Release Date: April 16th, 2013
Genre: Romance, Sci-fi, Dystopia
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Pages: 408
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

In Sloane’s world, true feelings are forbidden, teen suicide is an epidemic, and the only solution is The Program.

Sloane knows better than to cry in front of anyone. With suicide now an international epidemic, one outburst could land her in The Program, the only proven course of treatment. Sloane’s parents have already lost one child; Sloane knows they’ll do anything to keep her alive. She also knows that everyone who’s been through The Program returns as a blank slate. Because their depression is gone—but so are their memories.

Under constant surveillance at home and at school, Sloane puts on a brave face and keeps her feelings buried as deep as she can. The only person Sloane can be herself with is James. He’s promised to keep them both safe and out of treatment, and Sloane knows their love is strong enough to withstand anything. But despite the promises they made to each other, it’s getting harder to hide the truth. They are both growing weaker. Depression is setting in. And The Program is coming for them.

Blurb: If you don't buy into the premise, this is just a contemporary romance.

Review: The gist of this book is that teens can be "infected" with depression. And so many of them are being "infected" that they are committing suicide in droves. I think it said 1 in 3 teens committed suicide. That sounds like a really cool premise, except that... I didn't buy it.

The world of this book is SO DEPRESSING. All adults are so paranoid about the kids getting depressed that the teens can't display any emotion (even extreme happiness is frowned upon), can't disagree with anyone, and essentially they don't have any individualism. Who wouldn't be depressed in a world like that? If I had to keep such a tight leash on myself all the time I can actually see why suicide might seem like a viable option.

My best friend suffers from depression. And she's told me before that she knew she didn't have anything to be sad about, but she was still sad. Perhaps if the author had started earlier in the "epidemic" history. If we had seen teens who really did have nothing "wrong" with their lives get depressed and commit suicide in large amounts. But that's not what I saw. I saw teens in a crappy world with only one way out.

Because of this, everything else that happened in the book just seemed like a contemporary story. This was another one of those books where a good portion of it was told in flashbacks, and those flashbacks didn't have anything sci-fi or dystopian about them. I don't like contemporary romance. I find it dull. And yet when we would come out of the flashbacks we would get just enough of a glimpse into the sci-fi aspects of the book that I kept reading.

I didn't hate this book, but I was far from loving it. If there are more in the series I will not be reading them because I feel like there isn't enough sci-fi stuff to carry the story, and I don't care about the romance.

Other Reviews:

• Katie's Book Blog (Loved it!)
• Xpresso Reads (It was okay)
• Birth of a New Witch (REALLY Didn't Like It. WARNING has some strong language!)

*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: April 3rd, 2012
Genre:  Political Intrigue, Romance, Historical Fiction
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Pages: 549
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

Seventeen-year-old Ismae escapes from the brutality of an arranged marriage into the sanctuary of the convent of St. Mortain, where the sisters still serve the gods of old. Here she learns that the god of Death Himself has blessed her with dangerous gifts—and a violent destiny. If she chooses to stay at the convent, she will be trained as an assassin and serve as a handmaiden to Death. To claim her new life, she must destroy the lives of others. Ismae's most important assignment takes her straight into the high court of Brittany—where she finds herself woefully under prepared—not only for the deadly games of intrigue and treason, but for the impossible choices she must make. For how can she deliver Death’s vengeance upon a target who, against her will, has stolen her heart?

Blurb: An adult book in YA clothing. Disappointing.

Review: I'm afraid to say I didn't like this book. I posted the following review on Amazon, and (as Amazonites are wont to do) have recieved some... interesting criticisms. But I'm going to post the same review here and y'all can judge for yourself.

Okay, I stayed up late to finish this just because I wanted to write down my thoughts while they were still fresh. To keep it fairly simple, I'm just going to make a list of why I gave this book 2.5 flowers:

1. This does not read like a typical YA book. This reads like an adult book with a MC who is 17. But because it takes place in medieval France, she is a MEDIEVAL 17, which feels more like 30. There's a LOT of talk of sex, harlots, abusive men, etc. And the book culminates in a sexual act. Plus, it just reads like an adult book.

