All the Rage by Courtney Summers

I thought about skipping today. I'm sick (not even bad sick, just a stupid sore throat and stuffy nose and it's the worst EVER) and my office is currently a mess (but it's not my fault, so that has to count for something). But then I got some soup (chicken and dumpling) and some medicine (sore throat lollipops) and grabbed my laptop (Vaio) and put on some Buffy (Netflix), and I'm ready to go.

I finished this book last week and wrote a rather hasty review on Goodreads, and now that I've had a few days to let it soak in, my hasty review holds true. But, first, let's see what all the rage is about (DID YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE?):

The sheriff’s son, Kellan Turner, is not the golden boy everyone thinks he is, and Romy Grey knows that for a fact. Because no one wants to believe a girl from the wrong side of town, the truth about him has cost her everything—friends, family, and her community. Branded a liar and bullied relentlessly by a group of kids she used to hang out with, Romy’s only refuge is the diner where she works outside of town. No one knows her name or her past there; she can finally be anonymous. But when a girl with ties to both Romy and Kellan goes missing after a party, and news of him assaulting another girl in a town close by gets out, Romy must decide whether she wants to fight or carry the burden of knowing more girls could get hurt if she doesn’t speak up. Nobody believed her the first time—and they certainly won’t now — but the cost of her silence might be more than she can bear.

The title pretty much sums up my feelings: all the rage. All of it.

I was barely ten pages into this book when I started feeling angry. I had to set it aside for a little while because I wanted to reach in and slap the junk out of so many characters. Why did the boys get to be rude while the girls had to prance around being perfect and beautiful? Why weren't the parents paying attention to anything their jerk sons and daughters were doing?

Well, then it wouldn't be this book.

I suppose that's what Courtney Summers wanted the readers to feel, though. Romy Grey is two different people in one body, and while I know that it's fiction, another part of me is so angry because it's really not. And that made me more upset than anything. I've never gone through something as harrowing as Romy went through, but I know the feeling of wanting people not to look at you a certain way. Poor Romy is just trying to get through the rest of her high school career and it seems like everyone is hell bent on making that short time the worst for her. It made me remember how mean high school can be, and I wanted to shake all these horrible people and tell them that they better enjoy this time because it's downhill from here for them.

This was an absolutely amazing book. I don't want anyone to think that I'm putting it down or that I hated it. I loved it. I counted down the minutes until I could come home and read it. It's beautiful and depressing and heartrending and crazy. Basically, Courtney Summers perfectly captured every emotion that is supposed to come out of a tragedy that was Romy and Penny. And the ending - WOW. Throughout the book, you sometimes forget that there is a mystery to be solved and when it finally is...holy canoli. It' sad and wonderful at the same time.

The book comes out April 14, so mark your calendars. Seriously. Don't forget about this book.

A For Serious Post

I just spent about a half hour playing around with the colors and themes of this blog, and yet there have been no changes. Sometimes I wish I had a good eye for color and could just - poof! Make it happen in two seconds. I swear, one day I'll find something I like and make up my mind.

But this post isn't about colors or themes! No way! This is about what I promised on Wednesday: a massively long blog about the future of my writing! How exciting! How thrilling! What a lot of exclamation marks in these few sentences!

So, on Wednesday, I gushed about Penryn and the End of Days, you know, the book that made me think of nothing but Amory and her friends. I said that it gave me ideas. Boy, did it ever.

Let's start this with a flashback: the main idea for Amory came when my boyfriend and I were at a Coheed and Cambria concert way back in 2008 (if you don't know who they are, LOOK THEM UP. I'll wait). One of the lines in the songs gave me such a vivid image of a fallen angel getting her wings burned off that I knew I had to form it into some kind of coherent thought. What started as one thought turned into many, and before I knew it, I was spending most of my time at work writing scenes or backstory or just getting to know my characters (honestly, thank god I had a do nothing job). I had an image of what I wanted the story to be, and then it grew, so I planned a second book, but then that grew, and soon enough I had three books. I had them planned out perfectly, down to the very last word.

