Aaand, I'm back!

And I'm back from the world of computer exile! (Well, for the time being anyway.) I can type properly again so I'm posting the review of Lauren Kate's novel Fallen very shortly. I hope you've all had a merry Christmas, by the way :).

Waiting on Wednesday: The Immortal Rules {5}

*sorry for the lack of pictures. I'm at a friend's house right now so the cover image will come later*

You will kill. The only question is when. In the dark days since the insidious Red Lung virus decimated the human population, vampires have risen to rule the crumbling cities and suburbs. Uncontested Princes hold sway over diminished ranks of humans: their "pets." In exchange for their labor, loyalty and of course, their blood, these pets are registered, given food and shelter, permitted to survive.

Unregistered humans cling to fringes, scavenging for survival. Allison Sekemoto and her fellow Unregistereds are hunted, not only by vampires, but by rabids, the unholy result of Red Lung-infected vampires feeding on unwary humans. One night, Allie is attacked by a pack of rabids, saved by an unlikely hero...and turned vampire.

Uncomfortable in her undead skin, Allie falls in with a ragtag crew of humans seeking a cure, or cures: for Rabidism and for Vampirism. She's passing for human...for now. But the hunger is growing and will not be denied. Not for friendship—not even for love.

The Iron Fae were AWESOME and I know that many of us are vying for the release of The Immortal Rules. I'm not a sucker for vampire books (get the pun? ha ha) but anything written by Julie Kagawa is something I want to get my hands on. It comes out on the 24th April, 2012, so be sure to get a copy when it comes out.

Leave a link and I'll check out your post :).

2011 Goodreads Choice Awards: The Best of YA Fiction

The 2011 Goodreads Choice Awards are up, and so are the best titles of 2011 young adult fiction! This is pretty exciting for me since I'm searching for new books to read and the Choice Awards are a good place to start.

Where She Went by Gayle Forman topped the Young Adult Fiction list. The runner-up was Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins (Stephanie's novel Anna and the French Kiss is on my wishlist), and What Happened to Goodbye by Sarah Dessen was third.

Other notable titles (for me) include Divergent by Veronica Roth--it was the favourite overall book of 2011, City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare (I am a big fan of Cassandra's books), Silence by Becca Fizpatrick (Hush, Hush is on my wishlist), The Iron Knight by Julie Kagawa (I have a special tag for her!), and finally, Delirium by Lauren Oliver (on my wishlist--this just confirms the fact that I need to read it). Here's some stuff you might want to check out. Click on the covers to check out their Goodreads pages. GAH! It's not working and the little kid crying behind me isn't helping matters either. Sorry, not a big fan of screaming kids.

I've added a few of these books to my ever-growing wishlist. Check out the Goodreads Choice Awards, seriously!

Review: Clockwork Prince by Cassandra Clare

Goodreads | Amazon

In the magical underworld of Victorian London, Tessa Gray has at last found safety with the Shadowhunters. But that safety proves fleeting when rogue forces in the Clave plot to see her protector, Charlotte, replaced as head of the Institute. If Charlotte loses her position, Tessa will be out on the street and easy prey for the mysterious Magister, who wants to use Tessa's powers for his own dark ends.With the help of the handsome, self-destructive Will and the fiercely devoted Jem, Tessa discovers that the Magister's war on the Shadowhunters is deeply personal. He blames them for a long-ago tragedy that shattered his life. To unravel the secrets of the past, the trio journeys from mist-shrouded Yorkshire to a manor house that holds untold horrors, from the slums of London to an enchanted ballroom where Tessa discovers that the truth of her parentage is more sinister than she had imagined. When they encounter a clockwork demon bearing a warning for Will, they realize that the Magister himself knows their every move and that one of their own has betrayed them.Tessa finds her heart drawn more and more to Jem, though her longing for Will, despite his dark moods, continues to unsettle her. But something is changing in Will; the wall he has built around himself is crumbling. Could finding the Magister free Will from his secrets and give Tessa the answers about who she is and what she was born to do?As their dangerous search for the Magister and the truth leads the friends into peril, Tessa learns that when love and lies are mixed, they can corrupt even the purest heart.

Okay. This review contains spoilers. Lots of them. I put super-spoilers in white (you have to highlight to read) so I think this review is pretty safe to read, but I do have spoiler warnings in front of certain paragraphs/sentences just to be sure :). Sorry in advance for the million spoiler alerts I give.

The second installment of the Infernal Devices is so much better than the first. There’s less mystery but more character development.  Cassandra Clare really starts to flesh out her characters. We learn more about Will’s past, more about Nate, more about the Clave, more about Jessamine. As far as I can recall (and I can’t recall that much because I am so jet-lagged), there was only one fighting scene. The other stuff was mostly verbal and mystery-solving, and I loved that.

