Review: Slated by Teri Terry

"Kyla’s memory has been erased,
her personality wiped blank,
her memories lost for ever.

She’s been Slated.

The government claims she was a terrorist, and that they are giving her a second chance - as long as she plays by their rules. But echoes of the past whisper in Kyla’s mind. Someone is lying to her, and nothing is as it seems. Who can she trust in her search for the truth?"

I DEVOURED THIS BOOK.  As in I read the whole thing yesterday after work, skipped yoga, and didn't help with the dinner dishes, and was too lazy to walk and get CANDY when it was offered to me to get me away from reading.  Not sorry.

Originality: 7.5- dystopian future, but I liked the spin of having a "clean slate" and basically not knowing anything about the world, like, knives, they are sharp, watch out.

Absurdity: 4- ok ok, but its dystopian!!    I wasn't shocked by much as totally ridiculous, just got swept right along.

Paranormal Romance: 6.  O Ben.  with the you know and easy to please attitude, no wonder all the girls swooned a bit.  Goosie Mama would love the build up to the kiss in this one. 

Harry Potterness: 6.  Couldn't stop.  Do not know if I was just tired and burned out, but this book was just what I needed.

I am currently in a post- Friday Night Lights lull, since I am 7 years late and JUST found it this fall. My life is more empty without Coach and Tami, and for last night, I didn't even think twice that there is nothing left for me to watch on TV.  Book 2- I am on the hunt for you!

Waiting on Wednesday: With All My Soul by Rachel Vincent

What does it mean when your school is voted the most dangerous in America? It's time to kick some hellion butt...After not really surviving her junior year (does "undead" count as survival?), Kaylee Cavanaugh has vowed to take back her school from the hellions causing all the trouble. She's going to find a way to turn the incarnations of Avarice, Envy and Vanity against one another in order to protect her friends and finish this war, once and forever.

But then she meets Wrath and understands that she's closer to the edge than she's ever been. And when one more person close to her is taken, Kaylee realizes she can't save everyone she loves without risking everything she has....(GoodReads).

I CANNOT believe I read all of the Soul Screamer books, and that the final book, book seven comes out this week! This Wednesday I am "waiting on" With All My Soul by Rachel Vincent. Have you read these books? They are fluffy and have one of the most epic mixes of paranormal ideas I have yet come across, but for some reason (aka the Hudson boys) I cannot stop. I hear someone dies in this one, but I most want to see how the love triangles (yes, that is a plural) finish once and for all.

A big thanks to to Jill at Breaking the Spine for hosting WoW, a weekly meme that showcases upcoming publications we are looking forward to. Cheers!

(PS. What are you "waiting on" this week?)

Review: An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

One of my new years resolutions was to read more smart books, and since John Green is a fan favorite in these parts, I made my way once again into the young adult section of the library- Via:

When it comes to relationships, everyone has a type. Colin Singleton’s type is girls named Katherine. He has dated–and been dumped by–19 Katherines. In the wake of The K-19 Debacle, Colin–an anagram-obsessed washed-up child prodigy–heads out on a road trip with his overweight, Judge Judy- loving friend Hassan. With 10,000 dollars in his pocket and a feral hog on his trail, Colin is on a mission to prove a mathematical theorem he hopes will predict the future of any relationship (and conceivably win the girl).

Is anyone surprised I loved it?  Much less heavy (i.e., no painful public hysterical tears) compared to The Fault in Our Stars, but just as funny and engaging as ever! And the math and footnotes. It was just a cool idea.

Originality: 10.  O a book about a teenage boy overcoming a relationship, on a road trip to find himself?  No, you havent read this, this is much better then that.  Satan Pigs, Pink Mansions and tampon string factories combined with mathematical functions which made my brain spin a bit. 

Absurdity: 4. Forget the tampon string factory, this book just feels REAL.

