Review; City of Bones

Cassandra Clare
Goodreads summary:
When fifteen-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder -- much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons. Then the body disappears into thin air. It's hard to call the police when the murderers are invisible to everyone else and when there is nothing -- not even a smear of blood -- to show that a boy has died. Or was he a boy?

This is Clary's first meeting with the Shadowhunters, warriors dedicated to ridding the earth of demons. It's also her first encounter with Jace, a Shadowhunter who looks a little like an angel and acts a lot like a jerk. Within twenty-four hours Clary is pulled into Jace's world with a vengeance, when her mother disappears and Clary herself is attacked by a demon. But why would demons be interested in ordinary mundanes like Clary and her mother? And how did Clary suddenly get the Sight? The Shadowhunters would like to know. . . . 

In honor of the movie coming out in August 2013, I thought I’d revisit City of Bones by Cassandra Clare. This an urban fantasy, a genre I’ve somehow only discovered in the last year, and has a cult-like following. The buzz online and almost worship of Clare made me very curious what all the fuss was about.

The thing I think I liked best was the gripping and twisty story.  It grabs the reader right away with a scene full of action and intrigue. When agents say writers need to hook the reader from the first few pages, they should use this book as an example of how to do it.

I enjoyed the characters and how even in this introduction to them and their world, the reader feels invested. Poor Clary spends the whole book finding out that everything she knew about her life is basically completely false and is not only learning the truth, but picking up the pieces. I liked how, unlike many books written for young adults, the parents and other actual adults are central to the story. It felt multidimensional.  I also felt totally compelled by the villains and how the reader was always guessing what was going to come next.

The world of the shadow hunters that Clare has created is complete and satisfying. I was left wondering what will come next and am very thankful that there are so many other completed volumes in the saga to sate my hunger. There was one tiny element in the ending that rubbed me the wrong way – anyone who has read the book will no doubt know what I mean, but I won’t do a spoiler – but I have a feeling that item has been “taken care of” in the next books.

All in all, an excellent read and certainly enough to entice me to keep going. I am curious about the movie for sure, and how the story will measure up to the original. I’ve seen the trailer and lots of still shots from shooting and while I’m not sold on many of the lead cast members (Clary AND Jace for example) I’m sure it will be great.
FOUR STARS

Beautiful Creatures Movie; 10 days to go

ONLY 10 MORE DAYS TO GO WE CAN'T DEAL WITH THIS RIGHT NOW WOAH

Recently the hype for the upcoming film 'Beautiful Creatures' (based on the Young Adult book by Kami Garcia and Margareth Stohl) has increased with its approaching release on the 13th of February. And in all fairness, we can see why!

It's going to be big, and personally we can't wait to see Alden Ehrenreich's Ethan walk onto our oversized cinema screens while we try to block out the sound of the baby crying and the annoying kid sat behind who keeps kicking our seat.

However, we still have a full 10 days left until the film comes out, so how better to spend it than drooling over the movie posters right?!

The perfection in this poster... seriously though... *buries head in a bowl of cheese puffs*

gahhhhhhh oh my god

We honestly cannot wait 

What do you guys think about the posters? Are you excited for the movie?

Zone Out Mode's Monthly Fanfic (#1)

I know this is a bit late! I'm sorry please don't hate me, but here we go, we're kicking of our Monthly Fanfic feature with Husna's fanfic 'With Your Love (A One Direction fanfiction)'.

So far, 'With Your Love' has 24 Chapters uploaded and is still in the process of being updated on Wattpad. Read below to find out a little bit more about it and also about the author of the fanfic, Husna!

One headache was all it took.
All it took to ruin my career, and loose my best friend.
I found out I had a brain tumor and I had to leave the X factor. I made it so far, but it didn't matter, it was over, I couldn't go on my brain tumor took my career, friends, everything away from me.
I decided not to tell Niall about the brain tumor because I knew that he would leave the competition and come home with me back to Mullingar. I didn't want that for him, I wanted him to carry on with his life, and peruse his dream of singing.
When I got back home, and the surgery was a success, I never thought that I would ever see my best friend again. What were the chances? Niall moved on, got famous, and was currently in the worlds biggest boyband!
Little did I know that Fate is its own person, it does whatever the hell it wants. So one day, I did bump into my best friend.
But what happens when you start to fall in love with your best friend without evening realizing it?



With Your Love was nominated to us by a reader of the fanfic and fortunately, Husna agreed to do a short interview with us, and here it is:

It's an obvious question but, why did you decide to write a fanfic?  

Well, I started to read fanfics and I realized how cool it would be if I were to write one. I've always loved writing since I was little, and I have a burning passion for One Direction, so I mashed my two loves into one, and wrote a story about them :)  

That's cool. If you could meet anyone in your fanfic, who would it be?  

