BOOKS READ THIS WEEK
Read: A Winter of Ghosts (#3 The Waking Trilogy) by Thomas Randal
Book Information
Synopsis
Kara’s life in Japanese prep school has been a whirlwind of terror, as a demon’s curse keeps waking up ancient, evil creatures to torment her and her friends. When a student goes missing during a visit to a mountain forest, Kara and her friends are sure the curse has struck again. This time, it’s a demon of winter, whose power is more chilling than anything they’ve encountered so far. And then it gets worse: the demon kidnaps Kara’s boyfriend, Hachiro, with whom she’s just starting to fall in love. Desperate to save him, Kara ventures back into the snowy woods, where dark forces await her . . .
Details
Format: Kindle Edition
File Size: 402 KB
Print Length: 206 pages
Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
Publisher: Daring Greatly Corporation (20 Jan. 2013)
Sold by: Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
Language: English
ASIN: B00B3VLI9C
Review
This was a fantastic ending to an amazing trilogy.
In this final installment of the trilogy the reader sees the development of Kara’s and Kara’s Fathers relationships as well as Kara’s friendships and the ultimate destruction of the demons curse.
Again in this book the authors world building and general descriptions made me as the reader feel like I was a part of the story as well as be able to empathise with what the characters were feeling.
The cover art work, authors writing style, the fact that I will read the book again in the future and recommend it to others/ buy it for friends and family members that I think will enjoy it; are the reasons that I have given this book a five star rating. In essence the trilogy as a whole is more than well worth the five stars plan to give it when I write the trilogy review
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The End of all Things (#1 The End of all Things) by Lissa Bryan
Book Information
Synopsis: After a terrible virus ravages the planet, Carly Daniels, one of the few survivors, hides in her apartment in Juneau trying to survive the best she can with only occasional forays to gather food. With her is Sam, a wolf puppy she found starving on the streets. He becomes her companion and a reason to continue when giving up sometimes seems like the more attractive option. Still dazed with shock and grief, she hopes for the world to go back to normal soon.
She is discovered by Justin, an ex-soldier who is intent on making his way to Florida before the winter sets in. Justin coaxes her out of her hiding place and convinces her to join him on his journey, because a warmer climate will be their best chance against the extremes of Mother Nature.
Together, they begin a perilous journey through a nation laid to waste by the disaster. Challenges abound along the way. The weather, injury, and shortage of supplies all help to slow them down. In time, they discover that they aren’t the only survivors. Some are friendly but some have had their minds destroyed by the high fever. Then there are those who simply take what they want, leaving Carly and Justin with no choice but to defend what is theirs.
But their journey is not without joy and love. Together, they face every struggle, including an unplanned pregnancy. Despite the perils of bringing a child into a world of chaos, their baby is a new beginning for themselves and a symbol of hope for the other survivors they find along the way.
This is the story of their journey to find a place to begin a new life, and a home in each other.
- Format: Kindle Edition
- File Size: 755 KB
- Print Length: 264 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1612131417
- Publisher: The Writer’s Coffee Shop (22 Jan. 2013)
- Sold by: Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
- Language: English
- ASIN: B00B4ZK9QA
REVIEW
Thank you Cindy Bidwell from thewriterscoffeeshop for asking me to do a review for this and the next two books in the series for her blog hop.
This is the first book in a dystopian romance series based around a young woman and her partners travels across post virus Canada and into America from Juno in Alaska. It sees them having to deal with lack of food, being attacked and an unplanned pregnancy.
Lissa’s character descriptions and world building were so well written that you could really see things through the characters eyes at some points I even felt I was actually in the story. I particularly felt for Carly and Justin when they found put that Catly was pregnant especially their fear over what would happen to them and their child once s/he was born. I also felt their relief when they found the settlement and them when they realised they had infected its inhabitants with the infection.
