Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Waiting on Wednesday (124): Ivory and Bone by Julie Eshbaugh #WaitingonWednesday #WoW @epicreads

1 comment:

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event that is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine and spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.



Title: Ivory and Bone
Author:
Julie Eshbaugh
Publisher: HarperTeen (HarperCollins)
Release Date: June 14, 2016

The only life seventeen-year-old Kol knows is hunting at the foot of the Great Ice with his brothers. But food is becoming scarce, and without another clan to align with, Kol, his family, and their entire group are facing an uncertain future.

Traveling from the south, Mya and her family arrive at Kol’s camp with a trail of hurt and loss behind them, and hope for a new beginning. When Kol meets Mya, her strength, independence, and beauty instantly captivate him, igniting a desire for much more than survival.

Then on a hunt, Kol makes a grave mistake that jeopardizes the relationship that he and Mya have only just started to build. Mya was guarded to begin with—and for good reason—but no apology or gesture is enough for her to forgive him. Soon after, another clan arrives on their shores. And when Mya spots Lo, a daughter of this new clan, her anger intensifies, adding to the already simmering tension between families. After befriending Lo, Kol learns of a dark history between Lo and Mya that is rooted in the tangle of their pasts.

When violence erupts, Kol is forced to choose between fighting alongside Mya or trusting Lo’s claims. And when things quickly turn deadly, it becomes clear that this was a war that one of them had been planning all along.



I loved me some A. A. Attanasio in my teen years, and this just reminded me of that! I hope Ivory and Bone is at least nearly as good as that old school prehistoric fantasy!

What are you waiting on this week?

Thursday, October 22, 2015

Review: The Vampire Combat Field Guide by Roger Ma #BibPleaseReview #ColoringBook #Giveaway @penguinrandom @nita_basu

10 comments:


Title: The Vampire Combat Field Guide
Author:
Roger Ma
Publisher: Berkley (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: October 6, 2015
Acquired Via:
Publisher

In The Vampire Combat Manual, Roger Ma, the nation’s preeminent expert in undead warfare, prepared the average citizen to defend against a brutal vampire attack. But without appropriate training, even the most adept slayer of bloodsuckers can be left vulnerable.

Therefore, the Institute for Undead Combat Studies has once again created an essential practice handbook for anyone seeking to avoid serious injury, infection, or death at the hands of a vampire. This comprehensive guide includes:

  • Detailed illustrations to aid in identifying various types of the undead and their vulnerabilities, as well as anatomical drawings you can color to promote knowledge retention
  • Interactive mental and physical exercises that will teach invaluable fighting techniques and prepare you for battle
  • Work pages to hone weapon selection, defensive and offensive techniques, and precise staking strategies
  • and much more!
With the proper preparation, no one need fear death by exsanguination or an eternity spent in darkness. Learn to ward off these bloodthirsty creatures while you can—or say good-bye to your days in the sun...

My Review

When I was offered a review copy of The Vampire Combat Field Guide, I was excited because I have a lot of hope for this new trend of adult coloring books. While it was not exactly what I was looking for, it's a pretty fun little coloring and activity book.

Instead of crayons, I chose to go with colored pencils for my time spent with the book. The illustrations are pretty detailed, and I don't think it would be feasible to try to use crayons or markers. There is a good deal of shading in the illustrations already, so I think colored pencils are the only thing to use.

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Waiting on Wednesday (123): The Crown's Game by Evelyn Skye #WaitingonWednesday #WoW @EpicReads

1 comment:

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event that is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine and spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.



Title: The Crown's Game
Author:
Evelyn Skye
Publisher: Balzer + Bray (HarperCollins)
Release Date: May 17, 2016

Vika Andreyev can summon the snow and turn ash into gold.

Nikolai Karimov can see through walls and conjure bridges out of thin air.

They are enchanters—the only two in Russia—and with the Ottoman Empire and the Kazakhs threatening, the tsar needs a powerful enchanter by his side.

And so he initiates the Crown’s Game, a duel of magical skill. The victor becomes the Imperial Enchanter and the tsar’s most respected adviser. The defeated is sentenced to death.

Raised on tiny Ovchinin Island her whole life, Vika is eager for the chance to show off her talent in the grand capital of Saint Petersburg. But can she kill another enchanter—even when his magic calls to her like nothing else ever has?

For Nikolai, an orphan, the Crown’s Game is the chance of a lifetime. But his deadly opponent is a force to be reckoned with—beautiful, whip-smart, imaginative—and he can’t stop thinking about her.

And when Pasha, Nikolai’s best friend and heir to the throne, also starts to fall for the mysterious enchantress, Nikolai must defeat the girl they both love . . . or be killed himself.

As long-buried secrets emerge, threatening the future of the empire, it becomes dangerously clear—the Crown’s Game is not one to lose.



