The Murmurings by Carly Anne West

Everyone thinks Sophie’s sister, Nell, went crazy. After all, she heard strange voices that drove her to commit suicide. But Sophie doesn’t believe that Nell would take her own life, and she’s convinced that Nell’s doctor knows more than he’s letting on.

As Sophie starts to piece together Nell’s last days, every lead ends in a web of lies. And the deeper Sophie digs, the more danger she’s in—because now she’s hearing the same haunting whispers. Sophie’s starting to think she’s going crazy too. Or worse, that maybe she’s not….

Oh goodness. That cover is looking into my soul.

Now of course, with that cover and that description, you'd expected to go sit in a corner in a fetal position crying because the Takers are coming to get you. You aren't really right.

I mean...... I liked it. But I didn't. What I liked was that Carly Anne West took what we thought of schizophrenia and slapped us in the face with something entirely different. Kudos to you *clap clap clappity clap*. And the book did have parts that made my grab my favorite blankie to protect me (but then again, Don't Look Under the Bed , the Disney movie, also did that to me (but then again again, I was like 6)).

What I didn't like was the romance. The romance involving the main character was sooooo unnecessary. I felt like it didn't belong in the book.

All in all, it was pretty cool. I'd still recommend that people read this. 

Across the Universe by Beth Revis

A love out of time. A spaceship built of secrets and murder. 

Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awaken on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into the brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.

Amy quickly realizes that her awakening was no mere computer malfunction. Someone - one of the few thousand inhabitants of the spaceship - tried to kill her. And if Amy doesn't do something soon, her parents will be next.

Now Amy must race to unlock Godspeed's hidden secrets. But out of her list of murder suspects, there's only one who matters: Elder, the future leader of the ship and the love she could never have seen coming.

Okay let's start with the cover. This is maybe one of the most beautiful book covers like, ever. But it;s seriously misleading. The reason I held off on reading this so long is because the cover made me think it was a sappy sci-fi/romance novel, but it hardly is any romance (thank God). The story was more centered around politics and secrets and things like that.

Now. This book was ultra spectacularly AMAZEBALLS. Beth Revis did a great job with the characters. My favorite was definitely Harley. He felt so real to me. I could feel the sadness and longing that he felt for the outside world. Also I could feel the pain Amy felt at losing everything she loved. 

But OHEMGEE THOSE PLOT TWISTS. Beth Revis let you think you knew exactly what's going on just to turn around and smack with some bomb-tacular plot twist. Had me curled up in a ball crying.

I'd recommend this to anyone who likes young adult sci-fi. (P.S. If you were hoping for a bunch of romance, don't read this. Not too much romance in it.) 

Cinder (The Lunar Chronicles #1) by Marissa Meyer

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.

So I've recently gotten into the whole fairytale-spinoff thing. It's pretty cool.

Now you, like many (including myself), probably looked at that description and said "That book looks like it's meant as a bedtime story for 6 year old girls (or 45 year old men. Hey, I don't judge). You my friend, are very wrong.

OH MY SWEET JESUS THIS WAS GREAT. I heard about it from this youtube book vlogger (katytastic) and read it. I really thought it was gonna suck. I really did. It had a bunch of plot twists and cliffhangers. And the romance wasn't that classic cheesy YA novel romance where girl and boy fall in love and they fight off the bad guys before riding into the sunset. It was a tad bit more reasonable.

One of the things I didn't like about this was something I don't like about a lot of YA novels. I hate, and I mean HATE, when authors substitute curse words for something ridiculous ("oh stars" instead of "oh sh**") but have no problem with violence. It's utterly irritating.

But I will be reading the second book.... eventually and doing a review on it. Unfortunately the third one isn't coming out until 2014 and the fifth is expected in 2015. This will be a long and treacherous wait.

Well, ta ta biblioholics!!!!

Quick side note:

Taylor is on punishment (sad face) and won't be blogging for a while. I guess I'm flying solo for a while......