Book Review - The Kiss Of Deception By Mary E. Pearson

The Kiss Of Deception is the first book in The Remnant Chronicles by Mary E. Pearson.

It follows a princess named Lia who flees her kingdom on her wedding day to avoid an arranged marriage that was supposed to secure an alliance with another kingdom. She settles in a small village and starts getting used to her life there until two mysterious men arrive. Lia doesn't know it yet but these men are the prince she was engaged to and an assassin that was sent to kill her. 

The story evolves from there and I never became bored with it. Although I couldn't really say there was must action in it, it still captivated me. Lia was a brilliant heroine and as the book developed I became more and more involved in her story. The prince and the assassin were great too and we got to hear from their perspectives as well as Lia's, which was interesting. A lot of the book was just Lia at the village yet the author wrote it so well it was a really quick read. The only problem that I found with this was that I had the prince and the assassin mixed up for the majority of the book. it was probably just something that happened to me though. So, I rate this book a 4/5 stars.

I highly recommend The Kiss Of Deception and don't be put off by the lack of action in it because it really doesn't affect it negatively. Send me a comment if you thought about this book differently or if this post has made you want to read it!

Leah.

Book Review - Fangirl By Rainbow Rowell

This is another contemporary stand-alone novel by Rainbow Rowell.

It follows a set of twins, Cath and Wren, who are going to college. Wren is very sociable and outgoing while Cath is the total opposite and likes to write fan fiction. It follows their journey through college, how Wren and Cath drift apart and don't do as much together as they used to and the story of Cath's fan fic. When Cath meets her roommate's boyfriend, she may have to step out of her comfort zone a bit. 

I liked this book but I didn't think it was brilliant or anything. I don't really understand where all the hype is coming from. I know that sounds as if I really don't like it but there were some aspects I really enjoyed and some that I really didn't, so it's kind of mixed feelings for me. I really liked Cath, I thought she was easy to relate to, but I didn't like the whole fan fiction part. There were pages of the actual fan fiction she was writing throughout the book and I just ended up skipping them. The romance was quite cute and I did enjoy reading that part of it. I also thought that it was dragged out too much and a lot of it seemed to be just Cath sitting in her room. Overall I'd just give it a 3.5/5 stars, it's still a pretty ok rating because, as I said, there were some aspects that I did enjoy.

I hope I didn't put you guys off too much because that's just my feelings towards this novel. If you do read it and have your own opinion please leave a comment so I can know.

Leah.

Book Review - Eleanor and Park By Rainbow Rowell

This book is a contemporary, stand alone novel by Rainbow Rowell.

It's about two teenagers, Eleanor and Park, quite obviously. Eleanor moves to a new school and already she is an outsider. She begins to get to know Park, who sits beside her on the bus, and they fall in love.

There is not much more to this novel than that because it's just a romance, but there are other issues involved too. Eleanor's family life is very hard and things like abuse show up, which I found very hard to read. I felt so sorry for her and upset but that really shows how well it was written. I really liked Eleanor as a character and she was so strong despite everything that was happening to her. I give it 4/5 stars just because at times I found it hard to process. I liked that even though the romance was the main focus, there were other aspects threaded through the story also. 

I highly recommend this book as a quick, cute but thought provoking novel.

Leah.

Book Review - The Death Code By Lindsay Cummings

The Death Code is the second and final book to The Murder Complex by Lindsay Cummings.

I'm not going to talk about the plot in this review because I do not want to give away anything that happens in the first book so I'm just going to go straight to talking about what I thought of it.

The Death Code was brilliant. When I finished the first book I thought it was going to be so hard for the author to finish the plot in just one more book, but she did a great job. It was not rushed in any way and it definitely did not disappoint as a sequel. I read it in one go and the writing flowed so well. It had me on the edge of my seat throughout the climax and I felt like I was actually there too. More characters were introduced in this one but they were all great. The end was very satisfying but I still wished the story wasn't over because I didn't want to leave Meadow and Zephyr behind. Again, the amount of gore and that sort of thing was similar to what was in The Murder Complex so if you read the first one you should be fine and if you can't stomach it, do not read it because it does appear quite visual. I rate this book 5/5 stars! The only bad thing about this book is that I think the cover is significantly uglier than the first one, which I love, but that doesn't effect my rating.

Read this series, it's amazing!! But not too good if you're looking for some comic relief, haha.

Leah.

Book Review - The Murder Complex By Lindsay Cummings

The Murder Complex by Lindsay Cummings is the first book in her YA, dystopian series of two books.

