Review: Moon Called by Patricia Briggs

Title: Moon Called (Mercy Thompson #1)
Author: Patricia Briggs 
Publisher: Ace books
Release date: February 1st 2006

Rating: 3.75/5

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Mercedes Thompson, aka Mercy, is a talented Volkswagen mechanic living in the Tri-Cities area of Washington. She also happens to be a walker, a magical being with the power to shift into a coyote at will. Mercy's next-door neighbor is a werewolf. Her former boss is a gremlin. And she's fixing a bus for a vampire. This is the world of Mercy Thompson, one that looks a lot like ours but is populated by those things that go bump in the night. And Mercy's connection to those things is about to get her into some serious hot water...

Moon Called is the first book in the Mercy Thompson series (there are 10 books so far), and its a compelling and enjoyable urban fantasy book.

Mercy lives in a world where werewolves, vampires, fairies, witches and other supernatural creatures exist, in fact she´s a coyote shape shifter, which is known as a walker. Mercy does not know another walker like her, so as a child she was adopted into a pack of werewolves where she was always different, she´s acquaintance with pack politics but since she left the pack were she grew up as a teenager, she tries to stay out of werewolf politics.

Mercy work as a mechanic and as much as she tries to stay away from the local wolf pack, it´s a little difficult because Adam the pack alpha is her neighbor and she is a good friend of Jesse her teenage daughter. And when a young werewolf arrives at her shop asking for work, Mercy agrees to help him, without knowing the danger that´s is following.

Mercy is a tenacious, clever, strong hero, although not physically, since being a walker only transforms her into a coyote but she does not have super strength, nor her wounds heal quickly, the great advantage she has,  is that she´s supernatural fast in her coyote form and she has a good nose.

Overall, Moon Called is a good first book in a series, the plot has a good rhythm, has no slow or boring moments, I had some problems with how is resolves at the end, but nothing unforgivable, we also see the beginning of a love triangle, but do not expect romance in this book. I do recommend it to urban fantasy fans.

Review: My Plain Jane by Cynthia Hand, Jodi Meadows, Brodi Ashton

Title: My Plain Jane (The Lady Janies #2)
Author: Cynthia Hand, Jodi Meadows, Brodi Ashton
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release date: June 26th 2018

Rating: 3.75 o 4/5

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You may think you know the story. After a miserable childhood, penniless orphan Jane Eyre embarks on a new life as a governess at Thornfield Hall. There, she meets one dark, brooding Mr. Rochester. Despite their significant age gap (!) and his uneven temper (!!), they fall in love—and, Reader, she marries him. (!!!)

Or does she?

Prepare for an adventure of Gothic proportions, in which all is not as it seems, a certain gentleman is hiding more than skeletons in his closets, and one orphan Jane Eyre, aspiring author Charlotte Brontë, and supernatural investigator Alexander Blackwood are about to be drawn together on the most epic ghost hunt this side of Wuthering Heights.

My Plain Jane is a funny reimagining of Jane Eyre (which I have not read but I have an idea of the story) with a paranormal twist. When I started reading it, I had an idea of ​​what the story was about and I knew it was a sort of a parody but I didn´t know that there is a narrator whom is constantly "talking" with the reader and clarifying how things were in other times, which I found funny.

The book is told from three points of views, Jane Eyre´s, Charlotte Brontë´s and the ghost hunter Alexander Blackwood.

Jane Eyre is an orphan, poor young woman, she´s a teacher in Lowood school for young ladies and whose greatest aspiration is to be a governess, but she has a secret that no one at her school knows .... she can see ghosts and hopes that no one will discover her ability, but when by accident it is discovered that she is a seer, she immediately accepts the position as a governess in Thornfield Hall. Once there she meets the somber, brooding and temperamental Mr. Rochester and almost immediately falls in love.

Up until there I think it's very similar to the original story, not counting the paranormal aspect, what makes it even more different is that Charlotte Brontë (the writer of Jane Eyre) is a character in the story, she´s a student of Lowood school, a close friend of Jane Eyre and dreams of being a writer and spends her time writing stories where Jane is the main character.

On the other hand we have Alexander Blackwood who belongs to a secret society (that everyone knows about) of ghost hunters and most of the time he spends his time trying to recruit Jane and trying to drive away Charlotte (as the latter is very persistent).

What unites all the characters is the paranormal part, since a lot of the plot revolves around the ghosts. There is a lot of humor and some references to other classics (I didn´t catch all, but those about Jane Austen I did understood everything!, ... I think).

Overall, My Plain Jane is a funny, humorous novel, which does not take itself seriously, but which in turn is the re imagining of a classic, but it isn´t perfect, its slow pace at times. What I got tired after the sixth time is that everybody tells poor Jane how plain she´s, they get out of their way to talk about her plainness, but I did enjoy it!.

Book trailer

Review: Ask Again Later by Liz Czukas

Title: Ask Again Later
Author: Liz Czukas
Publisher: Harper Teen
Release date: March 11th 2014

Rating: 3.5/5

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Despite what her name might suggest, Heart has zero interest in complicated romance. So when her brilliant plan to go to prom with a group of friends is disrupted by two surprise invites, Heart knows there's only one drama-free solution: flip a coin.

Heads: The jock. He might spend all night staring at his ex or throw up in the limo, but how bad can her brother's best friend really be?

Tails: The theater geek...with a secret. What could be better than a guy who shares all Heart's interests--even if he wants to share all his feelings?

Heart's simple coin flip has somehow given her the chance to live out both dates. But where her prom night ends up might be the most surprising thing of all...

Heart is a young girl in high school, she has a policy of not going out romantically with anyone, because she wants to avoid her mother's mistakes at all costs, so for the Prom, she decides to go with her group of friends and avoid dramas, but at the last minute her brother volunteered her to be the date of his best friend Troy, who has recently been dump by his girlfriend. Troy is an athlete, who has always been good to Heart, but she does not feel any kind attraction to him, which makes him a possible good date. But on the other hand Heart receives a proposal the same day to go to the dance with Ryan, a friend, she likes him but she does not feel any kind attraction towards him and after he tells her a secret, he´s also a possible good date for the dance.

