October 2018 – Kat Pollock

Review of Geekerella

Posted on October 30, 2018 by writingkat95

I realize this book has been out for a while, but I recently came across it and felt like it was such a gem I absolutely had to write about it.

Definitely the same kind of energy as Fangirl, Geekerella is a delightful love letter to fandom. It’s witty and heartfelt, and makes you care so much about the characters that you almost can’t stand it when they face hard times.

Honestly my favorite thing about this book was that it is unabashedly cheesy. The love story is swoony and dramatic and packed with emotion, and it feels exactly as heightened as I remember first love feeling as a teen. Whether you’re the same age as the characters and seeing yourself reflected in the immediacy of their journeys, or an adult reading and remembering the dizzy years of your youth, this book is sure to sweep you off your feet.

Also it has a lesbian fairy godmother character. Just. Amazing. I need an entire spin-off of her adventures.

Happy reading!

Blog Post

Writing Update

Posted on October 25, 2018 by writingkat95

So I know it’s been a while since I posted here, and I am trying to do better about that.

I’ve been working on what seems like the millionth round of edits for The Book at the Top of the Closet, and that’s going really well. I’m hoping to have the edits done before Christmas so I can start querying at the beginning of 2019.

I’ll be posting more updates here as well as book reviews and maybe some other stuff as well. Until next time, happy reading!

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Review of Give the Dark My Love

Posted on October 22, 2018 by writingkat95

I’m back! And I’m here with a review of Beth Revis’s new dark fantasy novel, Give the Dark My Love.

I’m not gonna lie guys, this book ate my heart for dinner. Without getting into spoiler territory, what I can say is that this book is just as much about grief as it is about necromancy.

The emotional threads running though the book are even more compelling than the external plot (which is also pretty great). Nedra and Grey are so different, and their differences help drive their relationship and the plot.

Honestly the characters are all well written, but what struck me the most was the non-point-of-view characters. In a lot of fast paced stories like this one, secondary characters tend to get simplified or reduced to archetypes. In this story, I found a lot of those archetypes subverted or expanded upon, and it really made a difference in how real the secondary characters felt.

Now, I do feel like I should mention that there is significant gore in this book, quite a bit more than I’m used to seeing in YA. While it all felt organic and relevant to the plot, it was very disturbing at times. If you don’t do explicit gore and violence, this is not for you. (I mean, it’s about necromancy, so, be prepared for really gross dead body things. Seriously, reader discretion advised)

In any case this is an incredible book with so much heart and if you can stomach the gory bits, you’re in for a really compelling story.