Category: Young Adult

Title: Gybe
Author: Kristi M. Turner
Genre: Young Adult
Source: YA Bound Book Tours
Release Date: August 28, 2016
Rating: ★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Nicole is an 18-year-old, juvenile delinquent who desperately wants to take control of her life but must find a way to overcome her own self-sabotage and a judge who won’t easily let her escape her past. She keeps food on her plate and clothes on her back by stealing. It is far from the life she wants, but she has known little kindness in her life and, therefore, gives little back. When Judge Newton charges her for the first time as an adult, Nicole recognizes a separating path: She can stay on her path to destruction or she can accept the unexpected generosity of the Kutcher family, whose house she is charged with burglarizing.
Child psychologist, Cynthia Kutcher, believes she can help Nicole confront her anger and build back the self-worth she lost when her father abandoned her to a drunken uncle after her mother’s death.
Along the way to building a more valuable life, Nicole meets Keagan, an affluent young man with whom she begins an often overwhelming love affair despite the conflicts their disparate pasts bring.

Review:

I loved the beginning of this story. It was an original story, with Nicole going to prison but then finding help. It was a unique beginning but the story fell into some cliches by the end. 

I really liked Nicole. I felt attached to her right away. Having her in trouble at the beginning created sympathy for her. At first I wondered who Keagan was, since he is introduced long before he enters Nicole’s story. But I liked the clever relationships between characters. 

Halfway through the story, it skips two months ahead. It wasn’t clear what exactly happened during those two months, but a lot of changes happened in their lives. I wish they mentioned what happened then, because I kept wondering about it.

There were some proofreading errors in the story, such as the continuous misspelling of the word “chick.” But I enjoyed this story. There were some clever twists, which made the story unpredictable and exciting. 

Title: Carry Me Home
Author: Jessica Therrien
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Acorn Publishing
Source: Xpresso Book Tours
Release Date: September 26, 2017
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Lucy and Ruth are country girls from a broken home. When they move to the city with their mother, leaving behind their family ranch and dead-beat father, Lucy unravels.

They run to their grandparents’ place, a trailer park mobile home in the barrio of San Jose. Lucy’s barrio friends have changed since her last visit. They’ve joined a gang called VC. They teach her to fight, to shank, to beat a person unconscious and play with guns. When things get too heavy, and lives are at stake, the three girls head for LA seeking a better life.

But trouble always follows Lucy. She befriends the wrong people, members of another gang, and every bad choice she makes drags the family into her dangerous world. 

Told from three points of view, the story follows Lucy down the rabbit hole, along with her mother and sister as they sacrifice dreams and happiness, friendships and futures. Love is waiting for all of them in LA, but pursuing a life without Lucy could mean losing her forever.

Ultimately it’s their bond with each other that holds them together, in a true test of love, loss and survival. 

Review:

This book was not at all what I expected, but I really enjoyed it!

This story was an intense rollercoaster at times. There were a lot of serious situations, involving drugs and gangs. These things were even more scary since the story is told from multiple first person perspectives so we get the firsthand account of what was happening. 

I liked how the stories of the two sisters were often conflicting. One would be in a gang fight, while the other was out camping among the wildflowers. These dueling images highlighted the different lifestyles of the sisters and created great tension. 

I didn’t think that the cover of the book suits the story. The light blues and pinks make it appear to be a softer plot than it is. It was actually quite dramatic. I think the cover should have been darker to reflect the story. 

Also, I think the father’s role was forgotten for much of the book. I would have liked to see what happened to him later in the story, rather than them just moving away and forgetting about him. 

I really liked this story. I recommend this book for a thrilling read, that’s reminiscent of the summer. 

About the Author:

Jessica Therrien is the author of the young adult series Children of the Gods. Book one in the series, Oppression, became a Barnes & Noble best-seller shortly after its release. Her trilogy has been translated and sold through major publishers around the world, such as Editions AdA (Canada), EditionsMilan (France), and SharpPoint Press (China).

Aside from her Children of the Gods series, Jessica is the author of a kid’s picture book called, The Loneliest Whale. Her award-winning stories can also be found in a published anthology of flash fiction.

Jessica currently lives in Irvine with her husband and two young sons. She is working on an a YA suspense thriller series and a middle grade fantasy series.

Author Links:

http://jessica-therrien.blogspot.ca/

<p class="textbox" dir="ltr" >https://twitter.com/JessicaTherrien

https://www.facebook.com/jessicatherrienauthor/

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5406182.Jessica_Therrien

Giveaway:

https://widget-prime.rafflecopter.com/launch.js

Thank you to Xpresso Book Tours for letting me participate in this blog tour. 