For sure Valerie. Just because she is very chill,  has a great personality, and doesn't take life very seriously and I think we would get along great. 

Ok nice, could you describe your fanfic in less than 10 words? 

Hmm this is going to be hard well here we go: Different, not so serious, cute, fun, unique, filled with love

What's your favourite book? 

Well my favorite book is The Percy Jackson Series which really got me into reading :)

Lastly, if you could have any superpower, what would it be? 

For sure being invisible because there are so many things you can do without getting caught :)

Excerpt:
I lay in bed refusing to glance at the time because I didn't know want to get out of bed. It was just one of those days where your mind seemed to think about the most randm topics. Anything seemed interesting to me right now .

"VALERIE WAKE UP YOU LAZY EXCUSE FOR A HUMAN BEING." My best friend Taylor yells somewhere from downstairs. I groan and turn over in bed, not want to get up at all. I lived with my best friend, Taylor and we just understood eachother. I've never really been this close to anyone except for Niall. Yes, Niall as in Niall Horan from the world's biggest boyband, One Direction. I smile as some memories flooded through my head.

*FLSHBACK*  

“SMILE!” Niall said  

“NO!” I reply hiding my face in his chest  

“Why?!” He asks  

“I look funny,” I say  

“No you don’t know smile”  

It was a gorgeous day and me and Niall were at his house near the pool with the rest of our families.  

I caved in and looked at the camera and smiled.  

Right when I did so, Niall’s mom grabbed the camera.  

“This is a great picture to show in a slide show when you two are married!” She says laughing.  

Everyone that went to our school always asked if me and Niall were dating but we weren’t. We were just best friends and I never felt anything more or less for him, he was like a brother to me.  

“Niall, at least smile, you look like a baby raccoon that lost its mother,” Maura (Niall’s mom) said.  

Niall and I were laughing so hard that Niall fell into the pool, and as he was holding me, I fell in with him.  

I snapped out of the flashback and smiled mostly to myself. My life wasn't perfect, far from it actually. I was only really good at one thing, singing. After much convincing, Niall made me audition on the X-factor with him. I made It pretty far, up until the first live shows actually. I was a pretty modest person and never really accepted compliments on my voice. However, I will admit that I wasn't the worst singer out there. Anyways, once I got into the live shows, my whole world turned upside down. I found out I had a brain tumor. Until this day, my best friend doesn't know why I left the X-factor. Me and Niall never talked, I ignored him because I didn't want him to know what had happened to me. I regret it so much, because now I can't get a hold of him. He's famous, there was no chances. Why is it that when you lay in bed, and feel lazy, that your mind decided to wonder and think about every damn thing in the world? I sigh and get out of bed, and stretch my sore muscles.


You can read Husna's fanfic here!

Bad Apple Tour

Today we're taking a look at Bad Apple by Barbara Morgenroth, book one of her mature YA series.

Bad Apple 
Barbara Morgenroth

Book Description:
“You tell and next time you won’t even be able to crawl away.”

Neal Marchal lived with this threat for the next eight years. When she finds her neighbor murdered, she knows who did it. The why is the secret the family has been keeping forever. The reminder to never reveal the secret is her limp.

She rebuilt her life and now Neal has everything to live for—music, performing and a growing affection for the young man who pulled her to safety.

Then Joe comes home. Neal knows Joe’s going to finish what he started 8 years ago because she told. But this time Neal vows the outcome will be different.

Excerpt:

Chapter 1 

I could smell the blood before I saw him.   

Two steps down the short hallway and I was in the kitchen with him.  There was blood up the refrigerator, red handprints where he tried to hoist himself to his feet.  Splatters and streaks pointing the way to the person now almost unrecognizable but for the clothes I had often seen him wear. 

I thought nothing as I turned and went for the phone.  It wasn’t there.  Just like Paul.  He wasn’t there anymore. 

I am a girl of constant sorrow,  

I've seen trouble all my days. 

Stepping out of the house into the fading light of day, the air was fresh and clean but the smell hung on me like a dirty blanket thrown over my shoulders.   

A car pulled into the driveway and Aunt Maude hurried up to me as best she could. 

“Too late,” I said. 

She started to push past me. 

“Don’t go in.”  Two nights ago we had shared a meal with him here, when he was alive and whole.  “Remember him from dinner.” 

“Can you tell what happened?” 

“Yeah.  Someone was really, really pissed off at him.” 

Maude couldn’t help herself.  She had to go inside and see for herself.  I wondered if, at her age, she could have seen worse.  Living on a farm, bad things happen all the time.  This was a special kind of bad that surpassed accidents. 

About the Author:

Barbara was born in New York City and but now lives somewhere else. By now, she thinks of herself as a country girl and knows more about gardening and animals than how to ride the subway.

