sotnasck's reviews
413 reviews

It's been a while since I've encountered a book like this, I did a fairly well done job of keeping myself away. This has everything a typical YA book has and every cliche as well. And there has to be a record here because this is the book that had the most cliches I've ever read.

And was it for the amount of cliches or other reason, the story is incredibly predictable to the point of you seeing things happening from miles away. The revelations are only revelations for the protagonist because she is, well, quite stupid. Sophie is really dumb and prone to idiotic decisions and most of the time you see yourself wondering how can she do such things. And in the end she has a spur of not being stupid (she spends so much time being dumb that when she is not it feels a bit out of character, not gonna lie here) to fall into being a tad hypocrite, but even when she is being smart it still isn't the smart thing to do. The whole premise of the book is based on not doing the smart thing. Which brings me to the Mafia boys... 

Not once have I felt uneasy about the boys, the boys not once acted shady, everything seemed so pedestrian. Everybody was like "you gotta take care, don't mess with those people" but said people not once did anything, everything was mentioned. We were told a bunch of stuff, there was chapters of exposition (possibly 3 in a row) where we sat and listened to one character lay out everything we need to know. There was no suspense, no figuring things out by piecing together things... Sophie would enter a room, sit in a chair, and someone would explain to her (and us) in a very educative manner who they were, what they were doing, what would happen.

A serious issue I have was how sexual assault was used as a plot device for the protagonist to be saved by her knight, then it was brushed off until the plot needed the device again later and so the protagonist went to confront her abuser just to be yet again saved by her knights. The whole thing is incredibly wrong. And this quote right here, really bothered me:

After this quote many things became clear about the story and the writing.

All in all I didn't care about the protagonist nor the story, the Mafia aspect was as light as I expected it would be, the characters are underdeveloped so they don't catch your attention with the exception of the twins. In the whole book, only Luca and Valentino didn't fit the box. Valentino, actually, is the only bitch I respect in this house.

So glad this book ended this series in a good note. The only complaint I have is that considering this book covered a lot of years, I wish it was longer and things were explored more. But other than that I liked pretty much everything. Even Nicholas was not an asshole this time, to my delighted surprise. And Henry, still my absolute favorite, was as great as ever and I loved to see him with Sarah in the moments when they were around.

Last but not least, kudos for the very realistic and well written bodyguard trope. Looking at you, Like Us series...

beware of spoilery review :)

Oh, man... I don't know where to start with this review.

The other day I've read Shatter Me again and it was not a surprise to me that I felt differently towards many things that I have loved before, maybe I outgrew this series, maybe I'm just more conscious and critical of things... whatever the reason, I finished the re-read wanting to slap some sense into Juliette and all of her metaphors (that are gone in Restore Me, so take from that what you will) but I understood that it was the first book and Juliette would get much better by the end of Ignite Me, it was a development, she was going to find herself by the end of it. So imagine my surprise when a fourth book comes out and Juliette is STILL finding herself, which is weird because we had three books of that. And, okay, finding one self is a life going proccess I'll give you that, but this is fiction and we have character arcs and developments that happened in the past three books, so I have a hard time accepting that instead of moving forward we're going in circles here.

When I heard the news of a fourth book my first question was, why? My first fear was, is Juliette really going for Supreme Commander when she knows nothing about leadership or politics? Hasn't she been locked in the past 3 years or so? How is she going to pull it off? The answer is: she doesn't, and I appreciate the fact that it is acknowledged that she sucks at it, and when that happened I thought "alright, she's aware that she's not fit for it so we're going to work on it right?" Wrong. Juliette spends 3/4 of the book complaining she doesn't know what to do while actively doing nothing to improve herself. She doesn't learn, she doesn't work, she goes on walks and stares at the ocean and thinks "I'm useless" but then she goes back to her room and makes out with her boyfriend or has a chat with her best friend. Not once do we see Juliette doing anything worth of someone in her position, so how am I supposed to feel sympathy for her struggle? I don't. Juliette complains and then gets mad when someone calls her out saying that Warner would be a better leader and then she has some diplomacy to work on and panicks because she thinks Warner would do a better job... And the whole situation becomes cringeworthy the more the book goes on, to the point of Juliette saying that all she does is read mail but then there's an event in two days and she has no idea about it. Listen, I have no problem with Juliette being inexperienced, hell, I was expecting it, but instead of working on this we got nothing and that is the problem.