Title: Long Way Down
Author: Jason Reynolds
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Canada
Source: NetGalley
Release Date: October 17, 2017
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

A cannon. A strap.

A piece. A biscuit.

A burner. A heater.

A chopper. A gat.

A hammer

A tool

for RULE

Or, you can call it a gun. That’s what fifteen-year-old Will has shoved in the back waistband of his jeans. See, his brother Shawn was just murdered. And Will knows the rules. No crying. No snitching. Revenge. That’s where Will’s now heading, with that gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, the gun that was his brother’s gun. He gets on the elevator, seventh floor, stoked. He knows who he’s after. Or does he? As the elevator stops on the sixth floor, on comes Buck. Buck, Will finds out, is who gave Shawn the gun before Will took the gun. Buck tells Will to check that the gun is even loaded. And that’s when Will sees that one bullet is missing. And the only one who could have fired Shawn’s gun was Shawn. Huh. Will didn’t know that Shawn had ever actually USED his gun. Bigger huh. BUCK IS DEAD. But Buck’s in the elevator? Just as Will’s trying to think this through, the door to the next floor opens. A teenage girl gets on, waves away the smoke from Dead Buck’s cigarette. Will doesn’t know her, but she knew him. Knew. When they were eight. And stray bullets had cut through the playground, and Will had tried to cover her, but she was hit anyway, and so what she wants to know, on that fifth floor elevator stop, is, what if Will, Will with the gun shoved in the back waistband of his jeans, MISSES.

And so it goes, the whole long way down, as the elevator stops on each floor, and at each stop someone connected to his brother gets on to give Will a piece to a bigger story than the one he thinks he knows. A story that might never know an END…if WILL gets off that elevator. 

Review:

This is such an amazing book. 

It’s an incredibly moving story. It reminded me of other popular books right now, where the main character has to deal with the aftermath of his brother being shot and killed. 

The story is written in verse, which is unique. It made the book a quick read. Some of the phrases were just so beautiful and moving. I loved the lyrical style of writing. 

This is a story about the never ending cycle of revenge. When does it end? 

The ending gave me chills. It was so good! I highly recommend this moving story!

Title: Eight Days on Planet Earth
Author: Cat Jordan
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Harper Teen
Source: YA Bound Book Tours
Release Date: November 7, 2017

Synopsis:

A heart-wrenching romance full of twists that are sure to bring tears to readers’ eyes, from Cat Jordan, author of The Leaving Season.

How long does it take to travel twenty light years to Earth?

How long does it take to fall in love?

To the universe, eight days is a mere blip, but to Matty Jones, it may be just enough time to change his life.

On the hot summer day Matty’s dad leaves for good, a strange girl suddenly appears in the empty field next to the Jones farm—the very field in rural Pennsylvania where a spaceship supposedly landed fifty years ago. She is uniquely beautiful, sweet, and smart, and she tells Matty she’s waiting for herspaceship to pick her up and return her to her home planet. Of course she is.

Matty has heard a million impossible UFO stories for each of his seventeen years: the conspiracy theories, the wild rumors, the crazy belief in life beyond the stars. When he was a kid, he and his dad searched the skies and studied the constellations. But all of that is behind him. Dad’s gone—but now there’s Priya. She must be crazy…right?

As Matty unravels the mystery of the girl in the field, he realizes there is far more to her than he first imagined. And if he can learn to believe in what he can’t see: the universe, aliens…love…then maybe the impossible is possible, after all.

Cat Jordan’s Promo Post:

The 5 Things I Ask Myself Before Starting a Writing Project

1. What’s the opening scene?

In my earliest novels, I would start things off with a bang, often in the middle of action or even dialogue. It can be disorienting to a reader to not know what is going on or who is speaking. Some stories need this but most stories prefer a clever/beautiful/interesting opening line. I want to draw the reader into my world and I don’t want them to start off confused (unless that’s my goal!).

Now when I begin a project, I try to place myself in the new world as if I were my reader. What do I want to see? Is that interesting? Is that character compelling? Is the voice something I want to hear for three hundred pages?

2. What is the ending?

Again, as a newbie writer, I would imagine my books with a bang of an ending too. With all of these “bangs,” you’d think I was writing thrillers! However, what I discovered – both as a reader and a writer – was that I needed to know what happens after the climax of the story. Back in high school, I learned this was a “denouement” but I didn’t know how to apply it until I became a novelist.

