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A review by maddiemarie
Rain by Amanda Sun
3.0
I really wasn't expecting much from this book, but I still feel a tad disappointed. After reading Ink, I thought I knew what I was in for: a little bit of cute romance and a weak supernatural plotline that was cringey but bearable, and a cool little look at life in Japan. So, really, my bar was low. It wasn't that I disliked Ink, but I just... I was very self-aware while reading it that it was not exactly stellar literature.
Which is fine. In moderation, at least. So, after a couple of months I decided to pick up Rain from the library and continue.
And... it was fine.
It was decidedly less fine than its predecessor, though. I probably should have expected that but I didn't.
I feel like for me to explain my complicated relationship with this book, I need to break it down into categories.
WRITING
The writing in Rain is quite similar to my overall feelings for it. Those being... it was fine.
Amanda Sun has some good bits sprinkled into Rain, but she also has a lot of cringey things in it that really leave a bad taste in my mouth. I didn't write any quotes down or anything, but you'll just have to take my word on it.
CHARACTERS
Underdeveloped does not even begin to cover these characters. They are like drawings with no color. They are like chicken with no seasoning! Seriously, I have read so much about Tomohiro and the way his copper hair looks like in the sunlight and how cute his smile is and blah, blah, blah. Yet, after being inside Katie's Tomo-obsessed brain for two freaking books, I still don't know a lot about him or how he thinks or anything like that.
Things will just happen and Katie will be like, "Oh, Tomo would never do that" or "Tomo would do this" and I'm just like... okay? Seems legit, Katie. God knows I have no idea what the hell he would do in any given situation.
Also, one of the things that I liked in Ink was Katie and her spunkiness, but I felt like Amanda Sun took every last bit of personality from Katie and just injected her with filler.
Seriously, what happened? Katie used to be so assertive and sassy and she just did what needed to be done. Now, she's just a typical teenager in any YA book ever written.
PLOT
And here, folks, is where things went downhill.
And fast.
Just as a disclaimer, this section will probably be riddled with spoilers.
Now, I will begin.
So, what the heck happened? Literally nothing makes sense.
So, Katie is part-kami now? I mean, I guess I should have expected that would happen at some point. But the whole story behind how she became that way is so confusing. Like, megaaaaaa confusing.
So, Katie's absentee father went on a business trip to Japan, and then along the way he got some pomegranates or something. And then he brought them home, I guess, even though I'm pretty sure you can't even bring fresh food on a plane like that. (I know this because my grandmother tried sneaking a whole bag of apples on our flight back from Mexico and made us almost late for our flight.)
Then, after he has brought them home, he feeds them to his pregnant wife. But, the twist here is that one of the pomegranates was not a real one, but instead was one drew by a Kami????? And when Diane is explaining this to Katie, she says that she remembers one of the pomegranates being a weird color or something, so that's how Katie massively jumps to the conclusion that it was drawn by a Kami. You know, I have a really great idea when it comes to miscolored pomegranates, and it is: DON'T FEED THEM TO YOUR PREGNANT FREAKING WIFE! I know that it's a crazy concept, but maybe then Katie's mom wouldn't have gotten sick from it and nearly died.
So, since this happened, Katie is now a "manufactured Kami", and has ink in her veins. My question is, how would her mom eating the fruit have done that? Like, that seriously does not make any sense. If this were the case, then why wouldn't Katie's mom have become a Kami? And here's an even better question: Why would a Kami even draw a freaking pomegranate anyway? Did they draw one and then just put it in a food cart or something just to maybe get someone sick as a prank or something? Did they do it on accident? Also, all it takes from Diane is to say that the pomegranate was a weird color to have Katie convinced that a Kami drew it. ????????? I know that I am not being the least bit coherent, but I seriously have NO IDEA how Amanda Sun mapped this out in her head, or how people have been reading this and not even questioning it.
Later in the book, Tomo and Katie walk into the school only to find that there are messages written in ink on every chalkboard of every classroom in the school saying things like "Demon Boy" in reference to Tomo, and "the girl must die" in reference to Katie. The people in the school are like "oh, this must be some sort of prank." PRANK? What teenager would do something like that? Like, what the hell? What sort of comedic value is there to be gained from writing crap like that on walls? Also, why would someone write that on literally every chalkboard in the whole damned school? It's just so weird and confusing and scary to be blamed on a little prank.
