Saturday, November 30, 2013

Review: Only Half Alive by Konstanz Silverbow








The World's darkest creature will be their brightest hope!

While darkness haunts her, she craves the light. Christina is a demon, but she doesn't want to be. She is willing to sacrifice everything to change it. Only one person stands in her way, and he will stop at nothing to keep her the way she is.

The greatest battle of light vs dark threatens every living creature, a battle that could destroy all. And the demon in love will only have one chance to save everyone.



Friday, November 29, 2013

Release Day Review: Death of the Mad Hatter by Sarah J. Pepper


I love fairytales, especially the old ones. I loved reading them as a child, watching them turning into Disney movies, or just regular movies with real people. I love introducing these worlds to my children because there’s so much magic in them.
So when Sarah contacted me to see if I would be interested in reading and reviewing her new story; Death of the Mad Hatter, I grabbed it and ran.
To tell you the truth, I don’t think I stopped again.
In Death of the Mad Hatter, we jump a bit back and forth, but it is never confusing – Sarah is very good at remembering to tell us as a Reader where we are and who is doing the narration.
Alice Mae is Alice from Wonderland. The little girl who chased a white rabbit down a rabbit hole in her aunt’s garden.
Alice befriends M.H (a.k.a Mad Hatter) in Wonderland and becomes his apprentice. For a while, everything is alright… But this is Wonderland. It is a land where up is down, and down is up, where the wrong word can make you lose your head, where logic has no function, loyalty is two-faced and where you better start embracing your inner craziness, because sanity is of no use.

Thursday, November 28, 2013

Review: DearHart Clan Series by Eri Nelson

 
Hi guys!
Welcome to my stop today in the DearHart Clan Series Tour. I have a review for each book, so just scroll down, and see what my opinion of these book are.
 
 
Book 1: The Call from Within

 
The Call From Within is Eri Nelson’s first look into this series.  It is here that we meet Owen our Pack’s clan leader.  He has been driven by what is expected of an alpha.  Facts that were told through the decades all but look like fiction to him now.  So he never dared to believe in fate and only let duty push him forth.  Although now his resolves make no sense and it took little to no time at all in showing him through the lust he feels for another.
Kristen Still bares the imprinted mark to our handsome alpha.  However he wasn’t the first to notice what she was and it’s that bedding of prior passions that control her new weakness.  Yes, Owen is pushed by jealousy to possess what his four footed insight tells him is his.
A former distraction wanted more than heated moments with Kristen.  In her he saw a stronger life force for his young and if Brinston Drake must he would take what he needs from her.  He just did not foresee another finding her as well.
 While the rest of Eri Nelson’s cast of characters find their selves caught up in furthering personal existences. Another by the name of Wash seeks to use their distractions as his gain.  A rogue sent to track and update, Wash is tested by his hatred and desire for revenge.  He’ll have it but not as quickly as he would like.  But soon enough Owen will slip farther into his madness over a bitch in heat.  Then Wash perhaps can use the heated vixen to distract both her and the alpha into their future demise.
 
The Call from Within is a fast read on only 84 pages, and is probably my favorite of the three books so far. There are minor flaws (mainly grammatically), but they’re easy to overlook.
We get to know the main characters in the Dearhart Clan Series, and I’m happy we get to meet them before being thrown into the entire pack. The love story between them feels a bit rushed, but at the same time, right – for them.
I wish that Eri would’ve explored their personalities a bit more, digged a little deeper into who they are.

Wednesday, November 27, 2013

Author Take Over: Alyssa Cooper - interview



Hi everyone! My name is Alyssa Cooper, and I'm today's guest blogger here on Sabina's Adventures in reading. I'm just a weird Canadian girl with a life-long passion for the written word and a fretful lack of time. I'm the author of Salvation, a piece of literary fiction wrapped in a vampire story, and Benjamin, a story of love, loss, and psychedelic drugs due to be released next month.

These days, you can find my poetry and prose all over the place. Check out my website for a full list of published works!

I figured the best way to talk about myself too much without feeling like I was talking about myself too much was to let you guys ask the questions. This author interview was compiled by my friends, fans, and wordweaving colleagues - thanks so much to all of them!



"What inspires you the most when writing?" Kirstie Herrington



I think the one thing that has always inspired me the most is humanity; the human experience, the human condition, the polarities between our deepest emotions. There is something so compelling about pure humanity - it is what gives a story meaning. Romances, tragedies, and even horror, they're all about humanity. Even in a story like Watership Down, where rabbits are the key players and humans appear only as shadows in the background, it is still the rabbits' humanity that draws us into their tale. We wouldn't empathize with those rabbits if they were simply rabbits. We love them because they act like humans. Because they're people, with families and feelings and lives. And that's what inspires me the most.




