Darqstarz Rising

I liked this book. It has a great story. It has excellent art. And, it has an awesome layout. The themes tackled in this book are lessons I wish I could pass on to kids without sounding like a stodgy, pompous adult: *Be yourself *Do cool things *Don't let people bully you *Stand up for yourself *It's okay to be who you are But instead of sounding outdated like I would, Black does an excellent job with this book communicating those things in a way that's not preachy and that's really relevant to kids. It's a girly book, focusing a lot on relationships, and the group, or "scene" that Scarlett and Crimson are putting together. The book uses the word "scene" a lot, which means clique or group. In my junior high, the only scenes were farmers or heavy metal kids, but today's schools are much more complex. And, Scarlett and Crimson are creating a new scene called Darq, which is different from the other scenes in their school which exclude everyone else. Darq is cool because it includes everyone, and it's about creating, especially music. From the cover, I thought this book would be like Emily The Strange, depressing and anti-social. DarkStarz Rising is actually totally the opposite. These girls are true heroes that you'll want your kids to emulate. It also subtly integrates in a supportive website. I wish the business books I read followed the lead of DarkStarz Rising, unobtrusively placing the website on a cool picture on page 20, instead of every page saying, "go to the business website...or else." The last chapter of the book is a preview for the next installment in the series, A Light in the Darq (Scarlett and Crimson).

Darstarz is about two girls and one boy. They want to enter a band competition. The two girls are very into fashion, and wear a lot of black. Their band is name Darqstarz. There is a group of mean girls who are trying to get one girl to join their group, yet she decides to design Scarlett and Crimson's Darqstarz! We'll let you read the rest My daughter (8 yerars old) would rate the book a 4.5 if she could - she was just not into all the rock band banter.She thinks that girls who like adventure would very much like this book, but is unsure how boys might react to it. We loved all the illustration and clever parts of the book (like the IM scripts). It is very well put together and modern in its feel and execution. She would definately like to read more of Scarlett and Crimson's adventures!

It's a simple enough story of a two girls who form a goth band, well Darq band, with the new kid who comes to school. I wish I had books like this as a kid. Mostly, people my age were called freaks in high school and didn't have literature other than E. A. Poe to calm our sensitive nerves. The book itself is very pretty. Many illustrations of the cute Darq girls at school, in the graveyard, shopping for vintage clothes. I did like the message that you should be your own scene. It might sound stupid to adults, but as a kid, cliques rule. Well, even in adulthood, cliques rule, you either just forget them or fit in somehow. But this book starts out as saying "you are your scene". Then ends with "you are your own scene". And this is nice because it shows kids they should be who they are inside and not just to fit in, even with the kids' cliques who aren't popular. I liked the pages that were brown with the type over it. The chat room things were interesting. I got another teen book where the same thing happens, so I guess a lot of teen books add chats into the mix. I don't have kids, so this is like me seeing "what the kids are reading." Overall, I'd recommend this book to someone's child, esp if their parents are goths or reformed goths. The pictures are super cute and the message is pretty good, not much violence or anything like that, just some kids wanting to win a band contest. One of the girls even has a dead mom, which bleeds into my other review, Goth Girl Rising, which also features a dead mom. And chat rooms. And angst.

I read this book in one sitting. I couldn't put it down because I became entranced with the illustrations and the characters. A school type story of the pops and the unpops is given a new flavor by these two characters who celebrate simply being just who they are. This books combines the technology of today's social websites, the love of music that is new and exciting, as well as the trials of being different when the popular kids concentrate on being the same. There is so much creativity and positive energy in this story. I hope we see these characters through many more stories.

I got this book for my 8 year old daughter because she loves books with pictures, still. This book is filled with interesting illustrations, and is graphically fascinating. The story does lean towards a "goth" lifestyle, but in a fairly innocent way. The story revolves around the main characters of Scarlett and Crimson, and their music band. If your child likes graphic novels and manga (Japanese comic stories), they might like this series. There is regular text for the story, but mixed with illustrations and inserts from Scarlett and Crimson's instant messaging, etc. It all made for great fun for me to read as well. I wish we had books like these when I was a kid! That being said, I would say this book would be in the age range of 8-11. There is also a website associated with this series,[...] which is pretty cool.