And what does Heart do to decide between them? Throw a coin in the air and if its heads she will go with Troy and if its tails she will go with Ryan. Heart throws the coin and we never see how the coin falls, so in the subsequent chapters the story alternates in parallel between what would happen if it was Ryan or Troy. Personally, I like the stories of alternating or parallel realities very much in the style of Pivot Point by Kasie West, Just Like Fate by Cat Patrick or the movie Sliding Doors, where we see the classic "what if".

Ask Again Later is a contemporary novel with a funny, adorable story (one reality more than another) with a light romance, some drama, but nothing heavy. The plot has some aspects that irritated me, but nothing that I could not overcome. The book has a good ending, is what I expected and I recommend it when they want to read a light YA book.

Review: The Hating Game by Sally Thorne

Title: The Hating Game
Author: Sally Thorne
Publisher: William Morrow
Release date: August 9th 2016
Reading level: Ages 18 and up

Rating: 4.5/5

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Nemesis (n.)
1) An opponent or rival whom a person cannot best or overcome;
2) A person’s undoing;
3) Joshua Templeman.

Lucy Hutton and Joshua Templeman hate each other. Not dislike. Not begrudgingly tolerate. Hate. And they have no problem displaying their feelings through a series of ritualistic passive aggressive maneuvers as they sit across from each other, executive assistants to co-CEOs of a publishing company. Lucy can’t understand Joshua’s joyless, uptight, meticulous approach to his job. Joshua is clearly baffled by Lucy’s overly bright clothes, quirkiness, and Pollyanna attitude.

Now up for the same promotion, their battle of wills has come to a head and Lucy refuses to back down when their latest game could cost her her dream job…But the tension between Lucy and Joshua has also reached its boiling point, and Lucy is discovering that maybe she doesn’t hate Joshua. And maybe, he doesn’t hate her either. Or maybe this is just another game.

The Hating Game is a contemporary romance novel that focuses on a fun love-hate relationship between two co-workers.

Lucy Hutton is the executive assistant of one of the CEO of a publishing house, she´s good at her work, she´s always smiling, is the type that wants to please others and be good with everyone. She has a good working relationship everyone with the exception of her mortal enemy Joshua Templeman whom is the executive assistant of the other CEO of the publishing house, he´s also good at his job, but he´s cold, hard, rarely laughs (if ever) and only cares about doing his work well, regardless of whether he´s well liked or not. The publishing house where both currently work was merged a few months before and both come from different part of the publishers (they share office space and their desks are facing each other).

From the moment they met Lucy and Joshua hate each other (or at least that's what Lucy says) and start their game of hating each other. Lucy's life is lonely, every workday she goes to work, hate Joshua and then goes home, sleeps and the next day is a repeat of the day before until the day that at an office meeting it´s announced that a new position will be opened, for which Lucy is perfect as so is Joshua, so they start a new competition/game between them where the attacks between them change and they start to get to know each other a bit more and the dynamics they have had since they met starts to change and Lucy realizes that Joshua can smile occasionally and she realizes that whether or not Joshua wins, her life will not be the same once the winner is announced.

Overall, The Hating Game is a very funny chick-lit novel that had me laughing out loud more than once, I read it in two days (which is fast for me), it has a good romance, likeable characters (I did like Joshua), lots of sexual tension and great banter between them. This is the kind of  story that you end up with a big smile once you finish reading it. I really loved this book! and I recommend it to everyone that likes romance novels.

Review: All the Beautiful Lies by Peter Swanson

Title: All the Beautiful Lies
Author: Peter Swanson
Publisher: William Morrow
Release date: April 3rd 2018
Reading level: Ages 18 and up
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 4/5

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Harry Ackerson has always considered his stepmother Alice to be sexy and beautiful, in an "otherworldly" way. She has always been kind and attentive, if a little aloof in the last few years.

Days before his college graduation, Alice calls with shocking news. His father is dead and the police think it’s suicide. Devastated, Harry returns to his father’s home in Maine. There, he and Alice will help each other pick up of the pieces of their lives and uncover what happened to his father.

Shortly after he arrives, Harry meets a mysterious young woman named Grace McGowan. Though she claims to be new to the area, Harry begins to suspect that Grace may not be a complete stranger to his family. But she isn’t the only attractive woman taking an interest in Harry. The sensual Alice is also growing closer, coming on to him in an enticing, clearly sexual way.

Mesmerized by these two women, Harry finds himself falling deeper under their spell. Yet the closer he gets to them, the more isolated he feels, disoriented by a growing fear that both women are hiding dangerous—even deadly—secrets . . . and that neither one is telling the truth.

If you are in the mood of a good mystery thriller look no further, you found it! All the Beautiful Lies had me turning pages like crazy and sufficiently intrigued to want to know more about the main characters.

Harry Ackerson is young man that days before his college graduation receives a call from his stepmother telling him that his father is dead, so he travels to his hometown to learn more about the cause of his dead, initially he´s told that his father fell from a cliff, but Harry suspect something is wrong because his father took the same path everyday from work, so he knew it well.

Harry relationship with his stepmother is polite but he doesn´t know her well and he´s awkward around her, even though she had been married to his father for four years, his unease with her is justified (but you have to read it to know why).

The story is told in two parts, the first part is told from the perspective of Harry and Alice in different timeline, Harry´s point of view is in the present and Alice´s is in the past when she was a teenager (Alice story remind me of another book). The second part of the book is told from two different characters that have some kind of connection with Alice and Harry and again is told from two different timeline.

All the Beautiful Lies fascinating, dark and creepy at times, with some twisted taboo relationships. I recommend you read it, but beware that contain some delicate topics. And as I am of the idea that when you read a mystery book the less you know the better, I will say no more.

