Feature and Follow #1

So I've found another new meme to take part in, Feature and Follow hosted over at Parajunkee and Alison Can Read. The aim of the blog is to gain new followers! :)

How to participate:

Gain new followers and make new friends with the Book Blogger Feature & Follow! If this is your first time here, welcome! You are about to make some new friends and gain new followers -- but you have to know -- the point of this hop is to follow other bloggers also. I follow you, you follow me.

What sets this Hop apart from others, is the Feature. Each week they will showcase a Featured Blogger, from all different genres and areas. Just remember it is required, if you participate, to follow the Features and you must follow the hosts (Parajunkee & Alison Can Read) as a courtesy.

                         Featured Blog: The Bookshelf Review

Question:

What would you do over if you were to start your blog again from scratch?
Errrm, I'm not too sure to be honest. I've only had this blog for just over two months so I'm still in the learning process, though I do wish that I knew how to make my own blogger template. This one from Lee-Lou blogs is lovely :).

If you are a new follower, please let me know so that I can follow you back :)
 

xxx

Waiting on Wednesday #1

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted over at Breaking the Spine , which allows us to show off the books we cannot wait to get our hands on! :) This is my first time participating in this meme, so here we go:

J R Ward - Rapture

  Mels Carmichael, reporter for the Caldwell Courier Journal, gets the shock of her life when a man stumbles in front of her car outside the local cemetery. After the accident, his amnesia is just the kind of mystery she likes to solve, but she soon discovers they're over their heads with his past. Over their heads with passion, too ...As shadows walk the line between reality and another realm, and her lover's memory begins to come back, the two of them learn that nothing is truly dead and buried. Especially when you're trapped in a no-holds-barred war between angels and demons. With a soul on the line, and Mels's heart at risk, what in heaven - or in hell - will it take to save them both?

After reporter Mels Carmichael hits a disheveled man with her caroutside the local cemetery, she pays a visit to the stranger in the hospital. The only thing he remembers of his past is seeing a name written on a headstone: that of Jim Heron—a fallen angel charged with rescuing souls from the seven deadly sins. Now, as Mels struggles to help this mysterious stranger rediscover himself, Heron himself returns to prepare for a battle between good and evil.

Publication date: 25/09/2012

How amazing does this book sound!? I'm a massive fan of J. R. Ward and cannot get enough of her writing. I devoured the previous three books in her The Fallen Angels trilogy and cannot wait for this book to come out! I'm pretty positive the WARDen will be featured in next weeks W.o.W as well! 

xxx

WWW Wednesday :)

Wednesday's meme is hosted over at Should Be Reading, a meme which I'm actively taking part in in which we show off the books we've read, we're reading and going to read :).

The rules are simple. All that has to be done is to answer the following three questions:

• What are you currently reading?
• What did you recently finish reading?
• What do you think you’ll read next?

What are you currently reading?
I'm currently reading Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races. It's a book which I bought at the beginning of summer and have been eager to start reading. I'm just over a 100 pages into the book now and so far I'm not feeling too positive about it! Not quite sure that water horses are my thing to read about, BUT it's only the beginning so the book has a loooong time to get better :).

What did you recently finish?
I recently finished reading Rachel Hore's The Memory Garden. It's not a book which I'd usually look at never mind buy, but I absolutely loved it! It's a romance and I loved it so much I've immediately ordered another of her books :) it's nice to take a shine to something that's a bit different to my usual 'darker' genres. 

What do you think you'll read next?
Errrm, I think next I will read Graceling by Kristin Cashore. It's a book I bought awhile ago but just haven't got round to reading it yet. I'm a bit gutted about the cover which my book has - I really liked the one with the sword on it! Lol meh :) so fingers crossed it will be as good as it sounds :).

xxx

Teaser Tuesday!

Today I'm going to once again participate in a meme hosted by MizB over at Should Be Reading : Teaser Tuesday! What must be done is:

*Grab your current read

* Open to a random page

* Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

* BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS!

