The Disenchantments

Publisher: Penguin (Dutton)
Pages: 307
Publication Date: February 16, 2012
Type: Hardcover, bought 

Colby and Bev have a long-standing pact: graduate, hit the road with Bev's band, and then spend the year wandering around Europe. But moments after the tour kicks off, Bev makes a shocking announcement: she's abandoning their plans - and Colby - to start college in the fall.

But the show must go on and The Disenchantments weave through the Pacific Northwest, playing in small towns and dingy venues, while roadie- Colby struggles to deal with Bev's already-growing distance and the most important question of all: what's next?

Morris Award–finalist Nina LaCour draws together the beauty and influences of music and art to brilliantly capture a group of friends on the brink of the rest of their lives.

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I could say something deep. Something about love and epiphanies and  growing up and being a teenager on the brink of everything just wondering what the fuck you're going to do with this whole entire life.  

But I don't want to say that.  Here's what I want to say:

Nina LaCour has the most honest writing I've ever read.

Clockwork Prince

Publisher: Simon & Schuster (Margaret K. McEldberberry Books)
Pages: 502
Publication Date: December 6, 2011
Type: Hardcover, bought

In the magical underworld of Victorian London, Tessa Gray has at last found safety with the Shadowhunters. But that safety proves fleeting when rogue forces in the Clave plot to see her protector, Charlotte, replaced as head of the Institute. If Charlotte loses her position, Tessa will be out on the street and easy prey for the mysterious Magister, who wants to use Tessa's powers for his own dark ends.

With the help of the handsome, self-destructive Will and the fiercely devoted Jem, Tessa discovers that the Magister's war on the Shadowhunters is deeply personal. He blames them for a long-ago tragedy that shattered his life. To unravel the secrets of the past, the trio journeys from mist-shrouded Yorkshire to a manor house that holds untold horrors, from the slums of London to an enchanted ballroom where Tessa discovers that the truth of her parentage is more sinister than she had imagined. When they encounter a clockwork demon bearing a warning for Will, they realize that the Magister himself knows their every move and that one of their own has betrayed them.

Tessa finds her heart drawn more and more to Jem, though her longing for Will, despite his dark moods, continues to unsettle her. But something is changing in Will; the wall he has built around himself is crumbling. Could finding the Magister free Will from his secrets and give Tessa the answers about who she is and what she was born to do?

As their dangerous search for the Magister and the truth leads the friends into peril, Tessa learns that when love and lies are mixed, they can corrupt even the purest heart.

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I didn't cry, but I was close.

Man, I really did not expect it to be the love triangle.  Deceit, imminent death, actual death, end of the world, those I was prepared for.  I didn't think the love triangle was the heart-breaker.

And that, that right there, is probably why it's so completely and utterly fantastic.  So often, love triangles are simply a plot device.  Something to cause drama, waste pages.  And often, it's clear from the start who's the favored of the two.  One of the reasons I'd never been a fan of the TMI love triangle was that it's so painfully obvious.  Clary never cared for Simon that way. It was always Jace.  Without question.

But that's not the case here.  That's not the case here, and it never will be, because Tessa loves them both so, so much, and they love her as much if not more, and they love each other, making this one of the few true love triangles in existence.  Perhaps they don't love each other that way, but it doesn't really matter, does it? Because it's still the cause of all the heartbreak.  There was no real sadness in the love triangle of TMI--Simon wanders merrily into his new love dilemmas, Jace and Clary have their happily ever after, etc. etc.   

And we all know that can't happen here.

Because they both love her, but they both love each other so much that they could never willingly cause one another harm; that they'll sacrifice their own happiness for one another, even if it means everything.

Unlike so many love triangles, there is no happy ending to be found here. Either way the scale tips, everyone's hearts will be crushed, and mine will go with them.  It's a horribly sad thought, to be honest; that no matter how Tessa ends this story, she and her partner will be haunted by the memory of a third. There's no simple happily-ever-afters  in a love triangle as real or painful as this, and as much as it kills me, kills them, I applaud Cassie Clare for that. I applaud her.