2. SO. MUCH. POLITICS. Here I was thinking I was going to read a book about a kick-butt female assassin, and what I got was about 400 pages of trying to remember which barons were the good guys and who were the bad guys. Listening to councils jibber jabber about who the 12-year-old duchess should marry, blah blah blah. All the while our assassin friend wasn't doing very much assassin-ing.

3. Ismae was a little flip-floppy. This may just be because I'm a love-skeptic, but she's spent her WHOLE LIFE fearing men and thinking that all men are evil, and after just a few weeks being SURROUNDED by men (many of which want to rape her) she falls in love with more than one. Granted, those she falls in love with (not all romantically) are really great men, but it just seemed a little strange that she would be so willing to become buddies with them. I'm not really a "feminist" but I do like characters to stand strong in their beliefs, or at least give me REALLY good reasons why their beliefs change (Sidenote: this was demonstrated very well in this book's religious beliefs. I loved Ismae's internal struggles with right and wrong.).

4. The world confused me. I personally don't like it when books have just enough stuff that is real that I can't tell what's fake. I'm not an expert on medieval France, so I didn't know which parts of this book were coming out of LaFevers' brain, and which parts were real. This is a minor thing, but still bugged me.

#3 and #4 are more secondary concerns. They were at the back of my mind as a read, but not huge factors. What was HUGE was #1 and #2. #1 made me dislike the book just because there is a REASON I dislike adult books. I read YA on purpose. And #2 bothered me because it made the story SO SLOW. And I've never been interested in political intrigue books. The only time that kind of thing has been able to keep me interested is in books like the Attolia books (and those are a lot shorter and less dense than Grave Mercy, and the characters were more interesting) and the Trickster's Choice series (which has a LOT more going on than just political intrigue, even though PI is the main plot).

I really WANTED to like this book, but I just couldn't. I wish I had read it with lower expectations, then I probably wouldn't have been so dissatisfied.

Other Reviews:

• Emily's Reading Room (4.5 Stars)
• Reading Teen (5 Stars)
• Janina (2/2.5 Stars)

*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: February 28th, 2012
Genre:  Dystopia, Romance
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 375
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

I’m pushing aside the memory of my nightmare,
pushing aside thoughts of Alex,
pushing aside thoughts of Hana and my old school,
push,
push,
push,
like Raven taught me to do.
The old life is dead.
But the old Lena is dead too.
I buried her.
I left her beyond a fence,
behind a wall of smoke and flame.

Blurb: Hard to follow and connect to, Pandemonium falls far short of the bar set by Delirium.

Review: I spent a lot of time debating whether to give this book 3 or 2.5 stars. There were so many things that bothered me. I loved Delirium, and I don't think this one is just suffering from "second-book syndrome." It's more than that. I just honestly didn't like it.

For one thing, each chapter changes flips back and forth six months. This made it pretty impossible for me to connect to the story. Every time I started to feel for the characters in one timeline, I'd be pushed into another and it just frustrated me. I think that if this story had been linear, I would have liked it A LOT more. I feel like she was trying to put two separate books into one, and she didn't need to.

Next was the "love" part of the story. This series is based on the idea of love being a disease, so you know somebody's going to fall in love. I won't tell you who for risks of spoilers. But I will tell you that their "falling in love" seemed trite, rushed, and was clearly just something to create tension that didn't really need to be there. I didn't understand why the girl was falling in love with this guy, and vice versa. It was a very... hormonal love, I think. Desperate, almost. Blah.

And there's a "twist" at the end that I totally saw coming, even though as I read the book I kept saying "no. Please no. Not that." Because it was CHEAP! I found myself saying "Oh puh-lease!" I had hoped this series would be more original than that. Not to say that it won't cause some interesting conflict in book 3, but I would have been MORE interested to see how the author had moved on WITHOUT this choice.

And just as a side note, these characters don't know the following words: poop, crap, dung, feces, droppings, excrement, etc. The only word they know is s***. And that drove me nutso. And there was one (maybe two) f-bombs.

So all-in-all, not much love. Definitely fell short of Delirium. Will I read the third one? No. This book kind of killed any love I had for the characters.



