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Albert Camus

Don't walk behind me; I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me; I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend.

Sunday, March 31, 2013

Review and Giveaway The Grimm Chronicles 2 Blog Tour

Description:

200 years ago, the Brothers Grimm changed everything.

With the help of a little magic, fairy tales were made real, manifesting all over the world. Charming princes. Gold-hunting dwarfs. Terrible step-mothers. Heroic animals.

Then, slowly, they began to change. Everyone—from Prince Charming to the old miller—grew more evil. Corrupted. A hero was chosen to stop them, hunting them down one by one and destroying them with the help of a magic pen and a special rabbit assistant.

For 200 years, the hero’s magic pen has been passed on from generation to generation. The newest hero is Alice Goodenough, an 18-year-old junior from Washington High School. While her friends spent their summer working and having fun, Alice found herself doing battle with creatures most human beings don’t even realize exist. A giant snake. A blood-sucking prince. A terrifying half-man, half-hedgehog. Dastardly dwarfs intent on mind-controlling everyone who uses a cell phone.

Now, senior year has begun. With it comes a new challenge at school, where bullies have grown bolder and classes more challenging. As if that’s not enough, Alice must face off against a collection of Corrupted who all share a terrible secret, one that might awaken a creature capable of doing untold damage. To uncover the secret, Alice will have to face off against a man-eating lizard, a bloodthirsty sea captain, and a mysterious wizard who can see into the future …

My Review:
I must admit that I didn’t finish the book until now. BUT only because the plans you make are not always match with those that real life have for you and, like Alice (fortunately not quite the same) you cannot always do what you want and when you want. And that sucks! Especially when you really want to read a certain book.

From what I've read so far I can say that it announces even a better volume than the first! The action starts quicker, and the authors have imposed a much faster rhythm from the start. The tension, the horror, thrill and puzzles don’t delay too long. Several plans are open and you cannot wait to see how they will coalesce.

Alice’s Heroine's life is closely weaves to the real one, with the concerns and requirements of senior year. Briar seemed to become (even) nicer. Seth is present and the way in which Alice relates almost everything to him, sustain the hope for a change in their relationship.

The corrupt characters seem to be difficult to split "only" into the good and bad. The assumption that to be corrupted is equivalent to being evil turns out to be inconsistent and this is an aspect that I liked in the first volume also: the power to choose to oppose the fate that you're doomed at. The range between good and evil is very high, with many shadows and patches of light and evil seems to going to extreme.

The secondary and transient characters are built to contribute to a story which is as moralistic as it is funny, full of adventure and suspense.

In short, the Grimm Chronicles #2 is a book for which I will definitely make time to finish it and which I recommend to you. It brings not only a story well and with passion written, but also the pleasure of remembering childhood stories and even discovering a new ones.

I received the book for review as part of Book Tour - Thank you
The Grimm Chronicles 1 review - here

 Romanian:
Tour schedule
Trebuie să recunosc că nu am reuşit să termin cartea până la acest moment. DAR asta doar pentru că planurile de acasă nu se potrivesc mereu cu cele din târg şi, la fel ca Alice (din fericire nu CHIAR la fel), nu putem face mereu ceea ce vrem când vrem. Şi asta sucks! Mai ales când vrei neapărat să citeşti o carte.

Din câte am citit până acum vă pot spune că se anunță un volum mai bun decât primul! Acțiunea începe mai repede, iar autorii au impus un ritm mult mai alert încă de la început. Tensiunea, groaza şi enigmele nu se lasă aşteptate prea mult. Mai multe planuri sunt deschise şi abia aştepți să vezi cum se vor întrepătrunde.

Viața lui Alice de Eroină este strâns legată de cea reală, cu preocupările şi cerințele ultimului an de şcoală. Brian parcă devine (şi) mai simpatic. Seth este prezent şi modul în care Alice raportează multe la el, face să existe speranța unei schimbări în relația lor.

