COVER REVEAL! 'Midnight Burning' by Karissa Laurel

Another day, another cover reveal - this time for 'Midnight Burning', a new urban fantasy from Karissa Laurel! This cover reveal has been organised by Good Tales Book Tours, so a big thank you to them for letting me get involved.
Scroll on down to see the cover, you know you want to...

That is one heck of a book cover. I love the fact that you can see the mountains right behind the city; it makes me think there's going to be some journeying in this novel, and it's going to be cold and spooky and that's all you really need to make a brilliant urban fantasy setting. I think this, combined with the blurb, definitely means I'm going to have to pick it up at some point - and I really like the fact that it sounds as though it's going to be an adult urban fantasy, which is something I haven't read in a long time. 

About the book:

Solina Mundy lives a quiet life, running the family bakery in her small North Carolina hometown. But one night, she suffers a vivid nightmare in which a wolfish beast is devouring her twin brother, who lives in Alaska. The next morning, the police notify her that Mani is dead. Driven to learn the truth, Solina heads for the Land of the Midnight Sun. Once there, she begins to suspect Mani's friends know more about his death than they've let on. Skyla, an ex-Marine, is the only one willing to help her. 

As Solina and Skyla delve into the mystery surrounding Mani's death, Solina is stunned to learn that her own life is tied to Mani's friends, his death, and the fate of the entire world. If she can't learn to control her newfound gifts and keep her friends safe, a long-lost dominion over mortals will rise again, and everything she knows will fall into darkness.  

'Midnight Burning' publishes on July the 7th, so only a little under a month to go!

About the author: 

Karissa Laurel has always dabbled in writing, but she also wanted to be a chef when she grew up. So she did. After years of working nights, weekends, and holidays, she burnt out and said "Now what do I do?" She tried a bunch of other things, the most steady of those being a paralegal for state government, but nothing makes her as happy as writing. She has published several short stories and reads "slush" for a couple of short-story markets. 

Karissa lives in North Carolina with her kid, her husband, the occasional in-law, and a very hairy husky. She loves to read and has a sweet tooth for speculative fiction. Sometimes her husband convinces her to put down the books and take the motorcycles out for a spin. When it snows, you'll find her on the slopes. 

Karissa also paints and draws and harbors a grand delusion that she might finish a graphic novel someday. 

If you'd like to contact Karissa to tell her how beautiful her book cover is, you can tweet her @KarissaLaurel, or contact her on Facebook.

Endless Possibilities Read-a-thon Wrap-up!

Over these past few days, I've been taking part in the Endless Possibilities Read-a-Thon in conjunction with Good Tales Book Tours. I'd like to say another big thank you to Good Tales, for allowing me to take part in this read-a-thon, it was so much fun!

During the read-a-thon, I managed to complete two books: 'The Lover's Dictionary' by David Levithan and 'Panic' by Lauren Oliver. Not as many as I'd been hoping to read, but I was quite busy with work and going to a concert on Sunday night, so I couldn't apply myself to the reading as much as I wanted to. 

'The Lover's Dictionary' by David Levithan is quite a short book, as it's the story of a couple told through dictionary definitions; each 'chapter' is a word, and the plot on that page relates to the word. The thing I love about this novel is that we don't get any specifics about the couple - they could be young or old, black or white - and we don't get their names either, so it's easy to relate to the story no matter what background you come from. 

I either love or hate David Levithan's writing - he's extremely Marmite to me. 'Every Day' was one of my favourite books, but when I read 'Marly's Ghost' at the beginning of this year I was supremely disappointed. This meant I was quite nervous going into 'The Lover's Dictionary', as I'd been anticipating it quite highly due to the unique structuring of the story.

Thankfully, I was pretty impressed. When you get to the end it is a bit deflating, but because it's a snapshot of a life I was never going to get a resolution that I was completely happy with. The writing style was perfect though, quintessential Levithan, as he has such a talent for putting into words the little feelings that it's hard to verbalise. An example of that would be:

'I don't like it when you use my shampoo, because then your hair smells like me, not you.'

I really don't know why that quote touched me as much as it did, but I'm not ashamed to admit that it did make me shed a few tears - I was already feeling quite emotional from the rollercoaster ride that was their romance, and it really hit home because it was such an ordinary, day-to-day thing to comment upon.
This wasn't my favourite David Levithan book, but I can see myself coming back to this one over and over again in the future - it was a very quick read, taking me only a couple of hours, but I did really enjoy this one.

