If I Stay (If I Stay, #1), by Gayle Forman

If I Stay (If I Stay, #1), by Gayle Forman on Goodreads

Release Date: (Paperback) April 6th, 2010.
Age Group: Young Adult
Publisher: Speak

Overall: 3 Monkeys
Categories: Romance, Drama, Contemporary

Challenge: 100 Books in a Year, 2011 Debut Author Challenge*
Read in June 2011

Summary from Goodreads:

In the blink of an eye everything changes. Seventeen-year-old Mia has no memory of the accident; she can only recall what happened afterwards, watching her own damaged body being taken from the wreck. Little by little she struggles to put together the pieces - to figure out what she has lost, what she has left, and the very difficult choice she must make. Heart-wrenchingly beautiful, Mia's story will stay with you for a long, long time.

My Opinion:

I was really hoping to super-love this book, as everyone kept saying how much they'd cried with it and how much they loved it (I love to cry when reading a good book). But, sadly for me, this book didn't quite reach me as it did others. 

I found the storyline (almost-dead girl's spirit -?- walking down the hospital's halls, trying to figure out if living is worth it or if she should just let go) to be already used. Maybe it was because I'd recently watched a 2007 film (Awake) with Hayden Christensen, where his character is almost in the same place as Mia is. Only, Mia's story is much more dramatic, as opposed to Clay's (Hayden Christensen) where he does want to live but finds that people are trying to prevent that from happening. 

Anyway, it wasn't the story that gripped me, but the flashbacks that appear throughout the book, that tore at my heart. 

Cover of my edition.

When Mia tells us about her family (Isn't it nice to read about a whole family for a change? Well, until the accident, of course.), about how she and Adam became boyfriend and girlfriend, and about her best friend Kim and her many eccentricities, that was when I loved the book. 

Because those insights were completely functional to the plot, to make us feel things for the characters. And boy, did I feel them. 

In the end, I think Mia made a good choice. But I didn't like the way the book ended, it was way too open for an ending. I would have liked to see something else. 

We'll see how I like Where She Went, book 2! Apparently, it's told from Adam's POV. Oh, how I love a boy's POV in a book... *sigh*

*This book was released a couple of months ago in Argentina, making it a Debut in my country. 

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Nightshade (Witches' War, #1), by Andrea Cremer

Nightshade (Witches' War, #1), by Andrea Cremer on Goodreads

Release Date: October 19th, 2010
Age Group: Young Adult
Publisher: Philomel

Overall: 4 Monkeys
Interest: Series
Categories: Paranormal, Werewolves, Magic, Romance

Challenge: 100 Books in a Year
Read in May 2011

Summary from Goodreads:

Calla Tor has always known her destiny: after graduating from the Mountain School, she'll be the mate of sexy alpha wolf Ren Laroche and fight with him, side by side, ruling their pack and guarding sacred sites for the Keepers.

But when she violates her masters' laws by saving a beautiful human boy out for a hike, Calla begins to question her fate, her existence, and the very essence of the world she has known. By following her heart, she might lose everything— including her own life. Is forbidden love worth the ultimate sacrifice? 

My Opinion:

When this book came out last year, everyone was talking about it. Everyone. But since it's about werewolves, I wasn't very intrigued, despite the 5-star-reviews. Now that I've read it, I can honestly say that I really liked it. Not loved, but liked. 

Cremer does a very good job with her characters, but the beginning of the book was a little confusing to me. I don't know if it was because I listened to the audiobook and maybe missed something, but at first I didn't know if the humans knew about the nature of the pack, and were afraid because of that, or if they were ignorant of it, and were scared of them because of how the pack acted. It took me a long while to get that they didn't, in fact, know their classmates were wolves. (Maybe this happened only to me, or maybe to someone else too, I don't know.)

And there were other things that felt a bit forced, clichéd too. Like the incident in Haldis Cavern that led to... that thing you know if you read the book. It was way too obvious to me. I would have liked -maybe, loved- this book more if that hadn't happened.

What I did love -and the reason I'm giving this 4 stars- was the characterisation of the different characters. There were like ten wolves in Calla's pack, and all of them had a different and unique personality, which was brilliantly written. So, congrats Andrea for that!

Bryn and Ansel were terribly sweet! And the loyalty of the pack towards their alphas was great too. They may had had differences with them, but the pack certainly had no doubts when it came to protecting them.

I loved how Cremer wove the wolves' history with magic! And I cannot wait to learn more about Shay's place in all of this!

Shay was great. Romantic, strong, a bit shy... he was a brilliant character. Calla... she'll have to do more to get my attention. She felt like every other YA heroine to me. She was great in her own way, yeah, but I still wanted to see a bit more of her dark side. 

Overall, a really nice book! I'll have to read Wolfsbane soon!

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100 Books in a Year Reading Challenge, 2011

It's obvious to me that I won't be able to reach this goal. I'll be spending more time reading uni books than YA lit, but thought I'd sign up anyway.
Here I'll list the books I've read and reviewed,and some of them will crossover with the 2011 Debut Author Challenge.
I've also added a "Books Read in 2011" widget on the right sidebar, so you'll see what books I've read this year. Those books I'm reading now, which of course, I started last year, don't count. As soon as I'm done with those, I'll begin counting the 2011 books. 
Do you want to join? Click on the button! Books Read This Year:
1. Unearthly, by Cynthia Hand.

2. Island Beneath the Sea, by Isabel Allende

3. Anna and the French Kiss, by Stephanie Perkins

4. Book of Shadows, by Cate Tiernan

5. Wither, by Lauren DeStefano

6. Red Glove, by Holly Black

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