I have given this book a 4 star rating because the cover art and writing in this book was so good that I would definitely read the book again in the future as well as recommend it to others as well as buy it for friends or family who I think would enjoy it, as well as it being a solid start to what I am sure will be a fantastic series.
Author Bio
KINDLE BOOKS PURCHASED THIS WEEK
NETGALLEY BOOKS RECEIVED THIS WEEK
All Together Now by Gill Hornby
Enter Tracey – one of life’s soloists, and hiding a secret past; Bennett – a church choir refugee, baffled by the modern world. And Jazzy – who sees her voice as her passport straight out of town to a future of fame and fortune. Can they really fit in with dependable old regulars like Annie? Can they learn to work together, save their singing group and maybe even their community?
All Together Now is a funny, sharply observed and moving novel about the joys of singing, about living in harmony, about falling in love… and about the importance of finding your own, true voice.
Pub Date
- ISBN: 9781408704370
- Price: £14.99 GBP
- Edition: Hardcover
Libertine (Libertine #1) by Blair Lacey
I wasn’t made for love. I was made for sex.
And I must not ever forget that.
Opal has been used and abused, but is determined to turn a new chapter in her life. Escaping from her abusive ex took her all the courage she had, but when he threatens to return and torment her again, she fears for her own life … Meeting a tall, dark and deadly stranger might just be her salvation – or will it doom her?
Libertine is a dark romance novel with erotica and mystery elements. Provocative, dark & twisted … a story that will play with your mind, body and soul.
Pub Date
- ISBN: 0000000000072
- Price: $2.99 USD
- Edition: Ebook
Heart Collector by Jacques Vandroux
Finding murderers is just a day on the job for police captain Nadia Barka. But when a mutilated corpse is discovered in an old baptistery, she’s faced with some difficult questions: Who left a young woman’s body in a high-security museum in the middle of the night? And where is the victim’s heart?
Barka has no leads, until several days later when unassuming computer technician Julien Lombard comes forward, claiming to have had a premonition of the woman’s abduction and murder. The ensuing investigation turns up nothing, however, and Julien is just as skeptical about his intel as the police are. But, after another woman goes missing, Barka decides to take a chance and trust in Julien’s gift. Does Julien hold the key to preventing another gruesome crime? Working together, can they find the murderer before he steals another heart?
Amazon Publishing – AmazonCrossing
Pub Date
- ISBN: 9781477826829
- Price: $10.99 USD
- Edition: Other Format
Reluctantly Charmed by Ellie O’Neil
In the spirit of Cecelia Ahearn and Regina McBride, a lighthearted and relatable debut novel about an advertising copywriter who upends her ordinary life and captures the attention of the world after publishing a seven-part treatise on the existence of fairies.
Kate McDaid thought that going to the reading of her great-great-aunt’s will would be just another non-event in her ordinary life. A junior copywriter at an advertising agency in Dublin, she was used to spending her days wrangling clients, over-indulging in chocolatey products, and whiling away nights at the pub with her best friends, using her trusty bicycle to get around town. Instead, Kate finds out that the will and her aunt (also known as the Red Witch of Knocknamee) dictates that Kate must publish a series of strange poems called “The Seven Steps” under her own name in order to inherit the rest of her aunt’s estate.
And those poems? They’re a mysterious treatise on the importance and existence of fairies…
Kate decides to publish the Steps on a friend’s website, thinking that the low traffic on the site would let her posts go unnoticed. She never could have imagined that in a matter of days, she would find herself a local celebrity with her own group of devotees and the target of a mysterious and glamorous newspaper reporter. Even Dublin’s rock-and-roll sweetheart—and Kate’s onetime fling—writes a song inspired by the Steps.
While the Steps strike a chord across Ireland and the world, Kate takes the message to heart. But as the tone of each Step moves from free-spirited to sinister, Kate must decide if she will go through with publishing all seven Steps—or protect humankind from an ancient evil.
