Uninvited - Justine Musk

Not long ago I buckled down to read a book that had been in my to-read pile for years. Generally this isn't a very good sign, but regardless Uninvited intrigued me with the plot description on the back and a quote from Holly Black saying she loved it. It seemed like a quick read, so I decided to give it a real try after going through a few failed trial runs.

It was worth it.

Kelly has turned to drugs and other forms of escape since her brother, Jasper, walked away from a car accident where two others died and never returned. She absolutely believes that it wasn't his fault, but can't figure out why he left. Once a star student, Kelly is now following a dangerous path. Her mother is pregnant again, presumably to replace the void that her other son has left in their lives. Her world is turned upside down when Jasper returns, however. He appears to be the same brother who she knew, but appearances can be deceiving. Kelly starts to see things - Jasper's new tattoo appears to be moving, and she keeps running into a man that nobody else can see - and realizes that her brother might still be in trouble, and endangering her family at that. But Jasper won't open up to Kelly... so she decides to take matters into her own hands.

I was pleasantly surprised by this book - after trying it out so many times and failing to read it, I was beginning to wonder if maybe this book just wasn't for me. It's not often that a book will sit on my shelf for years before I read it and still end up being something worthwhile. This is one of those books.

There was the right amount of mystery and paranormal in here to satisfy me. Unlike some other books I've read recently (*coughcough*Betwixt*coughcough*) if Uninvited promises something's going to happen, it does. The book was paced well, and I didn't find it lagged in action or dialogue at any point.

As usual, I liked Nick, the secondary-character-who-may-be-a-love-interest. I don't know why, but I will never get sick of the best friend who happens to be a guy turning into a love interest. I wish Nick had been in the book more, but the truth is that this book is about Kelly's family, specifically Jasper, and I'm glad that the author didn't stray too far away from what was really important.

The one main complaint I have about this book is the same as I had for Above (see the last review) - the characters are too one-dimensional. Aside from Jasper, who himself feels like your typical bad-boy who usually ends up being the love interest, the other characters just didn't feel as developed as I would have liked them to be. While I like action in my books, I'm a very character-driven reader. I would have liked to learn more about Kelly, to figure out what makes her tick. I would have liked to see more of Archie, too, who seemed promising but didn't live up to my expectations by the end.

It was a good book, I'll give it that. I don't regret reading this. But in the grand scheme of things, this didn't blow me away and didn't offer anything new to the genre. I loved the ending; it took me completely off-guard. Read this one if you can get your hands on it, as it's worth a look, but there are many other books out there that deserve your attention more than this one.

SCORE: 6.7/10
IF YOU LIKE: Uninvited (Amanda Marrone), Ruined (Paula Morris)

Above - Leah Bobet

As you probably know by now, I often pick books out based on their cover. I'm a sucker for pretty artwork and especially pretty dresses. Usually this works out pretty well for me - some of my most favourite books were found that way (I'm looking at you, Wither). Every now and then, this method completely fails me. This is the case with this book.

Above looks pretty fantastic if we're basing this simply on an aesthetic level. There's a girl with bee wings on the cover, the CN Tower (go, Canada!) and a quote from Emma Donoghue, whose book (Room) I LOVED. I read the blurb on the jacket and it seemed interesting, so I borrowed it from work. It's not often I find a good book from Canada, and I was hoping that this would be the one.

Oh yeah, the plot. Matthew, a strange boy (though everyone in this book is strange) saved Ariel, a girl who can change into a bee, a while ago. Since then he has become incredibly infatuated with her, though it's hard for him to tell if the feeling is mutual. Matthew is the Teller of Safe - he keeps the stories of their refuge's past, as well as the origin stories of all of the people who live there. "Origin stories" sounds as if I were talking about superheroes, but I might as well be - people who live in Safe have found themselves there because they are different and are not/do not want to be accepted in the normal world. They are each abnormal in their own way: some have scales, some have animal limbs, others can turn into bees, see ghosts, shoot lightning. They have a pretty good system going on: raid Above whenever they need supplies, and stay put underground the rest of the time. Except an old enemy has shown up; one that threatens their entire existence. Safe is destroyed, and only a few people - including Matthew and Ariel - manage to escape.

Okay, so I've probably just made it sound like something you might want to read. This is where I was when I started. But there are a few things that I wish someone would have told me before I started.

1. The book is told from Matthew's perspective: This is the main problem I have with this book. The problem is not that the book is told in a guy's voice rather than a girl's... it's that Matthew is not able to speak properly. Being born and raised in Safe, I suppose nobody taught him the real way to talk, though most other people around him appeared to use normal words and sentence structure. This is not the same with Matthew. Don't believe me? "...because I know that look from Tales, the kind where people stare five feet into the distance for the Telling and you need to help to Tell them, like a hand light on the curve of the back." This is one of the more normal sentences. Some things in this book I had to reread multiple times, and I only read 20 pages in a whole day because I couldn't grasp the plot or the characters.

