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Tuesday, August 20, 2013

School :(

Sorry I haven't been posting, but I've been super busy with school. It started last Thursday and I'm already fantasizing about summer break...I can already tell its going to be a looonnnggg year.
I'll try to update Tuesdays, Thursdays, and at least once over the weekend. But, Ya know, life happens, and as much as I love my blog, school comes first (And I'd be grounded for life if i get anything below a B). Its one of those harsh truths, but I guess I'll just have to deal with it. Anyway, In the meantime you can look forward to a review of "Darkness Becomes Her" Super good Gothic toned Young Adult novel that takes place in New Orleans!





Monday, August 19, 2013

Infinity

Infinity

Released: May 25th 2010

Author: Sherrilyn Kenyon

Ages: 13-17

Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal, Urban Fantasy

Pages: 464

Format I Read: Hard Cover

Series Name: Chronicles of Nick




My life is complete. Thank you Sherrilyn Kenyon for brining this Masterpiece to life!! Nick is amazing.      The first words he says are "I am a socially awkward mandork."
If that  line does not make you want to beg for this book, we cant be friends. Nope. Never. Sorry.

Anyway... Nick is a fourteen year old boy living on the rough side of New Orleans. He and his Mom barely scrape by, eating a lot of powdered eggs and wearing second hand Hawaiian shirts. Hes friends with two awesome, kick-butt Zombie apocalypse prepers, Bubba and Mark.

When Nick's "friends" betray him and Zombies start running amuck in the streets and eating kids hands in the school cafeteria, it all hits the fan. Nick learns he has powers he couldn't even dream of, and that those strange high schoolers aren't all they seem to be.


There is no describing the awesomeness of this book. But  I suppose I should try...

Lets begin with our main character Nick. For starters Nick is hilarious. He's funny and sarcastic and a very cool guy, really. He loves his Mom a lot, and I think his adoration and respect for her adds a lot to the story. One of my favorite things about Nick is that he is so real. Trust me, I have had my fair share of time around 14 year old guys, and Nick feels like he could hop right off the page and join in on their "Bromance" at any given time.

Some books I've read in the past, the battle that the whole book has been building up to feels very...rushed. Like 2-3 pages rushed. It makes me really angry. The last 300-something pages have been leading up to this very unmemorable battle? Thanks a lot -_-


Thats how it feels. Its like the whole story hit a brick wall.
But thankfully this Was Not The Case with Infinity. I felt that the battle at the end was fulfilling enough to make it feel like  it didn't run head first into a brick wall, but at the same time it left enough mystery about Nick's powers for me to read the second book.

But this is deffinately one worth buying. Plus, the cover is gorgeous so it'll look great on you shelf!

Oh!! I almost forgot! There's an Infinity movie coming out eventually!! super excitedd!!!!

Thursday, August 8, 2013

The Host



Author: Stephenie Meyer

Published: May 6th 2008

Publisher: Little Brown and Company

Pages: 619

Genre: Sy-Fy,Young Adult, Paranormal

Format I Read: ebook





Earth has been repossessed. Little alien things called souls have taken over. The souls are surgically placed in a Human brain, and the Human that used to own the body gets erased, and the soul is all thats left. This became the norm; all Human bodies became hosts to the little silver souls. But this wasn't the case when Melanie Stryder became a host. Wanderer, the soul, was  given Melanie's body, things didn't go as planned. Wanderer wasn't alone. Instead of Melanie being smothered by Wanderer's presence, she rebelled. She refused to be erased.

When Wanderer stared to look through Melanie's memories, she discovered that Melanie wasn't the only resistor. She had been living with her little brother Jaime and her boyfriend, Jared.
Yada Yada Yada, then she meets up with the human resistance in the middle of the desert. Many of the survivors don't want her there, considering she is the enemy and all, but Wanderer/Melanie's Crazy Uncle Jeb wants to keep her. It causes an outrage with most of the people in the resistance, and Wanderer starts to wonder why she even came...

The Host is really a book about humans. About our nature, culture, and impulsiveness. It takes a step back and helps you analyze us, humans, as a whole. It was kinda interesting...But weird. Very Weird.

