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Splintered by A.G. Howard

27 Feb

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Book One in the Splintered Series

Rating: Three (generous) Stars out of Five Stars

5 Stars for the cover. 4 Stars for the first and last 50 pages. 2 Stars for everything else.

To be completely honest… I read this because of the cover art. Splintered is some legit cover porn. It’s vivid, bright and in your face gorgeous! Every time I picked up the book to read I would drool over it. Stare longingly into her eyes… try to come up with an emotion she’s portraying…. It’s captivating.

With that being said, the actual story left me wanting. The first 50 pages I was instantly drawn in to Alyssa. I immediately understood her emotions and her reactions towards the situation she’s in. There was enough of the old Alice story layered into the beginning of the plot that I was infatuated with how things could play out.

But…. once the incident at the asylum happens with Alyssa’s mom and she trips into Wonderland and begins the real adventure we all expect from this type of book, it’s gone. Buh Bye Alyssa whom I love. Hello typical YA novel. Now, Wonderland spinoffs and rewrites are always interesting and I’ve read my fair share of them (The Looking Glass Wars is pretty awesome). This one intrigued me because of the dark gothic-ness of the story line. While it did have the surreal characters, dark and creepy and fantastical, it was overshadowed by the all the other junk I’ve seen before. Love triangle, 0-60 lovefests in one chapter, self depreciating teen heroine, blah blah blah.

I know that Alyssa has always loved Jeb and so the InstaLove isn’t exactly “instant”, but where’s the awkwardness of transitioning out of friends into a relationship? It goes from brotherly protectiveness to sexified makeout scence and then possesive creepiness. Ummmm awkward much? I didn’t understand the relationship at all, it was so poorly developed. And with the pro-tag being in this weirdly relationship-but-not and having a mistress status, (because um the dude HAS A GRILFRIEND YOU TRAMP) the plot when from fame to lame pretty quick. And gag me with how insecure she is. Weak weak weak! I can’t stand weak characters! And Alyssa, why don’t you want to be with the butterfly? He’s hot and looooves and you guys have matching tattoos! TWINSIES!

The story picks up a little at the end so it was nice to end on a high note. But the lack of character development in the love interest was such a disappointment I don’t really have a desire to read another book of Howard’s. Ever.  Or at least any time soon.

Sad day.

 

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The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

7 Feb

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Rating: Four out of Five Stars

I am a big fan of audio books. My mom, sister and I used to listen to them all the time when I was younger and since the Boyfriend and I live in different states, audio books have become a life saver on the six hour drive to Cali. Needless to say, I have spent a lot of my life in the car listening to stories (nerd-tastic fuuuur sure!) and this is probably the best book on CD have listened to.

The reason why I say The Best? The descriptions are amazing. A movie was playing in my mind while I listened to The Night Circus. It was rich, dark, luscious with adjectives that made the circus come to life, the people spring into their characters. The story unfolds layer by tantalizing layers in a slow sweet simmering plot. And, readers be warned, there is one steamy scene that is probably the most provocative heaty scene I have read (well technically listened to) and the crazy part? Its maybe four paragraphs long with relatively innocent language. That’s just how well Morgenstern crafts the language in this book. It’s beautiful.

I also spent a lot of time with my mouth hanging open in awe at the incredible concept of the plot. Talk about having a hum-dinger of an imagination! The Cirque Du Reve a.k.a. The Circus of Dreams, was so far beyond what I could ever think up I just drooled over the descriptions of the tents. The Wishing Tree, the Ice Garden, the Cloud Maze… I wish I had an ounce of artistic talent so I could draw how I picture these things. If this book ever becomes a movie and the special effects are done right, it will be on par with epic movies like LOTR, HP, Benjamin Button, all those cinematic masterpieces.

If you do end up reading this book, I encourage you to try it on tape first. It’s really an entertaining read and a wonderful book to listen to. And with Jim Dale as the narrator… oh my lovely man voice. I just want him to whisper sweet nothings in my ear…sigh…

 

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Reached by Ally Condie

4 Feb

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Book Three in the Matched Triology

Rating: One out of Five Stars

Oh Ally… Ally Ally Ally… Please don’t hate me for this review.

I just want to say that I hardly EVER give one star ratings to books. I feel like its cruel because people work their asses off to write books and stories and they have to endure sooo much to get their ideas published. So know that I tried. I REALLY tried to find a saving grace in this book, but I just couldn’t. This whole Matched Trilogy was just not for me.

