Monday, 30 November 2009

Killer: A Pretty Little Liars Novel - Sara Shepard

Killer: A Pretty Little Liars Novel - Sara Shepard

Pages: 323
Publisher: Harper Teen
Release Date: 1st July 2009

Other Titles in this Series: Pretty Little Liars, Flawless, Perfect, Unbelievable (my review), Wicked (my review), Heartless (19/01/10), Wanted (29/06/10)

In picture-perfect Rosewood, Pennsylvania, ash-blond highlights gleam in the winter sun and frozen lakes sparkle like Swarovski crystals. But pictures often lie - and so do Rosewood’s four prettiest girls.

Hanna, Aria, Spencer and Emily have been lying ever since they became friends with beautiful Alison DiLaurentis. Ali made them do terrible things - things they had to keep secret for years. And even though Ali was killed at the end of seventh grade, their bad-girl ways didn’t die with her.

Hanna’s on a mission to corrupt Rosewood’s youth, starting with a very attractive sophomore. Aria’s snooping in her boyfriend’s past. Spencer’s stealing - from her family. And pure little Emily’s abstaining from abstinence.

The girls should be careful, though. They thought they were safe when Ali’s killer was arrested and A’s true identity was finally revealed. But now there’s a new A in town turning up the heat. And this time Rosewood is going to burn.

Killer is the sixth book in the Pretty Little Liars series, and this one definitely isn’t my favourite of them.

This instalment of the series made my love for these books waver. I have to admit that it pretty much annoyed me and I got a little bit fed up. It seemed to get a tad repetitive. Aria falling for inappropriate guys, Spencer getting tangled in lies and mistakes, Emily having serious girl/boy issues and Hanna battling to be Queen Bee. It’s been that way since the first book.

A was the only one that wasn’t the same. He/she seemed to have a new agenda, focused less on the girls’ exploits and didn’t play such a large part in Killer. A’s texts and emails brought up so many new questions and answered hardly any of them.

But any ill will I had towards Killer had evaporated by the last few shocking chapters. Sara Shepard really does know how to deliver an explosive cliffhanger! I was left staring blankly with shock and confusion for a good five minutes after turning the last page of Killer.

After Killer’s shock ending, I’ll be reading book seven, Heartless, as soon as it’s released next January. I will definitely be seeing this series through to the end, if only to find out what’s really going on!

Sophie
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Sunday, 29 November 2009

In My Mailbox 41

This meme was started by the fabulous Kristi who was inspired by Alea. If you want more information check out their blogs. All summaries are from the book jackets.

Beautiful - Amy Reed

This is what I am now.

When Cassie moves from the tiny town where she has always lived to a suburb of Seattle, she is determined to leave her boring girl existence behind. This is Cassie’s chance to stop being invisible and become the kind of girl who’s worth noticing.

Stepping into her new identity turns out to be easier than Cassie could have ever imagined…one moment, one choice, changes everything.

Cassie’s new existence both thrills and terrifies her. Swept into a world of illicit parties and social land mines, she sheds her virginity, embraces the numbness she feels from the drugs, and floats through it all, knowing that she is now called beautiful. She ignores the dangers of her fast-paced life…but she can’t sidestep the secrets and the cruelty.

Cassie is trapped in a swift downward spiral tinged with violence and abuse, and no one - not even the one person she thought she could trust - can help her now.

A contest win from the fabulous Kristi via Simon and Schuster US. Thank you both!

Sophie
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Saturday, 28 November 2009

2010 100+ Reading Challenge

I’ve signed up for my second reading challenge in a week! The 2010 100+ Reading Challenge is a challenge I’ve attempted every year since I was about thirteen, so I thought I’d make it official this year! You can sign up and read more about the challenge at J. Kaye’s Book Blog here. Here are the rules of the challenge:


“1. The goal is to read 100 or more books. Anyone can join. You don't need a blog to participate. --Non-Bloggers: Post your list of books in the comment section of the wrap-up post. To learn how to sign up without having a blog, click here.

2. Audio, Re-reads, eBooks, YA, Library books, Young Reader, Nonfiction – as long as the book has an ISBN or equivalent or can be purchased as such, the book counts.

3. No need to list your books in advance. You may select books as you go. Even if you list them now, you can change the list if needed.

