*Review* The Last Olympian – Rick Riordan

 The Last Olympian (Percy Jackson #5)

Rick Riordan

381 pages

ISBN: 9780739380338

Read 9-3-13

Format: Audiobook

Source: Library

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All year the half-bloods have been preparing for battle against the Titans, knowing the odds of a victory are grim. Kronos’s army is stronger than ever, and with every god and half-blood he recruits, the evil Titan’s power only grows. 

While the Olympians struggle to contain the rampaging monster Typhon, Kronos begins his advance on New York City, where Mount Olympus stands virtually unguarded. Now it’s up to Percy Jackson and an army of young demigods to stop the Lord of Time.

In this momentous final book in the New York Times best-selling series, the long-awaited prophecy surrounding Percy’s sixteenth birthday unfolds. And as the battle for Western civilization rages on the streets of Manhattan, Percy faces a terrifying suspicion that he may be fighting against his own fate.

I am so sad that this was the final book in the Percy Jackson series.  I loved everything about this series and I became so attached to all of the characters. Like Harry Potter and his friends, these characters have wriggled their way into my heart and I’ll love them forever.

The final installment was pretty satisfying and wrapped everything up nicely.  Nothing was left unanswered and there was a lot of action. There were some sad parts too (it is a war after all).  Some of the  characters I wasn’t crazy about I ended up liking a lot by the end of the series.  I loved hearing about all the mythology stories and seeing how the author brought the gods and goddesses to life.

I liked the funny dialogue between everybody and it made all the  characters even more charming and lovable.  The only thing I could possibly complain about in this series is the overuse of the word said – I said, Grover said, Annabeth said – all in the same paragraph sometimes, but other than that I can’t complain at all.

I will definitely be reading the other series by Mr. Riordan and I look forward to falling in love with more of his characters. I recommend this for anybody who loves a good adventure, mythology and awesome  characters.

Wonderful characters, action, nice wrap up, a favorite!!

 

*Review* Tides – Betsy Cornwell

 Tides

Betsy Cornwell

304 pages

ISBN: 9780547927725

Read 8-31-13

Format: Hardcover

Source: Library

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When high-school senior Noah Gallagher and his adopted teenage sister, Lo, go to live with their grandmother in her island cottage for the summer, they don’t expect much in the way of adventure. Noah has landed a marine biology internship, and Lo wants to draw and paint, perhaps even to vanquish her struggles with bulimia. But then things take a dramatic turn for them both when Noah mistakenly tries to save a mysterious girl from drowning. This dreamlike, suspenseful story—deftly told from multiple points of view—dives deeply into selkie folklore while examining the fluid nature of love and family.

This was my Random Reads pick for the month of August and I was excited to read it since I love stories with mermaids and such.  This was my first selkie story and it was interesting and a nice read.  The story was very well-written and I enjoyed the visuals that came from the author’s descriptions.  I have never been to New Hampshire, but I hope it is as lovely in real life as it is in the story.  We get to see the story from different views, so we get to see on land and in the water with the selkies and hear some abut selkie lore.

As for the characters, I liked them, but I wasn’t as connected with them as I would have liked to have been.  Noah was nice and hardworking and Lo was quiet, but a good sister.  I liked them, but I just didn’t fall in love with them.  Mara was interesting, but I felt it was kind of weird that Noah would want to immediately befriend a girl who was running around in an oversized men’s shirt and string as a belt for clothing.  There were a couple more issues that were a bit more serious that were touch on in this story, but not talked about in great depth; it was part of the story, but not THE story.

I loved the cover and it’s soft colors.  I like to think that the person on the front is Mara, seeing her both in her human form and her selkie form.  I also liked the title with the fancy scripted letters of the T and S.  I really enjoyed reading this book, even if I didn’t connect to the characters the way I wanted to, it was still a great story.  I will definitely read more by this author since she writes such lovely scenes.  I definitely recommend this book to those who love stories about water creatures!

Beautiful writing, selkie lore, good characters, didn’t connect to them like I wanted to.

*Review* The Battle of the Labyrinth – Rick Riordan

 The Battle of the Labyrinth (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #4)

Rick Riordan

375 pages

ISBN: 9781423101468

Read 6-17-13

Format: Audiobook

Source: Library

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Percy Jackson isn’t expecting freshman orientation to be any fun. But when a mysterious mortal acquaintance appears on campus, followed by demon cheerleaders, things quickly move from bad to worse.
In this fourth installment of the blockbuster series, time is running out as war between the Olympians and the evil Titan lord Kronos draws near. Even the safe haven of Camp Half-Blood grows more vulnerable by the minute as Kronos’s army prepares to invade its once impenetrable borders. To stop the invasion, Percy and his demigod friends must set out on a quest through the Labyrinth – a sprawling underground world with stunning surprises at every turn.

