Fallout Alley Youth Zone - under the invisible dome with the nuclear reactor at the center, where everyone over the age of 14 vanished one day, leaving kids to fend for themselves. Yes, they're still starving. Yes, they're still infighting. No, no one has made any progress on either diplomacy or finding an exit or anything else for that matter.

I just felt like there was no story progression, and I was sincerely depressed by the "stuck" quality of the main characters. While one of the major threats was removed in the last book, it appears to be back again here, which really means no progress was made. I felt, in some ways, like the plot took a step backward here instead of progressing, and I found myself less inspired to go on with the series. (As such, I'm taking a break rather than plowing through them all as I usually might do).

My overall reaction? Meh.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Gone

Gone by Michael Grant
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

When you were a kid, did you ever fantasize about what the world would be like if all the adults suddenly vanished? I know I did! Unfortunately for the kids of Gone, the adults - everyone over the age of 14 - do vanish, in one moment, and leave them behind to deal with survival, both for themselves and the infants and toddlers that are suddenly in their charge. The struggle inevitably leads to a fight for power and control between two factions, one led by a bully from the private school in town, one led by an unassuming natural leader from the public school.

Along the way, things get strange when kids develop powers, possibly due to the nuclear reactor in town, or maybe a meteorite that hit the area several years ago, or maybe a strange power that lives in a gold mine and calls itself "The Darkness", or maybe the green scary thing with teeth. I think it's a combination of all of the above, but the answers aren't found in this, the first novel in a series.

I found this to be a fun, quick read. I love the character of Astrid, or "Astrid the Genius" as she's known among the kids in this community, because she's smart and charming, which makes her a hero in her own way (along with the tender way in which she looks after her four year old autistic brother). I like that the book is smart and engaging in the way that makes you forget you're reading a YA book.

Were there a couple of moments that made my brows arch and my suspension of disbelief stretch a little thin? Yeah. But that happens to me often; I'm a bit of a realist. However it wasn't to the extreme and wasn't to the point where I didn't really enjoy the book.

When you get to the last eighty pages or so, be prepared to plow through to the end; you won't be able to put it down!

View all my reviews

Book Review - Caught

Caught by Harlan Coben
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I didn't discover Harlan Coben until late last year, and as I ease through his books (I have quite a selection waiting for me now on my eReader) I find myself wishing I'd found him years ago.

This is a solid mystery/suspense novel. It's captivating, kept my attention, and had a wonderful twist at the end that I wasn't expecting. Yay, a surprise! Too often I figure out all the twists way before the end, so I always try to point out the spectacular reads where I don't.

There is a cloud hanging over the head of a group of men who were freshmen suitemates at Princeton decades earlier. A college scandal, swept under the rug, seems to have spawned new scandals that are decimating lives left and right. One intrepid reported, instrumental in one of those scandals herself, is determined to get to the bottom of the crisis, as well as figure out why a young girl from her son's graduating class at the high school has disappeared. Is it connected? Is one of the men responsible for her disappearance? Or perhaps it's the mastermind behind all the scheming?

This was fun. It isn't literary or profound, it's just entertaining and fun and a fast-paced read. I really liked it.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Mr. And Miss. Anonymous

Mr. and Miss Anonymous by Fern Michaels
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Okay, so I didn't love this book. It went just a tiny bit too far with a little weirdness I couldn't reconcile.

Mr. and Miss. Anonymous is the tale of two donors - college students who make those extra few bucks they need to pay tuition by donating sperm and eggs to a fertility clinic near the Berkley campus. They both eschew the offered counseling, and find themselves suffering from terrible regrets twenty years later, when they run into one another at an airport while heading back to Berkley for a fundraising event. Their paths had only crossed briefly when they were students, but they never forgot one another. While in the airport, footage of a school shooting comes on the news and a child that looks remarkably like the gentleman donor is billed as an escapee of the melee.

The two set off to find out where there donations wound up, breaking all kinds of laws along the way, and track down the kid who looked so familiar on TV. Along the way they uncover a huge plethora of conspiracies, corrupt government officials, hitmen, scary old men, and ghosts.

