The Navel of the World by PJ Hoover

*spoilers for the first book*

Last summer, Benjamin and his friends did what every average kid does: hung out, had fun and oh...saved the world. But, this summer, the quintet has an even more difficult challenge to tackle. They must find Benjamin's missing brothers-a task that proves to be far more difficult than they ever could have imagined. In fact, it turns out that Benjamin's brothers are not to be found in the present. Somehow, someone has hidden them in the past. The Navel of the World is a fabulous adventure filled with mythology, magic and, even, a little bit of time travel.

 The great part about sequels is the reader is already acquainted with the setting and the characters. And, there's always something awesome about going back to a familiar world, especially one you liked. And, in this book,  PJ Hoover didn't disappoint.  The Navel of the World is one of those wonderful times where the sequel of a series is even better than the first.  It was funnier, more original and faster paced. This book was just so much fun to read! One of the aspects that I love about the series (and I've mentioned it before) is the sense of humour. Just to give another example:

"What should I call you?" Andy ground his teeth together, hardly getting the words out. 

The boy laughed. "Ah, my friends call me Nick."

"I'm not sure that clears it up," Benjamin heard Andy say telepathically. Heidi must have heard too as a huge smile broke out across her face. 

In my review of the first book, I mentioned that the characters were quite stereotypical. But, by the end of this book, I felt that they were much less so.  

And, of course, a review of this book would not be complete without a mention (or two!) of the time travelling. PJ Hoover had a really original concept about the way time travelling works in Lemuria  which  you may be able to guess if you've read the first book. Anyway, I'm not going to tell you it (you'll have to read the book to find out) but let's just say that it's pretty impressive. 

-RR2

Giveway: Ruined!

Today, we're hosting a giveaway for the book Ruined by Paula Morris. A link to the trailer of the book is HERE!

Summary: When Rebecca Brown goes to New Orleans to stay with her voodoo-obsessed aunt, she finds the beautiful city haunted by the effects of Hurricane Katrina. Rebecca is also startled to discover a haunting of a different kind: near a graveyard one night, amid the Spanish moss and beneath the moonlight, she meets a ghost girl named Lisette, who has been dead for 150 years. Lisette helps Rebecca unearth an ancient mystery in her aunt’s house, along with some troubling historical truths. Meanwhile, Rebecca must juggle adjusting to her snooty new prep school, developing a serious crush on a handsome boy, and dealing with an elite group of popular girls who may be linked to the ghostly mystery themselves.

How to enter:
+1 for commenting on this post
+1 for linking to this contest from your blog, facebook etc. You can have up to 3 entries for this. Please provide a link to each in your comments

Deadline: October 2, 2009

There are 5 copies up for grabs! So start entering!

Note: This contest is only open for US mailing addresses only. No PO Boxes

GOOD LUCK

Waiting on Wednesday: Brightly Woven by Alexandra Bracken

Waiting on Wednesday is a meme hosted by Jill over at Breaking the Spine.

My pick for today? Brightly Woven by Alexandra Bracken

Pub Date: March 2010
Sydelle Mirabil is living proof that, with a single drop of rain, a life can be changed forever. Tucked away in the farthest reaches of the kingdom, her dusty village has suffered under the weight of a strangely persistent drought. That is, of course, until a wizard wanders into town and brings the rain with him.

In return for this gift, Wayland North is offered any reward he desires—and no one is more surprised than Sydelle when, without any explanation, he chooses her. Taken from her home, Sydelle hardly needs encouragement to find reasons to dislike North. He drinks too much and bathes too little, and if that isn’t enough to drive her to madness, North rarely even uses the magic he takes such pride in possessing. Yet, it’s not long before she realizes there’s something strange about the wizard, who is as fiercely protective of her as he is secretive about a curse that turns his limbs a sinister shade of black and leaves him breathless with agony. Unfortunately, there is never a chance for her to seek answers. Along with the strangely powerful quakes and storms that trace their path across the kingdom, other wizards begin to take an inexplicable interest in her as well, resulting in a series of deadly duels. Against a backdrop of war and uncertainty, Sydelle is faced with the growing awareness that these events aren’t as random as she had believed—that no curse, not even that of Wayland North, is quite as terrible as the one she herself may carry.



So, what's your pick?

Waiting on Wednesday: Going Bovine by Libba Bray

Waiting on Wednesday is a meme hosted by Jill over at Breaking the Spine!

Today's pick is Going Bovine by Libba Bray
Release date: September 22, 2009

Can Cameron find what he’s looking for?

All 16-year-old Cameron wants is to get through high school—and life in general—with a minimum of effort. It’s not a lot to ask. But that’s before he’s given some bad news: he’s sick and he’s going to die. Which totally sucks. Hope arrives in the winged form of Dulcie, a loopy punk angel/possible hallucination with a bad sugar habit. She tells Cam there is a cure—if he’s willing to go in search of it. With the help of a death-obsessed, video-gaming dwarf and a yard gnome, Cam sets off on the mother of all road trips through a twisted America into the heart of what matters most.


Sounds ridiculously intruiging to me! And it's Libba Bray so it's def. on my MUSTBUY list!
What's on yours?

The Demon's Lexicon by Sarah Rees Brennan

My sister and I disagree on many things* but one of the things we agree on is that the Demon's Lexicon is the best book we've read so far in 2009.

