Book Review: Hunted

Release Date: March 14, 2017
Author: Meagan Spooner
Publisher: HarperTeen
Length: 384 pages
Source: Purchased Book/Library Audiobook

Beauty knows the Beast’s forest in her bones—and in her blood. Though she grew up with the city’s highest aristocrats, far from her father’s old lodge, she knows that the forest holds secrets and that her father is the only hunter who’s ever come close to discovering them.

So when her father loses his fortune and moves Yeva and her sisters back to the outskirts of town, Yeva is secretly relieved. Out in the wilderness, there’s no pressure to make idle chatter with vapid baronessas…or to submit to marrying a wealthy gentleman. But Yeva’s father’s misfortune may have cost him his mind, and when he goes missing in the woods, Yeva sets her sights on one prey: the creature he’d been obsessively tracking just before his disappearance.

Deaf to her sisters’ protests, Yeva hunts this strange Beast back into his own territory—a cursed valley, a ruined castle, and a world of creatures that Yeva’s only heard about in fairy tales. A world that can bring her ruin or salvation. Who will survive: the Beauty, or the Beast?

    

Review:

Protagonist: When Yeva's father loses his fortune in a venture ransacked by bandits, they and Yeva's sisters have to move to their father's old hunting cabin at the edge of the woods. Yeva feels happier there than in the city and hopes to go hunting with her father, but he urges her not to follow him. When he doesn't come back from one trip, Yeva follows him into the woods and discovers the horrors of the woods, including a monster who has trapped her. On the whole, I like Yeva, she's a headstrong and capable protagonist, she knows how to take care of herself and hunt, and she doesn't back down when challenged. Still, I do wish that I cared about her more, I mean, like I said I like her, but there was something holding me back from truly connecting with her as a character and I wish I knew what that was but unfortunately I don't, still as I've repeated already she's a great character, I just couldn't connect for some reason.

Romance: The romance in this book is a slow burning one, at least for Yeva, the Prince trapped in the Beast softens to Yeva rather quickly. Much like with the protagonist, there isn't anything about the romance that I don't like, it's slow burning and I can tell that the two characters truly grow to care and love each other and that love feels earned, but unfortunately, I couldn't connect with the romance very well. It may be because I couldn't connect with Yeva, but I wanted to love this romance, and in some aspects I do, but emotionally I could never get invested in the romance, try as I might.

World Building: This is one place this book truly shines. As many of you may know, my favorite fairy tale, and thus my favorite retelling fodder, is Beauty and the Beast, and I've never seen one set in Russia or based on Russian folklore before and I really enjoyed how this author wove those folktale elements into this story. I think this story takes place in a version of our world, though I'm not quite sure as I don't think it was said where this story takes place, only some mentions of real places every now and then. Still, the valley of enchantments that the Beast is cursed to, feels lush and beautiful full of creatures of all sorts, some I'd never heard of before. While the retelling itself had some unique qualities to it, unfortunately, it read as a very simple Beauty and the Beast retelling and while I loved the Russian folklore elements to the story, I wish there was something more unique about the retelling itself.

Predictability: As this is a retelling, pretty much everything in this story is predictable, save a few things but they are small and I mostly didn't predict them due to not remembering certain parts of the story from before. I mean, every major twist in this story was completely obvious, I really wish that the author had kept some secrets to herself because the foreshadowing in this tale is very obvious.

Ending: So, the end of this tale really serves to drive home the "lesson" of this story. It tries so hard to drive that lesson home that there are aspects to this tale that sort of crumble just to serve this supposed lesson. Don't get me wrong, I like the lesson and it does fit with this story, but I felt the message was very heavy-handed at the end of this tale. There is an epilogue to this tale that while appreciated, isn't really needed, and that's coming from me who loves epilogues.

Rating:

While I did enjoy this tale, I, unfortunately, couldn't connect with the characters and story as much as I wanted to and while I love Beauty and the Beast retellings, this one was, unfortunately, despite the interesting Russian folklore elements, rather basic in its story structure.

