Reviewers Roundup!(2)

This is a weekly feature on Pure Imagination inspired by The Story Siren's YAC but I'm going to do something a little different and just post the reviews of the books I loved or reviews that made me want to read a book, made me laugh or maybe sometimes made me shake my head in disagreement. Here are the reviews for the week of November 2, 2009.
 
Book Whisperer reviewed Girl in the Area by Lise Haines
"Girl in the Arena is an astounding alternate reality where violence and fame determines the status quo. Lyn may be the daughter of seven gladiators, but the glamour and glitz have lost their shine, her primary goal is to find a way out. While reading I found my emotions to be on a roller coaster, although one emotions tended to prevail from the beginning to the end; that is being flabbergasted at the acceptance of this lifestyle...."

Edge of Seventeen reviews Salt by Maurice Gee
"Salt has a strange setting; I can't describe it. It is dystopian--ruined and dying. Company rules with an iron fist. Although, when they came from over the sea their flags showed open hands, as if in greeting and peace. The rich live lavish lives and the poor die of starvation or illness. Many are hauled away every day to work in the various mines and other manual labour jobs where not much of you is left at the end of the day. The worst place to be is the salt mines, and to be assigned to Deep Salt is a death sentence. A slow and painful death sentence...."

Aimee at My Fluttering Heart reviewed Ice by  Sarah Beth Durst
"Durst has been an entirely clever seamstress in writing this novel. Known modern science and the mysteries of a timeless magic are patterned beside one another as if they have always existed as a pair. In order for a reader to suspend disbelief, the author is usually required to shift the characters into an alternate universe for the magic to occur. But by choosing the widely unexperienced but very real arctic territory as the story's environment, Durst maintains the mysterious beauty of an ice-covered fantasy world as well as injecting science into the storyline to ground the tale in reality...."

Tricia at My Reading Addiction reviewed On the Edge by Ilona Andrews
"I didn’t know what to expect from On the Edge, I love Andrews’ Kate Daniels series but this one is set in a slightly different world than Kate’s but once I started reading I was blown away by the complex world building and how easy it was to follow. The Edge is a place that lies between the Weird with it’s magic users and the Broken with it’s non magic folk. Those who live in the Edge have some magic and the luxury of being able to cross the lines into the other worlds for work and such, but people from the broken can’t see the Edge and those from the weird suffer great pain and death from crossing the lines...."

Sara at The Hiding Spot reviewed Before Midnight by Cameron Dokey
"Dokey's version of Cinderella is completely different than the Disney version that many are accustomed to. It was odd at first - I kept expecting certain events to occur, but Dokey successfully revamped this old tale. I was pleasantly surprised to find that in this version, Cinderella doesn't have an evil stepmother! Instead, there is a whole new villain, and, this time, readers get to see a bit of the person behind the villain...."

Book Blather reviewed Little Black Lies by Tish Cohen
"I thought the story line for Little Black Lies was very believable. I never found myself thinking that her lies or the storyline were too out there. In fact, the only part that made me go really? was the whole petting couch thing. (Think a puppy pile of teens with wandering hands on a couch) But the more I think about it, the more I remember things we could get away with in high school, so it’s really not that far fetched. In fact, everything else was so dead on that I could easily see this story happening in almost any high school across the nation. Kudos to Cohen for that!"