October 2015 Book Releases That We're Looking Forward To

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Hi guys!

We know we have been MIA for so so long, but we're trying to work on that right now. Since, we're not that busy this weekend, we're currently making queued posts that we'll be posting all through next week (technically this week, actually, because this will be posted tomorrow...). This is so that we can still give you guys good content when we're busy.

September is quickly ending, so we're here to give you a list of book releases to look forward to for the next month! Let's start with YA books (our fave genre), shall we?

1. Carry On by Rainbow Rowell
Expected Publication: October 6, 2015 by St. Martin's Griffin

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Synopsis (via Goodreads):
Rainbow Rowell continues to break boundaries with Carry On, an epic fantasy following the triumphs and heartaches of Simon and Baz from her beloved bestseller Fangirl.

Simon Snow just wants to relax and savor his last year at the Watford School of Magicks, but no one will let him. His girlfriend broke up with him, his best friend is a pest, and his mentor keeps trying to hide him away in the mountains where maybe he’ll be safe. Simon can’t even enjoy the fact that his roommate and longtime nemesis is missing, because he can’t stop worrying about the evil git. Plus there are ghosts. And vampires. And actual evil things trying to shut Simon down. When you’re the most powerful magician the world has ever known, you never get to relax and savor anything.

Carry On is a ghost story, a love story, a mystery and a melodrama. It has just as much kissing and talking as you’d expect from a Rainbow Rowell story — but far, far more monsters.

2. Future Perfect by Jen Larsen
Expected Publication: October 6, 2015 by Harper Teen
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Synopsis (via Goodreads):
Every year on her birthday, Ashley Perkins gets a card from her grandmother—a card that always contains a promise: lose enough weight, and I will buy your happiness.

Ashley doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with the way she looks, but no amount of arguing can persuade her grandmother that “fat” isn’t a dirty word—that Ashley is happy with her life, and her body, as it is.
But Ashley wasn’t counting on having her dreams served up on a silver platter at her latest birthday party. She falters when Grandmother offers the one thing she’s always wanted: tuition to attend Harvard University—in exchange for undergoing weight loss surgery.

As Ashley grapples with the choice that little white card has given her, she feels pressured by her friends, her family, even administrators at school. But what’s a girl to do when the reflection in her mirror seems to bother everyone but her?

Through her indecisions and doubts, Ashley’s story is a liberating one—a tale of one girl, who knows that weight is just a number, and that no one is completely perfect. 

3. What We Left Behind by Robin Talley
Expected Publication: October 27, 2015 by Harlequin Teen
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Synopsis (via Goodreads):
From the critically acclaimed author of Lies We Tell Ourselves comes an emotional, empowering story of what happens when love isn't enough to conquer all.

Toni and Gretchen are the couple everyone envied in high school. They've been together forever. They never fight. They're deeply, hopelessly in love. When they separate for their first year at college—Toni to Harvard and Gretchen to NYU—they're sure they'll be fine. Where other long-distance relationships have fallen apart, their relationship will surely thrive.

The reality of being apart, however, is a lot different than they expected. As Toni, who identifies as genderqueer, falls in with a group of transgender upperclassmen and immediately finds a sense of belonging that has always been missing, Gretchen struggles to remember who she is outside their relationship.

While Toni worries that Gretchen, who is not trans, just won't understand what is going on, Gretchen begins to wonder where she fits in Toni's life. As distance and Toni's shifting gender identity begins to wear on their relationship, the couple must decide—have they grown apart for good, or is love enough to keep them together?
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4. First and Then by Emma Mills 
Expected Publication: October 13, 2015 by Henry Holt and Co.
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Synopsis (via Goodreads):
Devon Tennyson wouldn't change a thing. She's happy watching Friday night games from the bleachers, silently crushing on best friend Cas, and blissfully ignoring the future after high school. But the universe has other plans. It delivers Devon's cousin Foster, an unrepentant social outlier with a surprising talent for football, and the obnoxiously superior and maddeningly attractive star running back, Ezra, right where she doesn't want them first into her P.E. class and then into every other aspect of her life.

Pride and Prejudice meets Friday Night Lights in this contemporary novel about falling in love with the unexpected boy, with a new brother, and with yourself.





5. Signs Point to Yes by Sandy Hall
Expected Publication: October 20, 2015 by Swoon Reads
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Synopsis (via Goodreads): 
The author of A Little Something Different brings you the most adorkable romance ever.

