Posts Tagged "Romance"

“Vanessa Sands is afraid of the dark. And heights. And the ocean. Fortunately for Vanessa, her sister Justine has always been there to comfort her. That is until the final moment when Justine plummets to her death during an ill-timed leap near the family’s vacation home in Winter Harbor. Everyone assumes that Justine’s death was accidental. Everyone except Vanessa. She is determined to uncover the truth.

Then another body washes up on the beach. And another….All of them men, grinning from ear to ear.

The deaths bring to the surface the root of Vanessa’s fears, and the secret she has kept for years. As the body count rises, Vanessa begins to realize who she really is…”

We’re no stranger to mythical creatures in young adult fiction, but sirens have mostly been an untouched topic. A topic our protagonist Vanessa Sands didn’t think she’d have to touch on either until the mysterious death of her older sister Justine.

Fearless Justine has always been a bit of a thrill seeker, and diving off Chione Cliff was always a favorite thrill when they visited Winter Harbor every year in the summer. Ever since a near drowning years earlier, Vanessa hasn’t been able to find the courage to head back into the water. Justine’s adventure seeking takes a turn for the worse when her jump off the cliff goes wrong and she loses her life to the water below. At least that’s what we’re lead to believe.

Vanessa doesn’t believe it was just an accident and returns to Winter Harbor to find some answers. She uncovers more than she bargains for when she realizes not just her sister’s true feelings, but also who Vanessa really is, and nothing will ever be the same. Not only that but there’s the mysterious Marchand family and Vanessa’s growing attraction to a childhood friend.

You might think you’ve got this novel all figured out. It’s about a bunch of mermaids with homicidal tendencies, with a bit of a love story thrown in. Wrong. Siren is a compelling mystery that’ll keep you guessing the whole way.

Tricia Rayburn’s writing is engaging as she takes us through the motivation of and background of the sirens as well as the history of Winter Harbor. Siren also has a very coming-of-age feel to the story as Vanessa not only deals with the devastating death of her sister but also uncovers truths about herself, her family and how people see her. She really grows throughout the story and finds the strength and bravery needed to take on the challenges coming her way.

Like all great YA books, there is a romance. I loved the natural development of Vanessa’s relationship with her childhood friend, Simon Carmichael. It was believable and sweet and balanced out the doom of so many murders. Simon is a real weather geek but all that knowledge is put to good use as Winter Harbor’s erratic weather points to forces beyond nature.

Though at first, I was going to give it a lower rating because of so many unanswered questions at the end, I did find out that Siren is the first of either two or three novels, which is definitely exciting. It’s got love, drama, the supernatural, a whole lot of mystery and a cute weather geek – what more could you want?

Pages: 344
Publication Date: July 2010
Rating: :

Teaser Quote: “The man, whoever he was, was dead. Done. Gone. Washed up like a fish.

And when he turned over, his eyes were wide open and his mouth was stretched in a wide smile, like he was happy about it.”

From the author of Saving Juliet comes a romantic comedy that is good to the last drop. When Katrina spots a homeless guy sleeping in the alley behind her grandmother’s coffee shop, she decides to leave him a cup of coffee, a bag of chocolate-covered coffee beans, and some pastries to tide him over. Little does she know that this random act of kindness is about to turn her life upside down.  Because this adorable vagrant, Malcolm, is really a guardian angel on a break between missions. And he won’t leave until he can reward Katrina’s selflessness by fulfilling her deepest desire. Now if only she could decide what that might be . . .

Currently, life sucks for Katrina. Since Java Heaven opened up shop next to her Grandmother’s Scandinavian coffeehouse, business has pretty much come to a screeching halt. The bills are piling up, no customers are walking through the door, and yet Katrina and her grandmother must find a way to make ends meat. Katrina is sixteen years old. She should be worrying about boys, her homework, and what she’s going to do on the weekend. Instead, she gets up before school every morning to work in the coffeehouse, and promptly returns after classes have finished to do much of the same.

To make matters worse, her best male friend, Vincent, starts hanging around with Heidi Darling. Katrina thinks this is bad for many, many reasons, but mainly she’s ticked off because Heidi is Mr Darling’s daughter, and Mr Darling owns Java Heaven – the very reason Katrina and her Gran are struggling so much. Where is Vincent’s loyalty? How could he do that to Katrina?

