{English} Rebel of the Sands (Rebel of the Sands #1) - Alwyn Hamilton

On Thousand and One Night meet the Wild West

For fans of: Strange the Dreamer - Laini Taylor, Die Sturmkönige - Kai Meyer
Publication: 2016
ISBN: 0571325254
Pages: 358
Goodreads

Blurb: "Tell me that and we'll go. Right now. Save ourselves and leave this place to burn. Tell me that's how you want your story to go and we'll write it straight across the sand."

Dustwalk is an unforgiving, dead-end town. It's not the place to be poor or orphaned or female. And yet Amani Al'Hiza must call it 'home'. Amani wants to escape and see the world she's heard about in campfire stories. Then a foreigner with no name turns up, and with him she has the chance to run. But the desert plains are full of dangerous magic. The Sultan's army is on the rise and Amani is soon caught at the heart of a fearless rebellion...
An epic story of swirling desert sands, love, magic and Revolution.

Opinion
Cover: You can't tell it from the photo, but the parts that are beige here are actually gold. It's both simple and magical, which is why I love it.
I coincidentally came across the german cover and was shocked. They absolutely white-washed Amani. Disgusting!

Content: As I wrote above, it's a mix of One Thousand and One Night and a Western. It's set in an oriental environment, at the edge of the desert, but has trains, guns and sharpshooters. That mix goes together surprisingly well.
The desert is swarming full of monsters and magical beasts, like Buraqi horses that can change into sand storms.

Women don't have much to say in this country, which is why Amani often dresses up as a boy. She lives a poor and simple life and dreams of fleeing from it.
There is a lot she has to figure out for herself, because in the begining she doesn't quite know what to do with her life. Only that she doesn't want to stay in Dustwalk and get to her aunt. But nothing goes as plannend and Amani has to change her route more than once.

Writing Style: I instantly liked Amani. She is a real fighter and doesn't give up. Even though her situation doesn't seem very hopeful to begin with. There's some relly good chemistry between her and Jin.
I like that she's not the selfless heroine, who only thinks about saving and protecting others. Probably because there's hardly anyone left. She fights for her dreams and hopes and never looks back, though she feels guilty sometimes.

The story has a lot of character developement, showing the world it is set in and just the right amount of action. The pacing is very balanced, which is probably why it doesn't get boring. The author's writing style is not too poetic, but that doesn't matter. No word seems like it is redundant.
The quote on the back is great, though my favourite is: Fire doesn't know good from evil any more than a bullet does.

My conclusion: Defintely a must-read!

My rating: 5/5 Buttons

{German} Straßensymphonie - Alexandra Fuchs

Es waren einmal die Bremer Stadtmusikanten...

Für Fans von: dem Musical Cats, Märchen, Arkadien - Kai Meyer
Veröffentlichung: 2016
ISBN13: 9783959911795
Seiten: 376
Goodreads

Klappentext: Seit dem Tod meines Vaters hatte sich alles verändert. Eine Bühne betreten und singen – das würde ich nie wieder können, dessen war ich mir sicher.

Doch dann kam er.

Wirbelte alles durcheinander und brachte die Katze in mir zum Fauchen. Gestaltwandler hin oder her, für mich war er nur ein räudiger Straßenköter. Doch seine Band brauchte dringend eine neue Sängerin – und ich jemanden, der mir dabei half, die Musik wieder zu spüren.



Meinung
Cover: Das Bild passt perfekt zum Inhalt des Buches. In einer Szene trägt Kat sogar dieses Outfit. Nur dass das Model fast ein bisschen zu schlank ist, immerhin hat Kat Kleidergröße 42. Toll, dass sowas in einem Fantasybuch vorkommt, noch lieber hätte ich es auch auf dem Cover gesehen.
Als ich es das erste Mal gesehen habe, musste ich mich über diese symbolhafte Katze wundern. Hätte man nicht eine richtige Katze verwenden können, habe ich mich gefragt. Wenn man weiß, was es damit auf sich hat, macht es natürlich Sinn. Ein Fantasybuch hätte ich auch nicht vermutet, eher eine Contemporary Novel, vielleicht eine Geschichte über eine Straßenmusikerin. Was die Gitarre da zu suchen hat, weiß ich auch nicht. Kat kann doch gar nicht spielen, nur singen.