Jane, a superstitious fangirl, takes an anonymous babysitting job to avoid an unpaid internship with her college-obsessed mom. The only problem? She’s babysitting the siblings of her childhood friend and new crush, Teo. 

Teo doesn’t dislike Jane, but his best friend Ravi hates her, and is determined to keep them apart. So Teo’s pretty sure his plans for a peaceful summer are shot. His only hope is that his intermittent search for his birth father will finally pan out and he’ll find a new, less awkward home. Meanwhile, at Jane’s house, her sister Margo wants to come out as bisexual, but she’s terrified of how her parents will react.

In a summer filled with secrets and questions, even Jane’s Magic 8 ball can’t give them clear answers, but Signs Point to Yes.


So, what did you guys think? Are you as excited about these books as we are? We really, really, really can't wait. As soon as these are out, we're gonna go broke buying them! Well, comment down below your thoughts, and tell us about books that you're looking forward to in October. :)




BOOK BLITZ: Let's Get Lost by Adi Alsaid + GIVEAWAY and GUEST POST!!!

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Let's Get Lost
by Adi Alsaid
Release Date: 07/29/14
Harlequin Teen

Summary from Goodreads:
Five strangers. Countless adventures. One epic way to get lost.

Four teens across the country have only one thing in common: a girl named LEILA. She crashes into their lives in her absurdly red car at the moment they need someone the most.

There's HUDSON, a small-town mechanic who is willing to throw away his dreams for true love. And BREE, a runaway who seizes every Tuesday—and a few stolen goods along the way. ELLIOT believes in happy endings…until his own life goes off-script. And SONIA worries that when she lost her boyfriend, she also lost the ability to love.

Hudson, Bree, Elliot and Sonia find a friend in Leila. And when Leila leaves them, their lives are forever changed. But it is during Leila's own 4,268-mile journey that she discovers the most important truth— sometimes, what you need most is right where you started. And maybe the only way to find what you're looking for is to get lost along the way.


Available Now!
Amazon * Barnes & Noble * Indie Bound * Harlequin.com

Early Praise:
“Reminiscent of John Green’s Paper Towns and road trip novels that feature a teen paving the way to adulthood, Alsaid’s debut is a gem among contemporary YA novels.” – School Library Journal

“Five love stories, beautifully woven together by a special girl in search of adventure, hope, and full appreciation of life’s simple pleasures. A do-not-miss.  ” – Justine Magazine

“Moving and poignant.”  - Glitter Magazine

“An entertaining and romantic road-trip debut.” – Kirkus

"Leila's quest to find the Northern Lights takes readers on a captivating cross-country journey, where four strangers' adventures collide into one riveting tale of finding yourself." ―YABooksCentral.com

 “This will likely be a popular summer hit, especially for older teen about to embark on their own journeys of self-discovery.” –Booklist

About the Author
Adi Alsaid was born and raised in Mexico City, then studied at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. While in class, he mostly read fiction and continuously failed to fill out crossword puzzles, so it's no surprise that after graduating, he did not go into business world but rather packed up his apartment into his car and escaped to the California coastline to become a writer. He's now back in his hometown, where he writes, coaches high school and elementary basketball, and has perfected the art of making every dish he eats or cooks as spicy as possible. In addition to Mexico, he's lived in Tel Aviv, Las Vegas, and Monterey, California. A tingly feeling in his feet tells him more places will eventually be added to the list. Let's Get Lost is his YA debut.  
Let's Get Lost Website!

Author Links:
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***GIVEAWAY***
1 signed hard cover copy of Let’s Get Lost
1 Let’s Get Lost luggage tag
1 Harlequin TEEN notebook
1 Let’s Get Lost sachel
1 Harlequin TEEN tote bag
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Book Blitz Organized by:


GUEST POST: Adi’s First Trip Alone


My sister likes to say that before I came back from my trip to Israel, she’d never heard me speak. That’s probably an exaggeration, but not an extreme one. When I boarded the plane to Israel on the eve of my eighteenth birthday, I was a shy kid, reserved, talkative only with my closest friends.

