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thistlechaser
The Bitching Tree by Scott Hungerford. First off, what a lovely cover! Covers on my kindle are black and white and less than an inch tall, so I never really get a good look at them until I make my post here. I love this one!
There were a number of really weird things about this book:
- When I opened this ebook for the first time, it was at the 60% point. I assumed that meant I had started it before but had DNFed it and somehow forgot to delete it, but I started reading anyway to see what it was like and what the heck the title meant. It was not familiar at all. The next day I checked my blog and there was no mention of it. I've never had a book start in the middle before...
- The story took a right turn at exactly the 60% point and went downhill soon after. If I were going to DNF it, it would have been at that point.
- What the heck was the title about? Since covers are so small on my Kindle, I kept re-checking to see if maybe I misread it. The Birthing Tree? The Bitching Teen? (The story eventually explained what it meant: It was a tree where crows gathered to 'bitch'.)
Anyway, the first 60% of the book was SO GOOD. In it a young crow was turned into a human to try to save his flock from an evil crow. The whole beginning of the story was about him learning to be human. The author really knows crows and I believed every moment of it!
Unfortunately at the 60% point the plot took over again. I know I can't complain about magic in a book where a crow turns into a man, but at the 60% point there started being other spells, objects of magical power, and the evil crow went from an invisible background threat to an actual foe.
The further into the book I got, the more it became like an action movie. Chases across a city, multiple gun fights... I eventually just skimmed the last third or so. Unfortunately there was (near) instant-true-love, too. I just didn't believe the relationship at all.
I wish I had DNFed it at 60%, as the book seems to have told me to do. The first half was just so wonderful, I really enjoyed it so much.
DNF
53) Runebinder by Alex R. Kahler. For some unexplained reason (which would be the theme of this book), the world ended a few years ago and somehow young people got magic. Really, in just a couple years. The main character was in high school, the world ended, and the story started two years later with him having magic. None of the worldbuilding was explained. The main character (who was Super Special Most Powerful Magic User Ever) fell into instant-love with another guy. (And something about the world ending somehow made everyone perfectly, 100% fine with same-sex love.) The story and setting might have been interesting if the author had explained any of it.
