Fall From Grace by Christine Zolendz

Grace has had her heart broken. Not by men, but by God. The people she loves have died endlessly as she is continuously shoved into the lived of dying women, as punishment for loving an angel. She doesn't feel anything for men, until Shane. A tattooed, guitar playing rock star, not to mention a man-whore (pardon my language), Grace doesn't know why she takes notice of him. She has to find her angel, because she'll never love another.

First of all, all that talk about witty heroines, wipe it from your mind. I thought I knew witty and strong heroines. False. Grace is level-minded and hilarious, two traits I love in a main character. She likes Shane, she doesn't deny it, but she also doesn't fall all over him to be used and abused. Unlike most girls in books these days, he falls in love with her first, and she remains funny and charming the whole time. I really liked Grace to be honest.

Shane is hot and intense. He doesn't always say the right things, but in the end he comes around. Most of the time he tries to deny his attraction to Grace, but everyone can see how he feels. There is another book that tells the story from his point of view, and I cannot wait to read it.

Grace is beautiful, and because I'm a sucker like that, I love it when guys hit on her. It's amusing, I know, shame on me, but I can't help it!

There are a few mistakes, as any amazon publisher will have, but all in all it was really good. The writing is much better than what I'd come to expect from amazon writers, and best yet–the books aren't expensive and don't raise in price further down the series (I loath that)!

I very much enjoyed this, and it should probably be on the top of the amazon free books list. It has some adult content, while no actual sex, things get pretty heated (wink wink) so evaluate your maturity before reading this, it's not a young adult book.

Bravo

Four Stars

Rosalie Williams

Fall From Grace on Goodreads

Indebted by Amy Bartol

The third book in The Premonition series, Evie is struggling to find her place in the violent world of angels and demons. Pursued on all sides for different reasons, Evie must discover who she can trust–before it's too late.

The writing in this book is eons beyond the previous two books. The first two, while the plot, dialogue and characters were strong, the writing made me feel like I was reading a self-published Amazon book that I should have gotten for free or $0.99. But this was a 180 degree turn around as far as the quality of writing, and even the editing seems to have been stepped up for this novel, as there were far fewer errors. This leads me to believe that the second book was a bit rushed, and she spent more time on this one.

I loved the plot in this. I came to actually really likes Brennus, and I feel bad for him because he really does love Evie, but she can never love him. He is fiercely protective of her–a trait that I totally love–but also treats her as an equal. He fills her in on plans and while he wants to keep her safe, he allows her to participate. He's also startlingly compassionate, and the funeral scene was particularly moving for me. I love how Amy wrote their accents into their words, and I very much look forward to seeing what roll Brennus and the Gancanagh will be playing in the next book.

Reed really isn't in this book too much, but I liked all the scenes he was in. I do feel like his character may be slipping a little, because I don't feel the same chemistry between him and Evie that I did in the first book. To be honest, I was leaning a little more towards Evie and Brennus by the end of this.

Here's the thing though. People are always coming after Evie, and I love the plot, because it's exciting and fresh. But nothing really bad ever seems to happen to her. It's always red-shirts that are dying, and I feel like that makes it unrealistic. She's always crying about how awful her life is, and yet compared to most people (especially other people in the group) nothing terrible has happened, and yet they all treat her like she's survived worse things than them. Shall we recap? She hasn't been physically tortured (Russell, Brownie, Reed, Zephyr and probably Buns, though it doesn't mention it). She hasn't been raped (every girl in the Gancanagh castle). She hasn't had the love of her life turn on her (Reed, Brennus and Russell). So I just don't understand why Amy is making it out that her life is so bad. Sure she's always running, but she seems to have escaped the worst of it.

I'm very interested to see where the plot leads. I'm not completely sure if the fourth book is the last, but I think it is. The story ended with a lot of potential, and I hope that the ending lives up to the excitement of the rest of the series. I can honestly say I can't predict the ending, which is very new to me. I just hope that it's a good one, and doesn't ruin the series for me.

