Beyond the Rising Tide Tour

Beyond the Rising Tide by Sarah Beard Kai met Avery only once--in the moment he died saving her life. Now when he's not using his new healing powers to help people, he watches helplessly as Avery's life is unraveled by his death. To help her, he risks everything by breaking the rules, dangerously blurring the barriers between life and death.

  Praise for the Book “Vividly imagined, this novel is the perfect mix of modern love story and literary fiction. One brimming with genuine emotion that had me re-reading passages simply because they were too beautifully written to experience just once.” --Julie N. Ford, author of With No Regrets 

“This book is not only an engaging and satisfying supernatural romance, but also a beautiful story about life, death, and the gray places in between.” --E.B. Wheeler, author of The Haunting of Springett Hall

"This is one of those stories that stays with you long after the closing scene. It was beautifully imagined and vividly written and I absolutely loved it!” --Teresa Richards, author of Emerald Bound

 

My Review

Rating: 4

I was definitely intrigued from the very beginning. A great imagining of the afterlife and the things that drive our souls. Kai was a wonderful and definitely a swoony hero. It took some time for Avery to grow on me and that was okay. She frustrated me, but in a way that drove me to see how she changed and grew. Her motivation for not talking about what happened to her wasn't always clear to me, but made it harder to like her. There was a point where I felt like the story went off the rails a bit, but I think it had more to do with what I expected from a storyline. A good book that kept me flipping the pages faster and faster as I got to the end.

Content: 

Sex - 1+ (Kissing and other descriptions of physical affection.)

Violence - 2 (Fights are described as well as deaths and an character who accidentally overdoses.)

Language - 0

Overall Content Rating - PG-13 for mature themes and issues.

Excerpts 

Avery

My mind retraces the past few months, all the conversations Tyler and I have had, the words we’ve said and haven’t said, all stemming from one incident, one day. And then I’m thrown back to that afternoon, back into the ocean and the cold, roiling waves. I feel them around me, tossing me this way and that, pounding over my head like a stampede of wild horses. I feel the salt stinging my eyes and see the abyss below me in the moment I dove under to find the boy. I saw him there, motionless and suspended in the deep, just out of reach. Just out of reach. My face feels hot, and I can’t breathe. But I keep my panic cloaked beneath my skin. A violent earthquake rattles my insides, but I tense my muscles, holding it in, restraining it, refusing to let it show. I dig my nails into my arm, anchoring them there, anchoring me into stillness, and I focus all my attention on the present physical pain in my arm. Kai’s hand reaches for mine. His touch stills my insides, draws out the tremors as though they’re water and he’s a sponge.

     * * *

Sarah Beard is the author of YA novels Porcelain Keys and Beyond the Rising Tide. She earned a degree in communications from the University of Utah and is currently pursuing an MFA in writing from VCFA. When she's not writing, she referees wrestling matches between her three boys and listens to audiobooks while folding self-replicating piles of laundry. She is a breast cancer survivor, a baker of sweets, a seeker of good love stories, a composer of melancholy music, and a traveler who wishes her travel budget was much bigger. She lives with her husband and children in the shadow of the beautiful Wasatch Mountains.

Website * Twitter * Facebook

Blog Tour Giveaway $25 Amazon Gift Card or Paypal Cash Ends 8/1/16 Open only to those who can legally enter, receive and use an Amazon.com Gift Code or Paypal Cash. Winning Entry will be verified prior to prize being awarded. No purchase necessary. You must be 18 or older to enter or have your parent enter for you. The winner will be chosen by rafflecopter and announced here as well as emailed and will have 48 hours to respond or a new winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way associated with Facebook, Twitter, Rafflecopter or any other entity unless otherwise specified. The number of eligible entries received determines the odds of winning. Giveaway was organized by Kathy from I Am A Reader and sponsored by the author. VOID WHERE PROHIBITED BY LAW.   a Rafflecopter giveaway

Robyn Reviews: GLADLY BEYOND by Nichole Van

Book: Gladly Beyond

Author: Nichole Van

From Amazon:

An ancient curse, fractured at the birth of three brothers.

Two strangers helplessly drawn to each other.

A love story two hundred years in the making.

Claire Raythorn arrives in Florence, Italy, shattered, alone, and anxious to rebuild her life--preferably one without men. But she soon finds herself hunted and haunted-- literally--when a mysterious stalker dressed like Mr. Darcy from BBC central casting appears in her photos. And only her photos. Who is this man? And what does his ghostly presence mean?

Dante D'Angelo simply wants to safeguard his brothers, despite the family curse that hounds his vision. But then Claire Raythorn walks into his life, untouched somehow by his curse. Soon, everything Dante thought he knew about himself starts to unravel, dragging Claire down with him.

