Into the Realm of Rush

Fairytale by Maggie Shayne was a magical novel. I was completely swept away with the characters and the plot. It was truly enchanting and I found myself pretending that I was Brigit, one of the main characters in the book.

Brigit was dropped off at an orphanage when she was a baby with a storybook and a beautiful necklace. She grew up on the streets and worked as an art forger to make money. But she wasn't as alone in the world as she thought and now her twin sister Bridin is searching for her so they can return to the Fairy realm of Rush.

Suddenly, I found myself trying to break free of the criminal world, praying that Raze's illness would improve, and that I could heal the hurt in Adam's eyes. Most of all, I was hoping that magic really did exist.

The plot of this novel had plenty of twists and turns to keep it moving at a steady pace. And there definitely were not any disappointing parts. Shayne made Brigit very relatable and real. She was a woman with a past, regrets, love, fears, hopes, and qualities of both the good and bad. If you're in the mood for a new character connection (aka friend), Brigit is your girl, fairy tale story included.

Fairytale on Amazon

Once Upon a Time

When Adam was younger, he was accidentally transported to Rush, a fairy tale kingdom, and was shown his future: a beautiful raven haired woman. The fairy queen that revealed his future only told him one thing: help her, but don't fall in love with her.

Bridin and Brigit are twins who were dropped of at an orphanage with matching books and necklaces. Books that tell a story of a fairy tale world and necklaces that ward off evil. Bridin remembers the history of her people in the fairy world of Rush, but Brigit was destined to forget.

Now it's time for them to go back to their homeland, save their people from the Dark Lord, and take their rightful place as the leaders of Rush. Separated for many years, Bridin must find a way to convince her sister that her dreams of being a fairy princess are true, with the help of Adam, who has grown up to become a scholar on fairy tale legends around the world.

Fairytale, by Maggie Shayne, transports the reader into a separate world where fairy tales aren't just ideas in children's books. So far this novel has me believing in magic and wishing for a hidden world, waiting to be discovered.

Graveyard Games

Dusty's twin brother, Nick, is dead.

Police are claiming that it was a wild animal, but the way he was found...
eyes torn out, chest ripped open, entrails eaten, blood seeping into the concrete of the mausoleum that he was found locked in.

"You ever known a cat who could open doors?"

Not believing the conclusion, Dusty decides to investigate on her own. A former cop should be able to figure this out. Right? The night he was killed, Nick was with his best friend, Shane. With a killing spree going on around her and three more people turning up dead, Dusty must follow her instincts to protect her hometown, and herself.

* *

Sheri Leigh's thrilling, and bone-chilling, novel is a perfect choice for the Halloween season. See if you can solve the mystery along side Dusty in Graveyard Games. Readers become Dusty's partner in this personal investigation. They can relate to her mourning over the death of her brother, her emotional plight of acceptance, and her hope for closure with the past and a twin brother who seems to have had a few skeletons in his closet.

This novel kept me guessing the entire time and I'm still not sure if I believe the ending. I'm torn between what I wanted to happen and what did happen (novels that end that way are always a little bittersweet).  Some of the events are a little unbelievable, but that's how the supernatural is and I can accept that, with only slight disappointment. Who am I to argue with an author's intentions? Regardless, I would definitely recommend this novel for a little Halloween horror, nothing that will send you into cold sweats or keep you up with nightmares, just keep you turning pages.

Graveyard Games is a finely crafted novel with a twist at the end you will never see coming.

Graveyard Games on Amazon

Wanting More

Gemma Halliday left me wanting more! More Maddie, more spying, more mystery, and definitely a few more pairs of heels.

Her debut novel, Spying in High Heels, was wonderfully refreshing. Her writing style and characters convinced me to fall in love with her book. <3

Readers can relate to Maddie on a number of levels. Worrying over little things like "lateness", her mother's new boyfriend/husband-to-be, and whether her boyfriend is leading a double life. Okay, probably not the double life, but at least the is-he-right-for-me thing. After finishing the novel, I feel like one of Maddie's closest confidantes, and it's a pleasant feeling.

Learning that there's a second novel in this high-heeled series is even more pleasant.

Spying in High Heels on Amazon

Beautiful Bad Cop vs. unBelievably Bad Boyfriend

Maddie has a lot of problems, all promising a complete nervous breakdown. But Gemma Halliday has me laughing out loud with her novel, Spying in High Heels.

Ramirez vs. Richard
Ramirez is...
a Los Angeles detective with a great body, an olympic style kisser, with a family of sweet Spanish women.

