Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Books 48 and 49

Day 42:

So I got a little lazy yesterday and was too tired and sick to write about my book when it was done, so I'll write about it now, as well as the one I finished today. I began another book and am currently in the middle of it, but it's 3am and I probably won't finish it until tomorrow. I'm finally feeling a bit better which helps a lot. It's really hard to make yourself read when really all you want to do is sleep and rest. I know that I need to read during the week though because I don't usually have time on the weekends, the exact opposite of most other people in the world I'm sure.

Book 48: Janie Face to Face



Author: Caroline B. Cooney
Genre: Young Adult, Mystery
Pages: 352
Series: Yes, 5 of 5
Purchased or Borrowed: Borrowed from the library
Date Read: February 10, 2013

3 stars
This is the conclusion to the Janie series, about a girl who realizes that she was kidnapped after seeing her own face on a missing child ad on a milk carton. Her real name was Jennie and she was abducted from a mall by a woman named Hannah who then decided to pass her off as her own child and dump her on her parents. The girl now known as Janie was raised unsuspectingly by the Johnsons, and now in this novel the little girl has grown up and is now 20 years old. She has had a difficult time trying to incorporate both of her families and become herself away from the kidnapping. This becomes even more challenge as they find out that a famous author is making a true crime story about her kidnapping. But then comes happy news, Janie is getting married to the boy next door, but hidden in the background still is Hannah, who is ready to spoil it and take back everything she believes is hers.

So, it has been a longgg time since I started reading the books in this series. Sometimes it is nice to come back to old characters that you've enjoyed, while other times you realize it has just been too long. In this novel's case, it was kind of nice, but it felt a little under done. I think that I wouldn't have noticed the writing nearly as much when I was younger than I do now. It was a nice conclusion to the series, but it just felt like it took too long for the author to make this choice, and then once she did, it wasn't great.


Book 49: The Madman's Daughter



Author: Megan Shepherd
Genre: Young Adult, Historical Fiction, Fantasy, Horror (this book falls under a lot of genres and makes it difficult to categorize)
Pages: 432
Series: Yes, book 1 of 3 (books 2 and 3 aren't yet released, and this book is a new release)
Date Read: February 11, 2013

4 stars
Juliet Moreau is a 16 year old girl who is having a tough life in London after the disgrace and departure of her father six years earlier, an acclaimed surgeon who was accused of conducting gruesome experiments. She suspects him dead, but then finds his assistant Montgomery alive in London and that he has been continuing his experiments on a remote tropical island and is determined to go back with him. She travels with Montgomery and a castaway named Edward, both of whom she feels drawn to, only to arrive to see the true depths her father has gone to in the name of science. He has experimented on animals so that they now resemble, speak, and behave like humans, but now one of them has gone rogue and has begun killing the others. Juliet knows she needs to end the experiments and escape, but who will she trust and how will she make it out of this madness?

This book, based on the novel, The Island of Dr. Moreau (which I just added to my to read list) was a fascinating departure of historical fiction as well as the lack of boundaries regarding scientific ethics. It seemed such a fascinating concept to me, and so different from other things that I have read. I find it difficult to describe, but I really liked this book. After reading, it seemed to me that this novel would be a stand alone title, only do I come to find that it will be a trilogy. The next book will be based on Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, which will be interesting though because I read it for this challenge already.

Now back to book 50 for a little bit before I go to bed :)

xo,
Erin

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