Jessica´s guide to dating on the dark side - Beth Fantaskey

Story: What would you do if in your senior year, a sexy, gentle and a little eccentric guy appears in your life, saying that he´s your long lost fiancè? And there´s more... he affirms that you are both vampires. And from royalty.

All of this happens in Jessica´s life. And this is only the begining.

If Jessica doesn´t accept her destiny, a war between the two most powerful vampire families will begin, and this will affect humans too. And this is a very hard choice to a seventeen year-old girl that only wants to love, graduate and be accepted. Will she make her mind?

My Opinion: When I started reading Jessica´s guide to dating on the dark side, I thought it was only a comedy book, ´cause a lot os people told me that it was very funny. But I was completely mistaken. It really is a very fun story, but we can find much more than humor on it. There´s a beautiful romance, drama and cruelty in some parts.

About each gender found in the book:

Humor: I laughed a lot with Lucius letters for his uncle. The way he starts "americanizing" himself and tries to explain his new life to Vasile (that´s very mean) is unmissable. Definitely brilliant!

Romance: Lucius is not only funny. He´s captivating! So gentle, so protective... the typical "prince charming" (vampire prince, but no problem with that!). Sometimes I wanted to kill Jessica. How could she reject him so many times? And I loved the way he did the same to her!

Drama: Lucius´ relationship with his family and with Jessica´s is very interesting. He wasn´t raised with love. He was raised to be a king, a warrior. He has scars on his soul and in his body. Besides this, he gest facinated with the "american way of life", so simple. Teenagers can do whatever they want. It makes him want to live each minute as his last.

"But Bia, you just speak about Lucius!!!" Yes! Because he is one of the best male characters I´ve seen, so interesting and free from cliches.

There´s a darker part almost in the end of the book, that´s great, but I won´t talk about it ´cause it would be a biiiig spoiler, so, I will leave you curious enough to buy and read this wonderful book, full of rich characters and an unforgettable story.

Thank U Beth, for sending me your book. I loved it!

How many stars: *****

Sondtrack? Him´s version to Wicked Game.

Taken by Storm - Angela Morrison

The Story: Leesie is that kind of girl which is worth marrying. She dreams with her charming prince - a perfect boy that will be her partner, that will understand and love her. She has principles, write poetry, is religious and boys desire her at school (but this is one thing that she doesn´t care about.)

Michael used to be a conqueror and a promissing diver, until his parents tragically died in an accident where the boat where they were, was hit by Isadore - a hurricane, and to make everything worse, he was the only survivor, what changes completely his way to see life. He doesn´t want to know about dating, school, or even smile.

Michael and Leesie end up getting to know each other. She is touched by his and he accepts the comfort she offers and they become friends.

They fall in love, despite all the rules of Leesie´s Mormon religion and Michael´s pain. And besides all of this, they have to learn to live with their own problems and with that special love that was given by destiny.

Minha Opinião: Touching. I guess that´s the perfect word to define this sweet and peculiar story, created by Angela.

It´s not news to anyone that I´ve become a fan of Angela without even start reading her books. I considered her an amazing person because of her answers for the interview I made with her for this blog. And because of that, I felt an even greater responsability to read and review her book. I thought: "What if I don´t like it?". So, I started to read it, ready for a storm, but after a few pages, I was absorbed by a delicious breeze and by all the graciousness of Michael and Leesie´s romance.

The book is written in a very original way, combining entries in Michael´s dive log (adapted to a common diary) and Leesie´s poetry and her virtual chat with a friend. This made the reading very entertaining, but also made me confused sometimes with so many expressions, abbreviations and acronyms. My English was not enough so far, hehe.

It´s beautiful to see how Leesie´s love slowly heals Michael´s wounds, and I liked the way he adapts her religion´s heavy rules to their relationship.

I´m very grateful to Angela for the amazing book she sent to me. And just as in the message she left to me in her autograph, "I was completely swept away".

How many stars: ****

Soudtrack: Stigmatized do The Calling

Jane - April Lindner

The Story: Jane Moore´s life is not so easy. She has always been family´s ugly duck, has recently lost her parents and doesn´t have any money, what made her leave college, where she was studying.

Without any other option, she got a job as a nanny at Thornfield Park, mansion of Nico Rathbury, a rock-star, typical bad boy, father of a little and lovely daughter, that doesn´t receive much of his attention.

Nico knows many futile women, only interested in his money and fame, and because of this he gets facinated for strong and at the same time sweet Jane´s personality and tries to keep her close, turning her into a close friend. Inevitably, they end up falling in love, but Nico has his secrets, and some of them may destroy his romance with Jane for forever.

My Opinion: I wrote a completely different review for this book, but I decided to download BBC´s mini-series Jane Eyre and I changed this text. Deservedly.

First of all, I have to affirm that April Lindner is very brave. For those who doesn´t know "Jane" is a retelling of Jane Eyre, that I´m ashamed to say that I´ve never read. But I had an idea of how big and wonderful Charlotte Bronte´s book is (by the way, what great sisters they were) and of April Lindner´s intteligence.

