Top Ten Tuesday (78)

This week's topic is top ten genre books I can't believe I haven't read yet.  I have this problem with YA Fantasy where I want to read all of them in theory, but am so hesitant to reach for one when it's time to pick my next book.  I don't know why this happens to me, because I really enjoy them when I read them, but they're just not my first go to.  Here are ten (probably really awesome) Fantasy reads I can't believe I haven't picked up yet.

Cinder – 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. 

The Raven Boys – Maggie Steifvater

It is freezing in the churchyard, even before the dead arrive.

Every year, Blue Sargent stands next to her clairvoyant mother as the soon-to-be dead walk past. Blue herself never sees them—not until this year, when a boy emerges from the dark and speaks directly to her.His name is Gansey, and Blue soon discovers that he is a rich student at Aglionby, the local private school. Blue has a policy of staying away from Aglionby boys. Known as Raven Boys, they can only mean trouble.But Blue is drawn to Gansey, in a way she can’t entirely explain. He has it all—family money, good looks, devoted friends—but he’s looking for much more than that. He is on a quest that has encompassed three other Raven Boys: Adam, the scholarship student who resents all the privilege around him; Ronan, the fierce soul who ranges from anger to despair; and Noah, the taciturn watcher of the four, who notices many things but says very little.For as long as she can remember, Blue has been warned that she will cause her true love to die. She never thought this would be a problem. But now, as her life becomes caught up in the strange and sinister world of the Raven Boys, she’s not so sure anymore.

Uglies – Scott Westerfeld

Tally is about to turn sixteen, and she can't wait. Not for her license - for turning pretty. In Tally's world, your sixteenth birthday brings an operation that turns you from a repellent ugly into a stunningly attractive pretty and catapults you into a high-tech paradise where your only job is to have a really great time. In just a few weeks Tally will be there.

But Tally's new friend Shay isn't sure she wants to be pretty. She'd rather risk life on the outside. When Shay runs away, Tally learns about a whole new side of the pretty world and it isn't very pretty. The authorities offer Tally the worst choice she can imagine: find her friend and turn her in, or never turn pretty at all. 
The choice Tally makes changes her world forever... 

Tithe – Holly Black

Sixteen-year-old Kaye is a modern nomad. Fierce and independent, she travels from city to city with her mother's rock band until an ominous attack forces Kaye back to her childhood home. There, amid the industrial, blue-collar New Jersey backdrop, Kaye soon finds herself an unwilling pawn in an ancient power struggle between two rival faerie kingdoms - a struggle that could very well mean her death. 

The Girl of Fire and Thorns – Rae Carson

Once a century, one person is chosen for greatness.

Elisa is the chosen one. 
But she is also the younger of two princesses, the one who has never done anything remarkable. She can't see how she ever will. 
Now, on her sixteenth birthday, she has become the secret wife of a handsome and worldly king—a king whose country is in turmoil. A king who needs the chosen one, not a failure of a princess.
And he's not the only one who seeks her. Savage enemies seething with dark magic are hunting her. A daring, determined revolutionary thinks she could be his people's savior. And he looks at her in a way that no man has ever looked at her before. Soon it is not just her life, but her very heart that is at stake.
Elisa could be everything to those who need her most. If the prophecy is fulfilled. If she finds the power deep within herself. If she doesn’t die young.
Most of the chosen do. 

Forever – Maggie Steifvater

then.

When Sam met Grace, he was a wolf and she was a girl. Eventually he found a way to become a boy, and their loved moved from curious distance to the intense closeness of shared lives.
now.That should have been the end of their story. But Grace was not meant to stay human. Now she is the wolf. And the wolves of Mercy Falls are about to be killed in one final, spectacular hunt.
forever.Sam would do anything for Grace. But can one boy and one love really change a hostile, predatory world? The past, the present, and the future are about to collide in one pure moment - a moment of death or life, farewell or forever.