Between then and now, changes have been made. Some of them for the better, some of them not. As I galloped closer to publishing, I began having self doubts and started changing my words into something that I thought others would like because I had probably read them half a dozen times before in another books. Pretty soon, I had something that I was proud of, but that only vaguely resembled what I had started out to write.

It was rather discouraging.

Over the last year or so, I've read over the first book to prepare myself for the second. It's been a lot of back and forth, reading and rereading, matching up characters and their settings. The more I read, the more I realized that while my words and story were good, they weren't what I truly wanted. A lot of the characters had been introduced at the last minute, as if I thought my main three weren't good enough. Some of the settings were confusing because I wasn't really writing what I knew. That's one of the main reasons why I've been lagging on the second book. It wasn't going where I wanted it to go and it was depressing me.

When I read Penryn, it hit me that the simple story was exactly what I had wanted. There is this one girl, her mom, sister, and a fallen angel. Sure, there's other minor characters, but at the core of the story, there were just these four. Somewhere along my line, my world became too populated with characters and settings, and I had lost the original meaning of the novel I wanted to write.

For the last two weeks or so, I've gone back to Amory. I went through it and matched it up with what I had envisioned back in 2008. It meant cutting out a lot of characters and rearranging a few things, but when I finally finished planning things out, I was happy. Light. Carefree. It felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

So I made the rather tough decision to pull my book from Amazon.

That doesn't mean that I'm done with it. No way. The weight has been lifted and that only means I have more room to write. I'm not going to start today or tomorrow, or even next month. I'm taking my time with this one, but that doesn't mean it'll take five years like the last one. Now I know where I'm going and I'm taking the advice of countless authors before me: write what you would want to read. And I am. I'm actually excited about getting back to Amory, because I'm going to be able to unleash the woman in my head onto the world.

Yes, I'm working a little backward here, but, to be honest, it's not like many people bought my book off Amazon (more on that way later in the future). Camp NaNo starts next week and I'm doing it just to get writing every day. I slacked off on that for far too long, and I know that's a main problem for Amory right now. I haven't been that excited about writing because I keep getting stuck at certain places, and I'm hoping to ram that wall down. I'm shooting for a June/July start, and then I can work on it for the summer, and hopefully start editing and rewrites at the end of the summer.

That means I get to keep you all updated on the writing process and how this one is panning out. I have a feeling that it's going to be a lot better than the last one, and I can't even describe how my heart is bursting to get going. But, as an old friend constantly reminded me, patience is a virtue, and I never really understood that until I started writing.

Here's to the new year, getting started a bit late. Have a fabulous weekend, everyone.

Penryn and the End of Days by Susan Ee

So I promised something kind of funny for Wednesday, and I'm going to deliver. Not that these books are funny (well, they are in some parts, but they're meant to be!), but...we'll get to that.

NetGalley sent me an email a few weeks ago to catch up on this series before the final book comes out in May. I'll be honest: I deleted the email because the synopsis sounded a little too close to home:

It’s been six weeks since angels of the apocalypse descended to demolish the modern world. Street gangs rule the day while fear and superstition rule the night. When warrior angels fly away with a helpless little girl, her seventeen-year-old sister Penryn will do anything to get her back. Anything, including making a deal with Raffe, an injured enemy angel. Traveling through a dark and twisted Northern California, they journey toward the angels’ stronghold in San Francisco, where Penryn will risk everything to rescue her sister and Raffe will put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies for the chance to be made whole again.

