Review: Sisters Red (Fairytale Retellings, #1)

Author: Jackson Pearce
Series: Fairytale Retellings, #1
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Release: June 7th 2010
Source: Borrowed
Pages: 324 (hardcover)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

Scarlett March lives to hunt the Fenris--the werewolves that took her eye when she was defending her sister Rosie from a brutal attack. Armed with a razor-sharp hatchet and blood-red cloak, Scarlett is an expert at luring and slaying the wolves. She's determined to protect other young girls from a grisly death, and her raging heart will not rest until every single wolf is dead.

Rosie March once felt her bond with her sister was unbreakable. Owing Scarlett her life, Rosie hunts ferociously alongside her. But even as more girls' bodies pile up in the city and the Fenris seem to be gaining power, Rosie dreams of a life beyond the wolves. She finds herself drawn to Silas, a young woodsman who is deadly with an ax and Scarlett's only friend--but does loving him mean betraying her sister and all that they've worked for?

Fairy tale retellings are without any doubt my number one soft spot when it comes to reading. Regardless of how well I know about the original fairy tale, I'm always easily entranced by the creativity and imagination that shined through each and every one of the newly-reinvented/reimagined stories. Except, perhaps, when such things do not exist at all in a book. I really wish I can leave some better parting words to SISTERS RED, but in the end, this is a fairy tale retelling that lacks everything.

Review: Splintered (Splintered, #1)

Author: A. G. Howard
Series: Splintered, #1
Publisher: Amulet Books
Release: Jan 1st 2013
Source: Borrowed
Pages: 371 (hardcover)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

This stunning debut captures the grotesque madness of a mystical under-land, as well as a girl’s pangs of first love and independence. Alyssa Gardner hears the whispers of bugs and flowers—precisely the affliction that landed her mother in a mental hospital years before. This family curse stretches back to her ancestor Alice Liddell, the real-life inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Alyssa might be crazy, but she manages to keep it together. For now.

When her mother’s mental health takes a turn for the worse, Alyssa learns that what she thought was fiction is based in terrifying reality. The real Wonderland is a place far darker and more twisted than Lewis Carroll ever let on. There, Alyssa must pass a series of tests, including draining an ocean of Alice’s tears, waking the slumbering tea party, and subduing a vicious bandersnatch, to fix Alice’s mistakes and save her family. She must also decide whom to trust: Jeb, her gorgeous best friend and secret crush, or the sexy but suspicious Morpheus, her guide through Wonderland, who may have dark motives of his own.

Technically speaking, A.G. Howard's rendition of Wonderland bears more resemblance to Tim Burton's wild if not wicked imagination than to the original Lewis Caroll's tale. Though regardless of the origin of Howard's inspirations, Splintered can sure hold its own place among YA literatures. Its rich and exquisite scenery, puzzling yet absorbing plot, along with those superbly-done characters, altogether combined into this elaborate visual feast in front of us.

Review: The Lost Boys (The Lost Boys, #1)

Author: Lilian Carmine
Series: The Lost Boys, #1
Publisher: Ebury Press (Random House UK)
Release: Oct 24th 2013
Source: Netgalley
Pages: 512 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

An intensely addictive romance novel about girls, ghosts, and forbidden love, ideal for fans of Stephenie Meyer

Fate has brought them together. But will it also keep them apart? Having moved to a strange town, 17-year-old Joey Gray is feeling a little lost, until she meets a cute, mysterious boy near her new home. But there’s a very good reason why Tristan Halloway is always to be found roaming in the local graveyard. Perfect for fans of Stephenie Meyer and Lauren Kate, The Lost Boys is a magical, romantic tale of girl meets ghost.

I was never a fan of Stephenie Meyer despite her overwhelming fame brought on by the Twilight series. Thus, the tagline in the blurb did more damage than good when it comes to drawing my attention. But one can hardly ever walk away from a ghost story that easy, even though now I wish I had done just that.

