Cover Whore Reveal: Enemy Within - By Angeline Kace

Through bribery & guilt I was able to hop on this reveal band wagon!

I can't believe that Angeline is already reveal the cover for book #2 in the Vampire Born Trilogy.

The 1st one was awesome (SEE), and I am SO ready to see what happens with Mirko, Brooke & Jaren!

Here's a brief synopsis of what to expect from Enemy Within:

"Half-vampire, Brooke Keller, rid the world of her worst enemy, only to find out the world's most powerful vampire wants her dead. And this time, she's not only fighting vampires, but a deadly disease that threatens to take her best friend's life.

Torn between Jaren and Mirko, Brooke struggles to convince her best friend to change over, keep her monster at bay, and learns her enemies are deeper within than she could have ever imagined.

Will love be enough to quell the darkness?

Does good really conquer evil?"



and now here's the fantastic cover....

If you want more information about Angeline or her great series, just visit her WEBSITE!

Fresh Face Friday 9-30-11

Who: Gracen Miller

What: Pandora's Box

Where does the road to Hell begin?

What happens when your son turns homicidal overnight, killing the family cat before gutting the family dog? Do you cower in fear or fight for your life? Madison Wescott fights against the odds. Distrustful of a God she doesn't believe in, she finds herself face-to-face with a demonic world she didn't know existed and discovers her own soul is darkened with demonic connections.

With good intentions?

Madison had it all…or thought she did. A husband she adored and a son that brought joy to her life. Then one morning her husband kissed her goodbye, headed off to work and disappeared. Life turned upside down, Madison grows desperate and despondent to help her bloodthirsty son after numerous attempts have failed. Only one man dares to challenge the supernatural forces manipulating them.

Or by demonic design?

Phoenix Birmingham breaches her life in a whirlwind of sarcasm and sexual appeal. A hero for the masses—and for her jaded heart—but few will ever know the sacrifices he has made or the sacrifices to come. Discovering her entire life has been influenced by multifaceted paranormal beings, Madison is determined to defeat the apocalyptic blueprint fate has decreed. Even with Phoenix's aid, can destiny be denied? Or will demonic design prevail and they pay the crucial price with their souls?

My Thoughts: I've had many followers comment on this series &  how it's the start of something great. So hopefully I'll be able to get my hands on a copy & see how amazing it is!

Cover: Hot, steamy and all things yummy!

Stalking Grounds: Facebook, Twitter, Website, Goodreads

Lie or Die Flash Fiction Showdown!

Lie or Die Flash Fiction Showdown

Step 1: Submit Your Idea Now!

 
Here is your chance to come up with a story idea and have not 1 but 5 authors spin it into an 800 word flash fiction tale! That’s 5 different YA paranormal authors with their own style and their own creativity taking your idea in 5 directions! Where will they go? You’ll have to wait until Oct 19^th to find out. 
 

But, for now, get your story idea in! You have from Sept 29, 2011 12:00am to Oct 8^th, 2011 11:59pm EST to submit your ideas by choosing characters, conflict and abilities. Details are in the form, which is linked [or below, depending upon blog] at the bottom of the post. Only entries into the form will be considered.  Anyone can enter their idea (open to international) and the winning idea will win a print book of their choice from one of the participating authors. What should you enter? Well, seeing as all of the authors are YA Paranormal writers,  chances are anything to do with a hot, young heroine/hero of the non-human type will spark their interest. But, so could a grotesque villain…Should it be regular old Earth or a dystopian world? Should unicorns frolic and mermaids flap about? Should there be a love triangle? YOU DECIDE!

Example
Characters - "Bill" - a male vampire, tall, dark and boring, prefers computers to good times, over 150 years old. "Sookie" - a female human, blond, barmaid, perky, Southern, sweet and hospitable but will resort to extreme violence when provoked.

Conflict - Someone wants Sookie dead. People she knows are being killed and it looks like Sookie is next. AND, there's a new vampire in town. He's tall, blond, sexy and powerful. While Bill may be old reliable, there's just something about Eric that she can't resist.

Abilities - "Bill" - speed, strength, can heal with his blood. "Sookie" - telepathic, good with a shotgun.

On Oct 9^th, our 5 expert judges a.k.a fabulous bloggers Fiktshun, Two Chicks on Books, Magical Urban Fantasy Reads,  A Life Bound by Books, and Taking It One Book at a Time (that's me), will choose THE IDEA, based purely on what sounds like the most fun to read about and announce it at Sunday, 6pm EST.

