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Monument 14 Sky on Fire Monument 14 Series Emmy Laybourne Books

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Monument 14 Sky on Fire Monument 14 Series Emmy Laybourne Books

I made this purchase, along with several others, because I wanted to get a feeling for how some writers write in a certain genre and a specific audience. This particular book seems to be geared towards a “middle-grade” audience (not sure how to describe it). In other words, it seems to be written for a young audience in their pre-teens to teens. Now, I will admit that the initial plot was interesting and kept me interested in wanting to know how the writer would tell it. However, I was dissatisfied. The story opens with this post-apocalyptic type of conflict. I love those sorts of conflicts, so I was curious to know where the writer went from there.
After the major conflict in the story happens (the hail storm), the main character and a group of children are trapped in what I pictured to be like a Wal-Mart. Up to that point, and I had no trouble with the plot or even the lack of character development. In those short chapters, there are so many characters shot at the reader that I stopped at chapter 13 and still don’t know who everyone truly is. There is a serious lack of developing a solid and interesting narrator, and there is a lack of character tags. Perhaps, not spitting out so many different characters out at once would have eased that issue some.
The story also seems to be more plot driven than character driven. The story seemed to have relied on that huge opening scene with the hail storm, but the story dropped down from there. After that opening conflict, what usually keeps me interested or keeps me reading is the narration, however, this narrator didn’t keep me hooked. The narrator himself is poorly developed and it seems like, for the sake of letting the reader know what is going on, the writer interrupts the narration to give these sort of “by the way this is what is happening” moments.
The Plot
However, I managed to pull through the narration to get further into the story for the sake of seeing how the writer drew out the rest of the story. Unfortunately, I was taken further and further out of the story the more I read. Now, I get that this is not a true story and has a science fiction taste to it. However, some things in this story seemed unrealistic or unbelievable (and I am not referring to the actual devastating event that took place).
What I mean is that some of the dialog seemed forced and the writer seemed to want to so desperately have a pun that it just ruined her dialog. One example of this is the man outside the Greenway wanting to get in. We are told that further along that this man outside seemed to have been exhibiting the same type of “rage” that the main character went through. What makes this part unrealistic and somewhat contradictory in the story, in my opinion, is that when the narrator “rages” we are told that he has trouble getting his words out when he tries to communicate to his brother. As a matter of fact, the narrator doesn’t speak when he “rages.” We are only told his thought of how he wants to punch and beat someone. If the main character is unable to talk here, how is the “gate rattler” able to dish out full sentences? Also, apart from that seeming contradictory to the effects of the “raging.” The “Wolf and the three little pigs” reference by the “gate rattler” was one of the dialogs that I am referring to that seemed forced in order to put a pun in the story. In addition to that scene seeming unrealistic, the writer just drops the conflict with the gate rattler. We hear no more about him. It seems like the writer didn’t want to go into the trouble of explaining what happened to him. Instead, she has the main character begin to sing to get the children to leave the gate where the rattler is (another action that seemed unrealistic or forced). Somehow, the children are able to ignore that someone wants to kill them. In fact, everyone forgets that someone is outside wanting to kill them and they all leave and are asleep in the next chapter. This was an issue for me to simply overlook.
Other issues that kept me from continuing on with the story were that the characters don’t seem to give a damn about Astrid after she disappears and hides in the store. No one (up to the point where I stopped reading) ever decided, “Hey maybe we should form a search party and look for her.”
Instead, there was a Ceremony, an Election, and the cleaning of the store (all of which are far more important than someone missing/gone). I found Josie’s sudden jump back into reality unrealistic and forced as well. She suddenly is okay and decides to take control. Not only that, but after she does and gives her demands (a ceremony and an election) NO ONE repeals the idea. Not one person says, “That’s stupid. There’s people dying out there and you want to have a ceremony and an election.” Everyone agrees to it, considering we know the group for contradiction each other. Example – Batiste’s constant fights with Chloe. It felt like the writer did not want to trouble herself with children arguing about what to do anymore and just decided they would all just think the idea is a good one. Don’t get me wrong, with rightful justification or explanation as to why everyone agreed the two ideas would have seemed okay.
And, the last thing that sort of drew me out of this story was the fact that these kids were all experts (I’m exaggerating) at something. The way they suddenly realized that the story’s air conditioning could be letting in toxic chemicals surprised me. The way they were able to seal the air conditioning vents surprised me. The way an eight year old boy appeared to cook so much better than me surprised me. I simply didn’t find these “children” to be “children enough” if that makes sense, and that was what drew me away the most from continuing to read. Again, I made this purchase to get an idea for how to write myself to this type of audience or this type of genre, and it seems like there were ways in which this story could have been told that would have kept my attention better. This story may work for the audience that it is written for, but just didn’t work for me.


