Allegiant, by Veronica Roth

Or this post might be more appropriately named, "Why Allegiant couldn't have ended any differently".

WARNING: THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS. LIKE BIG TIME SPOILERS. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

4.5/5 stars

Another series has come and gone, but very few have gone out in such a bang as Allegiant did. Veronica Roth took a risk and did something we rarely see in YA fiction: she killed off her main, point of view, character, and I bow down to her for it. I have a lot to say about that, but let me start with this: The book couldn't have ended differently. No matter how upset you are or how much you hate Veronica Roth now, this is the ending she thought would best suit the story, and she's one hundred percent vindicated for it. You can (and should because it's quite beautiful) read her response here. 

Don't get me wrong, I cried like a baby. So much so that I had to make myself a cup of tea and watch the entirety of Dirty Dancing at 3 a.m. in order to stop feeling so upset. But I love that Tris died, and I love how it ended, so if you want to hate me for that, go for it. 

Here's what I liked: First off, I really liked the entire genetic experiment plot line. It was completely unexpected and I thought it was a realistic concept for what was outside the city. There was also a lot of room for all that drama to go down so that was a nice touch, and I appreciate her adding some interesting new characters to the story. I loved that Tobias forgave his mother. I never hated Evelyn, I disliked the lengths she was willing to go to to "save" the city, but I never hated her. She was doing what she thought was best. But I'm glad that she and Tobias were able to put it in the past and patch up their relationship, it was what Tobias needed. With his father being the awful human that he was, and Tris dying, it wouldn't have been fair to leave Tobias all on his own. 

What I didn't like: I love that it was in dual point of view, but I feel like there wasn't a lot of difference in tone between Tobias and Tris. Now, it wasn't horrible and I could still tell whose POV we were in, but it would have been nice to see a difference in the way they thought (though maybe that makes them even more perfect together?). That's the short list of what I didn't like, and we can now move on to my spiel on Tris's death.

This is important. Rule number one. If you never take away anything from any of these posts but this, that would be okay. Never, never, never threaten an author because you didn't like the way a book ended. Threats aren't okay, guys, and from what I've heard, Veronica got a lot of them. Like I said before, she wrote what would best serve the book and she planned this from the very beginning of the series. You're all entitled to your own opinions, and emotional responses are the best, but just don't threaten writers because you didn't like their decisions. Not cool. 

Now here's why I think Tris's death was possibly one of the greatest things to happen in YA history, and maybe what caused this book to head to the top of my favorite series list: It was the ultimate sacrifice. Like the lovely Shailene Woodley said in an interview, Tris is constantly battling between being fearless and being selfless, being Dauntless or Abnegation. In the end, she didn't have to choose between the two, they were both a part of who she was. By sacrificing her life for her city and the people she loved, she was fearless and selfless, a true member of both factions. Tris gives a beautiful speech before she dies that really shows why this had to happen. On page 473, she says, "She [her mother] taught me all about real sacrifice. That is should be done from love, not misplaced disgust for another person's genetics. That is should be done from necessity, not without exhausting all other options. That is should be done for people who need your strength because they don't have enough of their own." This is a completely different girl from the start of the series, this is a woman who has been through hell and back and has made the decision to do what's best for other people. And she's not terrified, she accepts it. Hello, character development. Also as a side note, Tobias's reaction is heartbreaking and very real. He's angry and he's numb and he carries it with him forever. That part was, to me, harder to read than the actual death scene itself. Four for you Veronica Roth, you go Veronica Roth. (Other side note, if you really want to have a good cry, read the death scene and listen to "Oblivion" by Bastille... and then prepare for the waterworks)

Those are my thoughts, and you can agree or disagree as much as you want. I just think it was a poetic ending and I wouldn't want to change a thing. I could talk about this book for days, and I would like to apologize to the people who are still having to listen to me talk about it. So, thank you, Veronica. Thank you for taking the risk and having the guts to write your story the way it wanted to be written. Thank you for letting us all be a part of Tris's life and adventures, the good and the bad. Thank you.