From there, the authors will have 10 days to take the idea and run with it.

ADD YOU IDEAS HERE!

Want to know a little bit more about the participating authors? 

SM Reine:

SM Reine is a writer and graphic designer obsessed with werewolves, the occult, and collecting swords. Her YA fantasy books, "Six Moon Summer" and "All Hallows' Moon," have been praised as "fresh and fast-paced" and "captivating." Sara spins tales of dark fantasy to escape the drudgery of the desert, where she lives with her husband and the Helpful Baby. 
 

 

G.P.Ching:

Author of The Soulkeepers (DarkSide Publishing, 2011) and rebel suburbanite who makes wicked cookies, kicks patootie at Guitar Hero, and thinks guinea pigs are the perfect pet. Visit her at http://www.gpching.com/.

Tiffany King:

Hi, my name is Tiffany King the author of the Paranormal/Romance YA novel “Meant to Be” and I’m practically a native Floridian. My family and I have been here for the last fourteen years and have gotten quite used to the mild winters and scorching summers. I went back to school when I turned 31 and will finish up this spring. I wrote my book “Meant to Be” two years into my degree program and put it on hold while I finished school. Of course my degree has nothing to do with writing *drat* but that doesn’t mean that I’m not going to keep writing. During this process with “Meant to Be” I discovered just how much I love to write and I have many story ideas tucked away. I’m glad you made it to my blog and hope you will follow me and “Meant to Be” as we navigate through self-publishing. Welcome Aboard.

Megan Duncan:

Megan Duncan is a lover of all things paranormal, fantasy, sci-fi and anything just out of the ordinary. She is continually fighting her addiction to chocolate and living in her overactive imagination.

K.A.Tucker: 

Born in small-town Ontario, Kathleen published her first book at the age of six with the help of her elementary school librarian and a box of crayons. She is a voracious reader and the farthest thing from a genre-snob, loving everything from High Fantasy to Chick Lit. Kathleen currently resides in a quaint small town outside of Toronto with her husband, two beautiful girls, and an exhausting brood of four-legged creatures. Asylum, the sequel to Anathema,  will be released January, 2012

For More details about Lie or Die, check out the official website HERE!

The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister

Anne Lister was an upper-class English woman, who was born in 1791 and died in 1840. During her life she kept a journal, partly written in code. Her journals in their entirety run to four milloin words. It was her intention to destroy the journals before her death, but she died prematurely while travelling in Russia and the journals were saved intact at Shipden Hall, her home. It was only in 1887 that John Lister, the last member of the Lister family to live in Shipden Hall, decided to publish some parts of the journals in a local paper. The coded passages were not yet been deciphered and their content was unknown. However, John Lister and his friend, Arthur Burrell, a schoolteacher and antiquarian from Bradford, decided to try and decipher the crypthand passages. What they found out shocked these Victorian gentlemen to the core. In the coded passages Anne Lister described very honestly her feelings towards and relationships with other women. Mr. Burrell said that the journals should be burned, but John Lister understood them to be an important historical document and instead of destroying them hid the journals behind a panel in Shipden Hall. Mr. Lister died in 1933. Some time after the house opened as a museum. Prior to the opening there was an inventory of all the Lister documents, including the journals. They, together with other documents, now made the transition from private to public property. A copy of the key to Anne Lister's code was placed in the hands of Halifax's chief librarian, who kept it locked in his safe. A few people wórked with the journals in the years to come, but they omitted any reference to homosexual activities from any published material. Then in the early 1980s Helena Whitbread, a Halifax local, started working with the Lister journals. It was she who would finally bring to light also the coded passages of the journals. (Source: Introduction by Helena Whitbread in The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister)

The journals of Anne Lister are a very important part of not only lesbian history, but women's history in general. The entries published as The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister cover the years from 1816 to 1824. The journals make fascinating reading! The manners, friendships and feuds of a small English town told firsthand by someone who lived there make it all very real. And Anne Lister's honest accounts of her sexual and emotional relationships with women were endearing and hearbreaking, and sometimes frustrating :), and made me realise how similar to us people were back then. You might not like all of Anne Lister's ideas and opinions, she was actually terribly class-concious and held some very conservative views, but if you like your Jane Austen, you will also enjoy reading The Secret Diaries of Anne Lister. And for anyone interested in women's history, and especially lesbian history, this is an absolute must read.

