Blur (Steven James)

When I first bought Blur, it was largely due to two factors. First, I couldn't remember ever reading a thriller, and the very name sounds appealing. Second, it seemed that Steven James had won all of the critics' hearts. "A thought-provoking and thrilling mystery" proclaimed the New York Journal of Books, while The Suspense Zone went as far as to say "(James' writing will) leave you breathless." Being the young, impressionable teen I was two months ago, I happily purchased Blur. Only recently did I realize that all of that praise was in fact directed at James' other books.

Blur was a series of ups and downs the whole way through, my mental rating system constantly torn between two and five stars. There was so much potential within those pages, and so many careless errors. It was frustrating.
 Momentarily, I'll be ripping the book apart, although it pains me to do so. Know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, and let's plunge into the darkness.

The first third of Blur was painful.

We open on a town hit by the tragic drowning of a Emily Jackson, an unremarkable girl in high school. Everyone believes that the death was accidental, including Daniel Byers, a senior at Emily's former school. However, this all changes when Daniel starts seeing things. Visions of Emily start appearing, which no one but Daniel can see. "Stay. Seek. Learn," she says to him. Find the truth. Not knowing what else to do, Daniel follows her instructions as his line between reality and fantasy begins to blur- and what he discovers will change his life forever.

That all sounds great until you start reading.

One of my main problems with Blur would have to be the characters. It's almost as if James, this being his debut YA novel, thought he could cut a few corners and get away with it. But no! We're on to you, James.

This lack of care is perhaps most notable in the main character, Daniel, as well as a poorly thought out bully named Ty. The problem with Daniel is that he's a character with virtually no flaws. He's a brave, confident, smart, caring, modest guy who also just so happens to be the quarterback of the football team and a math genius. As if this isn't bad enough, it's practically shoved down our throats within the first chapter or two through cliché encounters and clumsy writing.

Ty, on the other hand, is somehow even more stereotypical and one-dimensional. It's as if his only purpose is to show the reader how great Daniel is. Honestly, we first meet this guy when he's stuffing some poor younger kid into a locker, until Daniel strolls over and saves the day. It's all rather predictable, rather dry.

During that scene, Daniel reflects that bullies are cowards like to pick on the weak. This soon proves to be false, however, when Ty goes out of his way to attack the strongest and most popular kid in the school-Daniel. He goes so far as to lay a trap for Daniel late at night on a isolated road, during which he pulls a knife. What's Ty's problem, honestly!? Sure, Daniel is annoying as hell, but... some explanation, or perhaps cutting some scenes, would make Blur a much stronger work.

Thankfully, the other characters were a slight improvement. Daniel’s friend Kyle was actually somewhat interesting, and as were most of the underused females. It was the relationships between these characters that got me through the rough start.

Indeed, the first third of Blur was hands down the worst. This was largely an issue of pacing. During that time, we were just getting introduced to the characters and nothing too remarkable happened to them. The middle was a little faster paced, and then the book tried to make up for lost time in the last few chapters. This made for a great ending, but significantly reduced the chance a reader would make it that far.

The one thing that James did manage to flaunt was the plot. By no means was the story groundbreaking, or without it’s flaws. It merely did it's job of being engaging. The questions of why Daniel had these hallucinations and who or what killed Emily were ever present and intriguing and, as we drew closer to the answers, the entertainment factor improved tenfold.

I do hope that this, as well as what can be salvaged from the characters, are enough to get any readers through the first third of Blur. The next two parts are exponentially better, and I promise it’s worth it.

Overall, Blur had great potential. The characters could have easily been fascinating, the premise was promising, but it was sadly done rather sloppily at first. Thankfully, it got it's act together in the second half, and manages to hang on for a respectable 7/10 rating.

Thanks for reading,

-Mark

Finished the book, and want to talk about it more in-depth? A separate, discussion post will be up soon!

Oh no. There's another!

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (Douglas Adams)

Note:

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe is the second novel in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series. If you'd like to read my review for the original guide, click here. Enjoy!

