giveaway

Giveaway: The Keatyn Chronicles by Jillian Dodd + Excerpt

December 9, 2012 by Sana

Title: Kiss Me (The Keatyn Chronicles, #2)
Author: Jillian Dodd
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Publisher: Bandit Publishing
Release Date: 28 November 2012
Pages: 312 (Paperback)

Synopsis

I’ve always written scripts for my perfect life.
But no way could I have ever scripted this.
My life is so far from perfect, it’s not even funny.
All because of a stalker.

I’m at a boarding school where I have to lie about who I am.
I can’t see my family.
I’m tutoring a Hottie God that tortures me with his smile.
The most popular girl already hates me.
But there’s this boy.
This hot, sweet, sexy boy.
So I’m going to stop trying to script my life and just live it.
Because who knows how long I have left.

The Excerpt

He leads me out of the party and across the hall, opens the door to an empty dorm room, turns on a lamp, then gently pushes me up against the door and kisses me.

Again, it’s a slow, soft, amazing kiss. The kind of kiss that makes me feel like he’s kissing my soul.

Oh my gosh. What the heck does that even mean? Kissing my soul? I’m seriously losing it here.

It’s official. Almost getting kidnapped has affected me. I definitely have some sort of post-traumatic stress thing, and the symptoms must include having irrational thoughts about Hottie Gods.

Aiden’s hands are very appropriately placed around my waist and are not moving.

Damn it, man.

Move your hands.

Kiss me with your tongue.

Take my shirt off.

Attack me already. Please! I can’t take it anymore.

But I don’t say any of that. I just savor each and every slow, amazing, and tongue-free kiss.

Maybe he was born without a tongue, I think for a brief second, but then I realize that I am dumb because he wouldn’t be able to talk if he had been, now would he?

He stops kissing me and looks deep into my eyes. I seriously should have guzzled a few shots the second I got here.

But I had no idea he would be here!

The way he’s looking at me is sorta unnerving but, at the same time, like the kiss, it electrifies me. His face is close to mine, but not so much that he is, like, blurry to look at. I figure if he can stare at me, then I can stare back.

And I take in every curve and angle of his face.

The way his jawline is flexing slightly. How his eyelashes are a dark, dark brown and curl upward. How he has a sexy teeny freckle just to the side of his left cheek. How his textbook lips are the exact color of the pale pink roses Tommy gave Mom for their anniversary, and how the sides of his mouth are turning up, starting to smile at me. He blinks slowly. When his eyes open, I study the emerald green of his irises, how they have little flecks of blue in them and maybe even a little gold around the edges. I feel like time is standing still again.

He slides his hands up into my hair and leans in to kiss me again. My body is trying to be good, but I can’t stop it from leaning into him. Melding to his body. I could stay this way forever.

He stops kissing me, looks deeply into my eyes again, and tells me he loves me.

Oh, wait.

He didn’t say that.

I just thought that.

Well, I thought his eyes told me that.

Shut up! It’s what it felt like.

And what the hell is with the going so slow? Does he not want to make out with me? Is he gay?

Finally he says, “You should probably go back and check on your friend. Those guys will get her drunk and take advantage of her.”

“We didn’t drink before we came. She can’t be drunk yet, and you promised me a drink.”

“Also, I don’t want people to notice we’ve been gone very long. They’ll think we’re having sex. We don’t want to ruin your reputation on your second day.”

“I think maybe you just don’t want to be alone with me. I don’t understand. You act like you’re all into me, but then we barely kiss.”

I get irritated and frustrated by this, but no way am I going to be the one to move things along.

And I thought he was a player.

So why isn’t he trying to play me? To use me? To take advantage of me?

I shoulda pretended to be drunk, maybe?

About the Author

Jillian Dodd grew up on a farm in Nebraska, where she developed a love for Midwestern boys and Nebraska football. She has drank from a keg in a cornfield, attended the University of Nebraska, got to pass her candle, and did have a boy ask her to marry him in a bar. She met her own prince in college, and they have two amazing children, a Maltese named Sugar Bear, and two Labrador puppies named Camber Lacy and Cali Lucy.

She is the author of the That Boy Trilogy and The Keatyn Chronicles Series.

Jillian Dodd can be found at

Buy Kiss Me (The Keatyn Chronicles, #1)

The Giveaway

Jillian Dodd has offered a Kindle or Nook copy of Stalk Me in the international giveaway below. Enter away!

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Thanks to ATOMR for the promo event.