I really liked Wanderer. She was really an enjoyable character. She was intelligent, selfless, and real.
She felt believable. She grew as a person/alien throughout the story. She went from not talking to anyone to playing soccer with the others. She picked up sarcasm from Melanie. Wanderer also had such a deep compassion for the humans she was living with.
I think Meyer did an excellent job with Wanderer.

She also did well on Ian. He went from the Villain's henchman to one of my favorite characters in the book.

It was boring in the beginning, and pretty slow toward the end. But I cried ( and I am NOT a cryer.)  It was sad. Fair warning for you anti-tears people.

It was good, not great. This is borrow from the library material, I wouldn't go and buy it. It's definitely worth reading, just not spending money on.

Monday, August 5, 2013

Daughter of Smoke and Bone



Author: Laini Taylor
Publisher: Little Brown books for young readers

Age Group: Teen
Genre: Young Adult, Supernatural
Pages: 418

Format I Read: ebookSeries: daughter of smoke and bone
Other Titles in series: Days of Blood and Starlight, Dreams of Gods and Monsters (To be Released)







Karou is a art major living in Prague. She lives in a cute little flat, her favorite haunt is a cafe called Poison, and has a very feisty, yet petite, best friend. Seems normal enough, right? Wrong.
She also runs errands for monsters that frequently appear in her sketchbook, speaks a multitude of languages, and has blue hair...
Her life is as normal as it can be considering her position, but when she was running an errand for her "friends" she comes across a stranger that makes her blood boil. After an...interesting...encounter, Karou is left confused and wanting answers...

Woah. I finished this book 2 days ago and I still don't can't sort out my feelings.

The writing is FANTASTIC. Like better than almost any book I've ever read. It was wonderful. Laini Taylor is a writing goddess.

Karou is such a wonderful character to read about. She's so different from most of the female protagonists these days. limited to no whining, not too overly dependent on her love interest. And can hold her own in a fight. Yay!!

The plot was awsommeeee!! I don't want to give too much away, but the "wishing" aspect of this book was perfect! I've never read a book with anything like it! It added a very new aspect to the story.

This book was going to be my favorite, I could feel it. But then I got through about a third of the book... Then I got massively bored and shortly after that, I got massively confused. Everything changed. Completely. The only way I can explain it is by calling it one huge flashback. But it wasn't really a technical "flashback" It was strange. And weird. And completely uninteresting for me. It broke the flow of the book. When the flashback ended, Karou was changed. Less light hearted, more like the person she was during the flashback. Karou was gone, replaced by the new (or old, depends on how you look at it.) person. It made me seriously sad :(

But this writing was gorgeous the entire way through.

All in all this book was good, I guess. If major, like as in HUGE flash backs don't bother you, read it.
If that would bother you, I wouldn't by it. borrowing it from a friend would be a good option though...

Monday, July 29, 2013

Hooked



Hooked

Released: January 29th, 2013


Author: Liz Fichera


Publisher: Harlequin Teen


Genre: Romance


Pages: 368


Format I Read: Paper Back



First off, Thank You Harlequin Teen for sending me this book!! 

This book is in two perspectives; Fred's and Ryan's


Meet Fred, A Native American girl who loves to golf. She joins the schools only golf team. Plot Twist: she's the only girl on the team. Fred gets a lot of support from the coach, but there is some serious dislike between her and the guys on the team. 
Not only is she the only girl, but she is much better than all the boys on the team causing them to dislike her even more. 

This is when she realizes that by joining the team she took somebody else's spot. This somebody happens to be Ryan's best friend, Seth. When Ryan and Fred are partners for the first  golf tournament, Seth's revenge begins. 


To keep this review spoiler free, all I can say is......









I didn't like Ryan. Nope. Not at all... There was just something wrong with his character. I found my self dreading the chapters written in his perspective.

Fred, on the other hand, was interesting. She had to deal with multiple stereotypes and serious real life issues (i.e: sexism, racist remarks, bulling) throughout the story. The interesting part was that she didn't get whiney like most female protagonists do today, she found healthy ways to deal with it.  It was a welcome change.

