Teaser ~ Found In Us (Lost #2) by Layla Hagen

Layla Hagen has posted the first teaser of Found In Us! Who's excited with me? Tell me in the comments! :D
So, without further ado, take a look at it:

Found In Us synopsis:

**This can be read as a STANDALONE. The second book in the Lost series tells Jessica and Parker's story.**

All Jessica wants -as a college graduate — is to be a good girl. She landed the job of her dreams at a museum and is trying to eliminate temptations. No more short skirts (when she can help it). No wild parties. And no men.

She particularly excels at that last thing. . .

Until her path crosses Parker’s. Again. Jessica remembers the last time their paths crossed very well. She was left with a seriously bruised ego. She knows it would be best to avoid him altogether. But the charming Brit makes it hard for her to elude his electrifying pull. He is as irresistible as he is captivating.

And enigmatic. 

Because underneath the sleek Armani suit and the sweet British accent that makes her crave his touch, Parker isn’t the perfect gentleman everyone thinks he is.

He’s exactly what Jessica doesn’t want, but desperately needs.

A bad, bad boy.

Lost in Us (Lost #1)

.*New Adult Contemporary Romance*

Serena has learned to live with her past, locking her secrets and nightmares deep inside her. But when her boyfriend of six years abruptly leaves her, she’s catapulted back into pain, nursing a broken heart. When indulging in mountains of chocolate doesn’t work, Serena decides the best way to deal with her shattered heart is to indulge in something else. A rebound . . .

The night she swaps her usual Sprite for tequila, she meets James. The encounter is breathtaking.

Electrifying.

And best not repeated.

James is a successful entrepreneur in Silicon Valley. A man who has amassed a fortune by taking risks. A man who has shunned commitment completely, and still does. He’s the exact opposite of Serena. But sometimes opposites attract. Sometimes they give in to burning passion. Sometimes opposites are perfect for each other. 

James is everything her damaged soul could want. His kisses are intoxicating, his touch out of this world. He makes her forget. He grants her peace from her pain. But as they grow closer, Serena discovers she isn’t the only one with a past. James carries the scars of a past much darker than hers. One that has left him damaged, hurt, and wary of love. A past that gives him the power to shatter her.

Now James and Serena must find a way to mend one another. Or risk losing each other forever.

And read my review right here!

Lost (Lost #0.5)

**Lost is a prequel novella to Lost in Us and can be read before or after. **

Whatever might help him forget his past and numb the pain, James has tried it all: booze, car races, fights, and then some. Especially women. College offers plenty of opportunities for everything. . . Especially when you have a trust fund to spend.

Serena spirals deeper and deeper into a hurricane of pain. But no matter how far she falls, there’s no redemption from the overwhelming guilt. 

Two souls consumed by their pasts fight to learn how to survive. But all hope seems to be lost. 
Until they meet each other.

 

~ Zee

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Cover Reveal ~ Risen (Fallen Desire #3) by N. L. Echeverria

Today is the cover reveal of Risen! This is the third book in the Fallen Desire Series by N. L. Echeverria. Take a look at the pretty cover:

I always try to see the connection of the covers and the book, so I'm pretty excited to read this one because I am so liking that cover. ;)

Here's the blurb:

“I can feel the evil seeping through my skin from every direction as my body consumes all of it. I can feel the hatred, pain and sorrow running through my veins as if it’s a part of me, as if I’m connected to the evil, drawn to it.” ~ Lindsay

Lindsay’s destiny continues in this ravishingly twisted third installment to the “Fallen Desire” series. When she’s tested by the powers of black magic she will find out who her true friends are. A new fallen angel, Luke, shows her a way of using the darkness to her advantage.

Will the dark magic consume her? Or will Lindsay remain in control?

Lucifer has known this day will come and is more than prepared. It is ordained that on the eighteenth birthday of the Redeemer she will embrace her true powers and stand by his side in the battle against the fallen.