The False Prince – Jennifer A Nielsen

In a discontent kingdom, civil war is brewing. To unify the divided people, Conner, a nobleman of the court, devises a cunning plan to find an impersonator of the king's long-lost son and install him as a puppet prince. Four orphans are recruited to compete for the role, including a defiant boy named Sage. Sage knows that Conner's motives are more than questionable, yet his life balances on a sword's point -- he must be chosen to play the prince or he will certainly be killed. But Sage's rivals have their own agendas as well.

As Sage moves from a rundown orphanage to Conner's sumptuous palace, layer upon layer of treachery and deceit unfold, until finally, a truth is revealed that, in the end, may very well prove more dangerous than all of the lies taken together.

The Diviners – Libba Bray

Evie O’Neill has been exiled from her boring old hometown and shipped off to the bustling streets of New York City—and she is pos-i-tute-ly ecstatic. It’s 1926, and New York is filled with speakeasies, Ziegfeld girls, and rakish pickpockets. The only catch is that she has to live with her uncle Will and his unhealthy obsession with the occult.
As Evie jumps headlong into a dance with a murderer, other stories unfold in the city that never sleeps. A young man named Memphis is caught between two worlds. A chorus girl named Theta is running from her past. A student named Jericho hides a shocking secret. And unknown to all, something dark and evil has awakened.

Evie worries he’ll discover her darkest secret: a supernatural power that has only brought her trouble so far. But when the police find a murdered girl branded with a cryptic symbol and Will is called to the scene, Evie realizes her gift could help catch a serial killer.

Unspoken – Sarah Rees Brennan

Kami Glass loves someone she’s never met . . . a boy she’s talked to in her head ever since she was born. She wasn’t silent about her imaginary friend during her childhood, and is thus a bit of an outsider in her sleepy English town of Sorry-in-the-Vale. Still, Kami hasn’t suffered too much from not fitting in. She has a best friend, runs the school newspaper, and is only occasionally caught talking to herself. Her life is in order, just the way she likes it, despite the voice in her head.

But all that changes when the Lynburns return.The Lynburn family has owned the spectacular and sinister manor that overlooks Sorry-in-the-Vale for centuries. The mysterious twin sisters who abandoned their ancestral home a generation ago are back, along with their teenage sons, Jared and Ash, one of whom is eerily familiar to Kami. Kami is not one to shy away from the unknown—in fact, she’s determined to find answers for all the questions Sorry-in-the-Vale is suddenly posing. Who is responsible for the bloody deeds in the depths of the woods? What is her own mother hiding? And now that her imaginary friend has become a real boy, does she still love him? Does she hate him? Can she trust him?

Blackwood – Gwenda Bond

On Roanoke Island, the legend of the 114 people who mysteriously vanished from the Lost Colony hundreds of years ago is just an outdoor drama for the tourists, a story people tell. But when the island faces the sudden disappearance of 114 people now, an unlikely pair of 17-year-olds may be the only hope of bringing them back. Miranda, a misfit girl from the island’s most infamous family, and Phillips, an exiled teen criminal who hears the voices of the dead, must dodge everyone from federal agents to long-dead alchemists as they work to uncover the secrets of the new Lost Colony. The one thing they can’t dodge is each other. 

What have you guys been putting off reading?

Top Ten Tuesday (77)

This week's topic is ten books I'd love to read with my book club.  Now, I am in a small YA book club with some of my former co-workers and I feel like whenever we try to pick our next book we have a lot of trouble figuring out what to go for.  We like to pick from all different YA genres, so that's what I tried to do with this list.  (Also, it's a really loose interpretation of a book club.  Generally we talk about the book for 5, 10 minutes tops and then have a lovely dinner and sometimes go see a movie.)

Jellicoe Road - Melina Marchetta
(This is actually our next book club book!)

