Book # 28: Clockwork Princess

Title: Clockwork Princess (Book #3 of The Infernal Devices series)

Author: Cassandra Clare

Date started reading: March 29, 2013
Date finished reading: April 3, 2013

Publish date: March 2013
ISBN: 9781416975908
Number of pages: 592

Official summary: "If the only way to save the world was to destroy what you loved most, would you do it? The clock is ticking. Everyone must choose. Passion. Power. Secrets. Enchantment. Danger closes in around the Shadowhunters in the final installment of the bestselling Infernal Devices trilogy. Be sure not to miss the special first edition, complete with an exclusive family tree." (http://www.shadowhunters.com)

Official book trailer:

How I obtained the book: Pre-ordered from Barnes & Noble for $15.55 using a giftcard I received as a reward through Plink.com.

My commentary:

• SPOILER ALERT:  Leave it to Cassie Clare to come up with an ending that would leave all her fans happy. Tessa gets to spend an entire lifetime with Will, then Jem turns back into a Shadowhunter from a Silent Brother and she gets to spend another lifetime with him.  So ultimately neither Team Will or Team Jem could be upset. In some ways, I think that was a cop-out. She should've had Tessa end up with one or the other, not both. I understand not wanting to make your fans mad, but at some point, you've got to realize that not everyone can, or should, have a happy ending.

Memorable quotes:

• “Life is a book and there are a thousand pages I have not yet read.”  
• “All Lightwoods look the same to me.” ~ Magnus
• “You know that feeling when you are reading a book, and you know that it is going to be a tragedy; you can feel the cold and darkness coming, see the net drawing tight around the characters who live and breathe on the pages. But you are tied to the story as if being dragged behind a carriage and you cannot let go or turn the course aside. I feel now as if the same is happening, only not to characters on a page but to my own beloved friends and companions. I do not want to sit by while tragedy comes for us. I would turn it aside, only I struggle to discover how that might be done.” ~ Tessa
• “You endure what is unbearable, and you bear it. That is all.” 
• “Sometimes one must choose whether to be kind or honorable. Sometimes one cannot be both.” 
• "I've heard that when I speak, it makes American women wish to strike me with umbrellas.” 
• “I am catastrophically in love with you.”  
• “You don't think I can fight. Because I'm a girl." ~ Tessa
  "I don't think you can fight because you're wearing a wedding dress. For what it's worth, I don't think Will could fight in that dress either." ~ Jem
  "Perhaps not, But I would make a radiant bride.” ~ Will
• “Men may be stronger, but it is women who endure.” 
• “Requited love is nice, but it doesn’t make much of a ballad.”  ~ Will
• “Most people are lucky to have even one great love in their life. You have found two.” 
• “Some secrets, she thought, were better told; some were better left the burden of the carrier, that they might not cause pain to others.”  
• “There is more to living than not dying.” ~ Jem
• “There are so many worse things than death. Not to be loved or not to be able to love: that is worse.” 
• “One does not question miracles, or complain that they are no constructed perfectly to one's liking.” 
•   “Choosing love or war: both are brave choices, in their own ways.” 
• “The world is a wheel. When we rise or fall, we do it together.”  
• “Our hearts, they need a mirror, Tessa. We see our better selves in the eyes of those who love us.” 
• “Every heart has its own melody. You know mine." ~ Jem
• “To lose an arm or a leg would be painful, but to lose the central truth of your life felt — fatal.” 
•   “Hope is not an illusion.” 
• “I can tell you that the end of life is the sum of the love that was lived in it.” 
• “Every heart has its own melody.” 
• “Lack of certification hardly proves intelligence.” ~ Will
• “Life was an uncertain thin, and there were some moments one wished to remember, to imprint upon one's mind that the memory might be taken out later, like a flower pressed between the pages of a book, and admired and recollected anew.” 
• “I don't suppose it would help if I told you that is the way life is. The good suffer, the evil flourish, and all that is mortal passes away.”  ~ Magnus
• “When I am in the darkness, I will think of it in the light, with you.” 
• “One must look at the next step on the path ahead, rather than the mountain in the distance, or one would never reach one's goal.”  
• “Not all that is mortal is useless.” ~ Tessa

Buy on Amazon.com: Clockwork Princess (Infernal Devices)

