Jessica Fortunato

I don't recall how I came across this book, might have been included with a group of books a friend sent. Either way, the story synopsis didn't sound bad so I stated into it. Overall the story was a bit shorter than I expected, as I finished it in just a few hours. I would say it falls in my genre of reading (Fantasy/Urban Fantasy) and I loved the idea behind a type of people that go around collecting sins from regular humans.

A couple issues I had while reading, and this may include some spoilers.

One, the main character (female) though is supposed to be aged around 100 years give or take, acted/reacted to everything like a teenager. She is 'locked' in her physical form at age 20, so I don't know if we are supposed to blame this on hormones that are locked in at that age. These quivery/giggly teenager moments she has whenever a guy appears in the story.... sigh. Yet there is one quick sex scene than thankfully doesn't get very descriptive - I don't care to read about sex scenes.

Second, when do we get to hear more of the collecting of sin? There was one scene where the main character did what she was trained to do, and supposedly had done for over half the years she has been around. Also, no one else was doing it. Yet there are many (guessing since it isn't really talked about) people that live this way.

Third, the ending was a bit disturbing. The guy she has been all googly about throughout the story is now out of the story (I won't say why), and now she gets together with the guy that was her 'trainer', who took her from the orphanage at a young age, and until the age of 20 was like a father figure to her. Whoaaaa.... so not cool. For this alone I would not want to classify this as YA, though it certainly seemed to aimed to that group of readers.

I noticed that there is a second book available, that per its description, seems to possibility go back and cover more about the actual sin collecting, but it doesn't look like it would be a continuation of this book - more like a prequel. Though my few thoughts on the short-comings here, I may pick up the next book, just because it piques my interest.… (plus d'informations)

I don't normally mention this in a review, but I can't help stating this fact: I really love this cover. As you can see it's fairly simple in the sense that it's only various shades of grey and black. I think this is what draws me to the image every time I see it. The way the black corners fade from the grey is beautiful. When I stare long enough at it, the cover looks to be in motion. But I'm not one to judge a book by its cover. I gave it the rating I did for a reason. The reason was what is held between the covers.

What I really enjoyed from this book was the mythology behind the sin collectors, or Sin-eaters as they are also known. The concept that there are immortals roaming earth whose purpose is to remove the sins from a soul before it leaves a dying body was interesting. I was torn between finding this to be a good thing and that this could be too easy of a way out for heavy sinners. Lily mentions that she has performed the ritual on some utterly vile human beings.

What left me a bit disappointed was that there wasn't much of a history established for the sin collectors. It's true that even these beings have their own speculations about where they came from and why they were made. This doesn't take away from the book in the least. I think my yearning to know more about the collectors made me enjoy the story more. It also may have helped me sympathize with the collectors' own questions about their origins.

Enough about that though. You want to hear about the story itself, I'm sure. I was hooked early on and fell in love with some of the characters right away. One of them was George. He's an 87 year old widower who visits Lily at the library daily. He added some light to her long life and I enjoyed reading their conversations. I almost wish there were more of them.

Another character I enjoyed was one we meet later on, Rebecca. All I can say about her is that she's an ancient collector and very mysterious. I wish it could tell you more about her, but without spoiling anything and the addition of her reclusive nature I can't say much. With the little hints into her character that we got, I wanted to see more.

There were many themes touched on throughout the book. What should be focused on is one's part in the world, be it in a family, a place, or a "profession." The collectors tend to question their purpose in life. Why do they collect; what will become of them if they do get killed; etc. Most all collectors lead a solitary life because they physically can't survive being very close to the sins held within other collectors. When a way around is found, these questions start to get asked more and more often. I liked that the book focused on themes such as these but didn't make the reader stumble when they showed themselves in the reading. There was a smooth mix of story and "philosophical thought" that blended perfectly.

A final little bit I'll discuss is the ending. This won't be a spoiler so don't worry. It ended, and leads to the next in the trilogy. That's great. The way it ended was a big surprise to me. The reader and Lily were lead to doubt some of the characters until the very end. I couldn't figure out who I trusted more, and that's a hard thing to accomplish. I've been discovering a good amount of novels recently that have great unpredictable twists to them and The Sin Collector has joined those ranks.

Overall this story was a fast-paced read with a number of great characters, unpredictable plot turns, and a great mythology. I now want to go read some of the real world myths about sin-eaters to maybe satisfy my craving for the next installment of The Sin Collector Trilogy.… (plus d'informations)

Earlier in the year I read Jessica Fortunato’s debut novel The Sin Collector, book one in her Sin Collector Trilogy. The book was a refreshing take on the paranormal in the sense that Fortunato dug up a little known (at least to me) mythical being sometimes known as a Sin-Eater or Collector. That alone had me had me wanting to read the book, and I wasn’t disappointed.

Not too long after the author allowed the fans to choose which character from the book they’d like to read as the star of a short story. Thomas won with flying colors. There was a good amount of intrigue into his past that I wanted his story to be told as well. This short story is the product of that voting process.

Fortunato’s writing style comes through in Thomas just as much as it did in her longer debut novel. This was great to see because sometimes an author can’t translate their normal style to the shorter form of a short story. The mechanics are just different, but that doesn’t seem to have gotten in Fortunato’s way.

The pace was fast, which is one of the things I loved about The Sin Collector. Also, while it’s easy to speed through, the it doesn’t let you breeze over the words. Some fast paced stories can easily be read and forgotten. With Thomas there is nothing lost along the way. The pace just helps the reader gain the information that they long for; Thomas’s history.

Did I like Thomas’s character even more after knowing where he came from and what he was doing long before what we know from Book 1? Affirmative! He was already one of my favorite characters, but this story was essential to locking him in as one of my favorite characters. Was his story all that I had been waiting for? Affirmative; it was satisfying and more. I had no idea what I was going to be reading since I didn’t have much to work with. He was very mysterious. What takes place in this story reveals all that was needed to be known…but then it leaves some more questions after it’s done.

I can’t get into the questions that arise. I’m pretty sure I have the answers, but you’ll need to read this story for yourself. I refuse to spoil anything about Thomas. I will say one things though, please read The Sin Collector before you read The Sin Collector Thomas.… (plus d'informations)