Emma

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I was really surprised by this. It was very creepy but in a good way. It almost reminded me of a Stephen King novel. In fact it reminded me of Blaze by Richard Bachman. We have a guy that gets himself into a bad situation. The entire book is about him trying to fix this situation and even though the things he is doing is wrong you can't help but feel sorry for him.

I really enjoyed this book. Parts are super creepy. Just when you think it can't get and worse it gets worse. And it was brilliant. Though I would put a big graphic content warning on this. So if thats not your sort of thing you may want to pass this one.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

This started off really good. It is a novel but almost feels like a series of short stories, every chapter tells a stand alone story about a female member of one family. I think this is the type of book you need to read more than once to fully understand what is going on, there is a family tree at the front of the book which helps, however flicking back and forth through the ebook version was slightly difficult.

The book is sort of a historical/ modern day fiction. However the final few chapters got so weird that I couldn't believe it was part of the same book. These chapters show what has happened to the family over 100 years in the future. I don't want to give away spoilers but it got really strange and these few final chapters are the reason why I gave this book such a low rating. Its almost like the book was trying to be like Cloud Atlas but it didn't work. I'm really quite disappointed as I was enjoying it up to that point.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I felt that this was very similar to The Broken Kingdoms series by N. K. Jemisin. In both the gods are physical beings who walk the earth. Though in this the gods didn't really feel like gods. In this the gods made a city then spent 3000 years living in that city ruling over the humans and expecting to be waited on hand and foot. Apparently they rule over this world though they don't do much ruling. In fact they spend most of their time dressing in fancy clothes and going to parties. They do so little it makes you wonder if they are really gods.

This is also the first part of a duology so we might find out more in the next book. Though I don't think I will be reading it. This was a reasonably good high fantasy novel but it didn't have anything that made it stand out. It was just one of many reasonably good high fantasy novels.

*I received a copy of this book from Hodder & Stoughton in exchange for an honest review.

** I should also say that I much prefer The Broken Kingdoms to this and if you had to choose between the two you should read The Broken Kingdoms :)

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

First of all I will say I got a copy of this book from Netgalley and I was only 25% through when I went out and bought a physical copy. I really enjoyed this book. It was a fascinating look at what could happen to religion if humans found life on another planet. But I have to admit I really liked the fact that you don't have to be religious in any way to enjoy this.

It brings up so many moral questions. Is it right to preach to these aliens when they barely understand human language. Is it right to give them medicine when its not clear if the aliens even understand what its for. I couldn't help but feel that these characters were breaking the Prime Directive in some way, even though its from Star Trek. One of the most interesting questions was brought up by one of the characters. Jesus died for our sins but did he die for these alien's sins as well.

Not only is this book a really interesting look at religion its a fantastic science-fiction novel too. The main character Peter is able to communicate with his wife back on Earth via a messaging system and we find out that all sorts of natural disasters have been occurring back on Earth. So we also see how Peter is torn between teaching the aliens about Christianity and worrying about his relationship with his wife and everything that is happening back on Earth.

I really enjoyed this book. The only problem I had was that the ending was very anti-climactic. I was left with more questions than answers about the situation back on Earth. But still a good read.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

The first thing I liked about this book is that it is the third part of a series and you would never know it. As far as I can tell it doesn't make any references back to the previous books. In fact if it wasn't for the giant ‘3' on the spine you would think this was a standalone novel

I also liked the fact that there was mermaids in it. Now these are not the mermaids you would find in a Disney movie. These are proper lure men to their death mermaids. Or to be technical sirens as they are called in the book. It was nice reading about something you don't normally come across in fantasy novels. Or at least this is the first time I've read a fantasy book with mermaids in it.

The only thing that annoyed me with this book was the magic. I read on Wikipedia that this series was the author imagining what would happen if we had magic in a modern day setting. And I really wasn't keen on it. Now this can work brilliantly, for example in Harry Potter, but the magical world and non-magical parts were kept very separate. In this everything was mashed together, you have angels and mermaids and wizards but you also have electricity and superheroes and Top Gear. It felt weird all that being together.

