In My Mailbox

In My Mailbox is a weekly meme hosted every Sunday over at The Story Siren. A great meme which allows bloggers to share what they receive/buy/borrow each week. 

Evening everyone. It's 22:17 so I'm sorry this is so late, I have had a busy work day at the art gallery.

So lets get to it!!

In My Mailbox this week I got:~

Starcrossed

Josephine Angelini

Blood Magic

Tessa Gratton

Sky Hawk

Gill Lewis

Delirium

Lauren Oliver



Mercy

Rebecca Lim

I'll be sure to add more information on the books tomorrow and try to get a video up!

Happy reading everyone!!

Low Red Moon Review

low red moon

Ivy Devlin

September 2010

Opening Line: 'I was covered in blood when the police found me.'

Closing Line: '"I do now", he said, and then he kissed me again, his smiling mouth matching my own.'

Favourite Quote: "I've seen into the forest, way inside, back where people don't go. My mother loved to look at it, would sit outside and watch birds and look at the trees, look far back as she could. And she let me look too. There's something there. Something old and strong, and people won't ever - there will always be woods here. Woodlake isn't - it's different. There is something stronger than humans here."

~Avery~

I must say, this is one of the prettiest books I've ever had! I know we shouldn't judge a book by it's cover, but we all do it!! It has a metallic red cover with embossed lettering and as you open the book there is a beautiful red image spanning two pages. Each page number is red along with the book title and author's name. Each chapter has a red tree and moon and in the bottom corner of most pages is a little red tree scene. Just Beautiful!!

I think the title of this book speaks for itself, yes you guessed, moon = wolf!!
In Low Red Moon Devlin has created a perfect paranormal, murder mystery, romance and I totally loved it!!!!

Avery Hood's world is torn apart after she is found with her parents bodies in the forest she grew up in, but she can't remember what happened. All she can recall is the colour silver moving 'inhumanly' fast. The trauma of her parents murder has caused Avery to block out the details of that night, no matter what she does to remember she just can't. And she is forced to live with Renee, the grandmother she hardly knows away from the forest she knows and loves.

As she deals with the loss of her parents Avery meets the new boy in town who understands what she is going through. Ben, has moved into the forest to live with his uncle not far from where Avery use to live. The two are drawn to each other in a way that can't be explained, Avery knows there is something different about Ben after seeing a glint of silver in normally brown eyes. Ben is a wolf! But Avery isn't completely normal herself! She is tied to the forest, she even acquires a red streak in her hair and knows when the forest is hurting. I love how Devlin has included the forest as a character in this story and given it a voice through Avery Hood.

I love the relationship between Avery and Ben, their want and need for each other is so strong it pours off the pages and I hated it when they were apart! I also liked the fact that, although they could tell how the other felt, Avery still isn't fully sure what Ben is able to do in wolf form, it doesn't help that he can't remember what he does in wolf form which always seems to fall on the night of a murder.
I also really liked how the relationship grew between Avery and her grandmother, it gave me a real sense of now matter what has happened family is always family. It was clear Renee had her own secrets which became clear as the story went on.

I was totally hooked before I even got to the end of the first page of this book!! What a great opening!! I found myself dragged into the story and like Avery I desperately wanted to know what had happened and who was behind the killings! With only a hand full of characters in the book I had my suspicions, but boy was I wrong!! And I was totally shocked when I discovered who was behind the deaths!
With all the twists and secrets and shocks I can't wait for the next book, with the way this one ended there has to be another!

5/5 Stars. Why? Because Devlin has created a new paranormal romance with the right amount of mystery, suspense, and a love story like no other!! A must read and an author I'll be keeping both eyes on!!

Inside Out Review

                                                                                                                                                                                     
               Inside Out by Maria V. Snyder

Review by Ni_kii

                            My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Trella is a scrub. A scrub is a cleaner in the lower regions. In the lower regions live thousands of people who are basically slaves. They each have a job and a shift pattern where they work half the day and sleep half the day. Scrubs have no families or living quarters. They have an assigned bed, which they share with a person who works on the opposite shift pattern, and all babies are taken away from their parents, at birth, and put into care homes where they are trained for future jobs. Trella is known as Queen of the Pipes as she like to spend her spare time in the pipes which separate the lower and upper regions rather than spend it with her fellow scrubs. In the upper regions live the more privileged people who are allowed families and proper homes. It is the hope of every scrub to get to the upper regions or the mythical gateway that leads to Outside (no one actually knows what is on the outside..)
The story begins with the Broken man (a man in a wheelchair) trying to get Trella, through her friend Cog, to help him with his quest to find the Gateway. Of course such talk is not allowed by the "Pop-Cops" (Population Control police who run the lower regions and enforce the rules) and they try to arrest the Broken man. Knowing that he will be sent to the Chomper (literally a machine which minces up unruly scrubs) Trella and Cog hide him away in a forgotten place which has been discovered by Trella on her travels. The Pop-cops search the lower regions for the Broken man, suspecting Cob and Trella as his rescuers. After Cob is arrested, and scheduled for execution, is up to Trella to try to get to the Gateway and hopefully save her friend. Along the way she gains support in unexpected places, especially from an upper named Riley.

