The Time Will Come (Sept. 27th)

Every Thursday l am going to list a book which l really want to read/keep meaning to get to. These are mostly books which have been on my shelf for awhile now but don't have to be, maybe you got it two weeks ago and really want to read it! 

~

Want to join in?

- Pick a book you have been meaning to read

- Do a post telling us about the book 

- Link the post up in the linky

- Visit the other blogs!

Cinder
by Marissa Meyer

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. . . .

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

I love fairytale retellings. So the fact that I purchased Cinder comes as no surprise. What is shocking is that I haven't even opened this yet, despite awesome reviews and really wanting to read it. My local bookstore had this a week before release when I picked it up, so the amount of time I've waited is ridiculous.

So, have you read Cinder? What did you think? Should this get pushed up the TBR pile? I'd love to know, so feel free to leave a comment. :)  

Waiting on Wednesday (Sept. 26th)

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking The Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week's pre-publication can't-wait-to-read selections are:

Destroy Me
by Tahereh Mafi

Perfect for the fans of Shatter Me who are desperately awaiting the release of Unravel Me, this novella-length digital original will bridge the gap between these two novels from the perspective of the villain we all love to hate, Warner, the ruthless leader of Sector 45.

In Tahereh Mafi’s Shatter Me, Juliette escaped from The Reestablishment by seducing Warner—and then putting a bullet in his shoulder. But as she’ll learn in Destroy Me, Warner is not that easy to get rid of. . .

Back at the base and recovering from his near-fatal wound, Warner must do everything in his power to keep his soldiers in check and suppress any mention of a rebellion in the sector. Still as obsessed with Juliette as ever, his first priority is to find her, bring her back, and dispose of Adam and Kenji, the two traitors who helped her escape. But when Warner’s father, The Supreme Commander of The Reestablishment, arrives to correct his son’s mistakes, it’s clear that he has much different plans for Juliette. Plans Warner simply cannot allow.

Set after Shatter Me and before its forthcoming sequel, Unravel Me, Destroy Me is a novella told from the perspective of Warner, the ruthless leader of Sector 45.

This might qualify me as sick in the head: Warner was my favorite character in Shatter Me. Cold, caculating, ruthless ... and yet charismatic and obsessed with Juliette in the most terribly beautiful way. He's my kinda villain.

So when I found out that this novella was being done and that it's from his point of view, I squeed with joy. Warner is such an interesting character that getting inside his head should be great! (And greatly disturbing, I am sure.) I absolutely cannot WAIT to get my hands on this. 

Ironskin

by Tina Connolly

Jane Eliot wears an iron mask.

It’s the only way to contain the fey curse that scars her cheek. The Great War is five years gone, but its scattered victims remain—the ironskin.

When a carefully worded listing appears for a governess to assist with a "delicate situation"—a child born during the Great War—Jane is certain the child is fey-cursed, and that she can help.

Teaching the unruly Dorie to suppress her curse is hard enough; she certainly didn’t expect to fall for the girl’s father, the enigmatic artist Edward Rochart. But her blossoming crush is stifled by her own scars, and by his parade of women. Ugly women, who enter his closed studio...and come out as beautiful as the fey.

Jane knows Rochart cannot love her, just as she knows that she must wear iron for the rest of her life. But what if neither of these things is true? Step by step Jane unlocks the secrets of her new life—and discovers just how far she will go to become whole again.

With its gorgeous cover and darkly compelling concept, Ironskin jumped out at me from the books being released this week and demanded to be featured. Channeling some Man in the Iron Mask vibes and featuring a love interest who might turn out to be cool or creepy, I can't resist checking this one out.

So, what are you looking forward to this week? Leave a link and I'll drop by and have a look. 

Shopaholic Sundays (Sept. 23rd)

Shopholic Sunday is a feature here at I Write, I Read, I Review where I get to share the fabulous things I've bought, borrowed or received. It's also a place where I sometimes share books coming out that I'm dying to read or tell you about events that have been here or that are coming which I think you might be interested in. Thanks for visiting!

Hey guys! 

