I like to read and share my thoughts on what I have read. Main Question I want to answer: Is That Book Appropriate for Middle Schoolers? Art by my amazing friend MelonGolem
Let's normalize short people 😭 because for some reason pjo fandom does NOT want anyone to be short. I've already seen multiple headcanons that Nico and Leo get a huge growth spurt STOP IT LET THEM BE SHORT.
Okay I finally started writing the story that's been haunting me.
I can't guarantee that it's gonna be Calron, but I do plan it to be if it goes the way I want it to. I also don't know if it's gonna have anything too crazy in it either as I normal write stuff that isn't too crazy.
Also posted on my Quotev. Chapter under the line. Thank you for reading! (not edited by the way)
Chapter 1: Headaches
""Sarah," he whispered, tears thick in his throat. "I'll tell him how you died protecting him. I will raise him to remember how brave you were."
Magisterium: The Iron Trial (Black & Clare, 4)
Callum Hunt thought he would never get use to waking up this way: his head bounced off the window of his father's Rolls-Royce as they sped down the highway.
And he was not happy about being woken up.
Honestly, Call would normally appreciate being woken up to the pain in his head. It helped him ignore the pain in his bad leg and pulled him out of his nightmares. But he was having a good dream for once filled with his favorite foods, animals, and his family in one piece. Out of all of the aspects of his dreams, his family being together was the one thing he would never have.
His father, Alastair Hunt, had always told him the same stories about his mother's death over and over again. When he was five, Call had vivid nightmares about a man stabbing her to death; fifty percent of the time, Call was watching the scene from a distance. The other fifty percent, he was the one who killed his mother.
Since Alastair noticed his son was having nightmares about it, he stopped talking about his wife. Call didn't know any other stories about his mother. He didn't even know what she looked like anymore. But when he still had the nightmare, he knew that she was the one dying at his feet.
"Callum," Alastair spoke. "I see you're awake."
Call attempted to keep in his snarky comment.
"Yeah," he responded before muttering, "like I could sleep with you driving like a maniac."
"I heard that," his father responded, "but I'll let that comment go. We're stopping shortly at a rest stop. You know the drill. Make sure you look presentable."
Call rolled his eyes before carefully sitting up in his seat. He attempted to stretch his bad leg out, hoping that would help with the pain that normally came when he had been sitting in the car for hours. Since Call was five, they had been living out of different cars that Alastair had stored all over the country. Sometimes they stopped often in order for Call to get WiFi to turn in homework since he was taking online classes, but since it was the summer Alastair had insisted on driving longer distances. He had been extra paranoid recently and had even seemed like he was up to something (Call did swear that his father was always up to something). But Alastair never told his son anything until he deemed it important. And whatever was going on, he did not think Call needed to know; if anything was truly going on that is.
"You're not going to tell me where we're going, are you?"
His father turned off the highway.
"Not yet. I'll tell you once we're done at our stop," Alastair responded, "don't take too long either. We have somewhere to be by one."
Call frowned, glancing at the numbers blinking on the vehicle's clock. It was almost 11:30.
An hour later, Call was brushing his hair in a gas station bathroom. He felt awkward wearing his nicest clothes: a dark grey collared shirt and a pair of nicer looking jeans. He rarely had any reason to wear this shirt. Normally it was for funerals that his father made him go to, even though they watched from a distance.
When he walked out of the front doors of the station, his father had Call's suitcase on the ground next to the car. Call felt himself panic: was his father going to just leave him at this gas station?
"Call come help me with this," Alastair called from the trunk. Obeying his father, he limped over. Alastair had a couple other things on the ground including a bag of Call's favorite snacks and drinks, his laptop bag, and a couple of Alastair's bags, "make sure all your stuff is packed in your bags. Make sure you have anything you need. I'll give you some money and continue sending you some throughout the school year, but I don't know when I'll be able to send anything."
"Wait, what are you talking about?" Call asked, "The school year?"
"I'm dropping you off at your new school. You'll be going to where your mother and I graduated from," Alastair frowned at his son, "Thought you might do well finishing school with other students. Plus they won't expect me to hide you there. It's become more mixed since I went there, more normal people these days. So you should be able to be unnoticeable while I keep them distracted. They don't know your name anyways, just that you're with me, especially since I've kept your magic in check."