There is also a movie titled The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister available on dvd. It's well worth watching and storyline follows the real journals pretty well, even if the moviemakers have changed some details in the story. The trailer is available on YouTube here.

I read this book for the GLBT Challenge.

South of Salem (Allerga Fairweather - Book #2) - By Janni Nell

Author: Janni Nell

Website

Release Date: 5/30/11

Purchase Info: Amazon, Barnes & Noble

My mother thinks my job is crazy. I’m a paranormal investigator; she’s Nancy Regan crossed with Martha Stewart. She’s always preferred my sister Lily, who is following in her perfect footsteps. This time, she needs me because my stepfather has been having dangerous episodes of sleepwalking. I thought her story about a ghost possessing him was hysteria, until the sleep walking epidemic spreads to other members of the family. Cousin Donna climbs out her apartment window and falls to her death.

So it’s a real paranormal investigation. Unfortunately my right hand, a hunky angel I’ve nicknamed Casper, has business of his own to take care of this time around—which might take him out of my life forever. Then my sister goes missing and I have to figure it out before Lily and her unborn child are harmed. Time, however, is not on my side…

Quirky, sarcastic heroine, Allegra's my kind of girl!

Coming back home after being away is never easy, in Allegra's case it's more of a pain in the ass. Her mother doesn't believe in her line of work, her sister is married to their brother (TOTALLY not what you think), oh and her step father is now possessed. If that doesn't spell out, WELCOME HOME, I don't know what does!?

Allegra's mother wants her to get to the bottom of what's possessed her step father & quickly, because possessions are so easy to figure out. As Allegra starts trying to unravel the mystery behind what's really happening with her family, secrets from the past are suddenly floating to the surface. Like mega powerful witches, maulhags and creepy sleep walking!
With the case taking off, Allegra has to now keep a watchful eye on her pregnant sister, for more then one reason. It seems ghosts of the past would do almost anything to get their hands on her unborn child.

Coming into South of Salem I hadn't read the first book in the series, but I found it very easy to catch up on the back history of the characters without being bored or over done.  
Allegra is a paranormal investigator with a hunky guardian angel who always happens to show up right in the nick of time. Though she totally has the hots for Casper (that's what Allegra named him), the Powers Above will revoke his guardian-ness if anything ever happens. It always seems like someone just has to step in & put a kink in a potentially awesome hook-up!
 I immediately fell in love with Allegra. She's got the quick responses and witty comebacks that will put any character in their place, but by the end of the book she shows a softer side that is always good to see. She takes pride in her work and doesn't care what anyone, including her family, has to say.
There was only 1 downfall that I found in this book, and it was that the ending was slightly rushed. There was SO much going on. Fights, witches, labor, angels, more witches, it just seemed like it was crammed in there. But I will continue to read about Allegra's journey, where ever it might lead her.


3.5/5

1st Annual MHAFH Charity Short Story Contest

The First Annual MHAFH Charity Short Story Contest

On October 1^st, My Home Away From Home bookpage and blog will be hosting 2 short story contests. One of Adult genre and one of the Young Adult genre.

Rules, Regulations and guidelines

·        Stories must be original unpublished fiction, typed and double-spaced, between 5,000-7,500 words and of either YA Paranormal or Adult Paranormal genre.

·        The short story is open to all U.S. and international writers. There are no age restrictions for the YA short stories, but we ask that ADULT stories be written by persons 18 and older.

·        Paranormal includes Supernatural, Paranormal, and Fantasy genres.

·        10 (ten) short stories from each category will be chosen and published in an ebook via LULU.com

·        All proceeds from the sales of the ebooks will be donated to The Pajama Program charity. (For more details about The Pajama Project, check out the website at www.pajamaprogram.org)

·        No previously submitted or published works will be allowed. Any plagiarized works will call for an immediate disqualification from the contest.

·        Short stories must be received in our email (homeawayfromhome.fb@gmail.com) by 11:59pm December 31^st.

·        When submitting short stories, be sure to include the contest genre you're entering, The Title, your REAL NAME OR PEN NAME (if using one) in the subject line.

EXAMPLE: (YA) The Phantom Menace by T. Scott.

·        Also include a short 5-6 sentence biography to be included in the ebook if your short story is chosen.

·        Please be sure to revise and edit your stories before submitting them as we will judge them as we receive them.

