Saturday Pages: Their Fractured Light & The Darkest Minds!!!

Hiya there guys!!

I'm having the weekend off and so far not many plans other than reading and binge watching something on Netflix (quite probably Daredevil, so I'll be up to date once the second season comes out). And maybe getting some sushi for dinner if I do some around the house chores too ;)

For this first Saturday Pages of the new year I have another two books that I read in 2015 but I had failed to review yet!


Their Fractured Light by Amie Kaufman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


The Starbound series has been a joy to my science fiction lover soul since I first got my hands on the first book, and now that I've read and loved the third and final one, my only complain is there I won't have any more of them to look forward to.

On Their Fractured Light not only we get alternating chapters of Gideon & Sofia's POV, but also there are some small... interludes I'd call them, with a different voice or voices that really do add some much to the story and bring the three books together in a rather unexpected way too!

Gideon and Sofia are a fantastic couple although their relationship ends up being complex and twisted due to their very own natures and their secrets. I really enjoyed how even lying to each other they found truths to hold on about each other, their own selves and what they really wanted to do and what risks were worth taking.

I was also very happy to see Flynn & Jubilee and Lilac & Tarver back! Getting them all as a big team, despite some hitches along the way was fantastic, because I loved having the other four back and they still didn't take away from Gideon & Sofia's spotlight!

There were some series twists and unexpected things dropped on us that really left me reeling and shocked and very very concerned for how my dears will save the day after the severly mind & heartwrenching twists were thrown into the story! I cannot say any more because big spoilers obviously, but wow... Amie & Meagan know how to throw things at you that both surprise you, break you and still make a lot of sense!

Quite simply put an amazing book and the perfect ending to this very beloved trilogy! Great characters, fantastic plot not only on this book but the overall for the whole trilogy! Irrestible science fiction, space opera style! Extremely deserving of 5 stars (with their respective star systems!).

My only complain? I don't think I'm ready to say goodbye to these characters!! I need more!! Maybe an extra epilogue? A novella? Something!!


The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I loved dystopian stories with an absolute passion till I got really burned on them, one of those problems of reading too much in the same genre, and so I have not read any dystopians and have been avoiding them for the past year. BUT, I had the whole series in my Kindle for quite a while and decided to read at least the first book to get myself acquainted with Alexandra Bracken's writing before diving into Passenger.

And soon enough I remembered why I used to love dystopian stories, why I rooted for their characters and why I was so hooked on them that I ended up burning myself up. The Darkest Minds is full of action, dangers, great characters and twisted plot that leave you breathless and a darkness and danger that cannot be discounted as something imagined and unprobable. Yes, mental powers are not likely to come after an illness, but the way the government and society reacted? Yep, not unlikely at all!

Ruby was an amazing character to root for, to worry about and to feel like smacking on the head on very rare occasions. Given her past and her fears, I could understand and forgive some of her less than stellar choices, thankfully rare as they were. I loved how she didn't want to be a leader or take risks at first, but she steps up when she knows she has to and when she needs to protect those she cares about.

I was very distraught about the ending because of the sacrificies that she makes, but since this is the first book in the trilogy, I'm both excited and scared to see what twists will come in the next books and to read about Ruby's journey!

Very much deserved 4 stars to the book that returned my love for dystopian books!


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Friday Reads: This Shattered World by Amie Kaufman & Meagan Spooner!!!

Hello guys!

Friday is here! And although today it's once again not a typical Friday for me, well typical for me as a nurse, but not for the rest of people with more usual working times. I'm once again working this weekend and I'm hoping it will be decent working weekend and not one of those mad ones.

For this week's Friday Reads I have one of my most awaited books from last year, one that I didn't get until earlier this month because I preordered a signed (and personalized!) copy on Books of Wonder, but as soon as it arrived I dived right into it!



This Shattered World by Amie Kaufman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Last year I read and loved These Broken Stars and so I was extremely excited for the second book in this companion novels series. So as soon as I got my hands on my copy, and once I got back from work, reading started and I didn't stop till I finished, sleep be damned!

This Shattered World takes place in Avon, a planet that is still undergoing terraforming and development, that is behind on schedule and that has the very explosive combination of unhappy natives and an outpost of the military there to try and keep the peace.

