Review - The Flight of Gemma Hardy by Margot Livesey

Title: The Flight of Gemma Hardy

Author: Margot Livesey

Publisher: Harper Collins

Publish Date:Jan 24, 2012

Hardcover, 447 pages

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Reading this book I found myself wanting to put the book down. I kept thinking, I'll read a little more and then see if I still like it. I really debated the entire way through this book. It wasn't that I didn't like this book, but I wasn't completely involved in this either. Or maybe it was just a really tough book to read. Margot writes this book like poetry. It was beautiful and in depth. It was much more intrinsic that I usually read. There is nothing light and airy about this book.

Gemma has a really tough life, but she has this wonderful spirit that just keeps ticking. I found myself rooting for her, but the circumstances seemed to get worse and worse til I felt bad. She is just destroyed at the boarding school and no one wants to help her. I can't imagine being that alone and still feeling the hope she pushes.

I want to tell you about her wonderful love story she finally has with this man who makes her feel alive and wants her to be more than she has ever had someone believe in her. She finds her true worth when she learns she can be a good teacher with her au pair. She has a few people who really do want the best for her, but life is not dishing Gemma much luck. 

I hate to tell too much about this book as the journeys she has intertwine each other. It is so worth the read, but it felt like I was trying too hard to read it too.

Summary -

 Acclaimed, award-winning author Margot Livesey delivers her breakout novel: a captivating tale, set in Scotland in the early 1960s, that is both an homage and a modern variation on the enduring classic, Jane Eyre

Fate has not been kind to Gemma Hardy. Orphaned by the age of ten, neglected by a bitter and cruel aunt, sent to a boarding school where she is both servant and student, young Gemma seems destined for a life of hardship and loneliness. Yet her bright spirit burns strong. Fiercely intelligent, singularly determined, Gemma overcomes each challenge and setback, growing stronger and more certain of her path. Now an independent young woman with dreams of the future, she accepts a position as an au pair on the remote and beautiful Orkney Islands.

But Gemma's biggest trial is about to begin . . . a journey of passion and betrayal, secrets and lies, redemption and discovery that will lead her to a life she's never dreamed.

hininininin

Review - Rurally Screwed by Jessie Knadler

Title: Rurally Screwed
My Life Off the Grid with the Cowboy I Love
Author: Jessie Knadler
Publisher: Berkley
Publish Date: Apr 3, 2012
Hardcover, 336 pages

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I went in to this book thinking it would be very similar to Pioneer Woman's book Black Heels to Tractor Wheels about meeting her husband, but I was surprised that it was really different. It had a similar feel, but otherwise it was it's own book.

Jessie is a woman living in New York striving to find out who she is and what she can do in the magazine world, but things just don't seem to be working out. In fact, they go horribly wrong and she is fired which leads her on a journey to being a freelance writer in cowboy town - ironically her home town. She grew up on the farm and did everything she could to get away and have a more city-fied life. Then she meets a man she falls in love with, but he has designs on staying a cowboy, living on a ranch and doing the things you do in a small rural town. He is religious and hard working. Though Jessie tries her hardest to fit in, it may not be the fit for her.

I really enjoyed though Jessie was going through many things that could have made her bitter, she still kept her chin up and didn't go into a huge spiral depression.

 Summary -
Jessie Knadler was a New York City girl, through and through. An editor for a splashy women's magazine, she splurged on Miu Miu, partied hard, lived for Kundalini yoga, and dated a man-boy whose complexion was creamier than her own. Circling the drain both personally and professionally, Jessie definitely wouldn't have described herself as "happy"; more like caustically content. Then one day, she was assigned a story about an annual rodeo in the badlands of Eastern Montana.

There, she met a twenty-five-year-old bull rider named Jake. He voted Republican and read Truck Trader. He listened to Garth Brooks. He owned guns. And Jessie suddenly found herself blindsided by something with which she was painfully unfamiliar: a genuinely lovable disposition. In fact, Jake radiated such optimism and old-school gentlemanliness that Jessie impulsively ditched Manhattan for an authentic existence, and an authentic man. Almost overnight, she was canning and sewing, making jerky, chopping firewood, and raising chickens. And all the while one question was ringing in the back of her head: "What the !#*$ have I done with my life?"

A hilarious true-life love story, Rurally Screwed reveals what happens to a woman who gives up everything she's ever known and wanted-job security, money, her professional network, access to decent Thai food-to live off the grid with her one true love (and dogs and horses and chickens), and asks, is it worth it? The answer comes amid war, Bible clubs, and moonshine.

Review - Thumped by Megan McCafferty

Title: Thumped
Bumped #2
Author: Megan McCaffery
Publish Date: April 24, 2012
Publisher: Balzar + Bray
Hardcover, 304 pages

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Right away I was wondering why I liked this book so much better than the first book, Bumped. It took almost three chapters for me to figure out that Megan McCafferty dropped many of the weird ways the girls spoke. She did leave a few in, "I was so . . ." was one of my favorites. Though she used so many "fertilicious," pregging, egging. The first book almost required a few definitions from the religious talk of Harmony to the excitable, teen talk of Melody. The second book however, was toned down and made this book so much easier to read and in retrospect more enjoyable.

I'll be honest though, I am a bit bummed that this is the last book. I was hoping for a trilogy to find out exactly where Harmony and Melody actually found their happiness. Do they decide to eventually have kids or will they forever be without? Do they really take the fame and fortune earned by "Bumping" and make a stand? Or is this really it?

