Athena Azmadeus
09-03-2010, 10:35 PM
CAUTION! This may be a spoiler! I don't go into any great detail about these books. But if you're like me, and you can figure out an entire story from the tiniest hints, you may not want to read this post.
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Review: The Forest of Hand and Teeth and The Dead-Tossed Waves.
I just finished reading the 2nd book in this trilogy, The Dead-Tossed Waves, and these are some of the most exciting books I've ever read. At first, I was leery about picking up another POPULAR young adult series. Every single POPULAR YA trilogy I've read has disappointed me.
So far I have not felt this way about the aforementioned novels...
Last week I read The Forest of Hand and Teeth and I could not put it down. I found it so exciting, exhilarating, terrifying, heartbreaking, inspiring, liberating, and intriguing, definitely intriguing! I've never been so drawn into the action of a book. I felt like I was watching a movie, practically chewing on my fingernails while anxiously flipping pages. And the secrets, the mysteries, wanting to know the answers, kept me up late reading. My imagination was very vivid, which drew me into the action and allowed me to sympathized with the characters.
I enjoyed the fact the love triangle was not the focus of the book. I've been reading young adult books lately and there seems to be a lot of emphasis on silly love triangles. I'm usually irritated by these juvenile love affairs but this one did not frustrate me. The story was there, but the focus of the book was about survival, breaking free, faith, not "giggle giggle, does he like me?" Also, this novel wrote what I consider to be the first successful love triangle: the love triangle where you could personally understand the interior struggles of love. You didn't hope the heroine would fall in love with guy #1 or guy #2, but rather feel confused about guy #1 and guy#2 just as the heroine does.
This may sound strange, but I didn't mind the characters weren't 100% benevolent. Their faults made you identify and sympathize with the characters more.
Down side to The Forest of Hands and Teeth: I believe an ending is a very integral part of any story, and this book had an ending that left you unfilled and the story unresolved. When I reached the end I thought to myself "Wait. Is it really over? Am I missing pages?" >flips through the book, searching for the lost chapters<
My personal epilogue... After finishing this book, I twiddled my fingers for 4-5 days, thinking "The book was so exciting but I'm not going to read the second book. I'm always so disappointed with popular YA series." Then I thought "The 1st book was so thrilling, I should put my name on the wait list at the library and get the second book, just to see." Then I went to "That book was so intriguing, should I buy the 2nd book without reading it first?"
I bought The Dead-Tossed Waves last night, finished it about 1/2 hour ago, and now I'm sitting her, writing about how excited I was while reading it! The second book is better, even more interesting, more intriguing than the first. The plot thickens as you read on, and it has a good ending. After reading it you will suffer the effects of "the middle story in a trilogy." The book leaves the ending open, giving you the expectation of the third book, of anxiously finishing the story.
The Dead-Tossed Waves also brought some closure to the end of the 1st book, which I did not have any faith would happen... again, the effects of reading disappointing YA books. Now, when I think about the ending to The Forest of Hand and Teeth, I no longer think "that was a terrible ending." I now think "That was a sad ending, well... maybe just a tad bit lousy, but certainly not terrible anymore."
For the third book coming out next year... I still will not get my hopes up. My past disappointments will not allow me to get excited over a YA book anymore. If I expect to read a mediocre, pathetic ending, and it is pathetic, then I will not fill disappointed. If I expect to read a mediocre, pathetic ending, and it is fantastic, then I'll be pleasantly surprised.
Downfalls / critiques As I said before, the downside to book one is the ending.
The downside to book two is about 1/8 of the book is slow. It's isn't until about three quarters in the novel before it gets slow like that, but it does pick up again! Another downside to book 2 is something I see in YA books again and again... the incessant, constant self-reflecting! Something happens in the book, the main characters stops to think about how that makes them feel. Normal for any story, right?
But something else happens, and the character stops to think about their emotions.
Then someone maybe says a comment, main character stops to think about what they said.
Then someone else says the next line, main character stops to think about their place in the universe.
Someone says the third line, and the main character stops to think about some random analogy that's completely inappropriate for the present situation.
Basically, main character self-reflection was highly over used. The author needed to understand readers are not inept to character emotions. We're not emotional sheep. When something terrible, happy, heartbreaking, over joyous, ordinary, or somber happens, we understand. We want to know how characters feel about the situation, but don't always need an analogy or "thought soap box." Physical reactions or subtle responses can be enough.
Expectations... even though I was so excited with these books, it still does not change they are young adult books. I've rarely read a YA book that is TRULY deep and profound (The exceptions being the religiously symbolic stories of Narnia). These books are not Life of Pi, The Chronicles of Naria, 1984 caliber. So while reading, remember it is another Zombie story, it is for teenagers, and it is suppose to be fun, not intended to be the next War and Peace.
The thrill I felt while reading this book is not a secret, as I'm sure you can tell. This book did scare me some. Last night I had to sleep with the lights on. This will probably not happen to you :-) I cannot watch scary movies... at all. The scariest I can handle is M. Night Shyamalan and he's not that scary. What especially scares me are Zombie movies. I don't know why, but they terrify me. I can't even watch 5 minutes of a Zombie movie, and won't! Really, truly, the scariness in these books is not that bad! To the majority of people, this would barely be a blip on the scary radar. So you might not be as intrigued / scared as I was.
