Review: Stars Above (The Lunar Chronicles #4.5)

Author: Marissa Meyer
Goodreads Rating: 4.38
Pages: 369

The enchantment continues....

The universe of the Lunar Chronicles holds stories—and secrets—that are wondrous, vicious, and romantic. How did Cinder first arrive in New Beijing? How did the brooding soldier Wolf transform from young man to killer? When did Princess Winter and the palace guard Jacin realize their destinies?

With nine stories—five of which have never before been published—and an exclusive never-before-seen excerpt from Marissa Meyer’s upcoming novel, Heartless, about the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland, Stars Above is essential for fans of the bestselling and beloved Lunar Chronicles.

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The Little Android: A retelling of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid,” set in the world of The Lunar Chronicles.
Glitches: In this prequel to Cinder, we see the results of the plague play out, and the emotional toll it takes on Cinder. Something that may, or may not, be a glitch….
The Queen’s Army: In this prequel to Scarlet, we’re introduced to the army Queen Levana is building, and one soldier in particular who will do anything to keep from becoming the monster they want him to be.
Carswell’s Guide to Being Lucky: Thirteen-year-old Carswell Thorne has big plans involving a Rampion spaceship and a no-return trip out of Los Angeles.
The Keeper: A prequel to the Lunar Chronicles, showing a young Scarlet and how Princess Selene came into the care of Michelle Benoit.
After Sunshine Passes By: In this prequel to Cress, we see how a nine-year-old Cress ended up alone on a satellite, spying on Earth for Luna.
The Princess and the Guard: In this prequel to Winter, we see a game called The Princess
The Mechanic: In this prequel to Cinder, we see Kai and Cinder’s first meeting from Kai’s perspective.
Something Old, Something New: In this epilogue to Winter, friends gather for the wedding of the century...

Review: Splintered (Splintered #1)

Author: A.G. Howard
Goodreads Rating: 3.98
Pages: 371

This stunning debut captures the grotesque madness of a mystical under-land, as well as a girl’s pangs of first love and independence.

Alyssa Gardner hears the whispers of bugs and flowers—precisely the affliction that landed her mother in a mental hospital years before. This family curse stretches back to her ancestor Alice Liddell, the real-life inspiration for Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Alyssa might be crazy, but she manages to keep it together. For now.

When her mother’s mental health takes a turn for the worse, Alyssa learns that what she thought was fiction is based in terrifying reality. The real Wonderland is a place far darker and more twisted than Lewis Carroll ever let on. There, Alyssa must pass a series of tests, including draining an ocean of Alice’s tears, waking the slumbering tea party, and subduing a vicious bandersnatch, to fix Alice’s mistakes and save her family. She must also decide whom to trust: Jeb, her gorgeous best friend and secret crush, or the sexy but suspicious Morpheus, her guide through Wonderland, who may have dark motives of his own.

Review: Last Ever After (School for Good and Evil #3)

Author: Soman Chainani
Goodreads Rating: 4.40
Pages: 655

In the epic conclusion to Soman Chainani’s New York Times bestselling series, The School for Good and Evil, everything old is new again as Sophie and Agatha fight the past as well as the present to find the perfect end to their story.

As A World Without Princes closed, the end was written and former best friends Sophie and Agatha went their separate ways. Agatha was whisked back to Gavaldon with Tedros and Sophie stayed behind with the beautiful young School Master.

But as they settle into their new lives, their story begs to be re-written, and this time, theirs isn’t the only one. With the girls apart, Evil has taken over and the villains of the past have come back to change their tales and turn the world of Good and Evil upside down.

Readers around the world are eagerly awaiting the third book in The School for Good and Evil series, The Last Ever After. This extraordinary conclusion delivers more action, adventure, laughter, romance and fairy tale twists and turns than you could ever dream of!

Review: Winter

Author: Marissa Meyer
Goodreads Rating: 4.54
Pages: 824

Princess Winter is admired by the Lunar people for her grace and kindness, and despite the scars that mar her face, her beauty is said to be even more breathtaking than that of her stepmother, Queen Levana.

Winter despises her stepmother, and knows Levana won’t approve of her feelings for her childhood friend—the handsome palace guard, Jacin. But Winter isn’t as weak as Levana believes her to be and she’s been undermining her stepmother’s wishes for years. Together with the cyborg mechanic, Cinder, and her allies, Winter might even have the power to launch a revolution and win a war that’s been raging for far too long.

Can Cinder, Scarlet, Cress, and Winter defeat Levana and find their happily ever afters?

Review: Fairest (Lunar Chronicles #3.5)

Author: Marissa Meyer
Goodreads Rating: 4.04
Pages: 220

In this stunning bridge book between Cress and Winter in the bestselling Lunar Chronicles, Queen Levana’s story is finally told.

Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Who is the fairest of them all?

Fans of the Lunar Chronicles know Queen Levana as a ruler who uses her “glamour” to gain power. But long before she crossed paths with Cinder, Scarlet, and Cress, Levana lived a very different story – a story that has never been told . . . until now.