I can’t count the number of times my eyes glazed over while reading Reached. And with my previous ratings of two stars for Matched and Crossed, I was tempted to not read the finale. But come on, how can you NOT read the last segment of one of the most popular YA books in the last few years?! It would be like.. sacrilegious. And the last chapter of Crossed made me want to find out what the conclusion held for Xander (love), Cassia (twatface) and Ky (blech).

My dislike is rooted in three parts. 1.) Writing Style 2.) World building/concept 3.) Characters.

1.) You could sing my a lullaby after I have been awake for 48 hours and it wouldn’t hold a light to how fast this book would put me to sleep. As much as I love reading it, poetry should not be a novel. Especially not a Young Adult dystopian novel. Give me a book of poems and I will read the shit out of it. But don’t try to write a 500 page book in all that flowery prose and expect me to stay awake. Seriously, even the “action scenes” were in slow motion and made me yawn. I just wanted things to speed the eff up. If Reached had been a 200 page book it would have been much more tolerable. But instead I had to suffer through 300 more pages of meh. Not my style. No thank you.

2.) While I think the idea behind this series was interesting and creative, book one was the only part that made me believe in the world. Book two was a bore and book three just made me go “WTF” the whole time. Listen yo, if you want to write a story about a dystopia and you want the concept to resonate with your readers, the world needs to keep developing over the series. I feel like Condie gave us a decent starting point in Matched but then dropped all world building in Reached. I wanted to learn more about the Society, about the Rising, about what happened to Ky and his family. But the bread crumbs were spaced soo far apart I kept losing interest. And then one character would stumble upon a clue and then “VIOLA!” all the sudden all three characters knew about it too?  Say wha?? How does that even happen?

3.) Um. Hate to sound harsh but… I think Cassia is my least favorite person ever. She was really supposed to be our heroine? She was the epitome of “book smart but not street smart”. She reminded me a lot of Gretchen from Mean Girls… just following the same stupid guy mindlessly when there are much better men right in front of her. Cassia also had the Gretchen tendency of latching onto to stupid shit and trying to make it happen. “Stop trying to make Xander’s love happen, it’s not going to happen!”

And why WHY is KY given credit for finding the cure? He was freaking passed out the whole time! He did NOTHING but act as a guinea pig unknowingly. AHHHHH! STAB MY EYES OUT PLEASE!
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And poor Xander.. poor lovely precious smart wonderful Xander. Every time Cassia turns him down…
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So yeah… Didn’t care for anything about this book or series. And all I have to say to Cassia is:

WvP62W4

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Poison Princess by Kresley Cole

1 Feb

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Book One in The Arcana Chronicles

Rating: Five out of Five Stars

*Poison Princesssssssss*

This book… oh this wonderful, mentally arousing, exquisite book.

My friend read this book first and she was soo obsessive about it *cough* AMY *cough cough* that I thought she would start sleeping with it at night. I could actually picture her curling her arms around her iPad and caressing it. That’s how stalker-ish she was about PP. And me? I laughed at her. The whole time I was thinking “WTH is wrong with you? That’s like the dumbest title known to man. Re-dic-u-lous.” So when I asked her to collaborate with me on my blog about the Best of 2012 and that book was on it and she became goggle-eyed over it AGAIN, I heaved a heavy sigh and resigned myself to read it. Purely so I could get her off my back about it and find out why she was in love with it.

Holy shit. I have never been so wrong in my life about a book.

It. Was. Fabulous.

I have been spoiled lately because a lot of really amazing books have been dropped into my lap this last month. But PP by far has the best one liners in it. They are one in a million zingers. And I am not typically one to quote books in my reviews, but just to prove my point about how witty this book is, I had to list a few:

“Hey, you’ve still got your endangered hymen. Which means you’ll make it to closing credits – I’m s.o.l.”

“Eves, on the scale from wholesome to whoresome, you’re practically Amish.”

“My mom could be really fierce. A regular Frau Badass.”

“You have two choices, grasshopper. Out-slut Clotile – or go Springer on her ass. I’m down for the assist in both scenarios.”

