Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Racing the Sun Release

So many great book coming out, including author Karina Halle's just-released-today-new-book, Racing the Sun.  





From the New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of Where Sea Meets Sky comes a new adult novel about a young woman who becomes a nanny in Capri and falls for her charges’ bad-boy brother.
When I’m traveling, I feel like the secret to my life, to myself, to really becoming, is one step ahead. It’s in the next destination, the next town I get lost in, the next stranger I talk to. It’s always next but never here . . . 


After six months of backpacking and soul-searching across the world, Amber MacLean is flat broke. There are worse places for a twentysomething to be stuck than the Amalfi Coast, but the only way she can earn enough money for a plane ticket home to California is to teach English to two of the brattiest children she has ever met.

It doesn’t help that the children are under the care of their brooding older brother, ex-motorcycle racer Desiderio Larosa. Darkly handsome and oh-so-mysterious, the young master of the crumbling villa tests Amber’s patience and will at every turn—not to mention her hormones.

When her position turns into a full-time nanny gig, Amber grows dangerously closer to the enigmatic recluse. But can she give up the certainty of home for someone whose closely guarded heart feels a world apart from her own?



RACING THE SUN by Karina Halle

Atria Books | July 28, 2015 | Paperback ISBN 9781476796444, $15 | eBook ISBN 9781476796482, $7.99 | 384 pages



Get Your Copy!

Amazon | Barnes & Noble| Blio | Books-a-Million | Google ebookstore | iBooks |Kobo




ABOUT KARINA HALLE  
With her USA Today Bestselling The Artists Trilogy published by Grand Central Publishing, numerous foreign publication deals, and self-publishing success with her Experiment in Terror series, Vancouver-born Karina Halle is a true example of the term "Hybrid Author." Though her books showcase her love of all things dark, sexy and edgy, she's a closet romantic at heart and strives to give her characters a HEA...whenever possible.

Karina holds a screenwriting degree from Vancouver Film School and a Bachelor of Journalism from TRU. Her travel writing, music reviews/interviews and photography have appeared in publications such as Consequence of Sound, Mxdwn and GoNomad Travel Guides. She currently lives on an island on the coast of British Columbia where she’s preparing for the zombie apocalypse with her fiancĂ© and rescue pup.


LINKS:

Dark Elements Finale

I'm so excited to announce that Jennifer Armentrout's finale in her Dark Elements series is finally here!  The last book, Every Last Breath will be released TODAY...and I'm so happy!!! I'm a huge fan of Jennifer's and her fun, freaky, fantasy/paranormal books so I feel like I can say already that this release is going to be epic.






Excerpt :

Roth cleared his throat. “Shortie, look…look at your hand.”
Look at my hand? Why in the world would he be asking me to do that in the midst of all the cray?
“Do it,” he said quietly and too gently.
The dread exploded in my gut like buckshot, and my gaze dropped to my left hand. I expected to see the weird marbling of black and gray, a mixture of the demon and Warden that existed inside of me and a combination I’d become almost familiar with by now. My nails had lengthened and sharpened, and I could tell they were hard enough to cut through steel, as hard as my skin, but my skin…it was still pink. Really pink.
“What the…?” My gaze traveled to my other hand. It was the same. Just pink. My wings twitched, reminding me that I had shifted.
Zayne swallowed. “Your…your wings…”
“What about my wings?” I almost screeched, reaching be‑ hind me. “Are they broken? Did they not come out—” The tips of my fingers came into contact with something as soft as silk. My hand jerked back. “What…”
Stacey’s watery eyes had doubled in size. “Um, Layla, there’s a mirror above the fireplace. I think you need to look in it.”
I met Roth’s gaze for a second before I spun around and all but ran to the fireplace I was sure Stacey’s mom had never used. Clutching the white mantel, I stared at my reflection.
I looked normal, like I did before I shifted…like I was going to class or something. My eyes were the palest shade of gray, a watered-down blue. My hair was so blond it was almost white, and a mess of waves that went in every direction like usual. I looked like a colorless china doll, which was nothing new, except for the two fangs jutting out of my mouth. I wouldn’t show them off at school, but that wasn’t what caught my attention and held it.
It was my wings.
They were large, not as massive as Zayne’s or Roth’s, and normally they were almost leathery in texture, but now they were black…black and feathered. Like legit feathered. That soft, silky thing I’d felt? It had been tiny feathers.
Feathers.
“Oh my God,” I whispered at my reflection. “I have feathers.”
“Those are definitely feathered wings,” Roth commented.
I whipped around, knocking over a lamp with my feathered right wing. “I have feathers on my wings!”
Roth cocked his head to the side. “Yeah, you do.”
He was absolutely no help, so I turned to Zayne. “Why do I have feathers on my wings?”
Zayne shook his head slowly. “I don’t know, Layla. I’ve never seen anything like this.”
“Liar,” hissed Roth, shooting him a dark look. “You’ve seen that before. So have I.”

