I HUNT KILLERS by Barry Lyga - REVIEWS and CONVERSATION

Julie and I read I HUNT KILLERS by Barry Lyga about the same time.  I was totally surprised that we both rated it the same. We texted back and forth as soon as I was done.  Here is how it went:

Of course, it is totally up to you guys to make your own decision about the book.  It is due out April 3rd, 2012. Here are our reviews:


Jazz Dent is the son of one of the most notorious serial killers in the United States. Billy Dent proudly killed over one hundred young women and told his son about each and every one of them. He made Jazz responsible for keeping the trophies from the murders in order. Jazz knows how to go about gaining the confidence of a potential victim, ways to kill and torture, and how to avoid being caught. It seems that every time he talks to someone those things keeps running through his mind. Jazz has to consciously think about acting “normal.” 

Jazz relies on his best friend Howie (a hemophiliac) and his strong-willed girlfriend, Connie, to keep him grounded. They know everything about him – all the gory details about his life with Billy and how he struggles to fit in with society. 

When dead bodies start turning up in town, it doesn’t take long for Jazz to realize another serial killer is at work. He does whatever he can to try and piece together the clues to prevent any other murders from taking place. When Jazz makes a startling discovery about the murders, it threatens to turn his world upside down all over again. Will he be able to catch the killer? 

I HUNT KILLERS is a wonderful concept. It is definitely a book that will fly off the shelves since a lot of people crave dark, macabre, suspenseful stories. I liked it and I liked Jazz, Connie, and especially Howie. Howie provides some lightness to a very dark story. People who love Dexter will definitely see the similarities. 

So, why did I only give it 3 Glasses? Well, there were several factors that led to the rating. One was the over use of the term “Dear Old Dad.” Over and over again Jazz referred to Billy in those terms. It grated on my nerves very early in the book. Another is the level of goriness. I know this is a young adult novel, but I thought it should have been more suspenseful and more gory. If the book is going to compare itself to Dexter, have an “in your face” title, and revolve around serial killers then it should scare the pants off of readers. Finally, several years ago I read another book where a teen was racing against time to save a girl from a serial killer and it was soooo suspenseful and I have that to compare it to. If you haven’t read it you should totally check it out – ACCELERATION by Graham McNamee.

"What if the world's worst serial killer...was your dad?"

That's the teaser on the back of this book. Of course it had me hooked!

Jazz is no ordinary teen, although he knows how to act like one. But when you have been raised by the world's most horrific serial killer it is hard to be "normal". Especially when your dad has taught you everything he knows in order to groom you as his successor. 

"Dear Old Dad" is now behind bars. Jazz really is trying to lead a normal life now. He has a girlfriend, he's in the school play. But Jazz' life is anything but normal. He lives with his crazy gramma, trying to keep the child welfare people from sending him to a foster home, his best friend Howie is a hemophiliac, and he lives in fear of becoming just like his father.

When a woman is found dead in a field with 3 fingers missing Jazz knows right away that another serial killer is on the loose. Unfortunately he can't get the law enforcement to agree with him before another murder is committed. Jazz joins forces with the police to catch the murderer. Jazz knows how a serial killer thinks and he wants to prove to himself that he is not like "Dear Old Dad". But it's a fine line he is walking because he understands the cravings to see a person's last breath seep out of them.

This is one of those books where I wish I had half hearts to give out. I would have given this a three and a half rating. I vacillated between really liking it and "it was just okay". I really liked the suspense of the story and the not knowing who the killer was until almost the very end. I disliked that this is a YA book. The theme was pretty horrific and sometimes goes into some gory details about what the killer did to his victims. Surprisingly the author kept the language fairly tame. I was offended by his use of Jesus, and g** d*** but other than that there really wasn't a lot of language, maybe because the theme was harsh enough? 

I Hunt Killers is published by Little Brown and will be out for sale in April 2012- I received my ARC copy at ALA in January.

SHUT OUT by Kody Keplinger-REVIEW

Things are out of control at Hamilton High. A rivalry that started over ten years ago is escalating. What may have started as name calling and taunting has turned into something is getting people hurt.

