Book Tour: Secrets: Diary of a Gutsy Teen

Secrets: Diary of a Gutsy Teen by Barbara Becker Holstein
Age Group: Young Adult
Genre: Contemporary Fiction
Release Date: February 10, 2015
Buy Links:

Amazon ♥ B & N

Book Description:

Following in the footsteps of The Truth, Secrets: Diary of a Gutsy Teen begins as the thirteen-year-old protagonist makes a move with her family to a new town. She has grown up a lot over the past year—and has made a list of everything that’s important to her now that she doesn’t want to forget when she gets older. 

But now, as she enters her early teen years, she begins to write down the secrets she wants to keep—and the ones she has no one to tell about. 

From new school experiences to a new baby in the family to a new crush, this new teen finally feels empowered on making her own decisions with confidence and keeping those secrets she holds dearest for herself.

In a positive and supportive diary-entry format, Dr. Barbara Becker Holstein encourages tween and early teen girls to carry the most precious parts of themselves into adulthood. A great book for mothers and daughters to read together, Secrets is aimed to improve communication, understanding, and self-esteem for young girls as they enter the rocky road of teenager-dom.

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Excerpt:

Date: December 2

Dear Diary,

I have a secret and it’s been eating me up inside, so I have to tell you. I lied to Angela. I told her I had a terrible sore throat and couldn’t come for the weekend. She said she was sorry and that she would invite me again.

I felt terrible, and then my throat really began to hurt. But I just couldn’t go to Springport for a whole weekend_even though I miss being around Angela.

Now that I have best friends here, I don’t feel the same way I used to about going back to visit. And I didn’t know how to tell Angela that. I could tell when we talked on the phone that she really wanted me to come. And she sent me a new selfie, holding a sign that reads I Miss You! She even told me that she doesn’t have a new best friend since I left. She really misses me. She also told me that Paul is in lots of her classes and he asks if she’s talked to me. How could I tell her I’m in love with Rob and don’t care about Paul anymore? How could I tell her that I have new best friends and want to stay here with them?

Review: Myopia (Wisteria #2)

Myopia (Wisteria #2) by Bisi Leyton
Age Group: Young Adult
Genre: Dystopia, Fantasy
Release Date: November 9, 2012
Buy Links:

Amazon

Book Description:

Sixteen-year-old Wisteria has embraced her deep bond with eighteen-year-old Bach, a member of a supernatural race called the Family, despite the risk of his family finding out. Should Bach’s people discover his bond with a human, Wisteria will be guaranteed a painful and bloody death—but somehow, being together is more important.

When Bach's father, the powerful Sen of The Third Pillar, hears rumors that his son has been willingly communing with free humans, the Sen decrees that Bach is to name a girl from the Family as his intended and pledge his life to her—something Bach as no intention of doing.

Their bond is tested when empirics, an elite group of Family investigators, are sent to the Isle of Smythe under the orders of Bach’s father to find artifacts stolen by the humans. They’re to find the artifacts at any cost. Among the empirics is Bach’s old friend, the stunning Alba, who has learned about Bach and Wisteria’s secret relationship, and surprisingly accepts this. With no one else in the Family to turn to, she becomes Bach’s ally and confidant, but possibly more.

As the empirics start to take over the town, Wisteria is torn between trusting Bach and the safety of the humans on Smythe. She soon realizes that she and Bach are on opposite sides of the war between the Family and Humans, and there is no middle ground. One of them must choose a side.

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I sat on this review for a day because I had conflicting feelings about it, but here I am 24-hours later and I still am not one hundred percent sure how I feel. Myopia by Bisi Leyton is the second novel in the Wisteria series. It follows what happens to Wisteria, Bach and the rest of the Isle of Smyth since the last book.

Now here’s my issue. I really do love this series; I think it’s unique, well written, imaginative and fast paced so I don’t get bored when I’m reading it. But I absolutely hate the way everyone in the book treats Wisteria aside from Coles and Bach. They have so much hate in them for her even after everything she’s done to keep them safe.

