Book Review (89).

Celtic Storms (Celtic Steel #1)

by Delaney Rhodes 

Publication: 4th February 2012

Publisher: Delaney Rhodes Publishing

Pages: 314

Genre: Historical Romance

Age Appropriate: Adult

Celtic Storms
Celtic Steel Series, Book 1

Darina O'Malley watched the sun set in the bay from the great tower in O'Malley castle. She said a silent prayer for her cousin, Kyra, hoping the message that was delivered to the MacCahan's did not spell sudden doom for her and her people. If what her Uncle Ruarc had told her was true, she was to be married to a stranger in nearly a fort night, and her world would turn upside down. 

The realization that her clan held secrets which could destroy them forever - chilled her blood. Who was this son of a Laird that she was betrothed to and how would he react when he learned the truth?

My Thoughts.

One of the things I love most is discovering new authors, what's even better is when their book is one that you don't want to put down.

And although I don't read a lot of it I absolutely love historical fiction, especially anything Scottish or Irish related and so I was very excited for this book, and I'm happy to say that I wasn't disappointed it was such an intriguing and exciting read that kept me turning the pages oblivious to anything else.

Darina is the oldest of five daughters in the O'Malley clan and after the death of her father Laird O'Malley they are in need of a new Laird after a curse put on the clan from a spurned woman, no males have been born into the family in years,  and so they have arranged a marriage between Darina and Patrick the eldest son of the MacCahan clan who will become Laird and take the O'Malley name.

While both Darina and Patrick are hesitant about the marriage once they meet there are definite sparks between the two and I loved their scenes together,  I also liked the fact that Patrick wasn't perfect unlike most books, he has a severe stammer and has lost a great deal of use in his right hand due to it being crushed by a horse when he was a boy, but I found that that just added to his allure not to mention that he is tall,dark and handsome.

This story although set in 1457 had the women in the O'Malley clan yards ahead of other women from that time, they all worked at their shipping business, were all taught to fight to defend themselves, wore pants which was a big no no in those days and were free to sleep with men before marriage, I think this added to the intrigue of the story and kept me reading on.

Patrick also arrives with a young boy Braedan in tow with his nanny who has a connection with the O'Malley clan unbeknown to either him or  the O'Malleys's which I thought was a great twist and added another layer to the story.

And there is a subplot involving the spurned woman who put a curse on the clan, Odetta who sacrifices young boys  in order to use black magic to start a war.

I can't say enough good things about this book I loved it and if this sounds like your kind of thing then definitely check it out.

I need to definitely hunt the next books down in this fantastic series.

I give this 4.5/5.

Waiting On Wednesday.

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Breaking The Spine where you can spotlight an upcoming release that you're eagerly anticipating.

This week I'm waiting on....

Dualed (Dualed #1)

by Elsie Chapman

26th February 2013 By Random House

Would you live through the ultimate test of survival?

The city of Kersh is a safe haven, but the price of safety is high. Everyone has a genetic Alternate—a twin raised by another family—and citizens must prove their worth by eliminating their Alts before their twentieth birthday. Survival means advanced schooling, a good job, marriage—life.

Fifteen-year-old West Grayer has trained as a fighter, preparing for the day when her assignment arrives and she will have one month to hunt down and kill her Alt. But then a tragic misstep shakes West’s confidence. Stricken with grief and guilt, she’s no longer certain that she’s the best version of herself, the version worthy of a future. If she is to have any chance of winning, she must stop running not only from her Alt, but also from love . . . though both have the power to destroy her.

The Program (Program #1)

by Suzanne Young 

April 2013 By Simon Pulse

Sloane knows better than to cry in front of anyone. 

With suicide now an international epidemic, one outburst could land her in The Program, the only proven course of treatment. Sloane’s parents have already lost one child; Sloane knows they’ll do anything to keep her alive. She also knows that everyone who’s been through The Program returns as a blank slate. Because their depression is gone—but so are their memories.

Under constant surveillance at home and at school, Sloane puts on a brave face and keeps her feelings buried as deep as she can. The only person Sloane can be herself with is James. He’s promised to keep them both safe and out of treatment, and Sloane knows their love is strong enough to withstand anything. But despite the promises they made to each other, it’s getting harder to hide the truth. They are both growing weaker. Depression is setting in.

And The Program is coming for them.

Catherine

by April Lindner 

January 2013 By Poppy

True love never dies in this modern retelling of one of literature's most haunting star-crossed romances, Wuthering Heights.

