Friday Following & Hopping (#20)

Happy Friday! Hello to everyone stopping by my blog via Follow Friday (hosted by paranormal queen Parajunkee).  I'd also like to welcome any of my old followers just dropping in to say hi. :)  Thanks so much for visiting-- leave me your blog links and I'll be sure to hop on over to your blogs and follow you back later. 

This week's featured blogger over at FF is: Caitlin @ The Cait Files

And the question is:

 

What is on your current playlist right now?

 

My answer: 

 

On my Music playlist *glances at MP3 screen*: 

 Muse, Seether, Within Temptation, Kings of Leon, The Beatles, and (I'm a hopeless Gleek) Glee's rendition of a Katy Perry song

On my Book Playlist (aka the to-read stack on my nightstand):

While you're here, feel free to check out my Half-a-Blogoversary Giveaway which is going on right now.  The button isn't anything special (blame my paintshop skills ;) but it is the biggest giveaway I've ever hosted and I'm so excited to have reached the six month milestone.

 I wish everyone happy hopping and a fantastic weekend!

Numbers: The Chaos by Rachel Ward

(Book #2 in the Numbers Trilogy)

Genre: YA dystopia

Pages: 368 (hardcover)

Published: March 2011 by Chicken House (in the US)

Recommended for: fans of dystopia, paranormal, and contemporary

The first Numbers book, which I read way before I ever even thought about starting a book blog, is a powerful, gripping read which is incredibly thought-provoking, gritty, and as beautiful as it is disturbing.  This sequel was all those things and more-- it more than lived up to the first book.  It is an unusual thing when a sequel surpasses the first book, but The Chaos has done that rare thing.  These are books which deserve more recognition and attention.  

Adam's mum Jem had a great and terrible gift, one she passed on to her son: she could see the numbers, or death-dates, of everyone around her just by looking into their eyes.  Together with Adam's misfit father Spider, she fled London seventeen years ago to escape the authorities who feared she was a terrorist after she predicted a catastrophe in the city.  Now that both his parents have fallen prey to their inevitable numbers, Adam's only family is his great-grandfather Val.  As rising tides and global warming threaten the coast, Adam and Val leave their peaceful seaside town for the chaotic capital that is London.  But Adam has inherited his mother's knack for trouble along with her curse for seeing death-- he struggles to get by in the city, and cannot fail to notice how many people's numbers are the same.  Why are so many people fated to die on New Years, 2027?  Sarah, an abused and haunted girl from the London suburbs, dreams of the answer every night.  Sarah's nightmares foretell a shattering natural disaster which will bring London to its knees and which will strike on the New Year.  But these same dreams also warn her to stay away from Adam, even as she realizes he may be the only one who can save her and the rest of the city... even as she realizes that she is falling as deeply in love with him as he is with her.   

The novel alternates between Adam and Sarah's first person POVs, with short chapters and constant suspense.  (Well, nothing is more suspenseful than impending doom and disaster.)  Both are fantastic characters and for once I wasn't skeptical of their deep, love-at-first-sight feelings for each other and their emotional connection, just as I totally believed Jem and Spider's love in the first book.  Some of the characters I just wanted to hug, which isn't exactly what you'd expect from this gritty dystopian novel.  Adam's grandmother Val has purple hair and more than a few screws loose-- and yep, I loved her.  She is the funniest literary grandmother ever, and would make a great replacement, I think, for the infamous Fruitcake Lady.  If she were a real person, I mean...  ANYWAY, all of the characters from Sarah and Adam and Val to the addicts Sarah stays with while she's homeless were amazing, and I felt totally absorbed in the story and the characters' fates.  

There are so many electrically-charged moments where everything is at stake and so many twisting plot revelations. The ending is a real shocker, and the premise posed for the yet-to-be-released third and final book in the series-- Infinity--, promises that the continuation of this story has as much potential as the first two books.  And just maybe it will do that really, really rare thing and be a third book in a trilogy which surpasses the first and second.  You guys have got to check this series out.

