Notes of Life

Author: Lauren Kate
Publisher: Doubleday
ISBN: 978-0-857-53164-3

Are you a Lauren Kate fan awaiting the final book in the Fallen series? If so, you’re in for a treat!

On 2nd February Doubleday release Fallen In Love in the UK, a book featuring four new love stories featuring the Fallen characters. Just perfect for this upcoming Valentine’s Day.

Everyone has their own love story and Fallen In Love gives us The Valentine of Shelby and Miles, The Valentine of Roland, The Valentine of Arriane and, finally, The Valentine of Daniel and Lucinda. The four love stories intertwine during a romantic Valentine’s Day in Medieval England to make, essentially, one story.

Fallen In Love is basically book 3.5 of the Fallen series. It happens during the same time-frame  as Passion (book 3), starting when Shelby and Miles land in Medieval England having arrived via an Announcer. Each of the stories is told from a different perspective and so we get to know some of the characters a bit better than we did in the novels of the series.

While Fallen In Love gives us more understanding and insight into the Fallen characters, I wouldn’t say it’s a necessary addition to the series, but it is a welcome one. I think it’s more of a bonus book and one I’m very grateful for! In fact, when I met Lauren Kate at the Passion book launch last year I’d asked her if she’d ever considered writing a book of short stories to go along side the series. Lauren had said that it was a good idea. It turned out that she was being cagey, for the very next day the publishers announced that Fallen In Love would be released this February!

At the end of Fallen In Love, fans are also treated to an exclusive first look at Rapture, the final Fallen book, due for release this summer. I was lucky enough to hear the lovely Lauren Kate read from this at the Passion book launch last year.

Fallen In Love is a must for any Lauren Kate fan!

P.S. – There is also a FALLEN BOOKS app to bring the cover to life, but I can’t yet find it on the Android Marketplace, only on the App Store for iPhones and iPads.

You can read my reviews of the books from the Fallen series via the links below:
1. Fallen
2. Torment
3. Passion

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Please note: I received this book free from Random House in return for a review. However, this has in no way influenced my opinion of the book.

Author: Becca Fitzpatrick
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 978-0857072276

Before I get started, Silence is the 3rd book in a series by Becca Fitzpatrick, and it pretty much picks up where the previous book left off. The first two books of the series are Hush, Hush and Crescendo.

Nora awakes in a graveyard. It’s cold and dark, and she hasn’t a clue what she’s doing there or how she got there. In fact, it turns out she can’t remember the last 5 months. Summer has been and gone, just like her memory.

This sets Nora on a mission to find out exactly what happened to her while she was missing and who kidnapped her, then she can plot revenge!

Of course, fallen angel Patch never seems to be far away…….

As it had been quite some time since I read the previous book in the series, I found myself with my own memory lapse… I couldn’t quite remember what had happened in Crescendo! Thankfully though, just like Nora’s memory, mine started to come back as I read on and it didn’t have an impact on my enjoyment of the book.

Sometimes a series can start lacking by the third book, but this isn’t the case with Silence and the Hush, Hush series. I thoroughly enjoyed it and there’s another book to come yet. I’ve now begun to feel like I really know the characters. Nora is certainly starting to grow up. Of course, we’re also treated to the appearance of past characters such as Vee, The Black Hand and Scott.

Silence is full of twists and turns, along with tension, action, romance and a little humour. The ending leads us nicely to the fourth book of the series, which I believe will be the final book. (I think this was originally only going to be a trilogy) and I can’t wait to find out what happens next.

If you’ve not yet read Hush, Hush or Crescendo, then I would definitely recommend you read this series in order. I don’t think Silence is a book you can jump into without having already read the previous two books.

A must for YA, fallen angel fans.

Buy Silence by Becca Fitzpatrick.

I was lucky enough to be invited to Lauren Kate‘s book launch by Random House Children’s Books.

For those who don’t know (and if you don’t, where have you been?!), Lauren Kate is the author of The Betrayal of Natalie Hargrove, as well as the Fallen series featuring Fallen, Torment, Passion and the upcoming summer 2012 release, Rapture.

You can read my reviews of the books from the Fallen series via the links below:
1. Fallen
2. Torment
3. Passion

The event was held at Proud in Camden, London last night. Unfortunately, I arrived at the venue soaking wet as our lovely British weather gave a downpour as soon as I came out of Camden Town tube station!

As soon as I arrived I was given a glass of bubbly and an eyeful of two topless male angels (See photo to the right showing Lauren Kate at the UK Passion Launch at Proud in Camden with angel waiters! Photo courtesy of Random House Children’s Books). What a great start to the evening!

Lauren Kate was delightful. She read us the prologue for Rapture, the fourth and final book in the Fallen series I can’t share any of it with you, but I loved it and can’t wait to read the book. I’ve got quite a wait though as it’s not out until next June (right in time for my birthday!). I loved listening to Lauren read and I think she’d be great at reading her own audiobooks.

Breaking News…

On 2nd February 2012 Random House Children’s Books will publish an original novel by Lauren Kate that is connected to her Fallen series. The novel, Fallen in Love, is a collection of four intertwined love stories featuring the Fallen characters we’ve come to love and adore… Miles, Shelby, Roland, Arriane and, of course, Luce & Daniel.

So that’s something to keep us fans going until the long awaited release of Rapture!