The book opens to two brothers being attacked by demons. The average person would be frightened or maybe, shocked, but for Nick and Alan, this is a regular occurrence. Their mother stole a charm from a magician that keeps her alive. It also keeps the three of them on the run as magicians constantly send demons after them. But, this time is different. This time, they can't run away as usual. Two siblings have turned up on their door, begging for help in erasing a demon's mark (the bearer of which will eventually be possessed by demons). Nick doesn't feel too inclined to help. But, when Alan receives a demon's mark, too, Nick will do anything to get rid of it....

I discovered Sarah Rees Brennan's blog two years ago and it quickly became one of my favourites. Eventually I started reading some of her fanfiction and loved that as well. So, when I finally got my hands on a copy of this book, I was a little bit worried that it wouldn't meet my expectations.

I shouldn't have worried. The Demon's Lexicon is a fantasy novel done right. The characters are frighteningly real (especially Nick who is definitely..frightening), the magic innovative but believable and the story both funny and near the end, touching.**

Sarah Rees Brennan is fantastic at building a believable, fantastical world inside our own world. The demons in the book will do anything to leave the demon world for the human world. But, here's the thing, while in the human world, they have to possess a human to survive. And humans aren't made to hold demons, so they can't stay for very long. Magicians often call up demons to make deals, offering memories filled with emotions in exchange for supernatural help. One way to summon a demon was to dance which I thought was interesting.

For all its fantastical elements, the Demon's Lexicon is also very focused on characters and the unraveling of stereotypes. Nick and Alan, the two brothers, are very different characters. Nick is callous and unfeeling and likes to fight (your typical bad boy) Alan is the weaker, really intelligent one who cares a lot about people (your typical bookish nerd). Except only kind of, because by the end, they manage not to fall into any stereotype. Anyway, most YA books tend to focus on romance, so it was nice to see a book more focused on siblings (although there is still a love triangle..).

. For all the darkness, The Demon's Lexicon never gets too creepy. Just like Sarah's blog, the book is funny. The Demon's Lexicon is darkly witty and I often got the feeling that the author was laughing while writing it. For example:

"Obviously that wasn't true," said the boy standing at her shoulder, taking a nervous step away and then back to her. "Obviously this is the place to come if you want to get murdered by lunatics. Um-we're sorry to have bothered you! Is there any chance we could just leave?
There was something a whole lot more familiar about his voice, which was light but wavered at crucial points where it was meant to be lightest and airiest. He was standing in the girl's shadow, but the light caught his earring.
Nick recognized that before he recognized the boy's worried face, the spiky blond hair that the darkness had turned into a pale crown.
"Wait," Nick said.
"O-okay. Is there any chance we could get off with a flesh wound?"


"You know him?" she asked James.
"Well, yes," said James. "He hangs around with a pretty rough crowd at school, Seb McFarlane and that lot, but they're smoking-behind-the-bike-shed rough. This is different. There were gunshots. My life was going to flash before my eyes, but it decided to hide behind my eyes and quake with terror instead. I think we should just go.
"I'm not going anywhere," the girl said. "I saw that bird turn into a man. You saw it too, Jamie. You must have."
"I don't know what I saw. It could've been a hallucination. You get those from sniffing glue."
"You've never sniffed glue!"
"I've smelled glue," Jamie said after a pause. "In art class."

After all this, is it really necessary for me to say that I desperately want the sequel? Because I do.

*who gets the washroom first, Jacob or Edward (you know, important issues like that).
**I can just feel Nick wincing at that word.

Silver Phoenix By Cindy Pon Blurb and Cover

on the day of her first betrothal meeting--and rejection--ai ling discovers a power welling deep within her. she can reach into other people's spirits, hear their thoughts, see their dreams...and that's just the beginning.
ai ling has been marked by the immortals; her destiny lies in the emperor's palace, where a terrible evil has lived, stealing souls, for centuries. she must conquer this enemy and rescue her captive father, while mythical demons track her every step. and then she meets chen yong, a young man with a quest of his own, whose fate is intertwined with hers. here is a heart-stopping, breathtaking tale for fans of action, fantasy, and romance--of anything with the making of legend.

Shadowed Summer by Saundra Mitchell

I haven't read a ghost story in, well...ever.* And, for a ghost story newbie like myself, Shadowed Summer is a good place to start-a tale that has enough thrills to be wonderfully spooky but not enough to be completely terrifying.

Iris and her friend, Collette, are prepared to spend another summer in the boring town of Ondine with only their imaginative games of make-believe to keep themselves entertained. But, then, everything changes when a mystery almost too good to be true-one that's been haunting the town for years- plummets right into their lives. More than fourteen years ago, Elijah Landry disappeared, creating possibly the biggest scandal the town has ever seen. Now, he's reappeared. As a ghost. And he wants to talk to Iris......

As mentioned, I'm not much of  a ghost story reader. Luckily, Shadowed Summer is much more than just that. Oh, it has the ghost story bits (which were all very enjoyable). Witchboards, and hauntings and surprising plot twists. But, Shadowed Summer also benefits from other things, like Saundra Mitchell's expressive prose.  Having lived in a small town for six years, I can say the portrayal of Ondine's small town-ness  is spot-on. And not having lived in a particularly warm place, I can also say that Saundra Mitchell succeeded in making the heat of the town come alive for me.

Shadowed Summer is also, (like most YA novels),  about coming of age. There's friendship, first love, and just plain old growing up. Saundra Mitchell really nailed Iris's relationship with her best friend, Collette, through all its arguments and making up and jealousy and lies. 

This is definitely a tale that I'll be remembering.

*Okay, I probably have at some point read a ghost story but I can't remember it so a) it probably wasn't very good and b) who cares? Let's talk about this book instead. It's awesome.

-RR2