Personajele corupte se anunță a fi greu de împărțit în „doar” bune şi rele. Presupunerea că a fi corupt este egal cu a fi rău se dovedeşte a fi contrazisă şi ăsta e un aspect care mi-a plăcut şi în primul volum: puterea de a alege, de a te opune soartei care ți-e sortită. Plaja dintre bine şi rău este foarte mare, cu multe umbre şi pete de lumină, iar răul se anunță a fi dus la extem.

Personajele secundare şi cele pasagere sunt construite pentru a reuşi să-şi aducă aportul la o poveste care este pe atât de moralizatoare, pe atât de amuzantă, plină de aventură şi suspans.

Ce mai, o carte pentru care cu siguranță îmi voi face timp să o termin şi pe care v-o recomand. Ea nu aduce doar o poveste bine şi cu pasiune scrisă, ci şi plăcerea reamintirii poveştilor copilăriei şi chiar a descoperirii unora noi.

Recenzia pentru The Grimm  Chronicles 1 - aici

Excerpt:

      In just moments, the dream changed back to the bar. Instead of country music playing this time, there was the sound of a beating drum. The pool table and the other tables were pulled back against the wall. A band was set up on the little stage. Tall black amplifiers stood on either side of the drummer. It was the guy with the baseball cap. The bassist was the formerly half-asleep one. The guitar player was Eyebrows himself, one hand held tightly around the neck of his sleek red guitar to mute the strings.
     In front of them were a hundred screaming fans. Everyone was dressed in dark clothes. Most had piercings. They were all cheering as the drummer picked up the tempo, the thumping of the bass drum so loud that the half-empty glasses of beer sitting on the bar hopped with each thump.
    And the bartender? Well, he couldn’t have cared less. He had bright yellow plugs in both his ears and was the only person in the room not nodding along to the drumbeat. He refilled a half-dozen cups with more beer, then stared out at the crowd.
     He had the same sour look on his face as the previous night.
    “Are you ready?” Eyebrows shouted into the microphone. His voice blared through the heavy black speakers. The crowd cheered. They were packed in tightly, hands raised high in the air.
    “Then let’s rock!” And with that, Eyebrows played a heavy chord. The crunching, distortion-driven sound escaped the speakers, flooding the room. Eyebrows changed to a new chord, then another, and by the third chord everyone in the room was dancing and cheering.
     His finger slipped and one chord came out all wrong and out of key. The crowd’s dancing stopped instantaneously. Some of the people looked around, confused.
    Eyebrows moved his fingers a little bit on the fret board, fixing the note. The dancing started up again. It seemed like everyone loved these guys … who were they? If only Seth were here, I thought; he would recognize the music for sure. It was hard rock, with crunching guitars and heavy bass drums and a furious tempo.
    So furious, in fact, that I was surprised the people kept dancing. For a moment, it looked like just another rock concert—albeit one more exciting than any I’d ever witnessed—but then I saw two people in the crowd look at each other, and I recognized the look immediately.
    Fear.
    Eyebrows let another chord ring out while he took a long swig from his beer. Then he picked up the tempo, quickly moving into a melodic solo. The crowd danced harder. They were cheering now—no, not cheering … crying out! They were in pain. They couldn’t stop. It wasn’t long before a handful of them collapsed in exhaustion, but still they writhed around on the floor. Some tried to escape, pushing each other over, unable to stop dancing.
    The exit was locked. The bartender smiled his yellow smile. Some shouted at him, others cried out. The music got faster.
    More people collapsed. Eyebrows slowed the tempo to a smooth groove, and the handful of brave fools who’d tried rushing the stage found themselves unable to move forward. They swayed left and right, almost as if hypnotized.
     I felt a cold breeze rush past me. The lights above flickered. More people in the crowd dropped to the floor, their legs still dancing in the air. Something began to escape from their open mouths: a blue essence, like a wisp of smoke, traveling to the little stage.
Ken Brosky

    Eyebrows opened his mouth, inhaling. Sucking up every last wisp.

