Book review: Messenger of Fear
THE BASICS
Title: Messenger of Fear
Author: Michael Grant
Genre: young adult/fantasy
Pages: 272
Original language: English
First edition: 2014
Rating: 2/5 stars
This is my first blog post (ever!) and I thought I'd start things of with a little book review. Honestly, I feel quite bad with a rather negative review being my first post, but Messenger of Fear is the last book I've read and I did want to say a few things about this story.
First things first, this isn't a genre I'd typically go for. The main reason I read it was because it was a gift and I just thought I would give it a go anyway. Another aspect that influenced my rating was the fact that I read a Dutch edition, and I really believe a lot was lost in the translation.
The main character of the story is Mara, a teenage girl who wakes up in an empty misty field without the slightest idea how she got there. With that being said, she also doesn't remember anything about herself or her life but her name. She's greeted by Messenger, a young man in a black coat who takes her on a peculiar journey in this strange ghost-likely world. They enounter different characters, who are all subjected to his power because they've commited some kind of 'sin'. Messenger explains Mara that he has the important task of making sure there's a certain balance between evil and justice in this world. Little by little, Mara discovers more details and memories from her own life and the reason she ended up in this new dimension.
The main problem I had with this book is the style of writing. The story is told trough the eyes of Maya, but to me it's pretty unlikely that a teenage girl would use such lengty and difficult descriptions. I felt like the writer wanted to impress his readers by just piling things on top of each other. Some parts felt really forced to me, but that's partly because of the translation - I often find certain words and sentences looking misplaced in translated copies. Another thing that bothered me was just the general behaviour of Mara: she's pretty much only an observer during the largest part of the story. I'll admit there are some pretty cool things happening at certain points, but it would be a lot more gripping if the main character would experience some of them. There's also quite a lot of repetition when it comes to Mara talking about herself: she explains about 25 times (I'm exaggerating of course) that she's curious and can't help to ask questions. Generally, the characters just didn't really appeal to me. There wasn't much happening either, besides Messenger dragging Mara from one hallucination-like experience to another. However, the plot was quite promising and maybe things could improve in the following books, - there are two sequels, I believe - but I'm not planning on reading those any time soon.
A few words to conclude my little ramble session of today: a book with a cool idea behind it, but sadly quite poorly written (in my opinion). Characters who appear rather shallow and don't have a lot to them. On to the next book, I'd say!
Cara X
Author: Michael Grant
Genre: young adult/fantasy
Pages: 272
Original language: English
First edition: 2014
Rating: 2/5 stars
This is my first blog post (ever!) and I thought I'd start things of with a little book review. Honestly, I feel quite bad with a rather negative review being my first post, but Messenger of Fear is the last book I've read and I did want to say a few things about this story.
First things first, this isn't a genre I'd typically go for. The main reason I read it was because it was a gift and I just thought I would give it a go anyway. Another aspect that influenced my rating was the fact that I read a Dutch edition, and I really believe a lot was lost in the translation.
The main character of the story is Mara, a teenage girl who wakes up in an empty misty field without the slightest idea how she got there. With that being said, she also doesn't remember anything about herself or her life but her name. She's greeted by Messenger, a young man in a black coat who takes her on a peculiar journey in this strange ghost-likely world. They enounter different characters, who are all subjected to his power because they've commited some kind of 'sin'. Messenger explains Mara that he has the important task of making sure there's a certain balance between evil and justice in this world. Little by little, Mara discovers more details and memories from her own life and the reason she ended up in this new dimension.
The main problem I had with this book is the style of writing. The story is told trough the eyes of Maya, but to me it's pretty unlikely that a teenage girl would use such lengty and difficult descriptions. I felt like the writer wanted to impress his readers by just piling things on top of each other. Some parts felt really forced to me, but that's partly because of the translation - I often find certain words and sentences looking misplaced in translated copies. Another thing that bothered me was just the general behaviour of Mara: she's pretty much only an observer during the largest part of the story. I'll admit there are some pretty cool things happening at certain points, but it would be a lot more gripping if the main character would experience some of them. There's also quite a lot of repetition when it comes to Mara talking about herself: she explains about 25 times (I'm exaggerating of course) that she's curious and can't help to ask questions. Generally, the characters just didn't really appeal to me. There wasn't much happening either, besides Messenger dragging Mara from one hallucination-like experience to another. However, the plot was quite promising and maybe things could improve in the following books, - there are two sequels, I believe - but I'm not planning on reading those any time soon.
A few words to conclude my little ramble session of today: a book with a cool idea behind it, but sadly quite poorly written (in my opinion). Characters who appear rather shallow and don't have a lot to them. On to the next book, I'd say!
Cara X
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