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Young Adult Fiction

Book Review : The Madman’s Daughter

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  • Release Date: January 29, 2013 
  • Genre: Sci-Fi/Historical
  •  Pages: 432
  • Publisher: Blazer + Bray (Harper Collins Children)


Synopsis : Inspired by H. G. Wells’s classic The Island of Dr. Moreau,The Madman’s Daughter is a dark and breathless Gothic thriller about the secrets we’ll do anything to know and the truths we’ll go to any lengths to protect. . . Sixteen-year-old Juliet Moreau has built a life for herself in London—working as a maid, attending church on Sundays, and trying not to think about the scandal that ruined her life. After all, no one ever proved the rumors about her father’s gruesome experiments. But when she learns he is alive and continuing his work on a remote tropical island, she is determined to find out if the accusations are true.

. . . and you thought you had father issues. Juliet Moreau’s life has been world of hardship since her disgraced father, the mad Dr. Moreau,  abandoned her family leaving them to ruin. Years later a chance encounter leads Juliet to her father and his mysterious island inhabited by strange islanders.

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Audiobook Review : Days of Blood and Starlight

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” . . . Whatever went on in the ash fall landscape and blood crusted world of war where her creations went forth to do violence.  It wasn’t her concern. She conjured the bodies. That was all. What more could she possibly do ?“

“It was the deed that matter not words. Do the thing. Kill the monster. Change the world”

– Laini Taylor, Days of Blood and Starlight

  • Release Date: January 16th 2013
  • Length : 15 Hours 25 Minutes
  • Genre: Fantasy
  • Publisher : Hachette Audio

Synopsis: An art student and monster’s apprentice Karou finally has the answers she has always sought. She knows who she is—and what she is. But with this knowledge comes another truth she would give anything to undo: She loved the enemy and he betrayed her, and a world suffered for it. . . While Karou and her allies build a monstrous army in a land of dust and starlight, Akiva wages a different sort of battle: a battle for redemption. For hope. But can any hope be salvaged from the ashes of their broken dream?


 Laini Taylor’s  Days of Blood and Starlight is the stunning continuation of the Daughter of Smoke and Bone story. I started this audio book the day it came out and I seriously did NOT want to finish it. Taylor’s beautifully written sequel continues the tumultuous tale of war, love and hope.

Placed on different  sides of a thousand-year-old war, Karou and Akiva have made their choice and now must  find some way of peace for their people, but a war this old doesn’t die so easily. Resurrections must continue, war must continue, but is their a place in this world for the  hopes and dreams of two lovers ?

Days of Blood and Starlight  is one of the most epic love stories you will read. Initially I was caught of guard by the insta-love in the first book, but the conflict and obstacles faced by Akiva and Karou will have you constantly wondering if love can prevail.

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Book Review : Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld and Illustrated by Keith Thompson (Leviathan #2)

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“Gravity was something you could beat; all it took was hydrogen, hot air or even a bit of rope. But being a girl was a miserable never-ending struggle.”

                                                  -Scott Westerfeld, Behemoth

  • Release Date: October 5th 2010                                                                 
  • Genre: Fantasy/ Alternate History
  • Publisher: Simon Pulse
  • Pages: 485

Synopsis: The behemoth is the fiercest creature in the British navy. It can swallow enemy battleships with one bite. The Darwinists will need it, now that they are at war with the Clanker powers. Deryn is a girl posing as a boy in the British Air Service, and Alek is the heir to an empire posing as a commoner. Finally together aboard the airship Leviathan, they hope to bring the war to a halt. But when disaster strikes the Leviathan’s peacekeeping mission, they find themselves alone and hunted in enemy territory.

  The second book in the Leviathan series picks up where Leviathan left off. Together our protagonists; the exiled Austrain Prince Alek and the Scottish midshipman Deryn Sharp masquerading as a boy, land in Istanbul. This melting pot city steeped in tradition is about to get rocked at its center.

Here the two get wrapped up in secret military missions, a revolution and a conspiracy. This novel focuses on the growth of the friendship between Alek and Dylan/Deryn. Deryn now has to deal with figuring out how much longer she can lie to Alek and how her lies are impacting their friendship.

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Head to Head Audiobook Review : Scarlet vs. Prodigy

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Young rulers, fugitives on the run and war on the horizon. The  Legend by Marie Lu and Cinder by Marissa Meyer audio books wow’d the contributors at Book sand Sensibility last year with their intriguing worlds, complex story lines and smart plotting. In 2013, both series debuted their second installments and I’m ready to see how these sequels hold up to their predecessors.

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Book Review: The Archived by Victoria Schwab

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“Curiosity is a gateway drug to sympathy.”

 ― Victoria Schwab, The Archived

 

  • Genre: Supernatural
  • Pages: 328
  • Publisher: Hyperion 
  • Release Date: January 22nd 2013

Imagine a place where the dead rest on shelves like books.
Each body has a story to tell, a life seen in pictures that only Librarians can read. The dead are called Histories, and the vast realm in which they rest is the Archive.
Da first brought Mackenzie Bishop here four years ago, when she was twelve years old, frightened but determined to prove herself. Now Da is dead, and Mac has grown into what he once was, a ruthless Keeper, tasked with stopping often—violent Histories from waking up and getting out. Because of her job, she lies to the people she loves, and she knows fear for what it is: a useful tool for staying alive.

Inspired by Dr. Who and a performance to “Gravity” by Sara Barielles on So You Think You Can Dance, I was peaked by this book’s inspirations before I even knew the plot.  I was a bit concerned about how it would all come together but, The Archived is an amazing speculative fiction novel, with a story all its own.

The Archive itself is a hidden place where the Histories of the dead are stored in unconscious bodies. When a History wakes and tries to escape the Archive, it’s the job of 16-year-old Mackenzie Bishop to find and return them. It’s a job she excels at until her little brother dies and her family moves to The Coronado, an old hotel renovated into apartments. Suddenly, things  are beginning to go wrong in the Archive and Mackenzie is sure it has something to do with The Coronado’s past.

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Short Story Review : The Coldest Girl In Coldtown by Holly Black

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  • Length : 29 pages 
  • Publication Date : February 10th 2010

 Info: In her debut collection, New York Times best-selling author Holly Black returns to the world of Tithe in two darkly exquisite new tales. Then Black takes readers on a tour of a faerie market and introduces a girl poisonous to the touch and another who challenges the devil to a competitive eating match. Some of these stories have been published in anthologies such as 21 Proms, The Faery Reel, and The Restless Dead, and many have been reprinted in many Best of” anthologies.

Did you know Holly Black’s newest novel, Coldest Girl in Coldtown started off as a short story ? It was featured in a 2010 anthology called The Poison Eaters, Coldtown comes in at just under 30 pages.

While at the Beautiful Creatures book signing last month, Kami Garcia raved about Holly Black’s short story The Coldest Girl In Coldtown and how excited she was to find out that Black was writing the novel. I decided to pick it up at the library to  learn a little bit more about Coldtown.

Now, you know Black’s Curse Workers series is one of our favorite reads at Books and Sensibility and when another authors recs something,  wehave to check it out.

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