love-the-jaws

Sunday, April 30, 2017

Review: You Sent Me a Letter by Lucy Dawson

1 star for You Sent Me a Letter by Lucy Dawson.

This is a book that manages to capture my attention for five chapters before I go full blast into speed reading.

I certainly do not enjoy reading a story built on self-denial, half-truths and cover-ups. To make matters worse, this tangled web of lies is messy and confusing; it's awful. That said, my curiosity still gets the better of me and I am keen to know how the story pans out. Hence the speed to reach the end of the story. No surprises there. Yes, expect the unexpected to be expected.

Review: The Brimstone Deception (SPI Files #3) by Lisa Shearin

2.5 stars for The Brimstone Deception (SPI Files book 3) by Lisa Shearin.

This book takes me long enough to finish reading. While the first half or so of the story is reasonably acceptable, the same cannot be said of the latter half.

Perhaps I am too tired to read pretty much anything by the time I start my nightly reading. Or perhaps the story is just so uneventful that my mind simply shut itself down each time I pick the book up. In any case, I suffer from a serious case of reader's block. Yes, I frequently find myself reading and rereading individual words or sentences mechanically without processing and understanding the meaning of the text in my mind. It gets so bad at one point in time that I decide to skip to the last chapter, read it and move backwards to where I have last stopped. Weird? But it works! So who cares?

Magic exists. Monsters are real. Fighting the forces of evil is a full-time job. Welcome back to the supernatural world where Agent Makenna Fraser and her partner, Ian, continue to fight the forces of evil and minions of darkness.

Review: Precinct 13 (Precinct 13 #1) by Tate Hallaway

4 stars for Precinct 13 (Precinct 13 book 1) by Tate Hallaway.

I come across this book purely by chance. To tell the truth, even though it is written in first person, I am kind of hesitant to read it in the first place, because the protagonist is a recent college graduate. More often than not, a fresh graduate points to a genre of new adult at best and young adult at worst. Both of which does not appeal to me of late.

Well, I am glad to have read the book after all for it is neither of the genres mentioned above. The urban setting is great, the fantasy refreshing and there is the element of surprise when the reader least expects it.

I am certainly looking forward to the next book in this series.

Review: Percy Jackson's Greek Gods by Rick Riordan

4.5 stars for Percy Jackson's Greek Gods by Rick Riordan.

This Greek mythology is certainly a welcome change from my last book. In fact, I feel so mentally exhausted after my last two trips to the Andes mountain and back that I am not sure if I can finish reading any book within the next thirty days. I do not know about you, but I do find reading non-fiction to be more intense and draining.

How to describe Percy Jackson's Greek Gods? One word. Uplifting. My mood literally soars as I smile and laugh my way through the short stories with each of the Greek Gods. Also, it helps that I have background knowledge of Greek myth in the first place which makes for an even better dry sense of humor.

Review: Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors by Piers Paul Read

4.5 stars for Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors by Piers Paul Read.

‘I come from a plane that fell in the mountains. I am Uruguayan.…’

This is the story of sixteen survivors; how they have suffered the plane crash, what they have done to remain alive and how their ordeal in the Andes have changed their attitude towards life. And because I have already read the book I Had to Survive, I can appreciate and understand this book in depth.

This book does well to offer the bird's-eye-view of all the goings on. The author provides a chronological order of the event, clearly depicts the occurrence of the plane crash, lays down the horrors of the aftermath and even presents analysis to break down the causes and likely culprits leading to the tragedy. However, due to the third person narration, the story coverage comes across as detached and somewhat lacking in warmth, faith and friendship among the survivors. I am also kind of disappointed that the book does not offer perspectives of the event as seen through the eyes of any or each of the survivors.