Eternity: Laury Falter

Man, I'm getting behind on reviewing!  I finished this a few days ago, but I've been busy. Anyways, this is the second book in the Guardian Trilogy.  This is a spoiler if you haven't read the first book.  And I have to say I liked it. 

Okay, sorry to do this, but I can't write a reveiw...the books are running together! Maybe, I'll do a review over the Whole trilogy when I finish this last book.  SORRY


Characters to know:
Maggie: She's mortal in this lifetime.  She loves Eran. 
Eran: The man who Maggie loves, and their history has been intertwined for centuries.
Gershom: A friend in the afterlife who she transported there just as he was dying.
Ezra, Felix and Rufus:  Her roomates!  They seem like a perfectly dysfunctional family, but in a good way.

Fallen: Laury Falter

So, I finally got the book I was originally going to read.  And I have to say it wasn't too bad. I really like that there was only ONE love interest.  It gets old with there being two!  That aside, I have to say this book had me intrigued from the beginning.  Which is something I love!  I hate having to trudge along 200 pages and then it gets good.  But this  caught my attention.  I'm glad it's a trilogy, because I have two more books to look forward to.
It starts off with Maggie, moving to New Orleans.  She's used to moving a LOT.  But this time it's a little different, she won't be living with her aunt, she's renting a house and she's gonna have a roommate, at least she thinks it's just one until she wakes up one morning and there are three people downstairs. She has an unusual gift, she can communicate with the dead.  And being in New Orleans, she makes quite a bit of money down out the Square.  She ends up encountering a few people who make the hair on the back of her neck stand up just being in their presence.  On the first day she has this feeling she's almost run over and is saved by some obnoxiously arrogant man, who is gone in a blink of an eye.  Eventually, she starts at this new private prestigious school, which she's not exactly thrilled about.  And she has these sames strange encounters with a few people.  With a few more near death experiences, she's saved by that same guy who saved her the first time. Bum bum bum!!!  Who is this dude?

Characters to know:
Maggie: She has a gift to speak for the dead and recently an ungodly number of near death experiences.
Eran: The mystery man who saves her every time.  Maggie feels some sort of connection with him.
Achan:  The guy who tries to kill her first, and her new classmate. 
Gershom:  She gets that hair-on-the-back-of-the-neck feeling when he's around, but befriends him anyways.
Ezra, Felix and Rufus:  Her roomates!  They seem like a perfectly dysfunctional family, but in a good way.

Fallen: Lauren Kate

It's not a dystopian novel!!!  So I thought this was a book someone recommended, but it was another book called Fallen.  But I didn't find out until I had already read it.  This was alright.  It was a little hard for me to get into, but I went ahead and just trudged my way through and in the end it didn't end up half bad.  It was completely different than what I imagined from the cover.  One thing I didn't like about the book was the perspective it was written.  I don't know if that's because I'm used to reading first person books or strictly third person.  But it was written in third, but it almost seemed like it needed to be written in first because it includes Luce's thoughts.  I don't know, it just confused me at times.
Pretty much this girl, Luce, is in reform school after her last love interest died while she was with him.  Well not so much died as was burned to death.  She doesn't really understand what happened.  She was kissing him and then all of a sudden things went awry.  So she's at reform school, and really it's the type of school where juvenile delinquents go.  When Trevor, the boy who burned died, she had seen shadows and they have been haunting her since she was a little girl.  And she tried explaining it but no one really took her seriously, which resulted in the reform school.
While she's there she meets a lot of interesting people.   But from the first day she feels a weird connection with this guy named Daniel and for some reason she attracted to him.  But she also has another admirer, Cam.  He's quite charming and keeps beckoning for Luce to date him.  She keeps having weird dreams of Daniel, she kinda feels like a stalker.  She does all this research on him and with help from her only friend on campus, Penn, she sneaks a peak at his school records. She keeps trying to talk to Daniel and have a friendship with him, but he keeps pushing her away and then at other times he seems really into her.

