Book Review: Shards and Ashes by Melissa Marr, Kelley Armstrong, Veronica Roth, Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl, Rachel Caine, Nancy Holder, Beth Revis and Carrie Ryan

Title: Shards and Ashes

Author: Melissa Marr, Kelley Armstrong, Veronica Roth, Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl, Rachel Caine, Nancy Holder, Beth Revis and Carrie Ryan

Publisher: HarperCollins

Pages: 384

Format: Paperback

Published: February, 2013

Price: Rp 105.000 -> Rp 30.000 [71% off] (Periplus)

Rating: 2 / 5 stars

Date started: October 5, 2014 - Date finished: October 5, 2014

Synopsis:

Gripping original stories of dystopian worlds from nine New York Times bestselling authors, edited by Melissa Marr and Kelley Armstrong.
The world is gone, destroyed by human, ecological, or supernatural causes. Survivors dodge chemical warfare and cruel gods; they travel the reaches of space and inhabit underground caverns. Their enemies are disease, corrupt corporations, and one another; their resources are few, and their courage is tested.
Powerful original dystopian tales from nine bestselling authors offer bleak insight, prophetic visions, and precious glimmers of light among the shards and ashes of a ruined world.

Review:
Shards and Ashes is basically a series of post-apocalyptic dystopian short stories written by different authors. To be completely honest I'm kind of torn on how to review and rate this book because there are stories that I liked but there are also some stories that I just didn't enjoy that much and had a hard time finishing it. ALAS I gave it a 2 stars / 5 stars because there are more stories that I didn't enjoy more than the stories that I've enjoyed. Let me break it down for you guys:

Stories that I like:

Hearken by Veronica Roth

Branded by Kelley Armstrong

Necklace of Raindrops by Margaret Stohl

Dogsbody by Rachel Caine

Dying while fighting for a better future seemed like a good way to go, maybe even a way to reach the kind of afterlife where she could be happy, where she could enjoy the sort of existence that people talked about when they talked about before.

Stories that I didn't really enjoy:

Pale Rider by Nancy Holder

Corpse Eaters by Melissa Marr

Burn 3 by Kami Garcia

Love is a Choice by Beth Revis

Miasma by Carrie Ryan

Better to die fighting than drown in the dead

From the stories that I like my most favorite one is Necklace of Raindrop by Margaret Stohl. It's about a world where people are living a very boring and safe life because they have a sort of necklace that can measure their life, if it runs out they'll die but they can also trade the beads/pearls in their necklace for something challenging in their life that'll make it more enjoyable and if the beads in their  necklace ran out they must do "the drop" and eventually they die. What's interesting about this short story is that it is told from different perspectives, which I think would be a bad idea since it's a short story but I felt that the writer did a great job in writing the story.

Love is a mistake when we're all going to die any day now

But from the stories that I didn't really enjoy, the hardest one for me to finish was Miasma by Carrie Ryan. I really struggled in finishing that story but I actually think the story was interesting, though in the end I finished it anyway. The story just didn't left any impression on me at all. I'm not going to tell you what it's about because maybe you guys will like it better than me, I dunno...

"Sometimes you have to do things you don't like in order to make a change in the world." he said 

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