Book 4: Never Never Review

Star Rating:  2 out of 5

I cannot even begin to explain how disappointed I was in this book. I thought the concept was fun, the synopsis made it sound so interesting but it fell flat for me. Did the author do a good job making Peter Pan unlikeable? Yes, she did. The problem was that she didn’t make James Hook likable. The only character that was remotely interesting was Tiger Lily but she ended up being nothing more than a love interest for Hook and a plot device.

I am not trying to discourage anyone from giving the book a try, but I really think the story was very flawed. It was very disjointed and that may be due to the fact that there was seriously a ton of useless details added to the book. I feel that a good author can tread that fine line between building a world and just throwing description in to fill pages.  Alas this book fell into the latter category. I found myself getting so very bored with the details and how it dragged on and on. Yet, the parts that actually mattered to the main plot did somewhat capture my interest (barely). So let me get into the pros and cons of this book because it was not all bad. If it was, I would have given it one star

*Slight spoilers ahead*
Pros:

• Tiger Lily was fantastic! She was strong willed, sarcastic, and overall the best character in the book.
• I did enjoy the mermaids and how they had that little touch of evil to them.
• The author did a great job showing how selfish and insane Peter Pan was.

Cons:

• So many pages of pointless detail or emotions that in fact did not help the story to progress. The author wrote just to fill out pages.
• Hook traveling to an island and having sex with numerous woman was just a weird addition. Yes, it showed that ultimately he was an adult but the first time they do this was weird. He was just thinking about Tiger Lily the entire time that he was having sex with this woman. A very weird addition to a Young Adult book. (Yes in some YA there is sex, but it was weird) The author did not go into detail for these conquests, but still I was not a fan of how it was thrown in.
• The ending in general. Yes in the original Hook gets eaten by the crocodile, but I wish it gave you more. I wish it told you that dying in Neverland allowed him to wake up from his horrible nightmare. In fact, that is how I am pretending that it ended. After everything in Neverland is created because of dreams, and the “neverwastes” were the stuff of nightmares. So, why couldn’t dying in Neverland mean that you just woke up?

Overall:

I am glad I finished the book, but not glad that it was not a very good book. I am not trying to discourage anyone from reading the book, but it was just not the book for me. Personally, I will not be reading any other books by this author. There just wasn’t enough positives in this book to make me want to give her another chance. Overall, the book accomplished being a new spin on a classic tale, just not a great one.

BLANCA PEAK HAS BEEN CLIMBED!!!