Paranormal Romance: 0/ Teen Romance: 7.  While this book is about all the Katherines, the Dumpers and the Dumpees, it is also about friends, parents, and the expectations and labels  we put upon ourselves.  So much more than romance (but there is implied kissing which was way better then the actual kissing).

Harry Potterness: 10.  Sigh, J Green you did it again.  Your interest with infinite, the future, and what we offer to that and what it means for the individual is very interesting.   I will continue to think on this for awhile, especially in context of the Fault of Our Stars, in my own personal book group in my mind:

 Q. What inspired you to write An Abundance of Katherines?

A. I’m really interested in why we are all so obsessed with mattering–why people in our historical moment are so fixated on fame and notoriety and leaving a legacy. (It says something the word “individual” did not take on its current meaning until the 18th century.) So that was part of it. Also, at some point in your adolescence you become aware that you are not quite so special as you’ve been led to believe, and this is a pretty difficult thing to reconcile, and I wanted to write about a young man who was experiencing that in the most extreme way possible.

This was a laughing rollicking story about friends and growing up, and I loved it.

Review: Evernight by Claudia Gray

Are you distracted by the
basic-cable level style of this cover?
Me too.

Bianca wants to escape.  She's been uprooted from her small hometown and enrolled at Evernight Academy, an eerie Gothic boarding school where the students are somehow too perfect: smart, sleek, and almost predatory. Bianca knows she doesn't fit in. 

Then she meets Lucas. He's not the "Evernight type" either, and he likes it that way. Lucas ignores the rules, stands up to the snobs, and warns Bianca to be careful—even when it comes to caring about him. 

"I couldn't stand it if they took it out on you," he tells Bianca, "and eventually they would." 

But the connection between Bianca and Lucas can't be denied. Bianca will risk anything to be with Lucas, but dark secrets are fated to tear them apart . . . and to make Bianca question everything she's ever believed (GoodReads).

Get ready to revisit the YA of 2009, aka Evernight by Claudia Gray. I read this to prep myself for the new book by Gray Spellcasters, which got a good review at Forever YA, a blog I trust. They are hilarious! And sassy! And like a good hunky lead, just like me! We are tots almost friends. Anywho....on to the book review for Evernight

• Absurdity: 6, only because the boarding school that is really home to supernaturals (or even just vampires) is easy to come across these days in YA books.
• Originality: 5. Middle of the road vampire stuff, but I did like that the main character "outsider" girl at least because part of the center of things, rather than being "special" and "different" and "misunderstood."
• Level of Paranormal Romance: 8. Hitting puberty means wanting to suck your boyfriend's blood, in a pseudo sexual way (since its YA, obvi, its mostly pseudo. Only Gossip Girl characters get it on). Can we also tell all teenagers in books everywhere that "risking it all" for a high school crush will most only make you mortified when you look back in ten years.....?
• Level of Harry-Potter-ness: 2. I gave up on the series after this book and the first half of the second. I like Balthazar because he is a dreamboat, but otherwise I couldn't get behind the series. I think it is because I reached my saturation point for vampire boarding schools somewhere around book two of Vampire Academy, but if I had read this in 2009 when it came out I probably would have felt differently and kept at it. 

Stacking the Shelves: Stay Awhile by Alysia Gray Painter

Good morning and happy Stacking the Shelves! This week I received Stay Awhile by Alysia Gray Painter. The best part, is that I recieved it from the fabulous AGP herself to review! Not only did I love the first two books in this series, Wilfair and Redwoodian (click for my reviews!) I also love emails from AGP. Because they are always hilarous. Many thanks from YAF & WSs to AGP for this read- I cannot wait!

“Stay Awhile” follows Fair, Gomery and Monty Overbove, and Fair’s best pal Sutton Von Hunt as they attempt to find out where the cousins’ mothers might be and why buildings seem to be moving under their own power. 

Several weird discoveries are made during the quartet’s mountain road trip, leading the young hotelier to land on a major decision, and announcement, about the motel’s pool and the futures of her two nice neighbors. 

