Zero at the Bone

Title: Zero at the Bone

Author: Jane Seville

Rating: 3.5 stars

Genre: Romance, Thriller

Number of Pages: 293

Publisher: Kindle

Publication Date: 2009

Summary: After witnessing a mob hit, surgeon Jack Francisco is put into protective custody to keep him safe until he can testify,

A hitman known only as D is blackmailed into killing Jack, but when he tracks him down, his weary conscience won't allow him to murder an innocent man.

Finding in each other an unlikely ally, Jack and D are soon on the run from shadowy enemies. Forced to work together to survive, the two men forge a bond that ripens into unexpected passion. Jack sees the wounded soul beneath D's cold, detached exterior, and D finds in Jack the person can help him reclaim the man he once was.

As the day of Jack's testimony approaches, he and D find themselves not only fighting for their lives...but also fighting for their future. A future together.

TBR Challenge: For March my TBR challenge was to read a book that was based on a characters emotional development.

Before I begin writing this review I think it would be first a good idea to start off by saying that I spent a good part of February in a reading slump, and as a result, said reading slump may affect my overall perspective and rating on this book.

I picked up this book for two reasons. First I wanted a book that wasn't particularly long, was probably action packed and it met the requirements of my TBR Challenge. When I find myself in a reading slump, I have found that a good way of getting out is to read a book that is fairly short and always has something happening. This book was, however, not quite what I was expecting.

For a book that was about hit men, witness protection and being on the run, this book was pretty lacking in the action. A good half of this book was simply waiting around for something to happen, and then waiting some more. Granted you can't have a book just filled with one fight straight after the other, you need to break them up, but this book was spread out for miles; and when you finally got a fight scene, it was over in a page or two. This would have been fine if something was happening in between but even the romance in the story was very slow due to the fact that D as a character is extraordinarily emotional dead inside.

I really didn't like the character of D. When I say he is emotional dead, I seriously mean it. D might have a moral compass that points north and does direct him in life, but he also lacks the most basic things that makes someone human. A character as emotional dead as D makes him difficult to relate and sympathise with him. This was all especially apparent when you compare him to Jack. Jack was full of life, wanted to know about everything and in comparison to D, Jack was the poster child of humanity.

D took a long time to develop as a character, and even at the end still came across as being quite emotionally dead. It is not until we are well into the second half of this book that we really begin to see him change and begin to live and the epilogue was a good indicator that he hasn't really grown so much as he has grown when it comes to Jack.

My second problem with D was his speech. D spoke like he was highly unintelligent and I really found this hard to accept when he was a man that ran on strategy as a survival mechanism. While I get that the way he talked was probably a way of bringing more depth to D, helping to show that there was more to him. I found myself thinking that Jane Saville was trying to write the worst character possible so she could more easily show that he will grow and develop. But that is just my opinion and based on the high reviews on goodreads I get the impression I stand alone in many of opinions of this book.

Despite the fact that I seem to have only written negative things about the book in this review, I did enjoy the book. The fact that I was in a reading slump and actually finished the book in a couple days shows this pretty well. 

Soundless

Title: Soundless

Author: Richelle Mead

Rating: 3.5 stars

Genre: Young Adult Fantasy

Number of Pages: 266

Publication Date: 2015

Publisher: Penguin

Summary: For as long as Fei can remember, no one in her village has been able to hear. Rocky terrain and frequent avalanches make it impossible  to the village, so Fei and her people are at the mercy of a zipline that carries food up the treacherous cliffs from Beiguo, a mysterious faraway kingdom.

When villagers begin to lose their sight, delivers from the zipline shrink. Many go hungry. Fei and all the people she loves are plunged into crisis, with nothing to look forward to but darkness and starvation.

Until one night, Fei is awoken by a searing noise. Sound becomes her weapon.

She sets out to uncover what's happened to her and to fight the dangers threatening her village. A handsome miner with a revolutionary spirit accompanies Fei on her quest, bringing with him new risks and the possibility of romance. They embark on a majestic journey from the peak of their jagged mountain village to the valley of Beiguo, where a startling truth will change their lives.