Review: Betwixt by Melissa Pearl Blog Tour + Giveaway

December 7, 2012 by Sana

ABOUT THE BOOK

Betwixt by Melissa Pearl

young adult paranormal self-published on 5 November 2012
first book in Betwixt series

Beautiful, wild-child Nicole Tepper is hit by a car and left for dead. But when she wakes the next morning, Nicole finds herself in bed without a scratch. Perhaps she was more intoxicated than usual, as her mother is giving her the silent treatment and her friends are ignoring her as well.

Things take a turn for the weird when Nicole soon discovers she is actually hovering between life and death. Her body is lying in the forest while her spirit is searching for anyone who can hear her. Unfortunately the only person who can is Dale Finnigan, the guy she publicly humiliated with a sharp-tongued insult that has left him branded.

Desperate, Nicole has no choice but to haunt Dale and convince the freaked-out senior to help her. Will he find her body before it’s too late? Or will the guy who tried to kill her with his car, beat him there and finish her off before anyone finds out?

THE RATING

THE REVIEW

Even though Betwixt is little over 200 pages long, it managed to stir up a range of emotions inside me. The story begins when Nicole was out partying as usual but then things turned from bad to worse when her boyfriend Trent leaves her stranded in the middle of nowhere. More annoyed than frightened, she starts walking down the road cursing, gets hit by a car and wakes up invisible to everyone but Dale Finnegan. With no memory of what happened last night, Nicole really thinks she is doomed.

On the surface, Nicole seems like the run of the mill popular, mean girl in high school who spend her days partying and staying out late at nights. She has almost convinced herself of the persona she adopted ever since Jody. The tree that Nicole tried to avoid looking at in order to forget the pain of what happened. To be mean and rude so people end up hating her which is so much easier than letting them see the damage in her.

There are little revelations along the way, as the discovery for Nicole’s body continues with Dale’s help. Being invisible to everyone except Dale, Nicole gets to see the true face of all the people in her life. When the initial shock wears off and search efforts go futile, Nicole gets the overwhelming feeling of deserving to die. To never be found. But it’s more about the journey of getting to her body than the destination. Especially when she drifts inside her body from time to time and the unbearable pain makes her realize the grave situation she is. She might just die if no one finds her in time.

Dale is a unique character in the book, he has an easygoing aura around him and the fact that it’s difficult for something to get to him. He might just have a scar running down one side of his face but he feels more proud of it than ashamed. No one know how he got it. He attempted to talk to Nicole before but she more than harsh with her and he finally had to let go. So when he comes across Nicole’s voice in school, despite being wary of her he decides to help her.

For all the time Nicole spends with Dale, she actually likes it but is afraid to admit so. Saddened by her parents initial reaction of her running away, Nicole goes through strong emotions when her parents consider the graveness of the situation as days pass. Dale and Nicole try to locate her body and find themselves more times at a standstill than they’d have preferred. However, when Nicole catches two people trying to find her body to bury her, things starts looking up.

The time Nicole and Dale spend together, confiding in each other and just being together is stirring. When Nicole gets to look at her life from the outside, she realizes how empty it really has been. And she knows why. It’s heartbreaking and gut-wrenching when her parents finally realizes that Nicole is worse off then they’d believe. What pulled them apart is part of the mystery and same goes for Dale and his headfirst approach towards life.

Betwixt is an engaging story of the time Nicole spends in between the state of living and dead. Will she survive and whether she would amend her falling out with her parents is an engrossing discovery. Betwixt is a thought-provoking book which jolts the reader’s mind to question the existence and why do we choose what we choose. Melissa Pearl has written a beautiful story of not just surviving life but living it. Yet for all that Betwixt offers, it’s a forgettable story because of its genericity.

THE QUOTES

‘I can feel the clock ticking with excruciating slowness as we wait for a resolution. It’s almost more painful than my wounds.’

‘And I want to kiss you every day, but not just because I’m saying goodbye.’

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Melissa Pearl was born in Auckland, New Zealand, but has spent much of her life abroad, living in countries such as Jordan, Cyprus and Pakistan… not to mention a nine month road trip around North America with her husband. “Best. Year. Ever!!” She now lives in China with her husband and two sons. She is a trained elementary teacher, but writing is her passion. Since becoming a full time mother she has had the opportunity to pursue this dream and her debut novel hit the internet in November, 2011. Since then she has produced three more books with her fifth novel, Betwixt, out in November 2012.

