Monday, 12 January 2015

Blog Tour: The Perfect Couple by Jennifer Echols



Hi guys, today I am thrilled to share my review of Perfect Couple, the second book in the Superlatives series by Jennifer Echols as part of the blog tour hosted by The Fantastic Flying Book Club. Before that here's a bit about the book.



Publisher: Simon Pulse
Publication Date: January 13th 2014
My rating: 4. 5 stars.
Perfect Couple is #2 in the Superlatives series about seniors at a Florida high school who are selected for their class's superlative categories in the yearbook, and how the labels change the way they view themselves and alter the course of their lives. Can your heart be put to a popular vote? As yearbook photographer, Harper is responsible for capturing those candid moments that make high school memorable. But her own life is anything but picture perfect. Her parents' bitter divorce has left her wondering what a loving relationship would look like. And ever since the senior class voted her and star quarterback Brody the “Perfect Couple That Never Was,” her friends have been on her case to ask Brody out. Brody doesn’t lack in female admirers, but Harper can't see herself with him. He seems confused about why they were matched together, too. They’re total opposites—the last people in the world who would ever be compatible, let alone the “perfect couple.” Yet ever since the class paired the two of them, they've found themselves drawn together--first by curiosity, then by an undeniable bond. The trouble is, though they're very attracted to each other and both of them admit this, they have a hard time getting along or even communicating clearly. If they’re the perfect couple, this shouldn’t be so difficult! Soon it becomes clear their class was wrong, and they throw in the towel. But after they walk away, both of them feel so changed from making the effort that they can’t forget each other. What if that means this match made in hell is the perfect couple after all?
Goodreads | Amazon | The Book Depository 


Perfect Couple by far has to be my favourite book in the superlatives series. Although I was a huge fan of Tia’s and Will’s relationship in Biggest Flirts, I love it even more when opposite characters start falling for each other, and you can’t get any more opposite than Brody and Harper. During the superlatives nominations Brody and Harper were the perfect couple that never was, despite both Brody and Harper having boyfriends/girlfriends at the time. Brody was the famous high school quarterback and Harper was the photographer for the school year book, they were an unlikely couple in most people’s eyes, but you know when you get nominated for something like the perfect couple that never was, you kind of get interested in finding out whether you could be a couple or not.

It was fun watching Harper realise and think about this more and more, what started off as innocent thoughts about Brody, listening to people tell her comments that Brody had made about her to actually changing things and wanting Brody was something Echols wrote in really well. Harper didn’t develop her feelings for Brody overnight, but through more and more interactions with Brody and sweet gestures made on his behalf when her own boyfriend was being a numpty, I would too have a hard time resisting Brody’s charms. Right from the beginning I disliked Harper’s boyfriend Kennedy, he assumed that just because he was in a higher position than Harper in the school year book, everything he did was right, he would disregard her opinion or suggestions immediately, start giving her the silent treatment when he felt like it and actually be jealous when something good happened to Harper, like her photo being published on the front page of the paper! It was obvious to see that Harper could do so much better without him, and although I don’t condone cheating I wanted Harper to find out if there was something between her and Brody.

Let me tell you the scenes that Harper and Brody shared were off the charts hot! *fans self* we never really got to see any real chemistry or romantic interactions of any sort between Harper and Kennedy, so the ones we got between Brody and Harper well made up for it. It was clear to anyone that if Harper and Brody gave their relationship a go and ignored all the road bumps along the way, they could be the perfect couple. I had a few minor issues with a couple of spanners that were thrown in the works and the way certain characters decided to deal with the situation, but I think in the long run these were quite good for the growth of our characters.

As you can probably tell I loved Brody and Harper, but I’m glad that we were able to spend a lot of time with some of my favourite characters from Biggest Flirts; Sawyer, Tia and Will. They once again went to show just how good friends they could be when Harper needed them the most and as usual Sawyer had me in hysterics on many occasions.

Overall Perfect Couple was another fantastic book in the superlatives series, I felt with Biggest Flirts that nobody could match up to Will and Tia’s characters, but once again Echols has surprised me with her introduction of Harper and Brody. The superlatives series is one that you shouldn’t miss out on, I will be eagerly anticipating getting my hands on Most Likely to Succeed, the third book in this series.




ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jennifer Echols was born in Atlanta and grew up in a small town on a beautiful lake in Alabama—a setting that has inspired many of her books. She has written nine romantic novels for young adults, including the comedy MAJOR CRUSH, which won the National Readers’ Choice Award, and the drama GOING TOO FAR, which was a finalist in the RITA, the National Readers’ Choice Award, and the Book Buyer’s Best, and was nominated by the American Library Association as a Best Book for Young Adults. Simon & Schuster will debut her adult romance novels in 2013, with many more teen novels scheduled for the next few years. She lives in Birmingham with her husband and her son.
Website | Goodreads | Blog | Twitter | Facebook



Wednesday, 7 January 2015

Mini Review: Rebel Belle by Rachel Hawkins

Rebel Belle (Rebel Belle #1) by Rachel Hawkins
Narrated by: Amy Rubinate
Publisher: Dreamscape Media
Length: 9 Hours 22 Minutes
Audiobook Publication date: April 29th 2014
My rating: 3.5 stars 


https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/91378.Speak_No_Evil

Harper Price, peerless Southern belle, was born ready for a Homecoming tiara. But after a strange run-in at the dance imbues her with incredible abilities, Harper's destiny takes a turn for the seriously weird. She becomes a Paladin, one of an ancient line of guardians with agility, super strength and lethal fighting instincts.

