YA Reviews

INCARNATE
BY
JODI MEADOWS
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Ana is new. For thousands of years in Range, a million souls have been reincarnated over and over, keeping their memories and experiences from previous lifetimes. When Ana was born, another soul vanished, and no one knows why.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
This book had a little of everything. Dragons and sylph and action and romance and it was all so very good! Right, so,  this is a world inhabited by a million souls. These souls are reincarnated over and over and they remember all their previous lives, at least most of them, since they have lived for so long that is not really possible to remember everything. And then, Ana is born. She is not a reincarnated soul, she is new, and people are afraid of her.
Ana has lived in near isolation with her mother, who never misses an opportunity to remind Ana of the soul that had to die for her to live. Yet, despite her mother's abuse, Ana grows inquisitive and strong. Afraid of her mother, but not afraid to do things.
Ana embarks on a quest to find out why she was born, and she meets Sam, who saves her life and is the first person to show Ana kindness.
I found the ending a little weird, it was hard to understand what was going on. It definitely let me with lots of question and eager to read the next installment (which I will buy as soon as I have money).
I loved this story so very much, it was full of longing and the first few chapter had me in near tears. I loved how Ana was a very vulnerable character, yet strong enough to be curious and try new things.
Sam was patient and calm and strong and brought Ana out of her shell little by little, showing her there was more  to the world than just what her mother let her see.
This is a book you definitely want to read.


BREATHE
BY
SARAH CROSSAN
A glass dome houses the survivors of the Switch, the period when oxygen levels plunged and the green world withered. A state lottery meant a lucky few won safety, while the rest suffocated in the thin air. Now Alina, Quinn and Bea are leaving the dome, walking straight into the heart of danger. They have only two days' worth of oxygen on their tanks. What will happen on the third day?
I loved the whole concept of the book. A world where you have to pay for the very air you breathe. A world where babies are tied to their beds to keep them from moving around much, therefore consuming more oxygen, a world where you need to buy oxygen tanks if you want to exercise, a world without trees.
The story is told in three different points of view. Alina ( who is part of the resistance, a group of rebels who want to restore air to the Earth's atmosphere), Bea who wants to move up in society and her best friend Quinn, who is part of the top members of society. The three of them embark on a journey outside of the dome, looking for other members of the resistance and the truth behind the politics of the dome.
I got into this story very quickly, the way the world is set up is very subtle and given to you trough action rather than words. The characters are very likable and flawed, very real. To me, Alina was the easiest to like. She is very focused and determined, she believes in the cause. Quinn is the son of very rich people, he cares very deeply for his best friend ( Bea) and does everything he can to help her. Bea was the one I liked less. And now that I think on it, she is very much like me. She follows the rules. She knows that things in their society are not perfect, but feels like there isn't a thing she can do about it and so she does nothing. She only wants Quinn to like her back.
This book is action packed and the romance is very subtle. This is one book I highly recommend.








NOBODY
by
Jennifer Lynn Barnes
 
 
 
There are people in his world whoa re Nobody. No one sees them. No one notices them. They live their lives under the radar, forgotten as soon as you turn away.
That's why they make the perfect assassins.
The institute finds these people when they're young and takes them away for training. But an untrained Nobody is a threat to their organization. And threats must be eliminated.
Sixteen-year-old Claire has been invisible her whole life, missed the Institute's monitoring. But now they've ID'ed her, he can't make the hit. It's as if Claire and Nix are the only people in their world for each other. And they are- because no one else notices them.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Wow, I don't even know where to start with this one. Jennifer Lynn Barnes is  one of my favorite authors, I absolutely adored her Raised by Wolves series and Every Other Day. But this story completely sailed over my head.
The story tells us about Nix and Claire, two people that exist in, what seems to be, another metaphysical plane. People barely notices their existence and when they do, people forget about them immediately. Claire's parents even have to tape a note in the door to their house so they can remember they even have a daughter. As for Nix, he has been trained since infancy to be an assassin.
I had a terrible time connecting to the characters. Claire has had a very sad life, but she has "trained" herself to imagine herself someplace- somewhere else every time someone ignores her. And I think that is what threw me off so much from the story and the characters. Every time Claire starts to feel bad, she imagines these situations to distance herself emotionally and it did the same to me.
As for Nix, he has always done (killed) what the Institute tell him to do. Until Claire. When he meets Claire he feels a pull so strong towards her, that he can't bring himself to kill her. But to me, the jump from hate to care was just too fast, too strong, too unbelievable. I didn't feel the chemistry in their relationship.
However, there is something to be said in the fact that I couldn't give up on this book. I just had to know what happened. The premise of the book was just too interesting, to me, to not learn what becomes of the characters.
In the end, I'm sad to say that I wouldn't recommend this book. But I definitely recommend the author. Go buy the other books by Jennifer Lynn Barnes, specially her Raised by Wolves Series.
 
 

 


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