Thoughts on the Delirium Pilot

June 21, 20143 Comments

About a year ago, hospital the pilot for a TV show called Delirium, cheapest based on the best selling trilogy by Lauren Oliver, hit the desks of someone important somewhere and that important someone took a pass.

And I was fairly disappointed. Let me be clear on this: I’m not a massive fan of the Delirium trilogy. I think it has a great concept but it was not played out well over three books. I was very disappointed in the finale book and I thought that a TV show could perhaps take the concept that Lauren created and turn it into a better story. But alas, that was not to happen.

That being said: Delirium has a great concept. Its a world not unlike our own, but for one thing: love has been labeled an actual disease and everyone must receive the cure at the age of 18. Lena Haloway can’t wait to get the cure, especially since her mother committed suicide from being much too in love with Lena’s father, who had long since passed. However, Lena meets Alex, who shows her a world outside the one she’s known and she starts questioning whether love really is a disease.

I really thought this could make a great TV show.

Just in the last week, however, there was an announcement that the pilot episode would be available for a limited time to be viewed on Hulu. It was released yesterday and, of course, I had to sit down and watch the pilot. Here are my thoughts:

I warn you: if you haven’t read any books of the Delirium trilogy, I would refrain from reading this post. It will have book spoilers in it.

What I Liked:

None of the actors, except perhaps Gregg Sulkin, were at all even close to what I pictured for the characters. However, I really thought that all of them captured what each character was feeling and how they felt. One that particularly jumped out to me was Daren Kagasoff as Alex. He was SO not what I pictured as Alex but I thought he captured the essence of him and that was really important to me.

I liked that they brought in Julian earlier. Julian makes his first appearance in the second novel, Pandemonium, and he certainly does not live next door to Hana. I liked that they kept up the curiosity of his character, and that he still had the sickness that kept him from getting the cure but I loved that they sort of seemed to be changing the direction he was headed in, from the book. In the book, he becomes a love interest of Lena and that annoyed me to no end. In the show, it showed more of a connection between him and Hana and I was kind of okay with that.

It stayed kind of close to the first book, and that’s the only book I really like in the trilogy. I thought that Delirium was a strong start but Pandemonium and Requiem just didn’t stick the landing. So when the pilot took a lot of familiar scenes from Delirium, I was fairly happy with that.

What I Didn’t Like:

Yeah, it stayed close to the book…it did the entire first book in the entire first episode! I know there are two more books, and writers can do whatever they want once a book becomes a television show (look at The Vampire Diaries) but it just was so weird to me. It went from Lena’s failed evaluation all the way to when she escapes over the fence and Alex is shot.

And that being said, everything felt so rushed. In my opinion, the first season could have been the entire book of Delirium but they rushed it and I’m not really sure why. I can’t see the purpose behind it because it just seemed to be rushed character and story development. The pilot opens with Lena explaining about deliria, and the cure, and how she can’t wait for it, and by the end of the episode, she’s avoiding the cure, and running from the police, to the “safety” outside the fence. That literally takes an entire book of story and character development for her to get to that point and they accomplished that in one episode…but not in a good way. It felt incredibly rushed, like an incredibly rushed movie version of the first book and that disappointed me.

Now, perhaps if they had continued with episodes, I could see the direction they were going with and maybe it would have made more sense to me. But it just didn’t, and I could see why it wasn’t picked up for a full show. I was annoyed at how fast everything happened. No one, even those who haven’t read the books, could honestly believe that Lena goes through that change so quickly. It was just very rushed and sloppily done.

I also felt like they could have emphasized more how the cure changes you, makes you sort of robotic and without real feeling. We kind of got that with Lena’s sister but not enough to really know what the cure does to you. Why would Lena scream and kick at the idea of getting it if we don’t *really* know what it does to you?

In The End:

I just didn’t like it. The more I thought about it, the more I was disappointed in how it went. It had the concept and it had the potential. The actors really embodied their characters, even though they’re not what I pictured and the world seemed really well built. I liked what they had started.