*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: September 12th, 2011
Genre:  Contemporary, Thriller
Publisher: Harcourt
Pages: 256
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click Here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary: 

Willa is lucky: She has a loving blended family that gets along. Not all families are so fortunate. But when a bloody crime takes place hundreds of miles away, it has an explosive effect on Willa’s peaceful life. The estranged father she hardly remembers has murdered his new wife and children, and is headed east toward Willa and her mother.

Under police protection, Willa discovers that her mother has harbored secrets that are threatening to boil over. Has everything Willa believed about herself been a lie? As Willa sets out to untangle the mysteries of her past, she keeps her own secret—one that has the potential to tear her family apart.

Blurb: Haunting and heartrending, Blood Wounds will keep you thinking long after you turn the last page.

Review: Reading this book I was reminded of why I don't read contemporary fiction. I just don't understand it. That's why I gave this book 2.5 stars, because I had no idea what to give it and figured smack in the middle made sense.

The book was a little disappointing in that the main conflict is solved very quickly, and the rest of the book is all about the characters and their relationships and emotions. This book is certainly emotional. So many different thoughts and feelings flying here and there. Lies uncovered, relationships found and lost, and so many SAD people. So depressing. My mom read it as well, and we talked about it for a while after reading it. There was plenty to discuss.

However, one thing we both agreed on is... well... there didn't really seem to be a point. I finished the book and thought "Okay. What was I supposed to take away from that?"

THAT is almost 100% the reason I don't read contemporary fiction. In fantasy, I am more than happy to finish a book and just say "that was a good story." But for some reason, contemporary fiction makes me feel like there needs to be some kind of message in the book. Some purpose in me reading it. (I know not everyone feels this way. That's my issue) But I couldn't find the purpose for this one.

The book ended after showing us how messed up all these people are, and by the end they still seemed pretty messed up. Yes, there was a bit of healing going on, but not enough to make me feel hopeful.

All in all I kind of felt like this was a non-story because all it did was make me feel sad. I didn't feel sad for anyone or about anything. I just felt sad. The sadness didn't make me want to tell my family I love them, or call up forgotten friends, it just depressed me. Kind of like the last two books of Pfeffer's Life as We Knew It series made me feel.

However, like I said, I am no one to judge contemporary fiction. So... take this review with a grain of salt.



*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: September 1st, 2011
Genre:  Post-apocalyptic, Romance
Publisher: Scholastic
Pages: 288
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click Here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary: 

The wars that followed The Collapse nearly destroyed civilization. Now, twenty years later, the world is faced with a choice—rebuild what was or make something new.

Stephen Quinn, a quiet and dutiful fifteen-year-old scavenger, travels Post-Collapse America with his Dad and stern ex-Marine Grandfather. They travel light. They keep to themselves. Nothing ever changes. But when his Grandfather passes suddenly and Stephen and his Dad decide to risk it all to save the lives of two strangers, Stephen's life is turned upside down. With his father terribly injured, Stephen is left alone to make his own choices for the first time.

Stephen’s choices lead him to Settler's Landing, a lost slice of the Pre-Collapse world where he encounters a seemingly benign world of barbecues, baseball games and days spent in a one-room schoolhouse. Distrustful of such tranquility, Stephen quickly falls in with Jenny Tan, the beautiful town outcast. As his relationship with Jenny grows it brings him into violent conflict with the leaders of Settler's Landing who are determined to remake the world they grew up in, no matter what the cost

Review: I feel bad that this was a tour book, and so I had to move it to the top of my TBR pile. I'm certainly not doing it any favors reading it so soon after Blood Red Road because it's too similar, and can't possibly hope to measure up.

To be completely honest, this book was... unmemorable. Already, just an hour after I've finished it, I can feel the storyline and characters seeping out of my brain. When I finished it I immediately thought "okay! What's next?" There was no reflection, no... anything. I was just done.

I think one of the reasons I felt this way is because I think this book is meant for younger readers. The main characters are 15 and 16, but I could see this as being a good book for those "almost teens." Kind of upper-middle grade. And middle grade is just not my thing.