Four Stars

Rosalie Williams

Indebted on Goodreads

Intuition by Amy Bartol

Taking place right where Inescapable left off, Evie is living with Reed and still trying to survive. After being attacked by non-Fallen angels, Evie realizes the risk that protecting her Reed faces, and decides to take matters into her own hands–even if it means leaving the man she loves.

The second book in this series is strong on plot, just as the first one was. There was one lull in the story that was a little boring, but for the most part it kept me invested. The narration switches to Russell at one point, which is interesting to see another perspective on everything that's going on. I do like reading from Evie's POV more, but it was a nice change.

While the writing did improve some, I noticed a lot more little issues with this one, like missing quotation marks at the end of a spoken sentence, or a word in the wrong tense. It didn't bother me too much though, and the writing was a little better so it makes me even more optimistic for the next book.

There's an introduction of a new "villain" in this book, and I really like his character. Brennus is intriguing because he loves Evie and will do anything to get her back, but unlike Reed's love for Evie, he wants her because she makes his life better, not so that Evie's life can be better. This dichotomy really shows the difference between Reed and Brennus' love.

The time Evie spends with Brennus is interesting and kept me on the edge of my seat. The slow shifting of her thoughts and feeling toward the Gancanagh is really intriguing, and while I didn't want her to become one of them, it was just a really good part in the story after things got a little boring with her and Russell up in Canada!

I liked that Reed, even though Evie left him, doesn't hold that against her and try to push her away. He's upset that she did it, but realizes why she did, and accepts the blame for his part in her leaving. All in all I think it made them a better couple, and once they were together again it was like breathing a fresh breath of air after drowning.

I very much look forward to the next book.

Three Stars

Rosalie Williams

Intuition on Goodreads

Inescapable by Amy Bartol

Inescapable is about Evie, a young girl's first year at college. She leaves her adoring uncle to pursue her dreams at a nice college on a full academic scholarship. She is greeted, however, by a hostile sophomore named Reed, and a warm-hearted Russell, whom she suspects there is more to than meets the eye. Though she feels like her relationship with Russell has more to it than is apparent on the surface, Evie can't deny her attraction to Reed, who is quickly warming to her to.

I would like to preface this by saying that I read a negative review about this book before buying it. I saw how high the ratings were and since the only option I had for reading it was to purchase it myself, I wanted to get an insider's look at what I was spending my money on. I honestly wish I hadn't because the review tainted my reception of the first half of the book. The beginning of a book is the hardest part for an author, because they have to begin building unfamiliar characters, while simultaneously hooking the reading with an exciting plot. I think if I hadn't been so pessimistic to start off, I would have let myself enjoy the beginning more.

So let's start with the bad things, so that I can get them out of the way before highlighting all the great parts of this book. Most blatantly is the issue with writing. Most of the writing isn't terrible. It isn't These Broken Stars good (thought that's a high standard to compare things to) but it also isn't terrible. The biggest issue Amy Bartol has is with those little tag sentences at the end of dialogue. She uses them far too much, and doesn't understand how not to make them repetitive. "She said (insert adjective here)" was used far too many times. But keep in mind this is a debut novel for Amy, so my hope is that her writing will improve throughout the series.

The other issue I had was her repetition. These seems like a book that wasn't edited by someone who knew what they were doing. Amy would use a fancy new word, and then use it again in the next sentence, then we would never see it again in the rest of the book! It's easy to fall into that trap, because the word sticks in your brain and as you're writing since you just used it, it's convenient to just put it back in again (See! As I was typing this sentence "easy" came to my head immediately, and I had to pause for a moment and settle on "convenient", so as not to do exactly what I'm critiquing.) Another repetition I saw was in Buns' speech. She uses "sweetie" in literally every sentence. This really bothered me at first, but it isn't something I couldn't get over.

Now on to the good stuff!

The storyline was very exciting, and so much was happening I never really got bored. The secret at the beginning wasn't hard to guess, but there's a twist to it that I didn't see coming. I like also that as she began to gain power she didn't just become some super-ass-kicking-ninja-girl overnight as so many girls do in YA novels these days. She gains power, but it's "young", the way it should be.

