Publisher: Scholastic Press
Genre: YA, Fantasy, Paranormal
Amazon ~ Goodreads ~ TBD
Synopsis: Here is a thing everyone wants:
A miracle.
Here is a thing everyone fears:
What it takes to get one.
Any visitor to Bicho Raro, Colorado is likely to find a landscape of dark saints, forbidden love, scientific dreams, miracle-mad owls, estranged affections, one or two orphans, and a sky full of watchful desert stars.
At the heart of this place you will find the Soria family, who all have the ability to perform unusual miracles. And at the heart of this family are three cousins longing to change its future: Beatriz, the girl without feelings, who wants only to be free to examine her thoughts; Daniel, the Saint of Bicho Raro, who performs miracles for everyone but himself; and Joaquin, who spends his nights running a renegade radio station under the name Diablo Diablo.
They are all looking for a miracle. But the miracles of Bicho Raro are never quite what you expect.
Maggie Stiefvater has been called “a master storyteller” by USA Today and “wildly imaginative” by Entertainment Weekly. Now, with All the Crooked Saints, she gives us the extraordinary story of an extraordinary family, a masterful tale of love, fear, darkness, and redemption.
My Rating
3/5 stars
My Review
All the Crooked Saints is a beautiful story about a family of saints and the miracles they help perform. While I really loved the idea of this story, it had a very slow beginning and a few annoying characters that made the book less enjoyable.
If you need a miracle, come to Bicho Raro, a Colorado town that takes in any pilgrim that needs help. The twist is that once the saint performs the miracle, your darkness comes to life and you must perform the second miracle yourself. The saints are not allowed to interfere or help the pilgrims with the second miracle, otherwise their own darkness manifests, and its always worse than those of any pilgrim. When Daniel Soria helps a pilgrim named Marisita, he must leave town to ensure that no other Soria will try to help him. His two cousins, Beatriz and Joaquin try to use their illegal radio station to try to reach out to their cousin and find him before its too late.
Let me start off by saying, the beginning of this book was really slow and painful. We get to know the main characters, the rest of the family, and a lot of pilgrims. There are so many characters in this small town that it was really hard to remember who everyone was in the beginning. There was absolutely no action or anything very engaging, so it was basically half of a book of just descriptions and a bit of dialogue. Finally about half way in, once Daniel leaves the town the action picks up and we finally get into the real plot of the story. At this point I actually started to enjoy the book a lot, and started to like the characters a lot more. So if you end up picking up a copy of this book and don't like it in the beginning, just keep reading because it definitely gets better.
There was a few characters I loved from the very beginning, such as Beatriz, Daniel, Pete, and a few of the pilgrims. Then there were the creepy/weird pilgrims such as the priest guy (don't remember his name) the snake twins, and Marisita. There were also Sorias that I didn't like, which were Joaquin and Beatriz's sister and her husband.
Beatriz is a strong and independent woman right from the beginning. She's really intelligent, and hard working (when it comes to doing things she likes) and she always knows the right thing to say. Although she seems perfect right from the start, she does go through huge character development, as she is able to eventually open up to people and show her emotions.
I thought I was going to love Joaquin from the beginning, but unfortunately the only time we see him in the book is when he is Diablo Diablo on the radio, it is very rare to see him outside of that setting, he just kind of disappears whenever daylight is out. I honestly would have loved to see more from him, especially some character development and more time in the story.
While I loved Daniel's story, I absolutely hated his love interest Marisita. I wasn't a huge fan of her character in the beginning of the story, and I hoped that my feeling for her would change as the story went on, but unfortunately it didn't. I didn't really understand her miracle, especially her second miracle because it didn't feel like she did enough to overcome her darkness. I didn't feel like she had any character development either, she just stayed the same person throughout the whole book.
While I loved the idea of Saints and miracles from this story, I think it could have been a lot better if there were some better characters or more character development, and the beginning wasn't so description filled and boring. If you love Maggie's writing then I'm sure you will like this one, so definitely try it out!
Happy Reading,
Aneta
If you need a miracle, come to Bicho Raro, a Colorado town that takes in any pilgrim that needs help. The twist is that once the saint performs the miracle, your darkness comes to life and you must perform the second miracle yourself. The saints are not allowed to interfere or help the pilgrims with the second miracle, otherwise their own darkness manifests, and its always worse than those of any pilgrim. When Daniel Soria helps a pilgrim named Marisita, he must leave town to ensure that no other Soria will try to help him. His two cousins, Beatriz and Joaquin try to use their illegal radio station to try to reach out to their cousin and find him before its too late.
Let me start off by saying, the beginning of this book was really slow and painful. We get to know the main characters, the rest of the family, and a lot of pilgrims. There are so many characters in this small town that it was really hard to remember who everyone was in the beginning. There was absolutely no action or anything very engaging, so it was basically half of a book of just descriptions and a bit of dialogue. Finally about half way in, once Daniel leaves the town the action picks up and we finally get into the real plot of the story. At this point I actually started to enjoy the book a lot, and started to like the characters a lot more. So if you end up picking up a copy of this book and don't like it in the beginning, just keep reading because it definitely gets better.
There was a few characters I loved from the very beginning, such as Beatriz, Daniel, Pete, and a few of the pilgrims. Then there were the creepy/weird pilgrims such as the priest guy (don't remember his name) the snake twins, and Marisita. There were also Sorias that I didn't like, which were Joaquin and Beatriz's sister and her husband.
Beatriz is a strong and independent woman right from the beginning. She's really intelligent, and hard working (when it comes to doing things she likes) and she always knows the right thing to say. Although she seems perfect right from the start, she does go through huge character development, as she is able to eventually open up to people and show her emotions.
I thought I was going to love Joaquin from the beginning, but unfortunately the only time we see him in the book is when he is Diablo Diablo on the radio, it is very rare to see him outside of that setting, he just kind of disappears whenever daylight is out. I honestly would have loved to see more from him, especially some character development and more time in the story.
While I loved Daniel's story, I absolutely hated his love interest Marisita. I wasn't a huge fan of her character in the beginning of the story, and I hoped that my feeling for her would change as the story went on, but unfortunately it didn't. I didn't really understand her miracle, especially her second miracle because it didn't feel like she did enough to overcome her darkness. I didn't feel like she had any character development either, she just stayed the same person throughout the whole book.
While I loved the idea of Saints and miracles from this story, I think it could have been a lot better if there were some better characters or more character development, and the beginning wasn't so description filled and boring. If you love Maggie's writing then I'm sure you will like this one, so definitely try it out!
Happy Reading,
Aneta
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