Not to mention the characters looking for a magical ring who kept making references to Tolkien and talking about hobbits. It was all very strange.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I think dystopias set in London are the in thing just now. I felt this was quite similar to The Bone Season what with the aliens and all that. Though I would say that The Bone Season was much better than this, I did feel that some parts of it still needed some work.

I didn't quite understand why some of the characters made the decisions they did. I didn't understand why this top secret “Department” allowed teenagers to take part in investigations. It also seemed to be terrible at following its own rules, most of the problems in the book wouldn't have happened if it followed the rules and didn't tell civilians about top secret work.

I also didn't like the references to Tesco, the Westfield Shopping Center and Star Trek. It brought be out of the novel and I really can't believe that in a dystopian setting after years of war people are just going about shopping like nothing happened.

But the thing with this book is I'm seriously impressed with the author, she is only 15 years old, she was 13 when she wrote this story. And while its not great, its not terrible either. It still needs some work but its an impressive first book for someone who hasn't even finished school yet.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

This was a very strange story. I literally finished it and went “Wait what?” because it is that weird. At the start you think Bjorn is just a regular guy but as the story goes on we find out that he is rude, narcissistic and just not a nice guy. You can't help but wonder if he is just mean or if he doesn't understand what he is doing wrong. Sort of a Sheldon Cooper type character.

I can't say I liked this book. Parts of it were quite boring but I can't help but feel that emphasises the boredom that comes from working in an office. Fortunately this book was very short at only 128 pages. Though it does end quite abruptly, it never explains what really happened leaving you wondering if the room is real or not.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I have to admit when I first got this book I assumed it was non-fiction. I was quite surprised to find out it wasn't but I enjoyed it anyway. It is quite similar to The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry and The Hundred-Year-Old Man, we see Aganetha at the age of 104 looking back on her life. Though I think this novel is quite a bit more serious.

This book is about running and the Olympics. The way the author writes about running is so lyrical it will make you want to go outside and run. But it is also about women's rights and unwanted pregnancy. I have to admit when I got to the end of this book I refused to believe I was finished. It was a lovely book to read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I think everyone should read this.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

This could have been a really interesting book but large parts of it didn't make any sense. At the beginning the main character Cass escapes from what is basically a prison. For most of the story she is trying to find her way to an island. A safe haven for Omegas. But even though there are presumably people out looking for Cass we don't see them till nearly the end of the book. Most of the time there is no sense of danger even though Cass is being hunted by these people.

While escaping the prison Cass rescues a guy, though there is no real reason why she rescues him. For most of the novel he hinders her escape attempt more than he helps. In fact it feels that the only reason he is in the book is to be a love interest. Which eventually turns into a love triangle like all “great” YA books.

The thing is the premise for this book is really interesting. It is set in a post apocalyptic world around 400 years after an explosion which we can assume – as there is machinery and electricity (even though it is banned) – was the result of an atomic bomb. This could have been a really good book but alas it was not.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

This was a really strange book, its basically a dystopia though it doesn't feel like a dystopia. In this world people have forgotten how to use written words so they communicate in music. This does mean that there are many musical terms in this book and I did spend a good while googling musical terms. It was an interesting book but I didn't enjoy it. I feel that its one of those books you need to read more than once to understand fully. I also have to mention the cover which is really beautiful. Its one of the nicest book covers I have seen.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I got a copy of this book from the publisher via bookbridgr. In the small amount of research I did I saw no mention of the fact that it is a sequel. If I had known it was a sequel I would not have requested it.

This book does not explain what is going on in this world. It assumes that the reader has read the first book; The String Diaries. The book focuses on the mysterious people known as the hosszu eletek but never actually explains what the hosszu eletek actually are. Some parts of the book simply don't make any sense and others refer back to The String Diaries without ever explaining fully what happened.

I tried to read this without reading The String Diaries and got very confused. Having gone back to read the first book I will say that this was mildly interesting. I was just pissed that I had to go read another book just to understand what was going on.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

The first thing I should say about this book is there are a number of graphic sex scenes. So if that isn't your thing then you may want to avoid this book. But apart from that I enjoyed it. It was one of those Snow Crash, The Forever Watch type books. Basically its a futuristic murder mystery.

