Customer Reviews

DarqStarz Rising (Scarlett & Crimson)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

My daughter read this book very quickly, and she is looking forward to the others in the series. She's also trying to persuade her best friend to read this book as well. She says:

"Crimson and Scarlett don't really fit in with the 'in' crowd at their school, and when the music contest comes up, they are determined to show their skills. The best thing about this book is the pictures."

She particularly liked the message written on the edge of the pages.

A fun read for the tweens of the world. Sadly, I found the premise to be so stereotypical and cliched. I realize it is difficult to come up with ways to set up the story and to get it going, but it just bothered me. The characters are fun, and help liven up the all too familiar storyline. The ending left me with questions, but obviously they will be answered in the next book in the series.

It talks about MP3's, websites, computers and anything else trendy. Flimsy premise for a story and overly complicated.

Although technically the Goths are an entirely different "scene" or clique, as Scarlett and Crimson helpfully point out in great detail to a transfer student from Great Britain (and any reader in need of a clue), "Darq" in appearance at least amounts to Kawaii or Chibi Goth, about as disturbing a concept to most Goths as can possibly be imagined,...

which isn't necessarily bad. Parents wishing to gently disabuse their children from the Goth scene could do worse than to give them (or better yet their younger siblings) this book: "After reading it I think I understand you better; I never realized how cute your Goth look is!"

They may never be willing to dress this way again!

But beyond its potential for scaring Goths normal, this book doesn't have all that much to offer. As other reviewers have pointed out, the triumph of our heroes is just too easy, the plot conflicts too easily resolved, and it doesn't help that we're given only half a book here (presumably on the theory that today's kids won't read long books), with the rest of the story coming in A Light in the Darq. Unlike some reviewers I don't think there is anything harmful in this book, but I think it may be too simplistic and insubstantial to hold a child's interest, especially for a continuing series: The Secret Ingredient, Fashion Face-off, and Crushed.

Best friends Scarlett and Crimson's adventures at school and at home are detailed in this new series. They both love music and have created their own philosophy called, "Darq" They've decided to be totally comfortable with themselves, aren't trying to be in the popular crowd and are devoted to music and creativity.

To me, the girls style seems to fall squarely under the rubric of Perky Goth, but they reject that label, substituting their own "Darq" sensibility instead. Their main competition are the Leetz, short for "elite" aka, the popular crowd of Queen Bees. Scarlett and Crimson befriend the new cute boy English exchange student, Pepper White, and together with tech-geek Winslow the four of them start a new band to compete in the Battle of the Bands against the Leetz.

I am the first to admit that I'm deliriously unmusical, and a lot of the band practice references went completely over my head. When describing their newest song, Crimson describes it as "Real chunky on the chorus line... then for the verses, I figured on something soft - keyboards making veils of sound to give it a spacey feel." You see? I have no idea what that means.

This book is a perfect confection for undemanding middle-grade readers. Plenty of full-color half-page illustrations feature cheery bobble-headed pre-teens. With several net-speak conversations excerpted from chat logs, this book really zips along. Design-wise this novel doesn't miss a single opportunity to stand out, the edges of the book are stamped in black with print along the edge. Darqstarz Rising ends with a sample chapter of the next book. Oddly, the first chapter of the next book is mainly an info-dump, so what you are actually reading is a quick re-cap of the book you've just read. I'd recommend this to parents of middle-grade students who are looking for something "clean" yet hip looking for their kids.

Allyson Black, Scarlett and Crimson #1: Darqstarz Rising (Simon and Schuster, 2009)

Okay, so this has nothing to do with the book involved, I don't think, but it does make me wonder. Simon and Schuster's kidlit arm is Simon Pulse. But Darqstarz Rising, the first book in Black's Scarlett and Crimson series, was released by Simon Spotlight, the press' entertainment/celebrity/gossip arm. What's going on there? Are Allyson Black and/or illustrator Patrick Spaziante celebrities whose names I should know? Not sure about whether they were before, but they may be now. Scarlett and Crimson is off to a fun, if somewhat facile, start.

