Review of Ever After High: Next Top Villain by Suzanne Selfors

Review of Suzanne Selfors' Ever After High: Next Top Villain

Release Date: January 6th, 2015

Synopsis as found on Amazon.com:

A brand-new series of school stories from the world of Ever After High!

Duchess Swan and Lizzie Hearts are roommates at Ever After High. While their personalities are very different, they bond over not quite fitting in with the other Royals. Lizzie, however, has one thing that Duchess doesn't: a happily-ever-after at the end of her story.

While Lizzie and the other princesses train for the day when they will rule their kingdoms, Duchess is torn between her role as the perfect, dutiful princess and her rebellious ambition to be a queen. When both girls are selected to attend General Villainy class, Duchess sees an opportunity to be a rebel while following the rules. But can she play a prank on her roomie to ace the class? Find out if Duchess' desire to change her destiny will make her Ever After High's Next Top Villain!

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I am really excited that this new series of Ever After High books is introducing different characters that have never been written about before. This first book in the entirely new series, written by a new author to the Ever After High family, Suzanne Selfors, is through the eyes of Duchess Swan.

While Duchess was mentioned once or twice, we never got to know her character.

Since Duchess' 8th Birthday, she has known what her fairy tale future would bring. She would be cursed to become a swan and she would have no Happily Ever After like many of the Royalty she knows. All she wants is to meet a Prince Charming and ride off into the sunset, but that future is not in the cards for her. There is one plus side for her, though. As a swan, she gets to be a Prima Ballerina... and that is the one thing she is good at.

When Duchess is placed into Mr. Badwolf's General Villainy class, she believes there must have been a mistake. She is not the villain in her story. She is the princess in distress. When she overhears a conversation between Badwolf and Headmaster Grimm, she gets the clue at to why her life is being flipped upside down. Grimm believes that Duchess wants to change her future and get her Happily Ever After. With Raven Queen having gone Rebel, they are going to need another Big Bad Villain to fill her shoes. He believes Duchess may be that person. Everyone may have the spark inside of them to go Evil and it looks like within Duchess, there just might be a Black Swan.

Before this story, the only picture I had of Duchess Swan was one of a stuck-up Princess who didn't look forward to her future and treated everyone else poorly. This story really changed my point of view on her character and there were quite a few times when I actually felt sorry for her.

I have to say, I think I enjoyed this book more than the books from the other series. Without the voice of the Narrator, this book feels less Juvenile and it made it feel like it was written for a broader audience. I love the series... and really most series that adapt fairy tales, so I am excited for the upcoming books. The new character point of views are really exciting and I can't wait to see what else Suzanne Selfors has in store for us.

Review of Magonia by Maria Dahvana Headley

Advance Review of Maria Dahvana Headley's Magonia

Release Date: April 28th, 2015

Synopsis as found on GoodReads.com:


Neil Gaiman’s Stardust meets John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars in this fantasy about a girl caught between two worlds…two races…and two destinies.

Aza Ray is drowning in thin air.

Since she was a baby, Aza has suffered from a mysterious lung disease that makes it ever harder for her to breathe, to speak—to live.

So when Aza catches a glimpse of a ship in the sky, her family chalks it up to a cruel side effect of her medication. But Aza doesn’t think this is a hallucination. She can hear someone on the ship calling her name.

Only her best friend, Jason, listens. Jason, who’s always been there. Jason, for whom she might have more-than-friendly feelings. But before Aza can consider that thrilling idea, something goes terribly wrong. Aza is lost to our world—and found, by another. Magonia.

Above the clouds, in a land of trading ships, Aza is not the weak and dying thing she was. In Magonia, she can breathe for the first time. Better, she has immense power—and as she navigates her new life, she discovers that war is coming. Magonia and Earth are on the cusp of a reckoning. And in Aza’s hands lies the fate of the whole of humanity—including the boy who loves her. Where do her loyalties lie?  


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Excerpt from Magonia:


I breathe in. I breathe out. The sky's full of clouds. A rope is looping down from above, out of the sky and down to earth. There is a woman's face looking at me, and all around us, hundreds upon hundreds of birds. The flock flows like water, surging up and into the air, black and gold and red, and everything is safe and cold, bright with stars and moon.


I'm tiny in comparison. and I'm not on the ground.


I know everyone has dreams of flying, but this isn't a dream of flying. It's a dream of floating, and the ocean is not water but wind.


