false 14 52 48 true 5851143 read 0 true 3634024 currently-reading 4 true 3634023 to-read http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/78939618 to: The Rose and The Beast: Fairy Tales Retold (Paperback) by Francesca Lia Block
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/78420254 to: Snakes and Earrings (Hardcover) by Hitomi Kanehara
I read this in one sitting, in a little over an hour, and it was one of the strangest reading experiences I've ever had. I've been disturbed by books before, but this elicited the most disgust than any other novel I've read. There were several times when I wanted to close the book and walk away, but at the same time I wanted to see where the story was going. It was like a train wreck.

Unfortunately, when I got to the end, I still didn't know what the author was trying to say. The narrator, Lui (an alias she claims is taken from "Louis Vuitton"--those Japanese girls and their brand worship!), doesn't really evolve at all or go through a notable character arc. I'm not sure if that's the point, or bad plotting.

The book is sort of a big "F**k you" to "conventional" Japanese conformism and a look into a rebellious youth culture rife with drug and alcohol abuse, body modification, reckless sexuality, and sado-masochism. The book is certainly shocking, written in a blunt, frank style with plenty of blunt, graphic sex. Not knowing anything about the book when I picked it up, I was wholly unprepared for that!

Apparently, the author, who was only 19 or 20 when she wrote the book, won a prestigious award for debut authors for this in 2003. I'm not sure that she won so much for literary merit than for writing such a raw and shocking thing.

I think, ultimately, that the author was trying to convey the emptiness and lack of sense of self many young people feel and the self-destruction they go to in order to feel anything. Lui, who is only nineteen, feels such emptiness that by the end, she's lost the will to live. She doesn't know who she is or what she wants and she can't find anything to fill the void.

On the one hand, I can see how the prevailing Japanese culture (and one in transition) could produce such horrifically sad creatures as Lui and Ama, the boy she lives with but knows nothing about, including his real name. On the other hand, people like Lui, drop-outs making a living on sporadic part-time jobs and then spending it on booze, sex, and clubbing and then moaning about how hopeless their lives are can become tiresome pretty quickly. I suppose that's the tragedy: they are in a downward spiral and can't manage to get out of it, and don't even know how they got there in the first place. The book left me with a lot of questions about Lui and her motivation for doing things the way she did--I couldn't understand her at all. She is a being comprised of pure self-hatred at its most destructive, as well as a complete lack of an independent self and ultimately weak in body, mind, and soul.

In short, the novella (it's only 120 pages) left me feeling off and upset. I liked it in the sense that I was glad I picked it up (because it is such a sad look into the psyche), but never want to read it again. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/77093858 to: Fallen (Hardcover) by Lauren Kate
Just as vampires are becoming old hat in YA literature, angels have swooped in to take their place in the pantheon of paranormal romance heroes--who knew? I was rather dubious of the whole trend (and still am), but boy, do I love me some Old Testament crazy, so I thought, "Let's see what they do with this." Even with my low expectations, I found this disappointing!

We begin with Daniel Grigori (whose last name gives the whole thing away if you know your stuff), a fallen angel cursed to fall in love with the same girl every seventeen years for eternity. The girl in question is Lucinda a.k.a. "Luce" Price, who has just entered Sword & Cross, a reform school for troubled teens, after the mysterious death of a classmate that she perhaps caused, but doesn't remember. As soon as she sees Daniel, she's drawn to him, and soon feels increasingly certain they have met before, and she'll do anything to try and his secrets.

Unfortunately, Luce is a pretty dumb heroine. She spends the entire book mooning over a guy that is mean to her every chance he gets and then mopes around feeling sorry for herself. That's kind of it. At one point she talks about how she knows Latin and French and had a 4.0 GPA at a top prep school, etc. but she sure doesn't read that way! She's not a strong character--she's not feisty, she's not witty, and, worst of all, she's passive. She doesn't do anything so much as things happen to her.

Daniel and Luce fall for each other time after time, but the author doesn't try very hard to make either Luce or Daniel interesting. Did the author think it wasn't necessary to show why they would fall in love with each other? Both were no more than cardboard cutouts. I don't think they even had a real conversation at all before they decided they were each others' ~true love~. I don't care if they've technically known each other for centuries, make them interesting in this incarnation!