Review: SIC

SIC by Scott Kelly
Age Group: Young Adult
Genre: Thriller, Mystery
Release Date: August 17, 2012
Buy Links:

Amazon

Book Description:

One rule: If another player taps you on the shoulder, you have to completely change your life within the next fifteen minutes. In front of everyone. Your car, your virginity, your grades, your identity – nothing is safe.

When five high school students from the wrong part of town devote their lives to playing the game David invented, they walk a line between insanity and enlightenment.

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It isn’t often that I read something and it leaves me speechless, actually that’s pretty rare. But I think it’s safe to say that [sic] by Scott Kelly blew me away. I’ll admit this isn’t my typical genre of books, I tend to stay in the paranormal romance area, but I am incredibly glad I decided to venture out into new territory.

It was the book blurb that initially drew me in and the story that unfolded in the following 208 pages was intense and original. I can honestly say I’ve never read a story like this before and the sheer concept of it fascinated and captured me. I could not put this book down. Jacob is compelling as he retells the story of David Bloom, Eureka, and the six.

While playing Eureka, six dysfunctional teens use the game to change their lives while psychoanalyzing every decision that people make and what makes a person who they are, circumstance or something else entirely. I like Jacob. I can’t help it, there is just something about the character that makes me want to reach out and be his friend.

Review: The Swan Prince

The Swan Prince by C. Margery Kempe
Age Group: Adult
Genre: Contemporary Romance, Erotica
Release Date: August 14, 2012
Buy Links:



Book Description:

Magic happens when love is true

Lena thought she'd found a prince when Charles rescued her four-year-old half-brother from the waters of the Serpentine. A simple boating accident sparks romance, but the man of her dreams seems to be hiding something. They're both unemployed — times are hard — but there's something else he's not telling her.

One night, Lena sneaks back into Hyde Park to find out if Charles is secretly camping in the park and gets the surprise of her life!

How far is Lena willing to go to rescue the man she's fallen for?

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I was pleasantly surprised to see that The Swan Prince was a lot better than I originally thought it would be. I originally decided to read this story because I was obsessed with the movie The Swan Princess when I was a little girl and spent a ridiculously long time attempting to get myself to turn into a bird by leaping in random ponds and lakes…Don’t ask.

It was a phase my parents did not appreciate, just like my mermaid phase and the salt in the bath water, anyway, enough about my weird childhood behavior. In The Swan Prince Lena takes her 4-year-old half brother for a boat ride on the Serpentine Lake and mystery man Charles saves him when he falls off the boat and into the water.

Review: Oxford Whispers

Oxford Whispers by Marion Croslydon
Release Date: October 8, 2012 (Paperback)
Age Group: Adult
Genre:  Paranormal Romance
Buy Link:

Buy @ Amazon

Book Description: 

Madison LeBon is dead set against the dead. She has vowed to ignore her Voodoo-stamped heritage and the psychic gift passed down through her Louisiana family. The world of the living is where she wants to belong.

But her resolution shatters when the ill-fated lovers in a painting—the subject of her first history class at Oxford—begin to haunt her. The lovers warn her against their own nemesis, a Puritan from the English Civil War.

In misty present-day Oxford, Madison embarks on a quest to unravel the secrets of the past and understand her personal bond with the painting. To protect herself, she must learn to accept her gift before life imitates art, in all its tragedy.

College becomes more complicated when she falls hard for Rupert Vance, a troubled aristocrat and descendant of one of the characters in the painting. With the spirit of a murderer in hot pursuit, Madison comes to realize that her own first love may be doomed…

Based on a real Pre-Raphaelite painting, Oxford Whispers is full of romance, drama and suspense.
Fall in love for the first time… Again

Two star-crossed lovers in the English Civil War A painting with haunting powers A murderous ghost back for revenge

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I’m team Rupert all the way!