Speaking of nothing... The Reestablishment is an organization of 6 (it doesn't matter, you'll understand why later) families from different continents that are all friends who had their children playing together, and by playing together I mean shooting each other with guns at the age of 10 because that's cruel and all the families had to be cruel and mad, and their children are all ruthless and trained and they all gather in Sector 45 for a Mean Girls slumber party. And I don't get how that happened. A place full of soldiers, a place monitored at all times, a place that was serious and shit that becomes a "mansion" with nothing but dinners and enemies coming in and out without no one saying anything. If the children of the commanders were so dangerous how could they just show up and do whatever they'd like? In Sector 45, the place where Juliette and Adam had a hard time escaping before. The answer is that everybody was so busy walking around doing nothing and having unnecessary drama that they didn't care enough about the "threat."

And boy, there's unnecessary drama. So much. Too much. And it pissed me off.

Juliette and Warner don't have a single meaningful conversation, after all that went down in the previous books, and I am supposed to buy this lack of communication between them. Every other character is telling them to talk with each other but they don't, suddenly it's too much to talk about and they gotta preserve their relationship by not talking. Seriously? The girl who murdered his father? The guy who unnapolagetic killed people in front of his girlfriend? Think about the first three books, then think about this little chat Juliette had with a new character:

Really, Juliette? You're surprised? Did you just woke up from a coma and forgot what happened in the three previous books? This is how I feel about this book, honestly. It feels like everybody forgot. Worse, the characters aren't themselves. Who is this Warner? And here is what hurt me the most, because I love Warner with all my heart, but I read this book and I couldn't find him. I'm actually glad he changed his appearance so much, because they are two different characters for me.

Nothing happens in this book. We have Juliette and Warner wandering around avoiding talking with each other, Juliette not learning how to do her job, Kenji having a ridiculous crush on the new girl*, a bunch of new characters that replaces the old ones like no big deal, indestructible Juliette™ , Juliette and Warner breaking up because it's impossible to work on a relationship without breaking up, Kenji and Warner being childish, the crazy ex-girlfriend trope and here is worth mentioning that I never expected such a low from Tahereh Mafi, what a disappointment. The plot is not there and suddenly in the last 5 chapters the Sector 45 is going to be destroyed so they stop their nonsense for five minutes to kill a bunch of people and get the old characters replaced for good and set the drama for the next book. Don't even get me started on the Ella's family thing, powerful sister, childhood friends and whatnot, this is not interesting. It's actually the opposite of interesting. We could have had so many great things, but this book was reduced to teenager drama full of suspense moments that were anything but suspense adding nothing. And we're back to Shatter Me level of characters being stupid, which would be okay if this was not the fourth book in the series.

*Seriously, what's up with that? Why you gotta do Kenji dirty like this? I was expecting a love interest for him but he was dumb and ridiculous and just to make the girl seem cooler than him? That is not okay. I'm actually really upset with this.

P.S. I never thought Adam would be the one thing I'm content with, yet, here we are.

beware of spoilery review :)

"Nikolai" duology, they said.

King of Scars was supposed to be good. The hype was real, countless of fans had been dying for a Nikolai book since ever, and oh boy, are we disappointed. Because where is Nikolai's book? Is this, whatever this is, it? How is Nikolai not the protagonist of his own book? And if you tell me that the book isn't only his I'm going to throw my hardcover copy in your window because I am done, the frustration is too much and if Zoya gets a pass for being a rude person 24/7, well, so do I. But I gotta give it to Zoya, she is less this time around, almost as if she got tuned down for the role of the love interest that does not fit her. Anyway... I feel like random things were thrown together for this book and accepted because of its sequel.

The first two chapters fooled me, there was so much potential and it was a great start. It set the tone for the book: Nikolai and his fight against his demon. But soon enough I realized that the first chapters were too good to be true, that the tone was a mislead, because I have been misleading myself. Nikolai and Zoya's plot got progressively worse while Nina's got better, and by the end of the book I was dreading whatever foolery would happen to Nikolai and Zoya while at the same time being delighted with the twists on Nina's chapters. There was clearly more investment from the author's part on one plot while winging it with the other. Leigh is a capable writer, we all know that, but her lack of interest for this book can be noticed. Either she was being lazy or didn't care enough about it, the end result was a mess. Magical rules that she had set for her world were ignored, the plot devices were ridiculous. Bees? Really? Was she reading The Raven King when writing this and thinking "a giant hornet? what an espectacular idea" and then proceed to write something just as dumb? Not much made sense in this book and the things that made sense before were brushed off. The book went from having an interesting premise to fillers upon fillers to get to the grand plot device of them all, the resurrection of the Darkling.

