shadrachankihttp://booklikes.com/photo/crop/50/50/upload/avatar/user.jpgshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com2024-03-19T11:18:42+00:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/rssreview: The Crystal Singer2015-01-07T00:00:00+00:002015-01-07T00:00:00+00:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129287/the-crystal-singershadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.comreview: How to Catch a Bogle (Bogle #1)2014-11-06T00:00:00+00:002014-11-06T00:00:00+00:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129288/how-to-catch-a-bogle-bogle-1shadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.comreview: Lady Lissa's Liaison2014-06-04T00:00:00+01:002014-06-04T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129289/lady-lissa-s-liaisonshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com
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review: The Walls of the Universe2014-05-29T00:00:00+01:002014-05-29T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129396/the-walls-of-the-universeshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.comreview: The Royal Ranger2013-11-06T00:00:00+00:002013-11-06T00:00:00+00:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129293/the-royal-rangershadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com The marketing of this series fascinates me. I know I need to check the children's section of my local bookshops if I want to find them. They are classified as juvenile fiction, or maybe sometimes as YA (I can't say as I have ever found them shelved in the YA/teen section, however). When the series starts, Will and his friends are fifteen years old, but by this last book they are, at an absolute minimum, in their mid-30s. That's a huge range of ages for a series of books aimed at children, but somehow it works.
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review: Summer Wars, Part 12013-10-25T00:00:00+01:002013-10-25T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129290/summer-wars-part-1shadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.comreview: Double Identity2013-09-18T00:00:00+01:002013-09-18T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129291/double-identityshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com Still, all told it is a fun, fast-paced read, and for the intended audience it should be pretty engaging.
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review: Wednesdays in the Tower2013-09-07T00:00:00+01:002013-09-07T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129292/wednesdays-in-the-towershadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.comreview: Black Hole Sun2013-07-09T00:00:00+01:002013-07-09T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129382/black-hole-sunshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com Unfortunately, for me the negatives rather outweigh the positives. Strike one, it's written in first person present tense. Mostly from the viewpoint of a single character (Durango), but there are some others thrown in there "when necessary". I find first person present tense to be very tricky to pull off properly in fiction. It isn't bad here, but there are a few rough spots and it is hard to get a full sense of the passage of time (not withstanding the date/time stamps at the start of each chapter).
Strike two, starting in medias res combined with throwing a whole lot of unfamiliar terms and story elements at the reader with no explanations given whatsoever. While I am no real fan of the extended info-dump (it usually bogs down a story something fierce), having to piece together what things are and how they work with no confirmation as to whether or not I am doing it correctly isn't particularly fun either. There has to be a balance, and that balance wasn't present here. Having lots of flashy action only carries things so far.
Strike three, there's a definite sense of "story soup" going on here. I could see elements that track to Firefly, Star Wars, Star Trek, Ender's Game, and samurai films. The tech seems very much subject to hand-wavium, and seems applied inconsistently throughout the story. I found it hard to get a real sense of time and place as a result. Particularly when you have a few characters in a far-distant, semi-dystopian future still quoting heavily from 19th century literature and 20th century culture (and people get the references without problems). Oh, and the mishmash of languages being dropped (untranslated, mind you) here and there, apparently for the purposes of flavour and world-building? Didn't work for me. There were too many of them, they weren't consistently applied, and it just came across as sloppy.
The story is also quite violent. This is to be expected as Durango and company are mercenary soldiers, but still. There were a number of places where it was really hard to follow the action, and on more than one occasion I found myself wondering just how things were supposed to work from a physics perspective. If I'm thinking more about the physics and logistics of a fight than the tension it is supposed to be building in the story, then I'd say something isn't working properly with the story.
I got this book through the B&N Nook Free Friday program.
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review: Avatar: The Last Airbender: The Search, Part 12013-04-23T00:00:00+01:002013-04-23T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129294/avatar-the-last-airbender-the-search-part-1shadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com I'm looking forward to July where we will hopefully get more answers.
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review: The Demigod Files2013-03-27T00:00:00+00:002013-03-27T00:00:00+00:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129295/the-demigod-filesshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com Second, the interviews with the various campers and the other Camp Half Blood related stuff. I found these mildly entertaining, but not much beyond that. They do give some insight/information into the characters and how the camp works, but in general they feel pretty light.
Third, the puzzles and games. Again, mildly interesting, but also rather simplistic. This is completely understandable, given the target audience for the book, but I wouldn't have been fussed had they been left out entirely. I'm not a huge fan of puzzles in books anyway, since they can create issues if you lend/borrow the book.
Finally, the character depictions...no. Just no. They don't match up with my mental pictures at all. Too cartoony for my tastes, with exaggerated proportions and garish colours. And there's just something off about the eyes in nearly every picture.
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review: The Lost Hero2013-03-14T00:00:00+00:002013-03-14T00:00:00+00:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129296/the-lost-heroshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.comreview: Redwall 2012-11-17T00:00:00+00:002012-11-17T00:00:00+00:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129297/redwallshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com Despite my love for the series, it had been years since I last read Redwall, and the last time I tried I discovered I wasn't in the mood for that particular book, so I set it aside. Since it had been years, however, I decided to give it another try. I borrowed the audiobook from my local library to listen to during my commute. The full cast audio is delightful, and I really enjoyed listening to this story.
Thing is...I realise now that Redwall is probably my least favourite entry in the series, and in listening to it I've been able to pinpoint a few of the reasons why this is. Redwall is the first book in the series, and on the world-building front it just doesn't mesh cleanly with the later books. The various groups and tribes of creatures are still largely undeveloped. There are mentions of large animals like horses, pigs, and stags, all of which are completely absent in later books. In Redwall there seems to be some implication that the Abbey mice and various woodland creatures are living alongside humans (see the aforementioned farm animals, plus mentions of towns), even though humans are never actually mentioned in the story. Reading Redwall after reading other books in the series winds up being jarring for me, simply because it's a literary step backward.
I still like the book, and I'm sure I'll read (or listen to) it again. Knowing why it isn't my favourite helps me appreciate it for what it is: the foundation and starting point for an amazing series of books that I absolutely love.
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review: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows2012-10-17T00:00:00+01:002012-10-17T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129298/harry-potter-and-the-deathly-hallowsshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com This was only my second time reading (or, in this case, listening) to the seventh book. There were things I'd forgotten, and things I'd remembered from the films which were changes to the storyline. All told, it's a powerful story, and Harry is an amazing man.
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review: Much Ado About Magic2012-08-20T00:00:00+01:002012-08-20T00:00:00+01:00http://shadrachanki.booklikes.com/post/1129299/much-ado-about-magicshadrachankihttp://shadrachanki.booklikes.com So I was extremely happy when I found out Shanna Swendson would be publishing the fifth book in the series as an ebook. I carefully marked the release date on my calendar so I could be sure to purchase a copy (and I really hope there will also be a print edition at some point in the future, because I do so like my books to match in format where possible).
This book did not disappoint in the slightest. I was torn between wanting to savour it slowly and wanting to gobble it up in big chunks of delightful storytelling. It had been a few months since I read the previous books in the series, but I was able to slide right back into the story and connect with the characters once more. The pacing was excellent and I think this book would provide a pretty good entry point to the series (though you will definitely get more out of it by reading the previous books first).
At the very end of the book was a teaser for the sixth book, which is slated to come out in ebook format on 1 October 2012. I already have the date on my calendar, and am eager to see what will happen next.
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