I received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
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Well, this was a nice surprise!!! Until yesterday, this I received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
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Well, this was a nice surprise!!! Until yesterday, this wasn’t even on my tbr, much less on my radar for books that I wanted to read this year, but how could I resist a fun adventure on the high seas???
I’ve never read a book by Adrienne Young before (edit: I just read Sky in the Deep and The Girl the Sea Gave Back because I loved this so much), but I’m glad that I finally have!
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“Keep your knife where you can reach it. Never, ever owe anyone anything. Nothing is free. Always construct a lie from truth. Never, under any circumstances, reveal what or who matters to you.”
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Fable, at age 14, was abandoned on the island of Jeval by her pirate father after her mother drowned aboard their ship. He left Fable to fend for herself for YEARS with the promise to give her what she was owed, should she ever manage to find her way back to him. Four years later, and she’s barely surviving, making whatever coin she can by dredging for gems, in the hopes of making enough to buy passage off of the island, in search of her father.
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Then, life throws more curveballs at Fable and she barely makes it off the island with her life. After begging for passage aboard the Marigold (as well as paying for it with almost every coin she has), she finds herself among a very young crew who aren’t who they seem, helmed by a young man with questionable morals, named West. (Every time I saw his name, I read it as Westley – aka the Dread Pirate Roberts, hehe). There, she struggles to prove her worth as a member of the crew, as well as finding her true place within the world.
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“‘What?’ The breath hitched in my chest. But his smile turned sad. ‘I have thought about you every single day since that day. Maybe every hour. I’ve counted down the days to go back to the island, and I pushed us into storms I shouldn’t have because I didn’t want to not be there when you woke up. I didn’t want you to wait for me. Ever. Or to think I wasn’t coming back.’”
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I absolutely loved Fable as a character, especially her courage and strength. No matter how many times she was knocked down, she got back up again. I also liked the majority of the crew, even if they did treat her rather poorly, at first.
But I especially loved the overall vibe of the novel. Rather than Daughter of the Pirate King, which very much resembled The Pirates of the Caribbean, this book definitely had more of a Black Sails atmosphere. It was fast-paced, wrought with danger, dark and gritty…basically anything you could want from a pirate novel. Finally, among the dozens of YA novels that I’ve read, I’ve come across one that finally did JUSTICE to the genre.
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Considering that massivecliffhanger ending, I’m distraught that not only do I need to wait for this novel to release – seeing that I read an ARC – but I need to wait even LONGER for the sequel.
I hope that all of you read this when it releases and give it all of the hype that this wonderful novel deserves!!!...more
I received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
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1) Woo the Shadow King. 2) Marry him. 3) Kill him and takeI received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
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1) Woo the Shadow King. 2) Marry him. 3) Kill him and take his kingdom for herself.
This gave me all the Cruel Beauty-vibes I've been craving and my favourite 2020 release thus far. I nearly read this WHOLE THING in one sitting with a grin on my face. It was SO GOOD. Morally grey characters who are so unapologetically bad...and I loved it.
Do yourselves a favour and pick it up when it releases in February. This is my first book by Tricia Levenseller and it most certainly shan’t be my last!...more
I received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
THIS BOOK WAS ABSOLUTELY MENTAL AND I LOVED EVERY SECOND OF IT.I received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
THIS BOOK WAS ABSOLUTELY MENTAL AND I LOVED EVERY SECOND OF IT. It wasn’t as confusing as the first instalment. The plot was faster with even higher stakes, leaving me so very worried for my precious babies. I was left an absolute mess and know I’ll have a torturous wait for the third book to release. *cries*
I received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
"It didn't matter what cards you were dealt. The City of Sin waI received this complimentary ARC from the publisher, in exchange for an honest review.
"It didn't matter what cards you were dealt. The City of Sin was a game, and the only way to win was to stack the cards in your favour."
This was a BRILLIANT finale!!!
For the first half, I was rather upset because all of my babies were grieving, in pain and lashing out at each other as they struggled to deal with everything thrown their way...but then, I thoroughly enjoyed witnessing them slowly make their way back to each other and win the Shadow Game as a team. Found families work best when they function as a unit, rather than going off on their own.
If I had one complaint, it would be Lola's arc. Her friendship with Enne was one of my favourite parts of the series, so the direction that she went in really broke my heart. :( Everyone was really judgemental and condemning of Enne, but - as I've said in other book reviews - it's easy to judge when you aren't faced with making the difficult choices. Anyone can form an opinion from the sidelines, when they have nothing invested in the outcome. It's especially hard when you're stuck choosing between two terrible choices.
Moving on from Lola though, I did love Enne and Levi's journeys the most. They were absolutely horrible to each other in the beginning, but when they finally COMMUNICATED (communication is KEY, people!), they were the team that we'd recognise from the first two books. Such a lovely couple to ship, as well!!! <3
This book was a thrilling ride of twists and turns! Every time you thought they'd won the Shadow Game, another curveball was thrown their way and I LOVED IT. I won't say that I didn't predict any of the twists - because I did (several of them, in fact) - but it didn't make it any less of an enjoyable experience for me.
