YA

Review: The Burning Sky by Sherry Thomas

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17332556 This book releases tomorrow! First of all how amazingly beautiful is this cover?? I judged this book by its’ cover immediately and was so excited to get to read and review it.

I’ve never read any of Sherry Thomas’s other books, but I’ve heard good things about them so I was even more excited to read this after I heard those.

This is a wonderful story of magical worlds, Royalty and a young girl. Iolanthe Seabourne discovers at the outset of the book that she is supposed to be the greatest elemental mage of her time. Which really shocks the crap out of her considering she’s pretty average in most things.

After she summons lightening to fix a ruined elixer her whole world changes and she finds herself on the run from those who want to harm her. Iolanthe finds that she has an ally of sorts in Prince Titus of Elberon and hesitates to put her faith and trust in him.

But Titus has his own agenda as well. Together they have to face their foes.

I love the magic elements in the book, the author did a wonderful job of world building. The setting for the majority of the book is at an all boys school, which is different since Iolanthe is female. Titus had thought he prepared for every contingency but he hadn’t thought of the possibility of a female that he would have to help. I enjoyed seeing how they worked through this and it was humorous to see the boys at the school and the issues that came with that.

But my favorite part of the book is a spoiler. I won’t spoil it but the way Iolanthe and Titus train is pretty different and those scenes were my favorite.

Oh, also this is going to be a trilogy but there was NO shocking cliffhanger that so many trilogies have. I want to read the next book but only because this one was so great.

Seriously, go get this book. You won’t be disappointed!

4.5 stars.

~ Clio

Buy it Now The Burning Sky (The Elemental Trilogy)

Review: Shadows by Paula Weston

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cover33319-mediumYA Supernatural or Paranormal genre has gone through many different fads. Witches, vampires and werewolves have all been covered to a great extent in a ridiculous amount of books. Some have been wildly successful with the stories they’ve told, spawning movies and fandoms like crazy.

But I read a lot of books in the Young Adult genre and over the last few months I’ve seen an explosion of Angelic books. I’m a sucker for books that draw from an established mythology and either make it their own or expand the established mythology into an even greater one.

And that is exactly what Shadows does so well.  Paula Weston managed to take what I’ve come to expect in an Angel story and add even more to it. This was a very fast paced book – in a good way – I didn’t want to put it down.  The world building done within the book was excellent, letting us see what we need to establish what is to come in the rest of the series.

While this is going to be a series, the ending was not cliffhanger-ish enough to drive me crazy. It left me wanting more but not to the people of being angry at the book. I liked the young adult/ new adult vibe Shadows has as well. Gaby is coping with the death of her twin brother, Jude and trying to move on with her life when the angelic world is brought solidly into her life and is forced to deal with the shocking consequences that brings along with it.

I can’t wait to read the rest in the series. I really liked the secondary characters and want to see much more of Rafa, Jason and Maggie.

I received this ARC from Netgalley in return for an honest review.

4 Stars

~Clio

Buy it Now Shadows (The Rephaim)

Review: Edenbrooke, by Julianne Donaldson

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Normally, I don’t read historical romances. But a certain Muse told me about Ms. Donaldson and said that I must read her. Boy, am I glad I glad I listened to her. This is the second book I’ve read of hers and I am in love with her writing. This book was so full of sweet romance that my eyes were prickling the whole entire time. I fell in love all over again. I feel like twirling with my eyes closed.

Marianne has been away from home for 14 months. She wants nothing more than to be reunited with her twin, Cecily, and her father. But instead, she must endure constant affections from an unwanted suitor in a city that is the complete opposite of where her home is.

She has been invited to spend some time in Edenbrooke with her sister and some family friends. And after a horrible incident with a highway man and then being subjected to a very flirtatious boy, she wonders what else will happen on her visit.

The longer she stays at Edenbrooke, the more her heart strings get pulled. She starts to feel things for Phillip, the heir to Edenbrooke, but she knows that her sister wants him, so she tries to remain only friends.

Phillip was the perfect gentleman. He was sweet and adventurous and enjoyed making Marianne blush every chance he could. But he always seemed to be there when she needed him.

My heart broke for Marianne, while she examined herself and found it lacking. She always put herself in her sister’s shadow and never realized that she was perfect, not inferior. She tries to convince herself that someone will love her, even if it’s for her inheritance.

Little does she know that love is right in front of her.

“Where is your compassion when I need it the most? Open your eyes, love, and see what is right before you: that I am not merely a friend, but a man deeply, desperately, in love with you.”

*swoon*

Seriously swooning happened. Phillip did everything a gentleman would do. He was perfect.

“I will always want her…Always! There is nothing you could do to change that.”

