Release Date: April 16th, 2013
Genre: Romance, Sci-fi, Dystopia
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Pages: 408
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

In Sloane’s world, true feelings are forbidden, teen suicide is an epidemic, and the only solution is The Program.

Sloane knows better than to cry in front of anyone. With suicide now an international epidemic, one outburst could land her in The Program, the only proven course of treatment. Sloane’s parents have already lost one child; Sloane knows they’ll do anything to keep her alive. She also knows that everyone who’s been through The Program returns as a blank slate. Because their depression is gone—but so are their memories.

Under constant surveillance at home and at school, Sloane puts on a brave face and keeps her feelings buried as deep as she can. The only person Sloane can be herself with is James. He’s promised to keep them both safe and out of treatment, and Sloane knows their love is strong enough to withstand anything. But despite the promises they made to each other, it’s getting harder to hide the truth. They are both growing weaker. Depression is setting in. And The Program is coming for them.

Blurb: If you don't buy into the premise, this is just a contemporary romance.

Review: The gist of this book is that teens can be "infected" with depression. And so many of them are being "infected" that they are committing suicide in droves. I think it said 1 in 3 teens committed suicide. That sounds like a really cool premise, except that... I didn't buy it.

The world of this book is SO DEPRESSING. All adults are so paranoid about the kids getting depressed that the teens can't display any emotion (even extreme happiness is frowned upon), can't disagree with anyone, and essentially they don't have any individualism. Who wouldn't be depressed in a world like that? If I had to keep such a tight leash on myself all the time I can actually see why suicide might seem like a viable option.

My best friend suffers from depression. And she's told me before that she knew she didn't have anything to be sad about, but she was still sad. Perhaps if the author had started earlier in the "epidemic" history. If we had seen teens who really did have nothing "wrong" with their lives get depressed and commit suicide in large amounts. But that's not what I saw. I saw teens in a crappy world with only one way out.

Because of this, everything else that happened in the book just seemed like a contemporary story. This was another one of those books where a good portion of it was told in flashbacks, and those flashbacks didn't have anything sci-fi or dystopian about them. I don't like contemporary romance. I find it dull. And yet when we would come out of the flashbacks we would get just enough of a glimpse into the sci-fi aspects of the book that I kept reading.

I didn't hate this book, but I was far from loving it. If there are more in the series I will not be reading them because I feel like there isn't enough sci-fi stuff to carry the story, and I don't care about the romance.

Other Reviews:

• Katie's Book Blog (Loved it!)
• Xpresso Reads (It was okay)
• Birth of a New Witch (REALLY Didn't Like It. WARNING has some strong language!)

*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

I was going to post a review today, but this is SOOOOO much more important! NEW SHANNON HALE!!! NEW SHANNON HALE!!! Coming April 2014! Stare in awe at the cover, then CLICK HERE to read what Shannon has to say about it!

EDIT: There's also a giveaway! Again, click that link to learn more!

Release Date: April 16th, 2013
Genre: Romance, Dystopia
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 360
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

There are no men in Claysoot. There are boys—but every one of them vanishes at midnight on his eighteenth birthday. The ground shakes, the wind howls, a blinding light descends…and he’s gone.

They call it the Heist.

Gray Weathersby’s eighteenth birthday is mere months away, and he’s prepared to meet his fate–until he finds a strange note from his mother and starts to question everything he’s been raised to accept: the Council leaders and their obvious secrets. The Heist itself. And what lies beyond the Wall that surrounds Claysoot–a structure that no one can cross and survive.

Climbing the Wall is suicide, but what comes after the Heist could be worse. Should he sit back and wait to be taken–or risk everything on the hope of the other side?

Review: (Keep in mind that I read this in one day, and almost EVERY book I read in one day I say "goes too fast" but I think this one really did regardless of how fast I read it)

This book started off great! It started really interesting because it posed lots of questions that none of the characters considered "questions." Why is there a wall around our village that we can't cross? Why do 18-year-old boys disappear? The characters ask these questions, then shrug and move on.

What I initially loved about this story was that it actually GAVE US ANSWERS! I get so tired of books that string you a long with question after question and just expect you to keep reading even though you're NEVER given ANY answers! Not with TAKEN. Not long after questions were asked, they were answered. And then more questions were asked an answered. And then... we started getting answers to questions we hadn't asked... And by the end I found myself wishing that the author had held SOMETHING back. Because now that I've finished it, all my questions have been answered, and the only thing that might motivate me to read the second book is the love triangle.