Post-apocalypse and dystopia books are really blooming right now, and there are those that stand up above the rest (Blood Red Road) and there are those that fall in the cracks. This was the latter. A very simple, straight-forward story. With very simple, commonplace characters. If you've got a young teen or preteen that you'd like to introduce to the post-apocalypse genre, this would be a good one for them. If you're a veteran of these kind of books and are looking for something that'll knock your socks off, I'd skip this one.



*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: February 1st, 2011
Genre:  Supernatural, Paranormal, Romance
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Pages: 340
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click Here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

Riley Blackthorne just needs a chance to prove herself – and that’s exactly what the demons are counting on…

Seventeen-year-old Riley, the only daughter of legendary Demon Trapper, Paul Blackthorne, has always dreamed of following in her father's footsteps. The good news is, with human society seriously disrupted by economic upheaval and Lucifer increasing the number of demons in all major cities, Atlanta’s local Trappers’ Guild needs all the help they can get – even from a girl. When she’s not keeping up with her homework or trying to manage her growing crush on fellow apprentice, Simon, Riley’s out saving distressed citizens from foul-mouthed little devils – Grade One Hellspawn only, of course, per the strict rules of the Guild. Life’s about as normal as can be for the average demon-trapping teen.

But then a Grade Five Geo-Fiend crashes Riley’s routine assignment at a library, jeopardizing her life and her chosen livelihood. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, sudden tragedy strikes the Trappers’ Guild, spinning Riley down a more dangerous path than she ever could have imagined. As her whole world crashes down around her, who can Riley trust with her heart – and her life?

Review: This book is a GREAT story. I know many of you struggle with "demon" books and such because of religion. I am a very religious person, however, when I read books like this I don't see the "demons" as actual demons. I just see them as any other paranormal creature. And in this regard the story was awesome. It was original, gripping, and well written.

The romance in the book bugged me (I just had a hard time connecting with the love interests), but it wasn't at the forefront of the story. This story was about Riley and the things she went through, and that included her relationships, but was not dominated by it.

I also really wished that MORE had happened. I felt that this book didn't cover a lot of ground. I wanted more excitement, more big reveals! What I got was a lot of exposition.

If I was rating the book on story alone, I probably would have given it 4.5 stars. I'm sure that the next books in the series will cover all the things I felt lacked in this book. Unfortunately, I will not be reading the rest of the series.

Even taking the demon's out of the equation, The Demon Trapper's Daughter was a very harsh read. I was worried about this before reading so I asked some people how severe the profanity was, and was told by numerous people that it wasn't very bad. This is always a dangerous question, because I know profanity doesn't bother most people like it bugs me. There was a lot of profanity in this book. Just about every curse-word you can think of (frequent uses of the f* word). However, I continued to read it because the MC herself actually had a fairy clean vocabulary. Unfortunately, only about 70% of the book is told from her point of view. And nearly all people she interacts with are very crass. This is what brought my rating down to 2.5 flowers.

And so, the awesome story and main character was enough to make me finish this book, but the profanity was just too intense for me to read the rest of the series. I hope someone I know will read them, though, so that I can ask them what happens.

If profanity/demons don't bug you, then you should read this. It's a purty good story.

Apologies for two negative reviews in a row. tomorrow I'll be posting an UBER-positive review! So look forward to it!



*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: December 28th, 2010
Genre:  Sci-fi, Romance, Dystopia, Fantasy
Publisher: Candlewick
Pages: 450
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click Here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Series: Incarceron #2 (Review of #1)
Summary(Slight spoilers, highlight to view): 

The only one who escaped . . . And the one who could destroy them all.


Incarceron, the living prison, has lost one of its inmates to the outside world: Finn’s escaped, only to find that Outside is not at all what he expected. Used to the technologically advanced, if violently harsh, conditions of the prison, Finn is now forced to obey the rules of Protocol, which require all people to live without technology. To Finn, Outside is just a prison of another kind, especially when Claudia, the daughter of the prison’s warden, declares Finn the lost heir to the throne. When another claimant emerges, both Finn’s and Claudia’s very lives hang on Finn convincing the Court of something that even he doesn’t fully believe.


Meanwhile, Finn’s oathbrother Keiro and his friend Attia are still trapped inside Incarceron. They are searching for a magical glove, which legend says Sapphique used to escape. To find it, they must battle the prison itself, because Incarceron wants the glove too.