~Melpomene

Buy it now Edenbrooke: A Proper Romance

Review: What’s Left of Me by Kat Zhang

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11043618 In this world all children are born with two souls in one body. One of those souls is expected to be recessive and to settle – basically fading away to nothingness. But when the norm doesn’t happen they’re called Hybrids and society considers them to be a very dangerous thing and force them to go through medical testing and counseling until the dominant soul is the only one left.

This is what Addie and Eva have gone through and come out the other side – but with a secret. Eva, the recessive soul, has survived. They consciously work daily to ensure that no one suspects this, not even their family.

“But understanding a thing and accepting it are so very different things.”

When they meet another Hybrid everything changes. Eva is given a chance to have a voice again and while Addie wants to stick with the status quo, for once Eva won’t let her. It’s incredibly dangerous and if anyone finds out they could be institutionalized or worse.

From the very beginning Kat Zhang’s prose grabbed me and pulled me into this world and into Addie/Eva’s head. The book is told from Eva’s point of view which is in stark contrast to her world, where she literally has no voice. Eva’s experiences were heartbreaking and very well expressed.

As the book progresses and there are more and more decisions to make we get to hear Addie and Eva’s internal monologue on how to deal with these new challenges. Addie has been used to being the dominant soul and letting go of that is hard for her but she still wants to give Eva the chance to not be hidden anymore.

I would highly recommend this book, it’s a different take that I’ve ever seen before and I am super excited to review the second book What We Were in a few weeks when it comes out!

5 stars

~Clio

Buy it Now What’s Left of Me: The Hybrid Chronicles, Book One

Review: When the World was Flat (and We Were in Love) by Ingrid Jonach

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15767908 This was an amazingly different Young Adult book. Different in a very good way. It captivated me from the first chapter and didn’t disappoint throughout the book. Do not let the science fiction genre title on this book scare you away!

Lillie lives in a small town with her Mom and has a small group of friends. Over the last few months she’s been having nightmares that feel very real and terrifying. But she doesn’t mention these to anyone because it’s kind of weird when you’re 16 and talking about bad dreams right?

It’s big news when Tom moves to the small town as there are very few new people in her school ever. Lillie feels very drawn to him but is rebuffed almost immediately. Yet they keep having interactions and at each one she feels that he may have the key to telling her what exactly is going on with her.

She eventually finds the truth and has to deal with that and how it affects the rest of her life and those around her since it changes things forever.

I loved the way this was written – I didn’t mean to finish it in one night but it just happened because I needed to know what was going on. I thought that Lillie was a very relatable character, I felt for her as she tried to figure out her feelings. Feelings of being so awkward around a boy she liked, trying to figure out what the hell was going on with her friends and dealing with bitchy girls in high school.

But on top of that traditional YA part of the book was the sci-fi part of the book. I don’t read sci-fi. Like ever. But this melded extremely well together and I loved the way it was done. I was fascinated throughout. I would highly recommend this to anyone who loves YA books but wants something a little bit different. The book comes out tomorrow and you should get it!!

I received this ARC in return for an honest review.

4 stars

~Clio

Buy it Now

When the World was Flat (and we were in love)

Review: Inescapable, by Amy Bartol

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I love angels!!!

I found this series after I read another angel series, and I’m so glad I did. I loved it even more after I realized the author is from my state. Gotta support the local authors, you know. 🙂

Anyways, this book is about Evie Claremont. She is starting the next chapter of her life as a freshman at Crestwood college. She is sad to leave her Uncle, who raised her, but she’s excited to see what’s in store.

That is, until she meets Reed Wellington.

Mr. Perfect.

More like Mr. Irritating. He wants her gone and she doesn’t understand why.

Then she meets Russell.

Mr. Cute southern boy who you can’t help but love. Who also turns out to be the best friend she’s ever had.

Strange things start happening to her and she can’t explain them. But Reed always seems to be there or know what’s happening. But he’s not telling her anything.

“So, since you know I’m not a fish, and I know you’re not a fish, what does that make us?”

“That makes us completely and utterly screwed.”

Well, that is, until the unthinkable happens and she is changed forever.

There was a love triangle, of course. Someone gets hurt. Someone gets really hurt and I get really mad. There is also a shocking ending. Lucky for us, books 2, 3 and 4 are out. There is a 5th coming soon. I’m DYING to read the 5th book!!

I can’t quite put my finger on why I love this series so much, but I just do. I’ll be rereading all four books before the fifth comes out. I can’t wait!!

~Melpomene

Buy it now Inescapable (The Premonition Series (Volume 1))
Buy it now Intuition (The Premonition Series (Volume 2))
Buy it now Indebted: The Premonition Series (The Premonition Series (Volume 3))
Buy it now Incendiary (The Premonition Series (Volume 4))

Review: Pivot Point by Kasie West (and giveaway!)