Taylor is leader of the boarders at the Jellicoe School. She has to keep the upper hand in the territory wars and deal with Jonah Griggs - the enigmatic leader of the cadets, and someone she thought she would never see again.
And now Hannah, the person Taylor had come to rely on, has disappeared. Taylor's only clue is a manuscript about five kids who lived in Jellicoe eighteen years ago. She needs to find out more, but this means confronting her own story, making sense of her strange, recurring dream, and finding her mother - who abandoned her on the Jellicoe Road.

Winter Town - Stephen Emond

Every winter, straight-laced, Ivy League bound Evan looks forward to a visit from Lucy, a childhood pal who moved away after her parent's divorce. But when Lucy arrives this year, she's changed. The former "girl next door" now has chopped dyed black hair, a nose stud, and a scowl. But Evan knows that somewhere beneath the Goth, "Old Lucy" still exists, and he's determined to find her... even if it means pissing her off. 

The Lost Girl - Sangu Mandanna

Eva's life is not her own. She is a creation, an abomination—an echo. She was made by the Weavers as a copy of someone else, expected to replace a girl named Amarra, her "other," if she ever died. Eva spends every day studying that girl from far away, learning what Amarra does, what she eats, what it's like to kiss her boyfriend, Ray. So when Amarra is killed in a car crash, Eva should be ready.
But sixteen years of studying never prepared her for this.
Now she must abandon everything and everyone she's ever known—the guardians who raised her, the boy she's forbidden to love—to move to India and convince the world that Amarra is still alive.
What Eva finds is a grief-stricken family; parents unsure how to handle this echo they thought they wanted; and Ray, who knew every detail, every contour of Amarra. And when Eva is unexpectedly dealt a fatal blow that will change her existence forever, she is forced to choose: Stay and live out her years as a copy or leave and risk it all for the freedom to be an original. To be Eva.

Faking Faith - Josie Bloss

Dylan Mahoney is living one big unholy lie.
Thanks to a humiliating and painfully public sexting incident, Dylan has become the social pariah at her suburban Chicago high school. She's ignored by everyone--when she's not being taunted--and estranged from her two best friends. So when Dylan discovers the blogs of homeschooled fundamentalist Christian girls, she's immediately drawn into their fascinating world of hope chests, chaperoned courtships, and wifely submission.Blogging as Faith, her devout and wholesome alter ego, Dylan befriends Abigail, the online group's queen bee. After staying with Abigail and her family for a few days, Dylan begins to grow closer to Abigail (and her intriguingly complicated older brother). Soon, Dylan is forced to choose: keep living a lie . . . or come clean and face the consequences.

The Unquiet - Jeannine Garsee

Sixteen-year-old Rinn Jacobs has secrets: One, she’s bipolar. Two, she killed her grandmother. 
After a suicide attempt, and now her parents' separation, Rinn and her mom move from California to the rural Ohio town where her mother grew up. Back on her medications and hoping to stay well, Rinn settles into her new home, undaunted by the fact that the previous owner hanged herself in Rinn's bedroom. At school, her classmates believe the school pool is haunted by Annaliese, a girl who drowned there. But when a reckless séance goes awry, and terrible things start happening to her new friends—yet not to her—Rinn is determined to find out why she can’t be "touched" by Annaliese...or if Annaliese even exists. With the help of Nate Brenner, the hunky “farmer boy” she’s rapidly falling for, Rinn devises a dangerous plan to uncover the truth. Soon reality and fantasy meld into one, till Rinn finds it nearly impossible to tell the difference. When a malevolent force threatens the lives of everyone she cares about--not to mention her own--she can't help wondering: who should she really be afraid of?Annaliese? Or herself?

Rats Saw God - Rob Thomas

For Steve York, life was good. He had a 4.0 GPA, friends he could trust, and a girl he loved. Now he spends his days smoked out, not so much living as simply existing.
But his herbal endeavors -- and personal demons -- have lead to a severe lack of motivation. Steve's flunking out, but if he writes a one-hundred-page paper, he can graduate.
Steve realizes he must write what he knows. And through telling the story of how he got to where he is, he discovers exactly where he wants to be....