I treasure this series so much. From the cutthroat gangs to the magical games, the Shadow Game is a glorious ride! I wouldn't compare this to Six of Crows as many people have, but if you do love the vibe that Caraval has, I'd definitely recommend it. This series is so very underrated, which is is frustrating because you're all missing out on something truly unique that deserves WAY MORE love than it gets....more
“Do you think a life has any value if one doesn’t leave some mark upon the world?”
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WOW. What a book. What. A. Book. How do I even begin to describe this masterpiece??? V.E. Schwab just may have outdone herself this time (and this is the eleventh book I've read of hers, omg)! I don’t know how she could possibly top this book in the future. Not only is this her best-written book to date, but you can also see that it’s her most personal one, as well. You can see how much love and care went into this, which is probably why it’s also been in the works for as many years as it has. It’s truly amazing to see how artists pour so much of themselves into their art.
“What she needs are stories. Stories are a way to preserve one’s self. To be remembered. And to forget. Stories come in so many forms: in charcoal, and in song, in paintings, poems, films. And books. Books, she has found, are a way to live a thousand lives – or to find strength in a very long one.”
One of the best parts of this book is honestly the plot itself, with all of the twists and turns that it entails, and what an unpredictable path that the story takes, so I’m not going to ruin it for anyone by going into too much detail. Sorry, but you don’t want to ruin the wonderful surprises for yourself.
“The darkness claimed he’d given her freedom, but really there is no such thing for a woman, not in a world where they are bound up inside their clothes, and sealed inside their homes, a world where only men are given leave to roam.”
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Meet Adeline LaRue. A young, spirited, French girl who, unfortunately, happened to be born in the wrong time and place, where women were unable to have the freedom that she desired. Rather, they were expected to marry young, tend to the homes, and bear children for their husbands. This goes against everything Addie wanted in life, such as exploration and adventure. She wanted to carve her own mark onto the world, rather than going through the motions of a life dictated as being proper for a woman in the small French town of Villon during the 1700s. She didn’t want to merely EXIST. She wanted to LIVE.
“And no matter how desperate or dire, never pray to the gods that answer after dark.”
Thus, when her wedding day came around, and she was faced with a man she did not love and a life she did not want…she ran. Ran to plead with the gods for another sort of life, a better life, where she could live her dreams, rather than damning herself as the other women in her village have. She didn’t want her spirit to die along with her freedom. She wanted to see everything the world had to offer. She didn’t want to waste it because society decided that it was time that she should settle down, not when she hadn’t even begun to live.
“I gave you what you asked for, Adeline. Time, without constraint. Life without restriction. You cursed me to be forgotten. You asked for freedom. There is no greater freedom than that. You can move through the world unhindered. Untethered. Unbound.”
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Unfortunately, it happened to be dark when she said her prayers, and it wasn’t a benevolent god who answered. A trickster offered her a deal, a deal she foolishly accepted in her desperation for freedom. But Addie wasn’t one to lay down and submit at the first sign of hardship. No, for 300 years she’ll play a game of cat and mouse with the god who took all of her desires and fashioned it into a curse that she refused to surrender to.
“This is the silence of a chess game being played. And this time, Addie has to win.”
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As we watch Addie over her 300 years of life, we see that she desires to hear three words more than any others … “I remember you.” And finally, after all these years, she meets Henry, a Jewish bookseller, who is as lost as she is, with monsters of his own, and who, for some reason, remembers her name. Over the course of this novel, we watch Addie, the god and Henry in this beautiful dance throughout time, and wonder how these three lives will ultimately come together and, unfortunately, how this poignant story will come to an end.
(Despite my five-star rating though, I will admit that I wanted a bit MORE from this novel. Considering that we were promised a love story of 300 years between a girl no one remembers and the devil, I felt a tad cheated because that's not really what this was. I won't go into detail because #spoilers, but I definitely felt that this was a case of false advertisement.)
“Being forgotten … is a bit like going mad. You begin to wonder what is real, if you are real. After all, how can a thing be real if it cannot be remembered?”
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I will say that this is a very slow, yet compelling novel. It’s very romantic, yet bittersweet. It definitely has the vibe of a historical novel as we travel with Addie over her 300 years of life, but it is also most definitely supernatural as you see the darkness trying to wear down Addie’s spirit, as she travels through the centuries, completely and utterly alone. I absolutely adored this and devoured it as fast as I could (something I definitely regret now, because you can only read a book for the first time once…but how could I have stopped myself? It’s simply THAT GOOD). So, do yourselves a favour and pick up this gem of a novel when it releases in the upcoming months. <3...more
✨ Helena ✨
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Books:
best-of-2020
(11)
