(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).

(This review may contain spoilers).

Having read a few other books by this author, I finally got round to reading this one.

I thought that this was quite an interesting idea and I liked the fact it had a bit of a link-in to Season of the Witch. While I did get a bit confused with the constant POV switching, it was interesting to see how Eloise and Jack related to each other. I would have liked to see a bit more of Jungles’ character, though, since he didn’t seem to have much of a life outside of when Eloise needed him. Even though he did put in an appearance and helped out towards the end, I would have liked to see a bit more development with him.

It was really interesting to see the hints of Eloise’s original personality, but it would have been good to get to know her more through the other people who knew her. Even Daniel’s and Francis’ conversations about her didn’t really reveal a lot… though I did think it was interesting to see Daniel suffering from something so ironic.

I did think it was good to see some parts of the past, but it was a bit confusing to have those parts written in first person. I did find myself getting a bit thrown during the plot, though. While Eloise was in danger, there wasn’t a whole lot of action happening with that, at least until the end.

I would have liked to see a bit more in the way of the interactions between the characters. Jack and Eloise’s relationship was glossed over in parts and I would have liked to see the conversation between them when Jack tells Eloise the truth.

I really did like the descriptions of the free-running and I would have liked to see Jack doing it a bit more. I did also find some of the things said by one of the other characters to be a bit weird and it would have been good to see exactly why the other person had so many problems with Eloise.

I thought the scientific aspects were really interesting and I did find the book really entertaining and easy to read. I definitely hope to read more books by this author in the near future.

(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).

(This review may contain spoilers).

I thought that this book had a really interesting plot from what I read of the blurb. Unfortunately, I felt that the execution of it wasn’t as good as it could have been.

I found it extremely hard to relate to any of the characters. There was far too much in the way of information dumping. I wasn’t given the chance to get to know any of the characters. The prologue of the book was really interesting, but although there was a lot of potential with the characters, I felt there were too many and too much in the way of head-hopping. I think the book could have been a lot better if there’d been considerably less in the way of POV-characters.

There was a lot of repetition in this book and although there was a lot of action, there were also quite a few scenes that dragged my attention from the book because I found them quite uninteresting to read.

I did think there were some quite interesting moments in this book. I appreciated the fact that there were some attempts to make Young Nimrod a more well-developed villain, but I found his parents’ reactions to his sister to be really unrealistic. They actually didn’t seem to care about her at all. And Young Nimrod actually seemed to forget what his apparent purpose was. It was interesting about the blinded thing, but it was extremely difficult to care about the fates of many of the characters, due to everything about them being revealed in several information dumping paragraphs.

I felt that this book really needed to be longer, with an expanded storyline and much less in the way of random exclamation marks. There was a lot of potential, but it took me longer to read, since I was interrupted repeatedly from the flow of the story. It was really disappointing, but there were also a lot of aspects I felt didn’t work. There was little in the way of tension or surprises in this book… and I did feel that Mark was a bit too willing to just spill everything straight away. And just why was he so willing to believe in the Antichrist just like that anyway?

(This review may contain spoilers).

Considering what I’m writing personally, it’s surprising it took me a little while to actually sit down and read the actual poems, even though I do know most of the storylines.

I thought it was good to see the different kinds of poems and also how the stanzas were shown with the different mythological figures exchanging insults in some. While I do sometimes find it more difficult to read poetry, I did think there was some really nice visual imagery in many of the poems.

I recognised the story of Brynhild and Sigurd from a movie I watched a long time ago and it was interesting to see a couple of different versions of it. There were a lot of dark moments in the poems, such as when the children are fed to their father… and I found it very hard to feel sympathetic towards Gudrun, no matter that she did lose her brothers. Then again, it seemed that violence triggered more violence and treachery worse treachery.

I thought the first poem, the prophecy, was quite an interesting one, though I was confused by the slightly different version that seemed to be shown at the end. It would have been good to see the different poems set side by side, so I could see the differences in the tones.

I liked being able to see the poem where Thor had to dress as a woman to get his hammer back and to see Loki show his intelligence in his responses to the giant. I also found Loki’s Quarrel to be a really interesting poem, especially given the references to past events and hostilities between the gods.

I found it a bit difficult to tell which events had actually happened and which were merely alluded to. I did feel that the poems, although amusing in some areas and intense to read in others, didn’t showcase as much of the personality of the Norse gods as I might have expected. There were some quite confusing moments in the poems, too, where references were made to cultural things that I found trouble following.

While it was good to have some notes in relation to the poems, I think those notes could have done with being written after the relevant poem, rather than at the back of the book, by which time, I’d forgotten my individual questions.

(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).

(This review may contain spoilers).

Even though I only know a bit about Edgar Allen Poe’s poems, I was immediately struck by the blurb of this book. I thought it sounded particularly intriguing and although I was a little confused by the constant switching between POV characters (I forgot whose past I knew and whose I didn’t between Face and King, for instance), I did find it really easy to empathise with a lot of the characters.

I thought there were a lot of good elements of foreshadowing in this book, even though I did feel there were a couple of instances where things were only revealed when they became relevant.

I really liked seeing the problems between Kevin and Seth and I found Seth a character who was really easy to care about. I would have liked to see a bit more development in the relationship between Kevin and Veronica, though.

I thought it was good to have the opportunity to see some of the scenes from Warren’s perspective later on, but I did feel that the start of the story did give away a lot of what could have been a surprise.

I didn’t really like the gang members for most of the book, even though it was good to see that a lot of them were well-developed. By the end of the book, I did actually like Face as a character. I thought his abilities were interesting and I especially liked his interactions with Seth. I thought that was the most interesting relationship in the book. I would have liked to see a bit more of Seth trying to deal with what had happened to his father, but it was good to see some of the scenes from his point of view.

I did think there were some really good descriptions in this book and the mental images from the gang members being killed made me cringe, though it was interesting to see the use of the poems in the deaths.

There was a lot of tension in this book that did manage to keep me reading throughout. I would definitely be interested in seeing more of the characters and also in reading more books by this author in the future.