Just when life can't get any more disastrously crazy, Harper finds out who she's charged to protect: David Stark, school reporter, subject of a mysterious prophecy and possibly Harper's least favorite person. But things get complicated when Harper starts falling for him—and discovers that David's own fate could very well be to destroy Earth.

With snappy banter, cotillion dresses, non-stop action and a touch of magic, this new young adult series from bestseller Rachel Hawkins is going to make y'all beg for more.



My Thoughts:
Harper Jane Price has her life on track.  She has a hunky boyfriend, she’s president of the student body, excelling at school, and cotillion is coming up.  Her future seems bright, shiny, and all planned out.  As she’s about to be crowned Homecoming Queen, the lack of lipgloss puts her future onto a very different path and her whole world spirals out of control.  Being in the wrong place at the wrong time bestows Harper with superpowers, and a mission to go with it: Protect the one person who has been her nemesis since the sandbox: David Stark.

Everything about him gets on her last nerve from his hipster glasses to his argyle sweaters and skinny jeans!  The feeling is very mutual and they drive each other bananas! There is no love lost between the two; he torments her by writing articles in the school newspaper calling her leadership skills into question saying that her concerns are silly and superficial. Now it’s her permanent mission to protect him! However, as Harper finds out why and they’re forced to work together she feels an unexplainable pull to him. *gasp* Hell must be freezing over!

Harper was pretty superficial at first, very concerned with appearances, but you could tell there was a sweet girl underneath all that desire for properness and perfection.  I loved that she turned into a badass with ninja fighting skills, and Harper was quite excited about it too, until she figures out who she’s supposed to be protecting.  David and Harper have the classic love/hate relationship.  Sparks fly whenever they interact and I was counting down the pages to that first steamy kiss!

As usual, Rachel Hawkins brand of humor had me cracking up and it was enhanced by Amy Rubinate’s brilliant Southern accent, and deadpan delivery. Book two, please!






Tuesday, 6 January 2015

Review: Biggest Flirts by Jennifer Echols (Superlatives #1)

Biggest Flirts by Jennifer Echols (Superlatives #1)
Publisher: Simon Pulse
Publication Date: May 20th 2014 
My rating: 4 stars


Tia and Will’s lives get flipped upside down when they’re voted Yearbook’s Biggest Flirts in this sassy novel from the author of Endless Summer and The One That I Want. Tia just wants to have fun. She’s worked hard to earn her reputation as the life of the party, and she’s ready for a carefree senior year of hanging out with friends and hooking up with cute boys. And her first order of business? New guy Will. She can’t get enough of his Midwestern accent and laidback swagger. As the sparks start to fly, Will wants to get serious. Tia’s seen how caring too much has left her sisters heartbroken, and she isn’t interested in commitment. But pushing Will away drives him into the arms of another girl. Tia tells herself it’s no big deal…until the yearbook elections are announced. Getting voted Biggest Flirts with Will is, well, awkward. They may just be friends, but their chemistry is beginning to jeopardize Will’s new relationship—and causing Tia to reconsider her true feelings. What started as a lighthearted fling is about to get very complicated…

I’ve had a really up and down relationship with Jennifer Echols books, but after devouring Biggest Flirts, I can safely say that this is my favourite Echols story yet. Echols brings a delightful, but also easy to relate to character in Tia, she’s quirky, fun, but also like everyone else has a lot of self doubts, because of this she doesn’t really do things to her full potential, she gives up on purpose such as trying for drum captain and on her school test. But when new boy Will turns up, Tia’s facing a real challenge, can she be with this guy who gets her, or is she risking her heart being trampled on?

I totally understand Tia’s predicament, with her sisters not having the best history with guys, like Tia I would probably be a bit reserved when it came to relationships with guys. Yes her sister’s lives had been thrown up side down and they had been burned multiple times, so not wanting to go through the same thing was understandable. But I wish Tia could have been honest with Will from the beginning about why she couldn’t be with him after their first day together. If I was in Will’s shoes I would assume too that there was a chance of a good thing between him and Tia, but to just be turned down the way he was awful. But I’m glad that he struck through this with his pursuit of Tia, although at times he didn’t go the best way about it, I’m glad that he didn’t completely give up. Because it was obvious to everyone that what Tia and Will had was truly special.