Another Little Piece of My Heart - Tracey Martin

At her dying mother’s request, Claire dumps Jared, the only boy she’s ever loved. Left with a broken family and a broken heart, Claire is furious when she discovers that her biggest regret became Jared’s big break. While Jared is catapulted into rock-star status, another piece of Claire’s heart crumbles every time his song plays on the radio.
The summer after her senior year, it’s been months since the big break-up, and Claire is just trying to keep her head down and make it through a tense trip to the beach with her family. But when Jared shows up, and old feelings reignite, can Claire and Jared let go of the past? Or will they be stuck singing the same old refrain?

The Prince of Venice Beach - Blake Nelson

Robert "'Cali" Callahan is a teen runaway, living on the streets of Venice Beach, California. He's got a pretty sweet life: a treehouse to sleep in, a gang of surf bros, a regular basketball game...even a girl who's maybe-sorta interested in him.
What he doesn't have is a plan.
All that changes when a local cop recommends Cali to a private investigator who is looking for a missing teenager. After all, Cali knows everyone in Venice. But the streets are filled with people who don't want to be found, and when he's hired to find the beautiful Reese Abernathy, who would do anything to stay hidden, Cali must decide where his loyalties truly lie. 

We Should Hang Out Sometime - Josh Sundquist

Josh Sundquist only ever had one girlfriend.
For twenty-three hours.In eighth grade.
Why was Josh still single? To find out, he tracked down the girls he had tried to date and asked them straight up: What went wrong?
The results of Josh's semiscientific, wholly hilarious investigation are captured here. From a disastrous Putt-Putt date involving a backward prosthetic foot, to his introduction to CFD (Close Fast Dancing), to a misguided "grand gesture" at a Miss America pageant, this story is about looking for love--or at least a girlfriend--in all the wrong places.

The Archived - Victoria Schwab

The dead rest on shelves like books. Each body has a story to tell, a life in pictures only Librarians can read. The dead, called 'Histories', rest in the Archive.

Da first brought Mackenzie Bishop here four years ago, when she was twelve years old, frightened but determined to prove herself. Now Da is dead, and Mac has grown into what he once was, a ruthless Keeper, tasked with stopping often—violent Histories from waking up and getting out. Because of her job, she lies to the people she loves, and she knows fear for what it is: a tool for staying alive.
Being a Keeper is dangerous and a constant reminder of those she lost, Da and her little brother. Mac wonders about the boundary between living and dying, sleeping and waking. In the Archive, the dead must never be disturbed. Yet someone is deliberately altering Histories, erasing essential chapters. Unless Mac can piece together what remains, the Archive itself might crumble and fall. 

What's next up on your book club's to be read list?

Top Ten Tuesday (76)

This week is a freebie week, so I'm going to go back and do my top ten most anticipated debut novels of 2015.  There are a lot of really awesome books coming out this year that I can't wait to check out.  Here are some that sound like they'll wind up being my favorites:

1. Red Queen - Victoria Aveyard

The poverty stricken Reds are commoners, living under the rule of the Silvers, elite warriors with god-like powers.
To Mare Barrow, a 17-year-old Red girl from The Stilts, it looks like nothing will ever change.
Mare finds herself working in the Silver Palace, at the centre ofthose she hates the most. She quickly discovers that, despite her red blood, she possesses a deadly power of her own. One that threatens to destroy Silver control.
But power is a dangerous game. And in this world divided by blood, who will win? 

2. The Wrath and the Dawn - Renee Ahdieh

Every dawn brings horror to a different family in a land ruled by a killer. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, takes a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. So it is a suspicious surprise when sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid. But she does so with a clever plan to stay alive and exact revenge on the Caliph for the murder of her best friend and countless other girls. Shazi's wit and will, indeed, get her through to the dawn that no others have seen, but with a catch . . . she’s falling in love with the very boy who killed her dearest friend.
She discovers that the murderous boy-king is not all that he seems and neither are the deaths of so many girls. Shazi is determined to uncover the reason for the murders and to break the cycle once and for all.

