Review: Independence by Shelly Crane

Summary (from Goodreads):

In the fourth and final installment, Maggie and Caleb must tie up all the loose ends of their lives and make a way to be together completely on their own. With everything that happened with Bish and Maggie's father, she's almost reluctant to move on and move out. And now she must figure out all of this...stuff...with Haddock. But of course, nothing can stay simple for the Jacobsons. Enemies who were thought to be dissolved have decided to not go down so easily. And old flames come calling for more than just Maggie. Caleb is torn between leading his family and personal wants. Maggie is torn between Caleb and being the leader of their people. But neither will let what they need most to be pushed to the wayside. They are determined to make it all work, design a plan toward destiny, and make everything right again for themselves and their family.

And then there's a wedding...

If you looked up the definition of 'cute' you would find a picture of this book. This series is the epitome of cute; it is cute bordering on cheesy and cringe inducing. If you aren't in the right mood when reading Independence and every Significance Series novel before this last installment you could easily hate these novels for their overload of cheesiness. Fortunately, after a long withdrawal from romantic YA novels and as I was feeling pretty down from my absolute lack of a significant other (you see what I did there? eh? eh?)  I was in the perfect mood to read a romantic, chick flick-y book about two soul mates.

My expression, late at night/early in the morning, was a constant 'awwhr' shape. I couldn't not enjoy reading this book even though I did have a couple of 'what the' moments.

...I'm not sure why it took me until the last book to say this but what is up with the only heterosexual soul mates, do homosexual Aces not exist? Please do correct me if I'm wrong but there are no significant pairings where both significants are male/female.

Another qualm I had with this read was the fact that Caleb is SO over protective and always there. Earlier I said something about the cheesiness and in most books when either or both of the two people in the relationship are overly clingy or overly protective or fall in love too quickly I wouldn't read past the first couple of pages of the first book of the series, let alone the final novel. To be honest the reason I don't usually read those kinds of books is because they creep me out; the excessive love makes me really uncomfortable.

The sole reason why I was not only able to read this series but actually enjoy it quite a lot was due to NO CHANCE OF IT EVER HAPPENING IN REAL LIFE. For me this read was complete and utter escapism. I was able to look past the fast moving relationship and utter devotion between Caleb and Maggie and all the other significants because in real life people don't touch a stranger and see a mapped out future of them forever and they don't get with-freaking-drawals if they don't touch each other for a certain amount of time and they can't read each other's mind every single second of the day. That is impossible (and when said aloud, veeery creepy... and God, I just realised that I would absolutely hate for somebody to constantly be in my head) and because of the complete impossibility of the story I just wasn't too bothered with it all. If this book had been a portrayal of a realistic love story with Maggie and Caleb acting the way they do in this novel? That would.. no, just no.

Reading this series all depends on what kind of novel you want to read (like always...). If you're the type of person who completely despises excessive love and unrealistic development of relationships in fiction you should really probably give avoid this series at all costs. If you're like me and usually hate these relationships in realistic fiction but could possibly read it in an alternative universe where everything is cray-cray (I promise I just used 'cray-cray' ironically ;) ), maybe give the first novel a go.

But as this is a review for the Independence, the last novel in the series, you have probably read the others and with that in mind... overall this book is a pretty acceptable rounding off to a series. Like its predecessors the story line is put on the back burner to the love story but it's enjoyable to read. Even though this is the ultimate definition of fiction with nothing I can really learn from it to benefit me or affect me in my life I didn't like the lack of homosexual significants, the sometimes just TOO much 'you're mine' and 'claiming' between Maggie and Caled and I found the ending to be a bit too perfect with everyone so happy and jolly.

All in all I liked it but I didn't like bits but I did like it. :D

Music choice: I actually really like this song and although it doesn't completely show the excessive love in the novel this song is cute and I really did find a lot of the novel cute. Also the chorus pretty much sums up everything the Aces believe..

'Until you got love, you know you got nothin'
You're missin' that somethin' that's gonna set you free, yeah
Until you got love, you'll always be runnin'
'Cause love is that one thing that everybody needs'

Until You Got Love by Jon Mclaughlin

itunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/indiana/id252385135

Review: The Maze Runner by James Dashner

Summary (from Goodreads):

When the doors of the lift crank open, the only thing Thomas remembers is his first name. But he's not alone. He's surrounded by boys who welcome him to the Glade - a walled encampment at the centre of a bizarre and terrible stone maze. Like Thomas, the Gladers don't know why or how they came to be there - or what's happened to the world outside.

The Maze Runner is pretty damn original, I can't say I've ever read a book quite like this before. Yes, there is plenty of sci-fi dystopian fiction on the shelves and an influx of them being made into motion pictures at the moment but this particular sci-fi dystopian adventure with its crazy ass ever changing maze and grotesque half flesh half metal killing creatures is just.. wow.