Marissa Meyer spins yet another unforgettable tale about love and war, deceit and death. This extraordinary book includes full-color art and an excerpt from Winter, the next book in the Lunar Chronicles series.

Waiting on Wedneday #2

(Brought to you by our friends at Breaking the Spine)

Author: Betsy Cornwell

Goodreads Rating: 3.84

Pages: 304

Release Date: August 25, 2015

Nicolette’s awful stepsisters call her “Mechanica” to demean her, but the nickname fits: she learned to be an inventor at her mother’s knee. Her mom is gone now, though, and the Steps have turned her into a servant in her own home.

But on her sixteenth birthday, Nicolette discovers a secret workshop in the cellar and begins to dare to imagine a new life for herself. Could the mysterious books and tools hidden there—and the mechanical menagerie, led by a tiny metal horse named Jules—be the key to escaping her dreary existence? With a technological exposition and royal ball on the horizon, the timing might just be perfect for Nicolette to earn her freedom at last.

Gorgeous prose and themes of social justice and family shine in this richly imagined Cinderella retelling about an indomitable inventor who finds her prince . . . but realizes she doesn't want a fairy tale happy ending after all.

Top 10 Fairytale Retellings

(Top Ten Tuesday brought to you by The Broke and the Bookish)

Time for another Top 10 Tuesday and I absolutely LOVE this week's topic!!! I'm going to divide this into two sections: 1-6 are my favorite retellings and 7-10 are retellings I want to read. Enjoy!

My Favorite Retellings

 1. Cinder (The Lunar Chronicles #1) by Marissa Meyer
Duh this is my number 1 :) I am only completely in love with the whole series and it is probably one of my favorite retellings ever! Retelling Cinderella, Red Riding Hood, and Rapunzel so far (With Snow White coming in November ;) )

2. Stitching Snow by R.C. Lewis
Another sci-fi retelling of Snow White that keeps pretty close to the original Snow White (as opposed to the Disney-fied version). Really enjoyed it and it is one of my favorite retellings :) I absolutely love Essie and Dane!



3. The School for Good and Evil (#1) by Soman Chainani
Another great retelling with a twist. Kids are kidnapped brought to a school for training the princes/princesses and villains of popular stories. Absolutely love this series :)

4. The Stepsister Scheme by Jim C. Hines
A retelling geared toward adults that is a cross between some popular princesses (Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White) with Charlie's Angels. Now, it's the princesses turn to save the prince from Cinderella's horrid stepsisters. These princesses kick some major booty!

5. Grim edited by Christine Johnson
This is a collection of short story retellings by a bunch of popular YA authors like Julie Kagawa and Claudia Grey. All stories are inspired by different Grimm fairy tales (and I highly recommend reading the originals to compare to the retellings). I really enjoyed reading the multitude of different stories. Some took a fantasy spin, some took a sci-fi spin, and some just took the original story in more detail. There was something for everyone :)

6. Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge
A great retelling of Beauty and the Beast. I really enjoyed the relationship between Nyx and Ignifex from beginning to end. It also had a lot of the elements from the Disney version in it :) And this was actually an ending that was, as I described, "cute as a baby bunny" :)

Retellings I Want To Read
7. A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
A retelling of Beauty and the Beast with some Faerie lore mixed in. A retelling of my favorite fairytale, by one of my favorite authors? YES PLEASE!

8. Splintered by A.G. Howard
This has been on my TBR list for a while and I'm still super excited for this Alice in Wonderland retelling :) Good thing I have both this book and it's sequel.

9. Beastly by Alex Flinn
I've heard so many good things about this book! It's a retelling of my favorite fairytale that I'm even surprised at myself for not reading this yet. I'm going to have to get on this....

10. The Great Hunt by Wendy Higgins
Again... another Beauty and the Beast retelling :) I've seen this on a number of WoW's and am so excited to dive into this!!

So tell us.... what are your favorite retellings?? :)

Cruel Beauty

Author: Rosamund Hodge
Goodreads rating: 3.78
Pages: 342
Format: ARC

Graceling meets Beauty and the Beast in this sweeping fantasy about one girl's journey to fulfill her destiny and the monster who gets in her way-by stealing her heart.

Based on the classic fairy tale Beauty and the Beast, Cruel Beauty is a dazzling love story about our deepest desires and their power to change our destiny.

Since birth, Nyx has been betrothed to the evil ruler of her kingdom-all because of a foolish bargain struck by her father. And since birth, she has been in training to kill him.

With no choice but to fulfill her duty, Nyx resents her family for never trying to save her and hates herself for wanting to escape her fate. Still, on her seventeenth birthday, Nyx abandons everything she's ever known to marry the all-powerful, immortal Ignifex. Her plan? Seduce him, destroy his enchanted castle, and break the nine-hundred-year-old curse he put on her people.

But Ignifex is not at all what Nyx expected. The strangely charming lord beguiles her, and his castle-a shifting maze of magical rooms-enthralls her.