Melissa Pearl can be found at

Buy Betwixt

| Amazon | Amazon (Kindle) | B&N | The Book Depository |

Click the banner for the tour schedule.

THE GIVEAWAY

The giveaway is open internationally and there are lots of prizes up for grabs!

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Thanks to Melissa Pearl and ATOMR for providing me a copy of Betwixt for review.

Review: Derailed by Alyssa Rose Ivy Blog Tour + Giveaway

December 4, 2012 by Sana

ABOUT THE BOOK

When you’re lost, sometimes the only place you can go is home.

Broken over the death of her fiancé, Molly leaves law school to return to her childhood home in North Carolina. Expecting to lay low until she can figure out what else to do with her life, she finds herself in the arms of her high school sweetheart, the boy who represents everything from the past she tried to leave behind.

Looking for an escape, she instead finds a way back to the girl she almost forgot existed and a future she never dreamed possible.

THE RATING

THE REVIEW

The combination of the eye-catching cover and the intriguing synopsis of Derailed pulled me in and I knew I had to read it. What I loved about Derailed is the setting; Clayton Falls sounds like a perfect little town with a beachfront. The story is written in such a way that there are little revelations along the way as to why Molly is so lost and what made her so cautious in life.

Guilt is a feeling Molly can quite relate to on a significant level. It surfaced ever since before she left North Carolina to pursue her dreams to become a lawyer. She finds a home in Boston with Adam as her fiancé and Becca as her friend. But when Adam dies, Molly is again guilt-ridden and loses meaning. In order to escape the memories of Adam, Molly abruptly decides to leave Boston and revisit her hometown.

Clayton Falls calls to her and overwhelmed with feelings of loneliness and numbness from grieving, she falls back on Kelly and eventually Ben, for support. Kelly is her best friend from high school who is getting married soon so a large part of the story revolves around her wedding. Molly is worse than she lets on; she is slowly inching away from her mother and sister and finds it hard to block out dark emotions.

Despite breaking up with Ben because of the events that followed after graduation, it is clear that Molly never stopped loving him. So while Ben feels familiar, for him having Molly back is a chance he is not going to let go at any rate. What Molly needs is to battle her inner demons instead of drowning in them and shutting everyone off.

Things start looking up when she opens up to Ben about her Dad and consequently about her past with Adam. It’s revealing to see where she is coming from and why was she holding back but she does get closure. It is actually inspiring to see her survive through a tough time in life.

I would have liked it if there was more to Ben’s story of how he pulled himself together. Also, Gavin’s persistence made him unlikable to me but what was lacking in Gavin’s character was made up by Jack’s spunk. In all, Derailed is an enjoyable and a bittersweet romantic story of love lost and found.

THE QUOTES

“The message was only three words, but his failure to respond had changed everything.”

“I felt a surge of guilt—the only thing I seemed to feel anymore.”

“The light was brighter than I’d expected, and I froze for a second, shivering as I realized how little stood between me and that train—or really how nothing did. Kind of how nothing stood between life and death.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Alyssa Rose Ivy is a Young Adult and New Adult author who loves to weave stories with romance and a southern setting. Although raised in the New York area, she fell in love with the South after moving to New Orleans for college. After years as a perpetual student, she turned back to her creative side and decided to write. She lives in North Carolina with her husband and two young children, and she can usually be found with a cup of coffee in her hand.

Alyssa Rose Ivy can be found at

Buy Derailed (Clayton Falls, #1)

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THE GIVEAWAY

As part of the blog tour, there will be six winners and one of them will be winning a print copy of each Derailed and Veer, the second book in the Clayton Falls series. So enter away! It’s international.

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Thanks to Alyssa Rose Ivy and ATOMR for providing me a copy of Derailed for review.

Review: Greta and the Goblin King by Chloe Jacobs Blog Tour + Interview + Giveaway

November 28, 2012 by Sana

Title: Greta and the Goblin King (The Mylena Chronicles, #1)

Author: Chloe Jacobs

Genre: Young Adult, Paranormal

Publisher: Entangled Publishing

Release Date: 13 November 2012

Pages: 298 (eARC)

Synopsis

While trying to save her brother from a witch’s fire four years ago, Greta was thrown in herself, falling through a portal to Mylena, a dangerous world where humans are the enemy and every ogre, ghoul, and goblin has a dark side that comes out with the eclipse.