Review: This series is weird. If I had to review this book in one word, that would be it: weird. Just like the first one there is a ton of things that aren't really explained. And I don't understand the prison AT ALL. But... maybe you aren't supposed to?

If you liked the first one, you will like this one. If you didn't like the first one, I would recommend you not read this because it's really confusing.

My biggest question: is this the last book in the series? Because the ending of this book didn't make ANY sense to me at all, but it seemed very... end-ish. However, I thought this was going to be a trilogy. Thoughts?

Sorry for the lame-o review. It's finals week.


*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: December 2nd, 2010
Genre:  Romance, Teenagers, Foreign
Publisher: Dutton
Pages: 374
Rating:
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary: 

Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris—until she meets Étienne St. Claire: perfect, Parisian (and English and American, which makes for a swoon-worthy accent), and utterly irresistible. The only problem is that he's taken, and Anna might be, too, if anything comes of her almost-relationship back home.

As winter melts into spring, will a year of romantic near-misses end with the French kiss Anna—and readers—have long awaited?

Review: I can totally see why this book is so popular, and I have absolutely no doubt that its popularity will continue to skyrocket after its release. Stephanie has created a story that has just the right amount of romance, friendship, conflict, tension, and above all it is witty. Stephanie is DEFINITELY someone I would want to be my friend. I like the way her brain workd

However, I would not want to be friends with her characters.

If you like contemporary fiction or romance, then you will LOVE this book. I don't like either of those genres. I thought maybe this book would be witty enough to overcome my anti-teen-angst feelings, but it wasn't. The characters drink (even though it's legal drinking), swear (some BIG profanities), and there is much talk of sex.

So all in all I gave this an average rating of 2.5 because I recognize that it is a brilliant story, but it just wasn't for me.

Although I did LOVE all the French things. J'adore francais!


I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase

Release Date: August 3rd, 2010
Genre: Romance/Supernatural/Paranormal
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Pages: 310
Series: Vampire Queen #1
Rating:
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary: 

Lenah Beaudonte is, in many ways, your average teen: the new girl at Wickham Boarding School, she struggles to fit in enough to survive and stand out enough to catch the eye of the golden-boy lacrosse captain. But Lenah also just happens to be a recovering five-hundred-year-old vampire queen. After centuries of terrorizing Europe, Lenah is able to realize the dream all vampires have -- to be human again. After performing a dangerous ritual to restore her humanity, Lenah entered a century-long hibernation, leaving behind the wicked coven she ruled over and the eternal love who has helped grant her deep-seated wish.

Until, that is, Lenah draws her first natural breath in centuries at Wickham and rediscovers a human life that bears little resemblance to the one she had known. As if suddenly becoming a teenager weren’t stressful enough, each passing hour brings Lenah closer to the moment when her abandoned coven will open the crypt where she should be sleeping and find her gone. As her borrowed days slip by, Lenah resolves to live her newfound life as fully as she can. But, to do so, she must answer ominous questions: Can an ex-vampire survive in an alien time and place? What can Lenah do to protect her new friends from the bloodthirsty menace about to descend upon them? And how is she ever going to pass her biology midterm?

Review: This book received a 2.5 flower rating because I absolutely LOVED parts of it, and absolutely DIDN’T love parts of it. I will break my review into these two groups:

Things I Loved

The vampirism! It wasn’t something to be desired at all. In many vampire books, the vampires bemoan the fact that they are soulless monsters, surviving only through murder of innocents, and yet it’s glorified. In Infinite Days Maizel was very good at describing how being a vampire affects your emotional state. Vampires are very tortured creatures. I also love how she described that they couldn’t feel anything. The dead nerve endings? Very cool.

The ritual. Being turned from a vampire into a human?! What?! I’ve never heard of such a thing. The opposite, yes, but not this. How original.

The coven. I loved the history behind Lenah’s coven. Where they came from, why she chose them, etc.

Things I DIDN’T love

The romance. Honestly, as I watched Lenah slowly fall in love with the character she eventually ends up with I kept thinking “He’s gonna turn out to be evil. He’s go to.” Why was I thinking that? Because I HATED him. I honestly thought it was a joke. He wasn’t appealing to me at all. Blah. And the guy she left behind? I actually did like him. Made me very irked. Oh. And there's a sex scene. SUPER vague. But still, teenage sex. Blah.