Review: Pines by Blake Crouch

Title: Pines (Wayward Pines #1)
Author: Blake Crouch 
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Release date: August 21st 2012

Rating: 4/5

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Secret service agent Ethan Burke arrives in Wayward Pines, Idaho, with a clear mission: locate and recover two federal agents who went missing in the bucolic town one month earlier. But within minutes of his arrival, Ethan is involved in a violent accident. He comes to in a hospital, with no ID, no cell phone, and no briefcase. The medical staff seems friendly enough, but something feels…off. As the days pass, Ethan’s investigation into the disappearance of his colleagues turns up more questions than answers. Why can’t he get any phone calls through to his wife and son in the outside world? Why doesn’t anyone believe he is who he says he is? And what is the purpose of the electrified fences surrounding the town? Are they meant to keep the residents in? Or something else out? Each step closer to the truth takes Ethan further from the world he thought he knew, from the man he thought he was, until he must face a horrifying fact—he may never get out of Wayward Pines alive.

Pines is one of those books that the less you know is better.

The story begins with a man waking up in the woods and the first thing he realizes is that it hurts to move and that he has several blows to his face and body, the second is that he does not know where he´s and the third is that he doesn´t remember anything about his life, so he gets up and starts walking until he arrives in a small town called Wayward Pines, there he starts to wander trying to remember whom he is and why he´s there and motivated by instinct he knows what and whom he can and cannot trust.

And the story follows him for several days, little by little he remembers whom he is and why he´s there, but there are things he doesn´t remember and is confused about many things. And within all this, the people of Wayward Pines, behave in a peculiar way and the village sheriff seems to have something against him. And among all this he doesn´t know who to trust, what to believe, and the more he investigates, he realizes that Wayward Pines is not what he expected.

Pines is a creepy sci-fi thriller that I recommend for science fiction fans, it has a super twist that really surprised me. I do recommend it.

Review: Tess of the Road by Rachel Hartman

Title: Tess of the Road
Author: Rachel Hartman
Publisher: Random House Books for Young
Release date: February 27th 2018
Source: Netgalley
Format: eARC

Rating: 3.5/5

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In the medieval kingdom of Goredd, women are expected to be ladies, men are their protectors, and dragons get to be whomever they want. Tess, stubbornly, is a troublemaker. You can't make a scene at your sister's wedding and break a relative's nose with one punch (no matter how pompous he is) and not suffer the consequences. As her family plans to send her to a nunnery, Tess yanks on her boots and sets out on a journey across the Southlands, alone and pretending to be a boy.

Where Tess is headed is a mystery, even to her. So when she runs into an old friend, it's a stroke of luck. This friend is a quigutl--a subspecies of dragon--who gives her both a purpose and protection on the road. But Tess is guarding a troubling secret. Her tumultuous past is a heavy burden to carry, and the memories she's tried to forget threaten to expose her to the world in more ways than one.

I loved Seraphina and Shadow Scale written by the same author, so when I saw that it was going to be another book in the same world, I knew that I had to read it.

Tess of the Road features sixteen-year-old Tess Dombegh, half-sister of Seraphina (main character of the Seraphina duology). Tess has spent the last two years in the court of Goredd, trying to get her twin sister a husband, but now that she has fulfilled her mission and her sister is about to get married, she has two options to enter a convent or to go live with her twin sister and future husband, and be the governess of her future nephews and nieces, but Tess makes a mistake and reveals a secret that could endanger her sister's marriage, so after the uproar her family decides to send her to the convent. But in the end Tess decides to flee and try to start a new life in the Kingdom of Ninys where nobody knows her and for greater security she decides to dress as a boy, since traveling as a woman is very dangerous. On the road she meets Pathka, a quigutl (a small species of sub-dragon), a childhood friend and someone who always told her fantastic stories about the huge snakes that lived under the earth. So once reunited they decide to travel together and look for these mythical creatures.

Tess had been impulsive and daring all her life, easy to get into trouble, in fact as a child she had the nickname "spank magnet", due to the spanks she received every time she got into trouble for her pranks, unlike her twin sister who always did the right thing and the proper thing of a lady. But due to a mistake she made when she was thirteen years old, her future change and despite her young age, she became bitter and resentful, in addition to having problems with alcohol, to mitigate her feelings of guilt.

Tess of the Road is about the journey of a young girl who tries to find her place in the world after having made mistakes that left her marked, as well as learning to love herself and forgive herself, in order to start a new life and not just run away from her problems.

Initially I was not liking the story because Tess is not a likeable person, so it took me a while to like the book, especially since I was waiting to see Seraphina, to which we get to see a little. Tess in the course of the story goes from a bitter and angry young woman to a woman who is learning her place in a difficult world where she lives because is a world difficult for a single women, without the protection of her family. In the end I liked it, it has a good ending that got me hooked to read the next book.

Review: Surprise Me by Sophie Kinsella

Title: Surprise Me
Author: Sophie Kinsella
Publisher: Dial Press
Release date: February 13th 2018
Source: Netgalley
Format: eARC

Rating: 3.5/5

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After being together for ten years, Sylvie and Dan have all the trimmings of a happy life and marriage; they have a comfortable home, fulfilling jobs, beautiful twin girls, and communicate so seamlessly, they finish each other's sentences. However, a trip to the doctor projects they will live another 68 years together and panic sets in. They never expected "until death do us part" to mean seven decades.

In the name of marriage survival, they quickly concoct a plan to keep their relationship fresh and exciting: they will create little surprises for each other so that their (extended) years together will never become boring. But in their pursuit to execute Project Surprise Me, mishaps arise and secrets are uncovered that start to threaten the very foundation of their unshakable bond. When a scandal from the past is revealed that question some important untold truths, they begin to wonder if they ever really knew each other after all.

This is the fourth book I´ve read from this author and it's different from her previous books that I´ve read, but in the end I did enjoyed it, it's very funny.

