Review: The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey

The 5th Wave
by Rick Yancey

Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 480
Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
Publication date: May 7, 2013
Suggested tags: young adult, dystopia, aliens



First in The 5th Wave series. From Goodreads:

"After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker.

Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother—or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up."

{ I received a copy of this book through Goodreads First Reads. }


The 5th Wave seriously messes with your mind. It leads you to think one thing and then pulls a "nope just kidding" and completely reverses it, then makes you think maybe you get it now, then takes that away in a horrible shocking way, then makes you think oh no wait you were misled before but maybe you get it now, then blows everything apart so you have no freaking idea what the heck is going on, or has been going on since the first page. But I LOVED IT.

There have been 4 waves so far, and now there will be 5. Families have been destroyed through the waves, and the survivors who remain desperately cling on to whoever and whatever they have left. They don't know what to do. They don't know who to trust. It's chaos. In the midst of all this, Cassie is trying to be brave and strong and protect her younger brother, but it's getting more difficult. There is a promise of rescue, of salvation. Her father insists they can trust them. But can they?

Seriously, my brain was on overdrive the entire time I was reading this book, and it was just one blindside after another. Yancey makes it so easy to put yourself in the characters' places - how would you react when you have no idea who you can trust? Is that innocent stranger standing in front of you really an innocent stranger, or an alien sent to destroy you? Hesitate, and you could be dead. And the synopsis doesn't even begin to cover everything that happens in this book. I'm trying to come up with a list of what goes on without giving spoilers and I can't even... it's that intense. You never know what to expect. It's terrifying and gruesome and... just... amazing. Aaaand, amid all these horrors, there's romance! What? I know. But it works.

Rick Yancey, you are brilliant and I am an instant fan, sir. I am eagerly awaiting my chance to devour the next book in the series, and I am sure I will laugh and cry and start hearing suspicious noises as I read it just like I did with this one.


Final verdict: I'm obsessed with it! I thought this book was amazing! It's now officially one of my favorite books! I immediately bought a copy for myself because I will be rereading it again and again! I shall be shouting about it from the rooftops for days and I am currently recommending it to everyone I come in contact with!

{ The 5th Wave book trailer }

{ More about Rick Yancey }

Rick Yancey's Goodreads profile
Rick Yancey's website
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The 5th Wave book website

New Release Round-Up: April 22-28, 2013

Young Adult


Arclight
by Josin L. McQuein

Release date: April 23, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 400
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Suggested tags: young adult, dystopia, thriller



First in the Arclight series. From Goodreads:

"No one crosses the wall of light . . . except for one girl who doesn’t remember who she is, where she came from, or how she survived. A harrowing, powerful debut thriller about finding yourself and protecting your future—no matter how short and uncertain it may be.

The Arclight is the last defense. The Fade can’t get in. Outside the Arclight’s border of high-powered beams is the Dark. And between the Light and the Dark is the Grey, a narrow, barren no-man’s-land. That’s where the rescue team finds Marina, a lone teenage girl with no memory of the horrors she faced or the family she lost. Marina is the only person who has ever survived an encounter with the Fade. She’s the first hope humanity has had in generations, but she could also be the catalyst for their final destruction. Because the Fade will stop at nothing to get her back. Marina knows it. Tobin, who’s determined to take his revenge on the Fade, knows it. Anne-Marie, who just wishes it were all over, knows it.

When one of the Fade infiltrates the Arclight and Marina recognizes it, she will begin to unlock secrets she didn’t even know she had. Who will Marina become? Who can she never be again?"

The Rules
by Stacey Kade

Release date: April 23, 2013
Available as: hardcover, ebook
Pages: 416
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Suggested tags: young adult, science fiction, aliens



First in the Project Paper Doll series. From Goodreads:

"1. Never trust anyone.

2. Remember they are always searching.

3. Don’t get involved.

4. Keep your head down.

5. Don’t fall in love.

Five simple rules. Ariane Tucker has followed them since the night she escaped from the genetics lab where she was created, the result of combining human and extraterrestrial DNA. Ariane’s survival—and that of her adoptive father—depends on her ability to blend in among the full-blooded humans in a small Wisconsin town, to hide in plain sight at her high school from those who seek to recover their lost (and expensive) “project.”