Honestly, I don’t know why I am so late on this review.  I guess I thought I already did it!  Sometimes I do that with stuff; it happens with scatter brained people like myself.  So, anyway…

I LOVE the Percy Jackson series!  I still have one more book to read, and I am going to be sad when it ends, that is how much I love it.  These kids have some crazy adventures and this book is no exception!  The labyrinth was really cool and crazy big.  There was so much that happened in this book!

The characters are all as great as ever, even Clarisse was able to be connected with for this one.  Things are building for the final book and I can’t wait to find out what happens.  Luke is evil as ever and we get to see Tyson some more and a couple others I don’t want to give away.  I wish I had super awesome books to grow up on like Percy Jackson (it wasn’t published until I was 20, nearly 21!).  The reader did a great job between the voices and the emotions of the characters.

Great characters, great reader, building tension, can’t wait to read the final book!

*Review* Ink – Amanda Sun

 Ink (Paper Gods #1)

Amanda Sun

326 pages

ISBN: 9780373210718

Read 7-18-13

Format: ARC Paperback

Source: Literary Lushes ARC tours

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On the heels of a family tragedy, the last thing Katie Greene wants to do is move halfway across the world. Stuck with her aunt in Shizuoka, Japan, Katie feels lost. Alone. She doesn’t know the language, she can barely hold a pair of chopsticks, and she can’t seem to get the hang of taking her shoes off whenever she enters a building.Then there’s gorgeous but aloof Tomohiro, star of the school’s kendo team. How did he really get the scar on his arm? Katie isn’t prepared for the answer. But when she sees the things he draws start moving, there’s no denying the truth: Tomo has a connection to the ancient gods of Japan, and being near Katie is causing his abilities to spiral out of control. If the wrong people notice, they’ll both be targets.Katie never wanted to move to Japan—now she may not make it out of the country alive.

The first think that caught my attention with this book was the cover.  It is beautiful and graceful and the dripping title is ominous. Then I read the synopsis and found out it takes place in Japan and I knew I had to read it for sure! Thanks to Brittany and Alyssa at Literary Lushes I got to be the first stop on the Ink book tour they are hosting and was able to enjoy this great book.

This author writes incredibly well and I loved the descriptions throughout the book, especially with the cherry blossom trees. The way she wrote out the imagery was very artistic and beautiful.  It is obvious that she had spent some time in Japan and I liked how she included Japanese words through the book. My only complaint on that would be that some of the words I still couldn’t figure out and they were italicized everytime (stupid complaint I know, but my brain kept accenting the words as I read it since they had italics).

As for the characters, I liked Katie pretty well, though I’m not sure why she really felt the need to know what Tomo was up to. She did well as a character who was learning the ways of a new culture and I liked how the book started out with her making a foreigner’s kind of mistake. With Tomo for some reason I didn’t have the connection I wanted, though I’m not really certain why. He was mysterious and confusing at first, but we get to see who he really is eventually.

This story felt very Japanesey to me (not that I’ve been there just seen a lot of movies, anime and manga) and pretty much the whole time it played out like an anime in my head, lol. The concept of having Japanese gods is really cool, though I didn’t learn as much about the mythology as I would have liked.

All in all I felt it was a really good story and beautifully written. I definitely will be reading the next book since the characters stuck with me and I must know what happens to them. Thanks again to the ladies at Literary Lushes! Check out there website to see what tours they are hosting and even join our awesome bimonthly Twitter chats!

Beautiful writing, good characters, great concept, would have liked to have seen more about the mythology.

*Review* The Titan’s Curse – Rick Riordan

 The Titan’s Curse (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #3)

Rick Riordan

304 pages

ISBN: 9780141382890

Read 5-31-13

Format: Audiobook

Source: Library

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 When the goddess Artemis goes missing, she is believed to have been kidnapped. And now it’s up to Percy and his friends to find out what happened. Who is powerful enough to kidnap a goddess? They must find Artemis before the winter solstice, when her influence on the Olympian Council could swing an important vote on the war with the titans. Not only that, but first Percy will have to solve the mystery of a rare monster that Artemis was hunting when she disappeared—a monster rumored to be so powerful it could destroy Olympus forever.

I love the Percy Jackson series!  It’s very exciting and fun.  The characters are great and I love hearing about the different Greek gods and goddesses.  The author really knows how to bring his characters to life!

Percy is a great character he is brave even though he is so young and he does whatever it takes to keep those he cares about safe.  He definitely has some crazy and dangerous adventures, but he has some great friends to help him out.  Annabeth is probably my second favorite character and you can tell Percy cares about her.

We get to see more of Thalia in this book and she is a strong character.  Her and Percy butt heads a lot and seems like they are both trying to be leaders.  The new quest is very dangerous, lives are at stake, Olympus is at risk and the goddess Artemis is missing, so there is plenty of action in this book.

The world in this series is really wonderful and it feels huge since they constantly have stuff going on, see new places and meet a lot of new people.  Not only do they have the places in the “regular world,” but they have all of the places they can get to from the mythological world as well.  I look forward to the last 2 books of the series, plus the movie for Sea of Monsters which comes out on my birthday 🙂

Great characters, vast world, action, exciting.