The False Prince - Jennifer A. Nielsen

The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen
Series: The Ascendance Trilogy #1
Published on April 1, 2012 by Scholastic

THE FALSE PRINCE is the thrilling first book in a brand-new trilogy filled with danger and deceit and hidden identities that will have readers rushing breathlessly to the end.

In a discontent kingdom, civil war is brewing. To unify the divided people, Conner, a nobleman of the court, devises a cunning plan to find an impersonator of the king's long-lost son and install him as a puppet prince. Four orphans are recruited to compete for the role, including a defiant boy named Sage. Sage knows that Conner's motives are more than questionable, yet his life balances on a sword's point -- he must be chosen to play the prince or he will certainly be killed. But Sage's rivals have their own agendas as well.

As Sage moves from a rundown orphanage to Conner's sumptuous palace, layer upon layer of treachery and deceit unfold, until finally, a truth is revealed that, in the end, may very well prove more dangerous than all of the lies taken together.

An extraordinary adventure filled with danger and action, lies and deadly truths that will have readers clinging to the edge of their seats.

Eh, this book was a mixed bag for me. For one side I had fun with it, but at the same time it never really lived up to my expectations since I was hoping this would be a new (for me) fantasy middle grade series for me to love. It started good, we have a lot going on at the start with getting to know all the boys and the other characters, trying to guess were all of this is going but the pace slowed around the middle, when all the boys are just training was kind of boring, the end did picked up the pace again but some of my enjoyment was already lost.
The world building, so important on fantasy novels never really was alive for me, we have a map that is pretty simple (really is just a stretch of land, three names on it and some cities) and we do know about the political system which was the most common for fantasy novels, a monarchy, so despite trying it never stood out from another fantasy novels out there.
The characters seemed quite nice at first, Sage did had some funny liners that reminded me of Percy (from Percy Jackson) but soon he couldn't hold up the scene all by himself and unfortunately there was no other character to step up and make my interest grown, a big part for me not caring much about any of the other characters are the fact that they're so damn predictable.
This book is supposed to have a lot of twists on their characters but really, unless you're the actual age targeted audience, you will probably see all these twists with a mile range and unfortunately this does took away some of the fun.
In the end I don't regret reading this book and will probably continue with the series because it was a quickly read with some nice fantasy elements but if you're looking for a great middle grade fantasy serie there are better ones out there.

All Fall Down - Ally Carter

All Fall Down by Ally Carter
Series: Embassy Row #1
Published by Scholastic on January 27, 2015
Pages: 320
Genres: Mystery, Adventure, Espionage

Format: eARC
Source: Edelweiss

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A new series of global proportions -- from master of intrigue, NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Ally Carter.

This exciting new series from NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author Ally Carter focuses on Grace, who can best be described as a daredevil, an Army brat, and a rebel. She is also the only granddaughter of perhaps the most powerful ambassador in the world, and Grace has spent every summer of her childhood running across the roofs of Embassy Row.

Now, at age sixteen, she's come back to stay -- in order to solve the mystery of her mother's death. In the process, she uncovers an international conspiracy of unsettling proportions, and must choose her friends and watch her foes carefully if she and the world are to be saved.

What I loved:
· Grace: she’s an amazing main character and I knew it was love at first sight when I was laughing out loud with one of her snarky comebacks right on the first pages, she doesn’t take shit and always stand to herself and what she believes it’s true, also being raised with her military brother and father turned her able to kick-ass too.
· The mystery: all through the book I was at the edge of my seat trying to figure out what the hell had happened on the night Grace’s mother died, Grace’s flashbacks and her reactions to them are so crazy and everyone seemed to be hiding stuff that it made me turn the pages very quickly – and I have to say I didn’t see that ending coming, now thinking back at some point I should have realized but I was so into the story and so worried on getting to the ending soon so I could find out everything that I didn’t really thought much about the hints while reading.
· The setting: there is so much things that can be done on this setting! With Embassy for various countries of the world and all their rivalries it was so intriguing to see how heated things could turn out to be by just let's see... A scarf be saw on the wrong place *winks*

What I think could have been better:
· Noah, Megan & Rosie: Grace’s friends on the Embassy row just felt really… Forced. I mean, Noah starts to hang out with her because he’s told to do so and them a few chapters later they’re both really considering each other best friends, and okay Grace never really had many friends but still it was awkward. Despite this very sudden connection I did enjoyed these characters and always loved they’re on the pages, it was super cool their little group searching for clues together and the funniest moments are on their interactions so I kind of feel hard very quickly for them too? Oops, but I do expect to see more of them, not just helping Grace, having lives and interests outside the main mystery on the others books of the series.
· Alexei: this characters suffers from his little time on the book (at least I thought it was little), he seemed an interesting character and I was hoping for a romance between him and Grace since their first interaction but there wasn’t enough scenes with them for me to get fully invested. Hopefully the sequel will remedy that!

Overall this book was everything that I was hoping for and a little more, it was funny and snarky but it also had some emotional moments (I even teared up a little bit), the mystery took me by surprise and I loved the interactions between Grace and her friends/probably-future-boyfriend. I recommend it to every lover of detective things (like Veronica Mars) and people looking for a fast paced read that it’s fluffy but also not fluffy at all (this doesn’t make any sense, but it totally makes sense with this book).