Lissa is sick of it and she is going to do something about it.

For too long the football and soccer teams have been fighting. The girlfriends of the players are the ones paying the price. They are the ones getting stood up because of a their boyfriends getting hurt during a fight; they are the ones being left alone in the car at “make out hill” when their boyfriends run off to chase someone who egged their car; they are the ones with the plan.

Lissa proposes a sex strike and slowly, but surely the other girls agree. One by one they place their hands on a recent issue of Cosmo and take the pledge.

"I hearby swear to abstain from all forms of sexual activity. This includes but is not limited to anything involving body parts below the belt. That’s either party’s belt. Oh, and second case is outlawed, too. Nothing, um, under the shirt…I’ll stand my ground, even in the toughest of times, and will resist temptation until the rivalry is put to an end."

The girls are sure it will be a quick victory, but as the weeks drag by and the boys don’t give in, tension run high.

Are the boys going to learn anything by being subjected to this punishment? Even a better question might be, what are the girls going to learn from dishing the punishment out?

SHUT OUT is another great look into the mind of a mostly typical teenage girl. While not as endearing as Bianca from THE DUFF, Lissa does pull at your heart strings. Keplinger has a knack for painting realistic pictures of high school and the many characters that walk the halls of the thousands of buildings across the U.S. I can’t wait to see what she come up with next.

 

FORBIDDEN by Tabitha Suzuma-REVIEW

Lochan and Maya are a great team. They share in the responsibilities around the house to where cooking, cleaning, and caring for their younger siblings is like a well-oiled machine. They have their routine. They support each other. As long as they can keep their mother’s attention long enough to get money from her to pay the bills, usually they are okay.

One wonders if things would have turned out differently for Lochan and Maya if they’d had a proper mother. One that didn’t force them to act as parents to the three younger children. One that, if she had done her job, would have given Lochan and Maya time to be “normal” kids – go out with friends, meet new people, participate in school activities.

But, that isn’t their reality. Lochan’s and Maya’s lives are much more complicated than the typical teen’s. They have fallen in love and can’t tell anyone about it – because they have fallen in love with each other. As their feelings solidify, Lochan and Maya grow more desperate to spend time together, but at the same time, feel terror that someone will find out. They know it is wrong. They know it is illegal. They know it would tear their family apart if their affair were revealed. They know something else, too. They know they can’t stop.

FORBIDDEN is intense. When finished, the reader will be emotionally drained. It is the kind of book that sticks with you for a while. The kind you find yourself thinking about at random times.

Not to compare it with FLOWERS IN THE ATTIC by V.C. Andrews, but…..if you had to stretch it you could definitely say that this is similar in the sense that the brother and sister fall in love. FORBIDDEN just actually has meat – story – quality.

Language Content - None
Violence Content - None
Sexual Content - There is a lot of sexual tension between the two main characters. Some scenes of interaction.  But, the most important thing when it comes to the sexual content in this book is the fact that the two main characters are siblings.

BLOOD WOUNDS by Susan Beth Pfeffer-REVIEW

     

       Julie's Review:   

 Willa lives with her mom, step-father and 2 step-sisters. They are an unusual blended family in the fact that they all get along, they love each other and they are one big happy family.

There are secrets being kept in Willa's family though. Willa's mom will never talk about Willa's real father. In fact she will not talk about her life before Jack, Willa's step-father. Willa has a few secrets of her own. She can never share how resentful she is of Jack's 2 daughters. But there is another darker secret that Willa knows she can never share with any of them. It is a secret that keeps her in control of her own life. Something she turns to for comfort when she really wants to scream.

When Willa's real father murders his present family and seems to be heading for Willa and her mother, Willa's life seems to spiral out of control. Bent on learning about her father's family Willa returns to the small town that her mother and her escaped from when Willa was only 4 years old.  Learning about her father, step-brother and step-sisters helps Willa discover who she is as a person.

At first I thought that this book was going to be more of a suspense/mystery. But that is only part of the story. The majority is Willa discovering who she is and where her place in her family is. I really enjoyed the story.

