HemLife

Hemlock By: Kathleen Peacock

12985143

Summary

Mac’s life has been turned upside down. She is being haunted by Amy in her dreams, and an extremist group called the Trackers has come to Mac’s hometown of Hemlock to hunt down Amy’s killer, A white werewolf. Lupine syndrome – also known as the werewolf virus is on the rise across the country. Many of the infected try to hide their symptoms, but bloodlust is not easy to control. Wanting desperately to put an end to her nightmares, Mac decides to investigate Amy’s murder herself. She discovers secrets lurking in the shadows of Hemlock, secrets about Amy’s boyfriend, Jason, her good pal Kyle, and especially her late best friend. Mac is thrown into a maelstrom of violence and betrayal that puts her life at risk. Kathleen Peacock’s thrilling novel is the first in the Hemlock trilogy, a spellbinding urban fantasy series filled with provocative questions about prejudice, trust, lies, and love.

Review

A small town full of dark monsters, teen boy drama, and the ghost of a dead best friend, well that can pretty much sum up Mac’s mess she calls life at the moment in this book. From her loved ones dying and disappearing right before her eye to finding out her loved ones could have done the killing all seems to be the normal day for the Heroin in this book series. The deathly dark tone this book gives off has me begging for more as I flip through chapters racing to reach the end of this mystery. From the outside, this book fills you with promises to be a book full of death and tragedy, but once you’ve broken open the cover you are left with one death and way too much tragedy, but its tragedy that takes up residence in your heart and really makes you feel for the characters in this book. The feeling of losing so much and constantly trying to fight for someone to stay with you just to have them ripped away from you anyways. I feel for this book in more ways than more.

The morbid tone and the way people are divided into two different groups, it’s almost like the red scare where everyone is turning on one another and the people you love are all wearing masks that you never could see through. The way this book holds the mystery until the very end without giving away any hints as to who the killer might be has made reading it worth the wait to reach the ending.

The characters in this book are some that I didn’t think I would even care about until their life was put on the line but there is that saying of “you never know what you had until its gone” has made me appreciate these lovable characters and feel the struggle that they all must go through to make things right for the best future even if it means hurting the one person you love.  This book is a fantasy filled with lessons about life itself.

Book Rating

 3.5/5 Red Roses 

I chose that rating because even though the plot line held up great and some of the characters have made a home in my heart I still feel like the cliche love triangle and the whole Lupine syndrome just seems very vague to me if you can catch it from a scratch or bite, could you still be able to catch it if you have an open wound and a werewolf still touched you I feel like that should have been researched a little better or just made it more reasonable really.

Read this book if you want a good werewolf, murder, mystery without looking too hard into the science of the book.

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Something Steampunk and Disappointing

Something Strange and Deadly By: Susan Dennard

9859436

Summary

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 the maddeningly stubborn yet handsome 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

First Thoughts

A Victorian setting filled with steampunk inventions some like a knockout for me but add in some zombies and what more could you ask for? Well, apparently not a whole lot because this author has gone past the extra mile to just raise the dead due to some illness or diseases like in most books. We are given a Necromancer who is going around beheading people to gain more power to raise more dead. We are given voodoo and thrust through the door of electric properties and machines, she has put so much work into going deep into thought about how everything in this book should work and even breaking it down for us on such a basic level, I feel like she did some major research to bring us this information. The plot is developing fairly well off to a slow start at first and it feels like the main goal here is to find her brother and stop the necromancer, there is also a budding romance between Daniel and Eleanor.

Eleanor is trying to be the Heroin of this book but she is failing hard i under the time era and that she must be a proper high society lady but I mean she could be a little more of a hero and not so much so a whining crybaby with a fiery spirit. Daniels character is the typical low society boy with a quick-fire attitude and Clarence I’m still not sure if he is a victim or suspect.

Final Thoughts

I absolutely love the idea of reading a steampunk Victorian world with zombies that were always referred to as the dead and the necromancer and the magic that was brought into this world. The ending to this great world was the biggest disappointment I could have ever read, just the ending was a quick sweep under the rug that left everything up in the air even for this to be a series book I still think I should get a little more closure then what I was given. The author had set up this entire book for a great finally just for it to be a bust. I will say I liked how the ending was not a perfect happy ever after ending and it was more of a realistic, dark fantasy ending.

The characters were still the same ones we met in the beginning just Elenor became less whinny which is all I had asked for. Daniel has become a guy that I am still not sure about his character he’s just, I cannot put my finger on it, it’s like a boyfriend of an abusive relationship. When El is fine he is mad or yelling at her and when she is hurt he just wants her to be fin, and this attitude could be worked on a little. Jie is one of my favorites out of this entire book her character is just so cute and funny.

Book Rating

Overall I will say read this book if you want to read a world about steampunk inventions with dirty politics and a crazy plot line that switches bad guys more than once. Also, read this book if you want a series and you have the second book on hand or can go out and buy it as soon as you finish the first book because this ending just is not a great place to end a book and hopefully the second book will help clear things up.

