Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Wishlist Wednesday #98


*Wishlist Wednesday is where you show a book that has been on your wishlist/TBR list for a while, the meme is hosted by Pen to Paper*



Paper Princess by Erin Watt

Publisher
EverAfter Romance 
Release DateApril 4, 2016
Pages: 370

The Story:

#1 New York Times Bestseller USA Today Bestseller

From strip clubs and truck stops to southern coast mansions and prep schools, one girl tries to stay true to herself.

These Royals will ruin you…

Ella Harper is a survivor―a pragmatic optimist. She’s spent her whole life moving from town to town with her flighty mother, struggling to make ends meet and believing that someday she’ll climb out of the gutter. After her mother’s death, Ella is truly alone. 

Until Callum Royal appears, plucking Ella out of poverty and tossing her into his posh mansion among his five sons who all hate her. Each Royal boy is more magnetic than the last, but none as captivating as Reed Royal, the boy who is determined to send her back to the slums she came from.

Reed doesn’t want her. He says she doesn’t belong with the Royals.

He might be right.

Wealth. Excess. Deception. It’s like nothing Ella has ever experienced, and if she’s going to survive her time in the Royal palace, she’ll need to learn to issue her own Royal decrees.

-via Amazon



Meet the Author

Erin Watt is the brainchild of two bestselling authors linked together through their love of great books and an addiction to writing. They share one creative imagination. Their greatest love (after their families and pets, of course)? Coming up with fun--and sometimes crazy--ideas. Their greatest fear? Breaking up. You can contact them at their shared inbox: authorerinwatt@gmail.com



Want to see my entire Wishlist? Check it out on Amazon: Books I Dream About

Happy Reading!

August 2016 Wrap-Up!

A review of the monthly activities on the blog incl. book reviews, memes, 
reading challenge additions, book hauls

Hey Bookies!

This is my Wrap-Up post for August! This month was a rough month for reading. Studying for GRE, my 28th birthday, job interviews, so on and so forth. Having said that said, I didn't do too much reading this month. 


Books Read:


Books Reviewed:

New Books:

For full details check out my In My Mailbox posts for August


Book In Progress:



Doon Forever by  Carey Corp & Lorie Langdon*
The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee**

*Little slow for me, having a hard time finishing
**First Audiobook ever, listen to it while working out

September TBR:

Doon Forever by  Carey Corp & Lorie Langdon
The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee
The Forgetting by Sharon Cameron
Stealing Snow by Danielle Paige

If you have any suggestions on improving my Wrap-Ups for the future posts, comment below.


Happy Reading!
Monday, August 29, 2016

In My Mailbox #28



*In My Mailbox is a weekly meme hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren which allows bloggers to share what books they bought/received each week.*


Hey Bookies! This week will be the twenty-eighth time hosting In My Mailbox and I am so excited to share with you what I received in my mailbox recently.


Last month I received an email from Blink asking if I would review two of their YA upcoming releases. Take a look below:



*If you're interested in the other books that are on my radar you can check out my Amazon Wishlist: Books I Dream About!

Happy Reading!
Wednesday, August 24, 2016

Wishlist Wednesday #97


*Wishlist Wednesday is where you show a book that has been on your wishlist/TBR list for a while, the meme is hosted by Pen to Paper*



Torn by Jennifer L. Armentrout 

Publisher
Jennifer L. Armentrout 
Release DateJuly 17, 2016
Pages: 368

The Story:

Torn between duty and survival, nothing can be the same. Everything Ivy Morgan thought she knew has been turned on its head. After being betrayed and then nearly killed by the Prince of the Fae, she’s left bruised and devastated—and with an earth-shattering secret that she must keep at all costs. And if the Order finds out her secret, they’ll kill her. Then there’s Ren Owens, the sexy, tattooed Elite member of the Order who has been sharing Ivy’s bed and claiming her heart. Their chemistry is smoking hot, but Ivy knows that Ren has always valued his duty to the Order above all else—he could never touch her if he knew the truth. That is, if he let her live at all. Yet how can she live with herself if she lies to him? But as the Fae Prince begins to close in, intent on permanently opening the gates to the Otherworld, Ivy is running out of options. If she doesn’t figure out who she can trust—and fast—it’s not only her heart that will be torn apart, but civilization itself.

-via Amazon



Meet the Author

# 1 NEW YORK TIMES and USA TODAY Bestselling author Jennifer L. Armentrout lives in West Virginia. When she's not hard at work writing, she spends her time, reading, working out, watching zombie movies, and pretending to write. She shares her home with her husband, his K-9 partner named Diesel and her hyper Jack Russell Loki. Her dreams of becoming an author started in algebra class, where she spent her time writing short stories. Therefore explains her dismal grades in math. Jennifer writes Young Adult Contemporary, Urban Fantasy/Paranormal and Romance. She writes New Adult and Adult romance under the pen name J.Lynn.



