New Release Tuesday #50: August 30, 2016

Hello dear Readers,

This week the sequel of An Ember in the Ashes. A Torch Against the Night by Sabaa Tahir.

Title: A Torch Against the Night

Genre: YA/Fantasy

Author: Sabaa Tahir

Publisher: Razorbill
Publication Date: August 30, 2016

Language: English

Hardcover: 464 pages
Meet the Author: Sabaa Tahir
Buy Me: Amazon

Book Description

THE ASTONISHING SEQUEL TO THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER, AN EMBER IN THE ASHES

"Most Spectacular Sequel" -- Entertainment Weekly Summer 2016 Must List

"Even higher stakes than its predecessor… thrilling..." —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“[An] action-packed, breathlessly paced story.” —Booklist, starred review

"Excellent." —Kirkus Reviews

Elias and Laia are running for their lives. 

Following the events of the Fourth Trial, an army led by Masks hunts the two fugitives as they escape the city of Serra and journey across the vast lands of the Martial Empire.

Laia is determined to break into Kauf—the Empire’s most secure and dangerous prison—and save her brother, whose knowledge of Serric steel is the key to the Scholars' future. And Elias is determined to stay by Laia’s side...even if it means giving up his own chance at freedom. 

But Elias and Laia will have to fight every step of the way if they’re going to outsmart their enemies: the bloodthirsty Emperor Marcus, the merciless Commandant, the sadistic Warden of Kauf, and, most heartbreaking of all, Helene—Elias’s former friend and the Empire’s newest Blood Shrike. 

Helene’s mission is horrifying, unwanted, and clear: find the traitor Elias Veturius and the Scholar slave who helped him escape...and kill them both.

Wendy

New Release Tuesday #49: August 16, 2016

Hello dear Readers,

This week a Memoir, The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo by Amy Schumer.

Title: The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo

Genre: Memoir

Author: Amy Schumer

Publisher: Gallery Books
Publication Date: August 16, 2016

Language: English

Hardcover: 336 pages
Meet the Author: Amy Schumer
Buy Me: Amazon

Book Description

“Amy’s got your back. She’s in your corner. She’s an honesty bomb. And she’s coming for you.”

—Actress Tilda Swinton and Trainwreck co-star

The Emmy Award-winning comedian, actress, writer, and star of Inside Amy Schumer and the acclaimed film Trainwreck has taken the entertainment world by storm with her winning blend of smart, satirical humor. Now, Amy Schumer has written a refreshingly candid and uproariously funny collection of (extremely) personal and observational essays.

In The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo, Amy mines her past for stories about her teenage years, her family, relationships, and sex and shares the experiences that have shaped who she is—a woman with the courage to bare her soul to stand up for what she believes in, all while making us laugh.

Ranging from the raucous to the romantic, the heartfelt to the harrowing, this highly entertaining and universally appealing collection is the literary equivalent of a night out with your best friend—an unforgettable and fun adventure that you wish could last forever. Whether she’s experiencing lust-at-first-sight while in the airport security line, sharing her own views on love and marriage, admitting to being an introvert, or discovering her cross-fit instructor’s secret bad habit, Amy Schumer proves to be a bighearted, brave, and thoughtful storyteller that will leave you nodding your head in recognition, laughing out loud, and sobbing uncontrollably—but only because it’s over.

Wendy

Book Review: A Time of Torment: A Charlie Parker Thriller /Mystery and Thriller /NETGALLEY READ

Hello dear Readers,

Below my book review of A Time of Torment: A Charlie Parker Thriller by John Connolly.

 

Title: A Time of Torment: A Charlie Parker Thriller

Rating: 4/5 Stars

Genre: Mystery and Thrillers

Author: John Connolly

Publisher: Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Publication Date: August 02, 2016

Language: English

Hardcover: 480 pages
Meet the Author: John Connolly
Buy Me: Amazon

Book Description

“Connolly again displays his mastery at combining the hard-boiled with the supernatural.” —Publishers Weekly (starred and boxed review)

Dangerous and driven private investigator Charlie Parker returns in the latest gripping thriller of internationally bestselling author John Connolly’s series, in which ungodly fears haunt a strange and isolated community.

Jerome Burnel was once a hero. He intervened to prevent multiple killings, and in doing so destroyed himself. His life was torn apart. He was imprisoned, brutalized.

But in his final days, with the hunters circling, he tells his story to private detective Charlie Parker. He speaks of the girl who was marked for death, but was saved; of the ones who tormented him, and an entity that hides in a ruined stockade.

Parker is not like other men. He died, and was reborn. He is ready to wage war.

