Waiting on Wednesday (114): Staked by Kevin Hearne

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: Staked (The Iron Druid Chronicles #8)
Author: Kevin Hearne
Publisher: Del Rey (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: January 26, 2016
When a druid has lived for two thousand years like Atticus, he’s bound to run afoul of a few vampires. Make that legions of them. Even his former friend and legal counsel turned out to be a bloodsucking backstabber. Now the toothy troublemakers—led by power-mad pain-in-the-neck Theophilus—have become a huge problem requiring a solution. It’s time to make a stand.

As always, Atticus wouldn’t mind a little backup. But his allies have problems of their own. Ornery archdruid Owen Kennedy is having a wee bit of troll trouble: Turns out when you stiff a troll, it’s not water under the bridge. Meanwhile, Granuaile is desperate to free herself of the Norse god Loki’s mark and elude his powers of divination—a quest that will bring her face-to-face with several Slavic nightmares.

As Atticus globetrots to stop his nemesis Theophilus, the journey leads to Rome. What better place to end an immortal than the Eternal City? But poetic justice won’t come without a price: In order to defeat Theophilus, Atticus may have to lose an old friend.


What's there not to love about a well-researched urban fantasy series about a hot druid and his hysterical giant pet dog?

What are you waiting on this week?

Early Review: The Scorpion Rules by Erin Bow (ARC) #yalit

Title: The Scorpion Rules
Author: Erin Bow
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books (Simon & Schuster)
Release Date: September 22, 2015
Acquired Via: Around the World ARC Tours
In the future, the UN has brought back an ancient way to keep the peace. The children of world leaders are held hostage—if a war begins, they pay with their lives.

Greta is the Crown Princess of the Pan Polar Confederacy, a superpower formed of modern-day Canada. She is also a Child of Peace, a hostage held by the de facto ruler of the world, the great Artificial Intelligence, Talis. The hostages are Talis’s strategy to keep the peace: if her country enters a war, Greta dies.

The system has worked for centuries. Parents don’t want to see their children murdered.

Greta will be free if she can make it to her eighteenth birthday. Until then she is prepared to die with dignity, if necessary. But everything changes when Elian arrives at the Precepture. He’s a hostage from a new American alliance, and he defies the machines that control every part of their lives—and is severely punished for it. Greta is furious that Elian has disrupted their quiet, structured world. But slowly, his rebellion opens her eyes to the brutality of the rules they live under, and to the subtle resistance of her companions. And Greta discovers her own quiet power.

Then Elian’s country declares war on Greta’s and invades the prefecture, taking the hostages hostage. Now the great Talis is furious, and coming himself to mete out punishment. Which surely means that Greta and Elian will be killed...unless Greta can think of a way to save them.

My Review

It's not very often that I stay up all night reading a book, but I did for The Scorpion Rules. I think that worked both for and against the novel because on one hand, there's not much better than reading a dark book (no, I don't mean scary) alone in the dark. On the other hand, I can't quite figure out if the weirdness of the novel was due to my insomnia or if The Scorpion Rules was just a strange book.

Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Hyped Books That Kayla's Never Read

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

Kayla's Top Ten Hyped Books She’s Never Read



1. Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James
In addition to me being a book snob... Well, I’m just a book snob. One of the things I try to avoid – as long as I’m aware of it – is fan fiction based on someone else’s work being published as their own ideas. And if this wasn’t enough, there is always the poor writing in the portions that I was unlucky enough to glance at. Not. Happening.





2. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
I’m interested in it, but it’s never been enough for me to drop my review books and pick it up.

Review: Mariposa by Kim Wells

Title: Mariposa
Author: Kim Wells
Publisher: Daydreams Dandelions Publications
Release Date: December 24, 2014
Acquired Via: Author
Murdered, then trapped between worlds as a ghost, Meg is surrounded by other lost souls, some seeking to make peace with their past, while others… others fear a killer in the netherworld, who feeds on what ghosts most treasure: memories. Each time he feeds, the killer grows stronger, and he begins to threaten both the dead and the living, including Meg’s grieving step daughter.

