Review of John Green's "An Abundance of Katherines"

    I normally try to space out my reading of high-profile authors, but chose to follow up Suzanne Collins with John Green for 2 reasons: 1) I have wanted to read a John Green book for a while now, because he is such a huge author currently in the YA field 2) After reading Mockingjay, I wanted to read something lighter, and so I compromised with my first stipulation by reading a light John Green book. I had wanted to read The Fault in our Stars, but after seeing the movie first, I new it would be heavy. With this review, I've decided to go more in-depth. My review of Mockingjay brief, because had I let myself go, I would have dissected like an alien life form:

    One thing that struck me immediately with this book, was that it was told in the third person. Many popular YA novels thick with quirky narrators and teenage angst opt for the first person view. I appreciated the extra effort. What I did not like so much towards the beginning, was all of the "telling" mostly used to describe character's habits. It felt like my hand was being held too much. The first third had some other troubles such as the narrator giving an opinion out of nowhere, clichéd dialogue and Colin being overly judgmental. Then the last third of the book seemed to get lazy with description, and throw in adverbs. The one thing that annoyed me that isn't a common issue, was the use of the word "fug," and more so its overuse. Until it was explained, the word seemed like a childish way to get around using cuss words. Dialogue does not need cussing to make it impactful, but this turned out to be more of a homage. Now that I have covered my issues, on to the story.
    What carried most of this book was Colin's personality, and just listening to him. Otherwise, not much else had me craving to see what would happen next. One of the strongest problems was the large cast of characters, that are all given limited time and limited personalities so that they seem like filler between Colin's breakthroughs. Most of the other dynamic elements seemed to just fall in place, and Colin merely coexisted with them. His relationship with Hasan and their bickering was also a highlight of the book, but their language made every other character seem too bland. I loved hearing from them so much, and following Colin's train of thought, that it seemed every other aspect was just a nuisance of Green to write.
    I had to admire John Green for the work he put into writing this, such as the cliffnote on remembering the number sequence of pi. He put a lot of love into the little details, that made this book seem real, but almost so real that they seem like they were outright conceived outside of the novel. I think the main issue of this book was spending too much effort on certain aspects that most of the story could not match that level of passion. It was an uneven trip.
    I do not think it was the strongest John Green book to have started off with, but with the few characters he played with, I could see all of the passion and precision he puts into his work. It is hard not to love a book where you can see the author put so much work into. Shelf.
   

Review of Kate Hattemer's "The Vigilante Poets of Selwyn Academy"

    Honestly, what drew me to the book, aside from the advertising, was the "Vigilante" in the title. Despite not being an actual superhero fiction story, a story of vigilante's has the same concept. However, the plot involving the rebellion against a reality tv show, also had my mind going. Now, let me finally stop dawdling and get to the good stuff (foreshadowing):

    Vigilante Poets straddled the line between ultra realistic, and utterly implausible to a large degree. The characters, emotions, and mundane qualities exuded real life, but much like a reality tv show, there were things that were off. And it was subtle, but I caught wind. For example: A reality tv show shot from a pool of contestants taken from one school that airs Friday nights at 9, and is shot the week prior to airing on tv. A few things wrong with this, in a glorious tricolon: Friday nights between 8pm-11pm is death to a tv show of this caliber, a reality tv show would most likely film months in advance, so there is time to edit every episode, and a reality tv show that takes only students from one highschool in Minnesota would lack diversity  which tv begs for.
    So, I got caught up in some flaws. However, the characters feel all to real. These teens have some unique personalities, are flawed, and do not suffer from many clichés. The writing was exciting, but also having fun with itself. It also had a realistic plot that was not forced towards an absolute resolution.
    The one thing that truly brought this book down was the pacing of the plot. So much time was spent waiting, and discovering, that there was only two instances in the book where the main characters did anything to challenge the system. I could not wait for something to happen, which is normally a good thing, but the breadcrumbs were spaced so far apart it was difficult to reach the next one without getting lost and bored.
    The climax of the book, really grabbed me by the collar though, and I finally got the payoff. If I could suggest anything for this book, it would be that actions speak louder than words. shelf.

