Saturday, September 28, 2013
So, as I do periodically, I went a bit book crazy these last few weeks. Here are all the ones I bought (plus one ARC sent for a blog tour):
ROSE UNDER FIRE! by Elizabeth Wein. Out of everthing I got, and there are some highly-coveted books herein, none was more coveted than RUF. Even Bitterblue doesn't compare. I loved Code Name Verity from my head to my toes so I have been waiting for this book since FEBRUARY. As soon as I can, this book is going down.
Amelia Anne is Dead and Gone by Kat Rosenfeld. This is for a readalong with Lyn of Great Imaginations and Pixie from the Bookaholic. I've heard the prose is lovely so I am pretty excited to start this soon.
BITTERBLUE by Kristin Cashore. I am also ridiculously excited for this. I love love love Graceling and, to a slightly lesser degree, Fire, so a return to this world (and PO) is more than welcome.
Once Was Lost by Sara Zarr. Over the last year, I've become quite the fan of Zarr's. While neither Sweethearts nor Story of a Girl has matched my love for How to Save a Life, I am still eager to see what this one has in store.
Relic by Renee Collins. Like I've said before, if you mention dragons, I'm pretty much dead set on reading your book.
The Shattering by Karen Healey.A book I found discounted on Amazon, I don't know much besides I liked the cover and synopsis enough to buy it purely on a whim.
The Waking Dark by Robin Wasserman. My extreme love for the author's The Book of Blood and Shadow made this a must buy for me, even if I am not a fan of horror books without zombies in them. Reviews have been good, and I've been sneaking chapters when I can and I do think I will enjoy this.
Dangerous Girls by Abigail Haas. I've already read this and holy moley this is a readable, compelling, utterly infuriating book.
Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John. All I know about this is that a few friends have really liked it and the hardcover was on sale for less than $4.
All Our Yesterdays by Cristin Terrill. When I ordered this, it was a standalone. It's since morphed into a series and I am really not sure how I like that.
Kinslayer (The Lotus War #2) by Jay Kristoff. I was lucky enough to get a print ARC of this earlier this summer so it's another I've already read (and reviewed.) And it is AWESOME.
The Dream Thieves (Raven Cycle #2) by Maggie Stiefvater. I utterly loved the first Raven Boys novel (it was my first Stiefvater, too!) so this is another highly anticipated read.
Vicious by V.E. Schwab. The hype around this is incredible. But hopefully, truthful. Another I wish I had two pairs of eyes for so I could read it while going about my daily life.
Steelheart (The Reckoners #1) by Brandon Sanderson. I loooooove Brandon Sanderson. He writes some of the best fantasies around (Mistborn, Stormlight Archive, etc.) and I am very interested to see what he does with this more modern novel.
Lastly, the ARC I was sent - The Color of Light by Helen Maryles Shankman. Thank you to TLC Tours for this one. And it is a hefty brick. Seriously, this book is big and weighty. But I am very much looking forward to reading it.
I also bought ebooks this morning. But first there was this:
Nook is having quite the sale. If you move quick enough, you can get all of these books at half off the regular ebook price. And those four books are:
Night Film by Marisha Pessl
On a damp October night,
beautiful young Ashley Cordova is found dead in an abandoned warehouse
in lower Manhattan. Though her death is ruled a suicide, veteran
investigative journalist Scott McGrath suspects otherwise. As he probes
the strange circumstances surrounding Ashley’s life and death, McGrath
comes face-to-face with the legacy of her father: the legendary,
reclusive cult-horror-film director Stanislas Cordova—a man who hasn’t
been seen in public for more than thirty years.
For McGrath,
another death connected to this seemingly cursed family dynasty seems
more than just a coincidence. Though much has been written about
Cordova’s dark and unsettling films, very little is known about the man
himself.
Driven by revenge, curiosity, and a need for the truth,
McGrath, with the aid of two strangers, is drawn deeper and deeper into
Cordova’s eerie, hypnotic world.