Now he will descend upon a strange, isolated community called the Cut, and face down a force of men who rule by terror, intimidation, and murder.

All in the name of the being they serve. All in the name of the Dead King.

My Thoughts

My first John Connolly book and I liked it. Now I know there are more books in the Charlie Parker Series  and I will eventually read more. For now, I can say I liked the book, the story, and I think the writing is fantastic. The Author has the ability to capture the reader's attention through his writing, the way the story is told. A fast paced read for me and one that I couldn't put down.

Thank you Atria and Netgalley for the copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Wendy

New Release Tuesday #48: August 9, 2016

Hello dear Readers,

This one was released last week, the Newest Oprah Book Club 2016 Selection.

 

From prize-winning, bestselling author Colson Whitehead, a magnificent tour de force chronicling a young slave's adventures as she makes a desperate bid for freedom in the antebellum South.

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead.

Title: It Ends With Us: A Novel 

Genre: Historical Fiction

Author: Colson Whitehead

Publisher: Doubleday
Publication Date: August 2, 2016

Language: English

Hardcover: 320 pages
Meet the Author: Colson Whitehead
Buy Me: Amazon

Book Description

The Newest Oprah Book Club 2016 Selection

 

From prize-winning, bestselling author Colson Whitehead, a magnificent tour de force chronicling a young slave's adventures as she makes a desperate bid for freedom in the antebellum South

Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. Life is hell for all the slaves, but especially bad for Cora; an outcast even among her fellow Africans, she is coming into womanhood—where even greater pain awaits. When Caesar, a recent arrival from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they decide to take a terrifying risk and escape. Matters do not go as planned—Cora kills a young white boy who tries to capture her. Though they manage to find a station and head north, they are being hunted.

In Whitehead’s ingenious conception, the Underground Railroad is no mere metaphor—engineers and conductors operate a secret network of tracks and tunnels beneath the Southern soil. Cora and Caesar’s first stop is South Carolina, in a city that initially seems like a haven. But the city’s placid surface masks an insidious scheme designed for its black denizens. And even worse: Ridgeway, the relentless slave catcher, is close on their heels. Forced to flee again, Cora embarks on a harrowing flight, state by state, seeking true freedom.

Like the protagonist of Gulliver’s Travels, Cora encounters different worlds at each stage of her journey—hers is an odyssey through time as well as space. As Whitehead brilliantly re-creates the unique terrors for black people in the pre–Civil War era, his narrative seamlessly weaves the saga of America from the brutal importation of Africans to the unfulfilled promises of the present day. The Underground Railroad is at once a kinetic adventure tale of one woman’s ferocious will to escape the horrors of bondage and a shattering, powerful meditation on the history we all share.

Wendy

New Release Tuesday #47: August 2, 2016

Hello dear Readers,

This week, the newest, highly anticipated novel from beloved #1 New York Time bestselling author, Colleen Hoover, It Ends With Us: A Novel.

Title: It Ends With Us: A Novel 

Genre: Romance/Contemporary

Author: Colleen Hoover

Publisher: Atria Books
Publication Date: August 2, 2016

Language: English

Paperback: 384 pages
Meet the Author: Colleen Hoover
Buy Me: Amazon

Book Description

The newest, highly anticipated novel from beloved #1 New York Times bestselling author, Colleen Hoover.

Sometimes it is the one who loves you who hurts you the most.

Lily hasn’t always had it easy, but that’s never stopped her from working hard for the life she wants. She’s come a long way from the small town in Maine where she grew up—she graduated from college, moved to Boston, and started her own business. So when she feels a spark with a gorgeous neurosurgeon named Ryle Kincaid, everything in Lily’s life suddenly seems almost too good to be true.

Ryle is assertive, stubborn, maybe even a little arrogant. He’s also sensitive, brilliant, and has a total soft spot for Lily. And the way he looks in scrubs certainly doesn’t hurt. Lily can’t get him out of her head. But Ryle’s complete aversion to relationships is disturbing. Even as Lily finds herself becoming the exception to his “no dating” rule, she can’t help but wonder what made him that way in the first place.

As questions about her new relationship overwhelm her, so do thoughts of Atlas Corrigan—her first love and a link to the past she left behind. He was her kindred spirit, her protector. When Atlas suddenly reappears, everything Lily has built with Ryle is threatened. 

With this bold and deeply personal novel, Colleen Hoover delivers a heart-wrenching story that breaks exciting new ground for her as a writer. Combining a captivating romance with a cast of all-too-human characters, It Ends With Us is an unforgettable tale of love that comes at the ultimate price.

Wendy