     In my mind, there are four essential elements to a good novel. First, an engaging plot line to keep you wondering. Second, great characters to keep you invested. Third, a thought-provoking message or theme, and finally pure entertainment value. Frankly, both The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and The Restaurant at the End of the Universe fell miserably flat on three of those points- and aced the fourth.
      Let's get the worst bits over with first. The Restaurant at the End of the Universe has a plot which is at best patchy and at worst utterly meaningless. It's rather tough for me to sum up, in fact. You could say that we follow Zaphod Beeblebrox, ex-president of the galaxy, in his attempts to evade the intergalactic police while searching for information about his past. Even that vague plot line, however, is flawed. In truth Zaphod doesn't seem to care much about what happened before part of his brain was locked off, and nobody seems to give much thought to the police. Anticlimax follows anticlimax, and you begin to understand that the author wasn't too focused on making a legible plot. In truth, it's nothing but a farce designed to bring you from one joke to the next.
Even that seems like giving the plot too much credit. I'll tell you now, once you get into this book and realize that everything that happens will end up underwhelming and inconsequential you begin to wonder why you even care. As a result, you don't. 
      Another recurring problem from the last book is the flat, two-dimensional characters. Most of the comedy in The Restaurant at the end of the Universe stems from the characters being oblivious/stupid/repetitive, or simply not caring about anything that goes on around them. This works well for comedy, but it's infuriating for the reader looking for relatable or indeed likeable characters. There's no character development. No lessons are learned. Everyone in the book is so incredibly predictable that the reader doesn't care  about them, either.
     I believe that I said in my review of Will Grayson Will Grayson that the ultimate goal of fiction should be to somehow make the reader think more deeply about their own lives. One way that an author can do this is by inserting themes or morals into their story. Again, Douglas Adams fell tragically short in this regard. If there is a theme, which I somehow doubt, it's that "The world has gone mad." I didn't walk away from this book thinking any deep philosophical thoughts, let me tell you.
      As if that's not enough, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe committed two more heinous crimes to make me even more ticked at it. First, they introduced time travel. Second, they murdered my favourite character. 
      I don’t know about you, but I just can’t accept time travel in any universe. I simply cannot comprehend how anything can function with people zipping in and out of centuries and mucking about in them. In this case, time travel damaged a plot that was already about to keel over and die. 
      Worse, my favourite character died. As previously noted no characters in the book were particularly likeable, but the one who I did somewhat sympathize with died in a blazing explosion and shows no sign of coming back. To add insult to injury, the other characters continued their theme of never caring about anything and didn't even mention him/her after (s)he died. That really ticked me off, to say the least.
     Clearly, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe has some major issues. Shaky plot, shaky characters, no lesson learned. Three of my hastily made benchmarks for a good novel thrown down the drain.
Still, the fourth benchmark entertainment, and that's where The Restaurant at the End of the Universe found it's stride. It's a hilarious read, and while there were some slower moments, it kept me engaged almost throughout.
The best way to understand why would be to read the book. In light of the fact that your shaking your fist at me now because that's a cheap response, I'll save myself the trouble of trying to explain and instead bring some of the book to you.
Let me set the scene. Dim the lights, and transport yourself a couple billion years into the future and a couple million light years away. You're at an extremely fancy restaurant, filled with people. Above you there's a glass roof, showing you the universe in all its glory. You've come through time and space to be here at this moment; the moment when the universe finally, completely, and literally ends.
There's a stage in the centre of the restaurant, where a humanoid entertainer named Max is at this moment listing some of the distinguished guests to the restaurant that night.
“And thirdly,” he said, “thirdly a party of Young Conservatives from Sirius B, are they here?”
A party of smartly dressed dogs stopped throwing rolls at each other and started throwing rolls at the stage. They yapped and barked unintelligibly.
“Yes,” said Max, “well, this is all your fault, you realize that?"
Isn't that gold? In four sentences that bit conveys the tone of the novel. I feel as though there are dozens of satirical references in The Restaurant at the End of the Universe that go right over my head. That one I caught, and appreciated greatly.
In conclusion, the entire Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series has been a rather interesting journey thus far. It’s certainly not for everyone; I had to cast aside my views as to what makes a good book in order to not hate this one from the outset. You'll have to consciously swallow your doubts about the novel in order to keep it an enjoyable read. If you can lose yourself in the humour of it all, however, you'll find that it'll be worth your while.
7.5/10 stars.