The romance is really great. I hate the love triangles these days where the girl can't make up her mind and it ends up pushing both the guys away. Evie is very clear in what she wants, and doesn't tell anyone otherwise. Reed is beyond sweet, but also fierce and protective, which is basically the perfect male lead. Russell is great, but I think his character got almost handicapped due to the strange way Amy chose to write his dialogue. Usually when a character has an accent the author will simply introduce the character that way, and write their words in proper English. But nope! Amy chose to literally sound out is accent, and I did find that annoying and it detracted from his character. Besides people with southern accents do know you to say "you" they don't always say "ya". So all in all I am team Reed, but I'm hoping to see better development of Russell's character later in the series.

Evie is a good character. She's supposed to be smart, and all the allusions the author uses does make her appear very well read. The only downfall with this is that Amy chose to explain EVERY allusion to make sure the reader realized how very smart Evie was in understanding this or inferring that. I think it's safe to say that most intelligent people can understand the allusions without detailed explanations, because they didn't seem like Evie, they seemed like Amy trying to make us understand how great Evie was. If she'd left well enough alone, I think I would have liked Evie even more. In the end I did like Evie, she didn't annoy me to death, but I didn't love her either. Like I said, hopefully she'll be fleshed out a little more in the following books.

The ending is surprising and I can honestly say I did not see that coming. I'm usually very good at predicting endings and plot twists, but absolutely not this one!

Most of the worst aspects can be chalked up to writing inexperience, so I'm going to maintain faith that the series will get better as it progresses and her writing matures. Why am I not putting it on my favorites shelf? The plot certainly deserves to be there because I can honestly say I did really love the story. I think reading it again without the pessimism so fresh in my brain because of the review will make me like it even more. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the book because there could be a really good world here. But it doesn't make the shelf individually just because of the poor writing. It's not the descriptions, it's not the dialogue (Because that was pretty good) it's basically just the tags on the dialogue that really took away that last star and a place on the favorites shelf. I wish a better writer had written with storyline because it is absolutely fantastic, and this book could have been so vivid.

I have hope for the rest of the series, and look forward to reading them. I just pray that the writing improves and the plot keeps being fast-paced and exciting.

Four Stars

Rosalie Williams

Inescapable on Goodreads

Angel Eyes by Shannon Dittemore

Angel Eyes is about young ballet dancer Brielle, returning home after the alleged murder of her best friend Ali by Marco (Ali's boyfriend). Depressed and cold (physically and mentally) Brielle has a hard time adjusting back into her old life, especially after meeting hot (don't worry, only his hands are hot) boy Jake, who may have more connection to her past than she first realizes.

Angel Eyes isn't a long book, and yet I was unable to finish it. I listened to it on audiobook, and it seemed like it just kept going on and on. The writing is elementary and repetitive, and the storyline is slow, adding to the laborious listen. The point of view switches between Brielle, Damian and Kanin, the latter two being angels. The switches are confusing and unnecessary. They add a lot of length to the book which it could do without. The story probably would have been better with just Brielle's point of view.

There were a lot of factor which added length to this book when it shouldn't have. 1. The point of view switches which as I said before didn't add anything to the story. 2. The long internal monologues. Brielle and both the angels spend a lot of time mulling things over in their heads, and it ends up taking way to long. As a listener of this book I found my mind wandering a lot, and when I realized I hadn't been paying attention it was sad because I hadn't actually missed anything. 3. The descriptions of the celestial are long and confusing. The idea is definitely there for this to be very cool, but the writing just isn't the caliber necessary to pull it off. The descriptions are complicated and almost vague, though detailed. It's a paradox that I just can't figure out. The author was clearly trying to convey this deep meaning about fear and how it's so difficult to get over because Brielle can see how it clings to people and multiplies like black tar blah blah blah. But she is clearly trying way too hard, and her elementary writing style just doesn't pull it off. The overall confusion of the entire book makes the storyline much too long and for listeners it just doesn't hold your attention.

