Stars and Smoke Stars and Smoke #1
Reviews
Read 1: 4.9/5 stars. Marie Lu slays, as per usual. WHY IS THE SEQUEL ONLY COMING OUT JUNE 2024.
I loved it, can't think of any faults besides minor editorial discrepancies, but somehow still can't give it 5 stars.
Read 2: 3.75/5 stars. Enjoyable but didn't have nearly as much impact as the first time. Addictive read, though.
Adventurous and action packed, with a cool twist on a typical bodyguard trope. Even though the main character there are upper YA, the writing style and overall content are accessible for younger YA too (in my opinion. I am not a parent, teacher, or librarian.)
Content notes: death of parent & death of sibling (in past), gun violence, hospital situations, kidnapping
It was fun. Definitely a little cheesy and could've leaned more into NA, as both main characters are 19, but this would be a great book for someone looking to bridge the gap between YA and NA!
Uber predictable. Uber unbelievable. Has my main qualm with Marie Lu: teenagers with Mary/Gary Sue skills they have gained from an unrealistically short amount of time. Book would have flowed better if the characters were at least late twenties/early thirties. Other than this, a mustache-twirling villain, and a twist you spy a mile away, I've read worse and it’s an enjoyable, albeit mindless, read.
everything Marie Lu writes is absolute perfection, and this was no exception
Highlights
"Don't drink too much. I don't want your publicist to deal with you trending online for some three A.M. mishap."
Yoongi core iykyk
You’ve got a real knack for torturing yourself, he thought, and pushed the images away to the back of his mind.
He's such a slay, oh my gosh
I will miss you, Winter Young, and your shadow walking beside mine. Don’t forget to look for me now and then.
I might just be there in the sky.
This is giving me war flashbacks to Champion.
Maybe nothing that had ever happened to him had been real. His entire life was a stage.
No, she wanted to yell at him. No, do not let them break you now.
One of his hands came up to wipe something wet from her cheeks. She realized she was crying.
“You’re okay,” he murmured to her in his lovely, melodic voice, and it was the most soothing sound in the world. “You’re okay.”
“I’m okay,” she whispered. Her words sounded more like hers now. “I’m okay.”
OH.MY.GOD.
“Hope you don’t mind chamomile,” she said, nodding to the unopened tea bag she handed him.
“Almost as good as jasmine.”
“What’s your favorite, then?” she said.
“The Merchant of Venice,” he replied automatically.
She must have meant the question as some sort of test, because she looked at him with new awe. “And what’s your favorite line?”
He hummed under his breath before answering. “The man that hath no music in himself, nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils.”
“Any good musician ought to have respect for the written word,” he said with a smile. “And Shakespeare wasn’t bad.”
"Sometimes it takes a nervous person to recognize one."
What an absolute bastard of a flirt.
There was no one else here, and yet, even now, he looked like a star, like he couldn't help but burn so bright that even the air was drawn to him, that the moon yearned to illuminate him.
Sydney had never been afraid of death, simply because she didn't think dead people felt anything. But dying? A different matter entirely.
A gap between her finger and its reflection meant a safe mirror— no gap meant something was up.
He could command the attention of ninety thousand people in an arena, could attract screaming throngs whenever he stepped out any door, could be on the covers of every magazine in the world. And yet he could never convince his mother to stay.
This is where Hideo is superior