Starting her career by writing tweens and YA books, (and did the cover photography for her first two books published by Atheneum so continuing to do the covers to her ebooks is predictable), she was actually aiming at the small screen. Television seemed like the perfect place for her even if she had no clue how to get there. Life is funny and often presents opportunities. Advice--Grab Them! Through a neighbor, Barbara wound up getting an introduction to a lower honcho at ABC and an audition to write for them. Her hopes were more than dashed, they were disintegrated, evaporated, demolished when ABC couldn't find a place for Barbara on General Hospital. (No Luke and Laura in her future!) To ease the crushing disappointment, Barbara wrote “In Real Life I'm Just Kate” about a 17 year old girl who becomes a star on a soap opera. That became an open sesame moment and shortly thereafter Barbara became the last headwriter for NBC's daytime serial, The Doctors, where she was ordered by the network to kill Alec Baldwin, shooting him not once but twice. With two different guns. From different directions.

Ah, good times.

You can read the book that started Barbara’s television career as the Kindle YA ebook, “Just Kate”, now with a substantial tweak because living life made her smarter.

You can also read about some could-be-hers-could-be-rumors experiences gleaned during Barbara’s stint in daytime television in the Kindle romantic comedy, In Under My Head.  Barbara is a recipient of a Writers Guild of America Best Writing Award for her work on One Life To Live.

Whether you're looking for a Mature YA or a romantic comedy, Barbara has a book for you!

Check out Barbara's website

Beautiful Beings by Kailin Gow

Hey guys, today we're featuring Beautiful Beings and Heaven and Hell (Beautiful Beings book 2) by Kailin Gow! Take a look and what do you think?

YA Paranormal Romance
Titles: Beautiful Beings and Heaven and Hell
Author: Kailin Gow
Date Published: 7/25/11

An ethereal exclusive boarding school with unearthly beautiful students...
Lux, a rebel girl, who has been seeing demons and angels since she was two...
Asher, the bad boy on a motorcycle who sketches angels...
Brax Kingsley who instantly captures Lux's eyes when she moves into the neighborhood...
And the Hatchett twins whose parents were murdered, leaving them a ridiculous fortune...
All brought together...all part of the puzzle behind the Beautiful Beings.

Author info:
Kailin Gow has appeared on top national syndicated talk shows such as ABC Radio, Barbara Dooley show, Chat with Women on KKNW Seattle, Broadminded on Sirius Radio XM, and more as a leading authority on YA and women's issues including self-esteem, body image, dating and sexual relationships, abuse, and bullying. Kailin has been a published author for over 10 years with over 100 titles published under her name and under pen names.

She is the founder of the community social site, The Saving You Saving Me Project, which helps teens, young adults, and women deal with social issues like sexual abuse, self-esteem, body image, bullying, cutting, relationships, and more in a positive community environment. The Saving You Saving Me Project is an extention of her YA-mature fiction Saving You Saving Me.
Kailin Gow began writing books for tween girls to help them with self-confidence and self-esteem. Her book, Gifted Girls Activities Guide to 365 Days of the Week, became a reference book used in girls organizations across the U.S. As her tween fans grew to become teens and young adults, Kailin began writing engaging and entertaining young adult book series for them. The results are book series like the Frost Series, PULSE Series, Wicked Woods Series, Stoker Sisters, Phantom Diaries, The Fire Wars, FADE, DESIRE, and more.

All her books are inspired by personal experiences. Saving You Saving Me was inspired by her experience as a peer counselor for young women during college and from her psychology major college roommate's experience being in a relationship similar to the one portrayed by Sam and Collins in the book. Loving Summer was inspired by Kailin's experience growing up with a family consisting of a mother, two sons, and a daughter who went through a similar experience of tragedy in the book. Aunt Sookie is based on herself and some actor friends she knows. The Frost Series, Circus of Curiosities Series, and FADE Series came about through vivid dreams. Never Say Never was inspired by Kailin's experience as a radio host and working with and interviewing bands, as well as having college friends who were in bands. Kailin also played the drums and keyboard for a band she once started. A classically-trained musician, she was once led her school orchestra, playing first chair violin. Her experience in the music world and her love of Phantom of the Opera, inspired the Phantom Diaries. PULSE was inspired when Kailin was in the hospital suffering from heavy blood loss post surgery and needed several bags of blood to survive (like a vampire). Beautiful Beings was inspired by her college encounter with a young demon exorcist. A pastor once told her she had the gift of sight and that she was destined to become a prolific author, many times over.

