Review: Unmade by Sarah Rees Brennan

* This review may contain spoilers for the previous books in The Lynburn Legacy series.

Unmade (The Lynburn Legacy #3)
By Sarah Rees Brennan
Publisher: Random House Children’s Books
Format: Hardcover
Source: Purchased

To Sum It Up: Despite Sorry-in-the-Vale appearing to be firmly in the grasp of Rob Lynburn, Kami isn’t ready to give up on saving her town—or Jared—just yet. A hidden piece of Lynburn family history may provide the hope Kami has been searching for, but she may not be the only one who has to pay a steep price to free the town from Rob. Without this sliver of a chance to defeat him, though, Sorry-in-the-Vale is certainly lost, and Kami can’t bear to watch that happen, either.

Review: I’ve finished reading The Lynburn Legacy series and survived to discuss it! As anyone else who’s also read the trilogy will probably agree, that’s no small feat. There’s been heartbreak galore throughout the series, and Unmade carries on that fine tradition. I hadn’t gotten very far into Unmade before I was already fearing for one of my favorite characters. All I could think was, for the love of God Sarah Rees Brennan, please don’t kill this character!

On top of worrying about the fates of certain characters, I was a tad anxious about what to expect from the book in general. Untold was a little lighter on plot advancement than I’d thought it would be, so I wasn’t sure if Unmade was going to be a rush to wrap up the series. Fortunately, that wasn’t the case; the action in Unmade was for the most part better paced than it was in Untold, although once in a while the quest to stop Rob Lynburn would take an extended backseat to a subplot.

From the beginning, this series’ greatest appeal to me has been how freaking hilarious it is amidst all of the evil sorcery enveloping Sorry-in-the-Vale. The series’ sense of humor is an exact match for mine, and that has contributed heavily to my enjoyment of all three books. Judge me as you will, but I’ve loved every minute of laughing out loud even as a town and its citizens stood on the brink of a takeover by a diabolical megalomaniac. If you’ve guffawed your way through the first two books like I have, you shan’t be let down by all of the witty dialogue in book three.

The other signature of this series has been its ability to seize the reader’s heart in its fist and pulverize it without mercy. I’m still looking for a few pieces of my heart, and not just because of some, er, stuff that happens that I don’t like to think about. My heart also forgot to beat a few times because it was too busy melting over the prose. There are some very prettily written lines (some of which may belong to Jared) that I needed to reread and reread again before I was ready to turn the page.

Despite having a few of the proverbial bad apples in their family tree, I’m really sad to bid adieu to the Lynburns: sweet Ash, brooding Jared (whom I loved because of said brooding), and even frosty Lillian. I actually grew quite fond of Lillian and was impressed by how protective she was of her two Lynburn boys. I’ll also miss Sorry-in-the-Vale, the quaint little English town with an epic tale to tell.

All in All: Unspoken is still my favorite installment because it’s simply spot-on in every way, but Unmade is a strong conclusion to the series.

Review: Untold by Sarah Rees Brennan

* This review contains spoilers for the previous book in the series, Unspoken.

Untold (The Lynburn Legacy #2)
By Sarah Rees Brennan
Publisher: Random House Children’s Books
Format: Hardcover
Source: Purchased

To Sum It Up: With the magical link between them cut, Kami and Jared no longer know each other’s thoughts. However much Kami believed she might welcome being alone inside her head for the first time in her life is almost entirely dampened by Jared’s anger over her decision to sever the bond. Meanwhile, Rob Lynburn and his followers are ready to revert Sorry-in-the-Vale to its past, in which the Lynburns ruled over it absolutely with their magic. Kami is determined to stop him, even without Rob’s numbers and the combined magical might behind him.

Review: I survived another Lynburn Legacy book! Let me tell you, things were looking pretty dicey following that soul-crushing ending of Unspoken. Never have I simultaneously loved a book and wanted to fling it across the room in such equal proportion. So it was with immense, and I believe totally justified, trepidation that I finally cracked open my copy of Untold.

I’ll get straight to what I wasn’t so keen about in Untold so I can spend the rest of the review gushing about what I loved. Surprisingly, the ending didn’t leave me too wrecked. Oh, it was upsetting for sure, but I’d anticipated much, much, worse. The thing about Untold is, it feels a bit too much like a middle book. It gets off to an awesome start with some homicidal scarecrows (!), but then there’s no real action until towards the end. In between, the novel focuses on the terrible awkwardness , and that’s probably phrasing it lightly, between Kami and Jared now that they’re no longer connected to each other. Jared is very angry at Kami, which sometimes gets to be too much for her and then she gets angry at Jared, and so forth. While I still love both characters and realize that theirs is an extremely unique and complicated relationship because of their now broken bond, I would have been okay with a little less Kami/Jared post-link fallout.

With that out of the way, it’s time for the gushing. This book—the hilarity! I chuckled my way through Unspoken, and I chuckled my way through Untold (Jared Lynburn: tavern wench. HAHAHA!). The characters just have this knack for saying the quirkiest things at the most unexpected times, and I simply LOVE IT. It’s as though this series knows exactly what I find humorous, nay, hysterical. During one exchange between Kami’s father, Jon, and Jared’s aunt, Lillian Lynburn, I couldn’t stop laughing. Out loud. I hardly ever do that while reading, but here’s a series that has made laughing out loud a rule rather than the exception.

