10 March 2017

Review: Seven Days of You

Seven Days of You Seven Days of You by Cecilia Vinesse
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The best way I can describe this is Lost in Translation for the teen set. A book that celebrates the opportunity to live and study abroad, along with everything else that goes along with it, it’s both quiet and fun, exciting yet subdued.

Why, then, am I not enthused by this book?

I couldn’t tell you 100% of the reasoning why. A lot of it is that this book doesn’t feel like it has a ton in the way of stakes going for it. There was little reason for me to root for a particular outcome, and everything felt rather mapped out from the start for me. The adventures (and I use the term here in context) felt fairly subdued on a whole, and, honestly, there wasn’t a ton here for me to invest the emotional energy.

Truly, there’s perhaps an argument to be made that this is more about setting and such for the audience rather than the deep story. But I compare it to Lost in Translation in that the story is one that I remember very little about while continuing to have very strong and vivid visuals. The result is a book that, in a way, felt like a vacation I’d like to go on, just not necessarily with the people involved. A good read, but far from mind-blowing.

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Review: Agents of Dreamland

Agents of Dreamland Agents of Dreamland by CaitlĂ­n R. Kiernan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A collection of shortish chapters in a novella that’s supposed to evoke a Lovecraftian feel, but it really just didn’t do the trick for me. I didn’t go in with much of any expectations, and I just found a lot of this to be a little lacking on a whole, and then it was over. Reading an advance of it, by the time I neared the end I was actively afraid that I had picked up a sample of the book instead of a full novel.

Overall, I just felt really disappointed by the whole thing. I’m usually into everything Lovecraft, but this missed the mark.

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