Throughout the book the main character is trying to get over a disaster in which he lost his wife. I would have liked to know more about exactly what happened but its really not that important to the story (well the disaster is important but spoilers). I actually enjoyed this book and I will definitely be looking for more books like it.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

The problem with this book is that there are much better fantasy books out there. The entire time I was reading this I couldn't help but compare it to The Killing Moon which was much better in my opinion.

It also annoyed me that the towns and cities were constantly moving. Now I have to say I did find it interesting that towns were constantly on the move and that castles float on lakes so they are in constant movement. But it annoyed me that there was no explanation for this other than “thats how it has always been“.

I was also surprised at how violent this book was, the sexy times were really quite graphic too. Overall it was an okay book. Good enough that I would read the sequel but there are better fantasy books out there.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

This book was really fantastic at portraying depression in a real way. It was so accurate that I actually became frustrated with the characters. In the past I have had low moments and though about death and I came to the realisation that I would much rather be alive than dead. Having experience with depression I know I should have sympathised with the characters but I couldn't help but be frustrated at Aysel because she couldn't see that she still had so much to live for.

Jasmine Werga told me that she hopes this book would “start a dialog about the realities of depression” and I think it has done that. Especially after Robin Williams' suicide it was great to have a book which shows that just because someone appears to be happy on the outside doesn't mean they are happy inside. Even though this is a young adult setting I think that anyone who has experience with depression could read this and relate to the characters. I know it has made me want to write about my own experience and I hope that it encourages others to write about it too.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I think this might possibly be one of the most interesting books I have ever read. It gives a detailed account of the US-Israeli effort to sabotage Iran's nuclear enrichment program through a cyber-attack on the computers controlling the centrifuges. It has interviews with the specialists who originally found the virus and their efforts to slowly pick apart its code, the book then goes on to show how this virus affected the machinery at the nuclear plant. I found this fascinating, its incredible to see how a few thousand lines of code could have such devastating real world consequences. It really makes you think about the future now that computers are such a huge part of our daily life.

The book does however assume that the reader has some knowledge of computers. If you think viruses are those things you go to the doctor for and worms are found at the bottom of the garden you may want to give this one a miss.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

The first thing I think everyone should know about this book is that you don't need to be a fan of Amanda Palmer or her music to enjoy it. The book was advertised as a longer version of her TED talk however I felt it was more like an autobiography. The book tells the story of Amanda's life but it also shows the ways she has asked her fans and the online community for help, from finding somewhere to sleep to finding musicians to play on stage with her. Throughout the book Amanda shows that it is okay to ask for help, as she puts it “take the donut“. I genuinely believe that if you want your blog or any other artistic endeavour to become a full time job you should read this book.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I can't decide how I feel about this book. It was partially based on the authors own life. He states “I was chronically shy as a child... I wanted to distance myself from school, from that whole experience. To have a keep-your-head-down-and-get-through-it attitude. I wanted to write something from the point of view of a schoolboy that felt real – real to the experience I had at school“. The author does this very well. But the entire way through this book I couldn't get the image of my own high school out of my head. I had a very similar experience at school, I didn't have many friends and spent many lunchtimes on my own. It was very weird, I kept imagining the characters in my own high school, even though it was nothing like the one described in the book. I spent more time thinking about my own high school experience than I did of the characters.

There was one thing however that annoyed me about this book. It is about obsession and mental illness. The main character has schizophrenia. From very early on in the story you know there is not going to be a happy ending. The entire way through the book you are trying to guess what is real and what is happening inside the main characters head. At the end there is a small epilogue telling you what was real and what wasn't. I didn't like this. Throughout the book you are told enough that you could make an educated guess at what happens at the end, I would rather have come away from the book still trying to workout exactly what happened instead of being told outright.

Basically this was a strange one, I can't say I liked it but I didn't exactly dislike it either.

*I received a copy of this book from Hodder & Stroughton in exchange for an honest review.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I think this is the sort of book where it is better going into it not knowing what it is about. My sister told me what the book was about as she has no concept of spoilers and I was surprised. Because just from the cover and the title you wouldn't think it was this sort of book. But its good, its really good. Its one of the best books I have read in this genre.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I'm the only one who knows the secrets her friends have hidden, the mistakes the police have made. I'm the only one who can warn her she's still in danger. I know exactly who attacked her. He's the same man who killed me.

