Book Review // Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé

Title: Ace of Spades
Author: Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé
Publisher: Usborne Publishing
Pub. Date: 10 Jun 2021

Synopsis

Chiamaka and Davon are the only two black students at the Niveus Private Academy. While Chiamaka is the most popular girl in the school, Davon stays in the shadows focusing on his music and keeping good grades. When both of them are selected to be part of the elite school’s senior class prefects, everything they were working for starts to fall into ruins. The arrival of anonymous bullies exposed their deep hidden secrets that crush their reputations but also a chance to get into a good college. Together, they decided to stand up against the bully and try to find who’s behind all the messages spread around the school. Small pranks turn into a dangerous game without an easy way out.

Book Review

It’s so hard to review this book without giving any spoilers. This story is a mix of the Gossip Girl, and the movie Get Out. It was pretty slow-paced at the beginning, but when the action started it never ended. The author visualized the racism and hate in prestigious American schools perfectly. I wouldn’t be surprised if it would be written based on the actual events. This book shows how wrong and messed up people are if they’re not fitting into their perfect picture.

Chiamaka since the first year at the Niveus Private Academy was climbing in the hierarchy as a smart and popular girl people would die to be friends with. It was a big surprise to her when she became a victim of an anonymous bully who knew about her more than anyone else. When the secrets get out, her status at the academy has been ruined.

Davon is a shy guy, who prefers to stay in shadows and not bring attention to himself. Music was his passion, and he spent most of the time working on his project and application to Julliard, instead of wasting his time on rich kids at his school. When someone anonymously shared with the whole school news about him being gay, his perfect senior year turned to ashes.

The only thing that connected them was the fact that they were the only black students in the school, which led them to suspicions that this is an act of racism.

The ending of the book was much more surprising than I was expecting it to be. I loved that both main characters were so different from each other, that when they started working together, it didn’t work that well because of their different point of view on the whole situation. I don’t read as many books that take place in high school anymore, but I loved this book and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading thrillers. It had very good plot twists at the end of the story that made this story even better than it had been in the beginning.

Rate: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I would like to thank NetGalley, Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé, and Usborne Publishing for providing me with an ARC copy of this book. It was one of my favorite reads of 2021, and I cannot wait to buy myself a copy of this book and read it once again.

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Love, Karo

ARC Review // The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna

Title: The Gilded Ones
Author: Namina Forna
Publisher: Usborne Publishing
Pub. Date: 04 Feb 2021

Synopsis

The biggest fear of sixteen-year-old Deka was to go through the blood ceremony. Even if she knew that she has never done anything that would make you impure, she was still scared of her blood to run gold. When the time of ceremony finally comes, the group of deathshrieks attacked the village. That’s when Deka discovered her cursed gifts; she could feel the deathshrieks coming and control them with her voice. However, even if the gifts would be very helpful for the village, the fight proved that she is impure and there is no place for her among her people.

Everyone, even the closest people turned their back on her. She is imprisoned, and the men of her village try to kill her, however, it is not possible. After nine attempts, a mystery woman paid her a visit, which can change her life. She offered her a way out of her situation. She proposed to join an army of alaki, a half-demons woman who is trained to fight deathshrieks.

Review:

It’s the first fantasy book I read based on the West African culture and I couldn’t be happier that I requested it on NetGalley a few months ago. From page one I knew that this book will take me on a journey none of the books did this year and I was right.

Deka is a young very powerful girl who was destined to become one of the most powerful warriors in the kingdom. However, when we meet her at the beginning of the book, she doesn’t show any signs of it. She is a nice obedient girl for whom the most important thing is to be impure and to find a husband who will give her a purpose in life. It all changes when she turns out to be alaki. All her dreams and plans need to change and she needs to grow up into her new rule. Her transformation in this book is marvelous. It’s not immediate. It took her a while to finally reach the moment when she understood that she needs to be proud of who she and her sisters are. Besides being courageous and powerful, she also is very smart. She didn’t allow anyone to brainwash her, and she started noticing things that none of her friends saw. She kept her eyes open, and never fully believed the emperor’s words.

Another amazing thing in this book was sisterhood. The author presented this aspect in a very successful way. This book is very feministic and I think it sent the right message to all the girls that read this book. Instead of fighting the individual fights, we should stay together and fight side by side (not literally obviously). I don’t want to give you too many spoilers but I adore the moment when Deka and the rest of Alaki became sisters. It was breathtaking and very powerful. I might say that it was one of the best scenes in the book.

The overall idea for the book is very well created and structured in the book. There weren’t any moments that wouldn’t be clearly explained/described so reading this book is very smooth. There weren’t any unnecessary scenes, everything was chosen in a way to make the reader understand the ending of the book and it was brilliant! I cannot wait to read the next book in this series! Hopefully, we won’t need to wait for it too long.

Rate: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I would like to thank NetGalley, Namina Forna, and Usborne Publishing for providing me with a copy of this amazing book! I loved every single detail about this story and cannot wait to find out what’s going to happen in the following books!

