Tangled Up In Books: February 2015

Top Ten Tuesday #49 - Things I Like/Dislike When It Comes To Romance In Books
Top Ten Tuesday #50 - Book Related Problems I Have
Top Ten Tuesday #51 - Favorite Heroines From Books

Waiting on Wednesday #36 - 02/04/15

Swoon Thursday #39 - 02/05/15

That's What HE Said Thursday #23 - 02/05/15

Alienated
Swoon Thursday #40 - 02/19/15
That's What HE Said Thursday #24 - 02/19/15
Bloodlines
Swoon Thursday #41 - 02/26/15
The Golden Lily

Challenge Progress:

My series read for February:

Bloodlines by Richelle Mead!!

Finally binge read this series and finished just a few days ago. So sad that it's over but it was pretty close to perfect :)

The Ultimate Reading Challenge 2015

I finished 4 more items on this list in February so now I'm at 9 out of 50...

O_O

I think my favorite accomplishment this month was binge reading the Bloodlines series. I bought each book as they were released and they've been sitting here on my shelves taunting me! Sigh. I already can't wait to add them to the list of books I will reread as often as possible! Other than that my bookish/blogging world has been pretty tame and unexciting.

Friday, February 27, 2015

COVER REVEAL: Need Me by Tessa Bailey

Need Me (Broke and Beautiful #2)

by Tessa Bailey

Expected Publication: April 21st 2015

by Avon Impulse

Genres:

New Adult, Contemporary, Romance

From New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Tessa Bailey, comes the next fun and sexy novel in her Broke and Beautiful trilogy!

“How did this tweed-wearing English professor turn out to be my dirtiest hero ever? Cause he really is.”--Tessa Bailey

When Honey Perribow traded in her cowboy boots for stilettos and left her small Kentucky town to attend Columbia University, she never expected to find a dirt-cheap apartment or two new best friends. No stranger to hard work, Honey’s sole focus is a medical degree...until she sees newly-minted Professor, Ben Dawson, and her concentration is hijacked. Honey is fascinated by her gorgeous, young English professor and vows to find a crack his tweed-wearing, glasses-clad exterior.

While at an off campus party, an accident lands Ben in a dark, locked closet with a sexy-sounding southern belle...and their chemistry is explosive. But when he discovers that the girl in his arms is the same beautiful student he can’t stop thinking about, he is stunned. Student-teacher relationships are strictly forbidden…yet no matter how hard he tries, Ben can’t stay away from Honey.

And when his attempts to fight their attraction nearly ruin the best thing that ever happened to him, Ben will do anything to prove how much he needs her.

About the author:

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Tessa Bailey lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband and young daughter. When she isn’t writing or reading romance, Tessa enjoys a good argument and thirty-minute recipes.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads

REVIEW: Bloodlines (Bloodlines #1) by Richelle Mead

Title/Series: Bloodlines | Bloodlines #1
Author: Richelle Mead
Publisher: Razorbill
Published: August 23rd 2011
Format: Hardcover | Pages: 421
Genre: YA, Paranormal, Romance, Urban Fantasy
Source: Amazon
★★★★★ (5/5) Stars!!!

Richelle Mead | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads

The first book in Richelle Mead's New York Times bestselling Bloodlines series

When alchemist Sydney is ordered into hiding to protect the life of Moroi princess Jill Dragomir, the last place she expects to be sent is a human private school in Palm Springs, California.

Populated with new faces as well as familiar ones, Bloodlines explores all the friendship, romance, battles, and betrayals that made the #1 New York Times bestselling Vampire Academy series so addictive--this time in a part-vampire, part-human setting where the stakes are even higher and everyone's out for blood.

Oh, Adrian. How have I missed thee? Let me count the ways...

As I drove away, I decided the Alchemists needed an entire department devoted to handling Adrian Ivashkov.