Karin's Review:

 
            Willa lives in a "happy family." Everyone gets along. Everyone loves each other. Everyone works together to keep their super busy lives in order. Willa does her part to keep everyone happy. She doesn't say anything about how she can't take private voice lessons or go on trips to other countries because her mother can't afford it. She sits quietly as her two stepsisters travel to Europe, take dressage lessons, play competitive tennis, the list goes on and on. Their mother pays for everything - leaving Willa to stay home and wait.

Willa isn't overly popular at school. She is known mostly because of her popular stepsister, but when Willa's biological father kills his current family (wife and three daughters) and is possibly on his way to kill her too, everyone finds out who she is. Willa, against her mother's wishes, starts to dig into the life she and her mother left behind when they ran away from her father years ago. It is a journey that will change her and her "happy family" forever.

BLOOD WOUNDS is a great book about family dynamics - especially for blended families. I was expecting there to be a little more suspense, but even without it I enjoyed the story. I wanted to keep reading to see what happened next and, in my opinion, that is a good indicator of the quality of a story. Definitely a book for those who like to read about family drama.

What amazed me is that I really liked Willa's stepsisters - even though they were portrayed as very privileged girls. I'm so glad the author didn't paint them as the stereotypical wicked stepsisters.

               

IN THE SHADOW OF EVIL by Robin Caroll-Repost from October 2010

MY ONLY VICE(Julie's other blog) is offering this book as a giveaway on her blog. Check it out to enter the drawing. 

Layla is a contractor. An unusual profession for a woman. But she is very good at her work. In fact she has just been nominated for a prestigious award. When one of the homes that she has built burns down and a dead body is found in the remains Layla becomes a suspect.


Maddox is the detective working the case. He too is good at his job. His one regret is that he was never able to find the person who murdered his mother. With a broken relationship with his father, and resentment towards a God that would allow his mother to die Maddox is only too willing to believe the worst of Layla.

Layla decides that she is going to try to discover who burned the house and murdered the person inside. While seeking answers from the various people that she contracted to work the site the killer realizes that she needs to be warned off. Layla is side-tracked when people she knows are brought to the hospital with bleeding noses that won’t stop and respiratory problems. The doctors can’t figure out what is the common denominator in the symptoms and they can’t identify what is causing the symptoms.

When Layla’s sister Alana’s fiance’ is hurt in an explosion, Maddox and his partner decide that they need to protect Layla from whomever is trying to hurt her. With their growing attraction for each other sparks fly! But Layla’s faith baffles Maddox. As the mystery unfolds and relationships are mended Maddox begins to see how faith is an important part of our existence.

As the killer becomes more desperate Maddox and Layla race the clock to find out the reason behind the killings. Will they be in time to prevent another tragedy?

Robin Caroll has written an excitement-filled story that will keep the reader wanting to turn the pages until the very end.

This is an inspirational novel appropriate for Young Adults and older.

ROSEBUSH by Michele Jaffe-REVIEW

Jane goes to a party on the Jersey Short expecting to have fun with her friends and a romantic night with her boyfriend. Instead she is run down by a car and left for dead – tangled in a rosebush on the side of the road.


Waking up in the hospital, Jane realizes she has no memory of what happened at the party and that she is paralyzed. With snatches of memory coming back at random moments and accounts from her friends, Jane attempts to piece together what really happened that night and who wants her dead, because the killer isn’t finished with her. Jane receives mysterious gifts and phone calls from the person responsible for her accident. The problem is, no one believes she is in danger. They blame the paranoia on all the drugs she is taking for the pain. Will she be able to figure out who is after her before it is too late?

Michele Jaffe crafted a great mystery. She is able to make the reader continually change their minds about what happened by presenting us with several feasible suspects. So, you might ask why I didn’t give it 5 glasses. I didn’t find the final cuprit to be believable. Other suspects had better reasons for wanting Jane out of the way than the actual person. Also, I liked Jane, but she was too easily swayed by boys. Every time she met a new one she seemed to like him. But, even with these two things, the book was great. I totally couldn’t put it down.

