I really like the setting, somehow we haven’t had a story in Hawaii told from the perspective of a local boy or had a story set in Hawaii at all. There’s a lot of surfer terminology I don’t exactly understand, but it adds to the authenticity of the story. I can tell that the narrator really wants to win but also respects his friend’s skills as a surfer even when Riley pulls ahead of him at the competition. But he gets wiped out and injured at the last heat, that made me really disappointed. I thought that he would be a lot more upset but he was in shock thinking about it, and the story ends there. I wonder what he did after that, or if he even got on a board again after that.

I really like the new additions to this story, it more bluntly shows how Maria is suffering from her father’s passing even though ten years have passed. She might be hurting herself and got in a Spanish argument with her mother on the day they were supposed to honor him. Maria is an honor student who takes care of her little brother while her brother has to work but the pressure and her feelings are weighing her down too much, she needs help but all her mother says to do is keep being happy

I forgot that I really liked how the author described things in the story, and how we’re casually told half a page in that this takes place in a future where working conditions for the middle class have somehow gotten worse. I really like the new addition, even though we still don’t know anything about the strange creature that forced his way into the narrarator’s work pod, it’s obvious that it was shot by something (or someone) and might be bleeding out. I wish I could read more!

I think that story is more polished this time around, but the pace is still too fast for me to get invested in the character and I still can’t feel any emotion behind the words so it all feels very stale. It’s just someone calmly describing a sports game and that’s not really interesting. We still aren’t told what happened to the narrator’s mother and the best friend isn’t mentioned before the last page, so everything in the story feels very out of order.

I really like how the main character is written so hilariously, even though she’s basically a psychopath I strangely enjoy hearing about her endeavors to cripple her boyfriend which resulted in his death. She complains a lot about having to clean up the girl her boyfriend cheated on her with so next time the main character hired someone, though I’m wondering where the money came from. She kills someone just because he resembles her boyfriend and stalks him for weeks before finally doing it, but for some reason blacks out and feels disappointed. I really enjoyed this story, it’s very well written. The main character is so likeable even though she’s a murdering psychopath. The extra pages add a lot to the character and the depths of her mental illness

The characters feel very stale, and I can’t help but crack up every time I hear them say “Tabasco Warrior” so seriously. The stages he goes through are over so quickly and the main character literally has no fear as he goes up the mountain that killed his father. He’s as bland as plain tofu. Also I have no idea what a “demon dragon” is. I really don’t like how Dasani is named after a bottled water company and that he’s just so perfect in every way, he has no flaw. I don’t really understand why he wants to be immortal.

I really like the picture at the beginning, it really sets the scene for a desolate story. It’s really tragic that a little girl had to take care of an addict and only got care from her mother to keep up appearances. It wasn’t her fault she died, Lilith shouldn’t have had that kind of responsibility. Her mother should have gotten help.

Lilith had to deal with her abusive and shitty alcoholic uncle, and it might be implied that he had relations with her mother since Lilith was described to look like her. But it might just be that her uncle is such a horrible person he tried to rape his niece for no reason.

It breaks my heart that Lilith seems to think that her only reason for living is to serve her family even though they don’t treat her like a person. Her uncle believed that he killed her, but said it was Lilith’s fault and buried her alive.

I am happy that she finally gets a break and can stay with a loving family for the first time in her life, but it seems like something bad happened to the mom. She even got to talk to a cute boy but his fangirls were so jealous they got Lilith gang raped. And even that wasn’t enough… one of them tried to drown her in the toilet.

At this point she’s definitely suicidal, as she complains that she keeps almost dying and feels annoyed that she hasn’t died yet. David, the cute boy she talked to was very worried about her and took her home again, but he was angry that she basically let herself be raped by those boys and said “you’re mine” just like her uncle had

It seems like she’ll always be around horrible people who take advantage of her. Lilith finds the remains of a child in the basement (because nothing good is ever in a basement) and discovers that Joe murdered one of his children and Lilith faces him though he kills her for it

It turns out she really is immortal, and keeps coming back like some kind of avenging angel. I really just thought that it was a miracle she survived the first two times, or that her tormentors assumed that she was dead. I can’t say it was a happy ending, but Lilith finally takes back her life and stops letting herself be a victim.

It’s better than the original version of the story but the ending is kind of ruined by giving it away on the very first page. I thought that the queen was going to die in childbirth but that cliche is done. The protagonist has very realistic fears which I really appreciate and can personally understand, of being a failure and letting his family down. The hero of the story even goes on an epic journey to get stronger and has a grand homecoming, but there isn’t too much description of that, we’re just told that it happens. Now I realize this is the only story that has sex in it, although it’s only mentioned in passing I think it’s a detail that makes the character feel more real. And just like in real life after a party you can wake up to a disaster, though that doesn’t usually end up with your dad being killed. I find it interesting that the story seems to be telling us that you should always execute your enemies if you can and that the story actually shows the bad guy laughing like a maniac though I don’t really understand his evil plan. It says he’s going to enact “genocide on the kingdom and the world?” I don’t think that the author knows what genocide means and they misspelled it. A battle between dragon riders and an evil sorcerer sounds amazing and I actually got a little excited reading about the good guys going off into battle. Even the environment is like a video game at the evil lair, with the dragons fighting medieval war technology and dark magic, including ghouls and zombie archers which is pretty awesome. I love how the evildoer put up such a good fight but he got defeated with a royal punch from the new king.

I always look forward to Cameron’s stories, especially since they seem to get better every time he writes one. He has gone into the fantasy genre before since he’s a fan of such things but the first one was more like realistic fantasy and the second like an alternate version of the TV show Supernatural. This one is really unique and it’s a story about a vampire trying to fit into the modern age and it’s really fun to read.

Usually when you hear this title it’s about someone really amazing in a respectable field or someone with incredible skills, but how a god is defined in this story is really depressing. I think that the protagonist is just a kid, and he might suffer from seizures and his parents decide to fix that by beating him. Even going to church he’s reminded that he has to constantly be punished for every little thing about himself that isn’t perfect and that’s horrible. He’s living in a very strict time period and I’m really hoping this character can find a way to be happy. It’s an accurate depiction of a brutal time in history for young people and the characters are very realistic though most of them are assholes