The story is told through three points of view. First we meet Eve just after her death. Eve is stuck in a state of limbo, dead but not quite gone. Eve is watching the proceedings and narrates the events of her life leading up to her death. Victoria is a mother trying to balance home and work life. She is investigating Eve's death and what is increasingly looking to be a case of wrongful arrest and imprisonment.

And finally we have Melody, a survivor of a vicious attack. The Life I Left Behind is not a typical murder mystery. It is really Melody's story of coping with the effects of post traumatic stress. Melody thinks she is fooling everyone while in reality she is not coping at all. Instead she had spent years cooped up in her fancy house she shares with her boyfriend.

Considering I don't normally like murder mystery type books I enjoyed The Life I Left Behind. The focus is very much on how Melody and Eve are linked and I though Melody's emotional decline was done very well. I really liked the modern references dropped throughout, current affairs, music and even The Great British Bake Off are mentioned. I only gave it 3 stars because as I have already said I don't normally like books in this genre and it wasn't the most amazing book I have every read. Still good though.

*I received a copy of this book from Headline in exchange for a honest review.

I need to go read The Bell Jar now.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

Melissa Anelli is regarded as an important person in the Harry Potter fandom. However I was never in the Harry Potter fan community so to me Melissa Anelli is just the owner of a rather popular fansite. And to be honest the only reason I wanted to read this book is because it was about Harry Potter. So when I read a review which said this book is basically Melissa Anelli “scrabbling at her fifteen minutes of fame” I was expecting to not like this book.

While part of this book is Melissa Anelli's autobiography it is also a fascinating account of how Harry Potter was published, the growth of the online fan community, fanfiction, the shipping wars and Harry and the Potters. Basically if you are a huge Harry Potter fan you should read this book. There was also one piece of trivia in this book which I found really interesting: It was an intentional decision by Warner Bros to keep the Harry Potter movies and books as separate as possible which means there has never been a movie edition of a Harry Potter book. I am embarrassed to admit I have been reading Harry Potter for 16 years and never noticed this before now.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

Hatshepsut was born into a privileged position in the royal household, and she was expected to bear the sons who would legitimise the reign of her father's family. Her failure to produce a male heir was ultimately the twist of fate that paved the way for her improbable rule as a cross-dressing king.

Hatshepsut successfully negotiated a path from the royal nursery to the very pinnacle of authority, and her reign saw one of Ancient Egypt's most prolific building periods. Scholars have long speculated as to why her monuments were destroyed within a few decades of her death, all but erasing evidence of her unprecedented rule. The Woman Who Would Be King traces the unconventional life of an almost-forgotten pharaoh and explores our complicated reactions to women in power.

This book is fascinating but it is also extremely frustrating. The author concedes that we do not have much information about Hatshepust. We know very little about her personality, her political manoeuvring and her relationships with her father, Thutmose I, her brother and husband, Thutmose II, and her nephew and co-regent, Thutmose III. The author makes liberal use of words like “perhaps” and “maybe”, she poses numerous questions asking what Hatshepust might have thought or how she felt. But of course we can't know the answers to these questions as the records simply do not exist. So the author makes assumptions of what the thoughts and feelings of Hatshepsut may have been.

I think it is important to learn about Hatshepsut. As the author puts it:

The challenges Hatshepsut faced and the sacrifices she made are familiar to powerful women of the twenty-first century: balancing the personal and the political, overcoming stereotypes of hysterical and unbalanced femininity, and making compromises never asked of powerful men. For Hatshepsut, her unprecedented success was rewarded with a short memory, while the failures of other female leaders from antiquity will be forever immortalised in our cultural consciousness.

However with all the speculation and guessing in this book I can't help but feel there may be a better way of learning about Hatshepsut.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

I have read many fantasy books and yet I've never read anything quite like this. This book feels very modern, and by that I mean it focuses on some very modern issues even though it is set in what is supposed to be an ancient world.

