Half-Blood by Jennifer L. Armentrout

Date finished: 17 December 2013

Rating: 5*

Series: Covenant, #1

View on Goodreads.

Armentrout has done it again.

Half-Blood was riveting. Armentrout’s take on Greek mythology was refreshing and interesting, and as per usual, she made me laugh out loud more than a few times.

I’ve always enjoyed Armentrout’s writing style. As a person writing about teenagers, for teenagers, she really hits the nail on the head when writing about typical teenager-ish things, and that helps tremendously with connecting with her audience. She doesn’t pretend to know what goes on inside of our heads, because she already knows exactly what’s going on.

Also, her talent for making up extremely hot, unusual boys who are totally off-limits is pretty incredible. First Daemon, and now Aiden… my friends and I have had several heated arguments over who would get whom if we were suddenly thrown into the worlds of the Luxen and the Pure-/Half-bloods. And none of them have ended well, let me just tell you.

My only criticism of Half-Blood was that the storyline was a bit too predictable. But that’s not such a big deal. If anything, it boosts the reader’s ego a little because by the end of the novel you’ve had so many, “I so knew that was going to happen,” moments that you feel like a freaking prophetess.

And as usual, there were so many quotes that I’ve highlighted and will be using in everyday life. My best was probably: “Are you lost, Lea? This isn’t where they’re handing out free pregnancy tests.”

I highly recommend this series for anybody who enjoys Greek Mythology-based novels like Abandon and Antigoddess – or even the Percy Jackson series. It’s a very different take on the typical “demi-god” theme, and on the whole a thrilling and riveting read.

Through the Zombie Glass by Gena Showalter

Date Finished: 14 December 2013

Rating: 5*

Series: The White Rabbit Chronicles, #2

View on Goodreads.

I have no words. For once, I am speechless.

Not for long…

Let me just put it out there that I am so incredibly sick of this idea that for every second book in any fantastic series (with only a couple of exceptions) the main couple always – ALWAYS – breaks up or does something of the same nature like fighting and ruining the perfect relationship that it took the author the entire first novel to establish.

To name a few examples: New Moon, Crescendo, Torment… even Onyx, to an extent.

Sadly, Through the Zombie Glass was no exception, and by the third chapter, I was angrily texting the person who recommended the series to me about the author’s irritating choice of plot line.

I wish I could say that it ruined the book… but it so didn’t.

Even though I literally just wanted to toss the book out the window during the third chapter, I was still strangely drawn to it… and I am not in the least bit ashamed to say that from the moment I started reading it this morning at 10:01 a.m., I did not put the thing down.

Like seriously. I didn’t even break to eat. The only times I was forced to look up from the page was when I texted the afore-mentioned friend, and the time that the little angel on my shoulder decided to shout at me for not drinking water and purposefully ruining my kidneys, to which I protested that Kat also had kidney problems and not once in the series had she been forced to drink water, so I could survive until the book ended before pulling myself out of my nest of pillows and blankets to go and fetch a bottle of water.

So yeah, if I get any type of kidney stone or infection after this, Gena Showalter can pay my medical bills.

Through the Zombie Glass was even better than Alice in Zombieland. And that’s quite unusual given the fact that my opinion of it decreased by ten percent after the whole Alice and Cole fight thing. So the rest of the book must’ve really made up for that, considering I gave it five stars.

As I said before in my review of Alice in Zombieland, the characters are so incredibly hilarious and lovable, and the author’s writing style is fantastic. I’m hooked. This series… just... wow. I highly recommend it, even if you think that you aren’t the zombie-book type of person.

OH SWEET HOLY ALIEN BABIES EVERYWHERE

ERMAGHERD.

ERMA-FREAKING-GHERD.

THE LUX SERIES. MOVIE. FILM. DAMON. ON SCREEN. MOVIE. DAMON. KATY. MOVIE.

EHRMAGHERD.

Jennifer L. Armentrout’s Lux Series (you know, the one that I’m forever mentioning in reviews, blogs, feelings posts etc. etc.) is becoming a movie. Or rather, the first novel, Obsidian, is being made into a movie.

A real movie. A film. With actors and everything.

As in, I get to go with my other Lux-obsessed friends – wearing my opal necklace because I am a badass and an alien-fighting badass at that, and my friends will wear their onyx and obsidian necklaces because THOSE ARE THE NAMES OF THE BOOKS OBSIDIAN, ONYX AND OPAL ARE YOU KEEPING UP WITH THIS LOGIC – to go and see Damon. On the big screen. In a movie theatre. Then I can go but the DVD. And watch it at my house. WHENEVER I WANT.

IT HAD BETTER BE AMAZING, ARMENTROUT. YOU HAVE AN ENTIRE FANDOM COUNTING ON YOU, HERE.

DAMON BETTER BE A FREAKING SUPERMODEL/OSCAR-WINNING ACTOR.

I’m freaking out here.

Somebody call me a doctor, I think I’m having a heart attack.

Take me out of the oven, cause I am so done.

That is all.

View Armentrout’s blog on this matter.

View my reviews of the series.

View the series on Goodreads here and here.


P.S. Yes, I know this is not exactly new news, but I only found out now so… No judgment.

Apologies for all-caps mode.

Alice in Zombieland by Gena Showalter

Date Finished: 13 December 2013

Rating: 4*

Series: The White Rabbit Chronicles, #1

View on Goodreads.

