Wednesday, August 27, 2014

Review: The Hidden Ones (Book One in The Legacy of Watchers series) by Nancy Madore


Genre: Fantasy
Publisher: Createspace
Published: January 10, 2013
Pages: 424
Source: I received this novel in exchange for an honest review.
Synopsis:LEGACY OF THE WATCHERS (the series) A historical, speculative, science fiction adventure

 Thousands of years ago something came out of the sky that changed the course of human history. Testimonies abound of these ‘angels’ and their hybrid offspring, the ‘Nephilim’ giants. These mighty ‘gods’ quickly rose to power, and the ancient world came alive with industry and culture. People who lived for hundreds of thousands of years as hunters and gatherers suddenly began settling in one place, cultivating the land and even governing themselves. They invented irrigation, the wheel and algebra. Yet amidst all this progress, an undercurrent of terror was spreading like wildfire, carrying whispers of ‘djinn,’ ‘daeva’ and ‘demons.’

 The Watchers were supposed to do just that: watch. But humankind proved far too tempting and they ‘fell’ to earth, taking wives and even producing children. But their children grew into unruly giants whose souls didn’t ascend like human souls when they die, but remained here on earth. These errant souls haunt the earth to this day. They are the ‘djinn,’ the ‘hidden ones,’ also known as ‘daeva’ and ‘demon.’ They have one purpose—to live. But to live they need bodies.

 This chain of events has now reached the point where the djinn need more than just our bodies to survive. They must take back control of the earth, just as in the days when they ruled as gods.

 The Hidden Ones (book one)
 As CEO of her own thriving company, Nadia Adeire is flush with success, but a secret society dating back to the Essenes believes her to be one of the ancient djinn—the notorious demoness of Hebrew legend, Lilith. What’s more, they have reason to believe that she’s plotting a catastrophic attack on the world.

 Nadia is snatched from her ‘perfect’ life and caught in a maze between a present day disaster and the ancient legends of the djinn. The only way out is to retrace the steps of her deceased grandmother, Helene. The deeper Nadia delves into the past, the harder it will be for her to emerge unscathed. But it’s the only way to stop this impending disaster that was set in motion five thousand years ago!

Review:

When I first saw this book I wasn't so sure about it. The cover didn't pull me in right away but I know from past experiences covers can mean essentially nothing. I read on into the synopsis and was highly intrigued. I mean in the first paragraph the author really grabbed me. I don't like much history except for ancient history... oh look this has that. Gods and Nephilim giants sounds interesting enough right and to put such a twist on this kind of a story. It was done very well I ended up giving this a 4 out of 5 stars on Goodreads. 

The amount of research and knowledge that had to go into this book is amazing. The sort of cultures one must know or gets to know when reading a book such as this. It was done so very well. Again like I stated up above I don't really like any other history other than ancient history so I loved when we got to see from Lilith's point of view and kind of see ancient life so to speak. I loved the map of Mesopotamia and even seeing some names through out the book that I have learned about in past ancient history classes that I have taken. 

The only problem I had with the book at the beginning was when the point of view jumped. When you first start reading you read of  Helene at first  I was confused because I thought it was just going to be about Nadia and most likely from her point of view. But as you keep reading you find out there are three different points of views in this book. One is Nadia, the other is Helene, and then there is Lilith. This kept the book interesting and alive in some parts where lot's of info is told to the reader. 

My favorite character to read about I would have to say was Lilith to read about all of her adventures that she had when she lived and seeing through her ancient eyes so to speak is amazing. And sort of tells another side to the whole good vs. evil story. It is easy to see where her logic is coming from and why she starts to hate humans. The only thing she forgot was that not all humans are the same and that's where I kind of think she lost her way so to speak, and that they thought they deserved things when it should have been earned. 

I am very interested to see where this story goes from here and what sort of trouble Nadia is going to get into with Lilith. So I will be continuing on with the series. If you are curious and want to know more about the author and her books her website can be found at: 

Sunday, August 24, 2014

Bout of Books 11.0: Day 7 Update

Bout of Books

Currently Reading: 

  • Elixir by Ted Galdi
  • Clockwork Angel by Cassandra Clare

Books Completed:

  • Rise of the Gryphon by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
  • The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
  • The Hidden Ones by Nancy Madore
  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
  • Four by Veronica Roth
Pages read today: 75

Total pages read: 1,647

Toughts:

Didn't get many pages read today like I wanted to. I think the reason why is because I was really thinking that Elixir was going to be captivating and really pull me in and be a fast read. That is not what happened. So after a grueling read of 50 pages I switched to Clockwork Angel, which is a very good read so far. But by the time I started reading this I was getting tired so I slept a lot and didn't get much read. 

Saturday, August 23, 2014

Bout of Books 11.0: Day 6 Update

Bout of Books

Currently Reading: 

  • Elixir by Ted Galdi

Books Completed:

  • Rise of the Gryphon by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
  • The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
  • The Hidden Ones by Nancy Madore
  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
  • Four by Veronica Roth
Pages read today: 292

Total pages read: 1,572


Toughts:

Again another good reading day! I just started Elixir but it only has 244 pages so I should be able to get through those by the end of the day... I hope. The Night circus was just sooooo gooood. I loved it and glad I was able to finish it today. I wish there was a movie to this that was just as beautiful or even better if I am wishing for things I wish for the actual circus itself. Being a person that is up overnight it would be perfect for me. 

