I read the first three books in this series last year and loved all of them.  With Radiant Shadows coming out soon, I decided to revisit these books in preparation – this time in audio book form.  I am only going to review the audio book production this time.  Here is my original review of Wicked Lovely for more on my thoughts on the story.  I did have this to say at the time I read Wicked Lovely last year:

Marr has created a wonderfully detailed world within a world, rich with diverse people, faeries, and their politics.  The tension remains consistent and taut throughout the book as the points of view switch between the main characters.  The reader gains a feeling of sympathy for all the characters.  Marr’s prose is poetic, her imagery sensual; something I find essential for a faery tale book and she captures perfectly the confused emotions of young adulthood.  You’ll be left wondering how quickly you can get your hands on the sequel.

And I still feel this way.  Alyssa Bresnahan does a fantastic job with the narration.  She brings Marr’s rich, detailed world to marvelous life.  Each character has their own unique, distinctive voice, easily discernible from each other.  She doesn’t just read the novel, she doesn’t even act it out, she breathes life into the story, the characters, she makes it feel real.  This is without a doubt my favorite audio presentation to date.  If you haven’t read this book or have been meaning to reread it, the audio version of Wicked Lovely is a great way to do it.

Wicked Lovely
By Melissa Marr
Read by Alyssa Bresnahan
Category: Young Adult, Fantasy
Published by Harper Collins, 10 hours 12 minutes
Format: Audio Book
On Sale: 2008
ISBN: 9780061214677

Purchase from:

I downloaded my copy from Audible.com.  It does not appear to be available (at an affordable price) in any other way.

Other reviews by:

Beth Fish Reads | Fyrefly’s Book Blog | Bart’s Bookshelf

I am a Book Depository and Indie Bound Affiliate and will make a very small profit if you buy a book through one of my links.

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I am a Southern girl. When I say I have a thick Southern accent, ah meen ah hayve ah theek Suthern axcent, that no amount of education has been able to rid me of. Reading this book brought out some Southern in me I didn’t even know I had and Lawd-a-mercy I loved every minute of it.

Ethan Wate is sixteen, star player on the basketball team and best friends with Link.  He’s never really had a girlfriend.  He’s smart.  He’s cute.  And he has been dreaming horrible dreams for months about a mysterious girl he’s never met.  So when he meets Lena Duchannes, the girl of his dreams - literally – he falls hard and fast.  What follows is an intelligent, modern fantasy and an original tale of star-crossed lovers, one of whom has a dark, dangerous secret that could get them both killed.

Beautiful Creatures is a delicious, lush, and haunting Southern gothic tale of some of the most memorable Southern characters, I’ve ever met.  And I’ve read Faulkner and lived to tell the tale.  Garcia and Stohl draw the reader into a dark world full of magic, voodoo, and create a gorgeously crafted Southern stew of which you will never get your fill.

I really like what Carrie Ryan, author of The Forest of Hands and Teeth said about the book:

“Like a thick, hot Carolina summer, this story seeps into you until it’s all you can think about.”

for while I was reading this book, it was all I could think about, and for several days after.  And if you have ever been in North or South Carolina during the summer, y0u know just what it feels like.  Thick.  And hot.   That feels like an apt description of this book.  Beautiful Creatures stays with you, which in my opinion, is saying a lot about a current Young Adult book. This is what I love about Young Adult literature.  Writers can take the fantastical and make it feel real, feel normal, and feel relevant.  While there is magic and the supernatural here, there are many important issues (not only to teens, but to adults as well either as parents or as suffers themselves) like dealing with the death of one parent, the abandonment of the other one, discrimination, looking for acceptance, and just the growing pains of growing up.  I’m in my thirties, but I’ve already dealt with the loss of both my parents, grandparents and always deal with the pain of growing up!   I highly recommend to anyone who likes YA and especially those who enjoy a little more depth in their YA reads.

I can hardly wait for the sequel.

