In episode 27, we review the first book in a super-popular franchise, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling (and talk about a lot of related things).
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Book Review Podcast Episode 27
Book Review
Book Review: Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer
Kid Lawyer
Theodore Boone #1
by John Grisham
read by Richard Thomas
My rating: 4 / 5
Genre: Middle grade fiction
Thirteen-year-old Theodore Boone’s parents are both lawyers, which gives him unique insight into the law system in his small town. He spends a lot of time at the courthouse and dreams of being a great trial lawyer someday. When his small town is rocked by a murder, he hates that he has to miss the trial to attend school. Then a classmate brings him some unknown evidence about the murder case, and Theo isn’t sure what to do with the info.
For the most part, this book was absolutely great and I really enjoyed it, though there are some things that I feel could have been done better. I really liked the trial side of the story. It reminded me a lot of David Rosenfelt’s Andy Carpenter series, which I also enjoy. I also liked Theo as a character and the relationship he’s built with various people at the courthouse. And there were a few moments that made me chuckle, especially early in the book. I was listening to the audiobook, and my 15-year-old daughter was nearby when I first started it, and she heard enough at the beginning (including those humorous moments) to decide to add it to her TBR as well. Another thing I appreciated is that Theo realizes the point when he’s in over his head and needs to consider taking what he knows to an adult. The way that all played out, too, I thought was pretty good.
I wish the story had gone a different direction than it did, though. I kept expecting even just a small twist in the plot by the end, but it never happened—maybe in an attempt to be more realistic than thrilling. And it certainly did seem realistic, but maybe throwing in a little more excitement would be good too. I also noted that the narrator (Theo) basically says near the beginning of the book that he doesn’t think of girls romantically at his age, yet he certainly is attracted to one of the women who works at the courthouse, and then there’s the girl in school that he thinks could become his girlfriend…so I guess all he really means is that he doesn’t think of that one girl at the beginning of the book romantically. Either way, it seemed like an unnecessary overall addition to a book with a 13-year-old protagonist.
I happened on this book when I was looking for something quick to listen to while waiting for some holds to come through, and the synopsis sounded interesting. If I had taken the time to read reviews first and see the 3.8 average rating right now on Goodreads, I probably would have passed, but I’m really glad I just dove in, because overall, I really enjoyed it and plan to keep going with the series. Richard Thomas does a great job with the narration, too. Overall, I’d say whether or not a teenager will be interested in this book will depend on what kind of fiction they like—if fast-paced action is important, this probably won’t suit them. If they’re interested in realistic fiction about crime and law and trials, this could be fascinating for them.
Find out more about Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer
If you’ve read this book, or read it in the future, feel free to let me know what you think!
Book Review: How to Train Your Dragon
How to Train Your Dragon
Book #1
by Cressida Cowell
read by David Tennant
My rating: 4 / 5
Genre: Middle grade fantasy
Though he’s the son of the clan’s chief, Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III leaves a lot to be desired as a Viking. When he and the other boys his age are tasked with capturing a young dragon to raise and train, he’s just hoping he doesn’t screw up by not getting any dragon at all.
I’ve actually struggled a lot as I’ve tried to write this review. It’s often difficult to base a book on its own merits if I read a book after watching and enjoying the movie (and in this case, I didn’t even know the book existed when the movie came out), but that has never been more difficult than in this case. The movie is so good and the book is so different, I’ve struggled so much to not compare them and let the book stand on its own. Really, the only similarities are the names of people and places, the inclusion of both Vikings and dragons, Hiccup’s overall character, and the main “antagonist.”
Comparisons aside, I did enjoy the book. I was surprised that dragons in the book are thinking, reasoning creatures, with a language of their own, yet the Vikings capture and tame them like beasts, not bothering to pay any attention to their speech. It’s not something you’d probably want to think too hard about, though I did like the way it plays out in the book. I kept expecting the story to go different ways than it did (which could have been because of the movie, but I also think it’s because I’m used to how books, especially for this age group, tend to go), but it’s a charming story in the end, and Toothless grew on me too.
