Review: Sweet Peril by Wendy Higgins

Sweet Peril
Wendy Higgins
Series: The Sweet Trilogy #2
Publication date: April 30th
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads - Amazon

Anna Whitt, the daughter of a guardian angel and a demon, promised herself she’d never do the work of her father—polluting souls. She’d been naive to make such a vow. She’d been naive about a lot of things. 

Haunted by demon whisperers, Anna does whatever she can to survive, even if it means embracing her dark side and earning an unwanted reputation as her school’s party girl. Her life has never looked more bleak. And all the while there’s Kaidan Rowe, son of the Duke of Lust, plaguing her heart and mind.

When an unexpected lost message from the angels surfaces, Anna finds herself traveling the globe with Kopano, son of Wrath, in an attempt to gain support of fellow Nephilim and give them hope for the first time. It soon becomes clear that whatever freedoms Anna and the rest of the Neph are hoping to win will not be gained without a fight. Until then, Anna and Kaidan must put aside the issues between them, overcome the steamiest of temptations yet, and face the ultimate question: is loving someone worth risking their life?

MY FAVORITE TRILOGY IS BACK! *jumps up and down*

I've been waiting so long for this that when I actually got my copy I might have cried a little bit. I was really nervous to read this because I thought Sweet Evil was just so freaking good and I didn't want to be disappointed in case this one didn't live up to it.

But guess what?

Sweet Peril is even better.

The book starts out with a prologue that gives us a little more background to the relationship the Dukes have with the Nephilims, and it kind of also gives us a really big scare. My first thought when I read it was that things were going to happen and they were going to hurt.

So after you start preparing yourself for the worst, the story picks up months after the ending of book 1 with Anna being completely different from the girl we read about on Sweet Evil. She's heartbroken and she's doing her best not to draw attention to herself, which means she's working. She's partying and drinking and leading people down to the rough road of self-destruction.

When she thinks things are finally settling down - as much as they can, anyway, when you're the daughter of a fallen angel and a Neph -, things take a really interesting turn. Suddenly, Anna finds herself traveling to foreign countries with Kopano and looking for allies to help her fulfill a prophecy that will have the entire world of angels, demons, and Nephs in chaos.

I cannot find the words to tell you how great this sequel was. It kept me hooked from the beginning until the very end, and it surprised me with all of its twists and turns along the way. The love triangle between Kai, Anna, and Kope was handled perfectly and made it for a believable plot aspect of the story. Anna and Kai's relationship or lack thereof and how it developed from him going away and then to what happens at the very end was also very well executed, and I'm just so happy with everything about it.

Wendy Higgins deserves all the cookies for giving us such an amazing story and characters to love, and I'll just sit here and quietly cry on my copies of Sweet Evil and Sweet Peril until the last installment comes out.

Review: Romero by Elizabeth Reyes

This book is part of my 2013 TBR Pile Challenge.

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Romero
Elizabeth Reyes
Series: The Moreno Brothers #4
Publication date: October 24th 2011
Rating: ★★★★☆

Goodreads - Amazon

Prim and proper middle school teacher Isabel Montenegro always runs the opposite direction from men like Ramon Romero. A foul-mouthed, uneducated, loose cannon has no place in her careful plans. But instead of running away, Isabel is completely captivated. The intensity of his nature, while a bit daunting, mesmerizes her in ways she can’t begin to understand. She’s unwilling to walk away—even when her instincts are screaming at her to run.

Romero has no idea what he's getting himself into when he first kisses Isabel. Shocked at the passion she invokes in him, he believes he can keep his usual short fuse under wraps. Falling fast and hard for someone so flawlessly sweet only makes him more aware that he’s far from perfect. If she is ever witness to his biggest imperfection, he’s sure she’ll bail. But when her meddling sister does the worst thing imaginable—bring other men between him and his Izzy—that fuse is lit and all bets are off.

Can two people who are worlds apart teach each other how to love, or will the reality of their differences drive them apart? 

I honestly didn't know if I was going to like this one. The idea of taking the focus off of the Moreno brothers to write a story about one of the family's closest friend was great, but I didn't think I was gonna be able to get into it, especially considering the way Romero didn't appeal to me in all the other books. I think that was one of the reasons why it took me so long to read this, but I am so freaking glad I finally did!

Romero was raised by his two uncles and lives a life full of women, alcohol, and parties. He has a bad temper and an even worse mouth, and he makes no excuses for who he is and where he came from. He worked hard to open his own business, and he's seriously proud to how far he's come in life by his own merits.