I'm going to be crying in Clockwork Princess. That I can assure you.

5 stars.

P.S. I didn't think she could excuse the assholian behavior, but she did it, goddamnit. She did it.

Shadow and Bone

Publisher: Hachette (Little, Brown)
Pages: 359
Publication Date: April 3, 2012
Type: Hardcover, bought

Surrounded by enemies, the once-great nation of Ravka has been torn in two by the Shadow Fold, a swath of near impenetrable darkness crawling with monsters who feast on human flesh. Now its fate may rest on the shoulders of one lonely refugee. 

Alina Starkov has never been good at anything. But when her regiment is attacked on the Fold and her best friend is brutally injured, Alina reveals a dormant power that saves his life—a power that could be the key to setting her war-ravaged country free. Wrenched from everything she knows, Alina is whisked away to the royal court to be trained as a member of the Grisha, the magical elite led by the mysterious Darkling. 

Yet nothing in this lavish world is what it seems. With darkness looming and an entire kingdom depending on her untamed power, Alina will have to confront the secrets of the Grisha…and the secrets of her heart.

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Books like this make me realize just how biased my ratings really are.

Because, objectively, this isn't perfect.  And that's what five stars means, right? Perfect. 100%. Not a flaw to be found.

And objectively speaking there are flaws in this novel.  

There's scarcely a good female character to be found aside from our lovely heroine.

The plot contradicted itself several times.

Alina's last name should be Starkova and you can't get drunk on kvas.

Etcetera etcetera.

But the fact is, when I was reading this novel, I wasn't thinking about a lack in female representation, or a contradictory plot, or improper last names.

I was thinking about the dark, magical, fantastical world, the one that consumed me the moment I cracked open this novel.  How marvelous and horrible and utterly entrancing it was; how wonderfully imagined, every last detail.

I was thinking about the romance, how it made my heart pound like a silly teenager (oh, right! I am a silly teenager!), made my stomach clench and made me grin like I was the one being kissed senseless.  

I was thinking about the plot, the crazy, layered, chilling plot that I could never quite predict.

I was thinking about a villain so complex that while I recognized the evil of his deeds, his own inherent darkness, the fact that he would most likely always be a terribly awful, terribly dangerous person . . . I still wanted some redemption for him, some semblance of a happy ending.

I was thinking about how beautiful it was despite the horror.  How I started this at 12 and finished it at 4 in the morning.

I fell really hard for Shadow and Bone.

And whatever the objective side of me may say, the part of me that stayed up until an obscene hour of the morning just to turn the final page and share my exhausted ramble of a gush with the internet refuses to give this novel anything less than five stars.

I Hunt Killers

Publisher: Hachette (Little, Brown)
Pages: 359
Publication Date: April 3, 2012
Type: Hardcover, bought

What if the world's worst serial killer...was your dad?

Jasper (Jazz) Dent is a likable teenager. A charmer, one might say.

But he's also the son of the world's most infamous serial killer, and for Dear Old Dad, Take Your Son to Work Day was year-round. Jazz has witnessed crime scenes the way cops wish they could--from the criminal's point of view.

And now bodies are piling up in Lobo's Nod.

In an effort to clear his name, Jazz joins the police in a hunt for a new serial killer. But Jazz has a secret--could he be more like his father than anyone knows?

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

There are a lot of reasons to love this book.

You can love it because it's unabashedly gory, but not in a senseless manner.  It's not gore simply for the sake of gore.  It's just honest detail, a refusal to censor the horror of a serial killer's deeds.

You can love it because it presents a compelling mystery, one that was terrifying, unpredictable, and completely satisfying.  

You can love it because it's a brilliant mixture of dark and witty.  The morbid humor is a fascinating counterbalance to the brutality pervading this novel.  It switched so easily from light banter to gruesome murder and heavy contemplation, without seeming corny or forced.  Rather, the abrupt switch from light to darkness made the darkness all the more terrifying.