Catherine is tired of struggling musicians befriending her just so they can get a gig at her Dad's famous Manhattan club, The Underground. Then she meets mysterious Hence, an unbelievably passionate and talented musician on the brink of success. As their relationship grows, both are swept away in a fiery romance. But when their love is tested by a cruel whim of fate, will pride keep them apart?

Chelsea has always believed that her mom died of a brief illness, until she finds a letter her dad has kept from her for years--a letter from her mom, Catherine, who didn't die: She disappeared. Driven by unanswered questions, Chelsea sets out to look for her--starting with the return address on the letter: The Underground.

Told in two voices, twenty years apart, Catherine interweaves a timeless forbidden romance with a compelling modern mystery.

Angel's Ink (The Asylum Tales #1)

by Jocelynn Drake

16th October 2012 By Harper Voyager

(Description from author)
The series is firmly settled in the urban fantasy genre, set in what I like to call an open world (ie, everyone knows about all the other races and has for a really long time, allowing everyone to live side-by-side in a relative, occasionally strained, harmony.) Some of the races that you meet in this series include, but are not limited to: humans, elves, trolls, dwarves, pixies, werewolves, vampires, ogres, minotaurs, incubus, faeries, goblins, and many many more that are fighting to get their time on the page. 

At the center of this mess is Gage Powell, a tattoo artist who owns a parlor in a sketchy little neighborhood in Low Town called Asylum. In a world that is naturally filled with magic, it only makes sense that many of the non-magic folk (like humans) could use an edge. In this world, tattoo artists aren't just tattoo artists. They are also licensed potion stirrers. For the right price, they can help you get an edge. Need courage, love, or luck? A tattoo artist can stir a potion to be placed in the ink of a tattoo that can help you achieve those things. 

Unfortunately, Gage has a secret that keeps coming back to haunt him despite his attempts to keep his head down and his nose somewhat clean. Lucky for him, he had a pair of employees that help him out. The first is Bronx -- a patient troll who manages to keep a level head and his sense of humor when things get bad. The second is Trixie -- a elf who is pretending to be a human because she's got her own problems, but she still manages to make time to give Gage a hand when he needs it.

The Other Normals

by Ned Vizzini 

25th Setember 2012 By Balzer + Bray

Given the chance, fifteen-year-old Peregrine “Perry” Eckert would dedicate every waking moment to Creatures & Caverns, an epic role-playing game rich with magical creatures, spell casting, and deadly weapons. The world of C&C is where he feels most comfortable in his own skin, so when his parents ship him off to summer camp Perry is sure he’s in for the worst summer of his life.

Everything changes, however, when Perry gets to camp and stumbles into the World of the Other Normals. Perry’s new otherworldly friends need his help to save their princess and prevent mass violence. As they embark on their quest together, Perry realizes that his nerdy childhood has uniquely prepared him to be a great warrior in this world, and maybe even a hero.
Bestselling author Ned Vizzini delivers a compulsively readable and wildly original story about the winding and often hilarious path to manhood.

Incarnation

by Emma Cornwall

18th September 2012 By Gallery Books

Lucy Weston tracks down the novelist Bram Stroker in her search to reveal the dark force who made her a vampire—and regain her humanity in the process.

In the steampunk world of Victorian London, Lucy Weston, a character in Dracula, seeks out Bram Stoker to discover why he deliberately lied about her in his popular novel. With Stoker’s reluctant help, she tracks the creature who transformed her from the sensual underworld where humans vie to become vampires to a hidden cell beneath a temple to madness and finally into the glittering Crystal Palace where death reigns supreme.

Haunted by fragmentary memories of her lost life and love, Lucy battles her thirst for blood as she struggles to stop a catastrophic war that will doom vampires and humans alike. Ultimately, she makes a choice that illuminates for her—and for us—the true nature of what it means to be human.

Book Review (88).

Fury (Mercy #4)

by Rebecca Lim

Publication: 1st May 2012

Publisher: Harper Collins Australia

Pages: 384

Genre: Paranormal

Age Appropriate: Young Adult

**Warning Contains Spoilers From Previous Books**

Heartbreak. Vengeance. Fury.