Isabel comes from a different world than Romero's. Her family has money and sometimes cares more about appearances than happiness, and her sister Pat makes Izzy's life hell trying to control who she dates and what she does. All to make sure their family's name is not shamed.

When Izzy and Romero cross paths, everything turns upside down. Romero learns that sometimes letting his anger get the best of him is not a good thing, and Izzy finds the strength to stand up for herself and fight for what she wants.

We see a lot of sides to all of the characters presented in the story, and I cracked myself up reading about Romero interacting with his uncles. This was a really fun read, and Romero ended up being my favorite book of The Moreno Brothers series so far!

Review: Walking Disaster by Jamie McGuire

Walking Disaster
Jamie McGuire
Series: Beautiful #2
Publication date: April 2nd 2013 by Atria Books
Rating: ★★★★☆

Goodreads - Amazon

Finally, the highly anticipated follow-up to the New York Times bestseller Beautiful Disaster. 

Can you love someone too much?

Travis Maddox learned two things from his mother before she died: Love hard. Fight harder.

In Walking Disaster, the life of Travis is full of fast women, underground gambling, and violence. But just when he thinks he is invincible, Abby Abernathy brings him to his knees.

Every story has two sides. In Beautiful Disaster, Abby had her say. Now it’s time to see the story through Travis’s eyes.

I fell in love with Travis while reading Beautiful Disaster, and when I found out there was going to be a book from his POV I almost died.

The best things about Walking Disaster were the extra scenes at the beginning and end and all the interaction with only Travis and Shepley and Travis and his family. It was the best thing to read about these little moments we didn't get to see, specially because they gave us some background to Travis' character and as to what he was thinking when things happened in the first book.

It was also really easy to get into Travis' head as the story goes along, and Jamie McGuire did a wonderful job in retelling all the events that lead to Travis and Abby getting together and then married. And the epilogue was amazing, with that little snippet of what the future of Mrs. and Mr. Maddox was like!

A little thing that I didn't really like about it was that a lot of the dialogue between Abby and Travis was cut, but I understand that was done so things wouldn't get too repetitive. It was still a wonderful book, and an even better end to the series.

Review: Golden by Jessi Kirby

This book is part of my 2013 Young Adult Contemporary Challenge.

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Golden
Jessi Kirby
Publication date: May 14th 2013 by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads - Amazon

Seventeen-year-old Parker Frost has never taken the road less traveled. Valedictorian and quintessential good girl, she’s about to graduate high school without ever having kissed her crush or broken the rules. So when fate drops a clue in her lap—one that might be the key to unraveling a town mystery—she decides to take a chance.

Julianna Farnetti and Shane Cruz are remembered as the golden couple of Summit Lakes High—perfect in every way, meant to be together forever. But Julianna’s journal tells a different story—one of doubts about Shane and a forbidden romance with an older, artistic guy. These are the secrets that were swept away with her the night that Shane’s jeep plunged into an icy river, leaving behind a grieving town and no bodies to bury.

Reading Julianna’s journal gives Parker the courage to start to really live—and it also gives her reasons to question what really happened the night of the accident. Armed with clues from the past, Parker enlists the help of her best friend, Kat, and Trevor, her longtime crush, to track down some leads. The mystery ends up taking Parker places that she never could have imagined. And she soon finds that taking the road less traveled makes all the difference.

Tell me, what do you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Parker Frost doesn't quite know how to answer that question. She's lived her entire life following the carefully thought out plan her mother has for her: study hard, get good grades, get into Stanford, study some more.

It's when she's doing her TA job and helping her English teacher with a school project that she finds something that's going to change her life forever, something that's going to make her question everything she thought she wanted in life and for herself.

A moment was all it took to change everything.

We don't get just Parker's story while we're reading Golden. It's kind of a two-for-one type of deal: we read about Parker and how she struggles with taking charge of her life, and then we get little snippets of Julianna and Shane's relationship and the mysterious Orion who changed everything.

Jessi Kirby does a great job with combining those two aspects together, what happened with what's happening now and then trying to figure out what happens next. It was really satisfying to me as a reader to put all of the pieces of the puzzle together just as Parker did, and seeing how her figuring out what went by all those years ago made her start changing things in her own life.

Taking a chance can be worth a lot more than you know.

It's taking a chance that puts Parker in this mess, and it's taking a lot of other chances along the way that help her learn the kind of person that she is and the kind of person she strives to be. That's what I loved most about the book. Parker finding herself and going after what she believes in, getting back up on her feet after she fails and trying again.

Golden turned out to be just as great as I thought it would, and it's not really a surprise it made its way to my list of favorites books ever. I definitely recommend it to anyone who likes an amazing story with a rich plot and well-developed characters. You won't regret it.

