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Friday, September 25, 2015

Exciting October 2015 Fantasy Book Releases


Omega (Omega #1)
by Lizzy Ford
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Publication Date: October 26th, 2015

Preorder your copy today:
Amazon

In a modern world ruled by territorial Greek gods, the human race has been oppressed, exploited and now, nearly destroyed by the constant infighting of gods. 

However, a human girl with the power of a goddess is coming of age. Alessandra is the Oracle of Delphi – the last prophesized – and bears the mark of the double omega. Soon after she turns eighteen, Alessandra is told her destiny: to step between the warring gods and the human race and save her world from certain ruin. 

For the gods, her appearance marks the beginning of the end – their end. They and the Triumvirate – leaders of the human elite – who serve them will stop at nothing to preserve their power. 

Alessandra emerges from the forest where she spent her life hidden from gods and men and immediately plummets into a race against time, gods, and herself to discover who and what she is in a world where everyone she meets has a hidden agenda, and those pulling the strings remain in the shadows.

Before she can determine exactly what kind of savior her world needs, she must first master her power by completing three trials devised by the Triumvirate to enslave her. 

One lone girl stands between warring gods and the people she’s destined to protect, but it’s the battle to understand who she is that she must win first.


The Witches: Salem, 1692
by Stacy Schiff
Genre: Historical Non Fiction
Publication Date: October 27th, 2015

Preorder your copy today:

Amazon / Barnes & Noble

It began in 1692, over an exceptionally raw Massachusetts winter, when a minister's daughter began to scream and convulse. It ended less than a year later, but not before 19 men and women had been hanged and an elderly man crushed to death.

The panic spread quickly, involving the most educated men and prominent politicians in the colony. Neighbors accused neighbors, parents and children each other. Aside from suffrage, the Salem Witch Trials represent the only moment when women played the central role in American history. In curious ways, the trials would shape the future republic.

As psychologically thrilling as it is historically seminal, THE WITCHES is Stacy Schiff's account of this fantastical story-the first great American mystery unveiled fully for the first time by one of our most acclaimed historians.
 



Our Lady of the Ice
by Cassandra Rose Clarke
Genre: Sci-Fi
Publication Date: October 27th, 2015

Preorder your copy today

Amazon

Hope City, Antarctica. The southernmost city in the world, with only a glass dome and a faltering infrastructure to protect its citizens from the freezing, ceaseless winds of the Antarctic wilderness. Within this bell jar four people–some human, some not–will shape the future of the city forever:

Eliana Gomez, a female PI looking for a way to the mainland.

Diego Amitrano, the right-hand man to the gangster who controls the city’s food come winter.

Marianella Luna, an aristocrat with a dangerous secret.

Sofia, an android who has begun to evolve.

But the city is evolving too, and in the heart of the perilous Antarctic winter, factions will clash, dreams will shatter, and that frozen metropolis just might boil over…


Welcome to the Night Vale
by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor
Genre: Sci-Fi Fantasy
Publication Date: October 20th, 2015

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Amazon / Barnes & Noble

From the creators of the wildly popular Welcome to Night Vale podcast comes an imaginative mystery of appearances and disappearances that is also a poignant look at the ways in which we all struggle to find ourselves...no matter where we live.

Located in a nameless desert somewhere in the great American Southwest, Night Vale is a small town where ghosts, angels, aliens, and government conspiracies are all commonplace parts of everyday life. It is here that the lives of two women, with two mysteries, will converge.

Nineteen-year-old Night Vale pawn shop owner Jackie Fierro is given a paper marked "KING CITY" by a mysterious man in a tan jacket holding a deer skin suitcase. Everything about him and his paper unsettles her, especially the fact that she can't seem to get the paper to leave her hand, and that no one who meets this man can remember anything about him. Jackie is determined to uncover the mystery of King City and the man in the tan jacket before she herself unravels.

Night Vale PTA treasurer Diane Crayton's son, Josh, is moody and also a shape shifter. And lately Diane's started to see her son's father everywhere she goes, looking the same as the day he left years earlier, when they were both teenagers. Josh, looking different every time Diane sees him, shows a stronger and stronger interest in his estranged father, leading to a disaster Diane can see coming, even as she is helpless to prevent it.

