Bloodthirsty is an absolutely hilarious and very unique tale of guy gets girl. Finbar’s method of attracting girls is unusual to say the least. Who would have thought that pretending to be a paranormal creature could be so effective? While Finbar’s success at masquerading as a vampire is in a way completely unrealistic, because I have difficulty believing so many high school girls would genuinely believe that their classmate was a vampire, there is still something so lovable about this story. Finbar’s social awkwardness and timidity will be easy to relate to for many teens, which only makes the happy ending more sweet. I applaud debut novelist Meaney for incorporating so many hilarious pop culture and YA vampire book references to make for an engaging and genuinely interesting read.
Bloodthirsty is sure to be enjoyed by fans of Into the Wild Nerd Yonder by Julie Halpern and Sucks to Be Me by Kimberly Pauley.
Rating: 4.25
Review copy from publisher Little, Brown
Bloodthirsty by Flynn Meaney
Feast of Fools by Rachel Caine
The Morganville Vampires series is fast becoming my favorite source of vampire guilty pleasure. This series is honestly one of the more unusual, fascinating, and undoubtedly exciting vampire series out there, and despite having many installments, the story just never gets old. In Feast of Fools, Caine incorporates several new villains which bring the danger in Morganville to the next level. I absolutely loved being along for the ride as Claire navigated so many new perils. The reader will be able to sense how the situation is heading downhill the whole time, and although I was able to guess ahead of the plot several times, I was not bothered by this, because the entire story is just plain thrilling. The disastrous ending scene, instead of bothering me as enormous cliffhangers normally do, just makes me want to get my hands on Lord of Misrule, the next installment in the series.
The Morganville Vampires series is sure to appeal of fans of the Dark Elite series by Chloe Neill and the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare.
Rating: 4.5
Review copy from publisher Penguin
Midnight Alley by Rachel Caine
Once again, Caine delivers nonstop thrilling action in this third installment to the Morganville Vampires series. It is nearly astounding how Caine manages to continue Claire’s adventures in Morganville without having them seem repetitive, especially with a relatively static cast of characters. This is probably because Caine is a master of plot. There are twists in the story with nearly every turn of the page, and the reader is continually kept guessing as to what will come next. In addition to the very exciting plot, though, Caine also makes sure to keep her characters realistic, or as realistic as a character can be in Morganville. Protagonist Clair in particular is enjoyable to read about as she struggles between her human and vampires loyalties. As per usual, Caine ends the story with an enormous cliffhanger, so I absolutely cannot wait to dig into the next installment, Feast of Fools.
The Morganville Vampires series is sure to be enjoyed by all vampire fans, especially those who also liked the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare and the Dark Elite series by Chloe Neill.
Rating: 4.5
Review copy from publisher Penguin
Win The Lost Saint by Bree Despain
Who's excited for the sequel to The Dark Divine? I know I am. Luckily for all of us, I've got some copies of The Lost Saint up for grabs.
The non-stop sequel to The Dark Divine delivers an even hotter romance and more thrilling action than Bree Despain's first novel. Grace Divine made the ultimate sacrifice to cure Daniel Kalbi. She gave her soul to the wolf to save him and lost her beloved mother. When Grace receives a haunting phone call from Jude, she knows what she must do. She must become a Hound of Heaven. Desparate to find Jude, Grace befriends Talbot - a newcomer to town who promises her that he can help her be a hero. But as the two grow closer, the wolf grows in Grace, and her relationship with Daniel begins to crumble. Unaware of the dark path she is walking, Grace becomes prideful in her new abilities - not realizing that an old enemy has returned and deadly trap is about to be sprung. Readers, raveous for more Grace and Daniel, will be itching to sink their teeth into The Lost Saint.
(2) lucky winners will receive an ARC ofThe Lost Saint by Bree Despain and blue nail polish (that matches the cover!)
courtesy of EgmontUSA
Other details:
- US mailing addresses only.
- Contest ends 1/15/11, at 9 p.m. PST.
