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kat_impossible's review
3.0
Review first published on Life and Other Disasters.
So, I should probably start at the beginning. Rami Ungar is a friend and fellow blogger, who I met through our shared love for Doctor Who! He is a self-published author and more than once the topic of me checking out his work has come up. I always felt like he was more at home in the horror genre, which everyone knows isn’t my thing at all, but he suggested I check out Reborn City, since it should be more up my alley. Now here we are! Reviewing the work of friends is never easy for me, but I am going to try my best to put my thoughts in coherent sentences!
What I Liked
-Reborn City puts an emphasis on people being prejudiced towards certain races or religions. It is really blunt at talking about all kinds of racism, while offering the reader a diverse cast of characters and I can definitely appreciate that! Also, it’s a topic that seems very current to me. With the refugee crisis still going on, it’s in fact a global topic, seen as people freak out and get ridiculously paranoid and xenophobic lately.
-The backstory of the characters was really intriguing and very satisfying once you found out how everything ties together! I think without the Epilogue, there would have been a couple of unanswered questions, but all in all Reborn City could be a standalone. However, now it is open to a sequel and does kind of make you wonder what the gang will be up to next.
-Even though I have to admit that it took me a while, I really liked the characters in the end. I think the backflashes helped most with that because often you only got glimpses of emotions which made it difficult to bond for me.
-I loved all the superpowers!! Some of them I recognised from other superheroes and others were completely unique. It was great to find out about them and to see how differently they could be used.
What I Didn’t Like
-I don’t know if that was because I am not a native English speaker or not, but I did not handle the gangster lingo well. I would have much rather preferred “normal” English with a couple of slang words thrown in, than them having sort of their own language – even if it does completely make sense in that particular setting!
-It bothered me a little how naive Zahara was about joining a gang and then how lenient they were with her. Also, I would have really liked to know more about her first two weeks with Hydra since she really seemed to take to some of the members, but I couldn’t quite get where that connection was coming from. As I’ve mentioned above, bonding was sometimes a little difficult for me, but I think it would have been easier if I had read about some actual bonding (this excludes Ilse and Zahara – I get their friendship!).
- I am not a big fan of violence. I get why it was there and why it was necessary, but it already started out really intense and I think that those sort of stories just aren’t the most enjoyable for me to read.
Lastly, I am sorry but I have to mention one more thing. I am a cover snob! I will admit to that freely and while I can guarantee you that Rami has many talents, I think the cover needs a lot of work. But since I don’t want to be a hypocrite, here’s my suggestion for how it might look better (please take into account that I am no tech-wiz either and that I am well aware that it could need some cleaning up):
Fazit: 3/5 stars! Reborn City wasn’t a bad story at all and quite the page turner in the end, but I think that other people can appreciate it more than I did!
So, I should probably start at the beginning. Rami Ungar is a friend and fellow blogger, who I met through our shared love for Doctor Who! He is a self-published author and more than once the topic of me checking out his work has come up. I always felt like he was more at home in the horror genre, which everyone knows isn’t my thing at all, but he suggested I check out Reborn City, since it should be more up my alley. Now here we are! Reviewing the work of friends is never easy for me, but I am going to try my best to put my thoughts in coherent sentences!
What I Liked
-Reborn City puts an emphasis on people being prejudiced towards certain races or religions. It is really blunt at talking about all kinds of racism, while offering the reader a diverse cast of characters and I can definitely appreciate that! Also, it’s a topic that seems very current to me. With the refugee crisis still going on, it’s in fact a global topic, seen as people freak out and get ridiculously paranoid and xenophobic lately.
-The backstory of the characters was really intriguing and very satisfying once you found out how everything ties together! I think without the Epilogue, there would have been a couple of unanswered questions, but all in all Reborn City could be a standalone. However, now it is open to a sequel and does kind of make you wonder what the gang will be up to next.
-Even though I have to admit that it took me a while, I really liked the characters in the end. I think the backflashes helped most with that because often you only got glimpses of emotions which made it difficult to bond for me.
-I loved all the superpowers!! Some of them I recognised from other superheroes and others were completely unique. It was great to find out about them and to see how differently they could be used.
What I Didn’t Like
-I don’t know if that was because I am not a native English speaker or not, but I did not handle the gangster lingo well. I would have much rather preferred “normal” English with a couple of slang words thrown in, than them having sort of their own language – even if it does completely make sense in that particular setting!
-It bothered me a little how naive Zahara was about joining a gang and then how lenient they were with her. Also, I would have really liked to know more about her first two weeks with Hydra since she really seemed to take to some of the members, but I couldn’t quite get where that connection was coming from. As I’ve mentioned above, bonding was sometimes a little difficult for me, but I think it would have been easier if I had read about some actual bonding (this excludes Ilse and Zahara – I get their friendship!).
- I am not a big fan of violence. I get why it was there and why it was necessary, but it already started out really intense and I think that those sort of stories just aren’t the most enjoyable for me to read.
Lastly, I am sorry but I have to mention one more thing. I am a cover snob! I will admit to that freely and while I can guarantee you that Rami has many talents, I think the cover needs a lot of work. But since I don’t want to be a hypocrite, here’s my suggestion for how it might look better (please take into account that I am no tech-wiz either and that I am well aware that it could need some cleaning up):
Fazit: 3/5 stars! Reborn City wasn’t a bad story at all and quite the page turner in the end, but I think that other people can appreciate it more than I did!
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