Deanna

I've had a hard time getting into magical realism in the past, but the YA format definitely helped to make this accessible. The writing is lush and beautiful, but that beauty seemed to soften the emotional climaxes of the book. There's depth to the ending, but I'm not sure the plot leading up to it adequately built that depth. That said, I did enjoy this book overall.

A book club read that I wasn't all that interested in, but ended up immensely enjoying. It's filled with anger, frustration, humor, and empathy and I devoured it.

This book was a slog for me and felt like the plot didn't begin until about 200 pages in. However, the issues touched upon in the book provided interesting and insightful discussions for our book club.

At almost double the length, Authority loses most of the eerie drive that made me devour Annihilation. It regained the feeling somewhat at the end, but for the most part, this book felt mired in small details.

Gave up after 4.5 stories. The titular story had promise, but I found the others tedious and boring.

I went back and forth in my enjoyment of the book, although it was interesting to read something set in the Aztec Empire. I sometimes found her word choice and descriptions simplistic, which felt jarring against the complexity of the world she had built and would therefore pull me out of the novel. The characters lacked depth for me, and so the emotional highs and lows the author wrote for them didn't register for me as intended.

I loved being back in the Old Kingdom with Lirael, but the climax seemed to happen far too quickly and the romantic plot line felt unnecessary.

Highly readable and engrossing. I could have done without the chapters about his family life - they didn't add anything to the story for me.

I had a very hard time getting into this book. I ended up enjoying the story within a story (Cyrah's story), but had to slog through the beginning and the end

Captivating, beautiful, and heartbreaking.

Twilight meets The Craft. I'll give it some points for the ending not going how I thought it would, but the protagonist is so secretive and melodramatic that it was hard to feel anything for her.

It was a cute, quick read.

Interesting and very accessible.

Felicia Day has a funny, conversational voice that works well for both her humorous and serious stories. An easy, fun, and insightful read.

An interesting read over all. I feel conflicted about the character of Evey and her almost blind acceptance of some of V's methods and convictions. I wish that she had been older and more questioning, as I think that could have enhanced the story.

The lesson from this is to check the page count before you request a book of short stories. I only read 19 of the 99 stories in this collection. Bradbury is at his best, for me, when he builds a sense of dread and ends up hitting you in the face at the end. My favorites were “The Night”, “The Million-Year Picnic”, “The Veldt”, and “A Sound of Thunder”. And the award for the most wtf story definitely goes to “The Small Assassin”. That one messed me up.

It got a little clich?? at times at the end, but overall really enjoyed the book.

I really enjoyed the first two books in this series. They were engaging and the pacing of the story really pulled me along nicely and made me devour the books. This last book was still very well done and I enjoyed it overall, but it felt mired in details. The photos that accompany the first two books made sense and added the story, where as in this book I felt that they oftentimes, at the beginning especially, did not help to progress the story and were just there because the author felt he needed to use a photo since it is a hallmark of the series. The action picks up towards the end and drew me in for the last 150 pages, but the previous 300 pages were slow going at times.

Truly captivating. I didn't want to put it down.

I really enjoyed this collection of short stories, for the most part. Each story also included a note from the author discussing which short story they drew their inspiration from and what that story and its themes meant to them, which was really interesting to read.

My out and out favorites from the collection were Neil Gaiman's “The Sleeper and the Spindle” and Holly Black's “Millcara”. I also enjoyed Melissa Marr's “Awakened” and Kami Garcia's “The Soul Collector”, but grew to appreciate them more upon reading the author's notes on the stories and their inspirations (Marr's linking selkies to feminism and Garcia's linking the themes in “Rumpelstiltskin” to the damage done by drugs and violence in inner cities).

Pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed the book and how amusing I found it (I don't remember finding Bloodsucking Fiends that great or funny). Teenage goth girl and “vampyre” wannabe, Abby Normal, was by far my favorite and most hilarious character.

I wasn't able to really get into the book until the end. The climax of the story is gripping and tense (once I started the last few chapters, I had to finish it), but the end ultimately felt rushed.

I really wanted to like this book, but I was bored for most of the stories. I was impressed by the wide range of cultural stories told throughout the book, but many came across as an oral tradition that didn't transfer well into print. The art is all over the place, but I do think that, for the most part, it fit with the style of the story being told.

A bit all over the place, but a fun read.

Definitely went in with too-high expectations. The book, while sometimes providing a fun glimpse back in to the Old Kingdom, suffered from slow pacing. Having finished the book, I understand the character of Clariel more, but while reading it was hard to feel anything for Clariel since she is so distant. I think her story could have more interesting aspects to it, but this origins story unfortunately did not provide any of the excitement that Sabriel or Lirael hold for me.