Can’t Wait Wednesday – WATCH US RISE by Renée Watson and Ellen Hagan

 

“Waiting On” Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, which encourages fellow bloggers to spotlight upcoming releases that we’re excited about.  It is a meme that I have  loved participating in for over a year now, but as Jill is no longer actively posting, from now on I’ll just be linking to Can’t Wait Wednesday, hosted by Tressa at Wishful Endings, which is a spinoff of the original WoW meme.

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My selection for this week is WATCH US RISE by Renée Watson and Ellen Hagan.  The cover for this book caught my eye immediately but I was really hooked once I read the synopsis.  It sounds like it’s going to be such a powerful and timely read.  I love the idea of these young women risking so much to make sure their voices and the voices of other young women are heard.

 

WATCH US RISE by Renée Watson and Ellen Hagan

Publication Date:  February 12, 2019

 

 

From Goodreads

Jasmine and Chelsea are sick of the way women are treated even at their progressive NYC high school, so they decide to start a Women’s Rights Club. They post everything online—poems, essays, videos of Chelsea performing her poetry, and Jasmine’s response to the racial macroaggressions she experiences—and soon they go viral. But with such positive support, the club is also targeted by online trolls. When things escalate, the principal shuts the club down. Jasmine and Chelsea will risk everything for their voices—and those of other young women—to be heard.

 

 

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I’d love to hear what upcoming book releases you’re waiting on this Wednesday? Leave me your link in the comments below and I’ll stop by and check out your CWW selection for this week. 🙂

Top Ten Tuesday – 10 Creepy & Atmospheric Reads to Get You in the Mood for Halloween

 

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.  Top Ten Tuesday has been one of my favorite memes ever since I started blogging, so huge thanks to Jana for taking over the hosting duties!

This week’s TTT topic is Halloween/Creepy Freebie.  This topic was a bit challenging for me since I don’t typically read scary books.  Yes, I know. I’m a chicken, lol.  Even though I don’t read horror, I do, however, enjoy books that are a little creepy and a lot atmospheric.  Those just make for perfect fall/Halloween reads for me.

 

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10 Creepy & Atmospheric Reads to Get You in the Mood for Halloween

 

 

THE WICKED DEEP by Shea Ernshaw 

So Atmospheric!

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  Welcome to the cursed town of Sparrow…

Where, two centuries ago, three sisters were sentenced to death for witchery. Stones were tied to their ankles and they were drowned in the deep waters surrounding the town.

Now, for a brief time each summer, the sisters return, stealing the bodies of three weak-hearted girls so that they may seek their revenge, luring boys into the harbor and pulling them under.

Like many locals, seventeen-year-old Penny Talbot has accepted the fate of the town. But this year, on the eve of the sisters’ return, a boy named Bo Carter arrives; unaware of the danger he has just stumbled into.

Mistrust and lies spread quickly through the salty, rain-soaked streets. The townspeople turn against one another. Penny and Bo suspect each other of hiding secrets. And death comes swiftly to those who cannot resist the call of the sisters.

But only Penny sees what others cannot. And she will be forced to choose: save Bo, or save herself.

 

 

AND THEN THERE WERE NONE by Agatha Christie

Positively eerie!

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  irst, there were ten—a curious assortment of strangers summoned as weekend guests to a private island off the coast of Devon. Their host, an eccentric millionaire unknown to all of them, is nowhere to be found. All that the guests have in common is a wicked past they’re unwilling to reveal—and a secret that will seal their fate. For each has been marked for murder. One by one they fall prey. Before the weekend is out, there will be none. And only the dead are above suspicion. 

 

 

THIS SAVAGE SONG by Victoria Schwab

Who knew music could be so beautiful yet so deadly?

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  There’s no such thing as safe in a city at war, a city overrun with monsters. In this dark urban fantasy from author Victoria Schwaba young woman and a young man must choose whether to become heroes or villains—and friends or enemies—with the future of their home at stake. The first of two books.

Kate Harker and August Flynn are the heirs to a divided city—a city where the violence has begun to breed actual monsters. All Kate wants is to be as ruthless as her father, who lets the monsters roam free and makes the humans pay for his protection. All August wants is to be human, as good-hearted as his own father, to play a bigger role in protecting the innocent—but he’s one of the monsters. One who can steal a soul with a simple strain of music. When the chance arises to keep an eye on Kate, who’s just been kicked out of her sixth boarding school and returned home, August jumps at it. But Kate discovers August’s secret, and after a failed assassination attempt the pair must flee for their lives.

 

 

1984 by George Orwell

Big Brother is watching you. Enough said.

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  Among the seminal texts of the 20th century, Nineteen Eighty-Four is a rare work that grows more haunting as its futuristic purgatory becomes more real. Published in 1949, the book offers political satirist George Orwell’s nightmare vision of a totalitarian, bureaucratic world and one poor stiff’s attempt to find individuality. The brilliance of the novel is Orwell’s prescience of modern life–the ubiquity of television, the distortion of the language–and his ability to construct such a thorough version of hell. Required reading for students since it was published, it ranks among the most terrifying novels ever written.

 

 

THE TELL-TALE HEART by Edgar Allan Poe

All of his stories are deliciously creepy, but this one is my favorite.

 

Goodreads Synopsks:  A murderer is convinced that the loud beating of his victim’s heart will give him away to the police.

 

 

THE HAZEL WOOD by Melissa Albert

If the main story isn’t creepy enough for you,

the Tales from the Hinterland embedded within the story are some of the eeriest I’ve read in recent years.

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  Seventeen-year-old Alice and her mother have spent most of Alice’s life on the road, always a step ahead of the uncanny bad luck biting at their heels. But when Alice’s grandmother, the reclusive author of a cult-classic book of pitch-dark fairy tales, dies alone on her estate, the Hazel Wood, Alice learns how bad her luck can really get: her mother is stolen away―by a figure who claims to come from the Hinterland, the cruel supernatural world where her grandmother’s stories are set. Alice’s only lead is the message her mother left behind: “Stay away from the Hazel Wood.”

