Blogoversary - Day 4

It's here! It's here!

Blogoversary and 1,000 Followers Giveaway!

*throws confetti*

Welcome to Day 4 of my Blogoversary! 

I can NOT believe its already been a whole year! 

AND just to make things even better, I just hit 1, 000 followers a couple weeks ago!

*throws more confetti*

Each day this week, Monday through Friday, I am posting some of my favorite reviews from the past year as well as a different giveaway every day! So be sure to come back every day and enter. All giveaways will end Sunday night (August 3).

To keep my posts from being crazy long, I am only posting bits and pieces from the reviews I'm sharing. You can can find links to all reviews in their entirety under the Reviews tab.

Today's Favorite Reviews: Shockers!

Books that shocked me, scared me, tore out my soul, or made me sob.

Shocked me:

The First Days

(As the World Dies: A Zombie Trilogy #1)

Rhiannon Frater

Goodreads     Amazon

Notable Book Quotes:

So small. So very, very small. The fingers pressed under the front door of her home were so very small. She could not stop staring at those baby fingers straining frantically to reach her as she stood shivering on the porch. 

Katie let the curtain fall back into place. Standing before the window, she felt herself let go of the old world and embrace the new. She would survive this. She would go on. That was all there was to it. She wouldn't give up without a fight. She would do whatever it took to survive. 

The crux of the argument was that Jenni was a bloodthirsty psycho and would waste all of the ammo while Juan was too stupid to understand guns were made to be fired.

Review Quotes:

Well. So, that was awesome. Hold on a moment while I catch my breath from all the zombie killing.

Frater's pacing throughout the book is incredible, each time the story slowed down for a bit I thought, "Okay, here it is. They're safe for a little while and now it's going to get boring". Um, no. The pace never slowed to a halt or left me feeling bored. The story would slow for a nanosecond, and then off we would go!

Aside from the wonderful pacing and delicious zombie killing gore, what really shines here are the characters. I do not avidly read horror, so I was unsure about this series for a while. But what sets Frater apart from others in the genre is two significant things. First of all, her lead characters are women. Strong, stubborn, crazy women. Second of all, her story is really character driven. All of the main characters are well-written and fully developed. 

Made me sob:

Prey

(Shifters #4)

Rachel Vincent

Goodreads     Amazon

Notable Book Quotes:

“Faythe…?" The tremor in his voice broke my heart. Then understanding surfaced, and his tear-filled eyes searched mine desperately. "No. No," he whispered through clenched teeth. "This was not wrong. It’s the only thing I’ve done right in months. Don’t you dare regret this.” 

Meow, meow, motherfucker. 

I still loved Marc desperately and couldn’t imagine life without him. Jace was…something else. Something I could feel but couldn’t articulate. . . . . He was something that would have to wait.

Review Quotes:

This is the five star worthy installment in this series that I've been waiting for! There is A LOT going on in this book!

There are two HUGE surprises - one that had my jaw hitting my chest and my copy of Prey almost taking a flight across the room. This one is so much more emotional than previous books, and I know - that's hard to say. The level of emotion here was off the charts. For the middle 100 pages my stomach was tied in a huge knot. 

This series just keeps getting more intense! I love the dramatic build up that is happening from book to book, as well as Vincent's change in scenery for each of them.

Tore out my soul:

This Is Not A Test

Courtney Summers

Goodreads     Amazon

Notable Book Quotes:

"I woke up and the last piece of my heart disappeared. I opened my eyes and I felt it go." 

"I don't know how I'm going to do this, move through the hours like someone who wants to still be breathing when I had so firmly made up my mind to stop. I'm not supposed to be here and the world has ended and it's too stupid and sad for words and it's changed time; a second is a minute, a minute is an hour, an hour is a day, a day is a month, a month is a year, and a year - I can't be here that long." 

"One of the dead - a girl - grabs my arm and pulls me to her and Rhys finally wakes up. He grabs my other arm and pulls me to him but as hard as he pulls, the dead girl pulls harder while the other four scramble around her for a piece......Rhys grabs the bat and smashes it against the dead girl's wrists, smashes it into the others, whatever he can do to get me free and I'm thinking about how it will never work, how this is it, when the dead girl's grip loosens."

Review Quotes:

I pulled This Is Not A Test off my bookshelf thinking I would read a little of it then watch some television and go to bed. Instead I read the whole book, cover to cover, in one sitting that lasted into the wee hours of the morning. I was so captivated by Sloane and this unique story that I just couldn't put it down. This Is Not A Test captured my heart (and several hours of my life) in the same vein as Fracture and Masque of the Red Death.

For Sloane, the zombies are just another way for her to die, and she sees death as a freedom that she welcomes. She harbors so much resentment for her sister, not to mention everything that's built up inside of her over living through years of abuse, that her inner most thoughts are all focused on when she can get away from the other survivors and finally end her life.

I've seen this book referred to as The Breakfast Club with zombies. That's pretty accurate because of the mash up of personalities of the six teens and the fact that they are stuck together inside a school. But really, that's where the similarities end. Because as the number of days the group stays in the school counts up, the strife among them grows and grows. There's pairing up and taking sides and violence.  

Scared me:

The Restorer

(Graveyard Queen #1)

Amanda Stevens

Goodreads     Amazon

Notable Book Quotes:

"I shouldn't be here. With You. "You scare me." "I do?" I said. "Sometimes you make me forget." My heart was pounding so hard, I though it might burst in my chest. "Is that bad?" "I don't know. I've held on for so long....I'm not sure I'm ready to let go." 

“There are a lot of things in this world to be afraid of, but a dead body isn't one of them.” 

"I was nine when I saw my first ghost."

Review Quotes:

Amanda Stevens delivers an eerie murder mystery with the added plus of the paranormal in The Restorer.

Her partner in solving the grisly murders is John Devlin, who I imagined as a typical, old-school cop. Devlin is tough and gruff, but something about him attracts Amelia right away. 

Stevens' ghosts are not of the Casper variety. They are spooky and scary. The idea that a ghost could attach itself to you and slowly suck away your happiness, your energy, and your life force is simply terrifying. There weren't many 'jump out and grab you moments', rather the scariness comes more from the constant feeling of creepiness throughout the novel.

Giveaway Day 4

Young Adult ARC Pack

Harbinger by Sara Wilson Etienne

Shadow and Bone (Grisha Trilogy #1) by Leigh Bardugo

These are both paperback advance copies. 

The cover for Shadow and Bone is different from the finished copy shown above. 

You must be 13 or older to enter. US/CAN only. 

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