Review: Ice Like Fire by Sara Raasch

Title: Ice Like Fire (Snow Like Ashes #2)
Author: Sara Raasch
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Release date: October 13th 2015
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 3.5/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

You can read my review of Snow Like Ashes - here

It’s been three months since the Winterians were freed and Spring’s king, Angra, disappeared—thanks largely to the help of Cordell.

Meira just wants her people to be safe. When Cordellan debt forces the Winterians to dig their mines for payment, they unearth something powerful and possibly dangerous: Primoria’s lost chasm of magic. Theron sees this find as an opportunity—with this much magic, the world can finally stand against threats like Angra. But Meira fears the danger the chasm poses—the last time the world had access to so much magic, it spawned the Decay. So when the king of Cordell orders the two on a mission across the kingdoms of Primoria to discover the chasm’s secrets, Meira plans to use the trip to garner support to keep the chasm shut and Winter safe—even if it means clashing with Theron. But can she do so without endangering the people she loves?

Mather just wants to be free. The horrors inflicted on the Winterians hang fresh and raw in Januari—leaving Winter vulnerable to Cordell’s growing oppression. When Meira leaves to search for allies, he decides to take Winter’s security into his own hands. Can he rebuild his broken kingdom and protect them from new threats?

As the web of power and deception weaves tighter, Theron fights for magic, Mather fights for freedom—and Meira starts to wonder if she should be fighting not just for Winter, but for the world.

Ice Like Fire begins three months after the end of Snow Like Ashes, so we get to see Meira dealing with the aftermath of winning the war against the Kingdom of Spring and freed the citizens of Winter of the concentration camps, those who after 16 years in exile returned to the Winter´s Kingdom to try to rebuild it, but it's not easy because after so many years away and most of the citizens sick and/or malnourished, it´ll take a long time to rebuild, time that the Winter´s Kingdom doesn´t have, due that the Kingdom of Cordell once that helped them throw off the yoke of Spring´s Kingdom, is pushing hard for their pay, it´s exploding their mines trying to find the "chasm of magic", which had been lost for centuries and there is speculation that the "chasm" will give magic to everyone, something Meira is not willing to let happen, because this could create chaos as it once did. Meira embarks on a journey through various kingdoms trying to find allies, besides trying to find the keys of the chasm of magic in order to safeguard them and prevent them from falling into the wrong hands.

So Meira, Theron, some soldiers and some people close to her make the long journey, visiting different kingdoms and during that trip Theron and Meira start having disagreements with regard to the "chasm of magic" and their relationship it becomes strained.

Ice Like Fire is told from two points of views, the main one being Meira´s, but there is also the point of view of Mather and through his POV we get to see what´s happening on Januari, Winter´s capital in the Meira´s absence.

In this second book of the series we get to know more about the world of Primoria, since Meira travels to the kingdoms of Summer, Yakim and Ventrall, I liked how each realm because they were so different, from their clothes, their physical features and their technological advances.

I felt it was a little predictable or at least I had a bad feeling about what might happen and I was right on almost all my predictions, but I could not help feeling that as the moment of truth approached, some kind of collision that can not be stopped and you just have to sit and watch to happen, despite my protests.

The ending was good but many events happen one after another, some of them I was just processing them when other major event happened. Ice Like Fire it isn´t as good as its predecessor, but it was a good second book and let me hooked to read the next book. Can´t wait to read the next installment.

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Waiting On Wednesday (193): Ruined

Waiting On Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

The book I´m waiting this week is

Ruined (Untitled #1) by Amy Tintera

Release date: May 3rd 2016

A revenge that will consume her.

A love that will ruin her.

Emelina Flores has nothing. Her home in Ruina has been ravaged by war. She lacks the powers of her fellow Ruined. Worst of all, she witnessed her parents’ brutal murders and watched helplessly as her sister, Olivia, was kidnapped.

