Review: The Casquette Girls - Alys Arden

Welcome to a storm-torn New Orleans, where the water level rose so high that people died trapped in their own attics, where crime is rife and people have been found murdered in the street. Now the water and the storm have subsided, Adele and her father come back to the city to salvage what is left of their lives. For Adele this journey is much tougher than she ever expected as she struggles juggling strange occurrences, murders, a new school and family issues. Soon, all that comes to the fore and Adele find herself fighting for the truth, only to find herself plagued by a very old curse that she has everything to do with.

This book was very unexpected for me. I had only read the blurb when I picked it up, so the prescence of something supernatural was kind of expected, but what those entities were really wasn't! Spoiler alert guys, this is, in fact, a vampire book... and a witchy book. Now, I don't usually go in for vampires any more, not with the travesty of sparkles haunting the once-terrifying version of them that I had in my head, but you know what? This book has changed my mind yet again. I really enjoyed the way that the creatures were portrayed in both a sympathetic light and as cunning monsters by using several characters to display their strengths and weaknesses, and their underlying humanity. There was one part in a diary entry, on a boat, where the story began to played out rather too much like Dracula for my liking, but it was a really lovely nod to the classic tale that made vampires what they are today.

The narrative was beautifully written. It flowed really well and although it had a fairly slow start, the build up and the confusion at first makes the rest of the story even more interesting for the reader. I was quite caught off guard at one point, when about a third into the book, we suddenly had a diary entry instead of the usual prose, written by Adele's ancestor, Adeline. This threw me off slightly, as I had just started getting really into Adele's story. However, once Adeline's story geared up, I enjoyed these diary entries enormously too.

The way that the story fit together was seamlessly done. I loved the way that every character had a reason for being there, and the way that things said earlier in the book make total sense eventually. You can never quite see the relevance of someone like Emile, for example, until they come into the story yet again in a quite unexpected way. At the end there are a few glaring omission ready for the next book, the chief among them being; what exactly was the freak storm? It was not natural, for sure.

As for characters, I found Adele a great character with a strong, charismatic voice. You can really sympathise with her, and she isn't your usually whiny teenager type either. Although her cluelessness at the beginning goes on for too long, she quickly becomes the perfect heroine for me; slightly flawed with plenty of courage, attitude and brains. The other characters were so well drawn you could imagine them standing in the room, but it was Desiree and Isaac who really took centre-stage as they both slowly grow on you, just as they do with Adele.

Nothing is as it seems to begin with, and this book certainly packs a punch at the end. There is a fair bit of suspense and a lot of action, as well as a couple of surprises. A truly well-written book with only minor issues.

Kyra_x

Broom With a View - Gayla Twist and Ted Naifeh

The casters and the vampires have always been enemies, but now war has broken out. With England no longer safe, Violet is unwillingly sent away with her Aunt Vera to the city-state of X, a haven for witches and vampires alike. Soon, the fighting crosses even those borders and Violet is flung into a world of chaos, made worse by the unwanted attentions of a sullen vampire under the influence of a love spell and those of a rich mortal. The story loosely follows that of Room With a View, but adds in a supernatural twist and a war to the mix.

Witches and vampires are really nothing new. Twilight and Beautiful Creatures have both been and gone, and there have been countless TV series and books on those two subjects that the ideas begin to run dry, that is, until you put them both together and have them fight it out. For Twilight it was werewolves, but in Broom with a View, casters are the new enemy of the vampire, and any relationship between the two is vile and dangerous. That is why the book stands out; the premise isn't the same old thing; human falls in love with supernatural being even though it's dangerous for them. No, this is more complex than that; these two are natural enemies.

The book is a third person narrative, focusing almost entirely on Violet, our leading witch. It is also a historical-type novel, presumably based in the Edwardian period, since that is when Room With a View takes place. However, it was very difficult to tell the period of the novel, and although the social etiquette added very nicely to the story, there was nothing relevant enough that it could not have been told in another time zone entirely. Maybe it is just me, but if you base something in a period of history and there is a war going on that includes England, would you not want to draw parallels with a war that England was involved with in our own history to make the story feel more real for the reader? This might be a tad pedantic of me, but I truly believe that this would have added more interest to the story.

Not to say the story was not interesting in the slightest, because I couldn't stop thinking about it when I wasn't reading. I always wanted to know how the issues would be resolved, and eagerly awaited the times when I could pick it up again. The main reason was the mess Violet gets herself into with a mortal man, Mr Wilberforce, after she agrees to marry him despite her best efforts.

As for the characters, Violet and her Aunt Vera were extremely well-drawn, along with Mr Wilberforce and his controlling mother. For such a quick book, many other characters also had more than one dimension, which was lovely to see. There was one exception; Sebastian Du Monde, who seemed quite one-sided throughout. There were no explanations to his moodiness at the beginning of the book which was quite compelling, nor any about how his motives at any point.

This book was a really enjoyable read and I would recommend it for teenagers and for adults in need of a light read. It had a good pace, a lot of humanity and a very unexpected crescendo. It gets an 8 out of 10

This book was sent to me on behalf of the authors for an honest review. Thank you for the wonderful read.

Dark Shadows

What do you get if you cross vampires, witches, ghosts and werewolves with Tim Burton?
Well, a bit of a mess, really.

The storyline is pretty good, and it has a great premise: A young man spurns the love of a witch because she's in love with someone else. The witch makes the other girl jump off a cliff and makes him a vampire. He gets locked in a coffin for nearly 200 years, until some workmen find him and dig him out. He sees his estate in ruins and vows to help his family.

That's all fine and dandy. What ensues is somewhat unpredictable and slightly corny. The vampire clearly doesn't fit in, so in come all the amusing bits from the trailer. They seem to be to be dotted in somewhat haphazardly around the main storyline, so they seem random and out of place. It's funny for a while, but then becomes a little tedious.

This doesn't mean to say that the whole thing is a shambles. Johnny Depp is, as always, a superb actor. And the prescence of the lovely Eva Green and Michelle Pfieffer is enough to boost the appeal enormously. Chloe Moretz's role really didn't make sense for me. Some lines she came out with were a little out of place again, but the part that made the least sense was a sudden turn of events nearing the end, which just made me utter 'really'?

The effects were very good, and I rather liked Helena Bonham Carter's character. And the musical score is great. But unfortunately the good outweighs the bad for me on this occasioin. I usually love Tim Burton, but there was something about this film that didn't quite sit well with me. Hopefully his next film, 'Frankenweenie' will have him back on form.

Entertaining, but sadly lacking. A 6 out of 10 from me.