When I read that part I was like "wtf lol I guess Jun must have done it." and expected that they would address it later but they never did. WHO WROTE THAT? Did Tomo blackout and do it or something? Did the ink do it itself? Did Jun do it? This seems like some pretty important info that I really have no idea about.
This kind-of-sort-of brings me to my biggest problem with this story. Amanda Sun has set absolutely no guidelines for how the supernatural elements in this story work.
1. Whenever Tomo or Jun or a Kami get hurt, half the time they have ink around them instead of blood. But they still have blood and bleed sometimes. So ??? Why does the ink just splat them whenever it feels like it?
2. Katie randomly bled ink one time?
3. The ink can make Tomo blackout and turn all evil and stuff. This made sense when Katie thought Tomo was descended from basically the Japanese version of the devil, but then it turned out that Tomo wasn't actually descended from that at all, and instead he is descended from two different types of gods. So, why is he still turning evil and stuff then? And is all the stuff that Katie investigated and found out about the other god just completely out the window? I mean, we had a pretty solid case that Tomo was related to the bad god, but then Amanda Sun was like "lol nevermind I don't want him to be related to him anymore" and had June related to him instead????????
4. Katie walks into an auditorium at Jun's school and sees him playing the cello and there are just swirls of ink floating around in the air. Katie is like, "oh my God this is the most beautiful thing la di da" while meanwhile, I am just soooo confused! Where does this ink just magically appear from? I keep reading the term "the ink is running through me" or "the ink is in my blood" and stuff like that, so is it kept inside? But if it's kept inside, then how does Jun randomly have a freaking aurora borealis over his head while playing the effing cello? And how do fireworks randomly turn into ink? None of it makes sense!!!!!!
OVERALL
The story is fine, okay? It's not as bad as I'm making it out to be, I guess. I know that it's hard to write a book, and it must be even harder to write and come up with a completely new world to put into the said book, but at the same time, this whole thing is so incredibly convoluted and nonsensical. There is no rhyme or reason for anything to happen other than it moves the story along. It's so full of plot-holes that its similar to a piece of swiss cheese. I felt so disconnected to the story by how unrealistic and just plain, flat-out dumb most of it turned out.
So yes, I was disappointed in this book. Am I still going to read the next one? ....yes, I am.
Feel free to tell me how dumb I am, but I still want to know what happens next. As they say, curiosity killed the Maddie, so who knows if I'll make it out of this one alive.
Thank you for reading this and I'm sorry for how dumb and incoherant I am in it. I definitely just ranted and ranted, but sometimes those the reviews are the best kinds!!
Which is fine. In moderation, at least. So, after a couple of months I decided to pick up Rain from the library and continue.
And... it was fine.
It was decidedly less fine than its predecessor, though. I probably should have expected that but I didn't.
I feel like for me to explain my complicated relationship with this book, I need to break it down into categories.
WRITING
The writing in Rain is quite similar to my overall feelings for it. Those being... it was fine.
Amanda Sun has some good bits sprinkled into Rain, but she also has a lot of cringey things in it that really leave a bad taste in my mouth. I didn't write any quotes down or anything, but you'll just have to take my word on it.
CHARACTERS
Underdeveloped does not even begin to cover these characters. They are like drawings with no color. They are like chicken with no seasoning! Seriously, I have read so much about Tomohiro and the way his copper hair looks like in the sunlight and how cute his smile is and blah, blah, blah. Yet, after being inside Katie's Tomo-obsessed brain for two freaking books, I still don't know a lot about him or how he thinks or anything like that.
Things will just happen and Katie will be like, "Oh, Tomo would never do that" or "Tomo would do this" and I'm just like... okay? Seems legit, Katie. God knows I have no idea what the hell he would do in any given situation.
Also, one of the things that I liked in Ink was Katie and her spunkiness, but I felt like Amanda Sun took every last bit of personality from Katie and just injected her with filler.
Seriously, what happened? Katie used to be so assertive and sassy and she just did what needed to be done. Now, she's just a typical teenager in any YA book ever written.
PLOT
And here, folks, is where things went downhill.
And fast.
Just as a disclaimer, this section will probably be riddled with spoilers.
Now, I will begin.
So, what the heck happened? Literally nothing makes sense.
So, Katie is part-kami now? I mean, I guess I should have expected that would happen at some point. But the whole story behind how she became that way is so confusing. Like, megaaaaaa confusing.
So, Katie's absentee father went on a business trip to Japan, and then along the way he got some pomegranates or something. And then he brought them home, I guess, even though I'm pretty sure you can't even bring fresh food on a plane like that. (I know this because my grandmother tried sneaking a whole bag of apples on our flight back from Mexico and made us almost late for our flight.)
