ARC Review: Talker 25 by Joshua McCune

Talker 25 by Joshua McCune
Series: Talker 25 #1
Release Date: April 22nd 2014
Publisher: Greenwillow
Source: Edelweiss
Pre-Order: Amazon | Book Depository

Goodreads Summary

It's a high school prank gone horribly wrong-sneaking onto the rez to pose next to a sleeping dragon-and now senior Melissa Callahan has become an unsuspecting pawn in a war between Man and Monster, between family and friends and the dragons she has despised her whole life. Chilling, epic, and wholly original, this debut novel imagines a North America where dragons are kept on reservations, where strict blackout rules are obeyed no matter the cost, where the highly weaponized military operates in chilling secret, and where a gruesome television show called Kissing Dragons unites the population. Joshua McCune's debut novel offers action, adventure, fantasy, and a reimagining of popular dragon lore.

This book is a big fat joke and I really wish I hadn’t been drawn to it because of it's pretty cover. I should have learned my lesson but I never do. Plus I decided to not read any of the reviews which could have prevented me from wasting the painfully long time it took me to read this book.

At first there was some potential. The first couple of pages made me think this book stood a chance and could either blow my mind or go down the drain. It took the latter path. The first time I knew this book was a goner was when the main character referred to her friend’s appearance as ‘the whore look’. Slut shamming right there and it happened so many more times. There wasn’t only slut shamming though, there were so many instances where female characters were mocked for various things.

Melissa falls under the teenagers that I’d like to slap category. She is self-centered and insensitive. She yells at her father and brother all the time and goes so far as to publicly humiliate her younger brother. Sure it was an accident but just because you’re fucking stressed doesn’t mean you have the right to take your anger on whoever the hell you want to. Melissa, like any other annoying ass teenager out there, swoons when she encounters a hot guy. Never mind the fact that the government thinks she is an insurgent and will most likely arrest her.

The insurgents are stupid. They are supposed to be rebels. They support the dragons and you know what? These shit heads aren’t rebels. They are kiss-assesses. They kiss up to dragons and try to win their favor. I am not kidding. The dragons are apparently self-sufficient so I don’t even understand why they need humans to help them. I don’t think the dragons even care. Like seriously. This is basically what the insurgents are like when it comes to dragons.

They fawn over them but aside from that, they don’t know shit.

The James dude, the love interest is equally as annoying.

“Probably. I don’t know. If you don’t face death every once in a while, how do you know how to live?”

It reminds me of a book I read a while ago, The Wicked We Have Done. The book referred to this ideal as Chaos Theory and because of the events of that book, his ideas don’t make me think, they just piss me off. No. Going out of your way to look for trouble is only going to end up with you being dead. There is something known as self-preservation and I am not sure James has it. Thankfully though, he doesn’t play a major role in this book so I didn’t have to put up with his stupidity for too long (this also means that there wasn't much of a romance so yay for that too).

A lot of the instances of slut/woman shamming aren’t exactly portrayed in a negative light. They are supposed to come across as jokes but they didn’t. For example, this

"Claire, whose hairy legs could be very well belong to a sasquatch..”

I didn’t laugh. I might have if I was the sort of human who thought that all women should shave their legs because otherwise, they’re just disgusting freaks, but as it is, I DON’T! Melissa also called her friend at the ‘camp’ a whore, and of course it was playful because she is one. She uses her body to get alcohol. If you cannot tell, I am being sarcastic here. Instead of mocking and making fun of her friend, she should try to help her. If she is so dependent on alcohol, then there is obviously something wrong here. But no. The world revolves around Melissa and no one else matters.

There are other completely insensitive instances in this book. Like this one.

"..sitting all retarded in the restroom”

This sentence was used to refer to a girl who just died and they were trying to think of things to comfort themselves so that they wouldn’t feel so bad about her death. I cannot even. I seriously cannot. SO MUCH RAGE. SO SO SO MUCH RAGE.

