Hey Everyone!
To honour the release of But Then I Came Back by Estelle Laure, Raincoast decided to host a blog tour! Below is a review and rating of the book and a Q&A with the author. I hope you find it as interesting as I did!
Review:
But Then I Came Back begins swiftly and immediately leads into the events preceding the accident. During these events, you get a brief backstory of Eden's character, her problems, and her family. Knowing these details really helped me to visualize the story. It made the whole book more realistic. Eden had a life before the incident, her story, her entire existence, didn't just suddenly start the second she slipped into a coma. She didn't know in advance that she was going to be harmed, so she continued on dealing with her everyday problems until the last moment.
AND THEN... THE COMA. Estelle Laure wrote exactly what I thought being in a coma would be like, minus the whole Jasmine situation. I imagined an alternate universe where everything resembles your normal life, but something is off. Maybe everyones' faces are distorted, or random events take place that make absolutely no sense, or, in this case, flowers appear randomly all the time. I was so impressed and happy to read all about it. It was just so incredibly bizarre.
I was also incredibly excited that the novel didn't centre around the romance. I mean, I enjoyed the scenes with Eden and Joe, but I was more interested in the plot line with Jasmine, and how Eden was recovering from her coma. This got an A+ in my book. My favourite part about Eden's therapy was probably how she treated the whole situation. She would give sassy responses to her doctors and therapist but still treated them like old friends. It was hilarious viewing these scenes through her eyes.
Overall, I would 100% recommend this book. It deals with tough issues but presents them well, and still adds lighter tones and comedic scenes. It shows you that even when things look bleak, they will get better.
Rating: 8/10
Q: Have you yourself endured such a traumatic experience? What led you to this idea?
A: I personally have not been in a coma or had a major accident I needed to recover from. A really close friend of mine committed suicide as I was working on this. I had been writing a story about love and romance and suddenly I couldn’t do it. My life was consumed by questions of life and death and suicide and why we make the choice to live or die on a daily basis. The story unfurled pretty organically from there once I gave in to the subject matter.
That's all for today! Want to read more Q&A's with Estelle Laure? Check out the following blogs in the next couple of days!
Lauren,
at the Autumn Bookshelf
Three Dark Crowns by Kendare Blake
Released: September 20, 2016
Read: September 2016
Publisher: HarperTeen
Format: ARC, 416 pages
Series: Three Dark Crowns #1
Description on Goodreads:
Fans of acclaimed author Kendare Blake’s Anna Dressed in Bloodwill devour her latest novel, a dark and inventive fantasy about three sisters who must fight to the death to become queen.
In every generation on the island of Fennbirn, a set of triplets is born: three queens, all equal heirs to the crown and each possessor of a coveted magic. Mirabella is a fierce elemental, able to spark hungry flames or vicious storms at the snap of her fingers. Katharine is a poisoner, one who can ingest the deadliest poisons without so much as a stomachache. Arsinoe, a naturalist, is said to have the ability to bloom the reddest rose and control the fiercest of lions.
But becoming the Queen crowned isn’t solely a matter of royal birth. Each sister has to fight for it. And it’s not just a game of win or lose...it’s life or death. The night the sisters turn sixteen, the battle begins.
The last queen standing gets the crown.
Review:
I read Three Dark Crowns such a long time ago, but it's not until now that I FINALLY figured out exactly what I want to say. Being one of my utmost favourite novels, I didn't know how to start this review and I didn't want to screw it up. So here goes nothing.
Katharine, Mirabella and Arsinoe are each fierce and riveting in their own way. It is clear right from the start that the people who raised each child had a massive impact on their behaviour and attitude. Arsinoe is a wild child that lives for the moment and ignores her queenly duties as much as possible. She doesn't like rules and is more interested in going on adventures than winning the crown. Jules, and the rest of her family, treated Arsinoe like a child (as she was) and not like the future queen. And rightly so. She got to have fun before she was forced to grow up, and that's an important perspective to have. Knowing how the villagers think and feel will bring Fennbirn into a better state of peace, making Arsinoe an accomplished queen.
Katharine on the other hand was raised to take what was hers and stomp on those who got in her way. She's somewhat blood thirsty, as she tries to be as ruthless as Genevieve and Natalia want her to be, but has a kind heart at times. She's more of a weakling and is intimidated easily, although she has put up with emotional and physical abuse most of her life. She's a strongly built character, and I don't mean physically. When you read about her, you feel like she's a real person and you come to learn how she'll react to certain situations.
Mirabella was definitely my favourite of the queens. I found her the most relatable and such a badass when it came to her gift. Her powers over wind, lightning, water and fire give her an advantage over her sisters, along with the lengthy amount of practice she's had over he years. Meanwhile, her home life is a lot healthier than Katharine's. She has a nice reliable foster family and friends that would do anything for her. I liked reading from Mira's point of view so much because of her curious nature. She was told all her life that her sisters were monsters and that when the time came, they'd slaughter her if she hesitates to kill them. Of course she'd doubt this and want to know more. That's what I admired; she didn't just believe what everyone said, she wanted to know herself what Katharine and Arsinoe were like.
The events of the book were enticing and I loved that you could read what was happening with one sister while knowing exactly what another was doing on the other side of Fennbirn.
Now about the romances... there was a LOT going on. I don't want to spoil too much, because it's not obvious who ends up with who, but I liked that the love triangles criss-crossed between the Elementalists, Naturalists, and Poisoners.
Overall I would DEFINITELY recommend Three Dark Crowns, not just for the epic plot line and extravagant characters, but for the beautiful cover as well.
Favourite Quotes:
- “Queens do not remember these things,"
"Saying so does not make it true."
"You will need it to be true, for it is too cruel otherwise, to force a Queen to kill what she loves. Her own sisters. And for her to see that which she loves come at her door like wolves, seeking her head.”
- “His eyes, when they meet hers, are like the storm. Perhaps he is not a boy at all, but some elemental thing, made by the crashing water and the endless thunder.”
- "We are all dual-natured, Queen Mirabella. Every gift is light and dark. We naturalists can make things grow, but we also coax lobsters into pots, and our families tear rabbits to shreds."
- "I could never hate you, but if you do not leave now, my cat will tear your throat out."
Rating: 9.5/10
Recommended if you like: witchcraft, powers, nature, finding the evil within characters, making a new OTP, unexpected endings, the elements (as in air, fire, water, earth), other novels by Kendare Blake, competitions to the death, reading about close relationships between people and their 'pets', adventure, slight romance (the book doesn't get very mushy)
Keep flipping pages,
Lauren
