{Review} Kill Me Softly by Sarah Cross

Title: Kill Me Softly

Author: Sarah Cross

Publisher: EgmontUSA

Release Date: April 10th, 2012
Pages: 335 (e-galley)
Source: NetGalley

Rating: ★★★★☆

Mirabelle Lively's past is shrouded in secrecy, from her parents' tragic deaths to her guardians' half-truths about why she can't return to her birthplace, Beau Rivage. A week before her sixteenth birthday, Mira runs away from home, desperate to find her parents' graves and answers about her past, but in Beau Rivage, nothing is what it seems. There she meets a strange pale girl with a morbid interest in apples, the obnoxious playboy who's a beast to everyone he meets, and the chivalrous guy who has a thing for damsels in distress. Here, fairy tales come to life, curses are awakened, and ancient stories are played out again and again. But fairy tales aren't pretty things, and they don't always end in happily ever after. Mira has a role to play, a fairy tale destiny to embrace or resist. As she struggles to take control of her fate, Mira is drawn to the lives of two brothers with fairy tale curses of their own . . . brothers who share a dark secret. And she'll find that love, just like fairy tales, can have sharp edges and hidden thorns.

{Review} Shattered Souls by Mary Lindsey

Title: Shattered Souls
Author: Mary Lindsey

Publisher: Philomel/Penguin
Series: Souls, #1

Release Date: December 8th, 2011
Pages: 324 (ebook)
Source: Bought

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Lenzi hears voices and has visions─gravestones, floods, a boy with steel gray eyes. Her boyfriend, Zak, can't help, and everything keeps getting louder and more intense. Then Lenzi meets Alden, the boy from her dreams, who reveals that she's a reincarnated Speaker─someone who can talk and help lost souls─and that he has been her Protector for centuries. Now Lenzi must choose between her life with Zak and the life she's destined to lead with Alden. But time is running out: a malevolent spirit is out to destroy Lenzi, and he will kill her if she doesn't make a decision soon.

{Review} Angelfire by Courtney Allison Moulton

Title: Angelfire
Author: Courtney Allison Moulton
Publisher: HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen Books
Series: Angelfire, #1
Release Date: February 15th, 2011
Pages: 453 (Hardcover)
Source: Bought
Rating: ★★★☆☆

Ellie is a normal girl who is haunted by terrifying dreams every night of her being hunted and killed by monstrous creatures. She had no idea those dreams meant something until she met Will. When they meet, she starts to remember things, as if they had known each other before. On her seventeenth birthday, on a dark street at midnight, Will awakens Ellie's powers and she knows that she can fight the creatures that stalk her in the grim darkness. Only Will holds the key to Ellie's memories, whole lifetimes of them, and when she looks at him, she can no longer pretend anything was just a dream. Now Ellie must hunt and kill the reapers that prey on human souls, with the help of Will and her power that no one can match. But in order to survive the dangerous and ancient battle of the angels and the Fallen, she must also hunt for the secrets of her past lives and truths that may be too frightening to remember.

Thoughts: Not gonna lie, I was pretty disappointed.

{Review} Switched by Amanda Hocking

Title: Switched

Author: Amanda Hocking

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Series: Trylle, #1

Release Date: January 3rd, 2012
Pages: 293 (Paperback)
Source: Bought

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆

When Wendy Everly was six years old, her mother was convinced she was a monster and tried to kill her. Eleven years later, Wendy discovers her mother might have been right. She's not the person she's always believed herself to be, and her whole life begins to unravel─all because of Finn Holmes. Finn is a mysterious guy who always seems to be watching her. Every encounter leaves her deeply shaken . . . though it has more to do with her fierce attraction to him than she'd ever admit. But it isn't long before he reveals the truth: Wendy is a changeling who was switched at birth─and he's come to take her home. Now Wendy's about to journey to a magical world she never knew existed, one that's both beautiful and frightening. And where she must leave her old life behind to discover who she's meant to become.

Cover Impressions: It was actually what drew me into the book in the first place, besides the synopsis. But yes, once again, I was fooled by the beauty of the cover, because what's underneath isn't pretty.

Thoughts: It's been a while since a book infuriated me so bad. I think the last book to leave me so flustered was A Beautiful Dark by Jocelyn Davies.  This book wasn't as bad as that trainwreck, but it really did get on my nerves.

