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alexalovesbooks's review
3.0
Starry Nights has a tantalizing cover, complete with the mysterious silhouette of an embracing couple set against the lush backdrop of the sparkly Parisian landmark, the Eiffel Tower. It's poised to immediately captivate potential readers, but sadly, the contents of this novel fail to live up to the promise of its cover.
As always, the positive & negative things will be listed below:
The book would be appealing to lovers of art in all its forms. There are many variations of art touched upon in the book, everything from ballet to painting to sketching to the opera. And as someone who enjoys most expressions of creativity, this aspect of the book worked. The art descriptions are lovely, and each masterpiece mentioned was enticing the reader to want to visit them in their respective museums. The reader would be hard-pressed to ignore the call to creativity that this book employs, and it's truly one of the winning parts of the novel.
Muses. It would be truly strange to explain this aspect, and nearly impossible to do so without spoiling parts of the story. But, as with most forms of art, the muse is alluded to many times in this novel. It seems fitting that Whitney would deliberately weave them into her story, albeit unexpectedly.
The secondary characters in this novel were fantastic. I adored meeting the other characters in this book - the two eccentric children of a famous art collector, Jackson's best friend, the characters in the paintings. Despite some of them only making brief appearances in the story, they felt more alive as characters and easier to love.
Jackson was a completely flat character. He basically lacked personality, and felt completely forgettable. The best way to describe him would be as a blur, where there were moments you knew him and moments you didn't. While it would have been wonderful to be able to root for him,it just didn't click with me in spite of his professed passion for art.
The entire novel read like it was A Midsummer Night's Dream. Everything that occurred in this novel was fanciful, whimsical and highly imaginative. Honestly, this is one of those things where it could be either positive or negative for a reader. While the whimsy was generally acceptable, it felt too outlandish at times and a bit over the top. If that was the author's intention, she certainly succeeded.
I had certainly hoped for more when it came to Starry Nights. Unfortunately, I failed to connect with the story or the main character, which resulted in me feeling apathetic towards this book. While it is likely that I will pick up Whitney's other reads, this is not necessarily one I'd recommend you start with.
(originally posted on the blog)
As always, the positive & negative things will be listed below:
The book would be appealing to lovers of art in all its forms. There are many variations of art touched upon in the book, everything from ballet to painting to sketching to the opera. And as someone who enjoys most expressions of creativity, this aspect of the book worked. The art descriptions are lovely, and each masterpiece mentioned was enticing the reader to want to visit them in their respective museums. The reader would be hard-pressed to ignore the call to creativity that this book employs, and it's truly one of the winning parts of the novel.
Muses. It would be truly strange to explain this aspect, and nearly impossible to do so without spoiling parts of the story. But, as with most forms of art, the muse is alluded to many times in this novel. It seems fitting that Whitney would deliberately weave them into her story, albeit unexpectedly.
The secondary characters in this novel were fantastic. I adored meeting the other characters in this book - the two eccentric children of a famous art collector, Jackson's best friend, the characters in the paintings. Despite some of them only making brief appearances in the story, they felt more alive as characters and easier to love.
Jackson was a completely flat character. He basically lacked personality, and felt completely forgettable. The best way to describe him would be as a blur, where there were moments you knew him and moments you didn't. While it would have been wonderful to be able to root for him,it just didn't click with me in spite of his professed passion for art.
The entire novel read like it was A Midsummer Night's Dream. Everything that occurred in this novel was fanciful, whimsical and highly imaginative. Honestly, this is one of those things where it could be either positive or negative for a reader. While the whimsy was generally acceptable, it felt too outlandish at times and a bit over the top. If that was the author's intention, she certainly succeeded.
I had certainly hoped for more when it came to Starry Nights. Unfortunately, I failed to connect with the story or the main character, which resulted in me feeling apathetic towards this book. While it is likely that I will pick up Whitney's other reads, this is not necessarily one I'd recommend you start with.