-Annie

Mentally, Physically, and Emotionally Preparing for NaNoWriMo

It's that time of year again folks, it's time for NaNoWriMo. Personally, I like to call November "Crap, how am I supposed to write a novel when I have two research papers, and other school work, and work commitments, and social commitments, and then be ready to study for finals" month. I'm prepared to make a calendar solely for the purpose of having that title replace the actual month name. For all that I complain, though, I love November. It's my second favorite month. And, I LOVE NaNoWriMo; I participate every year even though I usually don't get farther than 500 or so words (it's the curse of everything school related being due at the exact.same.time). But this year will be different. I will win NaNoWriMo. I will.

Okay, now some of you might be super confused about my love-hate relationship and that might be because you don't know what NaNoWriMo is. GASP! Fear no more for I shall educate you. Simply put, the goal is to write a novel of about 50,000 words in one month. Scary, yes. Exciting, yes. Pick an emotion, yes. You only "win" if you hit the word count, but let's be real here, you're a winner no matter how much you write. You win because you sat down, took time out of your day, and wrote. To me, that's the entire point of the event- it's motivation to write that novel or short story, and I refuse to let the pressure to finish get to me this year.

If this sounds like fun to you (crazy as it seems, it's a freaking blast!), I bet you're wondering how to participate. You have options. Of course, you can just start on November 1st and just write for yourself. Or, you can join the NaNoWriMo community here. This website is all kinds of awesome: you can add friends, keep track of your progress, find out about cool events going on in your community, and find prompts to keep you writing when you hit the wall. I'm on it and you should totally be my writing buddy! Basically, the best way to participate in NaNoWriMo is by writing, plain and simple (hint to hit the word count: write about 1,667 words per day). It doesn't have to be your best work, in fact, it probably won't be, but you'll feel crazy accomplished and it'll get you over that fear of writing a book. Super empowering!

So get to writing! Or at least, prepare yourself for the craziness that is to come. And if you want, you can follow me on Twitter because you're almost guaranteed some half brain dead, too much writing, don't know what I'm saying tweets and those are my pride and joy of the internet.

Next week, I'll be reviewing Veronica Roth's Allegiant (last book in the Divergent trilogy) which will include lots of feels, possible spoilers (not possible, definite), and the reason why I don't think it could have ended any other way. Did I mention the feels?

(synopsis from Amazon)

What if your whole world was a lie?
What if a single revelation—like a single choice—changed everything?
What if love and loyalty made you do things you never expected?
The explosive conclusion to Veronica Roth's #1 New York Times bestselling Divergent trilogy reveals the secrets of the dystopian world that has captivated millions of readers in Divergent and Insurgent.

Happy writing and have a fabulous week!
-Annie

Woah, Double Review: Unspoken and Untold by Sarah Rees Brennan

This series.
Yes.
Can't form.
Coherent sentences.







So this series came to me via recommendation from one of my professors, and the second I picked it up, I was absolutely hooked. The idea is so interesting to me: Kami is in love with the boy in her head, the imaginary friend who never went away. Sure, this idea sounds so romantic in theory- someone knowing your every thought and always being with you, but Kami soon realizes that it's actually an absolute nightmare. Especially since when they meet, they're completely disgusted by the sight of each other. The Jared in her head is nothing like the Jared in real life and it takes a lot of time for Kami to accept that. Besides all that drama, there's this entire paranormal situation that deals with sorcery and sacrifice and it's totally awesome!

Here's what I liked: As I said earlier, I love the idea behind the story. It's a psychological fact (and trust me, I had a lecture over this on Monday in Developmental Psych) that most of us grew up having an imaginary friend of some sort at some point in our lives. Now imagine that your imaginary friend is actually real and nothing like you expected him/her to be like. So that's what Kami and Jared are dealing with. I also loved the idea of the quaint British town that is actually run by sorcerers who, half want things to stay the way they are while the other half wants to go back to demanding sacrifices to ensure protection. Pretty nifty concept.

Oh, and the characters are the best. Like, they might be some of my favorite characters in a series right now. They're so distinctly different from each other but able to come together for the same cause. I like how mysterious the Lynburn family is, how lazy but loyal the Montgomery kids are, and how bad-ass Kami is. Kami is a winner, she's achieved rock star status without doing anything other than being herself. As an investigative journalist, she'd do anything for her story and always has a witty remark to go with it. It has a humor along the lines of The Mortal Instrument series as far as one liners, and the female characters are written with a lot of strength like something along the lines of Caroline Forbes, River Song, Veronica Mars, Buffy Summers, etc.  Overall, it's a series that'll leave you sitting at the edge of your seat panicking about what can possibly happen next. It'll also leave you with a lot of feelings and a little trace of depression when you realize you have to wait about a year for the next book... So there's that...