However, I felt, just like with the books, that they just didn’t execute it as well as they could have. The more I think about it, the more I realize that I just wasn’t happy with it. It was entirely too rushed, and you didn’t really have time to connect with the characters before they were thrown in a tailspin. Hana betrays Lena and tells her sister about Lena’s feelings. How am I supposed to care? We’ve only had an hour-ish to really love their friendship so what is it to me that there was this betrayal. Alex gets shot. Who cares? You’ve only watched one episode with him, how can you be attached to him? You can’t, honestly, and I feel like they needed to stretch out the storylines, give us a chance to get to know each character and watch them develop and change. Watch Alex and Lena fall in love, watch Lena change her mind, watch Hana change her mind, and it honestly would have been a much better pilot.

* * * * * * *

Book Review: Don’t Look Back by Jennifer L. Armentrout

June 21, 2014June 19, 20141 Comment

Genre:

Young Adult, doctor Thriller

Pages:

384

Part of a Series?:

Nope

Release Date:

April 15th, decease 2014

You Can Find the Book At:

GoodReads Summary:

Samantha is a stranger in her own life. Until the night she disappeared with her best friend, approved Cassie, everyone said Sam had it all-popularity, wealth, and a dream boyfriend.

Sam has resurfaced, but she has no recollection of who she was or what happened to her that night. As she tries to piece together her life from before, she realizes it’s one she no longer wants any part of. The old Sam took “mean girl” to a whole new level, and it’s clear she and Cassie were more like best enemies. Sam is pretty sure that losing her memories is like winning the lottery. She’s getting a second chance at being a better daughter, sister, and friend, and she’s falling hard for Carson Ortiz, a boy who has always looked out for her-even if the old Sam treated him like trash.

But Cassie is still missing, and the facts about what happened to her that night isn’t just buried deep inside of Sam’s memory-someone else knows, someone who wants to make sure Sam stays quiet. All Sam wants is the truth, and if she can unlock her clouded memories of that fateful night, she can finally move on. But what if not remembering is the only thing keeping Sam alive?

My Review:

I love Jennifer L. Armentrout and she blows my mind over and over again. I read the Lux series and was massively in love, mostly with Daemon Black. Then I read the Covenant series and my god, that series is incredible. I just recently read The Return, which is the spin off new adult series to the Covenant series and there will be a review for that later. But when her standalone novel came out, and it was hitting bookshelves everywhere (literally, everywhere, taunting me and my wallet all the time), I knew I had to cave in and buy this. So I did.

And I read it in one night.

Which I realize is not exactly a hard thing for me to do. This is legit the girl who read a 750 page book in 5 hours and 45 minutes. If a book catches me, I can read it in mere hours. Which is what this book did to me, easily.

This was a very different book from Jennifer. For a moment, I forgot I was reading it by her because it just didn’t read the same as others I had read from her in the past. It was creepy and scary and literally had me turning the pages frantically to find out what happened next. Jennifer has always managed to make me laugh and to swoon but she’s never scared me before, not like she has in Don’t Look Back.

Don’t Look Back builds this mystery around the main character, Samantha, who is very nearly killed, and must figure out what happened to her, and her best friend. Problem is, she doesn’t remember who she is or who her best friend is, which, you know, makes things kind of difficult. Kind of. Then Sam starts to go…kind of crazy. She’s receiving cryptic notes and seeing things and hearing things that shouldn’t be there. Its incredibly creepy and Jennifer writes it so well. It reads like a horror movie, almost, a thriller, but its better than any movie I’ve watched. I’m not a huge fan of horror/thriller, I tend to find them lacking good stories, good characters, but this one was just perfectly chilling.