Alice has long steered clear of her grandmother’s cultish fans. But now she has no choice but to ally with classmate Ellery Finch, a Hinterland superfan who may have his own reasons for wanting to help her. To retrieve her mother, Alice must venture first to the Hazel Wood, then into the world where her grandmother’s tales began―and where she might find out how her own story went so wrong.

 

 

THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE by Neil Gaiman

Magical Realism at its most atmospheric.

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  Sussex, England. A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn’t thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she’d claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.

Forty years earlier, a man committed suicide in a stolen car at this farm at the end of the road. Like a fuse on a firework, his death lit a touchpaper and resonated in unimaginable ways. The darkness was unleashed, something scary and thoroughly incomprehensible to a little boy. And Lettie—magical, comforting, wise beyond her years—promised to protect him, no matter what.

A groundbreaking work from a master, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out. It is a stirring, terrifying, and elegiac fable as delicate as a butterfly’s wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark.

 

 

JANE EYRE by Charlotte Bronte

Gothic spookiness and a mad woman in the attic. What more could you want?

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  Fiery love, shocking twists of fate, and tragic mysteries put a lonely governess in jeopardy in JANE EYRE

Orphaned as a child, Jane has felt an outcast her whole young life. Her courage is tested once again when she arrives at Thornfield Hall, where she has been hired by the brooding, proud Edward Rochester to care for his ward Adèle. Jane finds herself drawn to his troubled yet kind spirit. She falls in love. Hard.

But there is a terrifying secret inside the gloomy, forbidding Thornfield Hall. Is Rochester hiding from Jane? Will Jane be left heartbroken and exiled once again?

 

 

THE LANTERN’S EMBER by Colleen Houck

(So much Halloween goodness here. If this doesn’t get you in the mood for Halloween, nothing will.)

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  Welcome to a world where nightmarish creatures reign supreme.

Five hundred years ago, Jack made a deal with the devil. It’s difficult for him to remember much about his mortal days. So, he focuses on fulfilling his sentence as a Lantern—one of the watchmen who guard the portals to the Otherworld, a realm crawling with every nightmarish creature imaginable. Jack has spent centuries jumping from town to town, ensuring that nary a mortal—or not-so-mortal—soul slips past him. That is, until he meets beautiful Ember O’Dare.

Seventeen, stubborn, and a natural-born witch, Ember feels a strong pull to the Otherworld. Undeterred by Jack’s warnings, she crosses into the forbidden plane with the help of a mysterious and debonair vampire—and the chase through a dazzling, dangerous world is on. Jack must do everything in his power to get Ember back where she belongs before both the earthly and unearthly worlds descend into chaos.

 

 

THE WOMAN IN WHITE by Wilkie Collins

An atmospheric Gothic mystery with some scary bits along the way.

 

Goodreads Synopsis:  ‘In one moment, every drop of blood in my body was brought to a stop… There, as if it had that moment sprung out of the earth, stood the figure of a solitary Woman, dressed from head to foot in white’

The Woman in White famously opens with Walter Hartright’s eerie encounter on a moonlit London road. Engaged as a drawing master to the beautiful Laura Fairlie, Walter becomes embroiled in the sinister intrigues of Sir Percival Glyde and his ‘charming’ friend Count Fosco, who has a taste for white mice, vanilla bonbons, and poison. Pursuing questions of identity and insanity along the paths and corridors of English country houses and the madhouse, The Woman in White is the first and most influential of the Victorian genre that combined Gothic horror with psychological realism.

 

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Question:  What are some of your favorite creepy/atmospheric reads?

Backlist Briefs: Mini Reviews for CITY OF BONES & THE CHILD

Backlist Briefs:  Mini Reviews for CITY OF BONES & THE CHILDCity of Bones by Cassandra Clare
four-stars
Published by Margaret K. McElderry Books on March 27, 2007
Genres: Fantasy, Young Adult Fiction
Pages: 485
Source: Purchased
Amazon
Goodreads

GOODREADS SYNOPSIS:

When fifteen-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder― much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons. Then the body disappears into thin air. It's hard to call the police when the murderers are invisible to everyone else and when there is nothing―not even a smear of blood―to show that a boy has died. Or was he a boy?

This is Clary's first meeting with the Shadowhunters, warriors dedicated to ridding the earth of demons. It's also her first encounter with Jace, a Shadowhunter who looks a little like an angel and acts a lot like a jerk. Within twenty-four hours Clary is pulled into Jace's world with a vengeance when her mother disappears and Clary herself is attacked by a demon. But why would demons be interested in ordinary mundanes like Clary and her mother? And how did Clary suddenly get the Sight? The Shadowhunters would like to know...

Review:

I think I’m probably the last person on the planet to start reading the Mortal Instruments series, but finally decided on jump on the bandwagon as part of this year’s Beat the Backlist challenge.  I was looking for a fun and entertaining vacation read and City of Bones, the first book in this series, really fit the bill.  It’s a bit of a brick at 458 pages, but Cassandra Clare’s writing style is so fast-paced that I breezed right through the book in just a few sittings.

The worldbuilding was probably the biggest attraction for me in City of Bones. It was a fascinating journey to follow the protagonist, Clarissa Fray (Clary), as she learns about the world of Shadowhunters and Downworlders, a fantasy world that has been hidden in plain sight in NYC around her all her life.  The author does a fantastic job of weaving into her tale pretty much any kind of supernatural character you can imagine.  There are vampires, werewolves, witches, zombies, demons, and of course the Shadowhunters, who are warriors tasked with ridding the world of demons.

Aside from the fantastic worldbuilding, the characters were also a huge draw.  I was a little slow to warm up to Clary at first (I’m not even sure why honestly), but I immediately became sympathetic to her when her mother goes missing and Clary is attacked by a demon in her own home.  I especially warmed up to Clary as she began to interact with the Shadowhunters, especially Jace, who is handsome but kind of an arrogant jerk at times. (I do have to give Jace bonus points though since he is willing to help Clary find her mom.)  The author writes some hilarious banter between Jace and Clary, as well as between Jace, Alec, and Isabelle, some of Jace’s fellow Shadowhunters.  They were a fun group and I especially liked how they all had each other’s backs even in the most dangerous of situations.  Clary’s friend Simon added some entertaining nerdiness to the dynamic as well.

