YA Book Release: No One Else Can Have You by Kathleen Hale

Publisher: HarperTeen

Genre: YA, Mystery, Contemporary, Thriller

Release Date: January 7, 2014

Blurb from Goodreads:
Small towns are nothing if not friendly. Friendship, Wisconsin (population: 688) is no different. Around here, everyone wears a smile. And no one ever locks their doors. Until, that is, high school sweetheart Ruth Fried is found murdered. Strung up like a scarecrow in the middle of a cornfield.

Unfortunately, Friendship’s police are more adept at looking for lost pets than catching killers. So Ruth’s best friend, Kippy Bushman, armed with only her tenacious Midwestern spirit and Ruth’s secret diary (which Ruth’s mother had asked her to read in order to redact any, you know, sex parts), sets out to find the murderer. But in a quiet town like Friendship—where no one is a suspect—anyone could be the killer.

Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository | Barnes & Noble |  Books-A-Million

I love the book cover. It's so adorable! Check out the animated cover from HarperTeen here. 

 

About the Author  :
Kathleen Hale grew up in Wisconsin and graduated from Harvard in 2010. No One Else Can Have You is her first novel.

Goodreads | Blog | Tumblr | Instagram | Twitter








Quotes (Photo Credits to EpicReads) :

NA Book Release: Come to Me Quietly by A.L. Jackson

Publisher: NAL Trade

Genre: NA, Romance, Contemporary

Release Date: January 7th, 2014

Blurb from Goodreads:
Aleena Moore is content with her life. She has goals and dreams and an easy smile. She also has a secret she holds locked inside.

Jared Holt believes he doesn’t deserve to love or be loved. He destroys everything he touches. Haunted by the mistake that shattered his life, he’s fled from the memory of that pain.

Jared doesn’t know why he’s compelled to return, but finds himself drawn back to the place where it all began. The exact place where it ended. When he runs into his childhood best friend, Aleena’s older brother Christopher, he agrees to share Christopher and Aleena’s apartment while he looks for a place of his own.

Aleena is no longer the little girl Jared remembers from his past and evokes feelings in him he never wanted to feel again. Terrified of destroying her, he fights to keep her away. But her touch is something he can’t resist—the touch that sealed his fate.

Their pasts are intertwined and their futures uncertain. The only truths they know are the secrets they whisper in the night.

"If you're a fan of tortured bad boys and second chance romance, you will absolutely want to check this one out!!"

Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository | Barnes & Noble | Books-A-Million

About the author: 
A.L. Jackson is the New York Times bestselling author of Take This Regret and Lost to You, as well as other contemporary romance titles, including If Forever Comes, Pulled and When We Collide, as well as the New Adult Romance Come To Me Quietly due out January 7, 2014. 

She first found a love for writing during her days as a young mother and college student. She filled the journals she carried with short stories and poems used as an emotional outlet for the difficulties and joys she found in day-to-day life.

Years later, she shared a short story she’d been working on with her two closest friends and, with their encouragement, this story became her first full length novel. A.L. now spends her days writing in Southern Arizona where she lives with her husband and three children. Her favorite pastime is spending time with the ones she loves. 

Goodreads | Instagram | Facebook | Pinterest | Twitter | Blog

Book Review : Life as We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer

Published : October 1st, 2006

Publisher : HMH Books for Young Readers

Pages : 337

Genres : SciFi, Post Apocalyptic, YA

Blurb from Goodreads :
Miranda’s disbelief turns to fear in a split second when a meteor knocks the moon closer to the earth. How should her family prepare for the future when worldwide tsunamis wipe out the coasts, earthquakes rock the continents, and volcanic ash blocks out the sun? As summer turns to Arctic winter, Miranda, her two brothers, and their mother retreat to the unexpected safe haven of their sun room, where they subsist on stockpiled food and limited water in the warmth of a wood-burning stove.

  Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Book Depository

                                                               Review Time!

