Review: Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

I have two weeks. You’ll shoot me at the end no matter what I do.

That’s what you do to enemy agents. It’s what we do to enemy agents. But I look at all the dark and twisted roads ahead and cooperation is the easy way out. Possibly the only way out for a girl caught red-handed doing dirty work like mine — and I will do anything, anything, to avoid SS-Hauptsturmführer von Linden interrogating me again.

He has said that I can have as much paper as I need. All I have to do is cough up everything I can remember about the British War Effort. And I’m going to. But the story of how I came to be here starts with my friend Maddie. She is the pilot who flew me into France — an Allied Invasion of Two.

We are a sensational team.

**SPOILERS!!**





I'm really not sure what to think of this book.  When I picked it up and read the blurb I expected to read about Verity/Julie and Maddy's journey to France, but instead it was written almost like a diary by Verity where she describes various things in her life.  I was a bit confused as to why she focussed so much on her best friend, Maddy's, life and how the whole story was told from her point of view.  This was quite clever and I didn't realise that 'Queenie' was actually Verity until it was mentioned.

One thing I didn't understand about this style was how would Verity know what Maddy was thinking in these situations, or what she was exactly doing and thinking in the events where Verity wasn't there.  Apart from that I thought it was an interesting way to write and I didn't have a problem with it.

The book did kind of drag on a bit at times and I read it quite slowly, probably because of this.  I thought the book got better when Maddy started to narrate it - things that Verity had done were suddenly more clear and things that weren't even obvious were also revealed.  It also got more tense at this part as Maddy was trying to rescue Verity.

I thought the characters, especially Maddy and Verity, were good - I really got to 'know' them during the book.  I didn't like Verity a huge amount - I didn't hate her, but she definately wasn't my favourite character. 

Overall I liked this book!  I didn't love it, but it wasn't bad and I didn't hate it.


Rating: 3.5/5

Review: The Third Day, The Frost by John Marsden

Life in the war zone enters its sixth month of heart-stopping tension in the latest installment of the internationally bestselling Tomorrow series.

In the third installment of the Tomorrow saga, the anything-to-survive existence of Ellie and her friends has sharpened their senses and emboldened their plans. They aren't merely on the defensive anymore; they're also striking back. Their strategy? Attack the enemy not just on land, but also on water. If they have any hope of sabotaging the formidable container ship at Cobbler's Bay, then stealth is a must, but so, too, is one very big explosion.
And if they fail, they may face a whole new kind of terror -- imprisonment.

As I wasn't a fan of the first two books in the series, I was sure I wouldn't like this one much.  However, I was actually wrong!  I liked this book a lot more than the others.  I felt more happened in this book - there wasn't so many long parts where the characters just talked, and the talking parts were shorter and more interesting.  The characters seemed to have a better idea of what they were goig to do during the book, rather than sit around wondering if they were going to be found or captured.

This book was definately a whole lot more tense than the others, and I really got an idea of how the characters, especially Ellie, were feeling at differant times.  Mostly because of this I felt that we get to know them all a bit better, and while before the amount of main characters was slightly confusing it was easy to tell who was who as we know their personalities better now.

Although I liked this book, I wasn't really pulled in by it - if I had another book sitting next to it, I was more likely to pick up that one.  But when I was actually reading it, I was quite gripped.

There wasn't any romance, which I thought was good as I think it can distract from the main story!  As I have said before I'm not really into romance, especially in action and adventure books like this, so it could just be me.

Overall I enjoyed this a LOT more than the first two in the series.  I don't think I will carry on with the series - I am wondering what will happen after the unexpected ending, but it wasn't a cliffhanger enough for me to be desperate to carry on.  I think a cliffhanger ending would have been great considering I was getting into the series a bit more and would have made it even more exciting, but I was fine with how it ended anyway.

I am really not sure how to rate this book!  I feel a 3.5 would be too low, but a 4 too high.  So I'm not going to rate it.

Thank you to Chicklish for sending me this book!

Review: The Truth About Celia Frost by Paula Rawsthorne

Celia Frost is a freak. At least, that's what everyone thinks. Her life is ruled by a rare disorder that means she could bleed to death from the slightest cut, confining her to a gloomy bubble of 'safety'. No friends. No fun. No life.

But when a knife attack on Celia has unexpected consequences, her mum reacts strangely - and suddenly they're on the run. Why is her mum so scared? Someone out there knows. And when they find Celia, she's going to wish the truth was a lie.

A buried secret, a gripping manhunt, a dangerous deceit... What is the truth about Celia Frost?

This book sounded differant and interesting, so I really wanted to read it!
I wasn't dissapointed at all with it.  I didn't know what to expect, and what I found was a book full of excitement that was tense and had me gripped from the start.  I couldn't wait to get to the end and find out anwers to all the questions that I had throughout the book.  Fortunatly, all the things I had been wondering about were explained.
Although this book definately wasn't confusing, it was one of those books where as I read on, I understood things that happened earlier in the book better - and I love books like that!  Some of the chapters were from the point of view of someone who was trying to find Celia and her mum, which made the book more mysterious and added more excitement in parts that might have been otherwise boring.
To start with I liked Celia, the main character, but when she discovered there wasn't anything wrong with her I started to dislike her.  I didn't like how she tried hard to make her mum angry or worried, and it just annoyed me a bit.  however, that's pretty much my only complaint about the book!

I really liked this book.  It was gripping, exciting and I didn't predict what was going to happen at all - I really could not guess the reason why Celia's mum was so worried about her.

Rating: 4/5