Will is less dark and mysterious and more vulnerable in this book. *spoiler alert* We get to see a more human side of him, and I drooled all over the page during the Tessa-Will and Tessa-Jem scenes (I won’t elaborate but they were AMAZING…*swoons again*). Cassandra does a really good job with balancing the romance scenes and making sure that they aren’t overpowering. There was just enough to keep me satisfied but still wanting more.

I do, as always, have a few problems with the story. Firstly, Tessa seems like too perfect a character. I got the feeling that Clockwork Prince was building the climax for the finale while developing the characters further, but I don’t think Tessa got much of that. *spoiler alert* She doesn’t seem to have any flaws and most of the young males in the story—okay, only two, I guess—fall for her at once (!). No thank you. What’s so attractive about her, apart from her grey eyes (I got enough of that) and her hair and her intelligence? Why doesn’t she have any personality issues, when all the other characters in the story are obviously flawed?

The second problem was with the love triangle. *spoiler alert* I thought that Tessa’s relationship with Jem was perfectly platonic, and I would’ve loved for it to stay that way. What’s wrong with having just one girl fall in love with one guy and vice versa? YA authors seem to be missing a beat when it comes to things like this—under most circumstances, I do not like love triangles. And it is not acceptable to have a girl marry a guy just because the other guy she loves (even more than her fiancée, I think!) seems too unreliable. And I will take this opportunity to say that I’m on Team Will, since people on Goodreads seem to be taking sides for the finale. 

There’s a super spoiler-y thing here and it’s in white. You’ll have to highlight to see it. [spoiler]I bet you that in the last book—Clockwork Princess, I think—Will and Tessa will wind up together after all. Something’s going to happen to Jem. I used to like him until he stole Tessa away from Will. Poor Will! D: Also, while we’re here, instead of killing off Nate, I would rather Cassandra have dealt with the problem better. [end spoiler]

Clockwork Prince did have its faults, but I loved it in the end. The scenery was spot-on, the character development was excellent, showing Will in a human light was a really good move, and the writing flowed seamlessly. I can see that the mystery of the Magister and his far-reaching plans is going to continue into the next book, which I can’t wait to read, and I went through this book like a mouse going through nuts (LOL, very bad simile). I’m going to cheat and give Clockwork Prince four and a half stars. I would love to give it five stars but some parts didn’t quite get 100% from me. Four and a half stars? Everyone go and get it now! :D

+1/2
It was really good!

Bought a copy of Clockwork Prince!

Who would've predicted that I would stumble across a first-ed copy of Clockwork Prince at the airport? (Not me. That was a rhetorical question, by the way :P) Anyway, I was totally thrilled when my mum bought it for the plane.

I'm done reading it and the review will probably be posted tomorrow. I really liked Clockwork Angel and Clockwork Prince, the second installment in the series, completely exceeded my expectations. I have to say that it was way better than the first and that everyone should go and get it. Now.

Yup, that skeleton was me while I was waiting for CP. And do you know what's even better? The special first edition collector's copy comes with the letter Will writes in Clockwork Angel! I've taken a really horrible photo just to show all of you :P

Waiting on Wednesday: Tempest {4}

The year is 2009. Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun. 

That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future. 

Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities.
But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler.  Recruit… or kill him. 

Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

Everyone's been raving about Tempest, but I joined the book blogging world too late and missed the ARC tour sign-up. *sigh* The cover looks gorgeous and I am going to be first in line to get this (well, not quite--I'm going to get an eBook version from Amazon). Tempest is coming out on the 17th of January, so don't miss it! :D

Leave a link and I'll check out your Waiting on Wednesday post.

Off to the Airport!

I'm going to be on holiday for the next three weeks (boo, no internet) so see you all in January! :D Have a merry Christmas everyone! As it turns out, there IS internet! So yay!

Meet a Blogger {2}

What is Meet a Blogger?

Meet a Blogger is a feature that I plan to host every other Saturday, in which I'll find a book/writing blog that I really love and ask the blogger some questions.

Why join in?

There are so many great blogs out there, and memes and Meet a Blogger are ways to discover and share more of them!

How do I join?

The idea's still a bit crude at the moment, but if/when anyone actually wants to join in, they should contact the book blogger they hope to feature and conduct an interview. Try to ask interesting questions! If you're stuck on what to ask, just send me an email and I'll give you a list of questions that you might want to use. 

Then, when your interview is all done, take a screenshot of the page (with permission) and put it in your Meet a Blogger post. Comment on my most recent MaB post with the link, and you're all done! Although I'll be doing this every other Saturday, you can do this once a month, once every two months, on any day that suits you. 

If you've been featured by a Meet a Blogger participant, please consider joining too :). 

