Posts Tagged 'new york city'
Book Review: Flex by Ferrett Steinmetz (Series, #1)
May 30, 2016 opinionsofawolf	Leave a comment
'Mancy (magic) is illegal in this parallel world where people find their obsessions turn into magical powers. Paul Tsabo has spent his life fighting to keep 'mancers off the street and instead brainwashed into a military force. See, the universe hates magic, and if you use it too much, it will retaliate. By doing things like destroying Europe. So the brainwashing is safer. The only problem is that Paul has found himself obsessed with bureaucracy and has developed into a bureaucromancer. A series of unfortunate events leads him into agreeing to make Flex–magic distilled into crystal form for the non-magical to get high on. Paul has officially turned into what he once hunted.
This is a pretty cool concept. It sounds like it'll be Breaking Bad: Urban Fantasy Style. Unfortunately, a lack of world building and a lack of focus in the plot made the book fall flat.
Let's start with what I liked. The concept of how magic comes to be is pretty neat. I like the social commentary that magic is outlawed and the only magical people are the ones with an abnormal level of obsession with things. Using the urban fantasy magic element really highlights how different can be both beautiful and dangerous.
A key part of the plot revolves around Paul, who is recently divorced, and his wife trying to figure out how to co-parent. Paul is a majorly invested father. He doesn't just walk away after the divorce. That's nice to see. Also, it's an inter-racial family. Paul is white, his ex-wife is black, and their daughter is obviously bi-racial.
Romance is really not a part of this plot. I thought at first it might be when a new character is introduced but it actually turns out that she's introduced to develop a friendship with Paul. How often do we get to see genuine friendships between men and women in literature? Not often.
Unfortunately these positives were hurt by other aspects of the book. The worst is that the book reads like it's one book for the first half then completely changes course halfway through. Essentially, the first half of the book is about drugs and is basically Breaking Bad. The second half of the book that plot is totally dropped and instead the characters are pursuing a Big Bad Buffy the Vampire Slayer style. It's jarring and makes it feel like you're reading a draft rather than a final version of the book. Plus, the book is heavily marketed as the drug book, when in fact the drugs are just dropped in the middle of the book, which is disappointing if that's what you were reading the book for.
The world also isn't built enough. For instance, we know Europe disappeared but we don't know precisely how or when. This is a parallel universe to our own. You'd think that something like Europe disappearing would lead to some major changes in the world, but no. It reads like New York City is precisely like how it is in our world just with added 'mancers. This is illogical. It can't be both ways. It can't both be a world with major changes like no more Europe but also simultaneously exactly like our own.
The book reads like the author has an agenda that comes through too clearly at times. How much that will bother the reader will depend upon if the reader agrees with the agenda or not, I'd imagine. I didn't so it bugged me more than it might bother others. I also felt that some of the descriptive writing was weak or lazy, leading to a two-dimensionality that veers dangerously toward being offensive.
Overall, this is a good idea that was poorly executed. There are some individually cool scenes, particularly if you like seeing an interplay between our world, magic, and videogames. Recommended, then, to readers who seek out scenes like that and don't mind the other weaknesses laid out in this review.
Categories: Book, Genre, Review, urban fantasy Tags: book, ferrett steinmetz, flex, inter-racial relationship, magic, new york city, parallel universe, Review, series, series #1, urban fantasy
Book Review: Fables, Vol. 1: Legends in Exile by Bill Willingham et al. (Series, #1) (Graphic Novel)
June 9, 2015 opinionsofawolf	5 comments
All the characters from the fairy tales we know actually lived in that folklore world but were forced out into exile in modern-day New York thanks to an enemy known only as The Adversary. Snow White, right-hand to the ruler of Fabletown, seeks to keep everyone in line. But that gets more difficult when her own sister, Rose Red, is murdered. A reformed Big Bad Wolf, now their sheriff, promises to help her track down his killer.
