How often do you visit a library? Do you go to borrow books? Do research? Check out the multi-media center? Hang out with the friendly and knowledgeable staff? Are you there out of love or out of need?

The library in Sheet Harbour, NS (where I’m from) is central to the community. We don’t live near any bookstores or movie theatres, so the library is the best place to go to get free books and movies. It’s also the place to go if you don’t have great internet or a fast computer, though since high speed internet has come to the community, I don’t see as many people going to the library for the purpose of using a computer.

Our family orders library books and movies through the library website, and basically uses the physical library location as a pick up and drop-off station. Lately, I’ve been using the Digital Library to download young adult fantasy novels to listen to throughout the day. So far I’ve read Across the Universe, Cinder, and Cloud Atlas. They have a fairly decent selection of audiobooks, though I’d like to see some of the more recent young adult books added to the database that I want to read!

WRITING: 4 wings

Revis really shines with opening sentences. Each chapter has an opening line that really draws the reader in and makes you want to know more. Because the story is ping-ponged between Amy and Elder, we have a slightly different vocabulary and understanding between them and I enjoyed the made up swear words and other terms in Elder’s chapters. I think this book works well in audio format in this regard, because I think I would’ve been more annoyed at the back and forth narration if I were reading it in print, since sometimes the POV switches in the middle of a scene.

PLOT: 4.5 wings

The back and forth of the POV really worked for the audiobook. It allowed us to know the details of life on Godspeed through Elder and feel for Amy’s situation at having woken up early on a spaceship. I really enjoyed the amount of thought and detail that went into the ship and the people’s lives aboard it.

Makes you think–if you had the opportunity to be cryogenically frozen and be put on a spaceship to go to a new Earth, would you go? And there would of course be the risk that there would be complications with your freezing or melting, so you could die without even reaching the planet. I think I would go. But only if I’ve accomplished everything I wanted to do on Earth first.

Some story threads–like the character Orion, the mysterious man who works in the Record Hall and what his real deal was–were pretty obvious. Others, like some of Eldest’s secrets, did actually surprise me.

I wonder if the ending would’ve been more interesting if Elder had decided NOT to tell Amy a particular secret that was apparently eating him up inside for the entire book. This particular secret could’ve eaten away at him for another book or two and built up enough tension to create a big explosion, but instead, he tells Amy his secret. This was probably a good move in that it makes Elder more sympathetic, and ends the book on a more positive note with their relationship.

CHARACTERS: 4 wings

I liked that Elder and Amy didn’t fall head over heels for each other. Their relationship was a small piece of the tapestry of story threads that was Across the Universe. Because of the heavy themes of the book, like the survival of the human race, Amy’s feelings of loss because she realizes she will be older than her parents when they finally wake up, it fit that the romance was more subtle and mature. I also enjoyed Harley. He wasn’t your typical third wheel best-friend character and he had his own thing he was dealing with. The character of Orion, as I mentioned, was pretty see-through if you read closely enough. One character I am curious to see more of is the Doc, and how he will cope in the second book.

OVERALL: 4.5 wings

A thought provoking piece of young adult science fiction. Can’t wait to find and read the second book.

So I’ve decided I’m a crazy person and have signed up for the alphabet reading challenge, hosted by Babies, Books, and Beyond. I will be keeping track of my progress on the Reading Challenges page, and I’ve decided to do option “B”: the “lazy” option. Which is just recording the books you read as you go. It’s not really a lazy option if you ask me, since I think pre-recording the books you want to read might make you less likely to read them if you find something more appealing. But that’s just me.

Also, I should mention that if anyone has trouble finding books that start with “V” or “W”, you should check out my novels The Violet Fox and Within!

A – Across the Universe, by Beth Revis
B
C – Cinder, by Marissa Meyer
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z

It’s Valentine’s Day! Okay, so I’m not a huge Valentine’s-Day-is-the-best-day-give-me-chocolate-and-prezzies kind of all (though, I do like chocolate!). But I do appreciate a good romance plot in my books. A well written subplot can enhance any novel, and if it’s full of romantic tension, well, I’m in!

Here are three novels that have YA romance that I’m dying to read.