If you love the movie and are looking for a book like that, I don’t recommend you read this book. If you love David Tennant (or even if you don’t) and want to hear him do a brilliant job narrating a fun kids’ book, definitely consider listening to the audiobook. Overall, I’d say don’t let hearing that it’s not like the movie keep you from reading it, if you’re interested.
Find out more about How to Train Your Dragon
If you’ve read this book, or read it in the future, feel free to let me know what you think!
Book Review: True Life in Uncanny Valley
True Life in Uncanny Valley
by Deb Caletti
My rating: 1.5 / 5
Genre: YA contemporary
Eleanor has grown up with a single mom and always knowing that her dad is a wealthy, powerful tech/AI genius that doesn’t want anything to do with her, her sister, or their mom. But Eleanor can’t help but be obsessed with her dad and stalks him, both virtually and physically. When an opportunity comes up to work as nanny to her dad’s toddler son (her half-brother), Eleanor sort of falls into the job, but without revealing the truth about her identity and her connection to her charge or his father.
In case it’s not clear from my rating, I didn’t particularly enjoy this book. Humans are messy and creative and AI can never fully replicate them. That is the lesson that this entire book boils down to, which should be obvious to most of us. Of course, Caletti’s view of “messy” humans is downright terrible. Besides Eleanor’s deadbeat father, her mother is no peach either, fat-shaming Eleanor’s slightly chubby stomach, telling her how stupid she is, and making it clear that she’s always been an inconvenience. Eleanor’s older sister basically follows her mom’s lead, yet Eleanor often assures the reader that, “I know they really do love me.” I’m not buying it.
But on the plus side, Eleanor has two best friends who are basically perfect and perfect for her. The three of them have formed a book club through which they look down their noses at almost everyone else’s reading or book-reviewing habits. Seriously, I’m pretty sure that if I ever met these three, they’d absolutely hate me, and that’s considering that most of the specific things that Eleanor mentions the book club disliking aren’t even necessarily habits of mine. For example, they hate terms like “sickening thud” and seem to dislike half-star ratings (take that!) and constantly point out things that they think are cliché or tired tropes. Well, Soggy Bottom Book Club, to you I say that the inclusion of 3 best friends who don’t seem to ever fight and always understand each other perfectly is a cliché (and that!).
The main bright spot in this story is Eleanor’s connection to her little brother and even his mom, but even that comes with downsides. Like the fact that Eleanor is basically perfect as a nanny almost right away, despite some internal panic moments about really never having taken care of kids much in her life. And the fact that everyone is lying to everyone about everything pretty much through this entire book! (Except her best friends, because they’re perfect and always tell each other the truth.) There’s also a romance, which is nice at first, but then they start to make out all over Mexico and then there’s the super awkward sex scene—awkward meaning both that the characters are awkward and that I was incredibly awkward, because there are suddenly some very graphic descriptions. Though maybe it wasn’t as sudden as I thought at the time, considering the parade earlier in the book that I guess involves naked people and is just casually attended by people of all ages? Is this some Seattle thing I just don’t know about (and don’t want to know about)? I was also really thrown off by Eleanor saying (in the narration) that people of older generations, which in this case includes everyone from the toddler’s 30ish-year-old mom to Eleanor’s grandma’s age, were all about sex, but Eleanor’s generation isn’t…really? Really?
On top of all of that, I didn’t really get along with the writing style, which is basically like stream of consciousness. For 400 pages. And Eleanor is obsessed with a comic book heroine named Miss Fury, Miss Fury’s author, and the villainous creator of Wonder Woman—a man who stole ideas from his wife. And by obsessed, I mean that she sees Miss Fury as inspiration, something to aspire to in her own life, and almost every situation she’s in, she thinks of how she’d act if she were Miss Fury. I learned way more about the creator of Wonder Woman (William Moulton Marston) than I would have ever wanted to know, especially while reading a fictional story.
