Danjal Jannik Tindholm
3½, rounded up to 4.
This was fine, even good in places, but nowhere as good as the first one.
I was hesitant to read this, because, even if I was frustrated with the ending of What If It's Us, I thought it was good ‘cause slight spoiler happy endings doesn't necessarily mean the characters have to end up with a specific person. It's okay to have a good life without having a partner.
I know the characters are teens, though older teens than in WIIU, but there was just too much unnecessary drama - you know the kind, 30 seconds of communication would have cleared a lot up.
It seemed like the authors wouldn't let any of the characters be left behind, so in the last 50 pages or so, EVERYTHING is tied up nicely, they all get their happy endings, yada yada. I don't mind a happy ending, but it's just too cutesy when done like this.
3½ stars.
Yes, it took a long time, but life got in the way.
The first 350 pages or so were amazing, but at that point the story began to draaaag on, and a gazillion new characters were introduced, who were hard to keep track of.
Around page 500 it started to pick up again, and that is the reason I gave it that extra ½ star.
Good, but not great.
At the beginning of the book too many side-characters are introduced, and except for two of them, they are so blandly described that you struggle to remember who is who for the rest of the book. Unless you make the characters really outstanding, not even seasoned writers with decades of books' worth can make it work - even Stephen King has been guilty of this in later years.
I didn't feel as much for the characters as I did with “They Both Die at the End” or “History is All You Left Me”. Of course, this is Silvera's first book, so some rough edges are to be expected.
And now to the twist ...
SPOILER
When we a little more than halfway through the book learn that Aaron actually had the procedure at Leteo, I felt cheated. To me it was a cheap twist that just seemed like an afterthought. It made it all more confusing and made me doubt how much of the rest of the book was real or false memories or whatever. Overall the whole Leteo thing actually didn't sit well with me.
All in all, worth a read, but don't expect anything groundbreaking.
Stupid book.
Don't get me wrong, it was damn near perfect, but it made me cry. A lot. I mean, I should have seen it coming, what with it dealing with death and grief and losing your first love.
It's an easy, but deeply profound and touching read, and sometimes I was almost afraid to continue because the hurt was so real, so relatable.
Right.
My next read has to be something funny or silly.
Well, that took a while, didn't it?
As you can see it took me about forever to finish this, so I need to come clean: I rarely watch crime movies or series, and haven't read a whole lot of crime in my life; same with war, whether it's WWII, Vietnam, civil wars, or whatever. Those are just topics that don't interest me, and those are mostly what this book is about. Again, King is a good writer, but the subjects are just blah to me.
At the halfway point it got a little better, not much though, and there were a few instances where the story seemed to be picking up, only for it to be bogged down again.
Also, in the first half of the book there were so many characters introduced that I lost track of who was who. That got better around the halfway point, too, but there'd still been too many characters with no real bearing on the story.
So, 1½ stars, rounded up to 2.
Rounded up from 3½ stars.
Full disclosure: I am not really into fantasy, but this was recommended to me, so I gave it a go. I mean, you need to widen your horizons right? So far in my life the only fantasy books I have read are The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King, and The Neverending Story by Michael Ende, and must admit I love them both.
This one ... while cute and feel goody, it was ... safe. I was never bored and there was some funny stuff in it, but you were never really in any doubt that it would have a happy ending. Quirky characters meet Harry Potter meet X-Men, was the feeling I got. And for me it took half the book to become somewhat interesting.
Again, wasn't bored, I don't regret reading it, but it didn't make me want to read more fantasy.
Also, I was not quite sure who the democraphic is. It's written like a YA book, and there ARE kids in it, but the main character is a man in his 40s.
It was good, but the first half was much better than the second, which is why I deducted one star. In the start you weren't really sure if there was some supernatural stuff/magical realism going on, but it turns out that there's a rather contrived, Scooby Doo-ish reason for it all.
Well-written, but not quite sure if I'm gonna read the next three installments.
2½ stars.
Maybe I expected too much; I expected more balls to the walls horror as in some of his novels, but it was mostly a lot of interesting ideas with VERY ambiguous endings. I didn't really get a lot of the endings - or, as a matter of fact, a lot of what the stories wanted to say.
There was only one or two stories I really liked.
Such an awesome idea. Alas...
Some of the questions I couldn't directly find answers to, so I let them slide.
On one page a question # 277 is missing, and when you turn to the answers page for that entry, question 277 is answered with what was question 278.
Several places in the book a word is cut in the mid
dle without a hyphen. Makes some questions harder to read.
One question is how many sequels An American Werewolf in Paris had, and the “answer” is 2, even though “ ... in Paris” IS the sequel, and there were no more movies after that.
The answers for questions 741 and 742 are switched.
The Descent is NOT based on the book of the same title by Jeff Long, although the premise is similar.
And so on and so forth... I counted at least 30 mistakes.
A shame, ‘cause it's such a great idea with this book, but it just sours one's enjoyment of it.
Amazing story.
It's a story about shattered dreams, hope, heartbreak, new love, death, and ultimately life.
I think tears were streaming down my face for every fourth or fifth page, there is so much truth and poignancy in this nocel taht everyone, no matter age and orientation can find something of themselves.
Atlantis/Hearts in Atlantis er både en roman og fem fortællinger.
Den første (og bedste og længste) fortælling, handler om den 11-årige Bobby Garfield der i 1960 møder den meget ældre Ted Brautigan, der beder Bobby om at holde øje med de lumpne mænd, der er på jagt efter Ted.
Næste fortælling foregår i 1966 på et universitet, hvor en stor del af de studerende bliver afhængige af at spille Hjerterfri. Bobby Garfields barndomsveninde Carol spiller en mindre, men væsentlig, del i denne historie.
Tredje fortælling foregår i 1983 og handler om en af de drenge der som barn mobbede Bobby og Carol. Han lever i skyggen af sin tid i Vietnam, og foregiver at være blind, for at tigge penge i New York.
Fjerde fortælling foregår i 1999 og omhandler en af Bobbys barndomsvenner, Sully-John, der også lever i skyggen af Vietnam-krigen, og de tanker om skyld og død han gør sig efter en af hans soldaterkammeraters begravelse - en del af personerne fra de foregående fortællinger dukker også op i denne.
Femte fortælling foregår også i 1999, og Bobby kommer tilbage til sin barndomsby, hvor han ikke har været i næsten 40 år, for at få fred med fortidens drømme og håb.
Jeg tror, at denne roman er meget personlig for King; den fortæller om en helt almindelig barndom, samtidig med, at han prøver at forstå Vietnamkrigen.
Gys er der intet af, men der er en smule forbindelse til The Dark Tower-sagaen, så fans af denne vil måske også få et kick ud af at læse den.
Boy, this took a while.
I'm not a slow reader, but this book is, sadly, not very interesting. It took 100 pages before anything remotely interesting happened, and after that there were pages and pages and pages of boring bureaucracy with only very few instances of action.
Compared to other King books, this wasn't particularly well-written and had too much filler.
Funny and sweet, but almost TOO cute.
Yes, my eyes teared up here and there, and yes, there was a lot of poignant stuff in it, but still I felt some of the characters to be too much of a cliché, like the romantic, but two-timing French guy, the near-predatory rock singer, and the shy, soft artist.
One extra star, though, because I thought I had figured out who Sam would end up with, but it took a bit of an unexpected turn.
Worth a read.