Richard is...
missing, a liar, a cheater, and wanted for questioning in a tabloid scandal.

Now if only...
Maddie could actually take a pregnancy test, decide who's better boyfriend material, and stop stalking people in her peep-toe pumps.

If you haven't read this book - read it. It's a wonderful confusing piece of chaos that any girl is bound to find downright funny and easy to relate to. :D

Hiding in the Closet

Maddie Springer as two problems:
1. She's late. As in late... (but is too scared to take a pregnancy test)
2. Her boyfriend is missing, and has been for a few days.

Scared that she's carrying Richard's child, Maddie, the main character in Spying in High Heels, plans on talking to him about it before she can handle the results of a pregnancy test. Only he cancels their lunch date and then fails to keep his promise of calling her later that night.

The weekend passes and no still no word. So she does what any normal-perhaps-pregnant woman would do. She breaks into his house. Maddie finds the house empty with a stale air. She searches the condo for any sign of where her boyfriend disappeared to when another man enters the house.

With a gun. 

Hiding in the closet, Maddie manages to stay clear of the gunman, but now she has a third problem. What is a man with a gun doing rifling through her boyfriend's condo?

The writing in this book is fresh and hilarious. Gemma Halliday does a wonderful job in placing the reader right in the high heels of the narrator. At only chapter 2, I am delighted with this novel! Kick off your favorite pair of slingbacks and cuddle up with this book!

A Tale of Wicked Intentions

A friend lent me the book Wicked Intentions by Elizabeth Hoyt, and I'm sure as hell glad she did. It was a complete thrill ride, with more than just wicked intentions.

Temperance and her brother Winter run a foundling home for orphaned children in the worst part of London, St. Giles. The orphanage was opened by their father and the two siblings decided that they would take over the home when he passed. But now the home is running out of money. Quickly. Soon they will be evicted from their home and their father's dream will be nothing short of a failure.

Lord Caire has slightly unusual ... bed habits, and his reputation definitely precedes him. When his mistress is murdered, Caire vows that he will find whoever killed her and seek his revenge - in St. Giles. He seeks out Temperance as a woman who will help him uncover his mistress' murderer. And he will pay her - handsomely.

This man and this woman, both with horrifying secrets, strike a bargain, but are they able to keep their desire for pleasure away from that of business? 

Tracking down a murderer, saving orphaned children, seduction under the bleak stars of St. Giles... Needless to say, I read this novel in less than 24 hours.

Wicked Intentions on Amazon

A Little Love, a Little Mystery

By the end of Delivered With Love by Sherry Kyle, Claire had found more than she bargained for. What started as a search for her mother's teenage love turned into a passionate journey of discovery, forgiveness, and learning to live. The novel's ending may have seemed a little rushed, and a little to perfectly tied up, but the connections with the characters were definitely strong. 

The main character, Claire, is a woman who feels like she's at rock-bottom with no light to lead her from the darkness. Kyle does a wonderful job creating a friend for the reader with legitimate worries, fears, and problems. I felt myself wanting to skip a couple pages here and there just to figure out how it would all end up. Especially when it came to Blake - the police officer neighbor with perfect abs and master chef potential - who Claire discovers is sweeping her off of her feet. <3

Although this book has a lot of twists and turns, I was a little disappointed with the outcome because it seemed overly predictable. And after the question of who wrote the letter was answered, the rest of the novel sort of fell into place. However, Kyle did leave a few ends open for the reader's interpretation, which is always fun for the reader. 

Definitely a good book and one that I would recommend, if you're searching for a novel that mixes a little love with a little mystery. 

Delivered with Love on Amazon

Friend Instead of Character

Claire is getting closer to the truth about her mother's past and Michael is a little irked at the idea...

After finding a love letter written to her mother when she was only 17, Claire decided to search for the writer. Now she's in Capitola, California getting ready to move in to the house that the letter was sent from. The owner of the house, Michael, remembers her mother, Emily, but keeps his lips tight when questioned about the past.

Broke with worry nagging on Claire's very heartstrings, Michael decides that she would be the perfect person to live in the house and take care of his mother, Geraldine, for a small pay check and free room and board. But allowing Claire to be so close to his mother threatens to bring up the past, and Emily. He worries if his mother will be able to keep his secrets hidden from Claire while they live beneath the same roof.

Readers can relate to Claire's struggle and feel connected to her within the first few chapters. The basic needs of food and shelter, and how to pay for them, is something that everyone worries about. Readers will find themselves wishing they could be one of the characters helping Claire along her journey. In the novel Delivered with Love, Sherry Kyle writes Claire with faults and virtues, something many writers have trouble with, making Claire a friend to the reader, instead of just a character.