While I didn't like the plot as much as I could have, I really enjoyed reading about Fred and Ryan's family life. Both come from families that have serious issues. For instance, early on in the book we find out that Fred's Mom is an alcoholic. How Fred deals with her Mom felt very real to me.
If the character building hadn't been so good, this book would have been utter crap.

Most of the book's contents made me want to burn my eyes.

Like this....


The only  characters I genuinely like were Yolanda and Kelly, two very minor characters. I liked them the best because they were literally the only people that could make me smile. They weren't even that funny. I was just desperate for any humor. ANY AT ALL. When you are so deprived, even the most rude and crude jokes were welcomed with open arms.


So in the end this book was bad.
 Characters? Okay.
 Plot? Bad.
 Humor? None.

I can't say I'd recommend this to anyone. Sorry?






Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Hold Me Closer Necromancer

Hold Me Closer, Necromancer

Released: October 12th, 2010

Author: Lish McBride

Publisher: Henry Holt and Company

Genre: Urban Fantasy, Young Adult

Pages: 343

Series Name: Necromancer




It was okay. Not much more than that.

The character building wasn't all that great. The first few pages I honestly thought Sam was a girl. The writing style just felt very... feminine. It got better throughout the story, but first impressions are important, right?

There were a crap-ton of POVs in this book. I just didn't get attached to anyone, except Brooke. I have an odd love for her. She's the only one who felt...interesting? Funny? Likable? Any of those work for her. They don't for the other characters.

 Hmmm...I'm forgetting something. Oh yeah, how could I forget? INSTA-LOVE. There is nothing I hate more than insta-love. Nothing. I'm not going too deep into that because I don't want to be spoiling anything for anyone. But be forewarned, there was some insta-love regarding Sam and another person I'm not going to name for spoiler reasons.

Wow. That was negative. Don't get me wrong, this book was nice. It was light and kinda funny. It was kinda predictable and cheesy in some parts, but that made the book endearing. I will go on to say that this is definitely a book you borrow from a friend or get at the library.

Now, Moment of truth. Will I buy the next one? No. Unless one of my friends happens to have it or I stumble upon it in the library, I will not be reviewing or reading the second book. 

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

The Demon Trappers Series

Read this series. 
Do it. 
Now. 
I promise, you will thank me later.

While I loved this series (Its my new absolute favorite) I won't be reviewing the rest of the books. The main objective of this post is to assure you that the possible love hexagon never amounted to much. While Riley did...uhh, how do i say this nicely...Hop from guy to guy a bit, it never got a out of control as it could have.  Anyway, Denver Beck totally made the series. If it wasn't for him The Demon Trappers series would be teetering on the brink of "Slightly Awesome" instead of "So Freaking Awesome I Can Barely Comprehend It"

Bottom line, read these books. I don't typically scream my praises like this, but this is a really outstanding series! 

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

The Demon Trapper's Daughter


 The Demon Trapper's Daughter

Released: February 1st 2011
Author: Jana Oliver
Publisher: St. Martins Griffin 
Age Group: Teen 
Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal 
Pages: 368
Format I Read: ebook 
Series Name: The Demon Trappers 
Other Titles in Series: Soul Thief, Forgiven, Foretold



Welcome to year 2018's Atlanta, where demons roam the streets and the government is basically nonexistent. To keep the demons under control there is a guild dedicated to trapping the troublesome beasts. The guild consists of forty something males and one young girl, Riley.

I really liked Riley. Most of the time. She was funny, cunning, and imperfect. But she was also very harsh on my favorite character, Denver Beck, AKA the backwoods boy. It's quite the funny story really. When Riley was fifteen, she had the biggest crush on Beck. Backwoods boy being a few years older and her father's apprentice, it didn't work out in Riley's favor. Since then Riley's lost the puppy love, but the bitter feelings are still firmly in tact. 

This book was a roller coaster for me. I cried, laughed, cheered, grumbled, and sometimes wanted to give Riley a good thwack upside the head.  There was one persistent writing "technique" Oliver used that kinda rubbed me the wrong way. Like I said, my favorite character was Beck and he comes from the backwoods of georgia. That said, Oliver had all of his dialogue contain ya in the place of you and yar instead of your. It was quite distracting and...Weird. But I still adore Beck. He kinda reminds me of Daryl from The Walking Dead T.V show.

