Firstlife: Not since Lost has a story simultaneously confused the hell out of me and completely blown me away (My thoughts on book #1 in the Everlife trilogy by Gena Showalter)

Before I get too far into talking about my thoughts on Firstlife, I definitely need to mention that as I was reading this book, I constantly found myself thinking about the book Divergent by Veronica Roth and comparing this book to Divergent. Maybe that might not seem fair of me to do that, but no matter how hard I tried to avoid comparing the two books, I just couldn’t seem to help it a lot of the time. If you’ve read my review for Divergent, then you know that I went into reading Divergent really looking forward to that book, but I was ultimately incredibly underwhelmed and disappointed by it. In my opinion, Firstlife is very similar to Divergent in some ways; however, Firstlife is a much better book in the grand scheme of things.

That being said, as much I was loved Firstlife, I’m not going to deny that this book really confused the hell out of me at times as I was reading it, which really made the story hard for me to follow at times. Honestly, my overall experience with reading this book reminded me a lot of how I’ve always thought that Lost was a really awesome show, while also being a really weird and confusing show to watch at times. Because Firstlife was a rather hard story to follow and keep all the details of the story straight in my mind as I was reading it at times, it’s definitely hard for me to describe the plot of the book for the purpose of this review. I’m going to do my best, though.

Firstlife is about a girl named Tenley “Ten” Lockwood who lives in a society where the life that people are living now is referred to as “Firstlife”, while the afterlife is referred to as the “Everlife”. People have to choose one of two realms that they can make a contract with to live in when they die. The two realms are Myriad, which basically values independence, happiness and indulgence, while Troika is more about structure, equality, freedom of choice, and standing up for what’s right. If you don’t pledge yourself to one of those two realms, that means you’re unsigned and you’ll go to the Realm of Many Ends when you die, which is basically the equivalent of hell. The two realms have been at war with each other for centuries, and they both view Ten as being special and what’s referred to as a Conduit, which means she has the ability to help either realm win the war.

Because Ten refuses to sign with either realm, her parents put her in an asylum where she has been for a little over a year at the start of the book in an attempt to make her sign with Myriad. Personally, Ten’s refusal to make a decision regarding what realm she wants to sign with and the fact that the possibility of Ten signing with Troika causes a lot of conflict between her and her parents is one of the ways this book reminded me a lot of Divergent. After all, in the society that Tris Pryor lives in, it’s viewed as a major betrayal if a person chooses to join a different faction, rather than remaining a part of the faction that they were raised in. Ten’s refusal to sign with Myriad leads her father to give the doctors at the asylum his consent for them to try and torture Ten into agreeing to sign with Myriad. The fact that her father told them to torture Ten into signing with Myriad definitely put him in the running to be featured in a blog post that I’m thinking about doing where I discuss and debate which fictional characters from books that I’ve read relatively recently have the worst parents.

Cinder: Get ready to see the story of Cinderella like you’ve never seen it before (My thoughts on book #1 in The Lunar Chronicles series by Marissa Meyer)

Let me start off this review by saying that much like Veronica Roth’s Divergent, Cinder is a book that I’ve wanted to read for a very long time. Thankfully, it didn’t completely disappoint me like Divergent did. I’d even say that Cinder actually exceeded my expectations. That being said, I’m pretty sure that I wasn’t aware of the fact that Cinder is the first book in a series called The Lunar Chronicles until very recently when I saw reviews for the third book in the series, Cress, and a review for the fifth and final book in the series, Winter, on one of my favorite book review channels on YouTube, Bookables. With that said, here are my thoughts on Cinder.

One of the reasons why I’ve always wanted to read Cinder is because I’ve always been a huge fan of retellings or “reimaginings” of fairy tales. I love the movie Hoodwinked, but admittedly I still need to see Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil. I’m also a huge fan of the TV shows Once Upon a Time and Grimm. Much like those examples of fairytale retellings, Cinder is an awesome new take on the story of Cinderella. Another reason why I love this book so much is because I’m also a fan of science fiction books, TV shows, and movies. This story definitely contains some elements of science fiction given the fact that the character Cinder is a cyborg and people apparently live on the moon in the Lunar Chronicles world.

Linh Cinder, who’s usually simply referred to as “Cinder” in the book, is a very fun and likable character. I love how she really has a tendency to be sarcastic. At the same time, she’s definitely a character that has a lot of heart and compassion for others, despite the fact that her stepmother, Linh Adri, and her stepsister, Linh Pearl, are both quite mean to her. Cinder clearly cares a lot about her other stepsister, Linh Peony, who was also a great character. I was definitely very sad about the fact that Peony died after she contracted the letumosis plague.

The interaction between Cinder and Dr. Erland as they worked together throughout the book to try and find a cure for the letumosis plague was a lot of fun to read, and one of my favorite aspects of the book. I’m really hoping that Dr. Erland will be featured in the other books in The Lunar Chronicles series in some capacity. The fact that the citizens of New Bejing were dealing with the threat of a plague definitely added a really interesting element to the story and created some very compelling drama in the story as well, with Peony and Prince Kai’s father, Emperor Rikan, sadly both dying from the plague.

Divergent: I finally read this book, but did it live up to my expectations? Well… (My thoughts on book #1 in the Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth)

Let me start off by saying that the Divergent book series is a book series that I’ve really wanted to read and was really excited about for quite a while. I went into reading Divergent full of excitement and anticipation. Unfortunately, I ended up being very disappointed by this book.

One of the biggest problems that this book suffers from is a serious lack of world building. As I was reading this book, I kept waiting and hoping for Roth to provide some backstory for what happened that prompted their society to develop the social structure that they have with the five different factions: Abnegation (The Selfless), Dauntless (The Brave), Erudite (The Intelligent), Amity (The Peaceful), and Candor (The Honest). Also, how was it decided what the core values of each faction would be? There are some vague comments throughout the book about a war that happened at some point in the past, but it’s never fully explored or explained.

As I said in my reviews for Abigail Barnette’s books First Time (Ian’s Story) and First Time (Penny’s Story), it really bothered me that Barnette didn’t really provide a truly good explanation for why Penny had been waiting to lose her virginity in “Ian’s Story”. The explanation for that part of Penny’s backstory that was given in “Penny’s Story” ended up being very stupid and rather vague, which led to it also being incredibly frustrating and disappointing. I mention that only because much like the lack of a good backstory and explanation for something that played a huge role in the story hurt both versions of First Time, the lack of world building, backstory and depth behind each of the five factions really hurts Divergent as a whole.

Unfortunately for Divergent, the writing suffers a lot more due to its lack of backstory and world building since the book’s biggest flaws have to do with the key aspects of the story rather than being things that would be easier to forgive when it comes to any weaknesses that a story may have. Personally, I think the existence of good world building and thoroughly establishing backstory is especially important in books involving elements of fantasy or societies that are very different from the society we live in today. If an author neglects to give their characters and the plot a good and well written backstory, then the book really faces an uphill battle when it comes to being able to impress and entertain people, in my opinion.