But because Em has nothing, she has nothing to lose. Driven by a blind desire for revenge, Em sets off on a dangerous journey to the enemy kingdom of Lera. Somewhere within Lera’s borders, Em hopes to find Olivia. But in order to find her, Em must infiltrate the royal family.

In a brilliant, elaborate plan of deception and murder, Em marries Prince Casimir, next in line to take Lera’s throne. If anyone in Lera discovers Em is not Casimir’s true betrothed, Em will be executed on the spot. But it’s the only way to salvage Em’s kingdom and what is left of her family.

Em is determined to succeed, but the closer she gets to the prince, the more she questions her mission. Em’s rage-filled heart begins to soften. But with her life—and her family—on the line, love could be Em’s deadliest mistake. 

What book are you waiting this week?

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It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is a meme hosted by Book Date.

Each week we spotlight the books we are reading, planning on reading or just finished reading.

Click on the image to look description in Goodreads.

Finished reading

The Demon King (Seven Realms #1) by Cinda Williams Chima (4.5/5 stars)
The Lies About Truth by Courtney C. Stevens (4/5 stars)

What I´m going to read next?

What are you reading today?

Leave me your links!

Waiting On Wednesday (192): Girl Against the Universe

Waiting On Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

The book I´m waiting this week is

Girl Against the Universe by Paula Stokes 

Release date: May 17th 2016

Maguire is bad luck.

No matter how many charms she buys off the internet or good luck rituals she performs each morning, horrible things happen when Maguire is around. Like that time the rollercoaster jumped off its tracks. Or the time the house next door caught on fire. Or that time her brother, father, and uncle were all killed in a car crash—and Maguire walked away with barely a scratch.

It’s safest for Maguire to hide out in her room, where she can cause less damage and avoid meeting new people who she could hurt. But then she meets Jordy, an aspiring tennis star. Jordy is confident, talented, and lucky, and he’s convinced he can help Maguire break her unlucky streak. Maguire knows that the best thing she can do for Jordy is to stay away. But it turns out staying away is harder than she thought.

From author Paula Stokes comes a funny and poignant novel about accepting the past, embracing the future, and learning to make your own luck. 

What book are you waiting this week?

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Review: I Crawl Through It by A.S. King

Title: I Crawl Through It 
Author: A.S. King
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Release date: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Source: Netgalley
Format: eARC

Rating: 2/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

Four teenagers are on the verge of exploding. The anxieties they face at every turn have nearly pushed them to the point of surrender: senseless high-stakes testing, the lingering damage of past trauma, the buried grief and guilt of tragic loss. They are desperate to cope, but no one is listening.

So they will lie. They will split in two. They will turn inside out. They will even build an invisible helicopter to fly themselves far away...but nothing releases the pressure. Because, as they discover, the only way to truly escape their world is to fly right into it.

The genius of acclaimed author A.S. King reaches new heights in this groundbreaking work of surrealist fiction; it will mesmerize readers with its deeply affecting exploration of how we crawl through traumatic experience-and find the way out. 

I really try to like this book because it´s written by A.S. King author of Everybody See the Ants and although it´s a weird book, I did enjoyed it, but I came pretty close to not finish reading I Crawl Through It, but I decided not to give up and read it to the end, but it just did not liked it.

First of all it´s a very strange, surreal book with unreliable characters (in other books I´ve enjoyed this type of character) and quite frustrating. This was definitely not a book for me, but maybe other people will like it.

The lives of four teenagers who cope day to day in different ways (and some of them have PTSD) is intertwined in the story of Stanzi who feels she´s divided in two, likes to dissect frogs, and wears a lab coat at all times, with constantly absent parents and she´s hopelessly in love with her friend Gustav. Gustav spends his free time building a red helicopter which is invisible, no one can see it except Stanzi (but she can only see it on Tuesdays). China is a girl that due to something that happened long ago has swallowed herself and loves to write poems. And Lansdale is a compulsive liar and that due to this fact her hair grows every time she tells a lie (like Pinocchio).

