Genre: Young Adult

#3 in the Hunger Series

400 pages

Kindle

Kill or be killed. The future is bleak, the United States has fallen and in it’s place exists 13 districts that serve as the Capitol’s resources for materials and products. Each year the children of all districts must enter a lottery. The winners, one boy and one girl, are to participate in the annual Hunger Games. The Hunger Games commemorates the terms of each district’s surrender to the Capitol and a reminder of their rebellion’s loss. The event is televised for all to see as their children fight to the death in a survivor-like reality show until one person is left standing. May the odds be ever in your favor.

Just as the town clock strikes two, the mayor steps up to the podium and begins to read. It’s the same story every year. He tells of the history of Panem, the country that rose up out of the ashes of a place that was once called North America. He lists the disasters, the droughts, the storms, the fires, the encroaching seas that swallowed up so much of the land, the brutal war for what little sustenance remained. The result was Panem, a shining Capitol ringed by thirteen districts, which brought peace and prosperity to its citizens. Then came the Dark Days, the uprising of the districts against the Capitol. Twelve were defeated, the thirteenth obliterated. The Treaty of Treason gave us the new laws to guarantee peace and, as our yearly reminder that the Dark Days must never be repeated, it gave us the Hunger Games. The rules of the Hunger Games are simple. In punishment for the uprising, each of the twelve districts must provide one girl and one boy, called tributes, to participate. The twenty-four tributes will be imprisoned in a vast outdoor arena that could hold anything from a burning desert to a frozen wasteland. Over a period of several weeks, the competitors must fight to the death. The last tribute standing wins.

Taking the kids from our districts, forcing them to kill one another while we watch this is the Capitol’s way of reminding us how totally we are at their mercy. How little chance we would stand of surviving another rebellion.

Whatever words they use, the real message is clear. Look how we take your children and sacrifice them and there’s nothing you can do. If you lift a finger, we will destroy every last one of you. Just as we did in District Thirteen. To make it humiliating as well as torturous, the Capitol requires us to treat the Hunger Games as a festivity, a sporting event pitting every district against the others. The last tribute alive receives a life of ease back home, and their district will be showered with prizes, largely consisting of food. All year, the Capitol will show the winning district gifts of grain and oil and even delicacies like sugar while the rest of us battle starvation.

It is both a time for repentance and a time for thanks, intones the mayor.

Katness Evergreen is just 16 years old. She lives in district 12 where she cheats the clutches of the capitol by illegally hunting. She hasn’t had much happiness in her life but she vows her sister Prim will have better. She has starved, she has stolen, she has provided for her family, all for her sister. What will she do when Primrose Evergreen’s name is called as district 12’s female tribute in the Hunger Games?

This is one of the most insightful, though-provoking, pieces of literature that I have read in a long time.. I enjoyed the intensity of the games, the brutality mixed with the grotesque. Children are paraded like Roman gladiators, plucked from their homes and made up as physical symbols for their district. The Capitol treats this as a time for celebration, jeering on the children as they murder one another, fighting to live. You see the determination, the innocence and cruelty of the games. That even though there is a victor, that person must live with the nightmare of what they have become, a killer. Victory is bittersweet as he or she must mentor future tributes, continuing the miserable cycle of child murder.

Although I liked Mockingjay, I felt it lacked the intensity of the first two books. Prepare yourselves because some serious sh*t goes down in this final installment – this is war and with war comes causalities.  If I had to pick one aspect of Mockingjay that didn’t sit quite right with me, was the unresolved issue with Gale. I can’t go into detail without spoiling it for ya’alls, but I’d be interested if you also felt the same way… Also, I read this series back to back if I had waited over a year I might have been disappointed I think this is one of those books you’ll either love or throw against your day-glow wall in a fit of temper.

The Hunger Series stays with you long after you’ve finished reading the End.  If you are looking for something different, emotionally gripping, and hopeful; run don’t walk to read this series.

PS Papa Smokin’ read The Hunger Games and gives his nod of approval – thats kind of a really big deal in man language.

