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Review also posted The Wandering Fangirl.
I'm not sure what it is about the YA dystopian trend right now, but I love reading all the novels I can find, no matter the content. Good or bad, I try to get my hands on them. The great ones (such as [b:The Hunger Games|2767052|The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)|Suzanne Collins|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1293504845s/2767052.jpg|2792775], which is what everyone is aiming for right) know how to create a terrifying, if believable, future, and how to make us connect to the characters as they navigate their worlds. The bad ones focus on boring romances and love triangles and shoehorn the plot in. Then there are the novels like Wither, which fall somewhere in between.
I will forgive a novel or TV show a lot if the world building is fantastic. There's nothing I love more than a new world to explore. I love reading how things got the way they did, I love experiencing new societies. I love maps. Holy crap, do I love maps. But I digress. I'll also forgive a novel a lot if the characterization is great, or I'm drawn into a world despite it all.
Wither's world building falls apart if you think about it too hard. This great review highlights everything I found wrong with it -- from the gene therapy to the class discrepancies, the details don't make sense when you add them up, and if it weren't for the writing and character work, I would have abandoned this after a hundred pages in.
Thankfully, Lauren DeStefano's writing cloaks you in our heroine Rhine's world the way the rest of the world is cloaked from those living in the house of her new polyamorous husband. Seeing everything through her captive eyes and her heart makes the book bearable, even makes it good, because DeStefano has a beautiful way with words. Rhine is fully believable, from her unwillingness to fall for her new life to the occasional bouts of sympathy she may have for Linden, her husband. Her longing for the twin brother she misses and her new attachments to her sister-wives -- the quiet, older Jenna and the eager Cecily -- are written well. And, for once, I didn't mind the inevitable love triangle. It's treated as more like a building friendship, which makes me roll about in glee. So many dystopian romances are built on the boy simply being wrong for the girl, and while Gabriel, one of the house servants, is taboo for Rhine, he's a friend first.
Wither is a breath of fresh air in a crowded genre, and I'm looking forward to the second book.
I'm not sure what it is about the YA dystopian trend right now, but I love reading all the novels I can find, no matter the content. Good or bad, I try to get my hands on them. The great ones (such as [b:The Hunger Games|2767052|The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1)|Suzanne Collins|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1293504845s/2767052.jpg|2792775], which is what everyone is aiming for right) know how to create a terrifying, if believable, future, and how to make us connect to the characters as they navigate their worlds. The bad ones focus on boring romances and love triangles and shoehorn the plot in. Then there are the novels like Wither, which fall somewhere in between.
I will forgive a novel or TV show a lot if the world building is fantastic. There's nothing I love more than a new world to explore. I love reading how things got the way they did, I love experiencing new societies. I love maps. Holy crap, do I love maps. But I digress. I'll also forgive a novel a lot if the characterization is great, or I'm drawn into a world despite it all.
Wither's world building falls apart if you think about it too hard. This great review highlights everything I found wrong with it -- from the gene therapy to the class discrepancies, the details don't make sense when you add them up, and if it weren't for the writing and character work, I would have abandoned this after a hundred pages in.
Thankfully, Lauren DeStefano's writing cloaks you in our heroine Rhine's world the way the rest of the world is cloaked from those living in the house of her new polyamorous husband. Seeing everything through her captive eyes and her heart makes the book bearable, even makes it good, because DeStefano has a beautiful way with words. Rhine is fully believable, from her unwillingness to fall for her new life to the occasional bouts of sympathy she may have for Linden, her husband. Her longing for the twin brother she misses and her new attachments to her sister-wives -- the quiet, older Jenna and the eager Cecily -- are written well. And, for once, I didn't mind the inevitable love triangle. It's treated as more like a building friendship, which makes me roll about in glee. So many dystopian romances are built on the boy simply being wrong for the girl, and while Gabriel, one of the house servants, is taboo for Rhine, he's a friend first.
Wither is a breath of fresh air in a crowded genre, and I'm looking forward to the second book.
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Also posted at The Wandering Fangirl.
ALL THE DYSTOPIAN YA EVERRRRR.
This is a little different from my usual fare, in that it focuses on a young boy trapped in a hellish maze with other boys, and romance is non-existent. Thomas is new, and we learn of the world of the Glade and the maze through his eyes.
What works for this book is that it throws us straight into the mystery without trying to build up a true dystopian future. Hints and guesses are all we get of the world outside the maze, and we spend the entire time learning its terrifying secrets with Thomas. And holy crap, is this book terrifying in parts. Dashner doesn't skimp on the horror, creating half robot, half slug-like creatures that patrol the maze every night and kill every kid who gets stuck outside the Glade. I was genuinely creeped out at the description of them, and the tension only gets worse as the book goes on into the epic end.
However, most of the characters other than Thomas are very thinly drawn. There were only about five boys we really get to know, and I still have no real idea of who they were except for Thomas's friend Chuck. As for the girl, she shows up, is a catalyst, and things happen.
That's pretty much all The Maze Runner is, but I think Dashner has an amazing hand at driving up tension and creating such a terrifying, mindless villains that it overshadows the major lack of characterization for the supporting cast.
And the cliffhanger was excruciating. Totally checking out book two, The Scorch Trials, once I have time to fit it into my reading schedule.
ALL THE DYSTOPIAN YA EVERRRRR.
This is a little different from my usual fare, in that it focuses on a young boy trapped in a hellish maze with other boys, and romance is non-existent. Thomas is new, and we learn of the world of the Glade and the maze through his eyes.
What works for this book is that it throws us straight into the mystery without trying to build up a true dystopian future. Hints and guesses are all we get of the world outside the maze, and we spend the entire time learning its terrifying secrets with Thomas. And holy crap, is this book terrifying in parts. Dashner doesn't skimp on the horror, creating half robot, half slug-like creatures that patrol the maze every night and kill every kid who gets stuck outside the Glade. I was genuinely creeped out at the description of them, and the tension only gets worse as the book goes on into the epic end.
However, most of the characters other than Thomas are very thinly drawn. There were only about five boys we really get to know, and I still have no real idea of who they were except for Thomas's friend Chuck. As for the girl, she shows up, is a catalyst, and things happen.
That's pretty much all The Maze Runner is, but I think Dashner has an amazing hand at driving up tension and creating such a terrifying, mindless villains that it overshadows the major lack of characterization for the supporting cast.
And the cliffhanger was excruciating. Totally checking out book two, The Scorch Trials, once I have time to fit it into my reading schedule.
