After Eight* (2007)
Meg Cabot
Rating: 3.5/5
I had kind of given up on this series. The first three were really good, but it felt like there should have only been those three. In fact, I remember reading on Meg Cabot’s website years ago that there were only three planned in the series. All the storylines were finished off nicely.
Then, after the movie, suddenly there were more books to come in the series (I think I read that there will be ten or something). The forth was pointless. So was the fifth through seventh – I don’t really remember what happened in them.
I guess, it’s hard to write a series that is basically just a romance with some princess lessons, when the main characters already got together at the end of the third. All that was left for plots seemed to be angst, self-doubt, and breaking up, for no reason. There was no real conflict.
They were still well written (I’m not sure I’ve ever read anything that was badly written by her), but they weren’t anywhere near as good as her other series – which all seemed planned out and intended.
So, I was surprised that this book had CONFLICT, and that it was the good and reasonable kind. Not the sort that made me want to shake Mia and tell her to grow up. (Although, I guess ‘cause she was thirteen in the first, and is now sixteen, maybe she is starting to grow up.)
The conflict in After Eight (which is called something different in the U.S., I think Princess on the Brink**) surrounds Michael deciding that he is going to go off to Japan for a year or more to prove he is worthy of being Mia’s boyfriend (something some members of her family and the general readership of U.S. Weekly disagree with). He is going to work on some kind of robot that will help in heart surgery. However, he doesn’t realise that while he is off saving all these other hearts, he’s breaking Mia’s.
One of the things I like most about this series is that Michael always acts like a teenage boy: slightly (and seemingly unintentionally) insensitive to the feelings of others. I like the fact that he is so reasonable and logical, while Mia is so emotional and a little neurotic.
I really liked this, which surprises me because I wasn’t expecting to. I am actually looking forward to reading the next one – something that I haven’t felt since the second.
* Finished 28/4
** You see, us Australian and U.K. readers are terrible at remembering the order of series. A catchy tie-in title with the number in it really helps us out!
Actually, I have no idea why they have different names (apart from the fact they obviously have different publishers), but Meg Cabot’s Mediator series is also like this.
Meg Cabot
Rating: 3.5/5
I had kind of given up on this series. The first three were really good, but it felt like there should have only been those three. In fact, I remember reading on Meg Cabot’s website years ago that there were only three planned in the series. All the storylines were finished off nicely.
Then, after the movie, suddenly there were more books to come in the series (I think I read that there will be ten or something). The forth was pointless. So was the fifth through seventh – I don’t really remember what happened in them.
I guess, it’s hard to write a series that is basically just a romance with some princess lessons, when the main characters already got together at the end of the third. All that was left for plots seemed to be angst, self-doubt, and breaking up, for no reason. There was no real conflict.
They were still well written (I’m not sure I’ve ever read anything that was badly written by her), but they weren’t anywhere near as good as her other series – which all seemed planned out and intended.
So, I was surprised that this book had CONFLICT, and that it was the good and reasonable kind. Not the sort that made me want to shake Mia and tell her to grow up. (Although, I guess ‘cause she was thirteen in the first, and is now sixteen, maybe she is starting to grow up.)
The conflict in After Eight (which is called something different in the U.S., I think Princess on the Brink**) surrounds Michael deciding that he is going to go off to Japan for a year or more to prove he is worthy of being Mia’s boyfriend (something some members of her family and the general readership of U.S. Weekly disagree with). He is going to work on some kind of robot that will help in heart surgery. However, he doesn’t realise that while he is off saving all these other hearts, he’s breaking Mia’s.One of the things I like most about this series is that Michael always acts like a teenage boy: slightly (and seemingly unintentionally) insensitive to the feelings of others. I like the fact that he is so reasonable and logical, while Mia is so emotional and a little neurotic.
I really liked this, which surprises me because I wasn’t expecting to. I am actually looking forward to reading the next one – something that I haven’t felt since the second.
* Finished 28/4
** You see, us Australian and U.K. readers are terrible at remembering the order of series. A catchy tie-in title with the number in it really helps us out!
Actually, I have no idea why they have different names (apart from the fact they obviously have different publishers), but Meg Cabot’s Mediator series is also like this.
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