Don't get me wrong. I thought this book was so well thought up and completely creative. What a refreshing twist on the Teen Fiction Lit. It focuses on a very harsh opinion too of whether or not our society would adopt a similar policy of getting teenage girls pregnant to sell their babies should some catastrophic disease ever invade our society rendering women infertile. What is best for our teens? Bumping with parental consent or in secret? Is getting paid to have babies good or bad? Can it really be that easy of an issue?

Megan McCafferty also threw in religion to coincide with this touchy subject by allowing Harmony to come from a very religious sect of the country where women are not supposed to get pregnant for money, but rather get married young and be devoted to their God. Even though it was posed as two extremes, Megan McCafferty did a splendid job of making me vote for both sides. (ironic, huh?) But then again, I tend to vote for people who stand up for what they believe in.

Summary -
THE CONCLUSION TO ONE OF THE MOST TALKED-ABOUT NOVELS OF LAST YEAR

It’s been thirty-five weeks since twin sisters Harmony and Melody went their separate ways. And now their story has become irresistible: twins separated at birth, each due to deliver twins…on the same day!

Married to Ram and living in Goodside, Harmony spends her time trying to fit back into the community she once believed in. But she can’t forget about Jondoe, the guy she fell for under the strangest of circumstances.

To her adoring fans, Melody has achieved everything: a major contract and a coupling with the hottest bump prospect around. But this image is costing her the one guy she really wants.

The girls’ every move is analyzed by millions of fans eagerly counting down to “Double Double Due Date.” They’re two of the most powerful teen girls on the planet, and they could do only one thing to make them even more famous:

Tell the truth.

Review - Born Wicked by Jessica Spotswood

Title: Born Wicked
The Cahill Witch Chronicles #1
Author: Jessica Spotswood
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile
Publish Date: Feb 7, 2012
Hardcover,  330 pages

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Oh my goodness this book was SO GOOD!!! Seriously could not put it down. Every single character in this book was superbly written. Even the ones I didn't like, I still loved. Jessica Spotswood developed each character with such splendid patience without overloading the book with descriptions. I was hooked on every single word. And yes it is part of a series!!! I am so disappointed it took me so long to read this.

Cate is the oldest of three sisters, who are coincidentally witches, as was their mother. But they must keep this a secret because the Brotherhood is constantly on the look out for witches to punish. They like their women insipid, pretty and obliging. A few months before needing to proclaim her interests, Cate's old friend returns to ask her for her hand in marriage. She is surprised and elated, but then along comes a surprise to her heart. A man who is easily overlooked and sadly, below her class. How does she choose? As she is dealing with this heart-felt tragedy, her sisters are being pulled toward their new governess straight from the Sisterhood, who are possibly not just out saving the world from girls who need a mother figure. Cate seems to be on her own fighting to protect her sisters from their own magic nature, keeping their secrets and figuring out whom to be betrothed to. Meanwhile her mother has left her clues in a journal she must locate and then decipher.

Cate is wonderful! So smart, so sweet and yet, she follows her heart as far as it will take her without endangering her sisters. This book didn't end until the last couple pages. Drat!! I cannot wait til the next book in the series. What a wonderfully romantic, fantasy book. Cate does make a few friends along the way, though they are unexpected and surprisingly well placed, but I will not tell who they are because that is a huge giveaway. I absolutely love Finn too! He was so well written that I hardly noticed him til he was already a main character. And Tess, the youngest sister came out of nowhere to light the entire book on fire.

The only character I truly care for was their father. I get that he was sad for his wife's death, but he pissed me off because he let his daughters down so continuously. I really hope he pops up as a stronger character for them in the future books. Maybe he can be a secret Brother who fights for witches on the brain side?

Seriously, go read this book right now!! (Or click the links above and order it.)

Summary -

Everybody knows Cate Cahill and her sisters are eccentric. Too pretty, too reclusive, and far too educated for their own good. But the truth is even worse: they’re witches. And if their secret is discovered by the priests of the Brotherhood, it would mean an asylum, a prison ship—or an early grave.

Before her mother died, Cate promised to protect her sisters. But with only six months left to choose between marriage and the Sisterhood, she might not be able to keep her word... especially after she finds her mother’s diary, uncovering a secret that could spell her family’s destruction. Desperate to find alternatives to their fate, Cate starts scouring banned books and questioning rebellious new friends, all while juggling tea parties, shocking marriage proposals, and a forbidden romance with the completely unsuitable Finn Belastra.

If what her mother wrote is true, the Cahill girls aren’t safe. Not from the Brotherhood, the Sisterhood—not even from each other.

Title: Undress Me in the Temple of Heaven
Author: Susan Jane Gilman
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Publish Date: Feb 8, 2012
Paperback, 320 pages

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Here is where I wonder what type of review to write as I didn't necessarily enjoy this book, but at the same time I found it incredibly enlightening. Do I tell that I am left with so many questions regarding this endeavor of Susan's that it frustrates me? If I was her, I would need more closure. Will she be writing a sequel? I sure hope so because it kills me to not only to not know what really took place, but to be left without answers too. It is justifiably crazy talk.

This book is the prime example of why I chose not to have roommates after I divorced. People are plain crazy and you really don't know how cookoo til you live with them. And by then, what are you going to do kick them out on their arses and leave them to fend for themselves? Not me. I am a bit too kind-hearted for that. Damn it.

Susan starts her book out by explaining she has changed the names to protect the innocent. Blah, blah, blah whatever, so does everyone else. Uhm no, about halfway through the book I realize she without a doubt should have changed their names.

