How Barbie Met Ken
by Chelsie Nikol
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Reviewed for +Readers' Favorite
Barbie has it all, good looks, popularity, the rich and handsome boyfriend, she's cheerleading captain and a beauty pageant winner. So then why is she so unhappy? Maybe it's because the handsome boyfriend is actually an alcoholic who is also taking steroids, and has a tendency to be a bit violent with her. Or maybe it's because she wants something more out of life than the plastic dreams being told to her. Kenji is the loner of the school, his father passed away and he is into photography. Everyone calls him a tattletale, and he doesn't care. He just wants to survive long enough to get out of high school and be on his own. He is dealing with more adult stuff than anyone in high school. How Barbie Met Ken pairs these two people from opposite ends of the social spectrum in high school together for a class project, and how it ends up effecting them each. Chelsie Nikol does a wonderful job of creating characters we can visualize by using these familiar names, and adding in modern pressures and trials.
How Barbie Met Ken is a wonderful young adult and teen book, set in the senior year of high school, that talks about popularity, boyfriends, cheating, drugs and alcohol, college and careers, family and friends and so much more. It goes into all aspects of everyday life, but it does so with two characters that we can easily see in our minds, Barbie and Ken. Chelsie Nikol brings these two iconic names into the modern world and then turns it upside down as they become real people with real issues and problems to deal with. This is an excellent book for that high school age reader.
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Haven Lost
The Dragon's Brood Cycle, Book One
by Josh de Lioncourt
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
Reviewed for +Readers' Favorite
Emily is a high school hockey star in Minneapolis, with an extremely dysfunctional family life. For the most she is a typical teenager, except for her strange ability to know when and where another player on the ice is going to move. One day it all changes when she starts seeing the reflection of a boy in mirrors and windows, and when she gets home finds her mother dead of a drug overdose. She runs away and when she awakes she is in another land, another time, another world? Haven Lost is the tale of Emily's discover of what is important to her and her life in this strange place. She makes friends, decides without any prior knowledge of people who is good and who is evil and sets out on a quest she doesn't understand. Along the way she picks up a best friend in Celine, a ward in Michael and someone who just might become more than a friend in the future, Corbbmacc. Together they travel the land, looking for the answers that they need to understand what is going on. Josh de Lioncourt has done a wonderful job of mixing history, fantasy, and magic together into a tale that is compelling and exciting.
Haven Lost is set to be the first book in a series titled The Dragon's Brood Cycle. This first book sets the story up very well, you have a grand adventure, and it is not a short adventure either. It takes time to tell, yet the story never seems to get bogged down or drag, it is always moving along and begging you to turn the next page and keep going. The answers always seem to be on the next page. Josh de Lioncourt is a wonderful storyteller in that he is able to keep your attention and have you guessing the entire book. I never saw the reveal from the last three pages coming until I got to them, and that is not usually the case with mos books. This book and series has the potential to sky-rocket into the forefront of youth and teen reading, becoming the next Harry Potter series.
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Before I Wake
by Tamera Lawrence
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Reviewed for +Readers' Favorite
When Christine wakes in outside her car in the parking lot, she has no idea what she is doing there or why. Her body hurts and she can't remember anything. Slowly small memories come back to her, but it turns out they aren't recent memories. Before I Wake is a romance suspense story of a woman who loses five years of her memory. Why she would want to forget the last five years becomes evident as the story goes along, and we are introduced to the players in her life. There is the original boyfriend from that time, who is the father of her daughter, the current husband, who is having an affair, and assorted friends. Tamera Lawrence does an admirable job of mixing romance and suspense. Why is she bruised and battered? Was it the old boyfriend or the current husband? Which story to believe? Who to trust? And can she figure it out before it is too late?
Before I Wake is what I would call a Romantic Suspense Novel. There is a basic romance in the story but there is an added element of suspense. In this story Christine has lost her memory of the last five years, she thinks she is still engaged to her old boyfriend and pregnant with his child. Author Tamera Lawrence is able to blend the two into a compelling story that keeps your attention from start to finish. There are times when you want to yell at the old boyfriend for his behavior, other times when you want to yell at the current husband for his behavior. Neither are perfect, they sound like real, true life men, but at the same time, you want to keep reading to find out what happens and will Christine figure it out in time.
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Guardian
by A.L. Crouch
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Reviewed for +Readers' Favorite .
As a child Alex was in the car when her parents were killed, saved only by a voice and vision that only she could see. She ran from her small town home and the memory of that vision, but fate has brought her back home now, at age twenty-five. Her original goal was to get in and out of town as fast as she could, but once there, and in her old home, the vision from the past returns. Memories of the murder also return, and to keep herself alive, Alex must learn to have faith and trust in something that she cannot see. Guardian is a warming tale of the idea that there can be someone out there watching over us, loving us and keeping us safe, even if we can't see or hear them. A.L. Crouch does a wonderful job mixing faith and paranormal together to come to this unique blend in this story of seeing a vision that is not really there yet is.
Guardian is unlike any other story about a guardian angel that I have ever read. It is not that there is a heaven that sends those to watch over you, but is something entirely different, and it takes just the faith to believe in the unseen to see them. A.L. Crouch has written a story that gives you adventure, romance, suspense, mystery and intrigue along with faith and the paranormal, all wrapped into one amazing tale. It is something to read, and one that you will be hard pressed o put down before you finish it.
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Dream Killing
by Magus Tor
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Drew is an ex-CIA agent, who finds himself in a complex killing game each night in his sleep. Starting the night he first uses the new alarm clock he won in a raffle at the local coffee shop.
Max is a kindergarten teacher who has been in the game for awhile and wants nothing more than to get out. She and Drew are introduced in the real world by a mutual friend, T who is also playing the game.
As the three try to work together to stay alive and get out, T turns up dead. Drew and Max think there is something more to his death, and start looking into it. As they delve deeper, Drew renews his CIA connections and brings Max along, and together they make an excellent team.
There is mild romance between Drew and Max, but its nothing much. Mostly the book is focused on the killing game, the complex technology that it would take to produce such a game and to run the game, and who would want to do such a thing. There are twists and turns at every chapter.
It is well written and easy to read. Great for all readers.
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