Review: The War within These Walls

Title: The War within These Walls
Author: Aline Sax
Rating: 5/5

Summary: It's World War II, and Misha's family, like the rest of the Jews living in Warsaw, has been moved by the Nazis into a single crowded ghetto. Conditions are appalling: every day more people die from disease, starvation, and deportations. Misha does his best to help his family survive, even crawling through the sewers to smuggle food. When conditions worsen, Misha joins a handful of other Jews who decide to make a final, desperate stand against the Nazis.Heavily illustrated with sober blue-and-white drawings, this powerful novel dramatically captures the brutal reality of a tragic historical event.

Review:

There's a special place in my book reading heart for World War II novels.  Actually, it's one of the only pieces of 20th century history I care to study in any detail.  I think it's the part of me that has a deep-seated, strange fascination with human horrors and the great deal of pain we as a race can inflict upon one another.

My morbid fascination aside, this book was unique in it's structure from the general shape of the book to the drawings and text within.  The book is at least an inch taller than a usual hardcover book and the cover colors are mimicked throughout the text.

The protagonist was loosely drawn, which I found allowed for a more generalized experience.  I mean by this, that you could see the faces of history (more than just the character) in him and thus lends the character their pain and hardship on top of his own.

Plot-wise there were little to no surprises because it all fits with the time period and events of the Warsaw Ghetto, even if it is not perfect (it is fiction after all).

I would recommend this book to history book lovers, as well as those who do not like history but are looking for a stepping stone to get into the subject or an easy historical read.

Rating:

In My Mailbox [1]

In My Mailbox is a weekly meme created by The Story Siren

I get my books from a number of sources including buying, ARC copies, and the library.  This week I struck gold with a library book sale!

Bought

From left to right the books are:

The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff

Possession by Elana Johnson

Before I Die by Jenny Downham

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

Illuminated by Erica Orloff

Unearthly by Cynthia Hand

Sticky Fingers by Niki Burnham

Pretend You Love Me by Julie Anne Peters

The Prophecy by Dawn Miller

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

Matilda by Roald Dahl

Bonus DVD:  Cloverfield

Borrowed from the Library

Perfect Ruin by Lauren DeStefano

The Walking Dead: Rise of the Governor by Robert Kirkman

What did you get this week?

Top Ten Tuesday [7]

Top Ten Tuesday is an original meme created by The Broke and the Bookish

Top Ten Worlds We'd Never Want to Live in

1.  The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins - I love this book series, but I would sooner throw myself off a building then get killed in arena when the rest of the country watches.

2.  Matched Trilogy by Ally Condie - It's so controlled!  I need some breathing room.  Not to mention, only 100 books and 100 songs?  No thank you!

3.  Divergent Trilogy by Veronica Roth - I love the idea of sections, but hate the segregation.

4.  Freak of Nature by Julia Crane - At no point do I want to die and be forced to come back with my memories taken and sudden super-human abilities.

5.  The Giver by Lois Lowry - Come one, awesome story, really screwed up morals/world/teachings.

6.  The Program by Suzanne Young - Being an individual who needs mental health support, this is downright terrifying.

7.  Among the Hidden by Margaret Peterson Haddix - I feel like we kinda have this because of China's one child rule, but still don't like it.

8.  Room by Emma Donoghue - I know this is basically our world, but this is the ultimate dark side.  I would go crazy living in a shed for that many years.

9.  Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen - Totally would never make it in the circus business!

10.  Twilight by Stephanie Meyer - No sparkly vampires, thank you.

Review: Two Boys Kissing

Title:  Two Boys Kissing
Author:  David Levithan
Rating: 3/5

Summary:

New York Times  bestselling author David Levithan tells the based-on-true-events story of Harry and Craig, two 17-year-olds who are about to take part in a 32-hour marathon of kissing to set a new Guinness World Record—all of which is narrated by a Greek Chorus of the generation of gay men lost to AIDS. 
While the two increasingly dehydrated and sleep-deprived boys are locking lips, they become a focal point in the lives of other teen boys dealing with languishing long-term relationships, coming out, navigating gender identity, and falling deeper into the digital rabbit hole of gay hookup sites—all while the kissing former couple tries to figure out their own feelings for each other.

Review:

I have extremely mixed feelings about this book.  After reading 10 pages I was ready to put the book down and never pick it up again.  When I read the book jacket it sounded really interesting so I actually ordered it through my library system.  I started reading it and realized there were no chapters, but little breaks that separated a few very different story lines.

The story line that I was most disenchanted with (until the end when things seemed to get real) was the marathon kiss that this book centered around.  Personally, I liked the story of the blue-haired boy and pink-haired boy (of whom I cannot remember their names because I read this book a couple weeks ago).

Anyway, I obviously finished the book, but the interesting thing is that when I didn't put it down at that 10 page mark I ended up reading it in a little over 2 hours, no stopping.

So I'm not sure how to recommend this book because I'm not sure what drew me to it in the first place anymore, nor why I would read it again.

Rated: 3/5

Review: The Enchantress Returns

Title:  The Enchantress Returns
Author:  Chris Colfer
Series:  The Land of Stories [2]
Rating:  5/5


Summary:

After decades of hiding, the evil Enchantress who cursed Sleeping Beauty is back with a vengeance.

Alex and Conner Bailey have not been back to the magical Land of Stories since their adventures in The Wishing Spell ended. But one night, they learn the famed Enchantress has kidnapped their mother! Against the will of their grandmother, the twins must find their own way into the Land of Stories to rescue their mother and save the fairy tale world from the greatest threat it's ever faced.

Review:

I waited desperately for this book to come out and when it did I only got 20 pages in before I had to put it down!  It's not because I didn't like it though, it's because school refuses to let me read (did I ever mention law school is a horrible, terrible experience?  Because it is).  So anyway, I picked the book back up over my winter break and finished it as fast as I could.

Once I was allowed to pick it up I couldn't put it down!  I'm not huge on the fantasy world, but I'm a sucker for old time fairy tales and this series keeps so true to them, but with a modern spin that I love them.

At first I was apprehensive about the storyline.  Were we going to spend an entire book on another quest to create a mystical thing that may or may not exist?  Why yes actually.  That worried me immediately.  I liked the first book, and the quest and meeting all the storybook characters, but could Chris Colfer really hold my attention by doing something remarkably similar for another 500 pages?  Answer:  Yes he can.

I think I like most about this book how introspective the characters got without being obvious about it.  The characters questing, and the ones they ran into, learned life lessons (like any good fairy tale makes them do) and yet at the same time it wasn't pushed in your face repeatedly.  For example, statements like this one were peppered throughout the book:

“Anyone can have a once-upon-a-time or a happily-ever-after, but it's the journey between that makes the story worth telling.” 

So despite the fact that this is a juvenile book (i.e. located in the juvenile fiction section of the library) I would recommend it to people of [nearly] all ages.

I give it:

[Also, thank you to Little Bookworm Reviews for pointing me in the right direction to create quote boxes!  And has any fellow bloggers experienced blogger running slowly when trying to write a post lately?  It doesn't like to let me save.]