Book: Pretty Amy by Lisa Burstein

Published May 2012 by Entangled Publishing

Purchased for my Nook (304 pages)

Genre: YA: Contemporary

Find out more: Goodreads|Barnes And Noble|Amazon|Lisa Burstein

Goodreads.com Summary: Amy is fine living in the shadows of beautiful Lila and uber-cool Cassie, because at least she’s somewhat beautiful and uber-cool by association. But when the girls get stood up for prom and take matters into their own hands—earning them a night in jail outfitted in satin, stilettos, and Spanx — Amy discovers even a prom spent in handcuffs might be better than the humiliating “rehabilitation techniques” now filling up her summer. Even worse, with Lila and Cassie parentally banned, Amy feels like she has nothing — like she is nothing.

Navigating unlikely alliances with her new coworker, two very different boys, and possibly even her parents, Amy struggles to decide if it’s worth being a best friend when it makes you a public enemy. Bringing readers along on an often hilarious and heartwarming journey, Amy finds that maybe getting a life only happens once you think your life is over.

I have mixed feelings about Pretty Amy.  We did get a novel about a girl dealing with the consequences of being arrested, but it wasn’t what I was expecting.  I think I was expecting something a little more light-hearted.

It was very hard to care about Amy and what happened to her.  She whined (a lot) and made a lot of stupid decisions.  Which does happen, but if she doesn’t care if she ends up in jail, why should I?  I think that’s my main issue with the book- she’d rather go to jail than explain what happened, and do what she needs to do to stay out of jail.  It really felt like Amy was just going through the motions and got a job and did community service just so people would leave her alone.

I can relate to Amy in some ways- mainly, how insecure and lonely she is.  And even though I could relate to her in some ways, more often than not, I really couldn’t care.  As for her relationship with her parents, I didn’t get why she didn’t like them.  It was never clear why they don’t have a good relationship, so it was hard to believe that they were as bad as Amy thought.  If there was something that led them to having the kind of relationship they did, then it’s a shame we didn’t get to see it.

At the same time, I thought it was an interesting choice that Amy didn’t want to help herself for a lot of the book.  I was expecting her to be all, “I really screwed things up, maybe I need to get my act together.”  But she didn’t, and I kind of liked that getting arrested didn’t seem to be a life-changing event for her.  I liked seeing her thought process and why she did what she did.  And I did like Amy’s sarcasm.

By the end, though, she did want to change, but it also seemed a little out of place.  I think it’s because she resisted it for so long, but at least we see that she’s starting to realize that she needs to change.

I have to say that I loved AJ, her pet parrot.  AJ is easily my favorite character in the book.  At least Amy had AJ.  Her boss wasn’t too bad, but all in all, I didn’t care for a lot of the characters.  It’s definitely realistic, and I feel like all of the characters were pretty realistic, even if I didn’t like any of them.

Final Thoughts: I thought Pretty Amy was okay.  I could relate to Amy a little, and I really liked that there wasn’t a happy ending.  Things don’t go the way we want them to, and sometimes we have to deal with the consequences of our stupidity.  Pretty Amy gets a 2 out of 5.  It’s not for me, but I’m sure there are a lot of people who will love Amy’s story.

Book: Beta by Rachel Cohn

Published October 2012, by Disney Hyperion, 248 pages

Purchased for my Nook

Genre: YA- Dystopic/Science Fiction

Find out more: Goodreads|Barnes And Noble|Amazon|Rachel Cohn

Goodreads.com Summary: In a world constructed to absolute perfection, imperfection is difficult to understand—and impossible to hide.

Elysia is a clone, created in a laboratory, born as a sixteen year old girl, an empty vessel with no life experience to draw from. She is a Beta, an experimental model of teenaged clone. She was replicated from another teenage girl, who had to die in order for Elysia to be created.

Elysia’s purpose is to serve the inhabitants of Demesne, an island paradise for the wealthiest people on earth. Everything about Demesne is bioengineered for perfection. Even the air there induces a strange, euphoric high that only the island’s workers—soulless clones like Elysia—are immune to.

At first, Elysia’s new life on this island paradise is idyllic and pampered. But she soon sees that Demesne’s human residents, the most privileged people in the world who should want for nothing, yearn. And, she comes to realize that beneath its flawless exterior, there is an undercurrent of discontent amongst Demesne’s worker clones. She knows she is soulless and cannot feel and should not care—so why are overpowering sensations clouding Elysia’s mind?