Being a long-time fan of The 10th Kingdom, a story about the characters of folklore existing in a parallel universe to our own that some modern-day Americans accidentally visit, I was intrigued by this idea of a similar story in reverse. Instead of being engaging and a fun escape, though, my experience with it is best summed-up as meh. It's a cool idea that is saddled to a ho-hum plot and flat characters, thereby rendering it a mediocre read.
The basic idea is some unseen Adversary has driven the fairy tale folk out of their land and into exile in our own. In our land, they've all agreed to give everyone a clean slate to start over. So far so good. From here though things go from interesting and semi-unique to basically a noir plot we've all read before wrapped up in 2-dimensional fairy tale characters. Big Bad Wolf is the hard-boiled detective. Snow White is his lady assistant. A noir version of a fairy tale could have been good, but instead the flattest elements of both genres are mashed together, rather than the best of each. What you end up with is a wolf without his fangs or a hard-boiled detective without his cigarettes and womanizing ways. The grit is just removed leaving an overly-sanitized world.
I do enjoy a mystery plot but I also expect them to keep me guessing. I knew the solution long before the end, and I'm guessing most other readers would too.
The art is mostly good, although the depiction of the talking pig gave me goosebumps in a bad way. He doesn't really fit in to the feel of the rest of the art. However, the art is colorful and easy to follow, and made reading the story go quickly.
Overall, if a reader loves fairy tales and graphic novels and likes the idea of seeing fairy tale characters in modern-day New York, they will probably enjoy this book. Readers looking for an in-depth exploration of a fairy tale character or to see them more well-rounded in a non-fairy tale setting will be disappointed. Similarly, readers looking for a tough mystery to solve will want to look elsewhere.
Source: I remember I bought it at a comic book store, but I don't remember which one.
Counts For:
Categories: Book, fantasy, Genre, graphic novel, Review Tags: big bad wolf, bill willingham, book, comic book, fables, graphic novel, legends in exile, murder, mystery, new york, new york city, noir, Review, series, series #1, snow white, volume 1
Book Review: Breed by Chase Novak (Series, #1) (Audiobook narrated by Peter Ganim)
October 2, 2014 opinionsofawolf	5 comments
When Leslie married Alex, she knew they both agreed on wanting children. What she didn't realize, though, was how fiercely Alex, the last son in a long line of wealthy and powerful New Yorkers, would want only their own biological children. He's willing to try anything to get them biological children, and she feels she can't deny him one last-ditch effort with a doctor in Slovenia that a couple from their infertility support group swears worked for them. And the woman has the baby bump to prove it. So they fly off to Slovenia, and from the first instant in the doctor's office, Leslie feels that something just isn't right….
I'm a real sucker for evil pregnancy/children stories. Rosemary's Baby and The Omen are two of my favorite movies. So when I heard about this new take on a classic trope, I knew I had to try it out. The book ends up being much less about pregnancy and more about the perils of genetic modification, providing an interesting twist on the evil pregnancy trope that carries out through the childhood of the babies that were conceived.
Essentially, the parents' genetics were so messed up by the treatments performed by the doctor that they start turning into something different from human. Something a bit more animalistic. The children, of course, also have some of this animalistic genetics, but most of the differences don't show up until puberty. This allows the children to be innocents for most of the book while their parents have gone off the rails from their very first treatment. My favorite part of this book is how it offers a smart critique of pushing our bodies to do something they don't want to do. Where is that line? How far should we push things with science and at what point will using science make us something different from human? And is that something different going to necessarily be better? Leslie clearly feels that her children were ultimately worth everything she, her husband, and their bodies went through, but the book itself leaves the answer to that question up to the reader.
Beyond this concept, though, the actual execution of the characterizations and the plot get a bit messy. The writing can sometimes wander off onto tangents or become repetitive. Some aspects of the plot are explored too much whereas others are glossed over too quickly. The book starts out tightly written and fast-paced but toward the end of the book the plot gets disjointed and goes a bit off the rails. Part of the issue is a bit of a lack of continuity regarding just how messed up Leslie and Alex actually are by the treatments. Are they still at all human or are they completely untrustworthy? Is there any possibility of redemption for them? At first both seem equally far gone but then Leslie seems to pull back from the edge a bit, thanks to a MacGuffin. It's hard to be frightened of the situation if the frightening aspect of the parents comes and goes at will.
