[REVIEW] Broken by Kelley Armstrong

Published: April 2006
Publisher: Bantam
Age Group: Adult
Series: Women of the Otherworld #6

In this thrilling new novel from the author of Industrial Magic, a pregnant werewolf may have unwittingly unleashed Jack the Ripper on the twenty-first century — and become his next target…

Ever since she discovered she’s pregnant, Elena Michaels has been on edge. After all, she’s never heard of another living female werewolf, let alone one who’s given birth. But thankfully, her expertise is needed to retrieve a stolen letter allegedly written by Jack the Ripper. As a distraction, the job seems simple enough — only the letter contains a portal to Victorian London’s underworld, which Elena inadvertently triggers — unleashing a vicious killer and a pair of zombie thugs.

Now Elena must find a way to seal the portal before the unwelcome visitors get what they’re looking for — which, for some unknown reason, is Elena… (From Goodreads)

Broken is the sixth book in the Women of the Otherworld series and has Elena as the narrator.

In Broken, Elena is called for an favor that she owes the half demon Xavier, who had helped her escape from the research facility when she was captured. The favor is simple, steal the letter sent by Jack the Ripper that went missing back in the twenties. The job seems simple enough until Elena accidentally unlocks the spell on the letter releasing a dimensional portal. To make matters worse, Elena is pregnant and now there are zombies coming out of the portal and attacking her. Now Elena has to find a way to seal the portal in time, all the while trying to stay alive.

Broken had some parts that were confusing for me. Not because the story line was badly written but because I hadn't read book three, four and five. There were some events and people mentioned that I had no idea about but overall, the story was well written and I wasn't completely lost that I couldn't understand what was happening. 

As always, Elena and Clay's relationship is going strong and the plot in this book is different but still similar to the other books. 

I really would have liked it if they had touched on Jack the Ripper some more but I guess the main point of the book isn't about Jack the Ripper but about Elena's survival in this troubled time. 

Like my previous review, I can find no, or very little, faults with Kelley Armstrong's writing and her series. 

The cover is amazing and the story is very well written. 

If you love fantasy but not much of a Twilight fan, I would suggest you give this a try!

Enjoy!

5/5!
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[HAUL] Fifty Shades of Grey by E L James

So recently I've been noticing this book, Fifty shades of Grey by E L James so when I went out today and saw it, I had to get it.

I will admit that I completely got this due to the hype so I have no idea what it's about...that's never good but I'm positive I'll like it. (hopefully!)

The summary from the back of the book:

NOTE: THIS IS AN ADULT BOOK, i.e. for more mature audiences

When Literature student Anastasia Steele goes to interview young entrepreneur Christian Grey, she encounters a man who is beautiful, brilliant, and intimidating.  The unwordly, innocent Ana is startled to realize she wants this man and, despite his enigmatic reserve, finds she is desperate to get close to him.  Unable to resist Ana's quiet beauty, wit, and independent spirit, Gret admits he wants her, too - but on his own terms.

Shocked yet thrilled by Grey's singular erotic tastes, Ana hesitates.  For all the trappings of success - his multinational businesses, his vast wealth, his loving family - Grey is tormented by demons and consumed by the need to control.  When the couple embarks on a daring, passionately physical affair, Ana discovers Christian Grey's secrets and explores her own dark desires.

Erotic, amusing and deeply moving, the Fifty Shades Trilogy is a tale that will obsess you. possess you, and stay with you forever.