Inhalt: Der Klappentext ist ein wenig irreführend. Dieser Satz "Doch dann kam er." hat mich vermuten lassen, dass es wiedermal um ein mauerblümchenhaftes Mädchen geht, dessen Welt völlig auf den Kopf gestellt wird, nur weil irgendein geheimnisvoller, gutaussehender Typ auftaucht. Zum Glück ist das nicht der Fall! Nun, Levi wird tatsächlich als talentiert und perfekt (würg) (kotz) beschrieben, aber Kat hat zum Glück noch anderes im Kopf.

Kat ist eine bodenständige junge Frau mit einer tollen Stimme, die aber seit dem Tod ihres Vaters nicht mehr Musik machen will. Eine sehr realistische und nachvollziehbare Situation. Außer dass Kat eine Gestaltwandlerin ist und gerne Mal in Form einer Katze um die Häuser zieht.
Sie arbeitet in einer Bar, die nur Wandler betreten dürfen und da begegnet sie den Bandmitgliedern von Night Cirkus. Zufällig suchen die gerade eine Sängerin.

Insgesamt gab es mir in dieser Geschichte ein paar Zufälle zu viel. Es lief teilweise einfach viel zu glatt ab. Verletzungen heilen schnell und ohne Nachwirkungen. Selbst dieser Musikwettbewerb in Bremen, an dem die Band teilnimmt, hält keine Hürden bereit.

Was ich aber schön finde ist, dass Levi Kat dazu bringt, wieder Musik zu machen. Dass er einfühlsam ist und ein gutes Gespür dafür hat, was sie wieder aufheitern kann. Insgesamt halte ich ihre Beziehung für eine recht ausgeglichene. Auch hier läuft es mir aber zu glatt ab. Anfangs können sie sich nicht ausstehen - er ein Hund und sie eine Katze. Sie vertragen sich viel zu schnell und plötzlich passen sie perfekt zusammen.

An sich fand ich die Idee nicht schlecht, aber das Buch hat mir einfach zu wenige Überraschungen bereit gehalten. Um ehrlich zu sein, habe ich von Anfang an geahnt, wer hinter unseren Bremer Stadtmusikanten her ist.

Schreibstil: Der Text lässt sich angenehm und schnell lesen, vor allem das erste Drittel. Ab der Hälfte wird es leider etwas zäh, vor allem die Handlung verliert stark an Spannung. Hätte ich an dem Tag nicht so viel Freizeit gehabt, hätte ich das Buch vermutlich zur Seite gelegt und keine Motivation gehabt, es zu Ende zu lesen. Die Charaktere waren zwar in Ordnung, sind mir aber nicht sonderlich ans Herz gewachsen.

Da das Buch aus Kats Perspektive geschrieben ist, erfahren wir nicht viel über das Gefühlsleben der anderen Hauptcharaktere. Sicherlich hätte sich das irgendwie lösen lassen. Vor allem Liz, Micah und viele andere Wandler wirken dadurch seicht und einseitig. Als hätten sie keine anderen Interessen, als Wandler zu sein und/oder Musik zu machen.
Levi hatte hin und wieder Wutausbrüche, die ich nicht ganz verstand. Auch waren Kats Gedankengänge oft nicht ganz nachvollziehbar. Vor allem in der zweiten Hälfte kam das öfter vor.

Die Welt der Wandler kam recht einseitig rüber. Die Legende, wie sie entstanden sind, wird zwar erklärt, nicht aber welche Funktion oder welches Ziel sie haben. Seltsam fand ich auch, den Begriff krigare, der einfach Krieger auf Schwedisch bedeutet. Es wird nie erklärt, wieso gerade ein schwedisches Wort verwendet wird und nicht einfach das deutsche Gegenstück. In meinen Ohren klingt das wie die Leute, die ständig englische Wörter in ihre Sätze einbauen, um intelligenter zu wirken oder einfach anzugeben.

