Book Review: The Trylle Trilogy (Switched, Torn, Ascend)

Hey guys!

I have clearly fallen behind on my reviews and reads recently, and so to catch up, I'm doing collective and collaborative reviews. This round we've got all of the Trylle books, by Amanda Hocking. Let's start in order, shall we?

SWITCHED

When Wendy Everly was six-years-old, her mother was convinced she was a monster and tried to kill her. It isn't until eleven years later that Wendy finds out her mother might've been telling the truth. With the help of Finn Holmes, Wendy finds herself in a world she never knew existed - and it's one she's not sure if she wants to be a part of.

Nice Things First!

I LOVE the idea of the Trylle people, and their changelings being all over the country and such. I wish we had gotten a better idea of the people, though, in this first book, because otherwise it's mostly just focused on Wendy's confusion and what Finn is teaching her about Trylle. I think it would have been a better way to "show" this clearly faulty society by bringing Wendy out of her shining palace every now and then.

I wish there had been more about the Vittra in this volume because I was absolutely DYING to know why they wanted Wendy so badly, considering Queen Elora hardly seemed too thrilled to have her back home. I wanted to know why they were supposedly so different from Trylle, and why Finn, and everyone else they were mentioned around, hated them so much. That was intriguing.

Descriptions, descriptions and imagery for days!! I loved it, I could see the palace, and Wendy's room, and her human house, all in my head with Hocking's descriptions and writing style. It felt spot-on without being too long, dry, or distracting. Bravo!

The action at the end was thrilling, and made for some good reading!

Not so Nice Things, Next

I found Wendy as a protagonist annoying, especially when it came to Finn. I'm not a fan of "love at first sight" stories, and for Wendy this was a "lust at first glimpse" tale, no matter how hard she tried to "deny" it in the beginning. There didn't seem to be any point in the book when Finn wasn't being hot or cold simultaneously, often in the same scene, and I'm not sure how or why Wendy found this attractive, but she did, and so much so that she did not want to stay at the palace or be an semi-intelligent person if Finn could not be around. 

The plot sort of lost its momentum not too long after Wendy arrived at the palace, mostly because there wasn't too much pushing it forward, since it appeared that Vittra could not get into town. The biggest "event" was Wendy's debutante ball-thing, and training herself for that night, which get lost in the "OMG Finn is so HAWT"-ness.

Overall Impression:
Eh. 
I probably won't read it again, but I really liked the sequels, so I have to give it a decent review.

Blonde's Rating: 3.5/5


TORN

When Wendy Everly first discovers the truth about herself—that she’s a changeling switched at birth—she knows her life will never be the same. Now she’s about to learn that there’s more to the story…

She shares a closer connection to her Vittra rivals than she ever imagined—and they’ll stop at nothing to lure her to their side. With the threat of war looming, her only hope of saving the Trylle is to master her magical powers—and marry an equally powerful royal. But that means walking away from Finn, her handsome bodyguard who’s strictly off limits…and Loki, a Vittra prince with whom she shares a growing attraction.

Torn between her heart and her people, between love and duty, Wendy must decide her fate. If she makes the wrong choice, she could lose everything, and everybody, she’s ever wanted…in both worlds.

This book started out with a BANG! and kept the tensions high throughout! 

First Wendy is attacked by the Vittra after running away from the Trylle and back to her home and to her human host-brother. There she, Rhys, and Matt are abducted and taken to the Vittra castle *dundunDUNNNNN* where we meet MY NEW FAVORITE, Loki. Wendy doesn't exactly know what his game is yet, but he's sweet and pretty hot, and he's not too subtle about letting them escape.

When she gets back to the palace, political tensions between Trylle and Vittra, not to mention Wendy and Elora, are running sky high, and the histories of both types of troll are revealed to Wendy. 

There's a lot of worrying going on in this book, plus a lot of yelling and crying, between Wendy's fights with her mother Elora, and Finn. There's some side cuteness with host-brother Matt and Trylle friend Willa, but Rhys kinda disappears after they all go back to the palace (like, for the rest of the book). And we can't forget Wendy's new Tracker guard, AND LOKI!!! I wanted MORE LOKI. He is too adorable, and I wish Wendy could have seen how much he obviously cared about her, not like Finn, who would rather hide their feelings than ever put them first. 

