BOOK REVIEW: MEMORY BY TERESA P. MIRA ECHEVERRÍA

I received a free e-version copy of this story from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you so much!

This novelette, written by an Argentine author, is the story of Jedediah, a Mars colonizer, who tells his story from his younger years to his adulthood.

Jedediah’s life was always marked by the silence of his father, the dustiness of Mars, his solitude, and his neighbor’s pink car. One day, he meets Ajax, a native, one of the people who were genetically created and modified to the terraforming of Mars. The natives’ lives should be entirely devoted to making Mars a suitable place for humans. Later, they would be used as slaves. Ajax was one of the leaders of the revolution intent on freeing Mars from human captivity. Even though they only met once when Jedediah was young, a connection was formed. Jedediah grew, started working, and then set off to find Ajax. Meeting him, he found more than he was expecting: he found love, a sense of belonging, a home.

The novelette is divided into several short pieces, each one telling a little bit of Jedediah’s growth and how he views the planet he lives on. We get to see his childhood, his adulthood, and his own children and how Mars modifies them and connects them.

It was a lovely narrative about human behavior, emotions and actions: colonization, coming of age, love, sexuality, family, right and wrong, memory, and many other themes were discussed in this short narrative. The singularity of Mars gave space to a singular narrative, in which different characters, perspectives, and situations were intertwined to form a unique, and sometimes thought-provoking, story. The importance of memory and its role, how it modifies the way we behaved was explored in a different way, in which the consequences of one’s actions could transform the future radically and alter not only the person’s reality, but the reality of a whole world.

I would recommend this novelette if you are interested in a quick, deep read and, of course, if you like science fiction stories!

Book Review: A Darker Shade of Magic by V. E. Schwab

Book: A Darker Shade of Magic

Author: V. E. Schwab

Publication date: 2015

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

The plot of this book contains all clichés one can find in fantasy: a boy, who is one of the last of his kind, capable of great magic and, also, of great destruction; a mysterious plot that can endanger the lives of the entire world (or worlds in this case); a girl who looks forward to greater things and a life of freedom; a showdown between two or more components of the list of characters; and a bad guy who will stop at nothing to get what they want. All these elements can be found in this book. Did they make it less enjoyable? Absolutely not; I liked this book and its characters and story quite a lot.

Kell is one of the last Antari, blood magicians who can travel between worlds. There is Red London, thriving with magic and life; Grey London, a dull world that has forgotten about magic and how to use it; White London, a dying world that hungers for magic and wants to control it at any costs; and Black London, forever forgotten, the cause to the separation of the worlds. Kell is bound to Red London’s Royal family and travels between the worlds to deliver messages between regents. However, Kell likes to bring tokens from the different Londons, music boxes, chess pieces, etc, which is illegal and dangerous. When one of Kell’s visits to White London goes awry, he has to find a way to stop a dangerous chain of events he himself helped put into motion. His final destination: Black London. He will not be alone in quest: he will be helped by Delilah Bard, a thief and aspiring pirate who wants to live an adventure. Together, they will set off to help save the Londons from a terrible fate.

Kell is a very interesting character, full of possibility. As many characters in fantasy, he has lots of power, which can lead him to save the world or destroy it. Lila is amazing and completely fascinating. I loved seeing how she views the world and reacts to the different events. Both of they are morally gray and ambiguous, not being totally good or bad. Most of the times they fight for themselves and their ideals, wherever this might lead them. However, I was a little disappointed with the antagonistic side of the story. I was hoping for a little… more. I thought the bad side was quite evident and so were the reasons behind their actions.

There were some interesting plot twists and the book doesn’t stop for one minute. We are always jumping from situation to situation, trying to understand who to trust and where the story is leading us and what might happen in the end.

The side characters were also interesting, even though some of them could have been more well-developed. I hope to get to know more about Holland and Rhy. I already like Rhy a lot, but it would be nice to get him to be more participative in the events of the story. The same goes to Holland, the only other living Antari. His back story and motivations were not that explored and he would certainly be an incredibly nice character to get to know about. His complexity already shows and I think Shwab can do wonders with him.

SPOILER I refuse to believe he is dead. He wasn’t when Kell sent him to Black London and, as they both say, it is very difficult to kill an Antari. Black London is there to be explored. I demand more from both Holland and this other shady London END OF SPOILER.

I’m looking forward to knowing what will happen next, even though some of the possibilities are quite evident, and a little cliché as well.

SPOILER Of course Lila is Antari. She has magic inside her, she can travel between worlds and she has a glass eye END OF SPOILER.

Over all, a great read, full of magic, action, and morally ambiguous characters that will travel with you through several different and fantastic worlds. I strongly recommend this book.