So this book is about trolls, which is I guess pretty original. Wendy is one of the Trylle─that's what the trolls are called in this book.  But she also soon finds out that she's a princess, and will soon have to rule the land where the Trylle live in, which is called Förening (which I still have no idea how to pronounce). Wendy's first introduced to royal life in a Princess Diaries-esque way.

What infuriated me about this book was that all the characters expect her to know everything about the Trylle already, when they barely even taught her anything or educated her in any way. Finn sometimes tries to educate her, but Wendy ends up drooling over him and thus they both end up kissing or other romantic stuff that really annoyed me. 

Elora, a.k.a. the Queen and Wendy's real mother, was nothing but a bitch. A bitch who would not stop yelling at Wendy about the stupidest things. A princess does not do this, a princess does not do that. What the hell next? A princess does not blink? Jeez, give the girl a break already. She barely gave Wendy a chance to adjust with Trylle life. Royal Trylle life, at that.

Wendy wasn't totally a TSTL heroine, but she was pretty damn close. When her mother yelled at her, she did nothing but stand there and take it. There were some moments where I sort of liked her, moments where she said the right things, but very few. For the most part, I just really disliked her.

Finn is your typical love interest. At the start, when Wendy was at her school dance, he offered to dance with her and then started to straight up talk shit to her. I'm not kidding. One moment he was perfectly fine and sweet, and then a second later he turns into a complete jackass. If Wendy had slapped him, I would've fallen in love with her. But no, of course, she just runs away crying. But Finn wasn't as bad a jackass after that. He was your typical protective, "It's Too Dangerous To Be Around Me" type hero.

The story was so predictable. I mean, I'm sorry, but, was I supposed to be surprised near the end? Because I wasn't the least bit. I expected that to happen from like, 200 pages back or something. It was perfectly obvious to me.

So I guess to sum it up, I didn't like any of the characters or the story. I suggest you don't pick this up, but I heard from someone that it gets better in the sequel. I might still try the sequel, since I already have a copy, and I also want to see if it really does get better, because I do see some potential in it.

{Review} Wanderlove by Kirsten Hubbard

Title: Wanderlove
Author: Kirsten Hubbard
Publisher: Delacorte BFYR
Release Date: March 13th, 2012
Pages: 335 (e-galley)
Source: NetGalley

Rating: ★★★★★

In a quest for independence, her neglected art and no-strings attached hookups, 18-year-old Bria Sandoval signs up for the Global Vagabonds─a guided tour of Central America. Although it turns out to be the wrong one. Middle-aged tourists with fanny packs are hardly the key to self-rediscovery. When Bria meets Rowan, devoted backpacker and dive instructor, and his outspokenly humanitarian sister Starling, she seizes the chance to ditch her group and join them off the beaten path. Bria's a good girl trying to go bad. Rowan's a bad boy trying to stay good. As they travel across a panorama of Mayan villages, remote Belizean islands, and hostels plagued with jungle beasties, they discover what they've got in common: both seek to leave behind the old versions of themselves. And the secret to escaping the past, Rowan found, is to keep moving forward. But Bria comes to realize she can't run forever, and if she wants the courage to fall for someone worthwhile, she has to start looking back.

Thoughts: This book is actually the first travel/road trip style book that I've ever read, and I'm so glad that I'm not disappointed. It was so much fun to read!

I delved right into this book. Reading the descriptions all made me feel as if I was there, in all those beautiful places. It made me want to start travelling myself, although the last thing I am is outdoorsy.

Bria and Rowan's romance was paced just the way I liked it. And they're both such amazing characters, too, so that helps!

What else I loved about this book was the art. Man, Kirsten Hubbard can draw. I was totally a sucker for her drawings here because there were SO MANY BUTTERFLIES. xD If you've seen my review of Incarnate, you know I have a slight butterfly obsession, and butterflies were everywhere in this book. I wanted to eat them all!

Well . . . okay, that sounds kind of gross. But oh, you know what I mean.

If you also never read any travel/road trip style YA books, I suggest this book to start because it's absolutely fantastic. :D

~

This ARC was given to me by NetGalley and Delacorte Books for Young Readers. Thank you again!

