Monday, December 15, 2014

The Scorpio Races, by Maggie Stiefvater

The story of The Scorpio Races is a unique story and one that I haven't heard before. Thisby Island is a remote island with a small population. The island and it's inhabitants are fairly quite and keep to themselves. All of this changes each November when residents and tourists alike flock to the annual Scorpio Races held along the island's beaches. Each year young racers compete on horse back to become the champion of the races. The only thing different about these horses are that they are water horses- they do not like to be tamed. They're deadly. Not only is there a need to be the best horse back rider but there is also a need for survival in order to cross the finish line. Deadly horses are not enough to keep Puck away from the races. Winning the race is the only way to help her family survive and keep her and her two brothers together.

One would think that a book that encompasses adventure, fantasy, a little romance, and man eating horses would have something for just about everyone, guess again.

Scorpio Games was among 25 other books I found on a list (Pinterest of course) called "25 Series to Read if You Love the Hunger Games". I decided that I was going to choose a couple of the books and give them a try. Well, most of them were pretty good and I did end up reading the entire series that followed. All except one... Scorpio Races. With so many of the other books being great or even (dare I say it) better than the Hunger Games, I dived into reading this particular book with high hopes. My hopes stayed high for the first chapter, the second, the third, and by that point I was reading in hopes that something exciting just had to happen so I continued on. Nope. With this book being just over four hundred pages long, the most excitement occurred in the last thirty pages (and no, you can't skip to the end otherwise nothing would make sense.) Maybe if a was an avid horse rider or even a horse enthusiast I would have enjoyed this book a little more. But just being a fantasy lover was not enough to suffice. This is why this reviewer would not recommend adding this to your "Must Read List" and maybe crossing it off of your "If I have Time List".


JAC

1 comment:

  1. Jessie, I had the same experience with this book. I've loved this author's books in the past (her Raven Boys series is awesome!), and I'd heard much good press on this one. An added bonus is this is a stand-alone which (with a very few exceptions), I prefer to a story that is stretched over multiple books. So I, too, was excited to delve into The Scorpio Races. Although the writing was gorgeous (as is typical of Maggie Stiefvater), I couldn't get into the story. So I ended up giving it up a little more than halfway through. There are too many books on my "to read" pile to struggle through something I don't find interesting. --Alissa Bach

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