The summary of this book is interesting (which is why I wanted to read it, of course!), but the execution of telling the story leaves much to be desired.

This is a tough book to get through for several reasons:

-It's just accepted that Molly is a smart kid, or some type of prodigy. She displays a lot of practical knowledge and intelligence, but I didn't find it believable for some reason. It also seems like have a minor on a professional dig site is an insurance and liability disaster.

- All of the adults, at the top of their profession, needed a child to connect the dots?

- The author obviously knows a lot of paleontology and how dig sites work, but the technical aspects of language will be unknown to a lot of readers.

I just didn't find the book enjoyable and it was a serious slog to get through. Only finished it because I owed the publisher a review; if I had purchased this or borrowed from the library I would have quit at 30% in.

At the start of a summer internship at a dig site, Molly discovers a strange fossil that doesn't quite fit the description of any species of dinosaur ever found before. However, based on her obsession with mythology, Molly was able to notice striking similarities between the creature and a dragon. Before the team of paleontologists can even begin to work on identifying the creature, the fossil, along with all of their research and other finds, are stolen by a group posing as government agents. This leads Molly, Sarah, Derek Farnsworth, and Sean Oliphant on an international adventure to identify this revolutionary discovery before all evidence of its existence is destroyed.

I loved how this book seamlessly bridges the gap between paleontology and mythology with the use of actual people and locations. Throughout the book there are fake letters between actual scientists at the top of their field, such as Charles Darwin. It was a bit slow going at first. I felt like the first 50 or so pages was extremely paleontology heavy in ways that didn't add anything to the story line. With the characters backgrounds in paleontology, certain jargon and paths of thinking are expected; however, this was a bit excessive in my opinion. After the 50 page mark, I feel like there was a better balance and that the science related information actually benefited the plot.

The book switches between the viewpoints of the four main character with a change each chapter. I feel like making the POV clear at the beginning of a chapter would be beneficial. At the start of each chapter, I had to spend a page or two trying to figure out which character's POV it was. I don't thin that that type of guess work should be needed when reading a book.

I feel like the future installations of this series will be much better than this one, but I don't think that is entirely uncommon of series. This book introduced the larger problem to be faced in the upcoming books during the characters' adventures.

I received this book in exchange for an honest review from the publisher, which has not altered my opinion of this book. I would like to thank NetGalley and Inkshares for the advanced copy.

The whole concept of this book was so fascinating to me and sounded so interesting, I was very excited to read it when I got approved for a copy. However, right off the bat, within the first few chapters, I knew that this book would not be receiving any more than a 3 out of 5 from me. Unfortunately, between the pacing, the scientific info dumping, and the main character, this book was all over the place as far as what age it was written for and the intended audience.

It is obvious from reading the beginning that the author has some experience with actually participating in digs, which is awesome! They went into details and I really did enjoy that, however, for the ya genre I think it got a bit too wordy.

I also don’t know if it was because my version is an ARC, but there was nothing to indicate that there was going to be a POV change until it happened and it took me a second to figure out what was going on. I assume that will be changing in the final version, but for me it was confusing and took me several switches to get used to.

This was a fun novel involving paleontology and geomythology.
Have you ever wondered why cultures all around the globe have dragon myths? This book explores that idea. What if they WERE real?
The Bone Wars was slightly reminiscent of a YA Dan Brown book. It included real science, real history, and "real" mythology.
While the characters seemed a little like caricatures, I grew to like them through the story.
I would definitely read the sequel.

Thanks to Netgalley and Inkshares Publishing for a copy for review.

It's very clear that the author is deeply knowledgable about dinosaurs and fossil digs, and I was charmed by the premise of a high school girl getting a summer internship for a dig, but the wealth of detail on dinosaurs in the opening chapters does make the pace drag a little.

First, I would like to Thank NetGalley and Inkshares for a chance to read and review this eARC.

Should I just scream now or later? Because this is how I felt getting through this book.

This book actually was one of the first books I chose on NetGalley. The synopsis for it was so interesting I just wanted to know what it was about. Then I ended up owning the book and am finally writing the review. Took me a minute, (a LONG minute) but finally I just decided to get it over with.

I really tried with all my might to like this book, but I just could not!

I did not like the character’s; they were annoying, and I just did not care about them.

The beginning felt like I was in a Zoology lecture and reading from my textbook. Absolutely not! Totally skipped half of that.

The plot may have had substance but was just not executed properly.

Was just too all over the place and chaotic, which caused me to further not care and further skip pages.

There is nothing more that I hate to do when reading, is skip pages. But because I am reading an ARC, I also do not like to DNF.