The book is way too fast for the first 1/3^rd of the book with things happening one after the other and no time for readers to digest what is going on. The next 2/3rds slows down and kind of reminds me of some odd mix between The Program and The Hunger Games except with dragons. These kids are sent to Antarctica to be reconditioned so that they aren’t ‘dragon friendly’ anymore. The government is completely evil and for what reason I don’t understand. Of course humanity is going to freak out if a bunch of dragons came out of nowhere. Humans are not required to accommodate them. THEY SHOULD. They definitely should out of common courtesy but dragons are the strange species here and not humans (or the animals that inhabit the planet). Their presence could result in fractures in the ecosystem and a whole heap of other problems so I am not sure why the government is seen as evil (and also portrayed as evil in a very cartoonish way). Things are not so black and white and shouldn’t be portrayed as such. 

Also there is a weird TV show in this book which is why I said Hunger Games. These people are made to dress up and kill dragons to entertain the dragon hating public. *rolls eyes*. I don’t even know what to say to that.

The world building is very weak in this novel. The dragons came out of nowhere 15 years ago (the dragons don’t remember where they came from either), they are digging a giant pit in the middle of Kansas. Why? Also the dragons themselves make no sense. Their reproduction techniques remind me of flowers which just makes me go huh? On top of that, the ‘baby’ dragons remind me of giant puppies. The dragon in one scene goes so far as to ‘lick’ Melissa’s face a bazillion times. What? WHY? The adult dragons just reminds me of stuck up humans. We’re talking about dragons here and as someone who loves dragons, I am annoyed. There was a LOT of potential here for developing interesting dragons but the potential just went down the drain.

I ended up skimming huge chunks and even then it took me ages to read. This book dragged on and on and made me rage and even writing this review kind of makes me angry. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone unless you’re sure you're be able to handle it. I am pretty sure I won’t read the sequel unless I am feeling masochistic and decide I want to know what happens from this point onwards. 

Note that all quotes have been taken from an uncorrected proof and may be subject to change.

Eona by Alison Goodman

Title: Eona
Author: Alison Goodman
Series: Eon #2
Publisher: Viking
Release Date: April 19th, 2011
Buy: Amazon

Goodreads Summary

Eon has been revealed as Eona, the first female Dragoneye in hundreds of years. Along with fellow rebels Ryko and Lady Dela, she is on the run from High Lord Sethon's army. The renegades are on a quest for the black folio, stolen by the drug-riddled Dillon; they must also find Kygo, the young Pearl Emperor, who needs Eona's power and the black folio if he is to wrest back his throne from the selfstyled "Emperor" Sethon. Through it all, Eona must come to terms with her new Dragoneye identity and power - and learn to bear the anguish of the ten dragons whose Dragoneyes were murdered. As they focus their power through her, she becomes a dangerous conduit for their plans. . . .

Eona, with its pulse-pounding drama and romance, its unforgettable fight scenes, and its surprises, is the conclusion to an epic story only Alison Goodman can create..

 I started off by giving this book a three because I didn't think it was so bad that it deserved a two but then I realised a three meant that I actually liked the book and I didn't. This book was a big fat disappointment (no literally, it was 638 pages long).

It wasn't until page 84 (yes I remember somehow) that things started going downhill for me. For the first 84 pages, I was ready to be blown away by the awesomeness of this book but that didn't happen. Instead I read the second most disappointing sequel of the year (the first being Timekeeper). I thought that this book would help continue the streak of good books, but the streak finished before it even started. 

The only reason why I am not giving this book a 1 is because the concept was still interesting (which is the only positive thing I am going to mention).

I had three main problems with the book

1. Eona

2. Kygo

3. and their relationship

I really really really did not like Eona in this book. While she bothered me some in the first book it wasn't nearly as bad as it was this time around. She became a whiny and rather self centred girl in this one. I don't think she realised half the time that the world did not revolve around her own damn problems. Sometimes it seemed as though she was more bothered by the fact that Kygo and her couldn't have a real relationship than the imminent war.

