Review: The Raven Boys

The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater

Genre: Fantasy, Paranormal, YA

Rating: 9/10

I did it. After hearing over and over and over about the beauty, magic, and overall awesome-ness of this series, I finally read the first book.

I won't lie-- I was surprised when the book actually lived up to the hype surrounding it. After all, how many times have you read a overly hyped novel, only to be sorely disappointed?

The Raven Boys did not disappoint. Maggie weaves a spell-binding world, full of surprisingly complexity lyrical prose that manages to be fast-paced yet also introspective. I was drawn in from the beginning, pulled in by the beautiful words and the beautiful world, edged in darkness.

“Gansey had once told Adam that he was afraid most people didn't know how to handle Ronan. What he meant by this was that he was worried that one day someone would fall on Ronan and cut themselves.” 

The characters were well constructed, complex and dark and flawed and beautiful. Perhaps one of my only complaints about this novel was the lack of character development. At the end of the book, the characters felt very much the same as on page one. I get that this book is one in a trilogy-- and I could see the larger story arcs that were being built. However, I would have prefered to see some sort of change or development in any of the characters that I came to love.

“Fate," Blue replied, glowering at her mother, "is a very weighty word to throw around before breakfast.” 

The magic system was not ground-breakingly unique or innovative, yet I still loved it. I was genuinely spooked by parts of this book and that was something I was not expecting. There were shocking twists that not only managed to catch me off guard but, once revealed, made sense. The plot twists were the type that, one you know them, you can go back and see how the answer was really obvious all along. This an unique talent-- to surprise the reader while also staying within the bounds of the story and the characters.

The writing was lyrical, the plot fast paced, the characters complex; I had a hard time putting this book down. I can't wait to pick up the sequel! I would recommend this novel to just about anyone, but especially if you are a fan of modern fantasy.

What about you? What did you think of The Raven Boys? Did you see character development where I did not?

Review: Darkest Part of the Forest

The Darkest Part of the Forest by Holly Black

Rating: 9/10

The Darkest Part of the Forest was a beautiful, fast-paced novel, which upended gender norms with effortless grace. It features a strong, willful, female lead who dreams of slaying monsters and saving the world. Unlike some feminist pieces, this novel doesn't fall into the trap of contrasting strong female characters with a host of weak male characters-- the male characters here are strong and flawed and relatable.

Each characters' strengths and flaws were showcased as they fought monsters and puzzled out riddles, in this surreal world comprised of both faeries and Facebook, of charms and curses and English class. This might sound expected-- isn't that what all authors do?-- but I want to take just a brief second to talk about this.

One of my favorite sitcoms of all times, Brooklyn 99, features characters who exist all across the gender spectrum. You have female characters with stereotypical masculine traits, female characters with stereotypical feminine characteristics, same for the male characters. You get the point. However! For the non-macho male characters, every now and then, their non-macho-ness comes in handy. You know, they can solve the crime because they follow every food blogger in the city and know all about the latest food trends in a very non-manly way but hey it's cool because they just solved a murder. And the macho male characters have their macho-ness come in handy at various points in the show. Here's the thing though-- while there exists a female character who's super 'macho', her BA attitude, her strength-- all those non-feminine traits are seen as a hindrance and never are used to her advantage.

In Darkest Part of the Forest, Hazel is unrepentantly full of "non-feminine" traits. But this isn't seen as a problem she needs to overcome, rather she is treated like a normal person, where sometimes her reckless tendency to charge into a dangerous situation is helpful and sometimes it's really not.

Now that I've properly fan-girled over gender representation, let's move on, shall we?

Another thing that I loved about this book is that one of the most important relationships was the relationship between Hazel and her brother Ben. Yes, there is are romantic sub-plots and those are fun, but the author really focused on the brother-sister bond, which is a relationship that I feel we don't get enough of in literature. (or maybe I'm reading the wrong books!)

As previously mentioned, I love books that are inventive. I love new ideas or new representations and on this count Holly Black gets an A for her representation of fairies. They are beautiful and otherworldly, dangerous and dark.

While there were many things Holly Black excelled out, that does not mean this book was without its faults. Let me preface this one by saying I don't read YA books much at all. However, the characters in this book were just so young. They had this whole tragic backstory thing but y'all when your character is like 16, their tragic backstory happened when they were like ten. It was just hard to believe, reading about this ten year old who taught herself swordplay and went to go kill living creatures with her sword. Like, you're ten. When I was ten I dreamed about slaying monsters but in no way shape or form was I about to go off into a dangerous forest by myself.

“Once, there was a girl who vowed she would save everyone in the world, but forgot herself.”

Also, while I loved the lyric prose, this novel was written in a very distinct writing style that if you don't mesh with then this book is not for you. It's hard to explain, her writing style, but while it isn't arrogant it can err on the side of grandiose at times. 

"They were in love with him because he was a prince and a faerie and magical and you were supposed to love princes and faeries and magic people. They loved him the way they’d loved Beast the first time he swept Belle around the dance floor in her yellow dress. "

In summary, this book was a delightful read and an imaginative take on classic story, with enough twists to keep me surprised.  

What about you? Have you ever read The Darkest Part of the Forest? If so, what did you think?

Review: First Grave on the Right

First Grave on the Right by Darynda Jones

Genre: Paranormal

Rating: 6/10

It's not easy being Charlie Davidson-- first off having parents that would name you thus would definitely be a burden. Secondly she happens to be the grim reaper which is sort of a learn-as-you-go type of job full of dead people who sometimes request her PI skills to solve their murders.

I have strong mixed feelings about the book-- it's definitely a love hate thing going on here. There are parts of it I love-- the narrator has a strong, witty voice, the plot is fast paced-- and parts I hate-- the narrator thinks she's so witty the one-liners nearly dominate the story line, the story line itself is a little confused as to what it is.

Charlie is funny-- and the problem is she thinks she's hilarious. You could cut out half of all the one-line jokes dotted through the text and the book would be much better. When you start reading it's funny-- 200 pages later, it's a little less funny.

I alternated between liking Charlie and finding her absolutely insufferable. She has a chip on her shoulder the size of Newfoundland and the woe-is-me act can get repetitive for me. She honestly does have a lot to complain about-- but sometimes I want her to stop actively trying to piss off everyone around her.

The plot, while fast paced, reached a bit too far, and tried to do a bit too much. It's an easy problem for the first book in a series-- the author wants to set up bigger story arcs while also creating one that will start and finish in this book alone.

I thought there were some troubling non-consensual problems in this book. At the beginning of the book we find out that some dude has been coming to her in her dreams to sleep with her-- and she is in no way complaining about this turn of events. (**mild spoiler y'all**) We find out later that the mystery dream dude is a guy she met while in high school-- a guy who nearly sexually assaulted her and threatened to rape her. But the text focuses more on how hot he was as opposed to, you know, the problem with sleeping with a guy where in the only other interaction you had with him he threatened to rape you. I just want Charlie to talk about that-- to say something other than how sexy he was, to explicitly say how even though their first interactions were non-consensual, now they are consensual. I know this is a minor thing for most people-- I haven't read any other reviews that even bring this up-- but it was something that bothered me when I was reading this book. And maybe I'm being too nit-picky-- I mean she's clearly (kind of?) consenting now, so what's the big deal? Still.

Overall this book kept my interest, made me laugh out loud, and made me roll my eyes. If paranormal/urban fantasy books are your thing I would say definitely give this one a try-- it's a love hate book so while it was not my cup of tea, it just might be yours.

Have you ever read First Grave on the right? If so, what did you think?