Story was so disjointed, tried to be something it was not (as others have said/ Davinci Code)

The author perhaps would be great with a different book, or another genre


However, this particular one did not work for me at all.

My sincerest apologies Ms. Evans.

Reviewed an advance copy of The Bone Wars through NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.

Enjoyed this fun YA novel that follows the exploits of 16 year old Molly as she interns at a dinosaur dig over the summer. Pirates, ancient societies and a mystery involving scientific legends from Victorian England challenge Molly and friends.

Like a Michael Crichton novel for teens, this book entertains while teaching the reader a thing or two about the science of fossils. 5 stars for his fun, quick read.

My thanks to Ms. Evan and NetGalley for the opportunity to review The Bone Wars.

e-arc provided by netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

"ducunt volentem fata, nolentem trahunt."

this book was a bit of a mess.

the first quarter resembled a detailed how-to on digging fossils. the plot was a series of 'find clue, go to place, rinse, repeat", with most event catalysts being complete accidents or our main girl pulling obscure knowledge out of thin air to move the investigation along. the characters were fairly flat and one-dimensional, with very little done to distinguish their voices, even though each of the four had pov chapters. the Big Twist came out of literally nowhere, and not in a good way.

but despite all of that, i... enjoyed it? 'the bone wars' wasn't the best book i've read this year, but it definitely wasn't the worst. miraculously, i still had fun reading it, whenever i could take a break from rolling my eyes to get through a paragraph. for easy summer reading, though, it definitely did the job.

Thank you NetGalley for providing an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Molly Wilder has been interested in paleontology since she was a young girl, and she finally has the opportunity to take her interest in the study of fossils to the next level with a summer internship in Montana assisting graduate students with their work. Only, Molly doesn’t realize that she’s getting much more than she bargained for until she finds herself halfway around the world on a hunt for evidence that dragons once existed on earth after finding dragon bones in the West.

Eventually, a secret society is uncovered that has been hiding evidence of dragons from the rest of the world for centuries, and Molly and the others find themselves on the society’s bad side because of their investigating. Will the truth be revealed, or will Molly and her unlikely newfound friends be silenced like those before them?

I went into this book very open minded, but with no real expectations because the plot was something that I had never heard of or read before. I was excited because it was something new, but also because it was a new take on science fiction and fantasy stories. Unfortunately, this book wasn’t the right pick for me.

Unless you are someone who is very interested in paleontology and reading about fossils and dinosaurs and the Mesozoic Era, this book probably isn’t for you. I found a lot of it to be an information dump about the time of the dinosaurs, different fossils, and how to make casts of fossils. The pacing felt very choppy and awkward because of this, and the story itself fell very flat for me.

The writing style also wasn’t my favorite. I think that this book had good potential, but the idea doesn’t seem to have been executed in the best way. I liked how there were letters and “documents” woven into the story from past times that famous paleontologists were supposed to have written, but they weren’t formatted to appear separated from the story, so that made things appear a bit jumbled. Additionally, the POV changes have no indicator of which character is speaking in which chapter, so that became very confusing and took away from the story when I was trying to figure out whose perspective I was reading from. All of the characters eventually seemed to blend together, and I didn’t particularly feel attached to any of them or as if I could relate to them.

Overall, I wouldn’t recommend this book to others unless I knew someone extremely interested in paleontology and dinosaurs. Personally, it wasn’t my favorite, but that doesn’t mean it won't be someone else’s!

Bone Wars

Molly starts her adventure as a summer intern for a paleontologist in Montana and discovers her fossil that kick-starts a worldwide adventure. The book is unique in that it seeks to combine a YA adventure with the scientific world, mythological creatures, and some historically accurate events. This book may be a good recommendation for lovers of the Jurrasic Park Movies.

Thank you, NetGalley, for allowing me to read the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I'd say 1.5 stars rounded up.
The premise was absolutely fascinating, and I desperately wanted to love the story. Unfortunately, it just fell a little flat. The characters were annoying, the writing and grammar were... not very good, and the story's general execution was just done poorly.

My biggest issue was the grammar, honestly. I'm not sure if it was the book itself or my Kindle, but between the POV switches and absence of line breaks in the dialogue, I had no clue who was speaking.

As for the characters and execution, they were just very... middle grade, I guess. I know it's YA and Molly's 16, but I usually don't have too many issues with other YAs. It reads like it belongs in an elementary school library, right next to 39 Clues and Artemis Fowl.

This one's a letdown for sure, which is so disappointing because it could have been such a hit.

