Review: Wither by Lauren DeStefano

Wither by Lauren DeStefano
Publisher: HarperCollins
Cover Love: 9/10
Add to: Goodreads

Goodreads: By age sixteen, Rhine Ellery has four years left to live. A botched effort to create a perfect race has left all males born with a lifespan of 25 years, and females a lifespan of 20 years--leaving the world in a state of panic. Geneticists seek a miracle antidote to restore the human race, desperate orphans crowd the population, crime and poverty have skyrocketed, and young girls are being kidnapped and sold as polygamous brides to bear more children. When Rhine is sold as a bride, she vows to do all she can to escape. Yet her husband, Linden, is hopelessly in love with her, and Rhine can't bring herself to hate him as much as she'd like to. He opens her to a magical world of wealth and illusion she never thought existed, and it almost makes it possible to ignore the clock ticking away her short life. But Rhine quickly learns that not everything in her new husband's strange world is what it seems. Her father-in-law, an eccentric doctor bent on finding the antidote, is hoarding corpses in the basement; her fellow sister wives are to be trusted one day and feared the next; and Rhine has no way to communicate to her twin brother that she is safe and alive. Together with one of Linden's servants, Gabriel, Rhine attempts to escape just before her seventeenth birthday. But in a world that continues to spiral into anarchy, is there any hope for freedom?

My Review:

Wither reminds me of The Handmaid’s Tale mixed with a little bit of The Selection. There are definitely strong themes running in both of these novels which feature prominently in Wither. It has been out for a while and I’m totally surprised that I wasn’t told to read it sooner, because I really really enjoyed it! 

I loved reading from Rhine’s point of view. She had a very strong inner voice, which felt very realistic. All of the characters each had their own personalities and I’m sure I’m not the only one when I say that Cecily annoyed me so much, but she’s still only young. Jenna was an interesting character to work out, not everything was completely revealed about her and I am so curious. I truly felt so sorry for her, she clearly did not want to be in her situation so buried her head in books to forget where she actually was. Vaughn is such a creep, he is so sinister and slimy, and I’m looking forward to seeing his reaction to certain events in the next books. I actually felt sorry for Linden, I hated him at first, but as the novel progresses you can only feel pity for his ignorance. Gabriel is such a sweetie! I really like him, so I hope everything goes well for him. Rose is an important character; she emphasizes the disease and really shows all the girls the fragility of life. The short story at the end really helped me to see the difference in her attitude and behavior from when she was younger to when she was dying. 

The plot was good, it kept me entertained. I could see that certain things were going to happen when they did, but I still enjoyed it. There were lots of little loops and things that were tied up together at the end. I’m looking forward to seeing what happens next the most! 

Overall, a really entertaining and enjoyable read which left me hooked for the next one! 

4 out of 5 stars.

                                                     

Review: This is Not a Test by Courtney Summers

This is Not a Test by Courtney Summers
Publisher: St. Martins Griffin
Cover Love: 10/10
Add: Goodreads

 Goodreads: It’s the end of the world. Six students have taken cover in Cortege High but shelter is little comfort when the dead outside won’t stop pounding on the doors. One bite is all it takes to kill a person and bring them back as a monstrous version of their former self. To Sloane Price, that doesn’t sound so bad. Six months ago, her world collapsed and since then, she’s failed to find a reason to keep going. Now seems like the perfect time to give up. As Sloane eagerly waits for the barricades to fall, she’s forced to witness the apocalypse through the eyes of five people who actually want to live. But as the days crawl by, the motivations for survival change in startling ways and soon the group’s fate is determined less and less by what’s happening outside and more and more by the unpredictable and violent bids for life—and death—inside. When everything is gone, what do you hold on to?

My Review:

This is the very first book that I have read by Courtney Summers, but it will definitely not be the last! She has such an amazing writing style; I can truly get into the character’s mind and become the person myself. This is Not a Test is a book that certainly grabbed my attention straight away, firstly from the cover. Have you not seen it? It’s amazing, I love the simplicity of it, but also how her hair is swept across her face and the blood splatters the page make you want to delve in deeper. I was able to read the first chapter online and just KNEW that I HAD to have it after reading it. It kept me on my toes, shocked me, excited me and all in one little chapter. This is Not a Test is a book that will stay with you for weeks, heck, months even, after you’ve finished it. It still creeps up on me and I finished it in early December.

Summers knows how to create the perfect voice for her characters. Each and every one of them all has their own personalities and quirks and I felt like they were very believable. I cried with them, shouted with them and on the rare occasion, even laughed. Sloane –the main protagonist has such a distinct voice because she is broken, quite simply. She is not like the others, who genuinely want to survive and this was a very interesting perspective to read from. I liked Sloane, I really did. She was not perfect, but who is?

Although this is a ‘zombie post-apocalyptic’ novel, don’t be fooled. This is Not a Test may feature zombies, but most of the action takes place within the town’s school building. This creates a very atmospheric and hostile background. Being in constant presence of other people 24/7 and the fear of the zombies was the perfect concoction to create chaos. Things are not as they seem and do not trust anyone. Question everything and pay attention to subtle things. This is Not a Test focuses more on the character’s interactions and how well or not-so-well they deal with the zombies and each other.

This is Not a Test definitely keeps you on your toes. Right from the very start, things do not start well for Sloane. I don’t think the first chapter is still available but seriously, read this book! If you haven’t, you are seriously missing out! Summer’s is the expert in creating tension and there was not a dull moment in this book. I did not want to put it down, I cancelled dates, turned my phone off  and locked myself away with a hot chocolate for about three hours. So if you’re going to read this book, know that it is seriously addictive!  I was frantically turning the pages again and again, devouring it.

