Immortal Beloved by Cate Tiernan

Immortal Beloved by Cate Tiernan

Release Date: September 7, 2010
Publisher: Little, Brown
Pages: 416

After living for hundreds of years, would you begin to lose the ability to feel and to appreciate the little things? After all, what's one moment to you, than the merest blink of an eye? You'll have many more moments to come--an infinite amount of moments, in fact. So what would you do? Jet off to see the world? Donate some time to help worldly causes? Mindlessly drift from party to party, just trying to pass time and have fun?

The latter is what immortal Nastasya--Nasty to her friends--picks. Nasty indulges in fancy parties, excessive drinking, and her friends' carefree (and careless) attitudes. What's one more night spent with exciting company and good drink? It's not like she has to worry about her liver or a possible car accident afterwards--immortals are a pretty hardy bunch with plenty of time for their antics.

Boz, Incy, and a few other immortals from Nasty's close group of friends are living it large--expensive parties, trips to the other end of the world on a whim, and fast cars and designer clothes are the norm for them. Reckless behavior is second nature, since they hardly have to worry about the repercussions. Car crash? No problem; immortals will likely escape with just a few scrapes and bruises.
Incy and Nasty have floated from party to party together for years, leading to a close friendship between the two. Incy parties hard because he doesn't have anything better to do with his time, but Nasty parties to forget her past--and this party lifestyle definitely suits her needs. That is, until one night Incy goes too far and uses his magick to snap a man's back.

Shaken that her close friend could use his magick for bad and could just harm an innocent man without any remorse, Nasty flees her group of friends. And for the first time in decades, Nasty has feelings of guilt and cowardice. but after centuries of stamping out true emotions and feelings, Nasty does not know who to turn to, except for a woman named River whom she had only met once--and decades ago at that. Traveling from London to Massachusetts to find River and her place if she's still there, Nasty pins her last hope of possibly having something different than a life filled with nothing but debauchery on someone and some place she did not truly know, let alone understand. But Nasty may get more than what she's bargained for when she reaches River's End. The lifestyle of those there are very different from the one Nasty's gotten used to over the past few decades--and there's someone there who may have something to do with the past Nasty's buried deep for years.

Nasty definitely grew and matured a bit during the progression of the novel. Although she maintains some of the childishness and immaturity she displayed rather prominently during the beginning of the novel. She's also got a vulnerable side that surfaces as sarcasm and attitude, which puts her at odds with some of the others at River's End.
I would have thought that having lived over 400 years, and having seen what Nasty had, would have given her some perspective and made her mature at least a bit more than she had. I mean, she really didn't have it easy at points in her life--death, pain, famine, and loss--but she still sounded like a teenager most of the time. While I agree that some of those events could be traumatizing enough to make her repress them, the general hardships she had to go through before her wild party days should have still made her more mature than she sounded in Immortal Beloved.

The beginning of the book was okay. It was the second half that drew me in more and it was with greater reluctance that I set the book down when I had to as I got further along. The beginning had almost a Gossip Girl-esque feeling to it; parties! Rumors! Glamor! Flamboyant friends! But then things mellowed out and Nasty began her journey towards self-discovery.

I guess you could also say that certain times during Nasty's time at River's End (almost like a rehab for immortals) were slow as well. Things did not progress very quickly (I'm sure Nasty felt that way too!) but this could have also been to showcase Nasty's own journey at River's End. Her chores were described maybe once too often (there are only so many ways you can write about washing kale) but the flashbacks and other events kept it interesting enough that I wanted to keep going.

All in all, I enjoyed reading Immortal Beloved. However, I also felt that this novel was holding back, especially during the last third or so, to set up for a sequel. Although that part was not quite that enjoyable, I am looking forward to continuing Nasty's journey in the sequel, Darkness Falls which hits bookstores this month! I would like to add that I do hope that Nasty will grow and mature even more in book two as the immature voice that told the first part of this story was not exactly my cup of tea.

Overall: 3.75 out of 5
Plot: 4 stars
Characters: 4 stars
Writing: 3.75 stars
Cover: 3 stars

Waiting on Wednesday

Tempest by Julie Cross
(St. Martin's Griffin/January 17, 2012)

The year is 2009. Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun.

That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future.

Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities.

But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler. Recruit… or kill him.

Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

Yeah, yeah, I know, this comes out this month! But that doesn't mean I can't impatiently pine for it anyway, right? haha Sounds like an adventure with some romance and action--a favorite combination of mine! Hopefully not too heart-breaking though; I've read quite a few books that have been tugged on my heart strings lately!

What are you waiting for this Wednesday?

Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Breaking the Spine

Book Trailer, Twitter party and a tour, oh my!