So I set it aside. I ignored it. Then Amazon started sending me emails about it. Then NetGalley again. It felt like the world was telling me, Read this book, Seriously. And you know what? Thank you, world, because I finally did and...wow. Penryn is awesome. She's brave and loyal and heartbreakingly loving. Her entire family is screwed: her younger sister, Paige, is in a wheelchair, and their mother has seen demons her entire life, demons that make her do terrible things. The humans that populate this book range from helpful to crazed, and they all seem to find their way into the Resistance camp, along with the leader Obi, plus the twins Dee-Dum, who I absolutely fell in love with. The angels in this book are nothing more than glorified frat boys, partying it up while humans die around them and the world crumbles. They don't care about humans, except when they want to use them as decorations. But then there's Raphael, or Raffe. He's cold and ruthless and sometimes funny, but he has standards and he sticks to them, much to the disgust of this reader. It was terrible reading about (slight spoiler?) how his wings were cut from him, and the end, the end! No one should be subjected to what Raffe and Paige go through. The description of the dilapidated cities were strangely beautiful, and it really hit my heart because it was set in Silicon Valley and San Francisco, my old backyard. To read about the skyscrapers falling to the ground and the entire Bay Area being nothing more than an angel playground...it hurt! 

Lucky for me, instead of having to wait so many thousands of years for the sequel, I was granted permission to read both of them at the same time! SO right after I finished Angelfall, I started World After:

In this sequel to the bestselling fantasy thriller, Angelfall, the survivors of the angel apocalypse begin to scrape back together what's left of the modern world. When a group of people capture Penryn's sister Paige, thinking she's a monster, the situation ends in a massacre. Paige disappears. Humans are terrified. Mom is heartbroken.

Penryn drives through the streets of San Francisco looking for Paige. Why are the streets so empty? Where is everybody? Her search leads her into the heart of the angels' secret plans, where she catches a glimpse of their motivations, and learns the horrifying extent to which the angels are willing to go.

Meanwhile, Raffe hunts for his wings. Without them, he can't rejoin the angels, can't take his rightful place as one of their leaders. When faced with recapturing his wings or helping Penryn survive, which will he choose?

 I don't want to spoil anything, but let's just say that Paige is a little different than when Penryn lost her at the beginning of book one. She's not...herself. Neither is Raffe. He got some wings, but they're not the ones that he wanted. After escaping the Resistance camp, Penryn, Paige, and their mom are on the run, trying to find somewhere they can go, until Paige disappears. Now they're searching for her, and when Raffe steps in to help Penryn, things become a lot...well, not smoother, but a bit easier? Either way, those two need to stop already and just smash their faces together, whether or not Raffe thinks mixing with a Daughter of Man is bad or not. He wants to face battle just as much as Penryn does. We also learn a bit more about Uriel, the politician that's in the running to become Messenger, since Gabriel was murdered six weeks earlier. Always Uriel, I kid you not. But now Penryn and Raffe have some new "friends" and none of them are going down without a fight. This book was exciting and stuffed full of information, which made it the perfect sequel. There's still questions to be answered, so I'm eagerly anticipating the third one!

Unfortunately, we all have to wait another month and a half until the third one comes out, so that's not cool. It's okay, though, because these books didn't just give me entertainment, they gave me ideas. That's for Friday, though. It'll be a massively long post about the future of my writing, so be prepared! 

Now all I can picture are the Nazi hyenas in The Lion King. Great.

Distance and Time by Mel Henry

Good Monday, everyone! I told you I had something fun planned for today, and here it is: Distance and Time by Mel Henry. This book really threw me for a loop, mainly because I thought it was going to be one thing, and then it turned out to be the exact opposite. It took me a few days to really sort through my thoughts and feelings about this one. I've had a month now to do that, and I still fluctuate between happiness and extreme anger about the characters and their choices.

What's the story about, you may be asking? Let me tell you:

     Carlene Cooper was your average teenager. Average, that is, except for her relationship with Josh McCarthy, member of teen mega-group, South Station Boyz. Young love blossomed at a chance meeting when Carly was a senior in high school and Josh was just discovering what stardom really meant. Despite their chemistry, it was no surprise to anyone when their very different lives took very different paths a few months down the road.

     Years later, their paths cross again, and they must decide if the spark they felt back then is strong enough to rekindle. Josh has built a name for himself in show business, but Carly, too, has planted roots as a journalist in New York City. Will they be able to successfully merge their lives and overcome the obstacles that drove them apart a decade earlier?

