Wondrous Reads

Review: Chocolate S.O.S by Sue Limb

2012-01-27T20:10:00.002Z

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Format: Paperback
Released: January 5th, 2012
Rating: 8/10

Amazon summary:

Jess has broken up with Fred, though really she is waiting for him to come to her door and beg to get back together again. But is that the sort of thing Fred would do? He has said himself that he has no backbone ...Meanwhile, a gorgeous boy has moved in next door and, to Jess's mingled horror and delight, is making it very, very obvious that he would like to be a lot closer than next door ...Surely, now, Fred will be driven, in a fit of jealousy, to sweep Jess back off her feet? Won't he?

Review:

Chocolate S.O.S is the latest instalment in Sue Limb's side-splittingly funny Jess Jordan series, and features more madness from all the characters I've grown to love. There's mad granny who's still obsessed with murder, Jess and Fred the wacky comedic duo and a new arrival who goes by the name of Luke. Obviously that can only spell trouble!

This book is a bit different to others in the series as Jess and Fred are (gasp!) no longer an item. Jess broke up with Fred after the disastrous events at a recent comedy performance, and so this book's dynamic has changed. Jess is single, still pining for Fred and Fred is quiet, reserved and gaining lots of attention from fellow female school students. Jess is obviously jealous, but starts hanging around with new boy Luke, who's also a bit mental in his own way. It's all change for Jess Jordan!

I liked this book a lot more than the last one, Five-Star Fiasco, as it was funnier. I like nothing more than YA books injected with humour, and that's exactly what I got here. Jess has a knack for finding herself in stupid, but funny, situations, and most of them end up causing trouble. Even when she tells a little white lie to help someone out, the whole thing backfires and she suddenly finds herself on the phone talking to a friend's mum and pretending to be her own mother! Honestly, you just couldn't make this stuff up.

I'm eagerly anticipating the next book in this series, titled Party Disaster. I'm hoping that a few things are resolved, though: I want Jess and Fred to get back together, I want Flora to stop being so self-centred and I want Jess's dad to get a new boyfriend. It's not much to ask really, is it?! As I've said before when talking about this series, it's absolutely perfect for readers of Louise Rennison and Carmen Reid. Each author should win some kind of comedy award for their contributions to YA girl's fiction, because their take on teen life is easily the most lighthearted. In these often dismal times, I think that's exactly what we need!

EXCLUSIVE: UK Cover Reveal - Second Chance Summer by Morgan Matson!

2012-01-23T23:15:00.002Z

Thanks to Simon & Schuster, I can exclusively present you with the ace new UK cover for Second Chance Summer by Morgan Matson. I can't wait for this book to be published - I loved Morgan's debut novel!

It's published in the UK on June 7th, and here's what Morgan herself has to say about it:

I couldn’t be more excited about the Second Chance Summer cover! I love it so much, it’s been my phone background for the last two months. I think it perfectly captures the spirit of the novel, and like the Amy & Roger cover, there are lots of little details from the novel that show up in the art here. The cover just evokes the feeling of summer (and makes me really, really want a strawberry milkshake). I hope you like it too!

And here's the cover...

What do you think?

3 Year Blogoversary + UK Giveaway!

2012-01-17T18:01:00.002Z

[Image from Google]

Today is my 3 year blog birthday! I started Wondrous Reads on January 17th 2009 after a random day at work bookselling at Borders, and I never imagined it would end up anything like it is today. I've met so many lovely people through blogging - fellow bloggers, readers, publicists, authors - and I'm so glad for whatever made me do it. I've also discovered some really amazing books, a giant handful of them thanks to my publisher friends, and it's definitely broadened my reading mind and made me try new authors and genres. Here's to another 3 years!

To celebrate, I have a pretty cool giveaway for all my friends in the UK. Sorry to those in the US and worldwide, but I'll hopefully have something for you guys soon. Postage is even more expensive these days!

Here's all the details:

Courtesy of Simon & Schuster, I have a selection of new and upcoming titles to give away. They are:

The Future of Us by Jay Asher & Carolyn Mackler
Someone Else's Life by Katie Dale
Everneath by Brodi Ashton
Falling Fast by Sophie McKenzie
Smoulder by Brenna Yovanoff
Fated by Sarah Alderson

And courtesy of Orion/Indigo, I have chosen my 3 favourite books they've published from my 3 years of blogging, which are:

The Raven Mysteries: Flood & Fang by Marcus Sedgwick
Revolver by Marcus Sedgwick
My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece by Annabel Pitcher

Rules & info:

One (1) winner will win ALL the books!
Open to UK residents only.
End date: January 31st, 2012.
One entry per person.
You do NOT have to follow my blog to enter.
Books will be sent out by the very kind publishers.

Fill in the form below to enter. Good luck, and thanks for reading my blog! :)

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Review: The Future of Us by Jay Asher & Carolyn Mackler

2012-01-16T16:17:00.004Z

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's
Format: Paperback
Released: January 5th, 2012
Rating: 6/10

Amazon summary:

It's 1996 and very few high school students have ever used the internet. Facebook will not be invented until several years in the future. Emma just got a computer and an America Online CD. She and her best friend Josh power it up and log on - and discover themselves on Facebook in 2011. Everybody wonders what they'll be like fifteen years in the future. Josh and Emma are about to find out.

Review:

I'd been looking forward to reading this book for months, ever since I first heard about what could only be described as an epic collaboration. While I liked it and read it super quick, I didn't love it like everyone else seems to. Something didn't quite sit right with me, and I think it comes down to the lack of explanation for why Facebook suddenly appears on Emma's new computer and how it's possible for Emma and Josh to change their futures so quickly and easily. I have no problem believing in time-travel and other such things, but here I think I needed more information to support it.

Of course, The Future of Us has many good, even excellent, aspects. The references to 1996 are almost all accurate (I don't think Leonardo DiCaprio would have been as popular as the writers make out, though - Romeo and Juliet wasn't even on anyone's radar then and he didn't hit it big until late 1997/early 1998!) and the dual narrative gets full marks from me. I do like alternating points of view, and it made this book move quickly and keep its momentum. I also liked the characters, especially Tyson and Josh. Emma got on my nerves after a while, always trying to change things and being blind to what was right in front of her. The males in the book definitely made this book for me, and I'm assuming Josh's chapters were written by Jay Asher, who is brilliant. I could be wrong, though!

The Future of Us made me think about the future and what I'd do if I could see into mine and even change things. Sometimes I think I'd love to know what will have happened by 2027, but then other times the idea freaks me out too much. I wouldn't want to know because I don't think I could change anything, and I'd live the next 15 years waiting for things, good or bad, to happen. All this is addressed in The Future of Us but, like I mentioned earlier, the ripple effects from the present that ultimately change the future weren't quite so believable. When it comes to time-travel and future-changing, I ALWAYS need a good explanation. But that's just me.

As a contemporary novel, The Future of Us is a quick, engrossing read. It's really about a journey of self-discovery and seizing the moment (that didn't work so well for Willow in Buffy, remember? Ha!), and in that respect it's a must-read for fans of the genre. It's an interesting, original concept that for me required more in-depth exploration into the why and how. It's still one to add to the to-be-read pile, though!

In My Mailbox #151: New Books This Week

2012-01-15T09:36:00.001Z

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I received some really exciting books in the post this week! (And I'm quoted on the cover of Manic Days, which was an unexpected surprise!) I'm reading Under the Never Sky at the moment (it's getting better) and I'm still debating whether to read The Fault in Our Stars. I usually stay well away from its subject matter but I want to read this one. Can anyone tell me how sad it is?

Here's what was in my mailbox this week:

For review:

Talina in the Tower by Michelle Lovric

The Boy Project by Kami Kinard (US ARC)

Grave Dance by Kalayna Price

The Dead Ways by Christopher Edge

Spell Sisters: Sophia the Flame Sister by Amber Castle

Spell Sisters: Lily the Forest Sister by Amber Castle

The Angel at No. 33 by Polly Williams

Pendragon Legacy: Sword of Light by Katherine Roberts

India Dark by Kirsty Murray

Poppy's Hero by Rachel Billington

Lilah May's Manic Days by Vanessa Curtis

Under the Never Sky by Veronica Rossi

Bought:

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

Happy reading!

15 Days Without a Head Blog Tour: Dave Cousins Guest Post!

2012-01-14T13:21:00.001Z

15 Days Without a Head is a brilliant book about two brothers and how they deal with living on their own when their alcoholic mother leaves for over two weeks. I finished reading it yesterday and it's really good - so well written and the characters are realistic and down to earth. It's also quite funny too! It's available in the UK, and I would highly recommend it.

As part of the book's blog tour, Dave has written a guest post for me about his favourite books. For more information about him and his book, visit the following links:

www.davecousins.net
www.facebook.com/DaveCousinsAuthor
Twitter: @DaveCousins9000

Dave’s Dozen Wondrous Reads!

Robert Westall – The Machine Gunners. My favourite book by my favourite author. I’ve been collecting and reading Robert Westall since I was eleven and he never disappoints. A supreme craftsman who knows how to tell a story!

Jan Mark – Thunder and Lightnings. I read this when I had just started a new school in a new town. Being able to share some of my experience and anxieties with Andrew in the book, made those first few weeks a little easier. It was the first time I realised that stories can provide companionship and sometimes help us through difficult times in our lives. This book made me want to write, and continues to influence the kind of stories I want to tell.

Keith Gray – Creepers. When I first read Creepers I thought it was the perfect story: simple, clever, surprising and cool. I realised this was how I wanted to write. I’ve read all of Keith Gray’s books and they’re all brilliant. To have his endorsement on the cover of my debut novel makes me grin every time I see it.

Tim Bowler – Storm Catchers. Another book that had a huge influence on my writing. My wife bought it for our eldest because it sounded good; he never got around to reading it, but I did. I thought it was so great, I emailed Tim Bowler to tell him. To my delight and amazement, Tim emailed back, offering advice and best wishes for my own writing career. The fact that we now share the same publisher is something of which I am very proud.

Robert Cormier – I am the Cheese. Cormier’s books are dark, taut and edgy. I have great admiration for his writing, and the fact that he never flinches from what are often brutal truths, handling difficult, sometimes shocking subjects, with heart and honesty, never for effect.

Bill Watterson – Calvin & Hobbes. It’s an over-used term, but Bill Watterson is actually a genius. Calvin and Hobbes is as near to perfection as it is possible to get. Funny, wise and heart-felt, Watterson’s strips are beautifully drawn stories featuring two of the best characters ever created. Reading a few pages of Calvin and Hobbes never fails to inspire, enlighten and put a smile on my face.

Lucy Christopher – Stolen. A masterclass in character, setting and suspense. This beautifully crafted book is surprising, disturbing and kept me thinking, long after I finished reading.

Louis Sachar – Holes. Another perfect book. The idea and execution are sublime. Anybody serious about writing should read this book – twice. The sequel Small Steps is also excellent as is The Cardturner, which made me want to take up Bridge!

Frank Cottrell Boyce – Framed. I learned a lot from this book. Frank Cottrell Boyce is the master of understatement. Funny without being cheap, and heart-breaking without resorting to melodrama. I was lucky enough to hear him speak recently and he’s a lovely fella too!

Roger McGough – Waving at Trains. I like poetry (and song lyrics) and am often in awe of writers who can capture the essence of a moment in a few words. I love the sound of McGough’s poems, the rhythm of the lines and the way he plays with language. He can be laugh-out-loud funny and brutally dark in the same verse, and always makes me think.

William Shakespeare – Romeo and Juliet. (Not strictly speaking a book, and maybe too obvious to mention, but I wanted to anyway.) I’m not a huge aficionado of Shakespeare, but his writing has the ability to move me to tears and make the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. The plays were written to be performed, so I prefer watching a play, film adaptation, or listening to a sound recording, rather than reading the text. Baz Luhrmann’s film of Romeo and Juliet is brilliant. The contemporary setting shows how universal some of Shakespeare’s stories are. A great production of a superb, timeless story.

Charles Dickens – A Christmas Carol. I try to read this every Christmas and it always amazes me how modern it feels, despite the fact it was written nearly two hundred years ago. It encapsulates many of the things that Dickens was so good at: exquisite description and use of language; social commentary within the context of a great story; subtle humour, and some of the most memorable characters ever created. It’s also guaranteed to warm my humbug heart and spark the first flickering of festive feeling.

Review: Cinder by Marissa Meyer

2012-01-13T13:08:00.001Z

Publisher: Puffin
Format: Paperback
Released: January 5th, 2012
Rating: 8/10

Amazon summary:

Cinder, a gifted mechanic in New Beijing, is also a cyborg. She's reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister's sudden illness. But when her life becomes entwined with the handsome Prince Kai's, she finds herself at the centre of a violent struggle between the desires of an evil queen - and a dangerous temptation. Cinder is caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal. Now she must uncover secrets about her mysterious past in order to protect Earth's future.

Review:

I'd heard lots of good things about Cinder before I read it: the general consensus was that it was a must-read. So I promptly forgot about my own aversion to fairytales and cracked open my pretty red copy of the book. And let me tell you, I was not disappointed! Cinder was unlike any fairytale retelling I've read before; it wasn't flowery and Disney-esque, instead it was dark and brutal. Now *that* is my kind of fairytale!

Cinder is a twist on the famous story of Cinderella. Cinder is a mechanic living in New Beijing in the future, years after a devastating war has taken place. She's part android, has two (not ugly) sisters and is basically considered to be the lowest of the low by most of her immediate family. New Beijing isn't everything it's cracked up to be, though. There's a virus called Letumosis sweeping the nation, and anyone infected will most likely die once it reaches Stage 4. There's no cure, no hope of an imminent antidote, until Cinder meets a helpful doctor, a prince called Kai and a queen who is up to no good. Things quickly spiral out of control and Cinder's life is changed beyond repair, especially when someone close to her is exposed to Letumosis...

My little plot summary there does not do this book justice. I've tried to describe its awesomeness, but it's difficult - there's so much going on and the book moves at breakneck speed. Cinder kicks ass, the romantic elements are subtle but strong and the world Meyer has created is beyond cool. Just like the back of the book says, this is a fairytale but not as you know it!

I have very little to add in the way of criticisms when talking about Cinder. My only complaint would be that I think it's a bit long - I got 350 pages in and there was *still* lots more to come! Oh, and I guessed a major plot twist very early on in the book. That doesn't usually happen to me, so either this was a one-off or I'm finally starting to think ahead when I read. Either way, I wasn't surprised when I reached the end, and I think the shock was a bit lost on me because of that.

Cinder is such a brilliant debut novel, exciting and fresh and totally unexpected. The way everything unfolds is clever, and the parallels with Cinderella are fun to spot. There are three more books coming in this Lunar Chronicles series, each centred around three other female fairytale heroes, and OMG I cannot wait to read them. If they're anything like Cinder, we are in for a real literary treat.

Fated by Sarah Alderson: Book Extract!

2012-01-11T19:45:00.001Z

Sarah Alderson's new book, Fated, was published in the UK by Simon & Schuster last week, and here is a sneak peek at the book. Here's an Amazon synopsis to get you started:

What happens when you discover you aren't who you thought you were? And that the person you love is the person who will betray you? If your fate is already determined, can you fight it?

When Evie Tremain discovers that she’s the last in a long line of Demon slayers and that she’s being hunted by an elite band of assassins –Shapeshifters, Vampires and Mixen demons amongst them – she knows she can’t run. They’ll find her wherever she goes. Instead she must learn to stand and fight.

But when the half-human, half-Shadow Warrior Lucas Gray - is sent to spy on Evie and then ordered to kill her before she can fulfil a dangerous prophecy, their fates become inextricably linked. The war that has raged for one thousand years between humans and demons is about to reach a devastating and inevitable conclusion. Either one or both of them will die before this war ends.

If your life becomes bound to another’s, what will it take to sever it?

Hope you enjoy!