Infused with just enough magic and everyday familiarity that anyone can relate to, this fantastic debut is a page-turner with the perfect mix of humor and mystery.
Touchstone
Pub Date
The Changes Trilogy (The Weathermonger, Heartsease, and The Devil’s Children) by Peter Dickinson
Something has gone very wrong in England. In a tunnel beneath Wales one man opens a crack in a mysterious stone wall, and all over the island of Britain people react with horror to perfectly normal machines. Abandoning their cars on the roads and destroying their own factories, many flee the cities for the countryside, where they return to farming and an old-fashioned life.
When families are split apart and grown-ups forget how they used to live, young people face unexpected challenges. Nicola Gore survives on her own for nineteen days before she’s taken in by a Sikh family that still remembers how to farm and forge steel by hand. Margaret and Jonathan brave the cold and risk terrible punishment in order to save a man’s life and lift the fog of fear and hate that’s smothering their village. And Geoffrey and his little sister, Sally, escape to France only to be sent back to England on a vital mission: to make their way north to Wales, alone, and find the thing under the stones that shattered civilization—the source of the Changes.
Open Road Integrated Media – Open Road Media Teen & Tween
Pub Date
Swan Lake meets Robin Hood when the beautiful daughter of a wealthy merchant by day becomes the region’s most notorious poacher by night, and falls in love with the forester.
Jorgen is the forester for the wealthy margrave, and must find and capture the poacher who has been killing and stealing the margrave’s game. When he meets the lovely and refined Odette at the festival and shares a connection during a dance, he has no idea she is the one who has been poaching the margrave’s game.
Odette justifies her crime of poaching because she thinks the game is going to feed the poor, who are all but starving, both in the city and just outside its walls. But will the discovery of a local poaching ring reveal a terrible secret? Has the meat she thought she was providing for the poor actually been sold on the black market, profiting no one except the ring of black market sellers?
The one person Odette knows can help her could also find out her own secret and turn her over to the margrave, but she has no choice. Jorgen and Odette will band together to stop the dangerous poaching ring . . . and fall in love. But what will the margrave do when he discovers his forester is protecting a notorious poacher?
Thomas Nelson–FICTION
Pub Date
Vengeance of the Iron Dwarf (Companions Codex III) by R. A. Salvatore
R.A. Salvatore’s New York Times best-selling tale of the dark elf Drizzt Do’Urden continues immediately on the heels ofRise of the King, with an expanding war and greater danger to the finally-reunited Companions of the Hall.
In the evolving world of the Forgotten Realms setting, the Sundering has given way to months of cloud-cloaked darkness, and war rages under that oppressive sky. The orcs have broken a hard-fought treaty that’s held, however tentatively, for a hundred years, and the time to settle old scores has devolved into an all-out brawl for control of the ancient realms of the North
- ISBN: 9780786965700
- Price: $27.95 USD
- Edition Hardcover
Asylum by Jeannette De Beauvoir
Martine LeDuc is the director of PR for the mayor’s office in Montreal. When four women are found brutally murdered and shockingly posed on park benches throughout the city over several months, Martine’s boss fears a PR disaster for the still busy tourist season, and Martine is now also tasked with acting as liaison between the mayor and the police department. The women were of varying ages, backgrounds and bodytypes and seemed to have nothing in common. Yet the macabre presentation of their bodies hints at a connection. Martine is paired with a young detective, Julian Fletcher, and together they dig deep into the city’s and the country’s past, only to uncover a dark secret dating back to the 1950s, when orphanages in Montreal and elsewhere were converted to asylums in order to gain more funding. The children were subjected to horrific experiments such as lobotomies, electroshock therapy, and psychotropic medication, and many of them died in the process. The survivors were supposedly compensated for their trauma by the government and the cases seem to have been settled. So who is bearing a grudge now, and why did these four women have to die?
Not until Martine finds herself imprisoned in the terrifying steam tunnels underneath the old asylum does she put the pieces together. And it is almost too late for her…in Jeannette de Beauvoir’s Asylum.
