10
Jun222010
‘YA-10′ BOOK REVIEW: Sisters Red by Jackson Pearce
by Carolyn • Posted in 4 Star Reviews
Title: Sisters Red
Author: Jackson Pearce
Publisher: Hodder
Publication Date: June 2010
ARC: 324 pages
Genre: Fantasy
Young Adult
RATING: 8/10
SUMMARY:
The story of Scarlett and Rosie March, two highly-skilled sisters who have been hunting Fenris (werewolves), who prey on teen girls, since Scarlett lost her eye years ago while defending Rosie in an attack. Scarlett lives to destroy the Fenris, and she and Rosie lure them in with red cloaks (a colour the wolves can’t resist), though Rosie hunts more out of debt to her sister than drive. But things seem to be changing. The wolves are getting stronger and harder to fight, and there has been a rash of news reports of countless teen girls brutally murdered in the city.
Scarlet and Rosie soon discover the truth: wolves are banding together in search of a Potential Fenris, a man tainted by the pack but not yet fully changed. Desperate to find the Potential to use him as bait for a massive werewolf extermination, the sisters move to the city with Silas, a young woodsman and long time family friend who is deadly with an axe. But the clues to finding the Potential aren’t adding up, and Scarlet is shocked to learn new details of Silas’s family history. Meanwhile, Rosie finds herself drawn to Silas and the bond they share not only drives the sisters apart, but could destroy all they’ve worked for.
REVIEW:
This isn’t a run-of-the-mill werewolf book, but a very intelligently written story loosely based on the Red Riding Hood fairy tale. This is quite a special little book, from the depth of emotion felt by the characters to the attention to detail of their lives and surroundings.
I really enjoyed the relationships between the characters, Scarlett, Rosie and Silas. The relationships are quite complex and yet simple at the same time. Simple because they all love each other and would do anything to protect each other, but complex because they love each other in different ways for different reasons and this causes all sorts of complications.
It’s not just the relationships between the characters that are complex, but the characters themselves. My favourite is Scarlett who protected her sister from a wolf at the price of disfigurement. Her face and body are full of scars and she wears an eyepatch to hide the fact she has no eye. Her inner pain and anguish over this is palpable and I felt for her so much.
The werewolves in Sisters Red are not pretty or romantic, once turned the soul is ripped from the body to reveal an evil creature with no emotion and no remorse for killing. These are truly sinister werewolves.
There is a wonderful twist during the second half of the book, but unfortunately for me I had my suspicions quite early on, but the realisation of these suspicions was exciting all the same.
The first and last hundred pages were just magic, but sadly the middle lagged a little. The two sisters and their friend Silas move to the big city to hunt and it felt as though that’s all they did and it became a bit tedious. However, this didn’t deter me from reading the rest of the book and I was soon rewarded with an ending full of emotion combined with life-like fighting scenes that had me completely enthralled and my eyes brimming with tears.
VERDICT:
Sisters Red is a fantastic read, with interesting characters and a great plot. This is now one of my favourite young adult books. And of course I have to mention the amazing cover – gorg! 
SOURCE: Thank you to Hodder for sending me this book to review.
You can find out more about the author here:
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Next up on ’10 Fun Days of YA Fiction’: Later today Jackson Pearce will be stopping by with a great guest post, plus you will have the chance to win this fab book along with some other goodies!
10 Comments
I've been eying to have this!
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Great review.
The story sounds fascinating and I love the cover.
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This sounds really good and the cover is brilliant!
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Great review! I keep reading great things about this book!
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I knew you would ejoy this book its different and yet the same in so many ways
xx
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I love fairy tale retellings, so I guess it'd be a sin for me miss reading this one. It sounds like a delightful, romancy reads that could be enjoy by those who read YA as well as adult books!
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Great review, I loved this book! It's so good to have some nasty werewolves for a change, along with 2 kick-ass heroines reminiscent of Buffy.
Brilliant.
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Great review!
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Great review. I have read some great things about this book.Sounds like something I'd really enjoy reading.
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Darlyn – I hope you get to read a copy soon, it's a great book!
Sabrina – Thanks! It really is a great story, I really enjoyed it
Dot – I love the cover – add it to your wishlist, I've a feeling you would love this
Aleksandra – Thanks! So, had I, which is why I am so happy it lived up to the hype!
Ayesha – I did enjoy it
Shy – This is the first fairy tale retelling I've read and I really liked it. I've read a few YA books now and this one is definitely one of my favourites
Jenny – Scarlett & Rosie where certainly kick-arse! It would make a great film I think
Felicia – Thanks!
Elaing8 – Thank you – I would definitely recommend trying it, especially if you like YA and werewolves
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