3. The Sacred Lies of Minnow Bly - Stephanie Oakes

When seventeen-year-old Minnow stumbles out of the woods one winter morning, she is haunted and handless and covered in someone else’s blood. She has just escaped the strict religious commune run by a cruel man named the Prophet. In exchange for freedom, she leaves behind her family, her home, and Jude--an outsider boy who changed everything. 

But the real world isn't the sanctuary Minnow imagined. Soon, she gets arrested and placed in juvenile detention. Now, Minnow is being questioned by an FBI psychiatrist about the night she escaped, the same night the Prophet was burned to death in his own home—a murder Minnow may be responsible for.

4. Anne & Henry - Dawn Ius

Anne
Wild, brazen, mischievous, bewitching
HenryDriven, haunted, charming, magnetic
Apart, they are bound to destroy themselves. Together, they are bound to destroy each other.
Henry Tudor's life has been mapped out since the day he was born: student president, valedictorian, Harvard Law School, and a stunning political career just like his father's. But ever since the death of Henry's brother—perfect, high-achieving Arthur—his family has been twice as demanding. And now Henry's trapped: forbidden from pursuing a life as an artist or dating any girl who's not Tudor approved.
Then Anne Boleyn crashes into his life.
Anne is wild, brash and outspoken. She is everything Henry is not allowed to be—or to want. But soon Anne is all he can think about. His mother, his friends, and even his girlfriend warn him away, yet his desire for Anne consumes him. Henry is willing to do anything to be with her. But once he has her, their romance could destroy them both.

5. An Ember in the Ashes - Sabaa Tahir

LAIA is a Scholar living under the iron-fisted rule of the Martial Empire. When her brother is arrested for treason, Laia goes undercover as a slave at the empire’s greatest military academy in exchange for assistance from rebel Scholars who claim that they will help to save her brother from execution.
ELIAS is the academy’s finest soldier—and secretly, its most unwilling. Elias is considering deserting the military, but before he can, he’s ordered to participate in a ruthless contest to choose the next Martial emperor.
When Laia and Elias’s paths cross at the academy, they find that their destinies are more intertwined than either could have imagined and that their choices will change the future of the empire itself.

6. My Heart and Other Black Holes - Jasmine Warga

Sixteen-year-old physics nerd Aysel is obsessed with plotting her own death. With a mother who can barely look at her without wincing, classmates who whisper behind her back, and a father whose violent crime rocked her small town, Aysel is ready to turn her potential energy into nothingness.
There’s only one problem: she’s not sure she has the courage to do it alone. But once she discovers a website with a section called Suicide Partners, Aysel’s convinced she’s found her solution: a teen boy with the username FrozenRobot (aka Roman) who’s haunted by a family tragedy is looking for a partner. 
Even though Aysel and Roman have nothing in common, they slowly start to fill in each other’s broken lives. But as their suicide pact becomes more concrete, Aysel begins to question whether she really wants to go through with it. Ultimately, she must choose between wanting to die or trying to convince Roman to live so they can discover the potential of their energy together. Except that Roman may not be so easy to convince.

7. Playlist for the Dead - Michelle Falkoff

Here's what Sam knows: There was a party. There was a fight. The next morning, his best friend, Hayden, was dead. And all he left Sam was a playlist of songs, and a suicide note: For Sam—listen and you'll understand.
As he listens to song after song, Sam tries to face up to what happened the night Hayden killed himself. But it's only by taking out his earbuds and opening his eyes to the people around him that he will finally be able to piece together his best friend’s story. And maybe have a chance to change his own.