I also think its incredible that she’s able to weave such beautiful relationships throughout the book. Sam literally has to rebuild her relationship with everyone: friends, family, boyfriends, boys who are super cute who she wishes was her boyfriend instead, that sort of thing. And it all feels so incredibly authentic and confusing. So many of her relationships before her memory loss were frustrating and needed work, and now its even harder. These people remember what she was like, and she has to completely meld the two pieces of her together. Its confusing and that journey is taken so well through out the book.

There is also the conclusion of it, which obviously, as I write this, will be spoiler free. I hate ruining books for people. For awhile, I’d had a tiny inkling of what was going to be going on, but when it all came to an end, it was not the way I expected it. I knew the person responsible for a lot of the things going on, that part seemed to be creeping into my mind slowly. The why and how of it completely threw me off guard and I was wide-eyed all the way up until the last page. Way to go, Jennifer, for a completely surprising conclusion, and for scaring the crap out of me this entire novel. I was reading this at about 2 am and that probably wasn’t the best idea I’ve had.

Must read though. Seriously. If you like Jennifer Armentrout, you will like this very different novel from her. If you’re not a fan, read it anyway. If you’ve never read her books, then this would be a fun one to start with. Just remember to keep the lights on while you do so.

Rating:

4 out of 5 Stars

Book Review: In Honor by Jessi Kirby

June 20, 2014June 19, 2014Leave a comment

Genre:

Young Adult, this Contemporary, Romance

Pages:

235

Part of a Series?:

Release Date:

May 8th, 2012

You Can Find the Book At:

GoodReads Summary:

Honor receives her brother’s last letter from Iraq three days after learning that he died, and opens it the day his fellow Marines lay the flag over his casket. Its contents are a complete shock: concert tickets to see Kyra Kelly, her favorite pop star and Finn’s celebrity crush. In his letter, he jokingly charged Honor with the task of telling Kyra Kelly that he was in love with her.

Grief-stricken and determined to grant Finn’s last request, she rushes to leave immediately. But she only gets as far as the driveway before running into Rusty, Finn’s best friend since third grade and his polar opposite. She hasn’t seen him in ages, thanks to a falling out between the two guys, but Rusty is much the same as Honor remembers him: arrogant, stubborn . . . and ruggedly good-looking. Neither one is what the other would ever look for in a road trip partner, but the two of them set off together, on a voyage that makes sense only because it doesn’t. Along the way, they find small and sometimes surprising ways to ease their shared loss and honor Finn–but when shocking truths are revealed at the end of the road, will either of them be able to cope with the consequences?

My Review:

I love a good road trip book. I feel like I’ve been reading a lot of those lately so maybe this is something that I’ve been wanting to read. I love the idea of getting into a car, ready for an adventure and coming back with all these stories and with a sense of change in you. It makes me think of summer. It makes me think of possibilities. The idea of a road trip is very…romantic and adventurous to me. I’ve never actually been on one before so there’s that too.

I think that Jessi tells a sweet, and emotional story and I loved every minute of it. Honor is a really fun character, fumbling, and unsure, but you watch her find her footing as the novel continues on and I think that’s great. It goes along with that idea of change and growing on a road trip. I love that. I think that Rusty is quite annoying at first, but he grows on you, slowly, until you suddenly find yourself madly in love with him and you’re wondering how the hell you reached that point.

What I liked the most about this book was how real it felt. The death of her brother, her struggle with dealing with it, the emotions she felt for the people she came to meet on her death, the way she falls in love. It all feels so real and I think that’s what Jessi Kirby manages to do in all of her books. She creates this beautiful adventure in a grounded sense of reality and some days, that’s exactly what I need.

In the end, the thing that really got me the most was the relationship between Honor and her brother. Though her brother is dead as soon as you read page one, you get a great sense of what their relationship was like before his death. I have a thing for sibling stories. I have three younger brothers and two younger sisters, and a sort of brother-in-law and sister-in-law (My boyfriend and I aren’t married but after nearly 7 years, you start to think of his siblings as yours), and I love all of them immensely and I love the dynamic of the sibling relationship. I think Jessi does it beautifully and I got pulled into the story because of it, definitely.