You can love it because the characters are complex and lovable and remarkably flawed, in that way only real people are.

Or if you're feeling shallow and easily distractable, you can love it because it's got the coolest fucking cover art in existence.

But the reason I loved this novel as much as I did was the painfully realistic portrayal of Jazz's character.  Jazz is one of the most disturbed, imperfect protagonists you could possibly find, and I felt that Barry Lyga absolutely nailed him.  Everything. Every aspect of his thoughts, his words, his actions.  If there was a boy who'd been raised by the most horrible serial killer the world had ever seen, this is precisely how he would be.

Throughout the novel, Jazz faces the dilemma of whether or not he is doomed to follow in his father's footsteps.  Whether or not him becoming a murder is a possibility or inevitability.  Whether or not he is a sociopath. Whether or not he can care.

And I can tell you from experience that Barry Lyga captured those feelings perfectly.

The following is rather personal, but it's the reason I was so very impressed by Mr. Lyga's skill in the creation of Jazz's character.  If you don't wish to read this, you can skip to the bottom.

The thing is that I have been called a sociopath several times.  At a relatively young age.  By parents.  And when a ten- or eleven-year-old is called a sociopath, it makes them seriously consider the possibility.  What if they're right? What if I am a sociopath?  What if the way I act, the way I feel, is just a show?

Do I care about others, or do I simply think I do because that's what's expected of me?

Do I care, period?

Do sociopaths worry about being sociopaths?

And this struggle is written so perfectly in the character of Jazz that I was honestly stunned.  It gave him a new depth, and a remarkable relatability, even to those who haven't been confronted with this exact question.  At the heart of this is the more general dilemma of Will I follow in my parent's footsteps?  Am I my own person, or what they made me? 

That gave the novel an unexpected thoughtfulness and poignancy to accompany the gory murder.  

Would I recommend this? Yes. Yes. Yes.  I would recommend this a million times over.  Will everyone be able to read this? No.  Definitely not.  This is not a novel for the faint of heart; it is very, very graphic, and if you can't handle that, this will not be the novel for you.

But if you can, I suspect you will love every last gruesome detail.  

5 stars.

Wanderlove

Publisher: Random House (Delacorte Press)
Pages: 352
Publication Date: March 13, 2012
Type: ARC, won

It all begins with a stupid question:

Are you a Global Vagabond?

No, but 18-year-old Bria Sandoval wants to be. In a quest for independence, her neglected art, and no-strings-attached hookups, she signs up for a guided tour of Central America—the wrong one. Middle-aged tourists with fanny packs are hardly the key to self-rediscovery. When Bria meets Rowan, devoted backpacker and dive instructor, and his outspokenly humanitarian sister Starling, she seizes the chance to ditch her group and join them off the beaten path.

Bria's a good girl trying to go bad. Rowan's a bad boy trying to stay good. As they travel across a panorama of Mayan villages, remote Belizean islands, and hostels plagued with jungle beasties, they discover what they've got in common: both seek to leave behind the old versions of themselves. And the secret to escaping the past, Rowan’s found, is to keep moving forward.

But Bria comes to realize she can't run forever, no matter what Rowan says. If she ever wants the courage to fall for someone worthwhile, she has to start looking back.

Kirsten Hubbard lends her artistry to this ultimate backpacker novel, weaving her drawings into the text. Her career as a travel writer and her experiences as a real-life vagabond backpacking Central America are deeply seeded in this inspiring story.


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This book is lovely.

It's adorable and heart-warming without being cheesier than a goopy box of Kraft M&C.

It's deep and thoughtful, but not in a way that feels contrived, or thrust upon you.

It's funny in a wonderfully natural way, a way that feels like real teenage humor, not some adult's idea of what a witty teenager would sound like.  

It's chock-full of ridiculously beautiful drawings by the author herself.

And it fills you with an untamable longing for adventure, infects you with your own case of Wanderlove, makes you want to discover everything this world has to offer.

I adored it.

