Title: city of ghosts
Author: Victoria Schwab
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: scholastic press
Page count: 285
Release day: August 28th 2018
Series: Cassidy Blake #1
Rating: 3 stars
What is it about?
Cassidy Blake’s parents are ghosts hunters. But there is one quite important thing about Cassidy that her parents do not know, she can see actual ghosts. Because she died and came back alive a year ago, which her parents also do not know. Oh and her best friend is a ghosts, so for other people it can look like she is talking to herself.
She is really looking forward to her summer break, free of school ghosts. But then her parents tell her they are going to film a TV show about hunting ghosts during summer in one of the most hunted cities, Edinburgh. Which means her summer will also be full of ghosts. What a change of plans..
What I thought:
Since this book is written by Victoria Schwab, an author I consider a favourite, my expectations were sky high!
The positive
I think I said it before, but I really fancy some good humour in books, and this book definitely contains some humour!
“’Ghost five’ I say, for luck. A ghost five is like a high five for friends who can’t really touch. It’s basically me putting out my hand and him pretending to hit it, both of us murmuring a soft ‘smack’ sound on contact”.
I could really relate to this one haha:
“’Come on’, she says, dragging me to my feet. ‘it’s such a nice day.’ ‘It looks like rain.’”.
Besides the humour I also really enjoyed the writing style! All her books are just so nice to read even if it’s only for the writing!
I also want to say that I really like the characters, but know that I really start to think about it, they did not develop a lot throughout the book. So that perspective is a bit less, but then again the book is quite short, so not that much space for development.
The negative
I knew this would be a middle grade novel and that it would probably be quite different from her other works, but I was still really surprised by the difference. The building up to the story was quite long for such a short novel, that I was almost afraid nothing would really happen..
Cassidy is supposed to be 12, but it reads as if she is 14. Like how she handles things and talks is like 14, but then sometimes she would ask what a certain word means, which at 14 she should know. It really feels like as if the author was like ‘oh yeah she is not supposed to know this, let’s explain’. And that read a bit weirdly.
Also I really love Harry Potter, and Harry Potter references, but I think it was a bit overdone in this book.. And I’m wondering why there had to by so many of them?! I do understand them, but I’m wondering how many people of the actual age range know the books by heart, would it not be weird for them to read?
Okay my last complaint, this boko was waaaay to similar to the archived, with moving in and out of the veil. Like of course the actual age group would not have read the archived, but I would have expected something more original.. (I did really like the archived!)
So I did enjoy the book but I think it could have been better. But part of the reason is of course that I’m above the age group. And I do think people from the correct age group would enjoy it more!
Come talk to me!
What book of your favourite author disappointed you?