How she arrives at her life-changer of a decision, and the journeys she and her friends embark on, are in the light-hearted mix. As is Gomery Overbove, who is about a billion times more important in the heiress’s mind than 24,500 gallons of chlorinated water and some old diving board. (GoodReads).

Another thanks is due, this time to Tynga's Reviews for hosting Stacking the Shelves, a way to highlight the new reads we have picked up!  What is new on your shelves this weekend?

PS- How cute are the posters for the books!?


  

A Non-official Book Club! Or " In Which Grad Student Drinks Wine and Eats Tapas with Friends from High School"

So this past Wednesday I met up with two lovely friends from high school to talk about Looking for Alaska by John Green. Last month we had convinced our respective boyfriends/fiances/husbands to go on a triple dinner date. The highlights of this included 1. eating dinner next to the blonde and the lady of Lady Antebellum (I heart NYC) and 2. discovering that none of us girls had read Looking for Alaska. We decided to book-club it up and in record time all finished the book.

Some notes:

• none of us could definitely say what the characters look like. Is this good or bad?
• one friend found the first half of the book snooze-worthy.
• I shared that I laughed out loud on the subway at the fried burritos.
• We had a big debate about mental health and whether we agreed with Miles's analysis of Alaska. We saw far more signs of depression in her.
• Everybody really liked Miles's favorite class, religion. We had a nice discussion about how that class is important to the story, and both how the characters and the readers search for understanding about the book's big turning point.

 And all this happened at this cool bar The Barrel near Astor Place. Where happy hour runs all night at the bar. Which means wine. Huzzah!

I still appreciate Well Read Ryan Gosling

We are going to continue on our faux book club with An Abundance of Katherines, which means it is sort of a faux John Green book club. I could think of worse ideas!

Review: Girl of Nightmares by Kendare Blake

Guys, Girl of Nightmares by Kendare Blake was SCARY. It took me a while to read this book, not because it wasn't awesome (oh, I love Cass's voice) but I couldn't read it right before bed. I would get scared. I cannot even TELL you what the forest scene did with my overactive imagination. Nevertheless, I am happy I read this sequel. (See my review of Anna Dressed in Blood! Thanks for being awesome, Cas). 

It's been months since the ghost of Anna Korlov opened a door to Hell in her basement and disappeared into it, but ghost-hunter Cas Lowood can't move on.  His friends remind him that Anna sacrificed herself so that Cas could live—not walk around half dead. He knows they're right, but in Cas's eyes, no living girl he meets can compare to the dead girl he fell in love with.

Now he's seeing Anna everywhere: sometimes when he's asleep and sometimes in waking nightmares. But something is very wrong...these aren't just daydreams. Anna seems tortured, torn apart in new and ever more gruesome ways every time she appears.

Cas doesn't know what happened to Anna when she disappeared into Hell, but he knows she doesn't deserve whatever is happening to her now. Anna saved Cas more than once, and it's time for him to return the favor (GoodReads).

Originality: 9. I don't read a lot of ghost stories, but all of the magic feels original. In particular Cas's powers and Thomas's magic avoids feeling cliche. Bravo! 
Absurdity: 3. I am in to the paranormal aspects, but a couple of points go to teens being allowed to go to Europe without adult supervision. Eye roll!
Level of Paranormal Romance: 3. A ghost hunter pining after his ghost girlfriend who passed to the other side (so is she dead x 2? hmmm). But Anna and Cas do not get share feelings etc., so this score is low, but this does not mean that Cas's feelings are unaffecting. They are!
Level of Harry-Potterness: 5. This book is dark, something like the end of the HP series, and I think the cadence of the writing is striking. Get involved!

PS. Do you think the series is over? Or is there space for more?

Waiting on Wednesday: Infinityglass by Myra McEntire

Do I want to read the third Hourglass series book!? You bet! I just have to wait until July to get my hands on Infinityglass by Myra McEntire.  I bet you want to read it to, since Kaleb is delicious. ( See my review of book two, Timepiece, here!)