It isn’t enough to simply end a story. I need to imagine how all the storylines connect, or don’t connect; how characters continue with their lives. Even if I don’t write it all out for the reader, I need to know what those things are.

3. Where does the story take place?

For me, place is a character. Specificity of location is critical. I might plan to fictionalize a town, as I did with Eight Days on Planet Earth, but I need to know what the exact place is that I’m fictionalizing. If I use an actual city, as I did with The Leaving Season, I need to research as much as possible if I don’t know it personally. I need to have a visual image of what the houses look like and the trees and roads. How close is the next town? Is there a body of water? And since this is a work of fiction, what isn’t there that I can fictionalize?

4. What’s the title?

I have been known to change a title ten or more times before, during and after the process of writing. However, I absolutely must have a decent working title before I even start. The title – a good one – will define the story quickly, giving it a theme without me having to force one on it. It will also stick in my head so I can be thinking and working when I’m not actually in front of a computer writing it.

5. Is it a book?

This is the most difficult question to answer. Sometimes you have an idea that seems like it’s really cool and fun or eerie or important but it’s just a character or a situation or maybe it’s just a scene or two. A book, especially a YA novel, is over 60K words! Your story idea must be sustained over the course of a lot of pages.

Also, if I haven’t written something in a while or if I’ve started and abandoned ideas for various reasons, I might be anxious to get going on a new book. No matter how excited I am to start, though, I have to live with it for a while. This is actually something I learned from Stephen King’s On Writing.

Only write the story when you can’t let it go, when you can’t stop thinking about the characters, when you can’t get the narrative voice out of your head.

Only write the story when you can’t not write it.

Add to Goodreads

Pre-Order Links:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books-A-Million | Indie Bound | Harper Collins

About the Author:

When I was a teenager, the very first book I ever tried to write was pretentious and stilted and set in a future where there was no paper. Obviously, I fancied myself another Ray Bradbury (who I was thrilled to meet not once but twice!). The book had an awesome title and no plot but I had the most fun creating the characters and the world they lived in. That to me is the most enjoyable part of writing a novel: envisioning a world and populating it with all kinds of people and dogs. Gotta have a dog.

The worlds I create now as an adult are based on my travels from coast to coast in the US, to Europe and Mexico and Canada, and on the people I have met and loved and admired and feared. And dogs.

Currently I live in Los Angeles. With my dog.

Author Links:

Website│Goodreads│Twitter│Facebook

Giveaway:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Book Tour Organized by: YA Bound Book Tours

Thank you to YA Bound Book Tours for letting me participate in this blog tour.

Title: The Upside of Unrequited
Author: Becky Albertalli
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Source: Purchased
Release Date: April 11, 2017
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Seventeen-year-old Molly Peskin-Suso knows all about unrequited love—she’s lived through it twenty-six times. She crushes hard and crushes often, but always in secret. Because no matter how many times her twin sister, Cassie, tells her to woman up, Molly can’t stomach the idea of rejection. So she’s careful. Fat girls always have to be careful.

Then a cute new girl enters Cassie’s orbit, and for the first time ever, Molly’s cynical twin is a lovesick mess. Meanwhile, Molly’s totally not dying of loneliness—except for the part where she is. Luckily, Cassie’s new girlfriend comes with a cute hipster-boy sidekick. Will is funny and flirtatious and just might be perfect crush material. Maybe more than crush material. And if Molly can win him over, she’ll get her first kiss and she’ll get her twin back.

There’s only one problem: Molly’s coworker Reid. He’s an awkward Tolkien superfan with a season pass to the Ren Faire, and there’s absolutely no way Molly could fall for him. Right?

Review:

I loved this book! I read it in one day!

I connected with Molly right away. I could really relate to her. I liked how she openly discussed her body image issues and how she felt self conscious about people not liking her because of her weight. I’ve struggled with my weight my whole life so I could relate to those problems.

I’m an only child, so I couldn’t relate to Molly and Cassie’s relationship. But I have noticed how some friends become more distant when they get a boyfriend/girlfriend. I could understand that part of the story, and I think it would be believable for readers with close siblings.

I was so emotionally attached to this story. At times my heart was racing, and at others my eyes filled with tears.

This is a beautiful book. I absolutely loved it.

Title: The Divine Heart
Author: Danielle R. Mani
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Crooked Cat Books
Source: YA Bound Book Tours
Release Date: September 27, 2017
Rating: ★★★★★

Synopsis:

Seventeen-year-old Elle Collins spent most her life waiting for someone else to die…

When a heart donor is found, Elle awakes from surgery gifted with more than just a new heart—clairaudient messages and spiritual apparitions haunt her until she is convinced that she must be insane. Either that, or her donor is sending a message.