8. 5 to 1 - Holly Bodger

In the year 2054, after decades of gender selection, India now has a ratio of five boys for every girl, making women an incredibly valuable commodity. Tired of marrying off their daughters to the highest bidder and determined to finally make marriage fair, the women who form the country of Koyanagar have instituted a series of tests so that every boy has the chance to win a wife.

Sudasa, though, doesn't want to be a wife, and Kiran, a boy forced to compete in the test to become her husband, has other plans as well. As the tests advance, Sudasa and Kiran thwart each other at every turn until they slowly realize that they just might want the same thing.

9. After Hours - Claire Kennedy

Isa, Xavi, Peter, and Finn know that a job at the high-end Waterside Cafe isn't just about waiting tables. It's about the gossip, the hook-ups, the after-hours parties and, most of all, it's about Tips.
Tips--the high-stakes game based on dares. Whoever completes the most dares wins the collected money. A sum that could change a wasted summer into a Summer to Remember.
Isa is the new girl with an embarrassing secret, and as long as she stays on top of her game, she sees no reason why anyone could ever find out.
Xavi will do anything for the money...absolutely anything.
Peter, Xavi's stepbrother, has been in love with her for years, and he thinks the game is the perfect time to confess his feelings.
Finn is in the game just for the thrill. He has enough tips coming in to keep him happy...even if those tips come with some conditions.
From seduction to stealing to threats, the dares are a complete free-for-all, and only the best can win.
The sophisticated Waterside Cafe is anything but classy behind the scenes...and things are about to get dirty. 

10. For the Record - Charlotte Huang

Chelsea thought she knew what being a rock star was like . . . until she became one. After losing a TV talent show, she slid back into small-town anonymity. But one phone call changed everything. 
Now she’s the lead singer of the band Melbourne, performing in sold-out clubs every night and living on a bus with three gorgeous and talented guys. The bummer is that the band barely tolerates her. And when teen hearthrob Lucas Rivers take an interest in her, Chelsea is suddenly famous, bringing Melbourne to the next level—not that they’re happy about that. Her feelings for Beckett, Melbourne’s bassist, are making life even more complicated.
Chelsea only has the summer tour to make the band—and their fans—love her. If she doesn’t, she’ll be back in Michigan for senior year, dying a slow death. The paparazzi, the haters, the grueling schedule . . . Chelsea believed she could handle it. But what if she can’t?


What are you looking forward to reading this year?

Wildflower - Alecia Whitaker

Title: Wildflower
Author: Alecia Whitaker
Pages: 320
Publisher: Poppy
Source: Purchased
About: The best songs come from broken hearts.

Sixteen-year-old Bird Barrett has grown up on the road, singing backup in her family's bluegrass band, and playing everywhere from Nashville, Tennesee to Nowhere, Oklahoma. One fateful night, Bird fills in for her dad by singing lead, and a scout in the audience offers her a spotlight all her own.
Soon Bird is caught up in a whirlwind of songwriting meetings, recording sessions, and music video shoots. Her first single hits the top twenty, and suddenly fans and paparazzi are around every corner. She's even caught the eye of her longtime crush, fellow roving musician Adam Dean. With Bird's star on the rise, though, tradition and ambition collide. Can Bird break out while staying true to her roots?
In a world of glamour and gold records, a young country music star finds her voice.

I picked up Wildflower when I went to the fantastic #NovlDays event (free ice cream sandwiches y’all) at my faaaaavorite indie Oblong Books.  You should know by now that I love themed reading, so when I decided to take a last minute trip to Nashville I knew I had to push this to the front of my TBR pile.

Wildflower is the story of Bird Barrett, plucked off the stage she shared with her family’s band and given her own spotlight as country’s next darling.   The thing that I loved most about Bird is that she felt very real to me.  A lot of times it's very easy for the main character to be a clean slate, a generic plain girl who becomes famous and that's all she is.  Bird is so not that.