The stakes have risen even higher in this third book in the Hourglass series.
The Hourglass is a secret organization focused on the study of manipulating time, and its members — many of them teenagers -­have uncanny abilities to make time work for them in mysterious ways. Inherent in these powers is a responsibility to take great care, because altering one small moment can have devastating consequences for the past, present, and future. But some time trav­elers are not exactly honorable, and sometimes unsavory deals must be struck to maintain order.

With the Infinityglass (central to understanding and harnessing the time gene) at large, the hunt is on to find it before someone else does. But the Hourglass has an advantage. Lily, who has the ability to locate anything lost, has determined that the Infinityglass isn't an object. It's a person. And the Hourglass must find him or her first. But where do you start searching for the very key to time when every second could be the last? (GoodReads).

 Thanks to Jill at Breaking the Spine for hosting WoW, a weekly meme that showcases upcoming publications we are looking forward to. What made your WoW this week?

Top Ten Tuesday: Books We Bought...But Still Have Not Read

This is my version.
Look at the eye patch!

Hellllloooooooooooooo book bloggers! It is Tuesday again (the days of the week are wont to do that, to come each week and all). That means its Top Ten Tuesday hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. This week's TTT is dedicated to books we felt like we HAD to buy...but are still sitting on our shelves. Unread. OPPS!  Since we are dedicated library users, this is not too long a list for any of us. And I feel proud!

Grad Student:

1. Ulysses by James Joyce. Has anyone ever gotten through this book other than English majors? Oye, it is hard! But I bought it at the Strand, NYC's ultimate independent bookstore (full disclosure: I felt like a hipster doing it. Soooooo intellectual. And then I failed to read it).
2. Grey Eyes by Brandon Alston. It was free. I felt I needed it. I can't even tell you what it is about yet!
3. Sweet Venom by Tera Lynn Childs. I WANTED this, but I haven't read it yet.

Crazy Camper:

1. A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. This is classic, but somehow I cannot begin to read it. (Editors comment, aka Grad Student: CC thought this book was called A Conference of Dunces. That proves her " I cannot begin to read it" point all too well.)

Goosie Mama:

1. Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith.

Review: Blood Ties by Pamela Freeman (Castings #1)

For a change of pace I thought to myself, CC, READ A BOOK FROM THE ADULT SECTION OF THE LIBRARY.  So what did I do? Beeline towards the fantasy section. sigh, the best intentions.

A thousand years ago, the Eleven Domains were invaded and the original inhabitants forced on the road as Travelers, belonging nowhere, welcomed by no-one.   Now the Domains are governed with an iron fist by the Warlords, but there are wilder elements to the landscape which cannot be controlled and which may prove their undoing. Some are spirits of place, of water and air and fire and earth. Some are greater than these. And some are human.

Bramble: a village girl, whom no-one living can tame ... forced to flee from her home for a crime she did not commit. 

Ash: apprentice to a safeguarder, forced to kill for an employer he cannot escape. 

Saker: an enchanter, who will not rest until the land is returned to his people. 

As their three stories unfold, along with the stories of those whose lives they touch, it becomes clear that they are bound together in ways that not even a stonecaster could foresee - bound by their past, their future, and their blood.

This is full fledged fantasy, new worlds, magic, ghosts, and it was totally enthralling.

Originality: 8, its hard to build new worlds, but this one is great, somehow still becomes real without the pages of Tolkien and R.R. Martin's descriptions of things likes cloaks and feasts (THANK YOU FREEMAN!)
Absurdity: 5, its fantasy, so by design it is totally absurd, just accept the genre.
Paranormal Romance: 3.  This is not the point of this book.   I am sure a few people were mislead by the "adult" label, but there are no sweaty palms, beating hearts and low cut corsets in this book.
Harry-Potterness: 8.  This book switches points of few between the main characters, and the side characters in a way that builds the world without tedious descriptions, and I found it clever and unique.  It kept the story moving fast and kept me hooked.