As Nyx searches for a way to free her homeland by uncovering Ignifex's secrets, she finds herself unwillingly drawn to him. Even if she could bring herself to love her sworn enemy, how can she refuse her duty to kill him? With time running out, Nyx must decide what is more important: the future of her kingdom, or the man she was never supposed to love.

Cress (The Lunar Chronicles #3)

Author: Marissa Meyer
Goodreads rating: 4.49
Pages: 550
Format: Final Copy

In this third book in the Lunar Chronicles, Cinder and Captain Thorne are fugitives on the run, now with Scarlet and Wolf in tow. Together, they’re plotting to overthrow Queen Levana and her army.

Their best hope lies with Cress, a girl imprisoned on a satellite since childhood who's only ever had her netscreens as company. All that screen time has made Cress an excellent hacker. Unfortunately, she’s just received orders from Levana to track down Cinder and her handsome accomplice.

When a daring rescue of Cress goes awry, the group is separated. Cress finally has her freedom, but it comes at a high price. Meanwhile, Queen Levana will let nothing prevent her marriage to Emperor Kai. Cress, Scarlet, and Cinder may not have signed up to save the world, but they may be the only hope the world has.

Doon

Author: Carey Corp and Laurie Langdon
Goodreads Rating: 4.15
Pages: 368
Format: ARC from ALA13

DOON…

Veronica doesn't think she's going crazy. But why can't anyone else see the mysterious blond boy who keeps popping up wherever she goes? When her best friend, Mackenna, invites her to spend the summer in Scotland, Veronica jumps at the opportunity to leave her complicated life behind for a few months.

But the Scottish countryside holds other plans.

Not only has the imaginary kilted boy followed her to Alloway, she and Mackenna uncover a strange set of rings and a very unnerving letter from Mackenna's great aunt—and when the girls test the instructions Aunt Gracie left behind, they find themselves transported to a land that defies explanation. Doon seems like a real-life fairy tale, complete with one prince who has eyes for Mackenna and another who looks suspiciously like the boy from Veronica's daydreams. But Doon has a dark underbelly as well. The two girls could have everything they've longed for...or they could end up breaking an enchantment and find themselves trapped in a world that has become a nightmare.

DOON is loosely based on the premise of the musical Brigadoon, with permission from the Alan Jay Lerner Estate and the Frederick Loewe Foundation. Follow the journey at http://www.DoonSeries.com

~Destiny awaits!

Towering (Kendra Chronicles #3)

Author: Alex Flinn
Goodreads Rating: 3.69
Pages: 304
Format: ARC from YA Book Exchange

At first, I merely saw his face, his hands on the window ledge. Then, his whole body as he swung himself through the window. Only I could not see what he swung on.Until, one day, I told my dream self to look down. And it was then that I saw. He had climbed on a rope. I knew without asking that the rope had been one of my own tying.
Rachel is trapped in a tower, held hostage by a woman she’s always called Mama. Her golden hair is growing rapidly, and to pass the time, she watches the snow fall and sings songs from her childhood, hoping someone, anyone, will hear her. 
Wyatt needs time to reflect or, better yet, forget about what happened to his best friend, Tyler. That’s why he’s been shipped off to the Adirondacks in the dead of winter to live with the oldest lady in town. Either that, or no one he knows ever wants to see him again.
Dani disappeared seventeen years ago without a trace, but she left behind a journal that’s never been read, not even by her overbearing mother…until now. 
A #1 New York Times bestselling author, Alex Flinn knows her fairy tales, and Towering is her most mind-bending interpretation yet. Dark and mysterious, this reimagining of Rapunzel will have readers on the edge of their seats wondering where Alex will take them next!

Scarlet (The Lunar Chronicals #2)

Author: Marissa Meyer
Goodreads Rating: 4.46
Pages: 454
Format: ARC

Cinder returns in the second thrilling installment of the New York Times-bestselling Lunar Chronicles. She’s trying to break out of prison—even though if she succeeds, she’ll be the Commonwealth’s most wanted fugitive.

Halfway around the world, Scarlet Benoit’s grandmother is missing. It turns out there are many things Scarlet doesn’t know about her grandmother and the grave danger she has lived in her whole life. When Scarlet encounters Wolf, a street fighter who may have information as to her grandmother’s whereabouts, she has no choice but to trust him, though he clearly has a few dark secrets of his own.

As Scarlet and Wolf work to unravel one mystery, they find another when they cross paths with Cinder. Together, they must stay one step ahead of the vicious Lunar Queen who will do anything to make Prince Kai her husband, her king, her prisoner.

Cinder

Author: Marissa Meyer
Goodreads Rating: 4.04
Pages: 390
Format: Purchased Harcover

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. . . .

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

The Time Will Come #7

The Time Will Come is a meme hosted by Jodie over at Books for Company. I keep wanting to call this This Too Shall Pass, but alas, that is not the name, but the concept is the same. These are books that I really want to read but just haven't gotten around to.