The pacing. I kept expecting exciting things to happen. Certainly NOW she’ll have to fight for her life. No? Just dissect a frog? Oh… well, maybe in the next chapter… nope. She’s just going snorkeling. This was another one of those books that tricked me into believeing it was a paranormal story, when really it was just a romance story with a paranormal sub genre (for more information on how I feel about this, see rant).

The magic. I initially thought the magic was really cool, and then I noticed some inconsistencies that really bothered me.

The ending. BLAH! I really disliked the ending. It seemed rushed, confused, and illogical. And what REALLY irked me was that it was a cliffhanger ending, but the first chapter of the second book was included and it RUINED THE CLIFFHANGER! I shouldn’t have read it. If you’re going to end with a cliffhanger (I should mention that I loved the last line) don’t give it away on the next page! Especially since the next book doesn’t come out until 2011!

Anyway. There you go. My rather long review of Infinite Days

Release Date: November 2nd, 2010
Genre: Mystery/Sci-fi
Pages: 456 (ARC) Rumored 304 final copy
Rating:

Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

Tory Brennan, niece of acclaimed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan (of the Bones novels and hit TV show), is the leader of a ragtag band of teenage "sci-philes" who live on a secluded island off the coast of South Carolina. When the group rescues a dog caged for medical testing on a nearby island, they are exposed to an experimental strain of canine parvovirus that changes their lives forever.

As the friends discover their heightened senses and animal-quick reflexes, they must combine their scientific curiosity with their newfound physical gifts to solve a cold-case murder that has suddenly become very hot if they can stay alive long enough to catch the killer's scent.

Fortunately, they are now more than friends they're a pack. They are Virals

Review: This summary is deceiving. The ARC version of this book is 456 pages long. Nearly 500 pages! And the "viral" part of the book doesn't kick in until about 300 pages. For the first 300 pages, it's just a bunch of kids being detectives in your typical "the kids are right, but the adults don't listen" kind of story. Now, GoodReads and Amazon say that the final version is going to be 302-304 pages long. Dunno how they're gonna manage that. Bigger pages?

Anyway, don't get your hopes up for this book in terms of sci-fi. It was there, but not until over half-way through the book, and it was a stretch.

In short, this book was a weird combination of Nancy Drew, the Animorphs, and Scooby Doo.

My biggest problem with this book is that I could clearly tell this was an adult author struggling to find out how to write for a YA audience. Personally, I believe that YA books are/should be written just like adult books, except they have younger characters. There's no need to dumb down the writing style for teens. We get it. Honestly. The mature themes and profanity should be less extreme than most adult books, but most of this comes just from the younger age of the character.

Reichs did the exact opposite. She really dumbed down the writing style (so... much... repetition... and... dramatic... punctuation...) and left in quite a bit of profanity. I could tell she was a really good writer, but a YA editor just needed to set her straight. It read like MG, but had profanity like an upper YA.

All in all, disappointing. I had such high hopes.

Release Date: June 22th, 2010
Pages: 256
Genre: Dystopian/Feminism (or maybe anti-feminism?)
Rating:

Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

Sometime in the future, a lonely, windswept island is populated solely by women. Among these women is a group of teenaged Trackers—expert equestrians and archers—whose job is to protect their shores from the enemy. The enemy, they’ve been told, is men. When these girls come upon a partially buried home from the distant past, they are fascinated by the strange objects—high-heeled shoes, teen magazines, make-up—found there. What are they to make of these mysterious things? And what does it mean for their strict society where friendship is forbidden and rules must be obeyed—at all costs?

Review: I didn't really like this book. I think the reason I didn't like it is that the summary made me think that it was going to be about these really cool amazon women. Instead, it was about these teenage girls who were raised to be emotionless warriors, but ended up becoming teenage girls.

And I didn't really understand the main character. What were her motives? Did she redeem herself in the end? Did she need redeeming? I dunno. Lots of unanswered questions and confusing things.

So, just go in knowing that the summary is a little decieving. I think I would have liked this more if I hadn't read the summary.