Sealer's Promise is almost ready for betas. Finally.

I am 60% through a final read through--basically a pre-beta proof read. Thank goodness I decided to. There are so many little keyboard mix ups that I would not have wanted to have see the light of day! Plus it's giving me a chance to see this all "together" rather then over a long span like when I did revisions or editing.

I also have my new cover!!!! *is extremely excited* I've shown it to a few close friends and the responses have been good. (My aunt made fun of the book title when I e-mailed her, but she does stuff like that about everything.) I'm aiming to do a cover and book trailer reveal in October during my Cover Lover Month event. If you want to be involved in that, please let me know. :)

I'm also still looking for interview guests for Cover Lover Month, so if you want to be a guest here at I Write, I Read, I Review and talk covers, please click here to learn more about how to make that happen.

But enough about me, my upcoming debut and my plans for October (which also include taking part in Zompocolypse and the Spooktacular Paranormal Reading Challenge for the second year). You're here to see what I bought this week, so lets get to it! 

Stacking the Shelves is a meme created by Tynga's Book Reviews where we get to share the fabulous things we bought, borrowed or received during the week.

For Review:

Broken

A.E. Rought

Imagine a modern spin on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein where a young couple’s undying love and the grief of a father pushed beyond sanity could spell the destruction of them all.

A string of suspicious deaths near a small Michigan town ends with a fall that claims the life of Emma Gentry's boyfriend, Daniel. Emma is broken, a hollow shell mechanically moving through her days. She and Daniel had been made for each other, complete only when they were together. Now she restlessly wanders the town in the late Fall gloom, haunting the cemetery and its white-marbled tombs, feeling Daniel everywhere, his spectre in the moonlight and the fog.

When she encounters newcomer Alex Franks, only son of a renowned widowed surgeon, she's intrigued despite herself. He's an enigma, melting into shadows, preferring to keep to himself. But he is as drawn to her as she is to him. He is strangely... familiar. From the way he knows how to open her locker when it sticks, to the nickname she shared only with Daniel, even his hazel eyes with brown flecks are just like Daniel's.

The closer they become, though, the more something inside her screams there's something very wrong with Alex Franks. And when Emma stumbles across a grotesque and terrifying menagerie of mangled but living animals within the walls of the Franks' estate, creatures she surely knows must have died from their injuries, she knows.

I am extremely excited to be holding an ARC of this book. Broken looks like it's going to be absolutely fabulous and I am very excited to dive in. I did one of my major English papers on Mary Shelly's Frankenstein, so any book that references it has a tendency to be near and dear to my heart. When I read the description for this I was absolutely dying to get my hands on it. Huge thanks to Strange Chemistry for sending this to me. :) 

I Won:

A White So Red

by Krystle Jones

Seventeen-year-old Snow’s life changed forever the night her stepmother, the Queen, sent her huntsman to cut out her heart. Fleeing for her life, Snow runs to the Silver Forest, a place as dangerous as it is enchanting, and begins an adventure she could never have dreamed.

With no one at her side but a rowdy band of carnivorous dwarves and an arrogant, rogue prince who’s too handsome for his own good, Snow must confront the challenge that’s been laid before her: Kill the Queen, and take back the kingdom that should have been hers.

But if she is to succeed, Snow will have to tap into a powerful, ancient form of magic, one that may have been sleeping inside her all along.

I've been looking forward to A White So Red for a long time. I absolutely loved Krystle's vampire / dystopian novel The Scarlet Dagger, so seeing what she would do with a classic fairytale held a lot of appeal for me. She is also one of the people I've become good friends with in the year or so that I've been blogging or publicly talking about my novel, so seeing this *finally* be on the brink of being readable by everyone is great. (I like seeing my friends succeed.) 

I always have to watch what I am doing when I review stuff by friends, but I've done it before and as always I'll note it. If you want an unbiased review from me of her work, look at the one I linked for The Scarlet Dagger. That was back when I first met her (actually, how we met). For what it's worth--it got 5 hearts and my Kat's Meow award, so I thought highly of it.