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Monument 14 Sky on Fire Monument 14 Series Emmy Laybourne Books Reviews

I read the first installment and liked it well enough, but the series has gone way downhill with the second one. The characters are unlikeable and two dimensional...it wasn't such a problem in the first book, but by the second we should have started to flesh out their identities a little more and this just didn't happen. I didn't much like the hero of the novels, Dean...he seemed like a shallow jerk. His interest in his crush, Astrid, is mainly based on how she looks, and although this is typical of a teenage boy, it's not typical that he would develop deep feelings for her based on her characterization. She kind of seems like a train wreck, she's not very nice and she's a basket case. And I also didn't like the sexual aspect to the novel, and it wasn't just because this is supposed to be a book for teens. It didn't fit with the story. Astrid had already established she wasn't interested in Dean...why would she, in a space of twenty-four hours, go from declaring her disinterest to having sex with him ten minutes after her boyfriend and the father of her baby returned? That would never happen in real life, ever.This was like a soap opera. And then she decides she wants to be Dean's girlfriend, and Jake is okay with this? And Dean has no issues with the fact that she's pregnant with Jake's child? Good grief. There was no real relationship development between these two at all. The author should have left all that out and just had Dean continued to crush hopelessly on Astrid while concentrating on the main meat of the novel. However, I will definitely read the third installment when it comes out ANYWAY...so I guess the author can laugh all the way to the bank.
It's a good quick read, with very realistic situations, although I don't think anyone under 10th grade should read. Not only is there violence, with kids killing people, there are also sexual situations which should be kept to older kids.

However, the story is riveting and the characters are very believable! I really hope nothing like this disaster befalls us! The scary part is that it really could happen! It's a volcano eruption that starts a series of natural disasters that we have seen on a smaller scale already, so it is very believable! And plausible! Chillingly so!

Time to ready my disaster bag and include some good gas masks! And don't forget duct tape! Never forget the duct tape!
I literally couldn't put this book down. It was fast paced and the character development was spot on. You quickly wrapped in to this end of the world scenario and you are cheering for these kids. You are completely absorbed in to their world. I was blown away how quickly it hooked me and didn't let me go.

I normally would type in my favorite character at this point but it is too hard to pick. I mean Dean is great and a perfect narrator for this tale but I also love Astrid, Alex, Niko, Max and Jocie. It is just too hard. I'm going to go with Dean though because it is his point of view and his story right now. I have to say that I just love Max's stories. Now that kid has a life I want to know more about.

