Review: Adaptation by Malinda Lo

Adaptation

Author: Malinda Lo

Publication Date: September 18th 2012

Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers

Genre: Science Fiction / Contemporary

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Synopsis:

Reese can’t remember anything from the time between the accident and the day she woke up almost a month later. She only knows one thing: She’s different now.

Across North America, flocks of birds hurl themselves into airplanes, causing at least a dozen to crash. Thousands of people die. Fearing terrorism, the United States government grounds all flights, and millions of travelers are stranded.

Reese and her debate team partner and longtime crush David are in Arizona when it happens. Everyone knows the world will never be the same. On their drive home to San Francisco, along a stretch of empty highway at night in the middle of Nevada, a bird flies into their headlights. The car flips over. When they wake up in a military hospital, the doctor won’t tell them what happened, where they are—or how they’ve been miraculously healed.

Things become even stranger when Reese returns home. San Francisco feels like a different place with police enforcing curfew, hazmat teams collecting dead birds, and a strange presence that seems to be following her. When Reese unexpectedly collides with the beautiful Amber Gray, her search for the truth is forced in an entirely new direction—and threatens to expose a vast global conspiracy that the government has worked for decades to keep secret.

My Thoughts: I'm just going to start off with a bit of gushing. I completely LOVED Adaptation!! I couldn't put it down and just developed this connection with Reese, the protagonist. My feelings mirrored hers and I just wanted the best for her. I hadn't read anything by Malinda Lo before, but I will definitely be checking out her other works. There was just something about the style of her writing that grabbed my attention and wouldn't let me think of anything else until I finished the novel. I even had a dream about it. Here I am finished and am just itching for the next book! Unfortunately for me, it's going to be a long wait! Also, I just want to say that I really love the cover, it's so pretty and creepy at the same time.

Adaptation follows Reese while she struggles to try and figure out what happened to her and David after the accident that they can't talk to anyone about. They've been sworn to secrecy but weird things are happening to them. What exactly is going on, they don't know, but they are determined to find out. Then she meets Amber and things get complicated, there is just something about her that attracts Reese. Then they realize that they are being followed and there are bugs in their homes. They have to figure this out before they are silenced forever.

This was a fairly refreshing read for me, it's been awhile since I've read a sci fi about actual aliens. Malinda Lo uses the widely known conspiracies of Area 51 to her advantage and weaves a tale that will cause you to ask questions. Who knows, maybe something like this has really happened, without the world knowing about it. It will make you think about it! So what do you think? Is it possible that there are aliens out there? Have they already visited us without us knowing? I have to say that I personally believe that there is other  life out there, whether or not they've visited us, I couldn't say. Whether you're a believer or not, you should give Adaptation a try, it's a compelling read that is impossible to set down!

Review: Survival by A.M Hargrove

Survival

Author: A.M Hargrove

Publication Date: November 15th, 2011

Publisher: Smashwords

Genre: YA/Romance/Paranormal

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Synopsis:

While on a backpacking trip in the Great Smoky Mountain National Park, nineteen-year-old Maddie Pearce finds her world has been thrown into a vortex and is madly spinning toward the impossible. Abducted by a mad psychopath, Maddie narrowly escapes with her life. But that is only the beginning. Her mysterious rescuer introduces her to a world that Maddie has difficulty accepting as reality. Will this strikingly gorgeous stranger be the key to her future or will she return to her mundane world, scarred from her experience? Follow Maddie as she is forced to make difficult decisions that carry her to mysterious places.

My Thoughts: I will start off by saying I LOVED this book! I was sucked into it's pages from beginning to end. Never a dull moment, always on the edge of my seat, couldn't wait to see what happened next. It was very fast paced, in a good way, and was never ever boring. Now that I'm done, I can't wait for the next installment in the series. I absolutely need to read it.

Now for more about the book itself. The book was divided into four different books (segments), each one more exciting than the one before it. In the first book we get to know all about the character Madeline Pearce, or Maddie as is is more commonly called. Maddie lost  her mother unexpectedly at a very young age, and not to many years later she lost her father suddenly as well. She has no other family, and you can not help but pity her. But, at the same time you admire the strength and optimism she has to carry on with her life. She picks up the pieces and tries to embrace her new life of solidarity and she does a really great job. I loved reading the first segment, I grew to like Maddie a lot. She has a great, down-to-Earth, bright, happy personality that is very endearing. She also happens to be very clumsy and accident prone, in an adorable way that had me laughing out loud on a couple different occasions. I also felt like reading her describe what her life has been like up till now was like reading a diary entry, it seemed so natural and easy flowing, like she was telling all this to her closest friend and you were that friend. She also makes a lot of references to things that are popular in our present time, and that really helps you relate with her. I especially enjoyed the Harry Potter references :).

Moving up to present time in the story line, Maddie is all alone. She has one thing that she loves and holds on to from her life with her father, and that's hiking and camping and just plain being outdoors. So this one Christmas she decides to spend the night and day camping in her favorite spot on Smokey Mountain and the very unexpected happens. Maddie comes face to face with a serial killer that targets women. This part of the book had me feeling real fear, my heart was pounding in my chest as I read through her horrifying ordeal with this mad man. I won't give to many details but it comes to a point where the killer assumes her dead, and he moves on. She then is saved by a group of people called the Nunne'hi, they are a group of people yet unknown to the rest of the world. When reading about the Nunne'hi I got a very elvish vibe from them. They are not  elves, but if I had to describe them that is what I would say. But Tolkien elves! The Nunne'hi happen to have an alliance with aliens from a planet called Vesturon, with whom they protect the earth and the people on it. The aliens who are sent to work with the Nunne'hi are called Guardians. They look just like humans, with a slightly larger frame, some super human abilities, and are much more technologically advanced than us. The Guardian who is charged with helping Maddie's healing process is named Rayn. Upon their meeting there is instant, intense, crazy attraction.

Here comes the love dilemma that tugs on our heartstrings. Maddie is a mere human, Rayn is an alien from another planet! Not only that, his father just happens to be the leader of said planet and Rayn, being his first born son, is to be his successor. So here they are, they have this attraction that, you the reader, can feel coming at you off the pages. Their relationship is electric, it's on fire! It's intensely deep, very real, and best of all (for us readers) it's strictly  forbidden. Humans are never allowed to be on Rayn's planet, as well, Rayn is what we would consider royalty, he could not be paired with a human! Forbidden love has a way of reeling us in, we just have to read on to see what happens and if it's a love strong enough to beat the odds.

So, that's the big question! Will Maddie be OK with being in love with an alien, once she discovers  that is what he, in fact, is? Is she ready to be close to someone again after tragically losing the ones she was closest to? Will Rayn risk losing his family, disinheriting himself from the role as leader of Vesturon, or risk being imprisoned for bringing a human to his planet? These are not the only obstacles that get thrown in their path!

But that is as far as I will take you! As I love to say, you're going to have to read it yourself to find out. And on that note, I absolutely recommend that you do so! If you're a fan of YA, Paranormal, Romance, or all of the above, get your hands on a copy and read it :) I have faith you will love it as much as I did. Great work Hargrove! Lucky for me, and all of us, the next installment: Resurrection, is to be very soon released! I personally can not wait to get my hands on it! :)