[Review] Losing Hope

English Cover

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‚Losing Hope‘

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Colleen Hoover

Hopeless # 2

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Synopsis:
In Hopeless, Sky left no secret unearthed, no feeling unshared, and no memory forgotten, but Holder’s past remained a mystery.
Still haunted by the little girl he let walk away, Holder has spent his entire life searching for her in an attempt to finally rid himself of the crushing guilt he has felt for years. But he could not have anticipated that the moment they reconnect, even greater remorse would overwhelm him…
Sometimes in life, if we wish to move forward, we must first dig deep into our past and make amends. In Losing Hope, bestselling author Colleen Hoover reveals what was going on inside Holder’s head during all those hopeless moments—and whether he can gain the peace he desperately needs. (Source: Goodreads.com)

My thoughts about the book:
I admit that I didn’t wanted to read this book at first and only the spoiler scene of the ‘best non-kiss’ from Holder’s POV (here on Hoover’s website) has convinced me to try it nevertheless. Also at the beginning I was still sceptical because I thought it would become boring, because I already knew the plot and the secrets – but I lost this feeling more and more with every page I read. It was great how Hoover has begun this book and could present it really independent, even if much was already clear for the reader of ‘Hopeless’. Nevertheless it was entertaining, very rousing again so that I simply couldn’t put it aside anymore.

First I wasn’t convinced because the plot begins some time before the meeting with Sky, but later I recognised, how important this ‚prehistory’ is to understand a lot in the later action and to fully understand Holder’s behavior and his torn feelings. He has broken my heart during reading this book (just as Sky did in the first book) – even several times and I’ve suffered every page with him, like I hoped, cried and smiled alongside Holder. Together, I think, we’ve endured almost all emotions, which a book can offer and I was grateful for every single one of them. A very touching and emotional book!

I’ve fallen for Holder/Dean in the second book even more than in the first and also had to cry again at the end several times, but also for other reasons. It was great, beautiful and sad at the same time. Moreover I’ve liked that there were scenes, which weren’t written in Skys book, like the meetings with Brekin or the letters to Les. I don’t really know for whom I felt sorrier for or with whom I’ve suffered more – Sky or Holder … but yes, I suffered more with/ for Holder. *sigh*

Also the end was also really great and it was very nice that I could read on a little longer and get to know what happened afterward – like the thing with his mother and Sky, or the college … just a little forecast on their future lives together. I like such a thing very much and here I got it! *sigh*double sigh* 😀

With this book Colleen Hoover has written herself even further in my heart by her soulful, emotional kind of telling stories and now I will read every book of her that I get in my hands. I highly recommend it to all fans of part one and to the others –> please, please – get your copy of ‘Hopeless’!

Cover:
The Cover is perfectly suitable to the story and the first book, although I see Holder a little bit different. Nevertheless it is really nice made.

All in all:
Although I already know the plot, it has gripped me nevertheless and I couldn’t get enough of it. Holders POV is nearly even better than Sky’s and I’ve fell for Holder here even more than in the first book. I’ve no idea how Hoover made and she is my new idol – but it was stunning, beautiful and incredible. I’ve no more words for it! But just please, please, READ it!

Rating:
5 of 5 points – (I LOVED it – BUY it!)

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Quotes (© Colleen Hoover):

Holder: I casually lean against the mailbox and pretend to ignore the fact that she totally just checked me out. I’ll ignore it to save her embarrassment, but I’m definitely not going to forget it. In fact, I’ll probably be thinking about the way her eyes scrolled down my body for the rest of the damn day.
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Holder: It’s only been a few days, but since the moment I met her, no matter where I am, I’m constantly wondering about her. My attention is constantly homed in on her like I’m a compass and she’s my North.
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Holder: I can’t even explain to you how perfect this girl is. And when I say perfect, I mean imperfect, because there’s just so much wrong with her. But everything wrong with her is everything that draws me in and makes her perfect.     She’s flat-out rude to me and I love it. She’s stubborn and I love it. She’s a smartass and she’s sarcastic and every witty thing that comes out of her mouth is like music to my ears because that’s exactly what I want. She’s what I need and I don’t want her to change at all. There’s not a single thing about her I would change.
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Holder: A huge internal part of me was lost when I lost Hope, and I was convinced Les took the very last contents of my chest with her when she died last year. After being with Sky these last two days, I’m not so sure about that, anymore. I don’t think my chest has been empty this whole time like I thought. Whatever is left inside me has just been asleep, and she’s somehow slowly waking it up.    With every word she speaks and every glance she sends my way, she’s unknowingly pulling me out of this thirteen-year-long nightmare I’ve been trapped in, and I want to continue to allow her to pull me.
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I lift away from her cheek and look down at her.
Holder: „Thank you.“
She smiles. „For what?“ For being alive, I think to myself.
„For being you,“ I say out loud. Her smile fades and I swear she looks right through my eyes and straight into my soul. „I’m good at being me,“ she says. „Especially when I’m with you.“