Want to see my entire Wishlist? Check it out on Amazon: Books I Dream About

Happy Reading!

Saturday, August 20, 2016

Review : Destined for Doon by Carey Corp & Lorie Langdon


*Warning: This review may contain spoilers. Read at your own risk.

PublisherBlink
Publication dateSeptember 2, 2014
Pages: 368
Source: Own

The Story:
In this sequel to Doon, Kenna Reid realizes she made a horrible mistake—choosing to follow her dreams of Broadway instead of staying in the enchanted land of Doon. To make everything worse, she's received her Calling—proof she and Duncan are each other's one true love—and it's pure torment, especially when visions of the very alluring Doonish prince appear right before she goes on stage. So when Duncan tells Kenna that Doon needs her, she doesn't have to think twice. But even if Kenna can defeat the evil threatening to eliminate Doon, her happily ever after may still be in peril.

Amazon

Rating




One-word Review: FANTASTICAL

Reading Tune: Outlander - Main Title Theme
 by Bear McCreary ft. Raya Yarbrough


Tag Line:

Called to return, destined to rule.

Opening Line:

I glided down the backstage hallway with the sort of stealth that would've made my best friend proud.

My Review

Duncan MacCrae leaning against the edge of my dressing table holding a duffel bag. But I knew from experience it wasn't really him. It was a Calling delusion, a manifestation of my subconscious longing for my one true love -- a boy who was literally a world away. --page 11

I enjoyed the Doon, the first book of the series as it reminded me of a sort of YA version of Outlander. This second book, Destined for Doon, wasn't too bad either. The plot was definitely something up my alley. Hot, hulking, warrior prince, from another dimension/world, travels to this world to retrieve the the Queen's best friend, and Broadway addict, to defeat a great evil ... Only, the girl shattered the Prince's heart to return to her world and follow her dreams of starring onstage. Shattered by heartbreak and abandonment, Prince Duncan wants nothing to do with Mackenna, who is remorseful by her decision to leave him and torn between following her dreams and staying in Doon.

Giddy with shock, I whispered, "What are you doing here?
I waited for words of love, a confession that he couldn't exist without me any more than I could live without him, reassurance that he realized my leaving him on the Brig o' Doon had been at the expense of my own heart, and the promise that we would never be apart again. --page 12

The pacing of Destined for Doon was perfectly attuned with the storyline. Never felt bogged down by a slow trot. There was romantic tension, action, and more to keep the story flowing. Corp's and Langdon's writing and world-building was just as fun and fantastical as in Doon. As we all known, sequels rarely make the cut in comparison to its predecessor. Fortunately, Destined for Doon didn't disappoint. 

All in all, if you enjoyed Doon then you will enjoyed its sequel. Destined for Doon is romantic, wondrous and entertaining. Worth the time to read. I will be reviewing Shades of Doon soon.

Character Breakdown:

MacKenna Reid -- Feisty, stubborn, loyal and as independent as ever.


Duncan MacCrea -- Infuriatingly stoic, stubborn, hot with a dash of Cro-Magnon-Shriek.

About a third of the way down, I called out, "I'm on my way."
Duncan groaned before bellowing, "I said no! Stay where you are. Thas an order!"
"You're not the boss of me, you stupid ogre!" -- page 80

Meet the Authors:


 NY Times & USA Today Best-selling author, Carey Corp, wrote her first book, a brilliant retelling of Star Wars, at the prodigious age of seven. Since then, her love affair of reinvention has continued to run amuck. Writing both literary fiction and stories for young adults, she begins each morning consuming copious amounts of coffee while weaving stories that capture her exhaustive imagination. She harbors a voracious passion (in no consistent order) for mohawks, Italy, musical theater, chocolate, and Jane Austen. Her debut novel for teens, The Halo Chronicles: The Guardian, earned her national recognition as 2010 Golden Heart finalist and more recently made the N Times Best-seller list. Coming Sept, 2015:Shades of Doon (book 3 of the 4 book Doon series), a young adult series loosely based on the concept of the musical Brigadoon, used with permission from the Alan Jay Lerner Estate & the Frederick Loewe Foundation, and co-written with Lorie Langdon.



Lorie Langdon is one half of the author team that writes the best-selling DOON series, a YA re-imagining of Brigadoon!, published by Blink/HarperCollins. She has longed to write her own novels since she was a wee girl reading every Judy Blume book she could get her hands on. So a few years ago, she left her thriving corporate career to satisfy the voices in her head. Now as a full-time author and stay-at-home mom, she spends her days tucked into her cozy office, Havanese puppy by her side, working to translate her effusive imagination into the written word.