Beautiful Creatures
Written by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Reading level: Young Adult
Hardcover: 576 pages
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers; 1 edition (December 1, 2009)

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I received this book from a kind friend who sent me her copy to read.

So. I don’t know if you remember, but back in…oh, around August I think, there was this big fuss about the cover of Liar.  If you didn’t hear, the publisher put a picture of white girl on the cover.  Which is fine, I guess, but the protagonist is black.  Many, including the author, felt that this was done in, to put it nicely, poor taste, and such a stink was raised that the publisher actually consented to change the cover; which is the cover you see here.

The controversy had one good thing going for it. Free advertising!  I had only slightly heard of the book before all that happened.  After, I definitely knew I wanted to read it.  Because, despite the cover, it sounded like an awesome book.

And, I learned how to spell Larbalestier without having to look it up!

Micah is a liar.  Compulsively so.  Since the first day at her new school, when she had everyone believing she was a boy, until now, she lies.  She can’t help herself.  Four years later, she still lies.  From habit, for self-preservation, for attention.  But that is all over now.  She is going to tell the truth, from now on. She says:

Weaving lies is one thing; having them weave you is another.

That’s why I’m writing this.  To keep me from going over the edge.  I don’t want to be a liar anymore.  I want to tell my stories true.

But I haven’t so far.  Not entirely.  I’ve tried.  I’ve really tried.   I’ve tried harder than I ever have.  But, well, there’s so much and it’s so hard.

I slipped a little.  Just a little.

Truly.

I’ll make it up to you, though.

From now on it’s nothing but the truth.

Obviously Micah is an unreliable narrator and, while some of her lies seem silly, it’s obvious that she does it to hide something, something important, that she doesn’t want anyone to know.  It’s hard to take anything she says at face value, as her story is constantly changing.  One thing is made abundantly clear however.  Micah’s secret boyfriend Zachary, was murdered in Central Park, and she devastated.   Her grief is overwhelming, as is her desire for vengeance.   Thanks to the love she has for Zach and her understandable desire to find out who did it, she becomes a character worth caring for.  In Larbalestier’s skilled hands, Micah takes on a life, a desire, a need to tell her story that is captivating.  Some may not care for the unreliableness of the narrator or the ambiguous ending, but I loved both, as I usually tend to do.  I finished this book about a week ago and I still find myself thinking about it and know I will be rereading it, very soon.  Liar is not to be missed.

Buy this book here and support this blog:

Liar
Written by: Justine Larbalestier
Reading level: Young Adult
Hardcover: 384 pages
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA Children’s Books (September 29, 2009)
Justine on Twitter
Justine’s Blog

Author also wrote:

Magic Lessons | Magic’s Child | Magic or Madness | How to Ditch Your Fairy

Also Reviewed by:

Book Addiction | Devourer of Books | Becky’s Book Reviews | and many more…

I am a Book Depository Affiliate and will make a very small profit if you buy a book through one of my links. And then I will love you forever and bless you and all your children and your children’s children.

I bought this book for myself because I was wanting to reads it.  So there.

Shiver
Written by: Maggie Stiefvater 
Reading level: Young Adult
Hardcover: 400 pages
Publisher: Scholastic Press; 1 edition (August 1, 2009)
Author Blog
Author on Twitter

As a child, Grace was stolen by a pack of starving wolves and dragged into the woods behind her house to become their supper. But a yellow-eyed wolf saved her.  Ever since, she has been haunted by her wolf and has become obsessed with him.  They finally meet after a wolf-hunt (undertaken to rid the town of the wolves who have apparently killed a local teen) that sends a wounded and suddenly human Sam into Grace’s arm’s.

Sam had two lives; the one he lives with his pack and the one that sees him watching Grace from afar.  When he is wounded and finds himself with her, finally, after all these years, he is desperate to cling to his humanity and put off the inevitable transformation back into a wolf.  As they cling to each other and their fragile love, they also have to contend with others who would see Sam put down.  Permanently.

