Posts By: Giselle

Saturday, January 28, 2012

Review: Bound by Kira Saito

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Bound
Kira Saito
Release date: October 28th, 2011

Goodreads / Purchase

Sixteen year old Arelia LaRue lives in New Orleans where the music is loud, voodoo queens inhabit every street corner, and the ghosts are alive and well. Despite her surroundings, all she wants is to help her Grand-mere Bea pay the rent and save up for college.

When her best friend Sabrina convinces her to take a well-paying summer job at the infamous Darkwood plantation, owned by the wealthy LaPlante family, Arelia agrees.

However, at Darkwood strange things start to happen, and gorgeous Lucus LaPlante insists that he needs her help. Soon, the powers that Arelia has been denying all her life, come out to play and she discovers mysteries about herself that she could have never imagined.

*A copy was provided by Kira Saito for review purposes*
This cover is gorgeous, and the intriguing synopsis about voodoo had me excited to read it. Sadly, this wasn’t for me. Even though the plot was mysterious, the characters were infuriating.

Let’s start with Arelia, who has been hearing spirits her whole life. She’s taken a summer job at a plantation which appears to be filled with spirits and strange happenings. Arelia comes off as very immature for the most part of the book. She would overreact to the smallest things, as well as believe everything her jealous best friend told her (which we will get to in a bit). But then when it comes to voodoo, despite having heard spirits her whole life, she refuses to believe any of it. I could not, for the life of me, understand this girl. She lets herself get backstabbed by her best friend, lied to, then simply forgives her. This best friend, Sabrina, I despised her. She is the definition of spoiled, and a complete bitch. I didn’t understand why they were even friends. As for Lucus, the love interest, he was an ok character, but never really gave off any sort of charm. All in all, the whole cast was a big disappointment to me. I didn’t connect with any of them, nor did I understand their reactions to any of the events that happened in the book. They all seemed very stiff; unconvincing.

The plot started off really interesting with a good amount of mystery. I haven’t read many books based on voodoo so it was different. I liked learning about the lore, but unfortunately there wasn’t a lot of digging into it until the very end. I wish we had delved deeper into Arelia’s abilities. As soon as the plot starts getting more complex, the book ends; it felt unfinished.

The book is not awful, it does have promise. With some editing it could even be pretty good. But as is, I couldn’t get myself to enjoy it very much.  

2 Hot Espressos

Fresh Batch (Jan. 29th – Feb. 4th)

Posted by on 01/28/2012 • 16 Comments

Exclusively titled for Xpresso Reads, Fresh Batch features the hottest releases of this upcoming week. Flavour of the week:

=”1″> Harbinger

Sara Wilson Etienne Goodreads / Purchase 

Girl, Interrupted meets Beautiful Creatures in this fast-paced thriller

When sixteen-year-old Faye arrives at Holbrook Academy, she doesn’t expect to find herself exactly where she needs to be. After years of strange waking visions and nightmares, her only comfort the bones of dead animals, Faye is afraid she’s going crazy. Fast.

But her first night at Holbrook, she feels strangely connected to the school and the island it sits on, like she’s come home. She’s even made her first real friends, but odd things keep happening to them. Every morning they wake on the floors of their dorm rooms with…

Cover Reveal: Yesterday, Deadly Hemlock, Midsummer’s Nightmare & Winter’s Light

Posted by on 01/27/2012 • 11 Comments

Yesterday C.K. Kelly Martin Release date: September 25th, 2012 by Random House Books for Young Readers Add it to your Goodreads Synopsis currently unavailable More books by CK Kelly Martin:

Deadly Hemlock Kathleen PeacockUK cover Release date: July 5th, 2012by Simon & Schuster UK

Add it to your Goodreads

Mackenzie and Amy were best friends. Until Amy was brutally murdered.

Since then, Mac’s life has been turned upside down. She is being haunted by Amy in her dreams, and an extremist group called the Trackers has come to Mac’s hometown of Hemlock to hunt down Amy’s killer: A white werewolf.

Lupine syndrome—also known as the werewolf virus—is on the rise across the country. Many of the infected try to hide their symptoms, but bloodlust is not easy…

Review: Incarnate by Jodi Meadows

Posted by on 01/27/2012 • 31 Comments

IncarnateJodi MeadowsRelease date: January 31st, 2012by HarperCollins Children’s Books

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NEWSOUL Ana is new. For thousands of years in Range, a million souls have been reincarnated over and over, keeping their memories and experiences from previous lifetimes. When Ana was born, another soul vanished, and no one knows why.

NOSOUL Even Ana’s own mother thinks she’s a nosoul, an omen of worse things to come, and has kept her away from society. To escape her seclusion and learn whether she’ll be reincarnated, Ana travels to the city of Heart, but its citizens are suspicious and afraid of what her presence means. When dragons and sylph attack the city, is Ana to blame?

HEART Sam believes Ana’s new soul is good and worthwhile. When he stands up…

Young Adult Giveaway Hop

Posted by on 01/26/2012 • 37 Comments

Xpresso Reads is happy to be taking part in the Young Adult giveaway hop hosted by I Am A Reader, Not A Writer and Down the Rabbit Hole. With about 250 other blogs participating you have a plenty of chances to get away with some winnings.

What’s up for grabs? Your Young Adult book of choice at The Book Depository up to a value of 10$.  Open Internationally as long as TBD ships to you (is your country on the list? Click here) Giveaway ends on January 31st, 2012 Use the form below to enter.

Make sure to hop on over to the other blogs for more chances to win!Click here for links to all participating blogs

This giveaway was made possible by The Book Depository…

Review: Third Grave Dead Ahead

Posted by on 01/26/2012 • 27 Comments

Third Grave Dead Ahead(Charley Davidson, #3) Darynda JonesRelease date: January 31st, 2012by St. Martin’s Press

Goodreads / Purchase

Grim reaper extraordinaire. Whatever. Charley Davidson is back! And she’s drinking copious amounts of caffeine to stay awake because, every time she closes her eyes, she sees him: Reyes Farrow, the parthuman, part-supermodel son of Satan. Yes, she did imprison him for all eternity, but come on. How is she supposed to solve a missing persons case, deal with an ego-driven doctor, calm her curmudgeonly dad, and take on a motorcycle gang hellbent on murder when the devil’s son just won’t give up?

*A copy was provided by St. Martin’s Press for review purposes*

“Death comes to those who wait. And to those who don’t. So either way…” -Quote from Third…

Review: Angelina’s Secret by Lisa Rogers

Posted by on 01/25/2012 • 22 Comments

Angelina’s SecretLisa RogersRelease date: February 1st, 2012by Spencer Hill Press

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As a child, Angelina spent years in counseling learning that Josie, her imaginary friend, wasn’t real, but it turns out her childhood friend wasn’t imaginary after all.

Now Angelina has to accept she’s either (A) crazy or (B) able to see ghosts. Wanting to believe in her sanity, she chooses (B) and welcomes Josie back into her life. But even Josie can’t help her deal with Shelly, the spirit of a confused teenager, and things go very, very wrong.

When Angelina finds herself in a psychiatric hospital, she faces a choice: she can spend the rest of her life pretending to be someone she isn’t, or she can embrace who she is and take a…

Waiting on Wednesday (20)

Posted by on 01/25/2012 • 66 Comments

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event that is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine and spotlights upcoming releases that we’re eagerly anticipating.  My pick this week:

Death and the Girl Next Door                                     Darynda Jones                                     Release date: October, 2012 by St. Martin’s Press Add it to your Goodread

Things get turned upside down for sophomore Lorelei MacAlister when the Angel of Death starts high school in her small town. What she doesn’t know is that she has been slated to die. It’s simply her time. And Death has been sent to do the deed. But when she touches him, when she peers into his eyes and reaches into his heart, he realizes she is more than what he was led to believe, and he disobeys his orders. He brings…