Also, this is a story that lends itself to going to extremes – any story where a character starts to feel the effects of fame can go very big very quick.  Whitaker is very good about keeping it feeling like Bird really is a small time girl that happened into extraordinary circumstances.  She still hangs out mostly with her family, acquires a not famous bff (who is really awesome, btw), dates a boy and it’s not a huge deal.  Like, it’s not a be all and end all relationship; it doesn’t crash and burn spectacularly in some huge betrayal.  It just is.  And then it’s not.  There’s something very charming about that.

I would recommend Wildflower to anyone who likes contemporary books, country music, or well written characters.

Top Ten Tuesday (75)

This week's topic is 2014 releases that I meant to read, but didn't.  Because I'm the worst.

1. The Retribution of Mara Dyer - Michelle Hodkin
2. The Young Elites - Marie Lu
3. I'll Give You the Sun - Jandy Nelson
4. The Infinite Sea - Rick Yancey
5. Everything Leads to You - Nina LaCour
6. Glory O'Brien's History of the Future - A.S. King
7. In the Afterlight - Alexandra Bracken
8. Snow Like Ashes - Sarah Raasch
9. #scandal - Sarah Ockler
10. Something Real - Heather Demetrios

See?  The actual worst.  There are amazing books on this list, what is wrong with me?  Here's hoping I get to them this year...

Mistletoe & Mr. Right - Lyla Payne

Title: Mistletoe & Mr. Right
Author: Lyla Payne
Pages: 150
Publisher: Bloomsbury Spark
From goodreads.com: Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, not a creature was stirring…but lust refused to settle in for a long winter's nap.
She might be all nestled, snug in her bed, by why, oh why, do visions of the wrong guy dance in her head?

Jessica, (not Jessie), figures that nothing could be better than a trip to the Emerald Isle for Christmas break. So she takes a flying leap and follows her boyfriend home for the holidays, not only sure that he will finally agree they're destined for each other, but also that Ireland will provide the perfect backdrop to the beginning of their happily-ever-after. 

But it turns out his family--and his gorgeous ex-girlfriend--don't feel the same way, and even the family goat seems to be conspiring against her well-laid plans. The only person making the trip worthwhile is the very last one she should be thinking about, but Grady, the local farmhand, has a way of showing up when Jessica needs him most...and least.

I will reading literally ANYTHING if it says it's about Christmas.  Christmas is my favorite holiday and I want everything that I come into contact with in December to be Christmas themed.  When I saw this up on NetGalley I knew I had to request it.  Not only is it Christmas, it's Christmas in IRELAND.  It sounded totally up my alley.  And it was...kind of.

Jessica, (not Jessie - annoying), is a very structured person.  She has her whole life meticulously planned out and she's still in college.  The one thing not going according to her plan?  Her relationship with Brennan, the cute boy she met at a frat party at the beginning of her junior year.  They're dating, but it's not as serious as Jessica wants it to be.  What's a girl to do?  If you answered fly to Ireland to barge in on your boyfriend's family Christmas celebration with no warning to anyone at all, you are absolutely correct.

Okay, here's the thing.  This is a crazy thing to do.  We can all see that, right?  She doesn't tell Brennan or his family (who she's never met before) that she's coming to Ireland for Christmas.  She doesn't make any hotel plans, she just expects to drop in on these people at what is generally accepted as the busiest time of the year and stay at their home.  Not only is this so incredibly rude, but for someone who needs to have her entire life planned out by the time she's 21 I cannot for one second believe that she would not have planned to stay in a hotel in case the reception wasn't the one that she hoped for.  She could have just pretended to be on vacation when people gave her the 'girl are you serious???' face.  "Oh, me?  No I was just passing through the Irish country side (even though I never mentioned any kind of trip to Ireland at all to you) and thought I'd drop in to say Merry Christmas to your family."  Still not great, but much better than, "Hi, I'm your son's girlfriend who he clearly has never mentioned before and oh, by the way, I expect to take up space in your home during this busy time."

