In My Mailbox (6)

In My Mailbox is a weekly meme started by Kristi from The Story Siren where bloggers can share what books they've received and what they're planning on reviewing.

So... It's been what, a month?  Sorry for the suckish lack of posts on my part guys :(  So... this week, you get a 3 weeks in one IMM!  If that makes any sense at all.  And you are free to throw rocks at me for not posting a review yesterday... *cries in shame* The reason why I posted an IMM instead of a review is because they take less time to make and for some reason I'm much more focused when I write them up. 

2 weeks ago...

Won:
Family by Micol Ostow, 
What Would My Cell Phone Do by Micol Ostow from Smart Pop YA and Micol Ostow
Enthralled: Paranormal Diversions (anthology) from Jessi @The Elliott Review
Lock and Key by Sarah Dessen from Lulu @The Bookworm is Here!
The Near Witch by Victoria Schwab *signed* from Irish @Ticket to Anywhere

Clarity by Kim Harrington *signed* from I'm sorry, I really can't figure out who I got this from!  But thank you anyways!

Bought:

The Monstrumologist by Rick Yancey

So, it was around this time that I bought my books for school (no, I didn't include them here, I thought you guys probably wouldn't care what they were haha), and I didn't have time to read these pretties... I've started Enthralled and The Monstrumologist, but I'm going to have to put them on hold for a while...  hopefully I'll be able to read them in 2 weeks?  

Psssttt you guys should definitely check out The Monstrumologist, it won a freakin' Michael Printz award and is good so far.  Was almost discontinued by Simon and Schuster because of lack of sales, but now they're going to publish the fourth book because of the awesome fans who fought for this series.   

Last week...

Won:
City of Bones *signed*, 
City of Ashes *signed*, 
City of Glass by Cassandra Clare *signed* from Kimberly @In the Outhouse
Tighter by Adele Griffin *signed* from Melissa @Mel's Books and Info and Adele Griffin 

Gifted: 
Maximum Ride: The Angel Experiment, 
Maximum Ride: School's Out-Forever by James Patterson from Alice, my friend who is moving to Australia and couldn't bring these with her :(

So excited when I saw the TMI books, like you have no idea.  Love this series but I don't own any of the books.  Same with the Maximum Ride books, I was obsessed with these books in 6th grade, and have been reading them ever since.  Although I really think it should have ended with the 3rd book.  Anyways, I'm glad that I'm finally able to put these pretties on my bookshelf now.  I was also excited to see Tighter, which I've been wanting to read for a while now.  The author even wrote me a card, and OMG she has the prettiest handwriting!  I should have took a picture... She wrote my name on the bubble mailer and I swear, my name has never looked so pretty.

This week...

Won: 
Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins,
The Near Witch by Victoria Schwab (this is an ARC, which we're giving away HERE!),
Sweep (Volume I) by Cate Tiernan and neat-o swag from Tara @Hobbitsies
Wolfsbane by Andrea Cremer from Heather Anastasiu 

Words cannot describe my love for Hex Hall.  As of now, my favorite book I've read in 2011.  Yeah, I've only read about thirty something, but easily my favorite.  So I'm extremely excited to finally own a copy. :) I got a second copy of The Near Witch, so gonna give it away as a part of Karina's Birthday Giveaway, along with Beauty Queens and an ARC of Shut Out!  You know I definitely don't have time to read when I can't even read Wolfsbane, which I've been DYING to read since Nightshade came out.

And some neat-o swag I got!

From Starcrossed Trilogy on twitter

from Tara @Hobbitsies

So, what did you get in your mailbox this week? :)

It's Karina's Birthday/Spontaneous Giveaway!

Hello all! It's April... for once.  I sincerely apologize for the lack of posts, I promise I'll post a review by tomorrow/friday!  If I don't, someone please throw rocks at me.  School/SAT/True Blood has gotten in the way of my sanity...  But enough about me...

It's Karina's birthday today! :D  And I randomly decided to have a giveaway in honor of the birth of her awesomeness.  Karina is the original creator of Book Away, and this blog could not be at all possible without her!  (Seriously.  I've pondered creating a blog by myself once, long long ago, too scary.)

We're giving away...

ARC of The Near Witch by Victoria Schwab
ARC of Shut Out by Kody Keplinger *signed*
Beauty Queens by Libba Bray
Random swag that I have lying around



US only (I'm sorry international followers, I know I say that a lot, but we will have something for you hopefully very soon!)

Contest runs till August 31st, at midnight! (Whatever your midnight is, I'm too lazy to figure out time zones).

*Edit* I'm such a twit, forgot to say what the giveaway was first time around...

