Reviews

House of Secrets by Ned Vizzini, Chris Columbus

naja's review against another edition

This came up as the random pick of a book i own for the month of april but honestly don't want to read it right now or really own it so will pass it on to someone who's maybe actually the target audience and read it maybe in the future from the library or something. 

galathyn's review

5.0

I can relate with Cordelia (character) about reading :3 Wanna start on book 2 now.....!

echaurz's review

3.0

it was like someone tried to make a story out of a scrapped movie description

fela_feli's review

adventurous emotional funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

I LOVE THIS BOOK SM. I read it when I was like 11 and it was my favorite childhood book ever. and now i'm rereading it when i'm 17 and i still love it just as much. if not more. honestly, idk for sure if this book is actually good or if childhood me just loved it sm i don't really have the capacity to hate it. i mean, i think it is, without a doubt, a good book. but it's just greater to me because it's more dear to my heart. i think the plot is pretty interesting! for a kid's book anyway. and i actually love how realistic brendon, cordelia and eleanor are. and my favoritest ever is will ofc. has always been! my first book bf. he's so so dear to me. i love that he's british so he's all "what in the bloody blazes" and "crikey"

it threw me off that he was kinda sexist. i forgot about that but like given he's from the 1900s it makes sense, sort of. that his view on women are stuck in the 1900s. i didn't really like penelope hope appearing because like 11 year old me wanted cordelia and will to end up together so bad and penelope got in the way. she wasn't bad but like girl existed for 3.5 seconds so uh.. yeah. but cordelia and will seemed like a one-sided crush thing so, that was awkward. the kiss still made me giggle but it wasn't really much. i felt bad for will when penelope died, though. but he was kinda an ass when he was captain draper, but like he apologized so everything is all good because will is perfect. oh and i felt so bad for him because he's just a character and doesn't even have parents and when he died omg i was about to cry. the fact he thought his death wouldn't matter to anyone because nothing he knew was real but then he realizes brendan, eleanor and especially cordelia would care ☹ made me so emotional.

in the ending it seemed like everything got resolved kinda.. just like that. not much of a struggle there but it was relieving anyway. i actually really love how adventurous this book is, too! like it's one of my favorite things ever. and it's also pretty funny! and it keeps me from being bored and i can't wait to read the next book!!!

elefly115's review

adventurous challenging funny mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

webz's review

4.0

I somehow accidentally deleted my last review so now I have to start ALL over! :'( Where do I begin?! Okay so this book is a middle grade read but it was SO good. The bad guys/villains were crazy wicked and horrible. I got a bit freaked out at the descriptions of what was happening at this one part (it was night and I was alone and reading in the dark! What can I say, it was horribly awesome!) I loved how the characters seemed real and how you can really bond with them. Stuff keeps happening that constantly keeps you turning pages! Can I go on about how evil and wicked the bad people were in this book! Ah! They were crazy horrible! A lot of the stuff made me think that the book should be considered YA....but that's why I read middle grade books! Sometimes I'll find a little gem like this one in the juvenile section in the library and I'm pleasantly surprised with how good the book is. And can I just express my horror at a characters death? I mean, they didn't stay dead but for the parts when the character wasn't there I was in shock! Just a bit of a character crush yah know? haha, here's the spoiler:

Spoiler

Okay so one of the characters, Will gets a sword thrust through his back and then his body gets thrown into the sea! Now I could handle some of the other horrible things that happened, even the horrible death of this other character (that I happened to not really want in the story so I was fine with it lol) never seemed to really touch me! But this! My heart squeezed, and I was shocked, then sad, and then really mad at the author/authors! How could they kill Will! He was so...ARGH! But then he ended up living again (magic wish) and I literally pumped my fist in the air and said YEAH! So the author/authors are forgiven :D

This book really has everything! Pirates, band of bad men, a witch! It was awesome. And I could go on but I think you get the point. So....just read it okay? I promise you won't regret it!

sidnarwhal's review

4.0

Light reading, really easily to get involved with the characters, loved it, I thought it was a nice mix of The Chronicles of Narnia with the Charlie Bone series

mholleronsilk's review

4.0

This is a gripping and exciting fantasy novel that surprises shocks, it could be compared to the Percy Jackson novels and i thoroughly enjoyed this read. Be prepared for an adventure on every page and a land of mystical creatures that readers and lovers of the Spiderwick Chronicles will love!

eshalmahmud's review

4.0

It was a really good book. There was a good plot, fun characters and it was interesting plus entertaining. Highly recommend.

roxane_titaina's review

2.0

Bien que le synopsis du livre semble alléchant (trois enfants envoyés dans l'univers fantastique des romans d'aventure de leur bibliothèque) j'ai été plutôt déçue à la lecture. Tout va trop vite, on saute de scène d'action en scène d'action sans avoir le temps de se poser avec les personnages pour apprendre à les connaître. Personnages qui m'ont parus bien fades et clichés.
De plus la tendance des auteurs à balancer des références à la pop-culture toutes les trois pages devient très vite agaçante.
C'est dommage car cela aurait pu être un livre pour enfants/jeunes ados vraiment sympathique.