But when a cruel prank at school goes awry, it puts her in the path of Zane Bradshaw, the police chief’s son and someone who sees too much. Someone who really sees her. After years of trying to be invisible, Ariane finds the attention frightening—and utterly intoxicating. Suddenly, nothing is simple anymore, especially not the rules..."

Other YA new releases for this week:

Middle Grade


House of Secrets
by Chris Columbus & Ned Vizzini

Release date: April 23, 2013
Available as: hardcover, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 496
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Suggested tags: middle grade, fantasy



First in the House of Secrets series. From Goodreads:

"The Walker kids had it all: loving parents, a big house in San Francisco, all the latest video games . . . but everything changed when their father lost his job as a result of an inexplicable transgression. Now the family is moving into Kristoff House, a mysterious place built nearly a century earlier by Denver Kristoff, a troubled writer with a penchant for the occult.

Suddenly the siblings find themselves launched on an epic journey into a mash-up world born of Kristoff’s dangerous imagination, to retrieve a dark book of untold power, uncover the Walker family’s secret history and save their parents . . . and maybe even the world."

Other Middle Grade new releases for this week:

Friday Freebies: July 6, 2012

Click on each title to go to the Amazon Kindle edition listing. Be sure to double-check the price before you download!



How to Date an Alien
by Magan Vernon

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 234 (Kindle edition)
Publisher: Calta Press
Publication date: November 28, 2011
Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, aliens



First in the My Alien Romance series. From Amazon:

"High school senior Alex Bianchi's estranged father gets her an internship at Circe Operations Center to pad her college applications. But Circe isn't your typical military base. It's an alien-run operation center and not all of the aliens are friendly, especially the one that tries to kill Alex on her first day. When Ace, a dark-eyed Caltian, enters and saves the day, she can't help but be drawn to him. Can these star-crossed lovers survive when they're on the brink of intergalactic war?"

Meant to Be
by Tiffany King

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 287 (Kindle edition)
Publisher: Createspace
Publication date: March 15, 2011
Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, romance



First in The Saving Angels series. From Amazon:

"Krista Miller feels like she has lived her entire life in a glass box with her every emotion on display. She can’t help feeling like a defect as her sensitivities have made her socially inept and without any real friends; the one exception being the boy that visits her each night in her dreams.

Krista’s emotions are put to the test when a move to California triggers a devastating change to her fantasy world. The nightly comfort that the boy provides has now become a recurring nightmare as he is taken from her by an unseen force.

Struggling to appear normal, Krista enrolls in a new school and finds it to be nothing like she thought. Her new life is sent spiraling out of control from a strange connection with a boy, Mark, who claims to know all her secrets.

As Krista begins to explore the emotions that Mark evokes in her, secrets about their mysterious past and their predestined purpose threatens to separate them just when they have found each other."

The Moon Coin
by Richard Due

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 260
Publisher: Gibbering Gnome Press
Publication date: August 25, 2011
Suggested tags: middle grade, fantasy



First in the Moon Realm series. From Amazon:

"'Tales, unlike stories, never lie. You see, a tale is an account of things in their due order, often divulged secretly, or as gossip. Would you like to hear one?' —Lord Autumn

Uncle Ebb was so good at telling his tales of the Moon Realm that sometimes it sounded like he’d been there himself.

As children, Lily and Jasper listened raptly to his bedtime tales of a place where nine moons swirled around one another, each inhabited by strange and wondrous beings: magical lunamancers; undersea merfolk; wise birds; winged dragons; and Lily’s favorite, the heroic, leonine Rinn.

There was only one rule: don’t tell a soul.

But now, years later, Uncle Ebb is missing. Lily has learned the secret behind the tales, and soon Jasper will too. But there’s one big problem. You see, something terrible has happened in the Moon Realm. . . ."

Psion Beta
by Jacob Gowans

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition, ebook
Pages: 370 (Kindle edition)
Publisher: Jacob Gowans
Publication date: December 11, 2010
Suggested tags: young adult, science fiction, dystopia



First in the Psion series. From Amazon:

"Sammy, a 14-year-old fugitive, accidentally discovers he has the powers of a Psion.