Book #27: Unravel Me

Title: Unravel Me (Second in Shatter Me series)

Author: Tahereh Mafi

Date started reading: March 26, 2013
Date finished reading:  March 28, 2013

Publish date: February 2013
ISBN: 9780062085535
Number of pages: 461

Official summary:
"tick
tick
tick
tick
tick
it's almost time for war.
Juliette has escaped to Omega Point. It is a place for people like her — people with gifts — and it is also the headquarters of the rebel resistance. She's finally free from The Reestablishment, free from their plan to use her as a weapon, and free to love Adam. But Juliette will never be free from her lethal touch. Or from Warner, who wants Juliette more than she ever thought possible." (http://www.taherehbooks.com)

How I obtained the book: Checked out of library

My commentary: --

Memorable quotes:

• "I do not function properly." ~ Juliette
• "I am a spectacle, an anomaly even among the anomalies." ~ Juliette
• "Good intentions are great, but they don't change the facts. You are dangerous. Shit, you're scary dangerous." ~ Kenji to Juliette
• "I hear myself go on and on and on and I can't get myself to stop. It's like a button in my brain is broken, like I've developed a disease that forces me to apologize for everything, for existing, for wanting more than what I've been given, and I can't stop. It's what I do. I'm always apologizing. Forever apologizing. For who I am and what I never meant to be and for this body I was born into, this DNA I never asked for." ~ Juliette
• "I want to be the friend you fall hopelessly in love with. The one you take into your arms and into your bed and into the private world you keep trapped in your head. I want to be that kind of friend. The one who will memorize the things you say as well as the shape of your lips when you say them. I want to know every curve, every freckle, every shiver of your body.  I want to know where to touch you, I want to know how to touch you. I want to know convince you to design a smile just for me. Yes, I do want to be your friend. I want to be your best friend in the entire world." ~ Warner to Juliette
• "I'm beginning to think of hope as a dangerous, terrifying thing." ~ Juliette
• "Hope can make people do terrible things." ~ Juliette
• "Sticks and stones keep breaking my bones but these words, these words will kill me."
• "Books are easily destroyed. But words will live as long as people can remember them. Tattoos, for example, are very hard to forget. I think there's something about the impermanence of life these days that makes it necessary to etch ink into our skin. It reminds us that we've been marked by the world, that we're still alive. That we'll never forget." ~ Warner
• "Time goes on even when we do not." ~ Juliette
• "You're not the only person in this world who doesn't want to get out of bed in the morning. You're not the only one with daddy issues and severely screwed-up DNA." ~ Kenji to Juliette
• "Hope. It's like a drop of honey, a field of tulips blooming in the springtime. It's a fresh rain, a whispered promise, a cloudless sky, the perfect punctuation mark at the end of a sentence. And it's the only thing in the world keeping me afloat."  ~ Juliette
• "I am nothing more than the consequence of catastrophe." ~ Juliette
• "It takes a lot more than blood to be family. And I want nothing to do with him. I'd like to be able to watch him die and feel no sympathy,no remorse. He's the textbook definition of a monster." ~ Adam about Warner
• "I can love him, but I can't depend on him to be my backbone. I can't be my own person if I constantly require someone else to hold me together." ~ Juliette about Adam
• "My mind is a mess. Every single day I'm confused, uncertain, worried I'm going to make a new mistake, worried I'm going to lose control, worried I'm going to lose myself." ~ Juliette
• "My loyalties do not lie with The Reestablishment. My loyalties lie with those who know how to live. I only have two options in this game, love. Kill. Or be killed." ~ Warner