Rating:

4 out of 5 Stars

Book Review: Parallel by Lauren Miller

June 19, 2014June 19, 2014Leave a comment

Genre:

Young Adult, cost Contemporary, Science Fiction (I know, its weird)

Pages:

448

Part of a Series?:

Release Date:

May 14th, 2013

You Can Find the Book At:

GoodReads Summary:

Abby Barnes had a plan. The Plan. She’d go to Northwestern, major in journalism, and land a job at a national newspaper, all before she turned twenty-two. But one tiny choice—taking a drama class her senior year of high school—changed all that. Now, on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, Abby is stuck on a Hollywood movie set, miles from where she wants to be, wishing she could rewind her life. The next morning, she’s in a dorm room at Yale, with no memory of how she got there. Overnight, it’s as if her past has been rewritten.

With the help of Caitlin, her science-savvy BFF, Abby discovers that this new reality is the result of a cosmic collision of parallel universes that has Abby living an alternate version of her life. And not only that: Abby’s life changes every time her parallel self makes a new choice. Meanwhile, her parallel is living out Abby’s senior year of high school and falling for someone Abby’s never even met.

As she struggles to navigate her ever-shifting existence, forced to live out the consequences of a path she didn’t choose, Abby must let go of the Plan and learn to focus on the present, without losing sight of who she is, the boy who might just be her soul mate, and the destiny that’s finally within reach.

My Review:

As soon as I finished Lauren Miller’s Free to Fall, I knew I had to get my hands on Parallel. I had no idea what it was about but that doesn’t even matter. Free to Fall was creepy and futuristic and incredible and I didn’t have to be worried about being attached to multiple books. I like that. I had to wait until the Girls Gone Sci-Fi event in Redondo though, so I could support the bookstore and all that.

A couple days ago, I was stuck in bed, and usually when that happens, I read. I read Ruin and Rising by Leigh Bardugo because it was its release day and I was dying to find out what happened next in Leigh’s epic fantasy monstrosity of a great trilogy. I finished that fairly quickly (more on that later) and decided to pick up Parallel.

I fully intended to read some of it and then go to sleep like a completely normal person but I didn’t. I broke that intention so quickly because I literally could not put down this book. I finished it at 3 a.m.

Abby is living her life, making a movie in Los Angeles, and she’s wondering how on earth she got to this point, when two parallel worlds collide, and she’s in an alternate reality of her life. There was an earthquake a year previously, the collision, which caused her parallel self to take over her life. Each day that Abby wakes up could be a completely different story because of the decisions and paths that her parallel self takes in the path. It sounds a little confusing and it was for me at first, but you quickly understand as you watch it unfold. It reminded me a bit of Lauren Oliver’s Before I Fall, where one decision could change the course of events in the future.

And that’s what gets you so tied into it. You honestly have no idea what is going to happen next. Younger, parallel Abby is making such different decisions from the ones that Abby originally made and its putting her into very confusing situations. She’s both happy and unhappy with the different life that she’s living. Its addicting. Each move that her parallel self makes could create a completely different reality the next day. You literally cannot guess where the future is going. You literally cannot predict how the story is going to go and that is incredibly addicting.

I want Abby to be with this guy, but parallel Abby is with another guy and I love him too, and Abby misses cross country and acting but parallel Abby has become part of a crew team and its just crazy. You’re so torn between these two characters, and they are the same person. You want them to work toward the same goal and its not happening. Its so frustrating and I thought about closing the book, and finishing it the next day. But I could not stop it. I had to keep reading.

