Review: That Time I Joined the Circus by J.J. Howard

 
Synopsis: 

Lexi Ryan just ran away to join the circus, but not on purpose.

A music-obsessed, slightly snarky New York City girl, Lexi is on her own. After making a huge mistake--and facing a terrible tragedy--Lexi has no choice but to track down her long-absent mother. Rumor has it that Lexi's mom is somewhere in Florida with a traveling circus.

When Lexi arrives at her new, three-ring reality, her mom isn't there . . . but her destiny might be. Surrounded by tigers, elephants, and trapeze artists, Lexi finds some surprising friends and an even more surprising chance at true love. She even lucks into a spot as the circus's fortune teller, reading tarot cards and making predictions.

But then Lexi's ex-best friend from home shows up, and suddenly it's Lexi's own future that's thrown into question.

With humor, wisdom, and a dazzlingly fresh voice, this debut reminds us of the magic of circus tents, city lights, first kisses, and the importance of an excellent playlist.

Publisher: Scholastic

Page Count: 272

Edition: Kindle (A galley from NetGalley)

Rating: 3/5 stars

Review:

First of all, can we all just take a second to just stare at the GORGEOUS cover? It is so beautiful.

This book is about a girl named Alexandra/Lexi/X/Xandra Ryan whose father recently passed away. He left her no money, so she goes on a search for her mother. A clue leads her to a circus in Florida. After finding out that her mother isn't there, she decides to stay in order to make some extra money. She goes through a few jobs before she finally chooses to be a tarot card reader.

I thought this story was going to be amazing. I mean, the cover is to die for, the plot is so unique and different, I love me a good coming of age story, and it just sounded good to me. This book, sadly, did not meet my expectations.

Lexi was an okay character in the start of the book. I could really relate to her because I love to read and I don't have many friends. Lexi loves to read and she only has(had)two friends. But when you get further along into the story you find her changing. While Lexi does change in a good way, I thought that she also took a turn for the worse. She became selfish and let people push her around. I know her dad just died and I wouldn't be the same either. But she was crying in almost every chapter. Death is a hard topic for a lot of people. People grieve in different ways. Sometimes Lexi's emotional break downs were too much. Also, I hated how she quickly jumped from friend to friend to friend. In the beginning, Heather(I think that's her name)was so nice to Lexi. She showed her the ropes and had meals with her. Lina was a complete jerk to her while Heather was so nice. But the second that something better comes along, Lexi quickly goes to Lina, leaving Heather in the dust. Heather is mentioned in the first five chapters then never mentioned again. What's up with that? And when she starts hanging out with Jake and Lina gets "angry" with her for hanging out with him. She just blows him off for Lina. Then Nick comes into the picture. Don't even get me started on that.

I also hated the freaking love square. First it was Jake, then it was Nick, then it was Eli. Nobody has that many love interests in the course of a few months. Especially a girl who is "socially awkward". Lexi was not "socially awkward".

The last thing I wasn't too keen on in this book was how fast everything went. I know that it's not even 300 pages, but it didn't need to be rushed so much. The author had so much that she wanted to put into one book. I think it would have been better if it was longer and more drawn out. We'd go from one thing to another so quickly and I'd get confused. The flashbacks didn't help at all.

Enough ranting from me. Despite the very lengthy rant above, I really enjoyed this book. It was fun and light, which was just what I wanted. It didn't meet expectations, but wa still an enjoyable read.

I would reccomend this to middle school kids who want to start going into YA and anyone who wants a light read.

Review: The Nightmare Affair by Mindee Arnett

Synopsis: Sixteen-year-old Dusty Everhart breaks into houses late at night, but not because she’s a criminal. No, she’s a Nightmare.

Literally.

Being the only Nightmare at Arkwell Academy, a boarding school for magickind, and living in the shadow of her mother’s infamy, is hard enough. But when Dusty sneaks into Eli Booker’s house, things get a whole lot more complicated. He’s hot, which means sitting on his chest and invading his dreams couldn’t get much more embarrassing. But it does. Eli is dreaming of a murder.

