The Wicked and the Just by J. Anderson Coats

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



I'm so sorry that this review has taken me forever and a day to write, I truly hate it when real life swoops in and drops a bunch of university essays on my head and also a dash of relationship drama... but, alas, it happens. It took me about two weeks to read this book and that doesn't in any way reflect on the quality of it - it's just that spare time and I haven't seen much of each other recently. I actually enjoyed The Wicked and the Just immensely.

On the surface this seemed an awful lot like Code Name Verity, they are both historical fiction, both have two very different female protagonists that learn to assist each other when hard times come along. But I liked the style and the characters of this one much better. Plus the time it was set in fascinated me - what on earth do I know about 13th century Wales? Nothing. Forgive me, but the second world war is a more overdone topic. We got to see the nastiness, the bitchiness that extended across classes and the opposing cultures of the English and Welsh in this book. But the author is careful not to take sides with either protagonist or with the Welsh or English. I liked this a lot, she appreciated almost everyone's viewpoint and, because of this, so did I.

Cecily is a spoilt English brat who is snarky, bitchy, snotty and hilarious. I couldn't help but like her and stay on her side despite the stupid and immature things she constantly does. Make no mistake, she's not a particularly nice person, but nice novels rarely hold my attention anyway. I was interested in this selfish girl in a world she couldn't and wouldn't understand, I wanted to see how she developed as the story progressed.

Gwenhwyfar is nothing like Cecily, each day is a struggle to survive and on top of that she has to deal with that brat who fancies herself as lady of the manor. Both girls live very different lives but they begin to interweave and come together and sometimes they even find that they both share common interests - like getting rid of the local molester.

The writing style of this book was just spot on for my tastes. For a book that is mostly not plot-driven, it managed to keep me entertained with both girls' vibrant personalities, the unfortunate realities of living in such a time, and the way it showed how two girls of similar age who came into contact with one another every day could find themselves in very different positions in life. I have no idea how historically accurate this book was, whether the descriptions of Welsh towns and their workings was completely fictional or not, but I do know I really enjoyed most things about it. I think I would have awarded five stars had it been just a bit more action-packed, dramatic, grittier... you get the idea, I'm sure. It is still a great read.

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

My rating: 2 of 5 stars




I have a feeling I'm not going to be very popular by posting this review, everyone seems to love this book so far and I feel more disappointed in myself and my tastes than the novel or the author. Code Name Verity is one of those books that are the reason why I created the shelf its-me-not-you. I mentioned this very recently in my review of The Book Of Blood And Shadow and it is also similar to the experience I had trying to read The Book Thief and Feed. I just found 90% of the book long-winded and unnecessary.

The novel opens where the narrator has been captured by the Nazi opposition during WWII. She is given paper to tell her story and she does so through the eyes of her friend Maddie. Different, definitely. Maddie's story is told in various anecdotes, a technique I've already failed to appreciate in The Book Thief but I suppose the intention was to subtly build up a picture of both girls' pasts and their friendship. This book is not very plot-focused or fast-paced, it's about conversations and people and female pilots during the second world war, which would all have been great if it had been balanced out with a touch of drama.

I cannot tell you just how much I wanted to like this. It's about women's involvement in the war and us Northern girls - two topics that don't get nearly enough press. But, for me, there was just too big a focus on piloting and aircraft and I'm sorry but I struggled to care. If you read the author's note at the end she will tell you that this book is actually meant to be about pilots:

"This book started off rather simply as a portrait of an Air Transport Auxiliary pilot. Being a woman and a pilot myself, I wanted to explore the possibilities that would have been open to me during the second world war."

And not enough else was brought in. There's only so many descriptions of a pilot's job I can sit through before I start to snooze, each to their own but flying planes has never been an interest of mine. The best parts of this book were the touching ending and the fact that the narrator is delightfully unreliable (I love them, I do! Eugenides, I miss you...) but I needed more. All I really want is for a book to rouse some passion in me, whether it be excitement, sadness, anger even... I felt nothing.