(Make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)* Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

This weeks teaser is coming from Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races:
  It happens at the start of every November: the Scorpio Races. Riders attempt to keep hold of their water horses long enough to make it to the finish line. Some riders live. Others die.

At age nineteen, Sean Kendrick is the returning champion. He is a young man of few words, and if he has any fears, he keeps them buried deep, where no one else can see them.

Puck Connolly is different. She never meant to ride in the Scorpio Races. But fate hasn’t given her much of a chance. So she enters the competition — the first girl ever to do so. She is in no way prepared for what is going to happen.

Teasers:

'In my head, I trace the steps we'd have to take to get back to the house: around the other side of the lean-t0, down two sections of fence, over the metal-tube gate, then five metres to the door. Maybe one of us would get over the gate in time. That's not enough.' (p. 273).

So that's this weeks teasers :). I'd love to read yours!

xxx

Review: Crashing Eden - Michael Sussman

Crashing Eden – Michael Sussman

Summary:

For one boy and his friends, the path to Paradise comes at a cost—one they may not be prepared to pay.

When a biking accident leaves 17-year-old Joss Kazdan with the ability to hear things others can't, reality as he knows it begins to unravel.

A world of legends exists beyond the ordinary life he's always known, and he is transported to the same Paradise he's studying in World Mythology. But the strange gets even stranger when his new friends build a device that delivers people through the gates of the Garden of Eden.

Now Samael, the Creator God, is furious. As Samael rains down his apocalyptic devastation on the ecstasy-seeking teens, Joss and his companions must find a way to appease Samael—or the world will be destroyed forever.

My Review: 3.75/5*

Showcase Sunday :)

It's the time of the week again where we all get to show off our lovely book buys! Showcase Sunday is a weekly meme hosted by Vicki over at Books, Biscuits and Tea, so here are all the goodies I've treated myself with this week:

Books:

     

NetGalley:

       

Kindle:



So that's this weeks lot! :)
xxx

Exhausted!

Having just finished reading J. R. Ward's The Blackdagger Brotherhood: An Insiders Guide and I am feeling absolutely exhausted! I'm not going to post a review about this book because well, for no other reason than that I just really don't want to review every book that I read. It would make reading feel like far too much of a chore. I haven't got a clue why I've been left feeling so completely drained after reading that book. I loved it, it was so insightful to see how Ward writes, her original proposal, deleted scenes. It was great. It does make me wonder though of the difficulty for her to differentiate between what is real and what isn't. She is certainly an inspiration though, if I could write and have a tiny part of the success she's had with the 'Brothers' and her 'Fallen Angels' series I would be more than content.

Haven't long finished writing up a review for Crashing Eden and am looking forward to being a part of upping the publicity of the book shortly :). I'm at a loss now as to what to read next. I bought the latest in George R. R. Martin's series, A Song of Ice and Fire and also, to my shame... the second book within the Fifty Shades trilogy. I'm intrigued as to whyyyyy Christian Grey is so messed up! In all honesty, I feel that in order to earn the right to rant and whinge and moan about a book you really must read it first. It gives your argument a bit of stability and at least then you've tried to give it a chance :). Who knows, it might be better than the last? Not that that is an incredibly difficult task... lol. 

So what to read, what to read, what to read. I have so many books to choose from, whether it's on my Kindle or actual paperbacks. Paperbacks wise I have:

       

I'm not even gonna bother putting up all that is on my Kindle to-read list! Thinking I may go for something a bit different and finally crack open The Penguin Book of Classical Myths by Jenny March. It's a book I bought back at the start of June when I was reading Madeline Miller's A Song of Achilles (very good book, btw). It'll give my mind a nice awakening I think to learn about some new stuff :) feeling a bit stale having had so much time off. This summer 'holiday' started on the 12th of May and it doesn't end until the 30th of September. *Fingers crossed* on hopefully having a job at the place my boyfriend works!

On a very cheerful note, picking up the keys to my house for my final year at Swansea University tomorrow! Bring on the Masters in English! :D

xxx