Book Review: Nemesis by Brendan Reichs

Nemesis by Brendan Reichs

Published: March 21, 2017

Genre: Science Fiction, Young Adult

Hardcover Pages: 443

Synopsis:  He killed me. He killed me not. He killed me.

It’s been happening since Min was eight. Every two years, on her birthday, a strange man finds her and murders her in cold blood. But hours later, she wakes up in a clearing just outside her tiny Idaho hometown—alone, unhurt, and with all evidence of the horrifying crime erased.

Across the valley, Noah just wants to be like everyone else. But he’s not. Nightmares of murder and death plague him, though he does his best to hide the signs. But when the world around him begins to spiral toward panic and destruction, Noah discovers that people have been lying to him his whole life. Everything changes in an eye blink.

For the planet has a bigger problem. The Anvil, an enormous asteroid threatening all life on Earth, leaves little room for two troubled teens. Yet on her sixteenth birthday, as she cowers in her bedroom, hoping not to die for the fifth time, Min has had enough. She vows to discover what is happening in Fire Lake and uncovers a lifetime of lies: a vast conspiracy involving the sixty-four students of her sophomore class, one that may be even more sinister than the murders.

Thoughts: Nemesis starts off at a breakneck pace, with mysteries abounding about why Min has been killed every other year since she was eight, why she always comes back, and just who the strange man in the suit is that does the killing. The story makes you wonder just who is involved and what it all means, which is a great way to keep a reader engrossed. On top of all that, there is the threat of a life-ending asteroid on its way to hit the Earth, heightening tensions throughout the small town where Min lives.

Min herself is a strong female character who is pretty easy to get behind. She wants to figure out what's happening to her, and starts going to great lengths to do so. The other two main characters, Tack and Noah, are not quite as engaging as Min. Noah is like Min, in that he also is killed every two years, though he thinks he's just having dreams. Thinking he's crazy has made him pull away from life and hardly ever elicit his true opinion on anything, or take action when he knows something to be wrong. The third main character is Min's best friend Tack, who in many ways is the opposite of Noah, shooting his mouth off without thinking of the consequences at nearly every turn.

Bigger than not really liking Noah or Tack is that about halfway through the book, everything changes, and not for the better. You may want answers in the beginning, but once they start coming, they are, let's just say, not that satisfying. There's also this whole subplot with a bully, and I don't know, guys, bullies just get exhausting after awhile. Especially when they end up being as extreme as this one is. And on top of that, a bunch of random new characters start being introduced about halfway through, yet they do hardly anything at all, so it's just like... why? Why bother with all the descriptors for them.

Overall, the book starts off really well, but it ends in kind of a fizzle for me, to the point where it was a bit tough to get through. It's the first in what is supposed to be a trilogy, but I don't know that I'll continue. I just ended up feeling frustrated at what could have been.

Rating: 2.5/5

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What I'm Reading Next: Frozen Tides (Falling Kingdoms #4) by Morgan Rhodes

Easy Strawberry Sonker

Berry season is upon us, where you'll find cheap and delicious strawberries in abundance at your grocery and farmer's markets. Sometimes, you end up getting so many that you don't have time to eat them all by themselves. Enter - the sonker.

What the heck is a sonker, you ask? I had no idea either, but I was looking for something easy and delicious to make on a weeknight, and came across said sonker. It's basically very similar to a cobbler mixed with a pie, but there's no worrying about cutting together butter into a topping, or making a crust. That sounds just about right for a weeknight dessert, doesn't it?

What's also nice is that you can use frozen berries instead, and it will turn out just as delicious. My version here uses just fresh strawberries, but the first time I made this, I actually did a combination of fresh strawberries and frozen blueberries because I didn't have enough strawberries on their own, and it turned out great! The recipes I've seen all seem to use just one kind of berry, but I would think you could use any combination and it would turn out fine. Have a bunch of those mixed frozen berries from Costco? Try it!

The topping has a nice bit of sugary crunch to it when it's fresh, but it will become a little more soggy if you have this around for a few days. I didn't mind, though, it still tasted awesome. And yes, you really do want to have the baking dish set on top of a baking sheet when it's in the oven. The berries get to some mighty bubbling, and you'll have berry goop going on to the bottom of your oven if you don't have that to protect it. No one wants that.

Easy Strawberry Sonker
Author: Jen @ Fresh From The…
Servings: 9
Prep time: 00:10

Cook time: 01:10

Total time: 01:35

When you want a cobbler but don't want to go to the trouble, a sonker is just the ticket.