Review: World After (Penryn & the End of Days, #2)

Author: Susan Ee
Series: Penryn & the End of Days, #2
Publisher: Skyscape (self published work)
Release: Nov 19th 2013
Source: Purchased
Pages: 320 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

In this sequel to the bestselling fantasy thriller, Angelfall, the survivors of the angel apocalypse begin to scrape back together what's left of the modern world.

When a group of people capture Penryn's sister Paige, thinking she's a monster, the situation ends in a massacre. Paige disappears. Humans are terrified. Mom is heartbroken.

Penryn drives through the streets of San Francisco looking for Paige. Why are the streets so empty? Where is everybody? Her search leads her into the heart of the angels' secret plans where she catches a glimpse of their motivations, and learns the horrifying extent to which the angels are willing to go.

Meanwhile, Raffe hunts for his wings. Without them, he can't rejoin the angels, can't take his rightful place as one of their leaders. When faced with recapturing his wings or helping Penryn survive, which will he choose?

It wasn't too long ago when I was left completely awestruck by Susan Ee's stunning debut Angelfall - an apocalyptic fantasy so flawlessly mixed with paranormal elements. It is a work of utter excellence and superiority when compared with many others. Hence, as soon as I got my hands on its sequel World After, I devoured it as fast as I could with eager anticipations. And believe me when I say it, Susan Ee does not disappoint. World After is yet another YA masterpiece you all ought to appreciate.

ARC Review: The Summer I Found You

Author: Jolene Perry 

Series: Standalone

Publisher: Albert Whitman Teen

Release: Mar 1st 2014

Source: Netgalley

Pages: 256 (ebook)

( Amazon | Goodreads )

All they have in common is that they're less than perfect. And all they're looking for is the perfect distraction.

Kate's dream boyfriend has just broken up with her and she's still reeling from her diagnosis of type 1 diabetes. Aidan planned on being a lifer in the army and went to Afghanistan straight out of high school. Now he's a disabled young veteran struggling to embrace his new life. When Kate and Aidan find each other neither one wants to get attached. But could they be right for each other after all?

I'm surprised at how much I enjoyed reading The Summer I Found You, even though my analytical left brain is yelling furiously at my silly emotional right brain the whole time. It is so contradictory that I find myself bewildered about how I can possibly like it when I see its problems as plain as day. Nevertheless, it is, without a doubt, one of the more delightful reading experiences I have undergone lately and I appreciate this lightening of mood if just for its entertainment value.

Blog Tour Review + Giveaway: Butterman (Time) Travel, Inc. (Butterman (Time) Travel, Inc., #1)

Welcome to my stop on the tour for Butterman (Time) Travel, Inc by PK Hrezo. This is a NA Time Travel Adventure Romance.

This tour runs Feb. 10-21st with reviews, author interviews, and a few guest posts and top tens. It also includes a great giveaway. Be sure to check out our tour page with additional info and list of tour stops.

About the Book

Title: Butterman (Time) Travel, Inc

Author: PK Hrezo

Series: Butterman (Time) Travel, Inc, #1

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (self published work) 

Release: Nov 5th 2013

Source: Blog Tour Copy

Pages: 310 (ebook)

( Amazon | Goodreads | B&N )

It’s the year 2069 and even though eighteen-year-old Bianca Butterman is heir to the family biz, she may never see the day her time-craft license becomes official. When a government agent starts nosing around the operation, Butterman Travel, Inc. gets stuck with a full audit—part of a government take-over scheme to shut down all private time travel agencies. Enter former boy band superstar, Tristan Helms, desperate to retrieve a lost item from his past and willing to pay triple fare for a time-trip to get there, and Bianca has to find a way to complete the job and return home before the government gets wind and shuts down the family biz for good.

Welcome to Butterman Travel, Incorporated, a full service agency designed to meet all your exclusive time travel needs. We’re a family owned and operated business with one hundred years of experience. A place where you can rest assured, safety and reliability always come first.

Anxious to attend some special event from the past? Or for a glimpse of what the future holds?