Okay, I SO didn’t pin myself as the type of girl that would ever read those books that are basically classics that have been given a supernatural twist. You know, “Romeo and Juliet and Vampires,” “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies”… the works. Let alone any type of book about zombies.

So maybe I also thought that I didn’t like ghost books, and then I read Anna Dressed in Blood and it was amazing… so maybe my judgment is the tiniest bit flawed when it comes to gory/bloody books.

Nonetheless, Alice in Zombieland was incredible. And considering I went in totally expecting to find it disgusting and weird… it just shows how fantastic it really was.

Okay so maybe it was a little gross and weird, considering it’s about people who hunt creatures whose sole purpose in life – or non-life… whatever – is to devour your brains. But still, it was pretty excellently written for a book about the undead.

I think the number one reason I loved Alice in Zombieland was the characters. And the stuff they said. For example, I have convinced myself that I am Alice, she is me, therefore I will now forever say “craptastic” and other things Alice would say.

The amount of times I laughed out loud at Kat’s comments almost topped my laughing record at Luc from the Lux series by Jennifer L. Armentrout. And believe me, that is a large amount of laughter.

One of my favourites: “We can’t really spy on them if they’re not spying on us, now can we?”

Or even: “Girl, he wants to dip you in his Frosted Flakes and have you for breakfast. That’s his favourite cereal, by the way.”

Needless to say, I loved it. Everything was so well expressed, and her personal style of writing was so witty yet enthralling that it made me completely forget about all of my other problems, and jerk every time I was forced to exit Zombieland and re-enter the real world. I think I half-expected to find a zombie standing by my doorway every time I forced myself to put the book down to eat or sleep or something that’s unfortunately mandatory for survival.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go and devour the next book, because I’m currently dying from the suspense. It took a rather large amount of self-control to NOT go straight to Amazon.com and buy the next book, but rather to quickly type out a craptastic review and force myself to endure the torment of waiting.

“TASTE…”

Thoughts on Catching Fire

So I was lazing around wondering what I should do today when I realized that I haven’t even written a feelings blog on Catching Fire.

I didn’t even announce that I was going.

And I’ve seen it twice, now.

This is just horrific. I can’t believe it. I feel as though I’ve betrayed Suzanne Collins by going to see Catching Fire and then fangirling about it and not allowing the whole world to see how excited I was about it so that they can laugh at me because when it comes to The Hunger Games I am just that ridiculous.

I’m not even joking. I bought the special edition DVD of the first movie, and it came with a mockingjay pin and I freaked out right there in Musica about it and everybody thought I was crazy, and I’ve had the pin stuck onto my handbag ever since. It’s that bad.

But back to Catching Fire…

There are not enough words to express my feelings throughout that movie. It was just epic. I mean, I had high expectations already because the first movie was so good, but I was still shocked at just how good the acting, editing and directing was. It was just… beautiful.

They managed to stick to the book as much as possible. As a person who (almost) always reads the book before the movie, I do not tolerate directors who cut out huge chunks of the novel just to make the movie “better.”

The only problems that have arisen in The Hunger Games related to this is the fact that they cut out the mayor’s daughter and how she gave Katniss the mockingjay pin (although it was really sweet and meaningful how Prim gave it back to her etc. in the movie) and how Peeta didn’t have his leg amputated in the film, therefore he could actually swim. But that was it, I think.

Also, let me just add that whoever was in charge of casting for the two films is literally one of the most talented person on the face of this earth. Obviously the characters were not who I’d imagined them as in my head, but they were so close that it actually scared me. Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson and Liam Hemsworth were incredible. And Finnick… He was almost exactly like how I imagined him. Everybody was cast so well and I think that really helped to make the movies ten times better than they already were.

Think about it. If Kristen Stewart had been cast as Katniss, I would’ve sued. I literally would’ve sued the casting crew. I loved the Twilight books, but then the movies were… so ridiculous in comparison. They played a large part in ruining the entire series for me (the whole “team Jacob”/”team Edward” thing also made my blood sizzle… I mean seriously can you just calm down she ends up with the vampire so stop complaining the book has already been published.)

I can’t believe I just brought up Twilight in this review. Forgive me for my sins.

Oh, and I'm going to be a total teenage girl here and say that HOLY HELL KATNISS' WEDDING DRESS WAS SOOO BEAUTIFUL ASDFGHJKL CAN YOU NOT AND THE WAY IT LIT ON FIRE WAS EVEN BETTER THAN I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE CAN I PLEASE JUST HAVE THAT DRESS FOR MY WEDDING AT THE SAME TIME MARRY JOSH HUTCHERSON IN THAT WHITE SUIT GOD BLESS.

Anyway, Catching Fire was absolutely fantastic, and it just… it made me so happy. I absolutely loved it. And to those of you who have not read the books, and are currently complaining that it ends on a cliffhanger, suck it up, make yourself some tea and get ready to sit in a chair for about 4 days while you read the entire series start to finish with no breaks in between.

And to those of you who think that The Hunger Games is about teenagers with eating disorders, you are dead to me.

That also goes for the people who call the Catching Fire “The Hunger Games 2.” That’s not what it’s called. Do you call New Moon “Twilight 2”? Didn’t think so. Get your act together.

And if you haven’t seen the movie OR read the books… I just can’t be with you. I’m sorry. Go live on… Mars or something. You are a disgrace to the human race.