Kygo wasn't any better either. He acted less like an emperor and more like a spoil brat. Every time something when wrong he would throw a tantrum. Right now I am very glad that I am not under his rule because with a emperor like him, I might as well just forget about myself because my life must revolve around his wishes. The only thing that makes him better than Eona was that he wasn't nearly as love sick as her.

Eona and Kygo together?? Huh? They acted like a bunch of horny teenagers. 'Heat' flared between them when they weren't even in close contact. Oh COMMON! Have I not read enough crappy romances, that one of the ones that I was actually looking forward to went down the drain? In the first book they were mostly acquaintances but somehow they went from acquaintances to umm being in love? Before I even get to that let me mention, there is a love triangle of sorts going on here. One relationship is based on love and the other on lust. And no, this one was not the lust one, this was the LOVE one. I am not even sure where the love come from. Thin air perhaps? It happens often enough these days in YA so why the hell not? They also have huge trust issues which definitely do not help in making their relationship better. If they really loved one another, they would goddamn trust each other. I believe that trust is very essential to a relationship and without it a relationship just won't survive. 

I preferred Lord Ido to these two and that's saying something because I despised him in the previous book. 

At least he is true to his purpose. He knows what he damn wants and he will get it no matter the cost. He is not exactly redeemed in this book but I will say, he does seem to get better.

Aside from that, this book really did bother the feminist in me. I know, I know, its a part of the world building but I cannot seem to shake off the unease that comes from reading how low a position women hold in this society. Eona seems to be the strongest woman in the book but she is too busy worrying about her relationship with Kygo so that doesn't really help matters.

I realise I haven't mentioned anything aside from characters and relationships and thats mostly because the faults in those two things alone just overshadowed the book for me, I could not enjoy the excitement or anything else that was going on and it wasn't until the last couple of pages where I started enjoying the book. Sadly that wasn't nearly enough to redeem it for me. 

Hopefully people will have better luck than I did with this book.

Eon: Dragoneye Reborn by Alison Goodman

Title: Eon: Dragoneye Reborn
Author: Alison Goodman
Series: Eon #1
Publisher: Viking
Release Date: December 26, 2008
Buy: Amazon

Goodreads Summary

Eon has been studying the ancient art of Dragon Magic for four years, hoping he’ll be able to apprentice to one of the twelve energy dragons of good fortune. But he also has a dark secret. He is actually Eona, a sixteen-year-old girl who has been living a dangerous lie for the chance to become a Dragon-eye, the human link to an energy dragon’s power. It is forbidden for females to practice the Dragon Magic and, if discovered, Eon faces a terrible death. After a dazzling sword ceremony, Eon’s affinity with the twelve dragons catapults him into the treacherous world of the Imperial court, where he makes a powerful enemy, Lord Ido.

This book was a bundle of awesome. I am so glad I read it; although I am sure my librarian is happier I finally returned it.

It took me a long time to get around to this and even when I did I stopped reading when I found it there might be a love triangle in the sequel. Lucky for me there are nice people in the world and they cleared that up for me and so I continued reading.

I don’t pick up fantasy often mostly because it is a special genre; I don’t want to read anything in this genre that I am not sure won’t blow my mind.

From the plot, to the characters to the world building, everything was done very well in this book, so it’s safe to say my mind was blown.

It took me a while to write this review because my brain was too scattered to actually come up with anything that would justify this book.

There were times I wanted to smack Eon in the face because she didn’t realize the truth of what she was and didn’t want to embrace it but I understood it. I couldn’t call her stupid because if people knew she would be screwed (even though at one point I did exactly that).

The characters in this book are somewhat complicated, not all of them are likeable but that doesn’t mean you hate them. You never understand what their motives are because that’s what life at court is like; there are tons of politics, sides and my favorite, secrets. The secondary characters are well developed and also happen to be my favorites (Lady Dela, Ryko, Rilla and Chart).

