Blog Tour Review: Wendy Darling Volume #3 - Shadow by Colleen Oakes

Book info:

Title:  Shadow
Author:  Colleen Oakes
Series:  Wendy Darling #3
Genre:  YA Fairy Tale retelling/fantasy
Release Date:  July 18th, 2017
Publisher:  Sparkpress, SparkPoint Studio
Source:  ARC from publisher for review
My rating:  5 stars

Synopsis:

Wendy Darling has found herself once again in the arms of charming Peter Pan, the god-child who desires power above all things. This time, though, Wendy burns not with passion but with a secret: with Hook as her ally, she is there to defeat the evil that lies inside of Peter, the evil that holds all Neverland hostage—the Shadow.

To do this, Wendy must quietly undo Peter from inside his heart while at the same time convincing Tink to betray the twisted love that binds them together. This is a task made nearly impossible by the arrival of Booth, her sweetheart from London and a new pawn in Peter’s manipulative game—a boy whose heart she must break in order to save his life. 

As all of Neverland prepares to fight, Wendy races to untangle Peter’s connection to the Shadow, a secret long buried in the Forsaken Garden. When the time comes, pirates, mermaids, Lost Boys, and the Darling family will all rise—but if Wendy can’t call the Shadow, they will all be destroyed by Peter’s dark soul. War has come to paradise, and Neverland will never be the same.

My Review:
If you've followed me for a while, you know that I am a big fan of fairy tale retellings.  This series is one that I got the chance to read about a year ago, starting with the second book.  While I haven't gone back and picked up the first, even though I do have a copy, I was able to get right in with book two, Seas.    If you go click that link and check out my review, you'll see that I really enjoyed it.  So when I heard from the publisher about the chance to read the final book in the series, I jumped on the offer.  What is really fun about reading it right now, is that I actually was on a family vacation to Disneyworld when I started it this past weekend.  Even more funny is that the first ride I rode at the Magic Kingdom was the Peter Pan ride.  

In this final book in the trilogy, Colleen Oakes has taken the well-loved story of Peter Pan, and turned it around, while completely staying true to the original ideas and characters in such a way that you still feel you are in that original Neverland written about by JM Barrie.  If you haven't finished the first two books, you might want to quit reading for my final paragraphs of the review, just know that I highly recommend this whole series.

While we have come to root against both Peter Pan and Tinkerbell in this story, Wendy is able to still see the good in Peter, as well as Tink,  and be able to hope that not only will Wendy be able to defeat the Shadow that is destroying Neverland, but that somehow she can also redeem both Peter and Tink, and help them to be the characters that everyone can love once again.  I rooted for Wendy's love from back home, Booth, to understand when she had to play up to Peter, to make him believe she loved him instead of Booth, in order to save his life.  I love that what I feel is more realistic, for her explanation to convince Booth without a ton of distrust like you so often find in these situations.  While there were those who sacrificed in the end to defeat the shadow, it wasn't in a way that everyone just gave up and became good, no, it worked the way that it needed to.  Many beloved characters may have lost their lives in this story, but they did it in ways that pulled at my heart, and kept the story as rich as could be.  There were no easy out solutions for this, and there were still surprises at each and every turn of the tale.  

If you like a good retelling, or are a fan of Peter Pan, this is the book you need to pick up and read next! 

Tomorrow Land by Mari Mancusi

Tomorrow Land by Mari Mancusi
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

First I want to thank Netgalley for letting me read the egalley of this book. This is the first book I've read by this author, although I know of her from seeing her books at the bookstore where I work. So the premise sounded good, and I'm glad I requested it, and now I will be looking to read more of the author's books.
First I want to say there are some spoilers in this review, so read on at your own risk. First I have to say the cover of this is something that might turn me away. The story sounds good, and knowing the story now that I've read it the picture works, but before it was a little too sci-fi for me. And I do like science fiction. But this is a dystopian, apocalyptic, zombie book all in one. With even a touch of the X-men. The book starts out in the past, but you don't necessarily know that. We meet Peyton, and learn about the nerdy guy who has a crush on her, Chris. But Peyton is friends with one of the most popular girls, and is dating a popular guy, so isn't interested in Chris. Her friend, while popular, does seem to be a nice person though, not a mean girl. Her boyfriend, is pretty much a jerk though. In this dystopia, due to AIDS becoming a huge problem, they have created a vaccine, and you must get a certificate saying you've had your vaccine before you're allowed to have sex. Peyton's father is something of a pariah/freak in the town. He is basically a conspiracy theorist, even went to jail for something like that. Now he's preparing for the end of the world that he says is coming soon. A good start to the book, got me hooked.
Then, the next chapter, all of a sudden we're 4 years in the future, the apocalypse has occurred and Peyton is getting ready to come out of the safe shelter her father created for her and her mother. And as I read that, I was like, WHOA!!! I want to know what happened that led up to that point! But I was not to be disappointed, it turned out that the author changed back and forth between each chapter so that we got the whole story up to the time when Peyton came out into the new world as we learned what Peyton had to go through to get to her father. Her father implanted her with razor claws, kind of Wolverine like. And she got eye implants that helped her to see things, had GPS, could see the heat signatures, which helped her to find zombies. She also had nanobots in her bloodstream that made her stronger. So basically she became a fighting machine. She is so happy to find Chris still alive, or as he now is called, Chase. Chase is happy, but still a little upset with her. See, Peyton never showed up on the day he and his brother, and a band of other students from school, decided to go to the mountains to try to live it out.
Peyton has to get to Disneyworld. The one thing her father told her before she went down in the shelter was that he and some other scientists were meeting there to start a new society. That it was a safe place they could have everything they needed there. Plus, Peyton's implants will begin to go downhill after 4 years, and she'll need her dad to fix them.
I loved the back and forth by chapter. It worked really well for this story. YOu only learned what you needed to answer questions in the chapter before. I liked that, spoiler alert, this is a stand alone story, there is a solution to the problem, and it can be fixed. I won't tell you how, I'll let you read that yourself.
My only complaint, I'm not sure I like the way Peyton and Chase kept having to hide their feelings from each other for the good of the other one. Then they'd share and get past that, but then something else would come up and they'd vow not to get close again. It happened several times in the book, and it just seems to me that two people would agree to not keep doing that. I know they're still kind of young, like 19, but still. When they read their destination there is a surpise I didn't see coming, and I like that I was able to be surprised and not figure it all out. One other tiny thing that bothered me. Chase/Chris name change. There were times Peyton called him both names. I think either stick with the old or the new.
Great characters, I liked the kids, reminded me a bit of Monument 14 in that way. I liked the living in Walmart too. I think if zombies come, I'm going to go live in a nearby Target. :-)

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