Book Review - Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs


My rating: 5 of 5 stars


LOVED IT! LOVED IT! LOVED IT! By the way... did I mention that I loved it?!?! Very "Tim Burton-esqe"! I can totally see Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter playing lead roles in the MOVIE that 20th Century Fox has already bought the rights to! I've also noticed several reviewers comparing it to Lemony Snicket's style of writing. I can certainly agree with those comparisons. I'm telling you... this is the next big book! It's refreshing, different, intriguing, interesting, funny, scary, innocent... I could keep going!

Ok... I think I've done enough gushing! =) Let's get on with the review.

The book starts off in present day with Jacob, who is around 16 years old. He is bored with his priveleged life. He is very close with his grandfather and has grown up listening to stories about his childhood. Jacob was amazed and in awe of his grandfather's exciting life and looked up to him for it. He hung on every word the man said. His grandfather's stories were on the "fairy story" side... full of tales about peculiar children with abnormal abilities living in a big house guarded over by a bird. As Jacob grew older, he began to accept them as being just that, fairy stories.

Then one day his grandfather dies unexpectedly after being attacked. Jacob is the one who finds his grandfather. Right before he passes away, he tells Jacob a cryptic message that causes him to want to learn more about the place where his grandfather grew up.

Jacob goes on a trip, along with his father, to a small island off England where his grandfather spent time in a children's home after we was exiled from Poland during the second World War. This is the place where many of the "fairy stories" Jacob grew up listening to occurred. Here, he hopes to learn more about his grandfather and hopefully the cause of his death.

Included in the book are old, vintage photographs that the author Ransom Riggs selected from the collections of muliple photograph collectors. These pictures are incorporated into the story and really add a lot to it! Don't worry... they don't make it seem like a picture book.

I really loved the way this book was written. I was able to visualize the story in my head so much so that I felt as if I was watching a movie! However, there was not so much descriptive writing to the point that it felt like the story line drug. Ransom Riggs did a great job of balancing out the descriptions while still keeping the plot moving along. There are tons of twists and turns. The plot goes to unexpected places that you never see coming. The cliffhangers are well done. I was not able to put this book down... and it has been quite a while since I've found a book that did that to me.

The ending leaves you with a small cliffhanger, suggesting that there may be a sequel. I feel like Ransom Riggs has done a great job with this book... it is especially impressive that this is his first novel. I hope everyone will check it out!

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Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith and Jane Austen

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith


My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Pride and Prejudice AND ZOMBIES! Bet you weren't expecting that last word were you? haha

I've been eyeing this book on the book shelf for quite a while. I love the original version, Pride and Prejudice. It's one of my favorites. So I was naturally curious to see how exactly someone could incorporate zombies into the formalness that was the Regency Period.

So basically this book closely follows the plot of Pride and Prejudice. But right away you will notice a few changes - 1.) There are zombies roaming around 2.) Elizabeth Bennet and her sisters are trained zombie killers 3.) Zombie attacks happen frequently

There are some surprising differences from the original that do add a bit of shock for the person who is so used to the original version of the novel. The fact that Elizabeth is a badass zombie killer does add a little bit of fun to the book... you don't want to make her mad... and what do we all know Darcy does to her? He makes her MAD! Interesting haha

I don't really see much point in recapping the storyline because most of you are probably familiar with it to begin with. And I don't want to talk about all the interesting, fun quirks and changes that the zombies bring to the story because that would do nothing but spoil all the fun for you!

Final thoughts... if you like Pride and Prejudice you will find that all of your favorite parts are still there for you to enjoy. If you like zombies, ninjas, bad-ass fighting scenes then this book is for you! If you're just curious about it like I was... give it a try!

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