TOUCH by Francine Prose - REVIEW #1

Maisie has always been best friends with Shakes, Chris, and Kevin. She hasn't ever had "girl" friends and it has never seemed strange to her that she always hung out with the three boys. They treated her just like one of the guys - until Maisie goes away for a year to live with her mother. After deciding living with her mother and her new husband isn't going to work out, Maisie decides to move home to live with her father, even if that means living with her evil step-mother, Joan. Maisie is different when she comes back. Not in the way she acts or feels inside, but in the way her body looks. While she was away, Maisie developed large breasts. She isn't comfortable with them at all and the thing she dreads the most about them is how they might change the way Shakes, Chris, and Kevin react to her.
Never has she ever been more right. The boys act totally different and as much as she tries to return things to the way they used to be, it never feels the same.

The friendship between Maisie and the boys change even more after an incident on the school bus. But, what really happened? Every time Maisie tells the story it seems to change until she can't even remember what happened anymore. All she knows for sure is she feels desperately alone. All of her classmates avoid her and worst of all, she doesn't have her best friends to rely on anymore.

TOUCH is a good example of how stories can take on a life of their own. Unfortunately, after the first version gets out, there is usually little a person can do to stop it. Maisie learns first hand how it feels to be the focus of the entire school - and not in a good way.

THE POSSIBILITIES OF SAINTHOOD by Donna Freitas-REVIEW

Antonia wants to become the first “living saint”. She has been learning about saints and keeping a saint diary for 9 years. She has petitioned the Vatican over the years to make her a saint.



Antonia is 15 and goes to an all-girl Catholic school. Her mother owns and runs the family market located on the bottom floor of their apartment. Her grandmother lives with them. Her father passed away several years before. He gave her her first saint diary.


Antonia has never been kissed. She loves one of the neighbor boys that goes to the all-boy Catholic school right next door to the all-girl school. She has dreams of one day being kissed by him. The problem is that her childhood friend Michael seems to be the one that makes her heart quicken every time she sees him.


Will Antonia ever get that first kiss by the “boy of her dreams?” Will the Vatican ever accept one of her proposals of sainthood? Antonia prays to every saint she knows on both subjects.


I thought this was a cute story. Antonia’s character is funny, innocent and quirky. She is way obsessed with the saints, but that is what makes her character likeable. I really enjoyed reading this book.

ABSOLUTELY MAYBE by Lisa Yee - REVIEW

Maybelline(named after her mother’s favorite mascara) and her mother Chessy live in an apartment above her mother’s charm school. They live in Florida. Chessy has been married 6 times and is getting ready to marry husband number 7. Mabelline(Maybe for short), has a style all her own. She has done the beauty pageant circuit and was a big disappointment to her mother.

Maybe’s best friends are Hollywood(Daniel) and Ted. Hollywood has aspirations of going to college in California to study film. He always has a camera in front of him and always seems to be filming Maybe. Ted is adopted and his parents are always wanting him to be in touch with his Thai culture.

Hollywood is accepted into a college in California. When something happens at home that causes Maybe to want to leave the 3 friends decide on a road trip to California. At first they are all staying in Hollywood’s dorm room but when his roommate arrives Maybe and Ted must find other options. They end up sleeping in student lounges for a while. Ted finds a job next which then leaves Maybe on her own. Maybe is searching for her biological father. Concerned for her well-being Ted looks up one of her ex step-fathers and drops her off at his house.

From there Maybe’s life takes on different twists and turns. She ends up working in a taco truck with Jessica. She finds that she actually enjoys it. Hollywood wins a Documentary contest and Ted is working for an older actress. Maybe finds her real dad but is he all that she hopes for him to be?

I really liked this story. It’s a story of friendship, self-discovery, family and love.

Edifying Meets Edgy Halfway - THE MORTAL INSTRUMENTS TRILOGY by Cassandra Clare

Sorry we've been gone so long folks.  Julie has been in California visiting family and I've been finishing up my dissertation.  Now that things have settled down and Julie is on her way home, we can get back into the groove.  As an apology for our long absence, we have a wonderful chance for you.