Yup, that's right. 
It's a trilogy.  I'm excited, not going to lie. 
Anyone else? 
Expect a review in a while (still have a lot of books to get through...)

goodreads link 

[REVIEW] The Hypnotist by Lars Keplar

Published: June 2011
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
 Age Group: Adult - crime fiction

Prepare for The Hypnotist to cast its spell In the frigid clime of Tumba, Sweden, a gruesome triple homicide attracts the interest of Detective Inspector Joona Linna, who demands to investigate the murders. The killer is still at large, and there’s only one surviving witness—the boy whose family was killed before his eyes. Whoever committed the crimes wanted this boy to die: he’s suffered more than one hundred knife wounds and lapsed into a state of shock. Desperate for information, Linna sees only one option: hypnotism. He enlists Dr. Erik Maria Bark to mesmerize the boy, hoping to discover the killer through his eyes. It’s the sort of work that Bark has sworn he would never do again—ethically dubious and psychically scarring. When he breaks his promise and hypnotizes the victim, a long and terrifying chain of events begins to unfurl. An international sensation, The Hypnotist is set to appear in thirty-seven countries, and it has landed at the top of bestseller lists wherever it’s been published—in France, Holland, Germany, Spain, Italy, Denmark. Now it’s America’s turn. Combining the addictive power of the Stieg Larsson trilogy with the storytelling drive of The Silence of the Lambs, this adrenaline-drenched thriller is spellbinding from its very first page. (From Goodreads)

Before I read this book, I had read a lot of reviews raving about this book and how it was "the next Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" (a reference to the Millennium trilogy by Stieg Larson).

Well I'm happy to say that this book lived up to its expectations.  I'm still debating on which book I like better but for now it's a tie.

The Hypnotist is a crime fiction book about a hypnotist who uses hypnotism to treat patients(surprise surprise) and has retired from his career ten years ago when something bad happens in relation to his patients.  The story is very ambiguous about this event until later on in the story.

The hypnotist is first enlisted after a triple homicide happens and the only survivor is a little boy who was meant to be killed, due to the multiple knife wounds on his body but managed to survive.  The leading detective decides to resort to hypnotism in an attempt to find the killer but what they figure out may not be what they expected.

The Hypnotist to me, similar to the Millennium trilogy is like a bunch of subplots that create this giant plot.  The major plot at the beginning is the homicide, that's what brings the hypnotist in to the world of crime again which results in him remembering his previous job and what happened then.  There were many flashbacks as the main character, the hypnotist, tried to fill in the gaps that were created when he talks about previous events, since readers have never read about it before.  I don't want to spoil anything but what I can say is this story is much more complicated than just a triple homicide.  Things get very serious even after they solve the homicide - mind you that would have been a very nice ending on its own - and realize that there is much more to this than just murder.  The murders are connected to the hypnotists past patients and things become even worse when his son is kidnapped.  There is even a time crunch since his son needs to take his medication within a certain amount of time otherwise he will die.

Now, back to the review. The Hypnotist was truly a masterpiece.  The cover is ominous and creepy but that adds to the whole vibe.

The characters are all developed and all act in their own manner in the story.  Often there will be a chapter with they hypnotists as the narrator and than a chapter on his wife as the narrator.  This allows readers to get all the information possible since both of these characters are finding different information at the same time.

The way the story was woven too was astounding.  I really thought that the story would end when they found the killer of the homicide but the story was written in a way that it just flowed in to the other sub plots.  There wasn't any forced change, I just read through the book and came to a realization that this was much more than I thought.

The plot is more geared towards a stand alone novel as oppose to the Millennium trilogy where it was written for a series and so a lot of information revealed in past books are needed to understand the later ones.  This book gave you only the information needed to understand the story, which is understandable since there is no point in reading more than is needed,

The action was also amazing.  I could really feel the stress and fast paced movements the narrator did.  I remember reading it and my heart was beating so quickly because I was nervous as to what the narrator would find even though this story had nothing to do with me and I wasn't the one finding the bodies are the killer, but I definitely felt like I was a part of it. 


I would definitely recommend this book to you.  I'm hoping that Lars Keplar comes out with another book so I can read that one too.

5/5!

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[REVIEW] Wolfsbane by Andrea Cremer

Published: July 2011
     Publisher: Philomel Books
Age Group: Young Adult
Series: Nightshade #2

When Calla Tor wakes up in the lair of the Searchers, her sworn enemies, she's certain her days are numbered. But then the Searchers make her an offer, one that gives her the chance to destroy her former masters and save the pack and the man she left behind. Is Ren worth the price of her freedom? And will Shay stand by her side no matter what? Now in control of her own destiny, Calla must decide which battles are worth fighting and how many trials true love can endure and still survive. (From Goodreads)

Wolfsbane is the sequel to the first book in the series, Nightshade. 