Not only is she all the way around the world in a country she doesn't speak the language, but she is a bit new to new world experiences. Yes, Susan grew up a bit rougher than most so she is used to living a tougher life, but when her roommate starts spending time by herself to do "counter intelligence work," saying things like "there are people here to protect us" and other such nonsense Susan isn't quite sure what to make of the stranger that was once her acquaintance. Susan is feeling her own anxiety of being alone, away from everything she has known especially the comfort of identifiable food, bathrooms with doors and toilets. Now her only friend has abandoned her to crazy-ville.

There were many parts in this book that kept me turning pages to try and get past the ever present giant WHAT?! that surrounded this book. And even when I finished it I didn't feel sated, but it was still an incredible read making me glad I wasn't there, but more so that Susan wrote this book for me to experience it.

That being said, Susan please find an investigator and track down your friend to find out WTH happened bc I gotta know!!! Susan has such a wonderfully creative way of telling her story that I was truly riveted even when I was trying not to gag. I truly enjoyed her take on the everyday living of the oriental culture with things like public restrooms being big holes the ground women went in to squat above. The fact that rice is a palate cleanser served at the end of the meal rather than during. The cultural differences were amazing.

And not that anyone asked me, but since it is my review . . . .  I prefer the following cover over the one above. A small bummer when purchasing an ebook, they don't let me choose the cover I like.

Summary -

 They were young, brilliant, and bold. They set out to conquer the world. But the world had other plans for them.
Bestselling author Susan Jane Gilman's new memoir is a hilarious and harrowing journey, a modern heart of darkness filled with Communist operatives, backpackers, and pancakes.
In 1986, fresh out of college, Gilman and her friend Claire yearned to do something daring and original that did not involve getting a job. Inspired by a place mat at the International House of Pancakes, they decided to embark on an ambitious trip around the globe, starting in the People's Republic of China. At that point, China had been open to independent travelers for roughly ten minutes.
Armed only with the collected works of Nietzsche, an astrological love guide, and an arsenal of bravado, the two friends plunged into the dusty streets of Shanghai. Unsurprisingly, they quickly found themselves in over their heads. As they ventured off the map deep into Chinese territory, they were stripped of everything familiar and forced to confront their limitations amid culture shock and government surveillance. What began as a journey full of humor, eroticism, and enlightenment grew increasingly sinister-becoming a real-life international thriller that transformed them forever.
Undress Me in the Temple of Heaven is a flat-out page-turner, an astonishing true story of hubris and redemption told with Gilman's trademark compassion, lyricism, and wit.

Review - Wild by Cheryl Strayed

Title: Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail
Author: Cheryl Strayed
Publisher: Knopf Double Day Publishing
Publish Date: March 20, 2012
Hardcover, 336 pages

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I absolutely love this book!! It was so funny and so incredibly honest. Couldn't put it down and recommend it so highly!!

Cheryl has had a really hard life. Her mother has died from Cancer and she had to watch her go through it all. And Cheryl has punished herself the entire time with drugs, strange men and all the while pushing her husband away from her. Not the greatest beginning. At a low point, she is standing in line and sees the book about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail and buys the book. And in that one small moment her entire outlook changes. She will go hike this trail and see where it leads her.

The very first chapter tells of her losing her book over the side of a mountain. Irretrievable, she tosses her other boot over as well. In the middle of nowhere, without her boots what will she do.

I love the part where she breaks down and allows another hiker to go through her backpack called the monster because of it's gargantuan size. He pulls out all sorts of things, including 21 condoms. Where she thinks she will be using these is beyond even Cheryl, but she felt the need to bring them anyhow.

She faces life with such a funny outlook. It is almost boarder line absurd. She sinks herself in to these crazy moments, all kind of her own doing and yet, she seems to climb out of them a tiny bit smarter. Until one day, she just gets it. This book is her journey.

If you liked the book Eat, Love, Pray by Elizabeth Gilbert you should definitely read this!

Summary -
A powerful, blazingly honest memoir: the story of an eleven-hundred-mile solo hike that broke down a young woman reeling from catastrophe—and built her back up again.

At twenty-two, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's death, her family scattered and her own marriage was soon destroyed. Four years later, with nothing more to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life: to hike the Pacific Crest Trail from the Mojave Desert through California and Oregon to Washington State—and to do it alone. She had no experience as a long-distance hiker, and the trail was little more than “an idea, vague and outlandish and full of promise.” But it was a promise of piecing back together a life that had come undone.

Strayed faces down rattlesnakes and black bears, intense heat and record snowfalls, and both the beauty and loneliness of the trail. Told with great suspense and style, sparkling with warmth and humor, Wild vividly captures the terrors and pleasures of one young woman forging ahead against all odds on a journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her.

Review - Some Assembly Required by Anne Lamott

Title: Some Assembly Required
Author: Anne Lamott
Publisher: Riverhead Hardcover
Publish Date: March 20, 2011

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Not my usual type of book to read, not that I have one, but this one just pulled at my heart strings and longed for me to read it. I haven't read her first book, Operating Instructions, but was pulled in immediately. The way Anne Lamott wrote this book is like wonderful poetry. She has letters from her son, his wife incorporating how they are doing as new parents. Anne deals with the trials of being in the middle as a grandparent, but trying to stay out of all the controversy. She wants to tell her son what to do and yet, she chooses not to. Anne Lamott is an incredible writer who spills her heart out in this book.