Even though most people have probably already long since read City of Bones, I still don’t want to give away any spoiler, so I’m just going to say that the mystery of what has happened to Clary’s mother and why Clary suddenly finds herself attacked by demons really takes the reader on a journey filled with wild and crazy plot twists.  There was never a dull moment and I was thoroughly entertained from start to finish.  I’ve read complaints that the story borrows from the likes of Harry Potter, Star Wars, and more, and while I did see some resemblance, it didn’t bother me and I still enjoyed the story overall.  The star I took off is primarily because I smelled an unnecessary love triangle brewing.  4 STARS.

 

Backlist Briefs:  Mini Reviews for CITY OF BONES & THE CHILDThe Child by Fiona Barton
Also by this author: The Suspect
three-half-stars
Series: Kate Waters #2
Published by Berkley Books on December 14, 2017
Genres: Mystery, Fiction
Pages: 448
Also in this series: The Suspect
Source: Purchased
Amazon
Goodreads

GOODREADS SYNOPSIS:

‘An engrossing, irresistible story about the coming to light of a long-buried secret.

When a paragraph in an evening newspaper reveals a decades-old tragedy, most readers barely give it a glance. But for three strangers it’s impossible to ignore.

For one woman, it’s a reminder of the worst thing that ever happened to her.

For another, it reveals the dangerous possibility that her darkest secret is about to be discovered.

And for the third, a journalist, it’s the first clue in a hunt to uncover the truth.

The Child’s story will be told.

Review:

Fiona Barton’s The Child is a compelling story about what happens when a long-buried secret unexpectedly rears its head and threatens to shatter lives.  It follows the story of what happens when construction workers who are demolishing a house uncover the skeleton of an infant.  For most, since forensics indicate the skeleton has been there for decades, the tragedy is barely a blip on their radar, but for three women, the discovery practically turns their lives upside down.

Emma is haunted by the discovery of the skeletal remains because she fears her darkest secret is about to be revealed for all the world (and especially for her mother Jude) to see.  Not unlike Emma, Angela sees the infant’s death as a reminder of the worst thing that has ever happened to her but is also somewhat hopeful that the discovery could bring her the closure she has never gotten over the years.  And then finally, there’s Kate, a journalist who makes it her mission in life to find out who this infant is and how she ended up buried in someone’s backyard decades ago.  I thought the author did a wonderful job of fleshing out each of these characters as well as their motivations for paying such close attention to what happens every step along the way as the skeletal remains are investigated in hopes of identifying the infant.

The main issue I had with The Child was the fact that even though I was interested in why each character reacted the way they did to the discovery of the remains, I can’t say that I really connected with any of them.  I felt like a bystander watching everything play out and waiting to see whose life would be the most turned upside down as the events unfolded.  Aside from not really connecting with the characters, I also felt like the plot, although very interesting, moved very slowly at times. It was very easy to set the book down and just come back to it whenever.

Overall, The Child is still a very solid mystery that, even with the pacing issues, I still wanted to know all the answers to.  And if you can hang around until the end, Holy Plot Twist, Batman! I totally did not see the ending coming!  3.5 STARS

four-stars

About Cassandra Clare

Cassandra Clare was born to American parents in Teheran, Iran and spent much of her childhood travelling the world with her family, including one trek through the Himalayas as a toddler where she spent a month living in her father’s backpack. She lived in France, England and Switzerland before she was ten years old.

Since her family moved around so much she found familiarity in books and went everywhere with a book under her arm. She spent her high school years in Los Angeles where she used to write stories to amuse her classmates, including an epic novel called “The Beautiful Cassandra” based on a Jane Austen short story of the same name (and which later inspired her current pen name).

After college, Cassie lived in Los Angeles and New York where she worked at various entertainment magazines and even some rather suspect tabloids where she reported on Brad and Angelina’s world travels and Britney Spears’ wardrobe malfunctions. She started working on her YA novel, City of Bones, in 2004, inspired by the urban landscape of Manhattan, her favourite city. She turned to writing fantasy fiction full time in 2006 and hopes never to have to write about Paris Hilton again.

Cassie’s first professional writing sale was a short story called “The Girl’s Guide to Defeating the Dark Lord” in a Baen anthology of humor fantasy. Cassie hates working at home alone because she always gets distracted by reality TV shows and the antics of her two cats, so she usually sets out to write in local coffee shops and restaurants. She likes to work in the company of her friends, who see that she sticks to her deadlines.

City of Bones was her first novel.

About Fiona Barton

In Barton’s own words…

“My career has taken some surprising twists and turns over the years. I have been a journalist – senior writer at the Daily Mail, news editor at the Daily Telegraph, and chief reporter at The Mail on Sunday, where I won Reporter of the Year at the National Press Awards, gave up my job to volunteer in Sri Lanka and since 2008, have trained and worked with exiled and threatened journalists all over the world.

But through it all, a story was cooking in my head.

The worm of my first book infected me long ago when, as a national newspaper journalist covering notorious crimes and trials, I found myself wondering what the wives of those accused really knew – or allowed themselves to know.

It took the liberation of my career change to turn that fascination into a tale of a missing child, narrated by the wife of the man suspected of the crime, the detective leading the hunt, the journalist covering the case and the mother of the victim.

Much to my astonishment and delight, The Widow was published in 36 countries and made the Sunday Times and New York Times Best Seller lists.

It gave me the confidence to write a second book ,The Child, in which I return to another story that had intrigued me as a journalist. It begins with the discovery of a newborn’s skeleton on a building site. It only makes a paragraph in an evening newspaper but for three women it’s impossible to ignore.

The Child will be published in June 2017 and I am embarking on my next novel. My husband and I are still living the good life in south-west France, where I am writing in bed, early in the morning when the only distraction is our cockerel, Titch, crowing.”

