Poison Princess (Arcana Chronicles #1)

Evangeline “Evie” Green seems to have the perfect life. Entering her junior year of high school
she is on the varsity cheer squad, dating the senior quarterback and hottest guy in the school, her mother owns one of the wealthiest plots of sugar cane land in all of Louisiana, and everybody at school adores her. But things are not as they appear to be, Evie spent her entire summer in a mental institution after months of delusions, dreams, and talking to people who weren’t there. Evie’s grandmother hadn’t been right in the head, eight years before she had been taken away for saying and seeing the same things, and there was no way that Evie’s mother is going to let her go down that path.

            Things seem to be fine for Evie now, except for the dreams. She still dreams of a boy calling for help, an evil red witch, and the earth burning before her. Dreams are easily hidden, and kept secret from her mother. That is, until all the things Evie dreamed and had visions of start to come to pass. In the span of a day, nearly all life is obliterated from earth. Flares scorch the land, plants and animals die, standing water evaporates across the globe, and sickness runs rampant among the survivors.

            Evie is still alive, living on what remains of her southern plantation. Canned goods and underground wells have kept her alive for months, but supplies are running low. There is one thing she has on her side though, the ability to grow plants. Not a single drop of rain has touched earth in over seven months, and not a single plant survived the flares, but a drop of her blood on the earth and things start to bloom.

            When the militia starts combing their way across Louisiana, Evie has no choice but to leave her home with Jack. Jack. Handsome, dangerous and wild Jack who went to school with her. A boy who by all accounts is bad news, but the only person left on the earth who she even slightly knows. He promises to help her as long as she tells him her secret to making plants blossom in the remnants of earth.

            Evie isn’t the only one with powers who still walks. A battle of ancient enemies, reaching back thousands of years is coming to ahead and Evie has to decide what side she will be on. Deny her past selves, side with people she hates, kill the world or save it, every choice she makes leads her down one of two paths.

            I was hooked on this novel from the prologue. I read the entire book in less than a day, and it was a day well spent. I loved the Cajun feel from some of the characters, and how Evie discovered her powers and the paths she had to chose from. This is a series that I am excited to read, in the upcoming years as novels continue to be written.

Rebel Spring: a Falling Kingdoms novel

Rebel Spring picks up right where the previous novel Falling Kingdoms left off. The action of
this series is unmatched by most fantasy series. The author doesn’t shy away from death and emotion during the wars and rebellion, and the characters change with each event they come across. Things evolve quickly, keeping the action and humor alive every second I was reading. Just like in the first novel, there are four main characters that this novel follows.

First there is Cleo. After the attack on her kingdom, she was the only member of her family left alive, a pawn for The King of Blood to use to sway her people to believe his lies. Cleo is forced to marry the prince Magnum, a wedding that both parties find unfavorable. But Cleo has a secret, in her father’s dying breath he gives her a ring that has been passed down through the generations. A ring that once belonged to the sorceress Eva thousands of years ago. Cleo plays the part of the frightened princess, all the while trying to find the ancient crystals that she knows can help restore her kingdom.

Magnus isn’t any happier about the marriage to Cleo, but staying on his father’s good side is more beneficial. With his sister sick in bed, Magnus continues to become more and more ruthless and evil, just like his father. Magnus has become his father’s confidant, and knows that the road being built throughout all Mytica isn’t about unification, but about finding magic to take over the world and become immortal. As the novel goes on, Magnus’ devotion to his father and their cause starts to waiver, things are not always as they appear and when Magnus’ mother is believed to be killed by rebels, Magnus starts to believe that maybe his father isn’t telling him the whole truth and he should start looking into things himself.

After the attack on Cleo’s palace, Lucia has been in a coma like state for a majority of the first part of the novel. The magic she used continues to over power her, like a dark beast inside her wanting to destroy everything and everyone. Things are not better when she finally awakes. Lucia continues to try and fight, but it is a battle she is starting to lose. Even Lucia’s mother sees evil inside her daughter, and continues to poison her making her magic unusable. But the King has plans for his daughter, he believes her the prophesized reincarnation of the ancient sorcerous Eva, and wants to use her power to destroy everything. Lucia doesn’t want to succumb to the evil, but it is so tempting and the love of her father is enough to convince her to side with his dastardly plans.

Last among the man characters is Jonas. The first novel saw Jonas’ brother be killed, and after aligning with the King of Blood his people were murdered and betrayed. Now Jonas is leading the rebels against the King. But he needs a secret weapon, and just like in the previous novel he kidnaps Cleo. Things are different this time however, she is no longer against him, but somewhat supportive of his cause. After all, she doesn’t want to marry Magnus nor continue to watch her people suffer and die. Together they begin to hatch a plan, and Jonas begins to have feelings for the princess. Feelings that the other rebels don’t approve of, and think clouds his judgment. Now not only are the rebels fighting the King, but they are fighting amongst themselves over the best action to take and who should lead them.

I loved this novel even more than the first. I love the way magic is used and the myths that this novel draws on. The characters are relatable, and I love the interactions between them. Defiantly a 5 star novel.

Two and Twenty Dark Tales review

Every time I read an anthology or book of short stories I promise to never read a book like that again. I can’t stand them. They are never consistently good, at least half of them are bad and short stories means that I only get a small glimpse into a character and there is no room for development in character or plot.