Oh and the romance… sexy, sultry, feisty and fierce. Man oh man. I need me some Cajun flavor in my life! And to prove my point again… I present you with another quote:

“If you touch me like that again, Evangeline,” he began in a husky tone, dropping to his seat once more, “in the space of a heartbeat, I will have you off this bike and onto the closest horizontal surface. And I woan be picky, no.”

I laughed and giggled and swooned OUT LOUD over these characters. Evie is wonderful and brilliant. Wholesome and moral and such a freaking badass at the end. And Jack… I just want to… want to…mmm…well. Let’s keep this PG and say… he’s… attractive. Yeah….

*shakes heads to remove images*

Ok. Focusing again. What really is unique about this story is the dysoptia and the Tarot cards aspect. I get so super jealous of people who are this freaking creative. WHAT CAN’T I BE THIS AWESOME?!?! It’s a whole new take on why the world blows up and how to save it and survive. When I finished reading PP, Amy and I literally spent hours on the computer looking up Arcana symbols and Tarot card meanings. It was legit. Poison Princess it the book you read over and over and over again and never get tired of it.

Soo… I guess what I am trying to do is swallow my pride and say “Touche, Amy. I shalt never doubt you again.”

…while I make sure I preorder book number two and tuck book one up nice and cozy….

 

BONUS!!! Check out Amy’s Polyvore set inspired  by Poison Princess! Love love love it!

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Crewel by Gennifer Albin

30 Jan

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Book One in the Crewel World Series

Rating: Three out of Five Stars

First of all, can we talk about that delicious cover? GORG! I love the colors, the swirls, the lips, the face. It epitomizes what this book is about and I adore an author/artist who can capture the feeling of the book and recreate it for the cover. Two Thumbs Up.

I was really excited for this book. I actually requested it from the library but got tired of waiting so just bought it as an ebook so I could start reading it righthisminute. That being said, I am not quite as excited for the sequel to this book. I loved parts and I struggled with parts. So my review is a solid middle of the road yellow dashed line.

My biggest beef I have with Crewel is how intensely different this world is and how there was exactly ZERO adjustment time for my WSOD. I spent the first 35% percent of the book rereading the description to try to get a sense of WTH this world consisted of. Then, once the Crewler sat down and explained everything to Adelice, our main character, it was like the beautiful flower of knowledge bloomed in my head and all was right in my bookworld.

But then Adelice kinda goes crazy nutso and doesn’t really think about the consequences and the trail of awful she’s leaving in her path when she’s making her decisions. Flip two chapters later then she’s awesome and heroic again. Plus three more chapters, she’s a twat. The End? She saves lives.

See? Do you see my problem? It was so hot and cold, love and hate, rooting for and totally against. I felt like the plot was a ferris wheel and it would slowly go up towards amazing, crest, and then move towards awful. Over and over and over. The world, once explained, IS impressive. I really liked the concept of it, science meeting fantasy meeting dystopia!?!  Oh hells yes! The actual concept of this book is completely unique and the storyline is decent. But the characters just don’t jive well. And then throw in an awkward tree point love story and BOOM, it’s all the crap we’ve see before. For once FOR ONCE could the book Lord’s Almighty just have two people like each other and be done with it? I can promise all the YA author’s out there that there are just as angsty teen topics to write about.

All in all, I don’t think I can adequately review this until I read the series because so much hangs on what happens in the next books. Jury is still out. Meh.

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daynight by Megan Thomason

28 Jan

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Book One in HOPEFULLY the daynight Series

Rating: Five out of Five Stars

I have decided self-published books are my new “thing”. After the spectacular debut of Susan Ee’s Angelfall and Megan Thomason’s gorgeous gem of a book we have here, publishing companies need to get their heads out of the Twi-Hard’s  and 50 Shades of Crap’s asses and be smacked in the face with delicious stories like daynight.

My desperate need for all things dystopian novel got a real big present when I scored daynight FOR FREE on Amazon as a Kindle download. As I trudge my way through mediocre books, I like to have little treats as motivation. Daynight went from motivation to obsession in three chapters. This book is enthralling, captivating and I just want to devour and then savor everything about it.

