Book Review: Oppression

Book: Oppression
Author: Jessica Therrien
Genre: SciFi/Fantasy, Romance (YA)
Rating: 5/5
Page Count: 346 (Paperback)
Favorite Character: Probably Elyse, I try to stay away from picking the main character, but I really loved her.

Plot: (From Goodreads)

Elyse knows what it means to keep a secret. She's been keeping secrets her whole life. Two, actually. First, that she ages five times slower than the average person, so that while she looks eighteen years old, she's closer to eighty. Second, that her blood has a mysterious power to heal. For Elyse, these things don't make her special. They make life dangerous. After the death of her parents, she's been careful to keep her secret as closely guarded as possible. Now, only one other person in the world knows about her age and ability. Or so she thinks. Elyse is not the only one keeping secrets. There are others like her all over the world, descendants of the very people the Greeks considered gods. She is one of them, and they have been waiting for her for a long time. Among so many of her kind, she should not be very remarkable--except for the prophecy. Some believe she will put an end to traditions, safeguarded by violence, which have oppressed her people for centuries. Others are determined to keep her from doing just that. But for Elyse, the game is just beginning--and she's not entirely willing to play by their rules.

Review:


I wasn't expecting this book to have as much depth as it did, I even enjoyed how it ended, no crazy cliffhangers. I liked the characters, all of them really, and I had fun guessing who was descended from who before it was revealed. (I was right a good number of the time, I have a love for Greek Mythology). Anyway, though, this book is pretty short, at least on my Nook it was only about 200 pages, but there is a lot of story in those pages. But it wasn't overwhelming, which is what I was hoping for.

I love a good, well written, book based on Greek Mythology. And this is definitely one of those, but I'll stop raving about it now. I'd recommend it to people who like Greek Mythology or people with "superpowers" or hilarious/lovable characters.

Book Review: Book of Shadows

Book: Book of Shadows (Wicca #1)
Author: Cate Tiernan
Genre: Paranormal Romance/Urban Fantasy (YA)
Rating: 2/5
Page Count: 176 (Paperback)
Favorite character: I guess, Morgan. None of them really stuck out enough for me to pick a favorite.

Plot: (From Goodreads)
Morgan and her best friend, Bree, are introduced to Wicca when a gorgeous senior named Cal invites them to join his new coven. Morgan falls for Cal immediately and discovers that she has strong, inexplicable powers.

Review:

It was okay, I mean, it entertained me during the short time it took me to read the book, but it just annoyed me at the end. Maybe because pretty much everything in this book I've read before, except for the fact that they're modern witches practicing Wicca. Wicca is an interesting religion that a lot of people don't take as for what it is, thinking they're worshipping the devil or something, so I'm always interested to see how it's portrayed in the book. And there are many places this could of gone, but it was too short.

At the end, the last scene, I felt that it should of been the climax of the book. And I'm all for cheesy things, I love cheesy things, this was not cheesy. It was just overused. That doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it, though, it wasn't word shaking or anything, but it held my attention. I may even read more books in the series, but I won't be reading all of them, there is a lot.

Overall, it was okay. "Okay" and "interesting" seem to be the only adjective that come to mind for this book, it wasn't bad, but it just wasn't great. So if you like witch-y stuff and don't mind fainting and some awkward scenes that just seem weird or out of place, then you might find it entertaining, too. The mythology of the witches is interesting and I'd like to learn more about it, but it's just one of the redeeming qualities I found.

I don't enjoy posting reviews when I didn't like the book, I want to like books I read, I want to love them, but I'm going to try and continue this series, so I thought I'd get my thoughts out and organized about this one. Maybe the rest in the series get better, here's to hoping. Have you read this book or series? Did you love it? Think it was okay? Or even hate it? I'm curious. (It has an overall ratings on Goodreads of about 4/5 stars, so I want to know why people liked it so much.)