Auch wenn die Autorin einen schlichten Schreibstil hat, schreibt sie gute Songtexte. An einigen Stellen hatte ich wirklich Gänsehaut! Ich stelle mir die Musik von Night Cirkus in etwa wie Glasperlenspiel vor.

Mein Fazit: Wenn man keine allzu hohen Erwartungen hat, kann man mit diesem Buch wirklich gut abschalten.

Meine Bewertung: 3/5 Knöpfe

{English} Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices #2) - Cassandra Clare

Cassandra Clare's Shadowhunter books are still not boring!

For fans of: all The Shadowhunter Chronicles books, fairies
Publication: 2017
ISBN: 1442468408
Pages: 701
Goodreads

Blurb: Would you trade your soul mate for your soul?

A Shadowhunter’s life is bound by duty. Constrained by honor. The word of a Shadowhunter is a solemn pledge, and no vow is more sacred than the vow that binds parabatai, warrior partners—sworn to fight together, die together, but never to fall in love.

Emma Carstairs has learned that the love she shares with her parabatai, Julian Blackthorn, isn’t just forbidden—it could destroy them both. She knows she should run from Julian. But how can she when the Blackthorns are threatened by enemies on all sides?

Their only hope is the Black Volume of the Dead, a spell book of terrible power. Everyone wants it. Only the Blackthorns can find it. Spurred on by a dark bargain with the Seelie Queen, Emma; her best friend, Cristina; and Mark and Julian Blackthorn journey into the Courts of Faerie, where glittering revels hide bloody danger and no promise can be trusted. Meanwhile, rising tension between Shadowhunters and Downworlders has produced the Cohort, an extremist group of Shadowhunters dedicated to registering Downworlders and “unsuitable” Nephilim. They’ll do anything in their power to expose Julian’s secrets and take the Los Angeles Institute for their own.

When Downworlders turn against the Clave, a new threat rises in the form of the Lord of Shadows—the Unseelie King, who sends his greatest warriors to slaughter those with Blackthorn blood and seize the Black Volume. As dangers close in, Julian devises a risky scheme that depends on the cooperation of an unpredictable enemy. But success may come with a price he and Emma cannot even imagine, one that will bring with it a reckoning of blood that could have repercussions for everyone and everything they hold dear.

Opinion
Cover: It matches the one of Lady Midnight perfectly, I can't decide which one I like best. The London skyline gives a hint on where the story will take us, though it's also set in Los Angeles, Faerie and Idris.

Content: There is so much going on here, I don't know where to start, especially without giving away too many spoilers.
I've waited a year for this sequel to an amazing opening and had to wait more than a month longer than the release date was. I wanted to read this so bad and luckily, I wasn't disappointed. When I started to read, it was like no time had passed at all. The story picks up seamlessly where Lady Midnight stopped. While reading I noticed how dear and familiar the Blackthorns, Emma and Christina had grown to me.

Emma and Julian try to stay away from eachother, but the author constantly puts them into situations where they have to share a bed with eachother. I roled my eyes more than once at that. Don't get me wrong, I ship them really hard, but those scenes didn't feel as authentic as others to me.

With Alec and Helen we've got homosexual characters, Magnus and Mark are bisexual and in Lord of Shadows we discover that there's also a transgender character in this story. I'm just not sure what to think of it, since it is used as a plot device.

Something I really disliked is the amount of love triangles. I hate love triangles and then there are at least two of them in just one book. I know, Cassandra Clare loves love triangles (as we saw in The Mortal Instruments and then there's a very special one in The Infernal Devices), but was that really necessary?

A new character, Zara Dearborn, was introduced and I hated her immediately. She and her Cohort are the most aweful thing I could think of right now. They reminded me of all those populistic political paries that are in the media right now. It's easy to blame others for your faults and that's what makes them so dangerous.

