Vadim Ponomaryov Ponomaryov من عند الفتح، عمان من عند الفتح، عمان

I wouldn't say it's a bad book, but it really isn't that great at all. One of the things that kept me reading, was the mere-novelty, is it?-of Shakespeare. Basically, Susanna is Shakespeare's 13-year-old daughter. Her apiration is to become a singer, and she is also driven by her love of Thomas Cole. She leaves Stratford and her family to go to London to be with her father. She doesn't find the city life as what she thought it would be, or being with her father, but again, propelled by her desire to sing and her love of Thomas Cole, she is willing make things work for herself. Not the perfect summery there, but good enough. One of the things that ticked me off was there wasn't much happening. It's mostly just her in the city. Also, the plot was confusing, or at least how the climax works. I couldn't tell whether the climax was at the very end, with a speeding-denouement, is it?-and resolution (which is annoying for want of slowing down or filling in details). That, or the climax was more at the ending half, with it going up and down again later near the end. That confuses me. It's not the only thing I was annoyed at either. Did I mention the plot was, bland? It's mostly Susanna confused about love-for her father, her father's love, stuff about Tom Cole, etc.-and singing. And maybe a little of city life or basic family issues. There's not much conflict, I suppose, if you think about it. Pretty straightforward-what happens. You could probably guess what does happen in the end. Go ahead and guess, I got it right. Again, I'll say it's ok. But definitely, there wasn't enough charm or whatever in the story or Susanna. Maybe it's the story telling. Who knows? I just really didn't like a lot. Quite honestly, I'm giving it a bonus just for including William Shakespeare, a writer I much admire and enjoy.