[...] sometimes life gives us those rare moments where we do see a chance as it's happening. And in those moments, we have a choice. And sometimes we have to take a risk. And it's scary. It makes us vulnerable. But I know now that it's worth it.

Waiting on Wednesday (4): Impostor by Susanne Winnacker

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

Impostor

Susanne Winnacker

Series: Variants #1

Publication date: May 28th 2013 by Razorbill

Goodreads - Amazon

Can Tessa pose as Madison . . . and stop a killer before it’s too late? 

Tessa is a Variant, able to absorb the DNA of anyone she touches and mimic their appearance. Shunned by her family, she’s spent the last two years training with the Forces with Extraordinary Abilities, a secret branch of the FBI. When a serial killer rocks a small town in Oregon, Tessa is given a mission: she must impersonate Madison, a local teen, to find the killer before he strikes again. 

Tessa hates everything about being an impostor—the stress, the danger, the deceit—but loves playing the role of a normal girl. As Madison, she finds friends, romance, and the kind of loving family she’d do anything to keep. Amid action, suspense, and a ticking clock, this super-human comes to a very human conclusion: even a girl who can look like anyone struggles the most with being herself.

The premise on this one is really interesting?

The whole absorbing DNA thing and becoming someone else. And then working with the FBI to help catch serial killers.

And I can't wait to read about Tessa dealing with playing the part of Madison, being a normal girl for once, and then maybe learning how to accept herself for who she is?

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Connect with the author
Susanne's Website | Goodreads | Facebook | Twitter

Susanne Winnacker studied law before she became a full-time writer. She lives with her husband, a dog that looks like a sheep and three bunnies that have destroyed every piece of furniture she's ever owned in Germany. She loves coffee (in every shape and form), traveling and animals. When she isn't writing, you can usually find her in the kitchen, experimenting with new vegan dishes.

Top Ten Books Dealing With Tough Subjects

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme hosted at The Broke and the Bookish.

This week's topic is Top Ten Books Dealing With Tough Subjects (abuse, suicide, grief etc or something personal hard for you)

The Sea of Tranquility by Katja Millay: There's not much I can say without giving the story away, but it deals with the aftermath of abuse. We see how the character deals after going through a horrible situation, and how it affects everyone around said character. It's downright brilliant and one of my favorite books ever.

Dare You To by Katie McGary: This story is such a wonderful sequel to her first book Pushing the Limits. It gives us an in to Beth and Ryan's story, dealing with alcohol and drug abuse, physical abuse, homophobia, and childhood traumas. It's so amazingly written that I actually like this one more than I did the first.

Going Under by S. Walden: It took me a while to get around to reading this story, but I'm so glad I did. S. Walden writes about sexual abuse, depression, and suicide in a way that's more real than what we find in books these days. It also brings awareness to things that are happening today, and I thank her for it.

Find You in the Dark by A. Meredith Walters: Mental illness is a touchy subject for me, and the way Walters portraits it in this story is possibly one of my most favorite things about it. It shows the ups and downs of what is like to know someone with manic depression and that, even though you might really want to, sometimes love doesn't have the power to fix everything.

Hopeless by Colleen Hoover: Colleen owns my soul. And she managed to rip it all in pieces as I read about all of the traumatic experiences Sky suffered through as a child. From sexual abuse to kidnapping to feeling so utterly and completely broken at finding out the truth, this book is one of the best I've ever got my hands on.

Falling Into You by Jasinda Wilder: This book will gut you right from the start. And then it will just keep kicking you while you're already down. Reading about self-harm as a way to coping with grief always gets to me, because it's so easy to see where the person is coming from. Best thing about the entire story, though, is that Colton never tries to fix Nell. He only tries to help her heal.

The Coincidence of Callie & Kayden by Jessica Sorensen: I'll never get over how great this story is. The story tackles physical and sexual abuse, showing us the aftermath of it all, how the characters are dealing with what they've been through. My favorite thing about it is how the author chose to deal with the aftermath of it all, sexual abuse, the way it forces the female lead characters to come out of her shell and push her boundaries, make new memories, and learn how to trust people again. 

Ten Tiny Breaths by K.A. Tucker: Here we see grief when it's bottled up, pushed away, and ignored. Kacey's way of not-coping is possibly one of the saddest things I've ever read, specially when she sees herself being forced to deal with it. And with Trent we learn about what guilt can do to a person, how it can make them obsessive and drag them down and make them and others hurt.

