Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Heist Society

This is another of Ally Carter's wonderful books!! I, like so many others, have read ALL of her other spy series, and LOVED Heist Society just as much as I did Don't Judge A Girl By Her Cover. This book however follows a whole different set of characters, from the intoxicating Katarina Bishop, to the eccentric W. W. Hale the fifth. Ally Carter delivers another of her wonderful stories in this book just as well as she does her others. While Katarina has been off at boarding school for the last three months, she hadn't realized just how far behind she had gotten. After she meets with a powerful mobster Arturo Taccone who accuses her father of stealing five of his priceless paintings, she sets off with a two week deadline, a crew of teenage thief's, and a lot of hope, that will hopefully be enough to recover those paintings in time to get her father off the suspect list of Taccone and Interpol, while still making it back in time for soup at her Uncle Eddie's. This book follows Kat and her friends from one side of the world to the other and back again. And with each step it just gets better and better. Overall grade, A- of course!!

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Some Girls Are...and some girl's aren't??

Super popular Regina Afton has it all, the friends, the boyfriend, she's a member of the all-girl clique at Hallowell High The Fearsome Five, well, she was part of it. That is until rumors about her and her best friend's boyfriend start going around, by none other then the girl she mercilessly teased until she was popping diet pills like candy and becoming bulimic. Now her ex-best friend, Anna, is out for revenge in the worst ways. That's when Regina starts taking solace in the "bad boy with a hardened past" Michael Hayden, one of the people she herself used to bully. Soon she starts to see that Michael just might start being more then a friend, but that's only if the Fearsome Foursome don't break them both first as they have done to so many others. Ending with more then just an explosive conclusion to their senior year we'll see who is left standing, and who's been taken down a peg, or maybe even more. After reading this book I was blown away by how Courtney Summers did it again, actually this time she may have even done it better then the first time with the AMAZING book Cracked Up To Be, it shows the true inner workings of high school's, maybe not all, but a lot of them. I LOVE Courtney Summer's novels and cannot WAIT for her next one!! I'm sure it will be even better (if possible) then her first two!! So of course, overall grade A!!!

Monday, June 28, 2010

The Dust of 100 Dogs

When I read this book I was AMAZED. I loved the back story involving Emer and the current story about Saffron. Emer's story takes place in the 17th Century and starts of in Ireland, it then continues on her journey through France and across the seas all the way to Jamaica. Saffron's story takes place in America and then also in Jamaica. I absolutely loved Emer, from the beginning where she was just a innocent girl to when she fell in love with Seany Carrol, to her lives as one hundred dogs. The same goes for Saffron, when she makes her way to Jamaica. Sadly there is not much more I can say about this book without giving to much away except to say READ IT!!!!!! It was so good and I would definitely read it again!! This book is a great read, though is extremely sad at parts. I loved it SOOO much so of course, overall grade...A+!!!

Sunday, June 27, 2010

The Big Empty

Though this book was published back in 2004 (wow, it feels so long ago sometimes!!) it kind of pertains to what we are involved with right now. A lot of conspiracy theorists are afraid of a "super virus" that will kill over half of the population, and they think that the government is cooking it up right now or something silly like that. The thing about this book is that for anyone who has read or watched Stephen King's The Stand knows that there are fears of a super virus and this book more then just puts it perspective for the reader. This book occurs about a year after the virus Strain 7 killed three quarters of the human race. This book follows seven teens through the abandoned zones through the Big Empty to the secret community of Novo Mundum. On the way each teen somehow or another meets up with one another and some even fall in love (or out of it) with each other, causing some serious tension in some places, and their journey really shows how life could be if this ever happened. I loved this book as well as the next books in the series. It was suspenseful as could be and had a great story line that was easy to follow and kept you extremely interested the whole time. Overall grade A-

Saturday, June 26, 2010

Candor

I read this book and though I have seen a LOT of really good reviews for this book, and I would have agreed while reading most of the book, the farther into it I got, the more predictable the ending became. Sadly that made me kind of lose interest, though I still wanted to see how everything would end up, and sadly I was right about my predictions. This book revolves around Oscar Banks. His father owns and runs Candor, Florida. He controls everyone, even his own son, or so he thinks, using subliminal messages. Oscar however, discovered these messages and started making some of his own. He would help get some teens out, but for a price, and then when Nia comes to town, he has to make a choice, either let her become another Candor teen, or help her escape and lose her forever. When Oscar gets closer to her, he starts giving her his own messages, keeping her like she is while making sure she won't rat him out. When Sherman, the most annoying kid in the history of fictional characters, fails to leave Candor when he's supposed to and gets caught trying to run away, Oscar must make some quick decisions as to whether his love for Nia is worth the risk of being sent to the Listening Room, where all his messages he made for himself, all his memories of Nia, and so much else, will be erased. Overall this book was good but not the best, I did like so so my grade will have to be a B.