Lindsay knows he’s coming and that he will be ready for her. She gathers all of the witches and fallen angels that are willing to stand and fight, but she could never have prepared for what she will be faced with. Ethan does all he can to keep the fear of the hellhounds away but it’s a new friend that helps Lindsay kill the hounds that haunt her dreams. The anticipation of the coming battle has Lindsay questioning herself more than ever and she may end up trusting those she shouldn't. Unknown love and friendships ignite while true love is tested.

Will her love for Ethan stay strong? Will Lindsay be able to stand up to Lucifer or will she embrace the evil that lurks inside her?

Pre-order links are coming soon so keep an eye on it! ;)

If this is new to you and you're interested, here are the first two books:

Fallen Desire (Fallen desire #1):

A dream was the first time I saw his face and even then my emotions and desire for him were uncontrollable. The moment we encountered one another my life changed. Without even a single touch, an unimaginable connection bound us together for eternity. That is until evil forces us apart.

He opens my eyes to a whole new world, a world filled with vibrant colors radiating off of every individual, giving me sight into who they are as well as showing me the unbelievable powers that I possess. I never would have thought that we would be in this situation. For me I have no other choice but to save him even if it brings upon my own death. I will give anything for the one I love and to protect him from eternal pain.

My soul and destiny were created before I even existed, and if this is the path that God planned for me, I will face it openly as I will not let him lose faith in mankind for I am the redeemer.

***

“The moment I met him my world changed, I don’t know those around me, I no longer know myself, but what I do know is that only I can save him.”

Lindsay, a teen girl from New York City, has recently moved to a small town outside Portland, Oregon. She meets Kim and Derrick who quickly become her best friends, but when she meets Ethan, who is extraordinarily mysterious and gorgeous, her whole world changes.

Avarie, a witch and old friend of Ethan’s, helps Lindsay discover her powers and releases her ability to see the auras of those around her. Struggling to learn her new abilities and fighting her desire for both Ethan and Derrick, Lindsay will learn the truth behind both of them as they are fallen angels and she is the soul of the redeemer created to save those fallen who have been consumed by evil only if they are worthy of redemption.

Purchase links:

  

New Beginning (Fallen Desire #2)

"For he is my demon, and I am his redeemer" 

“New Beginning” is filled with newfound enemies, friendships and loves. 


With a renewed outlook on who she is, Lindsay's desperation to save Ethan intensifies as he grows weaker by the day. Saving him becomes her sole mission and she will face anyone who stands in her way. Now with Derrick as her Guardian Angel, Lindsay and her friends seek out answers through the book of "The Redeemer". 


When Lindsay's faced by Laurence, a demon who wants her dead, the true power of her abilities are tested. She soon finds many who are loyal to her, including Yolanda, the head of the Fallen Council and lover to Laurence. Lindsay quickly discovers that her urge to seek demons and save them becomes a part of her and something she can’t deny. 


A longtime friendship between Derrick and Kim blooms into something much deeper as Kim has waited for this moment for so long. Discover if Derrick’s never-ending love for Lindsay will stand in their way. 


Secrets lie behind the unexpected as a love causes betrayal. Follow Lindsay as she finds new friendships and becomes the leader she never thought she would be. When she’s faced with the true evil of a demon her determination to save Ethan guides her.

Purchase links:

  

~ Zee

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Maybe Someday by Colleen Hoover ~ Review

Purchase Links:

Synopsis:

At twenty-two years old, aspiring musician Sydney Blake has a great life: She’s in college, working a steady job, in love with her wonderful boyfriend, Hunter, and rooming with her good friend, Tori. But everything changes when she discovers Hunter cheating on her with Tori—and she is left trying to decide what to do next.

Sydney becomes captivated by her mysterious neighbor, Ridge Lawson. She can’t take her eyes off him or stop listening to the daily guitar playing he does out on his balcony. She can feel the harmony and vibrations in his music. And there’s something about Sydney that Ridge can’t ignore, either: He seems to have finally found his muse. When their inevitable encounter happens, they soon find themselves needing each other in more ways than one…


From #1 New York Times bestselling author Colleen Hoover, a passionate tale of friendship, betrayal, and romance—and the enchanting music that inspires one young woman to put her life back together.