But here's the thing about the love triangle. It's an interesting one (since it's two girls and one boy), but I never really connected with either of the girls. Perhaps it's because I read the book too fast, or perhaps it's because the book was full of "one week later"s and "two months later"s. I'm not a huge fan of books that skip so far forward in time. I want to SEE what happens there! Put your big breaks in between books!

But even though I've listed what I think are the books 2 faults (answers too many questions and goes too fast), it has many more virtues. I love the story, I love the setting, I love the premise, I love the main character (Bowman does a GREAT job writing from a male perspective [said a female]). And I certainly will read the second book. But am I dying to get my hands on it? No. The ending to this one left me perfectly content. Hopefully that doesn't mean that it also made this book perfectly forgettable.

EDIT: I initially wrote this review on April 24th. About a week ago I was trying to decide what to read and I saw this on my shelf and thought "Oh yeah! I really want to read Taken! Why haven't I read that yet?" I even picked it up and put it in my purse before I realized "Wait... I have read that." So, forgettable? Apparently.

Other Reviews:

• Xpresso Reads (Loved it!)
• Speculating on SpecFic (It was okay)
• A Girl, a Boy and a Blog (REALLY Didn't Like It)

*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: May 7th, 2013
Genre: Sci-fi, Apocalypse
Publisher: Putnam Juvenile
Pages: 480
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother—or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up.

Blurb: I will never trust another human being again.

Review: Ho. Ly. Crow. This book blew my mind! And I hadn't realized it until I read it that there has been a distinct lack of aliens in the YA world (when compared to other paranormal creatures). NOT ANYMORE! The 5th Wave fills that hole and THEN some!

This was the kind of book that kept me up until 1 or 2 in the morning because I just kept saying "one more chapter. Okay. One more." Hence it's "Squeaky Book" designation. I found the characters compelling, the story absolutely engrossing, and the morality wonderfully complex.

I was especially pleased that Yancey did a wonderful job switching points of view and still keeping me engaged in EVERY story. Oftentimes switching PoV just frustrates me because there's only one story I care about. Not so with this book. Every time it switched viewpoints I thought, "Yay! They're back!"

If there's one thing that I have to say against this book (and the reason it got 4.5 flowers instead of 5) is that it does have quite a bit of profanity. Actually, it doesn't have all that much, but what it does have is extreme. The reason why that didn't totally throw me off is because my big problem is with pointless profanity. Now, I don't like profanity ever, but I can at least understand/tolerate it when the characters are under duress. And these characters were under a lot of duress.

All in all a FAAAABULOUS book. Yancey doesn't disappoint!

Other Reviews:

• Xpresso Reads (Loved it!)
• Speculating on SpecFic (It was okay)
• A Girl, a Boy and a Blog (REALLY Didn't Like It)

*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: May 28th, 2013
Genre: Apocalypse
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Pages: 212
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Series: Monument 14 #2 (Review of #1)
Summary: (Spoilers, highlight to view)

The world hasn't ended...yet.

In this sequel to MONUMENT 14, the group of survivors, originally trapped together in a superstore by a series of escalating disasters, has split in two. Most of the kids are making a desperate run on their recently repaired school bus for the Denver airport where they hope to reunite with their parents, be evacuated to safety, and save their dying friend.

But the world outside is dark and filled with dangerous chemicals that turn people into bloodthirsty monsters, and not all the kids were willing to get on the bus. Left behind in a sanctuary that has already been disturbed once, the remaining kids try to rebuild the community they lost. But when the issues are life and death, love and hate, who can you really trust?

Blurb: AWESOME, but WAY too short.

Review: I want to avoid spoilers, so like most of my sequel-reviews, I'll keep this short.

I loved the first book in this series, and I loved the second book just as much. I found the characters just as engaging, and I loved getting to see more of the world. There were some moments that I was literally sitting ramrod straight because I was so excited about what was happening.

That's pretty much all I have to say in terms of a review. However, I do have one complaint: It was way too short. Not even an "I wish there was more" kind of short. It was a full-on "this isn't long enough." It read more like Monument 14 #1.5. A pre-sequel novella, or something. Maybe I've just become spoiled by big books lately, but anything under 300 (MAYBE 275) pages seems tiny. The first book was pushing it for me at 294 pages, but this one was just plum too short.