Fated by Sarah Alderson – Chapter 15

Lucas kept circling the cornfield. At one point he’d had an uninterrupted view of the circle with Evie stood in the centre blindfolded. He’d watched Victor give the orders and the others
converge. He knew Victor, of course, and he had heard about Earl, a long-standing member of the Hunters, recognised him by the baldness and the crossed swords on his back. The older red-headed lady, Jocelyn, lived in town. She was the one he had to avoid every day on his way to the Del Rey ranch. The fourth one, a girl called Risper, was an unknown. He didn’t think even Tristan knew of her. And clearly she was not a fan of Evie’s.
He decided to follow her, keeping his distance. He didn’t want to give himself away but they were all concentrating so hard on sneaking up on Evie in the centre of the circle that they weren’t paying any attention to their own instincts or the fact that an Unhuman was stalking them. But he didn’t want to throw Evie’s instincts – as delicately balanced as they were – she needed them all focused on Risper’s whereabouts.
Because he didn’t want to distract her, he had pulled back, just far enough to see the attack – Risper springing out of the corn straight at Evie, Evie ducking and rolling blind, spinning out of Risper’s way, narrowly avoiding a roundhouse kick to the ribs and firing a dart blind but hitting Risper’s arm.
He had smiled despite himself but now he was stalking Risper, who was stalking Evie, and his eyes were on the metal circles she was holding between her thumb and forefinger. He had no doubt that Risper intended to use them, no matter what Victor’s warnings had been, and his curiosity was piqued. Someone else with vengeance on their mind? Or was there some other drive? Either way it was strange for Victor to have her in the field. Mind you, it would save the Brotherhood a job if he just sat back and let her get on with it.
He felt Earl to his left – the man was light-footed for his size, but the sound of him unsheathing his swords was a dead giveaway. Luckily Evie heard it too. She froze and he watched her close her eyes and take a deep breath. When she let it out she started running full tilt and he had to sprint to keep pace with her, running a parallel course, getting flashes of her dark hair flying. At one point she came to a skidding stop, her blue eyes darting towards him, and he realised that she could sense him. Could she even see him? He had dived backwards well out of range, almost to the edge of the field, and waited until finally he heard a bullet crack and Earl shout, ‘I’m hit.’
Lucas couldn’t stop from smiling this time. Good hit. He wished he could have seen it. He edged further into the field, still anxious to keep an eye on Risper. It was easier to find Evie, he knew her scent by now, the strong smell of the lavender shampoo she used and the softer, more subtle scent of her skin. She was running at a crouch now, weaving in-between stalks but on a clear path, as though she was being drawn somewhere. He saw the wire on the ground a split second before she did and had to stop from yelling at her to jump. He didn’t need to. She saw it in time and leapt over it, diving onto her back with the gun pointed into the air. When she saw no one there she looked confused. And that’s when the red-haired woman stepped out from behind her, and tapped her on the back of the neck with
the tip of an arrow.
Silently she bent down and offered her hand to Evie and helped her up. Then she took Evie’s gun and fired it at the ground, making sure she got the wet paint on her shoe. ‘I’m out,’ she yelled, her eyes not leaving Evie’s the whole time. She then pointed with her arrow into the corn and whispered, ‘Watch your back.’
Evie nodded silently and moved off. Lucas followed.
Risper was almost as silent as he was. Almost as undetectable.
Almost.
Lucas picked her up first. She was stalking them, circling around Evie to come at her from behind. Lucas dropped back and hovered just out of range but Risper was like a panther, focused only on dropping her prey and not on the Unhuman right beside her that could drop her at any moment if he chose. He found his breathing was running rapid, his hands reaching for his father’s blade, and he had to force himself to hold back. There would be another time. Not right here. He wouldn’t stand a chance if he blew his cover taking out a girl who wasn’t even his target.
Risper was about ten metres to Evie’s left when he caught the circle of silver glinting in the sun. Evie paused too, as though suddenly alert to the danger, and Lucas watched as Risper drew back her arm.
He had to choose. And in the instant that Risper brought her arm forward, Lucas chose. He ran straight at Risper, knocking the wind out of her, managing to jolt her arm as she let the disc fly. She tore around, her eyes desperately searching for whatever had bumped her, but he was gone before she could piece it together. Her reaction would be panic, her senses screaming at her that there was an Unhuman out there, but maybe there was doubt too. No Unhuman would be stupid enough to enter a space with that many Hunters in it – would they? He tracked back to Evie, who was crouched down, her eyes fixed on the disc lying on the ground by her side.
An ear of corn lay next to it. She picked up the disc and turned it over, seeming to realise that it had been a kill shot but not understanding fully how she had avoided it. She got to her feet and started running, silently. She reached the clearing and dropped to her knees, her head bowed, her eyes shut.
Lucas felt himself tense, his ears tuned to the sound of Risper heading this way. What was Evie doing? He took a step towards her, instinctively wanting to shield her, realised what he was doing and stepped back into the shadows. Evie’s eyes suddenly flew
open. She was staring right at him but then she frowned before screwing her eyes shut again. He melted backwards and when she opened her eyes again he saw the confusion as she stared at the empty space around her.
And then in a move he couldn’t have foreseen she hurled the circular blade right at him. It grazed the air a millimetre to his left. Damn it. She was aware of him. She was feeling him. And he was endangering her more than Risper by being here.
And then he saw Risper stepping into the circle between him and Evie, levelling the blade and hurling it with force. He felt the wind still and heard the single whisper of steel cutting air and it felt like he was waiting for it to slice into him.
‘Hit!’ Risper yelled.
He stepped forward into the circle of light, saw his shadow fall ahead of him, announcing him. He heard the footsteps of the others running full tilt towards them and he stepped back into the shadows as they burst into the clearing.
And then he turned and vanished.

For more information, visit www.sarahalderson.com and follow Sarah on Twitter at @sarahalderson.

Chocolate S.O.S Blog Tour: Sue Limb's Fantasy Dinner Party + UK Giveaway!

2012-01-10T10:49:00.003Z

Chocolate S.O.S, the latest instalment in the hilarious Jess Jordan series, was published in the UK last week and Bloomsbury are blog-touring it all this week. I absolutely love this series: it's laugh-out-loud funny and has nicely filled the void left by Louise Rennison's Georgia Nicolson series. I've just read Chocloate S.O.S myself and can't wait for Party Disaster later in the year!

Here's the very funny Sue Limb talking about her fantasy dinner party... I don't know about you, but I'd like to be invited! And for more information on the Jess Jordan series, laugh your way over to www.jessjordan.co.uk.

Giving a dinner party is my worst nightmare, but I’ll be fine as long as somebody else can do the cooking (Jamie Oliver’s my favourite, and as this is a fantasy, I’d like Nigella to do the puds). Four comedy greats as my guests: what could be more fun? The only problem is, I have to confine myself to four. It’s a bit like choosing a pudding, except with puddings I usually confine myself to five.
I have to start with Stephen Fry, because he’s not only witty but has a brain the size of a planet – no, a universe. I could ask him questions that have always bothered me, such as, ‘What’s the capital of Poshbeckistan?’ and ‘Where do babies come from?’ He’s also urbane and imperturbable and could act as co-host, because I’d be far too tongue-tied to speak.
Jo Brand would be next. I have always adored her as she’s madly unpredictable and can be naughtily rude in a potty-mouth kind of way. I like that in a woman. (Though not in a man – men should be polite, give up their seats on buses, and wear smart suits and highly-polished shoes). I love Jo’s devastating and earthy wit. ‘You’ll have to heckle better than that, mate, or your face is going to be sat on.’ I get the feeling she’d be very relaxing company and as she was a psychiatric nurse for ten years, she’d know what to do if my teddy bear had one of his obsessive-compulsive attacks.
Reginald D Hunter is my third guest. What could be more enchanting than a big Afro-American guy wearing a little girl’s hairdo? I’ve seen him with bunches, I’ve seen him with an Alice band, and what I’d like at the dinner party is Reg in a bonnet with pink bows. He’s one of the most daring and edgy comedians around, but I want him to concentrate on mocking us Brits, because, as an outsider, he sees our weirdness in sharp perspective, and yet, bless him, he seems to like us for it.
Lastly, sorry if this is predictable, but it has to be Sarah Millican. I know she’s massively successful right now, and probably can’t even find time for a fantasy virtual dinner party, but there’s a reason she’s flavour of the decade. She’s chatty and matey like a best friend, and her material is about the domestic life we all recognize and share – socks down the back of the sofa, breakfast-in-your-pajamas stuff. She also takes photographs of puddings she has eaten, and posts them on her website. I’m sure she’d do justice to Nigella’s.

Also, here's a video of Sue talking about her Jess series:

Giveaway!

Thanks to Bloomsbury, I three (3) copies of Chocolate S.O.S to give away! Usual rules apply, and this one is UK only (sorry international friends!).

Rules & info:

Open to UK residents only.
End date: January 17th, 2012.
One entry per person.
You do NOT have to follow my blog to enter.
Books will be sent out by the publisher.

Review: Fracture by Megan Miranda

2012-01-09T20:46:00.001Z

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Format: Paperback
Released: January 5th, 2012
Rating: 7.5/10

Amazon summary:

By the time seventeen-year-old Delaney Maxwell is pulled out of the icy waters of a frozen lake, her heart has stopped beating. She is in a coma and officially dead. But Delaney pulls through. How? Doctors are mystified. Outwardly she has completely recovered. But Delaney knows something is very wrong. Pulled by sensations she can't control, she finds herself drawn to the dying. Is her brain predicting death or causing it? Then Delaney meets Troy Varga, who lost his whole family in a car accident and emerged from a coma with the same powers as Delaney. At last she's found a kindred spirit who'll understand what she's going through. But Delaney soon discovers that Troy's motives aren't quite what she thought. Is their gift a miracle, a freak of nature - or something much more frightening?

Review:

Fracture is probably one of the best YA thrillers I've ever read. It was less supernatural than I thought it would be, very well written and hard to put down. Megan Miranda created a selection of characters that were both likeable and realistic, and even her romantic elements didn't come across as forced or false like many do these days. It was a really refreshing read and a great book to choose to end my reading funk - I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Without giving too much of the plot away, I can say that Fracture is about 17-year-old Delaney Maxwell, a girl who survives after being under icy water for eleven minutes. Technically, she was dead and should have been permanently brain damaged. Instead she's something of a medical miracle, waking up and living her life as normal. Only things aren't normal: she feels a strange pull in the direction of dead people.

This whole concept was something I don't remember coming across before which, I have to say, is rather unusual these days. It was cleverly executed, and it was believable without being too far out in the realms of impossibility. It was an interesting gift that Delaney found herself with, and as she meets Troy and learns more about it, proceedings unfold at quite an alarming speed. The course of life and death could easily be messed with and altered, the only question is: will she do it?

Along with Delaney and Troy, Decker, Delaney's best friend and next door neighbour, was also a major part in Fracture. He wasn't just the token male romantic interest or the boy needed to make the girl come out of her shell. He was a genuinely well-written, likeable guy who had an important role to play in Delaney's life. In fact, he's one of the most memorable male characters I've read about recently, and I think Miranda did a great job of bringing him, and his friends, to life.

Fracture didn't affect me like my all-time favourite books have done, but it kept me hooked and made me think. It raised all kinds of questions about life, death and the universe - some of which I'm still pondering a few days later. I was pleasantly surprised with this one and I hope you will be too. It was a great debut novel to end 2011 on!

GIVEAWAY: Win The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith! (UK only)

2012-01-08T19:55:00.001Z

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight was published in the UK last week and, thanks to the lovely Sam at Headline, I have one (1) shiny very nice finished copy to give away!

Here's a summary from Amazon:

Who would have guessed that four minutes could change everything?

Imagine if she hadn't forgotten the book. Or if there hadn't been traffic on the expressway. Or if she hadn't fumbled the coins for the toll. What if she'd run just that little bit faster and caught the flight she was supposed to be on. Would it have been something else - the weather over the Atlantic or a fault with the plane?

Hadley isn't sure if she believes in destiny or fate but, on what is potentially the worst day of each of their lives, it's the quirks of timing and chance events that mean Hadley meets Oliver...

Set over a 24-hour-period, Hadley and Oliver's story will make you believe that true love finds you when you're least expecting it.

Rules & info:

Open to UK residents only.
End date: January 15th, 2012.
One entry per person.
You do NOT have to follow my blog to enter.
Book will be sent out by the publisher.

Fill in the form below to enter, and good luck!

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In My Mailbox #150: New Books Last Month

2012-01-08T00:28:00.001Z

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links (would usually) take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

Hello IMM, how I've missed you! As some of you may have noticed, I didn't post anything for the whole of December. I also didn't really read anything except one or two small books. I really needed a break from books and the internet, but now I'm back and excited about books again. Yay! From the beginning of December until now, I still had lots of books arrive in my mailbox - some for review and some I'd bought - so here's a rundown of everything that hasn't been mentioned on my blog. Sorry there are no links to Amazon, I just haven't got time to do that this weekend.

Happy New Year, everyone!

For review:

Touch of Power by Maria V. Snyder

Spaceheadz Save the World! by Jon Scieszka

Slide by Jill Hathaway (UK proof/ARC)

Tomorrow When the War Began by John Marsden

The Dead of the Night by John Marsden

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith

Dark Warning by Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick

Socks Are Not Enough by Mark Lowery (UK proof/ARC)

The Hunt by Andrew Fukuda (UK proof/ARC)

Noah's Child by Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt

In Darkness by Nick Lake

The Double-Edged Sword by Sarah Silverwood

The Medusa Project: Hit Squad by Sophie McKenzie

Invisible Fiends: The Beast by Barry Hutchison

Torn by Cat Clarke

Saving Daisy by Phil Earle

Falling Fast by Sophie McKenzie (UK proof/ARC)

The Rising by Will Hill (UK proof/ARC)

Wereworld: Shadow of the Hawk by Curtis Jobling

Chocolate S.O.S by Sue Limb

Magic in the Blood by Devon Monk

Retribution Falls by Chris Wooding

Black Arts by Andrew Prentice and Jonathan Weil (UK proof/ARC)

Switched by Amanda Hocking

Mortal Chaos by Matt Dickinson (UK proof/ARC)

The Book of Blood & Shadow by Robin Wasserman

Blood Red Road by Moira Young

15 Days Without a Head by Dave Cousins (UK proof/ARC)

Night School by C.J. Daugherty

The Donut Diaries: Revenge is Sweet by Dermot Milligan

Crossing Over by Anna Kendall

Advent by James Treadwell

The Things We Did for Love by Natasha Farrant

Pulse by Tricia Rayburn

Hallowed by Cynthia Hand

Cinder by Marissa Meyer (UK proof/ARC)

After the Snow by S.D. Crockett (UK proof/ARC)

The Future of Us by Jay Asher & Carolyn Mackler (not pictured)

~

Bought:

Dragon Art by Graeme Aymer

Breaking Dawn Movie Companion by Mark Cotta Vaz

The Complete Guide to Middle-Earth by Robert Foster

The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films by Doug Adams

A Field Guide to Narnia by Colin Duriez

Clockwork Prince by Cassandra Clare

Prince of Thorns by Mark Lawrence

Gin O'Clock by The Queen of Twitter

Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

~

Christmas Gifts:

The Alien Vault by Ian Nathan

The Art of The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

The Lord of the Rings Sketchbook by Alan Lee

Love You to Death: Season 2 by Crissy Calhoun

The Big Bang Theory A-Z by Amy Rickman

Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

Happy reading!

Author Interview: Mark Griffiths (Space Lizards Stole My Brain!)

2012-01-07T11:43:00.001Z

Mark Griffiths is the author of Space Lizards Stole My Brain!, a really fun book for younger readers. It was published in the UK this week and features illustrations by the brilliant Pete Williamson. If you like humour and stories of intergalactic mind-swaps, make sure you grab a copy!

----------

Hello Mark! For anyone who hasn't yet heard of your book, what do they need to know before reading?

The book is a sci-fi comedy aimed at kids aged 7-12. It’s about what happens when an evil alien lizard gets his mind transferred into the body of an ordinary Earth boy. Other than that the reader doesn’t need to know anything except how to read English and how to laugh!

What inspired Space Lizards Stole My Brain!? Any old sci-fi movies?

I was writing a TV script about a group of kids and there was one minor character in it who was this geeky 11 year old boy who talked like he was some inhuman alien warrior. It was never explained why the kid talked like that – maybe he’d read one too many weird fantasy novels or spent too long immersed in role-playing games. The TV script went nowhere but the idea of this character stayed with me for some reason. Then one day I realised that the reason why this kid talked like he was an inhuman alien warrior was because he WAS an inhuman alien warrior trapped in the body of an Earth kid! It was in working out who the alien and kid were that the story of Space Lizards Stole My Brain! came about. I was inspired more by comedy than by science fiction films – classic TV shows like Blackadder and Monty Python’s Flying Circus. Roald Dahl and Douglas Adams were big influences too.

You've worked with a great illustrator on Space Lizards: Pete Williamson. Did you write and send him snippets to illustrate or was he involved throughout the whole process?

Pete Williamson is amazing! His stuff has this wonderful bittersweet quality. He came aboard once the text of the book was finished. The book’s editor and designer created a brief for him based on the scenes they felt would make good illustrations. I had some input into this. One scene I was particularly keen to see illustrated was the bit where a Triceratops runs amok in a town centre. It’s one of my favourite pictures in the whole book. I also love the cover. It’s totally eye-catching and fun.

If your book was ever made into an animated film, which actors do you think would be perfect for voicing your characters? (For some reason I imagine Ray Winstone as Admiral Skink!)

Ray Winstone as Admiral Skink would be brilliant! I think Rupert Grint would make a great voice for Lance. He does that lovely put-upon, world-weary thing. Ramona Marquez (Karen in Outnumbered) would be great as Lance’s annoying sister, Sally. Dawn French would be loads of fun as Lance’s peevish Mum. I’ll make a note of these for when Mr Spielberg calls...

Say you were Admiral Skink, and your mind had just arrived on Earth from another planet. What 3 things would you have to take back with you to show the other space lizards how cool our planet is?

Ooh, good question! I would take a tree, probably the most beautiful thing our world has yet produced. I’d also take a boxset of The Simpsons, probably the funniest thing our planet has yet produced. Finally I’d take a pork pie from the bakers in my home town in North Wales, without doubt the tastiest thing our planet has ever produced.

What's next for Lance, Skink and the other Swerdlixians?

The sequel Space Lizards Ate My Sister! is out in August and I’m really excited already. It’s even wilder, weirder and funnier than the first book and I’m really pleased with it. It’s the first book I’ve written knowing it’s definitely going to be published and that was an amazing liberating feeling.

----------

Related links:

UK publisher's: Site / Twitter

News: Phil Earle's Saving Daisy Trailer!

2012-01-06T21:23:00.003Z

My lovely friend Phil has a new book out this week, titled Saving Daisy. His debut novel, Being Billy, was excellent, so I'm expecting this one to be just as good. I'm really looking forward to reading it! Anyhow, check out the below trailer and let him know what you think. Oh, and in case you want to know more, here's a summary from Amazon:

Daisy's mum is gone. Her dad refuses to talk about it. As far as Daisy's concerned, it's all her fault. As her life starts to spiral out of control, panic leads to tragedy and Daisy's left alone.

But sometimes the kindness of a stranger can turn things around. A stranger who desperately wants to save Daisy - if she'll only let herself be saved...

www.philearle.com

The Future of Us Blog Tour: 1996 Trivia!

2012-01-05T19:05:00.001Z

The Future of Us by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler is published in the UK today and, because the internet is so relevant to the book, Simon and Schuster UK have organised a really fun blog tour. Here's more information about the book, taken from the S&S website:

It's 1996 and very few high school students have ever used the internet. Facebook will not be invented until several years in the future. Emma just got a computer and an America Online CD. She and her best friend Josh power it up and log on - and discover themselves on Facebook in 2011. Everybody wonders what they'll be like fifteen years in the future. Josh and Emma are about to find out.