From the author of the New York Times bestsellers Slammed, Point of Retreat, Hopeless, This Girl, and Losing Hope, Maybe Someday is destined to become another bestseller and long-lasting fan favorite.

Includes a free original soundtrack by musician Griffin Peterson.

Review:

Now. This. Is. How. You. Write. A Book.

Maybe Someday is just written beautifully. The thing about Colleen Hoover is she always gets to me through her books. The characters’ dilemma, the emotions, the circumstances . . . it feels like my own. It doesn’t feel like I’m an outsider witnessing the story. It feels like I am in the story, feeling it all along with the characters. You can’t go wrong with Colleen Hoover. She’s one of those authors that when she writes a book, you just know you’ll love it.

I’m pretty sure Maybe Someday is something you haven’t read before. The concept is very original and incredible.

Ridge Lawson isn’t your typical hero, but you’ll fall in love with him nonetheless. His loyalty is something that should be acknowledged by putting up a shrine of him in the White House. He’s someone I will give a million brownie points for. He’s sweet, caring, and has a cool sense of humor. I’m so glad that I get to see inside his mind on his POVs. He’s a breath of fresh air for me from all the perfect book heroes.

Sydney Blake is leading a contented life—a life away from her parents, living with her best friend in an apartment, having her boyfriend of two years with her almost everytime, being a music major like what she wanted instead of the prelaw her father wanted for her. But in a matter of minutes, she almost lost it all when she found out that her boyfriend was screwing her best friend. I like it that she doesn’t do the traditional cheek-slapping. It’s too girly for my taste, and I really admire her for throwing three punches in one night.

Sydney knows how it feels to have your boyfriend cheat on you, and she doesn’t ever want to do it to another girl. Ridge is loyal to a fault, and he never goes back to his promises especially to someone he loves. But the heart has no qualms about right or wrong. It just feels. Maybe Someday might be fictional, but it gives you a dose of reality and makes you understand some issues with the heart.

I love the characters’ banters and pranks. It’s something that makes me enjoy a book because too much drama and self-involved thoughts tend to get very boring fast. I love Warren. Everyone should have a Warren in their lives. His loyalty and friendship is something to treasure.

I also like it that Ridge and Sydney doesn’t have a problem being honest with each other. They don’t hide their feelings so they’re able to work through it and move forward. I love their song-making sessions; how they work with each other and produce wonderful compositions. Colleen Hoover has a way with words that makes me feel everything the characters are feeling.

I want to crawl inside this book and live there for maybe forever. It’s truly more than a book. When you read it and follow through the album as you delve into the story, it’s truly an enjoyable and unforgettable experience. This book lived up to its title. Such a beautiful, heart-wrenching thing telling the story of two-people falling in love with each other under complicated circumstances. Might be Colleen Hoover’s best yet.

Album links:

listen for free here

iTunes

amazon

~ Zee

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What's Left Of Me by Amanda Maxlyn ~ Review

Goodreads and purchase links:

Synopsis:

Life works in mysterious ways.

Four years ago I became known as the girl with cancer.

I refuse to cry.

And I refuse to give in.

A relationship with a man is the last thing I’m looking for right now, but one night with Parker changes everything. He is persistent, and he knows what he wants. Me.

He doesn’t treat me like I’m fragile.

But he doesn’t know, and I’m not ready to tell him.

What if it changes everything?

Tragedy found me when I was seventeen.

Love found me when I was twenty-one.

My name is Aundrea McCall, and this is my journey.

Review:

“If everything that represents who I am is gone, then what’s left of me?”

When I first saw the blurb of this book, it got me hooked. A woman with a cancer, a guy with no clue. I was prepared for the conflict (guy knowing about the cancer) and the climax (girl knocking on the doors of death waiting to see if it’ll open for her)—or so I thought.

Aundrea McCall was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Cancer when she was eighteen. All of a sudden her normal life was thrown out the window and the struggle to live is knocking on the door. Everyone treated her like a china—fragile and sensitive. I admire her strength and determination in not letting the cancer control her life. She never gave in, though there were a few close calls. It’s just amazing how Aundrea fights it all. I feel like she represents someone in real life, that her bravery is not just fictional.

