Bookstore Wishlist

Bookstores tend to have all the most popular books in them and not always what I am specifically looking for. That's why I buy a lot of my books on Amazon.  They almost always have the book I want, they are much cheaper and hell, they save a trip into town!

But I have my eye on a few recent releases which I have seen and know I'm going to look out for next time I am in a Book shop. These are:



Matched by Ally Condie


The concept of this, instantly grabbed me. Anything dystopic and young adult immediately draws me in. Although the concept does seem interesting, there seems to be quite a strong romance element to it. This is the only thing that has put me off reading it so far. But as my 'to read' list shortens, I think I'm going to give it a try.










The Body Finder by Kimberly Derting 

I'd been very aware of the count down for the realise of this book, and was even quite excited myself. But other books just distracted me and I still haven't read this book. It doesn't appear to be dystopic or Sci Fi as far as I can tell, but I'm also going to give this one a try next time I'm in town.

Review of Inside Out

Title: Inside Out
Author: Maria V. Snyder 
Published: 2010
Pages: 315
My Rating: 3/5


I had been looking forward to reading this book for a while. I was immediately captured by the well composed cover art and interesting concept in the blurb.  It seemed like a perfect fit for my dystopia YA fix.

Unfortunately, I'm a little disappointed to say that I was a bit underwhelmed by this. It was basically what I expected when reading the blurb. But that was it, there didn't feel like there was anything more. I found the story line quite uninteresting and confusing, feeling like the main character, Trella was just going backwards and forwards to collect this, deliver that, discuss this... I didn't really feel like the story was going anywhere, and I couldn't get into it.

But this being said, I wasn't totally let down by it, and it wasn't a bad book by any stretch of the imagination. The writing was brilliant, exactly the sort of writing style that I love! It had the classic young adult characters that I'm always a fun of and the concept was brilliant! It definitely ticked all the boxes for a YA dystopia book, and I recommend it to fans of that gene.

Dystopia Reading Challenge

I love Dystopia books and since the summer I've read loads, so I thought it would be perfect to take part in this Dystopia Reading Challenge!

Here is the link where you can find out about it: http://bareadingchallenges.blogspot.com/p/dystopia-challenge.html

I'm going for challenge level 2. Contagion meaning that I will have to try and read 15 books before the end of the year, which sounds pretty easy for me. I read loads of the most popular dystopia books last year, so I'm gonna have to do some digging for more, which I'm sure won't be a huge problem.

Here's the Dystopia books that I read last year: 

1. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.
2. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins.
3. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins.
4. The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan.
5. The Maze Runner by James Dashner.
6. The Dead Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan.
7. The Declaration by Gemma Malley.
8. Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman. 
9. The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness.
10. The Ask and the Answer by Patrick Ness.
11. Monsters of Men by Patrick Ness.
12. The Scorch Trials by James Dashner. 

And here is a list of the Dystopia books I've read so far this year: 

1. Unwind by Neal Shusterman.
2. Knife Edge by Malorie Blackman.
3. The Giver by Lois Lowry.
4. Uglies by Scott Westerfield. 
5. Pretties by Scott Westerfield.
6. The Enemy by Charlie Higson. 

And finally, here is a list of Dystopia books that I could read for this challenge: 

1. Inside Out by Maria V. Snyder.
2. Specials by Scott Westerfield. 
3. Matched by Allyson Braithwaite Condie.
4. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro.
5. Shades of Gray by Jasper Fforde.
6. The Death Cure by James Dashner.
7. Little Brother by Cory Doctorow.
8. Feed by M. T. Anderson. 
9. The Running Man by Stephen King. 
10. Incarceration by Catherine Fisher.
11. The Compound by A. S. Bodeen. 
12. Feed by Mira Grant. 
13. Battle Royale by Koushun Takami.
14. 1984 by George Orwell. 

Inside Out and City of Bones

Today I finally got Inside Out, the book that I've been meaning to get for ages. It was 3 for 2 and I spent about 78 hours trying to find other 3 for 2 books to put with it. But I couldn't find any in that particular shop.
      
 But I did exchange Procession of the Dead in another book shop with a book called City of Bones by Cassandra Clare, part of the Mortal Instruments series. I probably should of got my money back instead of spending it all on books, but I just couldn't resist, I've heard so much about this book.