Alongside Will and Tia’s relationship, Echols managed to throw a nice mix of weird and wonderful characters from Tia’s trusty pelican friend Sawyer to Mrs Nakameto, whose continual one lines would have me in endless hysterics. I for one can’t wait to read the follow up books in the series, so that I can be with these great characters once more.

Echols was able to give us a story with a lot of fun, but she was able to weave in some serious aspects too. Echols was able to manage the balance between these really well, she could easily brighten up a scene when necessary, but also give you great insights in to a character’s back story with a deeper meaningful scene, and this was something I hugely appreciated. She was also able to show great character growth too, a lot of characters early on could have come across a little immature, but with the introduction of certain characters (Will), characters really went out of their ways to do the right thing not only for themselves, but other people too.

Overall Biggest Flirts was a truly wonderful fun read, despite the up and down relationship of Will and Tia, Biggest Flirts was certainly a winning read in my eyes. 





Monday, 5 January 2015

Monthly Recap: December


Number of Books read:
Jasprit: 10! I honestly thought I'd read way less!
Rachel: 17

Highest rating:
Jasprit: 4 stars
Rachel: 5 stars
 
Lowest rating:
Jasprit: DNF
Rachel: DNF
Books reviewed:

Jasprit: 
(click on titles for review link)


  
  
  



  




Rachel: 
(click on titles for review link)
Shadowed Heart: A Luc and Summer Novel

Best read of last month:
Jasprit: Perfect Couple by Jennifer Echols, this book was just a super fun read, I think I devoured it in like two days, not only did I get the chance to spend time with some of my favourite characters once again, but I also got to hang out with two wonderful main characters! 

Rachel: 
Vision in Silver by Anne Bishop,  Shadowed Heart by Laura Florand, and After the Night by Linda Howard. Two of my favorite series by authors I'm in awe of in one month! Luc and Summer's continuing romance after the happily-ever-after was beautiful and heart-wrenching! I didn't want Vision in Silver to end and I want to listen to the story on audio once it's released. So, so good! After the Night was my first book by Linda Howard and it will not be the last. All three were 5 star reads for me!

Book which surprised me the most: 
Jasprit: Snow Like Ashes by Sara Raasch, I don't know what I was expecting going into this book, but it certainly wasn't this, the world building was fantastic and super unique!

Rachel: 
Spider's Bite by Jennifer Estep. Unfortunately, not in a good way. With so much praise for the series I was hoping to love it, not so in my case. Gin was a cold main character that I found very hard to connect with and the romance was a disappointment. Let's hope the series gets better because I bought the next two books on an Audible sale before "reading" *listening* to the first one.

Fictional crush of the month:
Jasprit: Brody from Perfect Couple, I had the biggest crush on Will in Biggest Flirts, but as soon as Brody came along, I was like Will who? I could so read several more books from Brody, even though a lot of people had ideas of what Brody was like, deep down he was a really sweet guy.

Rachel:
Gray Rouillard in After the Night by Linda Howard. So sexy and bigger than life. Oh my!

Three books I'm most looking forward to this month:

Jasprit:

 (Click on titles for Goodreads link)

  
  


I don't think there's much that I can say about these books than that they're some of my highly anticipated reads for this month. I had received copies of The Winner's Crime and The Mime Order quite a while ago, but decided to wait a while before picking them up. And Bracken's series is becoming one of my favourites yet, I'm sort of sad that I have to say bye to these characters soon :(




 
 

Rachel:
(Click on titles for Goodreads link)
Closer Than You Think Worth the Risk (The McKinney Brothers, #2) Burned (Fever, #7)

Closer Than You Think will be my first book by Karen Rose but it seems she writes a lot of romantic suspense and I'm a huge fan of that genre.  Worth the Risk is book two in the McKinney Brothers series by Claudia Connor and I loved the first book! Can't wait to catch up with Abby, Matt and their family as well as meet Stephen and Hannah! Burned by Karen Marie Moning...need I say more? I've been waiting FOREVER for this book so I hope it will be good! Ryodan, here I come!

Bookish Photo:


I love it when a bookstore has all of your favourite authors books in. I about squealed when I saw this shelf at the Foyles store at Charing Cross and it was great to see two of Jenny's books promoted as staff picks. Everyone needs to read books by Jenny Han! 

How was your December?

Sunday, 4 January 2015

Bout of Books 12

Hi all! Bout of Books is back, I am once again thrilled to be taking part, its always great being able to throw yourself into so many amazing books early on in the year. So what is Bout of Books you say?? 

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, January 5th and runs through Sunday, January 11th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 12 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. - From the Bout of Books team

This year I've decided not to be too bound by goals, but have some fun, the books I hope to plan to read are mostly review books, except for one In the Afterlight by Alexandra Bracken. Here is my potential list of books, I'm hoping to read at least three.


  
  

  
  



You can find updated of my progress on my Twitter profile here and my Instgram profile here. Is anyone else taking part in Bout of Books? If you are I'd love to know what you're planning on reading, so feel free to link me up in the comments. Good luck everyone!




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