Desperate for answers the medical community can’t provide, Elle’s divination leads her to the family of her donor—a young girl named, Cas. With the help of her best friend, Rob—the guy who’s a testament that her new heart is capable of love, Elle must make sense of the clues Cas is sending. As pieces of Cas’s life and death emerge, Elle will discover that she and Cas share more than just a heart.

Add to Goodreads

Buy on Amazon!

Review:

This is a gripping novel. 

It is emotional at the beginning when Elle is sick. But after she gets her heart transplant the story takes an eerie turn, which was amazing. 

The story of Elle’s new powers is woven together perfectly with the ordinary problems that most teenagers face, such as first love. This makes the story relateable, even though there are paranormal aspects. 

The twists were so thrilling, I couldn’t put the book down. I ended up becoming suspicious of everyone, though there weren’t as many “bad guys” as I suspected. The conclusions were somewhat logical, but I enjoyed the mystery of it all. 

This is a great debut novel. I look forward to seeing what Danielle R. Mani comes out with next. 

About the Author:

Danielle R. Mani is a fan of the paranormal in both print and film. In her first book, The Divine One, Ms. Mani combines supernatural fiction with the everyday dramas of young adulthood. Her newest YA paranormal novel, The Divine Heart, is scheduled to be released later this year. Ms. Mani holds a Bachelor of Arts in education and a Master of Science in communications. She is currently a doctoral student studying parapsychology. She resides in Westchester, New York, with her husband, four children, two dogs, and two rescue cats.

Author Links:

Website│Goodreads│Twitter│Facebook

Giveaway:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Book Tour Organized by: YA Bound Book Tours

Thank you to YA Bound Book Tours for letting me participate in this blog tour.

Title: They Both Die at the End
Author: Adam Silvera
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: HarperTeen
Source: Purchased
Release Date: September 5, 2017
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

On September 5, a little after midnight, Death-Cast calls Mateo Torrez and Rufus Emeterio to give them some bad news: They’re going to die today. Mateo and Rufus are total strangers, but, for different reasons, they’re both looking to make a new friend on their End Day. The good news: There’s an app for that. It’s called the Last Friend, and through it, Rufus and Mateo are about to meet up for one last great adventure and to live a lifetime in a single day.

Review:

There has been a lot of hype about this book, and it didn’t disappoint me. 

The characters are instantly loveable. They have both suffered a lot, with the loss of their families. Even when Rufus makes mistakes, I was still rooting for him. 

The idea of finding out the day you die is a fascinating subject. It’s hard to decide if you would want to know. It’s intriguing to learn about your future, but it’s scary to know when you’ll die. Even the people in this story who tried to fight it, still ended up dying. You can’t change your fate. 

At the same time, I have to wonder if Death-Cast has a self-fulfilling prophecy. Since people know they will die that day, they don’t stop it when they sense it coming. This happens with Rufus’s family who don’t even try to escape the car crash that eventually kills them. 

There were some other minor characters whose Death-Cast-related stories were also told. At first, I didn’t like how these distract from the main plot. But these glimpses into other lives demonstrate how our lives are so interconnected. 

Even though the ending is given away in the title, I still kept hoping throughout the story that they would beat the odds. This is a very emotional story and I shed a few tears but I loved it. 

Title: The West Woods
Author: Suzy Vadori
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Evil Alter Ego Press
Source: YA Bound Book Tours
Release Date: September 22, 2017
Rating: ★★★★

Synopsis:

Magic, sacrifice and the quest for freedom.

Courtney Wallis wants nothing more than to escape St. Augustus boarding school. After uncovering a well-kept secret about the school’s founder, Isaac Young, Courtney turns to the school’s magic to convince her dad to let her leave. Things take a turn when she meets Cole, who lives in the nearby town of Evergreen. He gives her hope that things might not be so bad. However, the school’s fountain has other ideas, and binds Courtney to her ambition, no matter the cost.

As Courtney struggles to keep the magic from taking over, she and her friends get drawn into the mystery woven into the school’s fabric. Everything seems to lead back to the forbidden West Woods. Together, she and her friends seek out the spirits of the past to ask for help, and find themselves in much deeper than they’d bargained for.  If they succeed, Courtney could be free of the magic. If they fail, she may never be the same. 

Review:

This is a great story. 

It is a unique plot. Though it follows a typical fantasy storyline by taking place at a boarding school with a mysterious background, it was unpredictable. 