Don't Stop Now by Julie Halpern is Munch-Worthy
On the first day of Lillian's summer before college, she gets a message on her cell from her sort-of friend, Penny. Not only has Penny faked her own kidnapping, but Lil is the only one who figures it out. She knows that Penny's home life has been rough, and that her boyfriend may be abusive. Soon, Penny's family, the local police, and even the FBI are grilling Lil, and she decides to head out West, where Penny has mentioned an acquaintance. And who better to road-trip across the country than with Lil's BFF, Josh. But here's the thing: Lil loves Josh. And Josh doesn't want to "ruin" their amazing friendship.
Josh has a car and his dad's credit card. Lil has her cellphone and a hunch about where Penny is hiding. There's something else she needs to find: Are she and Josh meant to be together?
Who else out there is a huge Julie Halpern fan like me? Because I simply adored both Get Well Soon and Into the Wild Nerd Yonder. Adored. So when I heard about Don't Stop Now, naturally I got really excited because Halpern is just such a fantastic writer. So excited that I immediately started devising a plan for how to get my hands on an early copy. Which I finally did, as you can see.
It actually took me a long time to figure out what Halpern's upcoming novel was about. There's no listing on the publisher's website, and up until recently, it wasn't even on Amazon. I found out a little bit more from Halpern's blog and from emailing the wonderful people at Macmillan, but the summary above I copied from the back of my coveted ARC, because I don't think it's available anywhere else. I couldn't even find an image of the cover except for the ARC cover! But that's probably because Don't Stop Now won't be published until the summer of next year.
Releases June 7, 2011 from Feiwel & Friends.
The Book Muncher turns 3!
It's true! Today marks the three-year blogoversary of The Book Muncher. That's right, three years of reading, munching, and loving it. Sometimes loving it so much that I don't remember when my blogoversary is (yes, I forgot to do a post celebrating two years of munching, oops!).
(1) lucky winner will receive:
- a signed copy of Confessions of the Sullivan Sisters by Natalie Standiford
- a signed copy of Empty by Suzanne Weyn
- an ARC of The Demon Trapper's Daughter by Jana Oliver
- an ARC of Drought by Pam Bachorz
- Plain Kate by Erin Bow
- lots of book swag (including bookmarks, magnets, pins, and other goodies!)
- who knows what else I might add to this awesome prize pack?
To enter this contest, please fill out this form:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?formkey=dE54dm1fMmx1N2xxc3M1eS1iQ1ZxSnc6MQ
Please note that there are five mandatory (but easy!) feedback questions because I want to get a sense of what you guys really think about The Book Muncher. Please be honest!
Other details:
- US mailing addresses only.
- Contest ends 1/15/11, at 9 p.m. PST.
Book signing overload...in a good way
I went to two book singings this week. For some reason, I thought it was a good idea to post all of this at once, so I apologize if it seems like an overload of book signing pictures and commentary!
On Thursday, I went to the publication party for Edges by Léna Roy. My main motivation for doing so was because I saw her at the November Teen Author Reading Night at the NYPL Jefferson Market branch. That, and she's a Barnard alum, and I make a point of going to all Barnard alum author events.
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| Léna Roy reads from Edges |
Courtney Sheinmel, another Barnard alum author, was also there, but unfortunately, all the other Banardians left before we could take a Barnard group picture. I also chatted with a wonderful Macmillan publicist who I met previously at the Halo release party and met Léna's fantastic agent.
Then, on Sunday, I went back to Books of Wonder with a friend in order to see a LOT of YA authors. By a lot, I mean 10. That's the most I've ever seen at once. It was pretty awesome, if not almost overwhelming.
So, who was there? Rachel Cohn, David Levithan (yeah, this is the fourth time I've seen him and Rachel for Dash & Lily), Kirsten Miller, Richard Peck, Adele Griffin, Lisa Greenwald, Esther Friesner, Matt de la Peña, Flynn Meaney, and Samantha Schutz.
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| Esther Friesner, Matt de la Peña, Flynn Meaney, and Samantha Schutz |
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| Richard Peck, Adele Griffin, and Lisa Greenwald |
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| David Levithan, Rachel Cohn, and Kirsten Miller |
I had a really wonderful time chatting with Samantha, Flynn, Adele, Rachel, and Kirsten, in particular.
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| Samantha Schutz and me |
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| my friend Clara, Flynn Meaney, and me |
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| me, my friend Clara, and Kirsten Miller we're all Barnard girls! |
I was especially excited when Rachel told me that Kirsten, like her, is a Barnard girl. So, of course, I had to go interrupt her current conversation because I'm a Barnard girl too. Kirsten is a total sweetheart! She even gave me her own copy of The Eternal Ones and signed it because I gave away my ARC earlier.
As is the case with practically all book signings and events in NYC, there are interesting people in the audience in addition to those reading and signing. I saw J.A. Yang, who I met at an earlier book signing for the 2009 Debs, and, completely by chance, I ran into Kelsey from The Book Scout. I love meeting other book reviewers because frankly, I don't get to that often.
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| Kelsey, The Book Scout, and me |
So, I would say that the week was very productive in the way of book signings.
The Book muncher is interviewed...yet again
I feel like the month of December has made The Book Muncher suddenly popular. Featured Buzz Blogger on Random Buzzers. A Blog to Stalk on Figment. And now I've been interviewed over at Annick Press's blog.
Go check it out if you'd like: http://annickpressblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/meet-book-blogger-book-muncher.html
My two cents on reviews
I am a book reviewer. That’s obvious enough, but exactly does it mean to be a book reviewer? It’s rather redundant to say that a book reviewer is someone who writes reviews for books. There’s nothing debatable about that. My main concern here is how far a reviewer is entitled to go in a book review.
I’ll begin by making my own stance on reviewing painfully clear. I believe in the honest although not always positive review. I believe I have the right to express my opinion on what I read. I believe that a review should pertain to an author’s work, and not the author. And I believe that people, and this definitely includes reviewers and authors, should be mature about all of this.
Lastly, I'd like to remind all authors that reviews are opinion, and that while you are entitled to react in the way you choose to negative reviews, it is impolite and rude to insult the reviewer and/or encourage others to do so. Negative reviews are not insults to authors, but comments and constructive criticisms about the author's work.
This section above is taken directly from my “Book Review Policy,” a little section hidden somewhere on my blog that I’m sure few people aside from me have seen. It was a little disclaimer of sorts meant to encourage healthy conversation regarding negative reviews as opposed to verbal (or even physical) violence.
Unfortunately, not everyone on the world thinks like I do. And this creates problems when we are confronted with the negative review.
I have one example in particular that I want to delve into, mostly because it has a happy ending. But, before we get ahead of ourselves, I’ll start from the beginning.
On June 22, 2009, I posted a review on my blog for Gentlemen by Michael Northrop, but the review went up earlier on Amazon, GoodReads, and Shelfari, appearing May 29, 2009. I will be honest: I did not like the book. I did not request it from Scholastic, but I received it because I was one of their distribution lists. From the summary, I was mildly interested, and even though the story turned out to be totally different than I thought it would be, and not in a good way, I felt obligated to review the novel anyway because I had been provided with not one but two free copies from the publisher.
Sometime after my review went public, I stumbled upon this post on Alexa Young’s blog, The Worst Review Ever. I can’t say that I wasn’t completely surprised to have a negative reaction (having experienced a far worse response to a review that was not nearly as negative). But at the same time, I kind of was. I’ll admit, I was a little upset and angry at this post and some of the comments in response.
But when I go back and think about all of this now, while I still get a little miffed, I am less so now that I put everything into perspective. Yes, I wrote a negative review. Yes, the author, Michael Northrop, wasn’t so pleased when he saw the review. Yes, all of this could have been handled a lot better.
