Review: Reboot by Amy Tintera

Reboot

by Amy Tintera

Publication Date: May 7^th 2013

Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Bought

Find This Book: Reboot

Rating: 3/5

           

            I’ve owned this book for awhile, I actually don’t remember when I bought it, and I finally got around to reading it the past week! I’ve got to admit, I originally bought it for the aesthetic of the cover- it’s so cool. Besides, a book about a badass girl and a hopeless boy? Yes, please.

            SO. Reboot is about a girl named Wren who died, and 178 minutes later she woke up. When you die and come back you’re no longer human, and no you’re also not a zombie. You ‘Reboot’. You become stronger, faster, able to heal, and become less emotional. The longer it takes a person to Reboot, the less human they are. Our main character is the deadliest Reboot in the known universe (though it does only take place in a couple locations in Texas in some sort of post-apocalyptic world). She trains the newbies to be tough like her, except when she’s training a boy who’d only been dead for 22 minutes; her task is more than a little difficult. Our novel is a gripping story about friendship, love, and freedom and since it doesn’t end in a cliffhanger I’m not that interested in reading the sequel.

            178 and 22 have an interesting relationship. Callum is sweet and human-like, and honestly reminds me of one of my own relationships. It takes awhile but that cutie wins Wren’s affections and they decide to escape their government holding cells when she is ordered to exterminate the troublesome 22! I’d say their relationship was pretty well-written and adorable. It has a happy ending which was a pleasant surprise. Too many books that I’ve read recently have ended either bitter-sweet or full on tragedy so this was a nice change-up. Like I said before, the story ends on a pleasant note, not a huge cliffhanger or anything so I’m kind of content where the story is right now and might not read the sequel… 

            I don’t particularly have anything to nitpick at, there’s nothing that I disliked about this book and would totally recommend it to anyone interested! At the same time it was a bit underwhelming. The concept of Reboots is interesting and I think it could have been explored a bit more in this first book with some more background details. Specifically, What happened to the rest of the world? What is bringing these people back to life? Why is it that kids adapt better to being Reboots; does the government kill every adult Reboot? The book didn’t make me passionate by reading it, which is why I feel pretty “meh” about the book as a whole.

Review: The Sword of Summer by Rick Riordan

The Sword of Summer (Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard #1)

by Rick Riordan

Publication Date: Oct 6^th 2015

Publisher: Disney Hyperion Books
Source: Bought

Find This Book: The Sword of Summer

Rating: 5/5

I preordered this book the second it was available and was sitting as patiently as possible to await it’s arrival. Let me just say this- I was not disappointed! While I’m not sure if it reaches Percy Jackson/Heroes of Olympus standards, it was just as good, if not better than the Kane Chronicles. This book brings together a homeless boy in Boston, a deaf elf, an unappreciated dwarf who’s trade is bulletproof ascots, and a strong, empowering woman of color. None of these characters felt stereotyped and each brought something new and fresh to the story. Thank you Uncle Rick for bringing together some diversity here! Each of the characters had their own depth and backstory and while we got a satisfactory summation of each, I hope that that’s something Riordan will dive deeper into in future books.

For those of you that may have been wondering, Riordan pours on the sass and wit in this wonderful volume of Norse Mythology. There are many jokes for long-term fans of Riordan as well as just genuinely funny remarks. It’s similar to his old series, but at the same time The Sword of Summer is distinctly different. They travel to some of the different realms, encounter a squirrel, and have a very intense deep sea fishing expedition! In Midgard the world is set in Boston which was pretty cool. Knowing a bit about Boston drivers from living there myself it was also amusing to see this city from Magnus’s perspective. Additionally, we get to see Annabeth in the book momentarily and Magnus clearly doesn’t appreciate how much of a badass she is: yet.

Ok so general plot: Magnus is destined to pull his Father’s old weapon The Sword of Summer out of an old Norse shipwreck here in Boston and this basically triggers Ragnarok because that sword has been missing for centuries and it’s needed to cut Fenris Wolf free to start the apocalypse. For a unique twist, Magnus our main character gets killed in the first chapter. We then proceed to delve into Norse myth along with Magnus, which I thought was great because I don’t know them was well as I know Greek Myths. As usual the whole story flowed well and this is just another huge Riordan masterpiece. 

I would definitely recommend this to Riordan Fans, fans of Norse mythology, or anyone looking for characters other than strong hero-type hetero-normative white males! Not even Magnus truly fits that stereotype and it was just pure amazingness.

