My Rating – 3.75 Stars

This book is the 3rd and final book in the Daughter of Smoke and Bone series. This review will contain spoilers.

Sigh.

The end of a beautiful series. 

Here’s the thing, it’s been so long since I read the last book that I forgot a lot of things and struggling to remember small things took me out of the book a bit. So NOT the fault of the author (my own fault. I should have reread) 

Karou has tricked the chimaera rebellion by replacing Thiago, in the hopes that there can be a new future. A future of peace between the chimaera and the seraphim. 

A future with Akiva.

And this future must begin with an agreement of teamwork between the chimaera and the seraphim to bring down Jael. And that goes about as well as you can expect. There is a large amount of tension between the chimaera and the seraphim as they cram together in the caves of Karou’s old tribe. 

Influenced by Razgut, Jael has taken his Dominion soldiers to Earth, in the hope to gain weapons to fight the Stelians. While Jael is trying to gain benefactors; Karou and the others are plotting ways to stop him (while still trying to keep up that act that the White Wolf is not really the White Wolf).

To make matters worse, the Stelian Queen wants to kill Akiva (what?!) and the chimaera bodies that Karou left behind at the Kasbah have been discovered by humans in Morocco. 

Not to mention there is the introduction of a new character, Eliza, who may or may not be a prophet descended from an angel. And a new plotline that has to do with giant monsters that could destroy the seraphim and the chimaera, which are eating away at the veil between worlds.

Honestly, there was too much going on in this book. I felt like the plot of Karou and Akiva starting a new beginning was lost. 

I didn’t care for Eliza (or her arch nemesis Morgan who was a giant sexist douche) and her POV annoyed me for the most part. She didn’t really bring anything to the story. I also felt like her character was left largely unfinished. 

Liraz however, was wonderful and I wish we could have gotten more of her! The turmoil she went through in this book, grieving over her brother, and regret over the things she had done to chimaera. Ziri, as well was a great character that I would have rather had more of. 

There is only one real action scene in this book, and the confrontation you might expect between Jael and everyone else never happens (it goes by the way of Breaking Dawn. A talk. A bit more of a violent and threatening talk but still a talk.)

The tension between Karou and Akiva was beautiful as always however they don’t get the ending they were hoping for. It’s a bittersweet ending that gives us hope rather than a resolution.

Really, there is so much going on in this book that I felt like I have no real idea what it was about. It was about everything. 

That said, I still love this series and while this final book is not as rage inducing as other final books *cough*RequiemandAllegiant*cough* I think it missed its mark a bit. 

My Rating – 3 ¼ Stars

I received a free copy of this book from Netgalley on behalf of Scholastic books in exchange for a fair review.

In the distant future, America is split at the Mississippi River. A virus has ravaged the East and a giant wall has been built to keep the rest of a country safe. This virus was created by a company called the Titan Corporation. They built amusement parks and wanted to create freaky animal hybrid creatures for their parks. Well they screwed up big time and millions of people became sick. 

Delaney “Lane” Park McEvoy is a pretty normal teenage girl, living on the Western side of the wall. She has a few friends and a soft spot for stray animals. She spends her free time in self-defense classes that her father makes her take. She thinks her father is a successful art dealer that just happens to travel a lot. 

Wrong.

Her father, Mac, is a fetch; which is a person that crosses the wall into the east to retrieve things people have left behind. This is a highly illegal profession, punishable by public execution. And he’s just been busted. 

The director of the agency that busted Mac has a proposition for Lane. Get her father to do a special fetch to Chicago for her and she’ll erase his file. The problem is Mac crossed the wall, so Lane has to venture into the East to find him and she’s never even seen the other side of the wall before. 

The director gives Lane very simple instructions. Get to the island military base where there is a doctor that may know where Mack is and get back. If she can’t find her father, get back ASAP before they block the secret passage. Oh and don’t get infected.

Lane sets off into the East, pretty much unprepared. She does however remember the fairytales her father used to tell her as a child. They seem shockingly familiar to the sites and creatures she sees in the East. She realizes her father may have been secretly training her to become a fetch. 

Once in the military base she meets Everson (the good guy), a guard that actually seems to care about the people remaining in the East and Rafe (the bad guy), an outcast that steals and kills to survive and who knows her father. Both extremely attractive (of course), both want Lane. 

Lane soon learns that the East is not entirely like how she was told. Lots of uninfected people were left behind when the East was evacuated and the wall was built but the government doesn’t seem to care about them. The ones that were infected have turned into animal-people hybrids. 

Depending on the stage of the infection, some still have their human side and they are called “manimals”. Some have gone fully animals and they are considered feral. And sometimes ferals have no problem hunting humans.

So this book had its flaws (some big ones) but I kinda liked it. I liked Lane; her determination, and her heart of gold (even though it gets her in trouble). 

Rafe and Everson were total clichés and the love triangle was really (REALLY) in your face. Like BAM. LOVE TRIANGLE. No subtleties about it. If there had been no love triangle, this easily would’ve been a 4 star book. There were also some tiny holes in the plot. 

But I really liked the new spin on a dystopian world. A virus that creates animal/human creatures instead of zombies (or some other variation of the undead). It was something new and different and I did enjoy it. The action kept me going in this book. I flew through this so fast! There aren’t many slow moments. 

Overall, this book was okay. The love triangle was annoying enough to make me dislike the book but the creativity and the action kinda made up for it. I’m interested enough to keep an eye out for the sequel. 

