Mini Reviews: Happy Birthday to Me + Remembrance

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME
(Birthday Trilogy #1)
Brian Rowe
Paranormal Young Adult
314 pages
Self-published
Received from author for review

THE STORY (from Goodreads)
Seventeen-year-old Cameron Martin has a huge problem: he’s aging a whole year of his life with each passing day!

High school is hard enough; imagine rapidly aging from seventeen to seventy in a matter of weeks, with no logical explanation, and with prom, graduation, and the state championship basketball game all on the horizon. That’s what happens to Cameron, a popular pretty boy who's never had to face a day looking anything but perfect.

All Cameron wants to do is go back to normal, but no one, not even the best doctors, can diagnose his condition. When he finds love with a mysterious young woman, however, he realizes his only hope for survival might be with the one person who started his condition in the first place...

MY THOUGHTS
Despite its supernatural premise, Happy Birthday to Me is written in a way that makes circumstances seem fairly believable, the emotional depth and poignancy achieved during certain scenes enough to have us blinking rapidly to stave off tears as our hearts beat with a sympathetic rhythm for Cameron’s unenviable predicament. Unfortunately, the beautifully crafted quiet moments are often overshadowed by some seemingly unnecessary situations and behaviors that have us shaking our heads in dismay, the over-the-top reactions of friends, family and classmates to Cameron’s “disease” yanking the veil of believability from our eyes as quickly as the meaningful moments are able to raise it. We can’t help but long for more of the intimate family moments between Cameron and his image-obsessed parents as they all mature and come to understand just how much precious time they wasted on superficial trivialities, as those are the ones that are the most intriguing.

There is one rather large issue I had with this book and it’s completely personal in nature so it will most likely not be problematic for most readers, but it bothered me enough that I feel the need to mention it. My point of contention is likely directly linked to the fact that I’m rapidly approaching my 30th birthday and am therefore a bit more sensitive to the age issue than I would be normally, so I fully acknowledge that upfront. With that said, I found the utter shock and awe both Cameron himself as well as his peers expressed at seeing him at ages 28 and 30 to be a little off-putting. Cries of “is that you in there?” from his friends upon setting their eyes on his apparently ancient 30 year-old face seemed a bit overdramatic, and I’d like to think that if my 17 year-old self and my current self were side by side, my 30 year-old visage wouldn’t be completely unrecognizable and mind-boggling compared to my 17-year old one. I freely admit the reactions were most likely ratcheted up a notch for dramatic effect, and granted aging fifteen years in only fifteen days would be quite jarring, but there was a certain extremity to the reactions regarding his progression from 17 to 30 that rubbed me the wrong way.

Personal age issue aside and despite the somewhat questionable sincerity of Cameron's overall change of heart toward the end, the touching moments are well-done and it’s clear that Mr. Rowe is a talented writer, so I do look forward to more from him in the future.

Rating: 3/5


REMEMBRANCE
Michelle Madow
Paranormal Young Adult
314 pages
Available Now
Received from author for review

THE STORY (from Goodreads)
New Hampshire high school junior Lizzie Davenport has been reincarnated from Regency Era, England ... but she doesn't know it yet.

Then Drew Carmichael transfers into Lizzie's school at the beginning of the year, and she feels a connection to him, almost like she knows him. She can't stop thinking about him, but whenever she tries talking with him about the mysteries behind her feelings, he makes it clear that he wants nothing to do with her. Reaching him is even more difficult because she has a boyfriend, Jeremy, who has started to become full of himself after being elected co-captain of the varsity soccer team, and her flirtatious best friend Chelsea starts dating Drew soon after his arrival. So why can't she seem to get him out of her mind?

Even though Lizzie knows she should let go of her fascination with Drew, the pair of them soon find that fighting fate isn't going to be easy.

MY THOUGHTS
Remembrance is a well-written debut from Ms. Madow with a nicely paced story that keeps our desire to turn the pages relatively high, however, the plot itself and the characters we follow as it unfolds have some frustratingly all-too familiar qualities. Prevalent YA fiction elements appear in all their recognizable glory, with a new hot boy at school and instant electric attraction that turns swiftly into epic and transcendent love failing to be done in a way that elevates them out of the realm of trite and into something new and refreshing.

Elizabeth is a difficult young woman to fully support as, instant love aside, she allows all those around her to be insulting and, at times, downright cruel without ever straightening her spine and defending herself. Drew blows hot and cold on a fairly unparalleled scale, either ignoring Elizabeth entirely or verbally berating her one minute and then comforting her and soothing the burns he caused the next. He’ll shred her heart with seeming ease and then come sauntering back cooing apologies and feeding her excuses she’s all too willing to swallow, somehow convincing her their love is stronger than anyone could possibly understand despite all evidence to the contrary.

Ms. Madow shows a great deal of promise in her creativity and writing style, her characterization in this book just presents more problems than we can ignore in order to become thoroughly engrossed in the story.

Rating: 2.5/5