Suggestions

If you have any suggestions on how to improve, email me! And if this is confusing, do tell. I'm not the best at explaining.

~And now for the Meet a Blogger fun. No, I don't have a screenshot. I forgot this time *sigh*~

I finally got my first Meet a Blogger post up! So today's feature is with Zoey Talbon at Zoey's Uncreatively Titled Blog. She's been blogging since September 2011, and here are her answers to this week's questions.

1. What inspired you to start blogging? 

I actually don't know how to answer this question so that it makes sense. Over a year ago, I started the blog mainly as a thing for my writing, but I never posted. Like, I was lucky if I posted once a month. It just seemed like a waste of time. And then I read this book that I really loved, and went, hey, how can I get other people to love it too? And so I decided to write a review. And okay, it was kind of a "Well everyone else is doing it, so why shouldn't I?" But once people actually started commenting on reviews I was like, hey, if I can get even one person to buy a book I've loved, then it's worth it.

2. What motivates you to blog? 

Lol, I guess I just kind of answered that. The biggest reason is that if I find a book I love, I want other people to know about it. And if you want me to be honest, yes, it has something to do with the fact that I know if I don't continue to blog, I'll pretty much never get an ARC again :P But it's bigger than that. I see people saying they're in a reading slump, and I know what that feels like, and I know that when I'm in a reading slump, I troll some of my favorite blogs to see what they've loved lately. So I guess I'm trying to say that other blogs motivate me to blog?
And blogging motivates me to actually get some reading done. When I know people are waiting on a review - whether it's people who read my blog or publishers waiting via NetGalley - I'll know that I need to read instead of sitting there like a lump and doing absolutely nothing but staring at tumblr or something. 

3. If you were stranded on a desert island, which book would you bring with you and why? 

O_O These kinds of questions shouldn't be allowed. I want to say the 5th Harry Potter book, because it's fairly long and I can definitely read it over thousands of times, but I'd definitely skip the ending every time. I've read/seen Sirius dying enough times. :(

4. What books are you wishing for? 

I don't think these should be allowed either :P My list is huge, especially since pretty much all of my books were destroyed about two weeks ago. But I guess at the top of my list are Shattered Souls by Mary Lindsey, Everblue by Brenda Pandos, The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern, Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor, Across the Universe by Beth Revis, and The Beginning of After by Jennifer Castle. If you think about 2012 releases, my list is insane :P Though it's mainly Immortal City by Scott Speer, Something Strange And Deadly by Susan Dennard, Sweet Evil by Wendy Higgins, and Wrecked by Anna Davies. (And The Immortal Rules by Julie Kagawa. But, y'know, that should be on everyone's wish list.)<--Nicole's note: Agreed! 

5. What are your favourite genres? 

YA, obviously. I pretty much enjoy YA that has some romantic element (that isn't a love triangle) but I think I enjoy paranormal and dystopian YA fiction the most. 

Thanks Zoey! (And this post was meant to come on yesterday, but maybe it's still yesterday where you live. :D) Chat to Zoey; she's on Twitter @taytaystalker. Please check out my next Meet a Blogger post again in three weeks--I'm going on holiday soon :P.

The Immortal Rules Cover Reveal

Goodreads

You will kill. The only question is when. 
In the dark days since the insidious Red Lung virus decimated the human population, vampires have risen to rule the crumbling cities and suburbs. Uncontested Princes hold sway over diminished ranks of humans: their "pets." In exchange for their labor, loyalty and of course, their blood, these pets are registered, given food and shelter, permitted to survive. 
Unregistered humans cling to fringes, scavenging for survival. Allison Sekemoto and her fellow Unregistereds are hunted, not only by vampires, but by rabids, the unholy result of Red Lung-infected vampires feeding on unwary humans. One night, Allie is attacked by a pack of rabids, saved by an unlikely hero...and turned vampire. 
Uncomfortable in her undead skin, Allie falls in with a ragtag crew of humans seeking a cure, or cures: for Rabidism and for Vampirism. She's passing for human...for now. But the hunger is growing and will not be denied. Not for friendship—not even for love

I'm still fangirling over Julie Kagawa's new book, The Immortal Rules. I recently read The Iron King (and its sequel, The Iron Daughter, is on my wishlist) and I loved it--the review will be coming soon. Now she's writing a new story and the cover looks spectacular! Who cares if it's about vampires, even though I usually avoid vampire books like the plague?

I can't wait to read it when it comes out on the 24th of April!