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11988046 You know how you buy some books because they sound good-ish at the time and then when you finally read them months later you wonder why the heck you bought the book in the first place? (Maybe that’s just me…) Well, this book was so the opposite of that. I was expecting an average book when I began this but got an amazingly well written and captivating book instead. Yay to pleasant surprises!

Addie Coleman lives in a city where everyone has a type of paranormal power of the mind. Her power is a form of clairvoyance that allows her to take a decision she needs to make and see into the future (within limits) both paths that the choices would lead to. When her parents get a divorce she has to decide which parent to live with. Her mother is staying in the city Addie has grown up in and her father is moving out of the city into the normal world where no one has powers. Addie chooses to look into the future over the next 6 weeks to see which one she should choose.

Just the plot of this book is rather unique, with all of the YA books that I read I haven’t come across another with anything close to it. This is the author’s debut novel and I was blown away by that because of how well written and thought out the book comes across. I was surprised many times by different twists and plot points. Pivot Point has some suspense, a little bit of YA romance and while some of the characters have paranormal powers it is not heavy on that part. So if you normally stay away from the paranormal type books I would give this a chance!

Even better than the plot are the characters. Addie and her friends are all very fleshed out. Addie, in particular, was great – I understood her emotions and all of her actions made sense to me. I completely hate when I read a book and I spend most of the time wanting to smack the main character. Happily, that was not the case here.

If you’d like to win a copy of Pivot Point you need to do 2 things – follow this blog and comment on this post. I’ll post the winner next Thursday the 15th.

5 stars

~ Clio

Buy it Now Pivot Point

Happy Birthday to US…and a Giveaway!

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Next week our blog will be exactly 1 month old! The 5 of us have been having so much fun reviewing books and getting feedback both from readers and from some of the Authors we’ve reviewed.

We want to keep going and just make the blog better and better every month.

But in the meantime Happy Blog-iversary to us!! On behalf of all of the muses thank you to anyone who has read our posts!!

To celebrate I’m going to give away two of my most recent favorite books that I’ve read.

Pivot Point by Kasie West & The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay

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I’ve read both of these in the last month or so and they were both 5 star books for me. I’ll be posting my review of Pivot Point on Saturday and my review of The Sea of Tranquility. But spoiler alert – they were both freaking awesome. But in totally different ways.

So if you’d like to enter for the giveaway you need to do just 2 things – become a follower of this blog and comment on any of this post or the 2 reviews I’ll be doing. If you’re interested in only one of the books make sure to comment which one.

Next Thursday the 15th I’ll post the winners and contact you about getting your ebook to you!

Good luck 🙂

~ Clio

Review: A Really Awesome Mess by Trish Cook and Branon Halpin

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17288907A Really Awesome Mess is told from 2 different points of view, with each author writing one. Emmy is struggling with being adopted and fitting into what she perceives as her perfect family. She’s dealing with being a minority in a white family and trying to become super thin in any way possible. An incident at school leads to her being accused of bullying and having the police involved. Her life is basically not going so great at the moment.

Justin is dealing with some depression and anger issues at his divorced parents. His father walks in on him in a compromising situation and things don’t go well from there.

Both Justin and Emmy end up at The Heartland Academy, a reform school that is meant for kids who need to clean up their act and need more than just regular school. Their parents are hoping it will help them to deal with their issues. There, they meet a cast of characters with their own issues and we get to see them interact with other teens as well as therapists and teachers.

I found this book to be a really funny and touching book. Parts of the story were hilarious as we got to see the kids interact with each other and what they thought of the others issues. Parts were intensely touching as we see exactly why Emmy was accused of bullying and why Justin is so angry.

Seeing the teens come together and form a close group was the highlight of the book for me. They come together to help each other, first in not so healthy ways and then eventually in slightly better ways. Having them interact at the Fair in particular highlights each of their issues and how they are actually seen by other people. The group of teens are such a random group of misfits they almost reminded me of the movie The Breakfast Club at one point.

I think this is a great book that teens could get a lot out of – it’s funny enough they should want to read it all the way through but with enough of a lesson in perception versus reality that they could learn something at the same time.

At the same time as someone who reads a lot of Young Adult books yet is not exactly a Young Adult herself, it’s also a book that people of different ages can enjoy. We can all relate to most of the feelings that the teens went through in this book. The authors did a great job of fleshing those out and making me relate to the characters.

4 stars.

I received this ARC from Netgalley in return for an honest review.

– Clio

Buy it now A Really Awesome Mess