Shadow Kiss

Publisher: Penguin (Razorbill)
Pages: 443
Publication Date: November 13, 2008
Type: Paperback, received as gift

Is Rose’s fate to kill the person she loves most?

It’s springtime at St. Vladimir’s Academy, and Rose Hathaway is this close to graduation. Since Mason’s death, Rose hasn’t been feeling quite right. She has dark flashbacks in the middle of practice, can’t concentrate in class, and has terrifying dreams about Lissa. But Rose has an even bigger secret... She’s in love with Dimitri. And this time, it’s way more than a crush.

Then Strigoi target the academy in the deadliest attack in Moroi history, and Dimitri is taken. Rose must protect Lissa at all costs, but keeping her best friend safe could mean losing Dimitri forever...


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I didn't cry.


Maybe it's because I knew.  Because I've known for so long.  I knew the ending to this novel long before I even received the books, even longer before I started them.  I knew it.  I knew what would happen, and what's more, I know the series's very end.


But it's not just that.


It's also the nature of this feeling; it's not an ugly cry.  It's not a let-the-pages-drink-your-tears kind of novel.  It's just this quiet, overwhelming sadness.  This novel, these characters, weighing on my mind.  I can't shake them away.


I hate it and I love it.

Jellicoe Road

Publisher: HarperCollins (HarperTeen)
Pages: 419
Publication Date: August 28, 2006
Type: Paperback, bought

"What do you want from me?" he asks. What I want from every person in my life, I want to tell him. More. 

Abandoned by her mother on Jellicoe Road when she was eleven, Taylor Markham, now seventeen, is finally being confronted with her past. But as the reluctant leader of her boarding school dorm, there isn't a lot of time for introspection. And while Hannah, the closest adult Taylor has to family, has disappeared, Jonah Griggs is back in town, moody stares and all. 

In this absorbing story by Melina Marchetta, nothing is as it seems and every clue leads to more questions as Taylor tries to work out the connection between her mother dumping her, Hannah finding her then and her sudden departure now, a mysterious stranger who once whispered something in her ear, a boy in her dreams, five kids who lived on Jellicoe Road eighteen years ago, and the maddening and magnetic Jonah Griggs, who knows her better than she thinks he does. If Taylor can put together the pieces of her past, she might just be able to change her future.


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I can be a real idiot sometimes, did you know?

I heard about this one for months.  Maybe a year. Maybe more.  Even before I joined Goodreads, before anything.  I heard of this.  Saw it.  Saw people reviewing it, trying and occasionally failing to express their feelings for this.  This book.

And I expected to like it, but I kept my reservations.  Maybe I'd be the exception.  Maybe I'd be that one who it just didn't work for, who didn't understand.

I should've known it would end in this: 2 AM, tired eyes, and a mind that's never been more awake.  Wondering how books manage to do this to me and hoping they'll never stop.

I could talk about a lot of things.  I could talk about real characters and complex plotting and beautiful words.  There are so, so many things I could say.

But I'll never say enough for this book, so here's what I can tell you: I read it in a day.  I laughed.   I grew furious.  Grew happy again.  Curled on a small, painful couch and read for hours and hours and hours until my eyes wanted to blur but I wouldn't let them, because I had to finish, I had to.  And then they did blur, despite it all, and I cried.  Just for a moment.

And a few pages later, the book was done.

Hold Still

Publisher: Penguin (Speak)
Pages: 229
Publication Date: September 25, 2009
Type: Paperback, bought

An arresting story about starting over after a friend's suicide, froma breakthrough new voice in YA fiction 

Dear Caitlin, there are so many things that i want so badly to tell you but i just can't. 

Devastating, hopeful, hopeless, playful . . . in words and illustrations, Ingrid left behind a painful farewell in her journal for Caitlin. Now Caitlin is left alone, by loss and by choice, struggling to find renewed hope in the wake of her best friend's suicide. With the help of family and newfound friends, Caitlin will encounter first love, broaden her horizons, and start to realize that true friendship didn't die with Ingrid. And the journal which once seemed only to chronicle Ingrid's descent into depression, becomes the tool by which Caitlin once again reaches out to all those who loved Ingrid - and Caitlin herself.


