Sunday Post - 67 & Stacking the Shelves - 40

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimba @ The Caffeinated Book Reviewer ~this meme was inspired in part by ~ In My Mailbox~ It's a chance to share News. A post to recap the past week, showcase books and things we have received and share news about what is coming up for the week on our blog.

This has been a crazy week. Tuesday included a trip to Mobile for the funeral of my SNL's grandfather. We were able to stop by my grandparents' house to visit for a bit while we were there. Friday we celebrated my husband and father's birthdays with my family. And then Saturday night I went out to eat with some friends from high school for our ten year reunion. Busy week, but the good kind.

THIS PAST WEEK:

Monday: Review of Existence (Existence Trilogy, # 1) by Abbi Glines
Tuesday: Top Ten Books I Was Forced to Read
Wednesday: Waiting on Minders
Thursday: Review of Hex Hall (Hex Hall, # 1) by Rachel Hawkins (3 Stars)
Friday: From the Ashes: Shadow Kiss (Vampire Academy, # 3) by Richelle Mead (5 Stars)

UPCOMING THIS WEEK:

Monday: Review of Glass Houses (Morganville Vampires, # 1) by Rachel Caine
Tuesday: Top Ten Character Names
Wednesday: Waiting on Wednesday
Thursday: Review of This is Not a Test by Courtney Summers
Friday: DNF Review of Wilde's Army (Darkness Falls, # 2) by Krystal Wade

Stacking the Shelves is hosted by Tynga's Reviews.

Finding Cinderella (Hopeless, # 2.5)

By: Colleen Hoover

Published: October 14th 2013 by Atria Books

105 pages

Genre: YA/NA, Contemporary

Source: Personal Kindle Library

( Goodreads | Amazon free )

Goodreads description--This novella is a companion novel to the Hopeless series, but can be read as a standalone.

A chance encounter in the dark leads eighteen-year-old Daniel and the girl who stumbles across him to profess their love for each other. But this love comes with conditions: they agree it will only last one hour and it will only be make-believe.

When their hour is up and the girl rushes off like Cinderella, Daniel tries to convince himself that what happened between them only seemed perfect because they were pretending it was perfect. Moments like that with girls like her don’t happen outside of fairytales.

One year and one bad relationship later, his disbelief in insta-love is stripped away the day he meets Six: a girl with a strange name and an even stranger personality. Daniel soon realizes the way he pretended to feel about Cinderella and the way he really feels about Six may not be so different after all. Especially when the two loves of his life end up being one in the same.

Unfortunately for Daniel, finding Cinderella doesn’t guarantee their happily ever after…it only further threatens it

Significance (Significance, # 1)

By: Shelly Crane

Published: June 12th 2011 (first published June 1st 2011)

330 pages

Genre: YA, Fantasy, Paranormal

Source: Personal Kindle Library

( Goodreads | Amazon (currently free) | Book Depository | Booksamillion.com )

*Note: The above links to Amazon, Book Depository, and Booksamillion.com are affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.

Goodreads description--Maggie is a seventeen year old girl who's had a bad year. She was smart and on track, but then her mom left, her dad is depressed, she's graduating - barely - and her boyfriend of almost three years dumped her for a college football scholarship. Lately she thinks life is all about hanging on by a thread and is gripping tight with everything she has.

Then she saves the life of Caleb and instantly knows there's something about him that's intriguing. But things change when they touch, sparks ignite. Literally.

They imprint with each other and she sees their future life together flash before her eyes. She learns that not only is she his soul mate, and can feel his heartbeat in her chest, but there is a whole other world of people with gifts and abilities that she never knew existed. She herself is experiencing supernatural changes unlike anything she's ever felt before and she needs the touch of his skin to survive.

Now, not only has her dad come out of his depression to be a father again, and a pain as well, but Caleb's enemies know he's imprinted and are after Maggie to stop them both from gaining their abilities and take her from him.

Can Caleb save her or will they be forced to live without each other after just finding one another?