Summary -

In Some Assembly Required, Anne Lamott enters a new and unexpected chapter of her own life: grandmotherhood.

Stunned to learn that her son, Sam, is about to become a father at nineteen, Lamott begins a journal about the first year of her grandson Jax's life.

In careful and often hilarious detail, Lamott and Sam-about whom she first wrote so movingly in Operating Instructions-struggle to balance their changing roles with the demands of college and work, as they both forge new relationships with Jax's mother, who has her own ideas about how to raise a child. Lamott writes about the complex feelings that Jax fosters in her, recalling her own experiences with Sam when she was a single mother. Over the course of the year, the rhythms of life, death, family, and friends unfold in surprising and joyful ways.

By turns poignant and funny, honest and touching, Some Assembly Required is the true story of how the birth of a baby changes a family-as this book will change everyone who reads it.

Review - Crushed by KC Blake

Title: Crushed
The Witch-Game #1
Author: K.C. Blake
Publisher: Createspace
Publish Date: July 30, 2011
Paperback, 262 pages

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I wasn't sure what to expect with this book, but it was on sale, it had some pretty good reviews amongst the blog world, so I thought I'd give it a go. Oddly enough, it was lots of fun. I really enjoyed it.

These girls have a game they play every year. They pick boys that they can "crush" which equates to blowing witch dust on them and controlling them. They make fun of them, they play tricks on them and basically make them their slaves. It is cruel, but they don't seem to realize. Until they crush the wrong guy. Zach is a boy with special powers as well. But how long will Kristen try to play with him before he unleashes his fury?

Summary -
The Noah sisters rule Titan High with their beauty, brains, and magical powers. Each year they play a secret game: Crushed. The girls pick their targets carefully and blow enchanted dust into the boy’s faces, charming them, but this year Kristen makes a grave mistake. She chooses the wrong boy and almost dies that same day. Coincidence? Maybe. But something isn’t quite right about Zach Bevian. He doesn’t behave like a boy who’s been Crushed. He goes from hot to cold, from looking at her with contempt to asking her out on a date. She doesn’t know what to think. Does he hate her or is he truly falling for her? Is he trying to kill her, or is he trying to save her?

Review - Spell Bound by Rachel Hawkins

Title: Spell Bound
Hex Hall #3
Author: Rachel Hawkins
Publisher: Hyperion
Publish Date: Mar 13, 2012
Hardcover, 327 pages

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Okay so I really enjoy this particular series. It is fun, imaginative, occasionally romantic, but really it is just a great break from reality. It is the epitome of a day off book; so light and airy. This one followed up nicely, but for the first time I had an inkling of where it was going and what was happening. It felt a little rush with less detail and story than the last couple books. Some really cool secrets were revealed in this book that kept it going for me. Didn't get to see as much of my favorite character, her vampire friend and roommate at Hex Hall. It also had less history and more everyday stuff which, I thought, took away from it a bit. The great thing about this series is reminds me of the books I read growing up like The Babysitters Club. They make me feel good, I like to research the secret and feel a part of the story. At this point, the books can go anywhere, it will be fun to see what happens to Sophie and whether or not they get more action packed and unexpected, though I do not see another one in the making as of yet.

Review of Hex Hall

Review of Demonglass

Summary -
Just as Sophie Mercer has come to accept her extraordinary magical powers as a demon, the Prodigium Council strips them away. Now Sophie is defenseless, alone, and at the mercy of her sworn enemies—the Brannicks, a family of warrior women who hunt down the Prodigium. Or at least that’s what Sophie thinks, until she makes a surprising discovery. The Brannicks know an epic war is coming, and they believe Sophie is the only one powerful enough to stop the world from ending. But without her magic, Sophie isn’t as confident.

Sophie’s bound for one hell of a ride—can she get her powers back before it’s too late?

Review - Hunger Games (book vs movie)

Title: Hunger Games
Hunger Games #1
Author: Suzanne Collins
Publisher: Scholastic
Publish Date: Oct 31, 2008
Paperback, 374 pages

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As many people have probably already said, I highly recommend this book to everyone. It is such a phenomenal read. So many wonderful lessons - Be yourself; Work smarter not harder; Make friends, but be cautious; Use your strengths; Sometimes surviving is more important.

I really loved Katniss. Her character is so strong and so amazing. It really makes the reader wonder if they too would be so courageous. She ends up taking care of her mother and sister when her father is killed. She is the food bearer, the mother, the provider and all the loving family members required. She has little to herself except the spare time she allows herself to hunt - outside the city allowed lines. That is where she talks and hangs with Gale, her secret friend. Katniss is an expert marksman with her bow and arrow. She can also climb trees like a monkey. She is skilled in the ways of the forest knowing the good and dangerous food, plants and sounds. She and Gale long to skip away and be lost in the forest, free and alive, but Katniss will not leave her family.

The city controls the entire twelve districts that provide for the city. Each district has a specialty, Katniss resides in District 12 known for coal mining. Where the city reigns in materials, food and wealth the outer districts are poor and rely on the city to provide for them. This way they always have allegiance to the city.

As a thank you to the city for providing, each year two children are chosen to lead their district in the hunger games. Games in which there is only one victor, or two if happen to come from the same district. All children who are in need may put their names in the drawing as many times as needed for food, clothing, etc, but their name gets a higher probability of being drawn. We learn later in the book that District 1 trains all their children from a very young age to be the best in the Hunger Games; to win and therefore provide the necessary food for their district each year.