Now a dead woman must fight the battle of her life, for the sake of her friends and family, and find out for herself if love can indeed be stronger than death.

My Review

The beginning of Mariposa is very slow. I understand the reader needs some back story, and to see how strong Meg’s love is for Tony and his daughter, Amelinda, but I almost stopped reading. That along with how many times Meg mentions that she can’t believe she slept with Tony on the first date, really put me off.

Book Blast: The Memory Painter by Gwendolyn Womack #Giveaway

Title: The Memory Painter
Author: Gwendolyn Womack
Publisher: Picador (Macmillan)
Release Date: April 28, 2015
What if there was a drug that could help you remember past lives?

What if the lives you remembered could lead you to your one true love? What if you learned that, for thousands of years, a deadly enemy had conspired to keep the two of you apart?

Bryan Pierce is an internationally famous artist whose paintings have dazzled the world. But there’s a secret to his success: Every canvas is inspired by an unusually vivid dream. When Bryan awakes, he possesses extraordinary new skills…like the ability to speak obscure languages and an inexplicable genius for chess. All his life, he has wondered if his dreams are recollections, if he is re-experiencing other people’s lives.

Linz Jacobs is a brilliant neurogeneticist, absorbed in decoding the genes that help the brain make memories, until she is confronted with an exact rendering of a recurring nightmare at one of Bryan’s shows. She tracks down the elusive artist, and their meeting triggers Bryan’s most powerful dream yet: visions of a team of scientists who, on the verge of discovering a cure for Alzheimer’s, died in a lab explosion decades ago.

As Bryan becomes obsessed with the mysterious circumstances surrounding the scientists’ deaths, his dreams begin to reveal what happened at the lab, as well as a deeper mystery that may lead all the way to ancient Egypt. Together, Bryan and Linz start to discern a pattern. But a deadly enemy watches their every move, and he will stop at nothing to ensure that the past stays buried.

A taut thriller and a timeless love story spanning six continents and 10,000 years of history, The Memory Painter by Gwendolyn Womack is a riveting debut novel unlike any you’ve ever read.

Praise for The Memory Painter

“Gwendolyn Womack’s tale dazzles.” - US Weekly (Standout Spring Novels)

“The guy-meets-girl story as you’ve never heard it before…A mind-explosion of a journey ensues that involves time travel, mystery, love, and a whole lot of plot twists.” - Refinery29

“Suspenseful and ambitious…We predict The Memory Painter’s story of love and revenge will be one of 2015’s biggest literary hits.” - Paste Magazine (Best New Books of the Month)

Blog Tour (Excerpt): Untamed by Diana Palmer #Giveaway #Western #Romance @TLCBookTours @HarlequinBooks

Title: Untamed
Author: Diana Palmer
Publisher: HQN (Harlequin)
Tour Organizer: TLC Book Tours
Release Date: June 30, 2015
Stanton Rourke lives life on the edge. The steely mercenary is dangerous in every way…especially to Clarisse Carrington's heart. She and Rourke were playmates as children, but she's not the innocent girl he once knew. When tragedy robbed Clarisse of her entire family, her life was changed forever. Besides, she's a grown woman now, and there are secrets that hold her back from succumbing to her pursuer. As she struggles to keep her distance, sparks as hot as a Texas summer fly between them. But danger is following Clarisse, leaving her no choice but to rely on Rourke, even as the old wounds lying dormant between them flare up again…

Excerpt

Chapter 2

Rourke spent the night getting drunk. He was out of his mind from his father’s revelations. Tat had loved him. He’d pushed her away, for her own good, but in doing so, he’d damaged her so badly that he’d turned her into little better than a call girl.

He remembered her in Barrera, her blouse soaked in blood that even a washing hadn’t removed, the stitches just above one of her perfect small breasts where that animal, Miguel, had cut her trying to extract information about General Emilio Machado’s invasion of the country.