Overall Impression:
I liked Torn much more than Switched, and I'm glad I stuck with the series.

Blonde's Rating: 4/5


ASCEND

Wendy Everly is facing an impossible choice. The only way to save the Trylle from their deadliest enemy is by sacrificing herself.  If she doesn’t surrender to the Vittra, her people will be thrust into a brutal war against an unbeatable foe.  But how can Wendy leave all her friends behind…even if it’s the only way to save them?

The stakes have never been higher, because her kingdom isn’t the only thing she stands to lose. After falling for both Finn and Loki, she’s about to make the ultimate choice…who to love forever. One guy has finally proven to be the love of her life—and now all their lives might be coming to an end. 

Everything has been leading to this moment.  The future of her entire world rests in her hands—if she’s ready to fight for it

Okay, I'm not going to lie to you; I didn't read this whole one. I mostly skipped around to get to the Wendy-Loki parts, and I still got a very good idea of what happened, so I'm good. 

It's been a few weeks since the end of Torn, where Wendy has made a temporary truce with the Vittra until she is the Trylle Queen. Tensions are still high, however, as the Vittra have naturally found a loophole in their "truce" and are still hurting Trylle. Not to mention Wendy is set to marry her friend but not-at-all-love, Tove. Oh, and Loki is now a Vittra fugitive. That's cool, because it means he's not Wendy's enemy anymore!

There is a LOT going on, with Vittra attacking innocent Trylle/other trolls, Loki totally trying to be a third in Wendy's marriage, and Queen Elora slowly dying, Wendy has a lot on her hands, and she tries to deal with in her own ways. This doesn't always work out well for her, but it forces everyone around her to act, and it keeps the story moving forward.

There's a little bit of heartbreak at the end, but I think it ends happily (concerning my OTP for these books), so that's all that matters.

Overall Impression:
Like I said, it's a bit of a "blurred" impression, given how much I actually read, but it's a pretty good one.

Blonde (blurred) rating: 3.5/5

SERIES IMPRESSION
Much like my feelings on the Mara Dyer books, you must PUSH yourself through the first one to get to the goods in the second and third.

Do I recommend this series? 
Sure, but I found it at a slightly more juvenile reading level than some of the other books I've read recently. This makes it seem a little young, but it also makes them fast reads. That balances it out, I'd say.

The Book Hangover

The Book Hangover

I've heard the term, "book hangover" before, but I didn't realize just how much a good book is like alcohol until after I turned 21.

Think about it:

• Drinking puts your mind all out of whack, just like when you're in the middle of a good book, and nothing you say makes sense because all you can talk about is the story.

• At a family party, if you're drinking, you're probably doing it to isolate yourself from all of your relatives. I did the same thing with my books, when I would read at family gatherings.

• When you're reading too many books at once, you get easily lost and confused about who is who, which character belongs with which backstory, and where-the-heck-are-we-going?

• When you wake up the next day after finishing a particularly thrilling and involved novel, the wake of that story leaves you dazed and probably more than a little sad. And you probably have a headache from staying up so late to finish, and you don't really want to do much of anything but eat your feelings for that character you liked that died at the end.

• You tell yourself "I'm never doing that again" when you wake up this way, but in no time at all, you're back on that wagon.

I have found that there are really only two ways to combat and prevent a book hangover:

1. To not read.
2. To start about fifteen-thirty pages of a new book just before you finish the last one.

For me, option 1 is not a possibility, and it probably won't ever be. I don't want to be book sober, and I hope I never will be. 

Option two is one of my own making. I have determined that, by just-barely starting a new book in the last fifty pages of the one I'm about to finish, I can "keep the buzz" going when that first book ends in a blaze of glory. Instead of moping around and getting "hung-up" on that last book, I've already got something to look forward to, because I've read just enough of the new book to know who the protagonist is and what kind of trouble he/she is facing.