Friday, August 22, 2014

Bout of Books 11.0: Day 5 Update

Bout of Books

Currently Reading: 

  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
  • Four by Veronica Roth

Books Completed:

  • Rise of the Gryphon by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
  • The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
  • The Hidden Ones by Nancy Madore
Pages read today: 323

Total pages read: 1,280

Books to read:

  • Elixir by Ted Galdi

Toughts:

I got a whole bunch of reading done today! I flew through Four and am almost done with that, will be finishing that tomorrow and maybe even The Night Circus. I don't think I will be finishing Elixir by the end of this read-a-thon but it will be close. If I can read as much as I did today for tomorrow I might get through it but we will see. Also I broke into the thousands for pages read. Feeling so accomplished today!

Thursday, August 21, 2014

Bout of Books 11.0 Day 4 Update

Bout of Books

Currently Reading: 

  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

Books Completed:

  • Rise of the Gryphon by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
  • The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
  • The Hidden Ones by Nancy Madore
Pages read today: 239

Total pages read: 957

Books to read:

  • Elixir by Ted Galdi
  • Four by Veronica Roth

Toughts:

A good reading day if I say so myself. Glad to have another book finished now to dive into The Night Circus. I am loving it so far I think the reason being is because I love the circus so much. Also I have been posting on blogs and checking out as many new blogs as possible so I am definitely doing that goal as well. 

Wednesday, August 20, 2014

Bout of Books 11.0: Day 3 Update

Bout of Books

Currently Reading: 

  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
  • The Hidden Ones by Nancy Madore

Books Completed:

  • Rise of the Gryphon by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
  • The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
Pages read today: 170

Total pages read: 718

Books to read:

  • Elixir by Ted Galdi
  • Four by Veronica Roth

Toughts:

This was a day to catch up on some sleep. It also doesn't help that I wanted to play some Diablo 3 reaper of souls. But oh well it just came out I needed to play it! I hope to finish The Hidden Ones today and get some more read in The Night Circus. 

Bout of Books 11.0: Day 2 Update

Bout of Books

Currently Reading: 

  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
  • The Hidden Ones by Nancy Madore

Books Completed:

  • Rise of the Gryphon by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
  • The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
Pages read today: 227

Total pages read: 548

Books to read:

  • Elixir by Ted Galdi
  • Four by Veronica Roth

Toughts:

I didn't read as much as yesterday but that is because I didn't get very much sleep so I got a huge headache which then made me sick feeling. The Night Circus is real interesting but definitly not a book to read when sleepy so I had to switch to The Hidden Ones. 

Monday, August 18, 2014

Bout of Books 11.0: Day 1 Update

Bout of Books

Currently Reading: 

  • The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan
  • The Hidden Ones by Nancy Madore

Books Completed:

  • Rise of the Gryphon by Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love
Pages read today: 321

Total pages read: 321

Books to read:

  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
  • Elixir by Ted Galdi
  • Four by Veronica Roth

Toughts:

I think I did really good for the first day. Finished one book I had started and mostly through another. I also did look at atleast five other peoples blogs yesterday and made sure to comment on there Tbr's. People are reading so many good books! I hope to keep up this good pace through out the week.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

Bout of Books 11.0 Goals

Bout of Books

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, August 18th and runs through Sunday, August 24th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure, and the only reading competition is between you and your usual number of books read in a week. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 11 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog- From the Bout of Books team

Goals:

  • I am hoping to read at least a 100 pages a day 
  • I want to at least visit 5 new blogs everyday
Books I plan to read during the read-a-thon:




There of course might be other books as well depending on how fast I get through some of these but these are the ones I am going to try to stick to.

Monday, August 11, 2014

Review: Blades of the Old Empire (Book One in the Majat Code) by Anna Kashina

Genre: Fantasy
Publisher: Angry Robot
Published: February 25, 2014
Pages: 476
Source: I won this book from Goodreads book giveaways (First-reads)
Synopsis: Kara is a mercenary – a Diamond warrior, the best of the best, and a member of the notorious Majat Guild. When her tenure as protector to Prince Kythar comes to an end, custom dictates he accompany her back to her Guild to negotiate her continued protection.

But when they arrive they discover that the Prince’s sworn enemy, the Kaddim, have already paid the Guild to engage her services – to capture and hand over Kythar, himself.

A warrior brought up to respect both duty and honour, what happens when her sworn duty proves dishonourable?


Review:

The first thing that made me want to read this book was the cover. This cover looks awesome but past that I checked out the summary. After reading the summary I was highly intrigued. I ended up giving this a 4 out of 5 stars on Goodreads. 

One of the things that you notice right away is that you don't see Kara's point of view. You get to know her through the other character in the book. So it does jump point of views, the two main point of views are Kythar and Ellah. There are a few other ones but those are the two main ones you get to see. It was interesting seeing the main character from others eyes so to speak. At first this bothered me because I wanted to know what she was thinking or what was going on through her mind while everything was taking place. 