Thanks for reading,

-Mark

Will Grayson, Will Grayson (John Green and David Levithan)

It's the same spiel every time I read a John Green book. I get onto this blog, tell you how amazing John Green and his books are, and then I tell you how great the last book of his I read was. Today, it's a little different; I'll be raving not only about John and his book, but about John's co-author David Levithan, as well.
For John, I've nearly run out of words to praise him with. If you want to learn about him, click here and here and here and here and here and even here or here. I'll let previous me and a few other sources do the talking about John Green, which lets me get onto David Levithan.
I don't know too much about Levithan, besides the fact that he's a popular writer among the teen folk. He's written at a prolific pace since 2003, producing twenty novels by my count in twelve years. Many of his books involve gay characters, and he's been credited for changing the stereotype of gay novels from focusing relentlessly on the trials of homosexual characters to viewing them as regular kids with who just so happen to be gay. I'll for sure try to pick up another of his books in the future, as if all of the novels he produces are similar to Will Grayson Will Grayson, then I'll have my reading cut out for me for months to come.
Will Grayson Will Grayson is interesting in that almost all aspects of physical plot are cut out. At it's heart, it's about people's relationships with one another. There is no grand road trip or search for someone à la Paper Towns, or struggle against disease as in The Fault In Our Stars, just people struggling to understand each other with the fat cut off. Sure, that fat is often used to convey a message more effectively or to make a book more entertaining, but for whatever reason I didn't feel it was needed in Will Grayson Will Grayson. There was little to go on but the characters, and this made the characters so much more interesting to the reader.
The two primary characters in the book are, wait for it, Will Grayson and Will Grayson. The first of those is a high school student who's two main rules in life are don't care too much and shut up. Most definitely a result of this, he has approximately two friends. The first is the possibly-gay Jane, for whom Will has... mixed feelings. The second is the extremely gay in both senses of the word Tiny, who provides the only real plot of the story by putting on a musical all about his life.
Will Grayson the second, on the other hand, is a depressed, angry, and scornful gay person. When it comes to friends, he has none who would stand by his side in the real world. He does, however, have Isaac. Isaac is a boy Will met online, and the only ray of light in Will's otherwise dark and gloomy life.
Of course, near the middle of the book, the two Will Grayson's meet, and they're lives start to change.
Did I say before that the lack of conventional plot allows for more focused exploration of the characters, which makes them much more interesting? I did? Well, I'm saying it again anyways. It cannot be stressed enough; Green and Levithan nailed their characters.
There's not a character in this book who doesn't have multiple sides of their personality revealed. Both Will's, of course, have opposite, more sensitive sides. Tiny is explored very deeply, just as much as the Will Graysons are. In exploring these characters, the reader starts to relate to them.
So much so in fact that I feel the entirety of myself is hidden in the characters. I'm a good part Tiny, with a fair helping of Will Grayson the first thrown in there. I'm a dash of Jane, and a sprinkle of the other Will Grayson.
With so many characters being so relatable, I could almost feel that I was learning the lessons they learned along with them. Through fiction, I thought more deeply about my own life, which I honestly think should be the objective of fictional writing. Rarely do I come across a book like this. 9/10 stars, easily.
The last thing I want to talk about before I go is the contrast between John Green on his own and David Levithan with John Green. I've read no other works by Levithan, but I did get a bit of a feel for him because of how he affected Green.
For one, the book gained a larger sense of realism then any of the other John Green books I've read. This is not only in the lack of an extraordinary event to set the ball rolling, but also in the characters. I've heard people say that John's characters speak too eloquently for their age, don't act quite how they should. A large amount of them, it's said, seem to be amateur philosophers. In Will Grayson Will Grayson there was still a bit of that, but it was noticeably toned down. You should note that I'm usually all for slightly unbelievable elements if it strengthens the story, but I did feel that the down-to-earth nature of Will Grayson Will Grayson was the best thing for it.
Also, the story was considerably darker then other Green novels. Looking for Alaska, Paper Towns, and An Abundance of Katherines are all generally cheery novels. Sure there are problems, sure the characters are often upset, but overall the story is one grand adventure. Even in The Fault in our Stars, it's a love story more then anything. They keep their chins up.
Not always so in Will Grayson Will Grayson. One of them, as I said, is depressed and angry. All of the characters are imperfect, while some are downright treacherous. It doesn't all work out in the end.
This, however, just leads to a more engaging plot which you can lose yourself in. This is a book that kept me up at night. This is a book that I forced myself to stop reading at times just so that I could savour it. This is a book that I recommend to everyone.
Let's see what John Green comes up with next.