{Review} Paranormalcy by Kiersten White

Title: Paranormalcy
Author: Kiersten White
Publisher: HarperTeen
Series: Paranormalcy, #1
Release Date: September 1st, 2010
Pages: 335 (Hardcover)
Source: Bought

Rating: ★★★★☆

Evie is a girl who works for the International Paranormal Containment Agency (IPCA). She always thought of herself as normal, but she's the only human who can see through the glamours of the paranormals. She has a mermaid best friend, a faerie ex-boyfriend, and a shapeshifter that she's falling for. Paranormals are suddenly dying, and Evie's dreams are filled with haunting voices and mysterious prophecies. She soon realizes that there may be a link between her abilities and the sudden rash of deaths. Not only that, but she may be very well at the center of a dark faerie prophecy promising destruction to all paranormal creatures.

Cover Impressions: I like it but I don't. It's pretty and all, but the model just looks so . . . bored. And the whole setting just feels so gloomy, and this book was far from gloomy.

Thoughts: I kind of had mixed feelings after reading this book. I liked the Hex Hall-esque humor it has, and Evie was a likable and funny heroine. Although she annoyed me at times. I guess it was just because she was such a teenage girl, you know? Her whole entire room in the Center was pink, and she has a pink taser named Tasey. With rhinestones on it.

If Penryn from Angelfall were there, she would say: "It's an inanimate object. Get over it."

Anywho, yeah, so the slight annoyance I had with Evie was a reason that I didn't give the book five stars. Another reason is how cryptic everything was. That whole "Let me fill you" crap really annoyed me, because it was just so gross. It's probably just my dirty mind that's making me feel that way, but ugh. ._. I didn't like it at all.

What I did like in the book was Evie and Lend's romance. It was decently paced, realistic, and fluffy! I couldn't help but grin in a lot of their scenes because it was just so adorable. Bonus points for no love triangle. There could have been one, but to me, Reth was the antagonist here. NOT a love interest. I simply would not consider him a love interest because I hated him so so so so much.

Overall, this book was a fun, fluffy read. I'll definitely continue the series because book one still left me with a lot of unanswered questions.

{Review} Hallowed by Cynthia Hand

One of my most favorite angel books (which aren't really that much). <3

Title: Hallowed
Author: Cynthia Hand
Publisher: HarperTeen
Series: Unearthly, #2
Release Date: January 1st, 2012
Pages: 403 (Hardcover)
Source: Bought

Rating: ★★★★★

For months, Clara Gardner trained to face the fire from her visions, but she wasn't prepared for the choice she had to make that day. And in the aftermath, she discovered that nothing about being part angel is as straightforward as she thought. Now, torn between her love for Tucker and her complicated feelings about the roles she and Christian seem destined to play in a world that is both dangerous and beautiful, Clara struggles with a shocking revelation: Someone she loves will die in a matter of months. With her future uncertain, the only thing Clara knows for sure is that the fire was just the beginning.

Cover Impressions: It's beautiful! I first read this book as an ebook, but recently got the hardcover copy when it finally came out, and I love how it's so shiny. Yet my problem is kind of about the model, because she isn't exactly how I imagined Clara, because she doesn't look like a teenager at all. o_o I do love the covers for this series, though, and also the Australian version covers.

Thoughts: I was an emotional wreck after. This book was so much better than Unearthly─which was already amazing itself.

Clara is a heroine that I can definitely say I love. There's something about her that makes me sympathize with her. I guess it's just the way she thinks about things is just . . . Gah, it's hard to explain. There's just that likableness to her that I can't help but notice. She never once annoyed me, and she always made the right choices. I guess what I'm trying to say is that she wasn't a whiny bitch about things?

And besides:

"Before I moved here, I never got the whole love-triangle thing. You know, in movies or romance novels or whatnot, where there's one chick that all the guys are drooling over, even though you can't see anything particularly special about her. But oh, no, they both must have her. And she's like, oh dear, however will I choose? William is so sensitive, he understands me, he swept me off my feet, oh misery, blubber, blubber, but how can I go on living without Rafe and his devil-may-care ways and his dark and only-a-little-abusive love? Upchuck."

How could you not love her after saying that? xD After I saw that, I was just sold.

Now let's move on to Tucker and Christian. Oh man.

