ocie's Reviews (413)

Magnus is up against his greatest challenge yet—to stop the Viking warship Naglfar from sailing and bringing about Ragnorök. He and his pals will need a whetstone and a flask of mead (don’t ask why). They’ll face giants, deities, even a dragon (but mostly giants) on their quest. Plenty of mischief awaits in this latest MC adventure, so strap in!
I’ll be honest, I didn’t like this third MC adventure as well as the first two. There’s the usual amount of snark, which is great for those of us who live and breathe sarcasm. It’s the usual quest situation—go here to get this object so that you can go there and get that object, so that you can save the world. Maybe I’ve just read enough of those types of books. I mean, I love all the Norse stuff (it’s my heritage, after all), and Rick’s description of Norway is amazing, but like I said, it’s pretty much the same formula he uses for most of his books.
That aside, the details of the book are what made me give it 4 stars. When you stop looking at the big picture and focus on the details of the book, you get a lot more out of it. I love that pretty much all the characters get their own spotlight, so we can learn a bit more about each of them. I mean, they all get to share a bit of their history, and that’s something I’ve always wondered about (especially with Halfborn Gunderson). I love reading about the secondary characters. The more rounded they are, the better the book, in my opinion. I also enjoyed the sticky situations they got themselves into and how they got out. My favorite was probably when they got captured by Ægir’s daughters. They all managed to talk themselves out of getting killed until the very end (when they actually had to do some fighting).
One of the best things about this book is the sprinkling of mythology throughout the story. I mean, I know Rick does this with all his books, but when it’s a lot more interesting when it involves my ancestor’s mythology. That makes it more personal. I love Rick for staying true to the mythology.
That’s about it, I know it’s a short review, but that’s really all my thoughts on this book. Skål, mates.
-RCK

The Dreadful Tale of Prosper Redding has all the elements of a Junior Fiction novel. Prosper is 12 years old, doesn't quite fit in at school, and has a talent he's embarrassed to talk about.
And yet there are elements that are (in my opinion) a little mature for the age group.
there is a demon trapped inside Prosper, a malevolent being who wants to trick Prosper into selling his soul.
Ad the story goes on, it is revealed that Prosper's ancestor, Honor, made a deal with the Demon so that his family would be successful, but also that his rival's family would suffer.
Only Honor broke the contract, and now the demon is out for revenge.
So Prosper has roughly 2 weeks to figure out how to get rid of the demon and banish him so that he can't ruin (and perhaps kill) his family.
The Book is mostly serious, but it has some humor to it such as Alastor, the 800 year old demon, having difficulty adjusting to the modern world. It's almost endearing. It's hard not to like him, actually.
Actually, pretty much throughout the whole book I found myself hoping Al would redeem himself somehow. Aside from him calling Prosper "Maggot" all the time, he's actually a pretty likable character.
There were only a few characters I didn't like, but those were the bad guys, so that was OK.
All in all this book kept me interested all the way to the end. It was hard to put down. The writing style is great, and the plot twist at the end is epic.

This book was published in 1996. But with all the issues it deals with, I thought it was more recent. It's about a middle schooler who slowly realizes that he's a bully and that the vegetarian Quaker he and his friends bully is actually a really good kid. I thought his development was excellent. It really felt like I was inside the mind of a 7th grade football player. The PG version, that is.
Issues this book addresses include bullying, Different worldviews, environmentalism, Working class (and making ends meet), and just the very slightest touch on LGBT.

I got this book as a donation to the library. It looked interesting so I picked it up.
It starts off kind of slow, and I wasn't really into it at first. In fact, I think the only thing that kept me reading it was the jump between Simon in the modern world and the circus in the past.
But things started to pick up when Simon discovers that his mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother all committed suicide in the same way, on the same day (different years). So then there's this race to figure out what's going on and how to stop it because the anniversary date is approaching and his sister Enola is acting weird.
The Book kind of strings you along, revealing only a few clues at a time, so that while I wasn't TOO invested in it, I had to keep reading to see what would happen next.
I kind of had a suspicion about the ending (it's a spoiler so I won't reveal it) and though it turned out to be true, it still made for a really good ending.
I'm glad I picked this book up.
4/5 stars

My thoughts on The Antagonists: Book One by Burgandi Rakoska

I'm going to come right out and say that I did not like the writing style of this book. However, the story itself was absolutely amazing. So amazing, in fact that it made me forget my annoyance with the writing style. There are few books that have that effect on me.
First of all, there is the fact that the superheroes are secretly villains. we've seen a little bit of this before, but I, for one, have never heard a story where the proclaimed "superheroes" are actually working their own agenda and are really vile (not including politicians).
The back-and-forth between Victor and Minnie was great. In an age where people tend to love the bad guy, having a "villain" who actually IS worthy of being loved is refreshing. The part I liked the most was near the beginning. Minnie and Victor both want to break into a hospital to steal an envelope. At this point they are enemies, but they decide to team up to get the envelope.
I will say one thing about the writing style. At times it seems like it's written for 4th-6th grade, and at other times it seems like it's written for high school. That is the only thing that annoyed me.
I don't have much else to say about this book. It's a great story and I can't wait to read book two.
4/5 stars, would recommend to anyone who likes magic, superheroes, and underdog stories.

Ruth Ware's previous book, The Woman in Cabin 10, was one of the best books I read in 2016. It was thrilling, it kept me guessing, and I couldn't put it down. So I was very excited to finally get The Lying Game. Unfortunately Ware's latest work fell sadly short of my expectations.
Right from the beginning there is a mystery. I found myself reading as fast as I could because there are so many burning questions that I just NEEDED answered. But by the end of the first part of the book I had pretty much guessed all the answers. And aside from one plot twist at the end, I was right.
In addition to being too predictable, there is a lack of climax to the whole story. I mean, there is a fire at the end, but it doesn't really solve much. Throughout the book the problems and conflicts are treated as high-stress, with the question of "how are they ever going to fix this???" But in the end they're just... brushed away, as if they never mattered in the first place.
I'm not going to say this book was a waste of time. It was kind of entertaining for the few days I spent reading it, but by the last few chapters I was just reading to get it over with.
If you pick this book up, maybe you won't be able to guess what's going to happen. Every reader is different. If you can't predict what's going to happen, you'll probably like it.