Characters to know:
Luce:  She's the main character, she is in reform school because her (kind of) boyfriend died while she was there and she doesn't know what happened.
Daniel:  He's kind of Luce's love interest but he's constantly shoving her off.
Arriane:  Arriane takes a liking to Luce.  On the first day she (Arriane) takes Luce around the campus and just befriends her.
Penn: Penn quickly becomes Luce's friend. She's pretty much the only 'normal' AKA non-delinquent at Sword Cross.  She's there because her dad died and he was the groundskeeper there, and it was the only place she called home.
Cam: He's quite charming, but there's something about him that is too perfect.  He won't give up on trying to go out with Luce.

(I'll come back and edit the characters, but it's getting late and I have work in the morning.)

Legend: Marie Lu

I had gotten this a while back but never read it and after I finished my last book I saw that there and started reading it.  I wasn't sure what to expect, I thought it was gonna be way different.  By the title I just assumed it would be more swords and what not, but it really wasn't.  This book, like a lot of books I read is post apocalyptic.  I had to break up the reading WAY more than I would have liked because I just started a new job and I'm working quite a bit...and my mom is forcing me to be her little social butterfly so I'm not able to read as much. 

In this society the US is split into two known sections.  The Republic, which is all of California and the Colonies, which is the rest of the US. The story takes place in Los Angelos.  LA is split into different sectors.  The book switches prospective, from Day to June.  Day is a criminal, he's wanted to the Republic.  No one but his brother, John, knows that he's actually alive.  One night when Day is watching his house from another building his house is marked with a red X with an extra mark through it symbolizing that the plague is there.   June is a prodigy, she received a perfect on her Trials, which is a test that all 10 year olds test.  She is the only person who's received a perfect.  Day failed his Trials and his finger prints aren't in the system and the Republic doesn't really even know who they're looking for, only the fact that he goes by Day.  June, is still in school, and she's a bit of a trouble maker, but she gets away with it because she's a prodigy.  Her brother, Metias, is up in the ranks of their military.  He works in the city patrolling most of the time. And one time he's guarding the hospital when Day has planned to steal a cure for the plague.  And things get a little out of hand, he ends up throwing a knife and hitting Metias.  June finds out that Metias died that night and she is sent on an undercover mission to find out Day's true identity.

I liked the book, but the romance was a little too desperate for me.  I did enjoy action, and at times it kept me guessing. But it was a nice little quick read.

Characters to know:
Day: Wanted by the Republic for a LONG list of crimes. His most recent crime: Killing an officer.
June: A prodigy.  Her brother was killed and she wants to find the guy who did it...Day.
Tess:  Day's little friend.  She was an orphan that Day sort of took under his wing.
Metias:  June's older brother who dies trying to capture Day.
Thomas:  Metias' and June's friend.  He was Metias's close friend and he sort of has a thing for June.
Commander Jameson:  Ruthless commander.
Eden:  Day's little brother who contracted a strange mutation of the plague.
John: Day's older brother.  He's the only one that knows that Day is still alive.

The Immortal Rules: Julie Kagawa

Once again, I had no idea what this book would be about.  I figured it would be about some immortals, but I didn't think vampires.  Hah, I should have known.  But needless to say, it's about vampires and humans and things called Rabids.  For some reason I was reluctant to read it, I didn't know if I'd like it.  I was like.....eh this is gonna be lame.  But as I made it about 50 pages in, I started to really enjoy it.