The whole story around Malcolm and Annabel was very intrigueing.
And the end. The end really killed me. It was painful, so very painful.

Writing Style: Lord of Shadows is the 14th Shadowhunter novel on my shelf. One might think it would get boring, but it's not. On the contrary, Cassandra Clare manages to improve her storytelling by each new series. The Dark Artifices feature a lot more crime novel aspects then the other books, which goes really well together with all that demon hunting.
We get to know even more parts of the Shadowhunter universe, like the Centurions, the fairy realms and the parabatai bond. There are still plenty of mystieries, so I hope everything will come clear in the last book of this trilogy, The Queen of Air and Darkness.

I love how there are so many Blackthorn siblings, but each of them is different, has their own interests. They might look alike, but that doesn't say anything about their minds.
There were many plotlines in this book, more than in the prequel, I think? Sometimes it was a tad too much, but in the end it always turned out to be necessary that this or that person's POV was shown. Even the younger Blackthorns and Kit had their important role.
It was just when Clary and Jace showed up that I thought: Come on guys, get out of the spotlight already! Well, Magnus and Alec were very present in the second half of this book, but there was a more valid reason to it. You can tell that Magnus Bane is Cassandra Clare's most favourite character and I honestly can't blame her for that.

It was nice to visit the London Institute again. All the little hints to previous residents and then there's Jessamine! I honestly can't wait for The Last Hours. When The Dark Artifices and The Last Hours were announced at the same time, I anticipated The Last Hours much more than The Dark Artifices, to be honest. Mainly because I liked The Infernal Devices more than The Mortal Instruments and London is much more awesome than Los Angeles.
Well, Cassandra Clare has shown me that LA can be the perfect place for a Shadowhunter novel too. She describes it very lively and catches the non-touristic side of it. If she writes of touristic places, she shows them from the point of view of locals, a fact that makes the city more realistic.
A big part of the story is set in the fairy realms. We've already seen glimpses of it, but here we get to know much more detail. The Unseelie Court is fascinating, certainly as much as the Seelie Court. I bet it's not the last time we've been to this place.

My conclusion: Even though I don't like Cassandra Clare as a person, I will buy all of her future Shadowhunter novels.
So... When is The Queen of Air and Darkness coming out?

My rating: 4/5 Buttons

{English} Deep Blue (Waterfire Saga #1) - Jenniffer Donnelly

Under the sea...

For fans of: The Little Mermaid (Disney version, not Andersen fairytale)
Publication: 2014
ISBN: 1444921207
Pages: 336
Goodreads

Blurb: When Serafina, a mermaid of the Mediterranean Sea, awakens on the morning of her betrothal, her biggest worry should be about reuniting with handsome Prince Mahdi, her childhood crush. Instead she finds herself haunted by strange dreams foretelling the return of an ancient evil, and dealing with the deaths of her parents as assassins storm the betrothal ceremony, plunging the city into chaos. Led only by her shadowy dreams and pursued by the invading army, Serafina and her best friend Neela embark on a quest to avenge her parents' death and prevent a war between the mer nations. In the process they discover a plot that threatens their - and our - world's very existence.  

Opinion
Cover: This was an absolute cover buy; I found this remaindered book at a bookshop near my university and had to buy it immediately.

Content: The plot wasn't that special, but the setting definitely is and Jennifer Donnelly seems to have experience in telling a story. It's just that it's not a very good story and very predictable. It felt like every Disney Channel movie or series, probably because it has some connection to Disney.
The pacing was a bit too fast and things came to the main characters too easily.

The main characters are like every Disney princess ever, but not very relatable to me. Especially Serafina and Neela are very girly girls. Their only interests seem to be dresses and jewellry. The other "chosen ones" are very one-sided too. The girl with the red hair has fire powers. Who would have guessed.

In connection to that are plenty of stereotypes and cultural appropriation. The mermen from the waters near India wear turbans. How original. Besides, if they have lived 5000 years seperated from people living on land, why did they adapt to their clothing styles?