Easy by Tammara Webber: This story is about standing up for yourself. It shows how common it is for a woman not to report being assaulted, but then it gives us the lead female character deciding to take self-defense classes to make sure that, if it does happen again, she'll be able to protect herself. The reason why Lucas is the one to teach the class is also deeply rooted to a traumatizing situation he went through as a child, and it's great reading about how he takes all of that anger and turns it into something good.

Second Chance Summer by Morgan Matson: I cried like a baby reading this. This is a cancer book, but from the perspective of a daughter watching her father wither away. It's grief in its most pure form, reading about Taylor trying to come to terms with the fact that this is the last summer she's going to have with her father, and it's heartbreaking.

Musing Mondays (4): What I'm Reading

Weekly meme hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading.

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…

• Describe one of your reading habits. 
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s). 
• What book are you currently desperate to get your hands on? Tell us about it! 
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it. 
• Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us! 
• Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!

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Goodreads
Amazon

I've been a Nicole Williams fan since her Eden Trilogy days, so whenever she has a new book coming out I make sure to check it out and see if it interests me.

Lost & Found was released about a week ago, and it's been keeping me busy this past few nights.

The story is not something we haven't seen before - bad-girl gets shipped off to a ranch in the middle of nowhere by her mother and meets and falls in love with the owner's son -, but it's still an entertaining one.

I've been having fun reading it, at least. Rowen and Jesses' bickering makes up for a pretty interesting ride, especially with the way Rowen tries her best to keep everyone away only to have Jesse not even bat an eyelash to her weird sense of humor.

What I'm not enjoying is almost the same thing. Rowen's need to keep people at a distance. Even though I haven't finished the book yet, I know that's gonna cause some trouble and heartache. Which are good things in a story, but still.

I'm looking forward to see where the story goes and how it ends, and so far Nicole Williams has done a wonderful job in keeping me hooked to the story and its characters.

Review: If You Stay by Courtney Cole

If You Stay
Courtney Cole
Series: Beautifully Broken #1
Publication date: February 5th 2013 by Lakehouse Press
Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Goodreads - Amazon

24-year old Pax Tate is an asshole. 
Seriously. 

He’s a tattooed, rock-hard bad-boy with a bad attitude to match. 

But he’s got his reasons. 

His mother died when Pax was seven, leaving a hole in his heart filled with guilt although he doesn’t understand why. What he does know is that he and his dad are left alone and with more issues than they can count. 

As Pax grew up, he tried to be the kid his father always wanted; the perfect golden boy, but it didn’t work. His dad couldn’t overcome his grief long enough to notice and Pax couldn’t keep up the impossible perfect façade. 
So he slipped far, far from it. 

Now, he uses drugs and women to cope with the ugliness, the black void that he doesn’t want to deal with. If he pretends that the emptiness isn’t there, then it isn’t, right? 
Wrong. 

And it’s never more apparent than when he meets Mila. 
Sweet, beautiful Mila Hill is the fresh air to his hardened frown, the beauty to his ugly heart. He doesn’t know how to not hurt her, but he quickly realizes that he’s got to figure it out because he needs her to breathe.

When memories of his mother’s death resurface from where he’s repressed them for so long, Mila is there to catch him when the guilt starts making sense. Mila is the one…the one who can save him from his broken troubled heart; from his issues, from the emptiness. 

But only if he can stop being an asshole long enough to allow it. 

He knows that. And he’s working on it. 

But is that enough to make her stay?

Another one of those books that had me super excited to read it, only for the plot to fall flat and disappoint me.

The first paragraph was great. It made me want to stand up and clap and congratulate the author on such a start for her story, because it was just that good. It really gives you an insight as to who Pax is as a person and of how much he does not care about anything other than block himself out.

Pax is your standard asshole with a mysterious past and a serious drug problem while Mila is the naive good girl who wants to save him from himself. They're relationship is rocky from the start, Pax trying to get himself back together and dealing with his drug problem, and Mila wanting to forget about the bad boy she saved and who makes her feel like she never has before.

The book is told from dual POV, and that's where the problem starts. It just feels like whenever the change from Pax's POV to Mila's happens, the entire story just goes downhill. Pax's character was much more developed than Mila's, with us reading about how he deals with what happened in his past and coming to terms with the truth he kept buried for so long.

And Mila...

I didn't agree with most of the decisions she made along the way, and with how she often she made every bad situation about what she was feeling and how it affected her. I guess I just couldn't relate to her in this story, and that was what made me dislike this book as much as I did.

