Review: Shatter Me

Title: Shatter Me
Author: Tahereh Mafi
Series: Shatter Me #1
Genre: YA, Dystopian, Science Fiction
Pub Date: Nov. 15th 2011
Pages: 338
E-Book

I have a curse
I have a gift
I am a monster
I'm more than human
My touch is lethal
My touch is power
I am their weapon
I will fight back
Juliette hasn’t touched anyone in exactly 264 days.
The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette’s touch is fatal. As long as she doesn’t hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don’t fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color.
The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war – and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she’s exactly what they need right now.
Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior. 

I have been seeing this book around the blog-o-sphere for quite some time. It sounded like my kind of book; dystopian, supernatural abilities, romance. It still took me this long to pick up this book. Partly because there are so many books out there I am dying to read and partly the title. I cant exactly explain why but the title did not draw me in so I always found something else on my TBR to read.

YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK!! I had a very difficult time putting it down once I finally got to reading it!! I loved it.

The writing in this threw me off at first. There is writing that is scratched out much like the blurb above and often that the main character repeats herself. I found this to be rather annoying. The overall story was great though.

Juliette's character was hard for me to relate to. She is broken, needy, reclusive. I understand that this is due to how she has spent life for the past few years but it made it hard to like her. I kept thinking to myself, would you grow up and do something!! She had some character growth but not exceptionally so. I also had a hard time believing that Warner was a bad guy. While Juliette and Adam try hard to portray Warner as the villian, I couldn't seem to dislike him. Like any character I found his methods of doing stuff absurd and abstract but he doesnt strike me as Evil per se.

I am excited to continue this story and will be picking up the sequels in the very near future. Unravel Me is next followed by Ignite Me, both of which are already published and on my shelves! I have not researched to see if Tahereh Mafi has any other other novels but would consider reading other works if available. 

A little update

I have to keep reminding myself I do this for me and it doesn't matter if I blog all the time or stop for months at a time. I am not sure there is even anyone out there reading this. Here is an update anyway.

My life has been a chaotic mess lately but I am still reading when I can. I am also trying to get my daughter into reading more. She loves reading but I am pushing her to try books a bit harder cause she reads so well. I will also be having her tested for the gifted and talented class in her school for next year. So with all that I am going to be trying to do a few new things on this blog.

I am going to try to participate in weekly meme's but am not going to let myself feel guilty if I cant! I am also going to be including some vlogging. My daughter wants to give reviews about the children's books she is reading so I will be posting videos on youtube and here. They will very likely be short and to the point as at 7 she is not highly critical of anything. I will also be working on my backlogs of reviews to try and get them up.

The page may be getting new updates as well, my inspiration seems to be fleeting lately.

Lastly, I am hoping to be getting some reviews out of my sister, the other blogger on this site. She does not have internet so its difficult for her to do but I am hoping we will find a system cause she is dying to get her reviews out here.

So there it is, If you have any questions or thoughts let me know :)

Audiobook Challenge 2015

I am going to be participating in several challenges this year. It keeps me reading and more than that it makes me strive to read different things!! My first challenge is the Audiobook challenge from The Book Nympho and Hot Listens. This keeps track of how many audiobooks I listen to this year. I "read" 42 books last year but I can't tell you how many were audiobooks. This will help me to keep track of just that. You can see all the Challenges I am participating in on the Challenge 2015 tab at the top of the page!!

Happy Reading!!

Review: Ten Things We Did

Ten Things We Did (and Probably Shouldn't Have) by: Sarah Mlynowski
Series: N/A
Genre: YA, Contemporary
Pub Date: June 7th 2011
E-Book
368 pgs

2 girls + 3 guys + 1 house - parents = 10 things April and her friends did that they (definitely, maybe, probably) shouldn't have. 

If given the opportunity, what sixteen-year-old wouldn't jump at the chance to move in with a friend and live parent-free? Although maybe "opportunity" isn't the right word, since April had to tell her dad a tiny little untruth to make it happen.

In this hilarious and bittersweet tale, Sarah Mlynowski mines the heart and mind of a girl on her own for the first time. To get through the year , April will have to juggle a love triangle, learn to do her own laundry, and accept that her carefully constructed world just might be falling apart... on thing-she-shouldn't-have-done at a time. 

 This was a perfect quick read. It was extremely entertaining and hard to put down. I finished it in just two short days!! I found myself giggling out loud, fighting back tears and cheering April on as she found herself. The story is constantly bouncing between was is currently happening and some event in her life that she is referencing at that point. At first I found this slightly confusing but soon I relished it. It made the book sound like a story I would tell about my life, in which I would pause to explain something then jump back in. It made the story fresh and different and kept my attention. It is also a very good story about a girl finding herself and dealing with parental issues. As a child of divorced parents, and of parents who at times were very self centered, I really related to the book and felt like it was very realistic.

This is a stand alone novel. Yet another reason it may have been so refreshing. I have loads of series that I want to start or are in the midst of. Sarah Mlynowski does have several other novels including a series that may be very cute called Magic in Manhattan. I may try them someday but they are not moving to the top of this girls expansive TBR.