Plucked off the streets, he is thrust into the rigorously-disciplined environment of Psion Beta headquarters. As a new Beta, Sammy must hone his newfound abilities using holographic fighting simulations, stealth training missions, and complex war games. His fellow trainees are other kids competing to prove their worth so they can graduate and contribute to the war effort.

But the stifling competition at headquarters isolates Sammy from his peers. Learning to use his incredible powers is difficult enough, but when things go horribly wrong on a routine training mission, he must rely on the other Betas to stay alive.

The Silent War is at a tipping point; even one boy can be the difference.

But to do so, he must survive."

Character Interview: Geery from ExtraNormal

Welcome to stop #3 on the ExtraNormal Blog Tour, celebrating the release of ExtraNormal by Suze Reese! For more info, check out the ExtraNormal Blog Tour page on Suze's blog.

For my participation day on the blog tour, I knew I wanted to interview one of the characters from ExtraNormal. I really, really enjoyed reading this book (you can find my review here), and there were a lot of great characters, but my favorite without a doubt was Mira's best friend, Geery. So needless to say I was thrilled to be able to interview her! And I'm just as thrilled to share her answers with you here. Enjoy! :)


Thanks for agreeing to chat with me, Geery!
Oh dang. Happy to be here. I mean, seriously happy. This is the first time I’ve talked to a human. You can’t believe how cool that is.

It's cool for me to talk to a nafarian too! So tell us earthlings (or Neoearthlings, rather) a little about everyday life on Nreim. What do you like most, and what do you like least?
Nreim? One word: boring. I mean, I try to make my life interesting, but everything I do seems to upset people. Take our clothing, for instance. Three choices. Honest. Three. They get updated every year, but still. Three. I could go on but it would put us both to sleep.

Life can be boring here too. And speaking of "here," you seem like an expert on pop culture on our planet. How did you learn so much?
Oh no way, I’m not the expert. That’s Mira. She’s crazy incredible. I try to slip her up but I swear it can’t be done. The learning part? In some ways it’s super easy. I mean, total motivation. Nothing is better than Earth media. The hard part is getting hold of the stuff. See, on Nreim, it’s kind of unheard of to try to stand out. It’s actually considered rude to compliment someone’s appearance. The only thing people care about is intellectual stuff. The more you can do with your brain the better. But, rock stars? Movie stars? No way. The closest we come to that is musical composers (never with lyrics) and authors (never fiction). Bo-ring!

So you can’t even imagine how exciting it was to discover the media from your world. Like THE BEST THING. EVER. At first our government tried to keep it all hidden. But there was no way. I mean, it’s so much a part of your world it was bound to leak out. And once it did, bam it was a sensation. And that’s where Mira comes in. She’s got this amazing ability to track down Earth media even when the government has tried to hide it. Nobody knows how she does it. But it’s amazing. And if you know Mira, you’re probably wondering why she doesn’t get in trouble for pulling up contraband media? Well, the government gave up on making it illegal. They just do their best to hide it and hope we kids won’t care enough to look for it. Yeah, right. =)

You can choose how your bedroom looks everyday, right? What does yours look like right now?
Right now? That’s kind of embarrassing. John Travolta is dancing in his white jumpsuit to Saturday Night Fever. He’s the most adorable dork ever I think.

How did you meet your best friend Mira?
I don’t remember. Probably in our mom’s baby carriers. We’ve lived across the hall from one another our entire lives. I bet we winked at each other or something.

When you first found out about Mira and Jesse, what was going through your head?
Oh, I can’t go there. Too painful.

What about now? Have your feelings about him changed?
I’m working on it.

Any guys on your planet that you’re interested in?
Guys? Seriously? About a hundred and none at the same time. Guys are kind of like pets. You know you’d love them if you had them, but you can’t even imagine it until you get one. And for me I’ve got a few years till that’s even possible. So I look at guys, but it’s all just trying to imagine what it’ll be like in the future. I know that sounds crazy to you humans. But that’s how it is.

You were a big part of Mira’s investigations on our planet, even though you never left Nreim. Are you looking forward to your next adventures with her?
Oh totally. I’ve never been so excited about anything in my whole life.

