'Waiting on' Wednesday [5].

'Waiting on' Wednesday [WoW] is a weekly meme hosted by The Breaking Spine.

My WoW selection this week is:

Partials by Dan Wells

Release date: 29th March 2012

Publisher: Harper Collins Childrens

Buy this book: Amazon UK

Synopsis [Amazon]

The only hope for humanity isn’t human.
In a world where people have been all but wiped out by a virus created by part-human cyborgs called ‘Partials’, and where no baby survives longer than three days, a teenage girl makes it her mission to find a cure, and save her best friend’s unborn child.
But finding a cure means capturing a Partial…

Just look at that cover! As you can probably already tell I love a good cover and this one fits the bill!  However, it was the synopsis alone that got me wanting to read this book, it sounds so original and fascinating!  I can't wait to get my hands on it!

I would love to know what your 'waiting on wednesday' selection is this week...

Valentines Day [1].

Happy Valentines Day!  For my first choice of a romantic novel to talk about on Valentines Day I chose:

PS I Love You by Cecelia Ahern.
First published: January 1st 2003.
Buy this book: Amazon UK

Synopsis [Goodreads]:

A novel about holding on, letting go, and learning to love again.

Holly couldn't live without her husband Gerry, until the day she had to. They were the kind of young couple who could finish each other's sentences. When Gerry succumbs to a terminal illness and dies, 30-year-old Holly is set adrift, unable to pick up the pieces. But with the help of a series of letters her husband left her before he died and a little nudging from an eccentric assortment of family and friends, she learns to laugh, overcome her fears, and discover a world she never knew existed.

The kind of enchanting novel with cross-generational appeal that comes along once in a great while, PS, I Love You is a captivating love letter to the world!

I absolutely adore this book.  This was one of those books, for me, that I read and then advised everyone around me to read it too! I first read it when it was first released and ever since I haven't found a book quite like it.  There is a movie version, which I don't know whether it's a good thing or not, but I have never seen it.  I just didn't want it to ruin the book for me.  I know a lot of people have seen the movie first and loved it and then read the book and have been disappointed.  I fear that I will be the other way around! 

Questions for you:

1. Have you read the book?  What did you think?

2. Have you seen the movie?  What did you think?

3. If you have both read the book and seen the movie: in which order? Were you disappointed with any of them?  If so, why?

I have decided to go out and buy the dvd and watch it this Valentines Day...so wish me luck!
I will post my review of the movie on my other blog: www.kismetspillsall-movies.blogspot.com!

In My Mailbox [5].

‘In My Mailbox’ is a weekly meme hosted by The Story Siren.

The books I bought this week are:

Divergent by Veronica Roth [Amazon UK]
Tell Me No Secrets by Julie Corbin [Amazon UK]
The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater [Amazon UK]
Ravens by George Dawes Green [Amazon UK]
Becoming Scarlett by Ciara Geraghty [Amazon UK]
Room by Emma Donoghue [Amazon UK]
The Mortal Instruments #1: City of Bones by Cassandra Clare [Amazon UK]
The Mortan Instruments #2: City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare [Amazon UK]
Remember Me (Remember Me, The Return and The Last Story) by Christopher Pike [Amazon UK]

I will update this post with links to my reviews once they are posted.
I would love to know: what's in your mailbox this week?

Catch Up Sunday [4].

Catch Up Sunday is a weekly post I created to highlight what I have posted in the past week.

Memes:

[1] In My Mailbox [4]
[2] Teaser Tuesday [3]
[3] 'Waiting on' Wednesday [4]
[4] WWW Wednesday [4]
[5] Catch Up Sunday [3]

Updated Challenge Posts:

[1] ABC Reading Challenge
[2] 101+ Books in a year Challenge
[3] Read and Review Challenge
[4] Debut Author Challenge
[5] YA Contemporary Challenge
[6] Standalone Reading Challenge

Reviews:

[1] Fracture by Megan Miranda

WWW Wednesday [4].

WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Should Be Reading. 

[1] The book I am currently reading is:

Everneath by Brodi Ashton

[My Review]

Buy this book: [Amazon UK]

 

 

[2] The book I just recently finished is:

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith

[My Review]

Buy this book: [Amazon UK]

[3] The book I think I will read next is:

The Catastrophic History of You and Me by Jess Rothenberg

[My Review]

Buy this book: [Amazon UK]

'Waiting on' Wednesday [4].

'Waiting on' Wednesday [WoW] is a weekly meme hosted by The Breaking Spine.


