Tag: Thriller (Page 12 of 16)

BOOK REVIEW – Deadly Class, Vol. 1: Reagan Youth (Deadly Class #1-6) by Rick Remender

April 25, 2015 / Anna

Deadly Class, Vol. 1: Reagan Youth by Lee Loughridge, Rick Remender, Wesley Craig
Purchase on: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Synopsis:
It’s 1987. Marcus Lopez hates school. His grades suck. The jocks are hassling his friends. He can’t focus in class. But the jocks are the children of Joseph Stalin’s top assassin, the teachers are members of an ancient league of assassins, the class he's failing is “Dismemberment 101,” and his crush has a double-digit body count. Welcome to the most brutal high school on earth, where the world’s top crime families send the next generation of assassins to be trained. Murder is an art. Killing is a craft. At Kings Dominion School for the Deadly Arts, the dagger in your back isn’t always metaphorical.

➊ A tale of survival

Tell me, fellows readers, what are you ready to do to survive? What happens when the only hope life can give you is to eat expired chili and to fight with an old homeless over your fucking shoes? When the only choice offered to you is to attend an assassin school or to wait for a ~~painful~~ death to come?

“Happiness is just the absence of pain.
It’s the best I can hope for.”

Just picture it. You’re alone. Cold. Hungry. Desperate. Feeling guilty and useless. Here comes a bunch of crazy teenagers who ask you to follow them. What do you do? Do you follow them, even if it maybe means losing yourself even more? FUCK YEAH.

➋ Sarcastic humor and irreverent ton everywhere. Hey, we’re talking about an assassin‘s school, so obviously, don’t expect regular high school drama.

– Wait a minute, oops, actually, YES, expect it : girls drama, bullying, social groups, assignments – Just keep in mind that every single event can lead to some messed-up and bloody situation. Be prepared for drugs, blood, and many good laugh nonetheless.

➌ A world building is absolutely amazing : Welcome to San Francisco in the late 1980s!

➍ Friendship and amazing characters. Strangely ~~because we’re talking about crazy fucking teenagers, duh~~ what I loved the most was to follow these characters and to see the growth of their friendship. To be frank, it’s really, really rare that I find myself connecting to comic books characters. For real, I end underwhelmed most of the time with comics, because I struggle to feel, to root for the characters. While here, it seems that I couldn’t get enough of them.

➎ Marcus.

Yep, the guy won his own special place in my heart. Indeed there’s nothing that I like more than characters with ambiguous morality, that’s why I adored this little guy who’s not completely evil but who’s able to follow harsh paths in order to save himself and to be finally accepted. Moreover, I really have a soft spot for lonely, broken and slightly hopeless male-leads, I have to admit. ~~And he’s freakin hilarious on acid.~~

“Given what we’re about to do — I shoud feel like a terrible person.
But I don’t.
Morality’s just comfort food — It holds no meaning outside of our minds.”

Verdict: In my opinion Deadly Class offers everything I need to love a story : great characterization, suspenseful plot, enthralling world and so freaking fun, not to mention the ability to make the reader think – about this life, about the importance of friendship and the choices we make every day. Bravo.

BOOK REVIEW: I Am the Mission (The Unknown Assassin #2) by Allen Zadoff

April 24, 2015 / Chelsea / 0 Comments

I Am the Mission (The Unknown Assassin #2)
by Allen Zadoff
Purchase on: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Synopsis:
He was the perfect assassin. No name. No past. No remorse. Perfect, that is, until he began to ask questions and challenge his orders. Now The Program is worried that their valuable soldier has become a liability.

And so Boy Nobody is given a new mission. A test of sorts. A chance to prove his loyalty.

His objective: Take out Eugene Moore, the owner of an extremist military training camp for teenagers. It sounds like a simple task, but a previous operative couldn't do it. He lost the mission and is presumed dead. Now Boy Nobody is confident he can finish the job. Quickly.

But when things go awry, Boy Nobody finds himself lost in a mission where nothing is as it seems: not The Program, his allegiances, nor the truth.

The riveting second book in Allen Zadoff's Boy Nobody series delivers heart-pounding action and a shocking new twist that makes Boy Nobody question everything he has believed.

That was before. And I’ve been taught to handle before.

You put it away and replace it with now.

