30.06.26
A competent smalltown 'kids on bikes' (well, teens in cars) mystery that wasn't particularly distinct from similar YA stories and TV shows.
Showing posts with label young adult. Show all posts
Showing posts with label young adult. Show all posts
Your Time is Up - Sarah Naughton
51%
Who knew exams could be so exciting? Especially if 1) there are lots of flashbacks and 2) everyone leaves the exam room to generate the plot because exams are not exciting at all. But it was fine, even if the villain was obvious from the start and there was an unprofessional number of typos for a traditionally published book.
If You Could See the Sun - Ann Liang
11.03.26
This has a great premise and (slightly) unusual setting but it doesn't explore either enough. The tediously self-involved protagonist can turn invisible - so many possibilities! - but most of what she gets up to is skimmed over. Also not interrogated was the love interest letting her take the fall for something he was also involved in. But it's fine, as long as they're together, right?
The Thrashers - Julie Soto
60%
10.02.26A fun and thoughtful high-school supernatural thriller that leaned into the ridiculous horror tropes while also tackling the universal desire to belong. It could have been developed a little more - there were parts that needed more (and others that needed less) focus, and the protagonist didn't really have enough conflict, but generally it was engaging and mostly unpredictable.
Check and Mate - Ali Hazelwood
57%
06.02.26You can tell from the title that this is ridiculous in almost every way but Hazelwood is good at what she does and somehow it's still cute and engaging and relatively unpredictable (and quite educational about chess) if you don't think too carefully about the Cinderella fantasy of it all or the disappointingly flat ending.
Crooked Kingdom - Leigh Bardugo
31.07.25
Bardugo is a fine writer. Her worldbuilding is vivid and her characters are complex. I enjoyed the first book in this series. So why was this one so boring? I had to force my way through it, in search of a real plot, anything that wasn't adolescent heartache and confusing economics. And then, of course, at the end, nothing was as it seemed. Except for the things that were.
Six of Crows - Leigh Bardugo
11.06.25
This was structured like the card tricks that appear throughout the story - carefully planned, carefully dealt, only revealing the full hand at the right time. The worldbuilding was impeccable and the characters mostly three-dimensional. All that makes it a little easier to overlook the fact that those characters (as usual for Bardugo) are unrealistically precocious teens and the apparently independent women don't pass the Bechdel test.
The Last Dragonslayer - Jasper Fforde
26.10.24
I have no memory of buying this so I read it - and I only remembered I'd read it after finishing the book I'd read after it, a few days later, which isn't a good sign. It was fine - amusing, with good worldbuilding, but the story was confusing and not particularly exciting for a YA adventure. It was (Fforde's adult fantasy/satire) Shades of Grey lite.
The Queen of Nothing - Holly Black
17.07.24
And the last of my holiday reads was also the last in this intriguing trilogy. For a romantasy author, Black doesn't shy away from politics and power and the ways they can be manipulated by those who have power and those who don't (yet). And her main character is, interestingly, both skilled in scheming and clueless in relationships. But it was still a bit 'chuck everything at it and see what sticks', and there were a few elements about the ending that didn't quite work.
The Wicked King - Holly Black
06.07.24
That difficult second book in a trilogy, the bridge between the intriguing opening and explosive ending. This particular bridge wasn't particularly well designed - functional but more of a route to somewhere else than a journey in itself.
All Our Hidden Gifts - Caroline O'Donoghue
29.06.24
The ideas were interesting but it felt a little underdeveloped and messy without a clear structure or narrative drive. Its attempts to cover some serious themes seemed forced and worthy rather than naturally integrated into the story. All in all, it read like a promising early draft that needed some more editorial intervention.
(And an accidental second Irish book in a row - very different to the previous one.)
Fourth Wing - Rebecca Yarros
52%
So. Many. Words. So. Much. Angst. And So. Much. Hype for a fantasy novel that uses familiar old tropes gleaned from lots of other fantasy novels. The author had obviously spent a lot of time on the world building, but it was so dense that whatever it was the (tiresome) main character was supposed to be shocked about at the end depended on some detail that was lost in the mix. The dragons were pretty cool. But dragons generally are.
The Cruel Prince - Holly Black
I thought it was about time I read something by the prolific Holly Black and this turned out to be pretty awesome, in all senses: vividly written with fabulous worldbuilding and a complex, intriguing protagonist. It did have confusingly strange pacing, on both a general and line level, and abruptly changed tone when it went all Game of Thrones about two-thirds in, but I was quite happy to be swept along in the court intrigue.
Pretties - Scott Westerfield
This suffered from the usual 'second in a trilogy' problem of being more of a bridge to the last book than a destination in itself. It had moments of brilliance but mostly the author seemed not to know where the story was going, so it was hard to care. And the heroine's superpower for attracting the attention of useful young men - just bogus, as she might say.
The Extraordinaries - TJ Klune
57%
15.04.24This story, while funny and gloriously queer, featured one of the most irritating protagonists I've ever encountered. Why two hot guys were literally fighting over this self-obsessed, excruciatingly slow-on-the-uptake 16-year-old-who-behaved-like-a-10-year-old*, I had no idea. And the true secret identities were so obvious from almost the start that the 'great revelation' towards the end was more of a 'well, duh!', along with another twist that was basically spelled out which will be properly revealed in Book 2. Still, it was fun. (And I'd already bought Book 2 when it was offer so I might as well read it.)
*This aspect was particularly annoying. I know plenty of 16-year-olds and, yes, they're still children, but they try very hard not to behave like children. I also know people with ADHD and they don't behave like children either. Neither being a teenager nor ADHD are developmental limiters - quite the opposite, really.
The Naturals - Jennifer Lynn Barnes
I thought this was going to be another 'magic school' book but in fact this isn't fantasy - or only in the 'unrealistic wish fulfilment' sense. It's basically a rehearsal for Barnes' later Inheritance Games series - not-so-ordinary girl is put in extraordinary situation, rather tedious boys fight over her, poor pacing and plot development ensues - it's still as fun to read.
Uglies - Scott Westerfield
Interesting concept and world building, with its pace hampered by being split into a trilogy, so that, in the end, it felt incomplete.
Unraveller - Frances Hardinge
09.12.22
Hardinge is back on track after the rather disappointing Deeplight. Here's her typical robust world building, unflinching examination of power, politics, love and friendship, arresting turns of phrase and vivid characters. Maybe a little too episodic and drawn out but that's only a minor issue with this quality of writing.
Family of Liars - E Lockhart
17.07.22
Apparently, there's a subgenre called 'rich people dramas' and this is a prime example. I don't mind reading about impossibly entitled people - I mean, isn't imagining other's experiences what novels are for? - but this was just very boring. I was ready to give up when Something Suddenly Happened... and then it went back to being boring. We Were Liars was indulgent and predictable but at least it wasn't dull.
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