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Thanks to netgalley.com for the reviewer’s copy!

© netgalley.com

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Succession:

#1: Colleen Hoover – Hopeless »»
#2: Colleen Hoover – Losing Hope (Holder’s POV) »»
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(© goodreads)

About the author – Colleen Hoover:
She is addicted to diet pepsi and could tell you in a taste-test which restaurant it came from.
She gets stoked whenever she gets a message from goodreads saying I have a new friend request.
If you want to know when she have new books out or just want to be inundated by random, pointless blog posts, follow her at www.colleenhoover.com.
(Source: Goodreads.com)

Visit her Website »».

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[Review] Hopeless

English Cover

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‚Hopeless‘

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Colleen Hoover

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Synopsis:
Sometimes discovering the truth can leave you more hopeless than believing the lies… That’s what seventeen-year-old Sky realizes after she meets Dean Holder. A guy with a reputation that rivals her own and an uncanny ability to invoke feelings in her she’s never had before. He terrifies her and captivates her all in the span of just one encounter, and something about the way he makes her feel sparks buried memories from a past that she wishes could just stay buried.
Sky struggles to keep him at a distance knowing he’s nothing but trouble, but Holder insists on learning everything about her. After finally caving to his unwavering pursuit, Sky soon finds that Holder isn’t at all who he’s been claiming to be. When the secrets he’s been keeping are finally revealed, every single facet of Sky’s life will change forever….. (Source: Goodreads.com)

My thoughts about the book:
I’ve read the book in buddy read, although I actually had no time for it. Do I regret now that I’ve inter-pushed the book? Oh God – no – no way! The book was just so great and I‘ve no words for how thrilled I’m about it. *sigh*

However, I would like to start at first with the things, which have disturbed me and which are the reason, why it ‘only’ got 4.5 points, instead of the full five points. It is due to the fact that on the one hand some things in it were very foreseeable and most of my forebodings has turned out almost exactly like I’ve imagined it (the thing with Dean Holder, Karen, her father, … ). But nevertheless I’ve read it with great pleasure and have loved every chapter.
Moreover the book has dealt with a subject that I never really like to read and I also didn’t like it to read here about that, but now I won’t say too much about it, because I don’t want to spoil something. But it was tough stuff and not easy to swallow. But therefore I thing, Hoover made a good job and have treated the subject sensitively and in a way, that it was still okay for me.

In general Hoover has a great way to describe feelings and emotions and to express them, so you can really understand how you feel, when everything is just and on the other side, when everything falls apart and shatters you, as if you would life through it by yourself. All that was really awesome and I like her writing style and dialogues – now she is my new idol! 🙂
Particularly her dialogues were just perfect and well suited – maybe sometimes too perfect and beautiful, but I can ignore that fact. *lol*

And now to the characters, who I BOTH LOVE, which is very rarely the case, because I often fall for the boys, but then I’ve problems with the girl. But here I’ve also loved Sky and I found it so refreshing and exciting, that she simply always has babbled off about what she really thinks – without whining along and thinking everything till to the end… she was authentic and after some little difficulties at the beginning, she was through the whole book very likeable.