1. The Raven Boys, by Maggie Stiefvater

This is actually sitting on my shelf right now, and I can’t wait to dive into it. Maggie Stiefvater is one of my favourite authors and even though I didn’t enjoy The Scorpio Races as much as I enjoyed Shiver and Lament, I am looking forward to her smart word-crafting in this YA supernatural romance novel.

2. Across the Universe by Beth Revis

I have this sitting in my audiobook manager, just waiting to be listened to. As soon as I finish my current audioread, I’m going to dig into this one soooo fast. I just can’t wait. It’s not often I can find a good YA science fiction novel. And I just love the cover.

3. Insurgent, by Veronica Roth

Gotta love me some dystopian romance subplot. I was pleasantly surprised by Divergent even if I did have a few minor hang-ups with the plot. I actually placed a hold on this at the library (the audiobook digital library) but my hold expired. I’m too busy listening to Cloud Atlas. God is that book ever good. Maybe I’ll post a few here. It’s really almost beyond reviewing in some ways. But now I’m rambling. Insurgent = want to read.

This is a book I’ve been waiting to read for a long time, and imagine my delight when I found it in my library’s audiobook archive. I downloaded immediately and I was completely engrossed in the rich futuristic world of New Beijing and the human, cyborg, android, and Lunar characters that populate it.

WRITING 5/5 wings

Very descriptive. Each sentence painted a picture in my mind, and it was a great book to experience via narration, as I felt I was more involved in the world than if I had simply read it with my own eyes.

PLOT: 4.5 wings

Everything happens for a purpose, and you can feel the constructed-ness of the plot as you’re listening/reading. Not one event is meaningless. Every sentence, every word has its place. You really fall into the world, because there’s so much detail. And really, when you’re creating a futuristic world and you want it to be believable, it’s all about the details.

Even though you can predict a lot of the plot twists, it doesn’t matter–it’s all about the journey with this story. And that’s saying something, when you can not be bothered with nitpicking any other part, when nothing else bothered you. Listening to this book was like soaking in a warm tub.

CHARACTERS: 4.5 wings

Every character was unique. The narrator of the book also did a good job distinguishing between one character and another. I felt like they were real people. They were real people—with real problems. Having great characters like the ones in Cinder is just one piece of the puzzle. It’s the characters, the world-building, and the story and the way that it’s told that brings it all together. Like I said above, some of the plot twists and character paths were somewhat predictable, but I very much enjoyed the ride.

OVERALL 5/5 wings

Totally amazing. Loved it SO MUCH and I can’t wait to read the sequel. Completely absorbing.

WRITING: 4.5

Very beautiful, flowery writing. The editor in me cringed when sentences were started with actual numbers, as opposed to spelling them out. I realize this is a stylistic choice to reflect her OCD-ness with numbers.

I also felt like the crossing-out stuff, while interesting, wasn’t consistent enough. It was heavy near the beginning, and got lighter near the end. Not sure if that’s supposed to be a reflection of something–of character growth, maybe?–but it just seemed odd for it to disappear.

PLOT: 4

There was a part where I was unsure whether to trust Adam–the language seemed to present a sense of foreboding as they escaped. Perhaps this was representing Juliette’s fear to step into the unknown. The sensual scenes were well done, extremely sizzling! Overall the story flowed from one part to the next.

CHARACTERS: 4

I wanted to see more of Warner, but I think I was in the Adam camp in terms of routing for one guy or another. I think that there’s a novella that focusses on Warner? I could be totally wrong on this. Anyway, must find out more about him. I really admired Adam’s backstory and the lengths he went to to develop his relationship with Juliette. Also, I enjoyed the name choices for the three of them. “Juliette” is uncommon enough that I haven’t come across it much in YA, but common enough to have heard it somewhere else—Romeo and Juliette. Also, Adam’s name evokes Adam and Eve, so Adam and Juliette as a pair reference two well-known couplings in Western literature.

There were some characters that were introduced near the end of the story that seem interesting–I look forward to meeting them in the next book!

Overall: 4

It ended on a cliffhanger, and now I want to know what happens next! I would definitely read the second book.

I really like the colours in this cover! It’s coming out January 2013. Time to sit down and chat with Cecilia!

