REVIEW: The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson

Jack the Ripper is back, and he’s coming for Rory next…

            Louisiana teenager Rory Deveaux arrives in London to start a new life at boarding school just as a series of brutal murders mimicking the horrific Jack the Ripper killing spree of more than a century ago has broken out across the city. The police are left with few leads and no witnesses. Except one. Rory spotted the man believed to be the prime suspect. But she is the only one who saw him—the only one who can see him. And now Rory has become his next target…unless she can tap her previously unknown abilities to turn the tables.

            The Name of the Star is so much British boarding school love, so little time. Maureen Johnson put a lot of time and beauty into the details of the boarding school that Rory moves into in London. Did she spend a little too much time on the school details and not enough on the actual plot? That’s up for debate.

            While I really enjoyed this book, I definitely think the amount of detail that went into everything about the boarding school was overkill. I get it! Rory is living the dream. She’s moved to London and is living and going to school at a boarding school! I wish there’d been more exciting detail about London in general instead of so much focus on the school. Don’t get me wrong: I loved the school. Sign me up! But it was a bit much.

            As for other aspects of the story I enjoyed, there are the characters. While Rory’s classmates were kind of drab (other than the Hockey-loving Claudia and Rory’s roommate), I really adored the “Ghostbuster” squad. They didn’t get nearly enough time, detail, and characterization (because that all went to the school) and they were still way better than most of the people at the school. Give me Stephen over Jerome any day, because I feel like Jerome was an awful character and there was clearly no chemistry between him and Rory. I assume he’s not her forever love interest, and I really wish the Ripper would have just killed him because there was less than nothing between him and Rory and it was awful to read them get forced together. Boo (and her best friend, of course), Jazza, and Callum were all fine characters, but Jerome was the epitome of awful.

            Before I type out the words Jerome and awful together in any more sentences, I’ll digress. My favorite part of the book was the plot point of using people who’ve had a near-death experience and have been locked away in an insane asylum to hunt down ghosts. That’s not a bad idea at all! Either way, I really liked that part but overall the book was kind of a disappointment. I wanted to like it more than I actually did, and there were just a lot of things wrong.

            Firstly, there was way too much set up (too many details!). I seriously waited half of the book for something to actually happen, and when Rory finally became aware of her abilities she didn’t actually do anything with them. Then there were those extra chapters in different POVs that did absolutely nothing for the story. Plus, just because it’s an episodic sort of series does not mean that there shouldn’t be some overarching plot for the whole series (and so far there’s nothing). And finally, there was the fact that Rory expletive gave up at the end. Things were rough with the Ripper and she said, “Oh, just kill me!”. What a weak and disappointing character! I want a strong character that’s willing to do something, anything, to stop evil, but I guess that just wasn’t a part of Rory’s character chart. I honestly don’t think I can give this series another chance after the main character gave up, and that’s the biggest disappointment of all.

XOXO Tia

THOUGHTS: The Dos and Don'ts of Writing YA

 

            The amazing thing about writing YA is that it is a genre that is really blossoming as of late. There are so many new subgenres, styles, and motifs of writing that were not in this genre even 15 years ago. Times have certainly changed, and YA has become a genre for experimentation in a way. Similar to how teens are constantly experimenting with who they are, the genre has been experimenting with who it is. The genre is always changing just like it’s readership, but there are certain things that should and should not be found in YA books. Everyone is different, but I think this list is a good, comprehensive look at the dos and don’ts of writing YA.

THE DOS

1.     Have a strong, clear main character for the reader to follow through the story’s journey. Even in multiple POV stories where there are two or more main characters, they still need to be strong and clear.

2.     Make sure that at the end of every chapter there’s a slight cliffhanger, peak in the plot, question, new discovery, or something that won’t be cleared up until the next chapter. This keeps readers reading even though it’s five in the morning on a Monday, and they still haven’t done their math homework.

THE DON’TS

1.     I don’t care how amazing the world you have created is, or that you did detailed character charts for your main character’s whole family lineage. Don’t put all that in your writing. Story details have a time and a place, and if you have an awesome detail that doesn’t then you should nix it. Just because you know everything, doesn’t mean the reader needs to or even wants to.

2.     Long chapters are a big no-no. Young adults have busy lives. They’re constantly doing something, and nobody wants to stop reading if they’re not at the start of a new chapter. Plus, short chapters means readers feel more accomplished when they’ve read 15 out of 70 chapters more so than 2 out of 10 chapters.