I was completely disgusted by the amount of waste, lack of accountability and humor regarding the districts from the city. The city is so arrogant and clueless that they have no idea how sick the tributes feel being lavished in food and personal grooming only to be pawns before a televised audience as they die.

Surprisingly I felt the movie did a pretty spectacular job of sticking with the plot, feeling and overall quality of the book. Sadly, if a viewer did not read the book I feel they would be a bit lost as to why the city was so obviously colorful and brutally gaudy. I also fel they would not truly understand all the history of the hunger games, districts and the reason behind the actual need for each districts. They really skipped over that part, using the saying "May the odds be ever in your favor" as a way of explaining. I thought they could not have picked a better Katniss for the movie. She did embodied the character. I didn't care for the actor who played Petta, but I didn't like him the books either.

In the three books, the first in the series is my favorite. The newness of the idea, the rawness of the horror and the belief that Katniss will prevail is amazing. The second book was incredibly cruel and the third a bit lacking. But overall, I really love the series. It is insurmountably intelligent and reaches all levels of people.

Movie Trailer

Review - Hunting Lila by Sarah Anderson

Title: Hunting Lila
Lila #1
Author: Sarah Alderson
Publisher: Simon and Schuster UK
Publish Date: Paperback, 318 pages

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I devoured this book so fast, I honestly felt like I had a bit of a stomach ache. I hate that I have to wait til Aug to find out what happens next. I really, really, really want to read the next book!! It was just that good!

Lila is a girl who has had a hard life. You know those moments that change you! Lila's mom was killed which resulted in her dad moving them out of the country and she lost her brother in the process since he stayed behind. She was so numb from all the change that by the time she came out of it, she had basically created a reputation at school as a weirdo. So she was friendless, familyless (as he dad is never home) and she then realizes she has a special power. One that could be considered dangerous, though she doesn't until she is mugged and this power shows it has a mind of it's own. She immediately freaks out, steals her father's credit card and flies to her brother. And his best friend, Alex, aka the love of her life.

Oh yes, this gets real juicy folks!!

Her brother and his best friend are living lives where they hunt down killers. There are people after them all the time. They have serious security setup at home and at the base. Unfortunately Lila is not sure she wants to tell them about her secret. She doesn't want them to see her differently. As she holds on to this secret, she is pulled in to their lives and their secrets as well. They may very well be hunting the same people as she is becoming. Those with special powers.

LOVE LOVE LOVED THIS BOOK!!

I am excited to check out Sarah Alderson's other book called Fated and when you visit her blog, read her bio. It is truly amazing. I am so envious of her life. How cool is it that she has traveled so far and lives on a beach in Bali??

The only thing I found disappointing, is the book is not available through Barnes and Noble, but we can't have it all, now can we?

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 - Starters by Lissa Price

Title: Starters
Author: Lissa Price
Publisher: Delacorte Books
Publish Date: Mar 13, 2012
Hardcover, 368 pages

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The story premise of this book is SO BELIEVABLE that I was riveted from the beginning. I could not believe that this book was written so well that I felt I could see this happening in the future. Old people use younger people's bodies by renting them and living in them. There is a contract to avoid dangerous drugs, illicit sex, but do they really know what is happening in their bodies while they are out? Amazing!!

Callie is one of the unfortunate orphans who's parent's have died during the last Spore Wars. The only ones left are young and old. Many of the young are penniless and left to fend for themselves. Those not left alone are rounded up and arrested. They must find a way to live. Callie has not only herself to take care of, but her ailing brother. She goes in to investigate and ends up finding a solution to her problem she didn't realize she could fix. Renting out her body seems like a quick fix. Just three rentals and she will have all the money she needs. But one of the rentals has a plan, to kill someone important and use Callie as the body and face of the assassin. Something goes terribly wrong when Callie wakes up in her own body, but still in the rental contract. She must stop the assassin and save her life, but having the renter in her head might sway her to see the rental's point of view.

Summary -
HER WORLD IS CHANGED FOREVER

Callie lost her parents when the Spore Wars wiped out everyone between the ages of twenty and sixty. She and her little brother, Tyler, go on the run, living as squatters with their friend Michael and fighting off renegades who would kill them for a cookie. Callie's only hope is Prime Destinations, a disturbing place in Beverly Hills run by a mysterious figure known as the Old Man.

He hires teens to rent their bodies to Enders—seniors who want to be young again. Callie, desperate for the money that will keep her, Tyler, and Michael alive, agrees to be a donor. But the neurochip they place in Callie's head malfunctions and she wakes up in the life of her renter, living in her mansion, driving her cars, and going out with a senator's grandson. It feels almost like a fairy tale, until Callie discovers that her renter intends to do more than party—and that Prime Destinations' plans are more evil than Callie could ever have imagined. . . .

Review - Fracture by Megan Miranda

Title: Fracture
Author: Megan Miranda
Publisher: Walker Childrens
Publish Date: Jan 17, 2012
Hardcover, 262 pages

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I read this book initially because I read quite a few reviews that kept saying how good this was and of course, I didn't want to miss it. Sadly many times there are good reviews, I'm left thinking, "What am I missing?" But this one did not disappoint.

Delaney was a fabulous character. After being pulled from a frozen pond, pronounced dead they tell her she'll be fine. She is having a few questionable things happen that lead her to believe she may not be fine.

Troy made me suspicious from the get-go. I didn't necessarily not like him, but I didn't like him either. I felt like he was too shadey. They kept him in the forefront, but not enough to give him a clean bill. Kind of like when I am watching a mystery on tv, it's usually someone who is in the scenes, but in the background. But I won't tell you if he is good or bad.

