Early Reader Review: Blood Scion by Deborah Falaye

Source: From Netgalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This in no way alters my opinion or review.

Blood Scion by Deborah Falaye 

Series: Blood Scion #1
Publisher: HarperTeen
Publication Date:  March 8, 2022

 

Format: Ebook


Rating:


Goodreads Synopsis: 

This is what they deserve. They wanted me to be a monster.

I will be the worst monster they ever created.

Fifteen-year-old Sloane can incinerate an enemy at will—she is a Scion, a descendant of the ancient Orisha gods.

Under the Lucis’ brutal rule, her identity means her death if her powers are discovered. But when she is forcibly conscripted into the Lucis army on her fifteenth birthday, Sloane sees a new opportunity: to overcome the bloody challenges of Lucis training, and destroy them from within.

Sloane rises through the ranks and gains strength but, in doing so, risks something greater: losing herself entirely, and becoming the very monster that she abhors.

TRIGGER Warnings: attempted rape, excessive violence, torture, abuse, blood.

This book... is SO good, horrifying, graphic, brilliant, well done. I have so many emotions about this one.

Unlike most reviews, I wanted to share a non-dramatization of my reactions while reading this book.

• Start the book..."ok this is interesting, some action already, oh wow ...oh wow ok"
• Continues ..."this is a bit slow, might not be for me"
• Continues because the cover is GORGEOUS ... "some action, oh no  [so much anxiety], oh yes, oh wow... OMG... OMG OMG...
• Finishing the book... (Actually screaming)"ahhhhhhh, what?! AHHHH, what? NO NO NO, AHHHH' husband comes in to check on my mental health.. it is not good. I need the next book. he brings me cocoa instead... I guess that will have to suffice for now.

I hope you enjoyed that. It is not often that I have such a complete turn around about a book, and also that I am literally yelling at the end. There can be emotion, sometimes crying, but all out screaming... not often. This one had me.

Blood Scion follows Sloane, a teen that must hide who and what she is in order to survive. She is drafted into the army that is taking over her peoples land, killing them and she believes has also killed her mother (but there is no proof). Making the most of an absolutely horrible and terrifying experiences, Sloane attempts to find out what happened to her mother while training to be a soldier in an army shw couldn't care less about. 

I can tell you, in all honesty, the cover is what initially grabbed me for this book. It is stunning in everyway and fits this book expertly. The plot ties together epic worldbuilding with the mythology and lore of what I have learned is insipred by Yoruba-Nigerian myth. This is so beautifully done, and I am so interested in this mythology, I would like to learn more. 

Sloane's point of view thorughout this book really showcases the autrocity of war, the abuse and violence in the training and as a reader you really see a slow  corruption on her part as she has to deal with her morals and her survival or humanity. In this world, you cannot have both. The change was so emotional and anxiety-ridden for me to read. Sloane is not your normal teen lead character, she never has a chance to be a teen in her world, she already thinks like an adult in so many ways, has to be scheming and untrusting. I also really liked all of the side characters, they all had something to add to the story and to Sloane's progression through the maddness. 

The plot was very well done, but you need to be prepared for a lot of violence, death, and bloodshed. There isn't much pause from it either. This is a military, dystopian, fantasy that stays intense as you move through to the ending. Without giving too much away, Sloane has to fight to stay alive so many times, and not everyone is as lucky as she is. I cannot wait to read the next book in this duology. It was perfectly paced by the end and I can only imagine what the next one will bring us.

Recent Reads Video Review: Dancing in the Rain by Shelley Hrdlitschka

Source: From Librarything Early Reviewers Program and Orca Book Publishers in exchange for an honest review. This in no way alters my opinion or review.

Dancing in the Rain by Shelley Hrdlitschka
Publisher:  Ocra Book Publishers
Publication Date:  September 6, 2016

 

Format:  Paperback ARC

Rating:


 



Goodreads Synopsis: 

While struggling with the death of her beloved adoptive mother, sixteen-year-old Brenna reconnects with members of her biological family, hoping to discover why her biological mother broke off contact many years earlier. At the same time, she is falling in love with Ryan, who provides support while she grieves but has to leave her when she needs him most. Despite powerful feelings of abandonment, Brenna realizes that getting strong physically and focusing on the needs of others might just help her move beyond her crippling grief, find peace and plan a future for herself.
Dancing in the Rain continues the story that began in Shelley Hrdlitschka's bestselling Dancing Naked.

Review: 

If you don't want to watch me say 'um' a million times - here is a written review...

Dancing in the Rain is about a 16 year old girl dealing with the death of her adoptive mother. Brenna has a lot to deal with right now, her adoptive mother passed away, she id trying to decide if she wants to reconnect with her biological family, and there is a boy showing interest in her.