Cover: 4/5

Premise: 5/5

Characters: 5/5

Plot: 5/5

Overall Rating: 5/5

City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare

(#4 in the Mortal Instruments series)
Genre: YA urban fantasy
Pages: 424 (hardcover)
Published: April 2011 by Margaret K Elderry

SPOILER ALERT: Any spoilers are from the first three books in the Mortal Instruments series only.

My Take:

City of Fallen Angels honestly needs no introduction, nor does it really need another review (there are about 1,500 on Goodreads alone) stating what the millions of people who pre-ordered the book and waited on pins and needles for it and read it in four hours like it was the last Harry Potter all over again have already found out: it's good, it's pretty much fantastic.  But not as fantastic as the first three books in the Mortal Instruments series.  There's my review in two sentences; if you want to know the reason and method behind my madness, read on.

Why CoFA is great (and not so great):

--CoFA is great because we get to spend more time with the cast of the Mortal Instruments.  Nerdy and lovable Simon, sexy if emo Jace, bad-ass-with-a-whip and freak'in awesome Isabelle (my favorite character)... not to mention all the other token, beloved characters like Magnus, Alec, Clary, Luke, and Maia.
This is not so great because I think a couple of the characters were so drastically, annoyingly different from the Shadowhunters/warlocks we know and love.  They've definitely all changed throughout the course of the last three epic books, there's no doubt about that.  But while reading some of the characters made me feel like I was coming home (if ya know what I mean), I couldn't help but be extremely frustrated with Jace.  Jace is kinda whiny, we all know that, but in the past he has made up for it by A-- actually having valid reasons to be whiny, and B-- making us all snicker with his bluntness and sarcasm.  In this fourth book, I couldn't help but be annoyed with Jace, simply because I feel like he wasn't balancing the sarcasm and the crazy recklessness with the whining and morbid thoughts.  It was just way too much of the latter, and that made the book a lot less fun than I was expecting it to be.  Magnus Bane also disappointed me because, even though he didn't have a very big part in this one, he barely made me smile even once.  Magnus is one of my all-time favorite zany characters, but in CoFA I was really missing his snarky remarks and general Magnus-ness.  All that said, it was great to be reacquainted with Izzy and Simon (whose POV I really enjoyed) and Clary.

-- You know that happily ever after?  The one at the end of City of Glass, which had me going around in a blissful euphoria for days, smiling like a lunatic while I did the dishes?  Of course, good books are built on good catastrophes, so I knew a fourth book would rip all that to pieces.  I don't mind that-- anything for more Mortal Instruments books.  But maybe I was super-naive in hoping that Clary and Jace would be, you know, together forever now.  After all the crap they've been through to be together,wouldn't it be okay if they could just be in love and kicking major demon a$$ together now (like the sneak peek chapter led us to believe, right)?  But no.  Without letting a single spoiler-jam-packed rant slip from my tongue (er, fingers), let me just say that Cassandra Clare is cutting Clary and Jace no breaks.

Climbing down from my soapbox, I will say that the writing was up to par with Cassie Clare's other books completely, though the plot didn't capture my attention as fully as those of the first three books in the series.  There were a few crazy-cool surprises and twists, including one giant cliffhanger which I'm just dying to blurt out.  The book is worth reading for those last few pages alone, because I'm so excited now for what's to come in City of Lost Souls.  So all in all, I loved it... but I didn't love it as much as I'd hoped I would.  But such huge expectations are hard to live up to.

Cover: 4/5 

Premise: 5/5

Characters: 4/5

Plot: 4/5

Overall Rating: 4/5

Waiting on Wednesday (24)

"Waiting on" Wednesday is a weekly blogging event hosted at Breaking-The-Spine.com that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating. This week I'm waiting on... 

The Carrier of the Mark by Leigh Fallon

To Be Released: October 4th, 2011 

(from Goodreads):
 A move to Ireland is about to introduce Megan to her destiny, her real destiny, can she embrace it and will she survive it?

A tragedy in Megan’s past set her on a predetermined course. A chain of events has been set in motion that brings Megan to Kinsale, a small town in the south of Ireland where her destiny awaits her. Her life starts to fall into place as she makes new friends and settles into her new school. However, the reclusive and distant Adam DeRís calls to her body and soul.