This review has gone on quite long, but I think that, if nothing else, it showcases another problem with this book—there’s just TOO MUCH going on. I didn’t even touch on the AI aspect, beyond what I said at the beginning of the review. Eleanor seems to have far too little understanding of AI for her—you know what, no. I think I’ve said enough. If you’re still interested in reading this book, please check out the link below to see other reviews, though for once, I’m not as much in the minority in not enjoying this book too much, if that tells you anything (though yes, others did like it at least a little more than me).
Thank you to Netgalley and Random House Children’s for providing me a copy of this book to review.
Find out more about True Life in Uncanny Valley
If you’ve read this book, or read it in the future, feel free to let me know what you think!
Book Review Podcast Episode 26
In episode 26, Lena reviews 3 out of 4 books of The Lunar Chronicles, a YA sci-fi series by Marissa Meyer that starts with Cinder. Kristi reviews all three of The Emissaries, a series of biblical fiction by Angela Hunt, starting with The Woman from Lydia.
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Book Review: The Wedding Bond
The Wedding Bond
by Lee Tobin McClain
My rating: 2 / 5
Genre: Contemporary romance
When 29-year-old Kaylee publicly declares that she plans to be married in one year, despite not having had a long-term relationship in her entire adult life, she thinks that pretending to be in a relationship with the man who broke her teenage heart might help her be ready for marriage. After all, Phelan will only be in town for a month, so it’s safe, right? But Phelan has a big secret that threatens even a fake relationship, not to mention the feelings that are being rekindled by being close to Kaylee.
So much about what I expected from this story is not what I got. I wouldn’t say that “fake dating” is a normal preference of mine, but for whatever reason, I still decided to pick up a story that supposedly contained it. However, the fake relationship didn’t start until far into the book and was overall a very minor aspect. I can live with that, since I’m not necessarily a fan anyway. But the relationship in general was far too fast-burn for my preferences. Kaylee and Phelan had a history that turned out to be actually a little less involved than I thought, though that doesn’t stop them from being super attracted to each other as soon as they see each other again and practically unable to keep their hands off each other. I was certain this relationship was going to end up in bed—heck, I was certain they must have had a physical relationship back when they were teenagers, until the author casually drops that they hadn’t slept together when they were younger.
The book is billed as Christian romance, but to me, it could be called clean romance at best. Characters attending church “as often as they can” does not make a book Christian any more than attending church makes a person (in real life) a Christian. These characters do not make their decisions based on what God would want, what the Bible says, anything like that. One of them does get advice from a pastor (or priest? I was a little confused on that), but he ignores the advice. I guess it’s something that he later acknowledges that he should have followed the advice, but even that is mostly just because ignoring it caused a rift between him and the woman he wanted to have his hands all over. Then near the end of the book, Kaylee has suddenly started to rely a little more on God, which comes out of nowhere and is explained too quickly, almost like an afterthought.
The one star I gave this book (yes, I rated it 2, but because Goodreads doesn’t allow a 0 rating, that makes 1 star the worst possible rating, thus 2 stars is giving a book 1 more than 0) was mostly due to the story arc involving Phelan’s twin brothers and the deadbeat dad he was trying to track down. In the end, it may have been a little too convenient, but sometimes convenient can be nice. Outside of that, though, neither of the main characters or their arcs really stood out to me as anything interesting or different. And I just…didn’t really care if the ended up together or not (not that there’s much suspense involved in a story like this).
This is not a series or an author that I will read any more of, and I really don’t recommend it to anyone—it would probably be too “Christian” for people who don’t like Christian fiction, and though others who do like Christian fiction might not be as bothered by the physical aspect of the relationship as I was, I still wouldn’t recommend it for other reasons.
Find out more about The Wedding Bond
If you’ve read this book, or read it in the future, feel free to let me know what you think!
Book Review: Bark of Night
Bark of Night
Andy Carpenter #19
by David Rosenfelt
read by Grover Gardner
My rating: 4.5 / 5
Genre: Mystery
When a dog whose owner was recently murdered is brought to a vet by a man who pays to have it euthanized, Andy Carpenter is suspicious. Someone has been arrested for the murder, and it wasn’t the man who brought a perfectly healthy dog to the vet to be put down. So he once again dusts off his defense attorney skills and assembles the team for another case.