1996 Trivia

Here's some trivia from the year 1996. How much do you remember? I was around nine years old at the time so I can recall most of it, especially Take That splitting up and the Spice Girls arriving on the music scene. Feel free to add any of your own 1996 trivia in the comments - I'm sure there's loads we've missed out here!

It was a leap year.

Everyone was doing the Macarena.

Everyone was reading Angela’s Ashes.

Toy Story was released.

Oprah started her book club.

Take That split up.

Dolly the cloned sheep was born.

The first ever Pokemon game was released in Japan.

The Spice Girls released their first single.

Independence Day was one of the year's biggest movies.

There were 45 million people online worldwide – in 2011 it’s over 2 billion.

Google and Hotmail were born.

The chess computer named "Deep Blue" defeated world chess champion Garry Kasparov for the first time.

The English Patient won best film at the Oscars.

Wereworld: Shadow of the Hawk Blog Tour - Introduction by Curtis Jobling!

2012-01-04T15:54:00.002Z

WEREWORLD “7 REALMS, 7 BEASTS” BLOG TOUR

It’s come round fast.

January 5th sees the release of my third novel in the WEREWORLD series, “Shadow of the Hawk”, hopping out of the nest and taking flight into the wild. It’s been a busy couple of years for me, immersed in the writing of the books while also getting out of my hobbit-hole on occasion. It’s not enough for an author to sit at home and write: one of the biggest thrills for me is to go out and meet audiences, via festivals, school visits, book signings and even online. Children’s and YA is a crowded marketplace, bookshops jam-packed with a plethora of top titles, each grabbing the eye of passing book-lovers and cooing temptingly, inviting the potential reader to take a peek inside their covers. As an author, not only do I need to get out there and meet audiences, I love to: I get a thrill from hearing/seeing the reaction of people when I read from the novels, a constant reminder of why I got into the business of tale-telling in the first place. The fact that I’m ‘that bloke who designed Bob The Builder’ tends to be a bit of a curve-ball, throwing the audience who are expecting a cuddly preschool yarn, instead getting a face-full of tooth, claw, blood and gore.

Since the writing of “Rise of the Wolf”, the online community of bloggers, champions of authors and their books, has really opened up to me. I’ve met a ton of passionate, book-obsessed people through Twitter, blogs and other social media, so it’s a huge thrill to have a gang of said reviewers on board for the “7 REALMS, 7 BEASTS” Blog Tour. Big thanks go to Jenny at Wondrous Reads for kicking the shindig off!

There’ll be eight stops on the Tour, featuring reviews of the novel as well as introductions to seven of the new Werelords who appear in the third volume. I’ve picked the particular character descriptions to give readers a flavour of what they can expect in “Shadow of the Hawk”, a wider range of therianthropes making their presence known within the tale including Captain Klay (Barracuda), Krieg (Rhino), Queen Slotha (Walrus), Lady Shah (Hawk), Baron Bosa (Whale), Ignus (Lizard) and Arik & Balk (Apes). That’s really only scratching the surface though – there’s a whole host of new shapeshifting therians who come up against Drew and his allies within “Shadow...”

I’ll also be touring for “Shadow...” in January, with myself and the good folk from Puffin whizzing all over the country to meet audiences in the flesh and hopefully scare them silly. Can only hope you enjoy reading the book as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it!

Curtis, December 13th 2011

www.curtisjobling.com
www.wereworldbooks.com
Follow Curtis on Twitter: @CurtisJobling

Click HERE to enter the Spinebreakers competition!

SPoLaFS Blog Tour: 5 Reasons Why Jen E. Smith Loves London!

2012-01-03T07:09:00.001Z

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight is published by Headline in the UK this Thursday, and it is ACE. Really, really ace. You can read my review here, where I rave on about how Oliver is so swoonworthy and Jen E. Smith just plain rocks. Because she does!

My US counterpart for today's stop on the SPoLaFS blog tour is Kristi over at The Story Siren, and the next stops on the blog tour will be posted tomorrow over at Serendipity Reviews (UK) and Good Books and Good Wine (US). Before I get to Jen's post about why she loves England (Well, London. But yay!), here are two book trailers for you to watch. SWOON!

Five Reasons Why I Love London:

by Jennifer E. Smith

1. There’s so much history to London. Once, a friend from the UK was visiting me in New York, and I pointed out a building from the early 1800s. She looked at me like I was crazy for thinking it was out of the ordinary. As it turned out, her house – just a regular old suburban home in the UK – was from the early 1800s. Everywhere you turn in London, there’s something that’s breathtakingly monumental, from the Tower of London to the Parliament building, and Westminster Abbey to St. Paul’s Cathedral. And the literary history is equally amazing. The fact that you can still visit pubs that were once frequented by everyone from Charles Dickens to Virginia Woolf is amazing to me.

2. The doors. I’m not talking about the band. I mean the actual doors. They’re all so colorful! I think other cities should take note. The world would be a much brighter and happier place if there were more pink, green, and blue front doors.

3. If my time in the UK has taught me one thing, it’s that American chocolate is no match for British chocolate. As much as I love Hershey’s kisses, I’m afraid they just don’t compare to white chocolate buttons. I recently discovered a place in New York called The London Candy Company, and when I walked in and saw those buckets of Minstrels and Cadbury bars, it was like running into old friends.

4. There’s nothing like a London pub. I’ve spent a lot of time in New York searching for an equivalent, and while there are a lot of them here as well, it’s not quite the same. I can think of few things better than spending a Saturday afternoon in a pub in London, sitting in a booth with some friends and having a few pints while watching rugby. If I’m ever in the UK, and you’re having trouble tracking me down, the pubs would be a good place to start.

5. I know this sounds crazy, but I love the rain in London. It makes the whole city feel somehow more dramatic, and there’s an odd beauty to it. In some places, rain is a nuisance. But in London, it’s simply a fact. It’s like background noise. It’s a part of the city.

Review: The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith

2012-01-02T10:15:00.004Z

Publisher: Headline
Format: Hardcover
Released: January 5th, 2012
Rating: 9/10

Amazon summary:

Today should be one of the worst days of seventeen-year-old Hadley Sullivan's life. She's stuck at JFK, late to her father's second wedding, which is taking place in London and involves a soon to be step-mother that Hadley's never even met. Then she meets the perfect boy in the airport's cramped waiting area. His name is Oliver, he's British, and he's in seat 18B. Hadley's in 18A. Twists of fate and quirks of timing play out in this thoughtful novel about family connections, second chances and first loves. Set over a 24-hour-period, Hadley and Oliver's story will make you believe that true love finds you when you're least expecting it.

Review:

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, or Statistical as I will now refer to it, is one of those books that makes me sigh every time I think about it. It's contemporary YA fiction at its best, and kept me up reading late into the night. Once I started it I couldn't put it down, and I was willing to forego sleep to find out what happened to Hadley and Oliver. That's how much I love these people: they feel like friends now, and I want more. Whether I'm going to get it, I don't know, but I'm not above grovelling. Jennifer E. Smith, are you listening?!

Everything starts at an airport, where Hadley is running slightly late. She had to go back for her book, gave herself a papercut and ran into traffic on the way to the airport. She misses her flight, a flight that will get her to her father's wedding in England, and has to wait for the next one, where she's assigned seat 18A. It's because of those few lost minutes that she meets Oliver, a boy booked on the same London-bound flight, and the holder of ticket 18B. What follows is a lovely, lovely day of getting to know each other, which quickly moves into a drama-filled day of stress and emotion. I won't say why, and instead I'll just let you read it and peel away the story layer by layer. It's so worth it.

When I first heard about this book, I thought it would be a cheesy, unbelievable story about two people who meet, lock eyes and vow to spend eternity together. However, that isn't the case. I believed in every word Hadley and Oliver shared and, when their eyes inevitably locked, I felt it. I also wanted to climb into my book and steal Oliver away for myself, but we can't have everything, can we? Seriously though, if I could manifest my perfect boy, it would be him. I imagine him to be a mix of Ed Westwick (Chuck, Gossip Girl) and Darren Criss (Blaine, Glee), AKA. Swoony and Swoonier. In my mind he has Ed's Britishness and Darren's beautiful hair. *sigh* If any movie casting people are reading this, please see to it that these two audition. Thanks. ;)

Anyway, back to reality. Hadley and Oliver have chemistry, and I'm talking instant chemistry. If they sat next to a bunsen burner, it would flare and light up the room in a second. They're the best contemporary characters I've encountered in a long while, which leads me to my only complaint: I wanted more of them. Hundreds of pages more. The page count is fairly short, but wow could I have read on. As soon as I turned the final page, I wanted to flip back to the beginning and start all over again.

Statistical is like an old-school romance in a contemporary setting: think chance meetings, lingering looks and endless possibilities that all take place within a whirlwind 24-hours. It's the perfect example of how everything happens for a reason, and that even the most irritating displays of self-inflicted tardiness can lead to something way beyond what you imagined. Jennifer E. Smith will make even the hardest of hearts believe in love at first sight, and I think this book will cement her place in the YA contemp world. Readers will fall in love with her story and characters, and I'm sure she'll soon be inundated with requests for a sequel. I'll tell you right now: I will be first in line!

Wondrous Reads' Top 10 Books of 2011

2011-12-30T19:38:00.003Z

Making this list this year was a lot easier than I thought it would be. Artichoke Hearts has been my favourite book of 2011 since I read it way back in January; I knew it was special then and nothing has taken its place since. Most of the other books on this list were published during the first half of the year, which confirms that nothing really grabbed my attention towards the end of the year. There were a few exceptions, of course, but January-June was definitely stronger for me. I wholeheartedly recommend every single book on this list - I loved them all!

10. Rot and Ruin by Jonathan Maberry

9. Raising Demons by Rachel Hawkins

8. Where She Went by Gayle Forman

7. The Day Before by Lisa Schroeder

6. Divergent by Veronica Roth

5. We'll Always Have Summer by Jenny Han

4. The 13 Secrets by Michelle Harrison

3. Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys

2. Becoming Nancy by Terry Ronald

1. Artichoke Hearts by Sita Brahmachari

So here's to 2012. Happy reading, everyone. I wish you many fantastic books!

Wondrous Reads' Top 10 Book Covers of 2011

2011-12-29T18:47:00.001Z

It's one of my favourite times of year again - the time when I can post my 'best of' lists! This also marks the end of my month-long December blog break... hurrah! This year once again saw some brilliant book covers, and here are my top ten. Do you agree? Disagree? Let me know!

10. Silence by Becca Fitzpatrick

9. City of Fallen Angels by Cassie Clare

8. Hunting Lila by Sarah Alderson

7. Unearthly by Cynthia Hand

6. Fury by Elizabeth Miles

5. The Haunting of Charity Delafield by Ian Beck

4. Forgotten by Cat Patrick

3. Crossed by Ally Condie

2. Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys

1. Divergent by Veronica Roth

Here's to more great covers in 2012!

Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

2011-11-30T19:50:00.001Z

Publisher: Hodder
Format: Hardcover
Released: September 29th, 2011
Grade rating: A-

Amazon summary:

Errand requiring immediate attention. Come.

The note was on vellum, pierced by the talons of the almost-crow that delivered it. Karou read the message. 'He never says please', she sighed, but she gathered up her things. When Brimstone called, she always came. In general, Karou has managed to keep her two lives in balance. On the one hand, she's a seventeen-year-old art student in Prague; on the other, errand-girl to a monstrous creature who is the closest thing she has to family. Raised half in our world, half in 'Elsewhere', she has never understood Brimstone's dark work - buying teeth from hunters and murderers - nor how she came into his keeping. She is a secret even to herself, plagued by the sensation that she isn't whole. Now the doors to Elsewhere are closing, and Karou must choose between the safety of her human life and the dangers of a war-ravaged world that may hold the answers she has always sought.

Review:

Daughter of Smoke and Bone is one of those books that was published with a huge amount of hype surrounding it. Sometimes that can be a bad thing when the book unfortunately doesn't live up to high expectations, but in this case it was all deserved. Daughter of Smoke and Bone hooked me right from the start and I was soon invested in Karou's life. She's a brilliant, layered character with a lot to say, and I loved her.

Karou's life has been spent living with demon Brimstone - a wishmonger - and the chimaera that accompany him. Issa, Twiga, Yasri and Kishmish are all loyal to Karou and everything she does, as well as Brimstone and his darker endeavours. Laini Taylor makes even the chimaera endearing and attractive - I have no idea how she managed it but she did. Their traits and personalities make them so realistic they almost walk off the page. And don't get me started on Akiva, who Karou meets later in the book. He is one hot man!

As you can see, I don't want to talk much about Daughter of Smoke and Bone's plot. Everything unfolds bit by bit, and going into it would ruin the suspense and shocks that await you. I actually did guess one twist this time, which is really unusual for me. I was quite proud of myself!

Daughter of Smoke and Bone is Laini Taylor's biggest publication to date and it marks her first book to be released in the UK. I hope her back catalogue will see the light of day over here one day because I have a feeling she's going to be a bit of a superstar by the time the sequel arrives next year. Her lovely, descriptive writing makes this book stand out in a crowded market and her characterisation is pretty much faultless. In fact, my own criticism of the book would be that there were one or two slow sections. That's it. Not really worth mentioning, is it?

As you can tell, I absolutely loved Daughter of Smoke and Bone. I knew I would as soon as I heard about it over a year ago, and the following wait was rather agonising. However, it was well worth it and I can't wait for the sequel in 2012. It's a special book for fantasy readers - if you're a fan of the genre you really should give it a read. It's got a permanent place on my shelf and I hope it will have one on yours!

US Vs. UK: Glow Covers

2011-11-28T20:28:00.001Z

US // UK

I'll admit I'm not a big fan of the UK cover for Glow. I think the US cover is much more subtle and eye-catching, and I like that the model isn't the central focus. Both covers scream sci-fi, which is good, though I think the UK one gets that point across a bit better. Both fonts are really nice and quite similar, but the US placement wins for me. The US cover also reminds me by Matched and Crossed by Ally Condie, which is never a bad thing!

I don't know if it's just me, but recently I seem to be going off covers with people on them. They're just not doing it for me these days, and I'm guessing it's because I've seen so many. Still, there are one or two coming out that I can't wait to see in person... watch this space!

In My Mailbox #148 & #149: New Books This Week

2011-11-27T18:20:00.001Z

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

Here's what was in my mailbox over the last fortnight. Lots of S&S books - yay!!

For review:

To Be A Cat by Matt Haig (UK proof/ARC)

Sea Hearts by Margo Lanagan (UK proof/ARC)

Traitors by Tom Becker (UK proof/ARC)

Dark Parties by Sara Grant

Lolly Luck by Ellie Daines

The Storyteller by Antonia Michaelis (UK proof/ARC)

Bullet Boys by Ally Kennen

The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin

Trapped by Michael Northrop

Signs of Love: Love Match by Melody James

Someone Else's Life by Katie Dale

Smoulder by Brenna Yovanoff

Fated by Sarah Alderson

~

Bought:

Lady Gaga X Terry Richardson

Happy reading!

Crossed Blog Tour: A Day in the Life of Ally Condie!

2011-11-15T22:24:00.001Z

Ally Condie is the author of the international bestseller Matched, and its newly-released sequel, Crossed. Matched was chosen as one of YALSA’s 2011 Teens’ Top Ten, named as one of Publishers Weekly’s Best Children’s Books of 2010, selected as the #1 Pick on the Winter Kid’s Indie Next List, and received starred reviews from Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. In a starred review for the sequel, Crossed, Kirkus called the Matched series an “addictive, layered dystopic trilogy.”

A former English teacher (who still keeps her license current, just in case!), she lives with her husband and three sons outside of Salt Lake City, Utah. She loves reading, writing, running, and listening to her husband play guitar.

A Day in the Life of an Author (at Home)
by Ally Condie

This is a typical Thursday…one of my better writing days. On T/Th I have two hours when all three kids (ages 8,6, and 3) are in school. M/W/F are a little bit tougher because I have to do all my writing at night. Luckily, I’ve been writing daily for as long as I’ve had kids—eight years now!— so I am used to working around their schedules.

6:45 a.m.- Wake up, get in a quick 3-mile run in before the kids are up.

7:15-9:00 a.m.-Breakfast for the kids, dress the kids, check kids’ homework, go over the day’s schedule, eat, throw a load of laundry into the wash, pack lunches, get self dressed, eat breakfast, etc.

9:00 a.m.-Older two boys to school.

9:00-10:00 a.m.—Move laundry, play with three-year-old, answer an e-mail or two if anything has come in for work that is urgent.

10:00 a.m.- Walk three-year-old around the corner to the neighborhood preschool.

10:05 a.m. – Run down to the basement, move laundry to dryer, go into next room “office” to write. I have an hour and forty-five minutes, and it’s morning—not late, when I’m tired, so these are precious, precious minutes.

11:50 a.m.- Pick up preschooler.

12:00 p.m.- Pick up kindergartener.

12:00 p.m. -1:00 p.m.- Make the two boys lunch, eat with them, clean up lunch, take three-year-old upstairs for a nap.

1:00-1:30 p.m.-Kindergartener decompresses with an episode of Go, Diego, Go while I answer a few more e-mails and move more laundry.

1:30 p.m.-Babysitter arrives to stay with sleeping toddler while my son and I go to speech therapy.

3:30 p.m.- 5:30 p.m.- Get home from speech therapy, pick up third grader, wake toddler up from nap. Help kids with homework, piano practicing. Go outside with them to play and blow off steam.

5:30 p.m.-Husband (Scott) home. Yay!

5:30-7:00 p.m.-Make dinner, eat dinner, dinner clean-up, etc.