The last time he got close to
exposing the director, McGrath lost his marriage and his career. This
time he might lose even more.
Someday, Someday, Maybe by Lauren Graham
Franny Banks is a
struggling actress in New York City, with just six months left of the
three year deadline she gave herself to succeed. But so far, all she has
to show for her efforts is a single line in an ad for ugly Christmas
sweaters and a degrading waitressing job. She lives in Brooklyn with two
roommates-Jane, her best friend from college, and Dan, a sci-fi writer,
who is very definitely not boyfriend material-and is struggling with
her feelings for a suspiciously charming guy in her acting class, all
while trying to find a hair-product cocktail that actually works.
Meanwhile,
she dreams of doing "important" work, but only ever seems to get
auditions for dishwashing liquid and peanut butter commercials. It's
hard to tell if she'll run out of time or money first, but either way,
failure would mean facing the fact that she has absolutely no skills to
make it in the real world. Her father wants her to come home and teach,
her agent won't call her back, and her classmate Penelope, who seems
supportive, might just turn out to be her toughest competition yet.
Someday,
Someday, Maybe is a funny and charming debut about finding yourself,
finding love, and, most difficult of all, finding an acting job.
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
In the opening pages of Jamie Ford's stunning debut novel, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet,
Henry Lee comes upon a crowd gathered outside the Panama Hotel, once
the gateway to Seattle's Japantown. It has been boarded up for decades,
but now the new owner has made an incredible discovery: the belongings
of Japanese families, left when they were rounded up and sent to
internment camps during World War II. As Henry looks on, the owner opens
a Japanese parasol.
This simple act takes old Henry Lee back to
the 1940s, at the height of the war, when young Henry's world is a
jumble of confusion and excitement, and to his father, who is obsessed
with the war in China and having Henry grow up American. While
"scholarshipping" at the exclusive Rainier Elementary, where the white
kids ignore him, Henry meets Keiko Okabe, a young Japanese American
student. Amid the chaos of blackouts, curfews, and FBI raids, Henry and
Keiko forge a bond of friendship - and innocent love - that transcends
the long-standing prejudices of their Old World ancestors. And after
Keiko and her family are swept up in the evacuations to the internment
camps, she and Henry are left only with the hope that the war will end,
and that their promise to each other will be kept.
Forty years
later, Henry Lee is certain that the parasol belonged to Keiko. In the
hotel's dark dusty basement he begins looking for signs of the Okabe
family's belongings and for a long-lost object whose value he cannot
begin to measure. Now a widower, Henry is still trying to find his voice
- words that might explain the actions of his nationalistic father;
words that might bridge the gap between him and his modern, Chinese
American son; words that might help him confront the choices he made
many years ago.
Set during one of the most conflicted and volatile times in American history, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
is an extraordinary story of commitment and enduring hope. In Henry and
Keiko, Jamie Ford has created an unforgettable duo whose story teaches
us of the power of forgiveness and the human heart.
Margot by Jillian Cantor
Anne Frank has
long been a symbol of bravery and hope, but there were two sisters
hidden in the annex, two young Jewish girls, one a cultural icon made
famous by her published diary and the other, nearly forgotten.
In the spring of 1959, The Diary of Anne Frank
has just come to the silver screen to great acclaim, and a young woman
named Margie Franklin is working in Philadelphia as a secretary at a
Jewish law firm. On the surface she lives a quiet life, but Margie has a
secret: a life she once lived, a past and a religion she has denied,
and a family and a country she left behind.
Margie Franklin is
really Margot Frank, older sister of Anne, who did not die in
Bergen-Belsen as reported, but who instead escaped the Nazis for
America. But now, as her sister becomes a global icon, Margie’s
carefully constructed American life begins to fall apart. A new
relationship threatens to overtake the young love that sustained her
during the war, and her past and present begin to collide. Margie is
forced to come to terms with Margot, with the people she loved, and with
a life swept up into the course of history.
So many books, so little time!