4. Crossovers from other reading challenges count.

5. Challenge begins January 1st thru December, 2010. Books started before the 1st do not count.”


Here is my list, to be filled in as I go:
January
7. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy (for college, no review)
32. The Last Song - Nicholas Sparks
33. Swapped by a Kiss - Luisa Plaja
34. Kiss of Death: The Morganville Vampires
35. Drawing with Light - Julia Green
36. Never Bite a Boy on the First Date - Tamara Summers
37. Runaway - Meg Cabot
38. Radiant Shadows - Melissa Marr
39. The Keeper's Daughter - Gill Arbuthnott
40. Spirit Bound: A Vampire Academy Novel - Richelle Mead
41. Della Says: OMG! - Keris Stainton
42. Dido - Adele Geras
43. Dear Dylan - Siobhan Curham
44. The Moonstone Legacy - Diana de Gunzburg and Tony Wild
45. The Red Pyramid - Rick Riordan
46. The Sky is Everywhere - Jandy Nelson
47. The Last Summer of the Death Warriors - Francisco X. Stork
48. The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner - Stephenie Meyer
49. A Most Improper Magick - Stephanie Burgis
50. Forbidden - Tabitha Suzuma
51. My Name is Memory - Ann Brashares
52. Sweethearts: Star-Crossed - Jo Cotterill
53. Seriously Sassy - Maggi Gibson
54. Spirit Hunter - Katy Moran
55. Low Red Moon - Ivy Devlin
56. Withering Tights - Louise Rennison
57. The Other Countess - Eve Edwards
58. Fortune - Megan Cole
59. The Avenger - PC Cast
60. The Runaway Troll - Matt Haig
61. Blood Feud - Alyxandra Harvey
62. iBoy - Kevin Brooks
63. Passing Strange - Daniel Waters
64. Pictures of Lily - Paige Toon
65. Rules of Attraction - Simone Elkeles
66. Going Too Far - Jennifer Echols
67. Sing Me to Sleep - Angela Morrison
68. The Iron Daughter - Julie Kagawa
69. Amy and Roger's Epic Detour - Morgan Matson
70. Linger - Maggie Stiefavter
71. Troy High - Shana Norris
72. Glee: The Beginning - Sophia Lowell
73. Will Grayson, Will Grayson - John Green and David Levithan
74. Clockwork Angel - Cassnadra Clare
75. My Desperate Love Diary - Liz Rettig
76. The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins (re-read, no review)
77. Catching Fire - Suzanne Collins (re-read, no review)
78. The Eternal Ones - Kirsten Miller
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Friday, 27 November 2009

Featured on Friday: Lucy Christopher

Lucy Christopher was born in Wales but grew up in Australia. Lucy moved back to the UK to do her degree and is now doing her PhD. Stolen is her first novel.

1. Is there a specific time or place that you do your best writing in?
I now have my own office to write in, which is absolutely lovely! I have a huge desk covered with lots of papers and a vase of carnations - just perfect! I tend to take quite a while to get into writing most days as I have a terrible tendency to faff about with writing emails and making coffee and procrastinating! So, I guess my best time to write would be the afternoon once I’ve got all my faffing out the way. I also really like to pen down ideas when I am on a long journey on a plane or a train!

2. Who were your favourite authors as a teenager? Are they different to your current favourites?
A lot of my favourite authors from when I was a teenager are the same as the ones I have now, funnily enough.

My family moved to Australia not long before I started high school. I was a really small Welsh kid and I didn’t fit in. So I took solace in the (air-conditioned) school library and in Mrs Adamson, our librarian. Mrs Adamson was a jolly roly-poly smiley lady and, perhaps because she felt sorry for me and could see that I didn’t fit in, she took pity on me and found me lots of books to read. And she chose really exciting books. Books that I had never read before in Wales, or even heard of. Books that were mostly about Australia. The best thing Mrs Adamson did for me was to introduce me to Australian teen fiction. I still love Australian teen fiction, with my particular favourites being John Marsden and Sonya Hartnett. When I was 13 and 14, I used to be pen pals with John Marsden and I thought he was the most amazing author in the world! Now, fifteen years later, he wrote the quote on the cover of the Australian edition of Stolen!
I have picked up a few new favourite authors along the way though. It was a happy day indeed when I discovered Tim Winton (another Aussie author, though writes for adults), and I also really love David Almond!

