Title: SkylarkSeries: Skylark #1
Author: Meagan Spooner
Publisher: Carolrhoda Lab
Release Date: August 1st 2012
Pages: Hardcover, 344 pages
Source: Audiobook from the library
Summary from Goodreads:
Sixteen-year-old Lark Ainsley has never seen the sky.
Her world ends at the edge of the vast domed barrier of energy enclosing all that’s left of humanity. For two hundred years the city has sustained this barrier by harvesting its children's innate magical energy when they reach adolescence. When it’s Lark’s turn to be harvested, she finds herself trapped in a nightmarish web of experiments and learns she is something out of legend itself: a Renewable, able to regenerate her own power after it’s been stripped.
Forced to flee the only home she knows to avoid life as a human battery, Lark must fight her way through the terrible wilderness beyond the edge of the world. With the city’s clockwork creations close on her heels and a strange wild boy stalking her in the countryside, she must move quickly if she is to have any hope of survival. She’s heard the stories that somewhere to the west are others like her, hidden in secret—but can she stay alive long enough to find them?
While I did enjoy Skylark, it just felt a bit slow at times. I felt myself having to really focus or else I would lose interest. I can’t decide if it was the audio book narration, which was dry and not the best or if it was just the story in general. Skylark is far from a cookie cutter predictable dystopian story. It has actually been one of the better dystopian worlds I have read lately. The whole idea of having energy created from magic was something I found fresh and unique.
The story has twists throughout the whole plot with a slow building romance (no insta-love!). Overall I would give Skylark 3 stars, it was missing some pizzazz but the world building in the magical dystopia was well done and worth the read. I plan to read the sequel but I might stay away from the audio version of Shadowlark.
If you read/listened to Skylark, what did you think?
Title:The PrinceSeries: The Selection #0.5
Author: Kiera Cass
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release Date: March 5th 2013
Pages: ebook, 64 pages
Source:Library
Summary from Goodreads:
Before thirty-five girls were chosen to compete in the Selection...
Before Aspen broke America's heart...
There was another girl in Prince Maxon's life...
Don't miss this thrilling 128-page original novella set in the world of the New York Times bestselling novel The Selection. Also features a teaser to The Elite, Kiera Cass's hotly anticipated sequel to The Selection.
“She was looking at our fingers and not into my eyes, and thank goodness for that. If she were, she’d have seen how absolutely floored I was the first time I finally, truly saw her. The clouds moved at just the right moment, full lighting her face by the moon. As if it weren't enough that she was willing to stand up to me and clearly unafraid to be herself, she was dazzlingly beautiful.”
The Prince was a nice addition to the story. It was a different perspective to actually hear Prince Maxon's thoughts on love and the selection process. It was cute, I definitely swooned some when he described his first meeting with America. Even though I enjoyed it, I did not find it necessary to enjoy the series. Simply put, it was a nice filler story.