• "The world, I think, has a terrible, terrible sense of humor. It always seems to be laughing at me. At my expense. Making my life infinitely more complicated all the time. Ruining all my best-laid plans by making every choice so difficult. Making everything so confusing." ~ Juliette
• "It's so hard to be kind to the world when all you've ever felt is hate. ... It's so hard to see goodness in the world when all you've ever known is terror." ~ Juliette
• "Loneliness is a strange sort of thing. It creeps on you, quiet and still, sits by your side in the dark, strokes by your hair as you sleep. It wraps itself around your bones, squeezing so tight you almost can't breathe. It leaves lies in your heart, lies next to you at night, leaches the light out of every corner. It's a constant companion, clasping your hand only to yank you down when you're struggling to stand up." ~ Juliette
• "Loneliness is an old friend stand beside you in the mirror, looking you in the eye, challenging you to live your life without it. You can't find the words to fight yourself, to fight the words screaming that you're not enough never enough never ever enough. Loneliness is a bitter, wretched companion.  Sometimes it just won't let go." ~ Juliette
• "I want to trust but it scares the skin off my bones." ~ Juliette
• "I'm falling apart and into his heart and I'm a disaster." ~ Juliette
• "I'm wondering how many more mistakes I'll have to make before things finally fall into place. If they ever will."
• "The truth is a painful reminder of why I prefer to live among the lies." 
• "I have officially, absolutely collapsed inside." 
• "My heart is pounding so hard I'm surprised it's not bleeding." ~ Juliette
• "It's strange. How hollow I feel. Like there might be echoes inside me. Like I'm one of those chocolate rabbits they used to sell around Easter, the ones that were nothing more than a sweet shell encapsulating a world of nothing. I'm like that. I encapsulate a world of nothing." ~ Juliette
• "I have to keep remembering that Warner and I are 2 different words. We are synonyms but not the same." ~ Juliette
• "Sometimes I wonder about the glue. No one ever stops to ask glue how it's holding up. If it's tired of sticking things together or worried about falling apart or wondering how it will pay its bills next week. Kenji is kind of like that. He's like glue." ~ Juliette
• "You hate being in your own skin. You can't stand it. That's not called acceptance. That's called -- I don't know -- the opposite of acceptance. You are the opposite of acceptance." ~ Kenji to Juliette
• "You have severe mental constipation." ~ Kenji to Juliette
• "So you're exactly like a Venus flytrap. You reel 'em in. Clamp 'em down. Eat 'em up. ... You're like a sexy, super-scary plant." ~ Kenji to Juliette
• "Shit hitting the fan doesn't work around your schedule, princess." ~ Kenji to Juliette
• "Warner as a human being terrifies me more than anything else." ~ Juliette
• "You know, I could tell, the very first day I met you. There was something about you that felt different to me. Something in your eyes that was so tender. Raw. Like you hadn't yet learned how to hide your heart from the world." ~ Warner to Juliette
• "Every day I learn something new about myself and every day it terrifies me." ~ Juliette
• "I don't know how to hate you anymore. Even though I want to." ~ Juliette to Warner
• "A handful of letters doesn't always make a word." ~ Warner
• "My life has been nothing but battle and destruction." ~ Warner
• "All of my steps are wrong, always wrong. I am the incarnation of error." ~ Juliette
• "The truth is a painful reminder of why I prefer to live among the lies."  ~ Warner
• "I will have died having accomplished nothing. I am still no one. I am nothing more than a silly little girl bleeding to death on a psychotic man's floor. And I think if I could do it over again, I'd do it so differently. I'd be better. I'd make something of myself. I'd make a difference in this sorry, sorry world."  ~ Juliette
• "Impossible is such a stupid word."  ~ Juliette
• "I am living, breathing proof that nature is officially screwed, afraid of what it's done, what it's become. And I'm stronger. I'm angrier."  ~ Juliette
• "Mass chaos is in my future."  ~ Juliette

