Aussie Mixed Bag posts are something I started when we began this blog - it’s a way for me to share some short reviews of a couple of Aussie books. These are all books I read earlier in the year, but never got around to posting my reviews. Seeing as the AWW Challenge for 2012 is over, I'm playing catch up and posting three reviews together.




Red by Libby Gleeson
Published May 2012 by Allen & Unwin
Source: the library
Rating: 3 paws

From the blurb: Mud. In her mouth, her nose, her eyes. Mud in her hair and caked on her neck and her arms. Mud filling her shoes and seeping through her clothes. She coughed, spat, tried to clear her throat."What's your name?" the voice said againRed can't answer. She can't remember the cyclone. She doesn't remember her name, where she lived, who her family might be. What can she do to find out who she is and where she belongs?Is there anyone she can trust to help her?

Red by Libby Gleeson is set in Sydney after a cyclone has destroyed most of the coastal suburbs. A girl wakes up and has no recollection of who she is but a boy nearby lets her tag along with him. Peri has been living on his own, even before the cyclone, but is very guarded about his past. Together they try and piece together what happened to her, and he nicknames her Red because of her t shirt.

Libby is a well known Australian author and I was sure I’d read other books of hers but looking at the list of them now it seems I haven’t. I’m not sure what I expected from this book, there was just something about the cover that appealed to me and I love a book set in Sydney but this turned out to be aimed a lot younger than I thought it would be. Red is only eleven or twelve years old and I have a feeling this is older middle grade as opposed to YA.

It was an interesting idea to combine a realistic story with a cyclone in Sydney (something that probably wouldn't ever happen here) as well as the story of what happened to Red and her father and who they are running from. The story moved at a good pace though there were quite a few coincidences that stood out to me but overall I enjoyed the story and felt it was wrapped up well.



Halo by Alexandra Adornetto
Published 2010 by Harper Collins Australia
Source: audio book borrowed from the library
Rating: 1 paw

From the blurb: Three angels – Gabriel, the warrior; Ivy, the healer; and Bethany, the youngest and most human – are sent by Heaven to bring good to a world falling under the influence of darkness. They work hard to conceal their luminous glow, superhuman powers, and, most dangerous of all, their wings, all the while avoiding all human attachments.Then Bethany meets Xavier Woods, and neither of them is able to resist the attraction between them. Gabriel and Ivy do everything in their power to intervene, but the bond between Xavier and Bethany seems too strong.The angel’s mission is urgent, and dark forces are threatening. Will love ruin Bethany or save her?

Halo by Alexandra Adornetto is set in the fictional town of Venus Cove. Three angels, Bethany, Gabriel and Ivy are sent to Earth to help quell dark forces that are causing all the problems occurring in our world. They are to be friendly to humans but never get too close and everything is fine until Beth meets Xavier Woods, a class mate at the high school she enrols in.

It feels odd including this book as I have now heard that the author left Australia for the US a few years ago but I wasn't aware of that when I started this book. I started listening to the audio book on my way to and from work, mainly because I was curious about how bad this book could actually be. The first thing that stuck me was the accents that Alexandra did for the reading. I thought she was putting these American accents on and they sounded too fake and were annoying. Now I suppose she does actually have an American accent but at the time I found it a bit distracting.

At first I didn't think this was going to be so bad story-wise. Yes it seemed ridiculous that instead of being sent to a war-torn country, three angels end up in a little beach-side town and their mission is to attend school, either as a student or a teacher, and to encourage people to go to church and have faith and support their community. That’s all fine but the cynic in me thought they were wasting their time.

Bethany, and her brother and sister, are also really judgemental. They want to look after humans but at the same time they look down on them. Bethany thinks her fellow students are stupid and shallow and judges the girls for sunning their legs at lunch time – oh my! But at the same time she ends up getting caught up in wanting to look perfect for the prom just for Xavier Woods so she ended up being as shallow as her friends. I thought Xavier Woods was ok at first but when he and Beth discuss having sex and he decided for her that she was not ready, he showed how controlling and overly protective he was. Ag.