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Book Review // Speak the Ocean by Rebecca Enzor

Title: Speak the Ocean
Author: Rebecca Enzor
Publisher: Reuts Publications
Pub. Date: July 9th 2019

Synopsis

Finn is a young student who was interested in the ocean all his life. He’s working at Oceanica, the place that is training mermaids to perform and entertain the audience. For many years he was waiting for the day when he will become a trainer. His dream came true when they brought new mer to train. However, it wasn’t just some other mermaid. She looked exactly like the first mer that was discovered by his father. He decided to train her in his own way, without shocking her with the loop as most of the trainers do. Thanks to his new approach he discovered that mermaids are more than dangerous fish.

Erie is a princess of Seadom. She spends her days trying to find a pattern between the disappearing of the mermaids in her kingdom. However, the dates don’t make any sense to her. Her kingdom lives in the fear and hunger. She tries to find a way to help her people, but instead of helping she is the one who’s taken away to the land. Thankfully, her loyal guard Niku didn’t leave her alone and let the landfolk to take him with her. Since there is no way back, she decides to learn the language of humans and find out why are they doing this.

Book Review

This book is an emotional rollercoaster. Erie is such a precious soul, and I couldn’t bear anyone who tried to heart her. She cares for her people more than for her own life. I loved the moments when she was showing Finn and Jen that she is smarter than they thought. It was so cute how interested she was in the Disney movies and any other new thing that they showed them. It was so easy to fall in love with her. I wanted to cry whenever someone tried to break her like other Mer. Mermaids in the Oceanica were treated worse than you can imagine. They couldn’t speak or touch each other. If they do, they were shocked until they couldn’t move. The funniest thing is that people were surprised that they are trying to attack them or kill them whenever they have a chance. After all, they do to them I would be surprised if they wouldn’t want to do that.

Finn was the only trainer that proved it. He taught Erie respectfully and kindly and he received back the same thing. He understood that mermaids are not the bad guys here and that it needs to be changed. However, this change didn’t come fast to him. Throughout most of the book, he was one of the most annoying characters in this book. It’s not that I don’t like him because I do, he’s a good guy. I feel like he’s very lost because he finally found out that everything he believed in and dreamed about was a lie. Most of the time he behaves in a way that he doesn’t even want to notice it. Moreover, he is very selfish. He thinks only about what will be good for him and he doesn’t see how much he can hurt people around him with his actions. Thankfully, my precious Erie showed him that it’s not what life is about and changed him.

The story overall is beautiful. I love the smooth changes in the characters. It was very hard for me to get through the violence with which the trainers treat the mermaids and the reasons they were stating, she’s only a fish, were completely dumb. Even if she would be only an animal or fish, it doesn’t matter you can hurt them for your own entertainment.

The thing I loved the most about this book is a presentation of the cruelty to animals/sea creatures in places like Oceanica. Even if the mermaids do not exist and this is just a fantasy book, I’m sure that animals are not treated better in places like this. I’m really grateful that the author touched on this subject since the subject seems a little bit forgotten.

Rate: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I feel that this book deserves much more attention than it gets. It’s an amazing, well-written book that will make you forget about reality. I would like to thank NetGalley, Rebecca Enzor, and REUTS Publications for providing me with a copy of this book. I think that this book is joining the list of my favorite releases of 2020.

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ARC Review // Mayhem by Estelle Laure

Title: Mayhem
Author: Estelle Laure
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Pub. Date: 14 Jul 2020 

Book Review

Mayhem Brayburn is a young girl living in a shadow of her stepfather. He is loved by everyone in their town; however, no one knows about his dark side. He is very abusive towards her and her mother.  One day he went too far so they packed everything and left. They moved back to the Santa Maria, city her mother was born in. They moved in with her twin sister and three of her adopted kids. Mayhem finally felt that she is in place that she belongs to. The name Brayburn was very well known by people all around the city. There is a mystery behind it and even Mayhem did not know what exactly it all means. Her grand mother’s diary gives her a small insight of the story; however, it didn’t answer all her questions. Besides the mystery of her heritage, her family and the whole city is concern about the past kidnaps of teenage girls. Mayhem together with her cousins tries to solve this mystery.

It’s so hard for me to write this review. I was delaying it for the whole month and I still have troubles to put all my thoughts together about this book. It’s mostly because I’m not a fan of this book. I didn’t enjoy reading and very often I just wanted to skip some parts because they didn’t interest me in any case. I think the worst thing for me is that the plot didn’t make any sense for me. The whole book was focused on the powers of Brayburn women, but they don’t actually explain is it for a power? There wasn’t a clear explanation of this subject. Moreover, the characters in this book were on one side exaggerated and on the other side boring. They didn’t sell the story and didn’t make this story interesting. I think that it’s mostly because the plot was lacking something important.

I think that the characters that annoyed me the most in this book were Neve and Roxy. I just wanted to skip everything they were saying. However, I’m not going to lie I really liked Jason and Kidd. I felt really bad for them and what happened to them. I feel like Jason was an opposite from Neve and the really wanted to protect Mayhem and Kidd from the Brayburn curse, even if he knew he couldn’t. Kidd on the other side was the only one who from the beginning wanted to get to know Mayhem.

Rate: ⭐️⭐️

I’m actually curious if this book will have a continuation because the story ended in this way. Anyway, I would like to thank NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press and Estelle Laure for providing me this copy to review!

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