I would recommend this book to anyone who has ever enjoyed a good Rand O'Thor novel.... and if you don't know who that  is: WHEEL OF TIME, prepare to lose a few years of your life, I did circa 2007-2009.

Review: Through the Ever Night by Veronica Rossi

It's been months since Aria last saw Perry. Months since Perry was named Blood Lord of the Tides, and Aria was charged with an impossible mission. Now, finally, they are about to be reunited. But their reunion is far from perfect. The Tides don't take kindly to Aria, a former Dweller. And with the worsening Aether storms threatening the tribe's precarious existence, Aria begins to fear that leaving Perry behind might be the only way to save them both.

Threatened by false friends, hidden enemies, and powerful temptations, Aria and Perry wonder, Can their love survive through the ever night? (GoodReads)

Through the Ever Night by Veronica Rossi was good but not great, interesting but not absorbing. This was a pleasant diversion, but it did not suck me in the way the Under the Never Sky did. (See my review!)

• Level of Originality: 7. Rossi brings fantasy and dystopia together in a cool way. Out in the wilds live in-tune-to-nature-types with magical abilities (aka mindreading) while inside the pods is a modernistic dystopian world where people live out of most of their lives in simulated internet worlds called the Realms. In one book!
• Level of Absurdity: 4. Not much jumps out (although not much jumped out about this read in general) but I can point out that it seems like Aria and Perry are the only two people wandering the empty plains of their world. They run into each other more often than not.
• Level of Paranormal Romance: I liked most the evolution of the relationship between Aria and Roar. Perry is hunky and all, but its good to see an author balance a romance with developing friendships/alliances. P.S.: Having said that, and not that it isn't great to have boys and girls be friends and all, but can anyone else see Roar and Aria together? This girl is into that idea!
• Level of Harry Potter-ness: 4. Nothing stood out to me about this book, but I still like the story and will find out what happens in the next one.

Waiting on Wednesday: Antigoddess by Kendare Blake

Happy Waiting on Wednesday! Thank GOD it is halfway through the week- these newly dark mornings are brut-aaaaaalllll. Monday should have been National Sleep-In Day. Anywhosewhatsie, this week I am waiting on Antigoddess by Kendare Blake. Right now Girl of Nightmares is scaring the you-know-what out of me after dark, but I love her writing! 

Old Gods never die…Or so Athena thought. But then the feathers started sprouting beneath her skin, invading her lungs like a strange cancer, and Hermes showed up with a fever eating away his flesh. So much for living a quiet eternity in perpetual health.


Desperately seeking the cause of their slow, miserable deaths, Athena and Hermes travel the world, gathering allies and discovering enemies both new and old. Their search leads them to Cassandra—an ordinary girl who was once an extraordinary prophetess, protected and loved by a god. These days, Cassandra doesn’t involve herself in the business of gods—in fact, she doesn’t even know they exist. But she could be the key in a war that is only just beginning.

Because Hera, the queen of the gods, has aligned herself with other of the ancient Olympians, who are killing off rivals in an attempt to prolong their own lives. But these anti-gods have become corrupted in their desperation to survive, horrific caricatures of their former glory. Athena will need every advantage she can get, because immortals don’t just flicker out.

Every one of them dies in their own way. Some choke on feathers. Others become monsters. All of them rage against their last breath. The Goddess War is about to begin (GoodReads).

This books hits the shelves in September. As always, a big thanks to Breaking the Spine for hosting Waiting on Wednesday, a weekly book blog event that showcases upcoming releases we want to get ASAP. What are you "waitin' on?"

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Books on the TBR for Spring 2013

It's time for Top Ten Tuesday again, and it is my favorite type of TTT. This week's list is devoted to "Books On Our Spring 2013 TBR List" which means I can't wait to read everyone else's lists and get tons of ideas of new books I should know about.