My brother puts it a different way: “Before, you couldn’t decide if you cared or not. Then you decided you didn’t.” He said this when we shared an apartment in college, when I was doing things like taking spontaneous road trips to Baker, California just to have lunch, or founding a student organization at UNLV called Students for the Advancement of Silliness. I brought my first girlfriend to the top floor of a library and rained down thirty notecards with book quotations on them. I wrote editorials in the school newspaper about choosing to be happier.

Let me be clear about this: I didn’t notice it happening. In Israel, I read a lot. I walked around a lot. Though fluent in Hebrew, I didn’t speak a lot, because outside of my grandmother and some cousins, I didn’t know anyone. I could have made friends on the basketball courts where I played, or the bar full of American expats and travelers from all over the world, but I didn’t. By the end I was having more and more conversations with people there, because I’d learned that if I didn’t I could go days without saying a word. But that didn’t feel like growth; it just felt like loneliness, which wasn’t anything new. I had fun in Israel, and though I’d imagined something life-changing (I brought a notebook, thinking that maybe I’d write a book while there), I left thinking it hadn’t happened. The first day I returned to Mexico and had coffee with a friend, within twenty minutes, she said, “You’ve changed.”

It’s not like I went to Israel and came back a new person. I was simply more myself. The layer of shyness that usually hid parts of me from the world was washed away by the Mediterranean, or burned away from my skin from the suntan I gained on the beaches of Tel Aviv. I broke out of my proverbial shell, deciding, as my brother pointed out, that I no longer cared to reside within it.

Here’s what I’m trying to get at, and why Leila’s travels in Let’s Get Lost serve as the perfect backdrop to five coming-of-age stories: Travel leads to self-discovery. You grow, even if you don’t notice it happening. Especially if you do it at the age I did, the age the characters in the book are, the world seeps into your cracks and pulls you further out.

Book in Review: Played by Liz Fichera

5 stars


Title: Played
Author: Liz Fichera
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Publication Date: May 27, 2014 
Paperback: 352 pages
Format: ARC
Rating: 5/5

It is when a book hits so close to home that I find it the most difficult to write a review and make sense of how I feel about the story. Played is unexpectedly one of those books, and I've spent days trying to decipher my thoughts into words. Nevertheless, I shall attempt. 

Played tells the story of Riley and Sam, two people with completely different backgrounds, whose paths one day cross on a leadership camp for intelligent and outstanding students. They instantly hate each other: Sam thinking of Riley as a spoiled bossy white girl, while Riley thinking of Sam as this rude, moody and arrogant guy. But when they are paired up to work together, Riley finds herself in danger with only Sam there to save her. After spending a whole day together stranded at the bottom of a cliff, they form an unlikely friendship. Riley then decides to repay Sam by helping him get together with her brother's girlfriend who is Sam's crush. Told in the alternating POVs of Sam and Riley, Played is about how two different people fall in love. 

At first I found this premise quite shallow and unoriginal, considering there have been several stories made about a boy and a girl who hate each other but eventually fall in love and/or a girl who helps the boy get together with someone else but they 'unexpectedly' fall in love and end up together in the end anyway. The story of Played is a mesh of these two tropes and I wasn't as enthusiastic about it at first. However, Played drew me in the moment I got a glimpse into Sam and Riley's thoughts. I found both these characters very interesting, not necessarily likable but very compelling - and I wouldn't want to admit, but also relatable. 

Riley seemingly has the perfect life, especially in Sam's eyes. Her family is rich, her grades are high, what more could she ask for? But throughout the book you see how much she struggles to meet her parent's expectations, to excel beyond what she is capable of. Though Riley is presumed to be a good girl, the obedient one who never drinks and always gets straight As, we get to see Riley get in touch with her rebellious side, the side that we honestly all have but try the hardest to not unleash.  Throughout the book Riley does a bunch of stupid and selfish things, but through all of these, Riley is able to break out of her shell and mature into a person who can distinguish between right and wrong and also one who does not just follow blindly.

Sam is different. Being one of the few Native Americans in their school he tries hard to fit in. It was interesting to see how Sam juggled with his life home in the Rez and his life outside of it - how these two opposite ends would meet. Sam's struggle to be recognized by his father comprised a major part of his story and I liked how it worked out in the end. 

Both of them have their own problems to deal with - problems that are not unfamiliar to teenagers today. These are problems that concern family life, societal expectation, acceptance and yes even race. There is a part in the book where the characters ponder over what the politically correct term for Native American is, something that has possibly crossed the minds of any teenager in today's generation. At the beginning Riley experiments with Botox with her best friend, and here we see a girl who has for a long time obediently followed her parents expectations and now realizing that maybe just maybe, she does not want to anymore.