Whenever his father mentioned magic, Call always rubbed his obsidian bracelet his father had made him wear since his magic had appeared years ago. It helped dampen the energy his magic gave off when used and did not allow Call to use his magic as strongly as he could. It was a good way for Alastair to be able to safely teach Call everything he knew without attracting the wrong crowd or destroying things around him. As his father reminded him during their lessons: earth wants to bind.
Call watched his father pull out a bag of almost identical bracelets and he barely caught them when his father tossed them at him. Alastair gave him a weird look. With a frown, Call helped his father repack his bags. Once everything was back in the Rolls-Royce, Call watched the gas station fade into the distance.
Anna "Windflower" Fang ready to beat Valentine's ass,,
I love that the two hottest characters of the first book get to fight against each other. So true,, I take that so personally
The girl lunged forward, shoving her aweful noseless face towards him. “Look at me!” she said, her voice all twisted by her twisted mouth. “Look at what your brave, kind Valentine did to me!” “What do you mean?” “Ask him!” she screamed. “Ask him what he did to Hester Shaw!”
When I was younger, I tried to get into reading books through Audiobooks and realized after getting half way through a certain novel ACOTAR that I didn't like audiobooks.
Well I think that I have changed my opinion since I've started listening to audiobooks again.
Riley Oh's journey really felt nostalgic to me and reminded me of my younger years. It reminded me of Percy Jackson by the way Riley's voice appeared. I also loved how the novel is about healing and the love of a family, which is even shown through some of the background characters. There is one character (David) who feels like he's just tossed into the novel to keep the plot going. It would be cool to get a spin off or some short story about David as a whole or even more of him in the next two novels (which I don't expect since he's such a small side character).
My main complaint about this book is the way the characters flow together. As I stated above, a lot of characters feel like they are only part of the story to move the plot along.
I'm not meaning deities and adult figures by the way. I've already touched up on David as my example from earlier. And then there's Taeyo who's introduction flows a bit better, but if he is supposed to be the third to a trio of heroes, I wish there was some more development in his relationship with Riley and Emmett.
But overall, I really loved this novel. Listening to it was wonderful and so was finishing the physical book. I love Riley and I can't wait to see what other adventures she will have.
Young Adult due to alcohol, underage drinking, cheating, and even vandalism.
Other James Patterson Reviews:
(To Be Added to)
Read from: August 29th 2023 to September 18th, 2023.
"Confessions of a Murder Suspect" is a young adult novel written by two authors, both who normally collab together to write adult mysteries.
In that regard, Tandy's story is told in a way that makes me feel stupid. Not like I'm trying to put the pieces together, but that I am a stupid person. Which, I can be (I am human) but young adults and even middle grade readers are not stupid. Yeah they're learning who they are and trying to get ahold of life, but making stupid choices doesn't mean they are stupid.
Tandy talks like she is the smartest person on the planet. Like she is an adult with years of detective work under her belt. None of the adults in the novel are that great either as they are judgmental, unprofessional, or abusive on their own. From the cops, neighbors, and even her now dead parents, Tandy has no good role models. Even Samantha ends up being not amazing, but honestly I couldn't tell what role any of these adults truly had in Tandy's life. This is not just the fault of the adults themselves, but also of Tandy as a narrator. She spends to much time going back and forth between ideas. This doesn't add to the mystery or the drama. It just makes the novel feel like it is trying to do to much.
There is a little set up at the end of the novel for a continuation, but the novel also ends in a way that could allow Tandy's story to end.
The first Confessions novel left me with more questions than answers and I'm not sure if I care enough to even want answers to my questions.
---
Is the novel appropriate for middle grade readers?
I think it depends. It's a murder mystery, so there's that. There's talk of alcohol, underage drinking, cheating, and even vandalism. So do with that what you will.
I think that this could be fine for 8th graders or higher, but also I read stuff like this or worse when I was in middle school.
tangentwithtanner
andulkaphoto
