Release Day Review: Missing by Kelley Armstrong - 5 stars

Title: Missing

Genre: Young Adult Mystery/Thriller

Author: Kelley Armstrong

Publisher: Crown

Publication: April 18th 2017

Cover Rating: 3/5

Goodreads | Amazon

I honestly forgot how much I loved Kelley Armstrong's writing. Before I transitioned over to young adult books I was big on the whole Stephen king, crime/mystery/thriller adult books and paranormal romance. The first book I ever read by Kelley was a mass market copy of a bunch of short stories for her werewolf series. I didn't know what they went to. I just read them then I had to go looking for the actual series and I was in love. After I switched over to YA I picked up a book from her here and there but I never read them. After reading Missing, I am regretting not reading them and wondering how I forgot that I loved her work.

So, onto the review. How exactly do you write a spoiler free for a mystery suspense book? The best part about these kinds of books is that you aren't supposed to know what is going on. You are supposed to be lead down a trail of confusion and unanswered questions. Why else would a mystery book exist if that wasn't the end result? 

We have three main characters. Winter Crane is the narrator. Then Lennon is thrown into the picture and after that, Lennon is replaced by his brother, Jude. So we don't really have any points where we have all 3 characters but they each have very pivotal parts in this book.

Winter lives with her 'dad' in a rundown trailer. Her father won't be winning any "Best Parent" awards. She would rather sleep in the woods, surrounded by feral dogs, than sleep in the trailer with her father. She is med school bound and trying to get out of this shitty town they landed in after her mother died. The town her sister ran away and left Winter in. The town where a lot of people seem to want to get out of and things just don't seem right. But the town suddenly starts to get a little more interesting.

Enter Lennon. Winter saves him from the feral dogs that drove him up a tree. He isn't from the area but he had met a friend of Winter's at a concert a while back and had come to visit her. Then it turns out he isn't exactly the best at telling the truth. And that leads us to meeting out next character...

Jude! He is Lennon's "Irish twin" brother. Meaning they are only ten months apart. Once Jude is involved with the mystery that is going on, everything starts to get messy and fast paced. We find out exactly who Jude and Lennon's family IS and that leads us to some very interesting plot twists and wrong guesses as to who the bad guy really is. 

I couldn't help but love Jude. He was smart and a great fighter and was just a really good guy. I did have some weariness though, with how Lennon was. I was worried Jude would be the same. The book actually made you believe one thing or another about the brothers. 

The great mystery in the book is a missing person/murder situation and Winter and Jude are trying to find out what is really going on. That leads then through a lot of scary and strange situations. I was actually starting to the think the book had some paranormal elements to it because of a few parts, that's how creepy it got. But in the end everything was figured out and I was pretty okay with the ending. I do want to know what happened with Edie and her family. What happened with the killer. And what happened with Jude and Lennon's "parents" and how the mother came to be in the situation she ended up in. 

Ahhh this book was just so fricken good. Go read it. I cannot explain anything else in this review without some spoilers but seriously go read it! 

In the end, I really LOVED this book. It was a very complex mystery and it was creepy as hell. I am a horror movie queen. Always have been since I was seven or eight. So nothing really scares me anymore but there were parts of this book that had me putting it down and listening to make sure my house was safe. I also don't think reading the book in four or five hours during the dead of the night helped me. I really recommend this book to anyone who enjoys a good creepy mystery. Since I read this book as an eARC from NetGalley, I think I will purchase the hardback after it comes out so I can reread it. And I am NOT someone who rereads books often. 

Overall, I gave the book 5/5 stars.

REVIEW: The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas - Valera

Rate:

10/5

Goodreads Description:

Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend, Khalil, at the hands of a police officer. Khalil was unarmed.

Soon afterward, Khalil’s death is a national headline. Some are calling him a thug, maybe even a drug dealer and a gangbanger. Starr’s best friend at school suggests he may have had it coming. When it becomes clear the police have little interest in investigating the incident, protesters take to the streets and Starr’s neighborhood becomes a war zone. What everyone wants to know is: What really went down that night? And the only person alive who can answer that is Starr.

