July 2013 Wrap-Up

July meant winter holidays here in Australia. With no university, we both got a fair bit of reading done.

Review: Hearts in Exile by Mysti Parker

Title: Hearts in Exile
Author: Mysti Parker
Genre: Adult, High Fantasy
Source: the author
Goodreads | Amazon

In Tallenmere, fate has a way of catching up with you...

Somewhere, hidden in the waters of the Southern Sea, lies an island unlike any other. Within the amber glow of its pyrogem-laden cliffs, legend says the very heart of the dragon god Drae keeps the island, and its occupants, alive.

Loralee Munroviel, daughter of Leogard's High Priestess Arianne, had no idea what she would face when she arrived by boat ten years ago and was left alone in exile. All she knew about Draekoria's inhabitants was written in one tattered notebook. Now, her life revolves around keeping Drae's descendants happy. Never in her life did she imagine being a Dragon Keeper.

Captain Igrorio Everlyn, known as Sir Robert to his unit of Holy Paladins, has faced his share of hell, battling the evils of Emperor Sarvonn's tyranny and the dark god Tyr's abominations. But none of that compares to the ten years of hell he's been without Loralee, presumed dead.

One freak storm changes everything. Now the two of them must fight to reestablish the delicate balance of the island before the dragons take things into their own hands. Through it all, they discover the secrets that kept them, and their hearts, exiled for a decade.

Review by Chantelle and Nara

Book Discussion: The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

Title: The 5th Wave (The Fifth Wave #1)
Author: Rick Yancey
Genre: Young Adult, Post-Apocalyptic
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

The Passage meets Ender’s Game in an epic new series from award-winning author Rick Yancey.

After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother—or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up.

Review by Nara

Dare Me Trailer Blast

Dare Me trailer from Patrick Willems on Vimeo.

This is a trailer blast! So check out the trailer, and keep reading the post for more about the book, and to enter a fantastic giveaway!!

Review: Close My Eyes by Sophie McKenzie

Title: Close My Eyes
Author: Sophie McKenzie
Genre: Adult, Contemporary, Mystery
Source: The Reading Room reviewer program
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

It's been eight years since Gen Loxley lost her daughter, Beth: eight years of grief in which nothing's really moved forward, for all that her husband, Art, wills it to. Gen, once a writer of novels, has settled in to a life of half-hearted teaching, while Art makes his name and their fortune - and pressures her into trying IVF once again. For Gen, it seems a cruel act of replacement; life without Beth is unthinkable, unbearable - but still it goes on. And then a woman arrives on Gen's doorstep, saying the very thing she longs to hear: that her daughter was not stillborn, but was spirited away as a healthy child, and is out there, waiting to be found...So why is Art reluctant to get involved? To save his wife from further hurt? Or something much more sinister? What is the truth about Beth Loxley?

Review by Nara

Stacking the Shelves [11]

Hi, Chantelle here and it's that time of the month again for me to Stack the Shelves with the books that I received, borrowed or bought this month!

Review: Dualed by Elsie Chapman

Title: Dualed (Dualed #1)
Author: Elsie Chapman
Genre: Young Adult, Dystopian
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

You or your Alt? Only one will survive.


The city of Kersh is a safe haven, but the price of safety is high. Everyone has a genetic Alternate—a twin raised by another family—and citizens must prove their worth by eliminating their Alts before their twentieth birthday. Survival means advanced schooling, a good job, marriage—life.

Fifteen-year-old West Grayer has trained as a fighter, preparing for the day when her assignment arrives and she will have one month to hunt down and kill her Alt. But then a tragic misstep shakes West’s confidence. Stricken with grief and guilt, she’s no longer certain that she’s the best version of herself, the version worthy of a future. If she is to have any chance of winning, she must stop running not only from her Alt, but also from love . . . though both have the power to destroy her.

Elsie Chapman's suspenseful YA debut weaves unexpected romance into a novel full of fast-paced action and thought-provoking philosophy. When the story ends, discussions will begin about this future society where every adult is a murderer and every child knows there is another out there who just might be better.

Review by Nara

Beat the Heat Readathon Sign Up + Goals Post

Since we're probably going to be doing some reading during that time period, we thought we may as well join the Beat the Heat Readathon! Although it's actually really really cold here in Adelaide, Australia haha. You can sign up as well here.