Oh, please don't let this be like The Night Circus! I very much enjoy magical books, and I may even like a magical competition. *crosses fingers*

What are you waiting on this week?

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Blog Tour (Review): Murder and Other Unnatural Disasters by Lida Sideris #Giveaway #BibPleaseReview #TLCBookTours

2 comments:


Title: Murder and Other Unnatural Disasters
Author:
Lida Sideris
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
Release Date: September 30, 2015
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours

Watch out Southern California! There’s a new entertainment attorney in town and she’s got game. Only problem is, it’s not the one she should be playing. Corrie Locke belongs behind a desk, not behind a Glock. She should be taking VIP calls, not nosing around a questionable suicide. Instead, she’s hot on the trail of a murderer.

Luckily, she’s the daughter of a late, great private eye and she’s inherited his love of sleuthing...and illegal weaponry. It doesn’t help matters that her gene for caution is a recessive one. Corrie finds herself in the center of a murder case, unearthing suspects in shocking places. With a cold-blooded killer on the loose, Corrie will have to up her game, or die trying.


My Review

When Murder and Other Unnatural Disasters was pitched to me for review, it was described as being similar to Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum series. Since I think those books are incredibly cute, I figured I'd give Lida Sideris' book a shot. Honestly, I wasn't disappointed at all because Corrie Locke is just as bungling and adorable as Stephanie Plum, and the book was a really fun read.

Cover Reveal: Don't Get Caught by Kurt Dinan #Giveaway @SourcebooksFire @kurtdinan

1 comment:


Title: Don't Get Caught
Author:
Kurt Dinan
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Release Date: April 1, 2016

17-year-old Max Cobb is sick of being “Just Max”—the kind of guy whose resume boasts a measly 2.5 GPA and a deep love of heist films. So when an invitation appears in his locker to join the anonymous, untraceable, epic prank-pulling Chaos Club, Max jumps at the opportunity to leave “Just Max” in the dust.

Except that the invite is really a set-up, and Max—plus the 4 other kids who received similar invitations—are apprehended by school security for defacing the water tower. This time, Max has had enough. Time for Heist Rule #6:


Always Get Payback.

Let the prank war begin...

Interview

Describe your book in 140 characters or less?

A high school nobody recruits a crew of misfits for heists and pranks to get revenge on the mysterious Chaos Club. #DontGetCaught

How did you come up with the idea for Don’t Get Caught?

Top Ten Tuesday: Wishes Kim Would Ask the Book Genie to Grant Her @KHeniadis #TTT #TopTenTuesday

3 comments:

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created and hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

Top Ten Wishes I'd Ask the Book Genie to Grant Me



1. I would like to meet Jim Butcher.

Love the Harry Dresden Files series, and enjoyed the first book in his new series, The Cinder Spires. I would enjoy talking to him about books and life.



2. I would like to live in Harry Dresden’s world for a while...

...as long as I didn’t get hurt or killed. It would be even better if I could partner up with Dresden for a story.

Thursday, October 15, 2015

Blog Tour (Review): Mistress of the Court by Laura Purcell #historicalfiction #giveaway #TLCBookTours #BibPleaseReview

6 comments:


Title: Mistress of the Court (Georgian Queens #2)
Author:
Laura Purcell
Publisher: Myrmidon Books
Release Date: August 4, 2015
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours

The second in Laura Purcell’s captivating and acclaimed series of novels chronicling the lives and loves of the consorts and mistresses of Britain’s rash and reckless Hanoverian kings.

Her first novel in the series,
Queen of Bedlam, was shortlisted for Best Historical Romance 2014 and was Editor’s Pick, in Historical Novels Review.


Orphaned and trapped in an abusive marriage, Henrietta Howard has little left to lose. She stakes everything on a new life in Hanover with its royal family, the heirs to the British throne. Henrietta’s beauty and intelligence soon win her the friendship of clever Princess Caroline and her mercurial husband, Prince George. But, as time passes, it becomes clear that friendship is the last thing on the hot-blooded young prince’s mind. Dare Henrietta give into his advances and anger her violent husband? Dare she refuse?

Whatever George’s shortcomings, Princess Caroline is determined to make the family a success. Yet the feud between her husband and his obstinate father threatens all she has worked for. As England erupts in Jacobite riots, her family falls apart. She vows to save the country for her children to inherit – even if it costs her pride and her marriage. Set in the turbulent years of the Hanoverian accession, Mistress of the Court tells the story of two remarkable women at the center of George II’s reign.


My Review

I have always been fascinated by the British monarchy (to the point that I've taken college classes about them), and I can honestly say that I've never read any fiction about the Georges or their brides. How could I have possibly not picked up Mistress of the Court? I was glad that I did because it portrayed an aspect of being royal or around royalty that is usually glossed over.

