Tag: #Holly Black

March Wrap Up

9 Comments

Hey guys! I hope you all had a great month. I have definitely had an amazing month, and when I look back through it, I feel like March has been extremely long. In amongst everything I managed to read, I also managed to binge watch Vampire Diaries up until about episode 8 in season 5. So… I’ve definitely gotten through a lot this month!

Read:

Started:

Bought/Acquired:

ARCs/Review Copies:

Beta:

  • Rock – A – Bye Baby by LRW Lee

Goodreads Monday:

 

Other posts:

Book of the Month:

TCP

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

Published: January 2nd 2018 by LBBFYR

Of course I want to be like them. They’re beautiful as blades forged in some divine fire. They will live forever.

And Cardan is even more beautiful than the rest. I hate him more than all the others. I hate him so much that sometimes when I look at him, I can hardly breathe.

Jude was seven years old when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King.

To win a place at the Court, she must defy him–and face the consequences.

In doing so, she becomes embroiled in palace intrigues and deceptions, discovering her own capacity for bloodshed. But as civil war threatens to drown the Courts of Faerie in violence, Jude will need to risk her life in a dangerous alliance to save her sisters, and Faerie itself.

I hope you all had an amazing month like I did! Feel free to add your links to the comments so I can check them out!

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

14 Comments

TCP.jpg

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

Published: January 2nd 2018 by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers

Of course I want to be like them. They’re beautiful as blades forged in some divine fire. They will live forever.

And Cardan is even more beautiful than the rest. I hate him more than all the others. I hate him so much that sometimes when I look at him, I can hardly breathe.

Jude was seven years old when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King.

To win a place at the Court, she must defy him–and face the consequences.

In doing so, she becomes embroiled in palace intrigues and deceptions, discovering her own capacity for bloodshed. But as civil war threatens to drown the Courts of Faerie in violence, Jude will need to risk her life in a dangerous alliance to save her sisters, and Faerie itself.

I’m not going to lie – I was skeptical about this book. I was worried about the amount of hype and praise this book was getting and the fact that I usually fall into the category of not loving the books that everyone else loves and raves about. So when I saw this in the book store, I bought it on a whim and hoped for the best. I can safely say that I am so GLAD I did because this book was just breathtaking!

Whilst there were a couple of scenes written in the human world, the vast majority of this book takes place in Faerie. The world building that went on in this book was just beautiful. It was vivid, lush and it really popped from the page. I easily got lost just in the world building alone and it was like I was there with the characters, watching what was going on. I loved the way in which the beauty of the world went against everything else about this book. It went against the dark nature of the creatures that inhabit the world and it fit together perfectly.

I loved all of the characters – even the horrible ones. Each and every character brought something new to the plot and the world as a whole and no two characters felt similar at all. I loved watching characters and personalities clash as the book went on, along with the subtle ways in which the characters went against each other and the way in which it all wove together. Each and every character was complex and had multiple layers to them. I also loved the fact that none of the characters had any inhibitions about the fact that they were manipulative and nasty. They knew exactly what and who they were and they revelled in it.

I was expecting hate Prince Cardan… and I just didn’t. He is a dark and twisted character, but has another side to him that no one else knows about. I have such mixed feelings about Cardan – I know he is horrible and nasty, but I still really like him as a character and I am totally on bored with this dark and twisted character and I just want MORE.

Locke was another character who I found extremely interesting. I had guessed his game from the very beginning, but I still felt convinced by him despite knowing what he was doing. I felt as betrayed as the characters by the end – despite knowing! I loved the way in which he manipulated and twisted his words (considering the whole Faeries can’t lie thing) and it really reinforced the dark and twisted nature of the Fey and their manipulative sides.

As mentioned throughout this review – the book was DARK… and I loved every second. The characters were manipulative and dark and the plot itself added to the whole theme. I loved the betrayals, the word games and just everything about this twisted book. I lost all expectations for this book because it was just so twisted and I was just completely hooked. I HAD to know what was going to happen next. I physically could not put this book down to save my life and it resulted in me finishing it in one sitting.

The plot itself was also complex. It had multiple plot points and layers and they all wove together and intertwined to come together as one thing at the end. The plot was extremely easy to follow and get lost in despite the various points – I never once felt lost or confused. The plot had a direct effect on the character development – and I loved it! Between Jude and Taryn’s relationship developments, along with Cardan and Judes etc. It all worked perfectly together. Can I also just mention that I am totally on board with the twisted canon that was going on in this book!

I also just want to mention the ending! :-O It was easy to forget that Jude can outright lie and I was just not expecting the ending that happened. I was left reeling and I just need the second book… like right now!

All in all, I absolutely loved this book! I am glad I decided to pick it up and I am totally lamenting the fact that I have to wait till NEXT YEAR for the next instalment. I think hibernation is in order. The dark and twisted nature of this book was so refreshing and unique and I cannot wait to return to this world full of twisted, manipulative characters and betrayals! I gave this book 5/5 stars.