PPS I highly highly recommend you read The Huger Games (1st book), probably one of my favorite books this year.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Review Linger by Maggie Stiefvater
• Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater Review – A YA Novel Without Sparklie Vamps
• Choose Your Own Destiny Novel – Google Maps Can Suck It
• Intertwined By Gena Showalter (A YA Novel-Don’t Forget Your Hacky Sacks!)

Genre: Young Adult

#2 Wolves of Mercy Falls

362 pages

Kindle

Amazon

book received from publisher for review

In Maggie Stiefvater’s Shiver, Grace and Sam found each other. Now, inLinger, they must fight to be together. For Grace, this means defying her parents and keeping a very dangerous secret about her own well-being. For Sam, this means grappling with his werewolf past…and figuring out a way to survive into the future. Add into the mix a new wolf named Cole, whose own past has the potential to destroy the whole pack. And Isabel, who already lost her brother to the wolves…and is nonetheless drawn to Cole. At turns harrowing and euphoric, Linger is a spellbinding love story that explores both sides of love–the light and the dark, the warm and the cold–in a way you will never forget.

Linger pulls you in within the first line:

This is a story of a boy who used to be a wolf and a girl who was becoming one.

Linger picks up right after Shiver with Sam and Grace going about their daily lives. Sam, remains unsure if the ‘cure’ really works still shivers when the temperature drops to freezing. New characters, or new to me characters, since I have a bad memory – are introduced. Former musician Cole and tough girl Isabel are added to the list.  Much as I liked the first book, Linger is told from multiple point of views, at times only brief paragraphs of Sam’s feelings about Grace, or whole chapters devoted to Cole’s flashbacks with addictions. I haven’t read many books where authors can pull this off without getting nausea and throwing off your pace. This is one book that really pulls this off.

A majority of the book focuses on Cole and why he wanted to become a wolf. I’m always surprised when the young author adds adult themes like addiction, promiscuity and suicide. All topics that seem to work for Cole’s character as a transformative platform illustrating what he used to be to what he has now become. Cole is definitely one of the more interesting characters in this ensemble cast. Meanwhile, the precocious Isabel, who lost her twin brother to ‘the cure’, – finds herself oddly enamored of the mysteries Cole. But there’s trouble ahead,  Grace is starting to show signs of wolf; her scent starts to change, her sense of smell grows stronger, and then she gets the ‘fever’.

Linger is eloquently written about a wolf who became a boy and fell in love with a girl. For most of the book the pacing is a bit slow, which I didn’t mind but I think you definitely have to be in the mood for this style of writing. Maggie Stiefvater has one of the more interesting paranormal shapeshifter series out there. If you were hoping to learn more on how the Wolves of Mercy Falls came to be, sorry no such luck in this one perhaps in her next installmet.

If you loved Shiver you can’t miss this one. I mean it!

Other Reviews

My Friend Danny 4/5

And the winner of the Linger Giveaway is Chelsea, lucky SOB. I will be in contact with your shortly. Thank you all for entering and I will have more giveaways in the future *coughAugustcoug*

Possibly Related Posts:

• Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins – Spoiler Free I Swears!
• Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater Review – A YA Novel Without Sparklie Vamps
• Choose Your Own Destiny Novel – Google Maps Can Suck It
• Intertwined By Gena Showalter (A YA Novel-Don’t Forget Your Hacky Sacks!)

Genre: Young Adult

Release Date: August 1st 2009 (392 pages)

I think Target is my lucky book charm. For those that know my back story – it was a cold rainy day…sorry tangent. Any-hoo I was broswing the Target bookshelves , I was only supposed to be in the Home Good Section oops, and saw Shiver  a Young Adult book about snow and werewolves.   Of course I had to buy it!