Grad Student:
1. Requiem by Lauren Oliver
2. Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver ( clearly on an Oliver kick)
3. The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith.--What is taking me so long!?
4. The Uninvited Guests by Sadie Jones: "Contemporary readers will find much to relish in this brilliant pastiche of the greats of Victorian and Edwardian literature. Deftly composed with liberal sprinklings of acerbic wit, finely rendered pathos, and spine-tingling horror, The Uninvited Guests is a once-again triumphant work by a new and celebrated author." YES please!

Crazy Camper:

5. Everything by John Green I have not yet read- Starting with An Abundance of Katherines, Paper Towns, Looking for Alaska...

6. I am the Messenger by Markus Zusak- because I loved The Book Thief, and it helps me towards my resolution for 2013 of reading more smart books 

As always a big cheers of our whiskey sours to The Broke and the Bookish for hosting TTT, our fav weekly book blog meme!
                     

UPDATE: Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell

So back in January we first got wind of Eleanor & Park via NPR and became excited....it was a WOW.

NOW, this weekend, I was browsing John Green's blog, and saw this post:

"I reviewed the extraordinary new novel ELEANOR AND PARK in the New York Times Book Review

If you read a lot, you can get jaded. You can forget how a reader has to be generous to a book as much as a book has to be generous to its reader. You feel like maybe everything worth doing has been done, and nothing will ever blow you away ever again.

And then you read a book like Eleanor and Park, and you are shocked out of your complacency and grateful to be alive. As you can tell from my review in the New York Times Book Review, I really love this book. Months later, I’m still thinking about it.

You’re gonna love it, too. Read it. "

John Green loved it.  Remember when recommended the Book Thief and we all laughed, cried and wanted to hug it ( the book, we wanted to hug an inanimate object).  But what really sealed the deal for me? This quote from John's Review.

On the importance of Hand Holding:

"The hand-holding, by the way, is intense. “Holding Eleanor’s hand was like holding a butterfly. Or a heartbeat.” Evocative sensual descriptions are everywhere in this novel, but they always feel true to the characters."

Stacking the Shelves: Historical Fiction and YA Fun

Good Morning and happy weekend! Its time again for us to join Tynga's Reviews for Stacking the Shelves, a way to highlight the new reads we have picked up! I have one book from the library, and one from my roommate, a birthday gift (yaaaa getting books as presents).

 Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan looks ADORBS and has a great blurb about mysterious twins, creepy mansions, and premonitions---I can't wait.

 My roommate gave Erik Larson's newest historical fiction an American ambassador in Germany witnesses the growing injustices against Jews in 1933 Germany. If you have heard of The Devil in the White City, Larson's insanely good historical fiction about the 1893 Chicago Worlds Exposition and a Jack the Ripper-esque serial killer, this is the same author. The blurb for In The Garden of Beasts is long, but check out this section: 

"Suffused with the tense atmosphere of the period, and with unforgettable portraits of the bizarre Göring and the expectedly charming--yet wholly sinister--Goebbels, In the Garden of Beasts lends a stunning, eyewitness perspective on events as they unfold in real time, revealing an era of surprising nuance and complexity. The result is a dazzling, addictively readable work that speaks volumes about why the world did not recognize the grave threat posed by Hitler until Berlin, and Europe, were awash in blood and terror" (GoodReads)

These books couldn't be more different, but as we like to say at Young Adult Fiction and Whiskey Sours, we are omnivorous readers! :-) What books are new to your shelves this week?

Review: Scarlet by Marissa Meyer

Scarlet by Marissa Meyer = Fabulous, fabulous! I want more Meyer! This second installment in the Lunar Chronicles kicked butt. Cinder still rocks (now with a great sidekick) and we added Scarlet to the awesome. She is from the French countryside (a place that I am in love with) and serious shizz is going down--her grandmother has gone missing.

