At Water's Edge by S. McPherson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I received At Water's Edge free from We ♥ YA Books! and the author S. McPherson in exchange of my honest review.
"They say love can cross oceans but can it cross worlds?"
I am not much of a sci-fi reader and has been facing some difficulties getting into it, so tried out At Water's Edge as an experiment. I am happy with my decision since I am now seriously pumped about picking up more sci-fi books.
I am truly mesmerized by S.McPherson's writing. Her use of language, words, imageries has definitely touched my heart. I will be eagerly waiting for her to write more books. If you are reading this SM, please consider my request. :-)
Now coming to the plot of the book. It was fun and interesting and I was hooked on from the starting to the end though I had to read it slow due to a few work commitments. Dezaray is a not so perfect girl as she suffers from guilt due to her parent's death. She has an abusive brother at home who becomes difficult each day. She also considers herself paranoid due to these weird premonitions she has regarding weird stuff. But when one days her premonitions come true and she comes face to face with her other worldly extra terrestrial doppelgänger Lexoria, all hell break loose.
Dezaray falls into a portal and is transformed to the world of Lex which has magic, kingdoms, prince and princesses in it. She meets Milo there who shows her for the first time what love feels like. Now Lex who is left back on Earth has to adapt to Dezaray's life and pretend to be her twin. What she did not expect was to love living on Earth along with a boy named Nathaniel. But everything can't be well for a long time. A plot twist is definitely required to take the story forward. So what happens next is something that the readers have to read and find out.
The ending was nice, something I was routing for. Definitely intrigued to read the other books in the series. A good read and perfect for readers willing to try out the sci-fi genre.
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Me Before You by Jojo Moyes
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
"...I told him a story of two people. Two people who shouldn't have met, and who didn't like each other much when they did, but who found they were the only two people in the world who could possibly have understood each other."
Why is 5 stars the highest? Haven't we all heard the saying that "the sky is the limit"... This is another 10 star book for me. It is not because I am being emotional but because this book is so good.
A favourite Booktuber of mine recommended it on her channel saying that soon this book is going to be transformed into a movie starring Sam Claflin and Emilia Clarke (who doesn't love Finnick Odair and Daenerys Targareyan?) So I looked it up on Goodreads. I wouldn't lie and say that I was too intrigued to read it but after watching the trailer decided to give it a try. Thank goodness that I did so. Otherwise I would never have known such a fantastic book it is. (I tend to 'mostly' hate book-to-movie adaptations.)
This book is everything I could ever want it to be. It is humorous, satirical, witty, romantic, mysterious. Every effing thing. Both the lead characters Will Traynor and Louisa Clark are extremely witty and intelligent characters. The dialogues between them are not boring but dynamical. Two of the best characters I have ever read.
When Louisa's character was first introduced in the book and she said that there were 180 steps from her home to the bus stop I had this faint recognition in my mind of this girl being sad with her life (the usual heroines). But when I learnt more about her life I realized that she was not sad just ignorant about what the world could offer. Hell I wanted her to live. And it turned out so did her employer Will Traynor. Will's character was a very strong one but I found him to be stubborn a few times. But who am I to judge? I could never possibly imagine what his life could be like. I did not want him to die. I wanted him to live. I wanted Louisa and Will's relationship to somehow work out as it always did in some cliché romance novel. But then I realized what was the use of giving false hope to a reader when the reality was far from the truth. A piece of literature tends to become great only when it able to touch the lives of people. Not just give them a temporary satisfaction. A false hope of a happily ever after. When we know somewhere deep in our mind that is not possible.
I am still contradicted over Will's decision to die. I am hugely debated over death. A reality which I neither like to think or talk about. I know it that what Will did was not right but I also feel what he did was right. After all nobody can understand what we go through every day not even some perfect soul-mate. We come alone, fight alone, die alone. So our decisions should always involve our own priorities. I am not saying that we should not think about others. Or suicide is right. It is the most disgusting thing ever. But Will had a serious reason to consider it. Everybody felt that they wanted to hold on to him. They wanted him to survive but I know from my own experience that the pain subsides. It just does. In fact part of yourself is relaxed that it is finally over.
I liked Camilla Traynor's character. Her POV (which was unexpected) helped me to understand what is was like to be helpless. My heart goes out to her. I wish her all the best.
Me Before You just like The Fault In Our Stars (I am not even debating it) touched my heart. Even when they deal with huge topics they are books not of death but of living. As we just have one life and very very limited time.
I don't think I will read After You but I am definitely looking forward to the movie.
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Stolen: A Letter to My Captor by Lucy Christopher
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
5/5 stars. The most beautiful story I have ever read.
"Lets face it, you did steal me. But you saved my life too. And somewhere in the middle, you showed me a place so different and beautiful, I can never get it out of my mind. And I can't get you out of there either. You're stuck in my brain like my own blood vessels."
I love stories that are emotionally draining. Where the reader is unsure of her/his feelings about a character. We generally tend to see the world in terms of black and white. We see the good and the bad. The good mostly. We turn our backs to the bad until and unless it affects us. But in reality the world exists in grey, so do the people.
This story has three protagonists: Gemma the victim, Ty the abductor and Sandy the desert.
Ty is an extremely broken and vulnerable person who has been defeated by life. He does not know how to cope up with his life and tries to somehow exist but unsuccessfully until the day he meets his guardian angel: ten year old Gemma. Ty believes that meeting Gemma was a sign in his life that he had to try for himself. He could not just give up his life because he it was his turn to become the guardian angel to his saviour Gemma. Sandy, the great Australian desert was very near to Ty's heart. When everyone had turned their backs on him Sandy helped him to survive. He wanted to introduce Sandy to Gemma and show her what life could be life outside the bustling city where there was only pain and sadness. Gemma is reluctant at first because she has been kidnapped but later she realizes the significance of Sandy in their life. She starts loving Ty but is told later by her shrink after her rescue that the feeling she thought was love was nothing but Stockholm Syndrome.
I loved Gemma. She is so strong, so brave. Being a sixteen-year old she is so intelligent. She does not give in her situation. She strives to fight. There is the major contrast between her character and Ty's. Ty easily accepted defeat but Gemma does not. I am not sure of my feelings for Ty. At times I felt like punching him and at times I felt like hugging him and saying to him that everything was alright. Whatever his way may be his love for Gemma was true. But his method of expressing it wrong. I understand that he has seen enough in his life but he had no right to kidnap Gemma. Love cannot be bought and when love turns to obsession it kills the sweetness of love.
I understood that Gemma was a little unhappy in her life but her life was not that terrible that she needed saving. To be entirely uprooted from her teenager life and be taken to some place new. Gemma needed a friend, somebody to love her. Not somebody to take away her freedom. I wish that the circumstances of Ty meeting Gemma would have been different. I would have loved to see them together. Both so strong yet so vulnerable. But when I finished the book I knew I did not want them to be together. The time they spent together was one of a lifetime but of them needed their respective healing. I wanted Ty to realize his mistake and have a separate life. I did't want him to suffer. I wanted Gemma to go back to her life and this time try to find people who truly matter in life. I read on the author Lucy Christopher blog that she had built up the sequel to this book but was yet to write it. If that book truly come out I will definitely read it. I need to know what happens.
Another thing I loved about the book was the camel. How it had been shown in parallel to Gemma's life. How the camel had been stolen in the same way that Gemma had been. How it had rebelled in the beginning and later learned to love Ty. Maybe it had Stockholm Syndrome too. :p
The story is beautiful and my review can never give it justice. It is a story that will stay in my heart forever and readers need to read it to understand.
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