To survive, Greta has hidden her humanity and taken the job of bounty hunter—and she’s good at what she does. So good, she’s caught the attention of Mylena’s young goblin king, the darkly enticing Isaac, who invades her dreams and undermines her will to escape.

But Greta’s not the only one looking to get out of Mylena. An ancient evil knows she’s the key to opening the portal, and with the next eclipse mere days away, every bloodthirsty creature in the realm is after her—including Isaac. If Greta fails, she and the lost boys of Mylena will die. If she succeeds, no world will be safe from what follows her back…

My Rating

* * * *

The Review

Greta and the Goblin King sucked me in from the start. I had been pretty intrigued by the cover and the synopsis but to actually read the book, it was all I could ask for. The action sequences, the electric chemistry, Mylena creatures out for blood and a bounty hunter as the protagonist. Just wow. Greta is something else entirely and on top of it, Isaac is a very intriguing character.

Greta and the Goblin King is set in the world of Mylena where the humans are considered evil and where every kind of creature from faeries to goblins to gnomes, demons and ghouls thrive. But Agramon wreaked havoc on Mylena and the Great Mother had to put a curse of ice and snow and the two moons on the people of Mylena. The world-building is flawless and being as taken with the icy cold weather as I am, I found myself wanting to feel the cold penetrate deep in my bones more than once.

Add up all that with a human stuck in their world unwillingly as a result of a sacrifice to save her brother’s life. Suffice it to say that it hasn’t been an easy four years in Mylena for Greta. But Luke miraculously didn’t kill her on sight, instead took her in and taught her all the trades of surviving. Everything was as peachy as it could be for Greta when the goblin king decided to pay her a visit during her job as a bounty hunter. The same goblin who just a fortnight ago was trying to get her to say his name and unknowingly giving him the power to come inside her mind whenever she dreams. All because Greta intrigued him. Now isn’t that charming.

What do you do become when you have nothing? Fearless is only a glimpse into Greta’s personality and she is pretty self-reliant. But for a human to survive right along with paranormal creatures as a bounty hunter and trying to disguise her humaneness. Not an easy one. But somehow Greta manages until all hell in the shape and name of Agramon threatens to take her last bit of her sanity.

And then there is Isaac, the infuriatingly intense and hot as hell Goblin King of Mylena. Only not as much by choice but as a stroke of fate. It is so engaging to see Isaac hot on her trail, haunting her in her dreams, making her want him and trying to get her to see the real him. But Greta haven’t earned the title of the best bounty hunter for nothing. She is an expert when it comes to guarding her emotions. Only lately, along with Isaac, she is somehow also letting others affect her judgement and making her care.

Wyatt, Sloane, Jacob and especially Ray made me fall in love with their stories and it was admirable to see them trying to protect each other through thick and thin. All of them played a role in trying Greta to see the other side of the story and to light the fire in her again that willed her to live and survive in the cold, cursed land of Mylena.

I found myself absolutely engrossed in the story of Greta and the Goblin King, willing the words to fly by as quickly as they can so I would know what was going to happen next and how it would all play out. I always find such books to be great reads. I loved how Isaac remained true to his own self even in the most turbulent of times; that’s devotion. I can only imagine what kind of action would be in store for Greta in Books 2. Three cheers for Chloe Jacobs!

Best Quotes:

““You have such a peculiar way of speaking,” he said. “I rarely have any notion what you’re talking about, but I could listen to your voice all day long.”“

“There was no mistaking his frustration and anger, even his pain. It came off him like a fever, engulfing her with a blast of terrible heat, but she still felt safe, protected. It may only last for as long as he held her, but for now that was enough.”

About the Author

Chloe Jacobs is a native of nowhere and everywhere, having jumped around to practically every Province of Canada before finally settling in Ontario where she has now been living for a respectable number of years. Her husband and son are the two best people in the entire world, but they also make her wish she’d at least gotten a female cat. No such luck. And although the day job keeps her busy, she carves out as much time as possible to write. Bringing new characters to life and finding out what makes them tick and how badly she can make them suffer is one of her greatest pleasures, almost better than chocolate and fuzzy pink bunny slippers.

Chloe Jacobs can be found at

Buy Greta and the Goblin King (The Mylena Chronicles, #1)

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The Interview
Now it’s time for a fun interview with Chloe Jacobs getting to know more about Chloe, the characters and their story. I hope you all find it as much fun as I did!

So do you really own ‘fuzzy pink bunny slippers’ as it says in your bio?