Set against the lush backdrop of Florence, Italy--both past and present--Claire and Dante fight against an unknown evil for a future together. But, first, they must solve the mystery of their shared past . . .

Audience: Adult

Genre: Speculative Romance/Time Travel

Length: 400

Rating: 5

Review

I am not usually a fan of 1st person writing, but I got into this book quickly and really enjoyed the way it was written. I don’t want to spoil anything, so I will just tell you I really enjoyed this book. I enjoy time travel books, so this book intrigued me. You really need to pay attention to the book in order to understand what is going on. I loved the mystery weaved into the romance.

Claire and Dante make an enjoyable team. They work together really well. Nichole did a great job of drawing the reader in. I haven't read any of Ms. Van’s books, but I will certainly be doing so in the future. I would love to see some books telling the story of Dante’s brothers. I loved how this book showed the closeness of family and how they all loved each other very much. This is a wonderfully done book that lets the reader imagine all sorts of things. I really loved the surprise ending and who was the culprit all along.

This was a clean, enjoyable romance that kept me glued to my kindle in order to find out how their love story was going to end.

I received a copy of this book in exchange or my honest review

Content:

Sex - 1—some kissing and talking about ‘hotness’ and other such terms.

Violence - 0

Language - 0

Overall Content Rating - PG – Adult Themes

Guest Review: KINDRED by Octavia E. Butler (Beacon, 2004)

Guest Review by Gina Denny. Read her Goodreads reviews here and follow her on twitter @ginad129

From Amazon: Dana, a modern black woman, is celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday with her new husband when she is snatched abruptly from her home in California and transported to the antebellum South. Rufus, the white son of a plantation owner, is drowning, and Dana has been summoned to save him. Dana is drawn back repeatedly through time to the slave quarters, and each time the stay grows longer, more arduous, and more dangerous until it is uncertain whether or not Dana's life will end, long before it has a chance to begin.

Audience: Adult

Genre: Historical, Fantasy

Length: 288 pgs

Rating: *****

Review: I had a hard time deciding where to place this book on my shelves: I mean, obviously, there's a major historical element, as 90% of the book takes place in the antebellum South. But the main character is a modern black woman who travels back in time via a preternatual link she shares with a slave owner. Time travel would normally make a story science fiction automatically, right? But there's no feat of physics here, and the "science" mimics magic more than anything... and that's how I landed on "historical" and "fantasy" as the genre classification. 

This is the second speculative fiction novel I've read in a row in which the speculative elements were so subtle that they were almost unnoticeable. The story is character-driven, full of beautiful prose that isn't usually found in spec fic at all. I want to call it a literary novel with minor speculative elements - though it often gets sold as science-fiction. 

(Side note: black woman wrote and sold "science fiction" in the 1970s... why are we still dickering about with pen names and the whole "girls can't write sci-fi" nonsense at cons???)

Back to this book: It was beautiful. Poignant, powerful, and just gorgeously written. The protagonist, Dana, is strong with being a Strong Female Character. She just... is. She knows what is right and what she is entitled to, but she has limits and the story pushes her to those limits over and over again. 

I also love how... confused? Is that the right word? Maybe conflicted is better... I love how conflicted she was about her place and her position in the slave-holding South. She knew it was wrong, but she understood how easy it was to be manipulated, coerced, and forced to do things you knew were wrong. So powerfully presented. 

Don't get me wrong - this wasn't a "Gone with the Wind" sort of presentation of slavery. It was brutal, honest, and graphic. But it was also incredibly human. Lives were involved - not just statistics and faceless stories. I shed a lot of tears during this book. 

I'm definitely going to pull some more books by this author, I want to see what else she has to say.

Content: 

Violence 5/5: This was tough to rate. The violence isn't gory (like Goodkind or Martin), but it is horrific. Cold-blooded, vicious. Murder, suicide, hangings, whippings, beatings, casual violence. Multiple rapes happen off-screen. 

Sex 1/5: One really, really vague reference to the fact that a man and wife missed each other and didn't get to sleep until late one night. Allusions to the fact that they were "practically living together" before they were married. 

Language 4/5: Lots of uses of the N-word. All in a historical context, and the modern character discusses her displeasure of it repeatedly, but still. It's a lot. A handful of lesser words, and the B-word is tossed about several times too. 

Substance Abuses 1/5: A character gets drunk once. Whiskey is passed around at a party.

Overall Rating: PG-16* 

* * *

Gina Denny is a fantasy & sci-fi writer. Flipping fairy tales upside down, reimagining classics, and obsessing over something new every week. Ravenclaw. Mormon. Homeschooler.

*I gave the rating based on Gina's description of content

Review: THE HERE AND NOW by Ann Brashares (Delacorte, April 2014)

From Amazon: 

An unforgettable epic romantic thriller about a girl from the future who might be able to save the world . . . if she lets go of the one thing she’s found to hold on to.