My Rating – 3 ¾ Stars

I received a free copy of this book from Netgalley on behalf of Little, Brown books for young Readers in exchange for a fair review.

Elizabeth “EB” can’t wait to move from New Jersey to Berkeley and get out of her small town. She has a strained relationship with her mom and her dad abandoned has a child when he came out of the closet. So when she gets an email from Student Housing with her future roommate’s information, she is eager to get the ball rolling on her new life and quickly sends off an email to introduce herself.

Lauren “Lo” lives in San Francisco with her mom, dad and five younger siblings. She has two jobs and got lucky with a scholarship so she can afford Berkeley. She was crossing her fingers to get a single and finally have some peace and quiet. No such luck. She isn’t too happy about the idea of a roommate and definitely not one that seems to be as chipper as EB. 

They sort of reluctantly keep the emails going back and forth, letting little parts of their lives poke through. EB is way more forward that Lo and tends to share a lot more personal stuff but Lo breaks out of her shell a bit. They eventually form a nice friendship after some small bumps and one pretty big bump in the road. 

EB opens up about breaking up with a boyfriend she never really liked and finding a new boy that she actually loves with only a few weeks left before she moves across the country. Lo talks about the possible relationship with a guy that’s a different race. They share a lot about their fears of leaving friends, and home, and their families. How they each feel like terrible friends.

It’s a coming of age type book. Who isn't nervous about starting a new adventure in their lives and want to make sure you are compatible with your new roommate? Both girls had their own voices and were both pretty relatable. 

I’d write a longer review but not much happens in the book. Which was something I didn't like but it was enjoyable enough. Also the interracial dating thing was brought up A LOT. It was mentioned at least once in every chapter of Lo’s point of view and it felt weird to me. It seemed to be a bigger issue than it should have been. 

Overall I thought it was cute. A nice quick summer read.

You can read this review and more at Punk's House of Books and FicCentral

My Rating – 2 3/4 Stars

I received a free digital copy of this novel from Netgalley on behalf of Diversion Books in exchange for a fair review

Portia Griffin can’t speak. She has never been able to speak though doctors can’t figure out why. She has been able to lead a pretty normal life, despite her disability; she has loving parents and an amazing best friend, Felix (Actually, she’s pretty perfect in every way except the no voice thing). She is completely obsessed with music and Apple (Apple as in Steve Jobs) and Harry Potter.

The start of her sophomore year things start to change. There is a strange and painful tightening in her throat, an ache in her back, and sudden mood swings.

She also meets Max Hunter, a gorgeous musical prodigy new to her school and of course immediately interested in Portia. He writes her (bad, very bad) songs and they have a bit of an insta-love story (even though she occasionally dreams about murdering him). Poor Felix is friendzoned (in the very sense of the word. He’s a bit of a dick). It’s very clear from their first interaction that he is totally head over heels in love with Portia and her complete blindness to it is downright annoying.

Every time she starts to feel one of these attacks coming on, she visits the school nurse Ms. Leucosia, who gives her cryptic messages about how she’ll always be there for Portia whenever she needs her.

One day during the bus ride home, Portia is hit with one of these attacks and she is so terrified she hops off the bus and runs to her neighbor and former friend Charlotte’s house. She hears yelling and barges in to find Charlotte’s stepfather beating Charlotte’s mom. Portia suddenly understands why Charlotte became so distant and she is so overcome with emotion she begins to sing.

Her voice is the most beautiful sound in the world and also hypnotic, she convinces the step-dad to jump down a well (He survives unfortunately). Portia is so confused by her new voice and the incident at Charlotte’s house that for weeks she hides the fact that she can finally speak.

Finally one night at a club where Max is performing, a fight breaks out between Max and Felix and Portia is convinced that the only way to stop the fight is to sing. Everyone is transfixed, except Felix, because he can’t hear her.

Ms. Leucosia comes to the rescue and reveals that Portia is a Siren. A mythical being with a beautiful voice and special powers. Leucosia is one of the Sirens from the Odyssey and that her two sisters are evil and are plotting to pull Portia to the dark side. The dark side includes killing men for fun and eating them (which explains the dreams about Max). Portia must decide if she is going to use her powers for good or evil.

I wanted to like this book, it has to do with Mythology after all, but it fell flat. Really flat. Mostly because of the poetry and song lyrics. They were terrible. And cheesy. Portia even raps at one point. The overall writing was too…flowery. Portia describes Max’s voice as chocolate wrapped in sandpaper (what?!).

I didn’t like Felix, like at all. He was getting mad at Portia for not realizing he loved her, for dating another guy even though he was dating another girl, and for not loving him. He was a douche.

Also the insta-live and the triangle bothered me. The random pop culture references seemed strange and forced. What kind of teenage girl uses “stevejobs” as her password? Portia compares herself to Bella. She uses the term “RPatz”. Also Leucosia is supposed to be her mentor and guide her through this transition and she does nothing to actually help Portia. She comes off as useless to me.

And authors, can we stop with this – “If we don’t stop now, I won’t be able to stop later.” That translates to “If we don’t stop fooling around before I get too horny, I’m going to rape you later.” It’s not hot, it’s creepy.

This book just didn’t do it for me.

Read this review and more at <a href="http://punkshouse.wordpress.com/">Punk's House of Books</a> and <a href="http://ficcentral.com/">FicCentral</a>