Review: Belladonna by Fiona Paul

Title: Belladonna (Secrets of the Eternal Rose #2)
Author: Fiona Paul
Genre: Young Adult, Historical, Mystery
Source: HarperCollins Australia. Thank you!
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

Cassandra Caravello is trying to forget Falco, the wild artist who ran off with her heart, as she grows closer to her strong, steady fiancé, Luca. But Luca seems to have his own secrets. When he′s arrested by soldiers in the middle of the night, Cass′s life is once again thrown into chaos. She must save Luca, and that means finding the Book of the Eternal Rose -- the only evidence that will prove he is innocent.

So begins her journey to Florence, a city haunted by whispers of corruption, secret soirees and clandestine meetings of the Order of the Eternal Rose. And home to Falco, who′s working for the Order′s eerily stunning leader, the Belladonna herself.

Can Cass trust her heart to lead her to the truth this time?

Nothing is as it seems in this seductive thriller, where the truth may be the deadliest poison of all..

Review by Nara

Review: If He Had Been With Me by Laura Nowlin

Title: If He Had Been With Me
Author: Laura Nowlin
Genre: Young Adult Contemporary Fiction

Goodreads rating: 4.13 out of 5.00 (630+ ratings)
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon


If he had been with me, he wouldn't have died.

Throughout their whole childhood, Finn and Autumn were inseparable—they finished each other's sentences, they knew just what to say when the other person was hurting. But one incident in middle school puts them in separate social worlds come high school, and Autumn has been happily dating James for the last 2 years. But she's always wondered what if...

The night she's about to get the answer is also one of terrible tragedy.

Review by Chantelle

Massive Sizzling Summer Giveaway (INT) + Excerpt from Spectral by Shannon Duffy

Convinced she’s a part of the witness protection program, sixteen-year-old Jewel Rose is shuffled around the globe with her family like a pack of traveling gypsies. After arriving at lucky home twenty-seven, she stumbles upon a mysterious boy with magical powers claiming to be her guardian... and warning of imminent danger. Despite the obvious sparks between them, Jewel discovers a relationship is forbidden, and the more she learns about dark, brooding Roman, she begins to question who she can even believe—the family who raised her, or the supposed sworn protector who claims they’ve been lying to her all along.

As she struggles to uncover who her family has really been running from, she is forced to hide her birthmark that reveals who she is. With new realities surfacing, unexplained powers appearing, and two tempting boys vying for her heart, Jewel battles to learn who she can trust in an ever growing sea of lies, hoping she’ll make it through her seventeenth birthday alive.

Review: Demigoddess 101 by Kacie Ji

Title: Demigoddess 101
Author: Kacie Ji
Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal Fantasy
Source: the author
Goodreads | Amazon

The last thing Ava Goddard ever expects to see are toga clad people that no one else can. She quickly jumps to the conclusion that she is a) going crazy or b) she’s always been crazy and is only now realising it. That is until she actually meets one of these ‘hallucinations’ and learns that she’s a demigoddess. Not only that but she’s the daughter of Jupiter himself. 
Ava soon learns that being a demigoddess isn’t all as fabulous as she first thought it would be. Her life is invaded by gods and goddesses who want to befriend her including a frightening but ironically protective God of Death, a vengeful Queen of the Gods, a snarky dryad in her tree. And on top of it all she has to deal with her mother, overdramatic best friend and a soccer playing potential boyfriend as well.

Worse still, there is a goddess who is lurking in the dark who has been biding her time for the past several millennia waiting for her chance to take over. And she’s just found Jupiter’s one weakness.

Ava.

Review by Nara

ARC Review: A Really Awesome Mess by Trish Cook and Brendan Halpin

Title: A Really Awesome Mess
Author: Trish Cook and Brendan Halpin
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Release Date: July 23, 2013
Source: Publisher via NetGalley
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

Two teenagers. Two very bumpy roads taken that lead to Heartland Academy.
Justin was just having fun, but when his dad walked in on him with a girl in a very compromising position, Justin's summer took a quick turn for the worse. His parents' divorce put Justin on rocky mental ground, and after a handful of Tylenol lands him in the hospital, he has really hit rock bottom.

Emmy never felt like part of her family. She was adopted from China. Her parents and sister tower over her and look like they came out of a Ralph Lauren catalog-- and Emmy definitely doesn't. After a scandalous photo of Emmy leads to vicious rumors around school, she threatens the boy who started it all on Facebook.

