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3.39 AVERAGE
3.39 AVERAGE
I really enjoyed this book. I like the setting and feel that the author did a good job of immersing me into the book and bringing out the setting. I liked the plot and how the author brought everything together. I did like how Japanese culture and traditions played a part of the book. I liked the idea of an American girl slowly immerses herself in Japanese culture. I liked how the author included the romance and then finally the supernatural. Not everything was explained in this book, but I was okay with that because it left me with anticipation for the next book. The supernatural wasn’t over done and flowed nicely with the book. Everything about the book was amazing and brought together smoothly.
Katie was a pretty good character. Her transition from sad and confused to strong and happy was fun to read about. She resisted moving to japan at first but then she settles in and accepted her new life. I didn’t like how caught up she got in Tomohiro and how he took over her thoughts. She was willing to give up a lot for this guy. But she balanced this out by being strong and self reliant. I liked how the book was from her point of view and the thoughts and feelings that made up this character.
Tomohiro was a contradicting character that I really like. He had these two sides to him and Katie never knew which one he was going to use at any given moment. He had a bad boy outer shell and a good boy center. He constantly used that outer shell as a weapon and as a defense mechanism.
I really loved the ending of this book. I got all prepared for one ending and then I was left with this surprise of a cliff hanger. The author was very masterful with the ending and left me wanting more. I will be looking for more books by this author and publisher.
Katie was a pretty good character. Her transition from sad and confused to strong and happy was fun to read about. She resisted moving to japan at first but then she settles in and accepted her new life. I didn’t like how caught up she got in Tomohiro and how he took over her thoughts. She was willing to give up a lot for this guy. But she balanced this out by being strong and self reliant. I liked how the book was from her point of view and the thoughts and feelings that made up this character.
Tomohiro was a contradicting character that I really like. He had these two sides to him and Katie never knew which one he was going to use at any given moment. He had a bad boy outer shell and a good boy center. He constantly used that outer shell as a weapon and as a defense mechanism.
I really loved the ending of this book. I got all prepared for one ending and then I was left with this surprise of a cliff hanger. The author was very masterful with the ending and left me wanting more. I will be looking for more books by this author and publisher.
No surprise I loved this book...I have been fascinated with Japanese culture since I was quite young. I will definitely read the next book in the series!
While Ink may not work for some, I found it to be a different YA novel experience from what I'm used to. Sun blends Japanese art, culture, mythology, and language into a story exploring normal teen themes of social acceptance, romance, and growing up, all while showcasing an exciting supernatural element that was cool to say the least. I look forward to going back to Japan and following Katie and Tomo on their next adventure.
Find my full review here.
Find my full review here.
I pushed through cause the setting is beautiful. Also the cover is immaculate as you can tell. But I am so damn confused as to what occurred in this novel.
3.5 stars
I liked the concept of the book. I liked the environment and the mythology of the Kami Gods. The only problem I had was with the main character. I liked her at times but the majority of the time I found myself rolling my eyes at everything she did. I havent read a book with a main character that was overly sensitive so I guess that why I was annoyed with her all the time. But I liked that she never gave up on anything and she pushed though struggles (her mom dying and moving to another country where she didnt know the language). Shes tough but she cries alot... Shes also overly romantic, that if she and Tomo split up the world will be off balanced!
The romance was also leaning towards insta-love. I think if Tomo wasnt that "bad-ass" "tough" guy that was pushing Katie away and instead fall hard for her too, it would have been super annoying. I liked Tomo though, I wish there was more of him in the book though. Looking back, I dont think there was enough information for me to understand the struggles he was going though. And it didnt help that Katie was gullible and believed everything he said or others said to fully understand the other characters.
Katie is also a stalker, and it gets annoying because she kinda blames others for her stalking. Like she would follow Tomo and she would get caught and then she'll be like, well if you weren't so interesting or hiding something. There was this other time where she yelled at Tomo to tell her the truth about him and then she started to freak out and she was like "i dont know what to do with this unwanted information" when she would stalk him and asked him a million questions to know this information -_- Its a love or hate relationship with Katie for the reader, at least for me.
The Yakuza was also in the book. I didnt know who they were and the book doesnt explain who they are either so I had to google them. They are Japan's Mafia which I thought was a cool thing to put in the book. Its a mix of fantasy with the Kami gods but also real crime in the book, I enjoyed that aspect. I just wished the author explained who the Yakuza are so I wouldnt have to stop reading the book and read TruTv's 6 chapters of Yakuza's history (which was interesting, so I wasnt even mad... sorta).