Blog Tour (Review): Mercy House by Adam Cesare #Horror @TLCBookTours

Title: Mercy House
Author: Adam Cesare
Publisher: Hydra (Penguin Random House)
Release Date: June 9, 2015
Acquired Via: TLC Book Tours
Welcome to Mercy House, a state-of-the-art retirement home that appears perfectly crisp, clean, and orderly . . . but nothing could be farther from the truth. In Adam Cesare’s thrilling novel, the residents will find little mercy—only a shocking eruption of unfathomable horror.

Harriet Laurel notices the odor at Mercy House as soon as she sets foot inside, brought there against her will by her son, Don, and his wife, Nikki. In the early stages of dementia, Harriet has grown resentful of Nikki, blaming her daughter-in-law for failing to supply grandchildren. Yet even Harriet must admit that her mind becomes clearer as soon as she crosses the threshold. If it wasn’t for that annoying smell.

Arnold Piper is an eighty-five-year-old ex-Marine, a proud man who has cared for himself his whole life. But no longer. Betrayed by his aging body, Arnold is learning that the trials he survived long ago in war-torn Korea pale beside the daily indignities of growing old. Little does he know that his greatest nightmares are still ahead of him.

Sarah Campbell is an idealistic nurse whose compassion has been stretched to the breaking point at the chronically understaffed facility that is Mercy House. But now Sarah’s list of unpleasant duties is about to take a terrifying turn. For something wicked is brewing in Mercy House. Something dark and rotten . . . and deadly.

Praise for Mercy House

“Of all the new writers busting out on the scene—and there are some great ones, without a doubt—Cesare’s the young guy with the greatest encyclopedic gorehound know-how, blistering cinematic pace, unquenchable love of both fiction and film, and hell-bent will to entertain. . . . [He] does just about everything right.” — John Skipp, Fangoria

My Review

I'm glad that I've reached the end of the horror reviews that I have scheduled because I think my opinion of Mercy House suffered from me being burned out on the genre. I mean, it's set in a nursing home, which is horror in itself to many people. It sounded so good before I jumped into the horror swarm, but I was bored and skimming by the time I got to read it.

Waiting on Wednesday (113): The Sea King by C.L. Wilson

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 Sea King (Weathermages of Mystral #2)
Author: C.L. Wilson
Publisher: Avon (HarperCollins)
Release Date: July 15, 2016
He wasn't supposed to choose her...

Seafaring prince Dilys Merimydion has been invited to court the three magical princesses of Summerlea. To eradicate the pirates threatening Calberna and to secure the power of the Sea Throne, Dilys vows to return home with a fierce warrior-queen as his bride. But politics has nothing to do with unexpected temptation.

She didn't dare wed him...

A weathermage like her sisters, Gabriella Coruscate's gentleness exemplifies the qualities of her season name, Summer. Yet her quiet poise conceals dangerous powers she cannot begin to wield. Better to live without excitement, she reasons, than risk her heart and lose control— until an irresistible Sealord jolts her awake with a thunderclap of raw desire.

Until evil threatens everything they hold dear...

When pirates kidnap Summer and her sisters, Dilys is in a desperate quest to save the woman he loves. Only by combining his command of the seas with the unleashed fury of Summer's formidable gifts can they defeat their brutal enemies and claim the most priceless victory of all: true love.


I did not even know that Fantasy Romance was a genre until I stumbled across C.L. Wilson's Tairen Soul series. Then, it took me less than a week to devour all five books. I immediately jumped on her next book, the first in this series, The Winter King. Although I'm sad that The Sea King will not be out for another year, I'm glad that she delayed the release to do further work on the book. While researching for this week's WOW, I did discover that Wilson will be writing another book in the Tairen Soul series, which resulted in a loud-pitched squee. I really wish that I could find another author like C.L. Wilson, so that I could read amazing novels like these all the time.

What are you waiting on this week?