I liked the way that Courtney changed throughout the book. The effects of her wish really change her thoughts and actions. 

I wished there was more about Courtney’s dad in this book. I also thought that her conversations with Cole seemed forced. Sometimes they were repetitive and didn’t move the story forward. This book is part of a series so maybe in previous book Courtney’s dad and Cole have bigger parts. 

Even though I haven’t read the other book, I still enjoyed this one. And it’s by a Canadian author which is awesome! I’ll definitely keep my eyes open for the other book in the series. 

Buy Links:

Amazon US – https://www.amazon.com/West-Woods-Fountain-Book-ebook/dp/B074V3B7G1/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1505703590&sr=8-1&keywords=vadorihttps://www.amazon.com/West-Woods-Fountain-Book-ebook/dp/B074V3B7G1/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1505703590&sr=8-1&keywords=vadori

Amazon CA – https://www.amazon.ca/West-Woods-Fountain-Book-ebook/dp/B074V3B7G1/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1505703610&sr=8-1&keywords=vadori

B&N – https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-west-woods-suzy-vadori/1126995781?ean=9781988361109

Kobo – https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/the-west-woods

About the Author:

Suzy Vadori is an Operations executive by day, Writer by night. The Fountain is her debut novel for Young Adults. Suzy is an involved member of the Calgary Writers’ community, service as Program Manager for Young Adult at When Words Collide (a Calgary festival for readers and Writers) since 2013. Suzy lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada with her husband and three kids.

Author Links:

Website│Goodreads│Twitter│Facebook

Giveaway:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Book Tour Organized by: YA Bound Book Tours

Thank you to YA Bound Book Tours for letting me participate in this blog tour.

Title: Cress (The Lunar Chronicles #3)
Author: Marissa Meyer
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Source: Purchased
Release Date: February 4, 2014
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

In this third book in the Lunar Chronicles, Cinder and Captain Thorne are fugitives on the run, now with Scarlet and Wolf in tow. Together, they’re plotting to overthrow Queen Levana and her army.

Their best hope lies with Cress, a girl imprisoned on a satellite since childhood who’s only ever had her netscreens as company. All that screen time has made Cress an excellent hacker. Unfortunately, she’s just received orders from Levana to track down Cinder and her handsome accomplice.

When a daring rescue of Cress goes awry, the group is separated. Cress finally has her freedom, but it comes at a higher price. Meanwhile, Queen Levana will let nothing prevent her marriage to Emperor Kai. Cress, Scarlet, and Cinder may not have signed up to save the world, but they may be the only hope the world has.

Review:

Cinder and her gang are back again in this third instalment of The Lunar Chronicles.

I love the way that Meyer works these fairytales into the setting of the book. For example, Wolf (from Little Red Riding Hood) is a street fighter. In this book, Cress (aka Rapunzel) has been imprisoned in a satellite her entire life, rather than in a tower. This works perfectly with this story, which has ventured out into space.

Cinder’s story continues to unfold in this story. I still find her part the most fascinating. Maybe that’s because she started the story so we know the most about her. I like the other characters too but they don’t feel as fleshed out as Cinder.

I love this series, and I wish it never had to end. My reviews for Cinder can be found here and Scarlet can be found here.

Title: The Lightning Thief (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #1)
Author: Rick Riordan
Genre: Young Adult
Publisher: Hyperion Books
Source: Purchased
Release Date: June 28, 2005
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Synopsis:

Percy Jackson is a good kid, but he can’t seem to focus on his schoolwork or control his temper. And lately, being away at boarding school is only getting worse—Percy could have sworn his pre-algebra teacher turned into a monster and tried to kill him. When Percy’s mom finds out, she knows it’s time that he knew the truth about where he came from, and that he go to the one place he’ll be safe. She sends Percy to Camp Half Blood, a summer camp for demigods (on Long Island), where he learns that the father he never knew is Poseidon, God of the Sea. Soon a mystery unfolds and together with his friends—one a satyr and the other the demigod daughter of Athena—Percy sets out on a quest across the United States to reach the gates of the Underworld (located in a recording studio in Hollywood) and prevent a catastrophic war between the gods.

Review:

I love Greek mythology! So this series was made for me. Riordan does a great job of bringing Greek mythology into the modern world.

I kept smiling every time another myth was introduced into the story. For example, the Fates were in the story. They spin the threads of life. All of the myths were cleverly woven into the story.

There were also many twists that I didn’t expect. I did figure out who Percy’s dad was fairly early on. I think it was kind of obvious. But I was surprised at some of the other twists.

This is a great start to this series. I’m excited for the next books.