Review: Tris & Izzie by Mette Ivie Harrison

 Tris & Izzie by Mette Ivie Harrison

• Reading Level: Young Adult 
• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: EgmontUSA
• ISBN-10: 1606841734
• ISBN-13: 978-1606841730
• Received From: netGalley

   From Goodreads:
A modern retelling of the German fairytale "Tristan and Isolde", Tris and Izzie is about a young witch named Izzie who is dating Mark King, the captain of the basketball team and thinks her life is going swimmingly well. Until -- she makes a love potion for her best friend Brangane and then ends up taking it herself accidentally, and falling in love with Tristan, the new guy at school

My Thoughts:
I saw this book on netGalley and it was the cover that drew me in and then the synopsis is really good as well, so I had high hopes for this book. However, sadly this book most definitely did not live up to my expectations. When I got to page 4 and I read this line: "Mark told me that if I really disliked him he would 'exile' him, which meant that no one would speak to him without Mark's permission.", it was a total *headdesk* moment! That is the moment when I started to get a bad feeling about this book but I kept reading  hoping that it was a fluke.


Reason #1: The characters in her book are just downright annoying, absolutely none of them had any redeeming qualities about them. Izzie, to put it simply she's a moron, a hypocrite, and someone who thinks that she knows it all. Branna, I think I actually hated her more than I did Izzie. These girls claim to be best friends but they have no consideration for each other at all. Izzie decides that since Branna doesn't have a boyfriend that she is going to use one of her mom's love potions even though Branna said that she didn't want one. Then Branna decides to break her promise, of keeping the secret that Izzie's mom can do magic, because she "loves" Mark (who is Izzie's boyfriend) and wants to prove to him that Izzie has lied to him while she hasn't. Mark, is a freaking douche bag and very flaky, end of story! Tristan,  isn't even a main character. Mark gets more time in the book than he does even though it's his name is in the title.

Reason #2: The plot is a problem as well. The first part of the story you spend reading about the immature characters living their life as high schoolers and then all of the sudden a two-headed dog tries to kill Izzie. This is also when she finds out that there is a giant serpent trying to kill her and she has to kill it to free the place where she was born from his evil dictatorship. The magic just felt so out of place in the book and wasn't very well executed either.

Reason #3: I just didn't care. I didn't care if Izzie got killed by the serpent or if she killed the serpent. I didn't care who ended up with who. If for someone reason all of her characters mysteriously died, I would have been fine with that as well. The only reason that I finished the book was because it would have annoyed me to not have.

Overall, I give this book 1 Quill. I wouldn't even check this book out from the library. The plot had the potential but it was just a flop.
<3 Shannon

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? (3)

This is a great weekly event where everyone can keep track of the books finished last week & the books planning to read this week!

This Week I Read:

This last week I managed to finish reading Tris and Izzie by Mette Ivie Harrison. So my reading pace has picked up a bit but it's still not up to what it normal is. My friend finally told us a for sure date to when he is moving and that is the 19th. Now you may think that would make my reading pace go back to it's normal pace but I have my doubts because school starts back for me on the 17th and I also need to find a job relatively soon as well. However, I still have faith that I will be able to schedule reading time around: school, a job, daily exercise (I run/swim), and household responsibilities (my parents are making me commute this semester since I transferred schools), as well as a club or two that I join on campus *fingers crossed* that I'm able to do it. I'm probably not going to be posting my review for this book until about late September/early October since it come out on the 11th. It's not a particularly good review but if you can get it for free then I would so that you can form you own opinion of the book because it was a really easy read, though really frustrating.

This coming week I plan to read:

I'm definitely going to finish reading The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini and maybe get part of the way through Misfit by Jon Skovron. I threw in Dark Territory by J. Gabriel Gates and Charlene Keel as an optimistic addition to my reading week. 

So those are my goals for this week hopefully I can finish The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini and start on Misfit by Jon Skovron but it's going to take some serious work since I have a dinner with my other friend's family (they are basically mine and my friend, who is moving, second family), my birthday party (I turned 20 on the 6th), my friend who is moving going away party, and helping my friend (the one who's family I'm eating dinner with) move into her dorm.

***ATTENTION: A FANTASTIC GIVEAWAY! My Overstuffed Bookshelf is giving away a gently used Kindle 2 for her second blogoversary!!! Go enter by clicking here!!!***

<3 Shannon

In My Mailbox

In My Mailbox is a meme created by The Story Siren and inspired by Alea of Pop Culture Junkie! It is a list of what books you have received over the previous week, either for review, from the library, from the bookstore, or from trades.

For Review:

Tris and Izzie by Mette Ivie Harrison (netgalley)

Dark Territories by J Gabriel Gates and Charlene Keel (HCI Teens)

Cinder and Ella by Melissa Lemon (netgalley)

Wreath by Judy Christie (netgalley)
Misfit by Jon Skovron (netgalley)

That's what I got this week, what did you get in your mailbox?

<3 Shannon

It's Monday! What Are You Reading? (2)

This is a great weekly event where everyone can keep track of the books finished last week & the books planning to read this week!

This week I read:

In the last two weeks I have only managed to read the remaining 220 pages that I had left in City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare. I'm not usually such a slow reader but one of my best friends is moving 12 hours away (Pennsylvania) in about 3ish weeks! :( Which is super sad and I'm trying to spend as much time hanging out with him and our group of friends as much as possible! I'm not going to be reading much because we're trying to cram as much stuff in as possible: I have church for the next 3 Wednesdays, my birthday in 5 days, my birthday party in in 10 days, his going away party in 11 days, and school starts back in 16 days (blah!); and that is only the planned set in stone stuff because I'm sure I'm going to be seeing my friends a lot more (last week = 5 days). So yeah that is my explanation for my super slow reading pace.

This coming week I plan to read:

 

I am hoping to make considerable progress on Tris and Izzie by Mette Ivie Harrison  (I'm 16 pages in now) and if I some how miraculously finish this book then I am hoping to start on the Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini!

So those are my goals for this coming up week which I may be able to accomplish since my friend, who is moving, is up in PA sorting out stuff for school until Wednesday and I already warned my other friend that I might disappear until then so *fingers crossed* :)! I am also going to try and post my review for It's Not Summer Without You by Jenny Han and City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare so look for those as well.

<3 Shannon

It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

This is a great weekly event where everyone can keep track of the books finished last week & the books planning to read this week!

This week I read:

I finished reading the Crank Trilogy by Ellen Hopkins (Crank, Glass, and Fallout) as well as It's Not Summer Without You by Jenny Han (which is the 2nd book in the series).

This coming week I plan to read:

 

Finish reading City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare and Tris & Izzie by Mette Ivie Harrison and start reading Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

**I am going to try and get my reviews for Fallout by Ellen Hopkins and It's Not Summer Without You posted sometime tonight/tomorrow so look for those. 

**Also The Bookish Type is having a giveaway of Love Story by Jennifer Echols (she reviewed it as well!) it ends 7/25 at 11:59 pm EST, so go check that out and enter!

<3 Shannon