Okay, so, I’m extremely mad at myself. Excellent story, wonderful flawed boy to obsess over, fast-paced and intricate story-line so there was no way I could lose my interest easily-and yet, here I am, the next day after finishing, wishing I would have waited to read IATM until this weekend. I was tired. I was dreary. I had, like, no time to read in more than 20% chunks…I am beside myself with how dumb this decision was. I wasted a wonderful, amazing book because I couldn’t keep my damn fangirling in check, and a wonderful book lost half a star because of that. *Face palm*

It hurts to watch her go. Not in my head. Someplace else, someplace deeper.
Closer to my heart.

This story was completely different than the first. For one, our dear, er, hmm, can I say his real name without it being a spoiler? Ummm okay, I’ll just use his ‘op’ name for this mission-Daniel, our dear Daniel has faced an emotional trauma from his last mission he isn’t likely to recover from. His heart is broken, but he knows what his job entails and he knows he must move forward. But now, on top of all the maturity he has to wrangle at his age, he can finally ‘feel’. He isn’t just an emotionless drone going from operation to operation-he is finally starting to question the morality and sanity of The Program. And with these doubts comes fear-what if he messes up again? Will it cost another life? And, most of all, when it comes right down to it, would he make the same decision again if he had to?

I see this too-thin, too-tired boy who has been up most of the night, first on a mission and then on postmission planning, and I transform his energy into that of a boy who had trouble sleeping because he is nervous about the day to come. A sixteen-year-old desperate to impress, yet confused about who he is and what he is here to achieve.
In short, I make myself into Daniel Martin, the new recruit at camp.

I really enjoyed seeing his struggle to make the right decisions and to know whether he was heading down the right path or not. The thing is, it all became blurred. He had very little sleep, was trapped where he couldn’t reach his ‘Mother’ or ‘Father’, and he was questioning every little thing set before him. But here’s the kicker-At one point?? I’m pretty sure Daniel went off the deep end. He wasn’t himself for a very long time in this story, and it was so sad (and addicting, sue me) to see him fraying at the edges, losing himself through doubt, determination, and a longing for someone to connect to. But one thing was clear-he would not make the same mistakes from his last mission. His last mission took a piece of his soul, and we get to see first hand how it effects him every single day. Poor widdle ‘Daniel’. 🙁

Physical pain is easy. It’s the other kind that’s new to me. The emotional kind.

One thing was for certain in this story: The bromance stole the show, right alongside the action. It tore my heart to pieces to see two lonely boys finally find what they always wanted: An awkward best-friendship lol. At one point, and good lord this will seem weird, I totally laughed/squealed/giggled from the adorable-ness that is Howard and Daniel. I LOVE their friendship and it actually became my favorite part of the story-and if you know me at all, you know I don’t give two shits about friends in stories. A lot of people would balk at that, me not caring about friends and only looking out for the romance, but eh, that’s me! And for me to fall so hard for two best friends and almost tear up at the epicness that is their friendship? That’s huge (Think Jazz and, gasp, Howie, from I hunt killers and that whole series).

Before I can stop him, Howard rushes forward, squashing me in a bear hug.
I say, “I’ve got to be honest. It makes me uncomfortable when you do that.”
“Just once,” he says. “Then you can go back to being a tough guy.”

So, while I absolutely adored this story and am completely enraptured by this series and the boy that leads it, something key was missing here. Whether from my lack of sleep or time for this story, or from the lack of a romance I could get behind like in book one, something tiny was missing-Something that would make me go wooooooahhhhh, no way, like in book one. But, again, I screwed up and read the meat of the story last night with my eyes half closed and floated through every page when it was supposed to be perilous sooooo I’m guessing my rating would have been 5 had I read this when I should have. Anyway-Tortured, lonely, confused Daniel is someone I really fell hard for in this book. His humanity (or lack thereof near the end) was amazing to follow as we watched him decide just how far he’d go to prove his loyalty. I NEED book three now…damn it, why do I have to wait until JUNE?!!! UGH!

BOOK REVIEW – I Am the Weapon (The Unknown Assassin #1) by Allen Zadoff

April 23, 2015 / Anna

I Am the Weapon (The Unknown Assassin #1)
by Allen Zadoff
Purchase on: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Synopsis:
They needed the perfect assassin.