Blake and Kira our the main narrators and hot damn do I feel intimately connected to them. They are magnificently developed. The true talent of an author comes through when I can see their pro-tags in real life and describe their reactions to decision that has nothing to do with the book. I adored Blake and Kira. They are loyal and lovely with so much depth in their characters they became real to me even outside the book’s confines. And then there is Ethan, our third point to the Almighty Love Triangle. While he is a front runner of Kira’s affection, I firmly place allegiance with Team Blake. Either way, the budding romances,  tantalizing affections, and the swooning feelings we get to hear to from all sides is enticing. All three narrators are perfect and beautiful and interesting. This story really captures the unique personalities of the human race; what we will do for love, what we will give up for what’s right, what strong morals and unwavering loyalty can do.

Daynight is dynamic and interesting and has secured a spot in my Top Ten Favorite Dyspotia’s. I am drooling over Thomason’s work and I am aching to read the rest of this series. Please oh please finish this masterpiece off! If only for my sanity 🙂

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Everneath by Brodi Ashton

23 Jan

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Book One in the Everneath Series

Rating: Two out of Five Stars

Ugh this book. When I first read the description, I immediately put it down. The whole to-hell-and-back-plot and the dysfunctional romance sounded a little too tweeny Twi-hard for my taste. But then reviews started rolling in and it impressed some of my favorite bloggers so I put it on my “if I get around to it” shelf and was put on the long request list from the library. Then my friends were reading it and really enjoying it and all the sudden BOOM! It’s in my hands.

So then I was stuck with this book I wasn’t really excited about reading, which automatically taints my perception of the book. But even as I started reading it, I knew I wouldn’t like it. I didn’t connect with the characters, didn’t see the vavavavoom in the romance, couldn’t grasp the concept the way I like. It was exactly what I expected, “meh”. Be forewarned, this review does contain spoilers.

Nikki, the main character and narrator, annoys me. She’s “so afraid” of hurting people she just lies and lies and lies to them. Yeah, sweetheart, that makes perfect sense. Nikki spends the whole book trying to “make it up” to her family for ditching them for the Underworld. Which entails handing out flyers for her dad’s mayor reelection and ignoring her little brother, how sweet. Oh and the boy she is just soooo in love with that saved her from going insane after 100 years of being sucked dry of emotions? Way to not even TALK TO HIM for the first 3 months of your 6 months back. WHAT THE HELL. Nikki is spineless. She sits there and says it was  her fault for causing all these problems but she doesn’t DO anything about it. Actions speak louder than words, my friend. And all she did was talk. And whine. And sulk. Nikki only looked things up on the internet, maybe in a book or two but Jack did all the work. SPOILER AHEAD! And then sacrificed himself for her? After Nikki didn’t trust him, ran to another guy to fix things, was gone for 6 Earth months and then when she comes back she lies to him, ignores him, rebuffs all his advances for 5 and 1/2 months and in TWO WEEKS they are willing to die for each other? PUHlease. Shit is so not happening.

Needless to say, not exactly my favorite book. I do not plan on reading the sequel any time soon, if ever. Unless! Unless it has the meat and potatoes and she loves Cole. Because Cole is hot and feisty and deserves Nikki’s selfish self way more than Jack because he is also selfish.. and hot. 🙂

 

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Beta by Rachel Cohn

21 Jan

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Book One in the Annex Series

Rating: Four out of Five Stars

Beta is like the teenage girl version of iRobot. But instead of robots they are clones (ahh epic sci-fi-ness!) And as my nerd girl status reaches “ninja master”, that basically means LITERARY GOLD in my mind.

Beta reminds me a lot of Glitch. And by a lot I mean pretty much exactly. Sure the characters have a different quirks and different worlds, but the premise of the book is the same: you shouldn’t feel emotions, but you do so now you somehow have to deal with it and if you let people know, you will be deactivated. But since you are a badass, you are gunna stick it to the man and survive with your boymanlover. Yup, pretty sure I could be talking about either one of those books with that description!

Lucky for moi, I loved Glitch so it’s only normal that I would enjoy Beta too. BUT OMG THAT ENDING. I think this is the WORST CLIFFHANGER I have ever experienced.

Seriously, this was me reading the last three paragraphs:

JDKIn

C0pUt

k78zS

And then it ended and I realized book two DOESN’T EVEN HAVE A RELEASE DATE YET

D1nx1

Heartbreaking… seriously. Probably one of the most intense endings I have read in awhile. It’s not even the intriguing ending like Crossed by Allie Condie was. At least she left me with something I could think about, mull over, and let fester in my brain until Reached came out. Oh no, not Rachel. She created this whole world for you and then WHAMBAM thank-you-ma’am turned everything inside out.

