Posted May 21, 2015 in Reading, Review / 0 Comments
The Jewel by
Amy Ewing Series: The Lone City #1 Publisher: HarperTeen (2014)
Audiobook {10 hours and 12 minutes} (358 pages)
Rating: Also by this author: The White Rose,
The Black Key Also in this series: The White Rose,
The Black Key Reading Challenges: Read 2015 Synopsis
The Jewel means wealth. The Jewel means beauty. The Jewel means royalty. But for girls like Violet, the Jewel means servitude. Not just any kind of servitude. Violet, born and raised in the Marsh, has been trained as a surrogate for the royalty—because in the Jewel the only thing more important than opulence is offspring.
Purchased at the surrogacy auction by the Duchess of the Lake and greeted with a slap to the face, Violet (now known only as #197) quickly learns of the brutal truths that lie beneath the Jewel’s glittering facade: the cruelty, backstabbing, and hidden violence that have become the royal way of life.
Violet must accept the ugly realities of her existence… and try to stay alive. But then a forbidden romance erupts between Violet and a handsome gentleman hired as a companion to the Duchess’s petulant niece. Though his presence makes life in the Jewel a bit brighter, the consequences of their illicit relationship will cost them both more than they bargained for.
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Tagged as 4 star, Catholic, Catholic Connections, Read 2015, You Read How Many Books Challenge
Posted May 20, 2015 in Reading, Review / 2 Comments
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by
Ransom Riggs Series: Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children #1 Publisher: Quirk Books (2011)
Paperback (356 pages)
Via: Library Rating: Also by this author: Hollow City,
Library of Souls Also in this series: Hollow City,
Library of Souls Reading Challenges: 2015 Re-Reading,
Read 2015 Synopsis
A mysterious island. An abandoned orphanage. A strange collection of curious photographs.
A horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. As Jacob explores its abandoned bedrooms and hallways, it becomes clear that the children were more than just peculiar. They may have been dangerous. They may have been quarantined on a deserted island for good reason. And somehow—impossible though it seems—they may still be alive.
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Tagged as Library, Read 2015, Rereading Challenge, You Read How Many Books Challenge
Posted May 18, 2015 in Reading, Review / 2 Comments
Island of the Blue Dolphins by
Scott O'Dell Series: Island of the Blue Dolphins #1 Publisher: Laurel Leaf (1960)
Paperback (208 pages)
Rating: Reading Challenges: 2015 Alphabet Soup,
2015 Birthday Month,
2015 Color Coded,
2015 Re-Reading,
Read 2015 Synopsis
In the Pacific there is an island that looks like a big fish sunning itself in the sea. Around it, blue dolphins swim, otters play, and sea elephants and sea birds abound. Once, Indians also lived on the island. And when they left and sailed to the east, one young girl was left behind.
This is the story of Karana, the Indian girl who lived alone for years on the Island of the Blue Dolphins. Year after year, she watched one season pass into another and waited for a ship to take her away. But while she waited, she kept herself alive by building a shelter, making weapons, finding food, and fighting her enemies, the wild dogs. It is not only an unusual adventure of survival, but also a tale of natural beauty and personal discovery.
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Tagged as Alphabet Soup Reading Challenge, Birthday Month Reading Challenge, Color Coded Challenge, Read 2015, Rereading Challenge, You Read How Many Books Challenge
Posted May 14, 2015 in Reading, Review / 2 Comments
Beauty by
Robin McKinley Publisher: HarperCollins (1978)
Hardcover (247 pages)
Via: Library Rating: Reading Challenges: 2015 Birthday Month,
2015 Fairytale Retelling,
2015 Re-Reading,
Read 2015 Synopsis
A young woman, well educated and honourable, accepts responsibility for her father’s act and leaves her family to enter the enchanted world of castle and Beast. The Beast she finds is not the one she imagined, but can she stay with him?
A gifted storyteller embellishes the classic tale, developing a new and very real world of her own in a love story that has all the wonder and magic of the fairy tale.
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Tagged as 5 star, All Time Favorites, Birthday Month Reading Challenge, Catholic, Catholic Connections, Fairy Tales, Fairytale Retelling Challenge, Library, Read 2015, Rereading Challenge, You Read How Many Books Challenge
Posted May 13, 2015 in Reading, Review / 0 Comments
The Pharaoh's Daughter by
Mesu Andrews Series: Treasures of the Nile #1 Publisher: WaterBrook Press (2015)
eARC,
Paperback (384 pages)
Via: Blogging for Books Rating: Also by this author: Miriam,
Isaiah's Daughter,
Isaiah's Legacy Also in this series: Miriam Reading Challenges: Read 2015 Synopsis
“You will be called Anippe, daughter of the Nile. Do you like it?” Without waiting for a reply, she pulls me into her squishy, round tummy for a hug.
I’m trying not to cry. Pharaoh’s daughters don’t cry.
When we make our way down the tiled hall, I try to stop at ummi Kiya’s chamber. I know her spirit has flown yet I long for one more moment. Amenia pushes me past so I keep walking and don’t look back.
Like the waters of the Nile, I will flow.
Anippe has grown up in the shadows of Egypt’s good god Pharaoh, aware that Anubis, god of the afterlife, may take her or her siblings at any moment. She watched him snatch her mother and infant brother during childbirth, a moment which awakens in her a terrible dread of ever bearing a child. Now she is to be become the bride of Sebak, a kind but quick-tempered Captain of Pharaoh Tut’s army. In order to provide Sebak the heir he deserves and yet protect herself from the underworld gods, Anippe must launch a series of deceptions, even involving the Hebrew midwives—women ordered by Tut to drown the sons of their own people in the Nile.
When she finds a baby floating in a basket on the great river, Anippe believes Egypt’s gods have answered her pleas, entrenching her more deeply in deception and placing her and her son Mehy, whom handmaiden Miriam calls Moses, in mortal danger.
As bloodshed and savage politics shift the balance of power in Egypt, the gods reveal their fickle natures and Anippe wonders if her son, a boy of Hebrew blood, could one day become king. Or does the god of her Hebrew servants, the one they call El Shaddai, have a different plan—for them all?
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Tagged as 4 star, Blogging for Books, Catholic, Catholic Connections, Read 2015, You Read How Many Books Challenge