Review: Allegiant

Title:  Allegiant
Author:  Veronica Roth
Series:  Divergent [3]
Rating: 4/5

Summary:

The faction-based society that Tris Prior once believed in is shattered—fractured by violence and power struggles and scarred by loss and betrayal. So when offered a chance to explore the world past the limits she’s known, Tris is ready. Perhaps beyond the fence, she and Tobias will find a simple new life together, free from complicated lies, tangled loyalties, and painful memories. 
But Tris’s new reality is even more alarming than the one she left behind. Old discoveries are quickly rendered meaningless. Explosive new truths change the hearts of those she loves. And once again, Tris must battle to comprehend the complexities of human nature—and of herself—while facing impossible choices about courage, allegiance, sacrifice, and love. 

Review:

For those of you who remember, I had the countdown ticker for this book on this blog for at least a month before it was released, and at least a month after it released.  I bought it early and started it the day it came out, then put it down for almost 4 months.  It lost my attention and school grabbed my free time.  FINALLY though, I finished it, just a couple weeks ago.

For those who haven't read this book or haven't read either of the others (and don't want spoilers) turn back now and go read one of my other fun posts, the spoiling will begin after the picture.

^My thoughts exactly, and yes at the end I ended up almost crying in public.  This is why you don't read emotional books in public!  Except I didn't expect it to be emotional, I expected it to be predictable with a quasi-happy ending like every other book series with a "hero."

I'm not going to say I loved Tris and wish she hadn't have died, because really I liked her, and she was a good person, but she was human and definitely shouldn't have been impervious to everything, highly divergent or not.

I did like her death in a way because it made a piece of dystopian fiction more real.  The characters weren't superheros and they weren't super human.  And even though Tobias was amazing, he wasn't divergent like everyone thought, and he went through an identity crisis because of it!

Biggest problem I faced in this book was that I didn't remember who everyone was by the time I reached this book because I had read the other two back when Insurgent came out.  I could have looked up the characters, sure, but I don't do that.

I loved the paradoxes and life questions that seemed to face the reader at every turn, even if we didn't realize it.  For example:

“Knowledge is power. Power to do evil...or power to do good. Power itself is not evil. So knowledge itself is not evil.” 

It gives you life questions and a lot of their lives were about making choices where they seemingly had none.  I'm sure I'm not the only one who has felt like that.

I just... I liked this book, not as much as the first two, but I love the direction it took.  I like that I didn't predict the end, and I liked that it incorporated human nature in "our world" back into the equation.

What do you guys think?  I give it:

Comic Books [Part 2]

Comic books I read:

I'm back!  With more comic book awesomeness.  Sorry for the long wait, but life is crazy!  And not the fun kind of crazy where aliens invade and superheros come save you.

Anyway, I started reading "comic books" as Manga, and my favorite two series were/are:

                                  Godchild by Kaori Yuki             Rurouni Kenshin by Nobuhiro Watsuki

That was mainly in high school, though I still read what I have left of my collection from time to time.

Last year, again thanks to my friend Lita, I started buying American comic books.  I keep up with a number of them, including:

• Black Widow
• Empire of the Dead
• Loki, Agent of Asgard
• Ms. Marvel
• Winter Solider
• Wolverine

I also have miscellaneous volumes of Hawkeye, but I'm behind in the series and don't have the money to catch up.  Those volumes come out surprisingly fast.

I went from 100+ manga, to less than 50, but in the last 5 months I'm up to roughly 20+ comic books.  We now know where all my "fun money" goes.

Do you read any comics?

Review: The Devil's Arithmetic

Title: The Devil's Arithmetic
Author: Jane Yolen
Rating: 4/5

Summary:

This critically acclaimed novel by award-winning author Jane Yolen is now available in a beautifully designed new edition. Hannah dreads going to her family's Passover Seder—she's tired of hearing her relatives talk about the past. But when she opens the front door to symbolically welcome the prophet Elijah, she's transported to a Polish village in the year 1942, where she becomes caught up in the tragedy of the time. "Readers will come away with a sense of tragic history that both disturbs and compels." 

Review:

I have a thing for Holocaust books.  I and I definitely have a thing for people who refuse to acknowledge the Holocaust so I really liked this book if only for those two reasons.  I get (sorta) how Hannah is sick of remembering her past, especially when she sees it just as a boring religious ritual that is only enjoyed by the adults.  I love the time she spent in the past and how it wasn't just a dream.

However, I hated spending most of the book with her questioning everything as a dream (and me thinking it was an alcohol-induced hallucination/collapse), and then telling the people how right she was.  I hate when people are like that, thinking they are all knowing.

Once her memories faded though I love how she found her inner strength and then the book was all neatly, satisfyingly wrapped up in the end.

I'm normally extremely sad at the end of Holocaust books, this time I was relieved/happy/content.  It was odd.  I highly recommend the read though (then again, when do I post a review and not recommend the book?  Maybe I should try that some day)

Top Ten Tuesday [10]

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

It's my 10th Top Ten Tuesday!  That's so exciting for me!

[Top Ten] Items on My Bookish Bucket List

• Own my very own library (in a my very own house) and have it completely organized
  
  
  
• Read at least 10 classics in the next 10 or 15 years (so far I've only read Shakespeare in school and that doesn't count)
  
• Get a book published, and not only independently published, but picked up by a real publisher and marketed
  
• Own 1st editions of the British copies of the Harry Potter books
  
• Keep this book blog going for at least a couple years (with semi-regular posting)
  
• Re-read some of the books I hated reading in high school (maybe I'll like them more now)
  
• Own more than 500 books (something tells me I'm halfway there already)
  
• Travel to somewhere that I've visited only in a book
  
• Design my own cover art to a book, hopefully my own book
  
• Actually start reading books of the NY Times Bestseller list (that I read for that purpose only)

Comic books [Part 1]

Usually I avoid talking about my love of comic books (and manga in the past) because people are like Nerd Alert!  But I'm breaking my silence!  I am a comic book lover, I go to comic-cons, I watch the movies.  And I have a need, a mighty need, to share my love.

I'm going to break this post up into a series of four posts.  Because if I didn't this post would be so long I would loose you all pretty quickly with my nerd ramblings.  Also, disregarding manga for the sake of this post series and focusing on American comic books (mostly Marvel).  If anyone wants a post about manga, let me know!

Now, I'll map out the posts:

[1] My descent into the world

[2] Comic books I read

[3] The Marvel movies

[4] Characters and actors

I know it's a book blog, but I can't do this series without the movies and the actors.

My Descent:

How I got into The Marvel Universe:  my good friend (bad financial influence) Lita.  She convinced me to watch Thor, then The Avengers, and I've been hooked ever since.  The funny thing is that my descent into the world only took a month before I was going to my first comic-con.  For the con she made an amazing Lady Loki costume while I made a half-assed Captain America one.  It was an epic day.

It began with a basic love for the movies, but I leaped into the con with vigor and bought a handful of old comics which I quickly fell in love with.  I quickly realized how far the avengers/marvel universe reached and realized that The Walking Dead was also involved in comics and cosplay.  I have been a fan of The Walking Dead since season 2-ish.

Anyway, it was a quick descent, like I said.  I went from not watching action movies that weren't horror or cop related to re-watching Iron Man 6 times and The Avengers about 15 times in two months.  Since then I have collected about 20 comics and I'm planning my costume for my next con in April.

So my current favorite comic:

Black Widow

(I'm also going to try to cosplay her in the next con)