I  really enjoyed this book. I flew through it and was bugged eyed the whole time. It’s not a fast paced book but is does have a lot of twists that hold your interest and keeps you engaged in the story.

For the first book in the novel, it’s a great start to an awesome series. It’s dramatic, fast paced, sexy, and intense. But unless you want to be tortured like me for a year, wait until the second book comes out..

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Pure by Julianna Baggott

17 Jan

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Book One in the Pure Series

Rating: Three out of Five Stars

Oh my. Where’s my teddy bear?I am going to be completely honest here and say that this book terrified me. It gave me the internal creep crawlies, collywobbles, dithers, whatever you want to call them. 140 pages in I updated my status to

“This book gives me the heebie jeebies. It’s weird and creepy and I don’t think I like it very much because some of this shit is just freaky. Oh well.. power through until the middle and then I will reevaluate.”

In the end, I can’t pinpoint how I feel about Pure. It’s just… gruesome? The whole book is based on violence and horrible human tragedy. It has gag inducing descriptions in a world where I would cry myself to sleep every night. I was just so… uncomfortable.
That being said, and me having a few weeks to process this book (and read must more lighthearted dystopias), as much as the imagery in this book made me want to curl up in the corner and rock back and forth, it was amazing. It was tangible. It was real. It was imaginative. All the underlying YA Dystopia 101’s were there, boy meets girl, girl from wrong side of track, they work together to solve problem. Blahdeblah. But it was sick and twisted and a very probable world they lived. That is what makes me dislike this book, this shit could really happen guys! It was like an even darker version of the Unwind series, which is pretty impressive.

I wish Baggot would have spent less time describing the effed up effects the nukes had on people and spent more time on the story. Now that we’ve spent almost an entire book getting the shivers, I hope Fuse, Book Two will be more about the people and the story and the meat of the issues. She has some interesting characters and personalities to play with and really focusing on developing the dynamics between them could make an extremely interesting plot. I have connections with each narrator and although she bounces through what, five? view points, you really get an understanding of each of their unique minds and personalities. You know their fears, understand their decision making. It’s a beautifully crafted piece of writing, even if it does creep me out.

Pure gave me nightmares yes, but damn, Fuse could really turn out to be a badass book. And I will read it.

And then watch Disney movies before I go to bed…

P.S. Rumor has it the rights have been bought to make this book into a movie. Shit could get real crazy up in hurr if that was to ever come to fruition.

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The Crimson Crown by Cinda Williams Chima – the most amazing book I have ever read.

11 Jan

The Crimson Crown

Fourth Book in the Seven Realms Series

Rating: Five out of Five Stars

After finishing this book, I am attempting to write my final review for this series. This is almost painful for me because I am so passion about this book, these characters, this author, I want to do them justice. I feel like I need to hone and perfect my writing skills purely to try to make this review captures just how incredible this book is.

I have been a high fantasy lover all my life. I grew up with Harry Potter throughout childhood and went through high school with Eragon. Wizards, witches, and dragons were my mind’s companion and I adore my author’s imaginary worlds more than the bleak, sometimes colorless and cruel world we live in. This book though, has introduced my mind and soul to a completely different delicious culture of imagery.

I wish I could explain just how amazing Cinda Williams Chima‘s work is, but unlike her I lack the language to articulate the emotions she creates in me while I read. Her gorgeous world building, incredible prose, tangible character had me so invested in this series. I laughed, I cried, I hurt with Han and I was desperate with Raisa. I hated and loved right along with everyone in the book. Han and Raisa are more than just characters to me. They are living and breathing friends in my mind. They are the most wonderful, passionate, fierce people I know. They have fears, insecurities, unwavering faith in each other, and a true epic romance.

The pure brilliance of this writing literally has me wonderstruck. I am gagging on my praise because I just can’t focus my mind on one thing long enough to get out all of my swooning. I love that there is heartbreak and deaths because that what really happens in the world. People have awful things happen to them, but this fantasy novel shows that you can overcome even the most insurmountable obstacles if you trust your instincts, believe in your friends, and rely on love to power all.

Basically what I am trying to say, is this is the best series I have ever read. It’s the most beautiful, real, tragically wonderful (although it does have the best ending!) book/series of all time. Sorry, JK, your HP books have been usurped.

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