Review: Denton Little's Deathdate

Denton Little's Deathdate
Author: Lance Rubin
Publication Date: April 14th 2015
Publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers
~A copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review~

Fans of John Green and Matthew Quick: Get ready to die laughing.

Denton Little's Deathdate takes place in a world exactly like our own except that everyone knows the day they will die. For 17-year-old Denton Little, that's tomorrow, the day of his senior prom.

Despite his early deathdate, Denton has always wanted to live a normal life, but his final days are filled with dramatic firsts. First hangover. First sex. First love triangle (as the first sex seems to have happened not with his adoring girlfriend, but with his best friend's hostile sister. Though he's not totally sure. See: first hangover.) His anxiety builds when he discovers a strange purple rash making its way up his body. Is this what will kill him? And then a strange man shows up at his funeral, claiming to have known Denton's long-deceased mother, and warning him to beware of suspicious government characters…. Suddenly Denton's life is filled with mysterious questions and precious little time to find the answers.

Debut author Lance Rubin takes us on a fast, furious, and outrageously funny ride through the last hours of a teenager's life as he searches for love, meaning, answers, and (just maybe) a way to live on.

You know, I really love coming across books that have a sense of humour, especially my sense of humour. Denton Little's Deathdate is hilarious. Ridiculously hilarious, I couldn't stop laughing all the way through it, and yeah, there's issues, which I'll get to in a minute, and there were some awkward-did-you-really-go-there scenes, especially when it comes to, I don't know how to even phrase this, so let's just say, the sexual parts of the story, yeah? Okay. And some of the maybe familial relationships, It's hilarious, too. I know I'm saying hilarious a lot, but it was hilarious. it was so entertaining I didn't even care. It made me bypass. Keeping that in mind, I'm struggling to actually rate it, head v's heart kind of thing, because for me, the book did its job. I couldn't stop reading. It made me laugh. It made me smile. It made me want to know more.  But I can't rate it the way I want to, because though it did make me look away from some issues, I  can't review it that way.

Waiting on Wednesday (#87)

"Waiting on" Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases.

The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh

Expected publication: May 12th 2015 by Putnam Juvenile

A sumptuous and epically told love story inspired by A Thousand and One Nights

Every dawn brings horror to a different family in a land ruled by a killer. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, takes a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. So it is a suspicious surprise when sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid. But she does so with a clever plan to stay alive and exact revenge on the Caliph for the murder of her best friend and countless other girls. Shazi's wit and will, indeed, get her through to the dawn that no others have seen, but with a catch . . . she’s falling in love with the very boy who killed her dearest friend.

She discovers that the murderous boy-king is not all that he seems and neither are the deaths of so many girls. Shazi is determined to uncover the reason for the murders and to break the cycle once and for all

Because it sounds bloody awesome, that is all.

What're you waiting on? 

DNF Review: How to Win at High School (AKA: How to be a Dick in High School)

How to Win at High School How to be a Dick in High School
Author: Owen Matthews
Publication Date: March 3rd 2015
Publisher: Harper Teen
~A copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review~

Using Scarface as his guide to life, Adam Higgs is going from zero to high school hero.

Adam Higgs is a loser, and he’s not okay with it.

But starting as a junior in a new high school seems like exactly the right time to change things. He brainstorms with his best friend, Brian: What will it take for him to take over Nixon Collegiate?

Adam searches for the A-listers’ weak spot and strikes gold when he gets queen bee Sara Bryant to pay him for doing her physics homework. One part nerd, two parts badass, Adam ditches his legit job and turns to full-time cheating. His clients? All the Nixon Collegiate gods and goddesses.

But soon his homework business becomes a booze business, which becomes a fake ID business. Adam’s popularity soars as he unlocks high school achievements left and right, from his first kiss to his first rebound hookup. But something else is haunting him—a dark memory from his past, driving him to keep climbing. What is it? And will he go too far?

How to Win at High School’s honest portrayal of high school hierarchy is paired with an adrenaline-charged narrative and an over-the-top story line, creating a book that will appeal to guys, girls, and reluctant readers of every stripe. Adam’s rocket ride to the top of the social order and subsequent flameout is both emotionally resonant and laugh-out-loud funny

Oh, How to Win at High School, should be appropriately renamed How to Be a Dick in High School. I will keep this unusually short for my ranting reviews, unlike this book, have you seen how many pages it has?  It wouldn't have been so annoying if it had been productive and given character development, or, you know, actually gave it some, you know, what's that thing books have? Oh yeah, a story to tell. A plot. Both were rather none existent.

