QUICKY: External Forces (The Laws of Motion, #1), by Deborah Rix

Release Date: November 26th, 2013
Age Group: Young Adult
Publisher: Dime Store Books
Source: Publisher through NetGalley
Overall: 5 Monkeys
Interest: Dystopia
Categories: Dystopia, Romance, Series
Goodreads / Deborah Rix's Website
Read in October 2013

Summary:

It’s 100 years since the Genetic Integrity Act was passed and America closed its borders to prevent genetic contamination. Now only the enemy, dysgenic Deviants, remain beyond the heavily guarded border. The Department of Evolution carefully guides the creation of each generation and deviations from the divine plan are not permitted.
When 16-year-old Jess begins to show signs of deviance she enlists in the Special Forces, with her best friend Jay, in a desperate bid to evade detection by the Devotees. Jess is good with data, not so good with a knife. So when the handsome and secretive Sergeant Matt Anderson selects her for his Black Ops squad, Jess is determined to figure out why.
As her deviance continues to change her, Jess is forced to decide who to trust with her deadly secret. Jess needs to know what’s really out there, in the Deviant wasteland over the border, if she has any hope of making it to her 17th birthday. Because if the enemy doesn’t kill her first, the Department of Evolution probably will.

My Opinion:

What an awesome debut! With hints at Lauren Oliver's Delirium series, Deborah Rix has crafted a new and intriguing post-apocalyptic world. 

We're introduced to Jess a Divergent... um, DEVIANT! (LOL, jk), in a world where any signs of genetic deviance can cost you your life. Jess's only way to survive is to blend in... and become a part of an army dedicated to erradicate and keep at bay any Deviants.

I really should have written this review as soon as I finished it! I could have told you so much that I now seem to have forgotten!

But I can say that I loved this book so much more than I initially thought I would! Deborah created a world full of secrets and romance and action, a fast-paced world I want more of!

Jess's own personality was brilliant. She was her own woman, fighting to keep her secrets and her life. Her relationship with her new friends was very well developed too. 

Avatar: The Last Airbender, Volume One: The Promise, #1, by Gene Luen Yang

Contributors:

With: Bryan Konietzko By (artist): Gurihiru With: Michael Dante DiMartino

Release Date: January 25th, 2012
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Age Group: Children's
Overall: 4 out of 5 Stars
Categories: Avatar: The Last Airbender, NetGalley, Comics
Goodreads Page 
Read in April 2012 

Summary: 

The wait is over! Ever since the conclusion of Avatar: The Last Airbender, its millions of fans have been hungry for more--and it's finally here!

This series of digests rejoins Aang and friends for exciting new adventures, beginning with a faceoff against the Fire Nation that threatens to throw the world into another war, testing all of Aang's powers and ingenuity!
 

The continuation of Airbender and the link to its upcoming sequel, Legend of Korra!

My Opinion: 

I love Avatar: The Last Airbender, so when I saw this title in NetGalley, of course I had to have it!

The Promise starts off just where the TV show ended: with the Fire Nation's Lord defeated, Aang victorious and with Katara (YAY!) and Zuko at the Fire Nation's throne. 

It is now Aang's job to ensure that everything goes peacefully with the Harmony Restoration Movement, aimed at bringing the people from the Fire Nation living in their colonies back to their land. But of course, when stuff like this happens, people tend to make roots in the place they're taken to, and that's what the Fire Nation people have done. Now they don't want to leave, and this may bring problems to Aang and Zuko's plan.

Aang is a young boy, playful and loveable like always, as the rest of the characters: they're the same as they were in the TV show. The art was also very faithful, I loved some of their expressions! Especially Toph, love her! 

This was a very short read, at 74 pages, and we'll have to wait until next month for the next installment. Avatar fans, this is a must read, as it works as a link between A:TLA and Avatar: The Legend of Korra (now on TV!) 

New Girl, by Paige Harbison

Release Date: January 31st, 2012

Publisher: Harlequin Teen

Age Group: Young Adult

Overall: 3,5 out of 5 Stars

Categories: Drama, Romance, Retelling
Goodreads Page

Read in March 2012 

Summary: 

A contemporary young-adult retelling inspired by the classic 1938 romantic suspense bestseller Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.

They call me 'New Girl'...

Ever since I arrived at exclusive, prestigious Manderly Academy, that’s who I am. New girl. Unknown. But not unnoticed—because of her.