I haven't really been into fantasy much lately, but as I seem to have read most of the popular and young adult dystopia fiction, I think it's time to move onto something else. The one thing that angers me about the cover of City of Bones is that the title and authors name are at the bottom, compositioned well. But there's a huge quote by Stephenie Meyer right in the middle, what's that about!? Sorry, just had to mention that.

 But for now, I'm going to start Inside Out.
  

The Enemy

Title: The Enemy
Author: Charlie Higson
Published: '09
Pages: 416
My Rating: 4/5

I know I said that I had started reading Precession of the Dead about a week ago. Well....I couldn't get on with it. I got about 40 pages in and was bored. I don't know if I can take it back as I got it on a gift card, so I'll keep it for now, and maybe try reading it again.
     Lost with nothing to read, I picked up this book I'd got ages ago on a special offer but hadn't got to reading it yet. It's called The Enemy by Charlie Higson. I enjoy zombie books and thought this looked like fun. It's about a world that has succumb to the zombies of everyone above the age of 14. Anyone under that age left, is fighting to survive. It follows a group of kids who have lived in Waitrose for the past year fighting off the zombies 'Grown-ups' as they call them, and scavenging for food.
     This book definitely was fun. It was action packed, exciting and gory. Quite surprisingly gory considering the young age group. One thing that I think will stick in my head as unusual about this book, was a shocking death in the first hundred pages. But I will not say more as it's quite a large spoiler. It had excellent plot-twists. The only comment I have, is that I found something sloppy about the way the characters were written, but I wouldn't expect it to be too complex for an exciting zombie book like this. I know that there is a second out, that I have seen in the shops, and I am looking forward to reading it.

Shifty's War

This is sort of relating to the last post I made about Band of Brothers. I just wanted to talk about this new book that's coming out soon. It's a biography of Darrel 'Shifty' Powers, one of the paratroopers portrayed in Band of Brothers. I'm pretty excited to read it.
    I've always loved reading first hand accounts and biographies of soldiers during WW2. It's one area that really fascinates me. I've read Band of Brothers by Stephen Ambrose (what the mini-series was initially based on) and Easy Company Soldier by Don Malarky (one of the Easy Company veterans)  From the Pacific mini-series (another brilliant WW2 epic following US Marines in the Pacific, also created by Tom Hanks and Stephen Spielberg) I've read Helmet for my Pillow by Robert Leckie, With the Old Breed by Eugene Sledge and Islands of the Damned by R.V. Burgin. For Band of Brothers I'm also hoping to read Babe and Wild Bill's book, and Winters'.
      I know that these are all based off the mini-series' and have only really become famous because of that. But it's actually surprisingly hard to find first-hand combat accounts from WW2. I've read Sixty Days of Combat by Dean Joy (a US infantryman) and I've also got If you Survive (the authors name escapes me at the moment) to read. It's sad that there aren't more around as I'm sure some people have amazing stories to tell of the war. But alas, I'm just looking forward to Shifty's War for now.

The Tomorrow Series Mystery

A while ago I talked about the fantastic Tomorrow Series when I had finished the second book. After that I went on to order the third (the first two were only like £4 on Amazon). I found that the third, fourth and sixth books were around £70-£120 on Amazon! I was in shock, they were only paper back books, and as I said, the first two and (after I searched) the fifth and seventh, were only about £4. Ridiculous!
    I searched round, and found that out of the whole series, those three books were almost impossible to get my hands on without having to pay a hell of a lot of money! I found an Australian seller on Ebay selling the Australian versions for about £10 each including postage and packaging. It was perfect but I very (VERY) stupidly left off getting them until it was too late and there were no more. But I needed these books so bad! And as my birthday was in a month, I wanted to ask for them as a birthday present.
     In the end, I found this site that finds and sells out-of-print books which had quite a few of the books I wanted. Unfortunately, they were still pretty pricey, but just about affordable for my birthday. I decided on getting the third and fourth books and holding off on getting the sixth for the moment. The two books came to about £30. One is an second-hand hardback library book from Austrailia and the other is from the US with a cover that I HATE. But still, it's not about the covers, it's about the books and I now can't wait to read them.
      But I still can't get my head round the fact that the third, fourth and fifth books can't be found in the UK when the rest can. It will have to remain a mystery for now.

