whpltab's reviews
13 reviews

Trench: A Fantasy Novel of Epic Inconsequence by Ethan Childress

adventurous funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

5.0

The war of races has been raging for over a thousand years. The soldiers on the fringe have all but given up, and spend each day surviving rather than fighting. The conditions are horrible, the food sucks, and in particular Miller, a human and weak mage, and Treesinger, an elf, and a master shot, are given the worst of the crop of new recruits. As usual, they bet on who will be “The One” among their new recruits, and as usual, Treesinger loses. The recruits meet Captain Bozeman, and Treesinger lets the recruits in on the prank he’s been playing on Miller for a while now. 

Trench is a mostly lighthearted book about the life of those who live on the fringe, and about the war that’s been raging for a thousand years. We learn about what the sodiers have done to cope with being sent to the fringe, and how they make the most out of what they’ve been given. We learn the reasons that everyone has been sent to the fringe, typically because they couldn’t be dealt with anymore, and were sent there to die.

Each character has some sort of backstory or reason they were sent to the fringe, and they are all incredibly interesting and funny to read about. What I loved about this book was that even though it was so lighthearted and funny, it had serious moments in it, and in a way dealt with some real world problems. The cast of characters were diverse and incredibly interesting, and they all have a chance in the spotlight. It is an incredible book for someone who wants to read epic fantasy novels without having to memorize multiple characters' names, and an incredibly complex plot.

The Ash House by Angharad Walker

dark emotional mysterious sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

The Ash House tells a story about two boys, and their home, the Ash House. Dom, full name Freedom,  has lived there for as long as he can remember, and it’s his whole world, just as it’s the whole world for all the other boys and girls who live there. Sol, full name Solitude, has only just arrived. Before, he was at a hospital that just like all the others, couldn’t diagnose or treat his horrible back pain. In the middle of the night, he is woken up, and told that he’s being taken to the Ash House, where he could be healed. Once he enters the Ash House, he may not leave. He forgets who he was before he was Solitude, as all the children in the Ash House are named are Nicenesses. Freedom, Mercy, Merit, Solitude, and many more.

The headmaster has been gone for three years,

and just happens to stop calling when Sol arrives. The children only have the Doctor, a man with no clue how to heal, who experiments on the children, thinking his methods will work, whom all the children are scared of. Because of him, getting sick is not allowed in the Ash House. If someone gets sick, the birds will see it, and the Doctor will come. No one is allowed beyond the fence, because anyone who goes beyond the fence will die the worst death they can imagine.

Sol is an outsider, and because of him, strange things are happening in the Ash House. The only one willing to protect him is Dom, but Dom doesn’t know how to protect Sol when Sol won’t listen to him. 

Despite the thriller undertones of this book, the Ash House is mainly about a found family, and how it isn’t always what you expect it to be. It’s ultimately about how the children loved each other and their home and their headmaster, despite everything, because they had each other, and they didn’t need anything else. 

A Flame of Hurt and Harrow by T.S. Howard

adventurous dark emotional medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

The main character of A Flame of Hurt and Harrow is Faron, a seventeen year old boy who has been a part of a criminal guild for five years, since his father and twin sister were killed, and he was blamed for it. To pay for his continued acceptance into the guild, Faron must steal and kill for money. However, the crimes he commits eat at him, and the death of his sister, eat at his will to live. Synick, Faron’s only friend, and the guild master’s favorite apprentice tries to help, lending Faron money, and helping Faron with jobs, but he can only go so far until the Guild master notices. 

When an old friend of Faron’s father asks for Faron specifically, with a job for him, Faron discovers the secrets that his father had been keeping, and that his sister is definitely alive, and most likely trapped. Synick promises to help Faron escape, and keep the guild master from realizing for some time, and Faron escapes.

Along the way, as Faron encounters slavers and other monsters masquerading as people, he realizes that it’s so much easier to commit crimes when he feels like his need is greater than someone else's than when someone else is forcing him to do it. 

This book does a fantastic job of showing how the world isn’t anywhere close to black and white, as Faron must steal and kill others to survive, and to find his sister.

And as the book flashes back to the day Faron’s father was killed, and Hadria was taken, we learn that Faron’s father might not have been who Faron thought he was, and that there is something seriously bad happening to their world that he might have been the cause of.

Faron’s battle with his own consciousness takes up a large part of the book, as he refuses to kill or steal from others for the guild, is forced to steal and kill on the road, and as he gets closer and closer to Hadria, and to the truth of what really happened to his family.