I’ve grown very fond of Kami’s little group, and I was happy to reunite with all of them. Her best friend, Angela, is an absolute riot, and she’s in top-notch, nap-loving form in Untold. I also love Angela’s brother, Rusty; he’s so mellow (i.e. the polar opposite of his sister), yet quite observant. We also get a deeper sense of how far from easy life is for the other Lynburn lad, Ash. His father Rob is an evil sorcerer, mother Lillian perceives him as weak, and even cousin Jared isn’t very nice to him. I found myself feeling sympathetic toward Ash, especially given how his ice-queen mother treats him.

Although Untold didn’t quite match the spark of Unspoken for me, nonetheless it was a highly entertaining read. The wit that utterly charmed me in the first book continues to be a delight in the sequel. And in a series that seems to revel in maddening heartbreak, you have to cherish every instance of humor you can get.

All in All: Unspoken is still my favorite in the series thus far, but Untold is not without its moments. I do, however, think that it could have benefitted from some more action through the middle, instead of saving it all for the last few chapters.

Review: Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan

Unspoken (The Lynburn Legacy #1)
By Sarah Rees Brennan
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Format: Hardcover
Source: Library

To Sum It Up: Sorry-in-the-Vale may seem like a sleepy little English town, but in fact it hides some very dark secrets. Its fortunes appear to rise and fall with those of its founding family, the Lynburns, the last of whom left for America seventeen years ago. Now they’ve returned, and Sorry-in-the-Vale resident Kami Glass wants to find out why. Kami has a story of her own that she keeps to herself—her best friend is Jared, the voice in her head that has been with her all of her life. The last thing Kami expects is for Jared to be a real person who shows up in Sorry-in-the-Vale, but that is precisely what happens.

Review: If I could personify my sense of humor in the form of a book, it would be this one. I’ve never encountered a book that so perfectly matched my notion of what’s funny. I had to put Unspoken down several times because I was laughing too hard to continue reading, and out loud at that. And believe me, books don’t make me laugh out loud too often.

So what, exactly, did I find so amusing about this book? The characters, particularly our protagonist, Kami, are just unbelievably witty. The dialogue in the novel crackles with an easy levity that doesn’t feel labored. Of course, what constitutes comedy varies from person to person, and not everyone may think Unspoken is as riotous as I did. But for me, reading this was like meeting a kindred spirit.

Although it was the humor in Unspoken that bowled me over the most, not every aspect of the novel is about laughs and giggles. Something sinister is going on in Sorry-in-the-Vale, and it appears to be connected to the Lynburns, the town’s founding family. The tone of the book effortlessly shifts from light to chilling; it could be very creepy at times, yet without feeling like too much of a departure from the story’s droller moments. I am just in awe of how Sarah Rees Brennan weaved a dark, paranormal tale with hilarity.

I absolutely adored Kami as a protagonist. She possesses a contagious vivacity; I’d love to have her as my best friend in real life. I also loved her journalistic aspirations, though her list of potential stories for the school newspaper that she started up, The Nosy Parker (love that name, too), would be more at home in a supermarket tabloid. Kami was such a delight to read about; she’s smart, funny, determined, and a ton of other adjectives that there isn’t enough room in this review to include.

If Kami is my new fictional best friend, then Jared Lynburn is my new fictional boyfriend. He had me swooning even when he was only the voice in Kami’s head. Like Kami and just about every other character in this book, Jared has a knack for spouting witticisms. He’s also known a lot of pain in his life, and his source of comfort, through their mental connection, has been Kami. It is so, so awkward when Jared and Kami discover that the other is a real person. In a sense, they’ve known each other their entire lives, but at the same time, they don’t know each other at all. This is such an inventive concept, and the novel fully delivers on exploring both sides of sharing a bond like this. You have two young people who have been a part of one another’s lives for as long as they can remember. They’ve weathered tough times together, and yet they’ve never been able to experience being completely alone with their thoughts individually. This is quite different from your average conflict in a YA novel.

And now I must speak of something that still pains me when I think about it: the ending. It is cruel. So very, very, very cruel. I believe my mouth was open in a silent scream afterwards; I was too stunned to make any sound. There should be a support group for readers who’ve finished this book; I know I needed one to help me cope with what happened. Needless to say, I am desperate for the sequel; the story just CANNOT stay like this!

All in All: Despite how it ended, Unspoken was fantastic. I loved the original premise and how quirky the characters were. An ace read in every respect.

Favorite Quotes:

"'Let me reference the mansion again,' Kami said. 'Put the jerk in the south wing, you won't see him for weeks at a time. Or lock him in the attic. The law will not be on your side, but literary precedent will.'" — "Chapter 3: The Secret in the Woods"

"'I knew we should not have brought you,' Mom said. 'The Lynburns built this town on their blood and bones.'
'That was their first mistake,' Jared said. 'They should've built a city on rock and roll.'" — "Chapter 7: You Are Not Safe"

"'Is this true Kami? Are you going out on a date?' Dad asked tragically. 'Wearing that? Wouldn't you fancy a shapeless cardigan instead? You rock a shapeless cardigan, honey.'" — "Chapter 15: Burning or Drowning"