She finds herself increasingly drawn to Adam and his strange family. Adam knows a secret from her past and he and his family hold the key to her future. A future that binds her to Adam and his world, a world of power, mystery and ancient orders. A world that unbeknownst to her, she very much belongs in.

The synopsis of this book is so darn vague (!), but the ARC reviews I've been reading on other blogs and Goodreads promise that t'will be awesome indeed.  And that cover... I want to lick it. ;)


So, what are you waiting on this Wednesday? 

Vixen by Jillian Larkin

Genre: YA historical/chic lit
Pages: 421 (hardcover)
Published: 2010 by Delacorte Books
Recommended for: fans of the Luxe book series

Synopsis:
Jazz . . . Booze . . . Boys . . . It’s a dangerous combination.

Every girl wants what she can’t have. Seventeen-year-old Gloria Carmody wants the flapper lifestyle—and the bobbed hair, cigarettes, and music-filled nights that go with it. Now that she’s engaged to Sebastian Grey, scion of one of Chicago’s most powerful families, Gloria’s party days are over before they’ve even begun . . . or are they?
Clara Knowles, Gloria’s goody-two-shoes cousin, has arrived to make sure the high-society wedding comes off without a hitch—but Clara isn’t as lily-white as she appears. Seems she has some dirty little secrets of her own that she’ll do anything to keep hidden. . . .
Lorraine Dyer, Gloria’s social-climbing best friend, is tired of living in Gloria’s shadow. When Lorraine’s envy spills over into desperate spite, no one is safe. And someone’s going to be very sorry. . . .

From debut author Jillian Larkin, VIXEN is the first novel in the sexy, dangerous, and ridiculously romantic new series set in the Roaring Twenties . . . when anything goes.

My Take:

Vixen does for the Roaring 20s-- age of the so-scandalous flappers, vamps, speakeasies, and gangsters-- what Anna Godbersen's Luxe series did for the Victorian Age.  Debut author Jillian Larkin's breezy, fun writing style and characters are very similar to that of the Luxe, and I highly recommend this book to fans of that popular series.


The story is set in Chicago and centered around three very different girls: Gloria, who at seventeen is unhappily engaged to the enigmatic and wealthy Bastian Grey; her best friend Lorraine, who wants to be a flapper more than anything; and Clara, Gloria's cousin who arrives in Chicago masquerading as the prime country-girl cousin, but is in fact a big-time flapper fresh from the streets and scandals of New York City.  The chapters alternate between the three girls, and I felt very strongly about each of them.  Lorraine I positively hated, but then I think the author wants and expects readers to dislike Lorraine.  She's in love with Gloria's friend Marcus, and is constantly, ceaselessly pining for him throughout the entire book, yet is also constantly flirting with every other male character.  If Lorraine were the sole protagonist of Vixen, I probably wouldn't have been able to stomach 20 pages of her whining and backstabbing.  Luckily we have Clara, whose secret past and slow romance with Marcus (yeah, the guy Lorraine thinks she's in love with) make for an entertaining story-- I loved how she kept up the act of her prudish alter-ego, 'Country Clara'.

Gloria's storyline was my favorite by far.  Unhappy with her early engagement to a man she feels like she barely knows, much less loves, Gloria ventures out one night to the Green Mill-- Chicago's most notorious speakeasy bar.  There she ends up auditioning to sing in the club's jazz band-- a talented, all-black jazz band which her white, upper-class parents would so never approve of.  Gloria's act of rebellion implodes into a personal crisis as she forgoes engagement parties to sing at the Green Mill... and take music lessons from the handsome and charismatic pianist, Jerome Johnson, who she quickly begins to fall in love with.  Gloria knows her relationship with Jerome will never be accepted by her friends and family, much less her fiance, and she is forced to make a choice between the love of her life and jazz, and the sheltered life which has been planned for her since her birth.  

Add a couple of (admittedly cliched) gangsters, one very jealous and very bitchy Lorraine, and a whole lot of scandal to the mix, and you have Vixen.  It's a thrill ride of a novel that you won't be able to put down-- a great start to a romantic and exciting series which really captures the feel of the 20s, and is for that matter a heck of a lot more fun than reading The Great Gatsby.  I can't wait for the sequel, Ingenue, mainly because I have to find out what happens to Gloria and Jerome!