It's about this post apocalyptic society.  The city is New Covington is ruled by vampires and the people are pretty much just bloodbags.. The city is surrounded by huge walls to keep people in and the Rabids out.  The place outside the walls are known as The Ruins.  The Ruins are infested with Rabids.  Rabids are animals AND people who have been infected with a virus.  The human rabids are kinda described like the creatures from I Am Legend, at least that how I started to picture them after a while.  The book is from Allies prospective, she's a poor orphan girl who has to scavenge to survive.  In New Covington there are two types of people, Registereds and Unregistereds...The Registereds are fed only because they give blood twice a month.  The Unregistereds are illegal, so to speak.  If you're caught as an unregistered....you'll pretty much die.  She's an unregistered and that's why she has to scavenge for food.  Well her and her group are low of food so she does something dangerous.  She goes out to The Ruins to search for food, thinking that an old house from before the virus would have  food.  She knows a way out, that is hidden and no one knows about.   Well she find a cellar FULL of food and she starts to head back to the city when a shelf falls on her making her unconscious.  She wakes up and it's dark outside, the worst time to be out, especially in The Ruins.  But she makes it back without being attacked.  On her way back she encounters a vampire and watches him kill four men.  But the vampire doesn't attack her, he's fascinated by her and lets her go.  She makes it back to the place where her and the group have been squatting.  She tells them what she has found and they decide they need to go back out there and get food...and that's when everything goes awry.  Bum...bum...bummmm!!!!!

Characters to know: (Slight spoilers)
Allison: Allison, like I said in the intro up there, is the main character, she is/was a scavenger.  In an attempt to get food, she is attacked by Rabids and is given the choice to become a vampire or die.  She chooses vampire believing that all of her friends are dead.
Stick:  Is one of Allie's friends who she squats with.  He...well he's a wimp and Allison is always looking out for him, she is the sole reason he is still alive.
Zeke: Zeke is a human that she comes across after she becomes a vampire.  But he and the group he's traveling with have no idea she's a vampire.
Kanin:  Kanin is Allie's sire.  He teaches her how to live and survive as a vampire.
Jeb: Jeb is the leader of the group that Zeke is a part of.  Jeb is pretty much Zeke's adopted family.  They're all traveling to find the city of Eden.
Caleb:  While Caleb isn't really a main character, I feel like he's important to mention.  The only reason Allison meets the group of travelers is because she finds little Caleb alone and crying one night and she helps him find the group again.
Jackel:  Jackel is a vampire leader who is vicious.  He's lost all of his humanity.  He's blood thirsty and wants to find a cure for the virus.


I guess this means I'm on to the next book.  I have no idea what it's gonna be.

Wither: Lauren Destefano

     This is the first book of a trilogy...I didn't realize how many trilogies I've been reading.  Hah! But, as I read the book it brought up a lot of issues I'd never thought of in a 'utopian' world.  So the setting is in a future where the previous generation (the first generation) was artificially inseminated and the embryos were genetically altered to have no disease and to improve the life of coming generations.  Well, it worked well for the first generation, but when they started to have children they soon found out that their offspring wouldn't live long.  Females would live to 20 and males would live to 25.  But rich men would marry young women and sometimes multiple women at once.  And some of these 'women' are as young as 13. These girls are often kidnapped and pretty much taken to an auction and bid on.  It was appalling at first, but as I continued reading the book I realized it wasn't as sick and sadistic and it is in today's society.  I mean in the future if you can only live to 20... 13 or 14 is a good age to get pregnant.  But still a 20 year old man having sex with a 13 year old is still a little weird.  But anywho, I do understand that science behind it.  

     This girl named Rhine is kidnapped by Gatherers and is taken in a van and is eventually chosen to become this man's wife. The biggest reason she's chosen is because she has this rare genetic defect, where here irises are different colors.  Vaughn is her soon to be father-in-law and he's desperate for a cure to the premature death of this generation.  It seems noble on the outside until you realize how cold this man really is. She is constantly figuring out ways to escape this mansion that she's been 'whisked' away to.   They wives are forced to stay on one floor of the mansion for most of the book. 

     It was an...okay book.  It had parts that I liked, but at the same time I wasn't completely taken by it.  I was curious how it would end, but that's about it.  I felt that at places it was dry and it was just so....blah.  I don't know if it was the fact that the setting was pretty much the same throughout the whole book or what.  As I read, I grew tired of hearing about Rhine's nightmares, that were often the same.  And about her crying so much.  I mean, sure if I was kidnapped and taken from my twin brother I'd be upset too, but for an entire year it goes on.  I won't talk about the end of the book because I don't want to give it away, but I wish it was different. Hah!  But I did feel this constant pull between the 'love' interests in the story.  Part of me pitied her forced husband and the 'other guy'. I mean perhaps that will play into the coming books, who knows. 