It's not a perfect strategy, but it works for me. If I wasn't constantly reading two or three books, I'd probably never have gotten over [SPOILER] Dumbledore's death [SPOILER] or, more recently, the end to the Divergent trilogy.

It's hard, ending something you've spent 150-700 pages working on. It's hard to let those characters go, but we have to accept that story has to come to an end. In some series, we learn the hard way that they maybe should have ended sooner than they did, but whatever. I've come to realize that overly empathetic readers like myself need to have multiple things to focus our thoughts and emotions on, or else we'll put our whole beings into the stories we have in front of us, and a part of us dies with the end of the book.

I'm not saying feeling strong emotions for books is wrong, but it isn't right to let it control you. It is fiction, it is not real, and we must learn to let go. I personally move on faster when I have something new to hang onto, like a new project, craft, or book.

This is not a step-by-step program to rehabilitate your addiction. It is to nourish it, and help you get addicted to great books, so when you do consume your "poison," it's not crap.

I am NOT by any means saying that alcohol and reading are the same thing, or that they are the same kind of addictions.

In fact, I encourage you to nurture your addiction to books. 

Ten Reason to Read The Iron Fey

10 Reasons to Read The Iron Fey

Hello All,


If you haven't heard about Julie Kagawa's The Iron Fey series, (or if you have) and you, like me a year ago, don't think you like books about faeries, you need to take a look at my list of 10 reasons why you should read this series, or at least give the first book, The Iron King, a fair and unbiased shot.


Reason #1: A Strong, Relatable Heroine
Meagan Chase is the main character in this series. At first she seems like any other ordinary teenager, unpopular, totally in love with the hot-shot jock, and a goofy best friend by her side...until her little brother is stolen from their home and Meagan starts seeing crazy magical creatures all over the place. Suddenly Meagan's world is turned upside-down as her best friend turns out to be the most infamous trickster faery in the world and her search for her brother takes her into the beautiful and dangerous world of the Nevernever, the feary world, too dangerous for mortals.

DeviantArt user: http://skellingt0n.deviantart.com/art/Iron-Fey-196138057

Meagan is an awesome heroine because she has no idea what the heck she's doing, and that fact is completely believable to the readers. It's also great to find a girl who is so determined to reach her goal that she's willing to do anything, even if that means traveling to a poisonous world where no one can protect her! Meagan is clumsy, strong, full of love and passion, and totally and completely believable.

Reason #2: Comedy
These books are hilarious. That's not to say that there isn't a lot of action and drama happening, but the tension is often broken up to let the reader breathe during these high intensity moments -like right in the middle of a life-or-death battle!
Most of this comedy is brought on by Meagan's best friend, Robin Goodfellow, aka Puck from "A Midsummer Night's Dream" aka the most awesome MoFo ever. He has some of the best one-liners in these books, tossed out so non-chalantly in the middle of a serious moment that you HAVE to laugh out loud...even if you're in the middle of your Psychology class -oops!

Reason #3: Grimalkin
The coolest cat you will ever read about in your life. A mix between the Cheshire Cat and (am I crazy?) Professor Snape, he is wise and more than a little blunt. He is an essential character to each book's story arc, because without this feline, Meagan and crew would be stuck chasing their tails, so to speak, never getting anything done. He has a nasty tendency of disappearing at the slightest hint of danger and not returning for some time, but he really does know everything, and grows a reluctant fondness for the heroes of these stories -but he'll never admit to it.

Reason #4: Literary Antagonists
We've all read Shakespeare, some more eagerly than others, so readers should recognize King Oberon, Queen Tatiana, and Queen Mab of the Feary Courts in the Iron Fey series. Mab, mentioned in "Romeo and Juliet," is the cold ice queen of the Unseelie court, the icy, heartless and cruel fey who are constantly at war with the Summer court, where King Oberon and Tatiana from "A Midsummer Night's Dream" rule the Seelie fey, who are equally cruel, but take great and obvious pleasure in tricking and riddling their prey. The two Queens are definitely not Meagan's allies throughout these books, for a multitude of reasons, and Oberon isn't always on her side, either, but he's more "lenient" -if that's what you want to call it -with her than the others. It's really cool to see these characters and their larger-than-life personalities brought to light out of their original stories, especially when Kagawa alludes to their well-known histories in Shakespeare's works.