Buy on Amazon.com: Unravel Me (Shatter Me)

Book #26: Hades

Title: Hades (Book #2 in Halo series)

Author: Alexandra Adornetto

Date started reading: March 23, 2013
Date finished reading:  March 26, 2013

Publish date: August 2011
ISBN: 978-0312656270
Number of pages: 432

Official summary: "Heaven Help Her. Bethany Church is an angel sent to Earth to keep dark forces at bay. Falling in love was never part of her mission, but the bond between Beth and her mortal boyfriend, Xavier Woods, is undeniably strong. But even Xavier’s love, and the care of her archangel siblings, Gabriel and Ivy, can’t keep Beth from being tricked into a motorcycle ride that ends up in Hell. There, the demon Jake Thorn bargains for Beth’s release back to Earth. But what he asks of her will destroy her, and quite possibly, her loved ones, as well." (http://us.macmillan.com)

Official book trailers:

 

 

 

 

How I obtained the book: Bought for $1.95 at local used book store

My commentary:

•  I absolutely love the dedication in this book: "For everyone who's been to hell and back."

Memorable quotes:

• "A body is merely a vehicle. The deepest emotions are experienced through the soul." 
• "The righteous ones are always exhausting to have around."  ~ Demon
• "You make me feel things, Beth. That's why you have to stay. Hell's whole lot brighter with you in it." ~ Jake
• "I'd always interacted with the concept of evil on a philosophical level. Now I felt as though it was all around me, palpable and real." ~ Bethany
• "Time became my biggest enemy in Hades. On earth it had been so precious because I didn't know when it would run out, but here it was drawn out and immeasurable." ~ Bethany
• "If humans are God's greatest achievement, he seriously needs to review his design." ~ Jake
• "Debauchery gets a bit old after two thousand years." ~ Jake
• "Heaven has no mercy for the likes of me. I made a pact and belong to Hell now. Not even angels can dissolve those ties." ~ Hanna
• "Human emotion is an irrational force." ~ Michael
• "I know you want Beth back -- we all do -- but acting like some comic-book hero isn't going to help." ~ Gabriel to Xavier
• "The souls (in Hades) feel everything acutely. The beauty of Hades is that you keep regenerating only to go through it all again." ~ Jake
• "Don't deal with the devil if you can't handle it." ~ Jake
• "If you think you love me, then you don’t know what love is. Love has to be reciprocated for it to be real." ~ Gabriel to Molly
• "Never love that which you cannot keep." ~ Lucifer
• "If Heaven couldn't separate us, Hell's got no damn chance." ~ Xavier to Beth
• "I feel like I'm waiting for someone to jump out and tell me I've been punk'd." ~ Molly to the angels and Xavier
• "Beth isn't human, because humans have a soul that they struggle all the time to stay in touch with. Every day is a battle for them to listen to their conscience and do the right thing. If you knew Beth at all you'd know that she doesn't have a soul, she's all soul. She's filled with it, more than any human possibly could be." ~ Xavier
• "How come in all the paintings, angels are depicted guarding thrones in Heaven or taking out demons? I wonder why they're never shown in the kitchen making burritos." ~ Xavier
• "It was funny how the goofiest behavior could feel perfectly natural when you were in love." ~ Bethany
• "Bethany, you are a messenger of the Lord, not a detective in a B-grade spy movie. Try to remember that." ~ Gabriel
• "One does not need to lock up that which is not dangerous." ~ Lucifer

Buy on Amazon.com: Hades (Halo)

Book #25: Halo

Title: Halo

Author: Alexandra Adornetto

Date started reading: March 19, 2013
Date finished reading:  March 23, 2013

Publish date: January 2011
ISBN: 9781907410965
Number of pages: 496

Official summary: "Three angels are sent down to bring good to the world: Gabriel, the warrior; Ivy, the healer; and Bethany, a teenage girl who is the least experienced of the trio. But she is the most human, and when she is romantically drawn to a mortal boy, the angels fear she will not be strong enough to save anyone — especially herself — from the Dark Forces. Is love a great enough power against evil?" (http://us.macmillan.com)

Official book trailer:

How I obtained the book: Bought for $3.89 at local used book store (it's actually new, not used)

My commentary:

•  I saw this book and its sequel in the book store several times before I decided to actually pick it up and look at it. Initially I cracked up hardcore because at the beginning, the author includes a quote from William Shakespeare and Beyonce. My first thought was, "Who the hell does that?"

• I finally decided to buy the book when I turned to the author's biography and saw that the author was actually a teenager when the book was published. I was very intrigued to see how a teenager writing a book for teenagers would do compared to adults writing teenager-targeted books. 
• I was extremely pleased with this book. I normally find that the first book in a series lags really bad near the beginning, but this one didn't. I didn't feel like I was being bogged down by all this detail at the first of the book. It got right into the story and dispensed background as it went on. 
• I've seen some reviews where people say that they didn't like the love story between young angel Bethany and human teenager Xavier because it was "immediate love."  I don't agree with that. I think they were fascinated with each other immediately, but the love took time. I think they fell in love as they got to know each other. I don't agree that it was a cheesy love-at-first-sight story. 
• Compared to the other angel-related young adult series I've read, this one starts out much better than the "Fallen" series by Lauren Kate and the "Hush Hush" series by Becca Fitzpatrick, just as good as "Unearthly" by Cynthia Hand. I would also venture far enough to say that it starts out better than the "Blue Bloods" series by Melissa de la Cruz, but that is a combo of angels and vampires, so I don't think I can really compare them in the same way.

