Angelfall (Penryn and the End of Days #1) by Susan Ee

Book: Angelfall

Author: Susan Ee

Published: Skyscape, August 2012

Genre: YA Dystopia/Fantasy
Rating: 3.5/5

Amazon says "It’s been six weeks since angels of the apocalypse descended to demolish the modern world. Street gangs rule the day while fear and superstition rule the night. When warrior angels fly away with a helpless little girl, her seventeen-year-old sister, Penryn, will do anything to get her back.

Anything, including making a deal with an enemy angel.

Raffe is a warrior who lies broken and wingless on the street. After eons of fighting his own battles, he finds himself being rescued from a desperate situation by a half-starved teenage girl.

Traveling through a dark and twisted Northern California, they have only each other to rely on for survival. Together, they journey toward the angels’ stronghold in San Francisco where Penryn will risk everything to rescue her sister, and Raffe will put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies for the chance to be made whole again."

WHAT I THOUGHT:

Finally! A YA novel with a female lead who has more on her mind than boys! Yayy!

Such a refreshingly welcome and necessary debut novel.

I will disclose now that I have already read the second book World After but I'm going to do my best not to let that cloud my review of this one because, as I feel was the case for most readers, the second book was a significant drop in quality from what was truly a fantastic debut from Susan Ee.

I really enjoyed the idea and premise of the novel - different from the vampires and werewolves that overstayed their welcome a bit but still guaranteed an audience with that market - and Ee's telling of the story was quite striking. Raffe's struggle with his duty as an Archangel is clear and troubling and a little bit beautiful in an equally dark way. Penryn is *finally* the young female protagonist whose love interest really wasn't her main focus. Unwilling to let Raffe (who I really would love to meet) distract her, she is so focussed on her mission to save her sister. 

[I realise I keep suggesting Ee's Penryn is the only strong female lead in YA lit and I'm aware that thats not true. Moira Young's Saba in her Dustlands trilogy (which I will review as I reread in preparation for the final instalment) is one example but after reading so many YA dystopian novels in which the female lead has failed to wow me I have really been beginning to lose hope that it would ever change. That's perhaps a little depressing and over the top but you understand.]

The interactions between Pen and Raffe are for the most part awkward enough to be quite convincing while at other times are maybe a little bit cringey. Their chemistry is actually quite sweet and the ending leaves you hopeful of her future if not a little distressed at how the rest of it turns out.

As always with these sort of books there are a few issues within the imagined world. Only six weeks are supposed to have passed since the angel apocalypse but the world seems to have descended into anarchy and relatively quickly ordered itself. The rebel army especially managed to gather together people, resources and tactics. Pen's schizophrenic mother comes and goes as she becomes convenient and necessary for the story and there's very little explanation of her beyond that. This is unfortunate because to be quite honest I feel Pen's mother could make a really interesting character with her unpredictable and often dangerous nature and I would really have liked more of an exploration of the relationship between Pen and her mother.

Really these are minor gripes that do not detract from the story whatsoever. Overall I think it is a fantastic debut from Ee and I definitely recommend!

Thanks for reading and feel free to comment :)
Naomi Joy x

Matched (Matched #1) by Ally Condie

Book: Matched
Author: Ally Condie
Published: Penguin, June 2011
Rating: 2/5

Cassia has always trusted the Society to make the right choices for her: what to read, what to watch, what to believe. So when Xander’s face appears on-screen at her Matching ceremony, Cassia knows with complete certainty that he is her ideal mate . . . until she sees Ky Markham’s face flash for an instant before the screen fades to black.

The Society tells her it’s a glitch, a rare malfunction, and that she should focus on the happy life she’s destined to lead with Xander. But Cassia can’t stop thinking about Ky, and as they slowly fall in love, Cassia begins to doubt the Society’s infallibility and is faced with an impossible choice: between Xander and Ky, between the only life she’s known and a path that no one else has dared to follow.

WHAT I THOUGHT:

I have really gone back and forth about whether or not it's OK to post a bad review but it is nothing against the author, the general concept of the book has a lot of potential but I personally just found this book so hard to get along with and I'll do my best to try to explain why.

Let me set the scene as best I can. It's some time in the future and the Society has decided it's much better if they devoid everyone of any choice and limit the use of technology. Your job, spouse (your Match - hence the title) and even time of death is pre-planned by the Society. According to the Society too much choice is dangerous so they've established the Hundreds Database of the top Hundred Songs, Poems, Stories and Paintings. Enter our protagonist Cassia on the eve of her seventeenth birthday ready to be Matched and from there everything goes wrong.

What I will give author Ally Condie is that the writing is actually quite good and she's obviously actually put a lot of thought into her dystopian world. I'd say it works a lot better in terms of providing the reader with a background than, say, Suzanne Collins' Panem. The issue is the premise of the book and the interminably dull nature of her central characters.

Like many YA dystopian novels that are aimed at girls Matched uses the trusted love triangle formula that worked (ish) for Twilight and The Hunger Games. The issue with Matched is that there is no other plot-line. The fact that the decisions she's making affect the entire structure of the Society, that most are, seemingly, OK with, takes a backseat to the fact that Cassia really must decide which boy she loves. The other issue is that to devoid her characters of choice she effectively makes them incapable of any intense emotion. There's barely any grief at the death of Cassia's grandfather because, you know, the Society had decided it was best for him to go. Xander becomes almost entirely insignificant to the story. Never have I ever felt less for or cared less about the characters of a book than I did with this one. In part due to the storyline (or lack thereof) I found the characters equally lacking. Ky is supposed to be this mysterious unknown but I found I didn't really want to learn more. There is no depth to his character, he's just, for the most part, a bit of an ass. Xander. Poor Xander. Without the attempted mystery Condie put into Ky's character, Xander becomes unfortunately one-dimensional and dull.

Never have I come to the end of a book and felt so indifferent and, I mean, good on Ally Condie for selling the movie rights but I really do wonder if this film will see any of the success that Twilight or The Hunger Games has seen. I'll probably still see it anyway. I'm not interested in reading any future books in the series and I probably wouldn't recommend unfortunately. However I'm well aware that this is a minority opinion for this series.

Thanks for your time and feel free to comment ;)
Naomi Joy x