In Nightfall by Suzanne Young

I had a lot of fun reading this. I like the atmosphere of it and I could picture the town of Nightfall as I read. The author’s descriptions were really good. This book is basically a modern day re-imagining of the movie The Lost Boys, so vampires with family dynamics thrown in.

I did find myself yelling at the main character, Theo, because she just wasn’t getting it. Nice girl, maybe not the brightest. That was honestly ok with me though. It was nice that she wasn’t the prettiest, smartest, most popular girl ever. All of the characters were fully fleshed out and nobody felt like they were just there. The vampires are actually scary too!

I’d recommend this to fans of the author, vampire fans and fans of young adult thrillers.

Our Crooked Hearts a novel by Melissa Albert

I really enjoyed reading Our Crooked Hearts. The book switches back and forth from the present with Ivy to the past with Dana, her mother. It was a neat way to tell this spooky, mystery story. The book is categorized a contemporary fantasy, but it’s more of a mystery with witchcraft and family drama.

The book starts out with Ivy, who witnesses something strange one night that sets off an unexpected chain of events. She begins to question everything she’s ever known about her life, her mother and herself.

I won this book in a First Reads giveaway on Goodreads. All opinions are my own.

Sons of Anarchy Bratva by Christopher Golden

Bratva is “an original novel based on the FX series”and is “set after the fourth season of the groundbreaking television drama Sons of Anarchy, from the mind of executive producer Kurt Sutter.” The story is that Jax’s half-sister, Trinity, has gotten mixed up with some Russian Bratva gangsters so Jax, Opie and Chibs head out to Nevada to look for her.
The author, Christopher Golden, who is no stranger to tv-to-book adaptations, does a great job with the characters. They sounded and moved like themselves. He writes them as they are on the show, but with deeper insight. Even the side characters are fully fleshed out. Jax, Opie and Chibs were my favorites on the show, so reading a full length book about them was great.
The story moves along quickly as we piece things together with Jax and see things through Trinity’s eyes. The action scenes are face paced and well described. I could really picture the guys riding down a lonely desert at night. There were one or two slight editing errors, but it was ok.
I really enjoyed this book and I recommend it to any Sons of Anarchy fans out there.

Concrete Fever by Nathaniel Kressen

 

I finished this two days ago and I’m still not sure if I even liked this book. The main character/narrator is Jumper and he’s not the best guy. He’s a high schooler who drinks a lot and gets stoned while living in his deceased father’s high rise apartment New York City. One night, he decides to end it all and jump off the roof, but instead he meets a girl dancing on the ledge. He calls her Gypsy and they agree to act out a whole relationship over the course of one night while being honest with each other (but how would the reader know?), thus starting a crazy, alcohol and drug infused adventure. We never learn their real names and the ending was ok.

I honestly bought this book at the thrift shop based on the fact that the cover is neat and it’s signed. That’s not usually why I buy books, but it was this time.

Save the Date by Morgan Matson

Save the Date is about the weekend of seventeen year old Charlotte “Charlie” Grant’s sister Linnie’s wedding. All she wanted was a perfect weekend with the whole family together. Everything that can go wrong, does. Instead, she has to run around town with the Bill (the wedding planner’s nephew, which might not be so bad), try to keep relatives and neighbors from fighting, attempts to put off her decision about college, has a fight with her best friend and then there’s that thing with her brother’s best friend, Jesse.
In the end, the wedding is mostly saved and Charlie and learned a lot about herself and her siblings. Then her other brother reveals something that shocks everyone, which leads to more drama and hijinks in typical Grant fashion. The book ends on a hopeful note.
I seriously felt like I’d known these characters forever. The book takes places in the fictional town of Stanwich, Connecticut like Matson’s other books and I enjoyed visiting there again. I like that surrounding towns such as Putnam and Mystic were mentioned as well. This is the second book I’ve read by Morgan Matson and I just picked up The Unexpected Everything.

I gave this one 4/5 stars and I recommend it to fans of Morgan Matson, people who like contemporaries and anyone who likes a good YA book about family and figuring out your life.

Unbroken: 13 Stories Starring Disabled Teens edited by Marieke Nijkamp

Unbroken is a collection of short stories about teens with a variety of disabilities written by autors who also have disabilities. There’s a good amount of diversity represented here too. Most of them are good, but I did find myself losing interest a little bit in the middle of the book. It might just be me, but in some of the stories it wasn’t quite clear what the disability was.
My favorites were “The Leap and the Fall” by Kayla Whaley and “One, Two, Three” by Corinne Duyvis (It’s called “A Curse, A Kindness” in the official version.) I plan on checking out more of their work.
I received my copy for free from NetGalley but all opinions are my own. I would recommend this book to teens with disabilities, anyone who wants to diversify their reading and people who like short story collections. 3/5 stars.