Procession of the Dead

So I went into town today at lunchtime to get the book I have been looking forward to getting for a while (Inside Out by Maria V. Snyder) But even though I was told it was going to be in on Tuesday, they still didn't have it, and I didn't want to go through the hassle of ordering it, so I thought I'd wait.
     However, I still didn't have a book to read and I had a gift card leftover from Christmas, so I had a look around and found this book. It's called Procession of the Dead by Darren Shan. I read the blurb and a couple pages, and it seemed quite interesting so I gave it a try. It wasn't until I got home that I realised it was a zombie book. No complaints though; I love zombie books.
Here's the blurb:
Quick-witted and cocksure, young upstart Capac Raimi arrives in the city determined to make his make his mark as a gangster. Then he crosses paths with The Cardinal, and his life changes forever. 
      The Cardinal is the City and the City is The Cardinal. They are joined in soul. Nothing moves on the streets, or below them, without the Cardinal's knowledge. His rule is absolute.
        As Capac begins to discover more about the extent of the Cardinal's influence on this life he is faced with hard choices. And as his ambition soars ever higher he will learn all there is to know about loss, and the true cost of ultimate power ...


So even though it's quite a vague blurb, I thought it looked quite interesting. There will be more of this to come.

Revisiting The Maze Runner

So as I finished my book today and have nothing new to read until tomorrow (when I'm going to get a book called Inside Out on my lunch break), I picked a random book from my shelf to read tonight. And therefore, I thought I'd talk a bit about it before I get started.
       This book is called The Maze Runner by James Dashner, I read it back in September. It's about a boy with no memories of his previous life, only his name -Thomas- waking up and finding himself in a lift that brings him up to a place called The Glade. Here there are about 30-something other boys, who all arrived in the same way once a month with nothing but a name. They live there, sorting out jobs and searching the maze (that the Glade is centred in) for answers to their strange situation. I enjoyed this book, it was a bit slow paced at times, but the concept, the action and the characters urged me on.

        Just after Christmas, I read the second book to the (soon to be) trilogy called The Scorch Trails. It's obvious when reading The Scorch Trails, that the first book hadn't intended to be a trilogy at first, as it's concept isn't as organised as the The Maze Runner. BUT, with all this said, I actually loved The Scorch Trails more than the The Maze Runner. It kept you asking questions, it had an exciting pace, was quite scary at times and I liked feeling as though I was with the characters as they went on this journey. I just absolutely can't wait until the third book, The Death Cure, comes out in October. I need to find out what happens!

Review of The Dead of Night by John Marsden

Title: The Dead of Night
Author: John Marsden
Published: '97
Pages: 288

So today, while at college, I finished The Dead of Night by John Marsden. It's the second book in the Australian Tomorrow Series, that now has a film made from the first book.
    Here's a brief description of the story. It's told from the point of view of Ellie, a (by my guess) 17 year old girl living in a small town in Australia. Her and six of her friends -Homer, Fi, Corrie, Kevin, Lee and Robyn- go on a camping trip for a week and come back to find that their country has been invaded and everyone in their town has been captured and held in the Showground. Throughout the book, Ellie and her friends must struggle to survive by keeping out of sight of the trigger-happy soldiers, as they try to make some kind of impact agaisnt them.
    The thing I love so much about this series is how realistic it is. The characters are real. They are not just typical stereotype teenagers, nor typical emotionless heroes that you find in a lot of these types of stories. They react like how I would imagine anyone of us in that situation would and they think through their problems and plans carefully instead of going in with guns blazing.
     This book was a lot grittier to the first, there was more violence and sex, which makes me wonder what parents would think about their children reading this book, as I know that some schools have assigned it as reading (a brilliant choice in my opinion). There weren't quite as many action sequences or character development as I would have liked to have seen, but it was still a very enjoyable read. Exciting and heart-breaking. It starts of with a bang and ends with a bang (literally), with a fair few bangs in the middle. Note how I'm using the word bang to try and not give anything away. I'm so looking forward to the next.
    My problem is getting my hands of the next. The series has seven books altogether, and I'm only able to get books 1,2,5 and 7. For some odd reason, I'm not able to find books 3,4 and 6. It seems as though they are not available for purchase in this country, which I find very strange. But alas, I found the books selling on Ebay, in a different cover, from Australia. So I'm going to put in a bid for those and see if I can get it. Because I really can't wait to see what happens to Ellie and her friends.