If anyone discovers that Elysia isn’t the unfeeling clone she must pretend to be, she will suffer a fate too terrible to imagine. When Elysia’s one chance at happiness is ripped away from her with breathtaking cruelty, emotions she’s always had but never understood are unleashed. As rage, terror, and desire threaten to overwhelm her, Elysia must find the will to survive.

I have very mixed feelings about Beta.  I’m fascinated by Demesne, which is this very idyllic island that reminds me of Hawaii.  The air and water are basically drugged, and it’s a place where people can just relax.  I’m also fascinated with the clones, who seem to be replicated from someone who’s died.  They’re definitely slaves, and if they’re defects, they are destroyed.

But I had too many unanswered questions.  Like, Cohn mentioned the Water Wars, but didn’t explain it.  Yeah, it’s people fighting over water.  Was the water supply getting low?  Was it contaminated?  What was going on with water that people felt the need to go to war over it?  I don’t need a full-on explanation, but the basics would have been nice.  And I wanted to know more about the Insurrection and the clones.  Does someone really need to die in order to make clones?  It seems possible to create clones from living people, so why are we lead to believe that someone needs to die in order to create clones?  Why does taking ‘taxia “wake up” the clones?  And honestly, what is ‘raxia?  Why does it affect the clones differently?  Unfortunately, the history and the “rules” of the world Cohn created weren’t explained.  Hopefully, we get more of a history in the next book.

It was hard to connect with the characters.  I thought Elysia was on the boring side, and it was hard to care about what happened to her.  I didn’t care for her relationship with Tahir or Alex.  I thought Xanthe was really interesting, so it’s unfortunate people realize she’s a defect, and she “dies.”

And then the ending came.  That was such a frustrating ending to read, because it’s so conflicting.  The Insurrection is all about clones being able to make their own decisions and not be treated as slaves.  Yet Elysia has to keep a child (after she was raped, mind you) because it gives people hope, even though it’s not what she wants.  So frustrating, and not one of my favorite endings.

Then, we get to the cliffhanger, which was surprising because I should have been able to figure it out.  Still, I wasn’t expecting Zhara, who is Elysia’s First, to be alive.  I wasn’t sure about continuing the series, but I just might have to, with that ending.

Final Thoughts: I definitely have some issues with Beta, and I hope they’re worked out/explained in the next book.  It is an interesting idea, and hopefully, the interesting parts will be explored in the next book.  It gets a 2 out of 5.

Book: Dead Beautiful by Yvonne Woon

Published by Disney Press

Borrowed from the library, read as an e-book (267 pages)

Genre: YA: Paranormal

Find out more: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon~Yvonne Woon

Goodreads.com Summary: On the morning of her sixteenth birthday, Renée Winters was still an ordinary girl. She spent her summers at the beach, had the perfect best friend, and had just started dating the cutest guy at school. No one she’d ever known had died. But all that changes when she finds her parents dead in the Redwood Forest, in what appears to be a strange double murder.

After the funeral Renée’s wealthy grandfather sends her to Gottfried Academy, a remote and mysterious boarding school in Maine, where she finds herself studying subjects like Philosophy, Latin, and the “Crude Sciences.”

It’s there that she meets Dante Berlin, a handsome and elusive boy to whom she feels inexplicably drawn. As they grow closer, unexplainable things begin to happen, but Renée can’t stop herself from falling in love. It’s only when she discovers a dark tragedy in Gottfried’s past that she begins to wonder if the Academy is everything it seems.

Little does she know, Dante is the one hiding a dangerous secret, one that has him fearing for her life.

Dead Beautiful is both a compelling romance and thought-provoking read, bringing shocking new meaning to life, death, love, and the nature of the soul.

Dead Beautiful is one of the more interesting paranormal books I’ve read.  I really like her twist on the Undead, and the creepiness of Gottfried Academy and what they teach adds to that.

So, I though that teaching things like philosophy and Latin was really strange, even for a boarding school.  I mean, I get some high schools may teach some random stuff, depending on where you are, and which school you go to, but focusing on things like Latin, Crude Sciences and philosophy was just too random.  Of course, it all makes sense at the end, and there is a reason for why they focus on what they do.

There are a lot of little mysteries throughout the book, and they actually get wrapped up (for the most part).  I liked that I didn’t know what was going on for a lot of the book, but at the same time, we learn so much about what’s going on towards the end, which was a little annoying, because it did feel like it came out of nowhere.