Diane's search to reconnect with her son and Jackie's search for her former routine life collide as they find themselves coming back to two words: "KING CITY". It is King City that holds the key to both of their mysteries, and their futures...if they can ever find it.


An Inheritance of Ashes
by Leah Bobet
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Publication Date: October 6th, 2015

Preorder your copy today

Amazon / Barnes & Noble

The strange war down south—with its rumors of gods and monsters—is over. And while sixteen-year-old Hallie and her sister wait to see who will return from the distant battlefield, they struggle to maintain their family farm.

When Hallie hires a veteran to help them, the war comes home in ways no one could have imagined, and soon Hallie is taking dangerous risks—and keeping desperate secrets. But even as she slowly learns more about the war and the men who fought it, ugly truths about Hallie’s own family are emerging. And while monsters and armies are converging on the small farm, the greatest threat to her home may be Hallie herself.



The Sword of Summer (Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard #1)
by Rick Riordan
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Publication Date: October 6th, 2015

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Amazon / Barnes & Noble

Magnus Chase has always been a troubled kid. Since his mother’s mysterious death, he’s lived alone on the streets of Boston, surviving by his wits, keeping one step ahead of the police and the truant officers.

One day, he’s tracked down by a man he’s never met—a man his mother claimed was dangerous. The man tells him an impossible secret: Magnus is the son of a Norse god.

The Viking myths are true. The gods of Asgard are preparing for war. Trolls, giants and worse monsters are stirring for doomsday. To prevent Ragnarok, Magnus must search the Nine Worlds for a weapon that has been lost for thousands of years.

When an attack by fire giants forces him to choose between his own safety and the lives of hundreds of innocents, Magnus makes a fatal decision.

Sometimes, the only way to start a new life is to die . . .


Illuminae (The Illuminae Files #1)
by Amie Kaufman
Genre: Young Adult Sci-Fi
Publication Date: October 20th, 2015

Preorder your copy today

Amazon / Barnes & Noble

This morning, Kady thought breaking up with Ezra was the hardest thing she’d have to do.

This afternoon, her planet was invaded.

The year is 2575, and two rival megacorporations are at war over a planet that’s little more than an ice-covered speck at the edge of the universe. Too bad nobody thought to warn the people living on it. With enemy fire raining down on them, Kady and Ezra—who are barely even talking to each other—are forced to fight their way onto an evacuating fleet, with an enemy warship in hot pursuit.

But their problems are just getting started. A deadly plague has broken out and is mutating, with terrifying results; the fleet's AI, which should be protecting them, may actually be their enemy; and nobody in charge will say what’s really going on. As Kady hacks into a tangled web of data to find the truth, it's clear only one person can help her bring it all to light: the ex-boyfriend she swore she'd never speak to again.


Told through a fascinating dossier of hacked documents—including emails, schematics, military files, IMs, medical reports, interviews, and more—Illuminae is the first book in a heart-stopping, high-octane trilogy about lives interrupted, the price of truth, and the courage of everyday heroes.

The Witch of Lime Street: 

Seance, Seduction, and Houdini in the Spirit World
by David Jaher

Genre: Historical Fantasy
Publication Date: October 6th, 2015

Preorder your copy today

Amazon / Barnes & Noble

History comes alive in this textured account of the rivalry between Harry Houdini and the so-called Witch of Lime Street, whose iconic lives intersected at a time when science was on the verge of embracing the paranormal.
The 1920s are famous as the golden age of jazz and glamour, but it was also an era of fevered yearning for communion with the spirit world, after the loss of tens of millions in the First World War and the Spanish-flu epidemic. A desperate search for reunion with dead loved ones precipitated a tidal wave of self-proclaimed psychics—and, as reputable media sought stories on occult phenomena, mediums became celebrities. 


Against this backdrop, in 1924, the pretty wife of a distinguished Boston surgeon came to embody the raging national debate over Spiritualism, a movement devoted to communication with the dead. Reporters dubbed her the blonde Witch of Lime Street, but she was known to her followers simply as Margery. Her most vocal advocate was none other than Sherlock Holmes' creator Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who believed so thoroughly in Margery's powers that he urged her to enter a controversial contest, sponsored by Scientific American and offering a large cash prize to the first medium declared authentic by its impressive five-man investigative committee.  Admired for both her exceptional charm and her dazzling effects, Margery was the best hope for the psychic practice to be empirically verified.  Her supernatural gifts beguiled four of the judges. There was only one left to convince...the acclaimed escape artist, Harry Houdini.

