Category: Fiction

The Lost World by Michael Crichton

Fiction

Another week has gone by and I still haven’t finished the book I started two weeks ago. I feel like no one is going to believe that I have actually finished the book once I do, and that I will have made the review up. If it wasn’t for a sudden onset of abdominal pain and an emergency room visit over the weekend, I believe that I would have been able to focus and get through it. Due to anxiety and discomfort, I needed to read something entertaining to try and keep my mind off things while I waited in my hospital bed. I grabbed The Lost World from my pile before I drove to the hospital.

I had nothing else to do but read while I sat in the emergency department for four hours, but I was not only reading to pass the time, I was reading because the story was excellent. A character that was supposed to have died in Jurassic Park was surprisingly still alive. I actually said “what…”, as I was completely flabbergasted that I was finding myself reading a passage from their point of view. I am glad that this character wasn’t dead, I really enjoyed them in print and in the films. There are several new characters in this sequel, and you will recognize some of them if you have seen the movies. You will also notice that some of the characters are combined into one, or that personality aspects of certain characters are given to several different ones in the film adaptation. Besides enjoying the characters, the plot itself is rich and philosophical as it explores the great debate of all the questions and concerns regarding genetic exploration.

At the end of the book I longed for more, but sadly the author passed away at a relatively young age. I don’t know if he was planning on these books being part of a trilogy, but it definitely could have been explored. In the future, I plan on reading through the entire Michael Crichton collection; he has enough sci-fi books to keep me, or anyone else, going for a long time.

Into the Flame by Christina Dodd

Fiction

I was supposed to have finished a book on sociology for this week’s review, but it is taking me longer to read than I originally thought (I’ll explain more next week). So instead this week I have finished reading the fourth book in the Darkness Chosen series, Into the Flame. 

So I made a few predictions about some plot points in the book and I was wrong about the Wilder daughter, sort of. Although she does not initially find the fourth icon she does end up bringing it back to the family. The fourth son is technically the one who finds it, but like all the other Varinski men he cannot touch it. He manages to remove it from its hiding place by wrapping it up, and after he has hidden it Firebird finds it and brings it to the family home. I also had this idea that the fourth son was possibly an illegitimate son of Konstantine’s from before he ran away with Zorana, but I was wrong about that too. 

The series ends nicely, it’s a happy ending with a massacre preceding it. Overall, it’s a decent series, not nearly one of the best ones that I’ve ever read, but I might be willing to read at least the second and third books again. If you’re looking for an easy read, something to take for a day by the pool, you can choose any one of these books, you can finish one in a day.

Into the Shadow by Christina Dodd

Fiction

I was able to read the third book in the Darkness Chosen series over this past week and it was just as good as the previous book, Touch of Darkness. The plot is kind of similar to the last book, as we follow the story of the third brother, Adrik, and his love interest, Karen, who are far from their homes and the rest of the Wilder family who are back in the states. Now that I have enjoyed two out of the three books in this series, I am optimistic that I will enjoy the fourth, which I already have ready to go in my to read pile on my dresser. I have a feeling that I know who the fourth son is, the prophecy is so far coming true as it was told, and while I originally thought that maybe the Wilder daughter would step in and find the fourth icon, I don’t think it’s going to turn out that way. There is another man that I can’t wait to be introduced to. 

I am currently reading a very interesting book on a topic in sociology, but if I manage to finish it early, I think the fourth and final book in this series could be my bonus Friday blog next week. 

Heir of Fire by Sarah J. Maas

Fiction

I had a rare moment in which I read a few reviews of this book before I even picked it up. One of them mentioned that it was “slow” and that it kind of put them off continuing with the rest of the series. I bought it and read it anyway, because I usually ignore the opinions of others when it comes to books and films, and I think perhaps that reader was expecting it to be like the first two books. I found that there were equal amounts of down time and action, much less secrecy, more character growth. Also, a lot of the lure and history of the land was given through story telling by several new characters, which I personally enjoyed. I love it when a book gives you a ton of background information about the world, it makes the story so much more interesting. I am glad that I chose to not consider what others had said because we got to go to Wendlyn with Celaena, where magic still exists. We also get several different point of view chapters from characters we already knew, Dorian, Chaol, and Celaena, and new ones. There is more death in this book, more inner torment, and misery, but also a small glimmer of hope. I’m pretty excited to see what happens in the fourth book in this series, even though I have a feeling that things are going to get a lot worse before they start to get better considering that after Heir of Fire there are still four books to go. 

Nod by Adrian Barnes

Fiction

This book was gruesome and real, an end of days scenario written by a narrator in the midst of an existential crisis. It’s philosophical, gritty, and manic. The world is coming to an end but the main character never has an outburst, he seems unusually calm as the world and the people living in it decay around him. Perhaps because he has never really been part of the world to begin with, having always felt disconnected from people, is what makes it easier for him to accept the reality of what is happening. Throughout the story our leading man is rational and real. The lack of emotion in this main character was a change for me, but it was a good change of pace. 

I’m not sure if this is a book I want to keep, I don’t think it is something that I could read again, but I am not going to say that it isn’t worth a read, because it is. I will say, if you love cats, there is a very graphic description of some cruelty in the middle that I definitely do not want to read ever again, I don’t even want to go back to try to find the pages for anyone who wants to read the book but skip that part. This is one of my most interesting finds during one of my many book store browsing sessions.