You know, you'd think with how much I am indeed obsessed with Adrian Ivashkov I would have started this series sooner right? Well much to the dismay of at least one of my friends, I put my procrastination skills into overdrive on that one. I'm really bad with waiting when it comes to a series. Once I get to that last line of the last chapter I need to know that the next book is sitting there waiting for me. I live for the binge read, having all those books piled up next to me and burning through them. So even though I kept hearing things like, OMG read them already!...somehow, someway I held out until the release of The Ruby Circle. And now for the binge to commence!

I'd been raised believing that both races of vampires, Moroi and Strigoi, were dark and wrong.

It is so good to be back in this world and be with so many familiar characters whom I've loved again. I love Richelle Mead's spin on the vampire world. It's very unique and not just the same old thing done again and again. Of course there are still all the standard staples to every vampire story. The fangs, the diet, the inhuman beauty, the aversion to sunlight. It's the perfect mix of the old and familiar blended with the new and interesting. I've already read the Vampire Academy series twice since I discovered it and can't wait to continue on with Bloodlines and add them to the lineup.

The Alchemists had been playing Men in Black for centuries, long before humans dreamed of life on other worlds.

The reality of this spin-off series happening had me completely over the moon. I think you can tell from my review opener exactly why that may be. I feel like I'm going to be in this small minority, probably of one haha, among my friends most especially when it comes to just how into this series I will be since I've always been more Adrian over Dimitri. I mean, don't get me wrong, I adore Dimitri and there's no one more suited for the other than Rose and Dimitri...but my heart still belonged to, and was broken for, Adrian. He needed closure and I needed it for him! I found Sydney and the Alchemists extremely interesting in VA as well and I couldn't wait to find out more about her and her heritage. Plus the idea of a forbidden romance brewing had me all kinds of excited. Bring on the Sydrian feels because I kind of think I'm going to need them like I need air.

Because with those words, I began to put together a fragile theory of what he might be talking about.

While I will say that there were quite a few things that, at least for me, I found predictable. Well more so that I figured them out early on. I had tons of wild theories and I'd feel confident in saying that probably half of them turned out to be right. I don't really feel as if this was a bad thing, for me at least. I get equally excited about puzzling something out as I do being completely surprised or thrown for a loop. This book did very well at accomplishing both of these things for me and even the stuff that I did figure out didn't lessen my enjoyment because it was easy to see where it was going.

It was more like the kind of touch that simply said, You aren't alone. It was really the only thing he could offer. And in that moment, it was enough.

This was such a great start to this series. Plenty of favorite characters from VA made appearances, even if only briefly, plus there's a whole new set of people to both love and hate. And I do mean hate, I even wished a very slow and painful death on one of them. I'm really pleased with the storyline thus far. It's open to so many possibilities. Mystery, betrayals, magic, action, violence and swoons. I was already on the edge of my seat wishing I could figure out a way to read faster and figure out what the heck was going on! I've heard mixed and not so positive feelings about the books I've yet to read, but I'm trying to remain hopeful that this positive feeling from finishing Bloodlines isn't just a one time thing.

Thursday, February 26, 2015

Release Day Launch: The Hidden Library (The Collectors' Society #2) by Heather Lyons [Excerpt + Giveaway!]

The Hidden Library

(The Collectors' Society #2)

by Heather Lyons

Published:

February 26th 2015

by Cerulean Books

Genres:

Adult, Fantasy,

Romance, Fairy Tale

Summary:

Sometimes, the rabbit hole is deeper than expected...

Alice Reeve and Finn Van Brunt have tumbled into a life of secrets. Some secrets they share, such as their employment by the clandestine organization known as The Collectors’ Society. Other secrets they carry within them, fighting to keep buried the things that could change everything they think they know.

On the hunt for an elusive villain who is hell-bent on destroying legacies, Alice, Finn, and the rest of the Society are desperate to unravel the mysteries surrounding them. But the farther they spiral down this rabbit hole, the deeper they fall into secrets that will test their loyalties and pit them against enemies both new and old.

Secrets, they come to find, can reveal the deadliest of truths.

And don't miss the first book in the series!