David Jaher's extraordinary debut culminates in the showdown between Houdini, a relentless unmasker of charlatans, and Margery, the nation's most credible spirit medium. The Witch of Lime Street, the first book to capture their electric public rivalry and the competition that brought them into each other’s orbit, returns us to an oft-mythologized era to deepen our understanding of its history, all while igniting our imagination and engaging with the timeless question: Is there life after death?

Click here for more anticipated releases for October 2015 based on Goodreads followers!

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Review: Midnight Burning by Karissa Laurel

Midnight Burning
by Karissa Laurel
Genre: Fantasy
Publication Date: July 7th, 2015

Order your copy today:
Amazon

Synopsis: Solina Mundy lives a quiet life, running the family bakery in her small North Carolina hometown. But one night, she suffers a vivid nightmare in which a wolfish beast is devouring her twin brother, who lives in Alaska. The next morning, police notify her that Mani is dead. Driven to learn the truth, Solina heads for the Land of the Midnight Sun. Once there, she begins to suspect Mani’s friends know more about his death than they’ve let on. Skyla, an ex-Marine, is the only one willing to help her.

As Solina and Skyla delve into the mystery surrounding Mani’s death, Solina is stunned to learn that her own life is tied to Mani’s friends, his death, and the fate of the entire world. If she can’t learn to control her newfound gifts and keep her friends safe, a long-lost dominion over mortals will rise again, and everything she knows will fall into darkness.
 


My Thoughts: Before starting this book I had only read a quick synopsis and had not seen any reviews so I was pleasantly surprised to discover the premise of the story. I love reading anything with Norse Mythology. The author does an amazing job creating a unique story line full of Norse Mythology. I was captivated from the very first page by the authors beautifully descriptive writing and continued to be intrigued by the suspenseful and surprising twists. This book kept me on my toes the whole time and I was never able to guess what would happen next. I loved it!!

Solina, the main character, is had not to love! After losing her brother Solina travels to Alaska in search for answers to her brothers murder, what she discovers is more than she could have anticipated. On her path for answers she befriends Skyla, another strong female lead. Together the two make a great team. Every character is this book has a uniqueness about them leaving you wanting to know more of their story. 

Overall an addicting story leaving you with a million questions of what will happen next. I loved every minute and had a hard time doing much more than read this book all weekend. I am now impatiently awaiting for the release of the next book in this series. Crossing my fingers it's sooner than later!!!


Monday, September 7, 2015

Review: Retaliation by TL Coulter

Retaliation (The Assassins #1) 
by TL Coulter
Genre: Dystopian
Publication date: July 1st 2015

Purchase your copy today:
Amazon

Synopsis: Thirty years ago the United States was torn apart. When a newly divided America emerged, the new President Caesar Valence instituted the casting system. A casting ceremony is held quarterly for those who have recently turned sixteen. During the ceremony it is determined which class system each selectee will be permanently placed. Now that Caesar is dead, his son Justice has taken over as the new President. His rules have changed. Keeping order throughout America is no longer important to him. To him, it is a game. 
During Clara Mitchell's casting ceremony, she is lucky enough to be chosen to remain in the Upper Class system, or so she thought. Years later, a brutal attack rips away the one person she loves more than anything, her fiancé.
Clara's quest for retaliation against the men responsible for her fiancé s murder thrusts her into a secret society of assassins. It is there she learns that the world she thought she knew was all a lie, and she must learn to kill or be killed.


My Thoughts:  I was captivated from the first page!  TL Coulter did an amazing job with the narration of each character and the story line kept me wondering what would happen next!! I loved reading this book and getting to know each character I cannot wait to find out what happens in the second book of the series!! The author gives you just enough that you can't stop reading while throwing in one twist after the next.

Clara the leading lady has been through some tough times and heartbreak and it seems like there is plenty more to come. Her past is what makes her the strong willed and minded character she has become. I will remain optimistic when it comes to her future love life and family reconciliation. I can't say it enough, the author does such a great job building up the story line with plenty of unanswered questions leaving you ready to read the next book to see what happens next. 

This is not my typical read it's more suspense dystopian where usually I enjoy my fantasy books, but I loved this book!!