So, if you want my advice, I would read these back-to-back as if they were one book. Sky on Fire takes up immediately where the first book left off, so I don't even think it would feel weird. And if this were 1 500-600 page book I think it would be perfect. After all, when I love characters and a story this much, I want as much as I can! Hopefully book 3 (Savage Drift) will be bigger! But I'll definitely read it regardless of how long it is, 'cause this series is awesome!

Other Reviews (May have spoilers!):

• Chick Loves Lit (Loved it!)
• On the Wings of Books (It was okay)
• TBA (Didn't Like It)

*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

I am so pleased to welcome Emmy Laybourne back to Squeaky Books! She was here last year for the Squeaky Books Birthday Bash and I love having her back! Check out her pretty awesome guest post, and then enter to win copies of her books!


It’s such a joy to be back here on Squeaky Books to kick off the Blog Tour for Sky On Fire!

One of the best things about being a writer is the strange and fascinating things you learn while doing research! While writing the MONUMENT 14 series, I’ve learned about Thermobaric bombs, the intricacies of Google Maps, field methods for purifying drinking water, and I’ve basically memorized the layout of the dorms at the University of Missouri at Columbia. (They will show up in Book Three: Savage Drift!)

Without giving you any plot spoilers, I thought that I’d show you a list of the things I googled while writing SKY ON FIRE.

When you know that MONUMENT 14 is about fourteen kids from Monument, CO who take shelter in a
superstore while civilization collapses outside the gates and that the second book in the series, SKY ON FIRE, follows two groups of these kids, as one group tries to survive inside the store while the other braves a violent and dangerous landscape in a battered school-bus, some of these questions take on a sinister significance!

The 8 Weirdest Things I Googled While Writing SKY ON FIRE

1. Can you put sleeping pills into soup?
2. Air force slang for “girl.” Air Force slang for “injured person.”
3. How can I set a dislocated shoulder by myself.
4. Do they make battery powered chainsaws?
5. What’s it called when you throw up from working out too hard?
6. Ingredients of Kingsford Lighter fluid?
7. What’s the Mexican slang for testicles?
8. Can someone actually use a grappling hook to climb a building?

Now the question goes to you! What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever googled when writing? I’d really love to know...

Thanks to Enna and Squeaky Books. Tomorrow my book tour will head over to Reading Teen. Join me there for an exclusive interview. And please keep in touch with me at www.emmylaybourne.com, on Facebook at the Monument 14 Fan page or on the Twitter @emmylaybourne.


Good news! I have TWO books to give away to ONE lucky winner! Somebody will get a paperback copy of the first Monument 14 book, as well as a hardcover of Monument 14: Sky on Fire. Enter the rafflecopter below to win!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I've been getting a TON of spam comments since I took off captcha. Now, it's worth it to me if y'all really hate captcha. But... let me know how much you hate it, please. If don't want me to turn it back on, I won't. If you don't care, I'm bringing it back.

Seriously. I will do whatever you tell me.

(Also, I've had a really crazy last few weeks since school got out, but I've got a lot of stuff scheduled for next week and the weeks following. So FOR REAL, I'm coming back in full force soon.)

Release Date: July 24th, 2013
Genre: Horror
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 388
Rating: +1/2
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

The year is 1876, and there’s something strange and deadly loose in Philadelphia…

Eleanor Fitt has a lot to worry about. Her brother has gone missing, her family has fallen on hard times, and her mother is determined to marry her off to any rich young man who walks by. But this is nothing compared to what she’s just read in the newspaper—

The Dead are rising in Philadelphia.

And then, in a frightening attack, a zombie delivers a letter to Eleanor…from her brother.

Whoever is controlling the Dead army has taken her brother as well. If Eleanor is going to find him, she’ll have to venture into the lab of the notorious Spirit-Hunters, who protect the city from supernatural forces. But as Eleanor spends more time with the Spirit-Hunters, including their maddeningly stubborn yet handsome inventor, Daniel, the situation becomes dire. And now, not only is her reputation on the line, but her very life may hang in the balance.

Review: I'll admit, I'm a little zombie-crazed right now. I watch the Walking Dead, run using an app called "Zombies! Run!" and obsessively read zombie-related literature. That being said, Something Strange and Deadly was a zombie book that didn't quite fit into the zombie pop-culture genre and I'm still not sure how I feel about it.