Delaney has trouble seeing past her need to relate to someone and that is why she starts to hang out with Troy. I really enjoyed the twist of trying to figure out if Delaney was causing these catastrophic happenings or if she is just predicting them. The fun of trying to figure out if dying has caused her to connect with the dead.

This book was mysterious, thrilling and thought-provoking, but not freaky weird. I like that.

Summary -
Eleven minutes passed before Delaney Maxwell was pulled from the icy waters of a Maine lake by her best friend Decker Phillips. By then her heart had stopped beating. Her brain had stopped working. She was dead. And yet she somehow defied medical precedent to come back seemingly fine. Everyone wants Delaney to be all right, but she knows she's far from normal. Pulled by strange sensations she can't control or explain, Delaney finds herself drawn to the dying. Is her altered brain now predicting death, or causing it?

Then Delaney meets Troy Varga, who recently emerged from a coma with similar abilities. At first she's reassured to find someone who understands the strangeness of her new existence, 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?

For fans of best-sellers like Before I Fall and If I Stay, this is a fascinating and heart-rending story about love and friendship and the fine line between life and death.

Review - Pretties by Scott Westerfeld

Title: Pretties (Uglies #2)
Author: Scott Westerfeld
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Publish Date: Nov 1, 2005
Paperback, 370 pages

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Couple of things that took me by surprise. The second book, this one I am reviewing, was published back in 2005. That was over 6 years ago. Crazy that I am just now really reading the entire series. It is nice that I don't have to wait for the following book to come out, but odd that I haven't been really seeing the news on these til now. Second, there are at least three different covers that I have seen. I prefer the ones to the left. The designs are more attuned to how I feel when I read the books. I also do not care for books with real people on the front. I like to imagine the people on my own. Oh and these would make an incredible movie!!! (hint)

I read the first one months ago, so it did take me a bit to remember what I was reading and what had happened. You can read my review of Uglies #1 here!

I would highly recommend these books be read in the order they are in the series. I get this questions all the time at work and have a hard time because WHO wants to read a series out of order?? Really why would anyone do this? I admit that Westerfeld does a great job keeping the reader informed and up to speed, but that also takes away from reading the books and finding out what happens because they tell you in the next book.

Tally has survived being ugly, met the boy of her dreams (uhm, her ugly dreams) and he has taught her how to survive in the wilderness. Due to circumstances I refuse to divulge here, she winds up pretty. They give her the surgery to become pretty which she avoided in book one and she is now living in the city as a pretty. She is careless, vapid and constantly partying. She meets her old friend, Shay, but they aren't as close as could be because of Tally's slight betrayal in book one. She does meet a new boy, a pretty boy who she seems drawn to, but he has other plans and they involve Tally. As she is getting comfortable in Pretty Town she has a visit by an old friend. One she can't quite remember, but one that brings trouble and a whole whirl-wind of excitement. As her memory comes back, her level of trouble increases. She will soon learn the value of mind over body.

I am a huge fan of these books, not only as a teen at heart, but because they are clean and youthful. A teen, a tween, a younger maybe slightly sheltered younger person would truly love these books. They have excitement, energy and most importantly a young woman who is very inspiring. They teach you how to think for yourself and going with the flow still requires thinking. They teach how to be a leader amongst a crowd. And so many other wonderful life lessons.

Summary -
Gorgeous. Popular. Perfect. Perfectly wrong.

Tally has finally become pretty. Now her looks are beyond perfect, her clothes are awesome, her boyfriend is totally hot, and she's completely popular. It's everything she's ever wanted.

But beneath all the fun -- the nonstop parties, the high-tech luxury, the total freedom -- is a nagging sense that something's wrong. Something important. Then a message from Tally's ugly past arrives. Reading it, Tally remembers what's wrong with pretty life, and the fun stops cold.

Now she has to choose between fighting to forget what she knows and fighting for her life -- because the authorities don't intend to let anyone with this information survive.

Review - Kiss Crush Collide by Christina Meredith

Title: Kiss Crush Collide
Author: Christina Meredith
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Publish Date: Dec 27, 2011

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Leah is stuck in her life. She is living the life her parent's want her to and she is losing faith in it all. Then she meets this mysterious guy, Porter, and all bets are off. He is a working guy and she is rich man's daughter. She has her whole life planned out, including the boy she dating as her future well fill-in perfect guy. He is living moment to moment with no plans.

Leah is swept up in Porter and all that he represents - Freedom. She is allowed to live for the first time in her life and her heart craves it. Craves him.

This is such a sad story and yet, I was rooting for both of them. Could it be possible for Leah to really get what she wants and keep the boy who opened it up to her? Or will she succumb to life long lessons of do what you are expected?

This is such a fantastic quick read. It is the type of book to to take on a day off. A piece of chocolate that lasts longer than it should. Enjoy!

Summary -

Kiss
What Leah did—only she really shouldn’t have—one hot night at a country club party.

Crush
What Leah has—only she really shouldn’t have—on the guy with the green eyes, the guy who is not her perfect boyfriend, the guy who does not fit in her picture-perfect life, the guy her sisters will only mock and her mother will never approve of. Not in a million years.

Collide
What happens when everything you always thought you wanted—having cool friends, being class valedictorian and homecoming queen—runs smack into everything it turns out you really do want.

Kiss. Crush. Collide.
For Leah and Porter, summer is only the beginning.