I enjoyed this book but it took a blooming long-time to even start liking it! I started the book treating it as a Young Adult. By the end of it I had decided that I wouldn't sort it as a Young Adult on my shelves. The lead character, Trella, is a young adult (don't ask me how old....I gave up trying to figure out how these people measure time about 2 chapters in. It would take a calculator to work out everyones age and I hate math...Im not going to start doing it for a book!) and the book is written from her POV. This does, at points, give a Young Adult flavour to the tale. However this is where the young adult aspects start and end. The writing is fabulous but incredibly detailed and elaborate. I suggest you treat this book like Inception the movie - you skip details and you will get lost! The world building is probably the best I have seen since Iones' Demonica series and I loved this dystopian world. The mild romance was lovely to see build and I liked the fact that you saw it coming before the characters did, it was sweet. However the unnderlying themes were DARK. First the segregation between the classes was horrible. Yes it turned out that life wasn't as hunky-dory as believed in the upper region, but there was still a massive difference. The torture that went on for information was just plain evil, as was the casual disregard for life that was shown by the feeding of the scrubs to the "Chomper." The separation of families from their children was heartbreaking and the consequences of this entire population essentially being orphans was unthinkable. The whole underlying strands to this world were disturbing and that, along with the complexity of the plot and language, are the reasons I cannot class this as a YA book.

Did I like it? I loved it. It wasn't poison study (which I adored) but it was just as well written. I don't think I truly managed to get my head around the structure of the world until the end, but the amount of creativity and thought that went into its creation is astounding. It took me a while to warm to Trella. Occaisionally she bordered on obnoxious bint rather than strong-female, but I began to see that as a product of her upbringing and accepted it. I loved Riley. He was so sweet and brave....I always think that if a book, written in first person, can make you love other characters then its a winner. The other characters were likeable enough. One thing I like about Snyders' writing is she doesn't waste space. Every person and scene written had a purpose in driving the plot forward, so the pace never let up.
I enjoyed the romance, I rooted for the cause, I was disturbed by the evilness of the plot and I read it in two sittings. I think that about sums-up how good this book is and I have put the next one on my future reads book....Can I say more than that? :)

View all my reviews

Low Red Moon

Low Red Moon

Ivy Devlin

I am really really liking this book so far! The story has really got me, and I can't wait to read more tonight!

I must also say, this is one of the prettiest books I've ever had! I know we shouldn't judge a book by it's cover, but we all do it!! It has a metallic red cover with embossed lettering and as you open the book there is a beautiful red image spanning two pages. Each page number is red along with the book title and author's name. Each chapter has a red tree and moon and in the bottom corner of most pages is a little red tree scene.

Just Beautiful!!



Look out for...

...My first 'In My Mailbox' post which is a meme hosted by The Story Siren. Each Sunday bloggers share what they have recieved/bought/borrowed within the week. It a great little meme, please check it out over at The Story Siren.

Tantalize Review

Tantalize

Cynthia Leitich Smith

February 2007

Opening Line: Lousy idea, us sitting like that on the railroad tracks.

Closing Line: "Adios." I told Bradley. "Addio."

Good-bye.

Favourite Quote: "Odds don't matter when a predator beats them."

~Brad~

I hate to do this but I think this review will be short but maybe not so sweet!!

I had been looking at this book for sometime and I ended up getting it after I asked a friend to pick a book for me and my boyfriend bought it me as a gift.



After Quincie Morris and her uncle decide to 'revamp' the family restaurant with a vampire theme trouble soon begins. A month before the opening the chef is killed, the suspect, a werewolf!

The new chef is under pressure to come up with a vampire themed menu as well as look like one, which seems to come a little too easy to him.

I liked several of the characters in this story, Kieren, Quincie's best friend/possible boyfriend/werewolf is my favourite by far!! The story between the two is so believable I just hope they can find a way to be together.

I like Brad's cockiness and the fact he is so sure of himself. He is so underhand when it comes to Quincie and in my eyes it was very clear what he was up to and how the story was going to pan out. This was my problem.

Too much was easy to figure out in this story, I think I was only surprised by one thing, which is a real let down. And another thing I found hard was the fact that there was no real back story to the fact that there are were-creatures and vampires running around town. We get a little insight to Kieren's family but it really is just small and then nothing about anyone or anything else. I found this frustrating.