Kid's Lit Quiz

Fun Fact, I volunteer with the Kid’s Lit Quiz which is an international reading competition created by Dr. Wayne Mills. This year his World Final was being held in America and he had a bunch of authors invited who I had the pleasure of meeting. The one that stood out the most would be one of my childhood favorite author’s: Ron Roy, who wrote the A to Z Mysteries! To explain a little, Dr. Mills was a professor at the University of Auckland who couldn’t help but notice that kids didn’t get rewarded for reading like they did for sports. This led him to create a local Quiz, which is basically fun trivia about a number of children/young adult books. This quickly spread to heats in all of New Zealand with winners from different sections then competing in the final. Soon Australia, England, then to all of the UK, South Africa, Canada, and most recently Connecticut, USA and Singapore all joined the competition with winners in each country being invited to the World Final.

I became involved 3 years ago when Wayne first started quizzing in Connecticut to find his American finalists. The World Finals were to be held in New Zealand in July of 2012 and I hitched a ride with the winning American team and their coaches (who just happened to be from my old elementary school and the head coach just happened to be my 2^nd grade teacher). That year there were teams from New Zealand, Australia, Scotland (who represented all of the U.K.), South Africa, Canada, and the first ever U.S. team. It was such a blast watching all of the kids interact with each other, forming friendships and getting rewarded for reading! The teams are together for a week in the host country with the competition on Wednesday and fun activities in between.

This year, the World Finals are being held at Central Connecticut State University and we’ve taken the kids on plenty of cool trips. For the majority of them it is their first time in America and it was really funny to see them all react to a yellow school bus with no seatbelts. They were taking pictures with it like it was the Statue of Liberty! (They were also shocked with how high the back of the bus is ejected out of their seats every time they went over a bump). Visiting the Mark Twain house, Mystic Aquarium, and New York City is just the start of their trip. Just this Wednesday New Zealand won the trophy with South Africa coming in Second and America in Third. The night of the competition, it’s tradition to hold the International Dinner where the students, coaches, parents who came, coordinators, and guests get all mixed up and talk to people from other countries. I was sitting with on of the New Zealand girl’s mothers, the Coordinator for all of Canada (who will be hosting the World Finals in 2 years), an Illustrator, the aunt of one of the South African girls, and the grandmother and adorable little sister of one of the Canadian boys. They all had quite interesting and different stories to tell and it was absolutely great meeting all of them!

The week isn’t quite over yet. At the very least we have a Rock Cats game to attend this afternoon and I’m just so glad I met Wayne all those years ago and that I still get to be involved! (I was actually the person running the scoreboard on Wednesday). Even though there will be more space between me and the World Final next summer, (with college expenses I don’t think I’ll be able to fly all the way to New Zealand again) I know these are relationships that will last a long time and I look forward to when Wayne visits again for the U.S. heats and the Canadian World Final!

So that’s what I’ve been up to recently and why I’ve not been so active. Even though I’m a small fry college student, I’ve been spending a lot of time helping this all go smoothly :) For any of you interested in learning more here's a link to a demo quiz: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjf4MS30qJo and here's a link to the Kid's Lit Quiz Website 

Quizmaster Dr. Wayne Mills

Review: The Ring of Solomon (Bartimaeus 0.5) by Jonathan Stroud

The Ring of Solomon (Bartimaeus 0.5)

by Jonathan Stroud

Publication Date: November 2^nd 2010

Publisher: Hyperion
Source: Bought

Find This Book: The Ring of Solomon

Rating: 5/5

I read The Amulet of Samarkand years ago and absolutely loved how witty Bartimaeus was. The original trilogy is one of my most beloved book series and I was so excited to buy the prequel! (I was also pretty excited because I got to meet Jonathan Stroud and had him sign this book and The Screaming Staircase for me). I remember driving home from the book tour just over a year ago and imagining all the adventures I would have with Bartimaeus like it was just yesterday. Unfortunately, getting a signed copy meant it became my most treasured possession and I never wanted to take it to the beach or to the pool in case someone ruined it (thise locations are where I do the majority of my reading). That being said, it took me a very long time to start this book because I wouldn’t let it leave my room. That being said, I can’t believe it took song long for me to read this book!