Weekly Recap #75: Week of 10/21 -10/27

 

It’s time for another weekly recap post of all things happening on and off the blog. This week I’ll be linking to the Sunday Post, which is hosted by Caffeinated Book Reviewer and to Stacking the Shelves, which is hosted by Tynga’s Reviews.

So, I’m back home from my trip to New York City and what a great trip it was!  I had decided not to try to keep up with the blog at all while vacationing and I think it was the right choice because I truly had no downtime whatsoever to devote to it.  I won’t bore you to death with all of the details of the trip, but I’ll share a few highlights.  We got there Sunday evening and started our adventure with dinner followed by a show at the Comedy Cellar in Greenwich Village.  If you love stand-up, I highly recommend this place.  I’ve been there twice now and thought it was absolutely hilarious both times.  Plus, you can stroll around the Village before or after the show, which is always cool.

Those who know me well know that I have an obsession with food tours.  I like to pick up a little knowledge about where I’ve traveling to, but I’m really all about tasting all of the delicious food choices that are unique to the area.  I’ve done several tours in NY through Foods of New York and I highly recommend them, especially their Original Greenwich Village tour, which is incredible.  This time, however, we went with a different company, Urban Adventures, but still had an equally fantastic experience.  The tour we picked was the Lower East Side Food and Culture Tour and it took us through Little Italy, Nolita, SoHo, Chinatown, and more.  The food was delicious, and I had never really done much exploring in that part of the city so it was great to finally get to do that.  I think the highlight of the tour for everyone in my group was going to Yonah Schimmel’s Knish Bakery and trying our first ever knish.  OMG, so good!

We of course took in a couple of Broadway shows while we were there as well.  For those who have been following my misadventures in trying to score Hamilton and Springsteen tickets, you know this was a huge deal for me.  Now don’t get me wrong, you can still get tickets to either show, if you’re willing to pay through the nose to buy them from a third-party reseller.  I was not willing to do that.  It was either straight from the venue at the normal ticket price or I wasn’t going. So after more than a year of impatiently waiting for my turn, using the Ticketmaster Verified Fan program, I was finally able to score tickets to both shows for this past week.  I have cursed that whole process for months now, but I have to tell you, after seeing both shows this week, it was totally worth the whole pain-in-the-ass process.  Both shows were everything I hoped they would be and more.  Hamilton is truly brilliant.  It’s now my favorite Broadway musical and I think Lin-Manuel Miranda is nothing short of a musical genius.  46 songs, mostly rap and hip hop, minimal dialogue outside of the songs, and everything about the show just blew me away.  I’ve had the soundtrack on repeat ever since we got on the train to head back home.  And Springsteen is a master storyteller.  I’m not sure any other pop/rock artist could pull off the kind of show he puts on on Broadway.  It’s quintessential Springsteen, both in song choice and in showmanship.  Man, I just love that guy…

I could keep babbling about my trip, but I won’t.  Apologies in advance if this post is filled with typos or just rambles incoherently.  I’m still so tired because I don’t sleep well when I travel and I have a case of the post-vacation blues that I really need to get over, lol.

Oh, before I forget, I did go back and visit The Strand Bookstore and it was just as awesome as I remembered.  I didn’t buy any books, but I did pick up a ton of cool bookish merchandise – totes, pins, etc.  If you ever make it to NYC, I definitely recommend going there and then heading across the street to Max Brenner’s Chocolate Bar for a delicious gourmet Salted Caramel Hot Chocolate. Yum!

Oh well, that’s it for me.  I’ll be back to blog hopping and regular posting this week so I’ll see you around the blogosphere.  Have a great week!

 

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WHAT I’M READING THIS WEEK

 

   
       
 

 UPCOMING REVIEWS

     
      
 
 

 

 STACKING THE SHELVES

    
     
 

TOTALLY RANDOM

 

Review: THE GIRL FROM BERLIN

Review:  THE GIRL FROM BERLINThe Girl from Berlin by Ronald H. Balson
four-stars
Series: Liam Taggart & Catherine Lockhart #5
Published by St. Martin's Press on October 9, 2018
Genres: Historical Fiction, Mystery
Pages: 352
Source: Netgalley
Amazon
Goodreads

FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. All opinions are my own.

REVIEW:

 

Ronald H. Balson’s The Girl from Berlin is the fifth installment in his Liam Taggart & Catherine Lockhart series.  I actually didn’t even realize this book was part of a series when I requested it from Netgalley; I just saw that it was a dual timeline WWII historical fiction that focused on the rise of the Nazis and knew that I had to read it.  Thankfully, even without four novels of background on main characters Catherine and Liam, I was still easily able to follow along and enjoy the compelling story of The Girl from Berlin.

Catherine Lockhart and Liam Taggart are a very likable duo.  Catherine is a very successful attorney in the United States, and her partner Liam, is a private investigator.  I enjoyed the way they worked together, like yin and yang, to get the job done, as well as their easy banter.  It made me want to go back and read the prior four books to watch them work together more.

Aside from having a likeable team leading the way, I also found both timelines and their stories equally compelling.  The modern day timeline features Catherine and Liam being approached by an old friend who has an elderly aunt in Tuscany who is in desperate need of legal assistance.  A powerful corporation is claiming that they actually own the property that the aunt has lived on all her life, and they have served her with an eviction notice.  The aunt has a deed to her property, but somehow the corporation also has a deed so the question is whose deed is valid?  Catherine and Liam don’t know if they can help but are willing to give it their best shot.  Prior to taking off for Tuscany, the aunt sends Catherine a bound handwritten manuscript.  She will not discuss the manuscript but indicates that all the answers anyone needs regarding the ownership of the property are in this manuscript, which leads us the second timeline.  I found the aunt to be a very sympathetic character as well.  I mean, how can you not love a scrappy old lady trying to keep a greedy corporation from kicking her off her land?