But that’s not where the crazy ends. Katrina finds a strange boy passed out in the alley behind the coffeehouse one morning. Although she’s a bit freaked out by him, she mistakes him for a homeless person and in an act of pitying kindness, she leaves a coffee and a stale pastry for when he wakes up. But then he keeps showing up, saying that her act of kindness must not go unrewarded, and promises to fulfill her greatest desire. Katrina thinks he’s a nut job at first, but then things start happening that make her think there’s more to this strange boy than meets the eye.

Coffeehouse Angel is a super easy read and I totally dug being in Katrina’s head. When she ached, I ached. When she hurt, I hurt too. But mostly, I was impressed that I didn’t become irritated by her jealousy – and believe me, she spends a good chunk of this novel impersonating the green-eyed monster. Usually, I have little tolerance for such unrelenting self-pity, but I felt like I could empathize with her situation a little. I think all of us have had to deal with the kind of friendship problems Katrina goes through in this story. I was super happy that, at the end, she seemed to learn her lesson, though, and tucked her green-eyed monster impersonation away. I was exceptionally surprised by the outcome of the conflict that arose with Vincent, though. I thought the whole thing was going to turn out very differently. While I’d love to discuss my reasoning for this in this review, that’d be giving away the ending – and we can’t have that!

I drank way too much coffee while reading this novel. Must have been something about the constant mention of Java goodness.

Coffeehouse Angel is a lovely read. As good as red velvet cupcakes, if you ask me.

Pages: 276

Publication: 2009.

Rating::

Teaser Quote: “There’s a handy chart in here. It says the most common thing people ask for is fortune. But Katrina didn’t want that. She gave it to her friend. The second most common thing people ask for is fame.” Lars and Malcolm turned and looked at me. Yep, that’s right, I was still standing there. I don’t know why, I should have left those two idiots in the dust. “Could fame be what you most desire?” Malcolm asked.

Hey guys!

Here is my last review as an official member of yaReads team! Hope you enjoy, it has been a pleasure being here, and I have loved every moment. A big welcome to Christina, and to the forum go-ers, I’ll see you all around there.

Katie.

Jill Jekel has always obeyed her parents’ rules – especially the one about never opening the mysterious old box in her father’s office. But when her dad is murdered and her college savings disappear, this good girl is tempted to peek inside, because the contents just might be key to winning a lucrative chemistry scholarship.

To better her odds, Jill enlists the help of gorgeous, brooding Tristen Hyde, who has his own dark secrets locked away. As the team of Jekel and Hyde, they recreate experiments based on the classic novel, hoping not only to win a prize but also to save Tristen’s sanity. Maybe his life. As things heat up in the lab, though, Jill’s accidental taste of a formula unleashes her darkest nature and will compel her to risk everything – even Tristen’s love – just for the thrill of being…bad.

Jill Jekel has just lost her father to a brutal death. No one knows why. A murder in the dead of the night, no answers to be found by the police. Her mother can’t cope, spiralling downwards into a state of despair. Jill’s life has been turned upside down, with false sympathy on all sides, no one to talk to and no one to understand. Except for the mysterious Tristen Hyde who turns up at her father’s funeral for the soul purpose to comfort Jill. Or so it seems.

For Jill and Tristen are about to get to know each other better than what they ever thought they would. Paired up together to work in secret on an entry into the prestigious Foreman Foundation for the Promotion of Scientific Inquiry national scholarship contest, Jill and Tristen start to discover that their own family history might be closer linked than anyone had ever imagined. Found in the locked box in her father’s study, Jill and Tristen start to work on the secret manuscripts that were part of the hit novel The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. As Tristen starts to let Jill into more of his life, the pair discover that not only is it a matter of winning Jill a scholarship so she can attend college, but it might just be the answer to saving Tristen’s life. Yet as things begin to spiral more out of control, will Jill know when enough is too much?

Jekel Loves Hyde is the second novel from bestselling author Beth Fantaskey, her first novel being the popular Jessica’s Guide to Dating on the Dark Side. Jekel Loves Hyde is something different. Borrowing themes and linking in with the classic novel, I found you didn’t need to know anything about the original to understand the story. It was captivating and intriguing, the plot moving forward from one surprising revelation to the next. Twists that you didn’t originally see coming soon developed into influencing the ending.