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I want to say so much about this book, but no matter how eloquent I try to be, it won't be enough.  This is just one of those books, I suppose?  One of those books that I can't review, that I can't dissect and analyze  or simply shout "I love it!"


I can't.  I can't do that to a book like this.  


To be honest, I don't think anything I say will fully communicate this. This book. This everything.  My review will never be able to express what this book is, and what it does.

All I can say is that this book is real.

It's so real it's painful.  It's so real that you pause, double back, make sure that this is fiction, that there is no Dylan no Maddy no Tyler no Caitlin no Ingrid.  That these people, their world, it doesn't quite exist.

Even those stories where I praise the beautiful three-dimensional characters, their faults and their assets and their everything, those stories where I say, If I just looked out the window, I could see them there. Walking along. Living their lives. 

They're not this.

This is not a story glossed up and prettied and toned down, a story written to appeal to the masses, to make some dramatic point, to have some transcendental meaning.  It's a girl and the loss of the one person who knew her best.  It's a girl and new friends, new love, real family.  It's a girl dealing with grief and anger and hope and life.

This book is short because it doesn't have to be any longer.  It says all it needs to say in 229 pages.  

I would recommend this to everyone.

The Sinister Sweetness of Splendid Academy

Publisher: Penguin (Razorbill)
Pages: 279
Publication Date: August 21, 2012
Type: ARC, for blog tour

When Lorelei's old school mysteriously burns down, a new one appears practically overnight: Splendid Academy. Rock-climbing walls on the playground and golden bowls of candy on every desk? Gourmet meals in the cafeteria, served by waiters? Optional homework and two recess periods a day? It's ever kids's dream. 

But Lorelei and her new friend Andrew are pretty sure it's too good to be true. Together they uncover the sinister mystery, one with their teacher, the beautiful Ms. Morrigan, at the very center. 

Then Andrew disappears. Lorelei has to save him, even if that means facing a past she'd like to forget – and taking on a teacher who's a real witch. 

What Lorelei and Andrew discover chills their bones – and might even pick them clean! 



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This book helped remind me why I still adore middlegrade.


It managed to be cute, sweet, genuinely emotional, and creepy, sometimes all within the span of a few pages.  In a YA novel, that'd be almost bizarre; but in here? Not in the slightest.  Children have such a fantastic array of emotions, and are so very capricious.  They can switch from delighted to horrified to curious within the span of minutes.  And they have this honest, black and white view of the world that has always fascinated me more than anything.  


At first, this tripped me up.  While some of the characters were wonderful and real and intensely likable--Lorelei, Andrew, even Brian, despite his jerkiness--some of them seemed to be flatly evil, with no redeeming traits to speak of.  But then I remembered something, something I suppose I'd forgotten in the many months between my last middlegrade read.  I remembered that simply because Lorelei perceived these people as purely awful did not mean they were, in actuality, evil incarnate; it was simply how she saw them.  Lorelei is not a little kid, but even at her age, children have this tendency to make things out in such a way that the world is easier to grasp.  There are blacks and whites, rights and wrongs, but there are no shades of gray.


I'd accepted this, so it came as a very, very pleasant surprise when Nikki Loftin showed me that Lorelei could see the shades of gray, at least a bit.


Even those characters that should be completely despicable, the ones you know you're supposed to hate, root against, hope for their demise, etc., were not the evil, mustache-twirling (hair-twirling, since they're female?) villains that one might find in a middlegrade book for the younger ages.  They were terrible, yes, and I was rooting for Lorelei to defeat them, yes, but there were these small moments, these small emotions, that made them so very real, despite the fantastic circumstances.