Another issue is that the audiotape was divided into 8 sections, all about an hour and twenty minutes long. The first week of the book takes place in the first 5, and the last 3 are about one afternoon. As you can imagine this makes the story feel very awkward. There is no emotional connection to the story, so this long climax does nothing to you.

There is no romance between Jake and Brielle. Their conversations are awkward if they're personal, or one of them goes off on a long rant and the other just sits there listening. For example Brielle telling Jake about her "dark past" or Jake explaining everything about the world of angels to her. The explanations are long, and Jake does a horrible job, so it's no wonder Brielle is so confused the whole time!

Finally, the finale is long and boring. The descriptions are far too long to be reasonable, and half the characters you have no idea who they are. The action is stunted and badly composed. The dialogue during the fighting is worst of all. There's either a really long and basic description of the movements with no mention of sound whatsoever, or there's only talking and you imagine the characters just standing there.

Dittemore needs to go back to writing basics and review how to incorporate the 5 senses into writing to allow the reader to connect more fully with the plot and the characters. I could not finish this book, I will not finish it, and I do not recommend it. I'm giving it two stars because I liked the beginning, but it just went downhill from there.

Two Stars

Rosalie Williams

Angel Eyes on Goodreads

Halo by Alexandra Adornetto

Halo is an interesting book. Bethany, the youngest of three angels sent from heaven to disspell the darkness dominating earth, falls in love with a human boy. Against the rules, yet somehow allowed, their love is forced to face...not much.

Let's start with the positive. The writing is very good. Descriptions are not at all too long, and give an avid idea of what is happening at all times. There's a lot of potential for this book from the beginning. Unfortunately, it's a steady decline throughout the novel.

From the first day at school Bethany isn't much of an angel. She's rude, distracted, and self-centered. While her siblings immerse themselves in projects, she doesn't even try to do what she was meant to. Gabriel expresses his doubts about her selection for the mission, and he's completely right, she shouldn't have been sent. Even if she is this young angel who connects more easily with human nature, she should at least attempt to help! Not only that, but from her first day at school she is very much human. Her angelic nature doesn't come out in her personality at all, and she's just another awkward teenager.

The angel rules aren't followed either. There are many inconsistencies in the book, and details that are later ignored. For instance, in the beginning it is explained that angels do not sweat because they have an unlimited energy source. Only a few chapters later however, she describes her sweat making her hair stick. Then she goes for a run and is out of breath at the end, which isn't supposed to be possible! These little details distracted me from the story.

Lastly, the love story. At first it isn't bad. But I wasn't surprised to find out that Ms. Alexandra was only 18 when she wrote this book. The love story is desperate and rushed, with no real chemistry between the two before they're making undying confessions of love. Bethany also chooses very abruptly to reveal that she is an angel, before there is really any cause to do so. Further on she turns into a complete Bella when they break up for a week, and that is the point in which I lost all respect for her.

There wasn't a lot of action, and I got pretty bored. The action finale is extremely short for the length of the book, and Bethany is unconscious for most of it, so really it wasn't well organized.

It wasn't a terrible book, but as far as the angel theme goes, it's one of the worst I've read. I won't be looking into the next books in the series.

Two Stars

Rosalie Williams

Halo on Goodreads

Promise by Kristie Cook

As a foreward, I would like to preface this review with a quick mention of my thoughts. Despite the review, I was drawn to this book from the beginning. I was hooked immediately, regardless of all the flaws, and couldn't stop reading. The only reason it's getting such a low review is because of the ending. It was a five star book and probably my next favorite save the ending, which destroyed all my positive emotions for the plot, and the characters, and especially the author.

If you've read Twilight, you know exactly what the plot is, minus the love triangle, and replace the vamps with angels and demons. Despite that, I liked the story a lot more than Twilight. Why? I honestly can't tell you. So let's break it down.
1. The writing wasn't great, definitely a self-publisher.
2. The plot moved very quickly, and lacked substantial development.
3. The romance was superficial, and Alexis and Tristan seemed very awkward together despite their constant confessions of endless love.
4. This was such a big deal I have to say it twice, this literally was Twilight.