I think the main thing I wanted to point out is that the zombies were...normal? The book clearly takes place in a parallel universe where things are, for the most part, relatively the same. The only difference is that every now and again a corpse reanimates in a cemetery and no one bats an eye. Bells placed by graves (they used to do this in our world to avoid burying people alive- a 'deceased' person would ring the bell if they woke up in a coffin (which sounds absolutely horrific if you ask me)) alert the people in Eleanor's world that a corpse has woken up. The catch here is that beyond this occasional and normal reanimation, the zombie infestation that plagues the characters was not the result of some mysterious plague or disease. They were brought back to life by a necromancer, which definitely does not feature zombie pop-culture today.

Beyond the zombie commentary, I found the characters to be likable and interesting for the most part, but poorly written for the other part. I didn't feel like I knew any of the characters. This is completely random, so forgive me, but if the end of the book had revealed that every single character was a schizophrenic creation straight out of Eleanor's mind, I wouldn't have been surprised in the slightest, despite the fact that mental illness had no bearing in the story and such a revelation would have been akin to a "and then she woke up" type of ending. They just seemed like props to the story. Eleanor was a strong main character and the others were incredibly weak in comparison. The stark contrast here hampered the story.

As for the story itself, it was interesting enough. It was a weird mix of science and black magic, which was vaguely off-putting (I tend to like books that stay solidly in one camp or the other) but I still managed to finish the book and enjoy it just fine, even though it took me much longer to read. I've discovered that the rate at which I finish a book correlates quite strongly with how good it is. If it's good, I'll finish it within the day. If it's average, like this book, I'll finish it randomly over the course of a week. This was a book that took me about a week to read. The pace of the story was frenetic in some spots and slow and repetitive in others which meant that I would read through the fast spots and put it down during the slow spots. I like it when books have a steady, building crescendo. Also, you can completely predict where the plot is going (at least who the necromancer is) by the end of the second page.

Overall, it was a little better than average, but nothing superb.


*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.

Release Date: May 7th, 2013
Genre: Sci-fi, Romance, Action
Publisher: HarperTeen
Pages: 352
Rating:
Amazon Link*: Click here
Goodreads Page: Click here
Summary:

Five years ago, Wren Connolly was shot three times in the chest. After 178 minutes she came back as a Reboot: stronger, faster, able to heal, and less emotional. The longer Reboots are dead, the less human they are when they return. Wren 178 is the deadliest Reboot in the Republic of Texas. Now seventeen years old, she serves as a soldier for HARC (Human Advancement and Repopulation Corporation).

Wren’s favorite part of the job is training new Reboots, but her latest newbie is the worst she’s ever seen. As a 22, Callum Reyes is practically human. His reflexes are too slow, he’s always asking questions, and his ever-present smile is freaking her out. Yet there’s something about him she can’t ignore. When Callum refuses to follow an order, Wren is given one last chance to get him in line—or she’ll have to eliminate him. Wren has never disobeyed before and knows if she does, she’ll be eliminated, too. But she has also never felt as alive as she does around Callum.

The perfect soldier is done taking orders.

Review: I LOVED this book's unique take on what it means to come back after death. At first I thought they would be zombies. NOPE! Turns out they're SUPER HEROES! Unfortunately, they're super heroes controlled by an evil militarized government. Bummer.

I really enjoyed the relationship that grew between the two main characters. It's progress seemed genuine, and I really believed that they cared for each other.

HOWEVER, I'm not sure WHY I believed that. Because the main character is always talking about how she is emotionless, and yet she's always talking about the emotions she feels. The book briefly addresses this by suggesting that she might just be ignorant of her own emotions, but... this seemed like a bit of a plot hole. I think it was only because I was able to overlook it that I liked the book so much.

What I most liked about this book, though, is that I felt like I really got a good look at the world and the characters, but it was also really fast paced. There was never a dull moment, but also never any moments of "one thing led to another" and skipping ahead.

There's one thing that I can't decide if it's a downside or not. The ending left me totally satisfied. I put it down and thought "that's a good story, what should I read next?" as opposed to "that's a good story, I NEED THE NEXT ONE RIGHT NOW!!" Usually when I get the "what should I read next" feeling, I often forget about the book before the sequel comes out. But at the same time... I feel satisfied, and so I'm not sure if that's a bad thing. It's quite the conundrum. Take from it what you will.

Other Reviews:

• Ageless Pages (Loved it!)
• Realm of Fiction (It was okay)
• Book Brats (Didn't Like It)

*I am an amazon affiliate. If you purchase this book using my link, I will get a tiny fraction of the purchase, which goes toward contests.