I call it a dream, but feels realer than my life.


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This book is so unlike any book I have ever read before. The premise was incredible and I was hooked from the very beginning. I can definitely see the comparison to The Fault in Our Stars, but the similarity doesn't last very long. This book is certainly in a category all its own.


Aza is dying. Of what, no one knows. No one has ever seen anything like it before and every Doctor is stumped on how to save her. She is about to turn 16, but the Doctor's have said many times that she wouldn't live to see another Birthday. So she is used to thinking every day could be her last. It comes as quite a shock when she actually does die.


She wakes up somewhere she is unfamiliar with. When a woman who looks like an Owl (an actual bird/human hybrid) starts caring for her, it is no surprise that she freaks out. The woman is a Rostrae, one of the winged class who can shift from fully bird, to partially bird. Aza is on a ship in the sky full of these bird people as well as other alien looking people. These people are Magonians. They are able to sing magic into being... and Aza is no longer on land, she is in their world, Magonia.


Aza quickly finds out that the family she has left behind was never really her family at all. She was kidnapped as a baby and switched with a human child. She lived in a human skin, but her body was never made to live on land. That is why she seemed as though she was dying. Her body could not properly breath Oxygen. The Captain of this ship has been searching for her for 15 years... because she is the daughter of the Captain, Zal Quel. She is Aza Ray Quel.


Why, if this is really her home, can she not stop thinking about the best friend she left behind, Jason, whom she has always been in love with? Why can she not stop wishing to be with her family on earth? Zal has wanted Aza for something and it sure doesn't seem like its because she missed her. What is really going on?


This book opened up a whole new world to me. A floating world that is right above us amongst the clouds. I am excited to see where Headley takes this series. I am a huge fan and this is only her first foray into teen... Exciting prospects await!!

Review of Ferals by Jacob Grey

Advance Review of Jacob Grey's Ferals

Release Date: April 28th, 2015

Synopsis as found on GoodReads.com:


A sinister threat. A city in danger. A boy with the power to command the crows. Ferals is the first book in a dark, action-packed trilogy that’s part The Graveyard Book, part Batman, and all high-octane adventure.

Blackstone was once a thriving metropolis. But that was before the Dark Summer—a wave of violence and crime that swept through the city eight years ago, orchestrated by the fearsome Spinning Man. Now the Spinning Man is on the move again, and a boy named Caw is about to be caught in his web.

Caw has never questioned his ability to communicate with crows. But as the threat of a new Dark Summer looms, Caw discovers the underground world of Blackstone’s ferals—those with the power to speak to and control animals. Caw is one of them. And to save his city, he must quickly master abilities he never knew he had . . . and prepare to defeat a darkness he never could have imagined.  


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Excerpt from Ferals:


A long, long time ago, ordinary people knew all about ferals. The let us be, living in harmony with the natural world. But then things changed. It started with accusations of witchcraft and sorcery. A few ferals were rooted out. Others went into hiding, but some fought back, and that only made the problem worse. Many feral lines were... ended. After that, the survivors learned to keep their powers a secret. Their gift became a curse.


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An exciting new world for Middle Grade kids (and some Adults). Blackstone is home to many different kinds of people, but it has been a sanctuary to a certain type of person for as long as they can remember. Ferals have flocked to the city to find a home with others of their kind. A Feral is a person who can talk with animals. Now, this isn't Doctor Doolittle and they do not talk with every animal. Each Feral can speak to only one type.


For 13 year old Caw, he has been alone for the past 8 years... well, almost alone. He has his crows to keep him company. They have kept him safe, scavenged for food with him, and talked with him when he felt lonely. As far as he knows, he is the only of his kind. Until one day, a prison break near the forest he lives in opens up a whole new world to him and one by one he finds more people like him. He also meets the prison warden's daughter, Lydia, whom he has seen with her family while he has spied on them during their daily routine. He isn't spying on them to be creepy, but because he is jealous. His mother and father pushed him away when he was only 5 years old.


Lydia quickly becomes his friend after he and his 3 crows (Glum, Screech, and Milky) save her, as well as her father, Mr. Strickham, from being killed by one of the escaped convicts. Even though his crows do not trust her, she offers to take him to the library to learn to read. While there, they draw a picture of a spider that was tattooed on one of the convicts chest and leave it with the librarian. This drawing sets off a chain of events that will change their lives and rock their world to the point where nothing will ever be the same again.


