Review for Welcome Caller, This is Chloe by Shelley Coriell

Description : Big-hearted Chloe Camden is the queen of her universe until her best friend shreds her reputation and her school counselor axes her junior independent study project. Chloe is forced to take on a meaningful project in order to pass, and so she joins her school’s struggling radio station, where the other students don’t find her too queenly. Ostracized by her former BFs and struggling with her beloved Grams’s mental deterioration, lonely Chloe ends up hosting a call-in show that gets the station much-needed publicity and, in the end, trouble. She also befriends radio techie and loner Duncan Moore, a quiet soul with a romantic heart. On and off the air, Chloe faces her loneliness and helps others find the fun and joy in everyday life. Readers will fall in love with Chloe as she falls in love with the radio station and the misfits who call it home.

Review : A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. That is what this book is! Chloe is real, in highschool there are not many people who can stay optimstic when their bestfriend bashes you and tries to publically humiliate you but somehow Chloe overcomes it all.

Chloe is truly a character to look up to in this book. She takes it all in stride and never lets anyone see her down. She may go home and cry over everything she has lost with her two best friends since childhood but she will not let them see her down. She dresses like she does every other day * amazing * and holds her head high. When her life kind of gets hard due to a new counselor she has to improvise and work for the school radio station again she shines. The crew Duncan, Haley,Frick/Frack, Taysom and most of all Clementine who  doesn't really think she has what it takes but after her first time on the air she does get some people to respond to her.

As her show gets more and more attention and she falls more and more for Duncan she realizes she is happy. She loves doing her show, hanging out with the crew, and spening time with Duncan. Clementine kind of warms up to her but still thinks she will fail. Chloe has good ideas to get them more people to listen. She is someone again who people are drawn to and can't really explain it. She has that kind of personality and she doesn't let something that bothers her show.

Throughout this book it takes on high school in many ways that kids do today. There is the popular crowd that owns the school and makes people feel bad about themselves and the everyday problems of a normal highschool teenager and she shows them to let them think what they want and be above it all be yourself.

I loved this book and if you like something cute, funny and different this is your book! 

Review for Mirage by Kristi Cook

Description : Seventeen-year-old Violet McKenna is back for her senior year at Winterhaven, and her visions have returned as well. With her friends in danger, a mysterious (and hot!) new teacher as her psychic coach, and her Sabbat tendencies threatening her relationship with Aidan, Violet may just be in over her head.

Review : love. love. love. love. Kristi has outdone herself with this sequel and I will tell you now there are somethings you will see coming or kind of guess and the next minute be totally thrown and be so surprised you are devouring the book in a couple hours to see what happens. The book will keep you on the edge of your seat biting down your nails!!!!

I went a little crazy during this book.

Violet again is back at Winterhaven and loving it. She has her friends, Aiden and is happy to be back. She is finally in a happy place and loving life. Violet her first day sees something she just cannot believe and is totally freaking out but she is keeping the vision to herself telling herself it must have been a dream not a vision. As the book goes on alot is happening and she is learning tons of new things from school and about Aiden himself. As she learns new things about her sabbat side she is kind of freaking out and not liking at all what she is seeing in her visions. Tyler is the new guy at school who is obnoxious but is going through the same thing she did. He is something of a mystery and is totally confusing. Aiden is starting to act weird and Violet is getting very worried about him, not knowing what is going on, who can she go to for help?

As the book goes on you are thinking one thing and the opposite happens. Also there are some HUGE discoveries you will just love. This book totally topped the first one and Kristi keeps the momentum going and not letting you down. She keeps the book interesting and doesn't let the reader get bored, you want to keep going to see what is going to happen, are her visions true? can she save the ones she love? Can she figure out this mystery that is haunting her? You will have to read to find out what is going happen!

Review for Soulbound Legacy of Tril by Heather Brewer

Description:

What's worse than being blackmailed to attend a hidden school where you're treated like a second-class citizen? How about nearly getting eaten by a monster when you arrive? Or learning that your soulmate was killed in a centuries-old secret war? And then there's the evil king who's determined to rule the world unless you can stop him...