Review of Wesley King's "The Vindico"

    This one took me a while to get into because right out the gate, the writing did not impress me. I had suspected this would be a young adult novel, but the characters and writing would make the age range 10-14 year olds. Now, just because a book is catered towards a younger, does not mean that the writing has to be dumbed down. Yes, the jargon must be tamed, but trusting the readers to interpret a story should not change. A 10-year-old can understand that "he smiled" can infer that the character is happy. However, writing, " he said happily," is an insult to one's intelligence. Let's just get on with it:

    Gifted children attend a school where they are taught to control their powers so they may fight a great evil. This description can be used to describe many YA novels. The Vindico slaps on the twist that the children are being trained to be villains, but the only crime they seem to commit is not giving the reader enough credit. This book enlisted lazy adverbs to do most of the emotional work, and employed tons of dialogue for the exposition. The five protagonists are all giving one-dimensional personalities, and the side characters were difficult to distinguish from one another.
    Redeeming factors are hard pressed to find. If anything, the climax was a fast paced mix of twists and turns. King did a better job at juggling a double digit amount of characters in one scene than I would have expected. Overall, much like the villains in this story, the negatives outweigh the positives.
    If I had a shelf dedicated to books I did not want to reread, this would get a spot.

Review of Drew Hayes' "NPC's"

     After that horrendous first attempt, I managed to ruffle through another book in under a day. Thus, I am back on track towards my goal of 25(+) books. This next book caught my attention because its premise was along the very same lines I think, putting the NPCs (Non-Player Characters) of a table top game as the protagonists.

    This one will teach you never to take the background characters lightly. The premise of the story behind NPCs already put my foot into the door, and with all the paths it could have taken, I think it delivered. Truly, besides the association with our world, NPCs is truly an underdog story told in a high fantasy realm. It held my attention and strung me along, but it is still far from a masterpiece.
    The plot was pretty straightforward, a group of nobodies take up disguises as adventurers to go on a quest. It was nothing terribly substantial, but the characters were likable, especially Thistle. The scenes are well described without getting overly ornate, and the characters challenged their prospective roles to a rewarding degree. The twists and turns, though sometimes predictable, kept the plot fresh.
    Though there was plenty of action and adventure, I never truly felt on the edge of my seat craving to see what would happen next. The story had an odd lack of tension, and the stakes weren't raised high enough to warrant a ladder. A further objection was that the adventure was fairly tame. Written well, but tame for this genre. And near the beginning, the characters came off as dense, with the author spoon feeding the plot and then taking more time to summarize what had just been said.
    The concept had ample paths towards a memorable story, and while the one chosen was underwhelming, the characters and witty scenes made it a good read. Shall it sit on my shelf for days to come.

Review of Warren Hately's "Zephyr: Phase One"

    I think over a week I spent on this book, the first I picked up after declaring I would read no less than 25 books this summer. It was as if I opened my door to a new life and found a wall of snow there that I had to wallow through for days to find the world outside. Now I can blame a few components to my slow reading time such as my distaste for the narrative, my quest to catch up with Game of Thrones and my attraction to another book. However, the truth to it is I could not understand the book, and here's why:

     There is no doubt in my mind that Warren Hately can weave magic with words. He is certainly skilled at stringing together bold sentences, but almost to a fault. The high concentration of these overly wordy lines often distracts from the story. I can cite multiple instances where entire paragraphs consisted of only one sentence, which was barely related to the plot. Moreover, this style of writing bares no resemblance to the main character's attitude. A blue-collar closet superhero from New York who has the vocabulary of a British professor mixed with a 12-year old gamer.

     Honestly, Zephyr is one of the most difficult to like protagonists I have ever encountered. While his wit and humor had me laughing, they were only drowned by his racism, ableism, homophobia, and sexism. I had just as much trouble trying to deduce how Hately is opinionated on some of these hot button issues. He comes from another part of the world entirely, which also factors in to how odd it was that he wrote a novel set in the U.S., but flavored in his native Australian language. “Colours” and “bloodies” abound. If an American man from Queens with this temper heard another New Yorker speaking this way, he'd sock him. Back on topic though, it is difficult to get past the "Afro-Americans" and "Fags" thrown around all the time. Whether or not Hately understands these terms are offensive or is acutely self-aware, the book reeks of them.