·        We reserve the right to cancel or extend the contest if there are not enough submissions by the deadline date.

And last but not least… Get creative guys! Bring in your own creatures and beings. Mix and match myths and create your own world! Give us the characters you envisioned and don’t be afraid if its too weird or strange. They always make the best most interesting stories! Draw us in to your tales and leave us dieing for more because who knows? Someone might read your short story in the ebook and decide they want you to complete the tale!

Winners:

Judges will choose the top 10 short stories in each genre to be published in an ebook with all proceeds going to The Pajama Program charity.

Teaser Tuesday 27.9.2011

Teaser Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading.
The rules are:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two teaser sentences from somewhere on that page
• Be careful not to include spoilers

Share the title and author too so that other Teaser Tuesday participients can add the book on their TBR lists, if they like your teasers!

After reading The Calcutta Chromosome by Amitav Ghosh I chose to read another book set in India: Leela's Book by Alice Albinia. With the elephant-headed god Ganesh as one of the narrators and a story inspired by the Mahabharata but set in modern day Delhi, this promises to be an interesting read!

My teaser is from p. 26. Ganesh has just entered the story as a narrator and wants to introduce himself:

"I am Ganesh, elephant-headed god, misshapen son of Lord Shiva and Parvati; beheaded by my father for protecting my mother's honour; abusively given this flippant elephant replacement; too-long-term resident of Kailash, that icy and unfriendly mountain where my family chose to live; befriended only by my faithful Rat (divine vahana, godly mode of transport). I freely admit that my sworn enemy is Vyasa, pedestrian composer of India's too-long epic, a poem called the Mahabharata, every word of which I wrote.
Even as a very young elephant, I could feel words building up inside me, pressing against the end of my trunk, fighting to get out - and all at once I would lose control, as a great trumpeting, ear-popping tirade came shooting out into the air to disturb the concentration of that self-obsessed meditation hillock they called Kailash."

Dirty Blood - By Heather Hildenbrand

Author: Heather Hildenbrand

Website

Release Date: 4/2/2011

Purchase Info: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashword

I killed a girl last night. I did it with my bare hands and an old piece of pipe I found lying next to the dumpster. But that’s not the part that got me. The part that scared me, the part I can’t seem to wrap my head around and still has me reeling, was that when she charged me, her body shifted – and then she was a wolf. All snapping teeth and extended claws. But by the time I stood over her lifeless body, she was a girl again. That’s about the time I went into shock… And that was the moment he showed up.

Now, all I can do is accept the truths that are staring me in the face. One, Werewolves do exist. And two, I was born to kill them.

Fighting and breaking up with your boyfriend are things that are suppose to happen in high school. Killing a girl in an alley with nothing but your bare hands & a piece of pipe isn't.


Shocked & terrified suddenly a stranger appears out of the blue, which totally doesn't help with her freaked-out level. Trying to help her accept what has just happened, the fact that he smells good & is pretty damn hot is calming her just fine. Plus just looking into his eyes seems to make all Tara's worries drift away.

Waking up the next morning Tara knows the soreness in her muscles & scratches on her arms aren't from simply falling down. Something happened. Something big. 
When Wes suddenly appears in Tara's bedroom the first thing she's thinking, 'TOTAL HOTNESS'. Then her senses kick back in, along with a flood of alarm as to WHY this stud muffin is in her room! Wes is there trying to explain to Tara that she killed a Werewolf last night, while Tara's thinking, 'Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuure, because Werewolves are SO real'.
Oh is she in for a wake up call!Not only are they real, but there are Hunters too. Genetically born & raised to kill Werewolves, and she's one.
With a crazed Were leader hot on her trails, going to all means to draw her out of hiding so he can kill her, Tara knows she must tap into her Hunter heritage. But when a curve ball the size of Texas comes out of left field her entire world is thrown for a loop and Tara realizes nothing will ever be the same.

Dirty Blood is NOT your typical Werewolf novel. There are twists, turns and double backs that will have your head spinning throughout the whole book!
Tara was a fantastic as the heroine! Complex, stubborn, totally my kind of girl. I super enjoyed the relationship that her & Wes shared. It would make me happy, then would turn around  and shred the balloon of hope I had for them. Ups & downs were the key to this book, but man did they work out brilliantly. Just when you thought one thing would happen, BAM, that would happen instead! 
Heather's amazing balance of action, romance and cliff hangers have me anticipating the sequel like a child on Christmas Eve! Fantastic job!