EVERY LAST BREATH Synopsis:

Some loves will last ‘til your dying breath  


Every choice has consequences—but seventeen-year-old Layla faces tougher choices than most. Light or darkness. Wickedly sexy demon prince Roth, or Zayne, the gorgeous, protective Warden she never thought could be hers. Hardest of all, Layla has to decide which side of herself to trust.

Layla has a new problem, too. A Lilin—the deadliest of demons—has been unleashed, wreaking havoc on those around her…including her best friend. To keep Sam from a fate much, much worse than death, Layla must strike a deal with the enemy while saving her city—and her race—from destruction.

Torn between two worlds and two different boys, Layla has no certainties, least of all survival, especially when an old bargain comes back to haunt them all. But sometimes, when secrets are everywhere and the truth seems unknowable, you have to listen to your heart, pick a side—and then fight like hell…

“Armentrout is a major talent…I just can’t stop reading!”
--New York Times bestselling author Gena Showalter

“Armentrout works her magic with swoon-worthy guys and a twist you never see coming.”
--#1 New York Times bestselling author Abbi Glines on White Hot Kiss


And don’t miss the first titles in the Dark Elements Series!
BITTER SWEET LOVE
WHITE HOT KISS
STONE COLD TOUCH

EVERY LAST BREATH Trailer Link and Embed Code:

URL Link





About Jennifer L. Armentrout:  

# 1 New York Times and # 1 International Bestselling author Jennifer lives in Martinsburg, West Virginia. All the rumors you’ve heard about her state aren’t true. When she’s not hard at work writing, she spends her time reading, watching really bad zombie movies, pretending to write, and hanging out with her husband and her Jack Russell Loki.

Her dreams of becoming an author started in algebra class, where she spent most of her time writing short stories….which explains her dismal grades in math. Jennifer writes young adult paranormal, science fiction, fantasy, and contemporary romance. She is published with Spencer Hill Press, Entangled Teen and Brazen, Disney/Hyperion and Harlequin Teen. Her book Obsidian has been optioned for a major motion picture and her Covenant Series has been optioned for TV. Her young adult romantic suspense novel DON’T LOOK BACK was a 2014 nominated Best in Young Adult Fiction by YALSA.

She also writes Adult and New Adult contemporary and paranormal romance under the name J. Lynn. She is published by Entangled Brazen and HarperCollins.

Links:



Sunday, July 26, 2015

Six Months of Wonder

Here we are half way through 2015 already!  Can you believe it?  Me neither, honestly.  I've been busier than ever this year reading like a fiend, doing my mommy job, working a ton and trying to keep up on this blogging adventure.  So far, so good though and I can't thank you enough for continuing to visit me here and reading my ramblings.  :)

So I decided it would be fun to do a rundown of my favorite books so far this year.  It will likely make my job at the end of the year much easier than it was last year; because trust me when I say choosing a top 10 at the end of last year was incredibly difficult and actually kept me up at night trying to choose the "right" 10 I wanted to include.  So, without further ado, may I present to you wonderful readers my TOP 10 BOOKS for the first half of 2015, in no particular order, mind you:

The Mason List, by S.D. Hendrickson 
     Today, 8:15 p.m.
I hurt. I hurt so deeply, I felt the pain searing in my bones and jabbing like a hot poker into my heart. I knew nothing would make it better as the memories pulled from the crevices of my mind, detailing the bad and the ugly, filling my thoughts with regret as I slipped into the darkness. . .
When I was eight, my mother was dying of cancer, my father lost his job, and the bank kicked us out of our house. I was forced to move to the strange town of Arlis, Texas where my father and I slept in our car in the hospital parking lot. Desperate and hopeless, we lived on fumes of our former life.
Then one night, everything changed forever. A knock on the car window brought a family into my life that I only wanted to shut out. I hated charity and I hated the Masons. Well, except one. He made it impossible to hate him.
Jess Mason had the biggest blue eyes and ornery smile of any boy I had ever seen. He was a ray of sunshine in my dark world. A boy full of adventure, dragging me across the meadow of Sprayberry Ranch; a beautiful Texas paradise full of horses and tree houses that got us into more trouble than anyone ever imagined.
Jess was my everything as a kid until we grew up and the rules changed. Instead of living happily ever after with a boy full of love. . . I destroyed it.
- Alex Tanner