Reason #5: A Real Sense of Danger
I won't reveal any major plot points here, but just know that all of your soon-to-be-favorite characters are going to be in serious, life-threatening danger in these books. And each book raises the stakes of that danger just a bit more, bringing more tension and urgency to each chapter. Come prepared with a box of tissues and an oxygen tank, for when you start hyperventilating.

Reason #6: A Menagerie of New Magical Creatures
If I tried to name all of the faery creatures in these books, I think this post would be as long as its own novel. Basically every faery-related creature you've ever heard of makes at least a basic appearance in one of these stories. Some of these things include giants, trolls, goblins, wood nymphs, satyrs, unicorns, sirens, kelpies, redcaps, and even The Big Bad Wolf -that's right, THAT one. These creatures are all characters in themselves and often move the plot along or turn it around in a new direction. Otherwise they paint a very colorful backdrop to this already technicolor story.
Reason #7: The Hot Guy
Ash.
'nuf said.
Once you read the books, you'll understand. Strong, beautiful, hiding a dark and brooding past -love him. You'll have no choice.
(Team Ash)


Reason #8: The Forbidden Relationship
Meagan's a human, Ash is an Unseelie prince. All the rules of nature and the Nevernerver say it's impossible for them to be together. What better reason to try it? Love, duh. I love these two together, and screw everyone and anyone who tries to tear them apart! I died a little inside every time Ash had to push his feelings for Meagan away and pretend like it didn't matter! (But not in a Twilight-y way, more like a more intense and they-will-actually-kill-us-if-we-do-this kind of way).
Thank Goodness for The Iron Knight. It restored all of my faith in princely heroes, long nearly unattainable quests, and the possibility for happily ever afters -not that they belong in every story, of course.

Reason #9: The New Enemy
Everyone who reads faery folklore knows that the fey can't stand the touch of iron. Well what could possibly be more dangerous to a world of fey than an enemy made completely out of iron and as powerful as the imagination can dream? No one has ever thought to create this kind of bad guy, and it puts a very interesting twist into the storyline of these books. It makes winning for the good guys ten times as difficult as it would have been, and it puts an extra edge of tension to every encounter with the antagonists.
A brilliant idea for a new twist to the folktales.

Reason #10: A Fun and Easy Read
I hate it when teachers try to make you read books, because those literary fiction novels are so hard to read through with a looming deadline. For those kind of books, you need to be in a specific state of mind and have oodles of time to slowly absorb the atmosphere that the literary fiction is building. I have a short attention-span, and I don't have time to wait for that atmosphere to build.
That's why I like YA so much. It lays out an entertaining story very simply, so you can get lost in the story, not the words.
You will get lost in the Iron Fey. There's no question about it -the descriptions are too vivid and the characters are too lifelike for a reader to remain firmly planted in the real world. The action of the story takes you away from your reading room and into the Summer Court, or the through the halls of the icy palace of Tir Na Nog. There is no escape -once you're in, you'll Never -never! -come back out.
And you won't want to, either.

Welcome to The Blonde Reviews

Hello!

Welcome to the Blonde Reviews, where I -the blonde -review books and movies and TV shows that I watch right here in semi-perfect prose.

Now, seeing as I'm still kind of poor and pathetic and unpopular, I can't always update movies and TV shows in a timely manner, because I'm working into the wee hours of the morning.

My taste in books tends toward the YA Fantasy/Chick Lit realms (sorry I'm not sorry), but I do sometimes venture outside my comfort zone and try something new -especially with suggestions!

Movies range all over the place -except into horror/scary movies (unless I get lots of readers that want to make me suffer and ask and ask and ask me to go and review them).

TV shows are a little harder, because I can't keep up a regular TV-watching schedule, but there are shows that I follow every season, and sometimes I just have to do super major catch-up sessions every few weeks to keep myself updated.

So yes, I can't promise you the most timely of reviews, but I can promise you that they will be the best and most honest that I can give to you.

I'd never give anything less.

Thanks!
The Blonde