Then Eli’s dream comes true.

Now Dusty has to follow the clues—both within Eli’s dreams and out of them—to stop the killer before more people turn up dead. And before the killer learns what she’s up to and marks her as the next target.

Publisher: Tor/Forge

Page Count: 367 pages (US hardcover)

Edition: Kindle galley (Kindly provided by NetGalley)

Rating: 4/5 stars

Review:

Dusty Everhart is a sixteen year old Nightmare. No, she isn't bad. She's an actual Nightmare. One night while out feeding, Dusty realizes that she's feeding on her former classmate, Eli Booker. While in his dream, some things happen. She gets taken back to her school by werewolf police after almost being caught by Eli and his father. At the school, Dusty realizes that the dream Eli was having came true. So the rest of the story is her and Eli trying to figure out who the murderer is and why they killed.

This is a very fun, action packed, mystery. I enjoyed it from beginning to end. Dusty was an all right main character. She was funny, smart and witty. But sometimes I felt like her humor was a little too forced. There were some parts in the book where the author was trying to make Dusty overly funny and it didn't work for me. I also thought Dusty was a little too trusting to most people. But I overall did enjoy her character. Dusty was very strong and stubborn. When she knew she was right, she went with her gut. She never let anyone sway her opinion.

As for her side kick, Eli Booker, I thought he was average. We never saw much of him until the second half of the book. In the first half, he hated Dusty. For a good reason, I guess. But I didn't see why we were supposed to be rooting for Eli and Dusty to be together. There was never any real chemistry between them. I hope in the next book we are able to see more of him. I liked Eli and Dusty's friendship too. They were really good friends.

Dusty also has a best friend, Selene, who is a siren. I loved Selene. She was in the whole book and that was a nice change. In most YA books when the main protaganist meets the love interest, they drop their friends and be with the love interest. But I liked that Selene was a main part of the book. She was very funny and I loved how she was a femenist of some sorts. Selene hates that sirens are objectified as sex objects, so she dresses horribly. That was a nice touch to the book. I want to see more of Selene in the next book. Maybe something to do with her past and Lance? :D

The other side characters were good as well. None of them really stand out to me any way. The characters in this book were pretty average to me.

As for the plot in this book, I loved it. The whole Nightmare thing was SO unique and I loved it. I was really confused in the beginning, but I grew used to it after about fifty to eighty pages in. Mindee Arnett kept explaining the Will more than once and I liked that. I still have a few questions that I hope are answered later on in the series. The mystery aspect of this book really made this book good for me. I was guessing the whole time right up until the end. I sort of suspected the side kick to the villian, but I didn't guess who the villian was.

All in all, THE NIGHTMARE AFFAIR by Mindee Arnett is a great start to what I hope is going to be a great series. It's very Hex Hall-esque, so if you've been missing the Hex Hall world, I suggest you pick this book up when it comes out on March 5, 2013. THE NIGHTMARE AFFAIR is different enough from Hex Hall that it won't be repetitive. I gave this book four out of five stars because to me it wasn't enough for a five stars.

Review: The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin

Synopsis: Mara Dyer doesn’t think life can get any stranger than waking up in a hospital with no memory of how she got there.

It can.

She believes there must be more to the accident she can’t remember that killed her friends and left her mysteriously unharmed.

There is.

She doesn’t believe that after everything she’s been through, she can fall in love.

She’s wrong.

Publisher: Simon and Shuster Children's Publishing

Edition: Hardcover

Page Count: 452 pages

Rating: 4/5 stars

Review:

This book is about a girl named Mara Dyer who experiences a tragedy. Her family leaves their hometown and moves to Florida. Mara starts to experience strange things while in this town. While all this is happening, she meets a boy named Noah Shaw.