Similarly, in spite of the book wanting us to root for Alice and Adam (the twins Leslie and Alex have), it's hard to really feel for them when they come across as extraordinarily two-dimensional, particularly Alice. Children characters can be written in a well-rounded way, and when it's well-done, it's incredible. Here, though, Alice and Adam seem to mostly be fulfilling the role of children and not of fully fleshed characters.
Most of these issues are more prevalent in the second half of the book, so it's no surprise the ending is a bit odd and feels like it leaves the reader hanging. I was surprised to find out there's a sequel, as I thought this was a standalone book. On the one hand I'm glad there's another one, because the story isn't finished. On the other, I'm not a fan of such total cliffhanger endings.
Overall, the first half of the book offers up a thrilling and horrifying critique of just how far people should be willing to go to get pregnant. The second half, however, is not as tightly plotted and drops the well-rounded characterization found in the first half of the book. Recommended to pregnancy and/or genetic modification horror enthusiasts who may be interested in a different twist but won't be disappointed by a cliffhanger ending.
Categories: Book, Genre, horror, Reading Challenges, Review Tags: adam, alex, alice, audiobook, audiobook review, biological children, book, Book, breed, chase novak, children, evil pregnancy, genetic modification, genre, gmo, horror, leslie, new york city, peter ganim, pregnancy, Review, RIP IX, series #1, slovenia
Book Review: Something Spectacular: The True Story of One Rockette's Battle with Bulimia by Greta Gleissner (Audiobook narrated by Dina Pearlman)
January 24, 2014 opinionsofawolf	2 comments
Greta Gleissner finally achieved her lifelong dream of making a living just from her professional dancing. She landed the prestigious job of being a Rockette in the New York City show. She hoped that this newfound stability and prestige would cure her of her bulimia. What was there to binge and purge about when she was living her dream? But her eating disorder she'd had since a young age won't just disappear because of her newfound success. Soon, her bulimia is putting her job–and her life–at risk.
I was immediately intrigued by the elements of this eating disorder memoir that make it different from the, sadly, so many others that exist. Greta's eating disorder peaks in her 20s, not her teens. She was a Rockette, and she's a lesbian. An eating disorder memoir about someone in their 20s in the dance industry who is also queer was very appealing to me. What I found was a memoir that gives insight to having an eating disorder, the impact of homophobia, and an inside look at the professional dance world told in a non-linear, honest, and engaging manner.
Greta tells her memoir in the framework of a play. There are scenes, acts, overtures, etc… This lets her address the story in a non-linear way that still makes sense. The overture, for instance, shows a dramatic moment when her eating disorder was at full tilt and destroying her life. Then she backs up to the few months before she became a Rockette. The time of auditioning then being a Rockette is interspersed with flashbacks to help us better understand her life. Finally, she enters an inpatient clinic, where we get flashbacks in the context of her therapy. It's a creative storytelling technique that brings a freshness to her memoir.
Honesty without cruelty to herself or others is a key part of her narrative voice. Greta is straightforward, sometimes grotesquely so, about her bulimia and what it does to her. The eating disorder is not glamorized. Greta takes us down into the nitty-gritty of the illness. In fact, it's the first bulimia memoir I've read that was so vivid and straightforward in its depictions of what the illness is and what it does. In some ways, it made me see bulimia as a bit of a mix between an addiction and body image issues. Greta was able to show both how something that was helping you cope can spiral out of control, as well as how poor self-esteem and body image led her to purging her food.
