Looking For a Good Book

In my early days of requesting books for review I didn’t pay much attention to whether or not a book was a later part of a series – which has often been frustrating. Ignite, by Sara B. Larson, is the second book in her Defy series. A series I haven’t read prior to this.

Alexa is dedicated to Damian who has been newly crowned as King of his realm.  Alexa vows to guard him and to help him rebuild his territory (known as Antion). But a new threat to Damian and Antion arises and Alexa suspects that it’s not as clear-cut as it might seem on the surface. She needs proof of her theory however, which might leave Damian alone and undefended. To complicate matters, Alexa is in love with Damian but she doesn’t want him to know or it might negatively affect their professional relationship.

My basic reaction while reading this was that there was nothing here that felt particularly original.  Bearing in mind that this book is more than five years old now, perhaps it was slightly more original when it first was published.

What we have is a strong young woman, good with some old-fashioned fighting (notice the bow and arrow on the cover?), who must be a leader and must be tough even when under extreme adversity. But she’s also feminine, with longings for a particular man. It’s classic YA fantasy in the age of Hunger Games – capitalizing on a specific character type and some general fantasy world-building.

And that’s really what this boils down to, for me. This felt like something I’ve read before. On multiple occasions. I didn’t find too much new here, but if I had read this book before any number of other YA fantasies, then perhaps this would be the one to stand out. It was a fine read, but I suspect I won’t remember much about it this time next year.

Looking for a good book? Ignite, by Sara B. Larson is the second book in her Defy series, and if you like YA fantasy with strong young girls who won’t admit they’re in love with the lead male in the book, then you’ll enjoy this.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.

* * * * * *

Ignite

author: Sara B. Larson

series: Defy #2

publisher: Scholastic Press

ISBN: 0545644747

hardcover, 304 pages

Elsa is a scriptologist. With a specific pen and a certain notebook, a scriptologist can create new worlds and expand on existing worlds. But those worlds exist between the covers of the notebooks and when some of the books are damaged, it could mean the destruction of the worlds.

Elsa comes from a scripted world – a world that her mother, a respected scriptologist herself, is constantly writing and expanding. But when Elsa’s mother is kidnapped and the very existence of her world is threatened, Elsa realizes that she will have to call on her own talents, cross into the ‘real’ world, and find some friends to help save her world.

I absolutely loved this concept. Author Gwendolyn Clare drops us into this wondrous world right off the bat and we are quickly introduced to magic of scriptology and the dangers inherent in a world made from paper and ink. The development of the dangers proceeds nicely and this story is very well told.

The problem I had was with the characters.

Elsa, as the main protagonist, has some depth to her, but she’s pretty innocent and relatively gullible, but part of this might be to appeal to a specific YA audience, and I hope we’ll some growth in this area as the series develops.

The rest of the characters in the book are mostly dull figures used to move the plot forward but don’t come off as very real. Leo, Elsa’s love interest, is about as two-dimensional as the words on a sciptologist’s page. And because he’s flat, the romance that is suggested seems more a distraction from the story than an interesting plot or character development.

I started off liking this a lot but the further in I got the more ambivalent I became toward the story, because of the characters.

Looking for a good book? Ink, Iron, and Glass by Gwendolyn Clare is a YA fantasy with a great, clever premise, but the characters don’t live up to the world created for them.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

* * * * * *

Ink, Iron, and Glass

author: Gwendolyn Clare

series: Ink, Iron, and Glass #1

publisher: Imprint

ISBN: 1250112761

hardcover, 336 pages