4/5

Library Loot 25.9.2011

Library Loot is a weekly event co-hosted by Claire from The Captive Reader and Marg from The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader that encourages bloggers to share the books they’ve checked out from the library. This week Mr. Linky is at Marg's blog.

My library loot actually consists of two weeks worth of library books. And why is it that books I've reserved tend to arrive if not in pairs then in threesomes? :) 


Alameddine, Rabih: I, The Divine
I read about this book on Eva's blog and it sounded so interesting that I put a hold on it the very next day. It is a story told in first chapters, which made me very curious of how such a technique would work in a novel.


Albinia, Alice: Leela's Book
Leela is moving back to Delhi after years living in New York. Her return will unsettle many lives. The book is said to be "a tale of contemporary Delhi that crosses religious and social bounderies, reaching back into the origins of Mahabharata itself". I'm staying in India in my reading after finishing The Calcutta Chorosome by Amitav Ghosh and have just started this book. This far it feels very promising. If you have the elephant-headed god Ganesh as one of the narrators, how it could not be interesting? ;)


Blasim, Hassan: The Madman of Freedom Square
This is a collection of short stories by a writer-filmmaker originally from Iraq, who now lives in Finland.
The collection was published by a British publisher, but I heard just a few weeks ago that it will also be translated into Finnish. Blasim originally wrote the stories in Arabic. The English translation is by Jonathan Wright. From the back cover: "Blending allegory with historical realism, and subverting readres' expectations in an unflinching comedy of the macabre, these stories manage to be both phantasmagoric and shockingly real, light in touch yet steeped in personal nightmare. ... Together these stories afford us a rare glimpse of Iraq from the inside." This little collection will probably be my next read after I finish reading Leela's Book.


King, Rachael: The Sound of Butterflies
Maybe I read abouth this book in some blog? Don't remember exactly. Anyway, it's a historical novel set in 1903. Thomas Edgar, a collector of butterflies, is asked to take part in an expedition to the Amazon. When he returns, he is a changed man and has been rendered mute by what he has experienced during the expedition. The book is said to be "a story of passion and beauty, of brutalite and murder masked by surface spendour." Intriguing, isn't it?


Kneale, Ruth: You Don't Look Like a Librarian
A must read for any librarian. Just because of the title. When I got the book, I showed it to my boss, and she said to me: "Well, you don't look like a librarian!" :) The book is subtitled "Shattering stereotypes and creating positive new images in the Internet age".


Küng, Dinah Lee: A Visit from Voltaire
A comic novel about an American mother-of-three in Switzerland. She gets a visitor who offers to cure all that is bothering her and her family members and who claims to be the Voltaire, the 18th-century philosopher! Comic novels are not really my cup pf tea, but this sounded so intriguing that I want to give it a try.


Miller, Andrew: Pure
A few years before the French revolution a young engineer is asked to demolish the oldest cemetery in Paris. What starts as a "year of bones" for him, turnes out to become "a year of rape, suicide, sudden death. Of friendships, too. Of desire. Of love..." I have no idea whether I will love or hate this book! We'll see...


Moi, Toril: Sexual/Textual Politics. Feminist Literary Theory
I borrowed this classic, because I want to read what Moi says about Virginia Woolf.


Shafak, Elif: The Forty Rules of Love
Ella Rubinstein needs a new challenge in her life and takes a job as a reader to a literary agent. Her first job is to read a novel by Aziz Z. Zahara, a mysterious Scottish writer, whose book tells about the famous 13th-century poet Rumi. Ella is fascinated and starts a correspondence with Zahara. I've been thinking of reading this one for a long time now. Hopefully this time I'll finally get to it!

What treasures did you bring home from the library this week?

Mini Interview & Giveaway: Rachel Wade

Please welcome, Rachel Wade, author of Amaranth!

**crowd yelling & screaming**

So, I figured we'd keep the interview simple & easy!



 Top 3 Restaurants:

 I love SkyCity at the Space Needle (their tiramisu is out of this world, as is the view), a whole bunch of little joints at Pike Place Market (a Korean BBQ place I can never remember the name of), and the Lower Tavern on Orcas Island

(view the SkyCity)

Top 3 Book Boyfriends:

I never thought any book boyfriend would top Edward Cullen for me, but I recently began reading the Fifty Shades Trilogy by E.L. James, and now Christian Grey is positively my number one book boyfriend. He’s tortured, bossy (in a very good way...), and passionate. Don’t see anyone topping him—ever. Edward Cullen would come in second, followed by Damon from Vampire Diaries....for now

(Christian Grey of Fifty Shades)

Top 3 Holidays:

I love Easter, Christmas, and Halloween—in no particular order. Love ‘em all.