Book Review: Born Wicked

Book: Born Wicked
Author: Jessica Spotswood
Genre: Historical Fantasy (YA)
Rating: 5/5
Page Count: 330 (Hardcover)
Favorite Character: Cate. I just really liked her.

Plot: (From Goodreads)
Everybody knows Cate Cahill and her sisters are eccentric. Too pretty, too reclusive, and far too educated for their own good. But the truth is even worse: they're witches. And if their secret is discovered by the priests of the Brotherhood, it would mean an asylum, a prison ship--or an early grave.

Before her mother died, Cate promised to protect her sisters. But with six months to choose between marriage and the Sisterhood, she might not be able to keep her word... especially after she finds her mother's diary, uncovering a secret that could spell her family's destruction. Desperate to find alternatives to their fate, Cate stars scouring banned books and questioning rebellious new friends, all while juggling tea parties, shocking marriage proposals, and a forbidden romance with the completely unsuitable Finn Belastra.

If what her mother wrote is true, the Cahill girls aren't safe. Not from the Brotherhood, the Sisterhood -- not even from each other.

Review:

Witches. I love witches, so I might be a tad biased in that area. However, this was a very good book. I liked the writing, how their powers worked, and that this book went ways that surprised me. It's been a while since a book surprised me as many times as this one did and it made me excited. The characters, also, were all so different and, I thought, likable. And they surprised you, which is what people do. Their powers, though, were interesting to read about. How the spells were derived from Latin and how they could be spoken out loud or done nonverbally. And, of course, how they were related to their emotions. They were written well, though, and in a consistant manor, they were fun to read about.

And the historical aspect was done well. And the history of witches, the burnings, was interesting. I live in New England and that made me a little more interested in how the author would incorporate the witch trails, if at all. Overall, I'd recommend this book to people who like witches or historical fiction with a bit of a paranormal twist. There's even some romance sprinkled throughout, which was just perfectly done.

In My Mailbox (2)

It's Sunday and I bought books this week and even got one from Netgalley, so I thought I would give you an IMM. This week all the books I bought were from Barnes and Noble, but I'm going to listen them. (In My Mailbox is hosted by Kristi at TheStorySiren)

Amazon(independent seller):
The Colorado Kid by Stephen King

NetGalley:
A Greyhound of a Girl by Roddy Doyle

Barnes and Noble:
Embrace by Jessica Shirvington
Hearts in Atlantis by Stephen King
The Dead Zone by Stephen King
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
You Have Seven Messages by Stewart Lewis
Birthmarked by Caragh M. O'Brien
Merlin: The Raging Fires by T.A. Barron
Merlin: The Seven Songs by T.A. Barron

Those last two books are book 3 and 2 in the Merlin series, which is about Merlin before meeting Arthur, when he was very young. And Embrace is a new book, it just came out, I haven't gotten a chance to read it yet but it looks really good. A Greyhound of A Girl from NetGalley is one I've already finished. I gave it 3/5 stars but my review will be up closer to the release date, which is May 1st.

I seem to have fallen back into Stephen King, too, I hadn't read anything of his in a while and I'm currently rereading one of his books I haven't read in a while. Which is one of my favorite books and since I couldn't remember a couple things that happened, I thought I needed to reread it again. Speaking of King, I also got The Colorado Kid because I just finished Season 1 of Haven and wanted to read it. Also, I had to hunt for that book very hard.

I hope you had a good book week, also. And just an awesome week overall, it's good to be back in the book world, I've missed it.

Book Review: Interview with the Vampire

Book: Interview with the Vampire (Vampire Chronicles #1)
Author: Anne Rice
Genre: Horror (Adult)
Rating: 5/5
Page Count: 342 (Mass Market Paperback)
Favorite Character: Claudia.

Plot: (From Goodreads)
The time is now.

We are in a small room with the vampire, face to face, as he speaks, as he pours out the hypnotic, shocking, moving, and erotically charged confessions of his first two hundred years as one of the living dead. . .