In Wolfsbane, Calla and Shay allign with the Searchers and attempt to get back Calla's pack. Of course, things don't always turn out the way it's suppose to be. Because of Calla's choice and actions, the Banes took over the Nightshade pack and Calla's mother is executed. As well, Calla's brother was made an example, what happened I'll let you find out. When the searchers and Calla finally find where her pack is, somethings happen that are completely unexpected. New alliances are formed throughout the story and there's always surprises in every couple chapters.

Wolfsbane was more of the explanatory book to me. 

Much of the history of the Scion and the previous Guardian revolt is revealed, as well as some hidden secrets. 

Calla and Shay are also developing more of a romantic relationship which I was not happy to read about because I was completely for Calla and Ren but I guess after Ren's choice and actions in this book, I can be on Team Shay for a while...until the third book comes out then I'll decide again.

That's one of the reasons why i like this book, I never really figuered out who the main character, as an alpha wolf, would pick as her mate. I guess that is made more clear in this book. 

Andrea Cremer does an amazing job keeping you hooked in to this book. I remember reading it and there would be some parts that were utterly boring to read but then soon after, something exciting. Sort of a pattern, boring, exciting, boring, exciting. 

The cover for Wolfsbane is also really pretty. The publishing group had redone the covers for the entire Nightshade series. For Wolfsbane, there's Calla on the cover crouched in an animalistic way. Almost like she's about to shift and lunge at you. It's a very powerful image in my opinion. 

This series is amazing and if you like to read books about action, fantasy, and very powerful women, this is definitely one for you.

4/5
(originally posted in the TPL Word Out program)
MEH

[REVIEW] Bitten by R. L. Stine

Published: 2010
Publisher: HarperTeen
Age Group: Young Adult
Series: Dangerous Girls #1 & 2

Twin sisters Destiny and Livvy Weller return home from summer vacation with a dark secret . . . and an inhuman desire to drink blood. What have they become? Can they ever turn back? As their deadly secret becomes harder to keep, more questions arise and loyalties are tested. And as one sister descends into darkness, the other must find a way to save her—and herself. Who will live to see the glow of the next full moon? Which sister will survive?

In Dangerous Girls and Dangerous Girls #2: The Taste of Night, published together in Bitten, bestselling author R.L. Stine explores the dark creatures of the night. (From Goodreads)

Well first, this book is about vampires.
Shocker there. 

Secondly, the vampires aren't like the ones from Twilight that sparkle in the sun or the ones that have to drink immortal elixer, no. These vampires are the ones that live forever, suck blood and terrorize people. 

In the book there are twins, Destiny and Lizzy who end up being bitten by the same vampire while they are camp. The reason why the vampire bit them? Well they looked like the girl he loved that got killed. To be with her again, the vampire attempts to make them immortal but is interrupted in the process. That starts this whole crazy adventure. This book is made up of two parts, so in the first part, the girls are confronted with the truth that they are becoming hungrier and hungrier and that they thirst for blood. The other thing is that the vampire that bit them, well he can't continue the job unless it's a full moon so he ends up stalking them...kind of creepy in my opinion. Destiny (Dee for short) also starts to get stressed about finding a cure when the twins stumble upon another vampire that told them "The Restorer" could cure them if there was enough time left. So begins the hunt for the Restorer. Along the way, the girls also realize that there are vampire hunters in town and that their dad and the entire baseball team is a part of it. SO now they have to run for their lives as well as trying to save them. At the end of the first part, the twin's dad tells them that he is actually the Restorer and he saves Dee but Lizzy chooses to stay immortal, even turning someone else too. Well in the second part, it's completely about the psychological harm Lizzy does to her family by leaving her home. We also see Lizzy constantly homesick and wondering around at night finding people to drink. It gets serious later on when people start dying and the twins both think that the other twin had something to do with it...