Theres a lot of illustrations in the book that I though we so pretty, I couldnt stop staring at them or even the cover. Oops.
This book also reminded me of Twilight. But where Obsidian by Jennifer L. Armentrout had many parallels to Twilight and the story was awesome. Ink had the parallels and same concepts, but the execution was a miss.
I liked the concept of the book. I liked the environment and the mythology of the Kami Gods. The only problem I had was with the main character. I liked her at times but the majority of the time I found myself rolling my eyes at everything she did. I havent read a book with a main character that was overly sensitive so I guess that why I was annoyed with her all the time. But I liked that she never gave up on anything and she pushed though struggles (her mom dying and moving to another country where she didnt know the language). Shes tough but she cries alot... Shes also overly romantic, that if she and Tomo split up the world will be off balanced!
The romance was also leaning towards insta-love. I think if Tomo wasnt that "bad-ass" "tough" guy that was pushing Katie away and instead fall hard for her too, it would have been super annoying. I liked Tomo though, I wish there was more of him in the book though. Looking back, I dont think there was enough information for me to understand the struggles he was going though. And it didnt help that Katie was gullible and believed everything he said or others said to fully understand the other characters.
Katie is also a stalker, and it gets annoying because she kinda blames others for her stalking. Like she would follow Tomo and she would get caught and then she'll be like, well if you weren't so interesting or hiding something. There was this other time where she yelled at Tomo to tell her the truth about him and then she started to freak out and she was like "i dont know what to do with this unwanted information" when she would stalk him and asked him a million questions to know this information -_- Its a love or hate relationship with Katie for the reader, at least for me.
The Yakuza was also in the book. I didnt know who they were and the book doesnt explain who they are either so I had to google them. They are Japan's Mafia which I thought was a cool thing to put in the book. Its a mix of fantasy with the Kami gods but also real crime in the book, I enjoyed that aspect. I just wished the author explained who the Yakuza are so I wouldnt have to stop reading the book and read TruTv's 6 chapters of Yakuza's history (which was interesting, so I wasnt even mad... sorta).
Theres a lot of illustrations in the book that I though we so pretty, I couldnt stop staring at them or even the cover. Oops.
This book also reminded me of Twilight. But where Obsidian by Jennifer L. Armentrout had many parallels to Twilight and the story was awesome. Ink had the parallels and same concepts, but the execution was a miss.
Though I liked the cover and interior artwork, I am having to give this a wavering one/two star rating.
It started off as both a promising read and an interesting idea for a story, but the execution in the telling of was sadly lacking.
I will leave off with my review here for now...will comeback later to finish.
It started off as both a promising read and an interesting idea for a story, but the execution in the telling of was sadly lacking.
I will leave off with my review here for now...will comeback later to finish.
YOU CAN FIND MORE AT MY BLOG KARLEIGH.READS
I purchased this book off of bookdepository a couple months ago after I had seen it being hauled by booktubers. I didn't even think twice as soon as I heard that this book takes place in Japan. I may be a bit bias on this book because my undying love for Japan. If you don't know me then you wouldn't know that the whole reason I am attending university is so that I can teach in Japan.
So first of all can we just take a minute and look at the beautiful cover, now for those of you who have not seen this book in person you wouldn't know that the cover actually looks and feels like a canvas for painting. Every little detail in this book is amazing. I love that Amanda Sun got herself an artist to draw little things on pages. I enjoyed that there were falling sakura leaves in a flip-page animation, as well as the falling bird to go along with that part of the story. You can tell just how much love Amanda put into this book.
So this story follows a girl name Katie Greene, who has just recently moved to Japan after the death of her mother. She is forced to live with her aunt who teaches in Japan because her grandfather is dealing with cancer so she was unable to move in with them in Canada. Katie is put straight into a full Japanese school where her aunt believes that she will catch on to the language easier if she is completely immersed. There she meets Tomohiro Yuu, a tough looking guy who keeps telling her to stay away. Katie is so stubborn and bold that she doesn't listen because something about Tomo keeps pulling her in. Katie also starts to see that anything that is drawn on paper starts to move, from little doodles on her pages at school to sketches that Tomohiro does. First she thinks she is just seeing things, going crazy, but she soon realizes that there is more to Tomohiro than she thinks. Tomohiro happens to be a Kami, a descendant of the sun goddesses Amaterasu. Not only that but the Yakuza are after her and him as well.