What I wasn’t prepared for is the emotions that bleed from every word. The author’s choice of words in expressing the happenings, the thoughts, the emotions of the characters is astonishing. The words went straight to my brain as if I was there in the book; as if I’m the one experiencing it. Every word drips with feelings. I don’t know what kind of coffee this author drinks but I want to try it in hopes that I can express what I felt in this book properly. The characters’ predicament, feelings, and thoughts, it all assaulted me. What’s Left of Me is unputdownable (if that’s even a word; if it isn’t, it should be just to describe this book!).

And what did me in was the epilogue! I would’ve cried, except that my younger sister has let it slip so it kind of squished the suspense and pain. Still, it was written beautifully—that I can guarantee. I wish the rest of the book was that powerful, but I’m satisfied with how the story unveiled. The epilogue is just perfect. Maybe Amanda Maxlyn should be thankful that she isn’t within punching distance of her readers because she might just get it after putting her readers in an emotional roller coaster like that.

This book is just written beautifully. I wonder how those other reviewers have written their reviews because I can’t seem to write anything that makes sense. This book just left me in a mess. I can barely wait for the sequel. ;)

~ Zee

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Six Impossible Things by Fiona Wood

Links:

            What will you do when you suddenly find your world turned upside down? That’s what happened to Dan. He just found out that:
a) They’re broke.
b) His dad’s gay.
c) They’re moving to a new home and
e) He has a chance to renew his life.

            Enters the girl next door Estelle. Pretty, cute and out of his league. With these new developments, living in the old house of his great aunt, starting a new school and finding love he started a list of six impossible things he’ll try to do which are:

1. Kiss Estelle
2. Get a job
3. Cheer his mother up
4. Try to be cool in school
5. Try to talk to his father
6. Figure out how to be good.

The Bad

First off I'm more of a fantasy/sci-fi/thriller/crime reader but I do the occasional contemporary/slice of life books like this one. I get bored real quick the phasing and actions are slow which are a bit in this book. There's to much unnecessary scenarios which I think should have been focused more on Dan's situation.

The Good

I ranked this as a four out of five by purely looking at in the contemporary genre way. The book is about changes in one’s life. It shows how our lead character Dan man’s up to take the challenges thrown his way. He gets a job, helps his mother adjust from her post-traumatic experience on finding out her husband’s gay and tries to wrestle with everyday school life. It shows how he himself come to terms that his father will not always be there and sometimes you have to be the strong one in a crisis.

            

The best part of this was not about him getting the girl but how he gets the girl through a series of events where the choices Dan made had an impact to it.

            

I have this soft spot for underdogs so I might have a teeny bit of bias here but this one is a great read especially if you just want a rest from those action packed dystopian and other books that’s filled with heavy emotion.

~ Djan

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Love, In English by Karina Halle ~ Review

Synopsis:

He’s thirty-eight. I’m twenty-three.

He speaks Spanish. I speak English.

He lives in Spain. I live in Canada.

He dresses in thousand-dollar suits. I’m covered in tattoos.

He’s married and has a five-year old daughter. I’m single and can’t commit to anyone or anything.

Until now.Because when they say you can’t choose who you fall in love with, boy ain’t that the f*#king truth.

***

To a restless dreamer like Vera Miles, it sounded like the experience of a lifetime. Instead of spending her summer interning for her astronomy major, she would fly to Spain where she’d spend a few weeks teaching conversational English to businessmen and women, all while enjoying free room and board at an isolated resort. But while Vera expected to get a tan, meet new people and stuff herself with wine and paella, she never expected to fall in love.

Mateo Casalles is unlike anyone Vera has ever known, let alone anyone she’s usually attracted to. While Vera is a pierced and tatted free spirit with a love for music and freedom, Mateo is a successful businessman from Madrid, all sharp suits and cocky Latino charm. Yet, as the weeks go on, the two grow increasingly close and their relationship changes from purely platonic to something…more.