That's not the only thing that doesn't makes sense. If the merpeople have their own language, Mermish, why do they throw in so many words from other languages? All that Italian was really annoying (and I love Italian). There's a glossary at the end, but you'd have to go back and forth all the time. Again, they haven't been in contact with the humans in 5000 years and they're not supposed to get in contact with people on land. Then why bother learning their languages?

My conclusion: If you want a fluffy read and don't care for much depth, this is the book for you. Something you can read, but you're not missing out much, if you don't.

My rating: 3/5 Buttons

{English} Norse Mythology - Neil Gaiman

Of pretentious gods and stupid giants.

For fans of: well... norse mythology
Publication: 2017
ISBN: 039360909X
Pages: 297
Goodreads

Blurb: Neil Gaiman has long been inspired by ancient mythology in creating the fantastical realms of his fiction. Now he turns his attention back to the source, presenting a bravura rendition of the great northern tales. In Norse Mythology, Gaiman fashions primeval stories into a novelistic arc that begins with the genesis of the legendary nine worlds; delves into the exploits of the deities, dwarves, and giants; and culminates in Ragnarok, the twilight of the gods and the rebirth of a new time and people. Gaiman stays true to the myths while vividly reincarnating Odin, the highest of the high, wise, daring, and cunning; Thor, Odin’s son, incredibly strong yet not the wisest of gods; and Loki, the son of a giant, a trickster and unsurpassable manipulator. From Gaiman’s deft and witty prose emerges the gods with their fiercely competitive natures, their susceptibility to being duped and to dupe others, and their tendency to let passion ignite their actions, making these long-ago myths breathe pungent life again.

Opinion
Cover: It's. So. Beautiful. Ermagherd. Look at Mjöllnir, what a beauty!
I got the Hardcover edition and I don't regret it at all.

Content: This book is basically Neil Gaimans very own retelling of norse myths. There isn't anything new to me in there, since I'm studying Scandinavian Studies. But it was a fun read and I couldn't detect any mistakes. The author has definitely done his research.
I've never been able to decide what story I like best. My faves are the one where Mjöllnir gets stolen and Thor and Loki have to dress up as women, then the one with Idunn's apples and Balder's death. Especially that scene where Thor kicks a dwarf into the fire, just because he's angry that Balder is dead and the dwarf only happened to walk by at the wrong moment. Classic Thor.

Writing Style: He keeps to the order of the stories (from the origin of everything to Ragnarök), but mixes different sources and adds his own interpretations. Not very scientific, but I'd say it's okay since those stories have been told orally over centuries and every teller has added their own style.
I also liked who he described the characters, because he only used facts that we know for certain and still wrote modern dialogues that sound so very like them.

My conclusion: This book is something everyone should have on their shelves.

My rating: 5/5 Buttons

{English} American Gods - Neil Gaiman

Wordy novel with all kinds of mythology.

For fans of: all kinds of mythology (especially norse mythology)
Publication: 2001
ISBN: 0747263744
Pages: 640
Goodreads

Blurb: Days before his release from prison, Shadow’s wife, Laura, dies in a mysterious car crash. Numbly, he makes his way back home. On the plane, he encounters the enigmatic Mr Wednesday, who claims to be a refugee from a distant war, a former god and the king of America.

Together they embark on a profoundly strange journey across the heart of the USA, whilst all around them a storm of preternatural and epic proportions threatens to break.

Scary, gripping and deeply unsettling, American Gods takes a long, hard look into the soul of America. You’ll be surprised by what – and who – it finds there...

Opinion
Cover: There are many different editions of this novel and this is the one I got. It's quite simple, the font too. I already guessed what the tree would mean before I started reading (; I guessed correctly.