And remember, sometimes the love of a story simply comes down to personal taste. Like beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so is the fondness of a book.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Review: The Forest of Hand and Teeth and The Dead-Tossed Waves.
I just finished reading the 2nd book in this trilogy, The Dead-Tossed Waves, and these are some of the most exciting books I've ever read. At first, I was leery about picking up another POPULAR young adult series. Every single POPULAR YA trilogy I've read has disappointed me.
So far I have not felt this way about the aforementioned novels...
Last week I read The Forest of Hand and Teeth and I could not put it down. I found it so exciting, exhilarating, terrifying, heartbreaking, inspiring, liberating, and intriguing, definitely intriguing! I've never been so drawn into the action of a book. I felt like I was watching a movie, practically chewing on my fingernails while anxiously flipping pages. And the secrets, the mysteries, wanting to know the answers, kept me up late reading. My imagination was very vivid, which drew me into the action and allowed me to sympathized with the characters.
I enjoyed the fact the love triangle was not the focus of the book. I've been reading young adult books lately and there seems to be a lot of emphasis on silly love triangles. I'm usually irritated by these juvenile love affairs but this one did not frustrate me. The story was there, but the focus of the book was about survival, breaking free, faith, not "giggle giggle, does he like me?" Also, this novel wrote what I consider to be the first successful love triangle: the love triangle where you could personally understand the interior struggles of love. You didn't hope the heroine would fall in love with guy #1 or guy #2, but rather feel confused about guy #1 and guy#2 just as the heroine does.
This may sound strange, but I didn't mind the characters weren't 100% benevolent. Their faults made you identify and sympathize with the characters more.
Down side to The Forest of Hands and Teeth: I believe an ending is a very integral part of any story, and this book had an ending that left you unfilled and the story unresolved. When I reached the end I thought to myself "Wait. Is it really over? Am I missing pages?" >flips through the book, searching for the lost chapters<
My personal epilogue... After finishing this book, I twiddled my fingers for 4-5 days, thinking "The book was so exciting but I'm not going to read the second book. I'm always so disappointed with popular YA series." Then I thought "The 1st book was so thrilling, I should put my name on the wait list at the library and get the second book, just to see." Then I went to "That book was so intriguing, should I buy the 2nd book without reading it first?"
I bought The Dead-Tossed Waves last night, finished it about 1/2 hour ago, and now I'm sitting her, writing about how excited I was while reading it! The second book is better, even more interesting, more intriguing than the first. The plot thickens as you read on, and it has a good ending. After reading it you will suffer the effects of "the middle story in a trilogy." The book leaves the ending open, giving you the expectation of the third book, of anxiously finishing the story.
The Dead-Tossed Waves also brought some closure to the end of the 1st book, which I did not have any faith would happen... again, the effects of reading disappointing YA books. Now, when I think about the ending to The Forest of Hand and Teeth, I no longer think "that was a terrible ending." I now think "That was a sad ending, well... maybe just a tad bit lousy, but certainly not terrible anymore."
For the third book coming out next year... I still will not get my hopes up. My past disappointments will not allow me to get excited over a YA book anymore. If I expect to read a mediocre, pathetic ending, and it is pathetic, then I will not fill disappointed. If I expect to read a mediocre, pathetic ending, and it is fantastic, then I'll be pleasantly surprised.
Downfalls / critiques As I said before, the downside to book one is the ending.
The downside to book two is about 1/8 of the book is slow. It's isn't until about three quarters in the novel before it gets slow like that, but it does pick up again! Another downside to book 2 is something I see in YA books again and again... the incessant, constant self-reflecting! Something happens in the book, the main characters stops to think about how that makes them feel. Normal for any story, right?
But something else happens, and the character stops to think about their emotions.
Then someone maybe says a comment, main character stops to think about what they said.
Then someone else says the next line, main character stops to think about their place in the universe.
Someone says the third line, and the main character stops to think about some random analogy that's completely inappropriate for the present situation.
Basically, main character self-reflection was highly over used. The author needed to understand readers are not inept to character emotions. We're not emotional sheep. When something terrible, happy, heartbreaking, over joyous, ordinary, or somber happens, we understand. We want to know how characters feel about the situation, but don't always need an analogy or "thought soap box." Physical reactions or subtle responses can be enough.
Expectations... even though I was so excited with these books, it still does not change they are young adult books. I've rarely read a YA book that is TRULY deep and profound (The exceptions being the religiously symbolic stories of Narnia). These books are not Life of Pi, The Chronicles of Naria, 1984 caliber. So while reading, remember it is another Zombie story, it is for teenagers, and it is suppose to be fun, not intended to be the next War and Peace.
The thrill I felt while reading this book is not a secret, as I'm sure you can tell. This book did scare me some. Last night I had to sleep with the lights on. This will probably not happen to you :-) I cannot watch scary movies... at all. The scariest I can handle is M. Night Shyamalan and he's not that scary. What especially scares me are Zombie movies. I don't know why, but they terrify me. I can't even watch 5 minutes of a Zombie movie, and won't! Really, truly, the scariness in these books is not that bad! To the majority of people, this would barely be a blip on the scary radar. So you might not be as intrigued / scared as I was.
And remember, sometimes the love of a story simply comes down to personal taste. Like beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so is the fondness of a book.