7:00-11:00 p.m.- Scott takes over while I write in the basement. (I often go upstairs to read to the boys when they are in their beds. Scott handles baths, brushing teeth, pajamas, and sitting in the hallway to return various boys to their rooms until they all finally fall asleep. Yes, he is a saint.)

I will admit that this time of day is really hard for me to write, but since my kids still wake up ALL NIGHT LONG, I have a hard time getting up before 6:45 a.m. So I sit down and try to work through the fatigue in the evenings. Sometimes, I quit earlier, around 10:00, if I’m to the point where the words aren’t coming and it would be better for me to just SLEEP. ;)

Read a Crossed chapter sampler here and see the trailer here! You can also visit the Matched website here and get the Facebook app here.

Thanks to Ally for the guest post and, if you're in the US, check back tomorrow for a very cool giveaway!

UK News: A Statistical Message from Jennifer E. Smith!

2011-11-14T21:12:00.001Z

The UK cover for The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, written by Jennifer E. Smith and published by Headline next year, has sadly changed, and here's a message from Jen herself with more information!

I'm so grateful to all the UK book bloggers for your wonderful early support of The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight. The response has been overwhelming, and it's been so much fun to hear everyone chime in -- not just about the book, but about the jacket as well. Which is why I wanted to give you all a little update. There's been a slight change of plans; as much as we all loved the UK cover, we've decided to use the US jacket over here as well. I love this cover too, and I'm thrilled to have a unified look for the novel in both the US and the UK. It's rare that the same jacket works in two different markets, so it's exciting that people have embraced it on both sides of the ocean. And those of you who have already read the book will probably agree that it fits the story really well; it's romantic and cinematic and so perfectly in sync with the feel of the book. So I'm very excited to reveal it here, and I just wanted to take the opportunity to say thank you again for all the wonderful posts and comments and emails from all of you. Special thanks to my early UK readers including Bliss Magazine, The Bookette, Books for Company, Cat Clarke, Cheezyfeet Books, Chick lit Reviews and News, Chloe’s Chick Lit Reviews, The Crooked Shelf, Chicklish, Dot Scribbles, Giovanna Falcone, Heaven, Hell & Purgatory, Jess Heart Books, Keris Stainton, , Liz Rettig, My Favourite Books, Miss Page Turners, The Overflowing Library, Painting With Words, Roundwood Readers, Sugarscape, Thirst For Fiction and Wondrous Reads (apologies if I have missed anyone!). I'm looking forward to the publication in January!

In My Mailbox #147: New Books This Week

2011-11-13T11:43:00.001Z

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I didn't get many books in the post this week which gave me a bit of a chance to try and catch up. I did buy a few this week though as there were some exciting new releases. I also unexpectedly met Noel Fielding and Dave Brown yesterday (The Mighty Boosh) after queueing for four and a half hours. I LOVE Noel Fielding so I was *very* excited. They both signed Noel's new book and I got pictures with them. *swoon* I also saw Sam Stone again which was ace! Oh! And Snow Patrol's new album arrived two days early. *faints with excitement*

Here's what was in my mailbox this week:

For review:

The Man Who Rained by Ali Shaw

BZRK by Michael Grant (UK proof/ARC)

Hateful Heart by Sam Stone

Geekhood by Andy Robb (UK proof/ARC)

~

Bought:

11.22.69 by Stephen King

The Scribblings of a Madcap Shambleton by Noel Fielding

Inheritance by Christopher Paolini

A Game of Thrones (Collector's Edition) by George R. R. Martin

Have a great week, everyone!

Review: A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin

2011-11-11T09:11:00.001Z

Publisher: HarperVoyager
Format: Paperback
Released: March 31st, 2011 (new edition)
Grade rating: A/A+, I can't decide...

Amazon summary:

Summers span decades. Winter can last a lifetime. And the struggle for the Iron Throne has begun. It will stretch from the south, where heat breeds plot, lusts and intrigues; to the vast and savage eastern lands; all the way to the frozen north, where an 800-foot wall of ice protects the kingdom from the dark forces that lie beyond. Kings and queens, knights and renegades, liars, lords and honest men… all will play the Game of Thrones.

Winter is coming…

Review:

Like most SF & fantasy fans, I am completely enamoured (see: obsessed) with the Game of Thrones TV show. I didn't think it would be my thing at first, but it was. Obviously I bought all the books immediately and obviously they sat on my shelf for months until I had time to read all 807 pages of A Game of Thrones. I'm actually kicking myself that I waited so long to read it because I LOVED IT. So much so that I almost believe (and wish) I'm a Stark of Winterfell. Yep, my parents think I've gone mad!

I'm always a bit unsure of reading books after I've seen a TV or film adaptation, just in case I don't like it or there aren't enough differences to warrant doing both. A Game of Thrones is so worth the time it takes to read - there's so much backstory and extra information that, understandably, the show had to leave out. I understand everything a lot better now, though I'm still glad I read it after watching the first season of the show. It was a lot easier knowing who everyone was and what was going on, and I think it definitely helped me.

I won't rehash the story here as I'm sure a lot of people are familiar with this particular medical fantasy through one form or another. I will say that this story is filled with court politics and underhanded characters who will do anything to win the iron throne. There's deceit, rivalries, backstabbing and mind games aplenty, which all make for highly addictive reading. There's also elements of fantasy throughout the novel, though the most obvious (and best, in my opinion) doesn't present itself until the very last page. Talk about an infuriating but brilliant cliffhanger!

When watching the show, my favourite character is undoubtedly Daenerys. I'm rewatching it now and she's still my favourite. However, my allegiance changed when I read the book. Jon Snow is now my top character, followed by Arya and then Daenerys. Jon and Arya's were the ones I looked forward to most, though I also really enjoyed Tyrion the quick-tongued imp's. Even though this book is huge, the chapters are all fairly short and snappy and the point of view changes with each. I love books written like that so A Game of Thrones was an instant hit for me!

There's so much more I could talk about here (character casting, differences between the show and the book, the world of Westeros, George R. R. Martin's ability to shock me even though I know what's coming, his being able to continually ROCK MY SOCKS OFF), but I'll just say that I love everything about this book and the story and I'm really looking forward to reading A Clash of Kings. I'm still deciding whether to read it soon or wait for Season 2 to finish next year, but at the moment I don't think I'm patient enough to wait until summer 2012.

This is very much an adult book, but wow is it amazing. Read it if you're a fan of the show, or if you just want to be introduced to what has to be one of the greatest fantasy stories ever seen on book shelves.

Winter is coming!

Waiting On Wednesday: Hollow Pike

2011-11-09T21:02:00.000Z

Waiting on Wednesday idea from Jill at Breaking the Spine.

-----

Hollow Pike by James Dawson

* Published by: Indigo (UK)
* Format: Trade paperback (UK)
* Release Date: February 2nd, 2012 (UK)
* On Amazon: here

Summary from Amazon.co.uk:

Something wicked this way comes... She thought she'd be safe in the country, but you can't escape your own nightmares, and Lis London dreams repeatedly that someone is trying to kill her. Lis thinks she's being paranoid - after all who would want to murder her? She doesn't believe in the local legends of witchcraft. She doesn't believe that anything bad will really happen to her. You never do, do you? Not until you're alone in the woods, after dark - and a twig snaps... Hollow Pike - where witchcraft never sleeps.

There are many reasons why I want to read Hollow Pike, and here are a few of them:

1. James is ace.
2. He's a UK debut author.
3. It's a thriller about witchcraft.
4. The cover is AWESOME.
5. It's published by Indigo/Orion, aka. one of my favourite publishers.
6. The main character is called Lis London. Cool or what?
7. It sounds creepy, and I love creepy!

Roll on February!

Guest Post: Ian Beck talks The Haunting of Charity Delafield!

2011-11-08T10:39:00.000Z

The Haunting of Charity Delafield is now published in the UK and has such a lovely, children's classic cover look. Here's a post from Ian talking about his influences for the book. Thanks, Ian!

Ian Beck

In a sense everything you make is part original and part the sum of many influences. In the case of The Haunting of Charity Delafield it was not perhaps the most obvious things that were brought to influence. I was not, as it might appear, intentionally referencing The Secret Garden or any of those stories where a Victorian child is imprisoned in a golden cage so to speak. The influences on Charity were at first more visual and cinematic. It was partly Edward Gorey and his hapless Victorian children that set it off. I wrote a few lines in emulation of his style, just for the fun of it, describing a young girl having her hair brushed. The choice of that particular scene was in turn I am sure influenced by the opening of Jonathan Miller’s film of Alice in Wonderland, where Alice, (Anne Marie Mallick) is having her luxurious hair brushed out by a maid. As well as the visual beauty of the scene there were the close up crackling sounds of the hair and the brush and her stiff Victorian clothes. As so often happens with little bits of ideas or individual unrelated scenes they nag at you quietly for a long time. They sit in your head and raise themselves up every now and then and demand to be developed, to be watered like a plant in a pot. Other things get added in to the mix at random and then somehow they seem to belong to that first idea too, as if they had chosen to enter that particular folder in the brain. My daughter when very young began leaving little notes for a fairy she believed was in the house. I took to leaving replies in minute handwriting for her to find. This was a nice game for a while, and I kept all the notes and typed them up and somehow they seemed also to belong to the girl having her hair brushed by the maid. So the slow process of apprehending the thing as a proper story began. I finally drew a little watercolour picture of her out in the snow, (I must have snow, I love it) in a bright red coat. After many false starts I carried on with the story gradually accumulating scenes. At one point it was going to be a picture book. Other influences came to bear on it, for instance a chance viewing at a friend’s house of the Jean Cocteau film of Beauty and The Beast, surely the greatest and most beautiful fairy tale film ever. Then that same friend later told me that a friend of hers had a cat called Mr Tompkins. This struck home straight away as the perfect name for Charity’s cat so I shamelessly stole it. So it went on until I had enough of an idea to present to my editor Annie Eaton who had always liked the image of the little girl in the red coat, I had used it as my personal Christmas card the year before. Then the real work began, and three full drafts later she was finished and was not at all the book I thought I was going to write. It was altogether darker and in the end more emotional than I had imagined. My hope is that the story is now properly child centred, those children that have read it so far certainly seem to have enjoyed it.

Review: Dead Inside by Lost Zombies

2011-11-07T19:30:00.001Z

Publisher: Chronicle Books
Format: Large paperback
Released: October 1st, 2011
Grade rating: B/B+

Amazon summary:

A gradual mutation of a virulent strain of 'super flu' gives rise to millions of the undead, who quickly overwhelm treatment facilities and swarm cities around the world, leaving survivors on their own against a legion of the infected. Through found notes and messages- letters to loved ones, journal fragments, confessions, and warnings, readers can uncover the story of what went wrong, and come to know the individual voices of those affected by the zombie crisis.

Review:

Dead Inside: Do Not Enter really is just like PostSecret in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. It's a very fast read, but it's a fun one. I was surprised to feel a bit sad too, and a few pages even gave me chills. Mostly the ones where children talked about having to kill their friends and family... *shudder*

Zombies are big business at the moment, and Dead Inside has come along just at the right time. It strongly reminded me of The Walking Dead crossed with new movie Contagion (about a deadly disease), which to me is a very good combination indeed. The whole layout and idea was also brilliant, with some pages easily fitting the PostSecret bill. Seriously, I'm almost expecting them to appear in Frank's next collection!

Dead Inside is very much about survival, and chronicles a pandemic that leads to a zombie takeover. All the talk of flu and diseases made me think it's not so far away from real life, and the zombie side of things just made me think I was trapped in a field somewhere with Rick Grimes and a shotgun.

Fans of zombies will love this one, as will fans of the PostSecret formula. It's an entertaining read with an interesting, though not even slightly original, format. I hope there's more to come from Team Lost Zombies!

In My Mailbox #146: New Books This Week

2011-11-06T13:54:00.002Z

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I received some great books this week, but most importantly I FINISHED A GAME OF THRONES! I can now read some YA again, but I must say I loved it and I'm really looking forward to reading A Clash of Kings. I think GoT is actually the longest book I've ever read. Yay!

Oh, and I got Florence & the Machine's new album. AMAZING. Amazing!

Here's what was in my mailbox:

For review:

Unleashed by Nancy Holder & Debbie Viguie

Breaking Yawn by Stephfordy Mayo

Wonder by R. J. Palacio

Lost in Time by Melissa de la Cruz

Enthralled by Various Authors

Hollow Earth by John and Carole E. Barrowman

Deep Deep Down by Garrett Carr

Tempest by Julie Cross

Destined by P.C. & Kristin Cast

Crossed by Ally Condie

Where There's a Wolf, There's a Way by Lisi Harrison

Darkness Falls by Cate Tiernan

In Darkness by Nick Lake

The Haunting of Charity Delafield by Ian Beck

Happy reading!

Review: Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts

2011-11-04T10:59:00.003Z

Publisher: Macmillan Children's Books
Format: Hardcover
Released: September 2nd, 2011
Grade rating: C

Amazon summary:

Moments after several huge earthquakes shake every continent on Earth, something strange starts happening to some people. Michael can only watch in horror as an incidence of road rage so extreme it ends in two deaths unfolds before his eyes; Clementine finds herself being hunted through the small town she has lived in all her life, by people she has known all her life; and Mason is attacked with a baseball bat by a random stranger. An inner rage has been released and some people cannot fight it. For those who can, life becomes an ongoing battle to survive - at any cost!

Review:

I wanted to love Dark Inside, I really did. I'd been looking forward to it for months, had heard countless good things about it and was pretty excited when a copy arrived. I started it immediately, and was pleased to find that it started well. Eighty pages in and I was pretty hooked, though I still hadn't made that all-important connection with the four main characters. From that point onwards, everything seemed to change. It was a chore for me to continue reading, and I literally had to force myself to pick it back up each night. It took me almost two weeks to finish, which is almost unheard of for me!

Like I said, Dark Inside started off well. Really well. There were earthquakes around the world, people got all violent and murdery, and there were four main survivors that were now on the run from everyone and everything they knew. As far as post-apocalyptic fiction goes, this book was looking like a contender for the year's best YA title. I honestly enjoyed those first eighty pages, but I'm genuinely sad to say that after that is where our relationship came to an abrupt end.

I don't often write negative reviews, as I usually like most books I read. I have a wide, eclectic reading taste, and I'm easy going when it comes to my fiction. It's a bit hard for me to pinpoint what I didn't like about Dark Inside, as overall it didn't sit well with me. My main problem (aside from a character called Chickadee), and one which is never easy to overcome, was that none of the characters spoke to me. Not a single one. Aries, Mason, Clementine and Michael all had individual stories to tell, different experiences with the earthquakes and subsequent darkness, but I felt disconnected the whole time I was reading them. Their voices seemed flat, and it's possible it's because the book had no first person narrative. I do struggle with that sometimes, especially when the protagonists don't stand out to me or come across as particularly likeable. I think third person is a hard tense to write in when it comes to YA, and often it doesn't work for me. Sometimes it does, but rarely it seems.

I don't want to be too negative here, as I know how much work goes into writing a novel and I don't want to take that away from anyone. I know a lot of other readers loved Dark Inside from start to finish, and even though I found the plot slow and drawn out, I know they didn't. I'm still a fan of this book's premise, story and multiple narration, but the execution made it fall short. I can see myself reading more from Jeyn Roberts in the future but, if this is the start of a series, I probably won't be reading the sequel. I hope you'll still give this book a chance though, as I did. Hopefully you'll find something in it that I missed!

Dead Inside Blog Tour: Extract!

2011-11-03T19:00:00.002Z

When I was first asked to feature Dead Inside on my blog, I instantly said yes because it's about zombies, and I love me some zombies. Plus, it was pitched to me as The Walking Dead meets PostSecret. Cool, right? I was actually really surprised at how much I enjoyed it - it's a quick read but a clever, fun and sometimes sad one. I'll be posting my review soon so look out for that. For now, here's Chronicle's synopsis and two image extracts from the book.

'Post Secret' meets 'World War Z' in this chilling vision of the fallout following a global zombie pandemic. A gradual mutation of a virulent strain of 'super flu' gives rise to millions of the undead, who quickly overwhelm treatment facilities and swarm cities around the world, leaving survivors on their own against a legion of the infected. Through found notes and messages- letters to loved ones, journal fragments, confessions, and warnings, readers can uncover the story of what went wrong, and come to know the individual voices of those affected by the zombie crisis.

Waiting On Wednesday: Immortal City

2011-11-02T10:33:00.003Z

Waiting on Wednesday idea from Jill at Breaking the Spine.

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Immortal City by Scott Speer

* Published by: Razorbill (US)
* Format: Hardcover (US)
* Release Date: April 3rd, 2012 (US)
* On Amazon: here

Summary from Amazon.com:

Jackson Godspeed is the hottest young Angel in a city filled with them. He's days away from becoming a full Guardian, and people around the world are already competing for the chance to be watched over by him. Everyone's obsessed with the Angels and the lucky people they protect - everyone except for Madison Montgomery. Maddy's the one girl in Angel City who doesn't breathlessly follow the Angels on TV and gossip blogs. When she meets Jackson, she doesn't recognize him. But Jackson is instantly captivated by her, and against all odds the two fall in love. Maddy is swiftly caught up in Jackson's scene, a world of glamour, paparazzi - and murder. A serial killer is on the loose, leaving dead Angels' wings for the police to find on the Walk of Fame. Even the Guardians are powerless to protect themselves in the face of this threat … and this time it's up to Maddy to save Jackson.

I can't wait to read this! I first heard about it about a month ago and thought it sounded really good. I love the sound of the angels being celebrities, featured on TV and in magazines etc. It sounds like a different take on the angel side of things so I'm looking forward to seeing what it's like. I've seen the US ARC cover too and it looks ace!

In My Mailbox #144 & #145: New Books This Week + Blog Update!

2011-10-30T12:44:00.001Z

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I was at the Eternal Twilight 6 convention last week so didn't get to do my IMM. I did however receive some brilliant books in the post and I can't wait to get to them!