The Collectors' Society:

Excerpt:

We are about to open the conference room door and enter the hallway when he stops. He turns to me, his lovely eyes achingly sincere. “I want to take you on a date when all of this craziness is over. A real one. We've kind of gone about this all backwards, haven’t we?”

One corner of my mouth lifts up. “Are you saying you’d like to court me?”

There is no playfulness to his face, no quirk to his own lips. My heart flutters at his seriousness. “Yes.”

He wants to court me.

Too many emotions rush around in a caucus race throughout my body. I have no doubts of Huckleberry Finn Van Brunt’s feelings toward me. I understood them two minutes ago just as well as I did this morning when I woke up and from the night before and from the day in Wonderland where he said, in not so many words, that he was falling in love with me.

I told him he was my north star, and meant it. He countered we are binaries.

He and I . . . We've never said those words, though, not the ones that truly spell out fragile, deep secrets of a heart and soul. Words so easily and yet unfortunately uttered by many, be it to express their appreciation of fried bits of potatoes to sports teams on the television. Words offered so frivolously about a variety of subjects and yet can be the most difficult, most painful, most meaningful, most cherished syllables we gift another person.

I have said these words before, to another man. Another man I still love. One I know, in the deepest confines of my heart, that I will love until the last breath escapes my body. A man who courted me in secret and then publicly in the face of astonishment, disapproval, confusion, and, in the end, prophesies.

I have willingly given the man in front of me my heart, though, whether he knows it or not. He now holds it in his hands, and while I pray he is my future, there is still a part of me that bucks in conflicted confusion and delight by this declaration of his.

He wants to court me.

And yet, as sweet and romantic as such a gesture might be, I require no such formalities. My affections for Finn Van Brunt have already solidified into something real and wonderful and meaningful.

Giveaway:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

About the author:

Heather Lyons writes epic, heartfelt love stories and has always had a thing for words. In addition to writing, she’s also been an archaeologist and a teacher. She and her husband and children live in sunny Southern California and are currently working their way through every cupcakery she can find.

Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads

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Swoon Thursday #41

Swoon Thursday is a weekly meme hosted by YABound!

Here's what you do:

From the book you’re currently reading, or one you just finished, tell us what made you SWOON. What got your heart pounding, your skin tingling, and your stomach fluttering.

This week's pick is from:

The Golden Lily (Bloodlines #2)

by Richelle Mead

With a few swift steps, Adrian stood in front of me again. The wall was only a couple of inches behind me, and I had nowhere to go. He made no threatening moves, but he did clasp my hands and hold them to his chest while leaning down to me.

"No, you will listen. For once, you're going to hear something that doesn't fit into your neat, compartmentalized world of order and logic and reason. Because this isn't reasonable. If you're terrified, believe me―this scares the hell out of me, too. You asked about Rose? I tried to be a better person for her―but it was to impress her, to get her to want me. But when I'm around you, I want to be better because...well, because it feels right. Because I want to. You make me want to become something greater than myself. I want to excel. You inspire me in every act, every word, every glance. I look at you, and you're like...like light made into flesh. I said it on Halloween and meant every word: you are the most beautiful creature I have ever seen walking this earth. And you don't even know it. You have no clue how beautiful you are or how bright you shine."

I think I died right there. What are you swooning over this week?

That's What HE Said Thursday #24

If you want to find out more about That's What HE Said Thursday head on over to see the girls at Chapter Break and read all about it!

My Quote:

"He shouldn't have said that," repeated Adrian, eerily serious. He leaned his face toward mine. "I don't care if he's not the emotional type or the complimentary type or what. No one can look at you in this dress, in all that fire and gold, and start talking bout anachronisms. If I were him, I would have said, 'You are the most beautiful creature I have ever seen walking this earth.'"

Adrian Ivashkov to Sydney Sage

The Golden Lily (Bloodlines #2) by Richelle Mead

Since I'm on a binge read currently of the Bloodlines series you can probably expect to see nothing but Adrian for the next few weeks. He kind of makes you have a one track mind that way :)

Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Top Ten Tuesday #51

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke andthe Bookish!

