Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse | Book Review
Wednesday, 14 October 2020 • audiobooks, book review, books, entertainment, fantasy, Net Galley, review, ya books, young adult
There are two things I can say about Net Galley. The first is that it's really screwed up my reading plans. I'm all ready to pick up the next book on my TBR but what's that? I just got approved for a book I wanted? Well there go my plans. The second thing I can say is that it's given me the opportunity to read a lot of good stuff for free. When I saw that Rebecca Roanhorse's new book was available to request, I jumped on it. Now the book is out available for purchase from your local book peddler and in celebration of that, here's my review.
I already want the next book. I want it in my hands now. So if you're looking for a simple good or bad review, this is it. This book is good. In fact, it's wonderful. But for those of you who want more, I'll go on.
Premise: A ship sets sail for the holy city of Tova. On that ship is Xiala, the captain who is a disgraced Teek. She has the power of song that can calm the seas and warp men's minds. She has one goal, to deliver a passenger named Serapio to the holy city in time for the convergence, a holy time. But this year the convergence is happening alongside a solar eclipse and Serapio, the blind and scarred young man, has a destiny to fulfill. There is also Naranpa, the Sun Priest, who aims to reunite the people of Tova who have long since distrusted the priesthood. But she has enemies from all sides who don't want her to succeed.
I had a bit of fear when picking up this book. I feared that I would get confused. There really is a lot going on and one of the downsides of the fantasy genre is that if it's not done well, it's easy to get lost. I'm currently reading The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan and I got lost more than once. But I'm happy to say that Rebecca Roanhorse is a pro and it never got too hard to follow.
There was a good mix of characters and not many of them fell into any classic trope. Even if they did fit a certain trope's niche, they were their own person and not some cardboard cutout of what's expected of the genre. There was also no clear bad side. Though I did pick a side, it's not as clear as something like Jedi vs Sith. The characters and their various plights have depth beyond good vs evil and I loved that. Naranpa's goals are pure and honest. She wants to restore people's faith in the priesthood. Serapio's goals are honorable. He wants to bring forth an long dead god to bring his people back to their former glory. These two goals can't coincide. Only one side can win and I'm not sure who I want to get the metaphorical gold.
There was also wonderful representation for the LGBTQ+ community. A main character is Bi. More than one important side characters use gender neutral pronouns, and there's even transgendered representation. The best thing is, is that it all came about naturally. It never felt forced to meet some sort of unspoken woke quota. The only thing I found difficult was the use of the xe/xir pronouns since I'm used to the more popular they/them. But that's not really a big deal at all at it was easy to get used to even if it was jarring at first.
The world Roanhorse created is vast and full of possibility. Just like Terry Brooks's Shannara, Roanhorse's world in the Between Earth and Sky series has a lot of potential for stories beyond this series. Everything was original too which makes the promise for more even more intriguing. But right now all I want is the sequel to Black Sun. IT doesn't end on a huge cliffhanger, but it's so good that I want more right away.
Black Sun is a fun read. It has a very intriguing story with great characters that tell a unique tale. The world is immersive and easy to understand but that doesn't take away from the wonder of it all. Rebecca Roanhorse is a master of her craft and I'm so glad I got the opportunity to read this book.
Black Sun gets an 11 out of 11
Punching The Air | Book Review
Sunday, 11 October 2020 • audiobooks, book review, books, entertainment, general fiction, review, ya books, young adult
Punching the Air by Ibi Zoboi and Yusef Salaam is about a young man named Amal Shahid how gets wrongfully accused of a violent crime and sent to a juvenile detention facility. This story, written in verse, is about Amal and how he fights to maintain his sense of self and humanity in a prison that aims to break him. This story is loosely based on Yusef Salaam’s experience was one of the Central Park Five.
I received this audiobook as an advanced listening copy from Net Galley and Harper Audio in exchange for an honest review and honestly, I’m thankful I got to listen to this.
Books in verse are always hit or miss for me because poetry can be a more fluid art form that can leave more up to interpretation than prose can. This story was easy to follow but the ease of reading (or listening in my case) didn’t stop it from being deep and meaningful.
The narrator, Ethan Herisse, did a wonderful job and had a unique voice for all the characters. His cadence carried the intensity of the verse wonderfully and he helped me get lost in the story.