St. Martin’s Press – Minotaur Books
Pub Date
She thought her fiance was the perfect man—until he turned out to be the perfect killer… Katherine Cole is running for her life, desperate to escape the Valentine Killer—so-called because he stabs his victims through the heart and leaves them holding a telltale single red rose. Still he tracks her to New Orleans and begins carving a bloody path to her door. But this time, Katherine refuses to run any farther. This time, she’ll do anything to stop the madman she once loved, even trust the sexy cop promising to keep her safe…Detective Dane Black never lets his emotions interfere with his job, even as the Valentine Killer surfaces in New Orleans to stalk his prey. But when Dane agrees to protect the killer’s ex-fiancee, Katherine Cole, he can’t ignore the passion kindling between them. After a single unforgettable night binds them body and soul, Dane knows he won’t rest until Katherine is safe in his arms—and the Valentine Killer is dead. Dark and intensely sexy, this romantic suspense novel from USA Today bestselling author Cynthia Eden is sure to leave readers breathless.Amazon Publishing – Montlake Romance
Pub Date
- ISBN: 9781611099140
- Price: $12.95 USD
- Edition: Paperback
Black Dove, White Raven by Elizabeth Wein
A story of survival, subterfuge, espionage and identity.
Rhoda and Delia are American stunt pilots who perform daring aerobatics to appreciative audiences. But while the sight of two girls wingwalking – one white, one black – is a welcome novelty in some parts of the USA, it’s an anathema in others. Rhoda and Delia dream of living in a world where neither gender nor ethnicity determines their life. When Delia is killed in a tragic accident, Rhoda is determined to make that dream come true. She moves to Ethiopia with her daughter, Em, and Delia’s son, Teo.
Em and Teo have adapted to scratching a living in a strange land, and feel at home here; but their parents’ legacy of flight and the ability to pilot a plane places them in an elite circle of people watched carefully by the Ethiopian emperor, Haile Selassie, who dreams of creating an air force for his fledgling nation. As Italy prepares for its invasion of Ethiopia, Em and Teo find themselves inextricably entangled in the crisis — and they are called on to help.
Egmont Publishing – Electric Monkey
Pub Date
- ISBN: 9781405271363
- Price: £7.99 GBP
- Edition: Paperback
The Versions of US by Laura Barnett
Some moments can change your life for ever. Have you ever wondered, what if…?
A man is walking down a country lane. A woman, cycling towards him, swerves to avoid a dog. On that moment, their future hinges. There are three possible outcomes, three small decisions that could determine the rest of their life.
Eva and Jim are nineteen and students at Cambridge when their paths first cross in 1958. And then there is David, Eva’s then-lover, an ambitious actor who loves Eva deeply. The Versions of Us follows the three different courses their lives could take following this first meeting. Lives filled with love, betrayal, ambition but through it all is a deep connection that endures whatever fate might throw at them.
The Versions of Us explores the idea that there are moments when our lives might have turned out differently, the tiny factors or decisions that could determine our fate, and the precarious nature of the foundations upon which we build our lives. It is also a story about the nature of love and how it grows, changes and evolves as we go through the vagaries of life.
Orion Publishing Group – W&N
Pub Date
Deceived (Soul Keeper Series I) by L.A. Starkey
The battle betw
een the Titans and the gods of old did not end with them. The demand for revenge has dripped down into the next generation. Twins, Marcus and Nicolas, heirs to the throne of the gods and sons of the last remaining Titan, learn that the purpose of their existence is to fulfill a prophecy born of hate and despair.
They must battle for Pandora’s daughter’s heart, a girl lost to the human world and unaware of her hidden heritage. For four hundred years Marcus and Nicolas have only been allowed to touch the edge of their soul mate’s dreams, but the time of the prophecy has come.