The second timeline takes place within the pages of this manuscript as Catherine reads it on her flight.  It is a journal of sorts kept by a woman named Ada Baumgarten, a Jewish girl who was born in Berlin at the end of WWI.  The manuscript details Ada’s life as a violin prodigy and her growing friendship with a boy named Kurt.  It goes on to detail how life was in Germany in the space between WWI and WWII, especially the way Hitler and the Nazis began to slowly consolidate their power in the lead up to WWII.  The manuscript reminded me a lot of Anne Frank’s diary as she chronicled how life became more and more restrictive for Jews and how persecution of them just grew and grew the more powerful Hitler got.  Ada’s story is a powerful one and an emotional one as we see how she, her family, friends, and neighbors are all impacted by the Nazis and the utter hatred that they ushered in with them as they rose to power.

In addition to finding each of the individual timelines so compelling, I was also captivated waiting to see how the author was going to weave them together into a seamless tale.  How does Ada and her journey through WWII fit in to the modern-day story of this elderly Italian aunt who is in danger of losing her home?  I’m not going to say anymore about this, but just know that he does and that he does so brilliantly.

Overall I found this story a very satisfying read, but I did find the passages that focused on specific details of Ada’s musical performances less interesting than the rest of the novel and found myself skimming through them at times.  I think if I was a musician, I probably would have appreciated those details a bit more, but as someone who is non-musically inclined, just knowing Ada was a gifted violinist and that it made some of the Nazis treat her differently was enough information for me.

 

Ronald H. Balson’s The Girl from Berlin is a powerful tale that is filled with secrets, lies, and corruption.  However, it’s also a tale of hope, determination, and resilience.  And even though Catherine and Liam are technically the main characters, the real stars are Ada and the Italian aunt and what connects them.  For that reason, you can easily read The Girl from Berlin even if this is your first time reading a book in this series.  If historical fiction and dual timelines are your thing, don’t hesitate to pick up a copy of the The Girl from Berlin.

GOODREADS SYNOPSIS:

In the newest novel from internationally-bestselling author, Liam and Catherine come to the aid of an old friend and are drawn into a property dispute in Tuscany that unearths long-buried secrets.

An old friend calls Catherine Lockhart and Liam Taggart to his famous Italian restaurant to enlist their help. His aunt is being evicted from her home in the Tuscan hills by a powerful corporation claiming they own the deeds, even though she can produce her own set of deeds to her land. Catherine and Liam’s only clue is a bound handwritten manuscript, entirely in German, and hidden in its pages is a story long-forgotten…

Ada Baumgarten was born in Berlin in 1918, at the end of the war. The daughter of an accomplished first-chair violinist in the prestigious Berlin Philharmonic, and herself a violin prodigy, Ada’s life was full of the rich culture of Berlin’s interwar society. She formed a deep attachment to her childhood friend Kurt, but they were torn apart by the growing unrest as her Jewish family came under suspicion. As the tides of history turned, it was her extraordinary talent that would carry her through an unraveling society turned to war, and make her a target even as it saved her, allowing her to move to Bologna―though Italy was not the haven her family had hoped, and further heartache awaited.

What became of Ada? How is she connected to the conflicting land deeds of a small Italian villa? As they dig through the layers of lies, corruption, and human evil, Catherine and Liam uncover an unfinished story of heart, redemption, and hope―the ending of which is yet to be written.

four-stars

About Ronald H. Balson

When he’s not writing books, Ron is a practicing attorney with the firm of Stone, Pogrund & Korey in Chicago. He has been a civil litigation attorney for forty-three years. He was an adjunct professor of business law at the University of Chicago, Graduate School of Business for twenty-five years and was a frequent lecturer in the federal bar certification course and in trial advocacy seminars.

The demands of his legal practice have taken Ron into courts all across the United States and Canada, and for deposition testimony all across Europe and Asia. A few years ago, Ron became involved in a commercial dispute concerning telephone service in Poland. Numerous trips to Warsaw and southern Poland provided the inspiration for his first novel, Once We Were Brothers. Ron’s love of history and his travels to the Middle East provided the motivation for his second novel, Saving Sophie.

During the Once We Were Brothers book tour, Ron was introduced to several survivors of the World War II concentration camps. Of all the stories of courage and determination, one woman’s story was so moving that it formed the basis for Karolina’s Twins, Ron’s third book due out in 2016.

Ron was a finalist for the Harper Lee Award for Legal Fiction in 2014 and a finalist for the Premio Bancarella Italian Literature Award in 2014. He was an honoree at the Chicago Public Library Foundation’s Carl Sandburg Literary Award dinner.

Can’t Wait Wednesday – THE HUNTRESS by Kate Quinn

 

“Waiting On” Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, which encourages fellow bloggers to spotlight upcoming releases that we’re excited about.  It is a meme that I have  loved participating in for over a year now, but as Jill is no longer actively posting, from now on I’ll just be linking to Can’t Wait Wednesday, hosted by Tressa at Wishful Endings, which is a spinoff of the original WoW meme.

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My selection for this week is THE HUNTRESS by Kate Quinn.  Quinn’s The Alice Network was one of my favorite reads last year, so I was so excited to hear that she has another book coming out next year.  And this one just sounds incredible.  Nina, Ian, and Jordan all sound like characters that I’m going to fall in love with, and the idea that they’re hunting Nazis, especially the infamous “Huntress” has me on the edge of my seat waiting to get my hands on a copy of this book!

 

THE HUNTRESS by Kate Quinn

Publication Date:  February 26, 2019

 

From Goodreads

From the author of the New York Times and USA Today bestselling novel, The Alice Network, comes another fascinating historical novel about a battle-haunted English journalist and a Russian female bomber pilot who join forces to track the Huntress, a Nazi war criminal gone to ground in America.

In the aftermath of war, the hunter becomes the hunted…

Bold, reckless Nina Markova grows up on the icy edge of Soviet Russia, dreaming of flight and fearing nothing. When the tide of war sweeps over her homeland, she gambles everything to join the infamous Night Witches, an all-female night bomber regiment wreaking havoc on Hitler’s eastern front. But when she is downed behind enemy lines and thrown across the path of a lethal Nazi murderess known as the Huntress, Nina must use all her wits to survive.

