Review: Devils Unto Dust by Emma Berquist

Title: Devils Unto Dust
Author: Emma Berquist
Series: Stand Alone
Published By: Greenwillow (April 10, 2018)
Genre: YA Western/Dystopian
Source: ARC Provided by the Publisher (in exchange for an honest review)
My Rating: 5 Stars!


Book Description:
Ten years ago, a horrifying disease began spreading across the West Texas desert. Infected people—shakes—attacked the living and created havoc and destruction. No one has ever survived the infection. Daisy Wilcox, known as Willie, has been protecting her siblings within the relatively safe walls of Glory, Texas. When Willie’s good-for-nothing father steals a fortune from one of the most dangerous shake-hunters in town, she finds herself on the hook for his debt. With two hunters, including the gruff and handsome Ben, to accompany her, she sets out across the desert in search of her father. But the desert is not kind to travelers, and not everyone will pass through alive.


Western meets horror for this riveting story about survival, family, and inner strength. Tense, short chapters propel readers from one action-packed scene to the next, while Willie’s distinctive, introspective voice deepens the emotional stakes with every turn of the page. High concept and character-driven, Emma Berquist’s debut will satisfy fans of The Magnificent Seven, Rae Carson’s Walk on Earth a Stranger, and HBO’s Westworld.

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It isn't often that you get a mesh of genres that blend together so seamlessly and yet, Dust Until Devils did it and did it well. 

A mix of western, dystopian, and a bit of this and that, and this novel truly stands out and shines.

It was fun, adventurous, enthralling, and unbelievably hard to put down. With a rough and tough no nonsense heroine that you can't help but instantly like in a setting that is every bit as rustic as it is horrifying, this truly was a read that I did not want to end. 

With it's short but riveting chapters you can't help but be sucked in by the action, the adventure and the western feel of it all. I absolutely adored this and even though I believe this is a stand alone novel, I can't help but want a sequel. 

This seems to be the year for YA. It is not only bigger and badder than it ever has been before but undeniably easy to fall in love with all over again. 

*All thoughts and opinions are my own and were not influenced by the author or publisher. I was not compensated for this review.*

Giveaway: A Mark Unwilling by Candace Wondrak

I'm so excited to not only introduce you to A Mark Unwilling by Candace Wondrak but to be able to offer you a special giveaway for an e-galley of the book! Five lucky winners will win a copy of this and it's open international so yay! Also, if we get more than 40 entries, I will add another 5 winners to the giveaway so it's a win win! 

And you guys, check out this cover art, it is gorgeous! And that synopsis? So good!

I actually just started this today and I can't put it down!  I'm already 30% in and loving it! Witches, demons, vamps and a Mark, what's not to love. This isn't you average UF book, it is so much fun and totally unique in its own way. I'm really enjoying it and can't wait to see how it progresses. 

So don't forget to check out the giveaway and win a copy for yourself, I don't think you will be disappointed with it at all. 

Series: Book One in the Reckoning Series

Author: Candace Wondrak

Release Date: May 1, 2018
Genre: NA Fantasy

Book Description:

Lexa Blue thought she had her life figured out. She’d go to college, maybe get a job, and wait until the Demon whose Mark she bears comes to collect her soul. No real concrete plans since it wouldn’t matter in the end. What she did not expect was the end of the world. 

Conquest. War. Pestilence. Death. 

Even with her trusted Warlock friend, David, Lexa is clueless about how to stop the apocalypse—but she’ll still try; because of her Mark, she can’t die. Who better to fight the Horsemen?

It’s not that simple. With a prophetic girl as a new sidekick, a group of Vampires who’re suspect, and an FBI Agent who somehow knows her connection to the biblical figures, Lexa’s life is going to get a heck of a lot worse before it gets better. 

When her Demon finally comes to claim her, will she be ready? 

...Probably not.

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Review: Love and Other Word by Christina Lauren

Title: Love and Other Words
Author: Christina Lauren
Series: Stand Alone
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Published By: Gallery Books (April 10, 2018)
Source: ARC Provided by the Publisher (in exchange for an honest review)
My Rating: 4.5 Stars!



Book Description:
Love, loss, friendship, and the betrayals of the past all collide in this first women’s fiction novel from New York Times and #1 international bestselling author Christina Lauren (Autoboyography, Dating You / Hating You).

The story of the heart can never be unwritten.

Macy Sorensen is settling into an ambitious if emotionally tepid routine: work hard as a new pediatrics resident, plan her wedding to an older, financially secure man, keep her head down and heart tucked away.