My side of the coin
On my part, I could have phrased my opinions on Gentlemen in a more precise manner. Going back and reading my own review, though, I realize that although I know what I’m talking about, other people might not, or might misconstrue what I was trying to say. For example, when I wrote “readers who enjoyed The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger may find some merit in Northrop’s writing style,” I was really trying to say that I thought Northrop and Salinger have a similar writing style, particularly because they both incorporate stream of consciousness. Another thing that I should have made clearer was that I was not a fan of The Catcher in the Rye; I actually thought it was really boring. I noticed a lot of people didn’t understand why, if I didn’t like Gentlemen, I would recommend it to fans of the aforementioned classic. And as I mentioned above, it’s because I thought they had a very similar style.
What actually bothered me the most, even aside from some comments on Michael’s submission to The Worst Review Ever that basically said that my review was poorly written, was the suggestion that I should have made it clearer that the novel was not something for me. Um, well, sorry to sound so unsophisticated, but wasn’t that obvious? I can own up to the fact that my review of Gentlemen was not my best piece of work. There are definitely many things I would change about it. But to have me explicitly state that something was not for me is like saying that I didn’t have positive opinions about that something. Well, duh!
Is it really that hard for people to grasp that my reviews are really just my opinions? If I’m writing a negative review, I, for one, think that it’s pretty clear that I didn’t like the book, which means it probably was not for me. I’ve been operating under the assumption that The Book Muncher caters to an educated audience that should not need me to be overly explicit when I write a negative review. I don’t want to treat my readers like five year olds, and I don’t think that’s how they want to be treated anyway.
Another thing that bothered me was that my review was viewed as an attack on the book. There is a difference between a negative review and an attack. I apologize if it appeared so, but it was definitely not meant to be that way. Attacking a book, and especially its author, is never okay.
The author’s side of the coin
So there are definitely things that I could have done differently, but there are also things that Michael could have done differently. Let me state first that I am not in any way trying to attack anyone here. I’m just using one personal example to comment on.
I actually did not have any real personal experience with Michael’s reaction to my negative review of Gentlemen. I only found out about it after stumbling upon his post on The Worst Review Ever. This is both good and bad. While I appreciate not being confronted and personally attacked, it’s still not good to know that others are attacking or demeaning you.
Even though I’m no longer bothered by the fact that all that did happen, I still don’t think that it is completely right. It’s a two way street, and if it’s generally viewed that it’s not okay for a book reviewer to attack an author, then it shouldn’t be okay for an author to attack a book reviewer or encourage others to do so.
The happy ending
I was at a book signing when my friend introduced me to Michael Northrop. Upon that introduction, I thought back to my negative review and his post on The Worst Review Ever. I smiled, but inwardly, I was a little worried. I didn’t think that it would go well.
However, once I fully introduced myself as The Book Muncher we both acknowledged the fact that I wrote a bad review for his book, we got past that. Why? Because we’re both rational human beings. There’s absolutely no use in getting worked up about something so inconsequent, when viewing the bigger picture, as one negative review. I mean, even if I didn’t like the book, there were plenty of other people who did. And in the end, that’s really what counts.
The lesson we can all learn
If Michael and I can get past one little negative review, then why can’t everyone else? Why can’t some book reviewers grow up and learn to write with some grace and maturity? There is absolutely no merit in mercilessly attacking a book and its author, unless one wants to look like the nastiest person in the blogosphere. Why can’t some authors respond in a calm and rational manner to a negative review instead of trashing the review and the reviewer? There is also no merit in this except immediate personal satisfaction. Why can’t readers understand that reviews represent a single opinion and that it’s probably not a good idea to take one opinion as the truth?
Please note that this is not aimed at anyone in particular. I just hope that enough people will see this and modify their behavior accordingly, because it’s very unlikely that bad reviews will go away, but we can all act differently to reduce the potentially nuclear fallout.