1. What are the Halloween traditions in your family?

On Halloween my kids and I dress up and stroll around the neighbourhood, trick or treating. Later on, shivering with excitement and from the chilly air outside – more from the excitement – nibble on the goodies to our hearts contents. It’s like Christmas of sorts, only this time, instead of presents we have candy and more candy.

2. What is your favourite candy to eat during/on Halloween? What kinds of candy do you give out at Halloween?

I love Gummy Bears. Basically, chocolates and whatever Halloween candy I buy from the store.

3. If you had infinite resources/time/money/man-power, what awesome costume would you buy or make?

Oh, I would love to make one of Monster High dolls costumes, Draculaura. There’s one I’ve been dying to make for my daughter – she is a BIG fan of these doll trend. I probably will. I just need to get the right fabric and sew it up.

4. When you were growing up, what was the scariest thing that ever happened to you?

Hm, let’s see. I had a few scary moments while growing up. The one that tops all of them: When I was six years old, on my way to school, I was run down by a car. The memory of that huge Peugeot bearing down on me, my hands frozen in place was something I’ll ever forget. And then the impact.

(Wow. That’s intense.)

5. How did you come up with the idea for your Reapers Series?

I work as an assistant nurse. I’ve seen light dim from patients eyes, as death claims them. One day I asked myself where souls go after they leave the body. So about two years ago, I decided to explore this through this story and of course Grim was there to remind me how well he does his job. Questions popped up: Does he work alone? That’s when Ana was created along with other characters, and this led to exploring why she was chosen as the Reaper’s Novice. Other questions that popped up: What if Grim wasn’t the only party interested in Souls? What if he had adversaries?

(If you’re just skimming through this interview, you should definitely read the above two answers. They are superb).

6. If I had to choose how I’d die, I would like to go out in an epic battle for a worthy cause. Obviously living is pretty awesome, but if you had to choose, what would be your “ideal” death?

Oh, a good questions. Haven’t thought about that one, but dying for a worthy cause, like saving the world from a gigantic asteroid in space-–think Armageddon movie. Now that would be epic.

7. If you got to be reincarnated as any animal or plant life, what would you be?

Cheetah, hands down. They are sleek, slender, graceful, elegant primal predators, and built for speed. If the lion is the king of the jungle, then the cheetah is the prince or princess.

8. If you could be turned into any supernatural creature, what would you want to be?

Dragons. I LOVE dragons.

Thank you for having me on your blog, Clare.

No problem, thanks for answering my questions! Find Cecilia on Goodreads! Now enter to win an e-ARC copy of Reaper’s Novice!!

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Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly meme hosted by Should be Reading.

So this week I’m cheating a little bit. I’ve been neglecting this book blog for a little while because I’ve been so busy with the blog tour for The Violet Fox, and other client work. The blog tour is still going on (until November 13!) but I just wanted to touch base here at YA Fantasy Book Reviews to let you know that I haven’t forgotten about the blog, and that I’m still reading stuff. Slowly. Hahaha! I’m almost done reading Shatter Me, I want to get that review up ASAP!!

I hope you like the teaser! Add it to your Goodreads shelf, or find out more information about it from Faery Ink Press. There’s also a huge giveaway going on for another few weeks, you can win a physical copy and other stuff

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Musing Mondays is a book meme hosted by Should Be Reading.

This week’s question:

Do you have people online that you often discuss the books you read with? Not just book groups, but individual readers who share the same taste in books? If so, what do you like best about this? If not, do you wish you did?

I don’t usually have one person that I discuss books with. I have a group of writers on Twitter where we’ll periodically discuss the manuscripts we’re working on. And sometimes, if I’ve just read a book I liked, I’ll tweet about it, and people will tweet back at me, but I’ve never really had an instance where we’ll get a discussion going.

I enjoy talking with other indie writers about writing and publishing, though. ^_^

Musing Mondays is a book meme hosted by Should Be Reading.

This week’s question:

What is your least favourite book?

I’ve read some bad books in the past, but for me, it all comes down to the writing. If your work is not edited, if it fails to convey emotion, if it doesn’t jump off the page and grab me, I’m not going to like it. Sometimes an engaging story can trump the writing, but this doesn’t happen all the time.

How about you? What’s your least favourite book?