What I didn't like: I can't think of anything that I didn't like. I really can't. So I'm going to leave it at that.

Read this series, I promise you won't regret it (unless you hate humor, think girls are dumb, and just dislike books in general- thought if that's the case, why are you reading my blog ya crazy?). And when you do read it, you can join me in the anticipation for the next book (I hear a rumor that someone's going to die... dun dun DUN), and we can wait patiently (jk) together.

-Annie

This is Halloween (well, almost)

I love Halloween. I love it so much. I love the candy and the costumes and the scary stories (though don't even think about showing me a scary movie). Besides the fact that it takes place during my favorite month, there's just something about this unofficial holiday that really makes me happy. I'm going to say it has something to do with all the creativity and imagination that happens on Halloween- people get into character, and you all know there's nothing I love more than fictional characters.

I also love the story telling tradition that has become a part of the Halloween culture. We love to sit around and tell ghost stories while we eat our candy. Ghost stories are the bomb. Give me some Edgar Allan Poe to send shivers down my spine and make me sleep with one eye open. Remind me of the classic stories like Bram Stoker's Dracula or Mary Shelley's Frankenstein that still give me the creeps every once in a while. Now, I haven't read any Stephen King yet, but I promise that's going to happen someday soon.

So for this post, I was going to make a list of my favorite scary YA books, but then I realized they mostly all came from the same author: Laurie Faria Stolarz. That's the story of how this blog post turned into a huge spotlight showcase of one of my favorite thriller writers, and why you should read her books. Let's look at my favorites from Stolarz:

-Blue is for Nightmares series-

The title of the first book says it all: nightmares. Stacey has nightmares that people are going to die, and she's usually right. And then she starts having nightmares about her roommate, Drea, dying. So there's nightmares, death, and did I mention the psycho stalkers? Oh yeah, and then there's the creepy rhymes and messages in the bathroom and things that are just straight up scary. It's a beautifully written series that will tug at your heart strings, but scare you to death. So there's that.

-The Touch series-

Again with the titles, Deadly Little Secret, Deadly Little Lies, etc. This is a big stalker series, like someone is always being stalked by a crazy person. So that makes it scary, and Stolarz is really good at writing psychopaths. Add in the fact that there's some weird paranormal stuff going on and you've got yourself a proper thriller/horror series. Some chapters begin with a diary entry or a letter or something from the stalker's perspective and that is probably the stuff that left me scared to the bone because it just seemed so real.

-Project 17-

A group of high schoolers spend the night in an abandoned mental institution (which is rumored to be the birthplace of the lobotomy) so obviously nothing is going to go wrong. If only. I think this book kept me from sleeping for too many nights than I'd care to admit. This is especially scary because the hospital the story was based on actually exists in Massachusetts so that's cool... But Stolarz sticks to her great writing style, which includes dark situations, terrifying nursery rhymes, and paranormal activity (before that movie was a thing). Definitely a perfect Halloween read.

I'd like to include an honorable mention in this post, because this was a book that I found to be a bit scary (or more than a bit) but it's written by the always amazing Maureen Johnson. Yes, kiddos, I'm talking about the Shades of London series. Ghosts and Jack the Ripper. Ghosts and Jack the Ripper. Double whammy. Also, this is kinda my favorite book series right now so I'm going to talk about it every chance I get.

Those are my favorite scary stories, and they're really perfect to read now that Halloween is once again upon us. So check them out and get excited for Halloween! Find an awesome costume, read an awesome book, eat a lot of candy! As for me, I'm still trying to decide on my costume (it changes on a daily basis- Agnes from Despicable Me, Sailor Moon, and Fire Nation Katara are the top three options right now). I'm also searching for that perfect Stephen King book to read this season, so bring on the suggestions.

