Review #83 - Floored by a collaboration of YA authors

Details:

Title: Floored

Author: Sara Barnard, Holly Bourne, Tanya Byrne, Non Pratt, Melinda Salisbury, Lisa Williamson, Eleanor Wood

Publisher: Macmillan

ISBN 13: 978-1509862306

Synopsis:

When they got in the lift that morning, they were strangers. Sasha, who is at the UK's biggest TV centre desperately trying to deliver a parcel; Hugo, who knows he's by far the richest – and best-looking – guy in the lift; Velvet, who regrets wearing the world's least comfortable shoes to work experience; Dawson, who isn't the good-looking teen star he was and desperate not to be recognized; Kaitlyn, who's slowly losing her sight but won't admit it, and Joe, who shouldn't be there at all, but who wants to be there the most.

And one more person, who will bring them together again on the same day every year . . .

Review:

Review #82 - Phasma by Delilah S. Dawson

Details:

Title: Phasma

Author: Delilah S. Dawson

Publisher: Arrow

ISBN 13: 978-1787460010

Synopsis:

One of the most cunning and merciless officers of the First Order, Captain Phasma commands the favor of her superiors, the respect of her peers, and the terror of her enemies. But for all her renown, Phasma remains as virtually unknown as the impassive expression on her gleaming chrome helmet. Now, an adversary is bent on unearthing her mysterious origins―and exposing a secret she guards as zealously and ruthlessly as she serves her masters.

Deep inside the Battlecruiser Absolution, a captured Resistance spy endures brutal interrogation at the hands of a crimson-armored stormtrooper―Cardinal. But the information he desires has nothing to do with the Resistance or its covert operations against the First Order.

What the mysterious stormtrooper wants is Phasma’s past―and with it whatever long-buried scandal, treachery, or private demons he can wield against the hated rival who threatens his own power and privilege in the ranks of the First Order. His prisoner has what Cardinal so desperately seeks, but she won’t surrender it easily. As she wages a painstaking war of wills with her captor, bargaining for her life in exchange for every precious revelation, the spellbinding chronicle of the inscrutable Phasma unfolds. But this knowledge may prove more than just dangerous once Cardinal possesses it―and once his adversary unleashes the full measure of her fury.

Review:

Review #81 - Orphan Monster Spy by Matt Killeen

Details:

Title: Orphan Monster Spy

Author: Matt Killeen

Publisher: Usborne Publishing

ISBN 13: 978-1474942386

Synopsis:

A teenage spy. A Nazi boarding school. The performance of a lifetime.

Sarah has played many roles - but now she faces her most challenging of all. Because there's only one way for a Jewish orphan spy to survive at a school for the Nazi elite. And that's to become a monster like them.

Survive. Deceive. Resist.

They think she is just a little girl. But she is the weapon they never saw coming... with a mission to destroy them all.

Review:

June Wrap Up and July TBR

So in June 2018 I managed to read a total of 12 books, 

In order of reading I completed Sea Witch by Sarah Henning, The Extinction Trials: Exile by SM Wilson, Star Wars: Finn and Poe Team Up! by Nate Millici, Saga vol 4 by Brian K Vaughan, A Torch Against the Night by Sabaa Tahir, Star Wars: Lost Stars but Claudia Gray,  City of Bastards by Andre Shvartz, Spare and Found Parts by Sarah Maria Griffin, The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris,  A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers, Smoke in the Sun by Renee Ahdieh and Charmcaster by Sebastien de Castell.

 

Stats -  

Hardback = 3

Paperback = 2

Graphic Novel/Manga = 3

Audiobook = 3

Ebook = 1

 My 5 star reads were The Extinction Trials: Exile, Saga vol 4, A Torch Against the Night, Lost Stars vol 1, City of Bastards, A Closed and Common Orbit and Charmcaster. The Extinction Trials was a great second book and we learnt more about the characters and world, Saga vol 4 was another great instalment in the series, A Torch Against the Night was a brilliant sequel and I love the characters more and more, Lost Stars was a beginning to the adaptation of Claudia Grey's amazing book, City of Bastards was yet another great sequel which was packing with politics and action, A Closed and Common Orbit was touching, engaging and full of adventure and Charmcaster was a perfect re-read. The most disappointing read for me this month was probably Spare and Found Parts, it had a really interesting plot but it just didn't pull it off well enough for me. 

So in July I am continuing to read books in preparation for meeting the authors of them at YALC in London. Though there will be some others mixed in there too.

Review #80 - Charmcaster by Sebastien de Castell

Details:

Title: Charmcaster

Author: Sebastien de Castell

Publisher: Hot Key Books

ISBN 13: 978-1471406706

Synopsis:

Kellen, Reichis and Ferius are on their way to Gitabria, a city where amazing inventions are dreamed up and sold across the land of the Seven Sands.

But when the three of them stumble across a tiny mechanical bird, magically brought to life, they quickly realise all is not as it appears. 

Meanwhile two strange Argosi appear, carrying secrets from Ferius' past, together with an unlikely Jan'Tep ally.

And as time ticks on, all the cards in Ferius' deck point to the emerging tides of war . . .

Review:

Review #79 - Smoke in the Sun by Renee Ahdieh

Details:

Title: Smoke in the Sun

Author: Renee Ahdieh

Publisher: Hodder

ISBN 13: 978-1473664432

Synopsis:

After Okami is captured in the Jukai forest, Mariko has no choice - to rescue him, she must return to Inako and face the dangers that have been waiting for her in the Heian Castle. She tricks her brother, Kenshin, and betrothed, Raiden, into thinking she was being held by the Black Clan against her will, playing the part of the dutiful bride-to-be to infiltrate the emperor's ranks and uncover the truth behind the betrayal that almost left her dead.

With the wedding plans already underway, Mariko pretends to be consumed with her upcoming nuptials, all the while using her royal standing to peel back the layers of lies and deception surrounding the imperial court. But each secret she unfurls gives way to the next, ensnaring Mariko and Okami in a political scheme that threatens their honor, their love and very the safety of the empire.

Review:

Review #78 - A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers

Details:

Title: A Closed and Common Orbit

Author: Becky Chambers

Publisher: Hodder

ISBN 13: 978-1473621473

Synopsis:

Lovelace was once merely a ship's artificial intelligence. When she wakes up in an new body, following a total system shut-down and reboot, she has to start over in a synthetic body, in a world where her kind are illegal. She's never felt so alone.

But she's not alone, not really. Pepper, one of the engineers who risked life and limb to reinstall Lovelace, is determined to help her adjust to her new world. Because Pepper knows a thing or two about starting over.

Together, Pepper and Lovey will discover that, huge as the galaxy may be, it's anything but empty.

Review: