Xpresso Reads

Saturday, November 14, 2015

Fresh Batch (November 15th – 21st)

Posted by Giselle • 3 Comments

Fresh Batch, posted weekly, keeps you up to date on the hottest releases of the upcoming week.

Flavor of the week:

Just Visiting
Dahlia Adler
Publication date: November 17th 2015
by Spencer Hill Contemporary

Goodreads Purchase

Reagan Forrester wants out—out of her trailer park, out of reach of her freeloading mother, and out of the shadow of the relationship that made her the pariah of Charytan, Kansas.

Victoria Reyes wants in—in to a fashion design program, in to the arms of a cute guy who doesn’t go to Charytan High, and in to a city where she won’t stand out for being Mexican.

One thing the polar-opposite best friends do agree on is that wherever they go, they’re staying together. But when they set off on a series of college visits at the start of their senior year, they quickly see that the future doesn’t look quite like they expected. After two years of near-solitude following the betrayal of the ex-boyfriend who broke her heart, Reagan falls hard and fast for a Battlestar Galactica-loving, brilliant smile-sporting pre-med prospective… only to learn she’s set herself up for heartbreak all over again. Meanwhile, Victoria runs full-speed toward all the things she thinks she wants… only to realize everything she’s looking for might be in the very place they’ve sworn to leave.

As both Reagan and Victoria struggle to learn who they are and what they want in the present, they discover just how much they don’t know about each other’s pasts. And when each learns what the other’s been hiding, they’ll have to decide whether their friendship has a future.

Other releases this week:
* In no particular order *

– War With Love (Young Assassins #2) by April Brookshire
– Crush (The Tainted Love Duet #2) by Kim Karr[Purchase]
– Angels Twice Descending (Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy #10) by Cassandra Clare and Robin Wasserman[Purchase]
– Mystique by Shari Arnold [Purchase]

– The Golden Braid (Medieval Fairy Tale Romance #2) by Melanie Dickerson [Purchase]
– Corrupt by Penelope Douglas [Purchase]
– The Vanishing Throne (The Falconer #2) by Elizabeth May [Purchase]
– The Game of Lives (The Mortality Doctrine #3) by James Dashner [Purchase]

– Fire Falling (Air Awakens #2) by Elise Kova [Purchase]
– Hearts of Blue (Hearts #4) by L.H. Cosway [Purchase]
– Long Way Down (Calloway Sisters #4) by Krista Ritchie and Becca Ritchie [Purchase]
– Strange Girl by Christopher Pike [Purchase]

– Calvin by Martine Leavitt [Purchase]
– Dare to Disappoint: Growing Up in Turkey by Ozge Samanci [Purchase]
– Everything But the Truth (If Only . . . #6) by Mandy Hubbard [Purchase]
– Until the End (Sea Breeze #9) by Abbi Glines [Purchase]

Anything on your wishlist this week?

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Find previous Fresh Batch posts here!

Review: Calvin by Martine Leavitt

Posted by Amy on 11/13/2015 • 2 Comments

This book, though short packs quite a punch. It’s fun and quirky, but also serious as well. It follows Calvin who has schizophrenia on an extremely dangerous adventure. I enjoy reading books about mental illness when they are told in the POV of the person who has it. It is a scary and sad thing to know what they are going through, but my curious mind is always interested. I work in a field that deals with mental illness, so I am no stranger to it, but I am fascinated with how the brain works and I really do love books like this.