      And the plot. It does have its unique qualities, but that is not necessarily a good thing. In fact, the last few chapters, which are generally reserved for a climax, tell almost a completely different story fit for a book of it's own. 

     Another qualm I faced was the overabundance of characters. I counted 40+ superhero names within the book, all making random appearances. It was such a rough time trying to learn whom characters are when they show up randomly and in such large numbers. Perhaps the only secondary characters I got to know were the ones with the dialogue tags, "the gay hero says" or "a distinctly Afro-American voice." Ah, just a mess. And the attempt at putting heroes at the level of celebrities was just as poor. So many random celebrities were name dropped in the first chapter that I felt the author did all his research by reading People Magazine.

     I do think there is a possibility this deconstruction of the superhero genre could be groundbreaking and brilliant, but the execution was beyond me. I will not be holding on to this one.

Review of Mark Frost's "The Paladin Prophecy"

Quickie Review:

            Standard teen with special powers attends a school for the gifted, accompanied by his Australian guardian angel. Some evil ancient force composed of agencies, teenagers and monsters pursues him. It’s worth a read, and may surprise you. I would put it on my bookshelf.

Full Length Review:

Plot:

Will West’s family moves around every few years for no explanation. He has no close friends, so he spends his time running cross-country. When men called the Black Hats begin to pursue him, Will follows his dad’s 98 rules to survive. Once he learns that he has been accepted to an academy for the gifted, Will goes home only to find out his mom has become a zombie! Well, no. The Black Hats planted a mind control bug in her neck. After his father warns him to run, Will enrolls in the special school and flies off to safety.

The bulk of this book is Will gaining friends and unraveling the mystery behind who is after him. The plot fell apart for me though, somewhere around the part where Will abandons his family and uses Nando, a random taxi driver he just met to do reconnaissance on the bad guys. There is way too much going on, that the story was lost to all the cool features the author was trying to shove in.

2/5

Characters:

Will manages to meet a handful of wonderful characters that all get broad descriptions, but none particularly stand out, except Dave. However, most, including Will, don’t feel like fully realized ideas. Among Will’s friends, there is the brainy one, the slang-slinging gymnast, a piano player with fierce eyes, and a blonde love interest. While these may be new twists on past stereotypes, none defy expectations. They did make my laugh on occasion, though. The villain(s) had some interesting backstory, and some historical significance, but never displayed any awesome factors.

3/5

Setting/Description:

The book starts of in Ojai, California and moves Will off to The Center for Integrated Learning, a high school in Wisconsin. The Center is a high school for gifted students and recruits all students by merit. It houses a little over 1,000 students by Will’s calculations, yet boasts an entire shopping mall. It sounds too good to be true, or believable at all in our reality. I do enjoy the descriptions of snow though and I would make a pilgrimage to Popski’s any day of the week.

As for description, the book starts of with whole chapters dedicated to describing either people or areas. Some of the descriptions can even entice envy, such as the description for a hot rod and Will’s first Wisconsin breakfast. Yet, some of the time spent on describing minor things in great detail, could have gone to better use. Still, the writing never loses track and the words flow.

4/5

Writing Style:

This book is written in 3^rd person limited, past tense for the most part. However, at some points in time, the writing head hops mid-paragraph and the POV changes. The author enjoys lengthy descriptions, and characters so packed with personality they are borderline racist. Maybe it was the Mexican cab driver who can never form a grammatically correct sentence, or the Australian soldier who exclusively speaks in an Australian dialect like he never left. The pacing was slow at times, but picked up near the last 1/3 of the book, which was around 350 pages into this 560-page monster.

3/5

Potential:

This book already has a sequel due out in a few months. I think the author can carry the story through to a trilogy. With most of the description out of the way, I feel like the plot can get to maximum potential if the Mark Frost looks over mistakes from the first. This was also Frost’s first YA book, which was able to capture the teenage voice surprisingly well for a man bordering on 60.       His background in scriptwriting has given him to write the screenplay for the upcoming movie, which will definitely give this book some hype.

5/5

Final:

Plot 2/5

Characters 3/5

Setting/Description 4/5

Writing Style 3/5

Potential 5/5

Score 3.4/5