Boy Nobody is the perennial new kid in school, the one few notice and nobody thinks much about. He shows up in a new high school in a new town under a new name, makes a few friends and doesn't stay long. Just long enough for someone to die -- of "natural causes." Mission accomplished, Boy Nobody disappears, moving on to the next target.

But when The Program assigns him to the mayor of New York City, things change. Somewhere deep inside, Boy Nobody is somebody: the kid he once was; the teen who wants normal things, like a real home and a girlfriend; a young man who wants out. And who just might want those things badly enough to sabotage The Program's mission.

In this action-packed series debut, author Allen Zadoff pens a page-turning thriller that is as thought-provoking as it is gripping, introducing an utterly original and unforgettable antihero.

Goal: Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to review this book in such a way that readers can be interested to join The Program without revealing them too much classified information.

Agents: Please read enclosed file on Project I am a weapon thoroughly. Parts of the file are encrypted, please only use code spoilerTAG to unlock the contents exclusively after reading the book. Warning : Due to the critical nature of this mission, please keep in mind that you’ll have to decide whether or not what I’m telling you is accurate. Secrecy is needed, so you might as well read the book to decipher.

➊ Successful infiltration

✔ The writing flows easily and the choice of short sentences and first person POV appears to be perfect for this kind of book. Indeed while it’s sometimes misused by some writers, this writing style adds here to the feeling of speed we get throughout the book.

✔ The plot is well-wrapped and captivating, offering us a fast-paced, action-packed kind of novel where boredom doesn’t exist.

✔ The male-lead, who we will refer here as Ben, is a well-trained and realistic assassin. No fluffy sweet here, for once. Although he can come as a Gary Stu, his training can explain his high-level of abilities. I mean, did you see Jason Bournes’ training, for real? See? You know what I mean. Organized and focused, as a soldier he kills to obey orders but never needlessly or for the sick “pleasure” (ugh) of it. Not this kind of assassin here, but anti-hero still, because ~~thank you thank you thank you~~ for once here’s a character who acts and think as an assassin. Indeed contrary to many authors, Allen Zadoff dared to introduce a character who we’re not meant to love. Don’t get fooled though, Ben is a multi-layered character and as it is, he could start questioning his orders and maybe open his heart to ~~sensations~~ feelings. Maybe, maybe not. I guess you’ll see.

✔ The flashbacks, where we learnt details about Ben‘s training and early days in The Program, peaked my interest and I’m really curious to learn more about his past in the sequel.

✔ I absolutely adored the ending which let me both satisfied and eager for more. Moreover, it resolved some of my issues, so take my complains below with a grain of salt.

➋ Facts to stake out : please keep a low profile

✔ The relationships between the different characters, if generally well-done, aren’t perfect by any means.

– The romance I didn’t buy, because I never really felt the connection between Ben and Sam, daughter of the New York’s major who Ben is supposed to kill. To be frank, they were cute enough, I guess, but the short timeframe prevented me from rooting for them as a couple. Don’t get me wrong, Sam was an interesting character, and not our regular dumb female-lead changed by love. She’s smart, strong-minded and independent, and their interactions quite interesting, even if not free of roll-eyed worthy moments. Moreover, the “romance” is only a little part of the plot, so it didn’t bother me too much. View Spoiler »

– However I appreciated the evolution of the relationship between Howard and Ben, and to see the beginning of a possible friendship pleased me.

✔ Overall the teenagers are portrayed in a realistic way, therefore their actions seem quite… immature and stupid at some point (except for Ben).

– First Sam’s best friend. Seriously, his “back-off” show was ridiculous. Now, is it believable? Sadly, I think it is.

– The “she got her heart broken because A FEW YEARS AGO she had a relationship really deep that turned wrong”. She’s 16. How in the world can she … You know what? I don’t want to know. View Spoiler »

✔The political subplot … felt a little unbelievable and partisan to me. Excuse my cynical French talking but –

*cough* Really?

And that’s the only thing I’ll say. Now, everything isn’t as simple as it appears at first, so you may be pleasantly surprised, as I was. View Spoiler »

☠ You’re cover is blown : please stop right now!

To sum up, if I am a weapon is far from perfect, I read it in one sitting and that’s saying something, isn’t it? Despite his flaws, it stays a pretty good first book in my opinion and the ending gave me hope for an exciting sequel.