Don't Breathe a Word by Holly Cupala

My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars




I did that stupid thing where I don't check what a book's about before I start reading it with Don't Breathe a Word. The synopsis on the back of the paperback I have is quite ambiguous but it looked like a relatively short, interesting read. I began to be concerned when I realised it was another tale about abuse, I would never have started it so soon after a powerful novel like Split had I known.

However, Don't Breathe a Word is actually a completely different type of novel. Split is very realistic, brutal, in-your-face and painfully honest. It is also the significantly better book of the two. This novel, on the other hand, felt somewhat dreamlike. Joy's narrative alternates between the past and the present, the reasons for her decision to run away are introduced gradually in random flashes of memory. The writing is prettier than that in Split and I liked reading it, but it wasn't as powerful or meaningful for me either.

I'm starting to lean too much towards the negative here and I don't mean to, I rounded it up to four stars for a reason. Because this book isn't just about abuse, it's about the troubles faced by the 1.6 million runaways in the United States every year. How the majority of them will be assaulted in one way or another in their first month of living on the streets, and how many end up selling sex to buy food and clothes. Several colourful and intriguing characters are present in this novel, each with a different story and a vibrant personality. May, a girl who through struggles and heartache discovers she has talents beyond what she can offer with her naked body. Santos, the boy with the secrets and a pet ferret, who sneaks away in the evening and comes back with haunted eyes. And Creed, the musician who speaks to Joy's soul with his guitar.

And my comments about the writing were not supposed to be negative, take a look:

"At home, they'd clipped my wings and then caged me so I couldn't fall. Here, they bandaged one another's broken wings, helped each other fly."

I think the factor that most let down this story and made it 3.5 stars was the ending. Split does not have a perfect ending and some opportunities are missed, but Swati Avasthi recognises that in real life things don't always go the way you want and not everyone gets a happily ever after - and that's kinda the beauty of the novel. Don't Breathe a Word feels like a rushed super-happy conclusion, everyone's problems get solved within a few pages and the only unhappy one was the bad guy. I don't want to be left heartbroken, but the too-perfectness of it took something away.

Also, I think I should stop reading afterwords. I get choked up at nearly every single one, even when I've spent an entire emotional novel not shedding a tear.

Legend by Marie Lu

My rating: 3 of 5 stars




So I finally decided to pick this up after sifting through all the reviews and reading positive after negative after positive after negative, sometimes I guess you just have to see for yourself. And Legend was all right, pretty good when compared to some of the crap I've read recently, it just wasn't anything particularly spectacular either. That being said, I'm still probably going to read the sequel because I seem to have come down with that annoying disease known as "caringaboutthecharactersitis".

In my opinion, this book was significantly better than Delirium, Matched, Shatter Me, Dark Inside, Pure and Article 5. It stood out amongst other members of the overcrowded dystopian genre, but that was mostly because a lot of the others are so atrociously bad, rather than this being overly mind-blowing. It was fun, though, easy to read, quite entertaining, I don't have any regrets about reading it.

The main characters are far less annoying than some I've had the displeasure of encountering in this genre. They're not that original or inspiring but they're the kind of carbon copies I don't mind seeing so much. She is self-reliant and can kick ass without the sexy love interest's assistance. He's kind, considerate and brave. The chemistry between them never seems forced, despite it being yet another "they felt drawn to one another" scenario. Somehow it doesn't matter that much here.

The world building is the weakest part of the novel, something that seems to apply to most new releases in the dystopian genre. A fact which is strange when surely the whole point of a "dystopia" is the world the characters interact in. But whatever, I will begin to sound like a broken record. It does get better towards the end of Legend with clues being introduced about the time before the Republic existed. This gives me hope that Marie Lu is simply withholding her world building to prolong the reader's interest, but I just hope that I'm not left hanging on this matter at the end of the second book too.