Meet Kaya, a young woman with the power to heal and the determination to fight. But struggle as she will, she remains tied to three very different men: a hero who has forsaken glory, a tyrannical ruler who wants to use Kaya, and a warrior who's stolen her heart. Kaya learns the hard way that some ties can't be broken...and blood is the strongest bond of all 

Review :

Wow. Wow. I am IN love and I think  I have my new favorite book! Seriously this book will blow your mind and leave you reeling!!!! This book was absolutely amazing and I loved every single page, as soon as I got the book I read the synopsis and I was like this is going to be an amazing book and was I ever right!!!

I will start with Kaya. What a character, you fall in love with her right in the beginning. She is a brave, outspoken, stubborn girl with a whole lot of kick ass in her bag and she is hilarious. Some of the comments she says and somethings she does will have you on the floor. She was "blackmailed" from her family to go to Shadow Academy , and she did NOT want to go and she had a HUGE chip on her shoulder, then to top it off her guard never came and one to not wait went looking for the school herself. As she is walking she is cursing the school the guard and everything else in her way, when she comes face to face with a beast that took someone she loved dearly she is scared and has no idea what to do. Add in a stanger with silver hair and who is absolutely gorgeous, and him barking orders at you and you have no idea who he is , and as she trusts him and takes off he saves her life. Then he blows her off and she is surprised by his attitude.

As soon as she gets inside safely she is brought to the headmaster, (what a joke) and she is surprised by his appearance. As she finds out she will be bound in the next few days her head is reeling and she is not happy she won't have a choice to who she will get to have this bond with and she speaks her mind about it all through the book and you just have to love the way she is. There is sweet, gentle Trayton who is a by the book protocol following boy and she feels a connection with him but she wants the freedom to choose him, then there is reckless not so by the book Darius who you can't help fall in love with as a reader. He is the bad boy who is a not by the book rule follower. Throughout the book Kaya is breaking rules, talking back and speaking her mind about how she wants to fight, how healers should be able to protect themselves and of course they don't listen

.As the book goes on you are just falling more and more in love with this crazy stubborn girl, who is not shy to speak her mind (like I said before), fights for what she wants but what does she want? On this crazy journey through this book you have some questions answered, and a bunch left unasked and unanswered but by the end you are like where is the next book, it can NOT end like that and then you want to pull out your hair because hello how long until the next book, am I going to make it. I don't think I will I am already chewing my nails down for book 2 and to see what happens.This is a book for all you looking for something different in the YA category and I think you will fall in love with these characters as I have :D

Review for One that I want by Jennifer Echols

Description : 

Gemma can't believe her luck when the star football player starts flirting with her. Max is totally swoon-worthy, and even gets her quirky sense of humor. So when he asks out her so-called best friend Addison, Gemma's heartbroken.

Then Addison pressures Gemma to join the date with one of Max's friends. But the more time they all spend together, the harder Gemma falls for Max. She can't help thinking that Max likes her back--it's just too bad he's already dating Addison. How can Gemma get the guy she wants without going after her best friend's boyfriend?

Review : LOVE. LOVE. LOVE. You see out now alot of YA books that have the girl who is in love with her best friends boyfriend right now but Jennifer Echols beats them all by a landslide! She is an awesome author who makes you feel like you are in the book and her books seem real to me. Her books stand out because they are the same but different. You can relate to her characters so much more awesome and real!!!

Gemma is who every girl can relate to. She is overweight and has it reminded to hr everyday by her "best friend" which in my book is not a friend at all. Throughout the book she is losing the weight but she still feels she doesn't add up, but she is someone who you ask for advice because she is just herself. When she meets Max I was like wooo mama. When things start to get a little weird because she is feeling this connection with him and dating her "friend". I use the friend term loosely throughout the whole book I am thinking she is a sneaky witch I would LOOOOOVE to punch right in the face!!! As some true revelations come out, Gemma stays whole and strong and does not do what I would do! Throughout this book you see her struggling with her "friendship", making new friends, learning to love and when to open up to someone :)

This book is a must read! I know you will love it and if you love this then you can check out my all time favorite YA book Going Too Far also by Jennifer Echols!