Happy Reading!

Review: City of Heavenly Fire

City of Heavenly Fire by: Cassandra Clare
Series: Mortal Instruments #6
Genre: YA, Fantasy
Pub Date: May 27th 2014
Audiobook
20 Hours 38 Minutes

In this dazzling and long awaited conclusion to the acclaimed Mortal Instruments series, Clary and her friends fight the greatest evil they have ever faced: Clary's own brother. 
Sebastian Morgenstern is on the move, systematically turning Shadowhunter against Shadowhunter. Bearing the Infernal Cup, he transforms Shadowhunters into creatures out of nightmare, tearing apart families and lovers as the ranks of his Endarkened army swell. 

I read/listened the rest of this series back to back over a year ago. I was super hooked! The Nephilim was a new concept to me and I fell in love immediately. I rooted for Clary and Jace from the first few chapters! Finding out after reading the fifth book that I would have to wait almost a year and a half for the next novel almost put in into tears. I remember breathlessly ranting about this to my husband, whom doesn't read so didn't get why I was upset at all!! Anyway so I bought City of Heavenly Fire the day it came out!! Immediately my life became super hectic and I am just now reading it!! Shameful, I KNOW!!

I just need to note first of all that I loved the conclusion to this series. It was everything I could have wanted from a finale and honestly more than I expected!

The characters, le sigh, the characters. I know over the course of the series there has been a ton of progression but it is helped by leaps and bounds in this book! Something about the world coming to an end makes all the characters pull their heads out of the clouds. I am trying to find the words to explain. Part of me has just considered throwing a spoiler sign and just say all I want to. I may do that later ;)

I am combining the story progression, plot, and resolution here cause I would just find myself repeating. I am not a literary critic, I know many a person that could pick this book a part and find all its faults but personally I think it was perfect. I didnt find any parts dragging or lacking. I love the plot build up and the resolution. What I really want to say here is I was super impressed at the tying up of all the characters left that Cassandra Clare did after the conflict resolution!!! I was really concerned that after everything was said and done it would just be over but she has several chapters showing how life is going post war and all the cleaning up. Beautifully done!!

This series is complete! While I am sad to see if go, I prefer a conclusion versus more books in this instance. Cassandra Clare does have many other books and series most or all of them having to do with this world she has created. I found that City of Heavenly Fire more so then other books hints at stuff that makes you wanna read the other series to see if they hold more information!! Sneaky she-devil!!

Review: Eve and Adam

Eve and Adam by: Michael Grant
Series: Eve and Adam #1
Genre: YA, Sci Fi, Romance
Pub Date: October 1, 2012
Audiobook
6 hrs 50 Minutes

In the beginning, there was an apple-
And then there was a car crash, a horrible injury and a hospital. But before Evening Spiker's head clears a strange boy named Solo is rushing her to her mother's research facility. There, under the best care available, she is left alone to heal.
Just when Eve thinks she will die- not from her injuries, but from boredom- her mother givers her a special project: Create the perfect boy. Using an amazingly detailed simulation, Eve starts creating Adam.

I enjoyed this book for several reasons. First, it was a quick read in both length and in effort. It moved at a good pace and kept my attention. I am trying now at this really odd hour to remember if I have read a book with a similar premise before. I really don't think I have. I feel like I have read something about cloning once, or was that a movie? Anyway I digress. From the first time I heard about this book I have wanted to read it. I, like several other reviewers, was expecting something a little different then what you ended up with. However! I don't mind and actually prefer the direction this story lead. 

Characters. You don't see a lot of character progression in this book. I saw a bit in the two main characters but nothing in the rest. Especially none in a very stubborn Aislin which made me GRR a bit by the way. The story is told from three points of view at some point in the novel. I don't have an issue with this. Also I listened to this book and the readers did an amazing job giving the characters a voice and sounded so real. 

My only real reason for not giving this a 5-star type rating and review is a lack of WOW factor. It was all the thing I mentioned above and I would recommend the book to anyone. I just felt like it didn't have that moment that just made me stop and think that this book had something above anyone else. Do you understand what I mean? Of Course you do! I feel like the writing style was very simplistic. Which made it a great easy read but didn't give the imagination a lot to work with. It didn't explain a lot outside of what it took to get the point across.

I am pretty sure this is a single novel, Though for alot of the book I wondered cause I wasn't quite sure how we would get to a resolution in the amount of time I had left! hehe. Michael Grant has alot of other novels. I have his Gone Series in my TBR pile.

Teaser Tuesday #5

Teaser Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by MizB @Shouldbereading. Anyone can play along, just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two "teaser" sentences from somewhere on that page. 
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS
• Share the title and author so other TT participants can add the book to their TBR lists if they like your teasers. 

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My Teaser: 

"I say lightly, because what else am I going to do when the most beautiful boy in the world is seated beside me and several inches of him are pressed against me and I swear the taste of his breathe is sweet in my mouth. Choke."

- Eve and Adam by: Michael Grant