Sunday, June 29, 2014

Stacking the Shelves

Stacking The Shelves is all about sharing the books you are adding to your shelves, may it be physical or virtual. This means you can include books you buy in physical store or online, books you borrow from friends or the library, review books, gifts and of course ebooks!


Let's start off with the physical books I picked up this month.  A few of these I actually got towards the very end of May so I decided to add them into this list. (Disclaimer: I did receive a $50 gift card that I used to purchase a lot of the physical books!)

1. Sempre by J. M. Darhower
2. Sempre Redemption by J. M. Darhower
3. Undeniable by Shannon Richard (won through a giveaway on her page!)
4. He + She by Michelle Warren (won through a giveaway)
5. Idols by Margaret Stohl (ARC)
6. Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein (THANK YOU SO MUCH REBECCA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
7. Something to Talk About by Dakota Cassidy
8. Talking After Midnight by Dakota Cassidy
9. Better Homes and Hauntings by Molly Harper
10. The Wager by Rachel Van Dyken
11. The Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks
12. Thoughtless by S. C. Stephens
13. Anything but Sweet by Candis Terry
14. Fallen Too Far by Abbi Glines
15. Never Too Far by Abbi Glines
16. How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell
17. Real by Katy Evans
18. The Marriage Bargain by Jennifer Probst
19. Searching for Someday by Jennifer Probst
20. One Week Girlfriend by Monica Murphy
21. Second Change Boyfriend by Monica Murphy 
22. City of Heavenly Fire by Cassandra Clare
23. Dangerous Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl


Here is a list of the ebooks I got this month.....it's pretty ridiculous.  Most of the ones I picked up were either $0.99 or free at the time of purchase.

1. Dirty Angels by Karina Halle 
2. Wallbanger by Alice Clayton 
3. Broken by A. E. Murphy 
4. Learning to Forgive by R. D. Cole 
5. Bronze Horseman by Paulina Simmons
6. Infinity +  One by Amy Harmon 
7. Love in all the Wrong Places by Audrey Harte 
8. Unmasked by Cassia Leo 
9. Crash Into You by Katie McGary 
10. Bang by E. K. Blair 
11. Breathe by Kristen Ashley 
12. One Wild Night by Magan Vernon 
13. Dark Promise by Julia Crane 
14. The Vampire Affair by Vivi Anna 
15. Tristan by Jessica Sorensen
16. Trapped Under Ice by M. J. Schiller 
17. Coulda Been a Cowboy by Brenda Novak 
18. Coin Heist by Elisa Ludwig
19. Undone by Rebecca Shea
20. Burning in Water by Arielle Caldwell
21. Untamed by Victoria Green and Jinsey Reese
22. Out of Control by Victoria Green and Jinsey Reese
23. Corporate Candy by Destiny Dark 
24. Backstage Pass by Elizabeth Nelson 
25. Make Me Crazy by Codi Gary 

Hi, my name is Meghan and I am a book hoarder!  I really need Book Buyers Anonymous.  How about you?  What are some of the books you got this month?


****Also....I bought three graphic novels that are not listed.****

Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Unlit Star Cover Reveal

It's here!  It's here!  The cover for Unlit Star by Lindy Zart!



 
Release date: 8/29/14
 
 
Genre: New Adult
 
Blurb: Rivers Young was the popular guy untouchable by reality. He was like a star—bright, consuming, otherworldly. The thing about stars, though, is that they eventually fall, and Rivers Young was no different.

He fell far and he fell hard.

Delilah Bana was the outcast enshrouded in all of life's ironies. Alone, in the dark, like dusk as it falls on the world. When Rivers fell from the sky, she was the night that caught him. In the darkness, they found one another. Together they melded into something beautiful that shone like the sun.

Only, the greater the star is, the shorter its lifespan.

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Undeniable Launch Day









I'm so excited to be a part of Shannon Richard's Undeniable launch!  I just recently read Undone and absolutely loved it!  The story was so sweet and captivating.  I am just dying to read this next one in the series!  (Undeniable follows two other characters that we meet in Undone!)

About UNDENIABLE:
Grace King knows two things for certain: she loves working at her grandmother's café and she loves the hunky town sheriff. She always has. As she bakes him sweet treats, Grace fantasizes about helping him work up an appetite all night long. But whenever she thinks she's finally getting somewhere, he whips out some excuse to escape. Growing up, he never looked twice at her. Now Grace won't rest until she has Jax's undivided attention. Jaxson Anderson can't deny that his best friend's kid sister is the sexiest woman in Mirabelle, Florida. Unwilling to burden Grace with his painful past, Jax keeps the sassy blonde at arm's length. Yet one heated kiss crumbles all of his carefully built defenses. But when a town secret surfaces, threatening to destroy everything they have believed in, can the man who defended Grace from bullies as a child protect her now?