Review for Small Damages by Beth Kephart

Description : 

It’s senior year, and while Kenzie should be looking forward to prom and starting college in the fall, she is mourning the loss of her father. She finds solace in the one person she trusts, her boyfriend, and she soon finds herself pregnant. Kenzie’s boyfriend and mother do not understand her determination to keep the baby. She is sent to southern Spain for the summer, where she will live out her pregnancy as a cook’s assistant on a bull ranch, and her baby will be adopted by a Spanish couple. 

Alone and resentful in a foreign country, Kenzie is at first sullen and difficult. She begins to open her eyes and her heart to the beauty that is all around her and inside of her

Review : This book is amazing and real. It sometimes is slow and you are definately confused as to what is going on but it was truly an awesoem read.

The main character is Kenzie who my heart breaks for her a million times over in this book! Kenzie is an amazing character who feels everything, and it feels as if she is talking to herself and her baby all through this journey she is on. She had an amazing boyfriend, and friends, got into an awesome film school in the fall, and she finds out she is pregnant, she is scared but kind of excited picturing what the baby would look like but her mother and boyfriend don't really feel that way which breaks my heart. Her boyfriend kind of acts dumb, while her mother takes charge and sends her to Spain to have the baby and give it up for adoption she has it all set up without once asking her duaghter for her input.

As the story goes on, you can see Kenzie opening up to the grumpy old cook, and to Esteban (swoons) and you just fall in love with her even more. As she is spending her time there she gets more and more angry that she didn't speak up, that noone asked her what she wanted in this whole thing. She meets the parents her mothers friend found and truly likes them but she wants her baby and when that though finally comes out, she is a new stronger person who wants to ahve it all  (without the boy of course) and she comes to herself and actually says out loud what she wants and is happy. At the end I am confused but I think I know what will happen and felt relief at her decision.

This book truly makes you FEEL everything the character is feeling and you just want to reach through the pages hug her and tell her it will all be ok!!!! This book I recommend to everyone

Review for Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore

Description : Eight years after Graceling, Bitterblue is now queen of Monsea. But the influence of her father, a violent psychopath with mind-altering abilities, lives on. Her advisors, who have run things since Leck died, believe in a forward-thinking plan: Pardon all who committed terrible acts under Leck’s reign, and forget anything bad ever happened. But when Bitterblue begins sneaking outside the castle—disguised and alone—to walk the streets of her own city, she starts realizing that the kingdom has been under the thirty-five-year spell of a madman, and the only way to move forward is to revisit the past. Two thieves, who only steal what has already been stolen, change her life forever. They hold a key to the truth of Leck’s reign. And one of them, with an extreme skill called a Grace that he hasn’t yet identified, holds a key to her heart.

Review : WOW. WOW. I loved Graceling, enjoyed Fire but Bitterblue stole my heart! 

Bitterblue is an awesome character who doesn't feel whole. She feels like something is missing in her life and she cannot for the life of her figure it out. She is doing little things around the kingdom and she wants more responsibility, but her men aren't giving it to her. Bitterblue starts sneaking out into the city to see what is out there, what are the people doing. She finds more than she bargained for! She finds story tellers who are telling stories of Katsa, stories of her father and of other things that did and didn't happen. She knows what he was really like and she knows Katsa. In these bars with the story tellers she meets two young men Saf(who I am in love with) and Teddy who is just plain adorable. As she is thrust into their world, they have NO idea who she is and she starts finding out what is really going on in her city!