He speaks quietly, plainly, even gently . . . carrying us back to the night when he departed human existence as heir--young, romantic, cultivated--to a great Louisiana plantation, and was inducted by the radiant and sinister Lestat into the other, the "endless," life . . . learning first to sustain himself on the blood of cocks and rats caught in the raffish streets of New Orleans, then on the blood of human beings . . . to the years when, moving away from his final human ties under the tutelage of the hated yet necessary Lestat, he gradually embraces the habits, hungers, feelings of vampirism: the detachment, the hardened will, the "superior" sensual pleasures.

He carries us back to the crucial moment in a dark New Orleans street when he finds the exquisite lost young child Claudia, wanting not to hurt but to comfort her, struggling against the last residue of human feeling within him . . .

Review:

This wasn't what I expected. I've started this book before, twice, and I just couldn't continue. I had to be in a certain mind set for it and needed the physical book, I think. It's just such a wonderful story, well, it is if you don't mind all the killing and such. I love vampires, really, I love learning about their worlds' mythology of them, so to read about some "old school" vampires was nice. These aren't the vampires that the loner girl falls in love with, these are the vampires that will rip that girls throat out and it's refreshing. (But I love those vampires, too. Shh don't tell Louise!)

This is, of course, an interview with a vampire. Louise. And that's, I think, what had me worried going into this book, but it doesn't make the story any less then it would of been, it might even make it better, because the person who is interviewing him rarely interrupts. This, of course, isn't a book for everyone. It's very dark, especially when Claudia comes into the picture, but it is an amazing story. So if you don't mind of blood, a lot of blood, and killing, then, I'd suggest you pick up this book.

This Blog

I know that there haven't been many posts here since the beginning of the New Year and I truly apologize. I've been playing catch-up with school, I'm almost there, and Haley has been doing school things, too, but of a different nature. I don't know when Haley will be returning to the book reviewing world, but I'm going to try and post one or two posts a week here. Not just book reviews, but also IMMs(or just book hauls) and all other kinds of things. I have a couple of posts in the works already, I've been keeping a list of posts I want to do.

For example, I want to do some recommendations, but I don't know how I'll do it yet. Maybe one post with just 3-4 books, or a post about a certain book I really liked and want people to know about. What do you thinks? I also have some books that I want to post reviews for. I was in a huge reading slump and I've finally broken it recently, such a relief.

Also, our rating system has been letters, but I'm going to change how I rate things. Mostly because I feel like letters aren't really very precise. So we're going to go with good old fashion stars. (Or books, 5 our of 5 books, or ballons or whatever you wish to think of it as) And it's going to work with 5 bring that I loved it, 3 being it was okay- not great or amazing - and 1 being I didn't like it. 4 and 2 will be used as in betweens. 'I liked it but it didn't have anything to make me love it.' Or 'I didn't really like it, as a whole, but it did have redeeming qualities that made it a bit better.


Casey, who hopes that you're still around.

TBR Reading Challenge

I just signed up for this because I think it's a really good idea. I mean, it's good to read new books and everything, (for example, I'm also signed up for the Debut Author Challenge), but this one gets some books I've been meaning to read for a long time, read. I'm going to aim for the 11-20 level, and if I pass 20, which seems crazy at the moment, then I'll just try to complete the next level. (If you'd like to take part in this challenge HERE is where you can fine it)

I'll be posting my list of books in the "Book Challenge" tab on the blog. Right up there. Also, right below here, along with the books I've read, is going to be a list of books I want to read that would fulfill that challenge requirement. If I did a full TBR list, it would be hundreds of books long because I want to read a lot of things.

TBR:

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle
Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin
AND MORE...


Completed TBR Reading Challenge Books:

1. A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle
2. The Sign of Four by Arthur Conan Doyle
3. Love is the Higher Law by David Levithan (REVIEW)
4. Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice
5. Book of Shadows by Cate Tiernan