Thanks for reading,

-Mark

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)

Everyone in the galaxy, it seems, has read The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Except me.
This Sci-Fi/Comedy novel would've never strayed into my hands had so many people not suggested it. Friends talked about it, teachers recommended it. Even YouTubers sand it's praises.
Had it not been for them, I probably never would've picked up The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. It's a sci-fi/comedy mashup, and I've never read much into either of those genres. More importantly, this book was in that terrible unknown of the bookstore... the "adult section."
Rarely have a strayed into those dark recesses of Chapters. Those sections which sell books the likes of which my parents read, where no grand adventures are had, no one dies nobly, and the theme is some broad criticism of society in general. Basically, they're boring as hell.
Still, to appease the masses I put aside my qualms and bought the first four books in the series all jammed into one package. My reading material for the next month thus cut out for me, I brought it home and promptly forgot about it for a few months.
Only a week or two ago did I finally rediscover it and read the first few chapters. Next thing you know, I'm hooked. I finished just a few days later. Let me tell you now, it's good. Give me a few more minutes of your time, and I'll try to explain why.
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy starts with a man named Arthur Dent's house being demolished. Shortly thereafter, the earth is as well, and Arthur finds himself flying along on an alien spaceship along with a friend from earth who just-so-happened to be from another planet. Calamity ensues.
Thats really the clearest way I can think to sum it all up. I'll be perfectly honest when I say that, in this first novel at least, there isn't any grand over aching plot, which in retrospect makes it seem like the book would be terrible. There's some setup for the next novel, but mostly the characters just do without an obvious purpose. Jokes are made. Adventures are had. Nothing connects.
There wasn't a cohesive story. There was never any pressing worry for more then a chapter or two at a time, never some desperate, universe-altering quest, and yet I was riveted. Why? Because the book was damn funny, that's why.
The best way I can think to describe the humour in the book is that it's Monty-Pythonesque with a hint of ASDF movie or Rejected. Basically, some clever satire with a whole lot of seemingly random stuff. And it's brilliant.
Let me give you a small example of just how random this all is; as it turns out, dolphins are actually much smarter then humans and escaped the planet just before it was destroyed. The only creatures on earth smarter then dolphins are mice, who, as it turns out, experiment on humans while letting us think that we experiment on them.
Weird. Off the wall. It's done in such a clever way, though, that you forgive the randomness, the forget the lack of any real plot, and you just laugh your way through the novel. Please do give this book a shot- it's well worth it. It's worth it just so you know what your friends are talking about when they slyly say "You know the meaning of life? 42."

Thanks for reading,

-Mark

Looking For Alaska

I'm in shock. I'm in absolute shock. I've read three novels by John Green, and loved them all. And then I read this one... and it's just as good.

Seriously, is this guy a human being, or is he just an incredibly awesome writing machine, gaurenteed to write bestsellers every time he puts down his pen?

The first thing that stands out in Looking for Alaska is the division of the book into two parts. The first few hundred pages of the book are in a section called "Before," with each chapter labeled as "X number of days before." Then, after the event that throws everything the characters in the book know of of whack occurs, we move into the "After" section of the novel.
As with many if not all of the John Green books, the story centres around one major tipping point in the plot that plays with the protagonists emotions and forces them to rethink the world. This happens once again in Looking for Alaska, when due to a certain event our protagonist's life is thrown into a tailspin.
God, not being able to spoil the book is frustrating!
This is why I think that the "Before" and "After" scheme is really quite clever as an interesting way to clearly mark the change in the protagonists worldview. However, I've lingered on a trifle when I should have been giving you the whole picture, so let's move on.
The overall plot of the book was interesting, the writing meaningful as always. To give you an extremly quick overview of said plot, the protagonist of the novel goes off to a school away from home to spend his year. There, he learns to let his wild side go free under the guidance of his new friends. He has his world most rocked, however, when he meets Alaska- a beautiful, wild, and free girl who throws both his life and his heart around with reckless abandon.
A compelling plot, to be sure. Dispite this, the plot was not what most stood out in this novel.
To me, the most powerful aspect of John's writing is his ability to create complex and three-dimensional characters. You begin to understand the people in his worlds. You find that you can relate to them, and that's what really makes John's writing shine.
This book explored that idea once again, with Alaska and the protagonist shining. This made for another great book, as I believe that John Green is at his best when he writes with his characters in mind as opposed to plot. Looking for Alaska, The Fault in our Stars, and Paper Towns were all focused intensely on the experiences of the characters, and all of those books were beyond wonderful. An Abundance of Katherines, while also a respectable book well worth a read, was less character driven- or really strongly driven at all, I wouldn't say- and so didn't quite stack up to the other three aforementioned books. Having said that, I really hope that I didn't previously post a review of that book stating the opposite. It's been too long since I've posted on this blog!
In the end you may rest assured, good reader, that Looking for Alaska is a great book. I mean, I just compared it to Paper Towns and The Fault in our Stars! What do you expect?
Make sure to give this book a try if you haven't already. If you don't like the book, call me up and I'll personally reimburse you. I have that much faith that you'll like it.
Until next time, thanks for reading.