We're excited too!! Thanks, Geery! :)

Learn more about Suze Reese and ExtraNormal at suzereese.com,
and follow her on Goodreads, Twitter, and Facebook!

Find ExtraNormal on Goodreads and Amazon!

Review: ExtraNormal

ExtraNormal
by Suze Reese

Available as: paperback, Kindle edition
Pages: 370
Publisher: Valarian Press
Publication date: April 23, 2012
Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, aliens, romance



First in the ExtraNormal series. From Goodreads:

"Mira Johns is pretty much like any other teenage girl. Except that she knows how to harness electro-magnetic energy to communicate without words. And she's really, really far from home. Her assignment as an emissary to Earth sounds fairly simple: blend in, observe, and stay away from the planet’s primitive males. But after she finds one mysterious boy too irresistible for stupid rules, she realizes the real reason she's supposed to keep her distance: mates from her world can die if separated. But a series of serious accidents make it clear that someone wants to force her return. Mira decides her only hope is to uncover the truth to why she, the most mediocre of candidates, was actually chosen for this assignment—before the agency discovers her secret and sends her back home."

I was kindly provided a Kindle edition of this book for free by the author.

ExtraNormal is exactly my kind of YA. It's fast-paced, it's smartly written, it's got a love story that leaves you sighing, and (the icing on the literary cake) it's paranormal.

ExtraNormal sucks you in from the start, throwing you right in the middle of Mira's struggles to blend in with the human students at Los Robles High School. She knows the rules for her mission, but sticking to them proves to be a challenge. Luckily, her best friend Geery is only a stream (a sort of telepathic communication) away. Although Geery is back home on Nreim, she keeps Mira company from afar (slight SPOILER - highlight to read: and she turns out to be quite a great investigator when Mira finds herself deeply embroiled in a dangerous mystery).

I haven't read a lot of alien paranormal books, because I'm just not big on space or sci-fi. But Reese creates a really interesting version of aliens (who would prefer not to be called aliens, thank you). They look like us, sort of. But they don't like the way we smell. And their technology is advanced pretty far past ours. But Mira still finds a lot to enjoy about life on our planet. Her discovery that our food is way better than their food was one of my favorite recurring moments in the book.

Despite Mira's resolve to avoid interaction, especially with human guys, she keeps running into one guy in particular: Jesse Mecham. He's a bit of an outcast, due to a mysterious situation at school last year, but Mira sees past everyone else's apprehension and becomes friends with him. Good friends. And even though she tries to resist, she can't help falling in love with him. Which is a huge deal for a nafarian like Mira, because Jesse's a human, and human-nafarian matches are a big, life-threatening no-no.

This sets up a wonderfully conflicted paranormal love story. She can't love him, but she does, desperately, and he loves her as honestly and sweetly as any teenage boy possibly could. He can't know the truth about her, but he's asking questions, and Mira's having a hard time hiding things. And ultimately, by falling in love with him, Mira may have sabotaged her own future at home. She could never love and become linkmates with a fellow nafarian now, because she loves Jesse. And that is a serious problem. (SPOILER - highlight to read: Because she's already linked with Jesse, and when she goes home, aside from being ostracized due to her inability to ever find a linkmate there, being separated from Jesse could literally kill her. Is this a beautifully tragic love story or what?!)

The romance between Mira and Jesse is a big part of the book, and I loved every moment of it. They have an innocent, tender relationship that is based on pure love, not a superficial attraction based on physical acts. (To put it bluntly, their relationship doesn't revolve around sex.) Call me a prude, but I prefer to read about true love, with a true emotional connection between characters, and that's exactly what Mira and Jesse have. (SPOILER - highlight to read: The scene near the end, when Mira is able to stream with Jesse, left me nearly in tears. It was just so sweet and beautiful! I could picture them perfectly: heads together, smiling softly, looking into each other's eyes. Jesse knows her secret and he loves her just the same. I could never express the full extent of the warm fuzzies that scene gave me!) But another major part of the book is the mystery that starts building almost as soon as Mira arrives, which becomes more involved and more dangerous as each day passes.

