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Showing posts from September, 2011

Book Review: The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson

Title:  The Girl of Fire and Thorns Author:  Rae Carson Series:  Fire and Thorns #1 Pages:  432 Publisher:  HarperTeen Date of Publication:  20th September 2011 Source:  NetGalley Synopsis from Goodreads: Once a century, one person is chosen for greatness. Elisa is the chosen one. But she is also the younger of two princesses, the one who has never done anything remarkable. She can’t see how she ever will. Now, on her sixteenth birthday, she has become the secret wife of a handsome and worldly king—a king whose country is in turmoil. A king who needs the chosen one, not a failure of a princess. And he’s not the only one who needs her. Savage enemies seething with dark magic are hunting her. A daring, determined revolutionary thinks she could be his people’s savior. And he looks at her in a way that no man has ever looked at her before. Soon it is not just her life, but her very heart that is at stake. Elisa could be everything to those who need her most. If the pro

Book Review: The Iron Knight by Julie Kagawa

Title:  The Iron Knight Author:  Julie Kagawa Series:  The Iron Fey #4 Pages:  386 Publisher:  Harlequin Teen Date of Publication:  25th October 2011 Source:  NetGalley Synopsis from Goodreads: Ash, former prince of the Winter Court, gave up everything. His title, his home, even his vow of loyalty. All for a girl… and all for nothing. Unless he can earn a soul. To cold, emotionless faery prince Ash, love was a weakness for mortals and fools. His own love had died a horrible death, killing any gentler feelings the Winter prince might have had. Or so he thought. Then Meghan Chase—a half human, half fey slip of a girl— smashed through his barricades, binding him to her irrevocably with his oath to be her knight. And when all of Faery nearly fell to the Iron fey, she severed their bond to save his life. Meghan is now the Iron Queen, ruler of a realm where no Winter or Summer fey can survive. With the (unwelcome) company of his archrival, Summer Court prankster Puck, and

In My Mailbox #34

In My Mailbox is hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren . This week I decided to do another vlog, as I've got quite a lot to show you... It's better than the last one I did, so if you saw that, that's good I guess ;) Sorry about the rubbish lighting and sound, I recorded it with my laptop camera and it's not the best one in the world ;) Anyway, I hope you enjoy it! Hourglass by Myra McEntire (Won from Vickie at ComaCalm ) Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly (Gifted from Cicely at Cicely Loves Books ) Embrace by Jessica Shirvington (For review from Orchard Books) Sweetly by Jackson Pearce *Squee* (For review from Hodder Children's) This Dark Endeavour by Kenneth Oppel (For review from Random House Children's Books) Heist Society *signed* (For review from Orchard Books) Nightshade by Maryrose Wood SWAG  Heist Society swag - bookmark, buttons and a nail file(!) In case you didn't watch the video, I went to the Heist Society signing in Bluewat

Discussion Post: Love Triangles in YA

Hey everyone! I've decided to do something different for today - I've decided to try doing a discussion post! I've never done one of these before, and I've never even taken part in one, but I've always wanted to so I thought I might host one myself, just to see what it's like :) I've chosen a topic that I know a lot of people have very strong opinions about... LOVE TRIANGLES IN YA It can sometimes seem like every young adult fiction book has some kind of love triangle in it, especially paranormal books. Some people are sick of them, others absolutely love them.  Personally, I like love triangles. If they are well written and well thought out, then I think they can add a great aspect to the story, and they can make it a whole lot more interesting. However, I do think that if the love triangle is not an integral part of the story and is just used as a filler, then it can get very annoying. They have to be meaningful, and in some way it should make t