Yes, yes I know there aren’t really teams in this story, but Jackson does have a thing for Madison so technically you can route for him or Rupert I chose Rupert because of the redemption factor, but I’ll get back to that.

Oxford Whispers by Marion Croslydon is about a young woman named Madison who goes to Oxford to complete her education and winds up getting caught up in a mystery involving an old painting that she learned about in class. One thing you need to know about Madison is that she’s not like everyone else. She has a gift. Her family comes from a long line of voodoo practitioners and not only can she communicate with ghosts, but she has the power of telekinesis.

Blog Tour: Oxford Whispers - Guest Post: Marion Croslydon

Today we are pleased to welcome author Marion Croslydon to Pink Fluffy Hearts where she'll discuss how to create believable connections between two characters and dissect the relationship between Madison LeBon and Rupert Vance in her novel Oxford Whispers.

How to create a believable connection between main characters: 

Dissecting Madison LeBon and Rupert Vance's love

Hello Corina, Val, and Andi! Thank you so much for having me at Pink Fluffy Hearts. You have a lovely-designed blog, and I really enjoy following your reviews and posts. Keep on all the hard work, but don’t break up with Netflix!

After writing two novels (Oxford Whispers and its sequel, Oxford Shadows, out in May 2013), I’ve come to realize that the most difficult element to master in writing is characterization. If an aspiring author works very hard at her craft, the mechanics of novel writing, or plot building, I believe she might be able to produce a story, with a beginning, a middle, and an end. It might make perfect sense. However a novel is a different animal, and, at its heart, are the characters, their dreams, their fears, their passions, their shortcomings, and secret sins.

More than characters, a novel breathes through the relationships these people have with each other: Family, friends, arch-enemies… lovers. When I tell people I’m a romance writer, I sometimes get a patronizing look. Romance is considered like the lowest common denominator. How difficult can it be? Well, it’s actually the most challenging part of writing. Whether it’s a Harlequin, or a high-brow literary fiction, I don’t know a book without romance. The love story will make or break the novel, whether it takes center stage or it seems like a secondary storyline. If you screw it up, you’re done. Readers have to believe. They have to identify themselves, they have to care, they have to love.

Review: Wisteria

Goddess Fish Blog Tour:

Wisteria by Bisi Leyton
Age Group: Young Adult
Genre: Paranormal Romance, Horror
Release Date: August 15, 2012
Buy Links:

@ Amazon

Book Description:

Sixteen year old Wisteria Kuti has two options—track the infected around the Isle of Smythe or leave the only known safe haven and face a world infested with flesh eating biters. But even with well-armed trackers, things go wrong and Wisteria ends up alone facing certain death, until she is rescued by the mysterious Bach. Uninfected, Bach is able to survive among the hordes of living dead.

Eighteen year old Bach, from a race known as The Family, has no interest in human affairs. He was sent here to complete his Great Walk and return home as a man—as a Sen Son. The Family regard humans as Dirt People, but Bach is drawn to this Terran girl, whom he has never seen before, but somehow knows.

Hunted by flesh eaters, cannibals, and the mysterious blood thirsty group called Red Phoenix, Wisteria and Bach make their way back to the Isle of Smythe, a community built on secrets and lies.

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Like most books, I was drawn to Wisteria, because of the cover. There was something hauntingly beautiful about it that drew me in and created this picture in my head of a world at war type atmosphere. The color of her bright red dress against the background also caught my eye. Combine that with the summary and the mention of zombies, despite my irrational fear of them, and I’m hooked.

Sixteen year old Wisteria lives on the Isle of Smythe with her Mother and brother and it seems from the very beginning that she’s sort of an outcast from the rest of the teenagers on the Isle. She works with her Mother as a tracker, a group of Isle citizens who track and store data about the biters in Norton and other places on the mainland.