I kept a log of all the Ferals that were mentioned in the book and which animals they can communicate with.


Caw - Crows
Crumbs - Pigeons
Pip - Mice
Jawbone - Dogs
Mamba - Snakes
Scuttle - Cockroaches
Felix Quaker - Cats
Racklen - Wolves
Madeleine - Squirrels
Ali - Bees
Emily - Centipedes
Velma - Foxes
The Spinning Man - Spiders


Although it is mentioned that there are/were hundreds of different types of Ferals, some lines either died out during a tragedy that happened 8 years before the story begins, or they were too afraid to get involved with the events of this book.


I have loved this book and can't wait to see where Grey takes the story from this point. I think the plot is one I have never seen before and the story is very innovative. I think there are a lot of little "inside" jokes that the author has flecked throughout the story, like how the big bad villain is The Spinning Man. He controls spiders and the huge tragedy that killed off a lot of Feral lines happened 8 years ago (a spider has 8 legs). There is also the fact that the Cat Feral is named Felix. While this may not be obvious for most of the readers in this genre, there is a cartoon that began in the 1950's about a black cat named Felix (Felix the Cat). Little things like this make me smile, because it shows that the author not only has a sense of humor, but he really thought out the little things in the story.


While this book was written with tweens or younger kids in mind, it kept my attention the entire time. I recommend it for fans of Neil Gaiman, Rick Riordan, Brandon Mull, and the 39 Clues series..

Review of Death Marked by Leah Cypess

Advance Review of Leah Cypess' Death Marked

Release Date: March 3rd, 2015

Synopsis as found on GoodReads.com:

A young sorceress’s entire life has been shaped to destroy the empire controlling her world. But if everything she knows is a lie, will she even want to fulfill her destiny? The sequel to Death Sworn is just as full of magic and surprising revelations, and will thrill fans of Leigh Bardugo and Robin LaFevers.

At seventeen, Ileni lost her magical power and was exiled to the hidden caves of the assassins. She never thought she would survive long. But she discovered she was always meant to end up, powerless, in the caves as part of an elder sorcerer’s plan to destroy the evil Empire they'd battled so long. Except that Ileni is not an assassin, and she doesn't want to be a weapon. And, after everything, she’s not even sure she knows the truth. Now, at the very heart of the Empire—its academy for sorcerers—the truth is what she seeks. What she finds challenges every belief she holds dear—and it threatens her fledgling romance with the young master of assassins.

Leah Cypess spins an intricate and beautiful conclusion to Ileni's story. In the end, it may not be the epic decisions that bring down an empire, but the small ones that pierce the heart.

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The sequel to Cypess' first installment into the world of Assassins & Sorcerers, Death Sworn, does not disappoint. Death Marked has as much adventure and excitement as the first book, while bringing us into a whole new dynamic that we have yet to experience. While Sworn had us locked into a battle of wills deep in the caves of the Assassins, Marked is above ground in the school for the Empire's Sorcerers. We do see some familiar characters from time to time (other than the main characters of Ileni & Soren), but for the most part it is all new characters.

Ileni has killed the Master of the Assassins & the man she has fallen for has assumed the role of the new Master. She has turned her back on the caves, pulling up her bootstraps, sucking up her pride and running home with her tail tucked between her legs. On the road outside her little mountain village, she is ambushed and captured by Karyn, the woman who had infiltrated to caves in the previous book. She is the head Sorcerer at the Empire's school for Sorcerers. She is determined to turn Ileni to the side of the Empire and she will stop at nothing to make sure she betrays the Assassins.

Ileni knows what it is like to be alone and powerless, because her powers have finally slowly disappeared, so when she is offered the one thing she wants more than peace, what will she do? The lodestones in the walls of the academy have stored powers of the many people the Empire has killed and now that Ileni is there, she can access power she had thought she would never feel again. But those powers come at a cost. Karyn wishes for her to betray the man she loves... and if she doesn't, her powers really will be gone & Ileni will be kicked out on the street... to finally go back to her people in shame.

I am happy that this book was as good, if not even better than the first. You should have just enough time to run out and get Death Sworn before the release of the sequel in a little over a month. Make sure to pick it up, because it is definitely worth reading.

Review of Reborn by Jennifer Rush

Review of Jennifer Rush's Reborn

Release Date: January 6th, 2015

Synopsis as found on the inside cover flap:

No one involved with the Branch was ever innocent. Me included.