You've come to the right place. We’re a fully accredited operation, offering an array of services; including, but not limited to: customized travel plans, professionally piloted operations, and personal trip guides. *Terms and conditions do apply

Use our Web conferencing to contact our front line reservation specialist, Bianca Butterman, who will handle all your inquiries in a professional and efficient manner, offering a tentative itinerary and free fare quote, so you can make the most of your time trip.

We look forward to serving you at Butterman Travel, Inc., where time is always in your hands.

Have you ever considered the things you would do if one day you could travel in time? Past, future, wherever and whenever your heart desires, with a simple gesture of hand and BOOM!! you are there, mingling between what was already done and what has yet to come. If you are as fascinated and intrigued as I am, Butterman (Time) Travel, Inc will surely be a treat for you.

ARC Review: Fates (Fates, #1)

Author: Lanie Bross
Series: Fates, #1
Publisher: Delacorte Press (Random House)
Release: Feb 11th 2014
Source: Netgalley
Pages: 336 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

Perfect for fans of Jennifer Armentrout, Julie Kagawa, Rachel Vincent, and Sarah J. Maas, and for girls who love all things pretty, romantic and inspirational.

One moment. One foolish desire. One mistake. And Corinthe lost everything.

She fell from her tranquil life in Pyralis Terra and found herself exiled to the human world. Her punishment? To make sure people's fates unfold according to plan. Now, years later, Corinthe has one last assignment: kill Lucas Kaller. His death will be her ticket home.

But for the first time, Corinthe feels a tingle of doubt. It begins as a lump in her throat, then grows toward her heart, and suddenly she feels like she is falling all over again--this time for a boy she knows she can never have. Because it is written: one of them must live, and one of them must die. In a universe where every moment, every second, every fate has already been decided, where does love fit in?

"Different and imaginative."--Kirkus Reviews

It is never easy for me to turn down a pretty cover, despite the fact that this irrational urge has brought me more than a few disappointments. Well, that number may have to go up another notch today. To be fair, I don’t dislike Fates as much as some of the other ones, but that is hardly a compliment at all. While parts of the story remained quite entertaining to read, as a whole, there were way too many problems for me to fully enjoy it. 

Review: Tiger Lily

Author: Jodi Lynn Anderson
Series: Standalone
Publisher: Haper Teen (Harper Collins)
Release: July 3rd 2012
Source: Purchased
Pages: 304 (paperback)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

Before Peter Pan belonged to Wendy, he belonged to the girl with the crow feather in her hair. . . .

Fifteen-year-old Tiger Lily doesn't believe in love stories or happy endings. Then she meets the alluring teenage Peter Pan in the forbidden woods of Neverland and immediately falls under his spell.

Peter is unlike anyone she's ever known. Impetuous and brave, he both scares and enthralls her. As the leader of the Lost Boys, the most fearsome of Neverland's inhabitants, Peter is an unthinkable match for Tiger Lily. Soon, she is risking everything—her family, her future—to be with him. When she is faced with marriage to a terrible man in her own tribe, she must choose between the life she's always known and running away to an uncertain future with Peter.

With enemies threatening to tear them apart, the lovers seem doomed. But it's the arrival of Wendy Darling, an English girl who's everything Tiger Lily is not, that leads Tiger Lily to discover that the most dangerous enemies can live inside even the most loyal and loving heart.

Peter Pan was never a favorite of mine, nor was I at all familiar with the myths of Neverland. Although adored by many of my friends, it seemed that I never cared enough to read this particular fairy tale, which also explained my initial hesitation towards Tiger Lily. Let me tell you now, my friends, I was such a fool. Tiger Lily was nothing like the ridiculous and predictive story I had expected. Instead, it was a grand display of fascinations and wonderments. I loved exploring Neverland in Jodi Lynn Anderson’s imaginations and the tale of Tiger Lily and Peter Pan is downright heartwarming and tear jerking all at the same time.

Mini ARC Review: Under the Wide and Starry Sky

Author: Nancy Horan
Series: Standalone
Publisher: Ballantine Books (Random House)
Release: Jan 21st 2014
Source: NetGalley
Pages: 496 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

At the age of thirty-five, Fanny van de Grift Osbourne leaves her philandering husband in San Francisco and sets sail for Belgium to study art, with her three children and a nanny in tow. Not long after her arrival, however, tragedy strikes, and Fanny and her brood repair to a quiet artists' colony in France where she can recuperate. There she meets Robert Louis Stevenson, ten years her junior, who is instantly smitten with the earthy, independent and opinionated belle Americaine.

A woman ahead of her time, Fanny does not immediately take to the young lawyer who longs to devote his life to literature, and who would eventually write such classics as Treasure Island and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. In time, though, she succumbs to Stevenson's charms. The two begin a fierce love affair, marked by intense joy and harrowing darkness, which spans decades as they travel the world for the sake of his health. Eventually they settled in Samoa, where Robert Louis Stevenson is buried underneath the epitaph:

Under the wide and starry sky, 

Dig the grave and let me lie.

Glad did I live and gladly die,

And I laid me down with a will.

This be the verse you grave for me:

Here he lies where he longed to be;

Home is the sailor, home from sea,

And the hunter home from the hill. 

(Requiem, Robert Louis Stevenson)

Though most of the books I read are YA fantasies, occasionally I do try out some other genres as well, for the purpose of broadening my perspective. Under the Wide and Starry Sky is precisely the case of such experiment. While I appreciate the interesting story and Nancy Horan's excellent writing, this is simply not the kind of books for me. I struggled quite a bit trying to rate it and the 2 stars you see here reflect nothing except personal taste.

Review: Endless

Author: Amanda Gray
Series: Standalone
Publisher: Month9Books
Release: Sep 10th 2013
Source: NetGalley
Pages: 384 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

Jenny Kramer knows she isn't normal. After all, not everybody can see the past lives of people around them.

When she befriends Ben Daulton, resident new boy, the pair stumble on an old music box with instructions for “mesmerization” and discover they may have more in common than they thought. Like a past life.

Using the instructions in the music box, Ben and Jenny share a dream that transports them to Romanov Russia and leads them to believe they have been there together before. But they weren't alone. Nikolai, the mysterious young man Jenny has been seeing in her own dreams was there, too. When Nikolai appears next door, Jenny is forced to acknowledge that he has travelled through time and space to find her. Doing so means he has defied the laws of time, and the Order, an ominous organization tasked with keeping people in the correct time, is determined to send him back.

While Ben, Jenny and Nikolai race against the clock - and the Order - Jenny and Nikolai discover a link that joins them in life - and beyond death.

It is hard to describe the feelings that are going through my head right now. It has been awhile since the last time I got this attached to a book. Endless left me completely speechless, and I still cannot quite articulate the emotions I'm experiencing. I loved and hated the moment I flipped through the last page. When I realized there was no more to Jenny's story and that I had finished it, I felt my heart aching. Amanda Gray's brilliantly composed plot and characters swallowed me as a whole and I am perfectly content to stay in this mesmerizing dream.

Review: Chrysalis (The World of Bid'ABan, #1)

Author: Michelle Cornwell-Jordan
Series: The World of Bid'ABan, #1
Publisher: 3CM Media (self published work)
Release: Sep 30th 2013
Source: Author for review
Pages: 212 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

Ayda Blackhawk is the beautiful, mysterious new girl at Kindale High School, in the Earthen Elemental Division of Bid'ABan. She is not there to make friends but to bring destruction. Her assignment? To kill the Thunderkin heir Adrian Dusong.

But when Ayda meets the handsome Adrian, a twist of fate changes the rules. Ayda and Adrian find themselves, along with their world, at the cross roads to either destruction or redemption.

So it seems that my misfortune continues. If reading Rouge was a mistake led on because I misjudged its contents by the fancy cover, then picking up Chrysalis was a mistake caused by the exact opposite reason. I wish I had judged the cover more, that way I probably would have saved myself from this unsatisfactory read. I always try my best to support self published books and authors, but Chrysalis is perhaps one of those which made self published books to have such a bad reputation.

