Kiki Strike: Inside the Shadow City

Ok, so I think we all know that I have been a little (ok, really) behind on my reviewing lately. But its not entirely my fault. I am a little discouraged by the fact that you haven't been reading my reviews. *sigh* Oh well. Anyway, I finished Kiki Strike quite a while ago and I've been meaning to review it. So away we go...

Manhattan is a big place, with many great things about it. It is right there in the Big Apple, the residing place of hundreds of amazing authors, and the place thousands of tourist flock to every hour. But something you might not know about it is what is underneath. No, I am not talking about gas lines, and water pipes. Or, for you Peeps fans, I am not talking about giant worms, or apocalyptic rats. Although there are a lot of rats. No, I am talking about The Shadow City. The Shadow City is an intricate city of tunnels used hundred of years ago by criminals and thieves, but no one has set foot in it in decades. And that is where the story beginnings.

Our story starts off with twelve year old Ananka Fishbein, who discovers a large sinkhole in front of her house and goes down in to investigate. This is her first encounter with The City. But when the sink hole is filled, Ananka befriends the mysterious Kiki Strike in order to find another entrance. Kiki Strike is a ghostly pale, short, elfish girl with white-blond hair that showed up in Ananka's ritzy private school only a few days after she saw the sink hole. A little background info on Ananka, she is not rich. Her great great grandfather (or something) was very rich, but he put his money into a fund that would all and only go to his descendants schooling. Therefore, Ananka and her parents own a huge library of books about everything that fills their apartment, and Ananka gets to go to the best school in Manhattan. Together, Kiki and Ananka gather a team of delinquent, twelve year old girl scouts and call themselves the Irregulars. We have Luz, a super technical and inventive mechanic, DeeDee, a genius chemist, Betty, a master of disguise, and Oona, an expert forger and (later on) lock picker. Together, the Irregulars make a plan to map out the entire Shadow City, so that they can have control of it. But in trying to open a particularly difficult door, DeeDee causes a mass explosion that breaks a water line and knocks her out. The Irregulars rush her to the hospital, but when they arrive, Kiki has disappeared.... This is a story of a mysterious underground city, a hoard of man-eating rats, and kung-fu fighting princesses.

I loved this book. It had lots of great action and suspense and never once did I feel bored. The characters, plot, setting, everything was set up beautifully. It was also funny, which is always excellent. I was reading it under my blankets in bed to finish it. That is how good it was. Unfortunately, the absence of romance brought it down a point. So, I dub Kiki Strike: Inside the Shadow City 7.5 kinds of fawesome.


Shadow City exploring, kung fu fighting, man-eating rat escaping and yours,

The Last Days... (dun dun duuuuuhn...)

To ring in the new year, I finished the last 200 pages of Scott Westerfeld's The Last Days, and it was so FAWESOMELY, FEXCELLENTLY, FAMAZINGLY, FOOOOOOOOOL! I love, love, LOVED it! So before I even give you my review I will tell you that it has achieved the great honor of 9 KINDS OF FAWESOME!!! Partially because I kind of stole the scale from the book, but seriously it was that good.
Okay I kind of lied.
There were actually 2 things that I didn't like about it:
1.) The cover LIED! As you can see in the picture, it says that TLD is a sequel to Peeps, but it is, in fact, a companion book. It is about five new characters, and *****SPOILER ALERT***** Cal and Lace don't even really come back until the end.
2.) The absence of science at the beginning of the book. Yes, I missed all of Cals crazy science facts. It just felt strange. But then it started to make the book more eerie and intense, so I got over it.

Okay before I even start I have to send out a super ******SPOILER ALERT****** to anyone who has not yet read Peeps, because I am bound to slip something without even knowing. So, if you haven't yet read Peeps, go read the review of it and then READ IT! And then come back here.

Our story begins with Moz (short for Mosquito) and his best friend Zahler, two amazing guitarists who wish they had a band. On the way home from Zahler's, Moz meets Pearl as they together save a 1975 Stratocaster with gold pickups and hardware (this is a really cool guitar, for anyone who is confused) that fell from the sky. Well, actually a crazy lady chucked it out her window, but whatever. Pearl, a musical genius who can play basically anything, proposes to Moz that she, Moz, and Zahler form a band, they could be the Taj Mahal of alternative, death, metal, of the New Sound. To complete the band, Moz and Zahler recruit Alana Ray, who drums in time square on paint buckets, and Pearl goes to find Minerva. Minerva ***semi-spoiler alert*** is a peep, and she has been locked into her room eating just killed chickens and garlic with her cat, Zombie. Together, the 5 create a totally amazing a eerie New Sound, but Minerva's strange singing has cause the earth to rumble beneath them and with the "sanitation crisis" getting worse, they know something bad is about to happen....

Ok, so like I said, I thoroughly adored this book! It had everything. Zahler could make me laugh, Moz, near the end almost made me cry (why did he have to smash the poor, innocent... well I won't give that away.), and, okay I will admit it, I hated Minerva. But it was that kind of love to hate way, you know. The plot was not only exciting, but it was also eerie, almost like a horror story but so much better.This book had EVERYTHING! You name it, this book probably had it. YES!

Last Days adoring, cover uncovering, Minerva hating-ly yours,