I started reading Crawl Through It with great expectations but it may be that surrealistic novels are not for me or at least this one failed to capture my attention, it´s extremely weird and bizarre. This book wasn't for me, but I will try to read other A.S. King´s books.

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is a meme hosted by Book Date.

Each week we spotlight the books we are reading, planning on reading or just finished reading.

Click on the image to look description in Goodreads.

Finished reading

Magic Slays (Kate Daniels #5) by Ilona Andrews (4.5/5 stars)
The Distance Between Us by Kasie West (4/5 stars)

What I´m going to read next?

What are you reading today?

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Review: The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness

Title: The Rest of Us Just Live Here
Author: Patrick Ness
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release date: October 6th 2015
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 3.5/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

What if you aren’t the Chosen One?

The one who’s supposed to fight the zombies, or the soul-eating ghosts, or whatever the heck this new thing is, with the blue lights and the death?

What if you’re like Mikey? Who just wants to graduate and go to prom and maybe finally work up the courage to ask Henna out before someone goes and blows up the high school. Again.

Because sometimes there are problems bigger than this week’s end of the world, and sometimes you just have to find the extraordinary in your ordinary life.

Even if your best friend is worshiped by mountain lions.

Award-winning writer Patrick Ness’s bold and irreverent novel powerfully reminds us that there are many different types of remarkable. 

I was a fan of the TV show - Buffy the Vampire Slayer and it seems that Patrick Ness also liked it because there are several references that reminded me of the TV series, but with this story the author wanted to focus on those who are not the "chosen one", they aren´t even friends of the "chosen one", so that the main character of this story are those who regularly on a supernatural/paranormal stories, are the extras, the background. This story reads almost like a contemporary novel, because it has some supernatural elements, but it´s not the main of the plot.

The story is told almost entirely from the point of view of Mikey, a sort of normal guy, without any special power, he has problems of anxiety and OCD, he has a politician mother, an alcoholic father, an anorexic older sister - Mel - and Meredith his overachiever little sister, but they must appear to be the perfect family. Besides this he has a crush with his friend Henna since forever and seems to he finally have the opportunity to confess his feelings ... if he gets the courage and decides to say something before graduation.

Mikey group of friends consist of Mel (Mikey´s sister), Jason is his best friend, whom is gay and is a grandson of the goddess of cats and Henna for whom he has romantic feelings. And these gang is just waiting for the near future, to just finish school and go to prom.

At the beginning of each chapter there is a paragraph that describes generally the paranormal part of the plot, as the Immortals come to the human world with the intention to seize it and how the "indie" kids from any high school are always the chosen ones to fight these evils.

But the battle between the Immortals and the indie kids is in the background and the main characters refer to these guys  as the ones that always are fighting the zombies, vampires, ghosts, etc. and Mikey and gang can only hope that this time they do not destroy the school before graduation as they have at other times (this part was really funny).

Overall, The Rest of Us Just Live Here is a contemporary novel with satirical elements, besides having paranormal details as background, but the plot is about friendship, family and foremost is Mikey´s coming of age story, and how everybody can be the "chosen ones" and that's okay. I enjoyed reading this book.

“Not everyone has to be the Chosen One. Not everyone has to be the guy who saves the world. Most people just have to live their lives the best they can, doing things that are great for them, having great friends, trying to make their lives better, loving people properly. All the while knowing that the world makes no sense but trying to find a way to be happy anyway.”

Book trailer

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?

It’s Monday! What Are You Reading? is a meme hosted by Book Journey.

Each week we spotlight the books we are reading, planning on reading or just finished reading.

Click on the image to look description in Goodreads.

Finished reading

I Crawl Through It by A.S. King (2/5 stars)
Ice Like Fire (Snow Like Ashes #2) by Sara Raasch (3.5/5 stars)

I´m currently reading

What I´m going to read next?

What are you reading today?