British war correspondent Ian Graham has witnessed the horrors of war from Omaha Beach to the Nuremberg Trials. He abandons journalism after the war to become a Nazi hunter, yet one target eludes him: the Huntress. Fierce, disciplined Ian must join forces with brazen, cocksure Nina, the only witness to escape the Huntress alive. But a shared secret could derail their mission, unless Ian and Nina force themselves to confront it.

Seventeen-year-old Jordan McBride grows up in post WWII Boston, determined despite family opposition to become a photographer. At first delighted when her long-widowed father brings home a fiancée, Jordan grows increasingly disquieted by the soft-spoken German widow who seems to be hiding something. Armed only with her camera and her wits, Jordan delves into her new stepmother’s past and slowly realizes there are mysteries buried deep in her family. But Jordan’s search for the truth may threaten all she holds dear.

 

 

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I’d love to hear what upcoming book releases you’re waiting on this Wednesday? Leave me your link in the comments below and I’ll stop by and check out your CWW selection for this week. 🙂

Top Ten Tuesday: My Bookstore Bucket List -10 Bookstores I’ve Always Wanted to Visit

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.  Top Ten Tuesday has been one of my favorite memes ever since I started blogging, so huge thanks to Jana for taking over the hosting duties!

This week’s TTT topic is Bookstores/Libraries I’ve Always Wanted to Visit.  I could only think of one library, the New York Public Library, so I decided to go with bookstores.  I’ve pretty much never met a bookstore that I didn’t want to wander through, but the bookshops below are what I would call my Bookstore Bucket List.  I’d really love to visit all of these some day.

 

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10 Bookstores I’ve Always Wanted to Visit

 

1. SHAKESPEARE AND COMPANY, PARIS

 

 

Isn’t this the cutest shop?  I really blew this one too because I was in Paris

just a couple of years ago and forgot all about this gem.  Oh well, it’s an excuse to go back some day, right?

 

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2. THE STRAND, NEW YORK CITY

 

 

I actually have visited The Strand before but it was a rushed shopping excursion, so I’d love to go back.

Why?  18 MILES OF BOOKS! Oh and lots of fabulous author events.

 

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3.  THE LAST BOOKSTORE, LOS ANGELES

 

 

Another fail on my part because I’ve been to L.A. twice and didn’t know this bookstore existed until after my trips.

They sell new and used books and they also sell vinyl records. And how amazing is that book arch?!

 

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4. POLITICS AND PROSE, WASHINGTON D.C.

 

 

This one is actually pretty doable since I live in Virginia, but what appeals to me about this bookstore is that it has a great mix of literary and political events. Alan Greenspan, for example, is speaking there on October 16th and Tahereh Mafi has an event there the next evening.  Plus, you just never know who you might run into while you’re browsing. You might turn the corner one day and find one of the Obamas shopping for a new read.

 

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5. LIBRERIA ACQUA ALTA – VENICE

 

So much failing on my part because, again, I have traveled to Venice, Italy but because we were only there for a day, bookstore visiting was just not in the cards.  If I ever make it back to this incredible city, I will make time to visit this shop.  The store’s name means “Book Store of High Water” and, accordingly, they store many of their books in bathtubs, boats, and other waterproof basins.

 

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6. LIVRARIA LELLO E IRMAO, PORTUGAL

 

How beautiful is that? This is a bookstore where I could actually see myself wandering around

and gawking at the beautiful building rather than browsing the book offerings.

 

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7. BART’S BOOKS, OJAI, CALIFORNIA

 

I don’t even know exactly where in California this bookstore is, but it advertises itself as the largest outdoor bookstore in the world.

The idea of an outdoor bookstore intrigues me so I’d definitely be interested in visiting if my California travels happened to take me anywhere near it.

 

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8. BARTER BOOKS, UK

 

 

This is another shop where I just think the architecture is so cool.  Barter Books is also supposed to be one of the

largest secondhand bookshops in Britain so I bet a bookworm could score some pretty great deals here.

 

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9. THREE LIVES & CO., NEW YORK CITY

 

 

Three Lives & Co. is a neighborhood bookstore located in Greenwich Village.

It has been around since 1968 and I just love how wonderfully old fashioned it looks.

If I ever visited, I could see myself not wanting to leave.

 

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10. THE BOOK ESCAPE, BALTIMORE, MARYLAND

 

This is one I’ve been meaning to visit since Baltimore is only a couple of hours away from me, but I just haven’t quite made it yet.

It just looks like such a cute shop and I hear they have a great selection of used and rare books.

 

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Question:  What are some shops on your Bookstore Bucket List?

 

Backlist Briefs: Mini Reviews for BONE GAP & GIRL OUT OF WATER

Backlist Briefs: Mini Reviews for BONE GAP & GIRL OUT OF WATERBone Gap by Laura Ruby
four-stars
Published by Balzer + Bray on March 3, 2015
Genres: Young Adult Fiction, Fantasy
Pages: 345
Source: Purchased
Amazon
Goodreads

GOODREADS SYNOPSIS:

Everyone knows Bone Gap is full of gaps—gaps to trip you up, gaps to slide through so you can disappear forever. So when young, beautiful Roza went missing, the people of Bone Gap weren’t surprised. After all, it wasn’t the first time that someone had slipped away and left Finn and Sean O’Sullivan on their own. Just a few years before, their mother had high-tailed it to Oregon for a brand new guy, a brand new life. That’s just how things go, the people said. Who are you going to blame?

Finn knows that’s not what happened with Roza. He knows she was kidnapped, ripped from the cornfields by a dangerous man whose face he cannot remember. But the searches turned up nothing, and no one believes him anymore. Not even Sean, who has more reason to find Roza than anyone, and every reason to blame Finn for letting her go.

As we follow the stories of Finn, Roza, and the people of Bone Gap—their melancholy pasts, their terrifying presents, their uncertain futures—acclaimed author Laura Ruby weaves a heartbreaking tale of love and loss, magic and mystery, regret and forgiveness—a story about how the face the world sees is never the sum of who we are.

