May 31, 2017

Review--A Ghoul's Guide to Love and Murder by Victoria Laurie

A museum is hosting an exhibit of supernatural artefacts in honour of the Ghoul Getters' new film. Unfortunately, Gilley - engaged with wedding plans - donated a dagger which keeps the demon Oruc locked in the lower realm. Before M.J. can recover the bewitched blade, there is a murder and a heist at the museum and the dagger is stolen. Now Oruc and other formerly vanquished demons are suddenly causing mayhem. The Ghoul Getters are in for a devil of a time, rounding them up before these paranormal party crashers turn Gilley's wedding bells to funeral knells. 










It’s always a bittersweet feeling when you go into a book knowing it’s the last one of its series. I’ve been a longtime fan of Victoria Laurie! She was the first author I read in the genre I would dub as Paranormal Mystery or Cozy Paranormal Mystery, because they are Cozy Mysteries! The Ghost Hunter Mystery series became a fast favorite, because GHOSTS!! And mystery of course! A Ghoul’s Guide to Love and Murder is the final mystery of M.J., Gilley, and Heath and I am sad to see them go!

Things have been busy for M.J. First she and Heath just got back from an epic vacation only to find the crazy chaos that was waiting for them. Gilley had lent a very powerful dagger to a museum that was showcasing all the Ghoul Getters gear for the upcoming movie premiere that tells of their harrowing journey battling the Grim Widow. Since this is the very powerful dagger that acted as a gateway to letting in a super creepy ghost and his pet demon, M.J. has always kept it locked away but when she hears that Gilley lent it out all willy nilly, she is determined to get it back before the ghost or its demon break free. And that, naturally, is when the dagger is stolen!

I’ve had a deep love for this series ever since I started it wayyy back at the beginning. I remember always saving these mysteries for a day off because I was always able to devour them in one day. Sadly, that hasn’t happened in a while what with working full time now, but I still enjoy them all the same! This final one was absolutely amazing! It was like a throwback read and reunion all tied in one! Not only do we see some familiar faces, or hear them, we also get a few familiar ghouls popping back up as well! It was the ultimate kind of reunion! The one you never wanted to attend either!

I still cannot believe that this is the end of M.J.’s adventures! It’s been such a blast! All the times I’ve shared with her, Heath, and especially Gilley! It’s been a whirlwind of fun! As always, Gilley is there to make me laugh, but his character did surprise me a few time in this one. You can really see the characters heading off in their own directions to get towards their happy ending. But since M.J. does coexist in the same universe as Abby, I will always holdout for more appearances from her in that realm. Especially with all the things that were happening just as this story wrapped up. The mystery was solved and everything was grand, naturally, but there were still personal dealings that I really wanted to see happen, such as Gilley’s wedding! I mean, come on! The guy had it all planned out and I would’ve loved to seen it in an epilogue!

Back to the mystery element of the story, I thought it was done impeccably well, like all Victoria’s mysteries have been! We have just the right amount of creepy and dangerous combined. And that always makes for an excellent read in my book! Especially when we have Gilley overreacting with fear, because, seriously, this is creepy happenings. I totally don’t blame the guy, some of the time at least! The gathering of ghosts were super creepy, especially that widow. She was seriously freaky! And to basically have the baddest of the bad teaming together to wreak revenge on M.J. and her crew, you know things are going to be intense. And naturally, along with M.J., I totally didn’t pin our bad guy down at all!

I wasn’t without a few tears as well as I read this last adventure. There were moments where you knew we were seeing the prelude to goodbye. It was heart-wrenching to say the least because I am terrible at goodbyes. My only issue was truly with when we exited the group. Things had just wrapped up, and we had all these surprises popping up during the book that I would’ve liked to seen come into fruition but sadly we end things just as the mystery was wrapped up. And since the book is now a year old, I fear that even a short story is out of the question that will show these lingering happenings coming into fruition. Though I am very behind in Abby’s series, so perhaps if I get caught up with her I might be able to learn what happened through a phone call, or maybe a surprise visit! One can always hope since these two series coexist in the same world!