Another thing I didn't like - because I couldn't believe in it - was all the huge leaping to conveniently accurate conclusions. The protagonists would look at an unbelievably small piece of evidence and manage to solve an entire mystery out of it. I wasn't convinced, I don't care how smart you are, you would not have gone from A to B like that. You just wouldn't.

Though this isn't going to make it onto any of my "favourites" lists, I'd recommend this book to a lot of people. Those who keep loving trashy dystopias with a forbidden romance story, those who liked any of those books I listed in the second paragraph. Those who look for light entertainment rather than deep meaning or fantastic writing in their books. I conclude that Legend is not that bad, it'll probably be a hit with anyone who isn't getting tired of reading poorly constructed dystopia after poorly constructed dystopia.

Hush by Eishes Chayil

My rating: 4 of 5 stars




I was going to go to bed and write a review in the morning but I can't sleep because this book has affected me so much. I'm really quite disturbed and upset by this so if you're looking for something light and easy: stay away from Hush.

The first piece of advice I would give someone who's going to read this book is to stick with it. I normally find that my initial instincts are correct when reading a novel, if I struggle to get into it in the first few chapters I often never do. However, though I was immediately turned off by all the confusing Jewish terms I'd never heard of and found it difficult to connect with the story and narrator at first because of this, I quickly got used to it and Hush turned into a novel I won't be forgetting any time soon.

This book is about a strict Jewish community where keeping up appearances is what matters most and what happens behind closed doors stays there unless you want to bring shame upon your family. What I didn't know at first is that Eishes Chayil grew up in such a community and has experienced the lifestyle first-hand, the story is actually loosely based on what she witnessed herself as a child (read the afterword). I recently keep finding these novels where the author really knows what they are talking about and it does make all the difference to the story, everything is more detailed, more easily imaginable.

The story reminded me a lot of Speak, but it was more frustrating, more upsetting even, because the protagonist and the victim wanted and tried to speak out. They told people they should have been able to trust - parents, teachers, etc. - and were told to be quiet, were accused of lying because the truth would mean scandal for the family. I was horrified by how many adults failed a nine-year-old girl, how if they'd just put the child's pain before their desire for a squeaky-clean reputation she would still have been alive. Parts of this book felt like the narrator and myself were screaming at the other characters who just put their fingers in their ears and refused to listen.

This is a sad, sad book about guilt and misunderstandings, and those things you tell yourself you don't understand but fear you understand all too well. There's a letter near the end of the book written by the protagonist to her friend who died and it's one of the saddest things I've ever read. I could cry again just thinking about it. The reason this got four stars instead of five is because there were a few parts in the middle that could have been cut out or shortened (like the beginning of Gittel and Yankel's married life) and because I wasn't keen on the beginning. But these are small matters and I highly recommend this book to anyone who isn't afraid of an emotionally challenging read.

There is No Dog by Meg Rosoff

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I didn't get it.

This is the third book I've read by Meg Rosoff, fourth if you count my failed attempt to start Just in Case. What I've discovered to be most true about Rosoff's novels is that reading and liking one is far from a guarantee that you will enjoy the rest - or, in fact, any of the others - so I cannot offer words like: "if you enjoyed How I Live Now (etc.) this will be your kind of book". This novel is a million miles away from anything Meg Rosoff has previously written, and generally quite different to anything I've ever read.

My brother gets annoyed with me because he says that I have to have a reason for everything. That I expect books to have a point, to make a statement, and to leave me with an important message that makes me think for a while afterwards. This is only partially true - I love a bit of fun nonsense like Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging, but I think if a book takes on a subject like God and creation and the reasons for bad stuff happening in the world then there should be something important that the author wants us to take from it. To put it simply, I wanted more from this book. I don't think there was a hidden message and if there was I didn't get it.