Justin and Emmy arrive at Heartland Academy, a reform school that will force them to deal with their issues, damaged souls with little patience for authority. But along the way they will find a ragtag group of teens who are just as broken, stubborn, and full of sarcasm as themselves. In the end, they might even call each other friends.

A funny, sad, and remarkable story, A Really Awesome Mess is a journey of friendship and self-discovery that teen readers will surely sign up for.

Review by Nara

500 Follower Celebration!!

YAY! 2013 has been an awesome year for both of us, and we've finally reached 500 followers, which goes above and beyond our expectations. To celebrate, we're holding a giveaway over at our new facebook page which just went live. 

Enter for your chance to win a book of choice from the book depository, so it's open internationally!

ENTER HERE!

Love Triangles 101: Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead

Time for our third post as part of the Love Triangles 101 feature! In case you missed them here's the one we did about the Shatter Me. And here's one filled with random discussions (I mean, not that random- they were still to do with Love Triangles haha). Anyway, today we are discussing the awesome Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead!

Waiting on Wednesday [10]

The time has come again for Nara's monthly Waiting on Wednesday post. So, here are the books released in August that I can't wait to get my hands on:

Review: Stealing Parker by Miranda Kenneally

Title: Stealing Parker (Hundred Oaks #2)
Author: Miranda Kenneally
Genre: Contemporary Young Adult, Sports

Goodreads rating: 3.85 out of 5.00 (4, 200+ ratings)
Goodreads | The Book Depository |

Red-hot author Miranda Kenneally hits one out of the park in this return to Catching Jordan's Hundred Oaks High.

Parker Shelton pretty much has the perfect life. She’s on her way to becoming valedictorian at Hundred Oaks High, she’s made the all-star softball team, and she has plenty of friends. Then her mother’s scandal rocks their small town and suddenly no one will talk to her.

Now Parker wants a new life.

So she quits softball. Drops twenty pounds. And she figures why kiss one guy when she can kiss three? Or four. Why limit herself to high school boys when the majorly cute new baseball coach seems especially flirty?

But how far is too far before she loses herself completely?


Review by Chantelle

Cover Reveal: Wings (Black City #3) by Elizabeth Richards

Today we are super excited to share the cover to WINGS, the third and final book in author's Elizabeth Richard's BLACK CITY series!

Love Triangles 101: Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Okay, so this is our second Love Triangles 101 Post. In this one we'll be discussing the much loved Shatter Me series, and why we think that the love triangle works #Chapter62.

Review: Destiny's Flower by Linda Harley

Title: Destiny's Flower
Author: Linda Harley
Genre: Science Fiction
Source: Author
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

Doctor Lynn Davis is kidnapped by handsome Lord Kyle von Talion and taken to a far off planet, Saldiora. As she finds herself in this unfamiliar culture, she must learn to fight with a sword, ride a talking horse, and endure the politics of a royal court if she is to survive. Kyle has his hands full keeping Lynn from making cultural blunders and ensuring her safety. The Juntu's are plotting to take over Saldiora and consider Lynn to be a threat to their success. Will Lynn live long enough to fulfill her destiny and save the kingdom of Saldiora?

Review by Nara

Apocalypse! Blog Hop: Joelle Charbonneau Author Interview + Giveaway (INT)

Time for another giveaway hop! This one features the hot of the press, dystopian release: The Testing by Joelle Charbonneau. I reviewed it recently, here's the link: The Testing Review. We'll be featuring an interview with the author, Joelle Charbonneau, and the giveaway will be open internationally to wherever the Book Depository ships for free.

Love Triangles 101: Introductory Question

Time for our first post as part of the Love Triangles 101 feature! As part of the introductory post, we'll be tacking this question: Why do you think love triangles are so prevalent in YA, and how do you feel about them?

ARC August Sign Up Post

We at Looking for the Panacea do have a slight problem. TOO MANY ARCS! So, for the month of August we've decided to participate in ARC August, an awesome event organised by Read.Sleep.Repeat.  Sign up by clicking the link! There are incentives involved!

ARC Review: Extremities by David Lubar

Title: Extremities: Stories of Death, Murder and Revenge
Author: David Lubar
Genre: Young Adult, Horror
Release Date: July 23, 2013
Source: Publisher via NetGalley
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

Master of the macabre David Lubar turns his attention to dark and twisted tales for teens with Extremities: Stories of Death, Murder, and Revenge

A group of high school girls takes revenge on their sadistic gym teacher in the most fitting way possible. Two stowaways find themselves on a ship for the dead. An ancient predator stalks the wrong victim. Here are thirteen tales of death, murder, and revenge from the fertile and febrile imagination of master storyteller David Lubar—his first story collection for the teen audience.