     Just as she comes to the decision that will change their lives one way or the other, tragedy strikes and Detective Trey Foster enters her life unexpectedly. Now, Carly is faced with another choice. Will she choose the man she's spent her whole life loving, or will she push it aside for a chance at happiness out of the spotlight?

This book. Let me tell you a thing. When I first started reading this book, I thought I had stumbled upon another one of those "girls meets dream boy, falls instantly in love, and they live happily ever after" books. No way. Not this one. Mel Henry decided to start the book off this way and then veer it so off course that I'm not even sure we were on a road anymore. 

And that's not a bad thing.

Carly is awesome, mainly because she stays true to herself and her goals even when faced with Josh and his infinite glory. She keeps her dreams in mind as they navigate their relationship and even thought it sometimes made me want to shake her a scream, "He's a boy bander, Carly!", she never once gave into him if she knew it was the wrong decision. Josh, for his part, was charming, sweet, and caring, but it was clear that he sometimes thought everyone would move around their lives to accommodate him. This book deals with real problems and real consequences, and while it was sometimes heartbreaking to read, I'm glad that there were parts where no one swooped in to save the day. Sometimes bad things happen and you just have to deal with them. That's what happened to these characters. They looked their problems in the face and either dealt with them or let them overcome their will. Not to spoil anything, but one of the problems Carly has to face is so real that you keep praying someone will intervene, but, like real life, no one does.

And just who decided to write this messy crying novel?

     Mel Henry has been an avid reader since stealing her first Harlequin from her mom’s nightstand in second grade. Because some words were too big for her seven-year-old vocabulary, she took to writing her own stories (much to the relief of her teacher) and has been doing so ever since.

     After having held various jobs in her life that brought her no satisfaction and only a piddly income, she decided to publish her first book. She figured being a starving artist instead of just starving sounded much more interesting. Being able to do it in her pajamas and no make-up are just perks to the job.

     Living in Iowa with her husband and a couple of teenaged kids, Mel’s an avid cook (sometimes by choice), traveler (always by choice), and a hardcore warrior against chronic Lyme disease (definitely not by choice). She loves concerts, thunderstorms, and good coffee. She loathes conspiracy theories, egotistical people, and sushi.

     She is currently collaborating with three other authors on a project, and has the foundation in place for her next series. In the meantime, you can find her current works on Amazon and other online booksellers.

Get in contact with her by...

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/MelHenryAuthor

Blog: http://mellysramblings.blogspot.com

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/Mel_Henry@Mel_Henry

Goodreads Author: https://www.goodreads.com/MelHenry

Bottom line? Go buy this book. It's awesome and not the typical love story. It's real and it has depth and it keeps you wondering until the last page and beyond.

Amazon.com: http://amzn.to/1FsGW2P

Amazon.co.uk: http://amzn.to/1wR9ilx

B&N: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/distance-and-time-mel-henry/1116070586

Kobo: https://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/distance-and-time-1

iTunes:

https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id976232648

We're not over yet...

Coming soon!

Book 2 - Better in Time

Released April 1, 2015

Synopsis

     Still reeling from a break-up with his first love, Carly, Josh McCarthy is replanting his roots in Los Angeles in an attempt to start over. Once part of South Station Boyz (a teen super-group in the ‘90s), and a lengthy stint with a Broadway theater company, success is something that has always come easily to Josh—at least where his career is concerned. Love, on the other hand, has been a struggle.

     With a new role on a hit TV show and a change of scenery, Josh is hoping to get  back on track in every aspect of his life, with or without Carly. Meeting model-turned-agent, Abby Levy, should be the answer to his “without Carly” equation. So why do his thoughts keep driving back to her? Every day, to his own detriment, he finds new ways to compare his new love to his old one. He just wants to move on and not feel her absence anymore.

     Now faced with another major life decision, Josh decides to take a trip back to the Big Apple—back to Carly—to either reclaim his lost love or to finally gain the closure he needs to move on. What will he decide, and can everything really get Better in Time?

Click below to win a $10 giftcard!

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Seriously, I can't reiterate enough that you should buy this book. Sure, it has some real tear-jerking scenes, but Mel Henry writes some of the sweetest, happiest love scenes in the world, and that makes up for the puffy eyes.