More than halfway through the book I realized something horrible. This book had the potential to become a romance hexagon. No joke. There were literally four different guys that could easily become love interests. Right there I promised myself that I would not finnish the series if something as disastrous as a love hexagon were to evolve. so if this series isn't fully reviewed, you know why.

I have to admit, this book had a few faults, but its action and lovable characters balanced the scales. But if your looking for a really good demonic young adult book, this is what your looking for!




Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Anna Dressed in Blood


Anna Dressed in Blood

Released: August 30th 2011 
Author: Kendare blake

Publisher: Tor Teen
Age Group: Teen
Genre: Young Adult, Horror
Pages: 316
Format I Read: ebook
Series: Anna
Other Titles in the Series: Girl of Nightmares - review to come





This book is a little dated, but it is still one of my favorite books! Anna Dressed in blood is supposed to be horror, but to me it wasn't all that scary. Don't get me wrong, there were some very scary moments, but it wasn't overly terrifying! 

While this book may have lacked in horror, it scored in every other category. The plot line was almost genius, the characters (mainly Cas) were so developed, and Anna is, to this day, one of my favorite characters of all time!

Cas is a ghost hunter. He tracks down a gets rid of restless ghosts, and naturally we get led to Anna, a lovely ghost who tears apart anyone who enters her abandoned house.When Cas arrives, he expects Anna just to be another ghost, but he was oh-so wrong. Anna is like nothing Cas has ever seen before. She could gut Cas just as easily as a fish if she so desired,but for whatever reason she lets him get away. Thats all for the summary because this book is just so unexplainably awesome, you just have to read it yourself!!

But I will let you in on this: The ending is so amazing! I'm pretty sure I looked a lot like this....
And I either screamed a little or cried when i finished this book....I don't remember, regardless this book is pretty mind-blowing! 


Monday, June 3, 2013

Croak!



Croak


Released: March 20th 2012
Author: Gina Damico

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Age Group: Teen
Genre: Young Adult
Pages: 311
Format I read: ebook
Series: Croak
Other titles in the series: Scorch and Rouge (not published yet)




This book blew my mind! Lexington Bartleby is a great character, and throughout the story I really got attached to her! She is dark,hilarious, and tells everybody exactly what she thinks of them! 

The book starts out in a principals office, where Lex is being scolded for biting a boy who called her a "wannabe vampire." But was Lex listening to her elder's remarks? No, of course not! Instead she was wondering what her Principals head would look like on a giant wooden spear...which pretty much sums up our spunky protagonist!

What i think makes this book so amazing is that it completely lacks that slow, boring beginning that most books tend to have. It starts off running, and doesn't stop in till the very end! 
Everything about this story is captivating! The plot, the characters, and the little town of Croak were all wonderful! I really couldn't put the book down!! At the end of every chapter I was like..






intill I was finished with the whole book! 


What i hope stay consistent throughout the series is Lex's kick-butt attitude! But overall I recommend this book!! It's entertaining throughout the entire novel, and have I mentioned that its absolutely pee your pants hilarious? Because it is! 


Oh, and by the way...I absolutely adore Driggs!


Sunday, June 2, 2013

Hi!

Hi, and welcome to my humble little blog, Bonjour Books! I'm Ally, and I am quite possibly addicted to all things Bookish. Especially when it comes to Young Adult titles! My Blog will be dedicated to book reviews, and whatever else i find any enjoyment in doing. But first and foremost, this is a Book blog!

Whats that? You want to know more about me? Aww! Arn't you sweet?! As you probably guessed, I adore books! I review on quite a few different sites, but my little blog will have the most updated content! I play soccer and defender is kinda my thing! I'm in love with gymnastics but I've recently had to quit thanks to messed up joints :(  I'm also a cheerleader for Football, Basketball, and Wrestling for my high school. All this along with friends, homework, and book reviewing, I'm kinda a busy girl huh?

Anyway, like I said, most of the books reviewed will be fantasy, paranormal, sic-fi, urban fantasy, and apocalyptic/distopian fantasy! Now, enough talk! I need to get reading Croak by Gina Damico!! So far its amazing! Reviews to come!

Oh, and make sure to stop by again!