Hiding Out by Tina Alexis Allen

I honestly thought this would be better than it was. The book was mostly about the author’s college years, which she spent working at her father’s travel agency, going clubbing and going out for drinks (with potential lovers, friends and family, especially her dad).

There’s a deeper story about the weight of secrets and the damage they cause, but it’s buried under everything else. Allen talks about the inappropriate relationships she’s had through out her life, but sees nothing wrong with it. I honestly felt bad for her mother. The poor woman is treated horribly and the author mentions how heavy she is every time she’s in a sentence. It’s like she really wants you to know this woman was not skinny. At one point I felt like yelling “I get it! Your poor mom’s fat. Shut up!”

The book ends kind of abruptly with the last chapter jumping to 2005 when the author’s father has died. She mentions that she has a partner, worked in fashion and left that to act, and that’s it about her life now.

I won this book through a First Reads giveaway on Goodreads, but all opinions are my own.

Crazy Is My Superpower: How I Triumphed by Breaking Bones, Breaking Hearts, and Breaking the Rules by A.J. Mendez Brooks

I really enjoyed this book! I liked A.J. a lot when she was in WWE (where she competed as AJ Lee) and she came across as a great person outside of wrestling as well. The book talks about what her life was like before, during and after her career, but most of the focus is on her life with her family and how mental health and instability has effected her throughout her life.
She discusses growing up poor with parents who got evicted a lot, moved the family around constantly and didn’t really know how to care for their children. I felt bad for her and I’m happy that she made it through that.  The parts about her mother’s bipolar disorder (and eventually her own) were sad.
I loved learning about how A.J. got into wrestling and about her being on the NXT TV show. I had no idea that she had actually been around for a while before then. It was fun to get the inside scoop on the storylines from back then involving Kane, Daniel Bryan and CM Punk. Also, the way she talks about Punk makes me smile.
I think A.J. can be an inspiration to young girls because she overcame the odds (lots of them) and became successful. I would recommend this book to fans of AJ Lee, fans of pro wrestling and people who like to read about girls who kick butt.
Disclaimer: I was provided with a complimentary copy of this book by Blogging for Books so I could give an honest review.

Review of Venomous by Christopher Krovatin

Venomous is another one of my Dollar Tree finds. This one is about a boy named Locke Vinetti who lives in New York with his mother and little brother. He suffers from intense anger issues that he refers to as “angries” at first and then renames his anger “The Venom” after the Spiderman villain. The book follows his struggle to live a normal life despite the fact that he feels like he has a creature living inside of him waiting to destroy his life.

His best friend, Randall, introduces him to his friends, their tarot club and a pretty goth girl named Renee. Things seem to finally be looking up for him but it doesn’t last long. The book deals with mental illness, drinking, medications, therapy, family issues, anger management, love, friendship and death. It also has lots of swearing and has some sex, so this isn’t for younger kids.

I like that each chapter starts off with a drawing that’s a page from a graphic novel with a bit of story and it’s supposed to be one that Locke is writing. Even though the book can be pretty dark at times, it ends with a hopeful scene. The other thing that I like about the book is that it doesn’t make the idea of taking pills (like Zoloft) or seeing a therapist a weakness. Even though the characters themselves might have some issues with it, their friends don’t.

Review of Shut Up and Give Me the Mic by Dee Snider

I got Shut Up and Give Me the Mic because I like a few Twisted Sister songs and I like Dee Snider’s movie Strangeland. The fact that I found it at the Dollar Tree didn’t hurt. I wanted to learn more about how Twisted Sister got their start, which I did, but parts of the book were really boring. I had to make myself keep reading at some points. It’s refreshing to read about a rocker who didn’t do crack, didn’t drink a bottle of gin every night or sleep with every groupie available. That part was cool, but he had/has a huge ego (which he’ll mention repeatedly). It also ends sort of abruptly.

The book covers Dee’s career with local New York bands until he eventually ends up in Twisted Sister and everything took off from there. He met his wife, TS got a following and they got a record deal. Dee explains how things like royalties, making/promoting albums and tours really work and how much money the band actually gets, which is good information for anyone in a band. He also mentions all of the milestones he missed with his first son: most of his wife’s pregnancy, his son’s first steps, his first words, etc, because he was out on the road. You can tell how much he really loves his family and I liked that part.

After living the high life for so many years and then having the last Twisted Sister album and tour fail miserably and making some less than wise business decisions, Dee had to file for bankruptcy two different times. He lost just about everything except for his family and his wife’s hot pink jeep. Trying to pull himself back out of the hole was a humbling experience and it seemed to really open his eyes.  Then the book just ended! He mentions that to learn about what it was like for him to make Strangeland you’ll have to read his next book, but I don’t want to!