Brightest Kind of Darkness (Brightest Kind of Darkness, # 1)

By: PT Michelle

Published: June 27th 2011 by Patrice Michelle

357 pages

Genre: YA, Fantasy, Paranormal

Source: Personal Kindle Library

( Goodreads | Amazon (currently free) | Book Depository | Booksamillion.com )

*Note: The above links to Amazon, Book Depository, and Booksamillion.com are affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.

Goodreads description--Nara Collins is an average sixteen-year-old, with one exception: every night she dreams the events of the following day. Due to an incident in her past, Nara avoids using her special gift to change fate…until she dreams a future she can’t ignore.

After Nara prevents a bombing at Blue Ridge High, her ability to see the future starts to fade, while people at school are suddenly being injured at an unusually high rate.

Grappling with her diminishing powers and the need to prevent another disaster, Nara meets Ethan Harris, a mysterious loner who seems to understand her better than anyone. Ethan and Nara forge an irresistible connection, but as their relationship heats up, so do her questions about his dark past.

That's it for my shelves and recaps of my past and upcoming week. What did you add to your shelves this week? Any bookish news you want to talk about? Let me know!

From the Ashes: Shadow Kiss

From the Ashes is a feature here at Somewhere Only We Know where I re-read books that I read before blogging and finally review them.

You can see my From the Ashes reviews of Vampire Academy here and Frostbite here.

Shadow Kiss (Vampire Academy, # 3)

By: Richelle Mead

Published: November 13th 2008 by Razorbill

443 pages

Genre: YA, Paranormal, Fantasy, Vampires

Source: Personal Library (own in multiple formats)

( Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository | Booksamillion.com )

*Note: The above links to Amazon, Book Depository, and Booksamillion.com are affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.

Goodreads description--It's springtime at St. Vladimir's Academy, and Rose Hathaway is this close to graduation. Since making her first Strigoi kills, Rose hasn't been feeling quite right. She's having dark thoughts, behaving erratically, and worst of all... might be seeing ghosts.

As Rose questions her sanity, new complications arise. Lissa has begun experimenting with her magic once more, their enemy Victor Dashkov might be set free, and Rose's forbidden relationship with Dimitri is starting to heat up again. But when a deadly threat no one saw coming changes their entire world, Rose must put her own life on the line - and choose between the two people she loves most.

So Shadow Kiss is the book that takes the Vampire Academy series to the next level. I always tell people thinking about reading this series to at least give it until Shadow Kiss to decide how you feel about the series. Vampire Academy and Frostbite are both good and Frostbite progresses in depth and conflict, but Shadow Kiss blows both of these novels away.

Richelle Mead starts Shadow Kiss off with this opening scene that has you going "wow that's progressing fast," and "is this really happening," to "oh my goodness how embarrassing," and "poor Rose." And then you just end up laughing out loud--or I do anyway. This scene is the perfect way to set the tone for this book. Rose is so in her face, forcefully shown everything she wants, but can't have and I feel so bad for her. Still reeling from Mason's death, Rose is in an emotionally vulnerable place when we start Shadow Kiss.

A large portion of Vampire Academy is centered around Rose's training to become a guardian--Lissa's guardian. So I loved the concept of the field tests that Richelle Mead adds in as part of the novices' school curriculum. It's brilliant. But the setup and execution for the field tests doesn't really go as Rose expects it to. Rose, of course, has no issues in letting the authorities know how she feels about it all, but the guardians have good reason for making the decisions they have and Rose eventually comes to see the logic behind all of that. I just love how typical Rose handles all of this with her snarky, smart mouth.

Richelle Mead cuts this book with plenty of sarcasm and snarky, witty comments. Rose and Adrian continue to banter back and forth as well as Rose and Christian. I just love it. And considering how heavy the ending of this book is, the beginning needed all the lightness it could get from the jokes and laugh out loud moments.