I've been a bit quiet recently on the blog and that's because I've been doing a lot of overtime at work for the past 2 months. I'm finding I just haven't got as much time to read and write reviews, which is kind of annoying, but I'm hoping I'll be back to normal once my work hours settle down a bit. Also, I'm taking a quick break from YA to read Game of Thrones, as I've had it for months and really want to read it. I'm halfway through which means I've still got 400 pages to go. I love it, but wow is it a long book! Anyway, sorry for my absence and I really do hope to be back to normal soon. As you can see from the last fortnight's worth of review books, I've got a LOT of good stuff to read! As I'm sure all my fellow bloggers know, sometimes real life just gets in the way. It sucks, but hey, that's how it is.

Here's what I've got to look forward to in the coming weeks:

For review:

Mr Gum in 'the Hound of Lamonic Bibber' Bumper Book by Andy Stanton

Exile by Jakob Ejersbo

Working Stiff by Rachel Caine

Flying Blind by Deborah Cooke

The Double Shadow by Sally Gardner

Adventures of a Wimpy Werewolf by Tim Collins

More Bloody Horowitz by Anthony Horowitz

Dragons of Darkness by Antonia Michaelis

The Orphan of Awkward Falls by Keith Graves

Fracture by Megan Miranda (UK proof/ARC)

Lost Christmas by David Logan

Reckoning by Lili St. Crow

Pandemonium by Lauren Oliver (UK proof/ARC)

Dark Warning by Mary-Louise Fitzpatrick (UK proof/ARC)

Marshmallow Skye by Cathy Cassidy

Avenger's Angel by Heather Killough-Walden

Eva's Holiday by Judi Curtin

All These Things I've Done by Gabrielle Zevin (UK proof/ARC)

Tiger's Voyage by Colleen Houck

The Feral Child by Che Golden (UK proof/ARC)

Last Breath by Rachel Caine

~

Bought:

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss

Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson

The Last Werewolf by Glen Duncan

Love You to Death by Crissy Calhoun

Harry Potter: Page to Screen by Bob McCabe

Have a great week, everyone!

Review: Perfect by Ellen Hopkins

2011-10-25T19:10:00.001+01:00

Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry
Format: Hardcover
Released: September 13th, 2011
Grade rating: A

Amazon summary:

Everyone has something, someone, somewhere else that they’d rather be. For four high-school seniors, their goals of perfection are just as different as the paths they take to get there. A riveting and startling companion to the bestselling Impulse, Ellen Hopkins’s Perfect exposes the harsh truths about what it takes to grow up—and grow into our own selves. Because everyone wants to be perfect, but when perfection loses its meaning, how far will you go?

Review:

I can honestly say that I don't think there will ever be an Ellen Hopkins book I don't love. This woman is one of my favourite storytellers, and I think her books are among the most important I've read. I know she's not everyone's cup of tea, whether it be because of her verse style or mature content, but I think she's amazing. Perfect is yet another example of the high calibre of her novels, and it was well worth the wait.

Perfect is a companion novel to Impulse, and runs parallel to Conner's story. Perfect focuses on four very different characters: Cara, Conner's sister, Kendra, Sean and Andre. Their lives are all linked in one way or another, whether it be through family, friends or romantic relationships, and each is experiencing some kind of struggle with perfection. For Kendra it's a fight with eating disorders, and for Sean it's an addiction to steroids to make his sports performance better. These teenagers are all going through stuff no teenager should have to deal with, and that's where this book really stands out. Hopkins once again shows that she doesn't care about censorship of sensitive subjects: she'll tell it how it is, with realism and a candid voice, and hope that her readers will get it and be helped by it.

Perfect isn't always an easy read. Bad things happen to characters you like, sometimes through no fault of their own, sometimes at the hands of others. It's an eye-opening story of perfection and perceptions and, like every other Ellen Hopkins book, it stayed with me for days after turning the final page. The conclusion especially is somewhat haunting, and those of you who've read Impulse will know what I'm talking about. I knew what was coming, but still I hoped something would happen to alter the narrative. Reading the same events from other people's perspective was an unusual way to learn more about Conner, but it worked so well. Everyone is so fleshed out and real, I was sad to get to the end and have to leave them. That, my friends, is the power of a Hopkins novel!

What else can I say, other than buy this book and every other book written by this author. Read them, learn from them and keep them pride of place on your bookshelf. I really believe they'll be some of the most important books I read and I'm sure they've already helped me in everyday life, in the way I see people and how I respond to issues and problems. I can't wait for Ellen's next book!

Scream Street Blog Tour: Exclusive Scream Street Story Chapter 2!

2011-10-20T20:15:00.001+01:00

As part of the Scream Street blog tour to mark the end of the series and final book Flame of the Dragon (sob!), author Tommy Donbavand has written an exclusive short story that will be shared out between 13 blogs over 13 days. You can read the first part on Tommy's blog by clicking here, and the third part will be available at Mr Ripley's Enchanted Books tomorrow.

Here's chapter 2 for you all - enjoy!

Chapter Two

The Argument

Resus peered down the barrel of a very realistic sniper rifle as it protruded from the pages of Luke’s computer games magazine. “Identify yourself!” barked the paper soldier. “Name, rank and number!”

“This isn’t good,” Resus croaked.

Beside him, Luke continued beating at the zombies’ arms which reached out of his TV set, grasping for flesh. “Brains! BRAINS!”

“Cleo!” he yelled. “Get out of here while you still can!” What appeared to be a foot was beginning to stretch out of her notebook.

The mummy stood up and sighed. “You two are hopeless,” she said. Calmly putting her notebook and its emerging foot aside, she produced a magic wand from her bandages and waved it, muttering a spell under her breath. The yellow star at the end of the wand flashed. Instantly the US soldier and his rifle sank back into the glossy paper of the magazine, the zombies retreated into their game and the foot vanished.

The boys slumped onto the bed, struggling to catch their breath.

“That was you?” gasped Resus. “You made those things attack us?”

“I didn’t make them attack you,” said Cleo. “They were just doing what came naturally. If you weren’t both obsessed with violent games, you’d have been perfectly safe.”

“You can’t blame this on us!” snapped Luke. “What is that thing?” He reached for the magic wand.

Cleo quickly pushed the wand out of sight. “It’s ... for my project.”

Luke shook his head and started to pick up the broken pieces of lamp. “I might have known.”

“Hang on,” said Resus. “What project?”

Cleo sat down in the armchair again and opened her notebook. “Nothing to do with you.”

“Oh, so now you’re keeping secrets as well as trying to kill us?”

“I didn’t try to kill you!” Cleo insisted.

“All right,” said Resus. “Maybe you didn’t, but you conjured up some monsters to do it for you!”

“They weren’t monsters,” said Cleo. “They were characters.” She picked up her pen and started to write again.

“Don’t ignore me!” cried Resus, snatching the notebook from the mummy’s hands.

Cleo jumped up and grabbed the notebook, pulling it towards her. “Give that back!”

“Guys, stop it,” said Luke.

Resus ignored him and continued to glare at Cleo. “Why should I give it back?” he growled, pulling the book back towards himself.

“Because it’s private!” snarled Cleo, pulling the notebook in her direction.

“Listen to me!” Luke said firmly.

Resus tugged at the book again. “So, you are keeping secrets from us.”

“No!” shouted Cleo. “It’s just got nothing to do with you.”

“What’s so special about it?” yelled Resus. “Is it details of your next plan to try and bump us both off?”

“Of course not!” hissed Cleo through gritted teeth. “Don’t be an idiot!”

“Stop it!” shouted Luke. “Cleo, just tell him what you’re doing.”

“All right,” said Cleo. “If it will stop him acting like a baby.” She fixed Resus with a furious stare. “I’m writing a novel.”

~

Mantelpiece Musings Blog Tour: Annabel Pitcher's Playlist for Jas!

2011-10-18T19:40:00.002+01:00

If you haven't yet read Annabel Pitcher's debut novel, My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece, then you're really missing out. It's one of my favourite books of 2011, and Annabel is one of those lovely people you wish you could steal and talk to on a daily basis. Both her and her book are brilliant, and I urge you all to pick up a copy!

To celebrate the UK release of the paperback, Orion have put together a cool little blog tour, and I was lucky enough to get the music side of things. As you can see, Annabel - and character Jas - has excellent music taste. It's impossible to go wrong when my second favourite Offspring song is included, as well as some songs from up north where I'm from. What do you think? Did any of your favourites make the list?

Thanks for the post, Annabel!

Annabel Pitcher

Jas’ iPod…

Below are the songs that feature in the ‘most played’ list on Jas’s iPod. Some of them are loud and angry, some of them are soft and sad, and a couple are just so feel-good that they make you want to get up and dance around the room. Some remind Jas of Leo, and one of the songs makes Jas think of Jamie. Some are her parents’ favourites that Jas listens to whenever she feels a bit sentimental, and a couple were played at Rose’s funeral and help her feel close to her sister. Every single song on this list is worth listening to (Jas has great taste in music – far better than me). Click through them all and see if you can guess which song is which...

You really got me – The Kinks
London calling – The Clash
Ever fallen in love – Buzzcocks
Hero – Nickleback
Tears in Heaven – Eric Clapton
The Libertines – Can’t stand me now
Teenage kicks – The Undertones
Losing my religion – REM
Holiday in Cambodia – The Dead Kennedys
Take me Out – Franz Ferdinand
All the small things – Blink 182
Fat Lip – Sum 41
Life on Mars – David Bowie
That’s Entertainment – The Jam
Walk Away – Franz Ferdinand
When I Come Around – Greenday
Rancid – Ruby Soho
Want You bad – The Offspring
Time of Your life – Greenday
Stand by Me – Pennywise
Wanna be sedated – The Ramones
I don’t wanna miss a thing - Aerosmith
Boulevard of Broken Dreams – Greenday
I wanna be your boyfriend – The Ramones
Please, please, please let me get what I want – The Smiths
We are all we have – The Casualties
Blitzkrieg Bop – The Ramones
Stairway to Heaven – Led Zeppelin
Hey, That’s No Way To Say Goodbye – Leonard Cohen
Bittersweet Symphony – The Verve
Anarchy in the UK – Sex Pistols

In My Mailbox #143: New Books This Week

2011-10-16T14:15:00.001+01:00

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

Another ace week this week... can't wait to read all my new books! I'm away at a Twilight convention next weekend (yay!) so there will be no IMM, but I'll add it to the week after.

Here's what was in my mailbox this week:

For review:

The Dead of Winter by Chris Priestley

My Soul to Steal by Rachel Vincent

Cauldron Spells by C. J. Busby

Angel Fire by L.A. Weatherly

Wyrmeweald: Returner's Wealth by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell

The Vampire Stalker by Alison Van Diepen

Beat the Band by Don Calame

Arcadia Awakens by Kat Meyer

Dead Inside: Notes from the Zombie Apocalypse

Pendragon Legacy: Sword of Light by Katherine Roberts

Footloose by Rudy Josephs

Advent by James Treadwell

The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater

Space Lizards Stole My Brain by Mark Griffiths

Torn by Cat Clarke

Bought:

Lips Touch, Three Times by Laini Taylor

Happy reading!

Review: A Small Free Kiss in the Dark by Glenda Millard

2011-10-14T10:19:00.001+01:00

Publisher: Templar
Format: Paperback
Released: May 1st, 2011
Grade rating: B-

Amazon summary:

Skip's an outsider. He's never fitted in. So he takes to the streets. Life there may be hard, but it's better than the one he's left behind, especially when he teams up with Billy, an old homeless man. Then come the bombs which bring little Max and Tia, the sad dancer with a tiny baby. Scavenging for food, living on love and imagination, Skip's fragile new family tries to hold out as war grips the city, but too soon tragedy strikes when Tia dies. Max, Billy, Skip and the baby move on, to an old farm where they try to find new hope.

Review:

I don't know what I was expecting from A Small Free Kiss in the Dark, but it wasn't what I got. What I got was a touching story of family and courage set amongst a post-apocalyptic backdrop of war and desolation. It's a short book, but it's one of those that doesn't need hundreds of pages to get its point across. Millard's writing is sharp and succinct, which suits Skip and his story perfectly. Skip's a simple soul, and after being abandoned by his father and numerous foster homes, he lives on the street. It's not until war ravages the streets where he resides that he meets anyone he can call a family, and for him the war brings with it something beautiful.

Skip meets Billy soon after the bombs fall, and together they do their best to stay alive. Along the way they also find a small boy who's lost his mother, as well as a young girl, Tia, with a baby they name Sixpence. Billy is the strength and knowledge of the story, he's an old man so he's seen everything and lived through a lot. He passes his wisdom onto Skip as the story progresses, and Skip in turn becomes a wise boy who I'm sure is destined for great things. He forms a bond with Billy that becomes like that between a father and son, and he also treats Max as if he were his own brother. These unlikely survivors all find solace in each other's company, and they create their own sense of family. It's a lovely thing to read about, and it's what has stood out most about this book.

Although I liked all the characters and what they stood for, I still feel like something is missing from A Small Free Kiss in the Dark. Maybe it's that the war was never explained, so I never knew why these people were on the run. I'd like to say it didn't matter to me, but it did. I'm a great lover of detail and backstory, and that's where I think this book was lacking. It gets top marks for being character driven, but it wasn't enough for me. I was, however, very impressed with Millard's writing, and I'm actually really looking forward to reading more by her. A Small Free Kiss in the Dark is a short novel I'm sure a lot of people will love, it just didn't hit the right spot for me. Do give it a go, though, as it's an uplifting, hopeful story with a main character you can't help but root for.

Waiting On Wednesday: Shatter Me

2011-10-12T20:04:00.000+01:00

Waiting on Wednesday idea from Jill at Breaking the Spine.

-----

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

* Published by: HarperCollins (US)
* Format: Hardcover (US)
* Release Date: November 15th, 2011 (US)
* On Amazon: here

Summary from Amazon.com:

"You can't touch me," I whisper.

I'm lying, is what I don't tell him.

He can touch me, is what I'll never tell him.

But things happen when people touch me.

Strange things.

Bad things.

No one knows why Juliette's touch is fatal, but The Reestablishment has plans for her. Plans to use her as a weapon.

But Juliette has plans on her own.

After a lifetime without freedom, she's finally discovering a strength to fight back for the very first time—and to find a future with the one boy she thought she'd lost forever.

This sounds really OMG-good. I want to know why Juliette's touch is fatal. I want to know what her plans are and why she's had a lifetime of without freedom and I want to know NOW. Plus, Carla tells me it's amazing, which from her is very high praise indeed. Can't wait to read it!

Review: Stitch Head by Guy Bass

2011-10-11T10:22:00.002+01:00

Publisher: Stripes Publishing
Format: Paperback
Released: August 1st, 2011
Grade rating: A-

Amazon summary:

In the maze-like dungeons of Castle Grotteskew, the frightfully insane Professor Erasmus conducts his bizarre experiments on living things. His very first creation has been long forgotten - a small, almost-human creature, known only as Stitch Head. Poor Stitch Head has spent years vying for attention amongst a menagerie of freakish monsters. When a travelling circus ringmaster, Fulbert Freakfinder, promises to make him a star, Stitch Head wonders whether there is another life for him. But first he has to catch the professor's latest creation - a monstrous three-armed creature that's just smashed its way to freedom...

Review:

Stitch Head is a new gothic children's novel similar in style to The Raven Mysteries and Undead Ed, and is the first book by Guy Bass that I've read. It's funny and kooky, while at the same time heartfelt without being mushy. It's also full of monsters, castles and mad scientists - what more could you want?!

Stitch Head is about a tiny boy who was Professor Erasmus's first ever creation. Erasmus makes all kinds of monsters with multiple limbs or missing eyes, and he does all this within the walls of Castle Grotteskew in the town of Grubbers Nubbin (population: 665). Poor little Stitch Head has been forgotten by the professor, so spends all his time roaming the castle ensuring that no new monsters eat anyone. Nothing changes for him until Fulbert Freakfinder's Travelling Carnival of Unnatural Wonders arrives in town and offers to make him unforgettable. Things don't go quite to plan, though, and Stitch Head finds himself on a very big adventure for a boy his size!

I loved this book right from page one. Stitch Head is a character right up my street: he's flawed, tiny and very, very brave. I felt really sorry for him and his loneliness within Castle Grotteskew, and I was glad when he made friends with a new creation called Creature. Over the course of this book, Stitch Head realises how important friendship is and how forty years of being a cobweb magnet doesn't mean he can't go out and almost-live. Aww!

My favourite children's illustrator, Pete Williamson, is a huge part of this book, and he makes Stitch Head and the other characters and settings come alive. He's made Stitch Head look like a cute, tiny boy that gets clothing tips from Dennis the Menace, while Castle Grotteskew looks super gothic as it looms over the town. He and Guy Bass make a great team, so much so that I'm very much looking forward to the next Stitch Head book. This series is definitely one for fans of The Raven Mysteries and Scream Street - it's dark, monstrous fun!

Between Blog Tour: Jessica Warman Guest Post!

2011-10-10T19:08:00.004+01:00

Jessica Warman's Between is now published in the UK, and Jessica has written a great guest post for me as part of the blog tour. In case you don't know what the book is about, here's a summary from egmont.co.uk:

Only the good die young. Right?

Elizabeth Valchar has it all: friends, money, beauty, a cute boyfriend and assured popularity. But on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, she is found drowned next to her parents’ boat.

Everyone thinks it was a tragic accident – teens drinking on a boat, a misstep leading to a watery death. But Liz is still here after death, and she doesn’t know why. There are gaps in her memory.

Her only company Alex, a boy killed by a car a year earlier, Liz sets out to piece together her life.

But their small coastal town is hiding many secrets – about families, boyfriends and friendship. Plus, Alex hates Liz for being mean when they were alive. Was she as squeaky clean as she thinks she was? Could it be that she herself is hiding the biggest secret of all?