If you have yet to read any of Victoria’s mysteries I would highly recommend them! They are just amazing! They both are the perfect blend of mystery and paranormal and of course there’s still the added humor and sporadic bout of romance! Neither one of these is a series to be missed because they each are amazing and of course, GREAT reads!


Overall Rating 4.75/5 stars—just a wee bit off the top because I REALLY wanted to see a few of those unmentionable things happen but they were apparently too far off in the future. But like I said, I still hold out on hope of possibly seeing or hearing about it later on in Abby’s series! 





 

Waiting on Wednesday

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly blog post by Jill over at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights releases we're eagerly awaiting.


From the national bestselling author of Alice comes a familiar story with a dark hook—a tale about Peter Pan and the friend who became his nemesis, a nemesis who may not be the blackhearted villain Peter says he is…

There is one version of my story that everyone knows. And then there is the truth. This is how it happened. How I went from being Peter Pan’s first—and favorite—lost boy to his greatest enemy.

Peter brought me to his island because there were no rules and no grownups to make us mind. He brought boys from the Other Place to join in the fun, but Peter's idea of fun is sharper than a pirate’s sword. Because it’s never been all fun and games on the island. Our neighbors are pirates and monsters. Our toys are knife and stick and rock—the kinds of playthings that bite.

Peter promised we would all be young and happy forever.


I hope to be reading this one soon once my review copy comes in! I love Christina's books! Her twist on Alice was awesome and I loooove Peter Pan and always enjoy a good twist on the story as well!

 
PUBLISHER: Berkley Books
GENRE: Fantasy
RELEASE DATE: July 4, 2017 





May 30, 2017

BREAKING BLOG TOUR: ARC Review--Breaking by Danielle Rollins +CONTEST!

http://www.rockstarbooktours.com/


Companion novel to Burning.

Prep school gets a twist of supernatural suspense in this commercial YA thriller.

Charlotte has always been content in the shadow of her two best friends at the prestigious Underhill Preparatory Institute. Ariel is daring and mysterious. Devon is beautiful and brilliant. Although Charlotte never lived up to the standards of the school—or her demanding mother—her two best friends became the family she never had. When Ariel and Devon suddenly commit suicide within a month of each other, Charlotte refuses to accept it as a coincidence. But as the clues point to a dangerous secret about Underhill Prep, Charlotte is suddenly in over her head. There’s a reason the students of Underhill are so exceptional, and the people responsible are willing to kill to protect the truth…

Suspenseful and scintillating, with hints of the supernatural, this fast-paced thriller will keep readers hooked.


I received this ARC from the publisher, via Netgalley, in exchange for an honest and voluntary review. I was in no way compensated for this review. 


Breaking is the exciting follow-up to Danielle Rollins' Burning! Though, it's considered a companion novel, I would still recommend reading Burning first. There will be characters and events from there that will be mentioned in this one that without prior knowledge of them, it might leave you a bit confused. I found Breaking to be a bit more...mysterious than its predecessor. Granted, it's probably the mystery itself that had me more hooked! It's definitely different from the first book in a lot of ways, but there's still that air of familiarity that will have you linking the two together within time!

Charlotte is having a rough go of it lately, her two best friends, Ariel and Devon, have both committed suicide a month apart. Charlotte is left feeling lonely, confused, and all other sorts of messy emotions. Her mother is ready to withdraw her from her very elite private school since her grades are suffering and she's skipping classes. It's the night before she's set to leave that she finds a strange bottle among Ariel's, her roommate and best friend, things. She drinks it, thinking it was nothing more than booze that her bestie hid from her. It's not until the next morning that she realizes it was a clue left behind for her. Ont he bottle is 2/3. She and Ariel would play a game where Ariel would leave clues behind that were labeled 1/6 or such and at the end would be the prize! Charlotte thinks that maybe by finding the clues, she might be able to figure out why Ariel (and Devon) committed suicide.