Here's what I'm reading for next week's review:
Unspoken, by Sarah Rees Brennan (synopsis from Amazon)

A modern, magical twist on the Gothic Romance and Girl Detective genres, this book will appeal to fans of both Beautiful Creatures and the Mortal Instrumentsseries. Reviewers have praised the take-charge heroine and the spellbinding romance.

Bound together. Worlds apart.

Kami Glass is in love with someone she's never met—a boy she's talked to in her head since she was born. This has made her an outsider in the sleepy English town of Sorry-in-the-Vale, but she has learned ways to turn that to her advantage. Her life seems to be in order, until disturbing events begin to occur. There has been screaming in the woods and the manor overlooking the town has lit up for the first time in 10 years. . . . The Lynburn family, who ruled the town a generation ago and who all left without warning, have returned. Now Kami can see that the town she has known and loved all her life is hiding a multitude of secrets—and a murderer. The key to it all just might be the boy in her head. The boy she thought was imaginary is real, and definitely and deliciously dangerous.

Until next time, dear readers,
-Annie

United We Spy, by Ally Carter

You would think that after all these years I would have had time to mentally and emotionally prepare myself for the end of this series. Unfortunately, that didn't work out too well. It's never fun to come to the end of a wonderful series like this one, and I would like to thank Ally Carter for taking me on this thrilling adventure from my junior year of high school with the first book (I'd Tell You I Love You But Then I'd Have To Kill You) to my senior year of college with this final chapter. All that being said, I'm going to try to make this review as spoiler free as possible, but it might be hard. So here's your WARNING: IF YOU HAVE NOT READ THIS SERIES/ARE NOT CAUGHT UP YET, be warned that there might be some spoilers ahead.

Here's what I liked: It would be too cliche of me to say I liked everything, but that was very close to the case. I love the characters and always have. Cammie is such a strong female protagonist and we really get to see her grow throughout the series, leading up to her knowing exactly who she is in the end. I liked how in I'd Tell You I love You she was super normal girl. Yeah, she went to a school for spies, but she just wanted the nice, normal boy to like her. At that point, she wasn't really sure that this was the life she wanted for herself. But life goes on and so does the series, and the adventures and tests continue to get harder. Cammie realizes how good she is at being a spy, and she finds her passion in it. Let me tell you, she is absolutely awesome in this book. Our little girl has grown up! And this wouldn't be a proper review if I didn't take a quick second to mention my love for Zach. I love him I love him I love him. He's a good match for Cammie and they make a great team (relationship wise and spy wise). The action in this book is nonstop; you're literally at the edge of your seat the entire time and I wouldn't have it any other way. Ally Carter is especially good at planting pieces of information throughout the book that end up being super duper important at the end, so A+ for that. Also, it makes me wonder if Ally is secretly a spy herself...? But you didn't hear that from me. Oh, and did I mention the plot twists? I literally had to put the book down many times to process what had just happened because I SO DID NOT SEE THAT COMING BUT OMG. The plot twists will leave you gasping for air (in a totally good way), and that makes the espionage series ten times more realistic.

Here's what I didn't like: Not much, but I have to be picky. I know Cammie is the protagonist so it's all up to her to save the day, but I really love her gang and I wanted to see them much more in this book. Maybe it was just me, but I wanted Macy to be much more assertive throughout the book and I feel like she was a little passive. But I can totally overlook that considering everything the girl's been through in the last couple books. Also, there were multiple times when I feel like we just completely forgot that Preston was there. Like, he was in the scene but didn't do anything, which was kind of disappointing. Maybe I wanted him to play a bigger role than he did, but maybe I was only expecting that because he seemed to be a big player in the last book.

Overall, this was the perfect ending. I'm not going to spoil what exactly happened, but there was a part at the end that broke my heart because of the symbolism (when you've read it, you'll know what I'm talking about- fresh start and all that jazz). But I can't see the series ending without that specific event and as sad as I was that it happened, it just seemed to fit. Sorry for being vague. I'm also very willing to admit that I shed a few tears, especially during the graduation speech, but it was so well done and this series has such a special place in my heart that it was hard not to cry. I'm sad it's over, but the ending was worth it. So thanks again, Ally, for sharing this story with us and leaving me feeling like I could conquer the world. Just like Cammie.

-Annie