I adored that.  I adored every last character in here, but most of all, I adored Lorelei.  She was sweet and troubled and determined and far, far better than most MCs you'll find in YA today.  They could learn a thing or to from this girl, this eleven-year-old who loves her family and loves her friend and will do anything to save the people around her, no matter how they may act towards her.  

That's not the only thing I was fond of. I liked the writing, simple and smooth; I liked the plot, with its fast, even pacing that rushed me through this in less than a day; I liked the whole concept, completely creepy and completely original.  Granted, I guessed the main plot within the first 30 pages, but I do not fall within this book's intended audience.  I suspect that for the average 7-12 year old, the plot will be a wonderful mystery.

More than all this, though, the characters made the story.  Nikki Loftin has a real talent for creating characters that you can't help but love, and that, that guarantees I will read anything she writes, no matter the genre.

4.5 stars, but I loved the characters enough that it's being rounded to 5.

Terrier: Review and Giveaway

Publisher: Random House
Pages: 592
Publication Date: October 24, 2006
Type: Paperback, gift

Tamora Pierce begins a new Tortall trilogy introducing Beka Cooper, an amazing young woman who lived 200 years before Pierce's popular Alanna character. For the first time, Pierce employs first-person narration in a novel, bringing readers even closer to a character that they will love for her unusual talents and tough personality.

Beka Cooper is a rookie with the law-enforcing Provost's Guard, and she's been assigned to the Lower City. It's a tough beat that's about to get tougher, as Beka's limited ability to communicate with the dead clues her in to an underworld conspiracy. Someone close to Beka is using dark magic to profit from the Lower City's criminal enterprises--and the result is a crime wave the likes of which the Provost's Guard has never seen before.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 


This is my third time rereading Terrier.  Some books, after a read or two, grow old.  You enjoyed them the first time, but they're not ones you could pick up again with the same expectations.  Terrier is not one of those books.  Tamora Pierce's novels, period, are not those books.  No matter how many times I reread them, I'm still stunned by the sheer flawlessness of her writing, her characters, and her world.


Tamora Pierce's books are, for lack of a better word, very . . . mature.  By that, I do not mean they stray into the realm of Adult Fiction; they are still very firmly grounded in YA.  In fact, I first read her books when I was nine and enjoyed them.  But it's almost as if she is above the common tropes and pitfalls of YA; even when she uses something that might, in another book, seem cliche, she manages to make it into something so natural and perfect that you wonder why you ever questioned it in the first place.  This isn't a book written for hormone-fueled teenagers to angst over; it's a book written from a teenage character's point of view, but it is rich and complex and not dumbed down in the slightest.  It's the kind of YA book that people of any age can fall in love with.


One of the things that really sets Tamora Pierce apart from other fantasy authors, and other authors in general, is just how well she knows her world.  She has written five series in this world, and she could write more, because it is so vast and detailed that the story possibilities are endless.  When you read Tamora Pierce's books,  you get the sense that this woman knows every last detail of every last country and city and neighborhood in this magical realm she's created.  But the best part of this is that she doesn't burden you with the knowledge.  She doesn't dump it all over your head.  She simply slips you into her world and lets you discover for yourself.  This is one of the many reasons that I've always loved Tamora Pierce's books, despite not being the greatest fan of high fantasy.  Oftentimes, something that put me off other books of the same genre was the amount of world-building they attempted to do through telling.  Perhaps they knew their world well, but they tried to show their reader just how much they knew this world within the span of a few pages.  Tamora Pierce never does that.  She gives brief histories when necessary, but for the most part, she lets you explore the world on your own.

This was Tamora Pierce's first foray into first person aside from a few short stories, and I have to say, it worked brilliantly.  I love all of her books, so clearly she also excels at third person, but I think the first person, journal format was absolutely perfect for this book.  It gave it both that detail and that sense of immediacy that a story like this really needed. And there's even a reasonable explanation for why Beka would be keeping such a detailed journal in the first place; she is practicing for when she must make full reports as a Dog.  Like any realistic journal-keeper, she is not consistent in her length and detail; some days she is too tired or too frustrated to write, some days she simply glosses over because nothing important happened, and some days . . . well, one day she gets drunk and writes accordingly.  I really appreciated these little touches.