Follow the rules. Remember what happened. Never fall in love.
 
This is the story of seventeen-year-old Prenna James, who immigrated to New York when she was twelve. Except Prenna didn’t come from a different country. She came from a different time—a future where a mosquito-borne illness has mutated into a pandemic, killing millions and leaving the world in ruins. 
 
Prenna and the others who escaped to the present day must follow a strict set of rules: never reveal where they’re from, never interfere with history, and never, ever be intimate with anyone outside their community. Prenna does as she’s told, believing she can help prevent the plague that will one day ravage the earth. 

But everything changes when Prenna falls for Ethan Jarves. 

From Ann Brashares, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series, The Here and Now is thrilling, exhilarating, haunting, and heartbreaking--and a must-read novel of the year.

"This gripping story is set in a world unlike any other and inhabited by beautifully imagined characters that stay with you long after the last page. As always, Brashares expertly captures the wonder of love’s enduring power.” – Sara Shepard, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Pretty Little Liars

Audience: YA

Genre: Speculative Fiction, Romance
Length: 256 pgs.

Rating: ***** (A definite favorite!)

Review: This book just plain blew me away. Let me start out honestly. I didn't know who Ann Brashares was until just a couple minutes ago when I looked the book up on Amazon. I just got an email from NetGalley saying I was preapproved for this title, and since it looked really interesting I got on board. The book hooked me from moment one. And it's beautifully written. Poetic. There are so many passages I wish I could just share just because of how beautifully they're written. It's very thought provoking, and there may be a slight agenda to it. (There's a part toward the end that, it seemed to me, was a bit preachy about environmental awareness, but it only stuck out a tiny bit.) It moved really quickly. I was so engrossed I didn't want to put it down for anything. Luckily, or unluckily, I finished it in a couple days so I can get back to laundry now... I never got frustrated with what I didn't know. It seemed I would ask a question and a page or so later it would get answered. Perfect.

Source: I received a copy via NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

Content: Rated 1-5; 1 being saturated, 5 being minor instances.

Sex - 1+ (There is kissing and touching. The main characters talk about sex, though not graphically--in the context of a relationship.)

Violence - 1 (**SPOILER** There's a fight near the end, but no graphic gore or anything is discussed.)

Language - 3+ (I only add the plus in there because it contains one word that's very offensive to me, and a handful of instances of what I would refer to as a "worse" word)

Overall rating - PG-16*

(Be aware that I'm pretty conservative in my rating. Usually I think about my littler sister or as a mother, when would I let my child read this.)

Try this. Like beautiful, romantic YAs? Read MATCHED by Allie Condie.

Review: MIND GAMES by Kiersten White

I put this book on my TBR list, like the tippity-top of my TBR list, as soon as I knew it would come out. Then it came out and Storymakers was right around the corner and I was feverishly trying to finish editing THE GAME PLAN so it would be ready to pitch. Finally, I just bought it and set it on my desk as a incentive. Then, when I got back from Storymakers, and I had even more edits for THE GAME PLAN, I still moved it to my To Be Read Soon pile. (It sits by my bed, and I always pick up the next book in the stack when I need one.)

From Kiersten White's Blog: "A brutal, exciting gem of a book." --Holly Black, NYT Bestselling Author 

Fia was born with flawless instincts. Her first impulse, her gut feeling, is always exactly right. Her sister, Annie, is blind to the world around her—except when her mind is gripped by strange visions of the future. 

Trapped in a school that uses girls with extraordinary powers as tools for corporate espionage, Annie and Fia are forced to choose over and over between using their abilities in twisted, unthinkable ways…or risking each other’s lives by refusing to obey.

In a stunning departure from her New York Times bestselling Paranormalcy trilogy, Kiersten White delivers a slick, edgy, heartstoppingly intense psychological thriller about two sisters determined to protect each other—no matter the cost.

Audience: YA (Clean)

Genre: Speculative Fiction, Fantasy

Length: 237 pgs

Rating: *****+ (I absolutely loved it)

Review: I loved PARANORMALCY by Kiersten White, and a little while back she wrote a blog post an how, while MIND GAMES was very different from anything she'd ever written, it was also still pretty similar--in that it involved a "strong, smart, snarky heroine."

But Fia is very different. She is so beautifully broken that it hurts to read about her--in a good way. You just ache for this girls and then cheer for them. You can do it! You can make stuff better! This book made me really think and really feel and really want to read the next one right now. But I'm told (by Kiersten herself, seriously) that I have to wait until next February. Which is forever and ever away. 

Source: Bought this book via Amazon.

Try This Do you like out-of-the box YA? Try Robison Wells' VARIANT.

Check Out Kiersten's blog, where you will probably laugh your pants off.