A Little Vacation...For Reals

Happy Friday everyone!

All right, so technically I'm writing this on Thursday afternoon, but I'm running away this weekend to Arizona and thought that I should get an early start.

This week has actually been pretty productive, but not for the story I wanted to work on. I hit a road block of some sorts, but I didn't want to stop writing or else the road block would turn into a rut. So I've been writing - thousands and thousands of words, actually. I've gone crazy. It's for a story that started off as a silly idea, but now it's actually got some legs. I'm not saying that it's going to be a real boy any time soon, but it's something right now. It started off when I went through a spurt of YA novels and I wondered what would happen to the characters after the book ended. So that's the basic premise of this story, and it's kind of making me excited and laugh, so I'm going to keep with it until the road block for the actual story finally leaves. It also keeps me writing and it was kind of a schedule. As weird as it sounds, it was really nice.

I hate to say that I'm going to take a two to three day break from it, but maybe I'll get some writing done in Arizona. We're going there to visit my boyfriend's dad and bother the other dog and see some races. Down time is quite possible, especially since my boyfriend and his dad are going to be setting up the internet and plugging things in and doing manly stuff. I plan on poking the dog multiple times in his face and reading and doing some writing. Then I'll have more things to write about next week!

But I guess this is going to be pretty short because I have to finish packing and getting ready for work. I'll be back Monday with something pretty fun, and then maybe again Wednesday because I just finished a book yesterday that's not on the menu for Monday, and I really feel the need to talk about it. It's actually pretty funny, and I hope everyone else will share my humor when I put up the post Wednesday,

Have a great weekend!

Ethan Walker's Road to Wonderland

I know I keep reviewing the books in the Road to Wonderland series and saying that this is the best one yet, and I'm going to keep saying that until one of the authors proves me wrong. Ethan Walker's story is no less brilliant than Izzy's or Paris's, and it, sadly, kept me happier throughout the book than the other two. That doesn't mean this book is super happy. Not by any means. But Ethan made me laugh a lot more than Izzy's or Paris's story.

I guess we should start with what exactly this story is all about.

     At nineteen, the world has so many possibilities.

     Ethan Walker was a typical teenager in that respect. He was happy, living at home with his family and partying when the mood struck. He was in no rush to grow up. His life was a blank page just waiting to be written, but that couldn’t last forever.

     Unfortunately, reality came knocking at Ethan’s door, forcing him to face truths he’d never allowed himself to see in the past - truths that soon robbed him of his innocence and youth. With the life he’d always known gone forever, Ethan found himself battling demons in disguise, only to find his own weakness was his worst enemy.

     When temptation turned to indulgence, and the ghosts of his past encouraged him to dig deeper, Ethan sought salvation in the form of violence. His fists and fortitude became his bread and butter, but the new turn in his life rejected the familiar and opened the door to more evil.

     Inevitably, the darkness tried to sink him, and there was only one constant light that somehow seemed to shine brighter than the promise of escape: the mystery girl with the golden hair. 

     In order to survive, Ethan had to dig deep and find a strength in himself not even he was sure existed. Only when he found himself on a path to Wonderland did he start to see a future beyond his past. All he had to do to get there was learn to breathe and not get himself killed in the process.

It doesn't sound happy when I put it all out there, but trust me, it is. For the most part.

L.J. Stock does a wonderful job mixing in humor and sadness in this story, and she does an even better job weaving Ethan's story with Izzy's and Paris's. I love finding out new things about these characters and how long they've been in each other's lives, even if they didn't know it. Seeing the different perspectives (from different authors, no less) is fresh and exciting, and it's fun to see how the other person reacts in the same scene you've read before. And Ethan is such a great character: he's equal parts sweet, compassionate, brave, loyal, and clueless. You're cheering for him from the very beginning, and I found myself worried for all those he holds close to him, because Ethan tries so hard to keep everyone afloat. It seems like everything he does is to help someone else, and when he finally realizes that helping himself would be the best help for those around him, it's beautiful and inspirational. You fall in love instantly with Ethan because the way L.J. Stock writes him, you feel like he's a real person, making real choices, facing real consequences. I found myself putting the book aside during particularly tense or upsetting moments, because it all felt too close to home.