Eight Perfect Murders by Peter Swanson

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.5

The main character of Eight Perfect Murders is a middle aged man named Mal who owns a bookstore primarily for murder mystery books. Mal had always been fascinated with murder mysteries, and they were practically the only books he ever read, though he started avoiding them after the death of his wife. The book is about a series of murders going on that seems to be based off of a list of eight perfect murders that Mal came up with a long time ago, which was about several murder mysteries in books that Mal felt would have been the most impossible to solve in real life. It wasn’t a list Mal had really cared about. It had been for a blog that he hadn’t posted on in a really long time, and he hadn’t even thought about the list in a while.

However, while the murders aren’t exactly the same as in the books, the idea behind them is always fulfilled, and almost all the victims are people Mal is acquainted with.

As Mal starts to suspect everyone around him, unsure who he can trust, and unwilling to show his true hand to FBI agent Gwen Mulvey, secrets about Mal himself, his past, and the deeds he has committed are brought to the light as the killer draws out old cases as he creates new ones.

As Mal’s acquaintances are killed, the book flashes back to the past, showing Mal’s addict wife, and his complex relationship with her. I really enjoyed how Mal and his wife’s marriage was portrayed. They loved each other from the beginning, and told each other everything, and Mal always knew when she was out doing drugs, or with other men. She would always come home and promise not to do it again, and he knew he would always forgive her, and he would always wait for her, until the day he decided that he couldn’t live like that, always waiting for her at home as she made mistakes over and over again, and forgiving her time and time again.

I love how this book has so many twists and turns, and how none of them were what I expected. This book managed to surprise me at every turn, and I couldn’t put it down. It’s a great book for anyone that enjoys reading.

The Pants Project by Cat Clarke

emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

The main character of The Pants Project is a closeted trans boy called Liv. He’d known he was trans for a while, but was scared to come out to his family or his best friend, Marcie. Having just started middle school, Liv has to deal with the cruelty of children, especially Jade, a stereotypical mean girl who has turned most of the grade against Liv, including his former best friend. Other than Jacob, one of the most popular boys in his grade, and one of the kindest, Liv has basically no-one at school. Jade makes fun of Liv for being boyish, and for having two moms, making jabs about how everyone has a dad except her.

But, one of the worst parts of middle school, for Liv, is that girls are only allowed to wear skirts. Liv hates skirts. They make him feel weird, and anxious. Unfortunately, other than Liv, no one really cares about the dress code, especially not the principal, who claims to understand her, but won’t even look at changing the dress code because there are, “more important things to worry about.”

Faced with these obstacles, Liv, Jacob, Jacob’s friends, and a shy girl in their class named Marion stage a protest at their school, calling in Jacob’s dad, who is a photographer, and a bunch of reporters to their school to watch and record the school’s reaction to the girls wearing pants and the boys wearing skirts.

I really enjoyed how Cat Clarke showed that even in middle school, kids can struggle with being themselves, and making friends.

Marcie was so desperate to fit in, that she left her best friend for the bullies, and went along with almost every taunt and insult they threw at Liv, and at Liv’s moms, despite the fact that Liv’s moms had treated Marcie like family. It wasn’t entirely her fault, because the pressure of fitting in had gotten to her, and in the end, she chose the right side, but the struggle is still shown.

I also liked how Liv isn’t perfect. He has a temper, and has to remind himself not to punch Jade in the face many times. Marion is another outcast in Liv’s class, but unlike Liv, she appears to have no friends, always sitting alone, and eating alone. Despite Marion being Jade’s other punching bag,

Liv avoids Marion, thinking that she’s weird. He basically did the same thing that everyone else was doing to Marion, despite knowing how it felt. Liv finally realizes what he’s doing, and apologizes to Marion, who is more than willing to aid Liv and Jacob with the Pants Project.

In the end, the Pants Project is a story about accepting yourself, even if others don’t.

Vicious by V.E. Schwab

dark emotional tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

Vicious is a sci-fi book that takes place in a world in which people can gain special powers through certain circumstances,

those circumstances being near death situations.

The main characters of the books are Victor and Eli, who were both medical students, and best friends. Ten years later they’re both EO’s (ExtraOrdinary), and each other’s worst enemies.

Eli’s thesis project was to try and figure out how EO’s were made, but Victor wanted to go a step further. They managed to make themselves EO’s by placing themselves in near death situations. It worked, but as they turned themselves into EO’s, they realized that something essential was missing. Eli was immortal, and Victor could control his and other people’s emotional and physical pain.

What I enjoyed about this book is the subtle sugestion that rather than EO’s losing some vital piece of themselves that made them human, all being an EO did was bring out the piece of them that wasn’t fully human.