And the ending! It was beautiful and crazy and I wanted to throw the book across the room and I tweeted that to Lauren because I couldn’t believe she could end the book that way, and then she tweeted me, made me feel better about it. Now that I’ve thought about what Lauren said, and reread the last chapter, I am very happy with the ending. Its one of those ones that are utterly frustrating but absolutely beautiful at the same time. It reminded me of the sort of ending that Gayle Forman’s Just One Year. Hopeful, sad, cliffhanger, but so many good things. You come crashing to the end and you hope for more but I love that she leaves me waiting. I will always sort of wonder what is going to happen next and I love that.

Its a nice blend of science fiction (which makes my head spin at times) and contemporary. Its a story about trying to figure out what you want in your life, and how sometimes life just unfolds the way its supposed to and sometimes even the best plans don’t work. Abby has her Plan and it doesn’t go as planned, and she gets a second chance to see another way it could and I love that at the end, she knows she’s going the right way and that she’ll end up where she’s supposed to. I love it. Great job once again, Lauren, for making my head spin and leaving me wanting more once again. New book soon?

Rating:

4 out of 5 stars

Book Review: Free to Fall by Lauren Miller

June 19, 2014June 19, 2014Leave a comment

Genre:

Young Adult, approved Dystopian, Futuristic

Pages:

469

Part of a Series?:

Release Date:

May 13th, 2012

You Can Find the Book At:

GoodReads Summary:

What if there was an app that told you what song to listen to, what coffee to order, who to date, even what to do with your life—an app that could ensure your complete and utter happiness? What if you never had to fail or make a wrong choice?

What if you never had to fall?

Fast-forward to a time when Apple and Google have been replaced by Gnosis, a monolith corporation that has developed the most life-changing technology to ever hit the market: Lux, an app that flawlessly optimizes decision making for the best personal results. Just like everyone else, sixteen-year-old Rory Vaughn knows the key to a happy, healthy life is following what Lux recommends. When she’s accepted to the elite boarding school Theden Academy, her future happiness seems all the more assured. But once on campus, something feels wrong beneath the polished surface of her prestigious dream school. Then she meets North, a handsome townie who doesn’t use Lux, and begins to fall for him and his outsider way of life. Soon, Rory is going against Lux’s recommendations, listening instead to the inner voice that everyone has been taught to ignore — a choice that leads her to uncover a truth neither she nor the world ever saw coming.

My Review:

I was really excited when I received Free to Fall for review. I had heard good things about Lauren Miller from her novel “Parallel” and she was going to be a guest author at the Ontario Teen Book Fest so I was high in anticipation when reading this book. I was roughly half way through the book when I met Lauren, and she was so smart and so fun to talk to that I went home almost immediately to finish it.

I think what really gets me about all of this is that it felt so real to me. While Lauren’s novel takes place in the future, its not that far into the future and it is almost sort of warning of what is to come. Lux, the app that everyone uses on their phone, is like Siri on crack. I have Siri on my own phone but I must admit, I barely use it. Lux literally determines every movement of your day. It speaks in your own voices, tells you which bus to take when, what path is the wrong one, what coffee drink you should order, everything. It literally decides everything for you, and everyone trusts it blindly. I am getting shivers just thinking about it. For me, it felt so incredibly real.

I love that it was more than that though. The story could have been shallow, just a commentary on technology but it was so much more than that. Without going into too many spoilers, the more that we learn about Lux and the company behind it, the more that I felt the need to keep turning the pages. The mystery behind that and the mystery behind Rory herself was addicting. First, we’re on a roller coaster, trying to figure Rory out, and the next, we’re in the passenger seat while she unwinds the mystery of Lux. Its completely thrilling and terrifying. Everything that happens in this book seems so real, and terrifying and that’s what makes this SO good.

I also highly applaud Lauren Miller for accomplishing such a story in one novel. I honestly wish that other authors, myself, included could do that more often. It takes a lot to accomplish building up a story, and wrapping it up, in one book, especially in the sort of complicated story that she writes. Plus it makes it so much easier to move on to my ever growing list of books to read without having to worry about a sequel! I loved that! I think it takes a lot of talent to tell a complete story like in such a quick and perfect way.