She is not happy but doesn't know how to broach the subject to her advisors, people she has trusted but are keeping many important things from her. As she keeps sneaking out she finds out more and more. Of course Po and Katsa are there and I truly love them! Their story gets intertwined and kind of confusing but Bitterblue is doing her most to help the people who have been wronly accused, in which her true identity comes out on accident and without her being the one to have a choice on when to tell Saf and teddy!!!!

As Bitterblue falls for Saf, he is thinking about his next journey out of town. Many things come to light that you ask yourself throughout this book, and some questions don't get answered!!! I was fruistrated in the end and crying because of how it ended. But this book has you on a roller coaster of emotions and sometimes giving you whiplash on how it comes and goes! This is a must read and great ending to an AMAZING series

Author interview with Aimee Agresti

1. Can you tell us a little about yourself and the book?

Of course! ILLUMINATE is about a smart, shy 16-year-old named Haven, who discovers she's an angel-in-training forced to battle a pack of alluring devils as they attempt to buy souls all over Chicago. There's drama, romance, and loads of glamour because the action unfolds at a historic hotel. Sounds fun, right? 

As for me, let's see, I'm new at this. I spent years as a magazine writer--most recently at Us Weekly, which was such a blast!--but this is my first novel. Though I have to admit some of my magazine experiences did creep into the book. Whenever you see Haven at a fabulous party feeling awed by it all, that comes from how I used to feel covering movie premieres. I was always pinching myself and couldn't believe I was there!

2. What is your favorite chapter and why?

I absolutely loved writing the end of the book. The last 50 pages were a total whirlwind, I could barely type fast enough to get it down. It's just so exciting when the pieces start falling into place and all that work you put in outlining and laying this foundation pays off.

3. Where did you get your ideas for your book?

I wanted to write the kind of book I would've loved as a teen--one where the heroine starts off a bit unsure of herself but learns to tap into her inner strength and have some confidence. I always admired the strong, adventurous, independent girls on the bookshelves: Jo in LITTLE WOMEN, Sara Crewe in A LITTLE PRINCESS, ALICE IN WONDERLAND, and, above all, Nancy Drew.   

4. Was there any certain thing you listened to while writing, music? tv? silence?

Having the right soundtrack is HUGE. I started off listening to a lot of Coldplay and 30 Seconds to Mars. I needed a mix of dreamy tunes and anthems. Sometimes I would just put one song on a loop and listen to it for hours like some kind of crazy person. I got obsessed with the song "Norway" by Beach House. It's so haunting!

5. What do you do when you are not writing?

If I'm not writing, then I'm reading. And if I'm not writing or reading then I'm probably running to keep myself busy while my mind is working through whatever I'm writing. I also love museum-hopping. I live in DC so I'm always ducking into the Smithsonian museums, especially on weekday afternoons when I sometimes have them all to myself. So peaceful!

6. Which author would you most like to meet?

Oooh, do they have to be living? Because I would have LOVED to have met Hemingway and been part of that whole scene in Paris in the '20s. You know, like Owen Wilson in "Midnight in Paris"? How fantastic was that movie?! Anyway, Hemingway was my first author crush. He was like my summer boyfriend when I was in high school because we never actually read him in class for some reason, so I would just wait for summertime and read so much Hemingway. I loved his adventurous spirit.

7. What is your favorite food?

Chocolate, anything chocolate. If there are M&Ms anywhere near me, it's serious trouble.  

8. Who was your favorite character and why?!

My favorite character of all-time? Definitely Nancy Drew--she was so clever and strong and fearless, she was always a step ahead of everyone. She was everything I always wanted to be. 

9. What state/country do you want to visit the most?

That's tough, there are so many places I'd love to tour and then a whole category of places where I'd love to just disappear for a while with my laptop and write. I'd love to go to Provence, I have this romantic idea of it as just so beautiful and charming and full of great characters. 

10. Is there anything else you would like to mention to us?

Thanks for the great questions! Feel free to drop by my website aimeeagresti.com and have a look around!

This book comes out March 6 so keep your eyes open :