Top 3 Places to Live:

I’m a total hippie. Orcas Island, WA is my number one. And if I didn’t need peace and quiet, then downtown Seattle near the Market district would be my home. I also love the South and would live in Southern Louisiana in a heartbeat.

~~~~~~~

GIVEAWAY!

Rachel is kind enough of offer up 5 copies of Amaranth!!

• Leave a comment telling me who your book boyfriend/girlfriend is
• E-mail, so I can stalk ya ;)
• Name

Contest IS international & will run until Friday the 30th!

Fresh Face Friday 9-23-11

Who: Rachel Wade

What: Amaranth

Knowledge changes everything…

Hoodoo-influenced Southern Louisiana seems like the perfect place for Camille to escape her abusive past and dysfunctional family. She doesn’t expect to fall in love with the handsome Gavin Devereaux and plummet into the world of Amaranth, a place of exile for reformed vampires.

Wrestling to escape a deadly ex-boyfriend while giving Gavin a chance, Camille is confronted with decisions that threaten not only her life, but the lives of her inhuman friends she has come to love. Entangled in her friends’ quest for freedom, she dives into their realm and faces the threats of Amaranth’s ruler—the mother of all vampires—and her own inner demons.

Now Camille must decide whether she will derail her life and make the ultimate sacrifice for the monsters that interrupted her bumpy path back to sanity—what she still wants so desperately—or escape with Gavin before it’s too late for both of them.

My Thoughts: Seriously, who wouldn't want to read about exiled pissed off vampires? I plan on reading this in the very near future & hope that it lives up to the expectations I have in my mind.

Cover: Obviously it gorgeous! It's actually what drew me in....but is that a shock to anyone?

Stalking Grounds: Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, Website



**STAY TUNED FOR A MINI-INTERVIEW & GIVEAWAY**

Prodigy (Blood Rune Series)- By B. McMurray

Author: B. McMurray

Website

Release Date: 7/10/11

Purchase Info: Amazon, Smashword

A thousand years ago a powerful rune master crafted a magical rune into his bloodline. It passed on the knowledge of thousands of runic spells to his descendants, but then it disappeared for eight hundred years. Since then, most knowledge of runic magic has been lost, until a sixteen-year-old girl from Pasadena starts drawing strange symbols in her notebook.

Susan is attacked, her best friend is kidnapped, and the perfect man, Alrek, appears out of nowhere and vows to protect her. Alrek's instantaneous love for her seems almost too good to be true.

Susan is taken away from her life of mall shopping and expensive lattes, and is thrown into a world of runic tattoos, artistic magic, and an ancient school that seeks to master it all. Will Susan be able to use her gift to face the new challenges that threaten to destroy her life?

Will the truth about Alrek push Susan away?

 

Reading Prodigy was like dating the senior quarterback. You seem to be in heaven, can't believe it's happening, then you find him behind the Snac-Shack making our with Cindy Nelson....epic fail!

Ok, I'm not going to sugar-coat this, but I feel like I was dropped from a 80 storey building 3/4 of the way thru. I was falling in L-O-V-E with this book, the characters & the plot! Then boom, it's like a completely different author took over.

I'm getting ahead of myself, so let's go back to the beginning....

Susan knows that she's different, she's seeing things differently then she use to & is starting to drift from her best friend. (who's a complete & utter biotch!) When she runs into Alrek, a gorgeous stranger with a hot little accent, she sudden feels a pull to him that she's never felt. Susan knows that there is something different about him, especially after saving her life and he suddenly appearing in her room out of thin air!
With a million questions running through her head, Alrek wisks a confused Susan away to an ancient rune school half way across the globe to give her the answers she needs. It's then that she suddenly realizes what is held inside of her. With the pressure of the world on her shoulders, a crazy villain who will stop at nothing to get her & this instant hot attraction to Alrek that she feels, there's no telling what will happen.

*SPOILER ALERT*


So I'm gonna sum this next phase up as quickly as possible (or else I'll be gushing all day). Basically from this point enters a jilted ex-fiance, a best friend and James, an old class mate of Alreks. After encountering destruction like no other, courtesy of our seriously demented villain, Susan is left with no other option the to turn to James for help. Then from left field, a MASSIVE twist that leaves you blindsided, and suddenly Susan feels the need to go back to her home town to lure the evil villain there. Which I agree with, because she's on her home turf & whatnot, but when she suddenly decides that her & James should get jobs and enroll in high school, I was lost. This section of the book was completely off, drug-out and things, like certain emotions, felt forced. Magic that they were unable or was difficult to do is suddenly at their finger tips....it didn't sit right.