Friday, June 25, 2010

Third Warped Musing

I was reading the book The Sky Always Hears Me And The Hills Don't Mind the day before I had my audition at UWF and the night I got home I had this very odd dream. I couldn't remember all of it but what I did somehow made me connect the book and what happened before my audition. I kept thinking "why do this sound so familiar?" I thought about how I was sitting there waiting for my audition and I kept going over my monologue and kept going up to where my mom and friend were waiting and kept coming back down, and one time I came back down wearing a different shirt, pretty early on actually, and this guy started talking to me. He told me how I was going to do great and I had nothing to worry about I knew he was a musical theatre major and I told him how of course he'd say that, he's not only a guy auditioning for theatre but also for musical theatre!! It's not like there are a ton of guys comfortable enough to sing and act!! At the time I didn't think anything of it, but I realized he'd been on the campus tour with me and went to FTC with me as well!! Then it dawned on me that (if I get accepted) I'll be seeing him a LOT next year as well!! For some reason my brain connected this to The Sky Always Hears Me And The Hills Don't Mind when it came to Morgan and Rob!! The thing is, someone asked me "who do you like right now?" And I had to seriously think about it, not knowing who, and turning out there wasn't any!! Then I thought of this random nice guy I met, the one who's name I didn't even know, and realized that maybe the reason he kept smiling at me and reassuring me was because he thought that when I see him in the fall he'll remember me and I'll remember him and not only will I have already made a friend, but an important one since I'll be so involved in theatre and so will he. So in a way (no matter how weird) my brain connected how Rob and Morgan worked together and ended up a couple and so somehow with enough time apparently my brain says so will this guy who's name I don't know and me. The saddest part is that I only know he's from Miami and what school he goes too!! I don't even know his name!! What's even worse is that he knows mine (and how to pronounce it correctly) and what area of theatre I went out for...including my private tour of the theatre that blew me away!!! This theatre is AMAZING I can't imagine going anywhere else!! It is just PERFECT for me!!

Thursday, June 24, 2010

Darklight

This book out the first book to shame, it was just that AMAZING!! The ending alone was just so heart-wrenching and sadly enough, AWFUL because no one would want it!! I think I speak for almost everyone who read this book in saying WHY can't Sonny and Kelley be together!! I love their love story, and I love what Sonny would do if Kelley ever died. The thing is, I can't wait to read the third book, but I wish that the ending to the second one hadn't been so heart-wrenching sad. Overall though, this book was AMAZING, and I loved how you got to see into the Faerie world so much more, plus you learned SOOO much about Sonny, and surprisingly, about Mabh as well. So, without further ado, Much has changed since autumn, when Kelley Winslow learned she was Faerie royalty, fell in love with changeling guard Sonny Flannery, and saved New York City from a rampaging Faerie war band. When a terrifying encounter in Central Park sends Kelley tumbling into the Otherworld, her reunion with Sonny is joyful—but cut short. For they have been plunged into a game of Faerie deception and wavering allegiances in which the next move could topple a kingdom...or part them forever.

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

Fade Out...Morganville Vampires #8!!

Over the last year or two I have read every single Morganville Vampires Book. They have all been very suspenseful and just plain wonderful!! This book is no exception, it starts out right where book seven left off where Bishop was finally gone. So now without the evil vampire Bishop ruling over the town of Morganville, the resident vampires have made major concessions to the human population. With their new found freedoms, Claire Danvers and her friends are almost starting to feel comfortable again…Now Claire can actually concentrate on her studies, and her friend Eve joins the local theatre company. But when one of Eve’s cast mates goes missing after starting work on a short documentary, Eve suspects the worst. Claire and Eve soon realize that this film project, whose subject is the vampires themselves, is a whole lot bigger—and way more dangerous—than anyone suspected. That doesn't even include how Myrnin's pet Ava is acting stranger then usual, or how oddly Amelie is acting as well. This book is AWESOME and I can't wait for the next one!!

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Lament

When I began this book I didn't know if I was going to really enjoy it, but overall I really did. It was a fantastic novel and I cannot WAIT to read the sequel!! This book started off strong, and only grew in intensity leaving you with a heart clenching cliff hanger. It follows a brilliant Harpist Deirdre Monaghan and the mystical boy she meets Luke Dillon. Caught right alongside her is her best friend James. When she gets caught in the crossfire of faeries Luke is there to save her, or is that really what he wants to do?? Deirdre wished her summer was less dull, but maybe she's getting a bit more then she can handle. It only gets worse when the sinister faerie Aodhan shows up, thirsting for Deirdre's blood as well as the beautiful Eleanor another of the deadly Faerie Queen's minions. The plot thickens even further when James as well as Luke go missing, leaving behind blood, Luke's car, and a strange concoction of Deirdre's grandmothers.

Monday, June 21, 2010

Demon Princess: Reign or Shine

I just finished this book and could NOT STOP SMILING!!! It just made me so happy inside!! This book was happy, sarcastic, suspenseful, and so much else!! It made me want to read the next one IMMEDIATELY!! I cannot wait till June to read the next one, but anyways, this book follows recently-turned sixteen Nikki Donovan. She thinks she just this ordinary teenager until the surprisingly sexy Michael turns up telling her that not only is her father alive and wants to see her, but is also a demon. A demon king to be exact. And that, of course, makes her a demon princess, but also a Darkling, which is a half-demon, and she's the first one in over a millennium. Add the fact that her father is dying and since she's his only heir wants her to be queen of the Shadowland, well, you can guess that she doesn't really believe him (or want the job) right away. After a trip to the Shadowland and an assassin trying to kill her, and Nikki just might start to like her dad a bit more. But then again, she starts to like Michael a LOT more as well, which just so happens to be forbidden. Michael is a Shadow, a servant to the demon's like herself, and her father seems stuck in the old ways, even though he broke the rule about having human-demon relationships when he got Nikki's mother pregnant!! Nikki is just trying to survive high school and a new step-father, but of course it wouldn't be that simple!! I LOVED this book and cannot WAIT to read the sequel, so overall grade...A!!