Bitten reminds me alot of the Vampire Diaries, without the witches, werewolves, angelic blood and hot romances. It's sort of the sample of it.
I'll be honest, at first I thought this book was horrible. There's no depth in the plot and the girls are just constantly chasing some made up tale. It got better when people actually started to die and the plot deepend. 

What i did like abut this was the characters really expressed their emotions well. It was also a really easy read. I read the entire 480 page book in a little bit more then two hours. So I guess if you like books about vampires then give it a try but don't expect much.

3/5
(originally posted in the TPL Word Out program)
BORROW

[REVIEW] Cruel Love by Kate Brian

Published: June 2011
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
Age Group: Young Adult
Series: Privilege #6 [end]

After escaping from the Brenda T. Trumball Correctional Facility for Women and stealing the identity of a rich socialite, Ariana Osgood finally thought she was on the path she always believed she deserved. But it seems her past has caught up with her--and it's blackmailing her right back to her old ways. Now everything she wants seems further out of reach than ever...and the return of her nemesis--Reed Brennan from Private--is making things even worse.
The Privilege series comes to a close with all the suspense, romance, drama and, wherever Ariana is concerned, murder you'd expect. (From Goodreads) 

Cruel Love is the sixth and final book in the Privilege series. 

In Cruel Love, Ariana Osgood (under the guise as Briana Leigh Covington) once again has to fight for her new privileged life. When her false life starts to unravel due to her previous actions, she decides to take actions. After Lexa's unfortunate death, Ariana rises to the top of Atherton-Pryce Hall and is guarenteed an admission into Princeton, but when Dr. Meloni, the psychologist from the prison. starts working as a grief counseller to the students, Ariana realizes that her life is still in danger. And when she happens to catch sight of Reed Brennan one day, she starts to believe that all the murders that happened because of her can be justified if Reed just died. It also doesn't help that her friends are all becoming suspicious of her new erratic behaviour. So what does Ariana do? She takes matters in to her own hands. Ariana would do anything to keep her life, including murder.

This was probably the most exciting 200 page book that i've read in a long time. 

Right away, it starts with Ariana and her friends in the hospital waiting to hear the results for her friend Lexa. There's no building up, right away in the first chapter, there's a huge fights between Ariana and Palmer which builds the tension and really made me feel the anxiety that Ariana was going through. 

Kate Brian does a really good job with allowing the readers to feel Ariana's steady decent in to being psychologically crazy. The readers know every action she does so the one's that she commits in private are usually the more crazy ones, and it is clear that towards the end of the book, she starts to becoming psychologically worse. 

Everything also happens at a very quick pace, but still very dramatic and easy to follow along. 

Its funny to see that most of the characters in the book are oblivious to Ariana's actions. When Dr. Meloni almost sees Ariana with her friends, she starts to have a panic attack which her friends assume is from stress but Ariana knows the real reason.
The series also ended quite well. At first i wasn't happy but then i realized that if it was written any other way, the series probably couldn't end at all. All i can say is it's a happy or sad ending, depending on your feelings about certain characters. 

Ariana's psychotic nature is also more apparent in this book, in my opinion, due to her constant efforts to rid herself of one person, Reed. She stalks her and makes a concise schedule of everywhere Reed will be at what time, making sure to note if the path she takes would be a good place to kill her without being seen. That sort of scared me because before, Ariana wasn't this crazy about a murder but in this book, she plans each one out and executes them carefully...well attempting to be careful because things don't always happen as expected. 

I thought this was a well written series and if you enjoyed Private, you'll definitely enjoy this book but if you've never heard of Kate Brian, then i would suggest you read Private before starting this series since this is the spin-off series of Private. Private would explain alot of Ariana's past and actions.

Definitely this series is for people that are into suspensful, thriller novels with a hint of romance.

