Young Adult Book Giveaway

My daughter, Katie, attended the Las Vegas Book Festival this last weekend and had a ball.  She interviewed all 18 of the young adult authors.  She asked them what their favorite rereads are and "They're coming to get you.  Which would you rather fight off:  a hundred chihuahuas, a hundred cheerleaders or a hundred 2-year-olds?"

And she's hosting a giveaway for 3 young adult books along with lots of extra items signed by the authors.  So watch the video and enter the giveaway.  Katie's a whiz kid at putting together her videos, so even if you don't want to win a book I think you'll enjoy the video and the authors' answers to the interview questions.

A Trick of the Light

by Louise Penny

I am a big fan of Louise Penny's and have loved all her books, so far.  I didn't like this one so much.  I know it was the language that kept getting in my way.  The characters, writing, story were fabulous but the heavy use of the f word kept getting in my way of settling comfortably into a mystery by my favorite author.  That said, the objectionable language did fit in with the story and it did make a point.

Three passages that caught my attention:

"Armand Gamache knew no good ever came from putting up walls.  What people mistook for safety was in fact captivity.  And few things thrived in captivity."

"Our lives, when we were drinking, were pretty complicated.  Pretty chaotic.  We got into all sorts of trouble.  It was a mess.  And this is all we ever wanted.  a quiet place in the bright sunshine.  But every day we drank we got further from it."  (probably true of most addictions)

"And he recognized it for what it was.  Chief Justice Thierry Pineault was pissing on him.  It was delicate, sophisticated, genteel, mannerly.  But it was still piss.  The problem with a pissing contest, as Gamache knew, was that what should have remained private became public."

I am looking forward to her next book.  If the f word is used as much as in that book, I'll probably quit reading this series.  I hope it's not because I love the characters, love Penny's story telling abilities and love the intricate mysteries.

This was my husband's favorite of the series.  Read his review on his blog, Live and Learn.

Broken Birds, The Story of My Momila

by Jeannette

I didn't like this book.  The beginning was very interesting about the mother's and dad's experiences during the war.  This book claims to be the story of her momila but it was more about the children and their problems.

Darke

by Angie Sage

I have really enjoyed the Septimus Heap series.  Septimus is the seventh son of a seventh son in a line of wizards.  In Magyck, the first in the series, Septimus is stolen the night he is born by a midwife who pronounces him dead.  That same night the boy's father comes across a bundle in the snow containing a new born baby girl.  The following books reveal who this baby girl is and what happens to Septimus and, eventually, the adventures they share together.

As with the five earlier books, there are sinister forces at work in Darke. One of the characters has been Banished and Septimus must enter the Darke in hopes of retrieving him.  The Darke Domaine finds a way to enter the Castle and eventually engulfs it.  And a threatening Darke dragon is on the loose.

The covers of the books in this series are fun and creative, too - each cover looks like a locked book.  This picture shows the books in the correct order.  I haven't read them in order and I feel like I've been able to follow along quite well, but it would probably be best to read them order.  

I applaud Angie Sage for the wonderful, magical world she has populated with quirky, lovable characters.  Even thought the books are written for a 9 to 14 year old audience they held the interest of this 60 year old.  I enjoyed the writing, the suspense, the humor, the setting and, most of all, the characters.

Warner Bros. is working on a movie of the first book which I look forward to with great anticipation.

Kiss Her, Kill Her

by Lisa Dewar

My goodness but I'm so far behind on writing my reviews.  I'm still reading, albeit not as much, but I'm not keeping a record of what I've read.  I sent a stack of books off to my daughter a couple of months ago, all books that I had read but not recorded.  I did make a list but now I've lost my list.  A word of advise - Don't take up other time-consuming hobbies that interfere with reading and blogging.  Once you do there will be no turning back!  Last winter I started quilting and this summer I started doing genealogy.  Both fun, interesting and addictive.  Now that the temps have cooled down I'm back to quilting.

At one point last winter I read a review copy of Kiss Her, Kill Her by Lisa Dewar.  It was very interesting and took an unexpected turn early in the book.  Here's the write-up from the back of the book:

THE PREDATOR
New York City has a monster on the loose and his name is Tarryn Cooper Love.
No one had given a second glance to the handsome taxi driver, but in reality he had been molded to be a killer since early childhood. His mother, who valued a juicy murder above all else, had taught him well. Just one more trophy and he is set to reach his goal, surpassing his mother's idol, the infamous Ted Bundy.
THE PREY
When a beautiful young woman gets into his cab flashing a wad of cash, he thinks he's hit the jackpot. As she starts confessing her plans for ending her own life he decides to listen to her story, hoping to charm her back from the brink of death, to heighten his game.
What he discovers is a twisted tale that has taken her from the hardened streets of LA to the upper crust of New York...a story that might even rival his own.
Tarryn has to decide within the space of 24 hours, if he should kill her or save her - and perhaps save himself in the process

 The rating on GoodReads for this book was 4 stars.  I would only give it 3 stars because it didn't really have the intensity that made me want to keep reading.  I didn't like either character, although I did sympathize with both of them.  I think I suspected a direction the book was going to go (something I don't usually do because I tend to just float along through a book without thinking too much) and the book didn't take that direction.  That could have resulted in a good, surprising twist but it didn't.  Instead the book just plodded on, sharing the back stories of the 2 main characters.  That was interesting, but I kept waiting for some conflict to develop and it didn't.

I do hope Lisa Dewar will continue to write.  She does have talent and I would be interested in reading future novels.