Sunday, August 19, 2012

Won - Love is a Wounded Soldier by Blaine Reimer


Title: Love is a Wounded Soldier
Author: Blaine Reimer
Publisher: Backroad Books
Release Date: July 31, 2012
Pages: 256 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 19, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads








Summary:

Love is a Wounded Soldier combines the old-fashioned romance of a Nicholas Sparks novel with all the gut-punching grit of Saving Private Ryan to bring you a story of heartbreak and hope.

Despite growing up with an abusive, alcoholic father, and having to cope with the untimely death of his mother, Robert Mattox has retained his innocence and idealism. He woos and marries his first love, Ellen, and it appears his life is set for a happily-ever-after ending.
But World War II is raging, and its vortex snatches him away from his young bride. He finds himself fighting in Europe, witnessing and participating in the unspeakable ugliness and brutality of war. His love for Ellen holds him back from utter despondency, and his will to fight and live draws strength from his desire to return home to her.
When he finally does return home to Kentucky, he's exhausted, jaded, and scarred -- inside and out. His worst fear is how Ellen will respond to the changes in him, but when he gets home he finds that Ellen is different, too -- much different.
Can things between them ever be the same again? Or will their love be the war's most tragic casualty?

Friday, August 17, 2012

Won - Try the Morgue by Eva Maria Staal


Title: Try the Morgue
Author: Eva Maria Staal
Publisher: Liveright
Release Date: October 15, 2012
Pages: 224 (Hardcover)
Date Won: August 17, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads









Summary:
Ten years ago, Eva Maria Staal kept a gun in her purse. It was a present from her boss, Jimmy Liu, the international arms dealer extraordinaire with a taste for high-class male escorts. Together, Jimmy and his devoted assistant traveled the world's most dangerous hotspots, closing deals with ruthless warlords and corrupt generals, and trading Stinger missiles in Karachi, AK-47s in Chechnya, and hollow-point bullets in Islamabad. But burdened by her conscience, Eva Maria finally got out, married an optometrist, and had a baby. Now, assailed with memories of her secret life, she must reconcile her suburban present with a repressed but ineradicable past, one that blasts a hole so deep she doesn't know how to love her own daughter. Writing with a knowing intelligence only an insider could provide, this pseudonymous author has created a debut with remarkable intensity that examines the razor-thin line separating those who are drowned from those who are saved.

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Won - Motherland by Amy Sohn


Title: Motherland
Author: Amy Sohn
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Release Date: August 14, 2012
Pages: 352 (Hardcover)
Date Won: August 14, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads










Summary:

With her trademark blend of “social satire, interpersonal drama, and urban glamour” (The New York Times), Amy Sohn delivers a candid, unsentimental look at modern marriage. In her acclaimed novels, Amy Sohn has beguiled us with her pinpoint observations of how we live and love, giving voice to our innermost thoughts and everyday anxieties. Now, in Motherland, her most diverting book to date, she introduces us to five mothers and fathers in Cape Cod, Park Slope, and Greenwich Village who find themselves adrift professionally and personally.

Rebecca Rose, whose husband has been acting aloof, is tempted by the attentions of a former celebrity f lame; Marco Goldstein, saddled with two kids when his husband, Todd, is away on business, turns to anonymous sex for comfort; Danny Gottlieb, a screenwriter on the cusp of a big break, leaves his wife and children to pitch a film (and meet young women) in Los Angeles; fallen sanctimommy Karen Bryan Shapiro, devastated by her husband’s infidelity and abandonment, attempts a fresh start with a hot single dad; and former A-list actress Melora Leigh plots a star turn on Broadway to revive her Hollywood career. As their stories intersect in surprising ways and their deceptions spiral out of control, they begin to question their beliefs about family, happiness, and themselves.

Equal parts moving and richly entertaining, Motherland is a fresh take on modern marriage that confirms Amy Sohn as one of our most insightful commentators on relationships and parenting in America today.

Sunday, August 12, 2012

Won - Moochie's Place by Jim Murdock


Title: Moochie's Place
Author: Jim Murdock
Publisher: Infinity Pub
Release Date: 2011
Pages: 364 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 12, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads









Summary:

Action Packed Mystery, Suspense, Laughter, with characters driving a page turning Fiction Novel.

Unique characters supported by a loud-mouth parrot start a restaurant only to find a large sum of money hidden in the walls. Their competitor claims the money belongs to him. He tries to drive them out of business by burglary; shooting at one of the owners; birdnapping their pet parrot; torching their building; kidnapping their daughter; and holding them at gun point to recover the money. When his efforts fail, he attempts to kill the two main characters.