Charlotte tries to dig through her friends' things, struggling to find clues. While around her, it seems other weird things are happening. Her new roommate, Zoe, seems to be keeping secrets from her, not that they were close anyway. Her friend's ex-boyfriend, who she had a serious crush on, starts paying her more attention. And she can't help but feel like something is definitely off. There's this overall sense of weirdness and secretiveness going on throughout the whole story. Even when we start to get an inkling of an idea, it's nothing concrete, the mystery at large is still a mystery!

The suspense to this one was pretty awesome! As I said, you know something is off, something weird. Even Charlotte know this, but she can't quite fit the pieces together. We get quite the startling surprise fairly early too. One that will slowly begin to tie this book and Burning together. We get little hints, little tastes, and by the end, we're going to get one big picture! But alas, there's still questions! Those annoying little questions. And worse yet, I don't know if there are any more books! There has to be more books! I wouldn't say we entered detrimental territory, but pretty close!

It's always the little things that get left unanswered. Wondering who all was involved with this mystery that was happening! Why was it happening? What exactly were they trying to do? Perhaps there are more books to come and those questions can't be answered yet. But at the same time, I feel like we're missing something! There were way more details to this situation than I can really divulge in. So sorry for my vagueness, again!

As before, we have a little bit of romance going on in this one. I mentioned Charlotte crushing on her friend's ex-boyfriend, Jack. Like before, its very little. Hardly even there. I can't really say if I liked it or not. Jack and Charlotte have a history that we aren't really privy to, we get little hints of flashbacks, but I don't feel like it was enough for me to care about these two as a couple. I'm not sure if they're being a couple was meant to add to the story. Jack isn't quite meant to be written off though.

This book, you guys!! There is soooo much I am wanting to talk to you about it, but I can't because of spoilers. Errg! The ending though, it will really send you through a trip! It's mind boggling!! So many questions! So few answers. There has got to be another book! There just has to be!! yet' it's still too early to really know for sure! I just hope there is! My sanity is at risk here!

Breaking was a remarkably twisted read that will leave your head spinning, but I mean this in all the best ways! Who doesn't love a mind-twister? A book that leaves you guessing through its very end! Yes, through the ending, not until, because as I said, I still have sooo many questions! I truly hope Danielle isn't done with this world yet, there is still so much to know from it and I hoping that next year will bring us a conclusion! If you love twisted read that intrigue and captivate you, this is one you will not want to pass up!


Overall Rating 4/5 stars


Breaking releases June 6, 2017




Find it: AmazonB&NTBDiBooksGoodreads


About the author:




Author of the best-selling MERCILESS series, SURVIVE THE NIGHT, BURNING, and BREAKING. I'm currently working on the last installment of the Merciless books, & starting a new series to be announced later this year.







The Contest:

a Rafflecopter giveaway




The Tour Schedule:


Week One:

5/29/2017- The Cover ContessaInterview
5/29/2017- A Dream Within A DreamReview

5/30/2017- YA Books CentralGuest Post
5/30/2017- a GREAT readReview

5/31/2017- Pandora's BooksExcerpt
5/31/2017- Sweet Southern HomeReview

6/1/2017- BookHounds YAGuest Post
6/1/2017- Dazzled by BooksReview

6/2/2017- Tales of the Ravenous Reader- Interview
6/2/2017- Don't Judge, ReadReview

Week Two:
6/5/2017- Wandering Bark BooksGuest Post
6/5/2017- Pretty Deadly ReviewsReview

6/6/2017- Two Chicks on BooksExcerpt
6/6/2017- Novel NoviceReview

6/7/2017- Literary Meanderings Guest Post
6/7/2017- YA Book MadnessReview

6/8/2017- Mama Reads BlogExcerpt
6/8/2017- A Gingerly Review- Review

6/9/2017- Portrait of a BookGuest Post
6/9/2017- Storybook SlayersReview