     In the Bone there is a house. In the house there is a girl. In the girl there is a darkness. Margo is not like other girls. She lives in a derelict neighborhood called the Bone, in a cursed house, with her cursed mother, who hasn’t spoken to her in over two years. She lives her days feeling invisible. It’s not until she develops a friendship with her wheelchair-bound neighbor, Judah Grant, that things begin to change. When neighborhood girl, seven-year-old Neveah Anthony, goes missing, Judah sets out to help Margo uncover what happened to her. What Margo finds changes her, and with a new perspective on life, she’s determined to find evil and punish it–targeting rapists and child molesters, one by one. But hunting evil is dangerous, and Margo risks losing everything, including her own soul.

     When reclusive novelist Senna Richards wakes up on her thirty-third birthday, everything has changed. Caged behind an electrical fence, locked in a house in the middle of the snow, Senna is left to decode the clues to find out why she was taken. If she wants her freedom, she has to take a close look at her past. But, her past has a heartbeat…and her kidnapper is nowhere to be found. With her survival hanging by a thread, Senna soon realizes this is a game. A dangerous one. Only the truth can set her free.

     If I tell you right up front, right in the beginning that I lost him, it will be easier for you to bear. You will know it’s coming, and it will hurt. But you’ll be able to prepare. 

Someone found him in a laundry basket at the Quick Wash, wrapped in a towel, a few hours old and close to death. They called him Baby Moses when they shared his story on the ten o’clock news – the little baby left in a basket at a dingy Laundromat, born to a crack addict and expected to have all sorts of problems. I imagined the crack baby, Moses, having a giant crack that ran down his body, like he’d been broken at birth. I knew that wasn’t what the term meant, but the image stuck in my mind. Maybe the fact that he was broken drew me to him from the start. 
It all happened before I was born, and by the time I met Moses and my mom told me all about him, the story was old news and nobody wanted anything to do with him. People love babies, even sick babies. Even crack babies. But babies grow up to be kids, and kids grow up to be teenagers. Nobody wants a messed up teenager. 
And Moses was messed up. Moses was a law unto himself. But he was also strange and exotic and beautiful. To be with him would change my life in ways I could never have imagined. Maybe I should have stayed away. Maybe I should have listened. My mother warned me. Even Moses warned me. But I didn’t stay away. 

And so begins a story of pain and promise, of heartache and healing, of life and death. A story of before and after, of new beginnings and never-endings. But most of all . . . a love story. 

     The only thing inevitable in love is despair. 

I knew from the start that he would wreck me. 
Nothing could have prepared me for the day he walked into my life ... 
or the day he walked out of it. 

I self-destructed. 

All that remained was a shell of the girl I once was. 
SHATTERED. 

And I don't know if I'll ever recover.

    A Stone in the Sea ~ 

He wanted nothing at all... 

Until he found she had everything to give... 

Sunder lead singer and guitarist Sebastian Stone has everything--fans, fame, and fortune. He also has a heart full of bitterness and a reputation for a short-fused temper. But an outward reputation rarely reveals the true man inside. Facing assault charges after trying to protect his younger brother, Sebastian is sent to Savannah, Georgia to lie low until the dust settles in L.A. 

Shea Bentley is beautiful, kind, and hiding from the very lifestyle Sebastian has always embraced. 

When the mysterious, tattooed stranger begins hanging out at the bar where she works, Shea is quick to recognize he is nothing but trouble, but she's helpless to the way her body lights up every time his intense grey eyes tangle with hers. 

They both soon find themselves drowning in a sea of desire and passion that won't let them up for air. 

Sebastian knows firsthand secrets never die, and he's not the only one who's hiding them. 

Loving someone always comes with a price. But will it be Shea's past that costs them everything? 

    At age twenty-one, Auburn Reed has already lost everything important to her. In her fight to rebuild her shattered life, she has her goals in sight and there is no room for mistakes. But when she walks into a Dallas art studio in search of a job, she doesn’t expect to find a deep attraction to the enigmatic artist who works there, Owen Gentry. 

For once, Auburn takes a chance and puts her heart in control, only to discover that Owen is keeping a major secret from coming out. The magnitude of his past threatens to destroy everything important to Auburn, and the only way to get her life back on track is to cut Owen out of it.

To save their relationship, all Owen needs to do is confess. But in this case, the confession could be much more destructive than the actual sin.

     Liam wasn't supposed to be my happily ever after.

He wasn't even on my radar.
He was my husband's best friend

-- forbidden.

But my husband is dead and I'm alone. I ache for him and I reach for Liam.

One night with Liam changed everything. Now I have to decide if I truly love Liam or if he's just the consolation prize.