It follows a 15 year old girl named Meadow who is trained to kill and survive and a boy named Zephyr who both live in a society where the murder rate is greater than the birth rate. This is because a way to prevent all kinds of natural deaths, e.g. illness, were invented and in order to keep the population down an organisation had to be set up to keep the population steady.  This organisation takes people, like Zephyr, and turns them into programmed assassins. Zephyr doesn't know what he is yet and when he meets Meadow the story really begins to evolve.

I loved this book. Meadow as a character was really strong and independent and the book swapped between perspectives from Meadow and Zephyr so we got the picture of the story from each of the main characters. The plot was amazing and I've never read anything like this one before. However, it was quite bloody and gory and dark so if you don't like that sort of thing I would not recommend it. Other than that though I would definitely recommend it to you guys if you are into this genre. It was so unique and the characters were brilliantly written and you could hear their different voices in the perspectives and I never had to go back to the start of a chapter to remember who was speaking. I rate this book 5/5 stars and this series is definitely added to one of my all time favourites.

Read this book and tell me what you think of it!!!

Leah.

Most Anticipated Releases of 2016

This year is a very exciting year for new releases and I cannot wait to tell you about the books I'm most looking forward to!


This first one is Glass Sword which is a sequel to Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard. I'm not going to describe this book as it is a second in a series but Red Queen is about a world that is divided by people with red blood and silver blood. The reds are average and low class but the silvers have superhuman powers.
It is going to be released on February 9th.






The next one is Stars Above by Marissa Meyer. It is a collection of stories that follow the Lunar Chronicles series. This book goes into the past of some of the characters and since this is one of my favourite series I cannot wait to get this book.
It's expected to be released on February 2nd.







The Rose and the Dagger is the second book to The Wrath and The Dawn by Renee Ahdieh. I reviewed the first book recently and I absolutely loved it!! Again, I'm not going to go into the plot line but you can look at my other review if you're interested in this series.
It will be released on May 3rd.







Heartless by Marissa Meyer is another book I like the sound of. I'm willing to try anything by Marissa Meyer and this new series of hers sounds very interesting. It's a retelling of Alice in Wonderland but follows the Queen of Hearts as a girl.
It's release date is November 8th.










A Court of Mist and Fury is yet another book I want to read this year. It's the next book to A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas. It's a fantasy book with Fey and it follows a girl named Feyre. I've reviewed the first book already on this blog so check out that if you'd like.
It's supposed to be released on May 3rd.







The last major book I'm anticipating is The Last Star by Rick Yancey. It is the final book to The 5th Wave which movie is actually coming out this month! I've reviewed the first book of this series on this blog as well so please go look that up after this, but basically this series is full of action and aliens and great characters.
It's coming out on May 24th.




This list is definitely not complete but these are some of the best ones I'm most excited for. I might make a further list of books at a later date as I don't want to make this post too long and boring for you guys to read. If you would like another list please leave a comment to let me know what you'd like.

Leah.

Book Review - The Wrath And The Dawn By Renee Ahdieh

The Wrath and The Dawn is the first book in a series by Renee Ahdieh.

It follows a girl named Shahrzad who lives in a land ruled by a vicious boy king named Khalid who, takes a new bride every night and has them killed at dawn. Then, when Shahrzad volunteers to get revenge on the king for killing her friend, suspicion rises. Even more so when Shahrzad manages to survive through the dawn. She soon discovers that Khalid is not all that he seems.

This book was absolutely brilliant. I loved the concept and I especially loved Shahrzad and Khalid's relationship, it really made the book for me. This developed throughout the course of the book and we saw how they both changed as people. I also loved the little stories Shahrzad told Khalid because I'd often find myself just skimming through those sort of bits in other books but they completely held my attention here.The plot was also great and I was drawn into the story by the end of the first chapter. I rate this book a 5/5 stars easily.

The second book is coming out in a few months and it is one of my most anticipated books of 2016.

Leah.

Book Review - My True Love Gave To Me By Stephanie Perkins

This book is a collection of Christmas themed short stories written by various YA authors but edited by the well known Stephanie Perkins. 

There isn't much of a description of the book I can give you. It includes twelve romantic, holiday stories. Some of them are about Christmas and Hanukkah, others are about Winter's Solstice or New Year's. 

I found this book so cute. It was very lighthearted and sometimes even humorous. The majority of the stories were very good with brilliant characters. I'm usually not a big fan of short stories but I wanted to get this book to get into the Christmas mood. A lot of the stories left me wanting to hear more about the characters after which I suppose is a good thing. I rate this book a 4.5/5 stars.

I know it's a little late now but I think this book is great for anyone who wants to get into the holiday mood or to give to someone as a Christmas present.   

Leah.