Buy links:
Indie Bound: http://bit.ly/1igryh3
Books A Million: http://bit.ly/1irQmCA


About Shannon Richard:
Shannon Richard grew up in the Panhandle of Florida as the baby sister of two overly protective, but loving brothers. She was raised by a somewhat eccentric mother who showed her how to get lost in a book, and a father who passed on his love for coffee and really loud music. She graduated from Florida State University with a Bachelor's in English Literature, and lives in Tallahassee. She's still waiting for her Southern, scruffy, Mr. Darcy and in the meantime writes love stories to indulge her overactive imagination.

Shannon’s SM:


And just in case you need any more reasons why you should buy this book, here is an excerpt just for you!
 Excerpt from Undeniable

Grace threw the bag down onto the counter and looked up at him. “Are you honestly going to stand there and tell me that this clueless persona you have going on is the real deal? Are you honestly going to tell me that you have no idea?”

“No idea about what?”

“You want to know why I got upset last night?” Grace asked, marching over to him. “Why it infuriates me that you treat me like a little sister?” she shouted, shoving his chest hard. He was surprised by it and he fell a step backward. “I don’t have sisterly feelings for you, Jaxson; I don’t and I never will. But you’re too blind and stubborn to see what’s standing right in front of you!”
It was then Jax did the most impulsive thing he’d ever done in his life. He knew exactly where the impulse came from; he’d had the desire for years. He just wasn’t sure how the overwhelming need overran all of his sense. He grabbed Grace before he even realized what he was doing. He gripped her elbows and brought her body flush up against his. His mouth came down hard on hers. She inhaled, startled, and Jax took full advantage of the tiny opening of her mouth, dipping his tongue in and finding hers.

Holy shit.

Never in his life had Jax kissed a girl and felt like his whole body was on fire, burning from the inside out. This was incredible, like nothing he’d ever known. She was warm, and sweet, and soft. How could the inside of someone’s mouth feel this way? Taste this good?

Grace sighed in pleasure as her body relaxed against his. Her arms wound around his neck. He wrapped his hands around her waist as he walked her backward. When her back hit the counter he put his hands on her bottom and pulled her up to sit on top of it, their mouths never breaking.
Holy shit, his hands were on Grace’s ass. Her perfect, incredible ass.

Her shoes hit the floor a second before she pulled her legs around him, her bare feet running up the back of his thighs. Her hands were on his chest, as one of his pulled out the tie in her hair so that he could run his fingers through it. She grabbed on to his side, and her hands slid around and lowered until they were on his butt. She squeezed and he thought he was going to go off, right then and there.
He pulled away from her mouth, letting his lips travel down the slope of her neck. How many times had he fantasized about this? About feeling her soft skin underneath his lips? God he loved her neck, the soft delicate space at the hollow of her throat.

“Jax.” She said his name with so much need that he abandoned his exploration of her neck.
He palmed the back of her head in one of his hands as he slanted his mouth over hers. Grace moaned when their tongues found each other again. The sound of it rumbled in Jax’s chest and settled low in his abdomen.

 Jax wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that, wrapped around each other in more ways than one, before a crackling noise filled the kitchen. Mary Landers’s voice squawked through the speaker attached to Jax’s shirt.

“Seventeen, what’s your location?”

Jax pulled back from Grace, both of them breathing hard. Grace’s hair was everywhere, courtesy of his hands. She opened her eyes slowly, as if she was delaying coming back to reality, but Jax slammed into it hard.

What the hell had he just done?
*****
Grace was having an out of body experience. Or at least that was what it felt like.
Jax had kissed her.

God, his mouth had been on hers, his hands everywhere, her hands everywhere. Grace’s hands had been on Jaxson Anderson’s ass. And it was just as spectacular as she’d imagined.

But as Grace brought herself back down to earth, she registered the look on Jax’s face and her eyes snapped open as everything inside of her crashed.

He did not look happy.

“Jax?” Grace asked, searching his face for something, anything besides the regret that shone plan as day in his eyes. 

He didn’t answer, just disentangled himself from her as he took a step back. There was no warmth in his eyes as he pushed the button on the microphone on his shoulder. “Seventeen, on Sandy Beach Drive.”

“Seventeen, shoplifter at Forty-Nine Brooks Avenue. Deputy needed on location.”

