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missuskisses 's review for:
Anomaly
by Tonya Kuper
Review: http://bennitheblog.com/bookbiters/anomaly-by-tonya-kuper/
Josie is your typical nerd and honor student, except not typical at all, as she is poised to accept the National Physics Honors Award.
But her seventeenth birthday is Grade-A Awful. Her boyfriend Tate dumps her, her dad can’t be bothered to come home, and Josie has come down with a virus that makes her want to throw up. On top of that, she’s the same age as her older brother was when he died in a car accident, and she will never stop missing him.
Things start to look up when a boy named Reid shows up on the first day of school, looking just as hot under the motorcycle helmet as Josie pictured him. Soon, Josie learns that she can bend reality with her thoughts alone, and her life will never be the same.
Based on the blurb, I thought Anomaly was going to be a blast to read—Josie makes Star Wars references, and actually sounds like she’s ready to have fun with her own newfound abilities. Unfortunately, the book was a bit of an uneven mess. Sure, there are some funny Star Wars analogies; when Tate breaks up with her in front of others, Josie describes to us how that feels (keep in mind all quotes are from an ARC and are subject to change):
As Josie later explains:
More often than not, however, most nerdy references are just thoughtless throwaways. Josie wears tight Star Wars shirts that turn Reid on; Josie likes saying, “for the love of Khan” or “I’d bet the USS Enterprise…”; Reid calls Josie “Spock” when she’s being smart, etc. Nothing particularly clever.
The hugest disappointment was how Josie wasn’t nearly as fun as I thought she’d be. I understand that shock and doubt may be the most reasonable responses to huge, world-altering revelations, but if we’re already dealing with people who can form objects out of thin air, I’d prefer we drop the pretense of realism (and not trying to explain the phenomenon with pseudo physics).
I can also only handle so many emo teens who lament how they are Curse with Awesome; I am pretty much at my limit. And if one must be emo, I’d want her to be more eloquent than this:
Josie compares her training with Reid to The Empire Strikes Back Dagobah training scenes. Indeed, that’s what the bulk of the book consists of: training scenes. This is the whole of Anomaly comprising of Star Wars scenes: (1) Luke finding out he possesses the Force in A New Hope (Josie finding out she has superpowers), (2) Luke training with Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back (Josie training with Reid, so imagine a sexy Yoda taking all the time in the world to train Luke as they flirt but try to be serious but can’t help flirting again), and then (3) the Ewoks fighting the stormtroopers in Return of the Jedi (some silly action scenes at the very end).
Have you ever noticed while watching a tv show, nothing particularly exciting is going on, but the camera is swirling and moving around to help build tension? That’s how most of the action scenes felt. People are running around, shifting appearances, creating guns from scratch, but none of it felt compelling. Not enough time was spent building up the stakes; instead, it was training scene after training scene where Josie and Reid more or less ogled each other.
Anomaly held a lot of promise. In particular, although Josie and Reid seem like they’re in “insta-love” or at least “insta-attraction,” there’s good reason for it. Part of it’s because Josie inadvertently wields her superpowers to turn Reid into having an appearance that is most attractive to her. The other part I won’t spoil, but I did like the two together.
The twists and turns of the book could have been fun, too, had the book’s pacing evened out a little more.
So, this being the first book of the Schrodinger’s Consortium series, there’s room for improvement and growth. The premise is promising, but I’ll need a more focused plot and fewer whiny teens in the follow-up adventures.
I received a digital review copy of the book via NetGalley, courtesy of Entangled Teen.
Review: http://bennitheblog.com/bookbiters/anomaly-by-tonya-kuper/
Josie is your typical nerd and honor student, except not typical at all, as she is poised to accept the National Physics Honors Award.
But her seventeenth birthday is Grade-A Awful. Her boyfriend Tate dumps her, her dad can’t be bothered to come home, and Josie has come down with a virus that makes her want to throw up. On top of that, she’s the same age as her older brother was when he died in a car accident, and she will never stop missing him.
Things start to look up when a boy named Reid shows up on the first day of school, looking just as hot under the motorcycle helmet as Josie pictured him. Soon, Josie learns that she can bend reality with her thoughts alone, and her life will never be the same.
Based on the blurb, I thought Anomaly was going to be a blast to read—Josie makes Star Wars references, and actually sounds like she’s ready to have fun with her own newfound abilities. Unfortunately, the book was a bit of an uneven mess. Sure, there are some funny Star Wars analogies; when Tate breaks up with her in front of others, Josie describes to us how that feels (keep in mind all quotes are from an ARC and are subject to change):
I felt like I was wearing Princess Leia’s buns at a Star Trek convention.
As Josie later explains:
I threw myself into movies and books even more than I had before Nick [her brother] died. I find comfort in fiction—it’s safe. I can lose myself and find myself in books.
More often than not, however, most nerdy references are just thoughtless throwaways. Josie wears tight Star Wars shirts that turn Reid on; Josie likes saying, “for the love of Khan” or “I’d bet the USS Enterprise…”; Reid calls Josie “Spock” when she’s being smart, etc. Nothing particularly clever.
The hugest disappointment was how Josie wasn’t nearly as fun as I thought she’d be. I understand that shock and doubt may be the most reasonable responses to huge, world-altering revelations, but if we’re already dealing with people who can form objects out of thin air, I’d prefer we drop the pretense of realism (and not trying to explain the phenomenon with pseudo physics).
I can also only handle so many emo teens who lament how they are Curse with Awesome; I am pretty much at my limit. And if one must be emo, I’d want her to be more eloquent than this:
The agony and despair bored a non-repairable hold in my heart. There was no filling it.
Josie compares her training with Reid to The Empire Strikes Back Dagobah training scenes. Indeed, that’s what the bulk of the book consists of: training scenes. This is the whole of Anomaly comprising of Star Wars scenes: (1) Luke finding out he possesses the Force in A New Hope (Josie finding out she has superpowers), (2) Luke training with Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back (Josie training with Reid, so imagine a sexy Yoda taking all the time in the world to train Luke as they flirt but try to be serious but can’t help flirting again), and then (3) the Ewoks fighting the stormtroopers in Return of the Jedi (some silly action scenes at the very end).
Have you ever noticed while watching a tv show, nothing particularly exciting is going on, but the camera is swirling and moving around to help build tension? That’s how most of the action scenes felt. People are running around, shifting appearances, creating guns from scratch, but none of it felt compelling. Not enough time was spent building up the stakes; instead, it was training scene after training scene where Josie and Reid more or less ogled each other.
Anomaly held a lot of promise. In particular, although Josie and Reid seem like they’re in “insta-love” or at least “insta-attraction,” there’s good reason for it. Part of it’s because Josie inadvertently wields her superpowers to turn Reid into having an appearance that is most attractive to her. The other part I won’t spoil, but I did like the two together.
The twists and turns of the book could have been fun, too, had the book’s pacing evened out a little more.
So, this being the first book of the Schrodinger’s Consortium series, there’s room for improvement and growth. The premise is promising, but I’ll need a more focused plot and fewer whiny teens in the follow-up adventures.
I received a digital review copy of the book via NetGalley, courtesy of Entangled Teen.
Review: http://bennitheblog.com/bookbiters/anomaly-by-tonya-kuper/