You will truly begin to care for the characters in This is Not a Test. They all have little secrets that are unraveled throughout and some of them are real shockers. I really did not expect some of them, but that made me love the book even more. This is not a fairytale, so there is no guarantee for a happy ending. Some characters will not make it out alive and you’ll cry for them as if you were there. The realism is also there too, as they do act like normal teenagers would; getting some alcohol and playing truth or dare and there is some romance in this book.

Seriously, I cannot recommend this book enough. Just read it and you will understand. This is one amazing book that should not be missed. There is lots of action, a screamable(did I just make that up?)- amount-of-tension, some steamy romance and very human emotions. What are you waiting for?! Read it now!

5 out of 5 stars. 

                                              

Blog Tour: Rebecca Donovan - A Day in the Life

Hi guys! :) Today we have Rebecca Donovan here (author of Reason to Breathe, I can't wait to read it!) explaining what she does on a daily basis.
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There isn't anything typical about my days. Sure, there are many days that run together, following the same routine of getting out of bed, showering, eating breakfast while checking my social media sites and email, going for a walk, picking my son up from school, checking the social media sites and email again, working on  business obligations, reading and going to bed. Nothing thrilling or exciting about those days. But the days that I write, the days that I'm engrossed in the story and nothing else around me matters — those days, I may not even get out of my pajamas until four o'clock in the afternoon. I may neglect to eat, my creativity fueled by the caffeine of Mt. Dew. The hours slip by as the voices in my head fill the laptop screen in front of me. And when I look up, I'm sitting in the dark. Those days — the days when I live within a dream that gets translated into words, words that make me exhausted with every fathomable emotion— those days are my favorite. That's when I know I'm doing exactly what I'm meant to do. Days when I live in a blurry haze of reality are the days that I know I'm an author, and I wouldn't give up the rush of creating for anything.

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Thank you Rebecca! I really enjoyed reading your piece :)

If you want to get in touch with Rebecca you can so at: Twitter, Website or Facebook.

Blog Tour: A Day in the Life by Tammara Webber

Hi guys! Today I have Tammara Webber (New York Times Bestselling Author of Easy and Between the Lines) here, explaining what she does on a daily basis. If you haven't read Easy yet, I'd highly recommend it! It's amazing, my review is HERE if you wish to take a look.
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The I-wish Version of a Typical Morning: The day begins with a joyful bounce out of bed at dawn, followed by a rousing bit of exercise. I peruse the morning paper while sipping a cup of herbal tea and nibbling a croissant. I’m seated at my desk and tapping literary brilliance on my laptop by 7 a.m.

Reality: The snooze alarm button no longer says “snooze” because the alarm has been struck so often that the lettering has vanished. I roll out of bed when Moose, my cat, fwomps directly onto my stomach in a desperate plea for breakfast before he starves to death. (Note: Moose is nowhere near starving to death.) I can’t open my eyes fully before at least two cups of coffee (yes to cream and sugar) and breakfast – usually a bowl of nearly-healthy cereal (no milk) corrupted by a thorough sugar coating.

Once I’m more or less awake, I check my two email accounts, flag everything that requires a reply, take a vague count of how much email is piling up, and move on to answering questions and comments on Facebook and Twitter. If I have a blog post to write, a book to review, a colleague’s manuscript to critique, a Q&A due, or bills to pay, I do these first because I’ve convinced myself that my imagination will trigger more easily and the words will flow better once my daily to-do list is checked off.

Somewhere between noon and 3:00 p.m., I open my story notes and WIP (work in progress). Often – especially at the beginning and always in the middle of a novel – I force myself sit and stare at a cursor blinking on a blank page for hours at a time (with breaks for whatever’s in the pantry and an unreasonable amount of Diet Cokes). Sometimes I type and delete repeatedly while wondering how I’m ever going to finish an 80,000 word novel when I can’t manage to put a single sentence in my hero’s mouth.

When I’m lucky, though, I’m filled with ideas and able to dive right in. On a good day, I may write in half hour spurts throughout the rest of the day, or write until my fingers are numb, I’ve missed dinner, and it’s well past time for bed. Falling asleep while writing has been known to occur, making next-day pre-reads more interesting. (One writer friend, Laura Bradley Rede, confessed to falling asleep at the keyboard. The last thing she remembered doing before dragging herself off to bed was changing, ‘That would come back to bite him in the ass’ to ‘That would come back to haunt him.’ The next day, she found that she’d actually written, ‘That would come back to haunt him in the ass.’)

On the day I finish the first solid draft of a novel, it’s like the end of hibernation must feel for a bear. I emerge into a world that shifted when I wasn’t looking, and now it seems unfamiliar to me, and I seem unfamiliar to it. My family and friends are stunned to suddenly receive regular phone calls or lunch invitations. My cats are baffled to receive regular meals. I have time to read and socialize and shower consistently. Once the painful revision/editing phase begins, and during the frenzied promotional phase (both include a good deal of hair pulling – my own – and literal gnashing of teeth), I may determine that I’m never, ever writing another thing again.

And then I wake up with a slightly muddled idea for a new story, and the whole cycle begins again.
Sorry, Moose.

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Haha I loved this! :D Thanks Tammara! You can contact Tammara in a number of ways, on her Twitter, her website  and Facebook.