This week's topic is...

Top Ten Favorite Heroines From Books

Normally when I think of the word heroine I imagine someone like Katniss from The Hunger Games, who I didn't pick by the way, someone who's fierce and fights for something. So I picture fantasy book females. Now not all of the female characters I picked for this week's topic are fighting a battle or going on an epic journey or what have you, but they're still tough and hard to bring down in their own right.

Rose Hathaway - The Vampire Academy Series

Anytime you mention heroines, especially ass kicking ones, Rose is the very first character who comes to mind. No offense to the chick they have playing her in the film, which was terribad by the way, but they did a horrible job of casting Rose. Just so bad.

Nynaeve al'Meara - The Wheel of Time Series

This series, at 14 very long books, has such a vast cast of characters. Both male and female. And as you can see by my next three picks a lot of those female characters are, in my opinion, full of awesome. Nynaeve is my absolute favorite. She's strong and fierce and stubborn as all hell. And in so many ways reminds me a lot of myself. I've only gotten a bit over halfway through this series at this point in time so if anything happens to these three females I'm gonna be devastated!

Zarine "Faile" Bashere - The Wheel of Time Series

Faile doesn't make her appearance until quite a few books into this series but once she did I couldn't get enough of her. She knows what she wants and she's the type of girl who will stop at nothing to make it happen. I love how different her and Perrin are from each other and yet you couldn't find two people more perfect for each other. And even in the face of danger, no matter how hard he tries to make her do otherwise, she feels like her place is right by his side. Even faced with battle. He tries to send her away to keep her safe but she is fierce, oh so fierce and she ends up at his side no matter what.

Min Farshaw - The Wheel of Time Series

Until Faile made her first appearance in these books I'd have to say Min gave Nynaeve a pretty good run for her money as far as favorite female characters would go. I can't even really pinpoint the thing it is about her. She's just a lot of fun to read whenever she's on the pages.

Honestly I could have probably done this entire post of ten ass kicking female characters from The Wheel of Time because truly there are quite a few; Aviendha, Egwene, Elayne, Moiraine, Morgase, Suian who all in their own way have some sort of inspiring quality about them but I left it at my favorite three instead.

Vin - Mistborn

Vin goes from being this, in a sense, timid and untrusting, yet still tough young woman, to someone who slowly learns to put her trust and faith in others and becomes this amazing and fun character. I can't wait to really move forward in this series and see what happens to her next!

Hermione Granger - Harry Potter

How can you have a post about favorite bookish heroines and not include Hermione? Not only is she bookish herself and beyond brilliant but she's full of fire, determination, loyalty and tough as hell. I'd love to be a little more like her.

Alice - The Collectors' Society

Alice was one of those other names that came to mind right away. She gets a lot of things thrown at her in this very first book in the series and if someone like myself had gone through even half of the things she does I probably would have either offed myself or been sobbing in the corner saying something over and over about how I didn't want to go on. Though you probably wouldn't be able to understand me through all the sniffling and tears.

Katy Swartz - The Lux Series

Katy!! Aww she is probably going to always be one of my most favorite female characters. Ever. She kicks so much ass! Everyone tried to bring this girl down and look who was still standing at the very end. Freaking Katy! Plus she has Daemon so obviously she's amazing!

Mara Dyer - The Mara Dyer Series

Holy geeze this series and Mara really mess with your head! She's so resilient though. Even when nobody else had faith in her or believed in the things she was absolutely sure of, she stuck to what she knew was true and pulled out of some seriously messed up situations.

Cara Sweeney - Alienated

When everyone else around Cara were being complete douche canoes, people she loved and cared about and had known nearly all her life, she still stood up for what was right and her belief in Aelyx and his goodness. No matter what or who it would cost her. Lots of respect for her.

That's my list of favorite bookish heroines! Do you agree or disagree with any of my picks? (Be nice if you disagree haha!) Who made your list this week? :)