Greta also is unafraid to tell us about what goes on inside her own mind, and where she sees herself as having mistreated people in the past. I never doubted her honesty. Similarly, although Greta's parents definitely did some things wrong in how they raised her, Greta strives to both acknowledge the wounds and accept her parents as flawed and wounded in their own ways. You can hear her recovery in how she talks about both them and her childhood. She has clearly done the work to heal past wounds.
The memoir honestly made me grateful the dancing I did as a child never went the professional route. It's disturbing how pervasive body policing and addictions in general are in the dance world, at least as depicted by Greta. Similarly, it eloquently demonstrates how parents' issues get passed down to the children, and sometimes even exacerbated. Greta's mother was a non-professional dancer who was constantly dieting. Greta also loved dancing but her mother's body image issues got passed down to her as well. Food was never just food in her household.
One shortcoming of the memoir is that Greta never fully addresses her internalized homophobia or how she ultimately overcomes it and marries her wife. The book stops rather abruptly when Greta is leaving the halfway house she lived in right after her time in the inpatient clinic. There is an epilogue where she briefly touches on the time after the halfway house, mentions relapse, and states that she ultimately overcame her internalized homophobia and met her now wife. However, for the duration of her time in the clinic and the halfway house, she herself admits she wasn't yet ready to address her sexuality or deal with her internalized homophobia. It was clear to me reading the book that at least part of her self-hatred that led to her bulimia was due to her issues with her sexuality. Leaving out how she dealt with that and healed felt like leaving out a huge chunk of the story I was very interested in. Perhaps it's just too painful of a topic for her to discuss, but it did feel as if the memoir gave glimpses and teasers of it, discussing how she would only make out with women when very drunk for instance, but then the issue is never fully addressed in the memoir.
Similarly, leaving out the time after the halfway house was disappointing. I wanted to see her finish overcoming and succeeding. I wanted to hear the honesty of her relapses that she admits she had and how she overcome that. I wanted to hear about her dating and meeting her wife and embracing her sexuality. Hearing about the growth and strength past the initial part in the clinic and halfway house is just as interesting and engaging as and more inspiring than her darker times. I wish she had told that part of the story too.
The audiobook narrator, Dina Pearlman, was a great choice for the memoir. Her voice reads as gritty feminine, which is perfect for the story. She also handles some of the asides and internal diatribes present in mental illness memoirs with great finesse.
Overall, this is a unique entry in the eating disorder memoir canon. It gives the nitty gritty details of bulimia from the perspective of a lesbian suffering from homophobia within the framework of the dance world. Those who might be triggered should be aware that specific height and weight numbers are given, as well as details on binge foods and purging episodes. It also, unfortunately, doesn't fully address how the author healed from the wounds of homophobia. However, her voice as a queer person is definitely present in the memoir. Recommended to those with an interest in bulimia in adults, in the dance world, or among GLBTQ people.
Categories: Book, Genre, GLBTQ, memoir, Review Tags: audiobook, audiobook review, book, bulimia, bulimic, dance, dancing, dina pearlman, eating disorder, glbtq, greta, greta gleissner, lesbian, mental illness, mental illness advocacy reading challenge, new york city, queer, reading challenge, recovery, Review, rockette, rockettes, something spectacular, Something Spectacular: The True Story of One Rockette's Battle with Bulimia
Book Review: The Final Descent by Rick Yancey (Series, #4)
October 17, 2013 opinionsofawolf	1 comment
The man investigating the folios found with an elderly man who claimed to be over a hundred years old and named Will Henry has reached the final folio containing what this elderly man claimed to have been his life story. The final folio is discombobulated and poetic, and so the investigator arranges it for us to read following the style of Dante's Inferno. And what a story it tells.
Will Henry is now a bitter, cold teenager still serving Dr. Warthrop. When a man shows up at the door claiming to have a previously thought extinct monstrous snake's egg for sale, Will Henry takes the acquisition into his own hands. When they bring the egg to New York City for the annual meeting of Monstrumologists, Dr. Warthrop begins to question Will Henry's loyalty, and Will Henry increasingly ignores all advice, going off on his own bloody ideas. What direction will Will Henry's and Dr. Warthrop's lives ultimately take?