Want to know more about this awesome author, L.J. Stock? The you're in luck! Let's meet the author:

    From a young age L.J. Stock was led by her imagination. From the moment she could read she fell into worlds where trees could talk and little girls could move things with their minds.

    In no hurry to grow up, she found stories all around her, in the forests of Plym Bridge, the moss covered hills of Dartmoor, then, as she grew older, the wide spread city of Houston, where she currently resides and works. A constant daydreamer, she hopes that one day, her passion can become something more than just a hobby for her.

    Still led by her imagination, the worlds have slowly grown from childish adventures to urban fantasies and romances. With inspirational authors such as Enid Blyton, Roald Dahl, Judy Blume, John Grisham and Stephen King guiding her through her life so far, L.J. Stock has finally decided that it is time for her to go for gold and try land herself on someone else’s future list of favorites.

     Putting words on paper is as essential as breathing to her, but on the rare occasions that she isn’t writing, she can be found with a video game remote in hand or curled up on the couch with her pup and a good book. Music is also such an important part of her life, it’s a wonder there isn’t a background soundtrack playing wherever she goes.

     A good girl to most, a bad girl to a few, L.J. believes that every genre should be attempted and is more than likely to have tried to release three hundred series’ ranging from vampires and werewolves, to dystopian and even classic romance, before she reaches even middle age. At least, that’s the plan for now.

Want more information? Get in touch with her!

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LJStockAuthor?fref=ts

Twitter: https://twitter.com/L_J_Stock

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/9833142.L_J_Stock

Wonderland Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RTWSeries?fref=ts

Also, as always, make sure you pick up the other books in the Road to Wonderland series:

Izzy Moffit’s Road to Wonderland  by Victoria L James (book 1)

Amazon.com: http://amzn.to/1IzpieJ

Amazon.co.uk: http://amzn.to/1vO9Rde

Paris Hemsworth’s Road to Wonderland by Francesca Marlow (book 2)

Amazon US: http://amzn.to/1FBBKYm

Amazon UK: http://amzn.to/1aYe0nE

Then, if this wasn't enough, click on the link below to be entered to the things you see right here:

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Seriously, get these books. They're absolutely delightful and I find myself rereading them more often than I probably should, considering my TBR list. Read them for me and you can thank me later.

House of Echoes by Brendan Duffy

So I know that today is supposed to be a writing post, but I already have something lined up for Monday, and I felt the need to talk about this book before I burst.

So, first, the synopsis:

A young New York City couple with a boy and a baby in tow, Ben and Caroline Tierney had it all…until Ben’s second novel missed the mark, Caroline lost her lucrative banking job, and something went wrong with 8-year-old Charlie. When Ben inherits land way upstate from his grandmother, the two of them began to believe in second chances. But upon arriving in Swannhaven, a town that seems to have been forgotten by time, they’re beset by strange sights and disconcerting developments…and they begin to realize they might have made their worst mistake yet. But what dark secret is buried in this odd place? And will Ben and Caroline figure it out soon enough to save their young family?

Swannhaven sounds like this idyllic little village with these idyllic little people. They're all (well, most) so welcoming to Ben and Caroline, and they want to make sure that those two have everything they need to be successful at the Crofts, the large house the two are turning into an inn. Charlie, their oldest son, is a little weird, but everyone seems to dote on him. Except for the weird Watcher in the woods, who tells him repeatedly to leave or run. 

I don't scare easily. There are few books that makes me stop reading at night and say, "Nope. Not reading this when the sun goes down." This was one of those books. I would pick it up several times before I went to bed and tried to read it, but then it would start to make me nervous and I had to put it down. It's not jump out at you scary. It's not even strange demon running through a dark place scary. It was scary because I knew something was wrong, but I didn't know what exactly. I usually read a book like this and at least take guesses at who or what is the big bad, but my mind shut off during this book. In a good way! One moment I would be on the verge of guessing, but then the character would do something completely nice and it couldn't possibly be them. 