Ever since I was a little girl I’ve been fascinated with books with winter settings, snow, ice, blizzards, I swear I was born in Alaska in a previous life.  Since I grew up in Chicago (Go Bears), I’ve associated snow/winter with my childhood. Shiver takes place in chilling Mercy Falls, Minnesota where wolves rule the woods.  Grace has watched the wolves from her house since as long as she can remember.  On a cold winter day, Grace(age 6) dragged from her swing by wolves, shredding and ripping her apart.  As she lays dying, she catches the gaze of the only yellow-eyed wolf.  The wolf regains what little humanity he has left and saves her.  She is never the same again.  Meanwhile Sam lives two lives: in the summer, only a few months,  he is human until the cold makes him shift into a wolf.  Grace (age 17) longs to see her yellow-eyed wolf again.  When a freak wolf attack kills a local teenage boy, a hunting mob is rounded up to kill the wolves in the woods.  Grace is frightened her wolf will be hurt.  As she rushes home, she finds a boy naked, on her back porch.  It’s her yellow-eyed wolf, bleeding from a gun shot wound.  As winter nears and the summers become shorter, Sam must struggle to say human or risk losing his human side and Grace forever. Grace is the only one to survive an attack by wolves and still remain human.  Is she the key to the wolves humanity?—> I’ve got goose bumps reading this.

My Thoughts

This is my 3rd YA novel I’ve read this year (Stephanie Meyers broke my YA cherry) and thought Shiver was written beautifully. If you’ve read the Time Traveler’s Wife, Shiver mimics a similar writing style with the hero and heroine points of view.  The chapters are labeled by temperature, adding a chilling and suspenseful timeline till Sam changes into a wolf. Most werewolves books these days seem to focus on the moon as the change agent, Stiefvater’s adds a creative spin by using the season and cold for her wolves. Although this book was way more serious than Intertwined by Gena Showatler and lacked sparklie vampires,  this is one book that will stay with me even after “The End.”

Rating 4  Smokin’ Smooches

Amazon

Possibly Related Posts:

• Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins – Spoiler Free I Swears!
• Review Linger by Maggie Stiefvater
• Choose Your Own Destiny Novel – Google Maps Can Suck It
• Intertwined By Gena Showalter (A YA Novel-Don’t Forget Your Hacky Sacks!)

I’m going to level with you,  for realsies.  I have a horrible sense of direction.  I even get lost with Google maps and my lovely Tom Tom. Everyone in my family makes fun of me because they always know do the complete opposite of what I say. Well, with directions anyway.   When The Book Vixen posted her review on a choose your own adventure book, I wanted in. She was kind enough to mail me her copy of What if Everyone Knew Your Name by Liz Ruckdeschel and Sara James. I was so excited to read it and give Google Maps the middle finger. F.U. Google, I got this. 

Haley is a 15 year-old teen who moves at a pivotal point in her life to public school.  Already Haley and I have a connection as I moved at a “sensitive” time in my life from Chicago to Orange County California – I still use the guilt card on my parents to this day.  Haley faces the toughest choices of her life in her new life in New Jersey and I get to sit in the driver’s seat, font and center,  for Haley’s HEA.

Destiny 1: Haley has a super cute, next door neighbor named Reece, who is like totally hot for a 15 year old. While waiting for the bus, Reece waves at Haley and just as she is about to slyly ask him to walk her to school, the “cool” girls arrive in a White Cabrilou and whisk Reece away. Does Haley call her Dad to give her a ride to school or put on her big girl panties and brave the bus?  My Haley is not a wuss so I make her take the bus because we all know that cute, bad boys ride the bus.  Haley meets potential new BFF Irene Chen. 

At this point, it feels wrong to skip ahead to different pages. My OCD is kicking in and I want to turn back and read consecutively. But this {thumbs pointing at me} girl is throwing caution to the wind, unbuttoning the top button on her polo shirt and moving forward.

Destiny 2:  Next, Haley has to choose to give into peer pressure and take art with Irene and sexy-bad boy Johnny Lane or take AP history?  Who knows maybe Reece will be a brainiac and share a class with her. I choose art class.

Destiny 3: During art class Haley accidently upsets Irene by looking at her drawing which shows a very sexy Johnny Lane.  Irene is upset and gets angry with Haley.  Do I choose for Haley to run after and apologize to Irene? Or go home and talk to someone new.  I agonized for like 10 freaking minutes on this part! Moving on, I choose for Haley to apologize to Irene so I could get the 411 on cutie Johnny Lane. 