Can Liz discover the truth? And if she does, who can she tell?

An engrossing, compelling thriller that peels back the layers of small-town life to expose true, ugly, cruel human nature.

Hope you enjoy, and thanks again to Jessica!

Jessica Warman

As I’ve gotten older (I’m thirty), I find myself reflecting on the past quite a bit, thinking of how things might have turned out differently if I’d made different choices. The question of regret is interesting and complex to me, because so often life is such a gray area when it comes the validity of our choices.

Here’s a specific example for you: I began my college career at a prestigious private university, where I’d been given a full scholarship. For some reason, I couldn’t get comfortable there. In hindsight, I don’t really understand why. I had good friends, and we had plenty of fun times in that first semester. I enjoyed my classes. I had a boyfriend. Everything was good – but for some reason, I decided to leave. To my parents’ immense disappointment, I transferred to a large (non-prestigious, academically unremarkable) state school, where I didn’t have a scholarship.

The first time I stepped into my new dorm room at that new school, my roommate was sitting on the floor playing a video game (Tony Hawk Pro Skater) with a boy who, I would later learn, lived just a few doors down the hall from us. He turned around to look at me – the new girl – and I’m not kidding you at all: the moment I saw his face, I felt a jolt of something go through my body. It was the first time in my life that I’d met someone and felt instantly connected to them. I was a goner.

Two years later, I married that boy. This year we will celebrate our ten-year wedding anniversary.

A few months ago, my husband and I took a road trip and stopped to visit the school where I spent my first semester. I was astonished to realize that it was beautiful in pretty much every way: a gorgeous campus in an intimate setting in a lovely small town. And I’d had a full scholarship! What in the world ever motivated me to leave?

It was an odd feeling that day at my old school, as I walked around campus, considering all the ways my life might have turned out differently if I’d stayed. Even my husband said to me, “you’d have to be crazy to transfer from this place.” And he’s right. I still don’t really understand why I left. All I know is that, if I hadn’t, I probably wouldn’t have met him. Our two daughters would not exist. Everything would be different. It was strange to consider that idea, the possibility that there was a whole other life waiting in the wings for me, depending on what I chose. To be clear, I don’t regret any of my decisions; but what if things had unfolded differently? What if I’d never met my husband, or had a terrible time at my new school? Would I have spent the last 12 years wondering why the hell I ever chose to leave that beautiful little campus behind, regretting my decision to do so?

I think it comes down to this: it’s not productive to regret choices we made, when we had no possible way of predicting their outcome. We’re all doing the best we can, struggling together to keep our lives full and organized and satisfying. It’s not always easy. Life is full of missteps for everyone, no matter how prepared we might try to be. A bad decision (or many bad decisions) doesn’t necessarily make someone a bad person.

When I think about the things in my life that I truly regret – the things that eat away at me sometimes – there is one common thread weaving them all together. I regret the times in my life when I chose anger over compassion, cruelty over kindness, or my own self-interest over a greater good. What’s most interesting to me about this is that I regret these actions regardless of their consequences. It’s not a matter of thinking, “If I’d been kinder, the situation would have had a better outcome.” It’s only: I should have been kinder. Period. End of thought.

I think this is an important theme in BETWEEN, because Liz’s life is full of regrets. But when you examine her poor choices, you aren’t necessarily meant to come away from the book thinking, “well, if she’d been nicer, everything would have turned out differently.” The outcome isn’t really the point; it’s her actions that matter. At any given time, all we have is this moment. Nobody can predict the way our lives will unfold; even the most careful planning can be thwarted in a split second. What’s important, I think, is to be able to look back on life and say, “I did my best to be kind to others.” If I’m able to do that, I don’t think there is much room for regret.

In My Mailbox #142: New Books This Week

2011-10-09T10:05:00.000+01:00

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I had another great book week this week, with lots of surprise parcels and some pretty cool purchases.The rest of my week was less good, but that's another story. I'm glad to finally be back into my reading!

Here's what was in my mailbox this week:

For review:

Between by Jessica Warman

Sounds good!

Silence by Becca Fitzpatrick

I'm quoted in the inside cover of this one. SO EXCITED!

Heroes of Olympus: The Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan

I really want to start the Percy series, so I might just do that soon!

Bliss by Lauren Myracle

This one sounds intriguing..

Blood Runner by James Riordan

Not sure this is my thing but I'll give it a go!

Playground by 50 Cent

Hmm.

Darth Paper Strikes Back by Tom Angleberger

The first book in this series was okay, but I didn't love it.

Free Thaddeus! by John Gosselink

Sounds funny!

Anxious Hearts by Tucker Shaw

I've been meaning to read this for ages. Yay!

Sea of Tears by Floella Benjamin

Again not sure about this one but it's worth a try!

~

Bought:

Silence by Becca Fitzpatrick

I bought the red cover edition that's exclusive to WHSmith (where I work) and the Waterstone's exclusive because it's signed and numbered and has an extra chapter from Patch's POV.

Dragonlance Chronicles Omnibus by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman

I asked for fantasy recs on Twitter last week, and Kirsty at The Overflowing Library recommended this one. Looks good!

The Invisible Order: The Fire King by Paul Crilley

I LOVED the first book in this series. Can't wait to read this one!

~

Gift:

Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

I couldn't go to Laini's launch event in London last Monday so my friends at Hodder sent me a signed copy of the book. YAAAY!

Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis

My friend Amanda saw this pretty cheap so got me a copy as she knows I collect Narnia books. It's a nice hardback special edition one. :D

Hope you all have a great week and read some good books!

Midwinterblood 7 Event Blog Trail: Marcus Sedgwick Guest Post!

2011-10-07T07:03:00.001+01:00

I don't really think Marcus Sedgwick needs an introduction, so I'll just say this: if you've never read one of his books, please do so soon. He's one of the best authors to come out of the UK!

This week (yesterday, if I'm being specific) sees the publication of his new book, Midwinterblood, and to celebrate there have been real-life events going on all through England. The last leg of this is taking place on 7 blogs, and I am today's stop. Marcus has written a great post for me about - what else?! - vampires!

As a little extra from the lovely Orion publishers, you can visit an exclusive URL HERE to be taken to a secret page on Marcus's website, where you'll be able to find additional content - a book extract, perhaps... Enjoy!

Marcus Sedgwick

It’s true. Years ago I was amazed to discover that vampires were known to the Vikings, at least, if their sagas are to be believed. In a couple of them, the Eyrbyggja Saga for example, the bodies of those slain rise from the dead, causing havoc, slaughtering animals and men, and blood flows.

Some readers interpret these revenants as ghosts, but what, after all, is the difference between a ghost and a vampire? Not such a great deal. Both are spirits who, for whatever reason, come back after death, and the main difference is the association of blood drinking on the part of the vampire, the lack of corporeality on the part of the ghost. And yet, go back in time, and vampires, at least in the original folklore, are very rarely described as drinking blood, and the main difference seems to be more to do with where you lived, not what the revenant actually was. Eastern Europe has a strong vampire tradition, England does not. What we have here is ghosts. And yet, we dealt with ghosts in exactly the same ways that our Transylvanian cousin dealt with vampires: a stake through the chest, or mouth for example. Or better yet, both. To the superstitious mind, both of these frights, the vampire and the ghost, are just people trying to come back, with unfinished business to conclude with the living. And so are the viking vampires: often the victim of a domestic quarrel, the aggrieved party return after death to try and claim what they believe to be theirs: in the case of Midwinterblood, two children, twin brother and sister, whose uncle returns after death, claiming them as his own.

Don't forget to visit the secret link HERE, and visit marcussedgwick.com for more info on the man himself!

US Vs. UK: Daughter of Smoke and Bone Covers

2011-10-06T10:08:00.000+01:00

US // UK

I'm rather fond of both of these covers, though the UK wins it for me. I've seen our cover in person and at first I wasn't too sure about it, but then I saw it again at the Hodder offices and I couldn't stop saying "Ooh" as I stared at it in wonder. It's like its shininess cast a spell on me! Now I really do love it, the whole design and effect it gives off; plus it has a pretty ace back cover quote from Patrick Rothfuss! Anyway, I digress.

The US cover seems nice enough (haven't seen this one in real life - is it shiny? Foiled?), but something about it just seems a little off. Not sure what exactly, though I think it could be the eye mask. Also I'm not overly keen on the title font - I think the UK font is much cooler. That could well be something to do with the UK book being a crossover title (shelved in the adult section!) and the US one being YA. I think both these covers suit the target audience perfectly, and I would actually be happy to own either.

So, how about you? Do you have a favourite, something you particularly like about either cover? Let me know!

Review: Reel Life Starring Us by Lisa Greenwald

2011-10-05T08:59:00.002+01:00

Publisher: Amulet Books
Format: Hardcover
Released: October 1st, 2011
Grade rating: B/B+

Amazon summary:

Rockwood Hills junior high is known for its competitive academics and for the close-knit cliques that rule the school. When new girl Dina gets the opportunity to do a video project with queen bee Chelsea, she thinks this is her ticket to a great new social life. But Chelsea's own life has bigger problems than Dina can imagine - and the new girl might just get caught in the middle.

Review:

Reel Life Starring Us is the first of Lisa Greenwald's books I've read and also just happens to be the best MG book for girls I've read in ages. It's set during Chelsea and Dina's eighth grade year, includes lots of handy film tips and techniques and is all about being yourself and accepting others for who they are. Honestly, it's got great messages for teenage girls - every school library should have a copy!

The book is narrated by our two main characters, Chelsea and Dina. Now Chelsea is the rich, superficial popular girl with horrible friends, while Dina is the new girl trying to fit in in her new school. Dina was popular at her old school, but at Rockwood Hills she's seen as weird and a bit too out there. She carries a camera and videos stuff, and this little hobby is what gets her paired with Chelsea for a class project. Instead of switching partners like she wants to, Chelsea continues to work with Dina and soon changes her tune. She realises that her friends aren't nice people to be around, and that Dina is actually a lot cooler than she seems. After a family secret is brought into the limelight by her so-called friends, Chelsea really reassesses her friendships and makes some conscious changes to her school life.

Both of these girls are written so well and I'm sure every teenage reader will see a little of themselves in them, or at the very least someone they know. Changing friendships and eye-opening situations are things everyone goes through in school, so in that respect Dina and Chelsea are absolutely no different. I do think some of their problems are a bit trivial to be given so much attention, but then again everything can seem magnified when you're 13 and finding out who you are.

I enjoyed Reel Life Starring Us, for all of its important messages and its realistic portrayal of middle school. The mean clique were slightly too over the top for me at times, but without them the story would be a lot different. I think teen girls will love this story of acceptance and understanding, and it certainly won't be the last of Lisa Greenwald's books that I read.

Review: The Raven Mysteries - Diamonds and Doom by Marcus Sedgwick

2011-10-04T10:27:00.002+01:00

Publisher: Orion
Format: Hardcover
Released: October 6th, 2011
Grade rating: B+/A-

Amazon summary:

Join the wonderfully weird Otherhand family and their faithful guardian, Edgar the raven, and discover the dark secrets of Castle Otherhand. In the sixth of the Raven Mysteries, all manner of disaster descends on Castle Otherhand; weirdness abounds, the family are on the verge of being thrown out of their own home, and there's still no sign of the fabled treasure of the Otherhand. Worse still, there's no sign of Edgar, either. So will it be diamonds or doom for the Otherhands?

Review:

Well, this is it. The time has come. Marcus Sedgwick's ridiculously funny, mental tales of the Otherhand family have reached their end. I'm sad, as I knew I would be, but I'm also glad I can now go back and re-read the whole series. I'm also extremely excited about Marcus's new children's series next year, which will see both him and illustrator Pete Williamson reunited once again. I can't wait!

Anyway, I must go back to Castle Otherhand for a moment. Diamonds and Doom is, I'm happy to say, the most nutty, mad instalment yet. And what a way to end the series! There are strange monsters roaming the hallways, vortexes, magic spells, people turning to stone, Rob the new little raven and even a helping of prehistoric creatures. Basically everything you never thought you'd see in a Raven Mysteries novel! Each character handles the madness well, of course, with Solstice uttering many a "gasp!" and Cudweed being braver than usual. Even Lord Valevine seems genuinely worried, until it all becomes apparent that he just doesn't want to have to stop conducting his useless experiments. All in all, it's an Otherhand adventure like no other!

Pete Williamson's fantastic illustrations are on top form as per usual, with my favourite from this book being Edgar the raven in his holiday clothes standing in front of his suitcases. Hehe! I also learnt even more about the Otherhand family from the small nuggets of information at the start of each chapter, and I now know that Nanny Lumber scares fish and that a poor little mouse once got singed in a castle fire. How awful!

If you ever just want to read something wacky and laugh-out-loud funny, please, please pick up the Raven Mysteries series. It starts with Flood and Fang, spans six books and is my all-time favourite series for younger readers. I can give it no higher praise than that, but I think that's probably acceptable. As Edgar, and now young Rob, would say: Futhork!

Dark Inside Blog Tour: Jeyn Roberts Guest Post!

2011-10-03T13:48:00.001+01:00

Dark Inside has been out in UK bookshops for a good few weeks now, but in case you've missed it, here's more information from Amazon.co.uk:

Since mankind began, civilizations have always fallen - now it's our turn!

Jeyn Roberts

A Writer's Early Career

Hi everyone! I’m Jeyn Roberts and I’m the author of Dark Inside.
I’ve been asked to do a guest post on a writer’s early career. Being that every writer’s experience is different, I’ll just go with mine. I’ve been very lucky to have met a wonderful amount of people over the years who have helped me towards the quest for publication. Without them, I’d probably never have gotten where I am today.
I went the school route. Not everyone does and not everyone has to. But that’s the way I wanted to go. I was in my second year of university and heading towards a psychology degree when I took a Creative Writing class. I was hooked. I applied for the degree program at UBC and was accepted. From then on I went to Bath Spa University in England to do my Masters.
There are a lot of different opinions on studying Creative Writing. I personally loved it. Being a writer, we often fall in love with our words. Belonging to a good critique group can be invaluable. Learning to give and receive criticism can be an incredible learning experience. It also opens the doors to meeting a lot of industry people. It was there that I learned a lot about the publishing industry.
I was in South Korea when I wrote Dark Inside. I loved my job there, teaching English to High School students. Funny enough, the first time my agent rang, I was in the middle of teaching a class. My kids loved it! Teacher bad! So I turned off the phone. When I returned to my desk later and saw the email, I was horrified. I’d hung up on an agent!
I was still in Korea when we sent my novel to publishers. It was a very stressful time. I was in a very different time zone and had to stay up till three in the morning when it was afternoon in New York. Of course once I accepted the deals, I couldn’t sleep! I was too excited.
I’ve been very lucky over the past year. I’ve met some great teenagers who have been with me on Facebook through this journey. They’re all writers too. They’ve been great for giving me valuable feedback on my writing. I’m very lucky to have them.
My journey has been long but completely worth it. And I’d to share some of the advice I’ve learned over the years. Never give up. Writing is very subjective and a rejection doesn’t always mean your writing is bad. There could be a million other reasons why. Keep writing. And if the first book doesn’t get any interest, write another one. And then another one. You can only get better. Be open to criticism. As I said in the beginning, we are often too close to our own stories to see what might be wrong. Having other eyes is a great way to improve. Learn everything you can about the publishing industry. There are great websites that offer advice.
And keep reading because that’s the best part. So many stories, such little time.

Olympian Week Day 5: The Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan Extract!

2011-10-02T11:45:00.002+01:00

Rick Riordan's Heroes of Olympus: The Son of Neptune is published in the UK on October 4th, and there's a blog tour to celebrate this momentous day. Each blogger will be honouring a different Greek god or goddess, and for today's blog tour stop I'm paying tribute to Aphrodite, the goddess of love.

I'm sure you all know how popular the two Percy Jackson series are so I won't bore you about that, but I'll just say what a great thing Rick has done for reading and learning difficulties. You can find out more about that subject over at The Book Zone, which was Day 1 of the blog tour.

Photo credit: Marty Umans.

I hope you're all excited about The Son of Neptune - if you are, here's an extract to keep you going those last couple of days until you can go and grab a copy. Enjoy!