Cover: 5/5 (like it!)

Premise: 4/5

Characters: 4/5

Plot: 4/5

Overall Rating: 4/5

Half-a-Blogoversary Mega Giveaway!

It's my Blogoversary, guys!!! *squeals*
Okay, so it will be my blogoversary in exactly six months.  It's my Half-a-Blogoversary, anyway, and I fully intend to celebrate A Myriad of Books turning 1/2 a year old.

Take a look at what's what was up for grabs: THE GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.  Big thanks to all who entered!  I can't wait to host a one-year blogoversary giveaway!

Giving Away:

-- Virals by Kathy Reichs (hardcover)

-- The Iron Witch by Karen Mahoney (paperback)

-- Relic Master: The Dark City by Catherine Fisher (ARC)

-- Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick (hardcover)

-- Matched by Ally Condie (hardcover)

-- Swoon by Nina Malkin (paperback)

-- Elphame's Choice by PC Cast (paperback)

-- Claire de Lune by Christine Johnson (hardcover)

-- Pegasus by Robin McKinley (hardcover)

-- Red Riding Hood by Sarah Blakly-Cartwright (movie novel, paperback)

-- Sea Change by Aimee Friedman (hardcover)

-- Fallen by Lauren Kate (hardcover)

To Enter: Leave a comment with your entries (include links to anywhere you helped to spread the word for extra entries, please.  One comment for all your extra entries is fine, but add them all up for me!), and tell me which book of those I'm giving away you're most excited to read.  The last day to enter is Saturday, May 7th-- entries close at midnight. 

-- To enter, you must have a mailing address in the US or Canada, be at least 13 years of age, and you must follow A Myriad of Books. 

Extra Entries: 

+ 2 entries for each tweet or Facebook update you post about this giveaway

+3 entries for a blog sidebar link to the giveaway

+ 5 entries for a blog post about the giveaway (keeping it short and sweet is perfectly fine)


The two winners will be chosen by random.org on May 6th.  Winners will have 48 hours to claim their prize following my notification before I have to pick a new winner.  Good luck, you guys, and thanks so much for following and supporting my blog.  These last six months being part of the book blogging community have been fantastic, and I know the months and years to come will be just as awesome!

Waiting on Wednesday (23)

"Waiting on" Wednesday is a weekly blogging event hosted at Breaking-The-Spine.com that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating. This week I'm waiting on... 

 In The Forests of Night by Kersten Hamilton 

(sequel to Tyger Tyger)

Coming: October 3rd, 2011




(from Goodreads):

Teagan, Finn, and Aiden have rescued Tea's and Aiden's father and have made it out of Mag Mell alive, bringing a few new friends with them. But The Dark Man's forces are hot on their heels. Back in Chicago, Teagan soon realizes that she is not the target of the goblins. In fact, the goblins call her princess, and call her to come out and play. Something is happening to her, and she suspects it’s an infection she picked up in Mag Mell. An infected cat-sídhe becomes her test subject, and Teagan is determined to cure it of the sickness that seems to rot its flesh. If she can find a cure for the cat-sídhe, then maybe there is hope for her. 
Meanwhile, Kyle and Isabeau, Teagan’s goblin cousins, show up in her school, disguised as a substitute teacher and a foreign exchange student. They are sure she will come back to Mag Mell, as goblin blood is never passive. Once awoken, it will burn away every other aspect of her being, leaving her pure and solely goblin. When the process is complete, she will belong to Fear Doirich, the Dark Man. It is just a matter of time. In the meantime, Kyle and Isabeau are happy to entertain themselves by trying to seduce, kidnap, or kill Teagan’s family and friends. 
Tea knows she doesn’t have much time left, and she refuses to leave Finn to be hunted to the death or her family to be tortured and killed. A wild Stormrider, born to rule and reign, is growing stronger inside her, but as long as she can hold on, she’s still Teagan Wylltson, who plans to be a veterinarian and who heals the sick and hurting. The disease that’s destroying her—that’s destroying them all—has a name: Fear Doirich. 
And Teagan Wylltson is not going to let him win.