Our characters, Jubilee Chase and Flynn Cormac, are in different sides of the conflict, with different opinions, motivations and goals in life. You could say that the only thing they have in common is being in the same bar, in the same planet, at the same time. Flynn is a pacifist part of a rebel group and Jubilee is known as "Stonefaced" Chase and has a reputation for being tough and quite simply kick arse!

Flynn is not a man of action but he ends up taking on Jubilee, kidnapping her and starting a load of trouble for them both. They start from opposite sides, and by spending time together, fighting, debating and lost in the wilderness, they find that they might understand each other more than they would have every expected. And they find themselves on the same side trying to stop a disaster of planetary dimensions.

Jubilee is a tough girl, a soldier that founds her purpose and a reason to go on after some tragedies in her past, and she's so dedicated, that she's got a reputation that precedes her and makes her the biggest target for the rebels. She made think of Zoe from Firefly and I was rooting for her and her kick arse self from page one! The banter with Flynn, that starts like flirting, changes to hostility and mistrust and ends up in understanding and something more was simply fantastic! I loved how their relationship progressed, with a slow burn and loads of chemistry all over!

I won't be saying all that much about the plot, or when & where do Lilac and Tarver come into this because it's a slippery slope with spoilers, but all I can say it's that we learn more about certain "others" that we already met and it makes me loath and fear even more Lilac's dad. And I'm even more worried about what will happen on book 3!

Another fantastic space opera that appeals to me in the same way that Star Wars and Firefly did, very much deserving of 4.5 stars!

I'm simply in love with all the Irish refences in the book when it comes to the rebels, the language, the legends, the independence fight, their underdogs feel... I'm a lover of all things Irish, so this one simply was a treat on itself.



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Waiting On Wednesday #70!!

Waiting On Wednesday is a weekly feature hosted at Breaking The Spine  that spotlights those can't-wait-to-get-my-hands-on-them books that we are eagerly awaiting!


So what book am I absolutely dying and oh my goodness it-doesn't-matter-when-it-will-arrive-it-won't-be-soon-enough this week? This Shattered World by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner!!!

Goodreads Summary:


"The second installment in the epic Starbound trilogy introduces a new pair of star-crossed lovers on two sides of a bloody war.

Jubilee Chase and Flynn Cormac should never have met.

Lee is captain of the forces sent to Avon to crush the terraformed planet's rebellious colonists, but she has her own reasons for hating the insurgents.

Rebellion is in Flynn's blood. Terraforming corporations make their fortune by recruiting colonists to make the inhospitable planets livable, with the promise of a better life for their children. But they never fulfilled their promise on Avon, and decades later, Flynn is leading the rebellion.

Desperate for any advantage in a bloody and unrelentingly war, Flynn does the only thing that makes sense when he and Lee cross paths: he returns to base with her as prisoner. But as his fellow rebels prepare to execute this tough-talking girl with nerves of steel, Flynn makes another choice that will change him forever. He and Lee escape the rebel base together, caught between two sides of a senseless war."




Why am I eagerly awaiting This Shattered World? Well, last year I absolutely ADOREEED These Broken Stars, the first book in the Starbound trilogy of companion novels, and after reading a small sample, I'm so excited about this book!!


What are you all (im)patiently awaiting this week?

First Chapter, First Paragraph #12: Lark Ascending by Meagan Spooner!!

First Chapter, First Paragraph is one of the two memes that I will be alternating on Thursdays in place of my Ink & Batter posts during the summer, when I won't be baking due to the heat!

I discovered this meme via the ladies of My Shelf Confessions, and it is hosted on Tuesdays by Bibliophile by the Sea. But since I already have my blog tours posts and Tell Me Tuesdays, I thought that it'd work best on Thursdays for me!

The idea of this meme/feature is quite self-explanatory from its name, we share the first paragraph of the first chapter of our current read! Quite a good teaser for others to read and see if they'd be intrigued!

The book I'm reading this week released just yesterday, October 1st, but I got the ARC a while back as I won it from the author in a giveaway (THANK YOU SO MUCH AGAIN MEAGAN!!) and not wanting to read it too early, I ended up finding myself on release week and still not having read it!

 Lark Ascending by Meagan Spooner

My hands ached, my lower back screaming a protest. I longed to move, but even so much as a tiny shift to relieve my sore muscles might give away my position. I had the advantage up here, in this tree -- but moving would shake the branches, and the tiniest shiver of leaves would be all Oren needed to find me.











What do you think? Would you want to know more?
What are you reading right now?