She began taking her writing seriously when her daughter was diagnosed as being on the spectrum and her mother was fighting three types of cancer. Four years later, her daughter was no longer on the spectrum, and her mother became cancer free. Kailin believes in hope and miracles, after having been through several struggles and experiences herself. This is why she writes.
When not busy inhaling chocolate and drinking coffee by the gallon, Kailin makes time for writing fantasy books, blogging as an expert blogger for Fast Company, volunteering as an Emergency Responder and volunteering for battered women's shelters. For fun, she plays the electric violin, and puts together a music playlist for her radio and web shows.
Her Frost Series consisting of the Bitter Frost Series, The Wolf Fey Series, and the Fairy Rose Chronicles along with her other book series are being developed into worldwide MMORPG Games by SEE GLOBAL ENTERTAINMENT, which is the world's leading game developer known for developing the top blockbuster films into games.

Contact Links:

Facebook

Website

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Twitter

Links to buy:

Amazon

Barnes and Noble

Cover Reveal; Date Me, Hate Me, Love Me

Jillian Dodd is revealing the next three covers in her Mature Young Adult romance series, The Keatyn Chronicles. The covers were designed by Okay Creations.

Title: Date Me (Keatyn Chronicles, #3)
Expected released date: April 2013
Goodreads: Date Me

Title: Love Me (Keatyn Chronicles, #4)
Expected release date: September 2013 
Goodreads: Love Me 

Title: Hate Me (Keatyn Chronicles, #5)
Expected release date: January 2014
Goodreads: Hate Me


About the author:

Jillian Dodd grew up on a farm in Nebraska, where she developed a love for Midwestern boys and Nebraska football. She has drank from a keg in a cornfield, attended the University of Nebraska, got to pass her candle, and did have a boy ask her to marry him in a bar. She met her own prince in college, and they have two amazing children, a Maltese named Sugar Bear, and two Labrador puppies named Camber Lacy and Cali Lucy.

She is the author of the That Boy Trilogy and The Keatyn Chronicles Series.

Jillian Dodd | Facebook | Twitter

Project Nova by Frank Campisano

Frank Campisano

summary:
After World War II, the United States developed Project NOVA, an international peacekeeping program designed to operate outside the jurisdiction of the newly created United Nations. The Project quickly earned a reputation for accomplishing its goals by any means necessary, and was allegedly shut down following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Forty years later, detective John Lange's investigation into a rumored revival of Project NOVA leads to a string of startling discoveries about his own family tree. When the Project decides to cut his investigation short, Lange will have to learn that some cases are better left unsolved.


Excerpt:
CHAPTER ONE

I did my best to ignore the sharp pain of broken glass crunching underfoot as I cautiously entered the apartment. The piercing noise evaporated back into the ravaged living room’s eerie silence, but it was too late, by now she knew I was here. I regretted ever coming back here, to the place I once had called home.
As I looked around the apartment, I realized I had beenhastily cut out of all my old pictures, though most of the frames had fallen from the wall and lay shattered in pieces on the floor. The carpet was shredded and littered with everything from week-old laundry to empty liquor bottles. The walls’ paint was faded and the broken television in the corner was flipping through channels on its own due to an electrical failure.
Other than those few and far between signs of disturbance, as unsettling as they were, the apartment looked abandoned. I hadn’t visited the place in months, and neither had anyone else, until recently. My calendar was still showing plans for October…of the previous year.
Every bone in my body was sending up a red flag; I had walked right into a trap. I’d been in the business long enough to know a set up when I saw one. Not that it mattered, as I didn’t expect anyone to be leaving the building alive.
Right on cue, I heard the now familiar sound of glass shattering by the entrance. My first instinct was to wheel around and face the intruder head on, but I uncharacteristically hesitated.
“You shouldn’t have come here, John,” a woman’s voice, a familiar one, called from behind me. I stood frozen in place, realizing that she had lured me flawlessly into her web. The cold steel of a pistol pressed to the back of my skull was nothing new to me, but this time things were different. This case hit a little too close to home, literally.
“I loved you, you know,” I told her, struggling to find my voice. My voice was weak, but I refused to admit that I was on the verge of tears. I’d stared death in the face before, that wasn’t what broke me. No, what broke me was the fact that she represented everything I had lost in this life. Everything I had ever treasured, everything I had ever believed in, it was all swept away from me in one fell swoop when she left. Not a day had gone by when I didn’t long for my old life.
“I know you did,” she said as she lowered the handgun. There was a slight hint of remorse in her response. “I’m sorry things have to end this way.” She cocked the gun and brought it back into position, taunting me by offering false hope of a moment’s reprieve. I closed my eyes, preparing for the inevitable.
And that’s where my memory ends. When the bomb went off seconds later, the scene in the apartment building came to a fiery end. From what I can surmise, she had rigged explosives to bring me down with her in case things got ugly, but for whatever reason, she slipped up. In what I can only describe as God’s sense of humor, the woman and I were the only two survivors.

Read the whole of Chapter One of Project Nova here.