But what Starr does—or does not—say could destroy her community. It could also endanger her life.

Review:

JESUSSSSS

This book... This book leaves me speechless, I wanna throw this book at everyone's face aimlessly wave my arms around until they read it.

The book is real as fuck. I just.. I seriously can not bring up a solid thought to sum up this book besides IT IS THE COLD HARD TRUTH!

I am not part of the community affected in the book, but as a Latina, I feel similarly oppressed due to my ethnicity. I don't want to get into what affects Latinos because the topic of this book is about the Black Community. So I will talk as an outsider, since for Latinos, it is a different path.

I had a huge rant planned but I have decided against it after a friend of mine said okay, the political talk is good but youre not really talking about the book... So lets tone it down 1000 words or so.

Starr talks about how since she was a child, her parents would have to warn her about the police and how to act if she was ever caught, to keep her nose out of trouble and her head down. A grand portion of readers possibly can't relate to this, but Starr makes sure you feel just as stretched as she does, that the reader feels the fear. 

Thomas wrote some amazing characters. Starr becomes a different person from the one she initially was, and you can see this by the friends she surrounded herself with. As the book goes on, she realizes that one of her best friends is honestly not the greatest person on earth. Hailey (I went audiobook route, not sure how its spelled) is the kind of girl that we have all met at some point, maybe we are that person. The kind that claims to be a non racist yet turns a blind eye to oppression and has compassion for the oppressors. Hailey HAS been us when we make stereotypical assumptions about minorities, making them as a joke and sure, people laugh but that is just the thing, Hailey takes and makes it as a joke and when she gets called out for it, she gets offended, just as offended as the receiver of the joke is. 

Here we see how much Khalils' murder affects not just those that knew him but his whole community. The officer that shot Khalil starts to excuse his behavior and making up reasons for having shot him and holding Starr at gun point. Starr knows the truth though. And that scared her for the first half of the book. The fact that she didn't know to what lengths the police would go to keep her quiet. Now, the book wasn't an us vs them story. Starr knew and admitted that not all police officers where bad, she herself had an Uncle who was a cop. She was scared and angry at those that admired and the actual officer that shot Khalil.

In the book we also see another thing that personally I have been no stranger to. Protesting just because everyone is. Personally I have never been one to go out and protest and march. I don't know if you guys know what im talking about but a few years ago there was a whole outrage about Kony and the invisible children students were outraged beyond words and did all sorts of protest... For about a month at best. And then no one mentioned it again. People did it just because everyone was doing it, because they could get out of class in the name of doing something good. In the book, most of the students in the school get out of class in order to march for Khalil, which would seem like a good thing, but from the very beginning, it is clear that the students just didn't care, Hailey is the one that shines the light on this, mentioning how grateful she was for the protest, meaning that she could get out of her English class and skip the test she was not ready for. 

The book is full of things we have all seen at one point or another, whether its in real life or in the news. The book real, this book doesnt SPEAK the truth, it SCREAMS the truth. A truth that we all need to keep in mind, that we all need to be aware of. 

Recommend it?

FUCKING

YES

YES

YES

STOP READING

GO BUY IT, BORROW IT, CHECK IT OUT. 

Jesus, anything, everything. 

REVIEW: The Gender Game by Bella Forrest - Valeria

Rate:

4/5

Goodreads Description:

For fans of The Hunger Games and Divergent
comes a story like no other... 

A toxic river divides nineteen-year-old Violet Bates's world by gender.

Women rule the East. Men rule the West.

Welcome to the lands of Matrus and Patrus.

Ever since the disappearance of her beloved younger brother, Violet's life has been consumed by an anger she struggles to control. Already a prisoner to her own nation, now she has been sentenced to death for her crimes.

But one decision could save her life.

To enter the kingdom of Patrus, where men rule and women submit.

Everything about the patriarchy is dangerous for a rebellious girl like Violet. She cannot break the rules if she wishes to stay alive.

