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cassroberts89's Reviews (502)
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Wonderful book! I didn’t anticipate liking this as much as I did, and it made for a wonderful discussion at our library tween book club. Uncle Vincent was my favorite, such a sweet person. He made such a great foil to Holly’s character too, even though I think they have more in common than we were led to believe at first.
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
This was a pre read for homeschool high school literature options. I loved it! Can’t wait for book two!
P.S. Definitely go into this with the understanding that the romance is VERY ya. Still a great read though.
P.S. Definitely go into this with the understanding that the romance is VERY ya. Still a great read though.
challenging
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
It's Trevor Noah: Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood (Adapted for Young Readers)
challenging
hopeful
informative
lighthearted
reflective
tense
medium-paced
dark
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I hate to say this, I really do, but this was not worth pre-ordering and staying up late to read. I don't have time for a full review, just know that Sunrise adds basically nothing to the Hunger Games world. All characters, save perhaps for Maysilee, fall terribly flat. I first noticed this when I had a hard time even picturing characters in my mind. I went back to check: Yep. Virtually no physical descriptions. At all. I also could not buy into the deep, life-long love between Haymitch and Lenore, who has the personality of a wild-at-heart cardboard box. We are given like 5 minutes with all of the people Haymitch adores before he's shipped off to the longest possible prep/training session. Geez, this was like... 2/3 of the book? Idk I'd have to check. It felt like forever. Snore. The only real purpose seemed to be to give Haymitch and his fellow district 12 tributes time to get to know each other, and to give obvious cameos time to feed him info for the attempted sabotage of the arena. Which he is randomly and suddenly completely on board with doing. For some reason, that we don't really know. Because we don't really know him. Honestly, the entire book felt like a cheap, fan-fic-y attempt to "explain" why future-Haymitch is the way he is, knows the things he knows, and does the things he does, but not in any sort of organic way. It is very much just walking back from the end result. Does that make sense?
MAJOR spoiler below:
P.S. The very end (Lenore) was so implausible that I felt absolutely nothing. Poisoned gumdrops randomly left in the middle of a meadow? That's how we're doing this, Snow?
MAJOR spoiler below:
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Violence, Grief, Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Confinement, Gore
Minor: Suicidal thoughts, Torture
challenging
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I just… didn’t get it? All the characters (yes, ALL) seemed quite flat. And this is very much a character-driven novel, so that doesn’t work. We are living in the very self-absorbed mind of a pretentious 21-year-old college student who puts an enormous amount of effort into appearing something, or many things, that she is not. And that’s basically the story in a nutshell. I don’t feel like I even know her well at all, and I just spent 300-odd pages in her head. I couldn’t bring myself to care about anything that happened to any of them. Was I supposed to? Was the point to NOT care? I don’t f**ing know 🤷🏻♀️ but I feel like I could’ve spent that time on something far more interesting.
adventurous
challenging
hopeful
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This was… kind of weird? And I like weird. Maybe I just wasn’t in the mood for it? I’ll keep an eye out for this author, though, because the writing was fabulous.
funny
informative
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
Great examples of unconventional essays! We are branching out into argumentative writing in our homeschool, and I was looking for examples to share with my daughter. These are so fun, and a few of them fit my purposes very well. I’m sure I’ll turn to this book again for other types of examples, and hopefully my kids will peruse the rest of the book just for fun 😉
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Had to return to library. Pre read for use in our 9th grade homeschool English. I only got about 1/3 in, but it was great!