Review: The Line

The Line by Teri Hall
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

While not the best dystopian fiction around, The Line certainly had an interesting story to offer. As other reviewers have mentioned, it is plot-driven rather than character-driven. We are made to understand early on that Rachel is a good girl, her mother is always sad, and her mother's employer, on whose land they live, doesn't like to be bothered. I had really no information on the hired hand who helped around The Property, as they call it, other than that he was old and looked after Rachel when she was young.

The plot moved forward pretty steadily, although it took too long, in my opinion, to get to the good part. I'm also left wondering what other secrets Rachel's mother could be holding back, and why, all of a sudden, Ms. Moore became so friendly with the mother and daughter. Based on her previous character, I half expected her to clam up and try to either fix things on her own or throw them off The Property.

The book reads very easily, although Rachel's brain wanders a bit. Hall tends to have the characters go off on inner thought tangents, which can be detrimental to the flow of the story. I didn't enjoy that, but I didn't mind it so much as I would have in a different sort of book. What worked in the 19th century doesn't quite work now.

I agree with another reviewer who said it felt more like the first half of one book rather than the beginning book in a series. I think that, considering it was only 200-odd pages, a lot more could have been done with it to turn it into a complete story rather than a mini-novel that the publisher is trying to squeeze money out of.

I will probably check out book 2, but I hope it is a lot more fulfilling than this one. I rather enjoyed the read, but do acknowledge it could have been better.

All that said, I gave it a rating of 4 stars because I did really enjoy it, I finished it quickly and actually want to read the second book, and the writing style was pretty good. Recommended for people who like YA dystopian fiction, although don't expect The Hunger Games out of it.


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First Books of the New Year

Reached by Ally Condie and Insurgent by Veronica Roth

I love MyPoints.  I love it so much because, when I save up enough points, I get gift cards for books.  Books that are free to me are wonderful books!

It's amazing, then, that I received my latest MyPoints gift card in December and only today cashed it in.  I guess I was waiting for the right sale, or the right book, but whatever the reason, today I used it up and got two books I've been waiting for for a while.  I'm excited to start them!

My husband Chris is a member of some music message boards, and on one of them they post their music purchases.  I thought that would be a fun experiment for the blog, so now I present you with my first book purchase of the year.

Reached is the final book in the Matched trilogy by Ally Condie.  I really enjoyed the first two books and still haven't decided which guy I think is right for Cassia.  Maybe they'll end up in a threesome!  Haha.  That would be an ... interesting conclusion.  *cough*  In all seriousness, though, I am very excited to start this.  I'm trying to finish another couple of books right now, but as soon as they're done (two are library books) I'll be starting Reached.

Insurgent is book two out of three in the Divergent trilogy by Veronica Roth.  The first book, Divergent, received a lot of mixed reviews and I can understand why.  Tris is a bit whiny, her relationship with Four is just a bit too fated/cheesy/overdone, and the story line was a bit predictable.  But in all, I really got wrapped up in the war and what was going to happen to all these kids, who were being forced to fight without knowing what they were doing.  What were they going to do when they realized they had killed their friends, their families?  I can't wait to get deeper into the plot and see where everything is going.

This year is going to be a great reading year, I can just tell.