But abiding by rules has never been Violet's strong suit.

When she's thrust into more danger than she could have ever predicted, Violet is forced to sacrifice many things in the forbidden kingdom ... including forbidden love.

In a world divided by gender, only the strongest survive... 

Review:

So I was interested in this book because it is pitched as recommended for Divergent and Hunger Games fans, and I happen to be both. 

It was not wrongly, its not the first time I read a book by this author but I was still afraid that it wouldn't be good and that it would seem a little too much like Divergent and the Hunger Games. But she did such a magnificent job in making the story her own. 

We the readers get a job description of why the societies separated (Matrus ruled by Woman and Patrus by men) and how they treat members of the opposite sex. To be honest I feel like that whole topic was not far fetched from reality, specially in certain areas of the world, whether the author researched and drew from those ideas is a whole nother thing unknown to me but it makes this dystopian  that much more interesting. There is good world exploration throughout the book. 

Violet

Her story starts off in a way that is just such a perfect way to pull anyone into a story, it gets the adrenaline running, and theeeeen shes in jail, actually, she was in jail for most of her life. Add this to her little brother being taken away from her life and being orphaned, she has become very harsh and closed off. Now, it COULD get a little annoying how fast she would get mad at things or just how mistrustful she would be but it made sense all the way through. Violet is pretty much impulsive due to this. She wasn't my favorite character ever, sometimes I wanted to shake her, but hey, no book is perfect and she kind of had a reason to be the way she is.

Lee and Viggo

So Violet interacts with these characters the most and I am a slightly bit confused about who I am supposed to like and who will later on stab us in the back, I feel like we end up knowing more about Viggo personally. And hardly anything about Lee, I mean, if other books have taught me anything, there might be a good solid reason for this in the other books. Romance-wise there isnt much going on in this book that personally I like.

It isnt a topic of importance which I feel fits fantastically in the plot overall, I mean, to be honest it can be super annoying when a book gives you insta love or where the characters are super in love in a short around of time and one of them or both seems totally different than the originally where, you know what I mean? Like if Violet was all heart eyes by the end of the book, forgetting her original purpose, I wouldve been pissed. So far, there might be something there, there could be something in the future, but for now, they both have a mission, and that's their main focus. 

The ending of the book was all over the place. I am not going to lie, I had to read the climax of the book twice because I was like wait wait wait wait, what?

There was so much going on, in a good way, like, personally I was so pumped about it that I was flipping pages like crazy which could be the reason that I got confused and had to go back xD So.. that is my fault? 

Recommend it?

Yup, I do.

Author Spotlight: Letters to the Lost by Brigid Kemmerer - 5 STARS!

BRIGID KEMMERER is the author of LETTERS TO THE LOST (Bloomsbury; April 4, 2017), a dark, contemporary Young Adult romance; THICKER THAN WATER (Kensington, December 29, 2015), a New Adult paranormal mystery with elements of romance; and the YALSA-nominated Elemental series of five Young Adult novels and three e-novellas which Kirkus Reviews calls “refreshingly human paranormal romance” and School Library Journal describes as “a new take on the supernatural genre.” She lives in the Baltimore area with her husband and four sons. You can visit her at www.brigidkemmerer.com

Title: Letters to the Lost

Genre: Young Adult Contemporary

Author: Brigid Kemmerer

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Publication: April 4th 2017

Cover Rating: 10/5

Goodreads | Amazon

If you want to read a very sad, beautiful and meaningful book then Letters to the Lost is the book for you.

We have two main characters, Juliet and Declan, and the book flip flops back and forth between both of there perspectives. Both of our characters have suffered severe family losses. Juliet's loss is more recent but Declan's loss, although four years old, is still fresh because of the path he took with his life. Juliet wrote letters to her mother and left them at her grave and one day, Declan happens to be in that same cemetery and finds her letter and decides to reply. This sets the pace for the rest of the book and the two form a penpal type bond while neither party knows who the other is? It was amazing to see just how much a person can open up to a stranger. Sometimes it's just easier to spill your guts to someone who doesn't know you and can't judge you.