Surprise Me is about Sylvie and Dan, a couple that had been together for ten years, have been married for seven years and have five-year-old twins, they have a comfortable life and Sylvie considers that they have good communication as a couple and nothing can be better among them. Until they both go for an annual check-up and the doctor informs them that because of their good eating habits, that they exercise and that there are no hereditary diseases in the family, they have a life prospect of 68 years together, something that instead to cheer up them up, overwhelmed them, certainly when they decided to get married they did not think they would live for so many years, what will they do to keep their relationship for so many years?. Due to this question Sylvie decides to implement a project to Surprise Me, in which both will come up with little thing to surprise each other, so that there is novelty in their relationship, but not everything goes as they expect, in fact she begins to have doubts and realize that she does not really know her husband as well as she thought.

Sylvie thinks that their marriage is in the comfortable stage, they coordinate well as a couple, as parents, but once they both start to surprise each other, they begin to have ups and downs in their relationship.

I found it funny and strange that instead of being happy to have a good prospect of life, both begin to worry about being married for so long. It was very funny to see them try to surprise themselves and see that not all the surprises came out as well as they expect.

In the end, Surprise Me is a very funny and charming story, about a marriage that they did not know as well as they thought, they have a lot of misunderstandings and communication problems (without them there would be no plot), but at the end they have a good ending.

Review: The Body Finder by Kimberly Derting

Title: The Body Finder (The Body Finder #1)
Author: Kimberly Derting
Publisher: HarperCollins
Release date: March 16th 2010

Rating: 4/5

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Violet Ambrose is grappling with two major issues: Jay Heaton and her morbid secret ability. While the sixteen-year-old is confused by her new feelings for her best friend since childhood, she is more disturbed by her "power" to sense dead bodies—or at least those that have been murdered. Since she was a little girl, she has felt the echoes that the dead leave behind in the world... and the imprints that attach to their killers.

Violet has never considered her strange talent to be a gift; it mostly just led her to find the dead birds her cat had tired of playing with. But now that a serial killer has begun terrorizing her small town, and the echoes of the local girls he's claimed haunt her daily, she realizes she might be the only person who can stop him.

Despite his fierce protectiveness over her, Jay reluctantly agrees to help Violet on her quest to find the murderer—and Violet is unnerved to find herself hoping that Jay's intentions are much more than friendly. But even as Violet is getting closer and closer to discovering a killer... she might become his next prey.

This is the second time I read The Body Finder and I quite enjoyed it, maybe not as much as when I read it in 2011, but it is still a good story of the paranormal-mystery genre with some romance and has its creepy and chilling parts. I do recommended it.

The Body Finder tells the story of Violet, a sixteen-year-old girl that for as long as she can remember she can detect the bodies of animals that did not die of natural causes, since the bodies leave an echo to which she´s pulled when she is near them . In all her life she had only found a human body when she was a child while playing in the forest, but that changed when a sixteen years old Violet, found the body of a young girl and from that moment her is life changed, because she found one of victims of a serial killer who has been terrorizing her town.

Part of her ability is that she can detect echoes in animals or people that were killed and the other part is that she can detect an identical imprint in the killer, so when Violet discovers that the body she found is not the first victim she decides to do something about it with her ability and try to find the killer with the help of her reluctant best friend Jay.

A part that I liked a lot about this book is that there are certain chapters from the killer point of view, these chapters made it a bit creepy, which is good in this kind of books.

The plot is not only to find the murderer, but also about the possible romance between Violet and Jay, whom is her best friend, and to whom she recently been attracted to.

And something that could not be missing (if not, there was no story to tell) is that Violet, more than once put herself in danger. Added to this the story takes place in a small town that is surrounded by forest, in fact the backyard of Violet´s house is a forest, which increases the suspense in some scenes.

I was glad to read it again, since the first time I only read the first two books in the tetralogy and I need to know how Violet's story ends.

Review: The Kiss of Deception by Mary E. Pearson

Title: The Kiss of Deception (The Remnant Chronicles #1)
Author: Mary E. Pearson
Publisher: Henry Holt
Release date: July 15th 2014

Rating: 3.5/5

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Princess Lia is First Daughter of the House of Morrighan, a kingdom steeped in tradition, duty, and the stories of a bygone world.  She flees on her wedding day, shirking her duty, but is determined to marry for love and not to secure a political alliance.

Pursued by bounty hunters, she finds refuge in a distant village and settles into a new life, hopeful when two handsome strangers arrive.  She doesn’t know that one is the jilted prince and the other an assassin sent to kill her.  Deception abounds and Lia finds herself on the brink of unlocking perilous secrets—even as she finds herself falling in love.

The Kiss of Deception is a fantasy book that takes place in a world where there are three great kingdoms, the Kingdom of Morrighan, the Kingdom of Dalbreck and the Kingdom of Venda. The Kingdom of Venda is considered savage, barbarian and its citizens have almost no interaction with the other kingdoms, and the other kingdoms are weary of them so the other two kingdoms decide to form an alliance by marrying Princess Lia, First Daughter of the House of Morrighan and the Crown Prince of the Dalbreck Kingdom.

The story begins with Princess Lia fleeing the day of her wedding along with her best friend Pauline, since she hopes to marry out of love and not out of obligation as her parents did. Both flee and begin to live in a small fishing village, working in an inn, where they think to live for the rest of their lives.

On the other hand there are two young guys that are looking for her, one is the prince of Dalbreck, whom after being jilted on the day of his wedding, he wants to meet the princess, without any apparent plan beyond knowing her. And on the other hand we have another young man who is an assassin sent to eliminate Lia. When Lia meets them, they both seem attractive but she is attracted to one of them, and what follows is a kind of friendship-courtship between her and both; and for most of the book we as readers do not know which is which, but when we finally know who is the assassin and who´s the prince the story changes and it´s when Lia's adventure begins.

Overall, I enjoyed reading The Kiss of Deception, but it took me a while to finish reading it, because when I found out the identity of the assassin and the prince, I don´t know what happened to me but I stopped reading the book, maybe it could be that I start to read it a couple of days before New Year´s Eve, but it took me more than a week to read this book, but once I got back to it, I read it relatively quickly and I do intend to continue reading the trilogy.