The Branch is in shambles, but Anna, Sam, Cas, and Nick can't rest easy. Remnants of the organization lurk unseen and the flashbacks to their old lives are only getting stronger--especially Nick's.

Following scattered memories and clues from his Branch file, Nick sets off alone in search of answers and in search of the girl who haunts his dreams. But the sleepy town where she lives in full of secrets and Nick soon learns that uncovering their shared past may have deadly consequences.

Experience the Branch through Nick's eyes in this action-packed finale to the Altered saga.

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I freakin' love this series! I am a little confused though... while reading the book and after finishing it, I was positive that there would be another (at least 1, maybe more) book to go. But when I was getting the synopsis to put on here, it says that this is the finale for the series. WTF? I hope this is not the ending.

So unlike Altered & Erased (the first 2 books in the series), this book is not about Anna or Sam. They are still in the book, but their parts are minor. This book is all about Nick. The brooding miserable character that we all loved to hate and hated to love finally gets his time in the spotlight. We finally get to see his softer more compassionate side. While it does take a minute to step back and see if it even feels like the same character, I actually enjoyed this new Nick.

During his flashbacks, which are coming a lot lately seeing as how none of them are taking the medicine that the Branch was feeding them to keep their old memories away, Nick sees a girl. In this flashback, he isn't sure if he is trying to save the girl or kill her. In his mind, he knows that this girl's life is tied to his sanity and humanity. If he saved her, than maybe he can save himself. If he killed her, then he is no better than the abusive father he now remembers running away from so many years ago. This whole story centers on Nick leaving the group to find Elizabeth, the girl literally of his dreams.

When Nick finds her in a town a few hours away, she seems to be living her life again, albeit in a foster home. Elizabeth also suffers from flashbacks. Unfortunately for her, they are not from having her memories wiped. Hers are from the PTSD she suffers from 6 months she was held in captivity. She was kidnapped with her mother and forced to undergo tests in a lab. The last memory she has of her mom was of her being used to make Lizzy behave. When she was saved (Nick was the one who took her to a hospital after a mysterious stranger broke her out), her mother was never seen from again. Her father had committed suicide during the 6 months after he was accused of involvement in their disappearance.

Nick sticks around the little town she lives in so that he can uncover what really happened to Elizabeth and the role he played in all of it. He needs to know... what he doesn't expect is to fall for this beautiful broken girl.

So, seeing as how I have finished book 3, I was expecting to find out about book 4 or 5... now that Nick has a love interest and Sam has Anna, where are the love interests for Cas or Trev. Although they may have faltered the Branch's plans yet again, there is NO WAY that they will just disappear without a fight. The Branch has ties to the government, there HAS TO BE more to this story!!! Maybe we should all write letters to Jennifer Rush expressing out need for more. Do you think that would work?

Check back in a couple days for my first of 3 upcoming Advance Reader Copy reads... as always, Keep Reading!!

Review of The Goddess Inheritance by Aimee Carter

Review of Aimee Carter's The Goddess Inheritance

Release Date: February 26th, 2013

Synopsis as found on GoodReads.com:

Love or life.
Henry or their child.
The end of her family or the end of the world.
Kate must choose.

During nine months of captivity, Kate Winters has survived a jealous goddess, a vengeful Titan and a pregnancy she never asked for. Now the Queen of the Gods wants her unborn child, and Kate can't stop her--until Cronus offers a deal.

In exchange for her loyalty and devotion, the King of the Titans will spare humanity and let Kate keep her child. Yet even if Kate agrees, he'll destroy Henry, her mother and the rest of the council. And if she refuses, Cronus will tear the world apart until every last god and mortal is dead.

With the fate of everyone she loves resting on her shoulders, Kate must do the impossible: find a way to defeat the most powerful being in existence, even if it costs her everything.

Even if it costs her eternity.

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It has been a few years since I read the book that came before this one in the Goddess Test series, so I played catch up, yet again, when trying to remember everything that happened up to this point. Kate has passed her trials and The Goddess Test, making her the official Goddess of the Underworld along side Henry (aka Hades). While in Tartarus, she was tricked into letting out the father of the Gods & King of the Titans, Cronus, and now all of the Gods are getting ready for war. Kate feels responsible and is going to look for Rhea, Queen of the Titans, but before she even leaves New York, is caught by Calliope (Hera). Unbeknownst to Kate, she is pregnant with Henry's child.