Now, this clearly happens very early on in the book and it was something that I absolutely could not get over.  The rest of the novella was fine.  It's pretty much the expected drama - ex-girlfriend that the family still loves to bits and the bf is clearly not over, hot farmhand who saves the goat that Jessica RAN OVER WITH HER RENTAL CAR and she is super attracted to, wacky family hijinks like almost killing her boyfriend's father with pie spices.  You know, standard fare.  

I wasn't really expecting to be wowed by this one, so (besides getting me all riled up about her travel non-plans) it was a decent read for me.  I would recommend it to anyone looking for something Christmas-y or who has a thing for hottie hot hot Irish farm boys.

This Is What Happy Looks Like - Jennifer E. Smith

Title: This Is What Happy Looks Like

Author: Jennifer E. Smith
Pages: 416
Publisher: Poppy

From goodreads.com: When teenage movie star Graham Larkin accidentally sends small town girl Ellie O'Neill an email about his pet pig, the two seventeen-year-olds strike up a witty and unforgettable correspondence, discussing everything under the sun, except for their names or backgrounds. 
Then Graham finds out that Ellie's Maine hometown is the perfect location for his latest film, and he decides to take their relationship from online to in-person. But can a star as famous as Graham really start a relationship with an ordinary girl like Ellie? And why does Ellie want to avoid the media's spotlight at all costs?

Another solid contemporary romance from Jennifer E. Smith.  I really enjoy her straightforward, not-too-flowery writing style and I love her characters.  I really liked seeing Graham's perspective, a little peek inside a movie star's head who doesn't really feel like a movie star, and Ellie was awesome too.  The only thing that felt slightly off at first was the storyline with her dad.  I wound up liking how it played out, but at the beginning it felt a little unnecessary.  Also, something about the pacing felt choppy, but it may just be how it was broken up while i was reading it.  Overall this was a great contemporary summer read- just what I was looking for when I read it.

The Scar Boys - Len Vlahos

Title: The Scar Boys

Author: Len Vlahos
Pages: 256
Publisher: Egmont USA

From goodreads.com: A severely burned teenager. A guitar. Punk rock. The chords of a rock 'n' roll road trip in a coming-of-age novel that is a must-read story about finding your place in the world...even if you carry scars inside and out. 

Like an older, punk rock version of Wonder.  The Scar Boys tells the story of Harry, a boy badly disfigured by burns when he was a kid.  Everyone in his school is terrible to him, except one person - Johnny.  They become best friends and, as so many do, they start a band.  Turns out, they're pretty good.  They go from playing local events to clubs to the point where they want to take it on the road before Johnny leaves for college.

The Scar Boys is an exploration of a lot of things in a very quick moving time in your life.  The summer before college is that time where you start questioning EVERYTHING: your parents, your friends, and especially yourself.

From a bookselling point of view this book is a godsend.  I'm always looking for new books to give to reluctant teen boy readers and this is perfect.  It has a really great boy voice and is about one of my favorite things - music.  An easy sell and a great read.

Top Ten Tuesday (74)

Hosted by The Broke and the Bookish

This week's topic is

I am 100% a rereader.  I get attached to characters and never want to let go.  There are series that I’ll always reread that I’m not putting on this list because it is just a constant level of wanting to read them again in my brain (Harry Potter, The Princess Diaries, Secret Society Girl, Anna/Lola/Isla).

These are books I need/want to reread so I can continue the series:

The Darkest Minds

Throne of Glass

I Hunt Killers

The Mara Dyer series

Rebel Belle

And there are some books that I will never ever tire of rereading:

Bloodlines

Some Girls Are

Also Known As

Where She Went

 Love Happens (this is a totally cheesy 90s Christmas book that I have loved forever and reread every year DO NOT JUDGE ME)

What about you guys?  Do you like to reread or do you feel like it's a waste of reading time?