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

6th Annual Spooktacular Giveaway Hop (INT) - Enter to Win Maplecroft or Chapelwood by Cherie Priest! #Giveaway

31 comments:

Welcome to my stop on the humongous Spooktacular Giveaway Hop hosted by the scarily fantastic blogger, Kathy @ I Am A Reader, Not A Writer! Today I'm featuring The Borden Dispatches by Cherie Priest!

What You Can Win

I'm giving you your choice of one of the two books in the series as your prize. You can read about them below:

Title: Maplecroft (The Borden Dispatches #1)
Author:
Cherie Priest
Publisher: Roc (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: September 2, 2014

Lizzie Borden took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks; and when she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty-one...

The people of Fall River, Massachusetts, fear me. Perhaps rightfully so. I remain a suspect in the brutal deaths of my father and his second wife despite the verdict of innocence at my trial. With our inheritance, my sister, Emma, and I have taken up residence in Maplecroft, a mansion near the sea and far from gossip and scrutiny.

But it is not far enough from the affliction that possessed my parents. Their characters, their very souls, were consumed from within by something that left malevolent entities in their place. It originates from the ocean’s depths, plaguing the populace with tides of nightmares and madness.

This evil cannot hide from me. No matter what guise it assumes, I will be waiting for it. With an axe.



Blog Tour (Review): A Song for Ella Grey by David Almond #yalit #giveaway #BibPleaseReview

4 comments:


Title: A Song for Ella Grey
Author:
David Almond
Publisher: Delacorte Press (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: October 13, 2015
Acquired Via:
Publisher

Written in lyrical prose, this novel for fans of epic romances and mythology retellings explores themes of love, loss, fate, and destiny set against the dramatic and diverse backdrop of Northern England.

David Almond, recipient of the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award, a Printz Honor for Skellig, and the Printz Award for Kit’s Wilderness, has crafted an enchanting modern take on the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice.

Claire and Ella and their friends are bound by ties so strong they seem unbreakable. Then the strange and handsome Orpheus strolls onto the beach, and he sings them all into an astonishing new understanding of themselves. Ella is caught the hardest, fastest, deepest—and Claire is left with the pain of looking on.

Raw, emotional, lyrical, funny, and true, A Song for Ella Grey is a tale of the joys, troubles, and desires of modern teens. It takes place in the ordinary streets of Tyneside and on the beautiful beaches of Northumberland. It’s a story of first love, a love song that draws on ancient mythical forces. A love that leads Ella, Orpheus, and Claire to the gates of Death and beyond.


My Review

I'm a fan of literary fiction, so I am happy to give my reading time to any of that genre in the YA classification that catches my eye. A Song for Ella Grey definitely did that because I used to be obsessed with Greek mythology. However, the book has me a bit at a loss.

A Song for Ella Grey is young adult literature, but I think it is written for young people that are smarter than me. While I got the symbolism and all, I didn't quite "get" the book. It was hard for me to connect to the characters as a worrisome mom. I also had a hard time following what was going on. I have officially entered the dumb grown-up phase because it went completely over my head.

Monday, October 12, 2015

Spotlight (Interview): The Power of 10 by Rugger Burke #selfhelp @powerof10 @jkslitpublicity @angellebarbazon

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Title: The Power of 10: A practice for engaging your voice of wisdom
Author:
Rugger Burke
Publisher: Mill City Press, Inc.
Release Date: June 30, 2015

How do we become our greatest selves?

The Power of 10 is a practice for engaging your voice of wisdom through a process of inquiry and advocacy. Inquiry increases awareness of what is through questions that invite us to examine our current state of being. Advocacy advances what is possible by encouraging us to live into that greater way of being in every thought, word, and action.

Together, inquiry and advocacy evoke the voice of wisdom—that quiet, still voice inside us, the confluence of knowledge, experience, and insight flowing through all living beings that speaks to us through our bodies, hearts, and minds.

We know more than we think we do. As we learn to listen closely to our voice of wisdom, it reveals our true nature and purpose, calls upon us to commit to something greater than ourselves, and guides us toward choices that help us reach our highest potential. When we live in harmony with our voice of wisdom, what is and what is possible align, and wholeness and happiness become our way of being.

Put simply, the Power of 10 is a practice for engaging your voice of wisdom to become the greatest you—the you who is meant to be.


Author Interview

Why did you write this book?
It’s the book I wish someone had given me…years ago. At its heart the book is about making good choices. Looking back, I made lots of poor choices—and the worst ones affected people I love. Many of those decisions were largely avoidable. Realizing this made clear the importance of learning how to make good choices. Knowing this now, I would have benefited from such a resource both as a leader and in my personal life.

There are many new books published each day. Why this one?