-Mark

Inkheart

Inkheart holds a special place in my own heart.

Some of my earliest reading memories come from Inkheart. I have no idea how old I was when I first opened it's cover. All I do know is that when I picked it up once more a few weeks ago, I had nothing but a few wispy scraps of memory to go on.

I knew the basic premise of the series, which was that some guy named Mo could read things out of books, and that one day he'd gone and accidentally read out some villains. I knew that there was someone named Dustfinger who did stuff with fire, and I remembered a fairly important plot point about him and some kid that tagged along with him. I knew that there was a writer who got used to writing on parchment paper, which I believe was because he'd been transported to Inkheart land (although I'm pretty sure that we only get to see Inkheart land in the second or third book. I honestly can't remember). I remembered Dustfinger sneaking into someone's room, and I'm pretty sure that there's a castle later on in the series.

When I started reading this book for a second time, I didn't really have much to go on. The only other thing I remember about the book that I haven't listed already is that it was really good!

It was nice to be able to read a book, not knowing anything about it, but knowing that you liked it. It's like I forgot the ending to The Lord of the Rings movies, and then had the pleasure of rediscovering it. I almost found reading the book more relaxing that way.

For those of you who haven't read the book, let me give you a brief rundown. 

As I mentioned before, the premise behind the book is that a man named Mo has the ability to read characters out of their novels. Mo doesn't really understand this ability himself, or it's dangers- chief among them being that for every item he reads out of a story, something has to go into the story from his world. I'll leave out the fact that halfway through the book this inexplicably stops happening.

Anyways, Mo discovers this fact one night when he is reading out loud to his wife. Suddenly she is gone, along with his two cats, to be replaced by two evil villains from Inkheart as well as the character of Dustfinger. Capricorn and Basta, the villains, are driven away by Mo, leaving Dustfinger behind. Dustfinger, however, is immediately homesick and wishes he could be sent back into the world of Inkheart, something Mo does not know how to do. Eventually, Dustfinger simply leaves, and Mo is left in peace to raise his daughter Meggie. And so his life returns to a somewhat normal state. Then one night, Dustfinger shows up once more, still asking to be read back into his story. With the coming of Dustfinger danger arrives as well, and soon the villains from the story are attempting to hunt Mo and Meggie down. 

If Capricorn is able to find Mo, he'll attempt to use him, use him to bring from Inkheart an immortal monster known only as the Shadow. With the shadow by his side, Capricorn can take control of this world…

Inkheart has several things going for it. The author's love for literature shines through, with the characters often longing for a book to keep them company, as well as quotes from various works easing us into every chapter. The storyline is intriguing, the characters believable. This book isn't the kind of book that will keep you up reading all night, but it is a book that you want more of. One incredible thing about it? I cannot find a single thing blatantly wrong in this entire book. I am, however, upset, although not about anything in this book. I'm actually upset that there are more books in the series. 'But I thought you said that you loved the book!' I hear you say. True, true. Let me explain.

Predictably, by the end of this book everything is looking pretty good. The happiness levels of the main characters are generally on the happy side of the scale. Aside from a few loose ends necessary to justify a sequel, everything is wrapped up with a neat little bow, and the ending is satisfying. Unfortunately, the author couldn't leave it at that.

There are three books in this series, and from what little I remember of them and from what I've heard from my sisters, they are quite dark compared to the first book in the series. And I'm upset by that.

The author did a nice job in making the reader emotionally invested in the characters, and with the exclusion of a select few their future looks bright by the end. But then the author has to give us more! A new problem, more strife for the characters!

Usually, I love series. However, everything was wrapped up so nicely that it seems to me that the series should be over, finished. And I'm worried what might happen if we go through it all again.

Still, I enjoyed the book. I'll give it a solid 7.5, and cross my fingers that the next two books in the series don't make too much of a mess of it.

Thanks for reading,

-Mark

Untitled

Hey everyone, I just finished this one book that I have to tell you about. Interestingly, it doesn't have a title so far. Still, it's an absolutely brilliant book. It was written by Mark Jones... Wait.
WHOA! I FINISHED ANOTHER BOOK! TAKE THAT WORLD! BWAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Ahem. Right. Just letting you know! :)
Interestingly, my one subscriber Laura recently finished a book. Go Laura! This Christmas we'll have editing parties, and then they'll both be bestsellers, and then... we'll rule the world! :)

Thanks for reading,

-Mark