Fantastic Book! We read this novel as a diary, written by Miranda as she ventures through her hard journeys into the inevitable.

It starts off with a perfectly normal day at school, where a normal 16 year old teenage girl, worries about everything teens worry about in high school. I mean Prom, her best friends growing distant from each other, exams and her mother not letting her do what she wants to do. And then one day, on the news, an asteroid is announced to hit the moon. Everyone is celebrating, and they go out to watch it with snacks to eat out on chairs. Then, the worst thing happens. The thing no one expected to happen. The asteroid has hit the moon closer to Earth, therefore, changing Earth's climate. Tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanoes erupting. Everything happens. And, by "Everything", I mean everything negative. Now they have to find a way to survive. Yet, even though everything around her is going bad, she is, indeed, barely(not barely, that's exaggerating)surviving with her loved ones.

The way Susan writes Miranda's point of view is incredible. It is flawless. You can clearly feel what Miranda is feeling even through her short, but descriptive diary entries. You can feel her frustrations, her sorrow for her little brother(and her family members), and even her strong love for her family.

Since this novel is told from Miranda's PoV, you could only see the characters as how Miranda sees them through her entries. You don't really know much about the other supporting characters, because Miranda is describing them, therefore leading to you, only knowing the characters by her thoughts about them. However, the relationship with her family members, are clearly written out with details. You could easily tell how much she loves her two brothers and mother, yet hating them at the same time.

Again, I like reading Life as we knew it from Miranda's PoV. It was very interesting. Overall, I very much like this book a lot! The one thing I loved most was when the asteroid had hit the moon, it took only a matter of a few seconds before the panic set into everyone's minds. But, as Susan is writing Miranda's diary entries, it is incredibly descriptive that her writing makes it feel like Miranda and her family is surviving the after-effects for years and years after.(Although, clearly, it's not.) I totally loved this book!

The only thing I didn't like was that we didn't know any much about the other characters(friends of Miranda's)than what Miranda knows. I would've liked to learn more about them, I feel they add some sort of depth to the story even though, they're not really important and they just paint the plot(background).

Overall, I very enjoyed this book! I gave it a 4/5 stars. It was fantastic. The plot was amazing. The writing was awesome. Everything about it was awesome. I haven't read a book like this with such an interesting fast paced, yet it feels slow paced, storyline.

Quotes :

"Miranda, I want you to know how proud of you I am. "

"I love her but I could throttle her."

 Click "Read More >> " for a short excerpt of this amazing book!

Book Review : Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

Published : December 2, 2010

Publisher : Dutton

Pages : 372

Genres : Contemporary, Chick lit, Romance

Blurb from Goodreads : 
Anna is looking forward to her senior year in Atlanta, where she has a great job, a loyal best friend, and a crush on the verge of becoming more. Which is why she is less than thrilled about being shipped off to boarding school in Paris--until she meets Étienne St. Clair. Smart, charming,beautiful, Étienne has it all...including a serious girlfriend. 

But in the City of Light, wishes have a way of coming true. Will a year of romantic near-misses end with their long-awaited French kiss?

 Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Book Depository

                                                              Review Time!

Alright, the summary. Yea. I know. It makes it sound like it's just a regular teen romance novel.  But, I guarantee you, this novel is not just a regular YA novel, it is an amazing novel. The way Stephanie Perkins wrote this novel is incredible. The story plot was very easy to believe. Even their relationship was believable. I couldn't relate to the characters, but that's because I've never been in their situation before.

I love the way it's written! When I started this novel, right when we met St.Clair, I liked him immediately, especially because he has a British accent. I like how Stephanie had written it so that St.Clair says the words "me mum" and "shite" throughout the whole novel. It makes it more realistic because it's keeping true that St.Clair is British and that it is appropriate for him to use those words. 