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Review: A Madness So Discreet by Mindy McGinnis

Title: A Madness So Discreet
Author: Mindy McGinnis
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Release date: October 6th 2015
Source: Edelweiss
Format: eARC

Rating: 3.5/5

Buy on: Amazon | B&N | BookDepository

Grace Mae knows madness.

She keeps it locked away, along with her voice, trapped deep inside a brilliant mind that cannot forget horrific family secrets. Those secrets, along with the bulge in her belly, land her in a Boston insane asylum.

When her voice returns in a burst of violence, Grace is banished to the dark cellars, where her mind is discovered by a visiting doctor who dabbles in the new study of criminal psychology. With her keen eyes and sharp memory, Grace will make the perfect assistant at crime scenes. Escaping from Boston to the safety of an ethical Ohio asylum, Grace finds friendship and hope, hints of a life she should have had. But gruesome nights bring Grace and the doctor into the circle of a killer who stalks young women. Grace, continuing to operate under the cloak of madness, must hunt a murderer while she confronts the demons in her own past.

In this beautifully twisted historical thriller, Mindy McGinnis, acclaimed author of Not a Drop to Drink and In a Handful of Dust, explores the fine line between sanity and insanity, good and evil—and the madness that exists in all of us. 

A Madness So Discreet is a historical murder mystery novel that takes place within an insane asylum and begins with Grace Mae as a mental patient and the reason of why she´s there is because she´s a daughter of respectable family and is pregnant, so to hide the fact her parents admitted her to the asylum for the duration of her pregnancy. But it is there in the asylum, despite the treatment and care she receives as a mental patient, where she feels safer than at home, so with the help of Doctor Thornhollow, she manages to escape the Boston asylum and moves to the Ohio asylum, where she have a more humane treatment as a patient.

Dr. Thornhollow, is a young doctor, who is obsessed with criminal minds, and he´s studying murders and trying to determine the profile of the murderer according to details of the crime scenes and where there were committed. When he meets Grace, he decides to help her due to her good memory and her gift of observation to detail, so she becomes his assistant and together they watched crime scenes trying to make profiles of murderers (much like the TV show Criminal Minds, but when science was in its infancy), but only as observers with the permission of the police. And it´s by means of their nocturnal visits to various crime scenes that both the Doctor Thornhollow and Grace conclude that there is a serial killer in their city that targets young women and that the police are not making the connection..

The first part of this book takes place at the Boston asylum and is very disturbing, due to the methods the asylum use in their patients and the doctors and staff are horrible. This part is very dark and raw.

The second part of the book takes place when Grace is at the Ohio asylum, which has a better staff, and the doctor who is in charge is Thornhollow and patients have a little more freedom and humane treatment, this part was less dark. And is in this part where the mystery begins and we get to know more about Grace.

On the third part of the book, the plot changes and Grace´s problems are more personal and is where she confronts her demons.

Overall, A Madness So Discreet it was a good read, it´s a very interesting, dark, raw historical thriller. My favorite part is the part where the Doctor and Grace are doing profiles of potential murderers. As this is the third book I´ve read written by Mindy, I already had the idea that there would be romance and I was right, plus it was not necessary. It was an interesting read, that speaks a lot about the beginnings of criminal psychology.

Book trailer

Waiting On Wednesday (191): The Dark Days Club

Waiting On Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

The book I´m waiting this week is

The Dark Days Club (Lady Helen #1) by Alison Goodman 

Release date: January 26th 2016

New York Times bestseller Alison Goodman’s eagerly awaited new project: a Regency adventure starring a stylish and intrepid demon-hunter!

London, April 1812. On the eve of eighteen-year-old Lady Helen Wrexhall’s presentation to the queen, one of her family’s housemaids disappears-and Helen is drawn into the shadows of Regency London. There, she meets Lord Carlston, one of the few who can stop the perpetrators: a cabal of demons infiltrating every level of society. Dare she ask for his help, when his reputation is almost as black as his lingering eyes? And will her intelligence and headstrong curiosity wind up leading them into a death trap?

What book are you waiting this week?

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