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Blog Tour (Guest Post): Empire Ascendant by @KameronHurley #scifi #fantasy @angryrobotbooks @arobic8

No comments:
Kameron Hurley's The Mirror Empire was one of my favorite Science Fiction reads from last year, so I am excited to share her guest post today with you in celebration of the second in the series. I hope you enjoy her books and the post as much as I did!



Title: Empire Ascendant (Worldbreaker Saga #2)
Author:
Kameron Hurley
Publisher: Angry Robot
Release Date: October 6, 2015

Loyalties are tested when worlds collide...

Every two thousand years, the dark star Oma appears in the sky, bringing with it a tide of death and destruction. And those who survive must contend with friends and enemies newly imbued with violent powers. The kingdom of Saiduan already lies in ruin, decimated by invaders from another world who share the faces of those they seek to destroy.

Now the nation of Dhai is under siege by the same force. Their only hope for survival lies in the hands of an illegitimate ruler and a scullery maid with a powerful – but unpredictable –magic. As the foreign Empire spreads across the world like a disease, one of their former allies takes up her Empress’s sword again to unseat them, and two enslaved scholars begin a treacherous journey home with a long-lost secret that they hope is the key to the Empire’s undoing.

But when the enemy shares your own face, who can be trusted?

In this devastating sequel to The Mirror Empire, Kameron Hurley transports us back to a land of blood mages and sentient plants, dark magic, and warfare on a scale that spans worlds.


Guest Post

Other Suns: Reading, Championing and Remembering Writing from the Margins
Kameron Hurley



“There are no new things under the sun. But there are others suns.” - Octavia Butler

Dominant cultures are insidious not only because of the power they exert over individuals to conform, but because that power exerts a kind of hegemonic truth. In plain English, that means that when you grow up inside a culture, you believe that everything about how you live and work and play, all the things you think and feel, are simply the way things are. You believe this is the only logical way to live, work and play. You believe that even if you grew up somewhere else, you’d think and feel those same things.

And you would be wrong.

Where Are the Bloggers?

2 comments:
If you haven't noticed, our posts have been down for the past month or so. We're not on any official hiatus, but the three of us - Amber, Kim, and myself - just have things swamping us right now. Amber is overwhelmed with law things and has been for most of the summer. Kim has some personal matters that she is tending. I've been living so far out in the woods that I cannot get internet access at my house, except by paying an insane price for satellite internet. No, thank you. I'm also in a reading and review writing slump. Hopefully, I'll get past this soon.

I know that reading a really great book is usually the cure for a slump, so if you have any recommendations, please share them. As always, we appreciate you visiting the blog, and we hope that you'll take the time to enter a giveaway or two while you're here.

Wednesday, October 7, 2015

Books to Movies Giveaway Hop #2 (INT) #TheMartian #SciFi #Giveaway

61 comments:

Welcome to my stop on the Books to Movies Giveaway Hop hosted by Mary at Book Hounds and Kathy at I Am A Reader, Not A Writer.

This hop features books that have been made into movies, television series, etc. I recently went to the movies (which I never do) on a book to movie adaptation's release day (I do this even more rarely), and I was very pleased. I loved the book (read my review here), I enjoyed the movie tremendously, and I would like to share it with you.

What You Can Win



Title: The Martian
Author:
Andy Weir
Publisher: Crown Publishing (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: February 11, 2014

Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars.

Now, he's sure he'll be the first person to die there.

After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.

Chances are, though, he won't have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old "human error" are much more likely to kill him first.

But Mark isn't ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills—and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit—he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?



Giveaway

Thursday, October 1, 2015

Review & Interview: Auld Lang Secrets by April Patterson Clemens #Giveaway #BibPleaseReview @KHeniadis

6 comments:


Title: Auld Lang Secrets (A Saffron Ellis Mystery #1)
Author: April Patterson Clemens
Publisher: Clementime Press
Release Date: September 7, 2015
Acquired Via: Author

After Saffron Ellis returns to Ville de Bois, Wallace Hadley just knows his life is about to get more exciting. When a girl ends up dead at a New Year's party, Saffron and Wallace decide to solve the murder themselves, and Green Scarab Investigations is born!

In Auld Lang Secrets, book one of the Saffron Ellis mystery series, you'll be introduced to Saffron's eccentric family, peer into the souls of the residents of Ville de Bois, and discover Wallace's deep love for food. Come along for the cozy, clue-filled ride!


Author Interview

Kim (Bibliophilia, Please): Being a book lover, your second name stood out to me. Any relation to Richard North or James Patterson?

April Patterson Clemens: Not that I’m aware of. My great grandfather, Jessie Patterson, was an Irish cowboy, so not unless either are some relation to him.

Kim: This is your third novel (The Tale of Lord Zancrist and Bartholomew Trinket, being the first two), which all centralize around a mystery. Do you read a lot of mysteries?