Tell Me Tuesdays #14!!

Tell Me Tuesdays is a meme/feature created by the awesome ladies of Please Feed The Bookworm and La La In The Library where we can share how we choose the book we are currently reading from our TBR pile!

I'm always curious about that, cause as much as I tend to make myself a rough schedule for books to read and the like, I'm quite a mood reader and sometimes I just HAVE to ignore my schedule and read something else!

 Lark Ascending by Meagan Spooner

Lark thought returning home to face her city was the hardest thing she'd ever do. She was wrong.

No longer the girl who ran for her life, Lark's ready for the Institute. She never dreamed she'd find a rebellion, a Renewable, and those she used to love embroiled in the fight of their lives. She's mastered her magic, but she still doesn't know if she can master the darkness stirring inside her.

Nothing is simple anymore, and finding her place in this war—and discovering the terrible secrets behind her ruined world—might cost her everything she has left.




I was extremely lucky to win a signed ARC of Lark Ascending from Meagan Spooner and I had been postponing reading it but now that release date approaches I've finally allowed myself to read it!!

 So what are you all guys reading and how and why did you decide to pick up that book? Shiny new ARC? Comfort read? Scheduled for review? Must have new release? Tell me!!

  

Saturday Pages: Shadowlark by Meagan Spooner!

Hello everyone! I'm starting a new day for reviews here in the blog! I have a huge backlog of reviews since I went on a massive reading binge during my vacation time, and I want to share more reviews of those books I read with you all! So here it is, the first edition of Saturday Pages!

To kick off Saturday Pages I'm sharing a review of another book for my 2014 Series Challenge, it's one of the challenges that I had been slacking off a bit more as of late, but I remedied that quite a bit during my vacation time!

Shadowlark by Meagan Spooner

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This is a series where I find the world building so intriguing and with some many questions still unanswered that always compells me to keep on reading, even if with every book I take a while to warm up to Lark, the main character.

It wasn't as hard for me to get rooting for Lark in this book as it was in the first, cause she's a bit more determined and more of a fighter, even if now with her gift/curse she keeps on doubting herself. Granted that her ability is dangerous and she isn't sure she'll be able to control it, but it annoys me so much that it takes it so long for her to start training to try and control it.

Shadowlark is mostly the journey of Lark to find herself and finally accept who she is with her abilities and to accept the darkness in herself and not let it control her, as much as it is the physical journey to find her brother Basil. That journey takes her to Lether, a city where magic is also harvested from the Renewables to keep their population safe, and their leader Prometheus rules the city with an iron fist. There are a few revelations that I guessed quite ahead of time and Lark does have to make a few hard choices.

The relationship with Oren progresses very slowly, from which I'm thankful, and they have to find a way to accept themselves and each other with the darkness and the flaws, and to find a way to make their relationship work, because they simply seem to need each other to go on.

This is a good sequel not suffering much for middle book syndrome, even if by the end of the book we haven't got that much new information. Lark has grown and she has decided she will go on her own journey looking for answers she needs, and not just following orders, running from someone, or looking for someone to solve her problems.

A solid 3 stars and I'm quite looking forward for the final book in the trilogy to see if we finally get answers about the world and to see if Lark can find the answers she is looking for.



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Mark This Book Monday: These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman & Meagan Spooner!!!

Welcome to this Xmas week edition of Mark This Book Monday! For starters I'm sharing the review of what can be the most awaited book of the year for me and thankfully one that didn't disappoint at all!


These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


If I had to pick my most awaited book of 2013, These Broken Stars would be it. Since I discovered it early in the year I fell in love with its cover, a clear case of lust at first sight but I was wary cause I had been deceived before by pretty covers. Then I read the blurb and I knew I could really like this book, so I tried my best to get my hands on an ARC of this book without any luck. I preordered my copy from The Book Depository and it arrived a week after release day so I was about to blow a fuse I was so impatient to read it after all the 5 star reviews it had been getting from bloggers I follow & trust.

It arrived on a day off and that was just perfect, I spent my whole evening reading it. I devoured the book in one sitting, though I kept on closing the book now and then to savour the amazing writing (and gaze at the stunning cover, getting a harcover of this one was a brilliant idea, so worth it!).

The book starts with something that makes you think "Titanic in space" with the super luxury hyperspace starship Icarus, the jewel of the LaRoux corporation and the privileged girl meeting the low class boy. You can draw some parallels but it also start getting very different very soon.