Characters to know:

Rhine: The book is from her perspective.  Her twin is Rowan and orphans after their geneticist parents died in a tragic accident.  She's kidnapped and forced into marriage after replying to an add to give bone marrow to help find a cure.

Rowan:  Rhine's brother, she misses him dearly while she's forced into marriage.  He's left in New York while she's taken to Florida and he has no idea what happened to her.
Cicily:  She's 13 and one of Rhine's sister wives.  She's glad to be in this marriage, all she's familiar with is being in an orphanage, so this is a huge opportunity for her.  She's glad to be there.

Jenna:  She's another one of Rhine's sister wives, she's 18.  She hates it in the mansion.  When she was kidnapped, she was with her two sisters.  She was picked as a wife and her sisters were shot in the back of a van as Rhine, Cicily and her were taken away to be married.  

Linden:  Linden is 20, he's married and loves his wife, but she's sick and is about to die and his father wants him to get married so he can have children and try to find a cure.  He's an architect...well I'm assuming that's what he is.  He falls for Rhine completely.

Vaughn:  He's Linden's father, and he's searching for a cure to help his son live.  His wife died giving birth to Linden.   He also had to watch his first son die because of the virus.

Gabriel:  He's an orphan and has been at the mansion for a long time working in the house.  He's a slave, for the most part. He and Rhine start to talk and enjoy connecting with her.  He's terrified of Vaughn, and after something happens with Rhine he's taken to work in the basement.

Rose:  Rose is Linden's first wife. She was also forced into marriage, but she did love Linden.  They grew up together and when her parents died she came to live at the mansion. Linden adored Rose and he was heart broken when the virus tragically took her.

Pandemonium: Lauren Oliver

This is the second book in the Delirium Series.  So there will be spoilers about the first book!  You've been warned. =]

Alright, I just finished this book about 2.5 seconds ago and I figured I'd just write a review right now while everything is fresh in my head.
This book was just...meh for me.  There was some good parts to it, but I felt like there were too many coincidences.  She should have died about a billion times in this book but somehow she was miraculously saved each time.  So it was a bit of a stretch for me.  I don't know if it's the fact that I've read too many books like this, which I don't think I have or the fact that it was too predictable.  But I'll go with the latter.  I had quite a few moments of... "I called it."  Which was alright, but at times it was like...come on.  But I will admit, it is a good cliff hanger.  About the last page and a half, it's like...really!?  I mean I knew it was coming, but I just figured there would be a little more closure to it rather than just that one worded ending to the book.

The book is formatted differently than I've seen most books.  It actually reminded me more of a movie.  The chapters went from "then" to "now".   I actually really liked it.  It would go from how she became an Invalid and also you get to know other characters.  And then it shoots you back to the 'now' where she's back in a deliria free society.

Well, after losing Alex when they escaped...or well she escaped.  She runs, and she just keeps running. She never makes it back to Alex's encampment.  Instead she almost dies, but is rescued by some Invalids.  She ended up running 60 miles.  She soon becomes integrated into their little 'family'.  But as winter gets closer they all need to start to migrate to a warmer place and they start to make their way to Delaware.  All of that is in the 'then' chapters.
And in the 'now' chapters, she's been invalidated into a society in New York.  There's a rally and she needs to keep an eye on Jullian Fineman, no matter what.  And then all hell breaks lose.  They end up in a situation where they are forced to be together for...maybe two weeks? <---it's kinda fuzzy with the timeline. That's about all I'll say, because I don't want to spoil anything.