Anna is the main protagonist. The story is centered on her relationship with St.Clair. However, there are other characters too, Rashmi, Josh, Meredith, Amanda, Toph and many more. They're supporting characters, but I like how Stephanie Perkins makes it so that they're not just in the background, but they're mainly part of the story too. They're just needed in the story. Period. 

Truth be told, I liked Anna as the main character. She was a very well written character. She could be annoying at times, but seriously, everyone is annoying at a lot of points in their life. So, that made it more interesting and realistic. Although, I think she could've handled some problems better, but heck(whatever), her life was in chaos. THE NEXT SENTENCE IS A SPOILER.Her friends abandoned her sometime in the book or maybe they betrayed her(I'll leave it a mystery, so you'll have to read the book to know), and St.Clair has a girlfriend and she keeps stressing out why he's not breaking up with her.

St.Clair is awesome! I love him. Yea..too bad he isn't real. Omgosh. Did that surprise you? I'm sorry, let me repeat : St.Clair isn't real. He's never existed in reality, except inside your mind. I mean, Stephanie's writing is so realistic that you thought he was real. Right?! Right. His relationship with her was very enjoyable to read. They got into arguments, they did some irresponsible things, but it's easy to connect to with real life, where anyone could simply do what they did. I just can't get over how Stephanie wrote this book! It's fascinating to read, and every time I have to set the book down, the only thing on my mind would be this book. Heck, it would take me an hour to fall asleep!

 

I love this book so much! It is officially on my favorites list! This book just makes me jump with joy with hearts in the air! Now, I need to read Lola and the Boy Next Door!

For those who read the book, I have a game for you. Near the end of the book(page 344), Anna writes the most difficult letter she's ever written to Bridge. The game is to make up what you think Anna wrote in her letter to Bridgette!(Write it in the comments). 

Quotes :

I whirl around. "What's your problem? So you can keep dating Ellie, but I can't even talk to Dave?"

"What I meant was," he says, flustered. "Your feelings haven't changed? Since you've been here?" 

Click 'read more' for an excerpt of this book!

YA Recommendation: The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin

Happy New Years! It's now 2014..A new book challenge! I plan to read 60 books in 2014. What's your goal?

Quote of the Day : You have a new 365 page book to write, write a good one.

Title : The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer

Publisher : Simon & Schuster Books

Published : September 27, 2011

Author : Michelle Hodkin

Series : Mara Dyer #1

Mara Dyer doesn’t think life can get any stranger than waking up in a hospital with no memory of how she got there.
It can.
She believes there must be more to the accident she can’t remember that killed her friends and left her mysteriously unharmed.
There is.
She doesn’t believe that after everything she’s been through, she can fall in love.
She’s wrong.

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Alright, This book is one of my favorites. It is so good. You guys need to read this.

Excerpt :

The ornate script on the board twisted in the candlelight, making the letters and numbers dance in my head. They were jumbled and indistinct, like alphabet soup. When Claire pushed the heart-shaped piece into my hand, I startled. I wasn't normally so twitchy, and hoped Rachel wouldn't notice. The Ouija board was her favorite present that night, and Claire gave it to her. I got her a bracelet. She wasn't wearing it.
     Kneeling on the carpet, I passed the piece to Rachel. Claire shook her head, oozing disdain. Rachel put down her piece.
     "It's just a game, Mara." She smiled, her teeth looking even whiter in the dim light. Rachel and I had been best friends since preschool, and where she was dark and wild, I was pale and cautious. But less so when we were together. She made me feel bold. Usually.
     "I don't have anything to ask dead people," I said to her. And at sixteen, we're too old for this, I didn't say.
     "Ask whether Jude will ever like you back."
     Claire's voice was innocent, but I knew better. My cheeks flames, but I stifled the urge to snap at her and laughed it off. "Can I ask it for a car? Is this like a dead Santa scenario?"
     "Actually, since it's my birthday, I'm going first." Rachel put her fingers on the piece. Claire and I followed her.
     "Oh! Rachel, ask it how you're going to die."