Juliet is introduced as a girl who recently lost her mother in a tragic accident. She is not coping with this loss well, at all. In fact, it seems like she is getting worse. She quits everything she loves and she just moves inward on herself. Aside from her being unable to cope, she is also unable to move forward with life and her teachers have stopped giving her passes for "dead parent syndrome". One thing I did notice about Juliet, she isn't exactly the most observant person in the world. This observation comes from an email conversation that happens more toward the end of the book. Maybe someone else will notice it or, at least, I can hope someone else notices it so I don't feel so OCD about it.

Declan(really awesome name, Mrs. Kemmerer) is the troubled kid that has a record. So basically he is a stereotype. Or so it would seem from the way his classmates, and even his stepfather, talk about him. But there is so much more to him. So much more, and no one sees this because he doesn't show it. But what reason does he have to show it when people have already painted their pictures of him and changing someones view isn't exactly an easy task. So he just slipped into the persona and accepted it. But, the letter he finds left in front of a headstone in the cemetery he is mowing for community service, moves something in him and maybe, just maybe, he doesn't want to be the guy everyone seems to KNOW he is. Maybe, he wants to be happy and move on from the disaster that happened, not once, but twice. Declan was letting TWO days out of his entire life dictate who he was. But now? I guess you will just have to read the book and find out! Oh yeah, don't swoon too hard!

The relationships in this book are amazing. Normally side characters don't add a ton to the book but all of these characters and relationships were pivotal and added so much more to the story. I think that the more information we get from side characters the more we can get to know our main character and who they are as a person, especially before the book began, and that is very important because that is when we as reader start to connect with the character.

There is a ton of tragedy in this book. Now, normally, I get annoyed with books that over use tragedies. But this book... this book was written so well that the tragedies are believable. I didn't find myself rolling my eyes or shaking my head about the bad luck and it actually made the story more impactful.

There was a pretty big plot twist at the end of the book and I truly hope Juliet can learn to forgive her mother. No one likes to speak ill of the dead but it has to be hard to process things you find out after the fact. Aside from the plot twist, I was very satisfied with how everything wrapped up.

Overall, I gave the book 5/5 stars.

Okay, so these afterthoughts are going to be a bit spoilerish so if you haven't read the book and hate spoilers you should probably not read this but I am going to try to be as vague as possible.

Spoilers in...

3

2

....

1

What the hell happened with the yearbook picture?! I feel like that was a constant plot point and it was left open. I know it might not seem like much, and it really actually shouldn't be, but this plot point was the cause of fights and unwanted memories. It was pretty important to me. The other thing is... did Juliet decide to take pictures again? I have a feeling she did but it would have been nice to know for sure

1) How did you become an author?

I started writing when I was in middle school, mostly because I ran out of books to read. The first story I remember writing was about a boy with wings who escaped from a research facility. It was completely silly and ridiculous, but it was a lot of fun. It wasn’t until my late teens that I started to think I could write a full book, and it wasn’t until my late twenties that I thought I had enough talent to become a full time writer. 

2) What is your favorite book you have written?

This answer changes all the time, but right now, it’s Letters to the Lost. 

3) Who is your favorite character in Letters to the Lost?

Such a tough question! I think it’s Rev. He’s already become a reader favorite. When I put him on the page, I wasn’t sure what he’d do, but I love how he turned out. His book, More than We Can Tell, will be available April 2018. 

4) If you weren't an author what would your dream job be?

Probably a high school math teacher. I love working with kids, and I love math. 

5) If you had to pitch Letter to the Lost to a potential reader what would you tell them?

I would tell them it’s a story about a girl who copes with her mother’s loss by leaving letters at her grave, until a stranger writes back and they form an anonymous friendship – not realizing that they know each other in real life, and they don’t have the greatest opinion of each other. It’s all about learning to look beyond the surface of the people around us, because we all have a side to ourselves that we don’t show the world. 