Something that makes Vera feel alive for the first time.

Something that can never, ever be.

Or so she thinks.

Review:

Funny, bittersweet, and intensely heartbreaking. This is how I will describe this book. It takes you to different heights of love and plunges you down to drown in intense emotions. It makes you laugh, cry, sympathize with the characters and high from different whiffs of emotions.

Love, In English is written beautifully. The sequences of events leaves you on the edge of the seat, and the characters’ emotions reach inside your chest and build a camp in there so it feels like your emotions all along. I think the author has portrayed the issue in the story neatly and handled it all well as the book came to it conclusion.

While at times it seems that the events are slow-paced, it isn’t boring. In every book I always find a couple of characters to dunk in a river of lava (usually the heroine herself), but Vera Miles isn’t your typical how-stupid-are-you? heroine. She knows what she’s caving in on; falling in love with a married man is one thing, and acting on it is another. I admire her strength to stick to her morals even though she’s hurting and all she wanted was to be with Mateo. I like the way she uses her brain even when overwhelming emotions are flooding and drowning her.

This is a brilliantly written book. The emotions reach out to the readers and wrap itself around them. The book captured a realistic dilemma that makes it easy for the readers to sympathize with the characters.

This book is a must-read and must-reread. All is well that ends well. ;) 

~ Zee ~

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Falling From The Sky by Nikki Godwin ~ Review

Links:

Synopsis:

All stability in sixteen-year-old Ridge McCoy’s life crashed and burned in the plane crash that killed his dad. This summer-long basketball camp is his chance to improve his skills and escape his problems back home. But his summer plans take a turn in an unexpected direction when he meets Micah Youngblood, the guy who runs the carousel at the local mall and has a reputation for devouring straight boys’ heterosexuality for breakfast, alongside his chocolate chip pancakes. 

Ridge needs a way to avoid the guys at camp, whose only quest for the summer is to drown in beer and hook up with girls. So when Micah offers to explain how the ten unique horses on the carousel are significant to his tribe, Ridge takes him up on it. Still, Ridge can't decide if this is a bad thing or not. All he knows is that he hasn’t felt this alive since his dad fell from the sky, and as the horse adventures come to an end, Ridge finds himself falling as well – for Micah.

Review:

What would you do if you were falling from the sky?

Ridge McCoy is a quiet, sixteen-year-old guy who stops in the middle of anything to pray for airplanes when he sees one in the sky. He used to be very close to his dad. So when a plane crash in the middle of a rainforest ended his father’s life, it changed ridge’s life forever. He signed up for basketball camp to get away from his emotionally-wrecked mother and little brother who thinks ridge is the worst ig brother who ever set foot in this world, not to mention a  hot girlfriend who wouldn’t break up with him just because she doesn’t want to be the jerk-girlfriend-who-dumped-her-boyfriend-after-tragedy-struck-his-life.

When I started reading this book it must have slipped my mind somehow that it is M/M. I don’t usually read M/M books, but when I realized what’s happening this book has sucked me so far in that it’s kind of impossible to turn back. Questions have already flooded my mind and I’m a lot curious that I couldn’t put the book down.

Falling From The Sky has its own unique way to capture a reader’s interest. This book tested my open-mindedness, and after reading it I quite liked it. I think Ms. Godwin did a good job on addressing reality and homosexuality. Though ‘the emotions of the characters didn’t quite reach me, their predicament hooked my interest. I got to see how an attraction blossoms between the same sex and how they handle it. It was interesting how Ridge coped with his with his attraction with Micah Youngblood and how he overcame his fear in getting found out that he’s attracted to Micah.

The concept is cool. I like how their story started with carousel horses and its history. Micah Youngblood’s character is interesting since everyone knows he’s gay. The way he lured Ridge out of his shell…I salute this guy. He’s the epitome of clever.

Though I don’t usually read M/M books, I like how Falling From The Sky is written. I like the author’s writing style. The words she uses are easily relatable (if that's even a word). Reading this book may be weird for me, but I still think it’s written beautifully.

~ Zee ~

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