Destiny 4: Haley tracks down where Irene works at her family restaurant Golden Dynasty. After she apologies, the popular Reece-stealing girls pop in.  Do I make Haley sit and meet the new girls or cultivate a friendship with Irene?  Since I’m loyal, I make Haley stick with Irene.  These popular girls are nothing but spoiled Jersey shoreites and Haley needs real friends.

Destiny 5: There is some mysterious graffiti going on at school and Haley recognizes the handwriting and thinks it might be her friend Irene or Shaun.  She becomes suspicious of Irene’s behavior, should Haley tell the Dean her concerns?  Uh hello, no one likes a nark! I make Haley run the other way from the Dean’s office. Jr. High is brutal, I can’t have Haley known as a nark for the rest of her school year. That’s like a thousand years in teenage time.

Destiny 6: I’m hit with another agonizing fork in the road. Is Haley better off with Reece or cute, camera shy Devon?  Damn this is like Sophie’s Choice {pinches bridge of nose} I’m a sucker for the underdog, so Devon it is.  

Destiny 7:  There is a contest where the winner with the best art work will win a trip to San Francisco. Haley enters in Irene’s picture of Johnny Lane without consulting Irene.  Irene’s drawing wins, does Haley fess up and tell Irene or wait till she finds out?  This is my motto when you feck up you need to pull the humble card and say your sorry. Eating crow puts hair on your chest, or so I hear. 

After fessing up to Irene, who by the way already knew, Haley is disappointed that Irene is upset and will not be taking her to San Francisco.   My reaction is to tell Irene to suck it, but after holding my breath, Irene fakes Haley out {psych, made ya look!} and takes her to San Francisco.

The End.
 
So, uh, perhaps I should retract my earlier F.U. you statement, sorries Google. My Haley adventure sucked – I want a redo! I want a hot love triangle between Reece and Devon, I want drama with the cool mean girls ending with a cat fight complete with hair pulling and scratching. Finally, I want Haley to have her first kiss. You guys knew that I would totally re-read this and pick a different adventure, right? Cause that’s how I role.   Alas, my hopeless sense of misdirection strikes again, I eventually end up at my destination… I usually have to do about 3 u-turns along the way.   I’m u-turning Haley’s adventure and that’s that!

Many thanks to The Book Vixen  for allowing me to hold her book captive for over 2 weeks *kissy noises* you’re the best. 

Book Title: What if Everyone Knew Your Name by Liz Ruckdeschel and Sara James

Genre: Young Adult (340 pages)

Amazon Purchase Link 

Possibly Related Posts:

• Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins – Spoiler Free I Swears!
• Review Linger by Maggie Stiefvater
• Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater Review – A YA Novel Without Sparklie Vamps
• Intertwined By Gena Showalter (A YA Novel-Don’t Forget Your Hacky Sacks!)

Intertwined by Gena Showatler(Harlequin Teen)

Genre: Young Adult

Book Purchased by Moi

Release Date:2009 (448 pages)

ISBN-13:978-0-373-21002-2

Rating: 4 1/2 Smokin ‘ Smooches

Aden Stone is not like most 16 year old boys. He talks to people,…(in his head); and has  four souls who take up residence in his body.  Think “Hermans Head” but with special powers. Let’s start the introductions.  

Eve can time travel and is the ‘mother hen’ of the group

Julian has the ability to raise the dead. (Think George A. Romero’s zombie movies)

Elijah can see the future

And Caleb can control & possess another’s body 

 Aden’s future is bleak. Elijah has foreseen his death and now Aden must find a way to circumvent his potential future.   All he wants is a little peace and quiet.  He’s 16 and tired of appearing like a crazy person to the rest of the world. All his souls do is end up landing him in trouble! He can thank his resident squatters for his current predicament of being a ward of the state and now a ‘guest’ of the  ranch for juvenile delinquents. Folks just can’t seem to grasp he’s not crazy, he’s possessed!  