I liked this book. It was fast paced, full of mystery, and had a good amount of romance in it.* I liked how Mara at least tried to stand up for herself in this story. She didn't completely fall for Noah Shaw, the love interest, straight away. But I still thought it was too fast to be real. There was a supernatural twist to this book which was okay. I thought too much was happening and I got confused. The beginning and the end were good and I liked it. The middle focused too much on the romance and it turned into a typical paranormal romance.

I also didn't like how we never knew if Mara was telling the truth or not. I'm not saying that she was lying, not at all. Since she has "hallucinations", it's hard to tell when something is real and when it's not real. There would be parts where I would think that there was no way that this could be real, it had to be a hallucination. But then it turned out to be real and I didn't know what to think. There were parts where it was hard to understand what was going on completely. Some readers might get it but others might not.

This plot was very unique. I have never read anything quite like it. I'm curious to see where this might go in the future.

The characters in this book were real to me. But there were times where some of their actions were too unbelievable. Mara was a decent character. She declined toward the end, though. She started to get weird. "The only way I can protect them is if I leave." blah blah blah. Mara did get very selfish in the end. She thought about herself more than her family. She made it seem like she was caring but she wasn't. She put her family and Noah through crap and leaving is not the right decision. (Not a spoiler).

Let's get onto the love interest, Noah. I actually really liked him. There were times where I thought he was too arrogant but then he'd get really sweet. But really, the whole "Shaw's exhausted the whole female population of this school" thing got very annoying. It was so cliche. I loved the banter between Mara and Noah. It was so cute and funny.

If you are looking for a unique plot and a nice romance, go pick this book up if you want to. This is a lot like a typical paranormal romance** and if you don't like that, don't pick this up.

*I might be a bit biased because I love me some romance.
**By paranormal romance, I don't mean that as a spoiler. When you read the book you understand.

Giveaway! (Hosted by TheBookratMisty)

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Review: Twisted (Intertwined #3) by Gena Showalter

Warning: Do not read review if you have not read the first two books in this series unless you want to be spoiled for them. You have been warned.

Synopsis: His vampire girlfriend might have brought him back to life, but he's never felt more out of control. There's a darkness within him, something taking over; changing him. Worse, because he was meant to die, death now stalks him at every turn. Any day could be his last.
Once upon a time, the three souls trapped inside his head could have helped him. He could have protected himself. But as the darkness grows stronger, the souls grow weaker - just like his girlfriend. The more vampire Aden becomes, the more human Victoria becomes, until everything they know and love is threatened.
Life couldn't get any worse. Could it?

Publisher: Harlequin

Edition: Kindle e-book ( I got it from my library's site)

Page count: 564 pages

Rating: 4/5 stars

Review: Warning, I might get a little emotional. I just finished this book.

Oh. My Gosh. What the heck just happened?

This book is about four main characters. Aden(the main main character), Mary Ann, Riley, and Victoria. Aden was about to die in the second book and his girlfriend, Victoria, saved him. That's all I can say right now.

This book was like a small snowball going down a cliff. The crap that happened to these characters just got worse and worse and worse. It finally ended with the huge explotion. There was so much death and sadness, that it kind of made this book depressing. The action was there. Oh yes, it was. But I thought it was over kill. I loved it in the other books, but in this one...I don't know. Gena was shoving it into our faces I guess. These characters go through a lot of crap. None of them deserved it. Not even Victoria. *cough*My least favorite character*cough*. It was so horrible. No wonder everyone was mad. I especially hated what Gena Showalter did to Riley. He was my favorite character. But Riley was such a douche near the end that it dwindled my love for him. I hated it. I had to resort to loving Aden. ADEN. He was such a jerk through out the book. Both of them, actually. WHY? The ending and my love for the series in general saved it for me.

I still loved this book. I was just disappointed. God I'm so angry by that ending. I'm so angry.

Okay, you've suffered enough. Adios!