Review: Rouge (Rouge, #1)

Author: Isabella Modra
Series: Rouge, #1
Publisher: Smashwords (self published work)
Release: August 20th 2013
Source: Author for review
Pages: 297 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

“You have a fire inside of you.”

Hunter Harrison is no superhero. She doesn't wear a cape, or a lycra suit, or prance around dark alleyways looking for punk-ass kids to torment. But Hunter has a power; the power to control fire. And it is one nasty flame brewing in her soul.

In the midst of her senior year, uncovering the truth about her parent's death and how she came to inherit such abilities, and falling in love with a nerdy activist from her school, Hunter finds herself in a battle with a supernatural flame that reacts to her every emotion. Anger, fear, even passion arouse the flame within and Hunter fights to keep her identity secret whilst also protecting those she loves.

But being a hero is easier said than done, especially when tragedy strikes and Hunter is forced to make a choice; let the fire take control and seek revenge for her loss, or walk away. But mercy is a bitch, especially when there’s a fire boiling inside her hotter than the darkest pits of hell.

When I first saw Rouge on Goodreads, I was immediately drawn to it by the cover. The floating fire along with the darkness surrounding it fired up my interest almost instantly. Needless to say, I was excited to pick it up. Unfortunately, Rouge is one of those books which have exquisite exteriors but fail to deliver anything memorable as far as stories and characters go. I guess it is true that you can never judge a book by its cover.

Review: Ethereal Fury (Gemini Rising, #1)

Author: Jessica O'Gorek
Series: Gemini Rising, #1
Publisher: Cogent Publishing (self published work)
Release: April 13th 2013
Source: Purchased
Pages: 278 (ebook)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

Angry at the human race and its methodical destruction of her resources, Mother Earth recruits souls who have just left their bodies to serve Her, and turns them against humanity. Gemini, a clan of paranormal beings, picked from these possessed humans, emerges. A powerful, rising force proceeds to carry out Mother Nature’s plan to systematically destroy towns, cities, states… and eventually, the world. Amidst the chaos, a forbidden relationship between a human girl, Violette, and Onyx, a lead Gemini, begins. They will both find themselves in the middle of a revolutionary war that will either save, or destroy our world.

I had high hopes for Ethereal Fury. It was both refreshing and exciting to find a paranormal novel that is not about vampires, werewolves, or angels. The concept of Mother Earth and how she plans to destroy human race due to our long-going destruction to the environment screamed originality and I couldn't wait to start it. Unfortunately, after a long reading struggle (I almost give up on this book 5 times), I have to conclude that Ethereal Fury was not what I have hoped at all and this left me very sour at heart. So, be prepared and let the rant begin.

Review: The Elite (The Selection, #2)

Author: Kiera Cass
Series: The Selection, #2
Publisher: Harper Collins
Release: April 23rd 2013
Source: Purchased
Pages: 323 (hardcover)
( Amazon | Goodreads )

Thirty-five girls came to the palace to compete in the Selection. All but six have been sent home. And only one will get to marry Prince Maxon and be crowned princess of Illea.

America still isn’t sure where her heart lies. When she’s with Maxon, she’s swept up in their new and breathless romance, and can’t dream of being with anyone else. But whenever she sees Aspen standing guard around the palace, and is overcome with memories of the life they planned to share. With the group narrowed down to the Elite, the other girls are even more determined to win Maxon over—and time is running out for America to decide.

Just when America is sure she’s made her choice, a devastating loss makes her question everything again. And while she’s struggling to imagine her future, the violent rebels that are determined to overthrow the monarchy are growing stronger and their plans could destroy her chance at any kind of happy ending.

The Elite is the sequel to the #1 New York Times Bestselling novel The Selection by Kiera Cass. The series is set in a dystopian world and focuses mainly around the romantic relationships of the protagonist, America Singer, and the overall selection competition where the future queen of the country is chosen.