Will A White So Red far equally well? You'll have to wait and see. :) 

I Bought: 

Yes, I was bad. Yes, I spoiled myself with three new hardcovers from Chapters. But considering how much I've gotten done this summer I think I deserve them. :D I could not resist getting these! 

Throne of Glass

by Sarah J. Maas

After serving out a year of hard labor in the salt mines of Endovier for her crimes, 18-year-old assassin Celaena Sardothien is dragged before the Crown Prince. Prince Dorian offers her her freedom on one condition: she must act as his champion in a competition to find a new royal assassin.

Her opponents are men-thieves and assassins and warriors from across the empire, each sponsored by a member of the king's council. If she beats her opponents in a series of eliminations, she'll serve the kingdom for three years and then be granted her freedom.

Celaena finds her training sessions with the captain of the guard, Westfall, challenging and exhilirating. But she's bored stiff by court life. Things get a little more interesting when the prince starts to show interest in her... but it's the gruff Captain Westfall who seems to understand her best.

Then one of the other contestants turns up dead... quickly followed by another. Can Celaena figure out who the killer is before she becomes a victim? As the young assassin investigates, her search leads her to discover a greater destiny than she could possibly have imagined.

This was a Waiting on Wednesday pick for me a few weeks ago, but I've been so busy getting stuff done for Sealer's Promise that I haven't had time to read. So I held off on picking it up. Now that I'm about to be taking a 'breather' after I get SP out to betas and while I work on outlining the rest of the series, I should be able to dive into this soon. I'm looking forward to it--what I read on the way home in the car had my attention from the first page. I have high hopes here. 

Alice in Zombieland

by Gena Showalter

She won’t rest until she’s sent every walking corpse back to its grave. Forever.

Had anyone told Alice Bell that her entire life would change course between one heartbeat and the next, she would have laughed. From blissful to tragic, innocent to ruined? Please. But that’s all it took. One heartbeat. A blink, a breath, a second, and everything she knew and loved was gone.

Her father was right. The monsters are real….

To avenge her family, Ali must learn to fight the undead. To survive, she must learn to trust the baddest of the bad boys, Cole Holland. But Cole has secrets of his own, and if Ali isn’t careful, those secrets might just prove to be more dangerous than the zombies….

I wish I could go back and do a thousand things differently.
I'd tell my sister no.
I'd never beg my mother to talk to my dad.
I'd zip my lips and swallow those hateful words.
Or, barring all of that, I'd hug my sister, my mom and my dad one last time.
I'd tell them I love them.
I wish... Yeah, I wish.

Gena Showalter + Alice in Wonderland + Zombies ... How could I not pick this up? It also doesn't hurt that the book has a totally gorgeous cover. This book has potential to be totally fabulous and I'm going to do my best to get to it soon. It will likely be one of the books I read for the Spooktacular Paranormal Reading Challenge.

Dearly, Beloved

by Lia Habel

Can the living coexist with the living dead?

That’s the question that has New Victorian society fiercely divided ever since the mysterious plague known as “The Laz” hit the city of New London and turned thousands into walking corpses. But while some of these zombies are mindless monsters, hungry for human flesh, others can still think, speak, reason, and control their ravenous new appetites.

Just ask Nora Dearly, the young lady of means who was nearly kidnapped by a band of sinister zombies but valiantly rescued by a dashing young man . . . of the dead variety.

Nora and her savior, the young zombie soldier Bram Griswold, fell hopelessly in love. But others feel only fear and loathing for the reanimated dead. Now, as tensions grow between pro- and anti-zombie factions, battle lines are being drawn in the streets. And though Bram is no longer in the New Victorian army, he and his ex-commando zombie comrades are determined to help keep the peace. That means taking a dangerous stand between The Changed, a radical group of sentient zombies fighting for survival, and The Murder, a masked squad of urban guerrillas hellbent on destroying the living dead. But zombies aren’t the only ones in danger: Their living allies are also in The Murder’s crosshairs, and for one vengeful zealot, Nora Dearly is the number one target.