There is also a diverse group of secondary characters. Fred and Ryan, the two main characters in the first novel Hooked, contributed a big part to the story and I loved how they fit into it. I loved how they were a big key to Riley and Sam's realization and journey to acceptance of themselves. Everyone else was also very interesting and well-rounded characters: Trevor, Fred's brother who helps Sam by selling him his bike, Jay, the misogynistic jerk, Drew, Riley's best friend who's always there for her, Martin, who gives the best advice to Sam, Riley's parents who just really want the best for her, Sam's parents who struggle to understand him and last but not the least Sam's grandmother who I found so likeable and so genuinely nice.

The romance between Sam and Riley was well-paced as well. I absolutely abhor insta love so I liked how they started by not exactly liking each other. I loved seeing how they evolve from strangers to friends and finally into something more. The dream basket which Sam's grandmother gives to Riley is an important component of their love story and I found if to be a sweet but simple way to wrap things up. 

The best part of the book is the probably the last 15% of it. I loved how the story was concluded and the ending was just perfectly wondrous. It gave me this good squirmy feeling like I wanted to hug these two people and pat them in the back for a job well done.

Book in Review: Grim

audrey

 
Title: Grim
Author: Ellen Hopkins, Amanda Hocking, Julie Kagawa, Claudia Gray, Rachel Hawkins, Kimberly Derting, Myra McEntire, Malinda Lo, Sarah Rees-Brennan, Jackson Pearce, Christine Johnson, Jeri Smith Ready, Shaun David Hutchinson, Saundra Mitchell, Sonia Gensler, Tessa Gratton, Jon Skrovan
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Publication Date: February 25, 2014
Kindle Edition: 480 pages
Rating: 4/5 

I don't know most of the authors here so I don't have anything to base this anthology on. I also rarely read anthologies but I believe that this is one of the best I've read. Even though the book was written by multiple authors, the tone of the book didn't change. I think that this is quite hard to achieve so I applaud the authors for being able to do that.

I liked all of the stories although I did like some more than the others. The stories were based on other classic tales such as Beauty and The Beast. Not all the stories were as excellent as others though. I wouldn't give any of them a 1-star rating but there was one or two that I rated as 2-star books. Some of my personal favorites in this anthology were: The Twelfth Girl, Figment, and The Brothers Piggett. I'll be writing a short review of all the stories in this anthology to fully review the whole book. I don't really know what most of the stories were based on so I wouldn't really know how to compare the two stories but I'll try my best.

The Key by Rachel Hawkins (retell of Bluebeard)
This book was interesting and was a unique retelling but I think that I needed a little more detail. I would love to read this story as a full-length novel. I think that it would be much better told if it were written as a whole book instead of just a short story.

Figment by Jeri Smith-Ready (retell of Puss in Boots)
I said above that this is one of my personal favorites and that is completely true. I don't really remember the story of Puss in Boots which makes me totally useless in this situation. I do know that I really like this story. It was written well and I was hooked on the story from the very start. The story didn't actually remind me of Puss in Boots until I read on Goodreads that it was based on that.  

The Twelfth Girl by Malinda Lo (retell of Twelve Dancing Princesses)
Another one of my favorites. Again, I don't know the story that this one was based on so again, I can't compare. Even through that, I was gripped by the story. If I didn't know that this was based on another story, I would say that this book was super unique. Since I did know that this was based on another story, I focused on the fact that even if I didn't know the story it was based on, I was still sucked into the twelve girls' world. I could fell what they were feeling and I understood why the girls did what they did.

The Raven Princess by Jon Skovron (retell of The Raven) 
When I finished reading this book, I still had a couple of questions. Even if the story did end with an actual and final conclusion, I was still confused by the actual motives of the mother of the princess. I did think that the ending was perfect though with (SPOILERS!) the princess staying in her raven form and the hunter turning into a raven to be with her. (END OF SPOILERS.) I don't know of this is how the actual story ended but I still like this one.

Thinner Than Water by Saundra Mitchell (retell of Donkeyskin)
This was the story that disturbed me most. I was disgusted and horrified by what happened here but I also felt admiration for the main character since she was very smart and did things rationally. The ending wasn't very final though. There were things that I wanted to be resolved instead of left hanging. I don't think that I can handle a full-length novel of this story but I believe that it could have been ended with a little more detail than what we were given.