Eli’s decision that EO’s were an affront to God, and needed to be put back in the ground had brought out the joy he found in watching other people die.

His immortality was a gift from god, but the gifts of all other EO’s were from the devil. 

Characters like Eli and Victor already had some darkness hidden inside of them, and  it was brought out

by their near deaths and their attempted murders of each other.

However, there were other characters in the book that proved Eli was wrong. EO’s came back exactly the same if they didn’t have a hidden darkness inside of them like Victor and Eli did. Sydney, Victor’s protege

came back with the ability to bring back the dead.

Sydney proves that being and EO doesn’t make them unhuman, it’s what they choose to do with their powers. Most EO’s choose to go about their lives like nothing ever happened, some used their powers to help others, and some became criminals. It had nothing to do with being an EO. 

Another thing that I loved about this book is how there is no protagonist or antagonist. The book is as far from black and white as you can get. Both Victor and Eli are bad people, the only difference between them was that Eli was justifying his actions using God, and Victor knew he was a bad person. He knew that in their story, there was no hero. Just two former friends trying to kill each other.

Felix Yz by Lisa Bunker

emotional funny hopeful

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

Felix Yz is a boy with an alien inside of him. His father was a scientist, and one day an experiment went wrong while Felix was at the lab, ending with his father dead and Felix in a sort-of coma for a long time. Because of the accident and the being inside him, whom they named Zyx, Felix doesn’t have long to live. To separate himself from Zyx, Felix must go through the Procedure. The possibility of him dying during the procedure is incredibly high, but he will die if Zyx remains inside him. The story is told through Felix’s journal entries leading up to the Procedure, as he deals with his family, school, a crush, and having to say goodbye to either all of that, or Zyx, forever.

Zyx is unable to speak, so he communicates with Felix and his family through typing. Because he comes from a different dimension, it’s sometimes hard for him to understand things, and because of that, he sometimes reacts when something happens to Felix, causing misunderstandings. Because Zyx can take control of Felix occasionally, it causes Felix to have fits where sometimes he can’t even move, or he might do something that he doesn’t mean to do.

For instance, Zyx learns that vo’s a genius at chess, which leads to Felix technically defeating a grandmaster with no knowledge of chess at all.

Another interesting thing about the book is how Felix’s and other characters lgbtq+ identities are explored.

Grandy is one of Felix’s grandparents, and is neither a man nor a woman. Vo is Vern on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, during which vo wears jeans and button shirts and boots and tucks veir hair in a cap, and on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, vo is Vera, and wears dresses and blouses and skirts, and brushes veir hair out. On Wednesday, vo stays in veir room, and does nothing but meditate all day.

Grandy explains that vo doesn’t tell anyone whether or not vo was born a girl or a boy because vey are both Vera and Vern, and at the same time, neither, and that is veir way of expressing it. If people knew veir biological sex, others might assume they know what gender vo is, and that the whole Vera/Vern thing isn’t really who vo is, and vo doesn’t want that.

This book explores overall, the bonds of family, as Felix’s family do the best they can to support him, and love him no matter what.

All American Boys by Jason Reynolds, Brendan Kiely

emotional hopeful inspiring 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? N/A

4.75

All American Boys is a powerful book about a black boy named Rashad who is beaten nearly to death by a police officer who suspected he was stealing, simply from the way he looked. Quinn is a classmate of Rashad’s, an “All-American boy”. He witnessed Rashad getting beaten up by the cop, who just happened to be a family friend of his, and was like an older brother to him. Unsure how to deal with this, Quinn decides to just ignore it and pretend he didn’t see anything, but he is unable to when it becomes all anyone at school can talk about.

As Rashad heals in the hospital, he’s unaware of all the students in his school rising up in defense of him and all others who suffered like him because they looked different. Quinn realizes that in this situation, there is no such thing as being neutral.<

The author of All American Boys shows how discrimination isn’t all black and white, and how it’s not always a conscious choice.

Rashad’s dad’s experiences as a cop are an example of what society’s biases can do to you, even if you’ve never felt like any race is more than or less than another.

All American Boys is a book for all ages, and is guaranteed to teach a life lesson along the way.

Neanderthal Opens the Door to the Universe by Preston Norton

emotional funny hopeful 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? It's complicated

4.75

Neanderthal Opens the Door to the Universe, is a book about the worst parts of life in highschool. The main character, Cliff, has been put through the wringer throughout his whole life, and the only person who ever really cared was his older brother. 