When the end finally comes, it's a complete surprise. I had little hunches and clues, but I was not prepared for what I got. I think I actually said "oh my god" out loud while reading the ending. The last chapter was what got me, and for a little while there, I was so frustrated. But then I pushed through and realized, first, I'm impatient, and second, this was an awesome story. It doesn't come out until April 14th, but if you like dark, scary, suspenseful stories, I recommend snatching it up as soon as it does.

PS - Join me Monday for another Road to Wonderland installment! 

The Infinite by Lori M. Lee

I thought it appropriate to review The Infinite, by Lori M. Lee, the Monday after daylight saving time (which, IMHO, is stupid and ridiculous and unnecessary and we should totally stab daylight saving time). This is the sequel to Gates of Thread and Stone (which, ICYMI, the review is right here) and starts up right where the first one left off.

The official synopsis is as follows:

The walls of Ninurta keep its citizens safe.

Kai always believed the only danger to the city came from within. Now, with a rebel force threatening the fragile government, the walls have become more of a prison than ever.

To make matters worse, as Avan explores his new identity as an Infinite, Kai struggles to remind him what it means to be human. And she fears her brother, Reev, is involved with the rebels. With the two people she cares about most on opposite sides of a brewing war, Kai will do whatever it takes to bring peace. But she’s lost her power to manipulate the threads of time, and she learns that a civil war might be the beginning of something far worse that will crumble not only Ninurta’s walls but also the entire city.

In this thrilling sequel to Gates of Thread and Stone, Kai must decide how much of her humanity she’s willing to lose to protect the only family she’s ever known.

In the first book, Kai is really reluctant to use her magical powers, manipulating the threads of time. As the daughter of the Infinite Kronos, Kai should be bounding along in the River of Time, doing what her father does best, so that he can retire and she can become a new Infinite. But Kai doesn't want this. She has her brother, Reev, and Avan, the boy she fell in love with that became an Infinite to protect her. Not to mention all of her other friends - like absolutely perfect Mason (my opinion, but that should be everyone's opinion) - that she would be leaving behind. 

With the first book, I had to take some time to think about whether I liked it or not. This book was easy: I liked it. A lot. Kai gets out of Ninurta again and into Lanathrill, a city that no one really knew existed since the former kahl had kept them all cut off from the rest of the world. Reev is a wonderful brother, even if Kai doesn't see that all the time. Avan is...I'm not sure about him yet. He worries me. But MASON! Let me tell you about Mason. Mason is perfect and lovely and perfect. If the last book in this series is just following Mason around in his daily schedule, I'd read the junk out of it. Lori M. Lee also does a fantastic job at keeping you preoccupied with friendly neighbors that you don't really see the backstabbing coming. I spent a fair share of this book clenching my teeth together because the horrible people are really...well, horrible. I wanted to push them all off a cliff.

Lucky for you guys, this book comes out tomorrow, so no waiting, and the Kindle price is only $3.99. Also, Gates of Thread and Stone is only $2.00 on Kindle, so pick up the pair!

Rewriting and Reviewing

The rewrites have begun!

But, wait, Bree, you're saying, I thought you've been rewriting this whole time! Have you been lying to us? Are you just a big, fat phony?

Well, first of all, rude. Second of all, I have been rewriting, but not really. I changed the story into a PDF, loaded it onto my Kindle, and went through all the spelling/grammar mistakes (yes, I fixed those even though I knew I would be rewriting it all. This is what I do for a living). Then I read through it again and made notes of what I wanted to change, what I thought needed to be added, what I thought needed to be taken out. Then I went through it YET AGAIN and came up with a whole different ending than what I originally planned. Now that I have all my notes, all my spelling/grammar mistakes taken care of, and all my characters lined up like neat little ducks in a row, I can finally sit down, rewrite this story, and even tell you about it.