The fates of Cinder and Scarlet collide as a Lunar threat spreads across the Earth... Cinder, the cyborg mechanic, returns in the second thrilling installment of the bestselling Lunar Chronicles. She's trying to break out of prison—even though if she succeeds, she'll be the Commonwealth's most wanted fugitive.

Halfway around the world, Scarlet Benoit's grandmother is missing. It turns out there are many things Scarlet doesn't know about her grandmother or the grave danger she has lived in her whole life. When Scarlet encounters Wolf, a street fighter who may have information as to her grandmother's whereabouts, she is loath to trust this stranger, but is inexplicably drawn to him, and he to her. As Scarlet and Wolf unravel one mystery, they encounter another when they meet Cinder. Now, all of them must stay one step ahead of the vicious Lunar Queen Levana, who will do anything for the handsome Prince Kai to become her husband, her king, her prisoner (GoodReads).

• Absurdity: 10. Scarlet is officially insane with the Red Riding Hood retelling. Nana was a pilot in space and has been kidnapped, potentially by a gang with wolf nicknames!? Add in heavy sci-fi with hover crafts, robots, Lunars annnnnndddd secret laboratories  This is crazy but Meyer tells a good story, so bring it on.
• Originality: 7. so, so high for a retelling. I love how Cinder and Scarlett's stories intersected and the whole sci-fi world of genetic mutations and mental powers and robots was super fun and interesting.
• Level of Paranormal Romance: 8. I bet you a handsome, genetically modified wolf-man and raise you a couple of attractive ladies born on the moon, and will throw in some mind control powers for good measure. *****spikes the mic and walks out*****
• Level of Harry Potter-ness: 8 I did not have to push my way through this story: it totally sucked me in and kept me up late because it was awesome. Sounds like HP, no? Get reading!

Waiting on Wednesday: Across a Star-Swept Sea & Among the Namesless Stars by Diana Peterfreund

Us Girls at YAF&WS loved, loved, For Darkness Shows the Stars by Diana Peterfreund. This novel, Across a Star-Swept Sea is a companion novel that we can't wait to get our hands on.

"Centuries after wars nearly destroyed civilization, the two islands of New Pacifica stand alone, a terraformed paradise where even the Reduction—the devastating brain disorder that sparked the wars—is a distant memory. Yet on the isle of Galatea, an uprising against the ruling aristocrats has turned deadly. The revolutionaries’ weapon is a drug that damages their enemies’ brains, and the only hope is rescue by a mysterious spy known as the Wild Poppy.

On the neighboring island of Albion, no one suspects that the Wild Poppy is actually famously frivolous aristocrat Persis Blake. The teenager uses her shallow, socialite trappings to hide her true purpose: her gossipy flutternotes are encrypted plans, her pampered sea mink is genetically engineered for spying, and her well-publicized new romance with handsome Galatean medic Justen Helo… is her most dangerous mission ever. Though Persis is falling for Justen, she can’t risk showing him her true self, especially once she learns he’s hiding far more than simply his disenchantment with his country’s revolution and his undeniable attraction to the silly socialite he’s pretending to love. His darkest secret could plunge both islands into a new dark age, and Persis realizes that when it comes to Justen Helo, she’s not only risking her heart, she’s risking the world she’s sworn to protect. 


In this thrilling adventure inspired by The Scarlet Pimpernel, Diana Peterfreund creates an exquisitely rendered world where nothing is as it seems and two teens with very different pasts fight for a future only they dare to imagine"

And if you cant get enough, how about this novella, since we love Kai, Among the Nameless Stars:

" Before Kai joined the Cloud Fleet, he wandered… AMONG THE NAMELESS STARS.

Four years before the events of FOR DARKNESS SHOWS THE STARS, the servant Kai left the North Estate, the only home he’d ever known, and Elliot North, the only girl he ever loved, in search of a better life. But the journey was not an easy one."

 Thanks to Jill at Breaking the Spine for hosting WoW, a weekly meme that showcases upcoming publications we are looking forward to. What made your WoW this week?