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Won - Daughter of the Sword by Steve Bein


Title: Daughter of the Sword
Author: Steve Bein
Publisher: Roc Trade
Series: Fated Blades, #1
Release Date: October 2, 2012
Pages: 400 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 8, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads







Summary:
Tokyo cop Mariko Oshiro investigates the attempted theft of an old samurai sword — forged by the legendary Master Inazuma, a swordsmith whose blades are rumored to have magical qualities. She is only the latest in a long line of warriors and soldiers to confront this power, and it threatens to turn against her even as she learns to wield the sword herself...

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Review - The Immortal Rules by Julie Kagawa

Title: The Immortal Rules
Author: Julie Kagawa
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Series: Blood of Eden, #1
Release Date: April 24, 2012
Pages: 485 (Hardcover)
Date Read: July 9-11, 2012
Received: Bought
Rating: 5/5 stars It was amazing!







Back Cover:
My vampire creator told me this: "Sometime in your life, Allison Sekemoto, you will kill a human being. The question is not if it will happen, but when. Do you understand?"
I didn't then, not really.

I DO NOW.

Inside Cover:
In a future world, vampires reign. Humans are blood cattle. And one girl will search for the key to save humanity.
Allison Sekemoto survives in the Fringe, the outermost circle of a vampire city. By day, she and her crew scavenge for food. By night, any one of them could be eaten.

Some days, all that drives Allie is her hatred of them. The vampires who keep humans as blood cattle. Until the night Allie herself is attacked---and given the ultimate choice. Die...or become one of the monsters.

Faced with her own mortality, Allie becomes what she despises most. To survive, she must learn the rules of being immortal, including the most important: go long enough without human blood, and you will go mad.

Then Allie is forced to flee into the unknown, outside her city walls. There she joins a ragged band of humans who are seeking a legend---a possible cure to the disease that killed off most of the humankind and created the rabids, the mindless creatures who threaten humans and vampires alike.

But it isn't easy to pass for human. Especially not around Zeke, who might see past the monster inside her. And Allie soon must decide what--and who---is worth dying for.

Cover Impression: I liked the cover. I've always loved vampire books so I thought this was a unique picture for the cover. Vampires shedding tears of blood when they cry..sad but awesome.

My Thoughts: I loved this author ever since I read the Iron Fey series that I had borrowed from a friend. In the last book, The Iron Knight, there was an excerpt for this book and after reading it, I could not wait for The Immortal Rules to come out! It sounded like a different kind of vampire story but in a good way.

This book has great action, a kick-ass heroine, an amazing romance, and a chance to save the world. The details and the writing in this book are so great, you get sucked into the world with these amazing characters. I wanted to fight alongside Allie with her katana and kick some rabid butt! *hehe* But also at times, I was scared for the characters when they were fighting cause you never know if someone will get hurt from either humans, vampires, rabids, or rabid-disease-zombie-animals D:

Allie is turned into a vampire by Kanin, who is an awesome vampire who you sorta grow to love :) He's one of the main characters in the book. He saved her and also has to teach her everything to being a vampire. He teaches her that the Hunger will never go away unless she feeds on human blood..if she doesn't the Hunger with make her go mad and she will attack and kill anyone.

When Allie has to leave her city, she ends up finding a group of humans who allow her to come along on their journey. In this group, there is a guy who is Allie's age named Ezekiel "Zeke" Crosse. I love when books have cute romances. XD When Allie and Zeke first met, I just knew it was meant to be! But I also knew Allie was a vampire so it is a complete risk and she knows it too. So she had to be smart and not get too close to him. But I'm a sucker for a forbidden romance so I root for them all the way! :P

Allie learns that the group is trying to find Eden, a completely human city, and try find a cure for the disease. I want to tell more but I'd hate to give the rest of the book away D: but there is a crap ton more that I haven't told you so get the book!! I recommend this to everyone!! It is a great read and you will fly through it. I can't wait for the next book to find out more on Allie and everyone! This is my first review so if you have any advice please let me know :) I want to get better at this. Thank you for reading and get the book :P *hehe*

More on this book series check out --> http://www.bloodofeden.com/

Won - After the Fact by Owen J, Hurd


Title: After the Fact: The Surprising Fates of American History's Heroes, Villains, and Supporting Characters
Author: Owen J. Hurd
Publisher: Perigee Trade
Release Date: August 7, 2012
Pages: 272 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 7, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads

Won - Circle of Family by Mia Ross


Title: Circle of Family
Author: Mia Ross
Publisher: Harlequin
Release Date: August 21, 2012
Pages: 224 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 7, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads








Summary:

With his leather jacket, aviator sunglasses and restored WWII plane, pilot Ridge Collins has everyone in tiny Harland, North Carolina, talking. Especially single mother Marianne Weston's impressionable young kids-who think Ridge would make a fine father. But shy Marianne is afraid to open her heart to the handsome pilot with a harrowing past. For one, he's in town only temporarily. And Marianne is all about roots and Sunday dinners, while Ridge is into seeing what's around the bend. But two sweet kids are set on showing him there's no greater adventure than family.