They fall in love (though there isn't much development, it just happens), and get married. The girl is special even before she becomes a vampire–oh! Excuse me, an Amadis, my mistake–and they know she will have awesome power. Tristan is afraid to hurt Bella–Alexis! Sorry! I'm not sure what's wrong with me today–and so refuses to have sex with her until they're married. Alexis gets sick but no one considers she might be pregnant even after all the unprotected sex! It's ridiculous, honestly.

This read very much like a bad young adult novel save for the poorly written sex scenes.

Tristan was definitely my favorite character, though that's not saying much. The only other character with good development was Alexis, and she was immature and annoying. She most definitely didn't seem like she was nineteen, and most definitely not ready to be married and having children! None of the other characters became substantial or even played a big role. Her mother and grandmother were carbon copies of each other, and were completely interchangeable throughout the story.

While I won't ruin it for the readers, the ending ruined the entire story for me. Like I said, I was completely planning on buying the second book and giving this a five star rating until the last thirty pages destroyed everything. Trust me on this one, it's bad. I no longer have any intention of reading the next installment in the story.

Two Stars

Rosalie

Promise on Goodreads

Embrace by Jessica Shirvington

As far as angel books go, this is one of the best.

Lately there has been a big influx of angel series into the YA market. Probably starting with Fallen, on to The Fallen and Leviathan to the more recent Unearthly. All have unique takes on the angels sent to earth, and their purposes there. Embrace really hooked me with the characters though. 

What I appreciated most I think was the blurring of good and evil. There weren't angels who only did good things, and angels who only did bad things. There were insane exiled angels who did bad things, but it wasn't like they physically couldn't do good. 

The characters were vibrant and realistic. Pheonix was, in a word, hot. It's a thin line to walk with young adult books as far as sexual content goes. You don't want it to turn into one of those strange, over-descriptive, sex novels. But you also don't want to be too prude about it. I think Pheonix did a great job of being realistically boyish, this was particularly well demonstrated in the way he took advantage of her, felt bad about it, but didn't necessarily stop. He did feel remorse later, and I think he has real feelings for her, but that didn't stop him from doing exactly what most guys would when they have that kind of power. Yet he still had emotional depth, and I think that's what really sold him. 

Lincoln on the other hand, pissed me off. While I did actually like him, I hated how hot and cold he was. He spends almost the entire book trying to win Violet back from Pheonix. He even tells her they belong together when he's dying. Yet when she is finally free of Pheonix's hold, he disappears! I understand that he feels hella guilty that he was passed out unconscious while she was bleeding to death on the floor, but still! She needed him, and the one time he could actually be there for her, he wasn't!

Obviously I liked Violet, and I loved her best friend! Just when the story was starting to feel kind of heavy, she would jump in and add some comic relief that left me smiling. There was a startling amount of action and storyline in the book, which is a big relief from the last novel I read-Legend of Ociena Dragon-which felt like I was reading the beginning of a story stretched out through an entire book! This was filled with action and I really really enjoyed it. 

Just to make my feelings clear, I think I am officially team Lincoln. Don't let me down Vi!

On the other hand, I adored the ending of this book. It left my soul in tact, and I don't feel like I need to go eat a gallon of ice cream while watching the Breakfast Club until my whirlwind emotions calm down. I have the second book already downloaded from my library's online library, but do I dare open it? This novel left off on such a pleasant note, I'm deadly afraid of my heart being ripped out in the second!

Even if you haven't loved the angel craze, I do highly recommend this book.

Yours Truly,

Rosalie

Embrace on Goodreads

A Beautiful Dark by Jocelyn Davies

Skye is turning seventeen when two mysterious and strikingly handsome boys start fighting in the middle of her party. She's never seen them before, but can't help from being fascinated. They begin to appear more and more in her life, only to find out they are angels from both sides of the heavenly war monitoring her. Why? You'll just have to read it and find out.

