Top Ten Tuesday #18 - Books I'm Not Sure I Want To Read

Top Ten Tuesday is a Meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish where I will be picking from their top tens and attempting to reveal what my thinking is behind these choices.


Books I'm Not Even Sure I Want To Read:

1. The Casual Vacancy - JK Rowling
The Harry Potter books were a huge part of my life for a long, long time. reading an adult book by the same author would be difficult, but something so grounded in reality and politics feels completely dull to me and I have no intention of going there. On the other hand, the Robert Galbraith books look like they might be worth a read.

2. Anything by Rainbow Rowell
I have heard a lot of good things about this author's books, but I really feel like I may not like what I read. The subject matter of some of them doesn't sound like my cup of tea. I have to say, the only one I am considering is Fangirl.

3. My Sisters Keeper - Jodi Picoult
If the film doesn't make me want to see it, the book isn't going to do anything for me. I honestly don't think I would like a thing about this book. It seems to be a book that people either love or hate, and I reckon I would probably be in the hate category on this.

4. Dorothy Must Die - Danielle Paige
Mixed reviews. Very mixed. Not the best background to the book either. Still, the premise is really interesting and I'm a sucker for retellings. Most of the reviews point out that we don't actually see Dorothy for ages though, so maybe I'll pass on this one.

5. Ten Tiny Breaths - K.A Tucker
So many people like it! What if I dont? It seems to be something rather gritty and rather real, and for me too much realism makes me stop reading. Sometimes I just want to get away from the world, not be sucked into the depths of someone else's misery, whose life may be two steps away from being mine.

6. We Were Liars - E. Lockhart
Jesus, this book is so over-hyped, I'm sick of looking at the ridiculously cryptic synopsis. Still, it was 99p on kindle and I bought it nonetheless. I am still umming and ahhing over reading it though. Let's see if it's as good as people say it is.

7. Requiem - Lauren Oliver
I read the first two books, Delirium and Pandemonium, ages ago and I heard the end is a bummer.

8. Snap with the last Divergent book, so I'm not entirely sure on reading that either.

9. Reached - Ally Condie
I read Matched and Crossed so long ago that I can hardly remember the plot, only that Crossed wasn't as good.

10. Lux Series - Jennifer L. Armentrout
I am getting tons of hype... too much hype, about this series. People seem to love it but I am almost sick of seeing the covers.

Do you agree? If you don't, let me know why you think I should read the book. I'd love to hear your opinion.

Kyra_x

Divergent - Film Review

I read the book to this film a long, long time ago, and quite frankly, I like it that way. When you neglect to re-read just before you watch the film version, you tend to see it for what it is instead of nit-picking wrong or misplaced elements. I could remember the main plot but not much else, and the ending was a rather confusing jumble where I could remember how it all went down. That suited me just fine.

Divergent is a dystopian YA fiction set in a  world where people are divided into five factions, when they are a certain age, they undergo tests to discover which faction they belong in, and then they choose where they should be. Tris, out protagonist, gets inconclusive results on her test, marking her as a divergent and a threat to the way of life. She manages to place herself in the worst possible position when she opts to enter Dauntless, a free, fearless but harsh faction, where her nature could be discovered at any moment.

One thing that struck me straight away about the movie was that the explanation of the world was extremely rushed in order to get to the action, meaning that perhaps some in the audience don't fully understand the first few scenes where Tris and her brother choose other factions rather than the one they were born into. However, I don't see that as too much of an issue as you get the idea of the main factions involved as you watch the rest of the film.

Tris was acted very well by Shaliene Woodley, as her cleverness, determination and general kick-ass attitude shone through. Her range of emotions as opposed to the book weren't quite there, as in some scenes when you know Tris is terrified, she appears all too calm. A little bit of sweaty palms or twitchy fingers wouldn't have gone amiss there, though I understand that it would have been quite difficult to show her exact emotions. Four (Theo James) was pretty good too, and I think the right actor was chosen for the job sine he comes across really scary at first, and although he stays that way, his actions speak louder. The one thing that bugged me about the characters was the fact that it was very hard to differentiate between Al, Peter and ?, who all looked far too similar. Considering that Al at least was described rather differently in the book, I'd say that was a poor judgement call in order to get more good-looking boys onto the screen. Some famous faces included Kate Winslet, whose acting was fair but she didn't get much screentime, Jai Courtney, who was really cool, . while they were good, none really stuck out to me.

The depiction of the world was something that very pleasantly surprised me. everything looked extremely similar to how I envisioned it being as I was reading. Maybe the Dauntless camp could have looked a little bit more dangerous though.

As for content, the plot stayed very close to the book, and if there were any discrepancies, I never noticed. I was pleased to see one major event included that I had not expected after no-one fell to their deaths during initiation. Some elements have been left out, but honestly I felt that it lent to the overall pace of the film.