It's human feelings that inspire me to write, human experiences, but not just my own. It's almost as if my own pain is too close to be seen quite clearly. It's so much more beautiful to observe someone else's pain from across the room, some pain that I can see but can't quite understand, and to appropriate it. To distill some other life in the labyrinthian corridors of my own mind, and find a new world waiting on the other side.


Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Happy Release Day: ARV-3 by Cameo Renae

 


Hi Guys!!
Today it's a special day - Cameo Renae is releasing her new book (and series); ARV-3!! WOHO!!! Congrats girl! :-) So... let me tell you a little about the book:
 

June 6, 2014: The beginning of the end. The Apocalypse.

A nuclear fallout wiped out every living thing on the planet, except for a few thousand of us who took shelter in underground bunkers across the globe. Now, after thirteen long years, we were finally able to return to the topside to begin to rebuild.

We thought we were alone. We were never more wrong.

Before the fallout, scientists had worked on creating an anti-radiation vaccine (ARV). The first two attempts failed, but despite the incomplete tests and results, the government approved and distributed the third serum to the masses in an effort to aid those who had no shelter.

It worked, keeping those who remained on the topside alive, but it also altered and mutated them. This new and infectious threat had completely outnumbered us. Now, we not only had to rebuild our planet. We would have to fight for it.

My name is Abigail Park. I’m seventeen, and this is my story.



My family is what keeps my heart beating, and my world a happy place to be.

I love reading great books that whisk me away from reality, even if for a little while. :) Writing is my passion. I love creating new worlds and new characters, and taking wondrous adventures with them.

In My Dreams & Hidden Wings were both recently published through Crushing Hearts and Black Butterfly Publishing. Descent (A Hidden Wings novella) will be released May 15, 2013, and Broken Wings (Book 2 in the Hidden Wings Series) will be released June 1, 2013.

One day I will find my magic wardrobe, and ride away on my magical unicorn... ♥ Until then... I'll keep writing! ;)





 

Monday, November 25, 2013

Tour/Book Review: The Mirage by C. Warner-Thompson


Hello Lovelies, and welcome to my stop in The Mirage Tour. First day in the tour, make sure to stop by the other bloggers along the way in this tour, to see what they have to offer. You can see each stop and where to go here.

About the book:
 
Abbii has found the answers that she seeks but not everything is clear to her. She is confused and feels more alone than ever. Everywhere she goes, Shadows are hunting her down. Her friends are constantly in danger.

Not only are the Shadows chasing her, but now also The Forgotten- those pulled into Darkness willingly- and Abbii doesn't know who to turn to. Having lost her best friend Jake, she wants nothing more than to find him, but he is not the only one she cares for.

Nate, the hazel-eyed boy, is the only thing that seems simple and clear to her, but even he has secrets. Still filled with grief, she must decide whether to stay by Nate's side or fight to find the one that she lost.
 
 


 
The Mirage is the sequel to The Star (you can read my review of The Star here).
I enjoyed reading The Star, and was looking forward to The Mirage. In some ways, it was a very good read, a good continuation of this series, and in some ways it did disappoint.
The good things about the book are that there are some elements of surprise in it, the development of the different characters are surprising and entertaining.
The fight scenes are intense, I like the plot (mostly), I like the bad guys and the “grey areas”.
The not so good things…. There are a lot of repetition going on, sentences wise. Certain phrases are repeated throughout the book, and it gets to a point where I’m close to clawing my eyes out.
Abii herself is frustrating to me too. She just never learns, never opens her eyes, to realize what is going around her, but instead she is whiny, self-absorbed … in reality, Abii is turned into a person I really don’t like (or can relate to), in this book. 
Something else that seems to be consistent throughout Clemy’s books is the first quarter of the book. Every time she starts a book, the first quarter of the book feels forced, like she is struggling to find her voice, her path in the story… Once she gets past the first quarter (give and take), the story flows a bit better.
I’m not saying The Mirage wasn’t good. Because it was, but in my opinion, it needed some more work.  There were some good elements in this book, I just wish Clemy would’ve taken a bit more time to work it out a bit more, go exploring more in her own world. Based on that, I'm giving The Mirage 3 Potions.



 



 


Clemy was born in the UK in 1991 where she still lives, growing up alongside one younger and three older brothers.

Books and writing was an interest that she began to develop from the first years of secondary school, and on her thirteenth birthday, she began to plan and design the idea to write a fantasy novel. She finished secondary school with high GCSE's and then went on into further education to study English and all aspects of art and design. After six years of writing, planning and overall editing of the book, it was successfully completed, containing over 82,000 words, and self published in the first week of 2011.