3/5 Stars. Why? Because it was an OK read and I'm tempted to read the second just because I like Kieren and because of the way this book ended.

Angel Review

Angel

L.A. Weatherly

October 2010

This book surprised me, I was completely expecting to hate it after 30 pages when the POV had shifted a million times but, surprisingly, I loved it. It reminded me a little of the Host and a little of the TV show supernatural.

Alex is an A...moreThis book surprised me, I was completely expecting to hate it after 30 pages when the POV had shifted a million times but, surprisingly, I loved it. It reminded me a little of the Host and a little of the TV show supernatural.

Alex is an Angel Killer. Forced into a life of hunting Angels by his father after an Angel killed his mother (see the resemblances here...!) he finds himself isolated and alone after the CIA take over the operation and force all the Angel Killers to work individually.You see, in this book, Angels are aliens from another dimension who feed on humans life-force, leaving them with "Angel-burn", which is the facination and adoration of these creepy etherial beings, plus the suseptibility to mental degeneration and a whole host of other diseases. His next assignment is Willow, a half-angel (who doesn't know it!) who he can't bring himself to kill. They go on the run together, managing to evade both the Angels and the Church of Angel (a host of creppy fantatics with Angel burn) until it becomes apparent that only Willow can stop the forthcoming invasion.

I adored this book. First thing that I should note about it is it is Young Adult. There is no swearing, no sex and the violence (although incredibly creepy) is not written in a graphic no-holds-barred kind of way. I wouldn't class it as Romance, but as Urban Fantasy as the main storyline consists of the Angels. The romance is sweet and I can see that it will build over the next three books. One of the main critisms that I have read about this book is that it never really reaches that whole next level but, between the main characters finally accepting their feelings and the end of the book, is a period of about a month...I feel it was appropriate for a Young Adult book that they never "get it on". The Angels and their parasitic relationship with the Humans takes up the majority of the plotline and it's creepy. I think if I hadn't have read the Nalini Singh Guildhunter books, and therefore already been introduced to this whole idea that Angels can be as evil as everything else, I would have been more shocked and possibly a little less receptive to what this book is about. It really is a break from the norm!

It takes Willow almost 3/4 of the book to come to terms with her Angel, infact Alex, who has seen most of his family die via Angels, accepts it quicker! The only experiences she has with Angels are bad and it comes as quite a shock to learn she is half this supposed monsterous race. I loved it when she finally accepted that evil is a personal choice, not a genetic one. This was a book filled with personal growth for the characters.

I have just added the next one to my want-to-read list. I can't give it any higher praise than that!!

This book was reviewed by fellow blogger Ni_kii who reviews adult books over at http://scorchingbookreviews.blogspot.com/

Wondrous Strange Review

Wondrous Strange

Lesley Livingston

May 2009

Opening Line: 'Puck's tortured words rang in Kelley's ears as she lifted her head, struggling against the darkness that threatened to descend upon her.'

Closing Line: 'Magic time.'

Favourite Quote: "... I have a social life to maintain, you know. I have a date with an ambassador and you want me to cancel it so I can sit alone in this apartment, performing an equine comb-out."

~Tyff~

Really, really, really, liked it!!!

For sometime now I have been searching for another YA/Teen faerie story that can compete on the same level as Melissa Marr and I think I have found it!!

I liked it so much I was reading while spending time with my boyfriend, who I only see once a week!!

Kelley is living her life as a struggling actress waiting for her chance to be more than just an understudy. Kelley is given her wish and as she practices her lines in her beloved Central Park she meets a very handsome stranger, Sonny Flannery.

Unbeknown to Kelley, Sonny is a changeling, a mortal taken as a child and raised among faerie.

After rescuing a horse from 'drowning' Kelley soon discovers the truth about Sonny and learns that Central Park is hiding a secret. The park is a gateway between the normal world and the faerie's Otherworld and Kelley is about to discover her true heritage.

The story is full of fae lore, which is brilliant for readers like myself who are all ready addicted to faerie stories, but it is explained enough for new comers to the genre and will have you hooked like the rest of us to the fae world. As I said, I really really really enjoyed this story.

Livingston has created a new and original story that, like Kelley's world, is Wondrous! The first half of the story was often comical and flowed smoothly but as we reach the second half of the book the story speeds up a little. This is never a bad thing and I love when a story gets down to the nitty gritty but I often felt things moved a little to quick in the second half of the story and lacked detail.

However, that said the plot was great and although I was able to figure a few things out before they happened I was totally shocked at others. Hand over my mouth shocked!