Review: Warm Bodies (Warm Bodies #1) by Issac Marion

Synopsis: R is a young man with an existential crisis--he is a zombie. He shuffles through an America destroyed by war, social collapse, and the mindless hunger of his undead comrades, but he craves something more than blood and brains. He can speak just a few grunted syllables, but his inner life is deep, full of wonder and longing. He has no memories, noidentity, and no pulse, but he has dreams.After experiencing a teenage boy's memories while consuming his brain, R makes an unexpected choice that begins a tense, awkward, and stragely sweet relationship with the victim's human girlfriend. Julie is a blast of color in the otherwise dreary and gray landscape that surrounds R. His decision to protect her will transform not only R, but his fellow Dead, and perhaps their whole lifeless world.

Scary, funny, and surprisingly poignant, Warm Bodies is about being alive, being dead, and the blurry line in between.

Publisher: Atria/Emily Bestler Books

Edition: Paper back

Page Count: 239 pages

Rating; 4 or 3.5/5 stars

Review:

Let me just start off by saying, I might have went into this with higher expectations than it deserved. The movie trailer was completely different than the tone of the book. I have yet to see the movie, so I don't know if the trailer stays true to the actual movie. The trailer makes this seem like it's a light, fun comedy on zombies. But, Warm Bodies,  was not.

This book is about a zombie named R. R remembers nothing of his previous life and wanders around an abandoned airport all day. There are others like him and he lives in the airport with them. His "best friend" was M. One day R and M, plus a lot more zombies, go out to get food, AKA humans. R eats the brain of a boy and instantly gets his memories. He becomes enamored with a girl named Julie and saves her from the zombies.

Now if that doesn't sound good to you, I don't know what will. I know some people were put off by the fact that zombies in this book actually get feelings. But I thought it was a nice, fresh take on zombies. Zombies are dead creatures, so it's cool to see that they hunt humans for their emotions. I really this new take on zombies.

The writing style was very poetic and I loved it. I'd try to find some quotes for you, but none of them really stuck with me enough to write it down. But if you do pick this book up, be warned that the writing is magnificent.

Now for the things I didn't like. Like I said, I was expecting way too much from this book. I was expecting an action/adventure/romance. What I got was a book talking about philisophical topics. The question of whether life was worth living took up pages at a time and it was very slow. The author was trying to tell the readers something and I don't think I caught it. Maybe if I re-read this in the future, I might like it more. But I just did not like how philisophical this book was. The movie was very misleading.

Aside from the philisophical side of the book, I also didn't like how the zombies and humans acted. In this one scene near the end, there was this "fight scene". Notice the quotes around fight scene. This alleged fight scene lasted for two to three paragraphs and then was never mentioned again. It felt to rushed. When the Boney's left, it wasn't explained at all. It was like the author was just like "well, I have to make it end some how. I don't know how so let's just make it 'unexplained energy'." I would have appreciated it if he went into more detail. We were just told what happened and it wasn't very actiony. I was disappointed by that.

Also, did anyone else not like how we weren't told what year it was? It could have been the future, present or past for all I knew.

I may sound like I hate this book. I may sound like this book is nothing but disappointment. It's not, I assure you. My expectations were too high. I suggest you go into this with no expectations at all. You will like it better that way, I promise.

Stacking the Shelves #1

Hi everyone! Today I am going to start doing Stacking The Shelves. This is a meme where every Sunday bloggers share what they got that week. I don't get books that often, but I do have some to show you today! This meme was started by Tynga's Reviews. Here is a link to the blog: http://www.tyngasreviews.com/



The e-books: On Saturday the 16th, Amazon was having a deal where you could buy the entire Caster Chronicles series by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl for $2.99 each. I already had the third book (I've read the first two) so I got the rest of the series. I'll only show you the first one. You can look up the rest of the series if you want.

Beautiful Creatures (Caster Chronicles #1):


I also got some free books on my Kindle.


FREE E-BOOKS: Gravity (Gravity #1) by Abigail Boyd http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11384302-gravity

UnEnchanted (An Unfortunate fairy tale #1): http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13402447-unenchanted

That's it for this week's Stacking The Shelves! Leave links to yours below!