This novel immediately brought to the forefront of my mind everything I had loved about the original series. Those characteristics being the magic and demons, historical references, and humanly flawed characters. You don’t need to read the series to enjoy this spectacular book, however the world-building was done in the original trilogy so Stroud doesn’t explain about the demon summoning and pentacles much in this prequel. What you find instead is a snarky character telling about his fast-paced adventure in 250 B.C. Jerusalem with his additional commentary in the footnotes. While is does switch to a human perspective occasionally, Asmira was quite interesting unlike Nathaniel and Kitty in the originals. Asmira is a hereditary guard for the Queen of Sheba and is sent to Jerusalem to assassinate King Solomon in order to try and save her country from an invasion from Solomon’s army. Being sent on basically a suicide mission, she is being used just as much as the djinni being summoned around her. While she refuses to acknowledge this fact, Bartimaeus and Asmira are a bit similar in that regard and the book brings up a thought provoking perspective on philosophy and psychological slavery. Not so bad for the typically shallow YA book, right? 

While the reader knows that Bartimeaus can’t meet a gruesome end due to the fact that he is alive and well during Victorian England, the book was detailed and suspenseful enough to make me forget about those other books. While this wasn’t the prequel I wanted (I was looking forward to a book about Bartimeaus’s time with Ptolemy) this not only met all of my high expectations, but also went even further. 250 B.C. was a great setting and the book seemed well researched. To sum up; the plot was quite simple overall, it was your typical “girl meets boy who is actually a shape-shifting djinni who is in servitude to an evil magician who is one of the 19 powerful magicians who works for the King of Solomon who said girl is trying to assassinate to steal the most powerful object EVER”. Did I forget to mention the hippo wearing a skirt? This is definitely a book that everyone would look into if they enjoy humor, sass and a bit of history!

Throwback to my Selfie with Jonathan Stroud (2013)

Top Ten Tuesday #3

Hosted by The Broke and The Bookish 

Top Seven Characters I'd Like To Check In With

1.   Harry Potter

I know we got the little epilogue but I would just love to check in and have a story about his life, working his cool job, parenting his kids, social gatherings with the family, getting letters home from Hogwarts, maybe a class Reunion?

2.  Percabeth

I would love, Love, LOVE to read more about Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase. When do they stop questing? I doubt there’s any more “save the world” types of quests but just going out and saving some mortals from monsters? What about college and settling down, does New Rome work out for them? How often do they visit Grover and Camp Half-Blood? How do they help out the Kane’s in the couple of mashups if they’re across the country? Do they have kids in the future? They are my OTP of OTP’s. I grew up with them and I could read about their lives forever.

3.   Eragon

I finished The Inheritance Cycle about four years ago, right when the final book was released and let me tell you, it has been disappointing not to hear a peep from Christopher Paolini since. He actually said that he will return to Eragon’s world at some point and I would really appreciate that being soon. Angela and the werecat were awesome and I would adore a back story. Plus Eragon just went off into the dessert to train dragons and riders, how’s that working out for him? His relationship with Arya? It really pisses me off that they both admitted they loved each other as Eragon left Alagaësia to never return. I just really need a check up on Eragon and Arya, alright?

4.   June Iparis

Champion by Marie Lu was a roller coaster of emotions for me. Very rarely to books make me cry but that one had me bawling. When Day looses his memory and she took that as a sign to let him go, to not see the pain of the loss of his mother and brother every time he looks at her- that practically killed me inside. I thought that would be the end of the book but thank god for epilogues. They got a cutsie ‘strangers meeting on the street’ moment and got together anyways. So since they do in fact become a thing, I want to know what’s going on in their love lives. Plus I’m curious as to whether America becomes a first world country again.

5.  Bartimaeus

I am currently reading The Ring of Solomon (0.5) by Jonathan Stroud, but it’s a prequel (and not even the story I was most looking forward to). What I really need is a check up with Bart to see how he’s doing after Nathan. Does he get to live in peace for a while? Does another magician summon him? I just really need another dose of his sass, pronto.

6.  The Gaang

Avatar: The Last Airbender was my childhood (the cartoon and the graphic novel) and while they are currently releasing new graphic novels they just can’t come out quick enough. We’ve seen the Gaang as teens and we’ve seen them elderly/old in Legend of Korra, but I just really need a late 20’s check in and a reasing the family check in. Especially with Zuko. I’m assuming her marries Mai? But I would like canon confirmation.

7.  Hana Silna

Hana is from a lesser known series, The Riddle of Prague by debut author Laura DeBruce. Yes, I would like to know what happened after book one, but now I’m just starting to be generally concerned for the series. Book 2, The Temple of Paris, was scheduled for release the summer of 2014, with it’s cover released and everything. Then it was pushed back to the fall of 2014. However, it’s April 2015 and the book is still not out?? I would sincerely like a check in with not only Hana, but with the series and the author.