(originally posted on the blog)
jroxy13's review
I got a quarter of the way through this book and had to stop. Nothing of interest, bland writing and characters, and then I read some reviews that laid out what would happen in the rest of the book. Disappointing since the premise sounds fun.
debnanceatreaderbuzz's review
4.0
An unexpectedly wacky novel that I could never begin to explain, but let's just say it involves Muses, Renoir, the Louvre, a dancer, a friend who keeps a goat on his balcony, people stepping out of paintings, art that appears to be dying, and an ordinary boy who learns he may be the only one who can save it. I'd never have guess that such a zany tale lay inside the pages of this book with a cover of yet another couple kissing beside the Eiffel Tower. It is fun and romantic and surprising and (maybe) doesn't quite make sense but who cares? It's delightful.
reader_fictions's review
2.0
At first, I totally thought this was going to be one of those times where I really like a book that most of my friends did not. The early reviews were discouraging, but it was a 4 star book for the first 75 pages or so. From there, things slid downhill. My hopes were high for Starry Nights, but, sadly, a highly original, creative, beautiful concept turns into a cheesy pile of instalove. Be warned that this review does contain some spoilers.
The opening of this novel is so strong. Whitney's a talented writer, and the concept is gorgeous. At the outset, we have Julien, an artist of limited talent, whose mother runs a Parisian art gallery. He does tours and generally loves art of all forms, music, paintings, sculpture, dance, etc. At night, Julien wanders the halls and sees the art come alive. The subjects pop out of their frames, Degas' dancers performing ballets that only he can see.
The imagery of this, the idea that the paintings have lives of their own within the museum after dark, is stunning. While, yes, there are all sorts of reasons this is unlikely, it's beautiful magical realism, and done very well. At least, until it ceases being magical realism and turns into a paranormal/mythological plot.
While I wasn't a fan of this plot twist where the story went for the mythological rather than the subtle beauty of magical realism, which is one of my favorite things right now, I still admire the originality of the world building that Whitney devises. She's built a novel around the Muses, which I've not personally seen done before. On top of that, she brings in a look at the evolution of art, the way it went from being something done solely by educated men to something that can be created and appreciated by anyone. These are powerful themes, and I still think she handles her concept well. Though not quite what I wanted, her Muse mythology is fascinating and meaningful.
Where Starry Nights flops is the romance. It's a classic case of instalove, complete with the relatively flat characters so typical of this romantic "arc". Even before that, though, I have issues with the romance. She's a girl in a painting and he's a person, so their options are pretty limited, and, though I do sometimes go for weird ships, they didn't have enough of a connection for me to root for them in the face of odds where she's not even a real person. Sure, she likes to eat and he brings her food. They both like art. Wow, do they both like Breakfast at Tiffany's too? There wasn't any real verve or banter in their conversations which are largely boring, and I personally thought he and Emilie, who's in a total of three scenes, had a lot more chemistry.
This is the dog version of: "Is this a kissing book?" *groans*
Julien and Clio, the girl in the painting, fall in love pretty much immediately. In a rather classic Romeo & Juliet scenario, Julien is just out of a bad breakup. Clio, on the other hand, has been in a painting for over a hundred years in a private home, meaning that she hasn't seen ANYONE BUT HIM. He is literally the only boy she's seen in hundreds of years. Instalove is bad enough when there are options, but, when it's "I love you because you're the only person I've literally ever been capable of loving," to me that's not romance but desperation. Part of love is choosing that person over other people, not being cornered into it by circumstance.
Then, there's the ending, which is completely cheesy and convenient. The book could have at least ended in the expected heartbreaking place, but, oh no, this is paranormal romance world and there just HAS to be an HEA, even if it makes no sense. Let's nurture the concept that manicpixiedreamgirls will literally step out of our pop culture to love us. Yeah, that's healthy. Well, good luck to you, Clio and Julien. Two people with no marketable skills who got together when one was on the rebound and one had never spoken to another boy. I'm sure this will end well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wQp1vglWejs
All told, I do think there is a good framework to Starry Nights, but the instalove killed it. I'm left feeling not angry, but disappointed. This could have been a thoughtful, slow-paced, magical novel, but instead went the way of paranormal romance tropes.
The opening of this novel is so strong. Whitney's a talented writer, and the concept is gorgeous. At the outset, we have Julien, an artist of limited talent, whose mother runs a Parisian art gallery. He does tours and generally loves art of all forms, music, paintings, sculpture, dance, etc. At night, Julien wanders the halls and sees the art come alive. The subjects pop out of their frames, Degas' dancers performing ballets that only he can see.
The imagery of this, the idea that the paintings have lives of their own within the museum after dark, is stunning. While, yes, there are all sorts of reasons this is unlikely, it's beautiful magical realism, and done very well. At least, until it ceases being magical realism and turns into a paranormal/mythological plot.