With high expectations in herself, she immediately began to write a second novel in the series, while keeping her art and design a part of the process. The achievement of completing the first novel 'Purest Light,' allowed the ideas of the second to flow much easier and it was completed by early 2012. As she was writing the third and final book, New Beginnings, at the same time, the series was finished by its publication in 2013.

Writing is now a part of her everyday and she has now started her newest project, The Mirage, which is book two of three. 



 



 

 
 
 
 
 

Book Blitz & Giveaway: Chameleon by Kenya Wright


Title: Chameleon
Genre: New Adult Urban Fantasy
Author: Kenya Wright
 
 
Blurb:
 
Cameo lives in a caged supernatural city where all species are tagged at birth with silver brands embedded in their foreheads. Her X brand identifies her as a Mixbreed, but she’s so much more. Like a chameleon, she can shift from one person’s image to another.
 
It’s a great way to make money for a habitat street kid, or Cage Punk as most people call them. Wiz, her street partner-in-crime, finds her jobs to use her abilities. Some jobs entail changing into people to take academic tests. Others require more skill and involve higher risk.
 
When Wiz asks Cameo to stand in for a Were-wolf teenager who doesn't want to go to her debutante ball, it seems like just another job, until a corpse is discovered and an old friend of Wiz appears.

 
 
Kenya Wright always knew she would be famous since the ripe old age of six when she sang the Michael Jackson thriller song in her bathroom mirror. She has tried her hand at many things from enlisting in the Navy for six years as a Persian-Farsi linguist to being a nude model at an art university.
 
However, writing has been the only constant love in her life. Will she succeed? Of course.
For she has been coined The Urban Fantasy Queen, the Super Iconic Writer of this Age, The Lyrical Genius of Our Generation. Granted, these are all terms coined by her, within the private walls of her bathroom as she still sings the Michael Jackson thriller song.
 
Kenya Wright currently resides in Miami with her three amazing, overactive children, a supportive, gorgeous husband, and three cool black cats that refuse to stop sleeping on Kenya’s head at night.


Giveaway:
 
$25 Amazon Gift Card and Kenya Wright's Paranormal Romance ebook Bundle Giveaway (Eight Books: The first three Santeria Habitat Books, Vampire King Series, Incubus Hunter, and Chameleon)




Friday, November 22, 2013

Book Blitz & Giveaway: Alive (Crave #1) by Megan D. Martin

HAPPY RELEASE DAY MEGAN!!! :-D
 
About Alive:
 
Flesh-eating zombies, dirty sex, and a shattered past…
What’s more dangerous—the man who broke her heart or those trying to eat it?

 
Fighting to survive, Eve finds herself alone in the world after the Crave—the only parallel of her former life. On the hunt for her sister, she runs into Gage—the first and only boy to have her heart and break it. It’s been four years and he isn’t a boy anymore, nor is he the same person he used to be. Against her better judgment, Eve agrees to stay with him when he divulges information on a safe haven near the small town they grew up in—but that doesn’t mean she has to like it…

 
Returning home elicits a myriad of emotions that both Eve and Gage thought they had buried. The past and present collide and they are forced to the face bitter deceits that ruined them in the before and threaten to destroy them now…
 
 


 
About Megan:
 
 

Megan D. Martin is a multi-published author, mother, student and editor. In her spare time she enjoys decorating her house with strange things that do not match, playing her old school Nintendo Entertainment System, and buying fish for her many fish tanks. To learn more about Megan, check her out on these social networking sites.


Giveaway:




Book Blitz & Giveaway: Theirs to Play by Kenya Wright

About the Book:
 
 
Two billionaire brothers enjoy twisted games where women are the sport. They find a female, date her, and compete to see who can bed her first.


Too bad they picked the wrong one this time. Dawn's too smart for their verbal play and too quick to get trapped by clever ploys.


The more the brothers work to capture her heart, the more they discover she might not be theirs to play
 
Teaser:
 
Max's POV

She rubbed her hands together. “So I’m your game for tonight?”

“No, Dawn.” Hunger laced my brother's Freddy’s voice. It was the subtle change in his tone that happened right before he decided to take a woman to his bed. “You’re the game for this summer.”

Her expression didn’t break, never faltered or changed. She leaned in closer to him and licked her lips. I could’ve sworn I heard Freddy growl or maybe I’d done it myself. Her confidence did something to me, it lassoed my senses in, made me want to touch my dick and do nasty things.