Amal was a great character because he was wonderfully in the middle. He wasn’t some perfect angel of a kid but on the other side of things, he wasn’t some “bad kid” who always got into trouble. It could be said that Amal has a bad attitude. He has a problem with authority figures who don’t seem to believe in him and more than once his first instinct is to throw a punch. He’s a very realistic young man and I think it helps to show that this type of injustice can happen to anyone.
Punching the Air is very blunt about prison. Nothing graphic happens but there is violence against inmates, some of which obviously comes from a place of racism. But there’s also a few positive elements too like a kind guard, a friend Amal makes, and a poetry class that captures his attention. But the good stuff never once made prison look like anything other than an awful place. It just showed that Amal was finding ways to stay sane during it all.
This story has an important message. We need prison reform and we need to share stories about those who were wrongfully incarcerated as well as those who did commit a crime, but got harsher sentences due to the color of their skin, as well as addressing the treatment of prisoners.
Punching the Air is a wonderful book that tells an important story and it does so with a memorable main character and it’s written in a style that captured my attention from the first moment.
Punching the Air gets a 10 out of 11
They Both Die At The End by Adam Silvera | Book Review
Wednesday, 20 November 2019 • book review, books, ya books, young adult
The title is very straight forward. It's about two kids who find out they’re going to die. There’s a service called Death Cast that calls people shortly after midnight and lets them know that they’re going to die. That way people can be prepared and spend their last day however they wish. Death Cast doesn’t know how or at what time, just the day. Mateo and Rufus don’t know each other. But they will after they both get the call and find each other using an app called Last Friend, an app for people who don’t have anyone to spend their last day with.
The title says they both die but they could still survive. However, for a story like this, it doesn’t matter. The journey is what counts more. It’s like any show or movie about the Titanic. You know it’s going to sink, but that’s not why you watch it. The main character could be like Jack and die or like Rose and survive on a piece of wood big enough for two. But either way you don’t sit down to Titanic thinking it’s going to have a happy ending.
I’m going to be honest. I spent half the book disliking the characters. Mataeo was a wuss. I would have been more understanding if it was revealed he had some sort of mental issue, but no explanation was given besides him being a wussy homebody who was scared of the world. Rufus sounded like someone who got a copy of “how to talk ghetto” for Christmas and was practicing as much as he could. Everything was “mad.” The sun was mad bright, the food was mad tasty, and the music was mad loud. Not just that, but he started out very one bland note.
I found myself liking the characters more as the story progressed. They were changing and it was for the better. Mateo was less of a scaredy cat and Rufus was developing more and his . In the first half of the book I just enjoyed the story and the setup while in the second half I grew to like the characters as well.
I’ve read quite a few reviews for this book and one of the biggest complaints I read was about instalove. I want to assure you that there is no instalove. In my opinion, instalove is what happens in cheesy romance books or Twilight when Bella sees Edward for the first time and she’s eternally, irrevocably, and haphazardly in love just from the sight of the creepy old vampire.
This was a cute book. A typical YA drama/romance. It wasn’t bad at all but I’ve also read better. Adam Silvera had a really good idea with this book that never fully got fleshed out. Mateo and Rufus get nice and complete stories but other parts of the book, like the world it is set in and how things work, are never explained.They Both Die In The End has many pros and very few cons so I whole heartedly recommend this book to anyone who’s a fan of YA drama and romance.
I still have quite a few question. How does death cast know how is going to die? Why are the doomed called deckers? Some people are killed because they get the call and then do something stupid. So is the call that killed them? Would they still have died if they didn’t get the call even though the fact that they got the call is what made them take a certain action that caused their death?
If that last question was a bit confusing, allow me to explain in a non-spolier example. Let’s say I get called by death cast. I find out I’m going to die today. Because I get that call, I decide to do something I never would have done otherwise. I go skydiving. While skydiving my parachute fails and I fall to my death. But I never would have been skydiving if I never got the call. So would I have died anyway? Is death unavoidable?
Those questions aside, I still liked this and would recommend it to any fan of YA. If you're not a read of the genre, then I might stray away from this book. Otherwise, give it a go.
They Both Die At The End gets a 7.5 out of 11