Drama Before Action

Darkness Before Dawn By: J.A. London

12872080

Summary

At seventeen, Dawn Montgomery knows that monsters really do come out at night, after all, they are her job. It’s just after the thirty-years war between vampires and humans, and as an ambassador between the two sides (a role she inherited when her parents were killed), Dawn quickly learns that balancing schoolwork, teen life, and the requests of Lord Valentine, the most frightening vampire in the region, isn’t easy. And it only gets more complicated when she forms a tentative friendship with Victor, the mysterious stranger who rescued her from a hoard of vampires. Only to discover that not only is Victor a vampire but that he is Lord Valentine’s son. Soon Dawn is struggling to remember that with everything on the line, she can’t afford to fall for the enemy.

Review

First Thoughts

Throwing myself fully into this book so far has made me enjoy reading dystopian fantasy all over again. I love the dark and eerie tone of this book with the plot full of death and danger around every turn of the page I can feel the suspense seeping off of the pages.  The plot to this boom is one that takes you straight into the fire of the conflict of this boom with so many different things happening between vampires and humans, humans and humans, and vampires and vampires all have an all-out brawl with a secret being withheld from Dawn which I am dying to know what it is!

Being Dawn and being the sole person who decides the fate of not only herself but of the humans in her city. The constant level of intensity between Dawn and victor is so toe-curling great I just want them to do it already, although I do feel for Michael. I know Dawn is trying hard to resist but we all know it is going to happen. I feel so much for Dawn after losing everything and everyone in her family I can feel her pain when she takes on her role as the delegate and when she talks about her family.

Victor is the bad guy that you cannot help but fall in love with like all the other handsome dark hotties in literature. Micheal is a guy that we have all dated in high school or at least knew of just the guy who thought he was the toughest and was top dog and never wanted to be second-guessed.

Final Thoughts

So this plot was great until the ending I feel like the book’s fight scenes are a little not there really like the action is very vague and it’s mostly just about someone throwing something or breaking a chair the epic battle is just referred to as flashes to fast for the human eye until the two are in a deadlock. I think the author took an easy way out of the fight by making up an excuse so she wouldn’t have to draw out the action in the fight. The drama and the plot twist in this book are all this book needs for me to fall in love with it. The mystery man in the hoodie and the guesses I kept popping out I could not have thought that things would end the way they did I was racing through the sneak peek of the second book that left me still craving for my next fix.

Victor is perfect for this book I love the role he plays but I’m also worried about the role we don’t know about he is a character that keeps me guessing constantly he seems like he truly loves Dawn and he cares for her but it seems like there is something hiding inside him its a feeling I get from reading. I love the characters different personality and how they change throughout the book.

Book Rating

I think this book is a great read if you love vampires and a broken dystopian, and a great heroine with a crazy love triangle. The action in this book is pretty normal to low quality but the drama and dark fantasy is a great mix and a good read.

Reviews for Women Who Dressed in Black

These Reviews are meant for people who love the dark side of things always craving a dark gothic stand on life where everything is turned upside down in someone’s life and they are left to face the trouble of the darkness and accept their fate or try to change it these reviews are for the Women In Black.

1. Darkness before Dawn By: J.A.London

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The first book in a romantic and drama-packed trilogy perfect for fans of Rachel Vincent, Julie Kagawa, and Alyson Noel.At seventeen, Dawn Montgomery knows that monsters really do come out at night, after all, they are her job. It’s just after the thirty-years war between vampires and humans, and as an ambassador between the two sides (a role she inherited when her parents were killed), Dawn quickly learns that balancing schoolwork, teen life, and the requests of Lord Valentine, the most frightening vampire in the region, isn’t easy. And it only gets more complicated when she forms a tentative friendship with Victor, the mysterious stranger who rescued her from a hoard of vampires…only to discover that not only is Victor a vampire, but that he is Lord Valentine’s son. Soon Dawn is struggling to remember that with everything on the line, she can’t afford to fall for the enemy. Lusciously romantic and full of action-packed drama, readers will be swept away by this thrilling novel, the first in a trilogy.

2. Something Strange and Deadly By: Susan Dennard

9859436.jpgThere’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 the maddeningly stubborn yet handsome Daniel, the situation becomes dire. And now, not only is her reputation on the line, but her very life may hang in the balance.

3. Hemlock By: Kathleen Peacock

12985143.jpg

Mackenzie and Amy were best friends until Amy was Murdered. Since then, Mac’s life has been turned upside down. She is being haunted by Amy in her dreams, and an extremist group called the Trackers has come to Mac’s hometown of Hemlock to hunt down Amy’s killer: A white werewolf. Lupine syndrome also known as the werewolf virus is on the rise across the country. Many of the infected try to hide their symptoms, but bloodlust is not easy to control. Wanting desperately to put an end to her nightmares, Mac decides to investigate Amy’s murder herself. She discovers secrets lurking in the shadows of Hemlock, secrets about Amy’s boyfriend, Jason, her good pal Kyle, and especially her late best friend. Mac is thrown into a maelstrom of violence and betrayal that puts her life at risk.