This is a very engrossing film and a really great story. It has very much spurred me on to read both Insurgent and Allegiant, which had fallen by the wayside until now. I can't wait to see what the film-makers do with the rest of the series, even though I haven't read them yet!

My Review of the Book

Divergent on Goodreads

Divergent on IMDB

Kyra_x

Wednesday Wishlist #10

Today's wishlist is all about compilations. I'm not a huge reader of short stories, so it takes me a while to get through books with lots in, but these few are books that I'm more than willing to read;

A Cat, a Hat, and a Piece of String - Joanne Harris
Another book to add to my ever-growing Joanne Harris collection. I have half a shelf of her works now, and I think I'm only missing this and Runelight in terms of fiction. I still have yet to read all of Jigs and Reels, but from what I've read so far, it's pretty good stuff!

A Cat, a Hat, and a Piece of String on Goodreads


Shards and Ashes - Melissa Marr, Kelley Armstrong et al
A series of dystopian stories, told by the likes of Veronica Roth, Margaret Stohl and Kami Garcia. This is something I am dying to have a read of due to the amazing ideas that people can come up with for dystopias. Also, the cover is brilliant.

Shards and Ashes on Goodreads


The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories - Angela Carter
I had this one recommended to me after I told a friend about my love for all things fairytale. Apparently these are fairytale retellings with dark, sinister twists. It sounds exactly like my sort of thing! It has some amazing comments of Goodreads, so I'm really looking forward to reading it.

The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories on Goodreads

Wednesday Wishlist #1

So I am trying something new starting this week. In an attempt to make my blog a bit more consistent, from now on I'll be writing this little post. Every Wednesday (hopefully) I'm going to outline things that I've discovered recently (or ages ago, there's a lot of catching up to do) and tell you lot why I need them in my life.

This week's Wishlist is all the YA series that I feel I must read;

The One - Kiera Cass

Every time I glimpse the beautiful cover on my Amazon wishlist I always think about America and the competition to win Maxon's heart. This finale is going to be brilliant, and just look at that stunning dress on the cover.. wow.

Sever - Lauren DeStefano

Again, another beautiful cover and another compelling story. Maybe I need to re-read the first two though, because my mind is coming up blank as for the end of the second. What I do remember is that the first one was beautifully told and emotionally tangible, and the last will probably, hopefully, be no different.

Insurgent and Allegiant - Veronica Roth

With the film of Divergent out right now, I should be brushing up on Tris and Four's story by reading the next two. I'm feeling rather guilty that I haven't at least read Insurgent yet, as the ending of Divergent was so sad and so shocking that at the time I immediately wanted to read on. I'm looking forward to what Roth has in store for me.

Requiem - Lauren Oliver

My fellow YA readers must all be shocked and appalled at me by now, and I wouldn't blame you. I'm not as enthralled with the Delirium series as I am by the others, but nevertheless it's on the wishlist. Sometimes you just want to know how these messed up scenarios turn out in the end.

Divergent - Veronica Roth

Tris lives in a world where you get to choose how you live your life. There are 5 factions - Amity, Abnegation, Candor, Erudite and Dauntless. Each citizen chooses theirs when they are 16. after that, they belong to that faction for the rest of their lives. But what happens if you don't slot neatly into one faction; what if you are divergent?

Dystopian fiction for teens is bang on trend at the moment, thanks to the huge success of 'The Hunger Games'. And this book doesn't disappoint, even for an adult reader. The plot isn't all that twisty and can be obvious to an adult reader, but the depiction of this interesting dystopian concept is excellent. The plot, at times, can be a little cliche - this genre and romance seem to go hand in hand - but overall it is a thrilling, fast-paced read. The events culminate to an unexpectedly huge crescendo, and I wonder how the next novel will fare after that. One possible question that may remain in the reader's mind is exactly how the world came into being. Hopefully, an explanation will be given to us in the sequel.

While the novel does not compete with 'The Hunger Games' in terms of technical skill, it has many features that make it well worth the read:-

The characters are believable, likeable and realistic to their world. This, I think, can be see very well in Roth's protagonist, but also in her other characters. For example Albert, another initiate, is torn between a crush on a girl and the will to survive the initiations (or risk being factionless and living on the edge of society). I think it is good that they don't act or think exactly as we do, otherwise they wouldn't feel right to the reader.

It also really makes you think about yourself as a person. If you were in this world, which faction would you belong to? Would you also be divergent? Or would you choose to be factionless? There are tests in the book that you can place yourself into and decide how you would fare in that world - your capacity for selflessness, or your deepest fears.

Overall, I give it a 9/10. Not perfect, but definitely getting there.

The second novel, Insurgent, comes out on hardback on the 1st May 2012.