Yes, yes, yes!  This is yet another tale about a supernatural type being falling in love with a human girl.  I KNOW.  I have to say though, and I hope you will believe me, that Stiefvater has done so much more with this story of two misfits finding each other and falling in love despite unusual circumstances.  Her transitioning from the regular world to a world where men turn into wolves is seamless.  It is told in the alternating voices of Sam and Grace, which can be jarring, but here it works.  Each character has a very distinctive voice and I think if you didn’t watch the chapter titles to know who was speaking, you would still be able to tell.  The characters are well written and I really liked Grace.  She’s a strong, intelligent, brave young woman which is so important to have in YA literature.  Steifvater is also great with showing, not telling; you can see the chemistry between Grace and Sam without them saying “I love you” every couple of pages.

I read Lament after it first came out and really liked it, but I am even more impressed with Stiefvater’s growth as a writer between the two books.  She is definitely a YA author to watch and I can’t wait to read Ballad, and the next book in this series.

Author also wrote:

Lament | Ballad

Also Reviewed by:

I am a Book Depository Affiliate and will make a very small profit if you buy a book through one of my links.

I received this book from the library because they were sweet enough to buy it for me.

Killer unicorns anyone?

Title: Rampant
Written by Diana Peterfreund
Hardcover: 416 Pages
Pub. Date: HarperCollins Publishers, August 2009
Reading Level: Young Adult

The last thing Astrid expects to see, as she walks in the woods with her boyfriend Brandt, is a unicorn.  Particularly a blood-thirsty, man-hating unicorn.  So when the unicorn charges and stabs Brandt in the leg, she is just as shocked as anyone else would be.  Her mother Lillian on the other hand, is delighted.

Astrid is the descendant of Alexander the Great and the latest in a long line of women unicorn hunters.  Lillian is obsessed with unicorns and has been for most of her own life.  So when she is contacted and offered a chance for Astrid to go to Italy to learn to be a unicorn hunter, she promptly sends Astrid along to live out her own life-long dream.  Astrid is prepared to be miserable, until her cousin Phillipa appears.  They study swordplay and archery.  They study the hot guys.

But then, the killer unicorns start arriving.

This was a co-read with Kailana from The Written Word. We tried a different format this time, more of a chat style, which was tons of fun.  I really enjoyed this book.  You’ll find out more in our conversation.   Read the first half of it at her blog here.  Go ahead.  I’ll wait for you.

Done? Okay….here’s part two!

Heather: Did you have any problems with the book?

Kelly: Is there a book two for sure? I want to hope that there is, but most of the major stuff was resolved in book one. Anyway, as to problems with the book. Well, the Seth storyline bothered me. Even though it is explained why he did it and it all seems to work out in the end, I didn’t like that it had to happen. A lot of my problems, though, were pacing. While I really liked the story and the characters, sometimes I felt like the story was dragging along. It did a lot of the setting up characters that is usually accomplished in the second book in a trilogy. I hope that means that if there is a book two there will be a lot of action. The characters in this book were all coming into their own, so this book was a lot about exploration of who they were. I just wish sometimes it had been rushed again.

We talked about killer unicorns in general, but what did you think about the two unicorns that could be considered secondary characters in this book?

Heather: So, what did you think of the book from a critical standpoint?  Well written? Good plotting?  Any criticisms or loves?

Find out more in the first half over at The Written World.

Also by Diana Peterfreund:

Under the Rose: An Ivy League Novel | Secret Society Girl: An Ivy League Novel | Rites of Spring (Break) | Tap & Gown: An Ivy League Novel |

Also Reviewed By:

Presenting Lenore | The Book Lush | Read This Book! | Darque Reviews | Shooting Stars Mag| Frenetic Reader | and more…

Obligatory disclaimer.  I bought this book myself. Blah, blah, blah. I’m using Indie bound to make about $0.03 if I’m lucky. Ptttthpt.