Tour Stop (Review): Perfected - Kate Jarvik Birch

Perfected - Kate Jarvik Birch

Release Date: 07/01/14

Publisher: Entangled Teen

Synopsis (from Goodreads):

Perfection comes at a price.

As soon as the government passed legislation allowing humans to be genetically engineered and sold as pets, the rich and powerful rushed to own beautiful girls like Ella. Trained from birth to be graceful, demure, and above all, perfect, these “family companions” enter their masters’ homes prepared to live a life of idle luxury.

Ella is happy with her new role as playmate for a congressman’s bubbly young daughter, but she doesn’t expect Penn, the congressman’s handsome and rebellious son. He’s the only person who sees beyond the perfect exterior to the girl within. Falling for him goes against every rule she knows…and the freedom she finds with him is intoxicating.

But when Ella is kidnapped and thrust into the dark underworld lurking beneath her pampered life, she’s faced with an unthinkable choice. Because the only thing more dangerous than staying with Penn’s family is leaving…and if she’s unsuccessful, she’ll face a fate far worse than death.

For fans of Keira Cass’s Selection series and Lauren DeStefano’s Chemical Garden series, Perfected is a chilling look at what it means to be human, and a stunning celebration of the power of love to set us free, wrapped in a glamorous—and dangerous—bow.

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Review:
Ella is perfect; trained to be poised and elegant, to speak politely, to behave impeccably and to look stunning at all times. She is the perfect pet until one day she realises that she wants things she is not allowed to have.

Let's start with the characters. For a fairly short book, all of the main characters were extremely well-developed. I simply adored Ruby, and loved how the perceptions of characters like the congressman, his wife and Penn changed over time. Ella and Penn were both drawn beautifully with rounded ideals, loves, hates and dreams that neither of them were meant to have. This is truly a story about embracing every part of you and being happy in your flaws, but it is also a story about going out and getting what you want, no matter what others might say or think. Ella could have easily been a Mary-Sue, but thank God for her incredible naivety to begin with, then her confusion and indecision later in the book.

The themes running through this book are really interesting, and they were the ideas that made me want to host this tour in the first place; cloning and possession of humans. It is strange to think that others could think less of someone due to their status as a clone, as if they aren't real people. Of course they are! Aren't twins technically clones? As a twin myself, I can honestly say that I do not feel as if I have half of me missing; I am as much a whole as the next person. Anyway, the possession aspect really makes you think. Once upon a time animals were wild too, and we tamed them, interbred them and owned them. Is this a barbaric practice? It feels like it is barbaric to own another human being; it brings back thoughts of slavery and makes you remember that not everyone does have freedom. It is nice to see someone addressing these ideas in a western setting, because many westerners do not realise that slavery is something that still goes on today. Trafficking, the sex trade, forced marriage, child labour and bonded labour are all modern forms of slavery that still need to be abolished.

There were a few flaws within this read, the largest one being that some of the plot twists were very obvious. I found that I knew why the previous pet left the house pretty much as soon as the first hint was read, very near the beginning of the book, and this was only confirmed at the end. Maybe to a YA reader, this may not be so obvious, though, and if anything it reinforces Ellas naivety.

An engrossing read about forbidden love and ownership with a truly heartbreaking ending, putting me in mind of Wither and The Handmaid's Tale. If there is a second book, I will definitely be keeping an eye out!

Author Bio:
Kate Jarvik Birch is a visual artist, author, playwright, daydreamer, and professional procrastinator. As a child, she wanted to grow up to be either a unicorn or mermaid. Luckily, being a writer turned out to be just as magical. Her essays and short stories have been published in literary journals including Indiana Review and Saint Ann’s Review. She lives in Salt Lake City, Utah with her husband and three kids. To learn more visit www.katejarvikbirch.com


Author Links: http://www.katejarvikbirch.com/ 
http://www.twitter.com/katejarvikbirch
https://www.facebook.com/katejarvikbirchbooks

Thank you to Entangled Teen, Kate Jarvik Birch and YA Bound Book Tours for this opportunity.

Perfected Blog Tour
Blog Tour Organized by: YA Bound Book Tours

Kyra_x

Top Ten Tuesday #5 - Stunning Cover Designs

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.

I can't simply stop at 10 books, because there are way too many brilliant cover designs to choose from. Instead, here is a list of my favourite 20 in absolutely no order. They all pretty much peak for themselves in terms of how they're awesome, but if you disagree or think I've missed something out, don' hesitate to comment!

Angelfall - Susan Ee  ---  Cress - Marissa Meyer  ---  Wither - Lauren Destefano

Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch  ---  Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell  ---  Sweetly - Jackson Pearce

The Book of Lost Things - John Connolly  ---  Enchanted - Alethea Kontis  ---  Coral and Bone - Tiffany Daune

 

The Night Circus - Erin Morgenstern  ---  Some Quiet Place - Kelsey Sutton  ---  Dance of Shadows - Yelena Black

Gospel of Loki - Joanne Harris  ---  Matched - Ally Condie  ---  These Broken Stars - Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner

Splintered/Unhinged - A.G. Howard

The Selection - Kiera Cass

The thing about teen reads is that once you pick them up, it's so fun and quick to read them. This one was finished in 6 hours. Not 6 hours flat, there was an overnight break in the middle. It got put down very reluctantly at 2 in the morning. Anyway...

The Selection is a countrywide competition full of beautiful girls vying for the love/crown of Prince Maxon, the heir to the throne. America Singer is one of those girls. The problem? She's already in love with someone else. And it's about to get even more complicated.

