Oh, of course, hence why I haven't given up on it entirely. All I can say is that which I've read, what appear to be the popular works, are largely awful.
Yeah, I agree. I didn't think the Hunger Games was that great, and I never read past book one. I tried a couple of chapters of Divergent and gave up, etc.
I think it might be something to do with my academic background in social science, but I could never quite get over the way those worlds were constructed and how the characters interact with both the world and eachother. Yes, they're supposed to be dystopias, they're supposed to be unfair and falling apart and so on - but those systems were designed by someone, and it seems like they were deliberately designed to be societies which didn't work. Of course, this was always the author's intention, but it shouldn't feel like it was the intention of a government's founding to be wildly unworkable. Even just basic questions like "how big is this civilisation?" seem to go unanswered in the Hunger Games, where Panem seems to be at various times roughly the size of the United States, but with whole "districts" where only a small town's worth of people seem to live, while Divergent's civilisation seems to have been founded deliberately to promote sectarian violence.
I read Watcher in the Shadows last week by Carlos Ruiz Zafón which was pretty good. I've been on a massive non fiction kick so that was a nice break.
Divergent sucked, or at least as far as I read into book one did. The premise was too stupidly executed for me. I get the theme of rebelling against the role you were born into, but not the way it was over simplified into a world I could not identify with at all.
The stupidity of claiming that the main character is super special for having more than one personality trait, while almost literally every other character in the book retains characteristics of their former faction... I just... It feels like it was knocked together in an afternoon, it really does.
I am currently reading books but Ann Aguirre and Sandy Williams. They are Urban Fantasy novels and cater toward the female reader but are worth the read. I am a tomboy but feel drawn to these stories. They give enough info to let to draw conclusions and there are some twists.
It really, really sucked. I love the movie. I mean, I really love it. lol To the point of obsession. It's not so much the characters or the story that I love either. For some reason, it was just a very hopeful movie to me. It reminded me that you can be someone other than who society expects you to be (by her switching from Abnegation to Dauntless). That you can take control of your life and be who you want to be instead. The zip-line scene is my favorite, because of how free she seems and the music choice. Because of my love for the movie, I decided to buy the books! And holy crap, I hate them. I could barely make it through the first book, but I did because I wanted to see how different it was from the movie. Then I wanted to read Insurgent before I watched the movie, but only made it halfway. I've yet to even pick it up and try to finish it. I now have all three books and have only read one and a half. This is the first (and possibly only) time I can say that I like a movie more than the book. The Insurgent movie, however, lost the magic I felt with the Divergent movie. I was pretty disappointed.
I saw someone mention The Hunger Games a few posts up. I actually enjoyed the first two books in the series but the third one (particularly the second half of it) really soured my opinion of the series. I disliked the direction it went it and without spoiling anything, the ending was quite flat. The All Things Impossible series by Deborah Dalton is one I've recently discovered and enjoyed. I'm on book five and I'd recommend it to any fantasy lovers.
I am 28, and today in my writers group, someone told me that Young Adult wasn't around when I was a kid, and I had to stop and think...Was it? Was it not? Did Harry Potter not count? How about Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close? or Lord of the Rings? or Little House on the Prairie. Not technically YA but I definitely read a ton of Anne McCaffery's Pern series and Robin Hobb books. How about Jacob Have I loved? The YA dystopia obsession is more palatable than the Vampire/Werewolf teen romance movement (I think) But...and maybe I am off topic for saying so, but I am secretly glad I read Farenheit 451 before the Hunger Games even came into the periphery.
It suggests maybe that member is not well read. Wiki's YA entry discusses YA books over the decades. This is what they say about Harry Potter:
I didn't read the initial post properly and now I don't see how to delete my response. sorry. disregard
YA I've read and liked (they're more science fiction than fantasy, but still...): The Tomorrow Series (starts with Tomorrow When the War Began) by John Marsden The Ellie Chronicles (follow up to the Tomorrow series) by John Marsden TimeRiders (series) by Alex Scarrow Uglies (series) by Scott Westerfield
OK - here's my tuppence worth: YA Fantasy Cannot recommend enough: Tom Pollock - Skyscraper Throne (series of 3 books) Lev Grossman - Magician (series of 3 books) Philip Jose Farmer - World of Tiers (series of 5 books - more fantasy, than urban fantasy, but still) Recommended: Alan Dean Foster - Spellsinger (series of 8 books, including the 'son of spellsinger' books) John Wyndham - Chocky Haven't read the following, but they have been recommended to me, and are on my reading list Neal Shusterman - Skinjacker Trilogy Neal Shusterman - Unwind Dystology (series of 4.5 books) On the younger end of YA, but still good: Tony DiTerlizzi and Holly Black - Spiderwick Chronicles (series of 5 books) Diane Duane - Young Wizards (series of 9 books, just been updated to bring them more into the modern technological times) Eoin Colfer - Artemis Fowl (series of 5 books, last time I looked) Jeanne DuPrau - Ember (series of 3 books) Slightly more adult urban fiction Richelle Mead - Succubus (If you like Kelley Armstrong, then these should be right up your street) Simon Green - Nightside (more adult, sort of Fantasy Noir Private Eye - Some sex and violence, but not overly much, and not too graphic - also very clever, if somewhat dark, humour) @Belle Marion - if you liked farnheit 451 and the dystopian theme, then I suggest that you look at: Yevgeny Zamyatin - We (this is my absolute favourite dystopian society book by far! Though it may be hard to find a copy outside of Amazon, but worth the effort) Aldous Huxley - Brave New World Hope you find a book, or two, from this list, to interest you!
There's a few I would definitely recommend! You've got Philip Pullman's Mortal Engines series There's Garth Nix's Sabriel/Lirael/Abhorsen Trilogy, or his Keys to The Kingdom series And I cannot for the life of me remember the author at the moment, but there is a series that starts with a book called "Beyond the Deepwoods", which is also fantastic! Hope that helps!
I'm on the fourth book of the Percy Jackson spin-off series Heroes of Olympus. It's five books in total, and I definitely think it's worth a read.
Not sure if it's a YA fantasy, but I recommend Jay Lake's Green trilogy. The titles are Green, Endurance, and Kalimpura. It's a pretty cool little trilogy, I'm reading the second one, Endurance. After that I'll finish off the trilogy by reading Kalimpura. Word of warning though, the first part of Green will be emotionally taxing if you don't like reading about children getting hurt/abused. It covers how Green was enslaved as a child and forced to work for the Factor under the cruel Mistress Tirelle who does everything to break Green and destroy her former identity. It's about as pleasant as a sharp stick in the eye while someone beats you with a sand bag and force-feeds you ashes (and yes, all that happens to Green in the book sans sharp stick in eye.) But mercifully, that's just the first part, the rest...well, you'll have to read it and find out.
These may have been mentioned, but: The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer. Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld Incryptid by Seanan McGuire The October Daye series by Seanan McGuire Thursday Next by Jasper Fforde Any of the Discworld books by Terry Pratchett
I don't think this has been mentioned yet. Finder By: Emma Bull is an amazing YA book to read. It takes place in the Borderlands World created by Terri Windling back in the mid 90's. The world was so cool, one of the first urban fantasies that a few other Authors got permission to write some books in her world. Fun fact, the Main characters of the book were created by her husband, from another set of novels in the same world. definitely recommend reading it.
