[HAUL] The Casual Vacancy and The Raven Boys

Recently I picked up a couple of new releases.
 
1. Of course, as a Harry Potter fan, I had to pick up j.K. Rowling's new book: The Casual Vacancy.  It's her first adult novel and it's with a different publisher - hopefully that will do her good.

If you can't tell the book is about politics...or something like that. Honestly I had no idea about the plot of this until I actually picked up the book so don't feel guilty. 

"When Barry Fairbrother dies in his early forties, the town of Pagford is left in shock.
Pagford is, seemingly, an English idyll, with a cobbled market square and an ancient abbey, but what lies behind the pretty façade is a town at war.
Rich at war with poor, teenagers at war with their parents, wives at war with their husbands, teachers at war with their pupils...Pagford is not what it first seems.
And the empty seat left by Barry on the parish council soon becomes the catalyst for the biggest war the town has yet seen. Who will triumph in an election fraught with passion, duplicity and unexpected revelations?
The Casual Vacancy is J.K. Rowling’s first novel for adults." (From Goodreads)

I have high hopes for this book (as I do with every book that's by an author that I like!)

2.  The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater.  Maggie Stiefvater is one of my favourite authors ever since I read Shiver.  I was so excited to hear that she would be starting another series, after realizing that The Scorpio Races was not a series but rather a stand alone (clearly I was not pleased).

The cover is absolutely amazing, as are all of her books really.

"It is freezing in the churchyard, even before the dead arrive.

Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue herself never sees them—not until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks directly to her.

His name is Gansey, and Blue soon discovers that he is a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble.

But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can’t entirely explain. He has it all—family money, good looks, devoted friends—but he’s looking for much more than that. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents all the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul who ranges from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher of the four, who notices many things but says very little.

For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She never thought this would be a problem. But now, as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore." (From Goodreads)

I also have high hopes for this one.

I'll let you know what I think about these when I'm done!

[REVIEW] Forever by Maggie Stiefvater

Published: July 2011
Publisher: Scholastic Press Inc.
Age Group: Young Adult
Series: The Wolves of Mercy Falls #3 [end]

In Stiefvater's "Shiver," Grace and Sam found each other. In "Linger," they fought to be together. Now, in "Forever," the stakes are even higher than before. Wolves are being hunted. Lives are being threatened. And love is harder and harder to hold on to as death comes closing in. (From Goodreads)

Forever is the last book in the Wolves of Mercy Falls trilogy. If you've never heard of them, I think you should go read the first one (Shiver) right now. That being said, the Wolves of Mercy Falls revolves around the two main characters Grace and Sam. Maggie Stiefvater though, has a peculier way of writing each chapter. She tends to change the narrator, of course she lets you know when she does, but the change in narration adds an extra perspective. Often the characters are present during the same event but Stiefvater's way fo changing the narration gives you more thoughts and feelings as oppose to having  only one narrator. 

In Forever, the narrators are Grace, Sam, Isabelle and Cole. As a brief explanation of each character in case you haven't read Shiver or Linger (the second book in the trilogy), (NOTE: these are technically spoilers) Grace was attacked by wolves when she was younger but has yet to change in to one. At the end of Linger though, she is overwhelmed by the wolf cells inside her and eventually turns into a wolf. Sam was turned in to a wolf and adopted, in Shiver, he was cured temporarily, meaning he doesn't change into a wolf again but the wolf cells are still inside him. Grace and Sam are in love with each other. Isabelle is the girl who figures out the wolf secret. Her brother was turned into a wolf and killed. Cole is a famous singer, missing after he chose to be turned into a wolf. Cole is a genius and in forever, spends his entire time attempting to find a cure. 

So with that out of the way, Forever starts right after Grace turns in to a wolf. It follows Grace's experience from shifting from human and wolf, and the eventual wolf hunt that seeks to eradicate all the wolves living in Mercy Falls. Thus, throughout the book, Isabelle, Cole and Sam are attempting to save the wolves while Grace deals with personal issues when she tells her friend what she truly is. 

I find that at the end of every series, there seems to be a MAJOR battle at the end. The good guys usually win and then the series ends in a happy ending. Forever follows that exact pattern. At the end of the book, there's the giant wolf hunt. The wolves live and it is implied that everyone lives a happy life. The ending of this book though, in my opinon, was absolutely horrible. The ending just didn't seem like an ending. I remember flipping over trying to find the actual ending and actually visiting the book store in an attempt to see if my copy of Forever was faulty. No, turns out that really bad ending was the ending. Maggie Stiefvater's writing is truly amazing but i guess she didn't know how to end the series. 

Although the ending sucked, Maggie Stiefvater can really convey the character's feelings through her writing. I can really feel the sadness, happiness, anxiety and frustration that each character emotionally goes through. I remember at the ending of linger, I was crying and could not wait for the next book. Forever was just a whirlwind of emotions. With so many different narrators, I was feeling angry, then happy, then sad, then sympathetic. For Steifvater to do that just with her writing is truly amazing. 

Out of all three of the books, forever is my least favourite but this trilogy definitely is and if you love books about romance and werewolves, you should definitely try reading shiver.

3/5
(originally posted in the TPL Word Out program)