Characters to know:
Lena:  Main character, of course.  She's heart broken after losing Alex and constantly dreams about him.
Tack:  He's part of the Resistance.  He infiltrates New York with Lena and Raven.
Raven:  Raven, a few years older than Raven.  She seems almost older though, wiser I suppose.  She is closed off and refuses to talk about the past with anyone.  She claims that it's over and there's no more to be said about it.  Lena often recites some of Raven's mantras.
Jullian: The son of Thomas Fineman.  He was very sickly as a young child and had cancer.  The procedure may kill him, but that's what he's willing to do to support the procedure and a deliria free society. 
Hunter:  He's part of the Resistance and becomes on of Lena's friends. He was known as an Unnatural.  It doesn't go into much detail, but I'm assuming that means he's homosexual.
Alex:  He doesn't really need to be addressed, but he is the boy Lena is heart broken over and longs for.
Thomas Fineman (Jullian's father): Kinda like the leader of New York, he's a bit a butthead!

Spoiler alert after this!  It's my reaction to the ending, I had to share it. =]

Delirium: Lauren Oliver

This again, is another book I picked up on a whim.  It was on a book and it was on a book list.  I had had some online friends suggest it about a million times.  I took the plunge and read it.
I didn't know anything about the book, so I did a little research and found out that it was about a society that viewed love as a disease.  That sparked my interest.  I kept wondering about what a society would be like without love and how did they get rid of love?

Of course I figured there would be love in the book, and that it would be forbidden...blah blah blah.  Romeo and Juilet.  It takes place in Portland, Maine and this society is surrounded by an electric fence.  Kinda like The Hunger Games, but I let it go.  

The people in the society called the world outside the fence, The Wilds.  There are said to be people who live out there, but most people just think they're just rumors.  There was a bombing years ago that was supposed to kill all the people in the Wilds.    Throughout the book Lena is counting down the days until her procedure.  The procedure is the cure for 'love'.  People usually have the procedure on their 18th birthday because it's the safest time.  The brain is finishing development but severe cases of the 'disease' they will do the procedure early, but it can have severe side effects.

While I wouldn't say this book is gonna make it into my list of favorite books, but it was pretty thought provoking.  And of course I do love dystopian novels.

Characters to know:
Lena: The book is in Lena's perspective.  Her mom committed suicide when she was young and she lives with her aunt now.  She's preparing to have THE procedure.
Hana:  Lena's best friend, the often go running together.  Hana starts getting into things that are illegal.
Alex:  He's a security guard, and also a college student.  Lena and Hana meet him while trespassing while he's on watch.  He's got a lot of secrets, and soon because Lena's crush.
Aunt Carol:  Lena lives with Aunt Carol and her family.  Aunt Carol has had the procedure and is excited that Lena is getting hers.
Rachel:  Lena's sister.  She had the procedure only after being infected by the disease known as love.
Grace:  While Grace's character isn't huge, I thought I'd mention her because I really like her.  She's about 6...I think.  And she hasn't talked since her mother died....except when she has nightmares and only Lena hears her.
Lena's Mother:  The had the procedure 3 different times, but it never worked.  Before the fourth procedure she committed suicide.  Lena was young when it happened and always wished that her mother had really just run away into The Wilds. 

Matched: Ally Condie

I've been reading a lot of dystopian novels lately, and I saw this book on a book list, so I downloaded it for my Nook and decided to read it.

Looking at the book it, looked like that normal young adult book, and I wasn't sure what to think.  I read that back cover, not really expecting much out of it.  The story starts out the night of Cassia and her best friend Xander's Match Banquet.  In this society, they don't get to choose who they will marry, it's all picked out by The Society. She of course gets matched with someone perfect for her, but then when she goes to view her match's data, it's not her match's face that shows up, but someone else. Dun DUN DUNNNNN.
I liked it, but it wasn't completely capturing to me.  But it did keep me curious, so I kept reading....and reading. I think Condie really did a good job keeping the reader questioning things.  Before one question was answered, there would be another question that would pop up. 

Characters to know:
Cassia: The main character, it's from her perspective. 
Xander: Cassia's best friend.
Ky:  A schoolmate of Cassia and Xander, who didn't always live in the society, which is extremely unorthodox in The Society.

This is my first book review, I'm not sure how these are supposed to be done, but if you'd like to see something more, just leave a comment.