            Of course, I always falter and end up buying an anthology. Either because the topic the stories surround are interesting or because one of the authors in the anthology is one of my favorites. Both were the case when I read Two and Twenty Dark Tales: Dark Retellings of Mother Goose Rhymes. I love fairy tales, and stories from my youth. Especially retellings, I find them fascinating. So when I came across this book I had high hopes (especially when I found out the Suzanne Young wrote one of them).

            As usual though, I was disappointed in the book. While some of the stories were good, most weren’t. I liked the story based on the “Four and Twenty Blackbirds in a Pie.” In the retelling, the blackbirds were a rebel group against the king. The king using magic would trap his enemies inside a magic plate. It was a pretty good story, but it was one of the few I liked.

            I felt like most of the retellings were pushing relating the stories to rhymes, but even worse they weren’t complete stories. Rather than just short stories, I felt like they were just small snippets of larger stories and weren’t complete. Over all I would rate the novel a 2/5 stars, and hopefully I will learn to stop reading these types of books.

Flowers in the Attic by VC Andrews

I personally think the Flowers in the Attic gets a bad rap. Whenever I have mentioned I've read it, or how I am excited about the new movie lifetime is making, I get odd looks and snarls, comments of how all that book is about is brother/sister incest. Well I have news people, it's not. Yes, there is a moment with Christopher and Cathy but it is horrible for both of them. I read this book the first time when I was a sophomore in high school and went on a year long bender on all things VC Andrews. This series is still my favorite though.

After the death of their father, Cathy’s mother takes her four kids to their grandparents house. Grandparents who haven’t spoken to their daughter Corrine since she ran away with her husband, they don’t even know about their four grandchildren. When they show up, their grandmother locks them in the attic.

There mother comes to visit them, telling them that she just needs to make up with her father first, then they can all live in luxury. After all, her parents are loaded. She promises it will only be for a few days. And what is a few days when a huge fortune is at stake?

But a few days turns into weeks, into months, and now its been years the four children have been locked in the attic. Cathy and Christopher aren’t children any more, but teens with needs and desires they don’t understand. The two young twins have only grown an inch in over two years, their limbs are weak and their heads are unproportionate. Their mother’s visits have become fewer and far between. It seems almost as if she no longer loves them, that she’s moving on with her rich life.

Then little Cory dies, and their mother shows almost no remorse over the death of her youngest, who had doesn’t the last two years trapped in a small space. Something is very wrong, Cathy and Christopher know that they need to do something to get out and save Carrie before she to dies. But things below their attack are not as they appear, and Cathy is on the brink of discovering something terrible.

Pawn: Blackcoat Rebellion #1 by Aimee Carter

I wasn’t to sure if I was going to like Aimee Carter’s Blackcoat Rebellion series. I had read her Goddess Test series, and each book got worse and worse. When Pawn came out I wasn’t sure if I would end up reading it, but I am so glad I did.

Pawn takes place in a futuristic America. After international and civil wars had destroyed the economy, which had never fully recovered from the Recession in the early twenty-first century the government and the status of people changed. The government has set up a system based on Merit, they take care of everyone based on their level. Levels are from I-VII, and are determined after an individual has completed school at the age of seventeen. Level I is cast out into the waste land; II and III get the menial jobs of janitor, sewage specialist, house cleaner, etc; IV and V are the good jobs in banking, education, low level government, and only 3% of the population makes the cut. Level VI tends to be high ranking officials, right hand man to the elite political family, the top of the top. Level VII is reserved for the Hart family, the family that control everything.

While there are elections every few years, the only name on the ballot year after year is the head of the Hart family. They continue to promise that the system is working, and that because of the test is it the most fair way to have society move forward.

Kitty Doe was a second born, put into the foster system and dreamed of a life as a IV or V, but after the test she receives a III. Rather than face life as a poor sewage specialist, Kitty joins her childhood friend in a prostitution house. Kitty hopes to make money for the next month until her boyfriend takes the test (which she is sure he’ll score a IV or higher on), and marries her making null and void her III.

Her first night in the club, she is the main attraction. Her virginity up for the highest bidder. A man in the back bids the highest, higher than any other girl has gone for, only he’s not after her body. Once alone, the Hart family reveals itself, promising that they can make her a VII, but if she refuses they will kill her. Kitty accepts, after all what could be so bad about being a VII?

Kitty wakes up two weeks later, only she is no longer Kitty. The Hart family has spent absorbent amounts of money to turn her into Lila Hart, the prime ministers niece. Lila died under semi-mysterious circumstances, but more importantly the Hart family doesn’t want anyone to question the perfect hold they have on the community, and Lila had been causing problems. The Prime Minister and the rest of the Hart family want Lila to fix all the problems that Lila had been stirring up.

Lila had been involved with the Blackcoats, an underground rebellion that has been causing problems for the government and blowing up buildings. But Kitty is in over her head, she hates being used by the Harts, but it the longer she plays the part of Lila the more she realizes that the Blackcoat rebellion is bigger than anyone thought, an

d the Hart family is tangled up in it, in ways no one could ever imagine.

I loved this book, and am so glad that I gave it a shot even after how disappointed I was in her previous work. The characters were fun, and the twists and turns in the novel were spectacular. I cannot wait for the next book!