I read this book in one sitting, it was a quick, easy and light read of a very different and unique story. Three things in particular stood out about this book.

The first thing that I absolutely loved about this book was how Richelle Mead got around the fact that none of the characters could hear anything. We rely so greatly on sound and writing a book that is filled with people who cannot even fathom what sound is, takes some true talent. As you are reading and Fei gets her hearing back you feel as if you too are experiencing what sounds are for the first time. I was also amazed at how Richelle Mead described sounds. It's not easy to describe the sound something makes when we you can't use words associated with sound to describe it but Richelle creates a seamless way around this.

Another thing I loved about this book was the Chinese folk tale aspect. It is this folk tale aspect that brings the fantasy to the book. But if your not a big fantasy fan that's ok because this book isn't fantasy focused. Unfortunately this is one of things I also disliked about the book. I absolutely loved the Chinese folk tale idea and I would loved to have known more about it. Because of how short this book is, much of the story is told in the here and now. This meant that we only got the fantasy aspect at the end of the book when it was actually happening and didn't get much of a prelude or information in the beginning.

My final point about this book is the characters. Like with the fantasy aspect of this story much of the who the characters were was left untold due to happening outside the actual storyline. This I could understand because of how short the story was but I would like to have seen more character development that was directly tied into the plot events. Both Fei and Li Wei are strong characters who are spurred into action because it is called of them but this is who the characters are already. While they learn more about the outside world and lose some of their naive perspectives, this doesn't so much change them as educate them. But then perhaps that is the point, not everyone changes and grows from every event in their lives. 

Shatter Me

Title: Shatter Me
Series: Shatter Me Trilogy - book 1
Author: Tahereh Mafi
Rating: 3.5
Genre: Young Adult, Dystopia, Fantasy/ Sci-fi
Number of Pages: 338
Publication Date:November 2011
Publisher: Harper Collins
Summary (from the back of book): Juliette hasn't touched anyone in exactly 264 days. The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette's touch is fatal. As long as she doesn't hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don't fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong colour. The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war - and the Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she's exactly what they need right now. Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior.

The first thing I want to mention is the writing style of this book. You are either going to love it or hate it. Personally I found all the metaphors and crossed out to words, especially in the beginning of the book, difficult to get the flow of. It was a bit too stop and start for me. However, I do understand that this style of writing is essential for the book. Through writing from Juliette's perspective this style of writing provides an incredibly detailed line of sight in Juliette's mind. And the lack of stability that she is experiencing.

The second half of this book is a lot better than the first half, in fact the first quarter of the book almost made me put it down. For the first part of this book I was a little confused as to what was going on, especially the role of Adam and Warner. While I understand that Juliette is confused and therefore so is the reader, at times this caused the story to lack enough insight to hold my attention.

This next part will be a bit spoilery, so if you haven't read the book yet, divert your gaze:

The relationship between Adam and Juliette and even Warner's feelings for Juliette, leave me mildly annoyed and unhappy. To me, I found them both to be quite forced. The relationship between Adam and Juliette happens too fast, it almost insta-love. And I hate insta-love. While later in the book it is established that Juliette and Adam not only know each other from the past, but have always loved each other, this was not developed enough for me, and not developed early enough, for me to loose this feeling of insta-love. At first I questioned whether I had missed a page or two.

The potential for a relationship between Warner and Juliette was also something I struggled with. It is only now as I read the novella following the first book where I have gotten any idea of where a potential relationship between the two stems from. It is only near the end of Shatter Me that it is really hinted at that Warner has been following Juliette's live with interest, border lining obsession. And it is only in the novella that it actually becomes clear what Warner is thinking.

Once again I'm not sure if this is because Juliette thinks this way, so as a reader, so do I (after all, a larger proportion of this book is her internal monologue)...or if the relationships she has with these two boys is just something I find lacking. I will be persevering with this series as I have heard many people claim that the rest of the series is a lot better than the first book. I also feel that Shatter Me is a book you almost need to re-read once you get a better understanding of the series to fully appreciate it. The premise of this book really interests me as well and I am interested it seeing how the Reestablishment side of this series plays out.