Elzburg Reviews

Fire & Flood by Demitria Lunetta My rating: 2 of 5 stars War. It’s a heavy little word. For some reason I’d had the idea that this was more of a rival gang situation. So, what do we have here? Fire & Flood , book one of the new Mount Olympus Academy series. If you can't tell by the series name, it's set in a Percy Jackson -esque world in that it incorporates gods and monsters from greek mythology. But more than anything, I’d say that it resembles Harry Potter in how the main character gets whisked away from their crappy life into a magical boarding school that has different “classes” which are like the different “houses” in HP. And you best believe there is a super mean rival who literally has “cronies”. While we’re doing comparisons, I’ll also throw in that not only is the main character in the Assassination Class , but that the authors also threw in the “Ass-Class” joke that fans of the Assassination Classroom series use. (Though...

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion My rating: 4 of 5 stars My first impression upon finishing The Rosie Project was that this book was amazing. I loved the main character's voice and personality. This book was very enjoyable to read in the moment, however after completion and upon further contemplation I have some qualms. I had these feelings while I was reading as well, however they were buried deeper inside me, masked by the enjoyment the overall experience was giving me. I liked Don's character a lot, and thought he was very funny. Lots of laughing out loud. Because of this, I didn't like how at the end (view spoiler) [he changed for Rosie. I didn't think anything he changed for her (his verbature, his meal plan, his schedule, etc.) was necessary. All those things were part of his charm and part of what made him a highly efficient person. He literally made himself worse/dumbed himself down for Rosie, which I didn't like at al...

The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris My rating: 5 of 5 stars This book was absolutely fantastic! I enjoyed it immensely, and very much want to read all of the other books in this series. I accidentally listened to the end of the book via the audiobook, which I was unaware is an ABRIDGED version. So that was terrible. It also means that I actually did not take four months to finish this book. The audiobook basically just spoiled the ending for me, so I had to wait a few months to try and let it dissipate from my brain a bit before I actually finished reading it properly. View all my reviews

Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen My rating: 2 of 5 stars This book was so incredibly contemporary . It was so… Life. Normal. It made me aghast as to how someone would even think to write something so mundane. Like, what was the spark? The initial idea that drove Dessen to write this? Especially considering the fact that she had apparently already written eight other books more-or-less exactly like this one. Getting paid was certainly the motivation, but that’s not what I’m asking. Anyway, this was my first Dessen novel. I have known of her ever since I was in fifth grade, and even back then she had so many books that they spammed my local bookstore’s online catalogue. This annoyed young me, and I swore to boycott this nuisance author. Fast Forward to now, and I just want to see what all the fuss is about. I didn’t think this book was bad . I just think it got kind of boring after 200 pages of nothing, and then the realization that I still had almos...

The Show Must Go On by Kate Karyus Quinn My rating: 4 of 5 stars Because lucky me, even though I am 100 percent talking out of my ass, it turns out my ass is a secret genius. Wow. The Show Must Go On was surprisingly great. And by “great” I mean that this is very likely the best romance I’ve ever experienced (including books, movies, tv, etc.). It was also filled to the brim with funny lines like the one above, so for the first time in my life I found myself constantly laughing-out-loud while reading a book. But… then the ending happened… and it left me feeling insanely disappointed, which is what knocked a whole star off of my rating. Will actually walks over to [the bookshelf], like he's unable to resist the siren call of literature. Obviously, despite losing the glasses, his nerd instincts are still strong. First and foremost, since it doesn’t look like there are any reviews by people who have ever read Quinn before, I just want to st...

