These books blurred together. It is less than an hour at slow speed for all three together. The one that stood out was the one where two princesses adopt secret identities to fight monsters, without letting each other know of their alter egos. There is also a monster that serves as the science fair project. Not quite sure what the right audience is for these.
The Princess in Black, Books 1-3: The Princess in Black; The Princess in Black and the Perfect Princess Party; The Princess in Black and the Hungry Bunny Horde by Shannon Hale and Dean Hale
Princess Magnolia is a normal princess. However, when monsters appear she sneaks out to become the masked Princess in Black. Her "unicorn" gets transformed into her black horse. They go and battle monsters, and then return back to the princess duties. The books are all "chapter books", but are very short. The stories themselves are fairly indistinguishable.
The Snow Queen by Hans Christian Andersen
Disney's Frozen originated as an adaptation of Snow Queen, but then drifted significantly. In this original novella, an evil troll creates a glass which distorts everything so only the bad is viewed. Fragments of this fall all over the world. One boy gets the shard in his heart and eye. He becomes cruel. Later he disappears with the snow queen who makes him forget about his past. The others go on adventures. Then in the end, his sister is able to melt his shard with love and return him back to normal. There are plenty of elements that were adopted by Disney, but this story is more complex.
The battle between the partials and the humans heats up. They discover what can allow each other to live together, but don't want to make the change. It turns out that a well-meaning plan to "protect" the new species has actually led to the current apocalypse. We also learn more about the "blood man" who cuts off people's fingers and takes their blood. (It turns out he has some grand intentions, and some history with the female protagonist.) The novel includes plenty of action (including a battle in a bombed out mall.) However, the conclusion feels very rushed. What does become of the world?
In this second book, partials and humans are both working together and trying to kill each other. The narrative centers on a hybrid girl who is on the human side. She has lived with humans, but has partial characteristics. She tries to find the "cure" by searching the office of the biotech company that helped launch the partials. She finds the IT director who believes himself to be the last human. He has gone a little bit crazy after living alone for a dozen years. However, when talking about work, he suddenly "wakes up" and becomes more fluent.
They go on a quest to find more information. It takes then from New York to Chicago to the west. They eventually find a human population that is living safely alone. They have knowledge of the cause and the cure. Alas, it was not want they desire to here.
There is a message of unintended consequences. A few rogue people with power can cause extreme issues for the remainder of the population.
The fourth Charlotte Holmes book wraps up the series. Holmes and Watson are at school. Well sort of. They help with weird things they see going on. In the end, Watson decides to pursue a more "normal" school career. Charlotte opens her "help" clinic to help others that are in need. The book was pretty much a blur, but I liked the epilogue.
The Original is an audiobook-only novella that takes place in a near "singularity" world. People experience life through "themes", a form of augmented reality. They may be walking around in a drab city, but it will appear to be vibrant in a way they desire. (A couple could be "alone" in a park, even as many people next to them are also "alone".) There are ways to "check in" for repairs that allow people to experience near immortality. However, people can still be killed via bodily injury.
The story centers around the copy of a woman that had killed her husband. The "copy" was made from the most recent "backup". She feels like herself. However, she also has had combat training implanted. She is tasked with seaking out her "original". This story is fairly simplistic detective story. However, the universe is the main story here. There is a lot of potential to explore, but it seems to end too soon. This world is more interesting, but I think Snapshot had a better story.
Last of August is the second Charlotte Holmes novel. I probably should have read it before reading the third one. It starts with some basic teenage romance coupled with wealthy British dinner parties. Watson really likes Miss Holmes, but struggles with execution. There is also a big mystery to be solved related to art theft rings. Charlotte Holmes continues to be "super human". Perhaps those drugs that she is addicted to give he special power to (almost) always know what to do to help solve cases and get out of trouble.
In this Charlotte Holmes story, there is more "school life" than detective work. Jamie Watson is trying to finish school, but gets framed for a minor crime. Charlotte Holmes is on the run. There is a "unifying" marriages and a bit of independent "detective work", such as slyly digging through airline reservations. High school social life remains important - People don't want to rat on others for fear of killing their social life. Charlotte continues to be nearly "superhuman". Despite being a teenage drug addict, she manages to show up at just the right time to save the day.
Partials is yet another YA post apocalyptic novel. Humans created "partials" to help fight wars. These part-human/part robot creatures eventually turned on their human overlords. They unleashed a virus that wiped out much of the population. The novel centers on a society based in Long Island that thinks of itself as the last remnant of human civilization. They require every woman over the age of 18 to be perpetually pregnant in hopes of birthing a baby immune to the virus. Alas, the babies rarely live more than a few days. We follow the trail of a young medic and her friends who seek to find a partial in order to discover a cure. They eventually get the partial. She studies it and she (of course) becomes friends with him. However, they discover that they were pawns in a power grab by the controlling Senate. They see this as a great opportunity to declare martial law. Our heroes then escape and team with the partial to cure the virus. Only they discover a few more things in the process. The novel ties things up with peace, but leaves a large number of open threads for the sequel.
Descendants of Sherlock Holmes and Watson meet at an easy coast boarding school and become involved with a murder mystery. James Watson narrates and comes across as a normal teenager. Charlotte Holmes is pure fiction. Watson admits to fantasizing about her, and this helps justify the narrative. However, as a young teenager, she is just too good and deductions - and too worldly. (She is a drug addict, can seamlessly pose as anybody, runs a poker club and has been raped while high.) The story was engaging with a nice growth arc with the main characters, even if their lives seemed a little too vulgarly mature. The parental relationships, on the other hand, were a little on the odd side.
The world seems to be coming to an end. Natural and man-made disasters are also spreading in epic proportions. What is a girl supposed to do? Go on a cross country road trip with her best friend and a boy she just met, of course. In doing this, she finds out more about herself and her family and finally meets her aunt and uncle and long-lost sister. Meanwhile, hoodlums reign in the world, doing things in the name of "the church of America". This church was started by Pastor Frick, who had predicted the apocalypse and a rapture event. The disasters bring people to the church, while the disappearance of many people on the rapture date drives the country into a frenzy. Alas, while Frick was genuine and his church "good", he was eventually manipulated by a big business to sell things. Eventually, the church cooperation came to dominate media, consumer goods and most of society. The mobs used the teachings of Frick to justify "elimination" of sinners. The rapture event was even an orchestrated killing at the hands of the business. Frick still believes that he is doing good, but internally, he is feeling the struggle.