Cliff Hubbard is the neanderthal of Happt Valley High School, at 6’6’’ and 250 pounds. He has no friends, and is disliked by most of the students and teachers at HVHS. His home life is somehow even worse. His older brother committed suicide a year ago, his father is a drunkard who doesn’t care about anything, much less his family, and his mother can’t bring herself to leave him. 

His whole life is basically just waiting for high school to end so he can get out of there, until something strange happens. Aaron Zimmerman, the football team’s quarterback, returns to school after a near-death experience, and claims to have seen God. He tells Cliff that God had given him a list of things to do to make HVHS a better place, and that Cliff was supposed to help him. Cliff agrees, to his own confusion. However, over the course of the book, Cliff and Aaron find out that they have a lot in common.

They become very good friends, but underneath the friendship is the fear that they’re only friends because Aaron has a head injury that may or may not be messing with his brain.

Despite Aaron and Cliff being the main characters, Preston Norton explores the back stories of not just side characters, but supposed antagonists too. Instead of the antagonists being 2d villains, they have their own stories and backgrounds that are explored throughout the book. The ending of this book explores not just the hardships of school and the deaths of loved ones, but the power of friendship, love, and faith, and what it can do for not just you, the people around you. 

What I love about this book is how despite Cliff starting out as a loner whom everyone supposedly hates, when he opens up, and everyone else opens up, he finds out just how much he has in common with so many of his peers, who have also been hiding who they really are. It wasn’t the list, in the end, that brought out the best in HVHS, but the true sincerity in Aaron and Cliff’s actions that convinced the students and teachers that they could have a second chance.

The Sword of Kaigen by M.L. Wang

emotional sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

The Sword of Kaigen takes place in another world in which some people are born with different powers based on their heritage, a lot like Avatar: the Last Airbender. The main characters of the book are fourteen year old Mamoru and his mother, Misaki. Shirojima, their home, is very traditional, and women are expected to be housewives, raised to cook, clean, sew, take care of children, and that’s about it. They can only learn to read enough to read basic signs and recipes. Misaki, however, is different, even though her family doesn’t know it. In this world, there are great bloodlines that are said to have gotten their powers from the gods themselves. Misaki and her husband are from two of those bloodlines, and her husband’s bloodline is the most powerful of the jijakalu, the race of theonite that can control water and ice. Bloodline techniques are secret techniques that are passed down through the family, because typically that family is the only one that can achieve that technique. The Matsuda family technique is the Whispering Blade, a blade of ice that can cut through anything, even metal. Misaki’s family technique allows them to control their own blood, and for those powerful and willful enough, they could even control their own blood to force their body to limits that aren’t human.

When Misaki was young, her father trained her alongside her brothers, and sent her to a theonite school far from Shirojima where she learned to fight, and was a vigilante alongside her friends.

However, she was forced to come back, and marry Matsuda Takeru, the second son of the Matsuda family, and the youngest in history to achieve the whispering blade.

When Misaki returned to Shirojima, she buried her history of vigilantism and her fantasies of being a warrior,

and became a housewife, giving birth to four sons. 

What I love about this book is the way that Mamoru learns about the real world, and his reaction to it. Shirojima is blindly loyal to the empire, unaware that if a war is to start, they are, as the sword of kaigen, meant to be the first line of defense, and a sacrifice. The Emperor doesn’t care about them, but they don’t know that. As Mamoru starts to realize this, it shatters his world. Him and everyone he cares about are being lied to about everything. The history they teach is wrong, and he knows he can’t say anything, because at best, no-one will believe him, and at worst, he will be punished for spreading that kind of information. Mamoru has to deal with this basically all by himself, at the age of fourteen. Because he’s a Matsuda, he can’t show weakness. His mother, Misaki, has the opposite problem. She’s not allowed to be strong.

The turning point of the story is when Shirojima is attacked, and during the attack, Mamoru dies. He died with honor, taking down the strongest opponent using his whispering blade, becoming the youngest in history to ever form the whispering blade, though no-one would ever know it. 

The death of Misaki’s eldest son, and the supposed apathy of her husband, and the disrespect of the empire towards all of those who died in Shirojima devestates and angered Misaki, until she finally revealed herself to her husband, challenging him to a duel. During the duel, Takeru confesses that he had been so apathetic towards her because he hadn’t wanted to treat her the same way his father treated his mother.

I really enjoyed how this book showed how their whole family had issues, despite trying to appear perfect on the outside. Mamoru struggled with trying to be a perfect Matsuda, Misaki struggled with trying to be the perfect housewife, and deal with all her supposed failures, and the family she wasn’t sure she loved,

and Takeru hiding from his emotions his whole life so that he wouldn’t have to deal with the pain.