Lorie’s first solo novel, GILT HOLLOW, a YA romantic thriller, releases September 2016!



*** Check out the Doon series' website for more information: HERE 

Happy Reading!


Wednesday, August 17, 2016

Wishlist Wednesday #96


*Wishlist Wednesday is where you show a book that has been on your wishlist/TBR list for a while, the meme is hosted by Pen to Paper*



Deep Redemption by Tillie Cole

Publisher
CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform; 1 edition 
Release DateJuly 14, 2016
Pages: 524

The Story:

ONLY THROUGH BLOOD CAN THE DEEPEST REDEMPTION BE FOUND… He was born to ascend. He was destined to lead. He was never meant to fail. Prophet Cain lies broken and defeated on the floor of his cell. A cell he has been thrown into by the one person who was supposed to stand by his side until the end. His flesh and blood, his only companion. His beloved twin brother. Cain has sacrificed everything for his people. He left the safety and security of his life of study to infiltrate the infamous Hades Hangmen. He lived with them, rode with them, and then betrayed them. All in the name of a faith he can now feel slipping away from him. Like everything else he once held dear… But then his isolation is broken. Another prisoner is brought to the cell next to his. A woman fighting her own demons and fears. A woman who Cain understands needs him, as he needs her. As the connection between them grows, so does Cain’s resolve. He will right the wrongs he has done. He will atone for the evil acts carried out in his name. He will save the one he loves… … Even if the battle takes him to the gates of hell itself. Contemporary Dark Romance. Contains explicit sexual situations, violence, sensitive and taboo subjects, offensive language, and mature topics. Recommended for age 18 years and up.

-via Amazon



Meet the Author

Tillie Cole is a Northern girl through and through. She originates from a place called Teesside on that little but awesomely sunny (okay I exaggerate) Isle called Great Britain. She was brought up surrounded by her mother -- a farmer's daughter, her crazy Scottish father, a savagely sarcastic sister and a multitude of rescue animals and horses.


After years of teaching high school Social Studies and following her Professional Rugby Player husband around Europe, they have settled in Calgary, Alberta where Tillie spends most of her days (and many a late night) lost in a writing euphoria or in her dream of pursuing a dazzling career as a barrel-racing, tasselled-chap, Stetson-wearing cowgirl... Ye-haw!


Want to see my entire Wishlist? Check it out on Amazon: Books I Dream About

Happy Reading!

Saturday, August 13, 2016

Review : The Madman's Daughter by Megan Sheperd

*Warning: This review may contain spoilers. Read at your own risk.

Publisher
Balzer + Bray

Release DateJanuary 23, 2013 
Pages: 464
Source: Own

The Story:

For fans of Libba Bray, this first book in a gothic suspense trilogy is inspired by H. G. Wells'sThe Island of Dr. Moreau and has been hailed by New York Times bestseller Carrie Ryan as having "beautiful writing, breakneck pacing, a pulse-pounding mystery, and an irresistible romance."
Following accusations that her scientist father gruesomely experimented on animals, sixteen-year-old Juliet watched as her family and her genteel life in London crumbled around her—and only recently has she managed to piece her world back together. But when Juliet learns her father is still alive and working on a remote tropical island, she is determined to find out if the old accusations are true. Accompanied by her father's handsome young assistant, Montgomery, and an enigmatic castaway, Edward, Juliet travels to the island, only to discover the depths of her father's insanity. Torn between horror and scientific curiosity, Juliet knows she must end her father's dangerous experiments and escape her jungle prison before it's too late. Yet as the island falls into chaos, she discovers the extent of her father's genius—and madness—in her own blood.
via Amazon

Rating


One-word ReviewCREEPY

Reading Tune
Devil's Playground by The Rigs

Tag Line:


In the darkest places, even love is deadly.


Opening Line:


The basement hallways in King's College of Medical Research were dark, even in the daytime.


My Review


Plot:

Going into The Madman's Daughter I figured the story would play on Frankenstein themes with a YA twist. And I was fortuitously correct! On that note, the plot was intriguing, to say the least. Abandoned by her father and orphaned by her mother, a teen girl, Juliet, works nights in a creepy medical school cleaning blood, guts and dirt in order to survive. Once a renowned doctor, her father lost their prestigious family everything - fortune, home, reputation. Then disappeared.


Until somewhere from their past resurfaces and sets Juliet down a dark path.

The Madman's Daughter's pacing was perfecting in tuned with the progression of the story. Not once did I feel bogged down or hyperventilating by the pace of the story. I liked Sheperd's writing. The language was up to par with the era the story was written in. The world-building and the details were sown very well. I was drawn into the story.