But when she runs into Elliot Petropoulos—the first and only love of her life—the careful bubble she’s constructed begins to dissolve. Once upon a time, Elliot was Macy’s entire world—growing from her gangly bookish friend into the man who coaxed her heart open again after the loss of her mother...only to break it on the very night he declared his love for her.


Told in alternating timelines between Then and Now, teenage Elliot and Macy grow from friends to much more—spending weekends and lazy summers together in a house outside of San Francisco devouring books, sharing favorite words, and talking through their growing pains and triumphs. As adults, they have become strangers to one another until their chance reunion. Although their memories are obscured by the agony of what happened that night so many years ago, Elliot will come to understand the truth behind Macy’s decade-long silence, and will have to overcome the past and himself to revive her faith in the possibility of an all-consuming love.

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I'm so ashamed to admit that this is my first Lauren book and I can honestly say after finishing this, in almost one sitting mind you, what in the heck was I waiting for?

Romance books, heck the genre in general has so not been my thing lately but I saw the description for this and something resonated with me so I picked it up and consequently, barely set it down again.

I was completely and utterly captivated by it from the very first page.

This story. This friendship, this....everything. 

I don't even have words to describe how much I am in love with Elliot and Macy. With this book. With their story. Their passion and friendship. Their love and heartache. Their loses and tragedies and their strength and resilience. I just want to thumb through the book again and absorb it all over. It experience it all over again, one emotion at a time.

It was so good. So meaningful and yes, romance and all, exactly and everything, I needed.

*All thoughts and opinions are my own and were not influenced by the author or publisher. I was not compensated for this review.*

Review Sky in the Deep by Adrienne Young

Title: Sky In the Deep
Author: Adrienne Young
Series: Stand Alone
Genre: YA Fantasy
Published By: Wednesday Books (April 24, 2018)
Source: ARC Provided by the Publisher (in exchange for an honest review)
My Rating: 4.5 Stars!


Book Description:
OND ELDR. BREATHE FIRE.

Raised to be a warrior, seventeen-year-old Eelyn fights alongside her Aska clansmen in an ancient rivalry against the Riki clan. Her life is brutal but simple: fight and survive. Until the day she sees the impossible on the battlefield—her brother, fighting with the enemy—the brother she watched die five years ago.

Faced with her brother's betrayal, she must survive the winter in the mountains with the Riki, in a village where every neighbor is an enemy, every battle scar possibly one she delivered. But when the Riki village is raided by a ruthless clan thought to be a legend, Eelyn is even more desperate to get back to her beloved family.

She is given no choice but to trust Fiske, her brother’s friend, who sees her as a threat. They must do the impossible: unite the clans to fight together, or risk being slaughtered one by one. Driven by a love for her clan and her growing love for Fiske, Eelyn must confront her own definition of loyalty and family while daring to put her faith in the people she’s spent her life hating. 

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Sky in the Deep is a beautifully written novel about a young girl who is every bit as fierce and strong  as she is kick butt, brave and completely bad a$%. Truly, she makes you want to be her, fighting, death, and brutality and all. 

She is a warrior in every sense of the word and set in a very much Viking-esque atmosphere, this novel is one that will keep you on the edge of your seat eagerly turning the pages wanting more. 

Romance, struggles, and fights to the bloody death, this is a novel that will stick with you. It grabs hold of your emotions and keeps them front and center while it mercilessly plays with them as the story progresses and moves at a fast pace that will leave your heart pounding and your lungs gasping for breath.

Truly a stand out YA stand alone novel that is sure to grab your attention and leave you wishing there was more to come. 

*All thoughts and opinions are my own and were not influenced by the author or publisher. I was not compensated for this review.*

Blog Tour Book Review: The Broken Girls by Simone St. James

Simone St. James has quickly become a favorite when I want a story not only rip with mystery and intrigue but one that has some amazing historical detail and settings as well with a slight twist of the paranormal, which is why I'm so excited to be a part of this blog tour because her latest book, The Broken Girls was fabulous and I'm so glad that I read it. I strongly urge you to check it out as well as her other work because it really is fun. 

Release Date: March 20, 2018 (Berkley)

Genre: Historical with a Paranormal Edge

Source: ARC Provided by the Publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Book Description:

A breakout suspense novel from the award-winning author of The Haunting of Maddy Clare.

Vermont, 1950. There's a place for the girls whom no one wants--the troublemakers, the illegitimate, the too smart for their own good. It's called Idlewild Hall. And in the small town where it's located, there are rumors that the boarding school is haunted. Four roommates bond over their whispered fears, their budding friendship blossoming--until one of them mysteriously disappears. . . . 