The Bone Wars is the first in a series of books that are like the DaVinci Code if it focused on dinosaurs. And not just any dinosaurs, dragons!

Molly, a 16 yo intern, Farnsworth a veteran fossil hunter with ties to the black market, and Dr. Oliphant, the renowned paleontologist academic team up against the Order of St. George, with help from the mysterious S.V. group.

Gripping, action-packed, and referring back to correspondence from Darwin and Mary Anning, this book combines science and treachery.

Can't wait to read further, and will definitely recommend for school library acquisition

4.0/5

i think i got maybe 30 pages into this book. i couldn’t tell you why, but it was just too hard reading this book. i guess it was just too boring i couldn’t read anymore. DNF

I honestly don't have much to say about The Bone Wars as I did not finish the book. This book had a lot of information on dinosaurs and Paleontology. This made it very hard for me to get into as I'm not really into the study of either of those things.

I don't want others to stray away from reading this book based on my opinions. If you are interested in dinosaurs and such then this might be the perfect book for you!

Thank you to NetGalley for giving me a chance to read and review this book.

This what it feels like to do science

Erin Evan is a gifted story-teller, but an inexperienced novelist. In The Bone Wars she has written a good book. It could be better, and I am confident that her future books will be.

The Bone Wars is principally about four paleontologists, grad student Sarah Connell, her PhD advisor Sean Oliphant, her mentor Derek Farnsworth, and teenage intern Molly Wilder. The story is told in the first person by these four characters, but Molly is the central character.

The first thing I loved about The Bone Wars was its feeling of authenticity. Evan is herself a fossil-hunter. Even if no one told you this, you would recognize it. I was captivated by Molly's account of a long day spent lying on her side, working patiently to free a fossil femur from the rock in which it is embedded. If you have ever done research, you will recognize the peculiar combination of tedium and excitement that accompanies most research. I would have called it indescribable, had not Evan described it.

The second thing I loved about The Bone Wars was Molly. I recognized her. Molly is the kind of student every scientist wants to have on the team: intelligent, curious, full of fire and passion, eager to plunge ahead to whatever it takes to reveal truth. Molly will listen to you if you have something valuable to say, but she has no time for your BS.

Now, I am about to say some negative things about The Bone Wars, and I will emit more words on faults than on the good things. But I want to make it clear that this is a good book, that the faults I'm about to point out are minor and eminently fixable, and that I will look forward to Evan's next book.

Number 5 of Neil Gaiman's rules of writing reads,

5. Remember: when people tell you something’s wrong or doesn’t work for them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.

Keeping that in mind, I am going to describe certain things in The Bone Wars that didn't work for me, but I will try to resist proposing fixes. Evan can certainly figure that part out.

1. Exposition. Readers of The Bone Wars can't help but feel that they are frequently on the receiving end of an infodump. In the early parts of the book, these most frequently are there to get us up to speed on dinosaurs and fossil-hunting. But they continue later. For instance, there was one near the end of the book describing Sarah's situation (which I can't describe without spoilers) and how she found herself in it.

2. Point of view. Point of view switches unpredictably. Each chapter is told in the first person by a single character. But it switches unpredictably among Molly, Sarah, Derek, and Sean from chapter to chapter. We may have several chapters in a row by the same character, then we may have a run of chapters in which point of view alternates irregularly. We are never explicitly told who the narrator is, so the first thing one does at the beginning of a new chapter is look for clues about who is talking now. These are always present and usually pretty straightforward, but you may need to read several paragraphs in to find the first one.

3. Dr Sean Oliphant. It feels like I have met Oliphant in dozens of other fictionalized descriptions of scientists. He feels like he was taken directly from the /Catalog of Stock Fictional Scientist Stereotypes/ and plugged in here. Now, I want to be clear: I am not objecting that he is unrealistic or unbelievable or evil. My objection is that he's tiresome. This is not a person I would, given virtually any alternative, choose to spend time with. In fact, I think Evan realizes this, because toward the end of the book Oliphant's character develops some fire and heart. Unfortunately, the reader has had to endure Tiresome Sean for 80% of the book before he begins to become interesting.

4. Kindle formatting. The formatting on kindle was a mess, with random paragraph breaks, often in the middle of sentences.

Now, allow me to repeat that these defects are minor compared to the strengths. Please do not interpret the greater number of words spent describing faults as indicating that the faults outweigh the merits. This is a good book, and I will look forward to the sequel.

Thanks to Inkshares and NetGalley for an Advance Reader's Copy in exchange for a candid review. Book to be released 22-Apr-2023.