Release Day Review: The Last Thing You Said by Sara Biren

Title: The Last Thing You Said

Genre: Young Adult Contemporary/Tough Issues

Author: Sara Biren

Publisher: Amulet Books

Publication: April 4th 2017

Cover Rating: 5/5

Goodreads | Amazon

This book was heavy. I read it in one 3-hour sitting about a week ago and I still can't stop thinking about it. That's a good thing, I suppose, right?

Death is a complicated situation. It can either bring people together, tear them apart OR both. The majority of this book is spent watching death tear people apart. And I don't just mean the main characters, Lucy and Ben, I mean everyone. The mothers and fathers and aunts and uncle, you get to see it all. Death really messes up a family but the worst part is, the person who died, would never want her family acting this way.

Trixie. This book wouldn't even exist if it wasn't for Trixie. Last summer, Trixie, Ben, Lucy and Clayton(Lucy's brother) were all relaxing in the water. Then Trixie decided to have a swimming race to the island no too far from where they were floating. Her heart gives out during the race and her friends are unable to save her. Swimming was something she loved. She died doing something she loved and it took almost the entirety of this book for people to realize that. Yes, it is still a tragedy. And that tragedy ripped families apart because those families let her death do that. And that is not something Trixie would have wanted, at all. The bits and pieces we get about her and her life throughout this book paint a picture of a loving, caring, beautiful girl with a soul that matches. The author didn't just tell us that Trixie was an amazing person and expect us to go along with it. No, she showed us who Trixie was and that is exactly the right thing to do. So, after her death, we are left with Lucy and Ben, her best friend and her brother, and we get to see just how badly losing Trixie messed them up.

Lucy is our main character. We get to see things through her eyes, past and present. I really enjoyed her flashbacks and her Trixie's(you'll find out what these are if you read the book). With these we got to know Trixie even though she was dead. It's always nice to get a back story on a deceased character instead of the author just saying 'blah blah is dead' and moving on. Now, Lucy herself, I have multiple feelings towards her. She had moments where I was sad with her and then there were moments where I wish she would just stop the stupid crap she was doing. She was definitely a case of smart girl making stupid decisions.

Lucy and Ben are left to navigate life without Trixie and it really shatters their worlds. Ben turned self-distructive and that made this entire situation even harder to bear for Lucy. He hurt Lucy and that made losing her best friend AND seeing him anywhere extremely hard. Especially since Lucy is playing nanny to Ben and Trixie's little cousin so she sees him almost every day.

I loved Ben. Don't get me wrong. I was half and half between wanting to hug him and wanting to rip his face off. I also think that he was forgiven way too easily, especially after the HORRIBLE shit he said and did. But, love isn't just another 4-letter word, it is encompassing and full of every emotion you could possibly think of. Love is raw. Love is giving someone all the trust in the world that they won't rip you apart but it is also forgiving them if they do rip you apart. Love is the most sought after thing in this world. So why shouldn't it hurt like hell? Why shouldn't it give you every emotion this world has to offer? Life isn't worth living if you don't get to feel everything it has to offer. With that being said, I hope he gets his anger issues under control because he can be a great guy when he doesn't let his rage control him.

Simon... UGH. I don't even know if I want to go there, but I guess I have to. He was a fricken creeper. He was so disgusting and lowkey controlling. I have no idea how Lucy could stand to do that entire 'relationship'. God, just thinking about it makes me sickened. I would rather lick a skunk than have been in Lucy's shoes that summer and I'm so glad he got put in his place. I'm not sure if this is how the author meant for Simon to be perceived but I can't really imagine what else she would have been aiming for.

The setting of this book was really beautiful. It took place in a small town on the water. The residents all seemed to know each other and it was a pretty nice feeling. I don't know if the author based it off of an existing town or made it up entirely but either way she definitely made it come to life. The author is also very talented in making real, believable characters.