Content: It took me a while to read this book, because I just couldn't get into it. The plot was very slow and I couldn't really identify with the characters.
Shadow was just being released from prison and he always seemed mysterious to me. I could never quite decide whether I should like him or not. Everything in this story only happend to him, he hardly ever took action himself. There weren't any goals in his life, probably because his wife died and he really loved her. I was never completely sure if he grasped what all those people he met were. He didn't know much about any kind of mythology, that's certain. But he took everything in, without much surprise.
I knew immediately who Mr Wednesday was. As a student of Scandinavian Studies that wasn't really a surprise. He is just like you would imagine him to be. A trickster who's always seducing young (hardly legally) women.

Writing Style: Speaking of women. There were hardly any female characters and if they did show up, they all wanted sex with Shadow. Or Wednesday. Or both. Over all, there was a lot of sudden sex happening, which often came out of the blue.
The road trip theme could have been something I liked, but it was very monotone, unfortunately. It was always driving from point A to point B and eating somewhere in between. There were many descriptions that are hard to imagine if you've never been to the USA before.
The mix of different mythologies was quite interesting, but just too much sometimes, in my opinion. It always seemed to be the same when Wednesday and Shadow visited the old gods: they were - well - old and forgotten.
Despite all my criticism, Neil Gaiman really knows how to tell a story. Actually, most of his other novels sound very interesting, so I might give him another chance.

My conclusion: I really hope the Netflix series is better.

My rating: 3/5 Buttons

{English} Strange the Dreamer (Strange the Dreamer #1) - Laini Taylor

A book like a dream.

For fans of: Dream A Little Dream - Kerstin Gier, Daughter of Smoke and Bone - Laini Taylor, Die Sturmkönige - Kai Meyer
Publication: 2017
ISBN: 1444788973
Pages: 544
Goodreads

Blurb: The dream chooses the dreamer, not the other way around - and Lazlo Strange, war orphan and junior librarian, has always feared that his dream chose poorly. Since he was five years old he's been obsessed with the mythic lost city of Weep, but it would take someone bolder than he to cross half the world in search of it. Then a stunning opportunity presents itself, in the person of a hero called the Godslayer and a band of legendary warriors, and he has to seize his chance to lose his dream forever.

What happened in Weep two hundred years ago to cut it off from the rest of the world? What exactly did the Godslayer slay that went by the name of god? And what is the mysterious problem he now seeks help in solving?

The answers await in Weep, but so do more mysteries - including the blue-skinned goddess who appears in Lazlo's dreams. How did he dream her before he knew she existed? And if all the gods are dead, why does she seem so real?

Opinion
Cover: This is one of my favourite covers ever. And trust me, you'd have to see it in real life. The background looks almost like satin, as if they have put a night sky on paper. Then there's the Gold letterig and this incredible moth which go together so well.

Content: Daughter of Smoke and Bone is one of my favourite books ever and so I had high expectations on Laini Taylors new novel. I wasn't disappointed.
The world the story is set in has some sort of orientalic touch, without commiting cultural appropriation (at least in my eyes - tell me if I'm wrong). Thanks to Laini Taylors writing style (more below) I saw it all in front of me. It was almost as if I was actually there, as if I could feel the heat on my skin.
Lazlo Strange is definitely a very unusual hero. He's not Mr. Perfect, like so many guys in this genre, and that's what I always wanted to read about. Usually they are skilled fighters and aren't afraid of anything. But he loves books more than anything and keeps to himelf (reminds me of myself).
There are, of course, many more unique characters, but I don't want to reveal too much about them here. Let me just tell you that they are all very different and that it's not always clear who are the good and the bad ones. Oh, and there are very bad ones.

Writing Style: Laini Taylor paints pictures with her words. That's something you can hardly copy. It's incredibly poetic and I enjoyed every second of it.
There are fictional languages, but fortunately the author doesn't throw too much of them into the text.

Be aware: If you come looking for an action-packed, fast-paced novel, this is not it. You have to read it for the pure beauty of words. Well, it's not like there's no story at all. On the contrary, there are so many unique things in there and you can never guess where the story will lead you. This is what I love about Laini Taylors books so much.

My conclusion: That ending killed me. Give me book two already!
(ugly sobbing while I wait for next year)

My rating: 5/5 Buttons