Super Short Reviews (19)

Here are some quick thoughts on some recent reads. Book links will take you to Goodreads; RIRI is Reason I Read It.

What We Saw at Night by Jacqueline Mitchard: from library. RIRI: I usually love everything Jacqueline publishes. Sadly, I struggled to get through this novel. There was so much (necessary) emphasis on XP (get a brief overview at Wikipedia), Parkour (again, link to Wikipedia), and teens coming of age that the mystery seemed awfully muddled. There's one or maybe two suspects, there may be one or more murders (or maybe none), and Allie, our narrator, appears to be sane but I was really hoping she'd turn out to be off her rocker, if for no other reason than it would tie everything together for me. And then, I turn to what I think is the last chapter of the book only to find out it's a preview of the soon-to-be-released sequel, What We Lost at Night! So the book ended unexpectedly with a meh-cliffhanger. I was not impressed and won't be reading the sequel.

Fall to Pieces by Vahini Naidoo: from library. RIRI: it sounded interesting and a 2013 debut author. Here's another disappointing book. Strange, though, that I read two books in a row that have to do with teens and dangerous physical behavior. In this one, Ella and her friends do Pick Me Ups, which basically means that they make these really stupidly high jumps and get all banged up so that Ella can try to remember what happened on the night her BFF Amy jumped to her death. WTF? I didn't care about these characters at all, I didn't care why Amy jumped, and the reason was such a nonevent that I felt cheated. Most of the reviews are more positive than mine, so I'm going to chalk this up to me instead of the book. And you know it never bothers me, but I will offer up the fact that the "F" word is used an awful lot. 

Hoping that much next reviews will be more positive!!
Enjoy your reading!
Christi