Waiting on Wednesday 04/23/14

"Waiting On Wednesday" is a weekly meme hosted by Breaking the Spine that lets us feature upcoming releases that we can't wait to get our hands on!

Mogsy's Pick: 

 Firefight by Brandon Sanderson: January 6, 2015 (Delacorte)

I've actually been meaning to feature Firefight in a Waiting on Wednesday post for a while now, but then it wasn't until earlier this week that the sequel to the amazing Steelheart finally got a cover reveal.

I'm also quite disappointed to see that it has apparently been pushed back to 2015, which I only just discovered as I was putting together this post! ARRGH! Oh well. That the release date is in fact farther out than I'd expected notwithstanding, it's still my WoW because nothing can diminish my excitement, not even a longer wait. After all, even a writing machine like Brandon Sanderson needs a few extra months every now and then.

"They told David it was impossible--that even the Reckoners had never killed a High Epic. Yet, Steelheart--invincible, immortal, unconquerable--is dead. And he died by David's hand.

Eliminating Steelheart was supposed to make life more simple. Instead, it only made David realize he has questions. Big ones. And there's no one in Newcago who can give him the answers he needs.

Babylon Restored, the old borough of Manhattan, has possibilities, though. Ruled by the mysterious High Epic, Regalia, David is sure Babylon Restored will lead him to what he needs to find. And while entering another city oppressed by a High Epic despot is a gamble, David's willing to risk it. Because killing Steelheart left a hole in David's heart. A hole where his thirst for vengeance once lived. Somehow, he filled that hole with another Epic--Firefight. And he's willing to go on a quest darker, and more dangerous even, than the fight against Steelheart to find her, and to get his answers."

YA Weekend: The Living by Matt de la Peña

The Living by Matt de la Peña

Genre: Young Adult, Science Fiction

Series: Book 1 of The Living

Publisher: Delacorte for Young Readers (November 12, 2013)

Author Information: Website

Mogsy's Rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book first caught my attention because I noticed a blurb likening it to a Young Adult version of LOST - which was actually a show I really enjoyed before it turned all WTFery bizarre. The result however, was not quite what I expected. I wouldn't say I'm disappointed, though; The Living wasn't a bad book, just different.

I'm also not surprised to see that opinions are all over the place for this one. It is a book made up of several different sections that feel completely dissimilar from each other in terms atmosphere, setting, pacing. It is part disaster story and survivor narrative, but also with some hints of apocalyptic fiction and mystery. Try and imagine the movie 2012 meets Castaway, then maybe throw in a bit of 28 Days Later.

We start the story on a luxury cruise ship, which I thought was a rather unique and exciting setting. The international crew and passengers make for a very diverse cast, with characters hailing from all over the world. The protagonist himself, Shy, is a Mexican-American teenager whose home town is near the border, an area ravaged by a new illness coined Romero disease. Ever since the disease claimed his grandmother, Shy has been working for the cruise line in order to earn money to support his family.

Shy employed on board a ship and near Hawaii when "The Big One" hits, a megathrust earthquake that completely destroys the west coast of North America. The resulting tsunami sinks the ship, and while most perish, Shy manages to survive.

One more movie reference and I swear I'll be done, but I just wanted to point out that The Living ruined cruising for me by traumatizing me the same way Final Destination did with air travel. The scenes leading up to, during, and after the sinking were gripping and terrifying. Which was probably why it felt so incongruous when this section was followed up with a part featuring days of drifting aimlessly on the open water as Shy is marooned on a lifeboat. This section had its moments too, but it had nowhere near the heart-pounding force or intensity.

I was also slightly disappointed when I got to the final few pages and found a wide-open ending, and what was a very obvious lead-in to a series. I'd hoped that this would be a stand alone, though I'd had my doubts even before I started when I saw the slimness of the volume. As I got closer and closer to the last page I already suspected the author wasn't going to be able to wrap everything up.

In fact, as a first book to a planned series, The Living actually had the feel of very long introduction. But for all that, I still can't deny it has me hooked -- Matt de la Peña did a splendid job setting up an intriguing story and a lot of interesting relationships between the characters. I'll most likely pick up the sequel when it releases.

YA Weekend: The Eye of Minds by James Dashner

The Eye of Minds by James Dashner

Genre: Young Adult Science Fiction

Series: Book 1 of The Mortality Doctrine

Publisher: Delacorte (October 8, 2013) 

Author Information: Website | Twitter

Mogsy's Rating: 3 of 5 stars


I'll start by saying that I've never read James Dashner before this, but I know his name is well known in the world of Young Adult science fiction with his books in the Maze Runner series. Why I chose to tackle this book instead of starting with The Maze Runner is simple: I was initially drawn to the gamer culture aspect in the description, and it sounded enough like Ernest Cline's Ready Player One (which I loved) to make me even more curious.

There are definitely some similarities; the book follows Michael, a young man who spends most of his time in the VirtNet, a virtual reality network that offers total mind and body immersion so that anyone plugged in can experience any one of thousands of fantasy worlds like they are actually there. That's pretty much where the resemblance ends though. In Michael's VirtNet, a new cyber terrorist known as "Kaine" is purportedly hacking the code and trapping people inside games, so that in-game deaths lead to real life casualties and victims becoming brain-dead.

The best part about being in the VirtNet was never having to worry about risking your life, but now all that has changed. VirtNet Security forcibly recruits Michael, a talented gamer and hacker in his own right, to hunt down this dangerous enemy threatening the whole system. From here on out, the rest of the book is laid out in classic action-and-adventure format, where the hero and his two friends set out on a quest to find Kaine, picking up clues and investigating leads along the way.

The beginning had me pretty interested. The VirtNet system is very well described, especially with the setting of the game "Life Blood" serving as the opener. I loved the idea of how realistic and immersive these worlds are, and the infinite possibilities they present. The novel had a great intro, and a quick subsequent build-up to the main part of the story. I really thought this was going to be a winner.

But then something stalled along the way. The tight focus that was maintained throughout the first part of the book gradually unraveled, so that by the time we're in the middle chapters I felt that the story had lost its steam. It almost feels like the author had a clear vision of how the book begins and how it ends, but didn't really plan well for everything that needs to go in between. Michael and his friends' journey felt far too prolonged and lost its direction, leading me to ask myself several times while reading this, "Wait, what are they supposed to be doing again?"

To the book's credit, the ending did indeed hook me back in, but by then it was a little too late for me to feel the full impact. In any case, the big shocking twist at the end was certainly well worth it, though like I said, at that point it did not have the effect that it should have had. I also wonder if this novel would have been better served told in the first person; I think that would have given me a deeper connection to Michael's feelings, especially during that final revelation.

All in all, not a bad book, but I'm still debating whether or not I will pick up the sequel which is slated for a summer 2014 release. I very well may end up checking out The Maze Runner before I get a chance to read book two of this series.