Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs (RIP #5)

Book Summary (from the book)

A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. A strange collection of very curious photographs. Fiction is based on real black and white photographs. The death of grandfather Abe sends sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, and explores abandoned bedrooms and hallways. The children may still live.

My Review

What? RIP #5? I know, I know, I had a lot of books that would fall into the challenge, so I’m tackling them. Soon is the Read-a-Thon and for then I have a little more variety. Also, the lab is taking a big toll on me, so I’m going for the easy enjoyable books. Don’t judge me.

Back to the book.  Jacob is a teenager growing up in Florida, nothing special in his life, except that he comes from a rich family (mom side) and someday will inherit part of the business. On the other side, his paternal grandfather is a WWII survivor that used to tell Jacob stories…stories that he no longer believes in. But then something horrible happens; his grandpa is brutally murder and Jacob is the one to find him, dying and his last words trigger a search for the past.

The book is beautiful, I mean physically. Not only the pictures in it give it an eerie vintage look, but also the way they separated the chapters. That said, I think the author could’ve integrated the pictures a little bit better, although to be hones I don’t know exactly how. What I mean is there was a transition missing from text to pictures, but since I’m not a writer I can’t pinpoint how exactly this transition should’ve been done.

The story was nice, not original but not to an extent that I couldn’t see some things coming. That said, I was not expecting the bad guy to be...I won’t tell you, that would be ruining it. But that caught me by surprise. 

Now, one thing I have to say I did not like was the love story in it. Don’t get me wrong. I like love stories...is just that this seems so weird to me! Once again I cannot tell you exactly why, but let’s just say that the object of affection of Jacob might have some issues, besides her peculiarity. 

I am looking forward to the second part of the story (expected to come out next year) because I think the whole setting will be even more interesting than just the Welsh isolated island. I do hope the new set of pictures is introduced in a smother way.