Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Mini Reviews

Well, I've read several books recently (in between reading the Harry Potter books in prep for the sixth movie), and thought I'd mention them and a few comments.

Pillage by Obert Skye--This is classified as YA, but despite the age of the protagonist, I'd call it the young end of YA. Beck Phillips is 15, but the book's humor and reading level is, in my opinion, closer to that of a ten or twelve year old. Now, don't take that as a necessarily bad thing. I set the book out in hopes that my nine-year-old son would read it. Yes, I want him to, because I think he would enjoy it. It was a fun book. I liked the humor, it was full of dragons and adventuresome stuff young boys would love. It just wasn't exactly what I expected.

(On a side note, another book that was not what I expected was Dragonhaven by Robin McKinley--but that one was for the worse. Prattling, rambling waste of time, that book. Bleh.)

So Yesterday by Scott Westerfeld--I've blogged about Scott Westerfeld before--I love this guy's writing. And this book was not a disappointment. It was completely hilarious! This is a total teen book, cool and captivating without smut or cussing. That is one thing I love about Westerfeld's writing. He may throw a "d**n" in there ever now and then, but that's about the worst of it. He keeps your attention because his writing is good, engaging, and funny. Check it out and find out where you fall on the "cool pyramid" :).

The Distant Shore by Debora Coty--Debora is from my home town, and I've met her on a few occasions. She's fabulous, and funny, a really awesome public speaker. She's written a bunch of humor books for Christian women, and has done some writing for Women of Faith. But she got started with The Distant Shore, which is a YA historical novel. I will admit, this is not normally my kind of read (books generally need magic or dragons, or at least some kind of other-worldly adventure to keep my attention), and I bought the book mainly because I know Debora and wanted to read her fiction. It was a very well-written and sweet book. If you are someone who likes historical Christian fiction, you will like this book very much. The protagonist is nine, so this would be a perfect gift for a younger girl--the age group that would be into the "American Girl" series, I would guess. Visit Debora's site at http://www.deboracoty.com/.

OK, I feel better getting that out of my system :).

***And don't forget***
My book giveaway is still going on. Go to my earlier post here to see what I'm giving away and enter the drawings.

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