As paranoia, prejudice, and terrorist attacks threaten to plunge the city into full-scale war, Nora’s scientist father and his team continue their desperate race to unlock the secrets of “The Laz” and find a cure. But their efforts may be doomed when a mysterious zombie appears bearing an entirely new strain of the virus—and the nation of New Victoria braces for a new wave of the apocalypse.

Lia Habel’s spellbinding, suspenseful sequel to Dearly, Departed takes her imaginative mash-up of period romance, futuristic thriller, and zombie drama to a whole new level of innovative and irresistible storytelling.

Dearly Departed was one of my favorite books last year, so when I found out that the sequel was releasing and saw it today at Chapters I had to have it. I absolutely have to know what happens to Nora and Bram! This is likely another book for next month--if I can wait that long. 

So that was my week of absolute awesome. I would love to know what you got, too. I hope this week has been good to you. :) Please feel free to leave a link to your Stacking the Shelves, IMM, book haul, etc. and I'll do my best to visit. :) 

The Time Will Come (Sept 20th)

Every Thursday l am going to list a book which l really want to read/keep meaning to get to. These are mostly books which have been on my shelf for awhile now but don't have to be, maybe you got it two weeks ago and really want to read it! 

Want to join in?

- Pick a book you have been meaning to read

- Do a post telling us about the book 

- Link the post up in the linky

- Visit the other blogs!

The Boyfriend List
by E. Lockhart

E. Lockhart’s spot-on dialogue and descriptions of painfully but hilariously relatable situations make this young adult novel an addictive read.

Fifteen-year-old Ruby has had a rough ten days. During that time she:

* lost her boyfriend (#13 on the list)
* lost her best friend (Kim)
* lost all her other friends (Nora, Cricket)
* did something suspicious with a boy (#10)
* did something advanced with a boy (#15)
* had an argument with a boy (#14)
* had a panic attack
* lost a lacrosse game (she's the goalie)
* failed a math test (she'll make it up)
* hurt Meghan's feelings (even though they aren't really friends)
* became a social outcast (no one to sit with at lunch)
* had graffiti written about her in the girls' bathroom (who knows what was in the boys'!?!)

But don't worry—Ruby lives to tell the tale. And make more lists.

I don't know what's up here. This was recommended by a good friend. I bought it a year ago. I read a sample before I bought it and loved the sample. Yet here it sits. Eek! I do remember that I was going through a huge contemporary kick before I got this so maybe I was burnt out.

I don't know the exact why I didn't read it. What I want to know is, should I read it? 

Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments and link me to your post. Thanks for visiting. :)

Waiting on Wednesday (Sept. 19th)

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking The Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week's pre-publication can't-wait-to-read selections is:

The Mephisto Kiss
by Trinity Faegen

The eyes never lie. No one’s eyes are darker than Eryx. Not even the Devil’s.

When Jax and Sasha first see Jordan Ellis, they know she is no ordinary teenager. She’s the daughter of the President after all, but she’s also Anabo – a descendant of Eve.

What they don’t know is that Eryx plans to kidnap Jordan and force President Ellis to pledge his soul. If Eryx’s plot succeeds, the consequences would be catastrophic.

But the Mephisto brothers do know about Jordan’s secret identity. And for one of them, she could be the match that leads to their soul’s salvation.

Now it’s a desperate race against time to save Jordan and prevent Eryx’s haunting eyes from discovering her true identity.

A thrilling story of romance, danger, and intrigue, THE MEPHISTO KISS continues the marvelous mythology that began in THE MEPHISTO COVENANT.

The Mephisto Covenant was one of my most coveted books last year. While it did not have the absolute blow-me-away factor I was hoping it would, I did enjoy it and I have been looking forward to The Mephisto Kiss for months now. 

Trinity Faegen's series is my favorite heaven and hell based series I've read. Her mythology is fascinating, her characters--while they can sometimes drive me nuts--are distinct and she writes great romance. I can't believe it's almost time to pick this up. I have it pre-ordered so I don't have long to wait now. :) 

So what are you looking forward to this week? Leave a link and I'll drop by and have a look.