Enjoy a special 15th anniversary bonus story from Love Inspired Historical, His American Duchess by Anna Schmidt

Monday, August 6, 2012

Won - The Peculiar by Stefan Bachmann


Title: The Peculiar
Author: Stefan Bachmann
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Release Date: September 18, 2012
Pages: 384 (Hardcover)
Date Won: August 6, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads








Summary:

THE GRAVEYARD BOOK meets JONATHAN STRANGE & MR. NORRELL in this gothic steampunk page-turner for readers of all ages.

Bartholomew Kettle won't live long. Changelings never do. The child of a human mother and a faery father, Bartholomew is a secret, despised by both his races. If the English don't hang him for witchcraft, the faerys will do something worse. So his mother keeps him locked away, hidden from the world in the faery slums of Bath.

But one day Bartholomew witnesses a mysterious lady kidnap another changeling through a shadowy portal, and he realizes the danger is closer than ever before. Changelings are surfacing in the rivers, their bodies empty of blood and bone and their skin covered in red markings. A powerful figure sits in the shadows, pushing the pieces in place for some terrible victory. When a sinister faery in a top-hat begins to stalk Bartholomew's steps, he knows it's his turn. Something is coming for him. Something needs him. But when you're a changeling there's no where to run...

Won - The Janus Affair by Pip Ballantine and Tee Morris


Title: The Janus Affair
Author: Pip Ballantine and Tee Morris
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Series: Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences, #2
Release Date: May 29, 2012
Pages: 416 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 6, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads







Summary:

Evildoers beware Retribution is at hand, thanks to Britain's best-kept secret agents
Certainly no strangers to peculiar occurrences, agents Wellington Books and Eliza Braun are nonetheless stunned to observe a fellow passenger aboard Britain's latest hypersteam train suddenly vanish in a dazzling bolt of lightning. They soon discover this is not the only such disappearance . . . with each case going inexplicably unexamined by the Crown.

The fate of England is once again in the hands of an ingenious archivist paired with a beautiful, fearless lady of adventure. And though their foe be fiendishly clever, so then is Mr. Books . . . and Miss Braun still has a number of useful and unusual devices hidden beneath her petticoats.

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Won - Embers Of War by Fredrik Logevall


Title: Embers Of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam
Author: Fredrik Logevall
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Release Date: August 21, 2012
Pages: 864 (Hardcover)
Date Won: August 5, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads







Summary:

The struggle for Vietnam occupies a central place in the history of the twentieth century. Fought over a period of three decades, the conflict drew in all the world’s powers and saw two of them—first France, then the United States—attempt to subdue the revolutionary Vietnamese forces. For France, the defeat marked the effective end of her colonial empire, while for America the war left a gaping wound in the body politic that remains open to this day.

How did it happen? Tapping into newly accessible diplomatic archives in several nations and making full use of the published literature, distinguished scholar Fredrik Logevall traces the path that led two Western nations to lose their way in Vietnam. Embers of War opens in 1919 at the Versailles Peace Conference, where a young Ho Chi Minh delivers a petition for Vietnamese independence to President Woodrow Wilson. It concludes in 1959, with a Viet Cong ambush on a U.S. outpost outside Saigon and the deaths of two American officers whose names would be the first to be carved into the black granite of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. In between come years of political, military, and diplomatic maneuvering and miscalculation, as leaders on all sides embark on a series of stumbles that makes an eminently avoidable struggle a bloody and interminable reality.

Logevall takes us inside the councils of war—and gives us a seat at the conference tables where peace talks founder. He brings to life the bloodiest battles of France’s final years in Indochina—and shows how from an early point, a succession of American leaders made disastrous policy choices that put America on its own collision course with history: Harry Truman’s fateful decision to reverse Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s policy and acknowledge France’s right to return to Indochina after World War II; Dwight Eisenhower’s strenuous efforts to keep Paris in the fight and his escalation of U.S. involvement in the aftermath of the humiliating French defeat at Dien Bien Phu; and the curious turnaround in Senator John F. Kennedy’s thinking that would lead him as president to expand that commitment, despite his publicly stated misgivings about Western intervention in Southeast Asia.

An epic story of wasted opportunities and tragic miscalculations, featuring an extraordinary cast of larger-than-life characters, Embers of War delves deep into the historical record to provide hard answers to the unanswered questions surrounding the demise of one Western power in Vietnam and the arrival of another. This book will become the definitive chronicle of the struggle’s origins for years to come.