The Lying Game by Sara Shepard
Everyone always jokes about having a long lost twin, but Emma Paxton is about to find out that she really does have one—or at least she did. When Emma discovers a disturbing online video which stars someone who looks exactly like her, but couldn’t possibly be, she realizes that she must have a twin somewhere. She leaves her foster home in search of Sutton Mercer, but instead of finding her sister, she discovers a complicated web of lies and secrets. Sutton seems to be missing, but no one else thinks so—because everyone thinks that Emma is Sutton. At first this isn’t so bad, because Sutton has a charmed life a foster kid like Emma never thought she’d experience, but when it becomes apparent that Sutton is gone for good, Emma realizes that she needs some answers fast. Where is Sutton Mercer? What happened to her? And what does Emma do if the culprits are Sutton’s own friends?Stalk Me!
Well, Figment thinks you should!
What exactly is Figment, you ask. Well, in their own words:
Figment is a community where you can share your writing, connect with other readers, and discover new stories and authors. Whatever you're into, from sonnets to mysteries, from sci-fi stories to cell phone novels, you can find it all here.Basically, Figment is this super cool new website aimed at teens that encourages us to read, write, and share. It might seem like just one of many online young adult book communities like BookDivas and Random Buzzers, but I think that Figment has the potential to be something huge. The masterminds behind this project didn't conduct beta testing for months on the site for nothing! What I really love about this website is that nearly everything goes. Basically, this just means that it takes advantage of every available form of reading and writing and makes it compatible with the website, whether it's traditional print, electronic, or mobile. That's what I call progressive.
And I'm not just saying all this because I'm featured on their blog as a blog to stalk. Figment and I just have very high opinions of each other!
Get in on the action: http://figment.com/
And check out their feature on The Book Muncher (in which Very Nice Things are said about this blog): http://blog.figment.com/2010/12/07/blogs-to-stalk-the-book-muncher/
It Started with a Dare by Lindsay Faith Rech
It Started with a Dare tells the not particularly original story of a girl trying to fit into a new high school. The only way CG’s story stands out is that she doesn’t deliberately court popularity, or at least at first. Her inclusion in the in crowd comes as a total surprise to her, and unfortunately, once she realizes she’s in, she focuses on staying in, transforming herself into a careless and selfish person. Although CG holds herself above the other members of Alona’s clique, because she could care less about how she dresses and because she hangs out with a social outcast on the side, she really is no better than any of them, as CG eventually comes to understand. Her commitment to her new life of lies leads her to betray nearly every person, important or not, in her life, including herself. While CG’s exploits contain an important message or warning to readers, it is poorly executed. I had difficulty getting into this story because I could see the path that CG had chosen was a terrible one and personally could not relate to her choices at all. To make matters worse, every other supporting character was poorly developed and often hard to understand or inconsistent.
Though I didn’t find this novel particularly enjoyable, It Started with a Dare may still appeal to fans of Little Black Lies by Tish Cohen and The Diamonds by Ted Michaels.
Rating: 2.75
Review copy from NetGalley
StarCrossed by Elizabeth C. Bunce
Of late, I have been reading a lot of fantasy stories, and even though StarCrossed is just another one of those, I still immensely enjoyed it. What I really love about certain fantasies is that the reader is transported to an entire new world with entire new social customs and politics. It’s fascinating just to learn about them and to see how they are being challenged or changed in the story. In StarCrossed, Digger likes to think that she’s removed from all the politics, but she ends up becoming an integral part of them anyway. Digger is really such a strong protagonist; she has undergone so many hardships and personal betrayals yet she survives and even thrives. This story was just so fascinating to follow because of the exciting plot and realistic characters; I cannot wait for the continuation of Digger’s story in Liar’s Moon.
StarCrossed is sure to be enjoyed by fans of Plain Kate by Erin Bow, The Keepers’ Tattoo by Gill Arbuthnott, Trickster’s Choice and Trickster’s Queen by Tamora Pierce, and Brightly Woven by Alexandra Bracken.
Rating: 4.25
Review copy from publisher Scholastic
