In My Mailbox 81

I'm pretty excited about these books, especially Perception because I loved Clarity!

Everneath Teen Book Scene Blog Tour: Top Ten List

Stopping in today is Everneath author Brodi Ashton to share with us a list of ten things her child says to keep her grounded.

Author Top 10s

TOP TEN THINGS MY KID SAYS TO ME TO KEEP ME GROUNDED:

#10 "Percy Jackson already did mythology, and he's a BOY."
#9 "Please don't show your cover to my friends. It's embarrassing."
#8 Me: "I'm going to be in Wal-Mart!" Kid C (shrugging): "I'm in Wal-Mart at least once a week."
#7 "Mom, do you know any REAL authors? Because my teacher needs one to talk to her class."
#6 "Why did you have to write a book about... LOVE?" (Followed by melodramatic gagging sounds)
#5 "Wouldn't it be cool if Nikki ate Jack's BRAINS?! (Yes, he's into Zombies)
#4 (Looking at my cover): "That's a weird looking dude." me: "Um, that's a girl." Him (turning cover upside down): "Oh. I get it." me: "???"
#3 When a friend asked him what my book was about: "Um... Monsters. And dragons. And people who eat BRAINS!" There are none of these things. 
#2 (looking at finished copy) "What, they only made it out of paper?" Tosses it onto floor. me: "Yes, they cancelled the gold leaf printing." 
And the number one thing my kid says to keep me grounded: "WHY CAN'T YOU BE MORE LIKE R.L. STINE?" 

Thank you for sharing that humbling top ten list Brodi! Hopefully we’ll all have people as hilarious as your boy to keep us grounded too.

Description: Last spring, Nikki Beckett vanished, sucked into an underworld known as the Everneath, where immortals Feed on the emotions of despairing humans. Now she's returned- to her old life, her family, her friends- before being banished back to the underworld... this time forever.

She has six months before the Everneath comes to claim her, six months for good-byes she can't find the words for, six months to find redemption, if it exists.

Nikki longs to spend these months reconnecting with her boyfriend, Jack, the one person she loves more than anything. But there's a problem: Cole, the smoldering immortal who first enticed her to the Everneath, has followed Nikki to the mortal world. And he'll do whatever it takes to bring her back- this time as his queen.

As Nikki's time grows short and her relationships begin slipping from her grasp, she's forced to make the hardest decision of her life: find a way to cheat fate and remain on the Surface with Jack or return to the Everneath and become Cole's...

In stores now!

Everneath review

Description: Last spring, Nikki Beckett vanished, sucked into an underworld known as the Everneath, where immortals Feed on the emotions of despairing humans. Now she's returned- to her old life, her family, her friends- before being banished back to the underworld... this time forever.

She has six months before the Everneath comes to claim her, six months for good-byes she can't find the words for, six months to find redemption, if it exists.

Nikki longs to spend these months reconnecting with her boyfriend, Jack, the one person she loves more than anything. But there's a problem: Cole, the smoldering immortal who first enticed her to the Everneath, has followed Nikki to the mortal world. And he'll do whatever it takes to bring her back- this time as his queen.

As Nikki's time grows short and her relationships begin slipping from her grasp, she's forced to make the hardest decision of her life: find a way to cheat fate and remain on the Surface with Jack or return to the Everneath and become Cole's...

My thoughts: It wasn't a big surprise that I liked Everneath so much. Every review I read about this book mentioned a lot of great things to look forward to. And now that I’ve read it, I have no objections regarding those great things. It's not just because of the characters, which are compelling, or the writing, which fits the story so well. What gave me the greatest satisfaction was the plot and the mythology involved in it.

At this point, there are many YA stories that include (Greek) mythology. So it's becoming difficult to do mythological retellings without seeming old and repetitive. But Everneath thrives in seeming familiar while still being original. We get the familiar with the Hades/Persephone and Orpheus/Eurydice (and even Isis/Osiris) stories, but with a twist. Although Everneath (the place) seems similar to the underworld, it's different. And Everneath, along with other aspects of this book was different enough that they held my interest, because I didn't know what to expect. I didn't know what would be different from the way I normally imagine the underworld, or even what would change in the mythical stories that were used by the main characters to try and figure out how to change Nikki's future. But thankfully, these changes were refreshing and intriguing.