► Review terminated. To be continued…

BOOK REVIEW – Rock Chick (Rock Chick #1) by Kristen Ashley

April 22, 2015 / Anna

Rock Chick (Rock Chick #1)
by Kristen Ashley
Purchase on: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Synopsis:
Indy Savage, cop's daughter, rock chick and used bookstore owner, has been in love with Lee Nightingale, once bad boy, now the man behind Nightingale Investigations, since she was five years old. No matter what ingenious schemes Indy used to capture his attention, Lee never showed an interest and Indy finally gave up. Now Indy's employee, Rosie, has lost a bag of diamonds and bad guys are shooting at him. When Indy gets involved, Lee is forced to help. Complicating matters, Lee has decided he's interested, Indy's decided she's not. But she can't seem to keep Lee out of her life when she's repeatedly stun gunned, kidnapped and there are car bombs exploding (not to mention she's finding dead bodies).

Indy's best bet is to solve the mystery of the diamonds before Lee. Lee's challenge is to keep Indy alive and, at the same time, win back her heart.

Controlling asshole + TSTL heroine + plot nonsense + stereotypes everywhere = I’m calling bullshit.

For real, this book takes the crappy romance at a whole new level – I could be almost bewildered if I wasn’t so pissed. You know what? I read the full book and I don’t get it. I might write a full review when I calm down. Someday. In the meantime, I must introduce some facts to provide further information to explain my rating, because I do realize that I’m in a huge minority here.

Before I start, what you need to know is the fact that Indy knows Lee from her childhood and loved him almost always since, except for the 10 previous years. Why is it important? Why, because it’s used as the perfect excuse to explain that there isn’t ANY character development and/or relationship growth.

➊ Controlling asshole : Okay OKAY I get it, I get it. Here’s a handsome wild man, a tad mysterious, drop-dead sexy, who Indy loves since she’s 5, who carries a gun and is protective, who’s…

WHATEVER. I don’t care about all these wonderful qualities, because :

1) He is repeatedly violent in his moves : he pushes her, catches her wrist, “hook [her] around the back of the neck with enough force to send [her] slamming into him”. Wow, how romantic.

2) He wants to control every one of her actions, starting with their relationship : “This is happening between you and me,” he threatened.” Indeed Indy repeats several times that she is SCARED by him and his controlling behavior. What bothered me the most is the fact that the TSTL behavior of the heroine is used as an EXCUSE to explain Lee’s reactions and to make the reader believe that it’s okay. Nope. It’s not okay to handcuff your girlfriend at the bed because you don’t want her to go out. And it’s certainly not okay to FORBID your girlfriend to wear what she wants to wear. Oh, but don’t worry, Lee has an asshole as a friend who agrees with him.

“For what it’s worth, I’m with Lee. If you were my woman, there’s no fuckin’ way I’d let you out of the house wearin’ that.”

YOU DON’T SAY?!

3) He is a jealous prick. Now, a little jealousy can be great, but come on. Lee overreacts completely when Indy talks to another guy.

➋ TSTL heroine : basically, Indy is the stupid chick in scary movie. Yeah, you got it, the one we can’t help but yell at to STAY IN THE FUCKING HOUSE! To sum up, she is kidnapped 3 times, goes out every time someone tells her to stay hidden despite the really bad guys who constantly shot at her, decides to investigate while she obviously shouldn’t (plus, she gives her real name to every dubious person she meets : who does that??). I know some readers found her kick-ass. I’m sorry but this girl? She isn’t badass. No. When I think of her, here’s how I picture Indy :

What? She acts like she’s 16 while she’s 30.

Moreover, although in her inner monologues she complains about Lee’s controlling behavior, she always gave in. EVERY. FUCKING. TIME.

PS: I almost forgot to say that she is so fucking SPECIAL that she has 3 guys fighting for her. Yep. 3.

➌ Plot nonsense

You know what? I’m done.

BOOK REVIEW: Dangerous Boys by Abigail Haas

April 21, 2015 / Chelsea / 0 Comments

Dangerous Boys by Abigail Haas
Purchase on: Amazon
Add to: Goodreads

Synopsis:
Three teens venture into the abandoned Monroe estate one night; hours later, only two emerge from the burning wreckage. Chloe drags one Reznick brother to safety, unconscious and bleeding; the other is left to burn, dead in the fire. But which brother survives? And is his death a tragic accident? Desperate self-defense? Or murder?

