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Archive for the ‘Rating: 3 stars’ Category

Westsiders by Tom Finn

Posted in Life story, Rating: 3 stars, Review copy, Short stories, tagged , , , , , on June 25, 2012 | 1 Comment »

I must admit, I am not a massive fan of short stories. Why? Purely because they are short. With short stories, it feels almost like you start somewhere in the middle and before you realise the story is over. Imagine yourself really wanting to go swimming, you get ready, the excitement builds up and as soon as you are at the pool you jump in only to realise that the water is way too cold and you just shoot out of there never to return. That’s how short stories feel to me, never getting the full satisfaction the same way I get from other books.

Said that, now and again I feel like I need to read something else, something different, something unexpected and it is in these times that I reach for short stories. So when I got the chance to read the Westsiders, I thought, why not. And I wasn’t disappointed. This collection of short stories is like a deluxe package of spa treatment for your soul. You find yourself slowly strolling through 1940′s/50′s Corner Brook in Newfoundland listening to the stories of some of its residents. The book is full of more or less loveable characters and you only get a sneak peek into a brief moments in their lives. And that’s when you realise that generations upon generations have dealt with the same problems as people are dealing with now. The only difference is that now we have more options how to deal with the situations such as unwanted pregnancy or secret relationship and running away with a boss.

As you can imagine, Corner Brook in the middle of last century must have been place small enough for everyone to know everyone and ultimately a place where everyone was involved in everyone’s business. So there is no surprise that the underlying theme for the stories is an escape from Corner Brook. It seems that there are truly just two options – either to escape or stay and be the major topic of the town’s latest gossip.

Overall, I had nice time with this book  and my only hope is that when the time comes and I pick another book of short stories, I will be as lucky as with this ones.

(review copy)

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Dirty Little Angels by Chris Tusa

Posted in Life story, Novel, Rating: 3 stars, Review copy, tagged , , , , , on May 22, 2012 | 1 Comment »

I don’t know why, but I have really mixed feelings about this book. I really can’t say that I am disappointed by the book, because I am not and in the same time I feel like the book was missing something, but I really can’t put my finger on what the ‘something’ is. And of course, it doesn’t help that the more I think about how to write this review the less I know what to actually write…

Let’s take it step by step, first of all, what I liked about the book. I think the book has a great story and although it is a fiction, it can easily be a true story. The book is set in New Orleans in a very run down area. The author doesn’t hold back and portrays the struggle of the 16-year-old with her awakening libido, exposure to violence, drugs and a skewed view of a religion as well as trying to make sense (and find who to blame) why the family is falling apart. But to be honest, the little girl has her darker wicked side too and has ways how to cope in this environment. The book offers very interesting insight into a section of a society that is living sometimes on the right side of the law and sometimes dipping into the other side. It shows that the author clearly took the time to do the research.

What I particularly struggled with, was to build a bond with the characters (apart from Verma who is very sweet and down to earth). I tried over and over and it just didn’t work out for me and as a consequence, I didn’t really care about what is going to happened next. And I kind of feel sorry for that because the book is interesting and I should be able to enjoy it more.

For me, this book had all the right ingredients to be a great book but it is missing a ‘soul’. I don’t know whether I am biased because I have read quite a few exceptional books recently and this one didn’t reach the same high mark, which was slightly unsatisfactory. Said that, this book is still a better than average read so try and give it a go, maybe you will have better luck with it than me.

(review copy)

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Virals by Kathy Reichs

Posted in Action, Adventure, Rating: 3 stars, Young-adult fiction, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on May 7, 2012 | 1 Comment »

Before I start my review I should make two things clear.

Firstly, as you can see on my LibraryThing or Goodreads, I am a big fan of Kathy Reichs’ Temperance Brennan series. I find her books entertaining with thrilling plots and I also enjoy the scientific side of the books. I also think that they are very well written and thought through. No need to say that I totally love Bones, the TV series.

Secondly, I didn’t buy this book, I got is as a Christmas present.

Now I think I am ready to dive into my review.

When I received this book I was really excited as I haven’t read Kathy Reichs’ book for a while, so I was really looking forward to it. Then I realised that this book isn’t about Tempe and what’s more, it is classified in Young Adult (YA) literature. Don’t get me wrong, I have read my fair share of YA literature but it isn’t my first choice when I reach for a book. With this in mind I still like to believe that I approached this book with reasonably open mind.

After I finished the book I realised, that I have few issues with it. Actually, I kind of realised that while reading it, but how much relevant they are is up to you to judge. To start with, the main character is a 14-year-old, but I can’t imagine anyone of that age to have such a depth of knowledge and particular skills, not to mention such a freedom to run around any time of the day or night. I think the whole story would be more believable if she was 16/17 years. As in most of the other YA books, all the main characters acquire super powers. Nothing wrong with that if you are into it, but as I was reading, I repeatedly kept wondering how much similar this is to Twilight –  the part about knowledge sharing and communicating between wolves.

Overall the book was incredibly light read to the point where I started questioning how much time did Kathy spent on it. Maybe it is just me, but when I want to read Kathy Reichs’ book, I just expect more. As you can see I was pretty disappointed by the book, but I am happy to admit that this is partly my fault because I had high expectations. So to be fair, I give this book 3 stars but I know for sure that I don’t want to read sequel to this. I will just wait for the proper Tempe book, if there is ever going to be another one.

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Legitimate Issues by Cassandra DeBrown

Posted in Rating: 3 stars, Review copy, Thriller on April 28, 2012 | 3 Comments »

This book has everything – twins, broken heart, damsel in distress, super villainous villain plotting on a world scale, hard muscle hired for a dirty work and his almost comical sidekick, confusion, plenty of action and one very loveable dog. All in all, plenty of good ingredients for a nice and fast paced thriller. The book reads well and there is some depth to some of the characters but sometimes I felt that the reality was stretched bit too far to be believable.

I enjoyed the read but in the same time I would prefer for the book to be bit longer, which would give the author some room to beef up the characters little bit more and to offer the reader more detailed information throughout the whole story. Overall, this was nice and decent read.

(review copy)

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