Despite the letdown of hopes from the opening scene, Rose and Dimitri do continue to grow closer throughout Shadow Kiss. Dimitri's ability to predict Rose's behavior with the field experience setup, Dimitri volunteering to help with Rose's community service just to spend time with her, his protectiveness over her with Victor and the trial, telling her to wear her hair up for the trial, I could go on and on. Either way, the moments between them continue to build faith in each other, trust, tension, affection, all of the things that are necessary to make up truly epic love. Can I just say "fight scene" and "the cabin?" Those who have read this series will know what I mean. EEEE! *giggles like a little girl*

The other characters continue to grow as well. Lissa is showing herself to be more confident and comfortable in her abilities, herself, and in her opinions. Christian continues to press for what he believes in--though he does have a stint of jealousy throughout the book. Adrian grows more in his abilities, but his presence and the importance of having him around grows as well. Eddie is an almost completely changed character from where he was in the first two books. Being extremely affected by the death of Mason, his best friend, in Frostbite, Eddie can't help but take life and his job as a guardian seriously since he's seen first hand the hand of the enemy.

As I've said in both of my reviews of Vampire Academy and Frostbite, Richelle Mead continues to astound me with her level of foreshadowing. I've said before that good foreshadowing is a fine line between spelling out what's coming and hinting without the reader even knowing that's what the author is doing. Richelle Mead is a master. I wish I could tell you all of the places that I've found it, but most of them are spoilers for what's to come--obviously. But the fact that Richelle Mead is so good at placing these clues and phrases throughout this series makes Vampire Academy worthy to be read and re-read over and over again in my opinion. I love being able to see all of the pieces that she revealed throughout the series. Mind-blowing. Shoot, there's even one comment in Shadow Kiss that I don't know that Richelle Mead intended, but foreshadows some plot aspects in the Bloodlines series.

We find out more about what it means to be "shadow kissed" which makes sense considering that's essentially the title of this one. This would have been spoilerish for Frostbite, but once you know what's going on between the bond and Lissa and Rose with the shadow kissed business, some of Rose's behavior in Frostbite makes even more sense.

While all of Shadow Kiss is pretty stinking good, the best of the book is found in the last section really. From the "cabin scene" on things progress very quickly. I don't want to give away anything that happens, but be warned that there is quite the cliffhanger. Lucky for those of you who might not have read the Vampire Academy series yet, all of the books in this series are already published and you should be able to move straight from Shadow Kiss into Blood Promise. I will advise that you will probably want to do just that with the cliffhanger ending of Shadow Kiss. Some of us had to wait like 9 months or so after finishing Shadow Kiss before we could read Blood Promise. I still get chills reading the entire last portion of this book. I wish I could do some quotes from this section or even just talk about it, but I just can't spoil anything for you. It's too major.

There's so much more that I want to say, but I've got to cut it off somewhere. Shadow Kiss got 5 stars from me after my very first read. I'm willing to give it the same now. It's still epic. And as I said before, Shadow Kiss completely takes the Vampire Academy series to the next level. I do consider Shadow Kiss and the Vampire Academy series to be a must read. Have you read Shadow Kiss? What did you think? Let me know!

Hex Hall - Review

Hex Hall (Hex Hall, # 1)

By: Rachel Hawkins

Published: March 2nd 2010 by Hyperion Book CH

323 pages

Genre: YA, Paranormal, Fantasy

Source: Borrowed from my local library

( Goodreads | Amazon | The Book Depository | Booksamillion.com )

*Note: The above links to Amazon, The Book Depository, and Booksamillion.com are affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.

Goodreads description--Three years ago, Sophie Mercer discovered that she was a witch. It's gotten her into a few scrapes. Her non-gifted mother has been as supportive as possible, consulting Sophie's estranged father--an elusive European warlock--only when necessary. But when Sophie attracts too much human attention for a prom-night spell gone horribly wrong, it's her dad who decides her punishment: exile to Hex Hall, an isolated reform school for wayward Prodigium, a.k.a. witches, faeries, and shapeshifters.

By the end of her first day among fellow freak-teens, Sophie has quite a scorecard: three powerful enemies who look like supermodels, a futile crush on a gorgeous warlock, a creepy tagalong ghost, and a new roommate who happens to be the most hated person and only vampire student on campus. Worse, Sophie soon learns that a mysterious predator has been attacking students, and her only friend is the number-one suspect.

As a series of blood-curdling mysteries starts to converge, Sophie prepares for the biggest threat of all: an ancient secret society determined to destroy all Prodigium, especially her.