Advance praise for Embers of War

“Fredrik Logevall has gleaned from American, French, and Vietnamese sources a splendid account of France’s nine-year war in Indochina and the story of how the American statesmen of the period allowed this country to be drawn into the quagmire.”—Neil Sheehan, author of A Bright Shining Lie, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award

“Fredrik Logevall is a wonderful writer and historian. In his new book on the origins of the American war in Vietnam, he gives a fascinating and dramatic account of the French war and its aftermath, from the perspectives of the French, the Vietnamese, and the Americans. Using previously untapped sources and a deep knowledge of diplomatic history, Logevall shows to devastating effect how America found itself on the road to Vietnam.”—Frances FitzGerald, author of Fire in the Lake, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award

Saturday, August 4, 2012

Won - Her Homecoming Cowboy by Debra Clopton


Title: Her Homecoming Cowboy
Author: Debra Clopton
Publisher: Harlequin
Release Date: July 24, 2012
Pages: 224 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 4, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads








Summary:

After losing his mother, Annie Ridgeway's sweet six-year-old nephew thinks he's an orphan. Turns out the father he never knew is bull rider.

Colt Holden—the boy's hero. Before bringing them together as father and son, Annie has to make sure Colt is as good a man as he is a cowboy. When she arrives in Mule Hollow, she finds the handsome, honorable man guarding his burdened heart against caring for anyone or anything. Will a little boy's devotion be the fighting chance they all need?

Friday, August 3, 2012

Won - Mind The Thorns Issue 1 by Rob Osterman


Title: Mind The Thorns Issue 1
Author: Rob Osterman
Publisher: N/A
Release Date: July 18, 2012
Pages: 52 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 3, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads








Summary:

Regan knew her day was going down hill when she said "I Don't" while all her friends and family expected to hear "I Do", passed a middle when she found herself attacked and killed outside her favorite pub, and hit rock bottom when she awoke in a coffin still in her wedding dress.

In Issue 1: Regan awakens in her coffin, still dressed from her wedding and has no choice but to face her first night as a member of the living dead alone. She will meet other vampires, their thralls and even her former fiance as she tries to understand what she is, and what life or unlife may lay ahead for her.

This is ~Not~ a full novel but chapters 1-3 in the ongoing web serial "Mind the Thorns" hosted at http://www.MindTheThorns.com

Won - Syndrome E by Franck Thilliez


Title: Syndrome E: A Novel
Author: Franck Thilliez, Mark Polizzotti (Translation)
Publisher: Viking Adult
Series: Franck Sharko, #3
Release Date: August 16, 2012
Pages: 384 (Hardcover)
Date Won: August 3, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads







Summary:

The classic procedural meets cutting edge science in this huge international bestseller

Already a runaway bestseller in France, Syndrome E tells the story of beleaguered detective Lucie Hennebelle, whose old friend has developed a case of spontaneous blindness after watching an extremely rare—and violent—film from the 1950s. Embedded in the film are subliminal images so unspeakably heinous that Lucie realizes she must get to the bottom of it—especially when nearly everyone who comes into contact with the film starts turning up dead.

Enlisting the help of Inspector Franck Sharko—a brooding, broken analyst for the Paris police who is exploring the film’s connection to five murdered men left in the woods, Lucie begins to strip away the layers of what is perhaps the most disturbing and powerful film ever made. Soon Sharko and Lucie find themselves mired in a darkness that spreads across politics, religion, science, and art while stretching from France to Canada, Egypt to Rwanda, and beyond. And just who is responsible for this darkness will blow readers minds, as Syndrome E forces them to consider: what if the earliest and most brilliant advances and discoveries of neuroscience were not used for good—but for evil.

With this taut U.S. debut, Thilliez explores the origins of violence through cutting-edge and popular science in a breakneck thriller rich with shocking plot twists and profound questions about the nature of humanity.

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Won - Two Crosses by Elizabeth Musser


Title: Two Crosses: A Novel
Author: Elizabeth Musser
Publisher: David C. Cook
Release Date: June 1, 2012
Pages: 464 (Paperback)
Date Won: August 1, 2012
Received: Giveaway on Goodreads








Summary:
The glimmering Huguenot cross she innocently wears leads her deep into the shadows. When Gabriella Madison arrives in France in 1961 to continue her university studies, she doesn’t anticipate being drawn into the secretive world behind the Algerian war for independence from France. The further she delves into the war efforts, the more her faith is challenged. The people who surround her bring a whirlwind of transforming forces—a wise nun involved in the smuggling, a little girl carrying secret information, and a man with unknown loyalties who captures her heart. When she discovers a long hidden secret from her past, it all leads to questions about trust, faith in action, and the power of forgiveness to move beyond the pain of the past.