Mercy is an exiled angel cast down to earth and forced to live out thousands of different lives for her own protection. Betrayed by her eternal love, Luc, Mercy burns with fury. The time of reckoning is here and now she must wage open war with Luc and his demons. Ryan’s love for Mercy is more powerful than ever, but loving an angel is mortally dangerous. As their two worlds collide, Mercy approaches her ultimate breathtaking choice.

Hell hath no fury like Mercy ...

My Thoughts.

This is the final book in the Mercy series, a thrilling end to a fantastic series that was very hard to stop reading.

We come to the battle that the first three books in the series have been working towards, I found the start of the book to be pretty slow going I didn't finish as fast as I did the previous books and I kept picking it up and putting it down even reading another book in-between which I never do, thankfully towards the middle of the book it starts to pick up and we get a bit more action and excitement that I became a fan of in the other books.

The book takes off straight after the ending of the previous book and Mercy and Ryan take refuge in a church while they wait for the demons to disappear.

Mercy gets to spend a lot of time in her own skin so to speak after having spent centuries possessing other people's bodies, she and the Eight Elohim are at war with Luc (Lucifer) and his army of fallen angels

Luc needs Mercy to help destroy the world but in the last book she came to realise he doesn't love her and was just using her, not only that but he was responsible for her exile. 

Mercy spends some time in this book freeing some of the Eight that have been captured by Luc and been tortured in hopes to gather together and destroy Luc once and for all.

Mercy and Luc's relationship was quite a bit up and down in this book,  it was a bit back and forth on Mercy's part of deciding whether or not to break up with him to save his life and I wish that they could have been a bit stronger together as a couple.

We also welcomed back some characters from the previous books: Lauren (Ryan's twin sister) from the first book who finally gets to meet the real Mercy and Gia from the previous book who was Irina's assistant and one of my favourite characters from the series.

I would have loved to have known more about the Eight I think that they were very interesting characters and would have liked to have read more about them.

I was very happy with how the series finished it was exactly what I wanted, now if only we could get a series about the Eight I'd be very happy.

I give this 4/5.

A Big Thanks To Lara @ Harper Collins Australia.

(Arc) Book Review (87).

Team Human

by Justine Larbalestier, Sarah Rees Brennan

Publication: 1st July 2012
Publisher: Allen & Unwin Australia
Pages: 372
Genre: Paranormal
Age Appropriate: Young Adult


Just because Mel lives in New Whitby, a city founded by vampires, doesn’t mean she knows any of the blood-drinking undead personally. They stay in their part of town; she says in hers. Until the day a vampire shows up at her high school. Worse yet, her best friend, Cathy, seems to be falling in love with him. It’s up to Mel to save Cathy from a mistake she might regret for all eternity!

On top of trying to help Cathy (whether she wants it or not), Mel is investigating a mysterious disappearance for another friend and discovering the attractions of a certain vampire wannabe. Combine all this with a cranky vampire cop, a number of unlikely romantic entanglements, and the occasional zombie, and soon Mel is hip-deep in an adventure that is equal parts hilarious and touching.

My Thoughts.

I loved this book it was a totally different aspect to your normal everyday vampire book, ever since this appeared on Goodreads I've been dying to read it and so I was really happy when I received this arc.

Best friends Mel and Cathy are walking to school one day when they are distracted by somebody in a hazmat suit, knowing that it could only be a vampire inside it Cathy is extremely excited having been interested in them her whole life.

You see New Whitby is described as Las Vegas but with vampires who have their own section of town patrolled by their own policeman, they live in houses that are from centuries past and some of them even dress in clothes from the olden times.

So straight away Cathy is smitten with Francis (the vampire) but Mel is not a fan especially since another good friend Anna's father ran away with a vampire patient he had.

So while Cathy is trying her best and finally achieving to get close to Francis, Mel is totally against them being together and after threatening Francis with some information she found out about why he was enrolled at school he leaves  without a word to Cathy so she turns up at his house, Mel realises where she's gone and after breaking into his house they are caught by the owner of the house Camille a vampire cop and her human son Kit.

After professing their love to each other Cathy and Francis after only being together not even a month decide that they want to be together forever and so Francis asks Cathy to change into a vampire and she agrees.

The problem is there is a 10% chance that Cathy could become a zombie, yes in an original idea in a vampire book,  in turning a human if it doesn't work you die or turn into a zombie who then gets destroyed.

So Mel teams up with Kit who has some classic lines in never having associated with humans before he knows only what he's seen on t.v and his reactions to things had me laughing out loud, to change Cathy's mind.