Book Review: Mr Kiss and Tell (Veronica Mars #2)

Book: Mr Kiss and Tell

Authors: Rob Thomas & Jennifer Graham

Series: Veronica Mars

Published: 2015

TW: Rape

Veronica is now settled in her life in Neptune. She has a car, an apartment, and Logan is finally on shore leave. Veronica is hired by an insurance company to determine a rapist. A girl was found half dead in a ditch, beaten and raped. She spent months saying she didn’t remember what happened to her. Now she does and she is accusing a former member of the Neptune Grand hotel staff as her rapist. That could give her millions if proven true. Veronica is hired to prove or disprove her story. Meanwhile, Weevil’s trial is happening and Keith Mars is adamant on making the sheriff department, and the Sherriff himself, pay for planting evidences.

Mr Kiss and Tell is a very nice Veronica Mars story. It is always awesome to have Veronica involved in a case she is passionate about, seeing her kicking ass and taking names. The story is fast paced, never stopping too much, going from one case to the other or giving us a glimpse of Veronica’s life.

As usual, with Veronica, things could never be simple. She doubts herself, the world, her cases, her relationship, her job, her life, everything. Typical Veronica that we love and cherish. Her relationship with Logan is its usual turbulent state, with its bumps along the way. Her relationship with her father is still awesome as usual, as is her friendship with Wallace and Mac.

Leo also appears a lot in this book, which I quite liked. I like Leo, he was one of my favorite of Veronica’s boyfriends. He is very important help for Veronica during her search for the rapist and a nice character as well.

The plot is interesting and the mystery is good. It is always lovely to see Veronica’s crazy plans and how she drags everyone else into what she is doing. As mentioned before, there is a trigger warning for rape and rape discussions, as well as the usual misogynistic quips brought to you by your favorite police department.

Something else that I liked is to see the character development for the characters, especially for Weevil and his relationship to the other characters as well as his choices during the book.

I would recommend this book to all Veronica Mars fans and fans of mystery novels.

Book Review: Lair of Dreams (The Divners #2) by Libba Bray

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Rating: 4/5 stars

An ARC of this book was provided through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. 

Possible spoiler ahead!
The Diviners are the new sensation, especially Evie, the Sweetheart Seer, who has her own radio show and a crowd of fans waiting for her to tell them their secrets. However, not everything is good. A new sickness, the sleeping sickness, is spreading through the city. People simply go to sleep and then never wake up again. 
To go directly to the point: it was a lovely book and it left me terrified to go to sleep. But I didn’t feel it as strongly as The Diviners. There is less action and I felt things were resolved too easily (if they were resolved at all. Maybe not. You never know).
One thing that displeased me was the lack of Evie and Memphis. They are definitely my favorites and, Memphis especially, almost doesn’t show up. I liked the new addition to our Diviners team, Ling, a Dream Walker like Henry. Speaking of Henry: poor baby. I just wanted to wrap him up in a blanket and give him nice things. 
Sam is a character that also gets attention in this book. His story is interesting and the whole mystery surrounding him and his family is taken to a new level in the narrative. I’m looking forward to knowing what is going to happen with him and where the whole Paranormal Department is going to take us. The ending hinted at bigger things to come and new mysteries to be solved in relation to him and his family.
The dreams walks in this book were lovely and helped Henry find some answers to his past. However, I did not enjoy the mystery too much, because, for me, it was not mysterious at all. It was well-developed, interchanging Ling’s and Henry’s dream walks to their lives outside of dreams and how one was connected to the other. 
I love the mention to Gemma Doyle and how the two stories are in the same verse. It opens up lots of new possibilities. 
The only thing I can say with certainty that I did not like at all was exactly the same thing that I disliked in the first book: the love triangle. The book could certainly do without it and it wouldn’t miss a thing. Maybe Libba Bray will prove me wrong in the future, but for now I really don’t like it. 
Over all, I really recommend it. It is a great continuation to a great series. 

Book Review: The Thousand Dollar Tan Line by Rob Thomas & Jennifer Graham

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My marshmallow heart is happy. 
Veronica Mars is back on business. While her father recovers from the accident that nearly took his life, Veronica has to deal with Mars Investigations business. It is spring break, students from different universities come to enjoy the beach and to party. Everything is good until a girl goes missing. V is hired by the Chamber of Commerce to discover what happened and find the girl. However, things get complicated when another girl goes missing. Can Veronica find them before it is too late?
The Thousand Dollar Tan Line picks up from where the movie stopped. Veronica is back to being a private investigator, leaving her career as a lawyer behind. I loved to read about Veronica, Mac, Wallace, and everybody else. For those who don’t know, Veronica Mars is one of my favorite series, and Veronica has to be one of my favorite characters of all time. It was great to delve back into her world and explore the criminal world with her again. 
The mystery is great. Two different girls go missing after going to a mysterious party. Two families (one of them presents a great challenge for Veronica) looking for their daughter, the interests of the rich mixed in everything, and an incompetent sheriff. Just like old times. 
The writing is nice and it manages to capture Veronica’s personality very well. Her sass is brilliant and her comebacks never seize to make me laugh. I love her relationship with her father and this book presented it very well, how both of them care for each other and how they work so well together. 
Logan is not on it so much, which makes me sad, but V is constantly thinking about him and what their relationship means and where it is going. You know, typical LoVe story. As usual, Mac and Wallace are great and they are very important to the development of the story and of V’s personality and character. 
If you like the show I completely recommend reading this book!

