Sunday, September 28, 2014

Second Thoughts by Cara Bertrand



Second Thoughts is the second novel in the Sententia Series. The premise for the series is that hidden from the rest of the world is a group of people known as the Sententia. People with gifts that set them apart from the rest of us. 

The series starts in Lost in Thought with Lainey Young, plagued with flashes of deaths from the past, simply talks about her dizzy spells until she touches the car that cost her parents their life. Suddenly her choatic life is brought to a stand still as her adopted mother (her mother's best friend) and a friend of her father's decide it's time for her to go to boarding school. 

Northbrook Academy is everything Lainey never knew she wanted. Teachers who challenge her, friends who last longer then a few months, and a gorgeous boy. But it harbours secrets of it's own and they quickly surround Lainey. She also finds out that she's not insane, she's part of a race called the Sententia .... she has been gifted with the ability to see coming deaths and relive death's presence in items. Of course that makes her love for antiques rather awkward but that's neither here or there. 

The second book picks up right after the summer break. Lainey is eager to see her friend as well as her boyfriend. And still terrified by the last grim vision she saw. Her own death at the hands of the boy she loves. 

As the school term begins Lainey struggles with all the regular teenage stuff, tests, homework, the popular group. She also has to keep this secret from her best friend about who and what she is while debating if after graduation she wants to work for the leader of the Sententia, Daniel Astor. 


I really enjoyed this series! The writing was good, the story was fast paced. The idea is pretty popular right now in young adult paranormal novels but Cara Bertrand did such a great job that it didn't seem repetitive. It's funny and moving, the supporting cast of characters seems to have just as much life as Lainey Young which is always nice to read. 

The story lines are centered on real motives that lead to evil acts every day, moral decisions that can change a life. I especially liked the ending where Lainey is forced to make the decision between love and freedom. I was so .... amazed to see an author not give in to the easy answer. It was brilliant! I included the links on Amazon for both the first and second books!


Friday, September 19, 2014

After Twilight reveal!



After Twilight: Six Tales of First Loves, Extraordinary Heroines, and Daring Adventures. It's a great new boxed set by 6 up and coming young authors set in the YA genre.

I have read Silent Orchid by Morgan Wylie and it's amazing! That book alone is worth the price but right now there is an even better deal! They were one of the 15 YA books chosen to be part of the deal! You can find these 6 books for .99 at the ibook store!

iBook copy

For those who don't have iTunes but still want to get their hands on these great new books then here are the other links!

Amazon
SmashWords (It's also .99 here if you don't have iTunes!)

There is also a great program called Thunderclap! (Think Kickstarter but free!) The only thing they ask is that you check it out and share to your favourite social media site! Please check it out at Thunderclap: After Twilight


Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Devil Music by Carly Orosz



Devil Music is set in the 1980's, at the height of the Rock industry when the media was starting to talk about the effect that music has on children. Cain Pseudomantis is a demon living in Los Angeles in the power of a mortal. He can either commit the horrible acts he is commanded to or suffer harsh punishment. He only seems to find solace in the rock music he drifts to when he is free to be himself.

It's on a mission for his human master in the seedy underbelly of the city where he picks up a guitar for the first time and feels the thrill as he makes his own music. Unable to resist he buys the guitar which begins his journey into stardom with friends and loved ones.

However this is just the beginning and things begin to get hairy as murders start to terrorize the music scene. And his girl friend's father, the honourable Nathaniel Breen, televangelist, accuses him of turning the city's youth towards satanism! What's a demon with some morals gotta do to just live his life in peace!

I really enjoyed this book! It was kind of like Rock of Ages met Son of Sam in a strange clash of amusement and thrill rides! I felt like the author really gave a great grasp on the old adage about not judging people and showing that friends are friends, no matter who or what they are.

Also a really nice commentary on the fact that just because someone is supposed to be a good person doesn't always mean they are and vice versa. Good isn't always good, and evil isn't always evil. Sometimes we have to acknowledge that there is a middle ground and intentions do matter even if they don't always turn out the way we would like!



Devil Music

Tuesday, September 9, 2014

Back to School Reading List!

Another stop along the Back to School Tour will be with some brand new authors who are definitely worth checking out!  Hopefully you find something you like and feel free to follow the links to Amazon or check out other tours along the route by following the button at the bottom!



Rush of Shadows by Catherine Bell

When American pioneers set their hearts on a California valley where Indians had been living for thousands of years, a period of uneasy appraisal emerged, followed by conflict and soon enough by genocide. The epic greed and violence of the 1850's and 60's has been brushed aside by history, conveniently forgotten in the pride of conquest. Willful ignorance and cruelty, terror and desperation were common in that time, but there were moments too of nobility and compassion, ingenuity and forgiveness, qualities which might have prevailed if certain things had been different. Rush of Shadows brings to life two freethinking women, Mellie, a white, and Bah.




The Magic of Maxwell and his Tail

Everyone has magic but sometimes you have to search to find out what it is. That’s what Maxwell 
Mouse had to do. And he discovered that what he thought was something very bad was actually 
something very good, indeed.

The Magic of Maxwell and His Tail is more than just a charming, wonderfully illustrated story. With 
childlike innocence, it presents an inspiring motivational model for youngsters—especially gifted kids and those with special needs—to take another look at themselves and recognize their unique gifts. It shows them how to see beyond what appear to be limitations and appreciate them as positive attributes that will help them to soar.

Written by an educator with over 30 years in the trenches and based on sound educational principles acknowledging the various ways children learn (multiple intelligences), The Magic of Maxwell and His Tail is a micro-guide to life. It will delight children as they celebrate Maxwell’s triumphs, and warm the hearts of parents as they watch their kids discover how perfectly special they are.