3. If you were only allowed to take three books to a desert island, what would they be?
Just three? Oh, too hard! Well, I’d have to take a really fat book of short stories that I can dip into when I have different mood swings on my island (preferably a collection with lots of Hemingway and Carver and Poe!) Then I think I’d like to take a field guide to all the flora and fauna on the island so that I can keep studying and learning while I was there. And thirdly, it would have to be a thick blank writing journal so that I can write my own novel there!

4. What inspired you to tell Gemma and Ty’s stories?
It started with the place. I wanted to write a story that was set in the outback, in Australia. It’s a much maligned landscape that’s got some seriously bad press over the years. It is also a landscape of extremes. I needed an extreme subject matter to echo the extreme landscape that I wanted to write about. I thought that kidnapping seemed like a pretty extreme subject matter to tackle. However, I knew that my kidnapper couldn’t be your regular stereotypical kind of kidnapper. He had a to a kidnapper, and a person, with conflicting aspects in his personality; a character of contrasts ... just like the landscape he had come from. Once I’d worked this out, then the characters of Ty and Gemma seemed to come pretty easily to me.

5. The Australian outback is such a harsh, but beautiful place. Why did you choose to set Stolen there?
Oh, for so many reasons! This landscape has fascinated me for such a long time now. I love this landscape: it’s beautiful and restorative and the most fertile desert environment in the world. I love the indigenous cultures that are entwined with it. But, like Gemma, I also find this landscape terrifying. And, like Gemma, it’s not a landscape I am overly familiar with (I grew up in a country town in Wales and then in a suburb of Melbourne). When I first saw the Australian outback, I thought it was open and hot and dangerous. I knew that if I got lost in it, I would die.

I’ve also long been fascinated by the way that this landscape has been portrayed in earlier Australian children’s literature, Australian art and in media reports. It’s been reported as a landscape where backpackers get murdered, dingoes steal babies and children get lost. It’s a horror landscape, and yet it is also a beautiful and spiritual landscape at the same time. I wanted readers to question their thoughts about a wild and isolated landscape; to think about whether it’s really as awful as they first assume.

This landscape of love and fear, beauty and terror, echoes perfectly the way Gemma feels for Ty.

6. As I read Stolen I found myself liking and empathising with Ty even though I knew I shouldn’t. Was this your intention?
Yes. I wanted to place the reader in a similar position to how Gemma felt for Ty. As Gemma started to change her perception of him, I wanted the reader to also. In this way, I wanted the reader to question their initial assumptions about what is right and wrong, and wanted the reader to experience a kind of Stockholm Syndrome first hand too!

7. Kidnapping is such a controversial issue, and at first I was hesitant about reading Stolen. Were you ever worried that it may put people off?
A little! It was weird actually. As I started to write Stolen, all these kidnap cases came up! However, I kinda thought (hoped) it might work in my favour!

8. Are you working on anything at the moment? Can you tell us anything about it?
I have just delivered a book called Flyaway, which is totally different to Stolen. It’s about a girl called Isla and her relationship with a sick boy and a flightless swan. It’s happier than Stolen in a way, and I do hope the fans like it! Then after that book, I’m going to write another teen thriller!

Thank you very much, Lucy! You can visit Lucy on her website here and read my review of Stolen here.

Sophie
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Thursday, 26 November 2009

2010 Debut Author Challenge

Next year I am going to be taking part in my first challenge: The 2010 Debut Author Challenge, hosted by Kristi of The Story Siren. You can read more information about the challenge here, but here are the basics:

“What is the 2010 Debut Author Challenge?
The objective is to read a set number of YA (Young Adult) or MG (Middle Grade) novels from debut authors published this year. I'm going to challenge everyone to read at least 12 debut novels! I’m hoping to read at least 30! You don’t have to list your choices right away, but if you do feel free to change them throughout the year. I will also be focusing on mostly Young Adult novels.

Anyone can join, you don’t need a blog to participate. If you don’t have a blog you can always share your views by posting a review on
Amazon.com/BarnesandNoble.com/GoodReads/Shelfari, or any other bookish site.

The challenge will run from January 1, 2010- December 31, 2010. You can join at anytime!”

I will add to the list as I read them.
Sophie
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