Extract

Percy stumbled away from the gorgon, almost falling off the edge of the hill.
It was the smiley one – Beano.
Okay, her name wasn’t really Beano. As near as Percy could figure, he was dyslexic, because words got twisted around when he tried to read. The first time he saw the gorgon posing as a Bargain Mart greeter with a big green button that read: WELCOME! MY NAME IS STHENO!, he thought it said BEANO.
She was still wearing her green Bargain Mart employee vest over a flower‐print
dress. If you just looked at her body, you might think she was somebody’s dumpy old grandmother – until you looked down and realized she had rooster feet. Or you looked up and saw bronze boar tusks sticking out the sides of her mouth. Her eyes glowed red and her hair was a writhing nest of bright green snakes.
The most horrible thing about her? She was still holding her big silver platter of free samples: Crispy Cheese n’ Wieners. Her platter was dented up from all the times Percy had killed her, but those little samples looked perfectly fine. Stheno just kept gathering them up and toting them across California so she could offer Percy a snack before she killed him. Percy didn’t know why, but if he ever needed a suit of armor he was going to make it out of Crispy Cheese n’ Wieners. That stuff was indestructible.
“Try one?” Stheno offered. Percy fended her off with his sword. “Where’s your sister?” “Oh, put the sword away,” Stheno chided. “You know by now even
Celestial bronze can’t kill us for long. Have a Cheese n’ Wiener! They’re on sale this week, and I’d hate to kill you on an empty stomach.”
“Stheno!” The second gorgon appeared on Percy’s right so fast he didn’t have time to react. Fortunately she was too busy glaring at her sister to pay him much attention. “I told you to sneak up on him and kill him!”
Stheno’s smile wavered. “But Euryale . . .” She said the name so it rhymed with ‘Muriel.’ “Can’t I give him a sample first?”
“No, you imbecile!” Euryale turned toward Percy and bared her fangs.
Except for her hair, which was a nest of coral snakes instead of green vipers, she looked exactly like her sister. Her Bargain Mart vest, her flowery dress, even her tusks were decorated with ‘50% off’ stickers. Her name badge read: Hello! My name is DIE, DEMIGOD SCUM!
“You’ve led us quite a chase, Percy Jackson,” Euryale said. “But now you’re trapped, and we’ll have our revenge!”
“The Cheese n’ Wieners are only $2.99,” Stheno added helpfully. “Grocery department, aisle three.”
Euryale snarled. “Stheno, the Bargain Mart was a front! You’re going native! Now put down that ridiculous tray and help me kill this demigod. Or have you forgotten he’s the one who vaporized Medusa?”
Percy stepped back. Six more inches, and he’d be tumbling through thin air. “Look, ladies, we’ve been through this. I don’t even remember killing Medusa. I don’t remember anything! Can’t we just call a truce and talk about your weekly specials?”
Stheno gave her sister a pouty look, which was hard to do with giant bronze tusks. “Can we?”
“No!” Euryale’s red eyes bored into Percy. “I don’t care what you remember, son of the sea god. I can smell Medusa’s blood on you. It’s faint, yes, several years old, but you were the last one to defeat her. She still has not returned from Tartarus. It’s your fault!”
Percy didn’t really get that. The whole ‘monster‐dying‐then‐returning‐ from‐Tartarus’ concept gave him a headache. Of course so did the idea that ballpoint pens could turn into swords, or that monsters could disguise themselves with something called the Mist, or that Percy was the son of a
barnacle‐encrusted god from five thousand years ago. But he did believe it. Even though his memory was erased, he knew he was a demigod the same way he knew his name was Percy Jackson. From his very first conversation with Lupa the wolf, he’d accepted that this crazy messed‐up world of gods and monsters was his reality. Which pretty much sucked for him.
“How about we call it a draw?” he said. “I can’t kill you. You can’t kill me. If you’re Medusa’s sisters – like the Medusa who turned people to stone ‐‐ shouldn’t I be petrified by now?”
“Heroes!” Euryale said with disgust. “They always bring that up, just like our mother! ‘Why can’t you turn people to stone? Your sister can turn people to stone.’ Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, boy! That was Medusa’s curse alone. She was the most hideous one in the family. She got all the luck!”
Stheno looked hurt. “Mother said I was the most hideous.”
“Quiet!” Euryale snapped. “As for you, Percy Jackson, it’s true you bear the mark of Achilles. That makes you a little tougher to kill. But don’t worry. We’ll find a way.”
“The mark of what?”
“Achilles,” Stheno said cheerfully. “Oh, he was gorgeous! Dipped in the River Styx as a child, you know, so he was invulnerable except for a tiny spot on his ankle. That’s what happened to you, dear. Someone must’ve dumped you in the Styx and made your skin like iron, but not to worry. Heroes like you always have a weak spot. We just have to find it and then we can kill you. Won’t that be lovely? Have a Cheese n’ Wiener!”
Percy tried to think. He didn’t remember any dip in the Styx. Then again he didn’t remember much of anything. His skin didn’t feel like iron, but it explained how he’d held out so long against the gorgons.
Maybe if he just fell down the mountain . . . would he survive? He didn’t want to risk it – not without something to slow the fall, or a sled, or . . .
He looked at Stheno’s large silver platter of free samples. Hmm . . . “Reconsidering?” Stheno asked. “Very wise, dear. I added some gorgon’s
blood to these, so your death will be quick and painless.” Percy’s throat constricted. “You added your blood to the Cheese N’
Wieners?” “Just a little.” Stheno smiled. “A little nick on the arm, but you’re sweet to
be concerned. The blood from our right side can cure anything, you know, but blood from our left side is deadly ‐‐”
“You dimwit!” Euryale screeched. “You’re not supposed to tell him that! He won’t eat the wieners if you tell him they’re poisoned!”
Stheno looked stunned. “He won’t? But I said it’s quick and painless.”
“Never mind!” Euryale’s fingernails grew into claws. “We’ll kill him the hard way – just keep slashing until we find the weak spot. Once we defeat Percy Jackson, we’ll be more famous than Medusa! Our patron will reward us greatly!”
Percy gripped his sword. He’d have to time his move perfectly ‐‐ a few seconds of confusion,grab the platter with his left hand . . .
Keep them talking, he thought. “Before you slash me to bits,” he said, “who’s this patron you mentioned?”
Euryale sneered. “The goddess Gaea, of course! The one who brought us back from oblivion! You won’t live long enough to meet her, but your friends below will soon face her wrath. Even now, her armies are marching south. At the Feast of Fortune, she’ll awaken, and the demigods will be cut down like – like ‐‐”
“Like our low prices at Bargain Mart!” Stheno suggested. “Gah!” Euryale stormed toward her sister. Percy took the opening. He grabbed Stheno’s platter, scattering poisoned Cheese n’ Wieners, and
slashed Riptide across Euryale’s waist, cutting her in half. He raised the platter, and Stheno found herself facing her own greasy
reflection. “Medusa!” she screamed.
Her sister Euryale had crumbled to dust, but she was already starting to re‐form, like a snowman un‐melting in reverse.
“Stheno, you fool!” she gurgled as her half‐made face rose from the mound of dust. “That’s just your reflection! Get him!”
Percy slammed the metal tray on top of Stheno’s head and she passed out
cold.
He put the platter over his butt, said a silent prayer to whatever Roman god oversaw stupid sledding tricks, and jumped off the side of the hill.

Extract from THE SON OF NEPTUNE – HEROES OF OLYMPUS, BOOK TWO by Rick Riordan

Published by Puffin Books on October 4th 2011

© Copyright Rick Riordan, 2011

THE GREEK GODS ARE ALIVE AND KICKING IN THE TWENTY‐FIRST CENTURY

VISIT WWW.PERCYJACKSON.CO.UK

Puffin have also set up an amazing competition for schools, called Hunt for a Half-Blood Hero. This competition offers school students the chance to win the chance to have Rick streamed live into a school assembly, as well as a class trip to their local Sea Life Centre. Pretty cool, right? If you or anyone you know would like to take part in this competition, you can find more information HERE.

Make sure you check out Day 6 of Olympus Week which will be over at My Favourite Books tomorrow, where they will be celebrating Poseidon day with a guest post from Rick himself. Definitely not one to miss!

In My Mailbox #141: New Books This Week

2011-10-01T23:35:00.001+01:00

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I had an amazing week this week! I spent two days in London, met Christopher Paolini 3 times, visited various publisher friends and received many exciting books. It'll be hard to top this week for a while! I'm also glad to say I think I'm finally out of my reading slump. This calls for a Snoopy Dance a la Xander Harris!

Here's what was in my mailbox (and my trusty S&S tote bag) this week:

For review:

Space Lizards Stole My Brain by Mark Griffiths

This sounds funny and is illustrated by the brilliant Pete Williamson!

Eve by Anna Carey

Love the sound of this!

The Killables by Gemma Malley (UK proof/ARC)

I am a HUGE Gemma Malley fan. Can't wait to read this.

When You Were Mine by Rebecca Serle (US ARC)

I've heard really good things about this one.

The 13th Horseman by Barry Hutchison (UK proof/ARC)

I've been waiting for this for AGES. I'm sure it will be hilarious!

A Beautiful Evil by Kelly Keaton (US ARC)

I enjoyed the first book in this series and am looking forward to the sequel.

Variant by Robison Wells

I think this is a dystopian thriller. Sounds good and great cover!

The Straight Razor Cure by Daniel Polansky

I had heard nothing about this until Hodder gave me a copy. Looks intriguing.

This Dark Endeavour by Kenneth Oppel

Duplicate copy which will be going to a good home.

Fever by Lauren DeStefano (US ARC)

I still need to read Wither!

Everlasting by Elizabeth Chandler (US ARC)

Another series I enjoy - hope this one's as good.

The Wizard Heir by Cinda Williams Chima

This will also be going to a good home as I have a US hardback already.

My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece by Annabel Pitcher

A lovely paperback edition of this brilliant book. And I'm quoted on the inside back cover!

Falling Fast by Sophie McKenzie (UK proof/ARC)

This sounds GREAT!

And the Band Played On by Christopher Ward

Another book about Titanic. Really looking forward to reading it.

Dead to You by Lisa McMann (US ARC)

Reading this at the moment and really enjoying it. I love Lisa McMann.

Dear Bully by Various Authors

Sounds ace!

Advent by James Treadwell (UK proof/ARC)

This is another I'd heard nothing about, but it sounds SO GOOD.

Carrier of the Mark by Leigh Fallon

If the book is as good as the cover, I think I'm in for a treat!

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey (UK proof/ARC)

Sam at Headline basically sold this to me in 2 sentences. She's good, she is. It's a pretty proof copy too.

~

Bought:

Star Wars Year by Year: A Visual Chronicle by Ryder Windham, Daniel Wallace, Pablo Hidalgo and Gus Lopez

This came in at work and ended up costing me about £6. Not bad at all.

The Art of The Fellowship of the Ring by Gary Russell
The Art of The Two Towers by Gary Russell

I went to The Cinema Store in London and found these two gems. They're both AMAZING.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Something about this book just keeps calling to me, and I think it's the overall look of it. Basically I just need this book on my bookshelf.

The Inbetweeners Yearbook by Damon Beesley and Iain Morris

It's The Inbetweeners. It's hilarious. What more can I say?

Happy reading, everyone!

Struts & Frets Blog Tour: Book Extract + My Favourite Music!

2011-09-30T21:31:00.002+01:00

Struts & Frets, a music-themed book by Jon Skovron, is now published in paperback in the UK by Amulet Books with an awesome new cover! I like books about characters who love music, because music is a big part of my life and I don't think there's enough YA centred around it. Struts & Frets is a brilliant, funny, heartfelt read that I would recommend to everyone. Read the following extract and see what you think!

You can also view the extract a little easier by clicking HERE.

So, because Struts & Frets is all about music, I thought I'd write about some of my favourite music. Like I mentioned earlier, music is a HUGE part of my life. I have a very eclectic taste and like a bit of everything, but my favourite genre is still "emo" or "emo hardcore" and rock from around 1998 onwards.

I love music because it fits every mood, it makes me happy and there's almost nothing better than seeing your favourite band play live. Anyway, before I continure rambling for longer than this blog post should be, here's a list of my top 5 (actually 6; I cheated) musical people and accompanying YouTube videos. I recommend all these bands/artists to everyone!

1. Jimmy Eat World

Jimmy Eat World have been my FAVOURITE EVER band since summer 2001, when I first heard 'A Praise Chorus' on a free Kerrang! CD. After that I heard 'Bleed American' and that was basically the song to end all songs. They were the first band I ever saw live at my very first gig on November 9th 2001, when I was 14, and I'll never forget it. Their lyrics frequently make me tear up, and I think I've listened to their records more than any other. I've seen them in Manchester 5 times so far, and I'm hoping they tour again soon!

2. Coheed and Cambria

CoCa are SO close to Jimmy Eat World, but they just fall slightly behind. They're absolutely amazing - both live and on record - and they will always remain one of my all-time favourites. Their music is a sci-fi story, with each concept album adding to it. Claudio's voice is so unique and mesmerising, and when I met him he hugged me and I got lost in his giant afro-type hair. If you've never heard them before, you are in for a treat! Oh and here's a little fact: I own 14 different t-shirts. Most people I know have seen me wear at least one.

3. Brand New

I really don't know where to start talking about Brand New. I discovered them around 2001, when 'Your Favorite Weapon' started showing up in shops around here. Jesse Lacey's lyrics are unbelievable, his voice is magical and their CDs always brighten up my day (I'm listening to them now, in fact). They're an intense band, but I truly believe they're one of a kind. I have tickets to see them again next year, time #5, and I'm counting down the days!

4. Snow Patrol

Ah, Snow Patrol. One of the most amazing bands ever. The lyrics, music, Gary Lightbody... I love all of it. They're also amazing live, and have a similar intensity to Brand New. I was late getting into Snow Patrol - it was in 2006 at my first full-time job (Music Zone head office), just as 'Chasing Cars' was ruling the airwaves. I never looked back, and 'Final Straw' is an album that will always be one of my favourites.

5. Florence and the Machine.

Some people will know that I have a small obsession with Flo. She's like a goddess, full stop. Her voice is immense, 'Cosmic Love' and 'Blinding' have been the soundtrack to my life for a good couple of years now, and I've had the pleasure of seeing her live once. My friend and I were genuinely rendered speechless during and after the show, and on the way home we could only mutter one syllable words like 'wow' and things I can't possibly post here. Everyone knows who Flo is now, which is amazing. She deserves every second of her success... roll on Halloween and album #2!

6. The National

I couldn't do a top music list without mentioning these guys, who happen to be one of my more recent discoveries (early 2010, I think). All I'll say on the subject is please, please buy 'High Violet'. It's one of the greatest compilations of songs ever recorded, and I'm in love with Matt's baritone voice. Their songs have started cropping up on numerous US TV shows (Gossip Girl, The Vampire Diaries etc..), so they're well on their way to cracking the mainstream market. I cannot wait to hear what they come up with next!

GIVEAWAY: Win Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor! (UK only)

2011-09-29T10:40:00.000+01:00

Laini Taylor's Daughter of Smoke and Bone is published in the UK today and, thanks to the nice ladies at Hodder Books, I have one (1) shiny finished copy to give away!

Here's what Amazon says it's all about:

Errand requiring immediate attention. Come.

The note was on vellum, pierced by the talons of the almost-crow that delivered it. Karou read the message. 'He never says please', she sighed, but she gathered up her things.

When Brimstone called, she always came.

In general, Karou has managed to keep her two lives in balance. On the one hand, she's a seventeen-year-old art student in Prague; on the other, errand-girl to a monstrous creature who is the closest thing she has to family. Raised half in our world, half in 'Elsewhere', she has never understood Brimstone's dark work - buying teeth from hunters and murderers - nor how she came into his keeping. She is a secret even to herself, plagued by the sensation that she isn't whole.

Now the doors to Elsewhere are closing, and Karou must choose between the safety of her human life and the dangers of a war-ravaged world that may hold the answers she has always sought.

Here's the trailer, and you can see more at the official UK website: Daughter of Smoke and Bone.co.uk.

Follow the book on Twitter at @HodderBooks and @SmokeandBone.

Rules & info:

Open to UK residents only.
End date: October 7th, 2011.
One entry per person.
You do NOT have to follow my blog to enter.
Book will be sent out by the publisher.

Fill in the form below to enter, and good luck!

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News: Christopher Paolini UK Tour!

2011-09-26T20:29:00.000+01:00

Christopher Paolini, author of the Inheritance Cycle: Eragon, Eldest, Brisingr and the forthcoming final title Inheritance, is touring the UK this week. Here are the details of when and where you can find him!

For more info, see the Random House Facebook page here.

Wednesday 28th September
Time: 18.00-20.00
Forbidden Planet event
Christopher will be signing new editions of Eragon, Eldest and Brisingr

Venue: Forbidden Planet, 179 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, WC2H 8JR
Further information, visit ForbiddenPlanet.com.

Thursday 29th September
Time: 18.30
Waterstones’ Deansgate event
Christopher will be participating in an event for ticketed attendees. Christopher will participate in a signing event for non-ticketed attendees following the ticketed event. Tickets are £5 and can be purchased on Waterstones’ website.

Venue: Waterstone’s Deansgate, 91 Deansgate, Manchester, M3 2BW
Purchase tickets on Waterstones.com.

Friday 30th September
Time: 17.30-18.15
Event at Bath Children’s Book Festival
Christopher will be participating in a ticketed event at the Bath Children’s Book Festival. Christopher’s event will be followed by a book signing. Event tickets cost £5.

Venue: Bath Children’s Book Festival
Purchase tickets on BathKidsLitFest.org.uk.

Saturday 1st October
Time: 11.00 – Noon
Headline event at Brighton’s

Christopher will headline Brighton’s Fantasy Con at the Royal Albion Hotel. Christopher’s event will include an on-stage interview with Stephen Hunt from SFCrowsnest and will be followed by an audience Q&A. Christopher will be signing books following the stage event.

Venue: Royal Albion Hotel, 35 Old Steine, Brighton, Sussex, BN1 1NT
Ticketing information can be found on FantasyCon2011.org.

In My Mailbox #140: New Books This Week

2011-09-25T09:37:00.001+01:00

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I've been working a lot more than usual just recently and have had almost no time to read or blog. I'm hoping to get back to normal very soon, as I have some amazing looking books to catch up on! (Apologies to my fellow bloggers for the lack of comments - will be back soon!)

Here's what was in my mailbox this week:

For review:

Goliath by Scott Westerfeld

This is a fantastic series. Lovely cover too.

Devoted by Hilary Duff

I really enjoyed Elixir when I read it last year, and I hope this one is just as good!

This Dark Endeavour by Kenneth Oppel

This was a nice surprise finished copy. It looks brilliant!

No Ordinary Love Song by Alison Prince

Sounds good!

Minwinterblood by Marcus Sedgwick

Marcus Sedgwick is amazing. That is all.

Verity Fibbs by Cathy Brett

I like Cathy's books and am looking forward to this one!

~

Bought:

Titanic in Photographs by Daniel Klistorner and Steve Hall

I read the whole of this book yesterday and enjoyed every page. If you're a Titanic enthusiast, this is a book you need to own.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Tales by Various Authors

This is the biggest graphic novel I've ever seen, but I love it. It's HUGE!

Perfect by Ellen Hopkins

Ellen Hopkins... what more can I say?!

Have a great week, everyone!