While I wasn't a fan of this plot twist where the story went for the mythological rather than the subtle beauty of magical realism, which is one of my favorite things right now, I still admire the originality of the world building that Whitney devises. She's built a novel around the Muses, which I've not personally seen done before. On top of that, she brings in a look at the evolution of art, the way it went from being something done solely by educated men to something that can be created and appreciated by anyone. These are powerful themes, and I still think she handles her concept well. Though not quite what I wanted, her Muse mythology is fascinating and meaningful.
Where Starry Nights flops is the romance. It's a classic case of instalove, complete with the relatively flat characters so typical of this romantic "arc". Even before that, though, I have issues with the romance. She's a girl in a painting and he's a person, so their options are pretty limited, and, though I do sometimes go for weird ships, they didn't have enough of a connection for me to root for them in the face of odds where she's not even a real person. Sure, she likes to eat and he brings her food. They both like art. Wow, do they both like Breakfast at Tiffany's too? There wasn't any real verve or banter in their conversations which are largely boring, and I personally thought he and Emilie, who's in a total of three scenes, had a lot more chemistry.
This is the dog version of: "Is this a kissing book?" *groans*
Julien and Clio, the girl in the painting, fall in love pretty much immediately. In a rather classic Romeo & Juliet scenario, Julien is just out of a bad breakup. Clio, on the other hand, has been in a painting for over a hundred years in a private home, meaning that she hasn't seen ANYONE BUT HIM. He is literally the only boy she's seen in hundreds of years. Instalove is bad enough when there are options, but, when it's "I love you because you're the only person I've literally ever been capable of loving," to me that's not romance but desperation. Part of love is choosing that person over other people, not being cornered into it by circumstance.
Then, there's the ending, which is completely cheesy and convenient. The book could have at least ended in the expected heartbreaking place, but, oh no, this is paranormal romance world and there just HAS to be an HEA, even if it makes no sense. Let's nurture the concept that manicpixiedreamgirls will literally step out of our pop culture to love us. Yeah, that's healthy. Well, good luck to you, Clio and Julien. Two people with no marketable skills who got together when one was on the rebound and one had never spoken to another boy. I'm sure this will end well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wQp1vglWejs
All told, I do think there is a good framework to Starry Nights, but the instalove killed it. I'm left feeling not angry, but disappointed. This could have been a thoughtful, slow-paced, magical novel, but instead went the way of paranormal romance tropes.
kellyhager's review
5.0
I think this is one of those novels where, if a different author wrote it, it would be an absolute train wreck. This idea is so completely out there that it could easily have become ridiculous. Not surprisingly, Daisy Whitney handles this with a deft hand and makes it so believable and wonderful.
In a lot of ways, it reminded me of Midnight in Paris. It's a completely outlandish concept, but you almost immediately start to believe that it's possible and actually happening. (And seriously, if things like this were to happen, wouldn't they happen in Paris?)
This book is a huge departure from Daisy Whitney's other three books in terms of plot (her others are straight contemporary, no hint of the paranormal in them) but does have the great writing (in terms of plot, characterization and dialogue) that I've come to expect from her. Except now I have read all of her available books and there aren't any more. This is very sad. If you haven't read Daisy Whitney before, this would be a good one to start with, especially if you like paranormal fiction.
Recommended.
In a lot of ways, it reminded me of Midnight in Paris. It's a completely outlandish concept, but you almost immediately start to believe that it's possible and actually happening. (And seriously, if things like this were to happen, wouldn't they happen in Paris?)
This book is a huge departure from Daisy Whitney's other three books in terms of plot (her others are straight contemporary, no hint of the paranormal in them) but does have the great writing (in terms of plot, characterization and dialogue) that I've come to expect from her. Except now I have read all of her available books and there aren't any more. This is very sad. If you haven't read Daisy Whitney before, this would be a good one to start with, especially if you like paranormal fiction.
Recommended.
melissayabookshelf's review
3.0
I didn't like this one as much as Daisy Whitney's other novel, and it isn't because it's magic realism. There were a lot of things Iiked: the focus on art is unparalleled in any YA novel I've ever read and the ending was great. However, I had a hard time getting into the story, and I thought that there was a little to much explanation necessary for the novel's magic / a little too complicated.
take_me_awayyy's review
1.0
DNF. I just couldn't get into it.I mainly blame the writing. The upsetting thing is, this was my first Daisy Whitney and I've heard so many great things about her. I really wanted to like it.
Full review to come closer to pub date.
Full review to come closer to pub date.
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