Review ~ The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay
The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay
Summary:
I live in a world without magic or miracles. A place where there are no clairvoyants or shapeshifters, no angels or superhuman boys to save you. A place where people die and music disintegrates and things suck. I am pressed so hard against the earth by the weight of reality that some days I wonder how I am still able to lift my feet to walk.
Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her—her identity, her spirit, her will to live—pay.
Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at seventeen years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space.
Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding—or if he even wants to.
The Sea of Tranquility is a rich, intense, and brilliantly imagined story about a lonely boy, an emotionally fragile girl, and the miracle of second chances.
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I want to start off by saying how much I love this cover. The cleverness is just amazing.
I had to give this book between 3 – 3.5 stars. I loved the concept and thought it was incredible and a very touching plot to touch on. However, the story itself really did not get good until about 3/4’s in. The first 3/4’s of the story felt like filler, stuff that wasn’t needed or that could have been edited a lot. Too much time was spent on Nastya’s building relationship with Drew and Josh. And, yes, that was needed, we needed to see them all bond but I don’t think it really should have taken so much of the story to do so. It was like too much backstory without the actual backstory.
A lot more attention and emphasis should have been placed on her tragedy. We got fed tidbits of it and still really had no clue what happened until the end of the book. I just think I would have appreciated this journey more if we had more focus on the tragedy and how she moved on with those boys and the new town after the fact. The last 1/4 was so much better because we got into the issues more, we saw the relationship between Josh and Nastya. We saw how much Drew changed and stopped being such a self-centered jerk and actually cared for someone besides himself. We saw her finally deal with the pain and feel something other than acting numb. There’s not too much I can really say without giving it all away but the last part was the best.
I liked how thought out the telltale signs of distress were. The names, the clothes, the make-up, the hand, etc… symbolically it was incredible.
Also, sometimes while reading I felt like things were being repeated. I wish I could remember but it was like the author kept trying to reiterate her meaning by continuing to say the same thing with just different words. I wanted to fall in love with this book like so many others did, but I just didn’t. I didn’t hate it either. I actually thought the storyline has so much potential. And like everything in life, it’s just my opinion, we’re not all going to like the same things with the same capacity.
I would still recommend this book but it’s just not my favorite book.