This was a lovely book that I read on a road trip. I'll admit it was very addicting, but not for the page turning action that books often utilize. Throughout the entire story you feel like something big is about to happen, and if you can just read the next chapter you'll crack the code … and then the next chapter … and then the next. Do you catch my drift? The whole time you're on the brink of the plot breaking into excitement and it just never does. That's what really limited my enjoyment of the whole thing. While the writing is beautiful and truly describes the world well, not enough happens for how long it is. Even when you finally reach the climax it is very short, and not as shocking as it should have been.

I loved Asher, and Devin was cute, though I don't think we really saw enough of either of them in the entire book to really become emotionally attached. I hope that when I read the second I get to delve a little deeper into the series, because right now I'm very distant. I liked Skye a lot. Maybe because something about her name is just badass, or maybe because she didn't completely piss me off–I don't know. Either way, I can't wait to read more about her. She pulls off the awesome card way better than all those wanna-be badass heroines you see these days. 

It was beautifully written, truly professional writing I must say, and the cover art is dazzling. The world was painted in intricate detail, and I can't wait to find out more about it. 

I hope that she expands more on the characters, and answers some of the questions; because God knows she built up a lot of them, and answered very few!

Four Stars

Rosalie

A Beautiful Dark on Goodreads

The Mephisto Covenant: The Redemption of Ajax by Trinity Faegen

This was a fantastic book. I am happy so say that after a few weeks I have finally found a new book I can add to my favorites bookshelf.

A lot of reviews that I have read demote this book for characters that are too transparent and blatantly one-sided. But something that one must consider while reading this book, is the context. The Anabo are daughters of Aurora and descendants of Eve. They are purely good, and don't feel the more powerful of the evil emotions, ei. jealousy, hatred and rage. But what we do see in this book is the tremendous change that Sasha undergoes as she transforms into Mephisto. She slowly starts to feel those emotions, feel the temptation to resort to violence, and even succumbs to rage. So many reviewers' thoughts that she was too "goody goody" are the consequence of them not truly absorbing the plot. Had she not been so good, the story would have been flawed.

As for Melanie, her aunt, the same can be said for her. (I don't really think this is much of spoiler, but I'm going to mark it anyways just in case you don't want to risk it. I don't reveal anything huge about the plot though, only about Melanie's character). While she may be extremely evil, that is because she sold her soul to Eryx, therefore no longer feels the good emotions, the way Sasha does not feel the bad. Now, of course she was very evil before selling her soul, but I think that was a logical touch. Had Ms. Faegon tried to chalk up all evil to the lost people who had sold their souls to Eryx, I would have called BS. There is evil all through this world, and while a lot of people like to ignore it, the truth is it's out there, and a lot of it. Books often are filled with characters so intent on doing good and helping others. But in reality, few people are like that.

As for Jax, well, damn. Hot and I'll admit I'm a sucker for guys with a jealous streak. I only wish he'd been just a little bit more badass, if you know what I mean. Of course he was undergoing the transformation of becoming Anabo, so he was becoming more good, but still. I also really appreciated that Ms. Faegan didn't try to sell that he was a one thousand year old virgin. I mean come on, that would have been ridiculous. In the end I think it was a lot of the little things that made me really like it. The smaller touches that so often put me off of other books, drew me into this one.

The ending. The ending was great. Sometimes I want that heartbreaking finale that will leave me sobbing into my pillow for an hour, but in a book filled with so much religious thematics, I couldn't help but love the ending. Meeting God and sacrificing himself even though he knew she was already dead, I went all mushy over it.

Alright, here're the two things that I did not like about this book. One, I was confused. Did Eryx follow through on the promises he made in order to get souls? He followed through on some in the beginning, but later on it was like no one was getting what was promised. So that bothered me. The other thing was how Jax kept saying he loved her, but it's like it didn't really count until the end. Did he just want her to stay with him the whole book and only when she was dying realized that he loved her? Or what, because that was uber confusing to me.

Despite quite a few bad reviews on here, I would definitely recommend giving this book a chance. It may not be for everyone, but if you like it, you'll love it.

Four Stars

Rosalie

The Mephisto Covenant: The Redemption of Ajax on Goodreads