The Coldest Girl in Coldtown Review

Title: The Coldest Girl in Coldtown
Author: Holly Black
Release Date: September 3rd 2013
Publisher: Little Brown for Young Readers
Source: ARC for Review
Rating: 4/5

Tana lives in a world where walled cities called Coldtowns exist. In them, quarantined monsters and humans mingle in a decadently bloody mix of predator and prey. The only problem is, once you pass through Coldtown’s gates, you can never leave.

One morning, after a perfectly ordinary party, Tana wakes up surrounded by corpses. The only other survivors of this massacre are her exasperatingly endearing ex-boyfriend, infected and on the edge, and a mysterious boy burdened with a terrible secret. Shaken and determined, Tana enters a race against the clock to save the three of them the only way she knows how: by going straight to the wicked, opulent heart of Coldtown itself.

Review:

 

I haven't read a really enjoyable vampire book in quite a long time until reading Holly Black's The Coldest Girl in Coldtown. The atmosphere that Holly has weaved together in her latest novel in dark and gritty just like a tale about vampires should be.

 

While the book does start off on the slow side it serves a purpose, which is world building. The Coldest Girl in Coldtown has a complex world which takes time to explain to readers. If you stick through the slow beginning I can guarantee that you will end up loving the every other minute of the book.

 

As we all know vampire are REALLY over used these days in film and literature making it hard to create a story line that is unique. I strongly believe that The Coldest Girl in Coldtown stands out amongst other vampire book that have been written in the past and will continue to do so with the ones that are sure to come in the future. The concept, vampire mythology, and especially the setting are things that I haven't encountered before and is the main reason I ended up liking this book as much as I did.

 

Being a fan of Holly Black and not having read anything from her in a while I loved getting back into her writing and really enjoyed the dark element shes takes on in The Coldest Girl in Coldtown. Overall I really enjoyed The Coldest Girl in Coldtown and I was left wanting more (not sure if there will be more books or not). I highly recommend this book to fans of fantasy/paranormal books.

When We Wake Review

Title: When We Wake
Author: Karen Healey
Publisher: Little Brown
Release Date: March 5th 2013
Source: ARC for Review
Rating: 3

Sixteen-year-old Tegan is just like every other girl living in 2027--she's happiest when playing the guitar, she's falling in love for the first time, and she's joining her friends to protest the wrongs of the world: environmental collapse, social discrimination, and political injustice.

But on what should have been the best day of Tegan's life, she dies--and wakes up a hundred years in the future, locked in a government facility with no idea what happened.

Tegan is the first government guinea pig to be cryonically frozen and successfully revived, which makes her an instant celebrity--even though all she wants to do is try to rebuild some semblance of a normal life. But the future isn't all she hoped it would be, and when appalling secrets come to light, Tegan must make a choice: Does she keep her head down and survive, or fight for a better future?

Award-winning author Karen Healey has created a haunting, cautionary tale of an inspiring protagonist living in a not-so-distant future that could easily be our own.

Review:

Going into When We Wake I was very intrigued based on the concept of the book which is 16 year old girl named Teagan dying and waking up 100 years into the future. Right from the get go I picked up on what some of the major themes of the book would be; environmental issues and religion. The environment issues I found to be interesting, the religion... not so much.

The thing that I enjoyed the most about When We Wake is the not so hard to believe futuristic setting. The setting that Karen Healey created seems like a very plausible one that is plagued by issues caused by mans carelessness for our environment.

Fans of The Beatles will surely appreiciate this book as the chapters are named after their songs and their are countless mentions of them throughout the book, COUNTLESS. Maybe a bit too much for those (like me) who don't care for them that much.

I found myself really enjoying the characters, Teagan was an excellent voice to read the story from. The side characters were also very well written and long with the book itself. My only major complaint about the book is that I found there not to be a plot to the story until after 100 pages, which is almost half of the book. Once the plot did come into play is was full of fun things like conspiracies that will appeal to many.

Overall I did enjoy When We Wake, but it was not my all time favourite read. I do look forward to seeing where the story leads in the next book though.