5/5!
(originally posted in the TPL Word Out program)
MEH

[REVIEW] The Gathering by Kelley Armstrong

Published: April 2011
Publisher:HarperCollins New York
Age Group: Young Adult
Series: Darkness Rising #1

Sixteen-year-old Maya is just an ordinary teen in an ordinary town. Sure, she doesn't know much about her background - the only thing she really has to cling to is an odd paw-print birthmark on her hip - but she never really put much thought into who her parents were or how she ended up with her adopted parents in this tiny medical-research community on Vancouver Island.

Until now.

Strange things have been happening in this claustrophobic town - from the mountain lions that have been approaching Maya to her best friend's hidden talent for "feeling" out people and situations, to the sexy new bad boy who makes Maya feel . . . . different. Combine that with a few unexplained deaths and a mystery involving Maya's biological parents and it's easy to suspect that this town might have more than its share of skeletons in its closet.

In The Gathering, New York Times best-selling author Kelley Armstrong brings all the supernatural thrills from her wildly successful Darkest Powers series to Darkness Rising, her scorching hot new trilogy. (From Goodreads)

The Gathering takes place in a small town on Vancouver Island with a population of about 200. There, the St.Cloud company filled the town with employees that were promised the best care for their children. All employees that were hired have young children and the St. Cloud company thought that the best way to attract the parents is to promise the best for the children. In this town, the main character, Maya lives with her parents. Maya was adopted at the age of five and has a paw print shaped birthmark above her waist. Her best friend's called Daniel and her other best friend, Serena, drowned in a lake. The incident was deemed an accident but both Maya and Daniel have different opinions. Besides that, the new guy, Rafe, is constantly following Maya, wanting her to be his girlfriend. Mix that was a bunch of cougar appearences, a shady women by the name of Mina Lee that wants any information the towns children can tell her, and the unnatural events that are occuring and you have a very complicated life. So what does Maya do when she figures out who she really is and uncovers a huge conspiracy happening in her own town?

I love Kelley Armstrong books. More like i really like her adult books (The Women of the Otherworld series). Her teen books (The Darkest Powers Series) wasn't too good in my opinon so i was quite hesitant to read this book but i gave it a shot and well, it's definitely Kelley Armstrong.

There aren't as many, shall we say, romantic scenes as one expects from the Women of the Otherworld but this book has it's fair share. For once though, i'm happy to say that the plot of this book was not driven by the romantic relationships the main character has. In fact, the entire plot of the book is introduced ever so slowly. The reader does really know what it is until the main character realizes.

Basically the lie gets bigger and bigger and more secrets are revealed as the protagonist realizes that her small and quiet town might have more secrets then it seems to have. 

Of course, this book has to have some reference to the supernatural but Armstrong took a different route this time. The supernatural part of this book was more connected to First Nations and their tales as oppose to our perceptions of vampires, werewolves, etc. 

What i also really liked about this book was that Kelley Armstrong wrote it so ingeniously that you don't even realize that at the beginning, she's already revealed what the big secret is, but you don't know about that because you don't know clearly what's happening to the main character and what you're reading about. In fact, all i though about when reading the first couple of chapters is that the main character was getting visions and possibly she had some sixth sense. 

Well i was sort of right. The fact is, when the secret is revealed, the facts sort lining up, and you have a EUREKA moment when you realize that the signs were all there, you just didn't know what you were looking for. 

I found the characters to be also very intriguing. Maya is a very stubbern girl who often thinks too much in to events and people. Daniel is the overprotective best friend who has his own problems to deal with. The romance in this book was also not what i wanted. I always seem to be rooting for the overprotective, caring boy; not the bad-guy who the girl is obviously attracted to. 

Lastly, the ending of this book is a major cliff hanger. I'm probably going to read the second book just to see what's going to happen to them. Leave it to Kelley Armstrong to keep me hooked. 

So if you're a fan of fantasy, action, dark secrets, and Kelley Armstrong of course, read this book!

4/5
MEH