The Copper Gauntlet by Cassandra Clare and Holly Black

Leave a comment

the copper gauntlet.jpg

Callum Hunt’s summer break isn’t like other kids’. His closest companion is a Chaos-ridden wolf, Havoc. His father suspects him of being secretly evil. And, of course, most kids aren’t heading back to the magical world of the Magisterium in the fall.

It’s not easy for Call . . . and it gets even harder after he checks out his basement and discovers that his dad might be trying to destroy both him and Havoc.

Call escapes to the Magisterium — but things only intensify there. The Alkahest — a copper gauntlet capable of separating certain magicians from their magic — has been stolen. And in their search to discover the culprit, Call and his friends Aaron and Tamara awaken the attention of some very dangerous foes — and get closer to an even more dangerous truth.

As the mysteries of the Magisterium deepen and widen, bestselling authors Holly Black and Cassandra Clare take readers on an extraordinary journey through one boy’s conflict — and a whole world’s fate. (Goodreads)

I have had this on my TBR for over a year – ever since I read the first book in this series. I really enjoyed the first book (looking back on my review) and I knew at the time that the second book was something I wanted straight away. So, to say that I DNF’ed this book is disappointing. I was expecting a lot more than what I was given

This book was pretty much a mash up of all the Harry Potter books. We have our Harry, Hermione and Ron in Callum, Aaron and Tamara and Draco in the form of Jasper. Voldemort is played by a character called Constantine Madden – who, it turns out, placed his soul in the body of Callum. Surprise surprise. Our loved Hedwig is now a chaos ridden wolf called Havoc. The philosophers stone is an Alkahest. Callum even runs away from home after his dad nearly almost pulled a Vernon and Petunia Dursley in the sense that he wanted to lock him in the basement – granted, the Dursleys didn’t want to experiment on Harry… just lock him up. The Magisterium is Hogwarts and of course Hogwarts the Magisterium is Harry’s Callums home. Do you see where I am going with this? Oh, I almost forgot, they all run off to save Sirius Callum’s dad, who pulled a Snape and stole the Alkahest from Gringotts the Collegium. Yeah… it’s a rip off to say the least!!

What made it worse was the fact that I felt no connection whatsoever to the characters in any sense. In fact, they bugged me to death and I found them extremely boring! If I could have, I would have slapped all of them … multiple times! Ron Callum was bugging me with his evil overlord rubbish, whilst Harry Aaron and Hermione Tamara bugged me even more! I felt like this book was written for children in the middle school rather than a young adult book!

I don’t think it really helped that I haven’t read the first book in this series since I first read it over a year ago. Obviously I have read a lot of books in the time between then and now and I think I have just lost the plot in the sense that I can’t remember really what happened in the first book anymore. I felt confused. I think the first book is definitely worth a reread if you really want to read this book!!

I was really disappointed that I was given a knock off of my childhood! I expected more from this book and in that sense, the authors just didn’t deliver! I gave this book 1/5 stars.

Top Ten Tuesday

25 Comments

toptentuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by the Broke and Bookish.

Hi guys! Can’t believe we’r halfway through the year already – where is it going??? This weeks TTT is top ten books that I’d like to see as films/TV Shows. This is a hard one, especially (and we all know it), the books are always better than the films! However, here are my choices, in no particular order:

10. dragonlance Dragonlance by Magaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. I have read both the Chronicles series and the Legends series and I think, if done right, these books would make epic films! Just like Lord of the Rings!

9. the walls around us The Walls Around Us by Nova Suma. Not entirely sure how they would film it to get the right atmosphere, but I reckon this could be quite creepy!

8. Shatter Me Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi. For anyone who knows me/follows my blog etc. will know that I absolutely adore this series! I would love to see what they could do with it on screen!

7. Splintered Splintered by A. G. Howard. I reckon Tim Burton’s imagination could handle this – what do you guys think?

6. the selection The Selection by Kiera Cass. I guess this one is technically cheating since Warner Bros recently bought the film rights for this series – but I am still looking forward to it!

5. say her name Say Her Name by James Dawson. My life is missing a decent horror movie – or maybe I just don’t scare easily? Either way, this could make for a good horror movie! 🙂

4. Daughter of smoke and bone Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor. Again, this could be a great film – if the film industry could handle such awesomness…

3. The Iron Trial The Iron Trials by Holly Black and Cassandra Clare. This would be a challenge because of the high risk that it would be just like Harry Potter!

2. rites of passage Rites of Passage by Joy N. Hensley. With a little bit of everything in this book – it could easily be a crowd pleaser if done right.

1. Dangerous Girls Dangerous Girls by Abigail Haas. Again, another challenge. If they got the psychology right and portrayed it in the right way, this could be as enjoyable as the book.

That’s it! What do you guys think? Feel free to leave opinions, answers and links in the comments section below.