We also have a subplot in which her friend Anna is worried about her mum who is the school principal acting suspicious so Mel investigates sometimes with Kit tagging along.

I loved Mel as a character she was a tough tell it to you straight kind of person who would do anything for her friends and I can't wait to continue on with her other adventures in the next book being released next year.

I highly recommend you pick up this book  it puts a spin on your classic vampire stories and it's full of action and humour and may even get you thinking that if you had the chance to become a vampire would you take it?

I give this 4/5.

A Big Thanks To Allen & Unwin Australia.

In My Mailbox (28).

In My Mailbox Is A Weekly Meme Hosted By Kristi The Story Siren

Review.

The Friendship Matchmaker - Randa Abdel-Fattah (Scholastic Australia)

Dreamless (Starcrossed #2) - Josephine Angelini (Pan Macmillan Australia)

Brought.

City Of Lost Souls (The Mortal Instruments #5) - Cassandra Clare

Underworld (Abandon Trilogy #2) - Meg Cabot

Angel Eyes (Angel Eyes Trilogy #1) - Shannon Dittemore

Beauty - Lisa Daily

Hereafter (Hereafter #1) - Tara Hudson

Legacy (Legacy #1) - Cayla Kluver

Emblaze (The Violet Eden Chapters #3) - Jessica Shirvington

Feature And Follow Friday (28).

Q: Summer Break is upon us! What would be the perfect vacation spot for you to catch up on your reading & relax?

Well living in Australia it's currently Winter here, but when it's Summer I like to go to Phillip Island in Victoria where I live.

And oh it's also the hometown of brothers Chris Hemsworth (Thor) and Liam Hemsworth (Gale - Hunger Games).

Unfortunately I've never spotted them, damn!

Waiting On Wednesday.

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Breaking The Spine where you can spotlight an upcoming release that you're eagerly anticipating.

This week I'm waiting on....

Breaking Glass

by Lisa Amowitz 

9th July 2013 By Spencer Hill Press

On the night seventeen-year-old Jeremy Glass winds up in the hospital with a broken leg and a blood alcohol level well above the legal limit, his secret crush, Susannah, disappears. When he begins receiving messages from her from beyond the grave, he's not sure whether they're real or if he's losing his grip on reality. Clue by clue, he gets closer to unraveling the mystery, and soon realizes he must discover the truth or become the next victim himself.








Lovely, Dark and Deep

by Amy McNamara

13th November 2012 By Simon And Schuster

About a high-school senior, who, in the aftermath of a car accident that kills her boyfriend and throws her carefully planned future into complete upheaval, retreats to the deep woods of Maine to live with the artist father she barely knows and meets a boy who threatens to pull her from her safe, hard-won exile.

Amarok

by Angela J. Townsend

20th November 2012 By Spencer Hill Press

Life has been hell for seventeen-year-old Emma since she moved from sunny California to a remote Alaskan town. Rejected by her father and living with the guilt of causing her mother's death, she makes a desperate dash for freedom from her abusive stepfather. But when her car skids off the icy road, her escape only leads to further captivity in a world beyond her imagining. Dragged across the tundra by a crazed mountain man and his enormous black wolf, she finds that her gentle touch and kind heart earn her the wolf's friendship, and she names him Amarok, not knowing he was once a young man. When a vicious madman--trapped in bear form by an ancient Shaman--attacks the travelers and injures Amarok, Emma must find the strength to confront her fears and free the wolf she's come to love. But there's a catch--she must face down the evil shaman, a powerful Siberian mammoth hunter from the ice age, and he has no intention of giving up his power to her.

Mystic City (Mystic City #1)

by Theo Lawrence

9th October 2012 By Random House

For fans of Matched, The Hunger Games, X-Men, and Blade Runner comes a tale of a magical city divided. A political rebellion ignited. A love that was meant to last forever.

Aria Rose, youngest scion of one of Mystic City's two ruling rival families, finds herself betrothed to Thomas Foster, the son of her parents' sworn enemies. The union of the two will end the generations-long political feud—and unite all those living in the Aeries, the privileged upper reaches of the city, against the banished mystics who dwell below in the Depths. But Aria doesn't remember falling in love with Thomas; in fact, she wakes one day with huge gaps in her memory. And she can't conceive why her parents would have agreed to unite with the Fosters in the first place. Only when Aria meets Hunter, a gorgeous rebel mystic from the Depths, does she start to have glimmers of recollection—and to understand that he holds the key to unlocking her past. The choices she makes can save or doom the city—including herself. 