My WoW selection this week is:

Slide by Jill Hathaway

Release date: 1st March 2012

Publisher: Harper Collins Childrens

Buy this book: Amazon UK

Synopsis [Goodreads]

She sees through the eyes of a killer…
Vee Bell hates having narcolepsy. But collapsing at school is nowhere near as bad as the truth. When Vee passes out she slides randomly into other’s people’s heads and ends up seeing through their eyes. So when Vee finds herself in the head of a killer, standing over the body of a cheerleader, she’s beyond freaked.
Vee knows that this was no suicide. And when another cheerleader turns up dead, everyone is a suspect. Struggling to understand her terrifying and unwanted ‘gift’, Vee is tangled in a web of secrets, lies and danger…

This book sounds amazing! The cover looks great and the story to me sounds unusual and intriguing!

I would love to know what your 'waiting on wednesday' selection is this week...

Fracture - Megan Miranda.

Published: 5th January 2012
Format: Paperback

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Pages: 272
Age Group: Young Adult

Challenge: Debut Author Challenge 2012, 100+ Reading Challenge, Read and Review Challenge
Buy this book: Amazon UK

Synopsis [Amazon UK]

By the time seventeen-year-old Delaney Maxwell is pulled out of the icy waters of a frozen lake, her heart has stopped beating. She is in a coma and officially dead. But Delaney pulls through. How? Doctors are mystified. Outwardly she has completely recovered. But Delaney knows something is very wrong. Pulled by sensations she can't control, she finds herself drawn to the dying. Is her brain predicting death or causing it? Then Delaney meets Troy Varga, who lost his whole family in a car accident and emerged from a coma with the same powers as Delaney. At last she's found a kindred spirit who'll understand what she's going through. But Delaney soon discovers that Troy's motives aren't quite what she thought. Is their gift a miracle, a freak of nature - or something much more frightening?

The cover...

The cover is simple yet elegant.  It shows the image of Delaney, on that icy cold day wearing her red parka jacket not knowing her fate, perfectly.  It would have been great if the title was all icy or something though.

How did I find out about this book?

I bought this book for the Debut Author Challenge that I am participating in.

What is this book about?

Whilst on the way to play a game in the snow with some friends, a girl called Delaney loses her balance on an iced over lake causing the ice to crack and Delaney to fall into the icy water below.  Delaney was under the water/unconscious for eleven minutes, enough to kill her, but something keeps her alive and changes her life in a way she could never imagine.

My opinion...

The character of Delaney Maxwell is like that of any other young teenager who wants to be the best and have fun with it.  However, her life changes the day that she and her best friend Decker decide to cross the icy lake to get to their friends instead of going around it.

The fact that Delaney has experienced something terrifying and miraculous yet is still able to consider doing school work is beyond me?  She comes across as being worried for her life and yet there still has to be that mention of school and how she wishes to be Valedictorian, and get good grades, it makes no sense to me.  I get that you would want to be successful but not when it has only been a week or so since you came out of a life threatening coma!  I see that school can become a distraction for Delaney but it gets to the point where that is all she thinks about.

It seems that for the first 60 pages or so, it firstly defines what happened to Delaney and then it goes on a path of discussions of school, a will they won't they relationship between Delaney and her best friend Decker and a controlled zombie like state (this is what I imagine) every time Delaney feels the 'pull'.  Another aspect is that of people owing others - mainly that of Delaneys' debt to all of her friends for saving her life.  They all played a part in saving her and now she owes them for this privilege, all I kept thinking here was 'I'm not jealous of those friends!'.

In reference to the characters, I warmed to Delaney and Decker's relationship rather to Delaney herself.  The way in which they were able to have a conversation full of wit and humour was a main reason why I was so drawn to it. They've been best friends for years so when they start to get jealous of each others' relationships it slightly takes them by surprise but it was fun to find out what happens between the two of them and how their relationship has its positives and negatives.  I think this is the reason why I carried on reading the book, I wanted to know what would happen between them!  However, Delaney's relationship with her parents, especially her mother, was rather strange.  Her mothers actions after the accident are not entirely motherly and the reference to her own parents to somewhat explain that was weird and made it seem like this book should have some form of sequel (maybe it does?).  The character of Troy creeped me out from the beginning and made me think 'what is your purpose?' and I was quite disappointed in what I found out in regards to him.

Don't get me wrong, the book was ok, I just wanted there to be some sort of closure in regards to Delaney's 'power'.  Throughout the book she wants to save people so what now?  It doesn't really make any sense for this to be a standalone book.  It seems like there are two different stories going on in this book, both starting off with Delaney's accident.  The first is that of how Delaney's life changes through school, home and her love life and the other is the power in which Delaney obtains through the accident.

I think the message of the book however is powerful.  The question of 'If you had one day left to live, what would you do?' is a question worth finding out the answer to.

If you enjoyed this book: what to read next...

There is a short story in relation to this book highlighting Decker's side of the story title Eleven Minutes.  I think it is great that the author has taken into account what Decker was feeling the days in which Delaney was in a coma/on deaths door, however, it would be great to know his take on more of story.