Tarver is a condecorated war hero of 18 that is doing a publicity trip on board the Icarus and has to endure the vapidness and shallowness of it all. Lilac is the only daughter of the all powerful LaRoux magnate and she's an expert at wading the waters of society and she has her own baggage of secrets. Their first meeting has some sparks of attraction flying but it all goes crashing down on their second meeting, where Tarver learns who the girl he liked really is, and Lilac acts like she's supposed to and treats Tarver like he's below her.

Then all Hell breaks loose when the Icarus is wrenched out of hyperspace and a wild panic of people trying to get to scape pods throw (quite literally) Tarver & Lilac together much to their dismay. But right from the start we see that there's more to Lilac than the vapid socialite that she projects. They crash land on a planet that is a mystery and they start a journey together to try and reach the crash lading of the Icarus in the hopes to get rescued.

Both Lilac and Tarver aren't happy to be thrown together into the unknown like this and both are resentful about the treatment of each other and at first relay on their dislike of each other to deal with the unknown of the planet and situation. Lilac keeps getting frustrated about having to depend on Tarver and feeling useless, and Tarver keeps shifting between being irritated about having to haul a socialite across an unknown planet and being worried about how she's going to deal with the trek.

This book is one that relays heavily on character development, gorgeous evocative writing and a creepy mystery to keep you completely glued to the page. You can't wait to see how their relationship keeps on progressing from dislike to friendship and learning to work together to a romantic tension that makes you want to scream at the characters "kiss already, will you!?! You both are crazy about each other and make a great team!!".

There's so much progression on their relationship and so much character growth! I am in love with them both and their relationship, even though at times I wanted to smack Tarver for making it hard for Lilac with his forced pragmatism and I wanted to shake Lilac out of her "I hate feeling useless so I'm gonna throw a tantrum" moments.

The mystery that starts shortly after they start their trek through the planet has a bit of a paranormal streak but it ties very well with the science fiction background of the book too, and it's done in a way that is so creepy and disquieting! Nothing like thinking that you're going mad to scare the bejeesus out of me!

One big warning about this book, once you feel safe and think things are looking up and you are so happy for these two and are feeling all the feels and shipping them to confines of the Verse... BAM! This completely unexpected twist comes and totally leaves you a wreck of denial and tears. And then another twist comes and you just don't know what to think anymore!

Once I was done with the book I was so glad I was reading a physical copy cause hugging a book is much more satisfactory than hugging your eReader... and this book was one that deserved being hugged afterwards! I foresee a re-read not too far in the future. Very well deserved 5 stars for this one!



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Waiting On Wednesday #17!

Waiting On Wednesday is a weekly feature hosted at Breaking The Spine  that spotlights those can't-wait-to-get-my-hands-on-them books that we are eagerly awaiting!

These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman & Meagan Spooner is the book I'm just dying to get my hands on this week! It's been for a while and after all the awesome reviews it's been getting as of late I-JUST-CANNOT-WAIT!!

Goodreads summary:

"It's a night like any other on board the Icarus. Then, catastrophe strikes: the massive luxury spaceliner is yanked out of hyperspace and plummets into the nearest planet. Lilac LaRoux and Tarver Merendsen survive. And they seem to be alone.

Lilac is the daughter of the richest man in the universe. Tarver comes from nothing, a young war hero who learned long ago that girls like Lilac are more trouble than they’re worth. But with only each other to rely on, Lilac and Tarver must work together, making a tortuous journey across the eerie, deserted terrain to seek help.

Then, against all odds, Lilac and Tarver find a strange blessing in the tragedy that has thrown them into each other’s arms. Without the hope of a future together in their own world, they begin to wonder—would they be better off staying here forever?

Everything changes when they uncover the truth behind the chilling whispers that haunt their every step. Lilac and Tarver may find a way off this planet. But they won’t be the same people who landed on it."


Why am I eagerly awaiting These Broken Stars? Well, first of all I must confess myself guilty of cover lust but really, ain't it just gorgeous?? The cover grabbed my attention and then when I read the synopsis I was hooked! Sci-fi, space, survival in a deserted planet!! I decided to go on a limb and preoder the cover way back then, and now after reading so many fantastic reviews all over the place from bloggers I trust, I'm just bursting to read it!!

What are you all (im)patiently awaiting this week?