Book Review: The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

Now reviewing...The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

I decided to give this book 4 stars!!

This was an awesome book! The story is very original (unless apparently you have read The Host by Stephanie Meyers, which I haven't...so I thought it was neat!) and the characters are interesting! Here is a blurb about the the book:

"After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it's the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth's last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie's only hope for rescuing her brother--or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up."

Sounds interesting, right? I thought so! Through my "bookstagram", I had heard so many good things about this book and many people seemed to genuinely enjoy it so I thought I would give it a shot. Most of my opinions on this book are good, with only one or two things I didn't enjoy. I would definitely suggest this book to anyone who likes supernatural, YA books! Without further adieu, what I did and didn't like about this book.


SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!

Things I did like:

I really liked Cassie, the main character. You might be thinking, "Oh, Cassie for Cassandra" but as stated in the book, it is "Cassie for Cassieopia." I thought that Cassie was a very strong character and had a very unique train of thought in regards to other characters I have read about in other YA novels. Even when she is faced with hardship, she pushes through and does what needs to be done which is very admirable. Aside from her, I also like Evan and Ben. First, let's talk about Evan Walker. He seems like a very genuine guy and legitimately seems to care for Cassie. I was a little confused about him at first, but then I thought, "Well, he must just be kind of weird." Then we find out that he is a SILENCER. WHAT?! I am not going to downplay this any, but I was seriously sad when I thought that she was going to leave him and their relationship couldn't move forward since, you know, he is one of the aliens that invaded the Earth. However, she sees past that and then they work together to save her brother, Sammy. Seems like a happily ever after, except we have no idea what happened to Evan at the end of the book :,( Regardless of how the plot went, I liked the fact that Evan was trying to overcome his natural state because of love. I approve of him. Then there was Ben (Zombie). I know that he was brainwashed to be one of the bad guys, but I believe that he is really good at heart. Otherwise, he wouldn't have gone through all of the trouble to also go back and save Sammy (Nugget). At the end of the book, it seemed like maybe him and Cassie will have a potential romantic relationship in the future? Until I read The Infinite Sea, I won't know. Regardless, Ben is a good guy turned bad, then turned good again after his and Ringer's realization. Good for them.

Aside from the characters, I thought that the concept/plot was great and kept me wanting more! I cannot wait to begin TIS when I get it, hopefully sometime next week.

Things I didn't like:

Okay, so I have read plenty of books where the POV alternates between two characters. I have really come to enjoy that style of writing, it has definitely grown on me. This book was setup in a similar fashion, however, it was between more than just two characters. Here, we are looking at two main POV's and then two sub-POV's. Cassie and Ben are the biggest portions of the book, while Evan/Silencer and Sammy take up a small sliver of it. Don't get me wrong, I liked the style of bouncing between characters, however it drove me crazy that they were not labeled as to who it was. When I first started reading and finished the first section (Cassie) I moved on to the next one and it took me about 4 pages to realize that it was:

1. Not Cassie anymore

2. A male character with no name

Then, you don't find out this guys name until the end of his first section! It was super confusing for awhile which is the main reason I gave this book 4 stars. Even once you knew who the characters were, you would have to read a page or two usually to realize whose POV it was at that time since it didn't clearly state it at the beginning. All-in-all, I found the style good, but didn't like the lack of information on the character speaking.

Otherwise, I still really enjoyed this book and look forward to reading The Infinite Sea. I hope you found this review useful!


Happy reading! :)

Current Reading Update!

Hey Guys!

I am currently about 50% of the way through The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey! I hope to finish it soon, probably in the next couple days, so keep an eye out on the blog for my review of it!

Thanks!

-Julia :)

Book Review: Obsidian by Jennifer Armentrout

Now reviewing...Obsidian (Lux #1) by Jennifer Armentrout

I give Obsidian 4.5 stars. Now here's why.

For anyone who hasn't read any of the Lux series, it consists of five installments: Obsidian, Onyx, Opal, Origin, and Opposition. Technically, there is also a prequel, Shadows, but the main series is just those five books. Now, I have only read Obsidian so I cannot speak for the rest of the series, but WOW! I loved this book! It is a quick read but very entertaining! I haven't read the Vampire Diaries books, but I have watched all of the seasons of the show on the CW and I have to say that if you enjoy TVD, that you will most likely love this series! I definitely liked this first book anyways.

It begins with the average girl who is forced by her mother to move to a small city in West Virginia. She is a shy book lover (awesome girl in my opinion ;)) who tries to branch out and be friendly with the two kids that live next door. One, a girl named Dee and her brother, the gorgeous Daemon. It seems like something is up with them as Daemon comes off much less than friendly and seems to hate her form the minute they meet. Although her and Dee become instant friends, there are strange occurrences that begin to happen whenever Daemon and Dee are around which leaves Katy wondering what is up with them...

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Now I was just as confused as Katy was as to why everyone was so weird around her. I had my suspicions (vampires, werewolves, etc.) but didn't know exactly what it could be. As the story progressed, the circle of strange people increased which only made me more curious as to what they actually were! Of course, the one thing I didn't actually think of, ALIENS. Now, I have never read any books that had "aliens" because I always assume that it is some super strange sci-fi book that I will not like. However, the type of aliens in this book are not the typical aliens that we see in movies, so I found myself pleasantly surprised there! I like the originality of their race/powers as opposed to writing another story about vampires or other supernatural creatures. 

I also LOVE LOVE LOVE Katy and Daemon's relationship. At first, it seems that he is just a huge asshole (please excuse my language) and he doesn't want to be nice to Katy at all. However, as the truth unravels and Katy becomes aware of what he and the others are, she understands more of why he acted the way he did towards her. Now that everything is out in the open, they have a denial filled, sarcastic, snappy relationship with each other which I found hard to forget! Their blooming feelings are hard to avoid and I can see that he really seems to care about her. She just needs to come around now so they can live happily ever after, as human and alien :) Haha.

The one thing I didn't like is just how rude everyone is to Katy in the beginning when she has no idea why. I felt that everything that was said and done could have been written as "talking behind her back" as opposed to just being mean to the main character, but that is a minor downside compared to the rest of the book.

Anyways, I thought the book was very well written and had great characters that are hard to get away from! I will definitely be reading the rest of the series at some point, but first I need to get some other books on my shelf read before they start collecting dust!