From the first page, the detail in the story made me feel like I was right there in Japan with Katie. I loved every moment of the story, all the details from the way the cherry blossoms looked on the trees to the fact that she uses Japanese words to explain things like Conbini instead of Convenience store. Amanda did an amazing job immersing her readers right into the amazing world that is Japan. This book has made me want to find even more books written around/about/set in Japan, I don't know why there aren't more. I also didn't hesitate to pick up the second book in the series and preorder the third.
If you love Japan like I do I suggest you give this book a try, or even if you are looking for a good fantasy type novel that takes place in a new type of setting, you should check this one out as well. I highly recommend it!
5 out of 5 stars!!
I purchased this book off of bookdepository a couple months ago after I had seen it being hauled by booktubers. I didn't even think twice as soon as I heard that this book takes place in Japan. I may be a bit bias on this book because my undying love for Japan. If you don't know me then you wouldn't know that the whole reason I am attending university is so that I can teach in Japan.
So first of all can we just take a minute and look at the beautiful cover, now for those of you who have not seen this book in person you wouldn't know that the cover actually looks and feels like a canvas for painting. Every little detail in this book is amazing. I love that Amanda Sun got herself an artist to draw little things on pages. I enjoyed that there were falling sakura leaves in a flip-page animation, as well as the falling bird to go along with that part of the story. You can tell just how much love Amanda put into this book.
So this story follows a girl name Katie Greene, who has just recently moved to Japan after the death of her mother. She is forced to live with her aunt who teaches in Japan because her grandfather is dealing with cancer so she was unable to move in with them in Canada. Katie is put straight into a full Japanese school where her aunt believes that she will catch on to the language easier if she is completely immersed. There she meets Tomohiro Yuu, a tough looking guy who keeps telling her to stay away. Katie is so stubborn and bold that she doesn't listen because something about Tomo keeps pulling her in. Katie also starts to see that anything that is drawn on paper starts to move, from little doodles on her pages at school to sketches that Tomohiro does. First she thinks she is just seeing things, going crazy, but she soon realizes that there is more to Tomohiro than she thinks. Tomohiro happens to be a Kami, a descendant of the sun goddesses Amaterasu. Not only that but the Yakuza are after her and him as well.
From the first page, the detail in the story made me feel like I was right there in Japan with Katie. I loved every moment of the story, all the details from the way the cherry blossoms looked on the trees to the fact that she uses Japanese words to explain things like Conbini instead of Convenience store. Amanda did an amazing job immersing her readers right into the amazing world that is Japan. This book has made me want to find even more books written around/about/set in Japan, I don't know why there aren't more. I also didn't hesitate to pick up the second book in the series and preorder the third.
If you love Japan like I do I suggest you give this book a try, or even if you are looking for a good fantasy type novel that takes place in a new type of setting, you should check this one out as well. I highly recommend it!
5 out of 5 stars!!
I got this book from the author, free of cost, in exchange of an honest review from my side.
Firstly I would like to thank Amanda Sun, author of Ink, for giving me this opportunity of reading and reviewing this fabulous book.
Here the author took us into the contemporary world of Japan where we also find the mixture of Japanese culture, tradition, mythologies along with the modern environment which gave a fresh yet traditional feel to the plot and also helped in connecting with the characters and knowing the culture of Japan.
Katie (protagonist) moves to Japan to live with her aunt Diane who is an English teacher there after the death of her mother. She faces different hurdles, challenges and embarrassment in her day to day life while she tries hard to adjust herself in the new place. With the change in environment, language, customs, traditions, culture Katie feels herself lost and lonely but she makes some good friends like Yuki and Tanaka who support her really well. She meets the bad-ass, arrogant, playboy, gorgeous, sexy, Kendo star Tomohiro who has some big secrets about him that slowly starts to unfurl when Katie accidently witness his paintings to move, literally! Throw into the punch some bad and utterly dangerous guys and who want to dominate the world and also add to that the Mafias and you can imagine what a gripping read it is. Will Katie find out the gift or curse of Tomohiro? Will she be able to keep herself and Tomohiro safe? Why does her mere presence make Tomohiro’s abilities go wild? Will Katie be able to breach the rude and hard facade of Tomohiro and enter his heart? Will their love win over all the evils? Wanna find out? Then go grab it up!
The presentation of Japanese culture, tradition and the descriptions of Japan are really remarkable and it brought out a lively feel to the whole plot. The characterization is great with fully flourished characters and the crisp and clear dialogues made the characters desirable. The plot is well planned out and the writing style of the author is skilled and descriptive. Power-packed action and steamy yet conflicting romance really spiced up the story. Slow and steady process of revealing the secrets and mysteries made this read an intriguing one. The suspense is dense and heart stopping and the unpredictable twists and turns made the story a winning novel.