In 1936, Valerie Henshaw was three years old and had just lost her mother. She doesn't remember much about her, though: Rita Henshaw had been in an asylum for the better part of Valerie's life. She had claimed to see ghosts, just like most of her female ancestors. As Valerie turns seventeen, life couldn't be better. The second World War is over, the economy is picking up again, William Covington is madly in love with her, and from her place at the top in Boston society, Valerie can do no wrong. 

Until one moment changes all that. 

She unexpectedly finds herself in the same asylum as her mother, with the same doctor that treated Rita. Valerie is on a mission to discover why her family is plagued by these visions, but not everyone wants to same for her. When she gets too close to the truth, she finds out that some things just won't die.

(This was - honestly - the blurb I wrote two years ago in a notebook I keep at the side of my bed. I wrote it at about two in the morning, and I've cleaned up a good bit of it. You know, just so that it makes sense and whatnot.)

So. There it is. A paranormal YA set in 1940s Boston. Three things which I know nothing about. I know every author out there is always, Write what you know! And trust me, I have stories where it hits way too close to home. But I have been interested in asylums and the way they treated their patients for most of my life. The 1940s seemed like a good time to set this story because most institutions were "overhauling" their entire system and hospitals. World War II had just ended, things were picking up, and I just really like this era's fashion. Also, Boston. Ugh, Boston. I know next to nothing about that city, but when I finally developed this idea, it had to be Boston. I tried several different places, and none of them made as much sense as Boston. If that's giving something away, so be it. If not, haha!

I've already written a couple of pages, and that doesn't sound like a lot, but it's something. I'm hoping to get more down this weekend. First, though, I have to finish reading the book that I'm going to review on Monday! It's going to be The Infinite by Lori M. Lee. It's the sequel to Gates of Thread and Stone, and you can find my review for that particular book right here! So, I'll see you all Monday and have a fun weekend!

Consumption

Over the weekend, I went back to NetGalley to get some information about this book and noticed that it's coming out in May (May 26th) and not March, like I originally thought. I thought about doing a different book, but then I finished reading this on Saturday and knew I had to get my review down right away.

To be honest, I requested this book because it said for fans of Stephen King and Joe Hill, and those are two of my favorite writers. Also, they're kind of big shoes to fill. Luckily, Heather Herrman does not disappoint.

John and Erma Scott are on a trip across the United States in order to start over. While their marriage is falling apart, they both deal with it in different ways. But then they come across quaint Cavus, Montana, and they're suddenly fighting for something bigger than just their marriage. An evil sickness, older than time itself, is spreading through this town, and the infected are trying to make sure that it moves outside the borders, all across the world. John and Erma are quickly joined by an unforgettable band of characters: Riley, the local sheriff who just wants to make a wonderful home for his young daughter; Javier, an undocumented immigrant that lives for his mother and sister; Star, a teenage girl trying to deal with the death of her mother and the mentally checking out of her father; and Pill, an old man that knows way more about Cavus than he's letting on.

When I first started this book, it reminded me a little of Desperation by Stephen King, but then it took its own unique twist. Where, at first, I was so concerned with Erma and John being okay with each other, soon I was concerned with them just surviving the little town. Every character that the author added suddenly became both a survivor and a carrier in my eyes. I did know who to trust and who was already infected. The sickness that invades Cavus is relentless and terrifying, because anyone can contract it and all it takes is a little mistake.

One of my favorite things in this novel was that no one was exempt from getting this disease. The old, young, men, women, children, they were all susceptible. The author also didn't shy away from describing what happens to them. It's not gory, but very disturbing. For example, one of the teenagers that contracts the disease suddenly becomes a completely sexual being and rather forcefully hits on poor, bewildered Javier. Then she starts eating candles. It's insane, but in the best way possible. I found myself laughing at certain parts, and then becoming absolutely horrified with myself for laughing, because it's not funny. It's shocking and surprising, and I think I had to laugh if I didn't want to curl up under my blanket and hide for the rest of the book. 

I recommend this for anyone who likes a good horror story. Heather Herrman knocked it out of the park.

Rating: 4.5/5