Becca Normandy—that’s the name on everyone’s lips. The girl whose picture I see everywhere. The girl I can’t compare to. I mean, her going missing is the only reason a spot opened up for me at the academy. And everyone stares at me like it’s my fault.

Except for Max Holloway—the boy whose name shouldn’t be spoken. At least, not by me. Everyone thinks of him as Becca’s boyfriend…but she’s gone, and here I am, replacing her. I wish it were that easy. Sometimes, when I think of Max, I can imagine how Becca’s life was so much better than mine could ever be.

And maybe she’s still out there, waiting to take it back.

My Opinion:


It took me a while to get into this story. Normally I don't go for contemporary, but I'd read that this had a supernatural twist, so I decided to give it a go.


The first half of the book narrates the New Girl's life in Manderley, the boarding school her parents send her to. That's the school she wanted to go as a little girl, not now that she's a senior and has all of her friends in Florida. But she goes anyway, because she doesn't want to disappoint her parents. 


I loved that the book had two POVs: Becca's and the New Girl (BTW, we don't learn her name until the final chapter, if I remember correctly. When I read her name, I was like, what, this is your name?, and started looking for it in past chapters. Very well played, Ms. Harbison!). Becca's chapters would be in the 3rd person and NG's in the 1st. With Becca's we got to learn more about the why behind her disappearance. 


I only wish the first part of the book would have been faster-paced (yes, I like inventing terms, if they don't already exist). That's the part where you have to engage your reader. I felt like I was constantly reading a new girl's whines about how much she missed her family and home, and why everyone at school compared her to Becca. Becca's chapters, however, were completely engaging. She was a very cool character to read. 


The boys from this book were appealing, and their story with Becca really showed us who they were. I started feeling sorry for them, for how Becca had treated them. Max and Johnny were good characters. Max definitely captured my heart along with NG's!


This school fed on gossip and rumours, and the NG got to be the centre of attention from the start. I liked how her character evolved towards the end, and how the mystery around Becca was finally solved. 


So, my only critique would be: the book should have been more engaging in the beginning, like it is in the end. We can forget about the NG's whines, because they show her character, and she does change in the end. The end of the book definitely makes up for the slow parts.  

I'm giving it 3,5 stars based on my personal enjoyment. 

The Way We Fall, by Megan Crewe

Release Date: January 24th, 2012

Publisher: Disney-Hyperion

Age Group: Young Adult

Overall: 1 out of 5 Stars 

Categories: Drama, Dystopia, NetGalley, Did Not Finish*

Goodreads Page

Read in January 2012

Summary:

It starts with an itch you just can't shake. Then comes a fever and a tickle in your throat. A few days later, you'll be blabbing your secrets and chatting with strangers like they’re old friends. Three more, and the paranoid hallucinations kick in.

And then you're dead.
When a deadly virus begins to sweep through sixteen-year-old Kaelyn’s community, the government quarantines her island—no one can leave, and no one can come back.
Those still healthy must fight for dwindling supplies, or lose all chance of survival. As everything familiar comes crashing down, Kaelyn joins forces with a former rival and discovers a new love in the midst of heartbreak. When the virus starts to rob her of friends and family, she clings to the belief that there must be a way to save the people she holds dearest.
Because how will she go on if there isn't?

My Opinion:

I was expecting to love this book -the premise is good and it's categorised as a dystopia, which is a genre I love- but alas, I did not. A lot of other people seem to have liked it, and maybe that's why I was expecting too much from this novel. I'd seen a lot of 5 stars reviews on GR.

The novel's protagonist, Kaelyn, begins writing a diary for her ex-bestfriend, Leo. It starts out slow, but that's understandable, because that's how you're supposed to write a diary, little by little, not like a normal prose narrative book. But further on, that's exactly what it becomes; the diary transforms into something else, where Kaelyn narrates everything, but still in a slow pace.

I could not for the life of me relate to any of these characters: Kaelyn, her brother Drew, her cousin Meredith, her father... they were all there, but none (it seemed to me) had enough depth, they didn't seem real to me.

The way Kaelyn retells the events happening in her island are dull and unsufficient for my reader curiosity. Nothing interesting happened, and I found myself (after reading 157 pages) skipping chapters, that didn't show much promise either. The ending was predictable, too.

Needless to say is, I was very disappointed. I was truly expecting something different from what I got. I do want to keep reading what Megan writes, though. Maybe I'll like Give Up The Ghost, people say it's funny. 

*It wasn't that I didn't finish it, more like -like I said above-, I skipped chapters after reaching the middle, only to see how it ended and move on to my next read.