Now to Dean/ Holder – I just love HOLDER *sigh*
Again a guy, who goes straight on my Book-Boyfriend-List … slowly, it gets really crowded there, but I’ve to put him there as well. Holder hast just everything: From the appearance, sportiness, character, charm, humor, assertiveness, directness, strength, sensitivity … I could still babble on about what he has and how great he is, but I don’t want to take away everything from you, but I advise you to read the book and discover him for yourselves. I love Holder, although sometimes he is just too perfect and also always does the perfect things or says the perfect words, but that’s okay for me – sigh, if there were really guys like him. *sigh²* 😉

Moreover, I found great that the drama was not really between the two main characters, but because of other things and that they have always held together and got through it as a couple, as a unit. They have each other mutual strength and could hold on each other! I found this great and their chemistry together was simply unbeatable!
I also found even the sex scenes suitable, although I didn’t have thought about them in these exact moments in which they sometimes happened, but then, it was just right and I could understand it. *great*

Though the end was a little slower and unspectacular to the rest of the book, I still liked the last chapter because it was sweet and for me – this was the PERFECT last sentence. *beautiful*

Cover:
Wonderful cover and for me, this is the perfect Sky.

All in all:
An amazing book which I’ll definitely read again sometime and I can recommend it to everybody, who likes Contemporary Romances. It’s not a YA book, but New Adult and therefore also a little more steamy – which I liked very much. A Must-Read for all fans of this genre and this was certainty not the last book of Colleen Hoover – I want more books by her! 🙂

Rating:
4,5 of 5 points – (soo awesome!)
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Thanks to netgalley.com for the reviewer’s copy!

© netgalley.com

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Quotes (© Colleen Hoover):

Karen: „Dammit,” she says, “I could have sworn I heard boys in here.”
Sky: “And you seem disappointed because…”
Karen: “You turn eighteen in a month. I’m running out of time to ground you for the first time ever. You need to start screwing up a little more, kid.“
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Breckin: “I’m new here. And if you haven’t deducted from my impeccable fashion sense, I think it’s safe to say that I’m…  Mormon.”
Six: “And here I was thinking you were about to say gay.”
Breckin: “That too.  In all seriousness, Sky. I noticed you in class today and it’s obvious you’re new here, too. And after seeing the stripper money fall out of your locker before fourth period, then witnessing your non-reaction to it, I knew we were meant to be. Also, I figured if we teamed up, we might prevent at least two unnecessary teenage suicides this year. So, what do you say? Want to be my very bestest friend ever in the whole wide world?
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Holder: „Let me inform you of something. The moment my lips touch yours, it will be your first kiss. Because if you’ve never felt anything when someone’s kissed you, then no one’s ever really kissed you. Not the way I plan on kissing you.“
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Holder: “I told myself to just stay away from you and let you be mad at me, because I do have so many issues that I’m not ready to share with you yet. And I tried so hard to stay away, but I can’t. I’m not strong enough to keep denying whatever this is we could have. And yesterday in the lunchroom when you were hugging Breckin and laughing with him? It felt so good to see you happy, Sky. But I wanted so bad to be the one who was making you laugh like that. It was tearing me up inside that you were thinking that I didn’t care about us, or that spending that weekend with you wasn’t the best weekend I’ve ever had in my life. Because I do care and it was the best. It was the best fucking weekend in the history of all weekends.”
My heart is beating wildly, almost as fast as the words are pouring out of him. He releases his firm hold on my face and strokes his hands over my hair, dropping them to the nape of my neck.
He keeps them there and calms himself with a deep breath, then continues. “It’s killing me, baby,” he says, his voice much more calm and quiet. “It’s killing me because I don’t want you to go another day without knowing how I feel about you. And I’m not ready to tell you I’m in love with you, because I’m not. Not yet. But whatever this is I’m feeling—it’s so much more than just like. It’s so much more. And for the past few weeks I’ve been trying to figure it out. I’ve been trying to figure out why there isn’t some other word to describe it. I want to tell you exactly how I feel but there isn’t a single goddamned word in the entire dictionary that can describe this point between liking you and loving you, but I need that word. I need it because I need you to hear me say it.”
He pulls my face to his and he kisses me. They’re short kisses, mostly pecks, but he kisses me over and over, pulling back between each kiss, waiting for me to respond.

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Succession:

#1: Colleen Hoover – Hopeless »»
#2: Colleen Hoover – Losing Hope (Holder’s POV) »»
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(© goodreads)

About the author – Colleen Hoover:
She is addicted to diet pepsi and could tell you in a taste-test which restaurant it came from.
She gets stoked whenever she gets a message from goodreads saying I have a new friend request.
If you want to know when she have new books out or just want to be inundated by random, pointless blog posts, follow her at www.colleenhoover.com.
(Source: Goodreads.com)

Visit her Website »».

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[Review] Dare you To

English Hardcover

English Paperback Cover

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‚Dare you To‘ by Katie McGarry

Pushing the Limits # 2

Synopsis:
If anyone knew the truth about Beth Risk’s home life, they’d send her mother to jail and seventeen-year-old Beth who knows where. So she protects her mom at all costs. Until the day her uncle swoops in and forces Beth to choose between her mom’s freedom and her own happiness. That’s how Beth finds herself living with an aunt who doesn’t want her and going to a school that doesn’t understand her. At all. Except for the one guy who shouldn’t get her, but does….
Ryan Stone is the town golden boy, a popular baseball star jock-with secrets he can’t tell anyone. Not even the friends he shares everything with, including the constant dares to do crazy things. The craziest? Asking out the Skater girl who couldn’t be less interested in him.
But what begins as a dare becomes an intense attraction neither Ryan nor Beth expected. Suddenly, the boy with the flawless image risks his dreams-and his life-for the girl he loves, and the girl who won’t let anyone get too close is daring herself to want it all…. (Source: Goodreads.com)

My thoughts about the book:
I was really surprised and sooo hooked by the first book of this series and accordingly of this, my expectations for that book were also really high. Particularly because now it was about Beth, who though seemed to me in the first book a little bit unfriendly, but has already shown in the first part briefly, that her life isn’t anything but perfect and hence, I could understand her behavior and also her defense.

As well as also here in the second part, in which I still got a lot bigger and more exact look at Beth and her life – particularly on her mother and her relation to her, and also on her flubbed childhood, which I even wouldn’t wish my worst enemy. Therefore I can understand as already said, Beth’s reticence and her actions, which would have led to shaking my head with any other character. Beth often runs away and wants to close her eyes before problems, but then her uncle Scott gets custody for her, she has to live with him and his wife and there she gets to know the sportsman and god-boy Ryan. And, yes, here we also have found our romantic, male protagonist of the book.

First I had my problems with Ryan because he apparently has everything what one can wish for and looked rather superficial. But luckily this has changed during the book and a part for it, was probably also due to the fact that he’s a baseball player, a sports with which I have no interest in it at all. Luckily this aspect became less and less. 😉
I find Ryan was quite okay and a nice character, and then also Beth was a better, but they weren’t as awesome as the couple Noah and Echo from the first book. Unfortunately here I’ve missed this ‘wow-effect’, for which I can’t really find a reason.

Other readers often don’t like it, that in a further book you still see how happy the couple from a previous book is, when they whisper sweet nothings and kisses and so on, but I found that nice and I liked it, that Echo and Noah also showed-up it this book briefly – very briefly – and that they are still happy. I find something like that always absolutely sweet and also okay, if it’s not too much as it was here.

What has disturbed me very much was the fact that there were many clichés in the book, especially Beth, who comes from bad house, and Ryan, from a putatively intact, good and rich family. Also the bet, the reason because he has spoken at first to Beth, was not for my taste. It was not original and too similar to ‘Perfect Chemistry#1’ by Simone Elkeles, even if it has turn into a differently course.

I’m really sorry, but for me the big enthusiasm was missing, because there happened much surprising or special things in it, anyhow it was just too poor. Although I found her uncle Scott very great and it was a pity that at the end, there wasn’t more with him, or more together with him and his wife – or also that there weren’t any more occurrences with her friend Lacy, which I found also very interesting and I liked her at first sight.

At next the third book is coming out in autumn/ winter 2013‚ which will be called ‘Crash into You’, which will host the story of Isaiah. At the moment I’m not so glad about it, because right now I don’t really care much about Isaiah, but I will read it nevertheless, because I would like to conclude the whole series.

Cover Hardcover:
I like this cover as much as the first book and again, here are people on it, which fit well to the descriptions in the book (that’s not always the case ^^)

All in all:
It was a good book and all in all, I also had my fun while reading it, but nevertheless, I’m a little disappointed, because this great wow-effect was missing, which I had with the first part.

Rating:
3,5 of 5 points – (I really liked it)
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Thanks to netgalley.com for the reviewer’s copy!