Rating:

4 out of 5 Stars

Leigh Bardugo’s Ruin and Rising Launch Party at The Last Bookstore!

June 19, 2014June 19, 2014Leave a comment

I’m just going to start off by saying this: Leigh Bardugo and her friends really know how to throw a party. A launch party that is.

The first “real” launch party that I ever attended was Leigh’s last year for the middle book of the Grisha trilogy series, treat Siege and Storm. It was a total blast so when Leigh told me about her party back at the Festival of Books, ambulance I knew that this was something that I could not miss.

I met up with my friends Sylvia and Alex, and we ate some delicious pizza and Slurpees that were literally perfect for the moment. We then drove to pick up my friend Cassandra and made our way to The Last Bookstore.

If you’ve never been to The Last Bookstore in LA before, its an incredible place to go. There are books everywhere, and rooms that are like mazes, and tunnels and really cool doors and its just beautiful. Its one of the most beautiful bookstores I’ve ever seen. Leigh could not have picked a better place to launch her final novel in the Grisha trilogy.

There was lots of food to eat, and drinks too called “The Ruin” and “The Rising.” They were delicious, both the non-alcoholic ones and the ones with a kick ;)

The decorations were SUPER awesome. The entire bookstore was transformed to celebrate the series, and I just wanted to take pictures of everything.

The first pages of Shadow and Bone, Siege and Storm and Ruin and Rising

Leigh was introduced, in such a lovely way, and talked to us for a bit. She never fails to both make me laugh and inspire me. She read a bit from a diary that she had when she was about ten years old, and it was SO funny. Then she went through the basic plot line of Labyrinth. Yes, the David Bowie Labyrinth. It was, and has remained, a favorite movie of hers and she talks about why that is. We reach this pivotal moment of the film, where it goes from being a children’s movie to something a bit more, and she believes that it is YA. She talks passionately about YA, about reading it and writing it, and it was just plain beautiful. Leigh is incredibly inspiring.

She also read a very small bit of the beginning of Ruin and Rising, and then we all were dismissed for food, drinks and fun…oh and signing too.

My friends and I immediately departed for the photobooth. I had a TON of fun with it last year, and I was eager to get back into it again, with some of my most awesome friends :)

I also had the guts to get into the booth by myself this time. I SO would not have done that a year ago!

They also had a manicure station as well, but I’m a compulsive nail biter and I tend to stay away from that haha.

We finally decided to get in line to meet Leigh and it was a great time, as always. We talked a bit, and I told her I would see her in Vegas next week for the Fierce Reads stop and she signed my copy of Ruin and Rising. We also got lots of swag, which is always good. I love getting my hands on more bags, and bookmarks and pins.

And I got my special launch party edition sticker too, which my Siege and Storm has, and was MUCH needed for my Ruin and Rising.

As we were saying goodbye to everyone, and leaving the venue, there were two guys manning the front security desk. We had asked them early if there was a way to get our hands on the giant posters, the ones that I posted earlier, that had the first pages of each novel of Grisha trilogy. We were told that we couldn’t have them, because they were needed the next day at Leigh’s event down in San Diego. I know I was disappointed but it was okay. As we were leaving though, the two guys flagged us down and handed the posters over, making us SO incredibly happy. We ran back into the bookstore and made sure to get these posters signed by Leigh!

All in all, it was a great night, full of a TON of fun, especially the book kind, which is my favorite :) It is always a blast hanging out with my friends and meet new ones, and to see Leigh Bardugo again. She’s brilliant, hilarious and inspiring.

I definitely can’t wait for more launch parties for Leigh in the future!

Oh! I also got to talk to Leigh’s mom again, who remembered me from the last launch party, and a picture was totally necessary. I even put them back to back so you could see. What a sweetheart and so proud of her daughter. I love it!

I have finished Ruin and Rising already so watch out for a review coming VERY VERY soon!

Happy Reading everyone!