Giveaway (Ends midday Sunday, 2nd October 2011 – UK readers only – CLOSED!)

I’d taken my copy of Passion to get signed by Lauren, and, as we were also allowed to grab a copy of Passion at the launch party, I got to have the second copy signed for one of you. Yes, that’s right, one of my readers will win a signed copy of Lauren Kate’s Passion! To be in with a chance of winning, all you have to do is leave a comment on this post. That’s it!

Unfortunately, this giveaway is restricted to UK readers due to postage costs, but my international readers can look forward to another giveaway very soon.

UK readers have until midday on Sunday, 2nd October 2011 to enter the giveaway. A winner will then be chosen at random. (Giveaway entries now closed!).

Thank you so much to Lauren Kate and everyone involved in organising the book launch. I had a wonderful time, with plenty of bubbly top-ups by the gorgeous angels (Do you think I could have my own angel waiter at home?!) and met some lovely people. Thanks to Random House Children’s Books for inviting me.

Author: Lee Carroll
Publisher: Bantam Books
ISBN: 978-0-553-82557-2

I have had Black Swan Rising on my wish-list since Transworld mentioned its release. So when it was listed as one of the books to choose from in Transworld’s Book Group Reading Challenge, I picked it as my first book for the challenge.

So, was my first choice a good one? Definitely! Did it live up to my expectations? It did! I can safely say that I really enjoyed reading Black Swan Rising.

The setting of New York and the creepy fog that drifts in is the perfect setting and atmosphere for this story. We follow Garet James as her life goes from bad to worse.

For a young woman, Gary has her fair share of problems… money-issues, a struggling business and an elderly father to look after. On her way home after receiving bad news from her lawyer, Garet is forced to duck into an antiques shop by unexpected weather. The store owner recognises Garet and asks for her help in opening an old silver box which has been sealed shut. She agrees, but upon opening it things start to change… Garet’s world, once normal like yours or mine, is now a world in which magic, fairies, vampires, dragons and the like exist.

Black Swan Rising takes Garet and the reader on a journey of discovery, hope, love, possibilities and more. The story makes use of real-life historical events (including more recent ones) and characters throughout, which I found added an interesting aspect to the book. Black Swan Rising doesn’t just rely on one type of fantasy creature either, there’s a whole array of them.

This book encompasses a number of my favourite fiction genres… urban fantasy, crime, adventure and a little bit of love thrown in (OK, maybe more than a bit)! But it’s not just my favourite genres all rolled into one that made me love this book, it’s the atmospheric story and the ease with which I could read it.

Black Swan Rising is the first book in a trilogy, and, conveniently, the second book The Watchtower has just been released. My paperback copy of Black Swan Rising contains a sneak preview of The Watchtower’s first chapter and I’ve no doubt it’s a book I’ll be reading in the near future!

Buy Black Swan Rising by Lee Caroll from the Book Depository.

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Please note: I received this book free from Transworld Publishers as part of the Transworld Book Group Challenge. However, this has in no way influenced my opinion of the book.

Author: Ransom Riggs
Publisher: Quirk Books
ISBN: 978-1594744761

Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children is a story about Jacob and his storytelling Grandpa Portman. The tales Grandpa tells Jacob are magical, fantastical and quite unbelievable!

After Grandpa’s shocking and horrific death, Jacob sets out on his own adventure to find the children’s home his Grandpa once lived at and to find out just how much, if anything, of what his Grandpa told him is true. Having arrived on the remote Welsh island, Jacob sets about finding Miss Peregrine, could she still be alive? Having found the old children’s home in ruins and about to give up, little does Jacob realise that he’s about to discover a lot more, not just about Grandpa and the home, but about himself too.

This is no ordinary book. It isn’t just presented as text, we’re also treated to a wealth of black & white photos and hand-written letters dotted throughout the book as if they were in a photo album or scrapbook. The book was perfect for me… I love looking through old photographs and imaginging the story behind them.

The chapter titles are also thoughtfully presented on their own page decorated with a patterned background. Even the spine of the book is designed to look like an old leather-bound book found in the library of a big house.

So, does the story live up to the wonderful presented book? It certainly does! This is a fantasy story without any vampires, wolves or angels involved. It’s beautifully written with descriptive (but not overly so) text. While some of the story is set in the present day, a lot of it is set during World War 2. Despite the differing times, it is easy to follow. It’s haunting, fun, adventurous, mysterious and creative.

Despite really enjoying this book, I did have a few little niggles…

Niggle 1: Not a big niggle, but Cairnholm sounds more Scottish than Welsh. While we have a few islands ending with *holm, Cairn is Irish or Scottish Gaelic. (I’m just being really picky here though).

Niggle 2: Worm sounds more like a city kid and “sickest” in the sense that he says it is more American slang than Brit.

Niggle 3: The big niggle – More than once “taking a piss” is said when it should be “taking THE piss” (as in taking the mick or having a joke). “Taking a piss” is an entirely different thing!

Niggles aside, Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children is a wonderful book for teenagers and adults alike. I didn’t know quite what to expect with this book, but was pleasantly surprised. It’s definitely a book I’d recommend!

Buy Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs at the Book Depository.

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Please note: I received this book free through the Amazon Vine program in return for a review. However, this has in no way influenced my opinion of the book.