© netgalley.com

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Quotes:

Chris to Ryan: „You need a girlfriend.“
Lacy: „Exactly! I’ve been saying that for months. Not an evil girlfriend. We are not doing evil again. I was tired of wearing crucifixes. I considered carrying holy water, but then I would had to sneak into a church and then-“
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Ryan: „You’re a lot like that bird in the barn. You’re so scared that you’re going to be caged in forever you can’t see the way out. You smack yourself against the wall again and again and again. The door is open, Beth. Stop running in circles and walk out.“
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Beth: ‚That must be love: when everything else in the world could implode and you wouldn’t care as long as you had that one person standing beside you.‘

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Succession:

#1 Katie McGarry – Pushing the Limits »»
#2 Katie McGarry – Dared to You »»
#3 Katie McGarry – Crash into You

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(© goodreads)

About the author – Katie McGarry:
KATIE MCGARRY was a teenager during the age of grunge and boy bands and remembers those years as the best and worst of her life. She is a lover of music, happy endings, and reality television, and is a secret University of Kentucky basketball fan.

Katie would love to hear from her readers. Contact her via her website, katielmcgarry.com, follow her on Twitter @KatieMcGarry, or become a fan on Facebook and Goodreads.
(Source: goodreads.com)

Visit her Website »».

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[Review] The Sea of Tranquility

( ©Atria Books)

(© Antisocialite Press LLC)

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‚The Sea of Tranquility‘
by Katja Millay...

Synopsis:
Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her—her identity, her spirit, her will to live—pay.
Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at seventeen years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space.
Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding—or if he even wants to. (Source: Goodreads.com)

My thoughts about the book:
Holly crap-that, book brought me to heaven, then hell and back again.
But let us start slowly and from the beginning. The story was written in the present – what I like much in English books – and it switches the POV between the two central characters Nastya and Josh. I liked that and it has also fitted very well to the story and gave me the feeling that I’m in the heads of the characters and that I really could get to know them. Furthermore I also find Millay’s writing manner very suitable and pleasant, although she also let her characters curse out loudly if it fits – and it does. These are teenagers anyway and therefore it feels real and it’s great to read and it was fantastic. Oh, I repeat myself, but yes, it was really good 😉

This book is at the beginning very similar to the book ‘Speak’ by Anderson, but it was written much better – in my opinion. And the most amusing part was for me that Millay has made it possible that I’ve not noticed at all in the first chapters, that Nastya isn’t speaking; not a single word. But she communicates with the reader in a manner that this goes by completely unnoticed. Only when it was explicitly pointed out that she isn’t speaking, I’ve noted it and had to turn back and read parts of it once again to convince myself that she really has spoken no word so far. Really awesome and it shows the great writing manner of Millay. *brillant*

Now to the story: Both characters, Nastya and Josh, have massive problems with themselves and the world in general, which results from painful strokes of fate, which I wouldn’t even wish my biggest enemy. But both don‘t surrender, but fight further in their life and at some point and somehow these two ‘damaged’ characters meet each other. And both know that the other one is just as broken as they are. Cut a long story short– they become friends, become more familiar and it happens even more between them, what I don’t want to tell you right now. Only thus much – that the whole time I was with my heart with them and every page I worried so much about them. They both put me under their spell, especially Josh and now he is also my ‘book boyfriend’ of the month!

You can see now that not only the story could convince me and their way and their fights from their personal hells, no – also the characters themselves. Nastya wasn’t likeable to me immediately; I had to get to know her to get a better picture of her. However, also had my problems with it because she tells a lot and thinks about much, but she reveals only fragments of herself and together with Josh, I tried to solve her jigsaw puzzle and to discover her secret. And Josh – oh ♥ Josh ♥ – he is just amazing and I can’t catch it in words, how much I have suffered with him. Not only because of his past but also in between the story because of his problems with Nastya. Beside my darling Josh, I was also a fan of Clay and Drew. Drew is the sunny-boy of the story who makes everything a little lighter, and who you have to get to know a little better to look behind his narcissistic facade. And sometimes for me he was like a Golden Retriever – I just had to love him. 😉
And his parents, particularly the mother of Drew, are also absolutely great and here it has amused me to read also about other characters.

