Book review: Illusions by Aprilynne Pike

short review first...

Hearts at Stake and Out For Blood by Alyxandra Harvey
From what I'd read so far, Alyxandra Harvey's  vampire series is pretty much on the mediocre side, I don't hate it but it brings nothing new to the table. There are a few interesting ideas about vampires in the story, also the action scenes are good, but the 'good' vampires in the story is not very interesting---they are a bit too tame, too goody-two-shoes for my liking, and I do think it's pretty lazy to set up a series centered on one vampire princess and her seven VERY HOT, VERY HANDSOME older brothers (can things get even more cliched than this?) instead of introducing new characters along with the story. And the bad vampires...........they didn't even leave enough of an impression for me to care for them. I still haven't read book 2 because the library seems to forget to buy it when they went ahead to buy book 3. Haha.

Book Review: Illusions, by Aprilynne Pike; a.k.a Helpful hints on how to trash the fairylore, Twilight-style

Book Description from amazon.com :"I don't do patrols, I don't go hunting, I just stick close to you. You live your life. I'll keep you safe," Tamani said, sweeping a lock of hair from her face. "Or die trying."
Laurel hasn't seen Tamani since she begged him to let her go last year. Though her heart still aches, Laurel is confident that David was the right choice.
But just as life returns to normal, Laurel realizes that a hidden enemy lies in wait. Once again, Laurel must turn to Tamani to protect and guide her, for the danger that now threatens Avalon is one that no faerie thought would ever be possible. And for the first time, Laurel cannot be sure that her side will prevail.


Note: I only read the translated version of the book, not the original English text! And what I'd read in the translation did nothing to convince me I should spend my time re-reading the English one...

Note 2: I still don't have time to finish reviewing book 1 and 2, don't worry I'll get around it later.

So I finished reading Illusions, book 3 of Aprilynne Pike's fantasy series centered on the author's plant-based fairies (meaning: fairies are evolved plants, and they are called 'faeries' in the story), also centered on the love triangle involved Laurel, a young girl who had recently discovered she's in fact a fairy; David, her human love interest; and Tamani, Laurel's fairy bodyguard.

Still, instead of creating a fantasy world of its own, I found out the author had done smashing up every major rule in the ancient fairies lores.

So I'll do a simple checklist to show how and why the fairies in Illusions contradict with the traditional fairylore:

(1) Fairies don't speak in riddle. No, God forbid that they speak in riddle! their speeches are pretty much straightforward and perfectly understandable, just like humans'.

(2) Fairies don't look for chance to make bargain with mortals or other fairies. No, if you ask a fairy for favors, he or she won't ask you for something in return, and you're not in debt with them. How convenient it is!

(3) In the story, the old rule about fairies being not able to lie seems to be nonexistent. This rule seems to be ignored from start to end. One of the 'bad' fairies and even Tamani himself,  had been lying through their teeth the whole time.

(4) Fairies are in fact plants; and these walking, talking humanoid plants are eating other plants, fruits and vegetable for nourishment. Oh! I bet these plants-eating-fairies must be evolved from carnivorous plants (e.g. nepenthes) or parasitic plants, no kidding.

(5) Fairies are able to touch metal stuff (e.g. an iPhone, a car). So according to the author, metal wouldn't burn or hurt fairies, neither can it make them sick or kill them on spot. The only explanation I got is "Humans have the facts (about fairy) all wrong".

(6) Fairies are beautiful, 'good' creatures, and they love their youths very much, and it's perfectly okay for said 'good' fairies to send those so-called unseelie/'dark' fairies to a concentration camp and rip them of their reproductive capacity forever. Plus our heroine Laurel isn't bothered by such cruelty, the issue is brought up by Tamani for once but is brushed off just as quickly.

(7) A fairy is able to hide her wings beneath her dress/shirt with her long hair wore down for the whole time she lives in the human world, and no one ever notices a thing. Oh please, get real already! I would rather have her masked her wings with glamour or magic. And in the whole book Laurel doesn't act like she has to be cautious to cover her wings up. She just goes on like business as usual.

Need I continue?

It reminds me of Cassandra Clare, author of the Mortal Instruments series, who didn't write the most interesting fairy characters whatsoever, but at least Miss Clare has the decency to show some respect to the fairylore tradition. In comparison, what Pike had done looks like a vulgar trashing and butchering. What had those fairies done to deserve this?

The writing is okay, at least it didn't bore me to tear; but there's nothing exciting about it. The only parts of the story which I enjoy, is the parts when Laurel and David do scientific experiments on the fairy's cells. The love triangle between Laurel, David and Tamani is as annoying as always. Here is that beautiful girl, suffering the torment of having to choose between two nice, handsome boys who love her very much.

Oh, frankly I just don't give a damn. Laurel's indecisiveness annoys me to no end, her constant whining on her relationship problem sounds like trouble in paradise for most of the time, and I just don't care. It looks like she wants the best of both worlds without giving anything up, and it makes her looks greedy instead of desirable or lovely. And don't even get me start with her "Can she love two different boys at the same time?" nonsense. Looks like even since Twilight got published, indecisiveness is no longer viewed as a shortcoming, and a girl's inability to stick with only one boy and her lack of commitment are now tolerated. It looks wrong, and no, it doesn't look like an achievement of feminism nor sex liberation to me.

And then, Laurel made out with Tamani when she was still going out with David. Now the only word I can think of to use on her, other than 'Mary Sue', is 'SLUT'. I don't always label fictional characters, but this time Laurel gave me no choice.

Plus Laurel got angry with David when he got jealous of Tamani. She kept saying that she had the freedom to hang out with whoever she chose.......but did she ever consider how her boyfriend would feel about her constantly hanging out with a guy who showed a lot of interest in her? I think the most forgiving guy wouldn't be able to swallow this down, for goodness' sake.

*plot spoiler warning*

I found the relationship between two sexs and the stereotype of gender roles in Illusions disturbing. For example, Laurel has to be protected by a large group of male fairy guards (Tamani among them, and I hardly saw female fairy warrior around) and the only woman who can fight, who's also without a male partner, turns out to be the villain; and of course the bad woman wore an revealing low-cut dress which showed off her body. That's so stereotyped.  All these details pretty much  tells me both the author and the fictional fairy race aren't big on feminism, that is it.

The supposed Japanese exchange student, Yuki turns out to be a bad winter fairy in the end. In case you don't know, 'Yuki' means 'snow' in Japanese. Oh, what a dead giveaway. Who is Pike kidding anyway? Even the translator seemed to realize the problem, so he/she didn't translate Yuki's name directly into 'Snow', but translating the name into something else ('Yuki' can be the romaji of other Japanese female names as well, but 'yuki=snow' is most widely and commonly known) so the readers won't be able to figure out Yuki's true identity so easily.

Tamani is supposed to befriend Yuki to detect whether she was a threat, the problem is Tamani seems to do little to figure out Yuki's secret and most of his interaction with Yuki makes him look like he's leading her on, but the author seems to be telling us: it's okay; because Yuki turns out to be bad so Tamani's behavior is okay. But this kind of justification doesn't work for me.

*end of plot spoiler*

The final words: if you like to step into a beautiful, 'perfect' Mary Sue's shoes and insert yourself into the scenario of two hot guys fighting to win your affection, you might be able to enjoy Illusions, if it's not the case, stay away from this book for your own protection.