There were hints throughout the Monstrumologist series that it was going to continually descend to a dark place. But I must admit I was slightly fooled by the idea put forth multiple times that Will Henry at least for part of his life is happily married. I thought there would be a glimmer of hope in the ending. Boy was I wrong. This is an incredibly dark book, and a series ending that surprised me. While still a strong read, it didn't hold all the all-encompassing power and grotesque beauty I found in the first two entries in the series.
Yancey takes the poetic language found in the first three books and kicks it up a notch with the inclusion of the Dante-styled method for dividing the book into sections. Beyond that, the language itself becomes increasingly poetic. One line that is repeated a few times throughout the book is:
Time is a line. But we are circles. (page 4)
I found both the structure and the language interesting and gorgeous, and I really appreciate their inclusion in YA literature. I can imagine that many of the younger readers of the book might never have read Dante and seeing this structure in this book might spur them on to check it out. One thing that I've enjoyed throughout the series is that Yancey doesn't shy away from challenging YA readers, and I'm glad to see that continued here.
The monster in this story is delightfully terrifying. An egg that hatches a snake that eats its prey from the inside out? There's nothing not terrifying about that. Plus the monster is revealed early on, a nice change of pace from The Isle of Blood where we're left to wonder about it for a long time. There is also a secondary, surprise monster later on that I found to be a disgustingly nice touch.
The plot is quite complex, and yet also makes sense when various aspects of it are revealed. It also manages to still be fresh, even though The Curse of the Wendigo was also set half in New York City. The plot revolves much more around Will Henry and his choices and his personality than around the monster itself, which is appropriate. Dr. Warthrop's choices are also touched upon, but how everything has affected Will Henry is truly the focus of the plot. It's an interesting psychiatric study, and I was left truly wondering how things could possibly have worked out differently for either Will Henry or Dr. Warthrop. There are no easy answers, and that gray area is a great setting for horror.
The book spends a lot of time wondering both what makes a monster and if madness can be avoided or escaped. The first is a question addressed earlier in the series, and I think Yancey deals with it eloquently. The second takes quite a dark turn in this book, and I was left feeling empty, hopeless, and saddened.
Madness is a wholly human malady borne in a brain too evolved—or not quite evolved enough—to bear the awful burden of its own existence. (page 170)
It's certainly valid to view madness as an inescapable pariah for some. I suppose I just have more hope for the world than that. That's what left me disappointed with the ending. I wanted more hope. Other readers might be less bothered by the tragic end.
Overall, this is a strong final entry in the acclaimed Monstrumologist series. The poetic language is beefed up with a Dante style structure, and the plot is complex, following the ultimate impact on Will Henry of growing up as Dr. Warthrop's apprentice in Monstrumology. Some readers may be disappointed or overly saddened by the ending lacking a glimmer of hope but others will enjoy its incredibly dark turn. Readers of the previous three books should not miss this one.
Source: Amazon
Previous Books in Series:
The Monstrumologist , review
The Curse of the Wendigo , review
The Isle of Blood , review
Categories: Book, Genre, horror, Review, YA Tags: book, dante, dante's inferno, genre, giant snake, horror, monster, munstrumology, new york city, nyc, quotes, Review, rick yancey, series #4, snake, the curse of the wendigo, the final descent, the isle of blood, the monstrumologist, will henry, YA
Book Review: The Curse of the Wendigo by Rick Yancey (Audiobook narrated by Steven Boyer) (Series, #2)
April 11, 2013 opinionsofawolf	3 comments
Will Henry, 12 year old orphan and assistant to renowned Monstrumologist, Pellinore Warthrop, is shocked to find a refined woman on Warthrop's doorstep. She is the wife of Warthrop's best friend who has now gone missing in rural Canada while looking for the elusive wendigo (aka werewolf). Warthrop insists that there is no such thing as a wendigo, but he agrees to go looking for his missing friend anyway, even if he believes his mission was ridiculous and an affront to monstrumology's reputation.