Book Review: Liesl and Po by Lauren Oliver

Title:  Liesl and Po Author:  Lauren Oliver Series:  N/A Pages:  320 Publisher:  Hodder & Stoughton Date of Publication:  29th September 2011 Source:  Publisher Synopsis from Goodreads: Liesl lives in a tiny attic bedroom, locked away by her cruel stepmother. Her only friends are the shadows and the mice—until one night a ghost appears from the darkness. It is Po, who comes from the Other Side. Both Liesl and Po are lonely, but together they are less alone. That same night, an alchemist's apprentice, Will, bungles an important delivery. He accidentally switches a box containing the most powerful magic in the world with one containing something decidedly less remarkable Will's mistake has tremendous consequences for Liesl and Po, and it draws the three of them together on an extraordinary journey. From New York Times bestselling author Lauren Oliver comes a luminous and magnificent novel that glows with rare magic, ghostly wonders, and a true friendship that

In My Mailbox #33

In My Mailbox is hosted b Kristi at The Story Siren. WON The Poison Diaries: Nightshade by Maryrose Wood (UK Paperback) I won this from Donna and Jess from Book Passion For Life and I can't wait to read it, though I'll have to read the first one first... ;) GIFTED Slide by Jill Hathaway bookmark!  This is SO pretty! The colour is gorgeous, and Jill wrote on it and signed it for me :) If you can't see what it says, it says: 'For Bella! SLIDE into the mystery!' Thanks Jill! What did you get in your mailbox this week? Leave me a link in the comments! :D

Book Review: Dearly Departed by Lia Habel

Title:  Dearly Departed   Author:  Lia Habel Series:  N/A Pages:  451 Publisher:  Doubleday Date of Publication:  29th September 2011 Source: Publisher* Synopsis: As far as romantic pairings go in the year 2195, you don't get much more unlikely than an upper-class schoolgirl and a poor miner from enemy tribes. Filter in the fact that he's a zombie, and you're definitely talking about star-crossed love. Dearly, Departed is a cyber-Victorian/steampunk romance that takes place in the shadow of a new ice age. Nora Dearly, a mouthy teenage girl and apparent orphan, leaves school for Christmas - only to be dragged into the night by the living dead. Luckily for her, though, the good ones got to her first. From her reanimated rescuers she learns not only that zombies are roaming the countryside, but that her father is one - and that he's in terrible trouble. She also meets Captain Bram Griswold, a noble, strong, and rather sweet undead boy for whom she starts to

Kill All Enemies Blog Tour

Hey everyone, and today is my stop on the Kill All Enemies by Melvin Burgess blog tour! Yay! I have my first author Q&A session to share with you, which I'm super excited about, and his answers are awesome, in my opinion :) So here they are! ____________________ Bella: Hi Melvin, welcome to Cheezyfeet Books! Tell us about Kill All Enemies in less than 20 words. Melvin: It follows three teenagers in deep trouble, who turn out to be heroes in other areas of their lives. B: What inspired you to write Kill All Enemies? M: We’re always hearing abut bad kids – the kind who get excluded from school, get into fights – maybe the kind of kids who were out in the recent riots. I wanted to try and find out what was going inside their heads, so I went out to interview them. I was as amazed as any9one when I found out that so many of them were real heroes. B: Could you tell us a little about what it was like to go to the PRUs to research for Kill All Enemies? M: Really inte

Book Review: Kill All Enemies by Melvin Burgess

Title:  Kill All Enemies Author:  Melvin Burgess Series: N/A Pages:  271 Publisher:  Penguin Books Date of Publication:  1st September 2011 Source:  Publisher Synopsis from Goodreads: Everyone says fourteen-year-old Billie is nothing but trouble. A fighter. A danger to her family and friends. But her care worker sees someone different. Her classmate Rob is big, strong; he can take care of himself and his brother. But his violent stepdad sees someone to humiliate. And Chris is struggling at school; he just doesn't want to be there. But his dad sees a useless no-hoper. Billie, Rob and Chris each have a story to tell. But there are two sides to every story, and the question is ...who do you believe? My Thoughts: I wasn't sure what I was going to think about Kill All Enemies before I read it. On the one hand, it sounded really interesting and I was curious to find out about what the 'troublesome' kids thought when they were fighting, or running away etc, b

BBAW: Blogger Interview with Pam from Bookalicious!