I also appreciate that she gave them dialogue as would be fitting for those living in the scummy part of town in something akin to Medieval times.  They had their own little vocabulary which is all perfectly understandable in context, but really helps to add that sense of realism.  A huge pitfall for many authors setting their books in historical times, or historical times within a fantasy world, is accurate dialogue, but Tamora Pierce pulls it off wonderfully.

Despite the impeccable writing and world-building, however, where this book--and Tamora Pierce herself--truly shines is the characters.  The characters are the best because they are so, so real.  Every last one of them.  She handles such a wide, lively cast of characters and manages to make each one unique, each one a real person with real hobbies and thoughts and opinions and flaws.   I cannot think of a single side character in here that is not completely three-dimensional.  I fell in love with those I was meant to fall in love with and hated those I was meant to hate, and then there were some who did terrible things but whom I couldn't quite hate because it was so easy to see why they would do what they'd done.

And Beka. Oh, Beka.  I love her to death.  I love every part of her.  There are such a rare few main characters who never once get on my nerve throughout an entire book (much less a 590-page one), but Beka makes the cut.  She is yet another of Pierce's "strong female heroines," but as with all the others, she does not fit the modern YA concept of a "strong female heroine."  She is kickass at times, but she is not infallible; she is not flawless in her fighting, nor in her problem-solving.  She is painfully shy, but not, as one often sees today, in a way that is meant to be endearing.  She is not the awkward, quiet girl who meets a bold man that finds her shyness so damn adorable and sweet, etc. etc.   She considers it a cripple, something that interferes with her ability to arrest Rats and report at the Magistrate's Court.  However, despite her shyness, she doesn't simply let others walk all over her.  When Rosto, the charming Rat who is constantly flirting with her and whom she's made very clear she will not get involved with, makes too bold of an advance, she doesn't fall into his arms or simply let it slide;  she threatens to punch him (or mocks him for being "old," knowing it will sting his pride and turn him away).

I know many people may steer clear of this book because it is a high fantasy, or a mystery, or a "cop" book, or all of the above. If you are one of those people, I'd advise you to give it another look.  Because I am not a fan of high fantasy or cop books, and I am not always crazy about mysteries, yet this book is among my favorites.  Perhaps you'd enjoy it as much as I have.

In case I haven't already made it clear, this book gets a solid five stars.

Buuut wait! There's more! (totally did not just say that in a commercial voice . . . )  I love this book so much that I want to give others the chance to read it.  Now, if I had only one copy, I'd be pretty tight-fisted, because I'm leery about giving away my favorites.  However, I somehow ended up with not one, but two paperback copies of Terrier by Tamora Pierce.  So I am giving away one of them to you, my lovely followers!

Simply enter the Rafflecopter form below.

(giveaway is for US only--I'm really sorry to all of you international followers, but I just don't have the money to ship anywhere else)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Nevermore

Publisher: Simon & Schuster (Atheneum Books)

Pages: 543

Publication Date: August 31, 2010

Type: Paperback, bought

Cheerleader Isobel Lanley is horrified when she is paired with Varen Nethers for an English project. Cold and aloof, sardonic and sharp-tongued, Varen makes it clear that he'd rather not have anything to do with her, either. But soon Isobel finds herself making excuses to be with Varen. Steadily pulled away from her freinds and possessive boyfriend, Isobel ventures deeper and deeper into the dream world Varen has created through the pages of his notebook, a realm where the terrifying shories of Edgar Allan Poe come to life. 

As her world begins to unravel around her, Isobel discovers that dreams, like words, hold more power than she ever imagned and that the most frightening realities are those of the mind. Can she save Varen from the madness taking hold of him? Or will they both be consumed by the shadows of his nightmares?

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

*Disclaimer* I am writing this semi-blind, so if there are an abundance of typos, please inform me, and I shall go over this as soon as I receive glasses.  Also, it will be rather short.  My apologies.