The insta-love was pretty intense. Once Beth and Xavier Woods get together they are always with each other and Beth neglects her mission and other activities to spend all her time with him. She also cannot function without him to the point where she thinks it’s too hard to even breathe when they are no longer together. Double ag.

A character introduced later, Jake Thorn (who must always be referred to by his full name, this goes for Xavier Woods, too), really started to get to me and ended up being such a stereotypical caricature of an English boy. The accent was really annoying to listen to and I found every sentence he uttered made me roll my eyes, it was all so cheesy. And none of the even suspect he’s bad - Gabe and Ivy are meant to be fierce warriors but both are powerless against him and decide to wait until higher powers decide what to do rather than act now and stop a murderer.

I wasn't going to mention the religious aspect but it really felt preachy and it wasn't something I could ignore. Most angel books don’t go into as much detail regarding God/Heaven/Hell but this book did focus on it a lot and seemed to send the message that if we all just went to church more often, everything would magically be ok.

There was also a lot of repetition:  there are many, many descriptions of eye colour, the way hair flops into Xavier Woods' eyes, how good angels are at everything (yet Bethany is still a ditz) and just too many descriptions in general.

So this ended up being a full length review but it’s mainly just ranting and I really didn't want to dedicate a whole post just for this book. I definitely won’t be subjecting myself to the rest of the series.




Mercy by Rebecca Lim
Published 2010 by Harper Collins Australia
Source: purchased
Rating: 3 paws

From the blurb: Mercy ′wakes′ on a school bus bound for Paradise, a small town where everyone knows everyone else′s business... or thinks they do. But Mercy has a secret life. She is an angel, doomed to return repeatedly to Earth, taking on a new ′persona′ each time she does, in an effort to resolve a cataclysmic rift between heavenly beings. 

Mercy by Rebecca Lim is set in the fictional town of Paradise. Rebecca's an Aussie author and while the book does have a bit of an Aussie feel to it, it's never acknowledged as being the country where the book is set.

Mercy is a fallen angel. She's been exiled from heaven due to an incident but she can't remember what happened. Now she lives on Earth, inhabiting the bodies of humans, she never knows how long she'll be in one body. She'll be living in them, controlling their speech and actions and the next day she will awake in another person.

This time she finds herself in the body of a young girl called Carmen, on a bus to the town of Paradise where Carmen is going to visit another school and participate in their choir performance. Carmen is billeted with a family that has gone though a tragedy. Lauren Daley was kidnapped one night, two years ago leaving behind her older brother, Ryan and her parents. Mercy can sense the emotions of humans and this feeling is intensified by contact and she can tell the parents are still distraught. Ryan on the other hand is determined to find Lauren and hasn't given up hope that she is still alive. He's had strong feelings and visions of her and believes she's alive, possibly being held captive in a church.

Mercy decides to help Ryan track Lauren down and figure out who took her. They start investigating and focus on local churches and people who knew Lauren. I knew who the kidnapper was the moment we were introduced to them and thought Mercy should have been able to figure it out way before she finally realises.

Mercy is a very strong-willed character who's aggressive, blunt and extremely judgemental of the people around her, especially their physical appearance. She grew on me eventually because she does try to help the people she inhabits and she went out of her way to assist Ryan.

It took me a while to get into this book and even then I kept putting it down because I found it wasn't holding my attention. Because there's a lot that Mercy doesn't know or remember, as a reader I found I had so many questions that I knew weren't going to be answered. I wanted to know what happened to Mercy and who is controlling her now? She dreams of someone called Luc, who is he and can he be trusted? Is she ever going to find out who she really is and return to being an angel?

I always start reading an Aussie book thinking it's going to be excellent so I was disappointed that this fell short for me, I know a few other bloggers have really enjoyed it so don't let me feelings put you off. I do want to read the next book in the series because I really would like to know if the answers are revealed so I'll be checking that out soon.

These reviews are part of the Australian Women Writers 2012 Reading and Reviewing Challenge (the 2012 Challenge is now over, but you can sign up for the AWW 2013 Challenge here!)