Chloe is the only one with the answers. As the fire rages, and police and parents demand the truth, she struggles to piece together the story of how they got there-a story of jealousy, twisted passion, and the darkness that lurks behind even the most beautiful of faces…

Our lives are made up of choices. Big ones, small ones, strung together by the thin air of good intentions; a line of dominoes, ready to fall.

Dangerous boys , dangerous boys who won’t share their toys…..Yeah, okay, that was weird but…yeah. Anyway. It felt right! Lol. I think that kind of sums it up, though, wouldn’t you agree?? After reading Dangerous Girls a week or two ago, I’ve been enraptured in the simplicity of it’s severity-the idea that something that is supposed to be fun, a break from reality, turned into something that would change one group of friends’ lives forever.

A heartbeat, a split-second’s whim, that’s all it takes to change your life forever.

No, I wasn’t shocked by the end-I even guessed it. But the point is that the execution hadn’t escaped my attention. More and more I started to long for a creeptastic end like in DG, but didn’t quite know where to turn. So, the next obvious step was to find out if boys can be as scary as girls in Haas’s other novel…but what I didn’t know was that I was going to become so wrapped up in this story that I wasn’t going to like what happened to my beloved boy(s)-for there was no happy ending that included all three of them-none that could possibly satisfy my need for safety and a wonderful life for my favorite brother. None for the flourishing relationship between a small town boy and a girl who longed to get away….and none for the wild card with a thing for baby brother’s girlfriend that entered an already peaceful scene and blew it all to bits.

Two bodies, two sets of clear blue eyes.
One survivor. One way out of this.
History is told by those who win.

I’ll admit I assumed that most of the story would mirror that of Dangerous Girls. In all actuality, it was nothing the same. I actually got everything I wanted that I didn’t get in DG with this story-it was real time and it was all in progression and in order of events…I LOVED THAT!!! I love that we got to see the crazy seep out of every pore and that we watch the inevitable demise of each individual-what lead up to it, who made it out of the house alive, why they made it out of the house alive, and how everything began to go downhill at a rapid pace. I was guessing after every page, after every chapter, spinning so many different scenarios and begging it to land where I wanted it to, pulling my hair out, all the while forgetting that even if what I wanted to happen happened….how could anything ever be okay?? And where could it possibly go after that?

You can never really know someone.

****

We’re all strangers, in the end.

So many emotions, so much squealing, hoping, praying, making deals with an invisible book God just so things might turn out even a little bit okay, I was a mess from page one. Once I take a stance, I am hard headed and I don’t budge on what I feel, so no one could reason with me or pull me down from the ledge once I’d made my decision on how this just had to go. In that regard, it was so much different than DG, because I built up this deep-rooted connection to the main character, but also for the boy who stole my heart. There was still a really cool format, but it worked much better for me this time and for this story-A ‘before, now, and after.’ And it was so simple. I loved switching back and forth and seeing where it was all heading…even as I saw us all careening toward the edge of a cliff with no breaks on the car. But I was all in. That’s the point, isn’t it?? I was in that car, sitting right beside Chloe and Ethan and Oliver-all of us in a terror filled journey where crazy takes a back seat to cold-blooded logic.

It’s me, it’s all on me.
So I choose.

***

Blood in the hospital, blood at the house. Blood soaked through my T-shirt, sticky on my hands.

Sinister with an end that chills you to the bone, I guarantee you’ll get at least a little satisfaction, no matter what side you rest on. The journey these characters take is something I can get behind. And while I did love this story a little more than DG, I find myself giving it the same rating-why? Why is that? Well, it’s simple-The story may have ripped it’s claws deep into my stomach, but it still ripped so deep that I was emotionally damaged and disturbed, and I can’t say every moment of this fucked up novel satisfied me. And I guess I’m horrible because I just didn’t like the way things were spelled or written, sometimes…it felt a bit, hmm, rushed? So, yeah. It wasn’t as clean cut and precise, writing wise, to me, and it chilled me deeply more than once-both in good and bad ways. And, while the end was thrilling and deeply disturbing (and I totally didn’t guess where the end was going even though I had most of it right), it didn’t give me the same malicious contentment her other work did. And I don’t ever compare-ever-but in this case, there were similarities (and tons of differences) that I couldn’t help comparing-like a badass ending.