Memorable quotes:

• "A man in love can do extraordinary things, I don’t care if you’re an angel, you’re my angel, and I won’t let you go. I don't care if you're an angel, you're my angel, and i won't let you go." ~ Xavier to Bethany
• "One of the most frustrating words in the human language, as far as I could tell, was love. So much meaning attached to this one little word. People bandied it about freely, using it to describe their attachments to possessions, pets, vacation destinations, and favorite foods. In the same breath they then applied this word to the person they considered most important in their lives. Wasn’t that insulting? Shouldn’t there be some other term to describe deeper emotion?" ~ Bethany
• "Humans were so preoccupied with love. They were all desperate to form an attachment to one person they could refer to as their other half. It seemed from my reading of literature that being in love meant becoming the beloveds entire world. The rest of the universe paled into insignificance compared to the lovers. When they were separated, each fell into a melancholy state, and only when they were reunited did their hearts start beating again. Only when they were together could really see the colors of the world. When they were apart, that color leached away, leaving everything a hazy gray. I lay in bed, wondering about the intensity of this emotion that was so irrational and so irrefutably human. What if a persons face was so sacred to you it was permanently inscribed in your memory? What if their smell and touch were dearer to you than life itself?" ~ Bethany
• "I was not too impressed with human language; it seemed absurdly limited. There was so much that couldn’t be put into words. That was one of the saddest things about people -- their most important thoughts and feelings often went unspoken and barely understood." ~ Bethany
• "Sometimes it's better to stop trying to make sense of things. Life isn't clear cut, there are always gray areas." ~ Bethany
• "Straightforward relationships are overrated." ~ Xavier
• "Some say we can't choose who we fall in love with; love chooses us. Sometimes people fall for the complete antithesis of everything they believe they're looking for."
• "Without complexity, there's no intensity." ~ Jake
• "I prayed for all his dreams to come true. I prayed that I would always be able to connect with him -- even if I was no longer on earth." ~ Bethany about Xavier
• "To make one person the center of your world is bound to end in disaster. There are too many factors outside your control."
• "I'm a girl; of course I have a built-in miss-o-meter." ~ Bethany
• "The angel came, the angel saw, the angel fell." ~ Jake Thorn 
• "Don't worry, Beth; there's nothing I love more than a challenge." ~ Xavier
• "It was ironic how love could awaken them to the wonders of the universe, while at the same time confine their attention to one another." ~ Bethany
• "Most people think of religion as some kind of fashion statement. ... I believe in a higher power, a spiritual energy. I think life's too complex to be an accident." ~ Xavier
• "If Xavier was an illness, then I didn't want to recover." ~ Bethany
• "Even your reaction to being called interesting is interesting." ~ Xavier to Bethany
•  "Molly, the human form is beautiful regardless of size or shape." ~ Gabriel
• "Gabriel has as much feeling as that stone angel in the garden." ~ Bethany
• "Beth, I love you and nothing makes me happier than being close to you. You're intoxicating." ~ Xavier
• "Life's a game -- and I happen to know how to play." ~ Jake

Buy on Amazon.com: Halo

Book #24: Swear

Title: Swear (Book #2 in Swoon series)

Author: Nina Malkin

Date started reading: March 13, 2013
Date finished reading:  March 17, 2013

Publish date: September 2012
ISBN: 978-1442421110
Number of pages: 480

Official summary: "It’s been six months since ghost-turned-golem Sinclair Youngblood Powers confessed his love, stole Dice’s heart, and disappeared from Swoon, perhaps from existence. Despite the hurt, Dice has been moving steadily toward ordinary. Dreams of Sin still plague and pleasure her sleep, and the mark Sin left remains on her skin, still sore. But Dice has been throwing herself into music, finding solace in song and sometimes even in the arms of her band mate, Tosh. Life seems almost ... normal. The last thing Dice wants is to mess with anything remotely supernatural. But when her best friend’s boyfriend goes missing, Dice has no choice but to become very much involved. She knows that his disappearance was no accident, and it somehow has everything to do with Sin. Because Dice can feel it: Sin is back. And the promises and deceptions he left in his wake have returned to haunt him.What do you do when an oath of devotion threatens to destroy the one you love?" (http://www.ninamalkin.com)

How I obtained the book: Bought for $5.94 through Amazon using a giftcard I earned through Plink.com.

