Courtney Vail

Angels Club

by Courtney Vail

What a great feel good book! This book follows a group of girls who were deemed the outcasts and were picked on and bullied and decided to not just let others beat them down. Not only do these girls find a way to help themselves become the best they can be but they also begin to change the bullies. And it was all inspired by one special horse named Angel.

I would recommend this book to anyone and especially to children of this age that possibly are dealing with bullying and also to people who are doing the bullying. This book has a great message!… (mere)

Thank you for the book. Written with young girls in mind and with a sweetness and innocence. Centered around a rescue horse, named Angel, a club formed by seven girls, to promote good works to help others. They bestow angel kisses on people in their community they feel are worthy and have done good deeds. Juacinda and her friends in the club work together to organize a fundraiser, Sunnybrook Farm Therapeutic Riding Center's Fall Fundraiser, Equestrain Show and Art Exhibit, where Angel and other horses are raised and trained. The fundraiser was a big success, vendors, handmade crafts, homemade cookies, brownies, cider, hot coffee, a handmade CD, horse rides, picture taking all played a part. The playful theme of children, horses, adults, all working together, made the book successful. Excitement, love, care, discipline, Emily, a positive outlook. The credits at the end, including the authors, and horse, complete the picture for me.… (mere)

There are flashes of truly evocative, eloquent writing in Kings & Queens, so much so that I found myself reading the book more for the words than the story. Unfortunately, it's the story people read books for. Kings & Queens manages to convincingly convey the self-important, self-contained, self-centered viewpoint of a teenage girl named Majesty who acts, speaks and even thinks like an actual teenager. We are quickly introduced to her friends, mostly boys - she is one of the managers of the school baseball team and spends much of her time in their company - and it's Majesty and the boys who carry this story.

And what a story. While there's a shooting, two kidnappings, druggings, satanic worship and so much, much more, the story itself feels rather light on plot, to me. There's too much stuff going on for the characters - or the author - to be able to focus on. Several scenes that should have been important and would have added weight to the story were done off-scene while other scenes were dealt with at length that added very little to the story as a whole. The big reveal of the 'plot twist' added nothing to the story and felt like a maguffin. The ending itself was so anti-climactic I had to re-read it to remember what exactly had happened. The plot was cluttered, the supporting characters were paper-thin and the ending was tacked on. It felt very much like a good writer was telling a story they'd heard from someone else.

Overall this was not a bad book. It was well written and Majesty came across as an actual teenaged person - not a cardboard cutout or a hollow i-guy. I just wish Majesty had been more interesting or sympathetic.… (mere)

You know I love a great suspense novel. With the prologue, it just captured me because I wonder what was going on. It provided me the sense of mystery. And from that moment on, I knew I had to concentrate when reading the book. It kind of reminded me of those weird Tim Burton movies. No, I am not saying it was bad weird, I was like a rollercoaster with vines and darkness surrounding, and the track of the rollercoaster was chipped and broken. This book was a ride of emotion for me. I was kept on the edge of my seat wondering what was going to happen next. And as the book went on, the list of suspect accumulate! Whoa! I barely breathed. This totally created an exciting, unexpected reading experiment. I felt like my brain was twisted and curled (in a good way) like by the LOST creators.

The characters were all amazing. Alec and Derek were gorg! There were the typical male characters, one harsh dark, one supporting. Majesty was a kickass female! Oh yeah!

But I have to mention that the writing style of Courtney need a little time to adjust to (kind of reminded me of After the Snow by S. D. Crockett). I seriously recommend readers to pay attention. I know that a lot of other readers got confused while reading the novel, I love how different it is but it was a little hard for me. That is basically the little flaw of this book. Great job.… (mere)