04 July 2013

Sex and Violence by Carrie Mesrobian


Sex and Violence by Carrie Mesrobian
Publisher: Carolrhoda LAB     
Publication date: October 1st 2013
My rating: 4.5 star
AT FIRST YOU DON'T SEE THE CONNECTION.
Sex has always come without consequences for seventeen-year-old Evan Carter. He has a strategy--knows the profile of The Girl Who Would Say Yes. In each new town, each new school, he can count on plenty of action before he and his father move again. Getting down is never a problem. Until he hooks up with the wrong girl and finds himself in the wrong place at very much the wrong time.
AND THEN YOU CAN'T SEE ANYTHING ELSE.
After an assault that leaves Evan bleeding and broken, his father takes him to the family cabin in rural Pearl Lake, Minnesota, so Evan's body can heal. But what about his mind?
HOW DO YOU GO ON, WHEN YOU CAN'T THINK OF ONE WITHOUT THE OTHER?
Nothing seems natural to Evan anymore. Nothing seems safe. The fear--and the guilt--are inescapable. He can't sort out how he feels about anyone, least of all himself. Evan's really never known another person well, and Pearl Lake is the kind of place where people know everything about each other--where there might be other reasons to talk to a girl. It's annoying as hell. It might also be Evan's best shot to untangle sex and violence.

I was sitting here for 41 minutes, staring at the screen, trying to figure out what to say about this book. What to say to make people want to buy it and read it? Should I beg? Please, please, read it!  

The story starts of with Evan being a know-it-all and a ladies man. He knows how to get a girl to sleep with him and one day it all goes terribly wrong when SPOILERS  two rednecks beat him up severely and the girl gets gang-rapped. After that Evan can't even shower because everything brings him flashbacks. His father moves him for the nth time to a small city of Pearl Lake where he's forced to meet new people and heal. 

Even though Evan starts of as one of those arrogant guys who think they're better than everyone else, he quickly changes and we see his another side. He still thinks about sex a lot and he's still mentally undressing girls. 

Female authors don't usually write in a male perspective because most of the time it doesn't seem authentic. But while reading Sex and Violence I felt like the author did portray Evan as a real teenager, not something she thinks a horny teenage kid sounds like. She also did a wonderful job with other characters. At times it was like she put something of her own life in the story, some small detail or an opinion about certain things, like hating small dogs. 

While I was reading I though to myself. Trish Doller, the author of Something Like Normal would like this book. And then I saw she wrote a blurb for it. So weird. I'm glad she read it and all you people who loved Something Like Normal, pick up Sex and Violence when it gets out! You won't regret it! 



03 July 2013

Unbreak My Heart by Melissa C. Walker


Unbreak My Heart by Melissa C. Walker
Publisher: Bloomsbury    
Publication date: May 22nd 2012
My rating: 4 stars


Sophomore year broke Clementine Williams’ heart. She fell for her best friend’s boyfriend and long story short: he’s excused, but Clem is vilified and she heads into summer with zero social life. 
Enter her parents’ plan to spend the summer on their sailboat. Normally the idea of being stuck on a tiny boat with her parents and little sister would make Clem break out in hives, but floating away sounds pretty good right now. 
Then she meets James at one of their first stops along the river. He and his dad are sailing for the summer and he’s just the distraction Clem needs. Can he break down Clem’s walls and heal her broken heart?

Last year, when Unbreak My Heart came out I didn't want to read it. I can't remember why. I just didn't. but a couple of days ago I was browsing Goodreads and stumbled upon this book I decided to try it out because I was craving a story about redemption and I'm so glad I picked it up. It was just what I needed. 

Unbreak My Heart is a story about Clementine, who's in love with her best friend's boyfriend. She is forced to go sailing with her family after her friends turn their backs on her.  Clem spends the first half of the book being mean to her parents and sister. They forgave her cause she's dealing with a lot of this. Every thing changes when she meets James who's sailing with his dad. 

I think I've never read a book with a red-head love interest so this book already gained some points. James is so freaking cute. He loves to draw, talks a lot and smiles all the time which helps Clementine stop thinking about her problems. Well, she finally deals with them after seeing some people aren't so lucky, like her. 

Aside from cute love interest I would like to mention Clem's parents. They're an awesome example of busy parents doing a great job raising their kids. They still find the time to talk to their daughters and even take 3 months of work to go sailing. They let Clem blow out her steam, even though she was being rude. I don't think I can remember more than 3 examples of great parenting in YA novels so I was really pleased Melissa Walker gave us a loving and supporting family. 


02 July 2013

Top Ten Tuesday #22


Top Ten Books Most Intimidating Books

A Note of Madness by Tabitha Suzuma / The Fault In Our Stars by John Green / Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein / Finnikin of the Rock by Melina Marchetta / Split by Swati Avasthi   

 I'm actually scared to find out what these books hide inside. I'm pretty sure they are all heart-breaking, maybe all except Finnikin. It will take a lot of persuasion to get me to read them.

Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys / Crank by Ellen Hopkins / The Diviners by Libba Bray / Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor / Enshadowed by Kelly Creagh

These books are here based on their size, except Between Shades of Gray. I've been having problems committing to a book with more than 320 pages. I'm not sure when I'm finally going to read Daughter of Smoke and Bone. Maybe when the third book comes out so I'll have the complete collection and it will be easier. I also hate waiting for a sequel more than 6 months. 

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01 July 2013

Monthly To Read List: July 2013 + June recap


There are a couple of July New Releases I'm very much looking forward to. I'm not sure if I'm going to read all of them but I will read the conclusion of The Lying Game the moment I get my grabby hands on the book.

July New Releases:

 

I only read the first Kate Daniels novel and I will need to catch up before the release date. Thankfully, it's coming out on July 30th so I have time. Can't wait to read Left Drowning! Jessica Park wrote it! As in Jessica Park who created Matt from Flat-Out Love. 
You can click on the images for more details about the books. 


June was a month when I was catching up with egalleys. I did read some other books but I mainly stayed within the titles I got from NetGalley and Edelweiss.

Here are the reviews for those books:


Devyani's reviews:


Devyani read two books I was actually dying to read - Golden and The Moon and More. I didn't read any new June releases. It was so unbearably hot this month so I didn't have the patience to write reviews for all the books I've read this past month.

I didn't read one single print book. O_O This usually doesn't happen. My Playbook(Loki) wasn't opening my ebook library for two months so I was stuck reading on the laptop but he 'magically' started working again 2 weeks ago so I was catching up with some indie NA romances (which I usually end up despising) and egalleys. I was so happy I even ignored Siege and Storm. The poor thing is under the bed with my nerdy glasses. :D Don't worry Darkling, momma will be there soon.