Scarlett and Crimson are school outcasts, not fitting into any of the predefined sections of high school life (the jocks, the emo kids, you know the drill). Life goes on as usual until a new exchange student from England, Pepper White, takes a shine to Darq, the philosophy Scarlett and Crimson espouse. The three of them form a band just in time for the school's battle of the bands, but their whiz of a sound engineer is being blackmailed by the Leetz...

The divisions between the groups are a little too stringent to go with my memories of high school (though I grant you that was a long, long time ago), and paradoxically, a lot of those people slotted into those slots seem to have very little fidelity to their chosen clique. Still, the writing is breezy (and quick readers will blow through this short book in an hour or so, while slower ones will polish it off in an afternoon), the wit is biting without being mean-spirited, and the plot is perfect high-school fantasy fodder. I'll be following along with Scarlett and Crimson's adventures in the future; pick this up and see if you want to some along for the ride. ***

Darqstarz Rising is aimed at middle school readers. As a high school special educator, I chose to look at it a little bit differently. My question was:how well would this book 'sell' with HS Students who are lower level readers? I asked a couple to look through it. One actually borrowed it and read it through over a weekend.

The answer to my question: They liked it.

The book is set in a middle school, and the characters are middle schoolers. Although I thought it might be a problem, it wasn't. Neither person mentioned it. When I asked, one did not notice, and the other said it didn't make a difference. A comment about the school - the student's ability to access the building before school hours without adult supervision by just scanning in a 'special pass' with the janitor: highly unrealistic.

Neither one got the 'in' joke about V.Price Memorial MS.

They liked the characters, and the plot. The one who read the entire book liked the resoultion of the cyber-bullying issue in the book.

A comment about the plot was that there was really very little in terms of plot complications - the Darq girls got everything they wanted without really having to struggle. The book misses some opportunities to explore issues. One of the main characters is hapily easily dealing with the death of her mother. Another main character recently left home and moved to a brand new area. Neither of these iissues is addressed in depth.

There is an incident of cyberbullying that is well addressed. The issue is discussed at length, and it is resolved cleanly and positively.

The characters are likeable, and the book is very fast-paced. The illustrations are well done. It is an easy read for students who read at the 5-8 grade level.
There is no sex, no violence, and no drugs. Some issues addressed include social cliques, social isolation, peer pressure and cyberbullying.

It's nothing too serious, an amusing easy read.

Well-written and clever, "Darqstarz Rising" has great appeal. With characters named Scarlett, Crimson and Pepper Black and sharp dialogue, older elemntary and middle schoolers will devour it. I was enjoying this boook until the end. It just ended with a new problem needing to be solved. It's most likely to be continued in the next book in the series. That was why I only gave it 4 stars.

I tried to read with an open mind but thought that the main characters were gothic and anti-social. They wear mostly black and do not join into the school groups instead preferring to spend their time playing music by themselves and with other online goth groups. They get the new kid at school to join them so they can win a band competition. It's for pre-teens but I dislike encouraging pre-teens to look and dress like this. If you have a pre-teen who's already into black and other gothic appearances then perhaps this book is for them. If you have a pre-teen who fits a mainstream profile then this book is probably not for them.

My friend Devyn, age 11, read this book and has written the review below. She reads at a college level and is a champion speller. Take it away, Devyn!
*****
I did not like this book that much,but it did have some understandable points. the main point is to win a band contest on halloween night. their main band concept is Darq, a way of looking at the world from the inside out.

A lot of this book though, is all Gothic and "cute new boy", and I really don`t like that stuff. I believe that we here on Earth are not to understand EVERYTHING, because God made the world and everything in it, and the Bible says that we aren`t SUPPOSED to understand everything. The end. Devyn