Review:

I purchased Laura Ruby’s Bone Gap on a whim last year at a local bookfair.  I had no idea what it was about but the cover with its bee and honeycomb just really drew me in.  I finally sat down and read it recently and, wow, what a gem of a book it turned out to be!  It’s also one of those books that it’s hard to say much about without giving away its secrets, and because those secrets are really the heart and soul of Bone Gap, I’m going to keep my remarks brief and vague. I’ll just say that what starts out as a straightforward mystery about a young woman who goes missing in a rural town takes a major turn for the unexpected.

Because I grew up in a similar environment, I had tremendous sympathy for the characters in this story. It’s hard to have secrets when you live in a tiny town where everyone makes it their business to know your business, and where the gossip/rumor mill always runs rampant.  Clearly the underdog of the story, Finn O’Sullivan captured my heart immediately.  He and his brother Sean were abandoned by their mother and are trying to live on their own.  Both brothers are beloved by those in their town, but everyone thinks Finn is an odd duck so when he comes forward one day to say that he saw a young woman named Roza kidnapped, no one believes him.  Finn knows Roza’s life is on the line and my heart just broke for him as he tried and tried to get people to believe him with no luck.  And it’s when Finn takes matters into his own hands that the story takes a walk on the wild and unexpected side.  I don’t want to say anything more, so I’ll just say think Neil Gaiman, or maybe even Maggie Stiefvater or Alice Hoffman and you’ll have a feel for the truly magical direction this small town tale takes.

I loved Finn’s brother Sean too, who has had to put his dreams of working in the medical field on hold to be the head of the household since their mom left them.  Sean is a great big brother and a good friend to all.  Petey, one of Finn’s female friends, is a hilarious addition to the cast.  She’s tough and sassy and gives every guy in town a run for their money, and I just loved every scene she was in.  Lastly, there’s Roza, the young woman who has gone missing.  Roza has a very painful past that she is running away from, but her arrival on the scene just after Finn and Sean’s mom left them, fills a void in both boys’ hearts.  When she then goes missing, both boys are heartbroken all over again, which is another reason why Finn so desperately wants to find her.

My only real complaint about the story is that the ending felt a little rushed, but I still wouldn’t hesitate to recommend Bone Gap to anyone who is looking for an unpredictable tale filled with endearing characters and also to anyone who is a fan of magical realism.  4 STARS

 

Backlist Briefs: Mini Reviews for BONE GAP & GIRL OUT OF WATERGirl Out of Water by Laura Silverman
Also by this author: You Asked for Perfect
four-stars
Published by Sourcebooks Fire on May 2, 2017
Genres: Young Adult Fiction, Contemporary Fiction
Pages: 350
Source: Purchased
Amazon
Goodreads

GOODREADS SYNOPSIS:

Anise Sawyer plans to spend every minute of summer with her friends: surfing, chowing down on fish tacos drizzled with wasabi balsamic vinegar, and throwing bonfires that blaze until dawn. But when a serious car wreck leaves her aunt, a single mother of three, with two broken legs, it forces Anise to say goodbye for the first time to Santa Cruz, the waves, her friends, and even a kindling romance, and fly with her dad to Nebraska for the entire summer. Living in Nebraska isn’t easy. Anise spends her days caring for her three younger cousins in the childhood home of her runaway mom, a wild figure who’s been flickering in and out of her life since birth, appearing for weeks at a time and then disappearing again for months, or even years, without a word.

Complicating matters is Lincoln, a one-armed, charismatic skater who pushes Anise to trade her surfboard for a skateboard. As Anise draws closer to Lincoln and takes on the full burden and joy of her cousins, she loses touch with her friends back home – leading her to one terrifying question: will she turn out just like her mom and spend her life leaving behind the ones she loves?

Review:

Laura Silverman’s Girl out of Water is an engaging coming of age story about family, friendship, love, and sacrifice.  It follows teen Anise Sawyer, the quintessential California girl who loves the ocean and spends every free moment surfing with her friends.  When the novel opens, Anise is busy planning her last summer with most of her friends who are going off to college soon. All of her plans come crashing down around her, however, when her aunt is nearly killed in a car accident, and Anise and her dad have to travel to Nebraska to care for Anise’s young cousins until her aunt is well enough to do so herself.  Anise is torn:  California and the ocean are her happy place and she can’t think of anything worse than being separated from her friends and stuck in Nebraska all summer. At the same time, however, having lost her own mother, who abandoned her years ago, Anise knows how important family is and knows that going to Nebraska is the right thing to do.  But, boy is it going to be the longest summer ever…

This book worked well for me on a lot of levels.  I loved the focus on family and seeing Anise bond with and take care of her cousins.  In many ways, Anise needed them just as much as they needed her and it was nice to watch them all interact.  Anise is terrified that she’s going to somehow end up just like her mother and leave all her loved ones behind one day.  Having Anise work through those fears about her mother and abandonment really gave what could have been just a light summer read some added depth that I very much enjoyed.  The friendship dynamic also really kept me turning the pages.  Anise’s friends are all so fantastic and I loved that they were constantly trying to maintain contact with her even though she was halfway across the country.  She also makes a great friend/maybe more than friend named Lincoln while she’s in Nebraska and he was just too precious for words.  Lastly, I loved Silverman’s vivid descriptions of the ocean.  She makes it such a full sensory experience that I felt like I was on the beach watching the waves crash and smelling the salty air.

If you’re looking for a beautiful story about the importance of family and friendship and a young woman’s journey to find herself, I’d definitely recommend Girl out of Water4 STARS

four-stars

About Laura Ruby

Raised in the wilds of suburban New Jersey, Laura Ruby now lives in Chicago with her family. Her short fiction for adults has appeared in various literary magazines, including Other Voices, The Florida Review, Sycamore Review and Nimrod. A collection of these stories, I’M NOT JULIA ROBERTS, was published by Warner Books in January 2007. Called “hilarious and heart-wrenching” by People and “a knowing look at the costs and rewards of remaking a family,” by the Hartford-Courant, the book was also featured in Redbook, Working Mother , and USA Today among others.