One night after a not so awesome zombie encounter Aden meets Mary Ann, who surprisingly quiets the voices in his head.   He dreamt that he would meet a dark haired girl whom he will get to kiss (booyah) – but she will ultimately lead to his death.   He immediately is intrigued by this dark haired beauty.  Is Mary Ann this girl?   Throw in a werewolf, a vampire princess (Victoria), some punk ass troublemakers and Aden’s headache is about to get worse.  His only way to see Mary Ann again is to sign up at public school (yikes) and win Dan’s (D & M ranch counselor) over, all the while trying to act “normal”.  Hard to do when you’re possessed by souls and a undiagnosed schizophrenia resident of D & M Ranch (house for troubled teens) tends to throw off one’s A-game.

Aden’s mojo  causes a disturbance in the non human world, vampires, faeries, and witches all want a piece of him.  He has 1 week to meet the witches or else he and his friends will die.  Oh yeah and he has to battle  a bad-ass scary vamp who happens to be Victoria’s less than desirable betrothed.  Hacky sacks aren’t gonna solve this Cluster F. 

 Mary Ann is so not a risk-taker. She’s that girl in the yearbook that always wins the highest attendance award.  Her life is pretty much planned out until she meets Aden.  He makes her feel funny, like she’s known him forever.   Mary Ann doesn’t quite know what to make of Aden…or the green eyed werewolf who follows her to and from school.   Who was this mysterious sexy werewolf *swoon*? Could it be Shannon the quiet, stuttering, troublemaker at the D & M ranch? Or someone else?   Her boyfriend Tucker, a jock, and all around cool guy,  doesn’t seem to like Mary Ann’s new friends. It’s almost like he’s possessed or something .   What’s a girl to do with a forbidden romance with a werewolf and a best friend who’s possessed by talking souls? 

My Thoughts:

I am one of those rare readers that could not get into Harry Potter books *throws hands in front of face* so I held off reading a lot of young adult books until Twilight. This one is not to be missed!

This book was filled with all sorts of awesomeness.  I. Could. Not. Put. It. Down. Even though I’m an advocate for Smut, (heck I’m thinking of buying a I love Smut t-shirt) I didn’t feel like I was reading a book for teens.   I had no reading pains about missing my usual Rated R, mature content novels, while reading this book.  I loved the multiple character POV (Points of Views) with Aden and Mary Ann.  I found that Mary Ann’s love interest took center stage versus Aden’s love interest. I know I sound vague but I can’t mention any names or I’ll spoil it. I did like the creative aspects of the vampire world and werewolves 1. Vamps are alive not dead  2. Vampires & Werewolves can be BFFs  3. Faeries + Vamps=mortal enemies.

My only beef was the teeny tiny cliffhanger at the end, not a Karen Marie Moning Dreamfever cliffhanger (thank god).  If you are a Stephanie Meyer’s fan you might want to add this to your TBR pile.   I did find myself regressing  back into my teenage years by internally muttering “As if” to that totally heinous boyfriend Tucker *flips hair* and wanting to hop in my car and cruise for cute boys.  The fact that I’m not 16 and married was like a major buzz kill for my inner teenager.

 ” I said my father wanted you dead,” she admitted softly, gaze falling to the ground. “He no longer does.  I convinced him to wait, to study you. We still feel the hum of your power, after all. 

“Why?” {Aden}

“You…fascinate me.” Her cheeks brightened with pink. “That was stupid of me to say, Pretend I said some-thing else.”

“I Can’t” {Aden} said. Nor did he want to.

My All Time Fav Teen Quote Clueless: Alicia Silverstone: “Searching for a boy in high school, is like searching for meaning in a Pauly Shore movie.” 

What’s your favorite teen movie quote?

Possibly Related Posts:

• Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins – Spoiler Free I Swears!
• Review Linger by Maggie Stiefvater
• Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater Review – A YA Novel Without Sparklie Vamps
• Choose Your Own Destiny Novel – Google Maps Can Suck It