Waiting on Wednesday (125)

Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine.

Kill Me Softly by Sarah Cross

True love’s kiss just may prove deadly....

Mirabelle’s past is shrouded in secrecy, from her parents’ tragic deaths to her guardians’ half-truths about why she can’t return to her birthplace, Beau Rivage. Desperate to see the town, Mira runs away a week before her sixteenth birthday—and discovers a world she never could have imagined.

In Beau Rivage, nothing is what it seems—the strangely pale girl with a morbid interest in apples, the obnoxious playboy who’s a beast to everyone he meets, and the chivalrous guy who has a thing for damsels in distress. Here, fairy tales come to life, curses are awakened, and ancient stories are played out again and again.

But fairy tales aren’t pretty things, and they don’t always end in happily ever after. Mira has a role to play, a fairy-tale destiny to embrace or resist. As she struggles to take control of her fate, Mira is drawn into the lives of two brothers with fairy-tale curses of their own ... brothers who share a dark secret. And she’ll find that love, just like fairy tales, can have sharp edges and hidden thorns.

Ooh, this one sounds and looks amazing! I just love the cover and title for one, and the premise sounds pretty darn fabulous as well. Secrets? Places where fairy tales come to life? And two brothers who hold pasts of their own? Count me in for sure!

Kill Me Softly will be released April 10, 2012!

Amelia Anne is Dead and Gone by Kat Rosenfield

On the night of Becca’s high school graduation, the discovery of an unidentified dead girl left to bleed out on the side of a dirt road sends the town—and Becca—into a tailspin. Becca has always longed to break free from her small home town, but as the violence of the outside world creeps into her backyard, she withdraws and retreats inward, paralyzed for the first time in her life.

Short chapters detailing the last days of Amelia Anne Richardson’s life are intercut with Becca’s own coming-of-age summer, unfolding into the parallel stories of two young women struggling with self-identity and tense romantic relationships as the summer’s tumultuous events twist Becca closer and closer to the truth about Amelia’s murder.

Ooh, this one sounds so good! I love books that are delightfully creepy, and this one seems like it will be just that.

Amelia Anne is Dead and Gone will be released July 5, 2012!

My Very Awesome Contest

Since, I've been wanting to have another contest for a couple of weeks now, I've decided to have one called:

My Very Awesome Contest *

So, you may ask "What will I win in this very awesome contest of yours?" Well, the answer is in the following pictures.

The Books:

Crazy Beautiful by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

Dull Boy by Sarah Cross

Five Minutes More by Darlene Ryan

Sprout by Dale Peck

The Devil's Kiss by Sarwat Chadda

The Bookmarks:

Rampant Bookmark ( Thanks Diana!!)
Give Up The Ghost Bookmark ( Thanks Megan!!)

How To Enter:

Just comment below.

For Extra Entries:

+6 for already following/ subscribing to my blog
+3 for becoming a follower/ subscriber to my blog
+4 for linking to it from sidebar, facebook, twitter, myspace, actual post, and basically anything you can think off. ( unlimited times you can do this!)
+1 for adding me to your blog roll
+1 for commenting on my review of Crazy Beautiful here.
+1 for commenting on my review of The Devil's Kiss here.

Open To:

US and Canada residents only. Sorry, international readers, though if you have someone you can send it to in the US or Canada that can send it off to you eventually. You can supply me with their address if you win.

Ends:

September 22, 2009 at midnight. So, be sure to get your entries in on time!!

* I know very unique, right? I was orgianlly going to have "The Lauren Contest" featuring books from differnt authors named Lauren. But it unfourntly didn't work out, thanks to me giving some books to a friend to borrow, that I haven't gotten back yet. lol
* More bookmarks are going to be given away soon in random posts, so watch out!

Traveling To Teens Tour for Dull Boy

Traveling To Teens Tours are a way for us bloggers to get the word out about fantastic upcoming novels, that may be a great add to what you are currently reading. You can find out more about this all here.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dull Boy by Sarah Cross


Author Bio:

Sarah Cross is a Taurus born in the year of the Monkey. She is four inches taller than Wolverine, but does not have adamantium claws ... yet. Fierce but cute Pallas' cats are her favorite animals--and if you don't think that is relevant, then you really don't know her. She grew up in Ohio and now lives in New York. DULL BOY is her first novel.

Review:

Summary:

Sometimes I wish I didn't care what would happen if anyone knew the truth about me. But I do care. I have to keep this - super strength, flying - a secret. No one can know - not my parents, not my friends... It's just that it's getting harder to hide it.

Superpowers are awesome - unless you actually have them, like Avery does. There's only so much he can pass off as "adrenaline" before people start to get suspicious. Probably it's best to lie low, so guys in white lab coats don't come to carry him away, to find out what makes his freakish body tick. Who wants to be vivisected? But flying under the radar becomes a whole lot harder when you can actually fly. It's dangerous to be different, so for now he'll pretend to be normal, unremarkable Avery - a dull boy - anything to keep his secret safe.

What he doesn't expect is the horrifying truth about where his powers came from, who else might have them, and the madness of one villain's plan to turn this superpowered dull boy into something even more powerful and amazing.

Review:

I have to admit that since I was little I've always kind of had a slight obsession with superheros. I loved the Spider Man and X-Men movies. Oh, and Push, too, though that may not count. Anyway, getting back to Dull Boy, I was stoked when I found out that there was going to be a book coming out about superheros, since there's not many YA books on that topic. Luckily, Dull Boy was a pretty awesome book.

As soon as Dull Boy opens up you are drawn into Avery's complicated life. Since, how fast do you think that you'll get sent to a lab if you admit that you have a superhuman qualities? I would say extremely fast. Avery was a unique and heartwarming character. Since, you could imagine how hard it was for him not to know anyone who he could really relate too. The other characters, such as Sophie and Nicolas, were the same way, which made me happy that they all united together with their shared bond of superpowers.

One of my favorite parts of this novel was the in depth look Sarah gave you on the characters' superpowers. To what they could do to how when they first found out that they had superhuman abilities, it was all covered. Overall, I found it all extremely interesting and I think many others will to.

Sadly, I felt that the plot was kind of lacking. Since, it seemed that there wasn't one main struggle that the characters were trying to go against besides Cherchette, but that didn't hit up until the end. I know that many of you will argue that the teens coming to grip with their powers was the main focus. Though after a while that subsided a bit, leaving the book to become a bit boring.

Other than that, I felt that Dull Boy was a great debut novel from Sarah Cross. I look forward to reading more by her in the future. Also, does anyone else want a Dull Boy sequel, because I certainly do!

Grade: B+

Dull Boy in now out!

Author Guest Blog:

I will be posting this at later date and in a separate post. Since, Sarah schedule has been hectic lately, leaving her to not finish the guest blog. Sorry, for the delay.