 

The second book I read during the read-a-thon was 'Panic' by Lauren Oliver. I actually started this one first, but there was so much going on and it was so adrenaline-filled that I needed to take a bit of a break, because I get really emotionally involved in novels like this and I was much too on edge.

Panic is a game played by the seniors of the high school in Carp - every summer you can choose to participate in the game for the chance to win a minimum prize of $50,000. Panic has been going for seven years, and there has been three deaths in the game in that time period, but when you're from a dead-end town the desperation takes over, and nothing will stop you from trying to get a better life for yourself.

This is a dual perspective novel, switching between Heather and Dodge. Heather lives in the Fresh Pines trailer park with her mother, step-father and sister, and at first she only joins Panic to find a reason to be alive - she's just found out her long-term boyfriend, Matt, is cheating on her, and she's feeling pretty down in the dumps. However, Dodge has a much better reason for playing Panic - revenge, pure and simple. In a game of Panic a few years ago, the brakes on his sisters car were tampered with, leaving her paralyzed from the waist down. Now, the saboteurs brother is in Dodge's game of Panic, and Dodge wants to take something from him. "A sister's legs for a brother's life.". 

Panic is addictive; both the game and the book. I thought this would take me a while to read, but with the rapidly passing days and the sudden arrival of new Panic tasks, I flew through this book. This is the second Lauren Oliver novel that I've read (the first being 'Before I Fall') and I still absolutely love her writing, her characterisation and her characters voices. They seem to come alive on the page, and I have a feeling Heather and Dodge will follow me for a long time from now.
There were still a couple of issues with it - something that is meant to be really subtle and surprising was really obvious to me from one of the second chapters, so all of the hints and clues placed throughout just kind of annoyed me. But other than that, this one was an absolute rollercoaster, and I could not predict how it was going to end.
If you haven't read a Lauren Oliver novel yet, you really need to get on with it - you will not regret it, I promise you.

That was all I managed to read during these three days, but I'm pretty proud of it - I'd wanted to read both books for so long but hadn't had any time, and they both ended up being ace. Got some other exciting book things coming on the blog later this week, so keep an eye out! 

Endless Possibilities Read-a-thon TBR!

I'm taking part in the Good Tales Book Tours Endless Possibilities Read-A-Thon next week, so I thought I'd compile my TBR list ready, and let you guys know what I'll be challenging myself to read! I'm going to try and link them all to Endless Possibilities (even if the links will be a little bit stretched!)

1. 'The Lover's Dictionary' by David Levithan: what has more possibilities than a dictionary? All the different words that can be combined together, in any shape or pattern. Just choosing amorous, romantic words minimises the possibilities a little bit, but they're still pretty big, and I can't wait to see what happens in this novel. 
2. 'Panic' by Lauren Oliver: there are so many endless possibilities of things in the world that you can panic about!
3. 'Adverbs' by Daniel Handler: he can only use a selection of adverbs, but the possibilities of which adverbs used are endless!

I'm only going to try to read the three novels, because I'm also gonna try and read a couple of non-fiction books for my investigation into self-help as a genre. Wish me luck! 

COVER REVEAL! 'This One's For You' by Brandy Jellum

Another day, another blog post: this time a cover reveal for a novel that I am VERY excited about! If you wanna see that cover, scroll on down...

I don't think it's just me that loves this cover, is it? It looks like a summery, cute contemporary, and I'm sure I'm absolutely gonna love this one when it comes out.

All alone in a new state, Brennan Daniels has only the memories of her best friend, Reagan, to keep her company as she starts college. Reagan is the reason for everything Brennan does--before she died, she made Brennan promise to stay good until she found a man worth keeping. No boys, no dating, and definitely no falling in love--those were the rules for college, and Brennan carved them into the brick walls guarding her heart...

But there's a fire burning behind those walls, and when Brennan meets Owen Scott, the (mysterious) new guy across the hall, she can't deny the pull between them. He is everything she should never want. Everyone warns her to stay away--even Owen himself--but the heart wants what the heart wants, even if it knows that it's going to get hurt--even if it means throwing old promises to new flames...

If that synopsis doesn't instantly grab you, I don't know what's wrong with you! I think it sounds like a great novel, and I can't wait for release day on May the 12th to finally read this one.
If you like this book cover as much as I do you should go and tell Brandy on Twitter @brandy_jellum - I'm sure she'll appreciate the love!