And this comes from someone who absolutely loves him, who has him as her favorite character, but the Darkling should've stayed dead. Can authors, please, own up to their character's death? When a character dies and is brought back to life it takes away all of the emotional impact. It's meaningless. And is even worse when is done out of fan service. Because let's face it, it is. But not only did Leigh brought back the Darkling but she had to scold us while doing it. She had to shade us in every way she could. Be it from a quote calling us fools, or a cult plot in which every person seemed delusional or something else just as conceited. Listen, yes, the Darkling was terrible. He was a villain. But you shouldn't mock your readers for enjoying a character for its complexity, a character you wrote. That did not sit well with me throughout the book. But in the end for better or worse she brought him back, in the most uncreative way she possibly could. And worse, in the process of doing that she sacrificed Nikolai's story. The book that should be his and bears his name was anything but his, and in the end it dawns on you that the Darkling was not the plot device, Nikolai was.

At some point, a random character named Isaak got his own chapters. It came out of nowhere, 3/4 in the book. We did not get his chapters before, there was no background, no reason why we should care for him. And by the time Isaak was having a talk with the Shu princess and possible future wife of Nikolai, I felt sad. Because there I was, reading this random dude (no offense to Isaak, he was a stand up guy) doing all the things that Nikolai should be doing were he not preocupied in being stranged in a castle made of sand waiting for the oportune moment to serve his purpose. Isaak did all the politics, the courting, the attempted assassinations... And when Nikolai got back and cleared the air, I felt super sad again because there was so much potential not explored for him in this book. Instead he wandered around, doing what feels like nothing, just wasting time and development. And is worth noting that Zoya was with him all along and how Nikolai did not had scenes with another woman in the whole book, maybe the author really wanted us to buy into his relationship with Zoya. But to me they are not compatible, and only one short moment Nikolai had with another character was enough to scream that. No matter how much time he spends with only Zoya, how many "banters" they have, it all feels too flat, there is no chemistry, there was no real development. Yet another thing in which the author did not tried at all.

I am very upset about a lot of things, but mostly I'm sad for Nikolai. He is such a great character, he deserved better than this.

The star is solely for Nina. Her plot was great, the side characters were great. I'm rooting for her.

Now this is what I'm talking about! I really like this relationship and Henry did not let me down a single time in this book, bless him. Also, Sarah could not be more relatable.

beware of spoilery review :)

This started out so well, and it's not that I don't like it but by the end, I was disappointed with the female protagonist and kinda pissed with the male protagonist, I won't lie.

I just don't understand... The first time he was an asshole I made excuses for it because he was drunk and it was the very beginning of the book, so it had time for improvement but the book ends with him being as much of a prick as he was from the start. And I don't mean that he is an asshole period because there's good things about the character (I suppose), but it was three things specifically that are red flags for me. Offering money to a woman you just met to sleep with you. Objectifying and disrespecting to other people the woman you're in a relationship with and it does not matter that "he doesn't meant it" you're still opening the door for every other person to disrespect her, just as you did. And in the end, he did not believed her and accused her of only being interested in money, after she dropped her life for him and were willing to accept all his shitty society. I mean? Come on.

The only characters I truly enjoyed are Henry and Ellie. And speaking of Henry, I got outraged with the shit his brother pulled with him in the end. I know it's supposed to be romantic that Nicholas would abdicate of the throne for Olivia, but honestly, I couldn't go pass how he never spoke to his brother about changing his whole life. Nicholas was selfish to no end and didn't care at all about his brother's feelings? Damn, if one of my brothers pulled this shit to me I would be so fucking pissed and probably punch him in the face. I don't know how well Henry will deal with it, he might do great and be a better king than Nicholas ever would be, but the point is that it was done without any consideration for his feelings and what he wanted, and that is just not okay.

All in all, I'm reading the second book because I really like Henry.

Really enjoyed the writing style, it's very refreshing and the plot flew easily. Not as funny as I was hoping though, but still good.

I really like this book, more so than the first. While the first was about setting the characters and relationships, this one was about getting the story into motion. And I love Sydney. I already liked her a lot before, but with this book my liking of her grew into a full admiration and love. Her relationship with Adrian never ceases to amaze me, to be well developed and a slow burn that makes you want to die with every little thing. And better yet, is seeing how Adrian grew as a character since everything he went through. It warms my heart how great he is, how much potential he has and seeing him achieve that with Sydney is incredibly worth it.

Back when I've read this for the first time, I was incredibly bitter about certain things on Vampire Academy and everything I cared about was how this series could fix both mine and Adrian's broken hearts. After having dropped this series in the fourth book and mauling my feelings for years, I'm back to this reading to find out, to no one's surprise, that I'm still quite bitter. But that's not what this review is about, because if I started ranting about my negative feelings towards certain characters... Well, this would take some time.

The point is, this book is so refreshing. How great it is to be in the head of a female character that is good? That is strong and smart and interesting without diminishing others? A character you can relate to? A character that isn't constantly pissing you off? Just as good as having such a great protagonist, is to have a male character that does have a personality, that is interesting and funny and actually sexy. Even better is a good, solid, well developed relationship. If only the previous series had all this...