The characters were okay, but Renee living with her grandfather didn’t seem right.  I mean, he hasn’t seen her or talked to her in years, and all of a sudden, he shows up to take care of her because he’s her legal guardian?  If her parents didn’t get along with him, to the point that they had a fight, and he all but disappeared, why wouldn’t they change their will?  Of course, this makes sense later in the novel, but it’s still a little strange.  It is a shame we don’t meet Renee’s parents, or what her life with them was like before they died.  The characters were on the boring side, and didn’t really stand out.  They were pretty predictable.

I loved the setting of Gottfried Academy, though, and it seems like such a pretty yet creepy place.  It works really well for the plot, and just makes everything going on so much more creepy.

Dead Beautiful is okay, and yet is intriguing- I’m just interested enough to read the sequel, but not so interested that I need to read it immediately.  It gets a 2 out of 5.

Book: The Enemy by Charlie Higson

Published by Hyperion

Borrowed from the library, read as an e-book (296 pages)

Genre: YA: Post-apocalyptic

Find out more: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon~Charlie Higson

Goodreads.com Summary: As the days pass, the situation has gone from frightening to terrifying. Kids are being picked off the streets; the barricaded teens are surrounded by flesh-eating zombie adults. When a mysterious traveler arrives with an offer of refuge in London’s Buckingham Palace, they realize that they have no other option. What they can not yet understand is that their intense challenges will not end with their harrowing trip…

The Enemy is intriguing.  The idea that adults have this mysterious disease that turns them into zombie-like creatures before killing them is really interesting.  And it’s equally as interesting to see the kids try to take care of themselves in a world that’s gone to hell.

There’s a lot of suspense, and you see how hard it is for these kids, and if they’ll get the disease that’s completely changed the adults if they make it to adulthood.  We learn there are other groups of kids, and you hope they can work together instead of fighting amongst themselves.

It is hard to get attached to any of the characters when they could die in the next scene.  There’s certainly more violence than I expected, but considering that the adults are zombies, and the animals close by have gone completely wild, and they have to fend for themselves, it’s not totally a surprise.  At the same time, though, Higson really doesn’t have a problem with killing off his characters if he needs to.  There’s a lot of action, which made it really easy to read, but you also don’t really get to know the characters very well.

I thought the zombie royals were a little entertaining, and I love that it’s set in London.  Kids taking shelter in places like Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London made The Enemy interesting.  I did like seeing historic and important places being used as places where kids took shelter.  I do wonder if it just affects London, or if it’s all over.  The kids don’t seem to know anything, which makes sense, and is realistic, but at the same time, we just know what the kids know.  And that’s not much of anything.  A little more explanation would have been nice.

Overall, I thought it was just okay.  I already mentioned that there were a lot of characters, and it was hard to get attached to them.  But The Enemy, while interesting, just didn’t work for me.  It felt like there was too much going on, and I just couldn’t connect it with it.  It’s just…I can’t completely figure out what it is about The Enemy that didn’t work.

The Enemy gets a 2 out of 5.

Book: 1984 by George Orwell

Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Borrowed from the library, as an e-book (271 pages)

Genre: Fiction- Dystopic

Find out more: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon

Goodreads.com Summary: In 1984, London is a grim city where Big Brother is always watching you and the Thought Police can practically read your mind. Winston is a man in grave danger for the simple reason that his memory still functions. Drawn into a forbidden love affair, Winston finds the courage to join a secret revolutionary organization called The Brotherhood, dedicated to the destruction of the Party. Together with his beloved Julia, he hazards his life in a deadly match against the powers that be.

I finally read 1984, and I thought it was just okay.

1984 felt more like an essay than a novel at times, and while I thought a lot of the ideas were interesting, it was hard to get into.  Honestly, I was really bored when reading it, especially when Winston starting reading the book.  Parts of were easier to get through than others, but overall, it wasn’t as interesting as I expected.  1984 is certainly an important book, and a government that rewrites history and watches your every move is not only creepy but something that I could see happening.  The references to Big Brother make a lot more sense now, and I certainly get why the book in general is referred to a lot.

There’s certainly a lot of describing going on, and I think that contributed to a lot of my boredom while reading it.  I will admit that it’s not for me, and I get why people like it.  I’m still glad I read it, and I can certainly appreciate how relevant it still is, as well as the influence it has on the dystopic genre as a whole.  It’s a book that I never had to read in high school, and while I am glad I picked it up on my own, I’m also glad I never had to read it in high school, because I’m pretty sure I would have HATED it if I did.

1984- not my cup of tea, but I get why it’s considered a classic.  It gets a 2 out of 5.