Insatiable

Love this dress!

Insatiable is a new series that Meg Cabot is currently writing. If you've ever read Meg Cabot, don't expect anything like her old work in this novel! This isn't about teens - it's about an adult, Meena Harper. I can see the similarities in her writing in this book, but the topic is about vampires - something Meg Cabot hasn't done yet. 

So, Meena hates vampires. But she's a writer for a famous television station and the popular tv show she writes wants to incorporate vampires into the show now. Other shows are already doing that and they are getting higher views than Meena's job. 

What Meena didn't see coming (and she can see more than the average human) is that vampires would start to follow her around and she would get caught up in the middle of a vampire war! See, Meena has visions and can see how someone would die. She always tries to warn everyone, but strangers who she accidentally touches won't believe her and Meena feels like in some way it's her fault that she didn't try hard enough to keep them alive. 

When Meena touched Lucien for the first time, she didn't see his death. Later, she realizes he's a vampire, so he's already dead! Then Alaric, a vampire hunter, comes along causing Meena to wonder if Lucien is as evil as Alaric says or not really. 

Like I said, if you've ever read Meg Cabot's other series (1-800-Where-Are-You, Mediator Series, etc.) this is definitely not like that (topic and age wise). This book is very humorous, and sometimes makes fun of vampires - a new for today's books devoted to vampires. Also, the second book came out this month (Overbite)!

The China Garden

I've had The China Garden for a really long time and I still remember the storyline of this amazing book. Clare moved from London to a town called Ravensmere, where everyone knows everyone elses business. She didn't want to move there and she didn't like the small town atmosphere. Clare got extremely bored very quickly and decided to look up the history of the town since she got a strange vibe from it.

When Clare started to dig into the history, though, other townspeople started to get upset and tell her that she had no right to look at that information. Her mother seemed jumpy, and she wanted Clare to be "invisible" - kind of hard to do, though, if you are the only new person that has come into town for 5+ years.

Clare starts to get attention from local boy, Mark - as if he's attracted to her but hates that he is. With all of the mysterious events happening around Clare, she digs just deep enough into her past that there is no way to go back, causing Clare and Mark to get caught up in the history that just might be their future...

This was published in 1999 so I'm not sure if it's still in print or if it's reprinted again. I would definitely recommend it though because it is very well written and the mystery will make you not want to put the book down until the answer is revealed. Whenever I reread it I still want to finish it in one sitting, and I know the ending!

Entwined

Love this cover! So beautiful!

When I was a little girl, my favorite story was about the 12 Dancing Princesses. I'm not sure exactly why - I was a tomboy who hated dressed and hated dancing (still hate both to this day) so this story was the complete opposite of me. Maybe that's why I liked it so much? It was a foreign world that I would never willingly go to, but it was nice to read it and imagine myself being one of 12 princesses.

Entwined is a great remake of the 12 Dancing Princesses. It goes into more details than the original, short story and it has more of a storyline for the princesses than any other rendition I've read before. While this story is based on the eldest daughter, Azalea's, viewpoint, the reader gets a little piece of every princess and their uniqueness from their sisters.

One thing that is significantly different from this young adult novel than the original, shorter version is that we don't get to see/read first hand the journey that Mr. Branford (the hero) goes through and the magic he discovers. I only know about that because I can still remember reading the story and seeing the pictures of the hero going to save the princesses.

Heather Dixon did a great job retelling this famous fairy tale. Many young adults today won't know the original story, so rewriting it now is a great way to bring this story back to life for more teenagers to read!

From the original story that I grew up reading. My sister and I would
fight over who was the prettiest princess!

Academy 7

When reading the back of this book, I was not prepared for the setting of the story. It just seemed like two students were going to a prestigious boarding school and were rivals because they wanted to be the best in all of their classes and found that they were competing for that first place slot.

That is definitely not the case! The setting for this story is somewhere in the far future, where civilians live on different planets and they fly from one planet to the other. There is one diplomatic system and then each planet has their own ruler to carry out the rules.

Aerin was rescued when her ship was stuck in space: she wasn't able to reach another planet or another fueling station. After she was rescued, she took a series of tests on the ship, but wasn't told why. A few weeks later, she got a letter in the mail saying she was accepted at Academy 7, a very prestigious school where she would have to prove that she should stay there.

Dane is another student who was accepted to the school, and he is a celebrity because his father is the General of the government and also an alumni of Academy 7. When Aerin starts beating Dane in all of the tests - mental and physical - he starts to wonder why she doesn't recognize him and delves deeper into the mystery of her past, and, as he finds out later, his past as well.

Beauty Queens

This novel was very fun and upbeat, despite the circumstances the teenagers were in. Being stranded on an unknown island is bad enough - but being stranded when one is going to a beauty pageant? That was very unexpected for the 13 girls that survived the plane crash.

I love this book, and not for the reasons that one might think. Libba Bray has transformed beauty pageant ladies from their usual stereotypical features into girls who know how to hunt, fight, build huts, and survive through the worst of times. The cover of the book definitely represents the book: those girls were able to find a weapon out of all of their pageant belongings that they found after the plane wreak.

The best part in the book that I enjoyed the most was the introduction to Miss Illinois (I have to represent my state!) Now, while it may be completely unrealistic of how Sosie defeated the snake, you have to admit that Miss Illinois is pretty badass! She didn't give up without a fight, that's for sure!

This book is definitely different than Libba Bray's other novels and I really like that about this author. She writes more than one genre and is great at all of those genres! I think for this particular book, it is a new, refreshing topic that our young adult viewers have not see in writing before - sure there's the television series Lost but there definitely wasn't any beauty pageant contestants on that show!

And to conclude, here is my favorite quote from the book, page 379: "Really, being a librarian is a much more dangerous job than you realize."

City of Fallen Angels

Sigh. I really, really wanted to like this book. I was iffy at first because I liked the way City of Glass ended and didn't want to ruin the amazing ending that we were left with. And I have to say, this book was amazing because of the plot line, the further character development I learned about all of the characters, and being able to see Simon in action with his new... tattoo shall we say (in case any of you readers don't know what happened to Simon in City of Glass).

However, I have to admit, I really dislike the ending. I can't complain too much - there are 2 more books coming out in the series. This is not the overall ending to a great story. I just wish that I had the next 2 books right now so I wouldn't be left with this ending!

Also, I was shocked because I was under the impression that this was about Simon. Granted, I learned a lot more about Simon's character than I did from the previous book, but it was definitely evened out between the characters. (Not that I'm complaining, I love reading about Jace and Clary!)

Overall, it was worth the wait to finally read this book! (Because, let's face it, all of Cassandra Clare's fans have probably read this book 2 or 3 times since it's been released). Even though I complained about some aspects of the book, it doesn't change the fact that Cassandra Clare once again wrote a beautifully installment to her series and it can only get better, right?

By the way, I loved finding clues throughout the novel that will probably become more detailed in the new Infernal Devices novels when they are released!

Not much to say

This is how sleepy I am, haha

I don't have much to say today nor any reviews to post since I've been at work all day (very long, hot day..). However, I am very proud that I got through an entire month's worth of posts, from school assignments to anything that I wanted to talk about that particular day! :D I went from not posting, or even creating my own blog, to blogging for 30+ days straight! I'll be back tomorrow with a review on City of Fallen Angels because I'm almost finished with it!