Tag Archives: young adult fiction

Violet: When in Doubt, Stab Him

Posted by Seriah Black Sheep on

Violet Made of Thorns (Violet Made of Thorns, #1)Violet Made of Thorns by Gina Chen

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

My Summary:
Violet is a rags-to-famous fortune-telling prophetess who purposely thwarted the crown prince’s death destiny during childhood on the streets to make her own life better. Where that’s gotten her is under the king’s thumb, where she can’t say no and has to lie to the populace for a living for the king’s political gain. She lives under the shadow of a prophecy that the previous occupant of her position gave without explanation. When Violet discovers the answer to the prophecy is ransoming the prince’s stolen life back to the Fates, she can’t decide whether it’s in her best interest. Meanwhile, Prince Cyrus, who is ambiguously uninterested romantically in both women and men, can’t decide whether to throw Violet out on the street, trade her away for another seer, or get under her skirts…or a combination thereof. As the charismatic Cyrus is forced into a Cinderella ball where a blind date set up by his father threatens to overwrite his real destined bride, a witch plots to steer Violet’s visions to create a future where corruption magic reigns supreme. Under threat of a conquest-hungry dying king, fairy forest beasts, and more than one imposter, Violet struggles to understand who she is, what occupational knowledge for her profession has been lost, and whether love can exist without trust.

This is a romantic high fantasy beauty and the beast retelling that takes place entirely within one city. It has just as much a New Adult feel to it as Young Adult, though technically it is upper YA. You don’t have to know anything about the Fates, but I kind of wish I did. I drew heavily on my Fates knowledge from Stephanie Garber’s Caraval series. I would not be surprised, based on the ending, if this book gets a sequel.

My Thoughts:
This is the first book I’ve been able to speed-read and binge-read in a long time, and that’s a compliment. The heroine is snarky, and the prince snarks right back, making for a hate-lust combo that is hard to beat. Definitely squarely in the enemies-to-lovers trope. The roses-forest-wolfbeast combo is inventive, and the main character was classified as a seer and not a witch, except when it was construed that others might have a negative image of her. Considering the recent fads of overloading readers with witchcraft, I was relieved to see magic and threads of fate used in a way that I could enjoy them without being forced into a religious vise.

If you think the snarky characters will suddenly have a change of heart on the meaning of snark, you’re mistaken. I was impressed with the consistency of the characters’ personalities throughout the book without ever making it boring. Even the comic relief characters, like Camilla, never felt like they were there just for the sake of diversity or random humor.

One thing this book did do very well was diversity, without beating me over the head with it. Various elements of world cultures were integrated with the Fantasy in a realistic, believable manner that added to the world rather than distracting from the plot.

Another thing done very well was the narrative language of the book. Concise word-pictures were consistent and everywhere. I was able to read them quickly while still getting the full effects. I marveled at how many ways Chen avoided falling into the kinds of overuse of synonym or sentence structure patterns that plague my writing drafts.

What got confusing was Cyrus’ romantic preferences. I spent the first half of the book thinking he was asexual and only trying to find a bride because the king was pushing him. I had guessed that the heroine had to be an exception somehow, because of the prophecy and because it’s a fairy tale retelling. I was very confused about how he felt about Dante due to a later remark by Cyrus. I suspected he had always liked Violet, but none of that made sense until Cyrus said it himself, which took a really long time and I almost didn’t believe him by then, and then I only sort of bought in because he A) must have been covering up that he liked Violet the entire time he was around her from childhood, and B) still wanted to marry her after she tried to kill him…which was a little weird.

What I have mixed feelings about were the sex scenes. I understand that the age category is YA, which often involves censoring. The feel of the characters and the tone of the book were not lost in these scenes; rather, they hit all the right buttons, and I was super engrossed in reading them. But sometimes, because the language was only allowed to insinuate, I got confused. I thought Cyrus was touching her leg, or her stomach through the clothing, but that was not what was happening at all, and I only realized that because Violet’s reaction was disproportionate to what I had assumed was transpiring. If a younger reader picks up the book, they may not catch that they went all the way (or at least, I think they did; again, purposefully ambiguous due to language structure). But any adult who has read a blatant sex scene will figure it out. Either way, waaaaay better than some of the blackout scenes I’ve seen.

Consensus:
I would highly recommend this book to anyone who loves fairy tale retellings, beauty and the beast and Cinderella in particular, and enemies-to-lovers. If you’re hoping the heroine will turn out to be “a nice girl” and Prince Charming will be non-playboy charming, this isn’t the book for you. But if you enjoy quick wit and quick narrative pacing, and a heroine who has seen the ugly side of the world and is smart and scrappy enough to take nothing at face value, and if you understand that redemption is a long road, this book makes for quite a thrilling read.

