Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves

Read the Cover Story at Melissa Walker's blog. Very sexy indeed.

from Amazon:

Product Details

• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Hardcover: 464 pages
• Publisher: Simon Pulse; 1 edition (January 5, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1416986189

Product Description

Love can be a dangerous thing....

Hanna simply wants to be loved. With a head plagued by hallucinations, a medicine cabinet full of pills, and a closet stuffed with frilly, violet dresses, Hanna's tired of being the outcast, the weird girl, the freak. So she runs away to Portero, Texas in search of a new home.

But Portero is a stranger town than Hanna expects. As she tries to make a place for herself, she discovers dark secrets that would terrify any normal soul. Good thing for Hanna, she's far from normal. As this crazy girl meets an even crazier town, only two things are certain: Anything can happen and no one is safe.

I was very impressed with this book. It has been a long time since I read something so unique. Not only the character of Hanna, being biracial and manic depressive, but also with the town of Portero--the monsters, the Mortmaine. It was such a fun read; dark, sexy, daring and sometimes frightening, Reeves definitely brought sexy back to YA.

"Waiting on" Wednesday: Week 1

WOW is hosted by Breaking The Spine. This is my first time participating but I'll be doing it from now on :)

My first week's pick is DEAD IN THE FAMILY by Charlaine Harris. Release date: May 4th 2010

(some sources say May 27th, but I'm going by Amazon)

I am a big Sookie Stackhouse fan and in many ways, Charlaine's Southern Vampire Mysteries were the books that kick-started my own writing venture.

Product Details Hardcover: 320 pages Publisher: Ace Hardcover (May 4, 2010) Language: English ISBN-10: 0441018645 ISBN-13: 978-0441018642 After careful searching (nobody seemed to have a synopsis), I came across True Blood Online, and snagged us the following: Dead In The Family is the title of the 10th Sookie Stackhouse book by Charlaine Harris. On September 1 Mrs. Harris wrote on her blog: I finished DEAD IN THE FAMILY Sunday, the last possible day I could finish it. My friend Toni is reading it now, and then I’ll send it to my editor, Ginjer. The concept of DITF was originally quite different from the book I ended up writing, but that often happens and doesn’t quite scare me like it used to. At first I thought DITF would be very episodic; it turned out to have a unifying theme and to have a crazy night of resolution. Of course, this may change once my editor has a read! By the time I send a book in to New York, I hate it. Maybe I hate DITF a little less than others. I don’t know if that’s good or bad. Finishing a book is like coming up out of deep water. It’s a relief just to breathe and look around and return to the land of the living. I’ve had a long list of things that needed to be done, and now I have time to do them. Let’s wait and see what the editor will say about it… in the meantime there is already a synopsis of Dead In The Family available on the internet. Sookie Stackhouse has finally settled into a relationship with the Viking vampire Eric, and her errant brother Jason seems to have his life in order, too. But all the other people in Sookie’s life – Eric himself, her former lover Bill, her friend and boss Sam – are having family problems. Eric’s maker shows up with Eric’s ‘brother’ in tow, the ailing Bill can only be healed by a blood sibling, and Sam’s brother’s marriage is about to take place …or will it? The furor raised by the coming out of the two-natured has yet to settle; some people are just not ready to sit down to dinner with a man who turns into a dog. And Sookie herself is still recovering from her last ordeal. She’s definitely improving, physically and mentally, but she’s always going to have some dark moments now. The werewolves tell her that there have been strange and ominous passers-by in the Stackhouse woods; now Sookie is about to come face-to-face with one of her more distant relatives …

Splendor

Product Details Reading level: Young Adult Hardcover: 400 pages Publisher: HarperCollins; 1 edition (October 27, 2009) Language: English ISBN-10: 0061626317 ISBN-13: 978-0061626319 Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.8 x 1.5 inches

Product Description from Amazon

New beginnings.

Shocking revelations.

Unexpected endings.

A spring turns into summer, Elizabeth relishes her new role as a young wife, while her sister, Diana, searches for adventure abroad. But when a surprising clue about their father's death comes to light, the Holland girls wonder at what cost a life of splendor comes.

Carolina Broad, society's newest darling, fans a flame from her past, oblivious to how it might burn her future. Penelope Schoonmaker is finally Manhattan royalty—but when a real prince visits the city, she covets a title that comes with a crown. Her husband, Henry, bravely went to war, only to discover that his father's rule extends well beyond New York's shores and that fighting for love may prove a losing battle.

In the dramatic conclusion to the bestselling Luxe series, New York's most dazzling socialites chase dreams, cling to promises, and tempt fate. As society watches what will become of the city's oldest families and newest fortunes, one question remains: Will its stars fade away or will they shine ever brighter?

About the Author

Anna Godbersen was born in Berkeley, California, and educated at Barnard College. She currently lives in Brooklyn, New York.

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Splendor, like all The Luxe novels, has a gorgeous cover for those of us who like a pretty book, and it's contents are no less appetizing. As the final chapter to the series, I was almost sad to finish it so quickly, but I am very pleased with the ending. I must admit, I would love to see more of the Holland sisters and even Penelope and the Broud sisters, but the series came to a satisfying close.

I wish I could go in to detail, but I don't want to spoil a single thing for anyone else. I'd read a comment elsewhere that gave away a huge part of RUMORS for me (it was a very simple comment, but it ruined the impact of the scene it referenced) and I wouldn't want that for anyone else. All I can say, is that I throughly enjoyed every word of every book in The Luxe series and that I thought everything that happened in the end, was just the way it had to be and the way it should be. Thank you, Anna Godbersen and Harper Collins, for giving us this story.

The Luxe

• 
• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Hardcover: 448 pages
• Publisher: HarperCollins; First Edition edition (November 20, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061345660
• ISBN-13: 978-0061345661
• 
  

Get it on Amazon

From Publishers Weekly

With a quote from The Age of Innocence as an epigraph and an enthusiastic blurb from the creator of Gossip Girl on its back cover, this lavishly produced debut makes no secret of its twin influences. The story opens in 1899 with the funeral of Elizabeth Holland, a well-bred beauty said to have plunged to her death in the Hudson River. The narrative then travels back several weeks, tracing the relationships and events that have led to the somber assembly. This tangled web includes not one but two sets of star-crossed lovers; an upstairs/downstairs romance; a scheming social climber; a bitter servant girl; and oodles of money, all set in a Edith Wharton via Hollywood vision of Old New York. The dialogue has its clunky moments, and the plot twist that drives the tale is telegraphed from the very start, but readers caught up in the fancy dress intrigue are unlikely to mind much: it’s all part of the dishy fun. Needless to say, the ending paves the way for at least one sequel. Ages 14-up.

My Thoughts:

I just finished reading THE LUXE by Anna Godbersen. On a 1-10, I give it a 10. You fall in love with the characters right from the start. Although the book is told from the (3rd person) perspective of five different characters, you sympathize with all of them (except maybe Penelope Hayes) and by the end of the book, you feel you know them like your own friends. Even the supporting characters are great!

The cover of this book is beautiful and a very nice quality. I only wish they had had it in hardcover when I purchased it. Thankfully, I have the third book in the series in hardcover.

It's lengthy, the paperback being 433 pages, but you never loose interest. It is definitely a page turner, even to someone like me who has never really gotten in to historical romances.

Gosbersen (I love her name by the way, don't you?) recreated Manhattan island in 1899 just as you would imagine it--girls in unspeakably gorgeous gowns dancing with handsome young men at lavish parties and engaging in forbidden romances. This book is not to be missed!

Pick it up now for TEEN READ WEEK!