4. Defiance By C.J.Redwine

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While the other girls in the walled city-state of Baalboden learn to sew and dance, Rachel Adams learns to track and hunt. While they bend like reeds to the will of their male Protectors, she uses hers for sparring practice. When Rachel’s father fails to return from a courier mission and is declared dead, the city’s brutal Commander assigns Rachel a new Protector: her father’s apprentice, Logan the boy she declared her love to and who turned her down two years before. Left with nothing but fierce belief in her father’s survival, Rachel decides to escape and find him herself. As Rachel and Logan battle their way through the Wasteland, stalked by a monster that can’t be killed and an army of assassins out for blood, they discover romance, heartbreak, and a truth that will incite a war decades in the making.

Awaken By Desire

Awake at Dawn (Shadow Falls Series #2) By: C.C.Hunter

10800916

Summary

From the moment Kylie Galen arrived at Shadow Falls Camp, she’s had one burning question: What am I? Surrounded by vampires, werewolves, shape-shifters, fae, and witches, Kylie longs to figure out her own supernatural identity, and what her burgeoning powers mean. And now she’ll need them more than ever because she’s being haunted by a new spirit who insists that someone Kylie knows – and loves – will die before the end of the summer. If only she knew who she was supposed to save. And how. But giving Kylie the most trouble is her aching heart. Gorgeous werewolf Lucas left camp with another girl, but he’s still visiting her in her dreams. And Derek, a sexy half Fae who’s always been there for her when she needed him, is pushing to get more serious – and growing impatient, especially when Lucas returns. Kylie knows she needs to decide between the boys, and it’s tearing her up inside. Yet romance will have to wait because something from the dark side of the supernatural world is hiding in Shadow Falls. It’s about to threaten everything Kylie holds dear and bring her closer to her destiny.

Review

First Thought

So let’s talk dirty. . . about the drama that is, not about the two hotties who still seem to be fighting over Kylie we will get to that later. Right now I want to go over the facts this book makes me cringe about. Fact number one I cannot stand the lack of action in this book like for the love of god I want something to happen other than Kylie going back and forth between two guys she likes. Number 2 is the fact that Kylie can talk to the ghost and everything but apparently ghost cannot communicate with her very well so all we get is some weirdo covered in blood telling her to fix things and then vanishes that is the most useless thing in the entire would like really come on. So far the only stimulating thing that has happened is Perry going wild and shifter fighting it out with Kevin now that was great! We also get occasional I feel someone following my presence but it results in a let down of nothing happening. I live in danger and excitement in these kinda of books but all I’m getting so far is boy drama which is in almost every book you will ever read.

Character-wise Holiday has grown on me I feel like she is someone I can love she has been broken my a men once before and now she might be trying to love again but her kids in her camp are her life and she does everything to protect them no matter what and her back and forth with Brunette is just the best. I love the pent-up emotions that they share with each other but refuse to act upon which is made even better by Della always telling them they should ” Bump Uglies”. Brunette is also starting to grow on me because his character has become so much more than a guy in a black suit is a douche bag, he has become a teacher and caretaker of the kids as well as watching out for Holiday.

Final thoughts

My action came! FINALLY!! WE HAVE BROKEN THE ICE AND SHIT HAS HIT THE FAN!  Although it was a very tiny fan we still got what we wanted.  We have discovered the people who have been following Kylie and why they kidnapped her. We have been given not one but two pissed off she-wolf, a half skunk cat, along with heartbreak and new romance. What more could you ask for how about death and a lot of heartache, wrap that up in a box and put it under my Christmas tree because finally I have been given what I wanted all along but I will say it was given to me at the less than 100 pages mark and I now am still left with a cliffhanger until my next book in the series arrives. You heard right babes I am still going on with this series, I know you are probably asking why after I just like whinnied about it not giving me anything until the last 100 pages. It is because I was still interested in the book I before invested in the story and its characters even without the action. I need to know what happens with Kylie, Derek, Lucas, Della, Miranda, and even Brunette. I have grown attached to them. That is what makes this such a good series so far. Not just the plot but the characters.

The characters are not the icing on the cake in this book the characters are the cake and the plot is the icing. All the people in this book has grown and shown us a whole other side of them since the day we first arrived at the Falls. They aren’t characters anymore they are people that I feel like I have known my whole life and I’m falling in love with them all. That to me makes a book great.

Book Rating

Read this book if you read the first one and are still curious about how things pan out. Read this book and the first one if you are looking for a new series of new characters to fall in love with and a story to keep you carving for more. This book may not be full of fighting and action but it is full of drama, heart, and spirit, that is all I can ever ask for in a book.

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