It is intriguing that Livingston shys away from the general Seelie/Unseeline, Winter and Summer Courts, well, they are there but we are also introduced to the Autumn and Spring Courts as well as the Midsummer monarchs. Again a new twist on an old tale which works so well.

Great characterisation makes a great book and Livingston has achieved that here. In Kelley we have a strong, courageous, determined protagonist who may be a damsel in distress once or twice but I think she gives as good as she gets! And Sonny!! Oh Sonny!! The kick ass faerie killer who steals Kelley's heart, he will steel yours too!

4.5/5 Starts. Why? Because I loved the story and I loved Kelley and Sonny! The only reason this story didn't get 5 stars was because as I said, I felt somethings were a little rushed in the second half of the story which resulted in the loss of detail.

Wondrous Strange

I have about a third of this book left. I will admit to being a little slow with my reading at the moment as I have been working so much. I now have a few days off which will be spent reading and reviewing!

I am really really liking Wondrous Strange so far!! I didn't think I would find another faerie story as good as Melissa Marr's Wicked Lovely series but I think Lesley Livingston's series could be just as good!

Many Books to Read

Hi everyone, I have so many new books to get thorough, I just can't read quick enough. One of the new books I got this week is Iron Witch by Karen Mahoney and the Waterstone's edition has beautiful gold page edges. I can't wait to het started on all my new books!

Reviews

Reviews for books I read now will be posted on my home page, reviews for books I have read in the past will be posted under Midnight Reviews so don't forget to click there and give them a read.

Happy Reading everyone

Currently Reading


Wondrous Strange
Lesley Livingstone

I have been looking forward to reading this book and can't wait to get started, I love faeries at the moment! Melissa Marr started this love with her Wicked Lovely series.

DIE FOR ME Review

DIE FOR ME

Amy Plum

Release date: May 2011

Opening Line: The first time I had seen the statue in the fountain, I had no idea what Vincent was.

Closing Line: All I could do was hold my breath. And wait.

Favourite Quote: "So why don't you just pat yourself on the back for not getting in too deep before you found out, and be on your merry way back to Guyland?"

~Gerogia~

WOW!! WOW!! WOW!!

I was very much looking forward to this book and Plum does not disappoint!!

Set in the most beautiful, romantic, artistic city of the world, Paris finds itself home to newly orphans, Georgia and Kate. After their parents die in a tragic accident the sisters find themselves living in the French captial with their grandparents.

Both deal with the loss of their parents in their own way, Georgia spends her nights clubbing while Kate stays in her room, until the intervention of her Mamie and sister that is.

An intervention that will change her life forever! Kate soon finds herself spending time in art galleries, museums and coffee shops, which is where she first sets eyes on Vincent and her world is turned upside-down. Again.

When Kate falls for the gorgeous and mysterious Vincent she soon learns that Paris is not the safest place on earth.

For Vincent is a 'revenant'. Kate finds herself caught up in his world which sees him risk his life everyday. And as if that wasn't enough Vincent has immortal enemies, one that wish to destroy him and the rest of his kind.

When I pulled this book form the envelope I was more than a little excited, the front cover alone made me want to read it. And after reading the back of the book I knew it was for me.

I more than enjoyed this story, and yes, I read well into the early hours of the morning! I just couldn't put it down! I hated that I had to go to work, I actually found myself thinking of the characters and what was happening to them.

In her debut novel Plum had created a world that readers will become utterly engrossed with. Her attention to detail is truely amazing, which only adds to the romance of her story. I was so engrossed I actually felt like I was in Pairs watching Kate and Vincent's story play out before my eyes.

Plum has found just the right balance of charm, love, tenderness and wit.

Her main characters are strong, with their own sense of being and we are given enough information about the secondary characters that I found myself drawn to them just as much as I was to Vincent and Kate.

I know the author herself stated that the idea behind DIE FOR ME came after she had read Twilight and I know readers will compare the two. But I urge you not to!! They are two very different stories.

DIE FOR ME is a beautiful, haunting, loving story, that is rich in detail and will stay with you long after you have read the last page.

I look forward to reading the second instalment.

5/5 Stars - Why? Because not only is the story unique, Plum's writing is truely magical.



Currently Reading

DIE FOR ME

Amy Plum

I am currently reading debut author Amy Plum's DIE FOR ME which I recieved as a proof copy at the bookshop. I am only nine chapters in and it already has everything I love in a book, strong characters, mystery, love, loss and an amazing setting. Where better than Paris to meet the possible 'man' of your dreams!?



First Post

Hi everyone, this is a new Yonug Adult/Teen review site which is just getting started. Please follow me or pop back to see how the site is progressing. Hopefully it looks nice enough for everyone and it's easy to see things, any feed-back about the site would be more than welcome.

Thank you :)