Review: Great originality
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 12 4, 2013
The Boy from the Woods had a plot which just made me want to read it. I thought it sounded really original and was expecting to love it.When I actually started reading, there were parts which I loved and parts which drove me a little mad because the pacing changed that much. At the beginning, it felt like it rushed too much into the story and then other parts felt really long-winded. However, when the pacing felt right, I really enjoyed this book.The Boy from the Woods had a different feel from a lot of Young Adult romance books. The story stood out as it was unique (I hate that word but can't think of another way to describe this). It's not the typical kind of plot and that's what made me really enjoy it.Jen Minkman wrote a really intriguing book. I liked her development of Michael especially. She definitely knew how to control the way readers felt about him! At times I wanted to hate him and others I actually grew to like him. As well as the building up of Julia and Michael's characters, the side characters like Gaby and Anne were well developed too. I felt this was a strong point in Jen's writing.There were a few parts of The Boy from the Woods when I kind of switched off a bit. Like when she met up with her friends or whatever felt a bit repetitive. However, I feel like this was just due to personal taste. I would have preferred to see Julia with Michael more when I'm sure others wanted to see the story built up the way it was.Personally, I loved the few twists and turns throughout and was hoping to see more. The suspense kept me engrossed in the plot as I was always expecting something else to happen.Overall, I really enjoyed the originality and character development in The Boy from the Woods. With a little bit of work on the pacing, I feel like I'd probably have loved this book but I'm looking forward to reading more from Jen Minkman.*I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.