So, with all the back and forth emotions this book made me feel, I can say that I loved it. I hated some of the situations and I got angry at some people, but if a book doesn't made you feel SOMETHING then it has no right being a book. Lucy's parents were okay people. Her brother was a mooching ass-hat. Ben's parents weren't exactly the greatest. I understand they lost a daughter but they still had a son. Sadly, this is the common situation if a parent loses a child and has other children.

Overall, I gave the book 5/5 stars.

Tome Topple Round 3 TBR - April 7th-20th

I am participating in the third round of Tome Topple. It starts at midnight on April 7th and goes to 11:59pm on April 20th. Basically, you just have to read books with over 500 pages. There are also 5 challenge that I will post below.

CHALLENGES: 
1. Read more than 1 tome
2. Read a graphic novel (graphic novel bindups count)
3. Read a tome that's part of a series
4. Buddy read a tome (use goodreads and twitter to find buddies!)
5. Read an adult novel

MY TBR:

• Defy the Stars by Claudia Gray
• The Sculptor by Scott McCloud
• The You I've Never Know by Ellen Hopkins
• Strange The Dreamer by Laini Taylor
• It by Stephen King
• Black Witch by Laurie Forest
• (MAYBE) A Court of Mist and Fury(only if I finish ACOTAR)

Yes, apparently I am trying to kill myself with this TBR, lol. We shall see what all gets done! I will be doing a YouTube TBR video for this as well and probably doing updates over there too. So my YouTube is https://www.youtube.com/user/bookaholics8991

PrePub Review: Other Breakable Things by Kelley York + Rowan Altwood - 5 STARS

Title: Other Breakable Things

Genre: Young Adult Contemporary with Illness

Author: Kelley York + Rowan Altwood

Publisher: EntangledTeen

Publication: April 4th 2017

Cover Rating: 5/5

Goodreads | Amazon

I sort of feel like anything I say about Other Breakable Things would be a spoiler. It was a very good book and the events were just very unexpected, to me at least. So I am going to try and make this review short and as vague as possible but still good enough that it makes you guys want to read the book!

So we have Evelyn and Luc. They became really close friends right before Evelyn had to move to Arizona for her mothers new boyfriend. I will take about Evelyn's mother in the next paragraph. Then, Evelyn comes back three years later. And in those three years, Luc has pretty much stopped keeping in contact with Evelyn. So, Evelyn goes over to Luc's house and leaves a familiar gesture on his porch so he would know she was back and thus begins this extremely beautiful and sad journey of love, pain, hate, agony, happiness and death.

I know what you are thinking and, YES, Evelyn's mother is such a horrible person that she deserves her own paragraph. This woman... Men matter to her more than her own damn daughter. She uproots Evelyn at every chance she got just to be with a guy that never lasts long OR a guy that ends up doing something this woman will live to regret.

Luc was a very touch and go character for me. One minute I thought he was sweet and the next minute I wanted to slap him. He didn't seem to understand that pushing people away so they don't get hurt if he dies isn't exactly how life works out. In fact, it actually hurts the people around him even more. He was too busy pushing people away to live his life and I think that was one of the sadest parts of the story.

These two end up on a road-trip together and shenanigans ensue, sparks fly and feelings got hurt, a lot, but this journey was the beginning, and sadly the end, of something beautiful and innocent. Love is the biggest emotional roller-coaster anyone could ever go on. I am pretty sure if someone could find a way to use love as currency, it would be worth a lot more than anything we currently have. I truly enjoyed getting to know Evelyn and Luc. I really loved Luc's hobby, too. The author really fleshed these characters out and made them as realistic as possible. Yes, there were some situations that seemed a bit out there but that doesn't mean they can't happen.

The ending sucked soooo much! I really wish Evelyn and Luc could have established their relationship three years ago and just let everything take its course. I did, however, really like the little twist with the ending. I would have bet money that the first pages of the book meant one thing, not the other. And I would have lost money. Evelyn was such a brave character. People like her need to exist in real life.

Overall, I gave the book 5/5 stars.