This was a great installment in the series, with a little bit of a different take on the formula I always enjoy. The story this time is more focused on the investigation than the trial, allowing the different facets of the crime more room to breathe. It was a little complex, but it didn’t feel as convoluted as others have, and I think that’s because Rosenfelt expanded on it enough to keep that from happening. I always enjoy the inclusion of Andy’s team, and this time, we get to see the softer side of Marcus, which is fun. Overall, I felt like it was one of the stronger books in an overall great series! I especially recommend the audiobook, as Grover Gardner was clearly made to voice Andy Carpenter and brings his wit and sarcasm to life as wonderfully as ever.
Find out more about Bark of Night
If you’ve read this book, or read it in the future, feel free to let me know what you think!
Book Review Podcast Episode 25
In episode 25, we review Ruth by Ellen Gunderson Traylor, a fictionalized version of the book of Ruth in the Bible.
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Book Review: Very Dangerous Things
Very Dangerous Things
by Lauren Muñoz
My rating: 2 / 5
Genre: YA mystery thriller
When a murder game at a private school specializing in criminology is preempted by the real murder of a high school student, the victim’s ex-girlfriend is the prime suspect. But Sierra insists she didn’t do it and tries to enlist her ex-best friend Dulce in clearing her name. Dulce may be intrigued, but it’ll take more than the pleas of the girl she now considers her nemesis to get her involved.
The idea of a real crime being committed during a murder mystery game at a school for people studying criminology (though I really can’t say how realistic a school like this is) greatly intrigued me. And in some aspects, the mystery was good. There are a lot of clues, many of which are unrelated to the case, and the author throws in a lot of herrings to keep the reader guessing. (Other reviewers say the culprit was obvious from the beginning, but I did not guess it until close to the reveal.)
However, in many other aspects, the plot, mystery, and characters fell flat for me. The book had very strong Veronica Mars vibes to me, even before the show was outright mentioned, and I don’t know how intentional that was. From the horrible, corrupt sheriff, to the whole town turning against Dulce and her dad, to Dulce and Co. breaking into all sorts of places they shouldn’t be, it brought the show to my mind a lot. Everyone in this story is lying to everyone all the time. And the absolute worst of it comes from Dulce’s (current) best friend Emi who does whatever she wants, no matter who she might upset, lies to her best friend constantly, and then has the gall to accuse Dulce of being a bad friend because she resisted helping with the case for a long time. And that’s just one example of the terrible people in this book making stupid decisions.
There are background flashbacks peppered throughout the story, which aren’t really a bad way to introduce extra information, except that the bulk of the story is written in 1st-person, present tense from Dulce’s POV, and most of the flashbacks are 3rd-person, past tense (unless the person the flashback is about is Dulce, then they’re 1st-person, past tense). It’s a little jarring. What really threw me off, though, was when, in one of these flashbacks, Dulce is stated to be 13 and is making out with a high school guy and drinking alcohol. At 13! But it’s for a case for a detective agency that she and her then-best friend ran together (at 13!), so it’s okay. Then I realized that the flashback was said to be 2 years previous to the rest of the book, which meant that Dulce is still only 15 when the rest of the book happens, as would be most of the other major characters (maybe early 16), which still just feels so young to me, considering what these kids are already into. But to be fair, I’m pretty old-fashioned, so pretty much any age in high school feels too young for what these kids are into, something that is probably worth noting for anyone reading this review.
That brings me to the rest of what bothers me, which I know won’t bother everyone, but I also know that some people who read my reviews will probably be happy to know about this kind of content: multiple on- or off-screen characters are LGBT, and there is mention of religious people who are against this kind of behavior in a negative way (how dare they pray for them!). It made me consider DNFing the book. But since I don’t give a star rating when I don’t finish a book, feeling like it’s not really fair to the book or the author, and I had an ARC of this book and can’t really not give it a rating, I kept going. And in the end, it’s actually overall fairly tame compared to other anti-Christian/religious views in this area (though it’s interesting to note that the religious people actually came around to be okay with the LGBT behavior, so there’s that).
