Monday, May 12, 2014

Cress by Marissa Meyer (#3 in the Lunar Chronicles)

I was a big fan of Cinder and Scarlet, so I was looking forward to reading #3 in the series.  Here's the thing--the characters never go away! So it was a big cast for #3 and I'm wondering if they are all going to stay for the upcoming 4th book in the series, Winter.

Cress (short for Crescent) is a Lunar held captive on her own satellite in space. Like Rapunzel, her hair grows because she has nothing to cut it with, but the hair doesn't stay long once she escapes with Capt. Thorne.  Cress joins Scarlet and Cinder as they try to stop the evil Lunar Queen from marrying the prince and taking over Earth.  Of course, there isn't much conclusion to this book, but the action and characters are worth waiting for!  Can't wait for #4! And I'm hoping to see an ARC at Annual or Midwinter, please!

Thursday, May 1, 2014

Minority of One by B.A. Binns

I don't usually read self-published books, but this one caught my eye.  It was promoted on yalsa-bk as the ARC being free on NetGalley so it was an easy book to get access to.  The author lives in Illinois AND the book is about a gay black teenager.  What's not to like?

This kind of book DOES need to be published by a major publishing house.  I gotta admit that it needs some cleaning up and editing with the plot storylines.  I don't know how those editors to do, but they are really good at taking books like these and making them better.

Neill is the gay black teen boy who lives with his older brother.  He's being pushed into the medical field by his brother, but Neill isn't sure that's what he really wants.  Neill has just ended a relationship with Carl because Carl's family didn't approve of him being gay. And as much as Carl tries to be straight, it just isn't working.

Sheila is the white girl who has just moved to Chicago with her mother, who she is sure doesn't really love her.  Sheila is tough and solid, and she hates to be falling for the ladies man Julian.

All the characters are real and there is a great sense of Chicago--I enjoyed noticing familiar places and things as I read. 

There is a solid backstory about the parents that falls into place, although some of the events at the end are too dramatic for me.  However, I could see a reluctant reader eating this up.

I'm hoping the dialogue cleans up in print version--things ran together on my Kindle and sometimes the voices of the characters weren't distinct enough for me to know who was speaking.

By the way, this book does stand alone in the Farrington High series--no need to read the first two. Reminds me of the Bluford series as each book focuses on a different character.