For Samantha, life has been nothing more than a series of misfortunes and heartbreak. For years, she has kept her heart locked away, but change is rolling in like a tidal wave. Now Samantha must discern the thin line between love and lie, myth and reality, and it seems that time is running out…
Pub Date
Trail of Broken Wings by Sejal Badani
When her father falls into a coma, Indian American photographer Sonya reluctantly returns to the family she’d fled years before. Since she left home, Sonya has lived on the run, free of any ties, while her soft-spoken sister, Trisha, has created a perfect suburban life, and her ambitious sister, Marin, has built her own successful career. But as these women come together, their various methods of coping with a terrifying history can no longer hold their memories at bay.
Buried secrets rise to the surface as their father—the victim of humiliating racism and perpetrator of horrible violence—remains unconscious. As his condition worsens, the daughters and their mother wrestle with private hopes for his survival or death, as well as their own demons and buried secrets.
Told with forceful honesty, Trail of Broken Wings reveals the burden of shame and secrets, the toxicity of cruelty and aggression, and the exquisite, liberating power of speaking and owning truth.
The Lake Union team appreciates your interest in this title, and we encourage you to share your thoughts with the book community. If you would like to stay up-to-date on new titles from Lake Union, please go to our publisher page and click “Add to Favorites.”
Pub Date
Absolute Beginners by S.J. Hooks
Professor Stephen Worthington’s life makes perfect sense.
He teaches classes on Tuesdays and Fridays. He has dinners with his parents on the weekend. He goes to the gym with his comically crass stepbrother, Matt, a few days each week. And every night, he heads home at a reasonable hour, alone.
There’s only one thorn in Stephen’s perfectly organized side: Ms. Julia Wilde. Never has Stephen dealt with a more unruly student. She’s rude, provocative, infuriating—and she dresses in a way that is completely unbecoming for a lady. Stephen can’t wait for the semester to be over, and then he’ll never have to see her again.
That is, until Stephen finds himself out of the classroom and in Julia’s apartment. Suddenly, the student/teacher roles are reversed, and the professor receives a much-needed lesson between the sheets. Stephen thought his life made sense, but after his tryst with Julia, he finds himself changed in more ways than one. Maybe he’s coming down with something.
Or maybe, something a little out of the ordinary is exactly what this stuffy professor needs to really live.
*This novel contains mature content*
Full Fathom Five
Pub Date
Twisted (#1 Twistaed Trilogy) by Iela Smimova
Inspired by real life events, Twisted is a fascinating story of vulnerability, courage and the art of making a living in the sex trade…
Despite her sisters’ best efforts to intervene, she finds herself in Istanbul – culturally a world apart – in an attempt to make back the money and self-respect she’s lost. Vulnerable without the protection of Luxembourg’s champagne bars, she descends into a hell of drugs and high-risk sex until, at the novel’s terrible climax, a kidnapping, brutal assault and one-sided justice system lead to her imprisonment and a threat of deportation.
How will Natalia and Lena save Julia?
Twisted is the first book in the trilogy. The second book Craved will be released soon.
Pub Date
SAMPLES RECEIVED THIS WEEK
Avalon Duology: Avalon (#1 Avalon duology)
Portals (#2 Avalon duology)
The Bone Season Series: The Bone Season (#1 The Bone Season Series)
The Mime Order (#2 The Bone Season Series)
The Fallen To far Trilogy: The Fallen To Far Trilogy by Abbie Glines
Fallen to Far (#1 The Fallen to Far Trilogy)
Never to Far (#3 Thw Fallen to Far Trilogy
Shades of London Series by Maureen Johnson: The Name of the Star (#1 Shades of London)
The Madness Beneath (#2 Shades of London)
This Man (#1 This Man Trilogy) by Jodi Ellen Malpas
Acension (#1 The Trysoon Saga) by Brian Fuller
Three Parts Dead (Craft Sequence Book 1) by Max Gladstone