Fictional Book Boyfriends pt4

Once a month we like to gather a small list of  what we and others like to call Dream-cast or Fictional Book Boyfriends. We've said it in the past, we LOVE putting faces to the characters in our books (especially the men). We also LOVE seeing page to premieres. So we combined the two to do our spin on dream casting. We picked a few titles and show you who we imagined the leading men to be. We'll put the link to the previous ones at the bottom of this page, and just click the titles to go to the reviews.

Maybe Not by Colleen Hoover 

 Two bull-headed roommates fight the urge to date. 

Miles Teller as Warren.

With a character that is dripping with this much 

sarcasm how could we not pick Miles Teller.  

Bound by Duty by Stormy Smith

Girl with powers tries out the college experience to see if it can give her a feel of normal. 

Astin Skylar as Aidan 

With that boy next door face, well take two please!

The Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard

Girl discovers she has deadly powers and the government ain't having it.

 

 

 Robbie Amell as Cal 

Just look at that Prince like face.

Losing It by Cora Carmack 

Teacher and student have a secret relationship.

Jeff Kasser as Garrick

Because he looks like an angel that would happen to know calculus. 



Pt 1 / Pt 2 / Pt 3  

The Young Elites by Marie Lu

Adelina caught the Blood Fever when she was a young child. The fever swelled so much inside of her that a doctor had to remove her left eye. After she healed, she also developed markings that many children were cursed with after the Fever. Her hair and eye lashes turned silver and now she has a huge scar across her face where her eye should be. Her mother died from the Fever and her sister survived but did not become marked. She grew up with her sister who has developed into a beautiful young girl and her awful father who hates her for what she has become. Her dad sucks. Like really really sucks. After he makes a deal to sell her away to some old guy as his mistress, she tries to run away but he ends up hunting her down. She conquers up some dark powers and accidentally kills him.

Adelina doesn't discover that her powers are like the other Young Elites (a group of young folks that are marked from the Fever and developed supernatural type powers) until she is rescued by them at her execution for the murder of her father. Enzo, Raffaele, Lucent, Gemma, Michel, and Dante are the Young Elites who take her in and help train her and show her how to use her powers. Their main goal is to overthrow the king and take over the kingdom and like marked people like them live normal lives and not be outcast and executed.

First things first, this isn't a happy book. You're not going to come away from it feeling all the happy feels or find yourself laughing at funny dialogue. Marie Lu made this book super dark. Personally, I felt like I was reading a story from the villain's point of view instead of the heroines. Adelina isn't a heroine. She is dark and has dark things living inside her. She gains her power from how the darkness feels inside her and she thrives off of fear and anger. This isn't a story where she learns to harness her bitterness and turns good and hearts and happy endings. Nope, she gets darker and more powerful as the book goes on. I mean, you can't really blame her because she has pretty much been shat on her entire life. Her father sucks, society treats her like a freak, the kingdom wants her dead, and even her new Young Elite friends are kind of using her for what they can for their mission. She's a pretty bitter person and probably would do better with a round of therapy for her daddy issues instead of trying to conquer demons from the underworld. I just didn't like her as a leading lady because her choices and the things she does pretty much hurts everyone around her in someway. I just feel like she didn't develop as a character as the story went along. She just kind of spends most of the book feeling sorry for herself, talking about how she doesn't know how much time has passed, and being followed around by her father's ghost who tells her much she sucks.

The story was pretty much a NOmance for me. The relationship Adelina develops with Enzo was weird, especially since they are both so volatile. They are pretty much doomed even though nothing really even develops. I was kind of hoping she would start something up with Raffaele (who BTW kind of reminds me of a zen version of Magnus Bane).

Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad book. It just wasn't for me. I didn't feel attached to any of the characters and when deaths happened, I just kind of felt "meh." The writing was very descriptive and the world developed nicely. I didn't really feel like I was even getting into it until 100pg in, and even after that I didn't feel attached. I could have easily put this book down and not came back to it. There is a good cliffhanger and twist at the end, but I feel like it kind if sets it up for the next book.. Especially with what happens in the epilogue. I don't know. I know most people really loved this book, but it just wasn't for me. I probably won't bother reading the sequels because I just don't really care what happens to the characters.

