Just came across this as I was looking for my first read of 2022 and it being another Lauren Oliver I expected it to be nothing short of a masterpiece. Needless to say therefore it didn’t disappoint that much in that department and it had quite some interesting twists and turns here and there.

For what I imagine might be the first time around, Lauren here employs two points of view that contrast quite interestingly. The two major characters are Brinny and Mia and each give their own contribution as to how the story unfolds. It’s clear the author wants us to love Brinny more but I have to confess that at the end I had fallen in love with Mia so much more

At its heart this novel is actually a murder mystery although it also possesses fantasy-like elements that actually dominate the story’s plot. To tell the truth you just have to read to see how great it is. I’m going to give it a 4 on Goodreads and I think that high rating is quite well deserved.

I just picked this up randomly while looking for my next Meg Cabot read and I just thought why not check it out. It’s supposed to be about this small town girl who leaves her lair to find a new beginning in New York City but then a few misfortunes strike, though at this point I can’t pinpoint what exactly that would be. To be honest I love the ‘jinxed’ trope a lot, especially if a little magic is involved and I think I’m going to love this one given that it’s coming from Meg Cabot, truly one of my favorite authors in the YA and NA categories.

So, like you can tell I can’t wait to dig my teeth into it and when I get to, it should be so much fun.

Seriously I hurt to do series comparisons because no two books are the same nor do two authors practice their craft in the same fashion, but the extreme similarity between Matched by Ally Condie, and Delirium by Lauren Oliver, left me with no choice. Needless to say those books were published long ago and a lot has been said about them but my own opinion concerning them has been bugging me so much in my head I just thought let me say something before letting the matter come to rest.

To proceed I shan’t really get into the meat of the two stories nor dwell too much on their characters considering these are famous books that sold very well in the market, but what I would only want to say is that I found Lauren Oliver to have produced the better series overall. The first books in both sets are probably equal in strength and appeal, but as the two series progressed, I think Matched declined significantly and by the end had become so pale and dull I had to labor hard to finish it.

Lauren Oliver on the other hand simply tried to spice things up and although she did not always succeed to maintain the same level of excitement, her main character came out way stronger and tougher than her competitor’s. And to sum it all up her story kept its central focus: that of dealing with and toppling a tyrannical administration, which is something that Matched completely failed to do as it suddenly turned to be more of a search for a cure, a thing that totally had nothing to do with its opening premise.

So go ahead call me names if you want but I think Lauren Oliver gave to the world the much better product here

I just came across this totally by accident as I was searching for some reasonably good YA to peruse, just like I have been doing so much lately. The author name of Meg Cabot would have been synonymous with such successful series as the Princess Dairies or other hit standalones like Teen Idol, but boy was I so surprised to learn that Big Boned is actually an adult book, and a murder mystery no less.

It’s a great story to be honest, and part of a long series as well, featuring curvy but body positive heroin Heather Wells who is just as snarky and self-deprecating as you’d expect of any Meg Cabot M/C. But while I don’t have any major issues with this book’s structure, or plot, or the quality of its prose, which is always superb anyway if it’s a Cabot book, I rather found it a little strange that a highly successful writer like her would stoop as low as to produce a complete Stephanie Plum clone. Because, yeah that’s what Heather Wells is, complete with the infamous love triangle and a whole passe of clownish supporting characters. Not to say that’s too much of a problem, since seriously a number of authors have tried to do it to varying degrees of success, among them Darynda Jones and her Charlie Davidson, but when it comes to Cabot that was so totally unnecessary. A celebrated author like her ought to have crafted something distinct, something with her own characteristic flavor and not some slightly modified version of another author’s creation.

So that became my only gripe with this book. Go ahead and check it out if you want and I probably will be doing the same with the other books in the series but to be honest I still maintain that I’m bummed that a powerful author like Meg can wash away her legacy and just become a very pale version of Janet Evanovich🙂

Meg Cabot

A YA dystopian Trilogy

I picked this series up recently as part of my desire to visit most of those YA titles that I totally ignored at their time of publication but nonetheless achieved some measure of reader acceptance. This journey has produced quite some interesting surprises–which of course I cherished–but also at the same time I must say there has been a slew of disappointments along the way, too. The Birthmarked Trilogy unfortunately ranks among the worst in that category of disappointing reads.

I’m not really going to say a lot here because much has already been spoken about how so underwhelming this series is, and the many poor reviews on Goodreads are a case in point. Like most YA titles published in the new milennium, it features a love triangle, no a love square actually because not two but three men compete for the love of the heroin. The dystopian setting is intriguing at first but then everything just goes flat after after a number of chapters and the story never recovers from there. Books 2 and 3 were a complete waste of time, to say the least.

If you haven’t read this series then save yourself the time and just keep things that way.

Over the past weeks I’ve kind of been so hooked to Lauren Oliver–love her prose and swashbuckling characters–but sadly I’m not finding this one as adorable. To be honest I’m finding the two sisters Nick and Dara, the main characters of this story, a little too plain and everydayish, and the book rehashes certain scenes we have seen in other books, teenage drinking, hooking up etc. That being said however I will continue with the book anyway since I’m so much into everything Lauren Oliver and let’s hope something big happens here and the story swings into thrilling territory. Despite all those complains though, if you’re in the mood for some good YA, please do try this author. She’ll likely not disappoint you.

I just thought to grab this after glimpsing news that it had been turned into a TV series, by no less than Amazon Prime, of all content providers. It’s a contest based novel with a whooping $67k take-home prize for the winner, and for teenagers with pretty much nothing to do over the summer holidays, it takes a lot of effort to resist. This premise of the novel though is somewhat mindless because despite the real grim possibility of death and injury in the games, no one is forced to participate and getting involved is purely optional.

Reading-wise I’ve only gone about fifteen percent into the story and so far there hasn’t been any real fireworks, just some character intros and a few fights, but things might indeed get hotter as I wade deeper in. Lauren’s writing remains great, and her vivid descriptions bring to life even what might have been pretty mundane scenes, and I love her greatly for it. I haven’t watched the TV adaptation however, but might one of these days get to doing it.

By all means this ain’t my usual cup of tea when it comes to book choices, but I must say I’m finding this story to be quite engaging. To be truthful though I did have a look at it during my Wattpad days, but didn’t like it much and only read a few chapters then stopped. This time around I don’t hate it in the same way and I’m flipping through the pages at pretty much a fast rate. Perhaps it’s that it has been officially published–with the through editing and enhancement that goes with that–and so it has improved a lot, with regards to everything that usually makes debut novels suck. The basic plot structure though hasn’t been altered really, and it constantly repeats: fight, make love, fight again then make love–you get my point.

As far as the characters go however, I’m finding Tessa to be naive and clumsy, and even too whiny at times, while at the same time I don’t think Harden is the complete, nonredeemable jerk that he has been accused of being. And although I don’t think the two are quite made for each other, I honestly do believe there’s some room that they can understand one another at last, but we will see if that comes to pass. All in all not a bad debut at all.

Now over to you, did you check this series when it came out? And if so, what did you think?