Marissa Meyer's Cinder hit bookstores today!

To celebrate, she'll be hosting a Twitter/Facebook party on January 9th @ 7pm EST @marissa_meyer and she'll also be participating in a blog tour (find the dates/blogs here!)

Cinder: Book One in The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer

Even in the future, the story begins with Once Upon a Time…. Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth's fate hinges on one girl. . . . Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She's a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister's illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai's, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world's future.

Don't forget to check out the book trailer!

Congrats to Marissa for Cinder's release! I look forward to reading it!

Trailer Tuesday (10)

It's Tuesday! And this isn't strictly a book trailer, but I saw this a couple of days ago & figured I'd share it!

Hunger Games fever has really taken off and with just a few short months till it hits cinemas, a fan did a Lego remake of the trailer!

Enjoy!

Grave Dance by Kalayna Price

Grave Dance by Kalayna Price

Release Date: July 5, 2011
Publisher: Roc
Pages: 400

Whoever said dead men tell no tales obviously never met Alex Craft.

After a month spent recovering from a vicious fight with a sorcerer, grave witch Alex Craft is ready to get back to solving murders by raising the dead. With her love life in turmoil thanks to the disappearance of Fae Investigation Bureau agent Falin Andrews and a shocking “L” word confession from Death himself, Alex is eager for the distractions of work. But her new case turns out to be a deadly challenge.

The police hire Alex to consult on a particularly strange investigation in the nature preserve south of Nekros City. The strange part: There are no corpses, only fragments of them. A serial killer is potentially on the loose, and Alex has no way to raise a shade without a body, so she’ll have to rely on the magic of others to find leads. But as she begins investigating, a creature born of the darkest magic comes after her. Someone very powerful wants to make sure the only thing she finds is a dead end—her own.

Okay, so before I say anything, I'll admit that only recently have I begun to delve into these specifically sci-fi and fantasy genres. This was sent along by publicists who have sent me plenty of YA books that I've enjoyed so I decided to give this a try. Well despite the fact that this is undoubtedly a sequel, I actually quite enjoyed it. Granted, my enjoyment and overall understanding of the plot could have been improved by a ten-fold if I had actually read the first book. Nonetheless, this was an enjoyable read; Price has built up a complex world of human mortals, fae, and those in-between--and most importantly, how they all interact. I found most of it interesting and not overwhelming, most likely due to the fact that the story was captivating and thankfully not derailed by excessive detail of this alternate universe.

Alex is not your average girl, being able to raise the dead as shades and all, but her deeds from her past adventure about to catch up to her--and they just might reveal more about Alex herself than she is ready for. But she must forge ahead on the new murder case at hand, even as she has to tie up some loose ends, if she wishes to protect her friends--and herself--from danger. Of course having two handsome men, Death and a fae, Falin, coming onto her (possibly for more reasons than just physical attraction) just complicates things.

I liked the interactions between Alex and Death and Alex and Falin and the intricate story Price weaves was enough to keep me interested, even though I had not read the first novel. With that said, I would be very much interested in reading Grave Witch (the first Alex Craft novel) and the next book in the series whenever it comes out!

I'm backkkkk!

Hey everyone!

I'm back! I'm sure you've been able to tell since I've already had a few posts these past few weeks! Sorry for my lengthy hiatus; school, work, and trying to figure out my future overwhelmed me for a while. Things are getting back on track, however, and I'm very happy that I've been able to read more and review some lately! So stay tuned for more reviews, interviews, weekly memes and the like!

I've rung in 2012 with a new layout for The Book Vault! It's simple but pretty easy to navigate! I've also cleaned up my blog roll as it seems that unfortunately, a lot of people have had to close their sites or just stop blogging because they've been too busy. So if you've opened a new blog or you're stopping by for the first time, leave a comment or drop me a line--I'd love to check out more YA book blogs and/or do a link exchange!

I'm glad to be back, but unfortunately I don't think updates will be quite as frequent as before. I'm about to take more upper-level courses as well as work on grad school or med school plans, but I'll try to update as much as possible! Thanks for understanding!

Hopefully I'll be able to run a giveaway or something of some sort to celebrate being back, but I'll have to raising some shipping & handling funds first. (Tuition & textbook bills can be quite excellent at killing one's poor bank account!)

Let me know what you're reading or send me some book recommendations! Connect with me via FACEBOOK, TWITTER or GOODREADS! (or heck, all 3!)

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Happy New Year, everyone! Here's to a bright new year full of success, happiness and plenty of good books!



2011 was a rough year for me and passed with little activity for me and The Book Vault but I'm hoping to change that this year! More books, more interviews, more posts and more reviews!