*** Because I absolutely felt like I couldn't include the first without the second, which is just a continuation of the same story, I have two here.***

     Diamonds:   Bryna feels his eyes on her.   

Hot, seductive, enticing. 

He’s at least ten years older than her seventeen years, and he knows exactly what he’s doing to her with that look. 

Walking away would be the smart thing to do… 

But she can’t. Not that first night when he takes her home and claims her body. Not when he shows up in her life again with expensive gifts to win her trust. Not even when she’s falling for him, and everything else is falling apart…

     Gold: The prey becomes the predator.  

Love. That cursed four-letter word no longer belongs in Bryna’s vocabulary. The only four-letter word she knows now is gold.

…and fuck.

She’s well acquainted with that one. And that’s exactly what she plans to do. She’s no longer the golden girl, and when she meets a businessman who promises everything she could ever want from the arrangement, she intends to get her money’s worth. 

    Best friends since they could walk. In love since the age of fourteen. 
Complete strangers since this morning. 
He'll do anything to remember. She'll do anything to forget.  










So there they are, ladies (and gents), my favorite reads so far this year.  It was fun to go back through them all and re-live the emotions I felt while reading them, re-create the stories from memory, and think about what I loved about each of these books.  I'm generally NOT one to re-read a book.  There are VERY few that I've actually read more than once...and most of those are only because they were required reading in high school or college (like The Scarlet LetterRomeo & JulietThe Odyssey).  However, there are a couple in this list above that I liked so much, or touched me so deeply that I feel the need to actually read them again.  I feel like I need to be with those characters once again because for some reason, our story isn't quite finished.  What a strange feeling to have too because I've really never felt this way about a book and all of the sudden the urge to go back with these characters is very real and alive inside of me.

Thanks for taking a minute to find out what I'm reading, what I'm loving, and what I'm babbling about this week!  I've got loads of books that I have reviews waiting for so I will be posting more soon, I promise.

Wednesday, July 1, 2015

Cover Reveal!!!

Coming soon from the amazing world of Stacey Mosteller,:

PRETENDING SHE’S MINE by STACEY MOSTELLER

Livvie made her choice and Tyler Chamberlain is still reeling but he’s not giving up.  Fans of S.C. Stephens’s Thoughtless or K.A. Linde’s Avoiding Commitment will devour the sexy and angsty addition to the Nashville Nights series by NYT Bestselling Author Stacey Mosteller.


Title: Pretending She’s Mine
Author: Stacey Mosteller
Series: Nashville Nights #5
Genre: New Adult Romance
Release Date: July 14, 2015
Publisher: Self - published
Print Length:
Format: Digital
ISBN:

Synopsis: Livvie's made her choice. 
She chose the good guy, the steady one, the one who’s always been there. But where does that leave me? Now that she’s gone, there’s no reason for me to be the guy I pretended to be for her. You’ve heard Livvie’s side and Emmett’s, you know how that ends. Now it’s my turn. She thinks I gave up, but my fight is just beginning.
Who’s the one pretending now?

See where it all began with book 1 of the Nashville Nights series, Save Me from Myself.

Get More information at: Goodreads  | Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | iTunes


About Stacey Mosteller     


Stacey is the New York Times & USA Today Bestselling Author of Second Chances (co-authored with H.M. Ward) and the Nashville Nights series.

She is also a wife, mother, writer and self-professed bookwhore - not necessarily in that order! As the mother of three growing boys, her Kindle has become her temporary escape from the insanity of boys, dogs and her husband. Stacey can usually be found curled up with her iPad when she's supposed to be writing or creating endless playlists on Spotify!


Connect with Stacey at: Website | Facebook | Twitter |GoodReads | Instagram | Pinterest




Excerpt- Pretending She’s Mine by Stacey Mosteller
Available 7/14/15


I can’t stop staring at the last text he sent me.
Be happy, Livvie.
It’s an obvious goodbye, but it hits me like a “fuck you” too. His last chance to shove his middle finger in the air at me and let me know just how much what happened isn’t bothering him. It negates everything that happened in his apartment what feels like weeks ago, when in reality it was only an hour. As soon as Emmett pulled up in front of my house, I stomped inside and slammed my bedroom door, locking it behind me before he could rush in and try to fix us.
"C'mon Livvie!" Emmett’s voice comes through the door just before he starts banging on it with an open hand. "Talk to me. Don't shut me out again!" His voice rises to a shout and I cringe.
Don't shut him out? What did he think was going to happen? He gave me an ultimatum and I caved. But now, now that I’m staring down at his text, I'm wondering if I made the right choice.