Review - Dead to You by Lisa McMann

Title: Dead to You
Author: Lisa McMann
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Publish Date: Feb 7, 2012
Hardcover, 243 pages

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Dead to You was such an incredible concept and so close to being real that I was sucked in instantly. Lisa McMann wrote with such emotion for the losses of all the people involved.

Ethan was kidnapped when he was just seven years old. His brother was there when Ethan supposedly just walked right up to the car and got in, on his own accord. The anger and resentment that he has for Ethan is overpowering, but his entire life changed because of one action on his brother's part. Understandable. Then there's the youngest sister who is considered the replacement. Yet, Ethan and his youngest hit it off instantly. Every time she called him "Efan" I just melted!!

The way his parent's handles him after he is returned home is amazing. They give him a cell phone for which he has no one to call, but them. When he doesn't return home immediately his parent's are scared sick, instantly propelled back to the moment he was kidnapped. Lisa McMann writes these characters as if they are living and breathing. So hard to imagine it is just a book.

The ending is AMAZING!! And that is all I am going to say about that.

Read it!! Sensational and so worth every moment.

First book I have read by the author Lisa McMann, but I am really excited to read more of hers. She is just a wonderful writer and I hope the other books are just as thrilling.

Summary -
Ethan was abducted from his front yard when he was just seven years old. Now, at sixteen, he has returned to his family. It's a miracle... at first. Then the tensions start to build. His reintroduction to his old life isn't going smoothly, and his family is tearing apart all over again. If only Ethan could remember something, anything, about his life before, he'd be able to put the pieces back together. But there's something that's keeping his memory blocked. Something unspeakable...

Review - The Witch's Daughter by Paula Brackston

Title: The Witch's Daughter
Author: Paula Brackston
Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books
Publish Date: Jan 18, 2011
Hardcover, 305 pages

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The cover of this book is what initially grabbed me. The boots are fabulous and against that beautifully colored skirt, I was instantly intrigued. I read the back and discovered it's about a witch and the curse her mother inadvertently placed on her. If anything I was sure this would be a fine read.

It completely went above and beyond "a fine read." It was SO much better.

If you've read A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness, this has a similar feel. It feels haunting and purposeful. The woman in this story is smart, strong and likable. In fact, I felt the detailing in the story pulled me and made me like each and every character for a different reason. I equally enjoyed the history put forth. I liked that it spanned many centuries and stayed believable.

Every other chapter has the present day story of the main character Elizabeth, told by Elizabeth to a girl who has wormed her way into her life and heart after centuries of being alone. Through this story Bess teaches Tegan of the trespasses of the man who has betrayed Bess her entire life.

Summary -
My name is Elizabeth Anne Hawksmith, and my age is three hundred and eighty-four years. Each new settlement asks for a new journal, and so this Book of Shadows begins…

In the spring of 1628, the Witchfinder of Wessex finds himself a true Witch. As Bess Hawksmith watches her mother swing from the Hanging Tree she knows that only one man can save her from the same fate at the hands of the panicked mob: the Warlock Gideon Masters, and his Book of Shadows. Secluded at his cottage in the woods, Gideon instructs Bess in the Craft, awakening formidable powers she didn’t know she had and making her immortal. She couldn't have foreseen that even now, centuries later, he would be hunting her across time, determined to claim payment for saving her life.

In present-day England, Elizabeth has built a quiet life for herself, tending her garden and selling herbs and oils at the local farmers' market. But her solitude abruptly ends when a teenage girl called Tegan starts hanging around. Against her better judgment, Elizabeth begins teaching Tegan the ways of the Hedge Witch, in the process awakening memories--and demons—long thought forgotten.

Part historical romance, part modern fantasy, The Witch’s Daughter is a fresh, compelling take on the magical, yet dangerous world of Witches.Readers will long remember the fiercely independent heroine who survives plagues, wars, and the heartbreak that comes with immortality to remain true to herself, and protect the protégé she comes to love.

Review - Confessions of a Surgeon by Paul Ruggieri

Title: Confessions of a Surgeon
The Good, The Bad and the Complicated
Life Behind the O.R. Doors
Author: Paul A. Ruggieri
Publisher: Penguin Group
Publish Date: Jan 3, 2012
Paperback, 272 pages

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I absolutely love books that detail another part of life I wish I had time to experience. I have always dreamed of being a doctor. Who doesn't want to learn how to save people? Who doesn't want to live on the edge and experience anything and everything that can happen? Can you imagine holding someone's heart in your own hands? The possibilities are amazing.

I really enjoyed this book. Dr Ruggieri gives a very detailed behind the scenes look at being a doctor. Definitely details the good, bad and ugly. I really enjoyed reading about how Ruggieri feels he has no real human emotions when being a surgeon. He cannot feel the loss because the family has more; he cannot feel the stress at complications that arise because he has to fix them immediately; he cannot be mad at another surgeon who fumbles a surgery where he comes to the rescue and then is blamed for the problem. He must be robotic like and just get the job done. Not even close to being as serious as cutting open people, I feel his pain when it comes to working in retail.

I found the insurance and lab result information incredibly fascinating. He talks about how it can take up to a week MINIMUM to receive results back and then the doctor has to find the time in between all his other patients and to do's to read and research the results. With patients who call the day after a test is taken. The fact that a doctor cannot utter the word "cancer" until it is 110% sure. The stress of watching the patient beg for an answer and the doctor who thinks he knows, but cannot say until he has the papers in hand for fear of retribution.

Dr Ruggieri did a fabulous job of telling us how it really is to be in the O.R. room. I really enjoyed how much information he gave and how he told it in the experiences he had. Wonderfully written.