I think this story had huge potential, and the author writes well (minus the jarring POV and tense changes). But it’s pretty clear to me that I was never going to be the right audience for this book or probably for this author. I don’t personally recommend this book to anyone, but please do consider looking into it more if you’re interested.
Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Young Readers Group for providing me a copy of this book to review.
Find out more about Very Dangerous Things
If you’ve read this book, or read it in the future, feel free to let me know what you think!
Book vs. Movie: I Am Number Four
I watched this movie years ago, before I read the book or even knew a book existed. I remember enjoying it overall. Now that I’ve read the book, I re-watched the movie, and didn’t particularly like it as much this time. Of course, that has a lot to do with the deviations the movie makes from the book, some of which I just don’t even understand the reason for. Of course some things have to be cut out for the sake of time in a movie, and movie makers often want to make their movie more exciting and add more action and such. Below is a list, not by any means exhaustive, of the things that stuck out to me the most, for good, bad, or neutral (mostly for bad, in my opinion).
Spoiler notice: Since it’s too difficult to explain these differences without spoiling the book, I’ll just say that if you haven’t read it or watched the movie and don’t want to be spoiled, don’t read on.
- I definitely read “Henri” as the French version, since in the book, he has an accent that is reminiscent of French and chose his name to match. In the movie, he’s just “Henry.” This probably bothers me more than it should.
- Henri is…cold, gruff, not at all like the firm but kind Henri in the book. His relationship with Four is also not close and father-and-son-like.
- Sarah is also pretty cold when she meets John, which is unlike the book.
- In the movie, Henri doesn’t want John to go to school when they move to Ohio; John insists. This kind of just adds to the feeling I get that these don’t care as much about each other as they do in the book.
- We know from the beginning that Bernie Kosar was the gecko in Florida, though not that he’s a protector. I liked the reveal of him being special (though I had begun to suspect anyway), but at least there’s (so far) suspense for the viewer about him being alien, but not knowing if he’s good or bad.
- There is no explanation of the scars (which I’m pretty sure are supposed to be stripes, not spirals) as something they expect, no charm that forces them to be killed in order. The movie Mogodorians are apparently just OCD.
- He doesn’t know about his Legacies until the first one hits!!! And his ability to throw really hard is…new and surprising? In the book, he and Henri are anticipating his Legacies, and super strength, speed, etc. are common to all Garde, yet it’s clearly not something he expected in the movie.
- The Lumen turned off so much more quickly in the movie than in the book. Like, it really wasn’t even all that hard on him. And in the end, he has flashlights on his hands, but he never becomes fireproof. But apparently Six is fireproof?
- And then he sneaks out like someone who has no regard for his or his guardian’s life…and suddenly he can perform acrobatics and is quickly figuring out all sorts of stuff he can do randomly…there’s just no real logic behind any of it, and he doesn’t really have to work for any of it.
- John in the book makes some mistakes, but generally understands the stakes and listens to Henri. Movie John is willfully disobedient and just stupid, like blowing out lights along the street for fun.
- Sam gets an answer about his dad in the movie…that really surprised me!
- Henri tells John to bring others together, which in the book was a huge decision John had to make on his own, since doing so would break the charm that kept them mostly safe. Though I guess it’s not as scary of a prospect in the movie, since the charm doesn’t exist.
- Henri dies much earlier in the movie.
There’s more involving Number Six and their abilities and powers that was different, but it was mostly minor in comparison and seemed more neutral if anything. It’s a little sad that I liked the movie before, but after reading the book, it just didn’t feel right. I’m glad they didn’t make more like they had originally planned. I’ve seen that there might be a reboot, and I’d certainly give that a chance too, but this first one just didn’t do the book justice, in my opinion.
Have you read the book? Seen the movie? What are your thoughts on either, or both?
A Journey of Words 