Julie and I both LOVED LOVED LOVED Cassandra Clare's Mortal Instruments Trilogy. 

When asked about the trilogy Julie said:
"Yep, I liked them a lot.  They were fairly clean.  The demon stuff and the hint of sex would make them a bit more on the PG13 side.

Cassandra Clare is my hero.  I love the world she created in these books.  I want to be Clary and I definitely want to know Jace.  There were several times during the course of these novels where I was brought to tears or laughed out loud.  These are a must read.


Karin's Reviews:
CITY OF BONES
CITY OF ASHES
CITY OF GLASS

One lucky winner will win a box set from Amazon.  All you have to do is fill out the Google Form below by Thursday, July 1st.

ELEVEN BIRTHDAYS and FINALLY by Wendy Mass - 2 for 1 Post - REVIEW

Amanda and Leo are born in the same hospital on the same day. Every year they celebrate their birthday together. Until their 10th birthday. Amanda overhears Leo saying something about her that causes her to walk out of their party and not talk to him for a year.

When their 11th birthday arrives they wake up as usual and start their routine as usual. Each has planned a separate party for themselves. Neither is happy without the other. Most of Amanda’s guests leave to go to Leo’s party. Amanda goes to bed without opening her gifts.

When her alarm goes off the next morning she is confused. Not remembering why she would set her alarm on a Saturday. When her family starts to wish her “happy birthday” she believes that they are pulling a prank on her. But she soon realizes that she is back to the day of her birthday again! Everything is the exact same as it was on her original 11th birthday. Afraid that she is going crazy she goes through the day doing exactly what she did originally. Once again she is woken up by her alarm only to start her birthday day all over again. This happens several “days” in a row. Leo realizes that they are both re-living their birthday first.

Once they realize that they are both reliving their birthday they set out to try and find out how to make it stop. They learn about an old family feud between great grandfathers. They take a day to do whatever they want to do. They do nice things for people hoping that that will break the spell. They become best friends once more.

This is such a cute story! I loved every bit of it. There is humor in it. There is renewed friendship. There is family relationships and there is self-discovery in it. Wendy Mass has also written Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life which was very good and I’m looking forward to reading Finally.

 

   

Rory is counting the minutes until she turns 12. She has a list of things that she wants to do once she is 12. A couple of the things that she will be allowed to do are get a cell phone, get a pet, shave her legs and get her ears pierced. One mishap after another follows.

 

Wendy Mass did not disappoint me with this book! It made me laugh- out- loud in some parts. I think my favorite part was when Rory tried shaving her legs for the first time~oh my goodness it was funny! Even though there were laugh-out-loud moments in Rory’s attempts at working through her list you could see the life lessons that she was learning and the maturity that she is reaching by the end of the story. I thoroughly enjoyed this book!

 

Edifying Meets Edgy Halfway - The Last Survivors Trilogy by Susan Beth Pfeffer

The moon books are great "end of the earth" kind of books. They are full of survival and peril and triumph. I can't fully put them into the Edifying category because of vivid scenes of death and the constant peril that each book has. But they are not just Edgy kind of reads either. I think that the triumph of survival and the love of family that comes through in the books can make them valid Edifying reads also. With little to no cussing or sexual situations I recommend these books all the time.
Julie's Reviews - LAWKI, TDATG, TWWLI

The Moon Series is right up my alley.  I've always been a fan of disaster books.  I enjoy putting myself in the shoes of characters struggling to survive.  LIFE AS WE KNEW IT is told from a first person point-of-view in dairy form.  It reads really fast.  THE DEAD AND THE GONE is told from a boy's point of view, but in third person.  It is also more dark and disturbing.  THIS WORLD WE LIVE IN brings the first two books together and wrap Miranda's and Alex's stories up nicely.

Karin's Reviews - LAWKI, TDATG, TWWLI

NOTE: This trilogy used to be called The Moon Series, but lately it has appeared as The Last Survivors Trilogy.