Overall a great and fast-paced read with characters with whom you’ll get emotionally connected, all thanks to the vivid projection of the emotional weakness and outbursts of the characters by the author within skilled yet simple words. Just a little complaint I have, the side characters didn’t get the full attention of the author and they just got ignored and lost as the story progressed, a little attention towards them would have brought out some more bright colours within the story.
Firstly I would like to thank Amanda Sun, author of Ink, for giving me this opportunity of reading and reviewing this fabulous book.
Here the author took us into the contemporary world of Japan where we also find the mixture of Japanese culture, tradition, mythologies along with the modern environment which gave a fresh yet traditional feel to the plot and also helped in connecting with the characters and knowing the culture of Japan.
Katie (protagonist) moves to Japan to live with her aunt Diane who is an English teacher there after the death of her mother. She faces different hurdles, challenges and embarrassment in her day to day life while she tries hard to adjust herself in the new place. With the change in environment, language, customs, traditions, culture Katie feels herself lost and lonely but she makes some good friends like Yuki and Tanaka who support her really well. She meets the bad-ass, arrogant, playboy, gorgeous, sexy, Kendo star Tomohiro who has some big secrets about him that slowly starts to unfurl when Katie accidently witness his paintings to move, literally! Throw into the punch some bad and utterly dangerous guys and who want to dominate the world and also add to that the Mafias and you can imagine what a gripping read it is. Will Katie find out the gift or curse of Tomohiro? Will she be able to keep herself and Tomohiro safe? Why does her mere presence make Tomohiro’s abilities go wild? Will Katie be able to breach the rude and hard facade of Tomohiro and enter his heart? Will their love win over all the evils? Wanna find out? Then go grab it up!
The presentation of Japanese culture, tradition and the descriptions of Japan are really remarkable and it brought out a lively feel to the whole plot. The characterization is great with fully flourished characters and the crisp and clear dialogues made the characters desirable. The plot is well planned out and the writing style of the author is skilled and descriptive. Power-packed action and steamy yet conflicting romance really spiced up the story. Slow and steady process of revealing the secrets and mysteries made this read an intriguing one. The suspense is dense and heart stopping and the unpredictable twists and turns made the story a winning novel.
Overall a great and fast-paced read with characters with whom you’ll get emotionally connected, all thanks to the vivid projection of the emotional weakness and outbursts of the characters by the author within skilled yet simple words. Just a little complaint I have, the side characters didn’t get the full attention of the author and they just got ignored and lost as the story progressed, a little attention towards them would have brought out some more bright colours within the story.
I had been looking forward to reading Ink since it was previewed at the Harlequin Summit in February. The first in a new young adult series, it promised an original mythic element set in an exotic but contemporary locale.
Katie Greene is still settling into her new life with her aunt in Shizuoka, Japan, when she accidentally witnesses a nasty break up between Tomohiro and his girlfriend. Katie is shocked at the handsome, Kendo stars cruelty but wonders at his fleeting expression of pain and regret. She is further intrigued when she awkwardly gathers together the sketches flung at her feet and one of the figures appears to turn and glare at her. Despite being warned off by her friends Katie is drawn to Tomo, determined to discover just what she saw, and what he is hiding.
The strongest element of Ink is the introduction of a fresh concept for the paranormal genre which has exhausted all things vampire, werewolf and fae. The myth of the Kami (Japanese Gods), and Tomo's ability, is interesting and creative. Tomohiro's sketches come to life, but the spirit that inhabits them is malevolent, turning on him and whomever is near. It's a power Tomohiro does not understand and tries to keep hidden but he is finding it increasingly difficult to control his ability.
I also liked the way in which Sun incorporates the distinctive cultural traits of the Japanese, from changing footwear, to the popularity of Kendo and the normality of 'cram' schools, without bloating the text with details. The meaning of the few Japanese words used can be worked out using context (though there is a glossary at the back if needed) and the setting is a welcome change from small town America.
Unfortunately, I was so frustrated with Katie that my notes while reading Ink consist almost entirely of complaints about her attitude and behaviour. I thought her character was inconsistent, I considered her weak rather than vulnerable and I struggled to make sense of several of her decisions.
Sadly, my disappointment with Sun's character development affected my enthusiasm for the story considerable. There is definitely potential in the idea and room for the storyline to grow and mature but the characters will have to do the same to keep my interest.