WE OTHER
SUE BENTLEY
GIVEAWAY
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
SUE BENTLEY
Sue Bentley discovered a love of books at an early age. She worked for Northamptonshire Libraries for many years, while teaching herself the craft of writing. She is the author of the worldwide bestselling Magic Kitten, Magic Puppy, Magic Ponies, Magic Bunny series for age 5-9 years. She also writes for children and adults under various pen names. A lover of English Folklore, her books often contain elements of the otherworld and the darkness within the everyday. Her books have been translated into around 20 languages. We Other is her first book for Young Adults.
REVIEW - WE OTHER
***
I must admit upon reading We Other, I came away with mixed reactions. Firstly the positives; this story is Young Adult with plenty of bite. As Sue Bentley is usually an author for a lower age group there was a bit of a worry that this would just have teenage protagonists and that would be it. However, the story deals with themes of poverty, addiction and homelessness as well and there’s some violent scenes as well. The romance side line is also nicely done and not too over the top.
The human characters are detailed and realistic – Jess, Caleb and Alice are interesting and relatable and the story is not afraid to show their flaws. However, I did feel like some of the characters were not explored enough – Taryn for example just seems to be walking, talking exposition for the story and Caleb’s dad is just a caricature of evil.
The narrative itself is very easy to read and kept me interested throughout. The chapters jumping perspectives between multiple characters but keeping Jess central to the story was a nice mechanic and worked well to progress the story.
The negatives for me are the length of the book – We Other is a beast at 560 pages and not enough plot to really warrant it. By the time the story actually gets going it’s the end and even then not much has really happened in terms of plot progression. With some good editing the book can easily be cut in half and I think it will be a better standalone story for it.
My other negative is that the plot is predictable, the story gives you all of the information you need to logically work out what will happen next before any of the reveals so nothing is really surprising. It also is predictable in that it brings nothing new to the Young Adult Fantasy Fiction genre. Jess is an outsider who doesn’t fit in to the normal teenage environment, finds out she is actually a supernatural being (you could substitute Fairy with Witch, Harry Potter, Vampire Slayer etc) and not only that, but a really special, powerful one and then is given a quest to take down the establishment and shake up the supernatural world, despite having only known about it for a few minutes. It’s very standard stuff although it is done well.
Overall, We Other is a fairy-tale with bite with some good characters and interesting themes explored. However, it needs editing to get it shorter as it feels very much like a long winded set-up to a much more interesting sequel at the moment. Thanks to Rachel’s Random Resources for giving me a copy of We Other in exchange for an honest review.
LINKS TO PURCHASE
Purchase from Amazon UK - https://www.amazon.co.uk/We-Other-Sue-Bentley-ebook/dp/B07D19PRGL/
Purchase from Amazon.com - https://www.amazon.com/We-Other-Sue-Bentley-ebook/dp/B07D19PRGL/