This book is actually a follow up to another, called Dancing Naked. That book is about Kia and her teen pregnancy - with Brenna, so this book now is following the daughter in her adoptive family and life.  I did not read that first book but I don't think it is necessary as you get enough information from this one about Kia and her story to know about Brenna. However, if you are interested in Dancing Naked this may give you too much insight into that book.

I really enjoyed this story. Brenna is a very real character dealing with real emotions. I think I was reading this at the right time too since I have been dealing with a lot of emotions lately. Grief is so hard and this story shows Brenna's growth and adjustment as she deals with it. I love this character growth. There is also a romantic element as in most YA books but this one was not the complete focus as Brenna is dealing with other things too - I liked that as well.

If you enjoy contemporary and don't mind the possibility of a few tears, this one is for you.

Cover Reveal: Consent by Nancy Ohlin

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This is a simple, wonderful cover, I love it!

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Consent by Nancy Ohlin 
Published by: Simon Pulse
Publication date: November 10th 2015
Genres: Contemporary, Young Adult

About the Book

Bea has a secret.
Actually, she has more than one. There’s her dreams for the future that she can’t tell anyone—not her father and not even her best friend, Plum.
And now there’s Dane Rossi. Dane is hot, he shares Bea’s love of piano, and he believes in her.
He’s also Bea’s teacher.
When their passion for music crosses into passion for each other, Bea finds herself falling completely for Dane. She’s never felt so wanted, so understood, so known to her core. But the risk of discovery carries unexpected surprises that could shake Bea entirely. Bea must piece together what is and isn’t true about Dane, herself, and the most intense relationship she’s ever experienced, in this absorbing novel from Nancy Ohlin.

About the Author

I am the author of BEAUTY, a YA retelling of the Snow White tale, and ALWAYS,

FOREVER, a YA retelling of Daphne du Maurier's REBECCA. ALWAYS, FOREVER was originally published in hardcover as THORN ABBEY.

I've also contributed to several celebrity novels, including a New York Times-bestselling YA trilogy.

I'm currently hard at work on my next YA novel, which will be as mind-bending as ALWAYS, FOREVER (I hope!).

My favorite cures for writers' block are long walks, long showers, popcorn, chocolate, and really expensive coffee. I talk to myself a lot while I write (you know, to make sure the dialogue zings).

Find the Author

Website

Facebook

Twitter

Goodreads Author Page

Recent Reads: The Calling by Kelley Armstrong

The Calling by Kelley Armstrong
Series:Darkness Rising #2
Publisher: Harper
Publication Date: April 2012 

 

Format: Hardback
Source:My Home Library, Bought

Rating: Somewhere between 3-4 Stars



 


 


Goodreads Synopsis: 

Maya Delaney's paw-print birthmark is the mark of what she truly is -a skin-walker. She can run faster, climb higher, and see better than nearly everyone else. Experiencing intense connections with the animals that roam the woods outside her home, Maya knows it's only a matter of time before she's able to Shift and become one of them. And she believes there may be others in her small town with surprising talents.

Now Maya and her friends have been forced to flee from their homes during a forest fire they suspect was deliberately set. Then they're kidnapped, and after a chilling helicopter crash, they find themselves in the Vancouver Island wilderness with nothing but their extraordinary abilities to help them get back home.

In THE CALLING, the sizzling second book in the Darkness Rising trilogy, New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong pumps up the romance, danger, and suspense that left readers of THE GATHERING clamoring for more.

 Review: 


For July's TBR Jar pick I finally got around to reading The Calling. I LOVED the Darkest Powers Trilogy (and I do mean LOVED!!!!!!) and The Gathering of the Darkness Rising Trilogy caught my attention as well, but the characters aren't as great (in my opinion) as in Darkest Powers. So...on to the review...

This second book in the series is a great second book as far as trilogies go. Maya and her friends/ fellow test subjects are on the run -- and that is the whole book. We pick up right were book one left off and so I had to do a recap of book one since it was so long ago that I had read it, but after doing so the storyline just keeps on going in book 2. I think that the reason I have enjoyed the books so far is because of the action, they are teens on the run and the badies have guns and supernatural powers on their side. 

I like Maya the main character, she is strong and interesting, but I can't love her as much as I loved Chloe. I found Maya conflicted too many times for my liking - about trusting others, about her feelings, it was just bothersome. The other characters are all interesting as well but I feel needed more depth, there are the stereotypical clown guy, the strong trustworthy guy, the girly girl and the brute girl and that is really all they are so far, I hope they grow in book 3.

I did enjoy this book, the action had kept this trilogy on my radar so I hope to pick up book 3 at some point. 