The Magic of Maxwell and His Tail is the first in a series of books to entertain, educate, and encourage children to be their better selves.





The Cottoncrest Curse by Michael H. Rubin

In this heart-racing thriller, a series of gruesome deaths ignite feuds that burn a path from the cotton fields to the courthouse steps, from the moss-draped bayous of Cajun country to the bordellos of 19th century New Orleans, from the Civil War to the Civil Rights era and across the Jim Crow decades to the Freedom Marches of the 1960s. 

At the heart of the story is the apparent suicide of elderly Civil War Col. Augustine Chastaine who, two decades after the end of the Civil War, viciously slit the throat of his wife and then shot himself. Sheriff Raifer Jackson, however, believes that this may be a double homicide, and suspicion falls upon Jake Gold, an itinerant peddler with many secrets to conceal, not the least of which is that he is a Jewish immigrant in the post-Reconstruction South, where racial, religious and ethnic prejudice abounds. 

Jake must stay one step ahead of the law, as well as the racist Knights of the White Camellia, as he interacts with blacks and whites, former slaves, Cajuns, crusty white field hands, and free men of color as he tries to keep one final promise before more lives are lost and he loses the opportunity to clear his name.




Reservation Ravaged by JoAnna Senger

Hermione Daggert is a newly certified California private investigator and the junior partner in Denning & Daggert. Proud possessor of her own business card, she relies on her special analytical skills and ability to fade into the background so completely that people forget they met her. The senior partner, Emma Denning, turns over an assignment for a local Indian tribe, the Kanache, to Hermione. Over a year before, a man camped illegally on the reservation. The chief forced him to leave immediately. Ever since, the land on which he camped has seen unparalleled devastation. The chief’s grandson is injured in a freak accident on that section of the reservation and loses a leg. 

Hermione is hired to find that man. And she does. 

But that is only the beginning. The Kanache sell that section of the reservation to an academic entrepreneur, Dr. Frederic Unlickner, who uses the site to build the Institute of Holistic Health, his lifelong dream. Emma Denning despises Unlickner on sight and nicknames him “Dr. Unlikeable.” 

No longer content to simply maim a teenage boy, the land seems to seek new victims beginning with a fiery crash, burning a young socialite alive. Hermione finds herself working at the Institute, trying to unravel the geologic mystery with several murders tucked inside. No longer sure that she understands human nature, or anything else, she narrowly escapes being swallowed alive by the land underneath her feet.









Sunday, September 7, 2014

Touching Tales (Part of the Back to School Tour)

So it's that time of year again, people are going back to school or getting ready for the hectic rush of fall that leads into the holidays. But here are a few titles that will hopefully bring a few moments of peace among the craziness of the coming months!



The Story Keeper (Carolina #2) by Lisa Wingate

When successful New York editor Jen Gibbs discovers a decaying slush-pile manuscript on her desk, she has no idea that the story of Sarra, a young mixed-race woman trapped in Appalachia at the turn of the twentieth century, will both take her on a journey and change her forever. Happy with her life in the city, and at the top of her career with a new job at Vida House Publishing, Jen has left her Appalachian past and twisted family ties far behind. But the search for the rest of the manuscript, and Jen's suspicions about the identity of its unnamed author, will draw her into a mystery that leads back to the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains . . . and quite possibly through the doors she thought she had closed forever.

The Story Keeper



Rush of Shadows by Catherine Bell

When American pioneers set their hearts on a California valley where Indians had been living for thousands of years, a period of uneasy appraisal emerged, followed by conflict and soon enough by genocide. The epic greed and violence of the 1850's and 60's has been brushed aside by history, conveniently forgotten in the pride of conquest. Willful ignorance and cruelty, terror and desperation were common in that time, but there were moments too of nobility and compassion, ingenuity and forgiveness, qualities which might have prevailed if certain things had been different. Rush of Shadows brings to life two freethinking women, Mellie, a white, and Bah.

Rush of Shadows



Lisette's List by Susan Vreeland

From Susan Vreeland, bestselling author of such acclaimed novels as Girl in Hyacinth BlueLuncheon of the Boating Party, and Clara and Mr. Tiffany, comes a richly imagined story of a woman’s awakening in the south of Vichy France—to the power of art, to the beauty of provincial life, and to love in the midst of war.

In 1937, young Lisette Roux and her husband, André, move from Paris to a village in Provence to care for André’s grandfather Pascal. Lisette regrets having to give up her dream of becoming a gallery apprentice and longs for the comforts and sophistication of Paris. But as she soon discovers, the hilltop town is rich with unexpected pleasures.

Pascal once worked in the nearby ochre mines and later became a pigment salesman and frame maker; while selling his pigments in Paris, he befriended Pissarro and Cézanne, some of whose paintings he received in trade for his frames. Pascal begins to tutor Lisette in both art and life, allowing her to see his small collection of paintings and the Provençal landscape itself in a new light. Inspired by Pascal’s advice to “Do the important things first,” Lisette begins a list of vows to herself (#4. Learn what makes a painting great). When war breaks out, André goes off to the front, but not before hiding Pascal’s paintings to keep them from the Nazis’ reach.

With German forces spreading across Europe, the sudden fall of Paris, and the rise of Vichy France, Lisette sets out to locate the paintings (#11. Find the paintings in my lifetime). Her search takes her through the stunning French countryside, where she befriends Marc and Bella Chagall, who are in hiding before their flight to America, and acquaints her with the land, her neighbors, and even herself in ways she never dreamed possible. Through joy and tragedy, occupation and liberation, small acts of kindness and great acts of courage, Lisette learns to forgive the past, to live robustly, and to love again.