The Novel Hermit

daydreaming about books

Archives for July 2014

Holy Mother Cover

HOLY, MOTHER COVER! | She Is Not Invisible by Marcus Sedgwick

Comments : 10

holymothercover

Inspired by What She Reads, Pure Imagination Blog, and Stacked.

I admit I’m a book cover snob. Who isn’t though?

Book covers are the first thing that attracts readers to a book. A good cover can draw someone is, just as a bad cover can easily draw someone away. It can essentially make or break a book. Holy, Mother Cover! is where I showcase the book covers that stand out (or make me cringe), and discuss cover changes.

(A big special thanks to Georgie at What She Reads for bestowing me this fabulous name and to Charlotte at Gypsy Reviews for creating the beautiful feature banner you see before you.)

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COVER DIFFERENCES: She Is Not Invisible by Marcus Sedgwick

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Lists

TOP TEN TUESDAY | TV Shows I Love With Awesome Friendships!

Comments : 17

tttfestivo

[quote]Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish where we list our top tens![/quote]

This week’s topic is “top ten eight TV shows I love with awesome friendships.” I tend to watch shows with an emphasis on the friendships. I think it’s an unconscious thing. I gravitate towards them because they are the best. I love the character development between the characters. They just make me so happy. Here are eight shows I love that have awesome friendships in it.

FIREFLY

Firefly is a space western drama, set five hundred years in the future. It’s about a renegade crew aboard a small spacecraft, Serenity, who tries to survive as they travel the unknown parts of the galaxy and evade warring factions as well as authority agents out to get them. — Wikipedia

SPACE WESTERN, GUYS. SPACEEEEE. AND BEAUTIFUL FRIENDSHIPS AND EVERYTHING AWESOME. Seriously, Firefly is fucking amazing. Nothing beats the friendship in Firefly. The characters in this are the definition of a found family, which is what I hold dear to my heart. Every time I look for books, I’m looking for the friendship I see in Firefly. (I have high expectations.)

Remember this scene? “When you can’t run, you crawl, and when you can’t crawl, you find someone to carry you.” I WILL FOREVER WEEP AT THIS. (And yes, it is spoilery, so don’t click on the link for that.) Nobody gets left behind. Just, I’ll be here crying into my arm.

This is a show that everybody must watch. I can go on and on about it, but it’ll most likely be incoherent dinosaur squealing noises.

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Waiting on Wednesday

WAITING ON WEDNESDAY | A Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray

Comments : 4

wowfestivo

[quote]Waiting On is a weekly event, hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we’re eagerly anticipating.[/quote]

claudia gray-a thousand pieces of youA Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray
November 4, 2014
HarperTeen
Website | Twitter | Goodreads
Pre-order: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Book Depository

Every Day meets Cloud Atlas in this heart-racing, space- and time-bending, epic new trilogy from New York Times bestselling author Claudia Gray.

Marguerite Caine’s physicist parents are known for their radical scientific achievements. Their most astonishing invention: the Firebird, which allows users to jump into parallel universes, some vastly altered from our own. But when Marguerite’s father is murdered, the killer—her parent’s handsome and enigmatic assistant Paul—escapes into another dimension before the law can touch him.

Marguerite can’t let the man who destroyed her family go free, and she races after Paul through different universes, where their lives entangle in increasingly familiar ways. With each encounter she begins to question Paul’s guilt—and her own heart. Soon she discovers the truth behind her father’s death is more sinister than she ever could have imagined.

A Thousand Pieces of You explores a reality where we witness the countless other lives we might lead in an amazingly intricate multiverse, and ask whether, amid infinite possibilities, one love can endure.

 

Why I’m waiting?

I NEED THIS BOOK. This is one of the five books I will legit hurt somebody for it.

A Thousand Pieces of You has everything I love in it.

  • A insanely gorgeous cover? Check.

Are you in love with it? Because I am. Madly in love. The colors, the parallel universe reflecting against each other. Eeeek, LOVE. It reminds me of that movie with Kirsten Dunst and Jim Sturgess, Upside Down. (How can it not?)

  • Parallel universes? Check.

PARALLEL UNIVERSES, GUYS. I’m a sucker for those. Don’t you wonder what you are doing in a parallel universe? I do. (I bet my other self is more accomplished than I am, ha!) I love the image of these characters jumping through various universes. In a way, I want to read this book to live vicariously through them even though you can’t really jump through universes here…at least, not yet. I can’t wait to see the differences in them and the world.

  • Awesomeness? Check.

Can somebody give me this book please? Everybody and their grandma seem to have read this book, but I haven’t! Gimmmmmeeeee itttttt, pleeeeasssseeee. Like right now!

What books are you waiting on?

Reviews

REVIEW | Midnight Thief by Livia Blackburne

Comments : 5

Livia Blackburne - Midnight Thief

Midnight Thief by Livia Blackburne
July 8, 2014
Disney-Hyperion
Website | Twitter | Goodreads
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Book Depository
* ARC borrowed from My Friends Are Fiction (Thanks, Kristen! :D)

Growing up on Forge’s streets has taught Kyra how to stretch a coin. And when that’s not enough, her uncanny ability to scale walls and bypass guards helps her take what she needs.

But when the leader of the Assassins Guild offers Kyra a lucrative job, she hesitates. She knows how to get by on her own, and she’s not sure she wants to play by his rules. But he’s persistent—and darkly attractive—and Kyra can’t quite resist his pull.

Tristam of Brancel is a young Palace knight on a mission. After his best friend is brutally murdered by Demon Riders, a clan of vicious warriors who ride bloodthirsty wildcats, Tristam vows to take them down. But as his investigation deepens, he finds his efforts thwarted by a talented thief, one who sneaks past Palace defenses with uncanny ease.

When a fateful raid throws Kyra and Tristam together, the two enemies realize that their best chance at survival—and vengeance—might be to join forces. And as their loyalties are tested to the breaking point, they learn a startling secret about Kyra’s past that threatens to reshape both their lives.

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First sentence: “This job could kill her.”

A thief, an Assassins Guild, and “a clan of vicious warriors who ride bloodthirsty wildcats”? Midnight Thief should be a book I’d love to pieces, right?

Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. I thought it was okay. I didn’t love it as much as the people who raved about its awesomeness. I think the only thing I truly loved was the Demon Riders. Other than that, I was incredibly disappointed because it was dull and slow-paced, and I couldn’t connect with Kyra or Tristam. It took me a long while to warm up to it. The twists were a bit predictable and it only satisfied me for a while, but I still enjoyed the things Kyra, the main character, overcame and learned as a result. I wasn’t a fan of the romance. Also, I was expecting a big emphasis on the friendships (and a group working together), but I didn’t get that. My expectations for this book weren’t met at all.

Regardless of my lack of love for Midnight Thief, it had really good world-building in it and lots of twists, albeit predictable, that kept me interested in what would happen next for Kyra.

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Holy Mother Cover

SPECIAL HOLY, MOTHER COVER! EDITION | HAPPY JULY 4TH!

Comments : 13

HAPPY JULY 4TH, EVERYONE! 

In honor of this glorious day (which is also known as Independence Day), I decided to compile books into the United States flag for funsies! Voila!

To my fellow Americans, Happy Independence Day!! And to my international friends, happy July 4th! I hope all of you have a fabulous day. I will be off celebrating with my friends! :D

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*I know this isn’t an exact replica of the American flag, but let’s just pretend there’s 13 stripes. :P
** Please do not steal the book cover flag graphic. I took time and effort to make it. You can use it, but you must credit me.