Book Review: Missing Era - The Emergence by A. O. Khali

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BOOK: Missing Era - The Emergence

AUTHOR: A. O. Khalil

RATING: 2/5 stars

I’ve received this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.
Let’s make something very clear before I start the review per se: I loved the idea behind this book. It was a very interesting end-of-the-world story with some very intriguing twists and turns. I would gladly give 5 stars to the idea, for the novelty of it. However, there were some things that I could oversee so I could give more than 2 stars to the book and I think the main reason was the execution.
I’ll divide this review in two parts: the things I liked and the things I didn’t like. 
Things I liked:
1. Like I mentioned, I really loved the idea. Sinkholes start appearing all over the world and suddenly people start to go missing. The government and all authorities are baffled and no one has a good explanation for what is going on. And then, all in once, things start to get real bad. 
It was an awesome idea that could, and can, lead to an awesome story. I am very intrigued by where the story is going and where it is going to end. 
2. The Uglies. The Uglies are the people who start coming out of the sinkholes. They are completely different from us and they do things in a very interesting way. They are, most definitely, a really nice antagonist.
3. The prologue. It was excellent to set the tone for the story as well as where we are time-wise. It was one of the most well written parts of the book, if I can say so, and it left me wanting for more. If I have to be completely honest it was the prologue, more than the description of the book, that left me hooked and curious to know what was going to happen.
4. I really liked the main characters being adults. Nowadays, when we have a dystopic story or an end-of-the-world tale many of the main characters tend to be adolescents or young adults. The main character of this book and its narrator, Jayson, is an adult married man. This was a very nice change.
5. The POV. I like first person narrators because we get to see the story as someone sees it. Also because first person narrators are completely unreliable and they can’t be trusted in any way. It is nice to try to weave out what is actually going on and what is the character’s opinions on stuff. 
Things I didn’t like:
1. The narrative itself. I feel so much could have been done with the idea and I didn’t see much happening. I mean, the story doesn’t stop for one second, with the characters jumping from one place to the other, but many things I perceive as completely useless.
Also, the narrative repeats itself quite a bit, with many things being said two times or more in the same page. 
2. I couldn’t make much difference between the characters voices. Besides their opinions sometimes, they were no different. There was no distinguishable tone or mannerisms. 
3. But the main thing, the thing that really made me lower the rating (from 3 stars to 2) was the inherent sexism of this book. The main character was the one who always had the ideas, who led, who was always better than the other ones. The girls were never taken to the action, there was always an excuse to “keep them safe”, the girls had all the emotional reactions, etc. If that was only the main character, that would not be much of a problem, because the character can be misogynistic to no difference to the narrative. But I couldn’t separate the character’s opinions and actions from the narrative itself. Everyone and their dog seemed to think the same. 
All in all, this story has lots of potential and I am really intrigued to see where this is going. There is a good possibility that I will buy the next book to see how the story will unfold. The twist in the end was pretty nice and hinted at bigger things to come. 

Book Review: The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch

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Title: The Lies of Locke Lamora

Author: Scott Lynch

Series: Gentleman Bastard

This rating may have come as a surprise for the few of you who have known my struggles with this book, but let me tell you: I judged this book too soon.
This was my third try reading this. The first two times I simply was not interested enough to continue. I decided to try one last time and go till the end, no matter how boring it was for me. There had to be a reason for this book to be so praised. It started like the last couple of times. I was bored and couldn’t feel the story. But, to my surprise, two hundred pages in, I was sucked into the book and the world and just couldn’t stop reading!
Even during my two first failures with this book, one thing I was sure: the world the story is set in is awesome! This was confirmed now that I’ve read the whole thing. It is an ancient world, full of history and mystery. Camorr was built over the remains of an alien civilization that has long left the planet. However, they’ve left wonders for the humans to find.
The second thing that has called my attention since the first time: the characters. They are simply great. The more you read, the more attached to them you get. They’re funny, smart, brave, and completely stupid. They’ll do things that will make you roll your eyes, cry, or even laugh out loud. The friendship they have is amazing. And they’re all really badass. 
The plot is interesting and the action doesn’t stop for one single minute. We’re always jumping from one place to the other. The interludes at the end of each chapter were great to help us understand the characters, their motivation, and also the way the world they live in is structured. 
One thing I really enjoyed was the female representation. Even though the only female member of the Gentlemen Bastards is away and doesn’t appear in the book, it brings a great variety of interesting female characters that have the most diverse jobs: they are guards, magicians, spies, warriors, botanists, or sort of things. It is a breath of fresh air when it comes to fantasy.
Seriously, I’ve misjudged this book in the beginning. It was a solid five star after I’ve started really looking into it: fun, funny, action-packed, solid world-building, solid characters and narrative, nice plot twists. I really recommend this book.