Now to the points which I haven’t liked so much and which are the reason, why I can’t rate the book with 5 points. The first reason is Nastya. Of course I could understand why Nastya doesn’t speak so long and it was okay for me, but after three quarters of the book, it was more and more illogical for me, why she is speaking with others, but not yet with her parents – or also why she didn’t tell Josh everything. I know, everybody processes traumas differently, longer or shorter. But personally I found Josh’s strokes of fate worse and emotional more difficult to endure, but still he has opened himself for her, has trusted her, but Nastya kept him in suspense, and there were times, where I just wanted to strangle her. Then I wanted to hug her and take her pain way and there were even parts, where I wanted both of it at the same time.
Beside my problems with Nastya’s behavior, I also have to admit that sometimes it dragged a little. Everything was described very long and precisely and the story developed very slowly. Which wouldn’t have disturbed me – because I like it when relationships grow slowly– BUT the romantic scenes were also totally short and were written only like ‘by the way’ alongside the story, without getting into details or taking some time for it, for what I’ve wished for after all the struggle.
Moreover to that I didn’t liked it that sometimes in the middle of a scene, in which they have discussed something important, the chapter just ended and the scene was over, and then it was a jump to the next chapter, several hours or days later – without going in more detail on what has happened exactly in the previous scene. Gosh, I think this was the point which has frustrated me the most! And this point is probably also responsible for the rating. 😉

Cover (Atria Books):
Extremely nice cover and I must admit that I wanted the book in the first place because of the beautiful cover. 🙂

All in all:
I have no words for all feelings which this book has triggered in me and I don’t know whether I should be pleased with the sad, depressive parts or saddened. But they have moved me all together, as well as everything else in this story broke my heart and joined together again.
After the end of the book I feel like after a long run in which were are strenuous and lighter phases and now I’m just exhausted, but in good way. It is even in such a way that I won’t read another book in the next two days … because I just can’t. I simply need a break to come to terms with it. Weird – that’s a first.

Rating:
4,5 of 5 points – (so awesome)

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Thanks to netgalley.com for the reviewer’s copy!

© netgalley.com

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Quotes:

Nastya: ‚People like to say love is unconditional, but it’s not, and even if it was unconditional, it’s still never free. There’s always an expectation attached. They always want something in return. Like they want you to be happy or whatever and that makes you automatically responsible for their happiness because they won’t be happy unless you are … I just don’t want that responsibility.‘

Josh: ‚First you count it in minutes, then in hours. You count in days, then in weeks, then months. Then one day you realize that you aren’t counting anymore, and you don’t even know when you’ve stopped. That’s the moment they’re gone.‘

Josh: „I wished my mother was here tonight, which is stupid, because it’s an impossible wish.“ He shrugs and turns to me, drowning the smile that cracks me every time.
“It’s not stupid to want to see her again.”
“It wasn’t so much that I wanted to see her again,” he says, looking at me with the depth of more than seventeen years in his eyes. “I wanted her to see you.”
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About the author – Katja Millay:
She grew up in Florida where she spent her time hiding from the sun. Then she moved to NYC where she attended film school at NYU and spent her time hiding from the rats. She was a high school film production/screenwriting teacher in a former life and now she sits at her kitchen table writing stories and ignoring the frightening mountain of laundry threatening to overtake her home. The Sea of Tranquility is her first novel. (Source: goodreads.com)

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[Review] Pushing the Limits

English HardCover

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‚Pushing the Limits‘
by Katie McGarry

Pushing the Limits # 1

Synopsis:
So wrong for each other…AND YET SO RIGHT. No one knows what happened the night Echo Emerson went from popular girl with jock boyfriend to gossiped-about outsider with „freaky“ scars on her arms. Even Echo can’t remember the whole truth.
But when Noah Hutchins, the smoking-hot, girl-using loner in the black leather jacket, explodes into her life with his surprising understanding, Echo’s world shifts in ways she could never have imagined. They should have nothing in common.
Yet the crazy attraction between them refuses to go away. And Echo has to ask herself just how far they can PUSH THE LIMITS and what she’ll risk for the one guy who might teach her HOW TO LOVE AGAIN. (Source: Goodreads.com)

My thoughts about the book:
Though I’ve already heard from others that this book should be good, I still started this book with care, because I often have a different opinion – particularly with YA books. And see there, my concerns were absolutely unnecessary, because I loved it! *sigh* It was really a nice, heart-touching YA love story, which though got also a few critic points from me, but only at vanities, which don’t really count.

