#3 controllers

[eggpea]

Copped a neat lil PS4 for 180 :)

[mothergamerwriter]

YA Fantasy Review | Descendant of the Crane by Joan He

        Oh boy, was this one a rollercoaster. Descendant of the Crane is the YA debut from Joan He and it is one heck of a debut. There’s magic, courtroom drama, politics, and a mission to find who killed the king. If these sound like your cup of tea, I would recommend picking this one up!

Hesina is the princess of Yan, and when her father passes away she finds herself taking on the role of queen. The Imperial Doctress declares that the king died of natural causes, but Hesina has reason to believe that he was actually murdered. With the help of her siblings and a freed criminal, Hesina is determined to discover who her father’s murderer is and see them punished for it.

There is a LOT that happens in this book. We start out with Hesina and her adopted brother, Caiyan, headed to the Red Light District in order to enlist the help of a soothsayer. Sooths are banned and Hesina is committing treason even by seeking one out, but she is determined to find her father’s murderer. While the Silver Iris, the sooth who helps Hesina, can’t tell her who the murderer is, she does point her in the direction of someone who can help her, a convict who is currently imprisoned at the palace. The convict, Akira, becomes Hesina’s representative in the investigation into her father’s death.

The first half of the book reads like a police procedural, with trials and political machinations everywhere. Honestly, the first half of the book was a little slow for my personal tastes. BUT THEN there is a huge twist about halfway through the book that will leave you dumbfounded. This is when things really start to pick up as Hesina finds herself questioning everything she thought she knew.

While I was excited about the first twist that occurred, there were so many twists and turns in the second half of the book that I felt like it was giving me whiplash. I went on Goodreads to see when the second book was coming out only to learn that this is a stand-alone novel which was such a bummer. Without spoiling anything, if you are someone who needs their books to have endings that are tied up in a nice little bow, this may not be the book for you.

While the plot was a little hot and cold for me, the world that Joan He has created is so beautiful and vivid that I couldn’t help but fall in love with it. The world is inspired by China and I loved the descriptions of the clothes and the palace, and really just everything. I also fell head over heels in love with the characters. Hesina didn’t always make smart decisions, but she was trying her best. And the side characters were amazing. Akira, Caiyan, Lillian (Caiyan’s twin) and Sanjing (Hesina’s biological twin) all had such strong personalities.

Overall, I give Descendant of the Crane 3 out of 5 stars. The plot was a little slow for the first half of the book, and I felt like there were way too many plot twists in the second half, but the writing is absolutely beautiful and the characters are great.

  My Rating

YA Fantasy Review | Descendant of the Crane by Joan He was originally published on Mother/Gamer/Writer

[mothergamerwriter]

Sky in the Deep by Adrienne Young | Review | YA Historical Fantasy

    A YA novel about vikings?  Sign me up!  Sky in the Deep is the debut from author Adrienne Young, and if you’re into vikings, strong heroines, or both, I would suggest picking this one up, although I would say be prepared for less action than what is advertised.

The Aska and the Riki clans have been at war for as long as anyone can remember.  Every year during the fighting season, the two groups meet just so they can fight.  Five years ago, Eelyn lost her brother during a battle against the Riki.  So why does she see him fighting with the Riki this year?  When she is captured by the Riki, Eelyn must find a way to survive and get back to her father, the only family she has left.  But when the Riki are attacked by another clan, the Aska and the Riki must come together, or it’s possible none of them will survive.

I want to start out by saying I legitimately did enjoy this book.  However, I don’t like how it was marketed.  The entire plot is in the books description, which I always hate. If something is brought up in the description on the back of the book, I want it to happen fairly early on.  That was not the case with Sky in the Deep.  The attack on the Riki from the clan that everyone thinks is a legend doesn’t happen until about halfway through the book.  The first half was more of a slice of life novel in the Riki village where Ellyn starts to realize the Riki and the Aska really aren’t that different.  Personally, I love slice of life types of stories and I really enjoyed that bit of the story, but I was left feeling disappointed because I was expecting so much more action than there actually was.

My other really big complaint comes from Herja, the legendary clan that attacks the Riki halfway through the book.  Because the book description said that everyone thought they were just a legend, I thought there was going to be a supernatural element to them.  I was pretty disappointed to discover they were just another clan.  There were more of them, and they were bigger and scarier, but they were just regular vikings.  It could be that I just misinterpreted the description of them, but it was still a bummer.

For what it was though, I did really like the story.  Eelyn is a strong heroine who loves her family and the rest of her clan.  She spends a lot of the book torn between being relieved that her brother, Iri, is actually alive and angry because he left their clan to live with the enemy.  As she lives with the Riki and sees them doing the same things she would be doing with her family back at the Aska village, she starts to see that the Riki and the Aska really aren’t that different.  The romance between her and Fiske is something that doesn’t happen until much later in the book, and I honestly could have done without it, but I liked them both as separate characters.

Overall, I would give Sky in the Deep 3 out of 5.  It wasn’t what I was expecting based on the book’s description, but I still enjoyed it.  I would have given it a higher rating had it been blurbed differently, but it’s still worth picking up.

    My Rating

  Sky in the Deep by Adrienne Young | Review | YA Historical Fantasy was originally published on Mother/Gamer/Writer

[mothergamerwriter]

Graphic Novel Review | 30 Days of Night: Night, Again by Joe R. Lansdale

Fleeing the site of a secondary vampire infestation in the cold, wilds of Alaska, a band of survivors arrive at a climate change facility during the final days of a long period of extended daylight.

Graphic Novel Review | 30 Days of Night: Night, Again by Joe R. Lansdale was originally published on Mother/Gamer/Writer

[mothergamerwriter]

A Middle of The Road Read | The Traitor's Kiss by Erin Beaty

A slow starter with a great ending, see why The Traitor’s Kiss is a 3 Controller read in my review.

A Middle of The Road Read | The Traitor’s Kiss by Erin Beaty was originally published on Mother/Gamer/Writer

[mothergamerwriter]

The Review that Would Not Come | Dividing Eden by Joelle Charbonneau

A good but not great fantasy about twins and a desperate fight for the throne. See why it took me six months to write my review of Dividing Eden (Dividing Eden #1) by Joelle Charbonneau.

The Review that Would Not Come | Dividing Eden by Joelle Charbonneau was originally published on Mother/Gamer/Writer

[internetglitchstuff]

#eBay #retrogaming Sega Genesis Model 2, 3 Controllers, 18 Games, 3 AC Adapters, 2 RF Hookups…… https://t.co/XKVw9sAuIp http://twitter.com/AmazonBay4u/status/852680409825460224 April 14, 2017 at 01:30AM

#eBay #retrogaming Sega Genesis Model 2, 3 Controllers, 18 Games, 3 AC Adapters, 2 RF Hookups… https://t.co/8QQuQ5roWF #retroconsoles #Sale http://pic.twitter.com/vu6yI481Qe

— AmazonBay4u (@AmazonBay4u) April 14, 2017

[internetglitchstuff]

http://ift.tt/2oF3SKE Genesis Model 2, 3 Controllers, 18 Games, 3 AC Adapters, 2 RF Hookups ! WOW | eBay Sega Genesis Model 2, 3 Controllers, 18 Games, 3 AC Adapters, 2 RF Hookups ! WOW in Video Games & Consoles, Video Game Consoles | eBay#Sale #retrogaming Sega Genesis Model 2, 3 Controllers, 18 Games, 3 AC Adapters, 2 RF Hookups ! WOW: $42.67 (9 Bids) End Date: Thursday Apr-13-2017 18:21:37 PDT Bid now | Add to watch list #retroconsoles #ebay