Review: Carrier of the Mark by Leigh Fallon

Goodreads | The Book Depository

From the moment she sets foot at her new school in Ireland, Megan is inexplicably drawn to the darkly handsome Adam DeRis. But Megan soon discovers that her feelings for Adam are tied to a supernatural fate that was sealed long ago—and that the passion and power that unites them could be their ultimate destruction. 
This electrifying debut novel was first discovered on inkpop.com. the online community for aspiring writers. THE CARRIER OF THE MARK sizzles with unbridled romance, a unique supernatural hook, and a breathtaking Irish setting, and will entice fans of the Need series by Carrie Jones and the House of Night series by P. C. and Kristin Cast

So, my books finally decided to come. (The wait could possibly be put down to the simple fact that I was too cheap to pay for expensive fast postage.) For those amazing people who have been following me since Day One, you may have read this post, which details my Amazon shopping. And yes, it did take a whole month for Carrier to arrive, but here it is.

I have read many Goodreads and blog reviews about this book all of them mixed. I therefore formed the Nicole's Law of Carrier--it's like durian; you either love or hate it. But I digress.

Carrier has been compared to Twilight on multiple occasions, and I can certainly see the similarities. Both of the characters start out in a strange, new, isolated town with their fathers; go to school and make a whole heap of friends and find some strange guy stalking them; find out that the strange guy belongs to a mysterious family rumoured to be dabbing in shady dealings of some sort; get rescued by the guy at some point, and finally, fall in love with him.

Megan, however, is a far more loveable character than Bella Swan. She doesn't whine nearly as much, and she just isn't as irritating. Adam, on the other hand, caused me to look daggers at this book. He was so much of a carbon copy of Edward that he didn't seem like a new, original character. Rian and the other girl (Anu? Adam's sister) simply faded into the background for me most of the time. For the significance they played in the story as two of the four Carriers of the Mark, they simply didn't have enough time in the spotlight.

Adam and Megan's relationship was super creepy. One moment they weren't talking to each other, the next Adam was telling her how much he was attracted to her (eek! I would be so creeped out if someone talked to me like that, but fictional teenagers seem to love this sort of thing), and then they started kissing. Full-on snogging. Their relationship developed far too fast.

The dialogue was also a bit of a problem for me. For instance, when Fionn (Adam, Rian, and Anu[?]'s adoptive father--yep, sounds familiar, right?) was explaining more about the Carriers to Megan, the dialogue was completely forced. Case in point:

Fionn: There are four different elements.
Adam: Water (does water demonstration)
Rian: Fire (does fire demonstration)
Anu[?]: And earth (does earth demonstration)

It's not terrible, but it's certainly not the sort of conversation I would hold with someone in real life. Come on. That sounds just...forced. No other word for it.

Another thing was the info dumps. Oh, the info dumps. Fionn/Adam/some member of the DeRis family would take Megan's one question, and drag it into a full-length explanation that lasted two whole pages. It made my head spin and I actually didn't have a clue what was going on in the end. In fact, I don't quite get the stuff about the Carrier gene even now. There was way too much telling and not enough showing. Admittedly, Fallon is a first-time author, but she has an editor who should be able to point out this sort of thing.

I've rambled on about the negatives, but there are a few positives. The storyline and the plot are rather interesting (minus the girl-in-small-town cliches) and I love the idea of the Carriers of the Mark. I'll definitely be reading Dawn of the Knights, the next book in the trilogy, and hopefully Fallon would've brought her writing skills up to scratch by then.

There was so much hype about this book but it ended in disappointment for me. The book gets two stars.

Meh, it was all right, I guess.

Waiting on Wednesday: Under the Never Sky {3}

Aria is a teenager in the enclosed city of Reverie. Like all Dwellers, she spends her time with friends in virtual environments, called Realms, accessed through an eyepiece called a Smarteye. Aria enjoys the Realms and the easy life in Reverie. When she is forced out of the pod for a crime she did not commit, she believes her death is imminent. The outside world is known as The Death Shop, with danger in every direction. 
As an Outsider, Perry has always known hunger, vicious predators, and violent energy storms from the swirling electrified atmosphere called the Aether. A bit of an outcast even among his hunting tribe, Perry withstands these daily tests with his exceptional abilities, as he is gifted with powerful senses that enable him to scent danger, food and even human emotions. 
They come together reluctantly, for Aria must depend on Perry, whom she considers abarbarian, to help her get back to Reverie, while Perry needs Aria to help unravel the mystery of his beloved nephew’s abduction by the Dwellers. Together they embark on a journey challenged as much by their prejudices as by encounters with cannibals and wolves. But to their surprise, Aria and Perry forge an unlikely love - one that will forever change the fate of all who live UNDER THE NEVER SKY 
The first book in a captivating trilogy, Veronica Rossi’s enthralling debut sweeps you into an unforgettable adventure.

I love a good dystopian and Under the Never Sky seems really good! Leave a link and I'll check out your post :).