My commentary:

•  I really love how this book has roses on each side of the chapter numbers. It's a pretty touch throughout the book. Of course, roses play an important role in the book, so it makes sense that the cover would include roses and there would be roses throughout the book.

• I was so angry with the first book in this series for having so much sexual content and so many scenes of teenage drinking/drug use. This book did away with the vast majority of the sex, and you could focus much more on the supernatural content. Once all that sex/drinking/drug stuff was gone, the story was really great... well at least until....
• SPOILER ALERT: Dice ends up meeting with a bunch of gods and took on some of their powers, namely the ability to talk to animals. In the end of the book, Dice isn't the one who saves the day and the lives of her friends. It's a damn bird and Dice's kitten who recruit a bunch of other birds and mice to take down a ghost from Sinclair's past who has been causing havoc and kidnaps one of Dice's friends and the younger sister of another one of her friends. I was all about the supernatural storyline until suddenly Dice become Dr. Doolittle.

Memorable quotes:

• "Love is blue. A clear cerulean when new. A bright, bold, true blue in its glorious throes. And when it hurts, as it inevitably will, love turns deep, dark, the color of a bad bruise. I know all about that deep, that dark — I’ve been dealing with it for a while now. One night of true bliss with the boy I love, and then he was gone."
• "My nemesis is a sociopath with bloodhound tendencies who, as an added bonus, is already dead and ergo indestructible."
• "What do you think, I tote tarot cards around in my purse, just in case? They're not tampons, you know."
• "Sinclair Youngblood Powers is back in town. Time to get naked!"
• "The truth hurts, they say, but that's all they say -- they don't say how it hurts. That's because each painful truth has its own unique recipe for agony."
• "If she calls me a slattern -- that’s eighteenth century for 'slut' -- she’ll be picking Cocoa-Puffs out of her hair for days."
• "Pledge, promise, oath, vow -- if there's one thing I've figured out, it's that you can't swear to love."
• "Sometimes you can be up to your eyeballs in blessings and still blunder around like a babe in the woods. Sometimes you have to let hope and faith and trust do their thing, relinquish the control you never had in the first place, and accept what’s going to happen like a wave coming in from the sea."

Buy on Amazon.com: Swear

Book # 23: Swoon

Title: Swoon

Author: Nina Malkin

Date started reading: March 8, 2013
Date finished reading: March 13, 2013

Publish date: May 2009
ISBN: 978-1416974345
Number of pages: 432

Official summary: "Torn from her native New York City and dumped in the land of cookie-cutter preps, Candice is resigned to her posh, dull fate. Nothing ever happens in Swoon, Connecticut ... until Dice’s perfect, privileged cousin Penelope nearly dies in a fall from an old tree and her spirit intertwines with that of a ghost. His name? Sinclair Youngblood Powers. His mission? Revenge. And while Pen is oblivious to the possession, Dice is all too aware of Sin. She’s intensely drawn to him — but not at all crazy about the havoc he’s wreaking. Determined to exorcise the demon, Dice accidentally sets Sin loose, gives him flesh, makes him formidable. Now she must destroy an even more potent — and irresistible — adversary before the whole town succumbs to Sin’s will. Only trouble is, she’s in love with him." (http://www.ninamalkin.com)

Official book trailer:

How I obtained the book: Got through PaperBackSwap.com

My commentary:

• I was really unhappy with the amount of sexual content and drug/alcohol use in this book. I don't think that's at all appropriate for a young adult novel... even if real life is sometimes like that. It was hard to get into the supernatural storyline when it kept having all sorts of cheesy sexual stuff. The author writes on her website that she writes "about teenagers" not "for teenagers." I guess I get that, but I don't feel like reading some of the stuff in this book was even appropriate for me, and I'm in my 30's. 
• In the book, Sinclair becomes a golem (an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter) once Dice accidentally brings his ghost to life. I kept thinking about how there was a golem on a recent episode of the TV show "Supernatural," which made it hard to picture Sinclair as a sexy hot young man when "Supernatural" had a giant, extremely strong, unattractive man as its golem. This is what I kept seeing in my head:

Memorable quotes:

• "Love at first sight must be glorious. I wouldn’t know, since at first there was no sight. Smell, yeah — the tangy, salty scent of horses. Plenty of other sensations too. But I’ll get to that. The point I want to make up front is that by the time I laid eyes on Sinclair Youngblood Powers — in the flesh, that is — I was already in love with him. Nothing could change that. Not even the fact that he was dead." ~ Dice
• “The best listeners listen between the lines.”  
• “You are my life, but you are not my purpose.” 
• “I took Sin on faith, but if faith were money, fools would be billionaires.”  
• “You learn about fight or flight, but no one ever mentions the third alliterative option -- freeze.” 