Swagger by Carl Deuker My rating: 3 of 5 stars RTC. Until then, my notes: • this book has the most actual playtime out of any sports novel I've ever read so far • i really dislike the really short chapters • i really dislike the juvenile writing style, however it does perfectly match the main character • i'm in actual mourning after the author *major spoiler* (view spoiler) [killed off Levi (hide spoiler) ] . That monster. i read it while i was foam rolling and had to shove my kobo awake and get up to take a walk. i actually cried so much and so hard • i let it sit for a few days and I still shed a single tear for *same major spoiler* (view spoiler) [Levi (hide spoiler) ] after I came back to this book. this is the single saddest *same major spoiler* (view spoiler) [character death (hide spoiler) ] I have the ever experienced View all my reviews

Sourpuss by Merricat Mulwray My rating: 5 of 5 stars RTC . Until then, my notes and initial thoughts upon finishing this book (followed by Quotes I liked ): • what the fuck? • what? • i like the main character because she's an asshole just like meeeeee • seems like this is set in some kind of alternate dimension where things work out nicely (everyone loving Mal despite her being a raging asshole, (view spoiler) [setting a world-mother-fucking-record (hide spoiler) ] ). Except then everything goes to shit (view spoiler) [(everyone hates her and her record was fake) (hide spoiler) ] • wtf was the ending tho • did they literally (view spoiler) [get buried alive (hide spoiler) ] ??? What the fuck?????? • also did James fricken (view spoiler) [kill his mom??? At the very least he definitely beat her till she passed out (hide spoiler) ] • what the fuuck • this book had a few funny lines 👍 • wait they pulled a ME, dawg, and (view spoiler) [killed they main c...

Bird Box by Josh Malerman My rating: 5 of 5 stars I watched the movie and then read the book a few hours later, and it was a fantastic decision. They felt fresh and distinct in how they each show different possibilities and angles on the same basic story which acts as a unifier between the two halves, resulting in a magnificent whole. I suspect the order in which I consumed these played a big role in my enjoyment, since, yes, the book was better. I’ll use this opportunity to compare the book to the movie as a way to illustrate what this book did really well, and then what the movie was able to improve on. I’ll start with the former. Bird Box is a horror. Plain and simple. Its concept is deeply rooted in exploiting the character’s and reader/viewer’s fear of the unknown. Specifically: What we cannot see. Therein lies the simple problem with making a film adaptation: How does one portray an inherently unseeable horror through an inherently visual medi...

Renegades by Marissa Meyer My rating: 5 of 5 stars The superhero genre is as old as time itself. It feels like every month there’s a new superhero movie out in theatres, and now the genre is becoming more prevalent in the non-comic book world as well. Before reading Renegades I said to myself, “What in the world could Marissa Meyer have to add to this already exhausted genre?” Well... Somehow, someway, she did. This book was subverting my expectations since before it even began, starting in the prologue. (view spoiler) [In the beginning of the prologue I thought that Eva was going to be the badass of the story after the inevitable timeskip, since it’s always the little kid who becomes super powerful when they grow up in these types of stories. But then she got merked and I was like “Welp.” (hide spoiler) ] The twists and the turns only continued on from there and it ended up being an unexpectedly refreshing read. There is no info-dumping, as the wo...

Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia My rating: 3 of 5 stars This book is about me when I was in junior high Eliza Mirk, an internet hermit who has an insanely popular webcomic. Internet friends > in-person friends, am I right, fellow kids!? The people who love this book feel that way because they were able to intensely relate to the main character. The people who don't like this book feel that way because they disagree with her lifestyle and reading about it made them frustrated. I'm finding it extremely difficult to decipher my own feelings towards this book because I am somehow simultaneously on both sides of this coin. When I was younger I was EXACTLY like how Eliza is in this book: A total internet hermit who spent all my free time in my room hanging out with my online friends who I largely considered to be my best—and for the most part my only real —friends. I was also super into art, and whenever I wasn't hanging out onl...

Spells & Sleeping Bags by Sarah Mlynowski My rating: 3 of 5 stars This book was infuriating. Miri was super annoying during book 2, but she started this book off with some funny burns toward Rachel which made me think maybe she would be better in this book. Ha. No. She wasn’t. Miri. Oh Miri Miri Miri. So dumb. And it was annoying how it seemed like she didn’t even learn anything from the last book. She’s still all about saving the world and whatnot and being a dumbass. And she talked about poofing up money to help her help people, which is extremely illogical because she knows that poofing up money means she’s stealing money from somewhere else. Way to “help” out the world you fucking idiot. For the majority of this book I reckon she was under some kind of “emotion amplifying” spell but honestly that’s no excuse since she’s still her dumbass self. (view spoiler) [Her figuring out that Fake Rachel wasn’t real Rachel was nice and all but felt a bit...