Vermont, 2014. As much as she's tried, journalist Fiona Sheridan cannot stop revisiting the events surrounding her older sister's death. Twenty years ago, her body was found lying in the overgrown fields near the ruins of Idlewild Hall. And though her sister's boyfriend was tried and convicted of murder, Fiona can't shake the suspicion that something was never right about the case.

When Fiona discovers that Idlewild Hall is being restored by an anonymous benefactor, she decides to write a story about it. But a shocking discovery during the renovations will link the loss of her sister to secrets that were meant to stay hidden in the past--and a voice that won't be silenced. . . .

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About the Author:

Simone St. James is the award-winning author of The Haunting of Maddy Clare, which won two RITA awards from Romance Writers of America and an Arthur Ellis Award from Crime Writers of Canada. She wrote her first ghost story, about a haunted library, when she was in high school, and spent twenty years behind the scenes in the television business before leaving to write full-time. She lives in Toronto, Canada with her husband and a spoiled cat.

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Not only is The Broken Girls beautifully haunting but it is beautifully written. The kind of story that can both put goose bumps on your arms and tears in your eyes. It keeps you guessing, it keeps you reading, it keeps your attention and more than anything else, it leaves you wanting more by the end. 

This story is so complex in its simplicity. It is about a time when women, when girls, still didn't have a voice and were looked down upon and controlled by those both older than them and of a different gender. 

It deals with grief, in all its ugly shapes, sizes and forms and makes the outcome of it all so very touching, so very wonderful in it's power of those lost girls coming together and forming their own family, their own destiny, and most of all, not sitting by and letting other dictate who and what they were suppose to be.

Told in alternating times and point of views, this was so easy to fall into. Into the story, into the mystery and into the lives of these five girls who couldn't be more different from one another in almost every way imaginable. 

With a blend of historical, mystery and a slight paranormal edge, this really was a read that stood out and will be one for everyone. 

Review: Lake Silence by Anne Bishop

Title: Lake Silence
Author: Anne Bishop
Series: Book Six in the Others Series
Published By: Berkley (Ace) (March 6, 2018)
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Source: ARC Provided by the Publisher (in exchange for an honest review)
My Rating: 4.5 Stars!


Book Description:
In this thrilling and suspenseful fantasy, set in the world of the New York Times bestselling Others series, Vicki DeVine and her lodger, the shapeshifter Aggie Crowe, stumble onto a dead body . . . and find themselves enmeshed in danger and dark secrets.

Human laws do not apply in the territory controlled by the Others–vampires, shapeshifters, and paranormal beings even more deadly. And this is a fact that humans should never, ever forget . . . 

After her divorce, Vicki DeVine took over a rustic resort near Lake Silence, in a human town that is not human controlled. Towns like Vicki’s have no distance from the Others, the dominant predators that rule most of the land and all of the water throughout the world. And when a place has no boundaries, you never really know what’s out there watching you.


Vicki was hoping to find a new career and a new life. But when her lodger, Aggie Crowe–one of the shapeshifting Others–discovers a dead body, Vicki finds trouble instead. The detectives want to pin the man’s death on her, despite the evidence that nothing human could have killed the victim. As Vicki and her friends search for answers, things get dangerous–and it’ll take everything they have to stay alive.

*Amazon*B&N*

I have been in love with Simon, Meg, Vlad, Tessa and all the vanguard in the Others series since the very first book and when Simon and Meg's journey ended at book five, I wasn't ready to say goodbye to them. I don't think anyone that has read the magical, slightly horrifying world that Bishop has created in the Others, was. How can one ever be ready to say goodbye to beloved characters?

 Finding out book six would be a spin off of this amazing world was both a delight, elating and a bit terrifying.  

How could I possible relinquish control of this amazing world to a different set of characters in a different part of the world that Bishop had us all both fearing and loving?

To say I was a little scared was an understatement. 

With trepidation I opened Lake Silence and with a deep breath, a bag of chocolate near me and a blanket to snuggle up with, I took the plunge...slowly. A toe at first and then, yep, I was hooked and I jumped right in the rest of the way. All the apprehension and fear gone as I was once again immersed in this utterly terrifying and yet fascinating world. 

I loved seeing some old faces and getting a lot of new ones. Even after my initial reaction of wanting this to be about the Others I already knew and loved, it really was so nice to see some fresh faces and more importantly to learn more about the Elders! I'm so glad that we really get to see these glimpses of more of what the Others are and how they think and feel about each other and humans. This was by far one of the more detailed and maybe even more interesting looks into how their hierarchy works and functions. 

All in all, I am once again hooked and can't wait for more. 

*All thoughts and opinions are my own and were not influenced by the author or publisher. I was not compensated for this review.*