"Jane" is amazing! She got the most important scenes from the original story (as I could watch in the series) and turned them into a modern book, but tasting as a classic. A new masterpiece, a new story of a timeless tale.

There are some differences between both books. First of all, Jane happens in actual days and the male character is a musician. The girl that Jane babysits is Nico´s daughter, he´s not her tutor and there´s the press and the band. But we have the same essence, the gothic atmosphere is present and we recognize the same Jane, so strong, with her honest opinions, the Jane that changes, that blooms when falls in love. Well, I have to stop here so as not to tell the whole story.

This is a story that I´ll always remember, unforgettable. And I want to thank the author for giving me the oportunity to read her wonderful book, by sending me its ARC.

How many stars? *****

Soundtrack: Although I know it´s not the perfect melody, everytime I had Jane in my hands, I started to sing: Diary of Jane by Breaking Benjamin - and as Nico was a rock star, it´s worthy!!!

Stranded - J.T. Dutton

The Story: In Heaven, Iowa, nothing is as it seems. People hide their secrets and there´s a church that control their thoughts and deeds. And that´s where Kelly Louise will live.

And that´s in Heaven, this town so full of principles, that a little baby is found dead, a newborn, in the middle of the street. And nobody knows who´s the mother that abandoned her.

Besides her mother, Kelly lives with a conservative grandmother and a cousin of her age, but with entirely different personalities. While one of them is very cool, talks naturally about sex and makes her own mistakes, Natalie, the cousin, is very religious, follows all the rulles imposed by her grandmother and is repressed in every way.

But Natalie has a secret. Something that can change the way people see her and something that can prove that looks can be deceiving.

My Opinion: "Stranded" is known as a Young Adult book, but I´d say that it´s much more than that. When I started reading it, I thought I would encounter a teen drama, like The O.C. (that I really love). But I was completely mistaken. The story is strong, but the author tells it in a very soft and funny way and I got surprised.

Kelly and her cousin Natalie are very different, as I said, but there are some similarities between them. Although Natalie seems conformed with the life she lives, at every oportunity, she shows herself trapped in a cocoon, longing for freedom. Deep inside, she envies Kelly, that´s the family´s black sheep, at least in theory.

Natalie had a very hard life, and it makes us feel sorry for her (even when she acts like a bitch) and these difficults that he had been through made me understand her attitudes and justify her weird behavior for a girl her age.

To me, Stranded was a book with a beautiful moral that teaches us not to judge anybody by appearance. Human being are much more complex then they appear and you may never know a person, no matter how long you know her.

Recomended!

How many stars: ****

Sondtrack: Unfold by Marie Digby.

"I don´t wanna go on living

Being so afraid of showing

Someone else my imperfections."

Hunted by the others - Jess Haines

The Story: Shiarra Waynest is a private investigator in a city where humans live relatively well with the "Others" - vampires, werewolves, mages and other creatures with supernatural powers that appear long the way.

In this city, the "Others" conquered their rights, but in return they cannot cause any harm to anybody (for exemple, a vampire can´t bite a human unless theu both sign a contract allowing that.) Humans and Others can even get married and have kids.

Shiarra is in the middle of this confusion and although she doesn´t want get envolved with their issues, money speaks louder and she is hired by a female mage to find a powerful artifact that fell into the hands of a seductive and manipulative vampirem that puts her in a dangerous situation.

But Shia is not alone in this adventure. She counts on Sara, her human friend, Arnold, a nerd mage and Chaz, her handsome ex-boyfriend.

Will she be able to save her own life?

Minha Opinião: The girl, the vampire and the werewolf. Does it sound familiar? It may be, but I´m sure you´ve never read a story like this.

In Hunted by the others, the girl is brave, smart and even a little bold. The vampire is not so nice and the werewolf... he is another story. I promise I´ll mention him again in another paragraph *-*.

Jess Haines created a whole new world, full of fantastic creatures, where everything can happen... but somehow you start to believe in the things she write. You even start to ask yourself: "What if one of my friends is a vampire or a mage?" Who knows...

I really liked Shiarra, with her very human soul among so utopic beings. She cries, feels fear and asks for help when she needs it. But I also hated her reluctance in accepting Chaz back (the handsome werewolf). I´m in love with him and I beg the author: "Please Jess... I want more of Chaz in the next book!!!"

How many stars? ****

Soundtrack: It was not so easy! The book, despite of being a little dark is very funny too. So I chose Poison by Tarja Turunen that has both features.

You can buy it at Livraria da Cultura HERE

Almost to die for - Tate Hallaway

"The vampires.

Nikolai put a finger to his lips. "Don´t say their name, especially that one. Their hearing is incredible.

I halted my insistent march toward the road. "You sound like you know things about them."

"Are you kidding? My people have been hunters for centuries."

"Vampire hunters? You mean like Buffy?"