Frogs & French Kisses by Sarah Mlynowski My rating: 4 of 5 stars Welcome to my 300th book review!!! It felt like going from 100 to 200 reviews took no time at all, but finally getting to 300 has felt like a looong time coming. In reality the time between both of those was 16 months. I didn’t rate this second book as highly as the first one in this series because I couldn’t think of anything I didn’t like in the first book, whereas the same cannot be said for this one. I had some problems with some characters in this book, as well as the content. Miri… Was… Pretty annoying. Always trying to save the world and all. Like, please, calm down. Their mom was kind of annoying too, but Miri really stole the show. Both of them just went way too extreme with their magic. Content-wise, I guess I didn’t care about it as much? The whole thing was very focused on Rachel and her (view spoiler) [fake boyfriend Will (hide spoiler) ] , and on the Prom. I didn’t...

Bras & Broomsticks by Sarah Mlynowski My rating: 5 of 5 stars This was an extremely fun and super funny read (or, listen, because I audiobook-ed it), and just an all around good time. Bras and Broomsticks is about Rachel, a freshman in high school, and her quest to become an A-lister in school with the help of her younger sister’s newly awakened witch powers. Because she comes from a family of witches. You get it. As you might have gathered from the nature of her quest, Rachel is super immature, since she’s, you know, 14 years old. So I didn’t mind her immaturity one bit! I actually really enjoyed it because it made her feel super realistic and natural, unlike a lot of other books *cough* John Green *cough* that have their teenagers talk and act like astrophysicists. It also wasn’t like the bulk of other other books that demean and treat their teenagers like idiots and have them do stupid things in order to further the plot, under the guise of...

Turtles All the Way Down by John Green My rating: 3 of 5 stars Upon finishing this novel I thought back to what I had just listened to (I audiobook-ed it), and came away with the impression that it was an undoubtedly interesting case-study of a teenage girl with a very serious and life-threatening case of mental illness. What exactly that mental illness may be was left up to reader interpretation, but for the review’s sake I’ll say it had some symptoms of schizophrenia, psychosis, anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, dissociative personality disorder, and depression (the usual suspect). However, writing those out felt wrong because Aza’s character was something much too complex to merely shove under some labels, and they really don’t do her justice. Turtles all the Way Down is very much about Aza Holmes and the inner-workings of her mind. The context of the story in which we readers enter her mind is that of a mystery that has struck the city of ...

Coming Up for Air by Miranda Kenneally My rating: 3 of 5 stars I feel like the only way for me to get my thoughts across to you without revealing spoilers is to give you my actual real-time reflections I wrote down while I was reading this book, because that way I tell you what I was thinking and hoping to get out of this book without revealing what the actual outcomes ended up being. I've also included some final thoughts afterwards. Enjoy! Coming Up for Air is the second YA contemporary book I’ve read about a girl who competes in swimming, so I'm familiar with the intense training schedule, high level of food intake, and lack of social/love life that comes with being a high achiever in this sport. The first book I read, Surviving High School had the main character, Emily, be unhappy with all of that and too overwhelmed and too yearning for a social/love life that she quit the sport. I'd like to see this book explore Maggie being able ...

Zen and the Art of Faking It by Jordan Sonnenblick My rating: 4 of 5 stars This was a fantastic middle grade book! It didn't even necessarily feel like a middle grade book besides the main cast being middle schoolers. It never felt like the author was condescending or looking down on his readers by making the language super simple, which is something that often irks me with middle grade. That said, I listened to the audiobook, so it is possible that any less sophisticated language went unnoticed when spoken. Zen and the Art of Faking It is about an eighth grade boy named San Lee, and his decision to reinvent himself as a Buddhist Zen Master at his new school. Lots of Buddhist knowledge and enlightenment is to be found here (but don't worry, it's not about trying to convert anyone or anything). Being able to experience both the antics that ensue and learning about San's home life and what motivated him to make such a decision were int...