And can I just say that I love Jack! He just really loves this girl, which is why I want them

to have a happy ending sooo bad. On top of loving Jack, I really like Nikki. It's weird but 

she has a way of being sad without ever making me feel depressed when reading Everneath. 

I just want her life to get better.

And as far as the ending, it's not a cliffhanger, but it ends in a way that has me wondering what in the world Nikki's going to do to solve her new (and some old) problems. I have no clue what she's going to do, but I can't wait to find out!  

Incarnate review

NEWSOUL
Ana is new. For thousands of years in Range, a million souls have been reincarnated over and over, keeping their memories and experiences from previous lifetimes. When Ana was born, another soul vanished, and no one knows why.

NOSOUL
Even Ana’s own mother thinks she’s a nosoul, an omen of worse things to come, and has kept her away from society. To escape her seclusion and learn whether she’ll be reincarnated, Ana travels to the city of Heart, but its citizens are suspicious and afraid of what her presence means. When dragons and sylph attack the city, is Ana to blame?

HEART
Sam believes Ana’s new soul is good and worthwhile. When he stands up for her, their relationship blooms. But can he love someone who may live only once, and will Ana’s enemies—human and creature alike—let them be together? Ana needs to uncover the mistake that gave her someone else’s life, but will her quest threaten the peace of Heart and destroy the promise of reincarnation for all?

Jodi Meadows expertly weaves soul-deep romance, fantasy, and danger into an extraordinary tale of new life.

My thoughts: My feelings towards this book are still up in the air. There’s no doubt that it was good, but some parts were better than others. I was really excited when it started out. The main character is introduced, and then soon after, Sam. And the way they meet make for a seemingly interesting and entertaining future. But eventually Sam seems dull and kind of wimpy (sometimes), and Ana seems a bit repetitive, constantly saying how she's a nosoul (although Sam says newsoul), and how nosouls don't have feelings or deserve anything good to happen to them (or whatever). And then there are the creatures that exist in this world without an explanation that seems justifiable to me. 

But there are good points. The idea of “recycling” the same souls and having people who have gone from female to male, handsome to plain, fat to skinny, etc., makes things quite interesting. And having soul mates that can recognize each other in any lifetime is pretty cool.

On top of this, what's revealed in the end makes me pretty excited for the next book. The consequences of actions in Incarnate will definitely lead to big changes in the second book. But this is also why I'm still unsure of how well I liked this book. Because it feels like nothing happens until the very end. Incarnate is like one of those kinds of first books that seem more of an introduction than the first part of a story. Overall, I'm still hooked enough to want to read the second book, but with some reservations.

Additional note: This book does get cool points for the way all the characters (excluding Ana of course), and especially Sam, behaved. Something that annoys me is when characters are supposed to be hundreds or thousands of years old, but don’t seem different than a regular teenager. In Incarnate, you can definitely tell Sam, among others, are the ages they claim to be. It was actually really refreshing.

What are you reading on Mondays?

Book(s) read last week:
Tempest by Julie Cross
The Fault In Our Stars by John Green
Everneath by Brodi Ashton

Currently reading:
All That Bleeds by Kimberly Frost

Upcoming read:
Dark Parties by Sara Grant

In My Mailbok 80

The Alchemy of Forever sounds good. And The Fault In Our Stars was AMAZING! Plus my copy had a Yeti in it!

 (ex. pic above...my Yeti is sort of free falling)

Also, if you don't have a copy, you need to get one. NOW!

Tempest review

Description: 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.

My thoughts: Time travel is just one of the many things I’ve wanted to see come out of YA (so much so that I’ve been writing my own story about time-traveling for a while now)

And I finally read one!  And on top of that, it comes from a male’s perspective, which is pretty exciting in and of itself. But I was really nervous because this book was portrayed as being epic. On top of this, the first part of the book seemed kind of slow (because Jackson was in the dark about a lot of things). And if I’m being honest, Jackson and Holly’s relationship wasn’t (and still isn’t) that appealing to me.

 But midway through, the potential for epic…ness started to happen. New relationships were established. Old ones were revealed. And the time traveling bit, which was initially kind of boring (because of how infrequent it happened) became awesome! This increase in likeability also came from a lot of truths being revealed, the truth about Jackson, and the people around him. This included insight into the past and the future(s). I even started to like Holly and Jackson’s relationship by the very end (which is kind of ironic).

Overall, Tempest was good but not epic. But if Julie Cross continues the story the way she ended this one, the second book may in fact be…epic.