Review by Nara

Once Upon a Read a Thon: Day 3 Challenges

Today's the last day of the Read-a-Thon! Here are our answers for the Day 3 Mini Challenges.

Waiting on Wednesday [9]

Hi! And welcome to Chantelle's post for Waiting on Wednesday, where I'll be spotlighting my most anticipated releases over the next month! So without further delay,

This month, I am going completely crazy waiting for...

Once Upon a Readathon: Day 2 Mini Challenges

It's now day 2 of the once upon a time readathon, we've both been a bit behind our reading goals however the challenges are always a tonne of fun.

Review: Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

Title: Code Name Verity
Author: Elizabeth Wein
Genre: Young Adult Historical Fiction, Thriller

Goodreads rating: 4.22 out of 5.00 (11, 300+ ratings)
Goodreads | The Book Depository | Amazon

I have two weeks. You’ll shoot me at the end no matter what I do.

That’s what you do to enemy agents. It’s what we do to enemy agents. But I look at all the dark and twisted roads ahead and cooperation is the easy way out. Possibly the only way out for a girl caught red-handed doing dirty work like mine — and I will do anything, anything, to avoid SS-Hauptsturmführer von Linden interrogating me again.

He has said that I can have as much paper as I need. All I have to do is cough up everything I can remember about the British War Effort. And I’m going to. But the story of how I came to be here starts with my friend Maddie. She is the pilot who flew me into France — an Allied Invasion of Two.

We are a sensational team.



Review by Chantelle

PANACEA CANDIDATE 2013

Once Upon a Readathon

I know we just finished one readathon, but since it's the holidays, we're going to do another one! This one's shorter but hopefully we can keep up all the awesome reading that we've been doing. So here are our goals :)

Rush Book Blitz (Giveaway)

Rush (The Game #1)

by Eve Silver

Release Date: June 11, 2013

Publisher: Harper Teen

Summary from Goodreads:

So what’s the game now? This, or the life I used to know?

When Miki Jones is pulled from her life, pulled through time and space into some kind of game—her carefully controlled life spirals into chaos. In the game, she and a team of other teens are sent on missions to eliminate the Drau, terrifying and beautiful alien creatures. There are no practice runs, no training, and no way out. Miki has only the guidance of secretive but maddeningly attractive team leader Jackson Tate, who says the game isn’t really a game, that what Miki and her new teammates do now determines their survival, and the survival of every other person on this planet. She laughs. He doesn’t. And then the game takes a deadly and terrifying turn.

Available from:

    

Summer Lovin Read-a-Thon: Alma Mater

• “Alma Mater” Participation Post:
  • You are graduating today–list your accomplishments big and small for the week. Hop around and congratulate all of your friends on their accomplishments.

Blog Tour: The Bad Apple by Clay Held + INT Giveaway!

Title: The Bad Apple
Author: Clay Held
Genre: Middle Grade, Paranormal Fantasy
Source: The author as part of the blog tour

Goodreads rating: out of 5.00
Goodreads | Amazon

14-year-old Simon Warner isn't having a very good October. To start with, he drowned, and then the real trouble started. Next thing he knows, he's back among the living, and face-to-face with a
ghoulish-looking man who kidnaps his adopted father. Enter Nathan Tamerlane, a bonafide wizard, and soon Simon is deep in the hidden world of the supernatural, walking among the Freemancers: a secret society of wizards, and the stewards of all magic on Earth. 

Soon the truth is revealed: Simon's birth parents are wicked sorcerers who betrayed the Freemancers years ago before going into hiding. Making matters worse, a cruel and xenophobic warlock named Silas Darrow is gathering his followers (some would say worshipers) to lead an assault on the non-magical world. Now, if Simon ever wants to see his adopted father again, he's going to have to join Darrow's cult. Easier said than done. All it takes is one moment of weakness, and a powerful evil will infest Simon's soul forever.


Review by Nara

Summer Lovin Read-a-Thon: Hound Dogs

• “Hound Dogs” Participation Post:
• It’s good to be bad…boys that is! List those bad boys that make your heart go pitter patter. Got a picture to share so we can all drool (please)? You could do a character interview or create a bio for your favorite character. Or tell us where you would go if he were to ask you out on a date?