Review: Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn

Title: Sharp Objects
Author: Gillian Flynn
Publisher: Broadway Books
Release date: September 26th 2006
Reading level: Ages 18 and up

Rating: 4.5/5

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Fresh from a brief stay at a psych hospital, reporter Camille Preaker faces a troubling assignment: she must return to her tiny hometown to cover the murders of two preteen girls. For years, Camille has hardly spoken to her neurotic, hypochondriac mother or to the half-sister she barely knows, a beautiful thirteen-year-old with an eerie grip on the town. Now, installed in her old bedroom in her family's Victorian mansion, Camille finds herself identifying with the young victims—a bit too strongly. Dogged by her own demons, she must unravel the psychological puzzle of her own past if she wants to get the story—and survive this homecoming. 

In the months October and November I read several thrillers and Sharp Objects is among my favorites of them, because the plot hooked me from the beginning and it has very good twists and turns, although it was disturbing and had quite dark parts, it´s a very good book.

And as I am of the idea in regards to the books of the genre thriller-mystery that the less you know the better, I will not go into much details.

Camille is a thirty-year-old reporter, whom after several years away from her hometown, returns to cover for her newspaper the disappearance of a 10-year-old girl and the murder of another 9-year-old girl that occurred months earlier, and instead of going to a hotel, she stays at her mother´s and stepfather´s house with whom she has a difficult relationship, especially her mother. Once there, she begins interviewing both the local police chief and the parents of the girls, but in general she finds resistance from the police and the parents of one of the girls, as they don´t want to talk to her, so her stay lengthens until she gets the story and she approaches certain important people near the victims, but while all this happens, Camille remembers the reason why she didn´t want to return to her home town, besides meeting for the first time her 13-year-old half-sister. The problems she is having with her coverage, coupled with the problems she has with her family, make her personal demons reappear.

Sharp Objects is a rather dark thriller novel that is sometimes quite graphic in details and has disturbing scenes that can be uncomfortable and somewhat chilling and creepy, with a plot that is not pretty and with a shocking ending, but overall is a really good book. I highly recommend it.

Review: The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly by Stephanie Oakes

Title: The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly
Author: Stephanie Oakes
Publisher: Dial/Penguin
Release date: June 9th 2015

Rating: 4/5

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The Kevinian cult has taken everything from seventeen-year-old Minnow: twelve years of her life, her family, her ability to trust.

And when she rebelled, they took away her hands, too.

Now their Prophet has been murdered and their camp set aflame, and it's clear that Minnow knows something—but she's not talking. As she languishes in juvenile detention, she struggles to un-learn everything she has been taught to believe, adjusting to a life behind bars and recounting the events that led up to her incarceration. But when an FBI detective approaches her about making a deal, Minnow sees she can have the freedom she always dreamed of—if she’s willing to part with the terrible secrets of her past.

The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly is a hard-hitting and hopeful story about the dangers of blind faith—and the power of having faith in oneself.

I finished reading this book a week ago, but at the time I didn´t know how to rated it, because I had to think and assimilate the story and reread the ending. since it is not a closed ending, but an open ending with hope of  a better future.

The story begins with 17-year-old Minnow in the city and she had just committed a crime, for which she´s arrested and subsequently sent to Juvenal Detention Center. Minnow recently lost her hands and through her memories and the stories she tells her cellmate and the Doctor who works for the FBI, she´s revealing her story little by little, how she managed to escape and what happened night of the fire in her commune.

Minnow Bly was born in the city but when she was 5 years old, her father met the Prophet and shortly after she and her parents, the Prophet and more families went into the forest and created a commune in an inaccessible part of the forest, with the intention of never returning to civilization, since outside the commune the world is condemned and only those who live in the commune will be saved. So Minnow grew up with beliefs taught by the Prophet, she doesn´t know how to read because it isn´t necessary for women to know how to read, since their duty is to marry and have children, Minnow has many mothers since polygamous marriage is allowed and she has more than 15 siblings and she´s about to reach the age when God will called her to fulfill her mission of getting married and having children. But Minnow has trouble understanding or accepting the commandments of the Kevinian cult which is what ultimately gets her in trouble.

I think that with what I had the most problems with was the cultural shock, since the rules of worship could apply in some historical books, but it was the fact that it happened in modern day was what surprised me, when Minnow talked or remembered some teaching of the Prophet .

The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly is a contemporary book with chilling and creepy moments where we see how humans can become monsters and sometimes the worst ones can be the ones you trust. But it also has its light moments and despite the strong and dark moments it ends with a good note, so in the end it does not feel too heavy. It´s a good book with a plot that keeps you interested through 400 pages.

Review: Dangerous Girls by Abigail Haas

Title: Dangerous Girls
Author: Abigail Haas
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Release date: July 16th 2013

Rating: 5/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

It's Spring Break of senior year. Anna, her boyfriend Tate, her best friend Elise, and a few other close friends are off on a debaucherous trip to Aruba that promises to be the time of their lives. But when Elise is found brutally murdered, Anna finds herself trapped in a country not her own, fighting against vile and contemptuous accusations.

As Anna sets out to find her friend's killer, she discovers hard truths about her friendships, the slippery nature of truth, and the ache of young love.

As she awaits the judge's decree, it becomes clear that everyone around her thinks she is not just guilty, but dangerous. When the truth comes out, it is more shocking than one could ever imagine...

Dangerous Girls had been in my kindle for a long time, I do not remember where I saw it first, but it caught my eye because it´s a YA murder mystery, but before I start reading it, I did not read the blurb, so I started reading it without any idea what it was about and it really surprised me. From the first page it hooked me (this is another book that I read very fast).

Without going into much detail, because as in all thrillers the less you know the better. the story is about Anna a young woman whom on her spring break vacation goes with a group of friends to Aruba and in the group is her best friend Elise and her boyfriend Tate. And these group of friends go with the idea of ​​having fun without restrictions, so there are alcohol, drugs and sexual encounters with strangers and more, but the fun stops abruptly when Elise is killed and Anna is the main suspect of her murder. So Anna is in another country, where the law is different and where she seems to be the scapegoat of a highly publicized case.