Guest Post! Top 5 YA books of 2014 (so Far) with Author Margo Bond Collins

Kicking off 2014 with a YA Bang: Top 5 YA Books of 2014 (so far)

By Margo Bond Collins

2014 has only just started, and already I’ve read a whole pile of excellent YA books! Here are just a few of my favorites from the first six weeks of 2014, in no particular order:

Untethered by Katie Hayoz  

Purchase on Amazon

This book was recommended by another book blogger as the best YA book she had read in 2013, and as soon as I started reading, I figured out why. Hayoz’s prose is flawless and her characters engrossing—even when I wanted to kick Sylvie, the astral-projecting protagonist, I believed in her completely.  I was so deeply involved in this book that I completely forgot to cook dinner one night; I looked up and it was almost midnight!

These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner    

Purchase on Amazon

LaRoux and Tarver Merendsen are from different worlds, but when their starship crashes and they are stranded together on an apparently abandoned planet, they must learn to work together if they are going to survive—and if they are going to discover the source of the whispers and visions that haunt them in this strange place. I’m rarely taken completely by surprise when reading, but These Broken Stars did just that—it’s a haunting story, and I’m anxious for the next entry in the series.

Scintillate by Tracy Clark 

Purchase on Amazon

The end of this book left me gasping and wanting more—what starts out as a fairly traditional paranormal romance quickly turns into an amazing mystery/romance/thriller. Cora Sandoval, whose life-threatening illness leaves her with the ability to see auras, heads out to find her long-lost mother and discovers a whole world of power and magic. I can’t wait for the sequel!

Such Sweet Sorrow by Jenny Trout (a pen name of Jennifer Armentrout) 
 Purchase on Amazon

 In this novel, Romeo and Hamlet take a trip through the underworld in order to find Romeo’s love, Juliet. This novel delighted me, in part because I’m a college professor in my other life and have taught both Shakespeare and a whole slew of traditional heroic tales. Trout draws on and transforms literary tradition in entertaining ways in this book.

The Coldest Girl in Coldtown by Holly Black  

Purchase on Amazon

 I actually read this book for the first time at the very end of 2013, but I re-read it almost instantly in January because I love it so very much. I adored Black’s short story of the same name and was initially a little disappointed to discover that the novel was not, in fact, a continuation of the same story but rather a new story set in the same world. But that disappointment quickly disappeared as Black’s novel drew me in. Black has called this novel her “love letter” to vampire novels, and the vampires here are horrifying—being the single (potential) exception to that rule makes the love-interest vampire equally terrifying and attractive, adding up to the kind of vicarious adrenaline rush that draws me to vampire tales in the first place. 

Honorable Mention:
World After by Susan Ee  

Purchase on Amazon

 

This is the sequel to Ee’s amazing Angelfall, a post-apocalyptic story of humans struggling to survive in the days after an attack by an angelic host. This second novel is in some ways even darker than the first, but it does a good job of continuing the story and setting the reader up for the next novel.

My own YA novel, Fairy, Texas, was released in February. 
Purchase on Amazon

Blurb:

Fairy, Texas. A small town like any other.

Laney Harris didn't want to live there. When her mother remarried and moved them to a town where a date meant hanging out at the Sonic, Laney figured that "boring" would have a whole new meaning. A new stepsister who despised her and a high school where she was the only topic of gossip were bad enough. But when she met the school counselor (and his terminal bad breath), she grew suspicious. Especially since he had wings that only she could see. And then there were Josh and Mason, two gorgeous glimmering-eyed classmates whose interest in her might not be for the reasons she hoped. Not to mention that dead guy she nearly tripped over in gym class.

She was right. Boring took on an entirely new dimension in Fairy, Texas.

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Fairy High could have fit into one wing of my old school. The three-story, red brick building looked like it had been around for at least a century—it actually had carvings over two of the doorways that read “Men’s Entrance” and “Women’s Entrance.” I was glad to see that none of the kids paid any attention to those instructions.

            “Counselor’s office,” I muttered to myself. At least I wasn’t starting in the middle of a term—though given the fact that there were fewer than 500 students in the entire high school, I didn’t think I was going to be able to go unnoticed, even in the general bustle of the first day back from summer vacation.

            I walked through the door marked “Men’s Entrance,” just be contrary, and faced a long hallway lined with heavy wooden doors. The spaces in between the doors were filled with lockers and marble staircases with ornate hand-rails flanked each end of the long hallway. Students poured in behind me, calling out greetings to each other and jostling me off to the side while I tried to get my bearings. None of the doors obviously led to a main office; I was going to have to walk the entire length of the hallway. And people were already starting to stare and whisper.

            God. I hated being the new kid.

            I took a deep breath and stepped forward. I made it halfway down the hall without seeing anything informative—all the doors had numbers over them and many of them had name plaques, but neither of those things did me any good since I didn’t know the name or office number for the counselor. I was almost getting desperate enough to ask Kayla, but of course she was nowhere to be seen.