3.     Please don’t start your book in anybody’s POV other than your main character’s. It’s confusing and a little jarring to be experiencing something exciting in one person’s POV and then find out that person is a secondary character and now the rest of the story will be in this other person’s POV. This, of course, is a little different for multiple POV stories.

Like my list of favorite tropes, this is one of those posts that will probably get updated when I come across more atrocious don’ts in my reading.

XOXO Tia

REVIEW: The Fixer by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

            Sixteen-year-old Tess Kendrick has spent her entire life on her grandfather’s ranch. But when her estranged sister Ivy uproots her to D.C., Tess is thrown into a world that revolves around politics and power. She also starts at Hardwicke Academy, the D.C. school for the children of the rich and powerful, where she unwittingly becomes a fixer for the high school set, fixing teens’ problems the way her sister fixes their parents’ problems.

            And when a conspiracy surfaces that involves the family member of one of Tess’s classmates, love triangles and unbelievable family secrets come to light and life gets even more interesting—and complicated—for Tess.

            Despite my unadulterated love for Jennifer Lynn Barnes’ writing, I was sincerely concerned that I wasn’t going to enjoy this book when I initially heard about it. I’m not really into politics and that sort of this, so this book was mentally out of my comfort zone. Good thing I read it, though, because it was really great if a bit awkwardly bumpy in places. Look at me, reading a political thriller of sorts. Oh my gosh! Am I turning into an adult?

            First off, big spoiler in this paragraph, I’m going to mention a few of the things that turned me off and out of the book’s world a little. Now I realize that I am one of zero (and I do mean zero because as of right now I’m on the fence and holding my utter judgment until after book two), but I was not a fan of how Tess’s sister became Tess’s mom. It’s not that I didn’t love the plot twist, because trust me I loved it and the story potential is brings, it’s simply that I did not like how it was revealed. It just seemed so mundane. Blah blah, things are falling apart, I don’t want you not to know that I’m really your mother, blah blah. I thought there could have been more build up, or hey (better yet!), Tess could have figured it out on her own! Gasp! How does she come up with this?

            More on her figuring things out on her own, though. When hearing about this book, I really thought that I was going to get to see Tess become a fixer for this “high school” scene. I wouldn’t have even minded more “cases” being thrust upon her before the big conspiracy case. There just needed to be more of her becoming a fixer alongside her sister and then there needed to be a cross and some links between cases. The way that occurred in the book just seemed flat. It was a nice variation to the usual to kid in high school trope but I don’t think it was executed well enough to be an acceptable differentiation.

            The last thing that bugged me was how quickly Tess forgave Ivy for leaving her with her grandfather and for stopping writing letters. I would be livid if that sort of person uprooted me from the life I love to move to Boston and live with them. I’d never forgive them, even if they did tell me a huge secret that really “changes things”. I understand that tragedy brings people together, but to me Ivy was a bully that tore Tess from her home. Considering Tess’s key character trait of despising bullies, her forgiving Ivy so quickly just didn’t ring true.

            Now on to what I loved about the book: which is a lot! As I mentioned before, I’m not a huge politics fan but this book had me hooked. The more of the conspiracy that got revealed, the more I got invested. I would have liked if Tess could have figured out some secrets before her sister, but in the end she really got to determine her own fate and figure things out on her own (which I loved).

            Tess was a dynamic character for sure, and I loved her interactions with her friends and I adored Henry. Now there’s a ship for which I’ll knit a sail! But characters are never something with which I’ve seen Barnes struggle. She can build great characters that I will fall in love with inevitably and no matter what.

            One thing I was a huge hopeful for in the beginning was the maybe love triangle between Bodie and Adam. I thought it was so inventive to have a love triangle with the sister rather than the main character. In that instant, the book really felt like a TV series with the clear life of Ivy and then the life of Tess. An almost split POV story, if you will, and I thought it was going to be amazing! But then I was denied that joy by Ivy lackluster “love-type” emotions for Bodie. Finishing the book, however, I’m still hopeful that there’s a love triangle in Ivy’s future that I’ll get to read all about.

            And yes, there were the twists, thrills, and all other Barnes amusement park rides. There’s never a dull, untwisted moment in the book, and never a person without some sort of ulterior motive. But I’m guessing that’s just D.C. and I can’t wait for more.

XOXO Tia