There's always the chance that this book was too deep for me and that special metaphorical something-or-other went straight over my head. But, for me, this book was simply about an horny teenager who got the job of God because no one else wanted it... which would actually explain a lot. This horny teenager falls in love with a zoo-worker called Lucy, he has an assistant who can't stand him and a mother who has lost his beloved pet in a poker game. It's so ridiculously bizarre that I kept waiting for it all to come together and symbolise genesis or some interesting philosophy... or just, you know, something. I'm clueless as to what the point of this book was.

The novel seemed to try to be an odd combination of Monty Python-style blasphemy and Douglas Adams' humorous philosophy. The former I absolutely love and grew up on and was probably the reason that this book did give me a few laughs, especially near the beginning. The latter I still struggle to understand. Adams is the kind of author who I occasionally love to quote - about dolphins, creation, etc. - but really don't enjoy reading that much.

I decided to read this after I noticed it got a starred review on Kirkus that promised interesting questions like "if life were without flaws and no one ever changed or died, what role would God have?" And sure, it delivered the questions, but made no attempt to answer them... sorry, but I can come up with plenty of these questions myself. It's the discussions and possible answers that I wanted to read.

If you're looking for a bit of strange, British humour (yeah, I know Rosoff is from Boston, but she moved to the UK in 1989 and it looks like we got to her) and philosophy, then you might actually like There is No Dog. But I, for one, would suggest you get your fix from an author who does it best and leaves a lasting impression - and I love him! - Stephen Fry.

Split by Swati Avasthi

My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars



Split was somewhere between 4 and 5 stars for me, so I'll go with 4.5 because I can't make my mind up. I spent most of the novel thinking I would give it 5 stars, but there was something a little unresolved for me. Okay, a lot unresolved, but DO NOT read this if you haven't read the book: I wanted their mother to find a way out, I understood that this book's message is that it's not as simple as that, I understand why she struggled to leave him, how her life had been shaped around her husband and their violent existence... but I wanted the final message to be that it was possible, even though it was difficult. I didn't like how the ending seemed to be an acceptance that some people are just doomed to stay with their violent partner for the rest of their life. But, apart from the stuff in that very spoilery spoiler, this was an unbelievably powerful novel. It does what so many other books have tried to do but the writing, the characters, the emotions running wild in this book... they all contributed to make it stand out amongst stacks of stories about domestic violence.

The story opens where Jace Witherspoon has finally left home, his mother, and his abusive father behind. He wants to start a new life with his older brother - Christian - who ran away years before and hopes his mother will eventually break away and join them. But Christian's life is very different now and he is reluctant to ever go back to the way things were before, not to mention the fact that Jace isn't being entirely honest, a lot has happened since Christian left and he isn't too eager to share a lot of it. Can Jace and Christian build a new life as brothers and put their violent upbringing behind them? Or will Jace's secrets bring the past crashing down onto the two of them?

What Swati Avasthi has here that gave her the ability to write such a stand-out novel, is years of experience dealing with just these kind of people, relationships and abusive partners/parents. It shows, it really does. A lot of authors try to answer that question: why does an abuse victim still stay with their partner? Most of them fail because it's not a simplistic answer, you need to take a deep look into these relationships, see how the victims become psychologically changed to believe that they somehow deserve it, that they cannot cope with any other way of living, that the good times are worth the bad. I don't pretend to be an expert on domestic violence, but I knew someone who was in this kind of relationship and people always say "I just don't understand why they don't leave", "it's pretty simple, if someone hurts you, they don't love you, so you walk out the door". I've seen it first-hand and what they don't know is that the victims are being damaged far more psychologically than they are physically. You cannot tell someone to snap out of a mental disorder, and it is a very similar kind of thing. The routine of violence becomes so embedded into them that they start to just accept it. It's sad but true and Swati Avasthi is one of very few authors who shows this.

But this isn't just a novel about domestic violence. It's a novel about how people can change their lives for the better, how with work you can choose to move on from your past and re-create yourself, how you do not have to let the bad stuff that has happened define you. It's about fear. Fear of another person, fear for another person, fear of yourself and who you might be turning into, fear of making the people around you just as screwed up as you are.

Moving and unforgettable.