Ingredients:

• 2 pounds (6 1/2 cups) fresh strawberries, hulled, or 2 pounds (7 cups) frozen strawberries
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• Salt
• 1/4 cup water
• 3 tablespoons cornstarch
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 cup milk
• 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and hot
• 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions:

1. Adjust oven rack to the middle position and preheat oven to 350F. Line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside for the moment. Combine the strawberries, 1/4 cup sugar, and 1/4 teaspoon salt in a large bowl. Whisk water and cornstarch together in a small second bowl, then add to the strawberry mixture and toss until strawberries are evenly coated.
2. Transfer the strawberry mixture to an 8-inch square baking dish and place the dish on the prepared baking sheet. Bake for 35-40 minutes (1 hour for frozen strawberries) until the filling is bubbling around the sides of the dish, stirring and scraping the bottom with a rubber spatula halfway through.
3. Remove sheet from the oven and stir the filling, scraping again with the spatula. Whisk flour, baking powder, remaining 3/4 cup sugar, and 1/4 teaspoon salt together in a bowl. Whisk in the milk, melted butter, and vanilla extract until smooth. Pour batter evenly over the filling.
4. Bake until the surface is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, another 35-40 minutes, rotating the dish halfway through baking. Let cool on a wire rack for 15 minutes.

Recipe thanks to Cook's Country

Book Review: The Fates Divide (Carve the Mark #2) by Veronica Roth

The Fates Divide by Veronica Roth

Published: April 10, 2018

Genre: Science Fiction, Young Adult, Fantasy

Hardcover Pages: 450

Synopsis:  Fate brought them together. Now it will divide them.

The lives of Cyra Noavek and Akos Kereseth are ruled by their fates, spoken by the oracles at their births. The fates, once determined, are inescapable.

Akos is in love with Cyra, in spite of his fate: He will die in service to Cyra’s family. And when Cyra’s father, Lazmet Noavek—a soulless tyrant, thought to be dead—reclaims the Shotet throne, Akos believes his end is closer than ever.

As Lazmet ignites a barbaric war, Cyra and Akos are desperate to stop him at any cost. For Cyra, that could mean taking the life of the man who may—or may not—be her father. For Akos, it could mean giving his own. In a stunning twist, the two will discover how fate defines their lives in ways most unexpected.

With the addition of two powerful new voices, Veronica Roth's sequel to Carve the Mark is a chorus of hope, humor, faith, and resilience.

Thoughts: In doing a quick glance at some of the reviews on Goodreads to see if others were liking this sequel to Carve the Mark, I discovered that a lot of people really didn't like the first book in this duology. I was actually pretty surprised, as I quite liked the first one, so much so that I put it on my favorite books of 2017 list. Even more surprising: the people who didn't like the first one very much were also saying they enjoyed the second one more, whereas I, again, think the opposite.

That's not to say that I didn't like this book, because I did (indeed, I read it quicker than I have any other of my recent books!), just not quite as much as the first one. It does what a lot of stories do that I am quickly seeing that I find kind of annoying - it splits the characters up. In the first book, it was all about how Akos and Cyra were forced together and eventually came to care for each other, so I guess it makes sense that now they are "forced" back apart again, though the forced thing is really not true since they ultimately have the same goals.

The story also goes for a heavy twist a little over halfway through that certainly works for the story, but does also border on the rather implausible. I'm not going to say it because most of the story kind of hinges on this twist, but I will say I didn't really see it coming, so I guess that's good? What I did like, though, was that the story didn't go into too much war fighting. So many of these types of books end up heading into war stories, which I just... blah. Seen it a million times, and yes it may make sense, but I'm glad that here she found a way to have bits of it, but still keep it about the main characters' stories.

Speaking on the main characters, Roth also introduces some new first person perspectives into the mix. One is more limited, while the other plays a much larger role, and I'll be honest, I was just wanting to get back to Akos and Cyra whenever it was one of these new chapters. It was done, I'm sure, mostly to give a larger view of what was happening across the galaxy rather than solely focusing on Akos and Cyra, but I guess I just didn't like one of the characters very much. I won't say who as to not influence other opinions!

In saying all that, though, I did still enjoy the book. It was a satisfying conclusion in many ways, got to the action quickly, and was never boring.

Rating: 4/5

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What I'm Reading Next: Nemesis by Brendan Reichs