Anna's group of friends is made up of privileged children, whom are children of politicians, bankers, CEOs, etc. and Anna is a new-rich, so she´s new to their world, so her family is not as powerful as that of her friends.

The story reminds me of those murder mystery films, where everyone could have a motive to murder Elise, both her friends and people they meet on the island and I came to doubt many and had several of my suspects. The book begins with murder and little by little there are leaps in the plot between the present and the past, all seen from Anna's point of view, where we see the dynamics of the group and how it was Elise with her friends.

I loved Dangerous Girls! is a dark story about teenagers without limits, but the main plot is the murder mystery and the highly publicized trial against Anna. I have no idea whether the trial is realistic or not, but it seemed that the prosecutor distort the facts to make Anna look guilty.

I highly recommend it, it's mind-blowing, but keep in mind that there are strong themes, so I recommend it for mature YA.

Review: This Darkness Mine by Mindy McGinnis

This Darkness MineThe Dem
Author: Cinda 
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Release date: October 10th 2017
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 3.5/5

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Sasha Stone knows her place—first-chair clarinet, top of her class, and at the side of her oxford-wearing boyfriend. She’s worked her entire life to ensure that her path to Oberlin Conservatory as a star musician is perfectly paved.

But suddenly there’s a fork in the road, in the shape of Isaac Harver. Her body shifts toward him when he walks by, her skin misses his touch even though she’s never known it, and she relishes the smell of him—smoke, beer, and trouble—all the things she’s avoided to get where she is. Even worse, every time he’s near Sasha, her heart stops, literally. Why does he know her so well—too well—and she doesn’t know him at all?

Sasha discovers that her by-the-book life began by ending another’s: the twin sister she absorbed in the womb. But that doesn’t explain the gaps of missing time in her practice schedule or the memories she has of things she certainly never did with Isaac. As Sasha loses her much-cherished control, her life—and heart—become more entangled with Isaac. Armed with the knowledge that her heart might not be hers alone, Sasha must decide what she’s willing to do—and who she’s willing to hurt—to take it back.

Edgar Award–winning author Mindy McGinnis delivers a dark and gripping psychological thriller about a girl at war with herself, and what it really means to be good or bad.

This Darkness Mine is a Young Adult psychological thriller, quite dark and has an unreliable main character.

Sasha is a 17 year-old girl, in her senior year of high school, she´s the valedictorian, is the first clarinet in her school and her goal is to enter the Oberlin Conservatory, so she practises her clarinet for hours every day, in addition to having the perfect boyfriend to match her image, but everything changes when Sasha starts to not remember some periods of time and Isaac a rebellious classmate begins to talk to her as if they know each other and he makes comments of things that can not be possible. Besides her heart accelerates every time he´s close and she knows things about him that she shouldn´t know. And the things in her life become stranger when she discovers that she had a twin who died in the womb and that she absorbed her (vanishing twin syndrome) and Sasha begins to doubt that her twin sister has completely disappeared and that she´s a part of Sasha.

This is the fifth book of the author that I´ve read, so I already have an idea about what to expect, since her books are typically raw and dark. Where the main character isn´t necessarily a nice and likeable person, but usually they´re strong, intriguing and malicious when necessary, they do everything to survive, something that I enjoyed in her books, but it can be a little shocking for those who are not accustomed to her way of telling stories.

Overall, it´s an interesting, intriguing, dark and twisted story that hook me and couldn´t put down. I read it relatively fast, since I had to know what was going to happen with the main character and when I finished reading I did not know if I liked it or not ... It´s a weird story and I had to process it. In the last chapters there are several shocking twist and has an interesting ending.
And due to certain scenes I recommend it to mature Young Adult.

Review: Halfway to the Grave by Jeaniene Frost

Title:  Halfway to the Grave (Night Huntress #1)
Author: Jeaniene Frost
Publisher: Avon
Release date: October 30th 2007
Reading level: Ages 18 and up

Rating: 4.5/5

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Half-vampire Catherine Crawfield is going after the undead with a vengeance, hoping that one of these deadbeats is her father - the one responsible for ruining her mother's life. Then she's captured by Bones, a vampire bounty hunter, and is forced into an unholy partnership.

In exchange for finding her father, Cat agrees to train with the sexy night stalker until her battle reflexes are as sharp as his fangs. She's amazed she doesn't end up as his dinner - are there actually good vampires? Pretty soon Bones will have her convinced that being half-dead doesn't have to be all bad. But before she can enjoy her newfound status as kick-ass demon hunter, Cat and Bones are pursued by a group of killers. Now Cat will have to choose a side . . . and Bones is turning out to be as tempting as any man with a heartbeat.

Halfway to the Grave is the first book in the Night Huntress series, which consists of 7 books, plus several spin-offs and the main character is Cat Crawfield a 22 year old woman, she hunts and kills vampires because her mother feels a great hatred against vampires (because she was abused by one of them), so she taught Cat at a young age to hate such monsters. That´s why night after night Cat goes out to hunt them with the intention of killing them until one night she meets with Bones a vampire who is not so easy to kill and in which she´ll forge an alliance where he would teach her a little more of the supernatural world .

Because Cat is half vampire and half human, she´s stronger, faster and has better senses than a human, something that she uses in her favor when she fights the monsters, but Bones will slowly demonstrate to her that not all vampires are villains, and that among humans there are also monsters, something that initially she doesn´t see because of her hatred so ingrained to vampires.

The romance develops slowly due to Cat's prejudices and also Bones doesn´t try to seduce her immediately, but takes his time to gain her confidence, although it´s obvious that there is attraction between them.

Overall, Halfway to the Grave is a very good beginning of a series, with romance, action and has an cliffhanger ending that hooks you to continue reading the series. This is the second time I read the book and I really enjoyed it again. I recommend it for fans of paranormal romance novels.