The world building is done beautifully. It’s amazing how much of the culture Goodman incorporated into this book.

The plot was rather interesting, we know who the bad guy is but I think this first book was meant as an introduction into this world and the sequel is where we’ll learn more about the dragons and have tons of fighting scenes. Beside that what made the plot really interesting was what was going on in the court. It’s a very interesting place, plus.. the prince.

I believe book does the fantasy genre justice; it has action, a strong female lead, a good plot, great world building and my personal favorite, DRAGONS! So I recommend it to everyone who loves the genre as well.

I look forward to reading the sequel and seeing how the romance works out.

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman

Title: Seraphina
Author: Rachel Hartman
Series: Seraphina #1
Publisher:  Random House Books
Date Published: July 2nd, 2012
Buy: Amazon

Goodreads Summary

Four decades of peace have done little to ease the mistrust between humans and dragons in the kingdom of Goredd. Folding themselves into human shape, dragons attend court as ambassadors, and lend their rational, mathematical minds to universities as scholars and teachers. As the treaty’s anniversary draws near, however, tensions are high.

Seraphina Dombegh has reason to fear both sides. An unusually gifted musician, she joins the court just as a member of the royal family is murdered—in suspiciously draconian fashion. Seraphina is drawn into the investigation, partnering with the captain of the Queen’s Guard, the dangerously perceptive Prince Lucian Kiggs. While they begin to uncover hints of a sinister plot to destroy the peace, Seraphina struggles to protect her own secret, the secret behind her musical gift, one so terrible that its discovery could mean her very life.

Sometimes you go into a book secretly hoping it will blow your mind but keeping low expectations so as not to be disappointed. That was me and Seraphina.

Seraphina captured me right from the start. I had no doubt it was going to be an amazing book when I read the beginning. It starts off by giving us a brief overview of Seraphina’s childhood and a bit about her relationship with her uncle and her father. I loved how she compared her wanting her uncle’s attention to cat behavior.

There are many reasons to read this book. The reason I read it was because of dragons. I love dragons. Always have since I was a kid. But you know, there are dragons in a lot of books but I never read (in YA) something with dragons being a main part of the story instead of just looming in the background.
How do I go on describing this book?

I love the main character. I love her romantic interest and no for those who may think so, it ISN’T a love triangle. I certainly hope it doesn’t become one in the sequels either.

Anyways, Seraphina is a great female lead. She has a secret that no one must know. It would get her father and her into a lot of trouble. She doesn’t tell anyone the secret until well the end of the book when there isn’t a choice. I remember this scene early in the book where Lucien tries to get her to tell her more about what happened to her real mother and she says something to hurt him. It makes me happy she isn’t one of those female leads who if given some attention will spill all her secrets.

There is so much beauty to this book. Everything fits together like a puzzle. I don’t have anything to complain about. I just want to read this book over and over again.

I think one of the best things about this book is the rivalry between the humans and dragons. The author doesn’t make either one good or bad. Because the world isn’t black and white. No one can be completely right or completely wrong.

Yes maybe in the beginning the dragons may seem like the enemy but they aren’t. I never viewed them that way.

I’ve said a whole bunch of things now but I STILL haven’t mentioned Lucien. HA. That’s an achievement. Yeah, I need to keep a hold on my fangirling because I absolutely love him, nothing else should be said. He is a character everyone should get to experience on their own.

The best thing about the romance between the two is that they both know that they have other priorities, so as much as they love each other they know they have stuff to do. They trust each other and their relationship is developed slowly. Seraphina goes from thinking he is arrogant to respecting him to becoming friends with him and to finally loving him. It’s fun to watch that change. I always love it when relationships take their time to develop.

This book is a must read. I wish the sequel would come out sooner. It’s hard to wait for it.