Flash forward to 9 months later... everyone thinks that Kate is searching for Rhea, so no one except for Cronus, Calliope, & Ava (Aphrodite) are even aware that she is not. Ava has been forced into helping Calliope, because she has kidnapped Ava's husband, Nicholas (Hephaestus) and is forcing him to create a weapon infused with the power of a Titan... the only power strong enough to kill a God. Cronus only wants to marry Kate and make her his Queen, because of the generosity she showed him. No one has been kind to him in millennia. Calliope has always wanted Henry and plans on keeping the unborn child.

This book centers on the final fight between the Gods & Cronus. There is plenty of action that will satisfy even those finicky readers. There are a lot of realizations and eye opening scenes, while the author is closing the door on this series. There are even a couple major character deaths.

If you enjoy books about Greek Mythology, you are sure to enjoy this series... just keep the diagram ready that is located in the back or front of every book in the series, because the name changes are sometimes a little confusing and hard to keep up with.

Review of The Goddess War: Mortal Gods by Kendare Blake

Review of Kendare Blake's The Goddess War: Mortal Gods

Release Date: October 14th, 2014

Synopsis as found on Amazon.com:

As ancient immortals are left reeling, a modern Athena and Hermes search the world for answers in Mortal Gods, the second Goddess War novel by Kendare Blake, acclaimed author of Anna Dressed in Blood.
 

Ares, god of war, is leading the other dying gods into battle. Which is just fine with Athena. She’s ready to wage a war of her own, and she’s never liked him anyway. If Athena is lucky, the winning gods will have their immortality restored. If not, at least she’ll have killed the bloody lot of them, and she and Hermes can die in peace.

Cassandra Weaver is a weapon of fate. The girl who kills gods. But all she wants is for the god she loved and lost to return to life. If she can’t have that, then the other gods will burn, starting with his murderer, Aphrodite.

The alliance between Cassandra and Athena is fragile. Cassandra suspects Athena lacks the will to truly kill her own family. And Athena fears that Cassandra's hate will get them all killed.

The war takes them across the globe, searching for lost gods, old enemies, and Achilles, the greatest warrior the world has ever seen. As the struggle escalates, Athena and Cassandra must find a way to work together. Because if they can’t, fates far worse than death await.

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It has been a year and a half since I picked up the Advance Copy of Antigoddess. A year and a half is a long time in between books. Although it is partially my fault I waited so long, seeing as how the sequel did come out in October (3 months ago)... well, and I did read the Advanced Copy of the first book. So I only had my self to blame when I had to catch up while reading to remember all the little things that happened in Book 1. Luckily, Blake has a way of writing that not only explains to you what is going on, but definitely helped to jog my memory on everything that already happened.

Book 2, Mortal Gods, in the Goddess War series, was similar and yet different to its predecessor in that it continued on introducing different Gods and what their ailments are, but it also gave us a hint at the cause of it. To explain for any of you readers who haven't picked up this series yet, each of the Greek Gods we meet is dying... slowly. They are no longer immortal and are at war to solve the reason they are dying. Each is dying in a different way. The Gods we met from Antigoddess were:

Athena (growing Owl feathers on and inside of her body, including inside of her veins, organs, mouth, skin, etc)
Hermes (losing all body fat and muscle, slowly withering away)
Poseidon (all of his body was turning into different sea life)
Aphrodite (going insane)
Demeter (her body is stretching and stretching until it covers the most of a Nevada desert)
Hera (turning into a Marble statue)
Apollo (no visible signs)

In Book 2, we meet a few more Gods:

Artemis (the animals she lives among are turning on her and she is being chased by a pack of rabid dogs)
Ares (all of his healed war wounds are breaking open and he is losing blood... lots of it)
Persephone (one side of her body is dead and the other is rotting)

Most of this book is spent as the Mortal Heroes prepare to wage war on what we the reader see as the Villains. We do get some action through the book, but most of the real drama doesn't happen until the last chapters of the book. There are some minor fight scenes between Athena & Ares, or when Ares wolves attack some of the Humans, but they are over quickly and all we are left with is the aftermath of days of healing and training.

I am a lover of all books about Greek Mythology. While I loved Antigoddess and enjoyed Mortal Gods, it left a lot to be desired. I hope the 3rd book picks up the action, because I need something to happen worth wild to feel like I've lost myself in the story.

If you enjoyed this book, pick up Aimee Carter's Goddess Test. I am going to read the final book in that series next... which is long over do.