First thing, I really like how the magic works in this. Magic is created by the citizens of Gujaareh in their dreams. This magic is taken to the Hetawa which is the main temple of the Hananjan faith (the religion in this book) where it is used to heal the sick. However the Hetawa have to uphold Hananja's Law, the principal tenant of which is peace. This means they are able to judge whether a person is corrupt and if so send out a Gatherer who will take the person's Dreamblood (magic) and send them on to Ina-Karekh (heaven, basically). A Gatherer is also able to do this to a person if they are so sick that they are unable to recover, in a sense giving them a good death. However this now raises a moral question, should the Hetawa be allowed to kill anyone they choose for the sake of all who live in the city.

I loved the characters, they feel like real people struggling with their ethics, history and sexuality among other things. Not only that but we have this very interesting affection between the two main male characters Nijiri and Ehiru. This isn't a sexual thing more of a mentor/mentee relationship, but you get to see how the affection changes and grows throughout the course of the book. We also get to see some fantastically strong female characters and though it is only mentioned in passing (read the sequel for more) we have a very interesting way that women are viewed in this world. In that they are seen as goddesses and don't need a Gatherer's help to get to Ina-Karekh and yet are treated as subservient to men.

One thing I did have a problem with is that Jemisin jumps straight into the plot, no info-dumps or exposition. However this means that you really need to concentrate and possibly even re-read the first 100 pages, this is the unfortunate problem with having a fantasy setting with very foreign names and places. There is a glossary at the back of the book but that only helps to an extent.

Another thing is that we know this setting is based loosely on Egypt, I would have liked a map so I could better understand where everything is, however after checking the author's blog it seems that she has a problem with maps in fantasy books. In fact it seems she thinks that if she didn't need a map while writing the book, the reader won't need a map either. Now I personally think this is a little arrogant considering the author created the world and is expecting the reader to see it the same way she does in her head. But that's just me.

I cannot recommend this book enough, seriously if you enjoy fantasy read this. This is in fact one of the only books where I have been disappointed with a sequel because it did not lead on directly from where the first book finished. I had an epic book hangover after this that even reading all of N. K. Jemisin's other published works did not fix. I enjoyed this book so much that it is very possible I will name is as my favourite book of 2015 (even though I technically read it in 2014).

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com

I was really disappointed with this book. It was slow, boring and I didn't care for the characters. It felt like it would have worked better as a novella rather than a full length story. However, the final 30 pages were fantastic. Like classic terrifying Stephen King. I was told that the ending was very H. P. Lovecraft however I haven't read any of his work so cannot confirm this. But this ending gave me a lot of trouble in trying to rate the book. While the end is brilliant it still does not – in my opinion – make paying full price for this book worthwhile.

Originally posted on bluchickenninja.com.

June Mottershead was four when her father, George, moved his family to Upton, two miles from Chester, to begin the process of turning his dream into a reality. With no other children around to play with – her sister Muriel was ten years older – June's friends became the animals. Her closest friends became the animals. Her closest companion was an orphaned chimpanzee which she hand reared, and for six years the two were inseparable.

June soon became the poster girl for Chester Zoo and photographs of her cuddling lion cubs soon graced the front pages of British newspapers. She was 13 when war was declared in 1939 and, with the backbone of the staff headed to the front, it fell to June to take over as head keeper.

June is now in her eighties, is the guardian of her families legacy and in Our Zoo, she tells the fascinating story of a working class family with a very unusual home. This story of how her father set out to build a zoo without bars was turned into a six-part drama series currently airing on the BBC.

Stories about animals are basically my kryptonite and this book had many of them. There are plenty stories of hand-reared wild animals and the photographs of chimpanzees helping to build their own enclosure will melt your heart. This is a fascinating story of the every-day struggles and make-do attitude by the entire Mottershead family.

The story was told in chronological order with a few anecdotes outwith the timeline which was slightly confusing. I did feel that the story ended very abruptly and I turned the page expecting there would be more. But overall I loved this story and the only problem I had with it was the length. I would have quite happily read another 100 pages.

If you like these sorts of books I would also recommend Jeremy and Amy by Jeremy Keeling. This is the true story of a zoo keeper, an orangutan and one mans dream of turning a derelict pig farm in Dorset into a cageless sanctuary for primates.

*I received a copy of this book from Headline in exchange for an honest review.