Review: This Girl by Colleen Hoover

This Girl
Colleen Hoover
Series: Slammed #3
Publication date: April 30th 2013 by Atria Books
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads - Amazon

Layken and Will’s love has managed to withstand the toughest of circumstances and the young lovers, now married, are beginning to feel safe and secure in their union. As much as Layken relishes their new life together, she finds herself wanting to know everything there is to know about her husband, even though Will makes it clear he prefers to keep the painful memories of the past where they belong. Still, he can’t resist his wife’s pleas and so he begins to untangle his side of the story, revealing for the first time his most intimate feelings and thoughts, retelling both the good and bad moments, and sharing a few shocking confessions of his own from the time when they first met.

In This Girl, Will tells the story of their complicated relationship from his point of view. Their future rests on how well they deal with the past in this final installment of the beloved Slammed series.

I was really nervous about reading this, to be honest, because from the blurb it just sounded like I was going to get the same story as Slammed, only told differently. I didn't want the repetition of it, reading about the same situations all over again when I already knew how things were going to go. And that's where Colleen's brilliancy came to play and proved me so butterflying wrong.

This Girl gives us Will and Lake reminiscing about their relationship right from where Point of Retreat left off, and it's written in a way that makes it all so much more than a simple retelling of the books. We get new information and little snippets of things we didn't know were going on during the story, all the while reading about Lake's reactions to all of it and about Will's perspective of situations and their relationship.

And just like the two previous books, this one will make you feel all the things.

Right from the beginning, it just gives you this sense of nostalgia as you read about Will and Lake's journey, with the added bonus of knowing things will be okay, and then with the best epilogue and slam poetry piece you've ever dreamed of.

It was such a sweet and amazing read that it left me a little bit heart broken at the end, because it meant leaving these incredible characters behind. Colleen Hoover owns every little tiny piece of my soul, and this book just shows me how much she deserves it.

Review: Unlovable by Sherry Gammon

This book is part of my 2013 TBR Pile Challenge.

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Unlovable
Sherry Gammon
Series: Port Fare #1
Publication date: January 19th 2011 by Wordpainting Unlimited Inc.
Rating: ★★★☆☆

Goodreads - Amazon

Port Fare, New York, has fallen into the clutches of true evil. The Dreser brothers have arrived with a scheme to increase drug sales in the area by whatever means possible. Seth Prescott is part of MET (Mobile Enforcement Teams) a branch of the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration). He's been assigned to work undercover at Port Fare High, and things aren't going very well, until senior Maggie Brown enters the equation. He's harbored a secret crush on her from day one, and now that she is in the center of the case, he's trying to stay clear and objective while walking the line between business and unrequited love.

Maggie is truly the poster child for Heroin Chic, complete with jutting bones and dark-ringed eyes, but is she an addict, or is there another reason for her appearance? She struggles with her feelings for Seth, fearing he is just another person who will eventually let her down, as everyone in her life has done thus far.

Maggie has spent her life caring for her alcoholic mother. A task that has left her heavily burdened and alone. Before long, her mother's health takes a turn for the worst, sending Maggie's life into a tale-spin.

While Seth works relentlessly to inject fear into the dealers and flush them out into the open, Maggie fights to stay alive as the hunt turns deadly.

Seth and Maggie's romantic journey is one of humor, heartbreak, and self-discovery.

I've been meaning to read this for forever, and the opportunity presented itself when I signed up for the 2013 TBR Pile Challenge. What caught my attention when I first saw this book was the premise of an undercover agent falling in love with a high school girl, mostly because I just love all the heartbreak that situations like this bring.

Seth goes undercover as a high school student to try and bring down a ring of heroine drug dealers who started targeting and sealing drugs to teenagers. And Maggie is the poster child for heroin chick: too skinny, hair falling flat and dead from her head, sunk eyes with dark circles under it, and always wearing baggy and long-sleeved sweatshirts.

As they grow closer and the investigation progresses, Maggie's name comes up as one of the people who could be the FBI's missing link to catch the drug dealers. Seth is assigned to keep close watch and "become her friend", but his feelings for her and the certainty he has that she's not guilty soon get in the way, and what is an already complicated situation ends up becoming even messier. Especially considering the secrets both of them are keeping from each other.

The events are told in various POVs, so we get everyone's side of the story, and I think that's one of the reasons why I didn't like this book as much as I thought I would. As nice as it was to read about different perspectives from different characters, some of the dialogue just seemed a little bit off to me.

Maggie and Seth's relationship was also a bit hard to relate to, considering how they go from Seth flirting and Maggie shutting him down to both of them being desperately in love with each other.

Overall it was an interesting book, enough to make me want to read the sequel, but there was nothing there that really caught my attention.