Nebula

A Monday Book Review

Let me first say (as if you have a choice) that I really enjoy reading Rachel Vincent’s Shifters series. It’s fun, it’s got a spunky strong heroine, and even though the main character’s name is spelled in a really annoying way (Faythe), the story is good enough that I can (usually) get past it.

*sort-of spoiler in here–I ruin the “big reveal” of what she is*

There were some wonderful lines of prose in this book, and I’ve wasted almost as much time as it took me to read the novel in search of a sentence involving a spork. I really need to start marking cool phrases as I read, because I never did find the sentence with the spork.

Cool bit of dialogue (other than the sentence with the spork, which I just wasted another 15 minutes searching for. Apparently my photographic memory is not what it used to be):

“Why do you hang out with him?”

“We’re teammates.”

Ahhh. And if blood was thicker than water, then football, evidently, would congeal in one’s veins. (p. 109)

Sad bit of dialogue; I think it’s a cliche at this point:

…if I freaked out this time, they’d probably put me on the express gurney to the mental-health ward. Do not pass Go. Do not collect two hundred dollars. (p. 133)

I didn’t like Vincent’s take on banshees at all, and I was disappointed at her writing style for young adult literature, as the main character sounded a little too jaded, and her humor too adult. However, I’m too lazy to prove my argument with any actual evidence from the text, so take that opinion with some proverbial salt. The main character (with an unusual name for her age group: Kaylee) does not seem authentic, and neither does her very-conveniently super-hot boyfriend who literally shows up out of the blue at the beginning of the story and a) has all the information, b) doesn’t share it immediately, c) also has an unusual name, and d) makes out with Kaylee all the time.

Vincent’s treatment of reapers was also bothersome, as the basic idea of a bureaucratic reaper system is the same as that in the television series Dead Like Me. People are scheduled to die, and reapers have bosses who make sure they’re doing their job correctly, i.e. grabbing the right soul at the right time.

I hardly feel like a person qualified to make judgments on other peoples’ books right now, as I’m nursing a rejection over my own. I’ve just read some other fantastic books, though (hello Fire by Kristin Cashore!) so I’ll have mostly good things to say for the next few Mondays. Maybe even a Medley Monday Review.