Ugh this is another one that I just didn't love. It might be my own fault on this one though. I went into it not expecting to love it. I didn't quite understand why Sophie would cast the original love spell that got her thrown into Hex Hall. It felt pretty obvious to me that there was a need for Sophie to get sentenced to Hex Hall and this spell gone wrong just seemed to fit the bill--yet didn't. While the spell going wrong fit into the rest of the book, the reasons behind why Sophie decided to perform the spell in the first place just didn't make sense to me with the rest of her character throughout the book.

The most disappointing part to me was how cliche Hex Hall was. We've got the supermodel mean girls, the hot guy who's off limits, the gay best friend who the rest of the school hates (thankfully not because she's gay because that would be too cliche, but because she's "different" in another way--being a vampire), the MC who happens to be utterly plain and horrible at magic, but miraculously saves the day in the end all the while developing a relationship with the super hot guy. (I really wish you guys could see my face right now...Ooo I know...I'll insert a picture.) Here you go...

Even the idea of Archer being able to raise his one eyebrow and then Sophie remarks how jealous she is because she's always wanted to do that. I know I've read this exact same sentence in at least ten other books. Also....if a character proves time and time again that they don't seem to have much information about what's going on, there is no need to repeatedly ask them "you seriously don't know?" UM...I think that should be obvious at this point. Why is the MC's lack of information still a surprise to you?

I didn't quite connect with Sophie or Archer or Jenna or...well any of the characters really.

This review is coming off really harsh. I didn't hate it. I just didn't think there was anything different about it from most of the other YA paranormal books out there. Perhaps had I read this book a couple of years ago, I would have LOVED it. But not so much at this point in my reading life.

Hex Hall gets 3 stars from me. Have you read Hex Hall? What did you think? Let me know!

This review is part of my "All Things Halloween" October review event.

Waiting on Minders

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

Minders

By: Michele Jaffe

Expected Publication: January 30th 2014 by Razorbill

400 pages

Genre: YA, Science Fiction

( Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository | Booksamillion.com )

*Note: The above links to Amazon, Book Depository, Booksamillion.com are affiliate links. Affiliate links support giveaways for Somewhere Only We Know readers.

Goodreads description--A high concept, cinematic read with a surprising twist, MINDERS asks the question: who is really watching who?

Q: If the boy you love commits a crime, would you turn him in?

Sadie Ames is a type-A teenager from the wealthy suburbs. She's been accepted to the prestigious Mind Corps Fellowship program, where she'll spend six weeks as an observer inside the head of Ford, a troubled boy with a passion for the crumbling architecture of the inner city. There's just one problem: Sadie's fallen in love with him.

Q: What if the crime is murder?

Ford Winters is haunted by the murder of his older brother, James. As Sadie falls deeper into his world, dazzled by the shimmering pinpricks of color that form images in his mind, she begins to think she knows him. Then Ford does something unthinkable.

Q: What if you saw it happen from inside his mind?

Back in her own body, Sadie is faced with the ultimate dilemma. With Ford's life in her hands, she must decide what is right and what is wrong. And how well she can really ever know someone, even someone she loves.

How awesome is that cover? What are you waiting on this week? Let me know!

Top Ten Books I Was Forced to Read

Top 10 Tuesday is a post hosted by The Broke and the Bookish and this week's topic is Top Ten Books I Was Forced to Read.

I broke these down into books that were kind of forced on me by other people and books I was forced to read in school. But that means I exceed the 10 limit--what else is new.

Forced By Other People

1) Personality Plus by Florence Littauer - Dad

2) The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman - Dad

3) It's All About Him by Denise Jackson - Dad

4) The Prophet by Khalil Gibran - Husband

5) Persuasion by Jane Austen - Husband

6) One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp - Coworker

Forced In School

1) Shiloh by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor - 4th Grade

2) The Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks - 6th Grade

3) James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl

4) Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George - 5th Grade

5) Where the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls - 6th Grade

6) Mrs. Frisby the Rats of NIMH by Robert C. O'Brien - 5th Grade

7) The Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson - 5th Grade

8) Frankenstein by Mary Shelley - 9th Grade

9) Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte - 5th Grade

What are your favorite books that you were forced to read? Let me know!