“Ten-four.”

“Jax,” Grace said, sliding off the counter and taking a step toward him.

“I have to go,” he said, taking another step back from her.

“You’re not even going to say anything about what just happened?” she asked, trying to keep calm.
His mouth tightened before he shook his head. “It was a mistake. It shouldn’t have happened.”
Grace inhaled sharply, pulling back from him like he’d just hit her. And really he had, because those words were a slap in the face.

I’m not going to cry. Not in front of him.

So Grace did the only thing she could do, she walked away from him.

She stepped around him and pushed through the door out into the cafĂ©. She closed her eyes as she leaned against the wall and tried to breathe past the tightness in her chest. 

It was a mistake.

She reached up and grabbed her throat. The wall behind Grace shuddered slightly as the side door in the kitchen closed. He was gone and he didn’t want her. She slid down the wall and pressed her face into her bent knees.

It shouldn’t have happened.

God it hurt. It hurt so damn much.

Grace gave up trying to fight it and let the pain wash through her. She wasn’t sure how long she sat on the floor hugging her bent knees. She kept reliving what had happened in the kitchen.
He’d grabbed her. He’d kissed her. Not the other way around. But he’d also decided that it had been a mistake.

Grace was done. She was done waiting for a man who didn’t want her. She was done living with this constant ache. She refused to let him break her. She wasn’t going to let that man affect her anymore.
Grace wiped the remaining tears from under her eyes and pulled herself up onto her feet. She took a deep breath before she pushed through the door and walked back into the kitchen. Jax’s cup of coffee was still sitting on the counter, so was his bag of scones. Grace stared at them for a second before she grabbed both of them. She threw them into the trash can with so much force that the coffee exploded up and around the sides.

Okay, starting now she wasn’t going to let him affect her anymore.
 


 


Monday, June 23, 2014

News from Rachel Van Dyken



The Dare:

From #1 New York Times Bestselling Author Rachel Van Dyken, comes the third and final book in the New York Time's Bestselling Bet Series...

Boring Beth Lynn has always lived up to her nickname... until she wakes up in a hotel bed next to a sexy as sin state senator she re-connected with at a wedding the previous night.

The biggest problem? She can't seem to remember anything about the night before except for crying into a box of cookies, and she's pretty sure Grandma Nadine slipped something in her drink. And what should have been a one night stand turns into a six day adventure when Grandma whisks them off to Hawaii to save them from the ensuing media firestorm.

Jace isn't looking for commitment -- he believes he made that clear when he left the wedding with Beth. Then again, he can't remember much of anything other than the way her skin felt beneath his hands. Now he's stuck with her at some lame couple's retreat and trying his hardest to fight the attraction only a woman like Beth could invoke.

He doesn't think it can get any worse.

But one spider attack... A donkey ride from hell... And an unfortunate episode with Viagra tea -- and there's one thing Jace knows for sure: He should never have agreed to Grandma Nadine's suggestion in the first place.

Because if this isn't paradise, and it isn't a vacation -- that only leaves one option.

Survival.

But to make it through alive... they might lose their hearts in the process.
 
(Romantic Comedy, Friends to lovers, Vacation Romance, New Adult Romance, Funny Stand Alone, Bargain Books, Humorous Romance)



BUY LINKS

AMAZON

Barnes & Noble:

iTunes:


TRAILER

Saturday, June 21, 2014

The Tales of the Fairy Anthology

Blurb: 
Step into the realm of the fairies, where darkness and light come together to create a world full of mischief and magic. A place where pixie dust and brownie favors are often counter balanced by the sinister temptations and mad schemes of the darker side. Here, you can choose to walk with the heroes or be carried away by the fairy lover of your dreams. Just be careful not to fall too deeply, you may never come home. In this collection, ten talented authors have come together to bring you sixteen fantastical stories of the lighter and darker sides of the fae. The product of this collaboration is an incredible journey into a world that will whisk the reader away on gilded wings, but might not let them go.

Stories by Catherine Stovall, Zoe Adams, Andrea L. Staum, Cecilia Clark, Shannon Eckrich, Shebat Legion, Mariana Thorn, Lillie J. Roberts, Lexi Ostrow, K.R. Wilburn.

Event Link: https://www.facebook.com/events/443530489125228/ 
Buy Link: http://smarturl.it/TalesoftheFairy 

Thursday, June 19, 2014

Favorite Steampunk Books

A friend of mine asked me to come up with a list of my favorite books in each genre.  She said she would definitely keep up with that list and reference it if I were to make one.  So....I decided to go for it.