Review: Love & Gelato by Jenna Evans Welch

Title: Love & Gelato
Author: Jenna Evans Welch
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Release date: May 3rd 2016

Rating: 4/5

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“I made the wrong choice.”

Lina is spending the summer in Tuscany, but she isn’t in the mood for Italy’s famous sunshine and fairy-tale landscape. She’s only there because it was her mother’s dying wish that she get to know her father. But what kind of father isn’t around for sixteen years? All Lina wants to do is get back home.

But then she is given a journal that her mom had kept when she lived in Italy. Suddenly Lina’s uncovering a magical world of secret romances, art, and hidden bakeries. A world that inspires Lina, along with the ever-so-charming Ren, to follow in her mother’s footsteps and unearth a secret that has been kept for far too long. It’s a secret that will change everything she knew about her mother, her father—and even herself.

People come to Italy for love and gelato, someone tells her, but sometimes they discover much more.

Love & Gelato is a contemporary novel that takes place in Tuscany, Italy and features a young girl whom is going to spend her summer vacation with all the intention of hating everything, as she´s forced by a promise she made to her mother, but ends up falling in love with Tuscany and the people she meets there.

Lina recently lost her mother and before she died, she asked her to go to Tuscany and meet Howard, whom was her best friend at the time she lived in Tuscany and that him will take care of her. When Lina meets Howard, who happens to be her father, she decides to meet him, to spend her vacation there, but once the summer ends, she hopes to return to her old life in the United States. But not everything is as she expected since once there she receives her mother's diary of her time there as a student and little by little with the help of Ren (a young Italian she meets near her home), she decides to visit all the places that her mother writes about in her diary and maybe that way she´ll know a little more about her and Howard and she will see her father through her mother´s eyes.

I love these types of books where you follow clues or in this case a diary where you are slowly discovering the story or some other element along with the characters, in this case Lina visits the places that her mother mentioned in her diary and we get to see Tuscany along with her, in addition to also know a little more about her mother´s life before she had her and we go along with her as she visit parts of the city with her new friend and love interest.

I really enjoyed it and it´s one of those books that leave you with a very good feeling and looking forward to visiting Italy. I do recommend it, if you enjoy cute contemporary novels. I´m looking forward to reading more of her books.

Review: They Both Die at the End by Adam Silvera

Title: They Both Die at the End
Author: Adam Silvera
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release date: September 5th 2017
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 4/5

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On September 5, a little after midnight, Death-Cast calls Mateo Torrez and Rufus Emeterio to give them some bad news: They're going to die today. Mateo and Rufus are total strangers, but, for different reasons, they're both looking to make a new friend on their End Day. The good news: There's an app for that. It's called the Last Friend, and through it, Rufus and Mateo are about to meet up for one last great adventure and to live a lifetime in a single day.

This is the first book I´ve read written by Adam Silvera and what caught my attention was the name of the book They Both Die at the End, it simply intrigue me and after reading the synopsis I knew I had to read it (Unlike of someone close to me, whom said that she didn´t want to read it because she already knew the end).

The story unfolds in what I assume is an alternate world, since every day in the early hours of the morning people who are going to die that day are warned by telephone through the service Death-Cast, which is a 100% accurate service and if you receive their call that day, it means that you are going to die before the day is over, but the rules are that they do not tell you in what way or at what time, just that you are going to die, so that you put your things in order, make your farewells and even have your funeral if you wish.

The story begins on September 5, 2017 when Mateo receives his call from Death-Cast, he is an insecure young man of 18 years of age and who has always lived a life without risking for fear of being wrong, so when he receives his call initially is paralyzed by fear and does not want to leave his apartment for fear of dying prematurely, but eventually decides not to spend his last day in the world alone so by means of an app called Last Friend he finds Rufus.

Rufus a 17-year-old boy, he also receives his Death-Cast call and for an event that happens when he receives his call, he can not spend his last day with his adoptive family, so through the Last Friend app, he meets Mateo and together they spend their last day together.

Both will help each other, Rufus will help Mateo, he will help him to do things he would not normally do, while Mateo will help Rufus to accept himself and be a better person, since the latter had been angry with life for some time.

I liked that the book takes place in a day, and in that time both become good friends, as they both tell things they have not told anyone and also develop romantic feelings for each other. The end is what I had expected, but it left me wanting to know more, one more paragraph, but I understand why it end up like this.

They Both Die at the End is a contemporary novel with sci-fi vibes and I really enjoyed it.

Review: The Secret History of Us by Jessi Kirby

Title: The Secret History of Us
Author: Jessi Kirby
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release date: September 7th 2010
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 3.5/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

Gorgeously written and emotionally charged, The Secret History of Us explores the difficult journey of a teenage girl who must piece her life together after losing her memory in a near-fatal accident.

When Olivia awakes in a hospital bed following a car accident that almost took her life, she can’t remember the details about how she got there. She figures the fog is just a symptom of being in a week-long coma, but as time goes on, she realizes she’s lost more than just the last several days of her life—she’s lost her memory of the last four years. Gone is any recollection of starting or graduating high school; the prom; or her steady boyfriend Matt. Trying to figure out who she is feels impossible when everyone keeps telling her who she was.

As Liv tries to block out what her family and friends say about who she used to be, the one person she hasn’t heard enough from is Walker, the guy who saved her the night her car was knocked off that bridge into the bay below. Walker is the hardened boy who’s been keeping his distance—and the only person Olivia inexplicably feels herself with. With her feelings growing for Walker, tensions rising with Matt, and secrets she can’t help but feel are being kept from her, Olivia must find her place in a life she doesn’t remember living.

I read The Secret History of Us in record time at least for me, I admit that is not a very long book since it only has 288 pages, but I read it in a matter of hours that for me is very fast, because the plot hooked me from the prologue and it really did not let go until the end.