Calvin was a really great character in so many ways. He is smart, funny, and determined. Yes, he may have schizophrenia, but that is just one…

Review: Captive by A.J. Grainger

Posted by Amy on 11/12/2015 • 4 Comments

I always find it hard to review books that I have no strong opinion of either way. I didn’t really like this book, but I didn’t dislike it either. It was readable, but it didn’t make me NEED to keep going. The main character wasn’t all that interesting, but I did kind of like her… sometimes. As you can tell by the title and synopsis, this book is about a girl who is kidnapped because she is the Prime Ministers daughter. She is the leverage to get what they want. So of course, she is being held captive and we learn about her history through her wandering thoughts. We also learn about the conspiracy that got her to this place by one of her kidnappers. The book opens pretty cool,…

Review: The Anatomical Shape of a Heart by Jenn Bennett

Posted by Amy on 11/10/2015 • 14 Comments

I adored this book! It wasn’t perfect, but I really enjoyed it and didn’t want to put it down. I loved the main characters, but beyond that, I wanted so bad to learn their story. I was instantly drawn into this book and it was like I was there with them on their journey. It was great watching their romance form, and it was so heart breaking when they were going through awful things. I was very invested in them and where life would take them, and especially the past that had made each of them who they were.

Bex was an interesting character. She doesn’t have a whole lot of friends because people find her a bit weird. By weird, I mean morbid. She is fascinated by anatomy….

Review: We’ll Never Be Apart by Emiko Jean

Posted by Amy on 11/09/2015 • 4 Comments

I’m always up for a book that is creepy and messes with your head, and this sounded like it was perfect for that. Sadly, it really fell short for me. It’s supposed to be a mind fuck, but it was too predictable. It was supposed to be creepy, but it just wasn’t. I didn’t really like the main character much because she was kind of boring. Even though she is breaking all the rules and is out for murder, she just seemed a bit blah for me. And the love interest… there always has to be one of those right? He didn’t do much for me. He’s the one who is supposed to be all dangerous, but helpful, and really a sweetheart. Yeah, he met all those stereotypes on the…

Fresh Batch (November 8th – 14th)

Posted by Giselle on 11/07/2015 • 8 Comments

Fresh Batch, posted weekly, keeps you up to date on the hottest releases of the upcoming week.

Flavor of the week:

Winter Marissa Meyer Series: The Lunar Chronicles #4 Publication date: November 10th 2015by Feiwel and Friends

Goodreads Purchase

Princess Winter is admired by the Lunar people for her grace and kindness, and despite the scars that mar her face, her beauty is said to be even more breathtaking than that of her stepmother, Queen Levana.

Winter despises her stepmother, and knows Levana won’t approve of her feelings for her childhood friend–the handsome palace guard, Jacin. But Winter isn’t as weak as Levana believes her to be and she’s been undermining her stepmother’s wishes for years. Together with the cyborg mechanic, Cinder, and her…

Fresh Batch (November 1st – 7th)

Posted by Giselle on 10/31/2015 • 10 Comments

Fresh Batch, posted weekly, keeps you up to date on the hottest releases of the upcoming week.

Flavor of the week:

The Lies About Truth Courtney C. Stevens Publication date: November 3rd 2015by HarperTeen

Goodreads Purchase

Sadie Kingston, is a girl living in the aftermath. A year after surviving a car accident that killed her friend Trent and left her body and face scarred, she can’t move forward. The only person who seems to understand her is Trent’s brother, Max.

As Sadie begins to fall for Max, she’s unsure if she is truly healed enough to be with him — even if Max is able to look at her scars and not shy away. But when the truth about the accident and subsequent…

Review: The Dead House by Dawn

Posted by Giselle on 10/30/2015 • 7 Comments

Disclaimer: this wasn’t a scary book. When we say ‘scary’, that’s something I would give to the likes of Daughters Unto Devils by Amy Lukavics and Girl from the Well + The Suffering by Rin Chupeco. This wasn’t even a mind-fuck of a book a la Dangerous Girls

However, that doesn’t mean my mind didn’t reel from it. Even though this didn’t have the quiet or the jumpy horror I am well fond of, how this book delivered a kickass psychological paranormal thriller made me shiver in my boots.

1. Unreliable narrator? Check. 2. A book majorly in a dairy format, showing us the thought processes of our heroine, therefore giving us an intense sneak peek of the insanity of the situation? Check. 3. Notes, transcription of videos, medical reports, letting us also see…