I can't believe it took me this long to get to the sequel of one of my rare 5 star reads, The Monstrumologist . I gave my dad a copy of The Monstrumologist for his birthday, and his enthusiasm for the series brought my own back to me, so I joined in with him to read through it. I had a bunch of credits stacked up on Audible, so I went with the audiobook versions. My speedy father reading in print quickly outpaced me, but that's ok. I'm really enjoying the audiobooks, although I'm sure I will be reading the final book in the series in the fall when it comes out on my kindle. Can't wait around for the audiobook! All of which is to say, my enthusiasm for the series remains high, if not steady, and the audiobooks are just as enjoyable as the print.
Yancey does something brave for a second book in the series. Instead of following the formula that worked so well in the first book and basically doing a monster-of-the-week-in-our-town method like Buffy and so many other urban fantasies, he changes things up. There is a monster, yes, but it is entirely different from the first one. This is a monster that might not even exist, unlike the anthropophagi in the first book who are almost immediately clearly real. Additionally, Warthrop and Will must travel away from New England to go looking for the trouble. It does not come to them. Another good plot twist is that the story does not entirely take place in Canada. It moves to New York City. Thus we get both the dangers of the wilderness and the dangers of the city in one book. These plot choices mean that what makes this series a series is the characters, not the fantastical nature of their world. By the end of the book I was thinking of the series in terms of the relationship between Will and Warthrop, not in the context of what nasty beast we might meet next. It thus does what great genre fiction should do. It looks at a real life issue and dresses it up with some genre fun. And the issues addressed here are big ones. What is love and what should we be willing to sacrifice for it? Is it more loving to stay with someone at all costs or to let them go to protect them? At what point do you give up on someone?
The horror certainly felt more grotesque this time around, although it's possible I just wasn't remembering the anthropophagi that well. This is a bloody book full of horrible things. Precisely what I expect out of my genre. There's not much more to say about the horror than keep it up, Yancey. Also that this might not be for you if blood and guts and profanity are not your thing. But they *are* mine and, oh, how well they are done here.
Just as with the first book, the language Yancey uses is beautiful. It's rich, eloquent, visual, and decadent. It's a word-lover's book. An example:
But love has more than one face. And the yellow eye is not the only eye. There can be no desolation without abundance. And the voice of the beast is not the only voice that rides upon the high wind….It is always there. Like the hunger that can't be satisfied, though the tiniest sip is more satisfying than the most sumptuous of feasts.
The characterization here remains strong for Will and grows much stronger for Warthrop. Will grows and changes as a 12 year old in this time period in his particular situation would be expected to. With Warthrop, though, we get a much clearer backstory and motivations for his actions. In the first book we came to know Will. In this one we come to know Warthrop, although Will is not left without any development. It's a good balance. I also enjoyed the addition of two female characters, who I thought were well-written, particularly Lily, the budding young feminist determined to be the world's first female monstrumologist. She is truly three-dimensional in spite of her rather limited screen-time compared to Will.
The pacing doesn't build steadily from beginning to end. It rather builds to a first climax, comes back down and builds again to a second climax. This makes sense, particularly in a werewolf book, but I must admit it felt a bit odd in the moment. It almost felt like reading two books in one until it all came together in the end. In fact, this is one of those books that gets better the more you look back on the story as a whole. Be prepared to enjoy it more in retrospect that in the first reading.
The audiobook narrator, Boyer, has a tough book to work with. There are a wide range of characters of multiple nationalities to act out (Canadian, German, French, New York, Massachusetts, etc…). Additionally, at least three different languages are spoken (English, French, and German). I'm not fluent in anything but English, but I did take German in university, and I can say that his German accent is at least passable. He also does an excellent job creating a unique voice for each character. I only rarely got lost, and that was generally due to rapid-fire conversation where each character only had a word or two. I must say, though, that he does mispronounce a few words, which detracts from Yancey's gorgeous writing. I blame the audiobook director for this, though. S/he should have realized and corrected this. Overall, though, the mispronounced words are only in a couple of locations and do not deeply affect the reading of the book.