When I was reading book one, I thought that Christian was merely an obstacle. I seriously did. Because I was completely head over heels for Tucker. I was always rooting for him and never rooting for Christian. But, in this book, Cynthia Hand made both of these guys irresistible. Christian did sweep me off my feet eventually, even if I tried so hard not to be.

I both love and hate Hand for being able to do that. I love it because that's very rare, to make both guys in a love triangle equally amazing, and that just proves that she's a very talented author. I hate it because now choosing between them is impossible. She made me question my loyalty to Team Tucker.

That's another thing. Why can't there be a team Tustian? Or Chriscker? Or whatever else. >_< Because I love them both. I totally understand how this is a hard choice for Clara, because it's also a hard choice for me. In love triangles I usually either root for one of them or neither. Now I'm rooting for both.

Aaaargh. Cynthia Hand, what have you done to me? x_x

If you haven't read this series yet, I definitely suggest you pick up the first book, Unearthly. :D If you want a good, fluffy angel series, then this series is for you.

{Randomness} Christina Grimmie

Okay, all of you obviously know that I'm gay.

But.

I swear to God, I have the biggest crush on her. >_<

Seriously, I'm probably the most obsessed Grimmie fan you could ever meet.  For those of you who have no idea who she is, let me show you one of her covers.

Okay, maybe two. But come on, isn't her voice just awesome? x_x

Now let me show you one two of her Above All That Is Random videos, which I'm deeply obsessed with.

These are SO FRIGGIN CATCHY. Each time I listen to them I can't help but sing along. xD They get stuck in my head a lot. I even had to use those YouTube-to-MP3 thingies and then download them to my phone because I wanted to listen to these songs a lot. They're not even real songs, but I love them. o_o

Go to her channel right now and check out all her other covers, and then look up her original songs. DO IT.

I always wondered why Rebecca Black got so much more famous than she did. :/ This is real talent.

But anyways, yeah. You need to check her out and give her the fame she deserves. >_< I know I'm like creepily obsessed with her, but I don't care~ She's awesome!

{Booktalk} Recent Buys 3/17/2012

So I just got back from the bookstore today, and was pretty thrilled to see that there were a lot of new releases that I'd been dying to get. Though the problem is, I already read most of them as ebooks, and it would have been so much better if they'd released them sooner. :c

Still, I decided to buy them anyway. You know, maybe I might want to re-read them in the future. Because reading physical copies feel so much better, in my opinion. I only read ebooks if I were desperate and couldn't wait any longer for it to be released here.

Here are the books I got.

The ones I've already read are Unearthly, Hallowed, Shatter Me, Bewitching, Under the Never Sky and Everneath, although I read Everneath as an ARC ebook so maybe I'll re-read that soon.

I am pretty stoked to read the ones that I haven't read, though. :D

{Review} Angelfall by Susan Ee

Now where Evermore is the worst book I've ever read, this one is the best. The. Best.

Title: Angelfall
Author: Susan Ee
Publisher: Feral Dream
Series: Penryn & the End of Days, #1
Release Date: May 21st, 2011
Pages: 255 (ebook)
Source: Bought
Rating: ★★★★★★★★★★

Penryn Young lives in a post-apocalyptic world where avenging angels have taken over the modern world. She lives with her mentally challenged mother and her handicapped little sister Paige. On the day her sister gets taken by a pack of angels who left behind one of them, she teams up with the wingless angel Raffe to find her sister and save her before it's too late. But they will face many obstacles in the way.

{Review} The Immortals series by Alyson Noel

Now let's talk about the worst YA series I've ever read.

Yes, I read through all that.

I guess I just liked the torture.

{Review} Fallen by Lauren Kate

Okay, let's kick off this blog with a review of what I think is one of the most horrible books I've ever had the misfortune of reading.

Title: Fallen

Author: Lauren Kate

Publisher: Delacorte Press
Series: Fallen, #1

Release Date: December 8th, 2009

Pages: 452 (Hardcover)
Source: Bought

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆

Lucinda Price gets enrolled in the Sword & Cross boarding school in Savannah, Georgia after an accident that happened involving her burning someone. There she meets new friends, including Daniel Grigori who immediately catches her eye with his aloofness. Little did she know that these new people she met had a lot of secrets, and she was about to be in the middle of it all.