“If you think you can last the whole summer with me involved in your little game, then you’re not as smart as I thought. Are you Freddy?” She moved in closer. Her breast hovered beautifully over the table. Her face was half a foot from his.

Freddy gripped the table so hard; I could see the whites forming around his fingertips. “You like saying my nickname don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Get used to it, you’ll be moaning it soon.”

“Hmm. You’ll have to earn a moan from me, sweet Freddy. You’re not the first rich guy I’ve met and you won’t be the last.” She sat back in her seat.
 
 
Author Bio:
 

Kenya Wright always knew she would be famous since the ripe old age of six when she sang the Michael Jackson thriller song in her bathroom mirror. She has tried her hand at many things from enlisting in the Navy for six years as a Persian-Farsi linguist to being a nude model at an art university.

 
However, writing has been the only constant love in her life. Will she succeed? Of course.
For she has been coined The Urban Fantasy Queen, the Super Iconic Writer of this Age, The Lyrical Genius of Our Generation. Granted, these are all terms coined by her, within the private walls of her bathroom as she still sings the Michael Jackson thriller song.

 
Kenya Wright currently resides in Miami with her three amazing, overactive children, a supportive, gorgeous husband, and three cool black cats that refuse to stop sleeping on Kenya’s head at night.

 
Find Kenya Wright here:
 
 
Giveaway:
 
 

Thursday, November 21, 2013

Book Review: Fiery Edge of Steel by Jill Archer





Darkest Light of Day
Last year a friend of mine gave me Darkest Light of Day, the first book in the Noon Onyx series. I got fascinated by the world Jill Archer had created. See, normally when we read about Armageddon, the good guys always win. Oh they might endure a whole hell lot of damage, but in the end… the good guys ALWAYS win. Not in Jill’s books. Armageddon came and left and the BAD guys won. The Demons won. Guess what? The world is still turning. The sun rises in the morning and sets in the evening. People’s lives didn’t change all that much. Life still continued. There are those with magic, and those without. There are demons and angels. Maegesters are male, have waning magic and controls the demons by the law they made – who knew that demons were so stuck with their precious rules?

Then we have the Mederi, females, healers, waxing magic. So, this is the normal pattern. But of course this doesn’t oblige to Noon and her brother, Night. Their magic got mixed up in birth, so Noon has the waning magic and her brother the waxing. In Darker Light of Day we follow Noon, and how she slowly goes from denial about her magic to accepting it – although not entirely willingly. My heart ached for Noon in Darkest Light of Day. I understood why she so desperately wanted to get rid of her magic, to be normal. See, Noon is the only one in a VERY long time to wield the waning magic as a female. NOT easy!!  In reality, it’s no wonder Noon has trouble coming to terms with her magic. As a child, she was taught to hide her magic so nobody would notice the mix up (they don’t have to declare their magic before their 21th year). And when Noon finally declares, people (well, most people) look at her like she’s a freak, even her best friend through childhood tries to change her magic with an ancient spell…

In Fiery Edge of Steel, we see a Noon that has changed a bit. Although there are still times where she wish she didn’t have waning magic, that she was “normal”, she still hates to kill – Noon has mostly accepted her magic, with the abilities and responsibilities that comes with that. She’s even primorus in her class. Which also lands her first case. Out in the Shallows, a long boat trip away from “home”.

There are so many things I could say about Fiery Edge of Steel. Many, many things. And to be honest. I loved it. Every second, each page was amazing. The boat trip on the way to the Shallows are filled with action, lessons to learn, edges that needs to be filed down, assumptions and a downright emotional roller coaster.  

As always there are little pieces of the big puzzle left here and there from Jill Archer to keep us on our toes. Not to mention, she throws a mean left hook. I did see one of her punches coming, but the one involving a special person close to Noon…  Ouch. Seriously Jill…. Give a girl some warning first, will ya?

Closing the book, I was sad due to some events that will be too spoilerish to tell you about, but I was also… content. Happy and pleased. Jill Archer created another wonderful read in an amazing world that I have come to love dearly.

Now I just have to wait for the next book; White Heart of Justice, which should be released this spring.

I give Fiery Edge of Steel 4 potions. Jill Archer and her Noon Onyx series is definitely something you don't want to miss out on!!





Jill Archer is the author of the Noon Onyx series, genre-bending fantasy novels about a post-grad magic user and her off-campus adventures. DARK LIGHT OF DAY and FIERY EDGE OF STEEL, the first two books in the series are available now from Penguin/Ace. The third book, WHITE HEART OF JUSTICE, will be released May 27, 2014. Jill lives in Maryland with her husband and two children.
  



 


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