So, on Twitter, blogs, Goodreads, Facebook, wherever, you may have heard about this thing going on called BBAW. Wondering what it is? Well, it's the Book Blogger Appreciation Week, where you can nominate and vote for your favourite blogs to win awards like Best Written Book Blog, or Best Book Blog Meme. They also have blogger interviews, which is what I'm doing today. So, here is my interview with Pam from Bookalicious ! (The text in italic is my comment on Pam's answer, my actual answers to the questions are over at her blog :) ) If you could go anywhere in the world for a week’s holiday, free of charge, where would you go and what would you do there? I would go to Iceland and sit in those hot springs with a book featuring extremely cold weather. Bella: Ooh, hot springs :)  If you could choose ONE meal to eat at least once every day for the rest of your life, what would you choose? You know I don't really eat breakfast but if I did and I had to choose only on

Book Review: Ten Things We Shouldn't Have Done by Sarah Mlynowski

Title:  Ten Things We Shouldn't Have Done Author:  Sarah Mlynowski Series:  N/A Pages:  329 Publisher:  Orchard Books Date of Publication:  4th August 2011 Source:  Bought Synopsis from Goodreads: I was about to live a sixteen-year-old's dream. House on the beach. No parents. Parties whenever we wanted. Boys wherever we wanted. April and her best friend, Vi, are living by themselves. Of course, April's parents don't know that. They think she's living with Vi and Vi's mum. But it's not April's fault that her dad decided to move away in the middle of high school. So who could blame her for a little white lie? Or the other nine things that April (probably) shouldn't have done that year... Apologies for the rambley review... It hopefully makes sense though ;) My Thoughts: I was super excited to read this book - it sounded funny and silly and after reading a lot of paranormal books I decided that I wanted to read something light-hearted,

In My Mailbox #32

In My Mailbox is hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren. BOUGHT Sweet Venom by Tera Lynn Childs (Kindle version) I am SO excited to read this! It sounds so awesome :D I loved Forgive My Fins and I love Greek mythology, so nothing can go wrong with this, right? ;) FOR REVIEW The Other Life by Susanne Winnacker (UK Proof) I'd seen this around other people's IMMs and thought it looked pretty interesting, and then it turned up on my doorstep on Monday, and I've read the back and looked it up on GR and it looks awesome! Can't wait to read it! WON A Touch Mortal by Leah Clifford (US Hardback) I won this in Daph from Loving Books' Birthday Bash giveaway! I was so happy and the book is beautiful, so THANK YOU DAPH!! I can't wait to read it, I've heard mixed things about it but I've always thought it sounded good :)  FREE Bright Young Things by Anna Godbersen with bonus material (Kindle edition) This was free and I've been want

Top 100 YA Books

I had nothing scheduled for today, and I found this over at What's Your Story? , and I thought it would be cool to see how many of these Top 100 YA books I have read :) As Ashley says in her post, I have no idea how recent or correct this list is, but still, I think it's pretty cool ;) The ones that I have read will be in bold, and italics means I have it on my bookshelf but have not read it yet. 1. Alex Finn – Beastly 2. Alice Sebold – The Lovely Bones 3. Ally Carter – Gallagher Girls (1, 2, 3, 4) 4. Ally Condie – Matched 5. Alyson Noel – The Immortals (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) 6. Anastasia Hopcus – Shadow Hills 7. Angie Sage – Septimus Heap (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) 8. Ann Brashares – The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (1, 2, 3, 4) 9. Anna Godbersen – Luxe (1, 2 , 3 , 4) 10. Anthony Horowitz – Alex Rider (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9) 11. Aprilynne Pike – Wings (1, 2, 3) 12. Becca Fitzpatrick – Hush, Hush (1, 2) 13. Brandon Mull – Fablehaven (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) 14. Brian Selzni