3/5 stars

The Beginning of Everything: by Robyn Schneider

The Beginning of Everything by Robyn Schneider is a book about a boy named Ezra Faulkner. He's the definition of a parents wet dream; that is until his world comes crashing down on him... Well its not the world it's more like a car. Ezra use to be a star tennis player, the most popular guy in school, had the most popular girl in school as his girlfriend, and makes pretty good grades. He's living the high school dream until he walks in on his girl friend cheating on him at a party; where he gets in his car to leave and then immediately gets into a car accident. The crash shatters both his knee and dreams. His friends don't seem to get that he can't be the person he use to be. He can't play tennis, can't keep up with the wild pranks, and parties they go too... Oh and on top of all that his now ex girlfriend is dating the his replacement and friend... Sounds like the end of the world right? Well then you should know it's just the start of it. Ezra meets the mysterious riddle talking new girl Cassidy. Ezra is thrown into a world where he no longer knows who he is. He throws himself into school work, a debate team, and an old friendship. Thankful to have Cassidy to distract him from the accident and life in general by dragging him around on her endless adventures he soon realizes she might just be what he needed to get out of his accident funk. He'll soon learn that life isn't always about living up to others expectations it's about living up to your own. 

 I would like to thank the book gods for this book, because after reading so many fails in the contemporary ya field finally one has stepped up and won my heart... 

First off the cover of this book is beyond perfectly witty (Once you read it you'll know why). Second, again, I can't believe I liked a contemporary read. Third this book was like eating a handful of Valentine's Day candy; it was so sweet. TBoE will have your sides splitting and you hooked within the first few pages... Don't believe me? Well feast your eyes on this snippet from page four:

  “What the news reports didn't say was how the kid's head sailed backward in its mouse-ear hat like some sort of grotesque helicopter, and how Toby Ellicott, on his twelfth birthday, caught the severed head and held onto it in shock for the duration of the ride.
     There's no graceful way to recover from something like that, no magic response to the "getting head" jokes that everyone threw in Toby's direction in the hallways of Westlake Middle School.”

Think I made my point. BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE...
The characters in this book felt way more realistic than I could have imagined. Ezra's character development is off the charts along with his amazing level of sarcasm. I almost felt like a proud mama bear watching Ezra become a man over the course of this book. TBoE is full of razor sharp wit and took me by surprise with how compassionate it is. I imagine it's hard for a writer to really make a character develop so much in one book but Robyn Schneider makes it look effortless. Her writing style mirrors that of John Green's and definitely has the same tear jerker effect on people. Character development isn't the only thing that is strong in this book... The overall writing style and silver tongue that Robyn uses throughout this story is insane. The debate scenes and childhood flashbacks will have you dying of laughter. Oh and if you like vampires, witty  comebacks, and Harry Potter you'll enjoy this story as well.  

 The only downside(s) of this book was a rather predictable ending. I figured it out about half way through, but it still didn't stop me from getting teary eyed or enjoying the story till the

end. The only other thing was Cassidy... She wasn't my favorite female character. I did like her and Ezra's relationship; it was truly loving and sweet...but I found myself being annoyed with her. She keeps telling Ezra to be himself, to learn who he is, to tell her who he wants to be, but then gives nothing back in return. I guess I was just hoping she'd have as much development as he did. Basically by the end of the book I wanted to throat punch this B. As far as the sub characters in this book, they are as amazing as Ezra especially Toby. (Oh Toby you cutie you! I just wanted to pinch and kiss his cheeks!)

This book has a great pace, and is a nice new spin on a coming of age novel. I wont give away what happens at the end, even with its predictability, I was still happy with how she left the characters and the stories. TBoE is a perfect rainy day-cuddle in a snuggie-drinking hot coco book.  This was a light and fun read, and something that if you haven't had the chance to pick up you should definitely set aside and afternoon to do so. 

8/10 Stars  

-Angela