The Grimm Chronicles Volume 2 contains:

Episode four: The Orphanage of Doom
Episode five: Blood and Thunder
Episode six: The Order of the Golden Dragon

Bonus material:
The Lost Journal of Eugene Washington
Assorted fairy tales by the Brothers Grimm
A Legacy of Red

The Grimm Chronicles Volume 1
This book contains the first 3 episodes of the critically acclaimed series:
Episode 1: Prince Charming Must Die!
Episode 2: Happily Never After
Episode 3: Revenge of the Castle Cats

The Grimm Chronicles is intended for Young Adults aged 13 and up. The goal is to provide Young Adult readers with a strong, charismatic young woman in the role of the hero and provide readers with a positive protagonist who uses her brain to overcome obstacles life throws in her way.

Praise

5 stars!” ~ Bookies Book Blog

"Highly recommended for all who love fairy tales and the YA genre." ~ My Cozie Corner

"All in all the books were excellent." ~ LilyElement

"If you love fairy tales and them being turned into modern day stories you will love these short stories." ~ Mom With a Kindle

"5 stars (out of 5)" ~ I Am, Indeed

Isabella Fontaine and Ken Brosky’s incredible talent for storytelling takes the reader on an amazing action-packed ride fueled by endless creativity and limitless imagination. TGC is like a high-stakes version of Harold and the Purple Crayon meets a contemporary, above ground Alice in Wonderland. “ ~ Bookfetish

I absolutely loved this book! No, let me rephrase that, I FREAKING LOVE THIS BOOK! Nope, that doesn't even do it justice. Vol. 1 has the first three stories from the 12 that will ultimately make up the chronicles.” ~ Jesse Kimmel-Freeman
Purchase:

About the Authors
Ken Brosky received his MFA in fiction writing from the University of Nebraska-Omaha. He also teaches English at Madison College. This is his first Young Adult series.

Isabella Fontaine owns a farm in Wisconsin and enjoys reading weird books like House of Leaves. This is her first Young Adult series.

Tour Giveaway
5 Kindle ebook copies of The Grimm Chronicles Volume 2
Ends 4/11/13
a Rafflecopter giveaway

2 comments:

meduza said...

Cat de tare! Imi doresc de mult sa citesc povestile originale ale Fratilor Grimm, dar n-am avut ocazia :) Multumim pentru sansa :)

Unknown said...

Multumita iubitei mele mame (atenta la fiecare detaliu, oricat de insignifiant ar parea) , am reusit sa citesc povestile fratilor Grimmm (nu cele originale, am inteles ca acelea erau inspaimantatoare pentru cititorii mei slabi de inima- in plus, m-am informat putin de pe net cu privire la ceea ce ar putea cuprinde acele povesti si 0_0 -dap, asa aratam cand am aflat cum erau povestile lor originale ). Dar trecand peste acest moment si ajugand la subiectul cartii recenzate- mi-au placut la nebunie povestile fratilor Grimm si sa aflu despre inca o serie care a preluat ideile originale pentru a le transforma intr-o noua opera literara, dar mai apropiata secolului nostru, ei bine, m-am bucurat nespus si categoric, voi incerca sa citesc aceasta serie :)
Ceea ce ma surprinde de fiecare data cand aflu despre aceste 'adaptari' este faptul ca nu mai exista personaje bune si personaje rele- cotoroanta nu mai este cotoroanta, si nici printul fermecator- print fermecator, si aceasta caracteristica se poate aplica si la celelalte personaje- imi place foarte, foarte mult acest lucru, pentru ca se apropie de realitatea noastra, personajele sunt umanizate, avand si greseli, dar si trasaturi pozitive si mi-ar placea ca scriitorii sa continue cu aceasta tendinta, pentru ca lumea nu e doar alba sau neagra- si cred ca copii,tinerii sau chiar adultii pot invata acest lucru mai usor daca vor invata de la Alice,Brian si Seth, in plus exista si o actiune antrenanta- deci nimeni, nu se poate plictisi :)