Buy on Amazon.com: Swoon

Book #22: Defiance

Title: Defiance

Author: C.J. Redwine

Date started reading: March 5, 2013
Date finished reading: March 7, 2013

Publish date: August 2012
ISBN: 978-0062117182
Number of pages: 416

Official summary: "Within the walls of Baalboden, beneath the shadow of the city’s brutal leader, Rachel Adams has a secret. While other girls sew dresses, host dinner parties, and obey their male Protectors, Rachel knows how to survive in the wilderness and deftly wield a sword. When her father, Jared, fails to return from a courier mission and is declared dead, the Commander assigns Rachel a new Protector, her father’s apprentice, Logan — the same boy Rachel declared her love for two years ago, and the same boy who handed her heart right back to her. Left with nothing but fierce belief in her father’s survival, Rachel decides to escape and find him herself. But treason against the Commander carries a heavy price, and what awaits her in the Wasteland could destroy her. At nineteen, Logan McEntire is many things. Orphan. Outcast. Inventor. As apprentice to the city’s top courier, Logan is focused on learning his trade so he can escape the tyranny of Baalboden. But his plan never included being responsible for his mentor’s impulsive daughter. Logan is determined to protect her, but when his escape plan goes wrong and Rachel pays the price, he realizes he has more at stake than disappointing Jared. As Rachel and Logan battle their way through the Wasteland, stalked by a monster that can’t be killed and an army of assassins out for blood, they discover romance, heartbreak, and a truth that will incite a war decades in the making. (http://cjredwine.blogspot.com)

Official book trailer:

How I obtained the book: Checked out of library

My commentary:

• I normally don't go for the dystopian-type of books, but this one was not as bad as most. It was a  little odd to think that society would've been forced into forming cities behind walls that block out huge fire-breathing creatures, but I guess that's not as far as a stretch as some other dystopian worlds I've read about. 
• Logan and Rachel are a great match. They challenge each other in many ways and compliment each other in many other ways. It's sad that ultimately they are all each other has now, but that can only make their bond stronger. 
• The book isn't going on my long list of favorite books, but it was good enough that I'm glad I picked it up. It was a nice little break from all the vampire/witch/angel/god books.

Memorable quotes:

• “It’s probably my job to tell you life isn’t fair, but I figure you already know that. So instead, I’ll tell you that hope is precious, and you’re right not to give up.”  ~ Logan to Rachel
• “I love how you still think if you tell me to do something, I'll just check my brain at the door and do it.”  ~ Rachel to Logan
• “Silent acquiescence in the face of tyranny is no better than outright agreement.”  
• “I never thought it was fair that anatomy decided what my brain was fit for.”  ~ Rachel
• “No matter what has happened. No matter what you've done. No matter what you will do. I will always love you. I swear it.”  ~ Logan to Rachel
• "I'm a lot of things -- Protector, orphan, inventor, outcast -- but I'm not stupid." ~ Logan
• "You're in desperate need of someone to teach you your proper place." ~ Commander to Rachel
• "Whats the use in being diplomatic? I'd rather just pull my weapon and wing it." ~ Rachel
• "Do you really have to go into every situation with nothing but your wits and your knife?" ~ Logan to Rachel
• "Nobody appreciates a woman with vinegar in her soul." ~ Melkin to Rachel
•  "Loss is a gaping hole with jagged teeth, and I can't bear it." ~ Rachel
• "Fury is a welcome companion, warming me with something that almost feels like comfort." ~ Rachel
• "Love is a piercing ache that refuses to slide into the silence." ~ Rachel
• "He looks at you like he'd like to dip you in sugar and eat you up." ~ Willow to Rachel about Logan

Buy on Amazon.com: Defiance