Didn't like it. It was boring. The End. Gee, wouldn't that be a great review? <3 But unfortunately, I'm long-winded and can't keep my words to myself. Thus the near one hundred or so status updates that resulted from how much this packet of papers ticked me off. It's terrible where things get to the point that I can't hold back my tongue anymore, because normally I'm a person with more patience than a hundred thousand people put together. You can try me on that claim. My best friend knows this better than anyone, and you can feel free to ask Rain Misoa (said friend) should you want proof. That being said, my patience did not only swiftly dwindle, but my interest, attention, and care perished right along with them throughout this book. It took about fifty pages for me to be bored senseless. It took about one hundred for me to tilt my head to the side, roll my eyes, and drool lifelessly. Once a hundred and fifty pages hit, I was ready to discard the book into the recycling box and never notice it again, because at that point, it was about as unnoticeable to me as air on a daily basis. Then things shifted. They got increasingly... annoying. Obnoxious? Persistently vicious. I can come up with a thousand descriptive terms. Save me from building up my frustration through trying to vent my emotions.... But no, that's impossible, because it took not halfway through the book for all my non-interest to turn completely around into antagonistic rage. As vehement and rabid, wild-eyed and feral as a caged beast ravaged by injustices of freedom and health, withering sanity and goading destructive, vicious urges on into outbursts of cursing and blatant wishes for the main character's death and torment: I became wild and inane. I lost it. I completely lost it. This book was a poorly written, lust-driven, self-loving, feigned-hurt and needy, thin, scraggly, pathetic little scoundrel lightly veiled in the faux skin of a "story." But what is the story here? Let's be critical, because that is what a review demands: an honest and unbiased opinion, evenly influenced by the reader's experiences. Let's break it down then, shall we? Plot: To pair the female with the male. Why? Because they were chosen by the author. Based on no personality compatibility, intellectual aspects, similar interests, or other relations. Simply: because. Characters: Not self-sustaining if not tied into the main character. Main character: Not self-sustaining if not tied into lust for selected mate. Mate: Not self-sustaining if not tied in to main character. Thus: Cyclical and invalid cast, based on nothing initial or basic as foundation. Without foundation, none have anything to base themselves on: story falls apart. Setting: Invalid, filled with inconsistencies. Swamp versus beautiful cliff-side lake in midst of clean forest. Reform school with top notch security versus security never seen, teachers never mentioned or spoken of but rarely, and students allowed to do/go/act how they wish without reprimand (except in one or two minor situations that do not hold up to lasting evidence against this). Characters placed there to revoke old manners and improve themselves versus nothing ever being done that mildly warms up to usual boot camp styled "schools" resembling this one. Location: Unknown because too many town names mentioned without slightest consideration that readers will not know the area unless they've been in it before. Curfews and rules as always strictly maintained in most facilities of high containment strength versus literally none mentioned, let alone enforced in the slightest. End Result: Failure. Story Progression and Climax: Female meets male. Female and male end up together. The end. Any climactic moments were only begun, then cut off, and finally never brought up again. End Result: Failure in rising action, climax and falling action. Conclusion: Story progression nonexistent and irrelevant. Final Result: No story, no consistency, plot holes galore, and poor attempts to piece together reasoning leads me to conclude that while Kate has an ample vocabulary, her story telling skills are below that of a newborn baby's: in other words, nonexistent. On another note, all characters are cyclical and have no lives outside of the main character, meaning they do not hold up as real characters at all. The main character herself is only important so long as her purpose of being with the male lead continues, which means since there is no purpose besides their feelings, which are not supported by anything concrete and real (such as similar interests, hobbies, personality traits that either mirror or feed off one another, etc.), this means that there is no purpose to her being with the male lead besides physically wanting to have sex with him since he's pretty, they've been physically attracted to each other for millions of lives before, and they are attracted to each other physically yet again. Thus leading me to the suggestion that you should all put down this 452 page book, go watch an hour's worth of Animal Planet when they're doing a special on animal reproduction, and save yourself the bother of dealing with someone whose personality resembles a bucket of thumbtacks thrown into a blender and yet also simultaneously that of paint drying and peeling. It'll be the same thing, much less painful, much more beautiful, and far less time consuming. To get back to my actual comments: Kate, we all know you're making millions of dollars off of this, thanks to you having read the Toilet series and deciding to rip off the idea. But you no doubt thought you could do a better job because you actually consumed a dictionary to increase your vocabulary. However, without taking the time to grow a brain that knows how to use that vocabulary to create something worthwhile, you have done no better than Stupid Stephanie, your predecessor. You have wasted my time, and worse: thousands and thousands of pages of paper that could have been used to make something far more valuable than your "story": toilet paper. My last words are this: With all the poor attempts you made throughout this book to try to create interesting moments, or to keep people engaged as your main character incorrigibly stalked some random male human being (don't you dare bring up the angel bit, because we all know details do not apply to those inconsistent in their arguments, written or otherwise), you still showed us nothing besides your feeble writing skills in this book. Do you have a wealthy vocabulary? Yes, you do. Congratulations on that. But can you piece together a beginning, middle, and end in a satisfying, truly literary way? No. No, you cannot. Your story is filled with plot holes, you toss aside every character at a whim without concern and bring them up again when it's most convenient for you. You have no concern for anything outside your attempt at a plot, which doesn't hold up even with everything stacked up to create this ridiculously and unnecessarily lengthy read. Your character, while you claim her to be intelligent, does everything possible to prove you wrong through her simplest of actions, which you clearly thought to write off as her being innocent, but which just come off as her being deluded and false. Your attempts at romance are enough to warrant a restraining order in real life, and you do not base them on any of the real things that create a relationship. What arguments and misunderstandings you include in the relationship between Daniel and Luce, even to the point of making Cam a secondary love interest, fall apart at the seams because they show through as nothing but vague words without facts to back them up, or blunt personality traits on Luce's part that only further illuminate how selfish and backstabbing she really is. You, like Luce, use anyone and anything in this book until the need satisfies an end to further Luce's eminent togetherness with Daniel, and then you throw it away. You did it with Trevor, with Callie, with Arriane, with Cam, and with Penn. Every person is just a pawn for you and Luce, and it's sad how clearly your personality shows through in Luce just based off of your writing. It's a sorry day when people like you get so much adoration and popularity. Clearly, based off of this creation--your child, as my own writing is mine--you do not deserve the love you receive. When Luce said those things in your book, that was your guilt and hers shining through. You realize how unworthy you are, yet you still take the gushing of praise offered you. That's just one of the gamut of reasons why you get a one out of five from me. Your book is pathetic. I am not foolish enough to believe that someone who imagines up a story like this goes very far from their creation. Us artists never do. One more thing I must add that I forgot to mention: Predictability. Kate's book about beats the predictability level for children's television as they wait for you to point out where the obvious item is on the screen taking up a good fourth of it. Except: it's even MORE predictable than THAT. I already know that Daniel and Cam are [Insert Spoiler Here] which isn't "revealed" until apparently the third book in this series. I also knew every angel, both of the Student body and the Teacher kind... I don't even have words to describe how dull this read was. Not a single thing surprised me. Not even what happened with Penn and Miss Sophia struck me as remarkable. It all made far too much sense. It was all far too obvious. You really do fail in story-writing, Kate. Just thank your lucky stars--should those actually exist for you considering what your end product here was--that you chose to write in a laughably poor quality category and didn't try your hand at mystery. You'd be thrown out on the street for your frail attempt at a "plot." Now, to my Readers. If you want to bash this book, take it up. It'll be a torturous and dull read. But, at least you know what not to do in a book. To those of you who liked it: don't be fooled. There are better things--far better things--out there. Put it down. Don't give it a try. It's not worth it. Pick up anything else instead. Unless, of course, it's Toilet. *Smiles wryly and warmly* As a last word: I hope you all enjoyed my review~ Let's meet again in a better book.

this is a beautiful book. 88 pages long, 1896. willa cather apparently named this book along with the scarlet letter and the adventures of huckleberry finn as the three soon-to-be-eternal cornerstones of american lit. can't help but notice moby-dick isn't on that short list, which is weird, because while reading this i just kept thinking "wow, this is sort of like moby-dick on land minus all the story and adventure." which i'm not really sure what that means, but hey... this is a great book. it's basically a study of isolation. people who live in isolation either because they want to or simply because living in isolation is what life is all about. and the sorrows and heartaches and joys and consolations entailed in all that. it's one of those small books that seem to swell in your mind as and after you read them. great characters, images, moments. it falters a little before the end, but ends so strong, all's forgiven. i miss mrs. todd, i wish we could go back. but we can't. the boat's left. moving on. our days of writing at the desk in the rented schoolhouse are over.