Third on the List - Shattered, By Teri Terry (Slated #3)

Hey guys! So not many of you may know much about me so here's a little background about my life at the moment before I plunge into yet another book review/recommendation! I'm 16 years old and I'm from England. Many of you'd know that in England, at the age of 16, around May/June time kids here undergo a lot of exams, around 20 for most though it can vary depending on the subjects you take and whether you take any a year early. To cut to the chase, my exams finished last week (Hurrah!) and I'm now left with lots of time to do nothing much at all, hence why I've actually plunged head first into the books I've recently discovered from the bookstore and borrowed from the library.

In my trip to Waterstones a couple of weeks ago, I found out that one of the series' that I've been reading over the past couple of years had finally released its finale: Shattered. This goes for many of the series I've read and now I have a lovely stack of new books to read over the next few weeks!

As Shattered itself is the last of the trilogy, here's a few background details that you should know about the series and where it starts off with:

1. It's a dystopia, set in England (not America, shock horror!) around 30 years into the future.
2. It's based around a girl who's introduced to us as Kyla, who's been 'Slated' for being a young criminal over the age of 16.
3. In this world, Slating was introduced in order to remove the need to kill young criminals, rather they would have their memories slated and they would be attached with a chip in the brain and a Levo on their wrists to monitor their levels. This would be monitored by a number on the Levo and if it gets too high, or too low, it would cause the slated to black out, reducing the chances of them getting into fits of rage or becoming too upset.
4. The story is intriguing because Kyla starts to remember parts of her past that she shouldn't be able to remember and the story spirals on from there :)

Not to ruin anything for you but this world is amazing, simply because of the amount of mystery and unknown information that there is for your mind, as well as Kyla's mind, to feast on. Little details slip and so much is at stake that it's just brilliant. I finished the last of the trilogy in a matter of days which has been a rarity for me but I would thoroughly recommend the books if you love a) mystery, b) romance, c) dystopia style books and d) matters of morality (which is another theme that is explored thoroughly in the series) and e) the legendary 'Who am I?' question which is prevalent in this book, not just about personality but about what side Kyla wants to go on as well as the question of origin and her parentage.

I absolutely loved the series because it tackles issues that are so real and quite raw that you're just sucked in and pulled away with the wonder of the way life has become for people in this new England. It's questions what you should do and what is right and I honestly think that having to make the judgement yourself and wondering whether the characters' decisions are right is just amazing and I would thoroughly recommend the series.

If you'd like to find out more about the series, the link is here to the Goodreads synopsis/reviews of Slated,
the first book :) Thank you so much for reading! I hope that these kinds of posts are up your street and if you'd like me to do any other posts that you previously enjoyed, please do let me know in the comments!

I'll speak to you soon! Take Care :)

Wuthering Heights: A Book Recommendation (Spoiler Free!)

When I set out to read this book, I never imagined that I would enjoy it as much as I did.

In comparison to other books I've read, it was amazing because of the way it's so different from what you'd expect. Many of the characters are selfish and unlike able and that's what makes it so intriguing, because the love story is a story of two people who know they love each other and yet for reasons that they can't sort out between themselves, they don't get together and then what leads on from there is totally unexpected from a love story, that it's just worth reading for that. I won't spoil it!

The thing I really enjoyed about the book was the fact that it doesn't just follow the youth of the characters, it follows their lives and it's just beautiful to see how everything unfolds and how their children follow or completely change from the legacy of their parents. It was a good book because it wasn't just two separate families, it was two quarreling families and the fact that it didn't include third parties meant that the story was a lot easier to follow and the happenings were a lot more intense because you could follow the developments of the relationships between the characters as the years went by.

Above all, I would definitely recommend the book because of the fact the story unfolds in the most amazing and intriguing ways. I mentioned earlier that I liked it more than I thought I would and that was because, as many book worms out there would agree with me, when you read a book written from first person, and the narrator is selfish and perfectly detestable, it can completely ruin a good story line because of the way the story is distorted by the narrator's completely dumbfounded and unrelatable judgements. However, despite the fact the characters aren't exactly likable, it's not written from their point of view and that means that the narrator's views are expressed which makes the childish disputes and sulkiness not appear acceptable, rather, the narrator balances out the actions that make you question the sanity and morality of the main characters altogether.

The narrator was also one thing I loved about the book because she was both personal and detached; she knew the characters incredibly well and that meant that we could both watch the story unfold and know exactly why things were happening because of the point of view the story was written from. She both could relate the exact happenings and give us as the reader enough insight as the story unfolds for us to be able to follow along the character development and that was brilliant. I've not come across a novel written like it and 

I would thoroughly recommend the book if that sort of thing would intrigue you.

Finally, the ending was awesome because generations down the line, the characters actually become quite likable and that means that the story ends on a high and not a low like you might expect. The character development is fabulous and the depth that you can gain from each detail as well as the observations of the narrator just makes Wuthering Heights a fabulous read.

I hope that you liked this review, it's spoiler free and perhaps may serve more as a recommendation rather than a review. If you guys want me to do a review of the story and the characters, please do let me know because I just wanted to make sure that you didn't get the story spoiled for you if you were planning on reading the book! Thank you for reading! :)