Review: Ten Things We Did (And Probably Shouldn't Have)

Title: Ten Things We Did (And Probably Shouldn't Have)
Author: Sarah Mlynowski

Published: June 7th, 2011
Publisher: Harper Teen

Pages: 368
Format: Hardcover

Goodreads Summary:

2 girls + 3 guys + 1 house - parents = 10 things April and her friends did that they (definitely, maybe, probably) shouldn't have.
If given the opportunity, what sixteen-year-old wouldn't jump at the chance to move in with a friend and live parent-free? Although maybe "opportunity" isn't the right word, since April had to tell her dad a tiny little untruth to make it happen (see #1: "Lied to Our Parents"). But she and her housemate Vi are totally responsible and able to take care of themselves. How they ended up "Skipping School" (#3), "Throwing a Crazy Party" (#8), "Buying a Hot Tub" (#4), and, um, "Harboring a Fugitive" (#7) at all is kind of a mystery to them.
In this hilarious and bittersweet tale, Sarah Mlynowski mines the heart and mind of a girl on her own for the first time. To get through the year, April will have to juggle a love triangle, learn to do her own laundry, and accept that her carefully constructed world just might be falling apart . . . one thing-she-shouldn't-have-done at a time.

My Review:

This book was a great easy, summer read.

April, the main character, has decided to leave her family in order to stay in the life she's always known. With a father in Cleveland and a mother in France, April stays to live with her best friend Vi.

The only catch is that Vi's mother is on tour, leaving the house to the girls.

Things start going out of hand from there, with late night marathons, parties and boys, it was only a matter of time before April came to the realization that living alone wasn't as grand as she thought it would be.

From the beginning I knew this wasn't going to be a book I would fall in love with. It was cute, but it didn't have much depth to it.

Some points were very realistic, others (like getting away with living alone for 4 months without parent supervision) weren't. And in a way that's what keeps as a reminder that it was a fiction book.

What I did like about this story was how April would mention something about her past, then there would be like a mini chapter within the big chapter to explain it. It was like each backstory was its own little story and it showed you just how essential it was to the story as a whole.

Rating: 3/5

The Saskatoon Balloon Official Book Trailer!

Hey guys!

We've got an awesome book trailer to show you all! It first came to our attention thanks to Kate O'Hegarty, author of Mieradome and it's sequel The Saskatoon Balloon (which will be released around December 2011). Check it out:



Cool huh? Well it definitely caught my attention and now both books have been added to my to-read list. As soon as I can get my hands on copies of the books, you can be expecting a review.

Here's the summary from Goodreads for Mieradome:

Mieradome pulls the reader into a unique fantasy world of faeries and technology, a different take on the Alice in Wonderland concept. The story revolves around a young girl named Amavia who believes she is a human girl, but slowly comes to find she is a faery in the world of Mieradome. Slowly who Amavia was began to unravel to show the truth; the truth that she just may be the evil they need to destroy. This is the first novel in a series, and gives a glimpse of what is to come for the main character Amavia. Fans of the Harry Potter series and His Dark Materials will definitely enjoy this adventure.

Keep checking back for more updates on this series!

Karina

Overview: July

Alright, so here are the stats for July 2011:

In July we had just about 994 pageviews! That's about 25% more than last month! (yeah I did the math)

Here are the Top Five countries that visited Book Away:

1. United States
2. Australia
3. United Kingdom
4. Canada
5. Germany

Good job to our viewers from Australia and UK who moved up in rank from last month! The difference between 2 and 3 was ONE pageview!

Other countries include:

New Zealand

France

Mexico

Italy

Philippines

April and I did a combined of eleven posts, which is a good number but did not beat last month.

Sadly, we didn't get to go see Maggie, so there was no book bought and sadly no contest. Sorry guys. But maybe this month?

Coming in August:

My birthday!

School starts (sadly it will mean less posts)

Release of Bloodlines by Richelle Mead!

Keep up the pageviews! And we appreciate everyone who comments!

RAK July Recap

This was my first time participating in RAK and it was a lot of fun :)  I'm not sure if I'll participate in August because of school and last minute homework, but if I can, I definitely will!

RAK is hosted by the awesome Isalys and Vanessa at Book Soulmates and you can check out the August sign up post and rules HERE. 

Here are the RAKs I sent (yeah, I got a little too excited):

Torment by Lauren Kate to Gina @The Bucket List

Beautiful Darkness to Katie @Novel Society

Anna and the French Kiss to Ishita @The Reading Fish

Dark Mirror by P.J. Putney to Jessie @Remarkable Reading

Crusade by Nancy Holder and Debbie Viguie to Amber @Me, My Shelf, and I

XVI by Julia Karr to Briana @The Book Pixie

This month, I'd like to thank:

Gina @The Bucket List for sending me Gone by Michael Grant

Briana @The Book Pixie for sending me an ARC of The Sky is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson

And lastly, I'm sorry for the lack of posts on my part last week (April).  I have no excuse (well, no good excuse), but I hope to be back in the swing of reading, reviewing, and blogging this week.  And if I ever say I want to start watching a tv show in the future, STOP ME.  Thanks for putting up with my crazy :)