I so wanted this one to be good.  It seemed to have gotten a much more positive response than the majority of YA PNRs in the market today, and it was based off of Poe. I absolutely adore Poe, so that immediately sold it for me.

I was a bit confused when I originally looked at the rating on Goodreads.  It was not a bad rating, certainly, but not nearly as high a rating as I'd expected, considering all the top reviews were four or five stars.  And then when I finished, I couldn't fathom how people might give this less than a four.  But then I realized.  While I certainly do not have proof of this, I'd wager a guess that the one or two stars came from those who read the first 100 pages or so and then just gave up. DNF. One or two stars.

I will admit that the first 100 pages or so are a bit of a slog.  It would seem that stereotypes and melodrama abound, and there is little-to-no supernatural to be seen.  I was a bit put off, but I reminded myself of the glowing reviews and the fact that this book had 443 pages left, and I pushed on.

I am so glad I did.

This book is everything I wish paranormals of today would be.  It is dark and haunting and ridiculously creative.  It is a book with real characters and real relationships and real emotion.  It doesn't just have a plot  -- it has a crazy, beautiful, ridiculously complex story spanning over 500 pages without dragging.  It is centered largely around the works of a literary god and does him justice.  It has a female main character that thinks for herself and doesn't need a guy to prove her self-worth. It is fantastic.

I could ramble to you for pages about the gorgeous descriptions and incredible characters and mind-blowing world, but I'd rather not, because I think you might get a little tired, and my eyes hurt.  Suffice it to say this book rocked my (nonexistent) socks.  It was not flawless--there were a couple characters, like Alyssa and Mark and Lacy, who did stray into the realm of flat stereotypes, and some aspects of the plot could've picked up a bit sooner.  But honestly, that didn't really affect the sheer awesomeness of this book.  While this is technically a 4.5, I have no regrets in rounding it to a 5.  August had better come soon (or an Enshadowed ARC had better come sooner).

P.S. My friend and I spent about half an hour trying to decipher the words on the cover, despite my sister insisting that the cover maker did not intend them to be deciphered.  We were only able to make out a few small words and phrases.  If anyone else managed to make out more, I would love to hear about it . . . *hint hint*

Saving June

‘If she’d waited less than two weeks, she’d be June who died in June. But I guess my sister didn’t consider that.’ 

Harper Scott’s older sister has always been the perfect one so when June takes her own life a week before her high school graduation, sixteen-year-old Harper is devastated. Everyone’s sorry, but no one can explain why. 

When her divorcing parents decide to split her sister’s ashes into his-and-her urns, Harper takes matters into her own hands. She’ll steal the ashes and drive cross-country with her best friend, Laney, to the one place June always dreamed of going California. 

Enter Jake Tolan. He’s a boy with a bad attitude, a classic-rock obsession and nothing in common with Harper’s sister. But Jake had a connection with June, and when he insists on joining them, Harper’s just desperate enough to let him. With his alternately charming and infuriating demeanour and his belief that music can see you through anything, he might be exactly what she needs. 

Except June wasn’t the only one hiding something. Jake’s keeping a secret that has the power to turn Harper’s life upside down again.

So, I went into this expecting great things.  Glowing review after glowing review appeared on my Goodreads feed.  The premise was intriguing and fantastic.  People were even comparing Hannah Harrington to authors such as Melina Marchetta.

But despite that, I was a bit skeptical.  I'm always a bit skeptical when beginning books as praised as this one, like some part of me is mentally preparing for it not to be as amazing as everyone has claimed.  I don't like being let down.

Luckily, Saving June did anything but.

 I don't know exactly what to say about this book.  I don't know how to describe it.  I don't think I can even begin to communicate the rare and beautiful mix of music and love and anger and humor and loss that make up this brilliant little book.  So I'm just going to ask you to read it.  Maybe you'll be able to describe this better than I ever could.

Five solid stars.  Speechless had better come out soon, because the world needs more of this woman's genius.