The Story: Being a teenager is not that easy. Specially when you´re not much popular at school and you´re not the prettiest. Just to make the situation worse, you´re the daughter of a witch, but you don´t know how to make any spell to scare your idiot colleagues from school. Oh! And I almost forgot... still there´s the fact that you have different eyes. One is blue and the other is brown!

Is this disgrace enough? I haven´t even started telling the worst about Ana´s story.

On her sixteenth birthday, she simply discovers that besides being the daughter of a witch, her father is the Prince of the Vampires, in other words, she´s a dhampir, half human and half vampire. And witches and vampires are enemies and the war between them is just starting.

O Romance: But not everything in Ana´s life is tragedy, my friends! As she finds out that she´s a dhampir, she starts to be disputed by two different boys - Nikolai, a male witch, that comes from a legendary family of vampire hunters, and Elias, the capitain of the knights that protect the prince and becomes a kind of a "bodyguard" of hers.

They both touch Ana´s heart in different ways. But what will happen if she has to chose between the two lives? Will it influence in her relations with Nikolai and Elias?

Minha Opinião: Join vampires, witches (two themes that I really love), two irresistible and good doses of humor. There´s no way to go wrong! "Almost to die for" is a successful union of great ingredients.

It´s easy to like Ana, that shy girl, with a weird family, that tries to fit in some group at school. She´s not ugly, but she´s screwed by the popular guys and she just wants to be normal.

Besides all that, on her birthday she will participate of her Initiation as a "True Witch", but she knows it will be a complete disaster because she can´t do magic and this is making her very nervous. There´s a lot of pressure over her. And exactly in that day, Ana discovers that she´s a Vampire Princess. Isn´t that a lot for a sixteen years old teenager´s mind? Yes, it it... but we´re lucky ´cause Tate Hallaway tells this story wonderfully and Ana seems to deal pretty well with all these things. The book is still a little dark but it´s light, what I really liked.

And I have to confess that I didn´t want to be in Ana´s shoes. Nikolai and Elias are wonderful! And would never know how to pick only one. Nik is that handsome boy from school, super-cool, that sings in a band, besides this is cute and gentle, that would even be able to go against family tradition and not hunt the Vampire Princess. Elias is the sexy guy, that would give his life to protect her... and he conquered me every time he called Ana: "My Lady" ou "Your Highness". What a hard life, isn´t it?
I loved it! One more book to the list of the great YA books that I´ve been reading.

Quantas estrelas: ****

Tem uma trilha sonora: It was hard to find the perfect song, but I chose For the heart I once had by Nightwish, ´cause it talks about a heart that has changed, becoming darker.

True Vision - Joyce Lamb

"He thought he´d feel some guilt. He´d just killed a woman. But it was a woman who deserved to die. Just like the other one. They´s both known, and he couldn´t have them, anyone, knowing. Couldn´t let the secret out. It would destroy them, and they´d worked too hard for too long to sit back and let the destruction begin.

No, the secret to success was destroying the enemies before they could destroy you."

The Suspense: She was just a journalist full of idealisms, living in a small town, where everything that was published in its principal newspaper was controlled by its advertisers, what prevented her to publish many things. But she made the mistake to provoke one of the most powerful man of Lake Avalon.

It would be enough for her to make some enemies. But everything went worst when she witnessed a hit and run and the victim gave to her, with only one touch, her psychic powers.

Now Charlie can touch a person and see something from its past. Besides this, she can feel exactly everything the person felt in this moment. And this is not a good thing.

And someone decides that Charlie is dangerous for its plans. Someone that doesn´t want her to discover a fatal secret in one of her visions.

The Romance: Noah Lassiter is a detective from Chicago, that arrives in Lake Avalon to investigate the death of her friend. Yes, the same woman that transferred her powers to Charlie and the one that had a strong conexion with her. He knew that the hit and run was a murder and he decided to find the killer. He didn´t expected to fall so hard for Charlie and to live a torrid romance with her, full of surprises.

Minha Opinião: Everyone that read my blog knows that Romantic Suspense is my favourite kind of book. But I´ve read so many things with this theme, that the books end up being too similar and with no surprises. It didn´t happend with True Vision! Definitely!

I loved every page and the reading was very pleasant. I´m surrendering myself more and more to paranormal romances and Joyce Lamb´s story came in a good time, which I´m avid for these things.

I felt a deep agony for Charlie. She received a gift as a "heritage" from the lady that died and wasn´t prepared at all for what would happend next. Each time that she touched a person, she entered in a memory and phisicaly felt the pains and emotions of this remembrance. And this was true for good and bad things. I cannot forget to mention the hottest scenes between her and Noah, where she could feel the same as him (If you know what I mean ;)).

I felt sorry for her, when she became exhausted after so many visions, but I got envy too, ´cause devoted Noah was always there, to help in her difficult moments. Their dialogs are great and I fell in love with their romance. And the suspense is very good too.

I really recomend!

How many stars: *****

Tem uma trilha sonora? Yes! I found the perfect one - No need to explain by Lacuna Coil.

"Take and hold this hand what you feel inside?

Is another dream, won´t you give me a part."