All in all, I enjoyed The Madman's Daughter on the plane rides to and from ALA Annual Conference 2016. A gothic horror, The Madman's Daughter was dark and strange with a dash of romance. Having said that, I will finishing the trilogy in the near future and recommend it to anyone who is willing to read it. 


The next afternoon I found a lidded bowl full of live worms and roaches outside my door with a note written in a gentleman's handwriting. -- page 90

Character Breakdown:


The characters were well fleshed out. There was not the ambiance of lacking, or flat, monotonous characters. Sheperd's characters had flavor, life. And their dynamic ran like a well oiled machine.

Juliet Moreau - I enjoyed her character but at times Juliet annoyed the hell out of me. She could be meek and so buzz-headed when it came James and Prince. But she made a somewhat interesting character -- in that she was a bit strange, and dark, and didn't quite fit in.


 On the table beside me was the set of operating instruments. I wrapped my hand around the handle of he ax, normally used for separating the sternum of cadavers. I too a deep breath, focusing on the rabbit's neck. In a movement I knew had to be fast and hard, I brought down the ax.

The rabbit's screaming stopped. -- page 20

Montgomery James - Smart childhood friend, first love. Loyal to a fault - literally, to the one person he shouldn't be.



 He'd been our servant, I told myself. I didn't owe him anything. But that was a lie. Montgomery and I were bound together by our past. This was the boy who had secretly taught me biology because my father wouldn't. Who'd told me fairy tales late at night to distract me from the screams coming from the laboratory. -- page 36

Dr. Henri Moreau - A selfish, terrible, mysterious father. And bat-shit crazy . . . Or is he?


"Oh, and Juliet," he said. I turned back. Half of his face was thrown in deep shadow, while the whites of his eyes gleamed in the distant lights from the salon. "I'll be working in the laboratory late tonight. I've a good start on the new specimens. Don't be alarmed if you're awoken. The animals--they screams, you know. An unfortunate effect of vivisection. It keeps the whole household up". -- page 170

Edward Prince - Dashingly mysterious, passionate with a secret.


He leaned to the side and coughed, and then his hand found mine. He squeezed the life out of it. "Juliet . . . you looked even more beautiful when I thought I was dying." -- page 111

Here is one of my favorite quotes from 
The Madman's Daughter:


Juliet, he'd called me. He'd dropped the pretense of using my surname. I studied the waves beyond our hands, trying to work out the equation of my emotions. Since I'd seen him gain, in that room at the Blur Boar Inn, there'd been a tightness inside my chest whenever he was around, like string lashed around my heart. -- page 75 

Meet the Author:




New York Times bestselling author Megan Shepherd grew up in her family’s independent bookstore in the Blue Ridge Mountains. She is the author of the acclaimed young adult series THE MADMAN'S DAUGHTER and THE CAGE, as well as the middle grade novel THE SECRET HORSES OF BRIAR HILL. She now lives and writes on a 125-year-old farm outside Asheville, North Carolina, with her husband, two cats, and an especially scruffy dog.



***Check out Megan Shepherd's website for more information about her and The Madman's Daughter HERE

Happy Reading!
Wednesday, August 10, 2016

Wishlist Wednesday #95


*Wishlist Wednesday is where you show a book that has been on your wishlist/TBR list for a while, the meme is hosted by Pen to Paper*



King's Cage by Victoria Aveyard

PublisherHarperTeen 
Release DateFebruary 7, 2017
Pages: 448

The Story:

In this breathless third installment to Victoria Aveyard’s bestselling Red Queen series, allegiances are tested on every side. And when the Lightning Girl's spark is gone, who will light the way for the rebellion?
Mare Barrow is a prisoner, powerless without her lightning, tormented by her lethal mistakes. She lives at the mercy of a boy she once loved, a boy made of lies and betrayal. Now a king, Maven Calore continues weaving his dead mother's web in an attempt to maintain control over his country—and his prisoner.
As Mare bears the weight of Silent Stone in the palace, her once-ragtag band of newbloods and Reds continue organizing, training, and expanding. They prepare for war, no longer able to linger in the shadows. And Cal, the exiled prince with his own claim on Mare's heart, will stop at nothing to bring her back.
When blood turns on blood, and ability on ability, there may be no one left to put out the fire—leaving Norta as Mare knows it to burn all the way down.
-via Amazon




Meet the Author

Victoria Aveyard was born and raised in East Longmeadow, Massachusetts, a small town known only for the worst traffic rotary in the continental United States. She moved to Los Angeles to earn a BFA in screenwriting at the University of Southern California. She currently splits her time between the East and West coasts. As an author and screenwriter, she uses her career as an excuse to read too many books and watch too many movies. You can visit her online at www.victoriaaveyard.com.



Want to see my entire Wishlist? Check it out on Amazon: Books I Dream About

Happy Reading!