Yes, I did finish the book, but I just wanted it to stay on track and turn out to be a kickass book.

2/5

 

Cover Whore

 It's been a while since I've done a good, old fashioned Cover Whore.

So today, I'm going back to the roots of the Cover Whore beginning, where all I wanted was to find a cover that made my insides melt & could completely keep me occupied for a minimum of 2 hours!

Well I have found 3 beauties for you!

Illuminate by Aimee Agresti

From the winged shadow to the lighted wisps, I DIE for this cover!

Pandemonium by Lauren Oliver

There's just something about the tones & hues of this cover that absolutely GRABS me, it's beautiful!

Sacrificial Magic by Stacia Kane

Reminds me slightly of the original Fever covers,

but I think it's done very well & meshes the rest of the series covers perfectly :)

What GORGEOUS covers have you seen lately?!

The Lake by Banana Yoshimoto

I first heard about Banana Yoshimoto back in 1995 when her novel Kitchen was translated into Finnish. I read Kitchen and liked it a lot. It was different from what I usually read at the time. It might also have been the first book written by a Japanese author that I ever read. A year later N.P. came out in Finnish. I read that, too, and liked it, but somehow, after that, I kind of lost contact with her writing. It might have been because after those two no others were translated into my language and back then I usually only read in English books that were originally written in English. Then some time ago, during my three month hiatus from blogging, I was lurking on some of my favorite book blogs and stumbled upon Eva's thoughts about The Lake. The book sounded intriguing and the cover looked so cool :), and I could get it from the library right way. I simply had to borrow it.

I was not disappointed. The Lake is a love story, a story about loss and a story about healing. Chihiro is a young woman, who has recently lost her mother. She spends a lot of time staring out of her window and one day she notices a young man across the street doing just the same. They meet and form a somewhat hesitant relationship. Nakajima, the young man in question, seems emotionally very fragile and soon Chihiro understands that something horrible have happened to Nakajima in the past.

Reading The Lake made me remember all over again why I liked Kitchen and N.P. so much. Yoshimoto is a wonderful writer! Her style is simple and pure, like Japanese architecture, yet very vivid, and in it's simplicity it is also something very familiar to me as a Finn. We too like simplicity. I read her description of the lake and it's surroundings and not only could I see the picture in my head very vividly but her words also made me think about Finnish nature, very different from Japanese landscapes, but somehow I still felt a connection.

With its 188 pages The Lake is a quick read, but you might not want to read it too quickly. It's better to give the story some time. It deserves that. Reading the book slowly makes you appreciate the beauty of Yoshimoto's writing better. She has the enviable skill to say a lot with very few words. I must say that I enjoyed every page of the book. I loved the writing and I think the story was very well constructed. The relationship between Chihiro and Nakajima was portrayed perfectly. This was no sugarcoated romance, this was real life, and yet all the more sweeter in all its angst and hesitations.

After sort of a reading slump I was happy to find such a well-written, engaging novel to get myself back on track with my reading. The only problem is, now I want to read more Banana Yoshimoto and my TBR list is already a mile long... :)

Cover Whore Reveal - Cold Blood

Another cover reveal!! YAY!

I am absolutely LOV-ING being apart of showing you all these stunning covers, plus I adore the fact that I get to see them early ;)

Today you all get to see Heather Hildenbrand's cover for Cold Blood, the sequel to Dirty Blood! Here's the cover for Dirty Blood in case you haven't seen it (HOT right?!)

So what do you think of Cold Blood's cover??

I think that it's a perfect balance to the first cover!

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In honor of the cover reveal, Heather is hosting a giveaway on her blog, where you can enter to win a signed PAPERBACK of Dirty Blood, fresh off the press with its own new cover art. The winner of this giveaway will be receiving the very FIRST paperback with the new cover art! Second prize is a set of bookmarks, one with a special wolf charm, and the other signed by Heather. Check it out HERE