In ‘Pushing the Limits’ there are two troubled-teenagers, who meet each other, when they have to go to the same psychological school counsellor. The fate or Miss Collins, the school counsellor, wants, that Echo helps her school-colleague Noah in his studies and to tutor him. At first everything starts with lot of arguments between these two, later happens a revelation, up to the time, when they both agree to work together to get Collins files about themselves. Because both believe, that they need their file to get some information to set their life right again.
I don’t want to spoil here anything, but I’ve felt so sorry for both of them and I’ve to confess, that I’ve also spend a lot of tears – particularly at the end. But not because it was so sad, but because I was so happy and relieved that they could free themselves from their stroke of fate, and that has deeply moved me.

The story is written in the past in the first person and the POV switches between the main characters Echo and Noah. Therefore I‘ve took them both quickly to my heart and also although Noah is the official bad-boy of this High School, he was for me never a real asshole or somebody, who strongly had to change to be the guy, he’s later at the end of the book. For me he was always the frank, charming type, only that he didn’t wanted to let the others see this side of him and almost all his ‚bad‘ actions were only based on good intentions.

Echo is also a character who is seen differently by the other people in the book, than she really is. Only if you know the truth about her and about her past than you can also understand her behavior, her grief and anger.
And together the both are unbeatable and you already see, I can’t stop slobber anymore. So, yes, I’ve really liked their interaction and the both as a couple, were just amazing. 😉

Maybe some things in the plot were foreseeable, but anyway here the resolution of their past and above all also their feelings, which originate of it, were the more important things in the book. Also the writing style of the author was customized for the story and has worked out the emotions even more!

Unfortunately, for me regard the thing with the love scenes it was a little too ‘juvenile’. What would have no problem if it were a normal YA book, but the rest of it appeared for me more grown-up than usual, and therefore I found it too bad, that it didn’t happened ‚more‘ between Echo and Noah. You know what I mean? 😉
The second little critic point is that at the end it was over too fast and I’m in general no fan of so short epilogues, which only fast summarize up what happened during the last two months, since the last chapter has ended. And the book simply stops, when I still don’t have enough of the characters and the story still long and I simply like to join their lives a little longer.

Cover:
I find the picture very matching and also beautiful. I like particularly Echo’s red hair and the intimate approach of two characters. *sigh*

All in all:
I felt that this book is a great mixture of the books ‘Perfect Chemistry’ and ‘Beautiful Disaster’. So if you have liked one of these two books, than you will definitely also love this one. *promise*

Rating:
5 of 5 points – (I LOVED it – buy it!)
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Thanks to netgalley.com for the reviewer’s copy!

© netgalley.com

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Quotes:

‚Noah shrugged off his black leather jacked und tossed it around my shoulder. „How are you going to tutor me if you get fucking pneumonia?“
I cocked an eyebrow. What an odd combination of romantic gesture and horribly crude wording.‘

‚Echo: „You don’t know anything“
Noah: „I know crazy when I see it.“ The moment the words flew out of my mouth I regretted them. Sometimes when you see the line, you think it’s a good idea to cross it – until you do.‘

Echo: „I love you enough to never make you choose.“

Noah: „If you’re scared, tell me. If you need to cry and scream, then do it. And you sure as hell don’t walk away from us because you think it would be better for me. Here’s the reality, Echo: I want to be by your side. If you want to go to the mall stark naked so you can show the world your scars, then let me hold your hand. If you want to see your mom, then tell me that too. I may not always understand, but damn, baby, I’ll try.“

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Succession:

#1 Katie McGarry – Pushing the Limits »»
#2 Katie McGarry – Dare to You »»
#3 Katie McGarry – Crash into You

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(© goodreads)

About the author – Katie McGarry:
KATIE MCGARRY was a teenager during the age of grunge and boy bands and remembers those years as the best and worst of her life. She is a lover of music, happy endings, and reality television, and is a secret University of Kentucky basketball fan.
Katie would love to hear from her readers. Contact her via her website, katielmcgarry.com, follow her on Twitter @KatieMcGarry, or become a fan on Facebook and Goodreads.
(Source: goodreads.com)

Visit her Website »».