Review: The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

2011-09-23T09:46:00.001+01:00

Publisher: Pocket Books
Format: Paperback
Released: February 2nd, 2009 (new ed.)
Grade rating: A-

Amazon summary:

Charlie is a freshman. And while he's not the biggest geek in the school, he is by no means popular. Shy, introspective, intelligent beyond his years yet socially awkward, he is a wallflower, caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it. Charlie is attempting to navigate his way through uncharted territory: the world of first dates and mixed tapes, family dramas and new friends; the world of sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, when all one requires is that perfect song on that perfect drive to feel infinite. But Charlie can't stay on the sideline forever. Standing on the fringes of life offers a unique perspective. But there comes a time to see what it looks like from the dance floor.

Review:

I've had The Perks of Being a Wallflower on my shelf for a couple of years now. Although it's been published here in the UK as an adult novel, I'm pretty sure it's YA, though I could be wrong. While some of the content is a little more adult than young adult's might be used to, it's all relevant to Charlie's story and the growing up he does between his freshman and sophomore years of high school.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower uses first person narrative by a male teenager using the alias of "Charlie", and is told in the form of letters written to an anonymous person. It chronicles his freshman year in a Pittsburgh high school: the friends he makes, the loves he experiences and the realisations he comes to. At the start of the book Charlie is a wallflower: he's quiet and introverted, and prefers to watch life rather than participate in it. His one and only friend committed suicide at the end of the last school year, so Charlie is truly alone when we meet him. He reads, he writes, he cries, he's overly sensitive (at times this irritated me) and is the kind of good guy every mother hopes their daughter will be friends with. It isn't until he meets brother and sister duo Patrick and Sam that he starts to come out of his shell, and his journey of self-discovery is a fascinating one.

I found this book to be quite simple, both in style and content, but still I couldn't put it down. Charlie's life makes for compulsive reading, even though he's only going through the mundane, everyday tasks that most of us also go through. He experiences drugs for the first time, he gets his first kiss, drives his first car, yet all this normal stuff seems somehow bigger, more important when it comes to him. He over-thinks, over-analyzes everything, but it works for him and he sticks with it. His teacher, Bill, shows a belief in him that so far he's only seen from his Aunt Helen, and plies him with an array of books to read. Charlie realises that friends can come from all directions, and that being intelligent doesn't have to mean that all other, more fun, aspects of life need to be neglected.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower is set over the years of 1991 and 1992, when Nirvana were just making it big with 'Nevermind' and underground bands were at their best. There are many pop culture references to books, films and music, including Rocky Horror Picture Show, To Kill a Mockingbird and 'Asleep' by 80's Manchester band The Smiths. I love any book that references other media, whatever form it may take, and this was just one extra reason why I enjoyed it so much. I actually felt like I was back in 1991, listening to 'Asleep' on a mix tape with the car windows down as I drove through a Pittsburgh suburb. That would have been impossible as I was only four years old in 1991, but Stephen Chbosky somehow transported me back to a time and a place that I could never have known. I wanted to be there, in that car, with Charlie, Sam and Patrick, feeling infinite just as they did in that moment, when music was all they had and it transcended everything. What a magical, amazing feeling that is.

I never for one minute expected to like The Perks of Being a Wallflower as much as I did, and I've since told myself off for leaving it for so long. I can see why it's a coming of age classic and I sincerely hope that 2012's movie adaptation will do it justice. I feel like I have a new friend in Charlie who, like me, will always have a part of himself that fits into the wallflower category. I think I'll be re-reading this one very soon, and I urge you all to read it too.

Review: Frogspell by C. J. Busby

2011-09-20T19:38:00.001+01:00

Publisher: Templar
Format: Paperback
Released: September 1st, 2011
Grade rating: B+

Amazon summary:

Would-be wizard Max, his sister (who wants to be a knight), two humorous pet animal characters - Ferocious, a world-weary rat and Adolphus, an over-enthusiastic young dragon, encounter magic, double-dealing, Morgan le Fay's schemes to win the throne from Arthur, magical quests and more.

Review:

Frogspell is the first in a four-book series for younger readers set in the time of Camelot, King Arthur and Merlin. It's funny, kooky and full of endearing characters or all shapes, sizes and disguises, and I can't wait for the next one! I didn't think I'd enjoy it as much as I did, but I've always liked Arthurian legends and adaptations like the TV show Merlin, so I think I was always destined to like this fresh new twist on things. Plus, there's a dragon!

Max and his sister Olivia are fab characters to introduce this story, along with their companions Adolphus the dragon and Ferocious the rat. They get into all kinds of muddles and scrapes when Max accidentally turns himself and Olivia into frogs (orange with green spots and purple with red spots, in case you wondering), thanks to a wayward magic spell that has less than its desired effect. Many adventures occur, including meetings with Lady Morgana and the wise wizard Merlin, as well as Ferocious meeting an oversized lake pike and Adolphus discovering that his flying is actually quite wonky. Basically all a day's work in Camelot!

Frogspell also features illustrations by David Wyatt at the start of each chapter, all of which add to the story and make it that much more magical. My personal favourite piece of art is from the chapter titled 'Kidnapped', flying away with Ferocious on his back a big frog between his claws. It's a brilliantly fun book and I'm very glad there are more on the way - I just hope they'll be as good as this one. Oh, and Ms. Busby: if Adolphus ever needs a new home, please send him over to me!

In My Mailbox #139: New Books This Week

2011-09-18T11:07:00.000+01:00

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I received some really exciting books in the post this week, including Diamonds and Doom! Yay! I also got addicted to Downton Abbey and watched Series 1 just in time for the new series starting tonight. All in all, it's been an excellent week!

Here's what was in my mailbox:

For review:

The Raven Mysteries: Diamonds and Doom by Marcus Sedgwick

YAY!! I love love love this series, but I'm sad this is the end.

Struts & Frets by Jon Skovron

I read, reviewed and enjoyed this one when I first read it in hardback. Great music-themed book.

Pure by Julianna Baggott (UK proof/ARC)

I think this is now my third proof copy of Pure. Better read it soon.

Sweetly by Jackson Pearce (UK proof/ARC)

Looking forward to this one!

Talespinning by David J. Howe

I had never heard of this until it arrived but it sounds right up my street.

The Raven Mysteries: Vampires and Volts by Marcus Sedgwick

Already read and reviewed this one, and of course loved it. I keep all the paperbacks too though.

Envy by Gregg Olsen

Looking forward to finally getting to this one too.

Darkness Falls by Mia James

This was a nice unexpected surprise!

Sir Quinton Quest Hunts the Yeti by Kaye Umansky

Sounds fun!

The Warrior Heir by Cinda Williams Chima

I read this one almost 3 years ago and am glad to see it now published in the UK!

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith (UK proof/ARC)

I already read this months ago and it's one of my favourite contemporaries of recent years. I, along with some other bloggers, am quoted in this proof too. Ace!

~

Bought:

The Wedding Girl by Sophie Kinsella writing as Madeleine Wickham
Cocktails for Three by Sophie Kinsella writing as Madeleine Wickham
Sleeping Arrangements by Sophie Kinsella writing as Madeleine Wickham

I love Sophie Kinsella's books but have never tried these ones. The boxset was £5 - bargain!

The World of Downton Abbey by Jessica Fellowes

As I mentioned above, I got addicted to this show this week. The companion book is fantastic.

Stitch Head by Guy Bass

This looks like my kind of thing, and Pete Williamson has done the illustrations. Double cool!

Cudweed's Birthday by Marcus Sedgwick

Just had to complete the Raven Mysteries collection. :D

Happy reading everyone!

Review: Secrets at St Jude's - Party Girl by Carmen Reid

2011-09-16T09:13:00.002+01:00

Publisher: Corgi Children's
Format: Paperback
Released: August 4th, 2011
Grade rating: B+

Amazon summary:

The pressure's on this term for the Upper Fifths... There are new boyfriends and new parents on the scene, as well as the dreaded summer exams. But will the girls still find time for fun, and for each other? You can bet on it! A fantastic series full of romance and friendship - and a hefty dose of chick-lit glamour. Boarding school never looked this good!

Review:

Party Girl is the sixth (yes, sixth - where has the time gone?!) instalment in Carmen Reid's fantastically fun St Jude's series aimed at teenage girls. I can only compare it to Enid Blyton's St. Clare's and Malory Towers series for a modern audience, which I hope is a compliment of the highest order. The boarding school setting and ensemble cast of brilliant characters make for incredibly easy, compelling reading, and it's the kind of series that I never want to end. Please keep writing, Carmen!

Party Girl deals with a lot of different themes and issues, most notably missing parents, progressing relationships and looming school exams. Reid's characters, Gina, Min, Niffy and Amy, develop more with each book, which I'm grateful for. Too often a series can fizzle out rather than get better with each new book, but that's not the case here. Every time I finish the girls' latest adventure, I think it's the best yet. Then I read the next one and immediately want to change my mind. There's just something about Reid's portrayal of teen life and everything it brings, whether it be boyfriend trouble, exam anxiety or friendship issues. I could read these books forever!

I seem to remember reading that Carmen Reid will be writing a couple more St Jude's books. I'm so, so happy about this as I'm in no way ready to leave Gina and Co. yet. I need to find out what happens with her and Dermot, and whether Min aces her exams. I did miss Niffy's trademark pranks in Party Girl, and I'm hoping they'll be back in full force in the next book. I'm pretty sure I always say this, but if you're a teenage girl and have enjoyed books by the likes of Louise Rennison in the past, you definitely need to read this series. It's consistently entertaining and always a pleasure to read. Long live St Jude's!

GIVEAWAY: Win Signed Copies of Sister, Missing by Sophie McKenzie! (UK only)

2011-09-14T20:16:00.001+01:00

Sister, Missing, the highly anticipated to Sophie's bestselling Girl, Missing, is published in the UK tomorrow and the lovely folks over at Simon & Schuster UK are very kindly letting me give away some signed copies! I have five (5) up for grabs, signed by Sophie herself. Here's more info about the series - no spoilers, of course:

Lauren has always known she was adopted but when a little research turns up the possibility that she was snatched from an American family as a baby, suddenly Lauren's life seems like a sham. How can she find her biological parents? And are her adoptive parents really responsible for kidnapping her? She manages to wangle a trip across the Atlantic where she runs away to try and find the truth. But the circumstances of her disappearance are murky and Lauren's kidnappers are still at large and willing to do anything to keep her silent...

Rules & info:

Open to UK residents only.
End date: September 25th, 2011.
One entry per person.
You do NOT have to follow my blog to enter.
Books will be sent out by the publisher.

To enter, just fill in the form below. Good luck!

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Review: Ten Things We Shouldn't Have Done by Sarah Mlynowski

2011-09-13T20:06:00.003+01:00

Publisher: Orchard
Format: Paperback
Released: August 4th, 2011
Grade rating: B+

Amazon summary:

April and her best friend, Vi, are living by themselves. Of course, April's parents don't know that. They think she's living with Vi and Vi's mum. But it's not April's fault that her dad decided to move away in the middle of high school. So who could blame her for a little white lie? Or the other nine things that April (probably) shouldn't have done that year...

Review:

Ten Things We Shouldn't Have Done is such a fun, realistic contemporary novel, and is one of the best I've read this year. Each character is engaging and different, and their interwoven stories all kept me reading well past my bedtime. I remember I was at work wishing I could go home and see what happened next - I haven't had that feeling for a while!

Ten Things We Shouldn't Have Done is Sarah Mlynowski's second YA book to be published in the UK, and I hope to read Gimme A Call sometime soon. She has a great writing style and knows teenagers inside out, never compromising their realism or making them seem overly fictional. Her characters get into dodgy situations that teenagers are renowned for and, although the occasional event may seem too exaggerated, for the most part it's all on par with teenagers today.

April, the book's incredibly likeable main character, ends up living with her best friend Vi in her parent-less apartment with room for a new hot tub. April is dating Noah, who is an attractive, seemingly perfect boyfriend. You can imagine what their lives are like when they suddenly find themselves unsupervised and able to do whatever they want - teenage chaos ensues, and it's not always pretty. There are of course lots of laughs, and I still can't believe some of the stuff they got up to. This book is definitely very well titled!

I read Ten Things We Shouldn't Have Done when I just wanted something light and quick to lose myself in. It was exactly that, with more drama and more character development than I originally thought. I won't hesitate to read new Mlynowski books in the future, as I really enjoyed this one and still feel a little bereft at having finished April's story. Check it out if you're a fan of straight-up modern contemporaries - you won't be disappointed!

In My Mailbox #138: New Books This Week

2011-09-11T12:41:00.001+01:00

In My Mailbox idea from Kristi @ The Story Siren, and all links take you to Amazon. Click images for a bigger picture!

I had another great week this week - I especially can't wait to read Mister Creecher and Liesl and Po. (I've had proof copies for a while but haven't got round to them!) Sadly I hardly got any reading done this week, but I blame work!

Here's what was in my mailbox:

For review:

The Mortal Instruments gift set by Cassandra Clare

Great Stories from British History by Geraldine McCaughrean and Richard Brassey

The Story of the Olympics by Richard Brassey

The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller

Mister Creecher by Chris Priestley

The Complete Philosophy Files by Stephen Law

The Adventures of the New Cut Gang by Philip Pullman

Septimus Heape: Darke by Angie Sage

Steampunk! edited by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant

Liesl and Po by Lauren Oliver

Reel Life Starring Us by Lisa Greenwald (UK proof/ARC)

Dork Diaries: How to Dork Your Diary by Rachel Renee Russell

~

Bought:

World War II: The Definitive Visual Guide by Richard Holmes

Astonishing X-Men: Gifted by Joss Whedon and John Cassaday

Avatar: An Activist Survival Guide by Maria Wilhelm and Dirk Mathison

Vanish by Sophie Jordan

Bloodlines by Richelle Mead

~

Other:

Green Rider by Kristen Britain (This was free when I pre-ordered Christopher Paolini's Inheritance).

Happy reading!

Review: Scream Street #12 - Secret of the Changeling by Tommy Donbavand

2011-09-09T20:51:00.000+01:00

Publisher: Walker Books
Format: Paperback
Released: July 7th, 2011
Grade rating: A-

Amazon summary:

Just as Luke, Resus and Cleo are working out how to return the fifth relic, a whole new problem presents itself: Eefa Everwell's toddler niece, Poppy, has been replaced by a changeling! And the real Poppy is being held captive in the fairy realm by the evil Crimson Queen...

Review:

After eleven books there's still one thing the Scream Street series hasn't covered: fairies. Luckily book twelve, Secret of the Changeling, is here to fix that, and it does so with Donbavand's usual mix of wacky humour. In fact, it almost ends up as a horror parody of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, except this time it's Snow Fright and her Seven Ninja Dwarves. Chuckle!

If you're currently wondering just how the fair folk have ended up in Scream Street, I'll tell you. Poppy, Eefa Everwell's young niece, is replaced by a fairie changeling and is whisked away and held captive by the Crimson Queen. The Crimson Queen is very much like Queen Jadis from Narnia, or at least I thought she was. Basically she's evil and dillusional - everything you could want in a fictional queen!

Luke, Resus and Cleo, Scream Street's finest heroes, set off to save little Poppy, and along the way they encounter many a strange thing. It wouldn't be realistic if they didn't! It's a mad book, of course, but it's funny, clever and exactly what you've come to expect from this series. I love it!

Review: Hunting Lila by Sarah Alderson

2011-09-08T19:34:00.000+01:00

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's
Format: Paperback
Released: August 4th, 2011
Grade rating: A-

Amazon summary:

17-year-old Lila has two secrets she's prepared to take to the grave. The first is that she can move things just by looking at them. The second is that she's been in love with her brother's best friend, Alex, since forever. After a mugging exposes her unique ability, Lila decides to run to the only people she can trust - her brother and Alex. They live in Southern California where they work for a secret organisation called The Unit, and Lila discovers that the two of them are hunting down the men who murdered her mother five years before. And that they've found them. In a world where nothing and no one is quite as they seem, Lila quickly realises that she is not alone - there are others out there just like her - people with special powers -and her mother's killer is one of them...

Review:

I wasn't sure what to expect from Hunting Lila. I knew it was a paranormal thriller, but I didn't know how much would be paranormal and how much would be thriller. I certainly didn't expect to love it as much as I did, but I'm still thinking about it a fortnight later. There are certain characters (Alex, ahem) that just won't leave my head, and that's obviously testament to how well Alderson wrote them. Or maybe I just have a thing for fictional male characters called Alex?! Hmm, I think I'll stick with my first reason...

Hunting Lila is pretty much everything I could have wanted from a debut novel. I soon got over the fact there are no vampires (hehe) when I realised how quickly I'd been sucked in to the addictive story and Alderson's brilliant writing that accompanies it. I totally believed in every single thing that Lila said or did, and I loved the relationships she had with her brother Jack and his beat friend Alex. These characters had practically all grown up together, and their bond was like unbreakable steel. Nothing, not even shocking, life-changing revelations, could tear them apart or make them lose faith in each other, and that aspect of the characterisation was by far my favourite. They all seemed so genuine and real, which is something I hadn't seen for a while.

I mentioned earlier that Hunting Lila had a paranormal theme, and it does, though it's not the focus of the entire novel. It's also not one of those twists where you really have to stretch your imagination to make it believable, which was also a nice change. The non-stop action and fast pace helped keep the book moving at a good speed, and I can honestly say there are hardly any slow parts. Or if there are, they're of the excellent romantic kind!

Hunting Lila had plenty of romance, but the kind of romance (and boy) who sweeps you of your feet from its first appearance. The chemistry between Lila and Alex literally sizzled on the page, and the fact that Lila's feelings were seemingly unrequited made the tension even higher. I was on the edge of my seat for a good portion of the book, there was just so much going on and so much to take in. It was very, very exciting!

So far, I've recommended Hunting Lila to everyone I possibly can. It's a fine novel - one of the best of the year - and I can't wait to see what happens next. Alderson has hit the mark with this one, and I'm sure there's someone out there just waiting to award it best debut YA release of 2011. Read it as soon as possible!