Title: The Raven Boys Author: Maggie Stiefvater Series: The Raven Cycle, (Book One) Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Fiction, Mystery Pages: 416 Publisher: Scholastic Inc. Published: September 18, 2012 My Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆ iBooks amazon Goodreads

Synopsis From goodreads:

Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue never sees them–until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks to her. His name is Gansey, a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble. But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can’t entirely explain. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul whose emotions range from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher who notices many things but says very little. For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She doesn’t believe in true love, and never thought this would be a problem. But as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore.

My Thoughts: ☆☆☆☆☆

Can I just fangirl for a second? I waited a week before writing this review so maybe it might come out coherent, but no such luck! I am still not over the amazingness of this book, and I really hope I can do it justice! This is possibly the most well written book I have ever read that has more than two narrating characters! The narration alternates between four, sometimes five, characters, but there was NO confusion as to who the POV character was at any given time. And don’t let the blurb fool you! I thought it sounded like some fairytale knockoff at first, but I was WROOOOOOONG! The Raven Boys is one of the most original books I’ve ever read, and it’s so believable as you’re reading it that you get sucked into the story and you read 416 pages in two days like I did! How do I even communicate this? Let’s do an in depth analysis because this book deserves it!

The Writing:

The writing of this book is beautifully simple. To make a conflicting statement that probably won’t make sense to anybody but me, the writing is a form of showing by telling. You know how writers always end up in the “showing not telling debate?” This book does both and neither. The words are so intertwined that we’re told everything without really being told anything, and we’re shown everything, and told nothing at the same time. Yeah… I’m confused too, but you’ll get it if you read it! It’s very metaphorical and… fantasy like intone, but the words are simple enough that it doesn’t seem like that. It’s also not so simple that it seems like a book for younger readers, but not so overly metaphorical that you feel like you’re slogging through old English stuff either. Sorry to anyone who actually enjoys old English stuff and doesn’t have to slog through it. I wish I could be like you!

Character analysis:

Oh my gosh… The characters! They’re all so amazing and they feel so real and they’re all unique and I LOOOOOOOVE them! Let’s break it down before I go into hardcore fangirl mode… Blue Sargent: Blue seemed flat to me at first. I mean… That blurb put me off quite a bit from the get go. Killing her true love with a kiss? Yeah, no, NOT my style! But that’s not how Blue is AT ALL! She is eccentric, and weird, and cool, and sensible, and adventurous, and kind, and… generally an awesome character who isn’t like one of those characters who thinks she’s average but has every boy throwing themselves at her and can literally do anything she wants including fight off murderous bad guys with little to no training! She’s got an attitude, a strong set of morals, and the kind of mindset that doesn’t take nothing from nobody! Oh yeah! There’s also the fact that she acts like a kind of energetic battery for anything that can tap into it, including ghosts and her psychic family! How’s that for awesome and original?

Gansey: I do not care for Gansey’s character at this point in time. He just seems SO FAKE! But I also think he’s supposed to seem that way. and I have a sneaking suspicion that he and Blue are going to end up together at the end of this, and I reeeeeally don’t want that to happen unless he undergoes a MAJOR transformation! I like what he stands for, but can we please just drop the sixty-year-old politician act? That being said, he is very unique, and I can’t wait to uncover more of his past. I can’t tell why though because that would be a spoiler, and I refuse to spoil this book in the review even though I’m way late to reading this.

Adam: Where to start with Adam? Adam is… complicated. His story nearly made me cry, and I won’t tell you why for the same reason I won’t tell about Gansey. Let’s just say he’s had a rough home life, and no matter how much he wants to blend with the other Raven Boys, he just doesn’t. He’s different, strange, somehow more aware and yet unaware of the big picture. He’s the outsider of the group, but I think he’s got a part to play, and it’s gonna be a big one judging by the ending, which I won’t spoil.

Ronan: Can Ronan pleeeeease just come out of the pages so I can hug him and tell him everything is going to be ok even though things are probably going to be the polar opposite of ok?! I mean he’d probably just tell me to f* off, but I don’t really care! He try to be so strong, but really he’s a word away from falling apart. I have this thing for tragic heroes, and if Ronan doesn’t get his act together and do something amazing by the end of this series, I WILL cry.

Noah: Oh my gosh spoilers!!!! I must be careful. Noah isn’t actually there. He’s a “smudge,” to quote Gansey, just an imprint of something that once was. And that’s all you get on Noah, even though I had things half way figured out by the second time he was mentioned. Let’s see if you can get as close as I did! 😉

The Plot:

The beginning was SLOOOOOW… Stuff happened, and it was pretty big stuff, but the pacing was off. The writing made up for it though, and I am SO glad I stuck with it! After about… let’s say chapter 8ish, things got better, and better, and better… And that ending… That ending was epic! It was a total cliff hanger, but it was a good cliff hanger! When you read the last line, you will immediately want more! And it’ll be the good kind of wanting more, not the angry kind of wanting more that leaves you at a total complete loose end.

Final Thoughts:

You NEED to read this book! Just DO IT! And tell me what you think! The ending is slow, but you will NOT regret sticking with it! Here’s just one teaser quote for you from Ronan’s psychic reading… “A secret killed your father, and you know what it is.”

Did That Make sense?

Please share your thoughts of my review in the comments! I hope it was actually coherent, but I have a feeling it wasn’t because I am still too obsessed to make anything look sane. I LOVE every single character, and the writing style is amazing! And also I am in desperate need of some Ronan giffs… He’s my favorite character, (because I’m crazy like that), and none of the gifs on Tumblr had descriptions…. cries You guys should really put your favorite Ronan, or just raven boys in general, gifs in the comments and describe them so i can make a collage out of them and make it my screen saver. Yeah that sounded pathetic… Y’all don’t really have to find me gifs unless you just wanna make me really happy! Ok… I’m just rambling now… I’ll stop! Go read The raven Boys, and tell me what you think! I will be very sad if you don’t like it, but you will like it, so it doesn’t matter! From Cheyenne 🙂