The first list of books I'm creating are my favorite steampunk books.  I have not read many in this genre but have found that I absolutely love it.

1. Infernal Devices Trilogy by Cassandra Clare


 2. London Steampunk Series by Bec McMaster


3. Parasol Protectorate Series by Gail Carriger
 

4. The Steampunk Chronicles by Kady Cross


 5. Worldshaker by Richard Harland

 6. Leviathan Series by Scott Westerfeld



Are there any other books that you would add to this list? Would you like to see more lists in the future?  What categories/genres would you like lists of?


Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish where we make lists of bookish things! 

Top Ten Books on My Summer TBR!
 Hot guy with tattoos?  I'm in!

 I loved all of Cora Carmack's other books.  This one looks to be just as good!
 I LOVE the Beautiful Creatures series and am so excited that they did a spin off starring Ridley and Linc!
 A girl who finds out she is heiress to an estate in Lilaria???? Sounds like The Princess Diaries to me....which I LOVED!
 If you read one, you gotta read the sequel.
 Y'all know how much I love Dakota and the Plum Orchard series!
 I know, I know.....I haven't read it yet....it's just that if I read it then that means it's really over.  I'm going to do it...sometime...this summer.
 





I keep wanting to read these and with the third book coming out soon I want to read these so I can move on with the series.







What is on your summer TBR?  Have you read any of the books I have listed?  What did you think of them?  

Sunday, June 15, 2014

Review of Nash

Nash 
Author: Jay Crownover
Series: Marked Men #4
Rating: 5 Stars

Nash picks up right where Rome left off.  He is dealing with the news that the man he has known as his uncle is in fact his father, the father he grew up believing didn't want him.  While in the hospital with Phil, Nash meets Saint.  She is very nervous around him and he finds out they went to high school together.

I know a lot of people believe Saint is a little whiny and has low self-esteem but I loved her.  She was real!  Saint was overweight in high school and not many guys wanted to be with her.  She grew up, lost weight, but didn't lose her self-consciousness.  She believed she was hideous because of something she overheard Nash say that she believed it was directed towards her.  I'm sure many people have been in a situation similar to this before.

Nash and Saint had to overcome a lot in the trust department.  He was so incredibly sweet that it made me love him as much as I loved Rule.  

This has to be my second favorite in the series.  If you haven't picked them up yet....what are you waiting for?

 

Thursday, June 12, 2014

Just Read

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If you have been following Facebook and Twitter these past few weeks you may have come across some articles that are bashing what you choose to read.  My question is why does it matter what I, or anyone else for that matter, choose to read?  Doesn’t that attitude deter people from reading?  Do you really think that by you saying these things that I’m going to want to run and read what you deem appropriate?

My sister-in-law and I were discussing these issues the other day. She believes that reading is not as highly valued today as it once was and I agree with her.  I am a teacher and every year it gets harder and harder to get my students to enjoy reading.  For the most part, they think there are better things to do and if they can’t finish the book in ONE day then it isn’t worth reading.  They are used to being able to get information quickly and be done with it.  They can’t do this with a book.

So here’s my thing….as a teacher if I see students reading books below their grade level, should I tell them to be ashamed of themselves because it has no merit?  No value?  Should I point out that they are several years older than the main character and there is no way they can relate to them?
The answer to this is NO!  I should encourage them to read at ALL TIMES regardless of the grade level.  If I tell them they should be ashamed of themselves for reading I am turning them off to one of the greatest past times ever!  I have had students who only read graphic novels.  Do I care?  NO.  Do you want to know why?  BECAUSE I GOT THEM TO READ!!!!  Maybe one day they will be brave enough to try that chapter book they have been looking at.  Even if they don’t think they could ever finish it, they have the courage to try because I let them explore on their own terms.

How does this tie in to what is happening today?  Well….it’s simple.  Who are you and why do you think you have the right to tell anyone what they should or should not be reading?  If I choose to pick up a YA novel does that make me a bad person?  Does that mean that I am not smart because I am reading material geared towards a younger audience?  Again the answer is NO!  I read what I want to read.  I read to escape, to live adventures, to experience first love all over again.  I read to keep up with the trends.  I read to determine what books to share with my child.  I read for enjoyment.  And while I’m at it….I read across the age levels, from children’s books to adult books, from romance novels to literary fiction.  I am not ashamed of what I read nor will I ever be.  You should not be ashamed either!

Let’s work on building each other up instead of tearing each other down.  Especially over something so silly as what I choose to read.

Just Read!