eloise_bradbooks's Reviews (801)

I think this may be my favourite PJO book.
It's still just as fun and easy to read as ever, Percy is so naively adorable and yet so strong and brave, Annabeth is simply the best, jealous, ambitious and always so smart, together they are perfect. Although they are not even together yet. Yet. Knowing all of that, I even really like Rachel, it's great to see 'mortals' tag along with demigod quests. And of course Nico. I'd forgotten how much he was present in this one and I love him more and more every day.

Such a great end to an amazing series of books.
I cried and I' not even sure why (I'm an emotional wreck when it comes to fictional characters). It felt so good re-reading them, revisiting my favourite characters and reliving these adventures with them.
I think the only way to not fall into a "i can't stand my life rn now I miss them so much" is just to go through the Heroes of Olympus again. So Here. I. Come.

THIS REVIEW IS IN FRENCH AND IN ENGLISH.

FR : 4.5 / 5 - J'adore tellement Percy Jackson.
Bien que ce n'est pas le meilleur de la série, le livre reste rempli d'humour, on s'amuse en le lisant et on ne s'ennuie jamais. Ne pas voir beaucoup de Grover ne m'a pas dérangé parce que ça a permis à Percy et Annabeth de solidifier leur amitié, et ... oh mes dieux ... qu'est-ce que j'adore leur relation.

EN : 4.5 / 5 - I love Percy Jackson & The Olympians so much.
Even though this isn't the best book in the series, it's still filled with humour, reading it is just fun and you're never bored. Not seeing as much Grover didn't bother me really as it allowed Percy and Annabeth friendship to solidify, and ... Oh my gods ... do I LOVE their relationship.

PERCABETH FOREVER.

Let me start by saying that these poems are so visually pleasing. Beautiful to read/look-at.

The first part, The Cosmos, was my favourite. I have a thing for stars. The night sky. Constellations. The fact that we are made of stardust. I love that so much and finding those themes in poetry was wonderful, even though some ideas I found a little repetitive.
The other parts didn't grab me as much. The poems were nice, but I couldn't find myself in many of them (I blame my lack of relationship history).
Not until the last part, Heal, anyway. That one was beautiful again.
But the whole book is a bundle of positivity and fight for self love. And that is great.

That is what I have come to understand about poetry (I'm still new to this genre).
It's all very relative. Each person finds themselves in different poems, we are touched in different ways because we have different experiences and so no poem is wrong or right, it is how it personally makes you feel that counts.
Just because this book of poetry didn't reflect my soul for the most part, it doesn't mean it won't be the mirror you are looking for.

My feelings are all over the place after that epilogue.
I really feel like I'm part of the five boroughs family now and I want all of them to be happy. Ray and David included.
Michael and Nunzio though!!!!!! I know this book isn't centered around them but their parts gave me chills and tears and I am soooo in love with their love.
Can't wait to get my hands on the next five boroughs book and see what other characters Hassel is going to make me adore.

I have such strong emotions reading In The Company Of Shadows. Every time.
This book has over 1000 pages and I couldn't put it down.
Hsin Vega and Boyd Beaulieu have ripped my heart out and run away with it.

These trained spies and assassins are so complex and developed in ways that can be so difficult to read sometimes. Their lives are tough, and it was awful to see that I was even convinced that distance between them would be a good idea. They feel so much for each other. And I feel so much for them. It was difficult to read so much of what was going on inside a mentally ill "disturbed-monstrous assassin who doesn't care" when clearly... he does.
The world they're in is awful for them but brilliantly and gradually developed for us. It continues to be intriguing even as new elements are added in every book.

Do I wish the authors had made a director's cut like they had for the first book? yeah. probably. It was a long book. Lots of internal monologues, thinking about stuff. But getting inside their heads so much is also what makes us care about them on such an outstanding level.

I was so worried about them, still continue to be. Hopefully, after I've recovered my heart and emotions from this super long and heavy book, I'll continue on with the series and all will be good. Fingers crossed.

This book was definitely not what I expected... at I kinda liked it? Mostly?

It's a NA romance with a whole lot of love and a whole lot more of angst. This is due to the fact that we follow two men who fall in love, however one of them is an alien Prince who can't stay on Earth because of political reasons.

So at first we get the friendship, then the love, and that part was absolutely adorable. I love the characters and also recognized myself in certain things - I completely got that alien feeling (socially inept, hello!).

THEN we get to discover more about Harry, his planet and their culture, which was also interesting.
However...
1. It was quickly explained, in order to understand the problems we were faced with but then move back to the relationship aspect. I found the information interesting but too easily given away - could be more developed maybe?
2. Harry's planet seems to include the perfect cultural norms and laws that especially create the angstiest issues between Harry and Adam.

I do like reading angst, don't get me wrong, and political intrigue too. But the political intrigue here seemed to have been conceived in the author's mind just so we could have the angst between the boys? And I'm not sure I like that idea...

Anyway, even though a couple more things bugged me here and there, I can't help but be amazed at how much I was into this story. I read it in almost one sitting and found it adorable and heartwarming most of the time.
It's a nice short book to read when you're searching for an uplifting sweet romance.

3.5-4 /5. It feels like an interesting start to what could be a brilliant story. I can't wait to get into it more.

Maybe it's me still not used to comics, but I found this one's layout to be a little too much for my eyes at times. Maybe it was the mixture of the aquarelle type of drawing, the predominant white in certain pages I didn't like so much, and the fact that there was a lot of info, visual and verbal, on every single page.
But I think all of that is a matter of taste so shouldn't be regarded with too much weight.

3.5 /5
Again, I'm loving the story. And waiting for something big to happen.

The world is really interesting and some of the characters also are. Tim21 is a precious bean that needs protecting, Telsa could be a great one, that new character I was awaiting since the first volume could also be great, big robot and dog robot and blue guy accompanying them are cool too. I don't care about the others though, sorry.

I'm also still struggling with the amount of graphics on each page. Just like any story could feel rushed, here it feels like they can't afford to take time to tell the story, give us pretty views to look at. With a world like this, times of serenity with pretty robotic or space visuals could be really nice, no?
The cover for this volume, just like the cover for the first volume, is beautiful. I was expecting these kind of visuals to be part of the story too...

This is a powerful book, well deserving of the hype and praise it's getting.

It deals with serious issues (police brutality, systemic racism, gang violence, social classes etc) that need to be talked about. And it's great to see it in a YA book.

Furthermore, I was pleased to see that even the aspects of this book that aren't directly linked to those "serious topics" (friends, family, love, teenage life) were absolutely brilliant too! I love the characters and the relationships they have with each other.

It's a story of family and friendship and of people coming together and doing what's right, despite the consequences.