More recently I read another book called The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald. In this book the same thing happens where the main characters story is told through someone else's point of view. I think compared to The Great Gatsby this was done a whole lot better. This wasn't confusing at all when it came to knowing from who's point of view you were reading. So even though it was done differently it was still done very well. 

Now this story does kind of mention a previous one that took place before this book. I really want to mention you do not need to read that story to understand this one. Anna Kashina took down The First Sword, and might possibly be redoing it. I still really want to hear about there adventures before this book and hope she does some day re-publish it. The author does a really good job filling in the blanks from that story so it isn't all that necessary. 

Overall I loved the fight scenes and I definitely want to know more about Kythar's step brother and mother earth more. I loved how mother earth was described and it's kind of  creepy to think of spiders being all over someone to continually make them a dress. *shuddders* . I can't wait to see what sort of trouble all of these characters get into in the next book.

The second book that just came out this month called The Guild of Assassins. Now in this book as I have heard you do get to finally see Kara's point of view. So I am very excited to get to this book and finally get to delve into her brain a little. I know the main character in this book will be Mai who I also liked from the first book though not at first. He was a bit harder to read and like at the beginning of the book, I thought for the most part he was just playing around or just being mean to Ellah but in the end I don't think he meant harm from it. Hopefully we will see a bit more about him and his character in the next book that will make him not so mysterious. 

If you would like more information on The Majat Code books or even on Anna Kashina herself you can go to her blog : http://annakashinablog.wordpress.com/ and learn more there. 

Friday, August 1, 2014

July Wrap-Up

The Merciless by Danielle Vega

This is the first book in the series. I am not sure how many books this will be turned into and I am not sure if I will continue on it depends. It kind of is all wrapped up by the end for the most part. I will do a separate video review of this book.
Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo

This is the first book in the Grisha trilogy. I have had this book on my TBR shelf for quite a while. I picked it up finally for a buddy read that I was doing on Goodreads. I really enjoyed this book and hope to finish up the trilogy next month.
The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan

This is the first book in the Percy Jackson and Olympians series. I read this with a Goodreads group. My significant other has already read this whole series and enjoyed it a lot so I thought I would start on it so that we can discuss. I do understand now how the book compared to the movie is nothing a like. Overall it was pretty good.
The Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan

This is the second book in the Percy Jackson and Olympians series. This one is a lot closer to the movie then the first one but still had lots of things different. I am glad I got to read this one as well. I will note that in the books I find that Grover is a bit annoying and I don't really like his character. I did kind of like how he was portrayed in the movie though, perhaps he will get better as I read on.

Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo

This is the second book in the Grisha trilogy. I again read this with the same friend that I read the first one with. I liked this one a lot more then the first one. There is more action and more of the war seen in this one. Unlike in the first one where she is basically deciding who she likes more and figuring out her power.
The Tailor by Leigh Bardugo

This was a short story in the back of my copy of Siege and Storm. This is set between the first and second book. It is a short story told from Genya's perspective. This was very interesting and kind of lets you know why she does somethings that she did in the first and continues on in the second book.
Shatter me by Tahereh Mafi

This is the first book in the Shatter Me trilogy. I personally had a hard time reading this. It took a while to get accustomed to all the repeating that is done throughout the book and all the strikethroughs. I also kind of ruined myself since I know who the main character winds up with and in this book I don't see how that is possible at all. Though I have heard it gets better as you keep going so I will keep trying. Other than those issues with the writing style it was pretty good.
Scarlet by Marissa Meyer

This is the second book in The Lunar Chronicles.  I will be doing a video review on this one and the first book as well. I really enjoyed this one and love Wolf.
The Queen's Army by Marissa Meyer

This was another short story at the end of Scarlet. This is set between the first book and the second book. Though I really think you should read Scarlet before reading this short story. It is about Wolf and kind of where he was raised and what he went through as a kid and as an adult. If you read Scarlet first you wont be as  confused with where he is and who the some of the characters are.
Blades of the Old Empire by Anna Kashina

This is the first book in the Majat Code. I originally one this in a Goodreads giveaway and have found a new series that I will be continuing on with. I will have a longer written review of this book later on, on this blog.
The Giver by Lois Lowry

This is the first book in The Giver Quartet. I read this book because it is going to be coming to theaters in August so I thought I would read the book before watching the movie. It was some what interesting and I can see now the differences between the trailer and the book that might make some people mad. Overall it was a decent book just a little slow for me. I will continue the series though since I have the whole set it's just not high on my list of to read books.
Kalona's Fall by P.C. Cast and Kristin Cast

This is the fourth novella in the House of Night series. I expected a little more from this story I suppose. It was interesting and went in a way that I did not expect. It was more about Nyx and how she came to have these two men with her Kalona and his brother Erebus. I love each of the novella's because they have awesome drawings at the beginning of each chapter. They are beautifully done. Overall it was still good and it did kind foretell something about the last book and how this all may wrap up. I am excited to see the 12th and final book.

That was all the books I read in July :) How did you guys do?