A Path to New Discoveries

Losing someone important in your life is always a hard obstacle to overcome. A cloud of mourning hangs constantly above your head and your life becomes shrouded in a dense fog.

Especially when it's your mother. I haven't personally experienced this, but it's (sadly) something that inevitably happens. This makes Claire, the main character of Delivered With Love by Sherry Kyle, easy to relate to. In the opening chapter, Claire's attending her mother's funeral. After a long battle with cancer, her mother dies and Claire is left feeling lost, confused, and broken.

When Claire finds a love letter that was written to her mother years ago that is signed only with an initial, she is drawn to finding out who wrote it. She searches for a new connection with her mother, a connection with a sense of closure that will finally allow her to accept that her mother has passed on.

With an unreliable VW bug and a map that leads the way to Santa Cruz, a place the letter mentions, Claire finds herself on a path to new discoveries.

Could love be the Answer?

She is the chosen one. The one who will unite her people and end the feud that has raged for over five thousand years. 

In the final novel of "The Nine Lives of Chloe King" series, Chloe must do the unimaginable. She must find a way to end the blood thirsty war between the Mai and the Tenth Blades. Not to mention, keep those who she cares for safe including her best friend-fashionista Amy, comic book-loving Paul, Mai-trainer Alyec, and kitty hat-loving Brian. 

When Chloe finds Brian left for dead in an alley way, having been badly beaten, she knows that this war must stop. On his deathbed, Brian knows that there's only one thing he hasn't let himself do. Kiss Chloe, the girl he is in love with. Legend has it, as soon as a human and a Mai kiss, the human dies. 

But he doesn't have anything left to lose. In a feeble attempt to control the last moments of his life, Brian lifts his head and meets Chloe's lips with passion simmering beneath his skin. 

And he lives. 

Could love be the answer to the question of peace between the races? Will Chloe fight for her people by ridding their lives of the constant worry that a Tenth Blade will try to kill them? Does she have what it takes to sacrifice her life as a way to better her pride? 

As a three book series that I read in two days, I highly recommend this novel. You will not regret picking this up, nor will you be able to put it down. Check the link below to get all 3 at once! :D

The Fallen, The Stolen, and The Chosen (all in one) on Amazon

A Cat and her Claws

Chloe King is Mai. A member of an ancient race descended from Egyptian goddesses. She has the reflexes of a cat, not to mention the claws to go with it.

In the second installment of series, Chloe King is being protected by other Mai members, including the pride leader, Sergei. However, not all is as it seems.

Brian, a member of the Tenth Blades, is helping Chloe to stay alive.
Alyec, who is also Mai, is now Chloe's boyfriend.
And Kim... Well, Kim has cat ears.

Then of course there are Paul and Amy, Chloe's two best (human) friends, who are always there to help break and enter.

When Chloe's mother is kidnapped by the Tenth Blades, all must join together to find her, while still protecting Chloe from an executioner who may, or may not, be dead. What follows may be the war everyone is trying to avoid.

After polishing off the second novel in the series, The Stolen, in a little less that four hours, I'm on to the final book. Trust me, if you love fantasy and angst-y teenagers breaking rules and spreading their claws then pick this series up!

The Stolen on Amazon

Only Eight Lives to Go

Chloe King is a cat person. 

She can leap across buildings, move her body in acrobatic forms, ... extend her claws?? 

Chloe has just turned 16 and something, other than hormones, is racing through her body, transforming her into a comic book like human who can fight beside the best heroes. And it seems she has nine lives to do it in. 

After a fall from a 200 feet tower, a quick escape from the emergency room, Chloe knows that something is definitely going on. Not to mention the sudden attention of Alyec and Brian, two more-than-hot boys who, before her sixteenth birthday, would have never paid her the time of day. 

But Chloe doesn't have (enough) time to ogle over these handsome teenagers because someone is after her. The Order of the Ten Blades has sent an executioner to finish her off, no matter how many tries it takes. An orphan from the Soviet, Chloe must be careful with who she trusts, learn to understand her "superpowers," and pass Trig without getting herself killed. 

A character who is hard to relate to, more than a little bitchy, and walks a mile over on the wild side. Another exciting novel that I could not put down. On to Book 2...