Then, after he has brought them home, he feeds them to his pregnant wife. But, the twist here is that one of the pomegranates was not a real one, but instead was one drew by a Kami????? And when Diane is explaining this to Katie, she says that she remembers one of the pomegranates being a weird color or something, so that's how Katie massively jumps to the conclusion that it was drawn by a Kami. You know, I have a really great idea when it comes to miscolored pomegranates, and it is: DON'T FEED THEM TO YOUR PREGNANT FREAKING WIFE! I know that it's a crazy concept, but maybe then Katie's mom wouldn't have gotten sick from it and nearly died.
So, since this happened, Katie is now a "manufactured Kami", and has ink in her veins. My question is, how would her mom eating the fruit have done that? Like, that seriously does not make any sense. If this were the case, then why wouldn't Katie's mom have become a Kami? And here's an even better question: Why would a Kami even draw a freaking pomegranate anyway? Did they draw one and then just put it in a food cart or something just to maybe get someone sick as a prank or something? Did they do it on accident? Also, all it takes from Diane is to say that the pomegranate was a weird color to have Katie convinced that a Kami drew it. ????????? I know that I am not being the least bit coherent, but I seriously have NO IDEA how Amanda Sun mapped this out in her head, or how people have been reading this and not even questioning it.
Later in the book, Tomo and Katie walk into the school only to find that there are messages written in ink on every chalkboard of every classroom in the school saying things like "Demon Boy" in reference to Tomo, and "the girl must die" in reference to Katie. The people in the school are like "oh, this must be some sort of prank." PRANK? What teenager would do something like that? Like, what the hell? What sort of comedic value is there to be gained from writing crap like that on walls? Also, why would someone write that on literally every chalkboard in the whole damned school? It's just so weird and confusing and scary to be blamed on a little prank.
When I read that part I was like "wtf lol I guess Jun must have done it." and expected that they would address it later but they never did. WHO WROTE THAT? Did Tomo blackout and do it or something? Did the ink do it itself? Did Jun do it? This seems like some pretty important info that I really have no idea about.
This kind-of-sort-of brings me to my biggest problem with this story. Amanda Sun has set absolutely no guidelines for how the supernatural elements in this story work.
1. Whenever Tomo or Jun or a Kami get hurt, half the time they have ink around them instead of blood. But they still have blood and bleed sometimes. So ??? Why does the ink just splat them whenever it feels like it?
2. Katie randomly bled ink one time?
3. The ink can make Tomo blackout and turn all evil and stuff. This made sense when Katie thought Tomo was descended from basically the Japanese version of the devil, but then it turned out that Tomo wasn't actually descended from that at all, and instead he is descended from two different types of gods. So, why is he still turning evil and stuff then? And is all the stuff that Katie investigated and found out about the other god just completely out the window? I mean, we had a pretty solid case that Tomo was related to the bad god, but then Amanda Sun was like "lol nevermind I don't want him to be related to him anymore" and had June related to him instead????????
4. Katie walks into an auditorium at Jun's school and sees him playing the cello and there are just swirls of ink floating around in the air. Katie is like, "oh my God this is the most beautiful thing la di da" while meanwhile, I am just soooo confused! Where does this ink just magically appear from? I keep reading the term "the ink is running through me" or "the ink is in my blood" and stuff like that, so is it kept inside? But if it's kept inside, then how does Jun randomly have a freaking aurora borealis over his head while playing the effing cello? And how do fireworks randomly turn into ink? None of it makes sense!!!!!!
OVERALL
The story is fine, okay? It's not as bad as I'm making it out to be, I guess. I know that it's hard to write a book, and it must be even harder to write and come up with a completely new world to put into the said book, but at the same time, this whole thing is so incredibly convoluted and nonsensical. There is no rhyme or reason for anything to happen other than it moves the story along. It's so full of plot-holes that its similar to a piece of swiss cheese. I felt so disconnected to the story by how unrealistic and just plain, flat-out dumb most of it turned out.
So yes, I was disappointed in this book. Am I still going to read the next one? ....yes, I am.
Feel free to tell me how dumb I am, but I still want to know what happens next. As they say, curiosity killed the Maddie, so who knows if I'll make it out of this one alive.
Thank you for reading this and I'm sorry for how dumb and incoherant I am in it. I definitely just ranted and ranted, but sometimes those the reviews are the best kinds!!