Book Review: Ashes by Ilsa J. Bick

Title:  Ashes  Author:  Ilsa J. Bick Series:  Ashes Trilogy #1 Pages:  480 Publisher:  EgmontUSA Date of Publication:  6th September 2011 Source:  netGalley Synopsis from Goodreads: It could happen tomorrow... A cataclysmic event. An army of "The Changed." Can one teen really survive on her own? An electromagnetic pulse sweeps through the sky, destroying every electronic device and killing billions. For those spared, it's a question of who can be trusted and who is no longer human... Desperate to find out what happened and to avoid the Changed, Alex meets up with Tom---a young army veteran---and Ellie, a young girl whose grandfather was killed by the electromagnetic pulse. This improvised family will have to use every ounce of courage they have just to survive. My Thoughts: I really loved this book, SO much more than I thought I would. It had a really interesting plot line with lots of twists and turns that I did not see coming, and there was so

Book Review: Running From Secrets by Stephanie Void

Title:  Running From Secrets  Author:  Stephanie Void Series:  N/A Pages:  N/A Publisher:  Self-Published Date of Publication:  23rd January 2010 Source:  Author Synopsis from Goodreads: Bethany has never felt as alone as she feels in Linwood—until she dreams up Chime, a woman on the run because of a magic crime she didn’t commit. The dreams get more and more urgent, so Bethany tries to banish them by writing them down, only to discover she’s stumbled into the role of unwitting controller of Chime’s world. Chime is real here, and so is the possessed queen, minion army, mysterious professor, Vault Five, wind chimes with a secret code, child’s rhyme that can kill, the naked painting, and other things Chime’s story leads her to. She has to fix the story without erasing Chime and her world, because if she erases Chime, she will die as well. My Thoughts: I didn't really know what to expect from this book. I was pleasantly surprised, and I'm happy to say that

In My Mailbox #31

In My Mailbox is hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren. BOUGHT Journey's End by RC Sherriff (UK Hardback) Yay... I actually bought a book this week, but for once I'm not excited about it! ;) This is for my English GCSE, but it's a book I got this week so I thought I'd share it because I only got one other, which is good for my TBR pile :D  SWAPPED Trial by Fire by Jennifer Lynn Barnes (US Hardback) I swapped this using UK Swap Shop on Goodreads, and it's SO pretty and shiny! :D Can't wait to read it, I loved the first one (though I need a reminder what happened...) so this should be great :)  That's what I got this week, what did you get? Leave a link in the comments!

Book Review: Vampire Academy: The Graphic Novel by Richelle Mead, Emma Viceli and Leigh Dragoon

Title:  Vampire Academy: The Graphic Novel Author:  Richelle Mead Series:  Vampire Academy: The Graphic Novels #1 Pages:  144 Publisher:  Penguin Date of Publication:  23rd August 2011 Source:  Publisher Synopsis from Goodreads: After two years on the run, best friends Rose and Lissa are caught and returned to St. Vladimir's Academy, a private high school for vampires and half-bloods. It's filled with intrigue, danger - and even romance. Enter their dark, fascinating world through a new series of 144-page full-color graphic novels. The entire first Vampire Academy novel has been adapted for book one by Leigh Dragoon and overseen by Richelle Mead, while the beautiful art of acclaimed British illustrator Emma Vieceli brings the story to life. My Thoughts: I'd never read a graphic novel before, so this was my first. And I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was great to read a familiar story told in a completely new way. It was great to be reminded of the story from

New Releases in September

Here are all the new releases in September! If I've missed any, let me know in the comments and I'll add them! :)       Epic Fail by Claire LaZebnik (5th September 2011) Kill All Enemies by Melvin Burgess (1st September 2011) Abandon by Meg Cabot (1st September 2011)       Dark Inside by Jeyn Roberts (2nd September 2011) A Beautiful Dark by Jocelyn Davies (27th September 2011) Vanish by Sophie Jordan (6th September 2011)       Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins (29th September 2011) Sister, Missing by Sophie McKenzie (29th September 2011) The Faerie Ring by Kiki Hamilton (27th September 2011)       Silence by Becca Fitzpatrick (29th September 2011) Liesl & Po by Lauren Oliver (29th September 2011) The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson (22nd September 2011)       Ashes by Ilsa J. Bick (29th September 2011) Cold Kiss by Amy Garvey (20th September 2011) Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor (29th September 2011)       Beautif