I actually agreed with one of the "villains" when she said, "In this lifetime you're nothing more than you appear to be: a stupid, selfish, ignorant, spoiled little girl who thinks the world lives or dies on whether she gets to go out with some good-looking boy at school...I'd still relish this moment...killing you." I don't think that's supposed to happen.

Some other things:
*The climactic battle--which had no real build-up--takes place off-screen!
*The "villain" wasn't threatening and came off more as a simpering monologuer rather than clever or creepy. And he wore gold eye shadow.
*People did not smile in pictures in 1854, among other things!
*How are some fallen angels on the "good side" and others aren't? Fallen angels already chose Satan over God, no?

There are just so many interesting things an author could do with this subject, but it's so flat. There's just not enough of the mythology here to make it worth my while.

Oh, but I do like the cover. And I'll still recommend this to girls who liked Twilight...because it still manages to be better than Twilight.

]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/59637848 to: The Hunger Games (Hunger Games, #1) by Suzanne Collins
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/73665988 to: Havemercy (Hardcover) by Jaida Jones
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/72244547 to: Her Fearful Symmetry: A Novel (Hardcover) by Audrey Niffenegger
When Elspeth Noblin dies of cancer in London, her twin nieces, Julia and Valentina, (the daughters of Elspeth's twin, Edie) inherit her flat, though it comes with a few odd stipulations, and a ghost. Upon their arrival in London, the twins discover Elspeth may not have left her flat after all.

Taking place in Highgate Cemetery and Elspeth's apartment overlooking the cemetery, Niffenegger's story evokes a brooding, rain-soaked, Gothic feel. Living in the apartment complex is Elspeth's grieving lover, Robert, who is naturally drawn to the two who remind him of the love he has lost. The twins' other neighbor, Martin, suffers from both OCD and a broken heart since his fed-up wife, Marijke, left him. Of course, the twins breeze into the apartment and become entangled with the two men and the specter of their aunt.

Niffenegger seems most interested in the idea of self in this novel: the repercussions of the long separation of the twins Edwina (Edie) and Elspeth and the struggle of the younger twins to separate from each other. For most of their lives, the twins felt like a half to a whole, but is that enough? What happens to one twin when they are only one? How far would you go to break away, and how far would you go to reunite with those you love?

****

I have to confess, I only read through about 100 pages before I decided to skim through the rest of the book to see what happens. It's not that the book is bad, it's just that I didn't care enough to actually continue. I didn't particularly like any of the characters. Off the bat, I knew Elspeth was a scheming, conniving witch and I wasn't sure why Robert was so in love with her, or why he had been with her for so long. The Martin/Marijke storyline felt tacked-on as well.

I also didn't like the twins very much either--they were almost obnoxious in their "twinness"! And I'm a twin! I felt like they're closeness seemed forced instead of organic/easy. For example, they were too tactile--I feel that twins who are that close wouldn't need to touch each other that much. Also, 20 year-old twins wouldn't purposefully dress alike unless they had serious issues (which, clearly, they do)! The struggle between the dominant/passive twin was overwrought and tiresome.

Suspension of disbelieve is essential for this story, but in the second half, the story began to go places I didn't want to follow. The length that Valentina goes to escape her more domineering twin is truly insane and extremely selfish. Are we really to believe that a twin supposedly that close to her sister would do what she did with so little regard for her sister or her parents? Trust me, Julia would never get over what Valentina did to her. In turn what Elspeth does to Robert and Valentina is not only ridiculous, but also very cruel. By the end, I had no idea who I was supposed to be rooting for!

I can see why a lot of people would like the book--it is unique and written well enough (one nitpick: show don't tell! This was especially an issue in describing people), however, the characters just weren't my cup of tea and there were too many plot points, especially in the second half, that didn't agree with me. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/75586227 Firethorn (Hardcover) by Sarah Micklem
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/69141777 Michelle's review of Hush, Hush
by Becca Fitzpatrick

“I wanted to kill you, but I didn’t, see how much I love you?”

EW. That's also one of the many problems I have with the "Twilight" series! It's abuse, and it's not acceptable.
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/73666041 Shadow Magic (Hardcover) by Jaida Jones
bookshelves: to-read
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/68384175 Meghan's review of Catching Fire (Hunger Games, #2)
by Suzanne Collins

Yeah, I was so happy when your mom told me she was getting another one! Now we just have to wait for #3... which will be way too long! ]]>