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copyright: Harlequin Books

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Review: One Moment

English Cover

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‚One Moment‘
by
Kristina McBride

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Synopsis:
„This was supposed to be the best summer of Maggie’s life. Now it’s the one she’d do anything to forget.“
Maggie remembers hanging out at the gorge with her closest friends after a blowout party. She remembers climbing the trail with her perfect boyfriend, Joey. She remembers that last kiss, soft, lingering, and meant to reassure her. So why can’t she remember what happened in the moment before they were supposed to dive? Why was she left cowering at the top of the cliff, while Joey floated in the water below-dead?
As Maggie’s memories return in snatches, nothing seems to make sense. Why was Joey acting so strangely at the party? Where did he go after taking her home? And if Joey was keeping these secrets, what else was he hiding?  (Source: Goodreads.com)

My thoughts about the book:
Sometimes the insignificant books surprise you more than the books for which you’ve waited for months and you’ve started to read cheerfully. This book here I’ve found by chance on netgalley and I started to read it only because I wanted to read a not addicted-making book and I thought this book won’t carry me away so much or occupy me. There I’ve been so completely wrong! Because the book didn’t let me go anymore and now that I’ve finished it already a few days ago, I still think or sympathize about it.

Right at the beginning of the story happens the tragedy, which is also described in the synopsis, and where Maggie’s boyfriend Joey dies in an unnecessary accident. Nevertheless the police intervene and some inconsistencies are being thrown up in connection with Joey’s death and bring some secrets to light, which some would have rather liked to be buried with him.

But who thinks now, this book is about a thriller or a crime novel, than that is wrong, because in the focus stands unmistakably the grief processing and above all the emotional life of the main protagonist Maggie, from whose view the events are told, full of flashbacks from her time together with Joey.
In so doing the author has made it possible that the readers could also get to know Joey, although the reader knows the whole time that Joey is already death. Although I also know that all along I nevertheless felt with Maggie as she remembered her first date with him, their first kiss and everything and I could only cry all the time, because it’s so sweet and sad at the same time – and I have also grouted some tears during this book!

Beside Maggie, it also tells much about the other characters and friends of Joey and how they deal with his sudden death. The narrow clique existed of 3 girls and 3 boys in whom now an important part is missing and instead that Joey’s death bond them together even more, they and also their friendship threatens to break.
I could also like most of these other central figures, but right from the beginning I had problems with Shannon and I also didn’t get along with Tanna from the start but it got better during the book. In return Adam was at the same time my chosen hero and favorite and he could convince me more and more during the plot, although he has also twisted himself in the story and has turned in different directions.

The end remains, let us say‚ half-open‘. I liked that, because I could play a little with my own imagination, but at the same time not too much and without an end. I’m very glad how the story has developed throughout the book and I could feel and hope with the protagonists, also despair, though. Hence, the end after all this strain was that what I’ve wished for and I’m really happy about it. 🙂

Cover:
The cover was what got my attention first. So for me the cover shows very felicitous the feelings in the book, the melancholy and naivety, and it also gets the reader into the right mood for the story.

All in all:
A heartbreaking book, which has gripped and hasn’t let me go anymore up to the last pages. The author has made it greatly to bring the emotional life of Maggie by her words on paper and let them share with the reader. I wasn’t caught for a long time into such an emotionally story. *great*

Rating:
3,5 of 5 points – (I really liked it)
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Thanks to netgalley.com for the reviewer’s copy!

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Quotes:

„Running.
We were running.
Almost there.
But the thunder of my feet crashed through something in my consciousness.
And I knew.
It was like I hit an invisible wall.
One that did not exist for Joey.
I had been so close to flying.
Then, suddenly—I stopped.“

Maggie: „What if it’s as simple as one moment? One tiny thing, like that kiss on the rocks? What if I’d kissed him a little longer? Would he be alive right now? Or what if I’d stayed with him Friday night, what if I’d been with him… wherever he was?“.

Maggie: Above, leaves fluttered in the moonlight, and I wondered if their whispers were meant for me, if they were imprinted with a code that I needed to decipher. Some kind of important message that would help me get this right.

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(© goodreads)

About the author – Kristina McBride:

Kristina McBride, a former English teacher and yearbook advisor, dreamed of being a published author since she was a child and lived across the street from a library. Kristina has published two novels for young adults – The Tension of Opposites (May 2010) and One Moment (June 2012). She lives in Ohio with her husband and two young children.
(Source: goodreads.com)

Visit her Website »».

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