Before The Rose Bloomed by Ellen Hopkins (retell of The Snow Queen)
This was a nice story though not very satisfying. I actually do know The Snow Queen (finally, something I know) so I can compare. I don't think that this is the best that Ellen Hopkins could write. I think that she could tell this story a little bit better. That doesn't mean that I didn't enjoy it, I did. It kept my interest and was enjoyable.

Beast/Beast by Tessa Gratton (retell of Beauty and The Beast)
There are two retellings of Beauty and The Beast and to be perfectly honest, I like the other one better. This story was nice and I really liked it when I read it but when I read the second retelling of Beauty and The Beast, this paled in comparison. I don't really remember the story much but I remember liking it and finishing it faster than the other stories.

The Brothers Piggett by Julie Kagawa (retell of The Three Little Pigs)
I have read Kagawa's books before and I have to say, she is a great writer. This is one of the stories that stood out for me in this anthology. I liked it and it was very different from The Three Little Pigs even though as soon as I read it, I knew that it was based on that story.

 Untethered by Sonia Gensler (retell of The Shroud)
At first, I was quite confused by what was happening in the story but as the plot progressed and I learned more about what was actually happening, I started to really like it. I thought that it was very sweet in a slightly creepy way. The story was written well and I believe that the length of the story was just right. If it was longer, it might become less sweet and if this was shorter, the story might not show the bond of the family as well as it did in the story.

Better by Shaun David Hutchinson (retell of The Pied Piper)
This one is one of my favorites. It didn't remind me of The Pied Piper but when I saw that it was actually based on that, it all made sense. I liked the romance, the main character, and the love interest. It had a sci-fi theme so I was hoping that the story could have described the setting more but I'm not too disappointed that it didn't. 

Light It Up by Kimberly Berting (retell of Hansel and Gretel)
I've always been fascinated by stories with cannibals in them. That's probably because we rarely see them in stories. I would love to forget about this book's flaws just because of the risk the author took to write about something that isn't that common but I can't. There were some parts of the book that seemed a bit unreal. Not in a supernatural or fairy tale kind of unreal but in a is-this-really-possible kind of way.

Sharper Than A Serpent's Toungue (retell of Diamonds and Toads)
When I read this, I knew what it was based on but I didn't know the name of it. I remember loving the story it was based on so this story had a lot to live up to for me. It wasn't that great but I did enjoy reading it. There were a couple of things that were unexplained and I do wish that it was lengthened. 

A Real Boy by Claudia Gray (retell of Pinocchio)
This is another sci-fi story but I liked it better than the former story. The romance was great and the two were very cute together. Rowan was exactly like what I imagine future humanoid robots would be like. Blue + Rowan? I SHIP IT!

Skin Trade by Myra MacEntire (retell of The Robber Bridegroom)
This story was quite confusing but not too much that I couldn't make sense of the story. The romance felt a bit pushed, like the two weren't really the perfect pairing for each other. It wasn't spectacular but it wasn't terrible either.

Beauty and The Chad by Sarah Rees Brennan (retell of Beauty and The Beast)
This is the second retelling of Beauty and The Beast, the one that I like more. It really stood out among the other stories in this anthology. When I think of Grim this is part of the first stories that pop into my mind. No words needed. Just read it.

The Pink by Amanda Hocking (retell of The Pink)
 I had to think really hard to remember what this story was about. It just didn't stand out. It wasn't like The Twelfth Girl or Beauty and The Chad. It wasn't terrible though. The love story was cute and it had a happy ending but it wasn't that spectacular. It was average. Mediocre.

Sell Out by Jackson Pearce (retell of Snow White/Sleeping Beauty)
I didn't see it at first but then I realized that it really was based on Snow White (or Sleeping Beauty I'm not sure). I liked it but I found Emmett's sudden change of heart about Emily kinda weird. It happened so fast, I think I got whiplash. But other than that, the story was great and I think that it was a good way to end an anthology.

 All in all, Grim was a great anthology. I read it at the perfect time too since I felt like reading retellings of classic fairy tales. It would be perfect for anyone who would want to read retellings. It would also be perfect for those who just want to read a good anthology.

Have you read Grim? What do you think about it? Leave a comment!
 
  







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