Yes! I love them! My son found them in a store once and he said he had to buy them for me. He was four at the time, so I’m pretty sure my husband paid for them (which he probably regrets because he trips on them all the time—I have a bad habit of leaving them on his side of the bed *evil grin*).

What is the one thing writing Greta and the Goblin King has taught you?

Writing this story taught me the value of a fantastic editor. Without Heather’s help this book would never have been as good as it ended up.

What five words would you use to define your debut book?

Dark. Fantasy. Character-driven. Emotional.

Despite being a very strong character, Greta has a hard time figuring out who she really is. What made you write about such a character?

I was really intrigued about the idea of a character who is stripped of EVERYTHING. How would I survive if I were in her place? If I couldn’t call my family, or email them, or Facebook them? If I couldn’t see them again, and I had no friends. If, in fact, everyone wanted me dead?? It just seemed like the perfect character to set on this particular journey.

A Goblin King as the hero. How did you come up with the idea?

It started as a twist on the Hansel and Gretel story, and when I was thinking about the world Greta finds herself in, I knew there would be goblins and ghouls and all kinds of fairy tale creatures, so the Goblin King sounded like a much better choice than King of the Ogres. The trick was trying to make Goblin = sexy 🙂

How difficult it was for you to tackle the world-building in Mylena?

I LOVE world building. I can’t get enough of it. In fact, there was probably a lot more of the world building in the original draft, but for the sake of keeping up the pace of the book, we had to trim it down a little bit. In book 2 I’ll be expanding the world and hopefully helping readers see Mylena a little better.

What do you want readers to take away from Greta and the Goblin King?

I want them to see how much Greta grows, to see her strength and realize that it’s even more precious because it doesn’t come easy for her. As strong as she is, she struggles not to give into her loneliness and sorrow every day. I would also want readers to know that there’s much more to Isaac than we’ll see in this book, but not to worry. I’m going to put him through his paces in book 2.

What was the hardest part of writing Greta and the Goblin King?

The hardest part was trying to find a proper balance between the story and the backstory. Since the book starts after Greta and Isaac’s first meeting, I had to filter in their history at appropriate times in the book, trying not to halt the action and pacing of the current plot line.

And the best?

OMG the best part was the back and forth between Greta and Isaac. They had fantastic chemistry on the page and I LOVED writing the scenes when they were facing off against one another!

Everyone should know that you are – ?

Crazy.

Lastly, what question have you always wanted to be asked in an interview and how would you answer that question?

If I were a superhero, I’d be the kind that could read people’s minds. I always want to know what people are thinking. It must be the writer in me that’s always looking at someone and needing to know what’s going on in their head. I want to know their deepest darkest secrets, and I want to see their every desire.

…That would probably get me in a lot of trouble though. LOL

Thanks so much for letting me come visit you! I had a BLAST!

The Giveaway
Chloe Jacobs is giving away fabulous prizes to US/Can residents. International entries can win an eBook copy of Greta and the Goblin King. Rules are it the widget.

Enter away!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thanks to Entangled Publishing for providing me a copy of Greta and the Goblin King for review.

A Year of Blogging + Giveaway

November 13, 2012 by Sana

Anniversary Countdown

A year ago, at the crack of dawn, I created artsy musings of a bibliophile. I had been contemplating making one for a few weeks and then it just happened. I knew I wanted it to be in red color with specks of grey and black but I didn’t know the amount of hours I would spent perfecting and learning all the things about blog design. I knew Twitter is important in the blogging world, but I have found it to be a great social website to which I’m addicted.

I knew the top-notch bloggers but what I didn’t know was that the book blogging is a community far bigger than I deemed possible. From where I come from, readers of the books I like to read are few and far between. So to have tons of other bloggers to swoon over and discuss books with right from the comforts of my bedroom is utter happiness.

It’s hard to believe that I have spent 365 days blogging my heart out. There have been days when I missed it, when school and work made it hard for me to focus on books and keeping in touch with blogger friends. But I have gone at my pace and I know the journey is far from over. It started with a review of Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John and with the Blogoversary post gone live, I am thankful that I decided to blog about books.

Here’s to another year filled with awesome books, pretty covers, tweets about books, blog tours, authors and publishers love and my latest favorite genre, new adult.

Happy Bibliophilic Musings!

As a thank you to blogger friends, followers, authors, publishers and new followers, I give you all each a virtual hug and an international giveaway. If it’s not cake, it’s books. Rules are in the widget.