Jill and Tristen were also developed characters. They interacted in ways that are real, feeling like they could actually be real people in Fantaskey’s developed world. They faced trials and hardships and overcame them in their own unique way. However, it seems that despite two well-crafted lead characters, Fantaskey lacked development in her supporting characters. Becca, for instance, was weak and difficult to like. Supposedly the best friend to Jill, she never acted like it, and felt like a character that was merely there to create a conflict between Jill and Tristen.

Despite all the merits to Fantaskey’s plot, writing and main characters, I felt that Jekel Loves Hyde another novel aimed at the Twilight loving fans. The danger Jill and Tristen went through seemed too much like a heighted state of ‘life or death’ that they characters had to overcome to be together. It was, at times, difficult to see that the situations they found themselves in would really occur. I found that I needed to convince myself to continue reading, that whenever I put it down, it was difficult to pick it up again.

Pages: 282

Publication date: 2010 – available now

Rating::

Teaser quote: Not daring to believe, I swiped one arm across my eyes and slowly turned my face to his, sucking in my breath at the sight of his open eyes. Astonished not just by the fact that Tristen was alive but by the expression on his face. I heard the wonder, the confusion, in my voice as I dared to say his name. ‘Tristen’?

Love is all you need…or is it?

Penny Lane is sick of boys and sick of dating, so she swears off it all and starts The Lonely Heats Club. What penny doesn’t realise is just how many of her friends feel the same way and want to join her club. Even some girls she’d never have thought would care, want to sign up. Then the unthinkable happens…

So what do you do when you’re the founding member of an anti-dating club and you start to have feelings for a guy who obviously likes you back?

Penny is your average, normal everyday girl. She passes school, has her best friends who are there for her and a family who is normal. Well, normal if you discount the intense love her parents have for the Beatles. So intense, that they named their daughters after their favourite songs, went vegetarian because that’s what Paul McCartney did and refuse to listen to anyone else singing a Beatles song, except the Beatles themselves. And it’s the summer where Penny starts to think that she might get what she wanted. Nate Taylor.

Penny has known Nate since they were five; the Taylor’s are her parent’s longest friends after all. Nate was the only person Penny looked forward to seeing on her summer, her mind fixed on what they could do. This year, there is something more underneath the flirting. There is promise of what might be. Penny is thinking that all her dreams are going to come true. She has finally decided that Nate is the one, that he will be her first. That is until she finds him in the basement with another girl. A girl that is missing quite a few clothes. Suddenly, Penny knows what it is like to have a broken heart. Nate was all she ever wanted, and he lied to her and betrayed her, the one thing he said he would never do. Penny does the only thing she knows how to – turn’s to the Beatles for comfort, and inspiration.

For hanging on her wall is a poster of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Lonely. Hearts. Club. It’s an idea that changes the rest of Penny’s school year. Penny decides that she has had enough. Enough of guys that cheat and lie, enough of getting her heart broken and enough of the jerks that go to McKinley High. She starts a club that has her swearing off guys for the rest of her high school life. No dating, ever. It’s a decision that has her friends thinking she is crazy that is until they decided that they too, want to join.

Before she knows it, Penny’s club is the hottest thing at McKinley. Girls from all grades are want to join, and not always for the right reasons. And as the club gains more popularity, Penny is dancing closer to the edge of the line that could see her lose her best chance at a guy that could actually be right for her. For her decision to stick by the club rules, could not only affect her own life, but those of the people around her.

The Lonely Hearts Club is debut novel from Elizabeth Eulberg, who just like Penny, was sick of having to change herself to get a guy. It was this idea and an experience with a past friend that inspired Eulberg to create the story of The Lonely Hearts Club. It is something different, a romance where the rules have changed. One where friends try to understand who they are, and exactly what they want, not always with the best outcomes. The plot is easily relatable too – who hasn’t thought they found the perfect guy, only to discover that he defiantly wasn’t the perfect boyfriend. Who has lost a best friend to their new boyfriend, someone they haven’t known for long but is suddenly much more important than the friend they have had since year four. It’s a story of a group of friends brought together through the common trait of being single. Yet it is a celebration of finding yourself, of staying true to your friends and discovering that there are the good guys out there, but it might take a while for you to find them.