‘What did I do to deserve you?’

***

We assume the sun will rise every morning just because it has done every other day, but what happens when you wake up to darkness?

Anyway-some of you will love this, and some of you would probably like the other story by this author better. One is real time (ish), and the other centers around the conviction of a best friend who is in the wrong place at the wrong time on a vacation from hell. In all reality, they are both so fucked up I guarantee you won’t walk away the same person. You’ll wonder what kind of people hide beneath their ‘perfect’ or ‘pretty’ or ‘well-read’ personalities and smiles-you’ll question what kind of world you live in that this fictional story could even exist. But, I’ll be the first to tell you-this is real. This happens. People are fucked up…and all you can do is be yourself. After all, that’s what we are trained to do-Be the perfect kid. The perfect student. The perfect boy/girl. Look out for yourself and try to take care of those around you…but it all circles right back around to you, doesn’t it? All for one….and one for all.

The line of dominoes falling one by one . Click, click, click, they tumble faster until you can only see the two that really mattered:
The beginning, and this, the end.
Oliver, and Ethan, and I.

Jen	Chelsea
Arielle	Cassie

Jen	Chelsea
Arielle	Cassie

BOOK REVIEW – Deadly Class, Vol. 1: Reagan Youth (Deadly Class #1-6) by Rick Remender

Synopsis:

“Happiness is just the absence of pain. It’s the best I can hope for.”

“Given what we’re about to do — I shoud feel like a terrible person. But I don’t. Morality’s just comfort food — It holds no meaning outside of our minds.”

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BOOK REVIEW: I Am the Mission (The Unknown Assassin #2) by Allen Zadoff

Synopsis:

That was before. And I’ve been taught to handle before.

You put it away and replace it with now.

It hurts to watch her go. Not in my head. Someplace else, someplace deeper. Closer to my heart.

Physical pain is easy. It’s the other kind that’s new to me. The emotional kind.

Before I can stop him, Howard rushes forward, squashing me in a bear hug. I say, “I’ve got to be honest. It makes me uncomfortable when you do that.” “Just once,” he says. “Then you can go back to being a tough guy.”

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BOOK REVIEW – I Am the Weapon (The Unknown Assassin #1) by Allen Zadoff

Synopsis:

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BOOK REVIEW – Rock Chick (Rock Chick #1) by Kristen Ashley

Synopsis:

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BOOK REVIEW: Dangerous Boys by Abigail Haas

Synopsis:

Our lives are made up of choices. Big ones, small ones, strung together by the thin air of good intentions; a line of dominoes, ready to fall.

A heartbeat, a split-second’s whim, that’s all it takes to change your life forever.

Two bodies, two sets of clear blue eyes. One survivor. One way out of this. History is told by those who win.

You can never really know someone.

We’re all strangers, in the end.

It’s me, it’s all on me. So I choose.

Blood in the hospital, blood at the house. Blood soaked through my T-shirt, sticky on my hands.

‘What did I do to deserve you?’

We assume the sun will rise every morning just because it has done every other day, but what happens when you wake up to darkness?

The line of dominoes falling one by one . Click, click, click, they tumble faster until you can only see the two that really mattered: The beginning, and this, the end. Oliver, and Ethan, and I.

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“Happiness is just the absence of pain.
It’s the best I can hope for.”

“Given what we’re about to do — I shoud feel like a terrible person.
But I don’t.
Morality’s just comfort food — It holds no meaning outside of our minds.”

It hurts to watch her go. Not in my head. Someplace else, someplace deeper.
Closer to my heart.

Before I can stop him, Howard rushes forward, squashing me in a bear hug.
I say, “I’ve got to be honest. It makes me uncomfortable when you do that.”
“Just once,” he says. “Then you can go back to being a tough guy.”

Two bodies, two sets of clear blue eyes.
One survivor. One way out of this.
History is told by those who win.

It’s me, it’s all on me.
So I choose.

The line of dominoes falling one by one . Click, click, click, they tumble faster until you can only see the two that really mattered:
The beginning, and this, the end.
Oliver, and Ethan, and I.