Ruby is also the author of the Edgar-nominated children’s mystery LILY’S GHOSTS (8/03), the children’s fantasy THE WALL AND THE WING (3/06) and a sequel, THE CHAOS KING (5/07) all from Harpercollins. She writes for older teens as well, and her debut young adult novel, GOOD GIRLS (9/06), also from Harpercollins, was a Book Sense Pick for fall 2006 and an ALA Quick Pick for 2007. A new young adult novel, PLAY ME, is slated for publication in fall of 2008. Her books have sold in England, Australia, Italy, France, Germany, Denmark, Serbia and Montenegro. THE WALL AND THE WING is currently in development with Laika Studios for release as an animated feature.

Ms. Ruby has been a featured speaker at BookExpo, the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) annual convention, the Miami Book Festival, the Florida Association of Media Educators (FAME) convention, the Midwest Literary Festival, the International Reading Association’s annual convention, and Illinois Reading Council annual conference, among other venues, and she has presented programs and workshops for both adults and children at numerous schools and libraries.

Currently, she is working on several thousand projects, drinking way too much coffee, and searching for new tunes for her iPod.

About Laura Silverman

Laura Silverman currently lives in Atlanta, Georgia. She is a writer and freelance editor, and spends way too much time hugging dogs instead of working.

Silverman’s debut novel, GIRL OUT OF WATER, is a summery coming-of-age story about a California surfer girl sent to landlocked Nebraska for the entire summer. It debuted in May 2017. Her second novel, YOU ASKED FOR PERFECT, is about the effects of intense academic pressure on a teenage Valedictorian-to-be. It comes out March 2019.

Silverman has degrees in English and Advertising from the University of Georgia, and an MFA in Writing for Children from the New School. While she lived in NYC, she interned at Penguin and two different literary agencies. In addition to writing, Silverman also freelance edits manuscripts and query letters.

Weekly Recap #74: Week of 10/7 -10/13

 

It’s time for another weekly recap post of all things happening on and off the blog. This week I’ll be linking to the Sunday Post, which is hosted by Caffeinated Book Reviewer and to Stacking the Shelves, which is hosted by Tynga’s Reviews.

My apologies for being a bit scarce the past few days. Those deadlines I talked about last weekend are tomorrow so I’ve been been too busy and tired to put much effort into blogging.  I should be around more this upcoming week but then I’ll be off to New York for 5 days after that and after getting so behind the last time I traveled, I’ve decided I won’t be posting anything from 10/21 through 10/25 so that I can just start fresh when I return from my trip.  Once I get through my deadlines, I really need to get serious about planning some activities for my trip too.  If anyone has any ideas that are beyond the obvious touristy stuff, most of which I’ve already done, I’d love to hear them.

Outside of work, life was mostly a blur this week, although we did have make-up three soccer games.  The kids played well but we lost all three games, the end result of not being allowed to practice for fear of ruining the grass on the county’s sports field.  Don’t even get me started on that one, haha.  But we’re on to the playoffs now, so fingers crossed that they can get at least one more win and end the season on a more upbeat note than back-to-back losses.

Reading wise, I finished both Sea Witch and The Girl from Berlin last week.  Sea Witch was okay.  It started out strong but then fizzled a bit for me as I got closer to the end.  The Girl from Berlin, however, was a great historical fiction.  I devoured that one in about a day and a half.  I’m now working my way through Good Luck with That. I’m enjoying it so far but have found myself skimming occasionally because it’s 480 pages, which just seems long for a contemporary.  That or maybe I just have the attention span of a gnat this week, lol.

I also finally watched SOLO last night, after saying I was going to for 5 months.  It was actually much better than I was expecting it to be based on the critic’s reviews.  Both my husband and I really liked it and thought they did a great job making it plausibly fit into the rest of the Star Wars time line and I loved seeing the backstory for how Han and Chewy ended up partners. It was admittedly weird seeing someone who was not Harrison Ford play the part of Han but I was able to get past that and enjoy the film.

Oh well, that’s it for me.  I hope everyone else has a great week!

 

WHAT I POSTED LAST WEEK

 

 

WHAT I’M READING THIS WEEK

 

      
       
 

 UPCOMING REVIEWS

     
      
  
 
 

 

 STACKING THE SHELVES

 

  
      
     

 

TOTALLY RANDOM

 

Can’t Wait Wednesday – SLAYER by Kiersten White

 

“Waiting On” Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, which encourages fellow bloggers to spotlight upcoming releases that we’re excited about.  It is a meme that I have  loved participating in for over a year now, but as Jill is no longer actively posting, from now on I’ll just be linking to Can’t Wait Wednesday, hosted by Tressa at Wishful Endings, which is a spinoff of the original WoW meme.

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My selection for this week is SLAYER by Kiersten White.  I’ve always had a thing for books that are set in boarding schools anyway, but couple the boarding school setting with the fact that this is also basically a Buffy the Vampire Slayer spin-off and I’m completely sold. It sounds amazing!!!

 

SLAYER by Kiersten White

Publication Date:  January 8, 2019

 

From Goodreads

Into every generation a Slayer is born…

Nina and her twin sister, Artemis, are far from normal. It’s hard to be when you grow up at the Watcher’s Academy, which is a bit different from your average boarding school. Here teens are trained as guides for Slayers—girls gifted with supernatural strength to fight the forces of darkness. But while Nina’s mother is a prominent member of the Watcher’s Council, Nina has never embraced the violent Watcher lifestyle. Instead she follows her instincts to heal, carving out a place for herself as the school medic.

Until the day Nina’s life changes forever.

Thanks to Buffy, the famous (and infamous) Slayer that Nina’s father died protecting, Nina is not only the newest Chosen One—she’s the last Slayer, ever. Period.

As Nina hones her skills with her Watcher-in-training, Leo, there’s plenty to keep her occupied: a monster fighting ring, a demon who eats happiness, a shadowy figure that keeps popping up in Nina’s dreams…

But it’s not until bodies start turning up that Nina’s new powers will truly be tested—because someone she loves might be next.

One thing is clear: Being Chosen is easy. Making choices is hard.

 

 

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I’d love to hear what upcoming book releases you’re waiting on this Wednesday? Leave me your link in the comments below and I’ll stop by and check out your CWW selection for this week. 🙂