For a girl who likes to relate as much as possible with characters in novels reading a book about a guy dropped into a guy filled world didn't really appeal to me but I'm so glad I gave this a chance. Thomas, our main character, may not have boobs but his clear and raw human characteristics that Dashner writes incredibly well for Thomas and other Gladers in the novel is enough for me to easily relate the characters and to become crazily attached to them.

It's true that I was crazily attached extremely invested in the characters by the the end of The Maze Runner but that's not to say I was so at the beginning. When starting the novel many of the characters blended together, each of them simply a Glader and not separate people, which made it really hard to carry on reading let alone care for any of the characters. Thomas being the only character who wasn't just a Glader even still didn't truly grab my attention at the beginning of The Maze Runner. His behaviour which I would describe as arrogant was extremely irritating to read, he seemed to believe that everybody else should be falling over themselves to answer his questions and grant his wishes.

It is only 100 or so pages in that game changing and unexpected things happen and Gladers turn from Gladers to Chuck, Alby, Newt and Minho. From this point on, albeit the annoyingly repeated thought of Thomas that although he can't remember his past this must be the most traumatic/scariest/happiest moment of his life, I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the book.

If you haven't read The Maze Runner, I don't want to spoil it for you (this is me presuming you will go read it if you haven't :D ) so I'm just going to vaguely say that the ending AND THE FREAKING EPILOGUE is crazy shocking and if I'm the only one who was surprised I must have missed something really important and this is embarrassing... Anywhooo I am eagerly anticipating reading the next book in this series, I am majorly excited to see developments in the various relationships in the novel and even more excited to see where Dashner decides to take the story line.

Music choice: I seem to pick Linkin Park quite a lot but I think the confused and lost feelings and the desire to belong shines bright in both this song and the book.. 

Somewhere I Belong by Linkin Park 

itunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/meteora/id528435845

I'M SORRY!

I know, I know, I haven't posted in yonks, my exams triggered an unwanted book hiatus but all that unfortunate business of *whispers evil word* school *hiss* is over for the time being and I am most definitely dedicating most of my summer time to reading and blogging.. I promise!

You have no idea how much I have missed the feel of books in my hands, the words unfolding a visual story in my head and just generally fangirling over anything book related, whether it be the perfection that can be fiction boys or the release of the next Morganville Vampires novel. I am so ready for a book filled summer.

As well as the reviews of the pile of awesome books I'm reading right now I think I may also do some other book (perhaps music too) related posts for example top summer reads, most over rated books etc. So yay!.. Sorry again dudes!

love,

Review: Fracture by Megan Miranda

Summary (from Goodreads):

Eleven minutes passed before Delaney Maxwell was pulled from the icy waters of a Maine lake by her best friend Decker Phillips. By then her heart had stopped beating. Her brain had stopped working. She was dead. And yet she somehow defied medical precedent to come back seemingly fine. Everyone wants Delaney to be all right, but she knows she's far from normal. Pulled by strange sensations she can't control or explain, Delaney finds herself drawn to the dying. Is her altered brain now predicting death, or causing it?

Then Delaney meets Troy Varga, who recently emerged from a coma with similar abilities. At first she's reassured to find someone who understands the strangeness of her new existence, but Delaney soon discovers that Troy's motives aren't quite what she thought. Is their gift a miracle, a freak of nature-or something much more frightening?

After learning that Fracture was 'For fans of best-sellers like Before I Fall and If I Stay' I was practically going into cardiac arrest in the corner of the room at the idea of reading a book like If I Stay again. If I Stay is probably one of the most captivating and emotional YA books I have ever come across so this simple tag line and the very similar cover made me expect Fracture to be a carbon copy of my beloved If I Stay.

It is not.

And funnily enough, that is not actually a bad thing. Other than the genre, the fact both novels have the main character in a coma for a while and that both deal with issues with death in one way or another, Fracture and If I Stay are quite different.

Speaking of death, the most memorable and intriguing parts of Fracture are the arguments brought up by Delaney and Troy nearing the end of the novel about euthanasia and unnecessary suffering.

"What are you doing to her?"
"I'm helping her. I'm easing her suffering."

For a book I judged, and probably many others, after the first couple of chapters to be superficial and teenage angst ridden, Fracture is surprisingly thought provoking and raises many questions about death that could lead to a lot of deep discussion on the matter.