I really don't want to give away anything that has to do with the plot, because it's so exciting to learn it piece by piece along with Mira. As she starts putting the clues together, she finds they involve those around her: the teachers, Dr. Alison and Dr. Tom; the nextdoor neighbor, Becca; the annoying guy at school, Everett, who always seems to be around when trouble arises. The plot builds and builds until it all comes to an exciting, dramatic end, and you're not sure until the very last moment if Mira's going to come away as a hero or a failure. Some things that are revealed were a little foreseeable (SPOILER - highlight to read: for example, I knew Everett was involved with the Stones somehow, and as clues were dropped I did guess that he was their son), but most caught me off guard, which I loved. (SPOILER - highlight to read: Like, I knew Jesse would have some key role in all this, but I wasn't sure what his hearing "noise" had to do with it, and I did not expect him to be part-nafarian. Caught me off guard with that one!) The conclusion leaves things wide open for the next books in the series; it could go pretty much any direction from here, which makes it all the more intriguing and makes me wish the next book was out NOW.

ExtraNormal is one of the best YA books I've read in a long while; it's got well-crafted relatable characters, an innocently passionate love story, a strong storyline that keeps you compulsively flipping pages, and an ending that leaves you dying for more. I'll definitely be snagging the next book in the ExtraNormal series as soon as it hits shelves and/or ereaders!


Overall rating: 4 out of 5 stars


Coming on April 25: My ExtraNormal Blog Tour post, including an interview with my favorite character from ExtraNormal! Hmm, who could it be...? :)

ExtraNormal Soft Release

ExtraNormal by Suze Reese is available for download from Amazon today as a soft release!

First in the ExtraNormal series. From Goodreads:

"Mira Johns is pretty much like any other teenage girl. Except that she knows how to harness electro-magnetic energy to communicate without words. And she's really, really far from home. Her assignment as an emissary to Earth sounds fairly simple: blend in, observe, and stay away from the planet’s primitive males. But after she finds one mysterious boy too irresistible for stupid rules, she realizes the real reason she's supposed to keep her distance: mates from her world can die if separated. But a series of serious accidents make it clear that someone wants to force her return. Mira decides her only hope is to uncover the truth to why she, the most mediocre of candidates, was actually chosen for this assignment—before the agency discovers her secret and sends her back home."

Available in paperback for full release on April 23, 2012!

Check out Suze Reese's blog for a sneak peek of ExtraNormal with an excerpt and an extended description!

ExtraNormal blog tour starts April 23! I'll be participating - I was able to snag an interview with one of the characters from ExtraNormal! Come back to visit the Book Nook on April 25 for my blog tour post! :)

Friday Freebies: February 3, 2012

Click on each title to go to the Amazon Kindle edition listing. Be sure to double-check the price before you download!


The Dresskeeper
by Mary Naylus

From Amazon: "When 13 year old Picky Robson slips into a flouncy old dress from the depths of an old chest and finds herself back in 17th century London, she has no idea she is plunging herself into a dangerous adventure. For in 1685 England, she is Amelia, not Picky. Plus, she is wealthy and beautiful, and even has servants. There's one minor problem, however. Someone is trying to kill Amelia, and by the blood stains she finds on the flouncy dress when she returns to the present, they succeeded."

Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, time travel


The Emerald Talisman
by Brenda Pandos

First in the Talisman series. From Amazon: "To be normal, sixteen-year-old Julia Parker would shed her empathic gift in a second. Life has been difficult since her mother's mysterious disappearance ten years earlier - an event she witnessed, but can't remember. Julia's situation becomes more complicated after a near death experience from a blood thirsty stalker. As high school students go missing it is clear there is a connection to her own experience--past and present. Someone has to stop the madness and a chance encounter with a creepy psychic foretells that only Julia is the key to stopping the madness, but it may require the life of the one she loves. "

Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, vampires


Exiled
by RaShelle Workman

First in the Immortal Essence series. From Amazon: "An alien princess exiled to Earth.
An arrogant boy.
One week to get back to her planet or she'll die.
Her only chance for survival? She must help the boy find his soul mate.
Piece of cake!"

Suggested tags: young adult, paranormal, aliens