This is the second book in the Goblin Wars series, by the very talented Kersten Hamilton-- who I was lucky enough to interview last November when Tyger Tyger was released!  Can't wait to find out what happens to Finn and Teagan, and I absolutely love the cover.  :)

 So, what are you waiting on this Wednesday?

Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

Genre: YA dystopia
Pages: 326 (hardcover)
Published: May 2010 by Little, Brown
Recommended for: dystopia fans

Summary:
Set initially in a future shanty town in America's Gulf Coast region, where grounded oil tankers are being dissembled for parts by a rag tag group of workers, we meet Nailer, a teenage boy working the light crew, searching for copper wiring to make quota and live another day. The harsh realities of this life, from his abusive father, to his hand to mouth existence, echo the worst poverty in the present day third world. When an accident leads Nailer to discover an exquisite clipper ship beached during a recent hurricane, and the lone survivor, a beautiful and wealthy girl, Nailer finds himself at a crossroads. Should he strip the ship and live a life of relative wealth, or rescue the girl, Nita, at great risk to himself and hope she'll lead him to a better life?  This is a novel that illuminates a world where oil has been replaced by necessity, and where the gap between the haves and have-nots is now an abyss. Yet amidst the shadows of degradation, hope lies ahead.

My Take:

This is one of the best dystopias I've read in a long time.  It has a fast-paced, instantly intriguing feel which reminded me of The Hunger Games, masterpiece of that genre, except that Ship Breaker is definitely more of a 'guy's book' in some ways.  The synopsis catches the feel of the book perfectly, so I won't do my usual long-winded 're-summarizing and setting the scene' thing. 

The world in which Nailer-- who's young even for a YA protagonist-- lives is a harsh one, a coastline wrecked by tides and global warming, where it's difficult just to get by and many resort to terrible means in order to survive.  Global warming is a common reason given for a dystopian future and I sometimes find it a little redundant after reading like, thirty books whose authors all felt it would be a good idea to stick that 'this could be our planet's future if we don't shape up' theme in, but I liked the way Paolo Bacigalupi handled it and didn't mind a bit.  The ship breakers are impoverished scavengers who systematically take apart ships which wash up on the shore of their ragged coastline after storms crash them.  I felt immediately absorbed into Nailer's world and that of his loyal (and not so loyal) crew members.  Treachery and life-threatening situations run amok on the pages of this thrilling novel, and there wasn't a single character who didn't feel real enough to bleed.

I particularly liked Nita, the wealthy 'swank' girl who Nailer rescues from her ship against the wishes of his crew, who would just as soon see her drown.  The romance between them is cute-- they're like fourteen, so...-- and hopeful, but it isn't a big part of the story, nor does it need to be.  Richard Lopez is one of the most real and truly frightening villains I've read about, not least because he's Nailer's father, an addict who has abused him ever since the long-ago death of Nailer's mother.  I'm not giving away spoilers, but the showdown between them was seriously cooler than when Skywalker faced Darth Vader (oops, my nerd is showing again;).  This book might make a very good movie, actually.


The book also takes a stab at asking questions about the nature of humanity-- in the future, there are mutant half-men who are basically like human-animal crosses who serve one human for the entirety of their life.  The exception to this rule seems to be Tool, a mysterious half-man who accompanies Nailer and Nita when they flee to the now-ruined city of New Orleans to escape Nailer's father.  Tool was an interesting character, and like everyone in the novel, neither decisively good or bad.  I think too many books have characters who don't blur that line the way that real people do, and Ship Breaker should be applauded for doing a marvelous job of that.

On a side note, this book won the 2011 Printz Award.  Printz books always turn out to be some of the absolute best-- I wish I had room on my to-read list to read every single one of the Printz books from the last few years.  Anyway, happy reading to you all!!

Cover: 4/5 (it has a cool rustic look which is better in person)

Premise: 5/5

Characters: 5/5

Plot: 5/5

Overall Rating: 5/5