I would recommend this book to any of my dystopian loving friends and I have recommended it to co workers. I just really loved it.
I made this purchase, along with several others, because I wanted to get a feeling for how some writers write in a certain genre and a specific audience. This particular book seems to be geared towards a “middle-grade” audience (not sure how to describe it). In other words, it seems to be written for a young audience in their pre-teens to teens. Now, I will admit that the initial plot was interesting and kept me interested in wanting to know how the writer would tell it. However, I was dissatisfied. The story opens with this post-apocalyptic type of conflict. I love those sorts of conflicts, so I was curious to know where the writer went from there.
After the major conflict in the story happens (the hail storm), the main character and a group of children are trapped in what I pictured to be like a Wal-Mart. Up to that point, and I had no trouble with the plot or even the lack of character development. In those short chapters, there are so many characters shot at the reader that I stopped at chapter 13 and still don’t know who everyone truly is. There is a serious lack of developing a solid and interesting narrator, and there is a lack of character tags. Perhaps, not spitting out so many different characters out at once would have eased that issue some.
The story also seems to be more plot driven than character driven. The story seemed to have relied on that huge opening scene with the hail storm, but the story dropped down from there. After that opening conflict, what usually keeps me interested or keeps me reading is the narration, however, this narrator didn’t keep me hooked. The narrator himself is poorly developed and it seems like, for the sake of letting the reader know what is going on, the writer interrupts the narration to give these sort of “by the way this is what is happening” moments.
The Plot
However, I managed to pull through the narration to get further into the story for the sake of seeing how the writer drew out the rest of the story. Unfortunately, I was taken further and further out of the story the more I read. Now, I get that this is not a true story and has a science fiction taste to it. However, some things in this story seemed unrealistic or unbelievable (and I am not referring to the actual devastating event that took place).
What I mean is that some of the dialog seemed forced and the writer seemed to want to so desperately have a pun that it just ruined her dialog. One example of this is the man outside the Greenway wanting to get in. We are told that further along that this man outside seemed to have been exhibiting the same type of “rage” that the main character went through. What makes this part unrealistic and somewhat contradictory in the story, in my opinion, is that when the narrator “rages” we are told that he has trouble getting his words out when he tries to communicate to his brother. As a matter of fact, the narrator doesn’t speak when he “rages.” We are only told his thought of how he wants to punch and beat someone. If the main character is unable to talk here, how is the “gate rattler” able to dish out full sentences? Also, apart from that seeming contradictory to the effects of the “raging.” The “Wolf and the three little pigs” reference by the “gate rattler” was one of the dialogs that I am referring to that seemed forced in order to put a pun in the story. In addition to that scene seeming unrealistic, the writer just drops the conflict with the gate rattler. We hear no more about him. It seems like the writer didn’t want to go into the trouble of explaining what happened to him. Instead, she has the main character begin to sing to get the children to leave the gate where the rattler is (another action that seemed unrealistic or forced). Somehow, the children are able to ignore that someone wants to kill them. In fact, everyone forgets that someone is outside wanting to kill them and they all leave and are asleep in the next chapter. This was an issue for me to simply overlook.
Other issues that kept me from continuing on with the story were that the characters don’t seem to give a damn about Astrid after she disappears and hides in the store. No one (up to the point where I stopped reading) ever decided, “Hey maybe we should form a search party and look for her.”
Instead, there was a Ceremony, an Election, and the cleaning of the store (all of which are far more important than someone missing/gone). I found Josie’s sudden jump back into reality unrealistic and forced as well. She suddenly is okay and decides to take control. Not only that, but after she does and gives her demands (a ceremony and an election) NO ONE repeals the idea. Not one person says, “That’s stupid. There’s people dying out there and you want to have a ceremony and an election.” Everyone agrees to it, considering we know the group for contradiction each other. Example – Batiste’s constant fights with Chloe. It felt like the writer did not want to trouble herself with children arguing about what to do anymore and just decided they would all just think the idea is a good one. Don’t get me wrong, with rightful justification or explanation as to why everyone agreed the two ideas would have seemed okay.
And, the last thing that sort of drew me out of this story was the fact that these kids were all experts (I’m exaggerating) at something. The way they suddenly realized that the story’s air conditioning could be letting in toxic chemicals surprised me. The way they were able to seal the air conditioning vents surprised me. The way an eight year old boy appeared to cook so much better than me surprised me. I simply didn’t find these “children” to be “children enough” if that makes sense, and that was what drew me away the most from continuing to read. Again, I made this purchase to get an idea for how to write myself to this type of audience or this type of genre, and it seems like there were ways in which this story could have been told that would have kept my attention better. This story may work for the audience that it is written for, but just didn’t work for me.