Twelve

This book written by Jasper Kent has only one similarity with the much hyped about Twilight series - it's about vampires. That's as far as it goes because while Twilight focuses on the "forbidden love" between vampire!boy and human!girl, Twelve is about a human soldier hunting vampires.

I haven't read a lot of books set in Russia. In fact this would be my second one (the first was Night Watch). In both books, I found Russia painted to be very bleak, with especially harsh winters. But then, this is supposed to be Russia in 1812, a country at war with Napoleon. It wouldn't be right to paint Moscow as an idyllic summer retreat.

The story was divided into two parts and I think it flows well. The first part held me in suspense as the main character, Captain Aleksei, tries to discover the truth behind a band of soldiers the Russians have hired to help defeat the French. The second part is more about Aleksei becoming a vampire hunter, trying to destroy the threat against humanity.

Squeamish readers have to take note - there are several torture scenes described in great detail. One memorable scene in particular described how the vampires tortured their victim and deriving huge pleasure in it. Actually, I have no trouble in visualising this book as a horror movie with how descriptive the author was being.

On the whole, I find this a captivating read as it managed to keep me in suspense most of the time. The twist at the end also served to make it even more memorable in my mind.

Hello Again :P

Why, hello there! I'm surprised if anyone is still reading this blog as I haven't updated since forever :P Lack of motivation to write I suppose. Plus, there's nothing interesting going on.

So under a fit of boredom, I decided to update my layout. It's back to blue, the same colour theme as my first layout. Tinkering with the layout did take a while, thus I'm leaving the header as it is. Kind of boring, I know but searching for a new header would definitely take a longer time.

I'm now wondering what will be the contents in the future. Should I stick to random ramblings again, with a dash of reviews here and there? Guess that depends on what will catch my fancy when I want to update :P Ah well, let's see how long it'll be till the next post yeah?

Anyway, yesterday I came back and was greeted with a parcel on the table. Eh? I definitely haven't shopped online lately - more like having my sister shop for me nowadays haha. So what a pleasant surprise it was when I discovered I've received two books by Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games and its sequel which I can't remember right now. Have forgotten that I entered a contest in The Star about the two books LOL. Oh well, I've read positive reviews about the book and can't wait to start on them. Plus, I've recently bought Battle Royale (the novel). If I remember correctly, the two seems to have the same theme i.e. unlucky teenagers thrown into a contest for survival. I'd like to see the similarities and differences between the two.