The Fallen on Amazon

Igniting an Internal Passion

a) A sexy scandal. 

b) A romp around the photography studio. 

c) Unconditional love at the peak of a broken heart. 

d) All of the Above

Hope Tarr covers a lot of ground in Vanquished, one novel in "The Men of Roxbury House" series. Tarr brings the reader to their knees praying that Hadrian St. Claire survives the fight for Caledonia, the love of his life. With a blunt writing style that paints an accurate portrait of certain events, Tarr consumes the mind's eye of the reader, igniting an internal passion to have ... more. 

Readers slip into the pages, relating to the characters as Tarr shows their faults as well as their virtues. Hadrian's had a life full of mistakes and now is the chance to turn it all around. To accept his past, his present, and to make his future. A universal struggle that Tarr brings to the forefront. 

Correct answer? 

D

Begin this novel and fall in love with the first man from Roxbury House. 

Vanquished on Amazon

A Tortured Heart

Why do we give those who hurt us the upper hand by changing who we are after our pride, and heart, is injured?

Hope Tarr explores this query in Vanquished by creating a character who has changed her self after suffering a broken heart. Caledonia Rivers is presently a woman obsessed with politics and a fighter for the women's suffrage movement. She dons spectacles that she doesn't need and covers her figure with layers of clothing to hide her true womanly figure. All of this because one man and one unpleasant comment.

I feel like this is a commonality between the reader and Caledonia. We've all been hurt by people in our lives who don't agree with who we are and dislike us for what we're not. But why must we take that to heart and change because of it? At the time, the idea that there are people out there who will always accept us for who we are is so far out of reach that it is almost unfathomable. Yet, it's true. Those people do exist. Can we not dwell on that simple truth instead of the internal echoing of harsh words meant to singe the threads of our souls?

Once again, a past full of pain creates a tortured heart.

A Price too High?

Hadrian St. Claire needs money. 500 pounds or death, promised by those he is indebted to. Two weeks to come up with the money and no prospective photography jobs.

Until a strange man walks into his photography shop and wants to hire him for 5000 pounds. More than enough to pay his debt. The job? Take a nude photograph of Caledonia Rivers, the leader of a women's suffrage group who is highly renowned for her maidenhood, in order to stop her bill in Parliament. Blacken her reputation and remove the threat of women voting.

Caledonia, beautiful, vulnerable, intriguing. When Hadrian first set eyes on her his heart was warmed. A warmth  that he had never known before. A simple skipped heart beat and he can't wait to see her again. And then this offer...

Will Hadrian accept the 5000 pounds in order to ruin Caledonia's reputation and clear his name in the streets of England? Or is the price too high to accept this unmoral task?

Hope Tarr's novel, Vanquished, creates a heavy dilemma that will force readers to question their own morality and how far they would go to ensure their own survival.

Falling further away from the Apple tree?

Will Kindle create a fire underneath the apple tree large enough to send potential buyers to Amazon? With a tablet priced at $199 and a release date of November 15th (just in time for Christmas shopping), it looks like Amazon will come out ahead of the tablet market.

Perfectly priced for aiming at parents, the Kindle Fire is reasonably priced for children focused gifts. Not to mention the games, books, and learning tools the Fire is supposed to have. Touch screen, USB ports, books, mags, music all are included in Kindle's first tablet. Although, it does lack some things that the I Pad brags of having - cameras, etc.

For a person that was intrigued at the I Pad 3, the Kindle Fire has me impatiently waiting for reviews to come out after the release, as I walk a little further away from the Apple Tree. :)

Check it out here, on Amazon. :D


Kindle Fire photograph from Amazon.com

Craving a Stronger Connection

I'm a little disappointed in No Turning Back by Sharon T. Rose due to the drawn out nature of the important issues in this novel. I understand that everything was sequential and B couldn't take place without A happening.

However, I found myself wanting more about the characters themselves. I wanted to see what they were like, not be told in a conversation using a mere five sentences. If the details would have shown me the information instead of telling me, I feel like I would have had stronger connections with the characters. Thus, I would have liked the book better.

The connection between the reader and the main character is built towards the end of the novel. This is in part good because it's a series and in order to care about the next book, the readers have to be concerned about the main character in the first book. They have to want to know how the story ends.

But this is also in part bad because the connection formed is a weak one. If Rose would have formed the connection earlier in the novel then I would probably feel more compelled to read the second book.

The plot was wonderful though. A chaotic war between the Ancients and the Descendants on a faraway planet, Alluvia. The discoveries made throughout the reading of this novel were fantastic and highly creative, as if I were one of the Descendants fighting along side the others. If you like Science Fiction/Fantasy and want an easy light novel, I would recommend this one. If you decide to read it then let me know if you enjoyed it. :)

No Turning Back on Amazon