Summary -

As an active surgeon and former department chairman, Dr. Paul A. Ruggieri has seen the good, the bad, and the ugly of his profession. In Confessions of a Surgeon, he pushes open the doors of the O.R. and reveals the inscrutable place where lives are improved, saved, and sometimes lost. He shares the successes, failures, remarkable advances, and camaraderie that make it exciting. He uncovers the truth about the abusive, exhaustive training and the arduous devotion of his old-school education. He explores the twenty-four-hour challenges that come from patients and their loved ones; the ethics of saving the lives of repugnant criminals; the hot-button issues of healthcare, lawsuits, and reimbursements; and the true cost of running a private practice. And he explains the influence of the "white coat code of silence" and why patients may never know what really transpires during surgery.

Ultimately, Dr. Ruggieri lays bare an occupation that to most is as mysterious and unfamiliar as it is misunderstood. His account is passionate, illuminating, and often shocking-an eye-opening, never- before-seen look at real life, and death, in the O.R.

Review - Ashes by Isla Bick

Title: Ashes
Ashes Trilogy #1
Author: Ilsa J. Bick
Publisher: Egmontusa
Publish Date: Sept 8, 2011
Hardcover, 480 pages

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Starting with the obvious, this book is gore to the max. It has stories about flesh eating zombies. That said, I am so surprised I liked this book. I truly do not care for gore. Ew! It's gross. And the better the the author, the better the descriptions, the grosser it is. I don't want to read about a human turned zombie, kneeling down licking the fingers they just dragged through the oozing eye of a dead person.

On the other hand, this book had a major amount of humanity. It talks about what would happen should we have a sort of apocalypse; some die, some live and (of course) some become flesh eating zombies.

Main character: Alex, a woman set off on a journey to hike a mountain with her parent's ashes on her. Not only that she has a tumor in her head that is killing her and she has finally decided to forgo anymore treatments. This is her last hurrah. I like her. She is honest, fresh and wholesome. She is sweet and not afraid to speak her mind. Yet, I love the kindness she shows the strangers she encounters.

Enter Tom and Ellie, a grandfather and granddaughter who are out and about doing similar things as Alex. Trying to connect after Ellie's father died in the war. All she has left is anger and a dog she isn't too fond of.

With this one occurrence, they are pushed together for survival. They do not necessarily choose each other out of want, but rather the need. Alex allows Ellie to form her own opinions and then once decided, she is there for her. Even as a total stranger she realizes the losses Ellie endures at such a young age. The compassion is wonderful.

Sadly they never really tell what happened originally to wreak the havoc that occurs. There is much speculation about an EMP burst, a nuclear bomb. The fact is something terrible has happened that has destroyed the earth, or the parts they inhabit.

After the incident, Alex is different. Her headaches are nearly gone and she can smell from amazing distances. She knows something is going on in her body, but not exactly sure what. There is also no reason as to why some people died, some people changed and some people lived. They find a connection that teens who are going through puberty could now become zombies, but does that mean Ellie will change? They even encounter a man who has a friend who died, a friend who was fine for a couple of days and then BOOM instant zombie and he had to kill him before he was attacked. Will Alex change? What about the people Alex and Ellie encounter, will they change unexpectedly?

The ending is so amazingly wrong I couldn't help but be completely stunned and really excited to read the next one. In a very demented way. This book was so off and yet, I truly loved it. It's like the scary movie I cannot watch so I put my hands over my eyes and then peak through my fingers.

Summary -
It could happen tomorrow . . .

An electromagnetic pulse flashes across the sky, destroying every electronic device, wiping out every computerized system, and killing billions.

Alex hiked into the woods to say good-bye to her dead parents and her personal demons. Now desperate to find out what happened after the pulse crushes her to the ground, Alex meets up with Tom—a young soldier—and Ellie, a girl whose grandfather was killed by the EMP.

For this improvised family and the others who are spared, it’s now a question of who can be trusted and who is no longer human.

Author Ilsa J. Bick crafts a terrifying and thrilling novel about a world that could be ours at any moment, where those left standing must learn what it means not just to survive, but to live amidst the devastation.

Review - All These Things I've Done by Gabrielle Zevin

Title: All These Things I've Done
Author: Gabrielle Zevin
Publisher: Farrar, Straus andGiroux
Publish Date: Sept 6, 2011
Hardcover, 354 pages

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Highly looking forward to this book. Deeply disappointed. Not what I thought it would be like at all.

I really like Anya, the main character, but the rest of the book was kind of blah. Never a moment where I felt I couldn't walk away from the book and there was a lot going on.

Bummer.

It is getting pretty good reviews on goodreads - more than 3 stars.

Summary -
In 2083, chocolate and coffee are illegal, paper is hard to find, water is carefully rationed, and New York City is rife with crime and poverty. And yet, for Anya Balanchine, the sixteen-year-old daughter of the city's most notorious (and dead) crime boss, life is fairly routine. It consists of going to school, taking care of her siblings and her dying grandmother, trying to avoid falling in love with the new assistant D.A.'s son, and avoiding her loser ex-boyfriend. That is until her ex is accidently poisoned by the chocolate her family manufactures and the police think she's to blame. Suddenly, Anya finds herself thrust unwillingly into the spotlight--at school, in the news, and most importantly, within her mafia family.

Engrossing and suspenseful, All These Things I've Done is an utterly unique, unputdownable read that blends both the familiar and the fantastic.