Yeah, it was the ghosts, of all things, that bothered me. I couldn't figure out why they had to muddy the waters of my nice, neat little mystery novel.

It was an okay read, but nothing spectacular, and left me feeling a bit unsettled.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Identity Theft and Other Stories

Identity Theft and Other Stories by Robert J. Sawyer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

What a wonderful surprise this book was.

I grabbed it at the library, on impulse. I didn't even read the blurb before grabbing it, and I was surprised to find that it was sci-fi (I think I expected some kind of mystery/thriller from the title!).

Not only sci-fi, but sci-fi with a noir detective. It would be an understatement to say that my last foray into fiction with both of those elements did not go well. (A vast, vast understatement of epic proportions. So much so that I would have thrown this book aside if it hadn't been dark, and if I hadn't already been tucked into bed and wary of waking a snoring husband).

Boy am I glad I gave this book a chance. It was awesome! Funny, smart, witty in all the right ways, full of action, and kept my interest the whole way through. Yep, I loved it. Go figure.

View all my reviews

Book Review - I've Got Your Number

I've Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Why, hello Flavia!??

Okay, confession time here - this was an audiobook read for me. And the voice actor is the same person who narrates the Flavia De Luce series - all of which I've also listened to on audiobook. As a result, I found myself often thinking "how did Flavia grow up and get engaged and where are her sisters and-" well you get the picture. This may or may not have coloured my impressions of the book. I can't really tell.

While this was a fun, chicklit romp of a novel, I did find it to stretch it's credibility at points with me. I can understand exactly how a romance can develop, in this digital age of ours, through emails and texts. I can sort of understand how you might find a discarded cell and take control of it, at least in an emergency and at least for a few hours. What I can't understand is why the owner of that phone, when they discovered you had it, wouldn't cut off service to it. I also can't understand some of the developments later on in this book that just made me blink and go "Whaaa?"

I like Kinsella's books in general,and there are many that I consider solid, fun, five star reads. This was not one of them. There were a few plot inconsistencies, some character development that seemed totally off-base, a few bizarre twists that made me roll my eyes, and some very not-real moments. That said, there were also some genuine laugh-out-loud moments, some very witty dialogue exchanges, some interesting, quirky characters, and some down-to-earth, very real moments too.

With all that said, it left me smack in the middle of the road. I did like the book overall, but didn't love it. I would recommend it maybe as a side read, but not to someone who doesn't have a lot of time to read and wants their books to have real punch. It's okay. And sometimes that's enough.

View all my reviews

Book Review - Attaching in Adoption

Attaching in Adoption: Practical Tools for Today's Parents by Deborah D. Gray
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I've read so many adoption books in the last couple of years that they are starting to run together in some respects. They often give the same advice, in different words, and to that degree, this book is not much different from others I have read. And yet, it kept my attention riveted much more so than most of the others.

The reason? Well, I suspect that it's the real-life vignettes that pepper every chapter. It's difficult to imagine, before you are even in these situations, what it might really be like to face the challenges that professionals outline. However, when you're reading the stories of real parents and real children, it hits home in a different way than a list of possible problems and therapies does.

Attaching in Adoption gives a clear, concise outline as to what issues children may face, the different stages of attachment and how children react when attachment bonds are lost during each stage, and how to attach to children in any of those stages, including those who are having attachment difficulties. Some problems are of course exacerbated by additional problems, such as delays in development and/or affects from neglect, abuse and more, and this book also covers those issues, as well as the scary buzzword that throws fear into the hearts of all adoption-hopeful parents, "RAD."

This book was interesting, but I'm afraid I didn't retain as much of the information as I should have. I'm going to read it again once our kids are home, to hopefully absorb the information most pertinent to them in a more thorough manner. Going in and not knowing what issues we're going to face makes it all very overwhelming, but I appreciate that this author sees no situation as "hopeless" and gives practical methods to overcome all attachment obstacles.

View all my reviews