The story is great, if a little obvious for an adult reader. But that's what makes it a great. It's light-hearted, funny and lovely. You don't have to think too much about it, you just read and it whizzes by.

This book is very reminiscent of Wither, by Lauren DeStefano, in the way that both main characters feel trapped in a 'gilded cage' and have extremely mixed feelings. The closeness of other women vying for the same young man and the sense of sisterhood the reader gets is also very like it.

It also picks up on the recent dystopian idea of reality television - a world where you are chosen for something, and people watch your every move. However, this is nothing like The Hunger Games.
This book is a delight to read. The characters are lively and likeable. Their conversations are hilarious; you find yourself laughing out loud. And America, the protagonist, is relateable. We've all been through what she's going through, only on a less grand stage.

This is a pretty short review, because saying much more will ruin the plot for those of you who are interested in reading it. So without further ado it gets 5 out of 5 stars and applause. I can't wait to get started on the next in the series, The Elite, which comes out in April. But in the meantime I'll settle with the kindle short story that's coming out in February (The Prince).

Fever - Lauren DeStefano

I was casually walking around an Oxfam bookshop, not really wanting to buy anything in particular, when I saw this little beauty. The first one was great, and I was waiting for the oppurtune moment to pick this one up on the cheap from Amazon. But at a meagre £2.00, I just had to snap it up. It was so much cheaper than anything else I would ever find.

In my experience, trilogies always have one downfall: The second book is never quite as thrilling as the other two. The first one tends to be a story in itsself, and the third one is the huge climax. The second, therefore, is the build-up. There are only a few exceptions, and I'm sad to say that Fever is not one of them.

While the storyline was very good, I found that it lacked the goal that we had in Wither. Although I absolutely loved the characters, I found it harder to sympathise with them in this book.

However, the plot was very good. It has intrigue, love, loss, and it always keeps us wondering what is going to heppen to our beloved characters. Their time is running out, and their mortality is more pronounced. This time, you really can't see where it is going to lead you. I thought the ending in Wither was rather obvious, but here there's a twist that you don't see coming. Again, the cover perfectly encapsulates the story, though you don't see it at first.

A little review, this one. As there's not so much more to say about the writing, the characters or the themes that I didn't already say in my review for Wither.

7 out of 10 this time. But I have more hope for the final book, Sever, which should be out early in 2013.

Wither - Lauren DeStefano

The cover of this book has captivated me for a while - a beautiful young woman, a bird in a pretty cage.They are a couple of wonderful metaphors for entrapment and youth. The image, I can tell you now, does the story real justice. It includes the most important factors of the book, right down to circling the wedding ring on her finger. But no part is more important than what you will spot on the back cover; a depiction of an hourglass, nearly empty. The age-old symbol of time running out.

Could you imagine a world where men die aged 25, and women die at only 20? Where young girls are stolen away to be sold as prostitutes or brides to those willing to pay? Rhine is 16 years old when she is taken and sold to be a wife to 21-year-old Linden, whose first wife is already dying from the virus. At his mansion she is well-cared for, but she longs to see her twin brother and the lights of her home again. Down in the basement, something awful and terrifying is happening. Rhine desperately wants to escape, but time is running out, and in four short years she will be dead.

This story is heart-wrenching and beautiful at the same time. It is so full of emotion - of love, loss, sisterhood, anger, loyalty and even hate. It is despicably easy to read: You could get lost in it for hours only to find that you are much too close to the end. The plot is quite familiar and yet the way it is written and the difference in tone is entirely new. Notes of Margaret Atwood's 'The Handmaid's Tale' ring out from under the plotline; the take on the forced nature of being a wife for someone who you have never known is so akin to being forced to be a surrogate, like the handmaid. The absolute captivity and underlying fear is so extremely evident in the story.

The world is well-imagined and bursting with fine detail. The perfection of the world in which Linden lives, with his holograms, his golf course, his fine food and his servants is a stark contrast to the streets of Manhattan, where you board up your windows to stop orphans from stealing your food.

The characters are developed nicely. Each of them, even the minor characters, are multi-dimensional and so realistic. Rhine's voice is so strong that if you're not careful, it could start sounding an awful lot like your own, should you be stuck in such a difficult situation. You completely understand her thoughts and feelings, and she always does exactly what you think she should, or what you think you would do.

I could not put the book down and finished it within two days. I can't wait to know what happens next, in Fever (the second book in the Chemical Garden Trilogy).

An intriguing, realistic and achingly wonderful book. 10 out of 10.

Birthday Books

So it was my 21st Birthday on Friday, and of course I got a lot of books. That's the beauty of an Amazon Wishlist - no thinking required apart from which item to give on their part, and I get the books I'm interested in reading.

There is no doubt in my mind that I will be reviewing them, so I thought Id list them for you:

Bumped - Megan McCafferty
0.4 - Mike Lancaster
Runemarks - Joanne Harris
Wither - Lauren DeStefano
Green Rider - Kristen Britain (I also got The High King's Tomb, which is actually the third book in the series)

Three out of these books are dystopian, which is suspect is becoming a little bit of a pattern with me. But there is something about dystopian literature that really sits well with me at the moment. maybe it's because I feel the need to read something about a world that is entirely different to my own. I think that might be why I also like fairytales, sci-fi and fantasy so much. They are so different, and normally almost entirely a fabrication from someone's mind. It's a perfect chance to really see who an author is.

Anyway, I'm really looking forward to reading these books and reviewing them for you. With any luck, they won't be too difficult to read and I'm sure they will be as interesting and enjoyable as their blurbs sounded to me.