The story begins with Olivia waking up in the hospital, not knowing what she does there, nor how she got there, when she wakes up she´s inform that she was in a car accident and that's it, shortly afterwards they give more details of her accident, but all the information that her parents give her was very ambiguous, since they do not want to upset her and they also want to protect her. Several chapters went by before we learned that Olivia has amnesia (something that is not spoiler because it comes in the blurb), and that she didn´t remember several years of her life. A great part of the plot lies around her loss of memory and how she discovers things that had changed in her life, as she is no longer friends with certain people from her childhood, nor does she follows one of her great passions and now she has a boyfriend whom she doesn´t remember and that all the people close to her tell her that they were madly in love with each other, but she does not feel anything when she with him.

Something that I saw as impossible or that she had very bad doctors, is that they don´t test her to see how her memory is soon after she wakes up, after having a car accident, in addition to being hospitalized and in a week-induced coma, it isn´t until Olivia makes a comment about it, that the doctor made some tests on her.

Apart from that, we see how Olivia returned to her life where everyone tells her how she was before the accident and she tries to do the same things for the sake of others, but little by little she realizes that there are things of her that nobody knew and that little by little she begins to discover new things about her.

Overall, I enjoyed The Secret History of Us, it's a good story about where the main character is amnesic and her life after her accident , it has a few twists to the end of the story and it has a good ending.

Review: Hello, Sunshine by Leila Howland

Title: Hello, Sunshine
Author: Leila Howland
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Release date: July 11th 2017
Format: ARC

Rating: 3.5/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

A Prep School Girl with a Hollywood Dream

Becca Harrington is a reject. After being rebuffed by every college on her list, she needs a fresh start, so she packs up everything and moves to LA, giving herself one year to land an acting gig or kill herself trying.

Unfortunately, not everything turns out as planned, and after a few grueling months, LA is looking like the worst idea ever. As hard as she tries, Becca can’t land an agent, she's running out of cash, and her mom is hounding her to apply to more schools. In an act of desperation, Becca and her friend Marisol start posting short videos online—with the help of their adorable filmmaker neighbor, Raj—and the videos catch the attention of a TV producer. Could this be it? Her big break? Or will she have to move back home with nothing but some bad head shots and a monstrous credit-card bill?

Becca may not get the Hollywood ending she was hoping for, but perhaps she’ll learn there’s more than one way to achieve her dream.

Readers will love every page of this funny, romantic, aspirational, and ultimately triumphant novel about a girl who just wants to make it on her own.

Hello, Sunshine is a cute, light and fun contemporary young adult novel.

Becca, an 18-year-old girl recently graduated from high school, whom after receiving her rejection letters from all the universities that she applied, decides to go to Los Angeles to try her luck and see if she can become an actress. Her mother gives her a year to follow her dream, but after that lapse she must try to apply to some other university.

Becca has a plan, living with her cousin while she finds her way at LA and getting an agent as soon as possible, but from the moment she arrives to California nothing comes out as she expected and soon realizes that achieving her dream will not be as easy as she hoped, since it isn´t so easy to get an appointment with a good agent and the money she had is is running out faster than she thought so she´s resorting to her credit card and her debts increase, so her dream is further every day, but she does not lose hope of reaching it.

Overall, Hello, Sunshine is an ideal novel for the summer, a light read without much heavy drama, where we see a bit of the life of a young aspiring actress.

Review: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzi Lee

Title: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue
Author: Mackenzi Lee
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Release date: June 27th 2017
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 4.5/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

An unforgettable tale of two friends on their Grand Tour of 18th-century Europe who stumble upon a magical artifact that leads them from Paris to Venice in a dangerous manhunt, fighting pirates, highwaymen, and their feelings for each other along the way.

Henry “Monty” Montague was born and bred to be a gentleman, but he was never one to be tamed. The finest boarding schools in England and the constant disapproval of his father haven’t been able to curb any of his roguish passions—not for gambling halls, late nights spent with a bottle of spirits, or waking up in the arms of women or men.

But as Monty embarks on his grand tour of Europe, his quest for a life filled with pleasure and vice is in danger of coming to an end. Not only does his father expect him to take over the family’s estate upon his return, but Monty is also nursing an impossible crush on his best friend and traveling companion, Percy.

Still it isn’t in Monty’s nature to give up. Even with his younger sister, Felicity, in tow, he vows to make this yearlong escapade one last hedonistic hurrah and flirt with Percy from Paris to Rome. But when one of Monty’s reckless decisions turns their trip abroad into a harrowing manhunt that spans across Europe, it calls into question everything he knows, including his relationship with the boy he adores.

Witty, romantic, and intriguing at every turn, The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue is a sumptuous romp that explores the undeniably fine lines between friendship and love.

This book is really really good! I didn't expect to like it that much despite having seen good reviews of it. The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue is a historical fiction book that takes place in the 18th century and which features a bisexual young man.

Monty is described as a handsome young man who knows that is handsome, he´s immature, charming and accustomed to using his charms to get what he wants, be they beautiful maidens or handsome gentlemen, but he´s in love with his best friend Percy.

Lord Henry Montague, Viscount of Disley or Monty as the people close to him call him, is heir to the title of viscount in his family and therefore he´s expected to take over the family estate under the guidance of his father with whom he doesn´t have a good relationship because he was expelled from Eton. So his father sends him on his Grand Tour through Europe for a year, but on his return he´s expected to not cause any more problems or else. So Monty travels with his best friend Percy for which he has romantic feelings and his younger sister Felicity whom they have to take to finishing school along the way, but plans change when in France, Monty as prank or sort of revenge takes an object that puts them in serious problems, since from that moment onwards there will be people chasing them in order to recover the object.

Due that there are a group of highwaymen following them, Monty, Percy and Felicity will have to leave their itinerary and flee through Europe, where they will have adventures that will include pirates and other dangers.

Overall, I loved this book, it was a lot of fun and I really care for Monty, he´s lovable and I liked him, because more than once he's the young gentleman in distress that needs to be rescued or helped by his younger sister or Percy. I really enjoyed the romance, the historical elements as well as mythical (or magical) elements. It has a good ending and I just found out that it will have a companion novel where the main character will be Felicity, so I cannot wait to read it.

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