Review: Take Me There by Carolee Dean

Title: Take Me There
Author: Carolee Dean
Release Date: July 2010
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Length: 327

Source: Publisher
Format: ARC

Dylan has a bad-boy past and a criminal record. He knows that rich, beautiful Jess is way too good for him—but she has always been the one person who sees through his tough exterior and straight to his heart, and he has been hopelessly in love with her from the first time they met. He would change his life for a chance with her.

But trouble follows Dylan wherever he goes, and a deadly mistake soon forces him to hit the road and leave his dreams behind. He’s on the run and in search of answers—answers to questions he wishes he’d never asked.

Ok, so I admit I thought this was going to be a fluffy, verging on dull/predictable/ordinary story.

Wrong.

Wrong wrong wrong.

This book was deep, powerful, emotional, and tugged on my heartstrings like so few books have. The narrator, Dylan, had a strong and believable voice, and even though he has made some stupid choices, I couldn't help but find some way to identify with him and his struggles. And who doesn't love a bad boy who writes poetry?

Part mystery, part love story, part self discovery, this book is unlike any other book I've read. It made me appreciate the things my parents sacrifice for me, and what they sacrifice for each other. Carolee wrote with determination and that shone through her characters and her plot.

Please do yourself a favor and read this book. It has the power to change you in a way you don't quite understand.

1. Characters 20/20
2. Writing 20/20
3. Plot 21/20
4. Accurate YA voice 20/20
5. Cover 9/10
6. Title 9/10

Overall score: 99 or A

Review: Birth Marked by Caragh M. O'Brien

Title: Birth Marked
Author: Caragh M. O'Brien
Release Date: March 2010
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Length: 362 pages
Format: ARC

Summary (from Goodreads):

After climate change, on the north shore of Unlake Superior, a dystopian world is divided between those who live inside the wall, and those, like sixteen-year-old midwife Gaia Stone, who live outside. It’s Gaia’s job to “advance” a quota of infants from poverty into the walled Enclave, until the night one agonized mother objects, and Gaia’s parents are arrested.

Badly scarred since childhood, Gaia is a strong, resourceful loner who begins to question her society. As Gaia’s efforts to save her parents take her within the wall, she herself is arrested and imprisoned.

Fraught with difficult moral choices and rich with intricate layers of codes, BIRTHMARKED explores a colorful, cruel, eerily familiar world where one girl can make all the difference, and a real hero makes her own moral code.

Review:

I had a lot of trouble with this book in the beginning. I was so bored the first 50 pages. Painfully bored, and I wasn't a fan of the writing either. Technically, nothing was wrong with the writing, but it felt so... thick, for lack of a better word. I felt like I had to trudge through it since it did not flow well for me.

But then.

The story took off for me. The writing improved, the story got going, I fell in love with Gaia, with Capt. Grey, the story line-- everything. I was intrigued by the world, similar yet so different from our own, and how smart the book was. It involved genetic codes, DNA, all this scientific stuff that I hate in real life, but somehow O'Brien made it work for me. Made it interesting and compelling for me. I was flipping through the pages, unable to read fast enough, unable to figure out or guess how the story would end.

Gaia was an extremely strong female character, something that is not common in today's teen market. If she wanted to accomplish something-- like save her parents, deliver a 9 month baby whose mother had just been executed-- she went out and did it. She did not let any one, not even the government manipulate her own beliefs. Gaia had a backbone. She was a hero, not only to the characters in the book, but to me as well.

And I think there might be a sequel, judging by how open the ending of the story was. Any one know??

Grading:

1. Characters: 20/20
2. Writing 18/20
3. Plot 20/20
4. Originality 20/20
5. Cover 9/10
6. Title 10/10

Overall score: 97 or A