The characters that Eulberg constructed are instantly likeable, albeit at times a little frustrating. Penny as the founding member makes the most discovery and growth. From someone who doesn’t know who she is or what she wants, she turns into someone that decides exactly what she is going to do. Yet, getting there wasn’t easy, and Penny made her own fair share of mistakes along the way. Tracey provided the comic relief in a way that made you wish you knew her in real life. Tracey was always there, being supportive and knowing the right thing to do, even Penny didn’t know it herself. Diane is the friend that we have all seen, the popular cheerleader whose life all revolves around her boyfriend. That is, until she breaks up with her boyfriend. Diane becomes the second member of The Lonely Hearts Club, and comes to discover exactly what she was missing out on.

The Lonely Hearts Club is one of those easy, enjoyable reads that leaves you feeling good at the end of. A great debut from a promising writer.

Publication date: 2010

Pages: 290

Rating::

Teaser quote: “And, Nate? You kiss like a sobering dog, you have bad breath, and you wouldn’t know how to push the right buttons on a girl if we came with manuals. Happy Thanksgiving, Jackass.”

All right, I am going to be a bigger person starting right now.

Everything that happened this past summer, and every summer before it, has all led up to this. To now.

Every year Isabel spends a perfect summer at her family friends’ house. There’s the swimming pool at night, the private stretch of sandy beach…and the two boys. Unavailable, aloof Conrad – who she’s been in love with forever – and friendly, relaxed Jeremiah, the only one who’s every really paid her any attention.

But this year something is different. They seem to have noticed her for the first time. It’s going to be an amazing summer – and one she’ll never forget…

Isabel has been called Belly for as long as she can remember. As long as she has been coming to the beach house for summer. For her mum and Susannah are best friends, and Susannah owns the beach house. The perfect big house, the pool out the back, the beach, the sun, the surf. During the school year, Belly distracts herself thinking about summer and the beach house. It’s the place that she knows exactly what is going to happen, even if it’s not exactly what she wants to happen.

For also at the beach house is Steve, her annoying older brother, Conrad and Jeremiah, Susannah’s two sons. As much as Belly wishes they would include her, she knows it will never happen, not truly included. The only girl in a group of guys? Yea as if they would include her in their adventures. It’s something Belly has gotten used to. Just like she is used to Susannah cooking the same meal on the first night, her midnight swims and being left alone a nights.

Yet this summer, something seems different. For one, the reaction of Conrad and Jeremiah when she gets out of the car is completely not what she expected. Susannah doesn’t come to meet them, running out the door like always. The mood is different, almost as if everyone else knows something that they aren’t telling her.

Then comes the moment that she has been longing for. An invite to the bonfire that she was always considered too young to go to. It is there that she meets Cam. Cam Cameron. Someone different to everyone else. He doesn’t drink, doesn’t do drugs and can speak Latin and French, even if technically Latin is a dead language. Finally Belly meets someone that she just might be able to forget Conrad with. Someone who tells her that she is beautiful, someone who actually wants her around.

Yet as the summer draws closer to a close, will this really be enough to Belly to move on? Will she be willing to hurt those she loves, to gain what she needs most?

The Summer I Turned Pretty is the second novel from young adult writer Jenny Han, and the first of her novels that I have read. This story captured me, in a way that reminded me of my first love and my teenage years. Growing up and just waiting for the one guy to notice you. It’s a story that I think a lot of people can relate to, both young and old, either going through it currently or remembering what it was like. The Summer I Turned Pretty captures that journey and adventure to find who you are and to be seen as something different to what everyone thinks you are. Reminding me, in style, of Sarah Dessen’s novel Along For The Ride, the characters in Han’s novel are instantly ones you can recognise and connect with. The characters and their actions is what invests you in this novel. You want the best for them; you want everything to end up okay for them.

Belly is a gem. I find reflections of myself in her actions, and things that I wish I had done when I was her age. She has the strength to keep going, to try for something better because she believes the best in everyone. Her relationships with Conrad and Jeremiah and how she deals with her feelings is something that I think we all go through. The confusion of not knowing exactly what someone else thinks of you. Cam was also another breath of fresh air. I wish we had got to see even more of Cam then what was included. Susannah was the mother you wished you had, and Belly’s own mother is that of a typical mother – doing more that her daughter realised at the time.

An element that I really loved was the chance to go back in Belly’s past and see memories from previous summers, and how they created the person that Belly is now.

A beautifully light reading and feel-good novel.

Publication date: 2010

Pages: 288

Rating::

Teaser quote: When it started to get cold, I rubbed my arms, and Cam took off his hoodie and gave it to me. Which, was sort of my dream come true – getting cold and having a guy actually give you his hoodie instead of gloating over how mart he’d been to bring one.