            I turned back from scanning the halls for her and caught sight of the first adult I’d seen—and almost screamed. As it was, I gasped loudly enough for a guy walking past me to do a double take. The man standing in the open doorway was tall, over six feet, and way skinny—so emaciated that it looked like you ought to be able to see his ribs through his shirt, if his shirt didn’t hang so loosely on him. He had white hair that stuck out in tufts, thin lips, a sharp nose, and pale blue eyes that narrowed as he watched the kids walk past—and all the kids gave him a wide berth without even seeming to notice that they did so. He stood in an empty circle while students streamed around him in the crowded hallway.

            But none of that was what made me almost scream.

            For a moment, just as I’d turned toward him, I could have sworn that I’d seen the shadow of two huge, black, leathery wings stretched out behind him.

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About the Author

 

Margo Bond Collins is the author of a number of novels, including Waking Up Dead, Fairy, Texas, and Legally Undead (forthcoming in 2014). She lives in Texas with her husband, their daughter, and several spoiled pets. She teaches college-level English courses online, though writing fiction is her first love. She enjoys reading urban fantasy and paranormal fiction of any genre and spends most of her free time daydreaming about vampires, ghosts, zombies, werewolves, and other monsters.

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Connect with Margo

Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/author/margobondcollins

Email: MargoBondCollins@gmail.com

Website: http://www.MargoBondCollins.com

Twitter: https://twitter.com/MargoBondCollin  @MargoBondCollin

Google+: https://plus.google.com/116484555448104519902

Goodreads Author Page: http://www.goodreads.com/vampirarchy

Facebook Author Page: https://www.facebook.com/MargoBondCollins

Facebook Novel Page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Waking-Up-Dead/502076076537575

Tumblr: http://vampirarchybooks.tumblr.com/

Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/mbondcollins/

Manic Readers: http://www.manicreaders.com/MargoBondCollins/

Be sure to add Fairy, Texas to your Goodreads bookshelves: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19502285-fairy-texas

Recent Reads: Wicked Kiss by Michelle Rowen

Wicked Kiss by Michelle Rowen

Publisher: HarlequinTEEN

Publication Date: February 26, 2013

 

Format: Ebook

Source: Netgalley and HarlequinTEEN

My Rating:

Goodreads Synopsis:

My kiss can kill.

I used to be ordinary Samantha Day, but that's changed. Now, after one dark kiss from a dangerous boy, I can steal someone's soul…or their life. If I give in to the constant hunger inside me, I hurt anyone I kiss. If I don't…I hurt myself.

Bishop is the one whose kiss I crave most, but if I kiss him, I'll kill him. Then there's another boy, one I can't hurt. One whose kiss seems to miraculously quell my hunger. They're both part of a team of angels and demons that's joined forces in my city to fight a mysterious rising darkness, an evil that threatens everyone I know and love. I just wonder if I'll be able to help Bishop—or if I'm just another part of the darkness he's sworn to destroy….

NIGHTWATCHERS: When angels and demons must work together, something beyond evil is rising…

Review:

It has been a while that this book has been sitting in my Kindle needing to be read, and I FINALLY got around to it. I feel like such a slacker.

What I remember of Dark Kiss was a series of angels and demons and Sam, the main character, who has a crazy supernatural past that she does not know about. I have to say that Wicked Kiss helped bring a lot of the key plot points out again for the slacker of a reader that I am. It took key plot points from Dark Kiss and reiterated quite well in the rise and fall of this new book.

MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS FROM DARK KISS

Samantha has no soul; it was taken from her by her crazy aunt in an attempt to unleash chaos into the town of Trinity. While this would be a sucky situation for most, Sam is using it to her advantage, to learn about her new-found powers while also having to control her unending hunger for souls from others. In Wicked Kiss, Sam must come to terms with her soulless existence or find a way out of it by retrieving her soul from the guy who took it. Luckily this book picks up almost immediately after the end of the last one, no summer lag time, no year or two later schemes. That is one of the things I really liked about the plot, it really shoved the reader right back into the plotline. 

While I liked that aspect there were a few things that I was more keen on noticing reading the second book that the first, for example, there was a lot of instalove or even just flat out attraction going on.  Between Bishop and his demon brother there was a lot of tension when it came to who wanted Sam more, it was amusing, don’t get me wrong, but all of a sudden Kraven wanted in on the fun? It was a little strange.

I found Sam to be both strong and whiney at times, it was either her throwing a typical teenage tantrum or being wise beyond her years and I doubt most teens are like that, one way or the other, not both.

I did really like the plot, it kept me pulled in and I read the book in one sitting. Like I mentioned it picks right up where Dark Kiss left off and just keeps running, there are more greys to deal with, more angel/demon teaming up to vanquish them, more crazy people showing up to haunt the town and even an appearance of more of Sam’s family… Overall it was a very captivating read.