Top Ten Tuesday: Series We'd Like To Start But Haven't Yet

Happy Tuesday! Per usual we are participating in Top Ten Tuesday which this week is about series we know we should get involved with but have not started yet. Tell us what you think, and share your TTT!

Grad Student

1. The Goddess Test by Aimee Carter. I heard her talk and she was so charming, I bet I will like this series.
2. The Chronicles of Amber series by Roger Zelazny (BIG TIME ten-book fantasy series).
3. The Dust Land Series by Moira Young. I hear amazing things, and I could use a new Dystopian series when Delirum ends.

Crazy Camper

4. Delirium series by Lauren Oliver. I may the last one left who hasn't read it.

5. The Watchers series by Peter Lerangis  - selected by the American Library Association as a 1999 Best Book for Reluctant Young Adult Readers.

6. James Patterson's Maximum Ride series. Kids with wings? Saving the World? why not.

7. Ashfall by Mike Mullin. A series about a super volcano in Yellowstone, eh? This book had me at the mention of a National Park.

As always a big cheers of our whiskey sours to The Broke and the Bookish for hosting TTT, our fav weekly book blog meme!

Review: The Lost Prince by Julie Kagawa

The cover on my Nook edition was NOT
as mortifying as the original, but still,
it makes little sense re: the plot.

The Lost Prince by Julie Kagawa has some good moments, but overall it felt like a book I had already read. I wanted to know more about this series, which is officially called The Iron Fey: Call of the Forgotten, but we got very little about who the Forgotten are and what they want. I feel like I read a prologue, not an entire book.

Don’t look at Them. Never let Them know you can see Them. That is Ethan Chase’s unbreakable rule. Until the fey he avoids at all costs—including his reputation—begin to disappear, and Ethan is attacked. Now he must change the rules to protect his family. To save a girl he never thought he’d dare to fall for.

Ethan thought he had protected himself from his older sister’s world—the land of Faery. His previous time in the Iron Realm left him with nothing but fear and disgust for the world Meghan Chase has made her home, a land of myth and talking cats, of magic and seductive enemies. But when destiny comes for Ethan, there is no escape from a danger long, long forgotten (GoodReads).

• Originality: 2. Oh wait, is the Nevernever plagued by an all-powerful new type of fairy? Yup. Does it sound exactly like the Iron Fey series except now rather than Iron they are all smokey unknown fairies? Yup. Also, how many quests through The Nevernever can people in a series take? This format isn't bad, but Meghan quested, Ash and Puck quested, and now Ethan.
• Absurdity: 9. There is a big mix of traveling across the world from fairies in Ireland (which I can get behind) to fairies in Central Park (which is super-weird to me and has already been done. See my review of the Wondrous Strange series). Not to mention it was SUPER obvious who Keirran was. COME ON PEOPLE use your brains. 
• Level of Paranormal Romance: 2. Our players are not supernatural, but they fall for each other in fairyland, so that has to count for something. I knew it would happen, enjoyed the effects, but do not have much to report.
• Level of Harry Potterness: 3. A particularly boiler plate coming of age quest/adventure. I flew through this book. I will keep reading the series but its the type of book that really I can read at the same time as something else.

FTC Full Disclosure: I received a review copy from Harlequin Limited. Happy reading followed. (We do not accept or receive compensation for reviews at YAF and WS.) 

Stacking the Shelves: Bringing My A Game to the Library

Stacking the Shelves- not so new but totally amazing edition. People, I FINALLY got my hands on Girl of Nightmares by Kendare Blake, The Diviners by Libba Bray, and, AND, AND (caps for excitement) Scarlet by Marissa Meyer. I going to read this one first, no questions asked, but these three books are destined to get me out of my mediocre book slump as of late.

                  
What is new to your shelves? And a shout out to Tynga's Reviews for hosting Stacking the Shelves, a way to highlight the new reads we have picked up (in this case from the library :-))