Overall this is an excellent follow-up to a remarkable first book in the series. It brings to the table that which made the first so powerful: YA horror with rich language set in a historic time period. But it also changes things up enough to avoid falling into the monster-of-the-week trap. The entries in the series are part of a larger story, and that can be seen. Fans of the first book should pick up the second book asap.
Previous Books in Series
Categories: Book, Genre, horror, Review, YA Tags: anthropophagi, audiobook, audiobook review, book, canada, genre, horror, massachusetts, monster of the week, monstrumologist, new york city, pellinore warthrop, Review, rick yancey, rural canada, series #2, steven boyer, the curse of the wendigo, werewolves, will henry, YA
Book Review: Blue Bloods by Melissa de la Cruz (Series, #1)
The students at Duchesne Academy in New York City appear to be your typical bunch of wealthy, elite teenagers. Naturally gorgeous twins Mimi and Jack rule the school. Bliss became part of Mimi's entourage when her oil wealthy Texas family moved to NYC. Schuyler is part of the crowd of misfits who wear goth clothes instead of the more typical Louis Vuitton. They all gradually discover, however, that the secret to their families' wealth isn't just that they came over on the Mayflower. They are Blue Bloods–vampires who retire from their human shells every 100 years or so then come back with the same blood. Their teenage years are vulnerable ones, and someone or something out there is managing to kill some of the young Blue Bloods.
The vampire lore behind this story is not my style. It is so much not my style that just writing the above summary made me cringe. None of the official summaries of the book reveal much about the vampire lore, so let me tell you just in case it's not your style either. Blue Bloods is heavily steeped in Christianity. The vampires are fallen angels who are attempting to atone for their rebellion. They face hundreds of years of punishment trapped in human bodies that they must eventually retire then return in new ones. The vampires accomplish this reincarnation by taking some of the blood from the dead vampire and implanting it into a vampire woman's uterus. It all rings as a bit odd when you have a teenage character who's never done anything more wrong than sneak into a club be told that she must atone for this rebellion against god that she doesn't even remember doing hundreds of years ago. It really takes the bite out of vampires and makes them kind of pathetic.
Where the book is strongest is oddly where the vampire thing is on the back burner. Schuyler and Bliss get to model for a jean company, and that scene was actually quite enjoyable to read. If this had been your more typical murder mystery at an elite high school, I think it would have been a much better book.
Some reviewers had a problem with the presence of teenage drinking, drugging, and sex. I actually thought the sex was handled quite well, with teens talking about it a lot but nobody actually managing to do it. That read as very real. The alcohol is kind of a non-factor, since vampires can't be affected by alcohol. My only confusion with this is if that's the case, then why are they risking breaking the law to drink? I suppose it seems minor compared to convincing a human to become your familiar so you can feed off them. The drugs are entirely presented in a negative light the few times they are briefly mentioned.
What shocked me, and I can't believe how infrequently this is mentioned, is that there is incest and the vampires accept it. Gah! There are times when incest is present in a book, and it is handled so that all sides of the issue may be seen–all of the accompanying emotions are delicately handled. Here, the vampires just say that it's the way it should be and are protective of the siblings. Not much else is said of it, beyond a few teen vampires being grossed out, but it is made clear that their reactions are considered inappropriate by the vampires.
That said, it's not badly written on a sentence level. It reads naturally, which is probably the only reason I struggled through the cringe-inducing lore. It is essentially Gossip Girl crossed with Vampire Diaries with some incest and Christianity tossed in. If that's your thing, you will enjoy it. All others should probably pass though.
Source: PaperBackSwap
Categories: Book, Genre, paranormal, Review, YA Tags: angels, blue bloods, book, christianity, duchesne, elite, fallen angels, melissa de la cruz, new york city, nyc, Review, vampire, vampires