If you’re squeamish about blood magic via self-injury, though, maybe think twice.

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Cruel Beauty: Pure Love or Wicked Love?

Posted by Seriah Black Sheep on

Cruel BeautyCruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

My Summary:
Nyx is trained from childhood to take down her future husband, the Demon Lord of Bargains, who holds the kingdom of Arcadia captive and offered the bargain that stole her mother’s life. Knowing the mission will cost her own life, she grows to resent the people around her, who are allowed to be happy. Nyx faces her fate squarely, but neither her husband, nor his servant, nor the house they live in are what they appear to be. She starts to fall for her husband’s tranquil servant, a shadow who desires to help her but is unable to lend much assistance. The lines between hate and love blur as Nyx realizes that the resentment and selfishness in her own heart are not so different from the quick-witted wickedness of her doomed husband, and that he may be the only person who does not ask anything of her. In the end, the fate of the world rests upon the choice of embracing pure love or wicked love, who to betray, and whether once-in-a-lifetime love is worth sacrificing the rest of the world.

This is a paranormal/occult Beauty and the Beast novel, set in Greco-Roman times, in the kingdom of Arcadia. Multiple Greek gods and myths are referenced throughout the book, as the belief system of the majority of the characters.

My Thoughts:
The book started off pretty redundant and slow, with the recurring theme of Nyx’s hurt from her father’s inaffection, disgust toward her aunt’s affair, and internal battle against hating her sister Astraia (who was not chosen to wed the Gentle Lord because of her resemblance to their dead mother) and hating her mother (whose death began Nyx’s life of revenge). I felt like I really didn’t need these themes hammered home as many times as they were within the first couple chapters.

Once I figured out that this story was not about an epic take-down, but about solving riddles, I was able to sit back and enjoy it. The fact of the matter is, nobody really knows that much about the Gentle Lord, a.k.a. the Demon Lord. And certainly nobody but his wives and the doomed people he’s bargained with know much of anything about his house. The only person who seems to know stuff is Shade, who is bound not to tell, and the Kindly Ones (who aren’t so kind, and aren’t so available). Everybody else is trying to figure stuff out. Once you see the story as one big puzzle, it makes a heck of a lot more sense.

What really threw me was that Nyx’s original tactic for taking down the Gentle Lord’s house (with him, and probably herself, inside it) was almost irrelevant. She needed to find the rooms, yes. And they had massive significance. But it felt like there was virtually no point to all that world-building about Hermetic sigils and workings, except to give context for her father’s position. I think Nyx only used a sigil once in the entire book (turning off her bedroom lamp once to show how it works doesn’t count). And her “virgin knife” never made an emphatic comeback. Not to mention, throwing away her only true trump card—her virginity—didn’t make that big of a splash. Not only was it not played up after all those nervous warning bells in the beginning, but it didn’t make any difference to the outcome. She drops her dress, and then *bam* next scene. I thought, Wow, that could have happened a lot sooner, with virtually no ripples.

It was about halfway through the book that my mind started doing gymnastics, attempting to guess the answers to all the riddles and how they all tie together. It got super fun from there, though not a lot more emotional until nearer to the end. I won’t tell you the ending, but I will tell you that it’s worth getting to. And, DON’T SKIP AHEAD!!! Seriously, you’ll be soooo confused, because at one point the chronology becomes super important. If you read the book in order, you’re already getting pieces from all different parts of the chronology, so skippers beware. I didn’t skip, but if you do, you’ll just jumble the brain-bending ending.

Consensus:
If you’re intrigued by the book’s cover blurb about an unconventional Belle and a not-so-charming lord, this is definitely the book for you. If, however, you are waiting to see that there’s a lovely Prince Charming beneath that gruff, scarred male exterior…go find another book. Part of this book’s charm is that it doesn’t conform to that old-school/Disney pop-culture transformation; it’s more realistic.

I really enjoyed this book, as a story full of puzzles and riddles and mysteries and unconventional romance. The heroine is smart (but not too smart), and doesn’t give up easily, and she doesn’t change all that radically. This book is very much about loving people as they are, and loving within your capacity to love.

So, don’t read this book for the assassination action. Read this book to get to know Ignifex and Shade, the two juxtaposed, troubled men that Nyx is not sure she can save.

In all honesty, I would have liked some more details in the narration—more narrative coddling and in-depth, in-their-head emotional action. I felt a bit distanced from the characters, like I was watching the story unfold rather than feeling my heart race when I looked at one guy or the other, or almost drowned in a supernatural pool, etc. But I wouldn’t be able to pinpoint exactly how this should have been incorporated, because I feel like all of the characters were intentionally distant; they all had secrets. And the secrets were what made the book interesting.

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