Review: Half Wild

 Half Wild
Author: Sally Green
Publication Date: March 25th 2015
Publisher: Penguin UK
~A copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review~

After finally meeting his elusive father, Marcus, and receiving the three gifts that confirm him as a full adult witch, Nathan is still on the run. He needs to find his friend Gabriel and rescue Annalise, now a prisoner of the powerful Black witch Mercury. Most of all he needs to learn how to control his Gift – a strange, wild new power that threatens to overwhelm him.

Meanwhile, Soul O'Brien has seized control of the Council of White Witches and is expanding his war against Black witches into Europe. In response, an unprecedented alliance has formed between Black and White witches determined to resist him. Drawn into the rebellion by the enigmatic Black witch Van Dal, Nathan finds himself fighting alongside both old friends and old enemies. But can all the rebels be trusted, or is Nathan walking into a trap?

You know how much I loved Half Bad last year, right? It was just everything I'd been waiting for when it comes to the witches/magic genre since Harry Potter. With an original magical system, and prejudice that mirror's real life, and characters you're going to love and champion on and characters you're going to hate and want to stab, it set-up the Half Bad world and gave us a glimpse into how life is for the Half Codes and Black Witches. To describe Half Bad in one word, brutal. It was absolutely brutal, which of course, means Half Wild is no different and is absolutely brutal, too. Half Wild is darker, and if you thought Half Bad was bad with some of the actions against Nathan, the whole line between White and Black witches get's desperate, and intense and you get the impact of fight or be killed. We also get more than a glimpse into just how deep that prejudice runs and how quickly the world can go to hell with someone dangerous in charge.

Review: Homecoming

Homecoming
Author: Kass Morgan
Publication Date: February 26th 2015
Publisher: Hodder

~A copy was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review~

Weeks after crash-landing onto a rugged, nearly unpopulated planet Earth, the Hundred have managed to create a sense of order amidst their wild, chaotic surroundings. They work together to feed, shelter, and protect one another from countless dangers, including attacks by violent Earthborns. But their delicate balance comes crashing down with the arrival of new dropships from home--dropships carrying Glass and Luke, as well as the Vice Chancellor and his armed guards.


Suddenly, Bellamy must flee transgressions he thought he had left behind in space, as Wells struggles to maintain his authority on Earth. And while Clark searches for clues about her parent's whereabouts, she finds herself torn between finding them and helping the injured new arrivals in camp. Lives hang in the balance, as the Colonists find themselves fighting not just attackers from the outside, but also enemies from within

It's an end of an era. Well, for the book series, anyway. I'm sad to see it end, it's a sort of guilty pleasure for me, since if you've read the books, you know it's more character driven than Sci-Fi,or anything else. Like the show, the series goes into depth in the characters, how they change, how they think when they're in a dire situation. It's like an experiment into ones psyche. Unfortunately, for the books, there are too many characters being focused on for you to really get to know them.

Waiting on Wednesday (#86)

"Waiting on" Wednesday is a weekly event hosted by Breaking the Spine that spotlights upcoming releases.

 Ice Like Fire by Sara Raasch

Expected publication: October 13th 2015 by Balzer + Bray

It’s been three months since the Winterians were freed and Spring’s king, Angra, disappeared—thanks largely to the help of Cordell.

Meira just wants her people to be safe. When Cordellan debt forces the Winterians to dig their mines for payment, they unearth something powerful and possibly dangerous: Primoria’s lost chasm of magic. Theron sees this find as an opportunity—with this much magic, the world can finally stand against threats like Angra. But Meira fears the danger the chasm poses—the last time the world had access to so much magic, it spawned the Decay. So when the king of Cordell orders the two on a mission across the kingdoms of Primoria to discover the chasm’s secrets, Meira plans to use the trip to garner support to keep the chasm shut and Winter safe—even if it means clashing with Theron. But can she do so without endangering the people she loves?

Mather just wants to be free. The horrors inflicted on the Winterians hang fresh and raw in Januari—leaving Winter vulnerable to Cordell’s growing oppression. When Meira leaves to search for allies, he decides to take Winter’s security into his own hands. Can he rebuild his broken kingdom and protect them from new threats?

As the web of power and deception weaves tighter, Theron fights for magic, Mather fights for freedom—and Meira starts to wonder if she should be fighting not just for Winter, but for the world.

I loved Snow Like Ashes, so obviously this is going to be awesome.



What're you waiting on?