2. It's incredibly hard to follow what's happening: Tying into the last point, it's very difficult to follow the action or make sense of the plot. This is probably mostly due to Matthew's way of speaking, but it deserves its own point nonetheless. Three-quarters of the way through the book, I had NO idea what had happened, or what was currently happening. I understood individual events, but I just wasn't getting into it enough to say what was going on. If asked, I would not have been able to explain the plot to that point. By the end of the book, this had cleared up a little for me, but I don't think a book should confuse its readers up until the ending. I don't mean this in the same way as I would mean it for a mystery book - it's not that I was trying to figure out whodunnit, but rather didn't have a grasp of what the plot was actually supposed to BE. I had problems keeping track of characters, as well, and some I just gave up on figuring out.

3. The characters were one-dimensional: Or at least, what I could understand of them. Sure, at the end a little was revealed about the motivations of some people and why they did what they did, but I feel that there were just too many characters and not enough development on each of them. The author tries to fix this by adding random origin stories throughout the novel, but it's just not enough to make the characters intriguing and interesting. For characters with such strange deformities and origins, I would have expected a lot more in terms of development. This is the first book I have read in a long time that I don't feel attached to any of the characters by the book's end.

I wish that I could say I liked this book, I really do. I hate writing a bad review, and this may be the exact book for someone else, but it wasn't for me. It's rare I find a teen book that I don't enjoy, but here we are. If you're still thinking about trying it, by all means, do. The writing I imagine was supposed to be poetic, so perhaps you'll appreciate it and take much more out of this book than I did. I may try another book by Leah Bobet at some point, but not if the writing is still this way.

SCORE: 2.5/10
IF YOU LIKE: Wither (Lauren DeStefano) *Not because it's similar to this in any way, but because I love it and have to recommend you SOMETHING here!

Tighter - Adele Griffin

From the first page, we are introduced to Jamie, a girl who is being sent off to work as an au pair on a small, secluded New England island. The island is mostly off the map to everyone except the locals, and a handful of 'lifers' who come every year to vacation in their summer homes. Jamie is put in charge of Isa, an 11 year old girl with a wild imagination and an unconventional family. Isa lives alone with Connie, her housekeeper, while her father is away in Hong Kong.

Soon after Jamie settles in, Milo, Isa's trouble making brother (who, at 14 years old, is gorgeous and totally off-limits) arrives after being kicked out of summer camp. While Isa loves Miles, the town and Connie all seem to be very against him being on the island.

Jamie quickly learns about the previous au pair and her boyfriend, and the tragedy that happened on the island last year. Jessie, Isa's old babysitter, was killed in an accident with her boyfriend, Peter. The town is very reluctant to talk about what happened, making Jamie more curious as to what happened. Jamie becomes more and more consumed by the deaths and the mystery surrounding them as she begins to see the dead couple around the island. This is not new to Jamie - she has been seeing her dead relatives, Hank and Uncle Jim, for a while now. While she is not sure why they are coming to her, or what they want, she has resorted to stealing pills from her family's medicine cabinet to make them go away.

Part ghost story and part psychological thriller, this book was fantastic from beginning to end. The whole thing played out very much like a movie, and reminded me quite a bit (in terms of tone, not story) of the movie The Others. The story kept you guessing right until the very end, and was loaded with twists and turns that caught you off-guard.

I especially liked the character of Jamie. She is not your typical cookie-cutter heroine - she has problems, like everyone else. She struggles with events from her past and the reality of her future throughout the book, and speaks in a very real voice. It is hard to tell what is real and what isn't for Jamie, as the pills she takes skew her vision of the world and the events that are happening. The fact that the main character is unsure of what is actually real throughout the book makes it all the more disturbing and unsettling for the reader. How can we draw conclusions about the outcome of the book if the heroine herself can't fully tell us what is happening? I thought this was a fantastic way to write the book; I was creating theories and making guesses right until the very end.

One thing I particularly liked was the ending. Looking back on the book now, there are so many little hints about what is coming at the end that just went right over my head when I read them. This book definitely merits a reread - I feel like I'll discover more clues and foreshadowing as I go through it. The twist at the end of this is definitely on par with the ending of The Sixth Sense and The Others in my mind, which is great!

This book is not out for the general public yet (it only comes out in May) but I do hope it gets the recognition it deserves. It was a fantastic YA novel, and I will definitely be singing praises about this one for a long time!

One thing to note: this book is partially based on Henry James' The Turn of the Screw, a novella from 1898. While I have not read the original (I certainly will if I can get my hands on it, though!) I've skimmed over the summary. It's not exactly the same - the story is similar at the start, but then Griffin takes the story to a whole new level and makes it her own. Since this is a modern retelling, with a different story at its core, the reader will get the same experience whether they've read the original or not.

SCORE: 8.8/10
IF YOU LIKE: The Turn of the Screw (Henry James), Ruined (Paula Morris)