Book Review: Unearthed (Unearthed #1)

Release Date: January 9, 2017
Authors: Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Length: 336 pages
Source: Purchased Australian Edition

When Earth intercepts a message from a long-extinct alien race, it seems like the solution the planet has been waiting for. The Undying's advanced technology has the potential to undo environmental damage and turn lives around, and Gaia, their former home planet, is a treasure trove waiting to be uncovered.

For Jules Addison and his fellow scholars, the discovery of an alien culture offers unprecedented opportunity for study... as long as scavengers like Amelia Radcliffe don't loot everything first. Mia and Jules' different reasons for smuggling themselves onto Gaia put them immediately at odds, but after escaping a dangerous confrontation with other scavvers, they form a fragile alliance.

In order to penetrate the Undying temple and reach the tech and information hidden within, the two must decode the ancient race's secrets and survive their traps. But the more they learn about the Undying, the more their presence in the temple seems to be part of a grand design that could spell the end of the human race...

    

Review:

Protagonists: Mia and Jules find themselves on Gaia for very different reasons, Jules wants to study the lost civilization of the planet and Mia wants to scavenge it for all it's worth. These two characters collide in a fantastic way that really shows off just how well they work together. As the story moves forward we learn more about each character and why they decided to take a rather illegal trip to a mostly unexplored planet. I loved these characters so much, Mia is a serious firecracker who will put you in your place while Jules is a strict academic who's spent nearly his whole life dreaming of Gaia. These characters are fantastic separate from one another, but it's when they work together that they truly shine.

Romance: It's almost immediately clear from the moment they meet that Mia and Jules are attracted to one another, in fact, if I had to say anything bad about the romance in this book it would be that the attraction between the two was brought up a little too often and felt a bit heavy-handed at times. That doesn't, however, affect their chemistry in any way. These characters fit together in a way that's really hard to describe. While I've shipped my fair share of YA couples, there's something about this couple that sets them apart, a sense of rightness in their relationship, both before and after it becomes romantic. While the attraction between the two is clear from nearly the beginning, this is a rather slow burning romance as the secrets these two characters hide could very well tear them apart.

World Building: So, when I first read that this was comparable to Indiana Jones meets Lara Croft in space, I have to say I was almost instantly hooked. Now I've never really seen an Indiana Jones/Lara Croft style team up before, but if there's another one out there somewhere I'd love to see/read it because it seems so perfect after reading this story. I mean, I can't believe no one's thought about it before (maybe they have and I just don't know about it) because once things get going in this story they don't really stop. The Sci-Fi element to this story is amazing, a dying Earth in need of a miracle and a distant planet that just may hold the key to humanity's survival, it was incredible. I loved learning about the alien race on this planet and seeing how they would test the beings who received their call. These authors do suspense like no one else and there were many times throughout this story where I was genuinely worried about our protagonists and they narrate the freaking story.

Predictability: I feel that the perfect book is one that you can both solve some of the puzzles to while being completely caught off guard by fantastic twists and turns. This is one such story, or at least it was for me. If you know how to pick through foreshadowing, then one of the biggest twists of this book will be very apparent to you, that in no way means you shouldn't read this book, in fact, it's that reveal that even though I figured it out, still sent me reeling. Plus, there are all sorts of other twists this story has to offer. There was one twist in particular that had next to no foreshadowing, but utterly blew me away with how much it made sense once revealed. This book will take you on a wild ride, that's for sure.

Ending: So, going into this I expected a more or less standalone story, thinking that this was similar to the Starbound trilogy by the same authors and that the next installment would be a companion novel following the same threads that this story did. However, this is the first installment in a duology that from everything I can tell will have the same narrators and that completely changes how I went into the end of this story. The final climax is a high adrenaline and suspenseful ride that ends with a cliffhanger so crazy, that it just might make sense.

Rating:

Even with being a little heavy handed with the attraction between our two main characters, this story didn't fail to delight, entertain, and thrill. I can't wait until the next and final installment releases so I can figure out what will happen to these characters.