TITLE: The Raven Boys
SERIES: The Raven Cycle(#1)
AUTHOR: Maggie Stiefvater
GENRE: Fantasy, Young Adult
PAGE COUNT: 406
PUBLICATION: September 18, 2012
PUBLISHER: Scholastic Press
RATING: 4 out of 5 stars
“There are only two reasons a non-seer would see a spirit on St. Mark’s Eve. Either you’re his true love . . . or you killed him.”
Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue never sees them—until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks to her.
His name is Gansey, and he’s a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble.
But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can’t entirely explain. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul whose emotions range from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher who notices many things but says very little.
For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She doesn’t believe in true love and never thought this would be a problem. But as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore.
This is one of my all-time favorites now. I’ve owned this book for awhile, and I’ve heard about it even longer, but I just never cared enough to start the series, although Maggie Stiefvater is one of my favorite authors.
Thankfully, this past week, my school did state testing, which means a lot of reading! Although I hate testing because its so tedious, I enjoy being able to relax and read a book afterwards. I usually get a lot done and this was the perfect time to have the testing.
This book pulled me in right from the start. The writing is so beautiful. I was reading some reviews after I had finished this book, and some people said that Ms. Stiefvater didn’t describe the characters and background well during scenes. Honestly, I am not one for big descriptions. I mean, I appreciate it when necessary, but I just wanna get into the action.
Now into the book topics. The book is fantastical. I’ve never read a book with psychics and spirits before so I was gladly surprised by the summary. I love Blue’s unique name and it’s funny how “normal” people are so shocked by it. I can recall when Gansey and Blue meet one time and he renamed her Jane, which Blue was not happy about. Also Blue was trying to introduce herself to one of Gansey’s friends on the phone and they couldn’t understand her and so she said her name was Jane. The best part of that was that the friend sighed and said I thought you were saying blue at first. Laughter consumed me at the time.
It was very intriguing to read about Welsh mythology. I’m still a little confused about Glendower, but I’m sure I’ll learn more in the next installment of the series. Anyways, I’ve never heard about Welsh mythology so I thought it added another element to the story. In other words, this book is everything I have never read haha.
Now I just have to say that it is quite frustrating how I always ship the wrong couple! I don’t understand how I do it! It’s even worse because I know straight from the beginning who Blue is supposed to end up with. It literally says in the summary that she has a true love, which is obviously Gansey when you read the book. Even with knowing this, I still started to ship Blue and Adam! Pinterest came to the rescue though. I spoiled myself with pins about The Raven Boys and discovered Adam will eventually get together with a person I will not name for spoiler sakes. Let’s just say that once Adam and mystery person get together, it will make it easier to not ship Adam and Blue.
This was a story that I will one day reread. Go read it now!
As always, check back in later for more content, read a book or two and I’ll see you in the next post! xoxo-Izzy
Perky Books and Reads 