Reading Writing Wormer

Entice is the third in the Need series. It's a wonderful book about pixies...

If you haven't already read my review on Need and Captivate, the previous two books, then do! If you haven't read Captivate DO NOT CONTINUE IF YOU WANT TO AVOID SPOILERS.

The whole plot of this third book is Zara and her friends (Issie, Devyn, Astley, etc.), work to find a way to get to Valhalla, the place where her boyfriend, Nick, a werewolf, was taken when he was on the brink of death. It is a place where warriors injured beyond repair are taken to be magically healed to fight for the god Odin.

There, of course, was a confusing love triangle where Zara didn't really know her true feelings for Astley, her pixie king.

Besides trying to figure out how to get Nick back, Zara's main problem is having all her family and friends to accept and trust her, now that she is a pixie. It was a little depressing to hear how Betty secretly cried the night after she found out Zara turned. Devyn took a while convincing that she was still herself, too. But her mother was the worst. She was absolutely terrible and I would have never forgiven her if I was Zara.

I did not like the ending as much, though. I thought it started to seem a little cheesy when Zara climbed the rainbow. And I think it would have been better if Zara had beaten Frank in the fight without violence somehow, to show she keeps to her morals and she's still the old Zara underneath the blue skin.

As you can imagine if you know about me and my cover selection... I didn't like this cover very much. They seem to have gone downhill. I don't like models or people in general on covers because it forces me to use my imagination for the character's physical looks and since the author has little-to-no say in cover art, it's not always the way the author wanted it to be perceived. I like covers that are more symbolic of the theme of the book.
That said, you can probably see where I stand on the entire Need series covers. The first I liked because the lips symbolized (to me, anyway) the pixie's kiss. The second (Captivate) I didn't like as much because there was no symbolism in it, though it matched the whole dust-covered theme it wasn't too bad. But the third I didn't see as anything at all in it...
1. It had the full face of "Zara", which didn't look like how I imagined Zara at all.
2. She was really really pale and looked like she had dark, sunken-in eyes which looks like she's sick or dying.
3. There is dust on her lips like on the Need cover, but none on her eyelids like in Captivate.
4. There is no symbolism in her blowing/breathing pixie dust like she is on the cover.

But of course, enough rant about the cover. It did not impact how I read the book and overall, I think it was very well-written.

Sweetly was a wonderful novel that took the classic fairy tale of Hansel and Gretel and turned it into an urban fantasy about a girl who lost her twin to the mysterious witch in the woods when walking with their big brother.

The main thing I loved about Sweetly is the fact that it held a few themes throughout the book. For one, Gretchen (the re-told character of Gretel) always wondered and wondered why it was her identical twin that was taken and not her. She wonders how, if they were in fact completely identical, she could have ran faster or moved differently since they were supposed to have to same mind and same physical capabilities.
She also was very scared of disappearing. She did not like how her sister just disappeared from the Earth, when no one knew if she was alive or dead or anything. She's very scared of people just forgetting her and so she would just not exist as anything but a name.

I don't have a favorite character, but I loved Samuel and the whole Gretchen/Samuel thing going on. Hehe...
I didn't like Sophia very much when finding out everything at the end because I thought what she did was kind of desperate and she should have gotten those things. And she was kind of sketchy through the whole book, too.
I love how to townspeople's feelings progressed as they began to consider Gretchen and Ansel (re-told character of Hansel) part of their town.

One thing i thought through the book, was that Sophia's father wasn't killed–he was just turned into a fenris.


There was so many surprising things that came up throughout the book it was a very interesting mystery. It was very well written and Jackson Pearce has a lot of talent and she gives amazing writing advice. I'm sad that I will miss her when she visits my YALSA group in June, but I have confidence that I will see her again and I can't wait until the time comes.

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 i read the ARC form of this book, and it will not be in bookstores until June. But i believe you can pre-order on Amazon.


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You can visit Jackson's site here:
http://www.jackson-pearce.com/

You can see her blog here:
http://watchmebe.livejournal.com/

She makes great youtube videos here:
http://www.youtube.com/user/JacksonAPearce

and she's on LIVE every Wednesday at 8 pm EST where she talks about getting published, writing, and sometimes just random stuff about her books and YA. And sometimes none of the above. :
http://www.livestream.com/jacksonpearce

Hello all, a change of post today!

Fire and Ice (@fireicephotos) is doing a giveaway for jewelry inspired by the novel "Hourglass" by Myra McEntire!

Look here to see how to enter:
http://fireandicephoto.blogspot.com/

I am going to be reading Hourglass soon! I got it from my YALSA group and I can't wait to. It'd be awesome to have matching jewelry.:)
But good luck to everyone else entered!

You Don't Know Me by David Klass was one of the most touching books I have ever read. It was in an interesting 4th-person view with the narrator the main character while having him narrate like he's speaking to other characters in the book. The character, John, is so likeable that you connect with him so much throughout the book.

One of the best things about the book is the P.O.V. Throughout most of the book you get the impression that he is speaking to his mother. But there are also points where he announces he is speaking to other people like Violent Hayes or Billy Beezer.

It is also rather funny and interesting as the character explains his random train of thought. Such as his his various nicknames for people and objects. His tuba is not a tuba, but a frog posing as a tuba, and Violent Hayes' saxophone is not a saxophone, but a lizard that she is trying to strangle–thus her name "Violent". The man who is not his father is his mother's boyfriend and his dinner that is not a dinner is not a dinner because does not fill him up and does not taste like anything edible.

I do think that it is very very sad about how the man who is not his father beats him, but as my friend (who let me borrow the book) seems to think, I didn't find it to be the main point. I loved the book because it showed a different outlook on the world. How he thought of everything was estranged and just so different. The beating was just an addition to the component on how he dreads things, and influences how he looks at things.

I also loved the character Mr. Steenwilly. He was a smart person. And, he was one person who John even admitted, knew a little of John. He was a compassionate, smart, loving character.