While I scold myself for assuming the whole novel would be a fluffy mess of love triangles and typical teenage problems, I'm not surprised that I didn't expect much more than this after reading the first third/half of Fracture. From the very first page of the novel we are introduced to a character who is apparently the most perfect girl on earth with her intelligence (you are reminded of this of the charts intelligence regularly by the way), hate of popular people even though she hangs with the popular people (you know what I'm talking about) and picture perfect love interests. Yes, love interestS.. not one, not two but three amazingly hot (I am told by the description that that they are all very attractive...) guys who are shown very clearly to only be interested with our Delaney. I know. I rolled my eyes too.

Not only are the readers forced to listen to the tedious and constant internal dialogue of Delaney trying to work out why her best friend, Decker, is acting weirdly to her kissing another guy - spoiler.. actually it's not much of a spoiler, he loves her, we know it, he's known it for forever, everybody around them knows but Delaney... that's just great, another so called intelligent character who happens also to be unbelievably oblivious to everything around her - but there are also some random female characters thrown in to make Delaney look better. For example, we have this girl presented as a slut and inferior to Delaney simply because she likes Decker. Because that makes so much sense.

Saying all this, let's not forget that I did actually enjoy reading Fracture and it is a book that would appeal to those of you who like a splash of mystery in your YA fiction and just a bit of different. The second half of the novel is exciting and the way Miranda veers away from a predictable love triangle is amazing - I definitely didn't expect the way Delaney's love story played out! So, while usually I would say that life is too short to carry on reading a book that you aren't loving, for this little one I would say that it would be wise to stick it out until at least half way... for me, it was worth it.

Music choice: The very realistic dynamics Miranda creates between Delaney and her mother is actually one of my favourite parts of reading Fracture, not to mention the equally realistic snippets of information we receive about Delaney's mother's relationship with her parents. I love this song and it sums up all these parent-child relationships in Fracture... Numb by Linkin Park.

'I've become so numb, I can't feel you there
Become so tired, so much more aware
I'm becoming this, all I want to do
Is be more like me and be less like you'

itunes link: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/collision-course-ep/id182601259

Review: Model Spy by Shannon Greenland

Summary (from Goodreads):

Teen genius Kelly James is in a lot of hot water. A whiz with computers, she agreed to help her college RA, David, uncover some top-secret information. After all, she doesn't have many friends and David has always been nice to her. It doesn't hurt that he's supercute and irresistible, too. All she has to do is hack into the government's main computer system. But a few hours later, her whole life changes. She is caught and taken in for questioning, only this isn't your run-of-the-mill arrest. Rather than serve a juvenile detention sentence, she accepts the option to change her name and enlist in a secret government spy agency that trains teen agents to go undercover. As if that wasn't overwhelming enough, she discovers that David works for this agency as well! And before she even begins to understand what is going on, she's sent on her first mission as an undercover model. And who better to partner with than David himself!

Model Spy is a very quick read that is, at times ridiculously unrealistic however, it's a book that will put a smile on the reader's face.. either because they're enjoying it or because they're laughing at it. I guess a smile is a smile and reading this little pink mushy fluff ball is guaranteed to leave you with a wide idiotic grin on your face. FACT.

For me, after finding out that Kelly, our protagonist, is a girl with an 190+ IQ who is able to hack into the governments computer system further than anybody else in history and who's only flaw is being clumsy I couldn't take Model Spy seriously. Oh, and did I mention that this girl also happens to look like a 'Victoria Secret model' too?.. Although Kelly is presented as practically perfect, she could be pretty stupid for an incredible smart person and her ability to judge people, promptly placing them into a  neat little labelled box became quite annoying.

Other than Kelly there are many secondary characters Greenland introduces into the novel who are only slightly memorable because of their fun nicknames. Putting nicknames aside all these characters are very one sided and lacking in depth. As this is only the first book in the series the lacking in layers in the very minor characters is forgivable however it would have been nicer to have delved a little deeper into the personalities of important characters, for example David.

Speaking of David, our love interest, the book ends pretty ambiguously, not telling the the readers straight up whether or not David and 'GiGi' (damn, I will never get used to that name.. doesn't it strike you as a tiny chiwawa name?! No? Maybe it's just me...) get together. And that's not such a big deal because if you're truly worried about the outcome of this pretty shallow relationship you'll read the next book in the series and you weren't really interested (*cough**cough* me *cough*) then it didn't really matter where the two went romantically.

What I can say about this book is pretty simple. This book is fun. Silly, entirely unrealistic but fun. And however much it kills me to say this, I actually enjoyed reading this fun, silly book about "spies". What can I say? I have a soft spot for fun and cute. Overall, this book isn't intellectually stimulating at all but it's not supposed to be. If you're looking for a fluffy book that has a cute little meaning about people being more than they often appear to be then Model Spy is actually pretty much perfect.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an e-copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Music choice: Yes. This played on repeat in my head all throughout reading Model Spy. I'm sorry, okay? I don't know if I'm being sarcastic but here you go, the Mission Impossible theme song.