3.5 stars rounded up

thank you to NetGalley for the ARC!

(review contains some minor spoilers!)

this book is kind of a hot mess. I would describe it as half info-dumping and half Indiana Jones style fantastical adventure/mystery. The characters were often annoying and written in a young way that made it hard to believe these were adults at the forefront of their fields. I also had a hard time suspending my disbelief for most of Molly’s surprise knowledge and connections; whiz-kid know it all teen characters just never do it for me.

A lot of the mystery elements were also told to the reader, and often repetitively, instead of just letting us figure it out.

The surprise twist was somehow both predictable and inexplicable. The explanation really didn’t do anything to make it make more sense, and I think that definitely cheapened the story and the character.

I’m a big dinosaur fan, but this sometimes read like a textbook. I have story notes from years and years ago about grad students that dig up dragons and it was interesting to read someone else’s take on that concept. The bits with the Order and S.V. were definitely a lot and I’m not sure how I feel about the sort-of cliffhanger ending.

I think Sean and Derek’s relationship was definitely the most interesting, although I felt myself strongly wishing there was some layer of scorned lover to make it that much stronger. Derek and Sarah’s relationship kind of felt like it came out of left field in its depth at the end.

Overall, I hope there’s some changes before the final version, but I’d probably pick up a used copy, and I’d probably give any potential sequel a chance.

I honestly couldn’t make it past chapter 3. Didn’t like it. Didn’t dislike it. It’s whatever. Give it a try! You might like it better than I did.

The premise of the story is fascinating, and the book follows through on its promise of getting deep into paleontology and walking the line between science and myth. In many ways, I was reminded of Deborah Harkness's All Souls trilogy in that the author's expertise clearly comes to bear in the text, but whereas Harkness's expertise is in English history and literature, and her book series is clearly geared towards adults, Evan's expertise is in paleontology, with a primarily YA audience.

The YA label is tricky for this book, however. The plot largely follows Molly Tanner, a sixteen-year-old girl from California who's chosen for a summer internship to work at a dig site in Montana. The book, however, doesn't stay in Molly's point of view, but cycles through the other adults in her life: Sarah Connell, the graduate student she's interning for; Derek Farnsworth, the commercial fossil hunter who's helping on the dig; and Sean Oliphant, a famous scientist (and science communicator) who is Sarah's graduate advisor. As I read through these alternating points of view, I found myself distracted by the sameness of the four characters' voices, even though Molly is significantly younger than the rest of them. It took a while to figure out whose perspective I was in during each chapter change, and that significantly slowed down my reading in a way that, at times, felt frustrating. This could have been a fast-paced, thrilling ride, but the beginning especially felt quite bogged down in details from the other characters.

Granted, I am technically outside of the target age range for this book (though when the "right" age to read YA seems to be continually in flux). As a teacher, if I were to assign this book, there is still quite a bit I might draw out of the text with my students. I might ask about intellectual property. I might ask about ageism. I might ask about the story of science history they've learned in other classes, and ask about their awareness of the social influences of scientific discoveries. Though I have some reservations about the craft of the book, it might be the kind of story, like *Jurassic Park* or something similar, that would inspire a reader to dive further into the field of paleontology.

My rating is generous given that this is an ARC.

I couldn't resist reading a story about paleontology and cryptozoology. I love dinosaurs so the blurb had me hooked. Unfortunately, the story left a lot to be desired.

There are a lot of details about paleontology, digs, the technical and scientific aspect of the process of unearthing dinosaur fossils. There is also a sort of trbute to the history of paleontology, the forefathers of the science who lived in the 19th century and sometimes don't get the recognition they deserve.

Sadly, the story had two big issues for me:

- the characters are bland, I didn't find myself to care about any of them. The author tried to highlight Molly's value by making the actual scientists look...naive? stupid? The "help" Molly provided was...Googling myths and history? If she wanted to make her remarkable, she should have upped the research challenges.

- the plot regarding the historical trail looks it's inspired by Da Vinci Code, but only at the surface and is very basic. There is minaml depth, the motives of both the good guys and the villains are quite simplistic.

A fair rating would be closer to 2 stars, but I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt since it's not to be published until next year.

Thank you NetGalley and Inkshares for the ARC!

I found this book difficult to get invested in. While I think it’s admirable that someone with real knowledge of paleontology weaved real science and facts throughout the narrative, I found it a bit boring at times. Maybe I am not the ideal audience for the book! It definitely reads as extremely YA.
I would recommend this book toward an audience looking to read a book about dinosaur facts with some fiction added.
The writing was not bad, overall. I just think this book was not for me!