The Shadow Society

by Marie Rutkoski

30th October 2012 By Farrar, Straus & Giroux

What if everyone thought you were a freak of nature? What if they were right?

Darcy Jones doesn’t remember anything before the day she was abandoned as a child outside a Chicago firehouse. So she isn’t surprised that she doesn’t recognize Conn, the new boy at her high school, even though he seems to know her—or at least know something about her.

What does surprise her is how quickly she comes to trust Conn, and that he makes her feel both desire and desired in a way she hadn’t thought possible. But his interest in her is confusing. It doesn’t line up with the way he first looked at her.

As if she was his enemy.

When Conn betrays Darcy and she is arrested, she realizes that she can’t rely on anything—not Conn, not herself, and not even the laws of nature. Because this world isn’t the only one. Darcy belongs in an alternate world where the Great Chicago Fire never happened, and deadly creatures called Shades terrorize the human population.

Darcy needs some answers.

And she hates that the person most able to help her get them is Conn.

Break My Heart 1,000 Times

by Daniel Waters

16th October 2012 By Hyperion Book CH

Living in the aftermath of the Event means that seeing the dead is now a part of life, but Veronica wishes that the ghosts would just move on. Instead, the ghosts aren’t disappearing—they’re gaining power. 

When Veronica and her friend, Kirk, decide to investigate why, they stumble upon a more sinister plot than they ever could have imagined. One of Veronica’s high school teachers is crippled by the fact that his dead daughter has never returned as a ghost, and he’s haunted by the possibility that she’s waiting to reappear within a fresh body. Veronica seems like the perfect host. And even if he’s wrong, what’s the harm in creating one more ghost?

From critically acclaimed Generation Dead author Daniel Waters, comes a delectably creepy and suspenseful thriller. Break My Heart 1,000 Times will leave readers with the chills. Or is that a ghost reading over the page?

Book Review (86).

Muse (Mercy #3)

by Rebecca Lim

Publication: 27th October 2011

Publisher: Harper Collins Australia

Pages: 368

Genre: Paranormal

Age Appropriate: Young Adult

**Warning Contains Spoilers From Previous Books**

An angel in exile, caught between lives ... and loves

Mercy is an angel, exiled from heaven, and when she wakes in the body of nineteen-year-old Irina, Mercy discovers that she′s one of the world′s most infamous supermodels on the verge of a very public breakdown.

Against the glamorous background of Milan′s opulent fashion world, Mercy continues her increasingly desperate search for Ryan Daley, the mortal boy she remembers falling for in a past life. But this time, Mercy′s memories and powers are growing ever stronger - and she begins to doubt the pleas of her dream lover, Luc, as more of her mysterious past is revealed. Are Luc′s desires as selfless as her own or does he want her for a more terrifying purpose?

The grand scale celestial battle for Mercy′s soul builds to an incredible stormy crescendo as archangels and demons clash in a cataclysmic showdown that not all will survive ...

My Thoughts.

It's a compliment to the author of these books that they only get better as the series goes along, and more addictive you want to find out what's going to happen but then life intrudes and all you can think of is getting back to the book to find out what will happen next.

In a time when more often than not in a book series the books gradually get boring and shy away from the brilliance that was the first book this series has stayed constant and in my opinion exceeded the debut.

So this time Mercy finds herself inhabiting the body of a world famous russian model Irina, a junkie who isn't nice to anybody and is on the verge of her career being over due to her behaviour.

Irina for all her faults is still hounded by the paparazzi can't go anywhere without decoys being arranged her every scandal splashed across magazines and newspapers.

Thankfully Mercy has kept her memories from her time in Lela's body and she gets into contact with Ryan as soon as her assistant locates him and knowing it's for the best she tells him it's over and for him not to come and find her.

She comes to find that the Elohim are everywhere, watching her and warning her that Luc is on the way and that they wont let her leave with him and that he is to be killed for what happened between him and Mercy all that time ago that got her exiled to Earth.

Mercy comes to remember what happened and why she was sent to spend her time in countless different bodies and what she discovers shatters everything she thought was true.

I loved Mercy's reaction to having to act the supermodel it supplied a bit of humor to a book that was action filled and full of revelations.

Now onto the last book to see how the series wraps up.

I give this 4.5/5.

A Big Thanks To Lara @ Harper Collins Australia.